December 10, 2010 - Hope among both Jewish and Palestinian Israelis that a lasting peace between Israel and the Palestinians can ever be achieved appears to be fading, according to two major new polls released here Thursday. A solid majority of 63 percent of Palestinian Israelis and a plurality of 47 percent of Jewish Israelis say they don't believe that peace between the two peoples "will ever happen", according to the surveys, which were conducted separately in October and November. By contrast, 25 percent of Arab Israelis, who constitute between 20 and 25 percent of Israel's population, and 43 percent of Jewish Israelis believe peace is "inevitable" but will take more than five years to achieve...

Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=72716

Video: Israel's unwanted citizens
AlJazeera.net  

Boycott roundup: day of action against TIAA-Cref
Report, The Electronic Intifada  

Pelosi's Hawkish Views Undermine Obama's Middle East Peace Efforts

by: Stephen Zunes, t r u t h o u t | News Analysis 

There are a number of ironies in the efforts by conservative Democrats to oust Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi as the Democratic leader for being "too liberal." For one, had various combinations of the Obama White House, the US Senate and "Blue Dog" House Democrats not blocked her efforts for a much larger stimulus package and a series of jobs bills, the impact of the recession would have been far less in the lead-up to the mid-term elections and Democrats would have likely retained the House. 

December 10, 2010 - Hope among both Jewish and Palestinian Israelis that a lasting peace between Israel and the Palestinians can ever be achieved appears to be fading, according to two major new polls released here Thursday. A solid majority of 63 percent of Palestinian Israelis and a plurality of 47 percent of Jewish Israelis say they don't believe that peace between the two peoples "will ever happen", according to the surveys, which were conducted separately in October and November. By contrast, 25 percent of Arab Israelis, who constitute between 20 and 25 percent of Israel's population, and 43 percent of Jewish Israelis believe peace is "inevitable" but will take more than five years to achieve... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=72716 

11/12/2010

Weekly Collection of Occupation VIDEOS
From FriendlyStranger. ao

VIDEO Palestine on the Map?

Canadian Politicians attack Master`s Thesis by a Progressive Jewish Student
Jenny Peto`s 100-page thesis argues that today`s Jews of European descent "enjoy white privilege" and maintain a victim identity by participating in "hegemonic" Holocaust remembrance programs such as the March of the Living, during which young Jewish people visit Poland and Israel. The University of Toronto accepted the defended thesis and awarded a master`s degree to the 29-year-old, who is an activist associated with the Coalition Against Israeli Apartheid group. She`s also Jewish and a descendant of Holocaust survivors.

Medics: 2 teens killed by explosion of old Israeli shell
Ma`an: Two Palestinian teenagers was killed when an artillery shell left behind by Israeli forces exploded in Gaza Friday morning, medics said. Gaza medical services spokesman Adham Abu Salmiya said 16-year-old Victor Batniji was dead when he arrived at Gaza City`s Shifa Hospital. Moumin Helles, also 16, died shortly after arriving at the hospital. ao

Poll: Split over sending Palestinian fire crews to Israel
Ma`an: of 48,870 readers who responded to the 7-day poll, 50.3 percent (24,524) described Palestinians` participation as a disgrace, but 48.7 percent (23,761) said sending Palestinian firefighters to help was civilized and a humanitarian duty. Palestinian civil defense crews were dispatched to Israel to bolster the country`s woefully inadequate fire service.

Don`t Say We Didn`t Know #241
For years settlers living in Shilo have coveted land belonging to Palestinians from the village Karyut in the West Bank.

Israel Demolishes 10 Homes, School and Animal Shelters in Nablus District

• ·  AICafe: Censorship and Funding in Palestinian Cinema
• ·  Palestinian Legislators from Jerusalem Commemorate Human Rights Day
• ·  Institutional Racism Follows Fire in Israel
• ·  Israelis Protest Racist Rabbinical Decree not to Rent, Sell Property to Non-Jews
• ·  Palestinians Examine Options Following American Failure to Renew Peace Talks
• ·  Thoughts on Israel’s Carmel Forest Fire: What a Country!
• ·  Calls for Adidas to Withdraw Sponsorship of Jerusalem Marathon
• · 

http://www.alternativenews.org/english/

Somoud: Arab Voices of Resistance 

Tariq Shadid – 'Peace of the Slave': a dead end street on a journey to independence

The strongest words Abbas has spoken so far have been his threats to dissolve the Palestinian Authority, which is something many Palestinians have been waiting for for years. However, even in these bold statements, he chose words that can only illustrate his total subservience to the Israelis: "I'll ask Israel to take over." While dissolving the Palestinian Authority is supposed to be an act of rebellion, which is what could have given true weight and strength to his words, Abbas apparently would go about it in a way that would mean nothing more or less than a total surrender.

{More»}

Truth Justice and Peace nearly sunk as RTH convoy facts emerge, and as usual, Gazans get the worst part of the deal»

Unable to comprehend the "Kidnapping" situation and its enormous contradictions and question marks, our site announced we would do a completely objective report on what had happened, since some voices had been totally silenced and censored and others were reporting a fact and then denying it. Aware that the entire situation was already a disaster, but not at this point hopeless, we invited those involved to contribute to clarification and we would conclude our work after the convoy had achieved its mission. The immediate response to this was that the person doing the report was not “objective” (ie, not biased in Ken’s favour). However, pursuit of truth is a right and duty, and in that sense, PTT offers its readers our comprehensive analysis of the RTH convoy incident(s) up until the release of the "Gaza Ten". Despite severe gatekeeping attempts by those who (autonomously??) defend Ken without looking at the facts objectively, we have continued and hope this assists all of us and stimulates us to serve ONLY one cause, that of Palestine, and to avoid any other diversions from that sacred struggle.

David Morrison – Is Hamas opposed to a Two State Solution? (and 3 papers to check out)»

There is little doubt that, if a state of Israel existed within its 1967 borders, then Hamas would accept its existence. For years, Hamas spokesmen have emphasised that they are seeking a long-term truce with Israel, the price being Israeli withdrawal to its 1967 borders and the creation of a Palestinian state in the rest of mandate Palestine. As we demonstrate below, Hamas has been stating this position at least since the movement won the Palestinian election in January 2006. There is no doubt about this, even though political discussion about Palestine often assumes that Hamas is unalterably opposed to the existence of Israel and to a “two-state solution”.

Revealed: How the CIA protected Nazi murderers (By Cristian Salazar and Randy Herschaft in New York) - 12-dec-2010

December 12, 2010 - Declassified CIA files have revealed that US intelligence officials went to great lengths to protect a Ukrainian fascist leader and suspected Nazi collaborator from prosecution after the Second World War and used him to stir up trouble inside the Soviet Union from an office in New York. Mykola Lebed led an underground movement to undermine the Kremlin and wage guerrilla operations for the CIA during the Cold War, said a report prepared by two scholars under the supervision of the US National Archives. During the Second World War, Lebed helped to lead a Ukrainian nationalist organization that collaborated with the Nazis in the murder of the Jews of the western Ukraine and also killed thousands of Poles. The report details post-war efforts by US intelligence officials to throw the federal government's Nazi hunters off his trail and to ignore or obscure his past...

'Our lives became something we'd never dreamt': The former Israeli soldiers who have testified against army abuses (Donald Macintyre) - 12-dec-2010

December 12, 2010 - For anyone who has covered Israel, the West Bank and Gaza over the past few years, reading Occupation of the Territories, the new book from the Israeli ex-soldiers organisation Breaking the Silence, can be an eerily evocative experience. A conscript from the Givati Brigade, for example, describes how troops in the company operating next to his inside Gaza during 2008 had talked about an event earlier in the day. After knocking on the door of a Palestinian house and receiving no immediate answer, they had placed a "fox" – military slang for explosives used to break through doors and walls – outside the front door. At that very moment, the woman of the house had reached the door to open it. "Her limbs were smeared on the wall and it wasn't on purpose," the soldier recalls. "And then her kids came and saw her. I heard it during dinner after the operation, someone said it was funny, and they cracked up from the situation that the kids saw their mother smeared on the wall..."

Photos: Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine 43rd Anniversary Rally, Gaza City (Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine) - 12-dec-2010

December 12, 2010 - Tens of thousands of members and supporters of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine gathered today, December 11, 2010, in Gaza City's Palestine Stadium, marking the forty-third anniversary of the PFLP's founding in a mass rally. Palestinians from all sectors - men and women, elderly and children, workers and farmers, attended the rally from all sectors of Gaza City, and traveling in groups from throughout the Gaza Strip, waving red flags that filled the stadium. Comrade Jamil Majdalawi, member of the Political Bureau of the PFLP, delivered the main speech of the rally, emphasizing the need for Palestinian national unity to confront the occupier and build the resistance in the face of all repression. He emphasized that the Palestinian people have the right to all forms of resistance, including armed, popular and economic resistance, and that resistance is the only solution to the occupation...

Connection between the human rights march and West Bank demonstrations? (Joseph Dana) - 12-dec-2010

December 12, 2010 - ...Unlike the police presence in Tel Aviv, the army in Ni’ilin is present to attack, not defend. It is there to crush the spirit of unarmed resistance in the West Bank. It is there to reinforce that Palestinians are a controlled people living under constant Israeli occupation. As Naomi Chazan began her speech in Tel Aviv (I was following the updates on Twitter while tweeting my own), the army began covering the area of the protest with tear gas. Wave after wave of gas covered the area. Soldiers fired canisters directly at protesters. There was no restraint. Israel’s recognition of International Human Rights Day was starting to take full shape...

Two Palestinian Fighters Killed, One Israeli Soldier Injured In Gaza (by Saed Bannoura) - 12-dec-2010

December 12, 2010 - Israeli sources reported that two Palestinians were killed and one Israeli soldier was injured on Saturday at night when a resistance group clashed with Israeli soldiers invading an area inside the Gaza Strip. The army claimed that soldiers spotted two fighters approaching the security fence separating Gaza from Israel before Israeli tanks fired shells at them. Following the incident, Palestinian fighters fired rounds of live ammunition at Israeli soldiers who invaded the area, and moderately injured one soldier...

