Here are today’s news headlines from Occupation Info. For today’s commentary, op-eds etc please see this post…
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News: Israel crippled by general strike |
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(29-11-06) – Report, AP. Israel’s largest trade union began a sweeping general strike today, shutting down the country’s only international airport and all the ports. The strike began after the Histadrut union failed to reach an agreement with the government on providing funds to regional councils that have been unable to pay their workers for months. See Also: Israel general strike paralyses air travel, public sector (AFP), Industrialists petition court in bid to end public sector strike (Haaretz), Hirchson: General strike could come to end within a few days (Haaretz), and Manufacturers ask court to end strike (JPost). |
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News: Israel warns losing patience over truce violations |
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(29-11-06) – Jean-Luc Renaudie, AFP. Israel has warned that the Jewish state was losing patience over Palestinian rocket attacks that have continued to violate a tentative four-day ceasefire in the Gaza Strip. Wednesday’s warnings come amid a flurry of diplomatic efforts to shore up the truce, with Egypt’s intelligence chief Omar Suleiman in Israel and US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to meet Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas Thursday. See Also: Misfired rocket causes Gaza blast (Reuters), Qassam landed near Sderot yesterday (Haaretz), Rockets disappoint Olmert but hopes truce can last (Reuters), Congenial meeting in Beirut warns against possible detractors (PNN), and Fatah faction fires two projectiles at Sderot Tuesday (Ma’an). |
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News: Palestinian PM pushes 1967 borders proposal |
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(29-11-06) – Report, Reuters. Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh on Wednesday set the tone for his first foreign tour since taking office by promoting a Palestinian initiative based on an independent state on land outside Israel’s 1967 borders. After talks with Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa, Haniyeh told a news conference it was time governments in the Middle East and around the world put pressure on Israel to recognize such an independent Palestinian state. Haniyeh is from the Islamist movement Hamas, which has traditionally advocated a single Palestinian state in all of Palestine as it existed before the creation of Israel in 1948. See Also: Jordan refuses to receive Palestinian Prime Minister (PNN). |
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News: Desmond Tutu to head UN mission to Beit Hanoun |
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(29-11-06) – Report, Haaretz. Nobel laureate Desmond Tutu has been named to head a United Nations fact-finding mission to the Gaza Strip town of Beit Hanun, where at least 18 civilians were killed earlier this month, UN officials said Wednesday The South African anti-Apartheid campaigner and former Anglican archbishop of Cape Town will travel to the Palestinian territory to “assess the situation of victims, address the needs of survivors and make recommendations on ways and means to protect Palestinian civilians against further Israeli assaults,” according to the president of the UN Human Rights Council, Luis Alfonso De Alba. See Also: Desmond Tutu to head UN mission on Beit Hanun (AFP), and Credible Israeli probes key to break Mideast impunity: UN rights chief (AFP). |
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News: Israel – Arab party not to be dissolved for Syria visit |
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(29-11-06) – Aviram Zino, YNet. Attorney General Menachem Mazuz and Attorney Yaron Keidar, the party registrar at the Justice Ministry, decided Wednesday to reject Attorney Ophir Miller’s demand to dissolve the National Democratic Assembly party because “its objective is to denounce the State of Israel’s existence.” Miller claimed that the party violated the law, after its members visited Syria and Lebanon several months ago. See Also: MK Taha: Instead of probing me – use me (YNet), Mazuz rejects bid to ban Arab Balad party over MKs’ visit to Syria (Haaretz). |
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Report: Farewell to arms in Gaza |
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(29-11-06) – Rami Almeghari, IMEMC. The past five months saw the most severe round of fighting in Gaza, that has so far claimed the lives of 479 Palestinians (an estimated 80% of whom were not involved in fighting), and resulted in injuries to 4200 others, all by the Israeli military’s weaponry. In the same time period, Palestinian resistance fighters killed three Israelis — two soldiers and one civilian. In the aftermath of such a horrible period, both sides agreed on Sunday to a ceasefire, with the hope that this would lead to more calm and make way for peaceful means to be used instead. See Also: Gaza relishes moment of peace (BBC). |
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Report: No clinic? No school? We’ll open one |
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(29-11-06) – Aryeh Dayan, Haaretz. The reaction of the residents of Kafr Aqab to the situation in which they found themselves was completely different from that of other Palestinians in similar situations in other areas. Initially they did exactly what the others did: appealed the land-seizure orders for the construction of the wall, petitioned the High Court of Justice against its construction, organized demonstrations, sent demands to the Jerusalem Municipality and organized various lobbying activities. They soon realized, however, that they could expect to gain no benefit from all that, and opted for a different strategy. |
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Report: Media conference criticizes discrimination against Arab media |
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(29-11-06) – Press Release, Mossawa Center. The Mossawa Center has criticized the Israeli Cinema Council, large private companies, the government advertisement office, the Ministry of Transportation and the First and Second Broadcasting Authority for their discrimination against Arab media. This discrimination marginalizes Arab citizens and negatively affects their right to knowledge and their ability to express their needs and present them to the Arab and Jewish public. Insufficient allocation of advertising budgets to written and visual media, Internet, radio, television, cinema and even phone services has proved to be a method of further marginalizing Arab society. See Also: Women’s film festival in Jenin (PNN), and Israeli gov’t votes ‘yes’ to discrimination against Palestinians within its boundaries (PNN). |
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