Gaza-bound ship alters course after Israeli warning

Israeli Arab lawmaker Haneen Zoabi in her office at the Knesset, the Israeli parliament, in Jerusalem last month. The Knesset voted on Tuesday in favour of scrapping Ms Zoabi's diplomatic privileges, after she was accused of siding with the state's enemies by taking part in an aid flotilla to the Gaza Strip. Photograph: Ronen Zvulun/Reuters

IRISH TIMES, Thursday, July 15, 2010

MATTHEW KALMAN in Jerusalem

A SHIP sponsored by a Libyan charity that announced it would breach the Israeli blockade of Gaza with 2,000 tons of supplies reached an Egyptian port yesterday after altering its course. This followed a warning from Israel’s navy not to head to the blockaded Gaza Strip.

An Egyptian official said the Moldovan-flagged Amalthea arrived in El Arish, on Egypt’s Mediterranean coast about 45km (27 miles) south of the border with Gaza, in mid-evening and would begin unloading cargo.

“Medical supplies and passengers will enter Gaza through the Rafah border , while food will enter through the Awja border,” said Capt Gamal Abdel Maqsoud, who is in charge of the port.

In Jerusalem, meanwhile, an Arab member of the Knesset parliament warned of “a threat to democracy” after she was stripped of some of her parliamentary privileges as punishment for participating in the last blockade-busting flotilla in May.

Legislator Hanin Zoabi was on board the Mavi Marmara on May 31st when it was stormed by Israeli commandos and nine Turkish activists were killed. She says she was below deck during the raid and did not witness the killings.

The Israeli navy said it was monitoring the Moldovan-flagged ship that had been re-dubbed Al-Amal ( The Hope ) as it headed south yesterday after a night of slow progress due to engine trouble.

“You are in charge of the people on the ship, and any attempt to enter the area will be your fault only,” an Israeli naval officer warned the captain in a message broadcast on Israel Radio.

A reporter from Al-Jazeera on board the vessel said the Israeli ships were blocking its passage east to Gaza. He said the activists on board from the Gaddafi International Charity and Development Association headed by Saif Al-Islam Gaddafi, son of the Libyan leader, were determined to break the blockade.

A website recording the ship’s position ceased to function as it came within about five miles of El-Arish yesterday.

In Gaza City, Hamas prime minister Ismail Haniyeh led Palestinian demonstrators preparing to welcome The Hope to the tiny fishing port in Gaza City. He urged the ship to stay on course.

“Don’t fall for any tricks and don’t dock in any other port other than the one in Gaza. You are our sailing hope at sea,” said Mr Haniyeh at a ceremony in Jabalya, north of Gaza City, where he named a street after the Turkish flotilla.

Israel has eased the land blockade on Gaza, but Mr Haniyeh demanded “a complete end to the siege”. Dan Meridor, the deputy Israeli prime minister, said that all goods except weapons or other military material could be transported by land from Egypt or the Israeli port of Ashdod.

“What we want is to set the arrangement for inspections, so we can always check and not allow them to bust their way in,” Mr Meridor said in a radio interview.

Ms Zoabi of the National Democratic Assembly Party said she was not surprised that the “vengeful majority” in Israel’s parliament had voted to revoke her diplomatic passport and legal privileges.

“It is no wonder that a state which denies a million Arab citizens their basic rights is also revoking the rights of an MP who faithfully represents her voters,” said Ms Zoabi, one of 10 Knesset members representing Arab parties. There are also four Druze MPs who represent Zionist parties.

“This is a dangerous precedent for the Arab public, and a hostile message,” she said.

Israel Radio aired yesterday what it said was the navy’s warning to the captain that he would be held responsible for any showdown at sea.

On June 5th , the navy commandeered the Irish-owned aid ship Rachel Corrie after it refused orders to turn back or dock in Ashdod for its cargo to be vetted for overland transfer to Gaza.

An Israeli inquiry by a military panel into the navys killing of the Turkish activists concluded on Monday that there had been faults in planning the May 31st interception but that commandos had resorted to live gunfire in self-defence.

Israeli top officials to testify over botched ship raid

IRISH TIMES, Wednesday, July 14, 2010

MATTHEW KALMAN in Jerusalem

ISRAEL’S PRIME minister, defence minister and military chief of staff will testify early next month before a commission of inquiry into the botched commando raid on a Turkish ship bound for Gaza in May that left nine civilians dead and Israeli diplomacy in tatters.

But the next challenge to Israel’s maritime blockade of the embattled Hamas-controlled enclave is expected today.

By yesterday afternoon, the Hope, a Moldovan-flagged ship carrying a crew of 12, nine activists and 2,000 tonnes of supplies, was 120km off the Gaza coast.

An official log filed by the ship’s captain with authorities in Greece says its final destination is El-Arish, an Egyptian port on the northern Sinai coast near the Gaza border.

Israeli military officials said they had made initial radio contact with the Hope. An Al-Jazeera reporter on board said Israeli officials had threatened the ship unless it changed course away from Gaza. The Israeli military denied making threats, but said the vessel would not be allowed through the blockade.

“We asked them what their plans are and to identify who is on the boat. We’re waiting to see if they go to El-Arish as they first said they would. Taking over the ship is the last resort,” an Israeli army spokesman told The Irish Times.

The ship set sail for Gaza last weekend sponsored by the Tripoli-based Gaddafi International Charity and Development Association headed by Saif Al-Islam Gaddafi, son of the Libyan leader. Activists on the ship say they have invited the Israeli navy to board the vessel and inspect its cargo before allowing them to proceed.

“No weapons, no guns, no weapons on board,” said a crew member identified only as Angelo in a radio message apparently transmitted to the Israeli navy and broadcast on Israel Radio.

Last month, Israel raised restrictions on hundreds of goods it says will now be allowed through land crossings after inspection, but has vowed to keep the maritime blockade in place. Israel says it needs to inspect goods imported into Gaza in order to stop rockets and other weapons from reaching Hamas, which has controlled Gaza since it overthrew the Fatah forces of Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas in 2007.

Israeli court concedes extra powers for flotilla inquiry

IRISH TIMES, Tuesday, July 13, 2010

MATTHEW KALMAN in Jerusalem

PEACE CAMPAIGNERS in Israel claimed victory yesterday in a legal tussle with the Israeli government to increase the powers of a commission investigating the botched raid on a Turkish aid vessel that left nine civilians dead and Israeli diplomacy in tatters.

A compromise decision of the Israeli supreme court opened the door for the Turkel Commission, which includes David Trimble as one of two international observers, to subpoena soldiers and military commanders – a move the Israeli government had fought to prevent.

Meanwhile, the military’s own operational inquiry into the pre-dawn commando raid on the Mavi Marmara on May 31st levelled scathing criticism at the higher echelons of the Israeli navy, citing a series of intelligence and planning failures that led to the deaths of the vessel’s passengers and international embarrassment for Israel.

As a direct result, Israel has been forced to ease its blockade on the Gaza Strip after a four-year siege failed in its declared aims of bringing down the Hamas government and securing the release of captured soldier Gilad Shalit.

The “Public Commission to Examine the Maritime Incident of 31 May 2010” was created under the chairmanship of retired Supreme Court justice Yaakov Turkel in June, but no sooner had hearings begun than Turkel demanded his powers be increased. At the same time, the Gush Shalom (Peace Bloc) movement petitioned the Supreme Court demanding that the commission either be reconstituted as a full state commission of inquiry or scrapped.

On July 4th, the Israeli government bowed to Judge Turkel’s demands and reconstituted his inquiry into a government inquiry commission, which under Israeli law has powers to subpoena witnesses and compel them to testify under oath. But it excluded military personnel.

Veteran Israeli peace campaigner Uri Avnery told The Irish Times that the government’s decision was illegal, since the newly empowered commission had the right under law to summon any witness, including soldiers.

Mr Avnery said yesterday’s Supreme Court hearing was “a double victory” for Gush Shalom.

“It was the first time in the history of Israel that the court agreed to intervene in a matter concerning boards of inquiry. There have been many petitions before and they all have been refused,” said Mr Avnery.

“Second, the court actually said that if Turkel wants to interrogate soldiers he can do so. If the government does not accede to this demand, then we all go to the court again and the court will do what it deems fit.

“There’s a strong hint that then they will compel the government to agree,” he said.

The government had argued that the parallel military inquiry that reported yesterday made it redundant for Judge Turkel’s commission to also question soldiers, but they agreed to the compromise suggested by the court.

The findings of the military inquiry headed by reserve Brig Gen Giora Eiland appeared to raise more questions than they answered.

“The team concluded that not all possible intelligence-gathering methods were fully implemented and that the co-ordination between navy intelligence and the Israel defence intelligence was insufficient,” the committee said in a statement.

“The anticipated level of violence used against the forces was underestimated . . . The operation relied excessively on a single course of action, albeit a probable one, while no alternative courses of action were prepared for the event of more dangerous scenarios,” said the committee.

Israel will not allow aid ship to dock in Gaza

IRISH TIMES, Monday, July 12, 2010

MATTHEW KALMAN in Jerusalem

ISRAEL WILL not allow an aid ship sent by a Libyan group to reach Gaza, foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman said yesterday, just over a month after Israeli commandos killed nine activists in a raid at sea.

