PA approves plan to register UNESCO sites
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
March 6, 2013 - 1:00am

The Palestinian Authority cabinet on Tuesday decided to form a committee to prepare applications to register sites on UNESCO's world heritage list. Omar Awadallah, the head of UN file in the Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said that the committee's mission was to prepare heritage sites for the list to protect them from harm. Each ministry has been asked to cooperate with the UNESCO committee, and will prepare the files.

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Gaza Hamas rulers to start campaign to catch spies
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Associated Press
March 4, 2013 - 1:00am

Gaza's Hamas rulers say they will begin a new campaign to find Palestinian collaborators with Israel. Col. Mohammed Lafi of Gaza's Interior Ministry said Monday that the campaign aims to protect Palestinian militant groups battling Israel. Lafi says they will also warn other Palestinians of the dangers of spying. Israel security officials have long relied on a network of informants in the Palestinian territories to keep tabs on militants.

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Palestinian Justice System Still a Work in Progress
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Media Line
by Diana Atallah - March 4, 2013 - 1:00am

Ramallah -- When a Palestinian court ordered a government center in 2011 to remove garbage they disposed of on lands belonging to Majid Zaher (not his real name) near Ramallah, he thought his case was over.

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It’s Not an Intifada
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Foreign Policy
by Jonathan Schanzer - (Opinion) February 28, 2013 - 1:00am

Don't call it an intifada. Not yet, anyway.

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Palestinians say detainee tortured before death
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters
by Jeffrey Heller - February 24, 2013 - 1:00am

The death of 30-year-old Arafat Jaradat in an Israeli jail on Saturday and a hunger strike by four inmates have flared tension across the occupied West Bank, where stone-throwing protesters clashed with Israeli soldiers on Sunday. The Palestinian autopsy findings could further fuel unrest that has surged in the Palestinian Territories weeks before U.S. President Barack Obama is due to visit the region. Israel demanded the Palestinian Authority restore calm to the area.

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Wrong Cause
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
(Editorial) February 24, 2013 - 1:00am

Many injustices plague Palestinian society, few of which can be blamed on the Jewish state, even by the farthest stretches of the imaginations of Israel’s enemies. These are self-inflicted injustices. In the Gaza Strip, an Islamic quasi-state ruled by the totalitarian regime of Hamas has in the past few weeks arrested or summoned for interrogation at least 16 journalists as part of a campaign aimed at intimidating the local media, as reported by The Jerusalem Post’s Khaled Abu Toameh.

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Hamas, Fatah ‘not serious about reconciliation’
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Gulf News
by Nasouh Nazzal - February 13, 2013 - 1:00am

Palestinian rival factions Fatah and Hamas are not serious about achieving Palestinian internal unity and the recent Cairo meetings were only aimed at appeasing the Palestinian street, said a senior Palestinian official.

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Gaza rights groups question police use of force
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
February 6, 2013 - 1:00am

Human rights groups in the Gaza Strip are calling for authorities to investigate police use of force against civilians after the death of a suspected drug trafficker last week. Atiya Suleiman Qishta, 41, was killed on Saturday after he was shot in the back by an anti-drug unit of the Gaza police force. Police sources told the Palestinian Center for Human Rights that eight officers laid an ambush for the car as part of an attempted drug bust, but when Qishta stepped out of the vehicle he refused police orders to stop and attempted to flee.

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PA security man found dead in Ramallah
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Khaled Abu Toameh - February 6, 2013 - 1:00am

The body of a Palestinian security officer was discovered on Tuesday in his apartment in Ramallah. The officer, Hassan Jalayta, 40, from Jericho, had been summoned for questioning by his commanders. Jalayta left his family home in Jericho on Tuesday morning and was supposed to report for questioning, but did not show up, a Palestinian Authority security source said. The source did not say why the officer, who worked for the Preventive Security Service, had been summoned for questioning in Ramallah.

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Israel's Decision To Withhold Tax Money From Palestinians May Impact Security
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jewish Daily Forward
by Ben Lynfield - January 26, 2013 - 1:00am

In August 2011, a report by the Knesset’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee hailed the Palestinian Authority’s “comprehensive security coordination” with Israel in thwarting terrorist attacks — a judgment echoed in May 2012 by the chief of the Shin Bet, Israel’s domestic intelligence agency. “The security coordination with the P.A. is good,” Yoram Cohen told the same committee then.

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