http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3889331,00.html

PFLP chief urges Abbas to cancel talks
Bethlehem – Ma'an – The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine's leadership is urging President Mahmoud Abbas to reverse his "miserable decision" to return to peace talks with Israel.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=284160

Barhoum urges Fatah to return to resistance
Fawzi Barhoum on Thursday urged the Fatah faction to return to its national program and resistance away from the trend within it that was selling national rights and constants at a cheap price.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/

Russia rebuffs Israeli rebuke over relations with Hamas
On Wednesday, Israel slammed Russian President Medvedev for meeting with Hamas leader Meshal in Damascus.
http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/
russia-rebuffs-israeli-rebuke-over-relations-with-hamas-1.290241

Lieberman invites British FM to Israel
Foreign minister congratulates incoming British counterpart on his new post. Two politicians jest about difficulties in forming complex coalitions. Lieberman impressed by Hague's proficiency in Middle East.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3889352,00.html

Other News
Rahm Emanuel's father specialized in bus bombings in Palestine
(WMR) -- A well-placed British source informed WMR that Rahm Emanuel's father, Benjamin Emanuel, specialized in the terrorist bombings of buses carrying British troops and policemen during the British Mandate in Palestine.  British MI-6 files contain information on the elder Emanuel's participation in the terrorist activities of Irgun Zvai Leumi, a Jewish terrorist organization that targeted British forces, UN officials, and Palestinian Arabs in the lead up to Israeli independence in 1948.
http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_5870.shtml

Gaza man seeks asylum in Spain
Bethlehem - Ma'an - Mayor Victor Batarseh has issued an appeal to the Spanish foreign minister to grant an entry visa to a Palestinian from Gaza who says Hamas-aligned forces in the coastal enclave are threatening his life.  Kamal Elias Fuad Al-Tarazi was employed by the Palestinian security forces that ruled Gaza until Hamas took charge in 2007, and has resided in Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank ever since his car came under fire on 21 January 2008.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=284149

Analysis/Opinion/Human Interest
The charge: Arabs, Gideon Levy
The parliamentary inquiry committee headed by MK Ahmed Tibi on hiring more Arabs in the civil service issued its interim report at the beginning of the year. This impressive report should have been an indictment of Israeli society. But the report was met with indifference. It reveals severe state discrimination. But the report is only part of the problem. The other part is political and national: We can't ignore that the debate about the "Jewish state" excludes Israel's Arabs by definition, shunting them into a corner from which there is no way out.
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/the-charge-arabs-1.290083

Desperately smearing Goldstone, LARRY DERFNER
Inside the Israeli echo chamber, it’s now “case closed” on the war in Gaza. The country’s biggest newspaper, Yediot Aharonot, has “exposed” Judge Richard Goldstone as an apartheid-era hanging judge. This proves he’s a huge hypocrite whose word means nothing, which proves his report on the war in Gaza means nothing, which proves Operation Cast Lead was every bit the shining example of restraint and purity of arms Israel says it was.
http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Article.aspx?id=175401

'We want to live'
Salam Fayyad's plans for Palestine and the Palestinians are nought but a contrived folk festival where the occupied bow to their oppressors, writes Azmi Bishara
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2010/998/op3.htm

More settlements as talks begin
Plans to build yet more illegal settlements in occupied East Jerusalem emerge on the eve of proximity talks, reports Khaled Amayreh
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2010/998/fr2.htm

Taxing times
Spurred on by Israel's three-year-long draconian siege, Gaza is now in the grips of a vicious liquidity crisis, writes Saleh Al-Naami
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2010/998/re1.htm

Israelis' state of denial over treatment of Palestinians
But the army lies, to put it mildly. The language it uses to describe firing at non-violent Palestinian demonstrators is always laden with euphemisms, and the need to explain arises only when organizations like B'Tselem publish pictures in which it can be seen, for example, how settlers open fire and the army does not lift a finger. That is an example of the kind of things Israelis do not want to know about.  The territories are far away. The Palestinians live far away. This hallucination can be attributed to the walls, the separation roads, the army and the TV news. "Judea and Samaria" are close. The settlers live among us. There are photographs of them, their homes are photographed. They are in the army. They are the army. But the separation between those who are very close, who have the right to vote, weapons, rights and state financial support, and those who live at the same physical distance but must be left far away, on the other side of the walls, the fences, the roadblocks - this separation is made with the aid of the refusal to know. The denial.
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/israelis-state-of-denial-over-treatment-of-palestinians-1.289836

Denying Edward Said, Philip Weiss
One of my themes is that Zionism is dumbing down the Jews. In order to believe the Zionist narrative about Israel, you basically have to block out a lot of history and wipe out another people's humanity and experience, simply disavow it. Here's further evidence. Deborah Nussbaum Cohen in the Forward has a fine report on a controversy over a question on an Advanced Placement test. "Some Jewish" high school students ("Some Jewish" is my ace in the hole, too) have objected to an essay question that uses a quote from the late Palestinian-American author Edward Said.
http://mondoweiss.net/2010/05/denying-edward-saids-life.html

If OECD membership is the soft carrot, where’s the stick?, Ahmed Moor
The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) –a group of 31 governments designed to address economic, social and environmental issues – decided earlier this week to make Israel a full member of the coalition. I’m in Paris right now, and when I heard the news I jumped on the subway and went to the organization’s headquarters in the western part of the city. I was hoping to protest but aside from a heavy police presence, there wasn’t very much going on. It’s possible I was just late to the party (it was around five in the afternoon).
http://mondoweiss.net/2010/05/if-oecd-membership-is-the-soft-carrot-wheres-the-stick.html

Jamal Dajani: The Russians Are Coming
Israel expressed "deep disappointment" Thursday over a meeting the Russian President Dmitry Medvedev held this week in Syria with Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal, saying the organization must play a role in peace efforts.  Calling Hamas "a terror organization in every way," Israel's Foreign Ministry said in a statement that it expected Russia to stand by Israel in its struggle against Hamas.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jamal-dajani/the-russians-are-coming_b_576217.html

MJ Rosenberg: Neocon High School Kids: The College Boards Are Anti-Israel!
This story in the Forward today reminds me of something my older son wrote to us in a letter from Jewish summer camp when he was 14.He told us the kids were terrific but that some of them were so paranoid about Israel that he thought they were "crazy." After all, these were all pretty well-off Jewish kids at a beautiful spot in Massachusetts and yet they acted like they were under assault by the world . Some of them were even Republicans (because of Israel).  "Dad, he wrote, there is nothing worse than fascist children."  Naturally, I saved that letter.