NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Monday, December 29
BY ERICA SILVERMAN in Gaza City, MATTHEW KALMAN in Jerusalem, and HELEN KENNEDY in New York
DAILY NEWS WRITERS
Israel began massing troops and tanks near the Gaza Strip on Sunday as it pounded the Palestinian territory with a second day of "shock and awe" air strikes aimed at wiping out the militant Hamas government.
Israeli warplanes demolished a network of tunnels used to smuggle weapons, fuel and food into the blockaded territory of 1.5 million people. They also flattened a major prison and hit the campus of Islamic University in Gaza City.
About 300 Gazans, many of them Hamas cops and security forces, were killed in the two days of bombings, and an estimated 900 were wounded.
It was the bloodiest weekend for Palestinians since the 1967 Six-Day War. Hospitals and morgues couldn't keep up with the carnage, and bodies piled up as devastated relatives wailed in gore-slick corridors.
All signs pointed to the situation escalating.
Israel called up 6,500 reservists and began moving armored units to the Gaza border, paving the way for a ground invasion that could last several weeks.
Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, who is running for prime minister in Israel's Feb. 10 election, said Israel wanted to stop Hamas rockets - not reconquer the territory it quit in 2005.
"Our goal is not to reoccupy Gaza Strip," she said on NBC's "Meet the Press."
The air strikes aimed to destroy the infrastructure Hamas built since it won a surprise 2006 electoral victory over the moderate Fatah Party and took over Gaza last year.
It appeared to be a replay of the 2006 Israeli war on Hezbollah in Lebanon, where a minor border ambush triggered a devastating air assault, followed by an ill-fated ground battle.
In Sunday's air strikes, the high-rises of Gaza City shook and glass showered into the streets. Terrified prisoners fled the rubble of the Gaza City jail, their faces streaked white with dust and red with blood.
People brought wounded relatives and blankets filled with body parts to the hospital.
"I have a head here!" a man yelled as he rushed into Shifa Hospital, where the floors were slippery with blood.
Among the dead were seven teenage students at a UN-run school killed in an air strike while waiting for a bus, said Christopher Gunness, a spokesman for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency.
"Death is everywhere this morning," he said.
Crowds of Palestinians using bulldozers knocked down parts of a border wall with Egypt to escape the bombardment.
Egyptian border guards opened fire on some of the Palestinians, witnesses said.
Hamas threatened to mobilize a new wave of suicide bombers and vowed to target Livni and Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak, as well as the Fatah leadership.
"These strikes fuel our popular support, our military power and the firmness of our positions," said Hamas legislator Mushir al-Masri. "We will survive. We will move forward. We will not surrender. We will not be shaken."
Israel's "Operation Cast Lead" began Saturday, a week after a six-month ceasefire expired. Hamas had been steadily firing rockets into Israel, doing little damage but spreading daily fear.
With an election coming up, the Israeli government decided to abandon restraint.
"The Palestinians asked for a ceasefire, and we agreed. They themselves have violated the ceasefire. We didn't know why," said Israeli President Shimon Peres. "We were left without a choice but to bring an end to it."
Sunday, 28 December 2008
Saturday, 20 December 2008
Bethlehem's very secret Santa
Each year, an anonymous Christian businessman brings peace and goodwill (and presents) to Palestinian children. But his helpers are far from ordinary elves ...
Words Matthew Kalman
Photographs David Blumenfeld
SUNDAY TELEGRAPH "SEVEN" MAGAZINE
December 21, 2008
Star of Bethlehem: Abu Christmas announces his presence by ringing a bell
Dusk is falling as a bearded man slips out of a doorway near the bustling main street of Bethlehem and melts into the darkness. Outside, the streets are thronged with residents, pilgrims and tourists making last-minute preparations for Christmas.
As they hurry towards the Church of the Nativity, in Manger Square, which marks the site of Jesus’s birthplace, they hardly notice the man slipping into one of the hundreds of yellow Palestinian taxis that roam the streets of this ancient town.
The taxi stops at an apartment in Beit Jala, on the western outskirts of Bethlehem. As the man slowly makes his way up the staircase, a shy young girl stands at the door expectantly and then lets out a piercing scream, as she stares straight into the face of Father Christmas.
'Ahlan W’sahlan! – Welcome!’ shrieks 12-year-old Nasreen, running to fetch her brothers and sisters.
Father Christmas brings clothing coupons for Nasreen, her sisters, Gianna, 18, and Jihan, 17, Jolene, 14, along with toys for their younger brothers, Nicolas, six, and five-year-old Fahdi.
Watching in quiet elation, as the two young boys tear off the shiny wrapping paper, is their mother, Marlene. She lost her husband, a truck driver, nearly two years ago in a car accident. To make ends meet, the 36-year-old mother of six has been baking cakes at home and selling them to cafes in town.
As Christmas approaches, along with the anniversary of her husband’s death, she has been dreading the holiday. 'We don’t have a Christmas tree or decorations this year, since with the children missing their father, it was all too hard,’ she says quietly.
Earlier in the week, Marlene received a mysterious call, asking what her six children wanted from Father Christmas. She was told to expect a special visitor after 4pm. 'At first, I thought it was a joke,’ she says.
'We’ve had so many calls from people promising this or that, and then nothing would happen.
'I refused to believe it. Until now,’ she says, tears welling.
It is a scene repeated in dozens of the poorest homes across Bethlehem every year in the days before Christmas.
Few people know the identity of the man in the Santa Claus outfit.
It’s the closely guarded secret of a Christian businessman who, in the past eight years of acute economic distress, has given away tens of thousands of pounds to the most impoverished families in the town.
They have been hard hit by a growing economic crisis that has sent unemployment soaring to more than 25 per cent and pushed 20 per cent of families below the poverty line. The Israeli security barrier, built to deter suicide bombers, has cut them off from Jerusalem and surrounding villages. The Intifada and the barrier have reduced the 100 tourist buses that used to throng the streets each day to a trickle, all but destroying the town’s economy.
In the week before Christmas, the Secret Santa spends hours on the phone finalising the list of Bethlehem’s neediest youngsters, both Christian and Muslim, and then phones each child to ask what gift they would like. Then he trawls the streets of Bethlehem and Hebron – a half-hour’s drive away – scouring local shops for the best deals. The shopkeepers are sworn to secrecy, under threat of not getting his business in future.
Then, in a cigarette-smoke-filled lair the businessman and his elves – a small retinue of carefully chosen accomplices – wrap the presents and plan how they will go about delivering them. The operation – which I was allowed to witness only after agreeing not to reveal the location of the team’s headquarters or the identity of the men involved – is carried out with military precision.
The fact that some of the men have day jobs as officers in the Palestinian security services, and wear walkie-talkies, sub-machine guns and paramilitary uniforms, is a reminder of more sinister plots, and of other men, also operating under a veil of secrecy, who have carried bombs rather than bags of gifts.
The presents – delivered to more than 100 children – include Barbie dolls, Superman and Spider-Man costumes, stuffed toys, wireless remote-controlled trucks and guns, doll’s houses, shotguns and 'Fulah,’ a 2½ ft doll which sings Arabic songs.
The recipients are mostly content to squeal with delight and rip open their packages, revealing gifts they could never hope to receive from their own families. Some give the red-suited stranger a shy kiss or a sweet. Others stand in shocked and delighted silence.
After each delivery, Santa’s yellow taxi takes off at full speed. In the back seat, his helpers take turns in ringing a bell, attracting bemused attention from passers-by and mingling with the haunting chant of the minarets as the sound of the muezzin’s call for evening prayers drifts across the town.
In a twisting alley in the poverty-stricken backstreets near Manger Square, the Abdul family are waiting patiently at the door for the arrival of 'Baba Noel’, as Father Christmas is called here in Arabic.
A tiny kerosene heater is the only thing to warm the freezing apartment, home to Saliba, 10, Liandra, seven, five-year-old Giovanni and their mother Maryam.
'If there were more Santas in this world, there would be peace ... even here in Palestine,’ says Maryam as she watches the expressions of joy and wonder on the faces of her children.
Around the corner, 10-year-old Riham Endonya and her widowed mother, Carol, are waiting for their special visitor. 'He called and said he was coming today,’ says Riham, barely able to contain her excitement. 'I asked him to bring me a baby doll. My sister, Natalie, is 15. He is bringing her a voucher to buy clothes. We have dressed in our best clothes to greet him when he comes today.’
Nearby, Mary Jabriya says her five children have been up since dawn. Her four daughters, aged 11 to 17, all asked Santa for clothes. Her nine-year-old son, Tony, requested a wireless remote-controlled Jeep.
'The children love Santa Claus,’ says Mary. 'He promised to come and bring the gifts. The children could hardly sleep they were so excited. They have been awake since early morning, counting the hours until he comes.’
'The conditions in Bethlehem are very difficult. People don’t have enough money. You work, work, work and you get less and less,’ she says.
That goes for the man in the red suit himself. Maintaining his anonymity behind the code name Abu Christmas, he tells me that his own business has fared badly in recent years. 'I would like to do more, much more,’ he says.
Nevertheless, he helps as many as he can. 'I try to go to the poorest families, those in real need where the father is unable to work or perhaps isn’t there any more,’ says Abu Christmas.
'I ask people I trust to provide lists of the children who need help, on condition they do not tell anyone where the gifts have come from. They are only allowed to say that we are a secret Christian group that works under cover to make these families happy.’
The young children choose toys and dolls. The teenagers usually want clothes, so Abu Christmas gives them vouchers to spend at a clothing store. 'One girl said to me: “You can’t be Father Christmas. He isn’t in Palestine and he doesn’t speak Arabic.” I told her to test me and tell me what she wanted anyway. I hope she’ll get a pleasant surprise.’
In addition to his Christmas operations, the same anonymous benefactor has stepped in many times in recent years to help neighbours who have fallen on hard times.
'I believe that if a man needs food you don’t give him fish, you give him a fishing-rod and teach him how to use it,’ he says.
One man who received his help says Abu Christmas could have bought 'one or two houses’ with the money he has given away in recent years.
'I don’t know how much the total is,’ says Abu Christmas. 'I don’t keep a notebook. I do this every day. If I started to calculate the amount, it could be a problem, so I’d rather forget. I’m sure that God will give me back much more than I have given away.’
Words Matthew Kalman
Photographs David Blumenfeld
SUNDAY TELEGRAPH "SEVEN" MAGAZINE
December 21, 2008
Star of Bethlehem: Abu Christmas announces his presence by ringing a bellDusk is falling as a bearded man slips out of a doorway near the bustling main street of Bethlehem and melts into the darkness. Outside, the streets are thronged with residents, pilgrims and tourists making last-minute preparations for Christmas.
As they hurry towards the Church of the Nativity, in Manger Square, which marks the site of Jesus’s birthplace, they hardly notice the man slipping into one of the hundreds of yellow Palestinian taxis that roam the streets of this ancient town.
The taxi stops at an apartment in Beit Jala, on the western outskirts of Bethlehem. As the man slowly makes his way up the staircase, a shy young girl stands at the door expectantly and then lets out a piercing scream, as she stares straight into the face of Father Christmas.
'Ahlan W’sahlan! – Welcome!’ shrieks 12-year-old Nasreen, running to fetch her brothers and sisters.
Father Christmas brings clothing coupons for Nasreen, her sisters, Gianna, 18, and Jihan, 17, Jolene, 14, along with toys for their younger brothers, Nicolas, six, and five-year-old Fahdi.
Watching in quiet elation, as the two young boys tear off the shiny wrapping paper, is their mother, Marlene. She lost her husband, a truck driver, nearly two years ago in a car accident. To make ends meet, the 36-year-old mother of six has been baking cakes at home and selling them to cafes in town.
As Christmas approaches, along with the anniversary of her husband’s death, she has been dreading the holiday. 'We don’t have a Christmas tree or decorations this year, since with the children missing their father, it was all too hard,’ she says quietly.
Earlier in the week, Marlene received a mysterious call, asking what her six children wanted from Father Christmas. She was told to expect a special visitor after 4pm. 'At first, I thought it was a joke,’ she says.
'We’ve had so many calls from people promising this or that, and then nothing would happen.
'I refused to believe it. Until now,’ she says, tears welling.
It is a scene repeated in dozens of the poorest homes across Bethlehem every year in the days before Christmas.
Few people know the identity of the man in the Santa Claus outfit.
It’s the closely guarded secret of a Christian businessman who, in the past eight years of acute economic distress, has given away tens of thousands of pounds to the most impoverished families in the town.
They have been hard hit by a growing economic crisis that has sent unemployment soaring to more than 25 per cent and pushed 20 per cent of families below the poverty line. The Israeli security barrier, built to deter suicide bombers, has cut them off from Jerusalem and surrounding villages. The Intifada and the barrier have reduced the 100 tourist buses that used to throng the streets each day to a trickle, all but destroying the town’s economy.
In the week before Christmas, the Secret Santa spends hours on the phone finalising the list of Bethlehem’s neediest youngsters, both Christian and Muslim, and then phones each child to ask what gift they would like. Then he trawls the streets of Bethlehem and Hebron – a half-hour’s drive away – scouring local shops for the best deals. The shopkeepers are sworn to secrecy, under threat of not getting his business in future.
Then, in a cigarette-smoke-filled lair the businessman and his elves – a small retinue of carefully chosen accomplices – wrap the presents and plan how they will go about delivering them. The operation – which I was allowed to witness only after agreeing not to reveal the location of the team’s headquarters or the identity of the men involved – is carried out with military precision.
The fact that some of the men have day jobs as officers in the Palestinian security services, and wear walkie-talkies, sub-machine guns and paramilitary uniforms, is a reminder of more sinister plots, and of other men, also operating under a veil of secrecy, who have carried bombs rather than bags of gifts.
The presents – delivered to more than 100 children – include Barbie dolls, Superman and Spider-Man costumes, stuffed toys, wireless remote-controlled trucks and guns, doll’s houses, shotguns and 'Fulah,’ a 2½ ft doll which sings Arabic songs.
The recipients are mostly content to squeal with delight and rip open their packages, revealing gifts they could never hope to receive from their own families. Some give the red-suited stranger a shy kiss or a sweet. Others stand in shocked and delighted silence.
After each delivery, Santa’s yellow taxi takes off at full speed. In the back seat, his helpers take turns in ringing a bell, attracting bemused attention from passers-by and mingling with the haunting chant of the minarets as the sound of the muezzin’s call for evening prayers drifts across the town.
In a twisting alley in the poverty-stricken backstreets near Manger Square, the Abdul family are waiting patiently at the door for the arrival of 'Baba Noel’, as Father Christmas is called here in Arabic.
A tiny kerosene heater is the only thing to warm the freezing apartment, home to Saliba, 10, Liandra, seven, five-year-old Giovanni and their mother Maryam.
'If there were more Santas in this world, there would be peace ... even here in Palestine,’ says Maryam as she watches the expressions of joy and wonder on the faces of her children.
