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Abbas issues decree allowing gov't to be sworn in without parliamentary approval
Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas issued a decree late Saturday allowing a new emergency government to take office without parliamentary approval. A new Palestinian government comprising mainly of "independent technocrats" was to be sworn in Sunday, to replace the unity government dissolved by Abbas in the wake of the takeover of the Gaza Strip by Hamas. Abbas also declared a state of emergency. Hamas has a majority in the parliament - although the arrests by Israel of nearly half of the Hamas' lawmakers puts that majority in doubt and also makes it hard to reach a quorum.
Arab League states split over support for Abbas
Syrian sources told an Arabic language newspaper that Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas, fired by PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas of Fatah following the Hamas action in Gaza, had been democratically elected. Israel and the West have announced full support for Abbas, as have Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. During an emergency Arab League meeting Friday to discuss the events in Gaza, the three "moderate" Arab states threw their support behind Mahmoud Abbas' leadership, Syria and other states avoided expressing their full support for him.
Livni: Any international forces on Gaza borders must be prepated to fight Hamas
Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni has stated that any future international force stationed on the borders of Gaza must be willing and able to fight Hamas forces in the area. Noting the disinterest of the Israeli administration in any 'monitoring' force, Livni stated that "those who are talking in terms of international forces have to understand that the meaning is not monitoring forces but forces that are willing to fight, to confront Hamas on the ground. "At this stage, there is not even the beginning of the conditions under which a possible peacekeeping force could operate," Karel De Gucht, the Belgian Minister of Foreign Affairs, stated.
Hamas declares it will secure the release of BBC's Alan Johnston
Speaking at a press conference in the Gaza Strip on Friday morning, Abu Obeideh, spokesperson for Hamas, declared that the movement would not accept the continued detainment of the British journalist. Johnston, the only international correspondent to be permanently stationed in Gaza, was kidnapped on March 12, by a previouisly unknown group calling themselves 'Jaish al-Islam'. While Palestinian officials have indicated that they know where Johnston is being held, the British government have asked that they refrain from mounting a rescue attempt in the fear that the journalist may be killed in such an operation.
Israeli army kills two Palestinian suspects in separate West Bank operations
The IDF is continuing its campaigns to capture activists affiliated with all the terror organizations operating in the West Bank, irrespective of the civil war in the Gaza Strip. Nahal Brigade reconnaissance forces in Qalqilyah shot and killed an armed Palestinian who was found to be in possession of a pistol and an M-16 rifle. He was identified as an arms dealer associated with Fatah. In the village of Saida, north of Tul Karm, soldiers from an undercover unit shot and killed an unarmed Palestinian. The IDF announced that no worshipers would be permitted to visit Joseph's Tomb tomorrow night and Sunday, when Bratslav Hasidim are planning a mass convergence on the area. The army cited warnings of planned terror attacks to support its ban.
Egypt deploys troops on its borders with Gaza
Egyptian media sources reported on Saturday that the Egyptian army deployed scores of troops on the borders with the Gaza strip in order to stop any attempts to cross the borders by the Palestinians. In addition due to the state of infighting in Gaza, the Rafah crossing the only crossing in and out of Gaza was closed, leaving thousands of Palestinians stranded in the Egyptian side of the borders, Egyptian officials reported. Sources at the Rafah border from the Egyptian side said that Palestinians stuck there want to come back to the Gaza strip regardless of the situation in Gaza, the sources also warned of a humanitarian crisis there.
Israeli settler kills Palestinian civilian near Nablus
An Israeli settler rammed with his vehicle Palestinian civilian and killed him at a street south of the northern West Bank city of Nablus on Friday night. The resident was identified as Bassam Amirah, 46. Palestinian sources in Nablus stated that cases of settlers hitting Palestinian civilians with cars has significantly increased in the past few years around the city of Nablus.
Israeli settlers attack a civilian near Hebron
A group of Israeli settlers from the illegal settlement of Kirat Arba located east of the southern West Bank city of Hebron attacked and injured a Palestinians civilian from the city on Saturday. Suleiman Abu Si'efan, 32 sustained moderate wounds due to the attack, Palestinian sources reported. Witnesses said that the settlers attacked the man in front of a group of Israeli soldiers who did nothing to stop the attack. Moreover security guards of the settlement attacked a greenhouse owned by a Palestinian farmer located near the settlement, the guards threatened the farmers that the greenhouse is to be removed or the army will destroy it in one week.
