July 15, 2010

Middle East News: World Press Roundup

The New York Times looks at diminishing hopes for negotiations, and says settlement building has continued apace in spite of the partial moratorium. A Jerusalem home demolition leaves a Palestinian mother and four children homeless. Fatah says conditions are not right for direct talks. A Libyan aid ship to Gaza docks in Egypt and will ship its supplies overland. Israeli police suspect an alleged Jewish terrorist has killed four Palestinians. Ha'aretz says Israeli security is increasingly challenged by Jewish terrorism. Gideon Levy says PM Netanyahu is not being honest with the Israeli public. Special Envoy Mitchell arrives in the region to push for direct negotiations. A former Israeli official says Israel knows it cannot stay in the West Bank. Israeli soldiers are convicted for shooting a bound Palestinian prisoner. British Jews overwhelmingly support a two-state solution. Joseph Kechichian says Lebanon must treat Palestinian refugees better. Daoud Kuttab looks at threats to Palestinian residents of Jerusalem. Raja Kamal outlines problems facing Palestinian citizens of Israel. The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists looks at a new film about Palestinian nonviolent protests against the occupation.

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Cheer, Then Gloom, on Talks for Peace Deal in Mideast

In the upbeat atmosphere after their recent meeting in Washington, the prime minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, and President Obama expressed hopes of an imminent resumption of direct Israeli-Palestinian peace talks and of achieving a peace deal — within a year, according to Mr. Netanyahu, or in Mr. Obama’s case, before the end of his term.

There has been vague talk in Washington about a narrowing of gaps in the weeks since the indirect, American-brokered negotiations started in May.

Despite Settlement Freeze, Buildings Rise

One of the most contentious issues facing the Middle East peace talks is whether Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will extend the 10-month-old building freeze in West Bank Jewish settlements, as the Palestinians and Americans want.

Home demolition leaves mother, four children homeless

Dalal Rajabi, a mother of four children, came home Tuesday to find that her modest two-room house that has sheltered her family for two years had been razed.

A team of Jerusalem municipal workers protected by a large police force came to the Rajabis' 200-square-foot home in Beit Hanina, an East Jerusalem Arab neighborhood, broke down the main door, took the furniture out and proceeded to demolish it. Dalal Rajabi was not home at the time. She had left the house to take her son to see a doctor when the workers and a bulldozer arrived.

Fatah urges no direct Mideast talks for now

The Palestinian president's Fatah party said on Thursday there should be no move to face-to-face Middle East peace talks sought by the United States without progress in the indirect talks it is mediating.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, due to meet U.S. President Barack Obama's Middle East envoy on Saturday, is facing pressure from Washington to agree to direct negotiations with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu -- who says he is ready to start talks with the Palestinian leader right away.

Libyan Gaza-bound aid ship enters Egyptian port

A Libyan-chartered ship carrying aid for Palestinians reached an Egyptian port on Wednesday after altering its course following a warning from Israel's navy not to head to the blockaded Gaza Strip.

An Egyptian official said the Moldovan-flagged Amalthea arrived in El Arish, on Egypt's Mediterranean coast about 45 km (27 miles) south of the border with Gaza, in mid-evening and would begin unloading cargo.

Police suspect alleged Jewish terrorist killed four Palestinians

A right-wing Israeli extremist arrested this week over a string of stabbing attacks is suspected of murdering four Palestinians and attempting to murder another seven, according to details of the investigation released on Thursday.

Chaim Pearlman was arrested Tuesday, initially on suspicion of carrying out two murders in 1998, and for a series of attacks on other Palestinian victims over the last 12 years. The Petah Tikva Magistrate's Court on Thursday extended his remand by six days.

Shin Bet challenged by cases of Jewish terror

Suspicions against a member of the extreme right wing, Chaim Pearlman, link him to cases of Jewish terrorism that have yet to be solved: the murder of two Arabs, stabbed to death in Jerusalem more than a decade ago. In the police files and at the Jewish Division of the Shin Bet, there are a number of such conundrums left, and first and foremost among them is a series of shooting attacks in which Palestinians were murdered on West Bank roads during the early part of the past decade.