Around the corner, 10-year-old Riham Endonya and her widowed mother, Carol, are waiting for their special visitor. 'He called and said he was coming today,’ says Riham, barely able to contain her excitement. 'I asked him to bring me a baby doll. My sister, Natalie, is 15. He is bringing her a voucher to buy clothes. We have dressed in our best clothes to greet him when he comes today.’
Nearby, Mary Jabriya says her five children have been up since dawn. Her four daughters, aged 11 to 17, all asked Santa for clothes. Her nine-year-old son, Tony, requested a wireless remote-controlled Jeep.
'The children love Santa Claus,’ says Mary. 'He promised to come and bring the gifts. The children could hardly sleep they were so excited. They have been awake since early morning, counting the hours until he comes.’
'The conditions in Bethlehem are very difficult. People don’t have enough money. You work, work, work and you get less and less,’ she says.
That goes for the man in the red suit himself. Maintaining his anonymity behind the code name Abu Christmas, he tells me that his own business has fared badly in recent years. 'I would like to do more, much more,’ he says.
Nevertheless, he helps as many as he can. 'I try to go to the poorest families, those in real need where the father is unable to work or perhaps isn’t there any more,’ says Abu Christmas.
'I ask people I trust to provide lists of the children who need help, on condition they do not tell anyone where the gifts have come from. They are only allowed to say that we are a secret Christian group that works under cover to make these families happy.’
The young children choose toys and dolls. The teenagers usually want clothes, so Abu Christmas gives them vouchers to spend at a clothing store. 'One girl said to me: “You can’t be Father Christmas. He isn’t in Palestine and he doesn’t speak Arabic.” I told her to test me and tell me what she wanted anyway. I hope she’ll get a pleasant surprise.’
In addition to his Christmas operations, the same anonymous benefactor has stepped in many times in recent years to help neighbours who have fallen on hard times.
'I believe that if a man needs food you don’t give him fish, you give him a fishing-rod and teach him how to use it,’ he says.
One man who received his help says Abu Christmas could have bought 'one or two houses’ with the money he has given away in recent years.
'I don’t know how much the total is,’ says Abu Christmas. 'I don’t keep a notebook. I do this every day. If I started to calculate the amount, it could be a problem, so I’d rather forget. I’m sure that God will give me back much more than I have given away.’
Thursday, 11 December 2008
New approach counters diabetes in mice trials
SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Matthew Kalman, Chronicle Foreign Service
Beersheba, Israel -- When he was just 7 years old, Sacramento native Nate DeFelice was told he had Type 1 diabetes. So when he joined a diabetes research project at Ben-Gurion University here two years ago, he hoped it would be a meaningful experience.
As it turns out, the project could change his life and those of millions of other diabetics.
DeFelice, 27, never dreamed that he would help discover a potential cure for his disease, see the beginning of a Federal Drug Administration-approved clinical trial in the United States and co-author a scientific paper along with seven other researchers published in October by the National Academy of Sciences.
"It's exciting," said DeFelice, who studies pediatric medicine at the university's international health program run and must inject himself with insulin six times a day and check his blood sugar levels 10 times a day. "Managing diabetes is a full-time job."
Type 1 diabetes, usually diagnosed in childhood, is caused by a failure of the insulin-producing cells in the pancreas called "islets." They require daily injections of insulin, which helps break down glucose in the blood. As glucose levels rise, diabetics can suffer blindness and even death.
In Type 2 diabetes, sufferers cannot use insulin effectively but can sometimes manage their condition with lifestyle changes. Oral drugs, however, are often required - and less frequently insulin - to achieve metabolic control. Most people with diabetes have Type 2.
Welcome opportunity
When Ben-Gurion University biochemistry Professor Dr. Eli Lewis asked for volunteers to participate in new research on diabetes, DeFelice jumped at the chance.
Diabetes "is something I'm constantly aware of and constantly taking care of," said DeFelice. "It's a part of me, but I'd be happy to get rid of it."
Lewis, DeFelice and the other researchers have focused their investigations on islet transplantation. In 2000, doctors at more than 50 research sites in the United States, Canada, Europe and Japan transplanted healthy islets into diabetes patients, hoping the newly grafted cells would secrete insulin and effectively cure the disease.
But the cells were rejected, and patients resumed insulin injections after a few months.
The Israeli team then opted for a new approach, ignoring the rejection of the grafted cells and focusing instead on inflammation caused by the transplant itself. Lewis grafted healthy islets into diabetic mice and treated them with an anti-inflammatory drug called alpha-1-antitrypsin, or AAT. Within months, they discovered three encouraging results:
-- AAT enabled the newly grafted islets to survive indefinitely, successfully secreting insulin to control glucose levels like healthy pancreas cells.
-- The researchers stopped administering AAT and the islets continued to function. "We withdrew the therapy. That is something that is unique in transplant today," Lewis explained. "There is no approach today that is able to provide a limited amount of therapy. If a patient stops the current protocol therapy, any graft will be rejected: kidney, heart, lungs - including islets."
-- The third result surprised even the scientists. They found that even after transplant and halting therapies, the mice's immune systems remained intact and were able to reject additional grafts while the original transplant continued to function. Doctors call this state "tolerance," which means the immune system remains intact and able to attack foreign bodies while protecting the inserted graft.
"We were able to cure a mouse from diabetes by supplying the healthy cells and the mouse's immune system still functioned," Lewis said. "This is the closest thing that we can consider to cure diabetes."
If healthy islets that secrete insulin and control the body's glucose levels can be successfully transplanted, diabetics would be cured of diabetes, Lewis said. By using AAT, the researchers cured diabetes in mice and are hopeful they can do the same for humans. It is not yet clear what the transplant procedure would mean for sufferers of Type 2 diabetes.
'Impressive' results
The Israeli team's findings have caused much excitement among medical experts.
"The results of this study are really impressive," said Marc Donath of the Clinic of Endocrinology and Diabetes at the University Hospital in Zurich. "This study is a realistic hope not only for islet transplantation, but also for other organ transplantation."
Thomas Mandrup-Poulsen, chief physician of the Steno Diabetes Center and Faculty of Health Sciences at the University of Copenhagen, says the Israeli team is "at the frontier of islet research."
In the next year or so, the Israeli team will work with colleagues at Harvard University and other U.S. centers in FDA-approved clinical trials.
"Our study is ongoing," said Lewis.
Meanwhile, DeFelice says he prefers to wait for the results before breaking out the bubbly.
"Mice models are very different to human models," said DeFelice. "It's a black box."
This article appeared on page A - 14 of the San Francisco Chronicle
Thursday, 4 December 2008
Israel preparing a 'go it alone' air strike against Iran's nuclear facilities without consulting the U.S.
By Matthew Kalman
Israel is preparing to go it alone in a military strike against Iran's nuclear facilities, it was reported yesterday.
Officials in the Israeli Defence Ministry told the Jerusalem Post that while they prefer to act in consultation with the U.S., they were preparing plans that would allow them to act in isolation.
'It is always better to coordinate,' a senior Defence Ministry official told the newspaper. 'But we are also preparing options that do not include coordination.'
X-band radars, installed by the US at a military facility in Israel to counter a perceived missile threat from Iran, go operational this month
His comments came after President Bush refused to promise U.S. assistance in an attack, which would need to cross Iraqi airspace that is currently controlled by America.
According to the newspaper, Israeli military strategists are drawing up plans for an air strike against the emerging nuclear weapons programme in Iran, which experts believe is just three years away from becoming operational.
Israeli leaders fear that an Iranian regime armed with nuclear weapons will carry out Tehran's cold-blooded threat to destroy the Jewish state and destabilise the West.
At a military parade in Tehran in the summer, banners adorning six Shehab-3 missiles declared: 'Israel must be wiped off the map' and 'We will crush America under our feet.'
'While its preference is to co-ordinate with the U.S., defence officials have said Israel is preparing a wide range of options for such an operation,' the Post reported.
'Israeli officials have said it would be difficult, but not impossible, to launch a strike against Iran without receiving codes from the U.S. Air Force, which controls Iraqi airspace,' the report added.
Iran's atomic chief Gholam Reza Aghazadeh says thousands of uranium enrichment centrifuges are already in operation
Earlier this year, there were reports that Israel was holding major exercises along the length of the Mediterranean – about the same distance as the 1,000-mile flight to Iran – in what was seen as a dry-run for a possible attack.
But many experts believe a military strike against Iran is impossible without U.S. assistance, since many of the Iranian facilities are underground. Without American permission to fly over Iraq, and access to advanced U.S. intelligence, an Israeli strike is unlikely to succeed.
Last week, Iran's nuclear chief Gholam Reza Aghazadeh revealed that thousands of uranium enrichment centrifuges were already in operation at its nuclear plant in Natanz.
'At this point, more than 5,000 centrifuges are operating in Natanz,' said Mr Aghazadeh.
There were only 4,000 in operation in August.
Iran has been testing its upgraded Shehab-3 inter-continental ballistic missile, which is capable of carrying a nuclear warhead 1,242 miles – more than enough to hit Tel Aviv.
Meanwhile western diplomats said that UN sanctions and other diplomatic pressure were proving ineffective in persuading Iran to give up its Russian-backed nuclear programme.
'I do not belong to the optimistic camp which believes there is a solution for the Iranian nuclear issue,' NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer told reporters in Brussels today.
In September, US troops deployed an advanced radar system in Israel designed to help protect the country against a ballistic missile attack from Iran.
The Forward Based X-Band Transportable Radar system can detect an Iranian ballistic missile half-way into its 11-minute flight to Israel.
The X-Band radar is being linked to US satellite tracking stations and Israel's own Arrow II defensive rocket system, enabling them to detect and destroy an incoming Iranian missile before it enters Israeli airspace.
Wednesday, 3 December 2008
'You are the child of all of Israel,' rabbi tells orphan at funeral for Jews killed in Mumbai
By MATTHEW KALMAN in Ramle, Israel, and CORKY SIEMASZKO in New York
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Tuesday, December 2nd 2008
Little Moshe Holtzberg's parents were murdered in Mumbai, but he will not be an orphan.
While Israel's leaders and a sea of mourners looked on, a New York rabbi pledged Tuesday that the Brooklyn couple's 2-year-old son would have thousands of new parents.
"You don't have a mother who will hug you and kiss you," Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky said in an anguished eulogy. "You are the child of all of Israel."
Before Kotlarsky were the bodies of Rabbi Gavriel Holtzberg, 29, and his 28-year-old wife, Rivkah. He was wrapped in a prayer shawl, and she in a shroud.
The bodies were resting on chairs set outside a building that is a replica of the ultra-Orthodox Lubavitch movement's center in Crown Heights.
Rivkah's weeping father sent a fresh wave of grief spilling over the black-clad throng with the revelation that his daughter was five months pregnant when she was murdered by militants last week.
"They killed three people, not two," Rabbi Shimon Rosenberg said.
Moshe, whose Indian nanny rescued him from the Jewish center, was not at the funeral.
Israeli President Shimon Peres called on the world to unite in the fight against terrorism, using the moment to single out Iran for criticism.
"If the entire world doesn't join together as one man and say, 'Enough,' then the world is in danger," he said.
The Holtzbergs' killers are believed to be members of Lashkar-e-Taiba, a Kashmiri separatist group linked to Al Qaeda and based in a lawless corner of Pakistan.
When the service was done, the young couple was laid to rest in the ancient Jewish cemetery on the Mount of Olives near the grave of a child they lost to Tay-Sachs disease.
In Brooklyn, where the Holtzbergs lived until 2003, thousands more Lubavitchers watched the service at their main headquarters on Eastern Parkway.
Nearly 200 people were killed in the 60-hour terror rampage staged by just 10 militants in Mumbai, a megalopolis that's often referred to as the New York of India.
One of the dead was another former New Yorker, Rabbi Leibish Teitelbaum, 37, who was also buried in Jerusalem Tuesday.
Two other Americans, a Virginia dad and his 13-year-old daughter, were slaughtered in the killing spree.
Secretary of State Rice arrived in India Tuesday on a mission to cool off the Indians. The Mumbai police chief claims the killers were directed to their targets by a controller based in Pakistan. The Pakistani government denies any involvement in the Mumbai massacre.
India and Pakistan are neighbors with nukes that have fought several wars - and the U.S. doesn't want to alienate either ally.
Monday, 1 December 2008
Laser skin welding the suture of future for surgery
Abraham Katzir Dr. David Simhon carrying out a laser soldering procedure on the abdomen of a young woman
Scientists at Tel Aviv University are testing use of laser beams to seal surgical incisions, allowing skin and internal tissue to heal more quickly after operations and accidents.
"The technique of sewing the human body with needle and thread is an old one that has existed for thousand of years," said Prof. Abraham Katzir.
Ambulance medics may be able to use the new technique to close wounds quickly and safely at the scene of accidents.
The new method leaves less scarring than traditional stitches and helps give the wound better protection against infection.
"Sutures or stitches are not watertight, and blood or urine can pass through cuts, causing severe infection," Katzir said.
The use of lasers to heal surgical wounds was first proposed decades ago, but the early prototypes burned the skin and the tests were abandoned.
Katzir's new technique of skin welding avoids that problem because it uses a smart laser that corrects its own temperature as it works.
The new device has already been tested successfully in clinical trials on patients undergoing gall bladder operations in Israel.
Researchers believe it could be especially useful for plastic surgery and for sealing battlefield wounds on contact.
"It could allow soldiers to heal each other on contact with a laser wand," Katzir said.
The laser skin welding uses a special biological glue smeared on the two sides of the incision.
A laser warms it to the correct temperature to make the glue thicken and create a hard shell that protects the wound and allows it to heal while blocking germs.
Monday, 17 November 2008
New evidence surfaces of David's kingdom
SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE
Monday, November 17, 2008
The site recently uncovered by Professor Yosef Garfinkel could be the biblical town of Sha'arayim. (David Blumenfeld / Special to The Chronicle)
Matthew Kalman, Chronicle Foreign Service
Khirbet Qeiyafa, Israel -- For 3,000 years, the 12-foot high walls of an ancient city have been clearly visible on a hill towering above the Valley of Elah where the Bible says David slew Goliath.
But no one has ever linked the ruins to the city mentioned in the First Book of Samuel's famous account of the legendary duel and the victory of the Israelites - until now. On Tuesday, Hebrew University archaeology Professor Yosef Garfinkel will present compelling evidence to scholars at Harvard University that he has found the 10th century biblical city of Sha'arayim, Hebrew for "Two Gates." Garfinkel, who made his startling discovery at the beginning of this month, will also discuss his findings at the American Schools of Oriental Research conference hosted by Boston University on Thursday.
Garfinkel believes the city provides evidence that King David ruled a kingdom from his capital of Jerusalem. Some modern scholars have questioned the biblical account of David's kingdom and even whether he existed. Although it is not clear how the Sha'arayim relates to David, Garfinkel says finding a Judean city along the ancient highway to Jerusalem that appears to have been a fortress on the western border with the Philistines indicates a kingdom with a developed political and military organization that was powerful enough to include a major fortified city.
