U.S. Presses Israelis on Renewal of Freeze
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Ethan Bronner, Helene Cooper, Mark Landler - September 30, 2010 - 12:00am

The Obama administration is trying to cajole the Israeli government into a 60-day renewal of the freeze on Jewish settlement building by offering it security guarantees, ranging from military hardware to support for a long-term Israeli presence in the strategically sensitive Jordan Valley, according to lawmakers and other officials briefed on the proposals.

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U.S. envoy steps up shuttle to save Mideast talks
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters
by Ali Sawafta - September 30, 2010 - 12:00am

U.S. envoy George Mitchell on Thursday stepped up the pace of efforts to save Middle East peace talks launched four weeks ago, saying he was seeking common ground to avert their collapse. Former Senator Mitchell was speaking after meeting Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who says he will pull out of the talks unless Israel extends a freeze on new building in Jewish West Bank settlements, which expired this week.

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Arab League may bring settlement freeze debate to UN
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Shlomo Shamir - September 30, 2010 - 12:00am

Arab League representatives, set to meet in Cairo on Wednesday to discuss the future of the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks in the wake of the expiration of Israel's freeze on settlement construction in the West Bank, will also consider a proposal to request that an emergency session of the United Nations Security Council be held on the issue, sources at the UN told Haaretz.

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US envoy plans more talks with Abbas, Netanyahu
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Statesman
by Mohammed Daraghmeh - September 30, 2010 - 12:00am

RAMALLAH, West Bank — A U.S. emissary racing against the clock to salvage Mideast peace negotiations scheduled another quick round of meetings with Israeli and Palestinian leaders after talks Thursday with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas ended inconclusively. Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are deadlocked over Israeli settlement construction. Earlier this week, Netanyahu refused to extend a 10-month-old moratorium on housing starts in West Bank settlements. Abbas has warned he'll quit U.S.-sponsored peace talks unless the moratorium is extended.

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News Analysis: New Intifada may not erupt if talks between Israel, PNA fail
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Xinhua
by Saud Abu Ramadan, Emad Drimly - September 30, 2010 - 12:00am

GAZA, Sept. 29 (Xinhua) -- The ten-month moratorium to freeze settlement construction in the West Bank and Jerusalem ended on Sunday. Currently the Israeli government has not offered any statement on whether or not to resume settlement construction. The unclear Israeli stance over the issue of settlement, has left the Palestinian side reluctant to make their mind as they decided to wait until the upcoming meeting of the Arab League (AL) Committee on peace talks with Israel to be held on Oct. 4 in Cairo.

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Paris’s Role in the Peace Talk
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Dar Al-Hayat
by Randa Takieddine - September 29, 2010 - 12:00am

Benjamin Netanyahu did not, and will not heed the calls of his friends and allies to freeze settlement building and suspend the decision to re-allow the construction of settlements after September 26. But in truth, no one in the Arab world had any illusions that Netanyahu will respond to the calls of the U.S. administration or the European Union (EU), specifically the calls of his friend French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who urged him to extend the freeze on settlements.

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U.S. Jews outraged by Lieberman's UN speech on population exchange
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Barak Ravid, Shlomo Shamir - (Analysis) September 29, 2010 - 12:00am

Many American Jewish leaders fumed Wednesday when Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman proposed "an exchange of populated territory" as part of a Mideast peace deal in a speech before the UN General Assembly in New York. Lieberman suggested ceding parts of Israel with large Arab populations to a future Palestinian state in exchange for Israel keeping large settlement blocs in the West Bank, a proposal which has been part of his party's platform.

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How did They Deceive Abu-Mazen?
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Asharq Alawsat
by Abdul Rahman Al-Rashed - (Opinion) September 29, 2010 - 12:00am

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas deserves the award for the world's Worst Negotiator. Currently, he can celebrate one of two possibilities: either negotiations will be terminated, or settlement construction will be suspended. Despite my appreciation of the noble man, he made a mistake by simplifying the demands of the Palestinian people into one request; namely that all settlement constructions are ceased. This has now become the highest of his ambitions.

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Obama sets out guarantees to Netanyahu for 60-day freeze extension
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA)
by Ron Kampeas - September 29, 2010 - 12:00am

The Obama administration reportedly is promising Israel broad security and diplomatic guarantees in exchange for extending a settlement moratorium by 60 days. According to an article posted Wednesday evening by David Makovsky, a senior analyst at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a letter from President Obama to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pledges that the United States will: *Not ask for additional extensions on the partial ban on settlement building, which expired Sunday;

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David Grossman, a Man Who Owns Israel
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jewish Daily Forward
by Leonard Fein - (Opinion) September 29, 2010 - 12:00am

In his remarkable recent New Yorker profile of the Israeli writer David Grossman, George Packer observes that the heroine of Grossman’s new novel “embraces the breadth of Israel’s tragedy, a country that can take nothing for granted, not even its own existence.” (The novel, “To the End of the Land,” is newly available in English.) Yet Packer’s lengthy article, though tinged with tragedy to be sure, is colored as well by resolve, even triumph. For the Grossman he portrays is a steadfast Israeli patriot, a man who owns Israel.

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