YESTERDAY:
Headline Snippet from 9/10 News
Grandiose plan for east Jerusalem submitted
Posted: 3/23/2010
JERUSALEM (AP) — Jerusalem city hall has submitted a grandiose plan for hotels, businesses and new housing for Palestinians in the center of east Jerusalem.
The plan calls for developing a large area across from the Old City wall for tourism and commerce, as well as 1,000 additional apartments.
A statement said the proposal has been given to the local planning commission for debate. That’s the first of many steps of approval before construction could begin. That could take years and could stall at any stage.
A graphic accompanying the statement shows new housing built on top of present structures, indicating that the old buildings would not be destroyed.
The plan dates to 2008. In the past, Palestinians have objected, charging that vast areas would be bulldozed.
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TODAY:
Saudi Arabia: arrogant Israel challenges the world
Posted: 3/24/2010
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — Saudi Arabia has condemned Israel’s “arrogant” policies in Jerusalem which it says are denying the rights of Arabs and Muslims in the holy city.
A government statement Wednesday criticized Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for saying in Washington his government would not stop construction in Jerusalem, calling it the capital of Israel.
Israel recently announced new housing plans for east Jerusalem, which Palestinians want for a future capital.
The statement said Netanyahu’s comments denied the rights of Palestinians and Muslims in Jerusalem and ignored international efforts to relaunch peace talks.
The kingdom asked the Quartet, consisting of U.S., Russia, U.N. and the EU, to explain Israel’s “arrogant” policies which insist on challenging the world
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And then there is THIS:
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0310/34914.html
Netanyahu met with President Barack Obama in the Oval Office Tuesday evening for an unexpectedly-long 89-minutes until about 7:00, then stayed to consult with his own staff in the Roosevelt Room, according to a source briefed on the meeting. The two then met again for 35 minutes at 8:20 at Netanyahu’s request, the source said. But the meetings were shrouded in unusual secrecy, in part because U.S. officials, who just ten days earlier called the surprise announcement of new housing in East Jerusalem an “insult” and an “affront,” made sure to reward Netanyahu with a series of small snubs: There were no photographs released from the meeting, and no briefing for the press.
And as of late Tuesday evening, neither side had released the usual “readout” of the meetings’ content – a likely indicator of the distance between the sides.
But any impression that Netanyahu’s trip would mark a renewal of the troubled relationship between U.S. and Israeli leaders had faded by the time the men met. Netanyahu had spent the previous 24 hours of a U.S. visit lobbying allies in Congress to push back against public American criticism and to turn the focus to Iran, congressional sources said, and delivered a defiant speech to the pro-Israel group AIPAC, insisting on Israel’s right to build in Jerusalem.
snip
But with the special relationship between the two countries in a state of unusual ferment, Netanyahu’s tortured meetings with the series of Americans appeared anything but decisive.
Netanyahu “is too smart not to understand that Washington has changed,” veteran Middle East peace negotiator Aaron David Miller told POLITICO on Tuesday. “And that a potentially transformative president who is now king of the world for a day is facing off against Benjamin Netanyahu, king of Israel. And the fight between the two is not today. What we see now is positioning.”
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KING OF THE WORLD????????????