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1. Poll: Where do PA Arabs See Themselves in the Mideast Turmoil?
by Maayana Miskin
Palestinian Authority Arabs are pessimistic regarding their situation,
and most would support a non-violent way to reunite Fatah and Hamas and
form a state. However, when asked if they expect a youth revolution in
the West Bank similar to those that occurred in Tunisia and Egypt, only
22.8% said yes,31.3% said no, with the rest undecided, and
27.2% explained that they felt that Palestinian conditions are different
from those in the Arab countries.
Researchers questioned 1,360 PA adults, 860 of them from Judea and
Samaria and the remaining 500 from Gaza. The poll was conducted on
February 24-26.
The majority of respondents were pessimistic regarding the future, with
54.1% expressing concern regarding the state of the PA economy and
61.8% saying they fear for their lives, their family and their
property under the PA..
Of those surveyed, 80.1% said they support the protest movement in the
Arab world that has seen leaders toppled in Tunisia and Egypt, and
regimes threatened in Libya and Bahrain.
Still, despite uncertainty about their future and support for Mideast
protests,, they do not embrace the idea of turning their own lives
upside down. Close to 75% said they would support a non-violent
popular movement among Arabs in Judea, Samaria and Gaza aimed at getting
their government to bring an end to the Fatah-Hamas schism, a move that
would unite actively anti-Israel and terrorist Hamas with Fatah.
On the other hand, more than 76% said they would support a popular
uprising aimed at forcing Israelis to leave Judea and Samaria, but in
this case non-violence was not mentioned. The question of non-violence
is irrelevant, since attempted violence against Jews is ongoing.
Peace was also a non-issue. Only 19.6% expressed support for peace
talks, while 77.6% said the PA should continue to refuse to speak to
Israel unless Israel forbids Jews to build homes east of the 1949
armistice line.
Even the 19.6% who remained in favor of talks were not all optimistic:
just 18% said they believe an end to the Israel-PA conflict is possible
at this time.
Despite the strong support for unifying Hamas and Fatah, 56.5% said
they prefer PA Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, the current second in
command to Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, running their lives, to Hamas' Gaza
head, Ismael Haniyeh. Just 19.2% said Haniyeh would be preferable to
Fayyad.
2. US Sends Warships to Suez, Troops Stationed in Libya
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu
The United States is moving warships, planes and troops close to Libya
and two assault ships passed through the Suez Canal Wednesday morning.
The USS Ponce and the USS Kearge, carrying approximately 400 marines
passed through the waterway on the way to eastern Libya, where rebels
are in control as Muammar Qaddafi continues to rule in Tripoli.
The U.S. Armed Forces Monday set up bases in eastern Libya, joining
British and French special forces as a “no-fly” order looms. Russia has
vehemently objected to military intervention that would prevent Qaddafi from using planes to bomb protesters, arguing that such an order would be illegal.
The Arab League, which has joined virtually the entire world in
denouncing Qaddafi for slaughtering demonstrators, also objected to the
use of foreign militaries.
The United Nations Security Council on Saturday slapped economic and
military sanctions against Qaddafi, and Mark Lyall Grant, British
ambassador to the United Nations, said a no-fly order is possible.
"We will look at what is happening on the ground, and we will look to
take whatever measures we consider necessary to respond to events on the
ground," said Grant after the international body’s General Assembly suspended Libya from the U.N. Human Rights Council.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that the Obama
administration is "actively considering” a no-fly zone over Libya but
told the House Foreign Affairs Committee Tuesday that the opposition in
Libya wants it to be understood that “there not be outside intervention
by any external force,’ ’meaning foreign forces not acting through the
United Nations.
Qaddafi and the rebels are at a stand-off, with the opposition having downed at least one of the dictator’s planes and repelling other attempts to re-take the city of Benghazi in the east.
The Provisional Revolutionary Council is considering asking for
international help under the auspices of the United Nations to bomb
Qaddafi’s military bases.
“He destroyed the army. We have [only] two or three planes,’’ said Abdel-Hafidh Ghoga, the council’s spokesman.”
Defense Secretary Robert Gates yesterday opposed direct military
intervention by the United States, already bogged by the invasions in
Iraq and Afghanistan.
