Purpose: to provide a varied selection of articles from Arabic, Hebrew and English mainstream media outlets so readers get a flavour of what is being read by the general public about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict from different perspectives. The aim is to shine a spotlight for readers on the polarised narratives and constant one-sided messaging that appears in the media of each society, and often also in the international media. Solutions Not Sides makes no attempt to reconcile or support any of these narratives, but we believe it is important to understand each side’s perspective and the way that their society presents events if a negotiated solution is to be reached. 
 

Hebrew News Sources:
JPost - IDF TROOPS KILL ARMED PALESTINIAN ALONG GAZA FENCE
Third incident in 10 days along the tense border fence. Israeli troops shot and killed Marwan Nasser, 26, after he opened fire on them while trying to infiltrate into southern Israel, the military said Sunday morning. The Palestinian terrorist was wearing a green bandanna associated with Hamas’s military wing, the Izzadin al-Qassam Brigades. An Israeli tank fired at a post belonging to Hamas in response to the attempted infiltration… The incident came 24 hours after IDF troops shot dead four heavily armed Palestinians who attempted to infiltrate with rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs), AK-47 assault rifles and grenades. The four terrorists were identified as Abdullah Ismail, 21; Al-Hamaida Abdullah Ashraf al-Ghomri, 19; Ahmad Ayman al-Adeini, 20; and Abdallah al-Masri, 21, all of Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip…While Hamas did not release any official statement claiming responsibility for any of the recent clashes, the group’s spokesman Fawzi Barhoum said that “A continuation of the blockade on the Gaza Strip will bring about an explosion in the region, and therefore we must remove the blockade and end the suffering of Gaza residents.” IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Aviv Kochavi toured the border area on Sunday morning and visited the troops who foiled Saturday’s attack. “Your job is to defend the state’s borders and its citizens, and that is what you did here – very successfully – due to a quick assessment, precise use of weapons, a correct solution, fighting spirit and determination,” he said.
Read more: https://www.jpost.com/Breaking-News/Palestinian-reports-Explosions-heard-on-the-Gaza-border-598289

JPost - COURT: HAREDIM CANNOT HOLD GENDER-SEGREGATED MUSICAL EVENT IN PUBLIC PARK
The Nazareth District Court ruled on Sunday that the haredi (ultra-Orthodox) community may not hold a gender-segregated musical event at a public park in Afula. While the Afula municipality had supported the haredi event featuring vocalist Motti Steinmetz, saying that out of hundreds of public events, they were entitled to hold one event according to their customs, it said it would respect the court’s ruling. The decision does not mean that haredim cannot hold the August 14 musical event in which those males and females who want to sit separately could choose to. Rather, it means that the event organizers cannot force non-haredim attending the event or passing through to observe the gender-segregated measures that haredim might impose on themselves. Along those lines, the court wrote that organizers and police must ensure that no forced gender segregation occurs as well as prevent the posting of signs which might pressure non-haredi attendees to sit in a gender-segregated manner. Furthermore, the court said that police would be expected to aggressively pursue any complaints of gender segregation. The court ordered the city of Afula to pay NIS 5,000 in legal fees to local feminist activist Noga Sharon and the Israel Women’s Network NGO, who sued the city for sponsoring the event. Following the ruling, the intended featured performer reportedly canceled his performance. Senior United Torah Judaism MK Moshe Gafni described the ruling as “evil” and “appropriate for Tisha Be’av, the day of the destruction, and it will cause many people and youth not to participate in the event.” He also called on anyone going to the event to voluntarily separate along gender lines. Smotrich then called on all religious parties to tell Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that they are joining a coalition only on condition that legislation is passed which would allow gender-separate publicly-funded events, “to put an end to secular coercion and to allow the religious community to live according to its beliefs.” Democratic Union co-chairwoman Stav Shaffir in return blasted Smotrich’s comments, saying that “he and his messianic ideology spell destruction for the legal and justice system,” and that Netanyahu was giving the religious parties control of the state “in return for the greatest political bribe in history – allowing him to escape from the law.”
Read more: https://www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Court-Afula-wont-hold-public-Hassidic-concert-unless-women-sit-with-men-598334

