It's time for disengagement No. 2
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Akiva Eldar - (Opinion) April 11, 2011 - 12:00am

Every rocket launched from the Gaza Strip toward Sderot and Ashdod serves as "further proof" that the evacuation of the Gush Katif settlement bloc was a bad bargain. And once again we are being warned that "this is what will happen to Kfar Sava and Netanya if we withdraw from Judea and Samaria." And once again the settlers are able to pull the wool over people's eyes, turning themselves from a security burden into a strategic asset.

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Encountering Peace: The bombs bursting in air
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Gershon Baskin - (Opinion) April 11, 2011 - 12:00am

Yes, it’s difficult to think about peace when missiles are flying from Gaza into Israel, and when innocent civilians on both sides are regularly forced to take cover. Yes, it’s true that Hamas and its proxies in Gaza intentionally shoot at Israeli civilians, but it’s also true that many innocent civilians inside Gaza end up paying with their lives – killed by Israeli bombs. Go and explain to their families that their deaths were not intentional.

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Israel and Hamas Consider Cease-Fire
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Isabel Kershner - April 10, 2011 - 12:00am

Israel and Hamas signaled on Sunday that they were willing to restore calm after days of intense fighting, and while militants in Gaza fired about 10 rockets and mortar shells into southern Israel, most fell in open areas close to the border and Israel did not immediately respond.

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Internal Hamas Rift Snags Efforts to End Israeli-Gaza Fighting
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Media Line
by David Miller - April 10, 2011 - 12:00am

Hamas, the Islamic group that controls the Gaza Strip, is sending out contradictory messages about its willingness to enter into a ceasefire with Israel, amid signs of a yawning rift between its military and political wings. "We are interested in calm, but we want the Israeli military to stop its operations," Ghazi Hamad, Hamas’ deputy foreign minister, said in an interview on Israel Radio on Sunday. But the night before Abu-Ubaida, a spokesman for the Izz Al-Din Al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas' armed wing, showed no intention of stepping down the violence along the border.

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Short-term ceasefire, long-term instability foreseen in Gaza
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Xinhua
by Adam Gonn - April 10, 2011 - 12:00am

After a weekend of intense Israeli air strikes and artillery fire in response to over 120 rockets launched from the Gaza Strip, Hamas is calling Israel to halt its attacks. In an interview with the Israel Radio on Sunday, Ghazi Hamad, the deputy foreign minister of the deposed Hamas government, said that "we are interested in calm, but want the Israeli military to stop its operations." Earlier on Sunday Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said Israel was willing to accept a mutual ceasefire with Hamas.

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Israel believes Hamas trying to establish 'balance of terror'
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Amos Harel, Avi Issacharoff - April 8, 2011 - 12:00am

A 16-year-old Israeli was critically injured on Thursday when an anti-tank missile fired from the Gaza Strip hit a school bus near Kibbutz Sa'ad. The missile attack was followed by additional mortar shelling from Gaza. The launch occurred just four to five kilometers from the target, from a point where it was clear students were on board and it was possible to keep the bus within sight. A senior defense source told Haaretz on Thursday night that he believes this was an act by the military wing of the organization, and that their aim was to deter Israel and establish a "balance of terror."

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Palestinians charged in Jerusalem pipe bomb attack
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters
by Maayan Lubell - April 7, 2011 - 12:00am

An Israeli court on Thursday charged five Palestinians with planting a pipe bomb next to a Jerusalem monastery and planning other attacks around the city, a police spokesman said. The bomb, put last month in a rubbish bag outside the monastery, severed the hand of a municipal worker who picked up the bag. Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said the five men, residents of Jerusalem, were tied to the Islamist group Hamas and had admitted after their arrest that they planned to carry out more attacks against Israelis in Jerusalem.

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Hamas militants nabbed for planning to abduct Israeli soldier
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Xinhua
April 6, 2011 - 12:00am

Israel revealed Wednesday evening that its security apparatuses had nabbed three militants of the Islamic Hamas movement who planned to kidnap a Israeli soldier. The Israeli Radio reported that the internal security apparatus, better known as the Shabak, arrested a group of three Hamas members in January in cooperation with the Israeli army. The group planned to kidnap an Israeli soldier as a hostage and then reach a deal to exchange Palestinians imprisoned in Israeli jails, according to the radio.

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Hamas, Fatah met secretly in Gaza this week: official
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Xinhua
April 5, 2011 - 12:00am

Officials from rivalrous Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah party and the Islamic Hamas movement have met in the Gaza Strip this week in a renewed effort to reach reconciliation, a Hamas official said Tuesday. Ismail Al-Ashqar said representatives from the Hamas and the Fatah had discussed their views on the reconciliation and controversial issues obstructing the restoration of political unity between the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip and the West Bank, where the Fatah-led Palestinian National Authority (PNA) holds sway.

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Beyond Goldstone: A truer discussion about Israel, Hamas and the Gaza conflict
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Washington Post
by Jessica Montell - (Opinion) April 5, 2011 - 12:00am

The word Goldstone has entered the modern Hebrew lexicon as shorthand for anti-Israel bias and the deterioration of Israel’s international position. When the fact-finding U.N. mission headed by Judge Richard Goldstone released its report into Operation Cast Lead in the Gaza Strip 18 months ago, it seemed as if the world divided into two camps. There was the pro-Goldstone camp, arguing that Israel had committed war crimes in Gaza and must be held accountable; and there was the anti-Goldstone camp, which insisted that the report was nothing less than a blood libel against the Jewish state.

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