Hamas, pro-al Qaeda group clash in Gaza By Nidal al-Mughrabi – AUG 14,09
GAZA (Reuters) – Islamist radicals from a pan-Arab group defied the Hamas rulers of Gaza Friday by declaring an Islamic emirate,prompting clashes that killed 16 gunmen.
Although Jund Ansar Allah (Warriors of God) rallied only a few hundred men for an event at a Gaza mosque, it marked a clear challenge to Hamas's nationalist brand of Palestinian Islam by groups espousing a pan-Arab militancy aligned with al Qaeda.It was followed by clashes between Hamas policemen and supporters of the leader of the movement in the southern town of Rafah, near the Egyptian border.Medical workers said 16 gunmen, including at least three Hamas policemen, were killed and about 85 people injured.Hamas said its gunmen stormed the movement's stronghold, including the mosque where Abdel-Latif Moussa -- known to followers by the al Qaeda-style nom de guerre Abu al-Nour al-Maqdessi -- had announced before weekly prayers the start of theocratic rule in the Gaza Strip, starting at Rafah.
Hamas also stormed Moussa's house but did not find him.
We declare the birth of the Islamic Emirate,said Maqdessi, a heavily-bearded, middle-aged cleric in a red robe who was guarded by four black-clad, masked men with assault rifles. One wore what appeared to be an explosive suicide belt.An audience of several hundred men filled the mosque with cheers and shouts. Al Qaeda uses the historical term emirate to mean clerical rule across the Islamic world.
ZIONIST PROPAGANDA
Ismail Haniyeh, who heads Gaza's Hamas government, denied in his sermon Friday that any non-Palestinian gunmen were in the territory, as alleged by Israel which says veterans of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have taken up residence.Such groups do not exist on the soil of the Gaza Strip ... there are no fighters in Gaza except Gazan fighters,he said.Such Zionist propaganda from Israel was designed to turn the world against Hamas, he said.Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri called Maqdessi's speech wrong thinking and the Interior Ministry said he was mad.His group announced its presence in Gaza two months ago after three of its members were killed in a border raid on an Israeli base in which gunmen rode on horseback.Outside the mosque Friday, nearly 100 of the group's masked fighters in Pakistani-style dress, and with long hair in a style believed to imitate the Prophet Mohammad, carried automatic weapons and rocket-propelled grenade launchers.Hamas's leaders say it is a moderate movement while independent analysts say it gives priority to Palestinian nationalist goals over the international religious aims that are typical of al Qaeda's network.Israel unilaterally ended its occupation of the Gaza Strip in 2005 and withdrew its forces. Islamist radicals began to surface in Gaza following the takeover of the Israeli-blockaded enclave by Hamas in 2007, when it routed the forces of the secular Fatah movement of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.(Editing by Douglas Hamilton and Andrew Dobbie)
Hezbollah chief: We'll hit Tel Aviv if Beirut hit By SAM F. GHATTAS, Associated Press Writer – AUG 14,09
BEIRUT – The leader of Lebanon's militant Hezbollah warned Israel Friday his fighters would hit Tel Aviv with rockets if Israeli forces attack Beirut or the guerrillas' stronghold in its southern suburbs.Speaking on the anniversary of the end of the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah said the Shiite militants are now capable of striking any Israeli city.In 2006, the Iranian-backed Hezbollah rocketed the port of Haifa and other parts of Israel's north but spared Tel Aviv to the south. Israeli warplanes destroyed entire blocks in Beirut's southern suburbs, including Nasrallah's office and Hezbollah's headquarters. The inconclusive, monthlong war killed about 1,200 people in Lebanon, most of them civilians, and about 160 in Israel.Nasrallah's speech added to the tension of back-and-forth warnings between Hezbollah and Israel that have escalated since a July 14 explosion at a suspected Hezbollah arms depot near the Israeli border.Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday that Israel would hold the Lebanese government responsible for any attacks on Israeli targets by Hezbollah. He warned Lebanon against letting Hezbollah join the new government. He said the government in Beirut could not turn a blind eye to Hezbollah's activities while the group sits in the Lebanese parliament and plays a major role in the country's politics.Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak made an even starker warning last week, saying that in the event of renewed hostilities, Israel would go after not only Hezbollah but the entire state of Lebanon.Nasrallah, appearing on a giant screen from his hiding place, addressed thousands of supporters waving yellow Hezbollah flags who gathered for the rally in south Beirut. He said recent Israeli warnings against Lebanon do not signal that Israel is planning to attack soon.
He said the Israeli warnings were part of a psychological war aimed at preventing the militant group from joining a new Lebanese unity government, whose formation has been stalled since the June 7 election.Today we are capable of striking any city or village in Israel, Nasrallah told the crowd. He promised surprises if Israel launches a new war on Lebanon. He did not elaborate.It is our right to make (Israel) understand that if it bombs Beirut or the southern suburbs, we will strike Tel Aviv, Nasrallah said, drawing the cheers of supporters.The 2006 war began when Hezbollah guerrillas launched a cross-border attack that killed three Israeli soldiers. Hezbollah calls the outcome of the war a divine victory because Israel failed to crush the guerrillas, who withstood massive Israeli airstrikes and artillery bombardment.A U.N.-brokered cease-fire has held despite the threats from both sides.
Hezbollah chief says no war with Israel for now Fri Aug 14, 3:46 pm ET
BEIRUT (AFP) – Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah on Friday said his party stands ready for military confrontation with Israel but downplayed the probability of war in the near future.We do not think there will be a new Israeli war on Lebanon in the near future,he told a crowd of thousands gathered in Beirut's southern suburb, a stronghold of the Shiite group, to mark the third anniversary of the end of the summer war with Israel.Today we are in a better situation than we were three years ago,he said, referring to Syria, Iran, Hezbollah and the Palestinian Hamas movement.We do not want war, but we are not afraid of it and we say to you: if you bomb Beirut or its suburb, we will bomb Tel Aviv,Nasrallah said in the televised speech, adding that Hezbollah now has the capacity to strike any area in Israel.
Israel's 33-day war with Hezbollah in the summer of 2006 resulted in the deaths of more than 1,200 Lebanese civilians, a third of them children, as well as 160 Israelis, mostly soldiers.The conflict destroyed much of the country's major infrastructure and targeted Hezbollah strongholds in southern Lebanon and the southern suburb of Beirut before ending with a UN-brokered ceasefire on August 14, 2006.On Monday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned that the Lebanese government would be held responsible for any new attacks against Israel coming from its territory if the Shiite group was included in the cabinet.But Nasrallah said Netanyahu's warnings only amounted to psychological warfare and served to sow discord among Lebanese parties and hinder the formation of a cabinet.Seven weeks after the start of negotiations on a new Lebanese government, rival parties agreed on the number of ministers each political bloc will have but still disagree over who will get such key portfolios as foreign affairs, finance, interior and telecommunications.
Palestinian Fatah elects new party assembly Fri Aug 14, 9:02 am ET
BETHLEHEM, West Bank, Aug 14 - (Reuters) – Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah faction elected a new party assembly on Friday, in a further move to rejuvenate the movement after overhauling its main executive body this week.Some 600 candidates competed for 80 open places on the 128-seat Revolutionary Council at Fatah's first congress in 20 years, which began in Bethlehem on Aug 4.The Revolutionary Council, which convenes every three months, is charged with implementing resolutions of the congress and monitoring the performance of the Central Committee.Preliminary results indicated that Fatah's younger generation in their 40s would win places.Election officials said they had counted more than 70 percent of the vote and expected to finish the process around midnight, announcing final results on Saturday.Abbas on Thursday announced a Central Committee lineup that included several younger members and unseated a number of veteran old guard contemporaries of the late Yasser Arafat.
Palestinians of the diaspora came to Bethlehem from more than 80 countries for the 44-year-old movement's first convention on home soil.Fatah members believe their secular, Western-backed group is now better placed to seek reconciliation with the rival, Islamist group Hamas which controls the Gaza Strip, restoring some unity to the divided Palestinian nationalist cause.Reinforcement of Fatah, battered in parliamentary polls by Hamas in 2006 because of its perceived corruption, cronyism and complacency, may also strengthen Abbas's hand in talks with Israel as U.S. President Barack Obama readies a new peace plan.(Writing by Mohammed Assadi; Editing by Douglas Hamilton and Samia Nakhoul)
U.N. rights chief slams Israel over Gaza violations Fri Aug 14, 7:18 am ET
GENEVA (Reuters) – There is significant evidence that Israeli forces violated international law and human rights in their invasion of Gaza between late December and mid-January, the United Nations human rights chief said Friday.A report by U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay lambasted the nearly total impunity for the violations.The already critical human rights situation in the occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) deteriorated further during the war, she said in the report, the first of a series of periodic reports ordered by the U.N. Human Rights Council in January during Israel's Operation Cast Lead.The 34-page report is one of two -- together with a forthcoming one by South African jurist Richard Goldstone who has been conducting hearings in Gaza -- that will be presented to the council next month..significant prima facie evidence indicates that serious violations of international humanitarian law as well as gross human rights violations occurred during the military operations of 27 December 2008 to 18 January 2009, which were compounded by the blockade that the population of Gaza endured in the months prior to Operation Cast Lead and which continues,Pillay said.Pillay said rights violations included arbitrary detention, torture and ill-treatment, extrajudicial execution, forced eviction and home demolition, settlement expansion and related violence and restrictions on freedom of movement and expression.While these violations are of deep concern in their own right, the nearly total impunity that persists for such violations (regardless of the responsible duty bearer) is of grave concern, and constitutes a root cause for their persistence,the former South African high court judge said.
Pillay's recommendations included the following:-- Israel should lift the blockade of Gaza and restrictions on movement in and out of the West Bank, which amount to illegal collective punishment.-- Allegations of violations of humanitarian law and human rights during the Gaza war should be investigated by independent bodies, and victims should have the right to reparations.-- Israel should tackle impunity for violations, and curb its use of the military justice system, which does not meet international standards.-- Israel should end the illegal expansion of settlements in the occupied territory, halt evictions and demolitions of Palestinian homes, and end settler violence.Unlike rulings of the U.N. Security Council, the findings and recommendations of the Human Rights Council are not binding.Islamic and African countries, backed by Russia, China, Cuba and Nicaragua, currently have a majority on the 47-member council, which has spent more time on Israel/Palestine than on any other issue since being set up three years ago.(For Pillay's full report go to http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/hrcouncil/docs/12session/A%20HRC%2012%2037_AEV.pdf )(Reporting by Jonathan Lynn; Editing by Stephanie Nebehay)
Israeli diplomat keeps job after warning about US ties Thu Aug 13, 2:36 pm ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – An Israeli diplomat will keep his job after being reprimanded over a memo he wrote warning that government policy on settlements was harming the country's ties with the United States, a ministry official said on Thursday.Boston Consul General Nadav Tamir had been recalled for consultations after the memo criticising policy on Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank was leaked to Israeli media.The ministry's director General Yossi Gal made it clear to Tamir that he should not have distributed the memo as widely as he did within the ministry and Tamir expressed regret for having done so, the source said.On Monday, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman was quoted by his spokesman as saying that anyone who disagrees with, and is uncomfortable with, government policies can resign.Privately owned Channel 10 television reported last week that Tamir had warned that the refusal of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's right-wing government to heed US requests to freeze settlement activity was harming Israel's most important diplomatic relationship.The row over settlement activity in the West Bank, including annexed Arab east Jerusalem, has brought Israel's relations with its key ally to their lowest ebb in years.The Palestinians have refused to resume peace talks with Israel until it follows through with its undertakings under the US-sponsored process to freeze all settlement activity.
Israel rejects Sarkozy call to free prisoner Thu Aug 13, 11:44 am ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected on Thursday a call by French President Nicolas Sarkozy to free a Palestinian-French man jailed for plotting to kill a prominent rabbi, a government source said.The prime minister decided to reject the demand for the release of this Palestinian, the official said, adding that the man never expressed regret.Sarkozy recently sent a letter to the hawkish premier requesting the release of Salah Khamuri, a resident of annexed Arab east Jerusalem who carries a French passport. France asked for Khamuri's seven-year sentence to be cut by a third for good behavior.Khamuri was arrested in 2005 and convicted of plotting to assassinate Rabbi Ovadia Yossef, the spiritual leader of the powerful ultra-Orthodox Shas party, currently a member of Netanyahu's governing coalition.
Abbas rules out talks unless Israel halts settlements by Hossam Ezzedine – Thu Aug 13, 10:45 am ET
RAMALLAH, West Bank (AFP) – Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas on Thursday ruled out resuming peace talks with Israel unless it stops settlement building and insisted on the Palestinians' right to legitimate resistance.Abbas made the comments during the inaugural meeting of the new 23-member Central Committee his Fatah party elected during its first convention in two decades.He said negotiations with Israel would only resume on the basis of commitments made by both sides ... particularly a halt to all forms of settlement activity without exception in Jerusalem and the rest of the occupied territories.The US-backed leader welcomed the efforts of President Barack Obama and his insistance on the need to create a Palestinian state and to totally halt settlement activity.Israel's hawkish Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has risked a rift with Washington by refusing to heed calls to freeze building of settlements, which the international community considers illegal and a major hurdle in Middle East peace efforts.Earlier, the head of a delegation of US Democratic members of Congress blamed the Palestinians for failing to hold talks with Israel, calling it the largest thing impeding the peace process.I think the largest thing impeding the negotiations at this point is simply the unwillingness of Abbas to sit down (with the Israelis),House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer told reporters in Jerusalem.Abbas also stressed that while the Palestinians remain committed to peace, they also reserve the right to use legitimate resistance, guaranteed under international law against the Israeli occupation.A resolution with a similar wording was adopted during the Fatah congress, which opened August 4 and was due to formally conclude after officials announce later Thursday or Friday election results for its 120-member Revolutionary Council.
Abbas hailed the gathering as a huge success.This congress marks the beginning of a reform and renewal process within Fatah,said Abbas, who was confirmed as party leader during the congress in the occupied West Bank town of Bethlehem.The 2,000 delegates renewed Fatah's Central Committee in an election seen as an injection of fresh blood that could revive the Palestinian party founded by the iconic leader Yasser Arafat half a century ago to pursue independence, a movement that has lost much of its clout in recent years.Marwan Barghuti, a popular militant leader, was among those elected to the Central Committee, even though he is serving five life sentences in Israel for his role in deadly attacks.Top Palestinian negotiator and former prime minister Ahmed Qorei, who lost his seat on the committee, claimed interventions sullied the balloting.He told the London-based Al-Quds Al-Arabi newspaper he formally complained to the Fatah leadership not only against the results but also against the entire process of elections.The daily also cited Qorei -- who served as chief negotiator during the Annapolis peace talks in 2007 and 2008 -- as saying he no longer believes a two-state solution to the Middle East conflict is realistic.Such a solution is quasi-impossible. How can there be a state whose borders are not defined, whose territory is cut up by settlements,he said.The talks he chaired were launched under US sponsorship in November 2007 but the Palestinians suspended the process during Israel's war on the Hamas movement in Gaza at the turn of the year.Abbas played down the criticism and ruled out any break-up of the party.
US delegates blame Palestinians for no peace talks Thu Aug 13, 3:47 am ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – The head of a delegation of US Democratic members of Congress blamed the Palestinians on Thursday for failing to hold talks with Israel, calling it the largest thing impeding the peace process.I think the largest thing impeding the negotiations at this point is simply the unwillingness of (Palestinian president Mahmud) Abbas to sit down (with the Israelis),House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer told reporters in Jerusalem.Abbas has refused to meet with Israel's new right-leaning government until the Jewish state ceases all settlement construction in the occupied West Bank in line with repeated demands from the White House.Hoyer however said the issue of settlements should be addressed through direct negotiations and said if he had met Abbas during his delegation's week-long visit to the region, he would have asked him to drop preconditions.The United States' policy has been for a stop to any additional settlements. That is a thorny, tough issue... It's an issue that has to be solved at the negotiating table,he said.The delegation of 29 congressional Democrats met several senior Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as well as Palestinian prime minister Salam Fayyad.Hoyer said a scheduled meeting with Abbas had been cancelled because it conflicted with the Palestinian leader's Fatah party congress.Senior US Republican Congressman Eric Cantor, who visited Israel a week ago at the head of a similar delegation, also blamed the Palestinians for the stalled talks and criticised the US administration's focus on settlements.Israel and the Palestinians relaunched peace talks at a US conference in November 2007 but the Palestinians suspended the negotiations during Israel's three-week war on the Hamas movement in Gaza at the turn of the year.US President Barack Obama has called on both sides to return to the negotiating table while ramping up pressure on Israel to halt settlement construction, including the so-called natural growth of existing settlements.Netanyahu has said his government will not approve the building of new settlements but will continue to allow construction in existing ones.
Palestinian PM Fayyad seen at risk to new Fatah By Douglas Hamilton and Mohammed Assadi – Wed Aug 12, 10:30 am ET
RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) – Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, an independent technocrat favored by the West, may face pressure to cede his post to a figure from the resurgent Fatah movement, political sources said on Wednesday.Western diplomats said this might be one outcome of Fatah's landmark congress in Bethlehem, its first in 20 years and first on Palestinian soil, which senior figures say has strengthened the movement and its leader, President Mahmoud Abbas.This has always been on the cards. It remains to be seen what the president wants,said a Western diplomat.Remember, it's a caretaker government and it's entirely up to Abbas.A senior Fatah official speaking on condition of anonymity said it would be natural to review Fatah's position now that we have a new leadership (with) the right to reconsider its representatives in the government.Many in Fatah have been irked by Abbas's reliance on Fayyad, a former International Monetary Fund official, and complain budget cuts have hit the party and its loyalists.Fayyad's supporters, including Western aid donors, say the premier has curbed corruption and waste that Fatah's critics say were the hallmarks of its earlier rule.A source close to the prime minister said: The government should enjoy the official support of the biggest party.This means that the government may be changed, reshuffled or stay. But at the end of the day, the government should be publicly backed by the ruling party, not only by (Abbas).A second diplomatic source said rumors of Fayyad's likely replacement were merely background chatter prompted by shifting political fortunes at the congress, and predicted no change of prime minister.Fayyad had tendered his resignation in March, apparently partly in frustration at opposition from Fatah. But Abbas refused and confirmed him in the premiership in May, heading a cabinet with more Fatah representation. There were simply no credible alternatives to Fayyad, the second diplomat said.
STIR THINGS UP
The congress, now in its ninth day, was still counting votes on Wednesday for seats on the movement's general assembly, called the Revolutionary Council. Abbas, 74, was expected to hold a news conference once results were final.Fayyad, 57, has headed the caretaker Palestinian Authority government for the past two years, since Abbas dismissed an elected, Hamas-led government following fighting in the Gaza Strip in which the Islamists defeated Fatah-led forces.He is rejected outright as a Western puppet by the Islamist Hamas movement which runs the Gaza Strip and is Fatah's main political rival for dominance of the Palestinian cause.Some commentators say the forced retirement of several of Fatah's old guard who lost to younger generation leaders in the convention's ballot for a new Central Committee could breath new life into so far vain efforts to reconcile the two groups.Others point out, however, that the new faces on the top executive body are, nonetheless, veterans of the upper reaches of a long dominant party whose critics blame it for corruption, poor governance and a failure to win statehood for Palestinians.Fayyad has no significant power base of his own but is popular for his grass-roots engagement. Hamas would welcome his removal at any time. They consider him an obstacle to dialogue because of his security crackdown on Hamas in the West Bank.Fayyad's government has made progress in key areas. Public finance, once in chaos, is now up to international standards, he says. There is also better security in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, with U.S.-backed police helping curb crime and persuade Israel to ease some restrictions on movement.Fatah stalwarts attacked Fayyad for a June 22 keynote speech which they said exceeded his authority.Fayyad defended his outlook in an interview with Reuters on June 29, saying it was time for Palestinian leaders to stir things up and get on with building the independent state they seek, instead of waiting for a peace agreement with Israel.(Editing by Alastair Macdonald)
Abbas strengthened by Fatah conference by Hossam Ezzedine – Tue Aug 11, 1:16 pm ET
RAMALLAH, West Bank (AFP) – Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas emerged strengthened from his Fatah party convention at a time reconciliation talks with arch-rival Hamas and peace efforts with Israel are bogged down.Fatah unanimously voting to retain him as its leader, while rejuvenating the governing body in a separate vote at the congress in the occupied West Bank city of Bethlehem.Weakened by internal divisions, Fatah managed to put on a show of unity just by holding the convention, its first in 20 years.In the five years since taking over at the death of Fatah founder and iconic Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, Abbas has tightened his grip on a party known for indiscipline and still struggling to make the transition from a liberation movement to a governing political party.The political programme adopted by the congress reiterates the right of Palestinians to resist the Israeli occupation while also backing efforts for peace with the Jewish state, now deadlocked.During the congress, several members of the governing Central Committee stepped aside or were voted out to make way for younger men, including Marwan Barghuthi, who is behind bars for conducting deadly attacks in Israel.Two powerful Abbas allies were also among those elected to the committee -- former Palestinian internal security chief Jibril Rajub and Fatah's former strongman in the Gaza Strip, Mohammed Dahlan.Abbas treated this congress as a battlefield. He led with success and emerged victorious, said political analyst Abdelmajid Soweillem.I believe the new Fatah leadership will be inclined to support political negotiations with Israel and dialogue with Hamas,he added.
