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weekly report 16 - 22 Jan 2008
Occupied Palestinian Territories
: Gaza Emergency Appeal
Israeli air force attacks Gaza
Israel's air force attacked a senior
Palestinian militant as he drove through
the northern Gaza Strip on Monday,
wounding him and several others, a
source in the ruling Hamas faction said.
Two leaders of al Quds Brigades
assassinated in special Israeli
operation in Qabatiya
Israeli forces assassinated two leaders and injured
one of the al Quds brigades, the armed wing of the
Islamic Jihad, in a special Israeli operation in the
Qabatiya town, south of Jenin in the early hours
of Monday morning.
A Palestinian dies of heart attack
on one of Israeli checkpoints
On Sunday a Palestinian worker and a resident
of Deir Ammar refugee camp, west of Ramallah
city died of heart attack while waiting in line for
a long time at an Israeli military checkpoint,
near Na'leen town, trying to reach his work in Israel.
Israel has first suicide
boming in a year
A pair of Gaza Strip suicide bombers snuck
unto southern Israel where one blew himself up
Monday morning in an outdoor shopping area,
killing a shopper and injuring at least seven others,
according to police and Palestinian militants.
Abbas condemns Palestinian
bombing in Israel
President Mahmoud Abbas condemned a Palestinian
suicide bombing in the Israeli town of Dimona on
Monday but also levelled censure at an earlier
military raid by Israel in the occupied West Bank.
"The Palestinian Authority expresses its full
condemnation of the Israeli military operation
this dawn in (the Palestinian village of) Qabatia
just as it condemns the operation that took place
today in Dimona," a statement from Abbas's office said.
Fatah militant, PFLP claim
Dimona bombing - source
An armed wing of Palestinian President Mahmoud
Abbas's Fatah faction carried out a bombing in
southern Israel on Monday along with another
militant group, a Fatah source said.
Israeli army kills a Palestinian
resistance leader in Gaza
Palestinian sources reported that Israeli
jet fighters fired several missiles at Palestinian
car in the northern Gaza Strip town of Beit
lahiya on Monday afternoon, one killed and two
injured in the attack.
Egyptian forces trade fire
with Palestinians at border
Masked Palestinian gunmen and Egyptian
forces exchanged fire on Monday at Gaza's border
with Egypt, a day after Cairo closed the breached
frontier, witnesses said.
Prison Administration denies medical
treatment for a seriously ill detainee
Family of detainee Zeidan Mohammad Zeidan, 22,
from the northern West Bank city of Jenin, voiced
an appeal to save the life of their detained son as
he is seriously ill while the Israeli Prison
Administration (IPA) refuses to provide him with the
needed medical treatment.
The Israeli army kidnaps four
civilians from Hebron area
The Israeli army kidnapped four Palestinian
civilians from the southern West Bank city of
Hebron and nearby village on Monday during
pre dawn invasions.
Israeli forces arrest PFLP member at
checkpoint near Nablus
Nablus – Ma'an – Israeli forces arrested a Palestinian
affiliated to the Popular Front for the Liberation of
Palestine (PFLP) at the Beit Furik checkpoint
east of the city of Nablus in the northern
West Bank on Sunday.
Hamas sources: Palestinian security
forces arrests 9 members of the
movement from the West Bank
Hamas sources reported that Palestinian security
forces, affiliated to Palestinian President
Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah movement arrested nine
Hamas members on Sunday from several
parts of the West Bank.
Palestinians say settlers
uprooted 200 olive trees
West Bank villagers claim residents of
neighboring outpost uprooted some 200 of their
olive trees during the night; settlers
reject accusation.
Israel to demolish three
Palestinian houses near Tulkarem
Tulkarem – Ma'an – Israeli forces will demolish
three houses in the West Bank village of Far'un,
near Tulkarem, on Sunday. Israeli Authorities
have inhabitants of until Sunday to quit the area,
the head of the town's municipal council,
Abdul-Kareem Omar, said.
