Gaza Rocket Attack: After Gaza militants fired a Qassam rocket into the western Negev on Thursday, killing a Thai foreign worke, Israel’s response was firm. Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon said, “With or without Goldstone [Report on the Gaza War], Israel will defend its citizens. Today we see how absurd the Goldstone report was.”
According to the Israeli Defense Forces, more than 100 rockets have been fired from Gaza into Israel since Operation Cast Lead ended in January 2009. Although Hamas did not take the responsibility, Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilnai declared the Palestianian organisation responsible. Deputy Premier Silvan Shalon vowed that “the Israeli response will be appropriate. It will be strong,” adding, “This is a crossing of the red line, which Israel cannot accept.”
The killing came an hour after the EU’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Catherine Ashton, stepped into the Gaza Strip. She said:
On Thursday, Israel’s Deputy Ambassador to Britain, Talya Lador-Fresher, “Challenges and Hopes in the Middle East” to an University of Birmingham audience.
For her first challenge, Lador-Fresher chose the 2008/9 Gaza War. This had been “successful” since life in southern Israel is becoming normal and Egypt’s eyes have been opened so it no longer allows smuggling through almost 150 tunnels.
Challenge #2 is that the Fatah Party of Mahmoud Abbas and Salam Fayad do not represent the majority of Palestinians since Hamas is controlling the Gaza Strip. Hamas poses Challenge #3 is that Hamas is killing and hiding among the civilian population and then crying as if they have done nothing. (Lador-Fresher stated that both the Goldstone Report and the Human Rights Commission of the United Nations are biased against Israel on the Gaza issue.)
White House’s spokesman Robert Gibbs, condemned Jerusalem’s announcement from the White House. U.S. Vice President Joe Biden said:
I condemn the decision by the government of Israel to advance planning for new housing units. The substance and timing of the announcement, particularly with the launching of proximity talks, is precisely the kind of step that undermines the trust we need right now.
The European Union’s foreign-policy director, Catherine Ashton, said on Wednesday, “May I join Vice-President Biden in condemning the decision to build 1,600 new houses.”
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon also condemned Israel’s plan. Then, according to the Ma’an news agency, the Palestinian Authority’s leader Mahmoud Abbas warned that the move would derail negotiations before they had even begun and said:
It is apparent that the Israeli government does not want negotiations, nor does it want peace. The American administration must respond to this provocation with effective measures.
Israel’s Interior Minister Eli Yishai apologized on Wednesday for causing domestic and international distress and stated that he was uninformed of the district committee’s plan, because the matter was simply a routine, technical authorization. Yishai added:
If I’d have known, I would have postponed the authorization by a week or two since we had no intention of provoking anyone. It is definitely unpleasant that this happened during Biden’s visit. If the committee members would have known that the approval would have escalated to such a situation, they would have informed me.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu assured his guest Biden that the programme, which had been drafted three years ago and only received initial authorization that day, could take several months to be granted final approval.
Here’s the background: last Friday, US Mideast Special Envoy George Mitchell’s deputy, David Hale, said Israeli-Palestinian understandings since the Annapolis talks would not be binding.
Following the approval of two conditions (the outlines of a border deal with Israel and a complete Israeli settlement construction freeze) by the Palestinian Liberation Organization executive committee, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday that he hoped for direct negotiations in the near future, but reiterated that any permanent settlement would require recognition of Israel as a Jewish state and a long-term guarantee of Israel’s security.
Thus, the clear difference between two disputants’ mentalities: on one hand, Ramallah is considering indirect talks as a basis to be consolidated in order to move to the next round of direct talks; on the other hand, West Jerusalem sees indirect talks as a way to block preconditions.
In the midst of Defense Minister Ehud Barak’s permission for the construction of 112 housing units in the settlement of Beitar Ilit, despite the construction freeze in the West Bank settlements, U.S. Vice President Joe Biden arrived Israel on Tuesday while Mitchell moved to Ramallah for further talks. Read the rest of this entry »
John Holmes, UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, spoke to Haaretz before returning to Britain after 3 1/2 years in office.
