Compiled by Parker L. Payson

From the Jewish Press:

Another Lever:

The US in May prevailed upon the UN Security Council to postpone for one month reconvening state parties to the Geneva Conventions to discuss Israeli policies in the occupied territories, the Forward newspaper reported. Israeli activists believe that the Bush administration's decision not to reject the proposal to reconvene suggests "that Washington wants to keep the idea alive, in order to scare Israel into accepting terms for an American peace process. " Advocates for the proposal believe that under the Fourth Convention, which established rules for protection of civilians under occupation, Israeli settlement activity and deportation of Palestinian activists is illegal. The proposal to reconvene parties subject to the Conventions was part of the December 10 UN Security Council Resolution listing options to protect Palestinians living under Israeli rule. Israel contends that the Fourth Geneva Convention does not apply to Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories.

New Israeli Nuclear Reactor:

Israeli officials denied reports that appeared in Israel's Davar newspaper in May that the Soviet Union was negotiating to sell Israel a nuclear reactor, possibly to replace its Dimona facility, which is expected to need replacement in the near future, the Forward newspaper reported. The US reportedly opposes the Soviet-Israeli deal unless the Israelis agree to open their nuclear facilities to international inspection.

Smith Blasts Sharon:

Rep. Larry Smith (D-FL), traditionally one of Israel's strongest supporters in Congress, lashed out at Israeli Housing Minister Ariel Sharon in May, saying Sharon had personally "misrepresented" Israeli intentions to members of Congress. "Sharon was clear he was going to create settlements inside the Green Line, " which demarcates Israel's 1967 borders, Smith told the Washington Jewish Week. "He showed us maps, complete with lectures, showing us plans for settlements up and down the spine of Israel. There was nothing about settlements outside the Green Line. " Sharon has since announced that his ministry intends to build more than 13,000 settlements over the Green Line in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territory, effectively violating international law as well as a pledge made to Secretary of State James Baker in February, when the Bush administration released a $400 million housing loan guarantee to Israel.

WHO Are You:

Israel considered cutting its ties with the World Health Organization (WHO) in May, following the WHO's release of a report that criticized Israel for neglecting Palestinian health needs in the occupied territories. The report led to a resolution co-sponsored by several Arab states, plus France, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Sweden and Greece, that "expressed deep concern at the negative effects of the practices of the occupying power against the Palestinian people in the field of health during the intifada. " It regrets "the refusal of the Israeli authorities to allow experts to visit the occupied Arab territories" and deplores "the continuing deterioration of the situation, which seriously affects the living condition of the people, and compromises permanently the economic and social development of the territories. " Eighty-eight countries voted for the resolution. Only Israel and the US opposed it.

US Diplomat Threatened:

An American diplomat from the US Consulate General in Jerusalem was threatened at gun point by an Israeli settler while on a routine visit near the West Bank town of Al Khalil (Hebron) in May, the Israeli daily Ma'ariv reported. A State Department spokesman said, "We take this seriously, because two Israeli soldiers were near the incident and did not interfere. Immigration Law Changed: Because of protests by Israel and "economic strains, " Germany rescinded an offer it made upon German unification last year permitting Jews from all over the world to resettle in Germany, the Jewish Week of Queens, NY reported in May. German authorities have indicated that an estimated 3,000 Soviet Jews who entered the country during that time will be granted citizenship.

Shamir's Vigilantism:

A 21 -year-old Palestinian man stabbed three Jews in Jerusalem in May following Israel's decision to deport four Palestinian activists. None of the victims was seriously injured. The attacker was captured and badly beaten by a crowd, and police attempting to arrest the man were also beaten, the Forward newspaper reported. Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir responded to the attack by saying: "It is very serious; another despicable act in the central streets of Jerusalem. And unfortunately, the perpetrator was captured alive. It pains me a lot."

Land Confiscated:

An Israeli army court allowed the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) to bulldoze four tents which housed the family of a Palestinian convicted of killing three Israelis in Jerusalem last year. The family moved into the tents following the army's demolition in October of the family's original home on the same property. The decision was upheld to rip down the tents and allow the army to confiscate the property on which the demolished house stood, the Jewish Week of Queens, NY reported.

