Short On Peace, Long On Process
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Al Jazeera English
by Marwan Bishara - (Analysis) November 27, 2007 - 2:02pm

Hosted by the US president and supported by Arab, European and other foreign ministers, Palestinian and Israeli leaders are expected to re-launch their long stalled negotiations in Annapolis on Tuesday. Judging from its high attendance and low expectations, Annapolis is more likely to help three sitting ducks, Olmert, Abbas and Bush, than advance the cause of peace in the Middle East.

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Annapolis: The Cost Of Failure
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Review Of Books
by Henry Siegman - (Opinion) November 27, 2007 - 1:36pm

One of the first on-line responses to the publication of the letter to President George W.

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In Annapolis, Conflict By Other Means
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Middle East Report
by Robert Blecher , Mouin Rabbani - November 27, 2007 - 1:33pm

At an intersection in front of Nablus city hall, a pair of women threaded a knot of waiting pedestrians, glanced left, then dashed across the street. “What’s this?” an onlooker chastised them. “Can’t you see the red light?” Not long after, his patience exhausted, the self-appointed traffic cop himself stepped off the curb and made his way to the other side of the boulevard.

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Annapolis: Why Failure Is Not An Option
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Arab News
by Walid Awad - (Opinion) November 23, 2007 - 6:44pm

The Israeli right-wing and its allies in the media are working relentlessly to undermine the Annapolis peace conference. To make the conference convened by President Bush, his Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has made no less than eight visits to the Middle East in less than a year. But the Israeli government’s position on the conference has always been that of a reluctant participant, sending contradictory messages, lowering expectations and discouraging optimism about the outcome.

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Rice Sets Mid-east Peace Target
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bbc News
November 23, 2007 - 6:39pm

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has said the United States will try to broker a peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians over the next year. Ms Rice said both sides had agreed to work towards the establishment of an independent Palestinian state before US President George W Bush leaves office. She also said Washington hoped such negotiations would be launched at next week's peace conference in Annapolis. Invitations have been issued to Israel, the Palestinians and key Arab states.

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Will Annapolis Fail Like All The Others?
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bbc News
by Paul Reynolds - November 20, 2007 - 1:50pm

A veteran reporter on the Middle East asked me the other day: "Is it too late?" We had been discussing the prospects for the meeting in Annapolis in the United States scheduled for next week at which the Israelis and Palestinians are supposed to commit themselves to reaching a peace agreement. My instinct was to agree with him. We had first met in Jerusalem in the mid 1980s and have followed the ups and downs of negotiations since. The experience has not made us optimists. Aims of Annapolis

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Blair Gives Fillip To Mideast Peace Talks
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Financial Times
by Tobias Buck - November 20, 2007 - 1:48pm

Tony Blair, in his new role as Middle East envoy, unveiled a package of measures on Monday designed to aid the moribund Palestinian economy and inject fresh momentum into Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. The former British prime minister said the four development projects outlined on Monday had been the subject of debate for some time, and that their significance should not be exaggerated. But he insisted that “without hope of prosperity, rising living standards and an economic stake in the future for ordinary Palestinians, the politics will never succeed”.

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Invites Set For Mideast Conference
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Associated Press
by Anne Gearan, Matthew Lee - November 20, 2007 - 1:34pm

The United States plans to issue as early as Tuesday official invitations to a much-anticipated Middle East conference, to be held next week at Annapolis, Md., hoping for strong backing from a select group of Arab nations for the U.S. effort to relaunch Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.

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Blair Unveils Palestinian Schemes
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bbc News
November 19, 2007 - 4:41pm

The envoy of the Quartet of Middle East peace negotiators, Tony Blair, has announced a series of economic projects to help boost the Palestinian economy. Mr Blair unveiled four major projects, including a sewage treatment plant in Gaza, an industrial park in Jericho and an industrial zone in Hebron. The former UK prime minister warned that without the hope of prosperity, politics would never succeed. His announcement comes a week before a peace conference in the US.

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Israel's Economic Blockade Stops Gaza's Strawberry-farmers Selling Their Crop
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Independent
by Donald Macintyre - November 16, 2007 - 4:20pm

Almost all of Gaza's turbulent story is bound up with Jamil Abu Hmaideh's strawberry fields here in the far north of the strip. Between two wispy clouds high in the blue sky above us, two Israeli Apache helicopters hover on the look-out for the Qassam rocket-launching crews as we bite into the luscious, perfectly ripened fruit Mr Hmaideh has picked for us.

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