November 17, 2006
Criel sur mer, France
Thursday, November 23, 2006
Morning Papers - continued ...
Michael Moore Today
Three Marines killed fighting in Iraq
By Steven R. Hurst / Associated Press
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Three U.S. Marines were killed fighting in Anbar province, the area of western Iraq where many Sunni-Arab insurgents are based, the military said Thursday.
Assigned to Regimental Combat Team 7, the Marines died Wednesday from wounds sustained during enemy action, the command said.
The names of the deceased were withheld pending notification of relatives.
The deaths raised to at least 2,870 the number of U.S. servicemen who have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.
So far this month in Iraq, 52 American service members have been killed or died.
On Wednesday, at least 101 Iraqis died in the country's unending sectarian slaughter, and the U.N. reported that 3,709 Iraqi civilians were killed in October, the highest monthly toll of the war and one that is sure to be eclipsed when November's dead are counted.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8452
An Employee of American construction company Kellogg, Brown and Root (KBR), paints a turkey, a decoration for the U.S military Thanksgiving Day celebration, Wednesday, Nov. 22, 2006, in the Green Zone area in Baghdad, Iraq . Planning for the holiday began months ago and has called on the KBR food service staff to help mark the celebrations, according to KBR press release.
http://news.search.yahoo.com/news/search?p=kellogg+brown+root&c=news_photos
Reports: Cheney in Iraq for Thanksgiving
By Thomas Wagner / Associated Press
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraqi state television reported Thursday that Vice President Dick Cheney was in Baghdad. Private Al-Arabiya TV broadcast a similar report.
The American Embassy said that it could not confirm the visit, but that Cheney could be in the country to visit troops for the Thanksgiving holiday.
"I'm not confirming or denying he's here. I'm trying to figure that out," said Lt. Col. Christopher Garver, a U.S. military spokesman.
President Bush met with American troops on Thanksgiving three years ago during a visit that was confined to the airport and limited to several hours.
Also on Thursday, U.S. and Iraqi forces swept into Baghdad's Sadr City slum in an early morning raid, killing four Iraqis, wounding eight and detaining five, police said.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8457
Whistling Past Dixie
by Thomas F. Schaller
In Whistling Past Dixie, Tom Schaller issues a transformative challenge to Democrats: Build a winning coalition outside the South.
The South is no longer the "swing" region in American politics -- it has swung to the Republicans. Most of the South is beyond the Democrats' reach, and what remains is moving steadily into the Republican column. The twin effects of race and religion produce a socially conservative, electorally hostile environment for most Democratic candidates.
Spending valuable resources in Southern states is a dangerously self-destructive strategy that could serve to relegate Democrats to minority-party status for a generation. Political attitudes and demographic changes in other parts of the country are far more favorable to Democratic messages and messengers. The Midwest and Southwest are the nation's most competitive regions. There are opportunities to expand Democratic margins in the Mountain red states while consolidating control over the reliably blue northeastern and Pacific coast states. Before dreaming of forty nine state presidential landslides, the Democrats ought to first figure out how to win twenty-nine states. And that means capturing Arizona -- or even Alaska -- before targeting Alabama.
http://www.whistlingpastdixie.com/
Army Signs More Dropouts
Army Uses New Tool to Recruit 5900 ‘Quality’ Dropouts
By Tom Philpott / Military.com
A wartime Army struggling to attract enough “quality” volunteers is enlisting additional thousands of high school dropouts using an experimental screening tool to identify those most likely to complete their enlistments.
The Two Tier Attrition Screen (TTAS) is an added “quality indicator” that officials hope will allow the Army take in many more high school dropouts with greater confidence they won’t drive up attrition rates.
Years of research have shown that high school dropouts are more prone to be discipline problems in service and to be discharged early. The first-term attrition rate for non-graduates typically is 50 percent, almost double that of high school diploma graduates.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8447
Army Debuts New Slogan In Recruiting Commercials
By Ann Scott Tyson / Washington Post
The Army, facing another tough recruiting season, launched a $200 million-a-year advertising campaign this month and unveiled a new slogan: "Army Strong."
The campaign's core message is that the Army builds not only physical but also mental and emotional strength in recruits, bonding them into a powerful, close-knit team.
"There's strong, and then there's Army strong," a deep male voice intones as martial music rises from a brass band in the background.
The television ads, launched nationwide for Veterans Day along with Internet placements and other outreach, omit all but the most fleeting images related to the all-volunteer Army's biggest endeavor ever: the war in Iraq.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8446
Bring the troops home now
By David Ertischek / West Roxbury & Roslindale Transcript
Massachusetts residents made it rather clear this past election through the "Home from Iraq Now" nonbinding resolution - they want to bring our troops home from Iraq.
More than 60 percent of Massachusetts voters in 36 state representative districts voted in favor of the resolution that calls on Congress and the president to end the Iraq War immediately and bring all U.S. military forces home.
Roslindale resident Melida Arredondo, whose stepson, Alex, was killed in Iraq, was a local coordinator to get the resolution on the ballot.
"The polls are very skewed that are out there; they’re usually done by some bipartisan party people," said Arredondo. "This was a very important way to assess what the public sentiment is."
Arredondo said that getting the necessary 250 signatures was easy; going door-to-door wasn’t even necessary. She added that most people liked that the resolution was nonbinding so it could assess the popular sentiment.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8450
U.N.: Iraqi civilian death toll reaches new monthly high
BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Insurgent attacks in Iraq killed 3,709 civilians last month, making October the deadliest month since the war began in 2003, according to U.N. figures.
The U.N. Assistance Mission in Iraq, which issues bimonthly human rights reports on the war-torn country, came out with its findings for September and October on Wednesday.
September had 3,345 civilian deaths -- which, along with October, would bring to 7,054 the number of violent deaths during the two-month period, according to the U.N. tally.
Baghdad alone had no less than 4,985 deaths, "most of them as a result of gunshot wounds," said the U.N. Assistance Mission, using figures provided by the Iraqi Health Ministry.
The figures were slightly higher than in July and August, when 6,599 civilians were killed.
The number of civilian deaths has been rising all year since the February bombing of a Shiite shrine in Samarra, north of Baghdad, with sectarian violence escalating greatly after that attack.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8442
Study Claims Iraq's 'Excess' Death Toll Has Reached 655,000
By David Brown / Washington Post
A team of American and Iraqi epidemiologists estimates that 655,000 more people have died in Iraq since coalition forces arrived in March 2003 than would have died if the invasion had not occurred.
The estimate, produced by interviewing residents during a random sampling of households throughout the country, is far higher than ones produced by other groups, including Iraq's government.
It is more than 20 times the estimate of 30,000 civilian deaths that President Bush gave in a speech in December. It is more than 10 times the estimate of roughly 50,000 civilian deaths made by the British-based Iraq Body Count research group.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8080
Poll: Most Americans Now Say Iraq War Similar to Vietnam Conflict
By E&P Staff / Editor & Publisher
NEW YORK -- Claims by critics of the war in Iraq that this conflict is similar in many ways to the U.S. experience in Vietnam have long been derided by pundits and administrations officials. But a new survey finds that almost 6 in 10 Americans believe that the analogy is accurate.
A poll by Opinion Research Corporation released by CNN finds that 58% of respondents believe the war in Iraq has turned into a situation like the United States faced in Vietnam, up six points since early October.
In another finding, a whopping 63% of Americans now say they oppose the war in Iraq, with only 33% favoring it.
President Bush this week, on a visit to Vietnam, said that the lesson of that war was that the U.S. needs to stay in Iraq and "win" this time.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8443
Doctors Are Reportedly Fleeing Iraq
By Veronika Oleksyn / Associated Press
VIENNA, Austria -- Iraq's top doctors are under threat and are fleeing the country, leaving hospitals in the hands of medical students or junior physicians, an Iraqi lawmaker said Wednesday.
Doctors have been kidnapped and killed since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003 that toppled ex-Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, said Dr. Rajaa al-Khuzai, an obstetrician who is an elected member of the Iraqi National Council.
"They have been targeted since the fall of the regime," she told The Associated Press during a visit to Austria. "Some of them have been kidnapped and found dead in the streets, some have been released after paying a ransom."
She also told reporters earlier Wednesday that Iraqi hospitals face a shortage of medicines and are in dire need of new equipment.
"We were promised, or we believed, that we would have many new hospitals being built, and many health centers ... but none of this has been done," she said. "No hospitals have been built so far; only some of the hospitals have been serviced."
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8451
The New York Times
Anger Boils at Slain Official's Funeral in Lebanon
By MICHAEL SLACKMANBEIRUT, Lebanon, Nov. 23 – Tens of thousands of people poured into Lebanon’s Martyrs Square today, transforming the funeral service of the slain government minister, Pierre Gemayel, into a political rally exposing the hatreds and schisms that have paralyzed the state and threatened an increasing cycle of violence.
From early in the morning, and for hours after, streams of people flowed into the square, chanting slogans cursing the president of Syria, Bashar al Assad, cursing the leader of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, and cursing the Christian leader, General Michel Aoun, who has allied his party with Hezbollah.
It was a time of anger, more than mourning – as Mr. Gemayel’s flag-draped coffin was taken in a procession from his family home in the village of Bikfaya to St. George’s Cathedral in central Beirut 20 miles away.
“Nasrallah,” screamed a small cluster of young men, “the Sunni will dig your grave!”
Mr. Gemayel, who came from one of Lebanon’s most prominent and divisive Christian families, was ambushed and killed Tuesday as he drove his car through a Christian neighborhood on the edge of Beirut. He was 34, married, and the father of two small children. His grandfather and namesake, Pierre Gemayel, founded the Phalange party, a nationalist, religious militant organization once aligned with Israel; his father, Amin, was Lebanon’s president in the 1980’s.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/world/middleeast/23cnd-lebanon.html?hp&ex=1164344400&en=c7a65c2771d609b4&ei=5094&partner=homepage
Civilian Death Toll Reaches New High in Iraq, U.N. Says
By SABRINA TAVERNISEBAGHDAD, Nov. 22 — More Iraqi civilians were killed in October than in any other month since the American invasion in 2003, a report released by the United Nations on Wednesday said, a rise that underscored the growing cost of Iraq’s deepening sectarian war.
According to the report, 3,709 Iraqis were killed in October, up slightly from the previous high in July, and an increase of about 11 percent from the number in September.
The figures, which include totals from the Baghdad morgue and hospitals and morgues across the country, have become a central barometer of the war here and a gauge of the progress of the American military as it tries to bring stability to this exhausted country.
A dangerous trend has surfaced: Sixty-five percent of all deaths in Baghdad were categorized as unidentified corpses, the signature of militias, who kidnap, kill and throw away bodies at a rate that now outstrips the slaughter inflicted by suicide bombers. The report did not offer a breakdown by sect, and it is impossible to tell who is dying in greater numbers.
Indeed, the 52 bodies found by the authorities on Wednesday were far more than the 16 Iraqis reported killed in Baghdad and Baquba, a violent city north of the capital.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/world/middleeast/23iraq.html?hp&ex=1164344400&en=28c07cddeb1c538d&ei=5094&partner=homepage
Macy’s Parade Gets Tighter Weather Control Than Ever
By SEWELL CHANSeven pole-mounted anemometers will transmit minute-by-minute wind measurements to handheld computers. Police and emergency management officials will relay the data to balloon navigators. Aerodynamics engineers and a liaison from the National Weather Service will advise the incident commander, a three-star police chief.
These are among the new measures in place as the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade marches for the 80th time today, amid preparations worthy of a large-scale military operation.
But the precautions may not be enough to keep the giant balloons aloft.
A strong northeaster climbed up the East Coast yesterday, driving a wall of rain and wind before it, with gusts expected at just about the speeds that parade organizers fear the most. As bleak as the weather are the memories: of 1997, when a Cat in the Hat balloon crashed into a lamppost, injuring four people and leaving one of them in a coma, and last year, when an M & M balloon sent the head of a street lamp crashing onto a woman in a wheelchair and her 11-year-old sister.
The poor weather and heightened oversight could ground some or all of the 13 big balloons — 1 fewer than last year — that are set to fly today, starting at 9 a.m. In the best case, they could be flown so low as to practically be floats. In the worst case, as Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg warned, the hapless helium-filled creatures could be pulled onto side streets and summarily deflated.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/nyregion/23parade.html?hp&ex=1164344400&en=a3333eb421838383&ei=5094&partner=homepage
Proof Is Scant on Psychiatric Drug Mix for Young
By GARDINER HARRISTheir rooms are a mess, their trophies line the walls, and both have profiles on MySpace.com. Stephen and Jacob Meszaros seem like typical teenagers until their mother offers a glimpse into the family’s medicine cabinet.
Bottles of psychiatric medications fill the shelves. Stephen, 15, takes the antidepressants Zoloft and Desyrel for depression, the anticonvulsant Lamictal to moderate his moods and the stimulant Focalin XR to improve concentration. Jacob, 14, takes Focalin XR for concentration, the anticonvulsant Depakote to moderate his moods, the antipsychotic Risperdal to reduce anger and the antihypertensive Catapres to induce sleep.
Over the last three years, each boy has been prescribed 28 different psychiatric drugs.
“Sometimes, when you look at all the drugs they’ve taken, you wonder, ‘Wow, did I really do this to my kids?’ ” said their mother, Tricia Kehoe of Sharpsville, Pa. “But I’ve seen them without the meds, and there’s a major difference.”
