Israel expands plans to construct new homes in E. Jerusalem, West Bank
according to the Housing Ministry's proposed budget for 2008. The proposed budget includes funding for the construction of 500 apartments in Har Homa as well as 240 apartments in the nearby settlement of Ma'aleh Adumim. Minister for Jerusalem Affairs Rafi Eitan told Army Radio that Israel never promised to halt construction within 'the municipal borders of Jerusalem', whose eastern sector Israel annexed in 1967 after capturing it in the Six-Day War.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/937388.html

On 'Israel's right to exist'
There is an enormous difference between "recognizing Israel's existence" and "recognizing Israel 's right to exist". From a Palestinian perspective, the difference is in the same league as the difference between asking a Jew to acknowledge that the Holocaust happened and asking him to concede that the Holocaust was morally justified. For Palestinians to acknowledge the occurrence of the Nakba -- the expulsion of the great majority of Palestinians from their homeland between 1947 and 1949 -- is one thing. For them to publicly concede that it was "right" for the Nakba to have happened is something else entirely. For the Jewish and Palestinian peoples, the Holocaust and the Nakba, respectively, represent catastrophes and injustices on an unimaginable scale that can neither be forgotten nor forgiven.
http://www.palestinechronicle.com/story-12220742026.htm

Time to stop mourning
The celebrations planned to mark Israel's 60th Independence Day have become, as expected, a source of confrontation between the Jewish community, which seeks to foster patriotic feelings and build bridges between its divided populations, and the Palestinian-Israeli community, whose national tragedy it recalls. . . Only paranoia and a repressed feeling of guilt could produce the shocking sentence uttered by Public Security Minister Avi Dichter: "Those who sit year after year and cry about the Nakba shouldn't be surprised if in the end they really do have a Nakba."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/937182.html

Religious outpost takes over secular settlement in West Bank
The political significance is that the representatives of the outpost, delegates of a national-religious group of law-breakers, now constitute a majority in the government of the settlement and have a representative sitting on the regional council. "This is not only forcing a totally different lifestyle on the residents of the settlement, but also a mortal blow to the struggle against the outposts, which are institutionalized and organized criminality that challenges the legitimacy of the government of Israel to make political decisions," the original settlers' attorney Michael Sfard wrote to the authorities.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/937364.html

Ashamed of American Christian abandonment of their faith – by Ray Hanania (!)
Does your mother have to be from Bethlehem before you can even bother to care for the fate of that holy city? My mother and her family are from Bethlehem. She was born down the street from the Holy Manger where Jesus was cradled more than 2,000 years ago. And now, down the street from one of the most offensive, disturbing constructions, the 26 foot tall "barrier" that Israel's government declares is a "fence." This Wall is not constructed to protect Israelis from Bethlehem terrorism, or from terrorism from any other place in a conflict that has raged unending since 1947, but rather it is being built by Israel so Israel can steal more land from Palestinians who are Christian and Muslim.
http://www.theamericanmuslim.org/tam.php/features/articles/ashamed_of_american_christian_the_abandonment_of_their_faith/0015299

Reality in Bethlehem mars Christmas tradition
For generations, the Holy Land Arts Museum has been selling olivewood manger scenes to thousands of pilgrims wanting souvenirs from the biblical birthplace of Jesus. This year, the small Bethlehem shop decided that it was time to update the traditional Christmas scene. Gone is the olivewood stable shielding the baby Jesus, Mary and Joseph. In its place, looming over the angelic family, are an Israeli watchtower and three towering sections of an adjoining wall. "Bethlehem is like a small prison," said Jack Giacaman, manager of the museum. "Everywhere you look, there are walls."
http://www.kansascity.com/news/world/story/414349.html

