Overplaying Its Hand, Israel Still Holds Plenty of US Cards
Mazin Qumsiyeh writes of slain PA Minister Ziyad Abu Ein
. . . the Oslo accords gave a Palestinian cover to the Israeli theft of our natural resources like water and for the Israeli freedom to "develop" area C including industrial polluting settlements . . .
I was scheduled to meet with PA Minister Ziyad Abu Ein a few days later but he was killed yesterday [10 December] by the Israeli colonisation forces while he and over 100 Palestinians were trying to plant trees on private Palestinian land threatened by illegal Jewish colonies. One of his subordinates, another decent man who also belongs to Fatah, told me I should meet with him because he is "different from other Palestinian Authority men". He explained that Abu Ein is one of actions not speeches. My sister remembers him as a friend of her husband Hazem who was also a member of Fatah revolutionary council. I am ashamed to say that while I agreed to the meeting, privately I remained sceptical. Now that meeting will not happen unless it is in the afterlife. My Fatah friend and my sister were proven right about the decency of the man and Minister Ziyad joins tens of thousands who lost their lives while ACTING in the resistance to the colonial settler state of Israel. Others sitting comfortably in fancy PA offices will claim he is "the comrade" and will make speeches. I am certain Mr Abu Ein would not want that, he would want to be honoured by actions not words.
One can only hope that this tragic loss will not go in vain, that it would help awaken the decent people within Fatah so that they now remove the main block to our liberation: the Oslo accords and the security co-ordination that springs from it. My late friend Edward Said labelled these agreements as "the second Nakba". If change does not happen then the words of a "leadership" that does not participate in demonstrations will remain as hollow as their words after the massacres in Gaza or after the assassination of Yasser Arafat. I have a dream that Mr Mahmoud Abbas will wake up one morning and gather 500 of his staff and assistants (easy to do) and go to remove the illegal apartheid wall between Bethlehem and Jerusalem. I am sure he will be joined by thousands (me included) and that Israeli occupation forces will not be able to stop us......
"The darkest places in hell are reserved for those who maintain their neutrality in times of moral crisis." Dante.
Der Author , Mazin Qumsiyeh
Professor and Director Palestine Museum of Natural History,
Dahlan ,living the good life in Dubai.jpg (15 kByte, 397 x 301 Pixel) speichern
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Dahlan and Palestinian representative in Germany meet with German officials
A spokesperson of the Fatah movement revealed on Thursday that Fatah bloc PLC member, Muhammad Dahlan, and the Palestinian representative in Germany, Hayil Al-Fahoum, held a series of political meetings during President Abbas' visit to Norway and Italy last month.
Dahlan was in Berlin for medical treatment. The two Palestinian officials met with a senior German advisor for national security and foreign policy, and other officials in the office of the German chancellor.
Discussions ensued over the means to cooperate, in order to lift the siege imposed on the Palestinian people, and the German contribution to develop the Palestinian economy.
The Germans affirmed their confidence in the credibility of the Palestinian presidency, and stressed their inclination to reactivate their role in the peace process, especially as they are currently holding the rotating presidency of the European Union.
Palestinian Authority security services arrested dozens of Hamas supporters across the West Bank on Monday, sources from both sides said.
Hamas said in a statement that the arrests began on Sunday evening and continued into Monday, with detainees including students and academics.
A source inside the group's headquarters, who asked to remain anonymous, told AFP: "We received information that 60 members of Hamas were arrested throughout the West Bank."
2 children shot during clashes with PA security forces
Two Palestinian children were injured, one seriously, in clashes with Palestinian security forces near Balata refugee camp in eastern Nablus on Friday.
Locals told Ma'an that Mohammad Rakiz Abu Assab, 10, was shot in the stomach and taken to Rafidia hospital in a serious condition, while Mohammad Raed al-Hajj, 11, was shot in the foot and taken to al-Ittihad hospital.
Security sources told Ma'an that clashes broke out between security forces and dozens of youths on al-Quds street near the refugee camp after the young Palestinians closed the road and began throwing rocks on the street.
PA to pause ICC steps in exchange for tax revenues
When the Palestinian Authority joins the International Criminal Court on April 1, it will hold off on steps to against Israel regarding settlement construction, Israeli media reported Sunday.
The Jerusalem Post newspaper reported that the decision follows Israel's release of seized tax revenues.
According to the report, the ICC prosecutor has opened a preliminary examination on alleged Israeli war crimes during its devastating summer 2014 assault on Gaza.
Israel's prime minister's office announced Friday that Israel would release the funds it collects on the PA's behalf and withheld as punishment for its move to join the ICC.
US State Department Spokesperson Jeff Rathki said: We welcome the decision of the prime minister of Israel to release withheld tax revenues to the Palestinian Authority. This is an important step that will benefit the Palestinian people and help stabilize the situation in the West Bank.
EU High Representative and Vice President Federica Mogherini also welcomed Israels decision and said The EU has been pressing for this step, without which the Palestinian institutions' capacity to govern risked being fatally undermined.
Mahmoud Abbas calls for Arab military intervention against Hamas
Mahmoud Abbas calls for Arab military intervention against Hamas in Gaza
Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas issued a thinly veiled call for an Arab military intervention to overthrow Hamas in Gaza, along the lines of the Saudi-led bombing campaign in Yemen.
But the kind of intervention Abbas may be setting the stage for would likely consist of ground troops rather than airstrikes.
Abbas made the suggestion at the Arab League summit hosted by the Egyptian military regime in the Red Sea resort of Sharm al-Sheikh on Saturday.
Abbas speech indicates that a similar call by his religious affairs advisor in a Friday sermon in Ramallah represented official PA policy, and not the views of a maverick. Hamas has condemned the PA leaders statements.
Women in Balata camp protest PA security crackdown
Mothers from the Balata refugee camp near Nablus gathered Sunday to protest the ongoing detainment of their sons by Palestinian security forces.
The protest marked resulting tensions from a security campaign in the camp launched by Palestinian security forces against those who Nablus governor Akram Rajoub identifies as "wanted criminals.".......... .........According to an agreement sponsored by Hamdallah and Rajoub, those arrested but not proven guilty of any breaches of the law should have been released, locals have stated during past protests.
Some residents in the camp have accused Palestinian security forces of detaining individuals wanted by Israel and have demanded an end to security coordination between the Palestinian and Israeli security forces. ...........
Sorry Israeli leftists, I've got no sympathy for you
Half of Israelis are stuck with a prime minister they didnt want. All Palestinians are stuck with a president who lost his democratic mandate years ago.
A 15-year-old Palestinian was injured and his brother arrested when the two were assaulted by Palestinian police in Nahalin in southwestern Bethlehem late Friday, his family said.
The parents of Abd al-Hamid Ahmad Mahmoud Najajreh told Ma'an that their son had been badly hurt in his head, arm and foot by PA police officers who hit him with the butts of their rifles and sticks while breaking up a fight that the boy's family say he had not taken part in.
"Rocks were thrown at PA forces, but not by my sons," their father told Ma'an, adding that the police arrested Abd al-Hamid's older brother, Mahmoud, 18, for throwing rocks at PA forces even though he had not been in the town at the time of the fight.
