IKEA is considering extending its operations in Israel and opening up a branch in Ramallah, in the Palestinian Authority, and in Be’er Sheva and Jerusalem, the  Hebrew-language newspaper Yediot Acharonot reported.

Matthew Bronfman, who holds the IKEA franchise for Israel, reported said that “we’ll be happy to help establish the store” in Ramallah.

The planned stores for Be’er Sheva and Jerusalem would be consistent with the format of IKEA’s new format of opening “IKEA point” branches, which are one-tenth as large as the chain’s regular outlets.

The Egyptian military has demolished hundreds of smuggling tunnels from Hamas-controlled Gaza to the Sinai Peninsula and is preparing for an all-out onslaught against Hamas, Al Qaeda and other terrorists in the Sinai, Egyptian media reported Sunday.

The Egyptian offensive is a political and military shock to Hamas, with reverberations in Ramallah and Washington, on the eve of yet another attempt by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry to re-ignite the “peace process.”

“The reduction in smuggling will make it difficult for Hamas to maintain the level of its revenues, and therefore it will be hard pressed to contain the protests against its rule,” according to the Institute of National Security Studies (INSS). “It will also be difficult to infiltrate weapons into Gaza, mainly enhanced rockets and surface-to-surface missiles.”

The Egyptian Aswat Masriya media outlet reported that 805 tunnels along the smuggling route, centered in the border city of Rafiah, were destroyed.  It said that most of the tunnels have been used to smuggle fuel into Gaza.

The Egyptian army will also close the Rafiah border crossing between Egypt and the Gaza Strip “indefinitely,” an official source told Egyptian newspaper al-Masry al-Youm. It closed the Rafiah crossing and placed a severe siege on Hamas on Friday but without a peep from the international community, which still condemns Israel for the maritime embargo that is aimed at preventing the import of terrorists and weapons from the sea.

Terrorists in Rafiah targeted a military checkpoint Saturday, but no casualties were reported, and Egypt opened the Rafiah border crossing for four hours Saturday to allow humanitarian cases to cross the border.

The tunnels have been a key route for terrorists to travel freely back and forth to the Sinai Peninsula and establish terrorist outposts aimed at staking out bases for attack on Egyptian tourist areas, such as El Arish, as well as urban areas.

The army killed at least five terrorists on Friday, but Egyptian media reported a larger-scale offensive is in the works after an attempted assassination of Second Field Army commander Maj. Gen. Ahmed Wasfy on Wednesday. Egypt is using heavy arms and warplanes, maneuvers that are prohibited under the Egyptian-Israeli Peace Treaty of 1979 without Israel’s approval.

With the unstable and radical anti-Israel Muslim Brotherhood out of power, thanks to the military “impeachment” or coup – take your pick – Israel is not blocking any offense,

“Security sources confirmed that Israel does not mind that the Egyptian forces use heavy artillery and warplanes during the operation which is expected to start very soon” military sources confirmed to the official television on Saturday.

Official added, “The army had decided to cleanse the Sinai of armed gangs and terrorists “The operation will continue until it reaches its objectives, which are not only military but also aim to develop the Sinai.”

The Egyptian Air Force on Saturday sent in two Apache helicopters to gun down jihadists after it received intelligence information that they were hiding in olive groves and preparing to attack military checkpoints.

On Friday, an Egyptian helicopter was seen in the skies over Gaza for the first time since the Six-Day War in 1967.

The Hamas terrorist organization is an offspring of the Muslim Brotherhood and therefore is a natural enemy of the military that ousted Mohammed Morsi two weeks ago. Hamas has denied Egyptian military claims that its soldiers jailed 32 Hamas terrorists and arrested dozens others in the Sinai Peninsula last week.

Hamas figuratively shot itself in the head last August when it mounted a severe attack on the Egyptian army, killing 16 soldiers near Rafiah in a multi-pronged attack that was intended to continue into Israel but was foiled at the last minute by the IDF.

Ever since, Hamas has been an undeclared enemy of Egypt, and even the Morsi regime was suspicious of it.

The Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority also is benefiting from Hamas’ miseries but is suppressing its joy because Hamas has widespread support among Arabs in Judea and Samaria who are fed up with chairman Mahmoud Abbas.

Any moves by the Secretary of State Kerry to win some kind of a forum between Israeli and Palestinian Authority are a useless exercise without the inclusion of Gaza.

Another fallout of the offensive against Hamas might be negative for Israel in the near-term.

The Palestinian Authority, with the cooperation of “Peace Process media,” is cranking out the propaganda of a supposed dramatic return to Israel by  U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, at the same time his wife is on a hospital bed in critical condition in the United States.

Heinz Ketchup heiress Teresa Heinz Kerry was flown to Boston Monday after being rushed the day before from the Kerry’s Nantucket home to a local hospital.

Her conditioned was termed stable but critical.

The Secretary of State has been by her side since he returned from the Middle East two weeks ago, but that has not stopped the Palestinian Authority and supportive Israeli media from grinding out stories of his immediate return to Israel.