Twilight Zone / Now you are paralyzed, as we promised – by Gideon Levy
"We have to make you do a little sports," the Shin Bet interrogator said, launching four successive days of questioning accompanied by brutal physical torture. The result: Luwaii Ashqar can no longer stand on his feet. He sits in his wheelchair. His smile is captivating, his Hebrew rich and incisive. He is a young man whose world fell apart. He entered prison sound of body and mind and emerged a broken man. "They told me that five witnesses had testified that Luwaii had transported a wanted man. I told them that there was a famous wanted man named Luwaii Sadi, but my name is Luwaii Sati, and maybe they had mixed us up. He said to me: 'Are you saying the Shin Bet is that stupid?'
Fateh gunmen kill an unaffiliated youth in Nablus
Palestinian sources in Nablus reported on Saturday at night that Fateh gunmen shot and killed a Palestinian youth in Al Duwwar area, in the city. The sources stated that the youth Hani Al Srouji, 19, was shot after the gunmen shouted at him to stop but he didn't hear them. The gunmen apparently thought that he was trying to escape from them and opened fire at them. He was hit by two rounds of live ammunition in his head. It is worth mentioning that the slain youth, not a member of any faction, suffered limited mental abilities.
Mashaal: "Hamas does not want to seize power; Abbas is the elected president"
He also vowed that Hamas "would help rebuild the houses and institutions damaged in the deadly months of infighting between Fateh and Hamas gunmen". He added that what happened in Gaza came as a result of the lack of security, and that this situation led "to explosion in the crisis". Mashal also stated that Abbas has legitimacy as the elected Palestinian president, and that Hamas would co-operate with him in order to preserve the national interests.
Hundreds flee Gaza amid spillover fears
Hundreds of Fatah supporters fled the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip by land and sea on Saturday and the Islamist group threatened to take its fight against Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's forces to the West Bank. Abbas, who leads the secular Fatah faction, is set to swear in an emergency government on Sunday at 1pm that will bring an end to a US-led aid embargo. Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri said 150 Hamas supporters were "abducted" in the occupied West Bank in what he called acts of "real terrorism" by Fatah forces there. Hamas said it did not seek its own state in Gaza, where 1.5 million people are crowded along 40 km of coast. An Israeli army spokeswoman said Israel had allowed people to leave Gaza for the West Bank on a case-by-case basis but the border was later closed.
Israel eventually to allow food, aid supplies into Gaza Strip
Public Security Minister Avi Dichter said a Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip should be treated as a terror entity and cut off its weapons supply. He said that could require Israel to deploy along Gaza's border with Egypt to halt weapons smuggling. The United States plans to lift a ban on direct aid to the emergency government that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is forming. In the wake of the Hamas takeover of the Gaza Strip, the United States said Thursday that the Bush administration will now work to prevent the violence from spilling over to the West Bank. To achieve that, Israel may be urged to make concessions in the West Bank, since the United States aims to accelerate the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations to allow Abbas to chalk up some political achievements.
U.S. plans end to embargo once Hamas is out of the government
Mahmoud Abbas got a major boost in his increasingly bellicose showdown with Hamas on Saturday, with a U.S. diplomat saying he expects a crippling embargo to be lifted once the Palestinian president appoints a government without the Islamic militants. The new Cabinet is to be sworn in Sunday in the West Bank, where Fatah forces stormed government offices on Saturday. But the money is unlikely to reach Gaza, now controlled by Hamas and cut off from the world. Senior officials of Abbas' Fatah movement, who had fled Gaza, started reaching the West Bank . The head of Palestine TV said he had crawled for several hundred yards to evade gunfire at the Gaza-Israel crossing before making it to safety. (more on events in Gaza)
U.S., Israel map Palestinian approach (AP)
Bush and Olmert, who arrives Sunday in the United States for a three-day visit, will discuss an aid package to Abbas that will include lifting the embargo, financial assistance and weapons, Israel's Channel 10 TV reported Saturday. The report, which did not cite its sources, said Bush will ask Olmert to make other concessions such as dismantling roadblocks in the West Bank. Less clear, however, is how the United States and Israel will deal with the new rulers of Gaza. So far, Israeli officials have rebuffed calls from the right to reoccupy the Gaza Strip now that Iranian-backed extremists are in charge. At the same time, Israel says it will allow food and other basic supplies to avoid a humanitarian disaster. Still, with Hamas on the other side of the Israeli-Gaza border, it's not clear how the two sides will coordinate the passage of goods and people. In the past, Israel dealt only with Fatah personnel at the borders.
