Report on Violations of International Human Rights and Humanitarian Law Committed by the Israeli Military in Beit Hanoun, 15 May- 30 June, 2003 - Acrobat format
Palestinian Centre for Human Rights 2003-07-31
This report attempts to provide documentation of the violations of international human rights and humanitarian law perpetrated by the Israeli military against the civilian population of the greater Beit Hanoun area during the Israeli military siege which began on 15 May 2003. This report represents the findings of PCHR's preliminary investigations. Information in this report is sourced from statements taken from eye-witnesses and victims, site visits, and photographic and other evidence obtained by PCHR fieldworkers and researchers.

Economy in brief: EU grants 10m euro in support programs
Jerusalem Times 2003-07-31
Economic Minister, Maher Masri, declared recently that the European Union will initiate efforts by the end of this month to implement supportive programs for the Palestinian public sector in all aspects of life and especially in the industrial sector,the support comes as a special Grant to the Palestinian People in the amount of 10m euro.

Retail chain sales up 8% March-June
Globes 2003-07-31
Retail chain and shopping mall sales were down 3.3% in the first half of the year, compared with the first half of last year. -- The public is returning to the shopping malls and centers since the ceasefire with the Palestinians and the end of the war in Iraq. The monthly average of retail chain and shopping mall sales rose 8% in current prices in March-June 2003, while food sales were up 4%.

Palestinian women join single-mother campaign
Jerusalem Times 2003-07-31
The Jewish single-mother women’s campaign, who are protesting and leading a distinctive protest against the Minister of finance new economic plan, Benjamin Natanyahu and the economic policy of Sharon’s government, welcomed recently with warm atmosphere a group of Palestinian-Israeli single parent women who joined this campaign after a long march from Arab cities.

Bedouins hold on to tradition
Jerusalem Times 2003-07-31
Ibrahim Salman works as a taxi driver during the day, but as night approaches, he sheds his regular clothes, dons his traditional robes, and starts working as a judge and mediator for his tribe in the Sinai. Ibrahim, 31, who is a member of Al-Tarabeen clan, does not work alone; instead, as night falls, he joins his peers as they sit before a stove and prepare to work in a room whose roof is made of palm branches and whose floor is covered with simple rugs instead of colored carpets.

Globes-Smith survey: Less public support for Knafo
Globes 2003-07-31
A majority of respondents believe the single mothers movement will weaken and disappear. -- The main topics of public interest in the two weeks since the previous Globes-Smith survey are still dominated by the same topics that have concerned the country almost daily: economic crisis, its ramifications and consequences; and relations with the Palestinians, particularly since the hudna (truce). A third, no less prominent topic, has been the single mothers protest that erupted into the public consciousness three weeks ago.

Palestinian Boy Saves Lives Of Four Israelis
Islam Online 2003-07-31
GAZA, July 31 (IslamOnline.net) - A dead Palestinian boy saved the lives of four Israeli children - including two Jews - after his mother donated his organs, in a new Palestinian humanitarian gesture towards Israelis. Waleed Ouda fell off his house in the vicinity of Nablus 10 days ago, to be rushed to a nearby hospital - where modest medical capabilities were not enough to save his life.

Scientists bend sunlight to the operating theatre
The Guardian 2003-07-31
Israeli scientists have devised the ultimate in blue sky thinking - a beam of sunlight as a surgeon's scalpel. A team at Ben-Gurion University in Beersheba report in Nature today that they used solar surgery to burn away a tumour-sized lesion on the liver of an anaesthetised rat.

Fadlallah argues US wants Syria to stay
Daily Star 2003-07-31
Syria’s recent military redeployment in Lebanon may have been in response to US pressure on Damascus in the aftermath of Sept. 11 and the war on Iraq, but Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah believes that such pressure will not lead to the end of Syria’s role in Lebanon. “The problem of Syrian-American relations is that Israel stands in the middle,” the leading Shiite cleric and religious scholar told The Daily Star Wednesday. “US pressures on Syria stem from Israeli pressures on the US administration,” he said.

