APRIL 2001

Monday April 30, 2001

Main Headlines

• President Arafat affirms his commitments to the peace process and to the Egyptian Jordanian initiative to resume peace negotiations. In a meeting with the Israeli opposition leader Yossi Sarid, President Arafat believes the said initiative can constitute the basis for the resumption of peace talks. President Arafat had two telephone conversations yesterday with both President Mubarak of Egypt and King Abdullah II of Jordan.
• The Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres conveyed Sharon's response on the Egyptian Jordanian initiative back to Amman and Cairo. Sharon wants changes on the initiative, effectively emptying it from its real contents.
• Palestinian Minister of International Cooperation Nabil Sha'ath met yesterday with the Danish Foreign Minister in Copenhagen. Dr. Nabil Sha'ath said: President Arafat can not end the Palestinian Intifada without a peace agreement.
• The barbaric Israeli shelling of Palestinian cities resumed yesterday. Palestinian residential areas and police positions in Dir Al- Balah and Khan Younis were bombed causing large destruction to property and seriously injuring five civilians two of them seriously. A Palestinian boy was also injured. The injured Palestinians entered their land to work. The Israeli occupation soldiers fired at the Palestinians and prevented others from attending their land.
• Two other Palestinian men were shot and seriously injured last night near Tulkarm. Lives of both the injured Palestinians are in grave danger.
• As if he restraining them, Israeli army officers demand that Sharon give them a free hand to escalate the Israeli army aggression against the Palestinian population. The Israeli National Religious Party faction whip Shaul Yahalom, a coalition partner in the Sharon current government called on the Israeli occupation army to strike massively without limits against the Palestinian areas and people. Yahalom advocated accompanying the assaults with a world wide public relations campaign to justify and to cover the assault on the Palestinian people. Avigdor Lieberman, chairman of the so called Israel Bietinu political party and member of Sharon's government said that President Arafat is not a partner to peace with Israel, and criticized Israel's foreign minister Shimon Peres for travelling to Egypt and Jordan to discuss the Egyptian Jordanian initiative to resume peace negotiations.
• Thirty-three barrels of radioactive material was found in Hebron. The barrels with - extremely toxic material, Israeli Defense Forces - printed on them were discovered by Palestinian security forces. The material was buried in an area close to a cow and sheep farm in the city. Few months ago a similar shipment was caught in Jordan coming from Israel, the Jordanian authorities returned the shipment back to Israel. It appears that Israeli contractors entice local Palestinians to take this radio active dangerous material and dump it in the occupied Palestinian territories. The Palestinians who collaborated with Israel on this were arrested.
• The French foreign minister calls on Israel to lift the sanctions and to freeze Jewish settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories.
• More security meetings between Palestinian and Israeli personnel took place but without any tangible results.
• The Israeli ex foreign minister Shlomo Ben Ami says: Sharon's military solution will not stop violence.
• An explosion in Netanya inside Israel, a booby-trapped car exploded close to an Israeli bus near a Jewish settlement in the West Bank and a bomb exploded inside a Jewish settlement. No casualties were reported.
• Peres's mission in Cairo and Amman appears to have failed.
• Instead of addressing the Israeli aggressor and occupier, the American administration is reported to have asked the Palestinians to 'quite things down'. Palestinian cabinet secretary Ahamad Abdul Rahaman says: The American position with regard to the Israeli aggression on the Palestinian people is not fair. America is siding with the aggressor against the victim.
• President Arafat was surprised by the announcement of a cease-fire. Ahamad qura' denies that he reached an agreement with Peres on a cease-fire. Qurai said Israel has to either accept the Egyptian Jordanian initiative in full or to reject it.

Sunday April 29, 2001

Main Headlines

• Today the Palestinian Intifada for independence begins its 8^th month. On the ground the Israeli occupation escalates its aggression against Palestinian life, land, homes and trees, while the Palestinian people persist in their demand to end the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land and to regain their freedom and independence.
• Israeli occupation troops assassinated a Palestinian man aged 27 in Ayda refugee camp near Bethlehem and injured his son and nephew both five years old. Israeli tanks using shells and heavy machine guns attacked Palestinian residential homes and police stations in Khan Younis, Dir El- balah and Bietunia.
• Jewish settlers burn 200 Olive trees near the Palestinian village of Salfit near Nablus.
• Palestinians fire five mortar shells on Jewish settlements in Gaza. Six Israeli young men were injured lightly. President Arafat ordered the enforcement of his decision not to fire mortars on Jewish settlements and to dismantle Palestinian popular resistance committees established recently in Gaza.
• The Israeli opposition leader Yosi Sarid is scheduled to meet President Arafat in Ramallah today, Sarid is said to have a proposal formulated by the opposition to stop the Palestinian Intifada in exchange for a freeze on Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories. Obviously Sarid is in no position to influence Sharon to freeze Jewish settlements. Sharon opposes totally the concept of removing Jewish settlements from the occupied Palestinian territories. On the contrary, he ordered the building of new settlements and expansion of many others. Tenders to this effect were published this month in Israeli papers.
• President Arafat meets EU Foreign Policy Coordinator Solana and EU peace envoy to the Middle East Moratinos. President Arafat updated his guests on the continuing Israeli army attacks on the Palestinian population and the latest developments on the political contacts taking place in the region now.
  President Arafat last night received a telephone call from US Secretary of State Collin Powel. So far the American administration did not find it fit to invite President Arafat to meet with the US President George W. Bush. According to Vise President Chenny, the time is not appropriate yet.
• A Palestinian official source said: Sharon's statements on Jewish settlements are very dangerous.
• The French Foreign Minister criticizes Sharon's policies in the occupied Palestinian territories and held the Israeli government headed by Sharon as responsible for the consequences of the siege Israel is imposing on the occupied Palestinian territories.
• Al- Bayan newspaper published in the United Arab Emirates reported yesterday that Israel uses depleted Uranium and other active material in bombs used to shell Palestinian targets and positions in the occupied Palestinian territories. Al Bayan said that analysis of bomb fragments used by Israel against the Palestinian people proved that.
• Palestinian preventative security chief Jebril Rajoub says: Israel is a state lead by the army. A Palestinian Israeli security meeting is scheduled to take place today.
• Always ingenious in its ways to dominate, oppress, and control the Palestinian people. Israel is building steel gates on main roads between Palestinian cities towns and villages. One of the first steel gates is built on the main Jenin Nablus road close to Arraba village. This steel gate is closed at 11 P.M preventing people from travel in between towns cities and villages after the said time. Previously, Israel built steel gates on roads leading to Jewish settlements and Jewish industrial areas built in the occupied Palestinian territories.
• President Mubarak of Egypt says: Russia undertook to play a more involved role in the Middle East peace process.
• Palestinian minister of international cooperation says: The PNA will not accept any initiative that precludes freezing Jewish settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories.
• The Palestinian Minister of Labor denies that Israel allowed 11 thousand Palestinian workers to return to work. Palestinian officials and the Palestinian public refute Israel's pretensions that it has eased sanctions and the siege it imposes on the Palestinian people in the occupied Palestinian territories.

Thursday April 26, 2001

Main Headlines

• As if it is not already under siege, the Israeli occupation government announces a complete closure on the occupied Palestinian territories in the West Bank, Gaza and Arab east Jerusalem.
• Israeli occupation troops commit another crime in Rafah / Gaza last night. A bomb operated by remote control was detonated killing four Palestinian policemen and injuring six, three, of whom seriously.
  Israeli tanks stationed in Jewish settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories indiscriminately shell Palestinian towns, cities and refugee camps. Biet Jala, Hebron, Rafah, Biet hanoun, Ayda and Azza Palestinian refugee camps were shelled last night. The Israeli occupation forces targeted Palestinian medical teams yesterday shooting and injuring at least one of them. The medical team was trying to collect body parts of the Palestinian policemen killed in the explosion.
• Jewish settlers in the heart of the Palestinian city of Hebron attack Palestinian civilians, destroy businesses and journalists covering the news in the area.
• Poverty percentages in the West Bank and Gaza reached 55.7% of the population in the West Bank and 81.4% of the population in Gaza. More than two million Palestinians suffer severe hardships and poverty. Israel is conducting a systematic campaign against the Palestinian population in the occupied Palestinian territories purpose of which is to destroy the Palestinian civil society through the destruction of the Palestinian economy and hindering the education process.
  Hundreds of thousands of Palestinian workers are hit by the Israeli closure and siege imposed on the Palestinian territories. The effect is directly and indirectly hitting the workforce and all sectors of the Palestinian economy. The education process is being affected very badly.
  The Israeli deliberate and systematic measures are slowly destroying the Palestinian society, all of this is being done by the Israeli government in a subtle and discrete way in a manner hides Israel's actions and real intentions from the world. The Israeli propaganda machine comprised of Israeli government media campaign supported by mainly Jewish writers, journalists, analysts and public relations groups in the United States and the West in general are serving the Israeli military machine which is literally killing Palestinian men women and children, destroying homes and businesses, uprooting trees and turning fertile agricultural land into vast areas of ugly deserts, and most dangerous of all blinding people of the world from seeing the reality and the consequences of Israel's actions on the ground against a Palestinian population struggling for its freedom, independence and to end this barbaric Israeli occupation of Palestinian land in the West bank, Gaza and Arab East Jerusalem.
• Many distinguished European officials are visiting Palestine and Israel in an attempt to broker a solution for the current deadlock. The foreign ministers of Belgium and Spain are currently in the area. So far nothing tangible is being done to stop the Israeli slow genocide practiced against the Palestinian people. The Palestinian people effectively have no hope. The European peoples, the EU. Canada, Australia, India, China, Russia and all others are called upon to stop the Israeli ongoing savage aggression against the Palestinian people and to end the Israeli occupation of our land, because the Israeli occupation is the root of the problem and the cause of the ongoing instability in the Middle East.
• President Mubarak of Egypt will receive the Israeli foreign minister in Cairo on Sunday. First Sharon rejected out of hand an Egyptian Jordanian initiative to resume peace negotiations between the PNA and Israel, the European Union gave their support to the initiative and the American side did not oppose it. On his part, Shimon Peres working as a marketing man for Sharon and his obstructive policies suggested that instead of Sharon rejecting the initiative, he should live with it and destabilize it from within through asking for changes on the terms of the initiative and eventually rendering ineffective without actually announcing his rejection to it. On Sunday, Peres is due in Cairo to discuss changes on the initiative as Peres suggested and Sharon accepted.