In Bethlehem, a bond is born
The lyrics about the little town of Bethlehem, so closely associated with the Christmas season, ring with irony for a group of Cambridge [Massachusetts, USA] citizens who recently visited the Middle East. Among their conclusions: The barrier has devastated the local economy and, as described in the familiar carol, Bethlehem does indeed lie still. For many in the delegation - which included six Jewish members as well as two of Palestinian descent - the events and scenes they witnessed during the visit late last month remain emotionally raw and often difficult to convey to friends and co-workers. As a Jewish member of the delegation and as someone who had escaped from the Nazis in Vienna, Eva Moseley, 76, said the trip left her with "complicated feelings about the Holocaust," because "on top of the usual outrage and horror at what it was, I feel another layer of outrage at the way it is used to punish the Palestinians, who had nothing to do with it."
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2007/12/23/in_bethlehem_a_bond_is_born/

In photos: Bethlehem – Christmas preparations
http://news.monstersandcritics.com/middleeast/features/article_1382653.php

Christmas under Hamas rule
"You media people!" Father Musallam boomed at me when I first poked my head around his door. "Hamas this, Hamas that. You think we Christians are shaking in our ghettos in Gaza? That we're going to beg you British or the Americans or the Vatican to rescue us?" he asked. "Rescue us from what? From where? This is our home." On one of the walls hang huge photos of what the irreverent might be tempted to describe as the Gazan Catholic's Holy Trinity - the Pope, the Patriarch of Jerusalem, and the (Muslim) Palestinian president. I found a group of 10-year-olds on stage, rehearsing their Nativity play, watched, with great enthusiasm, by a group of their Muslim friends.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/7154134.stm

The Holy Land's dwindling Christians
"The Christians of the Holy Land . . . have shrunk to under 2%t of the entire population in the Palestinian territories and Israel," says Dr. Uwe Graebe. The reasons are many.  A clash between Western Christian civilization and Islam is offered as one explanation. Another explanation for the Christian exodus blames the Israeli occupation in the Palestinian territories. Graebe doesn't buy into either theory. Pragmatic responses are more persuasive, he says. It is normal for people to emigrate when living conditions are poor and they can do better elsewhere. "Christians don't suffer more than Muslims. They simply have better opportunities to emigrate because their families are significantly smaller, economically stronger and better educated and more highly skilled than their Moslem counterparts."
http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?article_class=3&no=381287&rel_no=1

Palestinian Christians say they are invisible to visiting U.S. evangelicals
Many American evangelical Christians believe that supporting Israel is a biblical imperative, and they are flocking to the Holy Land in record numbers. An estimated 130,000 American evangelicals are expected to visit by the end of the year. The pilgrims tour the Jewish and Christian quarters of Jerusalem's Old City. They parade through its streets to demonstrate their solidarity with Israel. They visit Galilee, the main locale of Jesus' ministry. They give hundreds of millions of dollars each year to projects in Israel. American evangelicals rarely seek out Palestinian Christians, however. David Parsons, spokesman for the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem, which champions evangelical tourism to the Holy Land, notes a "cultural divide" between evangelical Christians and the "more traditional" faith of local Christians. "For Palestinian Christians, you are born a Christian, and it is part of your identity," he said. "For evangelicals, you can be born into Christianity, but you still have to have your own experience of God."
http://www.statesman.com/news/content/news/stories/world/12/23/1223bethlehem.html

Music soars in the land of sadness
TAYBEH, West Bank – "We are the last and only entirely Christian village in the Holy Land," proclaimed Father Raed Abusahlia, parish priest at Latin Patriarchal, speaking shortly before the concert began. "We were evangelized by Jesus Christ Himself." Partly for that reason, an unlikely group of fine musicians – including Christians, Jews and Muslims – ventured through the darkness and winter cold last Wednesday to converge on this hilltop town to perform a Christmas concert of baroque music
http://www.thestar.com/News/article/288220

