January 11th

2012 could be a year of dramatic change ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bitterlemons by Yariv Oppenheimer - (Opinion) January 11, 2012 - 1:00am At first glance, this election year in the United States does not bode well for the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. » Read more

Settlers Vandalize Mosques: Attempt to Burn Vehicles ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency January 11, 2012 - 1:00am NABLUS (Ma’an) -- Settlers vandalized a mosque in a Salfit village on Wednesday and attempted to set fire to several vehicles,a Palestinian Authority official said. PA settlement affairs official Ghassan Doughlas told Ma'an that residents in the village of Deir Istiya had seen settlers fleeing the scene after throwing flammable material on three vehicles. » Read more

Israel should rein in its hardliners ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Gulf News (Editorial) January 11, 2012 - 1:00am There seems to be an inherent tendency in Israel to ignore as much as to deny the rights of Palestinians. If anything, this tendency reflects a deeper policy conviction amongst Israeli officials — that Palestinians do not deserve what is lawfully theirs. And perhaps this stands as the real obstacle to attaining peace. » Read more

Drivers Protest Israeli-only roads in West Bank ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency by Jenny Baboun - January 11, 2012 - 1:00am JERICHO (Ma'an) -- Around 60 people from across the West Bank on Tuesday tried to drive from Jericho to Ramallah on an Israeli-only road to protest Israel's restrictions on Palestinian movement. Popular resistance committees organized the motorcade of around 50 cars to protest the network of roads in the West Bank designated for the exclusive use of Jewish settlers. Committee spokesman Bashir Tamimi told Ma'an the protest aimed to send a message that the roads were built on Palestinian land and to protest settler attacks on Palestinians and holy places. » Read more

Telling stand ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jordan Times (Editorial) January 11, 2012 - 1:00am Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman is back to his old tricks, being a great spoiler of all efforts to restart peace talks between his government and the Palestinians. Lieberman is once again proposing the redrawing of Israel’s borders with the Palestinian territories, with a view to placing more Arab Israelis under Palestinian control in return for plans to annex parts of the West Bank. He also wants to strip as many Arab Israelis of Israeli citizenship as possible. » Read more

Mideast rivals should take a page from ANC's playbook ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The National by Tony Karon - (Opinion) January 10, 2012 - 1:00am Sunday's centenary of the African National Congress (ANC), the South African liberation movement for which I spent a decade of my life fighting apartheid in the 1980s, reminded me of a strange evening in New York in 1997. I'd been chatting at a media party with a well-known hip-hop scribe, who had offered me a ride home in his rented limo. When we began discussing my South Africa experience, he refused to believe that this white boy had been in the ANC. » Read more

Peace Now: Settlement Construction Soared in 2011 ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ynetnews by Yair Altman - January 10, 2012 - 1:00am The past year has seen a 20% rise in construction starts in the West Bank settlements, Peace Now said in a report published Tuesday. According to data by the settlement watchdog, Jewish construction in the West Bank peaked in 2011. It said Israel started construction work on 1,850 new housing units in the West Bank in 2011, a 19% increase from the previous year. The report, entitled "Torpedoing the Two-State Solution," Israel authorized 1,850 building starts for West Bank housing units and said construction continued on another 3,500 West Bank units over the course of 2011. » Read more

No free pass for Israel, Hamas in Gaza ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post by Sari Bashi - (Opinion) January 11, 2012 - 1:00am As an expert in occupation law and the legal status of Gaza, I read with interest Hillel Neuer’s op-ed (“Hamas says Gaza ‘not occupied’; UN disagrees,” January 5) equating continued recognition of the occupation of Gaza with what he terms “Palestinian helplessness.” Neuer calls upon the United Nations to adopt a position reportedly articulated by a Hamas official, namely that Israel’s occupation of Gaza has ended. » Read more

Palestinian Leaders Outraged Over West Bank Construction Data ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Los Angeles Times by Maher Abukhater - January 11, 2012 - 1:00am Palestinian leaders voiced outrage Tuesday over a new report that Israeli settlement construction in the West Bank rose 20% last year. The report released by the Peace Now group also says that building on East Jerusalem land seized during the 1967 Middle East War was at the highest level in a decade. » Read more

Is there a peace partner? ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ynetnews by Donniel Hartman - (Opinion) January 11, 2012 - 1:00am As the year 2012 began, Israel and the Palestinians sat down in Jordan and talked for the first time in more than a year. The discussions were prompted by a deadline from the Quartet and accompanied by relative disinterest in both Palestinian and Israeli societies. The conversation may have been substantive or merely warranting the diplomatic phrase, “fruitful.” » Read more