Palestinians skeptical after US freeze failure

Negotiators express doubt that indirect peace talks will succeed, call on Washington to take tougher stand. PA aide suggests declaration of statehood.

Netanyahu rules out Jerusalem split (AlJazeera.net) - 13-dec-201

December 13, 2010 - Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, has made clear that comments by the country's defense minister, in favour of dividing Jerusalem between Israelis and Arabs were not the policy of the Israeli government. "Ehud Barak's comments were not co-ordinated with the prime minister," an official in Netanyahu's office said on Sunday, speaking on condition of anonymity. "They represent the long-held views of the defense minister but do not represent the views of the government as a whole," he said...

Medics: 2 injured in Israeli shelling north of Gaza (Ma'an news) - 13-dec-2010

December 13, 2010 -- Two Palestinians were injured Monday by Israeli shelling west of Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip, medics said. Gaza medical services spokesman Adham Abu Salmiya said the injured were transferred to the Kamal Odwan Hospital with moderate injuries.

Hillary Clinton’s Empty Words Inspire Pessimism (Clive Granger) - 13-dec-2010

December 12, 2010 - Yesterday found Hillary Clinton clutching at straws in her talk on the Israeli/Palestinian peace process at the Brooking Institute, Washington D.C. Following the US’s failure to secure a settlement freeze Clinton’s superficial positivity about the peace process demonstrated a lack of understanding and sincerity...

Caution: Children Ahead
- The Illegal Behavior of Israeli Police toward Minors in Silwan Suspected of Stone Throwing (B'Tselem) - 13-dec-2010

December 12, 2010 - An investigation conducted by B'Tselem shows that, during the past year (November 2009 to October 2010), at least 81 minors from Silwan have been arrested or detained for questioning, the vast majority on suspicion of stone throwing. The arrests and detentions followed confrontations between Palestinians and settlers in the neighborhood, where there is great tension resulting from the taking of control of houses and archeological sites by settlers.

Palestinian Non-Violent Leader Released From Israeli Prision (Joseph Dana) - 13-dec-2010

December 13, 2010 - Before he had even reached the gate of Ofer military compound, Adeeb Abu Rahmah had his hands in the air in celebration. Abu Rahmah crossed the iron gate of the compound and walked into freedom after eighteen months in military prison. Despite the frigid mountain air, the warmth of Adeeb’s presence could be felt strongly by all present. He embraced his daughters immediately with tears in his eyes. With barely a moment to catch his breath, Adeeb kissed and hugged everyone that was present, occasionally throwing his hand high in the air with a peace sign and yelling out one of the many chants that are common on demonstration days in Bil’in...

13/12/2010

`Our lives became something we`d never dreamt`: The former Israeli soldiers who have testified against army abuses
The Independent - Former Israeli soldiers who have testified against army abuses have for the first time given up their anonymity, to make their voices all the harder to ignore. Donald Macintyre gets an exclusive preview of a powerful new book

Hasbara for Dummies - Insulting Our Intelligence
Ofer Neiman - Jewish Peace News - “…when irrelevant insults are constantly hurled at them for their international-law based criticism of Israeli policies, [European anti-apartheid/anti-occupation activists] will eventually say: ‘Look, I am tired of having to prove to you that I am not anti-Semitic. If my criticism amounts to anti-Semitism, in your perverted view, just carry on with this charade’"

Troops Kidnap Former Palestinian Minister in Jenin
Saed Bannoura - IMEMC & Agencies - "There are eleven elected legislators and ministers currently imprisoned by Israel"

The Charade of Israeli-Palestinian Talks
Noam Chomsky - In These Times - "It is hardly a secret that for 35 years the U.S. and Israel have stood virtually alone in opposition to a consensus on a political settlement that is close to universal, including the Arab states, the Organization of the Islamic Conference (including Iran), and all other relevant parties. With brief and rare departures, the two rejectionist states have preferred illegal expansion to security"

Public invited to inform on those renting to Arabs
Yair Altman - Ynet - In step supporting rabbis` letter on halachic ruling against renting to Arabs, initiative gives number so public can give names for `list of disgrace`

Keeping Israel Jewish and pure - and democratic if there`s time
Zvi Bar`el - Haaretz - It`s not a democratic state or a national Israeli state Netanyahu wants the Palestinians to recognize, but a state characterized by the values of Rabbi Wolpo, Rabbi Elyahu and the other geniuses

Israel may have no military option against Iran
Gideon Levy--Israeli leaders should understand that the attack option isn`t really an option - a thousand new fire trucks and even the Iron Dome missile defense system will not provide protection.

The unholy alliance between Israel`s Right and Europe`s anti-Semites
Adar Primor--Oy Europe! Its official arm, brave and mighty, was extended to us in the form of the dozens of firefighters and firefighting aircraft dispatched to battle the Carmel blaze. Its other arm - the outcast, disobedient one - came to ignite fires whose damages cannot be predicted. These took the form of the very unholy alliance between figures on Israel`s right and extreme nationalists and even anti-Semites in Europe that is gaining momentum in the Holy Land.

Today in Palestine
The Headlines--

OCHA Protection of Civilians Weekly Report for 1-7 December, 2010
OCHA

For previous articles since 2004 go to respective sections

Knesset Approves New Law Preventing Detainees From Meeting Lawyers For Six Month

Monday December 13, 2010 - 12:51

The Legal Committee of the Israeli Knesset decided on Monday to approve a new draft submitted by the Israeli Interior Minister, Yitzhak Aharanovitch, in which he demanded that Palestinian detainees, imprisoned on nationalistic/political grounds, should not be allowed to meet their lawyers up to six months after their arrest, the Maan News Agency reported. Full Story

EU Ready to Discuss the Recognition of Palestine

Monday December 13, 2010 - 12:31

According to sources at the Palestinian Foreign Ministry, representatives of the European Union will discuss the possibility of recognizing a Palestinian state along the 1967 borders, if no agreement is reached with Israel within a year. Full Story

Report on Police And Army Brutality Against Palestinian Children In Jerusalem

Monday December 13, 2010 - 11:15

Caution: Children Ahead - The Illegal Behavior of the Police toward Minors in Silwan Suspected of Stone Throwing... This is a report by the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories (B'Tselem). Full Story

Lamis Andoni: Europe must emerge from US’ shadow  

The central difference between the US and the EU is that most European countries, rhetorically at least, believe that a solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict must be based on international law and UN resolutions, while the US seeks to negate these to ensure that any solution is based on Israeli-manufactured facts on the ground.

MORE by Lamis Andoni
The PA's ultimate act of resistance
Let Israel keep its freeze
Palestinians and the ‘Jewish state’
‘Bullied’ but not surrendering
PA ‘must not bow to blackmail’...

13 Dec 2010 / Read More

Jonathan Cook: Israel’s war on Jerusalem children  

10 year old Palestinian boy: “One of the men grabbed me from behind and started choking me. The second grabbed my shirt and tore it from the back, and the third twisted my hands behind my back and tied them with plastic cords. ‘Who threw stones?’ one of them asked me. ‘I don’t know,’ I said. He started hitting me on the head and I shouted in pain.”

MORE by Jonathan Cook
Israel turns blind eye to racist state-employed rabbis
Wikileaks and the new global order
Publish it Not
Palestinian calls grow to seek UN resolution
Obama's bribe
Israel's self-destruction”
Rabbis' edict bars renting to Arabs
Peace might upend wealth of Israelis
The US arms ‘bonanza’ in Middle East
Remote-Controlled Killing...

13 Dec 2010 / Read More

Akiva Eldar: An end to the occupation first  

Fostering the illusion that the conflict is ending doesn't bring a solution closer; in fact, the focus on the final-status talks offers an alibi for deepening the occupation. The high and mighty words about two states for two peoples silence the protest voices of a nation that for more than 43 years has lived under the occupation of another nation....

13 Dec 2010 / Read More

• Palestinians in Israel would prefer one secular democratic state (but who’s asking them?)
• Clinton: Occupation robs Palestinians of dignity and self-determination and is radicalizing the Middle East
• UXOs: Did Israel deliberately arm Hamas?
• Peretz: secret meeting of Kissinger and Harvard heavyweights pulled Israel’s chestnuts from fire in ‘73
• More on the Washington Post’s new blogger’s ‘barbarous dialect’
• Princeton is stage for Jews for boycott, Vilkomerson and Blumenthal
• Hummus wars: DePaul Israel lobbyists say boycott campaign threatens Jewish students
• B’Tselem spotlights illegal behavior of police toward minors in Occupied Silwan suspected of stone-throwing
• The bubble: NPR devotes 9 minutes to Israeli miracle company ‘Better Place’
• Neocon questions: Where is the Palestinian Gandhi? And where is the great Churchill of our times?
• ‘Washington Post’s new blogger promptly calls for supporting human rights in Iran– and killing Iranian scientists
• My nightmare is shadowed by Assange
• Adeeb Abu Rahma, a leader of nonviolent protest, is freed after 17 months in prison
• Friedman seeks to blame Palestinians for breakdown of talks
• Israel: PA must change school curriculum

Akiva Eldar

Focusing on final status talks only deepens the occupation

EU to wait until 'appropriate' to recognize Palestinian state

Foreign ministers meeting in Brussels worry early declaration as per Palestinian request will harm efforts to resume peace process.

How much do U.S. Jewish leaders make?

The Forward publishes the annual salaries of the top Jewish leaders in the United States.

65 comments

• · 

65 comments

• ·  Palestinians are planning to make Netanyahu sweat

33 comments

Court finds postponing local elections illegal

Palestinian court finds June 10 decision to postpone municipal elections was illegal, orders PA to set new date. Factions welcome ruling as democratic victory.