"There is no question that Yosef Garfinkel has found a unique and interesting site of a type we haven't had until now," said Aren Maeir, professor of archaeology at Bar-Ilan University in Ramat Gan who is excavating Goliath's hometown of Gath nearby. "But we have to wait for more findings and more analysis."
The revelation comes only weeks after Garfinkel's team discovered the oldest Hebrew inscription ever found at the same five-acre site - a 3,000-year-old pottery fragment bearing five lines of text in proto-Canaanite script, a precursor of Hebrew. It was found in a house next to a massive gate on the western side of Khirbet Qeiyafa hill, which Garfinkel believed was the city's only entrance - until finding a second gate last week.
Carbon-14 tests at Oxford University on four olive pits discovered near the inscription dated the relic to the late Iron Age, specifically to the early part of the 10th century B.C., or between 1000 and 975 B.C., the time King David, leader of the Kingdom of Israel, would have lived. David is believed to have united Judea and Israel, establishing a large kingdom that under his son, Solomon, stretched to present-day Egypt and Iraq, according to the Bible.
The five-line text has not yet been deciphered because the ink on 10 of the 50 letters has faded, making them invisible to the naked eye. The fragment will be examined next week at Megavision in Santa Barbara - a company that manufactures digital cameras - and Cedars Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles, where sophisticated spectrum and ultra-violet fluorescence imaging may reveal the missing letters.
"The discovery of this early Hebrew text tells us for the first time that the people here could read and write at the time of King David, so historical knowledge could be transmitted in writing and not just by oral tradition as some have suggested," Garfinkel said.
Garfinkel knew from the biblical text that Sha'arayim was near the location of the famous duel between David and Goliath and wondered whether the ruins might be the city. Locating the second gate confirmed his belief that he had found the only site mentioned in the David and Goliath narrative that has yet to be discovered. Sha'arayim is not to be confused with the City of David, which is the name of a promontory located within Jerusalem.
Garfinkel, who has excavated numerous sites in Israel, says he discovered the second gate after noticing an apparent break in the massive stone wall as he walked along the 2,100-foot long structure that faced the road to Jerusalem. After two days of digging, his hunch paid off. A second entrance constructed from massive stones lay just a few feet beneath the topsoil.
"This is the only city from the Iron Age in this region ever found with two gates," said Garfinkel as he clambered over the huge structure. "It was probably a mistake. It made the city more vulnerable. It might explain why it appears to have been settled only twice, for very short periods."
Garfinkel says he is certain the newly-found massive stone gate was the main entrance to the city that existed at the beginning of the 10th century B.C. and then again for a few years at the time of Alexander the Great.
"It is enormous, it has symbolic value demonstrating authority and the power of the kingdom," Garfinkel said while describing the huge building blocks of more than 3 feet square and 10 feet long, each weighing more than 10 tons. "They are the largest ever found from the Iron Age. If King David ever came here from Jerusalem, he entered from this gate. It is likely we are walking in the footsteps of King David."
Some scientists say this Iron Age city with evidence of Hebrew civilization and an unexplored fortress at its center will transform current understanding of the ancient Israelites.
Little is known about the Davidic kingdom except for biblical text. In fact, there is little evidence that King David existed, except for one inscription discovered at Tel Dan in northern Israel in 1993 that refers to the "House of David." Some scholars have even suggested that David was little more than a local sheikh who commanded a small tribe in Jerusalem.
"We don't have to interpret the biblical story of David and Goliath literally," said Garfinkel. "There could have been many Davids and many Goliaths. I see this as a border area between the Israelites and the Philistines that was fought over through many generations, like Alsace-Loraine between France and Germany. ... The cities are all where the Bible says they are, and the dating of our finds shows they were settled at the time the Bible suggests."
To date, Garfinkel has excavated less than 5 percent of the site in two seasons of digging. Next year, the Foundation Stone, an educational organization based in Jerusalem that is supporting the project, hopes to encourage hundreds of volunteers to join the dig.
In the meantime, biblical scholars will undoubtedly be poring over the new findings and reigniting the debate over David's existence and whether he battled the giant Goliath as a youth.
"If he is right, this puts David and Solomon out there and shows they are not a figment of the imagination of some much later writer, as some have suggested," said Professor Maeir.
This article appeared on page A - 10 of the San Francisco Chronicle
Monday, November 17, 2008
The site recently uncovered by Professor Yosef Garfinkel could be the biblical town of Sha'arayim. (David Blumenfeld / Special to The Chronicle)Matthew Kalman, Chronicle Foreign Service
Khirbet Qeiyafa, Israel -- For 3,000 years, the 12-foot high walls of an ancient city have been clearly visible on a hill towering above the Valley of Elah where the Bible says David slew Goliath.
But no one has ever linked the ruins to the city mentioned in the First Book of Samuel's famous account of the legendary duel and the victory of the Israelites - until now. On Tuesday, Hebrew University archaeology Professor Yosef Garfinkel will present compelling evidence to scholars at Harvard University that he has found the 10th century biblical city of Sha'arayim, Hebrew for "Two Gates." Garfinkel, who made his startling discovery at the beginning of this month, will also discuss his findings at the American Schools of Oriental Research conference hosted by Boston University on Thursday.
Garfinkel believes the city provides evidence that King David ruled a kingdom from his capital of Jerusalem. Some modern scholars have questioned the biblical account of David's kingdom and even whether he existed. Although it is not clear how the Sha'arayim relates to David, Garfinkel says finding a Judean city along the ancient highway to Jerusalem that appears to have been a fortress on the western border with the Philistines indicates a kingdom with a developed political and military organization that was powerful enough to include a major fortified city.
"There is no question that Yosef Garfinkel has found a unique and interesting site of a type we haven't had until now," said Aren Maeir, professor of archaeology at Bar-Ilan University in Ramat Gan who is excavating Goliath's hometown of Gath nearby. "But we have to wait for more findings and more analysis."
The revelation comes only weeks after Garfinkel's team discovered the oldest Hebrew inscription ever found at the same five-acre site - a 3,000-year-old pottery fragment bearing five lines of text in proto-Canaanite script, a precursor of Hebrew. It was found in a house next to a massive gate on the western side of Khirbet Qeiyafa hill, which Garfinkel believed was the city's only entrance - until finding a second gate last week.
Carbon-14 tests at Oxford University on four olive pits discovered near the inscription dated the relic to the late Iron Age, specifically to the early part of the 10th century B.C., or between 1000 and 975 B.C., the time King David, leader of the Kingdom of Israel, would have lived. David is believed to have united Judea and Israel, establishing a large kingdom that under his son, Solomon, stretched to present-day Egypt and Iraq, according to the Bible.
The five-line text has not yet been deciphered because the ink on 10 of the 50 letters has faded, making them invisible to the naked eye. The fragment will be examined next week at Megavision in Santa Barbara - a company that manufactures digital cameras - and Cedars Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles, where sophisticated spectrum and ultra-violet fluorescence imaging may reveal the missing letters.
"The discovery of this early Hebrew text tells us for the first time that the people here could read and write at the time of King David, so historical knowledge could be transmitted in writing and not just by oral tradition as some have suggested," Garfinkel said.
Garfinkel knew from the biblical text that Sha'arayim was near the location of the famous duel between David and Goliath and wondered whether the ruins might be the city. Locating the second gate confirmed his belief that he had found the only site mentioned in the David and Goliath narrative that has yet to be discovered. Sha'arayim is not to be confused with the City of David, which is the name of a promontory located within Jerusalem.
Garfinkel, who has excavated numerous sites in Israel, says he discovered the second gate after noticing an apparent break in the massive stone wall as he walked along the 2,100-foot long structure that faced the road to Jerusalem. After two days of digging, his hunch paid off. A second entrance constructed from massive stones lay just a few feet beneath the topsoil.
"This is the only city from the Iron Age in this region ever found with two gates," said Garfinkel as he clambered over the huge structure. "It was probably a mistake. It made the city more vulnerable. It might explain why it appears to have been settled only twice, for very short periods."
Garfinkel says he is certain the newly-found massive stone gate was the main entrance to the city that existed at the beginning of the 10th century B.C. and then again for a few years at the time of Alexander the Great.
"It is enormous, it has symbolic value demonstrating authority and the power of the kingdom," Garfinkel said while describing the huge building blocks of more than 3 feet square and 10 feet long, each weighing more than 10 tons. "They are the largest ever found from the Iron Age. If King David ever came here from Jerusalem, he entered from this gate. It is likely we are walking in the footsteps of King David."
Some scientists say this Iron Age city with evidence of Hebrew civilization and an unexplored fortress at its center will transform current understanding of the ancient Israelites.
Little is known about the Davidic kingdom except for biblical text. In fact, there is little evidence that King David existed, except for one inscription discovered at Tel Dan in northern Israel in 1993 that refers to the "House of David." Some scholars have even suggested that David was little more than a local sheikh who commanded a small tribe in Jerusalem.
"We don't have to interpret the biblical story of David and Goliath literally," said Garfinkel. "There could have been many Davids and many Goliaths. I see this as a border area between the Israelites and the Philistines that was fought over through many generations, like Alsace-Loraine between France and Germany. ... The cities are all where the Bible says they are, and the dating of our finds shows they were settled at the time the Bible suggests."
To date, Garfinkel has excavated less than 5 percent of the site in two seasons of digging. Next year, the Foundation Stone, an educational organization based in Jerusalem that is supporting the project, hopes to encourage hundreds of volunteers to join the dig.
In the meantime, biblical scholars will undoubtedly be poring over the new findings and reigniting the debate over David's existence and whether he battled the giant Goliath as a youth.
"If he is right, this puts David and Solomon out there and shows they are not a figment of the imagination of some much later writer, as some have suggested," said Professor Maeir.
This article appeared on page A - 10 of the San Francisco Chronicle
Tuesday, 11 November 2008
Blair’s guard triggers chaos
DAILY MAIL
12 Nov 2008
TONY Blair’s bodyguard caused a major security scare at an Israeli airport yesterday when his gun went off by mistake.
No one was hurt, but there was chaos at Ben-Gurion airport.
The police special protection officer was unloading his gun outside prior to boarding a plane to London with Mr Blair when he accidentally fired into the ground. Israeli security officers surrounded him and detained him.
It was all the more embarrassing because it is the third time this year that Mr Blair has been at the centre of a security blunder.
Three months ago a female bodyguard assigned to him accidentally left her gun in the toilets of a Starbucks in London.
And in May Israeli fighter jets were scrambled to intercept an unidentified aircraft approaching Israel at high speed – only to discover it was carrying Mr Blair.
12 Nov 2008
TONY Blair’s bodyguard caused a major security scare at an Israeli airport yesterday when his gun went off by mistake.
No one was hurt, but there was chaos at Ben-Gurion airport.
The police special protection officer was unloading his gun outside prior to boarding a plane to London with Mr Blair when he accidentally fired into the ground. Israeli security officers surrounded him and detained him.
It was all the more embarrassing because it is the third time this year that Mr Blair has been at the centre of a security blunder.
Three months ago a female bodyguard assigned to him accidentally left her gun in the toilets of a Starbucks in London.
And in May Israeli fighter jets were scrambled to intercept an unidentified aircraft approaching Israel at high speed – only to discover it was carrying Mr Blair.
Thursday, 6 November 2008
Obama chief of staff Rahm Emanuel is no pal of ours, Israel's foes say
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Thursday, November 6th 2008
BY MATTHEW KALMAN
SPECIAL TO THE NEWS
JERUSALEM - Palestinians Thursday blasted President-elect Barack Obama's choice of Rahm Emanuel as White House chief of staff - and the appointee's father may have poured fuel on the fire.
Dr. Benjamin Emanuel, once a member of the Irgun militia that fought for Israel's statehood, was asked in an interview with the Hebrew daily Maariv if his son's appointment would be good for Israel.
"Obviously, he will influence the President to be pro-Israel," said the elder Emanuel, who immigrated to the U.S. from Israel in the 1950s.
"Why shouldn't he do it? What is he, an Arab? He's not going to clean the floor of the White House."
There was no immediate comment from Rep. Emanuel's congressional office.
While Palestinian leaders maintained a diplomatic silence, many ordinary Palestinians reacted with fury in comments posted on Web sites and chat rooms.
"With the appointment of this Zionist, Barack Obama is proving that he is more Zionist than the Zionists," said Subhi Abu Ishira on the Palestinian NGO network, referring to the anti-Arab remark by Benjamin Emanuel.
The Window into Palestine blog called Rahm Emanuel "the son of a terrorist, a real living terrorist."
Nabil Abu Rudeineh, official spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, said he had no view on Emanuel's appointment but doubted the optimism surrounding Obama's election would reach the Palestinians.
"He is talking about change," Abu Rudeineh said. "But for it to affect us, we have to see a change of American policy in the Middle East. The American policy is the same. It's not going to be changed."
With Michael Saul in New York
Thursday, November 6th 2008
BY MATTHEW KALMAN
SPECIAL TO THE NEWS
JERUSALEM - Palestinians Thursday blasted President-elect Barack Obama's choice of Rahm Emanuel as White House chief of staff - and the appointee's father may have poured fuel on the fire.
Dr. Benjamin Emanuel, once a member of the Irgun militia that fought for Israel's statehood, was asked in an interview with the Hebrew daily Maariv if his son's appointment would be good for Israel.
"Obviously, he will influence the President to be pro-Israel," said the elder Emanuel, who immigrated to the U.S. from Israel in the 1950s.
"Why shouldn't he do it? What is he, an Arab? He's not going to clean the floor of the White House."
There was no immediate comment from Rep. Emanuel's congressional office.
While Palestinian leaders maintained a diplomatic silence, many ordinary Palestinians reacted with fury in comments posted on Web sites and chat rooms.
"With the appointment of this Zionist, Barack Obama is proving that he is more Zionist than the Zionists," said Subhi Abu Ishira on the Palestinian NGO network, referring to the anti-Arab remark by Benjamin Emanuel.
The Window into Palestine blog called Rahm Emanuel "the son of a terrorist, a real living terrorist."
Nabil Abu Rudeineh, official spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, said he had no view on Emanuel's appointment but doubted the optimism surrounding Obama's election would reach the Palestinians.
"He is talking about change," Abu Rudeineh said. "But for it to affect us, we have to see a change of American policy in the Middle East. The American policy is the same. It's not going to be changed."
With Michael Saul in New York
British scientists jump in the saddle to identify 'mystery' horse illness which is racing across Israel
DAILY MAIL
6 November 2008
By Matthew Kalman
British experts have been called in to identify a mystery disease sweeping across stables in Israel which is being blamed for the death of several horses.
Experts are a at a loss to explain the disease which has left hundreds of horses with high temperatures, listlessness and no appetite.
At least 30 stables have been affected and the entire country has been placed under equine quarantine.
British scientists have been called to investigate what is causing a mystery illness affecting horses across Israel. File photo
All public horse meetings and shows have been cancelled until scientists at the Veterinary Laboratories Agency in Weybridge, Surrey, can pinpoint the cause.
