Last update - 18:42 07/07/2009

American Jewish soldier killed in insurgent attack in Afghanistan

By Haaretz Service and The Associated Press

Tags: Jewish World, Israel News

An American Jewish soldier was killed during an attack on his base in eastern Afghanistan Saturday, the U.S. Army has confirmed.

Pfc. Aaron Fairbairn, 20, of Aberdeen, Washington, was killed when an insurgent drove an explosives-filled truck into Combat Outpost Zerok and detonated it.

Another soldier - Pfc. Justin Casillas - was also killed in the attack, and 12 other soldiers were injured.

Fairbairn and Casillas were both Alaska-based paratroopers.

Fairbairn's death comes just weeks after a British Jewish soldier was killed in Afghanistan in June. Lieutenant Paul Mervis, 27, was killed when a roadside bomb exploded near him while leading his platoon on foot patrol.

Two Jewish U.S. intelligence officers, Shawn Pine and Lieutenant Roslyn Schultte, were also killed recently in Kabul. Schulte, 25, was the first female graduate of the U.S. Air Force Academy to be killed in action in Afghanistan or Iraq.

Australian Jewish soldier Gregory Sher, 30, was killed in January when his patrol base in southern Afghanistan came under rocket attack from Taliban insurgents.

Last update - 20:14 07/07/2009

Michael Jackson's fans descend on L.A. to say goodbye

By The Associated Press

Tags: Israel News, Michael Jackson

Michael Jackson fans came from near and far Tuesday to say last goodbyes to their pop music hero, some traveling from across the U.S. and Europe for his public memorial in Los Angeles.

Near the downtown Staples Center before where his service was to be held, vendors sold Jackson memorabilia such as T-shirts, collages, buttons and bouquets of snapdragons and dahlias.

Jackson's golden casket has arrived at the Staples Center mid-morning on Tuesday. A hearse carried the flower-draped casket in a motorcade from a private service earlier Tuesday at a cemetery hall in the Hollywood Hills.

"His music will live forever. That's why I'm here today. It's like closure. I'm a person who believes in miracles, and I'm witnessing one today," said Jenee Huitt of Los Angeles, referring to her gold wristband allowing her to be among the lucky fans to attend the memorial service.

Huitt, an etiquette teacher, said she met the Jackson 5 as a girl in the early 1970s.

"Diana Ross brought the Jacksons in to this event, introduced them and said, 'They're going to be stars,'" Huitt said.

Fans drove or flew in from around the United States and as far away as England - some just to be outside the event. Some wore trademark Jackson clothing, including sequined white socks and red leather jackets echoing those the singer wore in his music videos.

The scene was reminiscent of one of Hollywood's many awards shows, which draw vendors and celebrity gawkers. Police helicopters flew overhead, and officers patrolled on foot and bicycle. The crowds were orderly.

Fans carried signs such as "Michael Jackson Lives". One turned himself into a walking music video, strapping a flat-screen TV to his back that played Jackson numbers.

Claudia Hernandez, 29, said she loved Jackson's music as a girl growing up in Mexico. Now a day-care teaching assistant in Los Angeles, Hernandez said she has cried watching TV coverage of his death.

"I'm trying to hold in my emotions," said Hernandez, wearing a wristband to allow her admittance to the service and holding a framed photograph of Jackson. "I know right now he's teaching the angels to dance."

Half a dozen protesters stood among fans, condemning Jackson over his

child-molestation charges, holding signs that read, Jacko in Hell, You're

Going to Hell and Mourn for Your Sins.

But Jackson's devotees far outnumbered his critics. Mishelle Van, 37, drove with her cousin from Hesperia, California, arriving in Los Angeles at 1 A.M. They spent the early morning hours with other Jackson fans.

"They're touching us and saying, can you bring the love in for us?" said Van, who was among those with a wristband for the service.

Melvin Price, 43, flew in from England on Saturday, even before he knew he had won a ticket to the Jackson memorial.

"I wanted to pay my last respects to Michael Jackson," said Price, dressed in a red leather jacket. "I've been a fan of his for 35 years."

Beverly J. Ellis, 46, said she drove from Holly Springs, Arkansas, just to be there even though she could not get in. She planned to go to Jackson's Neverland ranch later in the day to take pictures and see if she could get a rock or other souvenir to take home.

"I'm just a groupie. I'm an old groupie now," said Ellis, who held an American flag and a sign with a photocopied image of Jackson. "I'm a die-hard, true fan."

Vernay Lewis, 32, flew in from Wilmington, Delaware, spent all Monday night on the streets outside Staples Center, wrapped in a blanket to stay warm overnight.

Lewis said she did not care that she traveled cross-country even though she did not have a wristband to attend the memorial. She just wanted to be near the singer and his fans.

"I think it was his kind heart, his gentleness, his childlike ways, said Lewis, who signed a wall for fans to offer farewell sentiments to Jackson. For me, he was the whole package as far as what an entertainer and what a person was supposed to be. I just think he was wonderful.

Last update - 17:59 07/07/2009

Kosher food at baseball games gets three strikes

By Jeff Weinstein, The Forward

Tags: jewish world

So A-Rod finally breaks his slump with a long drive into the seats, the fans leap to their feet - and wet tuna plops into your lap.

Even if there weren't the usual spat over who makes and packs the snacks for a game, a tuna sandwich or PB&J just doesn't cut it. At ballparks, salty, fatty, bad-for-you hot dogs and hamburgers aren't merely tolerated, they're required. So for observant baseball mavens, being kosher can be unfair.

The kosher baseball problem in New York was first addressed in 1998, when, under pressure from New York City Public Advocate Mark Green and Rabbi Marc Schneier, Shea and then Yankee Stadium opened small glatt kosher stands. Now that both Big Apple teams are playing in brand-new, tax-supported homes that include elaborate fast food and restaurant choices, kosher sports enthusiasts had new reason to hope that their needs wouldn't be ignored.

They weren't. New Jersey-based Kosher Sports set up four identical glatt kosher stands at the $800 million Citi Field - called "Debits Field" by older wags - and Ouri's Superior Kosher Caterers in Brooklyn did the same in the $1.5 billion Yankee palace. The season's on, and the 4 and 7 subway lines are jammed. So how's the food?

In general, Citi Field thrashes Yankee Stadium in the variety and success of its nonkosher food-stand offerings: authentic tacos, Blue Smoke barbecue, a branch of Danny Meyer's wildly successful Shake Shack. It's no different for kosher food, I've discovered, and the reason is simple: Kosher Sports at Citi Field cooks dogs and sausages on a small grill in front of you, while Ouri's somewhat wider selection is prepared off the premises, packaged, sealed and reheated. No matter how excellent the original recipes or ingredients, no fast food can survive such treatment with taste, texture or essential ballpark "snap" intact.

On a recent visit, the lines at both sets of carts are long right before the games begin, but they move steadily. Except for an occasional yarmulke, I couldn't tell from the customers' assorted ages and races that these stands are special - though once, near an Ouri's, a minyan formed during the seventh-inning stretch.

At times, the always-friendly staffers struggled to get orders straight and make change. This is especially true at Ouri's, because none of those carts have a cash register, just a lock-box. Also, all Yankee food stands except Ouri's list calories after each item. Confidence was not exactly inspired, and after a companion and I bought and sampled almost all of Ouri's food on offer = each stand was out of something, and even early on, none of the four had burgers - I am terribly sorry to say my confidence vanished.

The glatt frank ($5.50), mildly spiced and somewhat sweet, was lukewarm, watery and limp; the squishy bun didn't help. Too bad, because a hot dog is baseball's bottom line.

Barely heated chicken nuggets ($8) had long ago lost juiciness or savor and were hard to chew. Strips of rubbery beef layered on a flaccid hero with sweet pickle ($12) was almost impossible to negotiate, and the reddish mass of shredded shawarma ($12) on a similar roll had the feel of a perverse Pablum.

My Yankee advice? Try the toothsome knish, but make sure it?s hot, and then the respectable falafel plus tahini and greens ($8), if the pita?s edges haven't gone dry. There's also a fruit stand - yes, in Yankee Stadium - near Gate 4 for dessert.

Fewer kosher selections are offered at Citi Field, but they feel closer in merit and price to the temptations around them. I've always wished the fine Abeles & Heymann dog ($4.75) had a bit more garlic and spurt, but it went down well because the roll tastes like real bread; two pieces of quickly grilled pastrami placed on top to make a "pastrami dog" ($6.50) improve the bare frank enormously.

A plump A&H beef "Italian" sausage on an even better roll ($7.25) is topped with sautéed tricolor bell peppers. But bring your own mustard or ketchup; no packets are provided, and I was pointed to common condiment stations whose kosher qualifications are doubtful.

Many ticket buyers are grateful to have kosher options, yet I wish the "pleasure factor" were higher both in the food that's served and in patrons? expectations. Dietary restrictions need not be culinary limitations, even in a ballpark, and there's no reason for kosher cooking anywhere not to shine.

Writer and editor Jeff Weinstein, for more than 15 years the restaurant critic for New York?s Village Voice, covers cultural and gay issues at www.artsjournal.com/outthere.

Last update - 20:39 06/07/2009

German Jews urge boycott of Formula One over chief's Hitler remarks

By Reuters

Tags: Jewish World, Formula One

Germany's Central Council of Jews on Monday urged motor racing teams to boycott Formula One after its chief, Bernie Ecclestone, praised Adolf Hitler's ability to "get things done".

Ecclestone, 78, was quoted in the British newspaper the Times on Saturday as saying he preferred totalitarian regimes to democracies and as singling out Hitler for pushing things through effectively.

"No team should work with him any more - a boycott would be more than appropriate," said the Council's vice president, Dieter Graumann.

Graumann said Ecclestone was "either empty headed or unbelievably malicious - probably both" and said he risked driving the whole of Formula One into a wall.

Germany's Grand Prix takes place at the Nuerburgring this weekend.

"Just one week before the start of the Nuerburgring, the teams should make very clear that whoever praises Hitler, shows he is not serious," Graumann said in an interview with Handelsblatt newspaper. The Council confirmed the quotes.

Ecclestone was quoted in The Times as saying: "In a lot of ways, terrible to say this I suppose, but apart from the fact that Hitler got taken away and persuaded to do things that I have no idea whether he wanted to do or not, he was in the way that he could command a lot of people, able to get things done."

German media also reported that Guenther Oettinger, state premier of the southern state of Baden-Wuerttemberg, had cancelled a planned meeting with Ecclestone on the sidelines of the Nuerburgring race because of his comments about Hitler.

Ecclestone tried to clarify his comments in top-selling Bild newspaper on Monday.

"It is all a big misunderstanding. In the interview we talked about structures and that it's sometimes good if something can be handled stringently and decided without limits," he said.

Asked by Bild why he had praised Hitler, Ecclestone said: "I did not mention Hitler as a positive example but I just pointed out that before his terrible crimes, he succeeded in fighting unemployment and the economic crisis."

Asked if he wanted to apologize, he said: "I would never dream of hurting the feelings of a community. A lot of people among my closest friends are Jews. Everyone that knows me, knows that I would never attack minorities."

This is what is wrong with a Jewish state

By Bradley Burston

Tags: Israel News, Bradley Burston

Click here for more articles by Bradley Burston

JAFFA - Why was this Fourth of July different from all other independence days?

What the world has seen over the past 12 months is a re-definition of patriotism. It derives from a central lesson of the Obama campaign, the Obama victory, and, so far, of the Obama presidency: In true love of country, there is no room for hatred.

Perhaps this is what is so crushing, so profoundly depressing, about the people who have of late taken to redefining patriotism in Israel.

There is no little irony in the circumstance that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu chose Palestinian recognition of Israel as "the national state of the Jewish People" as a central tool in efforts to stave off peace talks and deflect demands for a settlement freeze.

Never, thanks to his government, has the concept of a Jewish state looked worse.

The undercurrent of racism in this year's election campaign was a clear warning. Overtly anti-Israeli Arab legislation and bills aimed at curbing Arab freedom of expression have soiled the concept of a Jewish state to a nadir that Israel's worst, most energetic enemies have never managed to approach.

The outpouring of hatred has since become an equal-opportunity sewer. Radical settlers and immigrants from the former Soviet Union have voiced unabashed, despicable racist attitudes toward a black president of the United States.

Inevitably, fellow Jews in Israel have become targets of the hatred as well. In Jerusalem, Jews who presume to be among the most devout of all adherents to Judaism, think nothing of attacking fellow Jews on the Sabbath with cinder blocks and glass bottles, all in protest over the opening of a parking lot.

Rabbis in the West Bank give Israel's enemies new ammunition week to week, by condoning killings of Palestinians.

And, in a reference to Israeli Arabs, ultra-Orthodox Housing Minister Ariel Atias this month chose the Bar Association, of all venues, to declare that he saw it as "a national duty to prevent the spread of a population that, to say the least, does not love the state of Israel." He went on to explicitly argue for segregation, not only between Jews and Arabs, but between ultra-Orthodox and secular Jews.

Whether all this is done in the service of patriotism or in the service of Jewish tradition, its effect is disservice to both.

Jewish tradition offers its adherents the widest range of choices, from an almost superhuman level of compassion and lovingkindness, to Old Testament admonishments to genocide.

It's up to the individual Jew to choose. And up to the Jewish state.

It's up to a Jewish state to find a way to oppose a Hamas government without resorting to blocking shipments of humanitarian supplies to more than a million innocent people, or arresting peace activists , among them a former U.S. congresswoman and a Nobel Peace Prize laureate trying to bring those supplies to Gaza.

It's up to a Jewish state to recognize when a policy of collective punishment is self-defeating as well as immoral, and to call a halt.

It's up to this Jewish state to redefine patriotism.

Love of country is, at heart, trust in a nation's people, faith in their better nature, esteem for their best hopes, understanding for the magnificence and the distinctiveness and the huge, infinitely shaded cultural palette of their simple humanity. Hatred has no place in this equation.

The choices here are never easy. The kinds of sacrifices which will be necessary to forge a peace with the Palestinians will come at the direct expense of many of the most fervent - if also most recent - ideologies of Orthodox Jewry, beginning with the imperative to settle the West Bank and oppose peacemaking.

The kinds of tolerance and policies which will be needed to deal fairly and humanely with refugees from Africa and with other non-Jews seeking a life in Israel will be difficult to enact and implement.

Yet we cannot call ourselves a moral Jewish state and countenance a situation in which, as in a Sunday edition of the newspaper, a picture of a refugee African boy protesting in Tel Aviv against threatened mass deportations, is placed directly atop an ad welcoming Jewish immigrants from southern Africa and wishing them "a smooth absorption in Israel, your new home."

The election of an African-American to the highest office of the nation which best embodied human equality - and for much too long, rebuffed it - is the kind of impossibility which takes minds and souls and forever alters them.

What sort of impossibility will it take for the Jewish state to place prophetically based compassion over rabbinically sanctioned boorishness and superiority to all those not exactly like us?

Hatred has no place in a Jewish state. And a Jewish state which sanctifies intolerance in the name of tradition or patriotism, will inevitably prove unwelcome not only to non-Jews, but to the Jewish People as well.

Last update - 05:30 06/07/2009

Israeli school system shafts children of olim, says ministry

By Cnaan Liphshiz, Haaretz Correspondent

Tags: israel news

The Education Ministry does not properly address the needs of children

born in Israel to immigrant parents, the Immigrant Absorption Ministry said on Sunday ahead of its annual symposium on the subject.

In 2008, there were 210,381 immigrant children in Israeli educational

nstitutions, the Absorption Ministry said.

"Most (63 percent) of these children were born in Israel to immigrant parents, yet the education system views only children who were born abroad as immigrant students," the Absorption Ministry said in a statement. "Therefore, the needs of Israeli-born immigrant children are not properly met."

The Education Ministry did not respond by press time.

Also, in 2008 there were 235,567 immigrant children in Israel, or 10 percent of all residents under age 18. The Absorption Ministry says this figure is proportionally among the highest in the West.

The 2009 Immigrant Children in Israel symposium is set to open on Monday in Jerusalem.

