January '08 Archive

January '08 Archive

1/31/2008 - Gaza militant killed near Rafah Israeli troops have killed an armed Palestinian in the southern Gaza Strip, near the border fence east of Rafah.

1/31/2008 - Gaza blockade amounts to collective punishment: HRW Israel's blockade of Gaza denies 1.4 million Palestinians the food, fuel and medicine they need to survive, Human Rights Watch said on Thursday, calling it collective punishment and a violation of international law.

1/31/2008 - The Israeli army attacks a Palestinian village near Nablus and kidnaps four civilians

1/31/2008 - Egypt tightens Gaza border gaps Egyptian forces have begun to prevent Palestinian vehicles from crossing sections of its Gaza border which were destroyed by Hamas militants last week.

1/31/2008 - Your portfolio: Eddie Gerald BBC News website reader, Eddie Gerald, took these pictures of a Palestinian family living in a cave at Mufakara in the hills south a of Hebron in the West Bank.

1/31/2008 - PLO envoy raps Lantos on 'insult' The PLO envoy to Washington accused a top congressman of insulting the Palestinian people.

1/31/2008 - UAE to rush urgent humanitarian assistance to Gaza The UAE Red Crescent Authority (RCA) will rush urgent humanitarian assistance to Palestinian population affected by current events in Gaza Strip

1/31/2008 - Hamas accuses Abbas of blocking reopening Rafah crossing

1/31/2008 - A fight for life in a power struggle Paralysed in a car crash, Maher al Aseli relies on an electric respirator to breathe. So, every time the power supply is cut, it is up to his family to man the pump to keep him alive

1/31/2008 - Israel repels Gaza suicide attack An attempted suicide attack Thursday on an Israeli military post in southern Gaza was repelled by Israeli soldiers who killed a militant, the army said.

1/31/2008 - Snow covers Jerusalem for second night Jerusalem, some of northern Israel and hilly areas in the occupied West Bank were covered in a blanket of snow for the second day in a row on Thursday and many cars stayed off roads due to hazardous driving conditions.

1/31/2008 - The army attack Jenin city and nearby village, troops kidnaps 6 family members of resistance men

1/31/2008 - Islamic Jihad urges Hamas, Fatah to start dialogue

1/31/2008 - Hamas says Israeli report encourages it to continue resistance "The results of the report should push us to continue abiding by our right of using all forms of resistance against the Israeli aggression on our people,"

1/31/2008 - High court allows power, fuel cuts to Gaza

1/31/2008 - Hamas says it wants to disconnect economically from Israel In an interview with the Palestinian news agency Maan, Ahmed Yousef, a former advisor to Hamas leader Ismail Haniya, said the move would include trying to reroute goods, including fuel supplies, to Gaza through Egypt.

1/31/2008 - The state of Gaza should shame us all By Barbara Stocking, Director of Oxfam

1/31/2008 - Egypt preventing Gaza car traffic from entering, pedestrians still allowed in ŤI only wanted to go fill up my canisters, I don't want to go back to Gaza without gas,ť

1/31/2008 - Jewish group begins new construction in East Jerusalem

1/31/2008 - Gaza's greenhouses become hot property in Egypt Gazans are busy dismantling greenhouses to sell in Egypt because it had been nearly impossible to export produce recently, he said.

1/31/2008 - Sick detainees hospitalized in Al Ramala, face deteriorating conditions

1/31/2008 - Orlev: Try Arab MKs who attended Habash's funeral

1/31/2008 - Congress members back Israel on rockets Two Democrats and two Republicans introduced a congressional resolution condemning rocket attacks on Israel.

1/31/2008 - Israel sowing the seeds of vengeance How can denying food access to over one million people who live on less than $2 per day possibly contribute to the safety of Israeli citizens? Great letter.

1/31/2008 - Frantic search saved child in closet Mohammed said the family moved to Edmonton because he heard the economy was doing well and he wanted to bring up his younger children in a safer environment than Gaza.

1/31/2008 - Jewish Defence League of Canada to Confront Terror Support Groups Since the Jewish Defence Leagues' recent revival, we have taken the position of being the sentinel of anti-Semitic and anti-Israeli attacks. LOL @ the irony. In America, the JDL is listed as a terrorist organization. Rightly so.

1/31/2008 - Day in pictures A Palestinian man looks nervously at Egyptian security forces as he takes cheese snacks back to Gaza after a shopping trip across the breached border.

1/31/2008 - Row looms over minister's Gaza comment Koenders said on Wednesday that Israel is guilty of collectively punishing the inhabitants of Gaza and says this contravenes international law. His comments followed a meeting with the head of the UN's Palestinian aid organisation UNWRA

1/31/2008 - Orthodox Jews to Join Other Arab Organizations in Protest Against the AIPAC (American Israel Public Affairs Committee) Annual Dinner, and Against the Recent Atrocities in GAZA

1/31/2008 - Islamic Relief Society in the Negev continues collecting support to the Gaza Strip

1/31/2008 - Palestinians: Settler hit teen over snowball Palestinian sources in the West Bank city of Hebron said Thursday that a Jewish settler assualted a local teen who he claimed threw a snowball at him.

1/31/2008 - Palestinian festival sparks controversy A Belgian government Web site has begun advertising a performance of Palestinian clowns that conveys "the real life of Palestinians separated from their water, their land, their history and their relatives by the wall of segregation."

1/31/2008 - A Hamas hardliner

1/31/2008 - Our sympathies lie with Gaza Israeli newspapers have criticized him and demanded his punishment by the FIFA, while the Palestinian minister of sports and youth has applauded him, and sent an official note to his Egyptian counterpart thanking him. He also requested his gratitude and that of the people of Palestine be delivered to the Egyptian star.

1/31/2008 - First group of Palestinian tourists to visit Sri Lanka

1/31/2008 - Keeping it fair and balanced at the Los Angeles Times we publish writers from Alan Dershowitz and Natan Sharansky on one side, and Edward Said and Khaled Mashal from Hamas on the other. These are important issues, complicated issues, life-and-death issues.

1/31/2008 - Grim reality in Gaza

1/31/2008 - Postcard: Gaza the breach was a chance to complete all manner of desperate errands. A Gaza waiter named Maher Sheikha carried his 12-year-old son Femeh through the mob, balanced across the destroyed metal fence and then climbed through barbed-wire tangles. Femeh was dying of a blood disease, and the only chance of recovery was rushing him to a Cairo hospital.

1/31/2008 - New Rep Announces 'My Name is Rachel Corrie' and 'Pieces'

1/31/2008 - Badu identifies with Palestinian hip-hop "They use (hip-hop) as a form of liberation, as a form of pre-resistance, as a form of therapy," she said.

1/31/2008 - Palestine asks for Russia?s support in Gaza crisis - ambassador

1/31/2008 - Lebanon concerned over Winograd Lebanon voiced concern that Israel may be preparing for a repeat of its 2006 war against Hezbollah.

1/31/2008 - Probe of 2006 War Ignored Civilian Deaths The London-based Amnesty International says the Israeli government-appointed Winograd Commission is "deeply flawed" because it fails to address the issue of war crimes against the civilian population in Lebanon.

1/31/2008 - Lebanon war report 'deeply flawed': Amnesty International Human rights group Amnesty International on Thursday criticised an Israeli report into the 2006 Lebanon war, saying it had failed to address major issues, including war crimes committed by its soldiers.

1/31/2008 - Israel should limit use of cluster bombs: Lebanon war report Israel's commission of inquiry into the 2006 Lebanon war called on the army to limit the use of cluster bombs in an effort to keep down the number of civilian casualties.

1/30/2008 - Two militants killed in northern Gaza Two Palestinian militants were killed and two others wounded on Wednesday in a gun battle with an Israeli army force in the town of Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza Strip, said medics and residents of the town.

1/30/2008 - School life on the West Bank Two Palestinian schools - and the startling problems that they face every day - are the subject of a remarkable new film from EducationGuardian and Teachers TV

1/30/2008 - The Israeli army shells northern Gaza and Palestinian resistance retaliates In Beit Hanoun, local sources said that jet fighters shelled a farm and residential areas, causing damage to property, but no injuries.

1/30/2008 - An urgent call for prayer; Gaza Christians 'desperate'

1/30/2008 - Snow further complicates relief supplies to Gaza Vulnerable refugees in the Gaza Strip could soon be without an important source of protein, as canned meat has not been imported into the enclave in recent days and supplies from the UN agency for Palestine refugees (UNRWA) are about to run out, a UN official who requested anonymity said on 30 January.

1/30/2008 - Islamic Jihad hails Abbas-Hamas dialogue on Rafah terminal crossing Khaled aL-Batch, a senior Jihad Gaza-based leader, said in a statement, faxed to press, that success of such a dialogue is a 'national imperative', in a way that would lead to lifting the siege being imposed on the Palestinian people and setting forth new arrangements for running the Gaza's crossings.

1/30/2008 - Conflicts killed 108 Palestinians, three Israelis, UN says The military conflict between Israel and the Hamas-led Gaza Strip has killed 108 Palestinians and three Israelis in the past month, the United Nations said Wednesday in summing up the explosive situation that has exacerbated a humanitarian crisis in Gaza

1/30/2008 - W. Bank Palestinian authorities announces emergency after bad weather

1/30/2008 - Palestinian woman dies in Gaza due to the Israeli siege imposed on the region

1/30/2008 - UN official cautions that Gaza sanctions will 'punish' vulnerable residents ŤHe noted his concern for the 1.4 million residents of Gaza, including the old, the young and the sick, who are already suffering from the impact of prolonged closure, and said that they should not be punished for the unacceptable actions of militants and extremists,ť

1/30/2008 - Charity makes dreams come true for injured Gazan children

1/30/2008 - Rare snowstorm hits the Middle East "I'm originally from Gaza where snow never falls," said Bothaina Smairi, 28, who was out in Ramallah taking photographs. "The white snow is covering the old world and I feel like I am in a new world where everything is white, clean, and beautiful."

1/30/2008 - Abbas rejects Hamas control over Gaza border

1/30/2008 - One Injured and four kidnapped during Israeli army attack on Jenin

1/30/2008 - Egyptians host Gaza rivals talks

1/30/2008 - Report: Egypt foiled attack on Israel

1/30/2008 - Soldier steals from Palestinians 'because of Gilad Shalit' A Golani fighter who stole NIS 100 (about $27.4) from a Palestinian house in the Gaza Strip explained that he committed the offense "out of anger after seeing a picture of Gilad Shalit. I wanted to buy pizza for my platoon."

1/30/2008 - Bush releases $32 million to the Palestinians President Bush released $32 million for emergency assistance to the Palestinians.

1/30/2008 - Israel's days are numbered - Iran "It has lost its reason to be and will sooner or later fall,'' he said.

1/30/2008 - Hamas rejects international presence on Egypt border

1/30/2008 - Gaza petrol stations boycott Israeli fuel shipments in protest Petrol stations in Gaza on Tuesday refused to receive fuel shipments from Israel except diesel for power plants and the cooking gas.

1/30/2008 - Security Council Loses Credibility Over Iran, Israel For more than 26 years, he pointed out, Israel has been in violation of UNSC resolution 487 which calls upon Israel to "place its nuclear facilities under IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) safeguard." The US does Israel's bidding at the UN (and just about in every other venue as well).

1/30/2008 - Why lovers of Israel should vote for McCain (according to Lieberman) ** He does not believe that talks with Iran will make the difference. Lieberman calls this approach "just naive". You can't expect that "words" will do the trick. The Iranians will react to "strength." And in McCain Lieberman found the "principled leader in time of war" that will not be swayed by public opinion. Whose war is this?

1/30/2008 - Methodist Church Renews Drive For Divestment From Israel Tensions are re-emerging between Jewish organizations and some mainline Protestant churches in the wake of a renewed drive for churches to divest from companies doing business with Israel......Relations with the Presbyterian Church (USA) are also strained, following remarks by church officials criticizing Israel because of the Gaza closure

1/30/2008 - Dire conditions for patients seeking medical treatment outside Gaza On Saturday, 19th January, Munir finally managed to leave Gaza following persistent campaigning on his behalf by numerous human rights organisations. Munir was one of the "lucky" ones. Hundreds and hundreds of other people in similarly critical medical conditions are still waiting, and hoping, to be given permission to leave.

1/30/2008 - Gaza: Israeli "End the Siege" Action at Erez Checkpoint

1/30/2008 - WJC praises Canada on Durban

1/30/2008 - Severed cables disrupt internet Internet services have been disrupted in large parts of the Middle East and India following damage to two undersea cables in the Mediterranean.

1/30/2008 - Israeli court backs Gaza blockade

1/30/2008 - 'Living stones' offer Christian witness in Holy Land

1/30/2008 - A model wears a creation by Palestinian fashion designer Jamal Taslaq part of his Spring-Summer 2008 high-fashion collection

1/30/2008 - Lantos blasts PLO office on Habash Afif Safieh, who heads the Palestine Liberation Organization's Washington office, on Monday described George Habash, who headed the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, as a "great leader" and opened a condolences registry for him.

1/30/2008 - Ad campaign targets rocket attacks The 220 spots by the nonprofit group, which promotes Israel's image in the media, will run on cable news channels and target national opinion leaders during an intense political season. They will be seen only in the Washington-area market.

1/30/2008 - Arab ministers attend anti-terrorism conference Arab interior ministers arrived in Tunisia Wednesday to debate how to cut off funding for extremist networks and improve frontier controls at a two-day conference.

1/30/2008 - Palestinian Territories: cameraman held by Executive Force for two days Reporters Without Borders firmly condemns the arbitrary arrests of journalists in the Gaza Strip by the Executive Force, Hamas? armed wing.

1/30/2008 - Poll: Palestinian majority wants pro-Abbas forces on Gaza crossings

1/30/2008 - Gaza crisis complicates U.S. peace efforts

1/30/2008 - Israel says Libya unworthy of seat on U.N. council During a debate on the Middle East, Libya's U.N. ambassador, Giadalla Ettalhi, angered his Israeli counterpart by accusing the Jewish state of "ethnic cleansing" and rampant human rights violations in the Palestinian territories.

1/30/2008 - Palestinians have little faith in Bush

1/30/2008 - Israel?s war crimes in the Gaza Strip

1/30/2008 - Egyptian president, visiting Iranian parliament speaker agree diplomatic relations soon to be restored Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak and the head of Iran's parliament agreed in an hour long meeting Wednesday that their nations could soon restore diplomatic relations, the visiting Iranian official said. The ties were cut after Cairo signed a peace deal with Israel in 1979.

1/30/2008 - Italy: US dialogue with Iran impossible, says Jewish leader The executive director of the American Jewish Committee, David Harris, said he found it difficult to accept that the US could negotiate with Iran until it halted its nuclear enrichment programme.

1/30/2008 - OSU students hold vigil for deprived Gaza residents

1/30/2008 - Israel probe finds war 'failure' Israel's 2006 war against Hezbollah in Lebanon was a "large and serious" failure, according to an Israeli government-appointed inquiry.

1/30/2008 - Israel to send vaccines to Gaza after border breach Israel will deliver thousands of vaccines for cattle and avian-borne diseases to the Gaza Strip because of fears the recent breach of Gaza's border with Egypt will bring a wave of sickness to the coastal area, Israeli officials said.

1/29/2008 - UN fails to agree Gaza statement Libya wanted language more critical of Israel than the US would accept.

1/29/2008 - Ha'aretz Rates the Candidates by Philip Giraldi The Israeli national interest is clearly not identical to that of the United States, except possibly to AIPAC, but it would be difficult to discern the difference based on the comments being made by American presidential candidates. Indeed, many of the candidates sometimes seem as if they are actually running for office in Israel.

1/29/2008 - Hamas chief discusses renewing talks with Fatah

1/29/2008 - EXTRA: EU calls on Israel to halt "illegal" settlements "The EU considers that settlement building anywhere in the occupied Palestinian Territories is illegal under international law. This includes Israeli settlements in both East Jerusalem and the West Bank,"

1/29/2008 - Egypt tries to seal Gaza border

1/29/2008 - Faeces Change the Face of Gaza The rain has not helped. The sludge has spread, and the stench with it. Starved of timely income and essential supplies, municipal services have all but ceased.

1/29/2008 - The Israeli Authorities destroy part of a Palestinian owned building in Jerusalem Palestinian sources reported that on Monday evening the Israeli Authorities demolished part of a house owned by a Palestinian family located in the northern part of Jerusalem city.

1/29/2008 - Egypt turns back 3000 Palestinians EGYPTIAN authorities have turned back around 3000 Palestinians trying to reach Cairo and other cities after crossing into Sinai from Gaza following a border breach, a security source said overnight.

1/29/2008 - OPT: Palestinians must not be re-imprisoned within the Gaza Strip "The 1.5 million Palestinians who live in the Gaza Strip have been virtually imprisoned there since June, most of them in abject poverty as fuel, food and medicinal supplies run out as a result of the Israeli blockade," said Malcolm Smart, Director of the Middle East and North Africa Programme. "They must not be left to live in the same conditions after the re-closure of the border."

1/29/2008 - Egypt cuts Gaza border crossing points to two

1/29/2008 - UN Security Council won't condemn Israel Sources in Livni's office said that Israel's insistence, backed by the US, was what caused Libya, the Security Council's chair this month, to go back on its demand that the discussion be held.

1/29/2008 - The Israeli army target several West Bank cities and kidnap 6 civilians

1/29/2008 - Israeli troops arrest Jihadist leader

1/29/2008 - 'Soldiers abused Palestinian detainees, took photos on their cell phones' Soldiers in the IDF's Kfir Brigade are suspected of abusing Palestinian detainees in the West Bank and documenting it all on their cell phone cameras, Israel Radio reported Tuesday.

1/29/2008 - Hamas: "P.A security forces arrested eight Hamas members in the West Bank"

1/29/2008 - The Israeli army attack several villages in northern part of the West Bank and kidnaps two civilians

1/29/2008 - Five Palestinians kidnapped from Hebron

1/29/2008 - Palestinians suffer as the world fails Gaza After hesitantly voicing their "concern" over Israel's post-Annapolis decision to expand Jewish settlements throughout East Jerusalem, both the United States and the European Union have lapsed into an embarrassed silence. All the frontrunners in this year's US presidential campaign ? Clinton, Obama, McCain, Giuliani ? have expressed their uncritical support for Israel as they compete for Jewish campaign funding

1/29/2008 - Cisco Announces $10 Million Investment to Support Job Creation and Economic Development in the Palestinian Territories Cisco (NasdaqGS:CSCO - News) today announced an investment of $10 million to seed a sustainable model of job-creation and economic development in the Palestinian Territories. The three-year investment, made in cooperation with the president of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, represents Cisco's continued commitment toward building stronger and healthier global communities through strategic social investments.

1/29/2008 - Arabs, Russians, protest against Israel?s siege over the Gaza Strip Hundreds of Arabs and Russians protested in Moscow on Tuesday against the unjust Israeli siege over the Gaza Strip and demanded the establishment of an independent Palestinian State with Jerusalem as its capital.

1/29/2008 - Palestinian engineer puts Tel Aviv on the right track

1/29/2008 - United Methodists explore divestment proposals Sprecher pointed to a resolution (#312) passed by the 2004 General Conference opposing Israeli settlements in Palestinian land. "This is the current policy of our church," he said. "So how do we make it more than just words?" He stressed that the action against Caterpillar is proposed because the company's bulldozers and other equipment are being used to clear Palestinian land, destroy Palestinian homes and olive groves and help erect the "wall of separation," some of which is on Palestinian land.

1/29/2008 - Passports to progress Israelis and Palestinians alike should join me in taking dual citizenship - for we share one destiny

1/29/2008 - U.S. hearing addresses anti-Semitism Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-N.Y.), the chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives Middle East Subcommittee, convened a hearing last week addressing censorship in the Arab world and how it spurs anti-Semitism. On the Republican side, Rep. Ileana Ros Lehtinen (R-Fla.) introduced a resolution last week calling for the United Nations to take steps to prevent the expression of anti-Semitism at U.N. events.

1/29/2008 - Knesset members want Joseph's Tomb repaired Israeli lawmakers are demanding that the Palestinians repair Joseph's Tomb.......Joseph's Tomb, the West Bank shrine considered to be the burial place of the biblical patriarch, was reduced to rubble as the Israeli army retreated from the area in October 2000.

1/29/2008 - Methodists back call for ending 'siege' The leader of U.S. Methodists endorsed a letter urging Israel to end the "siege" of the Gaza Strip.

1/29/2008 - Obama rejects Palestinian right of return Democratic presidential candidate reaffirms support for Israel, but backs Iran dialogue: Senator Barack Obama presented his views on Israel and the Middle East Monday in a phone conversation with Israeli and Jewish journalists.

1/29/2008 - Smashed border fence costs Gaza's smugglers Tunnel owner Abu Yassin said a customer cancelled a $150,000 job to smuggle 15 tons of medicine into the Gaza Strip on the night Hamas gunmen blasted open the border fence and shoppers streamed into Egypt. Since then, business has been dead

1/29/2008 - Bush says 'time has come' for Israeli-Palestinian peace

1/29/2008 - Gaza diary 4: Rana Elhindi In a bleak final entry, Save the Children worker Rana Elhindi concludes her diary on the current crisis in Gaza for the BBC News website.

1/29/2008 - No way to avoid Hamas now

1/29/2008 - Who is pushing whom into the sea - who is wiping whom off the map? Israel doesn't threaten to 'wipe countries off the map', true. It doesn't threaten - it just does it. It also doesn't threaten to 'annihilate' other nations. It doesn't threaten - it just DOES IT (to Lebanon in 2006's leveling of that nation).

1/29/2008 - Israeli official: Bolton said Rice caved on truce terms to end 2006 Lebanon war

1/29/2008 - US sharply toughens stance toward Syria

1/29/2008 - Russia wants creation of organization for Persian Gulf "A path to peace in the region will be opened when the parties to the conflict begin real negotiations, in which the positions of all parties will be taken into account. If good will is manifested, then important aspects such as the release of occupied territories, the stopping of settlement activities, refugees, and the creation of a Palestinian state, the Jerusalem issue may well be resolved,"

1/29/2008 - Delegation traveling to Middle East over Feb. break Rising to the challenge set forth by former President Jimmy Carter in his speech at Brandeis last January, the students will travel to the West Bank and Israel in an attempt to have a diverse experience and make connections, Kang said.

1/29/2008 - Obama speaks to Jewish voters on Israel Winning over Israel could help the Democratic presidential candidate gain favor with American Jews, who make up large voting blocs in key states like New York and Florida.

1/29/2008 - Students march for blockade issues Students banded together yesterday in efforts to bring attention to the issues facing the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip.

1/28/2008 - Israeli troops kill Palestinian in West Bank The officials said the teenager was shot in his stomach by the troops who were surrounding a building in the city during a search for militants.

1/28/2008 - U.S. lawmakers to attend Arutz-7 confab Four U.S. Congress members are confirmed participants in a settler-affiliated conference in Israel.

1/28/2008 - Border Breach Temporary Boost for Gaza The freedom for Palestinians to move unchecked across Gaza's border with Egypt for the past six days spawned frenzied trading that created tens of thousands of overnight entrepreneurs like Mikdad.

1/28/2008 - Hamas leader Meshaal in Saudi Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal met Saudi officials in Riyadh on Monday as part of a Saudi bid to mediate the return of Gaza, under Israeli blockade, to Palestinian Authority control, Saudi and Palestinian officials said.

1/28/2008 - Egypt wants Abbas forces to control Gaza border Egypt said on Monday it wanted the Palestinian Authority of President Mahmoud Abbas to control the border crossing with the Gaza Strip, excluding Hamas Islamists who have run the territory since June.

1/28/2008 - Abbas gets European and Arab backing Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit endorsed Abbas's proposal to deploy his own, Western-trained forces at the crossing along with the EU monitors, though the presence of neither force was imminent, given Hamas's command on the ground.

1/28/2008 - Palestinians mourn radical Habash

1/28/2008 - Israelis halt Gaza project backed by Tony Blair Mr Blair won public assurances from Israel last November that it would allow the final items needed to complete the Ł8?million project. But subsequent refusals by Israel to allow in enough cement means that all work has stopped.

1/28/2008 - Fatah: Hamas must not have border role

1/28/2008 - Israel allows fuel into Gaza; Palestinian officials say the amount insufficient

1/28/2008 - Arabs say Israel fully responsible for Palestinian crisis in Gaza Arab foreign ministers said Monday that Israel was fully responsibility for the deterioration in the Gaza Strip and demanded the Jewish state immediately lift its blockade, open crossing points and allow humanitarian supplies to reach the people.

1/28/2008 - Supplies run out in Egypt-Gaza border town

1/28/2008 - Bush to Gaza: 'Look what Hamas has brought you' Freedom?

1/28/2008 - Egypt offers more food, medicine for Palestinians in Gaza An Egyptian charity body has sent a convoy of some 50 tons of food and medicine to the Palestinians suffering a humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip, the official MENA news agency reported on Sunday.

1/28/2008 - Olmert postpones talks on Jerusalem The Olmert government is postponing talks with the Palestinians about the future status of Jerusalem.

1/28/2008 - 2 Border Guard officers charged with assault of Palestinian teen A video of the two beating the boy during what was suppose to be a routine patrol in the villages south of the West Bank city of Nablus, was aired on Ynet last March.

1/28/2008 - Troops attack a female detainee while in Tel Aviv to court Palestinian sources reported on Tuesday that Israeli soldiers attacked detainee Woroud Qasim, 20, from the Arab town of Al Teera, as she tried to talk to her brother before the court session in the Central Court in Tel Aviv.

1/28/2008 - Arabs plan strikes, protests in response to Mazuz decision Following Attorney General Menachem Mazuz's decision to close case of October 2000 riots, Arab sector set to embark on protest marches, strike on Friday

1/28/2008 - Palestinian militants reject rockets halt in exchange for fuel supplies

1/28/2008 - None Dare Call It Treason The Israeli connection is what's interesting about this covert operation, because it involves U.S. citizens, high government officials who have been part of an ongoing investigation that dates back to at least 1999, the earliest year mentioned in the AIPAC indictment.

1/28/2008 - Hezbollah demands inquiry into Beirut killings Lebanon's most powerful faction, demanded on Monday to know who was behind shooting that killed six opposition supporters in some of Beirut's worst street violence since the 1975-90 civil war.

1/28/2008 - End 'siege' of Gaza, Israeli activists urge Israeli authorities did not permit the relief aid to reach the Palestinian side.

1/28/2008 - Report: Chief Rabbi says move Gazans to a Palestine in Sinai

1/28/2008 - Aboutrika warned for Gaza protest Egypt midfielder Mohamed Aboutrika has been warned for making a political statement during his team's Africa Cup of Nations match on Saturday.

1/28/2008 - Barak secretly meets Pakistan president Defense Minister Ehud Barak secretly met last week with Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf, Israel's Channel 2 reported Sunday. The two met in Paris and discussed the Iranian nuclear threat and the situation in the Middle East.

