High in the Holy Land, a Biblical view of peace By Douglas Hamilton Douglas Hamilton – Wed Nov 19, 5:22 am ET
ELI, West Bank (Reuters) – When God ordered Abraham to slaughter a son, the angel of the Lord stepped in at the last minute to stay his hand. Was it a test of faith, or had Abraham's imagination simply run away with him? Scholars may differ, but to many Jewish settlers in the occupied West Bank, the story is as real as the airy heights and rocky slopes where Hebrew and Philistine armies clashed in biblical times, and where they live today.This makes it hard to discuss rationally a resolution of the conflict between the Palestinians and Israel over its occupation of West Bank land since the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.That's Highway 60. It's been there since Abraham, says Eliana Passentin, pointing to the road in the valley beneath her home in Eli on an 850 meter (2,700 foot) mountaintop, where on a clear day you can see all the way to Tel Aviv.Passentin, a 34-year-old former Californian with 6 children, did not build her spacious villa here for the stunning geography or the government subsidies. Every view from every window, she says, looks onto a piece of recorded biblical history.There's room here in Israel for everyone, she insists. But I don't believe we're on the way to peace. There's a lot of hatred toward us. She teaches her children to respect but suspect, she says. If my children hear Arabic here on the hill, maybe they should be scared.The 250,000-strong settler community is not monolithic and not all take the bible literally. But those who do believe they are following God's word, and have His blessing for recovering the holy land of Israel for its chosen people.Settlers deny their towns are an illegal obstacle to peace. On a tour they organized this week to redress a negative image in foreign media, they cited scripture going back 3,500 years to explain why a land-for-peace swap was out of the question.Yehudit Tayar talked about what we did in ancient times, as if recalling recent family history. When we were crossing the desert, she says. When we first came back to Shilo to worship the Holy Tabernacle which our families did three times a year back in the Iron Age.It's as if the intervening 3,000 years never happened.
DREAM TOWNS
Visitors to divided Jerusalem, only a half hour drive away, see checkpoints, watchtowers, teenagers with combat rifles and other daily manifestations of the occupation that might be removed almost overnight, if there was a peace deal.But looking at the reality of the settlements, their tended gardens and schools, and listening to the passions that gave rise to them, makes it plain that persuading -- or even forcing -- Jews to give these up will be a far bigger challenge.The red-tiled, stone houses of Kokhav Yaakov and nearby Psagot, a 20-year-old settlement, look like the 1950s suburbs of the American Dream, as drawn by Madison Avenue advertisers.You can almost see a new Buick in the driveway. Kids' bikes litter the watered lawns and wide sidewalks. Mom is baking apple pie in the kitchen. There's no need to lock your door...This is the innocent, idyllic gloss some put on settler life. But just beneath lies a hard bedrock of scripture.It was a tremendous rout for the Philistines and a tremendous victory for the Hebrews, says Rabbi David Feld, a former American who sees the stark hillsides through a biblical prism and talks passionately, as if it all happened yesterday.The ancients had chariots, they were like our tanks, he says with animation. He looks no further than the Book of Samuel to justify his place on occupied land. Israel has made peace with all the Arabs that want to make peace, says Feld. This is the biblical land of Israel.
CENTURIES-OLD TERRACING
Yovram Cohen of the nearby Ofra settlement is a self-taught winemaker and native-born Israeli whose parents came from Tunisia. He produces his Tanya Vineyard Merlot and Cabernet reds, keeps parakeets, and ignores religious politics. I'm not living here for political reasons. It's just where I live, and I bought this land, says the former paratrooper. Pressed about the threat of a land-for-peace swap, he says finally: If ever it comes, I will face it, when I have to.Cohen is not a typical settler. Most of the 38 settlements of Israel's Benjamin municipality are classified as religious.Seen from the heights, they look like real-estate brochure images of neatly landscaped new towns -- apart from adjacent trailer camps which the settlers call young communities but Israel classifies as illegal outposts. They crown rocky slopes terraced for centuries by Arab cultivators whose history the settlers want everyone to ignore. Illegal or not, they are all the homes of Jews whom Israel would have to remove, if ever it opts to trade land for peace. And now the settlers feel under threat, anxious that an election in February could vote in an unsympathetic majority. In an unprecedentedly frank stand by an Israeli leader, outgoing Prime Minister Ehud Olmert advocates withdrawal from almost all land taken in 1967 -- a hard idea to swallow for settlers cajoled and subsidized by successive governments.
