Hebron: At least 10 children arrested by Israeli military in one week
The extreme Golani Unit of the Israeli military is escalating its arrests of Palestinian children in Al Khalil (Hebron), targeting boys between the ages of 12 to15 years old with at least 10 reported cases of child arrests made just in the span of one week.
link to palsolidarity.org

Ethnic Cleansing / Destruction of Homes & Property / Apartheid 

Land, property, resources theft & destruction / Ethnic cleansing / Apartheid / Restriction of movement

Israeli Likud party calls to storm al-Aqsa Mosque
JERUSALEM (WAFA) 9 Feb – Members of the Israeli right-wing Likud party Thursday called to  storm al-Aqsa mosque next Sunday to build the alleged temple on the ruins of the mosque, according to Israeli right wing websites. Several websites of the Israeli right wing published an announcement on behalf of the Likud party, calling on thousands of the Likud members to storm al-Aqsa mosque along with a delegation headed by Moshe Feiglin, who ran against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for leadership of the party and received 25% of the votes of party members. The announcement said: “We call upon everyone to go up the Temple Mound, the Haram Ash-Sharif, one of the most important religious sites in the Old City of Jerusalem, to declare a proper leadership which insures our full control of the mount in order to build the temple on the ruins of al-Aqsa Mosque.”
link to english.wafa.ps

Nunu: Settlers' plan to storm Aqsa reincarnates Sharon war
GAZA (PIC) 9 Feb -- The Jewish settlers’ plan to storm the Aqsa mosque next Sunday would constitute a reincarnation of former Israeli premier Ariel Sharon’s war on the holy site, Taher Al-Nunu, the Gaza government’s spokesman, said. Nunu warned in a terse statement on Thursday of the repercussions of this crime, recalling that a previous “tour” for Sharon in the Aqsa plazas had ignited the Aqsa intifada.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk/

AFEH warns of increased violation of Aqsa sanctity
OCCUPIED JERUSALEM (PIC) 9 Feb -- The Aqsa foundation for endowment and heritage has warned of the Israeli occupation authority’s increased violation of the holy Aqsa Mosque’s sanctity. It warned in a statement on Wednesday of the goals behind allowing Israeli soldiers, males and females, to roam freely in the Aqsa plazas while wearing their uniform. It said that those soldiers were provocatively strolling inside the holy compound and taking photos, noting that they were previously not allowed into the mosque in their uniform since 2000. The foundation pointed out that 26 soldiers entered the Aqsa compound in two groups on Wednesday morning.
It also condemned the IOA for allowing tourists to enter the holy compound without any consideration to its holiness, recalling that one of them urinated at one of its corners a couple of days earlier in total disregard to the sanctity of the place.
In another incident, 12 Israeli intelligence officers, men and women, entered the Aqsa mosque on Thursday morning and toured its internal compound, while Jewish settlers continue to storm the holy site and try to perform rituals inside it.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

Israeli forces deliver eviction summons in Tubas
PNN 10 Feb -- On Thursday, Israeli forces summoned the citizens of Khirbet Wad Bazeq in Tubas governorate with eviction notices, as the IDF prepares to raze large tracts of local land. Reliable sources stated that "Israeli authorities have summoned the citizens with notices to vacate their residences so Israel could construct roads, under the pretext of security reasons."
link to english.pnn.ps

Israeli bulldozers demolish Palestinian home, tin shack in Jerusalem
JERUSALEM (WAFA) 9 Feb – Israeli Forces Thursday demolished a Palestinian house and tin shack in Jerusalem, according to local sources. They said that Israeli bulldozers demolished a Palestinian house in an area in the neighborhood of Beit Hanina, north of Jerusalem, in addition to a residential shed in al-Khalayleh, a neighborhood in the village of al-Jib northwest of Jerusalem, razing the entire land on which the shack is built and destroying all plants and trees. Forces also destroyed a wall built around the land under the pretext of building without permit.
link to english.wafa.ps

Israel to mull tax exemptions on donations to Zionist settlement
Haaretz 9 Feb -- The Ministerial Committee on Legislation will discuss on Sunday a bill recognizing donations to "Zionist settlement" for tax purposes. The bill would confer a tax exemption of up to thirty-five percent on such donations. The bill did not specify whether "Zionist settlement" referred to settlement in the West Bank or anywhere in Israel, although in practice it most likely means giving assistance to organizations that promote settlement beyond the Green Line.
link to www.haaretz.com

Lifta's imaginary future
Haaretz 9 Feb by Esther Zandberg -- Plans for a luxury development in an abandoned Arab village may have been scrapped - but dreams of restoring Lifta to its former glory are likely to remain just that ... Lifta, on the outskirts of Jerusalem, is the only abandoned Arab village in Israel that has remained intact since the War of Independence, and it has become a symbol of the destruction of the Palestinian community in this country. The only thing left to do now is to protect Lifta from architecture lovers and preservationists who paradoxically may cause the Palestinian memory of this place to vanish into oblivion, specifically as they attempt to preserve it.
link to www.haaretz.com

Palestinian officials worry about movement restrictions
PNN 9 Feb -- On Wednesday, a high-rank Palestinian official told al-Quds al-Arabi newspaper that the VIP identity cards carried by Palestinian officials, including the Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, will end in March. The news that Israel has refused to renew these cards has caused great concern within Palestinian governments' departments in Ramallah. The VIP cards facilitate coordination of travel between the Israeli and Palestinian governments and allow holders to move freely in the West Bank and Israel. Oddly, the VIP card which the President Mahmoud Abbas holds does not allow him to enter to Eilat ... An Israeli security source denied the news of withdrawing the VIP cards from Palestinian officials, especially from President Abbas, or that further restrictions were being placed on officials' movements. The source said that for technical reasons the VIP cards were issued for all Palestinian officials for only two months.
link to english.pnn.ps

Settlers

Settlers 'bulldoze 100 dunums' of Yatta lands
HEBRON (Ma‘an) 10 Feb -- Ma'on settlers bulldozed 100 dunums [25 acres] of lands that belong to Kharoubeh village on Friday, the coordinator of the popular committee against the wall and settlement said. Rateb al-Jabour said the settlers began to bulldoze the lands early Friday in an attempt to expand the settlement. He added that Israeli authorities are implementing a settlement scheme south of Hebron that aims to surround residents who are living between the wall and settlement. These acts aim to "tighten the noose" on citizens and make them leave their land, he said
link to www.maannews.net

Settlers 'raid Nablus village'
NABLUS (Ma‘an) 10 Feb -- Settlers raided a Nablus-district village overnight Thursday, sparking clashes with residents, a PA official said. Dozens of Israelis from Yitzhar settlement threw stones at a number of homes in Burin, Ghassan Daghlas, who monitors settler activity in the northern West Bank, told Ma‘an. No injuries have been reported. They smashed car windows on the main road from the Jewish-only settlement, he added. Youth from Burin gathered at the home of Ayman Sufan after it came under attack, and clashed with the group of settlers, Daghlas said.
link to www.maannews.net

West Bank village Qaryut clashes with settlers blocking land
RAMALLAH (Ma‘an) -- Palestinians clashed with a group of settlers blocking them from their lands in the central West Bank on Friday, with no injuries reported.  Dozens of residents of Qaryut village tried to enter lands under threat of confiscation near Shilo settlement, and a group of settlers fired on them, a Ma‘an correspondent said.
link to www.maannews.net

UN to probe Palestinian rights situation
GENEVA, Switzerland (UPI) 10 Feb -- A tour of the Palestinian territories will provide a better understanding of the effects of "disturbing" violence from Israeli settlers, a U.N. envoy said. Richard Falk, the U.N. special envoy on human rights in the Palestinian territories, started his tour of the region Friday to assess the ramifications of human rights issues "connected to Israel's occupation of Palestine."
link to www.upi.com

Israeli forces

IDF soldier linked to 'price tag' attack in West Bank Palestinian village
Haaretz 10 Feb -- An Israel Defense Forces soldier is suspected of perpetrating a so-called "price tag" attack in a Palestinian West Bank village, Haaretz learned on Friday, following recently intercepted security camera footage. The Golani Brigade soldier and resident of the Itamar settlement was arrested along with two young women after footage indicated the three vandalizing the Palestinian village of Luban al-Sharqiya near Nablus.
link to www.haaretz.com

Israeli forces raid, vandalize Palestinian prisoner's home
TULKAREM (WAFA) 9 Feb – Israeli forces at dawn Thursday raided and vandalized the house of Palestinian detainee in Israeli jails, Khalil Wajeeh from Atil, a town north of the northern West Bank city of Tulkarem, according to witnesses. Khalil’s father, Abd al-Rahman Wajeeh, told WAFA that a large military force raided his house and fired sound grenades inside the house after surrounding it, forcing the family to stay outside in the freezing winter cold for almost three hours, during which the forces destroyed the entire house contents.
link to english.wafa.ps

PCHR Weekly Report: 11 civilians wounded, 25 abducted by Israeli troops this week
IMEMC 10 Feb -- In its Weekly Report On Israeli Human Rights Violations in the Occupied Palestinian Territories for the week of 02 – 08 Feb. 2012, the Palestinian Center for Human Rights found that 11 Palestinians were wounded by Israeli forces this week, including 4 children. In addition, Israeli forces destroyed four buildings, and damaged 28 houses, 2 shops, a legal firm, a sports club, a school and 4 civilian cars in Gaza; and abducted 25 civilians in 47 incursions in the West Bank.  Full Report here
link to www.imemc.org

IDF takes back Israeli general who left in shame after war with Hezbollah
Haaretz 10 Feb -- Brig. Gen. (res.) Gal Hirsch, whose performance was widely criticized during the Second Lebanon War, has been appointed deputy head of a new IDF command tasked with "spearheading in-depth strategic operations." The new command will consist of a small number of officers who will deal with operations carried out far from Israel, sources at the Israel Defense Forces said.
link to www.haaretz.com

Khader Adnan

PA says Egypt intervening to free Khader Adnan
BETHLEHEM (Ma‘an) 10 Feb -- Palestinian Authority prisoners affairs minister Issa Qaraqe said Friday that Egypt was intervening with Israel to free Khader Adnan, who is on hunger strike in administrative detention. [End]
link to www.maannews.net

UN tells Israel of concern for Palestinian hunger striker
AFP 10 Feb -- A UN envoy called on Israel on Friday to do all it can for the health of a Palestinian prisoner who has been on hunger strike for the past 55 days in protest at his detention without charge. Robert Serry, the UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East peace process, said he "follows with concern reports about the deteriorating conditions" of Khader Adnan, who has been refusing food since December 18 -- longer than any Palestinian prisoner before him, according to Palestinian officials. Serry said he "calls on the government of Israel to do everything in its power to preserve the health of the prisoner and resolve this case while abiding by all legal obligations under international law."
link to news.yahoo.com

Israeli hospital: Khader Adnan risks dying
RAMALLAH (Reuters) 9 Feb -- A Palestinian prisoner on hunger strike for 55 days to protest against his detention without trial by Israel is refusing medical treatment and his life is in danger, a hospital spokeswoman said Thursday. Khader Adnan, 33, a member of Islamic Jihad, has been refusing to eat since mid-December, shortly after his arrest in the occupied West Bank, and has only drunk liquids since then. "He is not in good shape. People on a hunger strike for more than 50 days are in real danger. The doctors are extremely concerned," said Yael Shavit, spokeswoman for Sieff Hospital in the northern Israeli town of Safed, where Adnan has been taken. "He refuses to accept any treatment. He has not agreed to be hooked up to an IV," she said, referring to intravenous infusion. Palestinian officials say it is the longest hunger strike yet undertaken by a Palestinian prisoner and if Adnan dies, they expect major protests in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Adnan's wife, Randa, denies media reports that he is a leader of Islamic Jihad
link to www.maannews.net

Interview: Ex-prisoner reflects on friendship with Khader Adnan and his hunger strike for justice
EI 9 Feb by Bekah Wolf -- Mousa Abu Maria spent nearly five years, from 1999 to 2003, in Israeli prisons. He spent an additional 14 months, from 2008 to 2009, in administrative detention (without charge or trial). He, like current hunger striker Khader Adnan, was subjected to cruel and inhuman treatment and torture as part of his interrogation. In 2001, he shared a cell with Adnan. Abu Maria, a member of the popular committee in the West Bank village Beit Ommar and co-founder of the Palestine Solidarity Project, spoke to Bekah Wolf about Khader Adnan, who is being held by Israel without charge and has entered his 55th day of hunger strike.
link to electronicintifada.net

IN PHOTOS: On hunger strike in Gaza / Mya Guarnieri
AIC 10 Feb -- A number of Gazans have joined Khader Adnan's hunger strike to protest the inhumane conditions that Palestinian political prisoners face in Israeli jails. Israel often holds Palestinians in administrative detention without charges, depriving detainees of their right to due process. Adnan has been on hunger strike for 55 days and is currently hospitalized in Israel. While Adnan and his lawyers is contesting his administrative detention, the Israeli judge who heard the case yesterday declined to issue an immediate decision. Addameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association said that the delay "may prove fatal."  Here, Gazans fast at a protest tent in support of Adnan. Some lie in beds, with shackles, to simulate Adnan's current condition.
link to www.alternativenews.org

Other political detention

Israeli military court extends administrative detention for civil right lawyer Dr. Yousef Abdul Haq
9 Feb -- The Israel military court has extended administrative detention for two months in addition to three months already detained for civil rights lawyer Dr. Yousef Abdul Haq, a lecturer at An-Najah National University and the Cultural Coordinator for the Tanweer Palestinian Cultural Enlightenment Forum, currently detained in Ofer Prison near Ramallah. Yousef Abdul Haq was arrested November 7th, 2011 at his home at 2:00 AM, suffering from illness which requires constant dosage of medicine,  forcing his transfer to a hospital immediately after his arrest in Ramla. He was sentenced to two months in administrative detention immediately.
link to palsolidarity.org

IOF soldiers summon journalist, arrest his brother
AL-KHALIL (PIC) 9 Feb -- Israeli occupation forces (IOF) stormed Arub refugee camp to the north of Al-Khalil at dawn Thursday and served a summons to journalist Ala’a Al-Titi and arrested his brother Abdul Qader. Local sources told the PIC reporter that a big number of IOF soldiers stormed the three-story building of Jabr Al-Titi and a shop that belongs to the family and searched them thoroughly.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

Israeli forces arrest three Palestinian minors
HEBRON (WAFA) 9 Feb – Israeli forces Thursday arrested three Palestinian minors from the old city of the northern West Bank city of Hebron, according to security sources. Sources told WAFA that Israeli forces arrested three Palestinian minors; two of them 14 years old and a 15-year-old, after storming the old city and raiding several Palestinian houses along with firing gas and sound bombs. Forces also stormed several towns in the Hebron area, including west of Ithna, south of Yatta and al-Samou‘, setting up military checkpoints at their entrances
link to english.wafa.ps

Gaza

Egyptian-Palestinian talks on Gaza's power crisis
CAIRO (PIC) 10 Feb -- A responsible source at the Egyptian ministry of electricity and energy said that an Egyptian-Palestinian meeting will take place next week to discuss the power crises in the Gaza Strip and the help that Egypt can provide to Gaza in this field. A Qatari media sources said on Thursday that a high level delegation headed by Kanaan Obaid who is in charge of electricity supply in Gaza is due to arrive in Cairo to hold talks with senior officials at the ministry of electricity and energy in Egypt. The source said that the energy authority of the Palestinian government in Gaza warned on Thursday that the Gaza Strip will suffer a blackout  in 27 hours unless fuel supplies are allowed into the Strip to run the sole power station.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk/

Gaza ministry announces end to passport denials
GAZA CITY (Ma‘an) 10 Feb -- Gaza's ministry of interior called on Friday for all citizens who had been denied a passport to register for travel documents in the Gaza Strip. Fair access to travel documents was a tenet of the reconciliation deal agreed between Fatah and Hamas last May. A Gaza-based committee representing those without passports said on Sunday that thousands were still without travel documents.  The ministry said all citizens needing a passport should register at Hamas-affiliated Change and Reform party's offices in Gaza before Saturday at noon. Payment will be requested after the passport is issued, the ministry added.
link to www.maannews.net

Qassam fired from Gaza; structures damaged
Ynet 10 Feb --  A Qassam rocket was fired from the Gaza Strip at Israel Friday night, and exploded in a community in Ashkelon Coast Regional Council. No injuries were reported, but a few structures sustained damage. Earlier, Palestinian sources in the Gaza Strip reported that IDF forces opened fire at an Islamic Jihad military post in the northern Strip. According to the sources, one Palestinian was lightly injured and evacuated to a hospital.
link to www.ynetnews.com

Activism / Solidarity

3rd annual Global Day of Action to open Shuhada (Apartheid) Street
10 Feb Youth against Settlements -- This year, Palestinian activists in Hebron are planning a week of activities to commemorate the Baruch Goldstein Massacre and demand the opening of Shuhada [Martyrs] Street. The planned activities in Hebron are as follows: Monday 20/02/2012: Photo Exhibition about the Ibrahim Mosque Massacre and Non-violent Resistance in Palestine; Tuesday 21/02/2012: Tour For Israeli Parliament Members (if possible)....
link to palsolidarity.org

Turtles in Aqraba
ISM 10 Feb by 'Jonas Weber' -- ...We were planting trees in the small village of Aqraba, putting up pictures of our missed friends Rachel Corrie and Vittario Arrigoni. Men and women, young and old were helping out with the planting, and we were treated to tea sweet as syrup. Aqaba has lost 144,000 dunums of land to the ten illegal settlements surrounding the village. A road is being built between the settlements of Itamar and Gittit, effectively grabbing even more of the 17,000 dunums still in the village's possession. After the planting some villagers insisted on showing us something on the other side of the mountain adjacent to the hillside on which we were planting the trees. We went down the slope between the blooming red, yellow, and purple flowers. We crossed the road leading from Itamar to Gittit and started climbing around the hill on the other side. From a rock right next to the trail a turtle watched us wobble past a hyena's nest with our arms stretched out to our sides, so as not to lose our balance.
link to palsolidarity.org

Political developments

Fatah official: Palestine seeks Arab support for halt to Israel talks
BETHLEHEM (Ma‘an) 10 Feb -- Fatah Central Committee member Mahmoud Al-Aloul said Friday that Palestinian leaders will seek Arab support for their decision not to return to direct negotiations with Israel, after exploratory talks ended last month without agreement. PLO officials are set to brief the Arab League follow-up committee on Sunday, after Palestinian and Israeli envoys met for a series of talks in Jordan before an international Quartet deadline of Jan. 26 to submit proposals on borders and security issues. Al-Aloul told Ma‘an: "There will not be any more meetings with the Israelis. No one has any illusion that negotiations will lead to results, and we will ask the Arab committee to support our position."
link to www.maannews.net

Netanuyahu refuses EU demands to release detainees
IMEMC 10 Feb -- Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, rejected demands presented by representatives of the European Union (E.U.) to release a number of Palestinian political prisoners under a confidence-building measure that would also increase popular support to president Mahmoud Abbas. The Palestine News Network (PNN) reported that a number of E.U. counties also called for creating a “Blacklist” that would include the names of extremist Israeli settlers, in order to prevent them from traveling to E.U. countries. The settlers will likely be those who did not only attack Palestinians but also attacked Israeli soldiers and policemen.
link to www.imemc.org

Report: PA rejects Israeli incentive package
Ynet 10 Feb --  The Palestinian Authority has recently rejected an Israeli "incentive package" meant to encourage the PA's return to the negotiating table, Ynet learned Friday. A senior Palestinian official told Ynet that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas rejected the deal, which would have seen Israel free 30 Palestinian prisoners, some of whom were arrested prior to the Oslo Accords; as well as extend the Palestinian security forces' authority in Area B.
link to www.ynetnews.com