Tuesday April 24, 2001

Main Headlines

• A Palestinian boy 11 years old was shot and killed when Israeli occupation troops fired upon a funeral procession in Gaza yesterday, thirteen other Palestinians were injured. Israeli tanks opened fire on Palestinian homes and businesses in and around Biet Jala, Aida and Arroup refugee camps. The Israeli occupation forces also attempted to storm Rafah refugee camp to destroy more Palestinian homes, Palestinian resistance rebuffed them.
• Israel continues its illegal digging underneath the Aqsa Mosque. Recently, Israel asked UNISCO to postpone a visit by one of its representatives from visiting Jerusalem to investigate the ongoing excavations done by Israel since 1967. Israel's excavations underneath the Aqsa Mosque are endangering the structure of the Aqsa Mosque.
• President Arafat reiterated his commitment to signed agreements with Israel and asks the EU to increase its efforts to save the peace process. President Carter calls on the new Bush administration to renew credibility for the United States in the region.
• Ex-President of the United States Bill Clinton believes that President Arafat Wants to achieve peace with Israel.
• Israel is reported to have softened its opposition to the Jordanian- Egyptian initiative to resume peace talks with the Palestinian people. Palestinian observers are suspicious of Sharon's intentions particularly in light of his repeated positions with regard to withdrawing from occupied Palestinian territories, stopping Jewish settlements and arriving at a final status agreement with the Palestinian people. Peres is reported to be behind the apparent cosmetic change in Sharon's position.
• Members of the Israeli cabinet from the Likud differ in their positions with regard to President Arafat. The most extreme of those is Israeli minister of police Uzi Landau. Others are silent particularly with regard to Sharon's zigzaging policies. Landau is taking an extreme stance, it appears, because he is competing with Netanyahu on the leadership of the Likud. Both Netanyahu and Landau have been attacking President Arafat recently.
  In the Israeli public eye, there is no one more extreme than Sharon, he was elected on a security for Israeli ticket, some thing that appears to be not within Sharon's grasp. Hence, the ground is being prepared in the Israeli right wing camp to choose some one who is more extreme to satisfy Jewish extremists lust for more killing and destruction for the Palestinian people. Landau is demanding and pushing to do just land. Netanyahu is staring to appear one again on the scene.
  To observers both Israelis and Palestinians, this is a sign reflecting the apparent failure of Sharon thus far in the eyes of the right in Israel.
• Eight Israelis were reported lightly injured due to a car explosion near Tel- Aviv. In a drive by shooting near Tel Aviv, an Israeli was shot dead, investigators say the drive by shooting was a result of Mafia like conflict in the area.
• Palestinian Minister of Information and Culture says: A Palestinian delegation is expected to visit Washington soon.
• As Israeli occupation soldiers increase their attacks on Palestinian journalists,- latest victims of which - was Laila Odeh a senior correspondent for Abu Dhabi Satellite TV station who was shot in the leg by an Israeli live bullet while covering the destruction of Palestinian homes by Israeli bulldozers and tanks near Rafah last Friday.
  Palestinian journalists began a protest campaign designed to pressure the Israeli government to take measures against those who harass and attack Palestinian journalists and to expose Israel's so called freedom granted to the press.
• A fifteen-minute meeting was held yesterday between Palestinian and Israeli security personnel near Gaza yesterday. Another meeting lasting for three hours was held at the premises of the American embassy in Tel- Aviv last night.
• Washington warns its citizens from travelling to Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories including Arab east Jerusalem.
• Usama El- Baz, special advisor to President Mubarak says: Egypt does not fear Israel. El- Baz added that Israel can not attack Egypt, because such an action would mean the last nail in Israel's coffin.
• The Israeli Prime minister said to have signed a document allowing building a train track linking Gaza and the West Bank to be used as a safe passage between the two areas.

Monday April 23, 2001

Main Headlines

• An Israeli was killed and fifty others injured in an explosion in Kfar Saba in Israel. A Palestinian suicide bomber is said to have been behind the explosion. Sheik Ahmad Yassin of Hamas said this comes as a result of the bloody cycle waged by Israel against the Palestinian people. Fatah and the PNA denied any responsibility for this operation and a member of the Palestinian cabinet said, the PNA condemns any killings of civilians be they Israelis or Palestinians.
• Israel bombs Palestinian residential areas in Gaza. A Palestinian policeman died of his wounds sustained last week. The main Salah El- Din Street was closed by Israeli occupation forces and Palestinians were prevented from movement on this main road.
• Palestinian families are destitute in Gaza and the West Bank. Israeli bulldozers razed Palestinian homes to the ground. The percentage of Palestinian families not being able to meet their basic needs in terms of food, medicine and essential life services are on the increase. Whole families throughout the Palestinian country areas are dependent on material help and donations from charity organizations.
• President Arafat will meet in Ramallah today both the foreign minister of Spain and the foreign minister of Belgium.
• Meretz leader - leader of the Israeli opposition Yosi Sarid says: Conditions under Sharon are worse than what they were under Barak.
  83% of the Israeli public feel unsafe living in Israel.
• Israeli sources expect a meeting soon between President Arafat and Shimon Peres.
• Ahmad Qurai, head of the PLC says: Contacts between the PNA and Israel are focussing on the Jordanian Egyptian initiative.
• King Abdullah II of Jordan says: The area can not bear any longer the prevailing tense situation.
• Egypt questions the silence of Shimon Peres with regard to Sharon's excessive use of force against the Palestinian population.
• Syria reiterates its commitment to respond to the Israeli air raid on its base in Lebanon last week.
• Fatah denies any relation to a communiqué issued in its name adopting the suicide attack in Kfar Saba.
• Secretary General of the Arab League calls for an international peace conference on the Middle East. Madrid II.
• Head of the Palestinian general intelligence says, more meetings are scheduled with the Israeli side.
• Israel arrested a Jordanian and accused him of smuggling weapons.

