Israel Uses Absentee Land To Build Settlement
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Arab News
by Mohammed Mar’i - January 7, 2008 - 6:22pm

The Israeli Housing Ministry expropriated land belonging to residents from West Bank cities of Bethlehem and Beit Sahour in accordance with the “absentee law” for the construction of more than 1,000 housing units in East Jerusalem’s Har Homa settlement in Jabal Abu Ghneim. The ministry’s move is in violation of both an instruction from the Israeli Attorney General Menachem Mazuz to stop applying the absentee law in East Jerusalem and explicit promises by Israel to the United States that it will not apply that law in Jerusalem’s eastern quarters.

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Storm Grows Over Jerusalem District
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bbc News
by Martin Patience - January 7, 2008 - 6:19pm

Yellow cranes swivel in the winter sun on a hill in south-east Jerusalem; occasional bursts of drilling puncture the otherwise peaceful atmosphere. In almost any other part of the world this scene would go largely unnoticed. But for Israelis and Palestinians the issue of construction at Har Homa/Jabal Abu Ghneim has rapidly become a political battleground. The Israeli government announced plans last month to build 300 new apartments at the Har Homa development in occupied East Jerusalem, drawing a furious diplomatic response from the Palestinians.

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Israel "committed To Dismantling West Bank Settlements"
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Guardian
by Fred Attewill - January 7, 2008 - 6:18pm

Israel today said it was committed to acting "expeditiously" to dismantle unauthorised West Bank settlement outposts and would tell that to President George Bush when he arrives for talks on Wednesday. A spokesman for the prime minister, Ehud Olmert, did not set a deadline for the removal of the outposts, which are typically makeshift encampments often set up by hardline settlers.

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Hardline Israeli Settlers Plan Chilly Reception For Bush
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Agence France Presse (AFP)
by Michael Blum - January 7, 2008 - 6:14pm

Residents of one of the oldest and most radical Jewish settlements in the Israeli-occupied West Bank are dreading the upcoming Middle East visit by US President George W. Bush. The settlers of Kiryat Arba west of Hebron -- one of the first set up after the West Bank's capture in 1967 -- fear for their future amid new peace talks with the Palestinians. But they remain defiant over American pressure to freeze settlement activity during the talks, and plan to make their voices heard during the landmark visit.

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Israel's False Friends
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Los Angeles Times
by John J. Mearsheimer And Stephen M. Walt - (Opinion) January 7, 2008 - 6:05pm

Once again, as the presidential campaign season gets underway, the leading candidates are going to enormous lengths to demonstrate their devotion to the state of Israel and their steadfast commitment to its "special relationship" with the United States.

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Bush Faces Mideast Obstacles
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Associated Press
by Amy Teibel - January 7, 2008 - 6:04pm

President Bush heads to Israel and the West Bank this week, hoping his first visit as U.S. leader will open the throttle on Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking. But in the six weeks since Bush declared at an international gathering in Annapolis, Md., that "the time is right" to make peace, two perennial obstacles to Mideast peacemaking have already reared up: Israeli settlements and violence.

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Inside Track: Spoiling To Spoil
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The National Interest
by Barbara Slavin - (Opinion) January 4, 2008 - 2:28pm

On his first—and probably last—major trip to the Middle East, President Bush has a final chance to reorient and reinvigorate U.S. diplomacy in the region. If the past is any guide, however, Bush will miss another opportunity to reach out to U.S. adversaries and diminish their motivation to play the spoiler.

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The Fence Failure
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The American Prospect
by Gershom Gorenberg - January 3, 2008 - 5:14pm

When George W. Bush visits Israel next week, he's reportedly planning to take time off for a visit to the ruins of Capernaum on the Sea of Galilee, where Jesus is said to have lived and preached. I shouldn't begrudge someone shlepping across the world a couple hours for a private pilgrimage. But if Bush wants to pry time free from meetings in Jerusalem, it would be better spent on a tour of the Israeli separation barrier, a.k.a. fence, a.k.a. wall. Plenty of human rights activists who speak good English (maybe too good for W.) would be happy to guide him.

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Bush's Gordian Knot
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Middle East Times
by Claude Salhani - (Analysis) January 3, 2008 - 5:02pm

U.S. President George W. Bush is about to embark on a tour of several Middle Eastern countries starting next week as his presidency rounds the corner heading for the final stretch of its second and final term at the White House. The president will travel to Israel, the West Bank, Kuwait, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt over a period of eight days starting Jan. 8.

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Words Won't Stop The Construction
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
(Editorial) January 2, 2008 - 2:44pm

The announcement that the prime minister has directed cabinet ministers not to build in the territories behind his back sounds like a sleight of hand. The prime minister should not instruct his ministers to "increase awareness" of their ministries' actions that might impair negotiations with the Palestinians, but rather he should once and for all bring the Sasson report to the cabinet for approval. The report states clearly how to monitor settlement expansion.

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