Middle East News: World Press Roundup

NEWS: PLO officials say they are launching a campaign to restart negotiations with Israel. Hamas celebrates its anniversary with a fiery speech by Politburo leader Mishaal, who vows never to recognize Israel. Many in Gaza, however, are in no mood to celebrate. The PA says it will allow a Hamas rally in the West Bank. PM Netanyahu says the event proves Israel's security is threatened, and Israeli security officials say Hamas is trying to reactivate "sleeper cells" in the West Bank. Concerns are growing in Israel about the prospects for another Palestinian uprising. Pres. Abbas appeals for urgent Arab financial aid. Arab states promise $100 million a month as a "safety net" for the PA. Many Palestinian political figures call for national unity. Some Israelis are comforted by the Iron Dome missile-defense system, while others see it as insulation from deep-seated problems. PA anti-corruption officials say they are following new leads in the Rashid case. Israeli occupation forces arrest 13 Palestinians in the West Bank. Qatar proposes the Arab League withdraw the Arab Peace Initiative. Israeli authorities say undercover antiterrorism units can only take action against Arabs, not Jewish settlers. The EU is reportedly mulling ways for pressing Israel not to go ahead with its planned E1 settlement expansion. COMMENTARY: ATFP Board member Saliba Sarsar says after the UN vote, Israelis and Palestinians need to look for new paths to reconciliation. Thomas Friedman says Israeli hawks risk self-fulfilling prophecies of danger for Israel. The LA Times says Israel's settlement expansion plans only hurt itself. Ha'aretz says Israel has to stop destroying Palestinian cisterns in the West Bank. Leon Wieseltier says he no longer believes Israel and the Palestinians will achieve peace in his lifetime. Eitan Haber says Mishaal's speech shows prospects for peace are receding. David Myers says there are many important parallels between where Palestinians are today and Zionists were in 1947. Jeffrey Goldberg says Australia's UN abstention shows Israel's international allies are greatly diminishing. James Carroll says everyone concerned about peace and Israel's future needs to oppose the E1 settlement plan. Paul Pillar says Mishaal's recent Gaza speech plays perfectly into the hands of Netanyahu. Peter Beinart worries that a second term Obama administration will choose a policy of "benign neglect" regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The National says Hamas is failing the Palestinian people.

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Palestinians to launch 6-month initiative to restart talks with Israel ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz (Analysis) December 10, 2012 - 1:00am   Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said Monday that the Palestinian Authority plans to launch a new initiative to renew negotiations with Israel, which would include the release of prisoners and a halt to settlement construction. » Read more

Leader Celebrates Founding of Hamas With Defiant Speech ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times by Steven Erlanger - (Analysis) December 8, 2012 - 1:00am   » Read more

Hamas leader vows never to recognise Israel ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters (Analysis) December 8, 2012 - 1:00am   Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal, making his first ever visit to the Gaza Strip, vowed on Saturday never to recognise Israel and said his Islamist group would never abandon its claim to all Israeli territory. » Read more

Growing number in Gaza Strip are in no mood to celebrate ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Los Angeles Times by Edmund Sanders - (Analysis) December 9, 2012 - 1:00am   As tens of thousands of Gazans celebrated Hamas' 25th anniversary Saturday, Mohamed Mustafa Abdallah huddled by a small fire in a cinder-block shed, assembled from scraps of wreckage from his bombed-out wholesale food business a few feet away. » Read more

PA to sanction Hamas anniversary event in West Bank ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency (Analysis) December 10, 2012 - 1:00am The Palestinian Authority has officially agreed to allow a Hamas festival commemorating the movement’s 25th anniversary in the West Bank, an independent politician said Monday. » Read more

Netanyahu: Hamas's Gaza jubilation proves Israel is at risk ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters by Dan Williams - (Analysis) December 9, 2012 - 1:00am    Hamas's vow to vanquish Israel after claiming "victory" in last month's Gaza conflict vindicates Israel's reluctance to relinquish more land to the Palestinians, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday. » Read more

