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The news  2-8 February 2004:

Sharon’s withdrawal plan


Sharon dropped a bombshell with his announcement of a planned withdrawal from Gaza.

He later clarified his intentions, apparently to remove 17 out of 21 settlements. He also added that removing the settlements could take up to two years.

Political commentators were not short of devious and cynical explanations for Sharon’s new line.

Whatever Sharon’s motives, his new line was not popular with Gaza settlers, who were reported as preparing to fight evacuation.

The talk of withdrawal from Gaza caught left and right on the hop. One explanation was that Sharon was planning in effect to ’swap Gaza for the West Bank’ where the Gaza settlers could be relocated. Reducing Israel’s Palestinian population is also part of the plan. The US Administration is being briefed on the Israeli plan.

Palestine Monitor, organ of Palestinian NGOs, was appropriately cynical of Sharon’s strategic motivation - a cynicism that appears justified by this report from the Hebrew-language edition of Maariv.

Uri Avnery shared the cynical interpretation, and expressed it with his usual bite.

ISM founder Ghassan Andoni set out how Sharon’s plan contradicts the ‘Road Map’.

But Shimon Peres promised his support to Sharon’s withdrawal plan should the far-right quit the Government.

under occupation


A Commons Committee has called for EU economic sanctions against Israel for deliberately inflicting suffering, including malnutrition, upon Palestinians.

Novelist Linda Grant accompanied the women of Machsom Watch on their observers’ mission at Israeli checkpoints.

‘Fifty percent of the Palestinian families west of the fence have been separated from their relatives, as have 37.3 percent of the families to the east’ says Amira Hass in a powerful summary of the latest statistics on how the Wall will devastate the social and economic fabric of Palestinian communities in its path, and wreak havoc with their health facilities.

In one week Israel destroyed16 houses in the West Bank leaving 120 Palestinians homeless.

The Palestine section of Defence of Children International has announced the release of its lawyer Daoud Dirawi as part of the recent prisoner exchange. It gives details of children released with him but expresses its concern at the number of children still held without trial.

A senior Palestinian aide called on Arafat to renounce the intifada and impose his authority. And a former Palestinian Minister close to Arafat agreed that the Palestinians were collapsing into anarchy.

There were also reports of anarchy and gang rule in Nablus
.
Some observers are claiming evidence of a sea-change in attitudes by the PA leadership.

The Gaza-based Palestinian Centre for Human Rights has condemned recent violent attacks on media freedom, and called on the PA to take action. It has also expresed procedural concerns over the military trial of those accused of the attack on US diplomats in Gaza.

Michael Young in the Beirut English-language Daily Star speculated on the significance for Hamas of the prisoner release agreement with Hizbollah.

inside Israel


Israel’s Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom defended the Wall in a Guardian article as ’a fence built for peace’.

An Israeli woman reservist talked to Linda Grant about her mixed feelings.

Emmanuel Sivan in the London Arabic paper Dar al-hayat, analysed the strife in Likud.

A Knesset member claimed Israel knew Iraq had no WMD

Refuseniks are no longer as ostracised as they were in Israeli society. And though official figures show a fall in the level of refusal, part of this may be due to greater flexibility and cleverer tactics by the army authorities.

Amira Hass detailed the harassment and delay imposed as a collective punishment on Palestinian citizens of Israel visiting relatives in Gaza for the Eid festival. The women of Machsom Watch were also there.

David Wilder, spokesman for the Hebron settlers, called for Sharon to be sacked for his evacuation plan, and issued a veiled threat of violence and assassination - by extremists whose actions he deplores, of course.

Neve Gordon takes a critical look at ‘the only democracy in the Middle East’.

elsewhere


Professor Fawaz Gurges detects that the Islamic wave is receding in the Arab world, giving way among the young to a thirst for democratisation as the key to modernisation and independence.

Thomas Friedmann argues that Bush’s policies play into the hands of Hamas.

A poll shows US Jews are more doveish than their self-appointed leaders.

Cynthis McKinney, black former Congresswoman defeated by the Israel lobby, plans to run again at the next Congressional elections.

Democrat Presidential hopeful John Kerry appeals to Jewish- and Arab-American voters.

European submissions to the Hague Court on the Wall question the Court’s jurisdiction, although they dispute the Wall’s legality and question its route. US Jewish organisations are claiming credit for European governments’ support for Israel’s position.

Meanwhile Israelis and Palestinians demonstrated together against the wall in Jerusalem, where Uri Avnery gave this speech. The wall’s impact in Abu Dis is described in this passionate piece by Gideon Levy.

The EU could find room within its budget to help fund the ‘Geneva Accords’.

A local TV station in the Boston area broadcasts a weekly half-hour programme summarising news comment from media in the Arab world. Predictably, it has been attacked as ‘antisemitic’ and ‘pro-terrorist’ - although it is being broadcast thanks to the initiative of a prominent local Jewish activist.

European Jewish intellectuals at a recent symposium expressed mixed emotions about Israel’s responsibility for the rise in anti-Jewish feeling.

At Stockholm’s Museum of Modern Art attendance has soared since the vandalising of an exhibit by the Israeli Ambassador.

British Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks came under fire for praising the BBC.

Kathleen Christison outlines the contours of what she calls ‘Jewish self-absorption’.

And the good news - now you can Google in Yiddish.

2002

 

 

 

 


 

 

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