"We have argued from the start that this is bad legislation and the Obama administration has made clear that it agrees," APN President and CEO Debra DeLee said in a statement on the measure.

By HILARY LEILA KRIEGER

By MATTHEW WAGNER

At Pollard's request, Rabbi Ya'acov Shapira will work to strengthen Jewish hold on disputed east J'lem house.

At the request of Jonathan Pollard, Rabbi Ya'acov Shapira, head of the Merkaz Harav Yeshiva, will launch various educational and spiritual activities designed to strengthen the Jewish hold on a disputed house in east Jerusalem.

Speaking at an Americans for Peace Now luncheon in honor of APN activist and Jewish community leader Irwin Levin, Berman (D-CA) said: "Over the years, I discovered two things: first, I learned that there were indeed many Palestinians who were prepared to accept Israel and who genuinely believe in coexistence. Second, I discovered the immense toll the occupation is taking on Israel."

By Donald Macintyre in Jerusalem

Demonstrations against evictions of Palestinians to make way for Jewish settlers

At least 15 protesters were arrested yesterday as several hundred left-wing Israelis held their biggest demonstration yet against demolitions and evictions of east Jerusalem Palestinians designed to make way for Jewish settlers.

By Nir Hasson

Hundreds of left-wing activists, including several prominent politicians, protested in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in East Jerusalem on Friday.

The protest has become a weekly event in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, held to protest a Jewish takeover of Palestinian homes in East Jerusalem through the use of ownership documents dating from the period of the British mandate in Palestine.

Yedioth Ahronoth (p. B8) by Uri Misgav -- On the hilltop stands a building, like a colonial palace in the Third World. Around it lie the barren pastures of the surrounding villages, a flock of sheep chewing the grass, and two Palestinian shepherds suspiciously eyeing the construction.

E.B. SOLOMONT, Jpost correspondent in New York , THE JERUSALEM POST

NEW YORK - Inside a glittering New York City ballroom on Wednesday night, several hundred people turned out to support the construction of Jewish housing near an Arab-populated part of east Jerusalem.

Increasingly, you hear them at public events and symposia. You read their analyses in the press and on blogs. They are the "no-solutionists."

Ultra-skeptical, hypercynical, often giddy about their political nihilism, they typically argue something along these lines: "As a realist, I realize that there are problems in this world that simply can't be resolved. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is one of them."

By Josh Nathan-Kazis

An early January announcement that Israeli authorities had approved a new Jewish settlement on the campus of an American-funded yeshiva in East Jerusalem came just weeks after President Obama issued a statement condemning new Israeli construction in the area.

When I returned to Israel in the summer of 2000, following a four-year stay in the West Coast, I had two job offers. Ha'aretz offered me the Israeli-Arab beat, covering Jewish-Arab relations in Israel. And Yediot Ahronot offered me a unique beat, which would be created especially for me: the positive beat. All the time we only report bad stuff, the editor explained to me. We need good news and we need someone to proactively pursue good news, to make it his beat, the editor said.