April 30 2004

Jenin and Qalqilya Farmers Express Their Solidarity With Biddu Village
A popular meeting took place in Biddu today, when members of popular committees against the Wall in Jenin and Qalqilya challenged the closures and separation of the West Bank imposed by the Occupation and managed to reach Biddu in North West Jerusalem.
http://stopthewall.org/latestnews/500.shtml


Three Palestinians arrested in Biddu
Biddu along with 14 other villages will be completely surrounded by the Apartheid Wall, which will cut them off from the rest of the West Bank. Biddu will also lose two-thirds of its land. Since February 2004, five people have been killed by the Israeli military during demonstration against the Wall in Biddu.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/reports/writings/29Apr04_01_56_20JerusalemISMBiddu.htm


Wife of Shot Film-Maker Still Waiting for Answers
James Miller, 34, from Braunton, Devon, was killed by an Israeli Defence Force soldier on May 2 last year, while working in the town of Rafah. The father of two young children was filming a documentary about children in areas devastated by terrorism when he was hit in the neck – despite waving a white flag while working.
http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=2861478


IOF Wounds Child in Rafah
Mohammed Z0"rob 12, was shot in the abdomen with a live gunshot, adding that his condition is said to be serious. Witnesses told WAFA that the Israeli soldiers stationed at Zo"rob military tower deliberately opened direct fire at the child and seriously wounded him.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=597


Palestinians evicted from Hebron hills
Large forces of IDF troops and border policemen, accompanied by bulldozers, arrived in the area where several hundred Palestinians live in caves and pits near their fields. The route of the separation fence is supposed to cross the northern tip of the area and it is due to be built in the coming months.
http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/422228.html


IOF Kills Two Citizens, Demolishes 20 Homes
22-year-old Ahmad Kulaib, from the town of Hareth in Salfit, was shot dead by the Israeli soldiers. His body was taken to the nearby Nablus governorate hospital for examination.
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/198.html


Israeli troops demolish 19 Palestinian houses in Khan Younis
The troops forced the Palestinian owners to leave their houses without taking anything of their personal effects, the sources said, adding as a result, dozens of Palestinians were displaced.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-05/01/content_1449972.htm


And the Walls Came Tumbling Down
The officer ordered everyone in the buildings to evacuate in ten minutes. "I could not get anything from the house, not money, or the women's jewelry or furniture. It was all buried under the rubble." Abu Taha says the army put dynamite in the corners of the building and then blew it up from the inside.
http://stopthewall.org/analysisandfeatures/499.shtml


Israeli forces prevent Palestinian trade union leaders from commemorating the dead
the ICFTU called on the Israeli government to ensure that the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) refrains from preventing Palestinian trade union officials from carrying out legitimate trade union activities. As the world’s largest trade union body, the ICFTU condemned the defence forces’ petty and unnecessary harassment.
http://www.icftu.org/displaydocument.asp?Index=991219223&Language=EN


May Day Demonstrations in Israel and Palestine!
This Saturday, May 1st, 2004, they will be serveral demonstrations: In Nazareth, In Tel-Aviv, In Abu-Dis, In Nablus...
http://bellaciao.org/en/article.php3?id_article=836


Two IDF soldiers lightly hurt by Gaza missile
Earlier, Palestinians fired at IDF bases near the Gaza settlement of Neve Dekalim and at military forces on the Karni-Netzarim road in the Strip, Israel Radio reported. There were no injuries.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/422228.html


IOF Prevents Worshippers from Reaching al-Aqsa
Witnesses from Jerusalem said Israeli troops installed, on Friday morning, several military checkpoints at the gates of the Haram al-Shareef in the holy city of Jerusalem and prevented hundreds of Palestinian citizens from reaching it.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=595


Abu Mazen: Palestinians must reform to counter Sharon
The Palestinian leadership should start overdue reforms to counter its sense of powerlessness in the face of what it sees as an Israeli land grab, former Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas said on Friday.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=422290&contrassID=1&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


PM: Rejecting disengagement plan likely to mean new elections
New elections will likely be held if Likud members reject the disengagement plan in the party referendum to be held Sunday, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said Friday.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/422238.html


Sharon to advance pullout after referendum: Army Radio
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon will move his disengagement plan forward regardless of the results of Sunday's Likud referendum, Army Radio reported Friday.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/30/content_1449724.htm


Annan urges Arafat to give Gaza pullout a chance
"You are aware... that the Palestinian side too has obligations it has not fulfilled," Annan told Arafat. "The Palestinian Authority should immediately start taking effective measures to curb terrorism and violence."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/422286.html


Israeli Geneva Accord initiators cancel ad campaign supporting PM
The Israeli initiators of the Geneva Accord decided on Thursday to cancel a weekend advertisement campaign supporting Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, local newspaper Jerusalem Post reported.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/29/content_1448058.htm


Former US diplomats send protest letter to Bush
"Your unqualified support of Sharon's extra-judicial assassinations, Israel's Berlin Wall-like barrier, its harsh military measures in occupied territories, and now your endorsement of Sharon's unilateral plan are costing our country its credibility, prestige and friends," the letter says.
http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1083180186465


Al-Qaida: If we had chemical bomb, we would have hit Israel
"The [allegation] that there was a chemical bomb to kill thousands of people is a mere lie," the reported voice of al-Zarqawi says on a tape broadcast via an Islamic site on the Internet.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/422255.html


Time and the things it takes away - By Nayef Hawatmeh
A sea of blood runs in Jenin. A sea of blood runs from Palestine to Iraq. But nothing would disturb the death-like slumber of our leaders, from coast to coast. Meanwhile, our nations are dizzy with shock, writhing in pain, not knowing what hurts more, the claws of foreign foes or the grip of repressive compatriots.
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2004/688/op2.htm


Israeli pullout opponents say they'll rally behind PM after vote
"We will wave the flag of unity no matter what the result is," Ratzon, a leading opponent of the disengagement plan, said at a press conference ahead of Sunday's party referendum. "The Likud will be unified after the referendum. We are committed to accepting any decision."
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/30/content_1449890.htm


Ehud Ya'ari: ‘Gated Community’
There is a plan for withdrawal, both from the Jewish settlements and from army facilities. But the way it is to happen means that the Strip, with its 1.2 million residents, will be one big fenced-off prison camp, very much engaged with Israel, which will hold the keys to all its gates.
http://www.jrep.com/Columnists/Article-2.html


Sharon's willing accomplices
Like a ventriloquist dummy speaking the words of its master, we heard the world's most powerful man reciting a script written in Jerusalem by one responsible for bathing the Middle East in blood for decades.
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2004/688/op8.htm


Terrorism and Assassination
Israel has succeeded in creating the wide spread perception within Israel and among American society that violence committed by the Palestinian paramilitary is reprehensible and never justified, but that the violence committed by the Israeli occupation forces is somehow defensible.
http://www.counterpunch.com/ladah04292004.html


Video Conference with Maine University
Zejel Youth Exchange Program organized a video conference on the Middle East conflict with Maine University in Amerrica on Tuesday, 27th April. The conference was organized to encourage dialogue between Palestinian and American students and to narrow the gap between their perspectives.
http://www.najah.edu/english/news/show.asp?key=78


Report: Hezbollah gives Israel two weeks to reach deal on Kuntar
The Web site Middle East Online reported Friday that according to "Al-Kifah al-Arabi," Hezbollah has "the remains of the three Israelis who went missing in Lebanon in 1982 at the battle in Sultan Yaacub in Lebanon's (eastern) Bekaa Valley."
http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/422323.html


AP Toll Says 1,361 Iraqis Killed in April
Volunteers hunting for bodies in Fallujah find a woman and her daughter in their home, killed in the siege but undiscovered for days. Victims — young and old, women and men, insurgents and innocents — have been piling up day by day, making April the deadliest month for Iraqis — and Americans...
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=540&ncid=540&e=3&u=/ap/20040430/ap_on_re_mi_ea/april_toll_iraq


Iraq: Torture not isolated -- independent investigations vital - AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL
"Our extensive research in Iraq suggests that this is not an isolated incident. It is not enough for the USA to react only once images have hit the television screens". If Iraq is to have a sustainable and peaceful future, human rights must be a central component of the way forward.
http://news.amnesty.org/mav/index/ENGMDE140172004


Torture of Iraq Prisoners Prompts Wave of Revulsion
The chilling pictures show hooded and naked prisoners cowering and being sexually abused by their smiling captors, who include women. The prisoners were being held at the Abu Ghraib prison which Saddam Hussein used to torture his own people.
http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=2862642

April 29 2004

Palestinian injured by police horse in Biddu
Palestinian sources say that police continued to beat the demonstrator after he was injured by the horse. Six other Palestinians were arrested in the (Apartheid Wall) demonstration.
http://www.maarivintl.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=6700


People and Politics / The Pope also wants a letter from Bush
House International Relations Committee Chairman Henry Hyde's letter about the route of the separation fence will soon force Bush to decide what is more important - his relations with the masses of Christian voters on the eve of the presidential elections, or Sharon's relations with Benjamin Netanyahu the day after the referendum.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/421504.html


Palestinian woman dies from inhaling tear gas
Palestinian sources report that a 50 year old woman, mother of ten, died after inhaling tear gas fired by IDF soldiers at her house in the El - Phara refugee camp south of Jenin, Thursday.
http://www.maarivintl.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=6721


Weekly report on human rights violations
Israeli occupying forces have also continued construction of the “Annexation Wall” inside the West Bank and have continued to impose a tight siege on the OPTs. This week, 18 Palestinians, mostly civilians, including 5 children, were killed by Israeli occupying forces.
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article2609.shtml


IDF admits it killed Palestinian lecturer by mistake
The Israel Defense Forces admitted on Thursday that it accidentally shot and killed Dr. Yasser Abu Laimun, 32, a resident of the village of Taluza, north of Nablus in the West Bank, over the weekend. The army apologized for the death of Abu Laimun.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/421865.html


IOF Slays a Citizen, Arrests Five University Students, Demolishes Two Houses
In a fresh incursion today morning the Israeli occupying forces (IOF) killed a citizen in the eastern neighborhood of Jenin City, north of the West Bank. An IOF massive contingent advanced deep in the aforementioned area under a volley of heavy firings
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/193.html


IDF destroys 16 buildings in Hebron Hills
IDF destroyed 16 buildings, constructed by a British aid organization, in villages around the Hebron Hills area. Palestinian sources also reported that 13 people were detained in the village of Walaje near Bethlehem
http://www.maarivintl.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=6675


Al-Faraa Refugee Camp; Number of Wounded Rises to Nine
IOF opened today heavy fire at homes in Al-Faraa Refugee camp in the city of Tubas. One boy was reportedly wounded and thus the number of the wounded citizens has mounted to nine since the Israeli recent incursion into Tubas.
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/197.html


Israeli army demolishes two houses in W. Bank
the soldiers stormed into Soura village and opened intensive gunfire at Palestinians before evacuating the residents from the two houses owned by Palestinians detained in Israeli jails and dynamiting them.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/29/content_1447812.htm


Troops uncover 40-kilogram bomb on Israel-Gaza border
According to the Israel Airports Authority, which operates the crossing, the belt was discovered by an explosives-detection device during a search of the container.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/421511.html


Iraq pledges to honor Arab boycott of Israel
The commissioner general of the Central Boycott Office, Ahmed Khazaa, read out a statement saying that the meeting had discussed "Israeli attempts to penetrate Iraq" through deals offered by the U.S.-led occupation forces. Iraq "cannot but be against such attempts" by Israel to penetrate its markets...
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/422002.html


Palestinian Peace Campaigner Arrested
"They made me spend all this time this morning just to tell them I had no idea about it," he told reporters. Nusseibeh, president of Al Quds, has been working to gather support for a peace plan he put together with Ami Ayalon, former chief of Israel's Shin Bet security service.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=535&ncid=535&e=11&u=/ap/20040428/ap_on_re_mi_ea/israel_palestinians_7


AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL - Israel/OT: Open letter to President George W. Bush
Today, I am writing to express our deep concern about a number of issues related to human rights contained in your recent letter to Mr Ariel Sharon, Prime Minister of Israel, and in your statement to the press of 14 April 2004, on the occasion of your meeting with Mr Sharon. We note that some of these positions are contrary to international law
http://news.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGMDE150482004


Palestinians demonstrate in Gaza in support of Arafat
The demonstrators, including Palestinian students and representatives of the different Palestinian factions and movements, attended the massive rally organized on what was announced to be the "solidarity day with Arafat."
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/29/content_1447829.htm


Israeli Geneva Accord initiators cancel ad campaign supporting PM
The Israeli initiators of the Geneva Accord decided on Thursday to cancel a weekend advertisement campaign supporting Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, local newspaper Jerusalem Post reported. The decision was made after officials close to Sharon said the ads would kill his chances of passing the unilateral disengagement plan.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/29/content_1448058.htm


Rabbis call on Likud to vote against PM's plan
The rabbis, identified with far-right political movements, are members of a group called "Pikuah Nefesh," Hebrew for "saving lives," the highest precept in Judaism. The group believes that giving up any of the West Bank or Gaza violates religious precepts
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1083207642915


Haaretz poll: 43% of Likud voters against pullout plan, 36% for
The poll also showed that 14 percent of Likud members are still undecided, while 7 percent declined to say which way they will cast their ballot. Of those who are "certain to vote" or "inclined to vote," 46 percent oppose the plan...
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/421990.html


Arafat: Israel Must Recognize Palestinian Inalienable National Rights
Arafat reaffirmed that there can never be a place for the Israeli occupation, nor can there ever be a place for Israeli colonies or for Apartheid Wall around Jerusalem with its Christian and Moslem holy sanctuaries.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=593


PRIEST MEETS ARAFAT ON ISRAEL TRIP
During the week Mr Slocombe was taken to Ramallah, where he met the Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. He said: "His palace has been totally bombed and he is living in two rooms. It's not safe for him to leave the area because he might be killed by the Israelis."
http://www.thisissomerset.co.uk/displayNode.jsp?nodeId=124128&command=displayContent&sourceNode=124127&contentPK=9769451


U.N. envoy connects dots between Iraq, Israel
With Bush endorsing Sharon's plan to keep much of the West Bank and also his policy of extrajudicial killings, Mubarak is reporting "unprecedented hatred" of Americans by Arabs. "What happens in Palestine touches every people," including Iraqis.
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1082844619660&call_pageid=1038394944805&col=1038394944443


'Not enough evidence' to prosecute Sharon
Channel Two television quoted the report from a panel appointed by Menachem Mazuz, the attorney general, to investigate whether to press charges that could topple the Israeli leader.
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=516305


Gilad Sharon has 5 days to hand over Greek Island documents
After more than nine months since he was first ordered to hand over the tapes he made of conversations with Likud power-broker Appel, Gilad Sharon recently said that he destroyed the tapes some four years ago.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=421982&contrassID=1&subContrassID=7&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Bantustan Plan For an Apartheid Israel
And Sharon - crowned by victory and convinced that he has unveiled a daring new initiative that will foil all schemes - will be surprised to discover that in Washington he was pushed into embracing an accelerated process of founding the state of Israel as a binational state based on apartheid.
http://bellaciao.org/en/article.php3?id_article=835


After the Likud referendum
Americans sought to tone down Israel's enthusiasm over Bush's letter to Sharon, which the prime minister had described as a show of diplomatic support "unlike anything since Israel became a state." They explained to the Israelis that they would soon have to make a countermove in order to mollify their Arab and European friends.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/421482.html


Eight US soldiers killed by car bomb
on the latest of a string of attacks by insurgents which have killed over 120 US troops in April alone, more than during the six weeks of "major combat" with Saddam Hussein's forces. The blast came on top of the deaths of two US soldiers in attacks in Baghdad and northeast of the capital on Thursday.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1515&ncid=1515&e=17&u=/afp/20040429/wl_mideast_afp/iraq_us_toll_040429140544


U.S., Iraq Generals Reach Tentative Deal
U.S. Marines negotiated a "tentative" agreement Thursday to pull back forces from Fallujah, a deal that would lift a nearly monthlong siege and allow an Iraqi force led by a former Saddam Hussein-era general to handle security.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=540&ncid=540&e=1&u=/ap/20040429/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq


Saddam's secret agents behind attacks in Iraq: report
Iraqi officers of the "Special Operations and Antiterrorism Branch," known within Saddam's government as M-14, were responsible for planning improvised roadside explosive devices and some of the larger car bombs that had killed Iraqis, Americans and other foreigners, the intelligence report was quoted as saying.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/29/content_1448048.htm


BP ready to quit in blow to rebuilding hopes
John Browne, one of Tony Blair's favourite industrialists, indicated he had given up on Iraq because the political and security situation in the country had deteriorated so much.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1205701,00.html


Army Finds Troop Supply 'Getting Thin'
It's not yet certain that U.S. commanders in Iraq will ask for more troops, beyond the 135,000 there now, although it appears increasingly likely with violence high. But if they do, the Army would have to resort to extreme measures to answer the call.
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=519&u=/ap/20040428/ap_on_re_us/iraq_stretched_thin_1&printer=1

April 28 2004

Terror and Destruction: The Next Steps Towards Expulsion
On April 25th Occupation forces accompanied by an official from the High Planning Council of the Occupation authority warned the owners of the sheds, to demolish them within a week or the Occupation forces would carry out the demoltions, and force the owners to pay for the demolition expenses.
http://stopthewall.org/latestnews/496.shtml


IOF to Demolish 400 Palestinian Houses in Occupied Jerusalem
The Israeli interior ministry yesterday distributed demolition notifications on 40 Palestinian houses in the eastern area of occupied east Jerusalem, came in a plot to demolish nearly 400 houses.
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/187.html


No Need To Embrace Israel
Since then South Africa has emerged as a full fledged democracy which guarantees equality and franchise to all its citizens, while Israel continues along its original apartheid path. Hence when Archbishop Desmond Tutu visited the Holy Land in 2002, he expressed his distress at the conditions of the Palestinians. He observed that Israelis were "treating Palestinians in the same way...
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article2605.shtml


Drawing Caterpillar Out Of Its Corporate Cocoon: Company Should Examine Its Role in Mideast Violence
According to Caterpillar Chairman Jim Owens, in a letter sent to Jewish Voice for Peace on August 22, 2003, Caterpillar bulldozers are sold to Israel through the US Foreign Military Sales Program. In other words, Caterpillar bulldozers are not given to Israel as construction equipment but explicitly as weapons.
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article2602.shtml