PLC chief: Not illegal for Abbas to head govt
BETHLEHEM (Ma‘an) 10 Feb -- The secretary-general of the Palestinian parliament said Thursday that President Mahmoud Abbas faces no legal problems in taking on the role of prime minister, as agreed by Hamas and Fatah leaders last week. Hamas legislators and political analysts have critiqued the deal between ‘Abbas and Hamas chief Khalid Masha‘al, which will see the president head an interim government to unite Gaza and the West Bank in preparation for fresh elections. But Palestinian Legislative Council head Ibrahim Khreisheh said the appointment does not break any Palestinian laws, and expressed his support of the deal.
link to www.maannews.net

Hamas leader visits Iran after outreach to Gulf
TEHRAN (AP) 10 Feb – An Iranian semiofficial news agency reports that the Hamas prime minister of Gaza has arrived in Tehran. The visit may be an attempt by the Palestinian militant movement to avoid snubbing Iran even as it cultivates ties with the wealthy Gulf. The Friday report by Fars says Ismail Haniyeh will meet Iranian leaders, despite what the agency claimed were efforts by Gulf countries like Qatar and Kuwait to stop the visit.
link to old.news.yahoo.com

Water

The 'water occupation' of Palestine / Stuart Littlewood
There are few crimes more despicable then stealing your neighbor's water, and polluting what's left, then watching him and his children suffer thirst, disease and ruin. Most of us would want nothing to do with the perpetrators of such evil. British Water describes itself as the voice of the water industry. It talks about best practice and corporate responsibility, and lobbies governments and regulators on behalf of its members. No doubt it does a good job. It also has international ambitions including in the Middle East. So presumably it knows what's going on water-wise in the Holy Land ... The Israeli newspaper Haaretz last month reported on the French parliament's Foreign Affairs Committee findings on the geopolitical impact of water in confrontation zones like Israel-Palestine. According to the report water has become "a weapon serving the new apartheid… Some 450,000 Israeli settlers on the West Bank use more water than the 2.3 million Palestinians that live there. In times of drought, in contravention of international law, the [illegal] settlers get priority for water".
link to www.uruknet.info

UK helps Israel steal Palestinian water
PressTV 10 Feb --  Britain has decided to help the Israeli regime steal water from Palestinians, while even the Israeli press describe the act as a ‘water occupation.’  British Water, which represents the UK water industry supply chain, signed an agreement with Israel in December which received no media coverage. The agreement was not even published on British Water’s website. However, the Israeli regime’s embassy in London proudly reported the agreement.
link to www.presstv.ir

Palestine, France discuss preparations for water forum
JERUSALEM (WAFA) 9 Feb – Head of the Palestinian Water Authority Shaddad Attili and French Minister Henri de Raincourt Thursday discussed ways of cooperation between the two countries and preparations for the water forum. Spokesman of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs Bernard Valero said, in a statement issued by the Consulate General of France in Jerusalem, that the two ministers discussed necessary steps needed to implement the right to access water in Palestine. De Raincourt welcomed Palestine’s constructive participation to prepare for the forum held in Marseille in March.
link to english.wafa.ps

UNDP celebrates launching of Combat Desertification strategy in Palestine
RAMALLAH (WAFA) 9 Feb – The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) Thursday celebrated, in an official ceremony in Ramallah, the launching of the National Strategy to Combat Desertification in the occupied Palestinian Territory (oPT). The Palestinian Ministry of agricultural in cooperation and full coordination with all relevant parties prepared the agricultural sector strategy; the ‘Shared Vision 2011-2013’ which focused on efficiently and sustainably managing the natural resources in Palestine through increasing water availability and supply management as well as through improving the demand for agricultural water ... Mauring said that in February 2010, 193 countries have ratified the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification.  The Palestinian Authority was not among them, but now we are very close to the day where the Palestinian Authority will be the country 194.
link to english.wafa.ps

Israeli racism / discrimination

Ethiopian Israelis face increasing discrimination
AIC 9 Feb -- 1500 Israelis of Ethiopian origin demonstrated recently against Israeli racism and discrimination outside the parliament in Jerusalem. The protest took place after some landlords in Kiryat Malachi, which is home to a large Ethiopian Israeli population, refused to rent to Ethiopian Jews. “Israelis don’t want to have Ethiopians around,” says Shoko, an Israeli woman who provides counselling to Ethiopian youths in Haifa. “Their excuse to not rent flats to Ethiopians is that they are noisy...and they eat injera, which is a  ‘stinky’ bread, and its strong smell spreads all over the neighbouring area. In reality, Israelis don’t like Ethiopians because they are black...”
link to www.alternativenews.org

Other news

Palestine becomes member of International Council of Tourism Partners
HAWAII/BRUSSELS (WAFA) 9 Feb -- The International Council of Tourism Partners (ICTP) announced on Thursday that the Palestine Ministry of Tourism and Antiquity has become a member of this alliance of destinations, according to a press release issued by ICTP.ICTP president Geoffrey Lipman said: 'We are particularly excited about Palestine joining ICTP…it is one of the most iconic destinations on the planet containing some of mankind's great historical and cultural treasures…to support the evolution of its green growth future will be a privilege for our organization.'
link to english.wafa.ps

Report: UN confirms Israeli fence near Lebanese village
BEIRUT (Ma‘an) 10 Feb -- A UN peacekeeping official said Israeli forces have erected a barbed wire fence along its frontier with Lebanon, Lebanese media reported on Thursday. The barrier lies in a disputed area near Lebanese village Adaisseh, Lebanon's The Daily Star reported. "On the night of Feb. 7-8 in the general area of Adaysseh Israeli troops laid concertina wire to mark the mine field after prior notification to UNIFIL," spokesperson Neeraj Singh said in a statement. Israeli media reported in early January that the Israeli army plans to build a new 5-meter high and 1-kilometer long wall on the country's northern ceasefire line with Lebanon.
link to www.maannews.net

Israel boosts naval forces in natural gas fields
TEL AVIV (UPI) 9 Feb -- The Israeli government plans to build a floating liquefied natural gas terminal with a sea-based defense radar system off its Mediterranean coast while forming a naval force to protect its rich offshore gas fields against terrorist attack. The terminal, which is scheduled to pump 87.25 billion cubic feet of imported gas into Israel's energy network annually, is intended as a stopgap until the Jewish state's new fields go on-stream in 2013 at the earliest. The new fields, Leviathan and the smaller Tamar field, hold an estimated 25 trillion cubic feet of gas. Major new strikes are expected as Noble Energy Co., which has its headquarters in Texas, and its Israelis partners, extend exploration ... Israel's big finds, which are likely to extend into Cypriot and Lebanese waters, significantly alter the strategic energy picture in the eastern Mediterranean ... Lebanon, with which Israel is technically at war -- they clashed in a 34-day war in the summer of 2006 -- claims Israel's Leviathan field extends into Lebanese waters.
link to www.upi.com

'Anonymous' hacker group threatens 'reign of terror' against Israel
Haaretz 10 Feb -- Group uploads video blaming Israel for committing 'crimes against humanity,' and criticizes its treatment of Palestinians ... The video also makes reference to the possibility of an Israeli strike on Iran, claiming that Israel has “taken steps to ensure a nuclear holocaust,” and that it will not be allowed “to attack a sovereign country based upon a campaign of lies.” Moreover, the video threatens to start a crusade against Israel that will take the form of three steps, only revealing that the first of these steps will attempt to systematically remove Israel from the internet.
link to www.haaretz.com

PA security detains 56 in Israeli-held Hebron zone
HEBRON (Ma‘an) 10 Feb -- Palestinian security forces detained 56 Palestinians sheltering in the Israeli-controlled section of Hebron early Friday, after coordination with Israeli authorities. The dawn raid was the second Palestinian incursion into Hebron's H2 area in recent weeks, under full Israeli control since a 1997 deal split the city. A Palestinian security official told Ma‘an the sweep of arrests was permitted by Israeli authorities after pressure from Europe and the US. Residents told a Ma‘an correspondent they hoped the raid would end the use of the Israeli-zone as a refuge by criminals ... A security official told Ma‘an at the time there was no longer any place to escape the law in Hebron. "Outlaws will have nowhere to go except Palestinian prison after today," he said.
link to www.maannews.net

Egyptian military officers 'kidnapped'
EL-ARISH, Egypt (Ma‘an) -- The Azazma Bedouin tribe has kidnapped 17 Egyptian border officers after one of its members was killed trying to sneak into Israel, security sources said Thursday ... A gas pipeline running from Egypt to Israel was targeted Sunday, and militant group Ansar al-Jihad claimed responsibility saying it was in retaliation for the death in Egyptian custody of the group's leader ... Ansar al-Jihad said it carried out the explosion in the Massaeed area west of the Mediterranean coastal town of el-Arish. Gas pumping was stopped after the explosion on the pipeline, which supplies Israel and Jordan.
link to www.maannews.net

Israel teams with terror group to kill Iran's nuclear scientists, US officials tell NBC News
MSNBC 9 Feb -- Deadly attacks on Iranian nuclear scientists are being carried out by an Iranian dissident group that is financed, trained and armed by Israel’s secret service, U.S. officials tell NBC News, confirming charges leveled by Iran’s leaders. The group, the People’s Mujahedin of Iran, has long been designated as a terrorist group by the United States, accused of killing American servicemen and contractors in the 1970s and supporting the takeover of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran before breaking with the Iranian mullahs in 1980. The attacks, which have killed five Iranian nuclear scientists since 2007 and may have destroyed a missile research and development site, have been carried out in dramatic fashion, with motorcycle-borne assailants often attaching small magnetic bombs to the exterior of the victims’ cars. U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the Obama administration is aware of the assassination campaign but has no direct involvement.
link to rockcenter.msnbc.msn.com

groups.yahoo.com/group/f_shadi (listserv)
www.theheadlines.org (archive)

Khader Adnan enters the 55th day of his hungry strike in Israeli detention, he has not been charged with anything

Ethnic Cleansing / Destruction of Homes & Property / Apartheid

Palestinian family forced to destroy their home
Palestinian family in Occupied East Jerusalem have until Friday to clear the rubble from their house which they were forced to destroy with their own hands.
link to gulfnews.com 

Settlers take more land in occupied West Bank
Jewish settlers have seized a large area of the town of Yatta, south of the city of Hebron. The land grab is to expand an illegal settlement. The Yatta coordinator of the Popular Committees Against the Wall and Settlements, Rateb El-Jabour, told Quds Press that the settlers cordoned-off around 3,000 square metres in the early morning. This, he said, was a prelude to the land's confiscation for expansion of a settlement near ancient Susya. 
link to www.middleeastmonitor.org.uk

Land, property, resources theft & destruction / Ethnic cleansing / Apartheid / Restriction of movement

Israeli forces raid village near Hebron, block construction
HEBRON (Ma‘an) 8 Feb – Israeli forces on Tuesday raided the southern West Bank village of al-Karmil south of Hebron, stationed soldiers in a private house and prevented construction of a dirt road between the village and Khirbet Umm Nir which Israeli forces evacuated months ago. Ratib al-Jbour, coordinator of a committee against the wall and settlements in southern Hebron, said soldiers occupied the home of Ayman Muhammad Ali Abu Iram in al-Karmil and turned it into a military base. “The soldiers deployed on the roof after they locked the family inside the house,” he said, highlighting that Israeli forces erected checkpoints at the entrance to the village for inspections.
The local coordinator added that Israeli settlers from the nearby Suseya outpost occupied 3,000 square meters of land belonging to the al-Jbour family.
link to www.maannews.net

Tubas: Israel robs the Jordan Valley dry
ISM 8 Feb -- ...Called the breadbasket of Palestine, Tubas is a municipality about the size of the Gaza strip and includes several smaller villages and the northern parts of the Jordan Valley. The area is heavily dependent on agriculture, which has become increasingly difficult as somewhere between 60 and 70 percent of the municipality is under Area C and thus controlled by the Israeli Occupational Forces ... “This is not Israeli land,” said one of the farmers as we volunteers sat under the tallest tree in the village, sipping thyme tea that vaguely has reminders of cough syrup in its sweetness. From the hillside one can see the high tech farming facilities of the Israeli settlers on the other side of the road running along the bottom of the valley ... “Our ancestors lived on this land long before it was occupied by Turkey,” the man stated. “We never went into Israel. What am I to do about the fact that my land is in Area C?” The village is surrounded by eight Zionist settlements, and at present 70 percent of the land has been confiscated for Israeli interests. Water is also being stolen to satisfy the water guzzling modern farms of the settlers. The stream in the valley next to the home of the Bedouins has been systematically drained over the last 50 years and is now only a dried out riverbed.
link to palsolidarity.org

Stealing Palestine's resources illegal despite Israeli court ruling / Charlotte Silver
EI 7 Feb -- Pillage: for some the word conjures up lawless warfare, a time before the order of nation states or the rule of international law. Indeed, in its petition to the Israeli high court, the Israeli human rights group Yesh Din argues that “pillage” belongs to “ancient times,” when justice was determined by might and the victors of war were entitled to the fruits of the conquered land. But in today’s world, pillage continues. Obscured in the thick mire of economic agreements or obfuscations of law, pillage remains part of the modern world. In March 2009, Yesh Din filed a petition demanding a termination to all Israeli mining activities in the West Bank. The petition was served against the commander of the Israeli military, the head of Israel’s Civil Administration (which oversees the occupation of the West Bank) and 11 Israeli companies that run quarries in the West Bank and illegally transfer their spoils into Israel. International law prohibits an occupying power from exploiting the resources of the territories it occupies. According to international law, an occupying authority may only use resources of the occupied territory if they serve the benefit of the occupied population.
link to electronicintifada.net

Foundation: Israeli archaeologists dig cave under Palestinian homes
JERUSALEM (Ma‘an) 8 Feb -- Israeli archaeologists are continuing to excavate an ancient cave that runs under Palestinian homes in occupied East Jerusalem, the Al-Aqsa Foundation for Waqf and Heritage said Tuesday. Foundation representatives visited the al-Kittan cave, also known as Zedkiah’s Cave or Solomon’s Quarries, and say archaeologists are digging under Jerusalem's Old City in two directions to connect the cave to an ancient underground tunnel network. The cave, near Damascus Gate, is being extended towards the Haram al-Sharif compound housing the Dome of the Rock and towards Herod's Gate to the east, the foundation said. It highlighted that the route runs under Palestinian homes.
link to www.maannews.net

Nablus allocates tractors for land near settlements
NABLUS (Ma‘an) 8 Feb -- The governor of Nablus said Wednesday that his office allocated 300 tractors to be used for plowing Palestinian agricultural lands located near Israeli settlements in Nablus district. Jibreel al-Bakri says the step is an unprecedented action aimed at helping Palestinian farmers who exert huge efforts to cultivate their lands, especially in areas close to Israeli settlements and the separation wall. Al-Bakri highlighted that an agreement was reached with owners of 300 tractors to plough private lands for free as the Palestinian Authority will provide them with fuel for their vehicles. Every acre of land will be plowed, added the governor. “We decided to reach these lands and reclaim them without any exceptions, especially as these areas have been declared military zones by Israeli forces.”
link to www.maannews.net

Hamas men who hid out in J'lem Red Cross are indicted
JPost 8 Feb -- The Jerusalem District Attorney indicted two Hamas members on Tuesday morning for membership in a military terrorist organization and illegally residing in Israel. Khaled Abu-Arafa and Muhammed Totah lived in the Red Cross compound in east Jerusalem’s Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood for 18 months in order to resist arrest ... Abu-Arafa and Totah were elected to the Palestinian Legislative Council as representatives of Hamas in 2006. Interior Minister Eli Yishai revoked the men’s residency cards last spring, after the politicians refused to renounce their ties to Hamas. Attoun, Abu-Arafa and Totah held blue identification cards, which gave them Israeli residency but not citizenship.
link to www.jpost.com

Small triumphs in a Sisyphean war / Amira Hass
Haaretz 8 Feb -- News came this week of three individual battles against Israel's discriminatory regime that have scored gains. Bedouin from the Jahalin tribe will not be expelled to a community next to the Abu Dis dump, and their school will not be demolished. A tender for a luxury development in Lifta, a Palestinian village on the western outskirts of Jerusalem, destroyed in 1948, was withdrawn by court order. And Munther Fahmi, the Jerusalem-born owner of the bookstore in East Jerusalem's American Colony Hotel, will be allowed to remain in the city of his birth. Millions of hours of work and immeasurable amounts of endurance on the part of Palestinians has paid off ... How tempting it is to think that these three examples contain some magic formula that could be copied to ensure the success of thousands of other battles. But they don't. The awareness that these are exceptions to the rule tempers the already low-key celebrations.
link to www.haaretz.com

Amnesty to Israel: Cancel plan to forcibly displace Jahalin Bedouin communities
Amnesty International 8 Feb – Israeli defence minister Ehud Barak should cancel military plans to forcibly displace around 2,300 Bedouin residents of the West Bank to an area beside the Jerusalem municipal garbage dump, Amnesty International said today in a new briefing paper.  In "Stop the Transfer: Israel about to expel Bedouin from homes to expand settlements", AI called on the Israeli military to order an immediate halt to all demolitions in the 20 communities affected by the plan. Amnesty International said that verbal promises made by Israeli military officials last week not to implement pending demolition orders in Khan al-Ahmar, one of the Bedouin communities targeted for displacement in the Jerusalem district of the occupied West Bank, are insufficient.
link to english.wafa.ps

2600 Bedouins threatened with displacement as Israeli settlements expand / Sophie Crowe
EI 7 Feb -- The “E1” area of the West Bank, comprising 12 square kilometers, lies between the Maale Adumim settlement and occupied East Jerusalem, curling around and separating the Palestinian towns of Anata and Abu Dis. While E1 is home to roughly 2,600 Bedouins, Israel has prevented any Palestinian development there so that Maale Adumim might expand and new settlements can go up. Though the settlement development project was temporarily postponed in 2008 due to disapproval from the United States, Israel has long planned on emptying the space of its Palestinian inhabitants in order to implement the plan. Many of these communities have been displaced several times since the 1970s to make way for Israel’s settlement enterprise. Two years ago, rumors began circulating among the Bedouins living in the EI area of Israel’s intentions to displace them once more. link to electronicintifada.net

The journey to the border / Sarah Ziyad
Mondoweiss 8 Feb -- ...I can’t describe the disgust, rage, and deep sadness that this cast upon me. To be prevented from going somewhere -- the land of my father -- simply because of the “stigma” of my Palestinian name…I think that was the moment I truly inherited my identity as a Palestinian ... I called my father as I paced with burning eyes and heart, lips spilling my revelation—the terrible gravity and shock -- that must have read like the back of his hand. He answered, “I know, daughter. I know. This is the story of your grandmother, of your dad, your uncles…It’s not fair, habibti, and I know the hardest thing in the world for you is to see injustice. But listen to me. You cannot lose hope. Listen. You are my world now. I have given my life to make sure you and your brother and sisters have the best world possible…every family is like a little sun, my girl, and my hope is that if we continue to shine as bright as we can, and if many others do the same, eventually we can overwhelm the darkness. Don’t let this turn into hatred. We have to always remember, Jews have been through lots of injustice in history, too, and in the end we trust God to be the judge. We’re all people, even though we sometimes treat each other like we’re less than that. I’m glad you’re feeling this pain, but you can’t let it crush you.
link to mondoweiss.net

Coming home / Anan Abu-Taleb
7 Feb -- During the height of the holiday season, my brother and I embarked on a journey to see my failing father in the Gaza Strip. After an entire day of travel, we stood in front of an Israeli military checkpoint, the gateway to Gaza, which is but a 15-minute drive from my parents' home. After presenting our American passports and explaining the reason for our visit, we were denied entry. Despite countless efforts to present our case as humanitarian, the presiding officers remained steadfast on their decision. Our trip failed and we returned back to Chicago one day after arriving in Israel. On Dec. 24, upon arriving in Oak Park, it truly hit me. It became clear that I might not say goodbye to my father the way I wanted to. Anger, frustration, hopelessness, and deep sadness penetrated my soul
link to www.oakpark.com

Settlers

In Photos: Settlers and Israeli military violently steal land in Kufr Qaddoum
ISM posted 7 Feb -- Early this morning over 20 Israeli soldiers and Zionist settlers descended up on Kufr Qaddoum’s lands, arresting local villager Abu Ashraf, and dragging him off. Settlers were seen plowing through the land with bulldozers and military present. [27 photos, including some of the manhandling of Abu Ashraf, and one of the female soldier who attacked a 60-year-old woman. Oddly, some of the settlers appear to be black.]
link to palsolidarity.org

