- 19 dec 2010
Arab states preparing UN resolution against Israeli settlements
Israeli officials fear that Washington will not rush to exercise its veto power against such a resolution, which calls for international pressure for construction freeze.
Arab states and the Palestinian Authority are drafting a statement they plan to submit to the U.N. Security Council in the form of a resolution denouncing Israeli construction in the West Bank and East Jerusalem and calling for international pressure on Israel to halt construction.
Israeli officials fear that Washington will not rush to exercise its veto power against such a resolution.
According to a senior figure in the Foreign Ministry, representatives of the Arab bloc in the United Nations convened in New York on Thursday and Friday to start framing the resolution. The meetings are expected to continue and could produce a draft that will be distributed to Security Council members by the end of this week.
Some analysts believe the resolution will contain not only denunciations of Israel but also calls for international sanctions against the Jewish settlements, in the form of a boycott of businesses based there. Officials in Jerusalem are concerned that even if the resolution does not go that far, it could nonetheless encourage Western states to impose their own sanctions against the settlements.
Talk of the resolution is clearly causing anxiety in the Foreign Ministry and in the Prime Minister's Office. Eviatar Manor, the director general for International Organizations and the United Nations at the Foreign Ministry, and his staff were instructed not to provide any information on the issue to the media.
After repeated requests from Haaretz, an anonymous Foreign Ministry source agreed to say the following :"Israel views this matter with great concern. This measure joins other attempts by the Palestinians to circumvent the negotiations." The official added that Israeli embassies in Security Council member states are taking action to head off the resolution.
Senior Palestinian officials confirmed their intention to introduce to the Security Council a resolution which would deem Jewish construction beyond the Green Line illegal and define these areas as occupied lands.
The officials said it would be difficult or even impossible for the United States to veto such a resolution, since it conforms to the positions of the Obama administration. A veto, they said, would make it look as if Washington were dancing to the tune of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The Obama administration, the officials told Haaretz, had given the Palestinians a sense that it supported an absolute suspension of construction in the settlements and a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders, but that now, it is avoiding these issues.
"The Palestinian issue, which until recently was at the top of the administration's agenda in the Middle East has now become unimportant to them," one Palestinian official said. The officials said that last week's meeting between Mahmoud Abbas and U.S. Middle East envoy George Mitchell was difficult and that the PA president was disappointed by the results.
Mitchell presented to the Palestinians a "non-paper," an unofficial document, related to the talks with Israel that shocked the Palestinians.
The Palestinians said that the positions in the non-paper constituted a step back and that even the previous administration of President George W. Bush had presented a more pro-Palestinian position. They were particularly incensed by a clause stating that the negotiations were to be over the borders of the Palestinian state with Jordan, Egypt and Israel - excluding the Gaza Strip, East Jerusalem, the Dead Sea, the Jordan Valley and the no-man's-lands from 1948, which they say the Bush administration had agreed to.
According to a knowledgeable Israeli source, meanwhile, Mitchell and his entourage were very disappointed by their meeting with Netanyahu.
http://bit.ly/ijOVDr
Arabs to take Israel defiance to UN
Nabil Shaath
Arab countries will submit a draft resolution to the UN, protesting Israel's defiant construction of illegal settlements on the occupied Palestinian lands.
Nabil Shaath, a Palestinian negotiator said on Saturday that the draft would be sent to the United Nations Security Council or the world body's General Assembly, should it face a US veto in the former, Xinhua reported.
Both UN branches can impose sanctions on the parties, who refuse to abide by the organization's resolutions, he said.
Shaath, however, claimed that it is %u201Cdifficult%u201D for the United States to stand in the way of the resolution "after it has publicly opposed the settlement."
The UN and the European Union have underlined the illegality of the settler units under the international law.
Tel Aviv refused to extend a partial freeze on the settlement activities in late September, thus stalling direct talks with the Palestinian Authority (PA) that had resumed earlier that month in the United States.
The Palestinians say that the settlement construction is being carried out to prevent the establishment of an independent Palestinian state.
