Musical show of unity upsets many in Israel
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Common Ground News Service
by Ethan Bronner - March 5, 2009 - 1:00am

Achinoam Nini, a singer and peace activist, has long stirred controversy here. Known abroad by her stage name, Noa, she has recorded with Arab artists, refused to perform in the occupied West Bank, condemned Israeli settlements there and had concerts cancelled because of bomb threats from the extreme right. But lately it is the left that has been angry with Nini.

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Obama plans to boost security aid to Abbas's forces
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters
by Adam Entous - March 5, 2009 - 1:00am

The Obama administration plans to expand a programme to bolster Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's security forces in the occupied West Bank as part of a push for statehood, officials said on Thursday. Israel has given tentative backing to the programme as a test of Abbas's ability to rein in militants, one of its main conditions in stalled U.S.-backed negotiations over establishing a Palestinian state.

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US interests are not served by a stubborn Israel
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The National
(Editorial) March 5, 2009 - 1:00am

Critics of the Middle East peace process deride it as elaborate summitry and slogans that try hard but fail to mask the fundamental gap between the parties. They have a point: Israel is further from peace than ever before, the Palestinians are too weak and divided to agree on anything and the US is blindly behind the Israelis.

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"If We Could, We'd Be Building Like Crazy"
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Slate
by Linda Gradstein - March 4, 2009 - 1:00am

Elianna Passentin says she moved from her native California to this settlement deep in the heart of the West Bank because she wanted to raise her six children in a place tied to Jewish history. "Looking out our windows, we see Tel Shilo, which was the capital of the Israelite kingdom for 359 years and the site of the Tabernacle," she says. "In our garden we found dozens of pottery shards from the time of the Bible. Our children learn [the] Bible at home and then they see the Bible out their window."

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Clinton Says She Pressed for Gaza Border Opening
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Mark Landler - March 4, 2009 - 1:00am

A day after announcing a new diplomatic initiative in the Middle East, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton traveled here Wednesday to show support for the Palestinian Authority, saying she had pressed the Israeli government to open border crossings to war-torn Gaza. “We have obviously expressed concern about the border crossing,” Mrs. Clinton said after a meeting with the president of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas. “We want humanitarian aid to get into Gaza in sufficient amounts to help alleviate the suffering of the people in Gaza.”

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Clinton says two-state solution 'inescapable' for Middle East
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Times
by James Hider - March 4, 2009 - 1:00am

Hillary Clinton threw herself into the turmoil of the Middle East crisis yesterday by backing the creation of a Palestinian state despite opposition from the incoming Israeli Government. The US Secretary of State also dispatched high-level envoys to Syria to discern the opportunities for regional talks.

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Clinton should not listen to Netanyahu
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Gulf News
by Francis Matthew - (Opinion) March 4, 2009 - 1:00am

Every four years there is a depressing ritual in which a new US Secretary of State agrees that the US will secure Israel's security, but will also support the establishment of a Palestinian state. As has happened many times before, this week the Palestinians told Hillary Clinton that the Israelis should stop building illegal colonies in the West Bank. The Palestinian point was vindicated by the discovery this week of an Israeli government plan for a massive expansion of Israeli colonies, which was published by Peace Now, an Israeli peace lobby.

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Build on Bush's Middle East progress
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Christian Science Monitor
by Robert Zelnick - March 4, 2009 - 1:00am

George W. Bush made his greatest Middle East mistake before becoming president. Had he embraced rather than disowned Bill Clinton's desperate efforts to secure an agreement, Israeli and Palestinian leaders might have gone the extra mile to accommodate the new administration. The tragedy of the second intifada might have been averted. The seizure of Gaza by Hamas might never have occurred.

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Clinton meets Palestinian leaders
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Al-Jazeera English
March 4, 2009 - 1:00am

Leaders of the Palestinian Authority have urged Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, to push Israel to freeze settlement construction in the West Bank and open the borders of the Gaza Strip. Clinton met Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, and Salam Fayyad, the prime minister, on Wednesday in Ramallah, the administrative headquarters of the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority (PA). At the start of the talks Clinton reaffirmed Washington's commitment to a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

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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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