Canadian imprisoned for spying for Israel
Daily Star 2003-07-31
A Canadian national, Bruce Balfour, was arrested upon his arrival in Beirut on July 10 on charges of spying for Israel, State Prosecutor Adnan Addoum announced Wednesday. “His arrest came in compliance with an arrest warrant that had been issued by a military court,” he told reporters at the Justice Palace. He would not elaborate on the charges but said Balfour, a priest, was scheduled for a trial on Aug. 11.

Al-Bajaji denies meeting with Peres in Rome: no relations with Israel before the Palestinian state
Arabic News 2003-07-31
Member of the Iraqi transitional governing council Adnan al-Bajaji denied yesterday to have had held in Rome two weeks ago any meeting with the former Israeli prime minister Shimon Peres. He stressed that Iraq will not think of establishing diplomatic relations with Israel, unless an agreement is established by the Palestinians and the Israelis on the foundation of a Palestinian state.

UN interim force in Lebanon gets six-month extension
United Nations News 2003-07-31
31 July – Condemning all acts of violence and expressing great concern about the serious breaches and violations along the withdrawal line between Lebanon and Israel, the United Nations Security Council today extended for six months the mandate of the UN force monitoring the situation in southern Lebanon.

Jordan confirms it is hosting two of Saddam's daughters
Ha'aretz 2003-07-31
AMMAN, Jordan - Jordan's King Abdullah II has granted a haven to Saddam Hussein's two eldest daughters and their nine children, Information Minister Nabil al-Sharif said Thursday. Raghad Saddam Hussein and Rana Saddam Hussein, who had reportedly been living in poor circumstances in neighboring Iraq and whose father had killed their husbands a decade ago, arrived in the kingdom Thursday from the United Arab Emirates, al-Sharif told The Associated Press.

Groups Demand Repeal of Bush Immunity for U.S. Oil Companies in Iraq
SEEN Activist Network 2003-07-31
WASHINGTON - Representatives of the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) and Government Accountability Project (GAP) today urged Congress to investigate - and repeal - an executive order signed by President George W. Bush that gives sweeping powers to U.S. oil companies operating in Iraq...."In terms of legal liability, the Executive Order cancels the concept of corporate accountability and abandons the rule of law," charged Tom Devine, legal director of the Government Accountability Project. "It is a blank check for corporate anarchy, potentially robbing Iraqis of both their rights and their resources."

Saudis to let CIA interview 9/11 suspect
The Guardian 2003-07-31
The Saudi government has bowed to US pressure to let the FBI and CIA interrogate a mysterious figure at the heart of the September 11 investigation: a suspected Saudi intelligence agent who befriended and helped two of the hijackers in America.

US scraps nuclear weapons watchdog
The Guardian 2003-07-31
A US department of energy panel of experts which provided independent oversight of the development of the US nuclear arsenal has been quietly disbanded by the Bush administration, it emerged yesterday. The decision to close down the national nuclear security administration advisory committee - required by law to hold public hearings and issue public reports on nuclear weapons issues - has come just days before a closed-door meeting at a US air force base in Nebraska to discuss the development of a new generation of tactical "mini nukes" and "bunker buster" bombs, as well as an eventual resumption of nuclear testing.

Israel to take part in joint exercise with Turkey, US
ProLog.net 2003-07-31
JERUSALEM, July 31 (AFP) - Israel, the United States and Turkey will conduct joint air and sea exercises in international waters off the southern Turkish coast, the Israeli army said in a statement Thursday. The exercises, the sixth of its kind, would include sea rescues and command coordination between the three countries. Helicopters, reconnaissance planes and battleships will all be involved, the statement said.

