Palestinian Authority cracks down in West Bank town
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press
by Noah Browning, Ali Sawafta - June 4, 2012 - 12:00am

In the narrow streets of the Palestinian refugee camp in Jenin and the scruffy villages beyond, masked special forces bundle suspects into civilian cars with grim regularity, whisking them away to faraway Jericho prison. The near-nightly crackle of gunfire, sometimes from drive-by shootings against police stations, has accompanied a crime wave in the northern city of Jenin, once a hub of militants and suicide attackers who struck into nearby Israel.

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Security forces 'abuse detainees with impunity'
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
May 24, 2012 - 12:00am

BETHLEHEM (Ma'an) -- Palestinian security forces in the West Bank and Gaza abuse detainees with impunity and use excessive force against demonstrators, Amnesty International said Wednesday. The London-based rights group issued its annual report, and accused the Fatah-run Palestinian Authority and Hamas security forces of arbitrarily detaining each other's supporters.

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Palestinian forces seize ex-fighter in West Bank
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press
by Mohammed Ballas - May 13, 2012 - 12:00am

JENIN, West Bank — Palestinian security forces detained a prominent ex-fighter Sunday, stepping up a campaign of arrests following the death of the governor of the northern West Bank district of Jenin, residents said. Masked security men seized Zakariya Zubeidi in Jenin after halting his car, blindfolding him and shackling him before bundling him into another car and speeding away, residents said.

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West Bank Leader Says Security Forces Can’t Get Guns
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Jodi Rudoren - May 12, 2012 - 12:00am

RAMALLAH, West Bank — President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority said Saturday that his security forces were struggling because

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Hamas: PA detained 79 members in March
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
April 2, 2012 - 12:00am

GAZA CITY (Ma'an) -- Hamas on Monday accused the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority of detaining 79 members in the West Bank during March. Some 32 former prisoners of Israel were among those detained by PA forces, as well as 14 university students, Hamas said in a statement. Another 50 Hamas affiliates were summoned by PA intelligence services last month, the party added. The Ramallah-based PA also fired a teacher and a doctor over their affiliation to Hamas, the statement said.

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PA controlled office in Gaza ransacked
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
March 1, 2012 - 1:00am

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.

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PA: No Decision on Security Coordination
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
February 29, 2012 - 1:00am

BETHLEHEM (Ma’an) -- The the Palestinian Authority's minister of civil affairs, denied on Tuesday that the government had decided to end security coordination with Israel. Hussein al-Sheikh told the PA's Voice of Palestine radio that all options were under consideration, but decisions will wait until the president returns from abroad. The minister was responding to reports that the PA is planning to reconsider its security, political and economic agreements with Israel in the coming days, as a PLO official said Sunday.

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Israel to continue freeze on Palestinian tax money, says senior official
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Barak Ravid - November 21, 2011 - 1:00am

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his forum of eight senior ministers decided Sunday to continue Israel's freeze on the transfer of the Palestinian Authority's tax money, a senior Israeli official said, due to the latest moves by Fatah and Hamas aimed at establishing a unity government. Israel has been withholding $100 million of the PA's money, which Israel collects for it under the Oslo Accords.

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Abbas-Dahlan spat undermining Fatah, bolstering Hamas
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Khaled Abu Toameh - August 15, 2011 - 12:00am

As he prepares to submit a request to the UN in September for recognition of a Palestinian state, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has also found time to wage a relentless war against his former ally and friend, Fatah strongman Muhammad Dahlan. The rivalry between the two men, which reached its peak last month when Abbas ordered his security forces to raid Dahlan’s villa on the outskirts of Ramallah, has caused severe damage to Fatah and will only serve Hamas’s interests, Fatah officials warned.

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Abbas tells US lawmakers: NATO role in Palestinian state
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
August 12, 2011 - 12:00am

RAMALLAH (Ma'an) -- Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas told visiting US Congressmen on Thursday that the security of the future Palestinian state will be handed to NATO under US command, his adviser said Friday. The Palestinian state must also be "empty of [Israeli] settlements," the President said, according to official Palestinian Authority news agency WAFA.

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