Companies controlled by Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich donated tens of millions of pounds to a highly controversial Israeli settler group accused of displacing Palestinian families from Jerusalem, according to leaked documents seen by BBC News Arabic.

Settler organization increasing presence in Palestinian neighbourhoods
It is estimated that 199 Palestinian households currently have eviction cases filed against them, the majority initiated by settler organizations, placing 877 people, including 391 children, at risk of displacement.[1] Evictions can have a grave physical, social, economic and emotional impact on the affected families.
 
On 10 July, the Israeli authorities evicted Ilham Hussein Siyam and her four adult children from their home in the Wadi al Hilweh neighbourhood of Silwan in East Jerusalem, ending a 25-year-long legal battle. The eviction, in which settlers took part by removing the family’s furniture[2], followed the Jerusalem District Court ruling of 12 June 2019 in favour of Elad settler organization’s ownership of the majority of the Siyam family home, including the vacated apartment, a store and a nearby courtyard. The family’s appeal against the eviction was immediately rejected at the Israeli High Court on 8 July 2019.
 
Settlers have already moved into the evicted apartment, while Ilham’s family have moved in with other family members to live in what remains of the family property. According to the family, they now need to pay NIS 72,000 in legal-related costs to the Elad organization and NIS 50,000 to the District Court. In addition, according to Ilham Siyam, Elad organization has now demanded that the family pay them NIS 400,000 in retroactive rent, against which the family submitted an objection and await a final ruling. During the eviction, Jawad Siyam, who is one of the heirs and a Silwan community leader, was arrested and later banned from entering Silwan, including his home, for three days.

Means of Expropriation
In recent decades, Israeli settler organizations, with the support of the Israeli authorities, have taken control of properties within Palestinian neighbourhoods in East Jerusalem and established settlement compounds. These settlements are concentrated in the Muslim and Christian quarters of the Old City, Silwan, Sheikh Jarrah, At-Tur (Mount of Olives), Wadi Joz, Ras al-Amud and Jabal Mukabbir.[3] Settler activity in these areas has resulted  in the forcible eviction and displacement of Palestinian residents, with negative humanitarian impact. Most of these cases were challenged unsuccessfully in Israeli courts.
 
Palestinian houses have been transferred to settler organizations by various means. In some cases, settlers have pursued court cases to evict the Palestinian residents, on the grounds that the land or buildings were owned by Jewish individuals or associations in East Jerusalem prior to 1948.[4]
 
 
 
In other cases, the Absentee Property Law of 1950 is applied: this law, which was devised to formalize the expropriation of the land and property of Palestinians who were expelled or fled during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, has been applied, albeit inconsistently, to East Jerusalem since 1967.[5] In the case of the Siyam family, the deceased owner, Ilham’s grandmother, bequeathed the property to eight family members, and the Custodian of Absentee Property took control of two of these shares on the basis that the two heirs live abroad, and are ‘absentees’. Ilham is the daughter of one of these ‘absentee’ heirs.   In 2018, the Custodian auctioned its quarter share of the home and Elad won the bid for over NIS 2 million.
 
Settler organizations have also had some success in purchasing land and property directly from the Palestinian owners, due to the economically depressed situation in many of the affected neighbourhoods. In the Siyam case, Elad manged to buy the shares of property from four of the heirs: together with their purchase from the Custodian, they have succeeded in having a majority share in the property and the District Court ruled in their favour.

Le Soudan a douché mardi 25 août les espoirs des Israéliens et des Américains d’une reconnaissance rapide d’Israël, en écartant une éventuelle normalisation avec l’Etat hébreu avant la fin de la transition politique en 2022, lors d’une visite à Khartoum du secrétaire d’Etat américain, Mike Pompeo.

Sudan Agrees to Conditional Normalization of Ties with Israel
 
Sudanese and US officials have arrived to an agreement that includes removing Sudan from the US list of terrorism sponsors, sources reported, adding that the agreement will be officially announced in the coming few days.
 
 
The two sides have also achieved a principal agreement on Sudan’s role in Arab states normalizing ties with Israel, promoting regional peace and preserving the rights of Palestinians.
 
Khartoum, however, tied its position on normalization with Israel to fulfilling its demands which include the provision of a package of financial aid and facilitating its access to loans from international financial institutions.
 
Khartoum and Washington have agreed to the US presenting Sudan with a $7 billion support package, delisting the North African nation from the US list of terrorism sponsors, and ensuring that Khartoum will not be persecuted in the future, sources told Asharq Al-Awsat.
 
In principal, Sudan has agreed to normalize ties with Israel if its conditions are met.
 