'It's very unusual and although we are working round the clock testing samples from many horses, we still don't know the cause of this outbreak,' said Dr Boris Yakobson, director of the Kimron Veterinary Institute in Rishon Le Zion.
'We have placed all the horses in the country under quarantine and restricted the movement of all horses in Israel for the next 96 hours, until we get the results of the tests back from our colleagues in England.'
He added that he had never seen an outbreak such as this and that the horses seemed to be depressed.
'They are behaving strangely, they seem unhappy and they are off their food,' he said.
'We have heard reports of horses dying, but so far none of them have been brought to our lab for post-mortem examination, so we cannot confirm that this disease is fatal.'
In a nationwide alert sent out today, the Israeli Ministry of Agriculture confirmed the quarantine.
But the government assured people that the disease did not affect humans and could not be transmitted by contact between horses and people.
When the illness was first noticed last week, the ministry clamped a quarantine on several areas of the country.
But the outbreak continued to spread, prompting the dramatic decision to halt all movement of horses in Israel.
Barack Obama's turn to deal with Israel-Palestine conflict
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Thursday, November 6th 2008
BY MATTHEW KALMAN
SPECIAL TO THE NEWS
JERUSALEM - As President-elect Barack Obama was savoring his victory, a short-lived ceasefire between Israel and Hamas collapsed in a fusillade of mortars and missiles.
The headache that was Bill Clinton's and George Bush's for 16 years will become Obama's.
Gaza militants Wednesday lobbed dozens of rockets at Israeli border towns to avenge the deaths of six militants killed earlier in precision air strikes.
Israel unleashed the attack after uncovering a secret tunnel that was to be used to kidnap and kill their soldiers - and after finding rocket launchers poised to hit its border towns.
Secretary of State Rice acknowledged the obvious Wednesday: President Bush's hope for a peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians is dead.
Rice was en route last night to the Middle East to set the stage for future talks, but adding to the uncertainty, Israel is due to have a general election in February. And Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' term as president ends in January.
The Palestinians also remain hopelessly divided between the Hamas-governed Gaza Strip and Fatah-dominated West Bank.
It all amounts to a major challenge for the American President. Israelis and Palestinians were not hopeful that Obama would have any better success than his predecessors in helping them end their cycle of violence.
"It is irrelevant who won," said Ali Abdullah, a Palestinian from the West Bank village of Turmusayya, of Obama's victory. "They are just pro-Israelis, that's it. The Zionist lobby is controlling both, Democratic and Republican, so it doesn't matter."
While Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert hailed his victory as "historic and impressive," others made clear, as polls reflected, that Israel had preferred Republican John McCain.
Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, a lawyer who represents terror victims in lawsuits against the Palestinian Authority and various terror groups, said she feared a return to Clintonian diplomacy.
"We know that there will be tremendous pressure on the Israeli government. We know that Obama is bringing back the old team from the Clinton administration that pushes Israel to do stupid mistakes and we hope they will not repeat their mistakes once again," she said.
Thursday, November 6th 2008
BY MATTHEW KALMAN
SPECIAL TO THE NEWS
JERUSALEM - As President-elect Barack Obama was savoring his victory, a short-lived ceasefire between Israel and Hamas collapsed in a fusillade of mortars and missiles.
The headache that was Bill Clinton's and George Bush's for 16 years will become Obama's.
Gaza militants Wednesday lobbed dozens of rockets at Israeli border towns to avenge the deaths of six militants killed earlier in precision air strikes.
Israel unleashed the attack after uncovering a secret tunnel that was to be used to kidnap and kill their soldiers - and after finding rocket launchers poised to hit its border towns.
Secretary of State Rice acknowledged the obvious Wednesday: President Bush's hope for a peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians is dead.
Rice was en route last night to the Middle East to set the stage for future talks, but adding to the uncertainty, Israel is due to have a general election in February. And Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' term as president ends in January.
The Palestinians also remain hopelessly divided between the Hamas-governed Gaza Strip and Fatah-dominated West Bank.
It all amounts to a major challenge for the American President. Israelis and Palestinians were not hopeful that Obama would have any better success than his predecessors in helping them end their cycle of violence.
"It is irrelevant who won," said Ali Abdullah, a Palestinian from the West Bank village of Turmusayya, of Obama's victory. "They are just pro-Israelis, that's it. The Zionist lobby is controlling both, Democratic and Republican, so it doesn't matter."
While Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert hailed his victory as "historic and impressive," others made clear, as polls reflected, that Israel had preferred Republican John McCain.
Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, a lawyer who represents terror victims in lawsuits against the Palestinian Authority and various terror groups, said she feared a return to Clintonian diplomacy.
"We know that there will be tremendous pressure on the Israeli government. We know that Obama is bringing back the old team from the Clinton administration that pushes Israel to do stupid mistakes and we hope they will not repeat their mistakes once again," she said.
Wednesday, 5 November 2008
Tomb raider digs up witch: 12,000-year-old she-shaman, talismans unearthed in Israel
Ratner/Reuters Archeologist Leore Grosman of Hebrew University displays tortoise shells and other bounty dating to 10,000 years before Jesus was alive that her team unearthed in Galilee region of northern Israel.
The tomb is believed to be a witch or she-shaman from the prehistoric Natufian civilization, an ancient community that lived in the area 10,000 years before Jesus.
Scientists from the Hebrew University said the burial site at Hilazon Tachtit, in the western Galilee near Carmiel, contained a vast number of unusual grave offerings.
Among them were 50 complete tortoise shells, the pelvis of a leopard, the wing tip of a golden eagle, the tail of a cow, two marten skulls, the forearm of a wild boar and a human foot.
Dr. Leore Grosman and her team from the Institute of Archaeology at the Hebrew University found the witch was 45 years old, petite and had an unnatural, asymmetrical appearance due to a spinal disability that would have affected her gait, causing her to limp or drag her foot.
Grosman believes the special method of burial indicated the woman's special standing in the community. She said it was the first time the grave of an ancient witch had been discovered in the area.
She said the body was buried on its side with the spinal column, pelvis and right femur resting against the curved southern wall of the oval-shaped grave.
The legs were spread apart and folded inward at the knees.
Grosman said 10 large stones were placed directly on the head, pelvis and arms of the woman as she was buried, which could have been designed to protect the body from being eaten by wild animals.
Another theory is that they may have been placed there because the community was trying to keep the shaman and her spirit inside the grave.
The discovery was published in this week's edition of the scientific journal the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
"Tortoises, cow tails, eagle wings, and fur-bearing animals continue to play important symbolic and shamanistic roles in the spiritual arena of human cultures worldwide today," Grosman wrote.
"It seems that the woman in the Natufian burial was perceived as being in a close relationship with these animal spirits."
The Natufian civilization, dated from about 15,000 to 11,500 years ago, is believed to be the first human society to move from foraging to organized farming. It was the first civilization known to live in one place all year-round.
Sunday, 2 November 2008
It's 'CSI: Jerusalem' as scientist offers his expertise to public
Avner Rosengarten, who offers forensic testing to public, examines shirt at his Jerusalem lab (David Blumenfeld).
JERUSALEM - A top Israeli forensics expert has opened a cut-rate lab that brings CSI to the masses.
Suspicious about the red stain on your husband's collar? The designer perfume that just might be a fake? The boy who looks a little too much like the milkman?
Rosengarten got the idea to go into private investigative work years ago when, while working in Israel's main police lab, a woman called and asked if he could ID traces of face powder on her husband's collar.
He refused, but when he retired he took out a loan and opened the Forensic Science Institute in July.
"Forensic science is identified with police work, but I believe it belongs to everybody," he said.
"I decided to take the knowledge I gained from my criminal work and apply it to everyday problems for industry, consumers and ordinary people."
"It's enormous fun," said Rosengarten, 54.
Rosengarten's Forensic Science Institute, a state-of-the-art lab in a nondescript Jerusalem back street, can also determine the authenticity of documents, run DNA tests and check whether products are authentic or imported fakes.
He was quickly inundated with clients looking to check out all sorts of things.
He was asked by one woman to check whether her wig was made of real hair. For $400 he was able to confirm it was. For about $300, he ran tests on a red stain on a shirt collar. He delivers all his results face to face, which can be hard if it means effectively telling a woman her marriage is about to end.
"She already had her suspicions. We just provided the evidence," he said. "Lipstick doesn't come off in the wash."
Based on his police experience, his laboratory is also able to test samples from cosmetics firms who believe their products are being ripped off to see if they are the real thing.
"We can tell immediately if a shampoo or soap is fake. The fakes always smell much better," he said.
Rosengarten worked for years as a scientist for the National Forensic Institute in Jerusalem - in other words, CSI Israel.
Israeli security chiefs fear assassination plot from radicals
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Sunday, November 2nd 2008
BY MATTHEW KALMAN
Sunday, November 2nd 2008
BY MATTHEW KALMAN
JERUSALEM - Israeli security chiefs believe that extreme right-wing groups are planning a political assassination to push their battle to defend and expand settlements on the West Bank.
The grim warning came in a presentation to cabinet leaders Sunday as Israelis prepared to mark the 13th anniversary of the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.
"The Shin Bet has identified a willingness in the extreme right to use arms to stop diplomatic processes by harming political leaders," Shin Bet Secret Service chief Yuval Diskin told ministers.
National Infrastructure Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, a former army general, also said another political assassination was likely.
"In 1995, I said there would be a murder here, and today I am saying the same thing," Ben-Eliezer said.
Just weeks before he was gunned down in Tel Aviv, Rabin had dismissed Ben-Eliezer's fears by asking, "Would a Jew kill another Jew?"
"I told him, 'Yes,'" said Ben-Eliezer.
The warnings came after a weekend of violence at an illegal settlement in the West Bank where settlers clashed with Israeli police trying to evict them.
Internal Security Minister Avi Dichter also said that settler violence was on the rise.
"Police have identified an increasing readiness among extremists to lash out against the army and police officers," said Dichter, a former Shin Bet chief.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who will stay in office as caretaker prime minister until a general election in February, has condemned "wild people who behave in a way that threatens proper law and governance."
Elisheva Federman, whose illegal home near Hebron was destroyed early Sunday, accused the Israeli army and police of brutality.
"We will return and build it again," she vowed. "We will return at any cost, even if we have to live in a tent."
Friday, 31 October 2008
Israeli Universities to Open on Time, as Strike Is Settled
By MATTHEW KALMAN
Jerusalem
Jerusalem
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel averted a nationwide university strike on Thursday, just three days before the scheduled beginning of the new academic year, by intervening at the last minute to direct the government to restore nearly $140-million to the universities' budgets.
The prime minister's move, which will allow the academic year to begin on time on Sunday, led the country's education minister, Yuli Tamir, to say that she could "finally sleep at night."
University presidents here had announced the cancellation of the semester in a dispute over finances for the country's seven research universities and 30 colleges of higher education, all of which are supported by the government (The Chronicle, October 24).
The universities had demanded that the government, over the next five years, restore $625-million that was cut from their budgets a decade ago. They insisted on the immediate payment of the first 20 percent, or $125-million, with the remainder to follow in subsequent years.
The $625-million repayment was a key recommendation of the Shochat Commission, a government-appointed committee that suggested far-reaching plans to overhaul higher education in Israel more than a year ago (The Chronicle, November 30, 2007).
Ms. Tamir had accused Finance Ministry officials of "dragging their feet" in negotiations that finally broke down on Wednesday.
The Finance Ministry had tried to make the additional money conditional on the universities' accepting structural reforms recommended by the Shochat Commission. But such reforms would have led to a sharp increase in tuition rates, which the government wished to avoid with a general election looming.
Demand for Money
Mr. Olmert, joining the talks between the university heads and Finance Ministry officials for the first time during the protracted crisis, ordered the ministry to transfer the entire $125-million demanded by the universities, plus an extra $14-million for new development.
"I have taken a decision, not an easy decision—certainly not for the Finance Ministry—and I appreciate the ability of the ministry to cope with the difficulties which they will face as a result of this decision," said Mr. Olmert.
"The academic year will begin as planned on Sunday," Ms. Tamir told reporters after the meeting. "The prime minister took a brave decision that will enable the year to start and enable the higher-education institutions to appoint new faculty and attract young lecturers back to the country."
"It's a very large amount of money," she admitted. "The projects are vitally essential."
Menachem Magidor, president of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and chairman of Israel's Committee of University Presidents, welcomed the resolution of the crisis but warned the Finance Ministry that there would be further trouble if the money did not come through in this or future years, as agreed.
"We welcome the agreement that was achieved today, and we thank Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Education Minister Yuli Tamir for their role in bringing about a solution to this crisis in the higher-education system," Mr. Magidor told The Chronicle. "We must remember that this arrangement only solves the immediate problem in the coming year. We still have to work hard to find a long-term solution to the overall problem over the next five years. We will keep working and maintain our efforts to improve the Israeli higher-education system and provide the best services and conditions for our students."
Student leaders, who had joined with faculty members in protesting the government's failure to meet the demand for funds, breathed a sigh of relief.
"We are happy the school year is beginning as planned and that some of the budget, which was cut over the last few years, was returned to higher education," said Boaz Toporovsky, chairman of the National Union of Israeli Students, who was arrested during a demonstration on Wednesday outside the Parliament. "I hope that now it will be possible to find a long-term and all-inclusive solution for the system."
Wednesday, 29 October 2008
Case involving Jesus' brother burial box hoax on verge of collapse
SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Matthew Kalman, Chronicle Foreign Service
Jerusalem -- The high-profile trial of two Israeli antiquities experts accused of faking a burial box containing the remains of Jesus' brother and other priceless artifacts faced a humiliating collapse today after a Jerusalem judge advised the prosecution to consider dropping the proceedings after more than three years in court.
"After all the evidence we have heard, including the testimony of the prime defendant, is the picture still the same as the one you had when he was charged?" District Court Judge Aharon Farkash pointedly asked public prosecutor, Adi Damti. "Not every case ends in the way you think it will when it starts. Maybe we can save ourselves the rest."
The discovery of an ossuary or burial box inscribed "James son of Joseph brother of Jesus" created a sensation when first displayed at the Royal Ontario Museum in 2002. If authentic, it would be the only physical evidence ever discovered directly linked to the family of Jesus.
But the owner of the ossuary, Israeli engineer and collector Oded Golan, was arrested by Israeli police in 2003, and then charged a year later along with four others on 18 counts of forgery, fraud and damaging archaeological artifacts.
'Unholy Business'
In her new book on the case entitled "Unholy Business, A True Tale of Faith, Greed, and Forgery in the Holy Land," author Nina Burleigh appears to believe that Golan is guilty, but suspects his lawyers have raised enough doubts to avoid conviction.
The often explosive testimony has given a rare insight into the shadowy world behind the apparently cultured facade of priceless antiquities. Witnesses have described furtive encounters with Arab grave robbers, international smuggling and transactions involving hundreds of thousands of dollars based on a handshake.
But the collapse of the prosecution's case would be a major embarrassment for the Israeli police and Israel Antiquities Authority. They maintain the defendants faked the burial box along with other biblical-era relics that were then sold for huge sums of money and sent to major collections and museums around the world.