Enemy Combatant Vanishes Into a 'Legal Black Hole'
Washington Post 2003-07-31
The pivotal question: Can an American citizen, arrested on U.S. soil, be held incommunicado in a military prison indefinitely -- without being charged with a crime, without access to a lawyer? -- NEW YORK - It was the luck of the draw. Some other spring morning, Donna Newman would have encountered a different client in a prison jumpsuit, someone accused of fraud or drug trafficking. Instead, arriving at the federal courthouse in downtown Manhattan in May 2002, she met Jose Padilla.

Arab Groups in US File Lawsuit Seeking to Curb Patriot Act
Common Dreams/Boston Globe 2003-07-31
WASHINGTON -- Six Muslim and Arab-American groups asked a federal court yesterday to strike down a key section of the USA Patriot Act, filing the first constitutional challenge to the sweeping new powers that Congress gave the Justice Department the month after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

Jewish Groups Against Pipes Nomination
Common Dreams/Jews for Peace in Palestine and Israel 2003-07-31
WASHINGTON - July 30 - A broad coalition of Jewish peace groups today called upon President Bush to withdraw his controversial nomination of Daniel Pipes to the Board of Directors of the United States Institute of Peace. The Jewish peace groups also lauded the decision of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee last week to table a scheduled vote on Pipes' nomination to the U.S. Institute of Peace.

Suit Challenges Constitutionality of Powers in Antiterrorism Law
New York Times 2003-07-31
WASHINGTON, July 30 — The American Civil Liberties Union and six Muslim groups today brought the first constitutional challenge to the sweeping antiterrorism legislation passed after the Sept. 11 attacks, arguing that the law gives federal agents virtually unchecked authority to spy on Americans.

Iranian president vows support to Lebanon
Arabic News 2003-07-31
Iranian President Muhammad Khatami has stressed his country's support to Lebanese national resistance against the Israeli occupation, calling on the Islamic countries to unify facing the current challenges.

Tony Blair Comments on Palestinian Issues
Alternative Information Center 2003-07-31
Asked about his views about the Israeli government’s plan to continue building the fence, Prime Minister, Tony Blair, said in a press conference in London yesterday...

Christain Right Waves Flag for Israel
Newsday 2003-07-31
Washington - The Israeli prime minister wasn't due at the White House for another hour, but Richard Hellman and his friends were out early yesterday to show the flag - in fact, two of them, the Star of David side by side with Old Glory. "We are a Christian group for a strong U.S.-Israeli relationship," Hellman said as he paraded along Pennsylvania Avenue. "We are Christians. We believe in the truth of the Bible. We believe America will be blessed as it blesses Israel, as the Bible says."

Anti-WTO Protesters Claim Victory Despite Massive Arrests
Common Dreams 2003-07-30
MONTREAL -- Chanting anti-WTO protesters surged onto downtown Montreal streets Tuesday, claiming victory over globalization forces, even though their own numbers were down sharply due to a wave of arrests the day before. Riot police rounded up more than 200 people after an early-morning demonstration Monday against an informal meeting here of ministers from 25 of the 146 member-states of the World Trade Organization (WTO).

Lebanon holding Canadian man as an `Israel collaborator'
Ha'aretz 2003-07-31
BEIRUT - Lebanese authorities arrested a Canadian earlier this month on charges of collaborating with Israel, Lebanese Prosecutor General Adnan Addoum said yesterday. Addoum said the man, Bruce Balfour, was arrested on July 10 at Beirut airport on a military court order issued in absentia accusing him of visiting Israel and collaborating with the enemy. 

Foreign visits to US drop sharply
Christian Science Monitor 2003-07-30
From college students to lab researchers to au pairs, America is normally a magnet for millions of foreigners. But this year it's seeing a dramatic drop-off in the number of visitors. Both tighter restrictions on getting into this country - and a strong disillusionment with the US abroad - are causing tens of thousands of people worldwide to forgo trips to America. Critics say the decline is evidence of a visa-screening process too restrictive, creating a "fortress America."