http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=18038
OCHA: Number of travellers through Rafah crossing decreased again
Date: 13 / 12 / 2006 Time: 11:28


Palestinians waiting to cross at Rafah
(MaanImages)
Ma'an - According to the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), the number of travellers passing through Rafah crossing between the Gaza Strip and Egypt has fallen for the third consecutive period.

In their report for the period of 15-28 November 2006 in the occupied Palestinian territory, OCHA adds that an average of 33½ truckloads of goods were exported through Karni crossing between the Gaza Strip and Israel each day, up from 27 in the previous period (a 24% increase) and the highest since February. OCHA says that this number now constitutes 22% of the target set to be reached by the end of 2005 and only 8% of the target to be reached by the end of 2006.

In terms of pedestrian crossings, OCHA reports that Rafah crossing was open for 2 days during this period, allowing a total of 1,323 people to cross into the Gaza Strip and 1,291 people out.

OCHA adds that Erez crossing remains closed to all Palestinians except traders holding special permits and emergency humanitarian cases. According to the Palestinian Ministry of National Economy, 290 permits have been issued since 1st October.

OCHA also reminds the international community and readers that in regards to convoys between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, the implementation of truck convoys is now 11½ months overdue and the implementation of bus convoys for pedestrians is now 10½ months overdue.

http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=18039
Jerusalem Legal Aid Center petitions Israel's interior ministry to renew foreign passport-holders' visitor permits
Date: 13 / 12 / 2006 Time: 11:45


A Palestinian-American's 'last permit'
(MaanImages)
Ma'an - The Palestinian grassroots Campaign for the Right to (Re-) Enter the Occupied Palestinian Territory has issued a press release pointing out that the "Jerusalem Legal Aid Center (JLAC), on December 11, petitioned the Israeli Civil Administration and the Ministry of Interior (MoI) to reinstate the processing of visitor permit renewal requests and to reinstate those whose permits have lapsed."

The press release states that, "JLAC attorney, Sliman Shahin, presented the petition on behalf of spouses and children of Palestinians who submitted their applications in 2006 and whose permits subsequently expired during processing, were stamped "last permit", were not renewed, or whose holders are now forced to overstay their three-month permit."

The campaigners add: "On November 19, all 100 renewal requests returned to the Palestinian MoI, were either rejected or marked as 'last permit'. Some were extended as late as the end of December, while others expired during processing. Israel has refused to process any new permit renewal applications since then, leaving hundreds of people faced with the prospect of overstaying their permits or exiting the country so as to qualify for a visitor's permit renewal, and risking being denied reentry."

As detailed in previous press releases, there are hundreds of Palestinian families suffering as a result of these policies of Israel. The campaigners are keen to point out that, because, since 2000, Israel has frozen residency permits for Palestinian family unification, there are 120,000 family unification applications still awaiting processing. As a result, an estimated 500,000 people now face deportation or 'voluntary' departure if they wish to keep their families together.

The campaigners give the following example: "For instance, Soha N. and her Palestinian husband live in Beit Jala with their two children, ages 6 and 8 years old. Soha and the children are French citizens. Because the Israeli authorities refuse to issue them residency, they have been renewing their permits every three months. Soha's "last permit" expires December 25th. However, Israeli authorities required her two children to leave by December 4th. The family may be forced to relocate abroad in order to stay together, as the children are now considered "illegal" after overstaying their visas."

Shlomo Dror, the spokesperson for the Israeli Civil Administration, has responded to these tragic stories by saying that those foreign passport holders with family in the occupied Palestinian territories who stay illegally in the country would have to expect "tough consequences."

The Jerusalem Legal Aid Center is petitioning the Israeli authorities to continue processing permit renewal requests and to reinstate those whose permits expired so that they are not threatened with arrest and deportation.

Basil Ayish, a spokesperson from the Campaign for the Right of Entry/Re-Entry to the Occupied Palestinian Territory, says in the press release: "This petition by JLAC is a step toward challenging Israel's racist policies against Palestinian family reunification. Israel is closing the doors on families who want to stay legally. Denying residency, even through a renewable 3-month visitor permit, is a form of de facto deportation designed to create a demographic change in the oPt by targeting the most vulnerable segment of Palestinian society and forcing them to leave".

http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=18066
Israel has launching stations for its nuclear weapons west of Jerusalem, military magazine says
Date: 13 / 12 / 2006 Time: 18:53

Bethlehem - Ma'an - Military experts estimate that Israel possesses 150-200 nuclear heads, named 'Yeriho', and missiles that are able to carry those heads over a long distance, the 'Genus' military magazine has reported.