1/28/2008 - Israeli Soldiers Bare All In South Hebron Hills The incident was insult to injury as it occurred immediately after settlers from the illegal Israeli settlement outpost of Havat Ma?on, accompanied by Israeli soldiers, pushed the shepherd and his flock off the land.

1/28/2008 - Hebron special update: Gaza, Beit Ummar, and Hebron

1/28/2008 - George Habash

1/28/2008 - Hizbollah criticises Lebanese army over killings Hizbollah, backed by Syria and Iran, and the de facto leader of the opposition against the western-backed government, has demanded an inquiry into the killing of the protesters, almost all opposition members and Shia.

1/28/2008 - Yemen's President Saleh to seek European pressure on Israel

1/28/2008 - Giuliani bolsters Olmert ahead of Winograd Giuliani emphasized security and foreign policy issues when speaking to the Post, strongly defending Israel's actions against Gaza......He also reiterated his insistence that "Iran will not be allowed to become a nuclear-armed power" under a Giuliani administration and that the military option should be kept on the table.

1/28/2008 - Christian Peacemaker Teams Releases Video of Settlers Firing on Palestinian Shepherds in South Hebron Hills

1/28/2008 - US roadmap monitor meets Israeli FM

1/28/2008 - Cabinet okays change in law to reopen British Gas talks The cabinet approved an amendment to the natural gas law on Sunday that would allow it to buy gas from the British Gas Group's reserves off the Gaza coast and from other suppliers to sell to end users.

1/28/2008 - Rebel from a bygone era

1/28/2008 - Terrorism's Christian Godfather When war broke out in 1948, he returned to Lydda. In July, Israeli forces led by Moshe Dayan entered Lydda and its population emptied. Israeli accounts long portrayed the Palestinians as having "fled." But Israeli historian Benny Morris wrote in 1999 that Israeli forces killed at least 250 townspeople, including young men massacred in a mosque. "Immediately after this, with [Israeli Prime Minister] Ben Gurion's authorization, the troops expelled the inhabitants of Lydda and Ramle and drove them toward the [Arab] Legion lines to the east," according to Morris. Two articles in regard to Lydda - this one, and this one. Be sure to listen to the sound bite from the Anglican priest on the CNN website as it mentions the mosque massacre, which CNN decided against putting in the article. The Palestinians were forced out at gunpoint by Israelis/Jewish soldiers during the Lydda/Ramle death march, or as I call it, the Palestinian Trail of Tears.

1/28/2008 - Jerusalem Diary: Monday 28 January "Some people are surviving here," he said, in a voice so quiet that it barely punctured the din of the market. "But most of us are going under."

1/28/2008 - Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief concludes visit to Israel and the OPT I was more than surprised to learn about the subtle differences with regard to indicating religious affiliation on official ID cards. While Israeli citizens' ID cards no longer state the holder's ethnicity, those of Palestinians residents of the oPt do disclose their religion. In my opinion, to indicate the religious affiliation on official ID cards carries a serious risk of abuse, which has to be weighed against the possible reasons for disclosing the holder's religion

1/28/2008 - Sick detainees hospitalized in Al Ramala, face deteriorating conditions

1/28/2008 - The Dershowitz/Berman Primary Dershowitz has devoted his life in recent years to discrediting the careers and reputations of critics of Israel's occupation of the Palestinian territories, slavishly defending Israel against any and all comers, no matter the validity of their point.

1/28/2008 - US supports presence by Abbas forces on Gaza border

1/28/2008 - Arabs battle for citizenship; State unyielding

1/28/2008 - Protests across the US call for an end to Gaza siege Over the weekend, protests were held in a number of US cities and towns calling on Israel to end the imprisonment of 1.5 million Palestinians inside Gaza without access to food, safe water, electricity or medical care.

1/27/2008 - A Palestinian boy pulls an empty cart on the border between Egypt and the Gaza Strip

1/27/2008 - Hamas polices Gaza border with Egypt The small group of Hamas forces appeared to be coordinating efforts to restore order at the border with their Egyptian counterparts, jointly directing traffic and manning checkpoints. Both Hamas and the Egyptians were urging Gaza motorists to go back home.

1/27/2008 - Gazans head home as Egypt chokes off supplies

1/27/2008 - Palestinian factions mourn PFLP founder Hamas leader Ismail Haneya in a statement that "Dr. George Habash spent all his life struggling for the cause of the Palestinian people," adding that Hamas and the deposed government mourn Habash's passing away.

1/27/2008 - A tale of two visitors They speak of their existence as Palestinians with passion. Yet they do not seem angry. And while the men admit their life can be hard and it becomes frustrating, they look to their faith and their work as good Samaritans for strength and guidance......."Freedom - you can taste it, you can feel it ... this is why I'm thankful I'll spend 25 days here with you,"

1/27/2008 - Palestinians rally in West Bank cities to mourn PLFP leader George Habash

1/27/2008 - EU plans to revamp aid for Palestinians to make it fit with government goals The European Union plans to revamp its massive annual aid for Palestinians from next month to make it fit better with the economic reform program of Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad.

1/27/2008 - Beit Ommar under siege

1/27/2008 - News Photo Results for Gaza

1/27/2008 - Iran extends olive branch to Israel and U.S "Iran is not threatening Israel and does not want nuclear weapons." "Israel has nuclear weapons and it is threatening Teheran," he said

1/27/2008 - Christian Palestinian children light candles during a special prayer supporting Gaza people in the Holy Family Latin Church in the West Bank city of Ramallah

1/27/2008 - How To Help Feed and Support Children of The Gaza Strip And West Bank

1/27/2008 - Case closed against police for killing Israeli Arabs in riots during Palestinian uprising

1/27/2008 - Olmert and Abbas fail to shut border

1/27/2008 - Israel will resume Gaza supplies Israel says it will resume regular fuel supplies to Gaza in a week's time. They were stopped 10 days ago due to rocket attacks by Palestinian militants.

1/27/2008 - Teens turning cameras on Sderot Given international attention on the Palestinian plight in Gaza, Israel is searching for ways to stir foreign sympathy for its civilians targeted in the almost daily shelling attacks.

1/27/2008 - Court convicts IDF officer who led troops in W. Bank rampage

1/27/2008 - Giuliani Spends Morning at Synagogue Rudy Giuliani expressed his support for members of Florida?s Jewish community and the state of Israel during a synagogue visit this morning.

1/27/2008 - Shas threatens to quit gov't over Jerusalem Shas' Council of Torah Sages convened Sunday at the home of the party's spiritual leader, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, and announced that Shas would quit the government once negotiations with the Palestinians over the fate of Jerusalem begin

1/27/2008 - The True Miracle of Israel Never in history has a story been so slanted as that of Palestine and Israel. Never has the victim been so squarely blamed for his own misfortunes as the Palestinian. This is not an arrogant counter-narrative to Israel's concoctions. It's a glaring truth that continues to be either ignored or misunderstood.

1/27/2008 - Oscar winner Olympia Dukakis brings her one-woman show to UW-Madison She 's sitting shivah for a little Palestinian girl who her grandson shot, and she 's a Jewish woman.

1/27/2008 - Standing with Israel, but stepping on all other toes The mission statement of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre commits it to "standing with Israel". Its political power was shown last week, when it elicited a letter from Barack Obama urging the US ambassador to the UN to oppose a motion on Gaza unless rocket attacks by Hamas on Israel

1/27/2008 - Seven killed in Beirut violence

1/27/2008 - 20 Arabs suspected of Tanzim arms deals

1/27/2008 - Amal, Hezbollah call for end to Beirut clashes Lebanese Shiite movements Amal and Hezbollah have called on their supporters to leave the streets, after at least seven people were reported killed in clashes with demonstrators in the southern suburbs of Beirut.

1/27/2008 - Bush marks Holocaust remembrance "I was deeply moved by my recent visit to Yad Vashem, Israel's Holocaust museum," Bush said in his statement Sunday, referring to the culmination of his visit to Israel earlier this month

1/26/2008 - Found in Translation by Philip Giraldi if she is to be believed, a treasonous plot to embed moles in American military and nuclear installations and pass sensitive intelligence to Israeli, Pakistani, and Turkish sources was facilitated by figures in the upper echelons of the State and Defense Departments......Edmonds also claims that Grossman was instrumental in seeding Turkish and Israeli Ph.D. students into major American research labs by godfathering visas and enabling security clearances.......She further reports that beginning in 1999, the FBI was investigating senior Pentagon officials who were assisting agents of foreign governments, including Turkey and Israel. Edmonds has not publicly named names at the Pentagon, but a website linked to her appears to be a non-incriminating instrument for identifying suspects without doing so directly. Its ?rogues gallery? includes photos of Richard Perle and Douglas Feith........?If you made public all the information that the FBI have on this case, you will see very high-level people going through criminal trials,? Edmonds told the Times...... Edmonds?s claims that the section was infiltrated by translators who should never have received security clearances and who were deliberately failing to translate incriminating material are supported by the Justice Department inspector general investigation and by an FBI internal investigation, which concluded that she had been fired after making ?valid complaints.?........Edmonds?s revelations have attracted corroboration in the form of anonymous letters apparently written by FBI employees. There have been frequent reports of FBI field agents being frustrated by the premature closure of cases dealing with foreign spying, particularly when those cases involve Israel, and the State Department has frequently intervened to shut down investigations based on ?sensitive foreign diplomatic relations.?.......Curiously, the states-secrets gag order binding Edmonds, while put in place by DOJ in 2002, was not requested by the FBI but by the State Department and Pentagon?which employed individuals she identified as being involved in criminal activities.......It is generally believed that Waxman, a strong supporter of Israel, is nervous about exposing an Israeli lobby role in the corruption that Edmonds describes. Wow.

1/26/2008 - Israel suspects Iranians already working on nuclear warhead Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said, in an interview published Saturday, that Iran is "quite advanced" in its work on atomic weapons and may already be fashioning a nuclear warhead.

1/26/2008 - Palestinian radical founder dies Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has called three days of national mourning

1/26/2008 - Hundred thousands of Yemenis hold demonstration supporting Palestinian people The Capital Sana'a witnessed on Saturday the greatest demonstration of hundreds of thousands of Yemeni people in support to the Palestinian people against the barbarian aggression of Israeli army on Gaza Strip.

1/26/2008 - Egypt watches Gaza traffic go on On Saturday, the governor of the Egyptian border province of North Sinai said that Egypt would continue allowing Palestinians to come across the border, and that it would help them stock up on supplies.

1/26/2008 - Israeli police shoot Palestinian after stabbing Israeli police shot a Palestinian who had stabbed an Israeli border policeman near Jerusalem, Israeli police and ambulance workers said.

1/26/2008 - 2 children die in Gaza after Israel denies them travel approval

1/26/2008 - Gaza's falling wall changes Middle East map for ever For the first time in years Gazans feel free 'Free at last. Free at last. Are we finally free at last?'.....

1/26/2008 - Jordanians protest Gaza siege, call for UN intervention

1/26/2008 - The Israeli army attacks a non-violent protest near Bethlehem On Friday midday the villagers of Al Khader village located near the southern West Bank city of Bethlehem protested today against the illegal Israeli wall being built on the villagers lands.

1/26/2008 - Soldiers attack underage Palestinian detainees during interrogation

1/26/2008 - Houstonians protest Gaza blockade Raw video from the scene

1/26/2008 - Abbas calls on militants to halt Gaza rocket fire In a speech from the presidential headquarters in the West Bank town of Ramallah, Abbas also accused Israel of imposing collective punishment on the Gaza population by barring the transfer of food and medical supplies.

1/26/2008 - Border town united by Gaza border breach After the towering border wall slicing through Rafah was toppled earlier this week, long-separated relatives, friends and even former soccer buddies just had to walk a few yards to embrace and reminisce.

1/26/2008 - Fistfights as Gazans clear Egyptian shelves "Where are the Arab countries that should have sent food aid immediately as soon as they heard the border was open?"

1/26/2008 - Abbas to press Olmert to end Gaza blockade

1/26/2008 - A Palestinian Christian girl with a Palestinian flag painted on her face, prays during a mass service in support of Gaza

1/26/2008 - Gaza families flock across border amid continued chaos Early Saturday, many Egyptian-owned stores were shuttered, with groups of Palestinians gathering outside and pleading with shopkeepers to allow them to purchase food and supplies in anticipation of a more heavy-handed effort to re-seal the border. By nightfall, however, the security presence largely had disappeared, the throngs were back and sidewalk trading was brisk....."They were choking in a prison and now that prison is open," Ibrahim said. "To be honest, it's not just about profit. It makes me feel good to sell to them."

1/26/2008 - Why Bush Wants to Legalize the Nuke Trade with Turkey According to FBI whistleblower Sibel Edmonds, there is a vast black market for nukes, and certain U.S. officials have been supplying sensitive nuclear technology information to Turkish and Israeli interests through its conduits.

1/26/2008 - Rice decries 'foreign interference' after Lebanon bombing

1/26/2008 - Letter: Resist Israel lobbyists The drums for war with Iran are getting louder, and overpowering calls for restraint and negotiation. The only country advocating, in fact demanding, that the United states attack Iran, "regime change" is the euphemism used, is Israel......I cannot stand idly by and watch special interests, such as the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and their neoconservative partners, browbeat our leaders in Congress and the White House into actions that may well result again in Americans' lives being wasted in more unnecessary Mideast wars.

1/26/2008 - Christian Zionists Feel "Betrayed" by Bush's Road Map "Hagee's injection of the charged rhetoric of biblical prophesy into contemporary foreign policy," Posner writes, "has catapulted him to the forefront of an American Christian Zionist movement that has become the darling of conservative Israel hawks in Washington and neoconservatives yearning for regional war in the Middle East."

1/26/2008 - The Long Fuse to the Iraq War He talks about a parallel establishment and "an elite caste," but doesn't do anything to explore the huge pots of money available to the neocons and to politicians who stick by Israel. There is no follow through because all these ideas are close to anti-Semitic "canards," the word the pro-Israel crowd likes to use when anyone tries to address Jewish influence in public life......... If Heilbrunn doesn't believe this, he ought to state why not. As it is the reader is left with the shadowy sense that the neocons have a pro-Israel agenda that they are not upfront about. But it isn't a conspiracy, Heilbrunn warns. The neocons have convinced themselves that the U.S. and Israel have congruent interests.

1/26/2008 - The Biggest Jailbreak in History

1/26/2008 - Time to change direction The prime minister and his people apparently realized that the Israeli public loves to hate Olmert, but it hates the Palestinians even more. The tough position presented by the prime minister vis-ŕ-vis the besieged Gazans instantly turned him into the crowd favorite. The public likes to see its prime minister being indifferent to Palestinian suffering. This trick helped Ariel Sharon in the past, and now it serves Olmert.

1/26/2008 - Dutch Jewish group slams card of Anne Frank in kaffiyeh A Dutch Jewish organization last week condemned the distribution of a postcard showing a manipulated image of Anne Frank wearing a Palestinian kaffiyeh, calling it "a tasteless falsification of history." The company that published the postcard described it as "an idyllic image of peace."

1/26/2008 - Demonstrations "for Gaza and Sderot" on both sides of the fence A convoy of about 100 private cars and 25 buses is currently on its way to the Erez crossing in a demonstration of solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza and the residents of Sderot, under the slogan: "Stop the siege on Gaza: A demonstration for Gaza and for Sderot."

1/26/2008 - Hospitality in a suspicious world Palestinians were generous despite their bleak, constrained lives. Lives which, they were usually too polite to point out, my country was historically, partly responsible for.

1/26/2008 - Middle East peace deal possible this year: Blair

1/26/2008 - This exodus presents us Egyptians with a threat - and an opportunity

1/26/2008 - The Gaza 'tea party' Gaza is the Massachusetts of 2008. The "Intolerable Acts" of 1774 are a child's birthday party compared to the "Intolerable Acts" of 2008, committed by Israel. The Crossing of Rafah is the Port of Boston, 234 years later. We went to war over much much less than what these people have had to suffer - for sixty years.

1/26/2008 - McCain is using support for Israel to court Jews - and Christians

1/26/2008 - The Arab American News: New York activists take on Israeli settlement builder A network of pro-Palestinian organizations in New York is working hard to expose Israeli businessman Lev Leviev?s sponsorship of Israeli settlement construction. The groups have engaged in creative protests and organized boycotts and pressured those linked with Leviev. Their boycott campaign is gaining strong momentum.

1/25/2008 - Israeli air strike kills Hamas commander Mohammed Harb was killed along with one of his lieutenants when an Israeli missile struck their car, medical sources said.

1/25/2008 - Israel kills 4 in Gaza as Egypt begins closing border

1/25/2008 - Israel kills Palestinian in West Bank clash, medics say Witnesses said troops opened fire at local residents who hurled rocks at troops in the village, killing the teenager.

1/25/2008 - Qurea meets EU envoy for Middle East Peace Process, slams settlements, siege

1/25/2008 - Fearing Palestinian unrest, Jerusalem police limit access to Moslem shrine

1/25/2008 - 'Breakout into Israel' ahead A SENIOR Hamas official warned yesterday that the next breakout from the Gaza Strip could be into Israel, with 500,000 Palestinians attempting to march towards the towns and villages from which they or their parents fled or were expelled 60 years ago.

1/25/2008 - Hamas says its members carried out WBank attack Hamas's armed wing said in a statement on Friday that its members were responsible for an infiltration into a West Bank settlement that ended with the death of the two Palestinian militants.

1/25/2008 - US still blocks UNSC vote on Gaza while the new draft makes mention of rockets targeting Israelis, it strengthened its condemnation of Israel, according to officials in the Israeli Mission, who said the current draft was "very bad" for Israel.

1/25/2008 - Israel refuses to rule out retaliatory attack ISRAEL is still considering a large-scale military operation to stop rocket attacks from Gaza, according to defence minister Ehud Barak.

1/25/2008 - Hamas accepts Egypt invitation to meet Fatah

1/25/2008 - Palestinians profit from breach Faced with constant economic challenges and hardships, Gazans are used to using their wiles to keep bread on their tables.

1/25/2008 - Hamas: ?P.A security arrested five Hamas members in the West Bank on Thursday?

1/25/2008 - Israeli cop killed A Palestinian group claimed responsibility for killing an Israeli border guard in a shooting attack near Jerusalem.

1/25/2008 - Hamas challenges Egypt's bid to close Gaza border Egyptian security forces greatly reduced their presence along the breached Gaza border late on Friday after Palestinian militants defied their attempts to seal the gaps by bulldozing a new opening.

1/25/2008 - A Palestinian boy helps his sister as they make their way to Egypt after

1/25/2008 - Gazans scramble to Egypt in supply rush Gazan men heaved sheep and mattresses over a concrete wall at one border point. Young men helped women and the elderly scale the wall to buy food or medicine.

1/25/2008 - Egypt struggles to herd Gazans back to confinement

1/25/2008 - To avoid fence, Jerusalem Arabs are making move to Jewish areas This shift, wrought by the security fence, is profoundly changing the city?s character. In some cases it is prompting Jewish Jerusalemites unhappy with the changes to talk about leaving their neighborhoods or the city entirely......Jerusalem?s Jews seem to have mixed feelings about the changing demographics of their neighborhoods. Jews in some neigborhoods are setting up committees to prevent Arabs from moving in, and some are circulating fliers in synagogues against selling or renting homes to Arabs, according to Israeli media reports. This racism is truly the heart of this conflict; from the beginning the plan has been to be rid of as many Arabs as possible from the region in order to further the defining characteristic of Israel, the Jewish State. All manner of Israeli government policies are put forth (and have been since before the inception of Israel, really) in an effort to achieve this end.

1/25/2008 - Jordanians rally in support of Hamas in Gaza The demonstrators lambasted Arab rulers, without naming them, accusing them of standing idly by as ordinary Gazans suffer and called on Egypt to allow freedom of movement for Palestinians.

1/25/2008 - Israeli-Turkish relations tense as Erdogan says Qassams don't kill Relations between Israel and Turkey have become very tense in the last two days, after Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan claimed that no Israelis have been killed by Qassam missiles, while every Israel Defense Forces attack in the Gaza Strip kills dozens of Palestinians.

1/25/2008 - Security chief assassinated in Lebanon bomb A senior Lebanese police officer and 10 other people were killed this morning when a powerful car bomb exploded in an east Beirut suburb.

1/25/2008 - Shameful denial of Palestine holocaust

1/25/2008 - Neocons Shaken, But Not Deterred While battered, however, neoconservatives have not yet been forced from the field. And while their hopes that President George W. Bush would "take out" Iran's nuclear program before leaving office appear to have diminished substantially, their hawkish voice is still heard loud and clear both in the White House ? courtesy of Vice President Dick Cheney's office and Deputy National Security adviser Elliott Abrams ? and in this year's Republican presidential race, where neoconservative favorites include former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani, Sen. John McCain, and, until earlier this week, Fred Thompson......neoconservatives, both Jew and gentile, are bound by a "shared commitment to the largest, most important Jewish cause: the survival of Israel."

1/25/2008 - Ambassador vs. Ambassador: Is Obama good for Israel? A couple of weeks ago, the Israeli tabloid Maariv ran a leading headline claiming that Israeli officials do not want Obama to be elected. They don't think he will be good for Israel.

1/25/2008 - Blockade can't divide some Israeli, Palestinian friends

1/25/2008 - (By MJ Rosenberg)Gaza: Frozen and dark

1/25/2008 - The enemy within The Chicago Tribune justifies collective punishment by blaming the victims thereof.

1/25/2008 - Gandhi grandson leaves peace center He apologized "for my poorly worded post," saying he shouldn't have implied that Israeli government policies reflected the views of all Jewish people.

1/25/2008 - The agony of Gaza The highly publicized breakout of those Gazans also made it impossible to ignore the collective punishment being imposed on them by Israel's policy of closure and economic blockade. Hard to believe that this came from The Boston Globe.

1/25/2008 - Montreal Palestinians urge Harper to intervene in worsening situation in Gaza

1/25/2008 - Court denies Al-Arian's appeal in contempt case

1/25/2008 - BBC bids to suppress study on Middle East 'bias' In 2006, however, a study for the BBC governors led by Sir Quentin Thomas, the president of the British Board of Film Classification, found that the BBC's coverage of the Israel-Palestine conflict implicitly favoured the Israeli side. It concluded that the deaths of Israelis received greater coverage than Palestinian fatalities and made reference to "identifiable shortcomings".

1/25/2008 - A rough guide to Hebron: The world's strangest guided tour highlights the abuse of Palestinians

1/25/2008 - Candle procession in Kafer Kanna Arab town in solidarity with the Gaza Strip

1/25/2008 - U.S. Arabs protest Israeli blockade of Gaza Friday?s protest outside the offices of Israel?s consulate and U.N. mission was organized by groups including the Arab Muslim American Federation, the National Council of Arab-Americans, the Palestinian American Congress and Jews Against the Occupation.

1/25/2008 - Diplomats: EU foreign ministers to focus on Gaza The European Union's foreign ministers are set to focus on the situation in Gaza when they hold a regular meeting in Brussels on Monday, diplomats said.

1/25/2008 - Interview of Under Secretary Burns and Consul General Walles by Palestinian Media I want to say first of all, how much we support the United Nations and what UNRWA is doing in this camp as it does throughout the West Bank and Gaza, in Syria, in Jordan and in Lebanon. I think we all, members of the United Nations, have a responsibility to support the Palestinian people who are living under occupation and living in such hardship......We will in the next few weeks be providing more money, because we believe in the work that UNRWA is doing and we believe that Palestinian children should be educated. We believe that Palestinians should have dignity.

1/25/2008 - U.S. Jews working toward peace a sign of hope The voices of U.S. Jewish peace groups like Brit Tzedek v'Shalom, of which James and Jack are members, and Jewish Voice for Peace, which calls for an end to the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem, are rarely heard in the U.S. mainstream media.

1/25/2008 - U.N. aide played down attacks on Israel, envoy says Only one of the 15 council members -- the United States -- opposes the Arab draft. A senior U.S. envoy said Washington was unhappy with it because it fails to condemn the "terrorism" against Israel and ignores the causes of the problem.

1/25/2008 - Anderson: Palestine needs our help Israel receives more money than the Caribbean, Latin America and Sub-Saharan Africa combined. By some estimates the U.S. sends $22 million to Israel a day. Pinch this pipeline?even for a moment?and the entire occupation would grind to a halt.

1/25/2008 - Israeli, Palestinian influences in Middle Eastern cooking

1/25/2008 - Circuit judge resigns to do religious work A lifelong Tampa resident, Sierra is giving up her $145,000-a-year job to bring food and Bibles to Palestinian refugee camps in the West Bank.

1/25/2008 - WORLD SOCIAL FORUM: Palestinians in Lebanon Seek Right of Return There will be a demonstration in Jerusalem around the right of return for Palestinian refugees and the Nakba, or 'catastrophe', when they were forced out of the land that became Israel in 1948. Palestinians in Lebanon are some of the worst off -- having been displaced up to five times from fighting and the civil war since then.

1/25/2008 - Israeli Initiative campaign spotlights Palestinian refugee problem The Israeli Initiative said it was due to launch a massive advertising campaign "that seeks to place the solution to the problem of the Palestinian refugees at the center of the political agenda".

1/25/2008 - Panel discusses integration of Arabs citizens in Israeli media

1/25/2008 - Israel-Lebanon war sparks "human" films at Sundance

1/24/2008 - Medics say Israeli strike kills 2 Palestinians in Gaza An Israeli air strike on a car killed at least two Palestinian militants in the southern Gaza town of Rafah on Friday, security officials and medical staff said.

1/24/2008 - Three dead in Mid-East violence Two Palestinians infiltrated a Jewish settlement in the West Bank and attacked students at a seminary before being shot dead, police say.

1/24/2008 - Sick Gazans rush Egypt's chemists Abu Abdullah wanted only one thing when he crossed through the shattered wall into Egypt -- a vaccine for his baby boy that can't be found in the neighbouring Gaza Strip.

1/24/2008 - U.N. Human Rights Council rebukes Israel on Gaza U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour, in a speech on Wednesday, denounced Israel's "disproportionate use of force and targeted killings" as well as the Palestinian militants for firing rockets into Israel. Arbour, a former U.N. war crimes prosecutor, told the forum that international law forbids collective punishment and said Israel should lift all restrictions on aid intended for Gaza.

1/24/2008 - Egypt moves to stem tide of Palestinians breaching border Egyptian riot police attempted to reseal the country's border with Gaza today as Palestinians continued to pour through a smashed wall into north Africa.

1/24/2008 - Kucinich Urges Restoration of Humanitarian Aid to Gaza "Threatening the public health of 1.5 million people is not an effective or lawful means to ensure the security of Israel," Kucinich said. "Collective punishment will not stop the rocket fire; it only creates a questionable "balance" of suffering on both sides of the border.

1/24/2008 - Palestinians protest in Jerusalem, call for ending Gaza siege Dozens of Palestinian residents, and peace activists, held a protest on Thursday evening against the ongoing Israeli siege and attacks against the Palestinian residents in the Gaza Strip. The protest was organized by the Al Aqsa Foundation for Rebuilding Muslim Holy Sites.

