Seattle Post Intelligencer

Pakistan's Bhutto visits ancestral home
By STEPHEN GRAHAM
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
GARHI KHUDA BAKSH, Pakistan -- Former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto went to her ancestral village Saturday amid tight security and sprinkled flower petals on her father's tomb on her first trip to provincial Pakistan since the bloody assassination attempt against her nine days ago.
She vowed to fight Islamic extremism - a call that came as pro-Taliban militants in another corner of the country executed 13 captives in response to a military assault against their leader.
Bhutto returned on Oct. 18 from an eight-year exile to a massive welcome rally in Karachi, shattered by a suicide bombing that killed 143 people. She has since been largely confined to her residence in that city, but eager to start her campaign for parliamentary elections slated for January.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1104AP_Pakistan.html



Inside rebel Pakistan cleric's domain
By RIAZ KHAN
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
SWAT, Pakistan -- Long-haired militants with assault rifles and walkie-talkies guard the approach to the stronghold of Maulana Fazlullah, the radical cleric whose mission to spread fundamentalist Islam has provoked a bloody showdown with Pakistan's government.
Beyond the checkpoint, down a narrow track winding through orchards and by the clear blue waters of the Swat River, an Associated Press reporter was granted access to a sprawling seminary beyond state control, behind the new front line in Pakistan's faltering campaign against Islamic extremists.
Inside is a mosque and a maze of dozens of rooms, many still under construction. A shop sells audio cassettes of speeches by Fazlullah, who has earned the nickname "Mullah Radio" for his pirate FM broadcasts urging followers to wage holy war against America and its allies.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1104AP_Pakistan_Militant_Domain.html



Thousands call for swift end to Iraq war
By JASON DEAREN
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
SAN FRANCISCO -- Thousands of people called for a swift end to the war in Iraq as they marched through downtown on Saturday, chanting and carrying signs that read: "Wall Street Gets Rich, Iraqis and GIs Die" or "Drop Tuition Not Bombs."
The streets were filled with thousands as labor union members, anti-war activists, clergy and others rallied near City Hall before marching to Dolores Park.
As part of the demonstration, protesters fell on Market Street as part of a "die in" to commemorate the thousands of American soldiers and Iraqi citizens who have died since the conflict began in March 2003.
The protest was the largest in a series of war protests taking place in New York, Los Angeles and other U.S. cities, organizers said.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1110AP_Iraq_War_Protest.html?source=mypi



Many Democrats opposed to war with Iran
By ANNE FLAHERTY
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
WASHINGTON -- Still reeling from the fallout of authorizing the Iraq war five years ago, congressional Democrats are determined to put themselves early on record as opposing military action in Iran.
In recent days, many Democrats have gone to great lengths to denounce President Bush's strategy on Iran, including his decision to label Tehran's Quds military force as a terrorist group and his statement that a nuclear-armed Iran could lead to "World War III."
Democrats also are jumping on Bush's latest war spending request as proof that the White House is considering airstrikes on Iran's underground uranium enrichment facilities. Bush wants $88 million to continue developing a "bunker-busting" bomb designed to destroy deeply buried targets such as those in Iran.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1153AP_War_Politics.html



Iraqi women serve as Ramadi police
By KIM CURTIS
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
RAMADI, Iraq -- The women received their first paychecks a few weeks ago - about $500 for a month's work as police officers. They paid rent, bought food, wiped out debts. But the seemingly simple transaction has left at least one woman in fear for her life, another threatened with divorce.
The strict tribal and religious culture of Iraq's particularly in its western Anbar province, strongly discourages women from working outside the home and brings shame on men who allow it.
"Right now, our province is safe and peaceful. But anything could shake that up and we could be in danger," says Genan, a 37-year-old mother of three who's also seven months pregnant.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1107AP_Iraq_Women_Police.html