There is little doubt that some psychiatric medicines, taken by themselves, work well in children. For example, dozens of studies have shown that stimulants improve attentiveness. A handful of other psychiatric drugs have proven effective against childhood obsessive compulsive disorder, among other problems.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/health/23kids.html?oref=login
Fed Chief’s Help Enlisted for Trip to Press China
Wong Maye-E/Associated Press
Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr., left, has invited the Fed chief, Ben S. Bernanke, on his China trip next month. The two have traveled on economic missions before, here at a Group of 7 meeting in Singapore. By STEVEN R. WEISMANPublished: November 23, 2006
WASHINGTON, Nov. 22 — Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. has enlisted Ben S. Bernanke, the Federal Reserve chairman, to join an unusual delegation of cabinet members to China next month that will press for changes in Chinese economic policies long criticized by the administration and Congress, officials said Wednesday.
The trip in mid-December, to be led by Mr. Paulson, a former Goldman Sachs chairman with extensive experience in China, escalates the pressure on the Beijing leadership to crack down on piracy, open up its economy to outside investors and allow the value of the Chinese currency to fluctuate more freely, Treasury officials say.
It also has the effect of putting pressure on the Treasury secretary to get results from the Chinese at a time of mounting pressure from Democrats and Republicans to curb what they view as China’s reliance on exports.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/business/worldbusiness/23trip.html?hp&ex=1164344400&en=5d0160ea6b98852b&ei=5094&partner=homepage
Hastert Scouts for House Role After 8 Years as Speaker
David Scull for The New York TimesJ. Dennis Hastert, the longest-serving Republican speaker, returning to his office this month in the Capitol.
By CARL HULSEPublished: November 23, 2006
WASHINGTON, Nov. 22 — Speaker J. Dennis Hastert made history this year when he became the longest-serving Republican in that post. Now he is about to go into the books again as one of the few House speakers, and the first in almost 50 years, to rejoin the rank and file.
Defying expectations that he would immediately retire if the Republicans lost their majority, Mr. Hastert is preparing to remain in the House for at least the early months of the 110th Congress while he helps orchestrate a line of succession at home in Illinois and seeks to shape a political ending beyond his party’s defeat.
“It is not an ideal situation, but the speaker is a grounded person and is focused on serving another term in Congress,” said Ron Bonjean, a spokesman for Mr. Hastert.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/us/politics/23hastert.html?hp&ex=1164344400&en=f6e982b9d3cc1782&ei=5094&partner=homepage
Turkey Says Won't Walk Away From Talks on Cyprus
By REUTERSFiled at 8:57 a.m. ET
ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Turkey's chief EU negotiator said on Thursday Ankara would not walk away from Finnish-led discussions over Cyprus aimed at avoiding a crisis in Turkey's European Union membership bid.
Ali Babacan's comments follow an announcement by Cyprus's Foreign Minister George Lillikas on Wednesday that he will not attend a Finnish-hosted meeting of EU and Mediterranean foreign ministers next week unless Turkey changes its stance on the divided island.
``The Finnish presidency is exploring some ideas ... we know it is difficult,'' Babacan, who is also economy minister, told a World Economic Forum in Istanbul. ``We will not be the ones walking away from discussions, we are there to talk.''
His comments seemed aimed at letting Cyprus take the blame for any failure in the negotiations. Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul is due to attend the talks in Finland, which holds the rotating EU presidency.
The EU wants Turkey to open its ports to shipping from EU member Cyprus, but Ankara says the bloc must first lift trade restrictions against breakaway Turkish Cypriots it backs in the north of the divided Mediterranean island.
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-turkey-eu-cyprus.html
Hostage Death Raises Stakes in Nigerian Oil Crisis
By REUTERSFiled at 8:54 a.m. ET
ABUJA (Reuters) - The death of a British hostage in Nigeria's oil-producing south in a shootout between kidnappers and troops raises the stakes for oil workers but is unlikely to change much for the industry, security experts said on Thursday.
The Briton, abducted from an offshore facility with six other foreigners early on Wednesday, was killed when the kidnappers ran into a military patrol in the remote creeks of the Niger Delta.
It was unclear who shot him. Two other hostages were wounded, one seriously, in the firefight while the remaining four were released unharmed. All seven worked for Saipem, a unit of Italian oil giant Eni.
Abductions of oil workers are frequent in the lawless delta but hostages are normally released unharmed for a ransom.
The only other known hostage death occurred in August, also during a botched attempt by Nigerian troops to free the captive, a Nigerian employee of Royal Dutch Shell.
OPEC member Nigeria is Africa's top oil exporter and the eighth biggest in the world, but its roughly 2.4 million barrels per day (bpd) are pumped from the Niger Delta, where poverty and lawlessness fuel militancy and crime.
``In future, if we had people taken I would be talking to the government security forces to make sure that they don't try and rescue them,'' said an expert who coordinates security for one of the major Western oil companies operating in the delta.
``Oil workers are obviously going to be more concerned for themselves. But will this affect production or the way we do business? I would say probably not,'' he said.
FREQUENT KIDNAPPINGS
Eni said the Italian hostage who was seriously wounded in Wednesday's shootout would be flown home on Thursday to be treated at an Italian hospital. It said the man's condition was improving although he remained ``under close observation.''
The company said the body of the British hostage would be moved on Thursday from the creeks to Port Harcourt, the Niger Delta's main city.
Kidnappings have been a problem in the delta for years but 2006 has been particularly bad, with dozens of foreigners taken.
Usually, after a few days or at most a few weeks in the remote mangrove creeks of the delta, the hostages are released unharmed after the payment of ransoms.
Abductions are just one aspect of violence that has plagued the Niger Delta for years.
Many villagers in the poor, impenetrable wetlands region resent the oil industry for generating huge revenues for the faraway government and foreign oil firms while they have no power, no roads, no clean water and few schools or clinics.
This state of affairs has spawned a generation of angry youths eager to take up arms to press demands for development, or more often to make money.
Kidnappings for ransom, theft of crude oil and thuggery sponsored by politicians are all commonplace.
Systemic corruption among government officials and security forces and a complete breakdown of law and order in a region almost the size of England have also contributed to the deteriorating security situation in the delta.
Nigeria has cut oil output by a fifth since February, when militants fighting for local control of the oil wealth staged a series of attacks on pipelines, platforms and export terminals.
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-nigeria-hostages.html
White House Denies Cheney Is in Iraq
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESSFiled at 8:53 a.m. ET
BAGDHAD, Iraq (AP) -- The White House denied Iraqi television reports that U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney made an unannounced visit to Baghdad on Thursday.
David Almacy, a White House spokesman in Washington, said Cheney was not in Iraq and that his only currently planned travel to the region is the previously announced trip he will make to Saudi Arabia on Friday to meeting the next day with King Abdullah to discuss developments in the Middle East, including Iraq.
State-run Iraqiya TV and the private Al-Arabiya TV station reported that Cheney had arrived in the Iraqi capital on Thursday morning, apparently to visit American troops for the Thanksgiving holiday.
But U.S. Embassy and U.S. military officials in Baghdad couldn't confirm that, and it became clear later that the reports were erroneous.
For security reasons, previous visits to Iraq by U.S. President George W. Bush, Cheney and other high administration officials have not been made public in advance, but have been disclosed immediately upon their arrival -- regardless of whether they were accompanied by reporters or traveling without a press contingent.
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Iraq-Cheney.html
2 Killed, 10 Injured in India Bombing
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESSFiled at 8:57 a.m. ET
GAUHATI, India (AP) -- A bomb exploded Thursday near a train station in India's northeast, killing two people and injuring 10, police said.
The explosion occurred at a stand for auto-rickshaw taxis outside the train station of Gauhati, the capital of the insurgency-ridden state of Assam, said T. Rabha, a railway spokesman.
Assam's police chief, D.N. Dutt, said at least two people died on the scene and 10 others were injured.
Auto-rickshaws are three-wheeled, open-sided motor vehicles commonly used to transport passengers in India.
The bomb went off shortly before the Rajdhani Express from New Delhi to Gauhati was to enter the station, Rabha said.
Police said initial suspicion pointed to the United Liberation Front of Asom, or ULFA -- a separatist group that often targets government offices and public places.
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-India-Explosion.html
Weighing America’s Options in Iraq (6 Letters)
Published: November 23, 2006To the Editor:
Re “Lost in the Desert” (column, Nov. 22):
Maureen Dowd reports on the hand-wringing among the political elite over what to do in Iraq. Might I suggest a simple solution: democracy.
According to polls, some 70 percent of the Iraqi people want the United States troops to withdraw completely and as fast as possible. That should be reason enough for the United States to leave at once.
On top of that, the midterm election results suggest that a substantial majority of the American people want the same, and that is also backed up by polling data.
In the face of this sentiment, it is amazing that since the election, the elite — Democrats, Republicans and pundocrats — are talking more and more about sending additional troops.
Have we no democracy left?
John V. WalshShrewsbury, Mass., Nov. 22, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/opinion/l23iraq.html
Panel Calls for Big Changes in Medicaid
By ROBERT PEARWASHINGTON, Nov. 22 — A federal advisory panel says that long-term care for aging baby boomers threatens to bankrupt Medicaid, and it recommends sweeping changes to rein in costs, including greater use of managed care for the sickest Medicaid recipients.
The proposals set up a likely clash between the new Democratic Congress and the Bush administration, which has sent strong signals that it will seek big savings in Medicaid next year.
Panel members adopted the recommendations last week, by a vote of 11 to 1, and are drafting a report to be submitted next month to Michael O. Leavitt, the secretary of health and human services. Mr. Leavitt created the panel in May 2005 and is receptive to many of its proposals.
The panel, known as the Medicaid Commission, said states should have more freedom to alter benefits and eligibility for the program, which serves more than 50 million low-income people.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/washington/23medicaid.html
Aging Craft Orbiting Mars Appears to Have Succumbed
By JOHN NOBLE WILFORDIn words and somber tones usually associated with a death in the family, engineers and scientists said yesterday that the Mars Global Surveyor, the most durable spacecraft ever to orbit that planet, had fallen silent and was given little chance of revival.
The 10-year-old spacecraft — which mapped the Martian surface, recorded seasonal and annual climate changes, and gathered evidence of water in the planet’s past — has not communicated with flight controllers since Nov. 2. A disabled solar power array is the prime suspect.
“We may have lost a dear old friend and teacher,” said Michael Meyer, chief scientist for Mars exploration at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Dr. Meyer spoke at a news teleconference from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., where the mission is being directed.
Fuk K. Li, the laboratory’s Mars program manager, said the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, the newest spacecraft to explore the planet, drew blanks in several attempts on Friday and Monday to make a photographic inspection of the Global Surveyor. Given that failure, mission officials said yesterday that they had exhausted the most likely means of re-establishing radio communications.
The two spacecraft regularly passed within 60 miles of each other. But in the last three weeks, ground antennas have not been able to track the Global Surveyor’s orbit to fix its probable position, which could have been altered by the malfunction.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/22/science/space/22mars.html
Erasing Divide, College Leaders Take to Blogging
Andrew Councill for The New York TimesPatricia A. McGuire, the president of Trinity University in Washington, D.C., uses her blog to talk about issues of the day, like same-sex unions.
By DIANA JEAN SCHEMO
Published: November 22, 2006WASHINGTON, Nov. 21 — Thanks to an e-mail message from “trinity gurl,” an anonymous cybersnoop, Patricia A. McGuire, the president of Trinity University here, suddenly faced a digital-age dilemma.
The e-mail message turned in another student for using profanity on her personal Web page, which linked to Trinity’s Web site. Nothing scandalous, but Dr. McGuire was more troubled, she said, that “trinity gurl” had snitched in secrecy.
So Dr. McGuire reached for a particularly apt solution in the age of the blogosphere: She censured the eager informant on her own blog, comparing the e-mailer to Big Brother and asking, “Who is ‘trinity gurl’ and why is she sending me this kind of information about something a student is posting online?”
While some colleges and their presidents have seen their reputations shredded on student blogs, and others have tried to limit what students and faculty members may say online, about a dozen or so presidents, like Dr. McGuire, are vaulting the digital and generational divide and starting their own blogs.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/22/education/22blogs.html
Of Rubber and Blood in Brazilian Amazon
By LARRY ROHTERRIO BRANCO, Brazil — Alcidino dos Santos was on his way to the market to buy vegetables for his mother one morning in 1942 when an army officer stopped him and told him he was being drafted as a “rubber soldier.” Men were needed in the Amazon, 3,000 miles away, to harvest rubber for the Allied war effort, he was told, and it was his patriotic duty to serve.
Mr. dos Santos, then a 19-year-old mason’s assistant, protested that his mother was a widow who depended on him for support, but to no avail. He would be paid a wage of 50 cents a day, he recalls being told, and receive free transportation home once the conflict was over, but he had to go, that day.
More than 60 years after the end of World War II, Mr. dos Santos and hundreds of other poor Brazilians who were dragooned into service as rubber soldiers are still in the Amazon, waiting for those promises to be fulfilled. Elderly and frail, they are fighting against time and indifference to gain the recognition and compensation they believe should be theirs.
“We were duped, and then abandoned and forgotten,” Mr. dos Santos, who never saw his mother again, said in an interview at his simple wood house here in Acre, a state in the far west of the Brazilian Amazon that has the largest concentration of former rubber soldiers.
“We were brought here against our will,” he said, “and thrown into the jungle, where we suffered terribly. I’m near the end of my life, but my country should do right by me.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/world/americas/23brazil.html
Finding Bliss in Avalanche Country, British Columbia
Bonny Makarowicz for The New York TimesFirst light at Rogers Pass.
By MARK SUNDEEN
Published: November 19, 2006"ARE you skiers?” asked the desk clerk at the Best Western. When we said yes, she explained that they had certain rules: no skis in the rooms, no beer bottles in the pool area, no bare feet anywhere in the hotel. Lastly, and this one she stressed with the weariness particular to a service employee required to enforce such a rule: lastly, there will be no cooking in the rooms.
