Click on Link to download or play MP3 file || 4 m 0s || 3.66 MB || Welcome to Palestine Today, a service of the International Middle East Media Centre, www.imemc.org, for Monday June 23rd, 2008.
The truce in Gaza continues for the fourth day, while in the West Bank the Israeli army kidnaps five civilians, these stories and more coming up. Stay tuned.
The News Cast
The Hamas movement warned that if Israel implements the Israeli high court decision not to open the border crossing with Gaza until the abducted Israeli soldier in the Strip is released, the Hamas movement will no longer recognize the truce deal.
On Sunday the Israeli High Court of Justice ordered the Israeli government to keep border crossings to the Gaza Strip closed until noon today. The court decision was in response to a petition filed by the family of a captured Israel Soldier in Gaza, Gilad Shalit. His family demanded clarification on the terms of the Gaza cease-fire deal.
The petition that was filed against the Israeli state, Prime Minister Ehod Olmert, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and Defense Minister Ehud Barak, demands that the Israeli government justify why the truce between Israel and Hamas was not conditioned upon Gilad’s release or his transfer to Egypt.
Shalit was captured by Palestinian resistance groups in June 2006, during a resistance attack on an Israeli military site located in the Gaza Strip.
Last week The Egyptian-mediated truce between Hamas, which has controlled Gaza since June 2007, and Israel took effect. The ceasefire deal stipulates that Hamas will cease firing homemade shells into Israeli territory in exchange for Israel lifting the 12 month-blockade and ceasing all military attacks against the Gaza Strip.
In addition the truce deal states that Israel and Hamas will start to conduct indirect talks over a prisoner-swap deal. Both Hamas and Israel have announced that they agree on the conditions.
Fouzi Barhum, spokesperson of the Hamas movement in Gaza, said on Monday that if Israel does not open the crossing points into Gaza, the movement will consider this as a violation of the ceasefire deal and that Hamas will no longer be committed to the deal.
In the West Bank, five Palestinian civilians were kidnapped by the Israeli army during an invasion targeting the village of Dier Abu Mish’al located near the central West Bank city of Ramallah on Monday morning.
Witnesses said that at least 15 Israeli jeeps invaded the village on Monday at dawn at around 2:00 AM. Witnesses added that soldiers conducted a wide scale house-to-house search in the village and used police dogs.
During the search, soldiers forced all the families residing in the attacked homes to stay out, which also included children, local sources said. The military attack ended on Monday morning—troops left the village after kidnapping five civilian men.
Conclusion
Thank you for joining us from occupied Bethlehem. You have been listening to Palestine Today from the International Middle East Media Center, www.imemc.org. This report has been brought to you by Andrew Chappelle and Ghassan Bannoura