Samir Awad, who teaches political science at Bir-Zeit University in the West Bank, concurs.The new team includes many people who are close to Abbas and who at some stage or other worked with him,he said.Awad is convinced that by successfully leading the convention, despite heated debates and sharp attacks on the current leadership, Abbas pulled Fatah out of the intensive care unit.While Dahlan is a Hamas nemesis, Awad doesn't believe his presence on the Central Committee will affect a dialogue with the Islamists since other members are in favour of such talks, including Abbas himself.Another analyst, Hani Al-Masri, believes Abbas will have more room to manoeuvre both in domestic and international policies under the new leadership.He says Abbas now has several options on how to deal with Israel, as some members of the new committee support peace talks and others oppose them.The situation is similar regarding efforts at reconciliation with Hamas, the Islamist movement that seized control of Gaza in June 2007 by ousting Fatah forces after a week of deadly clashes.
While some have an intransigent line towards Hamas, most of the new members of the Central Committee, particularly those who scored best, are favourable to a dialogue that will produce results,said Masri.
Netanyahu warns Lebanon over Hezbollah power-share By Dan Williams – Mon Aug 10, 5:18 pm ET
JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel will hold Lebanon responsible for any future Hezbollah attack should the Iranian- and Syrian-backed militia be brought into Beirut's incoming government, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday.Though U.S.-backed Lebanese Prime Minister-designate Saad al-Hariri bested Hezbollah in a June ballot, he is holding talks on a new coalition expected to include the Shi'ite group and its allies. Hezbollah has a minister in the outgoing cabinet.Israel fought Hezbollah in its southern Lebanese bastions in a 2006 war but has accused the guerrillas of rearming under the noses of U.N. peacekeepers and plotting attacks on Israelis to avenge the assassination of a top militia leader last year.Some analysts believe that Israel, which has hinted it could attack arch-foe Iran's nuclear facilities, also wants to blunt Hezbollah's ability to serve as a retaliatory arm of Tehran.If Hezbollah joins the Lebanese government as an official entity, let it be clear that the Lebanese government, as far as we are concerned, is responsible for any attack -- any attack -- from its area on the state of Israel,Netanyahu told reporters.It cannot hide and say: It's Hezbollah, we don't control them.Triggered by Hezbollah's capture of two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border raid, the 2006 summer war exacted a heavy toll on Lebanese infrastructure. Some 1,200 people in Lebanon, mostly civilians, and 158 Israelis, mostly soldiers, were killed.
BORDERLINE CALM
Israel credits the offensive with keeping the border largely quiet since, but Hezbollah has said it is ready to fight again and is determined to hit back for the February 12, 2008 killing of its military mastermind, Imad Moughniyeh, in a Damascus car-bombing.Israel denied involvement in that slaying, and has warned that Hezbollah and Lebanon would bear the consequences for any reprisals against Israelis abroad.
Netanyahu's threat followed similar comments by the Israeli defense minister and deputy foreign minister in recent days. The spiraling rhetoric has stirred speculation on both sides of the frontier that a fresh conflict could be in the making.Senior Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hashim Safieddin said on Sunday that if Israel attacked Lebanon again, the group's response would make the 2006 war seem like a joke,Lebanese media reported.Underlining the point Monday, deputy Hezbollah leader Sheikh Naim Kassem said Israel would face a heavy price if it attacked.They know that we now are in a better position (than before) and in an excellent state of readiness, he told the group's al-Manar television station.Asked about Netanyahu's remarks, Deputy Israeli Prime Minister Dan Meridor said they were intended to preserve the quiet through deterrence. But he also made clear that Israel regards its neighbor as a potential Iranian proxy.Hezbollah is a terror organization that has become a semi-army. Basically, it is a branch of Iran on our northern border, with Syria's consent and with Lebanon's consent. This is not a healthy phenomenon,Meridor told Israel Radio.Assumed to have the Middle East's only atomic arsenal, Israel has questioned the efficacy of U.S.-led efforts to curb Iran's nuclear program through diplomacy. Iran denies seeking the bomb but has stoked regional jitters with virulently anti-Israel statements and support for Hezbollah and Palestinian Islamist militants similarly arrayed against the Jewish state.(Additional reporting by Tom Perry in Beirut; Editing by Charles Dick)
US senators press Obama on Arab peace role Mon Aug 10, 4:54 pm ET
WASHINGTON (AFP) – President Barack Obama should press Arab leaders for dramatic gestures on behalf of Middle East peace, an overwhelming majority of US senators said in a letter made public on Monday.We would like to understand what steps you are urging Arab states to take and what your expectations are from Arab states in the coming weeks and months, more than 70 of the 100 senators said in the message to the president.We also hope that you will continue to press Arab leaders to consider dramatic gestures toward Israel similar to those taken previously by brave leaders like King Hussein of Jordan and Anwar El-Sadat of Egypt.They were referring to Sadat's historic 1977 visit to Jerusalem and the king's opening of direct Jordan-Israel ties.Senate Democratic Majority Leader Harry Reid and Senate Republican Minority Leader Mitch McConnell both signed the message, which was drafted by Republican Senator James Risch of Idaho and Democratic Senator Evan Bayh of Indiana.
The letter came as Israel's ultra-nationalist foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, warned against attempting to impose a Middle East peace deal, saying the most peace talks can achieve for the coming year is improving security and the Palestinian economy.The US lawmakers also urged Arab leaders to end the Arab League boycott of Israel, meet openly with Israeli officials, boost trade relations with Israel, issue visas to Israeli citizens and invite Israelis to take part in academic and professional conferences, as well as sporting events.We also believe that Arab states must immediately and permanently end official propaganda campaigns which demonize Israel and Jews,they wrote.
Palestinians get EU, Saudi aid worth $255 mln Mon Aug 10, 3:33 pm ET
RAMALLAH, West Bank (AFP) – The cash-strapped Palestinian Authority has received 255 million dollars in aid from Saudi Arabia and the European Union, prime minister Salam Fayyad said on Monday.Oil-rich Saudi Arabia has ordered the transfer of 200 million dollars the Palestinian Authority, Fayyad told reporters at a ceremony during which the EU signed over to the Palestinians 39 million euros (55 million dollars).Fayyad said the Saudi aid was part of a one-billion-dollar financial assistance package pledged in January by Saudi King Abdullah to help the Palestinians deal with a steep financial crisis.I received a call from the Saudi finance minister, Ibrahim al-Assaf, who informed me of King Abdullah's decision to order the transfer of 200 million dollars to the Palestinian Authority's treasury, Fayyad said.The Palestinian Authority received pledges totalling some 12 billion dollars from international conferences in Paris in 2007 and Sharm el-Sheikh in March this year.But Fayyad has repeatedly complained that international donors have been slow to hand over the promised cash due to the political deadlock in the Middle East.During a visit to Norway in June he said that the PA needs 50 million dollars in international aid per month.And in May the Western-backed Palestinian Authority was forced to take out bank loans worth 530 million dollars to cover its operations.The latest EU aid brings to 207 million euros (around 293 million dollars) the total assistance received by the Palestinians from Europe since the beginning of the year.According to Fayyad, the Palestinian Authority has received a total of 703 million dollars since the beginning of 2009 in international aid, excluding the 200 million dollars announced Monday by Saudi Arabia.US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced on July 24 that the United States had given 200 million dollars to the Palestinian Authority -- part of a 900-million-dollar aid package announced in March.
China urges more global effort for Mideast peace Mon Aug 10, 2:57 pm ET
AMMAN (AFP) – China said on Monday the international community should lend more support to Israel and the Palestinians to help them resume peace talks and end their conflict.A two-state solution does not only require efforts by Israel and the Palestinians, it also needs more international support to help resume peace negotiations as soon as possible,visiting Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi told his Jordanian counterpart Nasser Judeh at a meeting, according to a statement.China backs all efforts to create a suitable environment for a just and comprehensive peace in the Middle East.The Jordanian foreign ministry statement said Judeh and Yang stressed that peace efforts should lead to serious negotiations.China plays a key role in supporting the Middle East peace process,said Judeh, whose country signed a peace treaty with Israel in 1994.Israel's Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman warned on Monday against attempting to impose a Middle East deal, saying the most peace talks can achieve in coming years is to improve security and the Palestinian economy.US President Barack Obama has vowed to work vigorously to end the decades-old conflict and his administration is attempting to put the faltering Middle East peace talks back on track.
Mideast peace unlikely in coming years: Israeli FM by Leigh Baldwin – Mon Aug 10, 10:58 am ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Israel's foreign minister warned on Monday against attempting to impose a Middle East deal, saying the most peace talks can achieve for the coming year is improving security and the Palestinian economy.The Palestinians' radical and uncompromising positions on Jerusalem, the right of return and the settlement blocs create an unbridgeable gap between us and them,Avigdor Lieberman told a delegation of US Democratic lawmakers.Therefore, Israeli policy must be based on reality and not illusion while maintaining the dialogue between us and the Palestinians, improving security arrangements and the economic condition of the Palestinians.This is the maximum we can reach in the coming years,Lieberman's office quoted the ultra-nationalist minister as saying.US President Barack Obama has vowed to work vigorously to end the decades-old conflict and his administration is attempting to put the faltering Middle East peace talks back on track following their suspension in December.The United States is also putting heavy pressure on hawkish Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to freeze settlement construction in the occupied West Bank -- a key Palestinian demand for talks to resume.
But Lieberman warned against any attempt to impose a peace deal.
Any other extravagant goal such as imposing an agreement that is limited in time, would again end in failure, disappointment and even confrontation, he told the US delegation.This is a realistic policy and all the rest is spin, public relations and lack of understanding of the processes taking place at this time.Lieberman on Monday also lashed out at Nadav Tamir, Israel's consul in Boston who had warned in a leaked memo that the government's policies on settlements were harming ties with the United States.Anyone who disagrees with, and is uncomfortable with government policies can resign,his spokesman quoted him as saying.Washington has repeatedly called for a total freeze on Jewish settlement construction.Last week Israel drew the ire of US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton after two Palestinian families were evicted from their homes in the Sheikh Jarrah area of east Jerusalem.President Shimon Peres later told the delegation Israel had agreed to stop building new settlements and that the only unresolved issue was construction within the bounds of those already there.The only point where we disagree with America is on building in existing settlements,he said.I believe this is negotiable.Peres also said Israel and the Palestinians were for now incapable of agreeing over key sticking point Jerusalem.I know that there is a solution for Jerusalem for the future,he said.But right now we cannot achieve it.
Israel occupied east Jerusalem in the 1967 Six-Day War and later annexed it, but the Palestinians see the city as the capital of their future state. Interior Minister Eli Yishai said, however, that Israel must continue building in settlements on the outskirts of Jerusalem.I hope we can convince the Americans to allow this construction,Yishai told reporters.
Israeli jets bomb Gaza tunnel in retaliation Mon Aug 10, 10:54 am ET
GAZA CITY (AFP) – Israeli warplanes struck the Gaza Strip on Monday near the southern city of Rafah, hours after at least three mortar rounds were fired into Israel, Palestinians and the army said.In the first air strike against the Gaza Strip since June 14, Israeli warplanes bombed an area where tunnels are known to run under the border to Egypt to evade the Israeli blockade of the Palestinian territory.An Israeli army spokeswoman confirmed the attack, saying a smuggling tunnel had been targeted.
The mortar attacks Sunday targeted the Karni and Erez border crossings between the Gaza Strip and Israel, and caused no casualties or damage.Later on Monday Palestinians fired another mortar shell against southern Israel, an Israeli army spokesman said, adding that it landed in an open area, causing no damage.Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has warned several times in recent weeks that the Israeli army would respond to each rocket or shell fired into Israel.According to the army more than 200 rockets and shells have been fired from Gaza since Israel's 22-day offensive against the Hamas rulers of the territory in December and January.
Operation Cast Lead, which led to more than 1,400 Palestinian deaths and devastated swathes of the coastal strip, was officially aimed at ending the firing of rockets from Gaza.
Friday, August 14, 2009
Sunday, August 09, 2009
ISRAEL SUMMONS US ENVOY OVER SETTLEMENTS
Israel summons U.S. envoy over settlement dispute By Allyn Fisher-Ilan – Sun Aug 9, 6:38 pm ET
JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel summoned one of its diplomats from the United States on Sunday after he circulated a memorandum accusing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government of doing strategic damage to ties with Washington.Israel's Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon said a disciplinary measure was being taken with the Israeli consul in Boston, Nadav Tamir, after publication last week of his very regrettable memorandum.Tamir's criticism appeared in a brief intended for internal circulation and was leaked in a Thursday newscast by Israel's Channel 10 television, which quoted him as saying differences with Washington over Jewish settlements had hurt relations.
The settlement issue has opened a rift between Israel and its main ally, with Netanyahu resisting President Barack Obama's calls to freeze the expansion of enclaves Israel has built in territory it captured in a 1967 war.Western-backed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has said that peace negotiations, stalled since December, cannot resume until settlement activity ceases in the occupied West Bank.
Tamir wrote that Israel's handling of the dispute was doing strategic damage to its ties with Washington and had given Israel a negative opinion rating in the United States, similar to those of Iran and North Korea.Ayalon said any friction with Washington had declined in the past several months, with frequent contacts between Obama's Middle East envoy George Mitchell, who has been holding talks with Israeli and Palestinian leaders to resume negotiations.Taking the rare step of dressing down a diplomat publicly, Ayalon told Army Radio no decision had been made as to whether Tamir should be dismissed.Ayalon said Tamir's document was not the work of a professional,contained more opinion than data. He called Boston, a liberal bastion, a bubble,unrepresentative of other U.S. regions where Ayalon insisted support for Israel had grown.
NETANYAHU: WE WON'T REPEAT GAZA ERROR
Netanyahu, who has said he wouldn't build additional settlements but wants to continue construction in existing enclaves to accommodate what he calls natural growth, said Sunday he would not remove any settlements before a peace deal.Remarking on the fourth anniversary since a Gaza pullout when Israel removed some 9,000 Jewish settlers and soldiers from the Gaza Strip and northern West Bank, Netanyahu told cabinet ministers we will not repeat this mistake.Netanyahu said Israel's withdrawal from coastal Gaza had not brought about peace and led ultimately to Iranian-backed Hamas Islamists who reject Israel's existence, to seize control.Israel has kept up an economic blockade of the coastal territory since shortly after the withdrawal, following Hamas' rise to power after a 2006 election. Palestinians say the policy creates hardship for many of the 1.5 million who live in Gaza.Some 500,000 Israelis live in the settlements built in occupied territory that is home to some 3 million Palestinians. The World Court has ruled that the settlements are illegal. Israel disputes this.
Israel PM vows never to evict settlers Sun Aug 9, 11:07 am ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pledged on Sunday that he will never evict Jewish settlers from occupied Palestinian land as Israel did in 2005 in the Gaza Strip.The withdrawal from the Gaza Strip brought us neither peace nor security. The territory has become a base for the pro-Iranian Hamas movement and we will never make the same mistake again,Netanyahu said at the weekly cabinet meeting.
We will not evict any more people from their homes,he added in comments carried by public radio.In September 2005, the government of prime minister Ariel Sharon unilaterally removed all Jewish settlements from Gaza in a move aimed at ending Israel's costly 38-year military presence in the Gaza Strip.Sharon vowed to follow up that withdrawal with further pullbacks from the West Bank, but a massive stroke incapacitated him and his successor Ehud Olmert abandoned the policy in the wake of the June 2006 capture of an Israeli soldier by Gaza-based militants in a deadly cross-border raid.An opinion poll published on Sunday showed Israeli Jews back Netanyahu's stance against halting construction of settlements in occupied territory, with 66 percent endorsing his view that Israel has the right to build in east Jerusalem, which Palestinians want as the capital of their proposed state.The survey of 512 people by Tel Aviv University's BI Cohen Institute found that only 27 percent of Israeli Jews, mostly supporters of the leftwing Meretz and Labour parties, oppose Netanyahu?s position.Netanyahu has risked a rift with Israel's strongest ally, the United States, by refusing to heed Washington's calls to freeze building of settlements, which the international community considers illegal.Deputy Foreign Minister Dany Ayalon on Sunday rejected UN protests against last week's expulsion of two Palestinian families from their homes in occupied east Jerusalem.In a meeting with UN Middle East envoy Robert Serry, Ayalon told him the expulsion followed a decision in an Israeli court and that Israeli jurisdiction applied to the entire city, a senior diplomat told AFP.On August 2 club-wielding Israeli riot police evicted two Palestinian families from their houses in Jerusalem's Sheikh Jarrah district.US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the European Union condemned the evictions, which followed an announcement by Israel that it planned to build Jewish homes in the Arab neighborhood.Israel annexed the eastern part of the city in 1967 but Israeli sovereignty over the conquered territory has not been recognised internationally.Around 200,000 Jewish people are estimated to have moved into the dozen or so Israeli settlements in east Jerusalem, home to 270,000 Palestinians.
Jewish Israelis back PM on settlements: poll Sun Aug 9, 8:37 am ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Two thirds of Jewish Israelis support the government's refusal to freeze settlement building in Israeli-occupied east Jerusalem, a poll showed on Sunday.Sixty-six percent endorsed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu?s view that Israel has the right to build anywhere in Jerusalem, according to Ephraim Yaar and Tamar Hermann, two professors who carried out the survey.Only 27 percent of Israeli Jews, most of them supporters of the leftwing Meretz and Labour parties, opposed Netanyahu?s position.Netanyahu has risked a rift with Israel's strongest ally, the United States, by refusing to heed Washington's calls to freeze building in the occupied territories, which the international community considers illegal.Despite the diplomatic tensions, 53 percent of those polled backed the prime minister's foreign policy, compared with 33 percent who judged it negatively.Forty-six percent of respondents viewed US President Barack Obama as biased towards the Palestinians, while 31 percent saw his stance as neutral. Only seven percent perceived Obama as favouring Israel.However, 38 percent of Jewish Israelis now say they trust the president, up from 26 percent two months ago.Tel Aviv University's BI Cohen Institute polled 512 Israelis by telephone on July 27 and July 28. The poll has a margin of error of 4.5 percent.
Israel warns Hezbollah over assassination report By Dan Williams – Sun Aug 9, 8:34 am ET
JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel will hold Lebanese guerrilla group Hezbollah and Lebanon itself responsible for any attempt to assassinate Israelis abroad, and will retaliate, Israel's deputy foreign minister said Sunday.Hezbollah blamed Israel for the Feb 12, 2008 killing of its military mastermind, Imad Moughniyeh, in Syria and vowed revenge. Israel has since reported failed bids by Hezbollah agents to target its citizens in Africa and Central Asia.An Egyptian newspaper Saturday reported the capture of several men linked to al Qaeda -- an exclusively Sunni Muslim group -- intent on assassinating Israel's ambassador to Cairo.But Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon said the alleged plot was certainly the work of Iranian-backed, Shi'ite Hezbollah.And I have one message here: If, God forbid, one hair falls off the head of any Israeli representative abroad, or of even an Israeli who is not an official representative, tourists, etc., we will consider Hezbollah responsible,he told Israel Radio.The outcome, for Hezbollah, will, I think, be of the utmost gravity,Ayalon said.For Lebanon too.It is important ... to relay this warning to Lebanon, which is responsible for Hezbollah -- that they will suffer the consequences if they carry out assassinations of Israelis.Egypt's independent daily Al Masry Al Youm reported that the al Qaeda-linked men had been arrested and confessed to monitoring the Israeli embassy and ambassador's house with a view to killing him, but had been foiled by tight security.Egyptian officials could not immediately be reached for comment and the report could not be independently confirmed.
Hezbollah had no comment on Ayalon's remarks.
Asked how he could assert that it was Hezbollah who were behind the plot rather than al Qaeda, Ayalon told Israel Radio:I don't want to get into the intelligence or operational issues here, but certainly there is both an ideological connection and a professional connection of sorts here.Al Qaeda, which follows Osama bin Laden's strict interpretation of Sunni militant Islam, considers Shi'ites heretics. The group is widely blamed for deadly attacks against Shi'ites in Iraq and it has repeatedly criticized Hezbollah. Hezbollah in turn regularly condemns al Qaeda for its attacks against Iraqis.Egypt, one of two Arab countries to have made peace with the Jewish state, sent shockwaves across the Middle East in April by accusing Hezbollah of planning attacks against Israeli targets on Egyptian soil.Hezbollah denied that charge, saying only that it had run agents in the Egyptian Sinai to provide arms and other support to Palestinians in the neighboring Gaza Strip.Israel drove Hezbollah from its southern Lebanon strongholds in a 2006 war but has since complained that the militia has been secretly regrouping, despite a beefed-up U.N. peacekeeper force.
Hezbollah has also boosted its political base in Beirut, and some analysts believe any threat it could pose to Israel would be as a retaliatory arm of Iran, should that country's nuclear facilities come under pre-emptive Israeli strikes.(Additional reporting by Aziz Kaissouni in Cairo and Nadim Ladki in Beirut; Editing by Patrick Graham)
Fatah endorses Abbas as party leader Sat Aug 8, 9:30 am ET
BETHLEHEM, West Bank (Reuters) – Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas received firm endorsement from his Fatah party on Saturday to remain its leader in an impromptu vote in which he was unchallenged.Abbas received the approval in a show of hands from the vast majority of Fatah's 2,300 delegates participating in the movement's first congress for 20 years and the first on Palestinian soil.Abbas succeeded the late Fatah founding father Yasser Arafat who led the movement for 40 years until his death in 2004.Fatah is seeking to throw off a reputation for corruption and cronyism that led in 2006 to an election loss to Islamist rival Hamas which opposes peace talks with Israel.The congress in Bethlehem began on Tuesday and has been marked by reformists' charges of vote-buying and nepotism by an old guard.(Reporting by Mohammed Assadi, writing by Ori Lewis in Jerusalem; Editing by Robert Woodward)
Clarification: BC-US--US-Mideast-Jordan Fri Aug 7, 2:25 pm ET
WASHINGTON – In an Aug. 3 story on American peace efforts in the Mideast, The Associated Press reported that Jordanian Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh rejected support for confidence-building measures that the U.S. wants Arab states to take to spur an accord. The story should have carried Judeh's remarks that voiced Jordan's approval for the overall U.S. peace effort. The principled approach taken by President Obama and his administration marks the kind of needed change that we can all believe in, reflect on and build upon,he said.
