Category: News

JERUSALEM — Out on Highway 60, the bulldozers are at work.

Next to the road that leads south from Jerusalem to Israeli settlements in the West Bank, the big yellow machines are scraping the earth, carving a flat, white, dusty shoulder. Along that strip, a high concrete wall is already being built, part of the newest segment of Israel's "separation fence." The planned route loops around the cluster of settlements known as the Etzion Bloc, putting them on the Israeli side of the de facto border.

Israeli-Palestinian diplomacy is stalled. The bulldozers are not. Once again they are changing the face of the land in a way that makes life far more difficult for Palestinians while damaging Israel's own long-term interests.

As described by Israel's Defense Ministry, the fence is purely a security measure intended to protect Israelis from Palestinian terrorists. Instead of running along the Green Line, the Israel-West Bank border, the route has been drawn to place major "settlement blocs" on the Israeli side — supposedly only to defend them as well.
(more…)

The teams will be concentrating on clearing from homes, schools, gardens, access routes and other populated areas in the Nabatieh region, as well as providing education programmes to manage the risk to thousands of returnees. The UN recently stated that they have seen around 100,000 unexploded cluster bomblets at 359 separate sites in Lebanon and, according to figures from the Lebanese military, there have been 39 injuries and 8 deaths – though these figures are rising.
(more…)

NEW YORK, USA, 4 October 2006 – Ninety-one children have been killed already this year in the West Bank and Gaza, almost double the number killed during the whole of 2005. Fear and violence are part of daily life in the occupied Palestinian territory, and children are suffering from increasing levels of stress.

“They are confronted with regular military operations, shelling, house demolitions, checkpoints on their way to schools,” says UNICEF Child Protection Officer Anne Grandjean. “As a result, we find a high prevalence of signs of stress such as anxiety, eating and sleeping disorders, and difficulties concentrating in school.

“All of these signs need to be tackled as soon as possible to avoid a long-lasting impact on the child’s development.”
(more…)

Republican Jews say Democrats have the problem, citing surveys that show rank-and-file Democrats much likelier to favor a more balanced U.S. approach to Israeli-Arab issues.

“We’re illuminating the fact that support for Israel is eroding within the Democratic Party,” said Matt Brooks, executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition. “They need to address the root causes.”
(more…)

$4,000 omission – Karen Minnis says she thought the paid-for event had been reported

Other state legislators and public officials on the Israel trip were senators Ryan Deckert, D-Beaverton, and Bruce Starr, R-Hillsboro, and State Treasurer Randall Edwards. Deckert and Edwards both reported the trips on their disclosure forms, which were filed in April and cover events in 2005. Starr did not report the trip.

“They can’t have an effect on foreign policy, but . . . the point is many of them go from the state level to a national level.” — Charles R. Schiffman, Portland Jewish Federation.
(more…)

Our humanitarian crisis is not the result of a natural catastrophe. There was no tsunami, earthquake or drought. We helped to build nations. We have the natural resources and human capital to build a thriving, stable Palestinian economy as well. We do not need international handouts. We need the free movement of people and goods. We need unrestricted gateways between the occupied Palestinian territory and the rest of the world.

American policy makers have tremendous influence with Israel. They should use it to insist on freedom of movement of people and goods, and to maintain access for Palestinian Americans and Palestinians with other foreign passports to continue to play a role in economic development. A vibrant Palestinian economy serves the interests of all — Palestinians, Israelis and Americans.
(more…)

As reports circulate of a sharp debate within the White House over possible US military action against Iran and its nuclear enrichment facilities, The Nation has learned that the Bush Administration and the Pentagon have moved up the deployment of a major “strike group” of ships, including the nuclear aircraft carrier Eisenhower as well as a cruiser, destroyer, frigate, submarine escort and supply ship, to head for the Persian Gulf, just off Iran’s western coast. This information follows a report in the current issue of Time magazine, both online and in print, that a group of ships capable of mining harbors has received orders to be ready to sail for the Persian Gulf by October 1.
(more…)

The majority of respondents to the University of Maryland poll said that “they would like the Iraqi government to ask for U.S.-led forces to be withdrawn from Iraq within a year or less,” according to the survey’s summary.

“Given four options, 37 percent take the position that they would like U.S.-led forces withdrawn ‘within six months,’ while another 34 percent opt for ‘gradually withdraw(ing) U.S.-led forces according to a one-year timeline.’

“Support for attacks on U.S.-led forces has grown to a majority position — now 6 in 10. Support appears to be related to a widespread perception, held by all ethnic groups, that the U.S. government plans to have permanent military bases in Iraq.”
(more…)

[Photo by Rachel Shabi]

A Christian-Palestinian microbrewery is defying the hardships of occupation

Taybeh the beer is crisp, clean and very drinkable. It comes in light and dark versions, with a label that proudly reads “The Finest in the Middle East.” Its makers seem to have tapped an unlikely region for venturing into the beer business.

“Everybody thought I was nuts to build a brewery in a Muslim region,” said Nadim Khoury, the company’s master brewer, regarding the glaringly obvious problem that the Quran forbids the consumption of alcohol.

Yet Palestinian Christians, who make up just under 2 percent of the total population of the Occupied Territories, aren’t the only ones drinking Taybeh beer. “We produce 600,000 liters a year,” said Khoury. “Of that, 30 percent sells to Israel and the remaining 70 percent within Palestine.” Sales of Taybeh, he added, account for only 15 to 20 percent of total beer sales in the West Bank.

“I don’t want to say exactly that the Muslims enjoy the beer more than the Christians — but they do,” said Sayib Nasser, a member of the Fatah Party and deputy governor of the local council in nearby Ramallah. Nasser, who is a Muslim, took part in the festival’s opening ceremony. “The festival has our support and our blessing,” he said. “We are proud of it.”
(more…)

Standards of human rights in the Palestinian territories have fallen to intolerable new levels, says a UN expert on the Mid-East conflict.
(more…)