Israeli forces arrest Al-Aqsa Brigades leader in Muthallath Ash-Shuhada village near Jenin
Eyewitnesses said that more than 12 Israeli military vehicles raided home of Rabi' Asa'sa at 2:30 am and called the residents through loudspeakers to evacuate the home. After the evacuation, the Israeli troops stormed the house using police dogs and shot Asa'sa in the foot before they seized him. Asa'sa was wanted by Israeli intelligence since several years and the Israelis failed to arrest him several in several attempts.
http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=26861

Israeli forces arrest seven Palestinians in Hebron
Israeli forces arrested on Sunday morning 7 Palestinians from the southern West Bank city of Hebron , Israeli sources said. Separately, sources within the Israeli army said that a military post in Ramallah in the central West Bank near Israeli settlement of Psagot came under fire last night. No casualties have been reported.
http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=26862

Israeli settlers: a hindrance to peace
The crowd of Hebron settlers shouted, "Gas the Arabs" and, "Death to the Arabs" as they forced open the door of Hasham al-Azzer's home which borders the neighboring settlement of Tel Rumeida, about 20 miles south of Jerusalem. The water pipes outside had already been destroyed, the grapevines poisoned, olive branches cut, and garbage from the Jewish settlement strewn on the pathway approaching the front door. Once inside they proceeded to wreak havoc, smashing furniture, computers and windows, scribbling graffiti on the walls, upturning personal belongings, and emptying the contents of cupboards and drawers onto the floors.
http://www.metimes.com/International/2007/12/20/israeli_settlers_a_hindrance_to_peace/1265/  

Refusing to accept apartheid in Beit Jala
Last night the rains finally arrived in Beit Jala, a small town in the West Bank, one kilometer west of Bethlehem and about eight kilometers south of Jerusalem. Its alluring hills are covered with olive trees, vineyards and apricots. In 1967 Israel confiscated 22 percent of Beit Jala's land. Now, the construction of Israel's separation wall is in full swing and will cut off another 45 per cent of Beit Jala's land. We went to visit the area to feel the impact of the wall and listen to the stories of the farmers who didn't sell their land and choose to resist the its confiscation.
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article9175.shtml

Palestinian prisoner battered, soldiers shield culprit
Dozens of Givati Brigade soldiers present as one of their own batters Palestinian prisoner with blunt object . None of the soldiers willing to confess. One soldier, still in custody, refuses to name guilty party, claims 'I am innocent'. IDF Prosecutor's Office: 'This is aggravated assault' – A military source investigating this incident told Ynet news that "This is a grave occurrence for several reasons. First and foremost this is assault and battery on a fellow human being in the guise of duty." [They've got to be kidding. This happens all the time. Why the sudden interest on the Israeli side? Must be for international consumption.]
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3485557,00.html

Palestinian prisoners in Guinness Book of Records
According to the report, Palestinian prisoner Sa'id Al-Ataba has been detained for more than 30 years which is the longest imprisonment in the world. No other political prisoner had served such a long period ; Nelson Mandela had served 26 years, and Lee Harvey Oswald, the assassin of former US president John Kennedy served 28 years in prison. The report also adds that 232 Palestinian prisoners have already served more than 15 years in Israeli jails including 73 who have served more than 20 years. According to the report, there was no such collective political imprisonment in the history of other peoples of the world.
http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=26863

Interesting (if typical) lie about video shown on PA TV
'Israel Inside' claims that PA TV is again airing a music video about a martyr going to join the virgins of Paradise – "This was part of the multifaceted PA campaign glorifying and encouraging terror, and promoting suicide terror as idyllic Shahada (Martyrdom for Allah)." [In fact this video is a tragic love song by the Egyptian superstar Kazim El Sahir and has nothing to do with the 'virgins' that some people believe suicide bombers get or anything similar.  It is about a man going to join his murdered lover in Paradise.]
http://web.israelinsider.com/Articles/Diplomacy/12497.htm

Cairo magazine claims Yasser Arafat was the commander of 'Black September'
Al-Ahram Al-Arabi quoted the Palestinian leader Marwan Kanafani as saying that late Palestinian president Yasser Arafat was the founder and commander of the "Black September" organization which claimed responsibility in 1971 for assassinating the Jordanian Prime Minister Wasfi At-Tal.
http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=26865

