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ISRAEL’S GOVERNMENT was on the brink of collapse Wednesday after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu chose a cease-fire over war with Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The decision, which prompted the defection of his defense minister, stopped a 24-hour-plus eruption of violence in which militants fired more than 450 missiles and mortars at Israeli civilians and Israeli planes bombed dozens of Hamas targets, including its television station and military intelligence headquarters. The cease-fire heads off a conflict that would have been unwinnable for both sides, and it opens the way to a larger truce that could ease what has been a mounting humanitarian crisis in Gaza. Mr. Netanyahu deserves credit for embracing it despite the political cost.

The veteran Israeli leader has been working with U.N. and Egyptian mediators on a plan to end months of sporadic conflict along the Israel-Gaza border, which cost the lives of more than 170 Palestinians and burned thousands of acres of Israeli farmland. In the first steps, fuel paid for by Qatar began flowing across the border to Gaza’s electrical plant, increasing what had been sporadic power supplies to homes to 12 hours a day and allowing sewage treatment plants to resume operations. Last week, Israel allowed Qatar to supply the Hamas administration with $15 million in cash, which in turn allowed civil servants and police to receive salary payments. In return, Hamas moved to scale back protests and attacks by militants along the border.

The budding detente nearly imploded on Sunday when an undercover Israeli intelligence mission triggered a firefight that killed eight, including an Israeli officer and a Hamas commander. That both sides stopped shooting after such a brief time showed that both Mr. Netanyahu and Hamas’s leaders remain interested in continuing and perhaps even expanding the truce. Hamas would like Israel to allow more imports and exports, expand its fishing zone and allow workers to commute to jobs in Israel.

(Washington Post)

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Arizona Republican Sen. Jeff Flake said Wednesday that he would not vote for any more of President Trump’s judicial nominees until the Senate votes on a bill to prevent special counsel Robert S. Mueller III from being fired — a pledge that could complicate Republicans’ hope to confirm dozens of conservative judges before the end of the year.

Flake’s warning will likely force Republicans — who hold 51 seats in the Senate — to rely on Vice President Pence to confirm any of the 32 judicial nominees pending before the full Senate, as Democrats have little incentive to support those who Flake has committed to oppose. It also means that Republicans will likely have to go around the Senate Judiciary Committee, where Flake is a member and the GOP has only a one-seat majority, to advance any of the 21 nominees waiting for that panel’s endorsement. That also will require Pence’s tie-breaking vote.

Flake issued his threat after Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) blocked Flake and Sen. Christopher A. Coons (D-Del.) from holding a vote on the bill, which would give any fired special counsel the ability to swiftly challenge their termination before a panel of three federal judges. Most Republicans — including co-authors Sens. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) and Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) — have argued that the bill is unnecessary because Trump would never dare fire Mueller, whose ongoing probe of Russian interference in the 2016 election has sought to learn whether anyone in Trump’s campaign conspired with those efforts.

Flake challenged that rationale, given Trump’s recent decision to appoint Matthew G. Whitaker as acting attorney general and give him oversight of the Mueller probe.

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By himself, Flake cannot completely foul up GOP leaders’ plans to confirm more conservative judges this year. But he and Coons said they hope to convince other Republicans to join their effort. If one more Republican does, they and the Democrats would be able to prevent Trump from getting any additional judicial nominees confirmed in 2018 — a move that Flake guessed would at least send a strong message about the importance of the special counsel bill.

“We are confident [the bill] would get 60 votes if given a vote,” Coons told reporters. “It is time for us to move from speech to action.”

One senator that Coons and Flake may target in the days ahead is Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine). Last week, she said that she thought the Senate should vote on the bill.

“Senate debate and passage of this bill would send a powerful message that Mr. Mueller must be able to complete his work unimpeded,” Collins said in a statement, in which she also said she was “concerned” about Whitaker’s views on Mueller’s probe.

Even if senators succeed in passing the bill, its fate in the House is uncertain. Though House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) has defended Mueller’s right to conduct his probe unimpeded, he has also determined that a bill to protect him is not necessary. Still more Republicans have charged that the legislation is unconstitutional, as it allows the courts to review the president’s hiring and firing decisions, which are considered his purview.

(Washington Post)