The magazine added that, according to satellite pictures, the launching stations of those missiles are in the area of Zechariya, near Beit Shemesh , west of Jerusalem

This information was published following the declarations by Ehud Olmert on German television, which appear to admit that Israel possesses nuclear arsenal.

According to Hebrew media sources, Israel fears that Arab countries may ask the UN to impose sanctions on Israel after the Olmert's declarations, similar to what happened with Pakistan, India and North Korea.

IsraelNationalNews.com
PM Olmert in Germany: We Have Learned the Lessons of the Shoah

By Nissan Ratzlav-Katz

On his first visit to Germany as prime minister, Ehud Olmert met with the German chancellor. At a memorial ceremony, he expressed some of the lessons the Jews have learned from the Holocaust.

Prime Minister Olmert and German Chancellor Angela Merkel met in Berlin on Tuesday - after the two leaders held three hours of informal talks upon Olmert's arrival in Germany on Monday. Spokesmen for the prime minister said the unannounced meeting on Monday focused on the Iran issue and on the Palestinian Authority.

At a joint press conference following their Tuesday meeting, Merkel said that Germany firmly supported the Quartet demands that the Hamas-led PA government recognize Israel, renounce terror and uphold agreements with Israel signed by the previous PA administration. She also noted German efforts to gain the release of IDF soldier Gilad Shalit from his Hamas captors, acknowledging that they have been unsuccessful.

Merkel said there was no military option that Germany was aware of to confront the Iranian ambition to develop nuclear weapons. International sanctions on the Iranian regime, on the other hand, will be discussed at the end of December in the UN Security Council, she said.

Chancellor Merkel strongly condemned the Iranian conference questioning the veracity of the Holocaust. "I would like to make clear that we reject with all our strength the conference taking place in Iran about the supposed nonexistence of the Holocaust," Merkel said at the press conference. Coincidentally, the Olmert-Merkel meeting was held the same day as the Iranian Holocaust denial convention.

Earlier on Tuesday, Prime Minister Olmert attended a memorial ceremony at Berlin's Gruenwald train station, from which 50,000 Jews were shipped to Nazi death camps and ghettos during World War II. In his speech at the station, Olmert emphasized the importance of the State of Israel as an open harbor for any Jew, something the Holocaust-era Jews did not have.

Olmert went on to explain some of the lessons he feels the Jewish People have learned from the Holocaust:
"We have learned and memorized the lesson: the weak and defenseless are doomed. Doomed are they who do not believe those who threaten to eradicate them. Doomed are they who remain complacent and do not prepare themselves to thwart the danger. Doomed are they who entertain the false illusion that they could escape harm and that they could rely on the mercy of strangers."
Olmert was ostensibly alluding to Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has threatened to wipe out the State of Israel.

Amidst quotes from the poets Heinrich Heine and Avraham Shlonsky, Prime Minister Olmert concluded:
"This is the legacy of our six million dead: to do everything in our power to make certain that the Jewish State will be the complete and furthermost opposite of the Nazi evil; to base our nation on the eternal values of the Torah and the prophets of Israel, the freedom and dignity of man, social justice, human morality, the sanctity of life and the dedicated pursuit of peace."

Following his visit to Germany, Olmert was to travel to Rome for meetings with his Italian counterpart Romano Prodi and with Pope Benedict.

Arutz Sheva IsraelNationalNews.com
UN Chief´s Parting Message to U.S., Israel, and PA

By Hillel Fendel

Outgoing U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, in two leave-taking speeches this week, took parting shots at both the U.S. and Israel - and threw in a call for "no more terrorism" for good measure.

In a speech at the Truman Presidential Museum in Independence, Missouri on Monday, Annan expressed criticism of the U.S. presence in Iraq. When the U.S. "appears to abandon its own ideals and objectives," he said, "its friends abroad are naturally troubled and confused."

Annan praised Harry Truman - the United States' post-World War II president who was instrumental in helping to found the United Nations - for bringing the matter of North-South Korean violence to the UN in 1950, and not trying to deal with the matter alone. Criticism of current President George W. Bush for not taking similar action regarding Iraq was thus implied.

Annan will complete his ten-year term as UN chief at the end of this month, and will be succeeded by South Korean diplomat Ban Ki-moon. Ban will be sworn in as the eighth UN Secretary-General tomorrow (Thursday), and will assume office on January 1.

Middle East Warning
On Tuesday, in his final speech to the Security Council in New York, Annan more directly addressed the Middle East conflict, warning that tensions in the area are "near the breaking point," that the region faces "grim prospects," and that if a solution is not found, "extremists the world over would enjoy a boost."

