June 15th

Obama’s Israel Policy Showing No Difference With Clinton-Bush
Media Mention of Ziad Asali In Bloomberg - June 15, 2010 - 12:00am

President Barack Obama clashed so often and so publicly with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during the first 16 months of his tenure that one Israeli newspaper reported Netanyahu believed Obama wanted a confrontation to improve U.S. ties to the Arab world. Then on May 31 came a moment that former U.S. Ambassador Martin Indyk says showed the real nature of Obama’s policy toward Israel: the deadly raid on an aid flotilla bound for Gaza that unleashed a torrent of international criticism and a move in the United Nations to censure the Jewish state.

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Egypt finds itself in a difficult position following Israel's attack on the Gaza flotilla. There is widespread international and Israeli skepticism about Israel's commission of inquiry, and UNSG Ban says an international commission is still required. PM Fayyad condemns an attack on an Israeli police officer. Palestinians release a study on export opportunities in Europe. Israel's security chief says lifting the blockade is risky but a minister says changes are being examined. A Palestinian is killed in a tunnel collapse. Hamas blocks a nonviolent demonstration against Israel's Gaza buffer zone. Israeli minister Dan Meridor says Israel should not build in areas that will become a Palestinian state. Yoel Marcus says the flotilla attack means the blockade is over. Ireland expels an Israeli diplomat over the Dubai assassination. Gadi Taub says Fayyad may be the Palestinian Ben Gurion. UC Irvine suspends its Muslim Student Union for disrupting a speech by Israeli Amb. Michael Oren. Palestinian MK Hanin Zoaby, who was on the flotilla, has reportedly become “the most hated person in Israel”

The Yom Kippur syndrome
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Yoel Marcus - June 15, 2010 - 12:00am

The blame game between the political and military establishments is revealing the same characteristics that led us to the Yom Kippur War, and the same subsequent spats over who was responsible and who must be held accountable. Then, as now, the chief failure was that of intelligence. Then, as now, the military was full of itself, sure that we'd "break their bones," in the famous words of then-chief of staff David Elazar on the second day of the Egyptian-Syrian assault. Israeli forces approaching Gaza flotilla

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Meridor: Israel should refrain from building in areas that will be annexed to PA
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Chaim Levinson - June 15, 2010 - 12:00am

Cabinet Minister Dan Meridor said Tuesday that Israel should refrain from building in areas that will be annexed to the Palestinian Authority in the future, even after a 10-month settlement construction freeze is over in September. Meridor made the comments during a tour of the West Bank settlements Efrat. "The freeze will be over in three months, and from then on we will not be committed to it; it's a matter of where it is wise and logical for us to build," Meridor said.

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Ireland tells Israel to withdraw staffer over Dubai hit
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters
June 15, 2010 - 12:00am

Ireland's government said on Tuesday it was calling on Israel to withdraw a designated member of staff at its Dublin embassy over the use of fake passports in the assassination of a top Hamas militant in Dubai in January. Foreign Minister Micheal Martin said an investigation had showed that the eight Irish passports used by suspects in the assassination of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh were forgeries. "The misuse of Irish passports by a state with which Ireland enjoys friendly, if sometimes frank, bilateral relations is clearly unacceptable and requires a firm response," he said in a statement.

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Shin Bet Chief: Hamas buying land within Jerusalem
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Jonathan Lis - June 15, 2010 - 12:00am

Shin Bet security service director Yuval Diskin said on Tuesday that the Islamist group Hamas was busy buying up land within the municipal territory of Jerusalem. Speaking at the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, Diskin added that the central forces currently operating in East Jerusalem were the Palestinian Authority, Hamas and the Islamic Movement. He explained that they were competing with each other over influence and presence in the area.

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Hamas blocks peaceful Gaza demo against buffer zone
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Xinhua
June 14, 2010 - 12:00am

Hamas security forces on Monday prevented Palestinian activists from holding peaceful demonstration against an Israeli-imposed buffer zone in the Gaza Strip, organizers said. Hamas policemen seized keys of vehicles that were set to transport tens of Palestinians to demonstrate near the no-go zone to the east of southern Gaza Strip town of Rafah, the Popular Committee Against Buffer Zone said in a statement.

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A Palestinian Ben-Gurion?
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ynetnews
by Gadi Taub - (Opinion) June 15, 2010 - 12:00am

At this time, Israeli prisons maintain a separation between criminal and security detainees. Some of the most veteran prisoners are unhappy about this, because when such separation is in place, the criminals talk about crime all day and plan their next criminal act, while security detainees talk about ideology the whole day and plan the next “acts of resistance.” Once upon a time, when the detainees were mixed, they spent their days arguing with each other.

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Palestinian killed in tunnel collapse in Rafah
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Xinhua
June 15, 2010 - 12:00am

A Palestinian worker was killed Tuesday in a tunnel cave-in beneath Gaza's southern borders with Egypt, witnesses said. Witnesses in the scene said a 22-year-old smuggler was buried alive in a tunnel collapse accident. His body was dug out a few hours later. On Sunday, a 17-year-old smuggler died instantly in a power shock while working in one of the tunnels that snake under the Gaza-Egypt borderline. Palestinian rights groups say at least 150 Palestinians have been killed in tunnel cave-ins and sporadic tunnel accidents.

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UN insists on int'l flotilla probe
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by E.B. Solomont - June 15, 2010 - 12:00am

The UN called on Israel to accede to demands for an international inquiry of the event surrounding the IDF raid of the Gaza flotilla Monday night, even as the Israeli Cabinet approved a committee to pursue an internal Israeli inquiry of the matter. "The Secretary-General [Ban Ki-moon] takes note of the Israeli announcement on their inquiry," UN spokesman Farhan Haq was quoted as saying by Reuters. Haq added, though, that Ban's "proposal for an international inquiry remains on the table and he hopes for a positive Israeli response."

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