Abir Dandis, the mother of the two girls who were murdered in the Negev town of Al-Fura’a last week, couldn't find a police officer to listen to her warnings, neither in Arad nor in Ma’ale Adumim. Both police stations operate in areas where Israel wants to gather the Bedouin into permanent communities, against their will, in order to clear more land for Jewish communities. The dismissive treatment Dandis received shows how the Bedouin are considered simply to be lawbreakers by their very nature. But as a resident of the West Bank asking for help for her daughters, whose father was Israeli, Dandis faced the legal-bureaucratic maze created by the Oslo Accords.

The Palestinian police is not allowed to arrest Israeli civilians. It must hand suspects over to the Israel Police. The Palestinian police complain that in cases of Israelis suspected of committing crimes against Palestinian residents, the Israel Police tend not to investigate or prosecute them.

In addition, the town of Al-Azaria, where Dandis lives, is in Area B, under Palestinian civilian authority and Israeli security authority. According to the testimony of Palestinian residents, neither the IDF nor the Israel Police has any interest in internal Palestinian crime even though they have both the authority and the obligation to act in Area B.

The Palestinian police are limited in what it can do in Area B. Bringing in reinforcements or carrying weapons in emergency situations requires coordination with, and obtaining permission from, the IDF. If Dandis fears that the man who murdered her daughters is going to attack her as well, she has plenty of reason to fear that she will not receive appropriate, immediate police protection from either the Israelis or the Palestinians.

Dandis told Jack Khoury of Haaretz that the Ma’ale Adumim police referred her to the Palestinian Civil Affairs Coordination and Liaison Committee. Theoretically, this committee (which is subordinate to the Civil Affairs Ministry) is the logical place to go for such matters. Its parallel agency in Israel is the Civilian Liaison Committee (which is part of the Coordination and Liaison Administration - a part of the Civil Administration under the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories).

In their meetings, they are supposed to discuss matters such as settlers’ complaints about the high volume of the loudspeakers at mosques or Palestinians’ complaints about attacks by settlers. But the Palestinians see the Liaison Committee as a place to submit requests for permission to travel to Israel, and get the impression that its clerks do not have much power when faced with their Israeli counterparts. In any case, the coordination process is cumbersome and long.

The Palestinian police has a family welfare unit, and activists in Palestinian women’s organizations say that in recent years, its performance has improved. But, as stated, it has no authority over Israeli civilians and residents. Several non-governmental women’s groups also operate in the West Bank and in East Jerusalem, and women in similar situations approach them for help. The manager of one such organization told Haaretz that Dandis also fell victim to this confusing duplication of procedures and laws. Had Dandis approached her, she said, she would have referred her to Adalah, the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, which has expertise in navigating Israel’s laws and authorities.

John Kerry revealed his long-awaited plan for peace in the Middle East on Sunday, hinging on a $4bn (£2.6bn) investment in the Palestinian private sector.

The US secretary of state, speaking at the World Economic Forum on the Jordanian shores of the Dead Sea, told an audience including Israeli president Shimon Peres and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas that an independent Palestinian economy is essential to achieving a sustainable peace.

Speaking under the conference banner "Breaking the Impasse", Kerry announced a plan that he promised would be "bigger, bolder and more ambitious" than anything since the Oslo accords, more than 20 years ago.

Tony Blair is to lead a group of private sector leaders in devising a plan to release the Palestinian economy from its dependence on international donors. The initial findings of Blair's taskforce, Kerry boasted, were "stunning", predicting a 50% increase in Palestinian GDP over three years, a cut of two-thirds in unemployment rates and almost double the Palestinian median wage. Currently, 40% of the Palestinian economy is supplied by donor aid.

Kerry assured Abbas that the economic plan was not a substitute for a political solution, which remains the US's "top priority".

Peres, who had taken the stage just minutes before, also issued a personal plea to his Palestinian counterpart to return to the negotiations.

"Let me say to my dear friend President Abbas," Peres said, "Should we really dance around the table? Lets sit together. You'll be surprised how much can be achieved in open, direct and organised meetings."

Thick locks hug the front gates of shuttered shops, now covered in graffiti and dust from lack of use. Only a handful of customers pass along the dimly lit road, sometimes stopping to check the ripeness of fruits and vegetables, or ordering meat in near-empty butcher shops.