IDF: Hamas trying to activate W. Bank sleeper cells ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jerusalem Post by Yaakov Lappin - (Analysis) December 10, 2012 - 1:00am   Hamas is attempting to reactivate its sleeper cells in the West Bank, the IDF has warned. Hamas’s terrorist infrastructure was destroyed in West Bank cities by the IDF following Operation Defensive Shield in 2002 and subsequent counterterrorism efforts. » Read more

Israel grows jittery of new Palestinian uprising ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press by Josef Federman - (Analysis) December 9, 2012 - 1:00am   The rising confidence and bellicosity of Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip, combined with rapidly deteriorating relations with Israel's would-be peace partner in the West Bank, are raising jitters in Israel that a new Palestinian uprising could be near. » Read more

Palestinian president appeals for urgent Arab aid ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press by Abdullah Rebhi - (Analysis) December 9, 2012 - 1:00am   The Palestinian president is urging Arab nations to provide major financial assistance to cover a new monthly $100 million budgetary shortfall after U.N. recognition of Palestinian claims to statehood — the result of a punitive Israeli measure. » Read more

Arabs offer Palestinians $100 mln a month "financial safety net" ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters (Analysis) December 9, 2012 - 1:00am   Arab states agreed to provide the Palestinian Authority with a $100 million monthly "financial safety net" to help President Mahmoud Abbas's government cope with an economic crisis after the United Nations granted de facto statehood to Palestine. » Read more

Divided over Israel, Palestinian groups call for unity ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters by Nidal al-Mughrabi - (Analysis) December 9, 2012 - 1:00am   Leaders of the feuding Palestinian factions, the Islamist group Hamas in Gaza and the secular Fatah government in the West Bank, urged reconciliation between the two former foes on Sunday despite diverging policies on Israel. » Read more

Some in Israel see acquiescence in Iron Dome missile defense system ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Washington Post by Scott Wilson - (Analysis) December 8, 2012 - 1:00am   Yakov Stern was born nearly 60 years ago in the young state of Israel, and in one way or another, he has been fighting for its survival ever since. » Read more

Anti-corruption chief: Officials in Palestine aided Rashid fraud ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency (Analysis) December 10, 2012 - 1:00am The Palestinian anti-corruption commission is readying to institute legal proceedings against Palestinian officials on suspicion of embezzling millions of dollars, the chief of the commission says. » Read more

Israeli forces detain 13 Palestinians across West Bank ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency (Analysis) December 10, 2012 - 1:00am   » Read more

Reconsider 2002 Arab peace offer to Israel, says Qatar ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Agence France Presse (AFP) (Analysis) December 10, 2012 - 1:00am   Qatar said yesterday that it was time to reconsider the Arab offer to normalise ties with Israel in return for its pullout from occupied Palestinian land. It also said the international Quartet attempting to broker peace between Israel and the Palestinians should be branded a failure. » Read more

Undercover Units Not Allowed To Operate Against Jews ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Al-Monitor by Amichai Atali - (Analysis) December 10, 2012 - 1:00am   An unprecedented resolution taken by the Israeli minister of public security, Yitzhak Aharonovitch, stipulates that from now on the undercover “Arabized” counter-terrorism units (commonly known as the Arab Platoons) will be barred from acting against Jews and are to act against Arabs only. » Read more

EU mulling ways to press Israel to ditch settlement expansion plan ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters (Analysis) December 10, 2012 - 1:00am   The European Union will look at ways on Monday to press Israel to ditch a plan to build settlements in a highly sensitive area of the occupied West Bank, but hold off on tough action soon despite international outrage over the decision. » Read more

Beyond the UN vote: New futures for Palestine and Israel ATFP World Press Roundup Article from New Jersey News by Saliba Sarsar - (Opinion) December 7, 2012 - 1:00am On Nov. 29, which marked the 65th anniversary of United Nations General Assembly Resolution 181, which called for partitioning British-mandate Palestine into independent Arab and Jewish states and a special international regime for the city of Jerusalem, the U.N. granted Palestine the status of a “nonmember observer state.” » Read more

The Full Israeli Experience ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times by Thomas L. Friedman - (Opinion) December 7, 2012 - 1:00am THESE were the main regional news headlines in The Jerusalem Post on Wednesday: “Home Front Command simulates missile strike during drill.” Egypt’s President “Morsi opts for safety as police battle protestors.” In Syria, “Fight spills over into Lebanon.” “Darkness at noon for fearful Damascus residents.” “Tunisian Islamists, leftists clash after jobs protests.” “NATO warns Syria not to use chemical weapons.” » Read more