La nouvelle
question palestinienne

Dans le nouveau Moyen­Orient,
celui qui émerge au XXIe
siècle, l’affaire palestinienne serait devenue marginale, un conflit périphérique. Peut­-être. Mais pas pour tout le monde. Le nationalisme palestinien ne va pas disparaître. Il pourrait entrer dans une
nouvelle ère, nourrir une autre
bataille, laquelle déterminera
l’avenir d’Israël – sa nature en tant
qu’Etat juif et démocratique. En ce
sens, il y a une « israélisation » de
la question palestinienne.

Loin d’être « centrale » dans la région, la question palestinienne est
chaque jour un peu moins la
« cause » des Arabes, en tout cas des Etats arabes. Ceux­ là, qui se sont entre­déchirés tout seuls, sont occupés ailleurs. Ils s’allient à Israël pour contenir un expansionnisme iranien qu’ils jugent
d’autant plus menaçant que les Etats­Unis aimeraient se « retirer » du Moyen­ Orient. Quant au
mouvement national palestinien, il est divisé et passablement
discrédité chez lui, à Gaza comme
en Cisjordanie. Mais les Palestiniens sont toujours là, eux :
2 millions à Gaza, bientôt 3 millions en Cisjordanie, sans compter un million et demi qui ont la
nationalité israélienne.

Deux populations côte à côte, l’une soumise à
l’ordre démocratique, l’autre à
l’occupation militaire : ça peut durer combien de temps ?
Si cette évolution se confirme,
la société civile palestinienne va
commencer à « penser sa survie au sein d’un seul Etat » et, poursuit l’essayiste de l’IFRI, le mouvement national, de son côté, va devoir « dépasser l’idée d’un Etat­-nation » propre comme aboutissement de sa lutte. Petit à petit, la
bataille portera sur l’égalité des
droits entre les deux populations.
Au bout de cette logique, il y a la
perspective de l’Etat binational. Dans l’édition d’automne de la revue belge Regards, l’historien Elie Barnavi, ancien ambassadeur
d’Israël à Paris, écrit : « Plus que jamais, l’alternative sinistre de l’Etat unitaire ou l’apartheid se profile à l’horizon. Dans les deux cas, le prix
en sera la mort du projet sioniste »
– un Etat majoritairement juif et
démocratique.

Quoi qu’on pense de la faisabilité d’un Etat binational au
Moyen­ Orient, qui peut passer pour passablement utopique, l’hypothèse en est relancée chaque
jour par la poursuite des implantations. Elle est le produit direct de
la politique que la droite israélienne mène depuis des années. Nétanyahou se félicitait récem-
ment d’avoir obtenu, avec l’accord
du 15 septembre, la paix sans céder
un pouce de la Cisjordanie. La
question palestinienne ne serait
plus affaire de partage foncier.
Peut­-être, mais telle qu’elle prend
forme aujourd’hui, elle va définir ce que sera Israël demain.

Israel’s Netanyahu brings his dirty laundry to Washington. Literally.
 
Over the years, the Israeli leader has developed a reputation among the staff at the U.S. president’s guesthouse for bringing special cargo on his trips to Washington: bags and suitcases full of dirty laundry, according to U.S. officials familiar with the matter.
 
The clothes are cleaned for the prime minister free of charge by the U.S. staff, a perk that is available to all foreign leaders but sparingly taken advantage of given the short stays of busy heads of state.
 
“The Netanyahus are the only ones who bring actual suitcases of dirty laundry for us to clean,” said one U.S. official, who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the details of a foreign leader’s visits. “After multiple trips, it became clear this was intentional.”

TURKEY: Salah Arouri, Hamas' 2nd in command and mastermind, tested positive for Covid, days after meeting Hezbollah's Hassan Nasrallah and Hamas leadership.

Israël-Palestine : la France a-t-elle changé de position ?

L'ambassadeur français à Tel-Aviv a rompu avec la ligne officielle, qui défend la solution à deux États comme seule option possible au Proche-Orient.

Who are the allies of the Palestinians now? Is it Iran, which is using the Palestinian cause as a pretext at the expense of the Palestinian people? Is it Iran and Khomeini, who want to liberate Jerusalem through Yemen, Lebanon, and Syria? The path to Jerusalem is known, that is if they truly wish to take it. Or is it Turkey, which Hamas leaders have thanked for its stance in support of Hamas and the Palestinian cause? That is simply because Erdogan announced that he was withdrawing his ambassador from the UAE in support of the Palestinian cause. Can anyone explain to me why Hamas leaders, instead of asking Erdogan to withdraw the Turkish ambassador from the UAE and pay to fly him back home, why they did not ask him to expel the Israeli ambassador from Ankara and call back the Turkish ambassador from Tel Aviv?