Excerpts: Israel convicts 2 in murder of Palestinian teen.Israel suspends EU
role in peace process.UAE troops to fight Syria jihadists. Syrians arrested
re illegal Lebanon entry November 30, 2015

+++SOURCE: Al Arabiya News 30 Nov.’15:”Israel convicts two in murder of
Palestinian teen”,by Staff Writer, with Agence France Presse and Associated
Press
SUBJECT: Israel convicts 2 in murder of Palestinian teen
QUOTE:”the 2 minors confessed …in what they described as a revenge for the
killing days earlier of 3 Israeli youths”
Full Text: An Israeli court on Monday[30 Nov] found two Jewish defendants
guilty of the 2014 murder of a Palestinian teenager in Jerusalem, but held
off on formally convicting a third man pending a psychological review,
Israeli broadcasters said.

Mohammed Abu Khdeir was 16 years old when he was abducted, brutally attacked
and burned alive by Israeli extremists in July of last year.

Israeli prosecutors soon charged three over the kidnapping and murder. One
of the defendants being a 31-year-old from the West Bank settlement of Adam
while the two others were 16-year-olds, one from Jerusalem and the other
Beit Shemesh, an Israeli town west of Jerusalem. All were from the same
family.

The court also delayed the verdict against the third suspect in the case,
31-year-old Yosef Haim Ben David, following a last-minute insanity disorder
plea.

The two minors confessed to abducting, bludgeoning and burning Abu Khdeir in
what they described as revenge for the killing days earlier of three Israeli
youths.

The incidents touched off Israeli-Palestinian violence that culminated in
the seven-week Gaza war.

Abu Khdeir's father denounced the delay in the verdict for the man accused
of being the ringleader and called for the trio's houses to be demolished,
as Israel does for Palestinian attackers.

“The court behaves one way with Arabs and another way with Jews,” Hussein
Abu Khdeir told reporters outside the court, calling the last-minute
psychiatric report by Ben-David's lawyers a “trick” and asking why it was
not submitted earlier.


(With AFP and the Associated Press)

+++SOURCE: Saudi Gazette 30 Nov ’15:”Israel suspends EU role in peace
process with Palestinians” by Reuters
SUBJECT: Israel suspends EU role in peace process

FULL TEXT:AL-QUDS — Israel said on Sunday it was suspending contacts with
European Union bodies involved in peace efforts with the Palestinians after
the bloc started requiring the labeling of exports from Israeli settlements
in the West Bank.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered the foreign ministry to carry out
“a reassessment of the involvement of EU bodies in everything that is
connected to the diplomatic process with the Palestinians,” a ministry
statement said.

“Until completion of the reassessment, the Prime Minister has ordered a
suspension of diplomatic contacts with the EU and its representatives in
this matter.”

EU officials played down the significance of the Israeli move, saying it had
been threatened in the past and that it was only a suspension which could be
lifted soon.

The EU published new guidelines on Nov. 11 for labeling products made in
Israeli settlements, a move Brussels said was technical but which Israel
branded “discriminatory” and damaging to peace efforts with the
Palestinians.

Drawn up over three years by the European Commission, the guidelines mean
Israeli producers must explicitly label farm goods and other products that
come from settlements built on land occupied by Israel if they are sold in
the European Union.

The EU’s position is that the lands Israel has occupied since the 1967
Middle East war — including the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Golan
Heights — are not part of the internationally recognized borders of Israel.

As such, goods from there cannot be labelled “Made in Israel” and should be
labelled as coming from settlements, which the EU considers illegal under
international law.

After the EU announcement, Netanyahu called it “hypocritical and a double
standard,” saying the EU was not taking similar steps in hundreds of
territorial conflicts elsewhere in the world.

“The European Union should be ashamed of itself,” he said while on an
official visit in Washington earlier this month. “We do not accept the fact
that Europe is labelling the side being attacked by terrorist acts.”

The development of settlements has been one of the obstacles to negotiations
between Israel and the Palestinians. US-backed peace talks stalled in April
2014.

