ISRAEL

• Official word is that Israeli forces have suspended their occupation of the Rafah refugee camp in Gaza, claiming to have accomplished the destruction of three tunnels used for arms smuggling plus the death of multiple armed militants, and are taking a breather.

• As usual, Palestinian claims of damage and dead vary widely from IDF reports, as Israelly cool points out to us.

THE PALESTINIANS

• The Palestinian Authority daily al-Ayyam has published a call to non-violent resistance written by the Palestinian Coalition for Peace, headed by former PA frontman Yasser Abed Rabbo. A heartening possibility, should anything come of it.

SYRIA & LEBANON

• Recent Lebanese elections have led to an upset for Amal and a victory for Hizbollah in local party politics. It will be interesting to see what this does to the balance of power in Lebanon vis-a-vis the ongoing Syrian occupation, as well as to Syria's position as a conduit of resistance fighters to Iraq.

• In an older but interesting read, Bashar al-Assad talks to al-Jazeera, speechifying about his opinions on everything from Arab reform to whether or not al-Qaeda exists. Masterfully, this younger Arab statesman strikes a careful balance between having no opinion and saying nothing.

• At least 3 protestors were shot dead in Beirut Thursday, after Lebanese troops opened fire on a demonstration against high fuel prices that replied by throwing stones when the police used water cannons to disperse them.

• b>JK: As NMargizin notes in an email, there is no word on this at all from the UN, EU, or US State Department. 2 months ago, Syria killed some 80 protesting Kurds in 1-2 days protesting and not a word from the UN, EU or State Department either. Meryl Yourish makes this point more strongly, in "The Failure of Israeli PR." I think Israel's problem includes a PR failure, mind, but it's deeper than that.

OTHER NEIGHBOURS

• Another pretense at solidarity and reform in the Arab World has taken a blow - this yearís Arab Summit was poorly attended and, as usual, rife with internal bickering between Gulf and Levantine groups.

• Egypt has declined a G8 Summit invite. Interesting that Hosni Mubarak would pass up a chance to be the center of attention, especially when the topic of this particular meet is democratic reform in the Middle East.