Israel takes a harder line ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Los Angeles Times (Editorial) December 4, 2012 - 1:00am When Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas announced that he would seek recognition from the United Nations for a Palestinian state, Israel complained that Abbas should have pursued that objective in face-to-face peace negotiations and warned of grave consequences, threatening to expand » Read more

Drying out the Palestinians ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz (Editorial) December 10, 2012 - 1:00am Since the beginning of the year, Israel has destroyed 35 rainwater cisterns used by Palestinian communities, 20 of them in the area of Hebron and the southern Hebron Hills. In 2011, Israel destroyed 15 cisterns, and in the preceding 18 months, 29. In many of these cases ancient cisterns were destroyed that had served the forefathers of the inhabitants of these communities. Recently, they have been restored with European assistance. » Read more

Losing Hope on Israeli-Palestinian Peace ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New Republic by Leon Wieseltier - (Opinion) December 6, 2012 - 1:00am LOST CAUSES are not wrong causes, unless winning is the measure of right. The historical victory of an idea reveals nothing about its merit: power has uses for fictions, and the popularity of lies is an ancient feature of human affairs. » Read more

Peace moving further away ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ynetnews by Eitan Haber - (Opinion) December 9, 2012 - 1:00am There were times when the entire world would "hold its breath" before Egyptian rulers delivered their speeches, thinking they would make some earth-shattering remarks. In Israel, way before the Egyptian leaders spoke, IDF intelligence officers would hand their commanders reports containing the statements they expected the Egyptian leaders would make. The result, in most cases, was quite amusing. » Read more

1947's Zionists, Today's Palestinians ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Daily Beast by David N. Myers - (Opinion) December 7, 2012 - 1:00am Sixty-five years ago, the Zionist movement scored the greatest success in its history—recognition on November 29, 1947, by the United Nations General Assembly, of the idea of a Jewish state in Palestine. U.N. General Assembly resolution 181 called for the creation of a Jewish state alongside an Arab State, with Jerusalem as an international protectorate. It was this diplomatic act that brought the State of Israel into existence. » Read more

Israel’s List of Friends Keeps Getting Shorter ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bloomberg by Jeffrey Goldberg - (Opinion) December 3, 2012 - 1:00am When I made an appointment to see Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard last week, I hoped we would spend most of our time discussing her new effort to better integrate her country into Asia. » Read more

Israel must not dismiss outrage over settlements ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Boston Globe by James Carroll - (Opinion) December 10, 2012 - 1:00am AFTER A STORM of criticism hit Israel for the plan it announced to expand settlements in the occupied territories, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pushed back. “Israel will continue to stand for its essential interests,” he declared, “even in the face of international pressure, and there will be no change in the decision it has taken.” » Read more

Meshal Goes Out of Bounds ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The National Interest by Paul Pillar - (Opinion) December 9, 2012 - 1:00am What Hamas political leader Khaled Meshal said at a mass rally in Gaza City on Saturday was contemptible. Taken at face value, his words eradicated any distinction between Israeli and Palestinian territory, and any possibility of Israelis and Palestinians living in peace. “Palestine, from the river to the sea, from north to south, is our land,” he said. » Read more

Why Obama Will Ignore Israel ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Daily Beast by Peter Beinart - (Opinion) December 10, 2012 - 1:00am The last week of November 2012 was a big one on the Israeli-Palestinian front. On the 65th anniversary of the partition resolution that created a Jewish state, the United Nations recognized a Palestinian one. Israel retaliated with the West Bank equivalent of sequestration: announcing it would move toward building settlements in an area east of Jerusalem called E1, which many observers believe would kill the two-state solution. » Read more

Hamas is failing its responsibility to Palestinians ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The National (Editorial) December 9, 2012 - 1:00am By the time Khaled Meshaal dropped to his knees and kissed the ground in Gaza on Friday morning, the damage had already been done. Declaring himself a martyr-in-waiting, Mr Meshaal, the exiled leader of Hamas, confirmed what many already knew: violence is the group's only vision for the future. » Read more

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