December 11th

Palestinian Christians to declare occupation 'a sin'
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
December 11, 2009 - 1:00am

Palestinian Christians from all denominations were in the West Bank city of Bethlehem on Friday to demand sanctions on Israel and to jointly reject Christian Zionism. Clergy have termed their movement the Palestine Kairos Initiative, modeled after black South Africa's 1985 Kairos Document, a theological statement that called on churches to join the fight against apartheid.

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Clashes after settlers torch mosque
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
December 11, 2009 - 1:00am

Six Palestinians fainted after inhaling tear gas fired by the Israeli military during a protest east of Salfit on Friday. Yasouf village's mayor, Abed Ar-Rahim Musleh, said the injured were hospitalized in Salfit. He described their injuries as light. Residents took to the streets in the northern West Bank village after Israeli settlers set fire to a mosque the same day. Soldiers opened fire when the crowd arrived near the illegal Tapouh settlement, which was built on Yasouf village lands.

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To the Arab world, Obama's Nobel leaves something to be desired
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Los Angeles Times
by Scott MacLeod - (Opinion) December 9, 2009 - 1:00am

The Nobel Peace Prize that President Obama receives in Oslo on Thursday seems to many in the Middle East like a cruel hoax. In June, Egyptians cheered him for pledging an intense personal effort to resolve the region's problems through negotiations rather than force, and his outreach to the Muslim world was surely on the mind of the Nobel committee when it made the award. In the last three months, however, the Obama administration has steadily undone the president's initial positive moves by seriously mishandling one of the Middle East's central issues: the Israeli-Palestinian dispute.

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Graphic Glimpses of West Bank Struggle on YouTube
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Robert Mackey - (Blog) December 9, 2009 - 1:00am

Israel announced plans last week to use the Web to improve its image abroad in two ways: by setting up a new unit of the Israel Defense Forces devoted to fighting criticism on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter, and through what the Israeli newspaper Haaretz described as “an initiative by the Information and Diaspora Ministry to train people to represent Israel independently on the Internet.”

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December 10th

Israel arrests a leader of nonviolent opposition to the settlement barrier in the occupied West Bank, and disrupts the farewell ceremony for UNRWA's outgoing chief. Swedish officials say the EU resolution on Jerusalem is very close to their original proposal. Israeli military officials say Palestinians are trying to coerce Israel into accepting Palestinian statehood. More Israelis approve of Pres. Obama, but still do not feel that he supports Israel. The BBC looks at divisions between Fatah and Hamas in Nablus. Jailed Fatah leader Marwan Barghouti is profiled by the Independent. PM Salam Fayyad says Palestinians will not issue a unilateral Declaration of Independence. Gideon Levy says Israel is a "semi-theocracy." Michael Jansen says the Arabs should take advantage of the recent EU declaration on Jerusalem, and the Swedish ambassador to Jordan reaffirms European concerns about human rights in the occupied territories. Israeli FM Lieberman expresses sympathy with extremist settlers. In Bitter Lemons, Ghassan Khatib says Israeli pressure must be resisted, and Daniel Seidemann says the EU resolution is neither revolutionary nor trivial.

Gideon Levy / Let's face the facts, Israel is a semi-theocracy
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Gideon Levy - (Opinion) December 10, 2009 - 1:00am

The storm over remarks made by Justice Minister Yaakov Neeman is in many respects a tempest in a teapot, which has for a long time taken on holier aspects than it seems. Neeman wants Torah law, or in other words, he wants Israel to be a country governed by Jewish religious law, halakha. In any event, Israel is already a semi-theocracy. The Israelis who were frightened by the minister's remarks and who love viewing their country as liberal, Western and secular are forgetting that our life here is more religious, traditional and halakhic than we are prepared to admit.

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Neither revolutionary nor trivial
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bitterlemons
by Daniel Seidemann - (Opinion) December 10, 2009 - 1:00am

The current episode in the never-ending saga of Jerusalem-related controversies relates to a leaked draft resolution implying that the Council of the European Union expects East Jerusalem to become the capital of a future Palestinian state. Banner headlines highlighted Israel's shock and dismay over this diplomatic "outrage". At this writing, PM Binyamin Netanyahu is pulling out all the diplomatic stops to convince the Europeans to retract the offending words; it is still not known if he will succeed.

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A timely wake-up call
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bitterlemons
(Interview) December 10, 2009 - 1:00am

an interview with Mahdi Abdul Hadi bitterlemons: What do you make of the reported Swedish draft resolution on Jerusalem? Abdul Hadi: There are several elements to this issue. First of all, in presenting this resolution to European countries, Sweden is merely stating what Europe's position has always been, whether in public or private, which is within the framework of United Nations resolutions. bitterlemons: So there is nothing new in the resolution?

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Israeli pressure must be resisted
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bitterlemons
by Ghassan Khatib - (Opinion) December 10, 2009 - 1:00am

The council of European foreign ministers is currently debating a draft resolution drawn up by Sweden, holder of the rotating EU presidency, which is supposed to specify EU positions on different aspects of the Middle East conflict. The draft posits positions, including on the issue of Jerusalem, that have caused fierce debate in European policy-making circles. Such debate indicates that there is a growing feeling among Europeans in general as well as their governments that Israeli actions in Jerusalem are exceeding all acceptable limits and are in clear violation of international law.

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Israeli minister says settlers' resistance 'natural'
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The National
by Omar Karmi - December 10, 2009 - 1:00am

As Jewish settlers step up their resistance to a temporary and partial settlement construction freeze ordered last month by the Israeli government, Avigdor Lieberman, Israel’s foreign minister, yesterday said the opposition was “legitimate” and “natural”.

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