Israeli settlers 'put new homes on Beit Ummar land'
HEBRON (Ma‘an) 7 Feb -- Israeli settlers have set up two new homes on land owned by Palestinians in the Hebron district, a popular committee spokesman said on Tuesday. Under the protection of Israeli soldiers, they set up two caravans on land belonging to late Beit Ummar resident Muhammad al-Zaqiq, the local spokesman Yousef Abu Maria said. The settlement Karmi Zur is established on 600 dunams of Beit Ummar land, he added.
Also on Tuesday settlers uprooted more than 25 olive trees planted last week by solidarity campaigners in Beit Ummar, he told PA news agency Wafa.
On Monday, settlers razed newly-planted trees in Qaryut village north of Ramallah, aided by security guards, villagers said.
link to www.maannews.net

Settlers steal protest tent in Hebron
HEBRON (WAFA) 8 Feb – Israeli settlers Wednesday stole a protest tent in Tel Rumeida, a neighborhood in the center of Hebron city, according to witnesses. Hana Abu Haikal told WAFA that Jewish settlers from Ramat Yishai settlement in the neighborhood removed the tent and took it. The tent, provided by the Palestinian Red Crescent, was previously vandalized by settlers. The tent was set up to increase Palestinian presence in the neighborhood, expose settlers and army attacks against Palestinian residents and their property, and to object restrictions on movement, including the recent closure of the neighborhood entrance with cement blocks, said Abu Haikal.
link to english.wafa.ps

Settlers attack a gas station in Jenin
IMEMC 8 Feb -- A number of armed Israeli settlers attacked on Tuesday a Palestinian gas station in Jenin, in the northern part of the West Bank, and forced the owners and the residents out.  The attacked gas station, Jar Station, is located on the Jenin-Nablus road; no injuries were reported.  Also, the settlers attacked a nearby former settlement outpost that was evacuated by the army. Soldiers were present during the two attacks and did not attempt to stop them, located sources reported.
link to www.imemc.org

Archbishop condemns monastery vandalism
JERUSALEM (Ma‘an) 8 Feb -- Archbishop Atallah Hanna on Wednesday condemned an attack targeting a monastery in west Jerusalem, expressing anger after extremists defiled the holy site with anti-Christian messages. In a statement, the archbishop said that "what the settlers have done is rejected, and their racism is humiliating. ... They didn't harm us, they harmed only themselves," he added during a visit to pray at the site.
link to www.maannews.net

Israeli forces

Israeli forces uproot olive trees north of Hebron
HEBRON (WAFA) 7 Feb – Israeli forces Tuesday uprooted more than 25 olive trees planted a week ago during a solidarity campaign with Beit Ummar, north of Hebron, according to local activist. Media spokesman of the popular committee against the Wall and Settlements, Yoused Abu Maria told WAFA that Israeli soldiers uprooted olive trees that were planted last week in Khallet al-Kutli, an area north of Karmei Tzur.
link to english.wafa.ps

AFP confirms veracity of debated Israeli abuse story
8 Feb -- AFP (Agence France-Presse) agency responded to criticism over a Jan. 25 photo showing an Israeli Army soldier driving a truck over the leg of an injured Palestinian construction worker, saying both the story and photo were valid. A recent press release by the news agency said "after several days of thorough research [...] AFP wishes to confirm the veracity of both the picture and the accompanying photo caption." ... Following the surfacing of the photos, the Israeli Embassy in Washington had asked all American newspapers "to consider ceasing to publish the photographs of Hazem Bader," claiming both the caption and the photo of the injured worker were untrue and "perhaps staged." AFP said the Jerusalem bureau of the agency went back and consulted other press agencies that were present in the area and also revisited footage filmed at the location.
link to www.hurriyetdailynews.com

Gaza

Is 17-year-old girl Cast Lead's latest victim? / Rami Almeghari
Text messages on a cell phone, some medicine and respiration equipment were all that remained after Haneen Abu Jalala, a 17-year-old girl from al-Bureij refugee camp in Gaza, died last month at an Israeli hospital. “Dad, please save me from this torture.” “Dad, you are the greatest dad on earth.” These were some of the texts that Haneen typed before she perished from respiratory complications she had sustained following, Israel’s war on Gaza in December 2008 and January 2009. Her family suspects that exposure to white phosphorous is the cause of her ailments and eventual death.
link to electronicintifada.net

Entering the deadly zone, demonstration in front of Erez
[photos] Chroniques de Palestine 7 Feb -- ...We met as last time near the destroyed building of the agricultural college of Beit Hanoun and walked into the direction of Erez, together with flags from different countries and footballs. One noticeable sad difference with last year was the absence of women in the demonstration; apparently it has become too sensitive now for them to participate. When we reached the open field we continue further and further until a distance of about 50 meters from the concrete Wall and Erez crossing ... After a few launch in the air of the footballs, we retreated a bit to enjoy a football game between a team made up of internationals and a team of Palestinians. Beit Hanoun is currently the only place in the Gaza Strip where such regular demonstrations are held
link to chroniquespalestine.blogspot.com

Geeks in Gaza / Kyla Springer
8 Feb -- What do you get when you combine geeks from Gaza, tech startup wizards from Seattle, app nerds from Google, economic development specialists from Mercy Corps and a little seed funding from generous donors? The first ever Startup Weekend in Gaza. Watch the video and get nerdy. What they're saying at the Gaza Startup Weekend: The one common thing that I think unites everyone here is that they really, really see a lot of opportunity her to kind of prove that even in Gaza... people are really skilled, really passionate, really powerful.
link to www.globalenvision.org

Arab doctors union holds session in Gaza City
GAZA CITY (Ma‘an) 8 Feb -- Doctors from 16 Arab countries joined the annual meeting of the Arab doctors union which was held in Gaza City Tuesday evening. Minister of health in the Hamas-run government Basim Naeim inaugurated the session and welcomed the delegation on behalf of the Hamas-run government. “Being able to hold this session proves that political and economic blockade imposed on the Gaza Strip since 5 years is being broken. Furthermore, you will bring to your homelands true testimonies about the destructive impacts of the war and the siege on Gaza on all aspects of life,” he added.
link to www.maannews.net

Gaza municipal officials conclude visit to Istanbul
GAZA (PIC) 8 Feb -- A high-level delegation from Gaza municipality left Turkey yesterday after participating actively in an intensive workshop organized by the municipal council of Istanbul about the recycling of solid waste ... The delegation also took field trips throughout the city of Istanbul during which its members visited wasteyards where they were briefed on the ways to extract methane gas from solid waste to generate economic electric power.
link to /www.palestine-info.co.uk

Israel allows 220 truckloads of goods into Gaza
GAZA CITY (Ma‘an) 7 Feb -- Israel opened the Kerem Shalom crossing on Tuesday to allow 220 truckloads of goods into the Gaza Strip. Palestinian liaison official Raed Fattuh told Ma‘an that one truck of flowers was also exported from the coastal enclave.
link to www.maannews.net

Luxmbourg grants UNRWA €15 million
JERUSALEM (WAFA8 Feb -- Luxembourg announced a multi-year financial commitment of €15 million to UNRWA, increasing its annual contribution to the Agency’s core work through the general fund to €3.75 million until 2015, which represents an annual progression of some 36%, Wednesday said a press release by UNRWA ... As one of the Agency’s most consistent donors, Luxembourg supports UNRWA's core human development activities, especially in the field of health.
link to english.wafa.ps

Detention / Court actions

Hunger striker Khader Adnan, held by Israel, in 'shocking' condition as solidarity grows / Ali Abunimah
EI 8 Feb -- Randa Adnan told Ma’an News Agency:  “Adnan is being targeted for a slow process of assassination” she said. She says she was “shocked” at her husband’s condition, and that he told her he feels he’s living the last moments of his life, she said. “A lot of the hair on his face and head has fallen off. He has not been allowed to shower or wash during all his time in detention, nor is he allowed to wear warm clothes in this cold weather.” She added that “during my visit, my husband’s heart swelled up and a medical crew neglected him for half an hour.” The Palestinian prisoner support group Addameer added through its Twitter account: ...When they saw their father, #KhaderAdnan’s young daughters asked, “Why does he look like this? Why can’t we take him home?” #Dying2Live ... Meanwhile, according to Addameer, Israel continues to obstruct legal challenges to Adnan’s “administrative detention”:
link to electronicintifada.net

PHR: Khader Adnan 53rd day of hunger strike : cause for grave concern
Physicians for Human Rights - Israel -- Family Visit: Following PHR Israel's insistence, a family visit was granted to the hunger striker, Khader Adnan Mousa. His wife, Randa, and two daughters visited him today ataround 09:30 AM. The visit lasted 45 minutes.This family reunion was shadowed by Khader Adnan's condition at the meeting. He was shackled two legs and right hand to his hospital bed, so during this important family visit he could not hug his daughters and wife.
link to www.phr.org.il

Group holds sit-in in solidarity with prisoner on hunger strike
RAMALLAH (WAFA) 8 Feb – The Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM) Wednesday held a sit-in in front of Israeli Ofer Prison in solidarity with detained Islamic Jehad leader Khader Adnan, who has been on hunger strike for 53 days, protesting his arrest ... PYM is holding a series of solidarity events which will continue until February 14, including sit-ins in front of the headquarters of the United Nations in Ramallah, Jerusalem, Jordon, and Beirut (Lebanon) as well as making Friday an international solidarity day with Adnan
link to english.wafa.ps

Israeli intelligence summons Palestinian minor
RAMALLAH (WAFA) 8 Feb – Israeli intelligence summoned Basel Tamimi, 13, from Nabil Saleh, a village north of Ramallah, to report to the Israeli military headquarters in Beit El settlement on Wednesday, according to Tamimi. He said Israeli intelligence called his father on Tuesday and threatened to arrest the Palestinian minor from his house if he did not report to Beit El  Tamimi said Israeli undercover forces arrested him for few hours on Thursday after he warned residents of the presence of undercover Israeli soldiers in the village. The soldiers arrested Tamimi and took him to the nearby Halamish settlement, where Israeli soldiers beat him with a whip for half an hour, he said.
link to english.wafa.ps

IOA holds journalist in administrative detention
NABLUS (PIC) 8 Feb -- The Israeli occupation authority (IOA) has ordered the administrative custody of Palestinian journalist Amin Abu Warda for five months starting today Wednesday without counting the previous period of detention. The Tadamun foundation for human rights said that the detention was at the request of the Israeli intelligence and the military commander. Tadamun said in a press release that Abu Warda, 46, was taken from his home in Nablus on 28/12/2011 and is now held in Megiddo jail ... The foundation said that Abu Warda, who has an MA in media, was questioned by Israeli interrogators on events that happened 30 years ago when he was still a minor. Abu Warda worked as a correspondent for a number of media outlets and was preparing a doctorate in his field in Malaysia.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

Israeli forces detain 2 in Beit Ummar
HEBRON (Ma‘an) 8 Feb -- Israeli forces detained two young Palestinian men early Wednesday after ransacking their homes in Beit Ummar north of Hebron in the southern West Bank. Muhammad Awad, a spokesman of a local popular committee against the separation wall and settlements, identified the detainees as 18-year-old Nadim Rasim Aziz Ikhlayyil and 22-year-old Raafat Muhammad Ali al-Allami ... Separately, Israeli soldiers stormed the home of Muhammad Younis al-Allami overnight. The soldiers, according to Awad, handcuffed Muhammad’s son Isam, 19. He was forced to wait in the cold for half an hour while they inspected the house.
Wednesday’s arrests brought the number of detainees from Beit Ummar since the beginning of 2012 to 23 including 13 detainees below 18.
link to www.maannews.net

Israeli forces arrest 12 Palestinians across West Bank
WEST BANK (WAFA) 8 Feb – Israeli forces Wednesday arrested 12 Palestinian from across the West Bank, according to local and security sources ... Soldiers also arrested a Palestinian youth, 22, from Yamoun, a town west of Jenin after raidng his house, tampering with its contents. Soldiers also stormed the village of Galboun, setting up checkpoints, and the town of Yaboud, southwest of Jenin, setting up ambushes and patrolling its military vehicles in its streets and alleys.
link to english.wafa.ps

Shabak tortures and ill-treats Palestinian detainees with impunity / Adri Nieuwhof
EI 7 Feb -- The Public Committee against Torture in Israel (PCATI) has released a paper on its efforts to hold the Israel Security Agency (ISA) - or Shabak - to account for its practices of torture and ill-treatment of Palestinian detainees. In Accountability Still Denied, PCATI reveals how Israel has evaded criminal investigations into all 701 complaints of torture and ill-treatment. In October 1991, Israel ratified the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. Israel should therefore prevent acts of torture. No exceptional circumstances whatsoever may be invoked as a justification of torture, according to the Convention.
link to electronicintifada.net

Israel High Court accepts journalist Ilana Dayan's appeal against libel verdict
Haaretz 8 Feb -- Israel's High Court accepted on Wednesday the appeal of veteran journalist Ilana Dayan, and partially accepted the appeal of former Channel 2 franchisee Telad, against the 2009 Jerusalem District Court finding that Dayan libeled an Israel Defense Forces officer. Dayan and Telad were ordered to pay the officer, known as Captain R., NIS 300,000 for showing footage and airing audio tapes that suggested he had "confirmed the kill" of 13-year-old Iman al-Hams near an IDF fortification in Rafah in the Gaza Strip in 2004 on her program "Fact."  On the program, which was aired a month after her death, it was understood that the officer performed and confirmed the killing of a girl, and he was heard on the program ordering his soldiers to kill “anyone who moves, who moves in the area, even if they are three years-old.”
link to www.haaretz.com

Racism / Discrimination

'Come learn with us' says coexistence principal to vandals
JPost 8 Feb -- Executive-director of Hand in Hand bilingual school in J'lem says cooperation between Jews, Arabs bothers vandals' perspective on life. “Kahane was not right, Kahane was wrong. Arabs will live and they will live with Jews. That’s what we do here, we live together.” That is what Shalom Dichter, the executive-director of Hand in Hand: Center for Jewish-Arab Bilingual Education in Israel, wants his students to take away from a vandalism attack against their unique school.
link to www.jpost.com

Political developments

Full text of the Doha Declaration signed between Hamas and Fatah
MEMO 8 Feb -- The Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement - Hamas, represented by its political bureau chief Khaled Meshaal, and the Fatah Movement, represented by its head and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, signed the Doha Agreement on Monday, 6 February 2012. The agreement is sponsored by Qatar and the Emir of Qatar, and is intended to achieve the formation of a Palestinian unity government headed by Mahmoud Abbas.
link to www.middleeastmonitor.org.uk

Hamas's Gaza-based leadership challenges Palestinian unity deal
Reuters 8 Feb -- Ismail Haniyeh and Mahmoud al-Zahar come out against key clause in Fatah-Hamas reconciliation deal in which Abbas would serve as both president and prime minister of future Palestinian government ... "We call upon the parties who signed and those who sponsored Palestinian reconciliation to reconsider and ... not to bypass Palestinian law," the parliamentary bloc said in a statement, arguing that a dual presidential-prime ministerial role for Abbas would be illegal.
link to www.haaretz.com

Hamas denies news reports about being divided over Doha declaration
GAZA (PIC) 7 Feb -- Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum categorically denied claims spread by Al-Arabiya channel that there were disputes within the Movement over the Doha declaration. Spokesman Barhoum told the Palestinian information center (PIC) such news reports were untrue and stressed that the Doha declaration is a package deal that would be implemented as a whole and simultaneously in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip ... Khareisha noted, however, that the designation of Abbas as a premier was against the Palestinian basic law and set the clock back because he would hold two posts, the Palestinian authority presidency and the premiership, as happened before with late president Yasser Arafat. He emphasized that there could be a solution to this unconstitutional matter by convening the legislative council to amend the basic law
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk/

Even with Doha, agreement, political arrests and purges ongoing in West Bank
WEST BANK (PIC) 8 Feb -- All inter-Palestinian reconciliation agreements especially the last one known as the Doha declaration seem to have not curbed the Fatah-controlled Palestinian authority and its forces from carrying out political arrests and job purges against Hamas cadres and supporters. In Qalqiliya city north of the West Bank, the PA security forces kidnapped one of Al-Da‘wa college's students called Abdullah Nofal and detained one of his college mates for several hours inside the campus. A PA military court also extended the detention of student Muthana Ashtiya, from Palestine technical college, for more 15 days for the second consecutive time after his trial was postponed several times. The de facto PA government also axed teacher Yazid Tanbour because of his political affiliation....
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

Elections commission says work in Gaza not yet permitted
RAMALLAH (WAFA) 7 Feb – Central Elections Commission (CEC) chairman Hanna Nasser Tuesday said work to update the voter registry in the Gaza Strip has not yet been allowed, according to a CEC statement ... Hamas and Fatah have agreed to hold elections by May. However, the CEC said it needs at least six weeks to update its voter registration list in Gaza and three more months required by law to prepare for national elections.
link to english.wafa.ps

Abbas tells US envoy reconciliation in line with peace process
RAMALLAH (WAFA) 8 Feb – President Mahmoud Abbas Wednesday told US special envoy to the Middle East, David Hale, that the Palestinian reconciliation does not contradict with the peace process. Abbas told Hale during their meeting in Ramallah that peace is his strategic choice and reconciliation is a national need. Abbas said the Palestine Liberation Organization is committed to all its obligations that came in the signed agreements, the road map and relevant international resolutions.
link to english.wafa.ps

Ashrawi: Europe's understanding of Palestinians' suffering must be met with action
RAMALLAH (WAFA) 8 Feb -- PLO Executive Committee member and Palestinian lawmaker, Hanan Ashrawi, Wednesday said in a statement, that the US-Israel strategic alliance is undermining the role of the Quartet.  “Thus, Europe’s understanding of the suffering of the Palestinians and their struggle for freedom and justice must be met with action.”
link to english.wafa.ps

France supports Doha agreement
JERUSALEM (WAFA) 7 Feb -- Spokesman of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Bernard Valero, said Tuesday that France supported the Palestinian reconciliation process initiated by President Mahmoud Abbas
link to english.wafa.ps

PLO delegation to US dismayed at New York police spying on Palestinians
WASHINGTON (WAFA) 7 Feb -- The General Delegation Of the PLO to the US is dismayed at the recent New York police document that called for spying on the Palestinian community, Tuesday said a statement by PLO office in Washington. According to the statement, the Associated Press obtained a secret document from the New York Police Department (NYPD), calling for increased surveillance of the Muslim community and their mosques. In particular, the document singled out the Palestinian community. “The Palestinian community, although not Shi‘a, should also be assessed due to presence of Hamas members and sympathizers and the group’s relationship with the Iranian government,” the document said.
link to english.wafa.ps

Other news

'Unprecedented' internet attacks strike West Bank
BETHLEHEM (Ma‘an) 8 Feb -- President Abbas' communications adviser said Wednesday that Palestine is facing unprecedented internet interruptions by hackers. Sabri Saidam told Ma‘an that huge quantities of emails are being sent in order to disable Palestinian servers. The campaign reached a peak on Wednesday at 6 p.m., he said, calling on people to be patient while it is resolved ... Hackers temporarily shut down two Palestinian news websites in the occupied West Bank last Tuesday. There was no immediate indication of who was behind the attacks on Wafa, the Palestinian Authority's official news agency, and several websites affiliated with Ma‘an Network, including its news page.
link to www.maannews.net

PA: Write only nice things about your leaders on Facebook
JPost 7 Feb -- Palestinian Authority security forces monitor social media giant; say criticism should be directed against Israel ...The Palestinian leadership's clampdown on Facebook users is seen as a pre-emptive measure to prevent the "Arab Spring" from infiltrating into the West Bank. Rami Samara, a Palestinian journalist from Ramallah, last week found himself under interrogation by two different security agencies in the West Bank: Military Intelligence and General Intelligence. Samara was detained while at work in the offices of the PLO's official news agency, Wafa. His crime: a comment he posted on his Facebook page ... Samara is the second Palestinian journalist to be targeted by security forces loyal to Abbas and Fayyad because of Facebook.
link to www.jpost.com

