The National praises PM Fayyad's state-building program. PM Netanyahu warns that settlement building cannot continue unrestrained. H.D.S. Greenway says peace is in sight. Questions are raised by the PLO dissolving of its negotiations unit. A Jerusalem conference is closed by Israel. The PA says an Israeli investigation into an attack in 2002 makes excuses for murder. Israel may recognize many outposts. Israel is concerned about the emerging new Arab order. Pres. Abbas points to an international consensus against settlement building. Hamas accuses Israel of escalating tensions. Settlers attack Palestinian villages. Bradley Burston asks what if Israeli forces treated settlers as they do Palestinians. Alon Idan says Netanyahu does not recognize his weakened position. A new poll shows favorable American attitudes towards Israel. Dennis Ross tells the J Street conference that time is running out for peace. DM Barak says Israeli citizens cannot take the law into their own hands. Gershon Baskin says Israelis can learn from J Street. The Swedish FM spends a night in Nablus. Hamas demands UN schools in Gaza stop teaching about the Holocaust. Fayyad says he's offered Hamas a pragmatic agreement, and seeks public input through social media.

Dennis Ross: Time running out for peace; status quo unsustainable
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ynetnews
by Yitzhak Benhorin - February 28, 2011 - 1:00am

The Obama Administration's "ongoing strategic discussions with the Israelis have taken on a character, a range of issues, intensity, and a frequency that is simply unprecedented," Dennis Ross told J Street's annual conference on Monday. The White House adviser on Middle East peace issues said that one of the Obama Administration's principles was “an unshakeable commitment to Israel’s security.”

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Poll: Americans still favorable towards Israel
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ynetnews
by Yitzhak Benhorin - March 1, 2011 - 1:00am

Barack Obama and Benjamin Netanyahu 's relationship may be shaky, the peace process is deadlocked – but Americans still have our backs. The latest Gallup Poll reveals that the majority of Americans, about 63%, continued to rate Israel favorably in 2011. Nearly 17% of Americans favor the Palestinians and 20% are impartial – supporting both sides equally or indifferently. Americans have not been affected by European and global de-legitimization efforts, not even by the apartheid week organized by Israel's adversaries in campuses around the world.

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Barak: We can't let citizens take law into their own hands
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
March 1, 2011 - 1:00am

In reaction to clashes that took place a day earlier in the Gilad Farm outpost in Samaria, Defense Minister Ehud Barak on Tuesday said that "We can not let citizens take the law into their hands." "These disturbances damage the rule of law in the country," Barak said during a tour of the Givati Brigade's training in the Negev.

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Netanyahu has failed to recognize his weakened status
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Alon Idan - March 1, 2011 - 1:00am

Last week Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called German Chancellor Angela Merkel. He phoned to say he was disappointed that Germany's had voted for a UN Security Council condemning the settlements. Merkel reportedly responded: "How dare you. You are the one who disappointed us. You haven't made a single step to advance peace." In response to Merkel's aggressive remarks, Netanyahu promised to deliver a new speech about the peace process within two or three weeks.

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Encountering Peace: Learning from J Street
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Gershon Baskin - (Editorial) February 28, 2011 - 1:00am

I am writing from Washington DC, where I’m attending the second annual conference of J Street, together with more than 2,000 American Jews from all walks of life, four MKs from Kadima and one from Labor. There are a number of other Israelis representing various peace and human-rights organizations.

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What if Israeli forces treated West Bank settlers like Arabs?
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Bradley Burston - February 28, 2011 - 1:00am

Around here, you ignore omens only at your peril. The settlement movement knows how the omens have been running for it today. All black. All unexpected. Imagine a sunny day in winter, on which someone brilliant, compassionate, articulate, truly peace-minded, and actually popular, announces candidacy for the head of - of all things - Israel's Labor Party. Unheard of. Absurd. But true. The name is Shelly Yachimovich.

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Swedish FM, in rare move, to spend night in Nablus
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Herb Keinon - March 1, 2011 - 1:00am

Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt arrived in Israel Monday for a four day visit that includes a couple out of the ordinary agenda items: sleeping overnight in Nablus, and touring Israel's northern border. Bildt, considered among the most critical foreign ministers of Israeli policy inside the EU, has not been in the country for some two years, having canceled a visit here in the Fall of 2009 because of Israeli anger over his refusal to condemn an article in the Aftonbladet newspaper accusing Israel of killing Palestinians and harvesting their organs.

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Settlers attack West Bank villages following outpost demolitions
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press
March 1, 2011 - 1:00am

Israeli settlers damaged houses and cars in a Palestinian village in the West Bank on Tuesday, police and witnesses said, in an apparent show of anger over the Israeli demolition of homes in an unauthorized settler outpost. Police say settlers are suspected of smashing windows of seven Palestinian cars and throwing a fire bomb at a Palestinian house.

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Hamas fights UN's 'poisonous' Holocaust lessons in Gazan schools
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Guardian
by Harriet Sherwood - (Editorial) February 28, 2011 - 1:00am

Hamas has vowed to stop the United Nations teaching children in Gaza about the Holocaust, saying it will poison their minds. The history of the Holocaust is planned to be included as part of a human rights curriculum in schools run by the UN Relief and Works Agency, which is responsible for the welfare of Palestinian refugees. More than 200,000 children attend UNRWA schools in Gaza. Hamas, the Islamist organisation that runs Gaza, has said it will do all it can to stop the teaching of Holocaust studies.

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