POMED Notes: “Different yet Similar: Governance in the West Bank and Gaza”
March 19th, 2010 by Josh
The Palestine Center – the educational arm of the Jerusalem Fund for Education and Community Development – hosted an event to explore the similarities and differences between systems of government in the West Bank and Gaza. How have they made institutional improvements and has this effected the balance between security and liberty? How sustainable and vulnerable are these state-like systems? Dr. Yezid Sayigh, Professor of Middle East Studies at King’s College in London, addressed these questions and provided an overview of an evolving Palestinian political landscape. Expected speaker Dr. Khaled Hroub from the University of Cambridge was not able to attend.
Click here for POMED’s notes in PDF, or continue below the fold.
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Posted in DC Event Notes, Democracy Promotion, Foreign Aid, Freedom, Hamas, Human Rights, Islam and Democracy, Israel, Mideast Peace Plan, Palestine, Political Parties, Reform | Comment »
POMED Notes: “U.S. Policies and Programs for Global Development: USAID and the FY 2011 Budget Request”
March 3rd, 2010 by Josh
The House Committee on Foreign Affairs held a hearing this morning to address President Obama’s FY2011 budget request for global development and international aid. USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah provided testimony about particular goals and objectives for USAID moving forward, and answered the committee’s questions regarding a variety of development trends and projects.
For POMED’s notes in PDF, click here. Otherwise, continue below the fold.
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Posted in Afghanistan, Congressional Hearing Notes (House), Diplomacy, Foreign Aid, Hamas, Iraq, Palestine, US foreign policy | Comment »
Goldstone Report: UN Votes to Extend Time
March 1st, 2010 by Josh
Via the Majlis, the UN General Assembly voted 98-7 to grant both the Israelis and Palestinians five additional months to investigate the findings from the Goldstone Report. Although a Palestinian Authority official applauded the action as a victory for both the Palestinians and international law, Alejandro Wolff, U.S. Deputy Ambassador to the UN, criticized the resolution and reiterated the administration’s position that the report is deeply flawed (Secretary of State Hillary Clinton also briefly addressed this issue in response to a question from Congressman Gary Ackerman at last week’s HCFA hearing). You can read the full GA resolution here.
Posted in Hamas, Human Rights, Israel, Military, Palestine, Terrorism, United Nations | Comment »
POMED Notes: “Promoting Security through Diplomacy and Development: The Fiscal Year 2011 International Affairs”
February 26th, 2010 by Josh
In a hearing on the administration’s recently released budget request, the House Committee on Foreign Affairs invited Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to give testimony on particular budgetary items relating to U.S. diplomatic and development efforts abroad. Committee Chairman Howard Berman (D-CA) opened the hearing with an affirmation of the value of investing in international diplomacy; not only to promote American values, but also as a method of prevention in order to mitigate the forces that cause international instability. Berman pledged to work with his colleagues to maintain or even increase the overall level of funding – approximately 1 percent of the entire Fiscal Year 2011 federal budget request – but ranking Republican committee member Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL) disagreed, using the poor economic environment as the basis to call for “selective freezes.” In particular, she questioned the wisdom of unconditionally funding the Palestinian Authority and the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), both of which she accuses of stealing hundreds of millions in foreign aid.
Click here for POMED’s notes in PDF, or continue reading below.
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Posted in Afghanistan, Congressional Hearing Notes (House), Democracy Promotion, Diplomacy, Elections, Foreign Aid, Freedom, Hamas, Hezbollah, Human Rights, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Morocco, Multilateralism, Palestine, Protests, Sudan, Syria, US foreign policy, Western Sahara, Yemen, sanctions | 1 Comment »
Pew Poll: Mixed, Decreasing Support for Hamas and Hezbollah
February 10th, 2010 by Maria
A newly released Pew Poll has some interesting new data on opinions from 25 Middle Eastern countries.
Hamas: Numbers show positive support for Hamas in Jordan (56 percent) and Egypt (52 percent) but interestingly enough, 52 percent of Palestinians rated the group negatively over 44 percent who rated them positively. Even more interesting is that only 37 percent of Gazans favored Hamas as opposed to 47 percent in the West Bank. Turkish respondents only gave Hamas 5 percent of its support.
Hezbollah: 63 percent of Palestinians and 51 percent of Jordanians rated Hezbollah positively - but the group did not poll as high in Egypt (43 percent) and actually rated the lowest in Lebanon (34 percent). However, in Lebanon, not surprisingly Hezbollah’s support was specific to religious divides. Nearly all of Lebanon’s Shia Muslims (97 percent) were in favor of the group, compared to only 18 percent of Lebanese Christians and 2 percent of Lebanese Sunni Muslims. Like Hamas, Hezbollah received very little support among Turks (3 percent).