Palestinian official: Israel threatens
more restrictions on Gaza fuel
Palestinian official warned on Monday that
Israel threatens to reduce deliveries of Gaza
power station's fuel and to diminish electricity
amounts of electricity which provides to Gaza
via cables next week. Every week, the only power
plant in Gaza needs 3.5 million liters of industrial
diesel to run. Nowadays, Israel allows 2.2
million liters into the station and threatens to
reduce this amount from February the 8th, said
Mahmoud al-Khozendar, deputy director
of Gaza petrol station owners' union.
Two Israeli soldiers expose their rear
ends to Palestinian farmers in Hebron
A footage, taken by a foreign peace activist near the
West Bank city of Hebron, showed two Israeli soldiers,
undressing their pants, exposing their rear ends to
some local Palestinian farmers.
Israel to maintain a state of alert
on Egypt-Israel border lines
Israeli military decided Saturday to maintain a
high security alert on Egypt-Gaza border line, in light of
continued security warnings, Israeli media sources reported.
Egypt: Hamas, Fatah should control
Gaza border together
Cairo wants Hamas and Fatah to jointly operate the
border crossing between Gaza and Egypt, a
spokesman for Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak
said Sunday. Meanwhile, the border was closed
Sunday by mutual agreement of Egypt and Hamas,
12 days after the Islamic organization blew up
the wall that sealed it.
Failure of negotiations to supply Israel
with natural gas from the first Palestinian field
A new-old dispute has emerged to the surface at the
height of the Israeli siege of the Palestinian people in
Gaza. The parties to the dispute are Israel and British
Gas (BG) which owns drilling rights in Palestinian
wasters opposite the coast of Gaza in partnership
with Consolidated Contractors Company (CCC)
and the Palestinian Investment Fund. The "Gaza Marine-1"
field was discovered by BG in September 2000.
The interior diaspora
A just settlement of the Middle East conflict will
have to consider the voices of Palestinians
living inside Israel.
US plans to settle Palestinians in Lebanon
The US is preparing a plan to settle the Palestinian
refugees permanently in Lebanon in return for writing
off 30% of its foreign debts. According to the Al-Nahar
daily, certain US political circles have prepared a plan by
which Palestinians are required to recognize Israel's Jewish identity.
As per the plan, Israel will deny the Palestinian refugees
their right of return to their homes in the occupied territories,
Press TV's Beirut bureau reports.
Egypt rejected an American-Israeli
proposal to re-settle 800,000 Palestinians in Sinai
According to almesryoon news, Egypt
rejected an Israeli-American proposal to resettle
800,000 Palestinian in Sinai. Sources told the
newspaper that Egypt informed Israel its rejection to
any re-settlement projects of the Palestinians in the
Egypt saying that the refugees' right to return to their
homeland is decided by the United Nations.
JNF to erect signs in parks, citing
destroyed Palestinian villages
During the War of Independence in 1948, some 500
Palestinian villages in the young State of Israel were
destroyed. Many residents fled their homes out of fear
of the Israel Defense Forces and other Jewish
elements active in the area; others were actively
expelled from their villages. Today, only a few of these
destroyed villages are publicly mentioned in
connection with their original locations.
Brothers jailed for plan to set fire
to cars during Gaza pullout
The Tel Aviv District Court sentenced Mordechai
Levinstein to 40 months in jail and his brother,
Elitzur Levinstein, to 30 months in jail for planning
to disrupt traffic on a major highway by setting
cars on fire to protest the 2005 disengagement
from the Gaza Strip. The plan to block traffic on
Ayalon Highway failed due to technical reasons.
IDF commander gets 15 months in
prison for W. Bank rampage
Gigi and five of his soldiers hijacked a Palestinian
taxi last July in the West Bank village of Dahariya,
near Hebron. They then shot an innocent passerby
and left him there, even though he was severely
wounded in the neck.
