| Iran blocks nuclear inspectors from visiting key site Posted: 02 Feb 2012 08:55 PM PST From AOL Defense: A dramatic visit by UN inspectors to Iran amid rising international tension failed to get answers about whether Iran seeks the bomb.
Iran tried to draw maximum publicity through a show of cooperation with inspectors from the UN watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency who visited Tehran this week. Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi said Iran was "prepared to make arrangements for inspection" of nuclear sites but that the IAEA team had not asked to go.
But IAEA chief inspector Herman Nackaerts and the agency number two Rafael Gross, who headed the inspectors, did not want to visit nuclear sites, which are already monitored by the IAEA. They wanted to see Parchin, a weapons testing ground, and also to see crucial documents and scientists who work there or are connected to such work, diplomats said. The IAEA had published in November an extensive report about alleged atomic weapons research by Iran, and Parchin was a key link in this. The IAEA has also been seeking for years to interview the man believed to head Iran's alleged covert military nuclear program, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, and once again did not get to him.
The Iranians refused access to Parchin, saying it was not a site where there is nuclear material and so the IAEA which verifies use of such material had no business there. This, however, goes to the crux of what the IAEA is now trying to do, which is to verify possible nuclear weapons research that may have been carried out without nuclear material. This can include learning how to make the trigger which sets of atomic bombs or the neutron initiator which speeds up the explosive chain reaction. The IAEA needs to investigate such matters, grouped under the heading "possible military dimensions" of Iran's nuclear work, before it can say whether the Iranian program is a peaceful or military one. Iran continues to play games, knowing that appearing to cooperate will take some of the pressure off from powers like Russia. 
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| An email from a grieving father and grandfather Posted: 02 Feb 2012 06:08 PM PST I received this email from Michael Craig Palmer:
Greetings! On Friday, September 23 last year, two Arabs motivated by hatred for Jews murdered my son Asher and his son Yonatan. Asher was driving from his home in Kiryat Arba to spend Shabbat with his wife, Puah, and her parents in Jerusalem. Puah was five months pregnant when her husband and son were murdered. Last week, Puah gave birth to Orit. Asher had chosen the name Orit before he died. The two Arabs who murdered Asher and Yonatan didn't know them. They targeted cars driven by Jews on the eve of Shabbat. Their motivation was anti-Semitic hatred. They wanted to kill Jews, any Jews and had been trying along with a gang of accomplices to kill Jews for several weeks. Asher and Yonatan were their first and only success. Several days after the murders, the Israeli security forces arrested them and the rest of their gang and they are now in jail awaiting trial. The hate-motivated murders of Asher and Yonatan and birth of Orit have been significant news in Israel. Here are a couple of links to recent coverage. http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/152173 http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4180871,00.html The deaths of Asher and Yonatan at the hands of Arab terrorists and the birth of Orit hold, in my opinion, a lesson of struggle and survival for Jews worldwide. I'm contacting you about this so that more people can hear this story, consider the lessons, and find a point of connection and hope between Jews in Israel and outside Israel. Ideas that you may have on how Asher and Yonatan's short lives can be honored by discussing them in public would be very appreciated. Thanks. Regards, Michael
Next week, on Tu B'Shvat at 1:00 PM, the family will dedicate and start planting a new vineyard in Kiryat Arba in memory of the martyrs. They plan to turn it into a park and playground to be dedicated to the baby Yonatan. 
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| Honest Reporting mission to Israel (advertorial) Posted: 02 Feb 2012 01:48 PM PST You might have noticed an advertisement on the right sidebar for the Honest Reporting Mission to Israel taking place May 30-June 5. As I wrote in an advertorial last year, the Mission always has first-rate speakers and tours. The Honest Reporting Mission is a fantastic way to actually meet and ask questions of newsmakers and policymakers in Israel. I would love to go and interview all of them for the blog! Which brings up a point. The Honest Reporting folks told me that if a certain number of my readers join the Mission, they will let me tag along for free.
Therefore, I have a vested interest in getting as many of my readers to go to the Mission as I can! And if I get to go, this blog will have a great week filled with video and exclusive interviews. So if you have some vacation time coming up at the beginning of June, you should consider spending an unforgettable week in Israel. Just sign up and tell them that you head about the Mission from me. Who knows - you may get to hang out with me for a week! 
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| Groundhog Day moment - 30 years of the same threats from Iran Posted: 02 Feb 2012 12:53 PM PST From JTA, November 15, 1982: A monthly periodical called "Imam" which is published by the information department of the Iranian Foreign Office has been sent to the United Nations correspondents in Geneva. The title on the cover reads, "Israel Must be Destroyed."
