Euronews, Nov, 19 - Herman Van Rompuy is the European President - Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Belgium, the Fleming Herman Van Rompuy gained substantial favour as a candidate for the new job of full-time European Union President relatively late in the game. It was his consensus-building skill holding a challenging coalition together at home which grabbed attention.

Pragmatic rather than charismatic was how at least one analyst described him. He is a Jesuit-educated former economics professor. He earned praise for getting opposing language communities who were tearing at the very fabric of Belgium to sit down with each other. Discretion won him points, but critics said his cool exterior concealed a degree of cynicism.

He is a steadfast devotee of NATO and the US. His backing by France and Germany did not endear him to all the other EU members. Diplomats have said what may be most in Van Rompuy’s favour is that so few people have heard of him.

Foreign policy

Catherine Ashton has had little foreign affairs experience. She was appointed a member of the British parliament’s upper house, the House of Lords, as a life peer, ten years ago. She was made a Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State in Education, then for Constitutional Affairs, then at the new Ministry of Justice.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown appointed her to his cabinet, as Leader of the House of Lords. Last year she was nominated as the UK’s member in the European Commission, where she picked up the trade portfolio. She holds the title Baroness Ashton of Upholland.

Ultimately, the European Socialists gave her their full backing for the new EU post, to be the centre-left’s counterbalance to the centre-right EU President Herman Van Rompuy.

Jewish leaders urge Germans to remember Kristallnacht - Berlin - AFP - German Jewish leaders urged the country Monday to remember November 9 as not only the date the Berlin Wall fell, but also as the anniversary of the Nazi Kristallnacht pogrom in 1938.   

Kristallnacht, seen as a prelude to the Holocaust, saw Nazi thugs attack hundreds of synagogues and Jewish businesses across Germany.   Around 90 Jews were killed and some 30,000 Jewish men were arrested for deportation to concentration camps.   

The pretext for the orgy of violence was the murder of German diplomat Ernst vom Rath in Paris by a student, Herschel Grynspan, who sought revenge for the expulsion of his family from Germany with about 15,000 other Polish Jews.   

Meanwhile in the Serbian capital Belgrade, around 200 people protested Monday against far-right groups on the International Day against Fascism and Anti-Semitism which is organised to coincide with the Kristallnacht anniversary.

Too many walls remain, says UNESCO Director-General elect on Berlin Wall anniversary - Paris, 9 November - On the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, UNESCO Director-General-elect, Irina Bokova, warned world leaders against complacency in the quest for freedom, human rights and cultural diversity, stressing that the battles for these universal values were not yet won.

“The fall of the Berlin wall, twenty years ago, was an event of immense historical importance for world peace and the advance of democracy,” Ms Bokova said. “It was the start of a new era, giving rise to hopes, not just in Eastern Europe but around the world, for a better life. A page had been turned.”

ISRAEL

Israel No. 4 in scientific activity worldwide - Jerusalem Post, Nov. 18, 2009 - By Abe Selig - Israel's in fourth in global scientific activity, ranking just behind Switzerland, Sweden and Denmark for the number of scientific publications per citizen, according to a report presented at Bar-Ilan University in Ramat Gan on Monday.

Based on figures from 2005, the report, which was compiled by the Council for Higher Education, also shows that in that year alone, Israeli scientists and researchers published 6,309 essays and articles in foreign scientific journals. According to those figures, nearly 1 percent (.089%) of all scientific publications in 2005 came from Israel.

While impressive, that number was a slight drop from previous years. In 1997, for example, 1.03% of all scientific publications came from Israel.

Additionally, citations of Israeli publications by other scientists were extremely high. According to the report, Israel Institute of Technology-Technion professor Avram Hershko, who won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 2004, published 148 articles and was cited more than 16,000 times.

Finland, the Netherlands and Canada followed Israel in the report, while the United States placed 12th, and Germany placed 15th. Japan, Britain and Russia also fell behind Israel.

Israel's role in global scientific activity is nearly 10 times the size of its percentage of the world's population, the report shows.

Despite the promising findings, however, the Council for Higher Education's Planning and Budgeting Committee on Monday warned that new research centers around the world could pose a threat to the status of Israeli universities.

According to committee members, the relative drop in Israel's scientific activity from previous years was based on the fast growth rate of research centers in developing countries like China and India, while the number of scientists at Israeli universities is dwindling due to the brain drain, the emigration of skilled academics from the country to higher-paying jobs abroad.
                             
November 18 - Israel News - Ban Ki-moon condemns plan to expand Gilo - By Yitzhak Benhorin, AP - UN secretary-general, state heads harshly criticize government's decision to construct 900 housing units at disputed southern Jerusalem neighborhood. Ban: Such actions undermine efforts for peace, plan is blatant expansion of settlement

Euronews, Nov 16 - Palestinians have announced new moves in a bid to secure international support for an independent state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip - They plan to take their case to the UN Security Council, frustrated at the lack of progress in talks with Israel.

Saeb Erekat who is the Palestinian chief negotiator stressed that they were not acting alone. “Palestinians are not going to take any unilateral steps. Palestinians and Arabs are seeking in consultation with the Europeans, the Russians, the UN, the African group, the Latin group, the Asian group and others along with the Americans to see the possibility of having the Security Council pass a resolution to recognize the two-state solution on the 67 borders,” he said.

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu responded with a warning. “There is no substitute to negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority and any unilateral path will only unravel the framework of agreements between us and will only bring unilateral steps from Israel’s side,” he said.
Netanyahu has called for a swift resumption of peace talks that have been stalled for a year. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is demanding a halt to Israeli construction in the occupied West Bank before that can happen.