Also on Saturday, Salam Feyadh, the PA's caretaker prime minister denied that the Palestinians could unilaterally declare a state -- a speculation which is currently being promoted through a media fanfare, AFP reported.
"What we're looking for... is a state of Palestine, we're not looking for yet another declaration of statehood," he said.
"We're not looking for a Mickey Mouse state, we're not looking for some form of self-rule, we're looking for a sovereign state of Palestine, where we Palestinians can live as free people."
http://www.presstv.com/detail/156213.html 7 jan 2012, 21:22 , Respect -
Maria 20 dec 2010
IOA scheme to build 130 housing units in OJ endorsed
OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)-- The Jerusalem District Planning and Construction Committee approved the construction of 130 new housing units between Gilo and Beit Safafa south of occupied Jerusalem.
Meanwhile, Israeli occupation forces (IOF) stormed on Monday the village of Ma'sara, south of Bethlehem, and warned the inhabitants that a mosque in the town would be razed on 23rd January along with two Palestinian houses.
Head of the national committee against the racist wall and settlement south of the West Bank Hassan Brejeh said that the demolition is part of the Israeli occupation authority's programmed policy in all Palestinian lands aimed at evicting the indigenous people and seizing their land.
In another development, Fanatic Jewish settlers in Nablus installed a huge menorah few kilometers south of the city in line with the IOA systematic Judaization policy.
http://bit.ly/gpHGJG 7 jan 2012, 21:22 , Respect -
Maria 22 dec 2010
New Israeli plan to build 180 settlement units near Amlesson area in J'lem
OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)-- The Israeli municipal council in the occupied city of Jerusalem unveiled a new plan to establish a new settlement outpost of 180 housing units near Amlesson neighborhood, south of the holy city.
Official from Amlesson society Jameel Lafi said this new plan is aimed at constructing five buildings composed of 180 apartments on an area of 37, 460 square meters of the total annexed land, adding that another 30 dunums of this land were earmarked for the establishment of public facilities, including a synagogue and a kindergarten.
Lafi pointed out that Israel confiscated 67 dunums of Palestinian citizens' land for the establishment of this settlement project.
The official affirmed that this settlement plan was revealed too late in order to disrupt any objection filed against the project by the Palestinian residents in the area.
The official, however, urged the residents to submit their objection before 27 of this month, the deadline set by the Israeli occupation authority
http://bit.ly/gouC0R
Israel slammed over railway project
A high speed Israeli train in West Bank, file photo
Tel Aviv is criticized for building a high speed bullet train railway line that links central Israel to the Jewish settlements built on the occupied Palestinian lands in the West Bank.
The bullet train line is supposed to run in 28 minutes from the suburbs of Tel Aviv to the illegally annexed East al-Quds (Jerusalem), where Palestinians hope to establish the capital of their future state. Israel Railways has budgeted USD 820,000 to plan the line, according to an article published in Maariv newspaper.
Some four miles of the proposed train route, parts of which have already been constructed, runs through Palestinian lands in the West Bank.
The residents of Beit Surik, a Palestinian village set to be severely affected by the train's route, are calling for international intervention.
"We, the people of Beit Surik, do not want the train line to be built on our land," they wrote in a public letter. "We see as fundamentally important that the people of the world support our right to decide on the use of our own land and help us change the route of this train line."
The announcement of the new Israeli train line plan has drawn sharp criticism from the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority.
"This shows not only Israel's short-term illegal activities in terms of settlement expansion, but its long term planning and execution of colonial projects that aim at nothing less than ending the two-state solution," a Palestinian Authority spokesman Husam Zomlot said.
The Israeli peace organization Coalition of Women for Peace is also launching a campaign to stop the train, and appealing to foreign activists to target those international companies involved in the project.
"According to international law, an occupier may not use the occupied resources solely for the benefit of its own citizens," the group wrote in a report the outlines the effects the train line will have on Palestinian communities.
