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Death toll from Gazan patients kept waiting
by the Israeli closure of Gaza reaches 107
Medical sources in Gaza on Sunday night reported that another
Palestinian patient joined those who have died waiting for
medical treatment, barred from leaving the Strip to receive
treatment by the Israeli authorities.
Large-scale Israeli operation in Nablus ends
with over 20 Palestinians kidnapped
The Israeli army has carried out a large-scale military
operation across the Nablus area and its refugee camps, in
the north of the West Bank, in the early hours of Monday
morning. The operation ended with over 20 Palestinians
abducted by Israeli army.
Israeli army kidnaps five teenagers from
villages near Tulkarem
The Israeli army attacked several villages near the
northern West Bank city of Tulkarem, abducting five
teenagers on Monday at dawn.
Police arrest 2 Jisr al-Zarqa teens for
allegedly throwing rocks on road
Police arrested two 15-year-old teens from Jisr al-Zarqa
early Tuesday for allegedly throwing rocks on the main
coastal highway during the past weekend.
The Israeli army kidnaps "immune"
Palestinian in Ramallah
The Israeli army attacked the Palestinian Authority's civil
defense offices in the central West Bank city of Ramallah
on Monday morning, and kidnapped one officer.
News / Arrest warrants issued for
family members of yeshiva gunman
How Israeli Troops Invade Homes in
Gaza, Brutalize, Smash and Steal
SAFA ABU SEIF, 12, was fatally wounded as she
stood in an upstairs room of her home in the Gaza
City district of Jabaliya 10 days ago. She was one of
27 children identified by United Nations staff among
the 107 Palestinians who were killed in five days last
week. Another 25 dead, including five women, were
identified as unarmed non-combatants. The status
of 13 more dead victims could not be determined.
At least three of the children were reportedly shot
in their homes by Israeli small arms or sniper fire.
Israeli sniper bullet takes 12-year-old girl's life
"I put my hand on her chest to stop the streaming blood.
She told me that she could not breathe, her body
trembled and she closed her eyes," said Ra'd Abu
Saif of his 12-year-old daughter Safa's last moments
after she was shot by an Israeli sniper last Saturday.
Safa was shot in the left side of her chest while she
was inside her home in Jabaliya, northern Gaza.
An ambulance tried to reach her but Israeli soldiers
opened fire at it, wounding a paramedic and causing
the tires to lose air, and so she bled to death three
hours after she was wounded.
Hamas warns Israel against
digging beneath al-Aqsa mosque
Hamas on Tuesday warned Israel against harming
the al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem following reports
that the Israeli authorities resumed excavations
beneath the Muslim's third holiest site.
"We warn against harming the al-Aqsa mosque
and warns of the consequences of the moves that the
Israeli occupation authorities make," said Taher
al-Nounou, spokesman for the deposed Hamas
administration in Gaza.
Israel should halt settlement plans-UN's Ban
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Monday urged
Israel to halt plans to build hundreds of new homes in a
Jewish settlement in the occupied West Bank, Ban's
spokeswoman said. "The secretary-general calls on
the government of Israel to halt settlement expansion
and reiterates that the fulfillment of 'road map'
obligations by both parties is an important measure
underpinning the political process between them,"
Ban's spokeswoman, Michel Montas, said in a statement.
Israel expands illegal settlements
in blow to peace process
The decision to build in Givat Ze'ev, a Jewish
settlement near the Palestinian administrative
centre of Ramallah, has dealt another blow to
the faltering US-backed Annapolis peace process,
Palestinians and diplomatic sources say.
Fayyad meets his ministers, slams
Israel's decision to resume
settlement construction
Palestinian Prime Minister, Dr. Salaam Fayyad, headed
on Monday the weekly cabinet session in the West Bank
city of Ramallah, and discussed Israel's recent decision
to resume settlement construction and to build 750
houses for settlers in Givat Zeev settlement.