Only 51.5 percent of immigrant students receive a high-school diploma - a

figure 10 points lower than for Israeli-born students. "This gap has not

shrunk in years," the report says.

In 2007, 23.3 percent of all children hospitalized in psychiatric hospitals were immigrant children born abroad, even though they account for only 3.7 percent of the general population.

School dropout rates for immigrant students have risen slightly this year, and are now double the 1.8 percent rate for Israeli-born students.

About 25 percent of all immigrant students are poor. Dr. Yitzhak Kadman,

chairman of the National Council for the Child . which coauthored the report . called on the government to cancel plans to slash childcare allowances for families with dropout children.

"This cut will hurt immigrant children more than anyone because they have a higher dropout rate," he said. "The original sin of having them drop out must not be coupled with the crime of slashing their allowances," he said

Last update - 03:51 05/07/2009

Former Beatles, Rolling Stones manager Allen Klein dies

By Reuters

Tags: Allen Klein, The Beatles

Infamous record label owner Allen Klein, who played a key role in the demise of the Beatles and also nabbed control of some of the Rolling Stones' best-known songs, died in New York on Saturday after a battle with Alzheimer's disease, a spokesman said. He was 77.

During a career spanning more than 50 years, the New Jersey-born accountant enjoyed a reputation as a savvy gangster-like figure. His ruthless business practices were reviled by many, but he also earned grudging respect for bullying labels into giving rich deals to his clients.

"Don't talk to me about ethics," he told Playboy magazine in 1971. "Every man makes his own. It's like a war. You choose your side early and from then on, you're being shot at. The man you beat is likely to call you unethical. So what?"

It did not hurt his reputation when he was sentenced to two months in prison in 1979 for tax evasion.

He once said John Lennon hired him to protect his interest in the Beatles because he and wife Yoko Ono wanted "a real shark - someone to keep the other sharks away."

His company, ABKCO Music Records, is one of the biggest independent labels in an industry controlled by multinational corporations. The spokesman said it would remain family-controlled. Two of Klein's three adult children work at the company, including son Jody who runs ABKCO. (The acronym stands for Allen and Betty Klein Co., Betty being his wife.)

Its assets include recordings by the Rolling Stones, the Animals, Herman's Hermits, Bobby Womack, the Kinks, Chubby Checker, Bobby Rydell and many others.

The publishing arm boasts more than 2,000 copyrights including compositions by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones, Cooke, Womack, Ray Davies of the Kinks and Pete Townshend of the Who.

Klein broke into the music business by auditing record labels on behalf of clients including Bobby Darin and Connie Francis. When he found they were owed royalties, he took half of the difference as a fee.

His first big management client was Sam Cooke, for whom he negotiated a lucrative recording deal in 1963 that gave the soul star unprecedented control over his own catalog.

Klein, who was already representing "British Invasion" artists such as the Animals, Dave Clark Five and Herman's Hermits, set his sights on the Rolling Stones, who were laboring under an onerous deal.

He renegotiated their pact in 1965, and ended up managing the group for about five years - taking a 20 percent fee.

The Stones eventually tired of Klein. But the only way to break free of him was to give up the rights to their master recordings and rights to such timeless tunes as "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" and "Jumpin' Jack Flash."

"In some ways Allen Klein was very much ahead of his time," Jagger said in the 1989 Stones documentary "25x5." "We lasted about three or four years with him, really, though the ramifications of that still continue to this day."

Richards was more philosophical, describing their experience with Klein as "the price of an education."

By then, Klein was focused on the ultimate prize, the Beatles. He offered his help to Lennon in early 1969, when the Fab Four's idealistic Apple Corps. label was fast draining the fractured group's coffers.

George Harrison and Ringo Starr also warmed to his pitch, but Paul McCartney was fiercely opposed. He preferred the expertise of his father-in-law, high-powered New York attorney Lee Eastman.

Amid a series of complex maneuverings that also have consequences to this day, Klein unsuccessfully tried to secure control of the Beatles' copyrights on behalf of the group. Michael Jackson ended up with the rights 16 years later.

Klein did score a rich recording deal for the Beatles, but relations within the group were past frayed, and it dissolved in 1970.

That year, Harrison "honored" Klein in a rough version of his song "Beware of Darkness" with the line "beware of ABKCO." "It might have ended up being prophetic. But at the time it was just a little joke," Harrison told Reuters in 2000.

Indeed, Harrison and Klein reunited in 1971 to put on the all-star Concert for Bangladesh shows at Madison Square Garden in New York. It took a decade for the funds to reach the refugees because of complex tax problems.

In addition to his children and wife, Klein is survived by his longtime girlfriend Iris Keitel, an ABKCO executive. His funeral will take place in New York on Tuesday.

Last update - 11:25 05/07/2009

Formula One Chief: Hitler got things done

By The Associated Press

Tags: Hitler, Israel news

Bernie Ecclestone, the Formula One chief, said on Friday that he preferred totalitarian regimes to democracies and praised Adolf Hitler for his ability to "get things done" in an outspoken interview with London's The Times.

The remark drew sharp criticism from politicians and Jewish groups on Saturday.

n the interview, Ecclestone expressed a preference for "strong leaders," citing former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Max Mosley, outgoing head of Formula One's governing body, as examples.

He was quoted as saying that democracy "hasn't done a lot of good for many countries - including this one."

"In a lot of ways, terrible to say this I suppose, but apart from the fact that Hitler got taken away and persuaded to do things that I have no idea whether he wanted to do or not, he was in the way that he could command a lot of people, able to get things done," Ecclestone was quoted as saying.

"In the end he got lost, so he wasn't a very good dictator."

"Politicians are too worried about elections," he said. "We did a terrible thing when we supported the idea of getting rid of Saddam Hussein. He was the only one who could control that country. It was the same [with the Taliban]. We move into countries and we have no idea of the culture. The Americans probably thought Bosnia was a town in Miami. There are people starving in Africa and we sit back and do nothing but we get involved in things we should leave alone."

The Board of Deputies of British Jews told The Times that Ecclestone's views were "quite bizarre," and Jewish Chronicle editor Stephen Pollard said he was "either an idiot or morally repulsive."

Labour Party lawmaker Denis MacShane told the newspaper that the remarks revealed ignorance of history and "a complete lack of judgment."

Calls to Ecclestone's London office were not immediately returned Saturday.

Ecclestone, who owns Formula One's commercial rights, is no stranger to controversial remarks. He once said women should dress in white "like all other domestic appliances."

In The Times interview, Ecclestone said that had been a joke, adding "I would love to have a good lady race driver and preferably black and Jewish too, but they might take maternity leave."

ast update - 00:00 17/10/2007

Jewish rightist: 'Finish Hitler's work, kill Ashkenazi Jews'

By Uri Blau, Haaretz Correspondent

Tags: Stiven Malik, incitement

A right-wing Jewish extremist has been disseminating calls for the assassination of leftists and Ashkenazim on Internet sites in Israel and abroad.

One film clip posted on YouTube, for instance, declares: "You are about to view a handful of leftist Ashkenazim that Hitler and Eichmann did not manage to incinerate. Before we begin, please remember: 90 percent of the moderate left are Ashkenazim!! 100 percent of the extreme left are Ashkenazim!!"

Next comes a picture of President Shimon Peres with the caption: "The murderer!" It is followed by pictures of Benjamin Netanyahu, Yossi Beilin and other politicians.

The clip concludes: "Now, after you have seen these unclean Ashkenazim, how degraded the Ashkenazi race is, and what a pity it is that Hitler and Eichmann did not finish off the Ashkenazim, I ask of you: Search for information on Google about Stiven Malik; there 'the document' awaits you."

The document in question is also full of incitement to violence: "If only we, too, could finish what Hitler began by destroying all the Ashkenazim, the descendants of the Jews who betrayed Germany."

Supportive comments have been posted on the Stiven Malik forum on the Israeli portal 2all; the forum has received thousands of visitors in recent month. Malik's anti-Ashkenazi incitement can also be found on the Israeli portals Tapuz and goop.co.il and on sites such as fresh.co.il.

A Haaretz investigation has concluded that "Malik" is a fictitious name used by a right-wing extremist who was once affiliated with Baruch Marzel's Jewish Front party, but was later expelled from it.

After Haaretz approached the relevant Israeli portals, some of Malik's writings were removed. Tapuz said it had given the material to the police, and Peres's office said it had given it to the Shin Bet security service. YouTube had not responded by press time.

Last update - 00:00 27/08/2007

YouTube criticized in Germany over anti-Semitic Nazi videos

By Reuters

Tags: Germany, YouTube, Nazi

Video-sharing Web site YouTube has met with harsh criticism in Germany for hosting clips that incite racial hatred, according to a news report due to be broadcast on German public TV late on Monday.

The videos hosted on YouTube include clips of a 1940 anti-Semitic propaganda film "Jud Suess" and two music videos of outlawed German far-right rock band Landser, which show footage from World War II depicting Nazi military operations.

Report Mainz, which is due to air the program, said in a statement that Social Democrat (SPD) parliamentarian Dieter Wiefelspuetz said airing the clips on YouTube in Germany was scandalous.

Report Mainz quoted him as saying: "Publishing these films amounts to aiding and abetting incitement of the people."

Report Mainz also said that Germany's Central Council of Jews Vice President Salomon Korn was considering pressing charges against Google Germany.

According to the statement from Report Mainz, German youth protection body Jugendschutz.net has complained to Google Germany more than 100 times and asked Google, which bought YouTube last year, to remove the clips.

Some of the material has been on the site for almost a year.

Google Germany was not immediately available for comment.

More than 60 years after the Holocaust, Germany is grappling with a rise in support for Nazi ideas. Neo-Nazi violence in Germany has reached its highest level since reunification in 1990

Last update - 15:46 02/07/2009

University of Vienna honors 2,200 Jews expelled by Nazis

By The Associated Press

Tags: jewish world, Nazis

Kurt Elias vividly remembers the day in 1938 when the Nazis barred him from entering the University of Vienna because he was Jewish.

"I had to send someone else in to get my dissection kit and coat," said the 90-year-old Elias, a medical student at the time.

Shortly thereafter, the Vienna native left Austria with just one suitcase and several dollars in his pocket. He ended up becoming a doctor in the United States and now lives in New York City.

Elias is one of more than 2,200 people listed in an online database launched this week containing the names of students and teachers - most of them Jewish - who were forced to leave the University of Vienna after Adolf Hitler annexed Austria in March 1938.

The database also contains the names of people who were stripped of their

academic titles - including famous writer Stefan Zweig, whom the Nazis in 1941 deemed unworthy of the philosophy degree he earned in 1904 because he was Jewish.

"This is a belated, symbolic initiative," reads the virtual memorial book.

While some entries consist of just a name, date of birth, basic biographical information and copies of inscription forms, others - such as the page dedicated to Elias - also include photos and life stories.

Some reflect the horrors of the time.

"She was deported and died in Auschwitz (Oswiecim/Poland) on January 1st, 1943," reads the final sentence of the entry dedicated to Antonie Frank, also a former medical student.

Project leader Herbert Posch said he and his team spent years identifying and trying to track down as many people as possible who were expelled from the University of Vienna 71 years ago.

In the end, he said, they reached about 150 and conducted some 100 interviews either in person, by telephone or via e-mail. Links to 14 videos of interviews are to be posted online in the near future.

But the search for victims is not over.

"It's a work in progress, Posch said, adding he hoped visitors to the Web site would help supplement entries with missing details - and help create new ones.

"We're presenting an incomplete list that, over the course of further research, will have to be complemented, expanded and possibly corrected," said his colleague, Friedrich Stadler, who heads a forum that investigates the history of the University of Vienna in the 20th century.

Still, Esther Fritsch, a Jewish community representative, described the

memorial book as a big step forward.

Organizers also compiled a handwritten memorial book that is on display in a light-filled former Jewish prayer house on campus. It has blank pages so that more names can be added as the project progresses.

To Elias, the database will help maintain the memory of what happened to him and many others.

"It's a very good idea to make sure the truth isn't forgotten," he said in a telephone interview from New York.

Last update - 12:57 02/07/2009

Austria's 'forgotten' concentration camp in danger of being demolished

By Anshel Pfeffer

Tags: austria, Israel news

If the excavations currently under way on a hill near the Austrian village of St. Georgen continue, within a few weeks little will remain of Gusen, one of the most horrifying of the Nazi concentration camps that was located nearby. Austrian officials say the work is necessary to prevent the collapse of underground tunnels on the site.

An estimated 36,000 to 50,000 inmates, including Jews, Soviet prisoners of war and political prisoners, met their deaths at Gusen, the site of an underground production facility for advanced Messerschmitt fighter jet aircraft and other weaponry. The planes were manufactured for the Nazi Luftwaffe with slave labor from the concentration camp. It has been 64 years since the closure of the aircraft factory, which was codenamed "Bergkristall."

One local resident who has been inside said the place resembles ten deserted soccer fields. Other than the gates to the factory and small memorial plaques, nothing on the outside bears witness to the tens of thousands of inmates who met their deaths as slave laborers there.

A small group of local residents and Holocaust survivors is trying to preserve the Bergkristall installation from demolition.

A few kilometers from the site stood the Mauthausen concentration camp, established in 1938 as a detention site for Jews and political prisoners, and ultimately as an administrative center for a network of affiliated camps established in the area under S.S. sponsorship. One of those camps was Gusen, established in 1940, initially as a quarry and slave labor center for the region's industry and agriculture. The inmates were actually made available for a fee as day laborers in the area. Gusen was expanded significantly in 1944, after Allied bombing of military industrial sites in Bavaria.

Thousands of slave laborers were used to dig underground facilities for the production of weapons and other military hardware. The most ambitious production facility was Bergkristall, built underground in an area estimated at 50,000 square meters, for the production among other weaponry of the Messerschmitt 262 jet fighter, on which Hitler pinned so many hopes.

Fewer than half the 70,000 inmates who went sent to Gusen made it out alive. The others were either executed or died of hunger, cold, disease or industrial accidents. The camp was among the most cruel in the Nazi Reich, and was actually ranked as such by the S.S. For a few weeks before the end of the war, the Bergkristall reached a record production level of 15 aircraft a day, but by that point the Nazis were running out of trains to transport them and fuel to fly them.

Production nonetheless continued at a murderous pace, ending only on May 3, 1945, days before the Nazis' surrender ended the war in Europe. About 20,000 Gusen inmates were liberated at the end of the war by the American army. Some died thereafter of disease, and the rest scattered around the world. Gusen has been called the "forgotten camp."

The Messerschmitt company was reestablished after the war and is now part of the giant EADS aviation firm which manufactures the Airbus airplane. Although the legacy of the Messerschmitt is carefully preserved by the firm, nowhere is the fact that slave labor went into the company's aircraft mentioned.

After the war, the Soviets tried to blow up the underground industrial facilities at Gusen, but the collapse of a residential area led them to simply seal the site. The Austrian government has chosen not to reopen it, although the Austrian interior ministry, which is responsible for historic preservation, did take control of the site in 2001.

When demolition work began at the site last month, the memorial committee mobilized, but the regional and national governments declined to stop the work. In response to an inquiry from Haaretz, the Austrian government said the work at Gusen constitutes "emergency measures" taken "in order to prevent the further decay of the tunnel system," and added that the activity at the site is being monitored by experts.

According to the Austrian government, after the work is complete in October, 1,900 meters of tunnel will be "preserved." The government said there was no alternative since the tunnels are in danger of collapse, adding that it was regrettable that the company carrying out the work did not notify the public or memorial organizations in advance.

"The responsible authorities in Austria," a government spokesman added, "will do their best to ensure that as a result of the above measures, the quality of the Gusen memorial site and accessibility for visitors will be decisively improved."

Despite the government's assurances, some local residents are convinced that the real reason for the work is to prepare the site for residential construction

Last update - 12:02 02/07/2009

Jew's Muse / The Iranian mullacracy will never go away

By Uzi Silber

Tags: Iran election, Israel news

As far as I'm concerned, the carefully calibrated observations spouted by professional Iran experts on news channels are about as valid as the opinions of the Shiraz-born proprietors of the Shalom Chai pizza parlor on Manhattan's Lower East Side. Unfortunately, David and Chaim were far too busy serving customers to field questions. Similarly, the Iranian-born ex-wives of two friends couldn't be reached for comment.