Israeli army detains 10 Palestinians in West Bank
Israeli troops raided the northern refugee camp of Balata and arrested 3 Palestinians, while the other 7 Palestinians were arrested during military raids in Jenin, Bethlehem and Ramallah... The Israeli troops stormed into the refugee camp under the cover of random fire at Palestinians' homes, injuring a Palestinian boy...
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/28/content_1445484.htm


Israeli Troops Go on Rampage in the West Bank
Israeli soldiers broke into Suheil Hanoona house in the neighborhood and held all the dwellers in the living room of the house before messing it up, putting surveillance cameras and turning the house into a military post.
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/189.html


2 Israeli soldiers wounded in Gaza car bombing
At around 7:00 a.m. local time (0500 GMT), a huge blast was heard southeast of the town of Deir El Ballah in the central Gaza Strip, residents said, adding that they saw ambulances evacuating casualties from the area.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/28/content_1445491.htm


Palestinian peace campaigner arrested
The Oxford-educated don, who is the Palestinian Liberation Organisation's representative in Jerusalem, has been working to galvanise support for a peace plan he put together with Ami Ayalon, the former chief of Israel's Shin Bet security service.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,2763,1205176,00.html


Palestinian urges SA to support peace
Speaking from the Palestinian Embassy in Pretoria today, Erekat, who represented Yasser Arafat, the Palestinian Authority president, at the inauguration of President Thabo Mbeki yesterday, said the South African experience still served as an inspiration to Palestinians.
http://www.sabcnews.com/world/the_middle_east/0,2172,78783,00.html


Remember Falluja
But while the killing of the guards, whose bodies were dragged through the streets of the city and then hung from a bridge, received wide media coverage, and thus prepared hearts and minds for the military revenge, the hundreds of victims of the American retaliation were practically a military secret.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/421014.html


U.S. says Bush not to renege on his commitments to Sharon
The America Administration moved Wednesday to sooth Israeli fears in the wake of reports the U.S. intended to send a letter of assurance to Jordan that would "balance" the letter President George W. Bush sent to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon...
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=421190&contrassID=1&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Saeb Erekat: Bush took my job by siding with Sharon
President Bush apparently has taken my job. Until the Bush-Sharon press conference on April 14, I was the chief negotiator for the Palestine Liberation Organisation, PLO, the only internationally recognised entity that has a mandate to negotiate a permanent peace with Israel.
http://www.gulf-news.com/Articles/Opinion2.asp?ArticleID=119398


Egyptian intelligence chief to visit Arafat
The Palestinian foreign minister said that Palestinians would seek a UN resolution on enhancing the rights of Palestinians against the backdrop that US President George W. Bush gave unprecedented endorsement to the Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's disengagement plan.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/28/content_1445710.htm


UN nuclear watchdog chief ElBaradei due in Israel in July
UN nuclear watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei, who has called for Israel to dismantle its nuclear arsenal, is expected to visit the country in July, officials said Wednesday. Sources said, however, that he is not expected to be allowed to visit the Dimona nuclear reactor.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/421248.html


PNA calls for cooperation in handling collaborator issue
"As long as there is a PNA that is responsible for internal security, this authority should assume its responsibilities and arrest those collaborators and put them to justice," Abu-Shbak stated. He said the security services had already arrested a number of Palestinians suspected of collaborating
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/28/content_1445610.htm


Lapid to PM: Government not bound by outcome of Likud poll
Justice Minister Yosef Lapid warned Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on Wednesday that the government would not be committed to the results of Sunday's referendum of Likud members on his disengagement plan.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/421182.html


French prosecutors open inquiry over terror attacks in Israel
The seven Jewish plaintiffs, who are French but live in Israel, filed their complaint in March 2003, accusing Arafat of masterminding attacks against Jews to back Palestinian demands for an independent state.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=421416&contrassID=1&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Iran Court Orders U.S. to Pay $600 Million
Iraqi gas attacks killed thousands of Iranians and Iraqi Kurds in the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war. Hundreds of thousands died on both sides and Iran has thousands disabled by chemical arms. "The court has ordered the American government to pay the money for furnishing Saddam with chemical weapons to attack Iran," IRNA reported.
http://www.myantiwar.org/view/17550.html


IDF to dig trench along Philadelphi Route ahead of Gaza exit
Under the disengagement plan, Israel will retain control of Philadelphi Road for the present. Although Prime Minister Ariel Sharon had originally favored a total withdrawal from Gaza, including Philadelphi, he eventually bowed to the wishes of senior IDF and Shin Bet
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=421184&contrassID=1&subContrassID=5&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Powell: Not anti-Jewish to censure Israel, but Nazi imagery is
"It is not anti-Semitism to criticize the State of Israel," the BBC quoted Powell as saying, "but the line is crossed when the leaders of Israel are demonized or vilified by the use of Nazi symbols."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/421185.html


Bush or Kerry, same incoherence
Kerry's endorsement of Bush's assurance to Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon that the US would support Israel's incorporation of Jewish settlements in the West Bank and oppose the Palestinian refugees' right of return, guarantees that any honeymoon a President Kerry has in the Arab world would be brief.
http://dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=5&article_id=2907


Targeting Arafat: A brief history
The first case is well known: In 1982, during the Lebanon War, Israeli intelligence and the Air Force made an effort to dispose of Arafat, who was in besieged Beirut. They failed, though there were close strikes from the air.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/421017.html


On the "New World Order" and the Origins of His Scepticism - Noam Chomsky
The United States is far in the lead in vetoing Security Council resolutions and in voting often in isolation or virtual isolation on General Assembly resolutions on a wide range of issues, including the Middle East, aggression, observance of international law, disarmament, environmental issues, you name it. That is why the U.N. was unable to act.
http://www.chomsky.info/interviews/19900917.htm


Jewish group accuses Swiss of anti-Israel “bias”
Donath also used his speech to urge Jews in Switzerland not forget their ties to Israel. "Should we not win the fight for Israel, and if we don’t overwhelm the anti-Semitism that is spreading in Europe, then our own position in the Diaspora will become untenable.”
http://www.swissinfo.org/sen/Swissinfo.html?siteSect=105&sid=1140782


Finding shades of southern Lebanon in the Gaza Strip
A few days ahead of the May 2 Likud referendum on Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to disengage from Gaza and parts of the West Bank, the similarity between the Gaza Strip and the security strip in south Lebanon stands out more than usual.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/421006.html


Libya invites Israel to international chess competition
Yerech Tal, said in response that "the association is in constant contact with the Israeli Foreign Ministry and the decision on whether to accept the Libyan invitation will be made following consultations with Israeli security bodies and the players themselves."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=421308&contrassID=1&subContrassID=7&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Bush says US forces 'will secure' Falluja
"Our military commanders will take whatever actions necessary to secure Falluja," Mr Bush said, as US marines continued air and ground attacks against what Mr Bush described as "pockets of resistance". Earlier, US marines encircling the town began shelling the city's Golan district
http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1079420653498&p=1012571727172


Al-Asad: Iraqis are right to resist
Speaking on Aljazeera's Open Dialogue programme, prior to the latest attack in Damascus, the Syrian president said the resistance represented the people of Iraq and was, therefore, legitimate.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/433BA912-50E1-4995-A232-C5146F90D623.htm

April 27 2004

S. Africa Observes Apartheid-Free Decade
President Thabo Mbeki was sworn in for a second term Tuesday as South Africa celebrated 10 years of democracy and an end to the brutal apartheid system that denied the most basic of rights to the vast majority of its people.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-4025745,00.html


The Right to Resist
Huwaida, not recognizing the authority of the occupier, returned to Biddu yesterday, April 25, to join a peaceful women's demonstration. In order to disperse the crowd, Israeli policemen mounted on horses charged the women, hitting them with batons. The policemen arrested four women protestors...
http://www.unobserver.com/layout5.php?id=1617&blz=2


3 Palestinians killed by Israeli soldiers in W. Bank
Israeli soldiers shot dead early Tuesday three Palestinians, two in the West Bank city of Tulkarem and a teenager in Ramallah, witnesses and medical sources said. The soldiers opened heavy gunfire at the residents, killing two and wounding another severely, they said.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/27/content_1443203.htm


Palestinian youth dies of wounds from Israeli gunfire
A Palestinian youth died Monday of wounds he received from Israeli gunfire, hospital sources said. Islam Rizik, 14, was shot in the head two weeks ago when Israeli soldiers opened fire to disperse Palestinians who pelted them with stones in the village of Deir Abu Mashal, northwest of Ramallah.
http://www.yourmailinglistprovider.com/pubarchive_show_message.php?iapinfo+2466


Number of the Wounded Citizens Mounts to 15 in Tulkarem
Three Palestinian citizens have been reportedly wounded today when Israeli soldiers opened fire randomly at Palestinian citizens in the West Bank Palestinian Refugee Camp of Tulkarem and thus number of the Palestinian wounded in the camp has mounted to 15.
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/184.html


Wounded Journalist Says IOF Intentionally Targeted Him
Samoudi, who works as a reporter to Aljazeera satellite channel and a cameraman for the Reuters, was shot and wounded on Saturday, as four other citizens were killed by IOF.
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/179.html


Palestinian family names twins after Yassin, Rantisi
Mazen Al-Najjar, who works in the Palestinian telecommunications company, said that he named his twin boys after the Hamas leaders as a way of paying tribute to the assassinated leaders as well as asserting the continuity of the Palestinian struggle.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/27/content_1443389.htm


Palestinian ambulances held at Israeli military checkpoint: medical source
Israeli troops refused to allow them to pass, saying they had not received previous authorisation, the source said. Only after Western diplomats intervened with Israeli authorities in Jerusalem were the ambulances allowed to proceed, the source added.
http://www.yourmailinglistprovider.com/pubarchive_show_message.php?iapinfo+2467


IOF Kidnaps Wounded Civilian from Hospital
Israeli soldiers broke into the Hospital and kidnapped Mousa Mqeitish 19, leading him into an unknown fate. Mqeitish was seriously wounded with a live bullet in the head and was under medical treatment when Israeli soldiers broke into the Hospital and kidnapped him.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=581


Police arrest Palestinian girl, 16, with butcher's knife in Old City of J'lem
The girl was standing next to two police officers who became suspicious because of her lingering in the area and arrested her. She subsequently told investigators that she intended to stab the two police officers, because her brother and friends are jailed in Israel.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/420425.html


School Stormed in Bethlehem, Howwara under Curfew
IOF tanks and armoured vehicles stormed the village and imposed a tight curfew as they also closed schools and all governmental and non-governmental institutions. Witnesses affirmed that Israeli patrols are moving in the village streets, indiscriminately shooting fire at civilians' houses, preventing them from going out.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=580


70,000 attend Gush Katif rally against PM's disengagement plan
Some 70,000 Israelis Monday afternoon attended a solidarity rally in the Gush Katif settlement bloc in the Gaza Strip to protest Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's "disengagement plan."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/420895.html


Palestinian state is within entire 1967 borders: Qurei
The Palestinian state is not in Gaza or the West Bank, but within entire 1967 borders, visiting Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qurei stressed here late Monday. Qurei made the remarks to reporters after his talks with Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa, Egypt's official MENA news agency reported.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/27/content_1441538.htm


Palestinian Authority: World Bank Launches Multi-Donor Trust Fund To Support Reform Program
“The Trust Fund was established by the World Bank in recognition of the very positive developments in the Palestinian financial reform domain over the past two years,” says Nigel Roberts, World Bank Country Director for the West Bank & Gaza.
http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/NEWS/0,,contentMDK:20195950~menuPK:34463~pagePK:64003015~piPK:64003012~theSitePK:4607,00.html


Saudi crown prince slams Israeli attacks on Palestinians
Crown Prince Abdullah met Tuesday with Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia. Abdullah condemned "the killings, deportations, demolition of Palestinian's houses and the assassinations and besieging of the Palestinian leaders."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/420967.html


Arab countries call for politically, economically boycott to Israel
Ahmad Khazaa, General Commissioner for the offices, made the call in a speech on the opening ceremony of the conference. It is important for the Arab countries to boycott Israel, he said, describing it as an "active reaction to the barbaric policy" of Israel.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/27/content_1441472.htm


Mideast quartet must take lead to enforce roadmap: Swedish FM
"We hope we can make the other parts in the quartet understand that now is the time for the quartet to take the lead and start to enforce the roadmap," Freivalds said at a news conference in Amman.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1514&e=6&u=/afp/20040427/wl_mideast_afp/mideast_iraq_jordan_040427114035


New leader of Hamas identified
Hamas on Monday denied the Israeli claims regarding Zahar, calling it a ploy to draw out information about the group’s murky leadership structure. All three major Israeli newspapers Monday identified Zahar as the group’s new leader.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/27/content_1441939.htm


El Salvador: Central American Palestine of the West?
International observers at the recent, heated elections in the Central American nation of El Salvador might have been surprised to discover amid the violent political polarization, a curious similarity between its two presidential candidates: both are Palestinian.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=4&article_id=2854


In search of a Palestinian strategy
Palestinians must confront their problems squarely. They are a people living under an oppressive occupation, with a weakened and isolated leadership, without an army and with a tattered security force, a wrecked economy and fractured institutions. The image of defenders of a just cause has gradually and relentlessly metamorphosed into that of terrorists.
http://www.bitterlemons.org/issue/pal2.php


Palestinians: Still Victims of Politics, Bigotry and Passivity - by James Zogby
"Those who care about Middle East peace, promoting Palestinian rights and saving the lives of innocents must act to challenge and change the political dynamic in the United States. It can be done. And too much is at stake to remain passive in the face of this urgent need."
http://usa.mediamonitors.net/content/view/full/6527/


Sharon Plan May Foil Palestine State, Historians Say
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to retain territories captured from Arab countries in the 1967 war has little chance of bringing peace to the region because it won't leave Palestinians enough land to create a viable state, said historians including Israel's Tom Segev.
http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000103&sid=autgiBh8aECE&refer=us


Bush Endorsement of Sharon Proposal Undermines Peace and International Law
President Bush has effectively renounced UN Security Council resolutions 242 and 338, which call on Israel--in return for security guarantees from its Arab neighbors--to withdraw from Palestinian territories seized in the June 1967 war.
http://www.fpif.org/commentary/2004/0404sharon.html


Sharon's US visit: intentions and reality
He took it from his private archive: a plan from the early 1980s that already bore his name, the thrust of which was to establish bantustan-like Palestinian enclaves in the occupied territories that would enable Israel to rule the land without bearing the Palestinian demographic burden.
http://www.bitterlemons.org/issue/isr2.php


Hezbollah silent on prisoner-swap with Israel
Lebanon's As-Safir newspaper said Yaalon's statement coincided with the expiry of the three-month period set by the German mediator to achieve the second phase of the exchange following a January swap between Hezbollah and Israel.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1515&ncid=1515&e=17&u=/afp/20040427/wl_mideast_afp/mideast_lebanon_israel_040427102527


Palestinian Tourism Lost $950 Million Due to Israeli Practices
Mr. Hamad accused the Israeli government of targeting the infrastructure of tourism in the Palestinian territories, through bombing many of its facilities and destroying major archeological sites and tourist attractions, pointing out the Ministry's great efforts in reconstructing and renovating what has been destroyed by the Israeli war machine.
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/183.html


Apartheid assassins meet match in Iraq
A South African killed in Iraq two weeks ago once worked for a secret apartheid death squad known as the Civil Co-operation Bureau. The CCB specialised in assassinating civilians who sympathised with black liberation movements.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,9400583^2703,00.html


Spain Completes Troop Pullout From Iraq
"No Spanish member of the Plus Ultra II brigade remains in Iraq," Zapatero told Parliament in a debate on his decision to withdraw the 1,300 troops. Zapatero said the only Spanish military personnel who remain in Iraq are logistics experts assigned with shipping home military equipment. He said these people should be out of Iraq by May 27.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=540&ncid=540&e=20&u=/ap/20040427/ap_on_re_mi_ea/spain_iraq

April 26 2004

April 26, Commemorating the tragic fall of the city of Yaffa in 1948
On April 25th, Israeli terrorist gang of Irgun and Haganah forces launched an attack and a bombardment campaign to ethnically cleanse the city. Jaffa was bombarded with more than 20 tons of Mortar artillery fire. Terrorizing the population with news of the massacre of Deir Yassin, the civilian population left by sea.
http://www.al-awda.ca/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=125&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0


Palestinian Territories: The Right to Resist
Over the last two months, the village of Biddu has been actively engaged in unarmed resistance to the destruction of its land and the ghettoization of its people resulting from the construction of the Apartheid Wall.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/WO0404/S00274.htm


Biddu-Palestina: violenza contro protesta di donne palestinesi ed israeliane (pictures included)
Wake up, world! Hear O Israel, wake up!! Israeli soldiers have made brutality a way of life against Palestinians, then they turned their weapons and death upon international peace activists, and now they are brutalizing Israelis who express disapproval of their ways. Who will be the first one killed?
http://italy.indymedia.org/news/2004/04/533588.php


Palestinian teenager killed by Israeli troops in Gaza Strip
Ibrahim Mussa al-Muqayad, 14, was hit by a bullet in the back when soldiers opened fire on a group of Palestinian youths throwing stones on a nearby military position, the medical sources and witnesses said.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1514&ncid=1312&e=4&u=/afp/20040426/wl_mideast_afp/mideast_unrest_toll_040426125844


Israeli troops injure Palestinian girl in Rafah
A Palestinian girl named Wafa Jodah, 15, was wounded with Israeli troops' gunfire in Rafah Monday evening, the Palestinian General Security Directorate in Gaza reported.
http://www.kuna.net.kw/English/Story.asp?DSNO=625740


Two Workers Wounded in Jerusalem
Two Palestinian workers were critically wounded Monday after having been severely beaten up by Israeli Occupation soldiers (IOF) in the town of, Biddu south west of Jerusalem, witnesses and medics said. Tens of people gathered near the scene and evacuated them after the soldiers had left.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=571


Israeli Colonizers Set Fire to Olive Trees in Nablus
colonisers from the "Yetzhar" colony broke into O'rif and randomly opened fire terrifying residents. Some of them set fire to trees while the others were protecting them. Israeli soldiers also participated in protecting the bands...
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=568


School Attacked by IOF in WB
Head master of Beit Sahour School said that Israeli soldiers stormed the school, shot rubber bullets and tear gas at pupils inside classes, wounding three and causing suffocation to many of them.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=570