1/24/2008 - Palestinian forces enter Jordan under U.S. program

1/24/2008 - GAZA EXODUS TO EGYPT - A 'Blessing in Disguise' for Israel? In Jerusalem the opening of the border with Egypt is even being greeted with some relief. "Cairo now has to solve the humanitarian problem that we have been dealing with until now,"......"The opening of the border relieves us of our responsibility for Gaza," a government official said, "and if the international community demands that the Israeli border with Gaza be opened, we will now point to the Egyptian role."

1/24/2008 - U.S., Israel discuss Iran Senior Bush administration officials are in Israel to discuss countering Iran's nuclear program.

1/24/2008 - Settlers attack a Palestinian house , international observers in Hebron

1/24/2008 - Israel pushes Egyptian responsibility for Gaza Israeli officials proposed that Egypt take over responsibility for supplying the Gaza Strip

1/24/2008 - Egypt jittery at Israeli proposal to disconnect from Gaza The Gaza border crisis caused another sharp flap Thursday in Egyptian-Israeli relations, with Egypt angrily accusing Israel of trying to dump all responsibility for the troubled Gaza Strip in its lap. According to Israeli officials, Israel DID just dump all responsibility for Gaza on to Egypt.

1/24/2008 - Video: Desperate Palestinians burst into Egypt

1/24/2008 - Gaza busts out of its blockade "We want to breathe some new fresh air, the air of freedom," said one woman as she headed toward Egypt with five children in tow. "I don't have much money to buy anything, but I will buy some detergent. My main reason is to just get out to see the other side."

1/24/2008 - Human Rights Council calls on Israel to end Gaza blockade The session opened with a plea by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour urging the Israeli Government to lift all restrictions on supplies into Gaza and pointed out that Israeli action in Gaza amounted to the use of collective punishment.

1/24/2008 - Situation in Gaza and the path to peace Article 33 of the fourth Geneva convention states that "no protected person may be punished for an offence he or she has not personally committed". The British government, as a signatory to the convention, has a responsibility to ensure that it is upheld.

1/24/2008 - US presses Egypt on Gaza border Ms Rice, arriving for talks in Colombia, said she understood Egypt's position, but said: "It is an international border, it needs to be protected and I believe that the Egyptians understand the importance of doing that."

1/24/2008 - Gaza diary 3: Rana Elhindi We have been working with the Coastal Municipalities Water Utility, a water company in Gaza, to map out where the greatest need for water is so that we can work at fast tracking supplies to these areas.

1/24/2008 - Border breach could let Israel cut Gaza link, say officials The deputy defence minister, Matan Vilnai, said the rush of Palestinians across the border - after explosives were used to breach the dividing wall on Wednesday - was an opportunity for Israel to "disconnect" from Gaza. He said Israel wanted to relinquish responsibility for the supply of water, power and medicine to Gaza.

1/24/2008 - In pictures: Gaza border break

1/24/2008 - Undercover Israeli troops invade Bethlehem and Kidnap two Palestinians

1/24/2008 - UN agency aiding Palestinian refugees appeals for funds to Gaza

1/24/2008 - The day Gaza's Berlin Wall came down Finally came crowds and crowds of normal Gazans, men and women, old and young, some on bicycles, a few being pushed in wheelchairs, simply enjoying the rare sensation of freedom.

1/24/2008 - Delegation invites Abbas to Knesset Israeli lawmakers attempting to visit Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah Thursday got an unexpected taste of life at IDF checkpoints when their convoy was denied entrance into the Palestinian territories.

1/24/2008 - Rights court awards 2 Palestinian asylum seekers ¤15,000 for inhumane treatment in Belgium The European Court of Human Rights on Thursday ordered Belgium to pay two Palestinian asylum seekers ¤15,000 (nearly US$22,000) each in damages for inhumane and degrading treatment they suffered while awaiting deportation.

1/24/2008 - The West's Orwellian Monopoly on Morality The US and Israel need a puppet government in Palestine so that a ghettoized remnant of Palestine can be turned into a "two-state solution." The two states will be Israel incorporating the stolen West Bank and a Palestinian ghetto without an economy, water, or contiguous borders.

1/24/2008 - Refugee stories - Letters from Gaza (3) ... no expectations

1/24/2008 - Escape from Gaza or Voluntary Transfer? Here's an excerpt from the Israeli newspaper Arutz Sheva which explains the real motive behind the incident: "MK (Israeli Knesset member) Aryeh Eldad is hailing the Arab exodus to Egypt as proof that voluntary transfer is indeed an option."

1/24/2008 - Actually I'm quite comfy in here Israeli veterinarian Dr. Motke Levinson (left) and Palestinian zookeepers wait for an antelope to come out of its crate at a zoo

1/24/2008 - 'US will continue to buy Israeli goods despite economic slowdown' "I understand the growing fears of Israeli exporters regarding the weakness of the US dollar and uncertainty of the US economy," Donohue said. "But even with a slowdown in the economy, we are still going to buy more Israeli goods than anyone else." Of course we will, it's probably legislated by now.

1/24/2008 - Gaza overlooked by U.S. voters; economy dominates race Americans are still largely clueless as to what Israel is really doing to those people, thanks to the influence of the Israeli lobby on our media.

1/24/2008 - OneVoice spreads its message at York University

1/24/2008 - American Official Visits Bethlehem and meets with UN Representatives

1/24/2008 - US Methodists to unveil proposals for divestment in Caterpillar The Church's social action agency wants the denomination to divest from companies providing products or services used for 'illegal destruction' in Palestinian areas.

1/24/2008 - McCain to U.N.: Condemn Palestinian attacks U.S. Sen. John McCain called on the United Nations to condemn Palestinian rocket attacks against Israel.

1/24/2008 - Alarm for Egypt as Gaza crisis crosses the border Demonstrations in Cairo and elsewhere today were a reminder that Gaza's suffering generates strong feelings.

1/24/2008 - US Officials Rejected Key Source on '94 Argentina Bombing The FBI agent, James Bernazzani, also says Argentine investigators had no real leads on an Iranian link to the bombing when his team was in Argentina. Three top officials in the US Embassy in Buenos Aires at the time ? including Ambassador James Cheek ? have confirmed the absence of evidence linking Iran to the bombing, which killed 85 people and wounded another 300.

1/24/2008 - Bush, Jordan king, discuss Gaza/Egypt issue

1/24/2008 - Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs: Brainwashing the U.S. Military, U.S. police departments and stealing elections

1/24/2008 - Former Ambassador to U.N. Advocates for Israel A staunch advocate of Israel, Bolton served as Assistant Secretary of State in the early 1990s.

1/24/2008 - Israel urges Davos business chiefs to boycott Iran

1/24/2008 - UN seeks 10 million dollars in Gaza aid from Gulf Arabs

1/24/2008 - Olmert: 2006 war with Hezbollah restored Israel's deterrence

1/24/2008 - 4,200 balloons released in NY to protest Qassam fire Israeli consulate organizes display to illustrate ongoing rocket attacks on southern communities

1/23/2008 - Israeli fire kills Palestinian in Gaza: medics Ismail Ahmad al-Attar, 50, was killed by gunfire as he worked in his fields in the northern town of Beit Lahiya near the border with Israel, they said.

1/23/2008 - Jews break down wall, escape the Warsaw Ghetto Play on words. You get the point.

1/23/2008 - UN: Despite Israel's promises, West Bank barriers have increased A United Nations report released Tuesday shows that there has been a six-percent rise in the number of barriers in the West Bank, despite pledges by Israel to reduce this amount

1/23/2008 - Blockaded Gazans pour into Egypt to stock up Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak said he had authorised the crossing of the Palestinians as long as they were unarmed.

1/23/2008 - US speaks to Egypt about its 'concern' over Gaza border

1/23/2008 - A broken society If you bottle up 1.5 million people in a territory 25 miles long and six miles wide, and turn off the lights, as Israel has done in Gaza, the bottle will burst. This is what happened yesterday when tens of thousands of Gazans poured into Egypt to buy food, fuel and supplies after militants destroyed two-thirds of the wall separating the Gaza Strip from Egypt. It was the biggest jail break in history.

1/23/2008 - Hebron UPDATE: Hebron Update: 06-14 January 2008

1/23/2008 - Gaza: man dies of wounds sustained earlier in the week, while navy attacks fishermen

1/23/2008 - Israel: fuel shipment to Gaza to thwart UN Security Council condemnation of Gaza siege

1/23/2008 - US worried about fleeing Palestinians Worried that they might be able to get the basic necessities that they cannot get due to Israel's blockade of Gaza? Worried they might get food? Worried for their wellbeing? F'k no. The US, being Israel's stool pigeon, is worried that they BROKE FREE.

1/23/2008 - Gaza humanitarian, Israel security needs must be balanced: Rice

1/23/2008 - Arab MKs: Israel committing crimes Some 300 representative of the "committee for lifting the blockade on Gaza", including members of Balad and the Islamic Movement, arrived at the Erez crossing and declared that they would try and transfer food to the Palestinian residents.

1/23/2008 - Palestinians urge unity at Damascus meeting

1/23/2008 - Radical Palestinians urge more resistance against Israel Hamas and Syria-based Palestinian radical groups called for stepped up resistance against Israel as they began a three-day "national conference" Wednesday while the Hamas-run Gaza Strip faced a crippling blockade.

1/23/2008 - UN Security Council seeks common ground on Gaza Another diplomat, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said: "It really depends on the United States."

1/23/2008 - Hope blooms for Gaza flower farmer who crossed into Egypt "I'm exporting to Egypt for the first time," he said, standing by dozens of boxes from which poked out his pink, yellow and white blooms.

1/23/2008 - Ecstatic Palestinians Go on Buying Spree Children bought soft drinks and chocolate, women scooped up cheese and cleaning products, and many men stocked up on cigarettes -- all expensive, or simply unavailable in Gaza because of Israel's shutdown of cargo crossings in June, after the Hamas' takeover. This article paints a portrait of what it must've been like for the Jews to escape from the Nazi ghettos.

1/23/2008 - Palestinians' donors conference calls for "further efforts" "Efforts by all parties are required for the economic situation to improve: by donors to fulfill rapidly their commitments, by the Palestinian Authority to ensure prompt and full implementation" of the program "and by Israel to encourage improved movement of goods and persons, which, as highlighted by the IMF and the World Bank, is a prerequisite to a full economic recovery."

1/23/2008 - Palestinian man dies of wounds sustained in Israeli raid - A Palestinian civilian wounded in an Israeli military raid earlier this month died Wednesday, his family said.

1/23/2008 - National Lawyers Guild Deplores Humanitarian Crisis in Gaza Caused by Israeli Blockade and Fuel Cutoff

1/23/2008 - Soldiers kidnap a Palestinian Human rights Activist in Nablus The Ahrar Center for Detainees? Studies reported on Wednesday that Israeli soldiers kidnapped Ahlam Jawhar, a Palestinian woman active in Human Rights, as she was leaving Nablus city through the Huwwara roadblock.

1/23/2008 - Additional flaps with US officials reported at roadblocks American diplomats continued this week to raise the Civil Administration's ire over their continued refusal to open their car doors or windows and present identification when crossing from Israel into the West Bank....."This appears to be a new policy," a senior official said. "What is strange is that only Americans are behaving this way and no one else." They're flipping the bird to you, as only Americans could. :)

1/23/2008 - Hamas calls for urgent meeting on Gaza with Abbas, Egypt

1/23/2008 - Israel to remove largest settler outpost by August

1/23/2008 - The Return of Dick Cheney by Philip Giraldi ** One would have thought that both Israel and the United States, not to mention Mahmoud Abbas, would have finally realized that there is no military solution to Hamas in Gaza, but the newer, more robust attitude is a product of the resurgence of Vice President Dick Cheney and the neocon hawks that surround him. Cheney and his friends are again planning to attack Iran before Bush leaves office.......The resurgence of Cheney and the instability arising from Bush's attempts to reinvigorate the faltering anti-Iran Arab coalition has alarmed several senior members of the American intelligence community who are now backing away from their optimistic assessment that the NIE on Iran ensured the US would not attack Iran.

1/23/2008 - Israelis kidnap the Governor's consultant to religious affairs in Bethlehem

1/23/2008 - Municipality plans 40,000 new J'lem houses The Jerusalem Municipality is planning 40,000 new apartments throughout the city over the next decade, including several thousand flats in various Jewish neighborhoods of east Jerusalem that have already been approved, the city said Tuesday.

1/23/2008 - Livni: Defense trumps reputation Israel's self-defense is more important than finding favor in foreign eyes, its foreign minister said.

1/23/2008 - "Hebron" Is There Peace Now?

1/23/2008 - 61% - U.S. Muslims Optimistic About Israel Six-in-ten Muslim Americans (61%) say that "a way can be found for Israel to exist so that the rights and needs of the Palestinian people can be taken care of," compared with 16% who say that the rights and needs of Palestinians cannot be taken care of as long as Israel exists.

1/23/2008 - Canada snubs UN anti-racism conference Canada's delegation to the 2001 conference issued a statement of reservation on its final declaration, which included a statement of concern for the "plight of Palestinian people under foreign occupation." The document stopped short of directly condemning Israel. Canada falls ever further to the burgeoning Israeli lobby of its own.

1/23/2008 - Muslim scholar appeals US visa refusal The US government has accused Ramadan of giving some 1,670 Swiss francs, (about 1,500 dollars) to a charity supporting the Palestinian people which Washington has blacklisted as being close to Hamas militants.

1/23/2008 - Concern over situation in Gaza "In my view, the measures that the Israeli authorities have now implemented against the people of Gaza are unacceptable, and at the same time counterproductive. Everything seems to indicate that the armed groups are coping well and continue to receive money and weapons, whereas the civilian population is suffering. Their situation is steadily deteriorating,"

1/23/2008 - Pakistan expresses concern over situation in Gaza

1/23/2008 - U.S. must continue to support Israel Let?s remember who attacked whom in 1967. Arab nations gathered forces in an attempt to wipe Israel from the face of the Earth Is the person not privvy to who exactly fired the first shot in the Six Day War? Evidently so, because Israel did so when it preemptively struck Egypt, destroying its air force.

1/23/2008 - More Yemenis rally against blockade of Gaza Strip

1/23/2008 - Obama: Note Hamas in Gaza resolution Barack Obama wants a U.N. Security Council resolution on the Gaza Strip to mention rocket attacks on Israel.

1/23/2008 - Palestinian Family to Hold Vigil Outside Israeli Embassy Commemorating One Year Death Anniversary of 10-Year-Old Daughter Killed by Israeli Soldier The family of Abir Aramin, a ten-year-old Palestinian girl who was shot by Israeli border police a year ago, will hold a vigil and protest outside the Israeli Embassy in Washington DC on Thursday, January 24 at 12:00pm.

1/23/2008 - Experience Is to Hillary as 9/11 Is to Giuliani she defended Israel's right to occupy Palestinian territory, not to mention its erection of The Wall. Then she disrespected another international body of law -- the International Court of Justice -- which she denounced for calling on Israel to abide by international humanitarian law.

1/23/2008 - Middle East: Region would prefer jaw, jaw to war, war While the US has nudged Israel back to the negotiating table, producing a comprehensive settlement that creates a viable Palestinian state would require the kind of American pressure on Israel that few expect of Mr Bush, who has gone farther than his predecessors in supporting Israeli policies.

1/23/2008 - Foreign Thought Police Target US Candidates Like her neoconservative soul-mates in America, Glick is focused like a laser on the issue of "respectability": it's important that she and her ideological confreres get to determine who's "legitimate," and who ? to put it in Bill Kristol's terms ? is "a crank." This latter category includes anyone who, like Paul, wants to abandon as futile the Bushian project of "transforming" the Middle East into nascent "democracies" while taking out Israel's enemies one by one.

1/23/2008 - Controversy dogs Rachel Corrie There is no question that the work is biased. It's one woman's view of the issues. Some feel it's not the right view.

1/23/2008 - American unveils her Middle East experiences in new book "I don't think people see men and women from Palestine, for example, as human beings. Any time they are seen it's always (in the context of) war or conflict and the result of that has been de-humanize people."

1/22/2008 - Israeli forces kill Hamas militant in Gaza: Hamas

1/22/2008 - A Palestinian killed in northern Gaza as Israeli aircrafts shell a home

1/22/2008 - Palestinians blow up border wall with Egypt More than a thousand Palestinians crossed freely into Egypt without facing interference from Egyptian policemen, the Rafah residents said.

1/22/2008 - This brutal siege of Gaza can only breed violence: Karen Koning AbuZayd in Gaza City Gaza is on the threshold of becoming the first territory to be intentionally reduced to a state of abject destitution, with the knowledge, acquiescence and - some would say - encouragement of the international community. An international community that professes to uphold the inherent dignity of every human being must not allow this to happen.

1/22/2008 - Red Cross Warns of Gaza Crisis The international Red Cross issued a dire warning on the state of basic services in Gaza on Tuesday, calling on Israel to lift a blockade it has imposed in response to increased rocket attacks by Palestinian militants.

1/22/2008 - Gaza hours from water and sewage crisis as fuel for pumps run dry Only 37 of the 122 water supply pumps have fuel and most will run out of fuel within hours. Only six water pumps have fuel to run for more than a day. Oxfam fears the risks of an outbreak of water borne diseases if the water and sanitation system shuts down.

1/22/2008 - Gaza: No Rights, Little Mercy

1/22/2008 - Egptian border guards open fire to drive off Gaza protestors Egyptian border guards fired in the air and used clubs and water cannon to drive back hundreds of Palestinian women and children who surged across the border from Gaza Tuesday in a protest to back their demands for the frontier to be opened for shipments of food and essential provisions, in short supply due to Israel's closure of its borders with the coastal strip.

1/22/2008 - Top EU official: Gaza siege not a war crime A change in EU attitudes towards Israel? In a briefing to Israeli reporters Tuesday, European commissioner for Justice Freedom and Security, Frano Frattini, said that the steps leading up to the Gaza blackout cannot be construed as a war crime and criticized the incessant Qassam rocket fire on Israeli civilian population centers.

1/22/2008 - Anger as UN debates Gaza blockade American and French representatives to the UN said the current draft was unacceptable as it did not refer to militant rocket attacks on Israel from within the Gaza Strip.

1/22/2008 - From Gaza City, a challenge for peace I challenge the United States to wield its influence to get Israel to try the only thing that it has refused to try to date to end the conflict: to immediately end the Israeli occupation without any preconditions and without holding my life and future hostage to some final-status solution yet to be negotiated.

1/22/2008 - Rice urges Israel to avoid Gaza humanitarian crisis U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Tuesday she had spoken to the Israelis and urged them to avert a humanitarian crisis in Gaza where Israel implemented a blockade on fuel and electricity.

1/22/2008 - A child's story from Gaza Because of the Israeli blockade on Gaza, Samer has not been able to travel to hospital for his treatment for weeks, and his condition is deteriorating by the day. His young cousin, Bassam Harara who had the same disease, died of kidney failure on November 6 last year. His parents fear that it is just a matter of time before he dies too.

1/22/2008 - PA sentences killers of 2 Israeli hikers to 15 years Fatah members Amar Taha and Ali Dandanes admitted to shooting attack on off-duty soldiers Ahikam Amihai and Sgt. David Rubin near Hebron last month. Ahikam's father: I call on Olmert to display some national dignity, bring the murderers to trial in Israel

1/22/2008 - Church Leaders Urge End to Gaza Violence Church leaders in the Holy Land are appealing to international leaders to end what they called the siege of Gaza, an "illegal collective punishment."

1/22/2008 - Hamas says won't abandon rockets under Israel attack "We are dealing with aggressive Zionist behaviour. Let Israel stop its aggression and its occupation of Palestinian land and the resistance, including rockets, will stop," Meshaal told Reuters in an interview.

1/22/2008 - Israel Metes Out Collective Punishment of Palestinians, Bush Yawns

1/22/2008 - Barak - Israel will apply more pressure on Gaza Israel will continue to apply "pressure" on the Gaza Strip to end rocket attacks, Defense Minister Ehud Barak said Monday night, just hours after he authorized a one-time shipment of fuel for its power plant.

1/22/2008 - The Popular Committees appeals the international Community to save Gaza from imminent disaster

1/22/2008 - Border protests over Gaza blockade Five tankers pumped fuel for Gaza's power plant through the Nahal Oz crossing, enough to provide electricity to Gaza City for two days. Three other tankers pumped cooking oil.

1/22/2008 - Israeli tanks shells civilians in southern Gaza Strip, no injures reported

1/22/2008 - Israel arrests 16 Palestinians in West Bank Three of those nabbed in Nablus were members of the Palestinian security services.

1/22/2008 - US: Israel 'defending itself' with Gaza blockade

1/22/2008 - Gaza militants resume rockets attacks at Israel

1/22/2008 - Stench wafts through Gaza as sewage system falters Gaza's creaking sewage system is the latest casualty of Israeli sanctions aimed at getting Hamas to halt militant rocket fire from the impoverished territory.

1/22/2008 - Despite entry of fuel shipments to Gaza, the crisis persists

1/22/2008 - U.S. diplomat backs Abbas's control of Gaza border A senior U.S. diplomat said on Tuesday the United States backed the idea of letting President Mahmoud Abbas's Palestinian Authority control main border crossings in Hamas-run Gaza to help ease local hardship.

1/22/2008 - The Israeli army injures a Palestinian youth and kidnaps him near Hebron city

1/22/2008 - Mayor okays 7,300 new homes in east Jerusalem: TV Jerusalem Mayor Uri Lupolianski has given the okay for the construction of 7,300 new homes in occupied Arab east Jerusalem, private television Channel Two reported on Tuesday.

1/22/2008 - Malaysia condemns Israel's blockade of Gaza

1/22/2008 - Israeli and Palestinian envoys trade charges at U.N.

1/22/2008 - Dutch want to participate in new Middle East peacekeeping force

1/22/2008 - Sudan students rally against Gaza blockade

1/22/2008 - Prime Minister welcomes Palestinian PM to No10 Gordon Brown has welcomed Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad to Downing Street.

1/22/2008 - Egypt and Iran presidents talk directly for first time Discussions focused on the Palestinian and Lebanese issues, the MENA news agency said in a one-sentence report.

1/22/2008 - Barak leaves to Paris for talks on the Iranian nuclear race Defense Minister Ehud Barak flew to Paris on Tuesday for talks with senior government officials with a focus on the Iranian nuclear threat.

1/22/2008 - Freedom?s Watch and ?Strong Supporters of Israel?

1/22/2008 - Gaza holds key to Mid-East conflict

1/22/2008 - Yaalon: Replace political perception "We must lay the values of democracy and strengthen and bolster Palestinians willing to promote ideas of sanctifying the value of human life, rather than sanctifying death, and human rights rather than oppression. Wow. This moron ought to get Israel to practice what it preaches first. Israel wouldn't know a thing about affording others basic human rights.

1/22/2008 - Mideast not funny? Four comics are working on it

1/22/2008 - Vancouver to mount contentious play

1/22/2008 - Oxford Union stages 'farcical' debate Oxford University's debating society is being accused of childishness and sensationalism by Jewish groups after inviting participants with alleged anti-Israel backgrounds to support a motion questioning Israel's right to exist in a debate on Thursday.

1/22/2008 - AJC Condemns UN Human Rights Council Special Session on Gaza The American Jewish Committee today denounced a one-sided "special session" scheduled by the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva this week on the recent escalation of violence in Gaza. The session was called at the request of the Arab Group and the Organization of the Islamic Conference.

1/22/2008 - Save the Children worker on the impact of Israel's blockade

1/22/2008 - Aisha, 3, the youngest Palestinian detainee, freed

1/22/2008 - Two Forms of Resistance

1/21/2008 - No light, no heat, no bread: stark reality for the powerless in Gaza "If new supplies don't come, we'll have to put the patients on manual ventilation. All of us will have to work at it non-stop, 24-hours a day,"

1/21/2008 - Gaza's sick fear for their lives as blockade bites "I am afraid," said the boy in a voice that was barely audible. "I could suffocate while asleep if the electricity suddenly goes off, I am afraid to die."

1/21/2008 - The poor and the sick suffer as Israel cuts power to Gaza

1/21/2008 - Israel to ease blockade of Gaza Israeli foreign ministry spokesman Arye Mekel told the BBC the easing of restrictions, which were imposed on Friday, was for one day only and the government would then review the situation.

1/21/2008 - Propaganda battle over Gaza plight Egypt is threatening to open crossing points into the Gaza Strip if Israel does not relent.

1/21/2008 - Jordan urges Russian pressure on Israel to end Gaza siege

1/21/2008 - Egypt sends troops to Gaza border for fear of Palestinian breakout

1/21/2008 - The Lessons of Violence This is not another typical spat between Israelis and Palestinians. This is the final, collective strangulation of the Palestinians in Gaza. The decision to block shipments of food by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency means that two-thirds of the Palestinians who rely on relief aid will no longer be able to eat when U.N. stockpiles in Gaza run out

1/21/2008 - Israeli settlers attack Palestinian women and children in Hebron; seven injured In the latest Israeli settler attack to take place in the Palestinian city of Hebron, a group of armed settlers attacked and beat a group of women and children, and a human rights worker who was accompanying them, on Saturday evening.

1/21/2008 - Soldiers assault and arrest B'Tselem worker in Hebron

1/21/2008 - Jordan's queen appeals to world community to help end Gaza blockade Jordan's Queen Rania on Monday described the Israeli blockade of the Gaza Strip as "a bad and painful" situation and appealed to the world community to move to ensure an end to the suffering of Palestinian civilians.

1/21/2008 - Mideast Arabs, Iran's Ahmadinejad worried over worsening Gaza situation In a statement issued by his office, Lebanon's Saniora said the Israeli actions in Gaza were "racist and barbaric" and that the world is not allowed to "remain silent on the Israeli actions."

1/21/2008 - Netanyahu: Israel should practice mass deterrence Opposition leader MK Benjamin Netanyahu (Likud) warned Monday that Israel might find itself "a country pointing missiles in three directions."

1/21/2008 - Abbas fights political battles for statehood

1/21/2008 - Gaza blockade sparks international outcry

1/21/2008 - U.N. agency says may have to halt Gaza food handout

1/21/2008 - A Palestinian girl reacts during a children's protest against Israel stopping fuel supplies to the Gaza Strip

1/21/2008 - No peace deal if Israel keeps building-Palestinian PM President George W. Bush's drive for peace between Israel and the Palestinians by the end of his term in office is unlikely to succeed unless the Jewish state stops building in the West Bank, the Palestinian premier said.

1/21/2008 - PMO denies Jerusalem building freeze

1/21/2008 - 'Israel's sanctions strengthen Hamas'

1/21/2008 - In pictures: Gaza power cuts

1/21/2008 - Hamas plans delegation to Egypt over Gaza blockade

1/21/2008 - Israel launches new satellite to spy on Iran Last November, a US intelligence report stated that Iran had halted its nuclear weapons programme, a finding that undermined hawks in the US who had been pushing for a strike against Iran's nuclear facilities. Israel, however, has publicly disagreed with the US intelligence finding.

