June 15, 2010

Middle East News: World Press Roundup

Egypt finds itself in a difficult position following Israel's attack on the Gaza flotilla. There is widespread international and Israeli skepticism about Israel's commission of inquiry, and UNSG Ban says an international commission is still required. PM Fayyad condemns an attack on an Israeli police officer. Palestinians release a study on export opportunities in Europe. Israel's security chief says lifting the blockade is risky but a minister says changes are being examined. A Palestinian is killed in a tunnel collapse. Hamas blocks a nonviolent demonstration against Israel's Gaza buffer zone. Israeli minister Dan Meridor says Israel should not build in areas that will become a Palestinian state. Yoel Marcus says the flotilla attack means the blockade is over. Ireland expels an Israeli diplomat over the Dubai assassination. Gadi Taub says Fayyad may be the Palestinian Ben Gurion. UC Irvine suspends its Muslim Student Union for disrupting a speech by Israeli Amb. Michael Oren. Palestinian MK Hanin Zoaby, who was on the flotilla, has reportedly become “the most hated person in Israel”

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Egypt in awkward position on Gaza following Israeli attack on aid flotilla

With pressure building on Israel to lift its blockade of the Gaza Strip, Egypt finds itself in the uncomfortable position of continuing to help enforce the siege while watching Turkey outflank the region's traditional Sunni Arab heavyweights in championing the Palestinian cause.

Israelis have mixed feelings about flotilla inquiry

With a sense of relief and a touch of anxiety, Israelis braced themselves Monday for another high-profile probe of their military's conduct.

Relief stemmed from the hope that an Israeli-led commission, approved by the government Monday, will head off U.N. calls for an international inquiry into Israel's May 31 raid on an aid flotilla seeking to break its blockade of the Gaza Strip. Nine Turkish activists were killed in the operation.

Anxiety persists, however, because recent inquiries into the military have led to political shake-ups and painful soul-searching.

Fayyad condemns attack on Israeli police

Prime Minister Salam Fayyad condemned Monday's shooting incident south of Hebron that left one Israeli police officer dead and two others injured.

The police had been operating in Hebron and the nearby illegal settlements and were reportedly en route to Beersheba when they were ambushed by the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, who said in a statement that the attack came as retribution for the shooting deaths of nine Turkish nationals aboard an aid ship bound for Gaza.

Young leaders prepare study on EU export opportunities

Following the EU announcement that officials were preparing a proposal to open the entire union's market to Palestinian goods, officials from the Young Leaders Organization in Ramallah said a feasibility study was underway.

The research will examine a series of export opportunities to EU nations, and according to a statement by the group, aims "to identify opportunities and constraints that prevent the exploitation of the designated ad hoc quota for Palestinian businesses who would like to export their products to Europe."

Israel reviewing Gaza blockade format - minister

Israel is examining ways to ease its Gaza blockade, a cabinet minister said on Tuesday, calling the current policy counterproductive and confirming remarks by Middle East envoy Tony Blair that change was likely.

"It is time to end the closure in its current form. It does not provide any value to Israel. From a diplomatic standpoint it causes great image problems," Welfare Minister Isaac Herzog told Israel Radio.

He said Israel had informed Blair, who briefed EU foreign ministers on Monday, that it intends to "permit an easier passage of goods" to the Gaza Strip.

Israel security chief warns lifting blockade risky

A top security official warned Tuesday that Israel would open itself to grave danger by lifting its three-year naval blockade of Gaza but did not oppose easing the embargo to allow more goods in through Israeli-controlled land crossings.

Yuval Diskin, head of Israel's Shin Bet internal security agency, also told parliament's foreign affairs and defense committee that Gaza militants possess 5,000 rockets, Israel's most specific estimate yet. Diskin's testimony was reported by a meeting participant who spoke on condition of anonymity because the session was closed.

Palestinian killed in tunnel collapse in Rafah

A Palestinian worker was killed Tuesday in a tunnel cave-in beneath Gaza's southern borders with Egypt, witnesses said. Witnesses in the scene said a 22-year-old smuggler was buried alive in a tunnel collapse accident. His body was dug out a few hours later.

On Sunday, a 17-year-old smuggler died instantly in a power shock while working in one of the tunnels that snake under the Gaza-Egypt borderline.

