News stories by Pierre Klochendler

JERUSALEM, Aug 07 (IPS) - "Strong together, we love Israel and trust the army" – while a tentative truce takes root, banners adorned with the national colours still dominate cities and highways across the country.

MISHOR ADUMIM INDUSTRIAL ZONE, Occupied West Bank, Feb 09 (IPS) - The longstanding Israeli practice of labelling settlement products ‘Made in Israel' is leading to mounting opposition to the occupation.

KFAR QARA’, Northern Israel, Jan 27 (IPS) - Welcome to Bridge Over the Wadi primary school, one of five bi-national schools under the ‘Hand-in-Hand' initiative of the Centre of Jewish-Arab Education in Israel. The centre strives to bring children from both communities to learn together in Hebrew and Arabic in the hope that they'll bridge the divide between the two peoples.

JORDAN VALLEY, Israeli-occupied West Bank, Jan 13 (IPS) - Israeli settler Gadi Blumenfeld distributes machetes to 15 Palestinian labourers and instructs them to cut the thorns off of his dates’ fronds. “I might be stabbed in the back,” he says, “but thanks to farming, we keep the area safe from terrorists.”

JINBA, Occupied West Bank, Dic 26 (IPS) - Jinba is in the crosshair of ‘Firing Zone 918' - and ‘Firing Zone 918' is a microcosm of the Israeli occupation. Together with seven other communities, Jinba is slated for demolition to make way for an Israeli training ground. Forced eviction hangs over a thousand Palestinians.

MAJD E-SHAMS, Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, Dic 11 (IPS) - The faint explosion is a reminder that though the newly refurbished fence protects their town, the two-and-a-half-year-old civil war which is tearing their motherland apart is never far off.

HAIFA, Northern Israel, Nov 27 (IPS) - As civil war paralyses Syria's transit routes and political flux in Egypt may affect security at the Suez Canal, Israel is busy repositioning itself as a transhipment hub and trade gateway to the Middle East.

QATSRIN, Occupied Golan Heights, Nov 11 (IPS) - In the municipal sports hall with an army officer to his side, Father Gabriel Nadaf, a Greek Orthodox Arab priest in full regalia, briefs Arab Christian twelfth-graders on the merits of serving in the Israel Defence Forces (IDF). "It's only natural that the country which protects us deserves that we contribute to its defence," he tells them.

OCCUPIED EAST JERUSALEM, Nov 07 (IPS) - As Palestinian-Israeli peace talks and nuclear talks on Iran's disputed nuclear programme continue, a unique international conference, "A Middle East without Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs)", was held in Jerusalem.

BATTIR, Occupied West Bank, Nov 03 (IPS) - "O green Battir, mother of the air," Mariam Ma'mmar sings in praise of her village. As the hot season draws to a close, the land – her people's strength – dries up. Not here in her Battir, where a peaceful form of resistance against the Israeli occupation is taking root.