Hamas disperses anti-Assad protest in Gaza
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Avi Issacharoff - August 17, 2011 - 12:00am

Protest was meant to show solidarity with Palestinian refugees who have fled their homes due to Syrian government's violent crackdown on demonstrators. Hamas police forces in the Gaza Strip dispersed a protest on Tuesday night against the Syrian government's deadly crackdown on protesters. The protest was meant to demonstrate solidarity with Palestinian refugees who have fled the city of Latakia, which has been under attack by Syrian military forces in recent days.

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Hamas official: Party not moving headquarters to Cairo
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
August 17, 2011 - 12:00am

A senior Hamas leader said Wednesday that the party has no intention of moving its headquarters in exile from Damascus to Cairo. Salah Bardaweil rubbished reports that the recent visit to Egypt by exiled Hamas leader Khalid Mashaal was to discuss moving the party's offices to Cairo. “Hamas has not discussed moving its office from Syria, neither was this the goal of Mashaal’s visit to Cairo,” Bardaweil told Ma'an. The Cairo trip was not a surprise visit, he added, and had been previously scheduled.

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Divided We Execute
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Inter Press Service (IPS)
by Mel Frykberg - (Opinion) August 16, 2011 - 12:00am

The execution of a Palestinian father and son by Hamas security forces in Gaza throws up a sharp difference over the death penalty between Gaza and the West Bank. In the West Bank a temporary moratorium is in place. The executions were carried out despite pressure from Palestinian and international human rights organisations for the death penalty in the occupied Palestinian territories to be rescinded.

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Abbas-Dahlan spat undermining Fatah, bolstering Hamas
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Khaled Abu Toameh - August 15, 2011 - 12:00am

As he prepares to submit a request to the UN in September for recognition of a Palestinian state, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has also found time to wage a relentless war against his former ally and friend, Fatah strongman Muhammad Dahlan. The rivalry between the two men, which reached its peak last month when Abbas ordered his security forces to raid Dahlan’s villa on the outskirts of Ramallah, has caused severe damage to Fatah and will only serve Hamas’s interests, Fatah officials warned.

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Abbas makes Arab aid appeal, sees risk to U.N. bid
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Alertnet
August 15, 2011 - 12:00am

President Mahmoud Abbas on Monday appealed for Arab financial support to help the Palestinians deal with "pressures and threats" from Israel and its allies which he said were a risk to his plan to seek U.N. approval for statehood in September. The Palestinian Authority faces a financial crisis which forced it to cut wages by half in July. Policymakers have identified a shortfall in Arab aid as the main cause.

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Hamas criticises Fatah over election plan
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Alertnet
by Nidal al-Mughrabi - August 14, 2011 - 12:00am

Hamas on Sunday accused Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah movement of violating a reconciliation agreement by opening voter registration for local elections due to be held in October in the occupied West Bank. Islamist Hamas, which seized the Gaza Strip in a 2007 civil war with Fatah, has described the planned ballot as illegitimate. Fatah is the dominant party in the Palestinian Authority, which exercises limited self-rule in the West Bank.

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U.S. Threatens to Halt Gaza Aid Over Hamas Audits
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Ethan Bronner - August 11, 2011 - 12:00am

JERUSALEM — The State Department sent a message to Gaza’s Hamas leaders on Thursday that it would withdraw some $100 million it is spending in Gaza on health care, agriculture and water infrastructure if they did not back off a demand to audit the books of American-financed charities operating there. The threat, delivered via an intermediary, came after Hamas officials suspended the operation of the International Medical Corps on Sunday for its refusal to submit to a Hamas audit at the charity’s site.

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Hamas employees' wages late due to cash crisis
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
August 7, 2011 - 12:00am

Civil servants in Gaza will not receive their July salaries until the end of August due to government cash shortages, Hamas finance ministry official Ismail Mahfouz said Sunday. Speaking at the Gaza government's information office, Mahfouz said that while some of the government's income came from internal revenue, a large part of the budget was received from external sources. He said there was a deficit in support from abroad, and that Hamas officials were trying to secure more finance from outside the Gaza Strip.

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Air strikes hit targets in the Gaza Strip
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
August 2, 2011 - 12:00am

GAZA CITY (Ma’an) -- Israeli warplanes struck two targets in the northern and southern Gaza Strip on Tuesday morning, with no casualties reported. Israeli air crafts fired at a target in Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip causing material damage but no human casualties, medical sources told Ma'an's correspondent. Israeli jets also fired missiles at a smuggling tunnel in the Al Brazil neighborhood of Rafah in southern Gaza, causing material damage only.

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Gaza film-makers decry Hamas censorship
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters
by Nidal al-Mughrabi - July 28, 2011 - 12:00am

It's not just the dearth of funds, equipment and studio facilities that prompts such laments from film-makers in the Gaza Strip. Four years into Islamist Hamas rule, cultural censors are fraying the already threadbare local movie industry. Locked in conflict with Israel and vying against secular Palestinian rivals in the occupied West Bank, Hamas has long invested in television- and Internet-based news, educational shows and even animated clips that advance its political views.

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