Israel Arrests Minors, Uses Electric-Shock and Tiny Solitary Confinement With Them
The solitary confinement policy has always been the systematic pursuit by the Israeli occupation jails to degrade the morale of the Palestinian prisoners and turn them into phantoms, incapable of knowing whether it’s night or day.
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/177.html


Israeli Arabs to mark Nakba Day with march
"Our goal is not to call for Israel's destruction, but to recall that there is a people that has not only not obtained its national rights, but whose very existence is under attack," explained Anbatawi.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=420386&contrassID=1&subContrassID=7&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Arab countries call for politically, economically boycott to Israel
It is important for the Arab countries to boycott Israel, he said, describing it as an "active reaction to the barbaric policy" of Israel. The conference will last for four days with the participation of 19 Arab states, during which how to reactivate the boycott will be discussed.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/27/content_1441472.htm


Drawing Caterpillar Out Of Its Corporate Cocoon: Company Should Examine Its Role in Mideast Violence
In fact, it was the first time ever that a shareholder resolution relating to human rights violations in the occupied territories has been brought before a US corporation. Though the odds against the resolution were tremendous, it still garnered 4% of the vote, enough to be re-introduced next year.
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article2595.shtml


Qureia says PA can control Gaza if PM carries out pullout plan
Qureia also blasted Sharon's threats against Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat, saying the Israeli government should "release Arafat from his confinement instead of assassinating him."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/420420.html


Palestinian PM pushes for timetable to implement roadmap
"If there is an adopted timetable guaranteed by the Quartet Committee, there will be a credibility on implementing the roadmap and if the matters remain unclear as happened in the past days, the situation will remain difficult," said Qurei.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/27/content_1441482.htm


Diplomats attack Blair's Israel policy
The virtually unprecedented letter criticises the prime minister for claiming influence over the US president, George Bush, and American policy, then backing the Israel policy when it was already "doomed to failure".
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/foreignaffairs/story/0,11538,1203898,00.html


Kerry jumps on Sharon bandwagon in favoring Gaza disengagement plan
The Washington Post declared immediately after the meeting that Bush had made some headway in the race to win American Jewish support; so Kerry didn't waste a minute, and jumped on the bandwagon, announcing his support for Sharon's plan.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/419583.html


Rivlin dedicates Independence Day torch to settlers amid criticism
Knesset Speaker Reuven Rivlin (Likud) expressed support for settlers at an Independence Day torch-lighting ceremony Monday night, despite criticism that a state event was not the appropriate place to make such comments.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/420342.html


Japan urges Israel not to harm Arafat
"To harm the president elected through a democratic election could cause damage equal to destroying the Middle East peace process," a Japanese foreign ministry official quoted Domichi as telling Cohen.
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/T11288.htm


Palestinians forced to live in state of disrepair (Palestinian refugees in Lebanon)
The wall destroyed by the wave could be rebuilt, making the house habitable again, but because Khatib is living in an unofficial Palestinian refugee camp this is forbidden under Lebanese law.
http://dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=1&categ_id=2&article_id=2843


Why does Sharon want to get rid of Arafat?
Sharon always turns to assassinating Palestinian leaders each time he goes through a crisis in an attempt to gain more support from his radical right-wing party, theLikud. Sharon intends to carry out his plans and disregards their consequences as long as they will work on enhancing his status and overshadowing his political failures...
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/26/content_1441306.htm


Bantustan plan for an apartheid Israel
Nor did the Palestinians err when they compared his statement to the Balfour Declaration - even if they perhaps failed to grasp that the statement is liable to have implications yet more grave than the 1917 pledge, and will compel a substantive strategic change in their struggle.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1203156,00.html


US moves inflame Arab moderates
"In fact, at one time in my life, I was as much an American as a Lebanese. Now I watch helplessly as those principles, that were so much part of me, are bulldozed mercilessly by the present administration." The motivation for writing the letter, he says, was the "flagrant one-sidedness of the United States toward Palestine and Iraq.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0426/p06s02-wome.html


PALESTINE: What Israel wants
If the olive branch is the symbol of hope, then Israel’s uprooting of hundreds of thousands of ancient olive trees from Palestinian land is a fitting metaphor for the current situation. With each passing day, Palestinians have less to hope for and more to fear as Israel annexes yet more land, builds more illegal settlements, destroys more homes...
http://www.greenleft.org.au/back/2004/580/580p17.htm


"What should we do? Let’s ask Israel!"
They are now merrily helping al-Qaeda recruit more terrorists in Iraq by blowing up houses, shelling populated areas and using snipers for targeted assassinations, methods that Israel perfected on the Palestinians. And we know how successful they have been with those tactics.
http://www.yellowtimes.org/article.php?sid=1897


A faith on the verge of extinction
No catalogue of Palestine would be complete without mentioning the Samaritans, the ancient quasi-Jewish sect mentioned in Islam and the Bible. Adherents of the faith present themselves as one of the most ancient monotheistic communities in the world.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/0F8A806A-15D5-47F0-B7DD-D995013FAF58.htm


Japanese Ex-Hostages Billed for Expenses
Three Japanese taken hostage in Iraq earlier this month have been charged a total of $21,000 by a travel agency for their air fare home from the Middle East and other expenses, an official said Monday. The ministry's position is that the bill should be paid directly by the former hostages and their families...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-4023143,00.html


US troops threaten to cross Shia 'red line' to enter Najaf
American troops will enter parts of the holy city of Najaf to crush the radical Shia cleric Muqtada Sadr but will avoid its sacred sites, a US general said yesterday. Shia leaders have warned there will be an explosion of anger among the 15 to 16 million Iraqi Shia if...
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=515274


Iraq unveils new 'inclusive' flag
What the new Iraqi flag might look like Iraq's US-appointed Governing Council has approved a new national flag for the embattled country, officials said. The design consists of a pale blue crescent on a white background, with a yellow strip between two blue lines at the bottom.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3660663.stm


U.S. Facing Opponents it Trained
But while Arab sections of the new Iraqi Army defect in droves, the United States has still been able to count on support from former members of Iraq's Kurdish guerrilla armies, the Peshmerga, who fought Saddam's regime for years before allying themselves with the Bush Administration in last year's war.
http://www.ipsnews.net/print.asp?idnews=23470

April 25 2004

Women’s Demonstration Against the Apartheid Wall
Despite attempts to de-arrest, one Palestinian woman, Deema from Al-Isawiya, was beaten and taken away by Israeli soldiers with three international women: Angela from France, Angie from Britain and Huwaida from the US. Meanwhile four soldiers on horses charged into the crowd, menacing women, following them and beating them with batons.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/reports/writings/25Apr04_10_50_56JerusalemISMBiddu.htm


Jerusalem: Israeli Occupation Forces Prevent the Movement of a PMRS Ambulance
At 6:30 AM in Nablus sixty-three year old Mohammad Hussein Abdel Razzaq, diabetic and suffering from heart disease, was referred from Nablus Hospital to Al Makassad Hospital in Jerusalem. The patient’s condition had severely deteriorated and he required a serious cardio-vascular surgical operation.
http://www.palestinemonitor.org/Other%20Updates/israeli_forces_prevent_medical_access.htm


Anti-Apartheid Wall Petitions Signed by 15,000 in Ireland
The IPSC intends to pressure the Irish Government to "get off the fence" and mobilise opposition in Europe to the Apartheid Wall which Israel is constructing through the West Bank.
http://stopthewall.org/worldwideactivism/495.shtml


Palestinians: Settlers burnt down house and olive grove
Palestinians say that settlers from the nearby settlements of Yizhar and Har Bracha broke in to the village of Kfar Avarif, south of Nablus, and chased one family from their home, then set the house on fire, and burned down a nearby olive grove.
http://www.maarivintl.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=6498


IOF Wounds Two Citizens, Terrorist Settlers Attack Another
a group of armed terrorist settlers attacked Sunday a another Palestinian civilian in the West Bank city of Hebron, causing him severe fractures in different parts of his body, as he was severely beaten by them. Local Palestinian sources told WAFA that the beating took place at the Bani Naim neighborhood, near the illegitimate Jewish settlement of Kiryat Arba’
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/171.html


Israeli killed, four hurt in separate West Bank shooting attacks
Around 9 P.M., one Israeli was killed and three others were lightly wounded by shots fired at a vehicle near Hebron. The gunmen fled the scene. Earlier Sunday, two Israelis were lightly wounded Sunday by a rocket that Palestinians fired at a Gaza Strip settlement, according to Israel Radio. Two homes were heavily damaged in the attack.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/419853.html


Al-Aqsa Brigades kill collaborator near Ramallah
Al-Aqsa Brigades has taken responsibility for the death of a Palestinian man from Beit Rima near Ramallah. Sources within the group state that the man was killed after admitting that he was collaborating with Israeli...
http://www.maarivintl.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=6496


Anarchy in the soul - journal from Biddu
Today, any single demonstration that takes place in the territories -- whether by Palestinians or Israelis, women or men, nonviolent or violent -- is treated to the same brutal behavior of guns, stun grenades, and clubs. And no one investigates the incidents in a serious, unbiased manner, and the soldiers learn that they can be more and more cruel, and no one gives a damn.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/reports/writings/25Apr04_10_54_07GilaSvirskyfromBatShalom.htm


3 Houses Demolished in Rafah
Witnesses told WAFA that Israeli bulldozers, backed by vehicles , four tanks and armoured personnel carriers shot their way into al-Salaam neighbourhood and started a demolish and shovel campaign of three houses.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=564


IOF Tightens Its Grip, Wounds a Boy, Bulldozes Houses
Palestinian medics of Nablus city reported that a 13-years-old boy was moderately shot and wounded by the Israeli occupying forces (IOF) in Al Shuhda square. He was admitted to Raphedia hospital, IPC correspondent reported.
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/168.html


The Arab National Conference / Final Statement
The statement stressed commitment to the national firm principles towards the Arab-Israeli struggle which call for the complete Israeli withdrawal from the occupied Golan, Sheb’a Farms, the Palestinian territories and for returning the legitimate rights to their legitimate owners.
http://www.sana-syria.com/english/headlines/23-4/arab_national_conference.htm


China opposes Israel's threats against Arafat
Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesman Kong Quan said here Sunday that China is opposed to any comments or activities that threaten the personal safety of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/25/content_1439192.htm


Spain's leader criticises Israeli threat to Arafat
"I don't think certain threats, that undoubtedly contribute to intensifying the climate of tension...are the right way," Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero told a news conference during a visit to Morocco.
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L24554450.htm


Mubarak seeks greater international involvement in Middle East crises
Mubarak also said the international community, especially the so-called quartet of the European Union (news - web sites), Russia, the United Nations and the United States, should spell out the steps required for the creation of a Palestinian state.
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/afp/20040425/wl_mideast_afp/egypt_mubarak_mideast_040425134328


Immigrant groups against disengagement plan join forces
As it appears that most Russian speakers in the Likud party are opposed to the plan, the main effort will be to motivate as many immigrants as possible to come to the polling stations.
http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/420051.html


Israel Court Ends Ban on Palestinian Journalists
The ruling by a panel of three judges said the Government Press Office had no right to deny press cards to Palestinian journalists once they had been given security clearance to enter Israel and work there.
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20040425/wl_nm/mideast_media_dc_2


Israel's population on Independence Day is 6.8 million
About 1.2 million residents were born in the former Soviet Union, or to a father who was born in the former Soviet Union. Some 500,000 of Israel's residents claim Moroccan ancestry, 245,000 claim Iraqi ancestry, 240,000 claim Romanian ancestry and 220,000 claim Polish ancestry.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/420045.html


Police suspect Sharon family took perks from Austrian tycoon
The prosecution told the court following Sharon's testimony it wants him either promptly arrested or fined for contempt of court for not supplying the court with the relevant documents.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/419826.html


Despised in their own country
The definition "dissidents" is, indeed, appropriate for them. Vanunu and the demonstrators against the fence, like the radical leftists of yore - Matzpen, Olam Hazeh, and a few other minuscule groups - oppose the activities that form the basis of the regime in Israel. In the absence of a true alternative, they not only oppose the government, they oppose the regime.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/419604.html


Analysis / Costly words
Once again Sharon has managed to focus attention on Arafat and made him a hero in the media among the Palestinians, in the Arab states and in international public opinion. Arafat has recently been in the shadows. Behind the scenes there was talk of the need to prepare for "the day after Arafat."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/419591.html


West Bank's great divide
Slashing through olive groves, breaking up fields of cauliflower and tomato, truncating roads, severing village from village, sundering families - a silent ash-gray concrete wall, coupled with miles of electrified fences, is relentlessly pushing its way through the West Bank and Jerusalem, through the lives and hopes of millions of Palestinians.
http://www.nynewsday.com/news/nationworld/world/ny-wowall253772444apr25,0,979731.story?coll=ny-worldnews-headlines


Vanunu: The Terrible Secret - by Uri Avnery
"The world must be prevented by all available means from hearing, from the lips of a credible witness, that the Americans are full partners in Israel’s nuclear arms program, while pretending to be the world’s sheriff for the prevention of nuclear proliferation."
http://usa.mediamonitors.net/content/view/full/6490/


Bush, Kerry stab Palestinians in back
And Israel reserves the right to re-invade Gaza, a hotbed of Palestinian resistance, at any time. In return, it has gotten U.S. endorsement for grabbing valuable land from Palestinians in the West Bank and is keeping an apartheid wall in place that cuts off Palestinian territory equivalent in area to the state of Rhode Island.
http://www.workers.org/ww/2004/palestine0429.php


American Christian delegate: Israel carrying out virtual holocaust against Palestinians
“Our people watch very little news which comes to them through mainly Jewish sources. They seldom get to see or know the Gestapo-like atrocities in Jenin and Rafah.” Thomson said the Bush administration was accomplice to the Israel’s genocidal war against a civilian population.
http://www.libertyforum.org/showflat.php?Cat=&Board=news_international&Number=1438558&t=-1#Post1438558


Zur: Israel has infiltrated Hamas leadership
Border Police head Cmdr. David Zur, said Saturday that "Israel has people in the leadership of the Hamas." Zur was responding to a question posed to him regarding Israel's success in finding and killing...
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1082793078162


Yemeni president calls for "immediate" US pullout from Iraq
"It has been proven to the world that there are no weapons of mass destruction," he said, referring to the main reason invoked by the United States and Britain to invade Iraq and overthrow the regime of Saddam Hussein.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1515&ncid=1515&e=1&u=/afp/20040425/wl_mideast_afp/yemen_iraq_mideast_us_040425180012


World Has Realized That Sharon Is the Major Threat to Region: FM Spokesman
On Sunday Iran declared it has now become quite clear that Israel, specifically its Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, is the major threat and the source of insecurity in the region. An earlier statement by Sharon declared an Israeli military buildup is needed to counter Iran.
http://www.mehrnews.com/wfNewsDetails_en.aspx?NewsID=73277&t=Political

April 24 2004

No lands, No houses, No Palestinians in Jenin
Considering the lands of the village would allow for further expansion potential for the two settlements of Khermesh and Mevo Dotan, the Occupation forces have employed several different policies to try and expel the people from the village. In addition to barring them from building any new structures, existing buildings are routinely demolished.
http://stopthewall.org/latestnews/491.shtml


Inquiry after Israeli forces caught using boy as shield
The boy, 13-year-old Mohammed Bedwan, and three adult protesters were tied to border police vehicles last week during one of what have become almost daily demonstrations against the routing of the Israeli government's barrier through Palestinian land.
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=514691


Israeli Wall Is 'Devastating Blow' to Palestine
In a document adopted at the end of a two-day meeting in Geneva last week, participants said the wall had dealt a devastating blow to an already fragile Palestinian economy. They said agricultural lands and water sources had been destroyed, confiscated or placed off-limits by the barrier's construction.
http://www.europaworld.org/week174/israeliwall23404.htm


Israeli special forces assassinated two and shot dead young boy in Jenin
ISM contact Ali Sammoudi eye witnessed the Israeli special forces open fire on the Palestinian boy. Ali was also wounded in the face with a live bullet that entered his left nostril and exited through his right cheek. The special forces were reinforced by 2 Apache helicopters overhead 6 tanks and approximately 20 jeeps.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/pressreleases/PR_24Apr04_08_08_53JeninISMMediaOffice.htm


Israeli Troops Sweep Qalqilya, Destroy House in al-Khader
Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) rolled Saturday into the West Bank city of Qalqilya and stormed tens of houses, beat up tens of citizens, and demolished one house in al-Khader village, witnesses and Palestinian security sources said.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=557


Prisoners' Health Conditions Deteriorate In Nafha Prison
In a press release, the Ministry said that the prisoners' health conditions are deteriorating because of Israeli jailers' maltreatment and medical negligence. It also affirmed that Israeli jailers assault the prisoners and severely beat them with clubs and moreover hurl tear gas canisters into the prison chambers.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=560


Palestinian Will Overcomes the Occupations’ Power
One of the biggest problems Sana’ faces is the continuous shootings in the area conducted by the army centered on the towers near her home, southeast Deir Al-Balah. She added: “every morning when I train, I fear that one of the bullets will hit me, always when I run next to the sea, I have to run and stay alert and cautious”
http://www.imemc.org/features/2004/april/runner.htm


Fundamental Jewish Groups Attack Arab Students at Safad College
Tarabulsy added, “I told the police about him and gave them his name and the names of those who threatened me, I also informed the police that they told me that if I do not expel the Arab students from the college, they will not only flatten the tire of my car and break its windows.
http://www.imemc.org/headlines/2004/April/week4/042404/safad.htm


Twilight zone / Locked out
"When we entered the operations room, I saw a metal box full of these keys," he recounts. "I said to myself: If there are so many, I have to take them home with me. Sometime I'll have to tell the true story, especially after I read that the IDF Spokesperson's Office denies that soldiers confiscate cars.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/418182.html


Demonstrators call for Arabs to sever all ties with Israel
Tyre MP Abdullah Qasir delivered a speech to the demonstrators. "It is about time these countries cut all relations with Israel, which is committing massacres against the Palestinians and their symbols and leader. "We cannot understand why the Arab leaders are not resilient in their opposition to the Israeli acts and to the blatant American support," he added.
http://www.terra.net.lb/wp/Articles/DesktopArticle.aspx?ArticleID=152552&ChannelId=4


