Mr Paskowitz brought 15 surfboards to the Erez crossing in 2007

By Jon Donnison
BBC News, Gaza

Even on a beautiful sunny day with the waves crashing around you, the beach at Gaza city is not the most idyllic.

A few teenagers kick a football among the litter.

Behind them are the remains of some of the bombed-out buildings from last year's conflict with Israel that have still not been cleared.

It's therefore a somewhat surreal sight to see young men, clad in wetsuits, boards tucked under their arms, splashing into the water. These are the surfers of Gaza.

"Surfing is beautiful," says Mohammed Abu Jayab, a slightly-built boarder who works as a part-time security guard.

"Life is difficult in Gaza but surfing makes me feel free," he says.

The Gaza Surf Club is far from flash: a dilapidated corrugated iron shack, about the size of an outside toilet.

But the group now has about 40 members.

"Palestinians are people like in any other country," says Mafouz Caberetti, the club's president.

"We love life. We like sport and surfing, but the problem is the media which portrays Palestinians as just terrorists and bad people but this is not true."

The waves can be bad though.

The sea around Gaza is heavily polluted with at least 60 million litres of raw and partially treated sewage being pumped into it every day.

"We have to choose the days carefully when we surf," says Mr Abu Jayab, "and some parts of the beaches are cleaner than others."

Most of the surfers are young men in their twenties and thirties.

Mr Caberetti says a lot of them are unemployed and have time on their hands.

The United Nations say unemployment is more than 40% in Gaza.

When they are not in the water, club members are often sitting around in the beachside club hut smoking water pipes and drinking tea while going over their latest moves.

The surfers come at all levels.

Some are still struggling to stand up on their boards, while others are happily riding 2m (6ft) high waves.

The inspiration for the surf club came from overseas, thousands of kilometres away in California.

Dorian "Doc" Paskowitz is a surfing legend.

The 89-year-old has been surfing for more than 70 years and still surfs today.

Several years ago he read an article in the Los Angeles Times newspaper about a couple of men surfing in Gaza.

"I saw the picture of the two Arabs in the newspaper and they had one lousy beat-up board between them," he said in an interview with the BBC near his home in southern California. "And I said this simply won't do."

Board mission

Gaza has been under a tightened Israeli and Egyptian blockade for almost three years, with only limited humanitarian aid allowed in.

Israel says this is necessary to stop weapons being smuggled into Palestinian militants and to pressure the Islamic movement Hamas which controls the territory and refuses to renounce violence or recognise Israel.

But the blockade means it has been very difficult to get surfboards into Gaza.

Mr Paskowitz, who is Jewish himself, decided to personally hand deliver 15 new boards to Gaza in 2007.

But when he arrived at the Erez border crossing, the main Israeli checkpoint into Gaza, he was told by Israeli security officers he was not allowed to pass and the Gaza surfers were not permitted to cross the border to collect the boards.

"I said to the Israeli soldier 'I came half way around the world, 12,000 miles, to deliver these boards. Would you let an old Jew fail?'", says Mr Paskowitz.

"I said to the guy, these guys are 50 ft away. Are you going to let them come through here and get these boards?"

Mr Paskowitz describes how he leant over and kissed the Israeli border guard before the soldier eventually allowed the Palestinian surfers to come and collect the boards.

And on the beaches of Gaza, those boards, now a little worse for wear, are still being used today.

Fresh out of the water, shivering and clasping his board under his arm, Mohammed Abu Jayab says he has not left Gaza since 1996 because of Israeli restrictions on travelling.

But he dreams that some day he might get the chance to surf in Hawaii or Australia.

"Inshallah [God willing]," he says, looking to the skies.

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U.S. isn't a neutral mediator between Israelis and Palestinians

"We can't desire peace more than the parties involved," "we can't force the parties to peace," - these and many similar slogans were the ABCs that generations of American leaders instilled in their Israeli counterparts. If even the United States "can't want peace more than the parties," what's there to fuss about?

But who are the parties involved? Isn't the U.S. administration also a party, with a strategic interest in peace between Israel and the Arabs? When is an American interest at stake and when an interest of the parties? When is the United States a partner and when is it a mediator, willing even to pay for the right to mediate?

The United States is not a neutral mediator that supplies the parties with its good services, a table to negotiate on, some snacks and muzak. The United States is an interested party, a superpower whose position in the Middle East and around the globe is based on its economic and military strength. It's also based on the Americans' ability to leverage those advantages for political action, to set the world's agenda and win legitimacy for waging wars and making peace.

The United States drafts the map of world threats, from Iran and Afghanistan to Russia's stockpile of nuclear missiles and Al-Qaida in Yemen. The United States also recruits other countries and international opinion to combat these threats. It decided to include the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in its threat list, and contrary to its own slogan, America is actively forcing a solution on the parties - and fortunately so.

We may argue about Washington's vision and style, and wonder whether it was wise to pick construction in East Jerusalem of all battles or to treat Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu like an unwelcome door-to-door salesman. But we can't fail to appreciate U.S. President Barack Obama's diplomatic determination and the political risk he has taken by marking Israel as a peace-refusenik.

The United States is not doing that "for the parties." On the face of it, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is not a strategic threat. More Israelis or Palestinians dying, or more Qasams in the south or Katyushas in the north won't bring down any state - most certainly not the United States. Solving the conflict won't stop the Iranian nuclear race and won't persuade India or Pakistan to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Syria won't cut ties with Tehran even if Israel recognizes Hamas.

