ISRAEL: PEACE AND  WAR

Jerusalem Post, August 28 - Tributes: Abie Nathan - From right to left - Even Abie Nathan's detractors spoke warmly of him on Thursday, a day after the maverick peace activist passed away in Tel Aviv at 81 years of age..

The man who founded the "Voice of Peace" pirate radio station and did jail time for visiting Yasser Arafat during his exile in Tunisia had plenty of critics, but even more fans. And as they were asked to speak about the man who some say was before his time in his brazen and often eccentric pursuit of peace, all of them spoke of someone who stood up for what he believed in and acted on what he thought was right.

…Others praised Nathan's global charity work, spanning from Guatemala to China.

…"It's still unclear if the time he spent sitting in jail brought peace," said Meretz MK Yossi Beilin. "But that he travelled the world and helped so many different people, that can be said without a doubt. He made an enormous contribution to the world."

Others said they had never personally met Nathan, but were moved by his efforts at starting dialogues between enemies.

…"He sailed there in '72 to bring toys to kids in Gaza, and later he organized a summer camp in Ashdod for Israeli kids and kids from Gaza," Halper said. "The second thing is that he said in 1966 that Nasser wanted to talk peace with the Israelis, and no one listened to him. If they had, think of the countless lives that might have been saved and the terrible violence that might have been prevented."

Monday, August 25, 2008 - Israel Releases 198 Palestinian Prisoners As Abbas Says No Peace Without Releasing All Prisoners - Early Monday morning 198 Palestinian prisoners were released from Ofer Prison, near the West Bank city of Ramallah. Hundreds of relatives and Fatah members waited at the crossing for the prisoners, who were released by Israel as a gesture to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas addressed the gathering saying that despite the great happiness, there is also sadness over the 11,000 Palestinian prisoners who are still in Israeli prisons. He then promised that there will never be peace until all Palestinian prisoners are released.

Moscow to build Dead Sea hotel - Russian capital's municipality say hotel to be constructed 'around mud that heals skin diseases' specifically for country's residents, with a budget set aside to provide special healing treatments

GAZA   

Yedioth Aharonot, August 30 - Blockade-running activists tour Gaza Strip, vow to bring 10 students on return voyage - By Agence France Presse (AFP) - Gaza City: Dozens of human rights activists from 17 countries toured the Gaza Strip on Sunday after their two fishing boats were allowed in despite an Israeli naval blockade of the Hamas-ruled territory.

The group also said it plans to bring 10 Palestinian students to Cyprus on the return voyage in another bid to highlight Israel's strict restriction of movement into and out of the impoverished territory of 1.5 million people.

This is a symbolic mission, and the idea is to break the siege," Jeff Halper, the only Jewish Israeli member of the group, told AFP. "Israel should have no right to control the movement of Palestinians."

The group also met Ismail Haniyya, who has led the Hamas-run government in Gaza since he was dismissed as prime minister by President Mahmoud Abbas, whose forces were routed by Hamas in a week of bloody clashes last year.

Haniyya gave the activists honorary Palestinian citizenship and passports to Palestine…
   
Christian Science Monitor - In One Town, Gazans Yearn for Previous Israeli Presence - Rafael D. Frankel - Three years have passed since Israel withdrew from Gaza, and in that time the economy has gone from bad to worse. "I want [the Israelis] to come back," says Riyad al-Laham, an unemployed father of eight from Mawassi - a mixed ethnic Palestinian and Bedouin town located in the middle of Gush Katif - who worked in the area's Jewish settlements for nearly 20 years.

"All the Mawassi people used to work in the settlements and make good money. Now there is nothing to do. Even our own agricultural land is barren."
   
Before Israel withdrew, Mawassi was a town of fertile corn crops and greenhouses, which - like the ones in the Jewish settlements - grew cherry tomatoes, sweet peppers, and strawberries. Now, only shells remain of many of the greenhouses that were stripped of valuable materials. A town that fed itself with its produce and the money its men made from working with the settlers, Mawassi is now dependent on food handouts from the UN.

TERRORISM
  
Los Angeles Times, Aug.27 - Bogota, Colombia - Western anti-terrorism officials are increasingly concerned that Hezbollah, the Lebanon-based Shiite Muslim militia that Washington has labeled a terrorist group, is using Venezuela as a base for operations - Linked to deadly attacks on Jewish targets in Argentina in the early 1990s, Hezbollah may be taking advantage of Venezuela's ties with Iran, the militia's longtime sponsor, to move "people and things" into the Americas, as one Western government terrorism expert put it.