The report also noted, "This line was planned for the exclusive use of Israeli citizens; it is imposed on the local Palestinian residents by the dictates of a military regime, in which they have no representation; and it would be completely inaccessible to the local residents."
http://www.presstv.com/detail/152758.html 7 jan 2012, 21:22 , Respect -
Maria 23 dec 2010
Since end of freeze: 13,000 homes approved
Construction in Ariel
Intensive building noted in outlying, smaller settlements since West Bank building freeze came to end. 'Construction will not affect future borders,' Prime Minister's Office claims. Peace Now: This is most active period in years.
Three months after the moratorium on settlement construction in the West Bank came to an end, the settlements are growing at an almost unprecedented pace.
According to data from the Peace Now organization, work has begun on no less than 1,712 new housing units, and in almost every second settlement there is a significant building project. This is especially noticeable in the outlying and smaller settlements.
In some 65 settlements there is a large construction project. In Kedumim, 76 new units have been started since the end of the freeze, in Revava 60, in Elazar 58, in Karmei Tzur 42 and in Neria 30.
In other settlements too the bulldozers are working overtime. In Shaked, 25 housing units are under construction, in both Paduel and Rehan 24, in Ateret 18, in Susia 15 and Maaleh Michmash 11. And the list goes on.
Renewed construction in Yitzhar
All this construction has begun since the direct talks with the Palestinians broke down and Israel decided not to extend the moratorium on West Bank settlement construction. The results are clear to all: Thousands more Jews will live in the West Bank when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas finally sit down to talk face to face, if it ever happens %u2013 which will cause yet more problems on the road to peace.
The Prime Minister's Office tried to play down the significance of the accelerated construction in the West Bank.
"The current construction will not affect the peace borders in any way," said Mark Regev, one of the prime minister's spokespersons. He said to the New York Times that building begun since the end of the freeze is taking place in existing settlements alone, and that no new land expropriations have taken place.
Dror Etkes, who has been monitoring building beyond the Green Line (the pre-1967 borders) for almost a decade, says he doesn't remember any period with such intensive construction.
Peace Now's Hagit Ofran agrees. "This is the most active period for years," she said. In addition to housing units which are already under construction, she says, some 13,000 additional units have been approved. In comparison, in each of the last three years only 3,000 housing units were built.
'We're catching up'
Settlement leaders make no effort to contradict the data presented by Peace Now. "The freeze is over, we're catching up," David Ha'ivri, from the Samaria Regional Council, said to the Times. "The Peace Now numbers are credible. The counting seems logical. The difference is we see this in a positive light while they see it in a negative light.
Yesha Council Director General Naftali Bennett said he had asked the government to advertize tenders for 4,000 additional housing units, mainly in the larger settlements.
In recent years, most of the settlement construction has been in the larger settlements, relatively close to the Green Line, including Maaleh Adumim, Beitar Ilit and Modiin Ilit, which will probably remain within Israel's borders if territorial exchange is agreed on. However, the current feverish construction is being carried out in settlements deeper within the West Bank, such as Tapuah, Talmon and Ofra.
"In many settlements where no new construction has been noted in recent years, there is now renewed construction and expansion," Peace Now said, and even sent a letter to the Defense Ministry detailing the illegal construction in the West Bank.
The international community perceives all construction in the West Bank and east Jerusalem as illegal and illegitimate, even though Israel has claimed in the past that construction in east Jerusalem is legal and will continue.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4003352,00.html 7 jan 2012, 21:22 , Respect -
Maria 24 dec 2010
U.S. criticizes PA bid to take settlement construction to UN
Foreign Ministry and the Prime Minister's Bureau continue talks with members of the Security Council in an attempt to thwart the resolution.
The United States responded with criticism to the Palestinian Authority's circulating a draft resolution to the members of the United Nations Security Council condemning Israeli construction in the settlements.
A senior US official told Haaretz: "Final status issues can only be resolved through negotiations between the parties, not by recourse to the UN Security Council. We, therefore, consistently oppose any attempt to take final status issues to the council as such efforts do not move us closer to our goal of two states living side by side in peace and security." The document, which the PA formulated together with Arab countries and a copy of which Haaretz has obtained, states that Israeli actions in constructing settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories, including East Jerusalem, are illegal and are the main obstacle to peace on the basis of a two-state solution.
