Palestinian UN draft / The more extreme, the better for Israel
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Akiva Eldar - October 14, 2009 - 12:00am

We should not get unnerved by the heartbreaking cries coming from Jerusalem regarding Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas' decision to appeal to the UN Human Rights Council with an upgraded Goldstone report. Wise men have said in the past, "the worse it is, the better it is." The more extreme the Palestinian offer gets, the chance of it winning support in the West dwindles.

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Draft UN resolution inserts text on Jerusalem
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
October 14, 2009 - 12:00am

A draft resolution submitted by Palestinian diplomats to the United Nations Human Rights Council calls for a full endorsement of the Goldstone report on Gaza and also condemns Israel for its policies in Jerusalem. The draft was made public on Wednesday on the website of the Israeli newspaper Haaretz. President Mahmoud Abbas’ government reportedly submitted the draft after it demanded a new debate on the Goldstone war crimes report.

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Fatah official: Abbas' adviser gave him bad advice over Goldstone
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
October 14, 2009 - 12:00am

Those who advised President Mahmoud Abbas to defer the Goldstone report gave him bad advice, Fatah Central Committee member Nabil Sha’ath told a Paris panel on Wednesday. Sha’ath spoke at an online panel discussion of the issues raised by the recent Palestinian Authority decision to delay the decision on whether or not to adopt the Goldstone report into UN policy. The discussion was organized by the Paris-based Arab European Studies Center.

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Palestinians urge Israeli punishment over Gaza
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press
by Edith M. Lederer - October 14, 2009 - 12:00am

UNITED NATIONS — The Palestinians called Wednesday for global action to punish Israel for alleged war crimes during its military assault on Gaza last winter, warning that the credibility of the United Nations and international human rights law was at stake. The demand was based on the findings of a commission headed by former South African judge Richard Goldstone.

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Israeli air strike on Gaza tunnels wounds three
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters
October 14, 2009 - 12:00am

GAZA, Oct 14 (Reuters) - Israeli warplanes attacked two smuggling tunnels along the Gaza Strip border with Egypt on Wednesday, wounding three tunnellers, Palestinian medical sources and the Israeli army said.   An Israeli army spokeswoman said the attack came in response to a rocket fired by Gaza militants into southern Israel late on Tuesday. It landed in an open field causing no casualties, the army said.

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American Jews Rethink Israel
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Nation
by Philip Weiss - October 14, 2009 - 12:00am

This year has seen a dramatic shift in American Jews' attitudes toward Israel. In January many liberal Jews were shocked by the Gaza war, in which Israel used overwhelming force against a mostly defenseless civilian population unable to flee. Then came the rise to power of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, whose explicitly anti-Arab platform was at odds with an American Jewish electorate that had just voted 4 to 1 for a minority president.

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UN chief backs Abbas decision to debate Goldstone report
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
October 13, 2009 - 12:00am

United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon supports a Palestinian proposal to reopen debate in the Human Rights Council on the Goldstone Commission's report on the Gaza war, his spokeswoman Michele Montas said on Monday. She said Ban assured Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas on the matter during a telephone conversation on Sunday. Israeli officials across the board have condemned the 575-page report which accuses Israel of war crimes during the wintertime offensive. The report also accused Hamas of actions amounting to war crimes by firing rockets at civilians in southern Israel.

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The Erdogan-Obama road map for peace
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Gulf News
by Sami Moubayed - (Opinion) October 13, 2009 - 12:00am

Eyebrows were raised at the 64th session of the UN General Assembly in September, when Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan rose to the podium and talked about the controversial report of South African judge Robert Goldstone. The UN-mandated report, released only days earlier, accuses Israel of war crimes in Gaza during the 2008-2009 crisis and possible crimes against humanity.

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Israelis may stay home to avoid arrest in Europe
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Washington Times
by Eli Lake - October 13, 2009 - 12:00am

Israel is seriously considering restricting travel to Europe by its senior officials and military officers, fearing they might be arrested in the wake of a disputed U.N. report that accuses the Jewish state of targeting civilians in its Gaza war earlier this year.

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Gaza government: We backed Goldstone from the start
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
October 13, 2009 - 12:00am

The Hamas-backed government in the Gaza Strip on Monday denied President Mahmoud Abbas’ allegations that the government did not support the Goldstone report on war crimes. Government spokesperson Taher An-Nunu said in a statement, “Goldstone met with the government and its ministers more than once, and he also met with the Prime Minister, Ismail Haniyeh, which led him to praise our government in his report clearly, openly and in public.”

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