Olmert also warns that Israel cannot tolerate vigilantes in the settler movement who undermine Israel's position by trying to drive out Palestinian neighbors and even fight its police. Former San Francisco Bay resident Passentin, whose house like Joshua's has the flat roof that Arab construction favors rather than the gabled, red-tiled settler model, says she feels a strong feeling of connection to this land.We are not bloodthirsty fanatics, she says. Unlike Feld and his wife Tamar, who described militant settler youth gangs as patriotic kids, she condemns violence and says her neighbors feel the same. If ever ordered to leave, she says, she will resist by legal means, not violent, and would never hurt any of our soldiers.Others say the day of abandoning the land will never come. We are here to stay, says Benjamin council head Avi Roeh. We are people who believe we are here for a mission. It's an act of Zionism, an act of patriotism.(Editing by Dominic Evans)
Syria site hit by Israel resembled atom plant: IAEA By Mark Heinrich Mark Heinrich – Wed Nov 19, 5:27 pm ET
VIENNA (Reuters) – A Syrian complex bombed by Israel bore multiple features resembling those of a nuclear reactor and U.N. inspectors found significant traces of uranium at the site, a watchdog report said on Wednesday.But the International Atomic Energy Agency report said the findings from an inspectors trip to the site in June were not enough to conclude a covert reactor was there. It said further investigation and greater Syrian transparency were needed.Obtained by Reuters, the nuclear safeguards report said Syria would be asked to show to inspectors debris and equipment whisked away from the site at Al-Kibar in the country's eastern desert after the September 2007 Israeli air raid.The United States gave intelligence to the IAEA last April that Washington said indicated the site was a reactor that was close to being built with North Korean assistance and designed to produce plutonium for atomic bombs.Syria, an ally of Iran whose disputed uranium enrichment program has been under IAEA investigation for years, says the site destroyed was a conventional military building and the uranium traces must have come from munitions used to bomb it.Damascus has dismissed as fabricated the satellite imagery, ground pictures of the site taken before Israel's attack and other intelligence underpinning the investigation.While it cannot be excluded that the building in question was intended for non-nuclear use, the features of the building, along with the connectivity of the site to adequate pumping capacity of cooling water, are similar to what may be found in connection with a reactor site, said the IAEA report, sent to its 35-nation board of governors ahead of a November 27-28 meeting.It said photographs also revealed a containment shield similar in dimension and layout to those of atomic reactors.It said Syria had not provided requested documentation to back its declarations about the nature of the building nor granted repeated IAEA requests for visits to three other sites seen as harboring possible evidence linked to Israel's target.Satellite pictures show Syria carried out landscaping of these sites to change their look and took away large containers after the IAEA asked for access to those areas, the report said.Other aerial imagery revealed Syria swept the Al-Kibar site clean after the attack and erected a new building on the spot. The IAEA will ask Syria to let inspectors take swipe samples from rubble, shrapnel and any equipment removed from Al-Kibar.
SYRIAN TRANSPARENCY NEEDED
It said IAEA Director Mohamed ElBaradei had urged Syria to provide the necessary transparency including allowing visits to the requested locations and access to all available information for the agency to complete its assessment.U.N. officials said the uranium contamination that turned up in soil samples collected at the site was a chemically processed form of the mineral that was not the enriched variety used to run nuclear power plants or as fissile bomb material.But the element found was not depleted uranium either, the type used to boost the penetrating power of munitions.