In attempt to elicit authentic if official Iranian views on the recent events in Tehran, I emailed queries to Iranian embassy VIPs in North America, Europe, India, Australia and New Zealand. These efforts have been fruitless as well.

That leaves me and my own ruminations -- as useful, I suppose, as anyone else's.

So here it goes: the Iranian mullacracy won't go away.

Government-backed motorcycle gangs have successfully smothered the desperate street protests; like those of '99 and '03, these too will soon be forgotten, Twitter, Facebook and Youtube notwithstanding. Rest assured: European officials and businessmen will be commuting to Tehran in a mere few months time, begging for business as usual.

And despite President Obama's firm, if lukewarm denunciations of the crackdown, the Americans won?t be far behind: at some future venue in Geneva, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will present Manouchehr Mottaki, her Iranian counterpart, with a toy 'reset' button just like the one she handed the Russian foreign minister last March. This gadget, recall, was meant as a metaphor for the Obama Administration's desire to diplomatically paper over Russian bullying of its neighbors.

International bleating to the contrary, when it comes right down to it, precious few worry about internal repression or oppression within dictatorially ruled countries. The Iranian government will get away with it, just as Chinese, Russians, Burmese, Venezuelan and Arab dictators have and do. And they all can, because it's not about human rights -- it's all just business.

The mullahs will never give up power. Like the dictators in Beijing, Havana, Yangon, Pyongyang, Riyadh, Moscow and Caracas, the Iranian military-mullah complex will endure because three decades in power has made the ruling elite fabulously wealthy and they?re not about to give all that up.

For the ascendant clique of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in particular, the money is a vital means to a far loftier mission - accelerating the arrival of the Muslim Shiite Messiah, known as the Twelfth Imam.

As it happens, this messianic End of Days worldview is held to a greater or lesser extent by all members of the Islamic political elite whatever their flavor, be it the hygienically challenged Ahmadinejad, his nemesis and corrupt billionaire power broker Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani, or former thug-turned Gandhi-like media darling, Mir Hossein Moussavi.

First the money; in wake of the 1979 Islamic revolution, Ayatollah Khomeini and his tough henchmen known as the Revolutionary Guards seized from the wealthy class thousands of lucrative properties and income producing businesses and placed them in so-called Islamic charitable foundations known as bonyads.

Over the decade that followed, the bonyads supposedly redistributed to the poor some of the wealth stolen by the Khomeini gang. But once the grand ayatollah died, the mullahs and Revolutionary Guards disregarded the bonyads? mandate of wealth redistribution, shifting their efforts instead to self-enrichment and intensified financing of jihadi terrorist organizations.

According to an influential 2003 article in Forbes Magazine, bonyads boast lucrative investments in disparate industries such as oil, real estate, pharmaceuticals, agriculture, shipping, construction and resorts. Freedom House estimates that the bonyads collectively control perhaps 20% of Iranian GDP, or over $100 billion. Bonyadic tentacles also reach into every small Iranian town where local operatives regularly extort local businesses. So much for justice.

As Vladimir Putin himself reportedly noted in 2007, the Iranian ruling clique is delusional. This is of course isn't unusual for autocrats: inhabiting bubbles and surrounded by trembling sycophants, dictators of all sorts are invariably prone to a megalomaniacal sense of destiny. Egypt's Gamal Abdel Nasser, Libya's Muammar Khaddafi and Iraq's Saddam Hussein each expected to unite the Arab world under their respective flags. Hugo Chavez is certain that he was born to lead the entirety of Latin America into a new socialist utopia.

Ahmadinejad has made it eminently clear in many public pronouncements that he sees himself as an agent put on earth to hasten the Twelfth Imam?s arrival; the archives of MEMRI.org provide ample record of these declarations.

It follows that any domestic or foreign opponent of the Iranian regime and its policies would be viewed by Ahmadinejad and his ilk as an obstacle to the Imam's eventual return, and as such, an intolerable foe. This holds true even when the foe happens to be a loyal son of the Islamic Revolution such as Moussavi.

Make no mistake -- Ahmadinejad and his ruthless clique will do whatever is required to hasten the arrival of their venerated Imam even if it takes the spilled blood of the very last unarmed Iranian.

The mullahs won't go: this isn't just about the power and the money -- it's about the coming of their Messiah.

Last update - 05:36 02/07/2009

Last remaining U.S. Jewish Republican Senator loses seat

By The Associated Press

Tags: Jewish World, Israel News

The defeat of incumbent Norm Coleman in the drawn-out Minnesota Senate race leaves U.S. Republicans without a Jewish senator for the first time in half a century.

Coleman's departure comes two months after the Republicans' other Jewish member, Arlen Specter, switched parties to become a Democrat. Coleman conceded his long-contested race with Democratic challenger Al Franken on Tuesday after the Minnesota Supreme Court rejected Coleman's legal challenge.

Republicans have had at least one Jewish senator since New York's Jacob Javits took office in 1957, reaching a peak of three during the mid-1980s.

In the House, Eric Cantor has risen quickly since he took office in 2001 to become the minority whip, the second-ranked House Republican. His other distinction is that, since 2003, he is the only Jewish Republican in the 435-member body. That is down from eight Jewish Republican members who served in the House during the 1990s.

There are currently 30 Democrats in the House who list their religion as

Jewish. The Senate will have 13 Jewish members as of next week when Franken, Coleman's rival in Minnesota, is sworn in. That's 11 Democrats and two independents who normally vote with the Democrats.

Ira Forman, CEO of the National Jewish Democratic Council, said the sharp drop in the number of Jewish Republicans in Congress paralleled the party's shift to the right. "It's a reflection of where the Republican Party has gone," he said. "It's left the Jewish community pretty cold."

Matt Broks, executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition, said his group was not happy with the defeat of Coleman, who has worked with them as a consultant. But he disagreed with those who say the Republican Jewish movement is declining, saying you will see and are seeing Jewish Republicans winning elections all across the country at the state and local level

Last update - 14:44 03/04/2009

Jewish U.S. troops to get gefilte fish and matzot for an Iraq Pesach

By Shlomo Shamir, Haaretz Correspondent

Tags: passover 2009, jewish world

Some 600 Passover kits will be shipped to Jewish soldiers serving in United States military units in Iraq, Afghanistan and the Persian Gulf next week.

Some of the kits will be delivered to Jewish sailors stationed on U.S. naval vessels in the Persian Gulf.

Each of the kits contains a package of regular Matzos, a package of chocolate-coated matzos, a large jar of gefilte fish, macaroons, a box of candy, a yarmulke, a Passover Haggadah and a booklet explaining the essence and traditions of Passover.

The kits were prepared, and will be delivered, by the JCC - the continental umbrella organization for the Jewish Community Center Movement - a U.S. government agency accredited to serve the religious and social needs of Jewish military personnel, their families, and patients in VA hospitals.

The kits are designed to enable Jewish servicemen and women deployed on U.S. ships and in remote areas of the world to have "a taste of Pesach" when the challenges of life in combat prevent attendance at family or communal services.

The Passover kits will be delivered along with special kosher for Passover combat rations that the U.S. military delivers to its Jewish soldiers.

Last update - 14:44 03/04/2009

Jewish U.S. troops to get gefilte fish and matzot for an Iraq Pesach

By Shlomo Shamir, Haaretz Correspondent

Tags: passover 2009, jewish world

Some 600 Passover kits will be shipped to Jewish soldiers serving in United States military units in Iraq, Afghanistan and the Persian Gulf next week.

Some of the kits will be delivered to Jewish sailors stationed on U.S. naval vessels in the Persian Gulf.

The Passover kits will be delivered along with special kosher for Passover combat rations that the U.S. military delivers to its Jewish soldiers.

100 Jewish cantors to perform at Warsaw's National Opera

By Reuters

Tags: Poland, Warsaw, Israel News

For the first time since the Holocaust, 100 Jewish cantors from around the globe are gathering to perform in Warsaw, once one of the world's leading Jewish centers, Poland's chief rabbi said on Sunday.

The cantors, who sing liturgical chants during Jewish religious services, will perform at Warsaw's National Opera, U.S.-born Rabbi Michael Schudrich told Reuters.

"This will be a symbolic, historic event, because prior to the Holocaust, Warsaw was a world center of cantorial culture," the rabbi said.

The Grand Opera, where the concert is due to take place on Tuesday, is less than half a kilometre from Warsaw's Tlomackie Synagogue, blown up by the Germans during World War Two.

The building has since been rebuilt and now houses the Jewish Historical Institute.

The chief organizer of the performance is American cantor Nathan Lam of Los Angeles, who has family ties to Warsaw.

Up until World War Two, 3.5 million Jews lived in Poland, a major international center of Jewish religious and cultural life.

Poland lost some six million of its citizens during the war, including three million Jews who perished in the Holocaust.

Last update - 06:28 27/06/2009

Disgraced financier Madoff ordered to forfeit over $170b

By The Associated Press

Tags: Israel News, Madoff

Disgraced financier Bernard Madoff has been ordered to forfeit over $170 billion for orchestrating perhaps the largest financial swindle in history, prosecutors said Friday.

U.S. District Judge Denny Chin entered a preliminary order of forfeiture Friday, according to Acting U.S. Attorney Lev Dassin. The order forces Madoff to give up his interests in all property, including real estate, investments, cars and boats.

According to earlier court documents, prosecutors reserved the right to pursue more than $170 billion in criminal forfeiture. That represents the total amount of money that could be connected to the fraud, not the amount stolen or lost.

The government also settled claims against Madoff's wife, according to Friday's order. Under the arrangement, the government obtained Ruth Madoff's interest in all property, including more than $80 million of property to which she had claimed was hers, prosecutors said.

The order makes it clear, though, that nothing precludes other departments or entities from seeking to recover additional funds

The agreements strip the Madoffs of all their interest in properties belonging to them, including a homes in Manhattan, Montauk, and Palm Beach, Fla., worth a total of nearly $22 million.

New York prosecutors seek 150-year sentence for Madoff

Meanwhile, federal prosecutors said in court papers Friday that Madoff should receive a 150-year sentence.

"The sheer scale of the fraud calls for severe punishment," the prosecutors wrote in response to a defense motion seeking lighter punishment.

Madoff, 71, is due to be sentenced Monday after pleading guilty in March to charges that his exclusive investment advisory business was actually a massive pyramid scheme.

Federal sentencing guidelines allow for the 150-year term, prosecutors said. Any lesser sentence, they added, should still be long enough to send a forceful message and assure that Madoff will remain in prison for life.

The government's papers quoted from letters to U.S. District Judge Denny Chin written by victims of the scheme who are suffering severe hardships.

"Madoff ruined lives," one letter said. "He deserves no mercy."

At the time of Madoff's arrest, fictitious account statements showed thousands of clients had $65 billion. But investigators say he never traded securities, and instead used money from new investors to pay returns to existing clients.

Prosecutors said Friday that the total losses, which span decades, haven't been calculated. But 1,341 accounts opened since December 1995 alone suffered loses of $13.2 billion, they said.

Madoff attorney Ira Sorkin argued in court papers last week for a 12-year

term. He said his client deserved credit for his voluntary surrender, full

acceptance of responsibility and meaningful cooperation efforts.

"We seek neither mercy nor sympathy," Sorkin wrote. But he urged the judge to set aside the emotion and hysteria attendant to this case as he determines the sentence.

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Last update - 13:39 26/06/2009

Meet Aaron Katz, Poland's first openly gay rabbi

By The Associated Press

Tags: Jewish World, Poland

When Rabbi Aaron Katz walks the streets of Warsaw's former Jewish quarter, scenes of that lost world fill his imagination: Families headed to synagogue, women in their kitchens cooking Sabbath meals, his father as a boy with the sidecurls of an Orthodox Jew.

But Katz's life could hardly be more different from that prewar eastern European culture, at least in one key respect: He is Poland's first openly gay rabbi.

Born in Argentina 53 years ago to parents who fled Poland before the Holocaust, Katz is the latest rabbi to play his part in reviving a once vibrant Jewish community that was all but wiped out by Hitler.

He settled into Warsaw's historic Jewish district in March with Kevin Gleason, a former Hollywood producer on such reality TV shows as "The Bachelor" and "Nanny 911," with whom he entered into a registered domestic partnership in Los Angeles two years ago.

They live only three streets from the birth home of Katz's father in a modern and spacious apartment with their dogs, two gentle brown boxers. Katz says he is moved by the links to his past, but keeps his focus on the future.

"I don't think we will come back to this great Jewish life," he said, referring to prewar Poland, a country where one person in 10 was Jewish and where synagogues, yeshivas and shtetls defined the landscape. "But I hope we will have a normal Jewish life in Poland."

Katz is certainly an anomaly in conservative Poland, where to be either Jewish or gay is challenge enough ? at least outside the cities. Of a population of 38 million, about 5,000 are registered as Jews, while thousands more have part-Jewish ancestry, and some have returned to their roots since Poland shed its communist dictatorship.

Katz is the second rabbi to serve Beit Warszawa, a Reform community with 250 members that was founded in the capital 10 years ago by Polish and American Jews who felt little affinity with some Orthodox practices, such as separating men and women during Sabbath services. The Reform movement ordains gay rabbis.

Homosexuals have won acceptance at differing levels throughout post-communist Eastern Europe. The Czech Republic and Slovenia recognize same-sex partnerships, as will Hungary from July 1. Poland hasn't gone that far. It has an active gay rights movement and gay nightclubs in the cities, but the Catholic church and some conservative politicians still publicly describe homosexuality as abnormal and immoral.

Katz, a citizen of Argentina, Israel and Sweden, says so far he has not faced anti-Semitism or homophobia in Poland. But some community members, speaking in private, reveal a degree of discomfort.

One woman at a Sabbath service whispered that she found Katz's open sexuality too "aggressive." A longtime male member counseled against writing about the rabbi, lest anti-Semites use it against the community.

A third member, Piotr Lukasz, said he himself supports gay rights, and marched with an Israeli flag during a recent gay rights parade in Warsaw. But he said he had heard others complain that it would weaken an already small and fragile community.

"They say that Poland is not a ready for a gay rabbi because the outside society is very conservative," said Lukasz, a 23-year-old student of cultural anthropology. "An openly gay rabbi is something very controversial."

Others, though, seem comfortable, as evidenced by a recent string of dinners where Jews and non-Jews joined Katz and his partner at their home, digging into goulash or chicken-and-potato meals around the dining room table and socializing through the evening.

Katz is the chief cook ? it's because he likes to be in charge, says Gleason, who instead welcomes guests warmly at the door and keeps their wine glasses filled through the evenings.

"I think the rabbi's home should be open," Katz said. "The moment that you take a position, your family takes the position too. It's a role."

Katz's life as a rabbi has been an evolution from one world to another. In the 1980s and early 1990s he was Sweden's chief Orthodox rabbi, married to a woman with whom he had five children now aged 16 to 31. Later he lived and worked in Berlin and Los Angeles. He had a dark beard, but today is clean-shaven.

The only photograph in their living room shows Katz and Gleason on the day they sealed their partnership ? which they refer to as a marriage ? surrounded by both their families, including Katz's sons and daughters, who are close to the couple and who showed their acceptance of the union with a gift of a ketubah, a traditional Jewish wedding certificate.

Katz's journey away from Orthodox Judaism was part of his "coming out process," he explains, but also was influenced by the realization that some of his children were not attracted to Orthodox worship. He concluded that Reform Judaism was more attractive to the young.

Still, he insists that as modern as he is, he loves tradition.

He keeps a kosher home and has enthusiastically embraced the Jewish tradition of matchmaker, using his dinners to introduce singles ? usually heterosexuals but not exclusively.

Asked how many marriages have resulted, he said "a couple," but Gleason jumped in to correct him: "You're being modest," he said.

Gleason, 50, was born into a Catholic family but converted to Judaism for Katz. He left Hollywood and now does administrative and fundraising work for the synagogue. He attends services, sitting in the back and tapping on his watch when he feels the rabbi's lively sermons are getting to long.