Report: OIC delegation will try to revive Mideast peace talks
Malaysian Foreign Minister Syed Hamid Albar said a delegation from the Organization of the Islamic Conference would meet with officials from the United States, the United Nations, the European Union, and Russia.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=419509&contrassID=1&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Powell urges Qureia to view pullout plan as 'opportunity'
United States Secretary of State Colin Powell urged Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia on Friday to support Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to withdraw from the Gaza Strip and some parts of the West Bank.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/419447.html


Sharon may ignore 'no' vote
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon could still pursue his proposal for withdrawing from the Gaza Strip even if his party rejects the plan in a referendum on May 2, according to a senior Government official.
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/04/23/1082616327146.html


Russia "deeply concerned" over Sharon's threat against Arafat's life
"We would like to reiterate Russia's resolute position on the unacceptability of such threats addressed to the legitimately elected leader of the Palestinian national authority, whom the international community has recognized in this capacity," he said.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/24/content_1438517.htm


Arafat defiant on Sharon threats
Addressing cheering supporters outside his headquarters in the West Bank town of Ramallah, Mr Arafat said Israel could never get rid of him. In poetic Arabic, Mr Arafat said the wind would never move the mountain.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3655761.stm


Israel Set To Obliterate Islamic, Arab Sites
Israel is planning to obliterate the Islamic and Arab character of Palestinian villages occupied in 1948 by marking out mosques, tombs and historical sites, a Palestinian organization warned on Friday, April 23.
http://www.islam-online.net/English/News/2004-04/24/article03.shtml


Brahimi's Israel comments draw Annan, Israeli ire
"The policy of Israel is a poison in the region, and that is the feeling of everyone in the region and beyond and I think this is a statement of fact, not an opinion," said Brahimi after a meeting with French President Jacques Chirac in Paris for talks on forming a local authority in Iraq.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/419424.html


Proud Vanunu Urges U.N. To Check Israel’s Nukes
"Israel doesn't need nuclear arms, especially now that all the Middle East is free from nuclear weapons. My message today to the world is: Open Dimona reactor for inspections," Vanunu told an impromptu news briefing as he walked free from Shikma prison...
http://www.unobserver.com/layout5.php?id=1616&blz=2


A Warning to Those Who Dare to Criticize Israel in the Land of Free Speech - By Robert Fisk
Are you really suggesting that the military occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip by Israel, its use of extrajudicial executions against Palestinian gunmen, the Israeli gunning down of schoolboy stone-throwers, the wholesale theft of Arab land to build homes for Jews, is in some way wrong?
http://www.counterpunch.com/fisk04242004.html


The wanderings of Umm Ghassan
When exactly did they leave Haifa, at the end of 1947 or beginning of 1948? Nadia Abdullah remembers these things according to family milestones, not political-national events. "Imad was born in 1946 and was 1 year old when we arrived in Tubas."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/418877.html


Bantustan in Gaza
The political, military, and economic aspects of the plan for the Gaza Strip and the enclave in the northern West Bank are amazingly similar to the homelands, one of the last inventions of the white minority in South Africa to perpetuate its rule over the black majority.
http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=15&ItemID=5395


Can Sharon Win By Force ?
That was the axiom that "neither side would triumph by force." But now, the dangerous duo of George Bush in the White House and Ariel Sharon in the Prime Minister's office has embarked on their attempt to prove this false.
http://www.unobserver.com/layout5.php?id=1615&blz=2


Kerry and Bush Melt into One
When asked by Russert if he agreed with the President's position on Israel as displayed at the Sharon and Bush entertainment special this past week, Kerry, quicker than a click of the mouse, answered, "Absolutely!"
http://www.counterpunch.com/cook04242004.html


The last taboo
During his years in prison, many wanted him to lose his sanity, to become a living symbol of the last taboo who sinks into oblivion. Almost paradoxically, Vanunu remained sane. And not only did he keep his sanity but also the more he was persecuted, the more he embraced Israel's crucifixion of him, and turned it into his symbol.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/418891.html


"Thanking Sharon" (by Bush's request)
Let examine the history of Sharon and what we should be "thanking" him for: Sharon's first documented sortie in this role was in August of 1953 on the refugee camp of El-Bureig, south of Gaza. An Israeli history of the 101 unit records 50 refugees as having been killed...
http://www.iap.org/thankingsharon.htm


Iraq: U.S. Treatment of Detainees Shrouded in Secrecy
“Building respect for the rule of law is not just about building courthouses and training judges,” said Richard Dicker, director of Human Rights Watch’s International Justice program. “The United States must also ensure that persons taken into custody are fairly treated in accordance with legal standards.”
http://hrw.org/english/docs/2004/04/21/iraq8477.htm


Violence flares in Iraq as US raises alarm over troop shortage
At least 39 Iraqis and seven US soldiers were killed in violence across Iraq as the United States raised the alarm over troop shortages in the lead-up to the June 30 handover of power.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1515&ncid=1515&e=1&u=/afp/20040424/wl_mideast_afp/iraq_worldwrap_040424185328


Saudis secretly provided extensive U.S. help during Iraq war
During the Iraq war, Saudi Arabia secretly helped the United States far more than has been acknowledged, allowing operations from at least three air bases, permitting special forces to stage attacks from Saudi soil and providing cheap fuel, U.S. and Saudi officials say.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=419553&contrassID=1&subContrassID=8&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y

April 23 2004

Women March for their land in Biddu
Women from the villages located northwest Jerusalem will meet on Sunday, April 25, 2004 in front of Biddu Municipality Council at 10am. They will march against the destruction of their land, the ghettoization of their community and the persisting escalation of violence from the Israeli army against nonviolent demonstrators.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/pressreleases/PR_23Apr04_09_14_26JerusalemISMMediaOffice.htm


Several Civilians Wounded in Jerusalem
Israeli soldiers opened fire and hurled tear-gas canisters at tens of Palestinian worshippers in Beit Ijza, witnesses said. The worshippers organized a demonstration after Friday prayers protesting against the Israeli construction of the Apartheid Wall.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=552


New official map of Israel includes barrier
The barrier appears in the map as a thick broken line with the words “security road” written near by it. The mapping authority took into account the possibility that the barrier’s path would change, and therefore included only segments already completed.
http://www.maarivintl.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=6399


Palestinian bysander killed by Israeli death squad
Abu Leimun's wife said he was a university professor and not known for his political affiliations. She said he was outside his house when a stray bullet killed him and complained troops had prevented an ambulance from evacuating him to a nearby hospital.
http://www.yourmailinglistprovider.com/pubarchive_show_message.php?iapinfo+2449


Craving for cookies costs Gaza girl her life
Mona's mother said she allowed her daughter to go out to buy biscuits because she believed the danger was further away. Mohammad Nassar, a medic at Jabalya Hospital, said the little girl held her hand over her gaping wound before she died, telling him she wanted to go home because her mother would be worried that she was late.
http://www.reuters.co.uk/newsPackageArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=498470§ion=news


IOF Resumes the Mass Killing: Six Citizens Killed in Less Than 24 Hours
The Israeli occupying forces (IOF) continued committing massacres against the Palestinian people, as in less than 24 hours, six citizens including two children were killed by IOF gunfire throughout the occupied Palestinian territories (oPt).
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/156.html


696 college students, 600 children killed since start of Intifada
696 college students and more than 600 Palestinian children and students were killed since the beginning of the Palestinian uprising in September 2000. In a lecture here on Friday, Abu Al-Hummus said that more than 4,000 students were wounded and 182 schools were destroyed.
http://www.kuna.net.kw/English/Story.asp?DSNO=624817


Weekly Report: On Israeli Human Rights Violations in the Occupied Palestinian Territories
Human rights violations perpetrated by Israeli occupying forces included willful and extra-judicial killings, incursions into Palestinian areas, indiscriminate shelling and house demolitions. Israeli occupying forces have also continued construction of the "Annexation Wall" inside the West Bank and have continued to impose a tight siege on the OPTs.
http://pchrgaza.org/files/W_report/English/2004/22-04-2004.htm


Protesters target Caterpillar over bulldozer sales to Israel
About 250 people rallied Friday in downtown Peoria to demand that Caterpillar Inc. stop selling bulldozers to the Israeli military, which uses the machines to knock down Palestinian homes. The Stop Cat Coalition also blamed the company for the death of a 23-year-old American student activist...
http://www.montereyherald.com/mld/montereyherald/business/8504637.htm


House Demolished, Arable Land Razed in Deir Al-Balah
Israeli bulldozers, backed by tanks, rolled into the eastern part of Deir al-Balah and destroyed a 2-storey house owned by al-Khatib family. Witnesses added that the Israeli bulldozers razed vast areas of agricultural land in the area causing havoc and devastation.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=547


PM told Bush his commitment not to harm Arafat is not valid
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon informed U.S. President George W. Bush at their meeting last week that his commitment not to physically harm Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat is no longer valid...
http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/419482.html


Israel’s Raid on Arab Banks in the Occupied Palestinian Territories: A Legal Analysis
The bank raid provides a case in point of how “the lives of those living in the West Bank and Gaza under Israeli occupation remain entirely in the hands of the Israeli military government,” [88] and how many of these actions continue to have a detrimental effect on every aspect of the lives of the Palestinian civilian population.
http://www.alhaq.org/releases/2004/israels_raid_full.htm


15 Italians and Catholic pilgrims run Holy Land peace marathon
Fifteen Italian athletes and Catholic pilgrims, including the head of the Vatican's pilgrimage office, ran a 10-kilometer "peace marathon" Friday from Jerusalem's Notre Dame Cathedral to the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=419459&contrassID=1&subContrassID=7&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Lebanon rejects U.S. protest over activities of militants
Lebanon on Friday rejected U.S. protests over the activities of militant Palestinian leaders that Washington labels as terrorists, saying the guerrillas will continue to conduct political and media work in the country as long as Arab lands are occupied by Israel.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/419474.html


U.S. says still opposed to assassination of Arafat
The U.S. State Department said on Friday it stood by its opposition to the assassination of Palestinian President Yasser Arafat after Israel's prime minister said he no longer felt bound by a pledge not to harm the Palestinian leader.
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N23641530.htm


Palestine to ask UN for sanctions against Israel
He said Israel must be pushed to abide by the United Nations Security Council Resolution 465 (Prohibition of the Establishment in the territories including Jerusalem March 1, 1980) and dismantle all their settlements as well as withdraw their forces along the 1967 borders.
http://www.emedia.com.my/Current_News/NST/Friday/National/20040423074220/Article/indexb_html


Israeli pullout from Gaza requires monitors -UN
"Occupation will end only when Palestinians gain control over their affairs in Gaza, when they go about their daily lives without being subjected to Israeli controls, and when they live free from the fear of yet another military incursion in their cities and villages," he said.
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N23590615.htm


World Bank: Aid for disengagement depends on PA approval
According to one report, the World Bank has already agreed to buy the settlements, in order to sell them to the Palestinians. Another report said that the Bank was not even waiting for the outcome of the referendum in the Likud and had already had the assets valued.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=418872&contrassID=1&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Quartet to meet on May 4 to try to give impetus to road map
The sponsors of the road map to peace between the Israelis and Palestinians will meet in New York on May 4 to try to give new impetus to the stalled plan, the European Union's foreign policy chief said.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=419440&contrassID=1&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Pastrami & Champagne
Three decades ago Winston Churchill's grandson asked Ariel Sharon how Israel should deal with the Palestinians. "We'll make a pastrami sandwich out of them," he replied. "We'll insert a strip of Jewish settlements in between the Palestinians, and then another strip of Jewish settlements right across the West Bank, so that in twenty-five years' time...
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20040510&s=careyshatz


OP-ED; Sharon’s skin and Bush’s spots - By Uri Avnery
Almost all the Palestinian population in the West Bank, some 2.5 million people, will be crowded into the remaining 45 percent of the area, which, together with the Gaza Strip, will constitute about 10 percent of the country called Palestine under the British mandate, before 1948. This area will be a kind of archipelago in the big Israeli sea.
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=story_23-4-2004_pg3_4


`What does Meshal know about life in Gaza?'
The political struggle between Hamas and the PA is nothing new. It has accompanied the two bodies almost from the day they were established. A particular low point in their relations came in the mid-1990s, when the PA began open warfare against Hamas activists, carried out arrests, and placed Sheikh Yassin under house arrest.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/418881.html


Israel, US alliance leaves PA in disarray
"The Palestinian Authority (PA) needs to have some serious reflection about whether it wants to continue in its role as the national authority and the cornerstone of a future state or whether it is going to become the administrator of a Palestinian ghetto whose surface area covers no more than 40 percent of the West Bank."
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=2&article_id=2684


What kind of state deserves to exist?
The Palestinians will be imprisoned from all sides, with no connection to the world, except through Israel. Israel also reserves for itself the right to act militarily inside the Gaza Strip.[1] But since the Strip will no longer be defined as an occupied territory, Israel will not be subject to the Fourth Geneva Convention.
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article2592.shtml


Despite everything, an improvement
Three main factors had positive effects on regional strategy. First among them, of course, is the American military presence in Iraq. It's a massive deployment, giving them rapid deployment capabilities. The deployment puts the Americans on the flanks of two countries that Israel considers extremist: Iran and Syria.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/418893.html


Palestinian fighters break out of jail
The Popular Resistance Committees helped break the fighters out of prison on Wednesday in defiance of Palestinian Authority President Yasir Arafat, who overruled a high court decision last month to drop charges against the three and release them.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/C5ABE4B9-BD79-486D-8737-4F0979F84517.htm


Norwegian leader: Press Israel to let Vanunu move here
The Norwegian opposition leader has asked his government to press Israel to remove the limitations on nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu and allow him to move to Norway as a political refugee
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/419458.html


Report: UN envoy to Iraq calls Israeli policy 'biggest poison'
United Nations special envoy for Iraq, Lakhdar Brahimi, claims there is a clear tie between the escalation of the situation in Iraq and Israeli policy, which he called "the biggest poison in the region,"...
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/419424.html

April 22 2004

Dhahr Al Malih: A Prison for its People
The people in the village of Dhahr Al Malih are now living as prisoners in their village after their permits have not been renewed since the thirteenth of this month. In October 2003 the Occupation forces issued a military order declaring the entire area –including isolated village and lands- behind the Wall as a "closed military area" where only Israelis are allowed...
http://stopthewall.org/latestnews/489.shtml


Disabled Rehabilitation Center Demolished, 3 Civilians Arrested
Continuing its wide-scale military aggression, Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) demolished early Thursday the building of Disabled Rehabilitation Center near al-Sheikh Zayid City in Beit Lahyia in northern Gaza Strip, witnesses said.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=538


Three Palestinian Children Killed
A 16-year-old boy was killed by a large-calibre bullet in his back while throwing rocks at soldiers, a girl, nine, was shot in the stomach outside her apartment complex and a four-year-old girl died of tear gas inhalation... [were they western it WOULD be a crime]
http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=2818880


Another Palestinian shot in Biddu
Five citizens of the West Bank village of Biddu have been killed by the Israeli military over the last month and a half during protests against the Apartheid Wall that the government of Israel is building on their farmland. Despite the use of excessive and lethal force against protesters, the people of Biddu remain committed to resisting the Wall through non-violent protests.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/reports/writings/21Apr04_16_00_17JerusalemPat.htm


Israel razes Rafah homes
The Israeli army staged an overnight incursion into the southern Gaza Strip town of Rafah and destroyed 13 houses, Palestinian security sources and witnesses said on Thursday.
http://www.news24.com/News24/World/News/0,,2-10-1462_1516063,00.html


Activists say Border Police held boy, 13, as human shield
He ended up on the hood of a Border Police jeep, at least one of his arms tied to a wire mesh screen that blocks the windshield from incoming stones, according to a photograph of the purported incident distributed Thursday by local group Rabbis for Human Rights.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/418705.html


Israel brings death to Tulkarim
Locals said occupation forces began shooting as soon as they entered the town and made no attempt at making a single arrest. A medic said one of the victims had been shot at very close range in the head and stomach.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/CDCCD131-4808-451D-9F92-20FD941CA108.htm


Two Israelis moderately injured in Gaza attack
Two Israelis were moderately injured this afternoon after Palestinians fired an anti-tank missile at an army outpost near the settlement of Kfar Darom in the Gaza Strip.
http://www.maarivintl.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=6396


Running from Gaza to Greece
At sunrise and sunset, Sanaa Bkheet, the only woman on the Palestinian delegation to this summer's Olympic Games, can be found running along the beach front of the Dir al-Balah refugee camp. The Palestinians gained International Olympic Committee recognition in 1993...
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/417667.html


ATTACK ON THREE AMBULANCES IN THE GAZA STRIP
Médecins du Monde, a humanitarian medical organisation, runs programmes in the Gaza Strip alongside the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS). Our team witnessed that during an almost 48 hour-long incursion led by Israeli armed forces in Beit Lahia and Ezbet Beit Hanoun, in the north of the Gaza Strip...
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/fromthefield/108265054984.htm


Israeli Colonizers Wound Child, IOF Arrests 11 Palestinians in Hebron
Medical sources in Hebron said that Rana Jaber 10, was wounded and suffered bruises in her face and different parts of the body as armed settlers assaulted her family in Hebron. "While my wife and children were heading home, a band of armed colonizers hit us with pieces of rocks,"
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=544


Blair Urges Palestinians to Accept Israel Offer
Tony Blair today urged Palestinians to accept Israel’s offer to pull out of the Gaza Strip and parts of the West Bank. President George Bush has endorsed the offer made by Israel’s Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in a major shift in United States policy on the Middle East.
http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=2816276


PNA rejects Powell's claim of Arafat undercutting Qurei
Powell said in an interview Monday with The Associated Press that Qurei was being undercut by Arafat as predecessor Abu Mazen had been before resigning. Shaath accused the United States of "trying to find the excuses in order to escape from their commitments and responsibilities towards the peace process in the Middle East."
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/22/content_1435397.htm


Palestinian group Hamas may hunt collaborators
"Collaborators are very dangerous, they threaten the entire society. We ask the Palestinian Authority to hunt them down and put them on trial," West Bank Hamas local leader Ra'fat Nassif told Reuters. "But we warn the Authority that if it fails to punish the collaborators, the resistance factions will be forced to play this role," he said.
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L22424482.htm


Annan voices alarm at deadly consequences of Israeli incursion into Gaza
United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan today voiced alarm at the deadly consequences of a two-day Israeli incursion into the northern Gaza Strip, noting that there were reportedly at least 10 civilians, including five children under the age of 15, among the Palestinian deaths.
http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=10489&Cr=middle&Cr1=east


