Israel to deport Gaza boat activists
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Associated Press
July 6, 2009 - 12:00am

Israel on Monday deported a former U.S. congresswoman, a Nobel peace prize laureate and other activists who were arrested and jailed after trying to break the naval blockade of the Gaza Strip. The Israeli navy commandeered their boat last week as it tried to sail from Cyprus to Gaza. It was the latest in a series of trips by activists trying to bring attention to the blockade imposed by Israel and Egypt on the territory after the Islamic militant Hamas seized power there two years ago.

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'Sounds worrying'
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Al-Ahram
by Dina Ezzat - April 14, 2009 - 12:00am

Karen Abu Zayd is commissioner general of UNRWA (the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East). Her job is to make sure that relief and human development are accessible to Palestinians under occupation, in Gaza, the West Bank and refugee camps scattered in countries neighbouring the occupied Palestinian territories. This mission is met through providing education, healthcare, social services and emergency aid to over 4.6 million refugees living in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, Jordan, Lebanon and the Syrian Arab Republic.

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The monumental folly at Sharm el-Sheikh
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Daily Star
by Rami Khouri - (Opinion) March 4, 2009 - 1:00am

The international pledges at Sharm el-Sheikh on Monday of some $4.5 billion in aid to the Palestinians to rebuild the Gaza Strip and promote the development of the West Bank seem like a monumental folly in view of the surrounding political context of this gesture. The financial generosity of the donors was largely offset by their political cowardice on two fronts: in challenging Israel to live according to the norms of law in its treatment of the Palestinians under its occupation; and in coming to grips with Palestinian political realities, especially the legitimacy and role of Hamas.

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U.S. Talks Tough on Gaza Aid
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Washington Post
by Glenn Kessler - March 1, 2009 - 1:00am

The United States on Monday will pledge $300 million in humanitarian relief for people in Gaza after the 22-day war with Israel but will maintain restrictions to prevent any assistance from reaching Hamas, State Department spokesman Robert A. Wood said. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, attending an international conference here to raise funds for the Gaza Strip, will also announce $600 million in assistance to the Palestinian Authority, which is controlled by Fatah, a rival of Hamas that is dominant in the West Bank.

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PA to seek $2.8 billion to rebuild war-ravaged Gaza
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Agence France Presse (AFP)
February 26, 2009 - 1:00am

The Palestinian Authority said on Wednesday it will seek $2.8 billion to rebuild Gaza, as Israel threatened another military offensive if alleged arms smuggling into the Hamas-run enclave continues. "We have prepared a document on the basis of which donors will make their aid pledges. It foresees a total of $2.8 billion for all sectors," Palestinian Premier Salam Fayyad said at the headquarters of his Western-backed government in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

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After the war, Gazans seek answers on white phosphorus
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Christian Science Monitor
by Ilene Prusher - February 5, 2009 - 1:00am

When Nafiz Abu Shabam received a 5-year-old patient at the Shifa Hospital early in the war between Israel and Hamas, he dressed her burns and sent her for tests. Three hours later, when he and other medical staff redressed the wound, they saw smoke coming from it. "We found small pieces of foreign material in her body, and even when we picked it out, the wound was still smoking," he says. "We were later told [by foreign doctors and human rights workers who arrived after the war started] that it was white phosphorus."

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The Obama Administration and the Unavoidable Issue of Palestine
Policy Focus by ATFP - February 5, 2009 - 1:00am

Overview

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UN 'shocked' by Gaza destruction
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from BBC News
January 23, 2009 - 1:00am

The UN's humanitarian chief has told the BBC the situation in Gaza after a three-week Israeli offensive against Hamas was worse than he anticipated. Sir John Holmes, who visited Gaza on Thursday, said he was shocked by "the systematic nature of the destruction". He said that the territory's economic activity had been set back by years. UN workers have been given access to Gaza. On Friday, Israel lifted a ban on international aid agencies entering the Palestinian territory. The ban had been in place since early November when tensions mounted between Israel and Hamas.

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Investigate now
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
(Editorial) January 22, 2009 - 1:00am

In the aftermath of the war, the questions arise. Now, as the last IDF soldiers leave the Gaza Strip and the plumes of smoke and dust dissipate over the ruins, the picture of the war starts becoming clearer.

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Embers of Mideast peace in Gaza
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Christian Science Monitor
(Editorial) January 20, 2009 - 1:00am

With the Gaza war at a strategic pause with a cease-fire, hopes for peace may now depend on Barack Obama's likely point man for the Middle East, Dennis Ross. He promises a new style of "statecraft" in dealing with Israeli-Palestinian issues. His usual first tactic after such flare-ups is to look for small steps to rebuild trust. But is there any trust to come out of the ruins of Gaza? Yes, once the world decides to look for it and if a declining number of peacemakers on both sides don't give up hope for a solution.

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