Chronology: July 16, 2008 – October 15, 2008

Sources

• AFP, Agence France Presse

• Al-Arabiya, Alarabiya.net

• Al-Jazeera, Aljazeera.net

• AT, Arab Times

• AN, ArabicNews.com

• AP, Associated Press

• BBC, www.bbc.co.uk

• CNN, www.cnn.com

• DNE, Daily News Egypt

• Fox News

• The Guardian

• GN, Gulf News

• Haaretz

• IHT, International Herald Tribune

• JP, The Jerusalem Post

• KT, Khaleej Times

• MEO, Middle East Online MSN Arabia

• MSNBC

• NYT, New York Times

• RFE-RL, Radio Free

• Europe-Radio Liberty

• Reuters

• RIAN, RIA Novosti

• SKY, Sky News

• TT, Tehran Times

• TDN, Turkish Daily News

• VOA, Voice of America

• WP, The Washington Post

• YT, Yemen Times Ynet,

• Ynet News

Arab-Israeli Conflict

See also Israel, Palestinian Affairs, Syria

July 22: In the aftermath of a backhoe attack perpetrated by a Palestinian construction worker in West Jerusalem that left sixteen injured, a mob of young Jewish residents in East Jerusalem assaulted two Arabs until the victims sought refuge in the house of a Jewish family. The mob threatened the members of the sheltering family, one of whom was stabbed before police arrived. [JP, 7/23]

July 24: Plans to construct the first new Jewish settlement in the West Bank in a decade were approved by an Israeli government committee, which left only Defense Minister Ehud Barak to provide the final approval for construction. Israeli authorities claimed the potential building site, which contained a school and military base, had been previously inhabited and thus did not technically qualify as a new settlement. [AP, 7/24]

July 29: The Israeli Defense Ministry announced that it would heed a 2006 ruling by the Israeli Supreme Court that ordered that the course of the West Bank separation barrier be revised. The barrier did not precisely follow the Green Line demarcated in 1947 as the borders of Israel, but rather strayed to encompass some Jewish settlements, consequently separating Palestinian farmers from their land. [BBC, 7/29]

July 30: Six Palestinians were injured in clashes with Israeli soldiers at the funeral of a ten-year-old boy killed during a July 29 protest against the Separation Barrier in the West Bank town of Na‘alin. Approximately 3,000 marchers turned out for the funeral procession from Ramallah to Na’alin. [Al-Jazeera, AFP, 7/31]

Aug. 6: Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert met with Palestinian President Mahmud ‘Abbas in Jerusalem. Olmert agreed to free 150 Palestinian prisoners “as a gesture of good will.” [AN, 8/7]

Aug. 25: Israel released 198 Palestinian prisoners to the Palestinian Authority’s presidential compound in Ramallah; two of the prisoners were convicted of killing Israeli citizens and had been serving jail terms since the 1970s. The move preceded a visit by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. Around 11,000 Palestinian political prisoners remained in Israeli detention centers. [Al-Jazeera, 8/25]

Aug. 26: Israeli police arrested US-born Israeli citizen Jeff Halper for entering the Gaza Strip as part of an international group protesting Israel’s blockade of Gaza which had been in effect since Hamas took power in Gaza in 2007. Halper had spent three days in Gaza with about 40 other activists prior to crossing into Israel, where he was questioned by Israeli police for violating an Israeli government order forbidding its citizens from entering the Gaza Strip. [BBC, 8/26]

Sept. 15: Israeli police launched an investigation of an attack on the Palestinian village of Asira al-Qabaliya in the West Bank perpetrated by about 100 Israeli settlers on September 13. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert called the rampage a “pogrom” and deemed the attack “intolerable.” The assault was caught on film by human rights groups and showed residents of the Yitzhar settlement attacking the village with gunfire and stones, as well as Israeli soldiers present at the scene who did not intervene to halt the destruction of Palestinian property. [BBC, 9/16]

Israeli authorities closed all crossings into Gaza indefinitely in response to a rocket attack on the southern Israeli town of Sderot. The attack was the first of its kind in almost three weeks and violated the June 2008 ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. No one claimed responsibility for the rocket fire, and leaders...