February 15, 2012
Opinion: Israel should wait and watch
What should Israel do about Syria? The short answer is, well, nothing. Or not much. Or not much at this time. That is, if you care to follow the advice of Israeli experts — and we all should keep in mind that the experts’ stock has been in steep decline recently because of the so-called Arab Spring, a development that no expert can truthfully claim to have predicted.
We presented three experts this week with similar questions: Moshe Maoz, professor emeritus of Hebrew University’s Department of Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies; Itamar Rabinovich, professor and former president of Tel Aviv University, former ambassador to Washington, and Israel’s former chief negotiator with Syria; professor Eyal Zisser of the Moshe Dayan Center at Tel Aviv University.
[Full transcript, Shmuel Rosner with Moshe Maoz: ‘Assad will fall, but not so quickly’]
In addressing Israel’s relationship to the upheaval in Syria, three main questions need to be asked: Does Israel want Bashar al-Assad’s regime to fall? Should Israel do anything about it? And what should Israel do if and when the regime collapses?
The three scholars we contacted were in agreement on all three questions: 1.) It doesn’t matter what Israel wants. 2.) No, Israel should not intervene. 3.) Wait and see. As Rabinovich framed it: “Speculation upon speculation, hypothesis upon hypothesis, it’s premature to do that.” Israel has to wait to see what happens and not prepare “seven responses for seven potential scenarios.”
Is it better for Israel to have Assad winning the confrontation with the opposition groups?
“Some people think it is,” Maoz said. “We know him, and he’s pragmatic, and we can do business with him, so I suppose some Israelis — even leaders — feel like this.” Zisser, however, believes that “Israel came to the conclusion that it is in the interests of Israel that he should fall.”
So, what should Israel do now?
Israel should “condemn the massacres conducted by the regime,” Zisser said, a point that Maoz also emphasizes. But it can’t do much more. “Israel couldn’t do very much,” Maoz said. “Basically, Israel should not intervene militarily for the time being. I do think Israel should offer some humanitarian help to the refugees, because Syria is a next-door neighbor and it’s good also for PR. Israel has helped Haiti and Indonesia and I don’t know how many other countries, so why not help Syria, the next-door neighbor? Israel cannot do very much, except begin to tell Syrians that whatever happens, we sympathize with the freedom fighters, and, whatever happens, we would like to discuss peaceful relations with the next government, with the next regime in Syria.”
Rabinovich thinks the prospect for Israel “of Syrian refugees” is not “a major issue.”
“It will be natural for Syrian refugees to flow to Arab countries, like Lebanon, Jordan, even Iraq, also Turkey,” he said. Thus, “there is nothing much we can do about the domestic situation in Syria. The last thing the Syrian opposition needs is to be embraced or supported by us — it would undermine their legitimacy. And so, at this point, we should be passive, but attentive.”
Clearly, Israelis are mostly worried about proliferation of Syrian missiles and chemical weapons, should the regime fall.
“We have to be attentive,” Rabinovich said, “because we do not want the Syrians to provide chemical weapons or any other deadly systems to Hezbollah or any other terrorist groups; we do not want al-Qaeda to establish itself in Syria.”
Maoz believes that such developments would be the only pretext to necessitate Israeli intervention. “If heavy weapons, including missiles with chemical warheads, which Syria has, are going to be transferred to Hezbollah, Israel should intervene and destroy [them].”
Maoz and Rabinovich both believe Assad will not survive (Zisser is more cautious), but even if this is true, all three also believe that this eventuality could well take longer than previously assumed. “It may take quite some time,” Rabinovich said.
“The balance of power even now is still in his favor, unfortunately,” Maoz said. “He has the support of the military echelons, most of them are Alawite, but Sunni and Christian Syrians also support him. Many people don’t want chaos, and Christians, for example, are afraid that the Muslim Brotherhood will emerge and then they will be in trouble.”
As to what might happen after Assad falls, it is way too early to judge, the experts agree. “It’s one thing if he’s replaced by an internal coup, the other if there’s a popular rebellion, a third if the country descends into chaos,” Rabinovich said.