"This was fraud of a sophistication and expertise which was previously unknown," said Police Comdt. Shaul Naim, who headed a two-year police investigation. "They took authentic items and added inscriptions to make them worth millions."
Experts recant
Scholars appointed to a special committee convened by the Israel Antiquities Authority accused Golan and his co-defendants of taking valuable ancient relics and adding inscriptions to increase their value.
Shuka Dorfman, director of the Israel Antiquities Authority, had described the charges against Golan as "the tip of the iceberg. These forgeries have worldwide repercussions," he said after the indictments were filed. "They were an attempt to change the history of the Jewish and Christian people."
But under cross-examination by defense attorneys, many experts recanted some of their findings. Judge Farkash's comments, which were excluded from trial transcripts but said in open court, came after more than 80 witnesses and 10,000 pages of testimony including evidence and cross-examination of Golan and leading archaeologists and scientists from around the world.
No definitive proof
"Have you really proved beyond a reasonable doubt that these artifacts are fakes as charged in the indictment? The experts disagreed among themselves. Where is the definitive proof needed to show that the accused faked the ossuary?" Judge Farkash asked prosecutor Damti. "You need to ask yourselves those questions very seriously, and if necessary consult with your superiors in the public prosecutor's office."
The two most important items said to be fakes were the James ossuary - a limestone burial box in use during the time of Jesus and a black stone tablet inscribed with 14 lines commemorating renovations to the Temple in Jerusalem by the biblical King Joash.
Golan, a 57-year-old world-renowned expert who started collecting antiquities when he was 8 years old, has consistently denied all charges during the more than three years of proceedings.
"The James ossuary and the Joash Tablet are 100 percent authentic. I have never faked an archaeological artifact in my life," he has said.
Dozens testify
To date, witnesses have included antiquities dealers, museum curators, experts and professors of archaeology, history, epigraphy and chemical isotopes from leading universities and museums in Israel and around the world.
In four days of testimony, multimillionaire collector Shlomo Moussaieff described scenes where dealers, professors and even Israeli diplomats came to his home, produced rare antiquities from their pockets and negotiated sales worth thousands of dollars.
On one occasion, Moussaieff sent his personal banker with Golan to buy some rare seal impressions from a Palestinian villager. They parked their car on a dirt road near the border with the West Bank and when the Palestinian arrived they gave him a bag containing $150,000 in cash.
Charges dropped for 2
Charges against two of the defendants were dropped during the trial. Another man pleaded guilty to a minor charge unrelated to the main accusations, leaving Golan and antiquities dealer Robert Deutsch, who were alleged to have been the leaders of the supposed forgery ring.
"I have never faked anything nor committed any crime," said Deutsch. "The authorities have ruined my reputation and I have lost my university teaching position because of the baseless charges leveled against me. When this is over, I will sue them for slander."
Meanwhile, Judge Farkash has advised the prosecution to think about continuing the case before reconvening the trial in January.
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Matthew Kalman, Chronicle Foreign Service
Jerusalem -- The high-profile trial of two Israeli antiquities experts accused of faking a burial box containing the remains of Jesus' brother and other priceless artifacts faced a humiliating collapse today after a Jerusalem judge advised the prosecution to consider dropping the proceedings after more than three years in court.
"After all the evidence we have heard, including the testimony of the prime defendant, is the picture still the same as the one you had when he was charged?" District Court Judge Aharon Farkash pointedly asked public prosecutor, Adi Damti. "Not every case ends in the way you think it will when it starts. Maybe we can save ourselves the rest."
The discovery of an ossuary or burial box inscribed "James son of Joseph brother of Jesus" created a sensation when first displayed at the Royal Ontario Museum in 2002. If authentic, it would be the only physical evidence ever discovered directly linked to the family of Jesus.
But the owner of the ossuary, Israeli engineer and collector Oded Golan, was arrested by Israeli police in 2003, and then charged a year later along with four others on 18 counts of forgery, fraud and damaging archaeological artifacts.
'Unholy Business'
In her new book on the case entitled "Unholy Business, A True Tale of Faith, Greed, and Forgery in the Holy Land," author Nina Burleigh appears to believe that Golan is guilty, but suspects his lawyers have raised enough doubts to avoid conviction.
The often explosive testimony has given a rare insight into the shadowy world behind the apparently cultured facade of priceless antiquities. Witnesses have described furtive encounters with Arab grave robbers, international smuggling and transactions involving hundreds of thousands of dollars based on a handshake.
But the collapse of the prosecution's case would be a major embarrassment for the Israeli police and Israel Antiquities Authority. They maintain the defendants faked the burial box along with other biblical-era relics that were then sold for huge sums of money and sent to major collections and museums around the world.
"This was fraud of a sophistication and expertise which was previously unknown," said Police Comdt. Shaul Naim, who headed a two-year police investigation. "They took authentic items and added inscriptions to make them worth millions."
Experts recant
Scholars appointed to a special committee convened by the Israel Antiquities Authority accused Golan and his co-defendants of taking valuable ancient relics and adding inscriptions to increase their value.
Shuka Dorfman, director of the Israel Antiquities Authority, had described the charges against Golan as "the tip of the iceberg. These forgeries have worldwide repercussions," he said after the indictments were filed. "They were an attempt to change the history of the Jewish and Christian people."
But under cross-examination by defense attorneys, many experts recanted some of their findings. Judge Farkash's comments, which were excluded from trial transcripts but said in open court, came after more than 80 witnesses and 10,000 pages of testimony including evidence and cross-examination of Golan and leading archaeologists and scientists from around the world.
No definitive proof
"Have you really proved beyond a reasonable doubt that these artifacts are fakes as charged in the indictment? The experts disagreed among themselves. Where is the definitive proof needed to show that the accused faked the ossuary?" Judge Farkash asked prosecutor Damti. "You need to ask yourselves those questions very seriously, and if necessary consult with your superiors in the public prosecutor's office."
The two most important items said to be fakes were the James ossuary - a limestone burial box in use during the time of Jesus and a black stone tablet inscribed with 14 lines commemorating renovations to the Temple in Jerusalem by the biblical King Joash.
Golan, a 57-year-old world-renowned expert who started collecting antiquities when he was 8 years old, has consistently denied all charges during the more than three years of proceedings.
"The James ossuary and the Joash Tablet are 100 percent authentic. I have never faked an archaeological artifact in my life," he has said.
Dozens testify
To date, witnesses have included antiquities dealers, museum curators, experts and professors of archaeology, history, epigraphy and chemical isotopes from leading universities and museums in Israel and around the world.
In four days of testimony, multimillionaire collector Shlomo Moussaieff described scenes where dealers, professors and even Israeli diplomats came to his home, produced rare antiquities from their pockets and negotiated sales worth thousands of dollars.
On one occasion, Moussaieff sent his personal banker with Golan to buy some rare seal impressions from a Palestinian villager. They parked their car on a dirt road near the border with the West Bank and when the Palestinian arrived they gave him a bag containing $150,000 in cash.
Charges dropped for 2
Charges against two of the defendants were dropped during the trial. Another man pleaded guilty to a minor charge unrelated to the main accusations, leaving Golan and antiquities dealer Robert Deutsch, who were alleged to have been the leaders of the supposed forgery ring.
"I have never faked anything nor committed any crime," said Deutsch. "The authorities have ruined my reputation and I have lost my university teaching position because of the baseless charges leveled against me. When this is over, I will sue them for slander."
Meanwhile, Judge Farkash has advised the prosecution to think about continuing the case before reconvening the trial in January.
Monday, 27 October 2008
Foreign Academics Protest Denial of Visas to Attend Health Conference in Gaza
CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION NEWS BLOG
Monday October 27, 2008
Jerusalem — Physicians and nurses from Harvard Medical School and other American universities were among dozens of U.S. and European health experts denied entry into Gaza on Sunday for an academic conference organized by the Gaza Community Mental Health Programme and sponsored by the World Health Organization.
The two-day conference, “Siege and Mental Health Walls vs. Bridges,” opened instead on Monday in Ramallah in the West Bank with a video-conference link to Palestinian health experts in Gaza.
Eyewitnesses said Israeli soldiers and security officers pushed the physicians, nurses, and academics back from the Erez checkpoint, the only pedestrian crossing-point from Israel into the Gaza Strip.
“I wanted to be part of this conference and support the people in Gaza and contribute to breaking the siege of the Gaza Strip imposed by Israel,” Eleanor Roffman, director of the field-training office in the division of counseling and psychology at Lesley University, told The Chronicle. Her visa application, and those of other scholars, was denied by Israeli officials on October 13, she said.
The Erez checkpoint has been closed since Hamas took over the Gaza Strip, in the summer of 2007, to all foreigners except diplomats, aid workers, doctors, and journalists. Only a few hundred Palestinians are now permitted to enter Israel through the checkpoint on a regular basis, but more than 11,000 Palestinians have been allowed into Israel for medical treatment so far this year.
Peter Lerner, a spokesman for the Coordinator of Israeli Government Activities in the Territories, an Israeli defense-ministry unit that coordinates civilian matters with the Palestinian Authority, said the participants were told two weeks ago that they would not be allowed into Gaza and arrived on Sunday as a political gesture.
“They caused a closure of the crossing, delaying any Palestinians who needed to cross at that time,” Mr. Lerner told The Chronicle. “They knew they had no approval.”
Mr. Lerner said there had been a ban on foreigners attending academic conferences in Gaza since Hamas took over. “We do not regard this gathering as humanitarian. It is just another platform to have a go at Israel,” he said. —Matthew Kalman
Monday October 27, 2008
Jerusalem — Physicians and nurses from Harvard Medical School and other American universities were among dozens of U.S. and European health experts denied entry into Gaza on Sunday for an academic conference organized by the Gaza Community Mental Health Programme and sponsored by the World Health Organization.
The two-day conference, “Siege and Mental Health Walls vs. Bridges,” opened instead on Monday in Ramallah in the West Bank with a video-conference link to Palestinian health experts in Gaza.
Eyewitnesses said Israeli soldiers and security officers pushed the physicians, nurses, and academics back from the Erez checkpoint, the only pedestrian crossing-point from Israel into the Gaza Strip.
“I wanted to be part of this conference and support the people in Gaza and contribute to breaking the siege of the Gaza Strip imposed by Israel,” Eleanor Roffman, director of the field-training office in the division of counseling and psychology at Lesley University, told The Chronicle. Her visa application, and those of other scholars, was denied by Israeli officials on October 13, she said.
The Erez checkpoint has been closed since Hamas took over the Gaza Strip, in the summer of 2007, to all foreigners except diplomats, aid workers, doctors, and journalists. Only a few hundred Palestinians are now permitted to enter Israel through the checkpoint on a regular basis, but more than 11,000 Palestinians have been allowed into Israel for medical treatment so far this year.
Peter Lerner, a spokesman for the Coordinator of Israeli Government Activities in the Territories, an Israeli defense-ministry unit that coordinates civilian matters with the Palestinian Authority, said the participants were told two weeks ago that they would not be allowed into Gaza and arrived on Sunday as a political gesture.
“They caused a closure of the crossing, delaying any Palestinians who needed to cross at that time,” Mr. Lerner told The Chronicle. “They knew they had no approval.”
Mr. Lerner said there had been a ban on foreigners attending academic conferences in Gaza since Hamas took over. “We do not regard this gathering as humanitarian. It is just another platform to have a go at Israel,” he said. —Matthew Kalman
Sunday, 26 October 2008
General election looms for Israel after Livni admits defeat in bid to form coalition government
DAILY MAIL
Sunday 26th October 2008
By Matthew Kalman
Israel is heading towards an early general election and the likely return of hardline former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni was elected as head of the governing Kadima Party last month, replacing Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who was forced to stand aside because of a raft of corruption scandals.
After more than a month of wheeler-dealing, Livni could not persuade enough parties to join a new government under her leadership. She described the pressures exerted by smaller parties as 'extortion'.
Israel is heading towards an early general election after Tzipi Livni failed to persuade enough parties to join a new government under her leadership
Because of Israel's Byzantine political process, a general election is not expected until February.
Polls indicate that the likely winner will be the right-wing Likud Party, signaling the return to power of former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after a decade in opposition.
Peacemaking foundered during Netanyahu's three-year tenure as prime minister in the 1990s, and his positions have not softened since.
He quit Ariel Sharon's government because he opposed Israel's 2005 withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. He also opposes ceding sovereignty over any part of east Jerusalem, which Israel captured in the 1967 Middle East war.
The political turmoil in Israel is matched by uncertainty in the Palestinian Authority, where President Mahmoud Abbas is due to end his term in January.
There are no plans yet for fresh elections among the Palestinians, who are deeply divided between Abbas's Fatah movement and Hamas, who seized power in Gaza more than a year ago.
The Middle East peace process, already in deep freeze, is now effectively on hold for the foreseeable future.
The key decision that sank Livni's ambitions was taken by the Ovadia Yosef, the octogenarian rabbi who leads the ultra-orthodox Shas Party.
Yosef ordered his followers not to enter Livni's new cabinet, apparently believing that Shas would receive greater power and bigger budgets from Netanyahu, as they did when he was prime minister from 1996 to 1999.
Livni went to the official residence of Israeli President Shimon Peres this afternoon to inform him of her decision to end her efforts at forming a coalition.
Peres said he expected the election to take place within 90 days.
Livni told reporters after meeting Peres that Shas and other parties had tried to force her into 'a government of paralysis' because of its exaggerated budget demands.
'I wasn't prepared to sacrifice Israel's economy in order to form a coalition,' she said.
'We'll go to elections as soon as possible. I'm not afraid of elections.
'The other possibility was for me to capitulate to extortion. But a government is supposed to advance processes and represent the good of the country, not just to survive in this or that coalition.
'I promised to exhaust efforts to form a government, and that's what I did.'
Sunday 26th October 2008
By Matthew Kalman
Israel is heading towards an early general election and the likely return of hardline former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni was elected as head of the governing Kadima Party last month, replacing Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who was forced to stand aside because of a raft of corruption scandals.
After more than a month of wheeler-dealing, Livni could not persuade enough parties to join a new government under her leadership. She described the pressures exerted by smaller parties as 'extortion'.
Israel is heading towards an early general election after Tzipi Livni failed to persuade enough parties to join a new government under her leadership
Because of Israel's Byzantine political process, a general election is not expected until February.
Polls indicate that the likely winner will be the right-wing Likud Party, signaling the return to power of former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after a decade in opposition.
Peacemaking foundered during Netanyahu's three-year tenure as prime minister in the 1990s, and his positions have not softened since.
He quit Ariel Sharon's government because he opposed Israel's 2005 withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. He also opposes ceding sovereignty over any part of east Jerusalem, which Israel captured in the 1967 Middle East war.
The political turmoil in Israel is matched by uncertainty in the Palestinian Authority, where President Mahmoud Abbas is due to end his term in January.
There are no plans yet for fresh elections among the Palestinians, who are deeply divided between Abbas's Fatah movement and Hamas, who seized power in Gaza more than a year ago.