Sunday April 22, 2001

Main Headlines

• During Mr. Sharon's six weeks in office, he has gone beyond his predecessor, Ehud Barak, in the use of tanks, helicopters and heavy automatic rifle fire against Palestinian civilians and military targets. In recent weeks, Israel also has begun to use surface-to-surface missiles to bombard Gaza.
• Bethlehem was shelled for at least two hours Wednesday, the most persistent attack on a Palestinian town since the latest round of Israeli - Palestinian conflicts erupted last September. The targets selected for shelling were economic ones; not only was a stone cutting factory severely damaged, but Israeli tanks bombarded a new conference center on the southern end of the city. The buildings are integral parts of Bethlehem's major industries; stone working and tourism. And then the Israelis moved into Gaza, if only for 24 hours. Facets of Sharon's strategy have been in full view during recent weeks. Dozens of homes on the edges of the Khan Younis and Rafah refugee camps in Gaza were destroyed. But the tin roofed, one-story houses, set close to one another, are not suitable for launching mortars and most offered no line of fire for snipers. The houses were destroyed to punish the Palestinians and hundreds of residents were left homeless. (Part of a report by Daniel Williams - Washington Post service.)
• With the Americans taking an isolationist stance, the thinking in Israel went, the Israeli forces would be able to make use of all the force at its disposal to combat Palestinian (resistance) that is limited in its capability. The Israeli forces started with rubber-coated steel bullets and live bullets fired at stone throwers, volleys of missiles launched at police stations, liquidations that resembled contract killings, and it ended with ground operations in Area A (under full Palestinian control). All this continued uninterrupted and threatened to extend the confrontations, while also inducing the Palestinians to respond as intensively as they could. When Israel enters the city of Khan Younis in the Gaza strip and demolishes dozens of homes, the Palestinian Authority cannot, and perhaps should not, sit idly by. It owes its people a reaction. And then, when the Palestinians escalated the use of their wretched weapons, Israel drew its Doomsday weapon: the re-conquest of Area A. With the dangerous trinity- Ariel Sharon, Benjamin Ben- Eliezer and Shaul Mofaz-it was clear that a re-occupation was only a matter of time.
  It was just at this juncture that Powell - US Secretary of State - intervened, showing magnificent timing. It is clear that the Israelis and the Palestinians will not be able to reach a viable settlement. It is equally clear that in the absence of a settlement the situation will continue to deteriorate and the bloodshed will continue to intensify. There is nothing wrong with Israel saying to the international community: We have failed in our attempt to find a solution, we are too violent and the Palestinians too violent - so come and help us. American and European troops separating the Palestinians from the Israelis can be good news for everyone concerned. Let's issue the invitation. If we can not help ourselves, at least let the world help us. (The above is Part of Gideon Levy's article in Ha'aretz April 22, 2001)
• Joint Palestinian Israeli security meeting took place yesterday near Gaza. The Palestinian side presented the Israelis with a memorandum detailing Israel's violations and the measures Israel should take to reduce violence. The Israeli side described the meeting as positive.
  President Arafat suggested a joint Israeli Palestinian declaration confirming their adherence to the Sharm understandings and the acceptance of the Jordanian Egyptian initiative. A Palestinian source said that Palestinian Israeli contacts are taking place, they can not however be described as negotiations. The contacts are more of brain storming sessions to find ways on how to calm the situation.
• The Israeli occupation army storms into Rafah again and destroys a Palestinian police position. Israeli occupation soldiers prevent Israeli and Palestinian peace activists from distributing food to Palestinian villages under siege.
• Palestinian families who were made destitute due to Israel's destruction of their homes are having very hard times trying to reconstruct their lives. Women, men and children, old and young people with no work and no schools sleep in the open, no sanitary, no running water and no place to prepare food to feed their children. The Israeli soldiers go into Palestinian residential area firing on people and property, destroy Palestinian homes and businesses and leave people destitute.
• President Mubarak of Egypt describes the Israeli Prime Minister Sharon as some one who is only interested in violence. The German newsmagazine Der Spiegel quoted President Mubarak as saying: "Sharon wants to force the Palestinian people to follow his line." President Mubarak also said that Sharon had extinguished any glimmer of hope that had followed the 1993 Oslo Accords.
• The Arab League is preparing to send a delegation to Washington, to the EU and to the UN to explain the gravity of the deteriorating situation in the Middle East.

Saturday April 21, 2001

Main Headlines

• For the first time since Sharon accompanied by his soldiers stormed into the courtyard of Al- Aqsa Mosque back in September, the Israeli occupation repeated its actions yesterday. The Islamic Wakf condemned this provocative action and warned of the sequences of such intrusions by Israeli occupation forces into the third holiest places of Islam in Arab Jerusalem. Palestinians demonstrated in Jerusalem yesterday protesting the Israeli continuing occupation of the Palestinian city.
• The destruction, the agony, and suffering is reaching each and every Palestinian home. Sharon's occupation soldiers, tanks and bulldozers are spreading death to people, to plants and to animals. Sharon is killing life in the occupied Palestinian territories. The Bush Administration gave Sharon the green light and he used it most efficiently. American money, American weapons and American political support. Some say, the American people are not supporting Israel's barbaric actions, some say it is the Jews who are pulling the strings in Washington, some say Bush is not all there. The problem is, Sharon feels that he has a green light to wreak destruction on the Palestinian people in the occupied Palestinian territories. Who is going to stop him?
• The Israeli occupation troops stormed Al- Aqsa Mosque yesterday and tightened its siege on Arab East Jerusalem. Two babies one 20 days old boy and a six-month-old baby girl died yesterday from suffocation. The Israeli occupation troops fired poisonous gas bombs into Palestinian homes in Shufat refugee camp north of Jerusalem where the baby girl died and into Al-Khader towns where the family of the baby boy lived.
• The Palestinian leadership considers the escalating Israeli aggression on the Palestinian population as a crossing of all red lines. The Palestinian leadership condemns the dangerous political and military adventures of the current Israeli government, and calls on the world community to stop the Israeli on going murderous attacks on the Palestinian people.
• The so-called easing of the siege on Gaza is not felt by the Palestinian population of Gaza. Gaza is still divided into sections and people find it very difficult to move from one section to another. Israeli troops hinder the traffic and search all cars, in the process delays of up to three hours can take in order to cross from one point into another.
• Secret talks said to be taking place within the UN framework to deescalate tension in the Middle East and to return to the negotiation tables. France is not optimistic that peace talks can be resumed soon. Russia says, the situation in the Middle East deteriorated to its status before the Madrid Conference ten years ago.
• Sharon reiterated his objections to a return to peace negotiations, refused a call from President Arafat for a joint address to both peoples to stop all forms of violence, and refused a solution on Jerusalem.
• An Israeli plan to expand Jewish settlements in Arab East Jerusalem plans to build more houses for Jewish settlers in the old city of Jerusalem, in Silwan and other neighborhoods in the Arab city. The Palestinian leadership calls on the international community to stop Jewish settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories and to stop the continuing Israeli aggression on unarmed Palestinian civilian population.
• An Israeli opposition leader describes Shimon Peres as a handbag carrier for the Israeli Prime Minister Sharon. Yossi Beilin, a justice minister in the government of the previous government of Ehud Barak says: Living by the sword isn't the solution for Israel. Yossi Beilin article with this title can be read in the opinion page on this home page.
• An American official says: The Bush administration is increasing its intervention in the Middle East in order to defuse an escalating situation.
• An American LawMaker says, Sharon turned down a proposal made by President Arafat to issue a joint anti violence statements by both President Arafat and the Israeli premier to their peoples.

Thursday April 19, 2001

Main Headlines

• Israel shells Palestinian residential areas in Gaza, Silwad, Bethlehem and Jericho, Israeli tanks invade Gaza again and leave. Palestinian police positions were hit, homes, cars, businesses are being destroyed and people killed and injured.
• The destruction in Biet Hanoun brings back the memories of 1967 when Israel invaded the West Bank and Gaza.
• In a letter to President Bush, President Arafat calls on Washington to pressure Israel to stop its aggression on the Palestinian people.
• Peres justifies the aggression and says the solution to the Palestinian Israeli conflict can only be political.
• The PNA welcomes the recent American position. Head of the Palestinian Legislative Council says: The United States proved that it can be effective in its role in the peace process.
• Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat says: Sharon is trying to destroy the PNA . Proxies for Sharon and ministers in his government openly call for 'doing away' with President Arafat and the dismantling of the PNA. Sharon is slowly doing just that.
• Assistant Secretary of State Ned Walker says: The US will have a more visible role to bring quite back in preparation for the resumption of peace talks between the Palestinian leadership and Israel.
• President Bush extends the Law for the PLO to have diplomatic offices in Washington.
• The Foreign Minister of France says: The situation in the Middle East is the worse since 15 years.
• Official sources in Sharon's office say: Sharon rejects the Jordanian Egyptian initiative to return to peace talks.
• The Israeli ambassador to France confesses his government crossed redlines. M. Moratinus, special EU peace envoy to the Middle East condemns Israel's show of brutal strength.
• Israel is said to be fearful of the Mitchell report investigating reasons behind the eruption of violence in the Middle East.
• The Security Council is worried by the Israeli aggression on the occupied Palestinian territories. European and international criticism is voiced against the continuing Israeli attacks on the Palestinian people under Israeli occupation.
• The Pope voices his concern on the violence in the Holy Land and urges all to consider deploying voice of reason to replace the sound of battle to solve and find a just solution in the Holy Land.
• Sharon received criticism from his ministers for not informing them of his plans to reoccupy Gaza last Monday. It is expected that differences between Sharon and his occupation army will increase as each blames the other for the 'mismanagement' of the operation to reoccupy parts of Gaza.

