Not Israel’s best times
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Arab News
by Osama Al-Sharif - (Opinion) September 6, 2011 - 12:00am

These are not Israel’s best times. A tussle with Turkey over a commando raid on a flotilla of aid-carrying ships heading to Gaza Strip last year in which nine Turkish citizens were killed, has just turned into a full-fledged diplomatic war. Ankara expelled the Israeli ambassador this week and vowed to challenge Israel’s blockade of Gaza at the International Court of Justice. Turkey’s main demand, that Israel issues an official apology for the naval attack, has been rejected — again — by Tel Aviv.

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Palestinian official: Abbas met Israel's Barak
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
(Analysis) September 6, 2011 - 12:00am

RAMALLAH (Reuters) - President Mahmoud Abbas met Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak last week, Palestinian officials said on Monday, his first publicly declared meeting with an Israeli government official for almost a year. Abbas told members of Fatah's Revolutionary Council that Barak had requested the meeting in Jordan to discuss the possibility of resuming negotiations which broke down a year ago because of a row over Jewish settlement expansion.

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Erdogan: Turkey suspends all defense ties with Israel
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Herb Keinon - (Analysis) September 6, 2011 - 12:00am

Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said on Tuesday that Turkey was "totally suspending" defense ties with Israel, after downgrading diplomatic relations with the country. While it was initially reported that Erdogan had also suspended all trade ties between the two nations, this was later clarified to refer to defense-related trade only. "Trade ties, military ties, defense industry ties - we are completely suspending them. This process will be followed by different measures," Erdogan told reporters in Ankara.

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News Analysis: Would Turkish-Israeli differences serve the Palestinians?
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Xinhua
by Emad Drimly, Osama Radi - (Analysis) September 6, 2011 - 12:00am

GAZA, Sept. 5 (Xinhua) -- Palestinian observers and analysts see the current differences between Israel and Turkey an opportunity for the Palestinian people and their just cause due to the significant role of Turkey in the region. However, they disagreed over evaluating the advantages the Palestinians would harvest. One question is that whether Ankara would show clear and practical position, and the other is whether the current crisis between the two countries is just a summer cloud since they are two old allies.

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U.S. envoys press Palestinians to drop U.N. statehood bid
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Washington Post
by Joel Greenberg - September 6, 2011 - 12:00am

JERUSALEM — Two senior White House envoys arrived Tuesday for meetings with Israeli and Palestinian leaders in a last-ditch effort to head off a Palestinian bid for recognition of statehood at the United Nations this month. David Hale, the Obama administration’s acting special envoy to the Middle East, and Dennis Ross, the president’s Middle East adviser on the National Security Council, are pressing for a resumption of peace negotiations that were broken off a year ago.

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Israel's best response is still to renew negotiations
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bitterlemons
by Itamar Rabinovich - (Editorial) September 5, 2011 - 12:00am

The terrorist attack launched from Sinai on August 18 against Israeli vehicles travelling to Eilat, and its sequels, have underscored and exacerbated four interlocking challenges facing Israel.

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UN report: Gaza blockade legal, Israel used excessive force
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
(Analysis) September 2, 2011 - 12:00am

BETHLEHEM (Ma'an) -- A UN report on Israel's deadly raid against a Turkish aid ship bound for Gaza has found that the naval blockade was legal but commandos used excessive force in the May 2010 incident. The New York Times, citing a leaked copy of the document to be released Friday, reported that it found Israel used "excessive and unreasonable force" after meeting "violent resistance" from some of the passengers. Israel and Turkey have been in dispute over an apology for the May 31, 2010 raid in which nine Turkish activists were killed.

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An American September
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Uri Savir - (Opinion) September 2, 2011 - 12:00am

The Middle East is at a critical crossroads. We are witnessing two dichotomies: • Most Arab countries are undergoing a rebellion of the young generation for freedom in which three dictators have already been toppled. In all these societies there is a tension between young (mostly secular) students, leading a revolution for democratic rule, and the more organized religious, sometimes fundamentalist, forces, anti-Western in orientation and striving for their religiouspolitical share of power.

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Abbas says Palestinian UN bid came after Israel rebuffed int'l treaties
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Xinhua
September 1, 2011 - 12:00am

The Palestinians decided to approach the United Nations for recognition after Israel refused to abide by the international agreements and laws, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said Wednesday. "Approaching the UN is not an alternative to the peace talks," Abbas was quoted by the Palestinian official news agency Wafa as saying, "it is an opportunity to get out of the current impasse that the peace process is facing due to the Israeli policy of settlement." Abbas made the remarks at a meeting held at his Ramallah headquarters with Rabbi Menahim Fruman, according Wafa.

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‘Acceptance of PA’s UN bid will push back talks for years’
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Herb Keinon - September 1, 2011 - 12:00am

A UN General Assembly resolution recognizing the Palestinian Authority as a nonmember state would create “unbridgeable gaps” and push back negotiations for years, a senior Israeli official warned Wednesday. The official said that once such a resolution was passed, the Palestinians would never be willing to negotiate on the basis of anything less, and no Israeli leader would ever be able to agree to what the Palestinians would likely get from the UN. He said that such a move would be a “strategic mistake by the world,” and said this was well understood by the US.

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