There's enough uranium here to raise questions. The onus of this verification is on Syria, said a senior U.N. official, who like others asked for anonymity due to political sensitivities.The uranium element in question was not in Syria's declared nuclear inventory. Syria's only official nuclear site is an old research reactor. It has no known nuclear energy capacity.The IAEA also intends to ask Israel for information addressing Syria's remarks about the origin of the uranium. Israel has remained silent on the matter since the air raid. ElBaradei said on Monday the uranium traces could have come on clothing of workers who had been in contact with nuclear materials somewhere, or from stored equipment. The report said Syria had told inspectors the site could not have been a nuclear facility because of unreliable, insufficient electricity supplies locally, limited available manpower and the lack of large quantities of treated water. But the report said inspectors saw enough electrical grid to power reactor pumps. Another senior U.N. official said the investigation had urgent need of high-resolution pictures of the site he said must have been taken in the immediate aftermath of the bombing. He said eight countries, which he declined to identify, had access to such imagery but had not turned it over to date. The report complained that the investigation had been severely hampered by (Israel's) unilateral use of force and by a U.S. failure to hand over relevant intelligence until seven months after the bombing. In light of (that), the agency's verification of the situation has been made more difficult and complex, as well as more time- and resource-consuming, the report said. (Editing by Janet Lawrence)
Israel spurns UN plea to ease Gaza blockade By AMY TEIBEL, Associated Press Writer – Wed Nov 19, 4:27 pm ET
JERUSALEM – Israel stood fast Wednesday by its decision to clamp shut cargo crossings at the Gaza Strip, brushing off pleas to ease the blockade from United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon.Israel sealed the passages two weeks ago after a 5-month-old truce between Israel and Gaza militants started unraveling in an effort to halt rocket and mortar fire at Israeli border towns.The crossings, a main source of imports to Gaza, have been cracked open occasionally to allow in fuel and vital supplies. But the closures have drastically reduced the amount of goods entering the already impoverished seaside territory of 1.4 million people, causing shortages of many basic goods.On Tuesday, Ban called Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to express his deep concern over the consequences of the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza, the U.N. said in a statement.He strongly urged the prime minister to facilitate the freer movement of urgently needed humanitarian supplies and of concerned United Nations personnel into Gaza, the statement said.Olmert said Israel was not to blame for the deterioration of conditions in Gaza, according to the prime minister's office. Gazans have only Hamas' regime of terror to blame, he said.
Hamas, an Islamic militant group committed to Israel's destruction, has ruled Gaza since violently overrunning the territory in June 2007.Israel's Gaza blockade has led to frequent blackouts throughout Gaza and resulted in shortages of food, supplies and even cash.Gaza's largest flour mill halted operations Wednesday, saying it had run out of wheat, and the United Nations said it was being forced to suspend cash grants to 98,000 of Gaza's poorest people because of a shortage of Israeli currency.The Israeli closure also prompted major international media organizations, including The Associated Press, BBC, Reuters and the New York Times, to send a rare protest letter to the prime minister, requesting that foreign journalists be allowed into Gaza. Israel has barred reporters from entering the area for the past two weeks. There was no immediate comment from Olmert's office.Defense Minister Ehud Barak told Army Radio on Wednesday that there has to be quiet for the crossings to open.At nightfall Wednesday, Palestinians reported a large explosion east of Gaza City. Hamas officials said the blast was caused by a shell, but it was not clear if it was an Israeli or Palestinian device. No one was hurt. Often homemade rockets and mortars fired by Palestinians at Israel fall short and explode in Gaza.Israel and Hamas have been observing a truce since June. The cease-fire has largely held until Israeli troops entered Gaza early this month to destroy a tunnel they said militants had dug to attack Israel. At least 17 militants have been killed since, and militants have fired about 150 rockets and mortars at Israel, by the military's count.Both Israeli and Hamas officials have said they hope to restore the calm, though Barak has said the military is ready for a large-scale operation if necessary.