Abbas says Barak to blame
for stalemate in talks
Israeli defense minister 'refusing to negotiate with
Palestinian side,' Palestinian leader tells Jordanian
reporters, adding 'Shalit has cost the Palestinian
people more than 1,000 casualties'.
IOA blocks Italian minister
from visiting Gaza
The Israeli occupation authority barred on Monday
Massimo Toschi, the Italian minister for international
cooperation and peace, from visiting Gaza to inspect
the humanitarian condition there in the context of
the tight Israeli siege imposed on the Strip more
than eight months ago. In a statement, the health
ministry in Gaza said that the IOA blocked the
Italian minister from entering Gaza in order to
prevent the world from knowing the ongoing Israeli
crimes committed against the Palestinian people,
pointing out that Toschi was scheduled to visit a
number of Gaza hospitals and institutions.
Abbas: Israel has agreed
to cease-fire with Hamas
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Monday
told the Arabic-language al Arabiya television network
that Israel had in fact agreed to a cease-fire with Hamas,
contradicting comments made earlier by Prime Minister
Ehud Olmert, who insisted that no cease-fire
agreement had been made.
Olmert denies ceasefire talks
with Hamas taking place
There is no agreement on a ceasefire with Hamas,
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said emphatically on
Monday after meeting with visiting Czech Prime
Minister Mirek Topolanek.
Hamas denies reaching truce with Israel
Hamas denied Sunday that it had reached
understandings with Israel over a truce or period
of calm, but confirmed that Egypt was playing a
role in trying to achieve a cease-fire.
Hamas disputes Abbas comments
on truce deal terms
Hamas denied on Tuesday comments by its rival,
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, that its
pursuit of an Egyptian-mediated truce with Israel
was motivated by a desire to protect its leaders
from Israeli assassination.
Islamic Jihad denies achieving
a truce with Israel
Khalid Al Batsh, one of the political leaders of the Islamic
Jihad denied recent news which stated that the movement
achieved a truce agreement with Israel via Egyptian
mediation, and added that such truce could be
considered if Israel stops its aggression.
of a reporter from Bethlehem
The Palestinian Journalists Bloc slammed the Israeli
army's abduction of Hasan Abdul-Jawad, from Deheisha
refugee camp in Bethlehem, on Monday at dawn.
The bloc considered the abduction as a direct violation
to the basic principles of human rights.
Jordan condemns Israeli settlement plans
Jordan on Monday condemned Israeli plans to build
hundreds of new homes in occupied east Jerusalem
and the West Bank, saying they "obstruct" regional
peace efforts. Jordan, which signed a peace treaty
with the Jewish state in 1994,"rejects Israel's
unilateral measures, particularly expanding
settlements," the palace quoted King Abdullah II
as telling Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas
at talks in Amman.
Paris slams ongoing settlement construction
France slammed on Monday the ongoing Israeli
settlement construction in the occupied West Bank
and considered settlement activities as obstacles that
are limiting the ability to create a viable Palestinian
State. The statement came after Israel resumed the
construction of homes in a West Bank settlement.
In show of love for Israel, Sarkozy makes
Peres his first official visitor
In the 16th century, French Protestant King Henry
IV said, "Paris is well worth a Mass"
(that is, conversion). The ruler today in the capital
believes the warming of relations with Israel is well
worth irate drivers' nervous breakdowns. That
statement was written in these pages in February
2004, during the visit of president Moshe Katsav to
Paris, the last official visit of an Israeli president in
France, and the first since 1988. Then-president
Jacques Chirac received his Israeli counterpart warmly,
stopping traffic for him in the heart of the city. Chirac
seemed to want to play the part of Jacques I, the leader
of a monarchy seeking - precisely at the end of its road
- the goodwill of the Jewish state.
Shas claims credit for West Bank construction
The first stage is Givat Ze'ev, and in the next stages the
Haredi [ultra-Orthodox] cities of Beitar Ilit and Modi'in
Ilit will also be released [for construction]."