“All the shops are closed. I’m the only one open. This used to be the best place,” said 64-year-old Mustafa Sunocret, selling vegetables out of a small storefront in the marketplace near his family’s home in the Muslim quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City.

Amidst the brightly coloured scarves, clothes and carpets, ceramic pottery and religious souvenirs filling the shops of Jerusalem’s historic Old City, Palestinian merchants are struggling to keep their businesses alive.

Faced with worsening health problems, Sunocret told IPS that he cannot work outside of the Old City, even as the cost of maintaining his shop, with high electricity, water and municipal tax bills to pay, weighs on him.

“I only have this shop,” he said. “There is no other work. I’m tired.”

Abed Ajloni, the owner of an antiques shop in the Old City, owes the Jerusalem municipality 250,000 Israeli shekels (68,300 U.S. dollars) in taxes. He told IPS that almost every day, the city’s tax collectors come into the Old City, accompanied by Israeli police and soldiers, to pressure people there to pay.

“It feels like they’re coming again to occupy the city, with the soldiers and police,” Ajloni, who has owned the same shop for 35 years, told IPS. “But where can I go? What can I do? All my life I was in this place.”

He added, “Does Jerusalem belong to us, or to someone else? Who’s responsible for Jerusalem? Who?”

Illegal annexation

Israel occupied East Jerusalem, including the Old City, in 1967. In July 1980, it passed a law stating that “Jerusalem, complete and united, is the capital of Israel”. But Israel’s annexation of East Jerusalem and subsequent application of Israeli laws over the entire city remain unrecognised by the international community.

Under international law, East Jerusalem is considered occupied territory – along with the West Bank, Gaza Strip and Syrian Golan Heights – and Palestinian residents of the city are protected under the Fourth Geneva Convention.

Jerusalem has historically been the economic, political and cultural centre of life for the entire Palestinian population. But after decades languishing under destructive Israeli policies meant to isolate the city from the rest of the Occupied Territories and a lack of municipal services and investment, East Jerusalem has slipped into a state of poverty and neglect.

“After some 45 years of occupation, Arab Jerusalemites suffer from political and cultural schizophrenia, simultaneously connected with and isolated from their two hinterlands: Ramallah and the West Bank to their east, West Jerusalem and Israel to the west,” the International Crisis Group recently wrote.

Israeli restrictions on planning and building, home demolitions, lack of investment in education and jobs, construction of an eight-foot-high separation barrier between and around Palestinian neighbourhoods and the creation of a permit system to enter Jerusalem have all contributed to the city’s isolation.

Formal Palestinian political groups have also been banned from the city, and between 2001-2009, Israel closed an estimated 26 organisations, including the former Palestinian Liberation Organisation headquarters in Jerusalem, the Orient House and the Jerusalem Chamber of Commerce.

Extreme poverty

Israel’s policies have also led to higher prices for basic goods and services and forced many Palestinian business owners to close shop and move to Ramallah or other Palestinian neighbourhoods on the other side of the wall. Many Palestinian Jerusalemites also prefer to do their shopping in the West Bank, or in West Jerusalem, where prices are lower.

While Palestinians constitute 39 percent of the city’s population today, almost 80 percent of East Jerusalem residents, including 85 percent of children, live below the poverty line.

“How could you develop [an] economy if you don’t control your resources? How could you develop [an] economy if you don’t have any control of your borders?” said Zakaria Odeh, director of the Civic Coalition for Palestinian Rights in Jerusalem, of “this kind of fragmentation, checkpoints, closure”.

“Without freedom of movement of goods and human beings, how could you develop an economy?” he asked.

“You can’t talk about independent economy in Jerusalem or the West Bank or in all of Palestine without a political solution. We don’t have a Palestinian economy; we have economic activities. That’s all we have,” Odeh told IPS.

Israel’s separation barrier alone, according to a new report by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTD), has caused a direct loss of over one billion dollars to Palestinians in Jerusalem, and continues to incur 200 million dollars per year in lost opportunities.

Israel’s severing and control over the Jerusalem-Jericho road – the historical trade route that connected Jerusalem to the rest of the West Bank and Middle East – has also contributed to the city’s economic downturn.