Still, the openness of their relationship can catch people in Warsaw off guard.

"I introduce him as my partner they say, 'Oh he's also a rabbi?"' Katz said. "When I say 'my partner' they think I mean like in business. So I say 'no, no, no, we are living together."

Last update - 10:05 25/06/2009

U.S. professor cleared over comparison of Gaza war to Holocaust

By Cnaan Liphshiz, Haarez Correspondent, and The Associated Press

Tags: Gaza, Israel News, IDF

A committee at a California university has cleared a professor who sent an e-mail comparing Israel's policies in Gaza to the Holocaust.

Officials at the University of California, Santa Barbara, sent a letter Wednesday to sociology professor William I. Robinson saying the committee had closed the matter.

In January, Robinson offended some students and others with an e-mail to his "Sociology of Globalization" class that juxtaposed grisly photos from the Nazi era with a recent Gaza offensive.

Jewish groups called the e-mail "hate spam" and claimed Robinson violated university policies barring professors from intimidating students and using campus resources for political reasons.

A leading pro-Israel student group blasted the move on Wednesday. "[The university] has blurred the lines between education and peddling of propaganda," the L.A.-based Israel advocacy group StandWithUs told Haaretz.

The affair was exposed by Santa Barbara student Leah Yadegar ? a graduate of the StandWithUs Emerson Fellowship program, which trains students in campuses in "response techniques" to anti-Israel efforts on campus.

"We are surprised and disappointed that the university chose not to uphold their standards for professional conduct," said Roz Rothstein, director and founder of StandWithUs, which filed the original complaint against Robinson.

"It is unfortunate that students will continue to be victims of partisan indoctrination and misinformation."

Robinson, who is Jewish, has said his justified criticism of Israel's policies should not be confused as anti-Semitism. Before the ruling, he had circulated a petition rallying colleagues and supporters against the internal probe into his actions.

First Jewish speaker for Britain's House of Commons

By Assaf Uni, Haaretz Correspondent

Tags: UK, Israel News, John Bercow

Britain's parliament got its first ever Jewish speaker of the house this week, with the election of Conservative MP John Bercow to replace disgraced Labourite Michael Martin.

Martin resigned last month over the expences scandal that has rocked the British political world.

Bercow beat nine other candidates in three rounds of voting, despite a lack of support from his own party, winning the final ballot with 322 votes to 271.

The new speaker has been MP for Buckingham since 1997.

Bercow, a 46-year-old father of three, was born to a Jewish middle-class family in the north London neighborhood of Finchley. In 2001, he visited Israel on the invite of a Jewish friend from the Conservative party.

Many of Bercow's supporters expect him to pursue reforms meant to restore public faith in government following the expences scandal.

Last update - 10:21 23/06/2009

Family of murdered Yemeni Jew among 16 covertly brought to Israel

By Reuters

Tags: Israel News, Jewish World

The relatives of a Jewish man murdered last year in Yemen were among the three families brought to Israel on a secret Jewish Agency mission earlier this week, a member of the Arabian peninsula state's Jewish community said on Tuesday.

The 16 Jews left Yemen on Sunday, the same day a state appeals court handed a death sentence to Abdul-Aziz al-Abdi for shooting dead Mashaa Yaeesh al-Nahari in December.

The three families come from Amran in the north but were living in the capital Sanaa because of deteriorating security amid a rebellion in neighboring Saada province by a Shi'ite tribal group.

"The Jewish Agency took charge of the operation to move the Jews after they previously helped a family of 11 to leave," said the source who declined to be named.

There are an estimated 200 to 300 Jews in Yemen, mainly in Sanaa, remnants of a centuries-old community that spoke Hebrew. About 50,000 moved to Israel in an airlift begun in 1949.

Israel defines itself as a Jewish state and offers citizenship to Jews from anywhere in the world.

Yemen, the Arab world's poorest country, is struggling with a Shi'ite revolt in the north, a secessionist movement in the south and growing militancy among Sunni al Qaeda sympathizers.

Last update - 08:36 23/06/2009

British teens get a taste of Orthodox Israeli life on reality TV

By Nathan Jeffay, The Forward

Tags: Israel News, Orthodox Jews

It was clear that something unusual was going on in the Orthodox-only village of Nof Ayalon, in central Israel, when residents spotted a bikini-clad teenager strutting her stuff.

Nof Ayalon, near Modi'in and not far from the Green Line, very much bears the imprint of its founders. It was set up in the mid-1990s by the nearby Yeshivat Sh'alvim, and ever since it has been a bastion of punctilious observance and modest dress.

Until, that is, the middle of May, when a British teenage girl with a penchant for provocative outfits arrived as part of a reality TV show. Also taking part in the program was a teenage boy who is a self-styled Goth and body-piercing enthusiast.

Both youngsters are non-Jewish high school dropouts from Hampshire, England, and the idea of the program they were taking part in was to see whether a week living with an Orthodox family could transform them from madcaps to menches.

The show is part of a BBC series, "The World's Strictest Parents," in which unruly British teenagers are sent to live with strict families in different countries. The episode filmed in Israel is due to air later this summer.

As the program will show, the battle lines between the Israeli family and the youngsters were clear from the start. You don't get keener devotees to authority than Tzipi and David Shaked (pronounced sha-kayd) and their five children, whose ages range from 5 to 18. The Shakeds live in accordance with every dictate of Jewish law, and moved to Nof Ayalon to be among others who do so. And few people have such an aversion to authority as their houseguests, Jack Travers and Gemma Lyons, aged 17 and 16, respectively.

"We saw it as a rare opportunity to extend a hand to troubled non-Jewish teens and in so doing, showcase Jewish values which should be seen by the outside world," said Tzipi Shaked, who, like her husband is American born.

In terms of Jewish doctrine, the Shakeds were determined "to push nothing down their throats," but when it came to their guests' conduct, discipline was in no short supply. Travers and Lyons were expected to overhaul their dress habits - skimpy in her case; medieval-style clothing, multiple piercings, thick black eyeliner in his - and observe various Jewish practices, including some Sabbath laws and rules of negia, which forbid members of the opposite sex from touching. The teenagers got a further dose of discipline from the army: they spent a day training on an Israel Defense Forces base.

The Israel episode produced a stormier clash than any that had occurred in the previous two seasons of the show - other host families have included Alabama Christians and Indian Hindus. Lyons was infuriated by the modesty expectations and flouted them by donning her bikini. The family threw her out of the house, and producers had to take her to a hotel - something that has never happened on the program in the past. "It was a massive deal," director Colin Rothbart told the Forward. After a day and a half, she apologized and was allowed back in.

The situation wasn?t helped by the fact that Lyons has an anger problem - an issue the show?s producers tried to address in a novel way. "The teenagers met a Holocaust survivor who has every reason in the world to be angry, but who had a smile on her face. The boy gets depressed, and this also helped him put things in perspective," Rothbart said.

Despite the fireworks, the family's values resonated with the teenagers in the end. "She's a pretty girl, and the mum said people may not judge her by who she is but what she's showing, and she began to accept this," Rothbart said. "In fact, now [that] she's back home, she's dressing more modestly.?

When it came time to observe the Sabbath, which occurred toward the end of the trip, Travers and Lyons were intrigued by Jewish observance. While the Shakeds expected their guests to observe the Sabbath laws only when in public, they chose to do as the family did. "They wanted to experience what it was like from our perspective," Shaked said.

For Travers, the Sabbath was a turning point. He stayed up until 4 A.M. chatting with the local youngsters who, Shaked reports, had resolved "not to judge a 'Goth' by his cover." She recalled: "It was a revelation to him that the teens of Nof Ayalon can hang out on a Friday night with no fistfights and without alcohol, but having fun."

The producers of "The World's Strictest Parents" are not allowing the teens to be interviewed, as they are still following their progress, but they said that Travers has admitted since the trip that he smuggled alcohol into the Shakeds' house, but said he did not drink it, as he found family life there enjoyable without stimulants.

It seems that some other religious concepts impressed Travers and Lyons, as well. They heard about the Jewish idea of teshuvah, or repentance, and both plan to make amends with family members and teachers and return to their studies back home. And in a surprising endorsement of Israel, they both want to go back this summer - Lyons to spend time studying in university, and Travers to work on a kibbutz

Last update - 15:06 21/06/2009

Top U.S. rabbi hails Iran protestors' 'vision of freedom'

By Jewishjournal.com

Tags: Iran Election, Israel News

The rabbi of Los Angeles' Sinai Temple, home to one of the largest Iranian Jewish congregations in the world, hailed on Saturday the wave of post-election protests in Iran as reflecting the biblical promise of freedom.

"The people marching on the streets of Iran have seen a vision of freedom," Rabbi David Wolpe, who is considered a leader of the Conservative movement, told some 1200 congregants from the pulpit.

Last update - 07:07 21/06/2009

Row grows over Norway honor for pro-Nazi Nobel laureate

By Cnaan Liphshiz, Haaretz Correspondent

Tags: Jewish World, Norway

By honoring novelist and Nazi-sympathizer Knut Hamsun, Norway has damaged the international Holocaust education drive that it has recently been appointed to head, campaigners against anti-Semitism told Haaretz. Yet, the leader of Norway's Jewish community disagrees.

In March, Norway assumed chairmanship of the 26-nation Task Force for International Cooperation on Holocaust Education in the midst of celebrating the 150th anniversary of the birth of Knut Hamsun, the country's once celebrated author who was shunned for supporting Norway's Nazi occupation regime during World War II.

The government has honored the novelist with celebrations, a commemorative coin and is allocating millions of dollars toward building a cultural center in the Nobel Prize laureate's hometown, which is to open in August.

Hamsun, who died impoverished at the age of 92 in 1952 (the government stripped him of his property) once gave his Nobel Prize medal in literature as a gift to Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels. He also met Adolf Hitler in Bavaria. The author of masterpieces like "Hunger," Hamsun is cherished by readers in Norway and around the world.

"No government should honor Nazis, their collaborators or their sympathizers," said Carole Nuriel, an analyst for the Anti-Defamation League. The ADL drafted a statement on Norway in consultation with the country's Jewish community, noting that in the framework of commemoration, the Norwegian government was "highlighting Hamsun's moral failure, not downplaying it."

A spokesperson for the Norwegian embassy in Tel Aviv declined to comment, but Bjorn Svenungsen of the foreign ministry in Oslo told Haaretz that honoring Hamsun is "a commemoration of one of Norway's most important authors." He said all parties involved have criticized Hamsun's Nazi past. The celebration is "a tribute to Hamsun's role in European literature, not an acceptance of his political views," Svenungsen added. "The event is also used to remember the massive criticism of Hamsun after the 1945 liberation."

Per Antonsen, a former veteran consultant on foreign policy to the Norwegian government, told Haaretz that Hamsun's commemoration was "a clear result of the government's deep-rooted ignorance and lack of political and moral consciousness."

The head of the Simon Wiesenthal Center's Israel office, Ephraim Zuroff, said Hamsun's commemoration "casts a shadow on the task force's work, turning it into something less effective" and "more symbolic than practical."

Anne Sender, chairwoman of Norway's Jewish community, said she would rather the government didn't honor Hamsun, but she nonetheless lauded it for "using the events to highlight the man's Nazi past alongside his genius." She said she did not see the commemoration as conflicting with Norway's task force chairmanship. "The commemoration can be used in a healthy manner, to teach people who are less knowledgeable about Hamsun's Nazi sympathies."

Michael Melchior, Norway's Danish-born former chief rabbi, said the legitimacy of commemorating Hamsun depended on the prominence given to his Nazi past. "If Hamsun's ignominy is displayed in all its acrimoniousness, it wouldn't conflict with Norway's chairmanship of the task force," he said. "If they turn him into a hero, it would merit condemnation regardless of the task force."

Erez Uriely, director of the Oslo-based Center Against Anti-Semitism, concurs. "We should remember the genius Knut Hamsun, both as one of the most important authors of his time and as a Nazi supporter," he said.

But Manfred Gerstenfeld, a scholar on anti-Semitism and chairman of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, said the problem goes deeper than just the Hamsun issue. "The outrageous state-sponsored honoring of Hamsun is only the tip of the iceberg of why Norway should never have been chosen to chair the task force," he said

Last update - 18:42 06/06/2009

UN investigator 'shocked' by scale of destruction in Gaza

By News Agencies

Tags: UN, Gaza, war crimes

The head of a United Nations team investigating possible war crimes by Israel and Hamas during the Gaza war said Thursday he had been shocked by the scale of the destruction in the Palestinian areas.

South African Judge Richard Goldstone spoke at the end of a four-day fact-finding trip to Gaza, during which his 15-member team interviewed dozens of witnesses and visited sites damaged in Israel's three-week offensive against Hamas that ended Jan. 18.

His team hoped to visit Israel and the West Bank as well, but Israel has refused to cooperate, citing alleged anti-Israel bias by the U.N. Human Rights Council, the probe's sponsor.

Goldstone said he hoped Israel's refusal would not weaken the final report, due in early September, adding that it would not keep the team from investigating allegations against both sides.

"If we haven't dealt with facts that Israel would like us to deal with, I think we can hardly be blamed for that," he said.

The team announced Thursday that it will hold public hearings with the war's victims later this month in Gaza and Geneva.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor said he did not anticipate a

change in Israel's stand toward the investigation or the Human Right Council, which has a record of criticizing Israel for its treatment of the Palestinians.

"They should call us the day the Human Rights Council decides on a human rights inquiry on some other place around the globe," he said, mentioning Darfur and Sri Lanka. "After that, we may start to be convinced that they are not singling out Israel."

Israeli, Palestinian and international human rights groups began calling for war crimes investigations soon after the 22-day war ended in January.

Israeli launched the war to stop eight years of Hamas rocket fire on Israeli towns.

Palestinian human rights groups say more than 1,400 Palestinians were killed, most of them civilians. Israel says around 1,100 Gazans were killed and that most were militants. Thirteen Israelis were also killed, three of them civilians.

Goldstone refused to comment on the ongoing investigation's content. But human rights groups have said Israel used disproportionate force and failed to protect civilians. They say Hamas fought from civilian areas and is suspected of having used human shields - all of which can be violations of international law.

Goldstone, who previously investigated war crimes in Rwanda and the former

Yugoslavia, said the public hearings in Gaza and Geneva later this month would allow the voices and the faces of victims to be seen and heard by the whole international community.

He said both Palestinians and Israelis would be invited to speak in Geneva.

Last update - 20:50 07/07/2009

UN investigator: Can't yet say if Israel committed war crimes in Gaza

By News Agencies

Tags: Israel News

The United Nations team charged with examining whether Israel and Hamas committed war crimes in the Gaza Strip during their war earlier this year has nearly concluded its probe, but says it is too early to determine a final verdict.

Richard Goldstone, a former chief UN war crimes prosecutor heading the four-person inquiry team, said he expected to submit the team's report to the UN Human Rights Council next month.

He made the comments as investigators wound up four days of public hearings from both Israelis and Palestinians.

Goldstone said his team regrets Israeli authorities blocked it from visiting Israel and the West Bank, but that testimony from victims from those areas was heard in Geneva, Switzerland.

Israel refused to cooperate with the mission because it regarded it as having biased instructions from the UN Human Rights Council, which has a track record of repeatedly singling out Israel for criticism and turning a blind eye to any Palestinian wrongdoing.

Goldstone said he regards the mandate of the fact-finding mission as requiring an independent investigation into all alleged violations of international humanitarian law and international human rights law during the IDF's 22-day offensive.

"The testimonies we have heard from victims and witnesses... have been very difficult to hear, but I believe it is important that we listen to these stories," said Goldstone.

He said it would be premature, however, to talk about any conclusions the team may have made or whether it has enough evidence to present a case of war crimes.

"The hearings gave a voice to the victims and keep them from being lost among the statistics," he said.

"Last week we were in Gaza and heard two days of hearings and listened to the stories of intense pain, loss and suffering from the people of Gaza," Goldstone said.

"Yesterday and today in Geneva we have heard from victims and witnesses from Israel and from the West Bank, and they too have shared with us moving stories."

