The United Nations is calling on Israel to immediately stop demolishing Palestinian homes in occupied East Jerusalem.

The UN says 60,000 Palestinians may be at risk of being forcibly evicted.

Israel says the houses are built without construction permits, which Palestinians say are almost impossible to obtain.

Al Jazeera’s correspondent Jacky Rowland is in Sheikh Jarrah where Israeli police dismantled a tent set up by a Palestinian family already evicted by Israeli orders in August.

Israel curbing water to Palestinians
October 26, 2009
JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Human rights group Amnesty International said in a report Tuesday that Israeli restrictions prevented Palestinians from receiving enough water in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip.
The report said Israel’s daily water consumption per capita was four times higher than that in the Palestinian territories.
“Water is [...]

Israeli court rejects separate West Bank road
By MATTI FRIEDMAN (AP)
22nd October 2009
JERUSALEM — Israel’s Supreme Court ruled Thursday against military regulations prohibiting Palestinian motorists from using a West Bank road, but stopped short of banning a widespread security measure that has drawn charges of discrimination.
The Israeli human rights group behind the appeal said it hoped [...]

Israel in Denial over Turkish Rage
by Simon Tisdall
22nd October 2009
The apparent inability of Israeli leaders to see their actions as others see them – that is to say, to put themselves in other people’s shoes – may partly explain the depth of the outrage with which they greeted the Goldstone report on last January’s Gaza [...]

Filmmakers: George Azar and Mariam Shahin
Munzer al-Dayyeh is a 40-year-old mechanic living in Gaza. In a land of ruin and disrepair, Munzer is kept busy fixing generators and repairing motorbikes.

In June 2007, Israel placed Gaza under siege and imposed an unprecedented blockade on nearly all movement and supplies in and out of the Gaza Strip.

Munzer is a traditional man from a conservative society where inter-marriage is common.

In Munzer’s case, inter-breeding has brought hereditary problems – most of his children are either visually impaired or physically handicapped.

Munzer can not find any way to get his children out of Gaza to get medical treatment.

Petrol is increasingly expensive, motorbikes not cars are becoming popular. Electricity is sporadic and infrequent, generators are becoming popular. Munzer fixes both.

But while the effects of war and ongoing siege may be good for his business, it has frustrated his attempts to secure medical treatment for his disabled children.

His eldest daughter is blind and clings to the hope of travelling to London for specialist treatment. His eldest son is suffering from muscular disorder.

Besieged in Gaza, neither has the hope of medical treatment abroad.

This film offers an insight into an everyday man struggling to make a living and to find a solution for his family in the unique difficulties of the Gaza Strip.

http://english.aljazeera.net/programmes/general/2009/10/2009101583548416422.html

Time and again, US backs Israel
by Linda Heard
20th October, 2009
Imagine that heavily-armed neighbourhood thieves break into your house, steal your property and shoot a family member. Naturally, you would call law enforcement. You know the names of the criminals and expect the police to arrest them. But what if the police hear the murderers’ names, [...]

Goldstone to U.S. Rabbis – Lieberman doesn’t want Middle East Peace Talks
Wednesday, 21st October, 2009
The author of a damning report on Israel’s winter offensive against Hamas in Gaza, Richard Goldstone, has said that Foreign Minster Avigdor Lieberman does not want there to be an Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
Goldstone, a South African Jurist, made the claim in [...]

Top IDF officer warns: Settlers’ Radical Fringe Growing
By Anshel Pfeffer
Wednesday, 21st October, 2009
The extremist fringe of West Bank settlers is growing, a senior officer on the Israel Defense Forces General Staff warned this week.
Though most West Bank settlers are law abiding, the officer said, recent years have seen an upswing in violent attacks by [...]

Tide is turning against Israel
Linda Heard
Tuesday 20 October 2009
Now even the United Nations Human Rights Council is “anti-Semitic.” Well, that’s the view of Israel’s Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz, who is outraged that the body rubber-stamped the Goldstone Report on war crimes committed in Gaza. Some years ago, that accusation would have had enormous shock-value, [...]