Noah Pollack concludes at Commentary, “The good news is that Muslims in the Middle East tend not to like the Islamists in their own countries. The bad news is that they tend to like the Islamists in other countries.” Although it is worth noting that Hamas and Hezbollah are very different from most “Islamist” groups in the region, which are unarmed.
This polling data was released last week, though the surveys were conducted between May and June of 2009. Click here to access a full PDF version of the report, which also includes polling numbers on views of Muslim leaders, the Sunni-Shia conflict and Lebanon’s growing divide.
Posted in Egypt, Hamas, Hezbollah, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, Public Opinion, Turkey | Comment »
POMED Notes: “Bahrain’s Vision Amidst Regional Realities”
January 29th, 2010 by Josh
The Middle East Policy Forum along with the Distinguished Women in International Affairs Series sponsored an event featuring Houda Ezra Ebrahim Nonoo, Bahrain’s Ambassador to the United States. Ambassador Nonoo presented remarks on the relationship between the United States and Bahrain and commented on Bahrain’s role in the Persian Gulf.
Ambassador Nonoo began with an overview of Bahrain’s diplomatic posture towards a number of pertinent issues. She echoed Bahrain King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa’s call for a fresh start to peace talks and quoted the king as saying: “The biggest mistake has been to assume that you can simply switch on peace like a light. We should move towards real peace now by consulting our people and by reaching out to Israelis to highlight the benefits of a genuine peace.”
For POMED’s notes in PDF, please click here. Otherwise, continue below the fold.
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Posted in Bahrain, DC Event Notes, Human Rights, Islamist movements, Israel, Mideast Peace Plan, Palestine, US foreign policy | Comment »
Gaza: The Goldstone Report Revisited, Peaceful Protesters Jailed
January 19th, 2010 by Maria
Haaretz recently reported that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas‘ request to the UN to postpone voting on the Goldstone Report last year was a result of threats he received from Israel that it would turn the West Bank into a “second Gaza” if he failed to request the delay. Interestingly enough, many are reporting on the latest calls from 11 Palestinian human rights groups who are pressuring Hamas to allow an independent investigation on war crimes it committed during its war with Israel last winter. Many are viewing this to be unusual, considering that human rights groups have usually focused on war crimes committed by Israel during the war and because it directly follows the release of the story concerning Israel’s threats to Abbas to have the Goldstone vote delayed. Palestinian groups maintain that the investigation is needed to establish Palestinian credibility so that similar Israeli crimes can also be investigated and punished. Gregg Carlstrom blogs on The Majlis that these requests from Palestinian organizations are a “step in the right direction.”
These requests are coming directly after Amnesty International calls Israel’s border closures in Gaza an unfair punishment to the entire Gazan population. “The blockade constitutes collective punishment under international law and must be lifted immediately,” it stated Monday. The organization also condemned Egypt’s recent decision to build an underground wall between its border and Gaza, which Cairo claims will prevent the smuggling of weapons and illegal immigration.
In related news, Lebanon’s The Daily Star ran a piece from the Inter Press Service that is reporting that several prominent Palestinian activists have been arrested after non-violently protesting Israel’s separation wall that has divided Palestinian towns. Of those arrested include Abu Rahme, a school teacher who was awarded the Carl Von Ossietzky Medal for outstanding service in his pursuit of human rights in 2008 by the International League for Human Rights’ board of trustees.
Posted in Hamas, Human Rights, Israel, Palestine, Protests | Comment »
Just Released: New Issue of the Arab Reform Bulletin
January 14th, 2010 by Josh
The new issue of the Arab Reform Bulletin, published by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, highlights ongoing political battles in Palestine, Jordan, Libya, and Egypt. Helga Baumgarten, professor of political science at Birzeit University in Palestine, uses her column to explore the question, “Who will be Arafat’s true successor?” The increasingly complex nature of the Palestinian political infrastructure has thrown a wrench into the traditional power equation which presumed, “whoever leads Fatah will lead the PLO, and the leader of the PLO will be elected president of the PA.” Though Mahmoud Abbas managed to win power immediately following Yasser Arafat’s death, Baumgarten largely dismisses him as a viable long-term option since he “lacks the charisma, mass popular base, and free access to external funds necessary to exercise control as Arafat once did.” After consideration, Baumgarten settles on four men who have what she believes is a sufficient balance between entrenched domestic ties and external (read: U.S.) friendships in order to challenge for a position of power: 1) Mohammed Dahlan, former head of Preventive Security in Gaza; 2) Jibril Rajub, Dahlan’s West Bank counterpart as head of the Preventive Security; 3) Tawfiq al-Tirawi, the former head of General Intelligence in the West Bank; and 4) Hussein al-Sheikh, another high-ranking official from the Palestinian security sector.