But the conflict becomes a strategic threat when it endangers America's stature on the global stage. When this is the threat, the United States can no longer afford merely to let the sides "desire" peace and gloomily watch from the sidelines as they continue to eat into each other's flesh. It's not Obama's personal pride that's at stake, and it's not the enormous U.S. aid to Israel. The Americans now see that when put to the test, this aid is not enough to help them implement their policy.

Israel is challenging the United States' strategic status. This provocation goes beyond the question of Israeli sovereignty versus American might. Idiotically, Israel is competing against itself because U.S. status is a fundamental part of Israel's strength. And when Israel is ready to demolish this foundation for the benefit of the bullies in East Jerusalem and the West Bank outposts, Israel puts its own citizens at risk.

Faced with Israeli foolishness, Washington can no longer afford to merely shrug. Too many American interests are at stake. So how will Obama deal with the Israeli naysayer? Will he renounce his demand to freeze construction? Will he present Israel with an obligatory work plan for reaching peace with the Palestinians? And to cut to the chase, will we see a rerun of the famous scene from the tenure of secretary of state James Baker, who left Israel a phone number it could call when it got serious about peace?

Washington has since taught the world that when it draws its map of interests, it is willing to use its military to obtain them. If Israeli-Palestinian peace is not that much of an interest, Washington should make this clear to both parties, lest they put too much hope on American maneuvering or, heaven forbid, labor under the impression that American pressure is mere pretense.

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Why Iran won't attack Israel

by Yousef Munayyer

No credible analysis of the situation envisions a scenario in which Iran would use nuclear weapons against the Jewish state. But proponents of Israel's colonial enterprise, who support maintaining a Jewish majority by the force of walls and soldiers in occupied territory, want everyone to believe that the focus should be on Iran, not on the occupation, and that Israel's security policies are justifiable against "existential threats."

Palestinians are in Israel today because they managed to survive the depopulation of 1948, the year the Jewish state was founded (Arabs constitute about 20% of Israel's population). Ironically, while Benny Morris' scholarship suggests that the mere existence of these Palestinians in Israel -- and millions more in the occupied territories -- irks him, Israel's substantial Arab population also blows a hole in his argument about the need to deal with the supposed Iranian nuclear threat.

Morris is part of an increasingly vociferous chorus warning of an impending apocalypse for Israel at the hands of a nuclear Iran eager to rid the Middle East of its Jews. Yet Iran's religious leaders have repeatedly stated that such weapons are "un-Islamic" or "forbidden under Islam."

Morris' role in our understanding of the region's history is confounding. Arguably, no one played a more central role in exposing Israel's role in the depopulation of Palestinians from their homeland than Morris. In his seminal work, "The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem," Morris, using declassified military documents, exposes the calculated effort by early Israeli leaders to impose a Jewish majority through ethnic cleansing.

Long considered a champion of modern Israeli historians who sought to shed light on the ugly side of Israel's birth, Morris shocked many Israelis and Palestinians alike when he later changed course. To Morris, the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians was no longer the problem at the heart of the conflict; in fact, he suggested that the problem was that Israel didn't finish the job in 1948.

Morris said in a 2004 interview "Under some circumstances expulsion is not a war crime. I don't think that the expulsions of 1948 were war crimes. You can't make an omelet without breaking eggs. You have to dirty your hands."

Morris added later in the interview that if Israel's first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, "was already engaged in expulsion, maybe he should have done a complete job. ... If he had carried out a full expulsion — rather than a partial one — he would have stabilized the state of Israel for generations."

Yet the pesky Palestinian minority Morris wishes had been expelled decades ago serves as a deterrent from a nuclear-armed Iran, should the Islamic Republic ever build nuclear weapons and consider using them on Israel. The fact that Arab Israelis were among the casualties of the 2006 war with Hezbollah speaks to the reality that no nuclear attack on Israel could happen without the deaths of countless Palestinians and Israelis, not to mention the likely destruction of Jerusalem, the third holiest site in Islam.

The reality of Palestinian casualties, the destruction of Jerusalem, the onset of regional war and the immediate destruction of Iran's regime as a result of a multilateral conventional or even nuclear counterattack all serve as a credible deterrent to a nuclear Iran. The Iranian leadership has shown a demonstrable interest in self-preservation

The alarmism espoused Morris and company isn't grounded in reality. Rather — just as with Iraq, Syria and now Iran — Israel constantly needs an enemy that it says threatens its existence. Otherwise the Jewish state would have a harder time maintaining its overwhelming military supremacy in the region and continuously changing the subject from resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to practically anything else.

The ideology at the foundation of the state of Israel and the very justification for its existence requires the existence of apocalyptic anti-Semitic forces with the intent and capability to annihilate. Without these boogeymen, whether it is Saddam Hussein, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or Arabs who "want to push Israel into the sea," the state of Israel ceases to have any justification for the maintenance of a Jewish majority by force or for its ongoing occupation of Palestinian lands.

The fact that Benjamin Netanyahu, the pro-colonization Israeli prime minister, has made every effort to connect the idea of a nuclear Iran to the Holocaust is evidence of this scare-mongering. Iran, like Iraq in 2003, is an inflated but necessary fear for Israel. No credible analysis of the situation envisions a scenario in which Iran would use nuclear weapons against the Jewish state. But proponents of Israel's colonial enterprise, who support maintaining a Jewish majority by the force of walls and soldiers in occupied territory, want everyone to believe that the focus should be on Iran, not on the occupation, and that Israel's security policies are justifiable against "existential threats."