1/21/2008 - IDF official rejects claims of humanitarian crisis in Gaza "There is no humanitarian crisis in Gaza," a military official told Ynet Sunday, claiming that the Palestinians had enough food supply to last them for the next weeks, and that any reports of such a crisis were created and promoted by Hamas.

1/21/2008 - Race heats up congressional debate One matter on which Stein and Laesch disagreed was Israel. Laesch said he would oppose any further military funding to Israel until it agreed to sit down with Palestinian leaders and discuss peace, with the possibility of an independent Palestinian state in the West Bank. Stein called Israel "a longtime, stable, staunch ally" of the United States, and said he would oppose cutting off aid to the country. Both Republicans agreed with that degree of support for Israel.

1/21/2008 - Photostory: As long as there is life, there is hope

1/21/2008 - Conference on anti-Semitism starts Tuesday in Jerusalem The issue of Palestinian incitement in the media against Israel will not be raised at the conference due to its focus on Europe.

1/21/2008 - Pope restates solidarity with Holy Land Christians

1/21/2008 - Palestinian group sounds like Al Qaeda but forgoes violence

1/21/2008 - Tunis worried about situation in occupied Palestinian territories

1/21/2008 - Gaza children's protest. Children in Gaza march through the streets to protest against Israel closing the Gaza Strip.

1/21/2008 - Bolton: Final IDF op in Lebanon had no impact on UN truce talks Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who "changed her mind fundamentally" after an Israeli aerial assault killed 28 civilians in Kana on July 30. "Rice exerted enormous pressure on me to reach an agreement already," he said. "Until Kana, the U.S. wasn't interested in another typical Middle Eastern cease-fire. We thought we would exploit the fighting to fundamentally change the situation, especially in Lebanon and Syria. But under the influence of her shock over Kana, the secretary of state changed her mind and only wanted an immediate end to the fire. That was the policy Rice dictated."

1/21/2008 - Lord Mayor of City of London visits Israel & Occupied Palestinian Territories for first time in nine years In East Jerusalem the Lord Mayor will visit the St John?s Eye Hospital. Lord Mayor David Lewis is a long-term supporter of the eye-treatment charity Orbis and will visit the St. John?s Hospital to present an indirect ophthalmoscope, equipment used for the diagnosis and treatment of retinal disease. It provides a wide angled view of the retina and will be particularly useful in the care of the many patients with diabetic eye disease. Diabetes affects approximately 14% of the Palestinian population

1/21/2008 - Israel may have to take military action against Iran: Bolton ** "One can say with some assurance that in the next year the use of force by the United States is highly unlikely," Bolton told AFP on the sidelines of the Herzliya conference on the balance of Israel's national security.

1/21/2008 - Abandon Mideast peace push By JOHN BOLTON here's the essential fix the President is in: He is far more likely to be successful in countering Iran's expanding influence and dealing with other major regional problems than in resolving the Arab-Israeli dispute - yet his pursuit of the former goal is impeded by his policies concerning the latter. The NY Daily News gives airtime to neocon John Bolton. Bolton wants Iran attacked yesterday.

1/21/2008 - When Bush Comes to Shove Israeli officials are adamant that neither Israel nor the U.S. has ruled out the use of force against Iran. In a media briefing on the second day of the Bush visit, a senior Israeli official claimed that while both countries preferred diplomatic and economic measures, they did not "remove any option from the table." .......Miller points out that if America does not act, and Israel decides to use force on its own, it will need American approval, because of the heavy U.S. military air traffic in and around Iraq.

1/21/2008 - Braverman: Globalization greatest danger not Iran "As far as I'm concerned, globalization is the greatest danger to Israel, not Iran. Everyone will solve the problem of Iran, the US, Russia, Europe

1/21/2008 - World Vision Lebanon warms displaced refugees World Vision is rushing badly needed blankets, heaters and other critical supplies to displaced Palestinian refugee families who are being hit hard by cold winter temperatures that have caused several deaths.

1/21/2008 - Palestinians stage protests over Gaza in Lebanon camps

1/21/2008 - Lebanese troops fire on Israeli jets

1/21/2008 - Islam-West rift widens, poll says

1/21/2008 - A Firsthand Look at the Holy Land

1/21/2008 - In Gaza, life destroyed by the Qassams "We hate the rockets!" says Daoud. "They destroy everything. We can't even work anymore."

1/20/2008 - Israeli missile strikes kill two Gaza militants

1/20/2008 - Gaza economy crushed by embargo With no raw materials getting in and no finished products getting out, Gaza's industrial sector has collapsed. Over 100,000 Palestinians have lost their jobs in the last six months, according to local unions.

1/20/2008 - Abbas wants end to Gaza blockade Several hundred Palestinians held a candle-lit rally in the centre of the West Bank political capital of Ramallah to show solidarity with their compatriots who were plunged into darkness in Gaza.

1/20/2008 - Egyptian killed near smuggling tunnels

1/20/2008 - Saudi prince offers full relations A Saudi prince said if Israel accepts an Arab League peace plan it could have full normalization with the Arab world.

1/20/2008 - An elderly Palestinian man plants olive trees during a demonstration against the Israeli separation barrier

1/20/2008 - West Bank settler population up 5pc The rise is attributed both to settlement expansion and to a high birth rate among religious communities.

1/20/2008 - Israel arrests 6 Palestinians in West Bank

1/20/2008 - Gaza plunged into darkness as Israeli fuel blockade takes effect From Damascus, Khaled Mashaal, the exiled leader of Hamas, appealed to Arab leaders and his rival, Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, to forget their differences and help the Gazans: "All Arab leaders, exercise real pressure to stop this Zionist crime ... Take up your role and responsibility. We are not asking you to wage a military war against Israel ... but just stand with us in pride and honour."

1/20/2008 - Israel orders closure of Gaza crossings as Palestinian anger and casualties increase Wadia had been working at a mechanics' market on Tuesday morning when the Israeli military launched a major ground incursion, beginning a new round of intense fighting in Gaza. When he heard the sound of gunfire, Wadia began to leave but was knocked to the ground by the force of an Israeli shell. It sliced off his left foot, shattered his right leg and shrapnel lacerated his stomach.

1/20/2008 - Source: Israel won't free two-thirds of prisoners Hamas wants released

1/20/2008 - Israeli blockade forces Gaza's only power plant to shut The British charity group Oxfam called the ban on fuel supplies "ineffective as well as unlawful". Gisha, a prominent Israeli human rights group said "punishing Gaza's 1.5 million civilians does not stop the rocket fire; it only creates an impossible "balance" of human suffering on both sides of the border".

1/20/2008 - Hamas says willing to apologize for seizing Gaza during dialogue Hamas is ready to apologize to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah movement for taking over the Gaza Strip by force, but only after dialogue with Fatahis resumed, a Hamas spokesman said Sunday.

1/20/2008 - Illegal West Bank settlers vex Israel Badriya Amer, 60, produced a document from the Israeli military administration in the West Bank listing the land where the outpost is located as the property of her late father. She said she was chased away by settlers a few months ago when she went to the area to pick olives.

1/20/2008 - Israeli ministers slam 'sewage rat' Nasrallah

1/20/2008 - Internal Memo Takes on Obama?s Approach to Middle East A confidential memo questioning Senator Barack Obama?s potential approach to Middle East policy was circulated earlier this month among staffers at a major American Jewish organization. In one section, the memo said that Obama?s approach to Iran?s nuclear program ?raises questions,? while another portion suggested that Obama expected more from Israel than the Palestinians in resolving the conflict between the two.

1/20/2008 - Pope to change liturgy offensive to Jews When Pope Benedict brought back the prayer, the chief rabbis of Israel expressed their concern in a letter to the pope, as did the Anti-Defamation League.

1/20/2008 - Canada removes U.S., Israel from torture watchlist Canada's foreign ministry, responding to pressure from close allies, said on Saturday it would remove the United States and Israel from a watch list of countries where prisoners risk being tortured.

1/20/2008 - A commercial model for Mideast would foster peace

1/20/2008 - Israel's Yehoshua calls for U.S. boycott Yehoshua further described all West Bank settlements as illegal and described the "Jewish lobby" as having "become a powerful tool of influence on Israel's behalf within the U.S. administration."

1/20/2008 - Hezbollah Decries Bush's Mideast Trip Hezbollah's reclusive leader appeared in public for the first time in a year on Saturday, accusing President Bush of using a recent Mideast tour to incite Arabs against Iran and telling Arab governments to confront his "satanic visions."

1/20/2008 - Anti-Iran Coalition in the Gulf? Read This. Before Bush's Middle East visit, White House briefers were telling correspondents that the president would be pushing the Israelis for a Palestinian settlement in return for Arab backing of a tough stance with Iran. It was suggested that Israel might be more tractable if the "Iranian nuclear threat" were removed.

1/20/2008 - Berman likely to head House Foreign Affairs Committee A member of the foreign affairs panel since he entered Congress in 1982, Berman is primarily known as a strong supporter of Israel. Early in his career, he wrote legislation funding joint U.S.-Israeli assistance projects in the developing world, and has worked over the years to increase aid to Israel.

1/20/2008 - When radio voices paint vivid pictures of far away places When an Israeli tank rolls down a Palestinian street, parked cars can often be completely crushed under its tracks. And I remember hearing of a few people in Nablus gathering quietly round an old Fiat that had just been flattened into a long strip of metal only a few inches high. Then the car's owner said, "Anyone got some jump leads? Perhaps it'll still start". That sort of black humour is part of the stuff of life in the West Bank, and in its way, it is significant. It helps people cope with the stress

1/20/2008 - Did 'The Times' Leave Judy Miller Out in the Cold Because She Was Jewish? And Other Parochial Asides from an Angry Bill Kristol I?ve often written that the neoconservatives became far less transparent about their devotion to Israel once they attained power. It was one thing to write as Jewish intellectuals about Middle East policy in books and little magazines in the 1970s, as Norman Podhoretz did when he said American isolationism was "a direct threat to the security of Israel," and quite another to be actually affecting that foreign policy and talking openly as Jews about Israel.

1/20/2008 - Why Republican candidate Mike Huckabee worries Jewish voters A few Jewish community leaders question whether his support for Israel stems from his sense that "we've got one true ally in the Middle East, and that's Israel," or whether it's linked to his desire to hasten the End of Days, Armageddon.

1/20/2008 - Israel's Shimon Peres calls for referendum on any peace deal

1/20/2008 - Israeli envoy slams torture claim as minister Bernier backtracks "Israel doesn't engage in torture, it's prohibited by Israeli law. Whoever had written this manual simply didn't know, or was misguided, or didn't understand." LOL

1/20/2008 - Palestinians pray for Mideast peace, too

1/20/2008 - Gazan hearts saved in Israel as conflict rages on

1/20/2008 - Rift between Israel, Druze growing Alluding to the historic alliance between Israel and the Druze, who serve in the IDF and contribute to the state in a wealth of other respects, Naffa noted that ?we (the Druze) had hoped that serving in the military would afford us equal rights to those of other Israelis. We soon, however, discovered that this is mere illusion when we awoke to a very harsh reality.?

1/20/2008 - Education Ministry drops Arabic studies from core curriculum The Education Ministry has decided against including Arabic in the compulsory core curriculum that was made public several weeks ago for the first time.

1/20/2008 - Jordan hides doubts over Bush's Mideast peace drive A senior Jordanian official with no sympathy for Islamists privately predicted disaster unless Bush pressed Israel hard for a deal in line with an Arab initiative that offered full peace with all Arab states in return for Israeli withdrawal to 1967 lines, a Palestinian state and an agreed solution for refugees.

1/20/2008 - Third of Jerusalem residents are poor: report Poverty is higher among Arab families with 62 percent of them living under the poverty line of around 1,000 dollars a month, said the report by the Jerusalem Institute for Israel Studies.

1/20/2008 - Palestinian hip hop featured at Sundance

1/19/2008 - Two Hamas fighters killed in Gaza Members of the military wing of Hamas, the Izzedine al-Qassam Brigades, exchanged fire with the troops. Two militants were later killed when Israeli aircraft fired three missiles at them.

1/19/2008 - PFLP calls for release of old prisoners in future Hamas-Israel prisoners swap An official from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) on Saturday called on Palestinian militant groups to stress for releasing old prisoners in any future prisoners swap deal with Israel.

1/19/2008 - UN rights official slams 'cowardly Israeli war crime' in Gaza "Recent action violates the strict prohibition on collective punishment contained in the Fourth Geneva Convention," Dugard charged in the statement put out by the UN human rights commission.

1/19/2008 - Gazans brace for more hardship as lockdown sets in "I have eight children, and me and my wife make 10. We will die of hunger. There is no work, nothing,"

1/19/2008 - Jihad spokesman: Different kind of response coming

1/19/2008 - Bush?s Remarks on Refugees Spark Outcry in Jordan Jordan, home to about 1.9 million Palestinian refugees, was this week the scene for deep disappointment over US President George W Bush?s remarks supportive of Jewish Israel and his unequivocal denial of the Palestinian refugees? right to return to their homes which they deserted upon Israel?s foundation in 1948.

1/19/2008 - Human Rights Advocates Meet United Nations Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process

1/19/2008 - A week of funerals in Gaza as Palestinians feel Israel's wrath Mariam Rahal, a 53-year-old grandmother and her two sons, were in the wrong place at the wrong time as they drove their donkey cart of oranges home through a mainly residential district of Beit Lahiya. Mrs Rahal was buried yesterday with one of the sons, Mohammed, 23. The pair were innocent victims of a four-day conflict between Israel and Palestinian militants that last night seemed far from over. They were killed when their cart was destroyed by a missile which targeted the car of a rocket-launching crew on Thursday evening.

1/19/2008 - Islamic body urges UN Gaza intervention Ekmeleddin Ihsanogulu, secretary general of the 57-nation Organisation of the Islamic Conference, accused the Israeli military of "committing successive massacres in the Gaza Strip, in which civilians were killed."

1/19/2008 - Acting Palestinian PM criticizes Gaza militants for firing rockets at Israel

1/19/2008 - Hamas claims it seized wouldbe suicide bomber sent by Fatah to kill Gaza PM Haniyeh Hamas claimed Saturday it has caught a wouldbe suicide bomber sent by members of the rival Fatah movement to assassinate Gaza's prime minister, Ismail Haniyeh.

1/19/2008 - Indonesia condemns Israeli military operations in Gaza

1/19/2008 - Gaza: 4 gunmen turn themselves in to IDF troops

1/19/2008 - Quds Brigades fighters exchange fire with invading forces in Qabatia Fighter of the Al Quds Brigades, the armed wing if the Islamic Jihad, exchanged fire on Sunday at dawn, with Israeli forces invading Qabatia town, near the northern West Bank city of Jenin.

1/19/2008 - Hamas urges Egypt to evacuate Gaza casualties through its borders "We call on Egypt to make a brave decision and open Rafah crossing point in southern Gaza Strip to provide medical treatment for the casualties of the Israeli attacks and bring in the basic humanitarian needs,"

1/19/2008 - AL condemns Israel's continued aggression against Palestinians

1/19/2008 - Co-defendants deny terror links "I am not al-Qaida. I have never been al-Qaida," said Adham Amin Hassoun, 45, a computer programmer of Palestinian heritage found by a jury to have been Padilla's recruiter for violent jihad overseas. "Your honor, I never wanted to kill anybody. ... Let us go back to our families, our kids."

1/19/2008 - Clueless in Mideast It is time for the media to start using the correct phraseology: Israel and the Occupied Territories, the West Bank and the illegal Jewish settlements.

1/19/2008 - Israeli actions root of problems in the Mideast After the 1948 War, Israel occupied 77 percent of historic Palestine and caused the Palestinian refugee problem. U.N. Resolution 194 asserted that the Palestinian refugees wishing to return to their homes should be allowed to do so. Israel has not allowed me or any other Palestinian to return to our homes and land.

1/19/2008 - Kaffiyeh-wearing protesters greet new Israeli U.K. Ambassador Israel's ambassador to Britain, Ron Prosor, was met by dozens of protesters against the Israeli occupation when he arrived Wednesday to speak at a bastion of anti-Israel criticism in British academia - the University of London's School of Oriental and African Studies......Israeli PR efforts in Britain have kicked up a notch since Prosor became ambassador two months ago.....Prosor says he wants to influence British public opinion, which he says is more extreme than the political establishment in its criticism of Israel, and hugely influential.

1/19/2008 - Israeli Peace group slams Israel for its attacks on the Gaza strip

1/19/2008 - Mediterranean EU members back creation of Mediterranean Union Portugal, Spain, France, Italy, Greece, Cyprus, Malta, Turkey, Lebanon, Israel, the Palestinian Authority, Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco are expected to be included in this group.

1/19/2008 - Trip makes Israel, Palestine 'personal' for Roman "The Palestinian refugee camps were one of the sadder things we did," said the freshman religion/philosophy major.

1/19/2008 - '07 assassinations that killed civilians to be reviewed The government is working on guidelines for establishing committees to review army assassinations in the West Bank and Gaza Strip that killed civilians in the past year.

1/19/2008 - Israelis, Palestinians to protest Gaza blockade, call for peace As Israel continues a military assault on Gaza, and rockets from Gaza terrify the bordering Israeli village of Sderot, Israeli peace advocates are organizing a relief convoy and peace demonstration, Jan. 26, at a Gaza border crossing. A parallel Palestinian demonstration will take place on the other side of the border.

1/19/2008 - "Hard left" academics latest anti-Semites, says Dershowitz - "and many of them are Jews." The majority of his remarks focused on what he called a growing group of "hard left academics who hate Israel with a passion - and many of them are Jewish," he added.

1/19/2008 - Obama, Hillary step up outreach efforts to Jews In Nevada, which is holding its caucuses on Saturday, Lewis was boasting the recent endorsement of Clinton by the state's only Jewish member of Congress and one of the most hawkish Democratic voices on Israel, U.S. Rep. Shelley Berkley. Also in Nevada, an Obama campaign official visited Jewish leaders to lay out the candidate's record on Israel.

1/19/2008 - More Jerusalem Arabs seek Israeli citizenship "My work and my life are inside Israel ," Shabane said. "I am very proud to be an Arab and Palestinian, but for practical reasons I'm not able to be part of the Palestinian Authority."

1/19/2008 - Turkish president in Syria for talks Gul will join Arab League chief Amr Mussa, who is in the Syrian capital to help broker a deal over Lebanon's presidential crisis, to launch celebrations marking Damascus being named the 2008 cultural capital of the Arab world.

1/19/2008 - Israeli troops detain another Lebanese shepherd

1/19/2008 - Hezbollah has Israel 'body parts'

1/19/2008 - Bush fails to persuade Arab allies Bush's visit coincided with fresh Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip and Palestinian rocket strikes on southern Israel. Images of bloodied and crying Palestinian children being rushed to hospitals flickered across Arab news channels.

1/19/2008 - Bush's Iran/Argentina Terror Frame-Up

1/19/2008 - Production of Arafat's scarf hangs by a thread The keffiyeh may remain a symbol of Palestinian solidarity and has become a fashion accessory from New York to Tokyo, but its sole surviving Palestinian manufacturer has cut production to a fraction of capacity and is in danger of closing.

1/18/2008 - Militant killed in latest Israeli strike on Gaza

1/18/2008 - Woman killed, dozens wounded in new Israeli strikes on Gaza A 47-year-old woman died when an Israeli warplane fired into a building that used to house a Hamas "interior ministry" in Gaza City, destroying the structure, they said.

1/18/2008 - U.N. agency says Israel blocks aid shipments to Gaza

1/18/2008 - EU urges Israelis to ease Palestinian movement

1/18/2008 - Israeli security Wall and settlements will create more grievances: India India Friday said that the ongoing construction of the security wall and the expansion of Israeli settlements will lead to creation of more grievances in the Middle East.

1/18/2008 - U.N. rights forum to hold special session on Gaza

1/18/2008 - Israeli air strike 'destroys Gaza ministry'

1/18/2008 - Aid Blocked As Gaza Crossings Closed

1/18/2008 - UN wants Gaza crossings reopened

1/18/2008 - More than 30 rockets hit western Negev since Friday morning

1/18/2008 - UN chief warns on Gaza violence "We all understand the security problems and the need to respond... but collective punishment of the people of Gaza is not, we believe, the appropriate way to do that," said John Holmes, undersecretary-general for humanitarian affairs.

1/18/2008 - Gaza child killing 'ends soldier release talks'

1/18/2008 - Israel - OPT: Gaza power cuts leave people cold physically, metaphorically

1/18/2008 - Scores protest the illegal Israeli Wall near Bethlehem

1/18/2008 - Israel orders closure of Gaza crossings as Palestinian anger and casualties increase Last night the Gaza death toll over the past four days stood at 34, among them at least 10 civilians.

1/18/2008 - Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories: Civilians on both sides pay price of escalation The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) today expressed its concern about the suffering of men, women and children taking no direct part in the ongoing conflict between Palestinian militants and the Israeli armed forces.

1/18/2008 - Israeli army kidnaps 8 Palestinians from the West Bank

1/18/2008 - Three injured in the weekly Bil'in Nonviolent action

1/18/2008 - UN special religion rapporteur to visit Israel, Palestinian territory The special rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief of the United Nations Human Rights Council, Asma Jahangir, it to visit Israel and the Palestinian territory it occupies from 20 to 27 January 2008, says the UN Organization in Geneva.

1/18/2008 - Palestinian president denounces Israel's Gaza strikes as 'brutal'

1/18/2008 - Livni fails to change Lavrov's stance on Iran Differences of opinion between Israel and Russia over how to deal with Iran surfaced Thursday when Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni called on Russia to support stronger sanctions against Iran, and Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov saying that Russia's current actions were sufficient

1/18/2008 - Israeli PM makes quiet visit to Gaza periphery towns

1/18/2008 - Art attack: international political artists in Palestine

1/18/2008 - State Department's Burns to resign

1/18/2008 - Reality in Mideast bears no relation to Bush's vision Twixt silken sheets in the very palace of King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, President Bush awakes to confront a Middle East that bears no relation to the policies of his administration nor the warning that he has been relaying constantly to the kings and emirs and oligarchs of the Gulf: that Iran rather than Israel is their enemy.

1/18/2008 - 5 Questions On Israel For The Next Debate

1/18/2008 - Bush's Influence in Middle East Fades Bush rang the alarm bell about Iran's clear and present nuclear danger, but his diplomatic message had already been overshadowed by last month's National Intelligence Estimate. While his Israeli interlocutors echoed the president's Iranian concerns, Arab heads of state took comfort in the assessment of Washington's intelligence community that said Iran suspended its nuclear weapons program when the United States invaded Iraq.

1/18/2008 - Livni continues Bush's course in Moscow This is no surprise since positions of Israel and the United States (that is, Bush personally) coincide on many issues, in particular on the prospects of Arab-Israeli settlement and Iran's nuclear ambitions.

1/18/2008 - Hamas Police Force Recruits Women in Gaza

1/18/2008 - German coalition split over foreign minister's contact with Syria Steinmeier met Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem in Berlin Thursday to demand that Syria play a "constructive role" in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process and in the political crisis in Lebanon.

1/18/2008 - Local pastor to help with peace in Palestine

1/18/2008 - Pregnant Detainee delivers her baby under harsh conditions

1/18/2008 - Palestinian protesters in Syria slam Israeli ?massacres?

1/18/2008 - Dream begins to fade under state of siege Bush may have spoken forcefully of the need for a contiguous Palestinian territory - "Swiss cheese isn't going to work when it comes to the territory of a state" - but with at least half of the West Bank land already allocated to settler or Israeli military use, according to the Israeli rights group B'tselem, there seems to be little room left for a Palestinian state......A self-avowed racist, King is a leading light in a movement, financed as far as is known mainly by wealthy foreign Jews and - critics say - with quiet backing from the state, to secretly acquire Arab property in East Jerusalem to build Jewish settlements.

1/18/2008 - Palestinian Prime Minister thanks UAE President Sheikh Khalifa for $9 million donation

1/17/2008 - Seven Palestinians die in Gaza as Olmert vows "war"

1/17/2008 - IDF kills senior al-Aqsa Brigades' operative

1/17/2008 - Gaza: Palestinian cancer sufferers denied safe passage Thirteen Palestinians in Gaza with cancer and other life-threatening conditions are being denied safe passage out of the beleaguered territory by Israeli military authorities, Amnesty International warned today, as it launched an 'urgent action' appeal on behalf of the group

1/17/2008 - Israel blocks access to Gaza A strike on Thursday night targeted a car in the northern Gaza Strip that was carrying members of the radical Islamic Jihad movement, killing two of them, medical sources said. However the blast also hit a cart travelling behind the car, killing the woman who was driving it and seriously wounding her passenger, a child. Two pedestrians were also hurt.

1/17/2008 - Israeli military kidnaps one Palestinian near Ramallah

1/17/2008 - Hamas investigates Gaza failures

1/17/2008 - Israeli army kidnaps at least 24 from Nablus

1/17/2008 - Israel plans to resume its settler-only road which will surround Jerusalem

1/17/2008 - Palestinians urge US to intervene over Israeli raids

1/17/2008 - At-Tuwani Release: Cistern contaminated in Humra Valley On 9 December, a group of Israelis, apparently visitors to the nearby settlement of Ma'on, or the illegal settlement outpost Havat Ma'on, walked through Tuwani. CPTers observed the group stop next to a cistern in Humra Valley, open the lid and raise the bucket

1/17/2008 - At-Tuwani Release: Olive trees destroyed in the night In the days preceding and following the incident, Israeli settlers and soldiers have threatened and harassed Palestinian shepherds grazing their flocks nearby. On Saturday, 12 January, a group of settlers from the illegal settlement outpost of Havat Ma'on approached shepherds grazing their flocks and fired six shots in the air. The Palestinian shepherds and their flocks scattered. On 15 January, Israeli soldiers threatened to arrest Palestinian shepherds if they continued to graze their sheep in the adjacent valley.

1/17/2008 - Egypt seizes explosives in Sinai: security official

1/17/2008 - Shalit's father consoles Hamas official The father of captive Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit extended condolences to a Hamas official bereaved by Gaza fighting

1/17/2008 - Neturei Karta decry 'Gaza massacre'

1/17/2008 - Four injured, among them a journalist in Hebron city during clashes with the Israeli army

1/17/2008 - Israel says arrested militants planning train attack Israel said on Thursday it arrested four members of a Palestinian militant group last month and accused them of planning to attack an Israeli passenger train.

1/17/2008 - US urges ally Israel to show restraint in Gaza The United States urged Israel Thursday to avoid the loss of innocent life in the violence-wracked Gaza Strip, but defended the Jewish state's right to strike against rocket and mortar attacks from Islamic militants.

1/17/2008 - Jordan urges EU help to stop Israeli attacks in Gaza, push peace

1/17/2008 - Ban raises concern over Israeli-Palestinian violence

1/17/2008 - Troops break into the headquarters of the Popular Resistance Committees in Hebron

1/17/2008 - Israeli FM calls for division of Palestine political forces

1/17/2008 - Aid pledges to Palestinians increased International donors have pledged $7.7 billion (3.9 billion pounds) in aid to the Palestinians over the next three years, more than initially reported, a Palestinian government minister said on Thursday

1/17/2008 - Abbas may quit over Gaza violence Mahmoud Abbas may resign in protest of Israel's recent raids on the Gaza Strip, aides said....."Israel's actions undermine the Palestinian Authority and drive more Palestinians into the open arms of Hamas and Islamic Jihad," one aide said.

