UN rep. backs declaration of Palestinian state in next year ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post by Tovah Lazaroff - October 26, 2010 - 12:00am United Nations Special Middle East Peace Negotiator Robert H. Serry told Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad on Tuesday that the UN will a support the declaration of an independent Palestinian state. Serry spoke to Fayyad while the two picked olives together near the West Bank village of Turmus'ayyeh, close to the Israeli settlement of Shiloh. » Read more

Israeli general lays out plan for reviving Gaza ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Statesman by Karin Laub - October 26, 2010 - 12:00am TEL AVIV, ISRAEL — The Israeli general who controls the gates of Hamas-run Gaza says he is pursuing a complex and delicate strategy: enable exports and development in the impoverished Palestinian territory while somehow preventing the Islamic militants who rule it from getting credit for any progress. » Read more

Ross warns Israel failed talks could imperil its security ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post by Hilary Leila Krieger - October 26, 2010 - 12:00am A top White House advisor warned Monday night that the progress Palestinians have made on security in the West Bank could be jeopardized if peace talks don’t move forward. Dennis Ross, a senior White House Middle East advisor, pointed to improvements the Palestinians have made in security and coordination with Israel over the past two years in a speech before American Israel Public Affairs Committee activists in Florida. » Read more

Why Israeli settlement construction must stop ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Christian Science Monitor by Nabeel Shaath - (Opinion) October 25, 2010 - 12:00am Ramallah, West Bank — After more than two decades of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, we are at a turning point in the history of the region. As a Palestinian negotiator for over 20 years, I see that tough decisions have to be made. The stakes are too high – not just for the Palestinian people, but for the entire region’s stability. » Read more

Hamas official: We are on way to liberate Haifa, Acre ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post by Khaled Abu Toameh - October 25, 2010 - 12:00am Hamas is on its way to liberate Haifa and Acre together with other armies, Hamas’s Minister of Interior, Fathi Hammad, declared on Monday. His threat came as Palestinian Authority officials stepped up their rhetorical attacks on Israel for refusing to extend a moratorium on settlement construction. One official condemned Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu as an “enemy of peace.” » Read more

An end to Bethlehem's unholy row ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Guardian by Jill Hamilton - October 26, 2010 - 12:00am This week Mahmoud Abbas confronted yet another impasse in the peace talks with Israel. However, on Monday, when he visited the 1,500 year-old Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, the alleged birthplace of Christ, he could boast a significant triumph in a longstanding stalemate. » Read more

Some Question Insistence on Israel as Jewish State ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times by Isabel Kershner - (Analysis) October 24, 2010 - 12:00am JERUSALEM — The more stridently Israel insists on Palestinian recognition of it as the nation-state of the Jewish people, the more adamantly the Palestinian leadership seems to refuse. As a result, some senior Israeli officials are beginning to question the wisdom of the policy of their prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who has made recognition of the legitimacy of the Jewish nation-state a prerequisite for any final agreement with the Palestinians. » Read more

Trading beyond the Green Line: the real deal for Palestine ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Guardian by Raja Khalidi - (Opinion) October 26, 2010 - 12:00am The Bank of Israel earlier this month issued a report on Israeli-Palestinian trade links that should make policymakers on both sides of the Green Line ponder deeply the premises of current and future economic relations. » Read more

Talking Peace and the Diaspora, do Jews outside of Israel have a role? ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) by Dina Kraft - October 25, 2010 - 12:00am Cloistered away in a snug meeting room with stone-faced walls and arched doorways across from Jerusalem's Old City, some of the most important Jewish communal leaders in the world came together recently to wrestle with a question: Is there a role for the Diaspora in Israel's decision making on peace? The answer: Yes and no. » Read more

Cantor: Take Israel out of foreign aid ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) October 24, 2010 - 12:00am A Republican Congress would seek to remove funding for Israel from the foreign operations budget, a GOP leader said. U.S. Rep. Eric Cantor, the Republican whip and the only Jewish Republican in the House of Representatives, told JTA that a GOP-led House would seek to defund nations that do not share U.S. interests, even if it meant rejecting the president's foreign operations budget. Cantor, of Virginia, said he wants to protect funding for Israel should that situation arise. » Read more