Giuliani's strong suit is common touch
By MARIANNE MEANS
SYNDICATED COLUMNIST
WASHINGTON -- Politics, as life itself, is often unfair.
The latest to be bitten by this unforgiving beast is the precarious Republican presidential frontrunner, Rudy Giuliani. His image as a tough guy who can actually run things is constantly reinforced by old television clips of his bold leadership striding through in New York City following the 9/11 attack on the Twin Towers. The horrific attack that day in 2001 is the centerpiece of his presidential campaign.
The memory has been stirred anew by the California firestorm, another tragedy of enormous scope handled by local officials with considerable authority and efficiency. Rudy, of course, had no hand in the addressing the California crisis, which Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and local officials had well in hand. They had prepared for such a problem -- imagine that! Still, it was a reminder that tough guys finish first. Sometimes. Then came his confession that he's rooting for the Boston Red Sox in the World Series. For a former New York mayor and lifelong Yankee fan, this is unforgivable.
For New Yorkers, it's a tremendous gaffe. It's far worse than Giuliani's support of abortion rights is to religious conservatives. "Traitor" cried the Daily News. "Red Coat: Yank fan Rudy pulls for Bosox" screamed the New York Post. "He may as well have joined Al-Qaida, as far as everyone is concerned," opined comedian Jimmy Kimmel on a daytime talk show.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/336993_meansonline27.html



Religion doesn't confer right to discriminate
By D. PARVAZ
P-I COLUMNIST
Two bills -- HR 3685 and 3686, which should be one bill -- seek to give gays, lesbians, bisexuals and the transgendered protection from discrimination in the workplace. Naturally, President Bush indicated that he'll veto the bills (assuming they go that far), a move groups such as Conservative Women for America applaud. A statement from the administration (on 3685) indicates that his main issue with the bill is that it "is inconsistent with the right to the free exercise of religion as codified by Congress in the Religious Freedom Restoration Act." So, being a Christian means you get to deny people jobs based on what goes on in their pants when they're not at work?

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/parvaz/337025_parvaz27.html



Burmese desperate for health care
By MARGIE MASON
AP MEDICAL WRITER
MAE SOT, Thailand -- They travel for days though checkpoints, across dangerous roads and past Myanmar's bribe-hungry soldiers to make it to the Thai border. They're not refugees fleeing the junta - they simply want to see a doctor.
Myanmar has one of the world's worst health care systems, with tens of thousands dying each year from malaria, tuberculosis, AIDS, dysentery, diarrhea and a litany of other illnesses.
While there are hospitals in the impoverished Southeast Asian nation also known as Burma, only a few can afford to pay hospital workers the various "fees" in the tightly controlled nation fueled by corruption.
"Even if you use the toilet in the hospital you have to pay money," said a 70-year-old man from Phyu Township, who journeyed two days by bus to see a doctor at the Thai border town of Mae Sot and have a cataract removed. He declined to give his name for fear of reprisals.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1104AP_Myanmar_Health_Crisis.html



Israeli party threatens to quit gov't
By LAURIE COPANS
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
JERUSALEM -- A key partner in the coalition of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert warned Sunday that he would withdraw from the government if an upcoming Israeli-Palestinian meeting includes negotiations on core issues of the conflict.
The threat by Deputy Prime Minister Avigdor Lieberman limits Olmert's ability to maneuver in the talks with the Palestinians, which have been renewed in recent months after seven years of fighting. A withdrawal of Lieberman's Israel Beiteinu Party from the coalition would weaken Olmert politically.
The Palestinians are demanding that the U.S.-sponsored conference to be held by the end of the year include talks on the major hurdles preventing a final peace agreement, including the fate of Jerusalem, Palestinian refugees and the borders of a Palestinian state.
While Lieberman's threat was not new, he has been making it more leading up to the meeting.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1107AP_Israel_Politics.html



Israel moves maneuvers away from Syria
By MATTI FRIEDMAN
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
JERUSALEM -- Israel has decided to move an upcoming military exercise off the disputed Golan Heights to avoid further heightening tensions with neighboring Syria, defense officials said.
The border has been jittery since Sept. 6, the date of a mysterious raid by Israeli jets on a target in Syria's north.
Next week's military maneuver was scheduled to be held partially on the Golan Heights, which Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 Mideast War.
Israel sent messages reassuring Syria that the exercise signaled no aggressive intentions, the officials said. But this week, the military decided to hold the exercise solely in northern Israel and not on the Golan Heights because of concerns it might unsettle the Syrians, they said.
The officials spoke Thursday on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to divulge details of the military's decision to the media.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1107AP_Israel_Syria.html