1/17/2008 - Ahmadinejad scorns US and Israel The Iranian leader also dismissed US ally Israel, saying: "The Zionist regime... would not dare attack Iran. "It knows that any attack on Iranian territories would prompt a fierce response," he added.

1/17/2008 - Israel FM urges firmer stance from Russia on Iran

1/17/2008 - Canada places U.S., Israel on torture watch list Canada's foreign ministry has put the United States and Israel on a watch list of countries where prisoners risk being tortured and also classifies some U.S. interrogation techniques as torture, according to a document obtained by Reuters on Thursday.

1/17/2008 - Israel "would not dare attack Iran": Ahmadinejad

1/17/2008 - Iran defiant after Israeli missile test

1/17/2008 - Israeli wounded in shooting attack near Modi'in

1/17/2008 - Israel's foreign minister: Iran nuclear controversy should be solved via sanctions

1/17/2008 - Israel test-fires ballistic missile after Iran warning

1/17/2008 - Three-way checkmate George Bush's visit to the Middle East has failed to loosen a Gordian knot of Hamas, Fatah and Israel

1/17/2008 - Pentagon's Islam "Expert" Hoisted by His Own Jihad Over the weekend, the Fox News Channel spun the centrifuges of Islamo-hysteria faster, featuring an interview with self-declared "terrorism expert" Steve Emerson, who alleged that radical Islamists had infiltrated the U.S. government and had gained enough clout to manipulate who gets hired and fired Emerson is quite wrong. To the contrary- the US government was infiltrated long ago by those other extremists - pro-Israeli ones. And they have proved far more costly to the American people in terms of blood and treasure than any of their Islamic counterparts. 0

1/17/2008 - Congressman says church, state should be separate Ackerman said he regretted that some constituents had misconstrued his vote and went on to say that his record reveals him as a man who has always supported religious freedom for all groups, including Palestinian Christians, whose particular plight has long been overshadowed by the overarching Jewish-Muslim tensions between Israel and its neighbors.

1/17/2008 - Israeli sources: seven Israeli soldiers injured, one seriously, at an Israeli naval base Israeli media sources reported that an artillery shell exploded onboard an Israel Navy missile ship at the Haifa naval base on Wednesday morning injuring seven soldiers, one critically.

1/17/2008 - Bringing Death and Destruction to Muslims The US is at war in Iraq, because the neoconservatives want to rid Israel of the Muslim governments ? Iraq, Iran and Syria ? that are not American surrogates and, therefore, are willing to fund Palestinian and Lebanese resistance to Israeli aggression. Israel, protected by the US, has disobeyed UN resolutions for four decades and has been methodically squeezing Palestinians out of Palestine.

1/17/2008 - Mid-East suffers rare cold snap In Syria, temperatures have dropped to minus 16 degrees Celsius. There has been widespread damage to crops in Syria, Jordan and Israel.

1/17/2008 - US to set up cluster bomb clearance team The United States will create a team of experts to defuse cluster bombs and other explosives that pose a threat to civilians after the end of a conflict, U.S. officials said Wednesday.

1/17/2008 - NYC jeweler sentenced in bogus bomb plot Alkatri also faces deportation to his native Syria as a convicted felon. One of his lawyers, Michael L. Soshnick, argued that a return to that country could be fatal because Alkatri is Jewish.

1/17/2008 - Dying to be heard When Rachel Corrie died under a bulldozer in 2003 - while protesting Israeli demolition of Palestinian homes in the Gaza Strip - she was immediately elevated to martyrdom by some, smeared as a meddler by others.

1/17/2008 - Lieberman, GOP seek out Jewish vote Lieberman told about 200 Republican Jewish activists that he's backing John McCain because his fellow senator and Iraq war hawk best understands the nature of the radical Islamic threat faced by ''our ally Israel'' -- while much of the Democratic Party has forsaken it......While Jews overwhelmingly vote Democratic on social issues year after year, the Republican presidential candidates this year have gone to great lengths to out-Israel each other -- from using Israeli newspaper email lists to traveling to Israel to addressing myriad Jewish groups.

1/17/2008 - Students win cash award to help reduce waste in Palestinian territories

1/16/2008 - Fresh Gaza air strike kills three "I tell the... enemy: What you are committing will deprive you of anything you're betting on. There will be no exchange involving Gilad Shalit, no calm or nothing of this sort," Mr Meshal said at a news conference. "Palestinian blood being spilt by you will be your curse. It will not bring you security. It will not prolong the existence of your entity,"

1/16/2008 - Gaza Airstrike Kills 12 Year Old Boy

1/16/2008 - Fresh Israeli airstrike kills two Palestinians Earlier on Wednesday, three Palestinian civilians, a father, his brother and his son were killed and five were injured in an Israeli airstrike on a car in eastern Gaza City, medics and witnesses said.

1/16/2008 - Israel kills Islamic Jihad leader

1/16/2008 - Israeli Settlers and troops attacked farmers and journalists in Bili'n village near Ramallah The farmers stated that they were working on their land located near the illegal Israeli wall that is being built by Israel on the village land when a group of armed settlers and Israeli soldiers attacked them and confiscated a tractor owned by the farmers.

1/16/2008 - Haniyeh:'Killing Palestinian leaders and their children will not kill Palestinian cause'

1/16/2008 - Palestinians on strike over Israel's killing of 18 Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and in the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip observed a general strike on Wednesday, in a rare show of unity after Israel killed 18 people in fighting a day earlier.

1/16/2008 - Israeli military kidnaps at least 12 Palestinians from Nablus

1/16/2008 - No prisoner swap after Israeli attacks Hamas said on Wednesday that Israeli attacks that killed more than 20 Palestinians in the last two days have dashed prospects for a prisoners' exchange deal involving an Israeli soldier held by the group

1/16/2008 - Iran's nuclear ambitions, Israel-Palestinian talks on agenda for Israeli FM's visit to Russia Livni also said that during her visit she would press for Ťmore effectiveť sanctions against Tehran's nuclear program at the United Nations

1/16/2008 - Former Border Guard officer convicted of manslaughter The Tel Aviv District Court convicted former Border Guard officer Tomer Avraham of involuntary manslaughter Wednesday, for killing a Palestinian residing in Israel illegally, and of assaulting another Palestinian in a Jaffa construction site in October 2006.

1/16/2008 - More Jewish families move to east Jerusalem project The international community has never recognised Israel's claim to east Jerusalem and Palestinians have demanded a halt to settlement activity in all areas occupied in the 1967 war.

1/16/2008 - Hamas: IDF massacre in Gaza result of Bush's support In response to the death of at least 17 Palestinians during the Israeli army's operation in Gaza on Tuesday, Hamas said in a statement that "the massacre conducted by the IDF is a direct result of the go-ahead and backing given by (US President George W. Bush) to the Zionists' continued attacks in the Strip."

1/16/2008 - The Palestinian government calls upon Israel to stop its attacks on Gaza

1/16/2008 - Jewish condos rise in Jerusalem As Israelis and Palestinians resume negotiations on Jerusalem for the first time in seven years, a new Jews-only neighborhood in the Arab half of the city is slated to begin filling up.

1/16/2008 - Hamas launches 21 makeshift rockets on Israel The military wing of Hamas launched 21 home-made rockets on Israeli targets outside Gaza Strip early Wednesday in response to an Israeli offensive in Gaza which left at least 17 dead.

1/16/2008 - Palestinian Presidency: Offensive, settlement prove Israel unserious towards peace The Palestinian Presidency announced on Wednesday that the Israeli military escalation against the Palestinians and the continuation of settlement activities in the West Bank proved that the Israeli government was not serious in peace talks with the Palestinians.

1/16/2008 - Palestinian gov't blames world community for Israeli offensive The Palestinian government led by Salam Fayyad blamed the international community on Wednesday for bloodily Israeli raids in the Palestinian territories.

1/16/2008 - Abbas meets with Chinese delegation Palestinian National Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas on Wednesday highly praised the positive development of ties between the Palestinian territories and China.

1/16/2008 - Abbas offers condolences to al-Zahar over slain son

1/16/2008 - Islamic Jihad calls for ending negotiation with Israel, resisting the ongoing Israeli assaults

1/16/2008 - Abbas speaks with senior Hamas leader in Gaza for first time since takeover

1/16/2008 - Assault on Gaza

1/16/2008 - Disabled youth dies after flat catches fire A 22-year-old disabled Palestinian man died yesterday after his apartment in a residential complex on King Faisal Road here caught fire which, the police believe, happened when he set it on fire in a suicide bid.

1/16/2008 - Russia 'seriously concerned' over Gaza violence: ministry Russia on Friday said it was "seriously concerned" over the latest violence between Israel and the Palestinians, as Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni prepared to fly to Moscow for talks.

1/16/2008 - Leading Fatah member urges reconciliation with Hamas

1/16/2008 - Reality bites Bush's Mideast peace plan

1/16/2008 - Hardliners leave Israel coalition An Israeli right-wing party has pulled out of the coalition government in protest at the starting of peace talks on core issues with the Palestinians.

1/16/2008 - Bad Reviews for Bush in the Mideast

1/16/2008 - Bush says Iran and Syria must end Lebanon interference President George W. Bush said on Wednesday that Syria and Iran must end interference in Lebanese politics, and called for nations in the region to support Prime Minister Fouad Siniora.

1/16/2008 - Israeli lobby takes journalists to Israel

1/16/2008 - Former Palestinian militant opens children's theater in West Bank town Last October he signed up for an Israeli amnesty and laid down his weapons. Next week, he is to formally open the ŤFreedom Theaterť in the Jenin refugee camp, home to around 16,000 people. ŤWe want to take the Palestinian cause to the people through theater,ť he said Wednesday, wearing his trademark Israeli military windbreaker, jeans and black boots.

1/16/2008 - The Islamic-Christian Front slams Israeli construction of a new settlement in Jerusalem

1/16/2008 - Yemen condemns Israeli attacks on Gaza

1/16/2008 - Ibrahim happy to call Lake Station home If Khalid Ibrahim had a dime for every time someone asked him about his name, he'd be able to retire. The son of immigrant parents, who came to the United States from Palestine, laughs when thinking about the questions Americans have asked him.

1/16/2008 - MESSAGE ON THE APARTHEID WALL

1/16/2008 - Olmert to American Jewish leaders: I want your voice to be heard on Jerusalem Olmert will not delegate the decision to world Jewry - the future of Jerusalem will be something for Israel to decide. However, he wants the voice of Jews around the world, even those who might not agree with his position, to be heard. E. Jerusalem is not Israeli-owned, it's Israeli-occupied, according to international law.

1/16/2008 - Anti-Muslim slurs scrolled on letters to Arabs Israeli-Arab citizens across Israel have been receiving lately letters containing slurs against the Prophet Muhammad. The recipients believe that an employee of the Israel Postal Company is behind the acts.

1/16/2008 - Italy, UN to help area near Nahr al-Bared

1/16/2008 - Palestinian couple find marital bliss in Nahr al-Bared rubble

1/16/2008 - Town hall steps protest on blockade of Gaza Strip DOZENS of people carrying flags, placards and a coffin gathered in Sheffield to protest about Israel's blockade of the Gaza Strip.

1/15/2008 - 19 Palestinians killed in raid on Gaza In Damascus, the exiled leader of Hamas, Khaled Meshal, accused the US of encouraging Israel to take a tougher line with Gaza. "This crime is the ugly fruit of Bush's visit to the region," he said. "He has incited the Zionists and has exerted pressure on the Palestinian side to become more hardline against Palestinian dialogue."

1/15/2008 - Israelis kill Hamas leader's son in Gaza raid The killing of Mahmoud Zahar's 24-year-old son, Hussam, will inflame hostilities. Hamas has so far sanctioned daily attacks on Israeli forces, but has refrained from carrying them out itself.

1/15/2008 - US, Iran One Misstep From the Edge by Philip Giraldi ** President Bush still apparently dreams of confronting Iran, even if the imploding situation in Pakistan makes it unlikely that he will risk doing so. Israel makes no secret of the fact that it would like Washington to act, and Israel's wishes are seldom denied in Washington. And then there are the hotheads on the Iranian side. The U.S. national interest in the Middle East would be best served by marginalizing those who want war and beginning to negotiate seriously. As Winston Churchill put it, "To jaw jaw is better than to war war."

1/15/2008 - Israel building new homes in east Jerusalem settlement

1/15/2008 - Report: Israel planning to assassinate Haniyeh Israel is planning to assassinate exiled Hamas leader Khalid Mashaal, deposed Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, and former PA Foreign Minister Mahmoud Zahar, but is waiting to give the green light on the operation until after US President George W. Bush leaves the region, the London-based newspaper, Al-Hayat reported on Sunday.

1/15/2008 - Army attack villages near Nablus and kidnaps three civilians Palestinian sources reported that the Israeli army attacked the villages of Awarta and Houwara located in the northern West Bank city of Nablus on Monday morning and kidnapped three civilians there.

1/15/2008 - Abbas condemns Israeli offensive on Gaza

1/15/2008 - Bush wraps up Middle East visit on peace, Iran, oil

1/15/2008 - Qureia: Talks absurd if Israel does not stop massacres

1/15/2008 - Arab League denounces Israeli incursion into Gaza

1/15/2008 - Hamas accuses Palestinian forces of arresting six members

1/15/2008 - Hamas arrests senior Fatah official in Gaza

1/15/2008 - Report: PA seizes rocket in Nablus

1/15/2008 - Israeli Settlers burn a Palestinian house and the Army up-root trees in Hebron

1/15/2008 - Israel reports Iranian-made rocket hit A rocket fired at Israel by Palestinians earlier this month was made in Iran, an Israeli lawmaker and security officials said Tuesday. Thus does the BS begin anew..

1/15/2008 - US using 1994 Argentine bombing investigation to pressure Iran US diplomats, working with their counterparts from Israel and Argentina, convinced the international police agency Interpol to issue "red notices" against five former and current Iranian officials. The most-wanted orders, which were issued last November, will prevent the Iranians from leaving their home country, but neither the US nor Interpol can force Tehran to hand them over, report Solomon and Perez.

1/15/2008 - Hebron UPDATE: Hebron Update: 31 December 2007 - 05 January 2008 earlier in the evening, a soldier came to their home to detain the boy because he was playing with stones on the roof. The father, who has a disability resulting from a previous encounter with Israeli soldiers during which both of his legs were broken, came to the roof to see why the soldier had come. The soldier started throwing stones at the father and the boy; the father started throwing stones back. The soldier called in more soldiers who beat the father on his hands and legs. When the father cried out, ?My legs are broken!? a soldier retorted, ?OK. I will break them more.?

1/15/2008 - Israeli army issues demolition order for Palestinian water well On Monday the Israeli army issued demolition orders against a water reservoir that belongs to Palestinian farmers from the Bedouin village of Al Hathalen, located near the city of Hebron in the southern part of the West Bank.

1/15/2008 - First round of Israeli-Palestinian talks on final status issues ends fruitlessly The first round of Israeli-Palestinian talks on final status issues ended on Monday afternoon without any announced result, Palestinian sources close to the negotiations said.

1/15/2008 - 4 hurt in Sderot rocket barrage

1/15/2008 - Fertilizer, frustration fuel Gaza's rockets He also makes a far more extravagant claim: He says the rocket that landed in Ashkelon was his own production, and that he made it at a cost of $900 for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a communist group that claimed responsibility for that attack. The Palestinian Islamic Jihad also separately claimed the attack as its own. "I laughed when they said it was from Iran

1/15/2008 - Top British journalists to visit Israel A UK-based pro-Israel lobby will bring a delegation of senior journalists from major media outlets to Israel on Sunday. Britain beware - you're next.

1/15/2008 - Walesa: World needs to combat Iranian threat "It seems we understand each other so very well and are doing so well together that we could establish the United States of Poland and Israel," Walesa quipped.

1/15/2008 - Rudy voices praise, skepticism on peace push as key Fla. vote nears Some right-leaning Israelis and American Jews who generally share Giuliani's hawkish views on the Middle East have been increasingly critical of President Bush and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's willingness to negotiate with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.

1/15/2008 - Ex-Jewish liaison for Clinton, Kerry plays Jewish card in Congress run Among a class of single-issue pro-Israel political donors, many believe that unseating Kirk is bad for the Jews -- especially since he could someday be in line for the secretary of defense job, according to Norpac?s president, Dr. Ben Chouake.....It is likely that few congressional candidates have as many deep personal ties to Israel as the 42-year-old Footlik. His wife, Grace, is an Israeli he met while living in Tel Aviv and working for a think tank started by current Israeli President Shimon Peres. His business partner is Yuval Rabin, the son of the slain prime minister Yitzhak Rabin.

1/15/2008 - Rice expresses US outrage over Lebanon bombing Three people were killed in a remote-controlled bomb blast that targeted a United States embassy car in the Lebanese capital of Beirut, the latest in a string of attacks in the troubled country.

1/15/2008 - Gaza's Christian population wanes

1/15/2008 - Netanyahu urges Shas, Yisrael Beiteinu to quit government Opposition chairman Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday urged Shas and Yisrael Beiteinu to leave the government in wake of the first meeting between Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and Chief Palestinian negotiator Ahmed Qureia over the core issues.

1/15/2008 - Efforts to block Saudi arms deal likely to be unsuccessful Top Israelis, including Defense Minister Ehud Barak, gave the sale their blessing after representations by U.S. officials. Reported sweeteners included guarantees that the JDAMs would be programmed not to include Israel as a target.

1/15/2008 - Effort to block Saudi arms deal is doomed With Congress having 30 days to reject the sale, its foes must run their opposition through a committee. Lantos, perhaps Israel's best friend among committee chairmen, was their best chance.

1/15/2008 - Four killed in Beirut explosion

1/15/2008 - Olmert: Hizbullah not interested in using its missiles Prime minister lauds achievements of Second Lebanon War, says Shiite group 'not inclined' to use its weapons against Israel. Olmert recommends against wide-scale incursion in Gaza that may cost Israel more than it's willing to pay

1/15/2008 - Adviser: Bush has 'great respect' for Jews Katz indicated to the institute staff that the president "is very appreciative about the Jewish contributions to America: to American culture, American economics and American planning," Bar-Yosef said. "This is why he feels so committed to the future of Israel as a Jewish state."

1/15/2008 - Olmert faces right-wing rebellion

1/15/2008 - Ms. magazine's rejection of ad elicits strong Jewish response She, along with authors Francine Klagsbrun and Phyllis Chesler suggested at the news conference on Tuesday that the magazine's refusal to run the ad was indicative of a pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel sentiment that is rampant within the feminist movement.

1/14/2008 - PLO to form separate W. Bank parliament

1/14/2008 - PLO Central Council calls on Hamas to resume dialogue

1/14/2008 - Two Palestinians indicted for murder of W. Bank settler Ido Zoldan

1/14/2008 - Israel Allowed a Short Time Fuel Import To Gaza

1/14/2008 - PLO left-wing parties boycott Hamas-led Damascus conference

1/14/2008 - Palestinian police reclaim West Bank streets

1/14/2008 - Israel, Palestinians open talks after push from Bush Pressed by the United States, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has ordered an effective halt to new construction in settlements. But Israel does not view building on West Bank land it has annexed to Jerusalem as settlement

1/14/2008 - West Bank's Jewish 'Outposts' Dig In Settlers have responded to Bush's comments not by curtailing construction, but by expanding it.

1/14/2008 - Bush's Arab world tour is significant for Israel** From an Israeli perspective, the three key elements were isolating Iran, coaxing moderate Arab countries into moving toward normalization with Israel and getting oil-rich Arab states to honor their financial pledges to the Palestinians......Bush's post-NIE Mideast diplomacy can be read in two different ways: bolstering the moderate Arab coalition against Iran as part of an ongoing policy of containment through diplomatic and economic sanctions, or as laying the diplomatic groundwork for a possible military strike against Iranian nuclear installations before the president leaves office.

1/14/2008 - Newsweek: Bush 'disowned' NIE to Olmert President Bush reportedly "all but disowned" the recent National Intelligence Estimate in private talks with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

1/14/2008 - Olmert renews threat on Iran Yediot Achronot reported that Israeli and U.S. officials will resume a strategic dialogue focused on Iran at the end of the month. Israel's representative will be Transportation Minister Shaul Mofaz; his U.S. counterpart will be State Department official Nicholas Burns

1/14/2008 - Iranian boats threaten, so the candidates step up rhetoric As usual, the talk on Iran eventually turned to Israel.

1/14/2008 - Bush seeks Saudi support for fragile Middle East peace talks Bush's talks in Riyadh were also expected to deal with Iranian policy in the region, including Tehran's nuclear ambitions and its support for radical groups such as Hamas, Hizbullah in Lebanon, and Shia militias in Iraq. Iran was the main focus of the president's keynote speech of his trip in Abu Dhabi on Sunday.

1/14/2008 - Barenboim becomes first to hold Israeli and Palestinian passports "Under the most difficult circumstances he has shown solidarity with the Palestinian people," Mustafa Barghouti, a Palestinian MP and presidential candidate, said at the recital held to raise money for medical aid for children in the Gaza Strip.

1/14/2008 - Release: Israeli Police and Military Remain Passive in the Face of Settler Harassment of Palestinians On Saturday 12 January, young Israeli settlers attacked two CPTers as they stood between a Palestinian man and a group of three Israeli boys. The boys were taunting the man with rude remarks in Arabic about the Prophet Mohammad. A group of 8-10 girls pushed, pulled and kicked Jan Benvie until she fell to the ground. The boys sprayed something in Johann Funk?s face that caused eye irritation. Two Israeli soldiers stood a short distance away and watched the attacks. A third soldier came forward to intervene only when the settler girls knocked Benvie to the ground.

1/14/2008 - It's Not About Iran Last year, King Abdullah II of Jordan delivered an address to a joint session of Congress. His focus was not on Iran or Iraq -- or even the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi refugees his small country is painfully hosting. In urging American diplomacy, his message was clear: "The wellspring of regional division, the source of resentment and frustration far beyond, is the denial of justice and peace in Palestine." This address was hardly noticed in our press. In contrast, when the king highlights the Iranian threat to his American visitors, everyone listens.

1/14/2008 - Jerusalem Diary: Monday 14 January President Bush confidently predicted peace within a year during his visit to Israel and the West Bank. Daniel Barenboim conducting the West-Eastern Divan Daniel Barenboim conveyed his own message, on Saturday night.

1/14/2008 - Canada's stance on Israeli settlements still unclear Uncertainty on this potentially explosive issue arose Sunday when Bernier was twice asked during a West Bank press conference whether Ottawa ? which officially opposes new settlement activity by Israel ? makes a distinction between housing construction in the West Bank and in East Jerusalem. Both times, the Canadian minister pointedly ignored the question. The second time it was asked, he abruptly ended the press conference and left the room.

1/14/2008 - Bush in new Saudi talks after first moves on arms deal The arms deal, which includes weaponry and high-tech munitions, has alarmed Israel and some US Congressmen, especially as Saudi Arabia refuses to recognise the Jewish state.

1/14/2008 - Refugees still face dire conditions at Nahr al-Bared, despite relief efforts

1/14/2008 - Report: Bush praises Syria strike President Bush was quoted as saying Israel's airstrike in Syria last year was an "important preventive action."

1/14/2008 - Obama targeted in smear campaign the Israel Policy Forum, an organization dedicated to mobilizing American Jews in support of sustained US diplomatic efforts in the Middle East, issued a statement which read that: "It?s hard to imagine that anyone would believe that life-long churchgoer Obama is a Muslim or that a guy with a pro-Israel record is a secret agent of terrorists."

1/14/2008 - Day in pictures A Palestinian man waits with his camel for a group of tourists on the Mount of Olives, overlooking Jerusalem's Old City.

1/14/2008 - Building begins on new Jewish homes in E. J'lem's Ras al-Amud neighborhood

1/14/2008 - Gaza tunnel smugglers stay busy

1/14/2008 - Israel to ease visa restrictions for Catholic clerics

1/14/2008 - Giuliani: Open to Abbas, but skeptical Some right-leaning Israelis and American Jews who often share Giuliani's hawkish views on the Middle East have been increasingly critical of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and U.S. President George W. Bush's willingness to negotiate with Abbas.

1/14/2008 - U.S. to boost aid to Jordan in 2008 by 48 percent The vast array of aid projects in Jordan helped by U.S. funds includes tourism and infrastructure schemes, managing water supplies, funding clinics in Palestinian camps and establishing programmes to rehabilitate Iraqi refugees.

1/14/2008 - BUSH'S TRIP BRINGS GLIMMER OF HOPE TO PALESTINIANS If there is anyone familiar with the Middle East who doesn't know that the Israelis have for years tormented the Palestinians with their oppressive road checkpoints (designed to humiliate them on every level), stand up please!

1/14/2008 - 'Billy Elliot' inspires teen

1/14/2008 - Former Israeli and Palestinian Fighters Embark on Speaking Tour of US Combatants for Peace is a group of former Israeli soldiers and former Palestinian fighters who have joined in solidarity to end the violence which has engulfed Israel/Palestine for generations. They have dedicated their lives to ending the occupation and seeking peace through non-violent means.

1/13/2008 - Three Palestinians killed in Israeli air strike on Gaza Three Palestinian militants, including the local head of an armed group, were killed in an Israeli air strike on a refugee camp of Gaza City late Sunday, medics and security sources said.

1/13/2008 - Erekat urges Hamas recognize Israel-PLO deals Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat urged Islamic Hamas movement on Sunday to commit itself to the deals signed between the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) and Israel.

1/13/2008 - Israeli leader: Outposts are 'disgrace'

1/13/2008 - Confront Iran danger early - Bush Mr Bush said Iran threatened the security of all nations and should be confronted "before it's too late".

1/13/2008 - US, Israel on 'same page' on Iran While the Israeli-Palestinian track dominated the public aspect of Bush's visit here, the Iranian issue played a dominant role in the private conversations between Olmert and the US president.

1/13/2008 - Palestinian negotiator rules out establishment of statehood in 2008 "The success to reach such a deal is subject to the Israeli government's capability to stop the settlement buildings, remove checkpoints, stop the offensive and engage in serious negotiations,"

1/13/2008 - Bush urges Iran regime to heed people's will "To the Palestinian people, the dignity and sovereignty that is your right is within your reach," said Bush, who after a first visit to the Holy Land as president last week, said he is "very hopeful" a final peace deal can be reached before he leaves office in January.

1/13/2008 - Hamas: IDF attack carried out because Bush gave green light during visit Sources within Hamas reacted to an IDF attack on a Hamas post in southern Gaza by saying: "The attack is Israeli implementation of the green light that President (George W.) Bush gave Israel during his recent visit that enables the opening of an attack on the Gaza Strip."

