January 26th, 2011

Hamas withdraws authorization of Abbas
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
January 26, 2011 - 1:00am

Hamas on Tuesday withdrew its authorization of President Mahmoud Abbas as the head of negotiations. Hamas official Khalil Al-Hayya said Abbas' mandate was not valid without the party's recognition. He also dismissed the PA's claim that it negotiated on behalf of Palestinians. Hamas does not participate in talks with Israel. The move follows the release of secret PLO documents covering a decade of negotiations with Israel, leaked to the Qatar-based satellite channel Al-Jazeera.

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The Palestine Papers expose an Israeli-dominated process
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Daily Star
by Rami Khouri - (Opinion) January 26, 2011 - 1:00am

The Palestine Papers being published this week by Al-Jazeera TV and The Guardian newspaper provide many important and, often problematic, insights into several key aspects of the long-running Israeli-Palestinian negotiations to achieve a comprehensive, permanent peace agreement. Reading through the entire archive of over 1,600 documents, however, as I had a chance to do at the Al-Jazeera offices in Doha, Qatar, this week, provides a useful overview of, and insights into, the three principal actors in the process: the Palestinian Authority, the Israeli government, and American officials.

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What should we take away from the ‘Palestine Papers’?
Media Mention of Ghaith al-Omari In PBS - January 26, 2011 - 1:00am

In recent months, peace talks between the Israelis and Palestinians have been fitful, to say the least. There was reason for hope when President Obama took office two years ago promising a recalculation of American foreign policy. By the time his administration restarted the negotiations in September, however, veterans of the peace process were skeptical that progress could be made. Now, just four months later, even the most optimistic observers have reason to be despondent.

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What should we take away from the ‘Palestine Papers’?
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from PBS
by Sal Gentile - (Opinion) January 25, 2011 - 1:00am

In recent months, peace talks between the Israelis and Palestinians have been fitful, to say the least. There was reason for hope when President Obama took office two years ago promising a recalculation of American foreign policy. By the time his administration restarted the negotiations in September, however, veterans of the peace process were skeptical that progress could be made. Now, just four months later, even the most optimistic observers have reason to be despondent.

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Death by a thousand leaks
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Los Angeles Times
by Aaron David Miller - (Opinion) January 26, 2011 - 1:00am

Somebody up there must really hate the Arab-Israeli peace process. Just when you thought it couldn't get any worse, that the odds against serious negotiations couldn't get any longer and the hope for a two-state solution couldn't be more forlorn, we now have the Palestinian version of WikiLeaks.

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A Palestinian View: International legality is not up for a vote
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bitterlemons
by Ghassan Khatib - (Blog) January 17, 2011 - 1:00am

The prospect of posing a referendum in the respective societies on any agreement reached between Israeli and Palestinian negotiators is not a new idea. Periodically it has surfaced in the political landscape, arising for different and sometimes contradictory reasons.

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Good News From the Middle East (Really)
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Jeffrey Goldberg, Hussein Ibish - (Opinion) January 25, 2011 - 1:00am

IT has lately become the accepted wisdom that the Middle East peace process is dead, finished, kaput. This belief has been reinforced by Al Jazeera’s release this week of some 1,600 documents that are said to describe the inside workings of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations in 2008.

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January 25th

Could This Be the Map to Mideast Peace?
Media Mention of Ziad Asali In American Online - January 21, 2011 - 1:00am

It's a cliche among foreign policy circles that everyone knows what an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement will look like. Now a Washington think tank with close connections to officials in both Israel and the United States has sketched out realistic borders for a new Palestinian state.

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Daily Star, letter to the editor
Media Mention of Ziad Asali In The Daily Star - January 25, 2011 - 1:00am

Dear Editor Dr. Ziad Asali and Dr. Hussein Ibish of ATFP (The American Task Force on Palestine) are wise in refusing to buy into the “clash of civilizations” worldview that so many Zionist ideologues and Islamists endorse. Time and time again I have watched the cycle of incitement and spin sabotage support for Palestine.

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Aaron David Miller, Daoud Kuttab and Yossi Alpher debate the wisdom of raising the settlement issue at the UN. Palestinians and Edmund Sanders say leaked memos show nothing new. The LA Times says Israel is consistently making its problems worse. Protesters rally in favor of Pres. Abbas. Peru becomes the latest country to recognize Palestine. Hamas urges Palestinian refugees throughout the Middle East to protest. Turkey's president says Israel's flotilla report has no credibility, and relations between two countries remain strained. Israeli leaders say Israeli companies doing business with Palestinian companies that participate in the settlement goods boycott should also be boycotted. Ha'aretz says Israel has a peace partner. Occupation authorities say digging under the walls of the Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan is completed. Hamas leaders ban two “anti-Islamic” books. Gershon Baskin asks what PM Netanyahu really wants. The Jerusalem Post and the Guardian both say a two-state solution is still viable. Aluf Benn says Israel has a partner for peace, if it wants it, in Abbas. Uri Avnery says the creation of a Palestinian state is gaining international momentum.

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