He said it was much better to see and hear people where they were affected and the team would have much preferred to hold the Geneva hearings in southern Israel, where Israelis have been subjected to rocket attack from Gaza, and in the West Bank.

"Obviously on this mission visiting Gaza was very important, not only to speak to people and hear what they suffered, what they endured, but also to see the physical damage, which I think shocked all of us, the extent of it," Goldstone said.

"No party to the conflict was fully cooperative," he said.

"That's the nature of this beast," Goldstone said. "One's dealing with strategic issues, one's dealing in some respects with intelligence matters, and one's got to do the best one can."

Goldstone says the team still plans to pose questions to the Israeli government, the Palestinian Authority and the Hamas rulers in Gaza, but then will wrap up the investigation and move on to writing its report, which is to be given to the United Nations by August.

Last update - 18:42 07/07/2009

American Jewish soldier killed in insurgent attack in Afghanistan

By Haaretz Service and The Associated Press

Tags: Jewish World, Israel News

An American Jewish soldier was killed during an attack on his base in eastern Afghanistan Saturday, the U.S. Army has confirmed.

Pfc. Aaron Fairbairn, 20, of Aberdeen, Washington, was killed when an insurgent drove an explosives-filled truck into Combat Outpost Zerok and detonated it.

Another soldier - Pfc. Justin Casillas - was also killed in the attack, and 12 other soldiers were injured.

Fairbairn and Casillas were both Alaska-based paratroopers.

Australian Jewish soldier Gregory Sher, 30, was killed in January when his patrol base in southern Afghanistan came under rocket attack from Taliban insurgents.

Last update - 18:06 07/07/2009

Israel turns to cyberware to foil Iran nukes

By Reuters

Tags: Cyberwar, Israel News, Iran

In the late 1990s, a computer specialist from the Shin Bet security service hacked into the mainframe of the Pi Glilot fuel depot north of Tel Aviv.

It was meant to be a routine test of safeguards at the strategic site. But it also tipped off Israel to the potential such hi-tech infiltrations offered for real sabotage.

"Once inside the Pi Glilot system, we suddenly realized that, aside from accessing secret data, we could also set off deliberate explosions, just by programming a re-route of the pipelines," said a veteran of the Shin Bet drill.

So began a cyberwarfare project which, a decade on, is seen by independent experts as the likely new vanguard of Israel's efforts to foil Iran's nuclear ambitions.

The appeal of cyber attacks was boosted, Israeli sources say, by the limited feasibility of conventional air strikes on the distant and fortified Iranian atomic facilities, and by U.S. reluctance to countenance another open war in the Middle East.

"We came to the conclusion that, for our purposes, a key Iranian vulnerability is in its on-line information," said one recently retired security cabinet member, using a generic term for digital networks. "We have acted accordingly."

Cyberwarfare teams nestle deep within Israel's spy agencies, which have rich experience in traditional sabotage techniques and are cloaked in official secrecy and censorship.

They can draw on the know-how of Israeli commercial firms that are among the world's hi-tech leaders and whose staff are often veterans of elite military intelligence computer units.

"To judge by my interaction with Israeli experts in various international forums, Israel can definitely be assumed to have advanced cyber-attack capabilities," said Scott Borg, director of the U.S. Cyber Consequences Unit, which advises various Washington agencies on cyber security.

Technolytics Institute, an American consultancy, last year rated Israel the sixth-biggest "cyber warfare threat", after China, Russia, Iran, France and extremist/terrorist groups".

The United States is in the process of setting up a "Cyber Command" to oversee Pentagon operations, though officials have described its mandate as protective, rather than offensive.

Asked to speculate about how Israel might target Iran, Borg said malware - a commonly used abbreviation for "malicious software" - could be inserted to corrupt, commandeer or crash the controls of sensitive sites like uranium enrichment plants.

Such attacks could be immediate, he said. Or they might be latent, with the malware loitering unseen and awaiting an external trigger, or pre-set to strike automatically when the infected facility reaches a more critical level of activity.

As Iran's nuclear assets would probably be isolated from outside computers, hackers would be unable to access them directly, Borg said. Israeli agents would have to conceal the malware in software used by the Iranians or discreetly plant it on portable hardware brought in, unknowingly, by technicians.

"A contaminated USB stick would be enough," Borg said.

Ali Ashtari, an Iranian businessman executed as an Israeli spy last year, was convicted of supplying tainted communications equipment for one of Iran's secret military projects.

Iranian media quoted a security official as saying that Ashtari's actions "led to the defeat of the project with irreversible damage." Israel declined all comment on the case.

"Cyberwar has the advantage of being clandestine and deniable," Borg said, noting Israel's considerations in the face of an Iranian nuclear program that Tehran insists is peaceful.

"But its effectiveness is hard to gauge, because the targeted network can often conceal the extent of damage or even fake the symptoms of damage. Military strikes, by contrast, have an instantly quantifiable physical effect."

Israel may be open to a more overt strain of cyberwarfare. Tony Skinner of Jane's Defence Weekly cited Israeli sources as saying that Israel's 2007 bombing of an alleged atomic reactor in Syria was preceded by a cyber attack which neutralized ground radars and anti-aircraft batteries.

"State of War," a 2006 book by New York Times reporter James Risen, recounted a short-lived plan by the CIA and the Mossad to fry the power lines of an Iranian nuclear facility using a smuggled electromagnetic-pulse (EMP) device.

A massive, nation-wide EMP attack on Iran could be affected by detonating a nuclear device at atmospheric height. But while Israel is assumed to have the region's only atomic arms, most experts believe they would be used only in a war of last resort.

Last update - 17:59 07/07/2009

Kosher food at baseball games gets three strikes

By Jeff Weinstein, The Forward

Tags: jewish world

So A-Rod finally breaks his slump with a long drive into the seats, the fans leap to their feet - and wet tuna plops into your lap.

The glatt frank ($5.50), mildly spiced and somewhat sweet, was lukewarm, watery and limp; the squishy bun didn't help. Too bad, because a hot dog is baseball's bottom line.

Writer and editor Jeff Weinstein, for more than 15 years the restaurant critic for New York?s Village Voice, covers cultural and gay issues at www.artsjournal.com/outthere.

Last update - 17:24 07/07/2009

Formula One chief says praise of Hitler was 'misunderstood'

By Haaretz Service

Tags: Israel news, Hitler

The director of the Formula One racing organization has apologized for remarks he made last week praising Nazi dictator Adolph Hitler.

"Those who don't know me think I support Hitler's atrocities; those who do know me have told me how unwise I was to articulate my points so badly that it should have been so widely misunderstood," Bernie Ecclestone told British newspaper on Tuesday.

"I'm just sorry I was an idiot. I sincerely, genuinely apologize," he said.

The World Jewish Congress had called on Ecclestone to resign or announce his own suspension after the Formula One chief praised Adolf Hitler for his ability to "get things done" in an outspoken interview with London's The Times.

He was quoted as saying that democracy "hasn't done a lot of good for many countries - including this one [The United Kingdom]."

"In the end he got lost, so he wasn't a very good dictator."

Ecclestone also told The Times that Saddam Hussein, the executed former dictator of Iraq, "was the only one who could control that country."

He was quoted as saying that democracy "hasn't done a lot of good for many countries - including this one."

"In the end he got lost, so he wasn't a very good dictator."

Ecclestone, 78, first apologized in an interview with the German daily Bild Zeitung on Monday, saying his remarks had been taken out of context.

Last update - 19:17 07/07/2009

Palestinian fatwa bans weddings without proof couple is swine flu free

By DPA

Tags: Israel News, Palestinians

The Palestinian Authority's top Islamic cleric on Tuesday issued a fatwa, or Islamic ruling, banning the issuance of marriage contracts without a certificate proving that couples are free of the swine flu virus.

The religious ruling was issued after more swine flu cases were registered in the West Bank.

In his fatwa, Chief Justice Taysseer al-Tamimi ordered religious courts in the Palestinian Authority not to complete wedding procedures unless couples bring a document from the Health Ministry proving they are not infected with the flu virus.

Al-Tamimi said the fatwa aims at curbing the spread of the virus in the West Bank.

The Health Ministry said Tuesday that two new cases were discovered in the cities of Ramallah and Bethlehem, raising the number of H1N1 cases in the Palestinian Authority to 69. No deaths have been reported.

Last update - 19:34 07/07/2009

Syria: No peace talks until Israel halts settlement activity

By News Agencies

Tags: Germany, Hezbollah

Syrian President Bashar Assad said on Tuesday that Israel must halt activity in West Bank settlements before Damascus considers renewing peace negotiations.

Assad told visiting German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier there is no real partner in Israel to make peace, repeating remarks he made last week.

Syria has said it is willing to resume indirect peace talks mediated by Turkey as long as they focus on a complete Israeli withdrawal from the Golan Heights, a strategic plateau captured by Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War.

Steinmeier, meanwhile, declared during the meeting that regional entities must not waste in laying the groundwork for Middle East peace, adding that none of the sides involved could afford to push off the process of negotiations for another year.

After meeting Monday with Assad and Foreign Minister Walid Moallem, Steinmeir called on the leadership in Damascus to do everything in its power to ensure a quick peace process.

Efforts must be made to "keep the region's destructive might must be kept to a minimum," he told the Syrian leaders, referring by name to Hezbollah, a Lebanese-based organization that draws support from Syria, as well as the radical Islamist Palestinian Hamas movement.

During a bilateral meeting with Assad, the two leaders were unable to come to agreement about the possibility of the resumption of Israeli-Syrian contacts. Those were suspended after Israel's military assault on the Gaza Strip earlier this year.

Steinmeier said he has doubts whether a Turkish mediator could make any advances in this area.

Moallem said there was only a limited window of opportunity to achieve Middle East peace and said Israel was wasting time. At the same time, he said Syria would not give up its claim to the Golan Heights, captured by Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War.

President Simon Peres told Steinmeier on Sunday that Assad must understand that Israel would not hand the Heights over to Syria on a

"silver platter."

In response, Moallem told his German counterpart that Syria did not want the Golan on a silver platter, but on gold.

Steinmeier also visited Lebanon on Tuesday, where he is supposed to meet with prime minister-designate Saad Hariri.

Last update - 17:50 07/07/2009

What would Arab states have to give in exchange for a settlement freeze?

By Reuters

Tags: Israel News, Arabs

U.S. Middle East envoy George Mitchell is pressing for a halt to Israeli settlement activity, holding out the prospect of reciprocal steps by Arab states towards normalizing relations with Israel.

Talks in London on Monday between Mitchell and Defense Minister Ehud Barak on a package that could include a settlement freeze and normalization ended inconclusively.

Further discussions are planned between Mitchell and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as early as next week.

Egypt and Jordan are the only Arab states that have diplomatic relations with Israel. Below are the regional normalization steps U.S. and Western officials say Washington is seeking:

# Arab countries in the Gulf would allow Israeli passenger and civilian cargo aircraft to fly over their territory. The move would save long detours on flights to Asia, a popular destination for Israeli travelers.

# Israel would be able to open interest sections in other states' embassies in Arab capitals, such as Riyadh and Abu Dhabi. Israel had interest sections in several Arab countries but they were closed after the start in 2000 of a Palestinian uprising in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

# Arab countries would lift bans on the entry of tourists and other visitors whose passports carry Israeli visas or entry stamps. Such a step would facilitate regional travel for tourists and business executives.

# Arab states would allow Israeli-registered mobile phones to operate on Arab networks, a move that could foster economic contacts.

# Israel and Arab states would hold cultural exchanges. Arab countries would ease restrictions that prevent their officials from meeting with Israeli counterparts at international events.

A senior Israeli official familiar with Mitchell's talks said Israel was skeptical the envoy would be able to coax Arab states to make concrete normalization commitments if only a temporary settlement freeze was declared.

"Even if the Americans can bring a serious settlement freeze, the normalization steps will be implemented only gradually and based on performance by Israel," the official said

Last update - 13:28 07/07/2009

Mubarak: Gilad Shalit is in good condition

By The Associated Press

Tags: Hosni Mubarak, Egypt

Israel Defense Forces soldier Gilad Shalit, who is being held captive in Gaza by Hamas militants, is in good condition, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak said on Tuesday.

The Egyptian president added that he hopes the issue of the soldier's release will be resolved soon.

Mubarak's comments came during a news conference Tuesday with President Shimon Peres, who was visiting Cairo. Shalit has been held in Gaza for more than three years by militants who tunneled into Israel and launched a raid against an IDF position along the Israel-Gaza border.

The 22-year-old Israeli sergeant has not been seen since, and Hamas has prevented the Red Cross from visiting him. Egypt has been mediating attempts to arrange a swap of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners, including militants involved in attacks, for the soldier.

When Mubarak was asked about Shalit, he answered: "Communications are ongoing. Shalit is in good condition. I hope that in the coming period, not in a long time, the Shalit issue will be closed."

Peres's visit was designed to discuss efforts to free Shalit as well as ways to promote a regional peace agreement.

Egypt and Jordan are the only Arab nations to have signed a peace agreement with Israel.

Both Mubarak and Peres emphasized that there is a good opportunity for peace.

"We cannot miss this opportunity. The differences between us are not that great that they cannot be overcome," Peres said. He also emphasized Israel's commitment to the two-state solution and said that Israel did not intend to build new settlements.

"Israel has no intention to rule over the Palestinian people. We have no intention to confiscate land, and we have no intention to build new settlements," he said. He did not address the issue of building within existing settlements, which has been a key point of contention between Israel and the United States.

The United States has been pushing for a freeze on all settlement building while the Israeli government under Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been arguing for the right to build within existing settlements to allow for growing families.

The presidency in Israel is largely a ceremonial role but Peres' high stature and the controversial reputation of the current Israeli foreign minister who has been shunned by Egypt after he cursed Mubarak for not visiting Israel means the Israeli president's visit takes on a greater diplomatic significance.

Last update - 17:53 07/07/2009

Obama: U.S. 'absolutely' did not give Israel green light to strike Iran

By News Agencies

Tags: Obama, Israel news, Russia

U.S. President Barack Obama rebuffed suggestions that Washington had given Israel a green light to attack Iran's nuclear facilities, in an interview with CNN on Tuesday.

Asked by CNN whether Washington had given Israel approval to strike Iran's nuclear facilities, Obama answered: "Absolutely not."

"We have said directly to the Israelis that it is important to try and resolve this in an international setting in a way that does not create major conflict in the Middle East," Obama said in reference to Iran's contentious nuclear program.

In the interview broadcast from Russia where he is on an official visit, Obama added, however: "We can't dictate to other countries what their security interests are.

"What is also true is, it is the policy of the United States to try to resolve the issue of Iran's nuclear capabilities," Obama said.

This would be achieved "through diplomatic channels," he added.

Sources close to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told The Washington Times that the premier is hesitant to request formal U.S. approval to launch military operations against Iran for fear that Washington would turn him down, according to a report which appeared in Tuesday editions.

The sources said the Israeli leader feels there is no point in seeking American acquiescence at this stage givenObama's stated intention to pursue a policy of diplomatic engagement with the Tehran regime, The Washington Times reported.

"There was a decision not to press [for U.S. approval of a strike] because it was probably inadequate for the engagement policy and what we know about Obama's approach to Iran," a senior Israeli official told The Washington Times.

Discussion over authorization for such a strike arose after Vice President Joe Biden told ABC news earlier this week that the U.S. would not stand in the way of an Israeli attack on Iran.

"Israel can determine for itself - it's a sovereign nation - what's in their interest and what they decide to do relative to Iran and anyone else," Biden said.

Obama: Russia must help end Iran threat

Obama, on a visit to Moscow on Tuesday called for the United States and Russia to overcome Cold War mistrust and forge a true global partnership, saying that the U.S. wouldn't need to deploy a missile defense system in Europe, a move Russia opposes, if Russia helped to bring the Iranian nuclear threat to an end.

"If the threat from Iran's nuclear and ballistic missile program is eliminated, the driving force for missile defense in Europe will be eliminated," Obama said in remarks prepared for delivery to graduates from Moscow's New Economic School.

