WASHINGTON - September 14 - Talks resume today between the U.S., Israel and the Palestinian Authority in the Egyptian resort town of Sharm el-Sheikh in the Sinai Desert.

Reuters is reporting: "The U.S. envoy to the U.N. atomic watchdog urged Arab states on Monday to withdraw a resolution calling on Israel to sign an anti-nuclear arms treaty, warning it would send a negative signal to Middle East peace talks."

MAIREAD MAGUIRE
also via Barbara Faibish
Available for a limited number of interviews, Irish Nobel Peace Laureate Maguire is calling for the immediate release of Palestinian human rights activist Abdallah Abu Rahmah. He was convicted of "incitement" and "organizing illegal marches" by an Israeli military court in late August. Another stage of his trial begins Wednesday. See: Free Abdallah

In a statement on the webpage of the Nobel Women's Initiative, which meets in New York City this week, Maguire called the conviction an "example of the ongoing repression of Palestinian peace activists by Israel. Rahmah is the coordinator of the Bil'in Popular Committee, which organizes weekly, non-violent demonstrations against Israeli settlements and the separation wall."

Said Maguire: "I know Abdullah Rahmah and many of villagers of Bil'in and Nil'in and have walked in peaceful human rights marches in both villages, all of which have ended up being violently attacked by Israeli soldiers. I am in admiration of Rahmah and the Palestinian villagers commitment to nonviolence and justice as they carried out their rightful resistance to Israeli annexation of their villages' land, building of this illegal wall, and West Bank settlements."

Maguire has also called for the release of and an end to the harassment of Mordechai Vanunu, who exposed Israel's nuclear weapons arsenal in 1986; he was imprisoned for 18 years and continues to be periodically arrested by the Israeli government. See: "Israeli Nuclear Whistleblower Vanunu on Mideast Nukes"

In 2007, the Israeli military shot Maguire at a protest in the West Bank.

ROBERT NAIMAN
Naiman is policy director of Just Foreign Policy. He recently wrote the piece "'Palestinian Gandhi' Convicted for Protesting; U.S. Silent" about Rahmah.