Maoz reminded that “a new regime might not be friendly, but it can still be pragmatic.” He believes that “the most powerful military power that will emerge out of the ashes could define the future of Syria. That could be a Sunni military force aligned with the Muslim Brotherhood.”
From the Israeli standpoint, one positive outcome if Assad doesn’t survive could be the weakening of Iran’s influence in the region. “Syria is not a match for Israel — Iran is a match — and there is a possibility that a Muslim Brotherhood state will disconnect past relations with Iran and with Hezbollah, who were supporting Assad, and this is going to be a very good gain for Israel,” Maoz said.
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Two Jews on Film: ‘This Mean War’ review [VIDEO]
Okay, so we have this cute girl who meets a sexy guy for coffee and they hit it off. A few minutes later (give or take) the same girl, meets another sexy guy, and they also hit it off.
Now in any normal situation, the girl would probably date both guys, right? Well, in ‘This Means War’ directed by McG…that’s not so simple.
The girl is Lauren Scott (Reese Witherspoon) and the two guys are FDR (Chris Pine) and Tuck (Tom Hardy). They happen to be, unbeknownst to Lauren, BFF’S and…CIA operatives.
Lauren has a successful career as a senior product evaluator for a leading consumer advocate publisher. It’s really much more interesting than it sounds. She has a very cool apartment and her own BFF, Trish (Chelsea Handler). What Lauren doesn’t have is a boyfriend and Trish is determined to fix that.
Trish signs Lauren up to an online dating service, and as fate would have it,…or at least the screenwriters, Timothy Dowling and Simon Kinberg, Tuck has also recently joined.
Tuck spots Lauren’s photo and he’s instantly hooked. They meet at the local mall for a quickie (date) and sparks fly.
After they say their goodbyes, a smitten Lauren wanders into a video store to rent a movie and…bumps into none other than…FDR. Note: The dude prowls video stores for women. It sounds worse than it is. Okay, FDR is a player.
Lauren and FDR also have instant chemistry. And….
What follows is Lauren trying to juggle both guys, and Tuck and FDR competiting with each other for her affection. And that’s where all the fun comes in.
I have to say that, what could have been perceived as, super creepy, is actually super funny.
Remember, these two guys are CIA agents…And what do CIA agents do? They spy…
FDR and Tuck not only place bugs, cameras and listening devices in Lauren’s apartment, so they can spy on her and each other, but they get their fellow CIA operatives to help them out in their…Who’s gonna get the girl first, mission.
Of course, you can’t have a spy movie without car chasses, kick ass fights and one or two nasty bad guys…Thanks to Henrich (Til Schweiger)an international arms dealer, who wants Tuck and FDR dead, we get all that as well.
Is ‘This Means War’ brilliant? Of course not. It’s not meant to be. But it is zany fun and yes…it’s definitely a chick flick. But one that guys will like as well…Especially when they see how romantic their date gets, afterwards.
Of course, that didn’t matter to John, the other half of ‘Two Jews On Film’. Check out our video to see what he thought and his bagel rating.
I gave ‘This Means War’ which opens in theatres, Friday, February 17, 2012, 3 1/2 bagels out of 5 because it made me laugh…a lot.
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Opinion: Dream big, y’all
In synagogue last Friday night, just after her sermon, the rabbi announced she had invited a special guest in honor of Jewish Disabilities Month.
The woman next to me leaned over and whispered. “What’s Jewish Disabilities Month?”
“That’s for Jews who get B’s in school,” I said.
Kidding, of course.
But in a culture that prides itself on education and achievement, there is a tendency to overlook those children, men and women who may never fit into the straight-A, Ivy League, graduate school and away-we-go model. Our norm is pretty exceptional.
One of the most moving stories I’ve reported for The Journal was on Dr. Michael Held, who in 1993 founded an organization called Etta Israel to make sure every Jewish child, regardless of his or her abilities, received a Jewish education. Held told me stories of families who kept their Down syndrome children locked in the house rather than allow the community to see them.