Separation of Jerusalem from West Bank

Before the First Intifada (Arabic for “uprising”) began in the late 1980s, East Jerusalem contributed approximately 14 to 15 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) in the Occupied Palestinian territories (OPT). By 2000, that number had dropped to less than eight percent; in 2010, the East Jerusalem economy, compared to the rest of the OPT, was estimated at only seven percent.

“Economic separation resulted in the contraction in the relative size of the East Jerusalem economy, its detachment from the remaining OPT and the gradual redirection of East Jerusalem employment towards the Israeli labour market,” the U.N. report found.

Decades ago, Israel adopted a policy to maintain a so-called “demographic balance” in Jerusalem and attempt to limit Palestinian residents of the city to 26.5 percent or less of the total population.

To maintain this composition, Israel built numerous Jewish-Israeli settlements inside and in a ring around Jerusalem and changed the municipal boundaries to encompass Jewish neighbourhoods while excluding Palestinian ones.

It is now estimated that 90,000 Palestinians holding Jerusalem residency rights live on the other side of the separation barrier and must cross through Israeli checkpoints in order to reach Jerusalem for school, medical treatment, work, and other services.

“Israel is using all kinds of tools to push the Palestinians to leave; sometimes they are visible, and sometimes invisible tools,” explained Ziad al-Hammouri, director of the Jerusalem Centre for Social and Economic Rights (JCSER).

Al-Hammouri told IPS that at least 25 percent of the 1,000 Palestinian shops in the Old City were closed in recent years as a result of high municipal taxes and a lack of customers. “Taxation is an invisible tool…as dangerous as revoking ID cards and demolishing houses,” he said. “Israel will use this as pressure and as a tool in the future to confiscate these shops and properties.”

A Palestinian bank has frozen the accounts of Hamas' security force after mistakenly paying the wages of 3,000 of the group's members, officials say.

The Gaza branch of the Palestine Islamic Bank says it acted at the request of the Palestinian Authority.

A spokesman for Hamas Islamist group described the move as illegal.

Tensions between Hamas and its rivals from Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah faction have been high since Hamas seized control of Gaza in June.

The Palestine Islamic Bank on Monday froze the accounts of at least 3,400 members of Hamas' Executive Force.

Hamas immediately denounced the move.

Hamas spokesman Ehab al-Ghsain said that "legal procedures could be taken against the bank in the coming hours," Reuters news agency reported.

The group also held the bank's manager for questioning.

Some 3,000 members Hamas' main force were paid the salaries earlier this month before the mistake was noticed.

The payments were halted and most were reversed, Fatah officials said.

But hundreds of Hamas men reportedly were able to cash their salary cheques.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert says prospects for peace could be boosted by the creation of a new Palestinian government without the Hamas party.

Israel would regard such a cabinet as a partner, he said, adding that Hamas' exclusion "creates opportunities".

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is to swear in a new cabinet after his Fatah party's violent split with the Islamist Hamas movement.

The US says it will lift an aid embargo once the new cabinet takes over.

The US consul-general in Jerusalem, Jacob Walles, said there were no obstacles to re-engaging with the new government, which would have full US support.

On Saturday night, Mr Abbas issued an emergency decree allowing him to swear in a new cabinet without the approval of parliament, in which Hamas has a majority.

Finance Minister Salam Fayyad is set to become the new prime minister. The presidential decree also enables his government to bypass parliament when they make decisions.

Mr Abbas sacked the Hamas Prime Minister, Ismail Haniya, on Thursday after factional fighting left more than 100 people dead in Gaza.

Shortly afterwards, the Hamas movement said it had taken over full control of Gaza, as its gunmen ransacked Fatah offices and arrested or executed its fighters.

The two parties briefly shared power in a fragile coalition formed after Hamas won a landslide victory in elections last January.

But the foreign aid that is a lifeline for Palestinian people and institutions was curtailed over Hamas's refusal to renounce violence and recognise Israel.

Hamas criticism

Mr Olmert said on Saturday that the planned formation of a new government could boost chances for peace and could be "advantageous" for the Palestinians.

Recent changes had made the situation "clearer", he said.

The new cabinet, he said, "presents an opportunity that has not existed for a long time".

"A Palestinian government which is not a Hamas government is a partner and we will co-operate with it."

