Israeli apology gets cool reception in Washington
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Associated Press
by Josef Federman - March 14, 2010 - 1:00am

Israel's prime minister expressed regret Sunday for a crisis with the United States over plans to expand a Jewish neighborhood in east Jerusalem, even as American officials played down the apology and called for bold Israeli action to get peace efforts back on track. With tensions rising, Israel deployed hundreds of police around east Jerusalem's Old City and heavily restricted Palestinian access to the area — the scene of several recent clashes.

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The Petraeus briefing: Biden’s embarrassment is not the whole story
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Foreign Policy
by Marc Perry - (Analysis) March 13, 2010 - 1:00am

On Jan. 16, two days after a killer earthquake hit Haiti, a team of senior military officers from the U.S. Central Command (responsible for overseeing American security interests in the Middle East), arrived at the Pentagon to brief Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Adm. Michael Mullen on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The team had been dispatched by CENTCOM commander Gen. David Petraeus to underline his growing worries at the lack of progress in resolving the issue. The 33-slide, 45-minute PowerPoint briefing stunned Mullen.

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Driving Drunk in Jerusalem
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Thomas L. Friedman - (Opinion) March 13, 2010 - 1:00am

I am a big Joe Biden fan. The vice president is an indefatigable defender of U.S. interests abroad. So it pains me to say that on his recent trip to Israel, when Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu’s government rubbed his nose in some new housing plans for contested East Jerusalem, the vice president missed a chance to send a powerful public signal: He should have snapped his notebook shut, gotten right back on Air Force Two, flown home and left the following scribbled note behind: “Message from America to the Israeli government: Friends don’t let friends drive drunk.

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U.S. gave Israel green light for East Jerusalem construction
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Akiva Eldar - (Opinion) March 12, 2010 - 1:00am

The apology offered by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Interior Minister Eli Yishai recalls the joke about the servant who pinched the king's bottom. En route to the gallows, the servant apologized: He thought it was the queen's bottom.

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How Bibi lost a best friend
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Guardian
by Aluf Benn - (Opinion) March 12, 2010 - 1:00am




Joe Biden delivers 'hardest truth' in Israel
Media Mention of ATFP In Politico - March 12, 2010 - 1:00am

Vice President Joe Biden departed from Israel Thursday leaving behind a raging controversy over the consequences of what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insists was the unintentional embarrassment of the highest-ranking member of the Obama administration to visit his country.

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Clinton Rebukes Israel on Housing Announcement
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Mark Landler - March 12, 2010 - 1:00am

In a tense, 43-minute phone call on Friday morning, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that Israel’s plan for new housing units for Jews in East Jerusalem sent a “deeply negative signal” about Israeli-American relations, and not just because it spoiled a visit by Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.

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Questions abound after Biden's Israel visit
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Los Angeles Times
by Edmund Sanders - March 12, 2010 - 1:00am

You come for a hug. You leave with a slap. It happens in the Middle East. Vice President Joe Biden's trip this week was supposed to highlight U.S.-Israeli cooperation to counter a perceived nuclear threat from Iran and kick off U.S.-brokered indirect peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians. Instead, talk about Iran was sidetracked and the outlook for peace may be murkier than it was before. Even here, people are not quite sure how that happened.

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Israel shows what it really thinks
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Independent
(Opinion) March 11, 2010 - 1:00am

Israel apologised for the embarrassment it had caused its most important ally by announcing it would build 1,600 new homes in disputed East Jerusalem at the very moment the US vice-president, Joe Biden, was in the country for a visit. But no apology – nor the implausible explanation that the announcement was a "procedural" matter of which Benjamin Netanyahu had not been informed in advance – can obscure the truth that this episode has revealed.

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The problem with illegal settlements
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jordan Times
by Daoud Kuttab - March 11, 2010 - 1:00am

The embarrassment the US vice president faced this week when, during his visit to Israel, the creation of a new settlement was announced should not have surprised him. The list of Israeli slaps in the face of US officials is endless. The situation has become such that many believe calls for a freeze of settlement activities should stop because they resulted in a frenzy to build even more Jewish settlements.

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