"America wants a strong, peaceful and prosperous Russia," Obama said. "On the fundamental issues that will shape this century, Americans and Russians share common interests that form a basis for cooperation," the U.S. President went on to say.

Obama also laid out a vision for the graduates of the sort of world he believed they should pursue.

"The future does not belong to those who gather armies on a field of battle or bury missiles in the ground," he told his audience. "The future belongs to young people with the education and imagination to create."

But he also told the Russian students that success in the 21st century depended on economies that functioned within the rule of law.

"People everywhere should have the right to do business or get an education without paying a bribe," he said, in an apparent reference to the corruption which even President Medvedev says blights Russian society.

Obama was careful in his remarks not to criticize the Kremlin leadership directly and he repeatedly said that the United States did not seek to impose any system of government on another country.

But his message that "governments which serve their own people survive and thrive; governments which serve only their own power do not" is likely to resonate with Russia's embattled pro-Western opposition, which criticizes the Kremlin for suppressing democracy.

Last update - 12:44 07/07/2009

Peres: My talks with Mubarak don't impinge on Lieberman's authority

By Jack Khoury, Haaretz Correspondent, Haaretz Service, and News Agencies

Tags: Shimon Peres

Prior to his meeting with Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak on Tuesday, President Shimon Peres told reporters that his trip to Cairo is not meant to impinge on Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman's position as foreign minister.

Peres said part of the president's job description was to represent the state abroad, and that his talks with Egyptian officials do not encroach on Liebermann's turf.

With Ehud Barak overseeing the Netanyahu government's contacts with U.S. officials over the disagreement on settlement construction, Lieberman is increasingly perceived in Israel as a marginal figure in shaping Jerusalem's foreign policy.

Prior to the meeting, Peres told Haaretz that among the issues to be discussed are the fate of captive Israel Defense Forces soldier Gilad Shalit, advancing the Arab peace initiative, and the Iranian nuclear program.

Peres said that he consulted with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prior to his departure for Egypt.

When asked if Netanyahu accepted the Arab peace initiative, Peres replied that the question needed to be asked of Netanyahu. He added that the issue was sure to be raised during his talks with Mubarak.

The president said that recent developments have created a convergence of interests in Israel-Egypt relations. Cairo and Jerusalem are seeing eye-to-eye on a number of security issues, including the need to stymie arms-smuggling from Sinai into the Gaza Strip, Peres said.

Mubarak said on Tuesday he believed Shalit was well and that he hoped

the issue would not take a long time to resolve.

"I believe there were contacts (with Gilad Shalit), and that Shalit is fine, and I hope that in the upcoming period, maybe, not in the long term, the issue of soldier Shalit will end," Mubarak said in a joint news conference with Peres in Cairo.

Last update - 12:12 07/07/2009

'Israel hesitant to seek U.S. okay to strike Iran'

By Haaretz Service

Tags: Barack Obama, Iran

The sources said the Israeli leader feels there is no point in seeking American acquiescence at this stage given President Barack Obama's stated intention to pursue a policy of diplomatic engagement with the Tehran regime, The Washington Times reported.

The report said that although Israel has concluded that a nuclear-armed Iran would pose an existential threat, it has refrained from attacking in deference to vital American interests in the region.

The Israeli government said it supported the new administration's efforts to pursue diplomacy in a bid to halt Iran's nuclear program, though it has warned that talks will fail unless the West sets a firm deadline for Iranian compliance.

In the latter stages of the previous U.S. administration, Netanyahu's predecessor, Ehud Olmert, requested that Washington provide Israel will bunker-busting bombs widely believed to be intended for use in an attack on Iran's nuclear installations, according to The New York Times. That request was rebuffed by George W. Bush.

Citing U.S. and foreign officials, the Times reported the White House was unable to determine whether Israel had decided to carry out the strike before Washington objected or whether Olmert was trying to get Bush to act more decisively before he leaves office this month.

The Washington Times report comes days after Vice President Joe Biden told ABC television that "Israel can determine for itself - it's a sovereign nation - what's in their interest and what they decide to do relative to Iran and anyone else."

The State Department sought to clarify the implications of Biden's statement, saying that the vice president's remarks should not be construed as an American "green light" for an Israeli strike on Iran.

"We are certainly not going to give a green light to any kind of military strike, but Israel is a sovereign country and we're not going to dictate its actions," State Department spokesperson Ian Kelly said on Monday.

"We share the Israelis' deep concerns about Iran's nuclear program," Kelly said. "But you have to ask Israel if they are going to make a strike."

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman on Monday welcomed Biden's statement, calling it "logical."

But other Israeli leaders avoided comment, a low-key reaction that suggested Israel did not see Biden's comments as a green light to strike Iran. Obama underlined that diplomacy with Iran remains an option

Last update - 09:16 07/07/2009

Report: Israel releases former U.S. congresswoman McKinney

By Reuters

Tags: Israel news, Gaza, Free Gaza

Israel has allowed a former U.S. congresswoman, Cynthia McKinney, to return home days after detaining her and other activists on board a ship carrying relief supplies for Gaza, a pro-Palestinian group said on Monday.

Israeli authorities intercepted the vessel, which had 21 activists on board, on June 30 and said it would not be permitted to enter Gaza's coastal waters because of security risks in the area and an existing naval blockade.

McKinney has been released, a statement by the American Muslims for Palestine said.

The statement said another American, John Judge, was still being detained. But later on Monday, a spokeswoman for the group, Kristin Szremski, corrected this to say that Judge was not being held.

"McKinney and the others were taking much needed food and medical supplies to the 1.5 million residents of Gaza, where Israel's two-year blockade has resulted in a complete economic breakdown that has forced more than 70 percent of the population into abject poverty," said the statement from the group based in Palos Hills, Illinois.

Last week a United Nations human rights investigator, Richard Falk, called Israel's seizure of the ship "unlawful."

Israel's ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva, Aharon Leshno-Yaar, rejected that charge and said "clearly the purpose of that ship was to create a buzz and serve as a propaganda vehicle against Israel."

McKinney was defeated for re-election to the U.S. House of Representatives in 2006, not long after she scuffled with a Capitol Police officer at a security checkpoint. She was not charged in that incident but apologized for it.

Last update - 13:32 07/07/2009

Norway invites Israelis to debate Nazi sympathizer's legacy

By Cnaan Liphshiz, Haaretz Correspondnet

Tags: Knut Hamsun, norway, nazis

Following angry reactions in Israel to Norway's honoring of novelist and Nazi-sympathizer Knut Hamsun, the institute commemorating him this year has invited Israeli campaigners against anti-Semitism to a debate next year. But the Israelis are demanding that the debate take place sooner, lest it become "irrelevant."

Last month Haaretz quoted campaigners who claimed that by declaring 2009 "Hamsun Year," Norway has damaged the international Holocaust awareness drive that it was recently appointed to head as chair of the 26-nation Task Force for International Cooperation on Holocaust Education. The once celebrated author, shunned for supporting Norway's Nazi occupation regime during World War II, was born 150 years ago and grew up in Hamaroy in northern Norway, where the government is building a cultural center in his name due to open next month.

Efraim Zuroff, head of the Simon Wiesenthal Center's Israel office, told Haaretz the commemoration "casts a shadow on the task force's work."

Manfred Gerstenfeld, chairman of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, said the Hamsun controversy was "the tip of the iceberg" of other disturbing phenomena in Norway.

"Knut Hamsun wrote magnificent literature, and also an obituary for Adolf Hitler," Bodil Borset, the designated director of the Hamaroy Hamsun Center responded last month in Aftenposten, the country's second largest newspaper. "He was among our greatest authors and a Nazi sympathizer. Can we reconcile this?"

The center, Borset said, would be "more than happy" to invite Zuroff and Gerstenfeld to attend a conference next year on the Hamsun Center's activities.

"Borset appears to believe that Hamsun's literary brilliance warrants the celebration of his birth, regardless of his active support for a regime which annihilated innocent civilians," Zuroff wrote in reply. While expressing willingness to attend, Zuroff insisted the event is held as soon as possible, while Norway still chairs the Task Force, so that it may have "practical consequences."

The Norwegian foreign ministry said that Hamsun's commemoration also focuses on his Nazi past and will thus serve as an educational tool. However, the commemoration is generating protest in Norway as well. Two weeks ago, unknown parties hung a Nazi flag over a statue of the novelist which was recently unveiled in the city of Grimstad in south Norway.

Mayor Hans Antonsen told the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation that whoever hung the Nazi flag there - presumably to protest the commemoration - perpetrated a "despicable act." He added: "We have a strong debate in Grimstad over Hamsun, and this is the absolute worst example of it."

Last update - 03:10 07/07/2009

Hamas taunts Israel with Gilad Shalit cartoon

By The Associated Press

Hamas TV in Gaza has broadcast a short animated movie mocking Gilad Shalit - the Israeli soldier captured by the militant Islamic group three years ago.

The Israeli media played excerpts from the movie on Monday.

The film depicts the 22-year-old Israel Defense Forces Sgt. chained to a jail cell wall, pleading with a Palestinian boy to be set free. The boy refuses, saying he has relatives in Israeli prisons.

Gaza militants captured the soldier in June 2006 after tunneling into Israel. Two other soldiers were killed in the attack.Shalit has not been seen since, and Hamas has prevented the Red Cross from visiting him.

Egypt has been mediating attempts to arrange a prisoner exchange in which Israel would release hundreds of Palestinian prisoners in exchange for Shalit.

Last update - 07:10 07/07/2009

Israel summons EU envoy over settlements criticism

By The Associated Press

Tags: Israel News

The Foreign Ministry on Monday said the EU ambassador to Israel was called in for explanations after the European Commission said Israel's settlement policy helps strangle the Palestinian economy and makes the Palestinian government more dependent on foreign aid.

In an unusually harsh statement Monday, the commission said that "it is the European taxpayers who pay most of the price of this dependence."

The commission says expropriation of fertile land for Israeli settlements, roads that serve settlers only and West Bank checkpoints help constrain Palestinian economic growth and make the Palestinian government more dependent on aid.

The European Union is one of the largest donors to the Palestinian Authority.

The commission says this year alone it has paid more than 200 million euros ($280 million) to help cover the Palestinian budget deficit

Last update - 23:56 06/07/2009

U.S. denies giving Israel 'green light' to strike Iran

By Natasha Mozgovaya, Haaretz Correspondent, and The Associated Press

Tags: Israel News, Iran, Joe Biden

Vice President Joe Biden's statement that Israel can decide on its own whether to strike Iran's nuclear sites should not be construed as an American "green light" for such an action, the State Department said on Monday.

"We share the Israelis' deep concerns about Iran's nuclear program," Kelly said. "But you have to ask Israel if they are going to make a strike."

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman on Monday welcomed Biden's statement, calling it "logical."

But other Israeli leaders avoided comment, a low-key reaction that suggested Israel did not see Biden's comments as a green light to strike Iran. President Barack Obama underlined that diplomacy with Iran remains an option.

Israel considers Iran a strategic threat because of its nuclear program and long-range missile development, dismissing Iranian denials that it intends to build nuclear weapons. Israel has been nervous over the Obama administration's attempts to engage Iran, and Israel has pointedly sent clear signals of its military capabilities while urging world action to rein in Tehran.

Meanwhile, the U.S. goal of dialogue with Tehran has been rattled by Iran's heavy crackdown on protesters in the country's disputed presidential election, though Washington says it still hopes the policy will bear fruit.

Interviewed by ABC-TV on Sunday, Biden appeared to depart from his previous comment that an Israeli attack on Iran would be "ill-advised."

Asked about the possibility of an Israeli attack against Iran's nuclear facilities, Biden replied Sunday, "Israel can determine for itself - it's a sovereign nation - what's in their interest and what they decide to do relative to Iran and anyone else."

The White House said Biden's remarks did not signal a shift in U.S. policy. In an interview published by the New York Times on Monday, Obama indicated the diplomatic option was still viable. "We have offered a pathway for Iran to rejoining the international community," he was quoted as saying.

Lieberman's response to Biden's comments was relatively measured. "I think he said things that are very logical," he said. "Israel is a sovereign state and at the end of the day, the government of Israel has sole responsibility for its security and future, not anybody else."

"Sometimes there are disputes between friends, but at the end of the day the decision is ours," he said.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office has refused to comment, underlining Israel's sensitive position on Iran and on U.S. policy toward Tehran.

Israel, which is widely believed to have a nuclear arsenal of its own, says it would likely be targeted by Iran, based on repeated statements by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad referring to Israel's destruction.

But even Israeli hawks like Lieberman recognize the limitations of an Israeli strike. Israel destroyed Iraq's nuclear reactor in a 1981 air strike, but experts do not believe Israel can do the same with Iran's nuclear operations, which are spread around the country, some of them hidden and heavily fortified.

Israel would also have to take into account the desires of the U.S., Israel's most important political and military ally.

The top U.S. military officer, Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned Sunday of the danger of an Iranian nuclear weapon - and of the fallout from an attack against Iran.

"I worry about it being very destabilizing not just in and of itself but the unintended consequences of a strike like that," he told CBS TV.

Netanyahu has been warning about the dangers of the Iranian nuclear program for years, calling for intensive world action to stop it. Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak, leader of the dovish Labor Party, speaks frequently of leaving all of Israel's options open.

Israel has sent several military signals to Iran.

This week an Israeli submarine said by foreign experts to have the capability of carrying nuclear-tipped missiles returned to the Mediterranean after crossing to the Red Sea in the direction of Iran, a mission seen as a warning. Also, Israel has held air force maneuvers that were described unofficially as practicing an attack on Iranian targets.

Lieberman, who has advocated radical military responses to a range of challenges over the years, could be expected to beat the drum for an Israeli attack on Iran.

Instead, he has voiced a contrasting concern - that Israel might be expected to do the world's dirty work by hitting Iran, leaving the world community free to criticize Israel afterward, as happened after the attack on Iraq in 1981.

During a visit to Russia, Lieberman said, "We do not intend to bomb Iran, and nobody will solve their problems with our hands.

Last update - 07:12 07/07/2009

German Jews condemn slaying of pregnant Muslim woman

By Agencies

Jews in Germany joined their Muslim compatriots Monday condemnong the horrifying murder of a pregnant Muslim woman in a Dresden courthouse last week.

The secretary of Germany's Central Council of Jews, Stephan Kramer, said he was appalled by the attack.

"All those people who have in the past belittled our concern about a phobia against Islam in Germany are seeing after this awful act how

rong they were," he said, adding that the German neo-Nazis had been rousing up a climate of xenophobia in Germany for years.

Aiman Mazyek, secretary of the Central Council of Muslims in Germany, said such violence was no wonder when Islam was constantly mentioned in the same breath as extremism and terrorism, but he warned against revenge.

"German Muslims must not be infected by the spark of hate that caused this crime," he said. "Let's prove now that the Germans have no cause to be afraid of us."

Marwa al-Shirbini, 31, who regularly wore a scarf, was stabbed 18 times by a German man of Russian descent as she was about to give evidence against him in a civil suit between them in Dresden.

On Monday, thousands of mourners marched behind the coffin of Marwa al-Sherbini, 32, in her Mediterranean hometown of Alexandria where her body was buried after being flown back from Germany.

"There is no god but God and the Germans are the enemies of God," chanted the mourners, while others carried banners condemning racism.

"We will avenge her killing," her brother Tarek el-Sherbini told The Associated Press by telephone from the mosque where prayers were being recited in front of his sister's coffin. "In the West, they don't recognize us. There is racism."

Al-Sherbini, who was about four months pregnant, was involved in a court case against her neighbor for calling her a terrorist and was set to testify against him when he stabbed her 18 times inside the courtroom in front of her 3-year-old son.

Her husband, who was in Germany on a research fellowship, came to her aid and was also stabbed by the neighbor and shot in the leg by a security guard who initially mistook him for the attacker, German prosecutors said. He is now in critical condition in a German hospital, according to al-Sherbini's brother.

"The guards thought that as long as he wasn't blond, he must be the attacker so they shot him," al-Sherbini told an Egyptian television station.

The man, who has only been identified as 28-year-old Alex W., remains in detention and prosecutors have opened an investigation on suspicion of murder.