Elsewhere in the issue, George Joffé of the Centre of International Studies at Cambridge takes a critical look at Saif al-Islam Gaddafi’s ascension within Libyan politics, noting that he recently achieved the second most powerful post in the Libyan political hierarchy despite his ideological differences with his father, current Libyan president Muammar al-Gaddafi. Joffé maintains that “the significance of this appointment cannot be overstated,” although “it remains to be seen how compromised [Saif al-Islam’s] reform agenda might be” due to his “domestication within the current Libyan political system.”
With regard to Jordan’s recent parliamentary dissolution, journalist Ibrahim Gharaibeh examines the potential areas of political consequence. He senses newfound optimism emanating from domestic Islamist movements, writing that “there are changes to the electoral law rumored that might favor their interests.” The original election law was instituted in 1993 following a previous decision by King Abdullah to disband parliament, and Gharaibeh predicts that the government may use the space created by this most recent dissolution “to embark on a series of social and economic reforms to meet the goals of IMF and WTO programs.”
For an overview of Issandr Amrani’s article on Egyptian electoral politics, published in the Bulletin as well, see our earlier post here.
Posted in Egypt, Jordan, Libya, Palestine, Political Parties, Publications, US foreign policy | Comment »
Palestine’s Rawabi: Breaking Ground on a Modern City in the West Bank
January 12th, 2010 by Jessica
In an interesting Associated Press article, Ben Hubbard reports on the progress made toward the groundbreaking of Rawabi, the first planned Palestinian city, which aims to foster economic development in the West Bank and create some 40,000 homes. Rawabi may be seen as a step on the road to statehood for Palestine, which Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad hopes to make a reality within two years regardless of the outcome of peace talks.
While a promising development, the new city already faces a daunting setback with the necessity of an access road to efficiently reach the city. While a relatively easy problem to resolve in a logistic sense, problems with the location of the access road create difficulties in the political sense. Approximately two miles of vital road cross Israeli-controlled land. Without approval for the access the $500 million dollar project may halt in its track. If approval of the road is granted the first citizens of Rawabi will take up residence in 2013.
Posted in Palestine | Comment »
Egypt: Moussa Won’t Run for President
December 23rd, 2009 by Jason
In an interview (Arabic) with al-Masry al-Youm, Arab League head Amr Moussa announced he will not run for president in Egypt’s 2011 elections. He explained, “The question is, is it possible? And the answer is, the road is closed.” The current constitution makes it nearly impossible for an independent candidate to run for president, and Moussa refuses to join a political party for pure “political opportunism.”
Meanwhile, President Mubarak met with King Abdullah in Riyadh today before heading on to Kuwait. They discussed the Middle East Peace Process and the Houthi insurgency in Yemen. Al-Masry al-Youm reports that the newly elected members of the MB Guidance Bureau swore fealty to General Guide Mahdi Akef yesterday. Sources within the MB suggest a new general guide will be named within two days.
Abdel-Rahman Hussein and Sarah Carr contend Egypt’s opposition groups are “blighted by internal divisions.” They observe that the Muslim Brotherhood has endured “heavy blows from the regime” as the media focused on the Brotherhood’s internal rifts. Meanwhile, Ayman Nour has been physically attacked, disbarred, and legally prohibited from running for office. While opposition groups banded together in October to campaign against the succession of Gamal Mubarak, the Kefaya movement has already withdrawn its support. Now Kefaya is left “trying to prove that it is still relevant” as it clamors for the election of an “alternative president” separate from the regime.
Babylon and Beyond delves deeper into the Muslim Brotherhood’s recent election, which resulted in a victory for the conservative faction. According to MB analyst Abdul Rehim Aly, “hard-liners couldn’t accept the presence of reformers within the group itself, so how can anyone expect them one day to have a dialogue with other people belonging to different religious and cultural backgrounds?”
Dalia Rabie explores several moral controversies of 2009, including the Ramadan arrests, the niqab ban and virginity kits, that “highlighted the conflict between Egypt’s so-called secular government and its age-old traditions.”