IRAN

New York Times, November 17, 2009 - Inspectors Fear Iran Is Hiding Nuclear Plants - By David E. Sanger and William J. Broad - Washington - International inspectors who gained access to Iran’s newly revealed underground nuclear enrichment plant voiced strong suspicions in a report on Monday that the country was concealing other atomic facilities.

The report was the first independent account of what was contained in the once secret plant, tunneled into the side of a mountain, and came as the Obama administration was expressing growing impatience with Iran’s slow response in nuclear negotiations.

In unusually tough language, the International Atomic Energy Agency appeared highly skeptical that Iran would have built the enrichment plant without also constructing a variety of other facilities that would give it an alternative way to produce nuclear fuel if its main centers were bombed. So far, Iran has denied that it built other hidden sites in addition to the one deep underground on a military base about 12 miles north of the holy city of Qum. The inspectors were given access to the plant late last month and reported that they had found it in “an advanced state” of construction, but that no centrifuges — the fast-spinning machines needed to make nuclear fuel — had yet been installed…….

MEMRI, Nov 16 - The current clashes between the Saudi security forces and Iranian-backed Houthi rebels who have infiltrated Saudi Arabia from Yemen have intensified the steadily escalating conflict between Iran and Saudi Arabia - In a column titled "The Houthis Are the Yemeni Hizbullah," Saudi columnist Muhammad bin 'Abd Al-Latif Aal Al-Sheikh wrote: "The situation in northern Yemen and in the south of our country, and the situation in Lebanon, are identical [reflections] of Iran's aspirations [and its method of] exploiting the sectarian dimension to further the next Persian agenda."
   
Iranian officials rejected the Saudi accusations, and made threatening statements. Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said about the fighting in Yemen: "We firmly warn the countries in the region and [our] neighbors against interfering in Yemen's internal affairs." An article in the daily Iran, which is associated with the Ahmadinejad government, claimed: "This war, which has been forced on the Shi'ites in Yemen, is a coordinated conspiracy by America and several Arab governments in the region, particularly Wahhabi ones...as evidenced by the fact that Saudi Arabia has occupied three Yemeni provinces and some 10 Yemeni islands...and is unwilling to withdraw from them, because they are very rich in oil."

OBAMA  IN  CHINA

Times, Nov. 17 - Obama urges China over Tibet and human rights - He affirms universal rights for all Chinese citizens and urges Beijing to resume talks with Dalai Lama..

Times, Nov. 17 - Obama in Shanghai criticizes internet censorship.

Times, Nov. 17 - China rounds up dissidents as Obama arrives - Beijing authorities detain dozens of activists to prevent them trying to approach US president.

EUROPE AND ISRAEL
       
European Jewish Press, Nov 10 - EU and Israel sign new agricultural agreement - Brussels (EJP) - The European Union and Israel have signed an agricultural agreement under which 80 percent of Israeli exported fresh products are totally exempt from all taxes and leaves.

The agreement was signed last week by Israel’s ambassador to the European Union, Ran Curiel, and his Swedish counterpart, Christian Danielsson. Sweden currently holds the rotating EU presidency.
The new agreement ratified in Brussels updates the original agricultural agreement signed in the 1970's as a result of lengthy negotiations led by Israel's Ministry of Agriculture and the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Labor.

Access to the markets of both sides has been greatly improved. In the processed agricultural products sector, over 95% of the products will be exempt from all taxes or levies. Considerable liberalization was undertaken in regards to all areas of fresh produce and approximately 80% will be exempt from all customs restrictions.

Each year, around one billion euros of Israeli agricultural and processed food products are exported to the EU.

Europe is Israel's most important trading partner in the agricultural field. More than 25% of Israel's agricultural products and more than 75% of its total fresh agricultural products are exported to European countries.

During the signing ceremony at the EU Council building, Israel’s ambassador Ran Curiel noted that 60 % of the Israeli agricultural exports to Europe come from the Arava region and Negev desert, in the South of the country, where rainfall does not exceed 50 millimeters per year.
Israel uses the world's leading technologies in the intensive production of fruits, vegetables and flowers.

Most of Israel's agricultural activities are conducted in periphery and desert areas. Both Israel and the EU view the existence of active and modern rural areas as essential as they are used to preserve open spaces and prevent rapid urbanization processes.

The Israeli ambassador also stressed that oranges and flowers are not anymore the products topping Israel’s exports. The country offers to the European consumer a broad and diverse range of fresh and processed food products.

The EU-Israel agreement is one element in the wide range of existing agreements between the two parties, including the Israel-EU Association Agreement, the Israeli-EU Action Plan as part of the European Neighborhood Policy (ENP), the Euro-Mediterranean partnership, as well as Israel's participation in several European programs and agencies, such as the Seventh Framework Programme for Research and Technological Development.

Another agreement on “mutual recognition of industrial products and conformity assessment” is to be signed within a few weeks.
In 2008, Israeli exports to Europe reached close to 18 billion dollars while exports from the EU to Israel reached 22,5 billion dollars.
This year marks 50 years since the EU and Israel established diplomatic relations.
 
Haaretz, Nov 16 - Boxing / Yuri Foreman takes world title with TKO - Rabbi-in-training is first Israeli champ - San Francisco - Yuri Foreman late Saturday night became the first Israeli to claim a professional boxing crown when he defeated Daniel Santos of Puerto Rico to take the WBA junior middleweight (under-70 kilogram) title on points.

Foreman, a Belarus-born Israeli who has lived in Brooklyn for 10 years and is studying to be an Orthodox rabbi, won the 12-round bout by unanimous decision - 116-110, 117-109 and 117-10