The need for these inflated threats has increased in the years since Israel signed peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan. Despite these agreements, Israel still maintains and furthers its occupation of Palestinian lands through blockade and settlement expansion.
The emperor may be naked in Tel Aviv, but he can continue avoiding attention and shame if he persuades the world to look in Tehran's direction instead.
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Indyk: If Israel manages alone, it can decide alone

By Haaretz Service

Former U.S. Ambassador to Israel Martin Indyk said on Wednesday that if Israel is a superpower that manages alone, then it can make decisions alone.

In an interview with Army Radio, Indyk said that if Israel sees itself as a superpower that does not need any aid from the United States, then it can make its own decisions. However "if you need the United States, then you need to take into account America's interests," said Indyk.

Indyk, who is currently the vice president and director of Foreign Policy at the Brookings Institution, and also serves as an adviser to Mideast envoy George Mitchell, emphasized these interests in a New York Times op-ed published on Monday.

"This is no longer just about helping a special ally resolve a debilitating problem. With 200,000 American troops committed to two wars in the greater Middle East and the U.S. president leading a major international effort to block Iran's nuclear program, resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has become a U.S. strategic imperative," wrote Indyk.

"Given Israel's dependence on the United States to counter the threat from Iran and to prevent its own international isolation, an Israeli prime minister would surely want to bridge the growing divide. Yet the shift in American perceptions seems to have gone unnoticed in Jerusalem," he continued.

Speaking to Army Radio, Indyk also said that Israel's main problem isn't Interior Minister Eli Yishai or Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, but rather the issue lies within the Likud party.

"The shift in America's Middle East interests means that Netanyahu must make a choice: Take on the president of the United States, or take on his right wing. If he continues to defer to those ministers in his cabinet who oppose peacemaking, the consequences for US-Israel relations could be dire," wrote Indyk in the New York Times article.

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Clinton presses Israel do more to start peace talks

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has again called on Israel to do more to pursue peace with the Palestinians.

She urged Israel to support efforts by the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank to strengthen institutions.

Mrs Clinton also called on the Palestinians to promote peace by ending incitement and fighting corruption.

Jewish settlement construction has caused deep strain in relations between the US and Israel and has hampered efforts to revive peace talks.

The secretary of state said supporting the Palestinian Authority led by Mahmoud Abbas was the best weapon to counter Hamas and other extremists.

The US has been trying to launch proximity talks between the two sides.

These were knocked off course by an announcement that Israel had approved plans for 1,600 new homes in the East Jerusalem settlement of Ramat Shlomo during a visit to Israel by US Vice-President Joe Biden.

'Bold leadership'

The secretary of state called for "bold leadership" on all sides when she spoke at a dinner attended by the ambassadors of Israel and several Arab states.

"Prime Minister Netanyahu has embraced the vision of the two-state solution," Mrs Clinton said.

"But easing up on access and movement in the West Bank, in response to credible Palestinian security performance, is not sufficient to prove to the Palestinians that this embrace is sincere."

"We encourage Israel to continue building momentum toward a comprehensive peace by demonstrating respect for the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinians, stopping settlement activity and addressing the humanitarian needs in Gaza, and to refrain from unilateral statements and actions that could undermine trust or risk prejudicing the outcome of talks," she added.

Israel has occupied the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, since 1967. It insists Jerusalem will remain its undivided capital, while Palestinians want to establish the capital of their state in the East Jerusalem.

Nearly half a million Jews live in more than 100 settlements in the West Bank, among a Palestinian population of about 2.5 million.

The settlements are illegal under international law, although Israel disputes this.

The Middle East quartet - the US, EU, UN and Russia - has called for a halt in settlement building and immediate final status negotiations to reach a comprehensive peace deal within two years.

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King Abdullah holds talks on ties, Mideast with Congress leaders

AMMAN (JT) - His Majesty King Abdullah on Wednesday underlined the time factor as key to realising tangible progress in the peace process.

He said the continuation of the status quo would trigger more tension and negative consequences that threaten the future of the region and its nations.

The Monarch made the remarks during several separate meetings at the Congress that tackled means to foster Jordanian-American ties and developments in the Middle East.

The Monarch held meetings with the US Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, US Senate Committee on Appropriations, US House Committee on Foreign Affairs and the US House Subcommittee on Foreign Operations.

In joint press remarks following a meeting with Speaker of the US House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi, King Abdullah said: “Yesterday, we had a very fruitful and successful summit with the president. But we are also here to discuss with the president the challenges of the Middle East, namely the peace process.”

King Abdullah said that at his Monday meeting with President Barack Obama, discussions covered means of coordination with the US to move forward the peace process in the region.

His Majesty highlighted that his discussions with congressional panels focused on bilateral issues and means to attain peace and stability in the Middle East.

In her remarks, Pelosi said: “When I became speaker, the first head of state that I invited to speak to a joint session of Congress was King Abdullah. He gave us the benefit of his thinking at the time, and we continue to count on the benefit of his wisdom. His views are sought here; his judgement is respected; and his friendship is valued.”