Yemeni cleric pleads guilty to aiding terrorists By TOM HAYS, Associated Press Writer – Fri Aug 7, 4:48 pm ET
NEW YORK – An ailing Yemeni cleric once sentenced to 75 years in prison in a high-profile U.S. terrorism prosecution quietly won his freedom Friday in a plea deal in federal court.Sheik Mohammed Ali Hasan Al-Moayad and his assistant pleaded guilty to conspiring to support violence by the Palestinian militant group Hamas. In exchange, they were sentenced to time served — more than six years — and will be sent back to Yemen within a few days.An appeals court had thrown out earlier convictions of al-Moayad and Mohammed Mohsen Zayed, who was serving a 45-year term. Prosecutors told the judge that they concluded another trial was unnecessary as long as the men finally admitted they were trying to raise money for terrorism.Al-Moayad, 60, responded, Yes, when asked by the judge if he knew Hamas engaged in politically motivated acts of violence targeting civilian populations,and that he associated and worked with Hamas leaders in Yemen and Hamas-related organizations to provide financial support to Hamas.The defendant, wearing a white kufi cap and prison smocks, turned down an offer to address the court before U.S. District Judge Dora Irizarry signed off on the deal in a nearly empty courtroom in Brooklyn. His lawyers asked that the cleric, who suffers from liver disease and a long list of other illnesses, be hospitalized until he leaves the country.This is an outrageous case,defense attorney Elizabeth Fink said afterward.It was a waste of American time. It was a waste of American dollars.Al-Moayad's reversal of fortune began last year when the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned his and Zayed's convictions. It found the defendants' rights were violated by what it called "highly inflammatory and irrelevant" testimony and evidence, including descriptions of a deadly suicide bombing on a bus in Tel Aviv and images of Osama bin Laden.
The pair had been arrested in an elaborate sting by two FBI informants who lured them to Germany in 2003. In meetings in a bugged hotel room, al-Moayad was recorded as promising to funnel $2 million to Hamas and al-Qaida; he also boasted that bin Laden called him my sheik.One of the informants, Mohamed Alanssi, set himself on fire in Washington before the trial in what he later described as an attempt to get more attention from the FBI. He recovered in time to take the witness stand in 2005 and describe al-Moayad as a dedicated funder of terrorism who boasted of giving bin Laden $20 million in the years before the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.Defense attorneys argued that al-Moayad was duped into the terror-financing scheme by Alanssi. They claimed the witness exploited their client's desire to fund a charitable bakery and other projects in Yemen, where he was a well-known cleric and high-ranking member of an Islamist opposition party.A jury cleared al-Moayad of supporting al-Qaida but convicted him and Zayed of conspiring to help Hamas. Then-Attorney General Alberto Gonzales hailed the convictions as another important step in the war on terror.
Israeli settlement freeze not enough for Saudis by Paul Handley – Fri Aug 7, 4:42 am ET
RIYADH (AFP) – Saudi Arabia believes that Arab recognition of Israel should only come after a final peace deal with the Palestinians and not simply be a quid-pro-quo for freezing settlement expansions, analysts say.Haaretz newspaper reported Thursday that Washington had proposed a one-year freeze last week to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as a way of persuading Arab states to move toward normalising ties with Israel.The proposal was made by US Middle East envoy George Mitchell in talks last week with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the newspaper said, although the premier's spokesman dismissed the report as mere media speculation.Middle East experts say Saudi Arabia, which is mostly calling the shots of Arab diplomacy toward Israel, would be deeply reticent to reward the Jewish state for anything short of a final peace deal with the Palestinians.In fact, says Robert Malley, the Middle East programme director at the International Crisis Group, Israel's desire for Arab recognition makes it more valuable as a final prize in the peace process.The ultimate signal for that recognition comes from Saudi Arabia,he said.It is very unlikely that they will expend their currency prior to the achievement of a final deal,he told AFP.
The Barack Obama administration has been pushing Saudi Arabia to make some gesture to Israel -- commercial openings, academic exchanges or overflight rights -- in exchange for a settlements freeze.But in a July 31 media conference in Washington, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal flatly rejected such gestures.He said Riyadh had already placed on the table its Arab Peace Initiative, which offers blanket Arab recognition of Israel for a two state deal with the Palestinians.Israel is trying to distract by shifting attention from the core issue -- an end to the occupation that began in 1967 and the establishment of a Palestinian state -- to incidental issues, such as academic conferences and civil aviation matters,he said.The question is not what the Arab world will offer,he said.The question really is: what will Israel give in exchange for this comprehensive offer.Awadh al-Badi, a foreign affairs expert at the King Faisal Centre for research and Islamic Studies in Riyadh, said the Saudis believe that previous Arab gestures toward Israel -- recognition from Egypt, a peace treaty with Jordan, and various communications openings -- have not resulted in any improvement of the Palestinians' status.On the contrary, Israel has continued to push Palestinians from their lands and homes, he said.The Arab world has for 10 years done what the Israelis wanted,he said.There is nothing on the ground that proves Israel is willing to go all the way.The real issue is the Palestinians, and they are already talking to (Israel) directly,he added.Riyadh feels it made a generous step by reviving its 2002 Arab Peace Initiative early this year, in the wake of Israel's December-January assault on Gaza which killed more than 1,400 Palestinians, analysts say.This is a major gesture for the Saudis to have made, former US ambassador to Riyadh Charles Freeman said in a July 28 interview with the Washington-based independent Saudi-US Relations Information Service.
There is no predisposition whatsoever... on the Arab side to pay for what Israel, in its own interest, ought to do,he said. The American side is thinking that any gesture by Israel, of any kind, should be paid for with some gesture from the Arabs. You have the Arabs saying no, we've made it clear that we're not paying anything until something concrete happens.There have been some Saudi-preapproved gestures in recent weeks from Bahrain, but minor. The Gulf emirate at the end of June sent a team of officials to Israel to retrieve several of its nationals seized by the Israeli military.In July, Bahrain's crown prince wrote an opinion piece for the Washington Post which criticised Arabs for not communicating to the Israeli people their commitment to a peace deal.Hady Amr, director of the Brookings Doha think tank, says the Arabs need to do more to sway the Israeli street, including gestures of recognition that are easily reversible if the result is not a movement toward a peace settlement.The Arab side should also undertake a vigorous public relations campaign, so that it cannot be blamed for not doing everything in its power to promote peace.
This could include distributing their peace initiative in Hebrew and taking out advertisements in Israeli newspapers.Putting the Arab Peace Initiative back on the table is not enough,he said.You have to sell.
Iran is the problem, not Israeli settlements: US lawmaker Thu Aug 6, 10:56 am ET
JERUSALEM, Aug 6, 2009 (AFP) – Senior US Republican Congressman Eric Cantor said on Thursday that the world should stop pressuring Israel over settlements and concentrate instead on the threat from a nuclear Iran.Cantor, Republican Whip in the House of Representatives, said the main obstacle to Middle East peace is the Palestinian refusal to recognise Israel as a Jewish state and not the Israeli settlements in the West Bank.I don't quite know what is driving the focus on the issue of settlements,he told Israeli public radio.We believe the focus should be on the existential threat to Israel from a nuclear-armed Iran,said Cantor, who is leading a 25-strong delegation of Republican lawmakers on a weeklong visit.Since hawkish Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu won elections in February, Israel has come under increasing pressure from US President Barack Obama to freeze settlement construction in east Jerusalem and the occupied West Bank, considered illegal by the international community.But Netanyahu has tried to shift world attention to Iran, which both Israel and the United States suspect of using a civilian nuclear programme to mask a drive for a bomb.Cantor insisted Washington should push for tough sanctions on the terrorist regime in Iran.We share the view with Prime Minister Netanyahu that we do not want to see undue pressure placed on Israel.Cantor, the Republican party's only Jewish representative in Congress, said it is up to the Palestinians to make the running in reviving stalled peace talks with Israel.If we are interested in a two-state solution we have to accept, and the Palestinians have to accept, that Israel is a Jewish state,he said.Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas has so far refused to recognise Israel as the state of the Jewish people, which Netanyahu has said is a key condition for the eventual creation of a Palestinian state.The visiting delegation is the largest group of Republicans to visit Israel.A similar delegation of 30 Congressmen from President Barack Obama's Democratic party is to travel to Israel next week.
JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel summoned one of its diplomats from the United States on Sunday after he circulated a memorandum accusing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government of doing strategic damage to ties with Washington.Israel's Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon said a disciplinary measure was being taken with the Israeli consul in Boston, Nadav Tamir, after publication last week of his very regrettable memorandum.Tamir's criticism appeared in a brief intended for internal circulation and was leaked in a Thursday newscast by Israel's Channel 10 television, which quoted him as saying differences with Washington over Jewish settlements had hurt relations.
The settlement issue has opened a rift between Israel and its main ally, with Netanyahu resisting President Barack Obama's calls to freeze the expansion of enclaves Israel has built in territory it captured in a 1967 war.Western-backed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has said that peace negotiations, stalled since December, cannot resume until settlement activity ceases in the occupied West Bank.
Tamir wrote that Israel's handling of the dispute was doing strategic damage to its ties with Washington and had given Israel a negative opinion rating in the United States, similar to those of Iran and North Korea.Ayalon said any friction with Washington had declined in the past several months, with frequent contacts between Obama's Middle East envoy George Mitchell, who has been holding talks with Israeli and Palestinian leaders to resume negotiations.Taking the rare step of dressing down a diplomat publicly, Ayalon told Army Radio no decision had been made as to whether Tamir should be dismissed.Ayalon said Tamir's document was not the work of a professional,contained more opinion than data. He called Boston, a liberal bastion, a bubble,unrepresentative of other U.S. regions where Ayalon insisted support for Israel had grown.
NETANYAHU: WE WON'T REPEAT GAZA ERROR
Netanyahu, who has said he wouldn't build additional settlements but wants to continue construction in existing enclaves to accommodate what he calls natural growth, said Sunday he would not remove any settlements before a peace deal.Remarking on the fourth anniversary since a Gaza pullout when Israel removed some 9,000 Jewish settlers and soldiers from the Gaza Strip and northern West Bank, Netanyahu told cabinet ministers we will not repeat this mistake.Netanyahu said Israel's withdrawal from coastal Gaza had not brought about peace and led ultimately to Iranian-backed Hamas Islamists who reject Israel's existence, to seize control.Israel has kept up an economic blockade of the coastal territory since shortly after the withdrawal, following Hamas' rise to power after a 2006 election. Palestinians say the policy creates hardship for many of the 1.5 million who live in Gaza.Some 500,000 Israelis live in the settlements built in occupied territory that is home to some 3 million Palestinians. The World Court has ruled that the settlements are illegal. Israel disputes this.
Israel PM vows never to evict settlers Sun Aug 9, 11:07 am ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pledged on Sunday that he will never evict Jewish settlers from occupied Palestinian land as Israel did in 2005 in the Gaza Strip.The withdrawal from the Gaza Strip brought us neither peace nor security. The territory has become a base for the pro-Iranian Hamas movement and we will never make the same mistake again,Netanyahu said at the weekly cabinet meeting.
We will not evict any more people from their homes,he added in comments carried by public radio.In September 2005, the government of prime minister Ariel Sharon unilaterally removed all Jewish settlements from Gaza in a move aimed at ending Israel's costly 38-year military presence in the Gaza Strip.Sharon vowed to follow up that withdrawal with further pullbacks from the West Bank, but a massive stroke incapacitated him and his successor Ehud Olmert abandoned the policy in the wake of the June 2006 capture of an Israeli soldier by Gaza-based militants in a deadly cross-border raid.An opinion poll published on Sunday showed Israeli Jews back Netanyahu's stance against halting construction of settlements in occupied territory, with 66 percent endorsing his view that Israel has the right to build in east Jerusalem, which Palestinians want as the capital of their proposed state.The survey of 512 people by Tel Aviv University's BI Cohen Institute found that only 27 percent of Israeli Jews, mostly supporters of the leftwing Meretz and Labour parties, oppose Netanyahu?s position.Netanyahu has risked a rift with Israel's strongest ally, the United States, by refusing to heed Washington's calls to freeze building of settlements, which the international community considers illegal.Deputy Foreign Minister Dany Ayalon on Sunday rejected UN protests against last week's expulsion of two Palestinian families from their homes in occupied east Jerusalem.In a meeting with UN Middle East envoy Robert Serry, Ayalon told him the expulsion followed a decision in an Israeli court and that Israeli jurisdiction applied to the entire city, a senior diplomat told AFP.On August 2 club-wielding Israeli riot police evicted two Palestinian families from their houses in Jerusalem's Sheikh Jarrah district.US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the European Union condemned the evictions, which followed an announcement by Israel that it planned to build Jewish homes in the Arab neighborhood.Israel annexed the eastern part of the city in 1967 but Israeli sovereignty over the conquered territory has not been recognised internationally.Around 200,000 Jewish people are estimated to have moved into the dozen or so Israeli settlements in east Jerusalem, home to 270,000 Palestinians.
Jewish Israelis back PM on settlements: poll Sun Aug 9, 8:37 am ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Two thirds of Jewish Israelis support the government's refusal to freeze settlement building in Israeli-occupied east Jerusalem, a poll showed on Sunday.Sixty-six percent endorsed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu?s view that Israel has the right to build anywhere in Jerusalem, according to Ephraim Yaar and Tamar Hermann, two professors who carried out the survey.Only 27 percent of Israeli Jews, most of them supporters of the leftwing Meretz and Labour parties, opposed Netanyahu?s position.Netanyahu has risked a rift with Israel's strongest ally, the United States, by refusing to heed Washington's calls to freeze building in the occupied territories, which the international community considers illegal.Despite the diplomatic tensions, 53 percent of those polled backed the prime minister's foreign policy, compared with 33 percent who judged it negatively.Forty-six percent of respondents viewed US President Barack Obama as biased towards the Palestinians, while 31 percent saw his stance as neutral. Only seven percent perceived Obama as favouring Israel.However, 38 percent of Jewish Israelis now say they trust the president, up from 26 percent two months ago.Tel Aviv University's BI Cohen Institute polled 512 Israelis by telephone on July 27 and July 28. The poll has a margin of error of 4.5 percent.
Israel warns Hezbollah over assassination report By Dan Williams – Sun Aug 9, 8:34 am ET
JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel will hold Lebanese guerrilla group Hezbollah and Lebanon itself responsible for any attempt to assassinate Israelis abroad, and will retaliate, Israel's deputy foreign minister said Sunday.Hezbollah blamed Israel for the Feb 12, 2008 killing of its military mastermind, Imad Moughniyeh, in Syria and vowed revenge. Israel has since reported failed bids by Hezbollah agents to target its citizens in Africa and Central Asia.An Egyptian newspaper Saturday reported the capture of several men linked to al Qaeda -- an exclusively Sunni Muslim group -- intent on assassinating Israel's ambassador to Cairo.But Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon said the alleged plot was certainly the work of Iranian-backed, Shi'ite Hezbollah.And I have one message here: If, God forbid, one hair falls off the head of any Israeli representative abroad, or of even an Israeli who is not an official representative, tourists, etc., we will consider Hezbollah responsible,he told Israel Radio.The outcome, for Hezbollah, will, I think, be of the utmost gravity,Ayalon said.For Lebanon too.It is important ... to relay this warning to Lebanon, which is responsible for Hezbollah -- that they will suffer the consequences if they carry out assassinations of Israelis.Egypt's independent daily Al Masry Al Youm reported that the al Qaeda-linked men had been arrested and confessed to monitoring the Israeli embassy and ambassador's house with a view to killing him, but had been foiled by tight security.Egyptian officials could not immediately be reached for comment and the report could not be independently confirmed.
Hezbollah had no comment on Ayalon's remarks.
Asked how he could assert that it was Hezbollah who were behind the plot rather than al Qaeda, Ayalon told Israel Radio:I don't want to get into the intelligence or operational issues here, but certainly there is both an ideological connection and a professional connection of sorts here.Al Qaeda, which follows Osama bin Laden's strict interpretation of Sunni militant Islam, considers Shi'ites heretics. The group is widely blamed for deadly attacks against Shi'ites in Iraq and it has repeatedly criticized Hezbollah. Hezbollah in turn regularly condemns al Qaeda for its attacks against Iraqis.Egypt, one of two Arab countries to have made peace with the Jewish state, sent shockwaves across the Middle East in April by accusing Hezbollah of planning attacks against Israeli targets on Egyptian soil.Hezbollah denied that charge, saying only that it had run agents in the Egyptian Sinai to provide arms and other support to Palestinians in the neighboring Gaza Strip.Israel drove Hezbollah from its southern Lebanon strongholds in a 2006 war but has since complained that the militia has been secretly regrouping, despite a beefed-up U.N. peacekeeper force.
Hezbollah has also boosted its political base in Beirut, and some analysts believe any threat it could pose to Israel would be as a retaliatory arm of Iran, should that country's nuclear facilities come under pre-emptive Israeli strikes.(Additional reporting by Aziz Kaissouni in Cairo and Nadim Ladki in Beirut; Editing by Patrick Graham)
Fatah endorses Abbas as party leader Sat Aug 8, 9:30 am ET
BETHLEHEM, West Bank (Reuters) – Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas received firm endorsement from his Fatah party on Saturday to remain its leader in an impromptu vote in which he was unchallenged.Abbas received the approval in a show of hands from the vast majority of Fatah's 2,300 delegates participating in the movement's first congress for 20 years and the first on Palestinian soil.Abbas succeeded the late Fatah founding father Yasser Arafat who led the movement for 40 years until his death in 2004.Fatah is seeking to throw off a reputation for corruption and cronyism that led in 2006 to an election loss to Islamist rival Hamas which opposes peace talks with Israel.The congress in Bethlehem began on Tuesday and has been marked by reformists' charges of vote-buying and nepotism by an old guard.(Reporting by Mohammed Assadi, writing by Ori Lewis in Jerusalem; Editing by Robert Woodward)
Clarification: BC-US--US-Mideast-Jordan Fri Aug 7, 2:25 pm ET
WASHINGTON – In an Aug. 3 story on American peace efforts in the Mideast, The Associated Press reported that Jordanian Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh rejected support for confidence-building measures that the U.S. wants Arab states to take to spur an accord. The story should have carried Judeh's remarks that voiced Jordan's approval for the overall U.S. peace effort. The principled approach taken by President Obama and his administration marks the kind of needed change that we can all believe in, reflect on and build upon,he said.
Yemeni cleric pleads guilty to aiding terrorists By TOM HAYS, Associated Press Writer – Fri Aug 7, 4:48 pm ET
NEW YORK – An ailing Yemeni cleric once sentenced to 75 years in prison in a high-profile U.S. terrorism prosecution quietly won his freedom Friday in a plea deal in federal court.Sheik Mohammed Ali Hasan Al-Moayad and his assistant pleaded guilty to conspiring to support violence by the Palestinian militant group Hamas. In exchange, they were sentenced to time served — more than six years — and will be sent back to Yemen within a few days.An appeals court had thrown out earlier convictions of al-Moayad and Mohammed Mohsen Zayed, who was serving a 45-year term. Prosecutors told the judge that they concluded another trial was unnecessary as long as the men finally admitted they were trying to raise money for terrorism.Al-Moayad, 60, responded, Yes, when asked by the judge if he knew Hamas engaged in politically motivated acts of violence targeting civilian populations,and that he associated and worked with Hamas leaders in Yemen and Hamas-related organizations to provide financial support to Hamas.The defendant, wearing a white kufi cap and prison smocks, turned down an offer to address the court before U.S. District Judge Dora Irizarry signed off on the deal in a nearly empty courtroom in Brooklyn. His lawyers asked that the cleric, who suffers from liver disease and a long list of other illnesses, be hospitalized until he leaves the country.This is an outrageous case,defense attorney Elizabeth Fink said afterward.It was a waste of American time. It was a waste of American dollars.Al-Moayad's reversal of fortune began last year when the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned his and Zayed's convictions. It found the defendants' rights were violated by what it called "highly inflammatory and irrelevant" testimony and evidence, including descriptions of a deadly suicide bombing on a bus in Tel Aviv and images of Osama bin Laden.
The pair had been arrested in an elaborate sting by two FBI informants who lured them to Germany in 2003. In meetings in a bugged hotel room, al-Moayad was recorded as promising to funnel $2 million to Hamas and al-Qaida; he also boasted that bin Laden called him my sheik.One of the informants, Mohamed Alanssi, set himself on fire in Washington before the trial in what he later described as an attempt to get more attention from the FBI. He recovered in time to take the witness stand in 2005 and describe al-Moayad as a dedicated funder of terrorism who boasted of giving bin Laden $20 million in the years before the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.Defense attorneys argued that al-Moayad was duped into the terror-financing scheme by Alanssi. They claimed the witness exploited their client's desire to fund a charitable bakery and other projects in Yemen, where he was a well-known cleric and high-ranking member of an Islamist opposition party.A jury cleared al-Moayad of supporting al-Qaida but convicted him and Zayed of conspiring to help Hamas. Then-Attorney General Alberto Gonzales hailed the convictions as another important step in the war on terror.