Wednesday April 18, 2001

Main Headlines

• After midnight last night, the Israeli occupation destroyed and burned more than 30 Palestinian homes in Hebron. Israeli tanks bombarded almost all neighborhoods in the Palestinian city of 120 thousand. Five hundred Jewish extremists settlers occupied parts of the city center, and a massive Israeli occupation force is there to 'protect' them.
• Washington moved. Israel withdrew its occupation forces from Biet hanoun in Gaza.
• President Arafat describes Israel's actions in Gaza as unforgivable crime. And president Mubarak of Egypt tells Sharon enough is enough.
• The Israeli occupation troops leave a trail of destruction and terror in Gaza. Human lives literally torn to pieces. Unable to collect the torn pieces of Mohammad Al- Masri's body who received a direct hit from an Israeli tank, ambulance crews and Palestinian civilians were unable to collect his body parts scattered on a large area. Crew and civilians came under Israeli tank fire.
• The Israeli occupation forces kill four Palestinians including young boys and teenagers. Bara Al- Shaer 9 years old was hit by two Israeli bullets fired from a heavy machine gun placed on an Israeli tank occupying Gaza. Two teenagers, Hamza Obiad 15 years and Rami Mousa 16 years were also murdered by Israeli occupation troops. Scores of Palestinian civilians many of them children and women were injured by the indiscriminate Israeli gunfire against the Palestinian civilian population in Gaza, Hebron, Bethlehem, Biet Jala; Al- Khader and Housan.
• President Arafat sent a letter to President Bush detailing to him the Israeli atrocities in the occupied Palestinian territories.
• Collin Powel demands that Israeli occupation troops leave immediately. Amman is awaiting Israeli reply to the joint Jordanian Egyptian initiative. The EU declares its inability to do anything to stop the deterioration in the Middle East as Sharon escalate the situation further and further.
• Sharon is back to his true self. The mask he put on his face during the election campaign is removed. The war criminal of Sabra and Shatilla is back. This time murdering Palestinian children, men and women in Gaza and the west Bank.
• Israel builds a virtual 'third temple' for people to see on TV screens in a museum built close to the Mugrabi gate in Arab East Jerusalem.
• President Mubarak warns Sharon not to delve into the unknown. Washington says Israel has no right to reoccupy Palestinian land under PNA control.
• A Palestinian official spokesman says: Israel will not make the Palestinian people kneel.
• The Arabs feel humiliation due to their inability to do any thing against the Israeli military attacks on the Palestinian civilian population in the occupied Palestinian territories.
• As Israel describes Palestinian security forces 'terrorists' Palestinian security officials will not attend future security meetings with Israelis.
• President Bashar Al- Asad says: Israel must be held responsible for the results of its actions. Lebanon asks the Arab league to meet and discuss the latest Israeli aggression on its soil.
• Thousands of Palestinians demonstrated yesterday commemorating " prisoners day" calling on the world community to release Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.
• More than 300 Palestinian children have been arrested by the Israeli occupation forces since September. According to a report by the International Secretariat of the World Organization Against Torture based in Geneva, Palestinian children and teenagers have been tortured mentally and physically. OMCT said, 100 youth have been detained at Maggido prison under the direct authority of the Israeli occupation forces, 20 in Prisons under Israeli occupation control in the West Bank, Eighty youths in Sharon and Tel Mond prisons and two teenage girls incarcerated at a women prison in Neve Tirtza prison in Ramla.
• Saudi Arabia condemns the Israeli attacks on the occupied Palestinian territories and Lebanon.
• Russia is said to be worried by the escalating situation in the Middle east.
• The head of the Israeli Shabak accuses President Arafat of smuggling weapons in his plane!

Tuesday April 17, 2001

Main Headlines

• In a gathering commemorating the 13th anniversary of Abu Jihad martyrdom, and speaking on behalf of President Arafat, Tayeb Abdulraheem said, the Palestinian hands are extended for a just and durable peace. And the Palestinian people will never surrender their rights.
• Israeli air raids on Gaza and Dier Al- Balah. Israeli tanks shell Biet Jala Tulkarm, Ayda refugee camp and Al- Khader near Bethlehem.
• In Hebron Israeli occupation forces bombard Abu Sneneh neighborhood and attempted to assassinate a Palestinian man. The man whose car was damaged received light injuries to his hand and shoulder, and was transferred to hospital.
• Sharon's government decides to partition Gaza into three areas separated from each other. Imagine what is this doing to peoples lives, unable to move, work or go to hospital. Israeli tanks storm into Biet Hanoun in Gaza destroying Palestinian homes. Israeli helicopters fly in the Gaza skies unchallenged delivering death to the Palestinian population. Israeli gunboats shell Palestinian positions from the sea. The Palestinian population has no arms to defend themselves against tanks airplanes or gunboats. The 'heroic' Israeli occupation army is fighting a Palestinian police force armed with light machine guns and a civilian population resisting the Israeli occupation with stones.
• Israeli occupation soldiers killed a Palestinian young man after he stabbed one of them while searching a Palestinian village.
• Forty six thousand Palestinian students will set the Tawjihi exam (GCSE) on June 9 this year. The Tawjihi exam will take place as scheduled.
• President Arafat meets king Abdullah in Jordan and describes the Jordanian Egyptian peace initiative as very important.
• The Israeli Chief of Staff warns the situation is deteriorating further.
• The Israeli occupation authorities in Arab East Jerusalem destroy graves belonging to the Roman Orthodox church in the grounds of the Church of All Nations"in East Jerusalem.
• An ex State Department official says: Washington can not withdraw from the peace process.
• The Israeli raid on Syrian positions in Lebanon is a dangerous step and will increase hostilities.
• The Jordanian Foreign Minister met Israeli officials in Tel Aviv and condemned the Israeli aggression on Syria and Lebanon.
• A security meeting between Palestinian and Israeli personnel was cancelled yesterday.
• President Mubarak of Egypt calls on the international community to assume its responsibilities and intervene on behalf of peace in the Middle East.
• American officials say: The continuing confrontations in the Middle East will hurt American interests in the region. Saudi Arabia warns the US of its continuing support to Israel.
• The Arab countries condemn Israel's attacks on Syrian positions in Lebanon. Israel is still threatening Arab countries saying the rules of the game have changed and the United States is accused of colluding with Israel. Hizbullah of Lebanon says: Sharon's dreams of security will be turned into a nightmare.
• Israel said to be searching for a mortar bomb factory in Gaza.
• The Syrian Foreign Minister Farouq Al- Shara'a says: Israel will pay a heavy price for its aggression in time.

Monday April 16, 2001

Main Headlines

• The Israeli army escalates its aggression against Rafah. Sharon's tanks and heavy machine-guns indiscriminately shell and hit Palestinian homes, business premises and residential areas. Thirty Palestinians including women ands children were seriously injured. The attacks by the Israeli occupation forces on Rafah is the second in the last two days.
• The Independent newspaper of London reported today on the demolishing of Palestinian homes asking if what is happening in the occupied Palestinian territories a tragedy or is it a war crime committed by the current Israeli government?
• An Israeli raid on Lebanon. The targets are a Syrian Radar position and other military installations. Three Syrian soldiers were reported killed and several injured.
• Olmert municipality plans to destroy more Palestinian homes in Arab East Jerusalem. Faisal Hussieni urges Palestinians in Jerusalem to resist Israeli occupation bulldozers with their bodies if necessary.

Sunday April 15, 2001

Main Headlines

• Sharon's occupation forces destroy 28 Palestinian homes and businesses. In an attack on area A in Rafah, the Israeli occupation troops supported by tanks and bulldozers razed 28 homes and injured 44 Palestinian civilians five of them seriously. During the night, Israeli tanks shelled the Austrian neighborhood in Khan Younis injuring many more Palestinian civilians.
  Israeli tanks and heavy machine guns placed in Jewish settlements in Gaza are being used to kill maim and destroy Palestinians while in their homes. Sharon's government is implementing its declared policies of razing row after row of Palestinian homes.
  On Wednesday, this happened in Khan Younis refugee camp, and now in Rafah. This policy is also used in Arab East Jerusalem, in Al- Khader , and near all Palestinian towns, villages and cities, this is being done to limit the expansion of Palestinian neighborhoods and to keep the Palestinian population in large concentration camps, deprived of freedom, of movement, from education, from health and from work. All this is happening while the world is watching, not doing any thing to stop this fascist and racist government of Sharon.
• The Palestinian leadership congratulates the Palestinian Christian community and all Christians throughout the world on the occasion of Good Friday and Easter celebrations.
• A missile fired by Hizbullah forces in southern Lebanon against an Israeli tank kills an Israeli soldier. Hizbullah affirms that its resistance to the Israeli occupation of Sheba'a farm will continue until its complete liberation. Shiekh Hassan Nasrallah of Hizbullah vowed to come to the help of the Palestinian people when Israel escalates its attacks on Palestinian civilians in the occupied Palestinian territories. Many view this attack on an Israeli tank as a warning to Israel not to escalate its atrocities against unarmed Palestinian civilian population resisting the Israeli occupation.
• Secretary general of the Palestinian Cabinet Ahmad Abdul rahaman said yesterday: Peace negotiations with Sharon are a waist of time. This man (Sharon) is not interested in peace. Commenting on the coming visit of the Jordanian foreign minister to Tel Aviv on Monday and his meetings with Israeli officials, Abdul Rahaman said, the Palestinian people and leadership do not expect much of this visit.
• Christian communities in Palestine celebrated Good Friday and Easter Sunday. Church leaders in Jerusalem said, the celebrations were limited to religious ceremonies due to the suffering of the Palestinian people and the Arab City of Jerusalem. Michele Sabbah, the Patriarch of the holy land said: it is the right of the Palestinian people to establish its independent state with Arab Jerusalem as its capital and it is the right of the Palestinian refugees to return home.
• Three Israelis were hurt in two explosions in Kfar Saba.
• The United Arab Emirates says: Washington is totally biased in favor of Israel. This is causing frustration in the Arab world. But apparently Washington could not care less.
• Israel bombarded southern Lebanon. Earlier, an Israeli soldier was killed when an Israeli tank was hit by a direct from a missile fired by Hizbullah fighters in south Lebanon.
• A Palestinian man who was injured and paralyzed by Israeli gunfire in the first Intifada died in hospital yesterday. Jihad Abu Samour 30 years old died in Biet Jalah Hospital from injuries received in his spine that left half of his body paralyzed for the last 12 years.