Olmert to tell Bush: We need to separate Gaza Strip, West Bank
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is planning to tell United States President George Bush at their meeting at the White House next Tuesday that there is an urgent need to view the West Bank and the Gaza Strip as separate entities and prevent contact between them, political sources in Jerusalem said Thursday.
Olmert: We will talk to Palestinian government sans Hamas
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said on Saturday night that Israel would consider a Palestinian government operating without Hamas as a legitimate political partner for future talks. "A situation that hasn't existed for a long time has been created over the course of the past few days in the changing landscape of the Palestinian Authority. We intend to work very hard to use this opportunity. The situation allows for new opportunities. A Palestinian government without Hamas can be a partner."
Awaking to a different Gaza – Philip Rizk in Gaza City
Last night [14 June], my host Isa told me military coups were the sort of thing he heard and read about, he never thought he would experience one. Yesterday Gazans did. With the electricity cut and cell phones working only rarely people clung to the radio to hear as the latest news unfolded. With only one local station in Gaza and only one perspective to be heard rumors abounded. One of the Fatah military compounds freed on Friday was the location of prisons and torture halls where many Hamas members had been tortured over the years for their opposition to the Fatah government. The Hamas celebration at taking it over was only logical. Generally people are very concerned about what the near future holds. The streets seem rather secure, but anyone that was at all in opposition to Hamas is scared, most are staying home or are in hiding somewhere. Cars are moving about, people are walking the streets. The combination of normalcy of life and fear of the unknown of the future makes for a strange atmosphere.
Arafat's Gaza home looted; Fatah militants seize Hamas-owned building in West Bank
For a second day in a row, Hamas fighters raided the homes of security personnel across Gaza, confiscating weapons as they consolidated their victory after a week of bloody street battles, witnesses said. Witnesses said looters ransacked Arafat's Gaza home, making off with the late president's personal belongings. "I saw armed people entering inside, stealing Arafat's things and burning one of the bedrooms," said one witness. In the West Bank , fighters loosely linked to the Fatah party of Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas ransacked dozens of offices linked to the rival Hamas movement on Saturday, in apparent revenge attacks after the Islamists seized power in the Gaza Strip. Members of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades destroyed offices at an Islamic school, a cultural centre, charities, local television and local radio in the city of Nablus, witnesses and Hamas said.
Hamas bans masks for gunmen
In their first order since seizing control of the Gaza Strip, Hamas Islamists banned gunmen from wearing masks - unless they are shooting at Israel. The masks have become commonplace in the Gaza Strip during weeks of factional fighting between the ruling Hamas movement and President Mahmoud Abbas's secular Fatah faction. Both sides wore the masks to hide their identities.
Report: bodies of 7 Hamas militants found in Fatah security building in Gaza
The bodies of seven Hamas members were found Saturday in the basement of the preventive security service headquarters, a Fatah stronghold captured Thursday, and the bullet-riddled corpse of a Fatah field commander turned up in southern Gaza. Two Fatah loyalists were killed Saturday, in what Fatah alleged were revenge killings. More than 100 people were killed in a week of clashes. [end]
Robert Fisk: Welcome to 'Palestine'
First, we demand that the Palestinians embrace democracy and then they elect the wrong party - Hamas - and then Hamas wins a mini-civil war and presides over the Gaza Strip. And we Westerners still want to negotiate with the discredited President, Mahmoud Abbas. All over the Middle East, it is the same. We love Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, whose torturers have not yet finished with the Muslim Brotherhood politicians recently arrested outside Cairo. Yes, and we love King Abdullah's unconstitutional monarchy in Jordan, and all the princes and emirs of the Gulf, especially those who are paid such vast bribes by our arms companies that even Scotland Yard has to close down its investigations on the orders of our prime minister. Those pesky Middle Easterners vote for the wrong people, support the wrong people, love the wrong people, don't behave like us civilised Westerners. So what will we do? How do we deal with a coup d'état by an elected government?
