Palestinians finally shed victimhood
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Daily Star
by Rami Khouri - September 28, 2011 - 12:00am

The Palestinian request last Friday for United Nations recognition of a Palestinian state in the land occupied by Israel in 1967 created quite a diplomatic stir. This came after weeks of anticipation and guessing whether the Palestinian leadership would ask the Security Council for full U.N. membership, or take the safer route of asking the General Assembly for non-member observer state status.

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Fatah official: Non-violence key to Palestinian struggle
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
(Analysis) September 27, 2011 - 12:00am

BETHLEHEM (Ma’an) -- President Mahmoud Abbas' adviser said Tuesday that non-violent resistance was crucial to the Palestinian struggle against Israeli occupation and that violent confrontation was not an option. Sabri Saydam told Ma'an that the Palestinians must take "the path of non-violent popular resistance to highlight Palestinian suffering" and avoid giving Israel any pretexts to export their "internal crisis."

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Palestine, yes, but Israelis draw the line at Jerusalem
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Independent
by Robert Fisk - (Opinion) September 27, 2011 - 12:00am

They wear their wounds well, the buildings of the old "green line". Forget the new Jerusalem hotels across the road, the state-of-the-art tramway that glistens down the highway; just take a look at the bullet holes on the walls to the left, the shell gashes in the preserved façade of what was once an Israeli army bunker and is now Raphie Etgar's little art gallery. You can still peer between the rusting iron shutters, across the road. A hundred metres away was the Arab Legion. Just 300ft from here was the Jordanian frontier.

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After U.N. Drama, Little Hope for Peace Breakthrough
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Forward
by Nathan Guttman - (Opinion) September 27, 2011 - 12:00am

An intense week of high-profile speeches and backroom diplomacy, which reached its climax with an official Palestinian bid for statehood, has reshaped the Middle East peace process, eroding the American position as lead player — which may, in fact, be President Obama’s strategy.

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Price to be paid
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bitterlemons
by Ghassan Khatib - (Opinion) September 27, 2011 - 12:00am

This past week witnessed the culmination of the Palestinian political move to the United Nations. We have seen key speeches by US President Barack Obama, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, in addition to the submission of the Palestinian application for state membership to the United Nations and, finally, a statement by the Middle East Quartet.

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Abbas Strikes Out
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The National Review
by Elliott Abrams - (Opinion) September 27, 2011 - 12:00am

The rapturous applause that greeted Mahmoud Abbas, appearing before the U.N. General Assembly in his role as chairman of the PLO, was deceiving. The collection of states that swooned when he mentioned Yasser Arafat’s 1974 appearance in the same hall will never give him a state — nor even the foreign-aid money to pay his delegation’s hotel bills.

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The speech Yasser Arafat never gave
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from NOW Lebanon
by Hussein Ibish - (Opinion) September 27, 2011 - 12:00am

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ moving speech before the United Nations General Assembly on Friday was certainly the high point of his career. His address will be forever remembered because Abbas was able to do what no Palestinian leader has ever done in the past: make the moral case for Palestinian independence in a clear, coherent, reasonable manner at the highest international forum.

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The speech Yasser Arafat never gave
In Print by Hussein Ibish - NOW Lebanon (Opinion) - September 27, 2011 - 12:00am

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ moving speech before the United Nations General Assembly on Friday was certainly the high point of his career. His address will be forever remembered because Abbas was able to do what no Palestinian leader has ever done in the past: make the moral case for Palestinian independence in a clear, coherent, reasonable manner at the highest international forum.

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U.S. hopes to not use veto to aid Israel
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Washington Times
by Ben Birnbaum - (Analysis) September 27, 2011 - 12:00am

The Palestinians have yet to lock down a nine-vote majority in the U.N. Security Council for their statehood bid, raising U.S. hopes that it could be spared the embarrassment of using its veto power in defense of an increasingly isolated Israel. Amid indications that Colombia and the Security Council’s four EU member states will abstain from any vote, attention has focused on Nigeria, Gabon and Bosnia, which have offered few signals about how they will vote.

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Palestinians’ Security Council Application Goes to a Committee
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Neil MacFarquhar - September 26, 2011 - 12:00am

The Security Council decided to meet on Wednesday morning to refer the Palestinian membership application to the Council’s membership committee. All 15 Council members have a representative on the committee. Given the sensitivity and interest of the issue, it will be heavy with ambassadors this time around, diplomats said. Even as the review is proceeding, both the United States and the Palestinians have been lobbying over the eventual vote in the Council, which is still weeks if not months away.

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