 Rescuing Zionism at Palestinian expense
Ali Abunimah

 Funding illegal Israeli settlements? Priceless
Bernard Keane

December 13, 2010 - Israel increases restrictions and house demolitions in the Jordan Valley. A report issued by the Arab League says that the Israeli occupation forces have increased the restrictions placed on Palestinians in the Jordan Valley. The Palestine and Arab Territories Section claim that Israel's aim is to expel the residents in preparation for its annexation of the land. The Jordan Valley is being increasingly isolated from the rest of the occupied West Bank....Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=72835

Israeli Police Demolishes Seven Homes In Lod
Saed Bannoura

PRC: Universal Jurisdiction change promotes further crimes
Palestinian Return Centre (PRC)

December 13, 2010 - The ministry of health in Gaza warned Monday that 137 types of medicine and 150 of essential medical supplies are out of stock in Gaza, among those supplies are drugs used to treat cancer and kidney patients. The ministry's pharmaceutical director is calling on the ministry's counterpart in Ramallah to release to the Gaza Strip the drugs it is withholding. Only 37 per cent of required medical supplies reached the Strip this year so far, he said. Gaza health ministry public relations director Ahmed Al-Ashi assigned blame to Israel's four year blockade on the coastal enclave for the sharp shortage. Israeli forces have blocked urgent medical and humanitarian aid from being imported into the Strip...Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=72830

The Psychological Underpinnings of the Turkish-Israeli Rift 

Alon Ben-Meir, 12.13.2010

Senior Fellow at NYU's Center for Global Affairs

Israel needs to be disabused of the notion that the Islamist tendency' of the AK Party is the only driving force behind Turkey's policy and Turkey needs to understand that Israel has serious and legitimate security concerns.

Read Post | Comments

December 15, 2010 - The Obama administration's failure to bribe Israel's right-wing government into accepting a three-month settlement "freeze" should have ended talk about the "peace process," but Obama's Middle East team is still crawling towards a two-state solution with little light at the end of the tunnel. State Department cables released by WikiLeaks will dim the lights further. The cables show that Israeli officials' stated vision of a Palestinian state is one that is feeble and toothless--a vision that could snuff out any remaining hope of a viable Palestinian state...Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=72929

Inside the moral corruption of Israeli society
Joseph Dana

Israel redefines the definition of Chutzpah
Joseph Dana

Desolation in Hebron’s Old City
Cecile Gault.

Wishing Qalandiya Away
By Joharah Baker 

RABBIS MAKE STRANGE BEDFELLOWS
Steve Amsel

December 15, 2010 - At around 3:30pm, Israeli police arrested a 19-year-old Palestinian man named Imen in Sheikh Jarrah, following a confrontation with settlers. The settlers’ dog, on a 2-meter long chain, attacked Imen as he stood on the street outside of his former home, which the settlers had dispossessed. The settlers responded with laughter and walked up to another house, which they are occupying although it had been the home of another Palestinian. As the settlers stood in front of the house, the man who had been attacked swung a pole against the house to make noise to scare the dog away. Then, the settlers began to take pictures with their mobile phones, and called the police...Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=72936

US House passes anti-Palestine bill (MJ Rosenberg) - 16-dec-2010

December 16, 2010 - At last the United States is responding to Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's refusal to freeze settlements and re-start negotiations with the Palestinians. Congressman Howard Berman (D-CA), chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, rushed to the House floor with a resolution drafted by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee [AIPAC] condemning the Palestinians for publicly suggesting that, in the wake of Netanyahu's refusal to freeze settlements and negotiate, they will consider a unilateral declaration of statehood.

We pay for every Israeli war at the gas pump (Max Ajl) - 16-dec-2010

December 16, 2010 - How about a new slogan for the anti-war and Palestine solidarity movements? We pay for every Israeli war at the gas pump! No aid to Israel! The New Zealand Herald reports: Opec is breaching its production limits the most in six years, signaling the world's biggest suppliers are ready to pump more crude next year as oil rallies towards US$100 ($133) a barrel. The Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries excluding Iraq pumped 26.78 million barrels a day this year, exceeding the quotas by an average of 1.934 million a day, the highest level since 2004, according to data compiled by Bloomberg....

16/12/2010

Wishing Qalandiya Away
Joharah Baker - MIFTAH - But this is the hard reality we Palestinians find ourselves in today. My daughter – or any other Palestinian child – should not have to worry about crossing a checkpoint to get home or whether her mother`s permit will be renewed by the Israeli interior ministry. But these I realized, are tangible concerns for her, real fears that obviously take precedence over wishing for a castle or for her prince charming.

Labour Is Concerned
Amira Hass - ZCommunications - Labour Party representatives who had visited the Ofer military tribunal in the West Bank two weeks ago expressed shock over how the court conducts its hearings. In a parliamentary debate about detained Palestinian minors, they said that given a sample of 100 children, 69 said soldiers beat them and kicked them when they were being arrested. The children were better off pleading guilty regardless of whether they had done something, because if they were detained until the end of proceedings, this could be three times longer than their punishment, the parliamentarians said.

Middle East peace process: Dead but not buried
The Guardian - Editorial - The Middle East peace process died a quiet, undramatic death with the statement last week that the US had given up trying to persuade Binyamin Netanyahu to stop building on occupied land as a prerequisite to direct talks with the Palestinians. Few, however, are interested in burying the corpse.

Caution: Children Ahead - The Illegal Behavior of the Police toward Minors in Silwan Suspected of Stone Throwing
B`Tselem - Information Sheet - B`Tselem urges the Jerusalem Police to observe the letter and spirit of the Youth Law while coping with stone-throwing incidents in East Jerusalem. The police must immediately end the arrest of minors at night and the use of violence by special forces during arrests. The police must also ensure that minors are interrogated only in the presence of their parents, and must emphasize options for the rehabilitation of the minors and for preventing injury to them.

IDF Refuses Palestinians Who Fought Carmel Fire Israeli Entry For Appreciation Ceremony
Richard Silverstein - Tikun Olam - In his original statement, the fire chief said more politely than what I’m about to say: we were kosher enough to allow all of us to enter Israel to fight the fire. But after it’s over it’s back to business as usual. Israeli Palestinian MK Ahmed Tibi summarized the incident succinctly:

Breaking the Silence: the occupation testimonies (part I)
Breaking the Silence - +972blog - The collection of 101 testimonies shows the degree of control Israel has over the lives of Palestinians. Unlike previous publications by BTS, this one is not about war crimes. More than anything, the testimonies reveal the banalities of the Occupation: the roadblocks, the nightly raids, the mass arrests and the daily humiliations which take place everywhere in the West Bank.

The `Real Jew` Debate
ROGER COHEN - The New York Times - The view that American Jews supportive of Israel but critical of its policies are not “real Jews” is, however, widespread. Israel-right-or-wrong continues to be the core approach of major U.S. Jewish organizations, from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac) to the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations.

Palestinians in Israel would prefer one secular democratic state (but who’s asking them?)
Audrey Farber - Mondoweiss - Palestinians in Israel seem to oppose a two-state solution. It`s not because of Jerusalem, or settlements, or resource distribution, even though these are all issues. It`s not about the borders at all; it`s about what happens inside them. From this perspective, two states means they run the risk of being forcibly expelled and sent to the West Bank. In two states, the Palestinian community in Israel is still a minority, still discriminated against, and possibly under greater physical threat than before. Take, for example, the EU Partnership for Peace Grant.

Outcry in Denmark over firm`s involvement in occupation
Adri Nieuwhof - The Electronic Intifada - The Danish-British security firm G4S has come under scrutiny after it was revealed last month that it supplies equipment and services to Israel for use at checkpoints and settlements in the occupied West Bank and at Israeli prisons. The company`s own promotional material describes how it has provided "security systems" to the Israel Prison Service, which detains thousands of Palestinian political prisoners.

P.A. Asks European Countries for the Recognition of Palestine

Thursday December 16, 2010 - 17:24

On Thursday, Palestinian negotiators asked to a number of European countries to recognize a Palestinian state in the 1967 borders, as a new strategy to failure of peace talks. Meanwhile, the U.S. approved a resolution opposing a possible unilateral declaration, Haaretz reported. Full Story

Nine Palestinians Detained in Hebron Area During Night Raids

Thursday December 16, 2010 - 13:14

Israeli forces arrested, on Wednesday night, nine Palestinians from Hebron region and transported them to an unknown location, Ma'an News and PNN echoed. Full Story

Israel Approves the Construction of New Settlements Near Beit Orot Yeshiva

Thursday December 16, 2010 - 12:51

According to Israel Radio, the Jerusalem Municipality gave approval, on Thursday, the construction of 24 additional Jewish houses, near the Ultra-Orthodox center Beit Orot in the occupied East Jerusalem. Ma'an News reported. Full Story

Mubarak Separately Meets Abbas, Mitchell

Wednesday December 15, 2010 - 23:10

On Wednesday, Egypt's President, Hosni Mubarak, held separate talks in Cairo with Palestinian President, Mahmoud Abbas, and U.S Middle East Envoy, George Mitchell, and discussed the means to resolve the current deadlock in peace talks.
Full Story

In A Letter Send To Turkish PM; Likud MK Says Israel Should Have Killed All Marmara Passengers

Wednesday December 15, 2010 - 22:17

Israeli sources reported Wednesday that Israeli Member of Knesset of the Likud Party, Dani Dannon, sent a sarcastic letter to Turkish Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, telling him that Israeli soldiers should have killed all of the passengers of the Marmara Ship that was heading to Gaza to deliver humanitarian supplies. Full Story

Moshé Machover: The endless so-called ‘peace process’  

Israel's strategic aim is to prevent the creation of anything that can even remotely be described as a sovereign Palestinian state; to colonize as much as possible of the best Palestinian lands; and to confine the Palestinians to a series of disconnected enclosures ­ not so much like Bantustans (which were a useful reserve of exploitable labour power for the South-African apartheid regime), but like US Indian reservations, or open prisons. The Gaza Strip has already been converted into the largest prison camp in the world....

16 Dec 2010 / Read More

Jonathan Cook: Apartheid Israel-style  

Adalah lawyer Suhad Bishar: "This legislation makes clear in very blunt fashion that the thrust of policy in Israel is towards maintaining segregation in housing between Jewish and Arab citizens."

MORE by Jonathan Cook
Israel's war on Jerusalem children
Israel's racist rabbis
Wikileaks and the new global order
Publish it Not
Palestinian calls grow to seek UN resolution
Israel's self-destruction”
Peace might upend wealth of Israelis
The US arms ‘bonanza’ in Middle East
Remote-Controlled Killing...