OIC tell US: Drop Israeli plan, bring UN into Iraq
An emergency meeting of the 57-member Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), the world's biggest grouping of Muslim states, said President George W. Bush's endorsement of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan was "detrimental to the peace process".
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1515&ncid=1515&e=7&u=/afp/20040422/wl_mideast_afp/malaysia_mideast_us_oic_iraq_040422144522


Livnat boycotts Ben-Gurion University due to faculty member's `incitement'
This is not the first time Livnat has complained to Braverman about Grinberg. Two years ago, she sent the BGU president a letter, asking him to denounce anti-Sharon criticism written by the political sociologist in Tikkun magazine.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/418137.html


What the Palestinian strategy must be
Politically, he[Sharon] has pursued what he started when Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982, namely to eliminate the Palestinian Liberation Organization as the political representative of the Palestinian people. On the territorial front, he is fulfilling the Zionist dream, relentlessly taking over land and water and walling Palestinians in isolated and useless enclaves.
http://new.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=5&article_id=2589


The dynamic of occupation - By Azmi Bishara
The Americans have bombed a mosque because five marines were injured by shots from within it. It is as if America is not supposed to pay any price for occupation, as if an injured marine justifies the bombardment of a mosque and the killing of 50 civilians. What can this conduct be if not an amalgam of fundamental fanaticism, imperial arrogance and barbarism?
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2004/687/op62.htm


Founding a binational state
After all, the goal of disengagement is to improve the demographic situation by removing a million and a half Palestinians from Israeli control and thereby reducing the danger that the country will cease to be a Jewish state.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/418166.html


NGO tries to bridge gaps in Palestinian refugee camps
During a time of increasing turmoil in the Arab world - for which many blame US foreign policies - this center provides a unique opportunity for Palestinians and Americans to meet and bridge the gaps created by world politics.
http://new.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=4&article_id=2584


World Bank reconstruction plan in Gaza, West Bank
Wolfensohn said the Palestinians urgently need an airport, and also a port and a free-trade area, which would be established in collaboration with Jordan and Egypt. He said managing the current Palestinian administration alone requires around EUR 400 million to EUR 600 million per year.
http://www.expatica.com/source/site_article.asp?subchannel_id=58&story_id=6878


Families evacuated from Gaza will receive estimated $400,000 each
It is estimated that each family evacuated from the Gaza Strip will receive an average of $400,000, for a total expense of $600 million. Sources close to the settlers claim the amounts are higher.
http://www.globes.co.il/serveen/globes/docview.asp?did=789242&fid=942


Unemployment hit 11% in February; 292,000 people out of work
Unemployment surged to 11 percent of the workforce in February 2003, according Central Bureau of Statistics figures released Thursday. Some 292,000 people are currently out of work.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/418593.html


East Jerusalem resident kidnapped in Iraq said released
Razouk's mother, Samira, told Haaretz on Thursday that she hopes her son will stop working in Iraq, and thanked Yasser Arafat, whom the family had asked for help after finding out Nabil had been abducted.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/418607.html


Sacked Information Ministry staffers file suit against Bremer
Employees from the former Iraqi Information Ministry have filed a suit against Paul Bremer, the US civil administrator in Iraq, for disbanding the ministry, leaving over 5,000 people unemployed.
http://new.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=2&article_id=2600


NGO slams occupation of Najaf hospital by Salvadoran coalition troops
A French non-governmental organization slammed the occupation of the biggest hospital in the Shiite holy city of Najaf in central Iraq... "We actively denounce this unacceptable situation, contrary to the Geneva conventions,"...
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1515&ncid=1515&e=9&u=/afp/20040422/wl_mideast_afp/iraq_salvador_najaf_040422182141


Pentagon: Iraq war running over budget, faces $4 billion shortfall
The Pentagon's top general said Wednesday that increased violence in Iraq is pushing the cost of the war over budget, threatening a $4 billion shortfall by late summer.
http://www.nola.com/iraq/index.ssf?/newsflash/get_story.ssf?/cgi-free/getstory_ssf.cgi?a0614_BC_Congress-Iraq&&news&emergency

April 21 2004

BUY OLIVE OIL / HELP REBUILD WATER WELLS
The Palestine Children's Welfare Fund (PCWF) has pledged to help the village of Jayyous rebuild and maintain a vital water well in the village... As many of you may remember, Jayyous was one of the first villages where the bulldozing of land and uprooting of trees began for Israel's Apartheid Wall over 1 1/2 years ago.
http://www.unobserver.com/layout5.php?id=1600&blz=2


Anata Targeted with Demolitions
Today Occupation forces destroyed 5 buildings in Anata, in the northern Jerusalem area. A small mosque, built approximately 6 months ago was also demolished. At least six houses in the area near the mosque are also slated to be demolished, as the Apartheid Wall is expected to pass directly through this area.
http://stopthewall.org/latestnews/488.shtml


It's murder, but it's OK, they're just Arabs
About 20 adult Palestinians and 7 Internationals headed into the olive groves coming within 100m of the work site. The Israeli forces fired tear gas and then attacked the demonstrators with horses and infantry. The mounted police ran down two Palestinians, arresting one after knocking him down with horse and baton. An ISM woman was arrested on the spot as well.
http://www.unobserver.com/layout5.php?id=1599&blz=1


Israeli raid in northern Gaza leaves 12 Palestinians dead
Eight Palestinians were shot dead by Israeli troops on Wednesday, including a 12-year-old boy, while another four were killed during the clashes in the Beit Lahiya area on Tuesday evening at the start of the operation.
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/afp_world/view/81258/1/.html


IOF Military Campaign in Selwad Leaves 70 Palestinians Arrested
Israeli occupying forces (IOF) arrested on Tuesday approximately 70 Palestinian civilians during its invasion to the Selwad town, west of the West Bank city of Ramallah, where it also destroyed the town’s mosque.
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/140.html


1 House and 6 Farms Destroyed in Jenin
Israeli soldiers stormed the house of Hamdouna and forced the family to leave. They forced them out in disarray and destroyed the house, levelling it completely to the ground, eyewitness said.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=531


Palestine calls for int'l intervention in Israeli raids
Palestinian security sources said the Israel Army opened its heavy artillery fire and Apache helicopter rockets against Palestinians in Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun. "The immoral operation contravenes with all the international resolutions and human rights laws," he added.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/21/content_1433070.htm


Al Aqsa Brigades says it attacked Israeli armored vehicle
The group said in a leaflet that several of its militants managed to plant a roadside bomb as the Israeli carrier drove over it near the neighborhood of al-Nadda in the northern Gaza Strip. "We totally destroyed the personnel carrier and we would continue defending our lands and our people,"
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/21/content_1433157.htm


IOF Opens Fire at Ambulance in Beit Lahya
the IOF opened heavy fire at an ambulance holding plate number 4339 damaging it completely .The ambulance was on its way to vacate the injuries caused by the Israeli attack against Palestinian civilians in the city.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=533


Palestinian Detainees Suffer Harsh Conditions in Israeli Prisons
Abd al-Razzek said in a press release that the prisoners in Shatta prison are submitted to daily torture, insult and curse, adding that Israeli soldiers offensively forced prisoners to take off their clothes without any justification.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=532


Palestinian cabinet may resign en masse
Quraya said on Wednesday this was one of several proposals being weighed in response to US assurances to Israel that it could retain some West Bank settlements and that Palestinian refugees would not resettle in the Jewish state in a final peace treaty.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/14A84705-B098-4EAE-A4BD-C2BD67C82EC8.htm


Qurie asks Bush to reconsider
In 1991, Qurie wrote, the US government stated that it "opposed unilateral actions that prejudge the outcome of permanent-status negotiations". Qurie said Bush was allowing Israel "to continue creating illegal facts on the ground" by expanding West Bank settlements.
http://news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,9353665%255E1702,00.html


Bush says world owes Sharon a 'thank you'
U.S. President George W. Bush on Wednesday rejected international condemnation of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and said world leaders owed him a "thank you" for his plans for the Gaza Strip and the West Bank.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/418117.html


EU presses Israel over Gaza pullout, digs at US
"What they presumably have in mind is a Palestine which is genuinely viable, not a collection of isolated 'bantustans' divided by tanks and settlements and walls."
http://www.eubusiness.com/afp/040421151211.nxu62koo


Vatican Regrets Al-Rantisi Execution by Israel, other Bodies Condemn
John Paul II, Pope of the Vatican, expressed sorrow yesterday for the loss of Dr. Abdulaziz Al-Rantisi, Hamas Leader in the Gaza Strip, by the Israeli missiles earlier this week, as other bodies around the world condemned such an Israeli attack.
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/141.html


Oxfam calls for clarity on Apaches
Oxfam will today demand that the government reveal if British companies have supplied components for Apache helicopters to Israel, the kind that were used to assassinate two Hamas leaders.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,2763,1197107,00.html


Sharon, Bush, Kerry Subjugate Palestinians
For his part, John Kerry cravenly offered no better. Appearing on Meet the Press, he said he was four-square behind the Bush-Sharon policy. And he even gave his blessing to the Israeli assassination of Hamas leader Abdel Aziz Rantisi.
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0420-13.htm


Gap between pullout plan backers, opponents narrows to 4%
Only 44 percent of registered Likud members eligible to vote in the upcoming party referendum slated for May 2 said they would vote in favor of the plan to remove all Gaza Strip settlements and several settlements in the West Bank, while 40 percent
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/418075.html


Hamas leapfrogs Fatah
Asked for whom they would vote if general elections were called, 31% said Hamas, while 27.1% opted for Fatah, which has dominated Palestinian politics for decades. It was the first time Hamas has registered a lead over Fatah in polls among Palestinians as a whole...
http://www.news24.com/News24/World/News/0,,2-10-1462_1515719,00.html


Vanunu to appeal High Court against restrictions placed on him
The Association for Civil Rights in Israel announced Wednesday it would petition the High Court of Justice in the coming days to remove the limitations the government has placed on nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu, who was released from prison Wednesday morning after serving 18 years.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/417702.html


Background / Is Israel secretly glad Vanunu spilled secrets?
"There are people who understand this very well," he says. "Every one with eyes in his head was glad, everyone who understands strategy and who followed what was going on in the Arab world after Vanunu."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=418032&contrassID=1&subContrassID=7&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Breaking an iron rule
Every Jew, man or woman, citizen of any country in the world, has potentially more rights in Israel than any Arab native citizen in the state. The Jew will have more chances to find a job, respectable housing, financial aid for higher education, personal advancement.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/417673.html


OIC ministerial meeting to adopt declaration on Palestine
The extraordinary ministerial meeting of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) on Thursday is expected to come up with a declaration on Palestine calling on Israel to respect international law.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/21/content_1432660.htm


Israel sent its spies to Australia to find Vanunu, says newspaper
Mr Peres, the founder of Israel's covert nuclear program and the prime minister who ordered Mr Vanunu's abduction from Rome, later won the Nobel Peace Prize for his work on the failed Oslo peace accords.
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/04/21/1082530234213.html


Gaza: UN agency resumes food distribution to 600,000 Palestinian refugees
The main United Nations relief agency for Palestinian refugees today resumed distributing emergency food aid to 600,000 people in the Gaza Strip following a three-week suspension after Israel imposed new restrictions at the sole commercial crossing point.
http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=10462&Cr=Refugees&Cr1=Gaza


Casting Mideast Violence in Another Light
WHILE his critics call him an apologist for the enemies of America - The New York Sun called him "the professor of hate" - he doggedly insists that he is merely carrying out his role as a historian, working to show how historical forces, largely ignored in the United States, have shaped the modern Middle East. Dr. Rashid I. Khalidi as the Edward Said Professor of Arab Studies...
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/20/nyregion/20profile.html?ei=5062&en=f06a7c81bd2119b2&ex=1083124800&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1082540740-fobGvgTwjUh5As5c9l6Nmw


Arab ally snubs Bush amid 'unprecedented hatred' for US
King Abdullah of Jordan flew home from the US after abruptly cancelling a meeting planned for today with the president in Washington. The king's move came as the Egyptian president, Hosni Mubarak, said there was more hatred of Americans in the Arab world today than ever before.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,2763,1197136,00.html


The Israelization of U.S. Armed Forces: Acceptable Numbers of Dead Babies
The young American Marine is exultant. "It's a sniper's dream," he tells a Los Angeles Times reporter on the outskirts of Fallujah. "Sometimes a guy will go down, and I'll let him scream a bit to destroy the morale of his buddies. Then I'll use a second shot."
http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2004/04/286289.shtml


US destroying Falluja homes
Ferocious fighting in the Iraqi town of Falluja has grown so intense that US occupation forces have begun destroying buildings and homes. Aljazeera's correspondent in Falluja, Abd Al-Adhim Muhammad, said exchange of fire in the Golan quarter grew so fierce that troops had to call in helicopter support on Wednesday.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/CDB10E42-D220-496A-98DF-534791054190.htm

April 20 2004

On This Day 1936: BRITISH MANDATE ARAB REVOLT 1936-39
The Arabs began by proclaiming an Arab general strike and boycott of Jewish enterprises and products. They made demands on the British Mandate administration, principally: 1.An end to Jewish immigration 2.An end to transfers of land to Jewish owners 3.A new "general representative government"
http://www.palestinefacts.org/pf_mandate_riots_1936-39.php
Other Sources:
Arab Revolt of 1936--1939
http://lark.cc.ukans.edu/~redbud/Encyclopedia.pdf
Great Uprising
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Uprising


Israeli troops kill four Palestinians in Gaza Strip
Israeli soldiers shot dead four Palestinians and wounded 25 others in confrontations with stone-throwers on Tuesday in the Gaza Strip, medics said.
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L20550840.htm


Israel Army kill Palestinian youth in West Bank refugee camp
Israel Army raided overnight the southern West Bank refugee camp of Al-Fawar, killing a Palestinian youth... The Israeli troops also took over a three-story building in the refugee camp after forcing 35 residents to leave it, retaining them outdoors and assaulting them physically.
http://www.yourmailinglistprovider.com/pubarchive_show_message.php?iapinfo+2425


Israel plans to assassinate 12 Hamas'' top leaders -- Al-Qassam Brigades
The Martyr Izz Eddin Al-Qassam Brigades, the Military arm of Hamas Movement accused Israel on Tuesday of planning to assassinate twelve of Hamas' top political leaders in the next period... seven are living in Palestine and the others abroad.
http://www.kuna.net.kw/English/Story.asp?DSNO=623921


Civilian Wounded in Rafah, 2 Buildings Demolished in Deir al-Balah
backed by tanks and bulldozers demolished today morning the 2-storey house of Mahmoud Abu Samra, director general of Ministry of Agriculture, in Deir al-Balah... The sources added that a gas station, belonging to 'Akila family, was also demolished by IOF...
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=519


Israeli Forces Storm an Orphanage Building
The society Director, Hashim al-Rojoub said that the IOF troops broke into the society after tightly besieging its vicinity and launched a search campaign, leaving grave damage to the building which shelters 40 orphans. They also seized a number of the equipment.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=521


a conversation with Abdel Aziz Rantisi, one day before his assassination
The Zionists continue destroying our lives for no reason but that we demand our legitimate rights and because we fight to put an end to the tragedy and multi-faceted suffering of our people. Therefore, we think that if the suffering of the Palestinians stops we have achieved victory.
http://www.bitterlemons.org/issue/pal2.php


King of Jordan cancels Bush talks over backing for Sharon
Jordan is seen as a key ally for the US in the region and the announcement indicates the scale of Arab anger at President Bush's support for Israel's plans to keep Jewish settlements in some occupied territories while withdrawing from the Gaza Strip and parts of the West Bank.
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=513243


Palestinian observer condemns killing of Hamas leader
Addressing an open meeting of the UN Security Council, the observer said that the killing of Rantissi, as well as two other Palestinian men who had been with him, was the latest in a long series of war crimes committed by the occupying power.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/20/content_1428610.htm


U.S. threatens to veto Security Council draft on Mideast
Meanwhile, the Palestinians blamed the U.S. during the meeting late Monday for emboldening Israel to assassinate Rantisi by vetoing last month's Security Council resolution condemning the "extrajudicial execution" of Hamas' founder Sheikh Ahmed Yassin
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=416695&contrassID=1&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Hamas ready to cooperate, but only in Gaza
Hamas said yesterday that it would stop attacking Israeli targets from Gaza if Ariel Sharon carried out his proposed withdrawal from the strip. But it maintained its right to fight against Israeli occupation of the West Bank and retaliate for the assassination of its leaders.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,2763,1195566,00.html


Powell assures Europeans U.S. committed to Palestinian state
Still, Powell lined up with President George Bush's assurances last week to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon that "the realities that exist in the area" should be taken into account in a peace accord.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/417263.html


Solana says EU wants to help make Israeli withdrawal from Gaza a success
"We would like to get the European Union engaged in the withdrawal from Gaza and the future stability of Gaza," Solana told reporters at the State Department after meeting with Secretary of State Colin Powell.
http://www.eubusiness.com/afp/040420152817.qeqfh86o


PCBS Report: 429,160 Settlers in the Palestinian Territories in 2003
A report released by Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) about the Israeli settlement activities in the Palestinian territories for the year 2003 indicated that the number of settlers in the Palestinian territories in 2003 reached 429,160 settlers, including 421,565 in the West Bank and 7,595 in Gaza Strip.
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/130.html


Court orders PA to pay millions to family of bomb victims
An Israeli court ordered the Palestinian Authority on Tuesday to pay NIS 74 million ($16.2 million) to six relatives of two Israelis killed by a Palestinian suicide bomber.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=417626&contrassID=1&subContrassID=7&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Ignore Vanunu; don't restrict him
Vanunu will also have to learn the addresses of all the foreign embassies in Israel - because he is not allowed to go near them either; and if he doesn't not know their exact locations, he might accidentally walk down an adjacent street and come close enough to one of them to land himself back in jail.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/417239.html


Beirut meet discusses Palestinian plight, Iraq
"We want to lobby in the Arab Summit for certain issues - for the support of Palestinian and Iraqi resistance and their people, more popular participation in the Arab world, more democracy, more reform - but according to an Arab agenda, not an American agenda."
http://new.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=2&article_id=2493


‘US neo-conservatives more dangerous than Jewish lobby’
“I never imagined that the (US) guarantees would reach the extent of allowing Israel to annex vast Palestinian territory and end the issue of refugees. I never expected a superpower to be so biased for one party against the other,” he said.
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=story_20-4-2004_pg4_1