Peace Delegation:

Seven Israeli Knesset "doves" met with members of Congress, journalists and leaders of major Jewish organizations in May to demonstrate that Israel, notwithstanding its hard-line Likud government. wants peace. According to an April 14 poll conducted by the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies at Tel Aviv University, 58 percent of Israelis support land for peace, while 34 percent support the creation of a Palestinian state. "I think that the [Israeli] government is really afraid of people like ourselves being exposed to the Jewish community and exposing the very fact that the majority of Jews and Israelis support land for peace, " Citizens Rights Movement leader Dedi Zucker told the American Jewish World.

Family Members Jailed:

The sister and wife of a 28-year-old Palestinian man named Iyad Joudeh were arrested in May to pressure him into confessing, the Israeli daily Davar reported. Iyad was arrested in April after crossing the Allenby Bridge from Jordan, where he was returning from studies in France, on suspicion that he is a member of an "illegal organization. " To date, no charges have been filed against Iyad, his wife or sister. Defense lawyers were denied permission to visit Iyad's wife and sister until after they filed a petition with Israel's High Court.

Nathan Hailed:

An estimated 20,000 people attended a demonstration to express solidarity with Israeli peace activist Abie Nathan, who began a hunger strike on May 1 protesting an Israeli law which prohibits contact between Israelis and members of the PLO. Nathan, a former Israeli fighter pilot who flew his private aircraft to Egypt to press for peace before the Camp David Accords, and who has twice been sentenced to jail terms for meeting with PLO officials, was taken by ambulance to an Israeli court in June to face similar charges. Members of the Israeli right and left, Palestinian civic leaders, and a group of Palestinians held in a Gaza detention center have appealed to Nathan to give up the hunger strike.

From the Middle East Press:

Libyan Detente:

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in April told US Secretary of State James Baker in Cairo that Libya wants to improve its relations with the US, Al-Hayat newspaper reported. The US in January renewed anti-Libyan sanctions, banning all business between the two countries. The sanctions were first imposed after Abu Nidal terrorists attacked the Rome and Vienna airports in 1986, killing 20. Libya, which has denied Western charges of supporting the attacks, said that it no longer supports terrorist organizations and that Abu Nidal, who defected from the PLO in 1973 to form a rival group, had been expelled from the country. Libya, which also seeks improved relations with Great Britain, recently renounced its ties with the Irish Republican Army (IRA). Last December, French courts established that Libya had supplied the IRA with over 120 tons of weapons from 1985 to 1987. Libya's foreign policy moves have been paralleled by domestic reforms which include returning homes belonging to absentee landlords that were taken in the late 1970s and early 1980s by squatters, under the slogan "the house belongs to the occupier." Since 1990, the CAABU Bulletin reports, thousands of expatriate Libyans have returned to their country, and over 10,000 have filed for property returns.

Lebanese Christian Moves:

The Lebanese National Liberal Party in May unanimously elected Dory Chamoun party chairman, the Middle East Times reported. Chamoun, who was the only candidate, is the son of Lebanon's late President Camille Chamoun and replaces his brother Dany, who was assassinated in October 1990. Unlike his brother, Dory does not reject the Taif accords, which divide power in Lebanon equally between Christians and Muslims. "We support the idea of helping the government establish itself, the administration re-establish itself, rebuilding the army and rebuilding the security forces, " he said. In an unrelated story, the Lebanese Forces (LF), led by rival Christian militia leader Samir Geagea, disarmed its 10,000-man militia in May, as part of the Taif accords, and shipped all its munitions to Israel and the Israeli-backed South Lebanon Army, led by Christian Lebanese officer Antoine Lahd.