Saturday April 14, 2001

Main Headlines

• Palestinian civilian demonstrations against the Israeli occupation take place throughout the occupied Palestinian territories. Seventeen Palestinian civilians were wounded when Israeli occupation forces used live fire and steel plastic coated bullets against them.
• Palestinian families who lost their homes when Israel destroyed them last Wednesday April 11, are now living in tents on the ruins of their destroyed homes.
• The Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon describes President Arafat as being the ' biggest enemy of Israel.' Sharon excludes any dismantling of any Jewish settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories and does not utter the word 'peace' - a word not in his vocabulary- even in the context he propagated in his pre election campaign.
  Uzi Landau, Sharon's minister of police wants a systematic bombardment of Palestinian institutions including Palestinian TV and Radio stations until the Palestinian people and the PNA surrender to Israel both militarily and politically, and Olmert, Mayor of West Jerusalem- East Jerusalem Palestinians do not recognize him as mayor, and do not participate in the elections- says he will strengthen Jewish presence in the city adding that the Aqsa Mosque in its entirety is Jewish, and promises that his 'municipality together with the Israeli ministry of police will destroy more Palestinian homes according to him built without Israeli permissions- Israel scarcely grant permissions for Palestinians to build in Arab East Jerusalem - its building is exclusive for Jews, Palestinians can only have their ID's confiscated and their homes demolished.
• According to Palestinian security sources, Israel sent a booby-trapped car into Ramallah with the aim of killing Palestinians. The Palestinian who was given the car for his use got suspicious, informed Palestinian security after which the car was moved to an empty space where it exploded.
• Sharon offers the Palestinian people a state on 42% of the West Bank and 70% of Gaza. The West Bank according to Sharon does not include Arab East Jerusalem, an area according to Israel's planning represents 17% of the occupied West Bank occupied by Israel in 1967. According to Sharon, this state will be unarmed, not in control of its borders, does not control what is underneath its soil, and can not have any agreements with any other state apart from Israel.
• Palestinian and world Christians celebrate Good Friday and Easter Sunday this week. Palestinian Christians can not enter Arab East Jerusalem effectively being barred from their holy places, most important of which are the Church of Holy Sepulcher and the Via Deloroza.
• Palestinian officials say, Sharon wants to return the Middle East into the era of no peace and no war, some thing that can not be sustained.
• Israeli writers, journalists and newspapers say Sharon's honeymoon is over.
• According to the British newspaper the Independent: Israel employed 4000 of its personnel to murder the Palestinian second in Command Abu Jihad back in 1988.
• Egypt says: the return of its ambassador to Tel- Aviv is subject to Israel accepting the Jordanian Egyptian initiative to resume peace negotiations.

Thursday April 12, 2001

Main Headlines

• Four Palestinians were killed and fifty injured by Israeli occupation tank and machine gunfire Thursday early morning. Israeli tanks and bulldozers stormed into the Palestinian refugee camp in Khan Younis /Gaza and destroyed 31 homes. Hundreds of men women and children are made homeless, they lost every thing they got.
• Israeli occupation tanks shelling the Palestinian neighborhood of Abu Sneneh in Hebron injured six Palestinians, burned and destroyed many Palestinian homes.
• Sharon's occupation army is waging a war of annihilation and destruction against the Palestinian people resisting the Israeli barbaric occupation, an ambulance catering for injured Palestinians, victims of Israeli gunfire in Hebron was hit by Israeli fire injuring all of its crew. Earlier, in Gaza, a Palestinian doctor was killed while treating two others victims of Israeli surface to surface missiles Israel is using against unarmed Palestinian population under Israeli occupation.
• In addition to daily tank shelling and missiles, the Israeli occupation army is still placing an impossible siege on the occupied Palestinian territories. The suffering and difficulties endured by the Palestinian people is very difficult to describe. Many hidden tragedies are not known, a whole population is being strangled, while the world community is watching. Sharon's occupation government is going ahead with its atrocities using American made weapons and American green light for its actions. Sharon sends more of his occupation troops into Jewish settlements in Gaza and the West Bank.
• Answering a question on Rabbi Ovadia Yosef 's speech to his followers on annihilation of Arabs, President Bush answered, violence must stop first!
• Under President Bush, the United States government vetoes a UN Security Council resolution calling for dispatching international protection force to the occupied Palestinian territories. Israel along with the US, actually supported by the US refuses any international observer force to come into Palestine to establish one and for all who is who is the aggressor and who is the victim in this conflict.
• Terje Larson, the UN representative in the occupied Palestinian territories says: Violence will spiral if political steps are not taken. Political negotiations are the only way to stop violence.
• An ex Israeli minister says: The Palestinian leadership is ready to return to peace negotiations. Yossi Bielin informed the Israeli Radio of President Arafat's willingness to return to the negotiating table on the basis of an Egyptian Jordanian initiative to resume negotiations. Sharon rejected the said initiative and dismissed it out of hand. His Foreign Minister Shemon Peres however said that an initiative put forward by PLC head Ahmad Qurai based on the Egyptian Jordanian initiative is 'interesting.'
• After a meeting with Israeli army and security officers in the presence of American observers, head of Palestinian Intelligence Amin Al- Hindi said: The Israelis promised to end their aggression on the Palestinian people and another meeting is scheduled for this Monday.
• In his meeting with American Secretary of State Collin Powel, President Jack Chiraq of France expressed his worries on the escalating situation in the Middle East. France condemned the Israeli attack on the Palestinian refugee camp in Gaza.
• American Palestinian contacts are limited to President Arafat and Secretary of State Collin Powel.
• Instructions from President Arafat to allocate forty apartments to house the victims of Sharon's attack on the Palestinian refugee camp of Khan Younis.

Wednesday April 11, 2001

Main Headlines

• The US based Human Rights Watch organization released a communiqué stating that Israeli occupation forces were responsible for the most extensive abuses, including excessive use of force against unarmed Palestinian demonstrators, unlawful killings, indiscriminate and disproportionate fire against Palestinian attacks, and a consistent failure to protect Palestinians from attacks by Jewish settlers.
• A Palestinian medical doctor was killed and twenty for others were injured yesterday after Israeli surface to surface missiles hit Palestinian positions both police and civilian in Gaza yesterday. Sharon's occupation government has planned to continue in its wild aggression against the Palestinian people under occupation. Sharon is using all his arsenal supplied by the United states to enforce a surrender on a Palestinian population armed with their love for their land and struggling for Palestinian freedom and living in dignity.
• Under the protection of the Israeli occupation army and police, the so-called "temple mount faithful" group conducts a provocative walk in Arab East Jerusalem.
• Sharon threatens the Palestinian people and asks the Israeli public to wait and see. Shemon Peres defends Israel's bombardment of Palestinian neighborhoods in Gaza and Bietunia. Sharon's occupation government plans to build 5000 housing units for Jewish settlers on occupied Palestinian land.
• European NGO's call for international protection for the Palestinian people.
• To the Palestinian people, the Israeli occupation is one of the most degrading aspect ever witnessed by humanity. Israelis/ Jews control every movement of Palestinian life in the occupied Palestinian territories, Israelis decide when a Palestinian move and when he cant, decides what the Palestinian buy and what he cant, a Palestinian can be arrested in the middle of the night, his home demolished without even any prior notice, Israelis on the gates of Palestinian towns armed with tanks, helicopter gunships, heavy machine guns, money and support from the strongest nation on earth, the United States of America is given the green light to do what ever it sees fit in the occupied Palestinian territories assured always of financial, military and political support from the United States. Without the backing Israel receives from the United States Israel can not violate Palestinian human rights, can not maintain its occupation and can not stay as an occupying power playing a death game with the Palestinian civilian population in the occupied Palestinian territory.
• President Bush insists on stopping violence and King Abdullah of Jordan emphasizes the American role in the peace process in the Middle East.
• The American General Consul in Jerusalem said yesterday: The American policy towards peace in the area remains the same, adding that the Americans called on Israel to ease its restrictions against Palestinian areas. Palestinians do not know what to make of such American statements, probably air bubbles that do not mean anything, or perhaps meant to cover the real American pro Israeli position.
• An Israeli writer recently wrote the following: The machine of the official Jewish establishment and its Israeli offshoot nauseates many Jews. Israeli government commits war crimes on a day-to-day basis. It is run by a certified mass murderer. The unprecedented siege, mass starvation, and summary executions are now routine. Bombing and shelling civilians are no longer anything to get worked up about. Many Jews see it, and are ready to say so in a cozy 'enter-nous' environment. They read news from Israel with resignation and disgust, like an English Victorian squire learning of the new exploits of his wild brother in a far away colony.
• In an article in the Herald Tribune, Henry Siegman (a senior fellow at the Council of Foreign Relations) wrote the following: Although it should be obvious, it seems not to be understood by either Israel or the United States that the demand that Israel's new government has put forward for unconditional cessation of Palestinian violence before negotiations resume is, in effect, a demand that Palestinians accept continuation of the occupation. After all, most members of Israel's current government believe that Israel no longer needs to change the status quo other than around the margin. The vast imbalance of power between the parties has masked the reality of Israel's use of that power to maintain the status quo- occupation. The occupation is rarely seen by Israelis or by the international community, as a resort to violence. Only Palestinian Intifada's are immediately recognized as violence. Palestinians believe that Israel is in violation of the Oslo accords because of its construction of Jewish settlements in the West Bank, and changes in Jerusalem designed to foreclose Palestinian claims.
  To Palestinians an unconditional agreement to end 'violence' means return to open-ended occupation. It also leaves Israel free to continue with its own form of violence - continued settlement in the West Bank. This they will not agree to.

