CMEP Bulletin: It’s the Occupation…

CMEP Bulletin: It’s the Occupation…

US Cautiously Watches Israeli-Palestinian Peace Initiatives [The Arab Weekly]
As Obama nears the end of his presidency, he is widely assumed to be considering a last move on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in which he has invested so much time with so little success. Among those options could be supporting a UN Security Council resolution on settlements, a resolution laying out Obama’s parameters for a final agreement or perhaps even US recognition of the state of Palestine.

‘Gush Etzion Settlement Bloc to Grow to Half-a-Million People’ [Jerusalem Post]
US State Department deputy spokesperson Mark Toner spoke out against the project on Tuesday, in response to a reporter’s question. “We’re concerned because these plans, if carried out, would have the effect of isolating Bethlehem from the southern West Bank, and that’s fundamentally – in our view, fundamentally incompatible with the pursuit of a two-state solution,” Toner said.

2017 Int’l Year to End Israeli Occupation of Palestine? [In Depth News]
The UN General Assembly is coming under strong pressure to declare 2017 as theInternational Year to End Israeli Occupation of Palestine, particularly in the aftermath of the July 2016 report by the Middle East Quartet – comprising the United States, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations. 2017 as the International Year to End Israeli Occupation of Palestine would mark the fiftieth anniversary of Security Council resolution 242 (1967), and the seventieth anniversary of Assembly resolution 181 (1947). The demand comes within days of 134 nations from around the world comprising the Group of 77 (G77) and China, stressing the urgency of achieving “without delay” an end to Israel’s 49-year occupation of the Palestinian Territory.

In The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, Even Calm Is Deadly [NPR]
American political scientist Dov Waxman of Northeastern University has found that regular violence leads people to doubt the situation will ever change. “They see it as almost an inevitable feature of life,” Waxman says. “So that saps the political will, if you like, to try to change the situation.” His research has focused on Israelis. But many Palestinians also don’t expect the situation will change. In addition to those killed on both sides during lulls in large-scale violence, tens of thousands of others are exposed to incidents that physically injure or traumatize them.

Click here to read the full Churches for Middle East Peace bulletin, including links to these stories.