The Goldstone recommendations on Israel/Palestine have been adopted by the European Parliament today on March 10 2009. The resolution was adopted with 335 votes in favour, 287 against and 43 abstentions and the following recommendations were agreed on:

1. All parties should respect human rights
2. Independent and impartial investigations within the next five months should take place within the next five months
3. The Goldstone recommendations should be implemented and monitored
4. There should be no restriction of NGO activities and the authorities should stop refraining their activities

Mustafa Barghouthi: the Arabs gave Netanyahu timeout four months; he gave four hours
Nablus

The Secretary General of the Palestinian National Initiative has called for the reversal of the decision to reopen negotiations with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whose government has announced the construction of 112 housing units in an illegal settlement on the occupied West Bank. Dr. Mustafa Barghouthi said that the Palestinians were giving Netanyahu a "timeout" for four months with regards to settlement building, but he did not even give the Palestinians four hours. In what Dr. Barghouti calls "acts of provocation", the Israeli government has announced in quick succession the proposed new settlement building, similar units in occupied Jerusalem, the decision to incorporate important West Bank mosques as "Israeli national heritage sites" and brutal acts of repression against Palestinians demonstrating against the occupying authority's actions.

Palestine's Mufti condemns Israeli plan to Judaize Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood
The Mufti of Jerusalem and the Palestinian territories and rector of Al-Aqsa Mosque, Sheikh Mohammed Ahmed Hussein, condemned the right wing deputy mayor of Jerusalem, David Hadari for touring the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood which included a visit to the Palestinian houses that were seized to be used as his new office.

Sheikh Hussein said, "This policy, pursued by the Israeli occupation authorities, seeks the Judaization of the Palestinian neighbourhood as a whole, and the expulsion of civilians from their homes so that the settlers could build thousands of housing units in the neighbourhood and impose new facts on the ground." He criticized the recently announced Israeli decision pertaining to building hundreds of housing units in the Betar Illit settlement situated on the Palestinian land in Bethlehem.

A civil servants’ syndicate in the Gaza Strip denounced on Tuesday the Palestinian government in Ramallah for blocking the salaries of about 500 staff from the Gaza Strip and dozens of staff in the West Bank during the past three months.

Speaking at the syndicates headquarters yesterday the teachers’ head, Mohamed Siyam, said "the salaries of 323 workers in Gaza, including 14 detained prisoners, were stopped due to the wage cutting policy adopted by the Fayyad government."

Siyam stressed that the job discrimination and staff wage cutting policy "adopted by" Fayyad's government is "an insult to the Palestinian people and an infringement on the rights and career prospects of the public servants."