15 Dec 2010 / Read More

Dror Etkes: Instead of befriending neo-fascists, Israel should make peace  

Anyone who has visited the West Bank in recent months has been greeted by the din of mountain-moving bulldozers and jackhammers, alongside giant foundation drills sending up clouds of dust that can be seen for miles. Cement mixers are working around the clock, and everything is being done in a grab-what-you-can atmosphere....

15 Dec 2010 / Read More

Israeli towns continue to rewrite bylaws to keep Arabs out  

Town draft bylaws: "...multigenerational and variegated communal life that upholds Zionist values and seeks to maintain Israel as a Jewish and democratic state in the spirit of the Declaration of Independence ... based on tolerance, human dignity..."

IOA Editor: The Jewish and anti-democratic majority that for more than six decades has systematically excluded the Palestinian Arab minority from access to land, national resources, equal employment and all other opportunities, is now attempting to codify its apartheid-like practices into law. Some liberal Zionists find the formalization of such long-held practices disturbing but, as can be expected, they are not prepared to criticize the structural foundation of such practices, which is inherent to Zionism....

16 December 2010 / Read More

Review: Film depicts struggle for peace in modern Bethlehem‎
Associated Baptist Press - Robert Wallace

A Nativity scene painted as a mural on the wall that divides Israeli and Palestinian parts of the Bethlehem area. (EGM Films) Each man's story is woven ...

Bethlehem Is Booked for Christmas‎ - The Media Line
Lessening violence ups Bethlehem tourism ahead of Christmas‎ - International Business Times
Bethlehem Mayor Decries Occupation, Lights Christmas Tree‎ - Palestine News Network
Washington Post - Mormon Times

AIPAC lauds US House resolution opposing unilateral declaration of ...‎
Ha'aretz - Natasha Mozgovaya - 41 minutes ago

"AIPAC supports the House's call for a negotiated solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and its strong opposition to efforts to seek recognition of a ...

Video: Riz Khan - Throwing away the roadmap to peace?

Al Jazeera

No Israel talks 'in any format,' Palestinians insist‎ - AFP
US House passes anti-Palestine bill‎ - Aljazeera.net
CNN - The Hindu

 "other Trotskyists" and Palestine‎
Workers' Liberty - Alan Johnson

What emerges is a Marxist approach to Israel-Palestine which avoids both .... During the 1948 Arab-Israeli war around 570000 Palestinian Arabs fled or were ...

Erekat Pulls Wool Over 'Guardian' Readers' Eyes‎ - Arutz Sheva

Open letter from the Jerusalem Palestinian Legislative Council members 

Thursday, 16 December 2010 17:10

15 December 2010

RE: The threat to expel us from Jerusalem, our home city

You may know that the last Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) elections were held on the 25th January 2006. The elections were organized by agreement with all concerned parties and with the full cooperation of national and international observers, who deemed them to be transparent, free and fair in accordance with international criteria.

The results was contrary to the expectations of the Israeli occupation authorities and its Western supporters as a result of which Israel embarked on a campaign to discredit and undermine the Palestinian democratic process. First to be targeted was Palestinian unity followed by extortion of the Palestinian leadership. In an unprecedented move, Israel also detained 64 members of the newly-elected PLC as well as ministers serving in the 10th Palestinian government. Read more...

The legal status of Israel's expulsion of elected Palestinian legislators from Jerusalem 

Thursday, 16 December 2010 16:45

Israel has ordered the immediate expulsion from Jerusalem of three elected members of the Palestinian Legislative Council - Mr. Muhammad Abu-Teir, Mr. Ahmad Attoun and Mr Mohammad Totah - along with a former Palestinian Minister of Jerusalem Affairs, Mr Khaled Abu Arafeh. All four are permanent residents of Jerusalem, a legal status imposed on the Palestinian population of East Jerusalem following Israel's occupation and illegal annexation in 1967.

According to the Legal Centre for Arab Minority Rights in Israel (Adalah), the expulsion decision violates Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which prohibits the deportation of protected persons from occupied territory. It also violates the constitutional rights of the parliamentarians to continue to live in their normal place of residence and homeland, and their right to family life. Read more...

Palestinian woman enters her fifteenth day of hunger strike in Israeli jail 

Thursday, 16 December 2010 14:30

A Palestinian woman being held in prison by the Israelis has entered the fifteenth day of a hunger strike. Linan Abu Ghalma, 28, from Nablus in the occupied West Bank was abducted from her home by the Israeli occupation forces in July at the same time as her sister. It is reported that her health is deteriorating badly.

The High Supreme National Committee for the Support of Detainees has said that it holds the occupation authorities fully responsible for Linan's life. Her detention, it claims, was part of a mass campaign against activists of the Popular Front in the city of Nablus. Read more...

Lieberman reiterates Israeli refusal to sign Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty 

Thursday, 16 December 2010 13:00  

A poll by the European Commission in 2003 across 15 EU member states found that Israel was regarded as "the top threat to world peace".Israel will not sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty intended to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons because the Zionist state "does not pose a threat to peace in the world". That is the view of Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman in response to a call from his Australian counterpart, Kevin Rudd. "The problem is not focused on the issue of the deployment of nuclear weapons itself," claimed Lieberman, "but over the responsibility of the State which posses weapons of this kind." Read more...

The repercussions of security coordination between the Palestinian Authority and Israel 

Thursday, 16 December 2010 11:29

By Sawsan Ramahi
The Oslo Accord restricted the function of the Palestinian Authority (the PA), not only with regard to the control it could exert over the residents of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, but also significantly in making its role to provide cover for Israel's security needs. Moreover, the Road Map committed the leadership of the PA to fight resistance to Israel's military occupation; to strike at the infrastructure of the resistance movements in return for the promise of "the possibility of establishing a Palestinian state". It is within this context that the team of US security coordinators, whose tactics have led to the political and geographic division of the Palestinian people, should be viewed.  

Since the beginning of the peace process, it has been apparent that Israel's primary goal has been to rid itself of the burden of administrating the populations of Gaza and the West Bank while retaining control of the largest possible area of land and the protection of Israel's security. The Oslo Accord was signed for this purpose and Israel allowed the PA to form a 3000-strong security force, which later increased to 30,000 in accordance with Oslo 2. The force was increased in size once again so that shortly before the start of the Al-Aqsa Intifada in 2000 it numbered around 40,000. Read more...

• Mondo Awards: Call for entries
• Israel can’t defeat Hezbollah –Israeli expert [Hint: So it should stop trying]
• BBC badgers Barak as no American outlet would: What is the US getting for its billions in aid?
• Talks foundered because– U.S. does not know what Palestinians want!
• Sourani, in 1999: ‘We should wait on no one to claim what is rightfully ours’
• The Guardian calls it: The peace process is dead, but some don’t want the party to end
• When in Rome, do as the Israelis do
• ‘The Palestine Cables’: WikiLeaks dox expose Netanyahu’s vision of Palestinian bantustan
• The shame, the shame! ‘I got him to crap himself’ is boast in new soldiers’ testimonies about occupation
• Secret House resolution says No to Palestinian statehood
• Poll says most Israeli Jews back rabbis’ anti-Arab letter, and Arab lawmakers say the letter originated in Knesset
• Alia Malek on Rula Jebreal
• Why I was willing to risk arrest at the AIPAC annual dinner
• ‘It is ethnic cleansing’
• Thoughts on a Jewish freedom-fighter, Masha Bruskina

Elie Podeh

Israel never really wanted peace

Gideon Levy

The farce of a secular and democratic Jewish state

• ·  Israel condemns Norway's upgrade of Palestinian standing in Oslo to 'diplomatic delegation'

Foreign Ministry official warns that Palestinians won't want to renew peace talks with Israel if they start attaining political goals without negotiations.

13 comments

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• Palestinians appeal to European countries: Recognize statehood even without

'Blast off Lebanon coast was IDF destroying espionage device'

Voice of Lebanon radio attributes explosion to Israel Air Force operations day after Lebanese Army said it had found two Israeli spy cameras in mountains near Beirut and Bekaa Valley.

17 comments

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• Report: Lebanon says Israel erecting 21 spy posts along its border
• Tapping into their telephones
• Discovery of Israeli 'spy cameras' is good news for Hezbollah
• Nasrallah: Hezbollah ready to repulse any Israeli attack, despite internal

AIPAC lauds U.S. House resolution opposing unilateral declaration of Palestinian state

ADL director: Nixon was a bigot, but a practical supporter of Israel 

Foxman calls Watergate-era recordings on which Nixon and Kissinger can be heard making disparaging marks against Jews 'ironic.'

7 comments

Submitting to criticism, Libya charity drops politics to avoid angering Israel 

The foundation, led by Gadhafi's son, sent a Gaza-bound aid ship in November, but now claims its priority is 'assisting the poor in sub-Saharan Africa.'

No Israel talks 'in any format,' negotiators say

After Arab FMs say no to talks without "substantial" Israeli proposal, Palestinian officials add halt to settlement construction to list of conditions.

Norway upgrades PLO mission, supports statehood

Fatah, Hamas bicker as final unity round looms

Solution to Palestine refugees imperative for peace - Chris Gunness

December 17, 2010 - Residents of Gaza see no hope for a brighter future -- and that's one of the most distressing aspects of the situation in the Middle East, according to an international Christian aid-and-development group’s advocacy officer for the region. Hanan Elmasu of the United Kingdom-based organization Christian Aid worked on a new briefing detailing the impact of Israel's measures to ease the blockade of Gaza after six months. Elmasu, a regular visitor to Gaza, told the British Baptist newspaper The Baptist Times, "Life for Gaza civilians is very traumatic. There is very little economic activity, high unemployment and much of the population are dependent on handouts." ...Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=73011

December 17, 2010 - A Palestinian boy died Friday afternoon after Israeli gunboats opened fire on his fishing boat and flipped it over off the coast of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. Gaza medical services spokesman Adham Abu Salmiya said 15-year-old Ziad Samir Al-Bardawil died after being treated for his injuries at the Abu Yousef An-Najjar Hospital...
Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=73008

Israeli Army Attacks Non-Violent Beit Ummar Demonstration with Tear Gas and Arrests (Joseph Dana) - 18-dec-2010

December 18, 2010 - Roughly forty five protesters, including many Israeli and international supporters marched to the agricultural lands of Beit Ummar, demanding access to their land which has been slowly confiscated by the nearby settlement of Karmei Tzur. Two Israelis and one international were arrested while the rest of the demonstration was attacked with tear gas and sound bombs...

