Boundaries | The American Task Force on Palestine

Abbas defends security cooperation with Israel
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Xinhua
April 16, 2012 - 12:00am

RAMALLAH, April 16 (Xinhua) -- Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said he will not stop security liaison with Israel despite the breakdown of peace negotiations. Abbas, in an interview with a Palestinian newspaper, also said he will not dissolve the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) in response to the lack of chances to build an independent state.

Israeli troops fatally shoot infiltrator who crossed border from Egypt’s Sinai desert
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press
February 28, 2012 - 1:00am

JERUSALEM — Israeli troops have killed an unidentified man who illegally crossed into Israel through the porous border with Egypt’s Sinai desert. A military statement says soldiers patrolling the border overnight spotted a group of people who had breached the frontier. It says the soldiers called on the people to stop, but the infiltrators opened fire, drawing return fire from the Israeli troops. The military said Tuesday that one man was killed and the others fled back to Egyptian territory.

Israel’s Academy for Occupation
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
(Editorial) February 15, 2012 - 1:00am

When the violent conflict in the territories was at its height a decade or so ago, then IDF Chief of Staff Moshe Ya'alon said Israel's goal was to sear the Palestinians' consciousness with the understanding that violence doesn't pay. Today, the government in which Ya'alon now serves as a minister doesn't miss an opportunity to sear the consciousness of Palestinians and Israelis alike with the idea that a diplomatic agreement on a two-state solution is no longer on the table.

Palestinian-Israeli negotiations are impossible
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Asharq Alawsat
by Bilal Hassan - (Analysis) February 2, 2012 - 1:00am

At present, there are no Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, as the conditions laid down by Israel would render them doomed to failure before they even start. Yet the Palestinian side has no alternative plan to the negotiation theme, which means that the issue will remain pending and frozen unless some change happens on the ground and alters the balance of power.

PA officials: Israeli border proposal a non-starter
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
January 27, 2012 - 1:00am

Palestinian officials said Friday that Israel's presentation of its ideas for border and security arrangements of a future Palestinian state at a meeting in Amman on Wednesday was a non-starter, envisaging a fenced-off territory of cantons that would preserve most Jewish settlements.

The Masada complex
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Jamie Levin - (Opinion) January 22, 2012 - 1:00am

In 1927, poet Yitzhak Lamdan wrote Masada, a poem glorifying the heroism and self-reliance of the early Zionist movement. The poem helped transform the remote hilltop fortress, largely forgotten since the writings of the Roman-Jewish historian Josephus, into an enduring symbol of the young State of Israel. Lamdan’s most famous line, “never again shall Masada fall,” became a rallying cry for a generation of Israeli soldiers who repeated these words in countless inauguration ceremonies.

Falling in Love With Dusty Treaties
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jewish Daily Forward
by J.J. Goldberg - (Analysis) January 20, 2012 - 1:00am

One of the more surprising twists in recent Middle East punditry is a sudden surge of interest among pro-Israel hard-liners in the fine points of international law. The topic isn’t usually popular with hawks; they tend to see it as an infringement on national sovereignty, employed mainly as a club for bludgeoning Israel. Seeing it raised in Israel’s defense is a novelty. It could be a good sign, if it gets Israel’s defenders and critics talking the same language for a change. But maybe I’m being too optimistic.

How will it all end?
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
by Susan Hattis Rolef - (Opinion) January 8, 2012 - 1:00am

In recent months the press has been flooded with articles by left-wing writers, including former Knesset Speaker Avrum Burg and author A.B. Yehoshua, who have argued that long-=standing Israeli settlement policy in the Territories has rendered a two-state solution irrelevant. The only remaining option, they say, is a single state west of the Jordan River.

'Mashaal agreed to non-violence, pre-67 borders'
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post
December 17, 2011 - 1:00am

Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal agreed in the context of reconciliation with Fatah that resistance to Israel must be non-violent and a Palestinian state should be based on the1967 borders, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said in an interview with the Euronews international television network. Speaking in the interview aired Friday, Abbas said that Mashaal agreed to those two points, as well as to elections in May 2012 when the two met last month.

Israel effectively annexes Palestinian land near Jordan Valley
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from
by Akiva Eldar - (Analysis) November 18, 2011 - 1:00am

Israel carried out a de facto annexation of Palestinian land northeast of the Jordan Valley and given it to Kibbutz Merav. Merav, part of the Religious Kibbutz Movement, is about seven kilometers northwest of the parcel. The route of the separation barrier in the area was changed so that the plot in question, about 1,500 dunams (375 acres), would be on the Israeli side.

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