The Hamas prime minister in Gaza, Ismail Haniyeh, met with leaders of other Palestinian factions Wednesday. He said they support maintaining the truce as long as the occupation (Israel) commits to it.Before the truce was reached, militants pelted Israel with near-daily rocket attacks, provoking sometimes harsh military retaliation that killed hundreds of Palestinians, including many civilians.U.S. President-elect Barack Obama called Abbas on Tuesday to tell him he would spare no effort to facilitate a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians, Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said Wednesday.In the West Bank, meanwhile, a court-ordered deadline expired for Jewish settlers to leave a four-story building in the volatile city of Hebron. The settlers ignored the ruling, which also said they must be evicted within 30 days if they don't leave voluntarily. Barak said the government would comply with the court order, but added defense officials would first try to persuade the settlers to leave. About 500 of the most extreme Israeli settlers live in Hebron in heavily guarded enclaves among 170,000 Palestinians. If Israeli security forces evict them from the building, violent clashes are likely. Media reports Wednesday said about 600 people have gathered around the building to prevent its evacuation. Settlers moved in early last year after claiming they bought the building from a Palestinian. The Palestinian denies the claim, and Israeli authorities have not recognized the sale as legal.
Syria must choose between peace or belligerence: Peres by Prashant Rao Prashant Rao –Wed Nov 19, 1:46 pm ET
LONDON (AFP) – Syria must choose between peace or belligerence in its dealings with Israel, and between relations with Iran or the Jewish state, Israeli President Shimon Peres said Wednesday.They cannot escape the choice... they are under the impression that they can do both, the former prime minister and Nobel peace prize winner said during a visit to London.They have to make up their mind. It's either peace or belligerence, Peres told reporters at a briefing.If they think they can make the peace with Israel and maintain their close relations with Iran and (Lebanese militant group) Hezbollah, they will discover that is not possible, he said.No potential American mediator -- which Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad has called for -- would agree to Syria negotiating peace with Israel while maintaining close relations with Iran, said Peres.I don't see an American (mediator) that will agree to do the two things -- to help the Syrians on agreeing the land (issue), and keep a very close relationship with the Iranians.The Syrian president last week called on Israel to prove it was interested in forging a peace deal, six months after the long-time foes relaunched indirect negotiations.Talks between the two countries needed international patronage, chiefly from the United States, he said.
Direct negotiations were frozen eight years ago after Israel baulked at Syrian demands for the return of the whole of the occupied Golan Heights, right down to the Sea of Galilee, its main water source.Israel seized the Golan Heights in the 1967 Middle East war, annexing it in 1981 in a move never recognised by the international community.Later on Wednesday, Peres addressed both houses of Britain's parliament for the second time -- he previously gave a speech to the House of Commons and House of Lords in January 1986.Addressing both houses is a rare honour that has only been conferred on 34 individuals, including Peres, since 1939, including Nelson Mandela, Mikheil Gorbachev, the Dalai Lama, Ronald Reagan and, most recently, Nicolas Sarkozy.
Other highlights of Peres's visit to Britain include an audience with Queen Elizabeth II plus talks with Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Foreign Secretary David Miliband Thursday.Earlier on the trip, he addressed students at the prestigious Oxford University, though protesters attempted to shout him down, according to British media.
Israel says it will boycott UN anti-racism meet Wed Nov 19, 1:18 pm ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Israel will stay away from an international anti-racism conference next year, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said on Wednesday, saying the meeting was certain to become an anti-Israel tribunal.Israel will not participate and will not legitimise the (Durban) Review Conference, which will be used as a platform for anti-Israel and anti-Semitic activity, Livni told a conference of North American Jewish leaders in Jerusalem.The April 2009 meeting in Geneva was called by the UN General Assembly as a follow-up to a controversial conference held in Durban in 2001 which ended in acrimony amidst accusations of anti-Semitism.Livni said there was no indication things would go better at the 2009 gathering than they had in Durban.