From Haaretz

Pictures suggest construction of Syrian nuclear reactor was underway in 2001
By Haaretz Staff
Pictures released on Friday by a satellite imagery company suggest that the construction of the suspected Syrian nuclear reactor attacked by the Israel Air Force on September 6 was underway as early as 2001, the New York Times reported on Saturday.
The images, released by the U.S.-based company GeoEye, were taken in September 2003. Senior U.S. officials and independent analysts who examined the pictures said that they suggest work had begun on the site as early as two years before the photographs were taken, according to the report.
Numerous foreign media reports have suggested the IAF bombed a partially-constructed nuclear reactor on the bank of the Euphrates River in northeast Syria, some 90 kilometers from the Iraq border.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/917474.html



Livni heads to China in drive against Iran nuclear program
By Barak Ravid, Haaretz Correspondent, DPA and Haaretz Staff
Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni set out for China on Saturday night for a visit that is part of a broader Israeli effort to press world leaders on Iran's nuclear program.
Livni is expected to tell Chinese officials that if the international community turns a blind eye to Iran's nuclear designs, there will be dire consequences for the struggle between the extremists and the moderates in the Middle East and, as a result, for the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
China, a permanent member of the UN Security Council, is staunchly opposed to stepping up the sanctions against Iran, an important trading partner.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/917472.html



Women will get abortions, legal or not, so keep it safe
By KATHA POLLITT
GUEST COLUMNIST
For years feminists and abortion rights supporters have pointed out that women have abortions whether or not the procedure is legal.
That was true here before Roe v. Wade, and it is true today in countries where abortion is restricted or banned. The difference is that when abortion is legal it is a remarkably safe procedure; when it is illegal, women are injured, women die, children are left motherless. (True, these are already existing, sinful children, not embryos or fetuses, but still.) This simple public health argument has gotten lost in a thicket of theology, sexual morality, "family values," politics, spin and outright disinformation. The coat hanger has become a political cliché, a relic of the '60s, like the peace sign. Oh, that old thing.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/337039_focus28.html



Climate Change (part I): Age of mega-fires
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER EDITORIAL BOARD
Today, California's burning. Tomorrow, who knows? The wildfires and the unprecedented evacuations are a phenomenon that is likely to grow across the West as unchecked climate change wreaks havoc with temperature and precipitation patterns.
As with hurricanes, science won't tell us whether global warming causes any specific fire. But the evidence about the trend is clear.
Earlier this year, a study in Science found hotter, drier temperatures have increased the number of Western forest fires, their size and the period of each year when fires were a threat. On CBS' "60 Minutes" last weekend, study co-author Tom Swetnam said the long-term effects of frequent, huge fires could kill half of the forests. CBS aptly titled the piece, "The Age of Mega-Fires."
So far, California's response seems to be better than anything in Louisiana during Hurricane Katrina. But the longer-term burden on Californians, emotionally and physically, is going to be huge. Federal taxpayers will also carry a good deal of extra load.
And it's not like California, its neighboring states or any of us in the West can expect the threats to ease. A 2006 study on global warming's impacts for Washington found the state already is fighting more forest fires per year. It predicted the state's direct costs would rise 50 percent by the 2020s. That doesn't include the loss of timber. Philip Mote, the state climatologist, has said insurance companies are paying attention to the Western risks.
Unfortunately, the Western side of the state also is likely to see more problems with flooding. Ironic though it might be, that fits all too well with the theory that climate change is likely to cause more extreme weather events.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/336685_fired.html