“I say very clearly, no ship will arrive in Gaza. We will not permit our sovereignty to be harmed,” Mr Lieberman said on army radio.

The Moldovan-flagged Amalthea , renamed Hope , left Greece on Saturday bound for Gaza on a trip organised by a charity chaired by Libyan leader Muammar Gadafy’s son Saif al-Islam Gadafy.

The group said the ship was carrying some 2,000 tonnes of food and medicine and complied with international rules.

Confusion surrounded the final destination of the Hope yesterday.

“Our mission is humanitarian and this is not a military operation or an act of terror,” Mr Gadafy told al-Sharq al-Awsat newspaper.

Ahmad Tibi, an Arab member of Israel’s Knesset, said the ship was aiming to break the blockade and head for the tiny fishing port on the beach at Gaza City. “The land and sea siege on Gaza can’t continue,” said Mr Tibi. He said the ship was carrying “food, particularly baby food, cereal, various kinds of juice, various medicines, especially for kidney patients, a generator and other aid that doesn’t include prohibited items.”

Mr Tibi said the activists on board were not intending to mount any violent resistance if they were intercepted by the Israeli navy but said the ship should be allowed to continue on to Gaza after an inspection.

Jamal al-Khudari, chairman of the Popular Committee Against the Siege, said in Gaza that they were expecting the ship there some time on Wednesday. “The ship’s crew will not surrender to the Zionists’ threats not to reach the Strip and dock in Ashdod,” he said.

In Jerusalem, Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu said the sea blockade would remain in place – a policy that he had explained to American and UN officials during a trip to the US last week. “I found broad support for our decision to lift the civilian blockade on Gaza while strictly maintaining the security blockade, and the understanding that we are doing what must be done in order to prevent the entry into Gaza of weapons, missiles and rockets, out of concern for the security of Israel’s citizens,” Mr Netanayahu told cabinet ministers.

Meanwhile, a former top Palestinian peace negotiator has warned that Mr Netanyahu’s refusal to freeze new Israeli construction in East Jerusalem had turned the city into “a ticking time bomb”.

Ahmed Qurei, the former Palestinian prime minister, told a Hebrew University of Jerusalem conference that Mr Netanyahu’s policies were endangering the chance of restarting peace talks.

200,000 join 12-day march seeking Gilad Shalit release

Aviva Shalit: "The time has come to say Stop! Enough!"

IRISH TIMES, Saturday, July 10, 2010

MATTHEW KALMAN in Jerusalem

FOUR YEARS after their soldier son Gilad was captured in a cross-border raid from Gaza, Noam and Aviva Shalit took to the road on a 12-day pilgrimage from their home on the Lebanese border to Jerusalem in an attempt to finally secure his freedom.

More than 200,000 people are believed to have joined them on the march, which attracted adoring press coverage and a raft of celebrities from supermodel Bar Refaeli to “Three Tenors” conductor Zubin Mehta, who staged a special concert for the family by the Israel Philharmonic in the desert on the Gaza border.

Hamas has demanded the release of 1,000 prisoners held by Israel for Sgt Shalit’s safe return (he was promoted from corporal while in captivity), including dozens responsible for the bloodiest suicide bomb attacks of the last intifada.

In polls, 72 per cent of Israelis said they were prepared to pay that price, and a similar number said they saw no other way to secure Sgt Shalit’s release. More than 80 per cent said they backed the Shalit family’s decision to take to the streets to pressure the Israeli government after four frustrating years in which their son has been denied any access from the Red Cross or other independent outsiders. The last communication was a video message recorded by Hamas almost a year ago.

“Four years of hell is too much,” Aviva Shalit told a rally in Jerusalem marking the end of their long march and the start of a vigil in a protest tent outside the official residence of prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu, where a huge portrait of the soldier hangs alongside a counter recording the number of days since his capture.

“There are no more excuses. My son has endured 1,474 days of hardship and pain in Hamas captivity. The time has come to say Stop! Enough!” she declared.

Israel is haunted by the experience of previous prisoner exchanges, when the release of convicted terrorists has backfired badly.

In a speech on July 1st that enraged the Shalit family, Mr Netanyahu, whose brother was killed leading the Entebbe rescue of hostages in 1976, said Israel could not pay “any price” for the soldier’s release.

“The most famous deal was the Jibril deal of 1985, in the framework of which 1,150 terrorists were released. Almost half of them returned to engage in terror and to murder dozens of Israelis at their own hands,” he said.

He must also consider the political cost of rewarding Hamas at the expense of the Palestinian Authority government of President Mahmoud Abbas, with whom the Israelis are trying to open direct peace talks.

The Hamas list of prisoners to be released is headed by Marwan Barghouti, Mr Abbas’s likely successor as Fatah leader and Palestinian president.

Fury as UK envoy hails terror chief: Hague faces calls to sack our woman in Beiruit

By Jason Groves and Matthew Kalman
DAILY MAIL 10th July 2010

William Hague was under pressure to sack Britain's ambassador to the Lebanon last night after she heaped praise on the spiritual leader of the terrorist group Hezbollah.

In an extraordinary 'personal statement' on the Foreign Office website, Frances Guy paid tribute to Sheikh Sayyed Muhammad Hussein Fadlallah, who inspired a string of terrorist attacks against Israel and the West.

Fadlullah, who died last weekend at the age of 74, became infamous in 1983 amid claims he had personally authorised the truck bombing of two barracks in Beirut, which killed 241 U.S. Marines and 58 French paratroopers.

Controversy: British Ambassador to Lebanon Frances Guy, pictured with Ayatollah Fadlallah, has sparked anger after praising the Hezbollah cleric in her blog

He was also behind the kidnapping of dozens of hostages, including Terry Waite, John McCarthy and Brian Keenan. He recently issued a fatwa legitimising suicide bombing.

But writing on the Foreign Office website this week Miss Guy, Britain's ambassador to the Lebanon since 2006, hailed Fadlallah as a 'true man of religion' and said he was the man she admired the most.

MOHAMMAD HUSSEIN FADLALLAH

• Born in Najaf, Iraq, in 1935 after his parents moved there from Lebanon to study theology. He returned to Najaf to study Islamic sciences for 22 years before moving to Lebanon
• The Muslim cleric was staunchly anti-U.S., but condemned the 9/11 terror attacks and had a progressive view towards the role of women in Islamic society
• Fadlallah was the target of several failed assassination attempts, including one in 1985 when a car bomb exploded in Beirut
• He died on Sunday at the age of 74 after a period of bad health. Thousands attended his funeral on Tuesday and Lebanese authorities declared it an official day of mourning.

Under the headline 'The passing of a decent man', she wrote: 'If I was sad to hear the news (of his death), I know other people's lives will be truly blighted.

'The world needs more men like him, willing to reach out across faiths, acknowledging the reality of the modern world and daring to confront old constraints. May he rest in peace.'

Earlier this week the American news network CNN sacked its Middle East editor Octavia Nasr for voicing similar sentiments about Fadlallah.

Miss Guy's comments have now been removed from the Foreign Office website.

Foreign Office sources said Mr Hague was 'deeply unimpressed' by her actions.

Last night the Foreign Secretary was under mounting pressure to remove Miss Guy from her post following an outcry in Israel over her views.

In a statement Ron Prosor, Israel's ambassador to London, said: 'In 1983, the Holocaust-denying Sheikh Fadlallah murdered almost 300 American and French servicemen in Beirut.

Pressure: William Hague, pictured at a press conference with Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, has been urged to sack Mrs May

'It is surprising that the British Ambassador believes that, "the world needs more people like him".'

HISTORY OF HEZBOLLAH

• First emerged as a Shi'a military organisation in 1982 following the Israeli invasion of Lebanon. Its forces were trained by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard
• It became one of the first Islamic resistance groups to employ suicide bombing, against members of the Israeli Defence Force during the war between 1982 and 2000
• At the end of the civil war in 1990, Hezbollah became a political group, winning 12 seats in the 1992 elections and launching the al-Manar TV station
• Hezbollah operates several hospitals, news services, and educational facilities within Lebanon
• Many countries designate Hezbollah as a terrorist organisation, and claim it is funded by the Islamic Republic of Iran.
  

Colonel Richard Kemp, a former adviser on terrorism to Tony Blair, said Miss Guy's position was probably untenable.

'The Foreign Secretary should consider whether she is a suitable person to remain in such an important and sensitive post,' he said.

'As a minimum she should be required to issue a full apology. Hezbollah have other political and social functions but they are above all a terrorist organization.

'Hezbollah carry out terrorist acts on behalf of Iran. They are responsible for helping to train and equip extremists in Iraq who attacked and killed British soldiers.

'They are potentially even more dangerous than Al Qaeda.'

A Foreign Office spokesman said: 'The ambassador expressed a personal view on Sheik Fadlallah. This did not fully reflect Government policy and the blog has been taken down.

'While we welcomed his progressive views on women's rights and inter-faith dialogue, we also had profound disagreements - especially over his statements advocating attacks on Israel.'

