This week marked the sixth anniversary of the death of President Yasser Arafat. Tens of thousands of loyalists marked the occasion on November 11 by participating in a festival commemorating the late leader at the presidential headquarters in Ramallah.
President Mahmoud Abbas addressed the throngs of people by outlining the PA's current negotiating status, saying the leadership would not compromise on its stance on illegal Israeli settlements or on Jerusalem.
"We don't want settlements on our land for they are illegitimate from the beginning," he said. "Jerusalem is the Palestinians' capital and the refugees will return."
Abbas also confirmed that there could be no final peace deal until all Palestinians prisoners in Israel's jails are released. Abbas also addressed the stalemated reconciliation talks with Hamas, saying the Islamic movement had carried out at "coup" against pro-Fatah forces in Gaza three years ago. Still, he maintained, Fatah wants dialogue with Hamas.
The aforementioned dialogue has reached a dead end, again. On November 11, Fateh representative Azzam Al Ahmad said the gap between Hamas and Fateh is huge despite both sides' commitment to continue talks in Damascus. According to Ahmad, the core of the dispute is each side's claim of legitimacy of their security services. Sources close to the conciliation talks have all said an agreement would most likely not be reached this year.
It looks as though no agreement of any sort will be reached any time soon given the impasse into which the Palestinian-Israeli negotiations have fallen. Although Secretary of State Hillary Clinton reaffirmed on November 10 that the United States was working "every day, indeed every hour" to revive the so-called peace negotiations, unilateral moves were compromising their efforts.
"We do not support unilateral steps by either party that could prejudge the outcome of such negotiations," Clinton said.
In particular, Clinton was referring to Israel's gung-ho attitude about pushing forward with settlement construction in the West Bank but particularly in east Jerusalem. On November 8, the Israeli movement Peace Now declared that the government was planning the construction of 1,300 housing units in the eastern sector of the city. According to the movement, the majority of the units are to be built in the settlement of Har Homa, or what Palestinians call Jabal Abu Ghneim. An additional 320 units, according to the Jerusalem District Planning and Building Committee are slated for Ramot, another settlement in the city. Furthermore, Israel announced that a further 800 housing units would be built in the West Bank settlement of Ariel.
Also, on November 8 Israeli television reported that 66 settler families have recently moved into the Palestinian neighborhood of Ras Al Amoud in Jerusalem. According to the report, the settlement enclave now houses 250 Jewish families.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has, so far, refused to extend a settlement freeze in exchange for a return to negotiations. "It is clear that Netanyahu is determined to destroy the negotiations and the proof is the declaration of new construction plans during his visit to the US. With this, he is closing all doors to the negotiations and he bears full responsibility for the collapse of the negotiations," said chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat.
The US is hardly pleased with the settlement plans either, with even President Barack Obama expressing his disappointment with the announcement. He said the plan to construct 1,300 homes in east Jerusalem could "obstruct the pursuit of peace".
"This kind of activity is never helpful when it comes to peace negotiations," he said.
The EU was even more vocal, with EU foreign policy commissioner Catherine Ashton saying in a released statement that, "This plan contradicts the efforts by the international community to resume direct negotiations and the decision should be reversed." The statement continued, "Settlements are illegal under international law, constitute an obstacle to peace and threaten to make a two-state solution impossible."
Netanyahu was not fazed one bit, obviously. Responding to the negative responses from the settlement announcements, the Israeli premier boldly retorted that, "Jerusalem isn't a settlement – Jerusalem is the capital of Israel." He went on to say in a statement released by his office that, "Israel has never put any sort of limits on construction in Jerusalem."
"Israel does not see any connection between the peace process and the building and planning policy in Jerusalem, which hasn't changed for 40 years," Netanyahu's statement said.
The Palestinians, who condition a return to peace talks with a complete halt of settlement activities including those in east Jerusalem, said they would take another route if Netanyahu did not change his ways. "Israeli unilateralism is a call for immediate international recognition of the Palestinian state," Erekat said.