Despite our efforts and those of friendly countries, for whose position we are grateful, the conference appears to be heading once again towards becoming an anti-Israeli tribunal, which has nothing to do with fighting racism, she said.She cited a paper the Asian Group submitted to the preparatory committee which she said reproduces, almost word by word, the rhetoric of the Tehran Planning Meeting in 2001, a meeting which led to the Durban 1 farce.Once again extremist Arab and Muslim states wish to control the content of the conference and derail it from its original mission, she said.UN Human Rights Commissioner Navanetham Pillay in September urged Israel, the United States and other countries not to boycott the conference, saying the hopes of many victims of intolerance could be dashed should differences be allowed to become pretexts for inaction.But Livni on Wednesday urged the international community not to participate in a conference which seeks to legitimise hatred and extremism under the banner of the fight against racism.
Miliband hopes 2009 year of change in Mideast by Jocelyne Zablit – Wed Nov 19, 9:33 am ET
BEIRUT (AFP) – Visiting Foreign Secretary David Miliband said Wednesday he hopes 2009will usher in changes around the globe that will bring about a comprehensive Middle East peace settlement.I think 2009 is going to be a very important year, Miliband told reporters as he wrapped up a brief visit to Lebanon that included meetings with President Michel Sleiman and Prime Minister Fuad Siniora.It is the year of change globally because there is a new American president, there will be a new Israeli government, there will be elections in Lebanon and ... in Iran as well.He urged countries in the region to work seriously toward peace through dialogue rather than violence.Instability in the Middle East has spread and will spread if it is not contained, he warned.Miliband said he had discussed with Lebanese leaders legislative elections planned next spring and the importance of going through with these polls.The world will be watching to see all parties respect the democratic process and ensure that politics and not violence are the basis for the decisions about Lebanon's future, he said.So often in history Lebanon has been the victim of other people's conflicts and we will know that there is a true prospect of lasting peace in the Middle East when Lebanon is no longer the victim of other people's conflicts.Miliband arrived in Beirut on Tuesday following a stop in Damascus where he held talks with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, the first British politician to do so since 2001.He said there was no reason for alarm among anti-Syrian parties in Lebanon over Britain's apparent rapprochement with Damascus.I don't think people should be concerned about dialogue when it is conducted on an honest and serious basis, he said. What I say publicly about the choices that Syria and other countries face and the responsibilities that Syria and other countries have is what I say privately to President Assad and to other leaders.
Syria has faced diplomatic isolation since the 2005 assassination of former Lebanese premier Rafiq Hariri in a massive car bomb. It denies any role in the killing.It has also been shunned by the West because of its ties with Iran, the Palestinian group Hamas and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, considered a terrorist organisation by the US and Britain.Miliband said Britain made a distinction between the military and political wings of Hezbollah, which has one minister in the current government.
It is right to draw that distinction and to emphasise that those who use violence for political ends cannot expect to have the support of the international community, he said.Earlier in his tour of the region, Miliband also travelled to Israel and the West Bank, holding meetings with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas.He last visited Beirut in June following the election of Sleiman and the formation of a national unity government which put an end to an 18-month crippling political crisis that had brought the country close to civil war.
Israel's Netanyahu pushes economic peace plan by Ron Bousso Ron Bousso – Wed Nov 19, 5:59 am ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Israel's hawkish opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday a Palestinian state should only be created once the economy is strengthened, adding that this would be at the heart of his peace plan if he wins February elections.Economic development does not solve problems, it mitigates them and makes them more accessible for solution, and creates a stronger political base, the former prime minister and head of the rightwing Likud party said.He went on to say that his government would continue US-backed peace talks with the Palestinian Authority in an effort to reach an agreement on agreeable issues.Polls project that Likud would gain a slight lead in February 10 elections that were called after Ehud Olmert stepped down as prime minister in September.Netanyahu rejected the current format of the peace process, saying he would not hand over the Palestinians occupied territories before strengthening the West Bank economy, fearing that radical Islamists backed by archfoe Iran would seize power there.Any area that we withdraw from will be taken over by Iran, Netanyahu said in a speech before the General Assembly of North American Jewish communities. All we are doing is creating an additional base for militant Islam.Israel withdrew from the Gaza Strip in 2005, where the Islamist Hamas movement violently ousted forces loyal to secular Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas less than two years later.Netanyahu said that while continuing talks with moderate Palestinians, he would seek to weave an economic peace alongside the political process that gives a stake in peace for the moderate elements in the Palestinian society.The plan will include creating thousands of jobs and the development of infrastructure and the removal of Israeli roadblocks across the West Bank in order to allow Palestinian movement "without impeding Israeli society.
