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BREAKING: An individual driving a passenger vehicle struck a security barrier near the White House at 17th & E. UPDATE: The female driver of the vehicle was immediately apprehended by Secret Service Uniformed Division Officers.

A damning report by Palestinian legislators, which has been seen by the Telegraph, concludes that Mr Arafat did nothing to stop the deals although he publicly condemned the structure as a "crime against humanity"... The report reveals that the cement originally came from Egyptian companies which supplied it at a huge discount of $22 (£12.50) a ton to help rebuild dilapidated Palestinian houses or buildings bulldozed by the Israelis. Between September 2003 and March this year, 420,000 tons of cement were allegedly sent to three big Palestinian companies. According to the report, however, only 33,000 tons were sold in...

Last Update: 29/12/2004 23:05 Abbas: There will be no peace until Israel tears down separation fence By Reuters Taking his campaign to succeed Yasser Arafat to the foot of the West Bank separation fence, PLO chief Mahmoud Abbas said on Wednesday there would be no peace until Israel tore it down. "No (Middle East) peace can transpire with (Jewish) settlements and the wall," Abbas said with his back to the separation fence around Qalqilyah near the West Bank's boundary with Israel. "We tell our neighbors: 'No matter how many settlements, walls or obstacles you build, it will not bring you...

Partition Fence Being Built By PA Arabs 23:08 Dec 23, '03 / 28 Kislev 5764 Deputy Chief-of-Staff General Gabi Ashkenazi told a Knesset committee today (Tuesday) that the partition fence will cost over 10 billion NIS and is being built to a large extent by PA Arab workers. “The security fence is being built, in many cases, by Palestinian Arabs,” Deputy Chief-of-Staff General Gabi Ashkenazi told a Knesset committee today (Tuesday). General Asheknazi, in an address delivered to the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Security committees today gave an update on the extent of the security fence, its cost, and...

Israel warned over separation fence as Syria threatens revenge By Justin Huggler in Jerusalem 12 October 2003 Days before the UN Security Council is due to debate Israel's "separation fence" in the West Bank, the Palestinians warned yesterday that if the fence is allowed to go ahead, it will mean "the end of the two-state solution" envisaged by President Bush. Fears are growing, not only for what remains of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, but for the stability of the whole Middle East. The war of words between Syria and Israel after an Israeli air strike near Damascus intensified yesterday, with...

Speakers at a Hebrew University symposium on the separation barrier warned on Monday that the wall currently under construction in Jerusalem could undermine all hopes of peace and trigger a new war. The symposium was sponsored by the Middle East Unit of the Truman Institute. Rami Nassrallah, a member of the International Peace Cooperation Center, charged that the current route of the separation wall in Jerusalem is only the first stage in an alleged plan to split the Palestinian population in the area and create a "Jewish Jerusalem" rather than a "united Jerusalem." Nassrallah warned that in the future Israel...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States is weighing reducing U.S. loan guarantees to Israel because of a fence it is building in the West Bank, U.S. officials said on Tuesday. Israel is constructing what it calls a security fence -- in parts a concrete wall and in others metal fencing -- to keep out Palestinian suicide bombers. Palestinians describe it as a new "Berlin Wall" that grabs territory they want to be part of an independent state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. U.S. officials said they have to consider trimming the loan guarantees because of a U.S. law...

TEL AVIV — Palestinian infiltrators have succeeded in breaching Israel's new security fence and barrier system. Israeli security sources said Palestinian infiltrators have scaled the four-meter high concrete fence by using a simple ladder. The Israeli project calls for the establishing of a 730-kilometer fence at a cost of $1.9 billion. Most of the project consists of a concrete wall or chain-link fence with sensors, cameras and military patrols. In one case, the sources said, Arab infiltrators brought a ladder to the fence in the northeastern West Bank. They quickly scaled the fence and entered a waiting car that took...

Monday, July 25, 2005 Justifying the Fence: A Surprising Source The New York Times is often harshly critical of Israel. OK, not all the time. Much of their reporting is factual. Some, however, does seem to have a bias. Today, however, there was a truly excellent article titled In Most Cases, Israel Thwarts Suicide Attacks Without a Shot. Yes, there are successful attacks, most recently on July 12 in Netanya. To quote a relevant point: Israel is also building a separation barrier - an electronic fence and in some places a huge concrete wall - to make it harder for...

TEL AVIV, Israel - Palestinians reacted with anger at Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon (news - web sites)'s warning that Israel might seize land if peace negotiations fail, though Sharon also said Israel must give up territory for peace. "You do not have unlimited time," Sharon told a news conference on Thursday, addressing the Palestinians. He added that if he feels the Palestinians are not serious about negotiating a peace deal, he may take unilateral steps. "Maybe (the Palestinians) can get things now that they won't be able to get then." The Palestinians, who claim all of the West Bank...