Pelosi, who commended the King’s distinguished leadership and strive for attaining Mideast peace, said: “King Abdullah has been a leader, a respected leader.”

His Majesty’s talks at the Congress addressed the US role in jump-starting serious and effective Palestinian-Israeli negotiations that lead to the establishment of an independent and viable Palestinian state that lives side by side with Israel.

Discussions covered efforts under way to realise Mideast peace in line with the two-state solution, which, he reiterated, is the sole way to bring about stability and security in the region.

At the meetings, King Abdullah warned against the dangers of the unilateral Israeli measures in Jerusalem, emphasising the need to halt these procedures that seek to change realties on the ground.

King Abdullah also stressed the centrality of the Palestinian issue and the need to launch serious and effective peace talks based on the two-state formula and within a regional context.

King Abdullah also voiced appreciation of the US assistance to Jordan that enable the Kingdom to implement development programmes and projects in different sectors.

The meetings, which brought about the Friends of Jordan Caucus at the US Senate as well as the caucus at the House of Representatives, covered means to develop the Jordanian-American partnership in various fields.

The Friends of Jordan Caucus at the US Senate was launched in April last year in Washington in the presence of Their Majesties King Abdullah and Queen Rania on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of establishing diplomatic ties between Jordan and the US.

The Friends of Jordan Caucus at the House of Representatives was launched in 2007 upon an initiative by Republican and Democratic representatives. It was the first such an assembly formed with an Arab country.

Source:

We have been lied to and cheated for years.

I received this in my email.

Here's an interesting read: and some important and verifiable information :

About 6 months ago, the writer was watching a news program on oil and one of the Forbes brothers was the guest. The host said to Forbes, "I am going to ask you a direct question and I would like a direct answer; how much oil does the U.S. have in the ground?" Forbes did not miss a beat, he said, "More than all the Middle East put together."

Please read below:

The U. S. Geological Service issued a report in April 2008 that only scientists and oil men knew was coming, but man was it big! It was a revised report (which had not been updated since 1995) on how much oil was in this area of the western 2/3 of North Dakota , western South Dakota , and extreme eastern Montana .....

Check THIS out:

The Bakken is the largest domestic oil discovery since Alaska 's Prudhoe Bay , and has the potential to eliminate all American dependence on foreign oil. The Energy Information Administration (EIA) estimates it at 503 billion barrels. Even if just 10% of the oil is recoverable. At $107 a barrel, we're looking at a resource base worth more than $5.3 trillion.

"When I first briefed legislators on this, you could practically see their jaws hit the floor. They had no idea." says Terry Johnson, the Montana Legislature's financial analyst.

"This sizable find is now the highest-producing onshore oil field found in the past 56 years," reports The Pittsburgh Post Gazette . It's a formation known as the Williston Basin , but is more commonly referred to as the 'Bakken.' It stretches from Northern Montana, through North Dakota and into Canada . For years, U. S. oil exploration has been considered a dead end. Even the 'Big Oil' companies gave up searching for major oil wells decades ago. However, a recent technological breakthrough has opened up the Bakken's massive reserves. We now have access of up to 500 billion barrels. And because this is light, sweet oil, those billions of barrels will cost Americans just $16 PER BARREL!

That's enough crude to fully fuel the American economy for 2041 years straight. And if THAT didn't throw you on the floor, then this next one should - because the information is from 2006!

U. S. Oil Discovery- Largest Reserve in the World

Stansberry Report Online - 4/20/2006

Hidden 1,000 feet beneath the surface of the Rocky Mountains lies the largest untapped oil reserve in the world. It is more than 2 TRILLION barrels. On August 8, 2005 President Bush mandated its extraction. In three and a half years of high oil prices none has been extracted. With this 'mother lode' of oil why are we still fighting over off-shore drilling?

They reported this stunning news: We have more oil inside our borders, than all the other proven reserves on earth. Here are the official estimates:

- 8-times as much oil as Saudi Arabia

- 18-times as much oil as Iraq

- 21-times as much oil as Kuwait

- 22-times as much oil as Iran

- 500-times as much oil as Yemen

- and it's all right here in the Western United States .

HOW can this BE? HOW can we NOT BE extracting this? Because the environmentalists and others have blocked all efforts to help America become independent of foreign oil! Again, we are letting a small group of people dictate our lives and our economy.

WHY?

James Bartis, lead researcher with the study says we've got more oil in this very compact area than the entire Middle East -more than 2 TRILLION barrels untapped. That's more than all the proven oil reserves of crude oil in the world today, reports The Denver Post.

Don't think 'OPEC' will drop its price - even with this find? Think again! It's all about the competitive marketplace, - it has to.

Do ya' think OPEC just might be funding the environmentalists?

Got your attention yet? Now, while you're thinking about it, do this:

Pass this along. If you don't take a little time to do this, then you should stifle yourself the next time you complain about gas prices -

By doing NOTHING, you forfeit your right to complain.

--------

Now I just wonder what would happen in this country if every one of you sent this to every one in your address book.

By the way...this is all true. Check it out at the link below!!!

GOOGLE it, or follow this link. It will blow your mind.

http://www.usgs.gov/newsroom/article.asp?ID=1911

I stole IDF documents to expose West Bank war crimes, Anat Kam says

"it was important for me to bring the IDF's policy to public knowledge." Anat Kam

Classified documents reveal that the Israel Defense Forces had committed war crimes in the West Bank, Anat Kam, the former soldier indicted for espionage over an alleged theft of top secret material, told the court earlier in the year, according to police documents released allowed for publication Monday at the request of Haaretz.

