March 20th

Physicians of female Palestinian prisoner on hunger strike say her life is in danger
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press
March 20, 2012 - 12:00am

JERUSALEM — A Palestinian woman who has refused food for the past month to protest her imprisonment by Israel without formal charges is in grave danger of dying, a medical rights group said Tuesday. Hana Shalabi lost 14 kilograms (31 pounds), her muscles are wasting and she is in excruciating pain, said Ran Cohen of Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, which has provided her a doctor. She has taken only water since her arrest on Feb. 16.

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Learning the lessons
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bitterlemons
by Ghassan Khatib - (Opinion) March 19, 2012 - 12:00am

Violence has been always a prominent characteristic of how Israel handles its relationships in the neighborhood. The state was created through violence wielded against the indigenous Palestinian population, resulting in the exile of 800,000 Palestinian refugees to surrounding countries. Afterwards, the use of force became a doctrine in Israel, used to intimidate its neighbors and impress its friends.

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This conflict has no military solution
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bitterlemons
by Ephraim Sneh - (Opinion) March 19, 2012 - 12:00am

We are in a period of loss of confidence in the peace process, when the chances of reaching a negotiated two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict appear distant. Now, again, we hear Palestinian voices calling for a return to violent struggle. This seems like an appropriate time to review the history of violent clashes between the two sides--and their outcome.

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U.S. War Game Sees Perils of Israeli Strike Against Iran
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Mark Mazzetti, Tom Shanker - March 19, 2012 - 12:00am

WASHINGTON — A classified war simulation held this month to assess the repercussions of an Israeli attack on Iran forecasts that the strike would lead to a wider regional war, which could draw in the United States and leave hundreds of Americans dead, according to American officials. The officials said the so-called war game was not designed as a rehearsal for American military action — and they emphasized that the exercise’s results were not the only possible outcome of a real-world conflict.

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The West Bank Through Chinese Eyes
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Daily Beast
by Bernard Avishai - (Opinion) March 19, 2012 - 12:00am

Three weeks ago—just while Benjamin Netanyahu was preparing for his Palestineless AIPAC speech—I accompanied a team of about thirty Chinese businesspeople on a visit to the West Bank, led by a former Duke colleague, Liu Kang, now also the dean of the Institute of Arts and Humanities Shanghai’s Jiao Tong University. It was kind of tour d’horizon for uninitiated but intrigued foreign investors—“some billionaires,” Kang assured me—shoe and leather manufacturers, toy exporters, equity-fund managers, people by now accustomed to seeing the world as their market, if not their oyster.

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March 19th

Decisions in the Interregnum in Palestine and Israel
In Print by Ziad Asali - The Huffington Post (Opinion) - March 19, 2012 - 12:00am

The year 2011 will go down in history as the year when the two-state solution went into deep freeze. Yet even during this hibernation there is much that can, and indeed must, be done to prevent an even graver crisis.

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NEWS: Palestinians are beset by soaring levels of debt. Jewish-American groups are increasingly divided over Iran policy. The Israeli debate about war with Iran is focusing on defense. Israeli and American officials agree Iran has not decided whether to create a nuclear weapon. The PA is negotiating the Palestinian tax revenue issue with Israeli officials. The IMF says Palestinians urgently need the delivery of pledged aid. Israel claims the Iranian military experts are operating in Gaza and the Sinai Peninsula. A UN report says Israeli settlers are taking over Palestinians springs. A new book by an Israeli academic claims Israeli textbooks promote hatred against Palestinians. Israeli and other women complain of sexual harassment at anti-occupation protests in the occupied territories. COMMENTARY: Peter Beinart says Zionists should boycott Israeli settlements and their goods in order to save Israel. Sarah Chayes and Amir Soltani say both Israel and Iran are using the nuclear issue as a diversion from deeper problems. Akiva Eldar says Israel is finding it increasingly difficult to plausibly claim victimhood. Avner Cohen says PM Netanyahu has shown contempt for the Holocaust. Nathan Jeffay asks why large “unauthorized” settlement outposts remain intact after years of court orders and promises to remove them. The Forward says it's a bad idea for pro-Israel groups to try to squelch campus free speech using Title VI. Emad El Din Adeeb says there is the danger of a war that begins in Gaza and ends in southern Lebanon. Elias Harfoush looks at changes taking place within Hamas and other Palestinian groups. Jeff Wheelwright looks at the effects of new genetic science on Israel's attempts to define “who is a Jew.” Barry Rubin says US primacy in the Middle East may have died in 2011.

In 2011, US primacy in the Middle East died
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Barry Rubin - (Opinion) March 18, 2012 - 12:00am

This is the end... Of our elaborate plans, the end, Of everything that stands.... No safety or surprise.... There’s danger on the edge of town.... And all the children are insane.... The West is the best.... But you will never follow me.” – “This is the End,” The Doors

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Defining Jews, Defining a Nation: Can Genetics Save Israel?
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Atlantic
by Jeff Wheelwright - (Analysis) March 14, 2012 - 12:00am

Herzliya, a broad-beached ocean-side resort 10 miles north of Tel Aviv, is booming with construction -- big hotels going up on the bluffs and expensive new bungalows on the bougainvillea-laden streets. Herzliya was named for Theodor Herzl, the 19th-century Zionist visionary whose dream to see the Jewish people resettled in their homeland triumphantly came to pass.

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Palestinian Transformations
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Dar Al-Hayat
by Elias Harfoush - (Opinion) March 18, 2012 - 12:00am

The times are different for Gaza, and they are different for Hamas. And just as the recent confrontation in the Gaza Strip represented a new test of the ability of Israel’s offensives to inflict human casualties and material damage among the ranks of the Palestinians, as if we needed further Palestinian bloodshed to discover this, it also represented a test for the Islamist movement and for its courageous hesitation to move forward in taking the risk of such a costly confrontation.

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