Christian Avenarius, the prosecutor in Dresden where the incident took place, described the killer as driven by a deep hatred of Muslims. "It was very clearly a xenophobic attack of a fanatical lone wolf."

He added that the attacker was a Russian of German descent who had immigrated to Germany in 2003 and had expressed his contempt for Muslims at the start of the trial.

At its regular news conference on Monday, a German government spokesman Thomas Steg said if the attack was racist, the government naturally condemns this in the strongest terms.

The killing has dominated Egyptian media for days, while it has received comparatively little coverage in German and Western media.

A German Muslim group criticized government officials and the media for not paying enough attention to the crime.

The incident in Dresden had anti-Islamic motives. So far, the reactions from politicians and media have been incomprehensibly meager, Aiman Mazyek, the general secretary of the Central Council of Muslims, told Berlin's Tagesspiegel daily.

Egyptian commentators said the incident was an example of how hate crimes against Muslims are overlooked in comparison to hate crimes committed by Muslims against Westerners. Many commentators pointed to the uproar that followed the 2004 murder of filmmaker Theo van Gogh by a Dutch-born Islamic fundamentalist angry over one of his films criticizing the treatment of Muslim women.

Abdel Azeem Hamad, chief editor of the independent Egyptian daily el-Shorouk, said that if the victim had been a Jew, there would be have been in an uproar.

"What we demand is just some attention to be given to the killing of a young innocent mother on the hands of fanatic extremist," he wrote in his column.

An Egyptian blogger Hicham Maged, "wrote let us play the 'What If' game."

"Just imagine if the situation was reversed and the victim was a Westerner who was stabbed anywhere in the world or - God forbid - in any Middle Eastern country by Muslim extremists," he said.

The Egyptian Pharmacists' Association called for a boycott of German drugs.

According to numerous interviews in Egyptian local papers with el-Sherbini family, the man who stabbed al-Sherbini used to accuse her of being a terrorist, and in one incident, he tried to take off her headscarf.

Laila Shams, al-Sherbini's mother, told the el-Wafd daily that her daughter said she'd difficulty finding a job in Germany because of her head scarf.

"One [employer] suggested she remove her head scarf to get a job. She said no," she said.

Officials from a German Muslim group and the country's main Jewish group made a joint visit Monday to the Dresden hospital where the victim's husband is being treated.

"You don't have to be a Muslim to act against anti-Muslim behavior, and you don't have to be a Jew to act against anti-Semitism," said Stephan Kramer, the general secretary of the Central Council of Jews.

Last update - 23:58 06/07/2009

Barak: Progress in talks with U.S. over settlements, but still a way to go

By Barak Ravid, Haaretz Correspondent and Reuters

Tags: Israel News, George Mitchell

In an attempt to bridge the divide between Jerusalem and Washington over the issue of West Bank settlement construction, Defense Minister Ehud Barak met with U.S. Mideast envoy George Mitchell in London for over three hours on Monday.

Most of the meeting took place in private, though Mitchell and Barak were later joined by the defense minister's team of consultants as well as by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's aide, Yitzhak Molko.

"I think there is progress. There's still a way to go," Barak told reporters after the talks in London.

He said he expected no imminent announcement on Israeli settlement building, a key issue in the talks.

However, Barak, who last met Mitchell on Tuesday in New York, said he was optimistic about the chances of "preparing the ground for launching a major peace process."

A senior U.S. official has told Reuters that Washington is asking Arab governments whether they might ease sanctions on Israel if it freezes settlement on land Palestinians want for a state.

"I think the Americans are active on this issue," Barak said when asked to confirm this.

"While they are demanding from Israel steps and concessions in order to enable this regional peace effort to take off, they are approaching the Arabs as well and asking what they can contribute in terms of ... starting normalization with Israel."

"We are looking and trying to find a formula (which) needs to show our readiness to be sensitive to the needs of others."

Barak described the talks with Mitchell as "a very good, constructive discussion" and said they had addressed all aspects of the Middle East peace process including the Palestinian, Syrian and Lebanese tracks.

He said they had discussed steps which could be taken to ensure "our slight differences regarding how to deal with the issue of settlements will ... be clarified but within the context of the need to push ahead the wider peace agreement."

Barak and Mitchell also agreed that initiating peace talks with the Palestinian Authority, Syria and Lebanon is a priority for both Israel and the United States. Both men released a joint statement which said that the two countries were committed to continued progress toward regional peace.

The statement also stressed that the Palestinians must continue to improve the security situation in the West Bank. Barak and Mitchell called on Arab nations to work toward normalizing their relations with Israel. The statement added that Israel must act on settlement building as well as freeing restrictions on the Palestinian population in the West Bank.

Barak and Mitchell said they expected continued progress to be achieved during Mitchell's visit to Jerusalem next week.

Aides to the defense minister said that Monday's meeting "continued the progress with regards to the settlement issue and furthered the understanding between the two parties."

Mitchell is scheduled to meet Netanyahu next week when he arrives in Israel.

Last update - 10:51 07/07/2009

Lieberman: Sarkozy's remark was a 'regrettable' verbal slip

By Mazal Mualem, Haaretz Correspondent and Reuters

Tags: Avigdor Lieberman

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said on Monday that French President Nicolas Sarkozy had made a "slip of the tongue" by calling for his dismissal, but that he was not disturbed by the remark.

Lieberman also dismissed what Israeli commentators call a snub by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has given Defense Minister Ehud Barak a mandate to narrow a rift with Washington over settlement building in the West Bank.

Neither Sarkozy nor Netanyahu have confirmed Israeli media reports last week that the French leader had told the Israeli during talks in Paris on June 24 to "get rid of" Lieberman as foreign minister.

Israel's Channel Two television and several newspapers said that Sarkozy had compared Lieberman, whose party has introduced legislation to curb the rights of Arab citizens, with French far-rightist Jean Marie Le Pen.

"People tend to say unnecessary things, including myself," Lieberman told reporters in parliament who asked him about Sarkozy's remarks.

"I relate to it as a regrettable slip of the tongue," said Lieberman, head of the Yisrael Beitenu party, Israel's third largest faction, said. "I'm not very excited by it."

A spokesman for Lieberman had denounced the reports of Sarkozy's comments as amounting to "intolerable" meddling in Israeli affairs, but Lieberman himself had avoided any comment before Monday's meeting of his parliamentary faction.

Lieberman has been accused of racism by Israel's Arab citizens for introducing legislation that could curb their rights. He has also said their towns be ceded to Palestinian jurisdiction in exchange for Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank.

The reports about Sarkozy's purported remarks had put a spotlight on a rift between Israel and Western countries over Netanyahu's rejection of calls to stop settlement building in land captured in a 1967 war which Palestinians want for a state.

Conflict of interest

Lieberman also said Monday that he had deliberately chosen to avoid taking part in the debate over West Bank settlement, as his own residence in a settlement would pose a conflict of interest.

"As far as I am concerned, there is a conflict of interest when someone who lives in a settlement, in an isolate town that is not even counted among the settlements, takes part in the issue," he said.

"I would not want to be accused of this when I have made it a calculated choice not to engage in negotiations on the issue with the Americans," he said. U.S.-Israeli relations are "more important than the will of a foreign minister," Lieberman said.

"There is no alternative to our relationship with the U.S., but we will never give up our red lines," he added.

Lieberman has come under fire of late for demanding to be made responsible for ties with the U.S., while Defense Minister Ehud Barak has actually taken charge of negotiations over construction in West Bank settlements.

Last week, French President Nicolas Sarkozy also urged Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to "rid himself" of Lieberman, who is seen as hawkish and hardline. Netanyahu and Barak have both come to Lieberman's defense in the face of public criticism.

Last update - 16:50 06/07/2009

'Migron outpost will be emptied within year, by force or by consent'

By Tomer Zarchin, Haaretz Correspondent

Tags: Israel news, West Bank

High Court told building underway to for 50 new homes in existing Adam settlement to absorb outpost evacuees.

The unauthorized West Bank outpost of Migron will be evacuated exactly a year from now, whether or not the settlers there agree to the terms of the evacuation, the State Prosecution said Monday.

The High Court of Justice heard that plans are underway to construct 50 new permanent homes in the existing settlement of Adam, to absorb the outpost evacuees.

Anar Helman from the State Prosecutor's Office told the court that any outpost resident who refuses to leave once construction of the new housing units has been completed will be removed by force.

The plan to absorb the outpost evacuees calls for the construction of 1,450 homes in Adam. Only 50 of the housing units have been approved by the Defense Ministry so far.

Anti-settlement organization Peace Now urged the court not to accept this arrangement, which was agreed by settlers and the Defense Ministry.

"Construction of a neighborhood in Adam is supposed to take years. Should the High Court accept this arrangement, it will effectively prepare the ground for dozens of families to remain on Palestinian territory, which is unlawful," said Peace Now director Yariv Oppenheimer.

"The time has come for [Defense Minister Ehud] Barak to stop passing the hot potato to the High Court, and for him to make the decision to evacuate the outpost immediately," he said.

Last update - 10:47 06/07/2009

U.S. and Russia agree on deal for cuts to nuclear weapons

By Haaretz Service and News Agencies

Tags: nuclear arms, Israel news

Negotiators from the United States and Russia have agreed the text of an outline deal cutting nuclear arms for their presidents to review and announce later on Monday, a U.S. official said.

U.S. President Barack Obama and his Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev, are likely to announce a so-called framework agreement on Monday evening at the Kremlin, giving detailed instructions to negotiators to produce a treaty ready for signing by December.

"There is text for them to review", the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. He emphasised that the agreement would only become final once the two leaders had reviewed it. "It is not done until it is done," he added.

In December an existing pact known as START-1 regulating the number of long-range nuclear weapons expires.

Medvedev told the Italian media on Sunday that Russia-U.S. ties have begun to revive of late, particularly with regard to a treaty on strategic offensive weapons.

"At the moment I think we are all moderately optimistic, both the Russian side and the American side," he said. "When I talked to [Obama] on the phone a few days ago, we discussed the agenda and the process of preparing a new treaty concerning strategic offensive weapons. And that is in a way the most important item on the agenda."

|But in addition to what we call disarmament issues, we naturally have an extensive agenda that reflects other concerns," he added. "These involve interregional conflicts, efforts to overcome the international financial crisis, local conflicts and finally bilateral relations."

Last update - 04:21 07/07/2009

Noam Shalit to UN: My son's abduction was a war crime

By Jack Khoury and Yanir Yagna, Haaretz Correspondents

Tags: Israel News, Gilad Shalit

Noam Shalit, the father of the soldier held by Hamas, testified Monday before the Goldstone Committee, which is investigating illegal conduct by combatants during Operation Cast Lead on behalf of the United Nations.

Shalit asked that the committee include in its final report that the Hamas operation that led to the abduction of his son, Gilad Shalit, was a war crime according to the definitions of the Geneva Convention, and that he must be released immediately. He told the UN Committee that the abduction of his son preceded all the other events in the Gaza Strip - the IDF siege on the territory, the launching of rockets by Palestinian groups, and finally the Israeli offensive - and argued that that action had resulted in the subsequent actions.

"The committee is meant to relate to human rights, and he [Gilad] has lived without human rights for three years. No one knows what happened to him, and not even the Red Cross has paid him a visit," Shalit told the committee.

Shalit also expressed his view that Hamas should be held responsible for the abduction and all its implications. In an unusual move he also noted the specific responsibility of Hamas politburo chief Khaled Meshal, and asked that "the committee determine that Hamas and Khaled Meshal are responsible for the war crime of taking hostages."

Ashkelon Mayor Benny Vaknin also testified before the committee, as did Ophir Shinar of the Sapir College in Sderot, Dr. Mirlo Sidrer, who was injured during a rocket attack on a medical facility at the Ashkelon mall, and a resident of Sderot, Noam Bedein, who heads a public relations group on behalf of the city.

Bedein showed the committee short films on the lives of the people of Sderot during the eight years under the threat of Qassam rockets. "We showed them films that highlight the reality for the residents of Sderot during the years under Qassams," Bedein said. "We documented the residents running for cover and the horror of their lives in recent years. We presented statistics and findings of research, so that they could understand what the residents of the Negev went through."

Last update - 16:58 06/07/2009

Peres: Syria won't get Golan on a 'silver platter'

By DPA

Tags: Palestinians, Israel News

President Shimon Peres said on Monday that Syrian President Bashar Assad must understand that Israel would not hand over the Golan Heights on a "silver platter" so long as Damascus continued its ties with Iran and Hezbollah.

Peres told visiting German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier that a true peace process between the long time enemies would have to take place at the negotiating table, without preconditions or mediation.

Syrian officials last month threatened to take back the Golan Heights by force if a peace agreement involving the return of the strategic plateau is not reached with Israel.

A group calling itself the Syrian Committee for the Freedom of the Golan said it would take steps to regain control of the territory, adding that Israel has not shown willingness to achieve peace or to return what they called "Syrian land."

Just prior to that, Assad rejected Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's offer to resume peace talks between the two countries from "point zero."

Assad said the negotiations should resume from the point at which they stopped under former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, when the two sides had planned to formulate mutual commitments that would enable the talks to move to a direct negotiations stage.

Germany to push Arabs to join Mideast peace process

Steinmeier began talks with Israeli leaders on Monday morning as part of a 40-hour trip to Jerusalem, Damascus and Beirut.

Steinmeier landed in Tel Aviv before dawn and opened his talks by meeting Peres at his Jerusalem residence. He was scheduled next to tour the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial, before meeting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman and opposition leader Tzipi Livni later in the day.

A planned stopover in the West Bank city of Ramallah, which was to

include an inaugural ceremony for some new, German-funded classrooms,

was cancelled due to an unannounced, last-minute visit by Palestinian

President Mahmoud Abbas to Jordan, a spokeswoman at the German

representation in Ramallah confirmed.

A key aspect of the discussions with the Israeli government is expected to be U.S. and European Union calls for a halt to settlement construction in the West Bank.

German officials said Steinmeier also hopes to persuade neighboring Arab states to take a more active role in diplomatic efforts to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The visit is Steinmeier's 14th since taking office in 2005.

He is scheduled to meet Tuesday with President Bashar Assad in Syria and in Lebanon with prime minister-designate Saad Hariri, son of former premier Rafik Hariri, who was killed in a bomb blast in 2005.

Last update - 09:19 06/07/2009

Iran vows 'real and decisive' response if attacked by Israel

By The Associated Press

Tags: Barack Obama, Israel news

Iran is ready to take real and decisive action if Israel attacks its nuclear facilities, a senior Iranian parliamentary official said Monday.

The remarks by Alaeddin Broujerdi, the head of Iran's parliamentary committee on national security and foreign policy, came after U.S. Vice President Joe Biden signaled that Washington would not try to prevent any such Israeli assault.

Both the U.S. and Israel are aware of the consequence of an erroneous decision, Broujerdi told reporters at the Iranian Embassy in Tokyo.

"I believe our response will be real and decisive," Broujerdi said. He declined to elaborate.

Israel fears Iran is developing nuclear weapons to target it. Iran denies it is pursuing an atomic arsenal, saying it only wants to produce nuclear power.

Israel's government has said it would prefer to see Iran's nuclear program stopped through diplomacy, but that it cannot rule out a military strike.

In an interview on ABC's This Week on Sunday, Biden was asked whether the U.S. would stand in the way if Israel - viewing the prospect of an Iranian nuclear bomb as a threat to its existence state - decided to launch a military attack.

"Look, we cannot dictate to another sovereign nation what they can and cannot do," he said.

Broujerdi also defended a recent crackdown on protesters following Iran's

presidential election.

Opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi has said the June 12 election, in which incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was declared winner, was illegitimate

and marred with fraud. Riots and protests have followed, although Iran's restrictions on media coverage have made it difficult to confirm some reports.

Broujerdi said Iranian police had merely acted to restore order, and accused Mousavi of instigating the protests.

"There is no confusion. It is (now) a totally peaceful situation in Iran," he said.

Broujerdi is visiting Japan as chairman of the Iran-Japan Parliamentary Friendship League.

The Guardian Council, Iran's top electoral oversight body, pronounced the election results valid last week. Ahmadinejad is set to be sworn in later this month for a second four-year term.