Iraq Can't Afford Food:

Although UN sanctions allow Iraq to purchase food, it is rarely able to do so because of large outstanding debt and inability to pay for shipments, the Middle East Times reported. The Iraqis "are very, very desperate indeed for wheat to feed the populace, " says Charles Scott, the Australian Wheat Board's Middle East marketing manager. "They simply haven't got any money to buy grain," he says. Australia will not release any of the one million tons of food Iraq requested in May until Iraq can prove it can pay for the shipment and until Iraq agrees to settle its outstanding $470 million debt. The Thai Rice Exporters Association in May also turned down an Iraqi request for 200,000 tons of rice because Iraq owes it $67.5 million in back debt. Iraq, which has a total foreign debt of about $80 billion, used to import 3.5 million tons of wheat a year, but only has imported an estimated 500,000 tons of wheat and flour from June 1990 to June 1991.

Yemeni Referendum:

More than 1.4 million Yemenis voted in May on a referendum approving the state's union, its 128-article constitution and its plan to hold nationwide parliamentary elections in 1993. The vote, which, according to government run San'a television, was passed by 90 percent of the voters, was held over the protests of two conservative Muslim parties, Al Haqq and the Saudi-backed Yemen Association of Reform, which called for a boycott in support of immediate parliamentary elections and a constitutional amendment stating that Islamic sharia law is the " sole" rather than the "main" source of Yemeni law.

Iran's Planes Now:

Iran has begun painting its insignia over Iraqi air force jets flown into Iran during the Iraq Kuwait war, Flight International reported in May. In late April, the Iranian government run international newspaper reported that Tehran would not return any of the Iraqi aircraft, which it says number 22 and Iraq says number 148, until stability has returned to Iraq and Baghdad has signed a formal peace treaty with Tehran, the CAABU Bulletin reported.

Referendum in Western Sahara:

The United Nations agreed to deploy 2,800 troops and civilians to oversee a September cease-fire and a January referendum in the Western Sahara, where Moroccan soldiers and Polisario guerrillas have been fighting a civil war since Spain withdrew from the territory in 1976, the Saudi Gazette reported. Although both the Polisario and Morocco agreed to base the referendum on a 1974 Spanish census which set the population at 74,000, over 240,000 Sahrawis are expected to participate in the vote. Morocco's King Hassan II, on his third visit to the region in 15 years, told Sahrawis that his government had spent over $500 million to develop the Western Sahara and that the results of the referendum, which offers a choice between independence and integration, would be "incontestable."

Al-Mahdi Released:

Former Sudanese Prime Minister Sadiq Al Mahdi and Muhammad Ibrahim Al-Nuqd, leader of the Sudanese Communist Party, were two of 299 political prisoners released from Sudanese jails in May as part of a general amnesty plan by Sudanese military ruler Omar Hassan Al-Bashir, in an attempt to bring relief to a country ravaged by civil war, a crippled economy and famine, the Saudi Gazette reported. The Sudan News Agency, Suna, announced in May that the government was also lifting price restrictions on produce in order to encourage food production.

Pakistan Appoints Woman:

Two days after Pakistan's lower house of Parliament passed a bill establishing Islamic shari'a as official law, Pakistan's Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif announced the appointment of Abida Hussain, the first woman, to his six-month-old cabinet, the Saudi Gazette reported. Hussain, who served as information minister for the caretaker government which supervised last October's elections to replace Benazir Bhutto, comes from the minority Shi'i Muslim sect, and is expected to come in conflict with conservative clerics in her position as minister of population planning.

Opposition Crackdown:

Tunisian authorities in May arrested at least 300 people, including 100 soldiers, suspected of planning a coup in Tunis to overthrow President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. According to reports in the official government newspaper La Presse, the main Tunisian Islamic opposition group, An-Nahda, planned a coup on October to establish an Islamic state. Tunisian Interior Minister Abdallah Kallal said that four leaders of AnNahda living in self-exile abroad, including An-Nahda's president, Rached Ghannouchi, were implicated in the attempt. The Algerian newspaper El- Watan reported that the arrests came two weeks after an assassination attempt blew apart the doors of the presidential palace in Carthage and killed four security guards.

Weapons to Mujahedin:

The US intends to deliver over 7,000 tons of weapons captured from Iraq, worth over $30 million new, to the Afghan mujahedin, the Saudi Gazette reported. According to reports in 7he New York Times, President Bush's 1992 budget request contains no aid for the mujahedin, who have received more than $2 billion from the CIA since 1980.