Fayyad hails popular resistance at Bil'in parlay
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Tovah Lazaroff - April 10, 2012 - 12:00am

Popular resistance against Israel reflects the rights of Palestinians, Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad asserted Tuesday. Speaking at the Bil'in 7th International Conference for Popular Struggle, Fayyad said, "Popular resistance is one of the best forms of resistance and reflects the rights of Palestinians." The PA prime minister also charged that settlements violate international law and go against the peace process.

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Israel Tries to Save West Bank Settlements it Vowed to Dismantle
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Los Angeles Times
by Edmund Sanders - April 10, 2012 - 12:00am

JERUSALEM —Israel's government is scrambling to find ways to save some of the unauthorized West Bank settlements it once promised to dismantle, including some that are built partly on private Palestinian land. The new strategy seeks to retroactively legalize some outposts and, in other cases, relocate Jewish settlers to nearby land that is not privately owned, in effect creating what critics say would be the first new West Bank settlements in years.

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Binyamin Netanyahu's support for settlers bodes ill for peace prospects
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Guardian
by Harriet Sherwood - (Opinion) April 9, 2012 - 12:00am

On its own, it seemed like an encouraging omen to anyone alarmed by the increasing entrenchment of Jewish settlers on the West Bank. Israeli security forces last week forcibly evacuated hardliners from a Palestinian house in the volatile city of Hebron, to the fury of the settlers and their backers. Hours earlier, Binyamin Netanyahu had intervened to halt the eviction; now he said the rule of law must prevail. Had the prime minister had a change of heart? Did the Hebron drama signal a new tough approach against radical settlers and their supporters inside Netanyahu's cabinet?

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Palestinians accuse Israel of destroying prospects for two-state solution with new settlements
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press
April 9, 2012 - 12:00am

UNITED NATIONS — The Palestinians accused Israel on Monday of systematically destroying prospects for a two-state solution to their decades-long conflict with its continuing campaign of settlement building. Palestinian U.N. observer Riyad Mansour sent a protest letter to the U.N. secretary-general, Security Council and General Assembly two days before the Quartet of Mideast mediators — the U.S., U.N., European Union and Russia — meets in Washington to discuss the long-stalled peace process.

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The important message of Peter Beinart
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Don Futterman - (Opinion) April 6, 2012 - 12:00am

Peter Beinart has been pilloried because of his call in a recent New York Times op-ed and in his newly published book, "The Crisis of Zionism," for a Zionist boycott of West Bank settlements. Beinart, former editor of the New Republic and founder of the new online forum "Open Zion," is tackling the concealed heart of our government's strategy: its campaign to erase any distinction between the occupied territories and Israel. Beinart has staked out a brave position, particularly in today's Zionist landscape.

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Presidency: Israeli settlement tender 'harms peace'
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
April 5, 2012 - 12:00am

BETHLEHEM (Ma'an) -- The Palestinian presidency on Wednesday condemned Israel's issuing of tenders for hundreds of new settler homes near Bethlehem. Israel's Housing Ministry published tenders on Tuesday for 827 new houses in illegal settlement Har Homa, between East Jerusalem and Bethlehem, Israeli daily Haaretz reported.

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PM looks to convert three outposts to settlements
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Tovah Lazaroff, Joanna Paraszczuck - April 5, 2012 - 12:00am

In a move likely to be condemned by the international community, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu on Wednesday said that his government planned to transform three West Bank Jewish outposts – Bruchin, Rehalim and Sansana – into new settlements. All three communities were created on state land over a decade ago, Rehalim in 1991, Sansana in 1997 and Bruchin in 1999, but were never authorized as settlements by the government. The government last authorized a settlement, Negahot, in 1999.

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Netanyahu did the right thing by clearing Hebron outpost
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
(Editorial) April 5, 2012 - 12:00am

Another attempt by the settlers to bend the law in the West Bank to their extremist ideology failed on Wednesday, with the evacuation of the so-called Machpela House. The eviction came after Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that delaying the execution of the Civil Administration's eviction order could ignite the area, in addition to constituting contempt of court and undermining the authority of the military commander and the defense minister. This was an important reminder that the West Bank is not the settlers' state.

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Hebron Settlers Threaten Retaliation After Israeli Police Evict Them
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press
by Alon Bernstein - April 5, 2012 - 12:00am

Israeli security forces swiftly evicted dozens of Jewish settlers from an illegally occupied building in this volatile West Bank city on Wednesday, ending a week-long standoff that had threatened to spill over into broader violence. The raid caught the settlers off guard. Only a day earlier, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had moved to block the eviction order. Settler supporters in Netanyahu's hard-line government condemned the surprise raid, a key political ally threatened to quit the coalition and settler leaders vowed retaliation.

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U.N. Pushes West Bank Settlement 'Probe'
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jewish Daily Forward
by Nathan Guttman - (Analysis) April 5, 2012 - 12:00am

Washington — A United Nations group’s decision to probe settlement activity on the West Bank has raised the specter of a new feud between Israel and the world body — and created a fresh headache for the White House. Israel quickly denounced the Human Rights Council’s resolution, which calls for a fact-finding commission to investigate the “implications” of the settlements for Palestinians. The Jewish state also severed all ties with the council.

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