3. Hamas Bans Holocaust Studies in UNRWA Human Rights Curriculum
by Chana Ya'ar
The de facto Hamas government in Gaza has banned Holocaust studies in the human rights curriculum of the region's schools.
Hamas said it would do everything in its power to prevent children from
being taught about the Holocaust in schools run by the United Nations
Relief and Works Agency, according to the Ma'an news agency.
“We will never allow teaching Holocaust to Gaza refugee camp children,”
said Gaza Education Minister Mohammed Ashqol. “Messing up Gaza's
education system is a red line which cannot be ignored.”
Hamas Culture Ministry officials added that the lessons were an “overt
intervention in Palestinian affairs” and warned the “suspicious plot”
should be countered, Ma'an reported. Ministry officials said teachers
who cooperated with the agency curriculum were guilty of “complicity in a
crime against culture.”
The unit, which is not new, has been part of the agency's human rights
curriculum in its schools since 2002, according to UNRWA spokesman Chris
Gunness.
Officials from the terrorist organization are at odds with UNRWA over the issue.
The terrorist group urged local school children to leave the classroom
if human rights lessons included information about the Holocaust, if
teachers tried to tell them about the genocide or gave them books about
the issue.
UNRWA: Children Deserve 'Peaceful, Non-Politicized Spaces'
Gunness defended the policy, slamming the attempt by Hamas to dictate the agency's curriculum.
Children deserve to learn “in peaceful, non-politicized spaces in which
they can attain the highest level of human development,” he said.
The agency operates 228 schools in Gaza, educating more than 200,000 Palestinian Authority Arab children.
4. Bedouin Face $275,000 Lawsuit for Land Grab
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu
Government prosecutors are preparing a $275,000 (1 NIS million) lawsuit
against Bedouin for the cost of removing them from government land they
tried to take over northwest of Be’er Sheva.
The suit is likely to be filed against the sheikh of the Bedouin tribe that has staged 13 attempts to grab government land near the Bedouin city of Rahat. The same sheikh participated in a violent demonstration, coordinated with New Israel Fund activists, against the planting of trees of government land by the Jewish National Fund (JNF).
The lawsuit is not unprecedented but is unusual and may be a new
measure to discourage Bedouin from continuing decades of confiscating
state lands, some of them adjacent to army training grounds and even
inside rifle ranges.
The final sum in the lawsuit has not been determined but is aimed at
covering the cost of the use of helicopters and a force of more than
1,000 police officers to evacuate Bedouin trespassers.
Last week, a Knesset member proposed a bill providing for the immediate
imposition of a fine against Bedouin who try to grab government land.
Officials estimate there are thousands of illegal Bedouin settlements,
also known as “non-recognized communities,” with tens of thousands of
illegally constructed buildings, in the Negev.
Aided by polygamy, prohibited by Israel law but with an exception for
the Bedouin based on “religious tradition” the Bedouin Negev population
has increased from a few thousand to more than 150,000 over the past
four decades. Bedouin already make up a majority of the Negev population
outside of Be’er Sheva. Some have begun to move into Jewish cities such
as Arad.
Many Bedouin families with two or more wives include as many as two
dozen or more children. Some of the families meet their expenses by
collecting child support payments from the government.
5. New Defense System Foils Anti-Missile Attack from Gaza
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu
The IDF’s new “Trophy-Windbreaker” system
intercepted a Gaza terrorist anti-tank missile for the first time on
Tuesday evening. It was successfully tested in training last year but
had not been employed in the Gaza area until Tuesday.
The system is designed to actively protect against anti-tank missiles, and it identified and intercepted the missile.
Shortly afterwards, IDF soldiers identified several terrorists in the area and fired in their direction, identifying a hit.
The IDF also deployed helicopters over the central Gaza area of Khan
Yunis after terrorists fired a rocket-propelled grenade at an army
vehicle patrolling on the road at the Gaza separation/security fence.
Gaza sources said the RPG set the vehicle on fire, but military
spokesmen said there was no damage and that no one was injured. Hamas
sources also reported that the IDF retaliated with artillery fire,
wounding one terrorist.
6. ‘Peace Process’ Crops Up Amid Arab Revolutions
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu
Quartet's Middle East envoy Tony Blair met with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu Monday to try to revive the moribund “peace process” amid the spreading Muslim revolutions in the Middle East.