Revered: Supporters of Fadlallah jump on his coffin during the funeral procession. The cleric was viewed as one of Shia Islam's highest authorities

Israelis welcome warm Obama reception for PM

The Irish Times - Thursday, July 8, 2010

Barack Obama listening to Binyamin Netanyahu in the Oval Office of the White House on Tuesday. Photograph: Reuters/Kevin Lamarque

MATTHEW KALMAN in Jerusalem

ISRAELI GOVERNMENT ministers yesterday expressed satisfaction with the warm reception given to prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu by President Barack Obama at the White House on Tuesday. Palestinians, though, were sceptical and some Israeli commentators derided the carefully staged photo-ops as “soap opera”.

It was Mr Netanyahu’s fifth meeting with Mr Obama in little more than a year and marked a stark contrast to their last encounter, when the Israeli prime minister was left cooling his heels during an Obama family dinner and then hustled out a back door.

Officials travelling with Mr Netanyahu indicated that Israel had agreed to an unofficial extension of a 10-month freeze on West Bank settlements to pave the way for direct peace talks with the Palestinians. “I think that the success of this meeting expresses the depth of the basic relationship between us and the US, and between us and the Obama administration, and of the importance of this special relationship on the subject of Israel’s security,” said defence minister and Labor Party leader Ehud Barak. “There were more things discussed than have been published in the media,” he said. “I don’t want to delude us – there will be ups and downs and difficult moments throughout the process, but I believe and hope that we, in the next few weeks, will be in the middle of direct talks that will promote the chances for peace and will ensure the security and interests of Israel.”

Foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman, who lives in the settlement of Nokedim near Bethlehem that is likely to be evacuated or destroyed in any peace deal, was uncharacteristically upbeat about the White House meeting, to which he was not invited.

“It’s important to conduct direct negotiations and it’s important to keep the diplomatic process alive. This dialogue . . . is important in itself.” Mr Lieberman warned, however, that it was “unrealistic” to expect the two sides to settle all their differences in the two-year timeframe that Mr Obama has proposed.

He said Mr Netanyahu told him after the meeting that the settlement issue was not central to the agenda but he indicated he would support a slowdown in construction for the sake of diplomacy.

Palestinian officials wondered if Mr Obama’s extravagant welcome for Mr Netanyahu that included a cheesy fireside chat between wives Michelle and Sara didn’t have some connection with shoring up Democratic support among Jewish voters in the crucial mid-term congressional elections.

“How can you conduct meaningful negotiations when Israeli bulldozers are digging up the land where we hope to establish the Palestinian state?” asked Palestinian chief negotiator Saeb Erekat. “The whole world and the US administration knows that the one who is blocking the door to direct negotiations is Netanyahu,” he said.

Israeli commentator Aluf Benn said Mr Obama’s hardline approach had failed to shift Mr Netanyahu. “Obama is changing his tactics. Instead of punishing Netanyahu with sticks, he is trying to entice him with carrots,” Mr Benn wrote in the Haaretz daily.

Israel Takes Intelligence Gamble on Hezbollah

AOL NEWS, Thursday July 8

Matthew Kalman Contributor

AOL News

JERUSALEM (July 8) -- In a rare and risky maneuver, the Israeli military has made public detailed intelligence on Hezbollah's military deployment in southern Lebanon, including data, maps and surveillance photographs.

Military chiefs say the material amounts to proof of a massive build-up of Hezbollah firepower in Lebanese villages close to Israel's northern border. Analysts suggest that Israel has displayed its intelligence in a bid to forestall any Hezbollah plans for an attack.

Israel also named the top Iranian commander in Lebanon as Hossein Mahadavi, a senior officer of the Al-Quds Force of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps. Israeli intelligence identified Mahadavi as "commander of Iran's overseas division" in charge of liaison between Tehran and Hezbollah.

By revealing such detailed intelligence data, Israel risks exposing its sources and giving Hezbollah clues on how best to redeploy its forces to new positions.

Several Lebanese citizens have been arrested in recent months and charged with spying for Israel.

Israel and Hezbollah last went to war in July 2006 after Hezbollah launched a cross-border raid in which eight Israeli soldiers were killed and two others kidnapped. The bodies of the missing solders were exchanged two years later for Samir Quntar, a Palestinian Liberation Front gunman from Lebanon convicted of killing three Israelis in a 1979 attack.

Now there are fears that growing tensions along the Lebanese border could spark a repeat of that monthlong conflict, in which more than 1,100 Lebanese and 159 Israelis were killed as Israeli troops invaded southern Lebanon and Hezbollah rained up to 300 rockets a day on northern Israel.

Israel says that U.N. Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended the 2006 Israel-Lebanon war and banned the transfer of rockets and weapons to Hezbollah, has been largely ineffective.

France has demanded a Security Council debate after French troops in the UNIFIL peacekeeping force were attacked, beaten and disarmed by villagers on July 3.

Israeli intelligence says the Shiite group now has thousands of fighters deployed along the border and an arsenal of more than 40,000 rockets supplied via Syria and Iran that could strike deep inside Israel -- even as far as Tel Aviv.

In a highly unusual on-record briefing, Col. Ronen Marley, commander of the Western Brigade on Israel's tense northern border, told reporters that "Hezbollah is establishing itself with increasing strength in the villages. Every day they are collecting significant intelligence on our forces along the border and every day they are engaged in digging, building and laying communications infrastructure to prepare themselves for war."

As an example, he produced aerial photographs taken by Israeli spy drones of Al-Khiam, a complex used as a detention camp during Israel's 18-year occupation of southern Lebanon that is now home to 23,000 people.

One building, marked in red on the photograph and highlighted with a large "X" in an extraordinary 3-D graphic that could have come from an arcade video game, is identified by the Israelis as a weapons storage facility located less than 150 yards from a school.



Marley revealed previously classified photographs to show what he said was a unit of 90 Hezbollah militants operating in Al-Khiam. He said more than 200 rockets were stored in the village.

He said Hezbollah had transformed more than 100 villages in the border area into "military bases" in preparation for an Israeli attack.

"By declassifying the intelligence, Israel is preparing the world," Jerusalem Post security analyst Yaakov Katz told Sky News. "It is to get the world to realize what will happen if there is a war. If there is a war there will be large-scale civilian casualties and vast devastation."

But Gerald Steinberg, head of the Project on Conflict Resolution at Bar Ilan University, says Israel's aim is deterrence, not aggression.

"I don't think Israel has any interest in launching a war against Hezbollah -- just the opposite," Steinberg said, recalling that Israeli commanders had held a series of similar briefings in early 2006, in which they analyzed the rocket threat from Lebanon and laid out Israel's battle plan should Hezbollah dare to attack.

"Hezbollah failed to understand that message, and when it launched an unprovoked attack across the border in July 2006, the Israeli army unleashed the battle plan it had previewed," Steinberg said. "Later, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah admitted that if he had heeded Israel's warnings, he would not have started that war. This time, it looks like Israel is determined to dissuade Hezbollah from using its huge rocket arsenal again, and so the Israelis are sending this very clear deterrent message."

Hezbollah has not commented on the Israeli military's statements. Earlier this week, Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit told the pan-Arab daily al-Hayat that there would be no war between Israel and Lebanon "as long as there has not been any operation to launch missiles or cross the border."

Israeli soldier to be charged over deaths of Gaza women

THE IRISH TIMES
Wednesday, July 7, 2010

MATTHEW KALMAN in Jerusalem

AN ISRAELI soldier is to face manslaughter charges for shooting dead two Palestinian women during Israel’s invasion of the Gaza Strip in January 2009.

Eyewitnesses said Raya Salma Abu Hajjaj (64) and her daughter Majda (35) were shot while walking with a group of 31 family members, most of them children, waving a white sheet in surrender as they tried to seek cover from the advancing Israeli forces.

The case was one of 30 documented in a UN report prepared by a special committee headed by Judge Richard Goldstone, but the army said it was already investigating the incident when the report was published.

The soldier, identified only as First Sergeant S of the Givati Brigade, will be the third Israeli soldier to stand trial for offences during Operation Cast Lead.

This was a three-week aerial bombardment and ground invasion of the Gaza Strip that destroyed hundreds of homes and left some 1,400 Palestinians and 13 Israelis dead.

Maj Gen Avichai Mendelblit, the Israeli military advocate general, said yesterday he had decided to take legal action against Israeli soldiers involved in several incidents during the incursion. Some officers and soldiers would face criminal indictments as a result of their conduct, while others would face disciplinary hearings.

A criminal investigation is also under way in the case of the deaths of 29 members of the Al-Samouni family in an air strike.

“More than 150 incidents have been examined and nearly 50 investigations have been launched by the military police criminal investigations division since the operation’s conclusion,” a statement from the Israeli army said.

Critics have accused Israeli forces of wanton killing and destruction during the invasion, but the army said the military operation was “limited in the scope of fire and forces used”.

“IDF soldiers operated in crowded urban areas while Hamas made deliberate and cynical use of the Palestinian population, creating a complex security situation,” the army statement continued.

“Hamas operated from within civilian homes, schools, kindergartens, mosques, hospitals and UN facilities while the population in the Gaza Strip was made hostage.”

Israeli rights activists said the military indictments barely scratched the surface.

Roi Maor, executive director of the Yesh Din legal rights group, accused the Israeli army of “massive failure to investigate” most of those responsible for suspected war crimes. “From September 2000 to 2009, only 18 soldiers were indicted for the deaths of Palestinian civilians and only four were convicted, most of them on very light charges,” Mr Maor said. “This hardly changes that grim statistic.”

