Issue no 72

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Issue No : 72 2th December, 2013

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Palestinian Cultural

Organization Malaysia

Read In This Report

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P 9 P10More than 400 Israelis commit

suicide every year

Mishaal arrives in Malaysia

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Don›t just resign, withdraw

from the negotiations altogether

By:Dr Fayez Rasheed

Israelis kill three more Palestinians in occupied

West Bank

Israeli Minister says settlement construction will

resume at a rapid pace

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Anti-Prawer demos planned worldwide

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CONTENTS

News of Palestine

Articles & Analyses

Don›t just resign, withdraw from the negotiations altogether 10

More than 400 Israelis commit suicide every year 9

Israel Insider

Mishaal arrives in Malaysia 5

Anti-Prawer demos planned worldwide 6

Israelis kill three more Palestinians in occupied West Bank 7

Israeli Minister says settlement construction will resume at a rapid pace 8

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News of Palestine

1/12/2013

Khaled Mishaal, the political bureau chairman of Hamas, arrived in the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur on Sunday to attend the Annual General Assembly of the rul-ing party “UMNO”.A senior source in Hamas told the PIC that Mishaal, who is heading a delegation comprising political bureau member Sami Khater along with Osama Hamdan, the head of the movement’s for-eign relations department, is scheduled to meet Malaysian Prime Minister Dato’ Seri Najib Razak.He added that Mishaal is also scheduled to confer with

UMNO Secretary General Da-tuk Seri Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor and a number of other political leaders in the country.The sources pointed out that Mishaal would deliver a speech at the international forum hosted by the ruling party before the inaugural session of its General Assembly.He is also expected to deliver an-other speech at the International Islamic University in Malaysia, which groups students from 100 nationalities including Palestin-ians.This is the first official visit for the Hamas supreme leader to Malaysia in an indication to the

Mishaal arrives in Malaysia

growing relations between both parties.For his part, the Chairman of the Palestinian Cultural Orga-nization Malaysia (PCOM), Muslim Imran, said that the of-ficial visit of top Hamas’ lead-ers to Malaysia will contribute to foster the relation with the Malaysian Government, which has been accelerated since the historic visit of Dato’ seri Najib to the besieged Gaza Strip.“The visit is a great opportunity to reinforce the Malaysian role towards the Palestinian issue at the regional and international levels”, added Muslim.

Source: Agencies

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Anti-Prawer demos planned worldwide

Palestinian Cultural

Organization Malaysia

Hamas urges Palestinians to unite against Israel’s Prawer plan

30/11/2013

Protests slated for Saturday in dozens of cities worldwide are likely to be the largest-yet demonstrations against Israel›s so-called Prawer Plan to uproot Bedouin vil-lages. A joint Israeli-Palestinian ac-tivist organization on Thurs-day announced the 24 loca-tions where demonstrations were scheduled to take place.In the announcement, the Al-ternative Information Center called on all who «oppose ethnic cleansing, displace-ment and confinement in the 21st century» to attend the protests.Israel›s Prawer Plan, if im-plemented, would result in the systematic destruction of more than 35 villages in the Negev and the «expulsion and urbanization» of more than 70,000 Bedouin Pales-tinians with Israeli citizen-ship, the AIC said.«The Prawer Plan is the larg-est Israeli land-grab since 1948,» the group said.Several Palestinian youth organizations called for

Saturday›s worldwide protest event in early November, the same day Israeli government of-ficials met in the Negev to dis-cuss plans for the construction of four Israeli neighbourhoods in place of the Bedouin village of Umm al-Hiran.«No one will live quietly and comfortably as long as a single family in Negev faces the threat of displacement. No one in this country will enjoy freedom and dignity if we Palestinians, espe-cially in Negev, do not live in dignity on our land,» the organi-zations said in a statement. Meanwhile, the Hamas Move-ment reiterated its strong rejec-tion of Israel›s Prawer plan that aims to displace the Palestinian

people from the Negev region and urged the Palestinian peo-ple and their political forces all over Palestine to stand united in the face of this scheme.In a press release issued on Saturday, Hamas said that the Prawer plan is racist and vio-lates the international law, es-pecially the international dec-laration of human rights.Hamas also stated that Israel›s plans to expand settlements and displace the Palestinian people from their native land are desperate attempts, which will never succeed in changing the history and uprooting the Palestinians from their land.