'Hamas coup is a serious blow'
Hamas carried out "a de facto coup d'etat" against the democratically elected government in Gaza which is a serious blow to the creation of a Palestinian state and has implications for the entire Middle East, the former UN Mideast envoy said. Terje Roed-Larsen, now the president of the International Peace Academy and a UN envoy for Lebanon-Syria issues, called the Hamas takeover of the Gaza Strip 'a defining moment in the history of the Middle East and the history of Middle East conflicts."
Hamas victory could be an opportunity for Israel
While no one would celebrate the official presence of a Hamastan a few kilometers from Sderot, the new situation would nevertheless provide opportunities. The de facto division between Gaza and the West Bank would allow Israel to maintain its boycott of Hamas in Gaza while utilizing the emergence of a political partner in the West Bank for the first time in many years. In this context, Israel should consider strengthening Abbas by transferring funds, renewing free movement for trade and lifting constraints on cooperation with Fatah members. For its part, Hamas may find that its victory over Fatah is only the beginning of its problems. The group will need to deal with a hostile international community, tension with Egypt, internal ideological divisions and provision of services to Gaza's civilian population.
Inside the Hamas revolution
Last week's short but brutal civil war in Gaza had many causes, but not least among them was the bitter personal feud between local Hamas leaders and Fatah's Gaza strongman, Mohammed Dahlan. This dates back to the mid-1990s when the late Yasser Arafat, then chairman of the newly created Palestinian Authority, responded to a wave of Hamas terrorist attacks in Israel by ordering his security forces to round up hundreds of leaders of the Islamic fundamentalist movement. To humiliate his devout Muslim captives Dahlan forcibly shaved their beards and many - including several who later became ministers - say they were tortured in Dahlan's cells. Dahlan has long been regarded by many Palestinians - not only in Hamas - as close to the US and Israel . In recent months the US with Israeli support began training, funding and equipping a new "presidential guard" force under Dahlan's command with the stated aim of using it to combat Hamas in the Gaza Strip. . . Hamas cannot hope to repeat its armed uprising against Fatah in West Bank cities where the IDF operates on a nightly basis. Israel's policy - if not its official rhetoric - has long sought to divide the West Bank from Gaza and to avoid being forced into a final peace settlement with the Palestinians.
Hamas seizes PA security files, says Israeli tactics exposed
After overtaking the Palestinian Authority's Preventive Security headquarters in Gaza City on Thursday afternoon, Hamas fighters report they have seized tens of thousands of highly valuable intelligence documents, including correspondence between the PA and others, including the CIA, regarding security issues. A Hamas member told Ynet that he and his men removed thousands of documents, video tapes and other equipment from the compound..... "If we release these documents, the entire world will be shocked, not just the Palestinians." The Hamas man said that the documents also implicate several Arab nations of involvement in the internal Palestinian power-struggle in an attempt to impair Hamas. According to the Hamas source the papers also document the PA's cooperation with the American CIA against Palestinian organizations, especially Hamas......
Hamas offers amnesty
On its first day in full control in Gaza, Hamas on Friday both mocked and reached out to its defeated Fatah rivals, offering them amnesty but also rifling through President Mahmoud Abbas' bedroom, stripping a former Gaza strongman's home down to the flowerpots and throwing a Fatah gunman off a rooftop. Abbas moved quickly to cement his rule in the West Bank, replacing the Hamas prime minister, Ismail Haniyeh, with Finance Minister Salam Fayyad. He initially said a new government would be sworn in later in the day, then postponed the event without explanation. Hamas, overwhelmingly elected in a 2006 parliament vote, denounced Abbas' decisions as a coup. Hamas' supreme leader, Syrian-based Khaled Mashaal, later said Abbas had legitimacy as an elected president and promised to cooperate, but warned Fatah against going after Hamas supporters in the West Bank. Ahmed Abdel Rahman, an Abbas adviser, rejected Meshaal's gesture. "There will be no dialogue with coup seekers, masked men and murderers" he said.