Sarit Michaeli of the B’Tselem human rights group called for an independent investigation into “the widescale killing of uninvolved civilians and the extensive damage that was wreaked on the Gaza Strip”.

Israel Holds Firm in Banning Gaza Residents From Studying in the West Bank

CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION
July 7, 2010

By Matthew Kalman

Jerusalem

The Israeli High Court has dashed hopes that Israel's decision to ease the blockade on Gaza will also enable students there to study in the West Bank.

In a ruling on Wednesday, judges here denied a petition by Fatima Sharif, a lawyer in Gaza, to attend classes at Birzeit University in the West Bank, where she has enrolled in a master's program in human rights and democracy.

The Israeli army effectively banned all Palestinian students in Gaza from attending West Bank universities several years ago and lately has been arresting and deporting those found in violation of the rule.

In 2007 the court instructed the army to reconsider the blanket ban and recommended that exceptions be granted in "cases that would have positive human consequences."

"Today the Defense Ministry admitted that since this judgment was handed down, Israel has not issued a single permit to a student from Gaza," said Sari Bashi of Gisha: Legal Center for Freedom of Movement, a human-rights group that represented Ms. Sharif.

Ms. Sharif said she believed her case fitted the criteria laid down by the court in 2007 because the course is not available in Gaza, where she works for an advocacy organization, the Al Mezan Center for Human Rights.

"I want to go back to Gaza at the end of my master's-degree studies to raise awareness about human rights within the society in Gaza. I firmly believe that every person has rights that they must be made aware of, including where these rights are violated, whether from within their own society or from without," she said.

The Ministry of Defense, the respondent in the case, told the court that an Israeli government decision on June 20 to ease the blockade on Gaza "does nothing to expand the criteria" for entering Israeli-controlled territory, "and it certainly does not permit passage for purposes of master's-degree studies."

Wednesday's decision appeared to set a harsh new precedent by accepting the Ministry of Defense statement without even referring to the 2007 ruling.

"We evaluated the case of the petitioner and were not convinced that in the current political-security situation, her personal circumstances justify intervening in the respondent's decision," the judges said in a written decision. "In a series of recent decisions, the court has not intervened in the policy of the respondent, and there is no justification to act differently in the case of the petitioner," they wrote.

Nomi Heger of Gisha, who argued the case for Ms. Sharif, said, "I regret that the court declined to follow its own case law and evaluate Ms. Sharif's request in the framework which the court itself established in 2007, namely the need to consider exceptions to the general ban."

Gisha officials said there is no possibility of appealing the decision, but, in light of the Ministry of Defense's admission that no students had been allowed to leave Gaza for the West Bank in the past three years, they plan to ask the ministry to clarify its understanding of the meaning of "positive human consequences."

Palestinians pack a punch through boycott of products made in Israeli settlements

THE IRISH TIMES
Tuesday, July 6, 2010

A joint initiative of the Palestinian Authority and private business is co-ordinating consumer power, writes Matthew Kalman in Ramallah, West Bank

UNDER THE logo “Your conscience, your choice”, a large yellow tag hanging in the window of Sana Obeidi’s pharmacy in Ramallah declares the shop to be free of any products from Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

The tag is in every shop window in Ramallah Hospital Street, and in more than 70 per cent of the 66,000 Palestinian shops throughout the West Bank.

The declaration, along with a pledge signed by shopkeepers not to buy settlement products and an official government certificate, is the result of a nationwide “Store to Store” campaign launched by Palestinian prime minister Salam Fayyad. “Our goal is to ensure the Palestinian market is free of Israeli settlement produce by the end of this year,” said Mr Fayyad.

“This will help ensure that the Palestinian economy can be self-sufficient,” he said. “Our goal is that every store in Palestine will carry our stickers. Then our homes will be cleared of the symbols of the occupation.”

Ms Obeidi said she supported Fayyad’s campaign, even though she personally had no need for it. “I’ve had this pharmacy for 20 years and I’ve never bought settler products,” said Ms Obeidi, whose sister lives in Dublin.

“If we buy from them, they use our own money to buy weapons to use against us.”

A booklet distributed to every Palestinian home in May listed some 500 items produced in the settlements, from food and wine to electronic goods and cosmetics. The boycott, which has aroused resentment in Israel, is being co-ordinated by the Al-Karameh (“Dignity”) National Empowerment Fund, a joint initiative of the Palestinian Authority government and private businesses.

“This is a Palestinian national programme to clear the West Bank of settlement products,” says Hitham Kayali, general co-ordinator of Al-Karameh.

“It comes as part of the government’s two-year plan to establish a Palestinian state. Our political stand against settlements is quite clear for obvious reasons but we have clear economic issues with settlements as well. In building our Palestinian state, and the institutions of that state, the main obstacles we face in building a prosperous economy are settlements.”

According to the Israeli pressure group Peace Now, more than 280,000 people live in 121 settlements throughout the West Bank, not including East Jerusalem. The settlements have long been cited by the Palestinians as a key obstacle to a peace deal with Israel through the creation of an independent state.

Mr Kayali says that while the built-up area of Israeli settlements covers only about 2.8 per cent of the land in the West Bank, some 40 per cent of the territory that Palestinians want to see inside their future state is controlled by Israel. “We Palestinians have the right not to be part of the settlement lifeline,” he says.

The campaign is aimed at settlement products, not the $3 billion worth of Israeli goods imported by Palestinians yearly. “We welcome Israeli goods. This is a glimpse at the future. Through this campaign, every Palestinian can show support for a two-state solution,” he says.

Mr Fayyad wants to back up the campaign with tough legislation. A new law has been approved under which shopkeepers found violating the ban will face fines of up to 10,000 Jordanian dinars (€11,170) and five years in prison.

In addition, some 22,000 Palestinians have been ordered to stop working in the settlements and cease patronising settlement stores. Palestinian officials driving government-issued cars have been warned that their vehicles will be confiscated if they are seen in the car parks of settlement shops.

Naftali Bennett, director general of the Yesha settlers’ council, says the campaign will have a negligible impact on the settler economy. He accused the Palestinian prime minister of sacrificing the welfare of his own people in pursuit of a political agenda and estimates the salaries of those working in the settlements support about 15 per cent of the Palestinian population.

“These are supermarkets where Israelis and Arabs shop together. There are lots of joint industries where roughly half are Palestinian employees and the other half are Israeli employees,” he says.

Mr Bennett says an independent Palestinian state is doomed to be overrun by Hamas, which took control of Gaza in 2007.

He offers instead a vision of settlers and Palestinians living together without an independent state. “Salam Fayyad wants to eliminate what I think is the favourable option of peaceful co-existence. That’s why he wants to sever all economic connections between Jews and Arabs. I think the very opposite. I think we ought to do everything in our power together to build more joint industries, to do more trading among each other.”

But back on Ramallah Hospital Street, ordinary Palestinian shopkeepers are relishing the idea of playing their part in detaching themselves from the hated settlements. “People here are poor, they don’t have enough money. We should be buying products made by Palestinians, not settlers. That would help our own people,” says Abu Majd Tarifi, a grocery store owner who says he stopped buying settler produce five years ago.

Israel eases Gaza blockade, issues blacklist items

THE IRISH TIMES
Tuesday, July 6, 2010

MATTHEW KALMAN in Ramallah

IN RESPONSE to growing international pressure, Israel announced on Sunday it was easing the blockade on the Gaza Strip after four years in which only a trickle of basic foodstuffs, fuel, medicine and other items were allowed into the Hamas-controlled enclave.

The Israeli defence ministry published an 11-page booklet which for the first time set out a list of “controlled items” that would continue to be banned.

These include “weapons and war material, including problematic dual-use items” including carbon fabric tape, chopped glass fibres, gas tanks, drilling equipment and epoxy resins.

In an attempt to prevent Hamas from building bunkers and other military facilities, Israel will allow cement and other construction material for “internationally-funded and supervised projects approved by the Palestinian Authority”. Under the Oslo Peace Accords, Israel controls all goods access to the Gaza Strip, including land, sea and air passages. Egypt, which controls a land crossing into Gaza at Rafah, enforces a strict ban on goods from its territory.

For years, Palestinians have circumvented Israeli and Egyptian inspection through some 200 tunnels under the Gaza-Egypt border used to smuggle in commodities from weapons and explosives to luxury cars and live animals.

The blockade was implemented following the abduction of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit in June 2006. His parents, who have attracted tens of thousands of supporters during a 10-day march to Jerusalem, said Mr Netanyahu had “surrendered” without securing their son’s release. Last night, the Shalit family and an audience of thousands attended a concert in Shalit’s honour by the Israel Philharmonic on the Gaza border.

“We have made great effort to ease the plight of civilian population and make things difficult for terror groups,” Yossi Gal, director general of the Israeli foreign ministry, told reporters in Jerusalem.

Israel said it would sharply increase the number of trucks carrying goods into Gaza.

Tony Blair, peace envoy for the Middle East “Quartet” of the UN, EU, US and Russia, hailed the Israeli move as “a significant milestone.” “The list of controlled items is tightly defined to protect Israel’s legitimate security needs,” said Mr Blair. “The number of projects to improve health, education, water and sanitation facilities that have received approval in the last few days has increased, and should continue to grow. These changes . . . should have a dramatic influence on the daily lives of the people of Gaza.”