As in previous discussions on the diplomatic process, official
statements already are flurrying without any signs of compromise,
particularly from the Palestinian Authority.
CNN quoted an Israeli official, who spoke anonymously, saying that
Prime Minister Netanyahu is considering a diplomatic initiative with an
interim agreement, a proposal that formerly was a mandatory step in the
moribund Roadmap Plan and which PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas has rejected several times.
"Of course, Israel would prefer a final status peace agreement, but
that has become all but impossible because of the Palestinian refusal to
negotiate," the official told CNN.
Abbas on Tuesday said that the Quartet, comprised of the European Union,
Russia, the United States and the United Nations, "must emphasize the
importance of freezing Israeli settlement" until reaching "the
establishment of a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital.”
His statement is a replica of his previous position that rejected several alternative compromises suggested by the Obama and Netanyahu governments.
Abbas said as far back as 2009 that his strategy is to go through the
motions of diplomatic talks while trying to forge international support
for the recognition of the PA as an independent country. He has won the approval of several Latin American countries but suffered a defeat in last month when the United States vetoed a resolution condemning Israel for building for Jews in Judea and Samaria.
Israel did not release details of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s discussion
with Blair Monday, but the Prime Minister later in the day told his
Likud party faction that Israel faces “a very difficult international
reality” and must be careful not to endanger current construction in
major popular centers in Judea and Samaria.
The Quartet is to meet in Brussels this month to discuss the diplomatic
process. Israel has not said if it will attend, apparently out of
concern that it will be trapped into further concessions that already
have alienated many if not most of his coalition members.
One Likud Central Committee member wrote
Likud Knesset Members Monday, “Tell the Prime Minister: Choose either
[Defense Minister Ehud] Barak, or us. We will not allow the Likud
government to be used by Barak as his base from which to attack
settlers.”
Foreign media continue to try to resuscitate ideas that have been
rejected for years. The widely respected Christian Science Monitor on
Tuesday published an opinion article by Dashiell Shapiro, described by
the newspaper as a “tax lawyer who has worked in the Middle East, who
suggested that the uprising in Egypt gives the country an opportunity to
take over Gaza.
Egypt ruled Gaza until the Six-Day War in 1967 and has consistently
refused to take any responsibility for the crowded and terror-ridden
region.
Nevertheless, he reasoned that Gaza Arabs are culturally closer to
Egyptian Arabs than those in Judea and Samaria. Admitting that “the idea
of returning Gaza to Egyptian control has always been rejected out of
hand, mainly by Egypt itself,” he argued that a post-Mubarak regime will
feel less threatened by Hamas, especially if the Muslim Brotherhood is
part of the new regime.
7. Jewish Purchase of Nof Tzion Gets Green Light
by Gil Ronen
The Nof Tzion apartment project in Jerusalem has cleared what may be
the final hurdle on its way to becoming a Jewish neighborhood. Digal,
the project's developer, revealed in a statement to the stock exchange
Tuesday that Bank Leumi has approved, in principle, an improved offer by
the firm for settling its debt to the bank.
The meaning of the announcement is that the bank has given the go-ahead
for a deal in which the parcel on which Nof Tzion stands will be sold to businessman Rami Levy and an American partner. The two will complete construction of the planned neighborhood and market the remaining homes to religious buyers.
The first phase of the project, which houses 90 families, was completed
several years ago. However, Palestinian Authority semi-resident Bashir
Al-Masri has been making efforts to buy Digal, and has confirmed that if
he succeeds, he intends to market the 180 planned units of Stages II
and III of the project to Arabs.
The latest development became possible after Levy made an improved offer to Digal Tuesday morning.
8. Netanyahu's Popularity Hits New Low of 32%
by Gil Ronen
The popularity of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has hit a new low,
according to a Channel 10 News poll carried out by Prof. Camille Fuchs.
Only 32% of the respondents - just under one third - expressed support
for Netanyahu. The number was down from 34% last month and 38% in the
month before.
With the courts about to decide whether to charge Foreign Minister
Avigdor Lieberman with various corruption related offenses, the public
was asked if Lieberman was indeed corrupt, or was a victim of the
Prosecution.
Twenty-five percent said the Prosecution had it in for him, 31% say
Lieberman is guilty of extensive corruption and 44% said they did not
know.
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