Delta removes 'Occupied' Territories from list
JTA 8 Feb -- Delta Airlines removed the phrase “Occupied Palestinian Territories” from its list of Middle East destinations. The destination “Palestinian Territories” remained Wednesday after the airline reportedly received e-mailed and tweeted complaints. Links to the site were quickly spread Tuesday via Jewish bloggers ... There are no operational airports in the West Bank or the Gaza Strip.
link to forward.com

Students, faculty speak out against Middle East violence
Purdue [Univ.] Exponent 8 Feb -- Palestinian boycotters have been making efforts to lessen the brutality imposed upon the Palestinian citizens of Israel. The Palestinian Campaign for the Cultural and Academic Boycott of Israel is appealing to artists and academic professors hoping to persuade them to stay out of Palestine until conditions get better. Famous musicians such as Roger Waters of Pink Floyd have chosen to stay out of the country in support of the campaign. Many Purdue professors have complied and allied with the boycott, including Bill Mullen, the faculty adviser of the Students for Justice in Palestine at Purdue. Mullen is a professor of English and American studies at Purdue. Tuesday night, he spoke to an attentive audience about what the group does and gave a vivid description of the ethnic cleansing among the Palestinians.
link to www.purdueexponent.org

EU, Sweden contribute €24.7 million to January salaries
JERUSALEM (WAFA) 7 Feb - The European Union and Sweden Tuesday contributed €24.7 million to the payment of the January salaries and pensions of around 84,300 Palestinian civil servants and pensioners in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, according to an EU press release.
link to english.wafa.ps

EU helps olive farmers with €2.2 million program
JERUSALEM (WAFA) 7 Feb -- The European Union (EU) has launched a €2.2 million program to support farmers dealing with olive and olive oil production in the occupied Palestinian territory including the Israeli-controlled Area C of the West Bank, an EU press release said Tuesday
link to english.wafa.ps

Foreign press rents Tel Aviv rooftops to cover Iran war / Richard Silverstein
Tikun Olam 7 Feb -- [Remember] the Israelis in southern Israel who took lawn chairs out to watch the IDF smash Gaza to smithereens in 2009?  Here’s a picture of another group of expectant, thrilled Israelis watching the action. That’s what the foreign press corps appears to be doing now in Tel Aviv in preparation for an attack on Iran.  They’re renting the right to put film crews and reporters on the city’s rooftops (Hebrew) during the upcoming war in order to cover the anticipated Iranian counterattack.  That way they can get great photo ops and pictures of missiles wreaking havoc on the city. What a story!  What a feast for the eyes!
link to www.richardsilverstein.com

IDF submarine fleet bars dual citizenship
Ynet 8 Feb -- The IDF now demands that new candidates for service in Israel's submarine fleet waive their foreign citizenship in order to join the elite unit. The demand to concede one's dual citizenship is made at certain IDF combat units and for posts requiring high security clearance. Submarine fleet recruits receive a notification stating they must renounce their foreign citizenships in order to qualify for the prolonged training, as part of their security screenings. Submarine fleet recruits who fail to complete the year-long training lose their foreign citizenships nonetheless.
link to www.ynetnews.com

Dagan: Israel faces no existential threat
Ynet 8 Feb -- Former Mossad chief presents plan to change Israel's form of government, aiming to repair current situation where minority groups hold excessive power over decision makers; claims Israel's government should be no bigger than that of US, China
link to www.ynetnews.com

Opinion / Analysis

The only Israel boycott that's actually working / Bradley Burston
6 Feb -- ...If we're lucky, the threat (no more than the threat) of an Iran attack (Bibi and Barak's Glory Days Redux fantasy) will be just one more dodge to keep settlers and their opponents at bay: long enough to make it to elections, long enough to get another fix of power, long enough to decide not to decide about the Palestinians, the settlements, the refugees, the haredim.
link to www.huffingtonpost.com

A Tu Bishvat reflection on Jewish-Palestinian tree wars / Rabbi Gideon D Sylvester
Haaretz 8 Feb -- An entire halakhic literature has developed around trees. Stealing produce from a Jew or a gentile is absolutely forbidden by the Torah, and wanton destruction of trees is prohibited by the Bible. But there are grey areas ... While traditionally, trees are symbols of life, peace and tranquility, in recent years, they have taken on controversial and sometimes sinister connotations. Israelis and Palestinians both claim that the other side plants olive groves in order to expand it borders and encroach on the other's land.
link to www.haaretz.com

Jews who are malicious to those who help us / Akiva Eldar
Haaretz 7 Feb -- Testimony from Yitzhak Navon and Ariel Sharon was not enough to prompt the state to give back the land it seized from an Arab man who helped Israel in 1948 -- The former Stern Gang member and right-wing politician Geula Cohen writes in her 2008 book "I Have No Strength to Be Tired" that she never visits the Israeli Arab town of Abu Ghosh, near Jerusalem, "without experiencing a strong urge to visit Yusuf's grave on behalf of my ungrateful people - whose leadership includes people who know how to love those who hate us and hate those who love us - and ask for his forgiveness."
link to www.haaretz.com

West does not have monopoly on veto morality / Zvi Bar'el
Haaretz 8 Feb -- How can we compare an American veto on an issue as just and moral as an occupation to a veto that helps an oppressive regime massacre its citizens? -- "At the end of last week we received a reminder about the environment we're living in. We heard Iran's ruler talk about Israel's destruction, we saw the Syrian army massacring its own people. Some leaders have no compunctions about harming their people or their neighbors," said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the start of the cabinet meeting. True, it's a lousy environment. Only one sentence is needed to complete the picture: "And there are governments that don't mind continuing to occupy other nations for nearly 50 years."
link to www.haaretz.com

groups.yahoo.com/group/f_shadi (listserv)
www.theheadlines.org (archive)

Hamas condemns Israeli attempts to wipe out Islamic, Christian shrines
Hamas strongly condemned the Israeli Judaization plans targeting Islamic and Christian holy shrines in occupied Jerusalem.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

650 students shut out of class for the second day in a row due to cuts in electricity
The administration of the mixed elementary school in Beer Ayoub, Silwan was forced to delay the start of instruction for the second day in a row due to a cut in electricity. The school’s electricity network has been damaged by rainwater that leaked into the building..This recent electricity cut deprives 650 boys and girls from attending their regular classes. Parents of children attending the school asked the Jerusalem Municipality to repair the leaks two months ago, but the scheduled repairs have been constantly delayed, one parent told Silwanic. Mousa Audeh, a member of the parents committee, said to Silwanic, ‘”How could the Jerusalem Municipality claim that it invests more money in developing education in East Jerusalem and doesn’t fix the electricity problem at one of these schools.” Silwan suffers from an extreme shortage of classrooms which forces 70% of neighborhood children, both boys and girls, to attend school outside of the neighbhorhood. Partially due to this, 61% of children in Silwan drop out before completing secondary school.
link to silwanic.net

An Ongoing Nakba: The Plight of Palestinian Refugees in Iraq
In September 2011, the month that Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud ‘Abbas submitted Palestine’s statehood bid at the United Nations, Qusai Abdul-Raouf of the Lebanon-based Palestinian Human Rights Foundation was undertaking the task of documenting the increasing number of attacks against Palestinians in the Al Baladiyyat neighbourhood of Baghdad. As he toured the neighborhood three gunmen, reportedly wearing Interior Ministry uniforms, abducted him. No one has seen him since.
link to www.jadaliyya.com

Neighborhood pays price of being on wrong side of Israel's wall
Residents of Kafr Aqab are cut off from most public services, even though they live within Jerusalem's city limits. The once-upscale area is now a slum. With a fire extinguisher in his hand and a cellphone pressed to his ear, principal Sameeh abu Rameelh battled an electrical fire in his Jerusalem high school's computer lab while pleading with the fire department to come to his aid.
link to feeds.latimes.com

Violence / Aggression

Soldiers assault man in Jenin
JENIN (Ma’an) -- Israeli forces assaulted a man in Jenin on Tuesday morning, witnesses told Ma'an. The unnamed man was stopped at a flying checkpoint near the Jenin village of Yabad. Witnesses said that soldiers took the man to a nearby area of olive trees where they began to assault him. They then took him to a unknown destination.
link to www.maannews.net

Palestinian cars sprayed with unknown materials at Israeli checkpoints, Abir Kopty
Lately I’ve been going to Jenin every 2-3 weeks with family members. We usually do our vegetable shopping in the city market. Last Saturday, on our way back from Jenin to Nazareth, we were surprised to find a new technology to check the ‘suspected’ cars at the Israeli checkpoint. The checkpoint’s check usually goes like this: There are about six lines of cars going out through the checkpoint, at each there are 1-2 "security" officers that ask for IDs, and decide whether this car including its riders, do or do not consist a major threat to Israel’s "security" and "existence". If they do not, the officer gives the car a white ticket, which means they are done with the "security" check. If yes, then the car gets a green ticket. Once you get the green one, you have to go to the far right route into a special check. You are asked to open all doors, take out all your belongings and go through physical check while the car is been checked separately.
http://mondoweiss.net/2012/02/palestinian-cars-sprayed-with-unknown-materials-at-israeli-checkpoints.html

Israel 'closes investigation into tear gas shooting'
BETHLEHEM (Ma'an) -- Israeli authorities on Sunday closed an investigation into the shooting of an Israeli activist with a tear gas canister in West Bank village Nabi Saleh, the Popular Struggle Coordination Committee reported. Ben Ronen suffered multiple fractures to his hand after being hit at close range on May 13, the committee said. He was informed by the Israeli internal affairs division that the case was closed because of insufficient evidence, the report added. The popular committee released footage of an Israeli border police officer firing the projectile towards Ronen during a weekly protest against land confiscation in the Ramallah-district.
link to www.maannews.net

 

Political Detainees

Israeli court ratifies detention order for Jihad leader
RAMALLAH (Ma’an) -- Israel's Ofer military court said Tuesday that an administrative detention order for Islamic Jihad leader Khader Adnan is in effect. The Palestinian prisoners society contacted the court on Monday to obtain a final decision regarding the order. The military court confirmed on Tuesday that the 4 month administrative detention order issued on Jan. 8 is being implemented.
link to www.maannews.net
 

Ad-Dameer Laywer Visits Hunger-Striking Detainee
Lawyer of the Ad-Dameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association, Samer Samaan, managed to visit the ailing hunger-striking detainee, Adnan Khader, who has been on hunger strike since 51 days despite the sharp deterioration in his health condition. Khader is currently at an Israeli Hospital in Safad.

link to www.imemc.org

Ofer jail isolates 8 Palestinian prisoners for going on solidarity hunger strike
The Israeli Ofer jail administration has isolated eight Palestinian prisoners on Monday for going on hunger strike in solidarity with Islamic Jihad leader Sheikh Khader Adnan.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

Mustafa Tamimi’s brother arrested in Nabi Saleh, by Allison Deger
Clashes took place last night in Nabi Saleh between villagers and Israeli occupation forces. The Israeli army invaded the village, stormed houses, arrested two men Luai Al Tamimi 19 (brother of martyr Mustafa Tamimi)  and Ta'min Muhammad Tamimi 29. They also assaulted father of Mustafa Tamimi who suffers from renal failure and severely swollen hands. Tamimi's mother, sister and two other brothers were also assaulted.  Villagers took to the streets to protest the Israeli army. They threw stones and the Israeli army responded with live bullets, tear gas canisters and sound-bombs. The villagers cheered for resistance and condemning occupation. Israeli jeeps pulled out but news sources confirm that army vehicles are still surrounding the entrances of the village. The Committees of Popular Resistance condemned the attack and blamed the responsibility of this tension on the Israeli settlers and their continued attacks which are usually backed by the Frontiers' Guards. They also considered assaulting Mustafa Tamimi's family a new crime in the long series of Israeli crimes against humanity.
http://mondoweiss.net/2012/02/mustafa-tamimis-brother-arrested-in-nabi-saleh.html

Soldiers detain 60-year-old blocking settler tree planting
QALQILIYA (Ma'an) -- Israeli forces detained a 60-year-old man obstructing Israeli settlers from digging up land in Qalqiliya village Kafr Qaddum on Monday, witnesses and security officials said. Yaqoub Ishtawi tried to block a group of Israeli soldiers and settlers from razing village land, activist Murad Ishtewi told PA news agency Wafa. Soldiers beat Ishtawi severely before detaining him, Ishtewi added.
link to www.maannews.net

IOF soldiers arrest 15 Palestinians mostly in Nablus
Israeli occupation forces (IOF) arrested 15 Palestinian citizens in the West Bank at dawn Tuesday mostly in Nablus province, local sources said.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

Six activists arrested in Issawiya
Israeli forces, accompanied by bulldozers, arrived in the East Jerusalem village of Issawiya early this morning and reportedly arrested six Jewish Israeli activists.
link to www.alternativenews.org

IOF soldiers arrest Palestinian, 3 foreign activists in Walaja
Israeli occupation forces (IOF) detained a Palestinian activist and three foreign solidarity activists while quelling an anti wall march in Walaja village to the south west of Bethlehem.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

IOF soldiers round up five Palestinians
Israeli occupation forces (IOF) rounded up five Palestinians in various West Bank areas at dawn Sunday.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

Female prisoner in Hasharon jail suffer joint pains without any help
Tadamun society for human rights said the health of Palestinian female prisoner Woroud Qasem, in Hasharon jail, has deteriorated very badly and she is suffering from severe pains in her joints.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

700 Palestinian prisoners start gradual hunger strike on Tuesday
The ministry of prisoners in Gaza has said that 700 prisoners in the Israeli Raymond jail would start a gradual hunger strike on Tuesday demanding improvement of their incarceration conditions.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

IOA sentences freed prisoner to administrative custody, arrests another
The Israeli military court in Ofer has ordered the administrative detention of freed prisoner Ayman Sharawne from Al-Khalil for six months.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

Shalit committee asks court to cancel release of freed Palestinian
A specialized Israeli committee formed to look into violations of the prisoners’ exchange deal claimed that one of the freed captives in the deal had violated conditions for his release.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

 

Gaza

Gaza tomatoes banned from Israel and West Bank
Israel allowed export of three truckloads of tomatoes from Gaza to Saudi Arabia on Monday but banned the trucks from unloading in Israel and the West Bank, where their natural markets are. Despite the fact that on their way to Saudi Arabia, the trucks will pass through Israel and the West Bank, Israel continues to ban sale of goods from Gaza in these areas as part of its "Separation Policy".
link to www.alternativenews.org
 

Miles Of smiles 9 Arrives In Gaza
Palestinian sources reported Monday that the “Miles Of Smiles 9” aid and solidarity convoy made it into the coastal region through the Rafah Border Terminal, between Gaza and Egypt. 

link to www.imemc.org

 

Activism / Solidarity / Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions

 
Kafr Adik’s weekly protest in review
Photos by Dylan Collins and Lazar Simeonov. KAFR ADIK – A popular resistance demonstration took place in Kafr Adik this Friday, marking the fifth week in a row that residents have organized a protest against the occupation and the increasing...

link to www.palestinemonitor.org

Qaryut joins in the new wave of popular resistance in the West Bank
Photos by Silvia Boarini and Giorgio Algeri   Last Friday, 3 February, the Palestinian village of Qaryut united for its first mass demonstration against the permanent closure by the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) of one of its main roads.

link to www.palestinemonitor.org

 

Celebrating heroes and olives: Qaryut begins to dismantle roadblock
Hundreds of peaceful demonstrators confronted heavily armed Israeli soldiers this Friday, February 3rd,  at a new protest in the village of Qaryut, planting nearly one hundred trees and partially demolishing the roadblock that has obstructed access to the highway since the First Intifada.  Although organizers were prepared for military violence, the protest remained peaceful until the end, and demonstrators marched home triumphantly with a promise from the military to remove the roadblock with a bulldozer, which they did later the same day. While the villagers celebrated this as a victory, Qaryut’s people continue to struggle for control of their lands and recognition of their rights. As of the publishing date, it is uncertain what will be the nature of future protests.

link to palsolidarity.org

Beit Ommar Demonstration Plants Hundreds of Olive Trees
On Saturday, February 4th, 2012, Palestinian villagers in Beit Ommar conducted their weekly demonstration against the settlement appropriation of their lands. The activists organized this week’s actions to plant dozens of olive trees near the Israeli settlement of Karmei Tsur. This week, the demonstrators were joined by a group of Palestinian and international runners conducting a marathon across the West Bank from Hebron to Jenin organized by Fair Trade groups and US-based community development group On the Ground.
link to palestinesolidarityproject.org

Farmers, internationals plant olive trees near Bethlehem
BETHLEHEM (Ma'an) -- Local farmers and international volunteers planted olive trees in the Bethlehem village of al-Khader on Monday as part of an ongoing advocacy initiative to protect Palestinian land. The Alternative Tourism Group and the YMCA-YWCA began the olive planting program on Feb. 4, and it will last until Feb. 13. On Monday, the group planted over 500 olive trees on agricultural lands belonging Ahmad Mousa, who owns 7,000 square meters, and Abdul-Hakim Salah, who has 15,000 square meters. Sixty international activists from 10 different countries arrived at the field at 8 a.m. to start planting 3-4 year old olive saplings.
link to www.maannews.net

Take action: Support United Methodist Church divestment campaign
United Methodist Kairos Response (UMKR) is an international movement in the United Methodist Church responding to the "Kairos Palestine Document," an urgent plea from Christians in the Holy Land for decisive action supporting a just peace in Israel/Palestine.
link to blog.endtheoccupation.org

Members of Asian People's Solidarity for Palestine Convene in Pakistan
TEHRAN (FNA)- The Palestine Foundation of Pakistan hosted a meeting in Karachi, where representatives of various Asian nations, who are part of the Asian People's Solidarity for Palestine (APSP), were present.
link to english.farsnews.com

No Valentine for Israeli blood diamonds
Members of the Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign joined London human rights campaigners in Hatton Garden, the centre of London’s jewellery trade, to raise awareness among shoppers and jewellers about the continuing sale of Israeli blood diamonds. Israel is one of the world’s leading manufacturers and exporters of cut & polished diamonds which generate more than US$ 1 billion (about UK£ 600 million) a year for the Apartheid State. Many jewellers falsely claim Israeli diamonds are “conflict-free” which is totally unjustified, given Israel’s blatant violation of international laws.
link to londonbds.org

David Wildman at PennBDS: Motorola and Caterpillar profited off apartheid South Africa before occupation, Alex Kane
Palestinian-American poet Remi Kanazi, who had a rocking performance at Penn's boycott, divestment and sanctions conference (BDS) Saturday night, explained the appeal of BDS in a tweet: "#BDS [is] so successful because it's a positive, ethical, rights based, anti-racist & inclusive movement to upend Apartheid. #pennbds." The conference showcased those qualities. But to add to Kanazi's list, one reason why BDS campaigns targeting Israeli apartheid is so appealing is because it has a successful precedent to look to, as David Wildman reminded conference-goers.
http://mondoweiss.net/2012/02/david-wildman-at-pennbds-motorola-and-caterpillar-profited-off-apartheid-south-africa-before-occupation.html

Abunimah highlights ‘turning point’ boycott conference, Philip Weiss
I'm just back from the boycott-divestment BDS conference at the University of Pennsylvania, and will have a lot to post on it in days to come. I must begin with Ali Abunimah's keynote speech Saturday, at which he emphasized the diversity and positive tone of the conference. He spoke to a hall jammed with over 300 people from countless different backgrounds. There was a great feeling of openness in the hall. Abunimah's report is here.
http://mondoweiss.net/2012/02/abunimah-highlights-turning-point-boycott-conference.html

Video of my Penn BDS speech and how Zionist filmmaker pretended to be from Canada's CBC, Ali Abunimah
Video and report about my Penn BDS conference keynote, and my account of how an anti-Palestinian filmmaker misrepresented himself as a CBC journalist in a dirty trick.
link to electronicintifada.net