Posted in Arab League, Diplomacy, Elections, Human Rights, Islam and Democracy, Kuwait, Middle Eastern Media, Mideast Peace Plan, Military, Muslim Brotherhood, Palestine, Political Islam, Saudi Arabia, Secularism, Women | Comment »
Egypt: Losing Arab Respect
December 21st, 2009 by Zack
Babylon and Beyond reports that Egypt is facing serious Arab criticism for its decision to build a wall at the Gaza border. Arab nationalists accuse President Hosni Mubarak of serving Israeli interests at the expense of fellow Arab Palestinians. BikyaMasr reprints a blog post from Zeinobia reflected the same sentiment that Egypt has become “ugly” in the eyes of the world and a constant source of international discord. Zeinobia argues “we [Egyptians] are also very patient, too damn patient to the level of building a pyramid in 20 years but as the Old Arabs said : Beware the patient’s anger and I will say beware the ugly Egyptian’s real anger!!”
The Daily News Egypt reports that the Muslim Brotherhood is preparing to appoint a new member to the Guidance Office within 48 hours. The decision process has caused a schism in the group, but these are being downplayed by Essam El-Erian, who many expect will be appointed to the post.
Sankalita Shome writes about the Cairo Human Rights Film Festival. After a rough start last year when the government pressured the host theater to back out of the festival, this years program features a larger selection of films, including features about the Ukranian Orange Revolution, U.N. efforts in Iraq, and a short film, N-70, about police abuse in Egypt.
Posted in Diplomacy, Egypt, Elections, Freedom, Human Rights, Journalism, Palestine, Public Opinion | Comment »
Saudi Arabia: Prince Saud’s Career
December 17th, 2009 by Jason
Michael Slackman of The New York Times profiles Saudi Prince Saud al-Faisal, the world’s longest serving foreign minister, and explores the question of succession in the desert kingdom.
King Abdullah is currently 85 years old and Crown Prince Sultan just returned home after receiving cancer treatment in the U.S. Given their age, it is largely expected the conservative Prince Nayef will serve as Saudi Arabia’s next king. Prince Saud was once considered a potential candidate for the throne, but his health has deteriorated in recent years.
Prince Saud calls his failure to help create a Palestinian state the greatest failure of his career. But as analyst Emad Gad argues, “the influence of individuals is limited because it is the vision of the king that prevails through his advisers.”
Posted in Diplomacy, Palestine, Saudi Arabia | Comment »
Palestine: Abbas Remains President
December 16th, 2009 by Zack
The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) has extended until further notice the tenure of President Mahmoud Abbas. The term of the Legislative Council, which hasn’t met since Hamas seized control of Gaza in 2007, was also extended until elections could be scheduled. The PLO also refused to resume negotiations with Israel until settlement construction is permanently frozen.
Jonathan Tobin argues that such preconditions for dialogue are a stall tactic employed by the Palestinians to avoid internal conflict, while the world continues to condemn Israeli PM Netanyahu as the roadblock to negotiations. Evelyn Gordon concurs and believes this tactic has been constantly successful for the PLO.
Ray Hanania recommends two new strategies for the peace process: immediately declare a Palestinian state alongside Israel and establish a “Settler-Refugee Exchange Program” that would return most settlements to Palestine and exchange land for those settlements Israel wishes to keep. In exchange, Palestinians would surrender their Right of Return. Mustafa Barghouthi also supports definitive action as he calls on the European foreign minister to press Palestinian rights immediately and for non-violent Palestinian movements to receive better support from the West. He argues that the collapse of a two-state solution will “only lead to a new struggle for equal rights, within one state […] There comes a time when people cannot take injustice any more, and this time has come to Palestine.”
At BitterLemons, Yossi Alpher argues that Abbas should recognize the validity of the settlement freeze to enter immediate peace negotiations and to pressure Netanyahu to make real long-term concessions to the Palestinians. Ghassan Khatib, however, sees the settlement freeze as a public relations gimmick that offers no real progress and he calls on the international community to pressure Israel for change, both politically and through efforts such as Britain’s attempt to label products from settler communities.
Aluf Benn writes in an op-ed that President Obama has adopted a “realist manifesto” that informs his belief in a gradual peace process, will push him to go beyond his insistence on a settlement freeze, and will eventually lead him to support direct dialogue with Hamas.
