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Welcome to Palestine Today, a service of the International Middle EAST Media Center, www.imemc.org, for Monday, November 1st 2010.

On Monday, the Head of the Negotiations Department at the Palestinian Liberation Organization, Dr. Saeb Erekat, stated that Egypt proposed the Palestinians to present a plan that represents their demands to the United Nations, and that this plan would also represent a unified Arab stance.

Also on Monday, Israeli army issued a statement revealing that Israeli soldiers kidnapped a Palestinian fighter, reportedly a member of Hamas’ al-Qassam Brigades, and that this fighter is believed to be behind a shooting attack against settler’s vehicles that happened two months ago near Bethlehem. Israeli army believes that the Hamas movement is trying to escalate its attacks in the occupied West Bank. The Israeli army has not given the name of the Palestinian arrested.

Israeli military invaded, on Monday morning, several houses in Hebron. Furthermore, Israeli soldiers invaded several towns near Hebron installed checkpoints; conducted inspections of Palestinian vehicles and checked the identities of passengers. Israeli army personnel, along with Israeli soldiers also abducted, on Sunday evening, a student from Hebron University and lead him to undisclosed destination.

On Sunday, an Israeli court charged two Israelis, a border officer and his friend, with firing live rounds at Palestinian-Israeli citizens last weekend in Safed, while shouting ‘death to Arabs’, ‘stinking Muslims’. The attack came in the midst of increasing rhetoric by local Rabbis and citty officials, including the major, against the Palestinian-Israelis, who publicly proclaim that Safed should be an ‘Arab-free zone’.

Hamas Leader, Ayman Taha, denied also on Sunday the secrets talks with Israel,regarding a prisoner exchange and condemned the idea of talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. The information of the ongoing communications between the enemies was given on Friday by the Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Jarida, which claimed that Syria had approved secret negotiations.

On Saturday, Peace activists around the world celebrated the announcement of the US Caterpillar Corporation, that it will stop shipment of armored bulldozers to the Israeli military, while a trial about the killing of Rachel Corrie is ongoing in Israel. Rachel Corrie was run down by a Caterpillar armored bulldozer in 2003 while trying to prevent the demolition of a Palestinian doctor’s home in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip. Her family has been fighting for seven years to achieve this announcement.

On Saturday at dawn, and old church was burned on Jerusalem by right-wing Israeli settlers, who hurled Molotov cocktails inside. The damage to the church was substantial, especially in the first floor.

On Friday it was the 54th Anniversary of the Israeli massacre In Kafr Qasim, in east of Tel Aviv, near the green line. On the evening of October 29, 1956, Israeli troops shot and killed 49 unarmed Palestinian civilians in the village of Kafr Qasem. Villagers of Kafr Qasem were joined by neighboring Arab villages and marched to commemorate those who were killed by Israeli army soldiers in the bloody massacre. Village leaders made speeches in remembrance of those who had died.

Kafr Qasim was one of seven villages along the green line that were considered high infiltration threats. The army placed all under a War Time Curfew with instructions to shoot and kill any villager violating the curfew. But the mayor was not informed of the curfew in time for villagers working in fields or outside the village to get back home. Border police shot and killed 49 villagers as they tried to return home including 23 children and a pregnant woman.

And this is some of the news from Palestine; for more updates; please visit our website at www.imemc.org. Thank you for joining us from occupied Bethlehem. This report has been brought to you by Hussam Qassis and Ane Irazabal.

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