Tuesday April 10, 2001

Main Headlines

• A Jewish Rabbi named Ovadia Yosef so called spiritual mentor of Shas, a right wing extremist party with 17 members in the Israeli Knesset (parliament) calls for the annihilation of Arabs. The Rabbi wished that the Arabs, are' eliminated from earth'. He recommended that Sharon's government uses Missiles "Ala Kief Kafak' i.e. the most powerful and destructive missiles that exist to eliminate Arabs.
• In the meantime, Sharon's surface to surface guided missiles, and tanks are bombarding Palestinian residential areas, homes, schools and police stations. Sharon's missiles and bombs murdered two Palestinian civilians and four children were seriously wounded. A Kindergarten and a girl's school were targeted in Bietonia near Ramallah.
• Israel's foreign minister Shemon Peres rejects's international objections to the continuing settlement building and expansion in the occupied Palestinian territories. Peres, a mouth peace for Sharon, a marketing manager in charge of adding some cosmetics on Sharon's government ugly policies is doing his best to destroy what ever left of his credibility as a man of peace. Peres lost most if not all of his credibility with the Palestinian people. An advocate of Sharon's policies, the father of all settlements, Peres has no credence what so ever.
• According to Ha'aretz, settlement plans so far for this year are like this:
  Plots for the construction of 225 houses will be sold in Alfei Menashe settlement, plots for 1328 houses at Ma'aleh Adumim, 92 housing units in Giv'at Zeev, Givat Benyamin 388, 594 housing units and 414 plots in upper Beitar, 340 units in Efrat, 6000 housing units to be built in a new settlement called Gvaot, 200 in Karnie Shomron, and 650 in Ariel. All those settlements and many more others are built illegally on land stolen from the Palestinian people, land Israel occupied by force in 1967.
• Yossi Beilin, a leading figure in the Israeli Labor party says: A return to the Clinton paper is inevitable, the PNA is our only partner …and the alternative to Hamas. Beilin also said, the day Sharon was elected is a black day and can only lead to evil.
• A Palestinian senior politician says: What is required now is a world pressure to make Israel freeze all settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territories and a commitment from the Israeli government to honor signed agreements and understandings reached with the Palestinian leadership.
• Koffi Annan offers his services to resume peace negotiations between the Palestinian people and Israel.
• Saudi Arabia accuses Israel of destroying peace efforts and calls on the international community to interfere to save the peace process.
• Israel says yes and no to the Egyptian Jordanian initiative to resume Palestinian Israeli negotiations. Israel says yes to the items in the initiative that suits her and says no to those items that does not. Israel particularly refuses the items in the initiative calling for a complete stop to building and expanding Jewish settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories particularly in Arab east Jerusalem. The Palestinian people say Jewish settlements on Palestinian land and peace are two lines that can never meet.
• President Arafat will visit Amman and meet King Abdullah upon his return from Washington.
• American attempts are being exerted to arrive at a deal based on the interim agreements and the understandings of Sharm el- Shiekh between the PNA and Israel.
• In a letter from Sharon to Powel, Sharon regrets opening fire on the convoy of Palestinian officials returning from a meeting with Israeli and American security officials in Tel Aviv. A similar letter was not sent to the Palestinian leadership or the concerned Palestinian officials.
• The Israeli newspaper Ma'areev says: The Palestinians insist on stopping settlements and implementing signed agreements.

Monday April 9, 2001

Main Headlines

• Palestinian Islamic and national sources warn Sharon's government against any attempts to infringe on the sanctity of the Aqsa Mosque.
• Israel bombs Gaza with surface to surface guided missiles. Palestinian police positions and civilian residential areas in Betonia/Ramallah, Bethlehem and Biet Lahia are targeted. Five Palestinians were reported injured and heavy material damages to buildings were caused. Israel is deploying its military force to inflict maximum damage on the Palestinian population in an attempt to deter Palestinians from resisting the barbaric Israeli occupation.
• A Palestinian woman and two of her children were injured by Israeli gunfire near Al- Khader / Bethlehem yesterday. The mother Nawal Kooper was hit in the back, her daughter Amani one and a half year old was hit in the head and her son Mahmoud eight years was hit in his right hand. The baby Amani is in critical conditions at Al- Makased hospital in Arab east Jerusalem.
• Family homes are hit and destroyed by the indiscriminate Israeli tank bombardment of Palestinian homes. The Israeli occupation soldiers have direct orders from their central commands to indiscriminately shell areas from which a bullet is fired against them. Complete Palestinian neighborhoods are being hit and destroyed, and civilians are killed, because Israel is bent on punishing a whole population.
• Using heavy tanks, the Israeli occupation army attempted to storm a Palestinian neighborhood built by the Austrian government in Gaza.
• Sources at the Palestinian Ministry of Finance say: Palestinian economic losses since September reached US $ 3.9 billion.
• Egypt's Foreign Minister Amre Mousa declares: The situation in the Middle East is critical and the Israeli policies are responsible for the deterioration and violence.
• Arab League Secretary General says: Extensive moves at the UN to provide international protection for the Palestinian people.
• President Arafat receives a phone call from US Secretary of State Collin Powel.
• The Israeli occupation army prevents a German medical delegation with medical supplies from entering Rafah. The Israeli occupation army ordered the delegation back and fired at one of its vehicles.
• Dr Erekat calls on the Bush administration to review its position and values the Egyptian efforts to rescue the peace process.
• Palestinian summer time will begin Friday April 14. In Israel summer time began today.
• Jordan prohibits companies dealing with Israel from trading with Iraq. This is in accordance with a trade protocol signed between Jordan and Iraq. Similar protocols were signed between Iraq and both Egypt and Syria.
• Jordanian groups call for an Arab alliance made of Palestine Jordan Syria and Iraq to confront the Israeli aggression and to end the Israeli occupation of Palestinian and Arab lands in Syria and Lebanon.

Sunday April 8, 2001

Main Headlines

• A Palestinian man father of nine, 58 years old Mahmoud Fayyad Harbiyyat was found dead yesterday immediately after soldiers from two Israeli border police vehicle stopped him beat him and then left. Eye witnesses said, this occurred around 7:30 a.m. Sunday morning near the village of Biet Awwa near Hebron. The body of Harbiyyat was taken to Abu Dis hospital for autopsy.
• Since September, Israel's occupation army and bulldozers destroyed 900 Palestinian homes in Jerusalem Gaza and the West Bank uprooted seventy thousand fruit trees and ripped apart large areas of fertile land. The financial losses incurred by the Palestinian people since September is in excess of US $3 billion. Sixty-four Palestinian pupils died and two thousand injured from Israeli gunfire during the last six months. Tens of schools are closed.
• Israeli tanks shell Palestinian areas in Ramallah, Gaza and Salfit. Israeli bulldozers destroyed large fields in Gaza and uprooted tens of fruit trees. Seven Palestinian civilians where hurt, one old man was seriously injured. The Israeli bombardment is causing tremendous material damage to property, caused electricity blackouts and terrorized Palestinian families.
• President Arafat will meet President Mubarak in Cairo today. Cairo calls on the American administration to mediate as an honest broker in the Palestinian Israeli conflict. Cairo also called on the US and the UN to provide international protection for the Palestinian people.
• President Arafat phoned the Israeli prime minister on the occasion of Pessah Seder - a Jewish religious holiday.
• Palestinian students from Hebron University demonstrate protesting the Israeli closure and siege imposed on Palestinian cities towns and villages. Students and staff find it almost impossible to reach the university.
• Special advisor to President Arafat Nabil Abu Rdianeh calls on President Bush to ignore a letter from the American Congress asking for a negative review of American Palestinian relations.
• Dr. Nabil Shaath says: We need an Arab and an international active moves at the UN in order to grant sending international protection force to the occupied Palestinian territories.
• Sheikh Sultan Bin Zayed Al Nahyan Deputy Prime Minister of the United Arab Emirates condemned the Israeli continuing aggression against the Palestinian people. Sheikh Sultan was speaking to members of the American Congress visiting the AUE.