Sudan pledges Darfur cease-fire at talks
By ALFRED DE MONTESQUIOU
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
SIRTE, Libya -- Sudan's government committed to a cease-fire in Darfur at the start of peace talks Saturday, but mediators and journalists outnumbered the few rebels who did not boycott the U.N.-sponsored negotiations, reducing hopes for an end to the fighting.
The large government delegation said its cessation of hostilities was a sign of goodwill for negotiations aimed at ending over four years of fighting in the western Sudanese region. But the pledge was not matched by the rebels, whose main leaders all refused to attend the talks.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1105AP_Darfur_Peace_Talks.html



Heavy fighting shakes Somali capital
By SALAD DUHUL
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
MOGADISHU, Somalia -- Insurgents and government-allied forces battled with machine guns, mortars and rocket-propelled grenades Saturday in the heaviest fighting to hit Somalia's capital for months, leaving at least seven people dead and dozens others wounded, witnesses and health officials said.
Islamic fighters briefly occupied a police station in south Mogadishu, before heading back out of the area, chanting "God is great," witnesses said. Witnesses said at least seven people including a woman had died in the heavy fighting between insurgents, government troops and government-allied Ethiopian forces.
At least 35 people wounded in the fighting were being treated at Mogadishu's Medina Hospital, said Tahir Mohammed Mahmoud, an administrative assistant. He said it was the worst fighting, and heaviest day for hospital admissions, for at least four months in the war-scarred city.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1105AP_Somalia.html



Rains flood capital of Congo, 30 die
By EDDY ISANGO
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
KINSHASA, Congo -- Heavy rains swelled into a torrent of water that swamped Congo's sprawling capital, killing 30 people in less than 24 hours, the government said Friday.
The death toll was likely to rise, an official at Congo's humanitarian affairs ministry said, because relief workers have not been able to reach many flooded neighborhoods.
"Thirty dead and about a hundred injured have been registered," said Serge Mulumbe, the humanitarian affairs ministry official.
The heavy rain started falling Thursday in the Central African city and continued into the early hours Friday.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1105AP_Congo_Flooding.html



7 held in plan to fly children from Chad
By ABAKAR SALEH
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
N'DJAMENA, Chad -- Seven crew members of a plane contracted to fly more than 100 children out of Chad were detained, authorities said Saturday, and Chad's president promised punishment for anyone involved in a plan to spirit the children to Europe.
President Idriss Deby traveled Friday to the eastern city of Abeche where 103 children were being cared for after authorities arrested nine French citizens, who had attempted to fly them to France. The French aid group L'Arche de Zoe, or Zoe's Arc, said it had arranged French host families for the children. It said they were orphans from Sudan's Darfur region.
But the head of UNICEF France, Jacques Hintzy, said Saturday that many of the children appeared to be from Chad, not Sudan. He also said the children were given bandages to provide the impression their evacuation was health-related, though none was injured.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1105AP_France_Darfur_Children.html



Argentine first lady likely to take over
By NIKO PRICE
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina -- President Nestor Kirchner and his wife are poised to launch a new political dynasty Sunday in an election that promises to replace him with her.
Argentines are grateful to Kirchner for engineering a recovery from a 2001 economic crisis that savaged the middle class, and that has translated into such broad support for his wife, Sen. Cristina Fernandez, that she will likely avoid a second round.
Argentine law prevents more than two consecutive terms, but a husband-and-wife team could alternate in power for as long as their support continues.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1102AP_Argentina_Election.html



I realize the traditional American Dream is to take nothing and make a million only to sell it to a greater entity of wealth, but, I wish local authorities would continue to exist over energy resources. When large corporations take over energy franchise, the opportunity for deterioration of seeking alternatives could be threatened while opting for fuels less environmentally friendly. I don't believe in large corporations when it comes to handling energy needs of communities. I believe the best chance alternatives have to be broadly used is for community commitment and control. There is no advantage to rate stability when large corporations seek to control energy sources. Alternatives are best managed by local authority. The advantage to incorporation with larger energy companies is reducing some management infrastructure. Those jobs don't need to be eliminated, they need to remember who they are serving.



