November 13th

The Prime Minister Vs. Public Opinion ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Miftah by Caelum Moffatt - (Opinion) November 13, 2007 - 3:54pm Most commentaries inundating the press at the moment meticulously analyze the consequences of a failed summit and center on the probable break out of another Intifada, as highlighted by Ahmad Qurei. This may well be the case but it is important to recognize that a successful summit could also cause uproar amongst Israelis which in turn could affect the Palestinians and hinder any positive steps taken. » Read more

Editorial: Black Mark On Hamas ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Arab News (Editorial) November 13, 2007 - 3:52pm The death of at least six people at a rally in Gaza organized by Fatah to mark the third anniversary of Yasser Arafat’s death is a black mark against Hamas. It could well prove fatal for the movement. There was no reason for Hamas security forces to open fire on the crowd — other than, of course, the fact they could not stomach the fact that hundreds of thousands of Palestinians had gathered in the center of Gaza, waving Fatah flags and carrying pictures of the late Palestinian leader. A more potent sign of Hamas losing the support of Gazans could hardly be imagined. » Read more

Hamas And Fatah Are Betraying Arafat's Legacy ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Daily Star (Editorial) November 13, 2007 - 3:51pm  Yasser Arafat has been dead for three years, harried to an early death by the Israeli siege of his battered presidential compound in Ramallah. Two camps - his own secular Fatah faction and the Islamist group Hamas - that claim to carry on his struggle for Palestinian rights have effectively been at war for months. In so doing, they have undermined their shared goal of justice for the Palestinian people and trampled a principle of ideological inclusiveness that was perhaps the most important hallmark of Arafat's leadership. » Read more

Gaza Violence Shows Worsening Divide ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bbc News by Martin Patience - November 13, 2007 - 3:50pm The violence during a rally to mark the third anniversary of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's death illustrates the deadly tensions between the two main Palestinian political factions. Six Palestinians were killed and dozens other injured as clashes broke out between Hamas and Fatah supporters at the Gaza memorial. Both sides laid the blame for the violence at each other's door. » Read more

Adam Lebor Looks Forward To Israel’s Sixtieth Birthday ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jewish Quarterly by Adam Lebor - (Commentary) November 13, 2007 - 3:49pm Sitting in a cafe on Shenkin street in Tel Aviv, reading the letters page of the Jerusalem Post, I much enjoyed an exchange between two American Zionist machers. M. J. Rosenberg, of the doveish Israel Policy Forum, opined that a true Zionist lives in Tel Aviv. » Read more

Arafat Remembered: 'hamas Threw Sound Grenades And Then I Got Shot In The Back' ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Independent by Donald Macintyre - November 13, 2007 - 3:45pm At least seven Palestinians were shot dead and scores more were injured yesterday as Hamas forces opened fire during a rally in Gaza City organised by the rival Fatah movement to commemorate the anniversary of Yasser Arafat's death Three years after the former president died in a Paris hospital – and almost six months after Hamas's bloody takeover of Gaza – an estimated 200,000 to 250,000 people took part in one of the largest political rallies held in the Palestinian territories in recent memory. » Read more

War And Peacemakers ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Newsweek by Christopher Dickey - (Special Report) November 13, 2007 - 3:44pm In a Middle East slipping from war to war, sometimes it seems only the old are truly impatient for peace. Certainly none is pushing harder than the octogenarian King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. His cause as crown prince in the 1990s and as reigning monarch since 2005 has been to settle as many disputes as he can in this region of clashing faiths, millennial rivalries and chronic conflagrations. They are all related, as he sees it, from Palestine to the price of oil, from Iraqi death squads to Iranian nukes to the risk of global recession, each cancroid problem feeding off the other. » Read more

Rice To Address G.a. Gathering ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) by Ami Eden - November 13, 2007 - 3:43pm With skepticism mounting over the upcoming American-backed Middle East summit, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is set to address the 3,500 delegates at the General Assembly of the United Jewish Communities. Rice, who is scheduled to speak Tuesday at the closing plenary session, returned recently from a series of meetings in the Middle East with Israeli and Palestinian officals aimed at laying the groundwork for the summit, which is slated for the end of this month in Annapolis, Md. » Read more

Hamas Cracks Down On Fatah After Gaza Rally Bloodshed ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters by Nidal Al-mughrabi - November 13, 2007 - 3:41pm Hamas rounded up dozens of Fatah activists in the Islamist-ruled Gaza Strip after its secular rival drew more than 200,000 supporters to a rally that ended in gunfire that killed seven people, officials said on Tuesday. The assembly on Monday, marking the third anniversary of the death of iconic Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, was the biggest held by President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah group in Gaza since Hamas Islamists seized the territory by force in June. » Read more

In The Mideast, America Casts An Imperial Shadow ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Washington Post by Rashid Khalidi - (Opinion) November 13, 2007 - 3:39pm Most Americans think that our role as a world power began with World War II, the "good war," and then continued with the similarly noble Cold War. We like to think that the United States acts in the world exclusively in the name of ideals such as freedom and democracy. » Read more