Things have changed for the better since then. Etta Israel now offers group homes, camp and Israel experiences, and Michelle Wolf, who created the first blog on the subject, Jews and Special Needs, at jewishjournal.com, charts the heartening growth of programs and opportunities seeking to include and assist people with disabilities.
These programs succeed — we as a community succeed — only when we stop viewing life as a race where just a select few make it to “the top.”
“What if instead of seeing life as a race,” Rabbi Naomi Levy wrote in her book “Hope Will Find You,” “we begin to see life as a hora?” — as a circle folk dance. “The question a person in a race asks is, How far ahead am I? The question a person in a dance asks is, How wide is my circle?”
It was Rabbi Levy who introduced the special guest at her Nashuva congregation services last Friday. The rabbi and I also happen to be married — I just call her Naomi — and our daughter, Noa, who turned 16 last weekend, has demonstrated each day the persistence and grace required to navigate the world when you aren’t, in the words of her bat mitzvah speech, “all put together.” But much of Noa’s success is due to the circle of educators, doctors, specialists, lawyers and friends who have devoted themselves to children with special needs, and to her.
The guest Naomi introduced was a 20-year-old Jewish rapper named Rio Wyles.
Wyles, clad in rapper chic — baggy pants, T-shirt, dark shades — stood silently on the bimah as Naomi recited his story.
At age 3, Wyles was diagnosed with autism. Specialists told his mother that his thinking would never rise above the abstract. But a succession of devoted specialists — Dr. Bill Takeshita, now affiliated with the Center for the Partially Sighted; cognitive therapist Shmuel Stoch, at the Yavneh Hebrew Academy; education therapist Carol Essey and others — helped him along. Wyles is now a proud graduate of the Academy of Music magnet program at Hamilton High School in Los Angeles, class of 2010.
At the age of 8, while browsing through the bins at Tower Records, Wyles told his mother, Judith Feldman, he intended to work in the music business. Doctors had warned her to keep her expectations in check.
“Do you want to work here?” Feldman asked her son, knowing even a record store might be a stretch.
“I want to be a rapper and own my own label,” Wyles shot back. “You gotta’ dream bigger than that, Mom.”
Rio Wyles transformed himself into the rapper Soulshocka.
He sought music mentors — Sam Kingston, Dave Stewart of Eurythmics fame and producer Joe Seabe at PASW Music Management.
As important as the professionals and friends who helped him were institutions like Vista Del Mar and its Miracle Project — whose founder and president, Elaine Hall, brought him to Nashuva — as well as Hamilton High and Day Jams, a summer rock music camp held at American Jewish University. Wyles was the first Day Jams camper with autism to be admitted — something his mother said transformed his life. Doors didn’t just open for Wyles — people chose to let him in.
Soulshocka performs along with the Miracle Project Fly Ensemble at autism-related charitable events, synagogues and elsewhere. He has a label, and a producer, Seabe. Soulshocka received the 2011 Autism Genius Award at Carnegie Hall, and a standing ovation last Friday night at Nashuva.
The two songs he performed were “We Will Prevail” and “Malfunction,” with music by Seabe and the lyrics by Wyles himself.
I’ll leave you with the chorus from “We Will Prevail.”
Walkin’ in a straight line
and never look back.
Never surrender when you’re
under attack.
Won’t be easy but you gotta stay strong.
Never give up cause the road is long. …
Somehow I know we will prevail.
We will not fail. We will prevail.
Somehow I know we will prevail.
We will not fail. We will prevail.
Somehow I know we will prevail.
Yeah.
Dream big, y’all.
Soulshocka.
I’m out.
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Opinion: The liberal case for Israel
For several years now, critics of Israel have been claiming that liberalism and democracy are in “crisis” in Israel. It’s what historian Gil Troy calls the “reddening of Israel, dismissing the Jewish state as a right-wing, religious, Republican project, increasingly foreign to cultured, blue-state Democrats.” Because American Jews are predominantly liberal and vote Democratic, these accusations, if left unchallenged, risk alienating many Jews from the Jewish state.