Activists demand Cornell cut ties with Technion
Activists with Cornell Students for Justice in Palestine call on Cornell University to end its relationship with the Technion, an Israeli university that is involved in the research and development of military and arms technology. Read and sign the open petition.
link to www.alternativenews.org

Open letter in support of professor Terri Ginsburg; appealing to N. Carolina Supreme Court
Terri Ginsberg was a visiting film studies professor at North Carolina State University when she was dismissed after sharing views critical of Zionism and the state of Israel. (You can read prior coverage of her case in Muzzlewatch, the Electronic Intifada and in Ha’aretz). She filed a grievance with the university, which denied her a hearing – three times. So she took her case to the courts.
link to www.muzzlewatch.com

Madonna to launch MDNA world tour in Israel
The Queen of Pop is set to perform at Ramat Gan Stadium in May, in her fourth Israeli concert in history.
link to www.haaretz.com

Racism & Discrimination

Video report to UN details racism in Israel
During Holocaust Rememberance Day in 2011, Israeli President Shimon Peres called Israel the most "anti-racist" country in the world. But this in-depth look at the xenophobia that is rampant and growing in Israeli society--and that is common to citizens and politicians alike--tells a very different story.
link to www.alternativenews.org

Ethiopian students? Not in our school
Students of Ethiopian descent living in Netanya are sent to 'their own' school; municipality: Registration areas determined years ago.
link to www.ynetnews.com

Only rude comments made to Arabs are allowed: MK Tibi disciplined yet again
Arab lawmaker earns second suspension after he is banned from delivering speeches in Knesset for one month over rude comments made to Ethics Committee chairman.
link to www.ynetnews.com

blatant racism of the Zionist usurping entity
from The Angry Arab News Service/وكالة أنباء العربي الغاضب by As'ad AbuKhalil"Army Radio reported on Monday that a street naming committee in the Jerusalem Municipality voted against renaming Eshkol Street to Rachmo after some residents complained the change could lead authorities to think they are Arabs.  “If you name our street Rachmo, they [the authorities] will think we are Arabs and delay us at the airport,” a resident of Eshkol Street reportedly said during a heated debate at the Jerusalem Municipality. According to the report, the street was to be named Rachmo after legendary restaurant owner Rachamim Ben-Yosef, whose eponymous eatery “Rachmo,” has become a Jerusalem landmark.  According to the report, the proposed street-name change lost momentum after one resident wrote in a letter that “the name Rachmo has an Arab sound to it. It is unacceptable that a street in west Jerusalem should have an Arab name. During security checks at the airport they ask us our address, and we if we tell them ‘Rachmo Street’ we will immediately be suspected of being Arabs and suffer all the delays that result from that.”
link to angryarab.blogspot.com

Tel Aviv continues to fine store owners open on Shabbat in mostly non-Jewish areas
Judge criticizes municipality's policy, notes that the last time the issue was discussed by the city council it was addressed in a 'lethargic, non-systematic' fashion.
link to www.haaretz.com

Career officer suspected of blackmailing women online
Police arrest 24-year-old IDF career officer accused of forcing dozens of women, girls to strip in front of computer camera as he watches while threatening to destroy their computers if they refuse.
link to www.ynetnews.com

Political Developments / Diplomacy / Other News

French official: J'lem to be capital of ‘Palestine’
BERLIN – The head of the French Consulate in Jerusalem told French and Palestinian municipal officials late last month that Jerusalem will be the capital of an independent Palestinian state. “Welcome to Jerusalem, capital of the future State of Palestine,” Frédéric Desagneaux said at a conference in the city, the French-language online news outlet JSS wrote.
link to www.jpost.com

U.S. says Palestinian deal ‘internal’ matter
WASHINGTON — The United States Monday remained on the sidelines over a deal signed between Hamas and Fatah to end a long-running discord between rival Palestinian movements, saying it was an internal affair. “As we’ve said many times, questions of Palestinian reconciliation are an internal matter for Palestinians,” said US State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland. The accord signed in Qatar was welcomed by officials from both Palestinian movements, but Israel warned Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas to choose between reconciliation with Hamas and making peace with the Jewish state.
link to www.rawstory.com

The Mainstreaming of Hamas Continues as Palestinian Unity Gains Steam (Time.com)
Time.com - Hamas vows to give Palestinian moderate leader Mahmoud Abbas the running room to see what talks can produce.
link to us.rd.yahoo.com

Doha agreement divides political opinion
GAZA CITY (Ma’an) -- The Doha agreement signed on Monday by President Abbas and Hamas chief Khalid Mashaal has been welcomed and criticized in equal measure by politicians and analysts. Hamas official Ismail al-Ashqar told Ma'an that the agreement "contradicted basic Palestinian law and overstepped the Palestinian Legislative Council." He urged President Abbas to take serious steps to implement the Cairo agreement as a whole, rather than being selective about which articles to implement.
link to www.maannews.net

Soldier forgets sensitive equipment in Palestinian store
IDF soldier buying cigarettes in violation of military protocol forgets case with night vision equipment in store. Owner returns equipment to local DCO.
link to www.ynetnews.com

Analysis / Op-ed

 

 

Israel to the United States: “We’ll Give You the War, You Give Us the Cannon Fodder”
The dogs of war are off the leash. In meeting rooms in London, Tel Aviv and Washington the dice have been thrown: snake eyes. Flashback, 1963: When John F. Kennedy decided not to escalate the soon-to-be disastrous Vietnam war and issued National Security Action Memorandum 263 (NSAM 263), he signed his death warrant. Scarcely six weeks after vowing to pull all American forces out of South Vietnam by 1965, Kennedy was dead, the target of an “executive action” orchestrated by the CIA, a coup d’état on behalf of America’s corporatist masters–the military-industrial cabal of hardline cold warriors who stood to lose billions if Kennedy lived. That sweet little deal to “win” the war in Southeast Asia cost some two million Vietnamese lives, 58,000 dead Americans and precipitated an economic crisis which dealt a death blow to post-World War II prosperity and launched the United States on its inexorable glide path towards becoming a failed state.
link to dissidentvoice.org

AIPAC Obtained Missile Secrets
Author Norman F. Dacey made powerful enemies. He turned the cozy estate-planning industry upside-down after publishing How to Avoid Probate in 1965. The book sold 2 million copies as Dacey barnstormed [.pdf] the country advising Americans how to structure their estates to avoid the costs, delays, and publicity of probate by setting up trusts.
link to original.antiwar.com

Ray Hanania – His own worst enemy
It’s always a dilemma. What to do, when people you admire are being attacked by the jealous and hateful? If you respond to it, it sometimes gives them the undeserved attention that they desperately seek. If you stay silent about it, you let baseless smears linger as if they contain some element of truth.  In the case of Ray Hanania attacking Palestinian surgeon and musician Doc Jazz, and Palestinian activist and publicist Ali Abunimah of the Electronic Intifada, I have decided to respond. Hanania, an Arab-American comedian of Palestinian origin, wrote down his vile accusations in the Jerusalem Post, a Zionist outlet that he apparently regularly contributes to as a columnist. Although he didn’t mention their names specifically, the descriptions he gave of them leave no doubt that Doc Jazz and Ali Abunimah are the two people his poisonous claims are aimed at.
link to ikhras.com

Where is the Palestinian Spring?
The Egyptian Revolution recently marked its first anniversary. When is the Arab Spring coming to Palestine?
link to www.alternativenews.org

Remapping Palestine and the Politics of Injury, Aimee Shalan
The struggle over Palestine, a struggle in which ideas, representations, rhetoric, and images are all fiercely contested, has been so overexposed in mainstream media in North America and Western Europe that the actual experience of Palestinians living under occupation has often disappeared from view. A preoccupation with “balance,” regardless of the asymmetry of the situation, has given vent to a seemingly vicious circle of tit-for-tat denunciations. In this context, legitimate Palestinian anger in response to decades of oppression is frequently regarded as an obstructive proclivity for “supercharged emotions” and the investment o
link to www.jadaliyya.com

 

Bahrain

Another Bahraini killed by toxic tear gas
Another Bahraini civilian has died of asphyxia after Saudi-backed regime forces fired toxic tear gas into a house, activist reported.
link to www.presstv.ir

 

1000s of Bahrainis attend funeral
Thousands of people in Bahrain have attended the funeral of a man who died due to inhalation of tear gas fired by Saudi-backed forces in Manama. 

link to www.presstv.ir

Bahraini mother freed after months in jail for revolutionary music
Prominent Bahraini activist Fadheela Al-Mubarak was freed on Monday, nearly a year after being arrested for listening to revolutionary music, as pro-democracy protests continue. Mubarak was among the first female activists to have been arrested in Bahrain when she was taken into custody at a checkpoint in March. She was sentenced to 18 months in jail by Bahraini authorities for listening to music that is common among many of the protesters, but is deemed revolutionary by the authorities. Mubarak was the first female to be tried in a military court in Bahrain.
link to english.al-akhbar.com

Bahrain opposition launch week-long rally for reform (Reuters)
Reuters - Bahraini opposition parties, launching a week-long 'sit-in' for political reforms at a mass rally, swore on Sunday to take their campaign to the centre of last year's democracy protest in the capital Manama.
link to us.rd.yahoo.com

Egypt

Egypt activists call for general strike on #feb11
This is the poster designed by graphic artist Ganzeer (whom we interviewed in this podcast) for the upcoming "general strike" announced by revolutionary movements on February 11, the anniversary of Mubarak's overthrow. As al-Ahram reports, the revolutionaries –regrouped under a new umbrella organization – have the following demands:
link to www.arabist.net

Great new anti-army video calling for Egypt general strike, Issandr El AmraniThis video, put out by Aalam Wassef, is one of the most daring and well-made I've seen yet by the anti-SCAF movement. The basic narrative is that the SCAF represents a military that has run Egypt into the ground for some sixty years, while enjoying the fruits of its economic empire, luxury hospitals, clubs etc. It calls for a boycott of military-produced products and a general strike on February 11.
link to www.arabist.net

Iran

US and Israel 'in unison' on Iran
The US is working closely with Israel to use diplomacy to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear power, President Barack Obama says.
link to www.bbc.co.uk

Incoming IAF chief: Iran is our top concern
Maj.-Gen. Amir Eshel said in rare speech last month that nuclear Iran would trigger arms race in Middle East, and should be addressed strategically before all other conflicts.
link to www.ynetnews.com

Attack on Iran will be disastrous: Turkey
Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu has urged diplomacy to resolve Western concerns over Iran’s nuclear program, warning that a military strike will result in a “disaster.”
link to www.presstv.ir

The Lede Blog: Israeli Ad Jokes About Strikes on Iran's Nuclear Program
An Israeli cable television company has removed an ad from its YouTube channel making light of a possible attack on Iran's nuclear facilities by Israel.
link to feeds.nytimes.com

Israel's Intentions on Iran remain unclear

Analysts differ on whether Israel's threat of a military strike on Iran's nuclear facilities is a bluff to spur tougher sanctions, or a real warning. By ramping up its threat to attack Iran's nuclear development program, Israel appears to have galvanized international attention on an issue it has long sought to bring to the top of the global agenda.

http://feeds.latimes.com/~r/latimes/middleeast/~3/SqMlbYJ17MM/la-fg-israel-iran-20120206,0,3741290.story

Widening Regional Escalation Anticipated After Israeli Attack on Iran, Richard Silverstein
Several interesting developments concerning the simmering war between Israel and Iran.  The  (in Farsi) by the director of an official government think tank that advocates Iranian attacks against Israeli sites.  The author argues that Israel’s sustained attacks within Iran demand a response.  An Israeli TV news report says (in Hebrew) that the Iranian website calls for a “pre-emptive” attack on Israel, and not one that is purely in response to an Israeli first strike.  Though it is reflective of the Israel’s narrow thinking that they would call such an Iranian strike “pre-emptive,” when Israel has already attacked Iran.  One of the specific sites indicated for targeting was Sdot Micha, Israel’s secret missile base and home of its Jericho intercontinental missile arsenal.
link to www.richardsilverstein.com

Would US back Israeli attack on Iran?
US President Barack Obama has stepped up pressure on Iran over its nuclear ambitions by signing an executive order to implement sanctions passed by Congress late last year. Amid speculation that Israel could be preparing a pre-emptive strike against Iranian nuclear facilities, some have wondered whether Washington would also support military action by its ally. But Leon Panetta, the US defense secretary, has said that attacking Iran would be "a conflict that we would regret", only serving to delay Iran's abilities to develop nuclear weapons, making the US a target for Iranian retribution and having dire economic consequences for the US and Europe. Al Jazeera's Patty Culhane reports from Washington.
link to www.youtube.com

Iraq

Iraq's al-Qaida claims 2 deadly attacks on Shiites (AP)
AP - An al-Qaida front group in Iraq has claimed responsibility for the two deadliest attacks on Shiites since the U.S. military completed its withdrawal last month, underlining an escalating sectarian security and political crisis that threatens to drive the country toward civil war.
link to us.rd.yahoo.com

Iraq's Sunni-backed ministers return to Cabinet (AP)
AP - Ministers from Iraq's Sunni-backed bloc ended their boycott of the Cabinet on Tuesday, a move that could restore some stability to the war-ravaged nation that has been mired in a security and political crisis since the U.S. completed its military withdrawal from the country.
link to us.rd.yahoo.com

Syria

The Lede Blog: Activist's Videos Tell of Syrian Carnage
An activist has posted a series of videos shedding light on the destructive force of the Syrian government's military crackdown in Homs.
link to feeds.nytimes.com

US closes embassy in Syria
The Obama administration has closed the US Embassy in Damascus and pulled all American diplomats out of Syria.
link to www.independent.co.uk

Syrian forces continue assault on Homs
Syrian forces pounded Homs on Monday, reportedly killing dozens, while an explosion hit the main oil pipeline fueling the restive city, opposition activists said. The explosion, the second in a week at the key pipeline which carries crude oil from the eastern Rumaila field, occurred in the district of Bab Amro, an opposition stronghold under heavy tank and mortar bombardment by President Bashar Assad's forces, residents and activists said.
link to english.al-akhbar.com

Seven Hours in Hama
“That is it! We cannot wait anymore. We are going to Hama, this morning.” My mother stood facing both of us, my twin and I, helpless and without words. It was Tuesday 16 March, two weeks after Hafez al-Assad reopened the sealed city of Hama after he massacred around forty thousand people in February 1982. My mother had vetoed our decision to travel there several times before, and we had yielded to her wishes, but not today. Hama was our childhood city that we used to visit almost monthly after the family moved to Damascus so we may attend college. We felt the mourning city calling to us. When you feel something so powerful, you have to answer.
link to www.jadaliyya.com

Theater at the UN Security Council, Asad AbuKhalil
It was quite a show at the UN Security Council this weekend. Susan Rice of the US could not believe that the veto was used in that august body. How could the veto be used to abort the will of the international community? Her country has sixty vetoes in support of Israeli war crimes.
link to english.al-akhbar.com

Yemen

Saleh target of shoe-attack in incident reminiscent of Bush in 2008
Ali Abdullah Saleh was greeted by groups of protestors as he left and returned to his hotel in New York Sunday. As Saleh came out of the Ritz-Carlton on Central Park South in New York a group of two dozen Yemeni Americans was protesting against his presence in the United States.
link to english.alarabiya.net
 

www.TheHeadlines.Org

Land Theft / Ethnic Cleansing 

Zionist plans to build a shopping centre on Armenian Church land
The Jerusalem occupation municipality announced a plan to build a new shopping centre with a car park on a piece of land that is owned by the Armenian Church in the old city.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

Anti-Semitism and Israel's Inherent Contradictions, Ramzy Baroud
In a recent article, columnist Yaniv Halili described British author Ben White as 'anti-Semitic'. He also denounced Arab Knesset member Hanin Zoabi for writing a forward to White's latest book, Palestinians in Israel: Segregation, Discrimination and Democracy. Those of us who can see through such distorted thinking know that White is a principled writer who has never displayed a shred of racism in his work. Zoabi is very well-known civil rights leader with a long-standing reputation of courage and poise. How could anti-racist endeavors themselves become the subject of accusation by Halili and others like him?
link to palestinechronicle.com

www.TheHeadlines.Org

Land, property theft & destruction / Ethnic cleansing / Apartheid / Restriction of movement

Jerusalem's Armenians outraged as city approves Jews-only parking lot in Old City
Haaretz 3 Feb -- Armenian residents of Jerusalem's Old City are protesting a municipal decision to designate a parking lot in the area solely for Jews, although part of it stands on land belonging to the Armenian Patriarchate
link to www.haaretz.com

Settlers install new outpost near Hebron
IMEMC 3 Feb -- A group of fundamentalist Israeli settlers installed on Friday a new illegal settlement outpost, south of the southern West Bank city of Hebron, while another group of armed settlers invaded areas in Beit Ummar town, north of Hebron. Rateb Jabbour, coordinator of the National Committee Against the Wall and Settlements, reported that approximately 250 settlers, accompanied by Israeli Border Police officers, invaded that Al-Carmel village, and installed six new caravans in Um Ash-Shuqhan area, near the Maoun illegal outpost that was installed on privately-owned Palestinian lands.
In related news, Yousef Abu Maria, media spokesperson of the National Committee Against the Wall and Settlements in Beit Ummar, stated that approximately 150 settlers attacked Palestinian farmlands in Za’ta area, east of Beit Ummar, and blocked the Jerusalem-Hebron road in front of Palestinian traffic.
link to www.imemc.org

Israel decides not to deport Palestinian bookshop owner
Haaretz 2 Feb -- The Palestinian owner of the American Colony Hotel's English-language bookshop will not be deported, after a special inter-ministerial committee granted him a two-year reprieve, after which he can apply to be a permanent resident. Munther Fahimi, the owner of the bookshop frequented by many foreign journalists and diplomats, was born in East Jerusalem, but lost his residency rights after spending years in the United States.
link to www.haaretz.com

Gov't to withhold aid from settlements
Ynet 2 Feb -- The government has decided to exclude 70 West Bank settlements from the list of national priority areas, Ynet has learned Thursday ...  On Sunday, the government voted to approve an updated version of the list, which included the 70 settlements. A day later, it was proposed to remove towns that are located beyond the Green Line from the priority map; the initiative was put up to a telephone vote, and was passed by a 15-10 margin. Several ministers abstained from the vote. Government sources estimate that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was concerned that including the settlements in the list will hurt the latest efforts to restart the peace talks with the Palestinians. Due to this fear, the West Bank communities were deemed ineligible for automatic aid. The settlements can still apply for incentives, but the decision to grant them these benefits is left up to the government.
link to www.ynetnews.com

Violence

61-year-old Palestinian woman in intensive care after settler attack
ISM 3 Feb by Fransisco Reeves -- When your land is occupied by those who harbor hatred towards you emanating from a belief that they are inherently superior to you, each day brings with it a genuine threat to the security of your life and the lives of your loved ones. “They want to kill,” is how Fares Muhammed Ibrahim simply put it. And on February 2nd, “they” very nearly did. At approximately 1pm Maysar Abd Al Majeed Ghanem, Fares’ 61 year old mother, was travelling in a car along with her husband and her son in law on their way to visit her daughter in Ramallah. The family were travelling along the main road connecting their village of Sarah to Ramallah, known as Yitzhar Road due to its proximity to the infamous settlement. They were attacked by three settlers standing near the entrance to the illegal Yitzhar settlement ... The rocks thrown by the three attackers were of such a size and thrown with such force they destroyed both the large rear window and smaller right rear window before striking Ghanem, causing three fractures to her skull and bleeding to the brain.
link to palsolidarity.org

Medics: Israelis attack shepherd in northern West Bank
NABLUS (Ma‘an) 3 Feb -- A 20-year-old Palestinian shepherd was injured on Friday after being attacked by Israelis in the northern West Bank, medics said. Red Crescent medics told Ma‘an that Mahdi Daraghma was beaten by Israelis from the Mehola settlement in the northern Jordan Valley while he was tending his sheep.  Daraghma was moderately injured and transferred to a Jenin hospital, they added. On Dec. 5, Israeli settlers kidnapped a 60-year-old shepherd south of Nablus, and stole all 50 of his sheep, local officials said.
link to www.maannews.net