As the list was published, Israeli defence minister Ehud Barak met in Jerusalem with Palestinian prime minister Salam Fayyad, the first public top-level contacts between the two sides since the election of Benjamin Netanyahu as Israeli prime minister in February 2009.

Turkey threatens to close airspace to Israel

THE IRISH TIMES
Saturday, July 3, 2010

MATTHEW KALMAN in Jerusalem

RELATIONS BETWEEN Israel and Turkey slumped to a new low yesterday after Ankara threatened to close its airspace to Israeli civilian aircraft unless it receives a public apology and compensation for its citizens killed in a commando raid on a Turkish ship sailing to Gaza on May 31st in defiance of an Israeli naval blockade.

“Ankara’s indignation over Israel will lead to further retaliatory measures in all fields if Israel refuses,” said the Turkish Zaman daily.

Turkey has already recalled its ambassador, frozen orders for military equipment and closed Turkish airspace to Israeli military flights, ending nearly 20 years of close co-operation during which Turkey was Israel’s most important Muslim ally.

Turkey’s demands were spelled out in a secret meeting in Brussels on Wednesday between Turkish foreign minister Ahmet DavutoÄŸlu and Israeli trade minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer.

Those talks triggered a row within the coalition of Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu because they were held without the knowledge of foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman.

After the meeting, Turkish officials said they believed Israel was considering paying compensation to the victims aboard the Mavi Marmara, now docked in Haifa port. Mr Ben-Eliezer denied he agreed to any compensation.

The deepening row has already cost the Turkish economy an estimated $400 million after more than 50,000 Israeli tourists initiated an unofficial boycott and cancelled their holiday reservations.

But Mr DavutoÄŸlu appears determined to make Israel pay for its attack.

“DavutoÄŸlu reminded Ben-Eliezer of Turkey’s demands from Israel, including an apology, payment of compensation to families of those killed and wounded, an international inquiry and an end to the blockade of Gaza,” said a Turkish foreign ministry spokesman. “The meeting provided an opportunity to convey in person the steps we expect to see taken so that relations can be repaired.”

“We will continue to pursue the issue,” Mr DavutoÄŸlu said in parliament. “We gave voice to our demands. We have brought our demands to the agenda at every opportunity.” A senior Turkish diplomat told Zaman that Turkey did not want to sever relations with Israel but was ready for such an eventuality. “Destroying such ties is easier than establishing them. But we are ready to face the negative impact of cutting these ties in an eventual absence of an apology from the Israeli side,” he said.

The Turkish Hurriyet daily said the Israeli government had signalled it was willing to consider compensation, paving the way for further talks.

“There will be a second meeting if the Israeli side takes a step toward [meeting] our demands,” a Turkish diplomat told Hurriyet .

But the report was quickly denied in Jerusalem. “We have no plans to do that, and the minister did not promise anything in that regard during his meeting with the Turkish foreign minister two days ago,” Mr Ben-Eliezer’s office said.

US officials, who were instrumental in initiating Wednesday’s talks after weeks of tension between the two countries, expressed the hope that relations could still be salvaged.

“A relationship between Turkey and Israel is not only in the best interest of the region, it supports our interests in the region as well,” said US state department spokesman Philip J. Crowley. “We certainly support this kind of dialogue that hopefully can help repair the fractures that have existed in recent weeks and months.”

Israel and Turkey hold secret talks in bid to mend fences

THE IRISH TIMES
Friday, July 2, 2010

MATTHEW KALMAN in Jerusalem

ISRAEL AND Turkey have held secret high-level talks in an effort to repair their crumbling relations after the deaths of nine Turkish activists in an Israeli commando raid on a Gaza-bound ship at the end of May.

According to the Turkish daily Hurriyet, the secret two-hour session in Brussels on Wednesday between Turkish foreign minister Ahmet Davutoglu and Israeli industry minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer, was initiated after strong pressure from President Obama.

The two ministers discussed ways to restore ties between Israel and Turkey, according to Turkish media reports. The meeting was mediated by an Israeli businessman and the US ambassador in Ankara.

The surprise meeting came as Turkey, once Israel’s closest Muslim ally, stepped up its demands for an international inquiry into the flotilla deaths, plus a public apology and compensation from Israel. Last week it closed its airspace to flights by the Israeli military, with whom it once had a very close relationship.

Mr Ben-Eliezer has longstanding ties with Turkey. Mr Davutoglu, a former university professor, is regarded as the strategic architect of Turkey’s aggressive new foreign policy consequent on strong opposition to its membership of the European Union.

The fact that Israel’s foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, was not made aware of the talks triggered a public row yesterday.

With 15 members in the 120- seat Knesset, Mr Lieberman’s party is prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s senior coalition partner. Without it, the government does not have a majority.

In a statement, Mr Lieberman’s office slammed the incident as “an insult to the norms of accepted behaviour and a heavy blow to the confidence between the foreign minister and the prime minister”.

Mr Netanyahu’s office cited “technical reasons” for the failure to inform the foreign ministry, but that only increased Mr Lieberman’s rage. “The prime minister’s office should have considered and dealt with this matter differently, or at the very least consulted,” he said in a live radio interview.

He cited a long list of people who knew about the meeting when he didn’t, including American officials and his arch-rival Ehud Barak – the defence minister and Labour party leader.

But Mr Lieberman stopped short of threatening to resign – a move that would bring down the government.

“We have no thoughts of quitting. We won’t give anyone that pleasure,” he said.

Israeli inquiry into flotilla raid runs into trouble

THE IRISH TIMES
Thursday, July 1, 2010

MATTHEW KALMAN in Jerusalem

A COMMISSION of inquiry set up by Israel to examine the botched raid on a Turkish ship bound for Gaza on May 31st that left nine activists dead has run into problems after only two days.

Yaakov Turkel, the retired Israeli supreme court justice chairing the commission, has demanded that it be enlarged and its powers extended beyond its original remit to include the power to subpoena witnesses of its own choosing. The original mandate barred the commission, in which David Trimble is an observer, from examining the government’s preparations before the incident. The defence ministry had also refused to allow any military or defence officials to give evidence.

But amid rumours that Judge Turkel was threatening to quit unless the commission was given some teeth, Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu agreed to extend some of the judge’s powers, including the right to recommend sanctions against individuals found guilty of wrongdoing. But the government still refuses to allow soldiers to give evidence.

The decision came after Gush Shalom, a left-wing group, filed a high court petition challenging the legality of the inquiry. Its leader Uri Avnery said the government had been forced to “admit Gush Shalom’s main contention – that the Turkel commission, with the very narrow authority and mandate given it by the government, was not able to conduct a serious investigation into the circumstances that led to the killing of nine passengers on the Gaza flotilla”.

“A thorough and independent investigation is needed,” he said.

Analyst Ze’ev Segal of Haaretz said the judge had no choice.

“Currently, the Turkel commission is crippled, dependent entirely on the government’s goodwill,” he wrote.

Meanwhile, Israel moved to ease international pressure and the prospect of more aid flotillas sailing to Gaza by increasing the number of trucks carrying allowable merchandise into the enclave each day from 100 to 150, and eventually to more than 300.

Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov welcomed the new policy as “a step in the right direction” at a joint news conference with his Israeli counterpart Avigdor Lieberman.

Nasser al-Sarraj, the assistant undersecretary of the Palestinian ministry of national economy, said home and office furniture, electrical appliances, sanitation tools, paint, and several non-electric metal tools would be permitted into Gaza for the first time since 2007.

Ismail Haniyeh, prime minister of the Hamas government, dismissed the Israeli move as “lies” designed to mask its continued control of Gaza.

The Israeli decision has been met with dismay in some quarters. The parents of abducted soldier Gilad Shalit, who have embarked on a 10-day march to Jerusalem to mark the fourth anniversary of his capture, said the sanctions should not have been lifted without their son at least being allowed a visit by the Red Cross.

Shortly before dawn, a Qassam rocket fired from Gaza destroyed a packing plant in southern Israel. There were no casualties.

Are Your Texts Depressed? The Computer Knows, Maybe

CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION

WIRED CAMPUS June 18, 2010

By Matthew Kalman

Software may know when you are depressed by examining your online behavior. Researchers at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, in Beersheba, Israel, have developed a program that can detect depression in online texts and could serve as a screening tool to direct potential patients towards treatment. Psychologists caution, however, that it hasn't actually been tested on real people.

Yair Neuman, associate professor in the department of education at Ben-Gurion, led a team that developed a computer program capable of identifying language with signs of depression. In a test, the program was used to scan more than 300,000 English-language texts from blogs and from online queries that people posted to mental-health Web sites. After the program identified the texts as depressive, a panel of four clinical psychologists reviewed 200 examples of such writings. There was a 78-percent correlation between the verdict of the computer program and the analysis of the human panel.

Mr. Neuman said the program was designed to find depressive content hidden in language that did not mention obvious terms like “depression” or “suicide.” He suggested that the program could be used to carry out initial screening on texts written by people who didn’t even realize they might have a problem.