New letter from Shalet, the captured Israeli
soldier in Gaza, Olmert: a deal on the way
Israeli media sources reported on Monday
that a new letter from Gil'ad Shalit the captured
Israeli soldier in the Gaza strip has reached his family.
Tekoa rabbi drafts Israel-Gaza cease
-fire agreement, deal for Shalit
Israelis and Palestinians involved in interfaith
contacts recently drafted a cease-fire agreement
between Israel and Hamas. The document, whose
implementation includes the release of abducted
Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, was submitted to the
cabinet and to the Hamas government in the Gaza Strip.
Middle East: Hamas leader outlines
conditions for peace and offers truce
Damascus, Syria, 1 Feb. (AKI) - Hamas leader
in exile Khaled Meshal has outlined a series of
conditions for peace with Israel, and talks about the
health of abducted Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit in an
interview with Italian weekly journal Panorama.
Despair as Gazans lose link to outside world
Seventy-year-old Naim Ahjazi needs just a half-hour --
45 minutes at most -- to run across the border to
Egypt and pick up the desperately-needed farm
supplies that he paid for last week. But the Hamas
gunmen standing guard at the frontier are not moved --
after nearly two weeks of unfettered access between
Gaza and Egypt, the border is shut again.
A Prison State,
Life in Occupied Gaza
Life in occupied Gaza was never easy, but conditions
worsened markedly after Hamas' surprise January 2006
electoral victory. Israel refused recognition along with
the US and the West. All outside aid was cut off, an
economic embargo and sanctions were imposed, and
the legitimate government was isolated. Stepped up
repression followed along with repeated IDF incursions,
attacks and arrests. Gaza's people have been imprisoned
in their own land and traumatized for months. No one
outside the Territories cares or offers enough aid.
Things then got worse.
Zakarnah: W.B government workers will strike
Tuesday and Wednesday
The Palestinian governmental workers union announced
on Monday that all public service employees in the West
Bank will go on strike on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Hamas explodes a giant hole
in Egypt's political cover
You'd almost think the leaders of Hamas had
hired a brilliant political consultant before they blew
down the Egyptian-border fence 10 days ago. Hamas
didn't just bulldoze the border wall. The extremist group's
leaders also laid bare the hollow nature of Israel's
collective-punishment policy, openly supported by the United
States - and the hypocrisy of Egypt's historic support of the
Palestinian cause. At the same time, they shored up
their own support among Gaza's 1.5 million restive residents.
Shavei Shomron man charged with
selling weapons to Palestinians
A 50-year-old resident of the West Bank settlement
of Shavei Shomron was charged Sunday in Tel Aviv
District Court with weapons trafficking and theft for
selling arms to Palestinians, Army Radio reported.
The man allegedly sold Palestinians four Israel
Defense Forces-issue M-16 assault rifles, as well
as a combat vest and ammunition clips.
PNN: Bilin honors the Spirit of the late
George Habash and calls for naitonal unity
Three citizens were injured during a weekly
demonstration in Bil'in. This Friday's was organized
in honor of the spirit of George Habash, founder of
the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.
Bil'in residents have actively resistance the Israeli
Wall and settlement expansion for years.
Aijaz Zaka Syed: How Can
India be Israel's Friend?
Sy Hersh confirms: Syrian facility bombed
by Israel was not nuclear
After Israel bombed a Syrian military facility last
September, the United States and Israel both claimed
the target had been a Syrian
nuclear facility under construction.
Israelis Fire Into Lebanon, Killing 1
Israeli forces opened fire across the Lebanese
border late Sunday, killing one person and
wounding another, Lebanese security officials said.
Winograd report ignores civilian deaths
UNITED NATIONS, 31 January (IPS)
A leading international human rights group is calling into
question the findings of an Israeli inquiry into the Jewish
state's war with Lebanon in 2006. The London-based
Amnesty International says the Israeli government-appointed
Winograd Commission is "deeply flawed" because it fails
to address the issue of war crimes against the
civilian population in Lebanon.