The left-wing Haaretz and Yediot Acharonot newspapers, without naming sources but presumably relying on Ramallah, proclaimed the supposed visit on Sunday. The story was gladly carried by wire services and Israel media.

“John Kerry is on his way back: the US secretary of state is expected to arrive in Israel for the sixth time towards the end of the week, in order to try and get the negotiations with the Palestinians to move forward,” said Yediot.

Haaretz chimed in that Kerry’s a senior peace process adviser Frank Lowenstein, has been meeting “almost daily” with Israeli negotiators and chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat.

It is logical they are meeting, though not necessarily together. It is logical they did not stay in Israel to tour the country.

But the story of Kerry’s supposed return seems to be a set-up for the Palestinian Authority’s next pitch, a “secret meeting” with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu.

Former PA minister Ashraf al-Ajrami said at the Knesset Monday, “I want to reveal a secret here. We held negotiations with Bibi Netanyahu, at his home, for many hours recently. Yasser Abed Rabbo negotiated directly with Bibi.”

It was not a secret, according to the response from the office of the Prime Minister. It was a lie.

Even Justice Minister Tzipi Livni, the government’s “Peace Process Minister,” said no such meeting has taken place since the new coalition government was installed in March.

Kerry has been in Israel five times since he took office early this year. After his last visit, after great expectations of a return to direct talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, he left behind a team of advisers and said, “I will be back soon.”

What is soon? The American Embassy in Tel Aviv told the Jewish Press “soon” means “soon” but admitted there has been no announcement on his travel plans for the week.

His immediate travel plans obviously are to drive back and forth from his home to the Boston hospital where his wife was admitted, all of which makes the Palestinian Authority, and their Israeli media sponsors, look more insensitive and crude than stupid.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry may or may come up with results in his peace process trip to the region, but at least he will have a full stomach.

He ate and talked with Jordan’s King Abdullah in Amman Thursday afternoon before flying to Jerusalem, where he and the Prime Minister will dine at 8:30 p.m. Israeli time (1:30 p.m. EDT).

The Secretary of State will meet with chairman Mahmoud Abbas on Friday in Jordan, presumably over lunch or dinner, and is scheduled to meet again with the Prime Minister Saturday night, where he hopefully will get his just desserts.

Israel security personnel have broken up another Hamas terrorist cell linked with one of more than 1,000 terrorists and security prisoners freed last year to bring home kidnapped soldier Gilad Shalit.

The Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet), IDF and police arrested Bachar Attalah Sa’ad, who lives near Ramallah, on charges of plotting to kidnap an Israeli soldier and shooting Jews.

His boss was Hasham Abed Hajaz, who had been sentenced to 10 life terms in prison for involvement in the murders of dozens of Israeli civilians and soldiers.

Hajaz was deported to Qatar, where he returned to terrorist activities even though he was not allowed to return to his home in Gaza.

He met with Sa’ad in Jordan earlier this year and taught him methods for shooting at Israelis, kidnapping a soldier and recruiting terrorists. Israeli authorities arrested him before he carried out plans to travel to Sudan for further terror training.

“He was supposed to receive four weapons from an unknown courier acting on behalf of Hajaz,” according to security officials.

Palestinian Authority organizers in Ramallah and Gaza published on Monday plans for massive protests at the Temporary Armistice borders that existed from 1948 until the Six-Day War in 1967, on the same day that U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry has declared a deadline for an agreement by PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and Israel to resume direct talks.

The protests and the deadline are on Friday, June 7, which also is the anniversary of the return of the Temple Mount to Jewish hands after 2,000 years.

It might have been a brainstorm by someone in the State Dept. to choose the date as being symbolic for enemies to make up and live in peace with each other forever.

If so, it illustrates to the Nth degree how little American policymakers understand the Israeli-Arab struggle, let alone the entire Middle East.

If the timing was a coincidence, it shows how totally inept they are.

Organizers of the protests plan simultaneous demonstrations in Jordan and other Arab countries.

In Israel, Arabs have been told to arrive in large numbers towards the old borders of Israel that existed as the Temporary Armistice Lines until the Six-Day War in 1967.

Protests are planned at the Kalandia checkpoint at northern Jerusalem, at the Damascus Gate in the Old City, Rachel’s Tomb, which is several hundred yards from the southern Jerusalem neighborhood of Jerusalem and which borders Bethlehem, in northern Gaza near the security fence, and at the Jordanian border.

Previous mass marches have been a total failure, but this time the stakes are high. If Abbas actually does back down and agree to speak with Israel without pre-conditions, his life literally could be in danger. If he does not, he risks the total wrath of the United States, but at this point, he might not care.

“Despite his good intentions, Kerry so far looks like a naive and ham-handed diplomat who has been acting like a bull in the china shop of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,” wrote Barak Ravid, diplomatic correspondent for Haaretz.

“It is a Lone-Ranger type of effort so far,” said Marwan Muasher, a former Jordanian foreign minister who is now at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace think tank, quoted by Reuters correspondent Arshad Mohamed, who covers the State Dept.