Tricky Bibi

This video should have been banned for broadcast to minors. This video should have been shown in every home in Israel, then sent to Washington and Ramallah. Banned for viewing by children so as not to corrupt them, and distributed around the country and the world so that everyone will know who leads the government of Israel. Channel 10 presented: The real (and deceitful ) face of Binyamin Netanyahu.

Mitchell arrives to push direct talks

US special envoy George Mitchell was scheduled to arrive on Thursday to push for direct Israeli-Palestinian talks, amid Israeli optimism that these talks will begin well before the 10-month settlement moratorium ends on September 26.

On the eve of Mitchell’s visit, one senior government official said the talks would begin “soon,” though probably not in the “next few days.”

'Nuclear Iran less threat than chance of binational state'

“A nuclear Iran is not the end of Israel. A binational state is the end of Israel,” political commentator and former consul-general in New York Alon Pinkas told members of the Israel Britain and the Commonwealth Association on Wednesday.

Speaking at the Sheraton Hotel in Tel Aviv prior to the IBCA general meeting, Pinkas initially addressed outgoing British Ambassador Tom Phillips, to whom he said that in an ambassador’s average three-to-four year in Israel there are two wars, two elections and one peace process.

Soldiers convicted in Nil'in shooting

The special military court convicted Lt. Col. Omri Burberg and his soldier, Staff Sgt. (res.) Leonardo Corea Thursday for unsuitable, threatening behavior towards a Palestinian.

The incident happened nearly two years ago in Nil'in when the soldier fired a rubber bullet at the feet of a bound Palestinian and his commander looked on as it happened.

Burberg, former commander of Battalion 71 in the Armed Coprs was convicted for attempted threats and Corea for illegally using a weapon. Both were convicted for inappropriate behavior.

British Jews favour 'two-state solution' in Israel

The majority of British Jews favour a "two-state solution" to the situation in Israel, and more than half would support negotiations with Hamas, according to research published today.

The study carried out by the Institute for Jewish Policy Research (JPR) found Jews in Britain strongly identify with and support Israel, with nine out of 10 having visited the country.

Nearly three quarters (72%) agreed Israel's action in Gaza in 2008 and 2009 was "a legitimate act of self-defence".

Palestinians in Lebanon deserve better

Once again, the fate that befell 450,000 plus Palestinian refugees in Lebanon has preoccupied that hapless country's leaders. Like other neighbouring states, Lebanon warmly welcomed Palestinians expelled from Israel over the years, providing them with relative security even if weak governments failed to regularise their presence. After the hugely mistaken 1969 Cairo Accords, which allowed refugees to arm themselves — ostensibly to attack Israel — Lebanon compounded the Palestinian tragedy by authorising a new battlefront on its own territory.

Legitimate questions

Over dinner in Bethlehem recently, I mentioned to my brother-in-law how Israel has strategically succeeded in cutting off Gaza Strip from the West Bank. While agreeing with me, he told me what a senior Israeli officer told him shortly after the beginning of the Oslo process. He said that Palestinians shouldn’t celebrate too much the withdrawal of Israel from Bethlehem, for before too long, Palestinians in Bethlehem will need to have a visa to enter Jerusalem.

Arabs, Israel's second class minority

In a recent column in The New York Times, Thomas Friedman reflected on the strong Israeli economy, quoting a recent survey that put the number of Israeli millionaires at 8,419.

The olive branch in the West Bank

Israel's ambassador to the U.S., Michael Oren, was recently quoted as saying that relations between the U.S. and Israel were undergoing a "tectonic rift in which continents are drifting apart." If the quote is accurate, which Oren later disputed, it is surely an overstatement. Still, an interesting divergence is developing in the means by which the U.S. and Israeli militaries are dealing with Islamic militants in territories they are occupying.

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