Puget Sound Energy to be sold
Private investors would provide $5 billion infusion for projects
By DAN RICHMAN
P-I REPORTER
An agreement to sell Puget Sound Energy to a group of private investors would give the state's largest gas and electricity supplier a $5 billion cash infusion to satisfy renewable-resource laws, strengthen its network against storm damage and accommodate the region's growing population, the company said Friday.
Bellevue-based Puget Energy said its board has agreed to sell the utility to New York-based Macquarie Consortium, an association of six investment groups and pension funds. The consortium has offered $30 per share in cash, a 25 percent premium over Thursday's closing price.
Stephen Reynolds, chairman, president and chief executive of PSE and its parent holding company, said the purchase would result in no rate increases, layoffs, changes in management or alterations to union relationships or benefits plans. The utility's headquarters will remain in Bellevue, and he will continue as its leader.
Reynolds said being freed from the need to raise money through equity offerings will help the utility comply with Proposition 937, a state renewable-energy initiative that he said effectively has required it to install a new wind farm every other year and a gas-fired power plant in the alternate years.

PUGET ENERGY AT A GLANCE
Holding company for Puget Sound Energy
Headquarters: Bellevue
PSE service area: 6,000 square miles, mostly Western Washington
Service area population, 2006: 4 million
Customers: 1 million electricity; 721,000 natural gas
PSE employees: 5,200
Puget Energy 2006 net income: $2.2 million, or $1.88 per share. Revenue: $2.9 billion. Assets: $7.1 billion
Incorporated: 1997. Grew by acquisitions and mergers, starting by acquiring a gaslight provider founded in 1873
P-I reporter Dan Richman can be reached at 206-448-8032 or danrichman@seattlepi.com.
Soundoff (42 comments)

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/business/336982_pse27.html?source=mypi



The Jordan Times

Hundreds treated for suspected food poisoning
Children Saturday receive medical treatment at a hospital in Amman, referred from Jerash where around 300 people were hospitalised for poisoning, which health officials attributed to either bad food or contaminated water (Reuters photo by Mohammad Hamed)
By Hani Hazaimeh
JERASH - Ambulances Saturday evening were lining at the entrance of Jerash Public Hospital to transport to Amman and other cities scores of people suffering fever and diarrhoea, initially blamed on food poisoning.
By Saturday evening, an official toll estimated the number of people suffering from the symptoms at around 300, all from Sakeb village in the northern Jerash Governorate.
However, some village residents said they believed the number to be much higher. Others also said they suspected contaminated water was the reason for the outbreak, not hummos sold at a nearby restaurant as first believed by the authorities.
As a precautionary measure, authorities closed down the restaurant near the village, 18km to the west of the Greco-Roman city of Jerash, and were testing samples of water, food and excrement.
Health Minister Salah Mawajdeh told The Jordan News Agency, Petra, that final results are expected to be out in two days. Tests were being conducted to detect salmonella, shigella or cholera.
Mawajdeh said that 90 per cent of the people treated for the symptoms had eaten hummos from the restaurant in question, two kilometres outside Sakeb, adding that by yesterday afternoon, 70 cases were referred to hospitals in Amman and the northern region.
But some residents interviewed by The Jordan Times said they did not believe bad hummos was the prime suspect. Mohammad Hamdan, who rushed his seven children to the hospital (they were later taken to the army-run Al Hussein Medical Centre (HMC) in Amman), said they did not have any hummos over the past two days.
Another Sakeb resident, Mamdouh Ayasrah, said he was busy moving furniture to a new house, where he and his bride would get married and had almost nothing but water and drinks over the past days. Ayasrah, who, with the rest of his 11-member family, were also referred to HMC, also said they suspected water contamination.
Tamer Ayasrah said his two-month-old cousin was among the cases. “Do not tell me that this infant had hummos.”
People from the village interviewed by The Jordan Times at the public hospital said that the restaurant was too small to sell this huge number of meals. Besides, in a village like Sakeb, inhabited by around 20,000, hummos is not a common dish.
They pointed out that the water network in the village is 40 years old and worn out.