“The perception in the region is this is a process of buying time … that the White House is not serious about committing to what it takes to get this issue resolved,” Muasher added. “I don’t think people are questioning the motives of Kerry, everyone thinks he is serious about this – and he is serious about this – but he is just acting alone.”

That is the truth. Kerry is alone in the Middle East, a fish out of water.

When Kerry talks to Abbas, he is talking to a wall, a man who for eight years has carefully and cleverly carried out a single-minded strategy of ”all or nothing” while assuming that the world really loves the Arabs and does not simply support its agenda because it cannot stomach dealing with a Jewish state that is not downtrodden.

When Kerry talks with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, he is speaking with a man who knows that the State Dept. cannot see past its nose. Israel has dangerously played the “peace process” game with the assumption, proven correct for 65 years, that the Arabs will shoot themselves in the foot in the end.

On Friday, the best that Kerry can hope for is extending his June 7 deadline.

Maybe he will schedule the next one for November 29, the day that the United Nations recognized the re-establishment of Israel.

Originally published at the Gatestone Institute.

While Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas was meeting in his office in Ramallah with Shelly Yachimovich, chairwoman of Israel’s opposition Labor Party, his Fatah faction was busy threatening Palestinians who meet with Israelis.

That Abbas continues to meet with Israelis on a regular basis in Ramallah does not seem to bother Fatah.

Nor does Fatah seem to be bothered that Palestinian security officers work closely together with their Israeli counterparts. That is called “security coordination” between the Palestinians and Israel.

But when Palestinian youths are invited to meet with Israelis as part of an interfaith dialogue project, Fatah is quick to issue denunciations and threats.

When Palestinian and Israeli teenagers are invited to play football together as part of a project to promote peace and coexistence, Fatah is also quick to react.

But Fatah has no problem when Abbas or any top Palestinian official meets with Israelis.

Nor does Fatah have a problem with some of its senior representatives carrying Israeli-issued VIP cards that grant them various privileges that are denied to most Palestinians, such as permission to enter Israel and avoid waiting at Israel Defense Force checkpoints.

Palestinian youths from Hebron, though, who met with Israelis near Bethlehem to share their problems and insights have been forced to issue a statement distancing themselves from the meeting.

Following threats from Fatah, which condemned the event as a form of “normalization” with Israel, the Palestinian participants claimed that they had been “misled” regarding the true goals of the meeting.

This claim was clearly issued because of the “anti-normalization” campaign waged by Fatah over the past few years. This is a campaign that — in the context of “peace” and “coexistence” projects that are often sponsored and funded by the European Union and the U.S. — aims at banning meetings between Israeli and Palestinians.

The most recent victims of the anti-normalization drive are Palestinian boys and girls who committed the “crime” of playing in a football match against Israeli teenagers. When pictures of the match appeared in the media, Fatah rushed to issue threats against the Palestinian players and those behind the tournament.

Organizers of the “anti-normalization” campaign, most of whom belong to Abbas’s Fatah faction, have been boasting that, in recent years, they have succeeded in thwarting dozens of planned meetings between Israelis and Palestinians.

But Fatah has not condemned its own leader, Abbas, for meeting with Yachimovich and other Israelis.

The real problem here is that Abbas himself has not come out against Fatah’s campaign of intimidation and threats. By remaining silent, Abbas in fact appears to have endorsed the “anti-normalization” campaign — at least so long as its does not affect him personally.

The Fatah activists who are threatening Palestinian teenagers and youths for talking to Israelis and playing football with them are the same people who claim, at least in public, that they support the peace process with Israel.

But how can there ever be a peace process when any Palestinian who meets with an Israeli is immediately denounced as a traitor? It is worth noting that most of these denunciations are coming from the “moderate” Fatah, and not from Hamas.

It now remains to be seen how Fatah will react if and when U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry persuades Abbas to return to the negotiating table with Israel. Will Fatah condemn Abbas for advocating “normalization with the Israeli enemy” when he sits at the negotiating table? Or will Fatah continue to go only after Palestinian boys and girls who just want to have fun and play football?

Originally published at the Gatestone Institute.

Israelis by a 4-to-1 margin are more confident than Palestinians in how President Barack Obama a handles his foreign policy, according to a Pew Research Center poll released Thursday.

The survey revealed that 61 percent of Israelis “express confidence in the American president to do the right thing regarding world affairs,” as opposed to 15 percent of Palestinian Authority Arabs.

Obama’s numbers among Israelis are a 12 point increase over when the same question was asked in 2011, reflecting the consensus after the president’s visit to Israel in March. His speeches were viewed in  Jerusalem and Ramallah won broad support from Israelis and anger from the Palestinian Authority.

The president’s emphasis on Israel’s security needs and the Jewish connection to the region stood in stark opposition to PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’ continued refusal to recognize Israel as a Jewish state.

Asked to assess whether Obama should increase or decrease his role in peacemaking, or keep it at current levels, 49 percent of Israeli respondents wanted to see greater involvement, 29 percent the same level and 15 percent less involvement.

Among Palestinians, the numbers were 41 percent wanting greater involvement, 19 percent wanting the same and 26 percent wanting less.