1/13/2008 - Israel, P.A. to tackle 'core issues'

1/13/2008 - Olmert: Bush no lame duck for us "Even though this is U.S. President Bush's last year in office, I believe that there is great consideration, deep significance and unprecedented sensitivity for the positions that the United States will take this year, especially on matters that are especially sensitive vis-a-vis the security of the State of Israel,"

1/13/2008 - Haaretz probe: Half of Gazans killed by IDF not involved in terror an examination by Haaretz reveals that the number of Palestinians killed by Israeli security forces was 816 during those two years, and that of them, 360 were civilians who were not affiliated with any armed organizations. Data from B'Tselem, the Israeli human rights organization, show that 152 of the casualties were under age 18, and 48 were under the age of 14. According to Diskin, 356 Palestinian Gazans were killed in 2006, and an additional 454 in 2007

1/13/2008 - 2 Palestinians indicted for kidnapping Israeli cabbie

1/13/2008 - Bush Disowns U.S. Intel, Tells Israelis Iran NIE ?Doesn?t Reflect My Own Views? In private meetings with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert this week, Newsweek reports that President Bush disowned the U.S. intelligence community?s judgments:

1/13/2008 - Eleven Palestinians injured, four abducted during Israeli settler attack in Hebron

1/13/2008 - Fatah leader wants probe of missing $2b.

1/13/2008 - Egypt rules out permanent U.S. presence across Egypt-Gaza border

1/13/2008 - Israel digs in over past AS CRANES help dig the foundations for new apartments in the Israeli settlements in the West Bank, archaeologists at the City of David site in annexed East Jerusalem are also digging away.

1/13/2008 - Head of ISA defines a terrorist as any Palestinian killed by Israel The total number of Palestinians killed by Israeli security forces in Gaza in 2006 and 2007 is 816. Of these, 152 were minors, including 48 under the age of 14. In addition, many men and women were killed in Gaza who took no part in the hostilities. It appears that the head of the ISA defines every Palestinian killed by Israel in the Gaza Strip as a terrorist.

1/13/2008 - B'Tselem: Does Diskin view kids as terrorists? "Does Yuval Diskin include five-year-old Maria Okal, eight-year-old Aya al-Astal, nine-year-old Yehi Abu Slamia and his five-year-old brother Nasrallah among the list of terrorist?"

1/13/2008 - An Appeal to end the solitary confinement of a Palestinian journalist

1/13/2008 - Settlers open fire on international human right activists near Hebron Sources in the city of Hebron told IMEMC that a group of international human rights activists were working near an illegal Jewish settlement outpost called Ma'on when a group of armed settlers opened fire at them at midday on Saturday.

1/13/2008 - Caritas Jerusalem holds fun days for Palestinian children One of the crucial objectives of the fun day is to get children from the different locations to share the same activities and feelings, as well as gathering Palestinian children together in peace, joy and celebration. The physically challenged were also included in the activities and they were involved carefully in the participation

1/13/2008 - Bush assured Israel over Gaza violence: Olmert US President George W. Bush has assured Israel that no peace deal with the Palestinians will be implemented until violence from Hamas-run Gaza stops, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said on Sunday.

1/13/2008 - Israeli pianist Barenboim takes Palestinian passport Daniel Barenboim, the world renowned Israeli pianist and conductor, has taken Palestinian citizenship and said he believed his rare new status could serve a model for peace between the two peoples.

1/13/2008 - Bush Push for Mideast Peace a Lame Duck Move "The Israelis want to treat us like a tree, deprived of water," she says. "They have taken our land and humiliated us... They've made it a living hell here."

1/13/2008 - Israel to get "smarter" U.S.-made bombs than Saudis

1/13/2008 - Gandhi's grandson blasts Israel, Jews In the blog entry, posted to the Washington Post's On Faith blog on Monday and titled "Jewish Identity Can't Depend on Violence," Gandhi wonders whether Israelis would not be better served "to befriend those who hate you" rather than turning Israel into "a snake pit" through "your attitude toward your neighbors."

1/13/2008 - Hebron REFLECTION: Normalizing Anarchy Before leaving Jerusalem for At-Tuwani, I had coffee with an Israeli conscript who refused to serve in the Occupied Territories. Hearing a description of the Israeli occupation from a former soldier was a helpful reminder of how war victimizes Palestinians but also extracts a heavy toll on Israeli soldiers

1/13/2008 - Broadcasting a Global Sampler Mr. Dajani, a 50-year-old Palestinian-American journalist, produces ?Mosaic: World News From the Middle East,? a Peabody Award-winning 30-minute daily report culled from the dispatches of more than 35 Mideast television broadcasts.

1/13/2008 - Canadian foreign minister pledges $300 million to aid Palestinians Bernier said the money, to be allocated over the coming five years, will be used for security and government reform.

1/13/2008 - British charity asked to shun Leviev A pro-Palestinian lobby asked a British charity to refuse donations by Israeli billionaire Lev Leviev.

1/13/2008 - Nasrallah: Israel to give crumbs to Palestinians

1/13/2008 - Anti-Israel Palestinian groups to hold Syria conference Participants are to discuss the right of Palestinian refugees to return to homes they fled when the state of Israel was founded in 1948, and resistance against Israel, said Raja.

1/12/2008 - Saudi cannot be launchpad for Iran attack: report ** A leading Saudi newspaper on Saturday ruled out any attempt by the United States to use the oil-rich Gulf kingdom as a launchpad for a possible war on Iran over Tehran's disputed nuclear programme......"Iran's supposed danger does not minimise the real danger of Israel, which is among 10 countries in the world to have nuclear weapons,"

1/12/2008 - Two Hamas armed wing members killed in Israeli air strike Two members of the armed wing of the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas were killed in an Israeli air raid on the southern Gaza Strip on Saturday, medics said.

1/12/2008 - Israeli army vehicle ran over a Palestinian child near Nablus city Jihan Samara was crossing the street with her mother when an Israeli army jeep ran her over, witnesses said.

1/12/2008 - Reporter offers Bush a Gaza, West Bank misery tour President Bush won't see the hospital wards where babies, just weeks old, are dying because their doctors can't get permission from Israeli authorities to go to Israel for treatment as they did in the past.

1/12/2008 - Bush visits Jesus birthplace in charged W.Bank "Some day, I hope that as a result of the formation of a Palestinian state, there won't be walls, and checkpoints. People will move freely in a democratic (Palestinian) state," Bush said.

1/12/2008 - Bush: Hamas delivers nothing but misery in Gaza Visiting U.S. President George W. Bush said on Thursday that the Islamic Hamas in the Gaza has delivered nothing but misery.

1/12/2008 - Plumbing business going down the drain Not surprisingly, Isam's income has dropped dramatically. His customers are spending less and the increasingly stringent Israeli closure system imposed on the West Bank has obliged him to pay higher customs and clearance fees for importing his products from Israel.

1/12/2008 - Gaza's American school attacked Hamas, the group that controls the Gaza Strip, has condemned the attack.

1/12/2008 - Gaza militants launch rockets at Israeli targets

1/12/2008 - UK officials concerned over the Israeli fuel cuts on Gaza

1/12/2008 - Patient number 70 dies due to the Israeli siege on Gaza The sources said that Yihiya Al Jamal, 53, had cancer and had applied three times to leave Gaza but the Israeli army refused. Doctors said that Al Jamal was diagnosed with cancer 9 months ago.

1/12/2008 - President?s Radio Address the Palestinians must have a state that is viable, contiguous, sovereign, and independent. Achieving this vision will require tough decisions and painful concessions from both sides.

1/12/2008 - Palestinians sue for NIS 40 million for land taken by settlers Palestinian landowners on whose property the West Bank settlement of Homesh was constructed are demanding NIS 40 million in compensation and the right to access their land. The state is trying to reach an out-of-court compromise in order to avoid a precedent setting ruling.

1/12/2008 - Jordan king urges clearer timetable for Mideast talks

1/12/2008 - US admits Mideast peace deal hangs on fate of Gaza Haniya hit out at the president's suggestion that a peace agreement might exclude the refugees returning to the homes they fled in the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. "We reject his denial of the right of return of refugees and his position on Jerusalem," Haniya said. "We do not accept that 11,000 (Palestinian) prisoners stay in Israeli jails and that (Jewish) settlements remain in Palestinian territory,"

1/12/2008 - Israel, Palestinians must get serious on talks: U.S

1/12/2008 - PNA denies role in Hamas-Israel swap talks over captive soldier Shalit

1/12/2008 - One International Protestor Injured Near Bethlehem Around 200 Palestinian villagers, Israeli and International supporters marched against the illegal Israeli wall that is being built in the village of Um Salmumah located near Bethlehem city.

1/12/2008 - Israel stressed to Bush that Iran is a nuclear 'threat': general

1/12/2008 - Two injured in weekly demonstration The villagers of Bil'in located near the Central West Bank city of Ramallah, along with their international and Israeli supporters conducted their weekly demonstration against the illegal Israeli wall on Friday.

1/12/2008 - Mofaz: Lebanon resolution worthless Transportation Minister Mofaz says Security Council Resolution 1701 that ended Second Lebanon War 'not worth paper it's written on'; former defense minister slams political leadership's conduct during war, says army not at fault for outcome

1/12/2008 - Fathers and Sons neoconservatism?s priorities, which range from strong support for Israel to vehement opposition to affirmative action, are heavily influenced by the values, interests and collective historical memory of the Jewish people.

1/12/2008 - Bush takes soundings on Iran Al-Khaleej, a UAE daily, accused him of "striving to transform the Arab-Israeli conflict into an Arab-Iranian conflict, since nuclear Israel, which is armed to the teeth with weapons of mass destruction, which is aggressive, expansionist, racist and an international outlaw, does not threaten world peace".

1/12/2008 - Mofaz: Israel must come to interim agreement with Palestinians Israel must strive for an interim agreement with the Palestinians that would ensure the foundation of a Palestinian state with temporary borders, but which would refrain from trying to solve the issues of Palestinian refugees or Jerusalem, Transportation Minister Shaul Mofaz said on Saturday.

1/12/2008 - Ban slams attack on UN force in Lebanon, rocket on Israel

1/12/2008 - AROUND 400 PEOPLE DEMONSTRATE NEAR US EMBASSY IN MANAMA THEY CHANTED SLOGANS AGAINST THE US POLICIES, CALLED FOR HALT OF WARS IN THE REGION AND FOR A JUST SOLUTION TO THE PALESTINIAN CAUSE AND THE REFUGEES PROBLEM

1/12/2008 - Israel?s true friends Two supporters of Israel in Congress say it isn?t about the lobby. Stoolies proclaim they are stoolies for a different reason (other than the efforts of the Israeli lobby). Of course we all realize that there are some in Congress who themselves have a passionate attachment to Israel all on their own, and thus do not need to be lobbied by pro-Israel groups. Lantos and Ros-Lehtinen comes to mind. There are many many more like them across America and in positions of power.

1/12/2008 - Bush Fails Again by Charley Reese As occupied territories, they fall under the Geneva Conventions. An occupying power is not allowed to take land or to build settlements in occupied territory. It is not allowed to destroy homes, to uproot olive groves, to deport people, and to wall the area off ? all of which the Israelis have done and are continuing to do........the main purpose of Bush's visit is to harangue the Arabs about the alleged dangers of Iran.

1/12/2008 - Know thine enemy or friend: Palestinian students study Israel Few of the students have ever traveled into Israel. From their classroom window they can see the concrete slabs of the wall and fence Israel is building to keep out suicide bombers. But the isolation doesn't stop them from wondering what it's like.

1/12/2008 - Blair in landmark talks with Jewish settlers The settler representatives told Blair that Olmert had no mandate to negotiate a peace deal with the Palestinians that required the dismantling of settlements in the occupied West Bank, Israeli participants in the meeting said.

1/12/2008 - Many Palestinians Offer a Bleak Opinion of Bush "The Palestinians are in agreement that in the history of the United States, Bush is more biased than any other American president toward Israel."

1/12/2008 - Turkish president to visit Egypt for Mideast, Iraq talks: official Turkish President Abdullah Gul will visit Egypt next week for talks on the faltering Middle East peace process and strife-torn Iraq, his office said Saturday

1/12/2008 - Washington Post Reviews DAM CD

1/12/2008 - Bringing Beethoven to the West Bank Berlin's well-known opera director, Daniel Barenboim, will show his support for Palestine with a charity paino concert in the West Bank city of Ramallah. His concert follows a visit by United State President George Bush.

1/12/2008 - Gaza Relief Convoy Campaign Is Gaining Momentum

1/12/2008 - Lebanon warns Germany of possible terrorist attacks

1/12/2008 - Syrians are rebuilding bombed site: report Syrians are rebuilding a desert site bombed by the Israeli military last September on suspicions it was supposed to house a nuclear reactor, The New York Times reported on its website late Friday.

1/11/2008 - Food crisis worsening in Gaza: World Food Programme Anaemia rates have risen to 77.5 percent as Gaza's isolation has deepened, Berthiaume said

1/11/2008 - Israel salutes Bush but cautious on "treaty" hopes

1/11/2008 - Rightists: Bush and Olmert bringing Holocaust upon us

1/11/2008 - Bush plans return visit to Middle East The timing of what would be his second visit to the area as US president would coincide with the 60th anniversary of the creation of the state of Israel, which Palestinians call the 'Nakba', or catastrophe, because of the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians displaced.

1/11/2008 - Bush ends Holy Land visit predicting peace deal "The establishment of a state of Palestine is long overdue," he said. "A peace agreement should happen and can happen by the end of this year."

1/11/2008 - Bush says US opposes Israel undermining Abbas forces "To the extent that Israeli actions have undermined the effectiveness of the Palestinian force, or the authority of the state relative to the average citizen, is something that we don't agree with, and have made our position clear," Bush told a news conference in the West Bank city of Ramallah with Abbas at his side.

1/11/2008 - Ron Paul draws stark contrasts with GOP peers Paul urged U.S. disengagement from the Israeli-Palestinian situation. "It would be much better to have a balance by being out of there. And I think it would be a greater incentive for Israel and the Palestinians and all the Arab nations to come together and talk because I think we get in the way too often. And besides, it's costing us a lot of money and it's costing us lives now.... We're out of money. We can't do it any longer."

1/11/2008 - Israel bars international peace activists from entering the Palestinian territories The Israeli Authorities barred on Friday international peace activists from entering the Palestinian territories as they tried to cross the Allenby Bridge between Jordan and the West Bank.

1/11/2008 - Bush tours Gulf to push Mideast peace, curb Iran

1/11/2008 - Military option against Iran is 'still on the table' ** Asked whether Israel had shown the president any intelligence contradicting the U.S. National Intelligence Estimate that Iran had stopped its clandestine military nuclear program in 2003, the official said: "This is one of the areas our countries and establishments, including the intelligence establishment, are working in very close cooperation. We don't wait for any special event before passing on information. I assume that the president knows whatever we do."

1/11/2008 - Group of Gazans arrives in Jordan for free medical treatment The group of 13 includes the elderly and women. As a good will gesture they will be treated free of charge by the Jordanian government, said Hashem Abdullat of the King Hussein Medical Centre where the patients will be hosted.

1/11/2008 - CIA reveals: We said in 1974 that Israel had nuclear weapons The issue of an American double standard regarding the nuclear activities of Israel and Iran often comes up when senior American officials visit the Gulf, as Secretary of Defense Robert Gates did last month.

1/11/2008 - Ms. magazine refuses pro-Israel ad Ms. magazine's executive editor, Kathy Spillar, disputes that version, telling JTA the ad showed political support for one of Israel's parties and thus violated magazine standards

1/11/2008 - O.U. rejects Bush's Jerusalem claim The Orthodox Union rejected President Bush's claim that Jerusalem is a "tough issue."

1/11/2008 - WHITE HOUSE NOTEBOOK: Bush gets heaps of praise in Jerusalem

1/11/2008 - Israeli military jams Palestinian radio with propaganda

1/11/2008 - Weisenthal Center: Lebanese blocking our ad Several other Arab newspapers did not respond requests to run the ad, which was timed to coincide with President Bush's to Israel. It did appear in the New York Times, International Herald Tribune, Ha'aretz and Jerusalem Post.

1/11/2008 - Likud slams PM's 'sycophancy' to Bush most of the meeting was devoted to the Iranian issue. Netanyahu pressed Bush to act against the Islamic Republic before he left office in January 2009.

1/11/2008 - Bush: We should have bombed Auschwitz The President's declaration, reviving one of the most enduring controversies from the war, came as he made an hour-long tour of the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial museum before leaving Israel for Kuwait.

1/11/2008 - Spy case still makes waves in Israel Ron Olive, the agent in charge of counterintelligence for the Naval Investigative Service at the time of Pollard's arrest, told the BBC that the incident was "one of the most devastating cases of espionage in US history" during which Pollard stole over "one million classified documents". "Even though Israel is an ally, it had friends that aren't necessarily friend of the US," said Mr Olive, who wrote a book about the case, Capturing Jonathan Pollard.

1/11/2008 - With concern and bemusement, Israelis follow U.S. elections "We are so closely influenced by what happens in the United States, so people think it?s in their own self-interest to support Hillary, assuming she will do more for Israel," ....."Of course we are all following the elections: This is going to be our president, too,"

1/11/2008 - Bishops from Europe and US to visit Holy Land in support of peace

1/11/2008 - Spielberg lends a hand "When Mr. Spielberg decided to funnel his profits from Munich into the Righteous Persons Foundation, he knew that he wanted to allocate these specific funds to programs based on co-existence issues,"

1/11/2008 - Six days in the West Bank - an unforgettable experience I'm always acutely aware of the danger of getting drawn into the propaganda battle between Israelis and Palestinians - I have many Israeli friends who I cherish dearly. But to put it bluntly the situation in the West Bank is dire. It's dire in the West Bank and it's even worse in Gaza. To allow the status to remain as it is simply unjust, unjustifiable and indefensible!

1/11/2008 - The military zone in Hebron As and by way of harassment, the Jews residing in the area beat even the school students on their way back home. With the Ecumenical Accompaniers accompanying the students, the incidents of harassment drastically reduced. For the EAs would just record the incident on their camera and put it on the net and distribute it to international human rights groups. This did act as a deterrent

1/11/2008 - Of ordinariness and occupation

1/11/2008 - Report: Wall construction, settlement expansion and nonviolent resistance in 2007

1/11/2008 - In pictures: Bush in West Bank

1/11/2008 - United Methodists meet with Caterpillar to discuss disinvestment The chief of the United Methodist Church's public affairs unit in the US will meet today with Jim Owens, President and CEO of Caterpillar in order to convey his opposition to Caterpillar's equipment sales to Israel.

1/11/2008 - Security Council condemns attack on Israel A rocket attack on northern Israel has drawn the condemnation of the U.N. Security Council. Libya's ambassador to the United Nations, the current president of the council, fought the resolution's adoption for 48 hours, Ha'aretz reported.

1/11/2008 - Paul, Giuliani debate Israel "The reality is that Israel is a close and strong ally of the United States," Giuliani said. "America has only a few extremely reliable allies, special relationships. The defense of Israel is a -- critical importance to the United States of America, and it goes much deeper than just tactical things."

1/11/2008 - Olmert stops talk of Pollard at meal Olmert asked Bush to pardon Pollard when he met with the president on Wednesday, but he was turned down.

1/10/2008 - Israeli doctors enter Gaza for first time since Hamas takeover For the first time since the Hamas takeover, three Arab Israeli doctors from the rights group "Physicians for Human Rights" entered Gaza Wednesday in order to administer medical treatment to Gazan residents.

1/10/2008 - Differing opinions fail to dent Israel's love affair with Bush While saying that he believed that diplomatic means ? including tightening economic sanctions ? would bring a solution, Mr Bush reassured Mr Olmert last night that the US regarded Iran as a threat, and that it would continue to be a threat if the international community did not come together to prevent it from developing the know-how to build a nuclear weapon

1/10/2008 - 'All options on table' to stop nuclear Iran: Israel "In assessing the threat from Iran we see in sync and think similarly. Both America and Israel understand the severity of the threat, the implication of the threat if it grows," Israel's US Ambassador Sallai Meridor said.

1/10/2008 - Olmert tells Bush construction in Jerusalem to continue At end of meeting with US president in capital, prime minister makes it clear Israel will not halt building plan in east Jerusalem despite American objection. 'We made it clear Jerusalem's status is different than that of the settlements,' Olmert says. Bush chooses not to confront his host, focuses on outposts: 'They must be evacuated'

1/10/2008 - Bush meets Israeli minister banned from US over spy case Eitan, a member of Israel's security cabinet, was the old Mossad handler for Jonathan Pollard, an American Jew sentenced to life in prison for spying on Israel.

1/10/2008 - Bush names general to monitor Mideast "road map" U.S. President George W. Bush has named Lt. Gen. William Fraser to monitor Israeli and Palestinian implementation of the long-stalled "road map" peace plan, the White House said on Thursday.

1/10/2008 - Gaza businessmen concerned over continued Gaza closure

1/10/2008 - Mideast Peace: Big Talk, No Action Bush himself said, "If given a chance the Palestinian people will work for freedom," They shouldn't have to. It is a basic human right guaranteed to people around the world. And we shouldn't be standing in the way of that freedom (as the Israelis have us doing).

1/10/2008 - Bush hardens tone, urges end to Israeli occupation "There should be an end to the occupation that began in 1967,"

1/10/2008 - Palestinian militants attack American school in Gaza The school's principal Ribhi Salem told reporters that the gunmen asked the school guards to leave after they broke into the school and then fired a RPG from zero range destroying the hall's contents.

1/10/2008 - Hebron Reflection: A Check on worship Here in Hebron, Muslim worshippers going to the Ibrahimi Mosque have to pass through at least two, often three or more Israeli military checkpoints.

1/10/2008 - Bush calls for end to Israeli occupation He said the question of Palestinian refugees should be solved by compensation and the chance for them to live in a future Palestinian state, effectively ruling out their return to the land that is now Israel.

1/10/2008 - Palestinians remain sceptical despite Bush's upbeat prediction

1/10/2008 - Ministers to present PM list of Palestinians to free for Shalit

1/10/2008 - Israeli military kidnaps three Palestinians in the West Bank

1/10/2008 - Bush prays in Bethlehem amid sea of barricades

1/10/2008 - Ramallah demo brands Bush 'war criminal' Angry demonstrators in the West Bank town of Ramallah branded US President George W. Bush a "war criminal" on Thursday as locals said he would do nothing for the plight of the Palestinians.

1/10/2008 - The World Food Program aid to Gaza The agency says it will take up to 2 million dollars a month to feed those in need. WFP spokesperson Kirstie Campbell says 70 percent of the population has to choose between putting food on the table or a roof over their heads.

1/10/2008 - Is AIPAC Making a Monkey Out of YOU?

1/10/2008 - Jerusalem: Right-wing activists arrested for incendiary Bush posters Extreme right-wing activists, including several teens, arrested for putting up posters depicting Peres, Olmert and Bush wearing kaffiyah. Youth were paid to put up posters

1/10/2008 - Sanhedrin to Bush: Declare that Israel belongs to Jews Right-wing rabbis pass on small letter to be delivered to US president on his upcoming visit which asks leader to free convicted spy Jonathan Pollard, declare Israel belongs to Jews, urge American Jews to make aliyah

1/10/2008 - Welcome, Mr President, to the misery you've created The human catastrophe deliberately inflicted on Gaza by western policies over the past two years is one of the great crimes of this century so far. It is especially unjustified since Hamas had been observing a truce in its attacks on Israelis for several months prior to winning the "free, fair and open elections" that the roadmap asked for. Hamas was, and continues to be, punished not for its occasional use of violence but simply for being popular.

1/10/2008 - Blair 'owes it to the Middle East' Those who know him well have told Guardian Unlimited that Blair "feels he owes it to the Middle East, after Iraq, to stay with the region and do what he can to address the central question of Palestine".

1/10/2008 - Say hello, wave goodbye Expectations for George Bush's grand tour of America's closest Arab allies could hardly be lower, writes Ian Black

1/10/2008 - Bush, Olmert kiss up to Shas, Israel Beiteinu Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and US President George W. Bush took steps to maintain Olmert's coalition on Wednesday by flattering Shas chairman Eli Yishai and Israel Beiteinu leader Avigdor Lieberman.

1/10/2008 - Mid-East readers' views of Bush trip The United Nations has been passing resolutions since 1967 and none of them has been implemented. I don't see Israel complying with international law in the next 12 months.

1/10/2008 - MIDDLE EAST DIARY: Sudan to take in stranded Palestinians "We die a thousand times a day," Wafaa Mazhar, 37, a mother of five, told Miret by phone. "We Palestinians are leading miserable lives. We're helpless, and no one feels our pain."

1/10/2008 - Bush meeting with Abbas recalls antipathy toward Arafat Yasser Arafat , the late Palestinian leader, literally loomed large Thursday in Ramallah as President Bush became the first American president to visit the Muqata, the battered compound that serves as the Palestinian Authority president's home.

1/10/2008 - Egypt soldiers found in mass grave near Israel The bodies of 30 Egyptian soldiers believed killed in the 1967 Arab-Israeli War were found in a mass grave in the Sinai desert close to the Israeli border on Wednesday, a security source said.

1/10/2008 - Sun & Peretz "Heart" Obama? Peretz further asserts that "Barack Obama has a better feel for this country [Israel] than she does." You can be sure that Hillary Clinton will be trumpeting her efforts in support of Israel in response before the week is out.

1/10/2008 - Police and Soldiers stand by while Settlers Occupy Palestinian Land, Build Structures, and Harass Local Residents

1/10/2008 - Documentary takes intimate look at Carter

1/10/2008 - New Israel lobby 'not taking on Bicom' A new London-based organisation dedicated to monitoring and analysing press coverage of Israel is to be launched shortly with a full-time staff.

1/10/2008 - In pictures: Palestinians and Israelis on Bush's visit

1/10/2008 - Question is how, not what Both Israelis and Palestinians are part of the human family. The vast majority of both want to live and work and raise their families in peace and security in a world that values justice and compassion.

1/10/2008 - Chief rabbi thanks Bush for 'war against Iraq' "I want to thank you for your support of Israel and in particular for waging a war against Iraq," Metzger told Bush, according to the chief rabbi's spokesman.

1/10/2008 - Beirut to complain to UN after Israel 'kidnaps' shepherd Lebanon is to complain to the UN Security Council, accusing Israel of kidnapping a shepherd from inside Lebanese territory, the prime minister's office said on Tuesday.

1/10/2008 - Lebanon arrests top member of Qaeda-inspired group A top member of an extremist Islamist group that waged a 15-week battle against the Lebanese army last year was arrested on Thursday in the northern city of Tripoli, a military official said.