Israeli settlement freeze not enough for Saudis by Paul Handley – Fri Aug 7, 4:42 am ET
RIYADH (AFP) – Saudi Arabia believes that Arab recognition of Israel should only come after a final peace deal with the Palestinians and not simply be a quid-pro-quo for freezing settlement expansions, analysts say.Haaretz newspaper reported Thursday that Washington had proposed a one-year freeze last week to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as a way of persuading Arab states to move toward normalising ties with Israel.The proposal was made by US Middle East envoy George Mitchell in talks last week with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the newspaper said, although the premier's spokesman dismissed the report as mere media speculation.Middle East experts say Saudi Arabia, which is mostly calling the shots of Arab diplomacy toward Israel, would be deeply reticent to reward the Jewish state for anything short of a final peace deal with the Palestinians.In fact, says Robert Malley, the Middle East programme director at the International Crisis Group, Israel's desire for Arab recognition makes it more valuable as a final prize in the peace process.The ultimate signal for that recognition comes from Saudi Arabia,he said.It is very unlikely that they will expend their currency prior to the achievement of a final deal,he told AFP.
The Barack Obama administration has been pushing Saudi Arabia to make some gesture to Israel -- commercial openings, academic exchanges or overflight rights -- in exchange for a settlements freeze.But in a July 31 media conference in Washington, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal flatly rejected such gestures.He said Riyadh had already placed on the table its Arab Peace Initiative, which offers blanket Arab recognition of Israel for a two state deal with the Palestinians.Israel is trying to distract by shifting attention from the core issue -- an end to the occupation that began in 1967 and the establishment of a Palestinian state -- to incidental issues, such as academic conferences and civil aviation matters,he said.The question is not what the Arab world will offer,he said.The question really is: what will Israel give in exchange for this comprehensive offer.Awadh al-Badi, a foreign affairs expert at the King Faisal Centre for research and Islamic Studies in Riyadh, said the Saudis believe that previous Arab gestures toward Israel -- recognition from Egypt, a peace treaty with Jordan, and various communications openings -- have not resulted in any improvement of the Palestinians' status.On the contrary, Israel has continued to push Palestinians from their lands and homes, he said.The Arab world has for 10 years done what the Israelis wanted,he said.There is nothing on the ground that proves Israel is willing to go all the way.The real issue is the Palestinians, and they are already talking to (Israel) directly,he added.Riyadh feels it made a generous step by reviving its 2002 Arab Peace Initiative early this year, in the wake of Israel's December-January assault on Gaza which killed more than 1,400 Palestinians, analysts say.This is a major gesture for the Saudis to have made, former US ambassador to Riyadh Charles Freeman said in a July 28 interview with the Washington-based independent Saudi-US Relations Information Service.
There is no predisposition whatsoever... on the Arab side to pay for what Israel, in its own interest, ought to do,he said. The American side is thinking that any gesture by Israel, of any kind, should be paid for with some gesture from the Arabs. You have the Arabs saying no, we've made it clear that we're not paying anything until something concrete happens.There have been some Saudi-preapproved gestures in recent weeks from Bahrain, but minor. The Gulf emirate at the end of June sent a team of officials to Israel to retrieve several of its nationals seized by the Israeli military.In July, Bahrain's crown prince wrote an opinion piece for the Washington Post which criticised Arabs for not communicating to the Israeli people their commitment to a peace deal.Hady Amr, director of the Brookings Doha think tank, says the Arabs need to do more to sway the Israeli street, including gestures of recognition that are easily reversible if the result is not a movement toward a peace settlement.The Arab side should also undertake a vigorous public relations campaign, so that it cannot be blamed for not doing everything in its power to promote peace.
This could include distributing their peace initiative in Hebrew and taking out advertisements in Israeli newspapers.Putting the Arab Peace Initiative back on the table is not enough,he said.You have to sell.
Iran is the problem, not Israeli settlements: US lawmaker Thu Aug 6, 10:56 am ET
JERUSALEM, Aug 6, 2009 (AFP) – Senior US Republican Congressman Eric Cantor said on Thursday that the world should stop pressuring Israel over settlements and concentrate instead on the threat from a nuclear Iran.Cantor, Republican Whip in the House of Representatives, said the main obstacle to Middle East peace is the Palestinian refusal to recognise Israel as a Jewish state and not the Israeli settlements in the West Bank.I don't quite know what is driving the focus on the issue of settlements,he told Israeli public radio.We believe the focus should be on the existential threat to Israel from a nuclear-armed Iran,said Cantor, who is leading a 25-strong delegation of Republican lawmakers on a weeklong visit.Since hawkish Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu won elections in February, Israel has come under increasing pressure from US President Barack Obama to freeze settlement construction in east Jerusalem and the occupied West Bank, considered illegal by the international community.But Netanyahu has tried to shift world attention to Iran, which both Israel and the United States suspect of using a civilian nuclear programme to mask a drive for a bomb.Cantor insisted Washington should push for tough sanctions on the terrorist regime in Iran.We share the view with Prime Minister Netanyahu that we do not want to see undue pressure placed on Israel.Cantor, the Republican party's only Jewish representative in Congress, said it is up to the Palestinians to make the running in reviving stalled peace talks with Israel.If we are interested in a two-state solution we have to accept, and the Palestinians have to accept, that Israel is a Jewish state,he said.Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas has so far refused to recognise Israel as the state of the Jewish people, which Netanyahu has said is a key condition for the eventual creation of a Palestinian state.The visiting delegation is the largest group of Republicans to visit Israel.A similar delegation of 30 Congressmen from President Barack Obama's Democratic party is to travel to Israel next week.
Thursday, August 06, 2009
US WARNS ISRAEL FREEZE SETTLEMENTS
U.S. wants Israel to freeze settlement for year: report Thu Aug 6, 4:41 pm ET
JERUSALEM (Reuters) – The United States has asked Israel to freeze West Bank settlement for a year to prod Arab countries to take steps toward normalizing relations with the Jewish state, an Israeli newspaper said Thursday.Defense Minister Ehud Barak, in interviews with Israeli radio stations, said an attempt to reach understandings with Washington over a suspension of construction in settlements, but he did not directly comment on the report in the Haaretz daily.All this is in the context of a broad plan for a comprehensive regional agreement that is apparently shaping up as a possible initiative by President (Barack) Obama with the main focus on the Palestinians and a door kept open, after a certain delay, for Syria and Lebanon,Barak told Israel Radio.The newspaper said a proposal for a one-year settlement freeze in the occupied West Bank was raised by Obama's special envoy, George Mitchell, during talks in Jerusalem last week with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.White House spokesman Robert Gibbs would not comment directly on the report but confirmed the United States was continuing to seek an Israeli hiatus in settlement expansion.Without getting into any specifics, the president's been clear in outlining the steps he believes the Israelis, Palestinians and Arab states should take in order to achieve a lasting Middle East peace -- and that includes a freeze on settlements,Gibbs told reporters in Washington.
WIDE RIFT
The issue has opened the widest rift in U.S.-Israeli relations in a decade and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has said peace negotiations with Israel, suspended since December, cannot resume until settlement activity ceases.Israel's Channel 10 television said an Israeli diplomat serving as a Boston-based consul had written an internal memo accusing Netanyahu's government of doing strategic damage to Israel's ties with its biggest ally by sniping over settlements.Consul Nadav Tamir wrote that Israelis and Americans who had ideological differences with Obama were ready to sacrifice the special relations between the two countries to further their own political agendas, the report said.Tamir was quoted further as writing in his brief to the Foreign Ministry that the high profile of the dispute had led to a feeling in the United States that Obama has to confront refusal on the part of the governments of Iran, North Korea and Israel.Barak has said Washington would present a Middle East plan within weeks and Israel should accept it.A U.S. State Department spokesman said last week that Mitchell would announce a peace plan in a matter of weeks.Arab moves toward commercial or diplomatic ties with Israel could help Netanyahu persuade partners in his right-leaning coalition to accept a compromise on settlements.But there has been little indication Arab countries in the region would make such gestures without a settlement freeze.Kuwait and Jordan said last week in Washington that Israel should fulfill its obligations before peace talks can resume. Saudi Arabia accused the Jewish state of not being serious about peace with the Palestinians.(Writing by Allyn Fisher-Ilan and Joseph Nasr; Editing by Jon Hemming)
Squabbling Palestinian movement gets Saudi scolding By Mohammed Assadi and Ali Sawafta – Thu Aug 6, 4:17 pm ET
BETHLEHEM, West Bank (Reuters) – Reformists kept up pressure for leadership change in the dominant Palestinian party Fatah on Thursday, and Saudi Arabia said no Palestinian state could emerge unless such internal divisions were healed.Fatah's first congress in 20 years got off to a rocky start this week, with charges by reformists that a well-entrenched but aging and politically discredited old guard had stacked the convention with loyalists to safeguard the status quo.Internal feuding and the risk of an open split in the Fatah movement of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, in addition to the deep rift between Fatah and Islamist rival Hamas, provoked a warning from Saudi King Abdullah in unusually blunt language.Even if the whole world agreed to the establishment of an independent Palestinian state, with all the needed support and backing, it will not be established as long as the Palestinian house is divided,Abdullah wrote in an open letter to Abbas.I'll be honest, brothers. The criminal enemy (Israel) could not over long years of continued aggression have inflicted as much damage to the Palestinian cause as did the Palestinians themselves in a matter of a few months,he said. The letter was published in the London-based Arabic newspaper al-Hayat.If a Middle East peace agreement can be negotiated to create a Palestinian state alongside Israel, it would be signed by the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), which is recognized by Israel and the UN, dominated by Fatah, and headed by Abbas.Unity within Fatah is crucial to a successful peace process.Western backers of Abbas hope this congress can restore credibility to Fatah ahead of an election expected in early 2010, the year that may see a new United States-led push for a comprehensive peace deal with Israel.
ROOM AT THE TOP?
Discredited by years of slow-moving peace talks and the taint of corruption under the late Yasser Arafat, humbled at the polls by Hamas in 2006, Fatah is in need of an overhaul and a re-launch, say younger-generation reformists.On Thursday, there were signs of some room at the top for new blood, as aging members of Fatah's Central Committee announced they would not be seeking re-election.Only eight of 16 incumbents of the ruling Central Committee were re-standing. But critics said the old guard could still cling to power with the vote of a congress packed at the last minute with 700 of their supporters. The youngest is over 70.I know my chances are slim but I want to run for the Central Committee,said Husam Khader, 47. He accused some committee members of vote-buying by bringing in their relatives and employees as members of the congress.Some delegates reported a heated discussion, with participants shouting at each other and cursing.An official from the Ministry of Finance alleged that some had used state money for their own families and spoke of nepotism in the top levels of the movement by officials who had appointed sons, daughters and friends as delegates.This is part of democracy, as long as we do not get into a fist fight,said one participant.The Central Committee was last chosen in Tunis in 1989. It normally numbers 21, 18 of whom are elected and three appointed. Five, including Arafat, have died in the intervening years.Nomination of a new lineup was to begin on Thursday evening and end on Friday. A vote was due by Saturday. There was no challenge to Abbas's leadership. The most popular figure next to the 74-year-old president is Marwan Barghouti, who is in an Israeli prison. I expect the young generation will occupy between 20 to 30 percent of the Central Committee seats,said reformist Jamal Shoubaki.This is a small percentage but it is a good start.
Reinforcing Fatah's democratic credentials is crucial to restoring Palestinian support for the Western-backed movement and displacing Islamist Hamas, which refuses to renounce armed struggle and accept Israel's right to exist.Fatah was humbled by Hamas in the 2006 Palestinian election, in a shock vote that upset Western hopes for the peace process. Hamas fighters in 2007 routed Fatah in the Gaza Strip, and Fatah now governs in the West Bank only.Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said Israel was watching the Bethlehem congress carefully but not interfering. My suggestion is not to be too impressed by what will be said at the Fatah convention as part of the internal dialogue,he told Knesset members on Tuesday.The real test will come after the convention when a leadership is formed there and a proper amount of legitimacy, and then we will see what this leadership is willing to bring to the negotiating table.(Additional reporting by Samia Nakhoul, Erika Solomon and Joseph Nasr; Writing by Douglas Hamilton; editing by Jon Boyle)
Top US lawmaker to visit Israel Thu Aug 6, 1:38 pm ET
WASHINGTON (AFP) – The top Republican on the US House of Representatives' foreign affairs committee said Thursday she will visit Israel next week in a show of support for the US ally against violent extremists.Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Florida will meet with top Israeli government officials including President Shimon Peres and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, her office said in a statement.The United States and Israel must continue to work together to forge even closer ties as we face the mutual threats posed by violent extremists and the regimes which support them, she said in the statement, which listed no meetings with any Palestinian officials.Ros-Lehtinen will visit the Western Wall and visit the southern Israeli city of Sderot, which has borne the brunt of rocket fire from Palestinian Islamist fighters in nearby Gaza.Sderot reminds us that the threat posed by violent Islamists and their state sponsors is all too real, and that we must defend freedom against those who would destroy it,Ros-Lehtinen said.Upon returning to Jerusalem, the lawmaker was to meet with survivors of suicide bombings and other attacks in Israel, according to the statement.And she was also to meet with a legal adviser to the Shurat HaDin Israel Law Center, whose stated mission is to pursue what it calls the perpetrators and financial supporters of Islamic terror through the courts.Ros-Lehtinen was also to attend a special showing of the film The Third Jihad,which has drawn angry criticisms from US Muslim groups, and attend a presentation illustrating violent anti-Israel propaganda in Palestinian media.
Govt concerned at Hezbollah rearmament: minister Thu Aug 6, 12:38 pm ET
BEIRUT (AFP) – Visiting Foreign Office Minister Ivan Lewis on Thursday said his country was very, very concerned that Lebanese Shiite group Hezbollah was stockpiling arms in violation of a UN resolution.We made it very clear to the Israeli government that the air incursions are a breach of Resolution 1701, Lewis told reporters in Beirut, where he met with President Michel Sleiman and caretaker Foreign Minister Fawzi Salloukh.And equally we are very, very concerned at the rearming of Hezbollah, which we believe to a significant extent that has taken place, which is in contravention of Resolution 1701.Lewis said he had sought assurances that the Lebanese army and the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) would prevent the further rearming and the use of military or terrorist means by Hezbollah.But Salloukh denied the militant party was rearming.Lebanon has not yet received any proof that arms are being smuggled to Hezbollah,he said.The last UN report on the implementation of 1701 says nothing on the smuggling of arms.Hezbollah's arms are an internal Lebanese affair,Salloukh added.The United Nation's tenth report on the implementation of Resolution 1701, which ended a devastating 34-day war between the militant Hezbollah and Israel in the summer of 2006, said UNIFIL had not found any evidence of arms smuggling in its area of operations in southern Lebanon.The report was published on June 29 this year.UNIFIL, set up in 1978 to monitor Lebanon's border with Israel, was expanded after the 2006 war.
Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak on Thursday said Hezbollah had stockpiled 40,000 rockets and warned the Jewish state would get tough in case of a conflict with Lebanon.We cannot accept that a neighbouring UN member state should have in its government representatives of a militia that has more than 40,000 rockets, Barak told Israeli public radio.Last month, an arms cache exploded in a village in southern Lebanon, an area considered to be a Hezbollah stronghold.The United Nations said the explosion marked a serious violation of Resolution 1701 and UN reports on the implementation of 1701 regularly express concern over the continued presence of Hezbollah arms in south Lebanon and Israeli air incursions.The Lebanese army said the cache dated back to the 2006 war but Hezbollah did not comment on the explosion.This weapons depot dates back to the July war,an army spokesman told AFP on condition of anonymity after the explosion.There was no one but Hezbollah in this area.
Palestinian Fatah renews top body in 20-year first Thu Aug 6, 11:12 am ET
BETHLEHEM, West Bank (AFP) – The Fatah party founded by iconic Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat was to start renewing its governing bodies for the first time in 20 years with candidates due to register on Thursday night.The candidacies for the Central Committee and the Revolutionary Council will be registered tonight,spokesman Nabil Amr told journalist at the Fatah congress in the West Bank city of Bethlehem.
Voting should start on Friday afternoon, he added.
While Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, who took over the party's leadership after Arafat's 2004 death is unopposed, a number of party dinosaurs are expected to make way for the younger generation.Among those seen as leading candidates are Marwan Barghuthi, the party's West Bank secretary general who is held in an Israeli prison, former preventive security chief Jibril Rajub and Mohammed Dahlan, once Fatah's strongman in the Gaza Strip.Longstanding Hamas-Fatah tensions boiled over in June 2007when the Islamists seized control of Gaza after a week of deadly street clashes, confining Abbas's power base to the Israeli-occupied West Bank.Infighting and corruption allegations have contributed to weakening the dominant position in Palestinian political life that Fatah enjoyed before Arafat's death.Opening the congress, the first in 20 years, Abbas on Tuesday admitted a litany of past errors by the party, and called for a new start.But the next day was marked by acrimonious rows as delegates demanded accountability from the party leadership.Hundreds of delegates protested the lack of administrative and financial accounting since the last congress in 1989 and rejected explanations that this was contained in Abbas's opening speech.
Iran is the problem, not Israeli settlements: US lawmaker Thu Aug 6, 10:56 am ET
JERUSALEM, Aug 6, 2009 (AFP) – Senior US Republican Congressman Eric Cantor said on Thursday that the world should stop pressuring Israel over settlements and concentrate instead on the threat from a nuclear Iran.Cantor, Republican Whip in the House of Representatives, said the main obstacle to Middle East peace is the Palestinian refusal to recognise Israel as a Jewish state and not the Israeli settlements in the West Bank.I don't quite know what is driving the focus on the issue of settlements, he told Israeli public radio.We believe the focus should be on the existential threat to Israel from a nuclear-armed Iran,said Cantor, who is leading a 25-strong delegation of Republican lawmakers on a weeklong visit.Since hawkish Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu won elections in February, Israel has come under increasing pressure from US President Barack Obama to freeze settlement construction in east Jerusalem and the occupied West Bank, considered illegal by the international community.But Netanyahu has tried to shift world attention to Iran, which both Israel and the United States suspect of using a civilian nuclear programme to mask a drive for a bomb.Cantor insisted Washington should push for tough sanctions on the terrorist regime in Iran.We share the view with Prime Minister Netanyahu that we do not want to see undue pressure placed on Israel.Cantor, the Republican party's only Jewish representative in Congress, said it is up to the Palestinians to make the running in reviving stalled peace talks with Israel.If we are interested in a two-state solution we have to accept, and the Palestinians have to accept, that Israel is a Jewish state,he said.Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas has so far refused to recognise Israel as the state of the Jewish people, which Netanyahu has said is a key condition for the eventual creation of a Palestinian state.The visiting delegation is the largest group of Republicans to visit Israel.A similar delegation of 30 Congressmen from President Barack Obama's Democratic party is to travel to Israel next week.
Hamas rockets a war crime: Human Rights Watch Thu Aug 6, 9:04 am ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Rocket attacks carried out against Israel by the Hamas rulers of Gaza and other Palestinian militants amount to war crimes, Human Rights Watch said in a report published on Thursday.Hamas forces violated the laws of war both by firing rockets deliberately and indiscriminately at Israeli cities and by launching them from populated areas and endangering Gazan civilians,HRW programme director Iain Levine said.Hamas rocket attacks targeting Israeli civilians are unlawful and unjustifiable and amount to war crimes,he said.The 31-page report examines attacks by Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups since November 2008 that killed three Israeli civilians and severely wounded dozens of others.The homemade Qassam and Soviet-designed Grad rockets used by Palestinian groups in the Gaza Strip cannot be aimed with any reliability, the report says.Under the laws of war, such weapons are indiscriminate when used against targets in densely populated areas,the New York-based watchdog said.As the governing authority in Gaza, Hamas should publicly renounce rocket attacks on Israeli civilian centres and punish those responsible, including members of its own armed wing, Levine said.Israel cited persistent rocket fire from Gaza as its reason for launching a devastating December 28-January 18 offensive that killed more than 1,400 Palestinians.HRW noted that in the past it had documented numerous violations of the laws of war by Israeli forces in Gaza, but stressed that violations by one party to a conflict never justify violations by the other.It said Hamas has significantly limited rocket attacks in recent months, but has not renounced attacks that deliberately or indiscriminately target civilians -- serious violations of the laws of war -- or brought to justice those responsible for initiating such attacks.
Hamas sharply criticised the report, claiming it exempts the occupation from the crimes it committed and puts the executioner and the victim on the same footing.It is a politicised report lacking objectivity and impartiality,the Hamas information ministry said in a statement.Resistance in all its forms is a legitimate right of the Palestinian people as long as they are under occupation and face state terrorism, the statement said.The Israeli military is conducting 15 criminal probes into troop conduct during the offensive, including allegations children were used as human shields.The Israeli foreign ministry has said that so far the evidence shows the troops pursued legitimate objectives with appropriate precautions, while Hamas committed grave violations of international law.
Israel would get tough in any conflict with Lebanon Thu Aug 6, 8:02 am ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Israel's defence minister claimed on Thursday that the militant Lebanese Hezbollah group has stockpiled 40,000 rockets and warned the Jewish state would get tough in case of a conflict with Lebanon.We cannot accept that a neighbouring UN member state should have in its government representatives of a militia that has more than 40,000 rockets, Defence Minister Ehud Barak told Israeli public radio.If there is a conflict on our northern border, we will use all necessary force,he said.What happened in the second Lebanon war will not happen again ... at the time a message from the United States indicated we must spare Lebanon's infrastructure,the minister said.Israel, which considers Hezbollah a terror group, fought a 34-day war with the Shiite militia in July-August 2006, in which more than 1,200 people, most of them civilians, were killed in Lebanon and 160 in Israel, most of them soldiers.Hezbollah continues arming itself and we must ensure certain types of weapon should not enter Lebanon,Barak said.