Times of Israel – Israel nabs the two suspected killers of Dvir Sorek; one has Hamas ties
Palestinian cousins, from Hebron-area village near where murder took place, taken for questioning; forces make two other arrests of relatives, confiscate vehicle used in attack. Security forces identified the two suspects as Nasir Asafra, 24, and Qassem Asafra, 30, from the village of Beit Kahil in the southern West Bank. While the Israel Defense Forces said that the former suspect is a Hamas member, neither of them had any prior arrests. Nasir’s brother Akrama and Qassem’s wife Ines were also arrested in the raid. A Shin Bet spokesman said security forces were looking into whether these two helped hide the alleged killers after the attack…Sorek was found stabbed to death in the predawn hours on Thursday outside the settlement of Migdal Oz, where he was studying in a religious seminary. His father Yoav thanked Israeli security forces on Saturday night for their quick work in catching the killers, but said in a statement he was “disappointed they were captured alive.” “We are glad that Dvir, may God avenge his blood, didn’t see the faces of his killers, and we will try not to see them either, not now and not in court,” Yoav Sorek said, using a traditional honorific for Jews who have been murdered. He added that Israeli security forces should work to prevent and thwart future terror attacks. The IDF said that some 100 residents of Beit Kahil began hurling stones at troops while they were carrying out the arrest raid. Soldiers responded using riot dispersal means to scatter them. No injuries were reported.
Read more: https://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-nabs-the-two-suspected-killers-of-dvir-sorek-one-has-hamas-ties/

Arab News Sources:

Wafa - Israel to punitively demolish houses of suspected attackers in Hebron-district town
Israeli forces Monday overnight notified the families of two Palestinians suspected of killing an Israeli soldier on last Thursday about their intention to demolish their houses in Beit Kahel town, northwest of Hebron. Security sources confirmed that an Israeli military force surrounded the family houses of Nasir Asafra and Kassem Asafra in Beit Kahel, and dragged the occupants outside before taking measurements and photos for the two houses in preparation for the planned punitive demolition. The raid came three days after the cousins 24-year-old Nasir and 30-year-old Kassem were detained by Israeli forces for being suspected for the killing of an off-duty Israeli soldier outside the settlement of Ofra on last Thursday. Kassem’s wife, Enas, and another man, identified as Akarma Asafra, were detained on suspicion they had assisted the suspected attackers. Israel resorts to punitively demolish the family homes of Palestinians as a mean of deterrence- accused of being involved in attacks against Israelis, a policy that Israel does not apply to Israeli settlers who were involved in fatal attacks against Palestinians. The policy was widely condemned by human rights groups as “a collective punishment” and “a war crime and crime against humanity”.
Read more: http://english.wafa.ps/page.aspx?id=49NgJea111231373110a49NgJe
 
The Palestinian Information Center - Israeli settlers attack Palestinian elderly man in al-Khalil
Israeli settlers on Saturday evening assaulted a Palestinian elderly man in Jabal Jalis area, east of the West Bank city of al-Khalil. Local sources said that a group of Israeli settlers attacked the Palestinian citizen Shaker al-Tamimi, 70, and his family near their home in Jabal Jalis. No serious injuries were reported. There are about 503 settler outposts in the West Bank and Jerusalem. They are inhabited by 800,000 Israeli settlers who carry out almost daily attacks on the Palestinians.
Read more: https://english.palinfo.com/news/2019/8/11/Israeli-settlers-attack-Palestinian-elderly-man-in-al-Khalil
 
PNN - Palestine warns US against backing Israeli annexation bid
Palestine has warned the United States not to “play with fire” by endorsing an Israeli scheme to annex the settlements the regime has constructed in the occupied West Bank in defiance of international law. Palestinian Presidential spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeineh made the remarks on Monday, after Zman Yisrael, The Times of Israel’s Hebrew-language site, reported that Prime Minister Netanyahu was attempting to obtain public approval from US President Donald Trump for the regime’s annexation bid ahead of the September 17 elections in the occupied territories. Just three days before Israel’s April 9 polls, Netanyahu had vowed to annex West Bank settlements if he won another term in office. Abu Rudeineh stressed that any decision that affects the Palestinians’ national rights, as well as international resolutions, will be considered “illegitimate,” Palestine’s Wafa news agency reported. The official further underlined Washington’s earlier instances of support for Israel, including recognizing occupied Jerusalem as Israel’s “capital” and standing by the side of the regime on the issue of Palestinian refugees and the salaries of prisoners and martyrs in addition to Israeli settlers’ intrusions into the al-Aqsa Mosque compound. He also warned that any US declaration of support for Israel’s new scheme would have “serious implications.”This step, if taken, would constitute … playing with fire,” the Palestinian official said, emphasizing that stability and security are indivisible and that “peace would not be made at any price.”Washington’s position will not create any for the regime, he added. Abu Rudeineh further reiterated the Palestinian people’s resolve to defend their “national rights, history, heritage, and holy sites, no matter how long it takes and expressed his hopes that justice and Palestinian legitimacy will ultimately prevail.”
Read more: http://english.pnn.ps/2019/08/13/palestine-warns-us-against-backing-israeli-annexation-bid/