Saturday April 7, 2001

Main Headlines

• Head of Amnesty International says: The international community can not sit doing nothing while Palestinian children are getting killed on the hands of Israeli soldiers and bombs exploding in Tel Aviv. The only way to begin solving the Palestinian Israeli conflict is by sending an international observation force to protect the Palestinian people immediately.
• Thousands of Palestinians walk with Hardan to his final rest place in Jenin. Hardan, a 27-year Palestinian man was deliberately assassinated by the Israeli occupation, effectively extra judicial execution perpetrated by Israel against a man who was not tried nor convicted. Sharon's government is beginning to behave in an erratic manner that would push the Middle East into deeper crises.
• Tens of Palestinians were injured during Israeli bombardments of Palestinian police positions, Palestinian residential areas and Israeli live ammunition firing against Palestinians demonstrating against the continuing Israeli occupation of Palestinian land in the West Bank, Gaza and Arab east Jerusalem. The Israeli occupation authorities prevent Palestinians both Muslims and Christians from entering Arab Jerusalem for prayers on Fridays and Sundays, or any other time.
• The Palestinian people and leadership warns Israel of continuing its settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territories and from encroaching on the Aqsa Mosque, the third holiest Shrine in Islam. Sharon should have leaned from his previous attempt to break into the Aqsa Mosque compound last September. The Palestinian people both Muslim and Christian stood for Sharon and aborted his attempt to harm the Aqsa Mosque.
• Israeli tanks bombard residential areas in Gaza and Bethlehem areas. President Arafat called on Kofi Annan, UN Secretary General to effectively intervene to save the Palestinian people from the continuing Israeli aggression on the Palestinian people and land.
• The Israeli occupation soldiers kidnap two Palestinian men from Ramallah. Near Jenin, the Israeli occupation forces opened fire on a Palestinian vehicle carrying Palestinian workers looking for work to feed their children, the Israeli fire hit a Palestinian worker in the head injuring him very seriously.
  The Israeli government insists on its assassination policies, and Jewish settlers collect and store weapons and ammunition to be used in their aggression against the Palestinian people under occupation.
• France and Egypt condemned Israel's settlement policies, its assassinations of Palestinians and the Israeli attack on Palestinian security officials returning home from meetings with Israeli security officials under the protection and patronage of the American administration.
• Several Israeli military measures are being taken throughout the Palestinian occupied territories designed to inflict maximum damage on the Palestinian population. Palestinians are prohibited from travel, closure and siege imposed on all Palestinian cities towns and villages, Palestinians are prevented from commemorating religious festivities in Nabi Muosa near Jericho and the Israeli authorities attempts to evacuate the village of Nabi Somwail from its Palestinian inhabitants. Protected by Israeli army occupation tanks, Jewish bulldozers rip Palestinian land apart, uproot trees and destroy farmlands. What is not reported in the news is far more dangerous and deadly than what is being reported. Sharon's government is trying to destroy Palestinian moral and ability to withstand and resist the Israeli occupation. Sharon is using the American position as a fig leaf to continue with his atrocities against the Palestinian people in the occupied Palestinian territories.
• Basing their argument on incorrect, untrue and dishonest information they receive from Israeli/ Jewish public opinion manipulators, the American Congress and Senates sent two identical letters to President Bush calling on him to punish the Palestinian people. Although the world at large see and hear the suffering of the Palestinian people, men, women and children, see the atrocities perpetrated by Sharon's government and his terrorists settlers against the Palestinian people under occupation, the US members of congress and house representatives, true to their color of expressing their allegiance to their Jewish financial backers, congress and senates members who are void of any humanity, greedy, manipulative and untrustworthy called on this young, naïve, untested American president to review American relations with the Palestinian people with view to cutting aid to the Palestinian people and to stand by the Israeli occupier, the Israeli aggressor.
• Germany is reported to have maintained its financial assistance this year to the Palestinian people. Germany will provide Palestinian institutions with 44 million Euro for water projects and for creating work opportunities for Palestinian men and women looking for work.
• An Israel police officer fire at an Israeli police station and accuses Palestinians of the firing.
• The Israeli defense minister was reported as saying that he regrets that Rabin's government did not evacuate the Jewish settlers from Hebron back in 1994.
• Attempting to take the heat of his boss Sharon, the Israeli minister of police, a right wing extremist accuses President Arafat of being a war criminal and calls for intensive air strikes against the Palestinian people.
• France says: The Israeli policies in the occupied Palestinian territories are mistaken and will only lead to more violence and destruction.
• A UN Committee on human rights meeting in Geneva yesterday assets the rights of the Palestinian people for self determination and for an independent Palestinian state. The United States and Guatemala were the only two countries who opposed the resolution. The other 48 countries voted in favor.
• An Israeli governmental committee recommends that Sharon's government prevent Muslims from entering the Aqsa Mosque.

Thursday April 5, 2001

Main Headlines

• After they finished their meeting with Israeli security officers in the presence of an American official, Palestinian security officers headed for Gaza. On their way home, Israeli soldiers fired at their vehicles injuring three Palestinian bodyguards accompanying the Palestinian officials. The Israeli I government is permitting its soldiers to fire at the very people negotiating with her to end the violence. What kind of confidence, trust or credibility Israel is trying to portray?
• Twenty-seven Palestinian homes were destroyed over the last three days in Arab East Jerusalem and the West Bank. Again… why is it that Israel is undermining any possibility for achieving quiet and a return to meaningful negotiations? Why does it continue its provocative barbaric actions, as there is nothing more barbaric than destroying people's homes? There is only one possible answer for this, Sharon is being made to enter into negotiations with the Palestinians on terms not acceptable to him, provoking Palestinian civilians and perpetrating destructive actions might put pressure on the Palestinian leadership not to continue with the negotiations thus relieving Sharon from something he does not desire, entering into political negotiations with the Palestinian leadership.
• Five Israeli soldiers reported killed when their armored vehicle overturned in the mountains around the Palestinian city of Hebron, a sixth is seriously injured.
• A spate of fatal roads accidents is hitting Israel these days, a family of six were reported to have been involved in a fatal road accident this morning, three people of the same family died, the other three were taken to hospital for treatment. Another traffic accident involving a number of vehicles occurred yesterday causing the death of at least one person and injuring another twenty. A report by Reuters said that, the Israelis are making up for their Intifada worries through travelling, eating more and watching more films. Nerve calming drugs are being used more often indicative of the current status of the Israeli society now.
• PLO General Secretary Mahmoud Abbas says, stopping all settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territories is one very important condition to resume peace negotiations with Israel.
• Nabil Sha'ath, Saeb Erekat and Shemon Peres held a meeting in Athens yesterday. The Palestinian and Israeli officials met in the presence of a senior EU official to explore means to resume Palestinian Israeli peace negotiations that were stopped on the eve of Sharon's election to office in Israel.
• Israel escalates its destruction campaign of Palestinian homes, and trains special Israeli forces to assassinate Palestinian activists.
• President Arafat received three female members of the Israeli Knesset. The Israeli MK's reported to have conveyed a message for a cease-fire from the Israeli defense minister. President Arafat noted that the Palestinian people do not have tanks, helicopters and gunboats in order to neither cease firing, nor are the Palestinians are encircling Israeli cities or imposing a siege on these cities.
• One million Palestinian children celebrate ' Day of the Child' today with black ribbons and black badges tied on their hands and chests.
• Head of the Palestinian Legislative Council Ahmad Qurai urges Europe and the US administration to move in order to save the peace process.

Wednesday April 4, 2001

Main Headlines

• Israel launches one of its most brutal attacks on Palestinian cities in Gaza and the West Bank. Missiles, tank fire and helicopter gunships participated in the attacks on Palestinian civilian and police targets. Fifty-five Palestinians including women and children were injured.
• Israeli tanks bombarded Bethlehem Housan and Al- Khader. A Palestinian girl resident of Bethlehem, Jessica Aboud age 4 lost her right eye and her little body received Shrapnel injuries from bombs fired by Israeli tanks bombing Bethlehem last Monday.
• Israeli bulldozers destroy five more Palestinian houses under construction in Arab East Jerusalem. The number of homes destroyed in Arab East Jerusalem since Sharon came to power reached 13. The amount of destruction Sharon's government inflicting on the Palestinian people is colossal. In order to suppress the Palestinian Intifada, Sharon plans to maximize material, psychological and physical damage on the Palestinian people.
• The Palestinian leadership calls for international protection for the Palestinian population under occupation.
• Nabil Sha'ath and Shemon Peres to meet in Athens today. On the agenda, means to end the cycle of violence and to renew peace negotiations. Peres says, a light at the end of the tunnel.
• Minister Yasser Abd Rabboh says: Palestinian Israeli meetings will take place in the coming few days with American participation.
• Because it is Palestinian, Israel rejects a joint Egyptian Jordanian initiative to resume negotiations.
• Donor countries meet to discuss providing support for the Palestinian budget.
• Sharon reiterates: His government will not budge from it's declared position and threatens more harsh treatment against the PNA.
• The Palestinian leadership holds Sharon's government responsible for the military escalation.
• An Israeli ex army officer says, security for settlers in Hebron will not be achieved without security for the Palestinians in the city.
• An Israeli analyst writing in Yedi'ot Ahronot says: The cycle of Israeli violence is on the increase. And a source at the Arab League declares the Palestinian people under occupation are in need of immediate protection.
• Head of the Palestinian district coordination office with Israel protest the settlers' atrocities against Palestinians in H2 area in Hebron.

