From PressTV
Israeli forces, Palestinians clash in occupied West Bank
Clashes have broken out between Israeli forces and Palestinian protesters in the village of Bil’in near the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah.
The new wave of scuffles erupted on Friday after Israeli soldiers attacked a group of Palestinians who were holding a march against Tel Aviv’s settlement activities.
The violence comes as Israel is set to confiscate the land belonging to the villagers to construct more illegal settler units.
Israeli forces have also clashed with Palestinian demonstrators in the town of Beitunia, west of Ramallah, close to the Israeli Ofer Prison.
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From PressTV
Netanyahu plays with fire in al-Aqsa: Meshaal
“Netanyahu is playing with fire when he allows members of his government, the Knesset, and the extremists to repeatedly storm the al-Aqsa Mosque – that’s dangerous,” Hamas Political Bureau Chief Khaled Meshaal said in a Thursday interview with Sky News.
Meshaal added that “the action of the occupation targeting the Islamic and the Christian Holy sites, in Jerusalem (al-Quds) and Palestine, and specifically the al-Aqsa Mosque, brings about the angry Palestinian reaction.”
He said the resistance of Palestinians against the Israeli regime “is a national fight, but Netanyahu is turning it into a religious fight. He bears responsibility for the consequences of what is happening.”
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From the Jewish Daily Forward
From the Jewish Telegrapic Agency
No Belgian recognition for ‘Palestine’ in sight, politicians say
(JTA) — Lawmakers from the parties that make up Belgium’s governing coalition denied reports that it had agreed in principle to recognize Palestinian statehood.
The Belgian Le Soir and De Standaard reported earlier this week that the four coalition parties had agreed to pass a motion in parliament favoring Belgian recognition. The government would then enact the recognition, which would make Belgium Europe’s second country to recognize “Palestine,” following Sweden’s lead in October.
The Belgian federal government’s interior minister, Didier Reynders of the Reformist Movement, played down the reports in an interview Thursday with Belgium’s Radio 1. Belgian recognition for a Palestinian state “is not on the agenda yet at all,” he said. “It should not happen in a unilateral manner, but in cooperation between Israel and Europe.”
And Peter De Roover, a lawmaker for the New Flemish Alliance, told the Joods Actueel Jewish monthly that “there is no text available on this subject, so in fact there is currently nothing” to suggest that Belgium’s government intends to recognize a Palestinian state. He said that efforts to promote recognition were a “work in progress.”
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From PressTV
Israel bars Irish nationalist from visiting Gaza
Israeli authorities have banned Irish nationalist leader, Gerry Adams, from making a planned visit to the Gaza Strip during his three-day trip to the region.
The leader of Sinn Fein said on Friday that Tel Aviv officials have so far refused to give any reason for their decision to block his visit to Gaza and expressed his deep disappointment over the denial.
“Preventing me from travelling to Gaza and talking to those citizens who have survived three Israeli assaults in the last decade and who are besieged and in need of massive aid to rebuild their shattered economy and society, runs contrary to the needs of a peace process and is very unhelpful,” he said.
Israel’s Ministry of Military Affairs was not immediately available for comment.
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From the Jewish Telegrapic Agency
Cousin of murdered Palestinian teen helped supermarket terror victims
JERUSALEM (JTA) — A cousin of the Palestinian teen who was burned alive in an apparent retaliatory attack was among the first to help the wounded in a stabbing attack at a West Bank supermarket.
Mahmoud Abu Khdeir, whose cousin Mohammed Abu Khdeir was killed this summer in the Jerusalem forest in apparent retaliation for the murder of three kidnapped Israeli teens, rushed to help the wounded inside the Rami Levy discount supermarket in the Mishor Adumim industrial zone near Maale Adumim, east of Jerusalem.
The assailant was identified as a 16-year-old Palestinian male with no prior record from a West Bank village. He was shot in the legs by a supermarket security guard.
Abu Khdeir was working in the supermarket’s storeroom when Wednesday’s attack took place.
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