The delusions of the peace process (Richard Falk) - 18-dec-2010

December 18, 2010 - It is astonishing that despite the huge gaps between the maximum that Israel is willing to concede and the minimum that the Palestine Authority could accept as the basis of a final settlement of the conflict, governmental leaders, especially in Washington, continue to pull every available string to restart inter-governmental negotiations. Is it not enough of a signal that Israel lacks the capacity or will to agree to an extension of the partial settlement freeze for a mere additional 90 days, despite the outrageous inducements from the Obama Administration (20 F-35 fighter jets useful for an attack on Iran; an unprecedented advance promise to veto any initiative in the Security Council acknowledging a Palestinian state; and the assurance that Israel would never again be asked to accept a settlement moratorium) that were offered to suspend partially their unlawful settlement activity.

Young man shot in the head by a tear gas projectile at the weekly demonstration in An Nabi Saleh (International Solidarity Movement) - 18-dec-2010

December 18, 2010 - Friday, at the weekly demonstration held in the village of An Nabi Saleh, a young Palestinian was shot by a tear gas canister in the back of his head. Falling down, he was further injured on the front of his head. The military continued to shoot tear gas into the area, without regard for the people coming to help the young unconscious man. It took over 45 minutes before an ambulance arrived, as the army stopped it and prevented them from entering the village. By the time the ambulance arrived, the injured man had regained consciousness. Leaving the village, the ambulance was stopped twice more. The man is now being treated at the hospital in Ramallah....

UN: Israel demolished 47 Palestinian structures in one week (Palestinian Information Center) - 18-dec-2010

December 18, 2010 - OCHA, the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, issued a report Saturday documenting 47 Palestinian-owned structures that were ripped down in the West Bank's Area C in one week for allegedly missing building permits. 43 of those structures destroyed in the period Dec. 8 to 14 were erected in housing complexes in areas announced to be closed military zones, known also as "shooting zones", the report said. The area is under Israeli security and civil control...

Book review: "Spy Trade" details history of Israel lobby in the US (Max Ajl) - 18-dec-2010

December 18, 2010 - Grant F. Smith, author of the new book Spy Trade, is staggeringly knowledgeable about the Israel lobby. Spy Trade is the latest in a series of books on the lobby published by his organization, the Institute for Research: Middle East Policy. In this volume, Smith offers a richly detailed narrative discussing the how and who of lobby activities in the United States from 1948-2009, uncovered through insistent Freedom of Information Act requests. Smith argues that the lobby has systematically broken US law, damaged the country's international reputation and generally led the country onto a path in which "irreversible damage ... to US governance" is incipient (21). Smith writes that perhaps we are flirting with national "suicide." ..

Palestinian farmer: Settlers burned my sheep alive (Ma'an news) - 18-dec-2010

December 18, 2010 - A farmer said he watched a group of settlers in the northern West Bank gather his sheep and set them on fire Saturday afternoon. When he returned to the area, he told officials, he found 12 sheep burned alive, five with severe burns and two others that were only lightly burned. "I've lost at least $12,000," he said, calling the act abominable. Mayor of Aqraba, the village near where the attack took place, Jawdat Bani Jabir, identified the farmer as 40-year-old Samir Muhammad Bani Fadl...

Palestine : Art, Music & Culture: "We will continue to sing": DAM's Suhell Nafar interviewed (17 December 2010)

Palestine : Human Rights: Israel's new wall (17 December 2010)

Palestine : Activism News: Resisting an ideology of inequality: Jody McIntyre interviewed (17 December 2010)

Palestine : Diaries: Live from Palestine: A Bethlehem Christmas wish (16 December 2010)  

Civil rights for Palestinian refugees  

The Palestine Civil Rights Campaign—Lebanon (PCRC) was organized in Washington DC and  Beirut, Lebanon in late 2009 with the goal of achieving, in concert with Lebanese  based NGOs,  the enactment… 

Dec 17 2010 / No Comment / Read More  

Kosovo organ donor ring: the Israeli connection  

17 Dec 2010: Most international trafficking rings have involved wealthy Israeli patients on 'transplant tours'  

Steven Spielberg was target of Arab League boycott, WikiLeaks cable shows  

17 Dec 2010: Leaked dispatch reveals diplomats from 14 Arab states voted to ban the director's films in response to his donation to Israel  

Palestinian PM: Plan to declare statehood by 2011 remains on track  

In interview with Channel 2, Salam Fayyad urged people not to give up hope for peace and not be discouraged because of failed attempts in the past. 

12 comments  

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• Report: Bolivia follows neighboring countries in recognition of Palestinian state
• U.S. House opposes unilateral declaration of Palestinian state
• Ban Ki-moon names settlement freeze a top UN goal for 2011  

18/12/2010

Testimonies reveal IDF campaign to dismantle Palestinian society
IDF soldier testimonies, collected by Breaking the Silence [part of a new book] ...confirm that the intent of the IDF during the Second Intifada was to undermine the ability of Palestinian society to politically challenge Israel, by destroying its capacity to function as an integrated whole. ao

Waiting for H: 8 hours with no passport at TLV airport
My friend H is arriving from Sweden for a conference in Jerusalem. Though Palestinian by roots and Arab by name, He is a Swedish national and a proud subject to the three crowns. The conference deals with world history and its effects on the region.

Gaza teen dead after Israel fires on fishing boat
A Palestinian boy died Friday afternoon after Israeli gunboats opened fire on his fishing boat and flipped it over off the coast of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. ao

The US and Palestinian Non-Violence
In his 2009 speech in Cairo, President Obama said: "Palestinians must abandon violence...." How does the administration respond when Palestinians do resist nonviolently? Check out the State Department fumbling over questions from an intrepid AP reporter about jailed Palestinian peace activist, Abdullah Abu Rahmah

Weekly Collection of Occupation and Activism VIDEOS
From FriendlyStranger. ao

PLO 'Disappointed' Over U.S. Resolution

By Natasha Mozgovaya

The Palestinian delegation in the United States expressed its "deep disappointment" on Thursday over the resolution passed by the U.S. House, which opposes unilateral declaration of a Palestinian state. Continue

• Palestinian farmer watches settlers burn 19 of his sheep, killing 12
• Drumroll please
• Stammering Crowley to Matt Lee: ‘I’m going to leave it at that’
• Is the bottom falling out on the special relationship?
• ‘Jewish Week’ frankly addresses power of ‘lobby’
• Bronner exaggerates Palestinian violence
• Israeli occupation contributes to the water crisis in the South Hebron Hills
• Imagine the Brookings Institution having a forum on the Future of the South in 1964 and inviting no black people
• Roger Cohen’s split screen on interventionism
• 50 years ago in the U.S., Jews were incensed by real estate ‘covenants’ against Jewish purchases
• Mondo Awards: Call for entries
• State Department says it has ‘raised’ Abu Rahmah case with Israelis…
• Mr President, answer Matthew Lee of the AP: ‘Why is it beneath the United States to come out and say something about this practitioner of nonviolence?’
• S. African politicians ‘beaten up by IDF’ & Please sign the petition to free Palestinian children detained by Israel
• Jeffrey Goldberg likens BDS movement to Nazi Germany policies

PFLP: UN must implement resolutions

The leftist party affirms stance against peace process, said supporters would better serve fledgling state by backing the UN as it enforces historic resolutions.

December 18, 2010 - Palestinian medical officials said late Saturday that an Israeli attack killed five Palestinians east of Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip. The bodies of five young men were received at local hospitals, a medical spokesman said. They were identified as residents of Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=73045

Palestinian workers on strike protesting humiliation at checkpoint (Ma'an News) - 19-dec-2010

December 19, 2010 - Palestinian workers from the Tulkarem district in the northern West Bank, who work in Israel and Israeli settlements, went on strike Sunday protesting ill treatment by security guards who man a local checkpoint. Head of the taxi drivers union in Tulkarem Muhammad Yasin told Ma’an that about 2,000 workers were on strike. He alleged that employees of the Israeli company which runs the At-Tayba (Ephraim) checkpoint deliberately humiliate workers as they cross...

Video: Israel criticised for unequal policies (AlJazeeraEnglish) - 19-dec-2010

December 19, 2010 - A new report by Human Rights Watch has slammed Israel's treatment of Palestinian communities in the West Bank. It says Israel is using a two-tier system to promote illegal settlements, while deliberately stifling Palestinian development. Al Jazeera's Nour Odeh filed this report from the community of Jubb Al-Dib, near Bethlehem, which has had first-hand experience...

HRW: Separate and Unequal Israel’s Discriminatory Treatment of Palestinians in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (Full Report) (Human Rights Watch) - 19-dec-2010

December 19, 2010 - This report shows that Israel operates a two-tier system for the two populations of the West Bank in the large areas where it exercises exclusive control. The report is based on case studies comparing Israel’s starkly different treatment of settlements and next-door Palestinian communities in these areas. It calls on the US and EU member states and on businesses with operations in settlement areas to avoid supporting Israeli settlement policies that are inherently discriminatory and that violate international law....

Israeli Army Claims Responsibility For Gaza Assassination, Five Palestinians Killed (Saed Bannoura) - 19-dec-2010

December 19, 2010 - The Israeli Army officially confirmed that its forces carried out the Air Strike that led, on Saturday, to the death of five Palestinians, believed to be resistance fighters. The army said that the Air Force targeted fighters preparing to launch rockets into adjacent Israeli areas. The slain fighters are apparently members of the Al Quds Brigades of the Islamic Jihad and the Popular Resistance Committees. There were identified as Khalil At-Taweel, Ahmad Al Assar, Ashraf Abu Sabt and Abdullah Al Shareehy, and Ahmas Al Za’lan. All are from Al Nusseirat refugee camp in central Gaza...