Britain urges Syria to help push Mideast peace Tue Aug 4, 12:47 pm ET
DAMASCUS (AFP) – Foreign Office Minister Ivan Lewis on Tuesday urged Syria to help push deadlocked Israeli-Palestinian peace talks and also resume its own negotiations with the Jewish state.Lewis also told reporters that Israel should return the strategic Golan Heights to Syria as part of a comprehensive peace between the two arch-foes, following talks with Foreign Minister Walid Muallem.We want Syria to use its influence in terms of helping to create the conditions now for the two-state solution between the Israelis and the Palestinians so crucial to the stability of the region,Lewis said.We expressed the hope that as soon as it is possible the negotiations resume between Israel and Syria on the question of the Golan Heights and also the question of normalising relations between the two countries, he added.Lewis, who arrived on Monday for talks with Syrian leaders, said a keynote speech in June by US President Barack Obama in Egypt to engage the region had struck optimism for Middle East peace.We think that there is now a very important opportunity that perhaps hasn't existed in the past for one of the world's great conflicts to begin to come to an end, the conflict of the Middle East,he said.A solution, he said, should include a viable Palestinian state alongside Israel and a comprehensive peace between Syria and Israel which includes the return of the Golan Heights.Turkey last year brokered four rounds of indirect talks between Israel and Syria, but these were suspended when Israel launched an offensive against the Gaza Strip in late December.
Syria has conditioned the resumption of talks to Israel's return of the Golan, which was seized by the Jewish state during the 1967 Six Day War and later annexed.But Israel refuses to give up control of the strategic plateau.Whatever the case, the Golan must remain under Israeli control in any agreement with Syria,Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman told a delegation of US congressman on Monday.Lewis also urged Syria to use its influence to help stabilise neighbouring Iraq and Lebanon.
Turkey slams Israel for Jerusalem evictions Tue Aug 4, 11:28 am ET
ANKARA (AFP) – Turkey on Tuesday slammed Israel for evicting Palestinian families from east Jerusalem, warning of serious repercussions for peace efforts in the Middle East.A foreign ministry statement urged Israel to refrain from steps that would harm confidence between the parties and change the status of east Jerusalem, stressing that this is vital for peace efforts.We call for an immediate end to this action, it said.Club-wielding Israeli police evicted two Palestinian families from their homes in occupied east Jerusalem Sunday, after which clashes erupted in the upmarket Arab district of Sheikh Jarrah.The action followed a decision by Israel's Supreme Court to order the eviction of the 53 Palestinians.Palestinians want east Jerusalem to be the capital of a future state that includes the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.Israel captured the territory in the 1967 Six Day War and subsequently annexed it in a move the international community has not recognized.Turkey has been Israel's main regional ally since the two signed a military cooperation accord in 1996, but Ankara's criticism of the Jewish state has remarkably mounted in recent years.In January, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan stormed out from a debate on the Gaza war in Davos with Israeli President Shimon Peres after accusing Israel of barbarian acts against the Palestinians.
Israel's Barak says U.S. to present peace plan soon Tue Aug 4, 9:32 am ET
JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said on Tuesday the United States would present a Middle East peace plan within weeks and Israel should accept it.In the coming weeks, their plan will be formulated and presented to the parties, Barak said, according to a spokesman for Israel's parliament who briefed reporters on the defense chief's remarks to its Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee.I believe that Israel must take the lead in accepting the plan,Barak was quoted as saying.
Barak has held a series of meetings with U.S. President Barack Obama's Middle East envoy, George Mitchell, on Washington's demand for a Jewish settlement freeze that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been resisting.Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has demanded a halt to settlement activity, as stipulated by a U.S.-backed 2003 peace road map, before negotiations suspended since Israel's invasion of the Gaza Strip last December can resume.Israeli media have speculated the Obama administration would put forward new peace proposals to try to break the stalemate reached in talks Israel and the Palestinians launched at a conference in Annapolis, Maryland in November 2007.Asked at a daily briefing in Washington on Monday when a peace plan might be announced by Mitchell, U.S. State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said: I think it will be in a matter of weeks.He gave no specifics.(Writing by Jeffrey Heller, Editing by Samia Nakhoul)
Jordan rejects US call to improve ties with Israel By MATTHEW LEE, Associated Press Writer – Mon Aug 3, 10:09 pm ET
WASHINGTON – Jordan on Monday mirrored Saudi Arabia in publicly rejecting U.S. appeals to improve relations with Israel to help restart Middle East peace talks, throwing a damper on the Obama administration's push for Arab support behind new negotiations.After talks here with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, Jordanian Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh said confidence-building measures that the U.S. wants Arab states to take will not produce a resolution to the conflict.Judeh and Clinton both criticized Israel for its weekend eviction of Palestinian families from an Arab neighborhood in east Jerusalem. But as Clinton looked on at a joint news conference at the State Department, Judeh rebuffed calls for Arabs to take incremental steps in normalizing relations with Israel before Israel agrees to withdraw from occupied Arab territory.In the Middle East, there has been in the past an overinvestment, perhaps, by the parties in pursuing confidence-building measures, conflict-management techniques, including transitional arrangements, and an overemphasis on gestures, perhaps at the expense of reaching the actual end game,he said.Judeh said that piecemeal approaches that never lead to peace and that have proven repeatedly to be confidence-eroding, rather than confidence-building must be avoided.And, he criticized Israel for its refusal to halt construction of Jewish settlements in occupied Palestinian territory and said the Israelis should respond to a 2002 Arab peace offer.Now, in 2009, many would say it is time for Israel to reciprocate,he said.Judeh's comments marked the second time in three days that an Arab foreign minister bluntly refused U.S. calls to improve ties with Israel with measures such as opening trade offices, allowing academic exchanges and permitting civilian Israeli aircraft to overfly their airspace as a way of demonstrating their commitment to peace.
On Friday, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal expressed similar sentiments, also at a news conference with Clinton. Unlike Jordan, though, which has signed a peace deal with Israel, Saudi Arabia does not recognize the Israel.Despite the statements, Clinton maintained that U.S. special Mideast Peace envoy George Mitchell was making progress and praised Jordan for its playing a strong and vital role in the region and expressed hope that negotiations could soon resume.We are working with the Israelis, the Palestinian Authority and Arab states to take the steps needed to make that possible, she said.The foreign minister and I discussed this effort, and I expressed our deep appreciation for Jordan's leadership in working with other Arab states to support peace with deeds, as well as words.At the same time, she criticized Israel for the eviction of the Palestinian families in east Jerusalem to enforce a ruling by the country's Supreme Court that the houses belonged to Jews and that the Arab families had been living there illegally.I think these actions are deeply regrettable,Clinton said.The eviction of families and demolition of homes in East Jerusalem is not in keeping with Israeli obligations and I urge the government of Israel and municipal officials to refrain from such provocative actions.State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said later that the top U.S. diplomat for the Middle East, Jeffrey Feltman, had spoken to Israel's ambassador to the United States Michael Oren on Sunday to express our concern about this step.
Arab leaders, on U.S. visits, put onus on Israel By Matt Spetalnick – Mon Aug 3, 6:11 pm ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Two visiting Arab leaders sought to ratchet up diplomatic pressure on Israel in Washington on Monday after Saudi Arabia accused the Jewish state of not being serious about peace with the Palestinians.Kuwait's emir, Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah, who met President Barack Obama, and Jordanian Foreign Minister Nasser Joudeh, who saw Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, both put the onus on Israel for reviving stalled peace moves.Israel has made clear its position that the Palestinians and Arab states that support them must first do more to help advance the peace process.I affirmed to President Obama that we are interested in bringing about peace in the Middle East, the emir told reporters as he sat down with Obama at the White House.It is in our interest that peace be brought about. And the indicator is that the recent Arab peace initiative that was agreed upon by all of the Arab parties and states, and we would implement this peace initiative when Israel implements and fulfills its obligations, he added.Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal, during a U.S. visit on Friday, rejected U.S. pleas to improve ties with Israel as a way of jump-starting regional peace talks, saying Israel must decide if it wants real peace, which is at hand, or if it wants to continue obfuscating.Arab leaders have sharpened criticism of Israel's right-leaning government over its resistance to U.S. pressure to halt all Jewish settlement construction, an issue that has created a rare rift between Washington and its close ally.Middle East peace -- along with "combating extremism and other regional threats and promoting reform across the Arab world" -- will also be high on the agenda when Obama meets Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in Washington on August 18, the White House said.
ARAB PEACE INITIATIVE STALLED
The Obama administration is pressing Arab governments for positive gestures toward Israel if it freezes settlements, a move the United States hopes will lead to regional peace negotiations. But Arab states are cool to the idea.Arab leaders say they remain committed to an initiative, put forth by Saudi Arabia and endorsed by a 2002 Arab League summit, offering Israel recognition in return for withdrawal from Arab land occupied in 1967, creation of a Palestinian state and a just solution for Palestinian refugees.Successive Israeli governments have rejected or ignored the offer, saying the return of refugees to areas now inside Israel would destroy the Jewish character of the state.Asked about Saud's accusation against Israel, Joudeh backed the Saudi minister's explanation of the Arab position. The Arab peace initiative is very clear. It is an end of occupation, establishment of an independent Palestinian state, after which there will be normal relations, Joudeh said.Obama, with Kuwait's emir at his side, made no mention of the matter, saying they would discuss the importance of moving the Arab-Israeli peace process forward. Since taking office in January, Obama has vowed a more active role in peace efforts than his predecessor George W. Bush.In a joint appearance with Joudeh, Clinton said: Everyone needs to refrain from provocative actions that might interfere with the path forward. And that's on all sides.(Additional reporting by Deborah Charles and Jeff Mason; editing by Patricia Wilson and Chris Wilson)
Clinton leads condemnation of Jerusalem evictions Mon Aug 3, 3:57 pm ET
WASHINGTON (AFP) – The United States and the European Union hit out Monday at Israel for evicting Palestinian families from east Jerusalem, warning that such moves endangered the Middle East peace process.US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton led the international condemnation, labelling the evictions deeply regrettable and provocative and accusing Israel of failing to live up to its international obligations under existing peace initiatives.I have said before that the eviction of families and demolition of homes in east Jerusalem is not in keeping with Israeli obligations,Clinton told reporters at a Washington press conference alongside Jordanian counterpart Nasser Judeh.And I urge the government of Israel and municipal officials to refrain from such provocative actions.Club-wielding Israeli riot police evicted two Palestinian families from their homes in occupied east Jerusalem on Sunday, after which clashes erupted in the upmarket Arab district of Sheikh Jarrah.
The action followed a decision by Israel's Supreme Court to order the eviction of the 53 Palestinians, including 19 minors.The Swedish presidency of the European Union expressed its serious concern about the continued and unacceptable evictions in east Jerusalem,which it said were illegal under international law.The strongly-worded EU statement issued in Brussels said the evictions contravene repeated calls by the international community... to refrain from any provocative actions in east Jerusalem.
They confirm a worrying trend that runs counter to the creation of an atmosphere conducive to achieving a viable and credible solution to the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians,it said.Clinton stressed the same point, saying both parties have responsibilities to refrain from provocative actions that can block the path toward a comprehensive peace agreement.Unilateral actions taken by either party cannot be used to prejudge the outcome of negotiations. And they will not be recognized as changing the status quo.There was further condemnation from individual European countries.French foreign office spokesman Romain Nadal branded the evictions illegal with regard to international law and said they were highly detrimental to the peace process.And Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere said they jeopardized the stalled Middle East peace process.The international community has repeatedly urged Israel to refrain from such provocative acts towards Palestinians as this is undermining the prospects for resolving the issue of Jerusalem within the frame of a two-state solution,he said in a statement.Israel captured the territory in the 1967 Six Day War and subsequently annexed it in a move the international community has not recognized.Palestinians want east Jerusalem to be the capital of a future state that includes the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.The Supreme Court ordered the evictions following an appeal by the Nahalat Shimon International settler group, which claimed Jewish settlers have title deeds for the properties, despite UN and Palestinian denials.Sheikh Jarrah is one of the most sensitive neighborhoods closest to the so-called Green Line separating east and west Jerusalem, with the fate of the city one of the thorniest issues in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
JERUSALEM (Reuters) – The United States has asked Israel to freeze West Bank settlement for a year to prod Arab countries to take steps toward normalizing relations with the Jewish state, an Israeli newspaper said Thursday.Defense Minister Ehud Barak, in interviews with Israeli radio stations, said an attempt to reach understandings with Washington over a suspension of construction in settlements, but he did not directly comment on the report in the Haaretz daily.All this is in the context of a broad plan for a comprehensive regional agreement that is apparently shaping up as a possible initiative by President (Barack) Obama with the main focus on the Palestinians and a door kept open, after a certain delay, for Syria and Lebanon,Barak told Israel Radio.The newspaper said a proposal for a one-year settlement freeze in the occupied West Bank was raised by Obama's special envoy, George Mitchell, during talks in Jerusalem last week with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.White House spokesman Robert Gibbs would not comment directly on the report but confirmed the United States was continuing to seek an Israeli hiatus in settlement expansion.Without getting into any specifics, the president's been clear in outlining the steps he believes the Israelis, Palestinians and Arab states should take in order to achieve a lasting Middle East peace -- and that includes a freeze on settlements,Gibbs told reporters in Washington.
WIDE RIFT
The issue has opened the widest rift in U.S.-Israeli relations in a decade and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has said peace negotiations with Israel, suspended since December, cannot resume until settlement activity ceases.Israel's Channel 10 television said an Israeli diplomat serving as a Boston-based consul had written an internal memo accusing Netanyahu's government of doing strategic damage to Israel's ties with its biggest ally by sniping over settlements.Consul Nadav Tamir wrote that Israelis and Americans who had ideological differences with Obama were ready to sacrifice the special relations between the two countries to further their own political agendas, the report said.Tamir was quoted further as writing in his brief to the Foreign Ministry that the high profile of the dispute had led to a feeling in the United States that Obama has to confront refusal on the part of the governments of Iran, North Korea and Israel.Barak has said Washington would present a Middle East plan within weeks and Israel should accept it.A U.S. State Department spokesman said last week that Mitchell would announce a peace plan in a matter of weeks.Arab moves toward commercial or diplomatic ties with Israel could help Netanyahu persuade partners in his right-leaning coalition to accept a compromise on settlements.But there has been little indication Arab countries in the region would make such gestures without a settlement freeze.Kuwait and Jordan said last week in Washington that Israel should fulfill its obligations before peace talks can resume. Saudi Arabia accused the Jewish state of not being serious about peace with the Palestinians.(Writing by Allyn Fisher-Ilan and Joseph Nasr; Editing by Jon Hemming)
Squabbling Palestinian movement gets Saudi scolding By Mohammed Assadi and Ali Sawafta – Thu Aug 6, 4:17 pm ET
BETHLEHEM, West Bank (Reuters) – Reformists kept up pressure for leadership change in the dominant Palestinian party Fatah on Thursday, and Saudi Arabia said no Palestinian state could emerge unless such internal divisions were healed.Fatah's first congress in 20 years got off to a rocky start this week, with charges by reformists that a well-entrenched but aging and politically discredited old guard had stacked the convention with loyalists to safeguard the status quo.Internal feuding and the risk of an open split in the Fatah movement of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, in addition to the deep rift between Fatah and Islamist rival Hamas, provoked a warning from Saudi King Abdullah in unusually blunt language.Even if the whole world agreed to the establishment of an independent Palestinian state, with all the needed support and backing, it will not be established as long as the Palestinian house is divided,Abdullah wrote in an open letter to Abbas.I'll be honest, brothers. The criminal enemy (Israel) could not over long years of continued aggression have inflicted as much damage to the Palestinian cause as did the Palestinians themselves in a matter of a few months,he said. The letter was published in the London-based Arabic newspaper al-Hayat.If a Middle East peace agreement can be negotiated to create a Palestinian state alongside Israel, it would be signed by the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), which is recognized by Israel and the UN, dominated by Fatah, and headed by Abbas.Unity within Fatah is crucial to a successful peace process.Western backers of Abbas hope this congress can restore credibility to Fatah ahead of an election expected in early 2010, the year that may see a new United States-led push for a comprehensive peace deal with Israel.
ROOM AT THE TOP?
Discredited by years of slow-moving peace talks and the taint of corruption under the late Yasser Arafat, humbled at the polls by Hamas in 2006, Fatah is in need of an overhaul and a re-launch, say younger-generation reformists.On Thursday, there were signs of some room at the top for new blood, as aging members of Fatah's Central Committee announced they would not be seeking re-election.Only eight of 16 incumbents of the ruling Central Committee were re-standing. But critics said the old guard could still cling to power with the vote of a congress packed at the last minute with 700 of their supporters. The youngest is over 70.I know my chances are slim but I want to run for the Central Committee,said Husam Khader, 47. He accused some committee members of vote-buying by bringing in their relatives and employees as members of the congress.Some delegates reported a heated discussion, with participants shouting at each other and cursing.An official from the Ministry of Finance alleged that some had used state money for their own families and spoke of nepotism in the top levels of the movement by officials who had appointed sons, daughters and friends as delegates.This is part of democracy, as long as we do not get into a fist fight,said one participant.The Central Committee was last chosen in Tunis in 1989. It normally numbers 21, 18 of whom are elected and three appointed. Five, including Arafat, have died in the intervening years.Nomination of a new lineup was to begin on Thursday evening and end on Friday. A vote was due by Saturday. There was no challenge to Abbas's leadership. The most popular figure next to the 74-year-old president is Marwan Barghouti, who is in an Israeli prison. I expect the young generation will occupy between 20 to 30 percent of the Central Committee seats,said reformist Jamal Shoubaki.This is a small percentage but it is a good start.
Reinforcing Fatah's democratic credentials is crucial to restoring Palestinian support for the Western-backed movement and displacing Islamist Hamas, which refuses to renounce armed struggle and accept Israel's right to exist.Fatah was humbled by Hamas in the 2006 Palestinian election, in a shock vote that upset Western hopes for the peace process. Hamas fighters in 2007 routed Fatah in the Gaza Strip, and Fatah now governs in the West Bank only.Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said Israel was watching the Bethlehem congress carefully but not interfering. My suggestion is not to be too impressed by what will be said at the Fatah convention as part of the internal dialogue,he told Knesset members on Tuesday.The real test will come after the convention when a leadership is formed there and a proper amount of legitimacy, and then we will see what this leadership is willing to bring to the negotiating table.(Additional reporting by Samia Nakhoul, Erika Solomon and Joseph Nasr; Writing by Douglas Hamilton; editing by Jon Boyle)
Top US lawmaker to visit Israel Thu Aug 6, 1:38 pm ET
WASHINGTON (AFP) – The top Republican on the US House of Representatives' foreign affairs committee said Thursday she will visit Israel next week in a show of support for the US ally against violent extremists.Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Florida will meet with top Israeli government officials including President Shimon Peres and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, her office said in a statement.The United States and Israel must continue to work together to forge even closer ties as we face the mutual threats posed by violent extremists and the regimes which support them, she said in the statement, which listed no meetings with any Palestinian officials.Ros-Lehtinen will visit the Western Wall and visit the southern Israeli city of Sderot, which has borne the brunt of rocket fire from Palestinian Islamist fighters in nearby Gaza.Sderot reminds us that the threat posed by violent Islamists and their state sponsors is all too real, and that we must defend freedom against those who would destroy it,Ros-Lehtinen said.Upon returning to Jerusalem, the lawmaker was to meet with survivors of suicide bombings and other attacks in Israel, according to the statement.And she was also to meet with a legal adviser to the Shurat HaDin Israel Law Center, whose stated mission is to pursue what it calls the perpetrators and financial supporters of Islamic terror through the courts.Ros-Lehtinen was also to attend a special showing of the film The Third Jihad,which has drawn angry criticisms from US Muslim groups, and attend a presentation illustrating violent anti-Israel propaganda in Palestinian media.
Govt concerned at Hezbollah rearmament: minister Thu Aug 6, 12:38 pm ET
BEIRUT (AFP) – Visiting Foreign Office Minister Ivan Lewis on Thursday said his country was very, very concerned that Lebanese Shiite group Hezbollah was stockpiling arms in violation of a UN resolution.We made it very clear to the Israeli government that the air incursions are a breach of Resolution 1701, Lewis told reporters in Beirut, where he met with President Michel Sleiman and caretaker Foreign Minister Fawzi Salloukh.And equally we are very, very concerned at the rearming of Hezbollah, which we believe to a significant extent that has taken place, which is in contravention of Resolution 1701.Lewis said he had sought assurances that the Lebanese army and the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) would prevent the further rearming and the use of military or terrorist means by Hezbollah.But Salloukh denied the militant party was rearming.Lebanon has not yet received any proof that arms are being smuggled to Hezbollah,he said.The last UN report on the implementation of 1701 says nothing on the smuggling of arms.Hezbollah's arms are an internal Lebanese affair,Salloukh added.The United Nation's tenth report on the implementation of Resolution 1701, which ended a devastating 34-day war between the militant Hezbollah and Israel in the summer of 2006, said UNIFIL had not found any evidence of arms smuggling in its area of operations in southern Lebanon.The report was published on June 29 this year.UNIFIL, set up in 1978 to monitor Lebanon's border with Israel, was expanded after the 2006 war.
Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak on Thursday said Hezbollah had stockpiled 40,000 rockets and warned the Jewish state would get tough in case of a conflict with Lebanon.We cannot accept that a neighbouring UN member state should have in its government representatives of a militia that has more than 40,000 rockets, Barak told Israeli public radio.Last month, an arms cache exploded in a village in southern Lebanon, an area considered to be a Hezbollah stronghold.The United Nations said the explosion marked a serious violation of Resolution 1701 and UN reports on the implementation of 1701 regularly express concern over the continued presence of Hezbollah arms in south Lebanon and Israeli air incursions.The Lebanese army said the cache dated back to the 2006 war but Hezbollah did not comment on the explosion.This weapons depot dates back to the July war,an army spokesman told AFP on condition of anonymity after the explosion.There was no one but Hezbollah in this area.
