New York Times - July 28
"Bill
Clinton Would Be an Ideal Middle East Convoy"
by Letty Cottin Pogrebin
What should Hillary Clinton do with Bill? That's easy. She should appoint him as special envoy to Israel/Palestine with a presidential mandate to jump start the peace process.
Bill Clinton is the perfect person to create bridging proposals and persuade both parties to make crucial compromises. No one in America is more conversant with the issues that divide Israelis and Palestinians and the events that have led them to the current impasse. No one else knows the neighborhood better — not just its leaders but the civil society activists and local organizers who will ultimately make peace a reality on the ground.
Because of his role as facilitator of the 1993 Oslo process that culminated in the handshake between Yitzhak Rabin
and Yasir Arafat on the White House lawn, and his last ditch efforts at the 2000 Camp David summit meeting with
Arafat and Israel's then-Prime Minister Ehud Barak, Bill knows the map right down to the streets in Jerusalem and
the squares in Ramallah. He knows where the minefields are — right of return, borders, security, and who controls
the Temple Mount. If there's the slightest possibility that this 100-year-old conflict can be brought to a
peaceful, permanent conclusion, Bill Clinton is the one who can make it happen.
Such an assignment would focus his formidable energy and expertise on this single complex issue and leave the rest
of the country for Hillary to run.
Washington Post - July 29
State Dept. criticizes Israeli settlement expansion, demolitions, Peace Now welcomes US criticism of Israel's
settlement expansion
Israel Hayom - July 29
US slams increase in Israeli construction
beyond Green Line, Peace Now quoted on Israeli government tenders for settlement homes
The News - July 29
New Israeli
Settlement Plans Provocative, Peace Now quoted on Israeli government tenders for settlement homes
Haaretz - July 28
Left-wing Israeli Activists Facing Violence, Death
Threats, Hagit Ofran, director of Peace Now's Settlement Watch, describes growing threats to the
organization
Haaretz - July 28
Secret 1970 Document Confirms First West Bank
Settlements Built on a Lie, features Peace Now's aerial settlement maps and Hagit Ofran, director of Peace
Now's Settlement Watch, cites the first usage of military orders to seize land for civilian use
Reuters - July 28
US concerned over Israel's
settlement activity, Peace Now quoted on Israeli government tenders for settlement homes
Daily Sabah - July 27
US slams
new Israeli settlement plans for undermining peace, Peace Now quoted on Israeli government tenders
for settlement homes
The Jerusalem Post - July 26
IDF raizes 15 illegal Arab homes in East Jerusalem and West Bank, Eyal Raz, spokesman for Peace Now, says
demolitions could exacerbate tensions
Washington Post - July 23
In the settlement of Kiryat Arba, the demand is to expand, Hagit Ofran, Director of Peace Now's Settlement
Watch, quoted on the threat of settlement expansion to peace
Early this week, the Washington Post ran a piece titled, “In the settlement of Kiryat Arba, the demand is to expand.” If you just read the title, you might think it was about the continuing growth of Israel’s settlements. If you only read the first few paragraphs, you might think that it was about the shocking murder of Hallel Ariel and the cynical use of her death to promote settlement growth.
But read to the end and you find that Kiryat Arba – one of the most iconic and radical of the ideological settlements, the settlement home to Baruch Goldstein (y”sh), who murdered Muslim worshipers at the Ibrahimi Mosque/Tomb of the Patriarchs in 1994 – is shrinking. Settlers there are given to lament that “political considerations and outside pressure means nothing changes.”
Who is helping lead the charge to bring this “outside pressure”? Peace Now.
So it is no surprise that in the same article, when the Washington Post wanted to learn the facts about Israeli settlements from an authoritative source, they turned to Peace Now’s Hagit Ofran.
News from Peace Now's (Israel) Settlement Watch:
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The fifth in a series of security validators for APN is Condoleezza Rice, an American political scientist and
diplomat. Rice served as the 66th United States Secretary of State, and was the first female African-American to
hold that position, as well as the second African American secretary of state, and the second female secretary of
state. Rice was President Bush's National Security Advisor during his first term, making her the first woman to
serve in that position. Before joining the Bush administration, she was a professor of political science at
Stanford University where she served as Provost from 1993 to 1999. Rice also served on the National Security
Council as the Soviet and Eastern Europe Affairs Advisor to President George H.W. Bush during the dissolution of
the Soviet Union and German reunification.
"Inshallah, we will meet in Riyadh."