Meanwhile, the Foreign Ministry and the Prime Minister's Bureau yesterday continued talks with members of the Security Council, particularly the United States, France and Britain, in an attempt to thwart the resolution.
The Israeli mission to the United Nations and the Israeli Embassy in Washington held talks with senior State Department officials and with the American mission to the United Nations, to ascertain whether the United States intends to veto the resolution.
Since President Jimmy Carter's term in office in the 1980s, no U.S. administration has supported a Security Council resolution that stated that the settlements are illegal. The traditional U.S. position since Carter's days has been that the settlements are an obstacle to peace. The Americans have made clear to Israeli diplomats that they oppose the Palestinian circulation of the draft resolution to the members of the Security Council, but they did not state clearly that they would veto it.
In contrast to similar cases, the draft resolution distributed by the Palestinians this time is relatively moderate, avoiding extreme anti-Israeli language. The Americans may therefore find themselves isolated in the UN if they decide to veto the resolution, and they may find it difficult to do so.
Other members of the Security Council, particularly Russia, China, Britain and France, tend to support the Palestinian draft resolution. The Palestinians reportedly intend to call for a meeting of the Security Council to vote on the resolution only in January, after the holidays, when Bosnia and Herzegovina replace the United States as president of the council.
The draft, which was formulated on December 20, also stated that the Security Council condemns all actions by Israel to change the demographic component, character and status of the territories, which is says contravenes international law. The document also mentions that the 2003 road map calls on Israel to stop all construction in the settlements, including for purposes of natural growth, and to dismantle illegal outposts built after 2001.
Meanwhile, U.S. Special Envoy George Mitchell told the Maine Public Broadcasting Network that the administration in Washington will not cease its involvement in the peace process between Israel and the Palestinians because American abandonment of the process could lead to an outbreak of violence. "I think that any president would not simply stand by and let a conflict erupt because it would not be in our interest," Mitchell said.
The envoy added: "One of the reasons we are involved there is because it is within the strategic interests and national interests of the United States that the conflict be resolved. I do think that we have to stay involved because our interest is at stake, and a principal point is that an eruption of violence or some other negative act could occur at any time with unforeseeable consequences."
http://bit.ly/g5K0an 7 jan 2012, 21:22 , Respect -
Maria 25 dec 2010
Israel builds, markets 5,000 settlement units in J'lem and W. Bank
OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)-- Specialist in settlement affairs Qais Naser said that the Israeli ministry of housing is working on building and marketing about 5,000 new settlement units in the occupied territories of Jerusalem and the West Bank.
Naser affirmed in a statement on Saturday that this Israeli ministry sold in 2010 more than 1,400 housing units in settlements in Jerusalem and the West Bank, especially the settlements of Homat Shmuel, Ma'ale Adumim and Pisgat Ze'ev.
He added that the ministry is embarking on marketing the sale of other 594 housing units in Pisgat Ze'ev settlement and 1,280 others in Homat Shmuel, and until now it has sold 312 units in these two settlements.
The specialist affirmed that the ministry announced during November 2010 tenders for the construction and leasing of 80 housing units in Pisgat Ze'ev and 158 others in Ramot settlement, adding that the Israeli committee of planning and building during the same month also declared plans to build 1,230 units in Har Homa, Homat Shmuel, and Ramot.
In another incident, Yerushalayim newspaper reported on Friday that the Israeli committee of planning and building intends to build 212 housing units north of Ramat Shlomo settlement in Jerusalem.
http://bit.ly/eafDNx
Report: Israeli settlement activity peaks in November 2010
OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)-- The Jerusalem center for social and economic rights released a report Saturday documenting Israel's violations against Arab citizens of Jerusalem in November 2010, with special focus on settlement activity in the city.
Israel's Jerusalem municipality okayed construction on 1,300 new residential units for Jewish settlers in that time frame in the eastern area of the Pisgat Ze'ev settlement, the group in Jerusalem reported. Israeli authorities have sights set on building 980 new units in the Har Homa settlement which was founded on the city's Jebel Abu Ghunaim district, and 320 more units in Ramot.