36 Hours: Whistler My friend Jason Munzke and I had come a long way for this, a couple hundred miles up Highway 95 from Idaho to Rogers Pass in Glacier National Park in British Columbia, looking for what some call the best backcountry ski terrain in North America. “Anything past Kicking Horse, that’s new territory for me,” said Munzke as we sped toward the Kicking Horse Mountain Resort.
We climbed the big valleys of the Canadian Rockies, steep white peaks rising up on either side and creamy puffs of smoke drifting up from the pulp mill at Skookumchuck.
Munzke (which rhymes with fun ski and is what everyone calls him) lives with his dog in a doublewide on an unnamed dirt road in northern Idaho, a part of the world that is home to back-to-the-landers, libertarians and militiamen. Munzke is none of those things: he’s a backcountry skier.
A fellow of Norwegian descent with a toothy smile, he has a dangerous combination of lifelong mountaineering skills and a masters in psychology (he’s a clinical therapist at a high school). You’ve heard of those wilderness programs for youths so wayward that a staff member must come to your door to haul bodily the little hell-raiser out to the woods. Well, that guy at the door: that’s Munzke.
http://travel2.nytimes.com/2006/11/19/travel/19rogerspass.html?ref=travel
A Growing Plea for Mercy for the Mentally Ill on Death Row
Michael Stravato for The New York TimesScott Louis Panetti, who shot his in-laws in 1992, during an interview from a Texas prison. “The devil has been trying to rub me out,” he said.
By RALPH BLUMENTHALPublished: November 23, 2006LIVINGSTON, Tex. — Scott Louis Panetti says he was drowned and electrocuted as a child and that he was recently stabbed in the eye in his death row cell by the devil. Mr. Panetti says he has wounds that were inflicted by demons and healed by President John F. Kennedy.
“The devil has been trying to rub me out to keep me from preaching,” Mr. Panetti, explaining why he faces execution, said in an interview from behind thick glass in the Polunsky Unit here in East Texas, where condemned prisoners are held before transfer to the death house 45 miles west in Huntsville.
Despite Mr. Panetti’s obvious mental illness — he was a mental patient long before he gunned down his in-laws in 1992 — he served as his own lawyer at his murder trial, throwing the courtroom into chaos with frequent gibberish. Now the hyperactive and gangling Mr. Panetti, 48, has become an illustration of the growing quandary over the application of a 1986 Supreme Court decision barring execution of the insane.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/us/23execute.html
State of the ArtFree Services to Inspire Your Cellphone
By DAVID POGUEThanksgiving, is it? Well, despite occasional headaches, technology has also brought us plenty to be thankful for: safety, convenience and entertainment on the go. Next time you’re running late, lost or lonely, ask yourself: aren’t you grateful for your cellphone?
Actually, don’t answer yet. With every passing month, cellphones are becoming even more useful. Sure, it’s nice that they let you call people from the road. But lately, their reach has grown, thanks to clever programmers making links between the cellular world and the Internet.
Here, for your gratitude-generating pleasure, is a rundown of some of the most exciting and powerful services awaiting your cellphone at this very moment. Better yet, at the moment, they’re all free.
FREE DIRECTORY ASSISTANCE By this time, it’s quite clear that nobody with a “$50 a month” calling plan actually pays only $50 a month. The cellphone companies will do anything to puff up your bill — like charging you $1.50 or $2 every time you dial 411 to find a phone number.
Try 800-FREE-411 (800-373-3411) instead. A computer or human being looks up a number for you at no charge, once you’ve listened to a 20-second ad. It’s a classic time-for-money swap.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/technology/23pogue.html
A Cinematic View of Italy as Morally Bankrupt
By ELISABETTA POVOLEDOMILAN, Nov. 20 — The lunchtime patter of a group of businessmen during the first few frames of “A Casa Nostra” (“In Our House”) neatly encapsulates the mindset of Italian capitalism as envisioned by the director Francesca Comencini. The men chat about food, soccer, insider trading.
The scene sets the tone. “A Casa Nostra” is essentially a film about money, about what it can buy and what people will do to get their hands on it (out of necessity or greed), whether it is selling their bodies, their possessions or their souls.
It is also about Italy today as the director sees it, a cinematic final curtain on the capitalist myth and this country’s transmutation from postwar prosperity to the widespread venality she says has taken root in the national soul.
The indictment, though harsh, takes no sides. “It’s a political film, but not an ideological one,” Ms. Comencini said during an interview in Rome, where she lives. “Today money is at the heart of contemporary Italian culture, and people think that’s normal.”
“But with that comes an inexorable barbarization of everyday life,” she added, and the loss of values that “may be difficult to recover once they’re gone.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/movies/23casa.html
Study Questions Need to Operate on Disk Injuries
Ethan Kaplan for The New York TimesDr. Eugene J. Carragee of Stanford called the risk of waiting with sciatica “if not extraordinarily small, at least off the radar screen.”
By GINA KOLATAPublished: November 22, 2006People with ruptured disks in their lower backs usually recover whether or not they have surgery, researchers are reporting today. The study, a large trial, found that surgery appeared to relieve pain more quickly but that most people recovered eventually and that there was no harm in waiting.And that, surgeons said, is likely to change medical practice.
The study, published in The Journal of the American Medical Association, is the only large and well-designed trial to compare surgery for sciatica with waiting.
The study was controversial from the start, with many surgeons saying they knew that the operation worked and that it would be unethical for their patients to participate in such a study.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/22/health/22spine.html?em&ex=1164430800&en=eaca068467097d45&ei=5087%0A\
Beyoncé Bounces Back: Film, Album and Warning
By KELEFA SANNEHIf you go down to your local record shop today and buy a copy of the recent Beyoncé album, “B’Day” (Sony Urban/Columbia), you might notice a sticker on the cover, advertising the contents. “Includes ‘Deja Vu’ featuring Jay-Z,” it says. Also: “Ring the Alarm.” And: “Bonus Track: ‘Listen.’ ”
There is no indication that the album includes one of the year’s best (and maybe biggest) pop songs. No warning that, after listening to Track 9, you may find a silly little catchphrase — “To the left, to the left” — lodged in your brain. In other words, there is no mention of a fast-rising hit called “Irreplaceable,” which might just be the greatest ... well, let’s not get carried away. But let’s acknowledge that this is precisely the kind of song that makes it easy to get carried away.
The outdated sticker is proof that a lot has changed since September, when Beyoncé’s second album was released, a day after her 25th birthday. It would be an overstatement to say that the success of “Irreplaceable” marks a comeback for Beyoncé. But certainly this fall has a been a weird, scary season for this singer and for her fans. We always knew she would score another era-defining hit. But we couldn’t have guessed she would do it like this.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/arts/music/23sann.html
Haaretz
Tens of thousands turn out to pay tribute to slain Lebanese minister
By Jonathan Lis, Haaretz Correspondent and Reuters At least 200,000 Lebanese poured into central Beirut to pay tribute to murdered Christian leader Pierre Gemayel on Thursday, turning his funeral into a show of strength against Syria and its Hezbollah allies.
The funeral in the St George Maronite Cathedral in the capital was attended by Lebanese Druze leader Walid Jumblatt and Arab League chief Amr Moussa. Television footage showed mourners weeping openly during the service.
Sunni Muslim, Druze and Christian leaders have accused Syria of killing Gemayel, scion of one of Lebanon's most prominent Maronite families. Damascus has condemned the assassination.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791854.html
Shin Bet opposes targeted killings of Palestinian politicians
By Aluf Benn and Avi Issacharoff, Haaretz Correspondents The Shin Bet security service opposes targeted killings of Palestinian politicians, Shin Bet chief Yuval Diskin told the security cabinet Wednesday.
The cabinet, which was discussing Israel's response to the ongoing Qassam rocket fire from the Gaza Strip, adopted Diskin's recommendation and decided against targeting politicians. However, it approved another controversial proposal: targeting Hamas institutions in the Gaza Strip.
During a discussion of the use of targeted killings to combat Qassam launches, defense officials explained there were three types of targets, and different instructions for dealing with each.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791587.html
IDF troops kill two Palestinian militants in northern Gaza
By Nir Hasson, Haaretz Correspondent, Haaretz Service and Agencies Israel Defense Forces troops killed two Palestinian militants Thursday morning during raids in the northern Gaza Strip.
Also Thursday, and IDF soldier was lightly wounded by an anti-tank missile in the northern Gaza town of Beit Hanun.
Both militants were killed near the northern Gaza town of Beit Lahia, in separate incidents. Islamic Jihad militant Jamal Al-Nidr, 22, was killed by an IDF sniper early Wednesday afternoon. The other militant, a 20-year-old member of Hamas, was killed by fire from an IDF tank unit Wednesday morning. Another militant was wounded in the clashes.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791871.html
IAEA indefinitely freezes Iran nuclear aid over plutonium risk
By Reuters VIENNA - The United Nations nuclear watchdog's board of governors Thursday indefinitely blocked an Iranian bid for technical aid for a reactor project due to fears it could yield bomb-grade plutonium, a diplomat in the meeting said.
But the decision, which the International Atomic Energy Agency's board adopted by consensus after days of wrangling between industrialized and developing nations, left open the possibility of revisiting Iran's request in future.
In a compromise hammered out in negotiations ahead of the board meeting, Iranian requests for IAEA technical assistance on seven other nuclear energy projects judged not to pose a risk of being diverted to bomb-making were approved by the governors.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791971.html
Hamas political chief Khaled Meshal arrives in Cairo for talks on Shalit
By Avi Issacharoff, Haaretz Correspondent, Haaretz Service and Reuters Damascus-based Hamas political chief Khaled Meshal arrived in Cairo on Thursday for talks on a prisoner exchange deal involving captured Israel Defense Forces soldier Gilad Shalit.
The delegation consists of several senior Damascus-based Hamas leaders, including the director of Hamas' Damascus offices, Immad al-Alami, and Mohammed Nassar, a member of the group's political bureau.
The Hamas officials are expected to hold meetings with senior Egyptian officials, including Egyptian intelligence chief OmarSuleiman.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791532.html
Palestinian sources: Saudis have severed ties with Hamas
By Avi Issacharoff Palestinian sources have claimed that Saudi Arabia has severed relations with Hamas in recent weeks, and the Saudi government is consequently refusing to meet with senior Hamas officials. Palestinian Foreign Minister Mahmoud a-Zahar, who visited the kingdom recently, did not meet with a single senior Saudi official during his stay, sources said.
Meanwhile, Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas has reached an agreement with Hamas on a diplomatic platform for a Palestinian unity government, Abbas said in a interview with the London-based paper Al-Hayat yesterday. What remains to be resolved, he said, are the issues of a cease-fire and a prisoner exchange for kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit.
Senior Hamas officials have said recently they would be willing to declare a temporary cease-fire with Israel. But an associate of Abbas said that Hamas has thus far only agreed to stop the Qassam rocket fire at Israel from Gaza: It has not agreed to a complete cease-fire that would also halt attacks in the West Bank and suicide bombings inside Israel.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791545.html
Bush's upcoming Mideast visit won't include Olmert, Abbas talks
By Aluf Benn, Haaretz Correspondent The White House has announced that George W. Bush is set to arrive in Jordan next week, but his itinerary will not include talks with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert or Palestinian Authority Chiarman Mahmoud Abbas.
According to the American announcement, the U.S. president will be minutes away from Jerusalem, by plane, and will not drop by. He did not even invite Olmert or Abbas for a meeting in Jordan, either together or apart from each other.
This decision is much more important than yet another clash between Israelis and Palestinians, or among Israelis themselves. The official purpose of Bush's visit to the region is a meeting with the prime minister of Iraq, Nuri al-Maliki. The American administration would like "to expedite the transfer of security responsibility in Iraq to the local government," a code for the commencement of an American disengagement from the Bush military adventure in the Middle East.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791844.html
Czech Republic extradites two alleged woman traffickers to Israel
By Jonathan Lis The Czech Republic on Thursday extradited two Jewish men of Russian origin to Israel on charges of trafficking women. Two Israeli men suspected of involvement in the affair were also arrested.
The four are suspected of trafficking women, pimping, unlawful imprisonment and battery. At least one of the men is also suspected of rape. Remand hearings for all four suspects will take place at the Petah Tikva Magistrate's Court on Thursday afternoon.
The investigation into the affair began in February, after an organization dedicated to fighting woman trafficking discovered that two young women that were being held by the Immigration Police were in fact victims of a trafficking ring. 0The two women had illegally entered Israel via Egypt at the behest of the two Russian suspects. They had subsequently been forced to engage in prostitution in a Haifa brothel run by the two Israeli suspects.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791980.html
Qassam attacks / No solution to rockets
By Ze'ev Schiff Israel wasted many years in fruitless debate over a technological solution to the problem posed by the Qassam rockets fired against Sderot and the western Negev. It is best not to delude the citizens of Israel with false promises: Even if a miracle does take place and a decision on the appropriate technological solution is made, it would be two to three years before emergence of the first results.
The Qassam problem has been characterized to date by a great deal of talk and false promises. A variety of committees were set up -- even an intraservice team of various experts -- and funds wasted, without any serious solution appearing on the horizon. At one point, the debate centered around the question of whether efforts should concentrate on developing a laser gun that could intercept Katyusha and Qassam rockets, or on building missiles capable of countering rockets and missiles. Israel invested in the development of the Nautilus (a weapons system) in cooperation with the United States; a few successful interception tests took place and the development was stopped. Among other reasons, the Americans argued that one of the Israeli firms participating in the project was suspected of trying to acquire secret technologies and was asked to leave the project.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791550.html
Nun and priest act as human shields against IDF bombing
By The Associated Press An American priest and nun spent several hours yesterday at a Palestinian militant's home that Israel has targeted for destruction, the first foreigners to join a weeklong standoff between Palestinian "human shields" and the Israel Air Force.