After all, if I’m a liberal concerned with things like human rights and social justice, how can I feel close to a country that I’ve been told neglects these concerns?
Our starting point, in the words of Catherine Ashton, High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, should be that democracy “can be awkward: thrilling, inspiring and liberating, but also messy, turbulent and unpredictable.”
Israel’s democratic journey has certainly been thrilling and turbulent, made even more complicated by two factors: One, Israel must constantly navigate the tension between its democratic ideal and its Jewish character, and two, it is surrounded by Jew-hating enemies sworn to its destruction.
Notwithstanding these complications, how can we gauge the health of Israel’s democracy? In my view, the test of a democracy is not whether it meets a perfect ideal, but whether it allows for the vigorous exercise of liberal freedoms. In other words, to what extent does Israel’s democracy give people the freedom to challenge the system and exercise their rights?
On that front, I met someone during my last visit to Israel — Gerald Steinberg of NGO Monitor — who gave me dramatic examples of these liberal freedoms. Here are a few:
Israel’s liberal democracy allows professors like Neve Gordon of Ben-Gurion University to call for a boycott of his own country.
It allows Israeli NGOs like Adalah to engage in campaigns that aim to delegitimize the Jewish state.
It allows organizations like the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICHAD) to participate in anti-Israel activities like the “Free Gaza” flotilla and receive funding from foreign governments hostile to Israel.
It allows human rights groups like Machsom Watch to monitor and heckle Israeli soldiers at checkpoints.
It allows groups like Boycott From Within to call for academic, cultural and business boycotts against Israel and hold demonstrations that demonize Israel and accuse it of being an apartheid state.
It allows groups like Coalition of Women for Peace to visit the family of the murderers of the Fogel family and to publicly condemn the Israeli investigation.
It allows Israeli NGOs like B’Tselem to provide dubious and damaging information to the United Nations-sponsored Goldstone Report, much of which was subsequently retracted by Goldstone himself.
It allows groups like Breaking the Silence to go on road shows publicizing allegations of “war crimes” against the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).
It allows anti-Israel Palestinian LGBT groups like Aswat and Al-Qaws to operate out of Israel and engage in activities that demonize Israel.
It allows anti-Semitic Israeli-Arab NGOs like Ittijah to publicize during the Gaza War that “the IDF is turning Gaza into a kind of extermination camp, in the full sense of the word and with the full historical relativity.”
It allows full access to the Israeli Supreme Court to human rights groups that get funding from countries hostile to Israel.
It allows Arab members of the Knesset to engage with Israel’s enemies and visit with terror groups like Hamas.
The list goes on, but you get the idea: Israel is home to a staggering amount of liberal activity, some of it even harmful to the state. And in addition to the hundreds of human rights groups, there is also an abundance of critical journalism, art, literature and film that is spawned by Israel’s open society.
Does this mean there are no flaws in Israel’s democracy? Of course not. Like every democracy, Israel has its share of racists and extremists. But what it does mean is that if you want to criticize Israel’s democracy, you’d better make sure to include the whole picture: Israel is a tiny nation under siege trying to balance its democratic and Jewish character while still allowing enormous freedom for people to challenge the system.
Fairness and balance are liberal virtues. Creating hysteria by unleashing over-the-top criticism and using words like “crisis” demonstrates neither fairness nor balance. It’s an alarmist approach that might be good for fundraising and selling books, but it distorts the truth and undermines Israel. Liberal critics who claim to love Israel should practice what they preach — they should promote healthy debate, not verbal fistfights.
I won’t be looking for a fight when I speak at the J Street convention in Washington, D.C., next month. I will promote words like “context” rather than “crisis.” I will argue that single-minded criticism of Israel’s democracy is not likely to attract liberal Jews to the Zionist cause, but that a full picture of a courageous and messy democracy stands a better chance.