Israel's Sham Democracy (by Stephen Lendman) - 19-dec-2010

December 19, 2010 - ...On December 17, the Adalah Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel said a new report lists 20 new Knesset laws and draft laws that discriminate against Arab minorities, threatening their rights as citizens. In some cases, Occupied Palestinian rights are also violated. For example, a recently proposed Knesset "Bill for Protecting the Values of the State of Israel (Amendment Legislation) 2009 requires organizations pledge loyalty to Israel as "Jewish and democratic." In a November 4 press release, Adalah said the bill: "violates the right of freedom of association and freedom of expression of all Arab organizations in Israel, which seek through democratic means to change the political, legal and social status in Israel. It asks those organizations to express their loyalty to the Jewish state and therefore it is not just a discriminatory law but one that seeks to oppress the rights of the Arab minority."...

Israeli forces storm Bethlehem hospital (Ma'an News) - 19-dec-2010

December 19, 2010 - Israeli forces stormed a hospital near Bethlehem on Sunday and demanded its admissions records for the past 48 hours, staff and witnesses said. Edmund Shehadeh, director of the Bethlehem Arab Society for Rehabilitation, in Beit Jala, said soldiers surrounded the hospital before storming its ER and demanding the records at gunpoint. The soldiers wanted records of all admissions since Friday, Shehadeh said..

• ·  19/12/2010

Israeli Airstrike Kills Militants in Gaza
FARES AKRAM - NYT - "Security officials in Gaza said that the rocket that the militants were carrying had not exploded and that pieces of an Israeli missile were found at the scene."

Arab states preparing UN resolution against Israeli settlements
Avi Issacharoff and Barak Ravid - Haaretz - "Israeli officials fear that Washington will not rush to exercise its veto power against such a resolution." id

Anti Colonial Struggle in the XXI Century
Ane Irazabal - IMEMC - "On December 14 1960, the U.N. General Assembly passed a crucial decision that changed the world map; the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples."

Israel`s new wall
Adam Morrow and Khaled Moussa al-Omrani - EI - "The new wall is coming up on the Egyptian border, and with Egyptian support."

Each of these detainees has a family
Buma Inbar [translation Adam Keller] - Crazy Country - "Each of them is an entire world. Some of them are teens who have not yet turned eighteen. How many of them did truly engage in terrorist activities against Israel? How many of them are truly so dangerous that there is no choice but to detain them?"

Bethlehem: Lessons from Christmas Town
Nicholas Blincoe - Guardian - "A giant inflatable Santa Claus has appeared outside the pirate DVD shop. It seems a good time to ask if the world`s Christmas Town has anything special to tell us about peace on Earth."

U.S. Gov't "Responds" to Questions About Imprisoned Palestinian Protest Organizer Abu Rahmah

Video
As the case of nonviolent Palestinian organizer Abdallah Abu Rahmah  has gained attention globally with statements from the European Union, The Elders (including former US President Jimmy Carter), Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and others, at least one reporter poses the question of Abu Rahmah's fate to the United States Undersecretary of State PJ Crowley. Continue

• 11 more families in Occupied West Bank are ordered to leave their homes inside 24 hours. Where is the U.S.?
• Guerrilla ad campaign in SFO
• Brooklyn-Jenin: Why didn’t the judges prevent the demolition in Lod?
• What slapdash H.R. 1765 reveals about the lobby and public awareness
• Gaza’s Social Network: Gazan bloggers share the reality of the siege with the world
• Red carpet is rolled out for the Spine-weary
• How does it feel for a Jewish reporter to do a spirit of Christmas story?
• quick sermon on irreligion
• Hollywood dramatized ethnic cleansing in India and Pakistan, why not the other I/P?
• Obama’s failure has served to expose Israeli intransigence here and abroad
• Palestinian farmer watches settlers burn 19 of his sheep, killing 12
• Drumroll please
• Stammering Crowley to Matt Lee: ‘I’m going to leave it at that’
• Is the bottom falling out on the special relationship?
• ‘Jewish Week’ frankly addresses power of ‘lobby’

Disillusioned Palestinians seeking new path

Since the US acknowledged it had failed to chart a path back to direct peace talks, senior Palestinian officials have made clear that they think negotiations are dead.

December 19, 2010 - It seems that we have come to the moment of truth in the Palestinian conflict, where all the signs indicate that the future of the issue, and the entire region, is now determined by Avigdor Lieberman, a far-right racist in Israel, in league with other extremists and fanatics in the Knesset. Some may say that Israel's Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is the most powerful man in the arena. After all, he's the one who has humiliated the Palestinians, insulted all the Arabs and challenged President Obama personally, beating them all in the process. This is true because it depicts the reality as recorded by the headlines. But it does not convey the whole message; it makes no mention of the forces which drive and guide Netanyahu...

Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=73084

December 19, 2010 - Appeal to stop the targeting of unarmed children working near the border in Gaza - 19 cases documented. Between 26 March and 10 December 2010, DCI-Palestine documented 19 cases of children shot whilst collecting building gravel near the border fence between the Gaza Strip and Israel. Due to a severe lack of job opportunities and a shortage of construction material entering Gaza from Israel, hundreds of men and boys scavenge for building gravel and other items amongst the destroyed buildings close to the border fence. The gravel is collected into sacks, loaded onto donkey drawn carts and sold to builders for use in concrete

Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=73083

The future of the Middle East is in the grip of Israeli extremism
By Fahmi Howeidi

The State of Israel vs. Jonathan Pollak
Joseph Dana

Kosovo organ donor ring: the Israeli connection
Paul Lewis, Guardian

Social Inequality in Israel (by Stephen Lendman) - 20-dec-2010

December 20, 2010 - An earlier article explained neoliberalism's impact on Israeli Jews, beginning in the 1980s. In 1985, the Knesset amended the Bank of Israel Law, prohibiting it from printing money to finance industrialization, full employment, and immigrant absorption. It was part of a neoliberal takeover, embracing a massive power shift from various government agencies to the Finance Ministry and central bank (the Bank of Israel), similar to American financialization that empowered Wall Street, the Federal Reserve it controls, and US FIRE sector overall (finance, insurance, and real estate)..

Racial discrimination - a tool of occupation (By Nour Odeh) - 20-dec-2010

December 20, 2010 - Our destination was Jub Al-Dib in the Bethlehem area. We located it on the map but getting there by car was a different story. That’s because the West Bank is very spread out, despite its small area. There are hundreds of sometimes tiny communities strewn across the hills and valleys. And going from Palestinian point A to Palestinian point B in the West Bank has nothing to do with directions, logic, or geography. It is decided by a very intricate system of rules, restrictions, and checkpoints that Israel has designed to limit Palestinian movement. There are settler-only roads, "shared" roads, and then there are no roads at all … just rugged terrains...

20/12/2010

11 Palestinian Families in Nablus District Given Order to Leave Area within 24 Hours
AIC - "Khirbet Tana has been demolished three times to date. The first demolition of the village occurred on 5 July 2005. Israeli forces destroyed the entire village, including the school, save for a 150 year old mosque. The Israeli military again destroyed around thirty structures, including a school, homes, and shelter for farm animals on 10 January 2010. This destruction stemmed from an Israeli High Court ruling sanctioning the demolition of the village and stating that the farmers removed from their land"

Bat Yam rally: `Arabs dating our sisters`
Yoav Zitun - Ynet - Organizer of demonstration to take place Monday says `public sick of Arabs hitting on Jewish girls.` Participants include right-wing activist Baruch Marzel

The State of Israel vs. Jonathan Pollak
Joseph Dana - "As the occupation and its crimes persist, so grows criticism of Israel – criticism that Israel does all in its power to repress. The judicial system is one of the main vehicles used by Israel against the resistance movement: Leaders and activists of West Bank popular protests are imprisoned in masses, and even inside Israel it becomes increasingly difficult to protest, resist or voice different opinions"

Al-Ma`asara Demonstration, 17/12/2010 - Israeli Army Attacks Nonviolent Demonstrators

Human rights group condemns Israel`s `discriminatory` policies
Hugh Naylor - The National - "Expropriating land, unequal access to electricity and basic services and a number of other "discriminatory" Israeli policies are making Palestinian communities "virtually uninhabitable" and forcing residents to flee as a result, according to a report released yesterday by Human Rights Watch"

Ship of Fools 2
Uri Avnery - Gush Shalom - “’Ship of fools 1’ went down on Yom Kippur. 2600 young Israelis, the flower of a generation, drowned with it. The ‘incapable’ Egyptians crossed the Suez Canal, and the glorious Bar-Lev Line, the pride of the Israeli army, collapsed. […] End of the Israeli superman mystique. ‘Ship of Fools 2’ will also founder. We cannot foresee how. Will it be a war that will lay waste to our towns and villages? Will it be an Islamic revolution in the Arab countries? Will world politics change dramatically?”

Will Julian Assange regret WikiLeaks? Past whistleblowers say no
Duncan Campbell - The Observer - Philip Agee, Daniel Ellsberg and Mordechai Vanunu all suffered for revealing the secrets of governments

America`s self-loving Jews aren`t helping Israel
Akiva Eldar - Haaretz - A Jew who truly loves himself does everything possible in order to save Israel from itself

Palestinian Worker Moderately Wounded In Northern Gaza

Monday December 20, 2010 - 11:42

Adham Abu Salmiyya, media spokesperson of the Emergency Unit in Gaza reported Monday that a Palestinian worker, in his thirties, was shot and wounded in his left foot while working close to the border in Beit Hanoun, in northern Gaza. Full Story

Israeli at center of Kosovo organ trafficking scandal

Monday December 20, 2010 - 09:36

Wealthy Israeli citizens on 'transplant tours' were the main recipients of trafficked organs in the recently-exposed 'Kosovo ring', according to an investigative report by the British 'Guardian' newspaper. Full Story

Israeli military announces deployment of new 'Windbreaker'-enabled tanks along Gaza border

Monday December 20, 2010 - 08:50

A new technology known as 'Windbreaker' shielding will be deployed in tanks stationed along the Israel-Gaza border, announced an Israeli military spokesperson on Sunday. Full Story

U.S. Envoys Arrives In Tel Aviv To “Restart Talks”

Monday December 20, 2010 - 08:31

Israeli sources reported that two senior American officials arrived in Tel Aviv on Sunday in order to hold talks with Israeli officials in Tel Aviv, and Palestinian officials in Ramallah, in an attempt to restart the stalled talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. Full Story

Israel/West Bank: Separate and Unequal

Monday December 20, 2010 - 08:08

(Jerusalem) - Israeli policies in the West Bank harshly discriminate against Palestinian residents, depriving them of basic necessities while providing lavish amenities for Jewish settlements, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. Full Story

The Great Islamophobic Crusade

By Max Blumenthal

Inside the Bizarre Cabal of Secretive Donors, Demagogic Bloggers, Pseudo-Scholars, European Neo-Fascists, Violent Israeli Settlers, and Republican Presidential Hopefuls Behind the Crusade. Continue

The Palestinian Authority and the problem of reform under Israeli occupation 

Monday, 20 December 2010 18:30

By Dr. Mohsen Mohammed Saleh
Is real reform of the Palestinian Authority possible or can reform only ever be a matter of "dancing to the Israeli occupation's tune"? Can the types of reform be split and classified in such a way that some administrative, economic, educational and social reforms are made, with the understanding that political and security reforms are much more difficult, if not impossible? Or will reform improve the image of Israel's occupation and prolong its existence, which in itself would be a deviation from the prime objective for which the Palestinian Authority was established - namely the end of the occupation and not merely improving the status quo? Read more...