The editorial states: "The deliverance of the Islamic countries from the international imperialism headed by the United States of America is dependent upon the destruction of Israel which is the symbol of that superpower in the region."
It adds: "It is sad to be reminded of the fact that had the war with the aggressive regime of Iraq not been forced on Iran, our brave people would have directed their struggle and resources towards the achievement of that objective." 
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| French Jewish mother wins custody battle with Saudi prince who kidnapped child Posted: 02 Feb 2012 11:50 AM PST Bittersweet: The Paris criminal court ordered Prince Sattam al-Saud from the kingdom's founding royal family, to hand over custody of his daughter Aya to her French mother, Candice Cohen-Ahnine, and provide child support of €10,000 (£8,300) a month.
For the past three-and-a-half years, the prince has kept Aya in a Riyadh palace despite efforts by the French foreign ministry and President Nicolas Sarkozy's office to resolve the issue.
But the French court ruling appears to have had no effect on the prince. "What do I care of Sarkozy?" he is cited as telling Nouvel Observateur magazine. "If need be, I'll go like [Osama] bin Laden and hide in the mountains with Aya."
 Miss Cohen-Ahnin, 34, and the prince met in London 14 years ago at Brown's nightclub and their daughter was born in November 2001.
Their relationship continued until 2006 when he allegedly announced that he was obliged to marry a cousin, but that she could be a second wife. She refused and they separated.
Miss Cohen-Ahnine claimed that her daughter was taken from her during a visit to Saudi Arabia in 2008 and that she was held in the prince's palace where she had only fleeting meetings with her daughter.
She said she managed to leave when a maid left her door open and she sought refuge in the French embassy.
Miss Cohen-Ahnin was eventually spirited out of the country after the prince allegedly produced a document purporting that she had been Muslim but had converted to Judaism — a crime punishable by death.
She said she was concerned about her daughter's upbringing when she discovered Facebook photos of her in a niqab and playing with her father's firearms.
Despairing at the lack of diplomatic progress, she published Give My Daughter Back, a book recounting her ordeal, in October.
Since the court ruling, the prince faces an international arrest warrant for ignoring the custody sentence.
Mrs Cohen-Ahnine said the court ruling was a "great victory for me and vindicates everything I have said … but I'm still very worried for my child's future."
The prince denied ever having kidnapped the child or the mother.
The prince said he would send lawyers to France to challenge the court decision but not his daughter.
"France hasn't got the right to take her back. She is a Saudi citizen and a princess. They cannot oblige a princess to leave this country," he said. Digital Journal adds: International Family Law states that under Saudi law "A foreign parent cannot take her or his children out of Saudi Arabia if the other parent is a Saudi national even if the foreigner has been granted custody rights." This position is reiterated by the U.S. State Department which advises "The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is not a party to the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction." Saudi law always favors a Muslim parent over a non-Muslim parent, and the family members of the father have more rights than a childs mother. So there is at least one Jewish princess in Saudi Arabia - who can never leave. 
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| Tech-washing! Posted: 02 Feb 2012 10:45 AM PST From WSJ: Who is going to be Europe's main technology hub? While London and Berlin both see themselves as claimants to the title, if you look at the numbers (and you take a Eurovision Song Contest view of the Continent) arguably neither can challenge Tel Aviv.
It was Ron Huldai, Tel Aviv's 13-year mayor and a former combat pilot, who, while London's Tech City was not even the subject of an interdepartmental memo, had got on with building a tech center second only to Silicon Valley. He did it not by installing high-speed fiber or hosting conferences. His approach, as he said in a recent interview with The Wall Street Journal, was much simpler.
"Tel Aviv had become a city that people used, not a city they lived in," he said. "We are creating a good place for hi-tech people to live in—I am doing it for the people working in hi-tech," he said.
It is the ''Field of Dreams'' model. If you build it, they will come. It is no coincidence that Tel Aviv was recently named the world¹s best gay city.
"It is about building an environment that is supportive," he said. Young digital entrepreneurs tend to be counter-cultural— attracted to cities that are vibrant, diverse and international. One third of the city is under the age of 35, and there is one bar for every 200 residents.
His bottom-up model—worry about the people—has proved successful.
According to a report commissioned by the city, Tel Aviv and its surrounding area, hosts more than 600 early stage companies. Access to venture capital is, per capita, 20-fold greater in Israel than in the rest of Europe. "If you take the amount of VC per capita, in Europe, it is $7. In the U.S. it is $72. In Israel it is double that," Jan Müehlfeit, Microsoft's European chairman asserted last year. Those damn Zionists, going through an elaborate charade to make Tel Aviv a tech-friendly city in order to cover up their crimes! 
