PA reduces price of bread to counter economy crisis
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
July 21, 2011 - 12:00am

RAMALLAH (Ma’an) – The Palestinian Authority ministry of national economy decided to lower bread prices from 4 to 3.5 shekels per kilo (10 slices). The decision goes into effect Saturday. Economy minister Hasan Abu Libdah announced the decision Wednesday at a news conference in Ramallah. He said the ministry would introduce a series of procedures during Ramadan to cope with the dire economic conditions. There will be monthly updates on the price, according to the production costs.

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FEATURE-Wife battering, sexual abuse get attention in Gaza
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters
by Nidal al-Mughrabi - July 20, 2011 - 12:00am

GAZA, July 20 (Reuters) - Most safe-houses in the Gaza Strip are meant to provide protection for armed militants on Israel's target list. Now Gaza is offering protected shelter to battered Palestinian women. Its lone women's safe-house, opened two months ago, has had eight clients, all guarded by police from the Islamist Hamas movement that runs the enclave and enforces a conservative though not radical Muslim religious code.

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Top official slams UN report backing Israel on flotilla
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Agence France Presse (AFP)
July 7, 2011 - 12:00am

UNITED NATIONS — A UN rapporteur Thursday slammed a highly anticipated UN report said to back a 2010 Israeli commando raid on an aid flotilla aiming to break the Gaza blockade which left nine people dead. "The United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, Prof. Olivier De Schutter, has received a draft of this report and he firmly opposes its conclusions," De Schutter's office said in an email. He was preparing "a statement where he denounces the conclusions" of the report by a UN commission which the UN chief is expected to release on Friday, it said.

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Heated debate over Palestinian prisoners in Israel
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from BBC News
by Yolande Knell - July 6, 2011 - 12:00am

The entrance to the Abu Jihad Museum for the Prisoners' Movement closely resembles a jail. Step inside the revolving steel door topped by barbed wire and you stand behind bars that surround the ticket desk. Exhibits at the site, in the West Bank town of Abu Dis near Jerusalem, tell the stories of Palestinian political prisoners from the British Mandate period to modern-day Israel. Palestinians have come to view their experience of detention, for actions that oppose the occupation of their land, as part of their national identity.

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Artists Investigate Identity and Boundaries in Extraterritorial Waters
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Alice Pfeiffer - June 22, 2011 - 12:00am

The legal term “ex-territory” historically refers to being outside the physical borders of a country and beyond its laws. Today, a project by two Israeli artists has found life in extraterritorial waters off Israel using a floating gallery and conference space as a forum for questions of boundaries and identity. The project was conceived in 2009, when two artists in Tel Aviv — Maayan Amir, 33, and Ruti Sela, 36 — were looking for a neutral space to screen a compilation of films by various artists in the Middle East.

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Doctors threaten to resign over PA inaction
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
June 3, 2011 - 12:00am

The doctors' union has threatened to submit mass resignations in response to a decision by the Palestinian government in Ramallah to refer an ongoing strike in the medical sector to court. Jawad Awad, head of the union, said “the decision taken by the government to go to court ... is a stab in the heart of democracy and citizens’ rights, which grant all workers a right to strike." Awad called on President Mahmoud Abbas to intervene in order to end the crisis.

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In helping Palestinians, IDF paramedics defy stereotypes
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA)
by Linda Gradstein - May 26, 2011 - 12:00am

Yana Kisluk tosses her long ponytail over one shoulder and adjusts her M-16 over the other. The pretty 21-year-old, who wears diamond stud earrings and perfect eye makeup, looks like any other young Israeli doing her compulsory military service. As a paramedic in the Israel Defense Forces, however, Kisluk belongs to a small group of Israeli soldiers whose job is to provide care for Palestinians rather than simply defend against them.

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Rights group accuses PA and Hamas of torture
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters
by Ali Sawafta - May 17, 2011 - 12:00am

A human rights body on Tuesday accused the Palestinian Authority (PA) of torture and arbitrary detention and warned it not to repeat the mistakes of Arab states by allowing security forces to become too powerful. The Independent Commission for Human Rights, releasing an annual report on human rights in the PA-ruled West Bank and the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip, said Hamas was also guilty of torture and arbitrary arrest.

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Analysis: Gaza escalation shows IDF deterrence eroding
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Yaakov Katz - (Analysis) March 21, 2011 - 12:00am

When Lt.-Gen. Benny Gantz took up his post as Israel’s 20th chief of General Staff in mid-February, the Egyptian revolution had only recently succeeded in toppling Hosni Mubarak – and concern was mounting in Israel over a possible takeover by the Muslim Brotherhood. That concern has not disappeared, and will likely manifest itself in the new multiyear plan that Gantz quickly drafted since taking office, to be presented next week to the cabinet for approval. But like many of his predecessors, Gantz has found himself facing a far more immediate threat from the Gaza Strip.

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Paralyzed Palestinian girl given Israeli residency
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Associated Press
by Josh Lederman - January 12, 2011 - 1:00am

A Palestinian girl paralyzed in an Israeli airstrike on Gaza will be allowed to remain in the country for medical care, according to a government document released Wednesday. The decision enables 9-year-old Marya Amen, along with her brother and father, to stay in Israel as temporary residents. The status ensures state-sponsored health insurance and compensation for the girl, who needs a respirator to breathe. A letter signed by Israeli Interior Minister Eli Yishai and obtained by The Associated Press Wednesday cites a "special humanitarian case" in granting the residency request.

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