Erekat said on November 12 that Palestinians would demand that the United States recognize their 1967 borders if it fails to persuade Israel to halt its illegal settlements.
"If the United States does not manage to impose on Israel an end to the settlements this month, the next step for us would be to demand from the United States recognition of the state of Palestine according to the 1967 borders," he said.
On November 10, President Abbas said he would demand an emergency Security Council session to discuss the continuation of Israel's settlement activities in Jerusalem and the West Bank. According to presidential spokesperson Nabil Abu Rdaineh, President Abbas asked Palestine's UN representative Riyad Mansour to formally make the request. Mansour will make the request via Arab states with full membership in the international body.
"Something must be done on the international level to halt the settlement expansion which the Israeli government is undertaking in the West Bank, including Jerusalem," Abu Rdainah said.
In a trip to the region, which included Damascus and the holy land, former US President Jimmy Carter said Hamas has agreed on November 12 to pass on a letter from abducted Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit to his family. Carter, who is in the region with The Elders, a group of world leaders committed to peace in the Middle East, said the consent came during his meeting with Hamas politburo Khaled Mashaal in Damascus. Carter also said he felt Hamas was interested in resuming negotiations for a prisoner swap with Shalit. "They let us know... they are very eager to proceed," Carter told reporters in east Jerusalem. During his time in Silwan, Carter criticized Israel's occupation of the West Bank, stressing that east Jerusalem should be the capital of a Palestinian state.
On November 9, clashes erupted in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Essawiyeh and on Al Zahra Street, resulting in several arrests and injuries. Israeli authorities handed out five demolition orders to houses in Silwan, and three in Essawiyeh and the Mount of Olives.
In the Jordan Valley, residents of the Ein Al Hilwa area said Israeli troops and settlers from the Meskiot settlement took over 200 dunams of their land declaring it a closed military zone on November 9. The residents also say many of them have been kicked off of their land and their homes destroyed several times in Israel's attempt to take over the entire area.
In Gaza on November 11, UNRWA operations director John Ging refuted Israel’s claims that it eased its siege on the Gaza Strip. Ging, who is known to be vocal on the subject of Gaza, said “There's been no material change for the people on the ground here in terms of their status, the aid dependency, the absence of any recovery or reconstruction, no economy.”
Rather, Ging said, "The easing, as it was described, has been nothing more than a political easing of the pressure on Israel and Egypt.”
Finally, in line with Netanyahu's insistence on Israel as a Jewish state, Safed's senior rabbis instructed the city's residents on November 8 not to rent to "non-Jews." Safed, in the northern part of Israel, was ethnically cleansed of its 10,000 Palestinians to make way for the immigrant Jewish population after Israel was established. The 18-member rabbi committee warned of an "Arab takeover" and told residents to inform on any neighbor who attempts to sell or rent to Arabs. “Refrain from doing business with him, deny him the right to read from the Torah, and similarly ostracize him until he renounces this harmful deed,” the edict reads.
Similarly, on November 7, the Israeli Supreme Court rejected an appeal by Jaffa residents and human rights groups opposing the leasing of land in the Ajami neighborhood of the city to an exclusive religious Zionist group, B'Emuna. The building complex to be built on the land is in a Palestinian-majority neighborhood in Jaffa.
UN Resolution 1325
Date posted: February 03, 2021
By MIFTAH
Kerry talks peace while Israel bars UNESCO mission [May 19 - May 25]
Date posted: May 25, 2013
By MIFTAH
President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu both met with US Secretary of State John Kerry this week in the latter’s fourth visit to the region since he assumed office.
After meeting with the two to ostensibly find ways to restart stalled negotiations between the two sides, Kerry urged on May 24 both Israeli and Palestinian leaders to take "hard decisions" to revive the peace process.
"We're getting toward a time now when hard decisions need to be made," he said at the end of his visit.
Kerry admitted a day before after meeting with the two leaders that there was skepticism and cynicism about his efforts to revive talks.
