March 1, 2012

Middle East News: World Press Roundup

NEWS: ATFP urges calm after Israeli occupation forces raid AQU, but questions what message Israel is sending. The stated Israeli reasons for the raids are hotly disputed Palestinians. The PA says seizing broadcast frequencies violates the Oslo agreements. Israel quietly recognizes a major “unauthorized” settlement outpost. A PA office in Gaza is ransacked by unknown assailants. PM Netanyahu's Washington trip will mainly focus on questions regarding Iran. Israeli officials say Syria's rebels want peace with Israel. The Pentagon says it has plans for a possible conflict with Iran. A Jewish Israeli Supreme Court justice says there is no need for Palestinian judges in Israel to sing the national anthem. The PA insists it is opposed to any new intifada. Jordan is slowly easing restrictions on work for Palestinians from Gaza. Democrats are pushing back against Republican efforts to monopolize Israel issues in the American campaign season. COMMENTARY: Amos Yadlin says Israel may feel forced to strike Iran on its own. Ari Shavit says if Netanyahu and Pres. Obama don't start working together on Iran, they may bring disaster on both their countries. Yonah Alexander and Milton Hoenig say there is still room for diplomacy with Iran on the nuclear issue. Gideon Levy says the silence of a judge who is a Palestinian citizen of Israel during the national anthem was a quiet protest. Avi Issacharoff says both Israeli and Palestinian leaders are setting the stage for another intifada. JJ Goldberg says Republican attacks on the church-state divide will not appeal to most Jewish Americans. The National says the ongoing controversy about Mohammed Al Dura shows the Israeli propaganda machine at work. Tariq Alhomayed says if Israel was doing what the Assad regime has been in Syria, the Arab outcry would be much more intense. Stuart Reigeluth and Julian Memetaj say Palestinians in Israel face systematic discrimination.

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Israeli forces raided AQU campus and prevented the University educational TV from Broadcasting

Dear Friends,

We have received the message below from Al-Quds University and I am forwarding it to all those who are interested in resolving this conflict with simple questions: What does this mean? What message does it send? Are such Israeli actions leaving any room for the quest for peace and for those who seek dialogue and compromise? Should the campus of Al-Quds University expect thuggish smashing in lieu of search warrants?

Israeli Troops Raid Two Palestinian TV Stations in the West Bank

JERUSALEM — Israeli troops raided two Palestinian television stations in Ramallah in the occupied West Bank early on Wednesday, confiscating transmitters, computer hard drives and documents and eliciting angry condemnations from the Palestinian Authority.

Officials at the two stations, Al Watan and Al-Quds Educational Television, said that officials from Israel’s Communications Ministry, accompanied by soldiers, spent several hours removing the equipment and documents.

PA: Israel seizing broadcast frequencies

BETHLEHEM (Ma'an) – The Palestinian Authority is describing Wednesday's raids on TV networks in the occupied West Bank as the possible beginning of a "frequency war" over limited broadcasting space.

The confiscation of equipment from Watan TV and Al-Quds Educational TV deprives Palestinians of their right to have frequencies for building modern wireless communication networks, the PA says.

Ramallah Prime Minister Salam Fayyad visited one of the stations, Watan TV in Ramallah, and said the Israeli operation was "oppressive and monstrous" and violated "all international laws".

Israel deepens hold in West Bank heartland, quietly legalizes unsanctioned settler enclave

SHVUT RACHEL, West Bank — Israel has legalized one of the oldest and largest of the unsanctioned settler enclaves dotting the West Bank, a step denounced by the Palestinians and Israeli activists as a show of bad faith ahead of talks next week between the Israeli leader and President Barack Obama.

PA controlled office in Gaza ransacked

GAZA CITY (Ma’an) -- Unidentified assailants raided the headquarters of the Palestinian Authority-controlled Civil Administration building in the northern Gaza Strip overnight Wednesday.

Headquarters chief Maher Abu al-Quf told Ma'an that the Israeli side of the office alerted them to an attempted robbery at 11.30 p.m. on Wednesday evening.

Personnel rushed to the site but the suspects had left the scene after damaging the offices and ransacking its contents.

It is the 11th time such an incident has taken place, Abu al-Quf said.

Hamas police have opened an investigation.

Israeli leader to US to talk about Iran tensions

JERUSALEM — Israel's prime minister sets off this week on a U.S. visit clouded by a deepening rift with Washington, which is pressing Israel to hold off on any attack against Iran's suspect nuclear program.

Although Israel says it hasn't decided whether to strike, it has signaled readiness to do so — a move that would have deep worldwide implications.

Israeli: Syrian rebels want peace with Israel

JERUSALEM — An Israeli lawmaker says Syrian opposition leaders have told him they want peace with Israel after Syrian President Bashar Assad falls.

Israel and Syria are bitter enemies. They have fought several major wars, and Syria backs violent anti-Israel groups.

Isaac Herzog said Wednesday that the Syrian opposition want to "be friends" with Israel. He refused to name his sources because he said they fear retribution by Assad. He said they are aligned with the main rebel factions. There was no confirmation from the Syrian opposition figures.

U.S. has military plan should Iran conflict erupt, says air force chief

U.S. Air Force Chief of Staff General Norton Schwartz said Wednesday that Washington has prepared military options to strike Iran's nuclear sites should conflict erupt, Bloomberg reported.

Just four days before Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's scheduled meeting with President Barack Obama in Washington, Schwartz told reporters that military options are being prepared in the event of a conflict.