“The problem is that most people are not aware of their situation and they will never get to an expert psychologist,” says Mr. Neuman. “The system can provide a screening process that will raise the awareness of the depressed and will send them to an expert because we cannot actually replace excellent human judgment.”

“What we can do is to provide a very efficient tool for screening for depression. In the United States, for instance, there is a huge problem of people suffering from depression and they are not diagnosed. The usual screening procedure is a questionnaire you should fill in online, but it is a self-selective process," he says, noting that people who fill out such a survey already suspect they have a problem. "What we can do is to analyze proactively, and this is the difference." Web sites focusing on consumer mental health might install the tool, and users could see a pop-up warning if the comments they post indicate a depressive pattern.

But those warnings might be false, says one mental-health professional. “Psychiatric diagnosis is a very, very complicated issue,” warns Tuvia Peri, director of the community counseling clinic in the department of psychology at Bar-Ilan University. “You don’t have a very high level of agreement between professionals because the diagnosis of depression is quite vague.”

“There is a long history of trying to determine psychiatric diagnosis by computers, to try to make them efficient and fast," he says. "This is a very small step forward, an important step, but we have texts that were diagnosed by a machine and then we have the same texts diagnosed by clinical psychologists. We don’t have any data about the actual, real state of the people who have written these texts.”

Thursday June 17, 2010

Jew vs. Jew: The Religious Conflict Tearing at Israel

By MATTHEW KALMAN / JERUSALEM

Tens of thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jews protested in Jerusalem, Israel against a court order to desegregate a religious school and force Jewish girls of European and Middle Eastern descent to study together. Baz Ratner / Reuters

Israel's domestic culture war between religious communities and the secular courts took to the streets, Thursday, as tens of thousands of ultra-orthodox Ashkenazi (European) Jews paralyzed the streets of Jerusalem and the Tel Aviv suburb of Bnei Brak in a protest march. The target of their outrage was the imprisonment of 43 couples for refusing to allow their daughters to attend a religious school where they would have to mix with the daughters of religious Mizrahi Jews (a term sometimes conflated with Sephardi and referring to those who hail mainly from the Arab world). Dressed in their Sabbath finery of tall fur hats and delicately-embroidered long black silk coats, men bound for prison were carried shoulder high by a dancing, singing throng through the streets of Jerusalem to the city's Russian Compound police headquarters. Some wore a red sash emblazoned with the legend "Holiness for the sake of heaven."

"We are going with gladness in our hearts," said Rabbi Eliahu Biton as he walked towards jail, although 22 of the convicted women and four of the men failed to appear.

The parents at the center of Thursday's drama, followers of Rabbi Shmuel Berzovsky who leads the tiny Slonimer Hasidic sect, chose two weeks in jail rather than send their daughters to the Beis Yaakov school near their homes in the religious West Bank settlement of Emanuel. Their reason? At the school, the Ashkenazi kids would mingle with religious Mizrahi kids, some of whom come from more secular extended families and therefore, say the Slonimers, could expose their sheltered daughters to unwanted influences from the wider world. And their imprisonment was the culmination of a two-year battle between the ultra-Orthodox sect, which effectively controls the school, and Israel's secular Supreme Court. Before the Beis Yaakov controversy, few people had heard of the Slonimer, named for the town in Belarus where their first rabbi lived 200 years ago, and the sect's internal power struggle between rival leaders in Jerusalem and Bnei Brak. But the fight over the schoolgirls has united the tiny group and transformed it into the latest torchbearers of a festering feud between the ultra-orthodox and the secular establishment.

Thursday's demonstration was the largest in Jerusalem since ultra-orthodox protesters gathered in similar numbers in 1999 in a show of strength against the supposed anti-religious bias of Israel's Supreme Court. A decade on, the gap between the two entities is wider than ever, with running debates over such issues as the power of religious courts, state subsidies for religious students, religious exemption from military service and access to public roads on the Sabbath.

In August 2009, the Supreme Court ruled that a separate stream created in Beis Yaakov school two years ago for the Slonim amounted to "rampant discrimination" against the rest of the pupils, who are 95% Mizrahi. The court ordered the school, which is financed by the state, to remove the physical barriers and integrate the classes. For six months, the parents defied the court. When the barriers finally came down, 43 families removed their daughters and then sent them to another state-funded school in Bnei Brak, an hour's drive away. But parents are not allowed to move their kids from one school to another in the middle of a school year without permission from the education authorities, and their departure left the Beis Yaakov school with too few kids to be viable.

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court ruled that the parents must return their daughters to the now desegregated school by Thursday or report to jail.

The open defiance of the parents led opposition leader Tzipi Livni to wonder aloud at the future of the rule of law in Israel and the deafening silence of government ministers scared of offending ultra-orthodox parties that hold the balance of power. "I have heard that there is a group of people who have said ahead of time that they refuse to accept a Supreme Court decision," Livni told supporters this week. "There is no room for such declarations in a democratic state. I am not a fan of the Supreme Court's involvement in all issues, but when the political and state leadership does not accept decisions based on the values of the State of Israel, the Supreme Court has no choice."

Aviad Hacohen, the lawyer who filed the Supreme Court petition on behalf of Yoav Lalum, chairman of the Noar Kahalacha association, which battles ethnic discrimination in religious schools, tells TIME that the Slonimer refusal to have their kids attend school with the Mizrahi girls has resulted in the school excluding dozens of Mizrahi girls since last Fall. And, he warns, the problem in Emanuel is the tip of an ultra-orthodox iceberg threatening to sink the rule of law in Israel.

"This can lead to real anarchy," says Hacohen. "I hope the rule of law will prevail, otherwise it won't stop with the ultra-Orthodox and others will do the same. I wish I could tell you the law will win, but I'm not sure."

Mistreated as a Student, an Alum Establishes Cash Prizes for Nice Professors at Israel's Technion

CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION
June 16, 2010

By Matthew Kalman

Jerusalem — What’s an alumnus to do when the university that was the gateway to his entrepreneurial millions was a place of "suffering" where professors "didn’t give a damn about the students"? Moshe Yanai’s answer: Give it millions of dollars to encourage faculty members to be more pleasant.

IBM minces few words when describing the work of Mr. Yanai, who holds one of the computer maker's prestigious fellowships: "One of the most influential contributors in the history of the data-storage industry. His 30 years of technical expertise and design innovation are legendary."

Mr. Yanai attributes his success in no small part to the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, in Haifa, from which he graduated in 1975. Now a multimillionaire, he has given quietly to charities for many years, including to the Technion, the academic incubator of Israel’s high-tech revolution. But memories of his bitter experience there discouraged him from doing anything high profile.

Now he has donated enough cash to support 15 prizes annually, each worth $30,000, for the next 20 years. A joint committee of faculty members and students will award the Yanai Prizes to professors who enrich the university experience and make the Technion friendlier to students.

"The Technion gave me my entry ticket to the world of computers, and I owe it much of my success, but my time there was one of suffering," he tells The Chronicle. "My personal experience in the Technion was not because I had difficulties learning but because of my treatment by professors."

While he was a student, Mr. Yanai had a wife and child, a job, and a battalion commander’s post in Israel’s army reserve. He says he got little sympathy from his professors when he asked them for materials after he missed a class.

"The problem in the academic world is that all the incentives are to produce papers," he says. "The publication of papers brings them prestige, promotion, everything. No one is really rewarding them for spending time with students."

Mr. Yanai says he has heard similar stories from other former students, and not just those who attended the Technion.

"I want to change the atmosphere and change the incentives for professors in a way that says the world is not only about papers," he says. "It’s also about teaching students."

Peretz Lavie, president of the institution, took no offense at Mr. Yanai’s accusations. "There is a story among MIT students that halfway across the bridge over the Charles River is a sign saying, 'You are now halfway to hell,'" he says. "There is a kind of halo effect around some institutes that they are tough and demanding, and there is almost a military type of discipline."

The question, Mr. Lavie says, is how to make education a more joyful experience: "Can you think about a type of a class that can make it also fun? Or make it also more interesting? This is the challenge to the teacher."

He says Mr. Yanai’s gift has the potential to transform the university. "These new prizes will change the atmosphere, making our studies in the Technion much more interesting, much more enriching, and changing this reputation of being a rough institute which is not friendly to the students," Mr. Lavie says. "Usually donors go for bricks and mortar."

When Mr. Yanai approached the Technion to discuss how he could help, his own bumpy experience as a student there was the proverbial elephant in the room. Mr. Lavie says the philanthropist told him he wanted to do something to make the campus atmosphere friendlier while preserving its academic rigor.

"This is how this gift was born," Mr. Lavie says. "He jumped at the idea, and he said, 'Let’s try and reward faculty for enriching the educational experience.'"

Policy, Parachutes and Paranoia - Behind the scenes of Middle East reporting

Major Fund-Raising Campaign Ends for Israeli Technology Institute

CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION

GLOBAL NEWS TICKER June 14, 2010

The American Technion Society announced on Monday that it had completed a $1-billion fund-raising campaign on behalf of the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, in Haifa. The campaign started in 1996. “This was the largest campaign ever for an American organization raising funds for Israeli higher education,” said Kevin Hattori, a spokesman for the New York-based society. The largest single donation was $50-million, for the Lorry I. Lokey Interdisciplinary Center for Life Sciences and Engineering. In the 14-year campaign, 61 percent of the gifts were valued at $1-million or more. The funds go to support new buildings, research centers and programs, faculty fellowships, and scholarships. Despite the economic downturn, the campaign, dubbed “Shaping Israel’s Future," was completed just eight months behind schedule.