Oslo's baleful legacy – by Nimer Sultany
The Oslo endless-fruitless-negotiations peace process has created an ambiguous situation: the Palestinians are caught somewhere between state-building and liberation struggle without being or having either. As a result they bear the responsibilities of freedom without actually enjoying freedom. The world looks at them as if they were in a postcolonial stage while the colonialists are still around. Additionally, the Oslo process has transformed the Palestinian revolutionary project into a corrupted comprador class that enjoys some benefits from the occupier. The victory of Hamas in the elections has caught this comprador class by surprise. Since then, the Fatah movement has refused to acknowledge its defeat. Hamas had refrained for more than two years prior to its elections from suicide attacks and has decided to participate in the electoral process created by Oslo.
U.S. policy and the situation in Gaza – by Amjad Atallah
When Hamas won the January 2006 elections, their plan was based on an understanding that the Israeli government wasn't actually interested in a two-state solution (despite rhetoric to the contrary), but was, in fact, most interested in security. They believed this desire could lead to the establishment of a hudna or long-term ceasefire that would give Israel what it needed, while Hamas would not have to sign off on anything that might compromise Palestinian rights. They didn't realize that the Israeli government would in fact choose insecurity over security, insecurity over a deal with Hamas. They didn't realize, further, that the US Administration's plan would involve falling back on old habits, leading an international economic boycott of Hamas and supporting and funding Fatah much in the same way it once funded the Nicaraguan Contras, in an effort to oppose the democratically elected government.
Crocodile Tears – by Uri Avnery
WHAT HAPPENS when one and a half million human beings are imprisoned in a tiny, arid territory, cut off from their compatriots and from any contact with the outside world, starved by an economic blockade and unable to feed their families? Some months ago, I described this situation as a sociological experiment set up by Israel, the United States and the European Union. The population of the Gaza Strip as guinea pigs. This week, the experiment showed results . . . Successive Israeli governments have destroyed Fatah systematically, cut off the feet of Abbas and prepared the way for Hamas. They can't pretend to be surprised.
Gush Shalom press release: Israel not without blame – by Adam Keller
Gush Shalom, the Israeli Peace Bloc, demands of the government to reopen immediately the border crossings to the Gaza strip, which are its vital lifeline . . . The government of Israel has engaged in open and blunt efforts to foment civil war among the Palestinians. Ministers and senior military officers repeatedly spoke of sending arms to Muhammad Dahlan and his troops, presenting them to their people as despicable collaborators.
Well, the conspiracy is unfolding before your eyes now.
It is unfolding in Iraq, Somalia, Lebanon, Palestine, and Afghanistan. Do you really need more evidence of a US-Saudi-Israeli conspiracy in the Middle East region? You look at Palestine and you see a reference to a Palestinian "civil war" as it is being called. People used to say that in Palestine it is very unlikely to have a Palestine civil war because the Palestinians have harbored a strong aversion to internecine battles and strife. But that is not true: collaborationist Palestinians have been killing other Palestinians, and dragging other factions into civil war, since at least the 1936-39 Palestinian revolt. The collaborationists were then represented by the Nashashibis and the Hashemites of Jordan.
Bradley Burston: 13 reasons why there is no Palestine
Two ships of state are headed directly toward each other at an average rate of 75 deaths per month. The first ship, which we will call I., has many captains and no rudder. It is slowly but inexorably sinking from the corrosive effects of corruption, callousness and exhaustion. The second ship, which we will call P., is sinking at a somewhat faster rate, its hull breaking in two, its crew in mutiny against itself. Vessel P. is unable to feed its passengers, unable to alter its fate. For your matriculation, answer the following, showing your work: What is the probability that both ships will sink before they next have a chance to collide? . . . Reason #6: Because the policies of both sides play directly into the hands of extremists on the other. Hamas is Hamas because of Israel. And no group in the Holy Land has done more to bolster the Israeli far right than Hamas.
The Case for Norman Finkelstein
the announcement of Finkelstein's tenure denial has spawned a national discussion. Academics everywhere have been forced to ponder the implications for the future of academic freedom in the United States, especially those who dare to criticise US and Israeli policy in the Middle East. Finkelstein, the son of Holocaust survivors, has been relentless in exposing what he calls "The Holocaust Industry": the institutions and organizations that have used the holocaust (the actual historical event) to justify Israel's criminal assault upon the Palestinian population and international law.
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