June 9th

Palestinian homes at risk in occupied West Bank ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Amnesty International USA June 8, 2009 - 12:00am Five families in the West Bank hamlet of Hadidiya are under threat of immediate eviction. At least 12 others are fighting eviction and demolition orders in the Jordan Valley area. In total, more than 150 people, many of them children, risk losing their home and being evicted from the area. The Israeli army destroyed the homes of 18 Palestinian families and their animal pens in the nearby hamlet of Ras al-Ahmar on Thursday morning. More than 130 people, many of them children, lived in the hamlet. » Read more

Can Obama change Netanyahu? ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Gulf News by Linda Heard - (Opinion) June 8, 2009 - 12:00am Speaking at Cairo University last week, US President Barack Obama put his credibility on the line. He told the Israelis to stop colony-building and to ensure that Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza have the opportunity to lead normal lives. Moreover, he stressed his commitment to a two-state solution, which he intends to make a personal priority, and equated the Palestinian cause with struggles against South African apartheid as well as the African-American civil rights movement. » Read more

UN's Gaza War Crimes Investigation Faces Obstacles ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Associated Press by Ben Hubbard - June 9, 2009 - 12:00am A veteran U.N. war crimes investigator acknowledged his probe of possible war crimes by Israel and Hamas — which included interviewing dozens of victims and poring through the files of human rights groups — is unlikely to lead to prosecutions. Israel has refused to cooperate, depriving his team access to military sources and victims of Hamas rockets. And Hamas security often accompanied his team during their five-day trip to Gaza last week, raising questions about the ability of witnesses to freely describe the militant group's actions. » Read more

Obama leaves settlers with stark choice - apartheid or a bi-national state ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz by Akiva Eldar - June 9, 2009 - 12:00am American pressure is penetrating the hearts of mainstream settlers. People like Uri Elitzur - who saw from a government office what many settlers do not see from the West Bank - understand that Barack Obama has changed the rules of the game between the United States and Israel, and that despite the right's victory in the elections, the Palestinians are not planning to go anywhere. What this means is that after 42 years of occupation, the time has come for the settlers to choose between Jewish land and a Jewish state. » Read more

Hamas West Bank Terror Plot Exposed ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ynetnews by Ali Waked - June 9, 2009 - 12:00am The Palestinian Authority said it has exposed a plot by Hamas to carry out a string of terror attacks against the Authority's officials and institutions in the West Bank city of Nablus and the surrounding area. PA officials said Monday evening that a Hamas member who was recently detained admitted to receiving 1.5 million euros from the Islamist group's leadership in Gaza in order to establish infrastructure aimed of undermining President Mahmoud Abbas' regime. He said that among the targets were headquarters of the Palestinian security services in Nablus. » Read more

Israeli indictments spark outrage ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The National by Jonathan Cook - June 8, 2009 - 12:00am The decision to prosecute 12 Israeli Arabs over what the local media have described as the “lynching” of an Israeli soldier on a bus shortly after he shot dead four passengers has been greeted with outrage from the country’s Arab minority. The inhabitants of Shefa’amr, one of the largest Arab towns in the Galilee region and the location of the attack, are expected to stage a one-day strike today in protest against the indictments. Seven of the 12 face charges of attempted murder. » Read more

Netanyahu convinced Obama seeks clash with Israel to appease Arabs ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz by Aluf Benn - June 9, 2009 - 12:00am Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu believes that U.S. President Barack Obama wants a confrontation with Israel, based on Obama's speech in Cairo last week, Netanyahu's confidants say. In Netanyahu's opinion, the Americans believe an open controversy with Israel would serve the Obama administration's main objective of improving U.S. relations with the Arab world, the aides say. In his speech, Obama called for a "new beginning" in relations between America and Islam, and spoke at length about the Israeli-Arab conflict. » Read more

Ignore the Theatrics, Bibi Just Wants To Build ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jewish Daily Forward by Gershom Gorenberg - (Opinion) June 3, 2009 - 12:00am The show goes on. As I write, a radio newscaster is repeating an item about the evacuation of an illegal settlement outpost in the West Bank: At Nahalat Yosef, near Nablus, the army demolished two makeshift mobile homes and removed a third, thereby erasing the outpost. Settler leaders promised to rebuild it. Judging from past experience, the promise will be kept. » Read more

Obama and the Two State Solution ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jordan Times by Gwynne Dyer - (Analysis) June 9, 2009 - 12:00am It was a good speech by any measure, and it will go some way towards lessening the mistrust of the world’s Muslims towards the United States. But when it comes to the core issue that has put Americans and Arabs on different sides of the fence over the past decades, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, it will take more than words. » Read more

'Obama proposed plan for peace deal within two years' ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz June 9, 2009 - 12:00am United States President Barack Obama has presented to Egypt and Israel a plan for a two-state solution to be finalized within two years, the London-based A-Sharq al-Awsat reported on Tuesday. A source in Cairo told the newspaper that Obama raised the plan with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during the latter's visit to Washington last month. According to the report, the plan envisions a Middle East peace deal by 2011 and would encompass an agreement for a Palestinian state. » Read more