I will tell my liberal audience that the real crisis is not with Israel’s democracy, but with one-sided critics who contribute to the popular slander that liberal Zionism is on its deathbed.
David Suissa is president of TRIBE Media Corp./Jewish Journal and can be reached at davids@jewishjournal.com.
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Yes or No? What Do Israelis Believe Will Happen With Iran?
Several have written to ask me what Israelis are thinking about Iran. Since I have arrived here I have been asking that question of everyone I encounter. All I need to say is “Yes or No?” and everyone knows what I am talking about. Everyone is thinking and worrying about Iran, but going about their daily lives as if there is no problem at all. The cafes are full. Kids are in school. People are going to work, seeing friends, and celebrating Shabbat with their families and dear ones.
Two very plugged-in Israeli friends, each of whom is close to the leadership of the country, had opposite views. One said to me, “I think it is a 90% probability that Israel will attack Iran between March and June of this year, because Israel simply cannot allow Iran to become nuclear.” The other said the opposite. “It isn’t going to happen. There will not be a war. It’s not in anyone’s interest. Pakistan has a bomb. We’ve got the bomb. So what!?”
Part of the angst that people naturally feel both here and in America is fed by the media that reports everything related to Iran’s nuclear program. The rhetoric and saber rattling is noisy, harsh and relentless. Yes, Iran has a brutal anti-Semitic government obsessively fixated on Israel and we would be fools to ignore the threat the Iranians pose. However, conventional wisdom says that if there is talk about it, it isn’t going to happen. When the talk stops, then we should worry.
It is the thinking of many here that Prime Minister Netanyahu and Defense Minister Barak have ratcheted up the rhetoric as a strategic move to pressure President Obama to push harder on sanctions and hopefully provoke protests in Iran that will lead to regime change. Sanctions are having a biting effect and anything could ignite street protests leading to an Iranian spring.
In this election year, an attack against and possible war with Iran led by the United States is remote in the view of most observers. It is the same for Netanyahu who is considering calling early elections to solidify his current popularity in a new Knesset.
If either Israel or the United States were to initiate an attack, Israel can expect missiles to fall on Tel Aviv. When Israelis are killed as a consequence of either Bibi or Obama making the first move, both can reasonably expect to suffer at the polls in their respective re-election bids.
What are Israelis thinking? Everything!
Do they believe there will be a war? Some yes – others no.
Will there be a war? Who knows?
I have also asked everyone here another question – my young ulpan teacher, senior citizens, soldiers, human rights activists, rabbis, working Israelis, everyone I talk to -“Are you an optimist or a pessimist about the future?” To a person each smiles and says, “Yes, I’m an optimist! I couldn’t live here if I didn’t feel optimistic.”
I too worry, but in the end I agree with most Israelis. Call me an idealist, a romantic, an optimist, a fool. But as I too tend to say what Israelis say, Yehiye b’seder (Everything – God willing – will be fine.)
Shalom mi’Yerushalayim.
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Jodi Rudoren of the New York Times, I hope I’m wrong
A couple of days ago, I had a conversation with a Jewish official who bitterly complained about the New York Times’ choice for its new Jerusalem correspondent. He didn’t even mentioned the name, as far as I remember, just told me she had no experience in the region and no knowledge of Middle East and Israel matters (late update: Rudoren did write about Israel in the past, something he did not know or did not think was enough to be considered as “experience”). The New York Times’ relations with official Israel are pretty bad already, and sending a rookie writer – rookie on such sensitive matters – will make relations even more troublesome. I thought he was probably overreacting – that’s one’s usual reaction to any complaint from Jewish professionals, isn’t it? – and now I am awaiting his “I-told-you-so” call.
Wednesday, I was tweeting my day through the barrage of reaction to Adam Kredo’s story on Jodi Rudoren’s, well, rookie mistake. “The New York Times’ newly appointed Jerusalem bureau chief played Twitter footsie on Tuesday with some of Israel’s most extreme non-terrorist critics,” he wrote. And later added that Rudoren also “took to Twitter to praise Peter Beinart’s forthcoming The Crisis of Zionism which she called ‘terrific: provocative, readable, full of reporting and reflection’.”