Israel's First Arabic-Language College Hopes to Bridge Differences in Opportunity

(NAI) View of Nazareth Academic Institution (NAI) in Nazareth, Galilee, Israel

CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION
June 14, 2010

By Matthew Kalman
Nazareth, Israel

After a decade-long struggle for official recognition, Israel's first comprehensive Arabic-language college of higher education will open its doors here in October.

The Nazareth Academic Institution will have some 120 students in its first year for a limited selection of courses in chemistry, communications, occupational therapy, and computer science.

From this small beginning, the founders hope it will blossom into the country's first Arab university, provide a peace-building bridge between Israelis and Palestinians, and stem the exodus of thousands of students who study abroad rather than contend with an Israeli system they say deters Arabs, who are one-fifth of the population. They also say it will greatly increase the opportunity for Arab residents, particularly women, to gain the qualifications necessary to join the work force, which would help the economy of the Galilee, where most Israeli Arabs live.

"We are going to create a viable institution that will provide a future for the young people in the Galilee. A multicultural academic center for peace, professional development, and the creation of a responsible, diverse leadership," said Susan Drinan, an American who is a General Electric executive and chairperson of the new college's Board of Trustees.

Critics of the plan say it will further marginalize the Arab minority in Israel; others fear it will become an intellectual hotbed of separatist Palestinian nationalism.

The debate has raged since 2000, when the Israeli government first decided in principle to open a college for Israeli Arabs in the Galilee.

The Mar Elias Educational Institutions, which operates an elementary school and a high school, immediately applied to the Israel Council for Higher Education for a license to operate the college. But the second Palestinian uprising erupted soon after, and the decision was shelved, apparently for political reasons.

Mar Elias, which was established in the Galilee town of Ibillin by the Greek Catholic Church, pursued the plan despite repeated rejections and delays. (In the interim period, it became a licensed branch campus of the University of Indianapolis, graduating more than 200 students, but the Israeli government ended all partnerships in which Israeli entities offer degrees from foreign institutions because of concerns about falling standards.)

Political Hand-Wringing

In 2009 the Israeli government and the Council for Higher Education finally gave Mar Elias their approval to open a new college.

Ramiz Jaraisy, the mayor of Nazareth who has authorized a site for the new college, including a fully equipped library, says the decision is long overdue.

"It's a pity that until now, after more than 60 years since the establishment of the state of Israel, there is not even one academic institution among the Arab minority acting under the auspices of the Council for Higher Education. It should have been implemented a long time ago," said Mr. Jaraisy.

Israel's only other Arabic-language colleges are five segregated teacher-training institutions.

The delays in the project were due to political hand-wringing, he said. "I was involved at least twice in the process of a decision in the Council for Higher Education concerning the establishment of an academic institution among the Arabs in Nazareth, and twice that process was stopped because of political decisions of ministers."

When Israel celebrated the 62nd anniversary of its independence in May 2010, some 1.54 million Arab citizens accounted for 20.4 percent of the total population of 7.58 million. But in the academic year 2007-8, the latest figures available from the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics, only 11.8 percent of undergraduate students in higher education in Israel were Arabs, falling to 6.6 percent of master's-level students, and just 3.5 percent of doctoral students.

During that period there were some 12,900 Arab students at Israeli colleges and universities and nearly 8,000 more at Arabic-language teacher-training colleges. But as many as 8,500 Arab students are reported to be studying abroad, most of them in Jordan.

"Arab students in Israel don't have an option for higher education in Arabic," said Yousef T. Jabareen, a law lecturer at the University of Haifa and director of Dirasat, the Arab Center for Law and Policy, in Nazareth. "Israel has established so far seven universities that have public funding. However, none of them is in Arabic. Israel does not have an option for higher education in Arabic for about 20 percent of its population."

For Arab students, "I see it as a violation of their right to equality, especially their right to education and their right to preserve their language and their cultural identity," he said.

Mr. Jabareen supports the development of the new college. "We need it to be a good, well-supported Arab university. I believe it could solve many of these problems," he said.

But even after the Council for Higher Education decision, the college may not survive because the accreditation was not accompanied by any of the financial support it had requested from the government.

"There are six colleges in Galilee, five of them are fully funded, all of them in Jewish areas. This is the only one in the Arab sector and the only one that is not funded," said Raed Mualem, senior vice president of the Mar Elias institutions who has pushed the project for the past 10 years. He said the trustees were trying to raise the $2-million necessary to begin operating in the fall, with a strategic plan that requires $150-million over the coming decade.

Steven G. Stav, who served until recently as director general of the Council for Higher Education, said he supported the project despite entrenched opposition to an Arab-oriented college and misgivings among council members about the quality of the teaching.

"We think it is very important for the Galilee that this college starts out and will be a positive donor and contributor to the area," said Mr. Stav.

"There was a question about this college because we do not promote sectorial colleges; we want to have integrated colleges," he said. "We have minorities that need some sort of self-definition in their teaching, but then you run into other difficulties."

Those "other difficulties" are apparently fears that an Arab college would become a hotbed of radicalism.

But Mr. Mualem and his colleagues say the opposite is true.

Peace Studies

"Our teaching staff is one third Christian, one third Jewish, one third Muslim," said Mr. Mualem. "I don't think any of the people we have on staff want to build an institution dedicated to the worldview of terrorists. We are exactly the opposite. One third of the students' program is compulsory peace studies. No matter what they are studying, the first thing they will study is peace, how to live in a multicultural society."

"We can be the bridge between Israel and the Arab world," he continued. "It is in our interest to develop our Israeli identity, but not to forget where we came from."

Arab students agree that the new college would be valuable.

Amani Odeh, a 22-year-old college graduate, said Arab high-school students have a hard time getting into Israeli universities and prefer to go abroad. She earned a degree in chemistry and environmental sciences from Mar Elias and the University of Indianapolis before that arrangement ended.

"Arab students leave for Jordan and other countries abroad to study for medicine, for example, because they can't get the grades," she said. "My cousin went to Italy to study medicine. My neighbor also went to study in Italy. Most of my friends who I finished high school with went to Jordan and other places."

But some Arab academics remain dubious. Fadia Nasser-Abu Alhija, associate professor at Tel Aviv University School of Education, said the existence of the five segregated Arabic-language teacher-training colleges has caused "difficulties" and "deep gaps" between the Jewish and Arab high-school systems.

"I am skeptical about running an Arab university because I am very anxious about the level and the standards of the kind of people who will run this institute," she said. "To maintain the level, I think we have to have equal education."

Egypt Denies Visa to Israeli University Leader

CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION

GLOBAL NEWS TICKER June 10, 2010

The rector of the University of Haifa has been denied a visa by Egypt, forcing him to cancel plans to go to an academic conference in Alexandria, reports the Ynet news Web site. The rector, Yossi Ben-Artzi, planned to attend the June 11-12 meeting of the Euro-Mediterranean University, but said his visa application had been rejected without explanation. Officials at Egypt's Embassy in Tel Aviv said that his request had not been denied deliberately and that it may have been a "technical mishap." In May, Uri Seligsohn, a professor of hematology at Tel Aviv University and governor of the International Society on Thrombosis and Haemostasis, was denied a visa to attend a meeting of the society in Cairo that he had helped organize.

Gaza's Shadow Economy Plods On

Friday, Jun. 04, 2010

A Palestinian smuggler exits a tunnel that runs between Egypt and Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on June 3, 2010 Said Khatib / AFP / Getty Images

By MATTHEW KALMAN / GAZA CITY

Days after the Israeli seizure of a flotilla of Turkish ships bound for Gaza that left nine pro-Palestinian activists dead and triggered worldwide condemnation, activists aboard an Irish-flagged aid vessel are bracing for the next round, while Israelis debate how to solve the problem. The 1,200-ton Rachel Corrie, named for the pro-Palestinian American activist who was killed in Gaza by an Israeli bulldozer, is heading south from Cyprus through the Mediterranean with a cargo of aid and banned building materials for the Hamas-controlled enclave.

Israeli leaders still stunned by the fallout from the May 31 flotilla raid are determined to stop the Rachel Corrie as well as not cause any more deaths that will hand Hamas and its supporters another p.r. victory. "We shall not allow the ships to reach Gaza — not now and not later on," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told his ministers. "We intend to direct the Rachel Corrie ship to the Ashdod port and transfer its civilian goods to Gaza following a security check." (See pictures of Israeli commandos storming the Turkish ships.)

Palestinians in Gaza eagerly awaited the drama unfolding off the coastline, hailing the Free Gaza Movement and the Turkish group IHH — which allegedly has jihadist sympathies — as heroes, with street marches and banners fluttering from buildings close to the tiny Gaza City port. The excitement is a change from the daily grind of survival, which can take many forms in the enclave's shadowy economy.