Source: Ma’an Agency + PIC

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Israelis kill three more Palestinians in occupied West Bank

27/11/2013

Israeli occupation forces killed three more Palestinians in two separate incidents on Tues-day evening in the south of the occupied West Bank city of Hebron. Although the kill-ings took place in two separate incidents, the Israelis claimed that the victims were all «plan-ning to carry out terror attacks inside Israel».Witnesses said that Israeli sol-diers shot at Mahmoud Al-Na-jjar and Mosa Qafeesha while the men were driving their car. Military sources told the Is-raeli media that the two men from the village of Yata died «instantly».According to Israeli newspa-per Yedioth Ahronoth, the Is-raeli forces exchanged gunfire

with the Palestinians and claimed to have found two pistols and two explosive devices in the car.The third Palestinian, Mohamed Nairoukh, was killed by Israeli forces several kilometres away from the site of the first incident. The Israelis also alleged that he was «planning to carry out terror attacks inside Israel».All three bodies were kept by the Israelis until late on Tuesday night, when they were handed over to the Palestinian Red Cres-cent.Prior to the killings, said local Palestinians, the Israeli occupa-tion forces imposed a blockade on Hebron and prevented people from moving in or out of the city. A number of soldiers went to Yata

and searched homes belonging to Palestinians in the village.Early today, Wednesday, clashes erupted between Palestinians and Israeli forces inside Hebron. The youths hurled stones at the Israeli soldiers, who responded with so-called rubber bullets and tear gas. Red Crescent sources said that dozens of female stu-dents in a nearby school were treated for breathing problems after inhaling the gas.The media is also reporting that Israeli occupation forces invad-ed several cities across the oc-cupied West Bank this morning, breaking into houses and search-ing them. Thirteen Palestinians have been arrested.

Source: MEMO

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Israeli Minister says settlement construc-tion will resume at a rapid pace

28/11/2013

Israel›s Minister of Housing Uri Ariel has said that settle-ment construction in the occu-pied West Bank will continue at a rapid pace. The minister, who is himself a settler, was participating in laying the foundation of an educational complex in the Itamar settle-ment near Nablus, in the north-ern West Bank, which will be named after the Vogel family who were murdered in the set-tlement three years ago.

The minister remarked that: «the majority of ministers in Netanyahu›s cabinet support constructing the educational complex to teach the Torah. We will build many houses in the West Bank and Jerusalem, and we will say to ourselves, and then to the world, that the

people of Israel are alive.»

In a related context, Israeli Cen-tral Bureau of Statistics reported an increase of 5.5% in settlement construction in the West Bank since the beginning of 2013 com-pared to the corresponding time frame in 2012, despite the fact that 2013 has witnessed a resump-tion of “peace” between Palestin-ian and Israeli authorities.

About 32,290 construction sites for new housing units were erected this year across the occupied West Bank, He-brew media said. The num-ber of settlement projects in the West Bank rose by nearly 130% compared to 2012, ac-cording to statistics released Thursday.

Source: Agencies

Settlement construction up 130% since resumption of “peace talks”

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More than 400 Israelis commit suicide every year

27/11/2013

Official data from the Israeli Knesset show that more than 400 Israelis commit suicide every year. According to the figures, the phenomenon has increased in recent years.

On Tuesday the Israeli Knesset held a special plenary session to discuss the problem and approved a national plan for the prevention of suicide.

The Knesset›s study centre found that the number of Israelis committing suicide each year in-creased from 290 in 2007 to 431 in 2010.

Furthermore, more recent data show that since 2010, around 400 Israelis have committed suicide every year, most of them men. More than 90 per cent of them suffered psychological strains, in-cluding 60 per cent suffering from depression.

According to the data, suicide has both direct and indirect effects on the Israeli economy. The direct cost is estimated to be around 100 million Israeli new shekels, and indirectly amounts to between 2 and 2.5 billion, including hospital services, insurance, police investigations and other related costs.

Israel›s Health Minister Yael German explained that the goal of the Knesset discussion is to achieve a 20 per cent decrease in the suicide rate.

Source: MEMO

Israel Insider

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By: Dr Fayez Rasheed

The resignation of the Palestin-ian negotiating team reflects the crisis of the talks between the Palestinian Authority and the Israelis. Close to twenty sessions since 30 July con-centrated mainly on Israel›s security needs; it knows how to run negotiations for its own best interests and is capable of blackmailing Palestinians, es-pecially given that they agreed to return to the talks even with-out a halt to settlement expan-sion, which has actually in-creased since the end of July. The negotiations are supposed to last for nine months accord-ing to the agenda proposed by the US.

Benjamin Netanyahu›s deci-sion to freeze the latest intend-ed settlement building in re-sponse to international disquiet doesn›t mean that he is going to cancel it. He will let the storm die down and then give the go-ahead yet again. For the negotiations, this will be busi-ness as usual.

