<table> </table> <strong><span class="subhead">Property rights</span></strong></p><p><strong>From <em><strong>The Ottawa Citizen </strong></em>(Canada)</strong></p><p>Property rights are not absolute. The state, under circumstances of greater importance to society than your individual possession, can confiscate your property. It should do that as a last resort and, when it is necessary, with the minimum of disruption to property rights.</p><p>Thus the residents of Roman Avenue find themselves in a pickle. They love their homes but those residences are in the way of a Transitway extension. The expanded Transitway is designed for the good of thousands of Ottawans. Thus we have a classic case of the rights of a few versus the greater good.</p><p><strong><span class="subhead">Suffering in Gaza</span></strong></p><p><strong>From <em><strong>The Daily Star</strong></em>, Beirut, Lebanon</strong></p><p>It is cruel coincidence that U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has been in the region to pursue the quest for Israeli-Palestinian peace at a time when the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) has announced plans to suspend all food aid to Palestinians in the Gaza Strip because of a lack of fuel.</p><p>Pundits and polemicists will argue endlessly about whether Israelis or Palestinians are to blame for the fact that over a million Palestinians will now go without the food aid that keeps them on their feet. The international community of nations, however, is not trapped like the Israelis and Palestinians. It can act on the basis of accepted principles of protecting civilians in times of conflict.