The Middle East peace process, already in deep freeze, is now effectively on hold for the foreseeable future.
The key decision that sank Livni's ambitions was taken by the Ovadia Yosef, the octogenarian rabbi who leads the ultra-orthodox Shas Party.
Yosef ordered his followers not to enter Livni's new cabinet, apparently believing that Shas would receive greater power and bigger budgets from Netanyahu, as they did when he was prime minister from 1996 to 1999.
Livni went to the official residence of Israeli President Shimon Peres this afternoon to inform him of her decision to end her efforts at forming a coalition.
Peres said he expected the election to take place within 90 days.
Livni told reporters after meeting Peres that Shas and other parties had tried to force her into 'a government of paralysis' because of its exaggerated budget demands.
'I wasn't prepared to sacrifice Israel's economy in order to form a coalition,' she said.
'We'll go to elections as soon as possible. I'm not afraid of elections.
'The other possibility was for me to capitulate to extortion. But a government is supposed to advance processes and represent the good of the country, not just to survive in this or that coalition.
'I promised to exhaust efforts to form a government, and that's what I did.'
Thursday, 23 October 2008
Israeli University Presidents Cancel Start of Academic Year
CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION
Friday, October 24, 2008
By MATTHEW KALMAN
Jerusalem
The heads of Israel's universities have canceled the opening of the academic year, scheduled for November 2, after the government did not restore $125-million in budget cuts.
University heads say the continuing crisis over the financing of Israel's public higher-education institutions, now entering its third academic year, threatens the very fabric of the country's university system.
"The universities are currently incapable of functioning and beginning the academic year," said Menachem Magidor, president of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and chairman of Israel's Committee of University Presidents.
The universities are demanding that the government, over the next five years, restore $625-million that was cut from their budget a decade ago. They say they cannot begin the academic year unless the first 20 percent, or $125-million, is paid immediately.
The $625-million repayment, to begin in 2008-9, was a key recommendation by the Shochat Commission, a government-appointed committee that suggested far-reaching plans for reform of higher education in Israel more than a year ago. So far the government has not found time to discuss the commission's findings in depth, nor to implement any of those findings.
The Israeli Ministry of Finance, which has wide independence in negotiating public budgets, has so far agreed to pay only $61-million for this academic year, but have not given out even that amount. Ministry officials are refusing to restore the $625-million that was cut unless the other recommendations of the Shochat Commission are also implemented. Those include an increase in tuition, which Israeli political leaders have declined to endorse in a year in which a general election is likely.
Shutdown 'a Disaster'
"Closing down the research universities is a disaster for us and the students," admitted Mr. Magidor, but he said the universities were left with no choice because of what he called the government's indifference.
The closure will affect 250,000 students at Israel's seven research universities and 30 colleges, all of which are publicly financed.
Earlier this month, the Committee of University Presidents sent out an e-mail message to the 150,000 students under its auspices warning them that the academic year would not begin on time.
"Unfortunately, under the current circumstances following negotiations with the Ministry of Finance, we cannot begin the academic year," the e-mail message said.
"The promises made by the Israeli government—that it would tackle the root of the problem and guarantee the survival of the system for many years to come—have not been fulfilled. Negotiations with the Finance Ministry have not resulted in an accord that would enable the proper function of the universities," it explained.
Yuli Tamir, minister of education, said she supported the universities' demands, but she appeared unable to help.
"Higher education and intellectual wealth are Israel's most important asset, and they mustn't be damaged," she said.
Israeli student leaders said they supported the professors' decision, even though it means that university studies will be disrupted for the third year in succession. Some students are only now finishing exams from last year after delays caused by a 90-day strike by tenured professors.
"The students understand the pressing budget needs," said a spokesperson for the National Union of Israeli Students.
Students and professors say they will stage a joint rally on Monday when the Knesset, Israel's parliament, begins its winter session.
Friday, October 24, 2008
By MATTHEW KALMAN
Jerusalem
The heads of Israel's universities have canceled the opening of the academic year, scheduled for November 2, after the government did not restore $125-million in budget cuts.
University heads say the continuing crisis over the financing of Israel's public higher-education institutions, now entering its third academic year, threatens the very fabric of the country's university system.
"The universities are currently incapable of functioning and beginning the academic year," said Menachem Magidor, president of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and chairman of Israel's Committee of University Presidents.
The universities are demanding that the government, over the next five years, restore $625-million that was cut from their budget a decade ago. They say they cannot begin the academic year unless the first 20 percent, or $125-million, is paid immediately.
The $625-million repayment, to begin in 2008-9, was a key recommendation by the Shochat Commission, a government-appointed committee that suggested far-reaching plans for reform of higher education in Israel more than a year ago. So far the government has not found time to discuss the commission's findings in depth, nor to implement any of those findings.
The Israeli Ministry of Finance, which has wide independence in negotiating public budgets, has so far agreed to pay only $61-million for this academic year, but have not given out even that amount. Ministry officials are refusing to restore the $625-million that was cut unless the other recommendations of the Shochat Commission are also implemented. Those include an increase in tuition, which Israeli political leaders have declined to endorse in a year in which a general election is likely.
Shutdown 'a Disaster'
"Closing down the research universities is a disaster for us and the students," admitted Mr. Magidor, but he said the universities were left with no choice because of what he called the government's indifference.
The closure will affect 250,000 students at Israel's seven research universities and 30 colleges, all of which are publicly financed.
Earlier this month, the Committee of University Presidents sent out an e-mail message to the 150,000 students under its auspices warning them that the academic year would not begin on time.
"Unfortunately, under the current circumstances following negotiations with the Ministry of Finance, we cannot begin the academic year," the e-mail message said.
"The promises made by the Israeli government—that it would tackle the root of the problem and guarantee the survival of the system for many years to come—have not been fulfilled. Negotiations with the Finance Ministry have not resulted in an accord that would enable the proper function of the universities," it explained.
Yuli Tamir, minister of education, said she supported the universities' demands, but she appeared unable to help.
"Higher education and intellectual wealth are Israel's most important asset, and they mustn't be damaged," she said.
Israeli student leaders said they supported the professors' decision, even though it means that university studies will be disrupted for the third year in succession. Some students are only now finishing exams from last year after delays caused by a 90-day strike by tenured professors.
"The students understand the pressing budget needs," said a spokesperson for the National Union of Israeli Students.
Students and professors say they will stage a joint rally on Monday when the Knesset, Israel's parliament, begins its winter session.
Saturday, 18 October 2008
Few results seen from Mideast teen peace camps
SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE
Saturday, October 18, 2008
Matthew Kalman, Chronicle Foreign Service
Ramallah, West Bank - Each year, hundreds of Israeli and Palestinian teenagers defy the violence and hatred that divides them by forging personal ties that they hope will lay the groundwork for future peace.
John Wallach, the founder of Seeds of Peace, a nonprofit group based in New York that has invited more than 4,000 young people from conflict areas to meet one another, said before his death in 2002 that such people-to-people programs have created "an enduring commitment to building a future of peaceful co-existence."
A virtual peace industry has flourished around these workshops, creating a raft of Palestinian and Israeli nongovernmental organizations. Between 1993 and 2000, Western governments and foundations spent between $20 million and $25 million on the dialogue groups, according to a 2002 report by the Israel/Palestine Center for Research and Information.
But the programs have failed to produce a single prominent peace activist on either side, most observers agree. And now the first wide-scale survey of Palestinians involved in these peace programs suggests that the enterprise has been a waste of time and money. The unpublished report, a copy of which was obtained by The Chronicle, was commissioned by an unidentified donor nation from Pal Vision, an independent Palestinian youth organization and research center in East Jerusalem that is involved in dialogue workshops.
Pal Vision is headed by Rami Naser Eddin, a 31-year-old activist who was jailed as a teenager for throwing a Molotov cocktail at an Israeli army jeep. The group surveyed nearly 400 Palestinian participants and counselors.
The survey concludes that most Palestinian groups have used dialogue funds to finance other activities, and that Palestinian participants were unrepresentative of a wider society, tending to be children or friends of high-ranking Palestinian officials or economic elites. Only 7 percent of participants were refugee camp residents, even though they make up 16 percent of the Palestinian population.
"After I saw this research, we stopped. It was shocking for me," said Naser Eddin. "Most of these projects, there is no sustainability. They just want to meet people, which is very nice, very interesting, to get to know each other. But what is the next step? What is the outcome? It's all for publicity, for the media," he said.
The results also stated:
-- 91 percent said they were no longer in contact with any Israelis that they had met through the program;
-- 93 percent said there was no follow-up to camp activity that they had participated in;
-- Only 5 percent agreed that their program had helped "promote peace culture and dialogue between participants" and;
-- Only 11 percent came away believing that "there is something that unites us with the other party."
"The long-term positive impact, if any, fades with time, because these meetings end with the termination of the program and there is absence of communication and follow-up at various levels. It is noted that these activities expire with the end of the meeting and the closure of the project," the report says.
The survey's authors also noted that Palestinian "organizations themselves refused to give any information regarding the participants and the type of programs introduced and other important information needed for this study."
Indeed, joint activities with Israelis favored by the international community are deeply unpopular in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, where talking to the enemy is generally regarded as betrayal. The workshops are typically conducted in the United States or Europe.
"Public opinion that prevails in Palestine regarding the financial corruption that exists within the NGOs, which are internationally funded, especially those organizations which encourage and lead such programs, prevented these NGOs from declaring about their joint activities with Israelis," says the report.
Naser Eddin says many Palestinian organizations working with Israelis denied having any contact.
"We were shocked. They denied it because they are afraid of the Palestinian local community," he said. "Most NGOs working with Israelis don't publish it in the media or in their annual report or anywhere."
Ahmad Safi, a survey researcher from the West Bank city of Ramallah who is involved in Breaking Borders, a dialogue group for adults from each side, said the impact on teens has been minimal.
"They go there (abroad), spend 10 to 14 days in a good environment, and they have fun, but they are much too far away from the reality," said Safi. "They find they can be friends as humans. They talk. They discover they can live with each other, but in Germany or the USA, not here. Then when they return back here, they found that it is useless."
Not all Palestinian participants, however, agreed.
Hiba Nusseibeh, 17, attended a Seeds of Peace summer camp in 2005 and last year returned as a counselor. She keeps in touch with several Israeli girls that she met through the program.
"Seeds of Peace has flipped my whole life over," said Nusseibeh, who comes from a prominent Palestinian family and attends an elite girls' school in East Jerusalem. "Before, I didn't know much about politics. I was living my own life and I wasn't involved in the conflict. Now I want to make changes. Seeds of Peace has made me more dynamic, more determined. First we must achieve our rights. Then we can work towards peace."
But several Israeli teenagers mirrored the disenchantment of their Palestinian counterparts.
Amichai Graniewitz, 16, was 11 when he attended a Kids for Peace summer camp organized through the Episcopal Church in Jerusalem and Atlanta. A group of 12 Jews, Christians and Muslims met weekly for several months before heading off to camp in Atlanta.
"I don't think it really changed anything," Graniewitz said. "We met once after the camp, and that was it."
Saturday, October 18, 2008
Matthew Kalman, Chronicle Foreign Service
Ramallah, West Bank - Each year, hundreds of Israeli and Palestinian teenagers defy the violence and hatred that divides them by forging personal ties that they hope will lay the groundwork for future peace.
John Wallach, the founder of Seeds of Peace, a nonprofit group based in New York that has invited more than 4,000 young people from conflict areas to meet one another, said before his death in 2002 that such people-to-people programs have created "an enduring commitment to building a future of peaceful co-existence."
A virtual peace industry has flourished around these workshops, creating a raft of Palestinian and Israeli nongovernmental organizations. Between 1993 and 2000, Western governments and foundations spent between $20 million and $25 million on the dialogue groups, according to a 2002 report by the Israel/Palestine Center for Research and Information.
But the programs have failed to produce a single prominent peace activist on either side, most observers agree. And now the first wide-scale survey of Palestinians involved in these peace programs suggests that the enterprise has been a waste of time and money. The unpublished report, a copy of which was obtained by The Chronicle, was commissioned by an unidentified donor nation from Pal Vision, an independent Palestinian youth organization and research center in East Jerusalem that is involved in dialogue workshops.
Pal Vision is headed by Rami Naser Eddin, a 31-year-old activist who was jailed as a teenager for throwing a Molotov cocktail at an Israeli army jeep. The group surveyed nearly 400 Palestinian participants and counselors.
The survey concludes that most Palestinian groups have used dialogue funds to finance other activities, and that Palestinian participants were unrepresentative of a wider society, tending to be children or friends of high-ranking Palestinian officials or economic elites. Only 7 percent of participants were refugee camp residents, even though they make up 16 percent of the Palestinian population.
"After I saw this research, we stopped. It was shocking for me," said Naser Eddin. "Most of these projects, there is no sustainability. They just want to meet people, which is very nice, very interesting, to get to know each other. But what is the next step? What is the outcome? It's all for publicity, for the media," he said.
The results also stated:
-- 91 percent said they were no longer in contact with any Israelis that they had met through the program;
-- 93 percent said there was no follow-up to camp activity that they had participated in;
-- Only 5 percent agreed that their program had helped "promote peace culture and dialogue between participants" and;
-- Only 11 percent came away believing that "there is something that unites us with the other party."
"The long-term positive impact, if any, fades with time, because these meetings end with the termination of the program and there is absence of communication and follow-up at various levels. It is noted that these activities expire with the end of the meeting and the closure of the project," the report says.
The survey's authors also noted that Palestinian "organizations themselves refused to give any information regarding the participants and the type of programs introduced and other important information needed for this study."
Indeed, joint activities with Israelis favored by the international community are deeply unpopular in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, where talking to the enemy is generally regarded as betrayal. The workshops are typically conducted in the United States or Europe.
"Public opinion that prevails in Palestine regarding the financial corruption that exists within the NGOs, which are internationally funded, especially those organizations which encourage and lead such programs, prevented these NGOs from declaring about their joint activities with Israelis," says the report.
Naser Eddin says many Palestinian organizations working with Israelis denied having any contact.
"We were shocked. They denied it because they are afraid of the Palestinian local community," he said. "Most NGOs working with Israelis don't publish it in the media or in their annual report or anywhere."
Ahmad Safi, a survey researcher from the West Bank city of Ramallah who is involved in Breaking Borders, a dialogue group for adults from each side, said the impact on teens has been minimal.
"They go there (abroad), spend 10 to 14 days in a good environment, and they have fun, but they are much too far away from the reality," said Safi. "They find they can be friends as humans. They talk. They discover they can live with each other, but in Germany or the USA, not here. Then when they return back here, they found that it is useless."
Not all Palestinian participants, however, agreed.
Hiba Nusseibeh, 17, attended a Seeds of Peace summer camp in 2005 and last year returned as a counselor. She keeps in touch with several Israeli girls that she met through the program.