He would also seek to develop three or four joint Israeli-Palestinian economic projects along the West Bank border area with the support of Egypt and Jordan, with which Israel has peace agreements.This is a definite change I intend to introduce into the peace negotiations, the hawkish MP said.But Palestinian prime minister Salam Fayyad has rejected Netanyahu's proposals for an economic solution to the Middle East conflict.Fayyad, a former International Monetary Fund economist, said the conflict was a political one that required a political solution.I am interested not in redefining the occupation but in ending the occupation, he said in an interview published by the Israeli daily Haaretz on Tuesday.
Obama calls Palestinian leader, says peace vital Wed Nov 19, 5:53 am ET
RAMALLAH, West Bank – A Palestinian negotiator says U.S. President-elect Barack Obama has called the Palestinian president and told him that peace is a vital interest for Israelis and Palestinians.Negotiator Saeb Erekat says the phone call took place Tuesday.Erekat says Obama told President Mahmoud Abbas that he will spare no effort to facilitate a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians.A year of U.S.-backed talks has not yielded tangible results and the fate of the negotiations is uncertain.Israel is holding elections in February. Opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu has said he would not continue peace talks in the current format. Also, Abbas faces a new political showdown with rival Hamas in January when the Islamic militants say his term expires.
UN seeks 160 mln dlrs from Gulf Arabs to meet budget deficit Tue Nov 18, 1:43 pm ET AFP – Karen Abu Zayd, commissioner for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian refugees.
AMMAN (AFP) – The cash-strapped UN agency for Palestinian refugees appealed on Tuesday to oil-rich Arab states in the Gulf to help meet a 160-million-dollar projected budget deficit next year.We are making special appeals to our Arab partners in the Gulf, said Karen Abu Zayd, commissioner of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East.We have had very good experiences with Gulf contributors in the past for major projects ... and we hope we will get the same kind of support.Abu Zayd was speaking to reporters after an UNRWA meeting in Amman, but she did not elaborate.According to the agency's website, UNRWA's original budget for 2008 was 504.1 million dollars.In January, the agency appealed to Gulf Arab states to provide nearly 10 million dollars in aid for the besieged Hamas-run Gaza Strip.UNRWA cares for some 4.2 million Palestinian refugees in Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria.
Israel to free 250 Palestinian prisoners by Ezzedine Said Ezzedine Said – Mon Nov 17, 2:35 pm ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Caretaker Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said on Monday that 250 Palestinian prisoners would be freed in a goodwill gesture, as Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas urged Israel to maintain the Gaza truce.The pair met in Jerusalem for the first time in two months, amid rising tension in and around the besieged Gaza Strip where Israeli forces and Palestinian militants have engaged in almost daily tit-for-tat attacks since November 4.Abbas had asked him to free Palestinian prisoners and Olmert told him of the decision to release 250 at the beginning of December, Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat said.In a similar move in August, Israel freed 198 Palestinian prisoners. More than 11,000 Palestinians are still held in Israeli prisons.A senior Israeli official said that none of the prisoners to be freed belongs to radical Palestinian movements such as Hamas, the Islamist movement which seized power in the Gaza Strip in June 2007.Since the Hamas takeover, the secular Abbas has held sway only in the West Bank.But he said that during his talks at Olmert's official residence in Jerusalem, Abbas stressed the need to maintain the truce in Gaza because it eases the suffering of the Palestinian people.He also urged Palestinian militants not to shatter the fragile truce that went into effect in and around Gaza on June 19. In other words, stop the futile rocket firings that don't help the Palestinian cause in any way, Abbas said.Abbas also met British Foreign Secretary David Miliband, who said it was vital the ceasefire be maintained. The discussions you have had today (with Olmert) seem to me to be a very important contribution to that, Miliband told the Palestinian leader.Miliband earlier toured Sderot, an Israeli town which regularly comes under rocket fire from neighbouring Gaza.A flare-up in violence last week prompted Israel to further tighten its blockade and completely seal off the aid-dependent Gaza Strip, though it allowed the delivery of humanitarian supplies on Monday for the first time in almost two weeks.
