Today's News and Views About Israel

CBC.ca/Margaret Evans/AP: "U.S. 'unwavering' in support of Israel: Obama" (1/09/2010)
“The White House is calling on Israeli and Palestinian officials to keep working toward "a just and lasting peace" after a shooting in the West Bank on Tuesday left four Israeli settlers dead. The Israelis were shot dead Tuesday evening while travelling in a vehicle near the West Bank city of Hebron.”
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CBC News Network: Carole McNeil/Margaret Evans: "West Bank funeral" (1/09/2010)
“"Hundreds of people gathered in the West Bank today for the funeral of four ISraelis who were shot dead in Hebron. Hamas says it's behind yesterday's attack, Hamas is the government of Gaza. It happened after dark on a busy highway used by both Palestinians and Jewish settlers. Israeli security forces worked with the Palestinian Authority to quickly round up about 150 members of the group."
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CBC News Now: Carole McNeil/Susan Bonner: "Peace talks under attack" (1/09/2010)
“The latest Middle East peace talks begin tomorrow and there’s already been an attempt to sabotage them as we reported yesterday afternoon, Hamas says it killed four Israeli settlers in the West Bank last night, one of them pregnant and also is promising more attacks. Israelis have retaliatated there was an attack on a Palestinian home, but the Israeli authorities stopped the settlers before they could do any serious damage.”
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CTV National News: Paul Workman "on the Mideast peace talks" (1/09/2010)
“The latest round of Middle East peace talks have begun in Washington, D.C. U.S. President Barack Obama met separately with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas. The real talks, though, begin Thursday with face-to-face negotiations.”
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CTV National News: Joanne Clancy "on the Mideast talks" (1/09/2010)
“Tension between Palestine and Israel has risen in the past two years, but now the leaders are gearing up to engage in peace talks. The issue of Jewish settlements in the West Bank, however, is threatening to shake the meetings before they even happen.”
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CTV News Channel: Moran Banai, policy director, "Mideast leaders must commit to bring lasting peace" (1/09/2010)
“A policy director with the Centre for American Progress says Obama set the tone of the talks in a broader context and made it clear that the leaders involved in the talks must stand up to the challenge and make a strong commitment to bring lasting peace.”
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Foreign Affairs News Release: "Canada Condemns Killing of Four Israelis" (1/09/2010)
"The Honourable Lawrence Cannon, Minister of Foreign Affairs, today issued the following statement on the August 31 killing of four Israelis near Hebron in the West Bank: “Canada strongly condemns last night’s killing of four Israeli civilians. We extend our deepest sympathies to the victims’ families. Such brutal, cowardly acts by those who resist peace efforts must not be allowed to undermine the important step that will be taken toward a comprehensive, negotiated settlement tomorrow in Washington, D.C. “Canada encourages both parties to remain committed to the resumption of negotiations. Violence and unilateral actions will only jeopardize the peace talks.”

National Post: Shimon Fogel, CEO, Canada-Israel Committee: "Abbas must prepare his people for peace with Israel" (1/09/2010)
“What will it take to close the gap and achieve a secure peace in the Middle East? The question is especially pressing this week -- with Israeli and Palestinian negotiators meeting in Washington to resume direct talks for the first time in over a year. To understand how to obtain a lasting peace today requires examining how it has been secured in the past -- and how, by contrast, other efforts have dissolved into bloodshed. Israel has enjoyed decades of peace with two former belligerent states: Egypt and Jordan. In both cases, Israel forfeited swaths of land in exchange for full recognition and the cessation of aggression. To secure an agreement with Egypt, Israel uprooted settlements and gave up the Sinai --an area nearly three times the size of Israel that contains vast oil resources.”
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National Post: AFP: "Hamas kills four Israelis on eve of peace talks" (1/09/2010)
"Four Israelis, including a pregnant woman, were killed in the West Bank yesterday, casting a shadow over Middle East peace talks that are to begin tomorrow."
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Globe and Mail: Isabel Kershner/Mark Landler (c/o NYT) "4 Israelis killed on eve of new peace talks" (1/09/2010)
"The killing of four Israeli settlers, including a pregnant woman, in the West Bank on Tuesday evening rattled Israeli and Palestinian leaders on the eve of peace talks in Washington and underscored the disruptive role that the issue of Jewish settlements could play in the already fragile negotiations."
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Toronto Star: Editorial: "Hopeful signs in Mideast" (1/09/2010)
"It’s hard not to be deeply pessimistic about direct Middle East peace talks launching today in Washington; the world has seen this movie before, and it usually has an unhappy ending."
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Montreal Gazette: Michael Oren, Israeli Ambassador to the US (via American Chronicle), "Peace has a chance" (1/09/2010)
"Israeli and Palestinian leaders will sit down at the State Department on Thursday for the first Middle East peace talks in 20 months, with almost nothing agreed on beyond the meeting itself and widespread doubt in the region that peace is anywhere close at hand."
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Globe and Mail: Norman Spector: "Nobel Peace Prize winner hosts dinner" (1/09/2010)
"Today, almost two years into his mandate and with his popularity in sharp decline, Mr. Obama – after twice blowing a renewal of the Mideast peace process through major unforced errors – has finally succeeded in persuading Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas to meet face-to-face. Few observers are optimistic about the prospects for peace – other than those who’ve made a career out of the process."

Edmonton Sun: Mindelle Jacobs: "Zealots and lunacy" (1/09/2010)
"The weekend before, Iran, lead by nutbar President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has said Israel should be “wiped off the map,” began loading up its “peaceful” nuclear power plant."

