April 20th

UN Rights Office Says Gaza Death Sentences Unlawful, Urges Hamas to Halt Planned Firing Squad ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press April 20, 2012 - 12:00am GENEVA — The U.N.’s human rights office says three men recently sentenced to death in the Palestinian territory of Gaza were executed unlawfully. A spokesman for U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay says the men didn’t have regular access to lawyers and were tried by a military court despite being civilians. Rupert Colville told reporters in Geneva that the death sentences carried out by hanging April 7 also weren’t approved by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas as required by law. » Read more

Neeman’s Own ATFP World Press Roundup Article from International Herald Tribune by Shmuel Rosner - (Blog) April 19, 2012 - 12:00am JERUSALEM — About two weeks ago, on the eve of Passover, Israel’s Justice Minister, Yaakov Neeman, dropped a policy bomb. He proposed a bill that would allow a small majority of legislators in the Knesset to reinstate laws struck down by the Supreme Court. » Read more

Israeli Official: Rockets Fired Toward Israel Were Smuggled From Libya after Gadhafi’s Fall ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press April 20, 2012 - 12:00am JERUSALEM — An Israeli defense official says rockets fired from Egypt toward Israel this month were smuggled from Libya. Israel says at least two rockets were launched from Egypt’s Sinai desert at the Israeli resort town of Eilat. No one was hurt. Egypt denies the rockets were fired from its territory. Libya has become an illicit source of weapons since the fall of dictator Moammar Gadhafi last year. » Read more

Easter in Ramallah ATFP World Press Roundup Article from International Herald Tribune by Rajah Shehadeh - (Blog) April 19, 2012 - 12:00am RAMALLAH, West Bank — Almost every year for over one hundred years on the Saturday before Orthodox Easter, the main street in Ramallah has been overtaken by marching boy scouts and girl scouts banging drums and blowing trumpets before tens of thousands of onlookers. It isn’t much of a parade. The music is as loud and out of tune as it is enthusiastic. Yet I try never to miss Sabt el Nour and the rowdy procession celebrating the miraculous light that beamed from Christ’s tomb in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in the Old City of Jerusalem the day before his resurrection. » Read more

Mahmoud Abbas’s unhappy anniversary ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Washington Post by Jackson Diehl - (Opinion) April 19, 2012 - 12:00am It was a year ago this month that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas turned his back on the U.S.-sponsored “peace process” with Israel and embarked on a radically different strategy for achieving Palestinian statehood. It’s time for a reckoning. Abbas’s step one was the surprise signing of an agreement in Cairo with the Islamic Hamas movement, ruler of the Gaza Strip, that promised to end the rift between Hamas and Abbas’s secular Fatah movement. A joint government was promised that would stage parliamentary and presidential elections within a year — i.e., by now. » Read more

Police: Israeli Wounded in Stabbing Attack by Arab ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press April 19, 2012 - 12:00am JERUSALEM — Police say an Israeli has been stabbed in an attack by an Arab in Jerusalem. The ultra-Orthodox Jewish man was seriously wounded and was taken to a hospital. Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld says two suspects were arrested following the incident Thursday. It took place near a Jewish prayer site in a predominantly Arab area. The attack is the latest in a series of politically-motivated stabbings in Jerusalem. Last month, an Israeli soldier was seriously wounded in a stabbing attack on Jerusalem's light rail line. » Read more

Egypt’s Brotherhood Blasts Mufti’s Jerusalem Visit ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press April 19, 2012 - 12:00am CAIRO — Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood on Thursday denounced a rare visit to Jerusalem by the nation's top Islamic theologian that broke with decades of opposition to traveling to areas under Israeli control. Grand Mufti Ali Gomaa replied that his two-hour visit on Wednesday was a show of solidarity with the Palestinians' claim to Israeli-held east Jerusalem. » Read more

Hamas Wouldn’t Honor a Treaty, Top Leader Says ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jewish Daily Forward by Larry Cohler-Esses - (Interview) April 19, 2012 - 12:00am Cairo — Any agreement reached between Israel and the Palestinian Authority will be subject to far-reaching changes if Hamas comes to power in a democratic Palestinian state, a top Hamas leader told the Forward in an exclusive and wide-ranging interview. » Read more

Radical action needed after Oslo's decline ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The National (Editorial) April 19, 2012 - 12:00am In 1993, when the Oslo Accords were signed and the Palestinian Authority was born, the senior Israeli politician Yossi Beilin was a leading advocate for Palestinian self-rule. The accords, and the Authority, were intended to pave the way for permanent solutions on borders, refugees and two-state control. » Read more

April 19th

The Israeli and Arab Dimensions of Iran's Nuclear Program ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Brookings by Shibley Telhami - (Analysis) April 10, 2012 - 12:00am Suzanne Maloney draws attention to many important angles of the international crisis over Iran’s nuclear program and America’s policy choices. But there are also others for Washington to consider—namely, the Israeli and Arab dimensions. Here are ten brief points for the next president to reflect on. » Read more