Tuesday April 3, 2001

Main Headlines

• Sharon's government sent American made gunships to assassinate Palestinians in Gaza, Palestinian civilians are killed and injured. Sharon's occupation army bombards the birthplace of Jesus Christ, the city of Bethlehem. The Jewish State launches its merciless war on the Palestinian population, Palestinian cities, villages, towns and refugee camps. When killing Palestinians and shelling Palestinian homes, the Jewish state does not discriminate between a woman and a child, between a church and a mosque, between a Muslim and a Christian, all are Palestinians, and hence, they have to be taught the lesson and to be deterred. How dare they ask for their freedom from our humanitarian occupation? After all, 10 Palestinians killed and 250 injured in one weekend testify to our restraint, we Jews are humane, we do not mean to cause them any harm, we only want their land, their water, and we rather not see them here at all.
• Jewish settlers in Hebron broke into Palestinian shops, looting, destroying them and setting them on fire. Assisted by Israeli soldiers, who on orders from Sharon's government placed H2 area in Hebron with its forty thousand Palestinian inhabitants, under an ongoing curfew that lasted six months so far, Jewish settlers used cooking gas containers to blow up, burn and destroy 11 shops, stores and business places in Hebron. The Israeli Hebron Brigade commander called the settlers/perpetrators ' a bunch of hooligans', no arrests however have been made.
• Israeli tanks carried out overnight bombardment of Palestinian neighborhoods in Bethlehem, Ramallah, Kufr Aqab, Nablus, Khan Younis and Rafah. Aida refugee, Biet Jala and Biet Sahur were also bombarded by Israeli tanks and heavy machine gun yesterday. Nine Palestinian civilians were injured including two infants and a four-year-old girl in Rafah.
• Palestinian Ambassador to the UN says, the PNA will continue calling for an international protection force to be dispatched by the UN Security Council. Last week, the United States vetoed a Security Council resolution calling for sending international forces to protect Palestinians in the occupied Palestinian territories. Immediately after that veto, Sharon's government sent its helicopter gunships into action over Ramallah and Gaza killing seven Palestinians and injuring more than 250. Sharon's government seems to have understood the US veto as a green light for it to go ahead with its military and economic aggression against the Palestinian people under the Israeli occupation.
• Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia calls on the international community to interfere to stop Israeli escalating aggression against the Palestinian people.
• Israeli gunships assassinate a Palestinian man in Rafah. Mohammed Atwa Abdel al, 27 years was killed yesterday on direct orders of Sharon and his government. Abdelal was assassinated in daylight, no court, no right for self-defense, and no appeal. Sharon is simply using a Mafia type assassination and killing in cold blood. This state-sanctioned terror should not pass without bringing the perpetrators into account. This is one additional crime committed by the Prime minister of Israel Eric Sharon, to be added to his murderous record.
• An Israeli member of the Knesset met President Arafat yesterday and suggested 15-day cease-fire. Sharon's office declined to associate itself with the Israeli Knesset member and said he is not talking on its behalf. Shemon Peres reported to have said in Stockholm that it is time to renew negotiations. Israeli commentators doubt if Peres is speaking in Sharon's name.
• President Mubarak met President Bush, and King Abdullah of Jordan is said to be on his way to Washington for a meeting with President Bush. A joint Egyptian Jordanian paper is reported to have been handed to the American administration dealing with resuming peace talks between the Palestinian people and Israel.
• Israeli sources said that Shemon Peres is interested in meeting President Arafat somewhere in Europe, perhaps on the fringes of an economic conference sponsored by the British magazine the Economist to be held in Athens tomorrow. Palestinian sources however said that President Arafat has no planes to travel to Athens in the near future.
• Austria warns of an impeding catastrophe in the Middle East, and Israeli sources say Jewish terrorism is on the increase.
• The Israeli occupation army prevents Palestinian journalists from entering Hebron, and is restricting their movements.
• Jerusalem's old city walls are in danger of collapse.

Monday April 2, 2001

Main Headlines

• Israeli bulldozers destroy five Palestinian homes in the village of Biet Dajan in the West Bank. Forty women, men and children became homeless over night. With any due regard to consequences or to the humanity of the Palestinian people, the Israeli government takes decisions that destroy the future of whole families. How can that be? Where is the world community? Where is the United Nations? Is there any credibility left to this organization? Is Israel a country above the law? Why is it Israeli war criminals are not summoned to the Hague? Those questions require immediate answers.
• A Palestinian boy died yesterday from an Israeli sniper bullet that hit him in the head. After two weeks in Coma, the boy Loay Tamimi - eleven years- had his last breath yesterday.
• Sharon's occupation army bombs residential neighborhoods in Bethlehem and Nablus, and erects new barriers on Palestinian roads.
• A minister in Sharon's government demands that Sharon's occupation army bomb the house of President Yasser Arafat in Gaza.
• The Sunday Times of London says: Sharon prepared lists of Palestinian targets for liquidation, and plans to implement the ethnic cleansing policy of transfer.
• Another Israeli minister in Sharon's government Ephrime Sneh says: Washington supports Sharon's operations against the Palestinian people.
• Sharon rejects a Jordanian -Egyptian proposal to renew peace talks. At a time when Israel is finger pointing at the Palestinian leadership accusing it of not willing to go back to the negotiations table, President Arafat was reported to have accepted an Egyptian - American proposal for a return to peace negotiations and to put an end to violence within a week. Sharon and Peres rejected the proposal.
• Sharon's government plans more Jewish settlements in the West Bank along the green line.
• The Israeli Prime Minister Sharon says: Jewish settlers in Hebron are going to stay there forever. For those who do not know, back in 1969, Jewish settlers burst into the Palestinian town of Hebron, backed up by guns and tanks, formed a commune headed by a thug named Moshe Levinger, and did not budge since then, keeping the Palestinian citizens of the town from living their lives, strangers squatting in Palestinian homes, and posing a constant threat. The Palestinian citizens of Hebron face occupation soldiers, tanks, searches and curfews, starvation, death and thousands of other obstacles in order to get the most elementary things of life. Settlers now number about 400 hundred, many of them stay during daytime only.
• Israeli occupation units kidnap 6 Palestinian security policemen manning a checkpoint in the Palestinian village of Jaljilieh.
• Israel expects her Ambassador in Cairo to be kicked out.

Sunday April 1, 2001

Main Headlines

• Violent Israel bombardment of Palestinian positions in Biet Jala, Beit Sahur and Gaza. Sharon's occupation tanks shell Palestinian residential neighborhood in Hebron, Nablus and Rafah. Israeli tanks shell Aida refugee camp near Bethlehem causing material damage and inflicting many casualties among the Palestinian civilian population, in the process terrorizing women, old men and children. The state of Israel under the leadership of Sharon is committing continuing murderous actions against a civilian population under occupation. The Israeli government blatantly violates the fourth Geneva Convention, UN Security Council resolutions and the human rights of the Palestinian people.
• Tens of thousands of Palestinians say goodbye to their loved ones- victims of Sharon's massacres. Seven young Palestinians were buried yesterday in Nablus, Ramallah and Gaza.
• The Israeli minister of defense warns of more attacks on the Palestinian people. With his smooth talk, Peres prepares the grounds and Sharon kills, maim, injure and starve Palestinian children.
• A State Department spokesman denies that the Bush administration gave the green light to Sharon's government to attack Palestinian cities and civilians causing the death of more than ten young men since Wednesday. Last Wednesday, President Bush vetoed a UN Security Council calling for the dispatch of international forces to protect the Palestinian civilian population under Israeli occupation. Further more, President Bush ignoring the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land and Israeli atrocities against a civilian population struggling for its freedom and dignity, unjustly accused President Arafat of being behind what he termed 'violence' in the occupied Palestinian territories.
• Tayyeb abdul Rahim, General Secretary of the Presidential Office said yesterday: The American administration no longer an honest broker of the peace process, emphasizing that the Palestinian leadership will never give up on Palestinian legitimate objectives for freedom, self determination and ending the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land.
• The Palestinian leadership exposes an Israeli plan to escalate its attacks and aggression against the Palestinian people in the occupied Palestinian territories. The Palestinian leadership calls on the international community to move to stop the Israeli dangerous aggression against the Palestinian people.
• Israel's hiding behind what she terms Arafat's refusal of Barak's generous offer is no longer bought by the world community. Before he left for Camp David, Barak lost his majority in the Israeli Knesset, and he could never have been able to pass a peace agreement on the basis of complying with UN resolutions.
• President Mubarak of Egypt discusses with American officials a joint Egyptian- Jordanian paper to reduce tension between the Palestinians and Israelis. Israel's radio today announced that Sharon rejected the Egyptian - Jordanian joint paper stating that he can not negotiate under fire.
• President Jack Chiraque of France expresses his deep concern on the escalating violence between both the Israeli and Palestinian sides. The EU's special peace envoy to the Middle East states that Sharon's policies are causing deep worries in the European Union.
• The Israeli defense minister threatens invading Palestinian cities towns and villages, i.e. instead of standing on the gates, he wants to come in. The Israeli defense minister is most welcome. Major General Majaydeh says: an Israeli invasion of Palestinian areas is imminent. Palestinian security forces are preparing for such an eventuality.
• Denmark calls on Israel to stop expanding Jewish settlements.