People and Politics / It's still the same old story, a tale of missed opportunity
The worry that there is an Israeli plot to turn the evacuation of Gaza into proof that the Palestinians don't deserve an independent state added urgency to the coordination between Hamas and PA, making such coordination a vital interest of Hamas.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/417259.html


Tactical victory and strategic victory
In other words, there is no military solution, no strategic military "victory" against a popular insurrection provoked by prolonged occupation. You cannot "win" this war unless you win the peace as well.
http://www.bitterlemons.org/issue/isr1.php


Rabbi Weiss Rips Ariel Sharon / Zionism
Rabbi Weiss then put some historical context on his comment and explained how the Zionism Movement, a political juggernaut, with only materialist objectives, has hijacked Judaism, the religion of the Jewish people.
http://usa.mediamonitors.net/content/view/full/6340/


Questioning Barak's legacy
But it would be a mistake to view Barak as some olive-bearing dove of peace, someone who offered justice to the Palestinians only to have Yasser Arafat flatly turn it down. Let's first remember what his "generous offer" did not include.
http://www.dailytexanonline.com/news/2004/04/19/Opinion/Questioning.Baraks.Legacy-664391.shtml


The Bush-Sharon Palestinian disenfranchisement pact
Sharon is clearly thrilled by Bush's backing. It is a remarkable arrangement. Sharon does not even have to extract concessions from a pliable and impotent Palestinian Authority. He can simply turn to George W. Bush and ask him to cede Palestinian rights.
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article2591.shtml


Cultural life in Palestine breaks the siege
The city that was under curfew in the afternoon is back to normal in the evening. Dozens of people gather outside Al-Kasaba Theatre and Cinematheque, excitedly waiting to watch the The Kite, a Lebanese/French film playing in Palestine among 28 European movies from Germany, the Netherlands, France, Belgium, Finland, Greece, Britain and Austria.
http://new.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=4&Article_id=2503


500 Prisoners of Qalqilia, an Example of Palestinian Prisoners Suffering
Since the outbreak of Palestinian-Israeli conflict, the Palestinian prisoners issue has been the dominant feature of such a conflict, as the Israeli occupying forces have been intentionally targeting the Palestinian people, either by killing, detention or expulsion.
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/136.html


Egyptian president says US subject of "unprecedented" hate
"Despair and a feeling of injustice are not going to confine themselves to our region," Mubarak said. "American and Israeli interests are not safe, not only in our region but in other parts of the world, in Europe, in America, anywhere in the world."
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1515&ncid=1515&e=8&u=/afp/20040420/wl_mideast_afp/mideast_egypt_us_france_040420181931


Attack on Iraqi prison kills 21; US races to halt coalition splinter
Eighteen mortar rounds rained down late in the afternoon on the coalition-run Baghdad Confinement Facility at Abu Gharib, west of the Iraqi capital, said Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt, the US-led coalition's deputy director of military operations.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1515&ncid=1515&e=1&u=/afp/20040420/wl_mideast_afp/iraq_worldwrap_040420165740


Robert Fisk: Iraq power handover 'a fraud'
The British occupation in Iraq took three years to fail between 1917 and 1920. It took us, the British, three years to unite the Shiites and the Sunnis behind us.It's quite an achievement - the Americans have managed to unite the Shiites and the Sunnis against them in just one year.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article6065.htm

April 19 2004

Trying to make the wall transparent
A joint project of Israeli and Palestinian artists, which is minimalist and fascinating in concept, will take place this evening at 6 P.M. in Jerusalem's Abu Dis neighborhood, near the separation fence. Two video cameras will film what is happening on both sides of the wall...
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/411099.html


Stop the Assassinations of the Palestinian People
The Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign mourns the death of Diya' Abd el Kareem Eid, martyred today in Biddu village. Only 2 days earlier, in Betuniya, another young Palestinian was killed by the Occupation forces, Hussein Mahmud Awad, who 17 years old. Hussein died after being shot in the head during a protest against the Apartheid Wall...
http://stopthewall.org/latestnews/485.shtml


3 Arrested, Arable Land Levelled in Hebron
Witnesses said that Israeli colonizers of Kyriat Arba' and soldiers attacked Palestinian land owners in Wadi al-Gharoos and arrested three of them as they were trying to prevent Israeli bulldozers from razing their land.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=510


Israeli army destroys Palestinian house in central Gaza Strip
The sources said that an Israeli Army force supported by tanks and bulldozers raided the area and surrounded a two-storey building owned by Mahmoud Abu Samra, director of the Palestinian Ministry of Agriculture.
http://www.yourmailinglistprovider.com/pubarchive_show_message.php?iapinfo+2418


Israel 'Will Invest Millions in West Bank'
Netanyahu reaffirmed Israel’s commitment to the settlements that will fall on the “Palestinian” side of the barrier. “There we are going to invest. I myself am going to approve hundreds of millions of shekels to invest in the settlements beyond the main fence,” he said.
http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=2800299


Rocket hits Israeli settlement, three wounded
Earlier Monday, an Israeli was seriously wounded in another rocket attack. Palestinians fire homemade rockets and mortars at the Jewish settlements in Gaza and communities just outside the fence frequently.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2004/04/19/international1332EDT0579.DTL


Soldier injured when Palestinians throw burning car battery at his vehicle
An IDF soldier was moderately injured when Palestinians hurled a burning car battery at his vehicle... Also in the West Bank Monday, three Border Police officers sustained light injuries when two patrol vehicles collided and crashed after the drivers lost control when Palestinians bombarded them with rocks.
http://www.maarivintl.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=6176


Three injured by stones thrown at bus in East Jerusalem
Three Israelis were lightly injured tonight (Monday) after Palestinians stoned an Egged bus in East Jerusalem. The bus driver was taken to Hadassah Hospital on Mount Scopus while two passengers were treated on location.
http://www.maarivintl.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=6189


IOF Hands over Clinically Dead Civilian in Jericho
"We received the body Kharioush, he is clinically dead as he was shot in the upper part of the body with several gunshots", Barqawi said. Barqawi added that Kharioush was shot in the head and chest with several bullets, affirming that Israeli soldiers stormed Tulkarem Hospital and kidnapped his body.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=512


Israel Closes 3 Schools in Jenin
Director of Education in Qabatya, Mohammed Salama, said that IOF soldiers stormed three schools in Seilat al-Thahr village of Jenin and forced teachers and schoolboys to evacuate the schools in a five- minute time.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=506


Israeli Soldiers Beat up Citizen in Tulkarem
"Israeli soldiers detained driver Dawood and brutaly beat him up with gun-buts, then they led him to an undisclosed place," eyewitness said. Israeli soldiers detained tens of Palestinian citizens and vehicles tried to access through 'Inab checkpoint. The soldiers provocatively restricted their movements.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=509


Fire chief: Israel may be facing 'arson terror' wave
The fires were preceded by clashes between security forces and anti-fence demonstrators at a construction site for the West Bank separation fence at the adjacent Palestinian village of Rantis. There were an additional two arson fires at the Nataf forest west of Jerusalem.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=417032&contrassID=1&subContrassID=5&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Refugees in Iraq mourn Rantissi, vow to return
Hundreds of Palestinian refugees here Sunday staged symbolic funerals for Hamas leader Abdelaziz Rantissi, vowing that Israel's killing of the "resistance hero" will not prevent them from returning home.
http://www.yourmailinglistprovider.com/pubarchive_show_message.php?iapinfo+2420


Israel Steals Antiquities in Jerusalem
The Popular Committee of Resisting the Apartheid Wall (PCRAW) said that the Israeli Authority of Antiquities, supported by IOF, has stolen Byzantine antiquities from the village of Beddo.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=507


PCBS: The number of settlers in the OPT in 2003 reached 429,160
Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics released Monday a Statistical Report on Israeli colonies in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) for the year 2003. The report contains statistical data about the population, the social, economic, and geographic indicators of the Israeli colonies.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=511


Arafat says Israel plans will make Gaza a "prison"
But after studying the details of the initiative, including Israel's intention to control Gaza's borders, air space and coastal waters, Arafat and the Palestinian leadership issued a statement slamming the plan as unacceptable.
http://www.reuters.com/locales/newsArticle.jsp?type=worldNews&locale=en_IN&storyID=4867518


Sharon gets boost from shift in stance by Shalom
Silvan Shalom, Israel's foreign minister, joined other key ministers on Monday in supporting a plan for the unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, citing US support for the plan as the reason for his change of stance.
http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1079420441093&p=1012571727172


U.N. Council Sets Emergency Meeting on Middle East
The U.N. Security Council scheduled emergency consultations on the Middle East on Monday at the request of Arab nations following Israel's assassination of a top Hamas leader and a major policy shift by President Bush.
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=4866430§ion=news


Indonesia condemns Israel's killing of Hamas leader Rantissi
"Israel has once again ... disregarded international law and world opinion by carrying out the unspeakable murder and political assassination, which the Indonesian government condemns in the strongest terms,"...
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/19/content_1427372.htm


Palestinian right of return tops agenda in Paris
Speaking in Paris, where he held talks with French President Jacques Chirac, Hariri said that Lebanon was favorable to the return of the refugees to Palestine. "This is a crucial issue for the Lebanese and they are in full agreement on it," he said.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=1&categ_id=2&article_id=2469


965,000 new immigrants have moved to Israel since 1989
A total of 965,000 new immigrants have come to Israel since 1989, according to a report by the Absorption Ministry released on Monday.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/417144.html


Poraz bans Vanunu from leaving Israel for one year
The government is also prohibiting Vanunu from discussing his work at the Dimona facility, holding a passport and approaching Israel's border crossings, Channel Two reported Monday night.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/417038.html


Israeli, American officials discuss limiting WMD in Mideast
The talks are expected to focus on the exchange of information and coordinating positions ahead of an expected discussion on the Iranian program by the International Atomic Energy Agency.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=417064&contrassID=1&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Evil Does Often Triumph
Apart from the imbalance of voices in the press, there is simply a great moral and ethical disproportion between the acts of desperate people opposing occupation and organized suppression by a heavily-armed state.
http://www.counterpunch.com/chuckman04192004.html


'There is one team working together: the American-Israeli team'
Two military occupations in the Middle East by two different countries with two different agendas. But for many in the region, the American-led occupation of Iraq and Israel's occupation of the Palestinian territories are becoming synonymous - two sides of the same anti-Arab coin.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=2&article_id=2453


Hamas Likely To Go For Collective Leadership
Top Israeli security official said Sunday that any figure who replaces Rantisi will be a potential assassination target. Similar to West Bank arrangements, where Hamas's leadership is not known, the Gaza Branch is likely to move into a style of an underground leadership.
http://www.imemc.org/headlines/2004/April/week3/041904/hamas%20likely.htm


Sharon's banana republics
Last week was a sad moment for international diplomacy. The world's two most powerful leaders, Bush and Blair, caved in to the most unscrupulous politician in the Middle East, who was found to be "unfit for public office" by an Israeli inquiry committee after the massacres of Sabra and Shatila in 1982.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/comment/0,10551,1194795,00.html


Spain will never again turn back on UN, says new defence minister
"We will never again turn our back on the United Nations," said Jose Bono. "Nor will we turn our backs on Spaniards -- be they rightwing or leftwing -- who neither understand nor accept the presence of Spanish troops in Iraq," he said.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1515&ncid=1515&e=14&u=/afp/20040419/wl_mideast_afp/iraq_spain_un_040419152142


Bush Names Negroponte Iraq Ambassador
If confirmed by the Senate, Negroponte would head a U.S. embassy in Baghdad that will be temporarily housed in a palace that belonged to Saddam. When up and running, the embassy will be the largest in the world.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-3995471,00.html

April 18 2004

Israeli soldiers shoot dead another Palestinian unarmed protester
The surgeon, Dr. Huwwari reported that the bullet had passed near De’yaa’s heart causing cardiac arrest and fragmenting one of his lungs, before exiting. A couple of hours after coming out of surgery and appearing to be stable, De’yaa died. De’yaa Abdul Kareem was in the olive groves located approximately 500 meters from the worksite of Israeli bulldozers when he was hit by a live bullet shot by an Israeli army sniper.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/pressreleases/PR_18Apr04_15_03_57JerusalemISMOffice.htm


Occupation Forces Shoot Three in Biddu
As soon as the Occupation soldiers appeared, the demonstrators met them by throwing stones, attempting to drive them out of the village, and stop the work on the Wall. Occupation soldiers immediately began firing a combination of live, and rubber bullets, severly injuring three.
http://stopthewall.org/latestnews/482.shtml


Villagers from Northwest Jerusalem Protest PA Inaction
Palestinians from the villages northwest of Jerusalem protested today in Ramallah against The Palestinian Authority and what the people perceive as it's inaction against stopping the Apartheid Wall.
http://stopthewall.org/photos/481.shtml


5-year-old girl injured by Israeli tank fire
He saw an Israeli tank in the road ahead of him. He turned to the right, onto his street. His five year old daughter, Batool, turned around to watch the tank. The tank fired several shots which went through his car, the car seat and into his daughter’s chest. He kept driving to the hospital. An ambulance was in the area; the tank smashed it, crumpling its wheels.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/reports/writings/17Apr04_14_33_30TulkaremPhyllis.htm


Separation wall to be completed before Gaza pullout: Sharon
His announcement at a cabinet meeting was regarded as bowing to Finance Minister Binyamin Netanyahu as this was one of the Netanyahu's conditions for supporting Sharon's disengagement plan. Netanyahu is expected to announce his formal support for Sharon's disengagement plan, Israel Army Radio reported on Sunday.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/18/content_1426258.htm


Israeli tanks shell Khan Younis, 9 Palestinians wounded
Israeli tanks shelled overnight Palestinians' houses in the southern Gaza Strip refugee camp of Khan Younis, injuring at least nine Palestinians, local security sources reported Sunday. Among the nine Palestinians injured, two of them were children aged nine and seven and in critical conditions...
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/18/content_1426224.htm


Israeli Troops Take it Out on Children and Wound Three, Two Critically
The Israeli occupying forces (IOF) violently confronted with the demonstrations that erupted after the extrajudicial execution of Hamas leader Dr. Abdel Aziz Al Rantisi, shooting three children and wounding them, two of them critically.
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/121.html


Child Wounded in Nablus
Witnesses said that Israeli soldiers stormed Barqa village of Nablus, opened fire at civilians and schoolchildren, injuring Mohammed Daghlas 13, with a rubber bullet in the head.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=495


Fatah armed wing claims responsibility for attacking Israeli jeep
Al-Aqsa brigades, the military wing of the Fatah movement said on Sunday that the Palestinian who was killed overnight near the southern Gaza Strip Jewish settlement of Kissufim was one of its members.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/18/content_1426315.htm


Rantisi chose open defiance rather than a life in hiding
Rantisi refused to go into hiding, despite the assassination of Sheikh Yassin. "It's death, whether by killing or by cancer. Nothing will change. If by Apache or by cardiac arrest, I prefer Apache," he said last month.
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=512525


Hamas vows "volcano of revenge" after Rantissi assassination, Sharon defiant
Hamas threatened a "volcano of revenge" against Israel as some 200,000 Palestinians packed the streets of Gaza... His killing late Saturday prompted a chorus of international condemnation, except in the United States, and sparked anti-Israeli and anti-US protests in Arab countries such as Lebanon, Egypt, Jordan, Iraq, Kuwait and Tunisia.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1515&ncid=1515&e=1&u=/afp/20040418/wl_mideast_afp/mideast_040418191713


Quraya seeks world's help on Sharon plan
Quraya on Sunday accused the United States of breaking international law by making "concessions" in support of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to evacuate the Gaza Strip.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/2B0D7865-9FCE-482C-8595-50483D7A9F18.htm


Mashal says Rantisi's killing will not weaken group
"What Bush told Sharon in the White House three days ago is the clearest green light and cover for Sharon's crimes and for what has happened to Dr. Abdel Aziz Rantisi," Mashal said. "Thus, it (the United States) is the one responsible for this crime."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/416695.html


Moussa calls for joint Arab action against Israel
Moussa emphasized that it is necessary to face "Israel's criminal policies," which he said has "reached its limits", with a serious Arab stance. Asked about growing public demands to boycott Israel and the United States, Moussa said such expression of public opinion mirrors the "frustration towards what is happening."
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/18/content_1426267.htm


Annan condemns Israel's assassination of Hamas leader Abdelaziz Rantissi
United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan has condemned Israel's assassination of Hamas leader Abdelaziz Rantissi and called on the country to end the practice of extrajudicial killngs, which violate international law.
http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=10431&Cr=Middle&Cr1=East


Kuwaiti government condemns assasination of Rantisi
Kuwaiti Council of Ministers, during its weekly cabinet session, reiterated Kuwait's strong condemnation of the terrorist action that the Israeli government committed against Rantisi, Kuwait News Agency reported.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/19/content_1426349.htm


U.S. declines to condemn Rantisi assassination
The White House early Sunday declined to criticize Israel's assassination of Hamas leader Abdel Raziz Rantisi, saying instead that Israel "has the right to defend itself from terrorist attacks" and urging restraint in the region.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=416387&contrassID=1&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


EU condemns Rantissi killing, insists peace talks must return to fore
"He once again reminded the Israeli government that extra-judicial killings are contrary to international law and pointed out that respect for international law should mark an important distinction between democratically elected governments and terrorist groups," the statement added.
http://www.eubusiness.com/afp/040418141352.odgq8lz4


Japanese Government Condemns Assassination of Rantissi
Yoriko Kawaguchi, the Japanese foreign minister, said in a statement today that the assassination was a thoughtless and unjustifiable act, giving no consideration of its consequences.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=501


Mashal: Arab nations abandoning Palestinians
Khaled Mashal, head of the Hamas political bureau, on Sunday lashed out at the Arab countries for failing to support... The Palestinians are deeply disappointed with the Arab leaders for failing to hold a summit to discuss the latest developments in the Arab world.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1082260238868


Hamas appoints new leader after Rantisi's assassination
Meanwhile, Israel's Army Radio said the successor to Rantisi is Mahmoud al-Zahar, a senior Hamas leader who escaped an Israeli assassination attempt last year. But Hamas refused to comment on the report.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/18/content_1425997.htm


Assassinating Rantisi a result of Sharon's visit to US: PNA
"We are starting to feel serious concern and danger, especially after this visit and US president George W. Bush's statements legalized the resumption of the Israeli aggressions carried out against Palestinians," Al-Khatib said.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/18/content_1426278.htm


