Mideast middleman quits _ but does it matter?
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press
by Dan Perry - (Opinion) May 16, 2011 - 12:00am

The question of whether mediators matter took on acuity this weekend with the resignation of U.S. Mideast envoy George Mitchell, a move that came exactly as the Israeli-Palestinian conflict he was asked to help resolve seems about to retake center stage. For all the hand-wringing in diplomatic circles, reaction on the ground in the Middle East itself, was uncharacteristically muted. That reflected the fact that peace talks have been largely frozen since 2008, with the exception of a brief span in September, a Mitchell-mediated effort that quickly ran aground.

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The Long Overdue Palestinian State
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Mahmoud Abbas - (Opinion) May 16, 2011 - 12:00am

SIXTY-THREE years ago, a 13-year-old Palestinian boy was forced to leave his home in the Galilean city of Safed and flee with his family to Syria. He took up shelter in a canvas tent provided to all the arriving refugees. Though he and his family wished for decades to return to their home and homeland, they were denied that most basic of human rights. That child’s story, like that of so many other Palestinians, is mine.

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Fayyad to Haaretz: Palestinians are prepared for statehood
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Avi Issacharoff - May 13, 2011 - 12:00am

Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad said yesterday the Palestinians have created all the conditions for establishing a Palestinian state. “The mission has been accomplished,” Fayyad said in an interview to Haaretz in Ramallah yesterday.

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Close the door on Israel's land grab
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The National
(Editorial) May 13, 2011 - 12:00am

What would you do if your citizenship were rejected once your passport expired? Impossible, you would think - a travel document isn't your only, or even your primary, tie to your land of origin. But that was the fate of 140,000 Palestinians, as the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz reported this week, when Israel quietly cancelled their West Bank residency status between 1967 and 1994. It was as if residents simply blinked out of existence when their travel documents expired.

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Hamas, Fatah delegates to meet in Cairo
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Xinhua
May 11, 2011 - 12:00am

Delegations from Palestinian rivals will visit Cairo Saturday to start discussions on forming a unity government, a Hamas official said Wednesday. The delegations will represent Hamas and President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah party, said Salah Al-Bardawil, a Hamas official in Gaza. Last week, the two movements signed a reconciliation agreement brokered by Egypt. The pact is sought to end political split between the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip and the West Bank, where Fatah holds sway.

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Mideast peace requires Palestinian self-criticism
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Shlomo Avineri - (Opinion) May 11, 2011 - 12:00am

Efforts by members of Israel's far right to forbid the country's Arab citizens from commemorating the Nakba are mean, foolish and destined to fail. But initiatives by the extreme left to turn Nakba Day into a joint memorial day for all of Israel's citizens are also doomed. Israel is not a binational state, and with all due liberalism and humanism, it is hard to treat victory and defeat in the same way.

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Abbas says Palestinians determined to get UN recognition
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Xinhua
May 10, 2011 - 12:00am

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said the Palestinians are determined to seek recognition of a Palestinian state from the United Nations in September, a Ramallah-based newspaper reported Tuesday. "The issue of going to the UN is decisive and it doesn't endure any play or maneuvering," Abbas said during a meeting of the Revolutionary Council of his Fatah movement here on Monday night, according to the report. However, Abbas stressed that the negotiations with Israel remain the preferable choice for the Palestinians and that the Palestinians will continue efforts to resume the talks.

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Celebrating interdependence on Israel's Independence Day
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Foreign Policy
by Ori Nir - (Blog) May 10, 2011 - 12:00am

Israel's Independence Day is a good time to revel in what such a small country has achieved in such a short time and under such trying circumstances. But it is also a time to resolve to do more. On the former point, Israel's achievements are indeed amazing. With a population of 7 million citizens, Israel is no less than a technological, academic, medical, cultural, artistic, and scientific superpower. And this is not just on a per capita basis, but in absolute terms. It is bursting with ingenuity and creativity.

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An improbable leader’s unrelenting quest for a state of Palestine
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Globe and Mail
by Patrick Martin - (Opinion) May 9, 2011 - 12:00am

He is an unlikely man in a most unlikely setting, but Munib Rashid Masri, who, 10 years ago in the middle of a violent intifada, built a palatial mansion on the top of Mount Gerizim overlooking this Palestinian city, deserves much of the credit for the historic reconciliation between the antagonistic Hamas and Fatah organizations.

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INTERVIEW-Israel must move on peace or lose out -lobbyist
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters
by Allyn Fisher-Ilan - (Interview) May 8, 2011 - 12:00am

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu must present a concrete plan for a two-state solution of the Palestinian conflict to the U.S. Congress this month or face the prospect of fresh violence, a U.S. lobbyist said. Jeremy Ben-Ami, director of J Street, touted as a left-wing version of the powerful pro-Israel AIPAC lobby group, said he was "trying to build a momentum" to stall a Palestinian plan to seek United Nations backing for statehood in September.

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