Syria crisis reveals hypocrisy of Israel's Arab MKs ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz by Eliezer Yaari - (Opinion) February 6, 2012 - 1:00am More than 300 people were murdered in Syria by their own government over the weekend, killed by tank, cannon and mortar fire. Their homes were destroyed and hundreds still remain buried under the ruins. There's a long trail of blood behind these numbers, flickering pictures of small children being thrown from windows and video taken with a cellphone of a man walking, a shot being heard and the man falling to the ground. » Read more

Israel can clear Mideast of nukes, it just won't ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz by Akiva Eldar - (Opinion) February 6, 2012 - 1:00am Palestinians are being regularly and illegally barred from reaching Dead Sea beaches in the occupied West Bank, according to a Supreme Court petition filed by Israel's leading civil rights organisation. The Association of Civil Rights (Acri) in Israel is challenging what it says is the frequently imposed ban by the military on Palestinians seeking to swim or relax at beaches in the northern Dead Sea. The salt-saturated sea is the only open water accessible to Palestinians from the otherwise landlocked West Bank. » Read more

Pro-Peace Group Barred From Leading Hebron Tours ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jewish Daily Forward by Nathan Jeffay - February 5, 2012 - 1:00am Tel Aviv — A year ago, Israel’s Education Ministry launched a program to encourage schools to visit Jewish sites in the occupied West Bank town of Hebron, drawing fire from doves who charged the ministry with bringing politics into school trips. The doves’ effort to stop the program failed. Having failed to beat them, a dovish group of army veterans sought recently to join them. But on January 28, the police informed the Hebrew University High School that members of the dovish organization Breaking the Silence would be barred from joining its students on their Hebron tour the next day. » Read more

PA to submit Israeli sites to World Heritage List ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ynetnews by Elior Levy - February 6, 2012 - 1:00am Failure to make progress during the latest round of talks between the Palestinians and Israel led the Palestinian leadership to examine new ways in which to gain recognition in the international arena. One such effort is focused on submitting nominations of heritage sites – both on Palestinian and Israeli territory – for inscription on UNESCO's World Heritage List. The Palestinian Authority was admitted as a full member of UNESCO in October 2011, which enables it to make bids for historic monuments and locations to be classified as World Heritage Sites. » Read more

Palestinian aids Israeli soldier left behind in raid ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters February 3, 2012 - 1:00am JERUSALEM, Feb 3 (Reuters) - An Israeli soldier stranded after a raid in occupied territory was escorted to safety by a Palestinian man in the same village the troops had targeted, witnesses and media reports said. The Israeli military said Friday a batallion commander had been suspended from duties for the soldier having been abandoned on enemy turf in the raid this week, an infraction which Chief of Staff Lieutenant General Benny Gantz saw as a "serious incident". » Read more

No Israeli Decision on Iran Attack, Obama Says ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times by Scott Shane - February 5, 2012 - 1:00am President Obama said Sunday that he did not believe Israel had made a decision on whether to attack Iran to disrupt its nuclear program and that diplomacy remained the “preferred solution” to resolving the standoff over what Western leaders believe is Tehran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons. » Read more

When Talk of War Transcends Idle Chatter ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times by Ethan Bronner - February 5, 2012 - 1:00am JERUSALEM — Israelis like to say that when it comes to military and security operations, those who know don’t talk, and those who talk don’t know. But the intense and increasingly public debate about whether to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities is challenging that piece of conventional wisdom. The standard view has been that successful attacks rely on secrecy and surprise, so the more talk there is about an operation, the less likely it will occur. » Read more

Final member of Damascus-based Hamas politburo leaves Syria ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Deutsche Presse Agentur (DPA) February 5, 2012 - 1:00am A senior member of the Hamas movement politburo, Imad el-Alami, previously based in Syria, returned to the Gaza Strip on Sunday. Hamas sources said he was the last remaining member of the movement's Damascus-based politburo to leave Syria. Hamas decided to leave Syria in order not to be seen as endorsing the regime of President Bashar Assad in his bloody crackdown against his own people. » Read more

Israeli premier to visit US to address lobby ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press February 5, 2012 - 1:00am JERUSALEM — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office says he will visit the U.S. next month for the annual conference of AIPAC, the pro-Israel lobby. A statement by Netanyahu's office Sunday said the prime minister would speak at the conference. It was not immediately clear if Netanyahu would meet U.S. President Obama during his visit. The visit comes at a time of deadlock in Israel-Palestinian talks and growing international concern that Israel could soon launch an attack on Iran's nuclear program. » Read more

Israel 'denied residency to thousands of Palestinians' ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency February 6, 2012 - 1:00am BETHLEHEM (Ma’an) -- Israeli policies have arbitrarily denied thousands of Palestinians the right to live in or travel to and from the West Bank and Gaza, an international rights group said Sunday. “Israel’s control over the population registry has significantly reduced the registered Palestinian population in the West Bank and Gaza, probably by hundreds of thousands of people,” the report by Human Rights Watch said. » Read more