US says Israel housing move unhelpful
WASHINGTON - The Bush administration, which
is sending Vice President Dick Cheney to the
Middle East for talks on peace and oil prices, on
Monday chided Israel for its plan to expand Jewish
housing in disputed Jerusalem.
Britain bans Likud's Moshe Feiglin
from entering country
Moshe Feiglin, leader of the Likud's Jewish Leadership
faction, was recently notified in a letter from British
Home Secretary Jacqui Smith that he has been banned
from entering the U.K. The letter, written by an
unnamed Border and Immigration Agency official on
Smith's behalf, said the agency "considered that you
are seeking to provoke others to serious criminal
acts and fostering hatred which might lead to
inter-community violence in the U.K. ... This has
brought you within the scope of the list of unacceptable
behaviors," it was reported in the London Jewish
Chronicle last week.
German in the Knesset? Some say no way
With a majority of 7 to 2, the Knesset House
Committee voted to allow German Chancellor
Angela Merkel to make a speech in Knesset next
week; some MKs upset at thought of German being
spoken in Israeli parliament.
Lieberman to Arab MKs:
One day we will 'take care of you'
Yisrael Beiteinu Chairman MK Avigdor Lieberman
said at a Knesset plenary meeting on Monday,
addressing Arab MKs, that "a new administration
will be established and then we will take care of you."
Israel's ultimate plan for Gaza
Israeli Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilnai's much
publicized remark last week about Gaza facing a "shoah" --
the Hebrew word for the Holocaust -- was widely assumed
to be unpleasant hyperbole about the army's plans for an
imminent full-scale invasion of the Strip. More significantly,
however, his comment offers a disturbing indication of the
Israeli army's longer-term strategy towards the
Palestinians in the occupied territories.
ISRAEL-OPT: Gaza forced to pump
more raw sewage into sea
As temperatures rise after the winter, more people in
Israel and the Gaza Strip will head for the seaside but
they should beware: Gaza is being forced to dump much
more raw sewage into the Mediterranean than before,
environmentalists told IRIN. According to Monther
Shoblak, head of the Gaza Coastal Municipalities Water
Utility, before the Israeli-imposed restrictions on fuel imports,
the utility was dumping about 20,000 cubic metres of raw
sewage into the sea daily. This was due to the outdated
treatment plants in the enclave being too small to handle
the amount of waste produced by the growing population.
No discounts and no installments
When soldiers fell in defense of the settlers in Gush Katif,
the Jewish brain invented the patent of unilateral
withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. When a terrorist
from the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Jebel
Mukaber murders yeshiva students in the west of the city,
the Israeli genius proposes unilateral withdrawal from the
capital's "outer neighborhoods."
My message to the Jews
I realize very well that you are not carbon copies
of each other. And I also know that there are many
Jews around the world who truly despise what
Israel has been doing to the Palestinian people in
your name. I earnestly commend these conscientious
Jews for their morality and human decency. It is
these honest people who enable us to retain the
hope that counting on Judaic morality is not a lost cause.
'Jenin, Jenin' director tells court film
based entirely on truth
The director of the film "Jenin, Jenin," Mohammed Bakri,
testified on Sunday in the libel suit brought against him
by five Israel Defense Forces reserve soldiers that he
would swear on all holy books that there were no
falsehoods in the movie.
Tamir 'deeply saddened' by mob
behavior during visit to yeshiva
Education minister verbally abused, kicked and
spat on by protesters angry with gov't policy in
front of Mercaz Harav seminary, site of
Thursday's terror attack.
N.Y. Gov. Spitzer in sex scandal;
pimp said to hold Israel passport
New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer, touted in the past as
the first potential Jewish U.S. president, found his
political career on the brink of collapse Monday
after he was accused of paying for a romp with a
high-priced call girl, in a prostitution ring allegedly
led by a man found with an Israeli passport at his home.
Dreaming of a better future in Gaza
Israeli officials said on 3 March that they finished
their military operation in the Gaza Strip, but the
Israeli attacks continue, and we fear that Israel is
still planning a major invasion. On 29 February,
Israel's Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilnai
warned of "a bigger holocaust" for Palestinians.