Palestinian rights groups say at least 150 Palestinians have been killed in tunnel cave-ins and sporadic tunnel accidents.

Hamas blocks peaceful Gaza demo against buffer zone

Hamas security forces on Monday prevented Palestinian activists from holding peaceful demonstration against an Israeli-imposed buffer zone in the Gaza Strip, organizers said.

Hamas policemen seized keys of vehicles that were set to transport tens of Palestinians to demonstrate near the no-go zone to the east of southern Gaza Strip town of Rafah, the Popular Committee Against Buffer Zone said in a statement.

Shin Bet Chief: Hamas buying land within Jerusalem

Shin Bet security service director Yuval Diskin said on Tuesday that the Islamist group Hamas was busy buying up land within the municipal territory of Jerusalem.

Speaking at the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, Diskin added that the central forces currently operating in East Jerusalem were the Palestinian Authority, Hamas and the Islamic Movement. He explained that they were competing with each other over influence and presence in the area.

Meridor: Israel should refrain from building in areas that will be annexed to PA

Cabinet Minister Dan Meridor said Tuesday that Israel should refrain from building in areas that will be annexed to the Palestinian Authority in the future, even after a 10-month settlement construction freeze is over in September.

Meridor made the comments during a tour of the West Bank settlements Efrat.

"The freeze will be over in three months, and from then on we will not be committed to it; it's a matter of where it is wise and logical for us to build," Meridor said.

The Yom Kippur syndrome

The blame game between the political and military establishments is revealing the same characteristics that led us to the Yom Kippur War, and the same subsequent spats over who was responsible and who must be held accountable. Then, as now, the chief failure was that of intelligence. Then, as now, the military was full of itself, sure that we'd "break their bones," in the famous words of then-chief of staff David Elazar on the second day of the Egyptian-Syrian assault.
Israeli forces approaching Gaza flotilla

Ireland tells Israel to withdraw staffer over Dubai hit

Ireland's government said on Tuesday it was calling on Israel to withdraw a designated member of staff at its Dublin embassy over the use of fake passports in the assassination of a top Hamas militant in Dubai in January.

Foreign Minister Micheal Martin said an investigation had showed that the eight Irish passports used by suspects in the assassination of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh were forgeries.

"The misuse of Irish passports by a state with which Ireland enjoys friendly, if sometimes frank, bilateral relations is clearly unacceptable and requires a firm response," he said in a statement.

A Palestinian Ben-Gurion?

At this time, Israeli prisons maintain a separation between criminal and security detainees. Some of the most veteran prisoners are unhappy about this, because when such separation is in place, the criminals talk about crime all day and plan their next criminal act, while security detainees talk about ideology the whole day and plan the next “acts of resistance.” Once upon a time, when the detainees were mixed, they spent their days arguing with each other.

UN insists on int'l flotilla probe

The UN called on Israel to accede to demands for an international inquiry of the event surrounding the IDF raid of the Gaza flotilla Monday night, even as the Israeli Cabinet approved a committee to pursue an internal Israeli inquiry of the matter.

"The Secretary-General [Ban Ki-moon] takes note of the Israeli announcement on their inquiry," UN spokesman Farhan Haq was quoted as saying by Reuters.

Haq added, though, that Ban's "proposal for an international inquiry remains on the table and he hopes for a positive Israeli response."

UC Irvine suspends Muslim student group

The University of California, Irvine suspended a Muslim student group over its disruption of a lecture by Israel's ambassador to the United States.

In a May 27 letter to the Muslim Student Union released Monday by the university, the student affairs disciplinary committee announced that after an investigation it found the group guilty of violating certain sections of the university's policies applying to campus activities, organizations and students, including disorderly conduct and obstructing university activities.

Arab Israeli the most hated person in Israel

Two weeks ago, she was virtually unknown. But after travelling aboard the Gaza-bound Mavi Marmara, on which nine Turkish citizens were killed when Israeli commandos stormed the boat, Hanin Zoaby, a 41-year-old, first-term Knesset member, has become the most hated person in Israel.

As an Arab Israeli, she also has found herself at the centre of a new political force with which Israel will have to contend.

Travesty of a probe

It is no better than a murderer offering to investigate his own crime. It does not matter that the work of the three-man inquiry will monitored by two foreign observers. This is a whitewash in the making.

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