Palestinian Fatah renews top body in 20-year first Thu Aug 6, 11:12 am ET
BETHLEHEM, West Bank (AFP) – The Fatah party founded by iconic Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat was to start renewing its governing bodies for the first time in 20 years with candidates due to register on Thursday night.The candidacies for the Central Committee and the Revolutionary Council will be registered tonight,spokesman Nabil Amr told journalist at the Fatah congress in the West Bank city of Bethlehem.
Voting should start on Friday afternoon, he added.
While Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, who took over the party's leadership after Arafat's 2004 death is unopposed, a number of party dinosaurs are expected to make way for the younger generation.Among those seen as leading candidates are Marwan Barghuthi, the party's West Bank secretary general who is held in an Israeli prison, former preventive security chief Jibril Rajub and Mohammed Dahlan, once Fatah's strongman in the Gaza Strip.Longstanding Hamas-Fatah tensions boiled over in June 2007when the Islamists seized control of Gaza after a week of deadly street clashes, confining Abbas's power base to the Israeli-occupied West Bank.Infighting and corruption allegations have contributed to weakening the dominant position in Palestinian political life that Fatah enjoyed before Arafat's death.Opening the congress, the first in 20 years, Abbas on Tuesday admitted a litany of past errors by the party, and called for a new start.But the next day was marked by acrimonious rows as delegates demanded accountability from the party leadership.Hundreds of delegates protested the lack of administrative and financial accounting since the last congress in 1989 and rejected explanations that this was contained in Abbas's opening speech.
Iran is the problem, not Israeli settlements: US lawmaker Thu Aug 6, 10:56 am ET
JERUSALEM, Aug 6, 2009 (AFP) – Senior US Republican Congressman Eric Cantor said on Thursday that the world should stop pressuring Israel over settlements and concentrate instead on the threat from a nuclear Iran.Cantor, Republican Whip in the House of Representatives, said the main obstacle to Middle East peace is the Palestinian refusal to recognise Israel as a Jewish state and not the Israeli settlements in the West Bank.I don't quite know what is driving the focus on the issue of settlements, he told Israeli public radio.We believe the focus should be on the existential threat to Israel from a nuclear-armed Iran,said Cantor, who is leading a 25-strong delegation of Republican lawmakers on a weeklong visit.Since hawkish Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu won elections in February, Israel has come under increasing pressure from US President Barack Obama to freeze settlement construction in east Jerusalem and the occupied West Bank, considered illegal by the international community.But Netanyahu has tried to shift world attention to Iran, which both Israel and the United States suspect of using a civilian nuclear programme to mask a drive for a bomb.Cantor insisted Washington should push for tough sanctions on the terrorist regime in Iran.We share the view with Prime Minister Netanyahu that we do not want to see undue pressure placed on Israel.Cantor, the Republican party's only Jewish representative in Congress, said it is up to the Palestinians to make the running in reviving stalled peace talks with Israel.If we are interested in a two-state solution we have to accept, and the Palestinians have to accept, that Israel is a Jewish state,he said.Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas has so far refused to recognise Israel as the state of the Jewish people, which Netanyahu has said is a key condition for the eventual creation of a Palestinian state.The visiting delegation is the largest group of Republicans to visit Israel.A similar delegation of 30 Congressmen from President Barack Obama's Democratic party is to travel to Israel next week.
Hamas rockets a war crime: Human Rights Watch Thu Aug 6, 9:04 am ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Rocket attacks carried out against Israel by the Hamas rulers of Gaza and other Palestinian militants amount to war crimes, Human Rights Watch said in a report published on Thursday.Hamas forces violated the laws of war both by firing rockets deliberately and indiscriminately at Israeli cities and by launching them from populated areas and endangering Gazan civilians,HRW programme director Iain Levine said.Hamas rocket attacks targeting Israeli civilians are unlawful and unjustifiable and amount to war crimes,he said.The 31-page report examines attacks by Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups since November 2008 that killed three Israeli civilians and severely wounded dozens of others.The homemade Qassam and Soviet-designed Grad rockets used by Palestinian groups in the Gaza Strip cannot be aimed with any reliability, the report says.Under the laws of war, such weapons are indiscriminate when used against targets in densely populated areas,the New York-based watchdog said.As the governing authority in Gaza, Hamas should publicly renounce rocket attacks on Israeli civilian centres and punish those responsible, including members of its own armed wing, Levine said.Israel cited persistent rocket fire from Gaza as its reason for launching a devastating December 28-January 18 offensive that killed more than 1,400 Palestinians.HRW noted that in the past it had documented numerous violations of the laws of war by Israeli forces in Gaza, but stressed that violations by one party to a conflict never justify violations by the other.It said Hamas has significantly limited rocket attacks in recent months, but has not renounced attacks that deliberately or indiscriminately target civilians -- serious violations of the laws of war -- or brought to justice those responsible for initiating such attacks.
Hamas sharply criticised the report, claiming it exempts the occupation from the crimes it committed and puts the executioner and the victim on the same footing.It is a politicised report lacking objectivity and impartiality,the Hamas information ministry said in a statement.Resistance in all its forms is a legitimate right of the Palestinian people as long as they are under occupation and face state terrorism, the statement said.The Israeli military is conducting 15 criminal probes into troop conduct during the offensive, including allegations children were used as human shields.The Israeli foreign ministry has said that so far the evidence shows the troops pursued legitimate objectives with appropriate precautions, while Hamas committed grave violations of international law.
Israel would get tough in any conflict with Lebanon Thu Aug 6, 8:02 am ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Israel's defence minister claimed on Thursday that the militant Lebanese Hezbollah group has stockpiled 40,000 rockets and warned the Jewish state would get tough in case of a conflict with Lebanon.We cannot accept that a neighbouring UN member state should have in its government representatives of a militia that has more than 40,000 rockets, Defence Minister Ehud Barak told Israeli public radio.If there is a conflict on our northern border, we will use all necessary force,he said.What happened in the second Lebanon war will not happen again ... at the time a message from the United States indicated we must spare Lebanon's infrastructure,the minister said.Israel, which considers Hezbollah a terror group, fought a 34-day war with the Shiite militia in July-August 2006, in which more than 1,200 people, most of them civilians, were killed in Lebanon and 160 in Israel, most of them soldiers.Hezbollah continues arming itself and we must ensure certain types of weapon should not enter Lebanon,Barak said.
Britain urges Syria to help push Mideast peace Tue Aug 4, 12:47 pm ET
DAMASCUS (AFP) – Foreign Office Minister Ivan Lewis on Tuesday urged Syria to help push deadlocked Israeli-Palestinian peace talks and also resume its own negotiations with the Jewish state.Lewis also told reporters that Israel should return the strategic Golan Heights to Syria as part of a comprehensive peace between the two arch-foes, following talks with Foreign Minister Walid Muallem.We want Syria to use its influence in terms of helping to create the conditions now for the two-state solution between the Israelis and the Palestinians so crucial to the stability of the region,Lewis said.We expressed the hope that as soon as it is possible the negotiations resume between Israel and Syria on the question of the Golan Heights and also the question of normalising relations between the two countries, he added.Lewis, who arrived on Monday for talks with Syrian leaders, said a keynote speech in June by US President Barack Obama in Egypt to engage the region had struck optimism for Middle East peace.We think that there is now a very important opportunity that perhaps hasn't existed in the past for one of the world's great conflicts to begin to come to an end, the conflict of the Middle East,he said.A solution, he said, should include a viable Palestinian state alongside Israel and a comprehensive peace between Syria and Israel which includes the return of the Golan Heights.Turkey last year brokered four rounds of indirect talks between Israel and Syria, but these were suspended when Israel launched an offensive against the Gaza Strip in late December.
Syria has conditioned the resumption of talks to Israel's return of the Golan, which was seized by the Jewish state during the 1967 Six Day War and later annexed.But Israel refuses to give up control of the strategic plateau.Whatever the case, the Golan must remain under Israeli control in any agreement with Syria,Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman told a delegation of US congressman on Monday.Lewis also urged Syria to use its influence to help stabilise neighbouring Iraq and Lebanon.
Turkey slams Israel for Jerusalem evictions Tue Aug 4, 11:28 am ET
ANKARA (AFP) – Turkey on Tuesday slammed Israel for evicting Palestinian families from east Jerusalem, warning of serious repercussions for peace efforts in the Middle East.A foreign ministry statement urged Israel to refrain from steps that would harm confidence between the parties and change the status of east Jerusalem, stressing that this is vital for peace efforts.We call for an immediate end to this action, it said.Club-wielding Israeli police evicted two Palestinian families from their homes in occupied east Jerusalem Sunday, after which clashes erupted in the upmarket Arab district of Sheikh Jarrah.The action followed a decision by Israel's Supreme Court to order the eviction of the 53 Palestinians.Palestinians want east Jerusalem to be the capital of a future state that includes the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.Israel captured the territory in the 1967 Six Day War and subsequently annexed it in a move the international community has not recognized.Turkey has been Israel's main regional ally since the two signed a military cooperation accord in 1996, but Ankara's criticism of the Jewish state has remarkably mounted in recent years.In January, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan stormed out from a debate on the Gaza war in Davos with Israeli President Shimon Peres after accusing Israel of barbarian acts against the Palestinians.
Israel's Barak says U.S. to present peace plan soon Tue Aug 4, 9:32 am ET
JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said on Tuesday the United States would present a Middle East peace plan within weeks and Israel should accept it.In the coming weeks, their plan will be formulated and presented to the parties, Barak said, according to a spokesman for Israel's parliament who briefed reporters on the defense chief's remarks to its Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee.I believe that Israel must take the lead in accepting the plan,Barak was quoted as saying.
Barak has held a series of meetings with U.S. President Barack Obama's Middle East envoy, George Mitchell, on Washington's demand for a Jewish settlement freeze that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been resisting.Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has demanded a halt to settlement activity, as stipulated by a U.S.-backed 2003 peace road map, before negotiations suspended since Israel's invasion of the Gaza Strip last December can resume.Israeli media have speculated the Obama administration would put forward new peace proposals to try to break the stalemate reached in talks Israel and the Palestinians launched at a conference in Annapolis, Maryland in November 2007.Asked at a daily briefing in Washington on Monday when a peace plan might be announced by Mitchell, U.S. State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said: I think it will be in a matter of weeks.He gave no specifics.(Writing by Jeffrey Heller, Editing by Samia Nakhoul)
Jordan rejects US call to improve ties with Israel By MATTHEW LEE, Associated Press Writer – Mon Aug 3, 10:09 pm ET
WASHINGTON – Jordan on Monday mirrored Saudi Arabia in publicly rejecting U.S. appeals to improve relations with Israel to help restart Middle East peace talks, throwing a damper on the Obama administration's push for Arab support behind new negotiations.After talks here with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, Jordanian Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh said confidence-building measures that the U.S. wants Arab states to take will not produce a resolution to the conflict.Judeh and Clinton both criticized Israel for its weekend eviction of Palestinian families from an Arab neighborhood in east Jerusalem. But as Clinton looked on at a joint news conference at the State Department, Judeh rebuffed calls for Arabs to take incremental steps in normalizing relations with Israel before Israel agrees to withdraw from occupied Arab territory.In the Middle East, there has been in the past an overinvestment, perhaps, by the parties in pursuing confidence-building measures, conflict-management techniques, including transitional arrangements, and an overemphasis on gestures, perhaps at the expense of reaching the actual end game,he said.Judeh said that piecemeal approaches that never lead to peace and that have proven repeatedly to be confidence-eroding, rather than confidence-building must be avoided.And, he criticized Israel for its refusal to halt construction of Jewish settlements in occupied Palestinian territory and said the Israelis should respond to a 2002 Arab peace offer.Now, in 2009, many would say it is time for Israel to reciprocate,he said.Judeh's comments marked the second time in three days that an Arab foreign minister bluntly refused U.S. calls to improve ties with Israel with measures such as opening trade offices, allowing academic exchanges and permitting civilian Israeli aircraft to overfly their airspace as a way of demonstrating their commitment to peace.
On Friday, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal expressed similar sentiments, also at a news conference with Clinton. Unlike Jordan, though, which has signed a peace deal with Israel, Saudi Arabia does not recognize the Israel.Despite the statements, Clinton maintained that U.S. special Mideast Peace envoy George Mitchell was making progress and praised Jordan for its playing a strong and vital role in the region and expressed hope that negotiations could soon resume.We are working with the Israelis, the Palestinian Authority and Arab states to take the steps needed to make that possible, she said.The foreign minister and I discussed this effort, and I expressed our deep appreciation for Jordan's leadership in working with other Arab states to support peace with deeds, as well as words.At the same time, she criticized Israel for the eviction of the Palestinian families in east Jerusalem to enforce a ruling by the country's Supreme Court that the houses belonged to Jews and that the Arab families had been living there illegally.I think these actions are deeply regrettable,Clinton said.The eviction of families and demolition of homes in East Jerusalem is not in keeping with Israeli obligations and I urge the government of Israel and municipal officials to refrain from such provocative actions.State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said later that the top U.S. diplomat for the Middle East, Jeffrey Feltman, had spoken to Israel's ambassador to the United States Michael Oren on Sunday to express our concern about this step.
Arab leaders, on U.S. visits, put onus on Israel By Matt Spetalnick – Mon Aug 3, 6:11 pm ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Two visiting Arab leaders sought to ratchet up diplomatic pressure on Israel in Washington on Monday after Saudi Arabia accused the Jewish state of not being serious about peace with the Palestinians.Kuwait's emir, Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah, who met President Barack Obama, and Jordanian Foreign Minister Nasser Joudeh, who saw Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, both put the onus on Israel for reviving stalled peace moves.Israel has made clear its position that the Palestinians and Arab states that support them must first do more to help advance the peace process.I affirmed to President Obama that we are interested in bringing about peace in the Middle East, the emir told reporters as he sat down with Obama at the White House.It is in our interest that peace be brought about. And the indicator is that the recent Arab peace initiative that was agreed upon by all of the Arab parties and states, and we would implement this peace initiative when Israel implements and fulfills its obligations, he added.Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal, during a U.S. visit on Friday, rejected U.S. pleas to improve ties with Israel as a way of jump-starting regional peace talks, saying Israel must decide if it wants real peace, which is at hand, or if it wants to continue obfuscating.Arab leaders have sharpened criticism of Israel's right-leaning government over its resistance to U.S. pressure to halt all Jewish settlement construction, an issue that has created a rare rift between Washington and its close ally.Middle East peace -- along with "combating extremism and other regional threats and promoting reform across the Arab world" -- will also be high on the agenda when Obama meets Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in Washington on August 18, the White House said.
ARAB PEACE INITIATIVE STALLED
The Obama administration is pressing Arab governments for positive gestures toward Israel if it freezes settlements, a move the United States hopes will lead to regional peace negotiations. But Arab states are cool to the idea.Arab leaders say they remain committed to an initiative, put forth by Saudi Arabia and endorsed by a 2002 Arab League summit, offering Israel recognition in return for withdrawal from Arab land occupied in 1967, creation of a Palestinian state and a just solution for Palestinian refugees.Successive Israeli governments have rejected or ignored the offer, saying the return of refugees to areas now inside Israel would destroy the Jewish character of the state.Asked about Saud's accusation against Israel, Joudeh backed the Saudi minister's explanation of the Arab position. The Arab peace initiative is very clear. It is an end of occupation, establishment of an independent Palestinian state, after which there will be normal relations, Joudeh said.Obama, with Kuwait's emir at his side, made no mention of the matter, saying they would discuss the importance of moving the Arab-Israeli peace process forward. Since taking office in January, Obama has vowed a more active role in peace efforts than his predecessor George W. Bush.In a joint appearance with Joudeh, Clinton said: Everyone needs to refrain from provocative actions that might interfere with the path forward. And that's on all sides.(Additional reporting by Deborah Charles and Jeff Mason; editing by Patricia Wilson and Chris Wilson)
Clinton leads condemnation of Jerusalem evictions Mon Aug 3, 3:57 pm ET
WASHINGTON (AFP) – The United States and the European Union hit out Monday at Israel for evicting Palestinian families from east Jerusalem, warning that such moves endangered the Middle East peace process.US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton led the international condemnation, labelling the evictions deeply regrettable and provocative and accusing Israel of failing to live up to its international obligations under existing peace initiatives.I have said before that the eviction of families and demolition of homes in east Jerusalem is not in keeping with Israeli obligations,Clinton told reporters at a Washington press conference alongside Jordanian counterpart Nasser Judeh.And I urge the government of Israel and municipal officials to refrain from such provocative actions.Club-wielding Israeli riot police evicted two Palestinian families from their homes in occupied east Jerusalem on Sunday, after which clashes erupted in the upmarket Arab district of Sheikh Jarrah.
The action followed a decision by Israel's Supreme Court to order the eviction of the 53 Palestinians, including 19 minors.The Swedish presidency of the European Union expressed its serious concern about the continued and unacceptable evictions in east Jerusalem,which it said were illegal under international law.The strongly-worded EU statement issued in Brussels said the evictions contravene repeated calls by the international community... to refrain from any provocative actions in east Jerusalem.
They confirm a worrying trend that runs counter to the creation of an atmosphere conducive to achieving a viable and credible solution to the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians,it said.Clinton stressed the same point, saying both parties have responsibilities to refrain from provocative actions that can block the path toward a comprehensive peace agreement.Unilateral actions taken by either party cannot be used to prejudge the outcome of negotiations. And they will not be recognized as changing the status quo.There was further condemnation from individual European countries.French foreign office spokesman Romain Nadal branded the evictions illegal with regard to international law and said they were highly detrimental to the peace process.And Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere said they jeopardized the stalled Middle East peace process.The international community has repeatedly urged Israel to refrain from such provocative acts towards Palestinians as this is undermining the prospects for resolving the issue of Jerusalem within the frame of a two-state solution,he said in a statement.Israel captured the territory in the 1967 Six Day War and subsequently annexed it in a move the international community has not recognized.Palestinians want east Jerusalem to be the capital of a future state that includes the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.The Supreme Court ordered the evictions following an appeal by the Nahalat Shimon International settler group, which claimed Jewish settlers have title deeds for the properties, despite UN and Palestinian denials.Sheikh Jarrah is one of the most sensitive neighborhoods closest to the so-called Green Line separating east and west Jerusalem, with the fate of the city one of the thorniest issues in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Monday, August 03, 2009
ARABS - ISRAEL MUST ACT - ITS ALWAYS THAT
Kuwait emir: Israel must act on peace Mon Aug 3, 3:38 pm ET
WASHINGTON (AFP) – Kuwaiti Emir Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmed al-Sabah told US President Barack Obama on Monday that Arab states will act on their peace initiative only once Israel implements and fulfills its obligations.I affirmed to President Obama that we are interested in bringing about peace in the Middle East. It is in our interest that peace be brought about,the emir said through a translator as he met with Obama at the White House.The visiting leader noted pan-Arab support for the initiative presented by Saudi Arabia in 2002 and stressed: We will implement this peace initiative when Israel implements and fulfills its obligations.The Arab peace initiative offers Israel full normalization of ties in return for its withdrawal from occupied Arab land and the creation of a Palestinian state.It also calls for a just solution to the problem of Palestinian refugees to be agreed upon in accordance with the UN General Assembly Resolution No. 194,which the Jewish state has repeatedly rejected.The fate of the Palestinian refugees and their descendants who fled or were driven out of their homes in what is today Israel in the 1948 war -- now numbering 4.6 million -- is a core issue in the Middle East conflict.Obama thanked Kuwait for hosting US troops in support of operations stemming from the March 2003 invasion of Iraq, and said he and his guest would discuss the conflict in Afghanistan, counterterrorism cooperation, pressure on Iran over its nuclear program, and the Middle East peace process.And I'm confident that, based on this conversation and ongoing work between our two countries, that we can strengthen not only Kuwaiti-US relationships, but also to create a more stable region of peace and security,said Obama.
Texan says God sent him to seek oil in Israel by Patrick Moser – Mon Aug 3, 3:18 am ET
MAANIT, Israel (AFP) – Texan John Brown says he is on a divine mission to find oil in the land of milk and honey.Brown, who calls himself Zionist Christian, is convinced that oil-dependent Israel is sitting on vast reserves of crude. Their location is mapped out in the Bible, he says.Standing on the platform of a 45-metre- (150-foot-) high rig in central Israel, Brown says he expects the black gold to start flowing within months. There's no maybe -- it's going to happen, the 69-year-old says.He is not the only one who has faith that there is oil under the Holy Land. Brown points out that his Zion Oil and Gas company, which is listed on the New York Stock Exchange, recently raised 21 million dollars.But his claim that the Bible shows where the treasure is buried has raised more than a few eyebrows.He is prospecting in a country where former premier Golda Meir once joked that Moses took the Jews through the desert for 40 years only to end up in the one spot in the Middle East that has no oil.I think she was wrong, says Brown, holding the well-worn Bible he always carries with him, and which he says is clear in mentioning the blessing of the deep that lies beneath.Brown says he became a born-again Christian in 1981 and was deeply influenced by Jim Spillman, an evangelical minister who preached at his local church.Spillman wrote a booklet -- The Great Treasure Hunt -- that claims to have found the X that marks the spot in the quest for Israeli oil.He is convinced that key clues are contained in a Biblical passage that calls for blessings upon the head of Joseph, and a map of the 12 Biblical tribes of Israel that shows what he says looks like the outline of a head.That is exactly where our licence is,Brown says.But he stresses that Zion Oil, which he founded in 2000, has also conducted extensive surveys.What started as a faith journey became more proof positive in that we have seismic and scientific evidence to back up what we're doing. We have plenty of that.