In the newly released material documenting court hearings surrounding Kam's arrest, the journalist and former IDF soldier said that the motivation behind her removal of sensitive military material was to expose "certain aspects of the IDF's conduct in the West Bank that I thought were of interest to the public."

Kam added that her thinking behind taking the top secret papers was to ensure that "if and when the war crime the IDF was and is committing in the West Bank would be investigated, then I would have evidence to present."

Kam said that she didn?t think that transferring the documents would endanger the country, as she did not think "the journalist would focus on the details of the military actions, but rather on the principles and the policies that were behind the the top officers' decisions."

Kam also explained that she turned to Israeli journalists because she assumed that "the censorship would not allow the publication of information classified as top secret or that is dangerous for publication."

Referring to the possibility that she would be penalized for the theft, Kam said that when she "burned the material [onto a CD] I thought that in the test of history, people who warned of war crimes were forgiven."

"I didn't have the chance to change some of the things that I found it important to change during my military service, and I thought that by exposing these [materials] I would make a change," the former soldier said, adding that it was for those reasons that "it was important for me to bring the IDF's policy to public knowledge."

The state has decided to prosecute Kam for the most serious crimes of espionage: passing on classified information with the intent of harming state security, charges which carry a maximum sentence of life in prison.

Kam faces other charges, including gathering and possessing classified materials with intent to harm state security, which carries a maximum 15-year prison sentence.

Presiding Judge Ze'ev Hammer wrote that "in order to inform the public of several aspects of IDF action in the West Bank, or to investigate war crimes in the West Bank, there is no need to gather and steal thousands of classified documents from the IDF which deal with the various military planning and action."

"Kam admitted during her investigation that her computer is not guarded and that she did not take interest into where the Haaretz reporter Uri Blau would store the documents or who would have access to them," Hammer added.

"She disrespected their [the document's] safekeeping and the importance and secrecy of the information," Hammer added.

Attorneys for Blau, Mibi Moser and Tal Leiblich said in response that "we consider this to be a positive development. Blau's attorney's will meet with Kam's attorneys in the coming days in order to evaluate the offer and take a stance following consultations with Blau."

On Sunday, Kam's defense attorney Avigdor Feldman told Haaretz that his client would relinquish her journalistic immunity as the source of Haaretz reporter Uri Blau and that she was calling on him to return to Israel from London with all the documents she has given him.

Feldman said that "the message we relayed to him is for the sake of Anat he should come back to Israel."

"We are working hard to convince Uri Blau through indirect ways to return to the country with the documents. I did not speak with him directly but we relayed a message to him. I think that he did not reveal the documents because he wants to protect her. Now she gave up her immunity as a source, and I am asking that he return, and his return, as far as I understand, will minimize the affair," Feldman said.

"I do not think he will be tricked," Feldman said. "I believe he will bring back the documents, he will not be harmed and the affair with Anat will also come to an end, I hope, quickly."

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IDF order will enable mass deportation from West Bank

A new military order aimed at preventing infiltration will come into force this week, enabling the deportation of tens of thousands of Palestinians from the West Bank, or their indictment on charges carrying prison terms of up to seven years.

When the order comes into effect, tens of thousands of Palestinians will automatically become criminal offenders liable to be severely punished.

Given the security authorities' actions over the past decade, the first Palestinians likely to be targeted under the new rules will be those whose ID cards bear home addresses in the Gaza Strip - people born in Gaza and their West Bank-born children - or those born in the West Bank or abroad who for various reasons lost their residency status. Also likely to be targeted are foreign-born spouses of Palestinians.

Until now, Israeli civil courts have occasionally prevented the expulsion of these three groups from the West Bank. The new order, however, puts them under the sole jurisdiction of Israeli military courts.

The new order defines anyone who enters the West Bank illegally as an infiltrator, as well as "a person who is present in the area and does not lawfully hold a permit." The order takes the original 1969 definition of infiltrator to the extreme, as the term originally applied only to those illegally staying in Israel after having passed through countries then classified as enemy states - Jordan, Egypt, Lebanon and Syria.

The order's language is both general and ambiguous, stipulating that the term infiltrator will also be applied to Palestinian residents of Jerusalem, citizens of countries with which Israel has friendly ties (such as the United States) and Israeli citizens, whether Arab or Jewish. All this depends on the judgment of Israel Defense Forces commanders in the field.

The new guidelines are expected to clamp down on protests in the West Bank.

The Hamoked Center for the Defense of the Individual was the first Israeli human rights to issue warnings against the order, signed six months ago by then-commander of IDF forces in Judea and Samaria Area Gadi Shamni.

Two weeks ago, Hamoked director Dalia Kerstein sent GOC Central Command Avi Mizrahi a request to delay the order, given "the dramatic change it causes in relation to the human rights of a tremendous number of people."

According to the provisions, "a person is presumed to be an infiltrator if he is present in the area without a document or permit which attest to his lawful presence in the area without reasonable justification." Such documentation, it says, must be "issued by the commander of IDF forces in the Judea and Samaria area or someone acting on his behalf."