http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=3191



Authorities to arrange independent monitors’ visits to polling centres
AMMAN (JT) - The government will arrange for NGOs to visit polling centres to enable them to oversee the elections, Prime Minister Marouf Bakhit announced yesterday.
The premier recently voiced support for the participation of NGOs in monitoring the November 20 parliamentary polls, saying in an interview with Jordan Television’s 60 Minutes news show earlier this month that the government had no objection to independent group participation.
The government will allow NGOs to visit ballot centres and get acquainted with government procedures, he said in previous remarks.
NGOs, reacting to Bakhit’s announcement, demanded more involvement in monitoring the polls. But the law allows only representatives of candidates to stay in the polling and vote counting centres.

http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=3192



Turkey threatens incursion after Iraq talks fail
SIRNAK (Reuters) - Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan threatened on Saturday to order an incursion into northern Iraq against Kurdish guerrillas after the failure of talks with Iraq aimed at averting a cross-border raid.
"The moment an operation is needed, we will take that step," Erdogan told a large flag-waving crowd in Izmit. "We don't need to ask anyone's permission."
The talks collapsed late Friday after Ankara rejected proposals by Iraqi Defence Minister General Abdul Qader Jassim for tackling guerrillas based in northern Iraq as insufficient and because they would not yield results quickly enough.
Turkey has massed up to 100,000 troops, backed by fighter jets, helicopter gunships, tanks and mortars, on the border for a possible offensive against about 3,000 rebels using Iraq as a base from which to carry out attacks in Turkey.

http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=3197



Israel plans to 'isolate Gaza 100 per cent'
OCCUPIED JERUSALEM (AFP) - Israel plans to paralyse the infrastructure of the Gaza Strip in every possible way and separate itself completely from the Palestinian territory in the long term, a minister said on Saturday.
"We want to separate ourselves from the Gaza Strip at the level of its infrastructure in every way possible," Deputy Defence Minister Matan Vilnai told Israeli public radio.
On Thursday, Defence Minister Ehud Barak announced that Israel would start periodic electricity cuts and limit fuel deliveries to the Strip because of the continued firing of rockets by militants.
But Vilnai said these measures were not really because of the rocket firing "but really to achieve the separation of this territory, which was approved in principle two weeks ago by the Israeli government, and whose application had only been delayed for a simple legalistic check". In September, the security Cabinet decreed the Gaza Strip "a hostile entitY". It has been controlled completely by Hamas since mid-June when the Islamist movement ousted security forces loyal to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and the Fateh Party.
"Long term we want to separate ourselves from this territory, 100 per cent," said Vilnai, adding that at the moment Israel was providing all the fuel that the Gaza Strip needed, as well as two-thirds of its electricity supplies.

http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=3196



In it together
Israeli ministers say they want to separate themselves completely from the Gaza Strip and paralyse the infrastructure of the tiny plot of land that so obsesses the world.
There is little surprising in the hostile and inhuman talk Israeli officials deploy when talking about the fate of the nearly 1.5 million people in Gaza. The excuse, as usual, is Israeli security, but, while not entirely to be dismissed, cutting of water supply and electricity and stopping trade cannot possibly be a proportionate response to homemade rockets.
A better bet is for Gaza to be allowed some kind of normal existence. It cannot be expected that Israel will work too hard towards this, but the country should at least help facilitate it, i.e., by allowing trade to cross borders and allowing the border to Egypt to be opened.
In addition, the international community can play an important part. Whether under Hamas or after a final agreement is finally nailed, Gaza needs to develop in certain ways. There are huge deposits of natural gas under Gaza’s seabed that need to be extracted which can bring as much as $1 billion to the strip’s economy while, at the same time, leaving the strip energy independent. Water and sewage treatment plants are a must, as is a serious infrastructure that can prepare the strip to join the world.
All these are projects for peace and it really doesn’t matter under whom they are started or completed. Gaza is home to 1.5 million people. These people do not deserve to suffer arbitrary collective punishment because Israel wants to maintain its occupation and because the world cannot distinguish between legitimate resistance and terrorism.