Three words would have sufficed
The Winograd Report - a year-and-a-half's work by five
high-powered and intelligent Israelis - had the entire
Israeli public waiting with bated breath. The report's
hundreds of pages can be perused and studied and
interpreted, and will, no doubt, be argued about in
the months and years to come. And yet, three words
would have sufficed: We were defeated.
Israeli Soldiers Speak Out
A searing interview with Avichai Sharon and Noam
Chayut, both veterans of the Israeli Defense Forces
and members of Breaking the Silence. Sharon and
Chayut served during the second intifada, an on-going
bloodbath that has claimed the lives of over three
thousand Palestinians and nine-hundred-fifty Israelis.
After thorough introspection, these young men have
chosen to speak out about their experiences as
self-described "brutal occupiers of a disputed land."
Producer: Sat Gwin.
Defending Israel to the "End Times"
These are busy days for Christian Zionists.
While President Bush recently returned from
his trip to the Middle East "optimistic" that a
peace agreement between the Israelis and Palestinians
could be reached by the end of the year, Pastor
John Hagee's Christian United for Israel (CUFI) is
setting forth plans to put the kibosh — if not on the
entire peace process — on any agreement that
would sanction the division of Jerusalem. And
Dr. Mike Evans has launched a "Save Jerusalem
Campaign" while Joel C. Rosenberg's Joshua Fund
is planning a major celebration in Jerusalem in
honor of Israel's 60th anniversary.
The lights have been turned
off, By Gideon Levy
One after another, the final lights are being turned off,
and a moral gloom is falling upon us as we stand at
the edge of an abyss. Just last week, three more lights
were turned off. The Winograd Report did not come out
clearly against the fact that Israel embarked on a
pointless war; the Supreme Court authorized
collective punishment and the attorney general
concluded that the killing of 12 Israeli citizens and
someone from the territories by the police does not
warrant a trial. The final keepers of order, the
lighthouses of justice and law, are reconciling
themselves with the most serious injustices of the
institutions of authority and no one so much as utters
a word about it. The upsetting and depressing crop of a
single week has drawn the moral portrait of the country.
Beatles: don't let it be!
The following is an open letter sent to the
Beatles on 2 February 2008:
Forty-three years ago, the government of Israel banned
your performance in the country for fear you would corrupt
the minds of Israeli youth. Now, Israel is extending an
apology and an invitation to you, hoping you will forget
the past and agree to help celebrate its 60th "birthday."
The Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural
Boycott of Israel (PACBI) urges you to say no to Israel,
particularly since the creation of this state 60 years ago
dispossessed and uprooted hundreds of thousands of
Palestinians from their homes and lands, condemning
them to a life of exile and destitution.
Continuing the struggle
Since being deported from Palestine in the
summer of 2005, I've been living and working in London.
Yet even here, Palestine doesn't leave you. At dawn on
the morning of Friday, 25 January, a friend of mine was
shot and left to bleed to death by Israeli soldiers in the
West Bank's Balata refugee camp.
The loneliness of the One-Issue Voter
Although I am now officially middle-aged, only once
have I felt the excitement of waking up to the joyous news
that my candidate won the US presidential elections.
Center Field: Want the best
president for Israel?
'
Hip-hop concludes Palestine Week
The culmination of Palestine Week at UNC wasn't a
keynote address by a renowned politician and wasn't
a lecture by a tenured professor in the history
department. It wasn't even a vigil marked by a
candlelit Polk Place. But the event's organizers and
performers would argue "Hip-Hop for Palestine,"
a concert that took place Saturday night in the Great Hall,
was perhaps the best way to tie the week's events together.
Unveiled: the Israeli women in 'burkas'
Modesty among some strictly Orthodox women can
now mean wearing 10 skirts and seven robes. A new
ultra-modest fashion among some strictly Orthodox
Israelis, in which women wear several layers of skirts,
robes, scarves and veils and avoid talking to men
other than their husbands, is creating a storm of
controversy among the country's religious communities.
Baghdad drowning in
sewage: Iraqi official
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