Question: In a previous interview with you more than a year ago, you suggested that Israel shake off the delusion that pressure on the Gaza Strip would lead to Hamas’ downfall. In your visit to Gaza this week, did you have the impression that the blockade was weakening Hamas?
Holmes: I don’t think my voice alone would have changed Israeli policy. It is hard to be sure what exactly the objective of this policy is. Of the blockade, the siege, the collective punishment. It is hard to see that it has been achieved, because Hamas is still there, firmly in control. Meanwhile, the condition of the people there [in Gaza] remains grim.
Sarkozy Steps Back from Palestinian State: On Monday, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and the leader of the Palestinian Authority Mahmoud Abbas discussed the future of negotiations and a Palestinian state. Sarkozy made two points: there should be no unilateral declaration of a Palestinian state before borders are defined with Israel, and there was no time to be waste in starting negotiations since “if there are no talks….we take the risk, the international community, of a third intifada”.
Abbas supported Sarkozy’s line, “Negotiations first, proclamation of a state later.”
Israel Pushes Washington for Harsher Sanctions on Iran: Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak left for the US on Tuesday, for five days of talks with senior American officials, including US Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, that will focus on Iran.
PA Security Prevents Attacks into Israel: According to Haaretz, the Palestinian Authority prevented a suicide attack about six weeks ago that a young woman (from Islamic Jihad) from Nablus had planned to carry out in Israel. Palestinian security sources said that it was not the first success to thwart such terrorist activities. Read the rest of this entry »
Iran: More posturing today over the nuclear issue, as well as slurs and counter-claims between the US and Iran on which country is the “dictatorship”.Human rights continues to dominate internal news, and labour activism appears to be gathering speed, although there no firm signs of a nationwide general strike yet. We have live-blogging from Ahmadinejad’s press conference, and as always, all news and links will be updated throughout the day on our live weblog.
Late-breaking news is of a rising challenge from the Karroubi family, with both Mehdi Karroubi’s wife and son making pointed challenges to the regime. That bears out the importance of the analysis by EA’s Mr Verdeof the beating of Medhi Karroubi’s son Ali: “Imagine for a moment that the son or daughter of a Presidential or Prime Ministerial candidate in the US or Britain had been taken away by plainclothes security forces and kept in an unknown locations for days. Imagine that he or she had been beaten and threatened with rape….”
1955 GMT: The lawyer for 21-year-old Amir Reza Arefi says his client has been sentenced to death for “mohareb” (war against God). Arefi was arrested in April 2009, before the June election.
1945 GMT: Keeping Rafsanjani in His Box. An EA correspondent puts together an important story: with the 7th general assembly of the Assembly of Experts due next week, probably on Tuesday and Wednesday, new attacks have been launched upon Hashemi Rafsanjani, the head of the Assembly.
A statement from a number of clerics at Qom declares that, due to the performance of Hashemi Rafsanjani in the past few months, he is not suitable to continue in his post. And Fars News, criticising Rafsanjani’s son Mehdi Hashemi for not returning to Iran after five months abroad, asserts that his settling in London is “strange and suspicious”.
1715 GMT: The Karroubi Wave. It appears that the Karroubi family — not just Mehdi Karroubi, but the family — are ready to propel the next wave of opposition to the Government and regime. In addition to Fatemeh Karroubi’s interview (1600 GMT), Mehdi Karroubi’s son Hossein has spoken out to Radio Zamaneh.
Gaza Rocket Attack: After Gaza militants fired a Qassam rocket into the western Negev on Thursday, killing a Thai foreign worke, Israel’s response was firm. Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon said, “With or without Goldstone [Report on the Gaza War], Israel will defend its citizens. Today we see how absurd the Goldstone report was.”
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