Posted in Diplomacy, Elections, Hamas, Israel, Mideast Peace Plan, Palestine, Public Opinion, Reform, US foreign policy | Comment »
Time: Person of the Year
December 16th, 2009 by Jason
Time has named Ben Bernanke as Person of the Year in 2009. However, the magazine also includes several people related to the Middle East and U.S. Foreign Policy.
General McChrystal was a runner-up for Person of the Year. In its list of “People Who Mattered,” Time includes Neda Agha-Soltan, Hamid Karzai and “The Twitter Guys” for their website’s role in the Iranian opposition movement.
Meanwhile, Foreign Policy has also come out with a list of the “Top 100 Global Thinkers,” also naming Bernanke as number one. Others listed include Barack Obama (2), Zahra Rahnavard (3), Bill and Hillary Clinton (6), David Petraeus (8), Sayyid Imam al-Sharif (10), Ashraf Ghani and Clare Lockhart (20), Fareed Zakaria (37), George Soros (38), Abdolkarim Soroush (45), Tariq Ramadan (49), Salam Fayyad (61), Anne-Marie Slaughter (79), and Samantha Power (80).
Posted in Afghanistan, Egypt, Iran, Military, Palestine, Publications | Comment »
Palestine: PLO to Extend Abbas’ Term
December 15th, 2009 by Jason
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas announced he will seek a U.N. resolution defining the Palestinian territories based on the 1967 borders. Rejecting a return to violence, Abbas also said he would resume peace talks if Israel institutes a settlement freeze “for a specific period” and recognizes the 1967 borders as the outline for a Palestinian state. His speech came at the launch of a two-day meeting of the PLO, which will likely result in the extension of Abbas’ presidential term in lieu of cancelled elections.
Hamas has declared any extension illegitimate. In fact, yesterday Hamas celebrated the 22-year anniversary of its founding. During the festivities, Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniya declared “We will never give up on Palestine from the river to the sea.”
Posted in Diplomacy, Elections, Hamas, Israel, Mideast Peace Plan, Palestine, Political Parties, United Nations | Comment »
Report: Human Rights on the Decline Part II
December 12th, 2009 by Jason
As we reported earlier, the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS) has released a comprehensive and thorough report, called “Bastion of Impunity, Mirage of Reform,” on the state of human rights throughout the Arab world. The full report in Arabic spans 254 pages and chronicles in detail the backsliding on human rights in the region while also identifying a few points of optimism. In addition to the full report, CIHRS has released a translation of the report’s introduction written by their general director, Bahey eldin Hassan, as well as a 21-page summary of the report in English.
According to Hassan’s introduction, while there have been important strides to “ease repressive measures” in the Middle East under the Forum of the Future regional initiative, in no country were there “real constitutional, legislative, or institutional gains that could upset the balance of power between authoritarian regimes and the forces of reform.” Hassan blames this failure on the narrow focus on electoral reform at the expense of human rights, the contradictory actions of the G-8 countries, attempts by the Arab League to co-opt reform with their own homegrown initiatives, and the European and American fear of Islamist electoral victories. Finally, Hassan contends “the last spark in the initiatives was quashed once and for all with the arrival of a new US administration” apparently unwilling to support democracy rhetorically.
Now, Hassan warns that the minor gains made over the past five years are under a “counterattack by Arab governments. Among other examples of backtracking, the Arab league disabled the Arab Charter on Human Rights, which only had 10 of 22 signatory countries to begin with. As with the CIHRS report last year, Hassan concludes that “lack of political will on the part of most regimes in the Arab region was the key to understanding and explaining chronic human rights problems in the region.”
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Posted in Algeria, Arab League, Bahrain, Democracy Promotion, Diplomacy, EU, Egypt, Elections, Foreign Aid, Freedom, Gulf, Hamas, Hezbollah, Human Rights, Iraq, Islam and Democracy, Islamist movements, Israel, Jordan, Journalism, Judiciary, Kurds, Lebanon, Legislation, Military, Morocco, Multilateralism, Muslim Brotherhood, NGOs, Palestine, Political Islam, Political Parties, Protests, Public Opinion, Publications, Reform, Saudi Arabia, Sectarianism, Syria, Tunisia, US foreign policy, United Nations, Western Sahara, Women, Yemen | 1 Comment »
POMED Notes: “Gulliver’s Troubles: The Obama Administration and the Middle East”
December 11th, 2009 by Jason
The Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars hosted a lecture by Aaron David Miller on the Obama administration and the Middle East. Miller served as a Middle East adviser to six secretaries of state and currently works as a Public Policy Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Center. Miller defined the purpose of government as an instrument to find solutions to problems. But in order for government to be successful, it must accurately assess the world and develop sufficient understanding. Unfortunately, the United States has not only failed to accurately comprehend the world abroad, but it has also misunderstood its role within that world.
