RAMALLAH, January 29, 2013 (WAFA) – An Attempt by the West Jerusalem municipal workers backed by a large police force to demolish homes in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan on Monday and the clashes that resulted was the focus of the Tuesday issue of al-Quds Arabic daily.

The paper printed a picture also shown on the other dailies of police attacking with dogs Silwan residents who tried to stop the demolition.

The residents were able to get a court order stopping the demolition but not before the police and workers have caused serious damage in the neighborhood and among people.

The main story in al-Ayyam Arabic daily talked about protests in the West Bank in support of prisoners. It printed a picture of families of prisoners holding a sit-in protest in Bethlehem, calling for release of the prisoners held in Israeli jails and whose situation is causing serious concern among their families, particularly the ones on hunger strike.

The Palestinian daily al-Hayat al-Jadida highlighted on its front page the violence that has engulfed Egypt in the last few days. It printed a cartoon on the front page of two people talking and one of them saying: “Egypt is taking care of Palestinian reconciliation.” The other person responds: “And who is taking care of reconciliation in Egypt.”

The meeting in Amman, Jordan between King Abdullah and Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal was also highlighted on the front page of the three dailies with al-Quds giving the story bigger space than the other two.

The dismal financial situation of the Palestinian Authority that caused public employees to protest outside the prime minister’s office in Ramallah on Monday and threats to continue in the work stoppage, which this week will be observed on Wednesday, Thursday and on Sunday of next week, was highlighted by the dailies.

They reported on a meeting between Minister of Finance Nabeel Kassis and quartet representative Tony Blair on the Israeli withholding of Palestinian tax funds.

Al-Hayat al-Jadida printed on its front page the attack by the pro-Israel camp and Jews on a famous cartoonist that appeared in the Sunday Times that showed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu building a brick wall over Palestinians. The cartoonist was accused of being anti-Semitic while others said it was a purely political cartoon and had nothing in it to claim it was anti-Semitic.

The other two dailies printed the cartoon and reaction to it.

M.S./F.R.