“It’s an indication of origin, not a warning label,” the EU ambassador to
Israel, Lars Faaborg-Andersen, told Reuters after the bloc’s decision was
announced.

Britain, Belgium and Denmark already affix labels to Israeli goods,
differentiating between those from Israel proper and those, particularly
fruit and vegetables, that come from the Jordan Valley in the occupied West
Bank.

Following the decision, all 28 EU member states will have to apply the same
labeling.

Israel’s economy ministry estimated this would affect goods worth about $50
million a year, including grapes and dates, wine, poultry, honey, olive oil
and cosmetics made from Dead Sea minerals.

That is around a fifth of the $200-$300 million worth of goods produced in
settlements each year, but a drop in the ocean next to the $30 billion of
goods and services traded annually between Israel and the European Union.

Israeli farmers in the West Bank have expressed worry about the impact on
their business and some have begun diversifying into markets in Russia and
Asia to escape EU rules.

In its statement, the Israeli foreign ministry said contacts with individual
EU countries — it named Germany, France and Britain — would not be affected
by Sunday’s announcement.

A ministry official said Israel would cease assisting EU-sponsored projects
intended for the Palestinians, but no specific instances or bodies were
named. — Reuters

+++SOURCE:Naharnet (Lebanon)30 Nov.’15:”UAE Says Ready to Commit Troops to
Fight Syria Jihadists”by Agence France Presse
SUBJECT: UAE troops to fight Syria jihadists
FULL TEXT:The United Arab Emirates has said it is ready to commit ground
troops against jihadists in Syria and described Russian air strikes in the
country as attacks on a "common enemy."

Quoted by the official WAM news agency on Monday, Emirati State Minister for
Foreign Affairs Anwar Gargash said the UAE would "participate in any
international effort demanding a ground intervention to fight terrorism."

"Regional countries must bear part of the burden" of such an intervention,
he said during a Sunday discussion on Syria.

The UAE is a member of the U.S.-led coalition carrying out air strikes
against the jihadist Islamic State group in territory under its control in
Syria and Iraq.

As the jihadists have held out against more than a year of strikes and
launched operations abroad including the November 13 attacks in Paris, there
have been growing calls for the anti-IS intervention to expand to a ground
force.

Russia launched its own strikes in Syria in late September and Iran has
reportedly sent hundreds of troops to support President Bashar Assad's
regime.

Critics -- including in the West and Sunni Arab Gulf nations -- have accused
Russia of targeting moderate rebel forces as well as jihadists.

In the UAE's first official reaction to the Russian strikes, Gargash said
"we agree that nobody will be upset by the Russian bombardment of Daesh or
al-Qaida as it targets a common enemy."

Daesh is an Arabic acronym for IS.

Gargash also suggested the Saudi-led intervention in Yemen -- which has seen
Arab countries including the UAE send ground troops against Iran-backed
rebels -- could be "an alternative model" to Western intervention in the
region.

"The global strategy to fight terrorism is no longer fruitful or enough," he
said.

On Sunday, U.S. senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham called for 100,000
foreign soldiers, most from Sunni regional states but also including
Americans, to fight IS in Syria.




+++SOURCE: Naharnet (Lebanon)30 Nov.’15:”Army Arrests 81 Syrians for
Entering Kebanon ‘Illegally, by Naharnet Newsdesk

SUBJECT Syrians arrested re illegal Lebanon entry

FULL TEXT:The army carried out a series of raids on Monday[30 Nov] in
several regions, during which 81 Syrians were arrested.

An army statement said the Syrian nationals were apprehended for entering
Lebanon illegally.

Eighteen motorcycles were also confiscated during the crackdown.

Security forces had intensified their measures across the country in the
wake of deadly a deadly suicide bombing that rocked the southern Beirut
suburb of Bourj al-Barajneh.

The attack, which was claimed by the extremist Islamic State group, left 43
people dead and 239 others wounded.
==================
Sue Lerner - Associate, IMRA