Israeli Minister Sees Annexation of West Bank Blocs
Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday Israel had received approval from the United States for a future Israeli annexation of West Bank settlement blocs under a unilateral disengagement plan from the Palestinians.
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=4857646§ion=news


Arafat urged to step down
Independent deputy Azmi Al Shuwaibi, at a parliamentary meeting in this West Bank town, proposed that Arafat follow the example of the late Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser. Nasser quit following the Arab defeat in the 1967 Middle East war.
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/Articles.asp?Article=79461&Sn=WORL


Background / Articulate Rantisi rivaled Arafat
When he returned to the territories, Rantisi was arrested and imprisoned numerous times by the PA. His popularity increased continually during the present intifada; a poll taken in the territories just before the killing of Ahmed Yassin put Rantisi second in popularity only to Yasser Arafat.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/416419.html


Sharon's Skin and Bush's Spots - by Uri Avnery
"It is said that Bush is the most pro-Israeli American president there ever was. I think that the opposite is true. I believe that he is the most anti-Israeli American president there ever was, because the Sharon-Bush plan is blocking the way to Israeli-Palestinian peace, our only hope for a normal life."
http://usa.mediamonitors.net/content/view/full/6314/


Assassination of Hamas Leader Lays Bare Anglo-American Rift
The UK again condemned “targeted assassinations” while the US backed Israel’s “right to defend itself”. The timing was particularly embarrassing for Tony Blair coming so close Washington talks with US President George Bush.
http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=2798439


Spanish PM gives order for pullout of troops from Iraq
U.S. President George Bush has urged Spain and other allies in Iraq to stick with Washington. "According to the information we have...it is not likely that a UN resolution will be adopted that will meet the conditions we have set for our presence in Iraq," Zapatero said.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/416730.html


11 US soldiers killed in one day in Iraq
an eleventh soldier died in a tank rollover accident occurred also on Saturday. Since April 1, some 104 US soldiers have been killed in Iraq. About 700 US soldiers have died in combat and non combat actions in Iraq since the war began in March 2003, it was reported.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/19/content_1426355.htm

April 17 2004

Israel repress nonviolent resistance
The cluster of villages in the Northwest Jerusalem area, including Biddu and Beit Surik, have consistently attempted to nonviolently resist the construction of the Apartheid wall throughout their lands over the last two months. The Israeli army has consistently repressed any form of protest with excessive violence in this region
http://www.palsolidarity.org/reports/writings/17Apr04_04_38_03JerusalemNealandEmilie.htm


Hamas chief assassinated by Israel
He had long depicted himself as a Hamas politician with no links to the military wing. But Israel had refused to accept the distinction, accusing him of being a top decision-maker on attacks and of using his media role to incite violence.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/F6718419-88F8-48D0-A3F1-2E4A4F2817AC.htm


INTERNATIONAL MEETING ON IMPACT OF WALL BUILT BY ISRAEL IN OCCUPIED PALESTINIAN TERRITORY concludes two-day session
A final document issued by the meeting said participants expressed deep concern over the dangerous current and potential humanitarian consequences of the construction of the wall, noting that it would bring further dispossession for a significant number of Palestinians.
http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2004/gapal953.doc.htm


One Article, Three Questions
All the contracting parties of the Geneva Convention, including Israel, must ensure the application of International Humanitarian Law. Since the Wall is illegal, all states that have signed the Geneva Convention have the legal responsibility to take part and stop the Wall's construction and its impact on the civilian population.
http://stopthewall.org/analysisandfeatures/472.shtml


Child used as human shield after beating
After local Palestinians and Israeli activists saw a young boy being beaten by Israeli border police, the boy’s mother sent a Palestinian man to try and help him and Rabbi Ascherman also approached the police. Both were arrested, along with a Swedish ISM activist.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/reports/writings/16Apr04_17_56_50JerusalemRHR.htm


Child hit by Israeli gunfire
A FIVE-year-old Palestinian girl was shot and seriously wounded as Israeli troops fired at a car in the West Bank town of Tulkarem, Palestinian security officials said today.
http://news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,9317035%255E1702,00.html


Hamas' Rantissi lived on borrowed time
Born near what is now Israel's coastal city of Ashkelon, Rantissi was taken as an infant to the Gaza Strip by his family, one of thousands of Arabs displaced during the war that led to the creation of the Jewish state in 1948. He grew up in the Khan Younis refugee camp and received his medical training in Egypt. Returning to Gaza, he helped found Hamas in 1987.
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L17243038.htm


Suicide bomber kills border guard, wounds three at Erez Crossing
Hamas and Fatah claimed joint responsibility for the attack. The bomber was identified as Fadi el-Amudi, 22, from Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip, an operative of the Fatah’s el-Aqsa Brigades.
http://www.maarivintl.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=6072


Hamas vows revenge; Qureia blames U.S. 'encouragement, bias'
"This blood will not be wasted. It is our fate in Hamas and it is our fate as Palestinians to die as martyrs. The battle will not weaken our determination or break our will," Ismail Haniya told reporters.
http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/416387.html


Palestinian PM says assassination result of US
"The Palestinian cabinet considers this terrorist Israeli campaign is a direct result of American encouragement and the complete bias of the American administration towards the Israeli government," he said in his reaction.
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L17303833.htm


Palestinians campaign for prisoners' release
The protests came on the annual day of solidarity with the prisoners, thousands of whom are in Israeli jails. In Gaza City, parents carried pictures of their imprisoned sons and daughters.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/s1089569.htm


Palestinians mark day of solidarity with prisoners in Israel
"Your people will never forget you," Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat said of the prisoners. "You are the ones that held up the banner of struggle for the sake of Palestine, for the sake of establishing a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/416314.html


Tibi calls on PA to consider declaring independent state
the new rules call for such a declaration that would create a new political reality in accordance with the UN resolutions in the matter. On Thursday, Tibi termed the Bush statement as a “fatal blow to peace efforts and slap in the face to the Arab world”, adding, “This is the first time the Americans officially approve settlements and the taking over of land by means of force”.
http://www.maarivintl.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=6076


Arab League Members Reject New Mideast U.S. Policy
"The council...affirmed unanimously that it rejects the new American position, which is likely to wreck the peace process in the Middle East," an official statement said. "This position encourages Israel to persist in its aggression against the Palestinian people and its threats to security and stability in the region," it added.
http://wireservice.wired.com/wired/story.asp?section=Breaking&storyId=852612&tw=wn_wire_story


Amman wants pledge U.S. committed to land-for-peace plan
Jordanian Foreign Minister Marwan Muasher said Saturday that Amman wants assurances that Washington is still committed to an Arab-Israeli settlement based on exchanging land-for-peace and creating a Palestinian state in line with the road map.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=416349&contrassID=1&subContrassID=8&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Turkey rejects Minister Olmert's request to visit
Turkish officials on Friday rejected a request by Minister of Industry and Trade Ehud Olmert to visit Ankara... Following Israel's assassination of Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Erdogan strongly criticized Israel and called the killing "a terrorist act."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=416362&contrassID=1&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Omri Sharon: If Gaza plan fails, PM might resign
The resignation, Omri Sharon added, would lead to the party's loss of its hefty share of 40 Knesset seats, since the public would seek a political alternative in the next national elections.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=416094&contrassID=1&subContrassID=7&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Anger at restrictions on Vanunu
Vanunu, who will have served 18 years for revealing details of Israel's nuclear arsenal, is to be forbidden to have contact with foreigners either in person or by correspondence. He will not be allowed to leave Israel or move from his home town without reporting to police.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,2763,1193735,00.html


Israel threatens to destroy settler homes
Israel is threatening to demolish its settler homes in the Gaza Strip during its planned withdrawal of the territory unless it wins assurances that they will not be turned over to the families of Palestinian militants. It is also negotiating with the World Bank for compensation for its "real estate assets" in 18 settlements in Gaza.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,2763,1193818,00.html


Profile: Dr Abd al-Aziz al-Rantisi
In 2003, al-Rantisi survived an Israeli assassination attempt. Suffering leg, arm and chest wounds, the spokesman escaped a US-made Apache helicopter gunship attack. The helicopter fired seven missiles on his car, and killed two passers-by - a mother and her five year-old daughter.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/A8D13FD0-8BFB-4B8E-AE45-8451E0D4ED9A.htm


Report: progess in stage II of Israel-Hezbollah prisoner swap
An Egyptian newspaper Saturday cited European sources as saying that significant progress in the second stage of the prisoner exchange between Israel and Hezbollah is likely in the coming weeks, under which Israel would receive "decisive information" on the fate of missing Israel Air Force navigator Ron Arad.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/416354.html


Earth and stones
writer who dwells not on politics but on the less familiar aspects of the Palestinian predicament. Mourid Barghouti is a prominent Palestinian poet who writes with great sensitivity and insight about his own experience of exile. But while writing in an autobiographical vein, he throws a great deal of light on the condition of his people.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,2763,1193393,00.html


Report: Two suspected Mossad agents arrested in New Zealand
Two Mossad agents were arrested in New Zealand last month, the New Zealand Herald reported on Saturday. The two, Uri Kalman, 30, and Eli Kra, 50, were detained after attempting to obtain a fake New Zealand passport. Another suspect in the affair, the report added, Ze’ev Barkan, 37, had left the country.
http://www.maarivintl.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=6082


Firing Up New Weapon in Fallouja: The Bulldozer
As U.S. aircraft mounted heavy fire against Iraqi snipers Wednesday, Marines began building an earthen barrier around this Sunni Triangle city, suggesting that the U.S. does not anticipate an immediate resolution of the standoff.
http://fairuse.1accesshost.com/news1/latimes124.html


US holding 200 Iraqi 'mutineers'
"They told us to attack the city and we were astonished. How could an Iraqi fight an Iraqi like this? This meant that nothing had changed from the Saddam Hussein days. We refused en masse," said Ali al-Shamari.
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/04/17/1082140098949.html


3 U.S. soldiers are killed in Iraq attack
Iraqi gunmen reportedly fired rocket propelled grenades at a U.S. patrol in a Baghdad suburb Saturday, killing three soldiers and wounding three others. There was no comment from the coalition authority.
http://washingtontimes.com/upi-breaking/20040417-082900-7059r.htm


Two More Japanese Hostages Freed in Iraq
Watanabe told Japanese public broadcaster NHK they were treated well and that their kidnappers told them they were released to avoid hurting Iraq's relations with Japan. They were also told to tell the Japanese government to withdraw its military from Iraq, NHK said.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=540&ncid=540&e=15&u=/ap/20040417/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_japanese_hostages_freed


Blair refused offer of get-out clause on Iraq
In the book, Plan of Attack, Mr Woodward writes that Mr Bush offered Mr Blair the option of keeping British troops out of the war because he was so concerned that the government might fall. Mr Blair rejected the offer.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,2763,1193887,00.html

April 16 2004

Bush Legitimizes Terrorism - By Robert Fisk
So President George Bush tears up the Israeli-Palestinian peace plan and that's okay. Israeli settlements for Jews and Jews only on the West Bank. That's okay. Taking land from Palestinians who have owned that land for generations, that's okay. UN Security Council Resolution 242 says that land cannot be acquired by war. Forget it. That's okay.
http://www.counterpunch.com/fisk04162004.html


17-year-old Palestinian killed by IDF near Ramallah
A 17-year-old Palestinian youth was killed on Friday afternoon by rubber bullets fired by Israel Defense Forces soldiers during an anti-fence demonstration near the West Bank city of Ramallah.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/416314.html


Resistance to the Wall Continues in Biddu Village
There were also numerous arrests, including a 12 year old child, and two Palestinians were beaten by the Occupation soldiers. One of those beaten was taken to the hospital after being hit around the head with batons. Moreover, destruction of land for the Wall's path started today in the village of Beit Ijza.
http://stopthewall.org/latestnews/473.shtml


46 Wounded, Including Many Children in an Anti Wall Protest
While army accused demonstrators of stone throwing, denying that army used rubber coated metal bullets, an Israeli peace activist, who was wounded in the leg, accused army with the excessive usage of force. The activists told reporters that soldiers fired a tear gas canister at a group of children who gathered at the balcony of their home.
http://www.imemc.org/headlines/2004/April/week3/041604/46%20wounded.htm


Viet Nam supports Palestinian people's just struggle
Ambassador Ngo Quang Xuan, head of the Vietnamese Permanent Mission to the UN, addressed an international conference held in Geneva, Switzerland, by the United Nations on the impact of Israel-built security fence in the Palestinian territory.
http://www.vnagency.com.vn/NewsA.asp?LANGUAGE_ID=2&CATEGORY_ID=29&NEWS_ID=95427


Christians line up to oppose Israeli barrier
Other Christian groups, such as the National Council of Churches USA, which includes Protestant and Orthodox churches, also have declared opposition to the wall. Mr. Hyde said that although he is "a staunch supporter of Israel," the wall is causing problems and the Bush administration should work with Israel to change its route.
http://www.ekklesia.co.uk/content/news_syndication/article_040416wt.shtml


Palestinian wounded in Yassin assassination dies of injuries
A Palestinian who was wounded in an Israeli air strike which killed Hamas founder Sheikh Ahmed Yassin last month died Friday of his injuries, Palestinian medical sources said.
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040416074821.mmhp3iyf.html


Yassin's two children show up in Gaza rally
Abdel Hamid and Abdel Ghani were seen driving the brown-van thattheir late father used to ride to attend Hamas rallies in the past. Hamid and Ghani were critically wounded when their father was assassinated by three Israeli missiles fired from Apache helicopters in Gaza on March 22.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/17/content_1424647.htm


Picking their battles
The villagers go out to their land in full force: men and women, young and old alike. They position themselves opposite the soldiers, wave flags, sing and try to get to the giant machines or sit down on the ground in an attempt to block them. And then what? Only God knows.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/415862.html


Israeli Colonizers Beat up Child in Hebron
A Palestinian child was wounded Friday after having been brutally beaten up by Israeli colonizers in the West Bank city of Hebron, WAFA and witnesses said.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=483


Israel bans Palestinians aged over 35 from leaving Gaza
A Palestinian public security spokesman said that the Israeli decision to prevent the Palestinians from traveling abroad "would harden the daily life of the residents and would affect students who study abroad."
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/17/content_1424642.htm


Palestinian refugee group blames peaceniks for Bush letter
Nasrallah demanded that Palestinians boycott persons involved in the peace initiatives, until they retract their remarks. Many other top Fatah figures in refugee camps on the West Bank responded similarly Thursday to the Bush-Sharon exchange of letters.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=416025&contrassID=1&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Irish EU presidency says unilateral attempt will not bring lastpeace in Middle East
The Irish EU presidency said Friday any attempt to resolve the Middle East conflict unilaterally would not bring lasting peace in the region, stressing that Israel had to reach agreement with Palestine to achieve security.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/16/content_1424575.htm


EU defends Mideast roadmap after controversial US shift
The European Union insisted Friday the "roadmap" to Middle East peace had not been driven into a dead end after a dramatic US policy reversal that has enraged Palestinian opinion and threatened again to strain transatlantic ties.
http://www.eubusiness.com/afp/040416172921.ufaso7k6


Middle East quartet to meet on 'road map'
Javier Solana, the EU's foreign policy chief, told an informal meeting of European foreign ministers in Tullamore, Ireland, that the meeting would take place in Berlin on April 28, where Colin Powell, US secretary of state, would be attending a conference.
http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1079420402659&p=1012571727172


Israeli embassy in Washington to invite John Kerry for visit
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon did not meet Kerry in his recent visit to the United States, even though Kerry's aides asked Israel's embassy in Washington to arrange a meeting between the two.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/416303.html


Mubarak shocked by Bush support of Israel plan
"Now we don't know what is going to happen," Mubarak told the Houston Chronicle. "I'm afraid there is going to be more escalation of tension, much more violence."
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/world/20040416-0818-mideast-mubarak.html


Barrier threatens Bethlehem
Israel's Supreme Court is weighing whether to approve one controversial section, which would ring at least five Bethlehem homes, requiring Palestinian residents to apply for Israeli permits to enter and leave the enclave.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/6B667980-186E-4576-81CE-3922B2ABEF94.htm


Urgent Islamic meeting called over U.S. stand
The world's largest Islamic organization will hold an urgent meeting next week to discuss rising violence in Iraq and the recent U.S. policy shift on Israel's withdrawal from the Palestinian territories.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20040416.wislam0416/BNStory/International/


RUSSIA INTERESTED IN DEVELOPING COOPERATION WITH OIC
Russia is interested in the development of cooperation with the Organisation of the Islamic Conference, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said after talks with Nabil Shaat, Foreign Minister of the Palestinian National Authority.
http://en.rian.ru/rian/index.cfm?prd_id=160&msg_id=4204967&startrow=1&date=2004-04-16&do_alert=0


Analysis / Creating a Bantustan in Gaza
South Africa will be very interested in the Israeli disengagement plan published yesterday. The political, military, and economic aspects of the plan for the Gaza Strip and the enclave in the northern West Bank are amazingly similar to the homelands, one of the last inventions of the white minority in South Africa to perpetuate its rule over the black majority.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/416059.html


Analysts criticize US policy switch
Masri dubbed such a position as "catastrophic for Lebanon." He added that it goes against United Nations Security Council resolutions, which state very clearly that the right of return is not to be negotiated by any nation.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=1&categ_id=2&article_id=2289


Balfour renewed
Needless to say, the annexation of these settlements would reduce the West Bank to three or four disconnected and badly truncated Bantustans. In other words, Palestinians would have to kiss good-bye their aspirations for a genuine and viable state in the West Bank.
http://www.amin.org/eng/khalid_amayreh/2004/apr15.html


A compact that will make things worse
President George W. Bush finally embraced the extremist ideology of the Israeli prime minister, Ariel Sharon, and endorsed his plan for unilateral withdrawal from the impoverished Gaza Strip in return for solidifying Israel's grip on the West Bank, building a segregationist wall and denying Palestinian refugees the right of return.
http://www.iht.com/articles/515441.html


We're screwed, say the Druze
In the protest tent in Hurfeish all agree: If they were Jews, their struggles for salaries and honor would win the media attention and national solidarity given to unpaid Jewish workers.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/416029.html


Arabs, Muslims are not behind European anti-Semitism
Examples of anti-Semitism cited in the earlier report included complaints that someone wore a keffiyeh at a meeting of the Italian Communist Party, where books by Palestinians were being distributed. Greta Duisenberg, the wife of the president of the European Central Bank, famously unfurled a Palestinian flag from the balcony of her Amsterdam apartment. This too...
http://new.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=5&article_id=2262


