Middle East

Echoing the recent protests in Egypt and Spain, it is the turn of Israeli youth to take to the streets and start camping to draw attention to the excessive cost of rents in Tel Aviv and other major population centres of the territory. An emergency session of the Israeli Cabinet is convened to try to deal with the situation.

The Israeli government is under heat now also from citizens who are normally indifferent to its immoral conduct. After a successful boycott of cottage cheese that forced the producer to put down the prices, hundreds of Israelis are now taking to the streets in protest of lack of affordable housing, building a tent town on Tel Aviv’s fashionable Rothschild Boulevard.

Politicians, pushed by the “ward lords”–the military, spend over 90 billion dollars a year, from taxpayer’s pockets, on nuclear weapons. This figure amounts to the UN budget for 45 years, and to 3/4 of the total annual sum spent on development aid. The U.S. alone spends over 50 billion dollars annually–enough to meet the Millennium Development Goals on poverty alleviation.

The Canadian ship the Tahrir pulled out of the Gaza Freedom Flotilla Two over the weekend, as only French ship the Dignity El Karameh and the Swedish-Norwegian-Greek ship Juliano remain to break the blockade of Gaza. The Tahrir finally gives up after Greek Port officials ask the activists to provide new documents that had never previously been mentioned nor required.

Protests continue in Tahrir Square six months after Mubarak resigned on the famous Day of Departure and while much of the world’s media is looking elsewhere for news. More demands are raised by protesters, yet the family atmosphere in Tahrir Square is causing difficulties for the military who fear using tear gas in such an environment.

The Israeli parliament is set to vote on a bill that will impose sanctions on people or organizations that call for a boycott of Israel or its settlements. The Israeli parliament’s legal advisor, Eyal Inon, was set to make a statement against the bill on Monday, saying the new law will damage freedom of expression.

Tomorrow, Palestinians will commemorate the seven year anniversary of the International Court of Justices (ICJ) ruling that the Israeli built wall and settlements in the Occupied Territories were against International law and International human rights and called for the dismantling of the wall. The Israeli government has ignored these calls repeatedly.

Tens of thousands of people took to the streets across Egypt on Friday to defend the uprising that toppled president Hosni Mubarak, directing their anger at the new military rulers over the slow pace of reform. In the capital, flag-waving protesters packed Tahrir Square, epicentre of the protests that ousted Mubarak in February, after a mass weekly Muslim prayer service.

UN chief Ban Ki-moon set an October target for rival Cypriot leaders to secure a broad accord on reunifying the divided Mediterranean island, after both parties agreed on Thursday to intensify talks. “I have every expectation that by October the leaders will be able to report that they have reached convergence on all core issues, and we will meet that month in New York.”

Some news need no comment, like this one by which nothing less than the United Nations, United States, European Union and Russia decided now to express ‘concern’ about Gaza as if the inhuman situation of its children and the elderly were not know to them.