Help! A Cease Fire! – by Uri Avnery
A paradox inherent in the conflict since its beginning is at work here: if the Palestinians are strong, it is dangerous to make peace with them. If they are weak, there is no need to make peace with them. Either way, they must be broken. "There is nothing to talk about!" Ehud Olmert declared at once. So everything is alright, the bloodletting can go on. . . If the Qassams were really bothering our political and military leaders, they would have jumped at the cease-fire offer. But the leaders don't really care about what's happening to the Sderot population. The Israeli strategic aim in Gaza is not to put an end to the Qassams. It would still be the same if not a single Qassam fell on Israel. The real aim is to break the Palestinians, which means breaking Hamas.
http://zope.gush-shalom.org/home/en/channels/avnery/1198361773/

Gazan children stage protest demanding ID cards for parents
The children raised banners calling on President Abbas and international institutions to facilitate identity papers for Palestinians who still lack them, preventing them from ever leaving "the prison of Gaza." While some Palestinians posses passports or identity cards issued by the Palestinian Authority, others have passports from Jordan, Egypt, Syria and numerous other countries. Without a state of their own, many Palestinians have no form of identification whatsoever.
http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=26860

Israeli military reconsiders a ground offensive in Gaza
An Israeli studies center voiced assessment today that the Israeli military won't launch an all-out ground offensive on the Gaza Strip, given likely casualties among the Israeli military. According to secret polls the Israeli army has conducted recently, the Israeli public is opposed to 'costly' offensive on the coastal region. The studies center estimated that at least 100 Israeli soldiers are likely to be killed, in case the army invades Gaza massively.
http://www.imemc.org/article/52070

Dr. Ahmed Yousif: Hamas willing to seek ceasefire with Israel
Yousif, a political advisor to the deposed Palestinian Prime Minister Isma'il Haniyeh, said on Saturday that Hamas movement would be willing to reach a ceasefire with Israel including stoppage of launching homemade projectiles if Israel lifts the siege on Gaza Strip, opens the crossings and end the humanitarian crisis. Yousif said any decision taken by the Hamas-led government in Gaza Strip would be binding to all the Palestinian factions as long as the decision serves the higher Palestinian interests.
http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=26868

Ayalon: IDF 'lacks intel' to launch Shalit rescue mission
Former Shin Bet head and Security Cabinet member Minister Ami Ayalon (Labor-Meimad) said Saturday that the IDF cannot launch a rescue operation to recover kidnapped IDF soldier Gilad Shalit at this time due to "intelligence failure." [translation: they don't know where he is.]
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3485409,00.html

Israeli military kills, wounds 49 Palestinians during Eid al-Adha
Israel's recent escalation against the Gaza Strip since the Eve of the Eid Al-Adha (Feast of Sacrifice) on Tuesday killed 22 Palestinians and wounded 27, A Palestinian human right centre on Sunday. TRhe Palestinian human losses are caused by the Israeli sudden assassinations and missile attacks carried out by the Israeli troops in Gaza over the past few days, the Palestinian Center of Al-Mizan for Human Rights said in a statement.
http://www.kuna.net.kw/NewsAgenciesPublicSite/ArticleDetails.aspx?id=1870141&Language=en

Gaza police commander's escort arrested on charge of treason
Yousif Az-Zahhar, who is brother of the prominent Hamas leader Mahmoud Az-Zahhar, explained that his escort was being interrogated on charge of collaboration with Israeli intelligence. Nothing has been verified yet, he said. Also, the spokesperson of Al-Qassam Brigades Abu Ubayda said that his men continue to detect for collaborators with the Israeli occupation, and that some of those who assisted the Israelis in the targeted assassination of Palestinian resistance' leaders have been revealed.
http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=26869