Annan mentioned the problems in Lebanon, Iraq, Syria and Iran - but concentrated most fully on the Israel-PA conflict. He blamed the Palestinian Arabs for perpetrating terrorism - "no resistance to occupation can justify terrorism" - and Israel for almost everything else: its anti-terror military operations in Gaza, its continued presence in Judea and Samaria, its anti-terror partition, and even its lack of understanding of the "fundamental injustice to Arabs" caused by the formation of the State of Israel.

Annan said that Israelis are unlikely to succeed in getting the Moslem-Arab world to change its attitude towards them unless "they themselves clearly grasp and acknowledge the fundamental Palestinian grievance - namely, that the establishment of the State of Israel involved the dispossession of hundreds of thousands of Palestinian families, turning them into refugees, and was followed 19 years later by a military occupation that brought hundreds of thousands more Palestinian Arabs under Israeli rule... Yet thousands of Israelis still live in territories occupied in 1967 - and more than 1,000 more are added every month. As Palestinians watch this activity, they also see a barrier being built through their land in contravention of the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice, as well as more than 500 checkpoints to control their movement, and the heavy presence of the Israeli Defense Forces."

Annan's remarks overlook several factors, including:
* Tens of thousands of Arabs moved into what became Israel in the years just before the establishment of Israel
* The 550,000 Arab refugees of 1948 were caused largely by the Arab nations encouraging them to flee, and then refusing to provide them with permanent housing solutions
* Arab League Secretary-General Habib Issa quoted his predecessor Azzam Pasha as "assur[ing] Arabs [in 1948] that the occupation of Palestine, including Tel Aviv, would be as simple as a military promenade... Brotherly advice was given to the Arabs of Palestine to leave their land, homes and property, and to stay temporarily in neighboring fraternal states." (Al-Hoda Lebanese daily, New York, June 8, 1951).
* King Hussein of Jordan said in 1960: "Since 1948, the Arab leaders have approached the Palestinian problem in an irresponsible manner... They have used the Palestinian people for selfish political purposes." Former Syrian Prime Minister Khaled Al-Azm admitted in 1972: "Since 1948, it is we who demanded the return of the refugees... while it is we who made them leave... We brought disaster upon Arab refugees... Then we exploited them in executing crimes of murder, arson, and throwing bombs upon... men, women and children -- all this in the service of political purposes..." (Joan Peters, From Time Immemorial, pages 23, 16)
* Israel welcomed hundreds of thousands of Jewish refugees from Arab countries in the years following its creation
* The United Nations has not taken a strong stand against current threats to annihilate Israel - one of the very reasons Israel was created in the first place

Sympathy for Israel
Annan also said that Israel must not be held to standards that are not applied to other countries, and questioned the effectiveness of the many UN resolutions condemning Israel: "One should ask whether such steps bring any tangible relief or benefit to the Palestinians. There have been decades of resolutions. There has been a proliferation of special committees, sessions and Secretariat divisions and units. Has any of this had an effect on Israel's policies, other than to strengthen the belief in Israel and among many of its supporters, that this great Organization is too one-sided to be allowed a significant role in the Middle East peace process?"

Without mentioning Iran, Annan said, "Some of the rhetoric used in connection with the issue implies a refusal to concede the very legitimacy of Israel’s existence, let alone the validity of its security concerns. We must never forget that Jews have very good historical reasons for taking seriously any threat to Israel’s existence. What was done to Jews and others by the Nazis remains an undeniable tragedy, unique in human history. Today, Israelis are often confronted with words and actions that seem to confirm their fear that the goal of their adversaries is to extinguish their existence as a State, and as a people."

"Therefore, those who want to be heard on Palestine should not deny or minimize that history, or the connection many Jews feel for their historic homeland. Rather, they should acknowledge Israel’s security concerns, and make clear that their criticism is rooted not in hatred or intolerance, but in a desire for justice, self-determination and peaceful coexistence."

Israel, Arabs, PA Leaders, and World - Guilty of Abuse and Exploiting
He said that the Arabs of the PA "have been miserably abused and exploited, by Israel, by the Arab world, sometimes by their own leaders and perhaps even, at times, by the international community. They deserve to see fulfilled their simple aspiration to live in freedom and dignity." The goal, Annan said, is "two states, Israel and Palestine, within secure, recognized and negotiated boundaries based on those of 4 June 1967; a broader peace encompassing Israel's other neighbors, namely Lebanon and Syria; normal diplomatic and economic relations... A solution that respects the rights of Palestinian refugees and is consistent with the two-state solution and with the character of the States in the region."