2 hurt in Israeli attack on north Gaza
GAZA CITY (Ma‘an) 3 Feb -- Israeli warplanes fired on sites across the Gaza Strip early Friday, injuring a young man and a child in northern city Beit Lahiya, a Ma‘an correspondent and medical officials said. Medical officials said the child suffered serious injuries to the head and hands. A young man was also hurt, and he was taken to hospital, said Gaza health official Adham Abu Salmiya. In southern Gaza, Israeli forces fired on a house east of Rafah and open lands near Bani Suheila east of Khan Younis, Salmiya added. At least one of the airstrikes targeted a tunnel in Rafah, onlookers said. An Israeli army statement said the strikes "targeted two weapon storing facilities in the northern Gaza Strip, three terror tunnels in the southern Gaza Strip and a weapon manufacturing facility in the central Gaza Strip." ... Seven projectiles were fired at southern Israel from the Gaza Strip on Wednesday with no reported injuries, Israeli news site Ynet reported.
link to www.maannews.net

Hamas accuses Israel of violating international law
Tel Aviv/Gaza City (dpa) 3 Feb -- The militant Islamist movement Hamas on Friday accused Israel of violating international law, after two civilians, including a four-year-old, were seriously injured in nighttime Israeli bombing raids on the Gaza Strip. 'The Israeli war machines are still practicing crimes against Gaza civilians and violating all the world's laws and conventions,' said Adham Abu Selmeya, a spokesman for Gaza's Health Ministry. An Israeli military statement Friday morning said aircraft had bombed six targets in the Gaza Strip, in response to rocket fire targeting towns and villages adjacent to the salient on Wednesday night.
link to news.monstersandcritics.com

AFP stands by Palestinian abuse story after Israeli complaint
Al-Akhbar 3 Feb -- Major news wire Agence France-Presse (AFP) defended a report it made on a Palestinian construction worker injured when an Israeli army driver drove over his legs on January 25, after the Israeli embassy in the US complained the incident was false. AFP ran the story along with an image (seen here) of the man, Mohammed Abu Qbeita, who was trying to prevent Israeli soldiers from seizing building equipment in the village of Al-Dirat in the West Bank.
link to english.al-akhbar.com

Israeli forces

PCHR Weekly Report: 5 wounded, 14 abducted in 50 Israeli invasions this week [26 Jan - 2 Feb]
IMEMC 3 Feb -- ...In the Gaza Strip, on 31 January 2012, Israeli forces stationed at the border between the Gaza Strip and Israel to the east of Shujaiya neighborhood in the east of Gaza City, opened fire at Munther Rashad Saleh al-Nakhala, 44, wounding him by a bullet to the left foot. He was hunting birds with friends with his near the building of the Energy Authority. He was nearly 500 meters from the border.  On 26 January 2012, Israeli forces stationed at the border between the Gaza Strip and Israel to the east of Khan Yunis in the south of the Gaza Strip opened fire at farms and residential areas in the east of Abasan village, east of Khan Yunis. Palestinian farmers were forced to flee their farms. Israeli forces continued the sporadic firing for approximately one hour. Neither casualties nor damage to property were reported....Full Report
link to www.imemc.org

IDF: Soldier left in PA village refused locals' assistance
Ynet 2 Feb -- Details of incident in which soldier was left behind in Budrus during operational activity revealed; force belongs to brigade in which Gilad Shalit served ... The Palestinians claimed Budrus residents escorted the soldier out of the village, but army officials stressed that he refused to receive any assistance from Palestinians and was picked up by an IDF vehicle within a few minutes. IDF soldiers are instructed thwart kidnapping attempts by all means necessary, including opening fire on would-be kidnappers.
link to www.ynetnews.com

Commander of soldier left in PA village suspended
Ynet 3 Feb -- IDF chief orders full inquiry into the incident, suspends 188th Armored Brigade commander pending investigation's results
link to www.ynetnews.com

Gaza

Warning of 'health disaster' due to power crisis
GAZA CITY (Ma‘an) 3 Feb -- The health minister in Gaza, Basem Naim, warned Thursday of a health and environmental crisis due to an increase of power cuts and their dangerous implications. Naim said hospitals and health facilities, subjected to 10-hour power cuts every day, may have to close down some sections like operation rooms and intensive care units which depend completely on electricity. He added they will have to also shut down central heating although it is winter. Naim added that depending on generators will not solve the problem, as the quantity of electricity generated from them is not enough to operate medical devices with high efficiency.
link to www.maannews.net

Political detention

Health of Palestinian seized in Ukraine 'deteriorating'
RAMALLAH (Ma‘an) 3 Feb -- A report by the Ministry of Prisoners’ Affairs says prisoner Dirar Musa Abu Sisi is suffering from various health issues in the liver, gallbladder, heart disease, high blood pressure, and anemia. The report says Sisi, in solitary confinement in Ashkelon prison, was detained in February. Abu Sisi’s condition is getting worse, and he lost nearly 32 kilos. He told a lawyer for the ministry, Kareem Ajwa, that the prison administration isn't providing any necessary medical treatment or examinations ... The prisoner, 42, was kidnapped by a special [Israeli] unit in the Ukraine.
link to www.maannews.net

Palestinian on 48th day of hunger strike chained to hospital bed / Yossi Gurvitz
972mag 2 Feb -- Khader Adnan, aged 34 of ‘Araba near Jenin, is on the 48th day of his hunger strike, and is held chained to a bed in the Mayanei Hayeshua Medical Center in Bnei Brak. So reports Israeli NGO Physicians for Human Rights-Israel (PHR-I). Adnan is protesting his administrative detention.
link to 972mag.com

Disobedience campaign to support Jihad leader
JERUSALEM (Ma‘an) 3 Feb -- The PA Minister of Prisoners Affairs said Friday that detainees in Israeli jails have launched a disobedience campaign to support detained hunger-striking Islamic Jihad leader Khader Adnan. Issa Qaraqe said Palestinian detainees are returning food, and refusing outdoor breaks and medical treatment to support Adnan's 49-day hunger strike ... The Jihad leader, who was detained from his Jenin-district home on Dec. 17, is protesting his treatment by Israeli prison authorities and the practice of detention without charge.
link to www.maannews.net

Totah and Abu Arafa refuse to see in their cell Red Cross delegates
WEST BANK (PIC) 2 Feb -- Palestinian lawmaker Mohamed Totah and former minister Khaled Abu Arafa refused to see Red Cross delegates who tried on Monday to visit them in Al-Maskobiyeh interrogation center. Totah and Abu Arafa said they took this step in protest at the failure of the Red Cross to fulfill its international obligations to protect Palestinian civilians and its complicity in Israel's violations against 26 Palestinian lawmakers in detention.
Link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

Fayyad meets father of detained Islamic Jihad leader
RAMALLAH (Ma‘an) 2 Feb -- Ramallah prime minister Salam Fayyad on Thursday met with the father of detained Islamic Jihad leader Khader Adnan. Adnan's father appealed to Fayyad to save his son's life. The Palestinian Authority prime minister appealed to human rights organizations to intervene in Adnan's case ... The Palestinian Center for Human Rights said Tuesday it was concerned over a deterioration in Adnan's health.
link to www.maannews.net

Activism / Solidarity

Video: 13 injured in Nabi Saleh demo
(1 minute ) BETHLEHEM (Ma‘an) -- Israeli forces injured 13 people in the village of Nabi Saleh, near Ramallah, during a Friday demonstration against Israeli land confiscation, witnesses said. A French national sustained an injury from a tear-gas canister, activists said. She was taken to a hospital in Ramallah where she received stitches before being released, they said.
Haitham al-Khatib photos of injury: link to on.fb.me
link to www.maannews.net

13 injured in Nabi Saleh during weekly nonviolent protest
ISM 3 Feb -- During the weekly non-violent protest in the village of an-Nabi Saleh on Friday several injuries were reported including that of a French citizen who was struck in the neck by an Israeli projectile. The young woman, reported to be named Amessi, was struck in the neck, initially thought to be by a tear gas canister, but later reported to be a rubber coated steel bullet. As of yet reports remain conflicted. The young woman was cut by the shot and lead to bleeding from the wound. Reports state that the young woman has been transferred to hospital where she is stable. Israeli military major, Peter Lerner, has claimed via his Twitter account that the young woman was struck by Palestinians throwing stones. Furthermore, it was reported by activists at the scene and by the Popular Struggle Co-ordination Committee that Nariman Tamimi attempted to film the young woman’s injuries, but was assaulted by Israeli soldiers. In addition to the injury sustained by Amessi, another international activist was struck in the waist by a tear gas canister. The young man, reportedly, has extensive bruising to the area. In total residents of the village have reported 13 injuries in an-Nabi Saleh, not including those suffering ill effects from tear gas inhalation..
link to palsolidarity.org

Music against the No Go Zone
ISM 31 Jan by Rosa Schiano -- Every Tuesday we demonstrate at the Erez border crossing, in Beit Hanoun, in the northern  Gaza Strip. The demonstration started at about 11:00 AM. We headed for the No Go Zone. The No Go Zone is an area taken by Israel that extends along Gaza’s entire northern and eastern border inside Palestinian territory. For all intents and purposes, the No go Zone imposed by Israel is illegal and prevents the farmers from working part of their lands. Those who enter the area are attacked by Israel with live rounds. This week we brought with us musical instruments, small drums, and a trumpet. We marched into the No Go Zone raising our Palestinian flags, playing music, and singing Palestinian songs like “Filisteeni” and “Onadekom.” We marched on the land ruined by the Israeli bulldozers, we crossed big ditches using our hands in a vain attempt to not to fall down into the mud, and we arrived near the separation barrier. At one point, our music was interrupted by Israel firing live ammunition at us. We were speechless at the Israeli live fire.
link to palsolidarity.org

Soldiers break up weekly Qalqiliya demonstration
QALQILIYA (Ma‘an) 3 Feb -- Israeli military forces clamped down on a weekly non-violent demonstration on Friday in the Qalqiliya village of Kafr Qaddum. The demonstration started after traditional Friday prayers and included hundreds of locals, internationals and Israeli peace activists, Murad Eshterwi, media coordinator of the protests, said. Soldiers fired tear gas and sound grenades at demonstrators, Eshterwi said, and erected a temporary checkpoint at the entrance to the village.
link to www.maannews.net

Palestinian hackers: A web of struggle
Ramallah (Al-Akhbar) 3 Feb - by: Fadi Abu Saada -- Armed with keyboards and modems, the “Palestinian Electronic Struggle” announces the birth of a new means of resistance against the Israeli occupation. Palestinian hacktivists, shielded behind aliases and firewalls, take aim at Israel’s fortified servers. Among them is a young Palestinian woman who goes by the name al-Aanida (the stubborn one). She has been involved in hacking Israeli websites since 2002. Al-Aanida stresses that she is “not one of the bad hackers,” as the term may suggest. “I cannot forget the spring of 2002, when Israel conducted Operation Defensive Shield against all Palestinian cities. That, to me, was the beginning, and many of my beliefs have changed since then.”
link to english.al-akhbar.com

Refugees

Hamas pleads for an end to the killing and detention of Palestinian refugees in Iraq
MEMO 3 Feb -- Hamas has denounced the treatment Palestinian refugees in Iraq and pleaded for an end to the "killing, torture, displacement and arrests in Baghdad". The Islamic Resistance Movement said that it holds the Iraqi authorities responsible for protecting Palestinian refugees in the country and exposing the groups behind the crimes. In a press release, the Hamas Refugees' Department said that it has been following the status of Palestinian refugees in Iraq closely, especially their treatment since the US-led invasion in 2003. "Palestinian refugees have been subjected to all kinds of torture and brutality," a spokesman said. "They have even been forced to write false confessions, so as to mobilise public opinion against themselves."
link to www.middleeastmonitor.org.uk

Political / Diplomatic news

Quartet 'proposes initiatives for Palestine entry to talks'
TEL AVIV, Israel (Ma‘an) 3 Feb -- PLO official Wasel Abu Yousef said Thursday that the diplomatic Quartet has proposed a series of measures to ease Israeli restrictions on Palestinians in order to restart stalled peace talks, according to news reports. The plan asks Israel to increase Palestinians' work permits for Israel, ease movement restrictions in the West Bank, allow Gaza to export to the West Bank and allow Palestinian police into Area B, currently under Israeli security control, according to a report in Israeli news site Ynet. A second phase would allow the PA to develop gas reserves off the Gaza coast, release Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, allow international projects in Area C which is under Israeli administrative control and reduce Israeli army activity in Area A -- under PA jurisdiction under the Oslo Accords but subject to regular Israeli army raids.
link to www.maannews.net

UN chief says time running out for peace deal
HERZLIYA, Israel 2 Feb – U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon warned Thursday that time is running out for a Mideast peace deal and urged Israel to make goodwill gestures, including easing its blockade of Gaza, to help lure the Palestinians back to negotiations. Ban attended a security conference in Israel just hours after visiting Gaza,
link to old.news.yahoo.com

Abbas and Meshaal to meet in Qatar to address Palestinian reconciliation measures
Ramallah (AFP) 4 Feb -- Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas chief Khaled Meshaal will meet on Sunday in Qatar, Fatah party spokesman Azzam al-Ahmed told AFP on Friday. Abbas and Meshaal “will discuss forming a government and political questions after the failure of talks” with Israel, Ahmed said. A meeting bringing together all Palestinian leaders in Cairo originally set for Feb. 2 had been delayed indefinitely, Ahmed added. Sunday’s talks will address “reconciliation measures” as well as the planned Cairo meeting, the spokesman said without providing further details.
link to english.alarabiya.net

PLO apologizes to UN chief
RAMALLAH (Ma‘an) 2 Feb -- The PLO leadership apologized Thursday for the "strange" welcome UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon received upon arriving in the Gaza Strip. Dozens of people threw shoes and stones at the UN chief's convoy as it entered Gaza, a Ma‘an reporter said. No one was injured ... It called on Palestinians to stop such behavior "contrary to the Palestinian tradition of hospitality." In Gaza, Ban played down the incident at a news conference. "I thank the people of Gaza for the warm welcome," he said, provoking laughter among local journalists. "I met many people who were waiting for me at the entrance." Many of those who protested as the UN convoy passed were family members of Palestinians being held in Israeli prisons.
link to www.maannews.net

Other news

Report: NY police spied on Palestinians
NEW YORK (AP) 2 Feb -- The New York Police Department recommended increasing surveillance of Palestinians to assess the presence of "Hamas members and sympathizers," a police document shows. The document, published Thursday by The Associated Press, calls for canvassing the Palestinian community in search of "terrorists" linked to Hamas and groups affiliated with the Iranian government. "The Palestinian community, although not Shi‘a, should also be assessed due to presence of Hamas members and sympathizers and the group's relationship with the Iranian government," the document said.
link to www.maannews.net

Rights group: Gaza court upholds death sentence
BETHLEHEM (Ma‘an) 3 Feb -- A military court in Gaza on Thursday upheld a death sentence issued last year to a man convicted of treason, a Palestinian rights group said. The High Military Court confirmed the sentence of death by hanging against a 27-year-old from al-Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza, identified only as W.K.J., the Palestinian Center for Human Rights reported.
link to www.maannews.net

PA security forces 'arrest state journalist'
BETHLEHEM (Ma‘an) 3 Feb -- Palestinian Authority security services arrested a journalist for the government's official news agency in Ramallah on Tuesday after he criticized PLO officials, a media rights group said. Rami Samara, a journalist for the PA's Wafa news agency, was released after a few hours, the Palestinian media rights group MADA said. His arrest followed a critical commentary he posted on Facebook about the most recent meeting of the PLO executive committee and the recent talks held in Amman with Israeli negotiators.
link to www.maannews.net

Jerusalem celebrates women in Palestinian art / Rasha Hilwi
Acre (Al-Akhbar) 3 Feb -- Themes of land, motherhood, nostalgia, and self-reflection permeate the works of ten Palestinian artists currently exhibiting at Contemplations. The Palestinian ART Court – Alhoash’s fourth collection exhibit, Contemplations, is dedicated to women in Palestinian art.
link to english.al-akhbar.com

Palestinian territories experience severe cold spell
MEMO 2 Feb -- EXCLUSIVE PICTURES A cold air current has descended over Gaza and other parts of Palestine for more than two weeks now accompanied by rainy downpours. The extreme cold weather has resulted in occasional power cuts which have forced Palestinians to resort to using electricity generators and an increased consumption of fuel. It has also led to the death of domestic birds, including chickens, on numerous farms resulting in a hike in prices and the diminished purchasing power of the average Palestinian ... Meanwhile the General Administration of Soil and Irrigation at the Ministry confirmed that since the beginning of the season, there had been no dry spells and that, "The rainy season this year reassures of large quantities of water to replenish the underground water reservoir estimated to be more than twenty million cubic metres."
link to www.middleeastmonitor.org.uk

UN chief expects Israel at Mideast nuclear conference
AFP 2 Feb -- Ban Ki-moon advises PM Netanyahu that Israel should send delegate to upcoming international symposium which will focus on creating nuclear-free Middle East
link to www.ynetnews.com

Opinion / Analysis

VIDEO -- Donor Opium: The impact of international aid to Palestine
YouTube 20 Dec 2011, uploaded to ISM site 3 Feb 2012 -- For twenty years now the international donor community has financially supported Palestinian institution-building, infrastructure development, the economy, public employees’ salaries, health and education, social welfare, the police, electricity production, private credit guarantees, and the bigger part of the civil society organizations with regards to democracy promotion, human rights, tolerance, women rights etc. Peace and the establishment of a Palestinian state have been the declared goals of all the support. But actual results are the fragmentation and pacification of the Palestinian people. This documentary film, directed by Mariam Shahin and George Azar, and funded by the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation, features Palestinian criticism of this externally funded "development".
link to palsolidarity.org

A foul smell is rising from Hebron and it's here to stay / Yossi Sarid
3 Feb -- Everything has to be rethought, dear parents, and it's a good thing we have an education minister who is ensuring reeducation, and a good thing he is drawing conclusions from the results of the Likud primary and announcing the expansion of the Hebron tours to encompass all schools ... All these years we were taught that it's not right to listen to just one opinion. But in Hebron, the other opinion isn't allowed in; it's barred by the police. In Hebron, the "verdict of history," as our teacher Adina calls it, is being handed down in the presence of one side only..
link to www.haaretz.com

Opinion: America's pastime game: Bashing Palestinians / Daoud Kuttab
2 Feb -- Apologists for Israel’s continued occupation and control over Palestinian lives have long contended that Israel is more interested in peace than the Palestinians. One exaggerated argument, repeatedly put forward to justify military rule, is that Palestinians teach their children to hate Jews. Politicians in the US, especially during election campaigns, find that bashing Palestinians has no downside and, moreover, yields a vote (and donation) jackpot. Palestinian textbooks are scrutinized for any hostile reference to Israel — or praise of Palestinian nationalism — and every frame broadcast on Palestinian television stations is analyzed by experts to see if it contains any incitement to violence.
link to www.maannews.net

groups.yahoo.com/group/f_shadi (listserv)
www.theheadlines.org (archive)

Bill will turn Bedouin dispossession into Israeli law
A new bill seeks to turn the controversial Prawer Plan into Israeli law. If the Knesset passes the legislation, it will pave the way for Israel to step up its efforts to disposess the Negev's Bedouin and relocate them to impoverished townships. This bill has gone totally ignored by both local and international media.
link to www.alternativenews.org

Palestinians escort lost soldier out of village
Combatant loses sight of fellow soldiers during routine operational activity near Ramallah, later returns unharmed. IDF launched inquiry. 
link to www.ynetnews.com

Land Theft / Land Theft & Destruction /  Restriction of Movement / Apartheid / Refugees

