July 16th

Dahlan: No direct talks until issues addressed ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency July 16, 2010 - 12:00am Palestinians will not enter direct talks until Israel addresses issues raised in proximity talks, Fatah leader Muhammad Dahlan said Thursday. Speaking to Ma’an Radio, Dahlan affirmed news reports that US President Barack Obama had agreed with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to pressure the Palestinian side into direct talks, but said a specific date or agenda had not been set. » Read more

Southern Gaza crossing to expand ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency July 16, 2010 - 12:00am Among the goods brought into Gaza on Thursday, officials said, were pebble aggregates to be used for expanding the Kerem Shalom crossing facilities. The expansion comes in line with Israeli announcements that under the new terms of the siege on Gaza, crossings facilities would be upgraded. » Read more

Endgame ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz by Noam Sheizaf - July 16, 2010 - 12:00am "The prospects of the negotiations with Mahmoud Abbas do not look promising. President Obama undoubtedly thinks otherwise, but if Abbas speaks for anyone, it's barely half the Palestinians. The chances of anything good coming of this are not great. Another possibility is Jordan. If Jordan were ready to absorb both more territories and more people, things would be much easier and more natural. But Jordan does not agree to this. Therefore, I say that we can look at another option: for Israel to apply its law to Judea and Samaria and grant citizenship to 1.5 million Palestinians." » Read more

In diverting Libya aid ship, Israel implements lessons from Gaza flotilla raid ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Christian Science Monitor by Joshua Mitnick - July 16, 2010 - 12:00am Israel ducked a sea clash with a Libyan-backed aid ship bound for Gaza with a combination of diplomacy and deterrence, applying some lessons from the fatal intercept of a Turkish ship that left nine pro-Palestinian activists dead and increased Israel's international isolation. » Read more

Israel to UN: West Bank ‘outside our boundaries’ ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post by Tovah Lazaroff - July 16, 2010 - 12:00am Israel argued this week that a major human rights treaty, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, did not apply to its treatment of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, because those areas were outside the country’s national boundaries, even as it defended its record on that score before the covenant’s monitoring body in Geneva. » Read more

Force Israel's hand on Palestinian home demolitions ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Guardian by Seth Freedman - July 16, 2010 - 12:00am In theory, a municipality demolishing illegal structures on its land should not raise any eyebrows. In practice, however, such a measure should be viewed in the context of the wider politics of the locality – and when it comes to the tinderbox of Israeli-Palestinian affairs, the Israeli authorities' actions should be seen for the provocative and spiteful behaviour that they are. » Read more

July 15th

Tricky Bibi ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz by Gideon Levy - July 15, 2010 - 12:00am This video should have been banned for broadcast to minors. This video should have been shown in every home in Israel, then sent to Washington and Ramallah. Banned for viewing by children so as not to corrupt them, and distributed around the country and the world so that everyone will know who leads the government of Israel. Channel 10 presented: The real (and deceitful ) face of Binyamin Netanyahu. » Read more

Mitchell arrives to push direct talks ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post by Herb Keinon - July 15, 2010 - 12:00am US special envoy George Mitchell was scheduled to arrive on Thursday to push for direct Israeli-Palestinian talks, amid Israeli optimism that these talks will begin well before the 10-month settlement moratorium ends on September 26. On the eve of Mitchell’s visit, one senior government official said the talks would begin “soon,” though probably not in the “next few days.” » Read more

Shin Bet challenged by cases of Jewish terror ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz by Amos Harel - July 15, 2010 - 12:00am Suspicions against a member of the extreme right wing, Chaim Pearlman, link him to cases of Jewish terrorism that have yet to be solved: the murder of two Arabs, stabbed to death in Jerusalem more than a decade ago. In the police files and at the Jewish Division of the Shin Bet, there are a number of such conundrums left, and first and foremost among them is a series of shooting attacks in which Palestinians were murdered on West Bank roads during the early part of the past decade. » Read more

Police suspect alleged Jewish terrorist killed four Palestinians ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz by Chaim Levinson - July 15, 2010 - 12:00am A right-wing Israeli extremist arrested this week over a string of stabbing attacks is suspected of murdering four Palestinians and attempting to murder another seven, according to details of the investigation released on Thursday. Chaim Pearlman was arrested Tuesday, initially on suspicion of carrying out two murders in 1998, and for a series of attacks on other Palestinian victims over the last 12 years. The Petah Tikva Magistrate's Court on Thursday extended his remand by six days. » Read more