1/10/2008 - Israeli ambassador, Turkish union leader in duel of words Israeli Ambassador to Turkey Gabby Levy and Mustafa Başoğlu, the head of the Turkish Health Workers Union (Sağlık-İş), were yesterday engaged in a harsh battle of words here in front of the press, upon remarks by Başoğlu criticizing the Israeli army?s practices in the Palestinian territories, which he said had led to uneasiness among the Turkish public

1/10/2008 - The United States Government?s Contribution to UNRWA?s 2008 General Fund Appeal The United States announces an immediate initial contribution of $40 million to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) in support of its 2008 General Fund Appeal. The U.S. contribution will support UNRWA?s provision of basic and vocational education, primary health care, and relief and social services to over 4.4 million registered Palestinian refugees in Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria

1/10/2008 - Methodist Lobbyist Takes Anti-Israel Divestment Agenda to Doorstep of Caterpillar Tractor

1/10/2008 - Congress Must Reaffirm "Mandate for Palestine" & Israel's Right to Exist, Another Palestinian State Would Be Illegal ?Children of Jewish Holocaust Survivors Los Angeles (CJHSLA),? a pro-Israel activist group headquartered in Los Angeles, California, is calling on the United States Congress to uphold and reaffirm their 1922 endorsement of the ?Mandate for Palestine.?

1/10/2008 - American Pro-Life Leaders Help Jewish Officials in Israel Oppose Abortion Congressman Chris Smith from New Jersey, who heads the pro-life caucus in the House of Representatives, is joined on the trip by Congressman Frank Wolf from Virginia and Congressman Joseph Pitts from Pennsylvania. They visited with Chief Rabbi Yona Metzger and expressed their concern that abortion is slowing the Israeli birth rate compared to their Palestinian neighbors.

1/10/2008 - Entries sought for 2008 Boston Palestine Film Festival

1/10/2008 - Canadian Muslims dismiss Harper government for 'lack' of Mideast policy The issue came to a boil in the summer of 2006 when Canadian Arabs and Muslims reacted angrily to Prime Minister Stephen Harper's comments over Israel's decision to bomb Lebanon in pursuit of Hezbollah terrorists. "It's now beyond (being) pro-Israel. It doesn't have a clear policy for any foreign issue,"

1/9/2008 - Israeli strikes kill three Palestinians in Gaza: medics The Israeli army carried out an air raid against the town of Beit Hanun in northern Gaza, killing two civilians in a residential building, Khadra Wahdane, 30, and Mohammed al-Kafarna, 22, medical sources and witnesses told AFP

1/9/2008 - Egypt's tunnels sustaining Hamas economy Food products, machinery parts, raw materials and even antibiotics are delivered to Gaza through the tunnels, subject to fees from private families that own some of the passages and to taxes by Hamas. Other smuggled products range from cigarettes to mobile phones.

1/9/2008 - PA security official: Al Aqsa Brigade has dismantled A dozen Palestinian gunmen surrendered to Palestinian forces on Tuesday, and the top Palestinian security official said this means a violent West Bank militia, is now defunct. However, Israeli officials are skeptical of such claims, and say gunmen still pose a threat to Israel.

1/9/2008 - Bush takes Mideast peace bid to occupied West Bank

1/9/2008 - Bush to visit cradle of Christianity on Holy Land tour On Thursday Bush will travel to the little town of Bethlehem, the biblical site of Jesus's birth in the occupied West Bank today surrounded by Israel's controversial separation barrier.

1/9/2008 - Clashes between Hamas, Israeli Navy on Gaza coast Hamas forces on shore traded fire with Israeli naval boats off Gaza's southern coast Tuesday, and an Israeli missile landed in nearby Egyptian territory, Hamas said.

1/9/2008 - Training of Palestinian forces gets slow start Israeli, Palestinian and Western officials said the first battalion of nearly 700 U.S.-screened recruits to an overhauled National Security Force will cross into Jordan this month for the American-funded training after a nearly year-long delay.

1/9/2008 - Thousands protest in Gaza against "vampire" Bush Some 20,000 members of the Islamist group, shunned by the West for refusing to renounce violence, set U.S. and Israeli flags alight. Bush was a "butcher" whose first presidential visit to the Holy Land was skewed towards helping Israel, they said.

1/9/2008 - In isolation, Gazans dismiss Bush's new push for peace "The intention of the US and Israeli blockade is to make me and my family suffer, so we'll withdraw our support for Hamas," says Salam Abu Salam, who runs a small tire repair shop in Gaza City's Jabaliyah neighborhood and says his income has fallen by three-quarters in the past six months, to about $15 a day. "But I didn't support Hamas to begin with. Now I see Abbas sitting down with America and Israel while Hamas continues to struggle for Palestinian rights. Who do you think I prefer?"

1/9/2008 - Pilgrims' Progress Breaks Gaza Siege "The pilgrim crisis reflected the conflict between the U.S., Israel and the Arab governments on one side and Hamas and the Arab public -- and all that stand for resistance against occupation -- on the other," he said.

1/9/2008 - Israel excludes priests, nuns The Israeli government has cancelled re-entry visas for priests, nuns and other church workers who wish to travel in and out of the Israeli occupied Palestinian territories.

1/9/2008 - 4 months in jail for soldier who abused Palestinian detainee The Southern Command Military Court sentenced a Givati Brigade soldier to four and-a-half months in prison Wednesday, after he was convicted of abusing a handcuffed, blindfolded Palestinian detainee.

1/9/2008 - Rabbi: Israel Should Not Negotiate With Palestinians Shas spiritual leader, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef told party chairman Eli Yishai on Wednesday that Israel should not negotiate with the Palestinians since Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has no control over the militants operating in the Palestinian territories.

1/9/2008 - Fatah Official: Abbas Has People's Mandate Rafiq Husseini, chief of staff for Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, says Abbas has the mandate of the Palestinian people to negotiate for peace, even though Hamas, which refuses to recognize Israel, now controls the Gaza Strip.

1/9/2008 - Bush in Israel: The West Bank Problem Bush will see that a hundred new, illegal Jewish outposts have mushroomed on rocky hilltops inside the Palestinian territories; some are no larger than a few trailers circled defensively inside barbed wire, while others are fortified towns of neatly rowed houses with red tiled roofs. Extremist settlers flaunted their disdain for Bush and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Wednesday by colonizing two more hilltops on Palestinian land.

1/9/2008 - Rice calls Israel's plan for disputed East Jerusalem area a 'settlement' "Har Homa is a settlement the United States has opposed from the very beginning," the Jerusalem Post quoted Rice as saying in an interview published on the first day of Bush's visit to Israel.

1/9/2008 - Bush slams Iran at start of Mideast, Gulf tour Three days after Iranian speedboats threatened a U.S. Navy convoy in the Strait of Hormuz, Bush joined Israeli leaders in issuing a stern warning to the Middle East nation. " Iran was a threat, Iran is a threat and Iran will be a threat if the international community does not come together and prevent that nation from the development of the know-how to build a nuclear weapon," .......The president's Iran stance buoyed Israeli leaders

1/9/2008 - Israel steps up warnings to Bush on Iran Some here have said the NIE has put Israel on the defensive, making it feel isolated in its assessment of the threat. That could prompt Israel to act unilaterally against Iran, analysts say, a move that would certainly be resisted by Washington. Still, Mr. Bush has indicated that Iran is a key issue as he visits the region.

1/9/2008 - Unauthorized Jewish outposts 'ought to go,' Bush says

1/9/2008 - Palestinian doctor files complaint over rights violations in Libya

1/9/2008 - Bush expedites Saudi smart bomb deal Israel has expressed concern over inclusion in the deal of Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAMS), commonly referred to as "smart bombs." Nevertheless, it has not actively fought the sale.

1/9/2008 - Syrian FM says Damascus ready for negotiations "We are by no means seeking a military solution against Israel. We are ready for negotiations with Israel, to realize the peace," Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem said in an interview with al-Arabiya television ahead of US President George W. Bush's visit to the region this week.

1/9/2008 - Israel planned 1991 strike on NKorea-Syria ship: report Israel had planned to destroy the vessel and missiles, which with a range of 500 kilometers (300 miles) would put the Jewish state at risk.

1/9/2008 - Israeli officer pleads guilty to espionage charges An Israeli army psychiatrist was convicted on Wednesday of trying to sell military secrets to Iran, Russia and Islamist group Hamas, a court official said.

1/9/2008 - Palestinians blamed for bombing that injured Irish peacekeepers Initial investigations by officers from the UN indicated that the blast was caused by a remote controlled roadside bomb.

1/9/2008 - Struggling in the U.S., some Iraqi refugees now want to go back To make the transition, many depend on locals like Gabi Jahshan, a Lansing grocer and a Palestinian refugee who's been in the US for over 30 years. Now, he steps in to help new arrivals find their lost luggage or look for jobs.

1/9/2008 - Poll: Israelis oppose concessions The poll suggested 66 percent of Israelis opposed a withdrawal to the 1967 border of Israel and 68 percent opposed dividing Jerusalem into Muslim and Jewish quarters.

1/9/2008 - Contacts with officials of the Palestinian Authority Riad Al?Malki confirmed the excellent level of the relations between the Republic of Cyprus and the Palestinian people, which is based on the historic bonds of friendship and solidarity between the two peoples.

1/9/2008 - Arab MK accuses MDA of racism against Palestinians MK Tibi outraged by directive calling on medics to take precautions when treating Palestinians

1/8/2008 - HEBRON URGENT ACTION: Stop work order issued for clinic in the Beqa' The Palestinian residents of the Beqa?a Valley are in danger of losing their clinic.

1/8/2008 - Palestinians sceptical as Bush bypasses Gaza

1/8/2008 - Five injured in unknown explosion in Gaza

1/8/2008 - Palestinian minister says Israel foiling security effort

1/8/2008 - PCHR Calls for an immediate end to attacks against Fatah offices, affiliated Institutions in Gaza

1/8/2008 - State backs Palestinian owner in Hebron dispute

1/8/2008 - Abbas and Olmert agree on talks

1/8/2008 - Hamas denies P.A security claims of arresting members of the Executive Force in Bethlehem

1/8/2008 - Jerusalem lights to go out so Bush can enjoy sunrise

1/8/2008 - Bomb strikes UN patrol in Lebanon Two Irish soldiers were lightly wounded when the device exploded near their vehicle, UN officials said.

1/8/2008 - Peace activists to speak at Ohavi Zedek Synagogue Two representatives of the Palestinian-Israeli organization Combatants for Peace will speak at Ohavi Zedek Synagogue in Burlington at 2 p.m. on Jan. 20.

1/8/2008 - Alliance formed to keep Jerusalem unified An Israeli group and U.S. Jewish group are banding together to promote a united Jerusalem.

1/8/2008 - Woman Gives Birth in Street at 3am As Soldiers Closed Checkpoint

1/8/2008 - Jewish nationalists form human chain around Jerusalem walls

1/8/2008 - FACTBOX-Israel's West Bank settlements

1/8/2008 - Israeli troops take Lebanese shepherd in southern Lebanon

1/8/2008 - Doubt surrounds Bush's Mideast peace bid

1/8/2008 - Lebanese army denies report of rockets fired at Israel

1/8/2008 - BG to close Israel office after gas talks collapse

1/8/2008 - Israeli-Arab tensions rise over visiting jewish group Arab leaders in Israel have condemned a partial Arab boycott of Jewish philanthropists visiting the country to learn about the social and economic problems facing Israel's Arab citizens.

1/8/2008 - Bedouin attack Sinai border post A group of Egyptian Bedouin has attacked police at a border crossing between Egypt and Israel.

1/8/2008 - Romney's appeal includes hard line on Iran, bipartisan record in Mass.

1/7/2008 - Israeli Troops Kill 3 Armed Palestinians

1/7/2008 - Gaza: Sniper fires at Israeli photographers

1/7/2008 - Salem man works the world's hot spots Right now, he is working for the U.S. State Department surveying Palestinian refugees in Jordan, Lebanon, the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The survey focuses on refugee resettlement, one of the key questions underlying the recent Middle East peace conference in Annapolis.

1/7/2008 - Israel delays return of head of Palestinian negotiating team Israeli authorities at Allenby Bridge between Jordan and the West Bank delayed Monday the entry of Ahmad Qureia, head of the Palestinian negotiating team, who was returning to the West Bank to attend a scheduled meeting with his Israeli counterpart Foreign Minister Tzepi Levni.

1/7/2008 - Egypt To Catch Gaza Smugglers With U.S. Funds Egypt also has accepted an American offer to send experts from the Army Corps of Engineers to train Egyptian border guards in the technology, Rep. Steve Israel, a Democrat of New York, said.

1/7/2008 - Israeli army arrests 11 Palestinians in West Bank

1/7/2008 - IDF launches probe into Palestinian's injury Ynet obtains x-ray images of Nablus resident critically injured after being hit in head by three metal bullets during IDF raid in West Bank city. Eyewitnesses say he did not endanger forces operating in area. Army: Incident being investigated thoroughly

1/7/2008 - Construction to start in area Palestinians want for corridor Construction is to start soon on 60 new housing units in the Jewish section in East Jerusalem's Ras al Amud neighborhood. The Jerusalem municipality has approved the project, which sources on the right have said could impede the creation of a Palestinian corridor between the eastern West Bank and the Temple Mount.

1/7/2008 - Israel accused ahead of Bush trip

1/7/2008 - Palestinians urge Bush to press for settlement halt The Palestinians on Monday called on US President George W. Bush to press Israel to freeze settlement activity when he visits the region this week in a bid to bolster the peace process.

1/7/2008 - Outlines of Palestinian state by end of year: Bush Even if Israeli and Palestinian leaders do not reach a peace deal by the end of 2008, there could be 'an agreement on what a Palestinian state will look like', US President George W. Bush told Israeli television.

1/7/2008 - Israel lacking proof on nukes

1/7/2008 - Bush: Israel no factor in Iraq "My decision was based upon U.S. intelligence, based upon the desire to provide security for our peoples and others," Bush said.

1/7/2008 - Israeli official: Swap Pollard for prisoners The Bush administration should swap Jonathan Pollard for Palestinian prisoners, an Israeli Cabinet member said.

1/7/2008 - Ex-NBA star spreads message of peace Monday's event was run as part of the Peres Center's Twinned Peace Sports Schools project and more than 100 boys, about half Israeli and half Palestinian, couldn't wait to get on the court with Armstrong, a three-time NBA champion with Michael Jordan's Chicago Bulls, and show him their moves.

1/7/2008 - Second conviction in Ze'evi slaying Israel convicted a second Palestinian in the 2001 assassination of Tourism Minister Rehavam Ze'evi.

1/7/2008 - New UN Mideast envoy arrives Serry is expected to spend his first week getting acquainted with the UN apparatus in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza Strip, and next week will begin talks with Israeli officials. He is expected to make a trip to Sderot one of his first high-profile acts in Israel.

1/7/2008 - IDF raid in West Bank draws concern The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply troubled by the Israel Defense Forces? (IDF) raid on the offices of three Palestinian media outlets in the West Bank city of Nablus last month.

1/7/2008 - Ending the Occupation of Palestine: The Verbal Obstacles Consider this fact: Under the United Nations charter, armed occupation is illegal; armed resistance to an occupation is recognized as legitimate.

1/7/2008 - Nukes, Spooks, and the Specter of 9/11 Edmonds draws a picture of a three-sided alliance consisting of Turkish, Pakistani, and Israeli agents who coordinated efforts to milk U.S. nuclear secrets and technology, funneling the intelligence stream to the black market nuclear network set up by the Pakistani scientist A.Q. Khan.

1/7/2008 - Israel's Barak says Hezbollah stronger than ever: report

1/7/2008 - Fatah al-Islam chief warns of attacks on Lebanon army

1/7/2008 - U.S. academic Finkelstein meets top Hezbollah official in Lebanon

1/7/2008 - Edwards' openness to Iran worries some pro-Israel Jews Edwards' stance is anathema to much of the pro-Israel establishment, which views direct negotiations as a means for Iran to buy time and develop a nuclear weapons program.

1/7/2008 - Ron Paul to Haaretz: Israel can get by without American aid

1/7/2008 - From Suha embrace to Iran hawk, Clinton now most favored by Jews "Iran is seeking nuclear weapons," she said in an Oct. 30 MSNBC-sponsored debate. "And the Iranian Revolutionary Guard is in the forefront of that, as they are in the sponsorship of terrorism." She added: "I prefer vigorous diplomacy, and I happen to think economic sanctions are part of vigorous diplomacy." It was straight from the pro-Israel playbook, and it illustrates what has attracted not only Jewish voter support but, perhaps even more substantively, Jewish fund-raiser support.

1/7/2008 - An Urgent Appeal From Jewish Rabbis, to the Candidates Running for the Presidency of the United States of America A group of Anti-Zionist Orthodox Jewish Rabbis will, with the help of the Almighty, tour several New Hampshire sites, where candidates are campaigning for the primaries, in order to deliver the following message.

1/7/2008 - Israel's richest man emigrates to Britain - and buys a Ł35m, bullet-proof mansion Lev Leviev, who until a week ago was classified as the richest man in Israel, has joined the growing list of Israeli billionaires who have made their homes in London, where wealthy foreigners are not asked to pay tax on income earned overseas.

1/7/2008 - Indian military, Israel to develop weapons The head of India's navy is the latest of his country's military leaders to visit Israel, despite testy diplomatic relations.

1/7/2008 - On U.S., Israel and Syria, Sarkozy cheers French Jews ?We have rarely heard such words of support for Israeli security from a French president,? said Meyer Habib, the vice president of the CRIF umbrella organization of French Jewry.

1/7/2008 - Peace mission ?The make-up of the busload of olive-pickers was different on each morning of my stay. There are Israelis who come regularly, perhaps once a week. They are committed to justice for the Palestinians, and their reasons for coming perhaps summarised by one who said that he came so that he could look at his reflection in the mirror in the morning without feeling totally guilty.

1/7/2008 - Yemeni-Palestinian economic cooperation discussed

1/7/2008 - TV comedy depicts world of the Arab Israeli A study published in 2006 by the Second Authority for Television and Radio, which regulates commercial broadcasts in Israel, showed that 50 percent of the characters appearing on prime-time commercial television were secular Jewish Israeli males with standard accents. Arabs accounted for 2 percent of the remaining 50 percent and were portrayed negatively.

1/6/2008 - Gaza teenager killed as Israel vows to up army operations

1/6/2008 - Four killed in Gaza raid Palestinian hospital officials said three of the dead in the al-Bureij refugee camp were civilians - a woman, an 18-year-old man and a 16-year-old youth.

1/6/2008 - 'Santa empty-handed' for Christmas in Gaza Even under occupation, it used to celebrate Christmas openly, though without the pomp and commercialism of the West. In the centre of Gaza City, a giant Christmas tree used to stand adorned with ornaments, and Santa Claus passed out gifts to people in streets. Today, the municipality is unable to afford a tree.........Last night was Christmas Eve for the Greek Orthodox community. It coincided with the miserable news that Gazans will now be forced to live without electricity eight hours a day because Israel is cutting fuel supplies to the territory's only electric plant

1/6/2008 - Israel denies intifada leader could be released for soldier

1/6/2008 - Olmert vows to escalate Gaza attacks

1/6/2008 - President Abbas attends Greek Orthodox Christmas Mass in Bethlehem

1/6/2008 - Palestine security detains 35 Hamas members Palestinian security forces have arrested 35 Hamas members in the West Bank, including two prominent leaders, the Islamic movement said Sunday.

1/6/2008 - Immediate action taken to contain avian flu, officials say

1/6/2008 - Haniyeh calls on Sarkozy to help resolve Mideast crisis In a long letter to French President Nicolas Sarkozy, Haniyeh said the Hamas-run government in the Gaza Strip is "prepared to cooperate with all international efforts to establish security and stability in the region."

1/6/2008 - Soldier moderately wounded in Gaza, 4 others lightly hurt Palestinians in al-Bureij refugee camp fire antitank missiles at IDF forces operating in area, wounding five soldiers

1/6/2008 - Nablus Invasion: Worshipers Shot by Israeli Army on Way to Mosque

1/6/2008 - Dichter: We must stop the Kassams, even at the cost of the Palestinians "We need to stop this war of attrition at any cost, especially at the price of the Palestinians," Dichter said during Sunday's cabinet meeting.

1/6/2008 - Report: Israeli military courts automatically convict Palestinians A report by the Yesh Din organization found that in 2006, more than 99.7% of those accused are found guilty, some 95% of the cases end with a plea bargain and the average hearing is just two minutes long.

1/6/2008 - Al-Qaida to Palestinians: Kill Bush Adam Gadahn, an American-born convert to Islam who often has served as Osama bin Laden's spokesman to the West, issued a video statement Sunday in which he addressed Bush's impending Middle East visit. There's something strange about Adam Gadahn. Who would benefit from the Palestinians even attempting to do Bush harm, mewonders?...

1/6/2008 - More than 10,000 police will guard Bush during Israel visit In Jerusalem some protests are expected from rightwing groups, particularly from a vocal organisation that lobbies for the release of Jonathan Pollard, who was jailed in the US in 1986 for spying for Israel. Pollard's supporters have taken out adverts on Jerusalem buses in Hebrew and English that read "Bush, free your captive".

1/6/2008 - Gaza Outages Expand After Fuel Cutbacks "The Israeli policy is not against Hamas, it is against us, the ordinary people," said Hassan Akram, owner of a grocery in Gaza City. "We are the only losers. Now it's cold and there's no electricity."

1/6/2008 - Egypt's Mubarak meets US Congressman amid aid tension Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak on Sunday met US Congressman Steve Israel, the official MENA news agency reported, amid furore in Cairo over Congress's decision to freeze millions of dollars of its aid.

1/6/2008 - Report: FBI translator says Israel planted nuclear 'moles' in U.S. The Times also says that Edmonds had claimed there were "senior officials in the Pentagon" who had provided assistance to Israeli and Turkish agents

1/6/2008 - Hardline Israeli settlers plan chilly reception for Bush Israeli settlements on Palestinian lands, among the most divisive issues of the intractable conflict, have been in the spotlight since the two sides revived their negotiations at a US conference in late November. Americans would never tolerate a foreign military seizing their property and violently occupying their land. We already went through that once. ONCE.

1/6/2008 - Citing security, state won't release settlement data The government is refusing to publish a databse containing full details about the settlement enterprise in the territories, including outposts and neighborhoods built across the Green Line. In response to a High Court of Justice petition on the matter, the Defense Ministry is arguing that publication would harm state security and Israel's foreign relations. In October 2006, Haaretz revealed the existence of the Spiegel Report - the largest database ever compiled by the state on the settlements, by then special adviser to the defense minister Brigadier General Baruch Spiegel. The report, whose preparation was kept secret, revealed that extensive building was carried out without permits on dozens of veteran settlements - not just outposts - often on privately owned Palestinian land. Shysters.

1/6/2008 - US President encourages Israel to remove a small number of the 300 existing W. Bank settlements

1/6/2008 - Palestinians celebrate the Orthodox Christmas Local Palestinians and international visitors flocked to the city from the early morning. Boy scouts bands from several parts of the West Bank played drums and Scottish bagpipes as they marched through the city

1/6/2008 - Israel warns of Iranian missile peril for Europe ** The Israeli government is furious about the recent US intelligence assessment which concluded that Iran had suspended its nuclear weapons programme in 2003, and hopes to convince the American leader that work is continuing on a bomb that poses a widespread threat.....He said Israeli officials would warn Mr Bush that failing to take action would have serious consequences beyond the Middle East, where Iran was funding groups, including Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza

1/6/2008 - Israel's false friends By John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt Other Israelis, as well as Jimmy Carter and Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu, have warned that continuing the occupation will turn Israel into an apartheid state. Nevertheless, Israel continues to expand its settlements on the West Bank while the plight of the Palestinians worsens. Given this grim situation, one would expect the presidential candidates, who claim to care deeply about Israel, to be sounding the alarm and energetically championing a two-state solution.

1/6/2008 - Hamas official says Bush's Mideast visit will be about Iran, not peace U.S. President George W. Bush's upcoming visit to the Middle East is not about pushing the Israeli-Palestinian peace process forward but will instead focus on Iran, a senior Hamas official said Sunday.

1/6/2008 - Abdallah family looks to rise from the ashes "One thing that's really common about most Palestinians is they have a chip on their shoulder," said Mazen, 27, a lawyer in Houston. "They have something to prove. There's always a struggle in their heart, mainly because they don't really have a country for themselves. So there's a struggle in their heart to do something good for everybody, to show that they're a good example from wherever they come from.

1/6/2008 - The AIPAC Spy Trial: A Case of Prosecutus Interruptus I see I'm not the only one to have lost count of the postponements. The defense deftly delayed on every imaginable ground, and was indulged by a noticeably sympathetic judge, who forced the government to produce top secret information - the very information Israel's AIPAC spy nest had gleaned from sympathizers inside our government. Furthermore, he has granted the defense demand to subpoena top government officials, including Condoleezza Rice.

1/6/2008 - Israeli army develops tiny bulldozer for warfare inside Palestinian cities The little machine is designed for rumbling down narrow roads and paths in the closer quarters of Palestinian cities, where old sections are warrens of crowded alleyways between rundown concrete block buildings.......The main innovation, besides its small size, is a firing post for the driver, the article said. The driver can fire in all directions, staving off attacks and Ťdestroying targets,ť the article said. Ordinary bulldozers to not allow the driver to open fire.

1/6/2008 - Obama supports Israel. Period. Yesterday, writing about Clinton and Edwards, I mentioned the fact that "the constant interest in, and the open sympathy for, Israeli affairs that is required of all important elected officials in the most Jewish of states in the U.S. has had its effect on" Clinton and Giuliani, The Israel Factor favorites. Obama doesn't have this advantage. He isn't from New York and, more importantly, is relatively new to the public sphere. For which country are these candidates campaining?

1/6/2008 - Declaring Forever War To the extent that a mayor of New York has a foreign policy, it needs to be loudly supportive of Israel. In a speech at the 2004 Republican National Convention, Giuliani struck the "Israel's war is our war" note by claiming that the war on terror began in Munich in 1972. His September 2007 proposal to expand NATO to include Israel is part and parcel of this approach. The Jewish Telegraphic Agency reported that Giuliani is "the clear favorite of the party's top Jewish activists."

1/6/2008 - When is it the Palestinians' turn? Christopher Brown writing from Shatila refugee camp, Lebanon, Live from Lebanon,

1/6/2008 - Speech axed from Brighton church over trouble fears "There are crimes committed on a daily basis against Palestinians. These issues must be elaborated.

1/6/2008 - IDF soldier illegally enters Bethlehem for the second time in a week For the second time in just over a week, Palestinian security forces apprehended an off-duty IDF soldier who had entered Bethlehem armed with his service-issue M-16 rifle Sunday.

1/6/2008 - From Ashland County to the Middle East, in search of understanding The couple supported Palestinian farmers harvesting olives near the cities of Jenin and Bethlehem

1/6/2008 - Letters to the Editor Christians who romanticize "O, Little Town of Bethlehem" need to face the harsh reality of life under a military occupation subsidized by our own U.S. government.

1/6/2008 - 'O Little Town' a bit discordant The two paragraphs devoted to her comments about the "fence" saving lives would have been better spent referencing the July 2004 decision by the International Court of Justice that Israel's wall was illegal where it entered Palestinian territory and should be immediately dismantled

1/6/2008 - Israel to receive Bush 'with joy' "Throughout his term, this president has demonstrated great friendship, great concern for Israel's security and full partnership with us on decisive issues vis-a-vis Israel's security and economy, and regarding bilateral relations."