The instructions, however, are unclear over whether the permits referred to are those currently in force, or also refer to new permits that military commanders might issue in the future. The provision are also unclear about the status of bearers of West Bank residency cards, and disregards the existence of the Palestinian Authority and the agreements Israel signed with it and the PLO.

The order stipulates that if a commander discovers that an infiltrator has recently entered a given area, he "may order his deportation before 72 hours elapse from the time he is served the written deportation order, provided the infiltrator is deported to the country or area from whence he infiltrated."

The order also allows for criminal proceedings against suspected infiltrators that could produce sentences of up to seven years. Individuals able to prove that they entered the West Bank legally but without permission to remain there will also be tried, on charges carrying a maximum sentence of three years. (According to current Israeli law, illegal residents typically receive one-year sentences.)

The new provision also allow the IDF commander in the area to require that the infiltrator pay for the cost of his own detention, custody and expulsion, up to a total of NIS 7,500.

Currently, Palestinians need special permits to enter areas near the separation fence, even if their homes are there, and Palestinians have long been barred from the Jordan Valley without special authorization. Until 2009, East Jerusalemites needed permission to enter Area A, territory under full PA control.

The fear that Palestinians with Gaza addresses will be the first to be targeted by this order is based on measures that Israel has taken in recent years to curtail their right to live, work, study or even visit the West Bank. These measures violated the Oslo Accords.

According to a decision by the West Bank commander that was not backed by military legislation, since 2007, Palestinians with Gaza addresses must request a permit to stay in the West Bank. Since 2000, they have been defined as illegal sojourners if they have Gaza addresses, as if they were citizens of a foreign state. Many of them have been deported to Gaza, including those born in the West Bank.

One group expected to be particularly harmed by the new rules are Palestinians who moved to the West Bank under family reunification provisions, which Israel stopped granting for several years.

In 2007, amid a number of Hamoked petitions and as a goodwill gesture to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, tens of thousands of people received Palestinian residency cards. The PA distributed the cards, but Israel had exclusive control over who could receive them. Thousands of Palestinians, however, remained classified as "illegal sojourners," including many who are not citizens of any other country.

The new order is the latest step by the Israeli government in recent years to require permits that limit the freedom of movement and residency previously conferred by Palestinian ID cards. The new regulations are particularly sweeping, allowing for criminal measures and the mass expulsion of people from their homes.

The IDF Spokesman's Office said in response, "The amendments to the order on preventing infiltration, signed by GOC Central Command, were issued as part of a series of manifests, orders and appointments in Judea and Samaria, in Hebrew and Arabic as required, and will be posted in the offices of the Civil Administration and military courts' defense attorneys in Judea and Samaria. The IDF is ready to implement the order, which is not intended to apply to Israelis, but to illegal sojourners in Judea and Samaria."

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What democracy is all about

By Uri Blau

"I certainly didn't think I'd have to stay in London and wouldn't be able to return to Tel Aviv as a journalist and a free man, only because I published reports that were not convenient to the establishment."

The telephone call I received about a month ago should not have been a surprise. "Your apartment in Tel Aviv has been broken into," the voice on the other end of the line said. "Everything's in a mess and it's not clear what has been taken."

Half an hour later, sweating in a Bangkok phone booth, mosquitoes flying around me, I spoke to the policeman who came to the apartment.

"Looks like they were looking for something," he said.

I had been told of Anat Kam's arrest earlier, in China, where I landed with my partner at the beginning of December. When I left Israel I had no reason to believe our planned trip would suddenly turn into a spy movie whose end is not clear. I certainly didn't think I'd have to stay in London and wouldn't be able to return to Tel Aviv as a journalist and a free man, only because I published reports that were not convenient to the establishment.

But the troubling information from Israel left me with no alternative.

Experiences I had read about in suspense novels have become my reality in recent months. When you're warned "they know much more than you think," and are told that your telephone line, e-mail and computer have been monitored for a long time and still are, then someone up there doesn't really understand what democracy is all about, and the importance of freedom of the press in preserving it.

When you discover that anonymous complaints about you containing a lot of detailed personal information have reached various investigation authorities, it is clear you have been marked by forces bigger and stronger than yourself. These forces won't hesitate to take steps reserved for states I don't think we want to resemble. So when they explained to me that if I return to Israel I could be silenced for ever, and that I would be charged for crimes related to espionage, I decided to fight. Sorry for the cliche, but this isn't only a war for my personal freedom but for Israel's image.

The Kafkaesque situation I found myself in forces me to return to basics. I am a journalist and my aim is to provide the reader as much information as possible and in the best way, with maximum objectivity. It's not a personal agenda, or a matter of Left or Right. In my years of work for Haaretz my name has appeared, alone and with others, above exposes dealing with public figures and institutions of all kinds, from Avigdor Lieberman, through Ehud Olmert and Ehud Barak to the Peres Center for Peace. None of those exposes could have been published without the help of sources and corroborating documents.

All the exposes in military or defense matters were vetted by military censors before publication, whether regarding the time Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi was a civilian and businessman or about the IDF's priorities in tracing Gilad Shalit. Or the story about how the IDF apparently violates the High Court of Justice's instructions regarding targeted assassinations. This story showed the readers authentic documents exposing the banality of executions with no trial.

It is clear to me that these reports were not always pleasant to read - neither to their subjects nor to the reader. But it doesn't matter, because the journalist's job is not to please his reader, employer or leaders. It is to provide people with the best tools to judge and understand the goings-on around them. Every journalist knows that exposes cannot be released without evidence - but no Israeli journalist has known until now that such exposes could have him declared an enemy of the state and find himself in jail.

