12.04.2009

calling all rocket scientists

1. American Jews eye Obama's 'anti-Israel' appointees

Every appointee to the American government must endure a thorough background check by the American Jewish community.

if you need to read more, it's at haaretz
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1132797.html


2. 'be vigilant against Israeli ploys' -- Kuwait

UNITED NATIONS: Kuwait has called on the international community to keep vigilant against Israeli ploys and to exert more earnest pressure on Israel to meet relevant UN resolutions. The call was made by Kuwait's acting charge d'affaires at the UN, Khalaf Bu Dhuhair, during the 64th UN General Assembly meeting on the latest Middle East developments.

He rapped a recent Israeli initiative to freeze the construction of more Jewish settlements in the West Bank only for 10 months as a "clear-cut maneuver" to blackmail the Quartet and international community.


read more @ kuwait times



3. atomic test detection site set up on Iran's border
AHA! so a UN agency doing something NEAR Iran PROVES that IRAN has been LYING to EVERYBODY. oh btw we love you Ahmad!!!!! - ed.

Israeli officials believe the international community is "starting to come to the understanding that Iran has been lying to everybody" about its nuclear intentions, a senior Israeli diplomatic official told The Jerusalem Post on Thursday.

The statement followed news of a UN agency completing a nuclear test detection station in Turkmenistan, just a few kilometers from the Iranian border.

The PS44 installation is the 337th facility of the International Monitoring System. It was set up by the Comprehensive Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO), a network of stations across the globe that monitors the atmosphere to detect nuclear blasts by countries secretly testing nuclear weapons.

PS44 is expected to be operational by 2010, once it has been tested.


...While the Turkmenistan site is part of a larger network, the opening of a station near Iran may signify that "the Iranian issue is finally gaining ground in the international community," according to the Israeli official...."Luckily, Iran itself is decimating the efforts of even its most vociferous defenders to help it avoid international criticism," the Israeli official said.


more @ jpost

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1259831457142



4. Canada stabs Russia in the back

The relations between Russia and NATO have been put to the test. One of the members of the North Atlantic Alliance – Canada – blocked the approval of all documents which were supposed to be discussed at the meeting of foreign ministers of Russia and NATO members on December 4.

The talks, which are to take place this Friday in Brussels, are supposed to become the first meeting of the Russia-NATO Council on the level of foreign ministers after the completion of the war in South Ossetia. Last year, the alliance suspended the work of the council over its disagreement with Russia’s actions during the war.

On December 4, the ministers are expected to gather in Brussels to discuss the development of cooperation between Russia and NATO.

No one said that the meeting can be canceled. However, it can become a formal gathering over Canada’s stance.

“Canadian officials blocked the approval of all documents at the meeting of the Russia-NATO Council. It means that there is a faction being created inside NATO, and this faction stands against the reset of relations with Russia,” Russia’s Ambassador at NATO, Dmitry Rogozin said December 1.


...“Since all questions at NATO are solved through a consensus, any delegation has a right to block a situation, and this is what we have today,” the official added.

Dmitry Rogozin also said that Britain and the Baltic States supported Canada’s anti-Russian stance.

...It is worthy of note that Canada has never supported Russia in any of its initiatives during the recent years. Quite on the contrary, when Stephen Harper took the office of the Prime Minister of Canada, he proclaimed the struggle for Arctic natural resources as a top priority of his politics. Mr. Harper regularly visits northern territories where he personally observes military drills and considers an opportunity to set up a powerful naval base in the area. The financial crisis did not let it all happen.


read more @ pravda



5. Syria defends Iran nuclear plans



Syrian President Bashar al-Assad defended Iran's controversial nuclear program on Thursday, during a visit to Damascus by Iran's chief nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili, and promised that cooperation between the two countries would continue.

...Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang also said on Thursday that Beijing hoped "to see the early settlement of the Iranian nuclear issue through dialogue and negotiation."

Tehran confirmed on Wednesday its intention to produce strongly enriched uranium, in defiance of last week's IAEA resolution. Syria has been a close ally of Iran for the past three decades, having sided with it against Iraq in the two neighbors' 1980-88 war.(AFP)

read more @ naharnet


6. quick we need more sympathy the supply is perilously low! -- Spielberg to make docudrama at Jerusalem hospital


Famed film producer Steven Spielberg plans to produce a docudrama series set at Shaare Zedek Medical Center in Jerusalem. Emmy Award-winning producer Phil Rosenthal, the creator and producer of the hit sitcom "Everybody Loves Raymond", will direct.

Dreamworks Studios, in which Spielberg is a partner, will produce the docudrama to be set and filmed in the hospital. Sources inform ''Globes'' that Israeli producer Zafrir Kochanovsky's TTV Productions Ltd. will apparently co-produce the show. Spielberg, one of the world's most successful movie directors and producers, has intended for a long time to work with the Israeli movie and television industry. He has already made two films with Israeli inputs: [ALREADY??? TWO??? - ed.] Schindler's List in 1993, about German businessman Oskar Schindler who saved Jewish families during the Holocaust, and Munich in 2005, about the PLO massacre of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympic Games, and the subsequent killing of the terrorists by the Mossad. In both films, Spielberg used many Israeli actors.

Spielberg is also a sponsor of the Holocaust Survivor Project, which documents survivors' histories.

The Shaare Zedek docudrama will go a step further, as it will be the first coproduction between Dreamworks and an Israeli producer. The project is not a philanthropic endeavor, irrespective of Spielberg's close ties to Israel; Spielberg will apparently try to sell it in as many countries as possible, including the US.

Hospital television dramas attract large audiences, with shows such as "General Hospital", "ER", and "Chicago Hope" among the many dramas set in hospitals over the decades. The Shaare Zedek will, however, be a docudrama, another very popular genre, and, more importantly, it will provide an opportunity to show authentic, original drama. The religious hospital serves secular and haredi (ultra-orthodox) Jews communities, as well as Arabs from Jerusalem and the West Bank, and Jewish settlers.

The docudrama may be considered an international coproduction. Collaborations with foreign producers have been increasing in Israel, so in which case, prominent European television funds and networks may also participate, such as Britain's BBC, France's ARTE, and Germany's ZDF.

Phil Rosenthal told "Globes", "Spielberg asked me to consider doing television in Israel. I proposed making a docudrama about Shaare Zedek hospital, to which my family and I have made donations for decades. He loved the idea of a crowded hospital whose patients are secular Jews, haredim, Arabs, and some of whose doctors are Americans. We'll get the show on the road very soon."

source: globes.co




7. does moving to the US make an Israeli more Israeli?

Every Israeli couple with children who move to the United States finds itself confronted with the quandary of how to maintain their offspring's Jewish identity in America.

again, if you need to read more, it's at haaretz
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1132795.html

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