http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=3172



Reconciling rights
Walid M. Sadi
Herouxville is a tiny little Francophone municipality in Quebec, Canada, nestled between Montreal and Quebec City. It made history last January when it adopted a “code of life” for new immigrants, especially Muslims who would opt to live there.
In actual fact, only one Muslim family lives in that town.
The ground rules spelled out in the code touch a variety of subjects ranging from gender equality and diet to religious freedom and lifestyles.
Although the Herouxville initiative is not likely to spread across Quebec Province, much less across the rest of the Canadian provinces, it still raises issues of deep concern for nations that attract immigrants of different races and cultures.
At issue for most of these countries is the so-called issue of identity, which means that countries that receive and welcome immigrants have a vested right, and even the obligation, to preserve their identity and culture. Immigrants are expected to assimilate or at least integrate with their host societies.
At issue also is the right of the new immigrants to enjoy their own religious, culture and even language, and not be forced to endorse the culture of their new homeland.

http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=3175



America’s self-defeating hegemony
By Francis Fukuyama
When I wrote about the “end of history” almost twenty years ago, one thing that I did not anticipate was the degree to which American behaviour and misjudgements would make anti-Americanism one of the chief fault lines of global politics. And yet, particularly since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, that is precisely what has happened, owing to four key mistakes made by the Bush administration.
First, the doctrine of “preemption”, which was devised in response to the 2001 attacks, was inappropriately broadened to include Iraq and other so-called “rogue states” that threatened to develop weapons of mass destruction.
To be sure, preemption is fully justified vis-à-vis stateless terrorists wielding such weapons. But it cannot be the core of a general non-proliferation policy, whereby the United States intervenes militarily everywhere to prevent the development of nuclear weapons.
The cost of executing such a policy simply would be too high (several hundred billion dollars and tens of thousands of casualties in Iraq and still counting).
This is why the Bush administration has shied away from military confrontations with North Korea and Iran, despite its veneration of Israel’s air strike on Iraq’s Osirak reactor in 1981, which set back Saddam Hussein’s nuclear programme by several years.

http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=3174



Peace Through Sport
Creating community ambassadors for peace
AMMAN (JT) - Leadership, motivation, vision and planning were the key words for Day 6 of Peace Through Sport which is holding its inaugural pilot camp in Amman, according to a statement from the Peace Through Sport. The initiative is the vision of its founder and chairman HRH Prince Feisal, president of the Jordan Olympic Committee, and has brought together 70 leaders of youth from seven countries and four religions. It aims to use sport as a vehicle for building bridges within divided communities. After five days of practical and fun sporting activity combined with serious classroom lectures, the pilot camp’s progress has been staggering. Internationally renowned academics in the field of promoting peace through sporting activity shared their knowledge with the delegates on how to become leaders within their own communities. One of the key objectives of Peace Through Sport is for the delegates to be able to return home and to share the knowledge and skills they have learned. The seeds planted by this initial training camp in Amman will grow across the world. Following a day of intensive and fruitful lectures and debate, delegates enjoyed a game of basketball after learning new skills taught to them by national coaches. They were also taught drills on using basketball to bring youngsters together. The Peace Through Sport pilot camp will run until October 31. Today the camp relocates to Petra and then Wadi Rum for an overnight stay.

http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=3181



ASE hosts Council of Federation of Arab Stock Markets
AMMAN (JT) - The Council of the Federation of Arab Stock Markets recommended activating the role of the general secretariat and formulating a mechanism for cooperation among financial securities establishments.
Hosted by the Amman Stock Exchange (ASE), the council of the federation also recommended strengthening contacts among companies operating in the field of financial services in Arab countries through conducting training courses and meetings and focusing on financial securities-related issues.
ASE Chairman Mohammad S. Horani stressed the importance of such gatherings within the drive to achieve the goals of the federation and to arrive at a fair and transparent environment in Arab stock exchange markets.
Horani emphasised the need for eliminating obstacles that preclude the exchange of securities among markets, achieving conformity among laws and regulations of Arab bourses and providing for further exchange of expertise in line with the federation’s objectives.
In his capacity as chairperson of a committee entrusted by the federation with amending its basic statute and activating its role, Amman bourse Chief Executive Officer Jalil Tarif briefed the participants on the committee’s achievements.

http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=3178


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