Ottawa Citizen: David Warren: "Goodbye Iraq" (1/09/2010)
"One is reminded of the wonderful peace that was achieved in Gaza when the Israelis finally did what the international community had been demanding for a long time, pulled up all stakes, and left that "occupied Palestinian territory." For some unaccountable reason (and I am still being facetious), Hamas did not get the message, quickly took over the lame local PLO administration, and attacks on Israel stepped up."

Hamilton Spectator: AP: "Four Israelis gunned down in car" (1/09/2010)
"Palestinian gunmen opened fire on an Israeli car in the West Bank and killed four passengers on the eve of a new round of Mideast peace talks in Washington. The Islamic militant group Hamas claimed responsibility."
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Toronto Sun: Reuters: "Hamas attack clouds Mideast talks" (1/09/2010)
“President Barack Obama was poised Wednesday to launch a new U.S. push for Middle East peace even as a flareup of Hamas violence and a deadlock over Israeli settlements loomed as potential deal-breakers.”

Northumberland Today: William Lambert (letter to the editor) "The wrong slant" (1/9/2010)
"… Over 1,300 Palestinians died during Israel's operation “Cast Lead”. For all her talk about Palestinian rockets Ms. Jacobs very conveniently neglects to mention how many Israelis have actually been killed by them. If one searches the Internet, those figures are very difficult to find, because they are exceedingly low and therefore embarrassing for Israel to report. Last time I tried this I came up with a figure of about 20. The Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) have killed more innocent Palestinian farmers and fisherman in the past couple of years than all the Israelis who died from all the homemade rockets ever launched from Gaza. Israel is also in clear contravention of dozens of United Nations resolutions re. its occupation of portions of Gaza, its wanton destruction of Palestinians’ homes and its routine assaults upon a largely defenseless population. Naturally, the right-wing rag which now passes for our local paper does not report those stories. It seems we must always support Israel and never criticize her no matter how wrong she may be. To do otherwise is to be instantly labeled as anti-Semitic. Ms. Jacobs's theory that “the left” is only motivated by an opportunity to delegitimize Israel is patently ridiculous. Israel does that to itself on an almost daily basis. Nobody could do Israel more harm than she does to herself, repeatedly."
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Halifax Herald: Jim Guild (letter to the editor) "Want to be left alone" (1/09/2010)
"In his Aug. 28 letter on Israel/Palestine, Mark David accuses letter-writer Ismail Zayid of "unbalanced and inflammatory comments presented without context." Let me provide the context: For more than 60 years, Israelis have shown by their actions that they do not recognize Palestinians’ right to exist and that they want to drive the Palestinians out of the occupied West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem. They prefer that Palestinian citizens of Israel go away as well. They have shown this by expelling hundreds of thousands of Palestinians, by building settlements for more than 300,000 Israelis in the occupied West Bank, by demolishing tens of thousands of Palestinian and Bedouin homes, by their devastating and bloody attacks on Gaza and other Palestinian lands, through targeted assassinations, and through systematic discriminatory legislation. Understandably, Palestinians want all this to stop, and they resist. They are not "utterly dedicated to the destruction of Israel and its citizens." They simply want to be left alone to develop their lives in an economically and socially viable state beside Israel."
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Halifax Herald: Miles Tompkins (letter to the editor) "Speaking of 'facts'" (1/09/2010)
"I was quite astonished to read Mark David’s Aug. 28 response to Ismail Zayid’s letter discussing "facts" regarding Operation Cast Lead in Gaza. Mr. David claims that the first act of violence came from the Gazans, a claim repeated during the recent flotilla incident. It is hard to give any credibility to "facts" released by a military force (IDF) and an incompetent government that, by its own admission, defines who is or is not a civilian in Gaza and what is or is not a legitimate military target under God knows whose law. If the IDF and Israeli government had any interest in "facts," they would have participated in the investigation headed by Richard Goldstone, competent enough to head the war crimes tribunal in both Yugoslavia and Rwanda, yet somehow turned into a buffoon when he focused his considerable prosecutorial talents on the war crimes of Israel and Gaza. Read the 500-page report and the specific incidents of civilian deaths and infrastructure destruction, read the Nuremberg Principles and the IDF’s Mandelblit Report, and come to your own conclusions. Apparently, Mr. David has not; otherwise he would have noted that human shields were used by both Hamas and the IDF during the conflict."
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Globe and Mail: AP: "'I can't regret the decision to go to war,' Tony Blair says in memoir" (1/09/2010)
“Mr. Blair – who is scheduled to be in Washington on publication day, attending Israeli-Palestinian peace talks in his role as an international Mideast envoy – has said he “set out to write a book which describes the human as much as the political dimensions of life as prime minister.”

Globe and Mail: Konrad Yakabuski: "Barack Obama turns the page in Iraq, sets sights on sour U.S. economy" (1/09/2010)
"The President is welcoming the Israeli and Palestinian leaders at the White House Wednesday on the eve of peace talks that he will broker. And the challenges posed by Iran and North Korea loom as large as ever, with unpredictable flare-ups a constant."

Montreal Gazette: Mike Collett-White: "Natalie Portman takes a dark turn in Black Swan" (1/09/2010)
“And Julian Schnabel directs "Slumdog Millionaire" star Freida Pinto in "Miral," about an orphaned Palestinian girl growing up in the wake of the first Arab-Israeli war, who finds herself drawn into the conflict.”

Winnipeg Sun: Paul Turenne: "Meet Sam Katz: Everything but a dentist" (1/09/2010)
"Born in Israel and raised in Winnipeg from the age of six months, when he moved here with his family, Katz grew up in the city's North End and West Kildonan neighbourhoods."