Status Update
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Foreign Policy
by Jonathan Schanzer - (Opinion) May 22, 2012 - 12:00am

A war is brewing on Capitol Hill. And while wars tend to create refugees, this one may result in fewer of them.

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Don't Tell Anyone But Israel and the Palestinians Have Been Negotiating
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Daily Beast
by Peter Beinart - (Opinion) May 22, 2012 - 12:00am

Last week I debated The Crisis of Zionism with my friend David Suissa at Temple Israel in Los Angeles. Whenever I suggested that Benjamin Netanyahu might be less than enthusiastic about birthing a Palestinian state near the 1967 lines, David responded that at least Netanyahu was willing to talk.

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Leave the page blank?
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bitterlemons
by Yossi Alpher - (Opinion) May 21, 2012 - 12:00am

My initial inclination in composing this article about the new, expanded governing coalition in Israel and the peace process was to leave the page blank. It is painfully obvious that there will be no serious peace process between this government and the Palestine Liberation Organization.

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Little change for Palestinians
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bitterlemons
by Ghassan Khatib - (Opinion) May 21, 2012 - 12:00am

The formation of a new Israeli government coalition that includes the Kadima party was a dramatic development in Israeli politics and took many politicians and observers by surprise. It was not, however, very exciting for Palestinians. Despite their increasingly difficult conditions, and despite their interest in any change that might revive the comatose peace process with Israel, Palestinians could not find any reason to feel hope after this shift.

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Peace directive in the hands of leaders
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Gershon Baskin - (Opinion) May 21, 2012 - 12:00am

I challenge the leaders, Binyamin Netanyahu and Mahmoud Abbas – how long would it take to make real peace if making real peace was your primary governmental directive? If you said to yourselves: I will make peace with the other side – there is nothing more important for me to do in my position as leader of my people – how could your personal decision affect real change and make the difference in leading us to peace?

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AN ISRAELI VIEW: Prisoner of the unity government
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bitterlemons
by Yossi Beilin - (Opinion) May 21, 2012 - 12:00am

The recent expansion of the ruling coalition in Israel to 94 members of Knesset did not reflect an intention either to lead or to thwart a peace process. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu needed no reinforcements in order to maintain a policy that has succeeded very nicely thus far from his standpoint: refuse to freeze settlement construction, make frequent declarations regarding a vague readiness to contemplate "painful compromises" and a Palestinian state somewhere in the West Bank, and place the blame for the non-existence of a peace process on the Palestinian side.

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How Obama Missed an Opportunity for Middle East Peace
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Foreign Policy
by PJ Dermer, Steve White - (Opinion) May 18, 2012 - 12:00am

"We were fond together, because of the sweep of the open places, the taste of wide winds, the sunlight, and the hopes in which we worked. The moral freshness of the world-to-be intoxicated us. We were wrought up in ideas inexpressible and vaporous, but to be fought for. We lived many lives in those whirling campaigns, never sparing ourselves: Yet when we achieved and the new world dawned, the old men came out again and took our victory to re-make in the likeness of the former world they knew." – T.E. Lawrence, Seven Pillars of Wisdom

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Tibi: Israel must show empathy on 'Nakba Day'
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Lahav Harkov - May 15, 2012 - 12:00am

MK Ahmed Tibi (UAL-Ta'al) spoke out against criticism of "Nakba Day" demonstrations on Tuesday, calling for Jewish Israelis to show empathy. "Recognition and empathy of the others' suffering is a lofty, humane value and a step towards peace between nations," Tibi said at a demonstration near Umm el-Fahm.

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Prisoners of Process
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Daily Beast
by Hanan Ashrawi - (Opinion) May 15, 2012 - 12:00am

Two days ago the news of an agreement between Israel and the Palestinian prisoners to end the hunger-strike broke. The prisoners, most of whom have been without food for a month, won the right to have Gazan family visit them in prison (such visits have been denied for the past seven years) and the release of roughly 20 prisoners from solitary confinement into the general prison population (one prisoner has been in solitary confinement for almost a decade).

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Informal talks still have a role
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bitterlemons
by Ghassan Khatib - (Opinion) May 14, 2012 - 12:00am

"Track II" or informal diplomacy played its most significant and constructive role in the history of Israeli-Palestinian relations prior to the Oslo breakthrough when the Palestine Liberation Organization started direct negotiations with the Israeli government. The reason track II talks flourished at that time--the late eighties and early nineties--was that Israel was refusing to deal directly with the Palestinian leadership.

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