Thus, Rudoren’s stint in Jerusalem ended before it even started. Well, not officially ended. But for all practical matters this is going to be an uneasy assignment for her to successfully navigate. I’m sure she’s a good writer and a fine reporter, I’m sure it didn’t mean much, or maybe she didn’t understand it did. The problem is that “when you have just been named the Times Jerusalem bureau chief, that may be a good time to hold off” tweeting, as Tablet’s Marc Tracy explained. And she didn’t “hold off”, and it is too late to give her such advice.
Yesterday, Jeffrey Goldberg wrote and tweeted about Rudoren’s mistake. She has to stop acting as if she were a J Street official, he wrote, but later tweeted that she “can un-tag herself as a J Street-proxy pretty quickly by doing a good job reporting”.
No, she can’t.
She can write from Jerusalem of course, as I expect she might still do. She can write fine stories from Jerusalem, she can have sources and can gain more knowledge and can even break some news. What she will not be able to do is to pretend to be unbiased. What she will not be able to do is to have good sources at the very top – at the offices of government in which people are already quite suspicious of the Times and will now be even more suspicious. Wouldn’t you be? With these people she’s probably toast, and without them she can’t be as good as a NYT Jerusalem reporter could be.
So here’s what’s going to happen: Rudoren will be told by her superiors to lay low and restart her period of Israel education. The decision to send her to Israel will not be reversed – a matter of journalistic independence and pride. The watchdogs of such matters will be alerted, they will constantly heckle her, every word interpreted, every nuance parsed. Letters to the editor will be sent. Complaints will be filed. No one will ever give her any benefit of the doubt. If her stories are critical of Israel, it will be a sign that she really is biased. If her stories are more positive, people will start whispering that she’s pandering to win back the confidence of official Israel.
All this is probably unfair to Rudoren. She doesn’t seem like the archenemy of all things Israel, she doesn’t seem like someone deserving of all the animosity and the acrimony and resentment. She made one foolish mistake, and can’t take it back since people already know what she really thinks, how she really feels. And she will not be easily forgiven for being honest about it (Rudoren was interviewed yesterday by Dylan Byers and said that “maybe six months from now I’ll decide that you can’t tweet as the Jerusalem bureau chief of the New York Times, but I think that would be really sad, because a lot of people get their news from Twitter”).
If she were to ask my advice (which I do not expect to happen even if she ever reads this post) I wouldn’t know what to tell her. Not to go? To go and do her best under these miserable circumstances? Once in a while a writer would like to be proven wrong – and this is one such case for me. I wish I could write again about Rudoren a year from now, and I hope I’d be able to apologize and take back my prediction about her.
Good luck Jodi Rudoren. And welcome to Israel.
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Opinion: Thank you Planned Parenthood
Amid all the hubris and rancor flying around the subject of women’s reproductive rights these days, I suggest we stop for a moment and send a word of thanks to Planned Parenthood for its 100 years of caring for both women and men with nowhere else to turn — almost 50 of those years in Los Angeles.
This venerable organization is well known for offering every kind of gynecological care, including birth control and, in a small percentage of cases, when requested, terminating unwanted pregnancies. But it also performs vasectomies for men, and sex education for middle- and high-school students — including peer-advocate programs — as well as parent and adult education.
At Roosevelt High School in Boyle Heights, for example, Planned Parenthood set up a clinic inside the school. In a single semester before the clinic, there were 34 positive pregnancy tests among students. In the semester after Planned Parenthood arrived, just three students became pregnant. And those benefits are both short- and long-term: Think of the teens whose futures were saved, who did not have to face the choice of having an abortion or aborting their own childhood. Think also of the public money saved on medical care for the teen mom and public programs for the unintended child. Roosevelt is living evidence that even a single office can have dramatic results, while the absence of intervention is extremely costly, both financially and emotionally.
