{"id":12190,"date":"2018-08-20T20:23:58","date_gmt":"2018-08-20T20:23:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=12190"},"modified":"2018-08-20T20:23:58","modified_gmt":"2018-08-20T20:23:58","slug":"one-detained-in-relation-to-shooting-outside-us-embassy-in-ankara","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=12190","title":{"rendered":"One detained in relation to shooting outside US Embassy in Ankara"},"content":{"rendered":"<div data-io-article-url=\"http:\/\/www.arabnews.com\/node\/1359206\/middle-east\" readability=\"137.895411433\">\n<p>\nLONDON: Uri Avnery, a peace activist who became the first prominent Israeli to meet in public with Yasser Arafat, died on Monday aged 94.<\/p>\n<p>\nAvnery, who was an Arab News columnist until 2016, met the Palestinian leader in 1982 during Israel\u2019s invasion of Lebanon and war with the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).<\/p>\n<p>\nHe crossed into west Beirut from the Israeli-held east to meet Arafat, sparking controversy back home.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\nIt was the first time Arafat had met with an Israeli, and from this perspective, it could be called a \u201chistoric meeting,\u201d Avnery wrote in Israel\u2019s Haaretz newspaper in February.<\/p>\n<p>\nPalestinian President Mahmoud Abbas Monday described Avnery was an \u201cicon of real and permanent peace\u201d in the region, the Palestinian WAFA news agency reported.<\/p>\n<p>\n\u201cHe was one of the first to have strongly endorsed the establishment of the independent Palestinian state and called for ending the Israeli occupation,\u201d Abbas said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\nA backbone of Israel\u2019s peace movement, Avnery never lost hope an agreement could be reached with the Palestinians.<\/p>\n<p>\nHe pushed since the end of the first Arab-Israeli war, for the creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel as a means to bring peace.<\/p>\n<p>\nWriting in Arab News in 2016 about<a href=\"http:\/\/www.arabnews.com\/node\/952856\/columns\" target=\"_blank\"><strong> the increasing levels of hatred<\/strong> <\/a>between Israelis and Palestinians, Avnery said: \u201cI am convinced that it is in the vital interest of Israel to make peace with the Palestinian people, and with the Arab world at large, before this dangerous infection engulfs the entire Arab, and Muslim world.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\nBorn in September 1923 in Beckum, Germany as Helmut Ostermann, Avnery emigrated to British-mandate Palestine with his family at the age of 10, fleeing Nazism.<\/p>\n<p>\nBefore becoming a prominent peace activist, he was a soldier and even part of a right-wing militia that fought both British and Arab forces.<\/p>\n<p>\nHe had no regrets about belonging to the group. \u201cI fought for the freedom of my people against the British occupiers,\u201d he said. \u201cFor the same reasons, I always thought that the Palestinians were entitled to their independence and freedom.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\nIn 1950, he founded an independent weekly magazine, Haolam Hazeh, which he edited for 40 years.<\/p>\n<p>\nHe started a political movement in 1965 and was elected to Israel\u2019s parliament where he served eight years.<\/p>\n<p>\nIn 1979 he was voted in as part of a different movement and spent two more years in the Knesset before resigning.<\/p>\n<p>\nHis meeting with Arafat took place after he travelled to Lebanon at the invitation of the Israeli military as part of a reporting trip. It lasted about two hours and \u201cdealt entirely with the possibility of peace between Israel and the Palestinian people,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n<p>\nIt was broadcast the same night on Israeli television and Avnery was questioned by police but faced no charges.<\/p>\n<p>\nIn 2003, during the Palestinian uprising, Avnery traveled with other Israeli activists to Arafat&#8217;s headquarters in the occupied West Bank, to act as a human shield against what they said were Israeli plans to assassinate Arafat after a Palestinian suicide bombing.<\/p>\n<p>\nAvnery wrote that working to prevent such an act was \u201cthe most patriotic thing\u201d to do at that time since killing Arafat would have been a disaster for Israel.<\/p>\n<p>\nIn Israel, politicians across the political spectrum paid tribute to his work.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\nArab politician Ayman Odeh called him \u201ca dear man who dedicated his life to peace.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\nForeign Minister Tzipi Livni described him as \u201ca courageous journalist and rare, trailblazing man.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\nHe maintained \u201chis principles despite attacks and planted in the heart of Israelis ideas of peace and moderation, even when they weren&#8217;t in the lexicon,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>\nPresident Reuven Rivlin said that his fundamental disagreements with Avnery \u201cwere diminished in light of the ambition to build a free and strong society here.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\nAvnery had been admitted to Ichilov more than a week ago after suffering from a stroke.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>LONDON: Uri Avnery, a peace activist who became the first prominent Israeli to meet in public with Yasser Arafat, died on Monday aged 94. Avnery, who was an Arab News columnist until 2016, met the Palestinian leader in 1982 during Israel\u2019s invasion of Lebanon and war with the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). He crossed into&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":12191,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12190","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12190","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12190"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12190\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/12191"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12190"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12190"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12190"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}