Father Peter Dougherty, 65, and Sister Mary Ellen Gundeck, 55, Michigan-based peace activists, said they were sent by God to help protect the Palestinians. The pair arrived yesterday morning at the family home of Mohammed Baroud, a militant involved in rocket attacks on Israel, and stayed for several hours. After sundown, Dougherty said they had left the house.
For the past week, Palestinian militants and civilians have crowded into five militants' houses, to bodily thwart Israeli threats to hit them with missiles. The use of human shields is a new tactic in the Palestinians' war against Israel's military.
Since militants kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit in June, the IAF has destroyed the homes of at least 73 militants, usually after calling and warning residents to evacuate.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791547.html
Olmert: Take Iran threats seriously; Iraq war good for Israel
By Agencies Prime Minister Ehud Olmert appealed to the world yesterday to take seriously the threats posed by Iran's nuclear program and declarations by Iranian leaders that Israel must be wiped off the map.
Speaking to a convention of the Orthodox Union, an American Jewish group, Olmert said the physical threat posed by Iranian nuclear weapons was no less dangerous than what he called the "moral aspect," calls by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for Israel's destruction, which he compared to Nazi Germany. "We heard the voices in the past of leaders of nations that were talking about the liquidation of the Jewish people," Olmert said. "We can't afford ... to listen and not to react."
"We can't allow anyone in any place in the world to continue their routine without responding," Olmert said.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791548.html
Poll: More than half of Israelis support Syria talks
By Yoav Stern More than half of Israelis would like to see Israel engage in negotiations with Syria, but are unprepared to withdraw from the Golan Heights as a price for peace, according to the results of a Market Watch poll released yesterday.
Fifty-seven percent of 499 respondents said they supported negotiations, while 54 percent said they could not agree to a Golan withdrawal. Fifty-nine percent said they feared another war would break out in the North unless talks were held.
Some 70 percent of respondents agree with the charges that Israel cannot handle holding negotiations with both Syria and the Palestinians at the same time. Meanwhile, 58 percent said they would prefer Israel begin talks with Palestinians before moving on to the Syrian front.
Syrian President Bashar Assad has called on Israel numerous times to renew negotiations, but has simultaneously hinted that Syria would be willing to take military steps if talks did not succeed. Syria seeks the return of the Golan Heights, which has been occupied by Israel since 1967. But peace talks between the two countries broke down in 2000.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791546.html
German museums press government to tighten requirements for restitution of art looted by Nazis
By Assaf Uni BERLIN - The German government is facing demands to toughen criteria for restitution to Jewish heirs of works of art looted by the Nazis. A number of museums from around the country have recently seen their most famous masterpieces returned to Jewish heirs and then quickly auctioned off to private collectors for tremendous sums. German culture minister Bernd Neumann held an urgent meeting earlier this week with museum directors to discuss their demands that claimants be held to a higher burden of proof in establishing Jewish ownership of art.
For years, German museums refused to return paintings to Jews, despite the fact that many had come from methodical looting. Under the Nazi regime, in addition to the looting, many Jewish families were forced to sell valuable art collections for bargain-basement prices to survive. An estimated 100,000 paintings worldwide still have not been returned to rightful Jewish owners.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791549.html
First eruv approved for southern California
By Shlomo Shamir NEW YORK ?Southern California coastal authorities have decided to allow a beachfront eruv - a boundary that makes it possible for observant Jews to carry objects on Shabbat - to be built in the state for the first time. The eruv will surround sections of Santa Monica, Los Angeles and Marina del Rey.
Orthodox rabbis and activists in southern California said they were pleased by Tuesday's decision. "It's a relief, and it's very exciting for us," Rabbi Ben Geiger, of the Pacific Jewish Center in Venice, California, was quoted as saying. Geiger was among those who led the efforts to get approval for the eruv.
Geiger told Haaretz that he hopes more people will pray at his synagogue now that Orthodox parents will be able to carry their children out of the house or push them in a stroller on Shabbat. He said the eruv will also mean that an 8-year-old girl in the community who uses a wheelchair will finally be able to attend services. The eruv transforms a "public" area into a "private" one, making it permissible to carry objects or push carriages or wheelchairs within the boundary.
Local authorities were in no rush to grant permission for the eruv, saying that the coast is a protected area for birds, who could get hurt if they fly into the eruv wire. The solution reached is that the Pacific Jewish Center will be able to set up the eruv for a three-year period, on condition that it affixes material to it that will make the birds aware of the wire, so that they can circumvent it.
Ernst & Young: Israel falls way short of tourism potential By Irit Rosenblum and Zohar Blumenkrantz Tourism to Israel could be doubled within five years, and reach 2-5 million tourists in 2011 - according to a report by Ernst & Young which the international consulting firm presented yesterday at a press conference. The report recommends revolutionizing Israel's management of tourism investment. The main points include substantial investment in marketing; establishment of a tourism investment committee to supervise investments in the sector by grants; and incentives and partnerships with the private sector.
The report was contracted by the Tourism and Finance ministries. Finance Minister Isaac Herzog said he planned to present the consolidated plan to the Socio-Economic Cabinet. "For the first time we have before us a real, overall working plan for the tourism sector," he declared. According to the report, Israel's greatest market potential lies in the United States, Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Sweden, Russia and China, which total about 18 million tourists - but only 6.6 percent of this number currently reaches the country.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791576.html
Abandoning the ivory tower
By Noam Ben Ze'ev Exclusively for the upper crust - until now, that was the feeling one got at the Jerusalem Music Center. Just descending the stairs in the picturesque Mishkenot Sha'ananim neighborhood emphasized the JMC's unique quality. One entered the hushed lobby to find a recording studio blessed with the last word in technology, designed for the use of a few dozen artists and a few on-site concerts. This clearly appeared to be an elitist institution that served the very few musicians at the peak of the talent pyramid.
But no longer. The JMC staff is signaling a shift in direction, and one can see proof of this Saturday night (8:30 P.M.), when the Jerusalem Quartet takes center stage. For the first time, JMC musicians will abandon the safety of their lofty haven and descend to the level of the man in the street, at the nearby YMCA auditorium. There, for a reasonable price, they will perform their superb New Chamber Concert Series, entitled "YMCAMERI" in honor of the venue.
They have retained their quality and content, and audiences will be treated to big names like Andreas Scholl, who is singing Vivaldi's "Stabat Mater"; clarinetist Antony Pay and the Aviv Quartet, who are playing Mozart; and other engaging, international ensembles and soloists.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791585.html
Olmert predicts unprecedented trade surplus of $6 billion
By Tal Levy Ehud Olmert is certainly optimistic about Israel's trade balance. "For the first time in sixty years, Israeli exports will be greater than Israeli imports this year," the prime minister stated yesterday, speaking at the cornerstone ceremony for Intel's new development center in Haifa. "The great dream we always had, that exports would exceed imports, that we will sell more than we buy, is coming true."
For the first time in Israeli history, exports will be some $6 billion greater than imports this year, Olmert said. "I think this is a great achievement for our economy." While the prime minister's words are heartening, it's an open question whether they're also true. Last Sunday, the Central Bureau of Statistics announced that imports of goods in the first ten months of 2006 reached $32.3 billion, while exports reached a much lower $25.1 billion.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791577.html
Jerusalem Post
France okays firing at IAF over Lebanon
By YAAKOV KATZ AND HERB KEINON
Talkbacks for this article: 137
French soldiers in Lebanon who feel threatened by aggressive Israeli overflights are permitted to shoot at IAF fighter jets, a high-ranking French military officer told The Jerusalem Post.
Wednesday, several days after meeting with an IDF general in Paris to discuss what he said was a "blatant violation of the cease-fire."
Last weekend, Maj.-Gen. Ido Nehushtan, head of the IDF Planning Directorate, traveled to Paris and met with military officials to explain why the IAF flies over Lebanon despite the UN-brokered cease-fire.
Nehushtan, new to his post and previously deputy commander of the air force, told his French counterparts that Israel was conducting the flights to collect intelligence on Hizbullah positions in southern Lebanon.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378461109&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Israel refuses to stop overflights
By TOVAH LAZAROFF
Talkbacks for this article: 16
Israel on Saturday refused to heed a renewed request by the United Nations to stop its surveillance flights over Lebanon. Israel insists the flights are necessary to monitor violations of UN resolution 1701 to ensure that there are no armed terror groups in southern Lebanon.
The international community, in turn, is of the opinion that the flights themselves are a violation of UN resolution 1701.
The second Lebanon war: JPost.com special report
"We have made strong protests to the Israelis regarding these violations. We have asked them to cease these actions, which are in violation of 1701," the United Nations spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters on Friday.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378373178&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Olmert, Peretz hold meeting on security
By GIL HOFFMAN AND JPOST STAFF
Talkbacks for this article: 4
As rumors continued to circulate about growing dissatisfaction in Labor's upper echelons with Defense Minister Amir Peretz, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Peretz met in Tel Aviv on Thursday in an effort to solve the nation's security problems.
At the beginning of the meeting, Olmert tried to break the ice and praised Peretz's son who was drafted into the IDF Thursday morning.
"Please tell him good luck and a pleasant service," Olmert said.
At the end of the meeting, the two agreed to meet again in order to repair their damaged relationship, Army Radio reported.
Sources close to both men said Wednesday the meeting would focus on security issues and be attended by other senior security officials. However, a spokesman for Olmert's aide said late on Wednesday night that it was unlikely that they would also use the occasion to agree to put aside their weeklong dispute over Peretz's conversation with Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas behind Olmert's back on Sunday.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378461320&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Analysis: All quiet with Olmert, Peretz
By ANSHEL PFEFFER
Talkbacks for this article: 2
After prolonged combat between the warring parties in which repeated salvoes were fired and heavy casualties were taken on both sides, conciliatory messages were exchanged yesterday. The fighting eased off and it looks like peace talks will take place today.
That's the latest update on the Olmert-Peretz front, which flared up over the last week after the prime minister ordered his defense minister not to negotiate with Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas. By Wednesday it seemed to be settling down to a tense cease-fire; on Thursday, they plan to meet and iron out their differences.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378461304&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Peretz caught in middle of Kassam alert
By JPOST.COM STAFF AND TOVAH LAZAROFF
A Kassam rocket landed near the cemetery in Sderot and another landed in the area surrounding Kibbutz Nir Am, bringing the total of Kassam rockets fired at Israel on Thursday to six.
Four Kassam rockets were fired from northern Gaza earlier in the day. Three rockets landed in open fields in the Western Negev, while the fourth landed near the Gaza security fence. There were no casualties or damage to property in any of the attacks.
IDF planning large scale Gaza operation
How to stop the Kassams
Hamas's military wing, Izzadin al-Kassam claimed responsibility for launching the rockets.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378464126&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Four Islamic Jihad terrorists nabbed
By YAAKOV KATZ, JPOST.COM STAFF AND AP
A joint Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency), IDF and police elite anti-terror unit operation nabbed four Islamic Jihad terrorists wanted for attempting to perpetrate suicide bombings in Israel. The four were arrested overnight Wednesday in the village of Kabatiya, south of Jenin. During the operation, gun battles erupted but no soldiers were wounded.
Ahmad Tlat Nzal, 23, a resident of Kabatiya, was arrested for involvement in shooting attacks against Israeli targets. Said Ali Hatanawi, 27, also a resident of Kabatiya, was taken for attempting to carry out terror attacks inside Israel. Ahmad Yusef Kamil Yalid, 20, resident of Kabatiya, was wanted for his involvement in terror activity. Yalid had previously spent two years in an Israeli prison from 2004-2006. The fourth terrorist, Yasser Zarini Yalid, 41, another resident of Kabatiya, was arrested for involvement in terror activity. He spent time in an Israeli jail nearly a decade ago, between 1984-1989.
An M-16, a Kalashnikov, a homemade weapon, a bulletproof vest and a magazine were confiscated as well.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378463201&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
IDF planning large scale Gaza operations
By YAAKOV KATZ AND HERB KEINON
Talkbacks for this article: 58
The IDF is expected to present the government with a plan in the coming days for a large-scale operation in Gaza, following Wednesday's security cabinet meeting in which precisely such plans were requested.
The security cabinet did not endorse any dramatic decisions to change the IDF modus operandi in Gaza, a message to the public - one government official said - that there is not one "silver bullet" that will put an immediate end to the rocket fire.
The security cabinet meeting was the first meeting between Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Defense Minister Amir Peretz since their relations were badly strained by a telephone conversation Peretz had with Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas on Sunday. Their interaction at the meeting was described as "correct."
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?c=JPArticle&cid=1162378454666&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Analysis: Creating a new Gaza reality
By YAAKOV KATZ
Talkbacks for this article: 5
The Fatah-controlled daily Al-Ayyam ran a front-page article on Tuesday listing what it believed were Israel's military and diplomatic options in the face of escalating Palestinian violence in the Gaza Strip.
Two of the options Israel has already adopted - reinforcing public institutions and schools in Gaza-belt communities as well as making major financial investments in developing an anti-Kassam rocket defense system.
On Tuesday, Deputy Defense Minister Ephraim Sneh said Israel would decide within several weeks which anti-rocket defense system it planned to develop and deploy along the border with the Gaza Strip.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378452552&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
S. African Jewish paper causes storm
By AMIR MIZROCH
Talkbacks for this article: 29
The South African Jewish Report, published weekly in Johannesburg, is engaged in a heated public spat with the country's Jewish minister of intelligence, Ronnie Kasrils, and the South African Freedom of Expression Institute (FXI), over the newspaper's refusal to publish a letter by Kasrils that, the paper's editor says, compares Israel's actions in the Palestinian territories to those of the Nazis during WWII.
The Report last week refused to publish Kasrils's reply to an article that questioned his stance on Israel.
SAJR editor Geoff Sifrin initially approved Kasrils's request to reply to an article by Anthony Posner entitled "Some Pertinent Questions to Kasrils."