And yet, Planned Parenthood has become the new curse word for some on the campaign trail, as well as among Catholic bishops and on the pulpits of some churches. Mystifying as it might seem, the question of women’s reproductive rights — birth control — is coming under fire. And it’s not just the “old dudes” who are fussing, as Jon Stewart so aptly suggested Monday night in a segment brilliantly titled “The Vagina Ideologues.” Women, including Sarah Palin, have jumped on board, too. (It is worth noting, however, that while still governor, in 2009, Palin reportedly appointed a Planned Parenthood board member to the Alaska Supreme Court. Go figure).
So, in light of all this, I made a visit last week to Planned Parenthood’s Los Angeles headquarters, realizing I had no idea what it’s like to go there. The headquarters are located in a bright-blue building on 30th Street, just south of downtown, not far from the USC campus. They’ve recently renovated an industrial structure, and while I sat waiting in the lobby for my guide, I was struck by how pleasant it was to be there — everyone coming into the offices that morning greeted one another with big smiles. Perhaps it’s the leadership, or maybe the sense of purpose in the workplace.
I toured the clinic, one of 18 Planned Parenthood health care centers in Los Angeles. It is well appointed and well thought-through: Recovery rooms, for example, allow for lots of sun, because light can help in healing. There were also plenty of private consultation rooms for doctors, conference rooms for classes, a library for resource materials, and, most interesting, the call room, where the initial contact with clients for all the centers is made.
Rocio Ayala, the customer service center manager, heads the couple of dozen phone screeners, who collectively take between 2,000 and 2,400 calls each day. That’s about 100 calls per screener per day, each call lasting about two minutes, Ayala said — and those minutes can change lives. All the operators are required to be fluent in both English and Spanish, and they have easy access to interpreters for every other possible language clients might use. Ayala, who is Latino, told me that many of the callers are seeking health care for the first time in their lives: “We’re the place that people can turn to when nobody else can help them.” Planned Parenthood takes health insurance, but it also offers services and birth control for little or for free, depending upon need. For the uninsured, out-of-pocket birth control can average around $50 per month, not affordable for those on the poverty line, said Serena Josel, deputy director of the L.A. offices. “For 60 percent of our patients,” she said, “we are their primary care provider.”
Sue Dunlap, CEO and president of Planned Parenthood, Los Angeles, has been with the organization for 13 years. She said the current controversy doesn’t surprise her, though she did sound a bit weary of the attacks on the organization’s mission. After all, she pointed out, studies have found that 99 percent of sexually active women in the United States use some form of birth control at some point. And one in five women in the United States will utilize the resources of Planned Parenthood in their lifetime. I can say anecdotally I know this to be true, based on my own women friends, Jewish friends included, who’ve gone there at one point or another in their lives — while short on cash for a doctor or just not knowing where to turn.
(For the record, Jewish law permits abortion in some circumstances, even requires it when the mother’s life is in danger, and birth control is permitted for married couples as long as the mitzvah of having children is also part of the plan. Some forms of birth control, such as the pill, are preferred over others, because they do not block or destroy the seed.)
The Guttmacher Institute, a nonprofit dedicated to advancing reproductive health worldwide, reports that 1.6 billion women worldwide are of childbearing age, 62 million of them in the United States, and that the average age that Americans have sex for the first time is 17. Given all that, the issue of containing unwanted pregnancies must be a burning concern for us all. More and more people are seeking help from Planned Parenthood in recent years, Dunlap said, and that’s because the economy has made them more “deliberate about having access to contraception.”
So why are we even talking about Planned Parenthood except in glowing terms?
“I wish I still found it surprising,” Dunlap said. “I do find it shocking. I hope there will come a time when we say, ‘Enough is enough.’ ” She is especially concerned for the younger generation, who don’t realize that they “can’t take access to birth control for granted,” she said.
“This is access to basic care.”
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Russia urges ‘serious’ search for compromise with Iran
Russia said global powers must work harder to win concessions from Iran over its nuclear program, warning that Tehran’s desire for compromise is decreasing as it moves closer to being able to build atomic weapons.