Olmert told Abbas that Hamas is to blame for violations of the truce in and around the Gaza Strip, and warned that if violence escalates, Israel will have to respond, a senior Israeli official said.On Monday, several rockets fired from Gaza hit southern Israel without causing any casualties.Each side has accused the other of violating the ceasefire in the latest flare-up of violence in which volleys of rockets and mortar rounds have been launched at Israel and 15 Gaza militants killed since November 4.Israel generally responds to the Gaza attacks by tightening the blockade it imposed after the 2007 Hamas takeover, but said it allowed 33 truckloads of humanitarian supplies into the coastal strip on Monday.A UN spokesman said that many more deliveries will be needed in the impoverished and overcrowded territory.
We cannot have another period when people are not getting their food assistance. We cannot allow people to get punished in that way, said Chris Gunness of the UN Works and Relief Agency, which distributes food to 750,000 Gazans -- half the population.
The violence as well as the political and geographical division of the Palestinian territories between Hamas-ruled Gaza and the West Bank under Abbas have complicated the peace process between Israel and the Palestinians. Palestinians and the international community say continued Jewish settlement activity in the Israeli-occupied West Bank is major stumbling block in the talks that were relaunched at a US conference in November 2007 after a seven-year hiatus. I called for a halt to all settlement activity, Abbas said after his talks with Olmert.
Analysis: Hamas, Israel trying to rewrite truce By KARIN LAUB, Associated Press Writer Karin Laub, Associated Press Writer – Mon Nov 17, 3:04 am ET
JERUSALEM – A June truce between Israel and Gaza's Hamas rulers comes up for renewal next month and it looks like both sides are trying to dictate more favorable terms.
That would explain why Israel and Hamas have been trading rocket fire and air strikes for two weeks, even as they keep saying they're interested in a continued cease-fire. But the attempt to establish new ground rules could easily spin out of control, especially if there are civilian casualties.Domestic concerns further complicate the situation.Israel is holding general elections Feb. 10 and the cross-border violence has become campaign fodder.Over the weekend, the hard-line opposition party Likud predictably portrayed the government as weak for not responding more harshly to the rockets. Put on the defensive, the leaders of the ruling Kadima and Labor parties delivered tough speeches, warning Hamas that Israel would strike a punishing blow if necessary.Yet a high-risk Israeli offensive in Gaza seems unlikely ahead of the election. And at a time of political transition in the United States, Israel might not want to start its relationship with Barack Obama in crisis mode.Yet continued rocket fire from Gaza would hurt the election prospects of Kadima and Labor and could turn the public mood against a key election promise of both parties — to keep trying to forge a peace deal with the Palestinians.Hamas, meanwhile, is trying to fend off criticism at home, particularly from smaller militant factions, that it accepted a bad deal and that the cease-fire hasn't improved life in Gaza. The territory has been under an international blockade since the violent June 2007 takeover by Hamas.
The Egyptian-brokered truce took hold June 19 and was to be renewed after six months. The details were never made public, but the general idea was for Israel to allow more goods into Gaza, which has suffered from chronic shortages under the sanctions.This was to be followed by negotiations on the release of an Israeli soldier held by Hamas-allied militants and by the eventual opening of the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt.The truce largely held, though Israel has closed the borders for brief periods in response to occasional rocket or mortar fire from Gaza. But even when the crossings did open, Israel never allowed in more than a trickle of goods. Negotiations over the captured soldier, Gilad Schalit, bogged down and Rafah, Gaza's main gateway, remained closed.
