In Isolation, Gazans Dismiss Bush's New Push For Peace ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Christian Science Monitor by Dan Murphy - January 9, 2008 - 6:11pm As Israel and the Palestinian Authority gear up for President Bush's first visit to the Jewish state and the West Bank, in which the president is expected to nudge along a hoped-for peace deal between the two sides, many residents of the isolated Gaza Strip are looking on with anger and cynicism. This densely populated coastal territory has been largely shut off from the outside world since Hamas, the Islamist militant group that the US and Israel consider terrorists, seized control from their rival Fatah here in June. » Read more

An Incentive For Peace ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Baltimore Sun by Emily L. Hauser - (Opinion) January 9, 2008 - 6:10pm Despite the recent Annapolis peace conference, Israeli-Palestinian violence is escalating. Last week, Palestinian rockets fell on Israeli cities, and Israel launched retaliatory airstrikes; in one day, nine Palestinians died, including a 3-year-old girl. Even as President Bush visits the region this week for the first time since taking office, Americans might be forgiven for not placing much faith in their government's attempts to broker peace. » Read more

Mideast Leaders Vow To Refocus On Talks ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Los Angeles Times by Richard Bourdreaux - January 9, 2008 - 6:09pm As President Bush headed to the Middle East to check on their peace talks, Israeli and Palestinian leaders agreed Tuesday to launch them in earnest, six weeks late. It was that long ago that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas stood beside Bush at an international conference in Annapolis, Md., and announced the start of full-scale negotiations with the aim of creating a Palestinian state by the end of 2008. » Read more

Egypt's Tunnels Sustaining Hamas Economy ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Washington Times by Erica Silverman - January 9, 2008 - 6:08pm An elaborate network of tunnels from Egypt has become the primary transport route for commercial goods entering the Gaza Strip, enabling the area's Hamas rulers to maintain a rudimentary economy in the face of an Israeli embargo. Food products, machinery parts, raw materials and even antibiotics are delivered to Gaza through the tunnels, subject to fees from private families that own some of the passages and to taxes by Hamas. Other smuggled products range from cigarettes to mobile phones. » Read more

Mr. Bush In The Middle East ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Washington Post (Editorial) January 9, 2008 - 6:07pm AYEAR AGO, the Bush administration introduced a new policy in the Middle East aimed at aligning "moderate" Arab states against Iran while simultaneously promoting the revival of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. As President Bush begins a tour of the region today, both ends of that strategy are in danger of unraveling. Never entirely in sync with the administration's concept of isolating Tehran, Arab states have been given further second thoughts by the recently released National Intelligence Estimate, which reported that Iran had suspended work on a nuclear bomb. » Read more

Bush's Trip To Mideast To Test His Credibility ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Usa Today by Charles Levinson - January 9, 2008 - 6:06pm President Bush is due in the Middle East on Wednesday to try to rekindle hope for a lasting peace, but first he'll have to win over skeptics such as Ghazi Bustami. "For seven years, Bush served Israel and made war," says Bustami, 31, the portly, soft-spoken Palestinian owner of a TV repair shop in this West Bank city. "Now with a few months left in his presidency he thinks of the Palestinians. But it's too late." » Read more

Bush Nudges Israel, Palestinians On Peace ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Associated Press by Anne Gearan - January 9, 2008 - 6:04pm President Bush, in the Mideast to push along a peace deal by the end of his presidency, gave orders to both sides on Wednesday. He told Israelis that "illegal" settlement outposts in disputed land must go and told Palestinians that no part of their territories can be "a safe haven for terrorists." » Read more