Making a case for a renewed dialogue with Iran, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said four rounds of U.N. sanctions and additional measures by Western nations had had “zero” effect on its nuclear program.
“There is an alternative. The alternative is the introduction of a serious negotiations process with the Iranian side,” Ryabkov, Moscow’s pointman for Iran diplomacy, said in a interview posted on the ministry’s website on Wednesday.
He said it would require “serious intent on the part of those holding this dialogue to seek compromises and propose a solution scheme that could interest the Iranian side.”
His remarks were posted hours after Iran announced advances including faster centrifuges for uranium enrichment, but also expressed readiness for new talks with global powers on a nuclear program Western states fear is aimed at atomic arms.
Ryabkov emphasized that “an Iran with nuclear weapons is not an option for Russia” but said there was no “hard, unequivocal evidence” that nuclear work which Tehran says is for purely civilian purposes was in fact aimed at producing a bomb.
“We have no smoking gun confirming the presence of a military component and a military aspect of the Iranian nuclear program,” he said in the interview with the journal Security Index.
Talks between Iran on one side and the United States, Britain, France, Russia, China and Germany on the other broke off a year ago with no progress in persuading Tehran to rein in its nuclear program and prove it is not seeking atomic weapons.
Russia, which built Iran’s first nuclear power plant and has far warmer ties with Tehran than Western nations do, has often stressed the need for talks and said too much pressure on Tehran was counterproductive. Ryabkov suggested time was not on the side of the world powers.
As its nuclear program advances, he said, Tehran “is gradually losing interest in discussing variants of deals in which, in exchange for certain steps to limit and suspend a series of elements of its nuclear program, Iran would receive only some cosmetic improvements in its situation.”
BAZAAR BARGAINING
“We are concerned that the distance separating Iran from the hypothetical possession of the technologies for the creation of nuclear weapons is decreasing,” Ryabkov said. “This is precisely why we believe it’s necessary to reach an agreement.”
Russia approved four rounds of sanctions in the U.N. Security Council in recent years, but says sanctions have exhausted their potential and criticizes the United States and European Union for imposing further punishments on Tehran.
“The result of these sanctions is, in the end, zero,” Ryabkov said.
He suggested Western nations should use fewer threats and more attractive offers.
“The bargaining starts with a price that has no relation to reality,” he said. “But if they see the buyer is not just wandering around the bazaar, that he really wants to buy this carpet, then the serious bargaining begins.
“But they will never just give the carpet away for free, and they certainly will not do so if the buyer takes a club or, worse, a pistol from his pocket,” he said, apparently referring to speculation that Israel could attack Iranian nuclear sites and to the U.S. refusal to rule out a military option.
Ryabkov laid out some details of a Russian “step-by-step” plan in which sanctions would be eased in return for verifiable steps by Tehran.
As a start, he said, Iran could freeze the number of centrifuges for uranium enrichment at current levels and place other restrictions on its centrifuge use. In return, global powers would refrain from slapping new sanctions on Tehran.
Later, the powers could try to ease Iran’s security concerns, “right up to measures of trust in naval activity in nearby bodies of water,” he said, a reference to tension between the United States and Iran over the Strait of Hormuz.
Editing by Andrew Roche
Russia urges ‘serious’ search for compromise with Iran Read More »
Matisyahu Beard.0: the Jewish reggae star is bringing the beard back
It’s been years since Jewish reggae artist Matisyahu ” title=”shaved his glorious beard” target=”_blank”>shaved his glorious beard.
At the time he said:
I felt that in order to become a good person I needed rules—lots of them—or else I would somehow fall apart. I am reclaiming myself. Trusting my goodness and my divine mission
Fans were concerned that this was an ” title=”bringing the beard back” target=”_blank”>bringing the beard back. That much can be seen from the image (right) that he tweeted.
So why the change of heart? Did Matisyahu just need a change of pace? Or is he indicating another spiritual shift?
Matisyahu Beard.0: the Jewish reggae star is bringing the beard back Read More »