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Harrass the IDF, not whistleblower Anat Kam

By Gideon Levy

Are Israelis entitled to know that the IDF's highest ranking officers gave advanced written permission to fire at innocent people during "targeted assassinations?" Isn't the media's supreme duty, not only its right, to report this?

Are Israel's citizens entitled to know that IDF commanders approved killing people even when it was possible to apprehend them, in blatant violation of the High Court's ruling?

Aren't we entitled to know about a secret Defense Ministry report saying about 75 percent of settlements construction has been carried out without a permit? That public structures in more than 30 settlements were built on private Palestinian land?

These are but few of the goings on exposed by journalist Uri Blau and which the state wanted to conceal. Now the state wants to settle the score with both the source and the journalist. In fact it wants to do more than settle the score.

Shin Bet security service head Yuval Diskin yesterday openly threatened, in the most scandalous way, that his organization will "remove its gloves" in dealing with this affair. "We were too sensitive to the media world ... that's the lesson we've learned from the affair," he said.

The lesson to be learned from the affair should be the exact opposite. A security service that destroys journalists' computers and threatens them has no place in a democratic state. The defense establishment is not trying (only) to keep state secrets in this case, but to cover-up grievous acts committed in the territories. These deeds were committed in our name, therefore we must know everything about them.

The violent, bullying defense establishment, which smashes computers, wants to settle the score with those who knew and would not keep silent; with those who witnessed the acts and would not take part in the cover up.

The Shin Bet has won again. Instead of dealing with the outrageous acts that were exposed, finding those responsible and bringing them to trial, everyone is preoccupied with persecuting the messengers and hunting down the whistleblowers. This is going on with the support of the security service's numerous mouthpieces in the media.

Anat Kam probably overheard corrupt discussions and should have been treated like any other whistleblower - the state should have protected her. The same applies to the journalist who exposed corruption. The witch hunt that came out yesterday after weeks of gagging - which also has no place in a democracy - is moving in the wrong direction, as the Shin Bet intended.

The GOC Central Command, in whose office the assassination meetings took place, should be the one in the heart of the furor. Instead, it's the one who reported them.

As usual with us, the marginal takes precedence over the primary, covered with layers of fake security arguments. The Palestinians already know the IDF and Border Police shoot to kill them even when they can merely arrest them.

But the IDF and Shin Bet don't want us to know that. It has nothing to do with security. It has everything to do with the kind of regime we're living in.

Yesterday a new Bus 300 affair began. Bus 300 was hijacked by Palestinians in 1984. Two of the hijackers, who were first reported to have been killed when security forces took over the bus, were in fact executed while in captivity by Shin Bet agents.

Then too, when the media published what happened, violating the censorship laws, some people found fault with the media instead of with the Shin Bet killers.

Consequently, the Hadashot newspaper, which published a picture of one of the hijackers being taken off the bus alive, was penalized and the killers received, eventually, a sweeping pardon. Only in time did it come out that the media was only doing its duty, and it led to cleaning the Shin Bet stables from lies and despicable acts of manslaughter.

It should be hoped that this time the public also understands that illegal, villainous acts must not be covered up by smashing the mirror (and computer).

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Israeli PM Netanyahu pulls out of US nuclear summit

Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu has cancelled a visit to the US where he was to attend a summit on nuclear security, Israeli officials say.

Mr Netanyahu made the decision after learning that Egypt and Turkey intended to raise the issue of Israel's presumed nuclear arsenal, media reports said.

Mr Obama is due to host dozens of world leaders at the two-day conference, which begins in Washington on Monday.

Israel has never confirmed or denied that it possesses atomic weapons.

"The prime minister has decided to cancel his trip to Washington to attend the nuclear conference next week, after learning that some countries including Egypt and Turkey plan to say Israel must sign the NPT," Reuters news agency quoted a senior Israeli official as saying.

Israel's Intelligence and Atomic Energy Minister Dan Meridor will take Netanyahu's place in the nuclear summit, Israeli radio said.

More than 40 countries are expected at the meeting, which will focus on preventing the spread of nuclear weapons to militant groups.

Landmark treaty

Israeli reports said there were concerns that Egypt and Turkey would call for Israel to sign the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

Along with India, Pakistan and North Korea, Israel is one of just four states that have not signed up to the NPT, which has 189 signatories.

Earlier this week, President Obama unveiled the new Nuclear Posture Review - which narrows the circumstances in which the US would use nuclear weapons - outlining his country's long-term strategy of nuclear disarmament.

On Thursday, the US president and his Russian counterpart, Dmitry Medvedev, signed a landmark nuclear arms treaty in the Czech capital, Prague.

That treaty commits the former Cold War enemies to reduce the number of deployed strategic warheads to 1,550 each - 30% lower than the previous ceiling.

The BBC's Kim Ghattas in Washington says the cancellation of Mr Netanyahu's Washington visit comes at a time of frosty relations between the two states.

The Israeli premier failed to see eye-to-eye with Mr Obama during his most recent US visit last month on the stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace process, our correspondent adds.

Washington criticised the building of Jewish homes in East Jerusalem, which prompted the Palestinians to pull out of US-brokered indirect peace talks.