Hamas says it has uncovered network of collaborators
According to reports, the three suspects who were detained had a Hamas official directly involved in the kidnapping of IDF soldier Gilad Shalit under surveillance and assisted the Israeli army in the recent killing of eight senior Islamic Jihad and Hamas members in Gaza. Hamas also suspects that the collaborators were involved in the death of a member of Hamas' armed wing, the Izz al-Din el-Qassam Brigades, as well as that of six activists in the al-Quds Brigades, Islamic Jihad's military division.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3485643,00.html

Palestinian parliamentarian condemns world's silence over Israeli aggression
In a letter to the Vice President of the European Parliament, Husam al-Tawil expressed his "deep shock" at the international community's silence over Israel's aggression against the population of the Gaza Strip, wondering whether "the world has grown accustomed to the smell of Palestinian blood". . . Due to the lack of spare parts, which the Israeli embargo has made unavailable in the Gaza Strip, the pumps of the public sewage system cannot be repaired any more. Several pumps therefore are not operating and a further breakdown would inundate large swaths of the lower lying areas in the Gaza Strip with raw sewage.
http://www.arabmonitor.info/news/dettaglio.php?idnews=21694&lang=en

General Commander of Abu Ali Mustafa Brigades dies of his wounds
This is the armed group affiliated to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). Mu'in Al-Masri aged 40 died on Saturday night of his wounds sustained in an internal explosion in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip months ago.
http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=26864

A vital Palestinian discussion
As long as Abbas himself does not speak with Hamas, he is also not a partner for dialogue about stopping the firing of Qassams. There is only one formula likely to address the Qassams: dialogue between Abbas and Hamas, reestablishing the national unity government and recognizing this government as the executive branch, even if it will not be a partner for diplomatic negotiations, at least at this stage.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/937185.html

Israeli security cabinet okays funding for 'Iron Dome' rocket defense system
which is designed to intercept short- and medium-range rockets such as Qassams and Katyushas. Developing the system is expected to cost NIS 811 million over the next five years. According to the defense establishment estimate, the first operational version of the system will be deployed in Sderot in two and a half years. Defense Minister Ehud Barak told the cabinet that he is convinced that Israel should continue to fortify communities within rocket range, until the anti-rocket system is operational.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/937429.html

Tearful Eid at Rafah Crossing
Amid sepulchral silence from the international community, the stranded Palestinians have no option but to start manning their own affairs all by themselves. – "We have resigned to our destiny and started to be self-dependent," said Yusuf Al-Fara, who has taken the initiative despite his old age. "We have set up a committee to contact charities in Egypt to provide us with much-needed medications, basic food stuffs and clothes."Al-Fara has rejected a generous offer from the Egyptian Syndicate of Physicians to provide them this `Eid with Udhiyah meat. "We told them we need medications and medical care instead," he said. "It is such a luxury." 
http://www.palestinechronicle.com/story-12220742324.htm

Poll: One third of Israel youth want to live abroad
35% of Israeli youth would be interested in moving abroad if they had the opportunity compared with 48% who believe it is better to live in Israel. According to the poll, a whopping 70% of Israeli teens feel that Israeli-Arabs are not loyal citizens of the State. Nearly half of those questioned said that if Israeli-Arabs completed national service, they would feel differently. 73% responded that they have full confidence in the IDF. 41% remarked that the Israeli government was more corrupt than governments abroad and 18% said it was less corrupt. A third answered that there was no difference.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3485912,00.html

US plans assessment of Mideast peace moves
(Reuters) The United States will conduct confidential assessments of whether Israel and the Palestinians are meeting their peacemaking commitments and share the results privately with the parties, U.S. and Western officials said. Israel has sought to keep the U.S. process of judging compliance with the long-stalled "road map" peace plan largely secret. Palestinians say they favor disclosure of judgments on whether Israel is halting all settlement activity and whether the Palestinians are curbing militants as the plan demands.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/23/AR2007122300280.html