The delusions of the peace process

Monday, 20 December 2010 17:45  

The politics of the peace process have emphatically ensured that the mere prospect for producing peace is nonexistent. 

It is astonishing that despite the huge gaps between the maximum that Israel is willing to concede and the minimum that the Palestine Authority could accept as the basis of a final settlement of the conflict, governmental leaders, especially in Washington, continue to pull every available string to restart inter-governmental negotiations. Read more...

Israeli ethnic cleansing surge: How many more Palestinian homes must be demolished before western governments act?

Monday, 20 December 2010 16:00

As Westerners busy themselves preparing for Christmas, Israel has accelerated its campaign of ethnic cleansing in the Occupied Palestinian Territories and within its own (non-declared) borders. Those familiar with the conduct of successive Israeli governments, right-and left-wing, will not be surprised. They have a long-standing reputation for using international diversions to advance their drive for lebensraum - living space - in Palestine. Read more...

Separate and Unequal 

Monday, 20 December 2010 15:15

Israel's Discriminatory Treatment of Palestinians in the Occupied Palestinian Territories

This report consists of a series of case studies that compare Israel's different treatment of Jewish settlements to nearby Palestinian communities throughout the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. It describes the two-tier system of laws, rules, and services that Israel operates for the two populations in areas in the West Bank under its exclusive control, which provide preferential services, development, and benefits for Jewish settlers while imposing harsh conditions on Palestinians. The report highlights Israeli practices the only discernable purposes of which appear to be promoting life in the settlements while in many instances stifling growth in Palestinian communities and even forcibly displacing Palestinian residents. Read more...

Asia aid convoy signals increased support for Gaza

Monday, 20 December 2010 13:15

By Renee Bowyer

The Gaza blockade has been in place for four years and Palestinians in the Gaza Strip have seen their country destroyed around them systematically. Their homes, universities, schools and hospitals have been reduced to rubble; their sick and injured have died; their sons and daughters have been denied their right to education and employment. Israel has increased its stranglehold and has subjected the people of Gaza to deadly attacks, including a full-scale war. International aid organizations have called on Israel to lift the siege as it is acknowledged widely that a humanitarian crisis exists inside Gaza. In the absence of meaningful efforts by governments, it has been left to individuals and civil society movements to act. Read more...

Israel fears that US may not rush to use UN veto

Monday, 20 December 2010 12:25

Israeli sources claim that the Netanyahu government is trying to suppress a draft UN Security Council resolution denouncing construction in Israel's illegal settlements across the occupied West Bank and Jerusalem. Israel fears that the Obama administration - which Benjamin Netanyahu humiliated by rebuffing requests for a freeze on settlement activity   will be in no hurry to exercise its veto against the resolution that is being prepared by Arab states and the Palestinian Authority. The sources added that Israel is making diplomatic efforts to stop the proposed resolution.

The Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz reported on 19 December that the Israeli government has serious concerns about such a resolution, which analysts believe could call for international sanctions against the Jewish settlements.

Arab League says Israeli escalation is a result of "international silence" 

Monday, 20 December 2010 11:45

The Arab League has denounced Israel for killing five Palestinians in the central Gaza Strip on Saturday, saying that the Israeli escalation "comes as a result of the international silence on the occupation authority's violations". Israeli bombs killed five Palestinians in central Gaza, bringing the total of Palestinians killed by Israel this month to 12. Ambassador Mohamed Sabih, the Assistant Secretary General for the Affairs of Palestine and the Occupied Arab Territories, described what happened as a crime that is being added to Israel's criminal record; the victims were unarmed civilians. Read more...

• What does Israel’s non-defense of poor Sderot say about security and policy?
• Howard Berman’s reversal is exposed by Haaretz (where’s the American press)
• Sneak Peak: The editors’ note from The Goldstone Report: The Legacy of the Landmark Investigation of the Gaza Conflict
• Seesaw battle underway in poll over Seattle bus ads
• Aubrey Chernick and the nexus of Islamophobia
• Secular Herzl sought to use ‘mystic elements’ to bind Jews to a place they had no living connection to
• The ‘intifadah of graves’
• Groundswell
• Omar Barghouti is on the Mondo Awards Panel of Judges

December 22, 2010 - Before I read this article, I was pretty sure that the Israeli leadership was shying away, for the moment, from anything like a reprise of the Cast Lead massacre, even though on the night of the 21 there were eight coordinated F-16 attacks on sites in Gaza. I'm a bit less sure now. Ashkenazi's job is to terrify Gaza's civilian population and instill in them constant and grinding terror. But it's also to prepare the ground for the next assault in t he eyes of Israeli and especially world public opinion. He told a parliamentary panel that "The situation in the south is tense and fragile, and it could deteriorate if a rocket attack causes a large number of casualties.".Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=73159

December 22, 2010 - If there is one thing a Palestinian cannot understand, or if he can understand cannot forgive, it is the apathy and hypocrisy with which governments in the "Free World", especially the United States, react towards issues of right and wrong in the Palestinian- Israeli conflict. Indeed, questions of morals and of justice seem to have no relevance, and policy appears in most cases to be determined solely by considerations of what one party only to the conflict might agree to, or at least not protest about... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=73172

Al Jazeera Interview: Wikileaks to release Israel documents in six months
The Peninsula

Ameer Makhoul's perpetual trial
Audrey Farber writing from Haif

Video: Bleak Christmas under occupation
AlJazeera

 Mazin Qumsiyeh and 7 Others Arrested Today at Al-Walaja
J. Qumsiyeh

Israeli warplanes attack Gaza refuge
Rami Almeghari

Construction Returns to the Separation Wall in al-Walaja
Popular Struggle Coordination Committee

PA: Hamas cell planned attack on Ramallah

Abbas warns of Israeli escalation in Gaza

Anger after Nazareth suburb cancels Christmas

Israeli, PA forces tour Bethlehem before Christmas

December 30, 2010 - When the Iraqi army fell before invading US and British troops in 2003, the latter's mission seemed to be accomplished. But nearly eight years after the start of a war intended to shock and awe a whole population into submission, the Iraqi people continue to stand tall. They have confronted and rejected foreign occupations, held their own against sectarianism, and challenged random militancy and senseless acts of terrorism. For most t of us, the Iraqi people’s resolve cannot be witnessed, but rather deduced. Eight years of military strikes, raids, imprisonments, torture, humiliation and unimaginable suffering were still not enough to force the Iraqis into accepting injustice as a status quo... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=73440

December 30, 2010 - Fuck Hamas. Fuck Israel. Fuck Fatah. Fuck UN. Fuck UNWRA. Fuck USA! We, the youth in Gaza, are so fed up with Israel, Hamas, the occupation, the violations of human rights and the indifference of the international community! We want to scream and break this wall of silence, injustice and indifference like the Israeli F16’s breaking the wall of sound; scream with all the power in our souls in order to release this immense frustration that consumes us because of this fucking situation we live in; we are like lice between two nails living a nightmare inside a nightmare, no room for hope, no space for freedom...

Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=73438

December 30, 2010 - ....Despite Shlaim’s nonsense about the "American national interest," he finally and fleetingly gets on track when he writes that "the argument that the Israeli occupation of the West Bank serves the American national interest is simply preposterous"; quite right, but it’s important to figure out why that occupation endures with American support, and the Lobby does not provide a sufficient answer to that question, although it should not be ignored, as some like Zunes tend to do. An "incalculable" amount of damage should be easy to prove, but what does Shlaim put in front of us? "As CENTROM commander, General David Petraeus, told Congress, Israeli intransigence on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is jeopardizing U.S. standing in the entire region. And as Vice President Joe Biden reportedly told Netanyahu: 'What you’re doing here undermines the security of our troops who are fighting in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. That endangers us and it endangers regional peace.’" So Shlaim wants us to take a stand against occupation so imperial managers can cluster-bomb brown people more effectively in Iraq (Shlaim is of Iraqi extraction, which makes this paragraph not merely idiotic but actually disgusting, shilling for American empire while arguing for bombing his own people)...

Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=73436

December 30, 2010 - Palestinian fishermen face great difficulties at work on the Mediterranean Sea: even after continual naval assaults by Israeli troops that have lead to several recent deaths and injuries and major damage to their boats and fishing equipment, there is still the fact that they are forbidden from fishing in deep water and go home without enough to feed their families. Sami Bakr, 31, says that despite the great effort he exerted d to avoid Israeli gunfire in his small boat, he failed: his cousin Muhammad died of injuries sustained from an Israeli raid. Most of his fishing equipment s destroyed as well.

Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=73437

Open-ended confrontation (Saleh Al-Naami) - 31-dec-2010

December 31, 2010 - Michael Ben Ari, a Knesset member on the fringes of the extremist right, is not the only Israeli parliamentarian calling for banning the Islamic Movement in Israel led by Sheikh Raed Salah. The release of Sheikh Salah from an Israeli jail after being imprisoned for five months and his statements that followed gave substance to this hardline Israeli position towards Sheikh Salah and his group. Those calling for disbanding the Islamic Movement include Knesset members from the centrist Kadima Party, the ruling rightwing Likud Party, as well as representatives of all rightwing religious parties...

