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I notice that Elliott Abrams has contradicted some points in my Sept. 6 op-ed "The Elders' View of the Middle East" (though my suggested title, "What Next for the Holy Land," would have been a better headline).
Israel announced building plans in contested East Jerusalem today in a move likely to complicate US-Israel talks over a freeze on Israeli settlements in disputed territories.
The reports came days after Israel announced other plans to build new settlements in the West Bank (see a map of the settlements here).
The Obama administration has pressed Israel for a freeze on all settlement activity as a condition for a return to peace talks with the Palestinians. Israel has shrugged off that demand.
B'Tselem said detailed research with careful cross-checking showed 1,387 Palestinians died, over half of them civilians and 252 of them children.
This contradicts an Israeli army report stating fewer than 300 civilians died in fighting in December and January.
Israel launched the assault to halt rocket attacks from Hamas-run Gaza.
The overall B'Tselem total broadly tallies with the official Palestinian death toll and the findings of other non-governmental organisations, although the proportion of civilians it identifies is lower.
Israel has picked contractors for 486 new homes in a settlement in annexed Arab east Jerusalem, officials said on Wednesday, days after approving hundreds of new homes in the West Bank.
"We published the winner of the bids," a spokesman for the Israel Lands Authority said.
He was clarifying an earlier statement that said the tendering process had been reopened.
Tenders were first invited in October 2008 but authorities rejected all the bids because of pricing disagreements. Authorities last month reversed the decision following an appeal by companies that had tendered.
The United States and its partners pushing peace in the Middle East are treating Israel's announcement that it will build 455 new housing units in the West Bank before imposing a freeze as a buyer reviewing the unannounced "delivery fee" for a new car: Swallow hard, pay the extra bucks and move on.
"It's difficult to understand what the Israelis want when they announce that kind of thing," one European diplomat said. "But it shouldn’t derail the process."
Israel’s expansion of illegal settlements on Palestinian land in the West Bank is intended to terminate the peace process before it even starts, Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) official Yasser Abed Rabbo said on Wednesday.
Abed Rabbo told the Russia Today TV network, “They know quite well that such steps will provoke the Palestinians and the Arabs, and even the international community who agreed that settlements must stop as a major part in the Road Map plan. Thus, the Israeli government’s aim is to thwart the political efforts that will eventually lead to the two-state solution.”
The Israeli government chose the path of settlements instead of peace, Head of the Negotiations Affairs Department in the Palestine Liberation Organization Saeb Erekat said Wednesday.
Erekat called the Israeli government’s insistence on creating “facts on the ground” only intensifies the deception when its leaders claim they want peace, he told UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process Robery Serry and US Consul General Daniel Rubenstein in a meeting alongside Greek Consul General Soterios Athanasius.
Fatah’s newly-elected Central Committee appointed controversial former Gaza strongman Muhammad Dahlan to be charge of information on Tuesday night.
The committee, which was reconstituted at the party’s convention in Bethlehem in August, held a meeting on Tuesday in the security compound (Al-Muqata’a) in Ramallah and
Central committee member Jamal Muheisin told Ma’an that Ahmad (Abu Mahir) Ghneim was appointed Deputy Chair and Secretary of Fatah movement.
The increasingly harsh political climate in Israel under Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing government has prompted the leadership of the country’s 1.3 million Arab citizens to call the first general strike in several years.
The one-day stoppage is due to take place on October 1, a date heavy with symbolism because it marks the anniversary of another general strike, in 2000 at the start of the second intifada when 13 Arab demonstrators were shot dead by Israeli police.
Israeli right-wing politicians and settler leaders have launched a last-minute campaign this week to pressure the government to reject the US call for a freeze on construction of Jewish homes in occupied Palestinian territory.
The efforts by the Right come just days before Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, is expected to reach a compromise with the United States on a temporary halt to settlement activity. Israeli media reported yesterday that he is likely to agree to a lull of six to nine months in the occupied West Bank.
It is becoming increasingly clear to the United States and Europe that Israel is simply not interested in returning to peace negotiations or ever will be under its current leadership.
The latest show of defiance from Netanyahu's government came through a few days ago when Israel officially approved the construction of 455 new colonies in the West Bank, totally dismissing US and others' demand to freeze all colony activity.
All over the Western world, community empowerment programs encourage resident participation by involving community leaders and organizers in decisions about the city in which they live. What could be better than the authorities and residents taking joint responsibility for municipal challenges? In East Jerusalem, this is not so straightforward.
The Israeli government’s approval this week of plans to construct hundreds of new settler homes on occupied Palestinian Territory may well be remembered as the hammer that drove the final nail into the coffin of President Barack Obama’s peace efforts. All Israeli settlement construction on occupied Palestinian land is viewed as a “breach of international law,” according to a 2004 ruling by the International Court of Justice.
Quite frankly, the program put forth by the government of the Palestinian Authority, detailed by Prime Minister Salam Fayyad in a document entitled “Palestine: Ending the Occupation, Establishing the State”, for the next two years is the only program that preserves the two states, undermines the occupation and ruptures its backbone by building the institutions of the de facto state.
How many Palestinians were killed in the Gaza Strip during Operation Cast Lead? Eight months after the operation, it seems as though the differences between the two sides' figures are only getting bigger.
Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal's recent visit to Egypt has brought the Islamist movement and Fatah closer to ending their differences, sources close to Hamas in the Gaza Strip revealed on Tuesday.
In another sign of rapprochement between the two parties, Hamas has welcomed plans by senior Fatah officials to visit the Gaza Strip for talks aimed at resolving the crisis.
The Fatah officials who are expected to visit the Strip include Nabil Sha'ath, Jibril Rajoub, Mahmoud al-Aloul and Fakhri Bsaiso.
Despite angry statements from the Palestinians and the Arab world, and condemnations from the US and the EU, Israel's announcement Monday of new housing starts in the settlements did not derail the diplomatic process; US envoy George Mitchell is expected here Saturday night, and Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is scheduled to fly to Egypt for talks on Sunday.
"The settlements aren't the be-all, end-all" of American policy efforts, one State Department official told The Jerusalem Post on Tuesday. "Our ultimate goal [is] to create the conditions for negotiations."
Links:
[1] http://www.americantaskforce.org/print/8751
[2] http://www.americantaskforce.org/printmail/8751
[3] http://www.americantaskforce.org/printpdf/8751
[4] http://www.americantaskforce.org/rss/wpr
[5] http://www.acpus.org/donate_online
[6] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/08/AR2009090802801.html
[7] http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0909/p99s01-duts.html
[8] http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8245433.stm
[9] http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5jnnlPH6j15W_xwkV4-u_Pqx3F0Eg
[10] http://jta.org/news/article/2009/09/08/1007714/israels-settlement-announcement-irks-negotiators-but-unlikely-to-derail-process
[11] http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=224713
[12] http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=224722
[13] http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=224571
[14] http://www.thenational.ae/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090909/FOREIGN/709089850/1011
[15] http://www.thenational.ae/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090909/FOREIGN/709089818/1011
[16] http://www.gulfnews.com/opinion/editorial_opinion/region/10347317.html
[17] http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=5&article_id=106272
[18] http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=1&article_id=106265&categ_id=17
[19] http://www.daralhayat.com/portalarticlendah/53667
[20] http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3774217,00.html
[21] http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1251804523436&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
[22] http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1251804523128&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
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