Hamas militiamen in Gaza on Sunday 28th attacked fuel trucks headed toward the Nahal Oz border crossing to pick up fuel for UNRWA - to enable food distribution - and for hospitals, forcing them to turn back, sources in the Palestinian Petroleum Authority said. "Dozens of Hamas militiamen hurled stones and opened fire at the trucks," the sources added. "The trucks were on their way to receive fuel supplied by Israel. The drivers were forced to turn back. Some of them had their windshields smashed."

Eyewitnesses in Gaza City said that at least on four occasions over the past few weeks, Hamas militiamen confiscated trucks loaded with fuel on their way from Nahal Oz to the city. The fuel was taken to Hamas-controlled security installations.

The head of the Palestinian Authority's gas agency said on Tuesday that Hamas gunmen had raided the Palestinian side of the Nahal Oz fuel terminal, stealing at least 60,000 litres of fuel meant for the Gaza power station in order to fill their own vehicles.

(This follows Hamas attacking the very crossing points where Israel delivers aid supplies to the Palestinians).

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

UNIFIL covering up Hizbullah activities south of Litani River

UNIFIL is intentionally concealing information about Hizbullah activities south of the Litani River in Lebanon to avoid conflict with the group, senior sources in Jerusalem have said. In the last six months there have been at least four cases in which UNIFIL soldiers identified armed Hizbullah operatives, but did nothing and did not submit full reports on the incidents to the UN Security Council.

A new report by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon with regard to Security Council Resolution 1559 briefly mentioned an incident at the beginning of March in which UNIFIL soldiers encountered unidentified armed men, and included no additional details. The incident described in the report had actually been a clash between UNIFIL and armed Hizbullah activists, driving a truck full of explosives, who threatened the Italian UNIFIL battalion with weapons. Instead of using force as required by their mandate, the UN soldiers abandoned the site. A diplomatic source at the UN said senior officials in UNIFIL and in the UN Secretariat brought heavy pressure to bear to have the incident erased from the report or at least to blur it.

(If UNIFIL units feel intimidated out of fulfilling their mandate they should admit so, don't you think?)

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Malaysian Muslim groups' ire at Chelsea FC Israelis

Malaysian Muslim groups have called for protests when Chelsea football club visits in July because the coach, Avram Grant, and a player are Israeli.

An alliance of 21 Muslim groups is angry the Malaysian authorities have given permission for the Israelis to visit the country with the London club.

Malaysia has no diplomatic relations with Israel, and the Malay Muslim majority is strongly pro-Palestinian. Malaysian citizens are banned by their government from visiting Israel.

The Muslim groups said allowing Mr Grant and midfielder Tal Ben Haim into Malaysia for the pre-season match would be "insensitive" to the Palestinian people.

"Malaysians should boycott the match," said spokesman Muhammad Azmi. "We should unite with the Palestinian people and fight for an independent homeland for them."

Mr Azmi said the alliance of Muslim organisations would hold a protest at the stadium ahead of the game on 29 July.

(Malaysia previously banned the film Schindler's List for being biassed towards Jews as compared with Nazis. It was eventually permitted with cuts to violent and nude scenes. In 1984, a New York Philharmonic tour in Malaysia was cancelled because the orchestra planned to perform a piece by Jewish composer Ernest Bloc)

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Palestinian dance festival receives veiled threat from Hamas

Hamas slams the Ramallah dance festival as ‘depraved’
25/04/2008
By Ben Lynfield Jerusalem
A Hamas-affiliated jurist has condemned a dance festival now under way in Ramallah as sacrilegious and cautioned that it could cause Palestinian young men needed to fight Israel to become effeminate.

Marwan Abu Ras, chairman of the league of Islamic ulama, or scholars, in Gaza, said in remarks carried by Hamas’s Palestinian Information Centre website that the Ramallah Contemporary Dance Festival “is more than forbidden”.

It is the first time Hamas has condemned the festival, one of the main annual cultural events in the West Bank.

It highlights how bitter relations remain between the Islamic Movement that controls Gaza and its largely secular Fatah rival in the West Bank, almost a year after Hamas seized complete control over the coastal strip.

“This is more than forbidden because it presents us as satisfied with all matters and that nothing remains for us except learning licentiousness and impudent art,” Mr Abu Ras said. “This is more than forbidden because it is taking place at a time when the sons of the Palestinian people are being killed and its holy places Judaised.”

The ban is symbolic only since the Islamic group’s writ does not extend to the West Bank. Troupes have come from Norway, Italy, Serbia, France, Germany and Spain to perform alongside the local Palestinian El-Funoun group.

The latter devoted its performance Saturday night to an adaptation to dance of cartoons of the widely popular Palestinian caricaturist Naji al-Ali, who was assassinated in London in 1989.

Mr Abu Ras said: “The nation is not in need of dance, it is in need of resistance and of committed men carrying rifles. It is not in need of men dancing alongside women on the pretext that this serves the national cause.” He termed the festival “morally depraved” and warned that it would “cause [male] youths to become effeminate”.

Commenting on the Hamas reaction, festival coordinator Joyce Hanania told the Jewish Chronicle: “We are upset about it. They just don’t understand.”

(Then again there's always that nice Mr Abbas, who some claim is a US/Israeli stooge.)