Today in Palestine! Headlines October 26, 2007 

PLO disputes Jerusalem rail plan

The Palestinians have begun legal action against two prominent French companies in an attempt to stop work on a contested light-railway project in Jerusalem. When it begins operating in 2010, the railway will stretch for eight and a half miles through West and East Jerusalem, taking, it is estimated, 400,000 passenger-journeys a day. Its backers say it will ease road congestion. But the Palestine Liberation Organisation, which is bringing the court case, through its delegation in Paris, argues that the railway will breach the fourth Geneva convention by providing infrastructure to Jewish settlements on occupied land. A key section of the line will run into East Jerusalem, linking Jewish settlements, which are home to tens of thousands of people, to the city centre. “This tram will constitute at least an element in the expansion of the colonisation of East Jerusalem by the state of Israel,” the Palestinian delegation said in a statement.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,2199617,00.html

Demonstration against land thefts at Umm Salamunah

On Friday morning Palestinian and international peace activists gathered near the village of Umm Salamunah, south of the West Bank city of Bethlehem. They took part in a protest against the construction of the Israeli Segregation Wall and the confiscation of village land.
http://www.imemc.org/article/51105

Egyptian Humanitarian mission calls for solution to crisis of stranded Palestinians

The Egyptian physicians syndicate on Friday called on the international community to alleviate the suffering of those two thousand Palestinians stranded on the Egyptian side of Gaza-Egypt since June because of Israeli border closures.
http://www.imemc.org/article/51103

PCHR: A Warning from Gaza: PCHR Palestinian Centre for Human Rights Press Release Date

Israeli Occupation Authorities Seek to Impose More Measures of Collective Punishment on the Palestinian People, and PCHR Warns of Further Deterioration to Humanitarian Conditions in the Gaza Strip PCHR calls upon the international community, particularly the High Contracting Parties to the Fourth Geneva.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/main/2007/10/25/pchr-a-warning-from-gaza/

Weekly Report on Israeli human rights violations in the Occupied Palestinian Territory

http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/rwb.nsf/db900sid/EDIS-78BM34?OpenDocument&rc=3&emid=ACOS-635PFR

Four Killed In Less 24 Hours in the Strip by Israeli Fire

Two members of the al-Qassam brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, were killed on Thursday morning by gunfire from Israeli Special Forces in the Abasan area of eastern Khan Younis, medical sources in southern Gaza reported.
http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_new/english/details.asp?name=20042

Palestinian policeman dies of earlier wounds sustained in internal clashes

Hamas media sources reported that one Palestinian police officer, died on Thursday at night of wounds sustained during clashes with gunmen east of Gaza City last week.
http://www.imemc.org/article/51096

Hamas sources: P.A security men arrested 13 members of Hamas

Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, stated on Thursday that Palestinian Security Sources, loyal to Fateh movement, in the West Bank, continued the arrest campaign that targets Hamas members and supporters and abducted 13 on Wednesday.
http://www.imemc.org/article/51095

Hamas government condemns Israeli attacks on Gaza

The Gaza-based Hamas-dominated government condemned the latest Israeli military escalation against both the Gaza Strip and West Bank, a government’s spokesperson said on Thursday.
http://www.imemc.org/article/51092

Israel-OPT: Gaza residents unable to get medical care, aid workers say

Dozens of patients in the Gaza Strip are unable to receive medical treatment, in some cases life-saving procedures, due to the continued border closures with Israel and Egypt, health officials and international aid workers said. “At least three patients denied exit permits have died since June, and others have lost limbs or sight,” Human Rights Watch reported. The Palestinian organization Al Mezan in Gaza said a fourth man, Nimir Muhammad Shuheibar, aged 77, died on 23 October while awaiting treatment.
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/rwb.nsf/db900sid/KARI-78BKMJ?OpenDocument&rc=3&emid=ACOS-635PFR

ANALYSIS: Israel’s real intention behind sanctions on Gaza Strip

There is an enormous gap between the reasons Israel is giving for the decision to impose significant sanctions against Hamas rule in the Gaza Strip, and the real intentions behind them. Defense Minister Ehud Barak authorized Thursday a plan for disrupting electricity supply to the Gaza Strip, as well as significantly shrinking fuel shipments. This is supposed to reduce the number of Qassam rocket attacks against Sderot and the other border communities. In practice, defense officials believe that the Palestinian militants will intensify their attacks in response to the sanctions. As such, the real aim of this effort is twofold: to attempt a new form of “escalation” as a response to aggression from Gaza, before Israel embarks on a major military operation there; and to prepare the ground for a more clear-cut isolation of the Gaza Strip - limiting to an absolute minimum Israel’s obligation toward the Palestinians there.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/917385.html