Jerusalem Municipality Forces Arab Resident to Demolish Own Shop
JERUSALEM, February 2, 2012 (WAFA) – The Israeli municipality of West Jerusalem forced a Palestinian shop owner in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan to demolish his own shop or face major financial and punitive consequences, Wadi Hilweh Information Center said Thursday. It said Akram Abbasi demolished his shop on Wednesday after he received a threat from the municipality that if he does not demolish it himself and remove the rubble, the municipality will do it for him and force him to pay costs. The municipality said Abbasi did not have a permit to build the shop. Palestinians say they build without permits because the municipality does not give permits to Arab residents.
link to english.wafa.ps

IOF soldiers blast part of Palestinian home, summon its owner
Israeli occupation forces (IOF) blasted part of the home of a Palestinian citizen in Yatta town, south of Al-Khalil, and broke many of its furniture at dawn Thursday.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

Israel to Open New Police Station in Occupied East Jerusalem
The Jerusalem Post, an Israeli daily, reported via their website on Tuesday that the State of Israel intends to open a new police station at the Mount of Olives, in occupied East Jerusalem.
link to www.imemc.org

IOA confiscates 431 dunums of cultivated land in Nahalin village
The Israeli occupation authority (IOA) has confiscated 431 dunums of cultivated land in Nahalin village to the west of Bethlehem.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

New demolition notices delivered by the Jerusalem Municipality
On the morning of Wednesday, 1 February, the Jerusalem Municipality, supported by Israeli forces, raided the neighborhoods of Ein Al Louzeh and Karm al Shiekh in Silwan and delivered new demolition notices. This raid led to confrontations with local residents due to the provocative behavior of the Israeli forces that attacked Hamoodeh abd al Razak and his brother, spraying them with tear gas.
link to silwanic.net

OCHA: 1, 100 Palestinians, mostly children, displaced by Israel in 2011
The UN office for the coordination of humanitarian affairs (OCHA) said about 1, 100 Palestinians, over half of them children, were forcibly displaced after Israel demolished their homes in 2011.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

 

Public Security Minister and the Jerusalem police chief tour Silwan under extreme security precautions
The Israeli Authority closed all of the entrances to Silwan and set up checkpoints while the Public Security Minister, Yitzhak Ahronovitch, and the chief of police in Jerusalem, Niso Shahaq, toured Silwan. They were received by David Bairy, the chairman of the settlement association ELAD, who apparently proposed the establishment of new police stations, most likely one in the settlement compound “Givatee Parking.”Silwan residents view the tour as a preliminary step before more formal discussions begin on 13 February. The police and ELAD enjoy a strong, well established relationship. Recently, the police allowed ELAD to turn an old police building into a residential settlement. In exchange, ELAD agreed to build a new police compound near the Ma’ale Adumim settlement that is also built on land confiscated from residents of East Jerusalem . At the end of the 90- minute tour, the convoy continued to the Mount of Olives, the rumored site of another proposed police compound. 

link to silwanic.net

Israel has closed 120 Palestinian institutions in Jerusalem since 1967
A Palestinian human rights organisation has revealed that the Israeli occupation authorities have closed more than 120 Palestinian institutions in Jerusalem since it completed its occupation of the city in 1967. Around 88 were closed down completely, while the others had to transfer their operations from occupied Jerusalem to the occupied West Bank. In a press statement, the Almakdasi Foundation said that the Israeli authorities have now closed-down the Islamic Club and Salwan Charity Foundation for a period of 30 days under the pretext of them receiving funding from Hamas and conducting activities on its behalf. This is despite the fact that both foundations have appropriate licences and Salwan presented evidence to prove its independence.
link to www.middleeastmonitor.org.uk

Top Likud minister: Peace will not come by uprooting Jews from their homes
Speaking at West Bank settlement, Education Minister Gideon Sa’ar says withdrawal from Gaza Strip 'did not improve or elevate Israel’s status, nor did it help achieve peace and security.'
link to www.haaretz.com

Yair Lapid: Jerusalem belongs only to the people of Israel
Budding politician, shy to expose his views in the media, has been more forthcoming in correspondences on his official Facebook page.
link to www.haaretz.com

Sabra’s Longing to Return
In Sabra, misery is never ending and suffering is eternal. Death has its own meaning. Pain has a number of synonyms. The home of resistance and immortality, unyielding, and defiant, Sabra, to me, is simply Palestine. I walked its dark and hallow streets. Immediately, I realized that I am amongst great martyrs and eternal freedom fighters. Blood, struggle, and the scars of war tell the tale of the place. Sabra’s daily life is a poem addressed to the sons and daughters of the forgotten Palestine. They greet you with a smile, and in their eyes you sense genuine warmth. They share with you to whatever they have. Even if it’s only scraps. Sighs have crept into the dreams of the Sabra children. They see nothing but the fight to return. The games the play are those of faraway Palestine. The trail of return is through the nozzle of a rifle.I went in with fear and respect. I went out longing to return.
link to english.al-akhbar.com

Violence

Medics: Israeli tanks open fire on northern Gaza
GAZA CITY (Ma’an) -- Israeli tanks opened fired on the northern Gaza Strip on Thursday, medics said. No injuries were reported as tanks opened fire at a crowd of people in Beit Hanoun, medical sources told Ma'an. Six projectiles were fired at southern Israel from the Gaza Strip on Wednesday with no reported injuries. The projectiles landed in the Shaar Hanegev regional council at around 9 p.m., Israeli news site Ynet reported.

link to www.maannews.net

Israeli warplanes blast targets in northern Gaza
Israeli warplanes blasted targets in Beit Hanun, north of the Gaza Strip, at dawn Thursday with no casualties reported, local sources said.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

Palestinian man injured after being shot by Israeli police
TEL AVIV, Israel (Ma’an) -- A Palestinian man was injured on Thursday night after being shot by a policeman in the central Israeli city of Rehovot. Police said they noticed a man acting suspiciously in the streets and opened fire on the suspect when he tried to run away from them, Haaretz's Hebrew language site reported. The man sustained injuries to his foot and was taken to hospital.
link to www.maannews.net
 

Political Detainees

Document - Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories: Palestinian hunger striker’s life at risk: Khader Adnan
Khader Adnan has been on hunger strike since 18 December 2011 in protest against his a dministrative detention , a procedure which the Israeli authorities use to detain individual s indefinitely without charge or trial . Israeli soldiers arrested Khader Adnan from his house in Arrabe village in the occupied West Bank on 17 December 2011 and transferred him to Kishon detention centre in Israel for interrogation. He reported being beaten and ill-treated during his arrest and interrogation. According to his lawyers, Khader Adnan announced a hunger strike after the first day of interrogation in protest against his ill-treatment and the conditions of his detention. He was moved to Ramleh prison hospital on 30 December 2011 after his health deteriorated as a result of his hunger strike. He has lost a significant amount of weight, as he is only accepting water. The organization Physicians for Human Rights has warned that his life is at risk.
link to www.amnesty.org
 

1 Feb. '12: Sharp increase in administrative detention in 2011; one detainee on hunger strike for 46 days

Physicians for Human Rights – Israel reported on 29 January that Khader ‘Adnan, has been on hunger strike since 18 December 2011. Thirty-four year old 'Adnan, from the village of ‘Araba near Jenin, was detained on 17 December 2011 and placed in administrative detention. ‘Adnan is on the hunger strike in protest against his administrative detention and the manner in which he was arrested and interrogated. According to PHR, “his condition is life-threatening.”
link to www.btselem.org

Khader Adnan Mohammad Musa: Israeli Prisoner of Conscience
In 1948, brute force established Israel. In 1967, militarized occupation of one-fifth of former Palestine followed. An entire people suffer. Collective punishment is official policy. So are torture, violence, land theft, apartheid, injustice, and other forms of state-sponsored terror. They include imprisoning Palestinians for wanting to live free on their own land in their own country. As a result, since June 1967, over 750,000 Palestinians have been imprisoned.
link to sjlendman.blogspot.com

IOA renews administrative custody of MP, extends detention of journalist
The Israeli occupation authority (IOA) renewed the administrative detention, without charge, of Hamas MP Mohammed Jamal Al-Natshe for six months for the second time running.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk
 

Crowded reception for recently freed Sa’eed Sarhan

 Sa’eed Sarhan was freed from Al Ramlah prison at noon on 31 January after the Central Court ruled that the police evidence presented against him was insufficient. Silwan residents expressed joy at his released and a large crowd gathered to welcome him home. Sa’eed Sarhan spent 9 months in prison. The prosecution tried to convince the court to expel Sa’eed from Silwan, but the judge ruled to release him.Sa’eed said to Silwanic site, “Today I’m out of the Israeli prisons not because of the justice of the Israeli courts because true justice would have given me no single hour in prison. This exposes the Israeli practices in the town of Silwan, and the judge who determined my innocence is also an Israeli who acted nine months too late. There are many people who were put in the prison oppressively.”Muhammad Mahmoud, Sa’eed’s lawyer said, “The Israeli prosecution made extraordinary efforts to falsify the charges against him which made me think that he would spend many years in prison, but thank God that he is now with his family.

link to silwanic.net

 

Gaza 

Gaza Human Rights Watchdogs not Meeting Ban Ki-moon
Gaza, (Alresalah.ps)--Human rights activists and associations excused for not accepting an invitation to meet the U.N. undersecretary Ban K-moon coming Thursday. Many of the activists invited favored not to attend Ki-moon and participate in the meeting for the way the U.N. selected them. Chairman of Al-Mizan human rights association Isam Yusuf said he is sorry for not accepting moon’s invitation since it does not extend to several officials bodies concerned such as the representatives of agriculture and health sectors and the spokespersons for the Palestinian captives in the Israeli jails or the Palestinian refugees.
link to www.alresalah.ps

Palestinians throw shoes at UN chief's convoy
Gazans express their anger at Ban Ki-moon's refusal to meet with the families of prisoners held in Israeli jails.
link to www.aljazeera.com

20 cars, 270 truckloads of goods to enter Gaza
GAZA CITY (Ma’an) -- Israeli authorities on Thursday opened the Kerem Shalom crossing to allow 20 cars and 270 truckloads of commercial and agricultural goods into the Gaza Strip. One truck of flowers was allowed to be exported from the coastal enclave, Palestinian border crossing official Raed Fattouh told Ma'an. The southernmost border crossing is the only operating entry point for commercial goods and humanitarian aid into the coastal enclave, which is home to more than 1.65 million Palestinians.
link to www.maannews.net

Gazans protest slow pace of reconciliation talks
GAZA CITY (Ma’an) -- Dozens of people in the Gaza Strip took to the streets on Wednesday night to protest the slow progress of reconciliation talks. Protesters banged empty cooking pots in a protest aimed at pressuring officials to speed up the process of national unity. Spokesman for the campaign Shamekh Badra said the protest was a success due to the wide participation of diverse sectors of society. The campaign, entitled "Loyalty to martyrs by ending the split," called on both Fatah and Hamas officials to speed up reconciliation in order to end the suffering of the Palestinian people.
link to www.maannews.net

Palestinian children's drawings find sanctuary at Swat
After being blocked by Jewish lobbyists in Oakland, California, an exhibit of drawings by Palestinian children in the Gaza Strip will be coming to Swarthmore on April 6. The project’s originator and organizer, Susan Johnson, met with the Students for Peace and Justice in Palestine (SPJP) on Monday night to discuss the specifics of their collaboration effort.  The drawings were collected by Johnson herself, who, in 2009, visited the Gaza Strip, a Palestinian territory that borders Egypt and Israel and is home to approximately 1.5 million people. Operation Cast Lead, a three-week bombing and invasion of the Gaza Strip by Israel that took place in early 2009, resulted in the death of around 1,300 Palestinians and caused enormous and largely irreversible destruction (to the regional economy and infrastructure). Johnson and her group visited centers, where they were shown drawings made by Gaza’s children as part of an art therapy program that dealt with the trauma sustained during these three weeks of invasion.
link to www.swarthmorephoenix.com

Protest / Activism / BDS 

Palestinians urge international community to join Global March to Jerusalem
The recent Arab uprisings throughout the Middle East and North Africa have proven that the Arab people are no longer willing to tolerate oppression and tyranny. They send a strong message to Western hegemonic powers and their oppressive regional allies that a new wave of nonviolent civil resistance will ultimately prevail over injustice and occupation. In addition, the Arab uprisings also send an important message to all people of the world that armed resistance is no longer the only option for pursuing change.
link to palsolidarity.org
 

BDS proposal wins big at Occupy Oakland
Participants of the Occupy Oakland movement voted to back the Palestinian-led boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement during a regular general assembly (GA) meeting Wednesday evening at Oscar Grant plaza. In a near-unanimous passage of the proposal by 135 people voting yes, 12 abstentions, and 1 no vote, Occupy Oakland vowed to stand with the BDS movement. Palestine solidarity activists with Intifada Tent, one of many mainstay groups at Occupy Oakland, tweeted after the vote in the GA...
link to electronicintifada.net

BDS is Nazism and Omar Barghouti is Hitler says UPenn professor in shocking smear, Ali Abunimah
In the latest shot against the upcoming boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) conference at the University of Pennsylvania next weekend, the movement is being openly compared to Nazism.
link to electronicintifada.net

As anti-BDS attacks mount, students feel unsafe but U of Penn President maintains shameful silence, Ali Abunimah
Yesterday I wrote to University of Pennsylvania President Amy Gutmann, asking her to condemn a vile and inflammatory attack by Professor Ruben Gur on the University’s own students. Gur likened those participating in this weekend’s conference on boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) (at which I will speak) to Nazis, and Omar Barghouti to Hitler. The unchecked inflammatory rhetoric by opponents of the conference, especially Professor Gur, is making students and conference participants feel unsafe. Most disturbingly, Gur singled out Jewish students and speakers, calling them “capos” at Nazi extermination camps. “Capo” or “kapo” is the term for a concentration or death camp inmate who collaborated with the Nazis.
link to electronicintifada.net

The BDS movement grows in Italy
Over the weekend of January 21-22, the third national meeting of the BDS movement (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) against Israel was held in Bologna, Italy. Roughly 80 activists from over 20 Italian cities representing groups, associations and political parties throughout Italy participated. The scope of the meeting was to evaluate the progress of ongoing campaigns, establish strategic objectives and shared work methods, exchange information between the various Italian groups working on BDS and reassess organizational aspects of the BDS movement in Italy.
http://mondoweiss.net/2012/02/the-bds-movement-grows-in-italy.html

Short history of BDS in France
As 2012 begins, a French activist looks at the short history of the French BDS movement, which mobilized in the wake of the Israeli assalt on Gaza, Operation Cast Lead.
link to www.alternativenews.org

French campaigns to intensify efforts in support of Palestine
French pro-Palestinian organizations and figures promised to intensify their events and activities in solidarity with Palestine and Gaza people.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

BDS Update: Peaceful Blitzkreig and Israeli Counter Attacks
The Third Annual BDS Conference opened 17 December at Hebron’s Children’s Happiness Centre, “to expand Palestinian civil society’s active implementation of BDS that is deeply rooted in the Palestinian struggle.” European BNC coordinator Michael Deas affirmed, “BDS is now the main framework for solidarity. We are very close to closing the European market to Israel.”
link to dissidentvoice.org

Thank You Lara
Lara Fabian was forced to cancel a concert planned for Valentine's Day in Lebanon after activists launched a campaign against the singer due to recently surfaced surfaced of her at a pro-Israeli banquet.
link to english.al-akhbar.com

Lara Fabian Out of Lebanon: Lessons Learned
The success of boycott activists in preventing a pro-Israel pop singer from performing a Valentine’s Day concert in Lebanon despite accusations of “cultural terrorism” and heated debates on Facebook may change the way boycott is advocated and legally protected in the country.
link to english.al-akhbar.com

 

Anti-Defamation League reprises debunked quote in attempt to discredit Helena Cobban and Penn BDS conference, Alex Kane

The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) is playing a leading role in the escalating debate over the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement and this week's pro-BDS conference at the University of Pennyslvania. Over at the organization's "Access ADL" blog, the ADL has begun to publish what they call are highlights from "five of the most anti-Israel individuals scheduled to speak at the conference." But they completely miss the mark in their attack on Helena Cobban, and instead attribute a quote to Cobban that she says she never said and for which there is no evidence of. 

http://mondoweiss.net/2012/02/anti-defamation-league-reprises-debunked-quote-in-attempt-to-discredit-helena-cobban-and-bds.html

Professor petitions NC Supreme Court
After criticizing Israel's treatment of Palestinians and US policies towards Israel-Palestine, Dr. Terri Ginsberg lost her tenure track position at North Carolina State University. The following Open Letter will be sent with signatures to the Supreme Court of North Carolina and to North Carolina State University (NCSU) Chancellor Randy Woodson.

link to www.alternativenews.org
 

Racism / Discrimination

Israel: High Court Rulings Undermine Human Rights
Recent decisions by Israel’s high court aim to legitimize clear violations of Israel’s international legal obligations. In one decision, the court disregarded international law prohibiting discrimination, and in another, it ignored international law on the use of resources in an occupied territory. Israel should annul a law preventing Israeli citizens from living with their Palestinian spouses and end policies that permit private Israeli companies to strip rocks and other construction materials from quarries in the occupied West Bank for their own economic gain.
link to www.hrw.org

The Israeli Supreme Court’s Decision in the Citizenship Law Case HCJ 466/07, MK Zahava Galon v. The Attorney General, et al.
Raneen, a thirty-six-year-old Palestinian citizen of Israel, is married to thirty-nine-year-old Hatem, a Palestinian from the West Bank. They have been living together in the north of Israel since getting married in 1999, and have three children. They lead a normal family life, with one glaring exception: Hatem has only a temporary residency permit that allows him to stay in Israel for one year. The Interior Ministry has total discretion over whether or not to issue and renew his permit. When Hatem’s current permit expires, he may not be granted another. In such case he may be forced to separate from his family. This is the harsh reality created by Israel’s Citizenship and Entry into Israel Law.
link to www.jadaliyya.com

Racism Report: Africans in Israel, Adam Horowitz
This report demonstrates that Israel continues to ignore its international obligations towards asylum seekers and refugees and that various laws, policies and practices are racially discriminatory at their basis against this vulnerable population.
http://mondoweiss.net/2012/02/racism-report-africans-in-israel.html

African refugees struggle to survive in Israel
Who are the Eritrean and Sudanese refugees that will be effected by Israel's Prevention of Infiltration Law, which passed last month? What did they face in their home countries and what do they struggle with now?
link to www.alternativenews.org

 

Senior sources: 'Evidence indicates Netanyahu's bureau chief harassed subordinate'

Testimony provided to Civil Service Commission investigators thus far appears to provide a solid evidentiary basis for the allegation that Natan Eshel, the prime minister's bureau chief, sexually harassed a subordinate named R. for a lengthy period, officials familiar with the investigation said on Wednesday.

link to www.haaretz.com 

Political Developments / Diplomacy / Other News

Israel asks U.S. to prod Palestinians to continue peace talks

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday asked U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to press Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to continue the talks with Israel that began last month in Amman. The Prime Minister's Office said that the conversation with Clinton lasted 45 minutes, and quoted Netanyahu as saying, "Israel is interested in continuous talks with the Palestinians while preserving the security interests of Israeli citizens."

link to www.haaretz.com 

Abbas: “We Seek Real, Comprehensive Peace”
On Wednesday evening, Palestinian President, Mahmoud Abbas, stated during a press conference, held in Ramallah, with the United Nations Secretary-General, Ban ki-moon, that the Palestinian leadership seeks a comprehensive peace agreement with Israel, but will not accept to hold talks while Tel Aviv continues its settlement activities in the occupied territories.
link to www.imemc.org

Mishaal-Abbas meeting postponed
The meeting between political bureau chairman of Hamas Khaled Mishaal and PA chief and Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas was postponed to an indefinite date.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

Resheq: Closure of my Facebook page “arbitrary”
Political bureau member of Hamas Ezzet Al-Resheq has lashed out at the Facebook administration for closing his personal page on the social network.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

 

Turkey PM accuses American Jewish writer of double standards on Israel
Erdogan's comment comes in response to novelist Paul Auster's refusal to visit Turkey in protest of the jailing of journalists.
link to www.haaretz.com

 