"I know this region well enough to know there is skepticism, in some quarters there is cynicism, and there are reasons for it. There have been bitter years of disappointment," he said. Still, he maintained: "It is our hope that by being methodical, careful, patient, but detailed and tenacious, that we can lay on a path ahead that can conceivably surprise people and certainly exhaust the possibilities for peace."
British foreign secretary William Hague was also in the region visiting with leaders on both sides and even visited the Bedouin community of Khan Al Ahmar between Jerusalem and Jericho, whose residents are under the threat of displacement.
On May 23, Hague was poignantly clear on where his country stands on Israeli settlements in the West Bank. "Israel has lost some of its support in Britain and in other European countries over time - this is something I've often pointed out to Israeli leaders -because of settlement activity, which we condemn,” he said.
"We strongly disagree with settlements on occupied land. Israel is a country we work with in many ways but we do disapprove of settlements,” he maintained, adding that: "We want to see both Israelis and Palestinians really commit themselves to the peace process while there is still a chance of a two-state solution."
In Khan al Ahmar, Hague listened to the residents’ grievances from Israeli efforts to push them out to make way for more settlement expansion. "We (in Britain) strongly condemn the building of settlements and recognise they are a severe threat to a two-state solution,” he told the people there.
On March 21, Israeli forces demolished two residential buildings in the Jabal al-Mukabbir in East Jerusalem. Earlier, they demolished two Palestinian homes in al-Tur, all under the pretext of unlicensed construction. Dozens of people have been left homeless from the demolitions.
A UNESCO fact-finding mission was supposed to arrive this week to look into Israeli measures in the Old City of Jerusalem and their impact on the archeological, cultural and heritage significance of the place, but was denied entry by Israel on May 20. Israel justified its decision by saying Palestinians were trying to politicize the visit.
"The Palestinians were not respecting the understandings,” an Israeli foreign ministry official said. “The visit was supposed to be professional, (but) they were taking measures that showed they were politicizing the event and not letting the delegation focus on professional sides of it," the official said.
UNESCO maintained that the mission was not cancelled, but postponed, the agency’s spokeswoman Sue Williams said.
The Palestinians said they expected Israel to pull something like this. “We weren't surprised by this decision because we believed that Israel's agreement to (allow the mission) was not convincing," minister of foreign affairs Riyad Al Malki said.
The Rafah crossing between the Gaza Strip and Egypt was reopened on May 22 after a five day closure. Egyptian soldiers and policemen closed the crossing following the kidnapping of seven Egyptian soldiers in Sinai, only reopening it after the soldiers were freed. Over 2,400 Palestinians had been stranded on both sides of the crossing during the days of the closure.
Extremist Israelis extended their attacks this week all the way to the Negev desert. On May 19, residents of the Retamim Kibbutz attacked the nearby Bedouin village of Bir Hadaj and set fire to a tent, according to head of the local village council, Salman Ibin Hamid
"The setters of Retamim are acting like they are in the West Bank," Ibn Hamid said. "These people have the mentality of the occupying settler to attack every Arab."
Finally, on May 23, the US appointed Gen. John Allen as special envoy on security issues in negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. According to a US official, Allen will deal with the U.S. position on Israeli security needs and the security arrangements that would accompany the establishment of a future Palestinian state.
Al Nakba commemorated amid increasing settler attacks [May 12 - May 18]
Date posted: May 18, 2013
By MIFTAH
This week Palestinians commemorated the 65th anniversary of the Nakba, the catastrophe of 1948 on May 15, with a variety of activities, demonstrations and events throughout the Palestinian territories and outside of its borders. Festivals were held in Ramallah and Nablus in addition to several protests and confrontations with Israeli occupation forces. In Jerusalem, clashes broke out between protesters and Israeli police and border guards when Palestinians commemorating Al Nakba, raising Palestinian flags and facing off with Jewish settlers and soldiers. Thirty people were wounded or arrested during the clashes in addition to six Israelis.