International News Sources:

Al Jazeera - Israel expels Filipino worker with Israeli-born son: NGO
About 600 mostly Filipino families could now face expulsion after losing their residency status. A Filipino migrant worker and her Israeli-born teenage son were in the process of being deported from Israel on Sunday night after successive court appeals failed, an NGO lobbying for children of migrants said. Rosemarie Perez was arrested by immigration officials along with her 13-year-old son Rohan on Tuesday for overstaying her work visa. On Sunday night, the two were under escort at Ben Gurion International Airport, near Tel Aviv, waiting to be put on board an El Al flight to Hong Kong, from where they would fly to Manila, said Beth Franco of United Children of Israel (UCI). "They're flying out tonight," she said, adding that Rohan had never been outside the Jewish state before. Earlier on Sunday, a court rejected Perez's latest plea to stay, immigration authority spokeswoman Sabine Haddad told AFP news agency. "She has been here illegally for 10 years," Haddad said. UCI argues that it is cruel to send Rohan - and other children of migrants - to a country they have never seen and where they do not speak the language. Last week, migrants, their children and native Israelis staged a protest in Tel Aviv against the policy of deporting Israeli-born children of migrants. Rohan has "never been to the Philipines, he doesn't speak the language, Hebrew is his first tongue", said Franco, adding that it had been his dream to serve in the Israeli army. "He sees this country as his own," she said. Haddad could not immediately confirm that the mother and son were on their way out of the country. She said that Rohan's father was a Turkish national who left Israel several years ago. Many of the 28,000 Filipinos - largely Christian - in Israel arrived to work as caregivers and domestic workers, but according to UCI, some 600 families could now face expulsion after losing their residency status.
Read more: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/08/israel-expels-filipino-worker-israeli-born-son-ngo-190811230755843.html

Express - 'Military strikes next' War fears as official reveals US and Israel could soon blitz Iran
ISRAEL and US are heading towards an outbreak of war with Iran, according to a leading US official, amid escalating tensions in the Persian Gulf. The next step for Israel and the US to take against Iran would be military strikes, according to a shock admission from a US official. Washington Strategy Group leader Joel Rubin made the stunning remarks after Israel confirmed it would be joining a US-led military alliance in the Gulf. In response to Israel’s role, Iran said it has the right to counter Israel’s role in the alliance, describing the move as a “clear threat”. Speaking to Fox News, Joel Rubin, who worked under George W Bush and Barack Obama in the White House, warned that the next step to take for the US would be “military strikes” against Tehran. He said: “Our policy of a maximum pressure again may be punishing them economically but we are not achieving anything at the table. “Right now we are self-isolating. Iran still has the capability of restarting its nuclear programme.” “So, well, what is next? Does it mean military strikes? That is where we are heading.”… sraeli Foreign Minister Yisrael Katz had earlier confirmed that the Israeli government is “contributing” to the US mission with intelligence and other “important capabilities”…Ron Ben-Yishai, an Israeli military analyst, explained that this would include the deployment of Israeli warships equipped with missiles in the strait. Earlier this week, Iran unveiled an upgraded missile defense system that can detect all types of cruise and ballistic missiles, and drones and has a range of 400 kilometers.
Read more: https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1164368/Iran-crisis-US-Israel-nuclear-strikes-military-world-war-3