The issue does not lie in the resignation of the negotiations

comes, which are not what the Palestinians want. However, the PA agreed to return to talks under pressure from the Amer-icans. What›s more important, though, is that the Palestinian Authority set negotiations as the main option for itself; this was a strategic error.

The Palestinian Authority does not learn from its mistakes and has not taken on board any of the lessons to be learnt from other national liberation move-ments in Asia, Africa or Latin America; to be more accurate, it does not want to take these lessons into consideration. Ab-bas regards resistance as «ter-rorism» or «illegitimate vio-lence»; he does not even want another intifada as the stones thrown would be «unjustified violence». He wants passive popular resistance, similar to that of M. K. Gandhi and his disobedient resistance in India against the British occupation; Abbas forgets the huge differ-ences in the nature of the two enemies. The British occupied India only to leave later on, but the Zionists came to settle

Articles & Analyses

Don›t just resign, withdraw from the negotiations altogether

team, because President Abbas can replace them with a new team if he actually accepts their resignation, which I doubt. The senior negotia-tor, Saeb Erekat, once said, «Life is negotiations». The real issue lies in the option of choosing negotiations in the first place despite Israel›s refusal to accept the Palestinian refugees› right of return, self-de-termination and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital. The principle of negotiations was not based on the UN resolutions in these regards and was not based on stopping settlements and the 1967 borders, or negotiating the essen-tial issues related to the essence of Palestinian rights. Unfortunately, Palestinian negotiators gave con-cessions gradually, until they got to the point where Israel has full control of the agenda and out-

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of the economic and administra-tive burden of the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The PA has acted in Israel›s fa-vour to dissuade active resistance against the occupation, and tied the Palestinian economy to that of Israel when the Paris Economic Convention was signed.

It looks as if the PA has forgotten its responsibilities towards Pales-tinians living in the diaspora by ignoring and deactivating PLO in-stitutions. It has come to believe that the PA itself is a replacement for the PLO, but this is a big mis-take. In doing so it has undermined its own case and negotiating tools with the Israelis.

ers, but is this an effective way to get these men and women set free? Experience shows that those who are released by the Israelis with one hand can be, and often are, re-arrested soon after with the other.

It also looks as if the PA has downgraded the importance of working cohesively with the Arab world, where the Pales-tinian issue has slipped from the list of priorities. Its ap-proach towards settlements and negotiations has pushed back the Arab people for whom Jeru-salem and Palestine have long been important issues.

It is now feared that the Pal-estinian leadership will buckle under American pressure in the proposed end result of the negotiations even though it is clear that the US is not an honest broker for peace. The Americans are 100 per cent be-side Israel despite occasional blips which sees harsh words exchanged between Washing-ton and Tel Aviv; that›s all they are – words.

What›s left to say is that nego-tiating with Israel is the wrong choice, full stop. Never mind the resignation of the negotiat-ing team, the PA must withdraw from negotiations completely. Only that will make the Israelis and their supporters understand that the Palestinians are serious.

in Palestine forever and to ex-pel its people. There is also the difference in the nature of the violence used by the British and Israeli occupations.

Abbas does not realise the na-ture of the Israeli enemy and that is a disaster (it would be an even greater disaster if we find out that he does). The late Yas-ser Arafat thought that by sign-ing the fateful Oslo agreement he would be on the threshold of the Palestinian state but he did not understand that Israel›s goal in agreeing to the gathering of the Palestinian fighters in one place was to limit their move-ment as revolutionaries and lib-erators. Unfortunately, neither Mahmoud Abbas, nor those in power in Gaza comprehend ful-ly that the Palestinian political split undermines national unity which is regarded as the main pillar in the fight against the en-emy. Hence, the PA in Ramallah pursues and arrests resistance fighters and so does the gov-ernment in Gaza after agreeing a truce with Israel through the Egyptians. National unity is one of the conditions for victory and the centre of gravity for the Pal-estinian people on their revolu-tionary path towards freedom.

The PA›s security coordination with the Israelis bolsters the oc-cupation. Indeed, through the establishment of the Palestinian Authority, Israel relieved itself

””the PA must withdraw from negotiations

completely

Has the PA done a full audit of what has happened since Oslo was signed? It seems not. It is astonishing that it has agreed to forego its right to join the Inter-national Criminal Court, through which it could take legal action against Israel, in return for the re-lease of relatively few long-term prisoners. The Israelis are stall-ing on the release of the balance of the agreed number of prison-

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Issue no 72

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