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?c=JPArticle&cid=1162378459829&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
continued ...
Three Marines killed fighting in Iraq
By Steven R. Hurst / Associated Press
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Three U.S. Marines were killed fighting in Anbar province, the area of western Iraq where many Sunni-Arab insurgents are based, the military said Thursday.
Assigned to Regimental Combat Team 7, the Marines died Wednesday from wounds sustained during enemy action, the command said.
The names of the deceased were withheld pending notification of relatives.
The deaths raised to at least 2,870 the number of U.S. servicemen who have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.
So far this month in Iraq, 52 American service members have been killed or died.
On Wednesday, at least 101 Iraqis died in the country's unending sectarian slaughter, and the U.N. reported that 3,709 Iraqi civilians were killed in October, the highest monthly toll of the war and one that is sure to be eclipsed when November's dead are counted.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8452
An Employee of American construction company Kellogg, Brown and Root (KBR), paints a turkey, a decoration for the U.S military Thanksgiving Day celebration, Wednesday, Nov. 22, 2006, in the Green Zone area in Baghdad, Iraq . Planning for the holiday began months ago and has called on the KBR food service staff to help mark the celebrations, according to KBR press release.
http://news.search.yahoo.com/news/search?p=kellogg+brown+root&c=news_photos
Reports: Cheney in Iraq for Thanksgiving
By Thomas Wagner / Associated Press
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraqi state television reported Thursday that Vice President Dick Cheney was in Baghdad. Private Al-Arabiya TV broadcast a similar report.
The American Embassy said that it could not confirm the visit, but that Cheney could be in the country to visit troops for the Thanksgiving holiday.
"I'm not confirming or denying he's here. I'm trying to figure that out," said Lt. Col. Christopher Garver, a U.S. military spokesman.
President Bush met with American troops on Thanksgiving three years ago during a visit that was confined to the airport and limited to several hours.
Also on Thursday, U.S. and Iraqi forces swept into Baghdad's Sadr City slum in an early morning raid, killing four Iraqis, wounding eight and detaining five, police said.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8457
Whistling Past Dixie
by Thomas F. Schaller
In Whistling Past Dixie, Tom Schaller issues a transformative challenge to Democrats: Build a winning coalition outside the South.
The South is no longer the "swing" region in American politics -- it has swung to the Republicans. Most of the South is beyond the Democrats' reach, and what remains is moving steadily into the Republican column. The twin effects of race and religion produce a socially conservative, electorally hostile environment for most Democratic candidates.
Spending valuable resources in Southern states is a dangerously self-destructive strategy that could serve to relegate Democrats to minority-party status for a generation. Political attitudes and demographic changes in other parts of the country are far more favorable to Democratic messages and messengers. The Midwest and Southwest are the nation's most competitive regions. There are opportunities to expand Democratic margins in the Mountain red states while consolidating control over the reliably blue northeastern and Pacific coast states. Before dreaming of forty nine state presidential landslides, the Democrats ought to first figure out how to win twenty-nine states. And that means capturing Arizona -- or even Alaska -- before targeting Alabama.
http://www.whistlingpastdixie.com/
Army Signs More Dropouts
Army Uses New Tool to Recruit 5900 ‘Quality’ Dropouts
By Tom Philpott / Military.com
A wartime Army struggling to attract enough “quality” volunteers is enlisting additional thousands of high school dropouts using an experimental screening tool to identify those most likely to complete their enlistments.
The Two Tier Attrition Screen (TTAS) is an added “quality indicator” that officials hope will allow the Army take in many more high school dropouts with greater confidence they won’t drive up attrition rates.
Years of research have shown that high school dropouts are more prone to be discipline problems in service and to be discharged early. The first-term attrition rate for non-graduates typically is 50 percent, almost double that of high school diploma graduates.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8447
Army Debuts New Slogan In Recruiting Commercials
By Ann Scott Tyson / Washington Post
The Army, facing another tough recruiting season, launched a $200 million-a-year advertising campaign this month and unveiled a new slogan: "Army Strong."
The campaign's core message is that the Army builds not only physical but also mental and emotional strength in recruits, bonding them into a powerful, close-knit team.
"There's strong, and then there's Army strong," a deep male voice intones as martial music rises from a brass band in the background.
The television ads, launched nationwide for Veterans Day along with Internet placements and other outreach, omit all but the most fleeting images related to the all-volunteer Army's biggest endeavor ever: the war in Iraq.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8446
Bring the troops home now
By David Ertischek / West Roxbury & Roslindale Transcript
Massachusetts residents made it rather clear this past election through the "Home from Iraq Now" nonbinding resolution - they want to bring our troops home from Iraq.
More than 60 percent of Massachusetts voters in 36 state representative districts voted in favor of the resolution that calls on Congress and the president to end the Iraq War immediately and bring all U.S. military forces home.
Roslindale resident Melida Arredondo, whose stepson, Alex, was killed in Iraq, was a local coordinator to get the resolution on the ballot.
"The polls are very skewed that are out there; they’re usually done by some bipartisan party people," said Arredondo. "This was a very important way to assess what the public sentiment is."
Arredondo said that getting the necessary 250 signatures was easy; going door-to-door wasn’t even necessary. She added that most people liked that the resolution was nonbinding so it could assess the popular sentiment.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8450
U.N.: Iraqi civilian death toll reaches new monthly high
BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Insurgent attacks in Iraq killed 3,709 civilians last month, making October the deadliest month since the war began in 2003, according to U.N. figures.
The U.N. Assistance Mission in Iraq, which issues bimonthly human rights reports on the war-torn country, came out with its findings for September and October on Wednesday.
September had 3,345 civilian deaths -- which, along with October, would bring to 7,054 the number of violent deaths during the two-month period, according to the U.N. tally.
Baghdad alone had no less than 4,985 deaths, "most of them as a result of gunshot wounds," said the U.N. Assistance Mission, using figures provided by the Iraqi Health Ministry.
The figures were slightly higher than in July and August, when 6,599 civilians were killed.
The number of civilian deaths has been rising all year since the February bombing of a Shiite shrine in Samarra, north of Baghdad, with sectarian violence escalating greatly after that attack.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8442
Study Claims Iraq's 'Excess' Death Toll Has Reached 655,000
By David Brown / Washington Post
A team of American and Iraqi epidemiologists estimates that 655,000 more people have died in Iraq since coalition forces arrived in March 2003 than would have died if the invasion had not occurred.
The estimate, produced by interviewing residents during a random sampling of households throughout the country, is far higher than ones produced by other groups, including Iraq's government.
It is more than 20 times the estimate of 30,000 civilian deaths that President Bush gave in a speech in December. It is more than 10 times the estimate of roughly 50,000 civilian deaths made by the British-based Iraq Body Count research group.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8080
Poll: Most Americans Now Say Iraq War Similar to Vietnam Conflict
By E&P Staff / Editor & Publisher
NEW YORK -- Claims by critics of the war in Iraq that this conflict is similar in many ways to the U.S. experience in Vietnam have long been derided by pundits and administrations officials. But a new survey finds that almost 6 in 10 Americans believe that the analogy is accurate.
A poll by Opinion Research Corporation released by CNN finds that 58% of respondents believe the war in Iraq has turned into a situation like the United States faced in Vietnam, up six points since early October.
In another finding, a whopping 63% of Americans now say they oppose the war in Iraq, with only 33% favoring it.
President Bush this week, on a visit to Vietnam, said that the lesson of that war was that the U.S. needs to stay in Iraq and "win" this time.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8443
Doctors Are Reportedly Fleeing Iraq
By Veronika Oleksyn / Associated Press
VIENNA, Austria -- Iraq's top doctors are under threat and are fleeing the country, leaving hospitals in the hands of medical students or junior physicians, an Iraqi lawmaker said Wednesday.
Doctors have been kidnapped and killed since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003 that toppled ex-Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, said Dr. Rajaa al-Khuzai, an obstetrician who is an elected member of the Iraqi National Council.
"They have been targeted since the fall of the regime," she told The Associated Press during a visit to Austria. "Some of them have been kidnapped and found dead in the streets, some have been released after paying a ransom."
She also told reporters earlier Wednesday that Iraqi hospitals face a shortage of medicines and are in dire need of new equipment.
"We were promised, or we believed, that we would have many new hospitals being built, and many health centers ... but none of this has been done," she said. "No hospitals have been built so far; only some of the hospitals have been serviced."
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8451
The New York Times
Anger Boils at Slain Official's Funeral in Lebanon
By MICHAEL SLACKMANBEIRUT, Lebanon, Nov. 23 – Tens of thousands of people poured into Lebanon’s Martyrs Square today, transforming the funeral service of the slain government minister, Pierre Gemayel, into a political rally exposing the hatreds and schisms that have paralyzed the state and threatened an increasing cycle of violence.
From early in the morning, and for hours after, streams of people flowed into the square, chanting slogans cursing the president of Syria, Bashar al Assad, cursing the leader of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, and cursing the Christian leader, General Michel Aoun, who has allied his party with Hezbollah.
It was a time of anger, more than mourning – as Mr. Gemayel’s flag-draped coffin was taken in a procession from his family home in the village of Bikfaya to St. George’s Cathedral in central Beirut 20 miles away.
“Nasrallah,” screamed a small cluster of young men, “the Sunni will dig your grave!”
Mr. Gemayel, who came from one of Lebanon’s most prominent and divisive Christian families, was ambushed and killed Tuesday as he drove his car through a Christian neighborhood on the edge of Beirut. He was 34, married, and the father of two small children. His grandfather and namesake, Pierre Gemayel, founded the Phalange party, a nationalist, religious militant organization once aligned with Israel; his father, Amin, was Lebanon’s president in the 1980’s.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/world/middleeast/23cnd-lebanon.html?hp&ex=1164344400&en=c7a65c2771d609b4&ei=5094&partner=homepage
Civilian Death Toll Reaches New High in Iraq, U.N. Says
By SABRINA TAVERNISEBAGHDAD, Nov. 22 — More Iraqi civilians were killed in October than in any other month since the American invasion in 2003, a report released by the United Nations on Wednesday said, a rise that underscored the growing cost of Iraq’s deepening sectarian war.
According to the report, 3,709 Iraqis were killed in October, up slightly from the previous high in July, and an increase of about 11 percent from the number in September.
The figures, which include totals from the Baghdad morgue and hospitals and morgues across the country, have become a central barometer of the war here and a gauge of the progress of the American military as it tries to bring stability to this exhausted country.
A dangerous trend has surfaced: Sixty-five percent of all deaths in Baghdad were categorized as unidentified corpses, the signature of militias, who kidnap, kill and throw away bodies at a rate that now outstrips the slaughter inflicted by suicide bombers. The report did not offer a breakdown by sect, and it is impossible to tell who is dying in greater numbers.
Indeed, the 52 bodies found by the authorities on Wednesday were far more than the 16 Iraqis reported killed in Baghdad and Baquba, a violent city north of the capital.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/world/middleeast/23iraq.html?hp&ex=1164344400&en=28c07cddeb1c538d&ei=5094&partner=homepage
Macy’s Parade Gets Tighter Weather Control Than Ever
By SEWELL CHANSeven pole-mounted anemometers will transmit minute-by-minute wind measurements to handheld computers. Police and emergency management officials will relay the data to balloon navigators. Aerodynamics engineers and a liaison from the National Weather Service will advise the incident commander, a three-star police chief.
These are among the new measures in place as the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade marches for the 80th time today, amid preparations worthy of a large-scale military operation.
But the precautions may not be enough to keep the giant balloons aloft.
A strong northeaster climbed up the East Coast yesterday, driving a wall of rain and wind before it, with gusts expected at just about the speeds that parade organizers fear the most. As bleak as the weather are the memories: of 1997, when a Cat in the Hat balloon crashed into a lamppost, injuring four people and leaving one of them in a coma, and last year, when an M & M balloon sent the head of a street lamp crashing onto a woman in a wheelchair and her 11-year-old sister.
The poor weather and heightened oversight could ground some or all of the 13 big balloons — 1 fewer than last year — that are set to fly today, starting at 9 a.m. In the best case, they could be flown so low as to practically be floats. In the worst case, as Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg warned, the hapless helium-filled creatures could be pulled onto side streets and summarily deflated.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/nyregion/23parade.html?hp&ex=1164344400&en=a3333eb421838383&ei=5094&partner=homepage
Proof Is Scant on Psychiatric Drug Mix for Young
By GARDINER HARRISTheir rooms are a mess, their trophies line the walls, and both have profiles on MySpace.com. Stephen and Jacob Meszaros seem like typical teenagers until their mother offers a glimpse into the family’s medicine cabinet.
Bottles of psychiatric medications fill the shelves. Stephen, 15, takes the antidepressants Zoloft and Desyrel for depression, the anticonvulsant Lamictal to moderate his moods and the stimulant Focalin XR to improve concentration. Jacob, 14, takes Focalin XR for concentration, the anticonvulsant Depakote to moderate his moods, the antipsychotic Risperdal to reduce anger and the antihypertensive Catapres to induce sleep.
Over the last three years, each boy has been prescribed 28 different psychiatric drugs.
“Sometimes, when you look at all the drugs they’ve taken, you wonder, ‘Wow, did I really do this to my kids?’ ” said their mother, Tricia Kehoe of Sharpsville, Pa. “But I’ve seen them without the meds, and there’s a major difference.”
There is little doubt that some psychiatric medicines, taken by themselves, work well in children. For example, dozens of studies have shown that stimulants improve attentiveness. A handful of other psychiatric drugs have proven effective against childhood obsessive compulsive disorder, among other problems.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/health/23kids.html?oref=login
Fed Chief’s Help Enlisted for Trip to Press China
Wong Maye-E/Associated Press
Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr., left, has invited the Fed chief, Ben S. Bernanke, on his China trip next month. The two have traveled on economic missions before, here at a Group of 7 meeting in Singapore. By STEVEN R. WEISMANPublished: November 23, 2006
WASHINGTON, Nov. 22 — Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. has enlisted Ben S. Bernanke, the Federal Reserve chairman, to join an unusual delegation of cabinet members to China next month that will press for changes in Chinese economic policies long criticized by the administration and Congress, officials said Wednesday.
