Wednesday, August 8

Today in Palestine! ~ Headlines August 8, 2007 ~

Brought to you by
Shadi Fadda

Israel: Villagers face evacuation orders, movement restrictions

AL-HADIDIYA, 8 August 2007 (IRIN) - Palestinian residents of al-Hadidiya village in Jordan Valley (in the West Bank), live without electricity or running water and most importantly, they say, face demolition and evacuation orders.


Strengthening resilience: Food insecurity and local responses to fragmentation of
The Palestinian economy in the West Bank and Gaza Strip (WBGS) has sustained significant losses as a result of Israeli measures taken in the aftermath of the outbreak of the second Intifada in September 2000. These losses were primarily driven by the closure regime, the construction of the Barrier, and, recently, the international economic and political boycott of the PA. Israeli measures on the ground are de facto fragmenting the West Bank, while access to the Gaza Strip is severely restricted. Further, the international boycott of the PA and Israel's withholding of PA tax revenue have disempowered Palestinian institutions, undermined services, and allowed important infrastructure to decay. As a result, key food security determinants—such as wage labour, food trade and social security schemes—are under severe threat, and dramatic change is being observed in some areas.


Army is expanding Huwwara detention facility near Nablus
The Nafha Society for Defending the Rights of the Detainees and Human Rights reported on Tuesday that the Israeli army is currently expanding the Huwwara detention facility near the northern West Bank city of Nablus due to the increasing number of kidnappings carried by the army during the daily invasions and attacks in the West Bank and especially in Nablus area.


Hebron store owner: Eviction was a façade
Owner of one of stores in city's wholesale market invaded by Jewish families tells Ynet evacuation will not change a thing: 'Everything that took place there was mainly meant for the cameras, but there were no clashes. The army and the settlers have the same goal'.


Four Palestinians kidnapped and two Israeli soldiers injured in the W.B city of Nablus
A massive Israeli force invaded the northern West Bank city of Nablus and the nearby Balata and Asker refugee camps, on Wednesday morning, searching homes and kidnapping
four Palestinians.


Palestinian militants explode bomb at Hamas compound
GAZA, Aug 7 (Reuters) - Palestinian militants exploded a bomb outside a major security compound occupied by Hamas forces in Gaza on Tuesday, the first such attack on the Islamic group since it seized the coastal strip in June, officials said. No one was injured in the blast, security sources said.


Photostory: The Apartheid Wall
Four hundred kilometers and counting -- for Jewish Israel the West Bank barrier represents a longed-for separation from Palestinians, couched in the comfortable narrative of security. But as its varied malign effects on Palestinian society become clear, the barrier along its chosen route is becoming an icon of dispossession, opportunism and brutality, exposing Israel's willingness for Palestinians to pay the price for its own security and prosperity as an ugly choice.


Detainees in Azion detention facility facing solitary and abuse
The Palestinian Prisoners Society (PPS) reported on Tuesday that Palestinian detainees held in the Azion Israeli detention and interrogation facility, in Azion settlement bloc west of Bethlehem, are facing abuse, torture, and that their conditions are gradually declining.


Two Palestinians Shot Dead In Gaza, As Abbas Rejects Talks With Hamas
On a day Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas rejected holding talks with the militant group Hamas, the Israeli military has shot dead two Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip, an area under the control of Hamas, a statement by their armed wing said on Wednesday.


Israeli Shell Kills Two Children In Gaza blast
Two Palestinian children were killed in the northern Gaza Strip on Tuesday after an Israeli shell they were playing with exploded, witnesses and medics said.


Abbas meets with Mubarak, describes Hamas takeover as destructive
Palestinian President Mahmoud on Wednesday branded Hamas' seizure of the Gaza Strip as damaging to the dream of a future Palestinian state and reiterated his refusal to launch negotiations with the group.


Francis Boyle: Destroying Democracy in Palestine
When the Palestinians democratically elected a government that the Neo-Conservatives in the Bush Jr. administration and their Kadima/Likudnik confederates in Israel did not prefer, they jointly did everything humanly possible to destroy it.


Yousef: "Hamas and Fateh and holding secret talks"
Dr. Ahmad Yousef, the advisor of Ismail Haniyya who is still acting as a prime minister of the displaced government in Gaza, stated that there are secret talks taking place between Fateh and Hamas with the participation of political figures from other factions and independent figures, in order to end the crisis between Hamas and Fateh and resume comprehensive national talks.


A Sort of Peace in Gaza
GAZA CITY - On Patrol in Shijaiyah, the toughest neighborhood in Gaza City, Lieut. Naim Ashraf Mushtaha, 31, an officer of the Hamas Executive Force, spots a man in civilian clothes carrying an M-16 assault rifle and walking through the street suqs in broad daylight. His officers quickly encircle the suspect and demand that he identify himself and turn over the weapon. The man turns out to be a member of one of the neighborhood's most powerful clans, and he refuses to give up his gun. "What's my name, boys?" he shouts to the gathering crowd of curious onlookers. "Mohassi Abbas!" they shout back. "See, everyone knows who I am," says the gunman. "I don't care who you are," says Mushtaha calmly, without raising his voice or his weapon. "No one is above the law."


