Skunk bombs deter West Bank rioters
12/8/08
Israeli security forces have started to use liquid “skunk bombs” to disperse demonstrators in the occupied West Bank, police said yesterday. Israeli defence scientists analysed the foul-smelling liquid squirted by angry or frightened skunks and created a synthetic version for use as a weapon. They said border police used the new crowd-control method for the first time at the weekend near the Palestinian village of Nilin at the weekly demonstration against Israel’s separation barrier.
See: http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24164374-2703,00.html
Israel weighs proposal for new West Bank settlement near Jerusalem
11/8/08
Israel has proposed building a new settlement in the West Bank near Jerusalem, a spokesman for the Yesha settlements council said on Monday. The council said officials made the new proposal as part of a deal to push them to quit the Migron settlement outpost - a hilltop collection of trailers that is home to more than 40 families that was established without government authorization. Ishai Hollander, spokesman for the settlers’ Yesha council, told Reuters that defense officials had proposed moving several families from Migron to another West Bank site. Hollander told Reuters the settler council would meet this week to discuss “a proposal put by the Defense Ministry … to build a permanent settlement of Migron nearby” to the current site, on a hill near the Palestinian city of Ramallah.
See: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1010559.html