Arutz Sheva, Aug.18 - From Italian Press: We Signed Pact With Terrorists - (IsraelNN.com) In a letter appearing in the weekend edition of the respected Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera, former Italian President Francesco Cossiga revealed that the government of Italy agreed to allow Arab terrorist groups freedom of movement in the country in exchange for immunity from attacks in Italy.

Cossiga wrote that the government of the late Prime Minister Aldo Moro reached a "secret non-belligerence pact between the Italian state and Palestinian resistance organizations, including terrorist groups," in the 1970s. According to the former president, it was Moro himself who designed the terms of the agreement with the foreign Arab terrorists. Ironically, Moro later met his death at the hands of homegrown Italian terrorists, the Red Brigades, in 1978. ….

…In his letter, the former Italian president also linked the Arab terrorist groups of the 1970s with the Italian far-left. ….

In an article in Corriere della Sera the week before Cossiga's admission, a former leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) also claimed that his terror group and the Italian leadership had reached an accord protecting Italy from attack in exchange for Italian non-interference in PFLP activities in Italy.

The former PFLP boss, Bassam Abu Sharif, later became a senior member of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and personal advisor to the late terrorist leader Yasser Arafat.

While there were several terrorist attacks on targets in Italy in the years following the alleged "protection" deal, most of them could be traced to Abu Nidal's terrorist organization. Abu Nidal rejected the authority of the PLO leadership and many of his attacks, including those in Rome, were assassinations of PLO figures and other Arab diplomats.
   
RUSSIA   

Spiegel, Aug.18 - The Dangerous Neighbor - Vladimir Putin Takes on a Powerless West - Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin approached the crisis in Georgia coolly and efficiently, prompting admiration even from some American observers. But Moscow's brutal strike against Georgian President Saakashvili has divided the Western world, with the split running straight through the European Union.
   
Haaretz, Aug. 16 - In Depth:  The Russian empire strikes back - “The most immediate change will be felt in the Caucasus, a region of utmost strategic and economic importance for both Russia and the West.

The region’s natural gas reserves are even more important than its oil as a global weapon…oil is a fluid that can be purchased from Russia today, from Norway tomorrow and from Saudi Arabia next week. Gas, on the other hand, must be supplied via pipelines that cost billions of dollars to build.

Gas pipelines must pass through several countries and are extremely dependent on local political conditions….In the past few years, European countries have been trying to develop direct supply lines from Central Asia states holding large natural gas reserves. Europe‘s growing dependency on Russian oil and gas spurred the continent’s efforts to find alternatives, which is irritating Russia….

Europe is becoming increasingly dependent on Russia for energy. Massive projects have been planned in recent years such as the Nabucco Pipeline to bring Central Asia’s natural gas by way of the Caspian Sea and Georgia to the Mediterranean. We can forget about that project now.

Russia has made that very clear. Russia did not invade Kazakhstan, but rather a small country that is a bottleneck between Central Asia and the West. No one will want to take the risk of angering the Russians again.

…The issue was not South Ossetia but rather Russia’s status in the world.

…Russia has demonstrated the limits of US power and Moscow’s historic destiny as regional and world superpower. The Empire has struck back and shaken the order of the world.

RIA Novosti, August 25 - Medvedev says Russia ready to cut ties with NATO - Sochi, - President Dmitry Medvedev warned on Monday that Russia could sever all ties with NATO amid a standoff over Russia's response to Georgia's offensive in breakaway South Ossetia.

NATO suspended cooperation with Russia last week, and said "business as usual" could not resume until the country withdraws all troops from Georgia.

If NATO is not willing to cooperate with Moscow, "we will take any decision, up to terminating relations entirely," Medvedev told Russia's envoy to the alliance, Dmitry Rogozin.

…Medvedev said a decision to sever ties with NATO would be difficult, and that he hoped Russia would not be forced to take such a decision.

…NATO has sent warships into the Black Sea, reportedly to deliver humanitarian cargo to Georgia. Russia has questioned the nature of the cargo, and criticized the bloc's military build up in the area as destabilizing. …
   
Jerusalem Post, August 19 - Russia's deputy army chief, Col.-Gen. Anatoly Nogovitsyn, accused Israel on Tuesday of arming the Georgian military with mines, explosive charges, special explosives for clearing minefields and eight kinds of unmanned aerial vehicles - "In 2007, Israeli experts trained Georgian commandos in Georgia and there were plans to supply heavy weaponry, electronic weapons, tanks and other arms at a later date, but the deal didn't work out," Nogovitsyn told a Moscow press conference. Nogovitsyn also said that the Russian soldiers had detained 20 mercenaries near the Georgian city of Poti, including three Arabs, all wearing Georgian army uniforms.

