Middle East News: World Press Roundup

The Christian Science Monitor examines how back-channels may play a key role in upcoming Israeli-Palestinian negotiations (2.) The Jewish Telegraphic Agency looks at how some Israeli setters are attempting to build further settlement outposts in the occupied Palestinian territories in order to subvert peace negotiations (3.) A Philadelphia Inquirer opinion by Eric Trager urges the inclusion of a second Arab party to the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations to help each side overcome their respective weaknesses (5.) The Toronto Star (Canada) reports on the unpredictability and arduousness of commuting for Palestinians in the occupied West Bank because of Israeli restrictions (7.) The Telegraph (UK) examines how planned Israeli construction in the Har Homa settlement threatens upcoming Mideast peace talks (9.) A Jordan Times (Jordan) opinion by Gwynne Dyer fleshes out Israeli PM Olmert's statements on the choices available to Israel being either a Palestinian state or an apartheid-like situation (11.) In Haaretz (Israel) Bradley Burston urges a new Israeli policy to encourage the elements within the Hamas movement moving towards accommodation with Israel (12.) Also in Haaretz, an editorial is critical of the Har Homa settlement expansion and warns of its many damaging ramifications (14.)

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Key Players In Mideast Talks May Remain Unseen ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Christian Science Monitor by Joshua Mitnick - December 12, 2007 - 5:16pm A handshake across a table and a spray of camera flashes will probably serve as starting gun of the first official Israeli-Palestinian negotiations in seven years Wednesday – talks aimed at producing a treaty on Palestinian statehood in 2008. Over the coming months, the talks will break into about a half-dozen subcommittees to tackle such issues as dividing Jerusalem and dealing with Palestinian refugees. But none of those discussions are likely to lead to breakthroughs necessary to clinch a final agreement, analysts say. » Read more

Hellish Journey Around Holy City ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Toronto Star by Oakland Ross - December 12, 2007 - 5:27pm It is not the volume of traffic, much less the issue of distance, that puts a pair of dents each day into the life of Mouse Hindi.I It is the city of Jerusalem. "There is no limit to the time it takes," says the 40-year-old Palestinian consulting engineer. "It could take two hours. It could take three hours. We don't know." The round-faced husband and father of five is talking about the daily journey he makes from his home in Beit Sahour near Bethlehem to his office in Ramallah. » Read more

Palestinians Demand Halt To Settlements As Peace Talks Begin ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Guardian by David Batty - December 12, 2007 - 5:29pm The first formal Middle East peace negotiations in seven years got off to a tense start today with the Palestinian Authority demanding a halt to Israeli plans to build settlements on disputed territory. Palestinian negotiators said the planned construction in the Har Homa neighbourhood in disputed east Jerusalem, along with Israeli military activity in Gaza, threatened to undermine the new peace talks. » Read more

Construction Threatens Mid East Peace Process ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Telegraph by Tim Butcher - December 12, 2007 - 5:33pm The light in the night sky near Bethlehem this Christmas will be no heavenly portent but a safety beacon on a crane in a nearby Jewish community so controversial it threatens to derail the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. Har Homa, largely overlooked on the world stage since construction began roughly ten years ago, has surged up the international agenda since Israeli authorities decided this week to build 307 new homes there. » Read more

The Middle East Needs A Lot, But Not More Weapons ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Daily Star by Raja Kamal - (Commentary) December 12, 2007 - 5:35pm The United States Congress will soon debate the decision of the Bush administration to sell $20 billion in sophisticated weapons to several Arab countries. This package is being presented by the White House as a way of promoting stability in a Middle East threatened by Iran's ambitions and the rise of terrorism. Congress should flatly decline the sale on the grounds that arming the Arab world is neither in the best interest of the region nor that of the US in the long run. » Read more

Israel 60 Years On - Partition Or Apartheid ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jordan Times by Gwynne Dyer - December 12, 2007 - 5:36pm Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was just back from the Annapolis summit where President George W. Bush tried to reboot the moribund Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. More importantly, November 29 was also the 60th anniversary of the United Nations vote that divided British-ruled Palestine into a Jewish and an Arab state. That promised Arab state still doesn’t exist, of course, but if the peace talks fail to produce it in the end, Olmert told the newspaper Haaretz, then Israel is “finished”. » Read more

Hamas - If We Can Kill Them, We Can Talk To Them ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz by Bradley Burston - (Opinion) December 12, 2007 - 5:39pm Call their bluff. Hamas this week inched one notch further toward some form of accommodation with a reality it cannot bring itself to stomach. Israel should do no less. In an open letter to U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Ahmed Youssef, senior political advisor to Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, wrote at the weekend that the Bush administration cannot at once "preach about exporting democracy in Iraq and Afghanistan and ignore the democratic process in Palestine." » Read more

Two Non-states ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz by Amira Hass - (Opinion) December 12, 2007 - 5:40pm Who says there is no cooperation between the Palestinian Authority/Fatah and Hamas? Indeed, ever since June the two sides have been working energetically, in a kind of pas de deux of demonstrative pirouettes, so that the Gaza Strip will become another quasi-state entity with its three governing authorities - executive, legislative and judiciary - separate from those in Ramallah. All three branches are acting outside the delegated powers of the PA president, with the help of a separate police force and a system of taxation, collection and other payments. Two non-states for one people. » Read more

From Annapolis To Har Homa ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz (Editorial) December 12, 2007 - 5:44pm U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice demanded explanations from her Israeli counterpart, Tzipi Livni, last week about the plan to build another 300 apartments in the Har Homa neighborhood of East Jerusalem. Rice did not make do with posing a question to Livni; she hastened to go public with the Bush Administration's objections to the plan. » Read more

Insider Account Of Peacemaking Details History Of Misguided Diplomacy ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jewish Daily Forward by Nathan Guttman - December 13, 2007 - 12:56pm As negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians reached their peak at the Camp David summit of 2000, the Clinton administration was facing such a shortage of manpower that a translator who had no diplomatic experience was drafted to fulfill diplomatic missions in the most delicate moment of the negotiation process. » Read more

Politics: U.s. Jews Tilt Rightwards On Israel ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Inter Press Service (IPS) by Jim Lobe - December 13, 2007 - 12:59pm U.S. Jews appear to have become more opposed both to Israel's making key concessions in renewed peace talks with Palestinians and to the U.S. carrying out a military attack against Iran's nuclear facilities, according to the latest in an annual series of surveys of Jewish opinion released here this week by the American Jewish Committee (AJC). » Read more

New Media Dodge Mid-east Censors ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bbc News by Robin Lustig - (Special Report) December 13, 2007 - 1:03pm It's never easy writing about media freedom. Even in countries where there is no official censorship, all reporters know there will always be some restraints on what they can say - editors need to be persuaded, owners need to be kept happy, the law has to be obeyed. » Read more

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