July 30th

Sincerity a must for Mideast peace ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jordan Times by Ahmad Majdoubeh - (Opinion) July 30, 2010 - 12:00am Recent high-level meetings in Washington and the region, and talk about the need for direct negotiations between the Palestinians and the Israelis on final status issues, indicate that something is in the offing. Peace advocates in the region and abroad always find it positive when the parties to the conflict are moving in the direction of peace, or, at least, exchanging views on how to jump-start the process. Apathy and stalemate are extremely harmful to both peace and the parties involved. As long as the momentum of peace efforts is kept, there is always hope. And hope is essential. » Read more

A barely tolerated minority ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz by Daniel Seidemann - July 30, 2010 - 12:00am Hamas-affiliated Palestinian parliament member Mohammed Abu Tir - renowned for his bright orange beard - is my neighbor in Jerusalem. We live about a mile apart. I've never met him, nor do I care to. I have no illusions about Hamas. Abu Tir has just been released after spending four years in Israeli jail in because of his membership of the Change and Reform Party, which is associated with Hamas (and which both Israel and the Palestinian Authority allowed to participate in the 2006 legislative elections ). He is now facing exile. Not new charges, not a new indictment, not a trial. » Read more

Is there really a difference? ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bitterlemons by George Giacaman - (Opinion) July 30, 2010 - 12:00am Syria and Israel negotiated directly in the US in 2000 and indirectly in 2008. The PLO and Israel negotiated indirectly first in the late 1980s and directly since the start of the Oslo process. Negotiations so far have not led to a comprehensive peace on either track. What moral can be drawn about the modus operandi, direct or indirect? None. The problem lies elsewhere. » Read more

We shall be as dreamers ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz by Yossi Sarid - (Opinion) July 30, 2010 - 12:00am This column joins in the call: Let's have proximity talks. For the talks are close, but the proximity is far off. It is not by chance that Benjamin Netanyahu has so far refrained from responding to the questions of the mediator who, had he not identified himself as the representative of a great power, would be suspected of loitering. Why reply, as long as it is possible to put him off with empty verbiage, and every delay is for the best? » Read more

Israel believes Abbas will bide time on direct talks until settlement freeze nears end ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz by Avi Issacharoff, Natasha Mozgovaya, Barak Ravid - July 30, 2010 - 12:00am Officials in Jerusalem believe that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas will attempt to delay at all cost the beginning of direct peace negotiations with Israel, even after the Arab League gave the green light for the process at a special session on Thursday. A senior source in Jerusalem said that Abbas will likely wait until September, when Israel's temporary settlement freeze expires, before declaring his own decision on the matter. » Read more

Gaza rocket ends quiet year for Ashkelon ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters by Douglas Hamilton - July 30, 2010 - 12:00am Palestinian militants in Gaza fired a rocket into Ashkelon on Israel's Mediterranean coast on Friday, blowing out the windows of an apartment block and damaging parked cars in a residential area of the city. No one was injured in the blast. But the attack ended over a year of calm for the city closest to the enclave ruled by the Islamist Hamas movement and it was likely to trigger a military response by Israel. » Read more

UN rights body tells Israel to end Gaza blockade ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters by Jonathan Lynn - July 30, 2010 - 12:00am Israel must lift its military blockade of the Gaza Strip and invite an independent, fact-finding mission to investigate its raid on a Gaza-bound aid flotilla, a United Nations rights body said on Friday. The U.N. Human Rights Committee also told Israel to ensure that Palestinians in the occupied territories can enjoy the human rights that Israel had pledged to uphold in the main international human rights treaty. » Read more

UN envoy says acts in Jerusalem 'provocative' ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency July 30, 2010 - 12:00am Robert Serry, the UN special envoy to the Middle East peace process, condemned the takeover by armed settlers of a building in occupied East Jerusalem on Thursday. Two Jewish families, protected by Israeli police, entered the building, home to nine Palestinian families, with documents claiming that they owned the property. Israeli National Police spokesman Mickey Rosenfeld said police were examining the documents “to determine whether they are accurate or not." » Read more

For biased critics of Israel, even its defensive actions violate human rights ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Christian Science Monitor by Jeffrey Robbins - (Opinion) July 30, 2010 - 12:00am In 1947, when excusing Soviet totalitarianism had become quite the rage in fashionable progressive circles, George Orwell eviscerated a British politician who consistently defended totalitarians but nevertheless denied that he was a defender of totalitarianism. “But of course he does,” Orwell wrote. “What else could he say? A pickpocket does not go to the races with a label ‘pickpocket’ on his coat lapel, and a propagandist does not describe himself as a propagandist.” » Read more

Breakthrough? Abbas gets Arab backing to enter Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Christian Science Monitor by Joshua Mitnick - July 30, 2010 - 12:00am Setting the stage for the Palestinians to negotiate directly with Israel, the Arab League agreed in principle today to Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas holding face-to-face peace talks with the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The decision of the Arab League's forum on Israeli-Palestinian talks is significant because it provides political cover for Mr. Abbas, who has been locked in a battle for legitimacy with Islamists from Hamas who oppose negotiations with Israel. » Read more