January 9th

Hopeless In Gaza ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Times by Stefanie Marsh - January 9, 2008 - 6:21pm We were in east Jerusalem, the day before we were due in the Jordan Valley to document the plight of Palestinian farmers, when the man from Oxfam burst in to the room. This was last week, when I spent five days in the occupied territories – Gaza, Hebron, the Jordan Valley and Bethlehem – inspecting living conditions in anticipation of President George Bush’s visit to Israel today. » Read more

Analysis: Bush Could Find Time Running Out For Peace ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Times by Richard Beeston - (Analysis) January 9, 2008 - 6:19pm When President Bush set foot in Israel today for the first time in a decade, he may have been tempted to believe that peace could finally be at hand in that tortured land. On the apron of Ben Gurion Airport, Israeli leaders and dignitaries turned out in force to pay their respects to the man regarded as the Jewish state’s most powerful supporter. Tomorrow, Mr Bush will receive a no less respectful reception when he travels to the West Bank to be greeted by President Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinian leadership. » Read more

Bush Must Dispense Bitter Pills For Peace ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Financial Times by Zbigniew Brzezinski - (Commentary) January 9, 2008 - 6:17pm President George W. Bush embarks this week on a trip to the Middle East that may determine how history judges his legacy. So far, it is safe to say that the judgment will be largely negative. Mr Bush’s foreign policy has undermined America’s global legitimacy, not to mention his own credibility. He has plunged the US into a protracted conflict in the Gulf region while neglecting the increasingly ominous al-Qaeda challenges in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Last, global public opinion has turned against the US. » Read more

An 11th Hour Attempt To Make History ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Speigel International by Pierre Heumann - January 9, 2008 - 6:14pm US President George W. Bush made his first trip to Israel on Wednesday in a bid to put Israelis and Palestinians on course for a peace agreement within a year. He wants to solve the 60-year-old crisis in his remaining 12 months in office. The hurdles are huge. Air Force One landed at Tel Aviv's Ben-Gurion Airport, where President Shimon Peres, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and other Israeli officials waited to greet Bush, seen by many Israelis as the best friend the Jewish state has had in the White House.   » Read more

In The Middle East, No Time To Spare ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Christian Science Monitor by George Moffett - January 9, 2008 - 6:12pm As President Bush commences his twilight foray into Arab-Israeli diplomacy, he is confronted by a singular and regrettable fact: Israel's long-term survival is not necessarily a given. Threatened by Islamic radicalism, demographic trends, and advances in missile technology, the Jewish state may be living on borrowed time. If he is to help redeem Israel from a tenuous future, Mr. Bush must reiterate one message above all: There will be no peace without a viable Palestinian state. » Read more

In Isolation, Gazans Dismiss Bush's New Push For Peace ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Christian Science Monitor by Dan Murphy - January 9, 2008 - 6:11pm As Israel and the Palestinian Authority gear up for President Bush's first visit to the Jewish state and the West Bank, in which the president is expected to nudge along a hoped-for peace deal between the two sides, many residents of the isolated Gaza Strip are looking on with anger and cynicism. This densely populated coastal territory has been largely shut off from the outside world since Hamas, the Islamist militant group that the US and Israel consider terrorists, seized control from their rival Fatah here in June. » Read more

An Incentive For Peace ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Baltimore Sun by Emily L. Hauser - (Opinion) January 9, 2008 - 6:10pm Despite the recent Annapolis peace conference, Israeli-Palestinian violence is escalating. Last week, Palestinian rockets fell on Israeli cities, and Israel launched retaliatory airstrikes; in one day, nine Palestinians died, including a 3-year-old girl. Even as President Bush visits the region this week for the first time since taking office, Americans might be forgiven for not placing much faith in their government's attempts to broker peace. » Read more

Mideast Leaders Vow To Refocus On Talks ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Los Angeles Times by Richard Bourdreaux - January 9, 2008 - 6:09pm As President Bush headed to the Middle East to check on their peace talks, Israeli and Palestinian leaders agreed Tuesday to launch them in earnest, six weeks late. It was that long ago that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas stood beside Bush at an international conference in Annapolis, Md., and announced the start of full-scale negotiations with the aim of creating a Palestinian state by the end of 2008. » Read more

Egypt's Tunnels Sustaining Hamas Economy ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Washington Times by Erica Silverman - January 9, 2008 - 6:08pm An elaborate network of tunnels from Egypt has become the primary transport route for commercial goods entering the Gaza Strip, enabling the area's Hamas rulers to maintain a rudimentary economy in the face of an Israeli embargo. Food products, machinery parts, raw materials and even antibiotics are delivered to Gaza through the tunnels, subject to fees from private families that own some of the passages and to taxes by Hamas. Other smuggled products range from cigarettes to mobile phones. » Read more

Mr. Bush In The Middle East ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Washington Post (Editorial) January 9, 2008 - 6:07pm AYEAR AGO, the Bush administration introduced a new policy in the Middle East aimed at aligning "moderate" Arab states against Iran while simultaneously promoting the revival of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. As President Bush begins a tour of the region today, both ends of that strategy are in danger of unraveling. Never entirely in sync with the administration's concept of isolating Tehran, Arab states have been given further second thoughts by the recently released National Intelligence Estimate, which reported that Iran had suspended work on a nuclear bomb. » Read more