On Nov. 4, this uneasy balance was upset.
Israeli forces moved 300 yards meters into Gaza to destroy a border tunnel dug by militants. Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said at the time that militants' had planned to abduct Israeli soldiers through the tunnel, similar to the 2006 capture of Schalit.However, defense officials acknowledged that Israel also was also trying to send a message that it would not allow Hamas militants to operate close to the border.Hamas responded with barrages of rockets and mortars on Israeli border communities. Israel, in turn, targeted rocket squads with air strikes, killing at least 15 Palestinian militants, including four on Sunday.Israel also stepped up pressure by keeping Gaza's borders closed, causing widespread power cuts, disrupting U.N. food distribution to the needy and drawing international condemnation.Hamas raised the stakes by firing several longer-range Grad rockets at the Israeli city of Ashkelon. By taking aim deeper inside Israel with the deadlier Grads, rather than at small border communities with crude homemade rockets, Hamas was trying to boost its powers of deterrence.The idea is to force the occupier to respect our people's rights and demand and stop all sorts of aggression against our people, said Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum. Israeli critics of the truce have repeatedly warned that Hamas is using the cease-fire to amass weapons via smuggling tunnels and that Israel is losing the ability to take the initiative. Hamas determines the rules of the game, it determines the pace, it decides when to fire rockets on Israeli citizens and how many, Gideon Saar, a senior Likud legislator, told Israel Radio. Still, both sides have an overriding interest in a cease-fire. Hamas needs calm in Gaza as it heads into a political showdown with its rival, moderate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Hamas contends that Abbas' term expires Jan. 8 and says it will install its own president at that time, closing perhaps the last door to the elusive possibility of restoring national unity. Israel, meanwhile, doesn't want to be dragged into a major military offensive in Gaza. Barak that would risk the lives of Israel soldiers for uncertain gains. Reoccupying Gaza would at best bring temporary calm, but more likely bog down his forces without an exit strategy. It would also distract the military from other key challenges, including the threats from Iran and Lebanon's Hezbollah guerrillas. Fiery rhetoric is not a policy, he told his right-wing critics Saturday. Karin Laub has covered the Israeli-Palestinian conflict since 1987.
Israel urges greater force vs Iran nuclear work Mon Nov 17, 1:31 am ET
JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert called on Sunday for a stronger international campaign against Iran's nuclear programme to thwart it with greater force.We must increase our measures to prevent Iran from achieving its devious goals, Olmert said in a speech to Jewish leaders in Jerusalem. Iran cannot become nuclear. Israel cannot afford it ... the free world must not accept it.We must unite our forces as part of the international community, led by the United States of America. We must confront Iran's malevolent diligence and thwart it with greater force.Israel and the West fear Iran may be using its nuclear programme to develop a nuclear weapon, which the Jewish state sees as a potential threat to its existence. Iran says its atomic programme is solely for energy purposes.Israel is widely believed to have the Middle East's only nuclear arsenal, although it has never confirmed nor denied it.Israel has backed Western economic sanctions against Iran but has said it is keeping all options on the table in its bid to halt Iran's nuclear programme.Israeli leaders have voiced concern about U.S. President-elect Barack Obama's stated readiness to seek dialogue either alongside or instead of sanctions as a method of persuading Iran to change its policies.Iran has not terminated its pursuit of nuclear weapons, Olmert said.He also accused the Islamic Republic of continuing to fund Palestinian militants and gunmen in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon.Olmert called for further sanctions against Iran, saying: It must become more costly to Iran to pursue nuclear weapons than to give it up.Olmert resigned as prime minister in September in the heat of a corruption investigation, but is staying on as caretaker prime minister until a new Israeli government can be formed after a February 10 election.(Writing by Allyn Fisher-Ilan; Editing by Janet Lawrence)