The Israeli municipality of Jerusalem demolishes a Palestinian home
The Israeli Jerusalem municipality and police demolished a Palestinian home located in the Wadi Al Joze neighborhood in Jerusalem on Wednesday. The house, which was under construction, belonged to Abdullah Al Jabi. The municipality said that the house was built without documents, documents that have never been issued to those Palestinians living in the occupied city since 1967.


The Hebron tactic
For about 25 minutes, they behaved liked lords of the land: One man, followed later by a young guy, descended from Mitzpeh Yair, one of the unauthorized outposts in the southern Mt. Hebron area, and prevented a United Nations jeep from traveling. UN directives prohibit leaving the vehicle in such cases, in order to avoid an escalation of friction. And so we, three Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) staffers and two Haaretz journalists, were forced to watch them demonstrate their lordliness from inside the car: The older one blocked the vehicle, in the middle of the unpaved road, with his body. Using hand movements, he ordered the engine shut down. When that didn't happen, he jumped on the hood and then on the roof and back on the hood, and finally lay back on the windshield and played with the wipers, taking them apart. The driver progressed slowly down the track, and the man leaned back on the windshield with force, until it broke and shards went into the driver's eyes.


Preventing a Bloodbath in Gaza
The belligerent Bush Jr. administration's policies against the state of Palestine in order to depose its democratically- elected government by organizing an internal coup d'état in Gaza by means of Palestinian surrogates under the command of General Mohamed Dahlan provide yet another compelling reason why it is too dangerous for world peace to keep these Neo-Conservatives in power until January 2009. If there had ever been any doubt about it, the Bush Jr. administration's aggression against Palestine 's democratically-elected government proved that their alleged program of "democratization" for the Arab and Muslim world was a joke and a fraud to begin with. To be sure, Article 21(3) of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which constitutes customary international law, expressly provides...


Abbas' gov't inadvertently pays salaries to outlawed Hamas militia
The government of Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas inadvertently paid one month's salary to 3,500 members of the Hamas militia he outlawed, Finance Ministry officials said Wednesday.


Palestinians Fete School Exam Scores
RAMALLAH, West Bank - The cell phone network collapsed under the load of frantic calls Tuesday, newspapers printed special editions and the streets reverberated with the boom of gunfire.


PLO appoints new commanders in Beirut, Sidon
The Palestinian Liberation Organization in Lebanon appointed Colonel Khaled Aref its former representative in South Lebanon, a commander in Beirut and Mounir Maqdah, the military commander of Fatah, its representative in Sidon. Sources close to the PLO said these new appointments come as part of the Palestinians efforts to reorganize their ranks. Aref and Maqdah will be responsible for refugee camps in Beirut and South Lebanon, respectively.


The Attempted Murder of Palestine
"Coup" is the word being widely used to describe what happened in Gaza in June when Hamas militias defeated the armed security forces of Fatah and chased them out of Gaza. But, as so often with the manipulative language used in the conflict between the Palestinians and Israel, the terminology here is backward. Hamas was the legally constituted, democratically elected government of the Palestinians, so in the first place Hamas did not stage a coup but rather was the target of a coup planned against it. Furthermore, the coup -- which failed in Gaza but succeeded overall when Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, acting in violation of Palestinian law, cut Gaza adrift, unseated the Palestinian unity government headed by Hamas, and named a new prime minister and cabinet -- was the handiwork of the United States and Israel.


Hamas chief says outside forces block reconciliation
Exiled Hamas supremo Khaled Meshaal on Wednesday accused outside forces of trying to block reconciliation between his Islamist movement and Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas's secular Fatah party.


Not Only Territory, But Viability--The Catch in Israel's "Generous Offers" at Jericho
On paper, the headlines sound promising, even stirring. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas at their meeting in Jericho that he would push for the establishment of a Palestinian state as "fast as possible" on "the equivalent to 100 percent of the territories conquered in 1967." The Palestinians, according to the report, would cede just 5% of the West Bank in return for territorial swaps. In other words, Israel would withdraw from 95.6 % of the combined West Bank and Gaza -- although whether Olmert includes East Jerusalem in this calculation is unknown.


Bush Officials May Face New Subpoenas
High-profile Bush administration officials could be called to the witness stand if two deposed pro-Israel lobbyists have their way in a court case that is moving toward a January 2008 trial date.

 
Iraqi Security Developments--Locals Say 36 Headless Bodies Found in District Controlled by U.S.-Backed Sunnis
Iraqis reported killed (Monday and Tuesday): 229. Iraqis reported wounded: 150. U.S. troops reported killed (Saturday to Monday): 9. U.S. troops reported wounded: 3. British troops reported killed: 1.


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1 comment:

  1. I hate what Israel has done to Palestine and the people. It is a disgrace that the United Nations lets Israel get away with it.


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