Israel rescinds Arab Christian clergy travel rights in W. Bank

Israel has rescinded some travel privileges for Arab Christian clergy traveling to and around the West Bank because of security concerns, an spokesperson for Israel’s Interior Ministry said Friday.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/917437.html

Blair’s true colours

The real reason Blair was seconded to the Quartet — liquidating Palestinian resistance to occupation — appears ever more clear, writes Saleh Al-Naami.
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2007/868/re62.htm

Abu Teir warns of Israeli policy in Jerusalem

In a letter sent from the Israeli detention of Nitsan, Sheikh Mohammad Abu Teir, member of the Palestinian Legislative Council of the Hamas Jerusalem bloc, warned on Friday of the acceleration of Israeli policies in East Jerusalem, whilst Palestinians are busy with preparations for the November conference.
http://www.imemc.org/article/51106

Rubber-Coated Steel Bullet Wounds Peaceful Demonstrator at Bil’in

Palestinians, Israelis, and internationals came together in the village of Bil’in for another non-violent demonstration against the internally-recognized as illegal separation Wall built on Palestinian land. IOF soldiers responded to the peaceful protesters with the usual onslaught of tear gas, sound bombs, and rubber-coated steel bullets. Two internationals.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/main/2007/10/26/rubber-coated-steel-bullet-wounds-peaceful-demonstrator-at-bilin/

Report: Fatah instigating conflict between Islamic Jihad, Hamas

Palestinian source tells al-Sinara newspaper Fatah members infiltrating into other groups to stir up conflict with Hamas: Since Hamas’ violent takeover of Gaza, their rivals in Fatah have been trying to regain control of the coastal strip—or at least regain some respect. The Nazareth-based daily al-Sinara reports that Fatah members have been slyly joining other Palestinian groups, such as the Islamic Jihad, in an attempt to push these groups toward confrontation with Hamas. Fatah activists in question did not join other Palestinian groups to aid them, but rather to “incite them into a civil war with Hamas,” he continued.
http://www.ynetnews.com/Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-3464232,00.html

Gaza Christians fear ’those more extreme than Hamas’

The kidnapping and killing of Rami Ayyad, manager of the Gaza Strip’s only Christian bookstore, sent shudders through the Palestinian coastal enclave’s tiny Christian community.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20071025/wl_mideast_afp/mideastgazachristiansislam_071025163108;_ylt=AgNvLQDulNwp2WxLzvKxL2cUvioA

Chaotic Nablus: Testing ground for Abbas

NABLUS, West Bank - The Palestinian president has chosen the West Bank’s most chaotic city to show he’s in control, winning U.S . praise Thursday for beefing up his security forces here as part of an attempt to reassure Israel that he can implement a future peace deal.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071025/ap_on_re_mi_ea/palestinians_cracking_down_1;_ylt=AtXyYwN_HOjQrol6MS97xDwUvioA

Palestinian source: PA to take control of Nablus soon

Security official tells Ynet 500 security personnel to enter Nablus to reinforce PA forces currently there; US general visits West Bank city to monitor transfer.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3464123,00.html

’I didn’t suggest we kill Palestinians’

Arnon Soffer arrives at our meeting armed with a stack of books and papers. Among them is a copy of an interview I conducted with him three and a half years ago ("It’s the demography, stupid," May 21, 2004), and print-outs of angry responses the geostrategist from the University of Haifa says he continues to receive “from leftists in Israel and anti-Semites abroad, who took my words out of context.” The passage that aroused the most ire was as follows: “When 2.5 million people live in a closed-off Gaza, it’s going to be a human catastrophe. Those people will become even bigger animals than they are today, with the aid of an insane fundamentalist Islam. The pressure at the border will be awful. It’s going to be a terrible war. So, if we want to remain alive, we will have to kill and kill and kill. All day, every day.”
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1191257273616&pagename=JPost%252FJPArticle%252FPrinter

Much like Auschwitz

Israel’s regard for Palestinians can be summed up in how it imprisons and terrorises them, writes Khaled Amayreh in the occupied West Bank.
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2007/868/re61.htm

Right of Entry: Adnan and Manal

Adnan Muhammad Hasan Khalil, American citizen of Palestinian descent, emigrated from the West Bank as a youth in 1976 and returned ten years ago to get married. At that time, he applied to the Israeli authorities for Family Unification (FU) in order to secure permanent residency in the West Bank.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/main/2007/10/25/right-of-entry-adnan-and-manal/

Sherri Muzher: Prioritizing Palestinian Dignity

There seems to be a huge disconnect between the politicians/activists and the Palestinian people they claim to champion.
http://palestinechronicle.com/story-102507155103.htm

’U’ Press keeps Pluto contract

Distribution deal was in question because of controversy over British publisher’s anti-Israel book.
http://media.www.michigandaily.com/media/storage/paper851/news/2007/10/25/UAdministration/u.Press.Keeps.Pluto.Contract-3056407.shtml