Israel forces Palestinians to demolish their own homes (Report, The Electronic Intifada) - 31-dec-2010

December 31, 2010 - More than 100 Palestinian protesters and their supporters blocked a main street in the city of Lyd on 28 December, demonstrating against the recent demolition of Palestinian homes and what residents say is a rise in racism and police brutality. On 13 December, officials with the Israel Lands Administration (ILA), the government agency that manages and leases state land, entered the Palestinian section of the segregated city flanked by bulldozers and hundreds of municipal, riot squad and border police forces. The bulldozers then demolished seven homes all belonging to the Abu Eid family in Lyd...

Israeli official claims that US will block Palestinian efforts at UN (Middle East Monitor) - 31-dec-2010

December 31, 2010 - An Israeli official has claimed that the US administration will exert all necessary efforts to suppress any Palestinian attempt to have a UN resolution condemning Israeli settlement activities in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. According to Israeli media sources, the anonymous official said that the United States will work behind the scenes to prevent any resolution condemning settlement construction from even being put on the agenda of the UN Security Council. If such efforts fail, he said, the US might use its veto or propose a "more balanced" draft resolution...

31/12/2010

Assange: I`ll reveal info that will spark Arab world coups
by Roee Nahmias - Ynet News "Wiki Leaks founder tells Al Jazeera leaked documents in his possession show top Arab officials disclose sensitive information to CIA "

Wiki leaks: Egypt still sees Israel as its main adversary
by Associated Press "Leaked US diplomatic cable suggests that the Egyptian military is in decline; Egyptian general: "We don`t want to do what suits Israel."

Single Gaza goods terminal operates
Ma`an News Agency - "Between 190 to 200 truckloads of goods including 20 new cars and five truckloads of cement for UNRWA projects were will be allowed into Gaza via the southernmost crossing, Kerem Shalom. "

Islamic Jihad refuses role in Haniyeh gov`t
Ma`an News Agency - "Maintaining its position as a extra-political movement, Islamic Jihad officials said Thursday that they had refused a seat on Gaza Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh`s new government."

New state budget gives settlements NIS 2 billion – and more
By Akiva Eldar - Haaretz "Security expenses for settlers living in Palestinian neighborhoods in East Jerusalem went up in the new budget, reaching NIS 3,160 per settler."

Iran’s Defense Minister Confirms Asgari Death, IDF Warns of Iranian Revenge Attacks
Tikun Olam - "The Kabuki-like drama of the suicide/murder of Iranian Revolutionary Guard general Ali Reza Asgari in Ayalon Prison continues to deepen. Today, Ynetnews reports that the IDF circulated an unprecedented warning letter to all reserve officers warning them that Iranian agents might take revenge on them inside Israel or abroad."

Invitation to a solidarity visit in Palestinian Susya
Call for Action "This Saturday, 1/1/2011 we`ll conduct a solidarity visit to the people of the village. Replacing the tents and repairing the damages are estimated in thousands of Shekels. Therefore , Any donation or help will be highly appreciated."

Settler and Military Violence Escalates in South Hebron Hills
The Villages Group - "Yesterday, Tuesday December 28, at 3 AM, Hajja Sara woke up to the sound of her dogs barking. Coming out of her living tent she saw her two adjacent kitchen tents going up in flames (pictures above)."

When the Exception Becomes the Rule: Incommunicado Holding of Palestinian Detainees
Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI)- Report (in Hebrew) "70 to 90 percent of GSS interrogees were denied meetings with an attorney for more than two weeks, in order to pressure them to confess. See also item from Guardian in OM of 29/12/10"

Israeli leftists have a racist past, too
Yitzhak Laor - Haaretz - Here, with the exception of a few enthusiastic young people, there is no struggle. Even the trickle of people refusing to serve in the army has dried up. The politicians benefit from this dead end: It lets them run from microphone to microphone and organize "coalition crises." The military leadership prattles on about our "damaged deterrent capabilities" like a beggar with his cup. And the rabble is brought into the streets to demonstrate about Jewish virgins.

Civilian Hit by a Tear Gas Canister at Weekly Protest in Bil'in

Friday December 31, 2010 - 18:10

On Friday, a civilian was hit by a tear gas canister during the weekly nonviolent protest against the Annexation Wall in the village of Bil'in. Also, dozens of people were treated from the ill effects of tear gas inhalation during the demonstrations in an-Nabi Saleh and al-Ma’sara. Full Story

Knesset Approves NIS 2 billion to Settlements in the New Year's Budget

Friday December 31, 2010 - 16:49

The Israeli Knesset approved its 2011-2012 budget on Wednesday, which includes two billion shekels (approx. US$ 564 million) to settlements construction, services and security, Israeli daily Haaretz reported. Full Story

Extra E.U. Funds in Support to P.A.'s Institution Building

Friday December 31, 2010 - 16:24

Prime Minister Fayyad and an E.U. Representative agreed today to support the P.A.'s institution building plan, a European information centre claimed on Friday. Full Story

Gaza Convoy Blocked in Egypt

Friday December 31, 2010 - 13:51

Egypt stopped activists on the Asia 1 aid convoy from reaching the Gaza Strip, an Egyptian daily newspaper quoted in Press TV reported on Thursday. Full Story

Five Palestinians Arrested During Night Raids in the West Bank

Friday December 31, 2010 - 12:48

Israeli forces detained five Palestinians around the West Bank in a series of night raids that ended on Friday morning. A woman and her son were also allegedly beaten, Palestine News Network reported. Full Story

Abbas: "The New Draft is Designed to Gain the U.S. Support"

Friday December 31, 2010 - 12:10

In the following days, P.A. and other Arab states will bring a draft resolution to the U.N. Security Council, calling to condemn Israel for the illegal settlement construction in the West Bank and Jerusalem. Abbas stressed on Thursday, with regard to a possible U.S. veto, that the draft follows Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's rhetoric. Full Story

Avi Shlaim: Obama and Israel – The pessimistic perspective 

30 December 2010

The American-Israeli special relationship is a classic example of the tail that wags the dog. As a result of its palpable partiality towards Israel, America has lost all credibility in the eyes not only of the Palestinians but of the wider Arab and Muslim worlds. The so-called peace process has been all process and no peace. It is worse than a sham. Peace talks that go nowhere slowly provide Israel with just the cover it needs to pursue its relentlessly expansionist agenda on the West Bank.

Gaza PM meets representative of the Jordanian Chief of Staff 

Friday, 31 December 2010 11:20  

The Prime Minister of the Palestinian Authority in Gaza has met a representative of the Jordanian Army Chief of Staff. The delegation which met Ismail Haniyeh was headed by Major General Mahmoud Forayhat, the head of military operations in Jordan. Read more...

Shaykh of Al-Azhar condemns arbitrary arrests and closure of Radio Qur'an in West Bank 

Thursday, 30 December 2010 17:30  

Dr Tayeb emphasized the need for Arab pressure on the international community to take a firm stand to end Israel's illegal settlement of Palestinian land in Jerusalem

The Shaykh of Al Azhar in Cairo has called on the President of the Palestinian Authority to end the policy of arbitrary detention and torture of Palestinians in the West Bank. Dr. Ahmed Tayeb urged Mahmoud Abbas to stick to national principles, unity against the occupation and protection from Israel's twin projects of Judaization and deportation. He also denounced the PA's decision to close Radio Qur'an in Nablus, describing the station's shutdown as an assault on the sensitivities of Muslims. Read more...

 Jesus Recruited: God-TV Helps Israel Oust Bedouin

Friday, 31 December 2010 15:00

By Jonathan Cook - Nazareth
 Half a million trees planted over the past 18 months on the ancestral lands of Bedouin tribes in Israel's Negev region were bought by a controversial Christian evangelical television channel that calls itself God-TV.
 
A sign posted a few kilometres north of Beersheba, the Negev's main city, announces plans to plant a total of a million trees over a large area of desert that has already been designated "God-TV Forest". Read more...

Dahlan faces partial boycott of press conference

Friday, 31 December 2010 14:00

Egyptian journalists in Cairo boycotted a press conference held by Fatah's Mohammed Dahlan

An Egyptian journalist specialising in the Palestine issue has claimed that key Palestinian and Egyptian journalists in Cairo boycotted a press conference held by Fatah's Mohammed Dahlan on 29 December. Ibrahim El-Darawy said that a number of journalists refused to attend the event at which Dahlan intended to respond to the stance against him taken by Fatah's Central Committee; the former Fatah minister then said that he would return to Ramallah. Read more...

Gideon Levy

A year of truth for the Mideast peace process

Abbas urges Quartet to draft new peace plan

After laying cornerstone for future Palestinian embassy in Brazil, the PA president calls upon UN, U.S., Europe and Russia to devise a new vision for Mideast peace.

More On This Topic

• Brazil hosts first Palestinian 'embassy' in Americas
• Palestinian draft condemning Israeli settlements designed to win U.S. support

U.S. dismayed Egypt still views Israel as chief adversary, WikiLeaks cables show

Haniyeh: We don’t pursue journalists in Gaza

Report: Cairo approves Asia 1 convoy entry to Gaza

Israel: Gaza projectile lands in south

Unexplained recorders behind arrest of US national at Rafah

• Entry 29: What do you do/if you are a Jew
• Entry 28: I nominate Aya Kaniuk and Tamar Goldschmidt
• Entry 27: Motherhood in Palestine
• Sister of Palestinian killed last year in Bil’in now struggles for her life following gassing at today’s demo
• Entry 26: Gaza Riviera
• Entry 25: Haiku for Rebecca
• Entry 24: Who is a Jew? Who is not a Jew?
• Entry 23: I nominate Mustafa, Zochrot, Emily, Norman…
• Entry 22: Deborah Fink of J-BIG
• Entry 21: Hakenkreuz and Davidstern
• Entry 20: Am I a Jew?
• Protesters in Bil’in remove parts of Israel’s wall
• Entry 19: Israel, an Elegy
• Entry 18: Why I argued with the ambassador
• Entry 17: Peggy Gish and her late husband Art Gish– they walk the talk