From 27 February through 2 March, the Israeli
army killed around 110 Palestinians in Gaza,
about half of them civilians, and nearly a quarter
children, according to the Palestinian Centre for
Human Rights in Gaza. Hundreds were injured.
Palestinians killed two Israeli soldiers and one
Israeli civilian.
One State or Two? The Debate Over
Israel and Palestine, By KATHY CHRISTISON
Editors' note: On Monday we ran Michael Neumann's
argument against the so-called "one state" solution for
Israel and Palestine. This is the first of three replies.
AC / JSC. Michael Neumann makes a strong case in
the last issue of CounterPunch against a single
Palestinian-Jewish state as the solution for the conflict
in Israel-Palestine. But there are critical flaws in his
argument. Neumann correctly condemns the
two-state solution as unjust because it "cements
Zionist usurpation of Palestinian land," perpetuating
the existence of Israel as "a state based on racial
supremacy." But he finds the one-state alternative
to this racist two-state solution to be simply impractical.
And why? Essentially because Israelis – these same
Israelis whom he accuses of racism, land theft, and
dispossession of the Palestinians – couldn't conceivably
accept it. The notion, he says, "that Israel would concede
a single state is laughable. … There is no chance at all
they will accept a single state that gives the Palestinians
anything remotely like their rights."
"Unwavering Commitment" to Inequality
Death hovered over Gaza long before locally-made
Palestinian rockets struck near the Israeli southern
town of Sderot on February 27, killing Roni Yechiah
and sparking an Israeli 'retaliation' that has already
claimed over 120 Palestinian lives. Yechiah's death
was actually the first of its kind in nine months, and
understandably so. The crude Palestinian rockets
were often criticized even by Palestinians as useless
in the tit-for-tat style of war underway, while easily
used by Israeli officials as a cacus belli, or at least as
an excuse for keeping Gaza 'contained', besieged and
on the brink of starvation.
Big bang or chaos: What's Israel up to?
Why did Israel attack Gaza with such brutality? Did
Israeli officials think, even for a fleeting moment, that
their army's attacks could halt, as opposed to intensify,
Palestinian rockets or retaliatory violence? Indeed,
was Palestinian violence at all relevant to the Israeli
action? Was the Israeli bloodletting in Gaza solely
relevant to the Gaza/Hamas context, or is there a
regional dimension that is largely being overlooked?
Bush send Cheney to meet Olmert, Abbas
Cheney departs Sunday for a trip to Oman, Saudi
Arabia, Israel, the West Bank and Turkey. Oil is
also on his agenda, as the White House - coping
with high energy prices that have socked American
consumers - continues to push for greater oil
production in the Mideast.
McCain to visit Israel next week
Hoping to garner support among Jewish voters,
Republican presidential candidate to arrive in Israel
on March 18, meet with Olmert, Livni and Barak.
Livni will meet Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary
of State Condoleezza Rice along with other senior officials,
her office said in a statement. "The meetings will focus on
the peace process, the Iran issue and other regional issues,
" it said.
Israeli minister says sack
ElBaradei over Iran
An Israeli cabinet minister called on Sunday
for the dismissal of the head of the U.N. nuclear
watchdog for not doing enough to curb Iranian
atomic projects with bomb-making potential.
Israeli Minister accuses IAEA chief of
serving as agent for Iran
Housing Minister Ze'ev Boim has accused the
head of the United Nations nuclear watchdog of
acting as an agent for Iran and of allowing the
Islamic Republic to proceed with its uranium
enrichment without international intervention.
IRAQ: Childhood Is Dying
Iraq's children have been more gravely affected by the
U.S. occupation than any other segment of the
population. The United Nations estimated that half
a million Iraqi children died during more than 12 years
of economic sanctions that preceded the U.S. invasion
of March 2003, primarily as a result of malnutrition
and disease. But childhood malnutrition in Iraq has
increased 9 percent since then, according to an Oxfam
International report released last July.
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