Nogovitsyn also said that Israeli troops in 2007 had trained Georgian commando troops.

….Some of the Israeli sales with Georgia in the past included night-vision equipment, rifles and unmanned drones for gathering intelligence. Israel did not agree, however, to upgrade the drones to those that possess high intelligence-gathering capabilities, the defense officials said to have contributed to military cooperation.

MIDDLE EAST

August 21, 2008 - Syria And Russia Discuss New Weapons Deal In Face Of US-Polish Missile Agreement - Syrian President Bashar Assad arrived in Russia on Thursday for a two-day visit during which he is seeking to purchase advanced weaponry from Moscow ……
    
New York Times, Aug. 15 - Turkey: Energy Cooperation with Iran - Iran and Turkey have agreed to increase their cooperation on trading energy, President Abdullah Gul of Turkey said Thursday. His announcement, in Istanbul with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran, hurt efforts by the United States to isolate Iran economically to compel it to halt nuclear development. …

JEWISH  CULTURE
   
Timesunion.com, Aug.10 - Students return to Jewish cemetery in Belarus - Colonie - A group of Siena College students made their second summer trip to restore a Jewish cemetery destroyed by the Nazis during World War II and neglected by generations of villagers in Rubezhevichi, Belarus.

The Baltic Times - August 18, 2008 - Latvia : Compensation for Jewish community ? - RIGA - Latvian Prime Minister Ivars Godmanis has issued a decree ordering the Justice Ministry to set up a new workgroup to consider compensations to Latvia’s Jewish community for losses it suffered during the Holocaust, Neatkariga Riga newspaper reports.

The issue of compensations is being raised again after the prime minister received a letter from a global Jewish organization in the spring..

ANTI-SEMITISM

EJC reacts to recent anti-Semitic attacks, Aug.27 - Following the desecration of the Holocaust Memorial in Berlin, as well as recent acts of anti-Semitism in numerous countries in Europe, the European Jewish Congress calls upon the EU country members to strengthen the existing legislation against racism and anti-Semitism.   

Haaretz,  August, 8 - Opinion: U.K. better than most of Europe at reporting anti-Semitism - The half-yearly figures for anti-Semitic incidents in Britain released Thursday by the Community Security Trust (CST) show yet another unwelcome rise, this time by 9 percent since last year.

This follows several years of increasing numbers of racist attacks against British Jews, and would appear to support the widely-held belief that Britain has a particular problem with anti-Semitism.

Where statistics are concerned, though, it is always worth looking a little deeper to understand what they really show.

One reason why Britain repeatedly records more anti-Semitic incidents than most other European countries is simply because Britain, and the British Jewish community, is better at recording attacks on Jews. CST has been recording anti-Semitic incidents since 1984.

Our network of 3,000 volunteers and security officers in hundreds of Jewish buildings and organizations around the country work to ensure that Jewish people know who to contact if they suffer anti-Semitism. Having said that, many people who are victims of hate crimes do not always report it to CST or to the police.

Over the past year we have worked hard, in partnership with the Union of Jewish Students, to encourage Jewish students to tell us if they suffer from anti-Semitism. We have also improved our contacts with smaller, isolated Jewish communities beyond the main Jewish centeRs of London, Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds and Glasgow.

So it should not be a surprise that the figures released Thursday show a rise in reports of incidents involving students, both on and off campus, and a rise in anti-Semitic incidents reported from smaller Jewish communities.

….Nor does it explain the year-on-year rise in anti-Semitic incidents we have seen in Britain since the late 1990s. There has definitely been a step-change in the number of anti-Semitic attacks and they have become more violent at the same time.

In addition, anti-Semitic ideas and images that were previously confined to the political margins can now be found in mainstream discourse.

These developments have been recognized by many people beyond the Jewish community, of which the 2006 Parliamentary Inquiry into anti-Semitism provided a breakthrough moment. It agreed with many of the concerns of the Jewish community and challenged the government to take action: a challenge that the government has not shirked.

The Inquiry process, its findings and the government's response are unique and provide a model for other countries to follow. They are just one reason why anti-Semitism should not, and does not overshadow the positive experience of Jewish life in Britain.