Last update - 21:46 05/07/2009

Fayyad: Jews can be equal citizens in Palestinian state

By Haaretz Service

Tags: palestinians, peace process

Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad on Saturday said that Jews would enjoy freedom and full civil rights in a future Palestinian state, according to a report in the Aspen Daily News.

"Jews, to the extent they choose to stay and live in the state of Palestine, will enjoy those rights and certainly will not enjoy any less rights than Israeli Arabs enjoy now in the state of Israel," Fayyad said in response to a question from former CIA director James Woolsey at the Aspen Institute's Ideas Festival.

According to the report, the crowd at the festival's Greenwald Pavilion applauded enthusiastically after Fayyad's remarks.

Fayyad told the audience that the Palestinians seek a "meaningful political process that is capable of ending the occupation," according to the newspaper.

The report said that Fayyad had also attended a panel discussion that included U.S. former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), who said that Hamas is a problem.

"I don't pretend to know how the Palestinian Authority should deal with it," Feinstein said, according to the report.

Fayyad replied that the answer is to get Palestinians to support "that which is done to affect a meaningful change for the better in people's lives. I think we stand a much better chance of winning that debate than going about it in a war of words, which has typified much of the argument over the divide."

Last update - 21:26 05/07/2009

Israel envoy tells U.S. Jews: There is no Israel-U.S. crisis

By Shlomo Shamir, Haaretz Correspondent

Tags: michel oren, israel news

Israel's ambassador to the United States told a group of American Jews on Saturday that the rift between the Obama and Netanyahu administrations over construction in West Bank settlements was not a crisis, but a difference of opinion.

Speaking at an Orthodox synagogue in the Hamptons, Long Island, Michael Oren said he was speaking as an expert on U.S.-Israel relations.

He told his audience that there were differences between the allies on certain topics now, just as there has been in the past.

The envoy referred to several examples to differentiate the current situation from past crises between Israel and the U.S. He mentioned the threat to impose sanctions on Israel in 1956 during the Sinai campaign and the crises stemming from U.S. military support for Jordan before the 1967 Six-Day War and the U.S. sale of intelligence aircraft to Saudi Arabia.

Oren on Friday warned against ignoring the Iranian nuclear threat, telling a Colorado audience that an Iranian atomic bomb could "wipe Israel off the map in a matter of seconds."

He said he would not "second-guess" the Obama administration's next move in dealing with Tehran's nuclear aspirations, and added that he was certain Obama had "the best interests of the U.S. and the interest of Israel at heart."

Last update - 21:15 05/07/2009

Jordan breaks up 'illegal' sit-in against Israeli imports

By DPA

Tags: Israeli agriculture

The Jordanian government said Sunday that a sit-in against the import of Israeli agricultural products was forceably dispersed because had not obtained a proper protest license.

"The sit-in was illegal because the participants did not obtain a prior license in compliance with the law," Minister of State for Information Affairs and Communication Nabil Sharif said in a statement.

He said the government was keen on the right of citizens to freedom of expression within the law.

According to eyewitnesses, a number of trade unionists and politicians were "beaten" as security men used force to end the sit-in in front of the Agriculture Ministry, which was called to protest the import of goods

from Israeli settlements set up in Palestinian territories in violation of international law.

Head of the Public Freedoms Committee at the Jordan Engineers Association, Maisara Malas, said that the protest was in conformity with the Universal Declaration on Human Rights.

Sharif said the Interior Minister Nayef Qadi met later with leaders of the trade unions and settled the issue with them.

Last update - 20:31 05/07/2009

Israel and U.S. have yet to reach compromise on settlement halt

By Barak Ravid, Haaretz Correspondent

Tags: Israel news

Defense Minister Ehud Barak will meet on Monday with U.S. special Mideast envoy George Mitchell in an effort to reach a compromise on calls for an Israeli settlement freeze and to seek ways to promote regional peace.

Barak and Mitchell, who met in New York last week, have still not reached an understanding on the contentious issue which has caused an unusual rift between Israel and the U.S.

"Unfortunately, there are no understandings or agreements [on settlements]," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told ministers at a Likud meeting on Sunday, when asked to elaborate on the matter. "All the reports saying we have agreed to freeze construction in the settlements are the sole responsibility of those who publish them."

During his visit to London this week, Barak will also meet with British Foreign Secretary David Miliband. The aim of this round of talks aimed at narrowing a rift with U.S. President Barack Obama, whose administration has demanded a halt to settlement activity.

The defense minister told reporters on Sunday he was aiming for a "broader understanding with the United States on diplomatic moves, including a comprehensive regional agreement".

Barak said Israel was also seeking "a way to translate" the 2003 road map peace plan into "a path acceptable to us, the United States and others".

After last meeting Mitchell, Barak made a link between any Israeli agreement to limit settlement expansion and progress on Arab states "normalizing" relations with Israel.

Barak has publicly raised the possibility Israel might temporarily refrain from starting new building projects - while continuing many under way - in settlements in return for initial steps towards a regional peace agreement.

Last update - 20:10 05/07/2009

Palestinians to host Brazilian soccer teams for solidarity match

By The Associated Press

Tags: israel news, brazil, soccer

Palestinian officials said Sunday that two popular Brazilian football clubs will play each other in the West Bank later this year in a show of solidarity with the Palestinians.

Football official Sami Makawi said the exhibition match between Rio's Flamengo and Sao Paulo's Corinthians will take place between Sept. 15 and Sept. 17 in the West Bank's only regulation-size stadium.

He added that the Brazilians support the Palestinian cause and know how much Palestinians love Brazilian football.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Yariv Ovadia said Israel's ambassador to Brazil issued a personal invitation to the teams to play in Israel as well. He said Israel hopes the teams will accept the offer.

Last update - 23:12 05/07/2009

Jewish swimmer to skip world championship for Maccabiah

By The Associated Press

Tags: jewish world, jason lezak

Triple Olympic gold medalist Jason Lezak said Sunday that his Jewish heritage inspired him to compete in Israel's Maccabiah Games instead of the upcoming World Swimming Championships in Rome.

Despite skipping the sport's top competition of the year, Lezak said his goal remains the same: to bring home the gold for the United States.

"I came here to swim fast and hopefully bring home some gold medals for the USA," Lezak said.

The Maccabiah Games is an international competition for Jewish athletes held every four years in Israel. More than 900 American athletes will compete in this year's games, officials said, making it the second-largest delegation behind Israel. The 10-day competition begins July 13.

"This is a very serious athletic competition that shares another purpose and that's to bring together worldwide Jewry," Ron Carner, chairman of the U.S. teams, said at a news conference with Lezak.

Lezak gained worldwide recognition in the 2008 Beijing Olympics' 4x100 meter freestyle relay when he dramatically overtook world record-holding French swimmer Alain Bernard in the relay's final stroke.

It was the fastest 100-meter lap in history and helped his teammate Michael Phelps to a record eight gold medals, eclipsing the previous record of seven held by another Maccabiah athlete, Mark Spitz.

Lezak's two other Olympic gold medals are for the 4x100 meter medley relay in Beijing and for the same event in the 2004 Olympics in Athens. He will be competing in multiple events at the Maccabiah.

"I learned from him that anything is possible," Lezak said, speaking of Phelps. "People doubted him and people doubted me and being able to accomplish things people don't think you can do, that's how you become a champion."

Last update - 18:08 05/07/2009

100 U.S. activists arrive in Egypt in bid to deliver aid to Gaza

By Haaretz Service and The Associated Press

Tags: israel news, egypt, Gaza

About 100 U.S. activists arrived in Egypt Sunday with the intention of traveling to Gaza to try to deliver medical aid despite a blockade on the territory.

It would be the largest group of U.S. activists to travel to Gaza since Hamas took control of the coastal territory in 2007. Since then, Egypt and Israel have sealed their borders with Gaza, allowing in only a trickle of commercial goods and humanitarian aid.

Most of the aid is cleared by the Egyptian government, and it was unclear whether authorities would approve the private medical aid.

The activists are part of an initiative called Viva Palestina that aims to send a convoy of 200 people by July 13.

U.S. organizer Mansour al-Barbari said Sunday the intended aid is worth about $1 million.

The Defense Ministry has recommended a partial lifting of the embargo on the Gaza Strip as a goodwill gesture toward the Palestinians to spur talks to free abdicted Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, Israeli media reported Friday.

Israel has been linking the opening of Gaza's borders to the release of Shalit, who has been held by Hamas militants for more than three years. Hamas has been pushing for a deal to trade him for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners currently held in Israeli jails.

Bruno's top five Jewish moments

By TheJewishJournal.com

Tags: Jewish World

Sacha Baron Cohen is back, with his highly anticipated (and litigious) mock documentary about a flamboyant gay fashionista who aspires to become the "biggest Austrian superstar since Hitler."

Universal Pictures has issued an embargo on reviews until the day before "Bruno's" July 10 release, but The Jewish Journal has compiled some of the film's top Jewish moments.

For instance, when Bruno fails to achieve uber-fame by solving the problems in Darfur, he comforts himself with the knowledge that "luckily, there is still one shithole left to fix in the world: "The Middle East" (or "Middle Earth," as he calls it). But he doesn't make many friends while traipsing in a black hat, pais and a speedo through a religious area in Israel, where enraged residents chase him out of the 'hood.

(here is the rest of the article on The Los Angeles Jewish Journal.com)

June 22, 2009 | 11:45 pm

Bruno’s Top Five Jewish Moments

Posted by Naomi Pfefferman

Bruno

Universal Pictures has issued an embargo on reviews until the day before “Bruno’s” July 10 release, but here are some top Jewish moments from Sacha Baron Cohen’s highly anticipated (and litigious) mock documentary about a flamboyant gay fashionista who aspires to become the “biggest Austrian superstar since Hitler.”

1) When Bruno fails to achieve uber-fame by solving the problems in Darfur, he comforts himself with the knowledge that “luckily, there is still one sh—hole left to fix in the world: “The Middle East” (or “Middle Earth,” as he calls it). But he doesn’t make many friends while traipsing in a black hat, pais and a speedo through a religious area in Israel, where enraged residents chase him out of the ‘hood.

2) Bruno conducts dialogues between Israeli and Arab leaders, including an ex-Mossad chief and a Palestinian mayor of Jerusalem. Alas, he confuses the word “hummus” with “Hamas.”

3) Bruno decides the best way to become famous is to be kidnapped by Muslim extremists, and so visits a leader of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade in a refugee camp in Lebanon. “I want the best guys in the business. Al Qaeda is so 2001,” he tells the man. “Your king Osama looks like a dirty wizard or a homeless Santa Claus,” he adds. Needless to say, Bruno gets kicked out rather than kidnapped.

4) Bruno and his manager, desperate to land celebrity interviews, consult a chart they have made of top actors. There is “Wilhelm Schmidt” (Will Smith), Adolf Pittler (Brad Pitt) and lastly, a man Bruno calls “Der Fuhrer.” The camera pans to reveal the photograph of said star: Mel Gibson.

5) After congressman Ron Paul pronounces Bruno a “queer,” the fashionista laments, “I couldn’t even shtup Rupaul (sic). How am I going to get famous?

Last update - 17:36 05/07/2009

German FM arrives for 2-day visit to push for Mideast peace

By DPA

Tags: israel news, germany

German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier is to arrive in region for a two-day visit, in which he plans to press for a return to the Middle Easdt peace process and to persuade Arab states to take a more active role in diplomatic efforts to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Steinmeier is due to spend two days in Israel, the Palestinian Territories, Syria and Lebanon, meeting with political leaders.

On Monday, Steinmeier is due to meet President Shimon Peres, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman in Jerusalem.

A planned meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank town of Ramallah is not expected to take place because Abbas is visiting Jordan for talks on forming a Palestinian unity government with the Hamas movement.

A key aspect of the discussions with Israel's conservative leadership is expected to be U.S. and European Union calls for a halt to settlement construction in the West Bank.

Israel has offered a temporary freeze but has declined to put an outright stop to settlement expansion.

Steinmeier, who is paying his 14th visit to the region since taking office in 2005, is also expected to push for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

On Sunday, Netanyahu referred for the first time to a "two-state solution" in reference to efforts to bring peace to the Middle East.

"We have achieved a national agreement on the formula of two states for two peoples," the prime minister said during the weekly cabinet meeting.

Last month, Netanyahu allowed the possibility of a demilitarized Palestinian state without mentioning a "two-state solution."

In Damascus, Steinmeier is expected to urge Syrian President Bashar Assad to play a more constructive role in helping to resolve the region's problems.

Foreign Ministry sources said he intended to urge the Syrian leader to end support for the Hezbollah movement in Lebanon and loosen political ties with Iran.

In Lebanon, the final stage of Steinmeier's tour, the minister is due to meet Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri, son of former premier Rafik Hariri, who was killed in a bomb blast in 2005.

Last update - 09:19 06/07/2009

U.S.: Letting Israel act freely on Iran isn't policy change

By Haaretz Service

Tags: Barack Obama, Iran

U.S. Vice President Joe Biden said on Sunday that the Obama administration would not stand in Israel's way should the latter chooses to take military action to eliminate Iran's nuclear threat.

White House officials said that the vice president's remarks demonstrated only U.S. allowance of Israeli sovereignty, and not a change in policy on the part of the Obama administration.

Biden told ABC reporter George Stephanopoulos that Israel has the right to determine its own course of action with regard to the Iranian nuclear threat, regardless of what the Obama administration chooses to do, .

When asked whether the Obama administration would restrain Israeli military action against Iran, Biden responded:

"Israel can determine for itself - it's a sovereign nation - what's in their interest and what they decide to do relative to Iran and anyone else."

Stephanaopoulos posed the question three times, and each time Biden repeated that Israel was free to choose its actions. "If the Netanyahu government decides to take a course of action different than the one being pursued now, that is their sovereign right to do that. That is not our choice."

White House spokesman Tommy Vietor said Biden's remarks did not signaling any change of approach on Iran or Israel.

"The vice president refused to engage hypotheticals, and he made clear that our policy has not changed," Vietor said. "Our friends and allies, including Israel, know that the president believes that now is the time to explore direct diplomatic options."

During the interview, Biden hinted that President Barack Obama was looking to take a harder line toward Iran over the latter's contentious nuclear program.

He said that Obama's offer for dialogue with Tehran remained on the table, but rejected the notion that the U.S. would make concessions for such negotiation to take place.

"The ball's in their court," Biden said. "If they choose to meet with the P-5 under the conditions the P-5 has laid out, it means they begin to change course. And it means that the protestors probably had some impact on the behavior of an administration that they don't like at all."

Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Sunday, when asked about Biden's comments, that the U.S. position on Iran and a military strike involves a political decision.

"I have been, for some time, concerned about any strike on Iran. I worry about it being very destabilizing, not just in and of itself but unintended consequences of a strike like that," Mullen said on CBS' Face the Nation.

"At the same time, I'm one that thinks Iran should not have nuclear weapons. I think that is very destabilizing," he said.

Last update - 14:08 05/07/2009

9 Israelis suspected of scamming millions from U.S. pensioners

By Yuval Goren, Haaretz Correspondent

Tags: fraud, U.S., Israel NEws

The Tel Aviv police fraud squad arrested on Sunday nine Israelis on suspicion of netting millions of dollars from U.S. pensioners in a so-called Nigerian scam.

Police raided an office in the city, which is suspected to have been the nerve center of the dodgy enterprise. The defendants, all in their 20s and 30s, allegedly phoned American pensioners, told them they had won the lottery and asked them for a fee of several thousand dollars for the transfer of the prize money, which in fact never existed.

The investigation has been conducted in conjunction with U.S. law enforcement agencies.

Last week, it was reported that the American agencies had urged Israel Police to step up the extradition procedure of another ten Israelis who were suspected of scamming $2 million in similar means.

Most of the ten defendants in the advance-fee scam, which was unveiled by police last September, are in their early twenties, without a criminal record.

The first hearing in their extradition plea took place last week, after a New York law enforcement official said many of the victims are old and frail, and urged the Israeli police to bring the alleged offenders to imminent justice.