To read POMED’s full notes of the event in PDF, please click here. Otherwise, continue reading below the fold.
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Posted in Afghanistan, Congress, DC Event Notes, Diplomacy, Elections, Iraq, Israel, Mideast Peace Plan, Palestine, US foreign policy | Comment »
Palestine: Jerusalem as Dual Capital
December 9th, 2009 by Zack
Laura Rozen reports that foreign ministers in Europe have issued a joint statement saying that “a way must be found through negotiations to resolve the status of Jerusalem as the future capital of two states,” calling on the Israeli government to “to cease all discriminatory treatment of Palestinians in East Jerusalem.” However the move did drop a Swedish proposal that explicitly supported East Jerusalem as a Palestinian capital (see our post). Al-Arabiyya goes on to explain that Europeans will not “recognize any changes to the pre-1967 borders,” thereby refusing to recognize Israel’s right to occupy the area.” The Arabist has a post detailing the political wrangling that went on in order to soften the statement about Jerusalem.
Foreign Policy relays an Israel official’s response to the idea: “The peace process in the Middle East is not like IKEA furniture.” But the magazine argues the Swedish draft was not taken directly from the Fatah platform, but is a composition of ongoing efforts. At the same time, Al-Arabiyya writes that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is disappointed about the watered down language, arguing that “the Swedish draft was a good draft because it put in clear cut terms the issue of East Jerusalem. Then came the final, vague form.”
MotherJones has run an article chronicling a non-violent resistance movement in the West Bank village of Jayyous, where the Israeli separation barrier has cut off the village from much of its agriculture.
In Lebanon, Abbas underscored the idea that Palestinian refugees are subject to Lebanese laws and explained that “If Hamas persists in its refusal to allow the [presidential and parliamentary] polls to take place in Gaza, I will not agree to the vote in the West Bank.”
Posted in Diplomacy, EU, Elections, Hamas, Israel, Mideast Peace Plan, Palestine | Comment »
Palestine: Committed to Two States
December 3rd, 2009 by Zack
In a letter for International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon writes that the U.N. is committed to working towards a two-state solution. Ban voiced his concern over the stalled negotiations, the humanitarian situation in Gaza and the importance of resolving the Jerusalem issue through negotiations. He called for a Palestinian unification and pledged U.N. pressure for previous Security Council resolutions.
The NY Times reports that Israeli has made its first arrests against settlers as part of a settlement freeze issued by PM Benjamin Netanyahu, the freeze is designed to prohibit new housing construction for 10 months in an attempt to resume peace negotiations. Lastly, President Mahmoud Abbas is expected to visit top Lebanese officials on Monday to discuss the right of return, rejection of naturalization and the civil and social rights of Palestinian refugees.
Posted in Diplomacy, Israel, Mideast Peace Plan, Palestine, United Nations | Comment »
Palestine: Jerusalem Divided?
December 2nd, 2009 by Zack
Haaretz has obtained a draft statement on the Middle East peace process put together by Sweden, the nation currently holding the E.U. presidency. The document calls for the division of Jerusalem between Israel and a Palestinian state and implies the E.U. would recognize a unilateral Palestinian declaration of statehood. The European proposal does not recognize changes to pre-1967 borders, pledges economic support for a Palestinian state, promotes a continued settlement freeze, calls for Gaza to be reopened, asks “all Palestinians to promote reconciliation behind President Mahmoud Abbas,” and requests that all involved actors recommit to the peace process.
Israeli opposition leader Tzipi Livni has condemned Sweden for its attempt to dictate the status of Jerusalem. While defending Israel’s fear of a Palestinian state, Carlo Strenger writes on the irony that 61 years ago Israel’s independence was declared despite Arab opposition and that now the situation may reverse. He argues that E.U. recognition and capital support could, in fact, reignite the peace process.
Alex Fishman argues that Abbas’ position in the PA “must be saved” and he sees the settlement freeze as an Israeli lifeline to maintain Abbas as the chief Palestinian force within negotiations. Mashe Arens shares that belief and goes further to claim that Palestine’s fractured leadership and demographics have pushed dreams of statehood further away than ever.
Posted in Diplomacy, EU, Israel, Mideast Peace Plan, Palestine, Reform | Comment »