1/6/2008 - Russia says it will host forum if Mid-East starts to stabilize - Foreign Ministry Russia remains willing to host an international conference on the Middle East in 2008 but is making "no practical moves to that end" as it is waiting for developments to make clear whether "stability is in the offing in that region," a Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman said.

1/6/2008 - Lieberman threatens walkout over 'core issues' A key partner in Ehud Olmert's coalition government threatened to quit if Israeli-Palestinian talks on "core issues" are held.

1/5/2008 - Israel kills 4 in Gaza raid as Olmert vows escalation Israeli troops killed four Palestinians in a raid into the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip on Sunday, witnesses said, and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert vowed to step up attacks on militants who fire rockets into Israel.

1/5/2008 - Report: Additional Palestinian wounded by IDF shell dies of his wounds

1/5/2008 - Egypt finds five tunnels into Gaza

1/5/2008 - Israel withdraws troops from northern West Bank city Israeli troops pulled out of the West Bank city of Nablus on Saturday after a three-day incursion in which they arrested 20 alleged Palestinian militants, the army said.......Palestinian medics said some 40 people were wounded by rubber bullets over the course of the operation. No Israeli soldiers were wounded.

1/5/2008 - Cancer patient dies due to the Israeli army siege on Gaza

1/5/2008 - Hamas dismisses Bush Mideast visit as "photo op" "Bush's visit is unwelcome because it aims to serve the occupation and provide it with political and psychological support," Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri said in a statement.

1/5/2008 - Thousands protest Gaza seige in Nazarath Israel - Thousands of Arab Israelis marched through the streets of Nazareth on Saturday in protest against Israel?s sealing-off of the Hamas-run Gaza Strip, according to an AFP photographer

1/5/2008 - Israel may trade Palestinian leader for soldier: official A senior Israeli official told army radio on Saturday that Israel might free the popular jailed Palestinian leader Marwan Barghuti in exchange for an Israeli soldier seized in June 2006.

1/5/2008 - Har Homa neighborhood slated for 'absentee' Palestinian land The Housing Ministry is pushing forward with the construction of more than 1,000 residential units in East Jerusalem's Har Homa neighborhood on land held by "absentee" Palestinians from the Bethlehem area. The move is in violation of both an instruction from the attorney general to stop applying the absentee law in East Jerusalem and explicit promises to the U.S. not to apply that law in the capital's eastern quarters........ It is now evident that most of the land for the 300 units belongs to residents of Beit Sahur who were declared absentee, so their lands were taken by the state without compensation or legal hearings. Land theft, folks, and how Israel does it and justifies it to itself.

1/5/2008 - Civilians in Gaza Appeal to Pope Benedict XVI for Support the only Catholic priest in Gaza, Father Musallam, earlier this week sent a letter to Pope Benedict XVI asking for support and prayers for th eChristian and Muslim Civilians who are caught up the middle of the unrest?

1/5/2008 - The Israeli army attacks Azon village and injures two civilians

1/5/2008 - 40 million NIS the cost of the damage that was made by the Israeli army in Nablus Shaher Sa'ed, the head of the Palestinian Workers Union, said on Saturday that the city of Nablus needs at least 40 million NIS to recover from the damage caused by the Israeli army in the city in the past three days

1/5/2008 - Abbas's forces question 2 West Bank Hamas leaders A Palestinian security force loyal to President Mahmoud Abbas detained two Hamas leaders for seven hours on Saturday after one of them said publicly the Palestinian Authority was behaving like Israel.

1/5/2008 - Military operations expand in ancient city "The 70,000 people who live in the city centre and the neighbourhoods around it have been placed under a curfew," a Palestinian security official said.

1/5/2008 - Security guard shoots Palestinian at landfill north of J'lem

1/5/2008 - Mideast visit to promote peace, corral Iran: Bush

1/5/2008 - Israel to brief George Bush on options for Iran strike ** Ehud Barak, the defence minister, is said to want to convince him that an Israeli military strike against uranium enrichment facilities in Iran would be feasible if diplomatic efforts failed to halt nuclear operations. A range of military options has been prepared.

1/5/2008 - Bush: We'd defend Israel in event of Iranian strike ** "If Iran did strike Israel," Bush said, "We will defend our ally, no ands, ifs or buts."

1/5/2008 - Bernier Set to Visit Middle East Bernier will leave Wednesday for his first trip to the Middle East, with stops scheduled in the West Bank and Israel.

1/5/2008 - Norman Finkelstein in The Netherlands Historians, human-rights organizations and the International Court of Justice have all rendered an overwhelmingly negative verdict on Israel's record. Now that Israel's record has caught up with it, American Jewry is slowly choosing to distance itself from Israel.

1/5/2008 - For sale: West?s deadly nuclear secrets The Turks and Israelis had planted ?moles? in military and academic institutions which handled nuclear technology. Edmonds says there were several transactions of nuclear material every month, with the Pakistanis being among the eventual buyers. ?The network appeared to be obtaining information from every nuclear agency in the United States,? ......One of the Pentagon figures under investigation was Lawrence Franklin, a former Pentagon analyst, who was jailed in 2006 for passing US defence information to lobbyists and sharing classified information with an Israeli diplomat.

1/5/2008 - Poll: 81 percent of Israelis back increasing IDF targeted killings The poll also found that 60.5 percent believe that Israel should not reach a cease-fire agreement with the Hamas in which the Israel Defense Forces would cease targeted killings if Hamas stops firing Qassam rockets towards Israel

1/5/2008 - The Sack of Annapolis If you want to appreciate just how hopelessly entangled America has become in the fate of modern day Israel and Zionism, you may want to take a look at an eye-opening article of December 5th in the Jerusalem Post.

1/5/2008 - Radio Address by the President to the Nation My first stops will be in the Holy Land, where I'll meet with Israeli Prime Minister Olmert and Palestinian President Abbas. I will encourage both leaders to move forward with the peace negotiations they began last November in Annapolis

1/5/2008 - Arab FMs call for swift consensus on Lebanese presidential election Arab foreign ministers on Saturday evening called for a swift consensus on Lebanese presidential election to choose army chief General Michel Suleiman as president, the Egyptian MENA news agency reported.

1/5/2008 - Egyptian minister skeptical of U.S aid Egypt's foreign minister restated his refusal to preconditions linked to a U.S. aid package the minister says is tied to a U.S.-based Israeli lobby.

1/5/2008 - Christian Zionists Gain Israel's Inner Sanctum In addition to raising great sums of money for Israel and devoting two-plus decades to building alliances with Christian Zionists, Eckstein has become an outspoken critic of Iran and its president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

1/5/2008 - Choir sings praises of Bethlehem concert They were accompanied by the Palestinian Youth Orchestra of the Edward Said Conservatory of Music and by pianist Sean Pollock of Jonesboro, Ark.

1/4/2008 - Palestinians killed in Gaza raid Two Palestinian militants have been killed by Israeli troops launching an overnight raid in the Gaza Strip, Palestinian officials have said.

1/4/2008 - At Tuwani Update: 16 December ? 31 December CPTers Benvie and Gish met with a lawyer from Yesh Din, an Israeli human rights group, regarding the contaminated cistern and the Israeli settler tour that may have been responsible.

1/4/2008 - 100 activists protesting on Route 443; four reported to be injured IDF soldiers were alerted to the area and were making efforts top remove the crowd. Demonstrators claimed that four people were injured after inhaling tear gas.

1/4/2008 - Israel's Supreme Court rejects rights groups' appeal against Gaza fuel cuts Israel's Supreme Court rejected an appeal by human rights groups on Thursday for an injunction against fuel cuts to the Gaza Strip, rejecting their argument that the cuts cause humanitarian harm.

1/4/2008 - Israeli forces kidnap four from different parts of the West Bank and injure one

1/4/2008 - Palestinians reject demilitarized state The Palestinian Authority has rejected Israel's call for a Palestinian state without a military and for authority to allow its own army to operate there.

1/4/2008 - Stated Clerk issues statement on Gaza Christians Kirkpatrick expresses 'alarm' at worsening conditions for all Gazans

1/4/2008 - Meshaal offers Abbas talks, holds to armed struggle Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal called on Friday for unconditional talks with the rival Fatah faction to halt violence between Palestinians but vowed to keep up the Islamist group's armed struggle against Israel.

1/4/2008 - Qassam rocket hits N Ashkelon, furthest distance ever A Qassam rocket fired by Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip on Thursday morning fell at an open field in northern Ashkelon, the furthest distance a rocket has struck yet, local media said.

1/4/2008 - In ongoing Israeli invasion of Nablus, 38 Palestinian civilians injured According to local medical sources, 38 Palestinians, including a blind teenager, have been injured by Israeli gunfire thus far, during the two-day invasion of the city of Nablus.

1/4/2008 - 4 Qassams lands in Sderot, one woman suffers shock

1/4/2008 - Report: Bush likely to visit Israel again in May U.S. President George W. Bush is likely to visit Israel again later this year, the website of the Israeli daily Ha'aretz reported on Friday.

1/4/2008 - Report: Palestinian baby critically wounded in IDF operation in Nablus Palestinian sources reported that a three-year-old Palestinian infant was critically wounded Thursday during an IDF operation in the old city of Nablus.

1/4/2008 - Three Palestinians injured as settlers of Mattityahu attack Bil'in

1/4/2008 - Um Salamunah village protest the illegal Israeli Wall On Friday morning 200 Palestinians, internationals and Israelis marched against the illegal wall being built on land stolen illegally by the Israeli army from the villagers of Um Salamunah, located near the southern West Bank city of Bethlehem.

1/4/2008 - Olmert, Abdullah meet in Aqaba During the meeting the Israeli prime minister told Abdullah that Israel will not build any new settlements nor appropriate any more land claimed by the Palestinians. Olmert repeated his desire to move toward a final peace settlement.

1/4/2008 - Biden and Dodd out Biden has long been close to the pro-Israel lobby, and his occasional criticism of Israeli policies has always been well-received because of his pro-Israel record. Dodd also has been close to the pro-Israel lobby, telling the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in late 2006 that he did not believe the time was ripe for Palestinian statehood.

1/4/2008 - Israelis and Palestinians organize a non-violent protest against Israeli settlement near Bethlehem On Wednesday afternoon a group of 50 Palestinians, Israelis and international Human Rights activists gathered at Har Homa settlement, known to Palestinians as Abu Ghinim settlement, which is built on land illegally taken by the Israeli army from the southern West Bank city of Bethlehem.

1/4/2008 - Fatah loses support among Palestinians Despite international political and financial support, the popularity of the Fatah faction headed by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has declined over the past month, partially because of mistrust in the group's leaders, according to a poll published Friday.

1/4/2008 - Peres blasted over left-wing event Shimon Peres drew right-wing fire for planning to attend an event organized by the Geneva Initiative, an independent Israeli-Palestinian peace movement.

1/4/2008 - County Durham firm to light up Holy Land

1/4/2008 - Fundraising event for Palestinian Village The problem for the people of At-Tuwani is that their land is wanted by others. In the early 1980s an Israeli settlement was established nearby and since that time the settlers, many of them from the United States, France and Israel itself, have harassed the local people, mainly farmers and shepherds, in an attempt to force them to move away.

1/4/2008 - Baghdad Palestinians hope for passage through India

1/4/2008 - Evidence of Israeli 'cowardly blending' comes to light A new report, written by a respected Israeli human rights organisation, one representing the country?s Arab minority not its Jewish majority, has unearthed evidence showing that during the fighting Israel committed war crimes not only against Lebanese civilians -- as was already known -- but also against its own Arab citizens. This is an aspect of the war that has been almost entirely neglected until now.

1/4/2008 - Hezbollah sets resolution terms The Lebanese opposition group Hezbollah has said openly that it will not allow a president to be elected unless it gets a third of the cabinet seats.

1/4/2008 - On Eve of Bush Mideast Trip, Hezbollah Chief Stirs Ire for U.S. Sheik Nasrallah said in the speech, adding America wants is to "forever abolish the spirit and culture of resistance in Lebanon." One way to do that, he said, was to settle the Palestinian Arabs in Lebanon as part of a larger solution to the regional problem ? "not for humanitarian reasons of course but to jeopardize the Palestinian cause and the right of Palestinians to return to their homeland."

1/4/2008 - Ahead of visit, White House talks friendship with Israel ? and pressure A standoff over settlement construction would represent a rare public break between Washington and Jerusalem during Bush's two terms in the White House, and could raise unpleasant memories of the first President Bush and Israel feuding over settlements. But, the White House argues, the current president's unflinching support for Jerusalem's tough anti-terrorist measures will go along way toward smoothing over any disagreements.

1/4/2008 - Palestinian militant found dead in refugee camp in Lebanon Residents of a Palestinian refugee camp in southern Lebanon found the body of an Islamic militant Friday who had been tortured and killed, local Palestinian officials and doctors said.

1/4/2008 - Bush blames Lebanon stalemate on Syrian interference

1/4/2008 - In interview with Israeli paper, Bush says Israeli-Palestinian peace possible within a year Bush also said he plans to use his time in the Mideast to rally opposition to Iran's nuclear program, saying a recent U.S. intelligence report that claimed Iran had suspended its program did not mean the danger was over

1/4/2008 - Throughout his career, Obama has reached for Jewish support AIPAC does not oppose diplomacy in engaging Iran, but dislikes it as an emphasis, believing that talks could buy the Iranian regime bomb-making time. But his words did not stop the Chicago hotel ballroom packed with 800 AIPAC members from cheering Obama on. A few weeks later, Obama drew more rubberneckers than any other candidate attending AIPAC's policy forum in Washington -- drawing away onlookers from Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) although she outpolls Obama among Jewish voters. No one winced when he said that Palestinian needs must be considered in working out a peace deal, although that's hardly standard AIPAC pep talk......in recent speeches, Obama tweaked his pro-Israel rhetoric to echo the recent drive by the Israeli government and pro-Israel groups to insist on recognition of Israel as a Jewish state.

1/4/2008 - Damascus becomes Arab cultural capital for 2008 Damascus heads into a new year as the cultural capital of the Arab world for 2008, hosting a year-long series of theatrical and musical events, along with talks by renowned intellectuals.

1/3/2008 - Nine killed in new Israeli blitz on Gaza Nine people, including a mother and daughter and at least four militants, were killed in the Israeli attacks, while 48 people were wounded and several houses destroyed, witnesses and medics said.

1/3/2008 - Hamas urges Abbas to stop talks with Israel Islamic Hamas movement on Thursday called on President Mahmoud Abbas of rival Fatah to stop meeting Israeli officials and return for dialogue with the Islamic movement.

1/3/2008 - Palestinian leftist factions launch campaign to thaw Hamas-Fatahfeud Palestinian leftist parties have launched a campaign to urge Islamic Hamas movement and President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah faction to end their feud, Palestinian radio reported on Thursday.

1/3/2008 - Palestinian security forces continue to arrest Hamas members in the West Bank

1/3/2008 - Israeli army kidnaps 28 Palestinians from several parts of the West Bank

1/3/2008 - Troops invade Nablus, impose curfew

1/3/2008 - Bush tells Jordan king the US is committed to peace: palace

1/3/2008 - HR group: 'IDF uses dogs to harass Palestinians' IDF soldiers are using dogs to attack and harass Palestinian civilians and detainees, the Public Committee against Torture in Israel (PCATI) charged in a letter sent earlier this week to Military Advocate General Brig.-Gen. Avihai Mandelblitt.

1/3/2008 - Palestinian PM assails Israel over West Bank raids

1/3/2008 - Olmert: Israel fails to halt settlements Israel has failed to uphold its promise to halt building in settlements, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said in an unprecedented acknowledgement Friday ahead of President Bush's visit to prod Israel and the Palestinians toward a final accord.

1/3/2008 - Bush calls on Israel to dismantle wildcat settlements "We expect them to honour their commitments," Bush said in the interview with Israel's mass-selling Yediot Aharonot daily.

1/3/2008 - Abbas to Saudi ahead of Bush trip

1/3/2008 - African asylum-seekers detained in "harsh conditions"

1/3/2008 - A Night to Honor Israel in Orlando Christians United for Israel (CUFI), the sponsoring organization, was founded in early 2006 when evangelical San Antonio-based Pastor John Hagee called on Christian leaders to form a nationwide pro-Israel group.

1/3/2008 - Israel accused after Bedouin shot dead on Egypt border

1/3/2008 - Study: Gaza pullout hurt Israel's image "We found that one of the main reasons for this phenomenon is that Israel continues to be viewed by the world as a conquering state," That's because it IS a conquering state. When Israel returns the land of its neighbors, and ceases the continuing seizure of the land of its neighbors, then perhaps the world will think otherwise. Rocket science.

1/3/2008 - Regional Anglicans fear Jerusalem conference could 'inflame tensions' the strong pro-Israel sentiments of the African and American bishops could have physical consequences for Anglicans living in the West Bank and Gaza, Jerusalem Anglican leaders fear

1/3/2008 - Hezbollah: We have Israelis' body parts

1/2/2008 - Israeli troops kill six gunmen in Gaza

1/2/2008 - Israeli troops kill Palestinian in northern Gaza Israeli soldiers stationed near the borders between northern Gaza Strip and Israel shot dead a Palestinian who approached the fence of the borders, Palestinian security sources said.

1/2/2008 - Hamas rejects call for early Palestinian polls

1/2/2008 - Israeli troops kidnap eight Palestinians during morning invasions to several part of the West Bank Palestinian sources reported that Israeli troops kidnapped eight Palestinian civilians during morning invasions on Wednesday that targeted several parts of the West Bank

1/2/2008 - Mosque near Bethlehem burned down by Israeli settlers

1/2/2008 - Palestinian President wants early elections

1/2/2008 - Report: the Israeli army kidnaps 2300 Palestinian workers in year 2007 The general Palestinian workers union issued a report on Wednesday stating that the Israeli army and police had kidnapped 2300 Palestinian workers during the year of 2007.

1/2/2008 - Palestinians go bald over factional rivalry Former Palestinian lawmakers and journalists shaved their heads in public in protest at the humiliating shaving of the moustache of a Fatah official by Hamas men in Gaza.

1/2/2008 - Israeli anger over Gaza crossing Israel has criticised Egypt's decision to allow 2,150 Palestinian pilgrims who had been stranded in the country to cross back into the Gaza Strip.

1/2/2008 - Israel warning on Hebron suspects Israel's defence minister has said his country is watching to see whether the Palestinian Authority prosecutes men suspected of killing two settlers.

1/2/2008 - Palestinian forces arrest gunmen in Nablus after attacking a Hamas leader's home Palestinian sources revealed on Wednesday that unknown gunmen were arrested in Nablus as they opened fire on Sheikh Fayyad Al Aghbar's home and injured his wife. Sheikh Fayyad Al Aghbar is a Hamas leader and a member in Nablus Municipality.

1/2/2008 - No more clay on the potter's wheel Sabri Mostafa Attallah's family is well-known in Gaza for producing beautiful Palestinian pottery

1/2/2008 - A Palestinian woman dies due to the Israeli siege on the Gaza Strip Miryam Judah, 32, had breast cancer. She died on Wednesday after the Israeli authorities did not allow her to leave the coastal region for medical treatment, the Palestinian Ministry for Health in Gaza reported.

1/2/2008 - J'lem seeks Bush okay for IDF free hand in W. Bank Israel would like the U.S. to agree to a number of limitations on the future Palestinian state's sovereignty. Israel wants Palestine to be completely demilitarized, and for Israel to be able to fly over Palestinian air space. Border crossings would be monitored by Israel in such a way that the symbols of Palestinian sovereignty would not be compromised, but Israel would know who was coming and going.

1/2/2008 - Islamic Jihad says Hamas-Fatah feud "very dangerous" Palestinian Islamic Jihad movement on Wednesday said the differences between Hamas and Fatah factions became "very dangerous

1/2/2008 - Hebron shooting attack not political, Palestinian government says The Ramallah-based Palestinian government said Wednesday that a shooting attack which killed two off-duty Israeli soldiers near Hebron last Friday was a 'criminal' incident, and accused Israel of claiming it had a political motive in order to justify its failure to implement peace requirements.

1/2/2008 - Pro-Abbas security forces arrest 13 Hamas members in West Bank

1/2/2008 - Olmert, Bush to discuss Iran nuke program

1/2/2008 - Abbas says Bush must speak out on Israeli settlements

1/2/2008 - Livni talks advocacy with U.S. students Tzipi Livni, trying to promote education about Israel on American college campuses, on Wednesday discussed advocacy with 41 Jewish student leaders from more than 25 American colleges......"We have you fighting for Israel," Livni said in a speech. "We know that you are there to defend Israel, and we are here to defend you. And all together we will win."

1/2/2008 - Leader of US civil rights group travels to West Bank to promote Mideast peace efforts The president of the civil rights group founded by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. left Tuesday for a trip to the West Bank to promote Arab-Israeli peace talks based on King's teachings.

1/2/2008 - Two Territories, No Nation

1/2/2008 - Israel does not expect war with Iran: Peres He said he did not believe the Iranian people wanted to destroy Israel or develop nuclear arms

1/2/2008 - Lantos' Holocaust experience suffused his political career The American Israel Public Affairs Committee described him as a ubiquitous presence in U.S.-Israel relations. "There is not a single issue impacting the U.S.-Israel relationship that does not carry the imprint or leadership of Tom Lantos," said a joint statement by AIPAC's president, Howard Friedman, and its executive director, Howard Kohr......His pro-Israel credentials were critical in giving Pelosi the upper hand when she came under fire from the White House in April for visiting Syria and delivering a peace message from Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

1/2/2008 - Qaeda might target Israeli basketball team in Turkey: TV

1/2/2008 - Syria hits back in row with Paris Syria says it is halting co-operation with France on efforts to resolve the Lebanese political crisis

1/2/2008 - Regarding Palestinians

1/2/2008 - As US turns on Israel, cracks form in the Great American Empire The present United States Government is now attempting to divide Jerusalem, destroy Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria, and turn it into a Palestinian Terror State. Will this be the undoing of itself? Are we today, witnessing the beginning of the end of the Great American Empire?

1/2/2008 - Right-wing rabbi calls for PM's death Government leaders should be hanged for negotiating with the Palestinians, Rabbi Shalom Dov Wolpe told an audience of rabbis in Tel Aviv, according to Channel 1 report aired Wednesday night.

1/2/2008 - Terror Prosecutions Shed More Heat Than Light

1/1/2008 - Hamas militant killed by Israeli artillery on C Gaza

1/1/2008 - Eight dead in Gaza faction clash The official Palestinian news agency says Hamas men have detonated explosives inside a six-storey building in Gaza City owned by members of the Doghmush family - an influential Gaza clan said to have links to armed groups.

1/1/2008 - Drowsy driver blamed for head-on collision in Arava The minivans carried a group of 20 Palestinian workers en route to Israel from the West Bank. Four of the Palestinians were killed instantly, five were moderately injured and the remaining 11 were lightly hurt.

1/1/2008 - Olmert: Jerusalem division inevitable

1/1/2008 - Hamas rejects call for early Palestinian polls Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) senior leader Mahmoud al-Zahar said here Tuesday his movement rejected the call for early legislative elections in the Palestinian territories.

1/1/2008 - Crippling West Bank roadblocks to remain in place: Israeli defence minister But in a New Year's interview ahead of the visit, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert struck a more conciliatory tone, telling Israelis that they must consider giving up much of the West Bank and part of Jerusalem for their own good.

1/1/2008 - Former Palestinian FM: Hamas, Israel reached declaration of intent Former Palestinian Foreign Minister Mahmoud al-Zahar confirmed Tuesday that the so called ?Swiss Document?, allowing for certain agreed-upon principles that would allow negotiations between Israel and the Hamas, in fact exists.

1/1/2008 - Palestinians stranded in Egypt leave for Gaza

1/1/2008 - Egypt threatens Israel over lobbying Egypt threatened to retaliate for lobbying against it by pro-Israel groups in Washington.

1/1/2008 - The Great Divide: Israel's forbidden road It runs straight through the heart of the occupied West Bank, but Palestinians are not permitted even to set foot on the asphalt their ancestors laid. Donald Macintyre reports from Beit Sira

1/1/2008 - Court rules to evict Jews from East Jerusalem house Ateret Cohanim members entered the building in April 2004 with a police escort, removed the Palestinian contractor and his family, and rented the apartments to Jewish families.

1/1/2008 - Stranded Palestinian pilgrims in Egypt threaten hunger strike over return to Gaza

1/1/2008 - Hebron Update: 17-30 December 2007

1/1/2008 - Olmert, Bush and Abbas to hold three-way summit in J'lem The leaders of Israel, the Palestinian Authority and the United States are expected to hold a joint meeting during President George W. Bush's visit here next week, in an effort to accelerate negotiations on the conflict's core issues - borders, refugees, and Jerusalem.

1/1/2008 - Gaza Is Tense as It Tallies Casualties The percentage of Palestinian civilians killed who were not involved in hostilities also declined in 2007, to 35 percent, from 54 percent in 2006, Btselem said.

1/1/2008 - Four Palestinians, Jewish settlers arrested in connection with fight Two Palestinians and two Jewish settlers were arrested on Tuesday evening near Bil'in under the suspicion that they were involved in a fight.

1/1/2008 - Killers of off-duty soldiers near Hebron were PA security officers

1/1/2008 - Four Palestinians kidnapped in Hebron during Israeli Invasion

1/1/2008 - Settlers erect two caravans near Bil'in

1/1/2008 - Jordan urges Israel to freeze settlements

1/1/2008 - Arab teen suspected of 'Internet terror' The suspect, along with Muslim cohorts from countries including Saudi Arabia and Turkey, allegedly wrecked a number of Web sites including those of the Likud Party and Maccabi Tel Aviv, as well as shopping sites and sites used as servers by various other companies....Last year, pro-Palestinian hackers shut down approximately 700 Israeli Web domains

1/1/2008 - SCLC leader travels to West Bank to promote peace efforts

1/1/2008 - Diaspora students to tell Knesset of challenges "To a large extent, it's ignorance on campus of the situation in the Middle East that brings about the [anti-Israel] sentiment that we're seeing there," according to Avi Mayer, who works for Hillel and is the coordinator for the American delegation to the WUJS conference. "We need to work more on campus."

1/1/2008 - Military blamed for Hezbollah war failures A REPORT by an Israeli parliamentary committee placed responsibility for failures of last year's war against the Lebanese Hezbollah militia on the military.

1/1/2008 - Hebron Reflection: Seam Lines

1/1/2008 - Warning: Al-Qaeda planning attacks on Israeli targets in Turkey The security establishment has received specific intelligence information according to which al-Qaeda cells that have infiltrated Turkey are planning to carry out terror attacks on Israeli targets and sites affiliated with the United States, Yedioth Ahronoth reported Monday.

1/1/2008 - Matter of life and death in Gaza

1/1/2008 - Church trek deepens faith In Israel, he absorbed the anger of Palestinian Christians who feel ignored by Catholic pilgrims who spend millions to restore shrines.

Palestine News Archive | Main page for Palestine | Site Map | Contact | Main Index

Copyright 2008 - astandforjustice.org