“What we can do, you wouldn’t want to be in the area,” Bloomberg quoted Schwartz as telling reporters in Washington on Wednesday.

Judge Rubinstein: Arabs don’t have to sing anthem

Supreme Court Justice Elyakim Rubinstein expressed his unwavering support for Justice Salim Joubran's decision not to sing Israel's national anthem, Hatikva, at chief Justice Asher Grunis' induction ceremony.

The anthem was sung at the end of the ceremony by all judges present, who then posed for the traditional group photo. Joubran, who is the highest-ranking Israeli-Arab on the Bench, chose to stand silently beside them.

The decision was harshly criticized, but Ynet learned Thursday that Rubinstein sent a letter to all presiding judges defending the decision.

PA not planning new intifada, says official

The Palestinian Authority is not planning a new intifada, but Israeli “provocations” and the ongoing stalemate in the peace process could trigger widespread protests in the Palestinian territories, a senior PA official in Ramallah said Wednesday.

The official’s comments came in response to a Haaretz report earlier this week to the effect that the Palestinians could launch a third intifada during 2012.

Jordan’s Lukewarm Welcome for Gazan Job Seekers

AMMAN -- Jordan is reportedly taking steps toward easing restrictions on Palestinians from the Gaza Strip looking for work in the kingdom, but progress has been slow amid controversy over its impact on the unemployment rate and the country’s sensitive demographics.

But even as progress has been slow, Gazans living in the kingdom like Ahmed Abdel Munim, who lives in a refugee camp near the Roman-era city of Jerash and is one of the beneficiaries, say they are already feeling the change.

Democrats Will Not Cede Israel to Republicans

The Democratic National Committee has a new commercial, called “The Facts,” that seems targeted at pro-Israel voters (I didn’t say “Jewish voters” for a reason). It reminds them that they shouldn’t listen to the mud being slung at Obama for supposedly abandoning the Jewish State.

Israel’s Last Chance to Strike Iran

Tel Aviv

ON July 7, 1981, I was one of eight Israeli fighter pilots who bombed the Iraqi nuclear reactor at Osirak. As we sat in the briefing room listening to the army chief of staff, Rafael Eitan, before starting our planes’ engines, I recalled a conversation a week earlier when he’d asked us to voice any concerns about our mission.

Jerusalem, Washington, and the Iranian bomb

The view from Washington: We went into an unnecessary, awful war in Iraq. We're in a complicated, depressing war in Afghanistan. Our economy is finally beginning to recover from the worst crisis it has known since World War II. In November we have elections. So we don't have the slightest intention of doing anything that could entangle us in a third war and a renewed economic recession. By no means will we attack Iran and we won't let Israel attack either. By no means will we impose a maritime blockade on Iran or collapse its central bank.

Iran’s last diplomatic chance?

As an ancient Persian proverb wisely reflects, “Even with the strength of an elephant and the paws of a lion, peace is better than war.” It is time for Iran to heed this thousand-year-old lesson and relinquish its nuclear ambitions before a doomsday scenario occurs.

Arab justice's 'Hatikva' silence was a song of protest

It was so moving on Tuesday at the President's Residence and so stately; another celebration of Israeli democracy, which so loves to effusively praise itself. The honorable Supreme Court justices posing for a group photo; the retiring court president taking leave with tears in her eyes; the incoming court president making an emotional speech - everyone complimenting one another, praising one another and lauding our exalted democracy.

Israeli, Palestinian leaders hastening the next intifada

At last Likud and the moderate right have found a formula to save the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. No longer will they talk about "conflict resolution" - the phrase now is "conflict management." The explanations are many and they sound convincing - the split between Hamas and Fatah, the large gap between the Israeli government and the Palestinian Authority on the core issues, and the most common excuse of all: There's no partner on the other side.

Rick Santorum and the Jewish Vote

Pennsylvania, it’s sometimes said, can best be understood as Philadelphia and Pittsburgh separated by Alabama. Geographically speaking it’s a big state in the heart of the liberal Northeast, home to great universities, Ben Franklin and the Liberty Bell, anchored by a great Eastern metropolis at one end and a once-booming Midwestern steel town at the other. Everything in between, though, is rural, gun-totin’, Bible-thumpin’ country.

A boy's death exposes Israel's deliberate fiction

In 2000, as the second intifada raged, a 12-year-old Palestinian boy, Mohammed Al Dura, was one of many children killed by the Israeli Defense Forces. Mohammed was shot as he and his father attempted to find cover and he died moments later in his father's lap. A Palestinian cameraman caught the incident on film, causing shock around the world.

But not even that evidence was enough for some to condemn Israel's actions; 12 years later, there is still a debate in France about the authenticity of the report.

Let us compare al-Assad to Israel

When considering much of what is being repeated in our region, on all levels about Syria, one is struck by confusion, for one party justifies what is happening, whilst another casts doubt, and a third attempts to be clever. Therefore you feel as if you are looking at a situation that is impossible to understand, namely an Arab case par excellence, which is a problem with no solutions, or in the desperate manner of Nabih Berri, a case where there is ‘no winners and no losers”, which is what I term a case of political fluidity.

Israel, democracy and the Arabs

The prolongation of the Arab-Israeli conflict is all about the illegal occupation, expropriation, colonisation, and annexation of Arab territory by Israel. And beneath the armour of the Israeli military machine is the systematic exclusion of the Other — the Arabs.

Jewish Israelis are xenophobic towards Arabs not so much because they fear them as an existential military threat, as Likud and Labour are prone to repeat, but rather because of the intrinsic demographic threat they present to the national identity of a Jewish State.

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