Israel keeps military option in Gaza pullout plan
Israel intends to withdraw from Gaza by the end of 2005 but will reserve the right to strike at security threats emanating from the coastal enclave, according to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's "disengagement" plan.
http://www.reuters.com/locales/newsArticle.jsp?type=worldNews&locale=en_IN&storyID=4847953


Sadr says "no compromise" as Shiite religious leaders warn US troops
"We will not allow the forces of occupation to enter Najaf and the holy sites because they are forbidden places for them," said Sadr in a fiery sermon. "I say that they are here to stay and will occupy us for many years and as such compromise will not work."
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1515&ncid=1515&e=15&u=/afp/20040416/wl_mideast_afp/iraq_najaf_shiites_040416154057


Too late for victories
But it is now simply too late for victories and for one basic reason, says Iraqi political analyst, Wamid Nadhmi: "Whether through stupidity or ill thought-out design, the Americans have created a reality their entire project was designed to suppress -- a revolt that expresses Iraqis common Arab and Muslim identity."
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2004/686/fr2.htm

April 15 2004

Clashes at anti-barrier protests escalate
outside the Palestinian village of Bidu. The Palestinians reported that 26 people sustained injuries, five of them with medium wounds. Ten people were arrested. 1,500 protestors took part in the largest demonstration since the protests against the barrier began.
http://www.maarivintl.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=6032


Thousands march in Ramallah to mark Bargouti incarceration
Thousands of Palestinians are currently marching in Ramallah to mark one year since Israel arrested senior Fatah leader Marwan Bargouti. Other senior Fatah members and Palestinian Authority officials are also taking part in the rally.
http://www.maarivintl.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=6023


On This Day 2002:
Marwan Barghouti, one of the most popular Palestinian political leaders, is illegally apprehended (arguably, abducted) in Ramallah -- a zone under Palestinian jurisdiction, according to the 1993 Oslo Accords between Israel and the PLO -- and moved to the Israeli detention center, Russian Compound (Moscobiya), in Jerusalem.
http://www.freebarghouti.org/news.html


COMMISSION ADOPTS THREE RESOLUTIONS ON THE VIOLATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS IN THE OCCUPIED ARAB TERRITORIES
the Commission adopted by a roll-call vote of 27 in favour, two against, with 24 abstentions, a resolution in which it stated that the settlements were a major obstacle to peace and to the creation of a Palestinian State. The Commission also demanded that Israel stop and reverse the construction of the so-called security fence...
http://www.unhchr.ch/huricane/huricane.nsf/view01/400428B523407689C1256E770057784B?opendocument


Sniper kills Palestinian in Rafah
Dr. Ali Moussa, the manager of the town's hospital, told KUNA that Ali Barhoum, 19, died after he was shot in the neck by a sniper, entrenched atop a high building in Al-Barahiman district, taken over by the occupation forces earlier today. His brother, Youness, aged 32, was hit and wounded in the thigh, the doctor said.
http://www.kuna.net.kw/English/Story.asp?DSNO=622109


2 Citizens Wounded; 2 Houses Dynamited in WB
Two Palestinian citizens were wounded, early on Thursday, and kidnapped by Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) in the West Bank city of Qalqilya, while two houses were dynamited in Bethlehem, witnesses and Palestinian security sources said.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=467


9 Arrested in Bethlehem and Tulkarem
In Bethlehem, seven Palestinian citizens were arrested by IOF in the al-Walaja neighbourhood and the village of Taqqo'a. Tens of Israeli armoured vehicles rolled into the neighbourhood of al-Walaja, in Bethlehem...
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=469


IOF Demolishes Houses in Rafah
Wafa correspondent reported that around 3 bulldozers backed by tanks and a US made Apache helicopter brutally swept into Bloc O in Rafah city, near the borderline and demolished several houses.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=463


Qassam Brigades blast three Zionist bulldozers during incursion
The Qassam Brigades, military wing of the Hamas Movement, today declared responsibility for blasting three Zionist bulldozers while resisting the Zionist army incursion into the southernmost Gaza Strip city of Rafah.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/am/publish/article_5563.shtml


20 Palestinian Injured in Israeli attacks in Gaza Strip
Israeli Air force apaches fired several missiles at Rafah Refugee Camp south of Gaza Strip injuring around 20 civilians in Bloc "J", Palestinian Sources said Thursday morning. Medical sources in Gaza Strip said four of the injured suffer serious injuries.
http://www.imemc.org/headlines/2004/April/week3/041504/rafah-attacks.htm


Israeli Special Force Brutally Attacks "Nafha" Prisoners
A large number of an Israeli special force members burst today into the Israeli prison of "Nafha" and severely beat the Palestinian prisoners inside, as a result many of them were reportedly wounded and suffocated.
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/104.html


Palestinian woman arrested near Ariel with 25-kg bomb
A Palestinian woman carrying a bag containing a 25-kilogram explosive device was arrested Thursday evening outside the West Bank settlement of Ariel.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/415985.html


Palestinian foreign minister urges "quartet" partners to intervene
"We would like the (other) members of the quartet to tell the Americans that this cannot lead to any positive effect,"... "He is adding unilaterally, without even consulting with us, his conditions and concessions that Sharon can annnex some parts of the West Bank on which he built illegal settlements and that refugees have not right to go back to their homes..."
http://www.eubusiness.com/afp/040415140833.lg6l4d6q


EU rejects U.S.-Israel move on Mideast borders
"The European Union will not recognize any change to the pre-1967 borders other than those arrived at by agreement between the parties," the Irish foreign minister, Brian Cowen, said in a statement on behalf of the EU presidency.
http://www.iht.com/articles/515269.html


Chirac calls Israel's unilateral plan to change borders "dangerous"
"For the borders, I consider that international law must be respected. I have reservations about any unilateral or bilateral undermining of international law," Chirac said. "If circumstances or men start playing with international stability and the rules of international law, it is a troubling precedent," Chirac said. "It's dangerous."
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1514&ncid=1312&e=6&u=/afp/20040415/wl_mideast_afp/mideast_israel_040415165854


Sharon meets with Powell ahead of victorious return to Israel
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was meeting with US Secretary of State Colin Powell ahead of his return to Israel, having secured crucial US support for his disengagment plan, a senior source on the delegation said. Earlier, Powell telephoned Palestinian prime minister Ahmed Qorei in a bid to explain Bush's statements...
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1514&ncid=1312&e=7&u=/afp/20040415/wl_mideast_afp/mideast_israel_us_040415160512


Arafat attacks Sharon's Gaza plan
In a televised speech, Mr Arafat called for an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital. He added that Palestinian refugees would never give up their "right to return" to former homes in Israel.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3627817.stm


US West Bank stance justifies violence, Hamas says
The militant Islamic group Hamas says an assurance by US President George W Bush that Israel can keep sections of the West Bank proves armed resistance is the only option for Palestinian people.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/s1088199.htm


Arab League: U.S. has adopted Israeli line on Mideast
"We expect the United States to play honest broker. We accused it before of being unbalanced. Now we can't even say that. The United States has adopted Israel's position," said Hesham Youssef, spokesman for the league's secretary-general.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/415794.html


Jordan criticises U.S. Middle East policy shift
"The American administration should not give any concessions that relate to final status issues especially those that relate to borders, refugees, and settlements," Foreign Minister Marwan al-Muasher was quoted as saying by the state news agency Petra.
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L15100014.htm


An Open Letter to Professor Menachem Magidor and the members of Israel's forum to combat the academic boycott
Academics worldwide should have an accurate picture of the situation that has long confronted Palestinian education: the Israeli government has set up a system of roadblocks and checkpoints that makes it difficult or impossible for Palestinian teachers and students to reach their universities, colleges and schools.
http://www.academicboycott.org/


Right-wingers slam 'political' freeze on settlement funds
Mazuz ordered the ministry to immediately stop the transfer of all funds to local authorities in the West Bank and Gaza, the Justice Ministry said Thursday. The freeze will remain in place until a proper mechanism is established to ensure the monies do not go to illegal outposts.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/415836.html


Bush rips up the road map
But he made it evident that the ground rules had changed, giving effective sanction to the Jewish settlement blocks that have been built throughout the West Bank since the 1967 war, and which traditionally were described by the state department as "obstacles to peace".
http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,1192128,00.html


Sharon's Visit with President Bush
in the current Israeli political-military establishment there is a partner for peace. The Israeli cabinet today is led by war criminals, and people who openly espouse the destruction of the Palestinians by ethnic cleansing, or what they euphemistically call "transfer."
http://discuss.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/zforum/04/sp_world_abunimah041504.htm


Ariel Sharon and George W. Bush's letters in full
In light of new realities on the ground, including already existing major Israeli populations centers, it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949...
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=415475&contrassID=1&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Syria says US seeks its help to pacify Iraq
Powell asked Syria to do everything in its power to assist with the "pacification of the situation in Iraq" while preserving the unity of the war-ravaged country, the news agency reported. It said the letter was delivered by US Ambassador Margaret Scobey to Syrian Foreign Minister Faruq al-Shara.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1515&ncid=1515&e=9&u=/afp/20040415/wl_mideast_afp/iraq_us_syria_040415193917


Sarajevo on the Euphrates
Falluja, Iraq, a low-rise, mostly Sunni city of about 200,000, has become this war's Sarajevo. I was there on Saturday and Sunday during what was supposed to be a cease-fire. Instead of calm, I found a city under siege from American artillery and snipers. At one of the city's clinics I saw dozens of freshly wounded women and children, victims of US Marine...
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20040426&s=jamail


US troops shell Fallujah mosque(not church)
The top of the minaret of the Hadret Mohammediya mosque and religious school was destroyed in the shelling at about 6.30pm. Parts of the outer wall were also hit and most of the windows of the complex were destroyed.
http://news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,9295319%255E1702,00.html

April 14 2004

Media File - Anti-Fence Demonstration
Demonstration against the Seperation Fence in Karbatha, Palestine. During the Demo., the israeli army shot a few demonstrator, one of them- Israeli.
http://dc.indymedia.org/media/all/display/18337


Bush Says Israel Could Keep Some Occupied Land
"In light of new realities on the ground, including already existing major Israeli population centers, it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949," Bush said...
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=politicsNews&storyID=4828771§ion=news


12 protesters hurt during protest against West Bank fence
Ten Palestinians were hurt, including a 12-year-old Palestinian boy who was seriously injured after being hit in the head by a rubber-coated bullet. Two Israeli protesters were also lightly hurt in their legs.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/415361.html


Israeli Colonizers Seize Land in Qalqilya
"While I was sprinkling my farm, several armed Israeli colonizers attacked and forced me, at gunpoint, to leave," Ishtiweh told WAFA. Rural Council of Kufr Qaddoum said that the colonizers, supported by Israeli soldiers, have recently escalated their attacks on Palestinian farmers.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=458


Protecting the land from destruction in Biddu
The bulldozers only worked for 4 hours but uprooted 27 olive trees from a grove belonging to a Palestinian family from Biddu, who draw all its income from these trees. However, the villagers replanted most of the trees which were uprooted by the Israeli army bulldozer just after the confrontation with the soldiers was over.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/reports/writings/13Apr04_15_47_20JerusalemEmilie.htm


IOF Dynamites a House, Arrests At Least 17 in WB
The soldiers obliged the house's 11 dwellers to evict it under the threat of gun, some of them were questioned. At 3:00 am today the soldiers detonated the house, causing damages to the neighboring houses and the injury of Mrs. Suheir Kua’, IPC correspondent reported.
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/092.html


On Palestinian Prisoner Day: 1,200 From Jenin Behind Israeli Bars
In Jenin district, north of the West Bank, the Palestinian Prisoner Society (PPS) reported that 1,200 prisoners of Jenin were still behind bars and sentenced to long prison terms, almost about 100 were serving lifetime sentences under untrue security allegations...
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_04/096.html


Arab League: Cautions against Possible Collapse of Al-Aqsa
The Arab League insisted on the necessity to refurbish al-Aqsa Mosque, especially the western Wall of the Islamic museum. Palestinian ambassador to Arab League Mohammed Sbeih called on the Arab states to coordinate their attitudes in order to expose the Israeli crimes of stealing Palestinian heritage.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=459


Palestinian militants escalate attacks against Israeli targets
The Israel Army confirmed the attack but asserted that the attack did not cause any injuries among Israeli soldiers, while the brigades said that the militants returned safely to their bases.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/14/content_1419749.htm


No right of return, Bush tells Palestinian refugees
U.S. President George W. Bush told Palestinian refugees Wednesday that they can forget about ever returning to their ancestral homes. Leaving Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon beaming at a joint press conference in Washington...
http://www.globeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20040414.wbush0414/BNStory/International/


Qureia rejects U.S. statement, says Bush first president to recognize settlements
This is like someone giving a part of Texas' land to China," he said, adding that over the years, U.S. administrations have assured the Palestinians that issues like borders and settlements would be handled in negotiations between the two sides.
http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/415419.html


Arafat: Israel Must Not Keep Settlements
Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat said Wednesday the peace process would be dead if the United States assures Israel it can keep some key West Bank settlement blocs and would not have to absorb Palestinian refugees.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=540&ncid=1312&e=1&u=/ap/20040414/ap_on_re_mi_ea/israel_palestinians_13


UK's Blair welcomes Sharon plans on Gaza, W.Bank
"I welcome Prime Minister Sharon's announcement that Israel intends to withdraw the Israeli Defence Forces from the Gaza Strip and dismantle all Israeli settlements there as well as some in the West Bank," Blair said in a statement.
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L14160620.htm


Russia: Israeli Occupation is the Core of Arab-Israeli Conflict
Russian Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov, reiterated Wednesday that the core of the Arab-Israeli conflict is obvious to International Community; it is undoubtedly the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories.
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=461


U.S. said diverting IDF-bound Hummer jeeps to Iraq
U.S. and Israeli defense officials have agreed that a shipment of dozens of armored Hummer jeeps, intended for use by IDF troops in the territories, will be diverted to American ground forces in Iraq, Israel Radio reported Wednesday.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=415271&contrassID=1&subContrassID=5&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Protesters disrupt Cat meeting
"They say they are a global citizen (but) I don't think a global citizen sells the tools that people use to destroy the lives of other human beings," said Cheryl Brodersen, whose niece, Rachel Corrie, was killed last year in the Gaza Strip when she was crushed by an Israeli bulldozer
http://chicagobusiness.com/cgi-bin/news.pl?id=12123


Palestinian Labourers Continue their Sit-in
labourers refused to go to work, inside the industrial zone, expressing their rejection to Israel's humiliating practices against them. Three protesters yesterday suffered from suffocation when Israeli soldiers lobbed tear gas at protesters near Beit Hanoon crossing...
http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?field=tech_news&id=456


Gilad Sharon may have to explain why he still has key papers
Army Radio reported on Wednesday that the prosecutor claims to have evidence that Gilad Sharon has documents he has claimed he does not have access to. He is thus also in danger of being charged with contempt of court for not adhering to the Supreme Court ruling.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/415376.html


Israel most affected from war in Iraq: Ranteesi
He warned Israel from the repercussions of trapping the United States in Iraq, saying that when the US administration would realize what Israel has done, it would also realize that embracing the Zionist entity is like embracing a snake.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-04/14/content_1419760.htm


Sharon bets political future on US summit
However, political analysts believe a lukewarm response from the White House would strengthen the hand of rightwing campaigners who view the Sharon plan as abandoning Likud's historic commitment to Israeli settlement throughout the occupied territories.
http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1079420315785&p=1012571727172


Background / How Bush and Sharon can save one another
Now, at a critical juncture in Middle East history, will the politically compromised leaders of the United States and Israel act in such a way as to come to one another's rescue? The answer to this question may well be: They already are.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=415387&contrassID=1&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y


Why all the fuss about the Bush-Sharon meeting?
What on earth is the difference between Barak's vision of 2001 and Sharon's vision of 2004? While Barak is viewed as being at the "hawkish" end of the Labor Party, things don't get much better at the "doveish" end.
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article2577.shtml


Gaza expects little from pullout
Even moving within Gaza, from north to south, is a nightmare because of military checkpoints around Israeli settlements like Netzarim and the Gush Katif bloc. But will all this change under Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's "disengagement plan" for Gaza? It appears not.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3626225.stm


Not like Yamit
That is the most pointed of all the questions: What will happen to the private homes, public buildings, water and road infrastructure, shelters and everything else. Israel's behavior will have an important influence on the atmosphere for both Israelis and Palestinians.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/415020.html


Delayed Arab summit could be around May 9: Yemeni leader
"We spoke about holding the Arab summit which could take place next month on the 8th, 9th or 10th," he told journalists after talks with President Jacques Chirac of France. Saleh said his talks here had focused mainly on the situation in Iraq, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and bilateral ties.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1515&ncid=1515&e=6&u=/afp/20040414/wl_mideast_afp/arab_summit_yemen_france_040414194745


Iraqi 'beaten to death' by US troops
AN Iraqi has died of his wounds after US troops beat him with truncheons because he refused to remove a picture of wanted Shiite Muslim leader Moqtada Sadr from his car, police said today.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,9282015%255E1702,00.html


Italian hostage in Iraq killed by captors: Al-Jazeera
The channel also said it had received a "video film and photos showing the murder of the hostage" but said it could not broadcast the material for fear of upsetting its viewers. In their statement, the captors said they had "killed the hostage after comments by (Italian Prime Minister Silvio) Berlusconi ... that the withdrawal of Italian troops from Iraq was not negotiable."
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1515&ncid=1515&e=2&u=/afp/20040414/wl_mideast_afp/iraq_hostages_italy_040414211402


Iraq Cleric Offers Peace Talks; U.S. Forces Poised
More clashes erupted between Sunni guerrillas and U.S. Marines in Falluja, west of Baghdad. Witnesses said a U.S. air strike hit the city's Hay al-Dubat area at dusk. They said four civilians and two fighters were killed in overnight fighting. The U.S. military announced eight more American soldiers had died in combat, bringing to 93 the number killed in action in April...
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=4827771


Blair heads to US for talks on Iraq with Bush and Annan
Prime Minister Tony Blair flies to the United States this week for what critics have labelled a crisis meeting with US President George W. Bush over the seemingly unravelling security situation in Iraq.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1515&ncid=1515&e=13&u=/afp/20040414/wl_mideast_afp/britain_us_iraq_blair_040414110253