Barack Obama must move ahead to final-status talks over Palestine
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Daily Star
by Joschka Fischer - (Opinion) January 4, 2011 - 1:00am

Two years have passed since Barack Obama was elected president of the United States. Much to his credit – and in contrast to his predecessor – Obama tried, from his first day in office, to work toward a resolution of the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians.

»

Abbas 'always ready' for talks after settlement freeze
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
January 4, 2011 - 1:00am

President Mahmoud Abbas said Monday that he was "always ready" to continue peace talks with Israel as soon as it freezes settlement building. "We are always ready to continue negotiations in the event that Israel comes to accept the stopping of its settlement plans," Abbas said in Tunis after talks with Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. "The United States has not succeeded in resolving this problem," Abbas said, adding that he was undertaking a "broad diplomatic campaign" in a bid to restart the peace talks and freeze settlement building.

»

U.S. renews Mideast peace bid after holiday break
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters
by Maayan Lubell - January 3, 2011 - 1:00am

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday senior U.S. officials will return to the Middle East this week to renew peacemaking efforts with Israel and the Palestinians. Direct peace talks collapsed late last year in a dispute over Jewish settlement building in the occupied West Bank, part of the land Palestinians seek for a state. Netanyahu said White House Middle East aide Dennis Ross and other U.S. officials would arrive later in the week. On Thursday, Netanyahu plans to hold talks in Egypt with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.

»

Israel's Labor: We'll quit if no progress to peace
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press
by Mark Lavie - January 3, 2011 - 1:00am

A top leader of Israel's Labor Party threatened Monday to pull out of the government if there is no progress in peace talks, reflecting growing impatience with the stalemate in negotiations with the Palestinians. An exit by Labor, a moderate party sitting uncomfortably alongside hawks in the ruling coalition, could undermine Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's parliamentary majority and force an election. That would sideline Mideast peace efforts for months. The pullout threat came from Labor Party stalwart Binyamin Ben-Eliezer.

»

Rejectionist Front
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'ariv
by Ben Caspit - January 3, 2011 - 1:00am

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu announced yesterday that he was willing to discuss all the core issues with Abu Mazen in closed meetings, and said that if he were to go into the room with the Palestinian leader he would sit down and discuss all the issues with him “until white smoke rises.” Ma’ariv has found that in reality, the situation is the complete opposite: In the past weeks, Israeli representatives, including Netanyahu, have repeatedly rejected official documents that their Palestinian counterparts have tried to submit to them, with details of the Palestinian positions on all the co

»

Mirror Image
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jewish Daily Forward
by Leonard Fein - (Opinion) January 3, 2011 - 1:00am

The argument has long-since been familiar: If a two-state solution fails, dies from sheer exhaustion, then we’re looking either at a continuation of the status quo or at some form of one-state solution. The status quo is inherently noxious; it is also inherently unstable. It is folly to suppose that it can endure indefinitely, that it will not periodically be interrupted by ever more lethal confrontations.

»

Israeli minister: Labor could bolt government
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Statesman
by Matti Friedman - January 3, 2011 - 1:00am

Israel's Labor Party will pull out of the government within two months if there is no progress in peace talks, a senior member of the party said Monday, in a potential threat to the stability of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's governing coalition.

»

Netanyahu: Israel agreed to new settlement freeze, but U.S. retracted offer
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Jonathan Lis - January 3, 2011 - 1:00am

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday that he had agreed to the U.S. suggestion of a three-month extension to the West Bank settlement freeze, but the Americans were the ones who retracted the offer. "The United States asked us to consider extending the freeze by three months, and the truth is that we were prepared to do so," Netanyahu said while speaking before the Knesset's Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee.

»

Israel's Netanyahu goes on the defensive
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Christian Science Monitor
by Joshua Mitnick - January 3, 2011 - 1:00am

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sought to deflect rising criticism at home over stalled peace talks Monday by telling Israeli lawmakers that it was the US, not Israel, that rejected a settlement freeze extension this past fall. "There was an American decision not to follow the track,'' said a government official who confirmed the remarks but was not authorized to speak for attribution. "The reporting out there that Israel rejected the American package is simply erroneous.''

»

Abbas: Israeli-Palestinian peace could be reached in two months
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
January 2, 2011 - 1:00am

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said Sunday that he believed Israel and the Palestinians could reach a deal within two months, if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was willing to take a new approach in the peace process. The Palestinian president reiterated that the time had come for decisions, rather than talks, and said that Jerusalem must be the non-negotiable capital of the Palestinian state. Abbas did add, however, that the Palestinians would not make a unilateral declaration of statehood.

»


American Task Force on Palestine - 1634 Eye St. NW, Suite 725, Washington DC 20006 - Telephone: 202-262-0017