The trip in mid-December, to be led by Mr. Paulson, a former Goldman Sachs chairman with extensive experience in China, escalates the pressure on the Beijing leadership to crack down on piracy, open up its economy to outside investors and allow the value of the Chinese currency to fluctuate more freely, Treasury officials say.
It also has the effect of putting pressure on the Treasury secretary to get results from the Chinese at a time of mounting pressure from Democrats and Republicans to curb what they view as China’s reliance on exports.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/business/worldbusiness/23trip.html?hp&ex=1164344400&en=5d0160ea6b98852b&ei=5094&partner=homepage
Hastert Scouts for House Role After 8 Years as Speaker
David Scull for The New York TimesJ. Dennis Hastert, the longest-serving Republican speaker, returning to his office this month in the Capitol.
By CARL HULSEPublished: November 23, 2006
WASHINGTON, Nov. 22 — Speaker J. Dennis Hastert made history this year when he became the longest-serving Republican in that post. Now he is about to go into the books again as one of the few House speakers, and the first in almost 50 years, to rejoin the rank and file.
Defying expectations that he would immediately retire if the Republicans lost their majority, Mr. Hastert is preparing to remain in the House for at least the early months of the 110th Congress while he helps orchestrate a line of succession at home in Illinois and seeks to shape a political ending beyond his party’s defeat.
“It is not an ideal situation, but the speaker is a grounded person and is focused on serving another term in Congress,” said Ron Bonjean, a spokesman for Mr. Hastert.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/us/politics/23hastert.html?hp&ex=1164344400&en=f6e982b9d3cc1782&ei=5094&partner=homepage
Turkey Says Won't Walk Away From Talks on Cyprus
By REUTERSFiled at 8:57 a.m. ET
ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Turkey's chief EU negotiator said on Thursday Ankara would not walk away from Finnish-led discussions over Cyprus aimed at avoiding a crisis in Turkey's European Union membership bid.
Ali Babacan's comments follow an announcement by Cyprus's Foreign Minister George Lillikas on Wednesday that he will not attend a Finnish-hosted meeting of EU and Mediterranean foreign ministers next week unless Turkey changes its stance on the divided island.
``The Finnish presidency is exploring some ideas ... we know it is difficult,'' Babacan, who is also economy minister, told a World Economic Forum in Istanbul. ``We will not be the ones walking away from discussions, we are there to talk.''
His comments seemed aimed at letting Cyprus take the blame for any failure in the negotiations. Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul is due to attend the talks in Finland, which holds the rotating EU presidency.
The EU wants Turkey to open its ports to shipping from EU member Cyprus, but Ankara says the bloc must first lift trade restrictions against breakaway Turkish Cypriots it backs in the north of the divided Mediterranean island.
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-turkey-eu-cyprus.html
Hostage Death Raises Stakes in Nigerian Oil Crisis
By REUTERSFiled at 8:54 a.m. ET
ABUJA (Reuters) - The death of a British hostage in Nigeria's oil-producing south in a shootout between kidnappers and troops raises the stakes for oil workers but is unlikely to change much for the industry, security experts said on Thursday.
The Briton, abducted from an offshore facility with six other foreigners early on Wednesday, was killed when the kidnappers ran into a military patrol in the remote creeks of the Niger Delta.
It was unclear who shot him. Two other hostages were wounded, one seriously, in the firefight while the remaining four were released unharmed. All seven worked for Saipem, a unit of Italian oil giant Eni.
Abductions of oil workers are frequent in the lawless delta but hostages are normally released unharmed for a ransom.
The only other known hostage death occurred in August, also during a botched attempt by Nigerian troops to free the captive, a Nigerian employee of Royal Dutch Shell.
OPEC member Nigeria is Africa's top oil exporter and the eighth biggest in the world, but its roughly 2.4 million barrels per day (bpd) are pumped from the Niger Delta, where poverty and lawlessness fuel militancy and crime.
``In future, if we had people taken I would be talking to the government security forces to make sure that they don't try and rescue them,'' said an expert who coordinates security for one of the major Western oil companies operating in the delta.
``Oil workers are obviously going to be more concerned for themselves. But will this affect production or the way we do business? I would say probably not,'' he said.
FREQUENT KIDNAPPINGS
Eni said the Italian hostage who was seriously wounded in Wednesday's shootout would be flown home on Thursday to be treated at an Italian hospital. It said the man's condition was improving although he remained ``under close observation.''
The company said the body of the British hostage would be moved on Thursday from the creeks to Port Harcourt, the Niger Delta's main city.
Kidnappings have been a problem in the delta for years but 2006 has been particularly bad, with dozens of foreigners taken.
Usually, after a few days or at most a few weeks in the remote mangrove creeks of the delta, the hostages are released unharmed after the payment of ransoms.
Abductions are just one aspect of violence that has plagued the Niger Delta for years.
Many villagers in the poor, impenetrable wetlands region resent the oil industry for generating huge revenues for the faraway government and foreign oil firms while they have no power, no roads, no clean water and few schools or clinics.
This state of affairs has spawned a generation of angry youths eager to take up arms to press demands for development, or more often to make money.
Kidnappings for ransom, theft of crude oil and thuggery sponsored by politicians are all commonplace.
Systemic corruption among government officials and security forces and a complete breakdown of law and order in a region almost the size of England have also contributed to the deteriorating security situation in the delta.
Nigeria has cut oil output by a fifth since February, when militants fighting for local control of the oil wealth staged a series of attacks on pipelines, platforms and export terminals.
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-nigeria-hostages.html
White House Denies Cheney Is in Iraq
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESSFiled at 8:53 a.m. ET
BAGDHAD, Iraq (AP) -- The White House denied Iraqi television reports that U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney made an unannounced visit to Baghdad on Thursday.
David Almacy, a White House spokesman in Washington, said Cheney was not in Iraq and that his only currently planned travel to the region is the previously announced trip he will make to Saudi Arabia on Friday to meeting the next day with King Abdullah to discuss developments in the Middle East, including Iraq.
State-run Iraqiya TV and the private Al-Arabiya TV station reported that Cheney had arrived in the Iraqi capital on Thursday morning, apparently to visit American troops for the Thanksgiving holiday.
But U.S. Embassy and U.S. military officials in Baghdad couldn't confirm that, and it became clear later that the reports were erroneous.
For security reasons, previous visits to Iraq by U.S. President George W. Bush, Cheney and other high administration officials have not been made public in advance, but have been disclosed immediately upon their arrival -- regardless of whether they were accompanied by reporters or traveling without a press contingent.
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Iraq-Cheney.html
2 Killed, 10 Injured in India Bombing
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESSFiled at 8:57 a.m. ET
GAUHATI, India (AP) -- A bomb exploded Thursday near a train station in India's northeast, killing two people and injuring 10, police said.
The explosion occurred at a stand for auto-rickshaw taxis outside the train station of Gauhati, the capital of the insurgency-ridden state of Assam, said T. Rabha, a railway spokesman.
Assam's police chief, D.N. Dutt, said at least two people died on the scene and 10 others were injured.
Auto-rickshaws are three-wheeled, open-sided motor vehicles commonly used to transport passengers in India.
The bomb went off shortly before the Rajdhani Express from New Delhi to Gauhati was to enter the station, Rabha said.
Police said initial suspicion pointed to the United Liberation Front of Asom, or ULFA -- a separatist group that often targets government offices and public places.
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-India-Explosion.html
Weighing America’s Options in Iraq (6 Letters)
Published: November 23, 2006To the Editor:
Re “Lost in the Desert” (column, Nov. 22):
Maureen Dowd reports on the hand-wringing among the political elite over what to do in Iraq. Might I suggest a simple solution: democracy.
According to polls, some 70 percent of the Iraqi people want the United States troops to withdraw completely and as fast as possible. That should be reason enough for the United States to leave at once.
On top of that, the midterm election results suggest that a substantial majority of the American people want the same, and that is also backed up by polling data.
In the face of this sentiment, it is amazing that since the election, the elite — Democrats, Republicans and pundocrats — are talking more and more about sending additional troops.
Have we no democracy left?
John V. WalshShrewsbury, Mass., Nov. 22, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/opinion/l23iraq.html
Panel Calls for Big Changes in Medicaid
By ROBERT PEARWASHINGTON, Nov. 22 — A federal advisory panel says that long-term care for aging baby boomers threatens to bankrupt Medicaid, and it recommends sweeping changes to rein in costs, including greater use of managed care for the sickest Medicaid recipients.
The proposals set up a likely clash between the new Democratic Congress and the Bush administration, which has sent strong signals that it will seek big savings in Medicaid next year.
Panel members adopted the recommendations last week, by a vote of 11 to 1, and are drafting a report to be submitted next month to Michael O. Leavitt, the secretary of health and human services. Mr. Leavitt created the panel in May 2005 and is receptive to many of its proposals.
The panel, known as the Medicaid Commission, said states should have more freedom to alter benefits and eligibility for the program, which serves more than 50 million low-income people.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/washington/23medicaid.html
Aging Craft Orbiting Mars Appears to Have Succumbed
By JOHN NOBLE WILFORDIn words and somber tones usually associated with a death in the family, engineers and scientists said yesterday that the Mars Global Surveyor, the most durable spacecraft ever to orbit that planet, had fallen silent and was given little chance of revival.
The 10-year-old spacecraft — which mapped the Martian surface, recorded seasonal and annual climate changes, and gathered evidence of water in the planet’s past — has not communicated with flight controllers since Nov. 2. A disabled solar power array is the prime suspect.
“We may have lost a dear old friend and teacher,” said Michael Meyer, chief scientist for Mars exploration at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Dr. Meyer spoke at a news teleconference from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., where the mission is being directed.
Fuk K. Li, the laboratory’s Mars program manager, said the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, the newest spacecraft to explore the planet, drew blanks in several attempts on Friday and Monday to make a photographic inspection of the Global Surveyor. Given that failure, mission officials said yesterday that they had exhausted the most likely means of re-establishing radio communications.
The two spacecraft regularly passed within 60 miles of each other. But in the last three weeks, ground antennas have not been able to track the Global Surveyor’s orbit to fix its probable position, which could have been altered by the malfunction.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/22/science/space/22mars.html
Erasing Divide, College Leaders Take to Blogging
Andrew Councill for The New York TimesPatricia A. McGuire, the president of Trinity University in Washington, D.C., uses her blog to talk about issues of the day, like same-sex unions.
By DIANA JEAN SCHEMO
Published: November 22, 2006WASHINGTON, Nov. 21 — Thanks to an e-mail message from “trinity gurl,” an anonymous cybersnoop, Patricia A. McGuire, the president of Trinity University here, suddenly faced a digital-age dilemma.
The e-mail message turned in another student for using profanity on her personal Web page, which linked to Trinity’s Web site. Nothing scandalous, but Dr. McGuire was more troubled, she said, that “trinity gurl” had snitched in secrecy.
So Dr. McGuire reached for a particularly apt solution in the age of the blogosphere: She censured the eager informant on her own blog, comparing the e-mailer to Big Brother and asking, “Who is ‘trinity gurl’ and why is she sending me this kind of information about something a student is posting online?”
While some colleges and their presidents have seen their reputations shredded on student blogs, and others have tried to limit what students and faculty members may say online, about a dozen or so presidents, like Dr. McGuire, are vaulting the digital and generational divide and starting their own blogs.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/22/education/22blogs.html
Of Rubber and Blood in Brazilian Amazon
By LARRY ROHTERRIO BRANCO, Brazil — Alcidino dos Santos was on his way to the market to buy vegetables for his mother one morning in 1942 when an army officer stopped him and told him he was being drafted as a “rubber soldier.” Men were needed in the Amazon, 3,000 miles away, to harvest rubber for the Allied war effort, he was told, and it was his patriotic duty to serve.
Mr. dos Santos, then a 19-year-old mason’s assistant, protested that his mother was a widow who depended on him for support, but to no avail. He would be paid a wage of 50 cents a day, he recalls being told, and receive free transportation home once the conflict was over, but he had to go, that day.
More than 60 years after the end of World War II, Mr. dos Santos and hundreds of other poor Brazilians who were dragooned into service as rubber soldiers are still in the Amazon, waiting for those promises to be fulfilled. Elderly and frail, they are fighting against time and indifference to gain the recognition and compensation they believe should be theirs.
“We were duped, and then abandoned and forgotten,” Mr. dos Santos, who never saw his mother again, said in an interview at his simple wood house here in Acre, a state in the far west of the Brazilian Amazon that has the largest concentration of former rubber soldiers.
“We were brought here against our will,” he said, “and thrown into the jungle, where we suffered terribly. I’m near the end of my life, but my country should do right by me.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/world/americas/23brazil.html
Finding Bliss in Avalanche Country, British Columbia
Bonny Makarowicz for The New York TimesFirst light at Rogers Pass.
By MARK SUNDEEN
Published: November 19, 2006"ARE you skiers?” asked the desk clerk at the Best Western. When we said yes, she explained that they had certain rules: no skis in the rooms, no beer bottles in the pool area, no bare feet anywhere in the hotel. Lastly, and this one she stressed with the weariness particular to a service employee required to enforce such a rule: lastly, there will be no cooking in the rooms.
36 Hours: Whistler My friend Jason Munzke and I had come a long way for this, a couple hundred miles up Highway 95 from Idaho to Rogers Pass in Glacier National Park in British Columbia, looking for what some call the best backcountry ski terrain in North America. “Anything past Kicking Horse, that’s new territory for me,” said Munzke as we sped toward the Kicking Horse Mountain Resort.