The Jerusalem clashes come at a time when settler break-ins to Al Aqsa have been on the rise amid increasing calls by extremist Jewish groups to make a presence at the compound. The break-ins have become a near daily event. Muslim worshippers and Palestinian youths have kept constant vigil at the mosque to stave off the break-ins which included settler groups who used children as a cover to enter the compound on the occasion of Shavuot.
Settlers in the West Bank have wreaked havoc this week as well. On May 17, three Palestinians were injured in clashes in Urif south of Nablus when dozens of settlers set fire to lands in three area-villages: Urif, Einabus, and Asira al-Qibliya. The settlers also attacked citizens and threw burning tires at people’s homes.
Jewish extremists attacked inside the Green Line as well. On May 14, extremists set fire to three cars and sprayed racist graffiti on a mosque south of Haifa, according to Israeli media reports.
"Price-tag" and "Eviatar," which is thought to refer to the name of a settler stabbed to death last week, were found on the mosque’s walls in addition to the Star of David. In Safed, even farther north, racist graffiti with the words "Arabs out" was found on walls in the city.
On May 13, Israeli settlers exhumed a number of graves and sprayed racist graffiti in the Sawiya village in Nablus. Ghassan Daghlas, head of the PA settlement activity file, said settlers from the Alia settlement were responsible for the damage.
On the same day settlers from Tel Hatimar begin building a religious school for children on Al Khader lands in the Bethlehem area.
The Israeli army meanwhile, uprooted over 1,200 olive tree saplings on May 16 and razed land Palestinian farmer in the northern West Bank, according to Daghlas. He said the army dug up over 40 dunums of farm land and demolished a water tank and stone walls in Ras Karker, near Nablus.
On May 17, three Palestinian laborers were wounded in Beit Ula northwest of Hebron after Israeli forces fired rubber-coated steel bullets and unleashed police dogs at them according to Issa al-Amla, coordinator for the popular struggle committee. He said Omar Al-Amla, 31, and Abdulkadir Al-Amla, 28, suffered multiple dog bites to the neck and hands. A third laborer, Jihad Saleem, was shot in the leg.
In Jerusalem on May 17, Israeli forces raided the home of Iyad al-Awar and insisted on taking his two children 6-year-old Qassam and 5-year-old Nasrallah for “interrogation”. While their father prevented the forces from arresting his boys, Israeli soldiers handed him a warrant ordering him to bring his children to the Russian Compound for questioning.
"We arrived to the Russian Compound and the troops wanted to take my kids for investigation; I refused and they beat me in the ear and the leg. My kids started crying and were so scared from the troops. They took my kids by force," al-Awar said.
Israeli Intelligence officers apparently questioned the children about their detained cousin Shadad, and asked if they had seen him throwing stones or Molotov cocktails at Israeli forces, Al Awar said.
On the same day however, Palestinians scored a tiny victory in the Jerusalem suburb of Abu Dis when they were able to tear a hole through part of the separation wall. Protesters marking the Nakba anniversary ripped a 4-meter hole in it, eyewitnesses said. Clashes ensued between the protesters and Israeli soldiers who fired tear gas and rubber-coated steel bullets. Several injuries were reported.
Peace Now reported on May 16 that the Israeli government planned to grant retroactive approval to four West Bank settlement outposts it had previously pledged to at least partially demolish.
The Israeli state attorney's office said that settlers had purchased the private Palestinian land on which they built, thus paving the way for the government to give its blessing.
"In the response, the government declares its intention to legalize four outposts, in isolated areas," Peace Now said in a statement, adding that the strategy was an affront to US Secretary of State John Kerry's efforts to revive dormant Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. "The intention to legalize outposts as new settlements is no less than a slap in the face of Secretary Kerry's new peace process," Peace Now said.
On May 14, Hamas and Fatah agreed in Cairo to form a national unity government within three months during which they would finalize and approve the Palestine National Council elections law. The two sides, represented by Fatah leader Azzam Al Ahmad and Hamas politburo member Mousa Abu Marzouq, came to the agreement under Egyptian sponsorship and said President Abbas would immediately begin talks on the new government formation. Once the government is formed, general elections can be held.