Every day, a long line of Palestinians queues outside the USAID distribution center in Beit Lahiya, north of Gaza City. Thursday was the turn of families with nine or more children; they have been issued with the relevant papers, allowing them to collect 3 kg of salt, 12 kg of sugar, 12 kg of beans, 16 L of olive oil and four 50-kg sacks of wheat flour. After 40 days, they will return for more. "The proportion of the population dependent on aid has risen to 80%, the number of the poorest of the poor has risen from 100,000 to 300,000 in the past year alone, and unemployment has reached 44%," says Chris Gunness, spokesman for UNRWA, the U.N. body that has been assisting Palestinian refugees since 1949. "How can anyone say there isn't a humanitarian crisis?"

At the Islamic University in Gaza City, two buildings on the campus are still in ruins nearly 18 months after they were bombed flat by Israeli jets during the war that ended in January 2009. Israel said the university's technology labs were being used for research and development to improve the 8,000 Qassam rockets that have been fired across the border since April 2001 — a charge the university flatly denies. University president Kamalain Sha'ath needs $50 million to rebuild the wrecked labs and replace damaged equipment, but Israel will not even let him bring in any building materials. (See pictures of life under Hamas in Gaza.)

Sha'ath continues to educate his 21,000 students, but he knows their chances of employment are slim. Last year, there were 20,000 applications for 2,700 teaching jobs advertised by the Ministry of Education and 1,700 applications for 50 English-language teaching positions at UNRWA. "The economy of Gaza cannot generate the number of jobs required for all of these people. With the blockade, it became more and more complicated," Sha'ath tells TIME.

The Israeli and Egyptian blockade was imposed in earnest after Hamas, the Islamist militant organization that came to power in parliamentary elections in January 2006, won control of Gaza and its population of 1.4 million in July 2007 after a vicious Palestinian civil war. The blockade was supposed to persuade Gazans to topple the Hamas government; secure the release of Israeli Corporal Gilad Shalit, who was abducted in June 2006; and end the firing of Qassam and other rockets across the border. None of those objectives has been achieved.

See the diplomatic fallout from the Gaza flotilla fiasco.

Israeli officials say the blockade must remain in place to stop Hamas from being supplied with rockets and other heavy weaponry by their allies in Hizballah and Iran. They reject the charge that they have plunged Gaza into poverty and food dependency, pointing to the first three months of 2010 that saw 3,828 trucks carry more than 95,500 tons of goods into the Gaza Strip, including food, medical supplies, wheat, rice, clothes, footwear, milk powder and baby food. Just days before the flotilla fiasco, the press office of Netanyahu sarcastically recommended the fine-dining restaurant Roots to foreign reporters sent over to chronicle humanitarian conditions. And indeed, in Gaza City, white-coated waiters do serve expensive meals at Roots. The beef Stroganoff has been unofficially dubbed "Bibi Stroganoff."

But much of the commerce that has managed to survive the blockade operates with rather shadowy mechanisms. At the small grocery run by Hani Abu Fadi in a refugee camp south of Gaza City, the shelves are stocked full of goods, from basic foodstuffs to chocolates. Many of the tins are Egyptian, but Hebrew packaging indicates that some items have been imported from Israel, including fresh milk and washing powder. Abu Fadi says prices have fallen by about one-third on some items in the past year. "There is no shortage of food; there are even stockpiles," he says. "I assume the wholesalers who used to work with the Israeli border crossings are now bringing their supplies through the [smugglers'] tunnels, but I don't ask." (See pictures of heartbreak in the Middle East.)

Down in the town of Rafah on the border with Egypt, a makeshift hut constructed from blue nylon sheeting nailed onto a frame covers the mouth of a smuggling tunnel underneath the frontier. A man who identifies himself only as Abu Ahmed dug his tunnel two years ago on the site of a destroyed house that he bought from the previous owner. It is 25 yards deep and half a mile in length. It took six months to build and is connected by cross-passages to five or six neighboring tunnels in case of emergency. He descends by rope down a 4-ft. square vertical shaft lined with wood to a passage that emerges in a gentle slope inside a building on the other side of the border. There is an emergency generator for electricity and a compressor to pump air through. "I bring in everything, but nothing that is illegal," he says. "From food and motorcycles to animals. I once brought in two lions for the zoo — small ones."

Abu Ahmed says that in a good month, he can make $300,000. His only tax was a one-off payment of about $2,500 to Rafah Municipality for electricity. A qualified doctor at a nearby hospital earns just $900 a month. Gazans are concerned that the new elite of tunnel smugglers have a vested interest in continuing the siege. (See pictures of 60 years of Israel.)

A poll conducted in March indicated that Palestinians were becoming fed up with Hamas: 37% of Gazans told the Palestinian Center for Public Opinion that they trusted the Fatah party of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to govern, while only 22% said they preferred Hamas. But with the actions against the aid flotilla last week, Israel may have inadvertently thrown the Hamas government a lifeline. "What happened this last week was a surprise for everybody," says Omar Shaban, president of PalThink, a Gaza-based strategic studies think tank.

Shaban says Israel's seizure of the flotilla brought the situation in Gaza to world attention and may trigger enough pressure on Israel to end its blockade. "The Gaza issue is totally different after the ships than before the ships. It's like a political tsunami, whether you support Hamas or not," he says.

Israeli troops attack ship carrying aid to Gaza killing 16

Israeli commandos have stormed a flotilla of ships carrying activists and aid supplies to the blockaded Palestinian enclave of Gaza, killing as many as 16 of those on board.

DAILY TELEGRAPH 31st May 2010

By Richard Spencer, Middle East Correspondent and Matthew Kalman in Jerusalem

Fighting broke out between the activists and the masked Israeli troops, who rappelled on to deck from helicopters before dawn.

A spokeswoman for the flotilla, Greta Berlin, said she had been told ten people had been killed and dozens wounded, accusing Israeli troops of indiscriminately shooting at "unarmed civilians". But an Israeli radio station said that between 14 and 16 were dead in a continuing operation.

"How could the Israeli military attack civilians like this?" Ms Berlin said. "Do they think that because they can attack Palestinians indiscriminately they can attack anyone?

"We have two other boats. This is not going to stop us."

But an Israeli military spokeswoman said that there had been a planned and organised attempt to "lynch" the boarding party. She said the activists were armed with knives and guns.

The Israeli government's handling of the confrontation was under intense international pressure even as it continued. The Israeli ambassador to Turkey, the base of one of the human rights organisation which organised the flotilla, was summoned by the foreign ministry in Anakara, as the Israeli consulate in Istanbul came under attack.

One Israeli minister issued immediate words of regret. "The images are certainly not pleasant. I can only voice regret at all the fatalities," Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, the trade and industry minister, told army radio.

But he added that the commandoes had been attacked with batons and activists had sought to take their weapons off them.

Israeli military sources said four of its men had been injured, one stabbed, and that they had been shot at.

"The flotilla's participants were not innocent and used violence against the soldiers. They were waiting for the forces' arrival," they were quoted by a news website as saying.

The flotilla had set sail on Sunday from northern, or Turkish, Cyprus. Six boats were led by the Mavi Marmara, which carried 600 activists from around the world, including Mairead Corrigan Maguire, the Northern Ireland peace protester who won a Nobel Prize in 1976.

It came under almost immediate monitoring from Israeli drones and the navy, with two vessels flanking it in international waters. The flotilla, which had been warned that it would not be allowed to reach Gaza, attempted to slow and change course, hoping to prevent a confrontation until daylight, when the Israeli military action could be better filmed.

But in the early hours of this morning local time commandoes boarded from helicopters.

The activists were not carrying guns, but television footage shown by al-Jazeera and Turkish television channels show hand-to-hand fighting, with activists wearing life-jackets striking commandoes with sticks.

The Israeli army said its troops were assaulted with axes and knives.

The television footage did not show firing but shots could be heard in the background. One man was shown lying unconscious on the deck, while another man was helped away.

A woman wearing hijab, the Muslim headscarf, was seen carrying a stretcher covered in blood.

The al-Jazeera broadcast stopped with a voice shouting in Hebrew: "Everyone shut up".

Israel imposed its blockade on Gaza after the strip was taken over by the militant group Hamas in 2007. It has allowed some food and medical supplies through, but has prevented large-scale rebuilding following the bombardment and invasion of 2008-9.

The flotilla is the latest in a series of attempts by activists to break through the blockade. The boats were carrying food and building supplies.

Activists said at least two of the other boats, one Greek and one Turkish, had been boarded from Israeli naval vessels. Activists said two of the other boats in the flotilla were American-flagged.

The confrontation took place in international waters 80 miles off the Gaza coast.

It was attacked by the head of the Hamas government in Gaza, Ismail Haniyeh.

"We call on the Secretary-General of the U.N., Ban Ki-moon, to shoulder his responsibilities to protect the safety of the solidarity groups who were on board these ships and to secure their way to Gaza," he said.

Turkish television meanwhile showed hundreds of protesters trying to storm the Israeli consulate in Istanbul. The incident will be particularly damaging for Israel's relations with what had been seen as its closest ally in the Muslim world.

"By targeting civilians, Israel has once again shown its disregard for human life and peaceful initiatives," a Turkish foreign ministry statement said. "We strongly condemn these inhumane practices of Israel.

"This deplorable incident, which took place in open seas and constitutes a fragrant breach of international law, may lead to irreparable consequences in our bilateral relations."