Top ministers fume after Gaza flotilla operation goes ahead without their approval
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Barak Ravid - June 1, 2010 - 12:00am

Senior ministers have been sharply critical of the fact that the decision to seize control of the flotilla to Gaza was made after two meetings of the forum of seven senior ministers but without official deliberation by the inner cabinet, the body that has the authority to approve military actions of this scale.

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That's No Way To Enforce a Blockade
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Slate
by Fred Kaplan - June 1, 2010 - 12:00am

Israel's storming of the Mavi Marmara, killing at least nine Free Gaza activists and wounding several more, was an act of jaw-gaping stupidity—strategically and tactically, even leaving aside morally. You needn't be a partisan of Hamas to think so. Look at today's headlines on the editorial page of Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz: "The price of flawed policy," "Fiasco on the high seas," "Seven idiots in the cabinet," "A failure any way you slice it."

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'Next time we'll use more force'
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Yaakov Katz - June 1, 2010 - 12:00am

Israel will use more aggressive force in the future to prevent ships from breaking the sea blockade on the Gaza Strip, a top Navy commander told The Jerusalem Post on Tuesday. "We boarded the ship and were attacked as if it was a war," the officer said. "That will mean that we will have to come prepared in the future as if it was a war." The anonymous comment came the day after the Israeli Navy raided a flotilla of international aid ships headed to the Strip. Nine activists were killed in the raid, and dozens were injured.

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IDF outlines rules of engagement in populated areas
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Anshel Pfeffer - May 28, 2010 - 12:00am

For the first time, the IDF has produced a document defining rules of engagement for the military during combat in areas of civilian population. It incorporates lessons gleaned from Operation Cast Lead, the Goldstone report and reports by human rights groups on IDF activities in Gaza. The document, prepared two weeks ago in the IDF's Concepts and Doctrine Section headed by Colonel Meir Finkel, is the army's first attempt to formulate a theory regarding IDF commanders' expected conduct during combat in a populated area.

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Gaza: 15 injured in Israeli airstrikes
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
May 26, 2010 - 12:00am

Fifteen Palestinians were injured on Wednesday morning as Israeli F16 warplanes bombarded a training base belonging to Hamas' military wing, the Al-Qassam Brigades, in Beit Hanoun in the northern Gaza Strip. Palestinian medical sources confirmed that some of the victims sustained critical wounds, with media coordinator for Gaza medical services Adham Abu Selmiyya saying injured were evacuated to hospitals in the northern Gaza Strip. He explained that several houses close to the training base sustained material damage.

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It's not too late for Israel to make peace
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Yoel Marcus - May 25, 2010 - 12:00am

Maybe it's a coincidence, but the day on which the massive Home Front drill began marked the 10th anniversary of Israel's hasty retreat from Lebanon, after 1,216 fatalities and a bitter taste of failure. That wretched war had many names, but most of all it was called "the war of deceit," because the cabinet was led astray. Those who led us to war promised a 48-hour operation but ended up going all the way to Beirut. The war, in its different phases, lasted 18 years.

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End the blockade in Gaza
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Hill
by Iara Lee - May 25, 2010 - 12:00am

This week, I will be boarding one of several ships that are part of a flotilla sailing to Gaza. The Israeli government’s recent decision to deny internationally renowned scholar Noam Chomsky entrance into the occupied territories suggests we, too, might be refused entry. Nevertheless, we will set sail with the intent of delivering food, water, medical supplies and reconstruction materials to communities in Gaza that are in need of humanitarian relief.

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Israeli army to ease some restrictions on WB movement
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
May 24, 2010 - 12:00am

The Israeli army said Monday evening that it would relieve some of the restrictions placed upon travel in the West Bank, after meeting with Palestinian Authority officials, a statement read. The apparent "good will gestures" include the entry of Palestinians with Israeli citizenship and ID cards through all checkpoints into the West Bank, and Tulkarem via the 104 checkpoint at weekends. Restrictions will be eased on senior Palestinian businessmen going through checkpoints and 60 roadblocks will be lifted throughout the West Bank, the army said.

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Israel denies offering nuclear weapons to Apartheid South Africa
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
May 24, 2010 - 12:00am

Israel on Monday vehemently rejected claims in a British newspaper that it offered to sell nuclear warheads to Apartheid-era South Africa in 1975. "There exists no basis in reality for the claims published this morning by The Guardian that in 1975 Israel negotiated with South Africa the exchange of nuclear weapons," the president's office said in a statement.

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Did Israel offer to sell South Africa nuclear weapons?
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Christian Science Monitor
by Christa Case Bryant - May 24, 2010 - 12:00am

In an apparent blow to Israel’s policy of “nuclear ambiguity,” the Guardian newspaper in Britain today asserted that it had the first written proof of a robust Israeli nuclear weapons program that the country has never formally admitted to. Relying on South African documents released to American academic Sasha Polakow-Suransky, whose book "The Unspoken Alliance: Israel's Secret Relationship with Apartheid South Africa" is coming out tomorrow, the Guardian said that Israel had offered nuclear weapons of three different sizes to apartheid South Africa in 1975.

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