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| Hamas leader calls for re-evaluation of "unity" saying Fatah is not serious Posted: 02 Feb 2012 09:36 AM PST Khalil al-Hayya, head of Hamas' political party "Change and Reform," has called on Hamas to re-evaluate the unity agreement with Fatah in light of Fatah's postponement of a meeting meant to create a framework for negotiations. He said in a statement, "Unfortunately, the reconciliation track needs a re-evaluation. None of the agreements that have been made on 20 December have been implemented. Reconciliation is not a media or political slogan, it benefits us and the Fatah movement, and to get those benefits one must be prepared to pay. We want to truly end the state of division without equivocation and without the disappearance behind the media or political slogans to reach the stage of full partnership in the PLO or the Authority or otherwise, and without this conviction, the reconciliation concept will remain elusive." Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said that Fatah's postponement of the meeting indicates that Fatah is not serious about reconciliation. And this meeting wasn't even to do anything concrete. 
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| Egyptian MP blames soccer deaths on - well, you know who. Posted: 02 Feb 2012 08:26 AM PST From MEMRI: Mustafa Bakri: Our country is entering a state of anarchy. This anarchy is caused by America, Israel and the former regime. Look at the New Middle East scheme. Don't talk about all the minute details. What happened in Port Said is a continuation of what happened in Muhammad Mahmoud Street, in Al-Qasr Al-Ayni Street, across from the government, across from Maspero, and in the soccer match against Tunisia. They are all connected. It is an attempt to bring this country down. How predictable was this? 
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| Gazans attack Ban Ki Moon's vehicle Posted: 02 Feb 2012 07:18 AM PST From Ma'an: Dozens of people threw shoes and stones at UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's convoy as it entered the Gaza Strip on Thursday, Ma'an's correspondent said.
No one was injured during the hostile welcome and the vehicles, which crossed into the Hamas-ruled territory from southern Israel, pushed through the crowd and sped away.
Ban is visiting the region to try to restart long-stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.
Many of those who protested as the UN convoy passed were family members of Palestinians being held in Israeli prisons. They hit the vehicles with signs bearing slogans accusing Ban of bias towards Israel and of refusing to meet the relatives of Palestinian prisoners. Who is Moon meeting in Gaza? From WaPo: In Gaza, he met with U.N. relief officials, aid groups and human rights organizations.
He also visited a U.N.-funded housing project in southern Gaza, where protesters held up signs saying, "We want to lift the siege on Gaza" — referring to Israeli restrictions on the entry and exit to and from Gaza of people and goods.
Ban's visit was being heavily secured by Hamas security forces, but he will not be meeting with members of the Hamas government, who are widely shunned internationally over their refusal to renounce violence. Islamic Jihad came out with a statement criticizing Moon, saying that Gazans don't need financial assistance or food, but rather someone to stand besides them. Given that UNRWA is a dedicated UN agency with a huge budget dedicated to only Palestinian Arabs, and that the UN has dedicated more time and resources to their problems than to any other people on Earth, this is a curious claim. There is a long history of Palestinian Arabs attacking UN personnel; the first UNRWA report in 1950 mentions a few of them. The Syrian office of the Agency, located in Damascus, was destroyed by explosives and a bomb was thrown at a truckload of workers in Lebanon. Threats of violence have been made against individual employees of the Agency. The UN's criticism of these attacks has always been muted. (h/t Ian) 
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| Egypt imprisons popular actor for "insulting Islam" Posted: 02 Feb 2012 06:03 AM PST From Al Arabiya: The Egyptian film star and the Arab world's most famous comedian, Adel Imam, received a three-month jail term with hard labor for his portrayal of Muslim characters on stage and screen, a newspaper reported on Thursday.
Al-Ahram online reported that Imam has been given the sentence in addition to a fine of approximately $166 for "defaming Islam" in some of the roles he has played.
Imam, who is considered to be one of the Arab world's biggest film stars, with 40 years of box office hits in and plays under his belt, was sentenced in absentia. Imam had criticized Hamas at the outset of the Gaza war - and afterwards. He also made a film in 1994 about the dangers of Islamic fundamentalism: Egypt's film industry is the bedrock of popular culture throughout the Arab world, and "The Terrorist" in the month since its release has become the top Egyptian movie moneymaker of all time, earning half its $447,000 budget in the first three days of its release. It has opened in theaters throughout the Arab world, despite threats from Islamic extremists and decrees banning it in Jordan and northern Lebanon.