There were also reports that one of Mr Netanyahu's confidants called Mr Obama a "disaster" for Israel.

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Israel's long-term future is in jeopardy

Jordanian King Abdullah has warned that Israel's long-term future would remain in jeopardy unless a permanent solution to the Middle East conflict was achieved, in an interview with The Wall Street Journal.

"I think the long-term future of Israel is in jeopardy unless we solve our problems," Abdullah told the paper in an interview that appeared online Tuesday.

The Jordanian monarch, who is scheduled to arrive to Washington on Saturday to attend President Barack Obama's Nuclear Security Summit, cautioned against "wasting too much time" in resolving the conflict in the region.

Pointing to the "tremendous tension" in the Middle East, Abullah warned that the "status quo is unacceptable."

"Over the Israeli-Lebanese border; if you spoke [to some Lebanese] today they feel there is going to be a war any second," he said. "[It] looks like there is an attempt by certain groups to promote a third intifada, which would be disastrous. Jerusalem as you are well aware is a tinderbox that could go off at any time, and then there is the overriding concern about military action between Israel and Iran."

"So with all these things in the background, the status quo is not acceptable; what will happen is that we will continue to go around in circles until the conflict erupts, and there will be suffering by peoples because there will be a war," added Abdullah.

Abdullah lauded Obama's efforts in pursuing a two-state solution for Israel and the Palestinians, but said: "They've had other things to deal with on their shoulders. The problem is what happens over the next couple of months."

"The job of Jordan and the other countries in the international community is to keep common sense and keep hope alive until America can bring its full weight on the Israelis and the Palestinians to get their act together and move the process forward," said the Jordanian king.

"We're sort of the power brigade... us and other countries, trying to see where issues of contention between Israelis and Palestinians and make the atmosphere more amiable. With the background that evil does not sleep," said Abdullah.

"There are those out there on all sides unfortunately, rejectionists, I think that's maybe a good term to use these days, who will do everything they can to spoil the future of Israelis and the Palestinians," he added.

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U.S.: Military action will not solve Mideast conflict

U.S. State Dept. spokesperson Philip J. Crowley said Friday that although Israel has a right to defend itself, military action would not solve the Middle East conflict, therefore Israel and the Palestinian Authority need to engage in direct negotiations.

"The Israelis have a right to self defense, "Crowley said during a press conference in the wake of a recent bout of violence, after Israel war planes struck the Gaza Strip in retaliation to rockets fired into Israeli territory.

"At the same time, as we have said many times, we don't ultimately think there is a military solution to this," he said, adding that "this is why we have been pressing the Palestinians and the Israelis to get into proximity talks that can lead to direct negotiations."

"We are always concerned that steps taken by either side, legitimate or otherwise, can be misconstrued, can be twisted and end up causing turbulence that can be an impediment to progress," Crowley added.

"Our message remains to the Israelis and Palestinians that we need to get the proximity talks going, focus on the substance, move to direct negotiations and ultimately arrive at a settlement that ends the conflict once and for all," Crowley said.

Earlier, both France and Britain issued condemnations against Israel's attack on Gazan targets on Friday.

French Foreign Ministry spokesman Bernard Valero said Friday that France was concerned about the rising tension in the Gaza strip and called Israel and the Palestinians to show restraint and act responsibly, Israel Radio reported.

Valero said that bold steps need to be taken to return security to the region and added that any action which could escalate the tension would be condemned by the French government and was unhelpful.

A spokesman for the U.K. Foreign Office said that London was "concerned by today's strikes and the escalation of violence in Gaza and southern Israel over the past week."

Talking to the U.K. newspaper The Telegraph, the official called "on all parties to show restraint," adding that Britain encouraged "Israelis and Palestinians to focus efforts on negotiation and to engage urgently in US-backed proximity talks."

Earlier Friday, a Qassam rocket was reported to have been fired by Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip, a report which the IDF Spokesman's Office said was the result of a false alarm.


At least 35 rockets were fired at Israel over the course of March.

Also Friday, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh called on the international community must intervene in the latest cycle of violence between Gaza and Israel in order to avoid a possible escalation.

Haniyeh urged the world must stop "the escalation and aggression," according to a Channel 10 report. He was likely referring to the Israel Air Force strikes, which destroyed what an Israel Defense Forces spokesman described as Palestinian munitions sites.

"We are contacting the other factions in order to reach an internal consensus as to the measures we may take in order to protect our people and strengthen our unity," Haniyeh told reporters in Gaza.

Friday's IAF air strikes were Israel's response to a Palestinian short-range rocket that was fired across the border into Israel on Thursday, an IDF spokesman said. The attack, which went unclaimed by any Palestinian faction, caused no damage.

Four air strikes blew up two caravans near the town of Khan Younis, witnesses and Hamas officials said. There were no casualties.

A fifth missile hit a cheese factory in Gaza City, setting it on fire, witnesses and Hamas officials said. Hospital officials said two children were slightly wounded by flying debris.

Helicopters struck twice in the central refugee camp of Nusseirat, destroying a metal foundry. There were no casualties.

An IDF spokesman confirmed the attacks, saying they had targeted two weapons-manufacturing plants and two arms caches.

Last Friday, Major Eliraz Peretz and Staff Sergeant Ilan Sviatkovsky were killed while pursuing a group of Palestinian militants trying to lay mines near the border fence. Two other soldiers were wounded in the incident, and two militants were killed.

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