Maghreb Islamists and Israel: Worrisome Signs

Ghannouchi’s statement on Voice of Israel radio, in which he said that “the future of Tunisian-Israeli relations is dependent on solving the Palestinian cause,” is still subject to both confirmations and denials.

link to english.al-akhbar.com 

Bahrain

Bahraini Regime Forces Kill Two Elders in Tear Gas Attack
Bahraini regime forces fired poisonous tear gas, killing two elderly protesters in two separate attacks.
link to www.almanar.com.lb

Bahraini detainees on hunger strike to protest torture
A leading Bahraini activist has disputed claims by the country's interior ministry that the hunger strikes in the country's jails are subsiding. On Sunday 14 leading political prisoners began refusing food after reporting systematic abuses in Bahrain’s jails, including beatings, torture and the use of tear gas. Since then the number of confirmed strikers had risen to nearly 200, with detainees demanding fair access to legal proceedings and respect for human rights.
link to english.al-akhbar.com

Iraq

Al-Qaida claims attack on Iraqi government center (AP)
AP - An al-Qaida front group in Iraq claimed responsibility for a bloody attack on a government compound in the Islamist militants' former stronghold west of Baghdad last month and vowed more attacks on the Shiite-led government as it tries to make up with its Sunni-backed members.
link to us.rd.yahoo.com

Hashemi Guards Arrested As Iraqiya Returns to Parliament
As Iraqiya lawmakers returned to parliament today, the Interior Ministry announced the arrest of 16 Hashemi bodyguards they have connected to terrorist acts. Fortunately, reports of violence were light today. At least two Iraqis were killed and 13 more were wounded across the country.
link to original.antiwar.com

Iraq to host Arab summit on March 29
The Iraqi capital is to host the next regular Arab summit on March 29, the Arab League assistant secretary general, Ahmed ben Hilli, announced on Wednesday in Baghdad.
link to english.alarabiya.net

Iraq executes 17 after U.N. rebuke (Reuters)
Reuters - Iraq executed 17 people on Wednesday, days after U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay criticized Baghdad for carrying out a large number of executions and questioned the fairness of its judicial proceedings.
link to us.rd.yahoo.com

Why we should be furious the Haditha massacre Marines got no jail time, Roqayah Chamseddine
Orwellian-style agitprop; this best describes the latest article written by James Joyner for The Atlantic on the Haditha massacre, which refers to the event in which 24 unarmed Iraqi men, women and children were killed by a group of United States Marines in 2005 in the city of Haditha, in the western Iraqi province of Al Anbar.
http://mondoweiss.net/2012/01/why-we-should-be-furious-the-haditha-massacre-marines-got-no-jail-time.html

Iran

 

Senate begins another Iran sanctions push, targets Ahmadinejad and Khamenei

On Thursday, the Senate Banking Committee will officially start work on a new sanctions bill against Iran, and senators are set to add even more sanctions to the bill as it goes through the legislative process -- including measures that directly target President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

link to thecable.foreignpolicy.com

Iran doubles defense budget amid rising tensions
Iran plans to more than double military spending over the coming 12 months, according to an annual budget proposal by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad presented to parliament on Thursday. "In the area of defense, there is a 127 percent increase," Ahmadinejad said in his statement to lawmakers. Iran's official defense budget for the current fiscal year – which ends in mid-March – is around US$12 billion, on top of which parliament has authorized a US$3 billion extension.
link to english.al-akhbar.com

 

This is terrorism: Israel sets up elite command unit to strike behind `enemy` lines
Kim Sengupta - The Independent - "The unit, headed by Major General Shai Avital, a former head of an elite reconnaissance squad, was ordered by the head of Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) to focus on undercover work."
link to www.independent.co.uk

Iranian nuclear bomb a matter of political will: US spy chief
Iran is keeping open its option to develop a nuclear weapon, but US intelligence agencies do not know whether it will eventually decide to build one, the US intelligence chief said on Tuesday. New US sanctions imposed over Iran's nuclear program were likely to have a greater impact than previous ones, but were not expected to lead to the downfall of Tehran's leadership, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said in prepared testimony on the annual worldwide threat assessment for the Senate intelligence committee.
link to english.al-akhbar.com

Dempsey Told Israelis US Won’t Join Their War on Iran, Gareth Porter
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Martin Dempsey told Israeli leaders Jan. 20 that the United States would not participate in a war against Iran begun by Israel without prior agreement from Washington, according to accounts from well-placed senior military officers.Dempsey’s warning, conveyed to both Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israeli Defense Minister [...]
link to original.antiwar.com

No Exit in the Persian Gulf?, Tom Engelhardt
When it comes to U.S. policy toward Iran, irony is the name of the game. Where to begin? The increasingly fierce sanctions that the Obama administration is seeking to impose on that country’s oil business will undoubtedly cause further problems for its economy and further pain to ordinary Iranians.
link to original.antiwar.com

The Sound of One Hand Clapping:The U.S. Tries Too Hard to Fear-Monger about Iran, Nima Shirazi
With Defense Secretary Leon Panetta's recent admission, alongside Israel's similar, near simultaneous, acknowledgement, that Iran is indeed not - I repeat, NOT - building nuclear weapons and has not even made any decision to do so, it seems certain sectors are doing their best to keep those war drums beating and public hysteria over Iran at a fever-pitch.  The fact that Clapper - a longtime favored colleague of Robert Gates - would use the bogus Saudi-Mexican-Iranian-Used Car Dealer assassination plot to reach the conclusion that Iranian leaders "have changed their calculus and are now more willing to conduct an attack in the United States in response to real or perceived U.S. actions that threaten the regime" is not only absurd but dangerous.
link to www.wideasleepinamerica.com
 

Syria

UN debates removal of Syrian president
Security Council convenes in New York over draft resolution calling for Bashar al-Assad to hand power to deputy.
link to www.aljazeera.com

 

Russian holds firm against military intervention in Syria
U.N. diplomats say they have made progress on a Security Council resolution, but challenges remain. About 70 more deaths are reported in Syria. As diplomats attempted to craft a compromise, Russia remained firm Wednesday in its pledge to veto any U.N. Security Council resolution that could open the door for international military intervention in Syria.

http://feeds.latimes.com/~r/latimes/middleeast/~3/i0lNCQ4JzzM/la-fg-syria-violence-20120202,0,1368187.story

Russia official says Moscow will not stop sale of weapons to Syria
Moscow has been one of Syria's most powerful allies - along with Iran - as Syria tries to crush the revolt against President Bashar Assad.

link to www.haaretz.com

Iran Warns Citizens to Avoid Bus Trips to Syria
The warning came after Iran’s government confirmed reports that 11 Iranian citizens, whom it described as pilgrims, had been kidnapped last week while visiting Syria.

link to feeds.nytimes.com

The Lede Blog: Video of Heavy Street Fighting in Syria

A video opened a view on the pitched battles raging between Syrian government soldiers and rebel forces.
link to feeds.nytimes.com

Fears of Syrian civil war grow as violence escalates
Violence in Syria appears to be worsening with at least 31 people killed on Wednesday in clashes between the Syrian army and rebels, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. The bloodiest battle took place in the al-Safsafa neighborhood of Homs, with 15 regular soldiers and eight civilians reportedly killed, according to the UK-based Observatory. Six rebel fighters were also said to have been killed in clashes in the town of Wadi Bardi on the outskirts of Damascus.
link to english.al-akhbar.com

 

Aleppo Energy Crisis: Running Out of Patience

A severe shortage of oil and petroleum products has brought Syria’s political and security crisis home to Aleppo, the country’s second largest city and economic powerhouse.

link to english.al-akhbar.com

Other Mideast News

Saudi Arabia: Christians Arrested at Private Prayer
Thirty five Ethiopian Christians are awaiting deportation from Saudi Arabia for “illicit mingling,” after police arrested them when they raided a private prayer gathering in Jeddah in mid-December, 2011. Of those arrested, 29 were women. They were subjected to arbitrary body cavity searches in custody, three of the Ethiopians told Human Rights Watch.
link to www.hrw.org

 

Hariri Alliance: Paper Plans to Nowhere?

Ahead of the annual rally to commemorate the assassination of former Lebanese PM Rafik Hariri, Lebanon’s March 14 alliance is busy drawing up plans for a comeback after being forced from government last year. The parties and politicians who make up the March 14 coalition have been preoccupied with the business of producing documents. After the experience of the past seven years, the current opposition is finding that the best course of political action often involves gathering their thoughts and recording them on paper.

link to english.al-akhbar.com 

 

Analysis / Op-ed

How the Occupation Became Legal
Eyal Press - The New York Review of Books - Surprisingly little is known about the legal apparatus that has enabled and structured the occupation. Filmed in nine days but based on years of archival research, The Law in These Parts aims to expose it. Even before the 1967 Six-Day War, the film reveals, officers in the army’s legal corps drew up guidelines for a separate system of laws that could be applied to territory under IDF control, rules they were convinced could strike a balance between order and justice.
link to www.kibush.co.il

The nonchalant, flippant, and nostalgic judges who put the occupation on legal footing, Scott Roth
I was fortunate enough to see “The Law in These Parts”, by Ra’anan Alexandrovicz at The Sundance Film Festival. It was, to put it mildly, a searing indictment of Israeli behavior on several fronts. The film sets out to examine how the legal groundwork (under Israeli law) for the occupation was conceived and put into practical use. The revelations aren’t pretty.
http://mondoweiss.net/2012/01/the-nonchalant-flippant-and-nostalgic-judges-who-put-the-occupation-on-legal-footing.html

The BBC censors the word "Palestine"
This press release from the Palestine Campaign beggars belief... PRESS RELEASE: for immediate release: 31st January 2012 * *BBC Trust rules in favour of censoring ‘Palestine’ The BBC has admitted it was ‘overcautious’ in editing the word ‘Palestine’ from an artist’s performance on Radio 1Xtra and has said it is ‘looking to learn’ from the way it handled the situation. However, in a ruling released today (31/01/12), the BBC Trust said the final content that was broadcast on the Charlie Sloth Hip Hop M1X – a music programme – was not biased and therefore did not breach its editorial guidelines.
link to www.arabist.net

The BBC Censors its own Report on Tunisia’s Jews Saying “No” to Israel, Alan Hart
There was a moment in a report from Tunisia by the BBC’s Wyre Davies when I could not stop myself laughing. I was listening to it on the Corporation’s generally excellent World Service radio. (In my view this particular BBC service is generally excellent because unlike all other BBC news and current affairs outlets, radio and tv, it often reflects some of the truth about what is happening in and over Palestine that became Israel).
link to dissidentvoice.org

Romney’s battle in FL was to show Adelson he is OK on Israel –TNR, Philip Weiss
Your Israel lobby at work. Noam Scheiber reports at the New Republic that Romney's big goal in Florida was to convince Sheldon Adelson to drop Newt (whom he and his wife have given $10 million) and come over to his side. So Sheldon Adelson is the prize. I remind you that Adelson has said all he cares about is being a good citizen of Israel, he regrets wearing the American uniform, and he wants the U.S. to attack Iran because of his fears for Israel.
http://mondoweiss.net/2012/02/romneys-battle-in-fl-was-to-show-adelson-he-is-ok-on-israel-tnr.html

Media Tell State Department: The Emperor Has No Clothes
When it comes to the so-called Israeli-Palestinian "peace process," the State Department daily press briefings have truly degenerated into a farce in which the mainstream media refuses to believe any longer.  Take, for example, yesterday's briefing, during which a succession of members of the media poked holes in the logic of the United States saying for the umpteenth time that Israeli settlement activity is "unhelpful" yet refusing to even consider any "consequences" for Israel's repeated and flagrant disregard of U.S. policy concerns.
link to blog.endtheoccupation.org

AIPAC met quietly with Dem thinktank to deplore writings critical of Israel, and took its leaders to Israel, Philip Weiss
Ron Kampeas has a good wrapup report on the CAP bloggers affair, the writers at the Democratic-Party-linked thinktank who were targeted by a smear campaign because they were critical of Israel. Kampeas concludes that the public attack on the writers was so over-the-top that it hurt the accuser, Josh Block, an Israel lobbyist formerly with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).
http://mondoweiss.net/2012/02/aipac-met-quietly-with-dem-thinktank-to-deplore-writings-critical-of-israel-and-took-its-leaders-to-israel.html

How Congress is crushing Palestine
Laila El-Haddad - Gaza Mom - "Congress’s policies aimed at, what exactly? Punishing the PA for its statehood bid? For attempting to reconcile with Hamas? Or simply in deference to Israel, their masters?"
http://www.gazamom.com/

Mossad chief held secret talks in DC with top U.S. officials, Annie Robbins
The Senate Select Committee on Intelligence met yesterday for the annual Worldwide Threat Assessment. And it was broadcast live. Haaretz reports "cursory comments" made by Senator Dianne Feinstein and General David Petraeus indicate they recently met with Mossad chief Tamir Pardo in Washington.
http://mondoweiss.net/2012/02/mossad-chief-held-secret-talks-in-dc-with-top-u-s-officials.html

Is Israel a failed state? asks ‘American Conservative’, Philip Weiss
The American Conservative is fabulous. It has a piece on Israel as a failed state, by Noah Millman. It is broaching a question that the New York Times and Washington Post will get around to in another five years, I guess. Millman observes that Palestinians have never reconciled themselves to the idea of a Jewish state-- and gosh, doesn't their opinion matter?
http://mondoweiss.net/2012/02/is-israel-a-failed-state-asks-american-conservative.html

In ’07, Gingrich blamed Israel for Palestinian conditions, Philip Weiss
Seems like both Barack Obama and Newt Gingrich have moved relentlessly right on the Palestinian issue. (Yes, and why?) Here's some more data. Tablet's Jacob Sugarman reports that one of Obama's rabbis on Israel/Palestine issue is, god help us, Ed Koch:
http://mondoweiss.net/2012/01/in-07-gingrich-blamed-israel-for-palestinian-conditions.html

New Texts Out Now: Ben White, Palestinians in Israel: Segregation, Discrimination and Democracy
Ben White: I wanted to write something that would accessibly describe the policies of segregation and discrimination that Palestinian citizens in Israel have experienced since 1948. Many people, even those who are engaged with Palestine/Israel to some extent, are unaware of the ways in which the Palestinian minority has been systematically marginalized in ways that go far beyond the “complaints of inequality” that surface in the mainstream media on occasion. This is more than popular prejudice; we are talking systematic discrimination in key areas of state policy such as immigration, citizenship, housing, planning, and budgets. So, for example, since 1948, over seven hundred Jewish communities have been established in Israel’s pre-1967 borders (that is, not including West Bank settlements). Yet in the same period, not one new city, town, or village for the Palestinian minority has been created, with the exception of seven townships made for forcibly displaced Bedouin in the Negev. The state’s approach towards its own citizens mirrors the pattern we see in the occupied West Bank: Jewish housing and construction is privileged in parallel with Palestinian housing and land ownership being targeted for demolitions, bureaucratic obstacles, and fragmentation.
link to www.jadaliyya.com

Is Israel on the Road to “Self-destruction”?, Alan Hart
One very well informed and courageous Israeli who thinks the answer is “Yes” is Merav Michaeli, a radio and television presenter who also writes for Ha’aretz. She is completely without fear when it comes to telling it like it is. On 2 January this year, for example, she wrote: “The Israeli government doesn’t want peace. There’s nothing new in that. It has been the proven way since the establishment of the state.”
link to dissidentvoice.org

Grandstanding and Betrayal -- Shalita Camp, Lebanon
In the US, it would be a difficult task to find even more revolting and groveling intellectual “half-men” to borrow a phrase from Syria’s beleaguered President Bashar Assad than Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich during their recent “debate” in Jacksonville Florida. While a high percentage of Republican Jewish voters will go to the polls in this winner-take-all primary, Mitt and Newt are also pondering their national fundraising networks as they gratuitously misrepresented history and betrayed their claimed religious and moral beliefs. Romney repeated his screed that President Obama “threw Israel under the bus” by following international law, seven UN Security Council Resolutions and world opinion by designating the pre-1967 borders as the starting point for peace talks. He also complained that America’s President “disrespected” Israel’s Prime Minister Netanyahu when Obama spoke recently at the UN and mentioned in passing illegal Israeli settlement building but did not discuss retaliatory rockets being fired from Gaza into occupied Palestinian territory.
link to www.counterpunch.org

New documentary presents shallow view of Arafat, Sarah Irving
A new documentary on Yasser Arafat accesses big-name Palestinian figures but wastes an opportunity to provide an in-depth look at the late leader.
link to electronicintifada.net

In interview of Muslim Brotherhood leader, NPR repeatedly asks about Israel’s security, Philip Weiss
I'm a fan of the anthropological term "culturally-bound." I think everyone is culturally-bound, and everyone has an obligation to struggle against the bindings. Though yes I tend to focus here on privileged Americans like myself. Well, last week Robert Siegel of National Public Radio interviewed Amr Darrag, a leader of a Muslim Brotherhood-aligned political party in Egypt, about policies favored by Islamists. And you should read his last eight questions below-- but Siegel seemed to me to be culturally-bound in his nagging apprehension about Israeli security and his concerns about the role of women in Egypt.
http://mondoweiss.net/2012/01/in-interview-of-muslim-brotherhood-leader-npr-repeatedly-asks-about-israels-security.html

Why American 'democracy promotion' rings hollow in the Middle East, Mark Weisbrot
Egypt's crackdown on Republican and Democratic organisations is hardly surprising: they're widely seen as stooges of US empire. I have to laugh when I see the International Republican Institute (IRI) described by the international media as an "organization that promotes democracy" (in this case, on NPR). The IRI is in the news lately because Egypt's military government has put some of its members on a "no-fly" list and thereby trapped them in the country, facing investigation and possible trial. I am wondering just how credulous these journalists and editors are: if I were to describe the Center for Economic and Policy Research as "a magical organization that transforms scrap metal into gold", would that become CEPR's standard description in the news?
link to www.guardian.co.uk

Ikhras Shoe Of The Month Award Winner – January 2012
Ikhras is pleased to announce the winner of the Muntadhar Zaidi Shoe of the Month Award for this January, 2012 is Imam Feisal Abdul-Rauf.  Speaking during his visit to occupied Palestine Feisal Abdul Rauf,  a self-declared supporter of Israel,  called on Muslims world wide to follow in his own foot steps and take a pilgrimage to the Zionist entity.
link to ikhras.com
 

www.TheHeadlines.Org

Tadamun: Israel detained student because of his graduate project
The international Tadamun society for human rights said the Israeli occupation forces detained about one month ago a university student from Tulkarem city because of his graduate research project.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk

www.TheHeadlines.Org

A new era. Years ago, I used to feel what it means to have a big brother. Nowadays, I no longer feel it. My brother is dead. I don’t know how my younger brothers perceive me. Senseless: Life goes on.

I am not who I am. Someone else lives inside me, permanently, forcibly. All I do is wait. An internal voice is resonating: O, nature, why did you create me Gazan. I protest. No one cares. I waste time.

Electricity goes off 16 hours a day. Israel claimed the life of the main line supplying Gaza with electricity the moment it claimed the life of a police officer, who probably left his family behind and promised to return back again. The next day, electricity got back temporarily, but he didn’t. We, Palestinians, are used to this very word: temporality. We left homeland behind to get back within weeks, but have not made it back home since then.

We are in desperate need of a savoir. No, we are not. Physician heals thyself first! We have to bear the responsibility for being here, on our own land. Had we left it for them decades ago, they would have lived peacefully without having people reminding them of the fact that this piece of land belongs to another nation. The bride was already married.

Today, I am here. I know no place, but this. No love, but this. No flag, but this. No ID and tear, but ours. We are being sued for a crime that we have never committed. We heard about it in the news, just like others.

Do they live like us? Do they cry? Do they make love behind the walls just like us? Are pupils taught 1+2 equals 3? Do they use Capital Letters? Do they have names? Do they complain? Or is their life just fine?

Wrapped in white shrouds, draped with Palestine’s flags, the dead were buried peacefully. A new day begins in Gaza.

I don’t want to end it this way. Boring.

This does not make sense. I’ll go to do something else rather than writing.

(Cross posted on Yousef Aljamal's blog He who is brave is free)