Fayyad's Road to Palestine
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Roger Cohen - (Opinion) April 29, 2010 - 12:00am

I spoke to the Palestinian prime minister, Salam Fayyad, for 90 minutes, and the word he uttered most often, by far, was “security.” As in, “The absence of security has been our undoing.” When Palestinian leaders are talking about their self-inflicted undoing, as well as the undoing inflicted on them by Israel, things may be starting to move.

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Israel tries new tactics against Palestinian protesters
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Los Angeles Times
by Edmund Sanders - April 28, 2010 - 12:00am

It's the usual Friday afternoon cat-and-mouse dance between Israeli soldiers and Palestinian protesters in this West Bank village. Young village men, joined by Israeli leftists and international activists, begin blocking roads with boulders and tires; soldiers take up positions at key intersections. Israeli forces fire tear gas canisters; protesters fling rocks. Before long, the military calls in one of its most dreaded weapons.

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Borrowing from Gandhi? Palestinian passive resistance gains followers
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Christian Science Monitor
by Joshua Mitnick - April 28, 2010 - 12:00am

As has become ritual in this Palestinian village for the last five years, every Friday several hundred demonstrators march toward Israel's security fence - and toward a confrontation with soldiers stationed on the other side.

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Arabs unveil new plan to thwart demolitions
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ynetnews
by Ronen Medzini - April 28, 2010 - 12:00am

Residents of Silwan's al-Bustan neighborhood in east Jerusalem presented an alternative plan to regulate illegal construction, in an attempt to thwart the razing of their houses. The alternative plan, unveiled during a Wednesday press conference, has already passed all technical requirements and was issued a zoning file at the municipality three weeks ago.

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Abbas signs anti-settlement legislation
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
April 27, 2010 - 12:00am

President Mahmoud Abbas on Monday signed into law a ban on Israeli settlement goods in Palestinian markets. The move officially makes trade in settlement goods a criminal offense, and follows weeks of deliberations and declarations. Abbas legal advisor Hasan Al-Ouri was quoted by the official Palestinian news agency WAFA as saying the regulations would target "the cancers found in the Palestinian body, which target the Palestinian people's humanity, soil, and fate."

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Palestinian girls get ticket to Intel science fair
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Statesman
by Grant Slater - April 27, 2010 - 12:00am

Watching her blind aunt and uncle struggle to navigate the steep slopes and scant sidewalks of this hilly city, one Palestinian girl decided to reinvent the stick. Armed with spare parts that are hard to find in the West Bank, Asil Abu Lil and two classmates patched together an obstacle-detecting cane that has won them a trip to San Jose, California, for Intel Corp.'s international youth science fair. The three girls are the first Palestinians to participate in the prestigious event.

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A new style of politics in the West Bank
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Statesman
by Mohammed Daraghmeh - April 27, 2010 - 12:00am

Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad is quietly changing the rules of the Arab-Israeli conflict with a simple credo: Palestinians have to build their state now and cannot wait for an elusive peace deal with Israel. He is moving ahead with an ambitious plan to get the Palestinians ready for statehood by August 2011 by trying to build it from the ground up: paving roads, reforming the judiciary, planning new cities.

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Hypocrisy
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bitterlemons
by Yossi Alpher - (Opinion) April 26, 2010 - 12:00am

The incitement issue is rife with hypocrisy on both sides. It is exaggerated by both Israelis and Palestinians so as to excuse their refusal to negotiate and to "score points", particularly with the international community. While the latter should be tough on incitement, it should not permit that issue to obfuscate the need for immediate progress toward a solution in more pragmatic spheres of the conflict.

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Israel arrests 24 Palestinians in West Bank
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Xinhua
April 22, 2010 - 12:00am

Israeli forces arrested 24 Palestinians during its raids in the West Bank early Thursday, Palestinian security sources said. The arrests took place during the Israeli incursion into the cities of Jenin, Qalqilya, Bethlehem and surrounding villages, according to the sources. Meanwhile, an Israeli army force also operated in an area east of Khan Younis city in the southern Gaza Strip, and Israeli bulldozers backed by tanks leveled some groves, according to local residents.

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Violence will only end up harming the Palestinians
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Daily Star
by Murad Bustami - (Opinion) April 20, 2010 - 12:00am

Covered faces, stones and tear gas: This was the scene on the streets of East Jerusalem in the “day of rage” last month, which was declared in response to the opening of a synagogue in the Old City’s Jewish Quarter next to the Al-Aqsa Mosque.

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