March 5th

Hamas rattles the Resistance Axis ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Daily Star by Rami Khouri - (Opinion) March 3, 2012 - 1:00am The decision last week by the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas to abandon its external headquarters in Damascus and support Syrians demonstrating for the removal of Bashar Assad’s regime is noteworthy on several levels. All of them affirm the vulnerable and changing nature of strategic conditions across the Middle East. » Read more

Obama and the Sanctity of Israel ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Dar Al-Hayat by Mostafa Zein - (Opinion) March 5, 2012 - 1:00am When US Administrations translate sanctity into reality, they find only Israel, especially in times of presidential or parliamentary elections, when sanctity turns into financial and media support for this or that candidate, and when the hundreds of millions of dollars become the main voter. Barack Obama has not departed from this golden rule since he reached the White House. When he was a candidate for the presidency, he visited Israel. He wore the Jewish skullcap (kippah) during his visit to the holocaust memorial, Yad Vashem. » Read more

Obama and Netanyahu to meet under the shadow of Iran and their own histories ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) by Ron Kampeas - (Opinion) March 4, 2012 - 1:00am WASHINGTON (JTA) -- As if their own fraught history and the prospect of a nuclear Iran weren’t enough, Barack Obama and Benjamin Netanyahu will bring to their meeting on Monday each nation’s vexing and at times self-contradictory relationship with war. Obama, facing what could be a tough re-election battle, must reconcile dueling American impulses: to stand up to bullies and to keep away from protracted bloody involvements overseas. » Read more

Obama’s unequivocal support for Israel won’t sway his diehard detractors ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz by Chemi Shalev - (Opinion) March 4, 2012 - 1:00am There are many people in both America and Israel who wouldn’t believe Barack Obama’s commitment to Israel’s security even if he sang Hatikvah, enlisted in the IDF and did reserve duty guarding an isolated West Bank outpost. These people are now dissecting the president’s speech to the AIPAC Policy Conference in Washington on Sunday in a way that will offer incontrovertible proof that it ranks a close second after Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s pledge to wipe Israel off the map. » Read more

Israel would be wise to listen to Obama's advice on Iran ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz (Editorial) March 5, 2012 - 1:00am U.S. President Barack Obama didn't wait for his private meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday to clarify his position on Iran's nuclear program. Speaking at the annual conference of AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the U.S. leader urged everyone to set the war drums aside. » Read more

Israel's brinkmanship, America's peril ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Los Angeles Times by Doyle McManus - (Opinion) March 4, 2012 - 1:00am Last week, Gen. Norton A. Schwartz, chief of staff of the U.S. Air Force, confirmed a no-longer-surprising fact: the Pentagon has sent the White House a menu of options for going to war with Iran. » Read more

Before attacking Iran, Israel should learn from its 1981 strike on Iraq ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Washington Post by Colin H. Kahl - (Opinion) March 2, 2012 - 1:00am On June 7, 1981, eight Israeli F-16 fighter jets, protected by six F-15 escorts, dropped 16 2,000-pound bombs on the nearly completed Osirak nuclear reactor at the Tuwaitha complex in Iraq. Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Defense Minister Ariel Sharon saw the reactor as central to Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s quest to build nuclear weapons, and they believed that it posed an existential threat to Israel. » Read more

Egypt warms to Hamas, but not allies yet ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The National by Hugh Naylor - March 5, 2012 - 1:00am CAIRO AND JERUSALEM // When Egypt provided a public platform last month for Ismail Haniyeh, the Hamas prime minister, it was seen as a more independent nation risking longtime ties with the United States and Israel to please its Islamist friends. To many observers, Mr Haniyeh's speech at Al Azhar University in Cairo, declaring his support for Syrian rebels fighting to topple the regime of Bashar Al Assad, also signalled the break-up of the revolutionary axis stretching from Tehran to Gaza City, and a major shift in the politics of the Middle East. » Read more

'Most serious' division in Hamas' history tests Meshaal's acumen ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The National by Hugh Naylor - March 5, 2012 - 1:00am JERUSALEM // Once firmly in control of Hamas, Khaled Meshaal no longer appears to be the Palestinian-Islamist group's undisputed leader. Rivals are stridently criticising the 55-year-old and the sweeping changes he has recently tried to engineer within Hamas. Such public dissension had been practically unheard of within the group's tightly regimented ranks. Others, sensing his weakened hand, seem to be not-so-subtlety jockeying for his position. » Read more

Now Syria's Foe, Hamas Still No Friend ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jewish Daily Forward by Nathan Guttman - March 4, 2012 - 1:00am Washington — In foreign relations, it is a longtime maxim that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” But despite its recent shift against the regime in Syria, that rule has done nothing, so far, for Hamas with the American government. The abrupt smashing of a decades-long bond between Hamas, which is designated by the United States as a terrorist organization, and Syria, a family-led dictatorship, is unlikely to facilitate Hamas’s rehabilitation, experts say, despite current efforts by the U.S. to assemble a wide coalition against the Syrian regime. » Read more