Mr Olmert was speaking before boarding a flight to the US for talks.

Mr Abbas is expected to swear in the emergency government on Sunday at 1300 local time (1000 GMT).

Hamas has denounced the move to form an emergency administration as illegal.

Fleeing Gaza

On Saturday, violence between the rival factions spread from Gaza to the West Bank, where Fatah remains dominant.

Second deputy speaker Hassan Khuraishah, an independent, told the BBC he had been beaten up as he tried to prevent Fatah gunmen from raising their flag.

In a show of strength, Fatah supporters paraded around Ramallah, firing weapons into the air and chanting "Hamas out".

Almost all Hamas politicians and prominent supporters in Ramallah have either fled or gone into hiding.

Fatah supporters also took over the Hamas-controlled legislative council in Nablus.

Meanwhile, hundreds of Fatah supporters are reported to have been fleeing Hamas-controlled Gaza by land and sea.

Gaza, and the much larger West Bank, are just 45km (30 miles) apart, but correspondents say they now look poised to function as two separate territories.

Israeli and Palestinian peace activists have been holding protests to mark 40 years since the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.

Protests were taking place in the West Bank and Tel Aviv, but Israeli police prevented a Palestinian conference on the anniversary in Jerusalem.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said creating a Palestinian state would wipe out the memory of the Arab defeat.

The Six-Day War changed the map of the Middle East, establishing Israel as the region's dominant military force.

Air strikes

Before the war, the 19-year-old Jewish state had been awash with fear, as Arab armies massed on its borders.

UN peacekeepers had been expelled from the Sinai, and Egypt had closed the Red Sea to Israeli shipping.

In an extraordinary showdown on the eve of war, Israeli generals swore and shouted at the prime minister that Israel had to strike first to be sure of victory.

The conflict began with air strikes that destroyed much of Egypt's air power on the ground.

By the end of the fighting, Israel had defeated the armies of Egypt, Jordan and Syria.

It captured territory three times the size of the country as it was on 4 June.

The Golan Heights and Palestinian territory in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem remain under its control to this day.

Conference banned

The Israeli government marked the anniversary with Jerusalem Day celebrations last month, in accordance with the Hebrew calendar.

The memory of [defeat] we hope will be erased by ending the occupation and by establishing our independent state Mahmoud Abbas

Israel has arranged no other official ceremonies for the anniversary and BBC correspondents in Jerusalem say there is a reflective mood and no fanfare.

Several hundred Palestinian activists held a rally in Ramallah in the West Bank, while more protesters marched to the Hawara checkpoint near Nablus - a key local symbol of the Israeli occupation.

In Hebron, about 250 activists of the Israeli anti-settlement group, Peace Now, marched while shouting: "End, end the occupation!"

But Israel banned a Palestinian conference due to be held in East Jerusalem.

Police deployed around the hotel hosting the conference, entitled "Jerusalem, the capital of the Palestinian state, how to transform slogans into reality", notifying the organisers of the ban.

More events will be held throughout the week, culminating in anti-occupation protests around the world on Saturday.

In an address to mark the anniversary, Mr Abbas remembered the "massive defeat" for the Arabs.

But he also said: "Despite all the difficulties our revolt was equal to this defeat, the memory of which we hope will be erased by ending the occupation of Arab and Palestinian territory and by establishing our independent state."

However, he also warned that recent infighting among Palestinians had left them "on the verge of a civil war".

In Egypt there are no official events to mark the anniversary or the sacrifice of those who died - just the occasional newspaper article recalling what happened.

The Israeli authorities are planning to build three new Jewish neighbourhoods in East Jerusalem, an area regarded as occupied land under international law. The plan, which has yet to receive final approval, would involve building about 20,000 homes.

The Palestinian chief negotiator, Saeb Erekat, said the plan destroyed efforts to re-start the peace process.

He said Israel had to choose between settlements or peace, but could not have both.

Yehoshua Pollak, Jerusalem's deputy mayor, said the intention was to create a contiguous Jewish residential area linking East Jerusalem with major West Bank settlement blocs.

Israel has occupied East Jerusalem since 1967. It annexed the area in 1981 and sees it as its exclusive domain.

This has not been recognised by the international community. Palestinians hope to establish the capital of their future state in the East Jerusalem.