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December 31, 2012

Yasser Arafat planned the second intifada, his widow says

Yasser Arafat planned the second intifada, his widow said in a television interview.

Suha Arafat said the late PLO leader told her about his plans in Paris immediately following the failed summit at Camp David in 2000 featuring Arafat, President Bill Clinton and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak.

“(H)e said to me, ‘You should remain in Paris.’ I asked him why, and he said, ‘Because I am going to start an intifada,' ” Suha Arafat recalled earlier this month during an interview with Dubai TV, according to a translation released this week by the Middle East Media Research Institute. ” 'They want me to betray the Palestinian cause. They want me to give up on our principles, and I will not do so.’ ”

He also spoke of leaving his legacy to his daughter, Zahwa.

“ ‘I do not want Zahwa’s friends in the future to say that Yasser Arafat abandoned the Palestinian cause and principles,” Suha Arafat quoted her husband as saying. ” 'I might be martyred, but I shall bequeath our historical heritage to Zahwa and to the children of Palestine.' ”

The international community blamed the start of the second intifada on a September 2000 visit to the Temple Mount by Ariel Sharon, then the prime minister of Israel.

At the request of his wife, Yasser Arafat's body was exhumed last month to test for radioactive poisoning after traces of the radioactive isotope polonium were found on his clothing, which has been in storage since his death in a Paris military hospital in 2004.

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Several eras end at one Lower East Side building

The collapse and demolition in 2006 of the First Roumanian-American Congregation synagogue at 89 Rivington Street — the “cantors’ Carnegie Hall” — seemed to have eradicated almost every trace of what was once a large and vibrant Jewish community.

But it had not. There is a remarkable vestige of the First Roumanian-American Congregation at 70 Hester Street, between Allen and Orchard Streets. It is the synagogue that the congregation built in 1860 and expanded as its membership grew, before moving to the much larger sanctuary on Rivington Street.

Read more at cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com.

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Hitler statue unveiled outside former Warsaw Ghetto

An Italian artist reportedly placed a statue of Adolf Hitler in a building outside what used to be the Warsaw Ghetto.

The statue, which depicts Hitler kneeling and is titled “Him,” is part of a new exhibition by Maurizio Cattelan titled “Amen,” according to the Simon Wiesenthal Center.

In a statement Thursday, the center called the display a “tasteless misuse of art.”

Efraim Zuroff, the center's Israel director, referred to the statue as “a senseless provocation which insults the memory of the Nazis' victims.”

The statue reportedly was placed in the Center for Contemporary Art in Warsaw last month and recently opened to the public. The art center’s website describes the exhibition as an exploration of the notion of “love thy enemy,” adding, “What does forgive  those who trespass against us mean? Evoking the traumas of history, they deal with memory and forgetfulness, good and evil.”

In the summer of 1942, about 300,000 Jews were deported from Warsaw to the Nazi death camp Treblinka.

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Israeli Supreme Court shortens whistleblower’s prison term

Israel's Supreme Court on Monday shortened by a year the 4-1/2-year prison term of a soldier who gave a journalist classified military documents, some relating to operations against Palestinian militants.

Ruling on Anat Kamm's appeal against the length of her sentence, the court said it was disproportionate to the penalty of four months of community service imposed on Uri Blau, a reporter for Haaretz, an Israeli left-wing daily.

Some of the 700 classified documents copied by Kamm, a clerk in a general's headquarters during her 2005-2007 army service, were the basis for reports by Blau that some assassinations of Palestinian militants authorized by senior officers may have violated Israeli law.

In 2006, the Supreme Court ruled the military had the right to assassinate members of Palestinian groups that Israel classifies as terrorist organizations. But the court said planners must have “strong and convincing” information that a killing is necessary and always try to avoid harming bystanders.

Although Blau's reports were submitted to the military censor, who approved their publication, he was accused of illegally possessing classified documents and agreed to a plea bargain in July.

Kamm, who cited ideological motives for her actions, admitted in a plea bargain to charges of espionage, collection and possession of secret information and passing it onwards. She began serving her sentence in November 2011.

Writing by Jeffrey Heller; Editing by Mark Heinrich

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This week from Israel

Rare findings from the First Temple era were found near Jerusalem
Road excavation at a new section of the Tel Aviv-Jerusalem Highway led to a unique archeological discovery from the first temple era. The ritual building that was found is one of very few findings from Judea during this time. 

Read more “> listed in Lonely Planet’s “Top Ten Hedonistic Cities Worldwide” list, there was a 4% increase in Israel tourism.  Is Israel on its way to become a common tourist destination?

Read more “>here.

 

The Pirates which desire Israel
They only go by first names, and believe that all decisions should be made by everyone together, online, only.” Election Day in Israel is less than a month away, and turns out two Pirates parties are striving for some seats in the Knesset.

Read more “>here.

 

Iron Dome contractor reveals some secrets…
Natan Barak, CEO of mPrest Systems,  gavea fascinating presentation at the quarterly get-together of the Israeli Semiconductor Club that took place at Azrieli Center in Tel-Aviv. In his presentation, the head of the company which is the main contractor of the Israeli defensive system Iron Dome, wowed the audience with some interesting information…

Read more “>here.

 

Israeli and Japanese theaters present: Sleeping with the enemy.
The Cameri Theater in Israel, in cooperation with the Metropolitan Theater of Tokyo, will present  Euripides’s timeless masterpiece The Trojan Women. This Greek tragedy will be played by both Jewish and Arab Israeli actors, along with Japanese actors. I am definitely not going to miss this one!

Read more  This week from Israel Read More »

President Obama delivers remarks on the fiscal cliff [LIVE]