Soldiers used tear gas and rubber bullets against Israeli, Palestinian, and foreign activists affiliated with the International Solidarity Movement who tore down a section of the West Bank security fence and forced open a locked gate on Monday. Five foreign ISM volunteers were reported wounded. Soldiers deployed at the site watched as more than 200 demonstrators marched toward the fence near Anin, northwest of Jenin, to allow villagers to tend to their fields on the other side of the fence. Troops were forced to intervene when the demonstrators began tearing down the fence. One of the group, a US citizen,...

West Bank fence certainly contributed to decline in terror Israel is constructing a new crossing point for the Palestinians on the eastern slopes of the Mount of Olives, where the calls of the muezzin, the ringing church bells and the biblical scenery all blend into one. The Defense Ministry is painting the concrete here in orange, just like the other crossings - not out of political subversion, God forbid, but to make those waiting at the crossing happy. Here and there, the orange is decorated with blue; not to balance out the political message, but only to make people happy....

El-ARISH, Egypt -- Egypt is building a 10-foot-high concrete wall along its border with Gaza to prevent any new breaches after Palestinian militants blasted through the barrier in January to escape a blockade of their territory, an official said. The new wall replaces a mixed barbed-wire, iron and concrete barrier which was breached in several places when militants blew it open with explosives, added the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not allowed to talk to the media. Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians flooded across the open border unchecked for 12 days before Egypt managed to...

Last Update: 10/10/2003 21:06 Sec. Council postpones separation fence hearing to Tuesday Shlomo Shamir, Haaretz Correspondent and Agencies The UN Security Council on Friday agreed to a U.S. request to postpone to next Tuesday an open discussion on the separation fence Israel is building in the West Bank and around Jerusalem. The decision was reached during a closed dicussion of Security Council members on the fence, which marked the first time the UN has addressed the issue. All UN member states will have the right to speak at Wednesday's hearing. During Friday's discussion, Syria presented a draft resolution condemning Israel....

• The International Court of Justice in The Hague (ICJ or UN Court) issued an opinion on July 9, 2004 on the legality of Israel's Security Fence.  The ICJ ruling is advisory and not legally binding.  • The court decided that it has jurisdiction to issue a ruling and ruled that Israel's construction of the fence is illegal and must be halted.  The court based its decision on an outdated route of the fence and did not take into consideration the threat that Palestinian terrorism poses to Israeli security.  The ICJ has never issued a ruling that condemns terrorist attacks against...

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's reported go-it-alone peace plan is a recipe for disaster, his Palestinian counterpart Ahmed Qurie told Israel's Maariv newspaper in an interview published Thursday. Violence erupted in the Rafah refugee camp in the southern Gaza Strip, where six Palestinians -- a gunman and five civilians -- were killed during battles with an Israeli force of 20 armored vehicles, medics said. Of Sharon's plan, Qurie predicted: "The conflict would continue, fires would burn, terror would increase and no one would gain. It would be a bad mistake to force a settlement on us. We...

Matt Spetalnick URIM, Israel (Reuters) - Israel is rushing to complete a three-layer-deep barrier of fences and walls on its border with Gaza to keep Palestinian infiltrators out after it pulls out of the territory, military officials said on Thursday. The army insists that, unlike Israel's internationally condemned West Bank barrier, the new project will not cut into Palestinian land. But the Palestinian Authority said such Israeli measures could keep Gaza sealed up like a giant prison. The plan calls for adding two new fences parallel to the border fence that already surrounds the Gaza Strip and putting up seven-metre...

IN AN attempt to thwart Palestinian suicide attacks, Ariel Sharon, the Israeli Prime Minister, yesterday directed that a 75-mile fence be built to divide Israel from much of the occupied West Bank. The fence will run from Kafr Salem, southeast of Haifa, near the biblical location known as Megiddo or Armageddon, to Kafr Kassem, not far from the Tel Aviv suburb of Petah Tikvah, which was the target of the most recent of 70 suicide attacks in the past 21 months. Construction will take one year and will cost more than £68 million. The fence will follow the so-called Green...

Some call it the separation fence. Some call it the security fence. Some just call it “the fence”, but the "Palestinians" like calling it a "wall". Truth be told, most of it is metal and wire, like any other fence. But there are parts of it, solid concrete, more than five meters - almost 20 feet - tall. More importantly than what it is, is why it is. Long before Israel - the state, government, and most of the people - wanted to build it, to "separate", the "Palestinians" had already built a wall between us. Suicide bombings, endless machine-gun...

        Thu Jul 31, 7:50 AM ET Foreign peace activists shout during a protest in front of a fence near the West Bank city of Qalqilya, July 31, 2003. Some 200 Palestinian and foreigners staged a demonstration against a controversial security barrier being built by Israel across the West Bank, demanding that it be torn down. REUTERS/Goran Tomasevic     Thu Jul 31, 8:35 AM ET Protestors paint slogans on a concrete security wall that separates Israel from the West Bank during a demonstration against the construction of the fence, in the West Bank city of...