Palestinian makes artistic mark on passports ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Alertnet by Jihan Abdalla - (Analysis) May 30, 2011 - 12:00am It is like no other passport control on earth. No stern official sitting behind a glass wall, no scanning of travel documents, no terse questions about where you are going. Instead, a lone artist greets arriving visitors and politely asks them if they would like an entry stamp. Living in occupied territory, the Palestinians do not have the right to set up their own frontier controls. Anyone who passes through Israeli checkpoints is swiftly absorbed into the bustling streets of West Bank cities like Ramallah. » Read more

Gaza activists warn Israel not to block new convoy ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Alertnet May 30, 2011 - 12:00am Pro-Palestinian activists told Israel on Monday not to interfere in a planned aid flotilla to Gaza in late June, barely a year after Israeli commandos boarded an aid ship killing eight Turks and one Turkish-American. Holding a news conference on the deck of the Mavi Marmara where the May 31 2010 confrontation occurred, a coalition of 22 activist groups called on governments to ensure there was no re-run of the incident. » Read more

The Virtues of Folding ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Foreign Policy by Aaron David Miller - (Opinion) May 30, 2011 - 12:00am "She crumbled," ace detective Phillip Marlowe observed in one of the greatest lines in Raymond Chandler's classic 1939 novel The Big Sleep, "like a new bride's pie crust." And so, come to think of it, has the Obama administration's approach to Arab-Israeli peacemaking. Thirty months in, a self-styled transformative president with big ideas and ambitions as a peacemaker finds himself with no negotiations, no peace process, no relationship with an Israeli prime minister, no traction with Palestinians, and no strategy to achieve a breakthrough. » Read more

Prayer, politics collide on midnight pilgrimage ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press by Mohammed Daraghmeh - May 31, 2011 - 12:00am A modest stone building holy to Jews in the midst of this Arab city is becoming an increasingly volatile friction point, drawing growing numbers of pilgrims on nighttime prayer visits, unnerving Palestinian residents and putting Israel's military into conflict with some of the worshippers it is meant to protect. The monthly trips by religious Jews to this largely hostile city, coordinated with Palestinian security forces, emphasize the complexity of the Holy Land's religious landscape and the sometimes deadly intersection of the sacred and the political. » Read more

New generation of Palestinian jihadists challenges Hamas ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Globe and Mail by Patrick Martin - (Analysis) May 29, 2011 - 12:00am The towering Ibn Taymiyyah Mosque, a white stucco building with blue glass, stands within sight of the Egyptian border, close to Rafah's infamous tunnels that supplied Gaza with food and arms over the past five years. The mosque is named for the 14th century Muslim scholar who combined a love of jihad with a hatred of anything unorthodox. This is the community from which Hamas sprang, where the Muslim Brotherhood ruled the roost under men such as Sheik Ahmed Yassin, the blind paraplegic preacher, and where devoted Hamas youths stared down Israeli tanks. » Read more

Fayyad: State will be on 1967 borders ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency May 31, 2011 - 12:00am Ramallah Prime Minister Salam Fayyad said Monday that the Palestinian state would be established on all territories occupied in 1967. "On 1967 territories, there are no disputed areas. There is no A, B, or C area, nor are there H1 or H2 zones. It is all Palestinian territory that has been occupied since 1967," Fayyad said. "The independent Palestinian state will be on all these territories including the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, and Jerusalem, the eternal capital of Palestine." » Read more

Abbas in Egypt for talks with military leader ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency May 30, 2011 - 12:00am President Mahmoud Abbas was in Egypt on Monday for talks with the country's de facto head of state on efforts to seek UN recognition for a Palestinian state, a military source said. Abbas briefed Field Marshall Hussein Tantawi -- who heads the military council in power since president Hosni Mubarak was ousted in February -- on his recent trip to Doha. » Read more

3 killed in blast at Gaza training camp ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency May 31, 2011 - 12:00am Three men were killed Tuesday in an explosion at a resistance training ground in the southern Gaza Strip. Popular Resistance Committees spokesman Abu Mujahid told Ma'an that three men affiliated with the group were killed in a blast at the Abu Ataya training ground in Tel Sultan, west of Rafah. It was not immediately clear what caused the explosion but the Israeli military said it was not responsible. Abu Mujahid identified those killed as Younis Abu An-Naja, Ramzi Abu Harb, and Mahmoud Al-Arqan. » Read more