We climbed the big valleys of the Canadian Rockies, steep white peaks rising up on either side and creamy puffs of smoke drifting up from the pulp mill at Skookumchuck.
Munzke (which rhymes with fun ski and is what everyone calls him) lives with his dog in a doublewide on an unnamed dirt road in northern Idaho, a part of the world that is home to back-to-the-landers, libertarians and militiamen. Munzke is none of those things: he’s a backcountry skier.
A fellow of Norwegian descent with a toothy smile, he has a dangerous combination of lifelong mountaineering skills and a masters in psychology (he’s a clinical therapist at a high school). You’ve heard of those wilderness programs for youths so wayward that a staff member must come to your door to haul bodily the little hell-raiser out to the woods. Well, that guy at the door: that’s Munzke.
http://travel2.nytimes.com/2006/11/19/travel/19rogerspass.html?ref=travel
A Growing Plea for Mercy for the Mentally Ill on Death Row
Michael Stravato for The New York TimesScott Louis Panetti, who shot his in-laws in 1992, during an interview from a Texas prison. “The devil has been trying to rub me out,” he said.
By RALPH BLUMENTHALPublished: November 23, 2006LIVINGSTON, Tex. — Scott Louis Panetti says he was drowned and electrocuted as a child and that he was recently stabbed in the eye in his death row cell by the devil. Mr. Panetti says he has wounds that were inflicted by demons and healed by President John F. Kennedy.
“The devil has been trying to rub me out to keep me from preaching,” Mr. Panetti, explaining why he faces execution, said in an interview from behind thick glass in the Polunsky Unit here in East Texas, where condemned prisoners are held before transfer to the death house 45 miles west in Huntsville.
Despite Mr. Panetti’s obvious mental illness — he was a mental patient long before he gunned down his in-laws in 1992 — he served as his own lawyer at his murder trial, throwing the courtroom into chaos with frequent gibberish. Now the hyperactive and gangling Mr. Panetti, 48, has become an illustration of the growing quandary over the application of a 1986 Supreme Court decision barring execution of the insane.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/us/23execute.html
State of the ArtFree Services to Inspire Your Cellphone
By DAVID POGUEThanksgiving, is it? Well, despite occasional headaches, technology has also brought us plenty to be thankful for: safety, convenience and entertainment on the go. Next time you’re running late, lost or lonely, ask yourself: aren’t you grateful for your cellphone?
Actually, don’t answer yet. With every passing month, cellphones are becoming even more useful. Sure, it’s nice that they let you call people from the road. But lately, their reach has grown, thanks to clever programmers making links between the cellular world and the Internet.
Here, for your gratitude-generating pleasure, is a rundown of some of the most exciting and powerful services awaiting your cellphone at this very moment. Better yet, at the moment, they’re all free.
FREE DIRECTORY ASSISTANCE By this time, it’s quite clear that nobody with a “$50 a month” calling plan actually pays only $50 a month. The cellphone companies will do anything to puff up your bill — like charging you $1.50 or $2 every time you dial 411 to find a phone number.
Try 800-FREE-411 (800-373-3411) instead. A computer or human being looks up a number for you at no charge, once you’ve listened to a 20-second ad. It’s a classic time-for-money swap.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/technology/23pogue.html
A Cinematic View of Italy as Morally Bankrupt
By ELISABETTA POVOLEDOMILAN, Nov. 20 — The lunchtime patter of a group of businessmen during the first few frames of “A Casa Nostra” (“In Our House”) neatly encapsulates the mindset of Italian capitalism as envisioned by the director Francesca Comencini. The men chat about food, soccer, insider trading.
The scene sets the tone. “A Casa Nostra” is essentially a film about money, about what it can buy and what people will do to get their hands on it (out of necessity or greed), whether it is selling their bodies, their possessions or their souls.
It is also about Italy today as the director sees it, a cinematic final curtain on the capitalist myth and this country’s transmutation from postwar prosperity to the widespread venality she says has taken root in the national soul.
The indictment, though harsh, takes no sides. “It’s a political film, but not an ideological one,” Ms. Comencini said during an interview in Rome, where she lives. “Today money is at the heart of contemporary Italian culture, and people think that’s normal.”
“But with that comes an inexorable barbarization of everyday life,” she added, and the loss of values that “may be difficult to recover once they’re gone.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/movies/23casa.html
Study Questions Need to Operate on Disk Injuries
Ethan Kaplan for The New York TimesDr. Eugene J. Carragee of Stanford called the risk of waiting with sciatica “if not extraordinarily small, at least off the radar screen.”
By GINA KOLATAPublished: November 22, 2006People with ruptured disks in their lower backs usually recover whether or not they have surgery, researchers are reporting today. The study, a large trial, found that surgery appeared to relieve pain more quickly but that most people recovered eventually and that there was no harm in waiting.And that, surgeons said, is likely to change medical practice.
The study, published in The Journal of the American Medical Association, is the only large and well-designed trial to compare surgery for sciatica with waiting.
The study was controversial from the start, with many surgeons saying they knew that the operation worked and that it would be unethical for their patients to participate in such a study.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/22/health/22spine.html?em&ex=1164430800&en=eaca068467097d45&ei=5087%0A\
Beyoncé Bounces Back: Film, Album and Warning
By KELEFA SANNEHIf you go down to your local record shop today and buy a copy of the recent Beyoncé album, “B’Day” (Sony Urban/Columbia), you might notice a sticker on the cover, advertising the contents. “Includes ‘Deja Vu’ featuring Jay-Z,” it says. Also: “Ring the Alarm.” And: “Bonus Track: ‘Listen.’ ”
There is no indication that the album includes one of the year’s best (and maybe biggest) pop songs. No warning that, after listening to Track 9, you may find a silly little catchphrase — “To the left, to the left” — lodged in your brain. In other words, there is no mention of a fast-rising hit called “Irreplaceable,” which might just be the greatest ... well, let’s not get carried away. But let’s acknowledge that this is precisely the kind of song that makes it easy to get carried away.
The outdated sticker is proof that a lot has changed since September, when Beyoncé’s second album was released, a day after her 25th birthday. It would be an overstatement to say that the success of “Irreplaceable” marks a comeback for Beyoncé. But certainly this fall has a been a weird, scary season for this singer and for her fans. We always knew she would score another era-defining hit. But we couldn’t have guessed she would do it like this.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/arts/music/23sann.html
Haaretz
Tens of thousands turn out to pay tribute to slain Lebanese minister
By Jonathan Lis, Haaretz Correspondent and Reuters At least 200,000 Lebanese poured into central Beirut to pay tribute to murdered Christian leader Pierre Gemayel on Thursday, turning his funeral into a show of strength against Syria and its Hezbollah allies.
The funeral in the St George Maronite Cathedral in the capital was attended by Lebanese Druze leader Walid Jumblatt and Arab League chief Amr Moussa. Television footage showed mourners weeping openly during the service.
Sunni Muslim, Druze and Christian leaders have accused Syria of killing Gemayel, scion of one of Lebanon's most prominent Maronite families. Damascus has condemned the assassination.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791854.html
Shin Bet opposes targeted killings of Palestinian politicians
By Aluf Benn and Avi Issacharoff, Haaretz Correspondents The Shin Bet security service opposes targeted killings of Palestinian politicians, Shin Bet chief Yuval Diskin told the security cabinet Wednesday.
The cabinet, which was discussing Israel's response to the ongoing Qassam rocket fire from the Gaza Strip, adopted Diskin's recommendation and decided against targeting politicians. However, it approved another controversial proposal: targeting Hamas institutions in the Gaza Strip.
During a discussion of the use of targeted killings to combat Qassam launches, defense officials explained there were three types of targets, and different instructions for dealing with each.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791587.html
IDF troops kill two Palestinian militants in northern Gaza
By Nir Hasson, Haaretz Correspondent, Haaretz Service and Agencies Israel Defense Forces troops killed two Palestinian militants Thursday morning during raids in the northern Gaza Strip.
Also Thursday, and IDF soldier was lightly wounded by an anti-tank missile in the northern Gaza town of Beit Hanun.
Both militants were killed near the northern Gaza town of Beit Lahia, in separate incidents. Islamic Jihad militant Jamal Al-Nidr, 22, was killed by an IDF sniper early Wednesday afternoon. The other militant, a 20-year-old member of Hamas, was killed by fire from an IDF tank unit Wednesday morning. Another militant was wounded in the clashes.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791871.html
IAEA indefinitely freezes Iran nuclear aid over plutonium risk
By Reuters VIENNA - The United Nations nuclear watchdog's board of governors Thursday indefinitely blocked an Iranian bid for technical aid for a reactor project due to fears it could yield bomb-grade plutonium, a diplomat in the meeting said.
But the decision, which the International Atomic Energy Agency's board adopted by consensus after days of wrangling between industrialized and developing nations, left open the possibility of revisiting Iran's request in future.
In a compromise hammered out in negotiations ahead of the board meeting, Iranian requests for IAEA technical assistance on seven other nuclear energy projects judged not to pose a risk of being diverted to bomb-making were approved by the governors.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791971.html
Hamas political chief Khaled Meshal arrives in Cairo for talks on Shalit
By Avi Issacharoff, Haaretz Correspondent, Haaretz Service and Reuters Damascus-based Hamas political chief Khaled Meshal arrived in Cairo on Thursday for talks on a prisoner exchange deal involving captured Israel Defense Forces soldier Gilad Shalit.
The delegation consists of several senior Damascus-based Hamas leaders, including the director of Hamas' Damascus offices, Immad al-Alami, and Mohammed Nassar, a member of the group's political bureau.
The Hamas officials are expected to hold meetings with senior Egyptian officials, including Egyptian intelligence chief OmarSuleiman.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791532.html
Palestinian sources: Saudis have severed ties with Hamas
By Avi Issacharoff Palestinian sources have claimed that Saudi Arabia has severed relations with Hamas in recent weeks, and the Saudi government is consequently refusing to meet with senior Hamas officials. Palestinian Foreign Minister Mahmoud a-Zahar, who visited the kingdom recently, did not meet with a single senior Saudi official during his stay, sources said.
Meanwhile, Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas has reached an agreement with Hamas on a diplomatic platform for a Palestinian unity government, Abbas said in a interview with the London-based paper Al-Hayat yesterday. What remains to be resolved, he said, are the issues of a cease-fire and a prisoner exchange for kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit.
Senior Hamas officials have said recently they would be willing to declare a temporary cease-fire with Israel. But an associate of Abbas said that Hamas has thus far only agreed to stop the Qassam rocket fire at Israel from Gaza: It has not agreed to a complete cease-fire that would also halt attacks in the West Bank and suicide bombings inside Israel.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791545.html
Bush's upcoming Mideast visit won't include Olmert, Abbas talks
By Aluf Benn, Haaretz Correspondent The White House has announced that George W. Bush is set to arrive in Jordan next week, but his itinerary will not include talks with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert or Palestinian Authority Chiarman Mahmoud Abbas.
According to the American announcement, the U.S. president will be minutes away from Jerusalem, by plane, and will not drop by. He did not even invite Olmert or Abbas for a meeting in Jordan, either together or apart from each other.
This decision is much more important than yet another clash between Israelis and Palestinians, or among Israelis themselves. The official purpose of Bush's visit to the region is a meeting with the prime minister of Iraq, Nuri al-Maliki. The American administration would like "to expedite the transfer of security responsibility in Iraq to the local government," a code for the commencement of an American disengagement from the Bush military adventure in the Middle East.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791844.html
Czech Republic extradites two alleged woman traffickers to Israel
By Jonathan Lis The Czech Republic on Thursday extradited two Jewish men of Russian origin to Israel on charges of trafficking women. Two Israeli men suspected of involvement in the affair were also arrested.
The four are suspected of trafficking women, pimping, unlawful imprisonment and battery. At least one of the men is also suspected of rape. Remand hearings for all four suspects will take place at the Petah Tikva Magistrate's Court on Thursday afternoon.
The investigation into the affair began in February, after an organization dedicated to fighting woman trafficking discovered that two young women that were being held by the Immigration Police were in fact victims of a trafficking ring. 0The two women had illegally entered Israel via Egypt at the behest of the two Russian suspects. They had subsequently been forced to engage in prostitution in a Haifa brothel run by the two Israeli suspects.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791980.html
Qassam attacks / No solution to rockets
By Ze'ev Schiff Israel wasted many years in fruitless debate over a technological solution to the problem posed by the Qassam rockets fired against Sderot and the western Negev. It is best not to delude the citizens of Israel with false promises: Even if a miracle does take place and a decision on the appropriate technological solution is made, it would be two to three years before emergence of the first results.
The Qassam problem has been characterized to date by a great deal of talk and false promises. A variety of committees were set up -- even an intraservice team of various experts -- and funds wasted, without any serious solution appearing on the horizon. At one point, the debate centered around the question of whether efforts should concentrate on developing a laser gun that could intercept Katyusha and Qassam rockets, or on building missiles capable of countering rockets and missiles. Israel invested in the development of the Nautilus (a weapons system) in cooperation with the United States; a few successful interception tests took place and the development was stopped. Among other reasons, the Americans argued that one of the Israeli firms participating in the project was suspected of trying to acquire secret technologies and was asked to leave the project.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791550.html
Nun and priest act as human shields against IDF bombing
By The Associated Press An American priest and nun spent several hours yesterday at a Palestinian militant's home that Israel has targeted for destruction, the first foreigners to join a weeklong standoff between Palestinian "human shields" and the Israel Air Force.
