Gaza must be rebuilt now
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Guardian
by Jimmy Carter - (Opinion) December 19, 2009 - 1:00am

It is generally recognised that the Middle East peace process is in the doldrums, almost moribund. Israeli settlement expansion within Palestine continues, and PLO leaders refuse to join in renewed peace talks without a settlement freeze, knowing that no Arab or Islamic nation will accept any comprehensive agreement while Israel retains control of East Jerusalem.

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'Back to crisis management'
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Al-Ahram
by Dina Ezzat - December 18, 2009 - 1:00am

Egyptian officials have expressed unreserved concern over the slow pace of development on the Palestinian scene, especially with regards to Gaza. Egypt's main concern, they privately admit, is not borne of sympathy with the Palestinians but concerns the consequences of the current stalemate on Egyptian interests.

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The Palestinians' opposite poles
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Washington Post
by Howard Schneider - December 15, 2009 - 1:00am

Sami and Tayseer Barakat grew up together in the concrete warrens of this refugee camp in Gaza, but the common thread ends there. As young adults, Tayseer moved to the West Bank while Sami remained in Gaza. The choices have shaped the brothers' lives, values, prosperity and opportunities, and they have placed the two at very different points in what is now a three-way feud among Israelis and Palestinians.

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Palestinian tunnel tycoons feeding demand for banned goods
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Guardian
by Harriet Sherwood - December 15, 2009 - 1:00am

Mahmoud is proud of the motorbike he bought two months ago for $700, now parked in the sand at the entrance of one of the tunnels used to smuggle the machines into Gaza. It is all the more precious these days. After an influx of bikes through the deep underground passages between Gaza and Egypt resulted in carnage on the roads by young, untrained riders, the Hamas government ordered the imports to stop.

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Egypt constructs huge Gaza wall
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Independent
by Ben Lynfield - December 11, 2009 - 1:00am

Egypt has reportedly begun building an underground iron wall along its border with the Gaza Strip in a major upgrading of its efforts to end smuggling through tunnels. Egyptian security officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed that the wall project is under way. Local residents reported Egyptian clearing work was in progress 90 metres from the border over the last three weeks.

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Egypt’s wall is not the cause of Gaza’s woes
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The National
(Editorial) December 10, 2009 - 1:00am

The news is sure to inflame the Arab world: Egypt is building, with US help, a new wall to prevent Gazans from tunnelling into the country. This development becomes all the more contentious since it comes nearly one year after the devastating Israeli assault on the Palestinian territory. But cooler heads must prevail. Any backlash against Egyptian authorities would be undeserved. It is Israel’s blockade, not Egypt’s wall that is starving the Palestinians.

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Egypt denies building 'Gaza wall'
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Al-Jazeera English
December 10, 2009 - 1:00am

Egypt has denied it is constructing an underground steel barrier along its strip with the Gaza border in an attempt to seal off smuggling tunnels built by Palestinians. Haaretz, an Israeli newspaper, reported that Egypt was installing a metal wall up to 30 metres deep along the strip used by Palestinians to break the Israeli blockade of the territory. The paper reported that the wall would be nearly 10km long as "impossible to cut or melt".

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Who will save Gaza's children?
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Guardian
by Victoria Brittain - December 9, 2009 - 1:00am

Among all the complex and long-term solutions being sought in Copenhagen for averting environmental catastrophe across the world, there is one place where the catastrophe has already happened, but could be immediately ameliorated with one simple political act.

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Israel closes sole oil and gas terminal on Gaza border
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Christian Science Monitor
by Erin Cunningham - December 7, 2009 - 1:00am

The population of the Gaza Strip is facing an acute cooking gas shortage this winter, after a unilateral Israeli decision in October to permanently close the sole oil and gas terminal between the coastal Palestinian territory and the Jewish state. The Nahal Oz crossing has been shut down for "security reasons," an official with the Israeli coordination office for the Gaza Strip said, adding that it will only act as "a backup" when the Kerem Shalom crossing in the south is too congested.

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A Chronicle of Gaza, in Kitsch Form
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Dan Williams - November 10, 2009 - 1:00am

“I can offer you a discount on the headbands,” said Tareq Abu Dayyeh, souvenir-store owner. “They’re just like the kind used by suicide bombers.” He was making a sales pitch at his Chairman Arafat Shop, one of Gaza’s oddest commercial outlets. A battery-powered, dancing Osama bin Laden doll occupies a shelf above Barack Obama coffee mugs emblazoned with a misspelling of the U.S. president’s middle name: “Abu Hussain Palestine Loves You.” A plastic Virgin Mary and Jordan River holy water share space with plaques depicting the Dome of the Rock, the foremost Muslim shrine in Jerusalem.

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