Then it shows the perpetrator of many of the attacks-[Adel Imam], dressed in Islamic militant gear as Brother Ali-hit by a car and left to convalesce in the home of an upper-middle-class family in the Cairo suburbs. With his true identity unknown to the family, Ali living in their midst learns the meaning of love and tolerance. He finds himself listening as the family roars with laughter at the ravings of a militant cleric, singing in the shower when he learns the family's beautiful daughter loves him, and impetuously hugging the Christian Copt he formerly loathed when the two men watch with rapture the Egyptian soccer team score a victory.
Imam's huge popularity is the engine behind the film's popularity. His expressive and not particularly handsome face has become the mirror of the Egyptian middle class, with its tribulations, celebrations and frustrations. This is not the first time Imam has taken on militant Islam. Six years ago, as fundamentalists in the militant stronghold of Asyut in southern Egypt declared art forbidden under Islam, Imam took his theatrical troupe on the road, performing for poor Egyptians in the heart of Asyut. Imam has always been considered close to the Mubarak regime. The Islamic Winter is descending over Egypt. 
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| Did the U. of Penn bend the rules to allow BDS conference? Posted: 02 Feb 2012 03:36 AM PST This weekend, the University of Pennsylvania will host a conference calling to destroy Israel via boycotts, divestment and sanctions. I am generally on the side of free speech. To me, the best way to fight such a hatefest is with the truth, and the Philadelphia community is doing an admirable job of countering the conference. But a recent article at Front Page magazine by Sara Dogan shows that the university seems to have bent its own rules on allowing a brand-new student organization to spring up specifically to host the hate-Israel crowd.  U Penn officials have turned a blind eye (and deaf ear) to the growing public outcry about the conference, claiming that it is solely a student matter and that, to stretch credulity, the university literally has no information regarding the conference, its funding, its sponsors, or its arrangements to use university facilities.
I made several calls to university officials to see if I could uncover the truth about Penn's sponsorship or funding of or cooperation with the BDS conference.
I first spoke with Executive Director Karu Kozuma at the Office of Student Affairs and hit a brick wall. Kozuma claimed that all funding decisions are handled by students themselves and he did not have any information on whether PennBDS receives student funds either in general or for the upcoming conference. Finding it a bit hard to believe that a university would exercise no oversight in such matters, I asked if there was a list showing all the Student Activities Council allotments for student organizations in the past year. Kozuma claimed there was no public record of this. He claimed to have forwarded my inquiries to the student leaders of PennBDS but I received no response.
A week after my initial call Kozuma responded by email to clarify that PennBDS had only recently become a recognized student organization and as such was not eligible to receive student activities funds for three months. He went on to explain, "As a student organization, Penn BDS receive a number of privileges to use at their discretion as resources are available. These include staff consultation and advising, administrative support, and free use of available common campus spaces. Depending on the campus space and type of activity, university facility hosts may charge student organizations for audio/visual, labor, security, and other costs. Use of the space itself is generally gratis. With the planned upcoming event, Penn BDS has reserved available campus spaces and is working with facility hosts to determine its A/V, labor, and other needs, which would incur costs as for other student groups."
Many observers and critics of the PennBDS conference and movement note that it appears to have sprung up overnight out of thin air. Yet Penn does have rules and regulations governing how long a student organization must be in existence before it may be officially recognized by the University and thereby be eligible to use university facilities free-of-charge.
The Student Activities Council (SAC) website notes that in order to apply for recognition, the first step toward achieving funding, a student organization at Penn must fulfill several criteria. As the website specifies, "All groups seeking SAC recognition must have been in existence for at least one year. Additionally, the group must have a board with a mix of upper classmen and a roster of past events the group has already put on. The group must also demonstrate an appeal to a reasonable portion of the Penn Community" (emphasis added).
I once again emailed Kozuma to inquire whether PennBDS had met these criteria– in particular, whether the group had existed for a full year prior to its recognition by the Student Activities Council. My inquiries met with no response, raising questions about whether the Student Activities Council and the administrators who oversee it may have bent the rules for PennBDS. Attempts to contact PennBDS directly to ask these questions were also ignored.
I also tried to extract information from the university's main public relations line and was again told that the conference was strictly a student affair being handled by PennBDS, that the university was not sponsoring it, and "it didn't go through our office." I reminded him that there had been a national public outcry over Penn's hosting of the conference—I thought that at least the university would have drafted a standard statement for reporters–and tried asking for more information, but was again shut down. I tried asking whether Penn BDS was being required to pay for the use of university rooms and facilities but was told again, "I don't know anything about it."
This unconcern and lack of transparency on the part of Penn, a university that once had a reputation for being more welcoming to Jews than its Ivy League counterparts, was disturbing. Free speech is one thing. Ignoring your own stated rules to support hate is quite another. (h/t David R) 
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