NEWS: DM Barak says Israel’s efforts on Palestinian UN initiatives should focus on Europe. Ma’an interviews UNRWA spokesman Chris Gunness. FM Lieberman says he won’t resign in the event of an apology to Turkey for last year's flotilla incident. An ancient ruin is uncovered in Nablus. Pres. Abbas is leading a global push for Palestinian statehood recognition. The Israeli cabinet is considering canceling the Oslo agreements in response to Palestinian UN initiatives. A senior PLO official says Israel isn’t implementing the agreements anyway. The Israeli Navy continues to deny fishing rights to Palestinians off the Gaza coast. Palestinian youth in Jerusalem turn to kite flying for a sense of freedom. COMMENTARY: Bernd Debusmann looks at the potential for boycotts against Israel in the United States. The Jordan Times says the “Arab Spring” doesn’t mean the issue of Palestine will remain on the back burner. Uri Avnery says US inattention is enabling the rise of extreme right-wing politics in Israel. Daniel Levy says the United States has been inconsistent in the Quartet. Howard Sumka says Israeli and Palestinian political elites have failed their peoples. Gidi Grinstein says Israel is only encouraging a Palestinian UN initiative by opposing one. James Carroll says Israel could stop a “train wreck” in September by recognizing the Palestinian right to statehood. D. Bloomfield says most Jewish Americans want Pres. Obama to do more to promote Middle East peace according to a new poll.

Israel’s opportunity to stop a train wreck
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Boston Globe
by James Carroll - (Opinion) July 18, 2011 - 12:00am

EVER SINCE outgoing Middle East envoy George Mitchell used the phrase “train wreck’’ with Charlie Rose in May, it has become jargon for what will happen in September when the Palestinian leadership goes to the United Nations seeking “full membership for the state of Palestine.” The Netanyahu government is so gravely threatened that it has made opposition to the UN affirmation of Palestinian independence a litmus test of loyalty to Israel. A catastrophe looms.

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Force and anti-force in the United Nations
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Gidi Grinstein - (Opinion) July 24, 2011 - 12:00am

Israel and the Palestinians may be advancing toward understandings with regard to recognition of Palestinian statehood in 2011. While it seems that both parties are determinedly heading toward confrontation, this outcome is made possible by the powerful interests that are at stake.

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Political Elites Have Failed Israelis and Palestinians
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Huffington Post
by Howard Sumka - (Opinion) July 24, 2011 - 12:00am

Weeks away from the anticipated and highly contentious United Nations General Assembly vote on Palestinian statehood, it's timely to ask what went wrong and what might move the issue in a better direction. Despite fears of the Palestinian streets reacting in frustration, it is appropriate now to look to the street for the solution.

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Jews Want Obama To Do More for Mideast Peace
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jewish Week
by Douglas Bloomfield - (Analysis) July 24, 2011 - 12:00am

Jews give President Obama a higher overall job approval than most other voters although they're still unhappy with his handling of the economy and don't think he's doing enough to broker Middle East peace. But that doesn't mean they're ready to vote for someone else next year, according to a survey of 800 Jews earlier this month for J Street.

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America’s attempted Quartet sophistry
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Foreign Policy
by Daniel Levy - (Opinion) July 22, 2011 - 12:00am

As more information seeps out from the Quartet principals meeting held in Washington on July 11, it becomes harder not to reach the conclusion that American policy on Israel-Palestine is now being driven almost exclusively by a desire to prevent any possible U.N. vote on the matter in the Autumn. Reading the draft text proposed as a Quartet statement by the U.S. (the text is not yet public, but the authenticity of the draft described here has been reliably confirmed) and rejected by the EU, Russia, and the U.N. Secretary General entrenches that conclusion -- and worse, that the U.S.

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A political baksheesh everyone needs to pay
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Arab News
by Uri Avnery - (Opinion) July 24, 2011 - 12:00am

A Riddle: Which fleet did not reach its destination but fulfilled its mission? Well, it’s this year’s Gaza solidarity flotilla. It could be said, of course, that last year’s “little fleet” — that’s what the word means in Spanish, much as “guerrilla” means “little war” — is also a reasonable candidate. It never reached Gaza, but the commander of the Israeli navy could well repeat the words of Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, whose victory over the Romans was so costly that he is said to have exclaimed: “Another such victory, and I am lost!”

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Not forgotten
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jordan Times
(Opinion) July 25, 2011 - 12:00am

The uprisings in several Arab countries may have temporarily turned the limelight away from the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, but that does not mean it will be on the back burner for long. Palestinians, Arab peoples at large, cannot forget the occupation, with all it entails, especially now that a showdown over the recognition of an independent Palestinian state is looming on the horizon. Israel must not deceive itself into believing that the Arab nation can ignore the Palestinian plight; it should not take comfort in the spread of Arab demonstrations calling for democracy and freedom.

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COLUMN-Desmond Tutu, Israel and US pensions
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters
by Bernd Debusmann - (Analysis) July 24, 2011 - 12:00am

WASHINGTON, July 22 (Reuters) - What's the connection between a South African Nobel Peace Prize winner, Israel, and one of America's biggest pension funds? An international campaign for economic, cultural and academic boycotts of Israel and Jewish settlements on the West Bank.

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Captive hearts fly free with kites in Jerusalem's Old City
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The National
by Hugh Naylor - July 24, 2011 - 12:00am

JERUSALEM // At dusk, the skies over the city's ancient and congested heart erupt into a frenzy of activity. That is when the Palestinian youth of Jerusalem's Old City congregate near Damascus Gate or climb on to the roofs of their clustered homes with plastic kites. For the casual observer, it is a spectacle of brilliantly coloured objects overhead. For children in this claustrophobic corner of East Jerusalem, lacking the recreational facilities that are so abundant in the city's Jewish areas, the kite channels pent-up energy into the skies above.

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