Daily Wire - Europe Set To Add Warning Labels On Israeli Products Made In Contested Territories
The European Union may soon place labels on products made in Israel's disputed territories – a label that would not be added to any other products from around the world. The Washington Free Beacon reported Friday that the "Advocate General of the European Court of Justice recently issued non-binding opinion arguing that EU law requires Israeli-made products to be labeled as coming from 'settlements' and 'Israeli colonies.'" In 2016, France adopted a measure that required labels be put on products from the Golan Heights, eastern Jerusalem, and the West Bank. In 2015, the European Commission adopted similar regulations but had no way to punish countries that refused to add the labels. After the French measure was adopted, the Israeli Psagot winery filed a lawsuit, according to the Free Beacon. The lawsuit claimed the regulations amounted to discrimination against Jewish countries and argued its case all the way up to the European Court of Justice. In 2018, France suspended the labeling policy. As the Free Beacon reported, that court seems close to affirming the lower court's opinion that Israeli products should have such a label on them. Yaakov Berg, CEO of Psago, told the Free Beacon that the labels were "discriminatory and illegal" since they would only apply to Jewish companies and no other companies. "We are not the Israeli government," Yaakov told the outlet. "Psagot winery is not responsible for Israeli government policy. But because we are Jewish owners of a winery in a beautiful and hotly contested land, we are being targeted and punished. And we are being punished precisely because we are Jews living in Judea where we have every right to be, as do the Palestinian Arabs and Druze and the Christians."… As the Free Beacon reported, the decision to add the labels "could pave the way for goods from any disputed territory to receive such treatment." It could also "trigger U.S. anti-boycott laws meant to stop Israeli-made goods from being singled out for unfair treatment on the international market." Brooke Goldstein, executive director of the Lawfare Project and a human rights lawyer, told the Free Beacon that the Advocate General's opinion blatantly discriminates against Israel. "The Advocate General's opinion said that goods produced by Muslims are to be labeled from 'Palestine,' and goods produced by Jews labeled as coming from 'Israeli colonies,' she told the outlet. "Both people are living in the same geographic location, and yet Jewish goods are being treated differently." The U.S. State Department has been adamantly against efforts to single out Israel, such as the anti-Semitic Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement
Read more: https://www.dailywire.com/news/50512/europe-set-add-warning-labels-israeli-products-ashe-schow
 

Opinion:

YNET - Israel’s government needs to heed Gaza wakeup call
Politicians should use a period of military superiority and calm to take initiatives rather than allow stagnation that may force a war with Hamas at an inopportune time and with a less cooperative leader at the helm of the PA. The latest terror attacks are proof that there is no vacuum in the Middle East. When there is no military or political advancement, bad actors on the ground usually from the extremes pick up the reins. Foiling the terror attack near the Gaza Strip was a coup for the IDF Southern Command, in fact we are in the midst of one of the better periods in terms of our military defences…This feeling of strength provides civilians with a sense of security, but it also allows politicians to maintain stagnation and avoid tackling the problems. This is the kind of Nirvana that brought about the fiasco of the Yom Kippur War, when Israel was caught unprepared and off guard by invading armies from Egypt and Syria. The same could be said for first and second Palestinian uprisings or Intifadas in 1987 and 2000 respectively and a possible third that may be yet to come. The planned attack from Gaza was attempted by renegade Hamas forces who opposed their leadership's policy of maintaining calm on the border…from the strategic perspective these incidents point to a weakening in the ranks of the military wing of Hamas. If there is opposition to the leadership's policies inside the terror group, it will become more than Israel's problem. If there is a successful attempt to carry out a major attack by operatives, it could force Israel into a war at an inopportune time and cause chaos inside the Gaza Strip…The tragic wakeup call of Dvir Sorek's murder should remind us that Mahmoud Abbas's cooperation with Israel is temporary. His successor, regardless of who that may be, will be unlike him, both in his personal history his ideology and in his view of Israeli-Palestinian relations…This is an opportune time for Israel to advance the best political solutions, now that it is strong militarily and is relied on by the PA.
Read more: https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-5567508,00.html

Bloomberg - How to Avert a New War in Gaza
Tensions between Israel and Hamas reignited this spring in the worst fighting since their 2014 war, sparking fears that another full-scale conflict could break out this summer. Certainly the incentives for escalation continue. There have been Gazan injuries during the riots along Israel-Gaza border; the murder of an Israeli student in the West Bank last week, decried as a terrorist event, is another. Up to now, both sides have repeatedly used diplomatic back channels to restore calm, at least temporarily. This pattern cannot hold endlessly. Gaza needs long-term strategic changes to address the underlying instability. There are things both sides can do, in their own best interests, to keep this steady, if uneasy, deterrence working. First, Israel should maintain its military superiority and deterrence over extremist factions in Gaza – primarily Hamas, but also Palestinian Islamic Jihad – which makes these extremist factions reluctant to conduct significant terror activity against Israel. Second, both sides should maintain communication channels, mostly through Egyptian (and if needed Qatari) mediators. That mechanism has been deepened in recent years, and can help clarify intentions, mitigate miscalculations and open the door for negotiation efforts and ceasefire talks. Third, both sides must also build upon recent initiatives to improve Gaza’s dire economic situation. Qatar provides humanitarian aid that has helped improve Gaza’s electrical infrastructure. Israel has also expanded fishing zones, promoted an initiative to build an industrial zone near the Israel-Gaza border and increased the number of Gazans allowed to work in Israel. Israel should go further though: It should also consider a wider worker transfer program into Israel and continue the electrical, water and sewage infrastructure improvement projects for Gaza. These efforts can coincide with the United Nations and donor countries establishing more industrial areas along the Israel-Gaza border. There is also a need to provide incentives to promote international and Israeli private investment in a high-tech sector inside Gaza. For Gaza’s economy to flourish, its internet speed will need to double and become much cheaper. Assistance for providing basic services to Gaza, such as health and education, also requires rethinking. U.S. funding cuts to the Palestinian Authority and United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) – a problematic organization to be sure, but also a major food and education supplier to Gaza – could worsen the situation. Instead of completely cutting off financial support for Palestinian services, the United States should gradually push the international community away from funding UNRWA, and toward other support agencies less connected to Gaza’s current failures, such as the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). Finally, the Gaza strip’s political structure and its dependence on the Palestinian Authority (PA) for economic support and management - although Hamas has effectively controlled Gaza since a coup d'etat in June 2007 - hinders its development. Without PA support, Gaza’s economy and infrastructure will deteriorate further under Hamas’ mismanagement. Since Gaza is becoming increasingly ungovernable, Hamas is looking to offload some of its responsibilities. This creates an opportunity to overcome the current political stalemate through a different form of governance in Gaza. 
Read more: https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-08-12/the-u-s-and-israel-can-avert-another-war-in-gaza