Father Peter Dougherty, 65, and Sister Mary Ellen Gundeck, 55, Michigan-based peace activists, said they were sent by God to help protect the Palestinians. The pair arrived yesterday morning at the family home of Mohammed Baroud, a militant involved in rocket attacks on Israel, and stayed for several hours. After sundown, Dougherty said they had left the house.
For the past week, Palestinian militants and civilians have crowded into five militants' houses, to bodily thwart Israeli threats to hit them with missiles. The use of human shields is a new tactic in the Palestinians' war against Israel's military.
Since militants kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit in June, the IAF has destroyed the homes of at least 73 militants, usually after calling and warning residents to evacuate.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791547.html
Olmert: Take Iran threats seriously; Iraq war good for Israel
By Agencies Prime Minister Ehud Olmert appealed to the world yesterday to take seriously the threats posed by Iran's nuclear program and declarations by Iranian leaders that Israel must be wiped off the map.
Speaking to a convention of the Orthodox Union, an American Jewish group, Olmert said the physical threat posed by Iranian nuclear weapons was no less dangerous than what he called the "moral aspect," calls by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for Israel's destruction, which he compared to Nazi Germany. "We heard the voices in the past of leaders of nations that were talking about the liquidation of the Jewish people," Olmert said. "We can't afford ... to listen and not to react."
"We can't allow anyone in any place in the world to continue their routine without responding," Olmert said.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791548.html
Poll: More than half of Israelis support Syria talks
By Yoav Stern More than half of Israelis would like to see Israel engage in negotiations with Syria, but are unprepared to withdraw from the Golan Heights as a price for peace, according to the results of a Market Watch poll released yesterday.
Fifty-seven percent of 499 respondents said they supported negotiations, while 54 percent said they could not agree to a Golan withdrawal. Fifty-nine percent said they feared another war would break out in the North unless talks were held.
Some 70 percent of respondents agree with the charges that Israel cannot handle holding negotiations with both Syria and the Palestinians at the same time. Meanwhile, 58 percent said they would prefer Israel begin talks with Palestinians before moving on to the Syrian front.
Syrian President Bashar Assad has called on Israel numerous times to renew negotiations, but has simultaneously hinted that Syria would be willing to take military steps if talks did not succeed. Syria seeks the return of the Golan Heights, which has been occupied by Israel since 1967. But peace talks between the two countries broke down in 2000.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791546.html
German museums press government to tighten requirements for restitution of art looted by Nazis
By Assaf Uni BERLIN - The German government is facing demands to toughen criteria for restitution to Jewish heirs of works of art looted by the Nazis. A number of museums from around the country have recently seen their most famous masterpieces returned to Jewish heirs and then quickly auctioned off to private collectors for tremendous sums. German culture minister Bernd Neumann held an urgent meeting earlier this week with museum directors to discuss their demands that claimants be held to a higher burden of proof in establishing Jewish ownership of art.
For years, German museums refused to return paintings to Jews, despite the fact that many had come from methodical looting. Under the Nazi regime, in addition to the looting, many Jewish families were forced to sell valuable art collections for bargain-basement prices to survive. An estimated 100,000 paintings worldwide still have not been returned to rightful Jewish owners.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791549.html
First eruv approved for southern California
By Shlomo Shamir NEW YORK ?Southern California coastal authorities have decided to allow a beachfront eruv - a boundary that makes it possible for observant Jews to carry objects on Shabbat - to be built in the state for the first time. The eruv will surround sections of Santa Monica, Los Angeles and Marina del Rey.
Orthodox rabbis and activists in southern California said they were pleased by Tuesday's decision. "It's a relief, and it's very exciting for us," Rabbi Ben Geiger, of the Pacific Jewish Center in Venice, California, was quoted as saying. Geiger was among those who led the efforts to get approval for the eruv.
Geiger told Haaretz that he hopes more people will pray at his synagogue now that Orthodox parents will be able to carry their children out of the house or push them in a stroller on Shabbat. He said the eruv will also mean that an 8-year-old girl in the community who uses a wheelchair will finally be able to attend services. The eruv transforms a "public" area into a "private" one, making it permissible to carry objects or push carriages or wheelchairs within the boundary.
Local authorities were in no rush to grant permission for the eruv, saying that the coast is a protected area for birds, who could get hurt if they fly into the eruv wire. The solution reached is that the Pacific Jewish Center will be able to set up the eruv for a three-year period, on condition that it affixes material to it that will make the birds aware of the wire, so that they can circumvent it.
Ernst & Young: Israel falls way short of tourism potential By Irit Rosenblum and Zohar Blumenkrantz Tourism to Israel could be doubled within five years, and reach 2-5 million tourists in 2011 - according to a report by Ernst & Young which the international consulting firm presented yesterday at a press conference. The report recommends revolutionizing Israel's management of tourism investment. The main points include substantial investment in marketing; establishment of a tourism investment committee to supervise investments in the sector by grants; and incentives and partnerships with the private sector.
The report was contracted by the Tourism and Finance ministries. Finance Minister Isaac Herzog said he planned to present the consolidated plan to the Socio-Economic Cabinet. "For the first time we have before us a real, overall working plan for the tourism sector," he declared. According to the report, Israel's greatest market potential lies in the United States, Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Sweden, Russia and China, which total about 18 million tourists - but only 6.6 percent of this number currently reaches the country.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791576.html
Abandoning the ivory tower
By Noam Ben Ze'ev Exclusively for the upper crust - until now, that was the feeling one got at the Jerusalem Music Center. Just descending the stairs in the picturesque Mishkenot Sha'ananim neighborhood emphasized the JMC's unique quality. One entered the hushed lobby to find a recording studio blessed with the last word in technology, designed for the use of a few dozen artists and a few on-site concerts. This clearly appeared to be an elitist institution that served the very few musicians at the peak of the talent pyramid.
But no longer. The JMC staff is signaling a shift in direction, and one can see proof of this Saturday night (8:30 P.M.), when the Jerusalem Quartet takes center stage. For the first time, JMC musicians will abandon the safety of their lofty haven and descend to the level of the man in the street, at the nearby YMCA auditorium. There, for a reasonable price, they will perform their superb New Chamber Concert Series, entitled "YMCAMERI" in honor of the venue.
They have retained their quality and content, and audiences will be treated to big names like Andreas Scholl, who is singing Vivaldi's "Stabat Mater"; clarinetist Antony Pay and the Aviv Quartet, who are playing Mozart; and other engaging, international ensembles and soloists.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791585.html
Olmert predicts unprecedented trade surplus of $6 billion
By Tal Levy Ehud Olmert is certainly optimistic about Israel's trade balance. "For the first time in sixty years, Israeli exports will be greater than Israeli imports this year," the prime minister stated yesterday, speaking at the cornerstone ceremony for Intel's new development center in Haifa. "The great dream we always had, that exports would exceed imports, that we will sell more than we buy, is coming true."
For the first time in Israeli history, exports will be some $6 billion greater than imports this year, Olmert said. "I think this is a great achievement for our economy." While the prime minister's words are heartening, it's an open question whether they're also true. Last Sunday, the Central Bureau of Statistics announced that imports of goods in the first ten months of 2006 reached $32.3 billion, while exports reached a much lower $25.1 billion.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/791577.html
Jerusalem Post
France okays firing at IAF over Lebanon
By YAAKOV KATZ AND HERB KEINON
Talkbacks for this article: 137
French soldiers in Lebanon who feel threatened by aggressive Israeli overflights are permitted to shoot at IAF fighter jets, a high-ranking French military officer told The Jerusalem Post.
Wednesday, several days after meeting with an IDF general in Paris to discuss what he said was a "blatant violation of the cease-fire."
Last weekend, Maj.-Gen. Ido Nehushtan, head of the IDF Planning Directorate, traveled to Paris and met with military officials to explain why the IAF flies over Lebanon despite the UN-brokered cease-fire.
Nehushtan, new to his post and previously deputy commander of the air force, told his French counterparts that Israel was conducting the flights to collect intelligence on Hizbullah positions in southern Lebanon.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378461109&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Israel refuses to stop overflights
By TOVAH LAZAROFF
Talkbacks for this article: 16
Israel on Saturday refused to heed a renewed request by the United Nations to stop its surveillance flights over Lebanon. Israel insists the flights are necessary to monitor violations of UN resolution 1701 to ensure that there are no armed terror groups in southern Lebanon.
The international community, in turn, is of the opinion that the flights themselves are a violation of UN resolution 1701.
The second Lebanon war: JPost.com special report
"We have made strong protests to the Israelis regarding these violations. We have asked them to cease these actions, which are in violation of 1701," the United Nations spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters on Friday.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378373178&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Olmert, Peretz hold meeting on security
By GIL HOFFMAN AND JPOST STAFF
Talkbacks for this article: 4
As rumors continued to circulate about growing dissatisfaction in Labor's upper echelons with Defense Minister Amir Peretz, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Peretz met in Tel Aviv on Thursday in an effort to solve the nation's security problems.
At the beginning of the meeting, Olmert tried to break the ice and praised Peretz's son who was drafted into the IDF Thursday morning.
"Please tell him good luck and a pleasant service," Olmert said.
At the end of the meeting, the two agreed to meet again in order to repair their damaged relationship, Army Radio reported.
Sources close to both men said Wednesday the meeting would focus on security issues and be attended by other senior security officials. However, a spokesman for Olmert's aide said late on Wednesday night that it was unlikely that they would also use the occasion to agree to put aside their weeklong dispute over Peretz's conversation with Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas behind Olmert's back on Sunday.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378461320&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Analysis: All quiet with Olmert, Peretz
By ANSHEL PFEFFER
Talkbacks for this article: 2
After prolonged combat between the warring parties in which repeated salvoes were fired and heavy casualties were taken on both sides, conciliatory messages were exchanged yesterday. The fighting eased off and it looks like peace talks will take place today.
That's the latest update on the Olmert-Peretz front, which flared up over the last week after the prime minister ordered his defense minister not to negotiate with Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas. By Wednesday it seemed to be settling down to a tense cease-fire; on Thursday, they plan to meet and iron out their differences.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378461304&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Peretz caught in middle of Kassam alert
By JPOST.COM STAFF AND TOVAH LAZAROFF
A Kassam rocket landed near the cemetery in Sderot and another landed in the area surrounding Kibbutz Nir Am, bringing the total of Kassam rockets fired at Israel on Thursday to six.
Four Kassam rockets were fired from northern Gaza earlier in the day. Three rockets landed in open fields in the Western Negev, while the fourth landed near the Gaza security fence. There were no casualties or damage to property in any of the attacks.
IDF planning large scale Gaza operation
How to stop the Kassams
Hamas's military wing, Izzadin al-Kassam claimed responsibility for launching the rockets.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378464126&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Four Islamic Jihad terrorists nabbed
By YAAKOV KATZ, JPOST.COM STAFF AND AP
A joint Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency), IDF and police elite anti-terror unit operation nabbed four Islamic Jihad terrorists wanted for attempting to perpetrate suicide bombings in Israel. The four were arrested overnight Wednesday in the village of Kabatiya, south of Jenin. During the operation, gun battles erupted but no soldiers were wounded.
Ahmad Tlat Nzal, 23, a resident of Kabatiya, was arrested for involvement in shooting attacks against Israeli targets. Said Ali Hatanawi, 27, also a resident of Kabatiya, was taken for attempting to carry out terror attacks inside Israel. Ahmad Yusef Kamil Yalid, 20, resident of Kabatiya, was wanted for his involvement in terror activity. Yalid had previously spent two years in an Israeli prison from 2004-2006. The fourth terrorist, Yasser Zarini Yalid, 41, another resident of Kabatiya, was arrested for involvement in terror activity. He spent time in an Israeli jail nearly a decade ago, between 1984-1989.
An M-16, a Kalashnikov, a homemade weapon, a bulletproof vest and a magazine were confiscated as well.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378463201&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
IDF planning large scale Gaza operations
By YAAKOV KATZ AND HERB KEINON
Talkbacks for this article: 58
The IDF is expected to present the government with a plan in the coming days for a large-scale operation in Gaza, following Wednesday's security cabinet meeting in which precisely such plans were requested.
The security cabinet did not endorse any dramatic decisions to change the IDF modus operandi in Gaza, a message to the public - one government official said - that there is not one "silver bullet" that will put an immediate end to the rocket fire.
The security cabinet meeting was the first meeting between Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Defense Minister Amir Peretz since their relations were badly strained by a telephone conversation Peretz had with Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas on Sunday. Their interaction at the meeting was described as "correct."
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?c=JPArticle&cid=1162378454666&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Analysis: Creating a new Gaza reality
By YAAKOV KATZ
Talkbacks for this article: 5
The Fatah-controlled daily Al-Ayyam ran a front-page article on Tuesday listing what it believed were Israel's military and diplomatic options in the face of escalating Palestinian violence in the Gaza Strip.
Two of the options Israel has already adopted - reinforcing public institutions and schools in Gaza-belt communities as well as making major financial investments in developing an anti-Kassam rocket defense system.
On Tuesday, Deputy Defense Minister Ephraim Sneh said Israel would decide within several weeks which anti-rocket defense system it planned to develop and deploy along the border with the Gaza Strip.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378452552&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
S. African Jewish paper causes storm
By AMIR MIZROCH
Talkbacks for this article: 29
The South African Jewish Report, published weekly in Johannesburg, is engaged in a heated public spat with the country's Jewish minister of intelligence, Ronnie Kasrils, and the South African Freedom of Expression Institute (FXI), over the newspaper's refusal to publish a letter by Kasrils that, the paper's editor says, compares Israel's actions in the Palestinian territories to those of the Nazis during WWII.
The Report last week refused to publish Kasrils's reply to an article that questioned his stance on Israel.
SAJR editor Geoff Sifrin initially approved Kasrils's request to reply to an article by Anthony Posner entitled "Some Pertinent Questions to Kasrils."
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?c=JPArticle&cid=1162378459829&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
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