March 11th, 2013

Kerry's Impromptu Meeting With Abbas
Media Mention of Hussein Ibish In The Daily Beast - March 11, 2013 - 12:00am

John Kerry’s unscheduled meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas Monday during his first official trip abroad was anything but a rogue moment for the new secretary of State.

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NEWS: Palestinian factions are due to meet again in Cairo in April for more unity negotiations. (Ma'an) The Palestinian election commission says it will publish the final voter registry on April 10. (Ma'an) Israeli occupation forces seriously injure two Palestinians in Gaza and Hebron. (Xinhua) The PA estimates there are 50,000 drug addicts in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem. (Ma'an) Israel finances its military justice system in the occupied territories in large part through fines against Palestinians. (Ha'aretz) Palestinians protest Israel's blocking of Palestinian family reunification. (Xinhua) PM Netanyahu holds the last meeting of his current cabinet, but without ultra-Orthodox parties present, as a new government begins to take shape. (Bloomberg/Xinhua) Egypt arrests an Israeli citizen in Sinai. (Xinhua) The PA is preparing more applications for UNESCO World Heritage Sites in the occupied territories. (Ma'an) The International Federation of Journalists accuses Hamas of preventing it from providing safety training to women journalists. (PNN) A new poll shows Israel's Palestinian citizens are more afraid of attacks by Jewish Israelis than outside forces. (Ha'aretz) A new Senate bill would allow Israel to join the US Visa Waiver Program. (JTA) Palestinians are increasingly upset with Egypt's pumping of raw sewage into smuggling tunnels in order to close them. (Al Jazeera)

COMMENTARY: Joseph Levine points out it's not anti-Semitic to examine the tension between Israel aspiring to be both a "Jewish" and a "democratic" state simultaneously. (New York Times) Peter Beinart says the pro-Palestinian left has a terrible blind spot regarding Hamas' oppression and misogyny. (Daily Beast/Open Zion) Aluf Benn says Israel is hoping to establish at least 1 million Jewish settlers in the occupied territories in the foreseeable future. (Ha'aretz) Gideon Levy says no one can respond to UNICEF's report on Israel's abuse of Palestinian children detainees by calling the organization "anti-Semitic." (Ha'aretz) Yonah Jeremy Bob says the UNICEF report ignores Israel's efforts to reform its treatment of Palestinian children detainees. (Jerusalem Post) Smadar Shir says anti-Arab racism is becoming widespread in Israel. (YNet) Bambi Sheleg says the wave of attacks against Arabs in Israel shows the basic values of the society are collapsing. (YNet) AP says Pres. Obama has three main goals for his trip to Israel and Palestine: Iran, relations with Israel and reviving negotiations. (AP) Barak Ravid says the United States now expects the parties themselves to take the lead on peace. (Ha'aretz) Adel Safty says Obama and Sec. Kerry must remember the international legal foundations for ending the conflict. (Gulf News) Chemi Shalev says it's crazy for many Israelis to be relieved that Obama doesn't appear to have a peace plan. (Ha'aretz) Emanuel Rosen says if Obama really doesn't have a peace plan, he might as well postpone his visit to the region. (YNet) Omar Baddar says Obama's visit has to be a "game changer" or the region faces decades of unending conflict. (Daily Beast/Open Zion) Alan Elsner says Obama's trip should be seen as a step in the right direction, not an end in itself. (The Hill) Barry Rubin says it doesn't matter what Israelis really think of Obama, they need to applaud him because they require American support. (Jerusalem Post) Hassan Barari says Netanyahu's new coalition won't last long. (Arab News) Nathan Guttman says AIPAC is trying to tack to the left and make the pro-Israel cause more liberal in line with Obama's America. (The Forward) Nathan Jeffay looks at the role of Sara Netanyahu. (The Forward) The Independent profiles the novelist and hit TV scriptwriter Sayed Kashua, a Palestinian citizen of Israel. (The Independent)<

Analysis: UNICEF report, gray areas and int'l law
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Yonah Jeremy Bob - (Analysis) March 10, 2013 - 1:00am

Overall, UNICEF’s report on Israel’s treatment of Palestinian children in the West Bank Military Courts, despite some more positive treatment than UN reports often give, did not give Israel high marks. The 38 recommendations and the tone of the document mostly spoke of Israeli violations of international law. But reading such a report is tricky.

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Israel going for one million Jews in the West Bank
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Aluf Benn - (Editorial) March 11, 2013 - 12:00am

The election campaign season comes to its real conclusion this week with the formation of the government and an unadulterated victory for the right.

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UNICEF isn’t anti-Semitic
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Gideon Levy - (Editorial) March 10, 2013 - 1:00am

It has already been met here with a typical shrug of the shoulders, the report by the United Nations Children Fund declaring that Palestinian children detained by the Israel Defense Forces are subject to widespread, systematic ill-treatment that violates international law. Now it’s no longer “the automatic majority” at the UN’s General Assembly, nor is it “Israel-haters” on the UN Human Rights Council. Now it’s UNICEF − and UNICEF is really another story entirely.

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Parallel lives in a tragicomic mirror: Novelist Sayed Kashua is trampling every barrier
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Independent
by Boyd Tonkin - March 8, 2013 - 1:00am

In January, one TV show swept the boards at the awards ceremony of the Israeli Film and Television Academy. It won five gongs. Small-screen buffs might assume that the recipient of all these accolades was Hatufim, the Israeli drama which – in its American remake – became Homeland. Not at all. Instead, honours rained on the bitingly funny and fearless sitcom Arab Labour (avoda aravit, a Hebrew idiom for a botched job).

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Is Sara Netanyahu the Erratic Power Behind Bibi's Throne?
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jewish Daily Forward
by Nathan Jeffay - (Opinion) March 11, 2013 - 12:00am

Of the many explanations for the long, drawn-out and chaotic coalition negotiations that have followed Israel’s recent election, the most intriguing is that they have more to do with Benjamin Netanyahu’s home life than with his political aspirations. According to one of Israel’s top journalists, it is his wife’s publicly known antipathy toward one of his main potential coalition partners that pitched Netanyahu into the mire of complications in which his negotiations remained stuck as of the Forward’s print deadline.

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AIPAC Tries to Brand Israel as Liberal Cause
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jewish Daily Forward
by Nathan Guttman - (Opinion) March 10, 2013 - 1:00am

After many years of outreach to conservative evangelicals, the pro-Israel lobby in Washington, facing a liberal ascendance, is now striving to make the case for Israel as a cause for progressives. At the recent annual conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, advocates of the organization explored strategies for capturing this constituency, largely by looking for ways, as Israeli diplomats put it, of presenting “Israel beyond the conflict” with the Palestinians.

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Foul sewage flooding raises Palestinian ire
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Al-Jazeera English
by Mohammed Omer - March 9, 2013 - 1:00am

Gazans are crying foul after Egypt stepped up its campaign to wipe out an underground network of transportation tunnels by blasting raw sewage down them, sometimes with deadly results for Palestinian workers.

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Challenges lie ahead for Netanyahu govt
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Arab News
by Hassan Barari - (Opinion) March 11, 2013 - 12:00am

Barring a last minute surprise, Benjamin Netanyahu is poised to form a working governmental coalition this week. His ability to form his third government is a slam-dunk after Yair Lapid, the head of Yesh Atid Party, relinquished his demand to assume the portfolio of foreign affairs. Lapid’s desire to be a foreign minister was the stumbling block in the path of forming a government with Bennett.

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