March 17th

Clinton: Egypt will keep the peace with Israel ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) March 16, 2011 - 12:00am Egypt's foreign policy will change, but it has an interest in sustaining its peace accords with Israel, Hillary Rodham Clinton said. "I think there will be different decisions" on foreign policy, the U.S. secretary of state told NPR on Wednesdaty after she toured Egypt. It was Clinton's first visit there since the revolution that ousted longtime dictator Hosni Mubarak, who had maintained the Camp David accords with Israel. » Read more

Reckoning Wrongly in a Massacre’s Wake ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jewish Daily Forward by J.J. Goldberg - (Opinion) March 16, 2011 - 12:00am “A proper revenge for the blood of a little child/Satan has not yet devised.” So wrote the revered Hebrew poet Chaim Nachman Bialik in his searing poem “On the Slaughter” in April 1903, a few days after the bloody Kishinev pogrom. The two-day rampage by townspeople in the czarist regional capital had left the Jewish quarter a smoking ruin, and 49 Jews hacked or beaten to death, while the czar’s police stood and watched. Bialik’s poem captured the outraged, horrified feelings of Jews across Russia and around the world: “The world is my gallows/And we are the select few/My blood is cheap…” » Read more

Report: East Jerusalem residents exempted from municipal taxes ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz March 17, 2011 - 12:00am Jerusalem city officials have notified East Jerusalem residents living beyond the separation fence that they are no longer required to pay municipal taxes, the official Palestinian news agency reported on Thursday. Citing a report by the rights group Center for Social and Economic Rights, the Wafa Palestinian news agency said that the city of Jerusalem were notified residents of these areas that they do not have to pay municipal taxes, known as arnona tax, after years of paying it. » Read more

Gaza groups call on Hamas to probe attacks on peaceful rallies ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Xinhua March 17, 2011 - 12:00am Gaza-based rights groups on Wednesday called on Islamic Hamas movement's government that rules the Gaza Strip to probe its police's violent attacks against peaceful rallies in Gaza on Tuesday. The Gaza Strip and the West Bank had witnessed on Tuesday massive popular rallies that called on Hamas and President Mahmoud Abbas Fatah party to end their internal division and reach a reconciliation agreement. » Read more

Netanyahu's schemes won't work ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Gulf News by George S. Hishmeh - (Opinion) March 17, 2011 - 12:00am Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas took the right step in condemning in strong terms the massacre of a five-member Israeli family, including two children and an infant, living in an illegal Israeli colony in the West Bank. No one in his right mind would not abhor this callous event, whose perpetrators are still unknown. "A human being is not capable of something like that," Abbas told Israel Radio. "Scenes like these — the murder of infants and children and a woman slaughtered — cause any person endowed with humanity to hurt and to cry." » Read more

Jordan says Israeli settlements threaten Mideast peace process ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Xinhua March 17, 2011 - 12:00am Jordan's foreign minister said Wednesday that demographic and geographic changes in the Palestinian territories resulting from Israeli settlement activities have threatened the Middle East peace process, the state-run Petra news agency reported. During his meeting with UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process Robert Serry, Jordan's Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh said the unilateral Israeli measures in the West Bank and East Jerusalem are illegal. » Read more

Wanting an end to the split ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jordan Times by Daoud Kuttab - March 17, 2011 - 12:00am March 15 marked the launch of yet another Arab youth movement, following those in Egypt on January 25 and in Libya on February 17. The aim of this youth-led movement appears simple: end the split between Gaza and the West Bank and between the PLO and Hamas. Popular uprisings are not new to Palestinians who introduced the term Intifada to the world in 1987. In fact many in Palestine feel that they broke the barrier of fear - a prerequisite for going out in the streets against brutal, violent crackdowns - long before the youth in Tunisia, Egypt and Bahrain. » Read more

Israeli army renews order to distance Gazans from border ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Xinhua March 17, 2011 - 12:00am The Israeli army on Thursday renewed warning to the Palestinian residents in the Gaza Strip to stay away from northern and eastern borders with Israel. The warning was carried by hundreds of flyers Israeli airplanes dropped in the coastal enclave, especially in areas near the borders, residents said. The Palestinians have to stay 300 meters away from the security fence, the flyers read. "Anybody approaching puts himself in danger, as the Israeli Defense Forces will take the necessary procedures to distance him, including opening fire when necessary. " » Read more

Palestinian man attacked in Israeli settlement ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press March 17, 2011 - 12:00am A Palestinian man says he was attacked by masked men inside a Jewish West Bank settlement. Palestinian laborer Sami Snobar says at least eight Hebrew-speaking men approached him at a construction site where he was working Thursday and asked him what he was doing there. He says he was hit on the head and body with a construction tool and a cinder block, and also sprayed. Snobar spoke from a Palestinian hospital. The incident took place in the Shiloh settlement. » Read more

Killings in Itamar not acceptable ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency by Daoud Kuttab - (Opinion) March 17, 2011 - 12:00am The brutal and inhumane killings of the Fogel family in Itamar is unacceptable and indefensible. No matter what anyone might say about the illegality of Jewish settlements in the occupied territories, murder is murder and murder of civilians irrespective of the circumstances must be denounced and rejected at all levels. Palestinians do want an independent state in the West Bank and Gaza. Jewish settlement activity is a major hurdle to Palestinian national aspirations. But all Palestinians fighting for freedom and independence should denounce this barbaric act against an Israeli family. » Read more