The National - Serious and decisive action to end the occupation of Palestine is the only effective way to end the conflict
The international community - especially European countries, which base relations with the Palestinian government on conditions set by the Quartet Principles, including security co-ordination - often forget to make their relations with Israel conditional on the same principles. They include a full cessation of settlement activities and the reopening of Palestinian institutions in East Jerusalem. It is in this context that the Israeli persecution and harassment of the Palestinian population, Palestinian political representatives and ministers in Jerusalem has been normalised. As the governor of Jerusalem, the highest Palestinian authority in the city, I have been arrested eight times and prevented from entering what remains of the West Bank. While the world chooses to be silent about our fate, what about the opening of a tunnel by Israeli settlers under Palestinian homes in Silwan, inaugurated by the envoys of the Trump administration? Or the Israeli settlers, supported by their government, taking over Christian buildings in Jaffa Gate, effectively separating Armenian from Christian quarters and severely affecting several Christian events? It is time to put an end to the old slogans about support for the two-state solution, a solution that is being buried deeper every day by Israeli actions and US support. Without East Jerusalem, the capital of the State of Palestine, there will be no Palestinian state, no two-state solution, and the result will be no peace. Serious and decisive action - Israel's respect for international legitimacy, an end to its occupation of Palestinian territory and a full cessation of annexation of our city - are the only effective ways to end this ongoing conflict. Ending the occupation and annexation will prevent Israel’s strategy of apartheid, ethnic cleansing and the forcible transfer of the Palestinian people from becoming an irreversible reality.
Read more: https://www.thenational.ae/opinion/comment/serious-and-decisive-action-to-end-the-occupation-of-palestine-is-the-only-effective-way-to-end-the-conflict-1.896687
 

The Guardian - ‘Look where we’ve got to – defeated and dominated’: my generation’s failure to liberate Palestine

Ramallah, my home city, has been utterly transformed during its half-century of struggle against occupation. But what has really been achieved? For many years, I was too involved in politics to notice my surroundings. I felt my very survival was at stake, and this was distracting enough. Now that I realise the limits of my abilities to make any effective change in the way the struggle is conducted, I no longer feel like this, and have more leisure to think of myself in the world, of my body in time. This morning, I had read that there are negotiations with Israel to allow buses to leave Ramallah through the Beitunia checkpoint, now called Ofer, to take worshippers to pray at al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem, 12 miles (20km) south of Ramallah, during Ramadan. My first reaction was happiness. Then I realised I have become so used to the decade-long closure of the outlet from Beitunia to Palestinian traffic, and have so internalised the new geography that Israel has succeeded in imposing, that this sounded extraordinary to me. How readily we accept the outrageous terms of our confinement: residents of East Jerusalem may not live in the West Bank, and those of the West Bank and Gaza Strip may not change their place of residence even if they get married to someone from another area in Palestine….The landscape familiar to me as I was growing up is no more; it has changed, as has the cast of characters, both Israeli and Palestinian. The legal strategies we employed to resist the occupation, believing they would bring it to an end, have dismally failed. The changes brought about over the past half-century have created a new overwhelming reality that calls for a different approach and a new kind of leadership. For us who have aged with the struggle, it is time we recognise our defeat, step aside, hand over the reins to the young, and place our hope in them.
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/aug/08/raja-shehadeh-ramallah-palestine-israel-occupation-struggle-failure-to-liberate