It's the geology confirming the theology,adds Brown, who has no previous experience in searching for hydrocarbons but has surrounded himself with veteran oilmen.Brown also got a major psychological boost when Isramco, a local venture whose major shareholder is US oil company Noble Energy, discovered vast natural gas deposits off the coast of Israel in January.The gas field 90 kilometres (55 miles) off Haifa has estimated reserves worth 15 billion dollars and was hailed by the then infrastructure minister as a historic discovery.Texan oilmen, a Turkish drilling crew and Israeli geologists work around the clock at Zion Oil's Maanit onshore rig, about 50 kilometres (30 miles) north of Tel Aviv.Pointing to just how much work is involved, company officials say it took more than 60 trucks to transport the 2,000-horsepower rig, leased from Turkish company Aladdin Middle East Ltd, from Haifa harbour to the site. Zion Oil says it recorded shows of hydrocarbons at the Maanit well in 2005 at depths of 3,636 to 4,696 metres (12,000 to 15,500 feet) but could not test them successfully because of mechanical problems. It re-entered the well in May and expects to reach a depth of about 5,450 metres (18,000 feet) drilling directionally to a distance of 750 metres (2,500 feet) from the rig. Until recently, people would laugh when we told them them we planned to drill for oil,says Zion Oil CEO Richard Rinberg.Company officials believe the reason no significant oil deposits have been found so far in Israel is that no one has been drilling deep enough.Zion Oil's deep drilling comes at a price -- 30,000 to 50,000 dollars a day, according to Brown. The Delaware-registered company currently holds two onshore petroleum exploration licences in Israel, covering a total area of 327,000 acres (130,800 hectares).Is its vision statement, Zion Oil says it has a calling to assist Israel in the restoration of the land by finding and producing oil and gas, helping to make Israel politically and economically independent.I do believe things don't just happen by chance, and that God, when he saved me, sent me here... to do this,says Brown.A significant oil find would have major implications for Israel and the Middle East as a whole, where surrounding nations that profess little love for Israel boast most of the world's known oil reserves.And Brown is convinced that the oil will be top grade.I couldn't imagine God giving Israel anything less than the Arabs have.
Israel evicts Palestinians from Jerusalem homes by Charly Wegman – Sun Aug 2, 9:07 pm ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Club-wielding Israeli riot police evicted two Palestinian families from their homes in occupied east Jerusalem, defying international protests over Jewish settlement activity in the area.Clashes erupted after police moved in at dawn around the homes in the upmarket Arab district of Sheikh Jarrah following an Israeli court decision ordering the eviction of the 53 Palestinians, including 19 minors.I was born in this house and so were my children, said Maher Hanoun, whose family was evicted along with the neighbouring Ghawi household.Now we are on the streets. We have become refugees.The Supreme Court ordered the evictions following an appeal by the Nahalat Shimon International settler group which claimed Jewish settlers have title deeds for the properties, despite UN and Palestinian denials.Jerusalem authorities have also given permission for the construction of about 20 homes in Sheikh Jarrah, in defiance of global calls for a halt to all settlement activity in occupied east Jerusalem and the West Bank.Sheikh Jarrah is one of the most sensitive neighbourhoods closest to the so-called Green Line separating east and west Jerusalem, with the fate of the city one of the thorniest issues in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.As some settlers carried boxes containing the belongings of the expelled families to a truck, others moved into the houses holding drills, shovels and ladders.
Police clashed with protesters and detained around 10 people.
We are all afraid of being kicked out, said Amal Kassem, a Sheikh Jarrah resident for more than five decades.She said Jewish settlers were holding fake title deeds to homes which the Palestinians obtained in line with a deal struck between Jordan and the UN agency for refugees in 1956, when Jordan had jurisdiction over the area.Senior Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat expressed outrage.Israel is once again showing its utter failure to respect international law,he told reporters.New settlers from abroad are accommodating themselves and their belongings in the Palestinian houses and 19 newly homeless children will have nowhere to sleep.The evictions also drew strong words from Israel's closest ally, the United States, which in recent months has placed increasing pressure on the Jewish state to halt settlement construction.The eviction of families and demolition of homes in east Jerusalem is not in keeping with Israeli obligations, said a senior US diplomat, who described the events as provocative.Unilateral actions taken by either party cannot pre-judge the outcome of negotiations and will not be recognised by the international community,he told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The United Nations too condemned the actions.
I deplore the totally unacceptable actions by Israel in which Israeli security forces evicted Palestinian refugee families ... to allow settlers to take possession of their properties,said Richard Miron of the UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process.The British consulate, which is in Sheikh Jarrah along with several other foreign missions, echoed the view. The Israelis' claim that the imposition of extremist Jewish settlers into this ancient Arab neighbourhood is a matter for the courts or the municipality is unacceptable,it said in a statement.These actions are incompatible with the Israeli-professed desire for peace. We urge Israel not to allow the extremists to set the agenda.Israel captured east Jerusalem in the 1967 Six-Day War and later annexed it in a move not recognised by the international community. It sees all of Jerusalem as its eternal, undivided capital and does not consider construction in east Jerusalem to be settlement activity.The Palestinians want to make the east -- home to some 200,000 Jewish Israelis and 268,000 Palestinians -- the capital of their future state.
UNRWA says needs at least $30 mln to meet deficit Sun Aug 2, 4:58 am ET
AMMAN (AFP) – The cash-strapped UN agency for Palestinian refugees said on Sunday it needs at least 30 million dollars to meet a deficit in its 545-million-dollar budget this year.UNRWA needs 30 million dollars... minimum. But the figure is so flexible and could change anytime, depending on the donations, Richard Cook, the agency's operations director, told AFP.Cook said the situation at the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees is the worst since I joined UNRWA 24 years ago and was unlikely to improve in the coming two years.The agency faces chronic financial problems, but we hope our traditional donors would continue to be generous because our situation is very difficult, Cook added.In all, the agency cares for some 4.2 million Palestinian refugees in the Middle East, including around 1.8 million in Jordan.The agency made a 160-million-dollar appeal last November to oil-rich Arab states in the Gulf to help meet growing demands for it services in 2009.
Fatah to reject Israel as Jewish state at congress: document Sat Aug 1, 3:51 pm ET
RAMALLAH, West Bank (AFP) – Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah faction will reaffirm its refusal to recognise Israel as a Jewish state at a major congress next week, according to a document obtained by AFP on Saturday.The congress document also reiterates the refusal of the Palestinian leadership to resume peace talks with Israel as long as it continues building Jewish settlements in Jerusalem and the occupied West Bank.The Fatah congress that opens in the West Bank city of Ramallah on Tuesday will be the mainstream Palestinian faction's first such meeting in 20 years, with some 2,000 delegates expected to attend from around the world.Israel has come under diplomatic heat over its settlement activity particularly in east Jersualem which it captured in the 1967 Six Day War and later annexed it in a move not recognised by the international community.Israel sees all of Jerusalem as its eternal, undivided capital and does not consider construction in east Jerusalem to be settlement activity.The Palestinians want to make the east of the city -- home to some 200,000 Jewish Israelis in 121 settlements and 268,000 Palestinians -- the capital of their future state.In the document Fatah underlines its refusal to recognise Israel as a Jewish state as demanded by Israel's hardline Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.Fatah links this refusal to its determination to protect the right of Palestinian refugees to return to homes they fled at the time of the creation of Israel in 1948.Abbas's faction is also expected to again endorse a 2002 Saudi-sponsored peace initiative with Israel.The offer calls on all Arab states to establish full and normal relations with Israel in exchange for the Jewish state's withdrawal from all lands occupied in the 1967 war and the creation of a Palestinian state.
The Islamist movement Hamas which rules the Gaza Strip has banned Fatah members from attending the congress and has warned it will take legal action against those who defy the order.Mahmud Zahar, a senior Hamas leader in Gaza, said earlier this week that the ban on taking part in the congress would be lifted if the rival Fatah freed all Hamas prisoners in the West Bank.Hamas-Fatah tensions boiled over in June 2007 when the Islamists seized control of Gaza after a week of deadly street clashes, confining the writ of Palestinian president and Fatah leader Mahmud Abbas to the West Bank.
Saudi rebuffs US on improving ties with Israel By MATTHEW LEE, Associated Press Writer – Fri Jul 31, 4:53 pm ET
WASHINGTON – Saudi Arabia on Friday bluntly rejected U.S. appeals for improved relations with Israel as a way to help restart Middle East peace talks, saying the Jewish state is not interested in a deal.After talks with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal said his country will not consider steps suggested by U.S. Mideast peace envoy George Mitchell until Israel accepts Arab demands to withdraw from all occupied Palestinian territories.
Incrementalism and a step-by-step approach, has not and, we believe, will not lead to peace, Saud said as Clinton looked on at a joint State Department news conference. Temporary security and confidence building measures will also not bring peace.What is required is a comprehensive approach that defines the final outcome at the outset and launches into negotiations over final status issues,the prince said, referring to the borders of a future Palestinian state, control of Jerusalem, the return of Palestinian refugees, water and security.President Barack Obama, Clinton and Mitchell all have been urging Arab nations to improve ties with Israel with confidence-building measures such as opening trade offices, allowing academic exchanges and permitting civilian Israeli aircraft to overfly their airspace as a way of demonstrating their commitment to peace.Clinton repeated that call in her remarks, saying the Obama administration wants the Arab states, including our friends in Saudi Arabia, to work with us to take steps to improve relations with Israel, to support the Palestinian Authority and to prepare their people to embrace the eventual peace between the Palestinians and the Israelis.Saudi Arabia's continued leadership is absolutely vital to achieve a comprehensive and lasting peace, she said.A bipartisan group of more than 200 members of Congress delivered a similar message Friday to Saudi King Abdullah, urging him to drop opposition to the administration's appeal for intermediate confidence-building steps.We have been disappointed thus far to see the public reaction of your government to President Obama's request, the lawmakers wrote in a letter to the monarch.We urge you to assert a strong leadership role and help lead the Middle East to a new era of peace and reconciliation by stepping forward with a dramatic gesture toward Israel akin to the steps taken earlier by the leaders of Egypt and Jordan.But Saud flatly ruled that out. He maintained that Israel was trying to distract the world from a Saudi-proposed Arab-Israel peace deal in which Arab states would recognize Israel provided it withdraws from Arab territory seized in the 1967 war.The question really is, What will Israel give in exchange for this comprehensive settlement offer? Saud said, noting that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ignored U.S. calls to stop constructing Jewish settlements in the West Bank and building housing in East Jerusalem.
Israel hasn't even responded to an American request to halt settlements, which President Obama described as illegitimate, he said.The Saudi stance is complicating Mitchell's efforts to bring the Israelis and Palestinians back to negotiations.But Clinton denied that the odds were insurmountable. She said Mitchell, who just returned from his fifth trip to the region, was making progress and developing a formula to get the two sides talking again.We feel like we're making headway and we are determined to do so in as short a period of time as possible, she said.
Rocket-battered Israeli border town enjoying calm By ARON HELLER, Associated Press Writer – Wed Jul 29, 4:21 pm ET
SDEROT, Israel – Six months after Israel ended its bruising offensive against Gaza Strip militants, the people of this rocket-scarred border town are enjoying their calmest stretch in recent memory.The rocket attacks that made life unbearable have all but stopped. Playgrounds are filled with children on summer vacation, stores are bustling and the town's public swimming pool is open for the first time in five years.
People are out more. There is movement. There is a different atmosphere, said Avigail Hazan, a 42-year-old storekeeper.It was worth going through the war for this. It's fun now; I'm calm.Life before the war — it wasn't life, agreed the town's deputy mayor, Rafik Agaronov. Now, thank God, there is quiet. Hopefully it will stay like this forever. If our children are calm, we are calm.Israel's anger and frustration over the incessant rocket fire on this working-class town less than a mile from Gaza's border was the loudly proclaimed reason for its invasion of Gaza. The fact that the attacks have all but ended has improved the atmosphere and set the stage for possible talks between Israel and the Palestinians.The U.S. has sent a parade of envoys to the region this month to explore the prospects. Those efforts have focused on bringing Israel together with Hamas' bitter rival, the moderate West Bank government of President Mahmoud Abbas. Hamas, which took control of Gaza from Abbas' forces two years ago, remains internationally isolated.Hamas has not ruled out firing more rockets, but the militants seem to no longer be targeting Israel.A Hamas spokesman, Abu Obeida, insisted Wednesday the militant group has not changed its policy regarding rocket attacks and called them one of the legitimate tools of the resistance.Still, rocket fire has dropped dramatically since the Gaza offensive ended in January, with some 220 rockets fired on southern Israel, according to the army. The last rocket attack on Sderot was May 19.That compares to 7,865 rockets and mortars fired on southern Israel since Israel withdrew from Gaza in September 2005, according to the military. At least 4,000 of those hit Sderot, making life miserable and increasingly dangerous. Eight people were killed and hundreds were wounded. The economy was paralyzed and nearly everyone was traumatized by the frequent wail of sirens and explosions.The heavy rocket fire brought life in Sderot to a virtual standstill as hundreds fled to get out of range. Those who stayed behind kept close to home and to their fortified shelters.
Israel's massive air and ground assault, which began last December, killed more than 1,100 Palestinians, wounded thousands more and caused massive destruction.Despite a backlash of international criticism and war crimes allegations, Israel says the assault achieved its primary goal of stopping the rocket fire. Israeli officials believe the offensive proved to be a powerful deterrent, though they also say Gaza's Hamas rulers are using the lull to rearm.Eager to win international acceptance, Hamas may now be showing restraint to gain favor with the outside world. The head of Israel's Shin Bet security service, Yuval Diskin, said this month that Hamas was giving more attention to diplomatic efforts to end its isolation.Israel has also dramatically scaled back its military activities, though the stifling economic blockade it has maintained since the fighting ended has prevented Gaza from rebuilding.With renewed fighting always a possibility, the residents of Sderot are enjoying the calm as long as it lasts.Perhaps the most visible change in town is the reopening of the Olympic-size pool, providing a welcome place to cool off from the sweltering Israeli summer. In recent years, the rocket attacks made the pool too dangerous to enter.The kids missed this, they needed this, said Zion Peretz, the pool manager, as campers jumped into the water behind him.It's given us a joy for life again.
But not everyone has been able to erase old memories that quickly.
Experts have warned of long-lasting psychological damage inflicted on Sderot's 24,000 residents, particularly children, who suffer from exceptionally high rates of anxiety and bed-wetting compared to other Israeli children, according to local psychologists.
Yaeli Biton says she is still under psychological care and takes daily anxiety medication. I hear a car screech, a refrigerator door slam, the air conditioner make noise, and I panic, said the 50-year-old Biton.It's been like this for eight years. The feeling doesn't go away in one day.Many in Sderot said they believe the current calm won't last, and that Hamas was using the tranquil period to prepare for another round of fighting. That looming possibility is evident in the barricaded shelters scattered throughout town. Even the pool has a safe room for bathers to scamper to in case of emergency.Still, residents say they can't remember a better time for their hard-hit town. On cooler evenings, it's not unusual to see people drinking a beer with their neighbors outside their homes, or playing backgammon or chess in the park.
Dina Keinan, who owns a bike store, said her sales have increased in recent months.
People didn't buy bicycles because they were afraid to ride them for long periods, she said.It's different now.Atara Orenbouch, a 37-year-old mother of six, said life in Sderot was almost a normal life. Her children can now walk around freely like all other Israeli children. At least they have a chance to have a little bit of a normal childhood, she said.(But) in the back of my mind, I am sure we will have a bad awakening.We just assume that we will go back to the rockets, but in the meanwhile we are happy.Associated Press Writer Jen Thomas contributed to this report.
Gaza father held in honor killing of daughter By RIZEK ABDEL JAWAD, Associated Press Writer – Wed Jul 29, 12:07 pm ET
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip – A Gaza man is being held on suspicion he bludgeoned his daughter with an iron chain, cracking her skull in a particularly brutal family honor killing,two human rights groups said Wednesday, citing police and forensics reports.
The assault was triggered by Jawdat Najjar's discovery that his daughter Fadia — a 27-year-old divorced mother of five — owned a cell phone, the groups said. He suspected she used it to speak to a man outside the family, according to the groups' reports.
Dr. Mohammed Sultan, who examined the victim, told The Associated Press that her head and face were bloodied, her body covered by bruises and that she suffered internal bleeding.Police confirmed Wednesday that Najjar turned himself in a day after the July 23 killing but did not give details. The officer at a police station in northern Gaza spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media.Three of the woman's brothers were also detained on suspicion that they acted as accomplices, said the rights groups Mezan and the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), citing police and forensics reports. The groups did not say how they obtained the reports.Fadia Najjar was the 10th victim of a so-called honor killing this year in the Palestinian territories and among Arab communities in Israel, according to rights groups.In such killings, a woman's life is taken by male relatives who suspect her of inappropriate conduct. Such killings are still widespread in the Middle East, where a woman's perceived misconduct can hurt the standing of a family and where tradition says the stain can only be removed by shedding her blood.
Traditionally, assailants have received light sentences.But the killing of Najjar shocked even activists used to detailing such crimes.Her father used an iron chain to beat her, while also kicking and punching her for about 40 minutes until she died of a fatal blow to the head, said Mezan and the PCHR.It's shocking, said Samir Zakout of Mezan.But it's not surprising because killers know they won't be punished harshly.In the West Bank and Gaza, honor killing assailants serve between six months and three years in prison, said Mona Shawa of PCHR. Gaza is ruled by the Islamic militant Hamas, while the West Bank is run by Western-backed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Justice officials in the two territories were not available for comment.In Jordan, officials said Wednesday they have set up special tribunals to deal with honor killings, hoping to speed up trials.The New York-based Human Rights Watch reported Wednesday that the Syrian government abolished a law that waived punishment for some honor killings and now allows judges to sentence perpetrators to at least two years jail.Associated Press writer Diaa Hadid contributed from Ramallah, West Bank.
US national security advisor meets Israeli officials Wed Jul 29, 8:49 am ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – US National Security Advisory James Jones was holding talks with senior Israeli officials on Wednesday as part of a push by Washington to revive stalled Middle East peace talks.Jones, the last of three senior US officials visiting the region this week, met Defence Minister Ehud Barak in Tel Aviv, Barak's office said without providing details on the discussions.Jones is also due to meet Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu before holding talks with the Palestinian leadership on Thursday in the occupied West Bank.Earlier this week US Defence Secretary Robert Gates and Middle East peace envoy George Mitchell held talks with Israeli and Palestinian officials on separate trips.The administration of US President Barack Obama is on a diplomatic drive to relaunch the stalled Middle East peace process with a view to a comprehensive deal between Israel and all its Arab neighbours.
Appeals court keeps alive suit against Iran By NEDRA PICKLER, Associated Press Writer - Tue Jul 28, 5:17 pm ET
WASHINGTON – A federal appeals court on Tuesday kept alive a wrongful death lawsuit against Iran over Hezbollah's assassination of the former chief of the country's armed forces 25 years ago.The U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Washington said the lower court applied the wrong law when it dismissed the claims of Gholam Oveissi's grandson, who sued Iran because it funded and directed Hezbollah's activities.Oveissi was a four-star general and chief of Iran's armed forces until early 1979, when revolutionaries deposed the Western-backed shah and established an Islamic Republic. Oveissi fled to the United States and then to France, where he took up residence in Paris.His grandson, Amir Oveissi, was born in California but moved in with his grandfather in Paris when he was a few months old. Gholam Oveissi was an outspoken opponent of Iran's revolutionary government and was gunned down while walking on a crowded Paris street on Feb. 17, 1984.Lebanon-based Hezbollah claimed responsibility. Oveissi's family fled Paris, eventually settling in Virginia.Amir Oveissi sued Iran in 2003 in U.S. District Court in Washington for intentional infliction of emotional distress and wrongful death. Iran did not respond or participate in the trial, and U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth ruled in 2007 that Iran was culpable in Oveissi's assassination.But the judge dismissed Amir Oveissi's claims. Lamberth said California law should determine the claim since he was born there, and California law said Amir Oveissi didn't have the legal right to bring to bring a claim over the death of an Iranian citizen.But the appeals court ruled that French law should apply because the assassination took place in France and both Amir and Gholam Oveissi lived there at the time. It ordered the lower court to apply French law to the case.
WASHINGTON (AFP) – Kuwaiti Emir Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmed al-Sabah told US President Barack Obama on Monday that Arab states will act on their peace initiative only once Israel implements and fulfills its obligations.I affirmed to President Obama that we are interested in bringing about peace in the Middle East. It is in our interest that peace be brought about,the emir said through a translator as he met with Obama at the White House.The visiting leader noted pan-Arab support for the initiative presented by Saudi Arabia in 2002 and stressed: We will implement this peace initiative when Israel implements and fulfills its obligations.The Arab peace initiative offers Israel full normalization of ties in return for its withdrawal from occupied Arab land and the creation of a Palestinian state.It also calls for a just solution to the problem of Palestinian refugees to be agreed upon in accordance with the UN General Assembly Resolution No. 194,which the Jewish state has repeatedly rejected.The fate of the Palestinian refugees and their descendants who fled or were driven out of their homes in what is today Israel in the 1948 war -- now numbering 4.6 million -- is a core issue in the Middle East conflict.Obama thanked Kuwait for hosting US troops in support of operations stemming from the March 2003 invasion of Iraq, and said he and his guest would discuss the conflict in Afghanistan, counterterrorism cooperation, pressure on Iran over its nuclear program, and the Middle East peace process.And I'm confident that, based on this conversation and ongoing work between our two countries, that we can strengthen not only Kuwaiti-US relationships, but also to create a more stable region of peace and security,said Obama.