"Seeds of Peace has flipped my whole life over," said Nusseibeh, who comes from a prominent Palestinian family and attends an elite girls' school in East Jerusalem. "Before, I didn't know much about politics. I was living my own life and I wasn't involved in the conflict. Now I want to make changes. Seeds of Peace has made me more dynamic, more determined. First we must achieve our rights. Then we can work towards peace."
But several Israeli teenagers mirrored the disenchantment of their Palestinian counterparts.
Amichai Graniewitz, 16, was 11 when he attended a Kids for Peace summer camp organized through the Episcopal Church in Jerusalem and Atlanta. A group of 12 Jews, Christians and Muslims met weekly for several months before heading off to camp in Atlanta.
"I don't think it really changed anything," Graniewitz said. "We met once after the camp, and that was it."
Tuesday, 30 September 2008
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert says pullback's only path to peace
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Tuesday, September 30th 2008
BY Matthew Kalman
SPECIAL TO THE NEWS
JERUSALEM - Israel must withdraw from most of the West Bank and give up East Jerusalem if it ever hopes to have peace with the Palestinians, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert declared Monday, stunning fellow Israelis.
He also said the Golan Heights must one day be returned to neighboring Syria.
"One more hill, another 100 meters, it's not something that will affect Israel's security," Olmert told the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper on the eve of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year.
"What I am telling you now has not been said by any Israeli leader before me. The time has come to say these things. The time has come to put them on the table," he declared.
Just what his words will mean for the peace process is uncertain. Olmert has been forced to step down over a corruption scandal and now heads a caretaker government while newly-elected Kadima party leader Tzipi Livni tries to form a new governing coalition the next five weeks.
If she fails , new national elections will be held in six weeks.
Olmert said Israel had a limited window of opportunity to take "a historic step" in relations with the Palestinians and the Syrians.
His comments provoked outrage from the Right and amazement from the Left.
The Yedioth Ahronoth wrote that Olmert's comments would complicate Livni's job even before she takes over.
"He places on the doorstep of his successor a foreign policy doctrine, the likes of which has never been spoken by an incumbent prime minister," commented his interviewers.
The Palestinians claim all of the West Bank, Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem - areas captured by in the 1967 Mideast war - for a future independent state. Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005, but retains overall control over the West Bank and all of Jerusalem.
Essentially, Olmert wants Israel to return to its 1967 borders - before the Arabs attacked.
"At the end of the day, we will have to withdraw from the most decisive areas of the territories. In exchange for the same territories left in our hands, we will have to give compensation in the form of territories within the State of Israel," Olmert said.
"We have to reach an agreement with the Palestinians, the meaning of which is that in practice we will withdraw from almost all the territories, if not all the territories," Olmert said.
"I think we are very close to an agreement," he added.
Most observers believe Olmert has no chance of achieving a breakthrough before he steps down and say he will more likely to be remembered for his ill-fated attack on Lebanon in 2006 than any peacemaking. He
Turning to Syria, Olmert said he had initiated secret talks in February 2007.
"It is true that an agreement with Syria comes with danger," he said. "Those who want to act with zero danger should move to Switzerland."
"I'd like see if there is one serious person in the State of Israel who believes it is possible to make peace with the Syrians without eventually giving up the Golan Heights," he said, referring to the strategic plateau which is the only occupied area outside Jerusalem formally annexed by Israel.
He admitted that his views had changed since he entered politics 35 years ago.
"For many of those years, I was unwilling to look at reality in all its depth," said Olmert, who once was mayor of Jerusalem.
His comments, signalling the most far-reaching concessions ever made in public by an Israeli leader, provoked fury among his critics. The Right accused him of betraying his nationalist roots and tying the hands of future Israeli peace negotiators. The Left demanded to know how his policies in office for nearly three years squared with his new-found generosity.
"The prime minister's concession of the essential borders for defense is a gamble on our very existence, and the future of the State of Israel," said Yuval Steinitz, a right-wing member of parliament and former chairman of the Knesset Defence Committee.
Steinitz said Olmert did not understand "the fundamentals of security."
Yossi Beilin, a leading dove-ish MP, said Olmert's change of heart had come too late.
"Olmert has committed the unforgivable sin of revealing his true stance on Israel's national interest just when he has nothing left to lose," said Beilin.
"You believe it is in Israel's national interest to make peace, but for two-and-a-half years, almost three years, all you have done is wage an unnecessary war in Lebanon and… stifle any peace process," Beilin said.
Tuesday, September 30th 2008
BY Matthew Kalman
SPECIAL TO THE NEWS
JERUSALEM - Israel must withdraw from most of the West Bank and give up East Jerusalem if it ever hopes to have peace with the Palestinians, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert declared Monday, stunning fellow Israelis.
He also said the Golan Heights must one day be returned to neighboring Syria.
"One more hill, another 100 meters, it's not something that will affect Israel's security," Olmert told the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper on the eve of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year.
"What I am telling you now has not been said by any Israeli leader before me. The time has come to say these things. The time has come to put them on the table," he declared.
Just what his words will mean for the peace process is uncertain. Olmert has been forced to step down over a corruption scandal and now heads a caretaker government while newly-elected Kadima party leader Tzipi Livni tries to form a new governing coalition the next five weeks.
If she fails , new national elections will be held in six weeks.
Olmert said Israel had a limited window of opportunity to take "a historic step" in relations with the Palestinians and the Syrians.
His comments provoked outrage from the Right and amazement from the Left.
The Yedioth Ahronoth wrote that Olmert's comments would complicate Livni's job even before she takes over.
"He places on the doorstep of his successor a foreign policy doctrine, the likes of which has never been spoken by an incumbent prime minister," commented his interviewers.
The Palestinians claim all of the West Bank, Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem - areas captured by in the 1967 Mideast war - for a future independent state. Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005, but retains overall control over the West Bank and all of Jerusalem.
Essentially, Olmert wants Israel to return to its 1967 borders - before the Arabs attacked.
"At the end of the day, we will have to withdraw from the most decisive areas of the territories. In exchange for the same territories left in our hands, we will have to give compensation in the form of territories within the State of Israel," Olmert said.
"We have to reach an agreement with the Palestinians, the meaning of which is that in practice we will withdraw from almost all the territories, if not all the territories," Olmert said.
"I think we are very close to an agreement," he added.
Most observers believe Olmert has no chance of achieving a breakthrough before he steps down and say he will more likely to be remembered for his ill-fated attack on Lebanon in 2006 than any peacemaking. He
Turning to Syria, Olmert said he had initiated secret talks in February 2007.
"It is true that an agreement with Syria comes with danger," he said. "Those who want to act with zero danger should move to Switzerland."
"I'd like see if there is one serious person in the State of Israel who believes it is possible to make peace with the Syrians without eventually giving up the Golan Heights," he said, referring to the strategic plateau which is the only occupied area outside Jerusalem formally annexed by Israel.
He admitted that his views had changed since he entered politics 35 years ago.
"For many of those years, I was unwilling to look at reality in all its depth," said Olmert, who once was mayor of Jerusalem.
His comments, signalling the most far-reaching concessions ever made in public by an Israeli leader, provoked fury among his critics. The Right accused him of betraying his nationalist roots and tying the hands of future Israeli peace negotiators. The Left demanded to know how his policies in office for nearly three years squared with his new-found generosity.
"The prime minister's concession of the essential borders for defense is a gamble on our very existence, and the future of the State of Israel," said Yuval Steinitz, a right-wing member of parliament and former chairman of the Knesset Defence Committee.
Steinitz said Olmert did not understand "the fundamentals of security."
Yossi Beilin, a leading dove-ish MP, said Olmert's change of heart had come too late.
"Olmert has committed the unforgivable sin of revealing his true stance on Israel's national interest just when he has nothing left to lose," said Beilin.
"You believe it is in Israel's national interest to make peace, but for two-and-a-half years, almost three years, all you have done is wage an unnecessary war in Lebanon and… stifle any peace process," Beilin said.
Sunday, 28 September 2008
First permanent post for American G.I.s in Israel
BY MATTHEW KALMAN
SPECIAL TO THE NEWS
Sunday, September 28th 2008
JERUSALEM - The United States has stationed 120 American troops and an early-warning radar system in Israel - marking the first permanent U.S. military presence there.
Soldiers and technicians from the U.S. European Command flew to the Nevatim military base in the Negev Desert last Sunday, bringing with them advanced radar systems designed to help protect Israel against a potential ballistic missile attack from Iran, according to the weekly Defense News.
Once operational, the system is expected to double or even triple the range at which Israel could detect, track and ultimately intercept Iranian missiles, Lt. Gen. Henry Obering, director of the Pentagon's Missile Defense Agency, told Defense News.
The Forward Based X-Band Transportable Radar will be linked to U.S. satellite tracking stations and Israel's Arrow-2 defensive rocket system, enabling the Israelis to detect and destroy any incoming Iranian missile before it enters Israeli air space.
Japan deployed the same system two years ago to detect potential missiles launched from North Korea.
The U.S. European Command has deployed troops and Patriot air defenses for joint exercises and Iraq-related wartime planning, but has never before permanently deployed troops on Israeli soil, according to Defense News.
"This is a major upgrade in bilateral preparations for the threats facing Israel," an Israeli defense official said.
A British newspaper reported Friday that President Bush refused to okay a preemptive strike by Israel against Iran's fledgling nuclear facilities.
In Israel, the X-Band is seen as a consolation prize.
Iranian state TV has reported testing of its Shehab-3 long-range ballistic missile, which is capable of carrying a nuclear warhead 1,242 miles - more than far enough to hit Tel Aviv.
At a recent military parade in Tehran, banners adorning six Shehab-3 missiles declared: "Israel must be wiped off the map," and "We will crush America under our feet."
The United Nations recently renewed economic sanctions against Iran designed to halt its nuclear program and stop Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons.
Israeli leaders fear that a nuclear Iran, driven by its violently anti-Jewish leaders, will try to destroy Israel.
SPECIAL TO THE NEWS
Sunday, September 28th 2008
JERUSALEM - The United States has stationed 120 American troops and an early-warning radar system in Israel - marking the first permanent U.S. military presence there.
Soldiers and technicians from the U.S. European Command flew to the Nevatim military base in the Negev Desert last Sunday, bringing with them advanced radar systems designed to help protect Israel against a potential ballistic missile attack from Iran, according to the weekly Defense News.
Once operational, the system is expected to double or even triple the range at which Israel could detect, track and ultimately intercept Iranian missiles, Lt. Gen. Henry Obering, director of the Pentagon's Missile Defense Agency, told Defense News.
The Forward Based X-Band Transportable Radar will be linked to U.S. satellite tracking stations and Israel's Arrow-2 defensive rocket system, enabling the Israelis to detect and destroy any incoming Iranian missile before it enters Israeli air space.
Japan deployed the same system two years ago to detect potential missiles launched from North Korea.
The U.S. European Command has deployed troops and Patriot air defenses for joint exercises and Iraq-related wartime planning, but has never before permanently deployed troops on Israeli soil, according to Defense News.
"This is a major upgrade in bilateral preparations for the threats facing Israel," an Israeli defense official said.
A British newspaper reported Friday that President Bush refused to okay a preemptive strike by Israel against Iran's fledgling nuclear facilities.
In Israel, the X-Band is seen as a consolation prize.
Iranian state TV has reported testing of its Shehab-3 long-range ballistic missile, which is capable of carrying a nuclear warhead 1,242 miles - more than far enough to hit Tel Aviv.
At a recent military parade in Tehran, banners adorning six Shehab-3 missiles declared: "Israel must be wiped off the map," and "We will crush America under our feet."
The United Nations recently renewed economic sanctions against Iran designed to halt its nuclear program and stop Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons.
Israeli leaders fear that a nuclear Iran, driven by its violently anti-Jewish leaders, will try to destroy Israel.
Friday, 26 September 2008
Paul McCartney Rocks Israel
PEOPLE.COM : Friday September 26, 2008
By Matthew Kalman
Forty-three years after an over-protective Israeli government banned The Beatles from their country, Paul McCartney performed in front of an audience of 45,000 in Tel Aviv, just days before the start of the Jewish new year.
The Israeli audience roared its approval as Sir Paul greeted the crowd on Thursday night and wished them a happy new year in Liverpudlian-accented Hebrew: "Shalom Tel Aviv. Shana Tova."
Though his current girlfriend, Nancy Shevell, 48, was in attendance, McCartney, 66, dedicated the song "My Love" to his late wife, Linda. He also paid tribute to his late bandmates George Harrison and John Lennon during the concert, which was filled with Beatles music.
McCartney wore a pink shirt and an early-Beatles-style black suit made by his fashion designer daughter Stella, 37.
"She is the best designer in the world but she doesn't do much menswear, it's mainly women's wear," he told Non-Stop Radio in Tel Aviv. "I don't look too good in her frocks."
After arriving in Israel a day earlier, McCartney and Shevell (who were together in London last week) took a trip to Bethlehem in Palestine, where they lit a candle for peace at the Church of the Nativity. McCartney announced, "This candle is for peace for people all round the world – especially Israel and Palestine."
By Matthew Kalman
Forty-three years after an over-protective Israeli government banned The Beatles from their country, Paul McCartney performed in front of an audience of 45,000 in Tel Aviv, just days before the start of the Jewish new year.The Israeli audience roared its approval as Sir Paul greeted the crowd on Thursday night and wished them a happy new year in Liverpudlian-accented Hebrew: "Shalom Tel Aviv. Shana Tova."
Though his current girlfriend, Nancy Shevell, 48, was in attendance, McCartney, 66, dedicated the song "My Love" to his late wife, Linda. He also paid tribute to his late bandmates George Harrison and John Lennon during the concert, which was filled with Beatles music.
McCartney wore a pink shirt and an early-Beatles-style black suit made by his fashion designer daughter Stella, 37.
"She is the best designer in the world but she doesn't do much menswear, it's mainly women's wear," he told Non-Stop Radio in Tel Aviv. "I don't look too good in her frocks."
After arriving in Israel a day earlier, McCartney and Shevell (who were together in London last week) took a trip to Bethlehem in Palestine, where they lit a candle for peace at the Church of the Nativity. McCartney announced, "This candle is for peace for people all round the world – especially Israel and Palestine."
MACCA'S PEACE MISSION
By MATTHEW KALMAN in Jerusalem
DAILY EXPRESS, Friday September 26, 2008
SIR Paul McCartney defied death threats and demonstrators as he took to the stage in Tel Aviv last night in front of more than 50,000 adoring fans.
He announced himself by declaring: "I am bringing a message of peace."
It seemed a long and winding road from the time, 43 years ago, when an over-protective Israeli government banned The Beatles for fear they would corrupt the nation's youth.
In a concert entitled Friendship First, Sir Paul, aged 66, played a selection of his hits spanning nearly 50 years, taking in Fab Four standards from the early 60s, through his days with Wings to the present.
He was paid about £1million for the performance.
It seemed a long and winding road from the time, 43 years ago, when an over-protective Israeli government banned The Beatles for fear they would corrupt the nation's youth.
