News Highlights:
- Two years into the siege on Gaza, many necessities are still blocked from getting in and exports are totally frozen; unemployment is high and many people live in poverty.
- Jimmy Carter says Israeli PM Netanyahu’s conditions are an obstacle to peace; however, the White House calls Netanyahu’s speech “an important step forward”.
- Israeli settlers are happy with Netanyahu’s statements, which did not call for any freeze on settlement expansion or evacuations.
- Israeli bulldozers start destroying parts of Abu Dis and Sawahreh in occupied East Jerusalem, to build infrastructure for a new settlement.
Feature:
The live interview with Palestinian academic and activist Omar Barghouti from Ramallah was unable to go ahead, due to problems with the phone connections. Omar is a leader with the Palestinian Boycott Israel Campaign and several of the recent statements and interviews he has made were discussed, especially regarding the victory with the French company Veolia. Our in studio panel then discussed the recent speech of Benjamin Netanyahu and how it did not present anything new for the Palestinians, and in fact fell woefully short of most important issues, especially settlements, the right of return and Jerusalem.
Focus on Zionism:
Highlights of a June 15th, 2009 report from Relief Web, the U.N. news service detailing how 300,000 Palestinians are under threat of losing their homes due to blanket demolition orders from Israeli authorities.
Here is an audio file of this show: