March 24th

PA: No talks till Jerusalem construction stops ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency March 23, 2010 - 12:00am There will be no peace or stability without a Palestinian Jerusalem, presidential spokesman Nabil Abu Rudaineh said on Tuesday. Responding to comments made by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the conference of the Israeli lobby group AIPAC in Washington on Monday evening, Abu Rudaineh spoke as President Mahmoud Abbas awaited news from the closed-door meeting between the Israeli leader and American President Barack Obama. » Read more

Netanyahu's reluctant gift to Palestine ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Guardian by Hussein Ibish - (Opinion) March 24, 2010 - 12:00am The Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu is not being honest with his fellow Israelis by insisting that settlement building is compatible with a peaceful future between Israelis and Palestinians, or that the colonisation of occupied East Jerusalem "in no way harms" Palestinians and is not in any sense different from building in Tel Aviv. » Read more

Petraeus requests West Bank, Gaza be included in Centcom's sphere ATFP World Press Roundup Article from World Tribune March 23, 2010 - 12:00am U.S. Centcom chief Gen. David Petraeus has urged the administration of President Barack Obama to include both the West Bank and Gaza Strip in his area of responsibility. Centcom has been responsible for most of the Middle East with the exception of Israel and much of North Africa. Israel as well as the West Bank and Gaza Strip have been located in U.S. European Command. » Read more

Britain says 'compelling' evidence Israel linked to Dubai assassination ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Christian Science Monitor by Carol Huang - March 23, 2010 - 12:00am Britain's Foreign Secretary David Miliband said Tuesday that there are "compelling reasons to believe that Israel was responsible" for the forging of British passports used in the Dubai assassination of a Hamas official. Miliband's comments, together with his promised expulsion of a diplomat from Israel's London Embassy, offer the first apparent confirmation of Dubai Police Chief Dahi Khalfan’s claim that Israel was involved in the Jan. 19 attack. » Read more

Peace talks could be delayed for a year, warns Israel ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Independent by Rupert Cornwell - March 24, 2010 - 12:00am An unyielding Benjamin Netanyahu held a 90-minute meeting with Barack Obama at the White House last night as the US intensified pressure on the Israeli Prime Minister to rein in settlements in disputed East Jerusalem. But, in talks earlier in the day with Congressional leaders on Capitol Hill, Mr Netanyahu warned that peace negotiations could be delayed another year unless the Palestinians dropped their "illogical and unreasonable" demand for a full settlement freeze, according to his spokesman. » Read more

Netanyahu takes Israel's case to Obama ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Los Angeles Times by Paul Richter, Edmund Sanders - March 24, 2010 - 12:00am President Obama met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House on Tuesday amid new signs that the two remain deeply divided over continued Israeli construction in disputed East Jerusalem. In their first face-to-face meeting after months of tension, Obama was expected to press Netanyahu for action to ensure that Israeli housing plans do not endanger peace talks. » Read more

Historic change or just empty rhetoric? ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Daily Star by Rami Khouri - (Opinion) March 24, 2010 - 12:00am The important relationship between the United States and Israel is evolving in unpredictable ways. Their recent tensions are important for what they reveal about a more sophisticated and integrated American view of its Middle East policies, one which balances a firm commitment to Israel’s security against the problems Washington suffers from its excessive pro-Israel tilt and the continued Zionist colonialism in occupied Arab lands. » Read more

Dispute with Israel underscores limits of U.S. power, a shifting alliance ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Washington Post by Glenn Kessler - (Analysis) March 24, 2010 - 12:00am The two-week-old dispute between Israel and the United States over housing construction in East Jerusalem has exposed the limits of American power to pressure Israeli leaders to make decisions they consider politically untenable. But the blowup also shows that the relationship between the two allies is changing, in ways that are unsettling for Israel's supporters. » Read more

Israeli Army World's Most Moral? ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Inter Press Service (IPS) by Mel Frykberg - March 23, 2010 - 12:00am Many Israelis like to believe, and the cliché is repeated regularly in Israel, that their army is the "most moral army in the world." However, following the Gaza war which left 1,400 Palestinians dead, most of them civilians, some Israelis have begun to question this. Furthermore, the fatal shooting of four Palestinian teenagers in the course of 24 hours over the weekend, in highly questionable circumstances, has forced the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) to investigate the incident amidst contradictory statements issued by the soldiers involved. » Read more

Netanyahu spends unheralded time at White House ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Washington Post by Glenn Kessler - March 24, 2010 - 12:00am Amid high tensions in U.S.-Israeli relations, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu met with President Obama for a total of two hours in two meetings at the White House Tuesday night under a virtual news blackout. No reporters or photographers were invited to record the scene or even a handshake between the two leaders, who met one day after Netanyahu, in a speech to a pro-Israel group, rejected the administration's plea that he halt construction in a disputed area of Jerusalem claimed by Palestinians as their capital. » Read more