Three new plans were launched that month to expand the Reches Shuafat, Har Homa, and Ramat Shlomo settlements with the erection of around 715 residential units inside them.
66 Jewish families moved to the Ma'ale Hazeitim settlement which was established on the city's Ras Al Amoud neighborhood amid a plan to expand the settlement and raise the number of Jewish residents.
Israeli authorities arrested five Palestinians in east Jerusalem's Arab Silwan district, and extended the detention of nine others from Silwan and Issawiyya, their ages ranging from 10 to 18 years.
Israeli police caused injury in November to an eight-year-old boy in Silwan, Adam Mansur Resheq. He was admitted into intensive care.
A tourist from Chile was brutally assaulted by a gang of extremist Jews while he was touring the city, after they mistook him for an Arab.
http://bit.ly/hCtt7K 7 jan 2012, 21:22 , Respect -
Maria 30 dec 2010
Palestinians draft UNSC resolution
An Israeli settlement
Palestinians are set to ask the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) in the coming days to condemn the continuing illegal Israeli settlement construction.
A copy of the draft resolution dated Dec. 21 -- obtained by the Associated Press -- shows that the Palestinians will call on the Security Council to declare the settlements illegal and ask Israel to freeze all construction in the occupied West Bank and East al-Quds.
The Palestinian Authority (PA) said on Wednesday that its Arab allies will present the resolution to the UNSC early next month.
The 15-member council, along with the international community, has condemned Israeli settlement construction several times in the past.
Due to the renewed settlement building activities, the PA broke off the long-delayed talks which resumed in early September.
The US could use its veto power in the council to defeat any resolution against Israel, the draft resolution said.
The US said on Wednesday that it will oppose any resolution brought before the United Nations Security Council that calls on Israel to end settlement activity in the West Bank.
State Department spokesman Mark Toner said the US continued to oppose Israeli settlement activity, but also opposed bringing the issue to the UNSC.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/157800.html 7 jan 2012, 21:22 , Respect -
Maria 31 dec 2010
Report: Israel allocates $564 million to settlements
TEL AVIV, Israel (Ma'an) -- In the 2011-12 budget passed by the Israeli Knesset on Wednesday, MKs set aside 2 billion shekels ($564 million) for settlements, the country's left-wing daily Haaretz reported.
The cash will go to settlements, their services and security, the newspaper said, adding that hundreds of millions of shekels more were hidden among the different clauses of the bill.
According to the budget, 200 housing units will be marketed in the largest West Bank settlement of Ma'ale Adumim in 2011, with 58 million shekels allocated to the city's development, with another 31 million shekels in 2012. In 2011, 500 housing units will be marketed in the Har Homa settlement in Bethlehem, where 238 million shekels were set to be spent over the two years.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=346942
Arabs to go to UN against Jewish settlements
RAMALLAH (AFP) -- Palestinian officials backed by other Arab states will shortly bring a draft resolution before the UN Security Council calling on Israel to halt Jewish settlements in Palestinian territories and Jerusalem, a spokesman said Thursday.
"We will go before the Security Council in the coming days to stop the Israeli settlements in the Palestinian territories, especially Jerusalem, capital of a Palestinian state, which is a red line for all Palestinians and Arabs," said Nabil Abu Rudeina, spokesman of President Mahmoud Abbas.
"We will present a Palestinian and Arab resolution," he told AFP from Brazil, where he is accompanying Abbas on an official visit.
Following a breakdown of direct peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians over settlements, the Arab League announced on December 15 that it would seek a Security Council resolution against Israel, ordering a halt to Jewish settlements.
It also called on the United States, which has vetoed resolutions against Israel in the past, not to obstruct such a move.
The draft resolution is due to come before the United Nations in January, when Bosnia takes the rotating presidency of the Security Council from the United States.
Direct talks between Israel and the Palestinians launched on September 2 were suspended three weeks later after an Israeli moratorium on settlement building expired and the Jewish state refused to renew it.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=346922