In a concert entitled Friendship First, Sir Paul, aged 66, played a selection of his hits spanning nearly 50 years, taking in Fab Four standards from the early 60s, through his days with Wings to the present.
He was paid about £1million for the performance.
The former Beatle's visit took place amid one of the largest security operations mounted in Israel for someone who is not a head of state.
His concert has been given the status of a state visit. Radio stations have been playing wall-to-wall Beatles music all week, weddings have been re-scheduled, theatre performances cancelled and most Tel Aviv clubs closed to avoid competing with the big event.
More than 5,000 security guards and police were stationed around the Yarkon Park stadium. The gates were opened three hours before the performance as hundreds of police battled to prevent the Israeli capital from becoming gridlocked by concert-goers.
Paul and his new love Nancy Shevell, 47, arrived in the small hours of Wednesday and checked into the Royal Suite at the Dan Hotel – one of the 21 suites and 70 rooms booked for the 100-strong team of musicians, technicians and hangers-on.
The couple spent the morning sunbathing on the hotel balcony overlooking the Mediterranean before making a quiet visit to Palestinians in the West Bank.
Their original plan had been to visit the Edward Said National Conservatory of Music in Ramallah, but word leaked out and anti-Israel protesters staged a demonstration outside the school.
His concert has been given the status of a state visit. Radio stations have been playing wall-to-wall Beatles music all week, weddings have been re-scheduled, theatre performances cancelled and most Tel Aviv clubs closed to avoid competing with the big event.
More than 5,000 security guards and police were stationed around the Yarkon Park stadium. The gates were opened three hours before the performance as hundreds of police battled to prevent the Israeli capital from becoming gridlocked by concert-goers.
Paul and his new love Nancy Shevell, 47, arrived in the small hours of Wednesday and checked into the Royal Suite at the Dan Hotel – one of the 21 suites and 70 rooms booked for the 100-strong team of musicians, technicians and hangers-on.
The couple spent the morning sunbathing on the hotel balcony overlooking the Mediterranean before making a quiet visit to Palestinians in the West Bank.
Their original plan had been to visit the Edward Said National Conservatory of Music in Ramallah, but word leaked out and anti-Israel protesters staged a demonstration outside the school.
To the alarm of his security advisers, Sir Paul decided instead to go to the conservatory's branch in Bethlehem, also in the West Bank.
To the delight of the 160 students, he sat in on a class, then produced a harmonica and played them a tune.
To the delight of the 160 students, he sat in on a class, then produced a harmonica and played them a tune.
Wednesday, 24 September 2008
A Therapeutic Film
JERUSALEM REPORT : October 13, 2008
By Leora Eren Frucht
The film "Circumcise Me" was a sort of therapy for filmmakers Matthew Kalman and David Blumenfeld, both veteran news reporters who live in Jerusalem.
British-born Kalman, a reporter, and Canadian-born Blumenfeld, a photographer, have worked for leading media outlets, including Time, Newsweek and the Boston Globe.
"At the height of the intifada, David and I were doing a lot of work together, reporting mainly about guns, bombs, exploded buses and people dying," recalls Kalman. "We were also asked to produce other people's documentaries - and those were also about suicide bombings.
"After you've seen enough dead bodies lying on the pavement after a suicide bombing of a bus, you realize you're becoming inured to the shock. When you see people still fused to their seats inside this blackened shell, and all you're looking at is the camera angle, you realize that you're losing a bit of what makes you human.
"It got a bit grueling and depressing. So David suggested we do something of our own, something fun. Doing this film has enabled us as reporters to retrieve a little bit of our own humanity. Basically this has been just one big act of therapy."
On an evening in 2004, he recalls, "I went to the opening night of Off the Wall Comedy Club [an English-language comedy club in Jerusalem], and there was this haredi [ultra-Orthodox] guy standing in the corner. I felt like saying to him: 'You're in the wrong place - this is a comedy club. Can I direct you to Me'a She'arim [an ultra Orthodox neighborhood]?' And it turns out that he was the headliner."
Kalman, who founded a comedy club at his alma mater, Cambridge, was delighted. "I thought he was funny, talented, charismatic and found his story so compelling. It seemed like the obvious choice for a documentary. That night I called David and told him: 'We've got our subject.'"
Campbell readily agreed. "He had nothing better to do," quips Kalman as Campbell, seated nearby, nods in agreement.
The film is an abbreviated version of Campbell's standup comedy show which is itself a tapestry of his colorful life and observations about subjects close to his heart. The filmmakers shot six of his shows and conducted interviews with the comedian in different locations in Jerusalem. There is also footage of Campbell's father, a lapsed Catholic who remains perplexed but not bitter about his son's conversion. The movie is being screened at over a dozen film festivals in cities across the United States over the next few months (http://circumcise-me.blogspot.com).
"In a lot of documentaries, the filmmakers research the story, but in this case the story was right there," Kalman notes. He also says that he had grown tired of interviewing "cynical politicians" and terrorists, while ignoring what he regards as the real heroes of the story - ordinary people coping in an extraordinary situation. He wanted to show that side of Israeli reality, too.
"The fact is that even at the height of the intifada, people continued to laugh. There was still a life going on in Jerusalem against the background of this craziness. And as news reporters we never got to report that."
One segment of the film - and show - deals with Campbell's own intifada experiences, including the loss of two close friends killed in a terror attack at the Hebrew University cafeteria in July, 2002. He handles the subject with sensitivity, but doesn't refrain from telling jokes about terrorists.
"In this film, we wanted to tackle the intifada, but from a different angle," says Kalman. "We think it's the first intifada comedy."
Extract from an article in Issue 13, October 13, 2008 of The Jerusalem Report.
By Leora Eren Frucht
The film "Circumcise Me" was a sort of therapy for filmmakers Matthew Kalman and David Blumenfeld, both veteran news reporters who live in Jerusalem.
British-born Kalman, a reporter, and Canadian-born Blumenfeld, a photographer, have worked for leading media outlets, including Time, Newsweek and the Boston Globe.
"At the height of the intifada, David and I were doing a lot of work together, reporting mainly about guns, bombs, exploded buses and people dying," recalls Kalman. "We were also asked to produce other people's documentaries - and those were also about suicide bombings.
"After you've seen enough dead bodies lying on the pavement after a suicide bombing of a bus, you realize you're becoming inured to the shock. When you see people still fused to their seats inside this blackened shell, and all you're looking at is the camera angle, you realize that you're losing a bit of what makes you human.
"It got a bit grueling and depressing. So David suggested we do something of our own, something fun. Doing this film has enabled us as reporters to retrieve a little bit of our own humanity. Basically this has been just one big act of therapy."
On an evening in 2004, he recalls, "I went to the opening night of Off the Wall Comedy Club [an English-language comedy club in Jerusalem], and there was this haredi [ultra-Orthodox] guy standing in the corner. I felt like saying to him: 'You're in the wrong place - this is a comedy club. Can I direct you to Me'a She'arim [an ultra Orthodox neighborhood]?' And it turns out that he was the headliner."
Kalman, who founded a comedy club at his alma mater, Cambridge, was delighted. "I thought he was funny, talented, charismatic and found his story so compelling. It seemed like the obvious choice for a documentary. That night I called David and told him: 'We've got our subject.'"
Campbell readily agreed. "He had nothing better to do," quips Kalman as Campbell, seated nearby, nods in agreement.
The film is an abbreviated version of Campbell's standup comedy show which is itself a tapestry of his colorful life and observations about subjects close to his heart. The filmmakers shot six of his shows and conducted interviews with the comedian in different locations in Jerusalem. There is also footage of Campbell's father, a lapsed Catholic who remains perplexed but not bitter about his son's conversion. The movie is being screened at over a dozen film festivals in cities across the United States over the next few months (http://circumcise-me.blogspot.com).
"In a lot of documentaries, the filmmakers research the story, but in this case the story was right there," Kalman notes. He also says that he had grown tired of interviewing "cynical politicians" and terrorists, while ignoring what he regards as the real heroes of the story - ordinary people coping in an extraordinary situation. He wanted to show that side of Israeli reality, too.
"The fact is that even at the height of the intifada, people continued to laugh. There was still a life going on in Jerusalem against the background of this craziness. And as news reporters we never got to report that."
One segment of the film - and show - deals with Campbell's own intifada experiences, including the loss of two close friends killed in a terror attack at the Hebrew University cafeteria in July, 2002. He handles the subject with sensitivity, but doesn't refrain from telling jokes about terrorists.
"In this film, we wanted to tackle the intifada, but from a different angle," says Kalman. "We think it's the first intifada comedy."
Extract from an article in Issue 13, October 13, 2008 of The Jerusalem Report.
Tuesday, 23 September 2008
Outrage as Jewish newspapers ban pictures of Israel's new PM because she's a woman
DAILY MAIL ONLINE : 22nd September 2008
By Matthew Kalman
Tzipi Livni is poised to become Israel's next prime minister - but ultra-orthodox newspapers in the Jewish state are refusing to publish her picture for reasons of religious modesty.
Israeli feminists have described the ban as 'laughably ludicrous.'
The 50-year-old foreign minister and mother of two has been hailed by some of the world's press as a 'Mossad beauty' but she has image problems closer to home.
Only about 600,000 of Israel's 7 million population are haredi, or ultra-orthodox, but they pack a strong political punch and include key officials including cabinet ministers and the mayor of Jerusalem.
Their lifestyle is governed by a strict code with regulations for food, clothes, reading material and education which many critics say goes beyond the rules of orthodox Judaism.
Signs hanging at the entrance to the ultra-orthodox neighbourhoods in Jerusalem warn women to dress modestly in the area.
'Mossad beauty': Tzipi Livni
'No haredi paper will publish Livni's picture,' said Avraham Kroizer, a public relations adviser to the incoming premier.
'Graphic artists will blur the faces of women that do make their way into pictures that the papers want to use.
'They will also blur pictures of television sets or other items deemed improper to be seen by the wider haredi public.'
Naomi Ragen, author of The Sacrifice of Tamar and other popular novels set in the ultra-orthodox world, said the ban on Livni's photograph was 'over the top.'
'But I'm not surprised,' said Ms Ragen, who campaigns for equal rights for religious women.
'The haredi newspapers never publish pictures of women. Women don't exist. These papers are the equivalent of a boys' club.
'Even when they are advertising for the female market, they won't print a picture of a woman holding a baby.'
One ultra-orthodox paper also said it would not be using Livni's name Tzipi - short for 'Tziporah' which means 'bird.'
'We might write "Mrs. T. Livni" or just "Mrs. Livni," but the name. Tzipi is too familiar. It is not acceptable to address a woman using her first name, especially when she goes by a nickname,' said a senior editor at Hamodia, the oldest ultra-orthodox daily.
'For us the newspaper is an educational device that not only informs but also teaches people how to behave,' he said.
Livni would be Israel's first woman prime minister since Golda Meir resigned in 1974. The Hamodia editor admitted their policy back then was different.
'Golda was an institution. She was a respected figure with decades of political experience before she became prime minister. But in recent years there has been depreciation in the level of politicians,' he explained.
Ms Ragen said it was 'laughably ludicrous' not to print Livni's full name.
'Why this would be a problem is beyond the grasp of an orthodox woman like myself,' she said.
'There is nothing in Jewish law that would remotely be able to excuse this behaviour.'
'God has no problem putting the names of many women in the Bible. Why the ultra-orthodox world feel they have to improve upon God escapes me. They are getting more and more fanatical every day,' she said.
Professor Galia Golan of the Inter-Disciplinary Centre University and a founder of the Israel Women's network, said the ban was 'like something from the middle ages.'
'It's ridiculous and it's terrible,' said Prof Golan.
'They are more conservative than Islamic fundamentalists who have no problems seeing women in public life.'
'To make a difference between Livni and Golda Meir is even more insulting. It suggests they had no problem with Golda because she was so manly, whereas Livni has honesty, intelligence, integrity – a different kind of politician who represents the feminine side of politics.'
By Matthew Kalman
Tzipi Livni is poised to become Israel's next prime minister - but ultra-orthodox newspapers in the Jewish state are refusing to publish her picture for reasons of religious modesty.
Israeli feminists have described the ban as 'laughably ludicrous.'
The 50-year-old foreign minister and mother of two has been hailed by some of the world's press as a 'Mossad beauty' but she has image problems closer to home.
Only about 600,000 of Israel's 7 million population are haredi, or ultra-orthodox, but they pack a strong political punch and include key officials including cabinet ministers and the mayor of Jerusalem.Their lifestyle is governed by a strict code with regulations for food, clothes, reading material and education which many critics say goes beyond the rules of orthodox Judaism.
Signs hanging at the entrance to the ultra-orthodox neighbourhoods in Jerusalem warn women to dress modestly in the area.
'Mossad beauty': Tzipi Livni
'No haredi paper will publish Livni's picture,' said Avraham Kroizer, a public relations adviser to the incoming premier.
'Graphic artists will blur the faces of women that do make their way into pictures that the papers want to use.
'They will also blur pictures of television sets or other items deemed improper to be seen by the wider haredi public.'
Naomi Ragen, author of The Sacrifice of Tamar and other popular novels set in the ultra-orthodox world, said the ban on Livni's photograph was 'over the top.'
'But I'm not surprised,' said Ms Ragen, who campaigns for equal rights for religious women.
'The haredi newspapers never publish pictures of women. Women don't exist. These papers are the equivalent of a boys' club.
'Even when they are advertising for the female market, they won't print a picture of a woman holding a baby.'
One ultra-orthodox paper also said it would not be using Livni's name Tzipi - short for 'Tziporah' which means 'bird.'
'We might write "Mrs. T. Livni" or just "Mrs. Livni," but the name. Tzipi is too familiar. It is not acceptable to address a woman using her first name, especially when she goes by a nickname,' said a senior editor at Hamodia, the oldest ultra-orthodox daily.
'For us the newspaper is an educational device that not only informs but also teaches people how to behave,' he said.
Livni would be Israel's first woman prime minister since Golda Meir resigned in 1974. The Hamodia editor admitted their policy back then was different.
'Golda was an institution. She was a respected figure with decades of political experience before she became prime minister. But in recent years there has been depreciation in the level of politicians,' he explained.
Ms Ragen said it was 'laughably ludicrous' not to print Livni's full name.
'Why this would be a problem is beyond the grasp of an orthodox woman like myself,' she said.
'There is nothing in Jewish law that would remotely be able to excuse this behaviour.'
'God has no problem putting the names of many women in the Bible. Why the ultra-orthodox world feel they have to improve upon God escapes me. They are getting more and more fanatical every day,' she said.
Professor Galia Golan of the Inter-Disciplinary Centre University and a founder of the Israel Women's network, said the ban was 'like something from the middle ages.'
'It's ridiculous and it's terrible,' said Prof Golan.
'They are more conservative than Islamic fundamentalists who have no problems seeing women in public life.'
'To make a difference between Livni and Golda Meir is even more insulting. It suggests they had no problem with Golda because she was so manly, whereas Livni has honesty, intelligence, integrity – a different kind of politician who represents the feminine side of politics.'
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