Texan says God sent him to seek oil in Israel by Patrick Moser – Mon Aug 3, 3:18 am ET
MAANIT, Israel (AFP) – Texan John Brown says he is on a divine mission to find oil in the land of milk and honey.Brown, who calls himself Zionist Christian, is convinced that oil-dependent Israel is sitting on vast reserves of crude. Their location is mapped out in the Bible, he says.Standing on the platform of a 45-metre- (150-foot-) high rig in central Israel, Brown says he expects the black gold to start flowing within months. There's no maybe -- it's going to happen, the 69-year-old says.He is not the only one who has faith that there is oil under the Holy Land. Brown points out that his Zion Oil and Gas company, which is listed on the New York Stock Exchange, recently raised 21 million dollars.But his claim that the Bible shows where the treasure is buried has raised more than a few eyebrows.He is prospecting in a country where former premier Golda Meir once joked that Moses took the Jews through the desert for 40 years only to end up in the one spot in the Middle East that has no oil.I think she was wrong, says Brown, holding the well-worn Bible he always carries with him, and which he says is clear in mentioning the blessing of the deep that lies beneath.Brown says he became a born-again Christian in 1981 and was deeply influenced by Jim Spillman, an evangelical minister who preached at his local church.Spillman wrote a booklet -- The Great Treasure Hunt -- that claims to have found the X that marks the spot in the quest for Israeli oil.He is convinced that key clues are contained in a Biblical passage that calls for blessings upon the head of Joseph, and a map of the 12 Biblical tribes of Israel that shows what he says looks like the outline of a head.That is exactly where our licence is,Brown says.But he stresses that Zion Oil, which he founded in 2000, has also conducted extensive surveys.What started as a faith journey became more proof positive in that we have seismic and scientific evidence to back up what we're doing. We have plenty of that.
It's the geology confirming the theology,adds Brown, who has no previous experience in searching for hydrocarbons but has surrounded himself with veteran oilmen.Brown also got a major psychological boost when Isramco, a local venture whose major shareholder is US oil company Noble Energy, discovered vast natural gas deposits off the coast of Israel in January.The gas field 90 kilometres (55 miles) off Haifa has estimated reserves worth 15 billion dollars and was hailed by the then infrastructure minister as a historic discovery.Texan oilmen, a Turkish drilling crew and Israeli geologists work around the clock at Zion Oil's Maanit onshore rig, about 50 kilometres (30 miles) north of Tel Aviv.Pointing to just how much work is involved, company officials say it took more than 60 trucks to transport the 2,000-horsepower rig, leased from Turkish company Aladdin Middle East Ltd, from Haifa harbour to the site. Zion Oil says it recorded shows of hydrocarbons at the Maanit well in 2005 at depths of 3,636 to 4,696 metres (12,000 to 15,500 feet) but could not test them successfully because of mechanical problems. It re-entered the well in May and expects to reach a depth of about 5,450 metres (18,000 feet) drilling directionally to a distance of 750 metres (2,500 feet) from the rig. Until recently, people would laugh when we told them them we planned to drill for oil,says Zion Oil CEO Richard Rinberg.Company officials believe the reason no significant oil deposits have been found so far in Israel is that no one has been drilling deep enough.Zion Oil's deep drilling comes at a price -- 30,000 to 50,000 dollars a day, according to Brown. The Delaware-registered company currently holds two onshore petroleum exploration licences in Israel, covering a total area of 327,000 acres (130,800 hectares).Is its vision statement, Zion Oil says it has a calling to assist Israel in the restoration of the land by finding and producing oil and gas, helping to make Israel politically and economically independent.I do believe things don't just happen by chance, and that God, when he saved me, sent me here... to do this,says Brown.A significant oil find would have major implications for Israel and the Middle East as a whole, where surrounding nations that profess little love for Israel boast most of the world's known oil reserves.And Brown is convinced that the oil will be top grade.I couldn't imagine God giving Israel anything less than the Arabs have.
Israel evicts Palestinians from Jerusalem homes by Charly Wegman – Sun Aug 2, 9:07 pm ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Club-wielding Israeli riot police evicted two Palestinian families from their homes in occupied east Jerusalem, defying international protests over Jewish settlement activity in the area.Clashes erupted after police moved in at dawn around the homes in the upmarket Arab district of Sheikh Jarrah following an Israeli court decision ordering the eviction of the 53 Palestinians, including 19 minors.I was born in this house and so were my children, said Maher Hanoun, whose family was evicted along with the neighbouring Ghawi household.Now we are on the streets. We have become refugees.The Supreme Court ordered the evictions following an appeal by the Nahalat Shimon International settler group which claimed Jewish settlers have title deeds for the properties, despite UN and Palestinian denials.Jerusalem authorities have also given permission for the construction of about 20 homes in Sheikh Jarrah, in defiance of global calls for a halt to all settlement activity in occupied east Jerusalem and the West Bank.Sheikh Jarrah is one of the most sensitive neighbourhoods closest to the so-called Green Line separating east and west Jerusalem, with the fate of the city one of the thorniest issues in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.As some settlers carried boxes containing the belongings of the expelled families to a truck, others moved into the houses holding drills, shovels and ladders.
Police clashed with protesters and detained around 10 people.
We are all afraid of being kicked out, said Amal Kassem, a Sheikh Jarrah resident for more than five decades.She said Jewish settlers were holding fake title deeds to homes which the Palestinians obtained in line with a deal struck between Jordan and the UN agency for refugees in 1956, when Jordan had jurisdiction over the area.Senior Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat expressed outrage.Israel is once again showing its utter failure to respect international law,he told reporters.New settlers from abroad are accommodating themselves and their belongings in the Palestinian houses and 19 newly homeless children will have nowhere to sleep.The evictions also drew strong words from Israel's closest ally, the United States, which in recent months has placed increasing pressure on the Jewish state to halt settlement construction.The eviction of families and demolition of homes in east Jerusalem is not in keeping with Israeli obligations, said a senior US diplomat, who described the events as provocative.Unilateral actions taken by either party cannot pre-judge the outcome of negotiations and will not be recognised by the international community,he told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The United Nations too condemned the actions.
I deplore the totally unacceptable actions by Israel in which Israeli security forces evicted Palestinian refugee families ... to allow settlers to take possession of their properties,said Richard Miron of the UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process.The British consulate, which is in Sheikh Jarrah along with several other foreign missions, echoed the view. The Israelis' claim that the imposition of extremist Jewish settlers into this ancient Arab neighbourhood is a matter for the courts or the municipality is unacceptable,it said in a statement.These actions are incompatible with the Israeli-professed desire for peace. We urge Israel not to allow the extremists to set the agenda.Israel captured east Jerusalem in the 1967 Six-Day War and later annexed it in a move not recognised by the international community. It sees all of Jerusalem as its eternal, undivided capital and does not consider construction in east Jerusalem to be settlement activity.The Palestinians want to make the east -- home to some 200,000 Jewish Israelis and 268,000 Palestinians -- the capital of their future state.
UNRWA says needs at least $30 mln to meet deficit Sun Aug 2, 4:58 am ET
AMMAN (AFP) – The cash-strapped UN agency for Palestinian refugees said on Sunday it needs at least 30 million dollars to meet a deficit in its 545-million-dollar budget this year.UNRWA needs 30 million dollars... minimum. But the figure is so flexible and could change anytime, depending on the donations, Richard Cook, the agency's operations director, told AFP.Cook said the situation at the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees is the worst since I joined UNRWA 24 years ago and was unlikely to improve in the coming two years.The agency faces chronic financial problems, but we hope our traditional donors would continue to be generous because our situation is very difficult, Cook added.In all, the agency cares for some 4.2 million Palestinian refugees in the Middle East, including around 1.8 million in Jordan.The agency made a 160-million-dollar appeal last November to oil-rich Arab states in the Gulf to help meet growing demands for it services in 2009.
Fatah to reject Israel as Jewish state at congress: document Sat Aug 1, 3:51 pm ET
RAMALLAH, West Bank (AFP) – Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah faction will reaffirm its refusal to recognise Israel as a Jewish state at a major congress next week, according to a document obtained by AFP on Saturday.The congress document also reiterates the refusal of the Palestinian leadership to resume peace talks with Israel as long as it continues building Jewish settlements in Jerusalem and the occupied West Bank.The Fatah congress that opens in the West Bank city of Ramallah on Tuesday will be the mainstream Palestinian faction's first such meeting in 20 years, with some 2,000 delegates expected to attend from around the world.Israel has come under diplomatic heat over its settlement activity particularly in east Jersualem which it captured in the 1967 Six Day War and later annexed it in a move not recognised by the international community.Israel sees all of Jerusalem as its eternal, undivided capital and does not consider construction in east Jerusalem to be settlement activity.The Palestinians want to make the east of the city -- home to some 200,000 Jewish Israelis in 121 settlements and 268,000 Palestinians -- the capital of their future state.In the document Fatah underlines its refusal to recognise Israel as a Jewish state as demanded by Israel's hardline Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.Fatah links this refusal to its determination to protect the right of Palestinian refugees to return to homes they fled at the time of the creation of Israel in 1948.Abbas's faction is also expected to again endorse a 2002 Saudi-sponsored peace initiative with Israel.The offer calls on all Arab states to establish full and normal relations with Israel in exchange for the Jewish state's withdrawal from all lands occupied in the 1967 war and the creation of a Palestinian state.
The Islamist movement Hamas which rules the Gaza Strip has banned Fatah members from attending the congress and has warned it will take legal action against those who defy the order.Mahmud Zahar, a senior Hamas leader in Gaza, said earlier this week that the ban on taking part in the congress would be lifted if the rival Fatah freed all Hamas prisoners in the West Bank.Hamas-Fatah tensions boiled over in June 2007 when the Islamists seized control of Gaza after a week of deadly street clashes, confining the writ of Palestinian president and Fatah leader Mahmud Abbas to the West Bank.
Saudi rebuffs US on improving ties with Israel By MATTHEW LEE, Associated Press Writer – Fri Jul 31, 4:53 pm ET
WASHINGTON – Saudi Arabia on Friday bluntly rejected U.S. appeals for improved relations with Israel as a way to help restart Middle East peace talks, saying the Jewish state is not interested in a deal.After talks with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal said his country will not consider steps suggested by U.S. Mideast peace envoy George Mitchell until Israel accepts Arab demands to withdraw from all occupied Palestinian territories.
Incrementalism and a step-by-step approach, has not and, we believe, will not lead to peace, Saud said as Clinton looked on at a joint State Department news conference. Temporary security and confidence building measures will also not bring peace.What is required is a comprehensive approach that defines the final outcome at the outset and launches into negotiations over final status issues,the prince said, referring to the borders of a future Palestinian state, control of Jerusalem, the return of Palestinian refugees, water and security.President Barack Obama, Clinton and Mitchell all have been urging Arab nations to improve ties with Israel with confidence-building measures such as opening trade offices, allowing academic exchanges and permitting civilian Israeli aircraft to overfly their airspace as a way of demonstrating their commitment to peace.Clinton repeated that call in her remarks, saying the Obama administration wants the Arab states, including our friends in Saudi Arabia, to work with us to take steps to improve relations with Israel, to support the Palestinian Authority and to prepare their people to embrace the eventual peace between the Palestinians and the Israelis.Saudi Arabia's continued leadership is absolutely vital to achieve a comprehensive and lasting peace, she said.A bipartisan group of more than 200 members of Congress delivered a similar message Friday to Saudi King Abdullah, urging him to drop opposition to the administration's appeal for intermediate confidence-building steps.We have been disappointed thus far to see the public reaction of your government to President Obama's request, the lawmakers wrote in a letter to the monarch.We urge you to assert a strong leadership role and help lead the Middle East to a new era of peace and reconciliation by stepping forward with a dramatic gesture toward Israel akin to the steps taken earlier by the leaders of Egypt and Jordan.But Saud flatly ruled that out. He maintained that Israel was trying to distract the world from a Saudi-proposed Arab-Israel peace deal in which Arab states would recognize Israel provided it withdraws from Arab territory seized in the 1967 war.The question really is, What will Israel give in exchange for this comprehensive settlement offer? Saud said, noting that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ignored U.S. calls to stop constructing Jewish settlements in the West Bank and building housing in East Jerusalem.
Israel hasn't even responded to an American request to halt settlements, which President Obama described as illegitimate, he said.The Saudi stance is complicating Mitchell's efforts to bring the Israelis and Palestinians back to negotiations.But Clinton denied that the odds were insurmountable. She said Mitchell, who just returned from his fifth trip to the region, was making progress and developing a formula to get the two sides talking again.We feel like we're making headway and we are determined to do so in as short a period of time as possible, she said.
Rocket-battered Israeli border town enjoying calm By ARON HELLER, Associated Press Writer – Wed Jul 29, 4:21 pm ET
SDEROT, Israel – Six months after Israel ended its bruising offensive against Gaza Strip militants, the people of this rocket-scarred border town are enjoying their calmest stretch in recent memory.The rocket attacks that made life unbearable have all but stopped. Playgrounds are filled with children on summer vacation, stores are bustling and the town's public swimming pool is open for the first time in five years.
People are out more. There is movement. There is a different atmosphere, said Avigail Hazan, a 42-year-old storekeeper.It was worth going through the war for this. It's fun now; I'm calm.Life before the war — it wasn't life, agreed the town's deputy mayor, Rafik Agaronov. Now, thank God, there is quiet. Hopefully it will stay like this forever. If our children are calm, we are calm.Israel's anger and frustration over the incessant rocket fire on this working-class town less than a mile from Gaza's border was the loudly proclaimed reason for its invasion of Gaza. The fact that the attacks have all but ended has improved the atmosphere and set the stage for possible talks between Israel and the Palestinians.The U.S. has sent a parade of envoys to the region this month to explore the prospects. Those efforts have focused on bringing Israel together with Hamas' bitter rival, the moderate West Bank government of President Mahmoud Abbas. Hamas, which took control of Gaza from Abbas' forces two years ago, remains internationally isolated.Hamas has not ruled out firing more rockets, but the militants seem to no longer be targeting Israel.A Hamas spokesman, Abu Obeida, insisted Wednesday the militant group has not changed its policy regarding rocket attacks and called them one of the legitimate tools of the resistance.Still, rocket fire has dropped dramatically since the Gaza offensive ended in January, with some 220 rockets fired on southern Israel, according to the army. The last rocket attack on Sderot was May 19.That compares to 7,865 rockets and mortars fired on southern Israel since Israel withdrew from Gaza in September 2005, according to the military. At least 4,000 of those hit Sderot, making life miserable and increasingly dangerous. Eight people were killed and hundreds were wounded. The economy was paralyzed and nearly everyone was traumatized by the frequent wail of sirens and explosions.The heavy rocket fire brought life in Sderot to a virtual standstill as hundreds fled to get out of range. Those who stayed behind kept close to home and to their fortified shelters.
Israel's massive air and ground assault, which began last December, killed more than 1,100 Palestinians, wounded thousands more and caused massive destruction.Despite a backlash of international criticism and war crimes allegations, Israel says the assault achieved its primary goal of stopping the rocket fire. Israeli officials believe the offensive proved to be a powerful deterrent, though they also say Gaza's Hamas rulers are using the lull to rearm.Eager to win international acceptance, Hamas may now be showing restraint to gain favor with the outside world. The head of Israel's Shin Bet security service, Yuval Diskin, said this month that Hamas was giving more attention to diplomatic efforts to end its isolation.Israel has also dramatically scaled back its military activities, though the stifling economic blockade it has maintained since the fighting ended has prevented Gaza from rebuilding.With renewed fighting always a possibility, the residents of Sderot are enjoying the calm as long as it lasts.Perhaps the most visible change in town is the reopening of the Olympic-size pool, providing a welcome place to cool off from the sweltering Israeli summer. In recent years, the rocket attacks made the pool too dangerous to enter.The kids missed this, they needed this, said Zion Peretz, the pool manager, as campers jumped into the water behind him.It's given us a joy for life again.
But not everyone has been able to erase old memories that quickly.
Experts have warned of long-lasting psychological damage inflicted on Sderot's 24,000 residents, particularly children, who suffer from exceptionally high rates of anxiety and bed-wetting compared to other Israeli children, according to local psychologists.
Yaeli Biton says she is still under psychological care and takes daily anxiety medication. I hear a car screech, a refrigerator door slam, the air conditioner make noise, and I panic, said the 50-year-old Biton.It's been like this for eight years. The feeling doesn't go away in one day.Many in Sderot said they believe the current calm won't last, and that Hamas was using the tranquil period to prepare for another round of fighting. That looming possibility is evident in the barricaded shelters scattered throughout town. Even the pool has a safe room for bathers to scamper to in case of emergency.Still, residents say they can't remember a better time for their hard-hit town. On cooler evenings, it's not unusual to see people drinking a beer with their neighbors outside their homes, or playing backgammon or chess in the park.
Dina Keinan, who owns a bike store, said her sales have increased in recent months.
People didn't buy bicycles because they were afraid to ride them for long periods, she said.It's different now.Atara Orenbouch, a 37-year-old mother of six, said life in Sderot was almost a normal life. Her children can now walk around freely like all other Israeli children. At least they have a chance to have a little bit of a normal childhood, she said.(But) in the back of my mind, I am sure we will have a bad awakening.We just assume that we will go back to the rockets, but in the meanwhile we are happy.Associated Press Writer Jen Thomas contributed to this report.
Gaza father held in honor killing of daughter By RIZEK ABDEL JAWAD, Associated Press Writer – Wed Jul 29, 12:07 pm ET
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip – A Gaza man is being held on suspicion he bludgeoned his daughter with an iron chain, cracking her skull in a particularly brutal family honor killing,two human rights groups said Wednesday, citing police and forensics reports.
The assault was triggered by Jawdat Najjar's discovery that his daughter Fadia — a 27-year-old divorced mother of five — owned a cell phone, the groups said. He suspected she used it to speak to a man outside the family, according to the groups' reports.
Dr. Mohammed Sultan, who examined the victim, told The Associated Press that her head and face were bloodied, her body covered by bruises and that she suffered internal bleeding.Police confirmed Wednesday that Najjar turned himself in a day after the July 23 killing but did not give details. The officer at a police station in northern Gaza spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media.Three of the woman's brothers were also detained on suspicion that they acted as accomplices, said the rights groups Mezan and the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), citing police and forensics reports. The groups did not say how they obtained the reports.Fadia Najjar was the 10th victim of a so-called honor killing this year in the Palestinian territories and among Arab communities in Israel, according to rights groups.In such killings, a woman's life is taken by male relatives who suspect her of inappropriate conduct. Such killings are still widespread in the Middle East, where a woman's perceived misconduct can hurt the standing of a family and where tradition says the stain can only be removed by shedding her blood.
Traditionally, assailants have received light sentences.But the killing of Najjar shocked even activists used to detailing such crimes.Her father used an iron chain to beat her, while also kicking and punching her for about 40 minutes until she died of a fatal blow to the head, said Mezan and the PCHR.It's shocking, said Samir Zakout of Mezan.But it's not surprising because killers know they won't be punished harshly.In the West Bank and Gaza, honor killing assailants serve between six months and three years in prison, said Mona Shawa of PCHR. Gaza is ruled by the Islamic militant Hamas, while the West Bank is run by Western-backed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Justice officials in the two territories were not available for comment.In Jordan, officials said Wednesday they have set up special tribunals to deal with honor killings, hoping to speed up trials.The New York-based Human Rights Watch reported Wednesday that the Syrian government abolished a law that waived punishment for some honor killings and now allows judges to sentence perpetrators to at least two years jail.Associated Press writer Diaa Hadid contributed from Ramallah, West Bank.
US national security advisor meets Israeli officials Wed Jul 29, 8:49 am ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – US National Security Advisory James Jones was holding talks with senior Israeli officials on Wednesday as part of a push by Washington to revive stalled Middle East peace talks.Jones, the last of three senior US officials visiting the region this week, met Defence Minister Ehud Barak in Tel Aviv, Barak's office said without providing details on the discussions.Jones is also due to meet Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu before holding talks with the Palestinian leadership on Thursday in the occupied West Bank.Earlier this week US Defence Secretary Robert Gates and Middle East peace envoy George Mitchell held talks with Israeli and Palestinian officials on separate trips.The administration of US President Barack Obama is on a diplomatic drive to relaunch the stalled Middle East peace process with a view to a comprehensive deal between Israel and all its Arab neighbours.
Appeals court keeps alive suit against Iran By NEDRA PICKLER, Associated Press Writer - Tue Jul 28, 5:17 pm ET
WASHINGTON – A federal appeals court on Tuesday kept alive a wrongful death lawsuit against Iran over Hezbollah's assassination of the former chief of the country's armed forces 25 years ago.The U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Washington said the lower court applied the wrong law when it dismissed the claims of Gholam Oveissi's grandson, who sued Iran because it funded and directed Hezbollah's activities.Oveissi was a four-star general and chief of Iran's armed forces until early 1979, when revolutionaries deposed the Western-backed shah and established an Islamic Republic. Oveissi fled to the United States and then to France, where he took up residence in Paris.His grandson, Amir Oveissi, was born in California but moved in with his grandfather in Paris when he was a few months old. Gholam Oveissi was an outspoken opponent of Iran's revolutionary government and was gunned down while walking on a crowded Paris street on Feb. 17, 1984.Lebanon-based Hezbollah claimed responsibility. Oveissi's family fled Paris, eventually settling in Virginia.Amir Oveissi sued Iran in 2003 in U.S. District Court in Washington for intentional infliction of emotional distress and wrongful death. Iran did not respond or participate in the trial, and U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth ruled in 2007 that Iran was culpable in Oveissi's assassination.But the judge dismissed Amir Oveissi's claims. Lamberth said California law should determine the claim since he was born there, and California law said Amir Oveissi didn't have the legal right to bring to bring a claim over the death of an Iranian citizen.But the appeals court ruled that French law should apply because the assassination took place in France and both Amir and Gholam Oveissi lived there at the time. It ordered the lower court to apply French law to the case.
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