Italy: Muslim relief agency delivers aid to quake victims

Onna, 23 Sept. (AKI) - Volunteers from an Islamic non-government organization have left the quake-devastated city of Onna in central Italy after having distributed over 1.5 tonnes of aid. Dozens of volunteers from Pakistan, Morocco, Egypt and Algeria worked with Islamic Relief to help victims of the quake by providing food, blankets and clothing.

"During the past few months (since the April earthquake) we have distributed more than 500 blankets, 1.42 tonnes of food and drink, thousands of hygiene kits, huge quantities of clothes and other first-aid materials, to Monticchio, Bagno and finally Onna," said the director of Islamic Relief for Italy Abdullah Gonzaga in an interview with Adnkronos International (AKI).

"In the tent city (of Onna), which has become a dramatic symbol in Abruzzo, our organization has installed itself there and been operating for six months."

"During this period we met Pope Benedict XVI in an emotionally touching visit, we also organized Arab-themed lunches as well as trips. We also collaborated with the Civil Protection Authority as well as Catholic and secular organizations, always with reciprocal satisfaction," Abdullah told AKI.

The devastating April earthquake reached 6.3 on the Richter scale and killed nearly 300 people, while displacing some 50,000 others and injuring thousands in the city of L'Aquila and nearby villages.

A large number of buildings in L'Aquila and other cities in the Abruzzo region have been destroyed and many residents have not yet been able return to their homes.

"With the delivery of the first new homes by the Red Cross on 15 September, we have also decided to leave one last memento to the inhabitants of Onna, by donating toys for the new day nursery and a 'thank you' certificate for each family and their wonderful reception," concluded Gonzaga.

Islamic Relief is an international relief and development charity founded in Britain in 1984, and its stated aim is to "alleviate the suffering of the world’s poorest people."

U.S. scientists net giant squid in Gulf of Mexico

By Jasmin Melvin

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. scientists in the Gulf of Mexico unexpectedly netted a 19.5-foot (5.9-meter) giant squid off the coast of Louisiana, the Interior Department said on Monday, showing how little is known about life in the deep waters of the Gulf.

Not since 1954, when a giant squid was found floating dead off the Mississippi Delta, has the rare species been spotted in the Gulf of Mexico.

The squid, weighing in at 103 pounds (46.7 kg), was caught July 30 in a trawl net more than 1,500 feet underwater as it was pulled by a research vessel.

The giant squid, which did not survive the rapid change in water depth when brought to the surface, was preserved and sent to the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History for further study.

Scientists aboard -- from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Interior Department's Minerals Management Service -- were participating in a pilot study on the diets of sperm whales.

"As the trawl net rose out of the water, I could see that we had something big in there ... really big," Anthony Martinez, a marine mammal scientist for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the chief scientist on the research cruise, said in a statement.

Remnants of giant squid have been found in the stomachs of its predators in the waters of the Gulf, Caribbean and Florida Keys so scientists were aware of their presence in the Gulf.

The squid discovered by the researchers is significant because the species are difficult to catch, leaving much to be learned about them.

Michael Vecchione, director of NOAA's Fisheries Service's National Systematics Laboratory, the squid was an important addition to the worldwide study of squids.

"This find illustrates how little we know about what is swimming around in the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico," he said.

Giant squid, which can be 40 feet long, are usually found in deep-water fisheries, such as off Spain and New Zealand.

"This is the first time one has actually been captured during scientific research in the Gulf of Mexico," he said.

The joint NOAA-MMS pilot study responsible for the find is part of a two-year, $550,000 study to determine the abundance and diversity of the type of fish and squid that sperm whales seek as prey.

UN chief challenges world leaders to change

By EDITH M. LEDERER, Associated Press Writer

UNITED NATIONS – Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon challenged world leaders on Wednesday to cleanse the globe of nuclear weapons, tackle the threat of catastrophic climate change and combat growing poverty from the global financial crisis.

The U.N. chief warned presidents, prime ministers and diplomats from the U.N.'s 192 member states that "no nation, large or small, can violate the human rights of its citizens with impunity."

He called for greater efforts to achieve peace in Darfur and Somalia. He urged a revival of negotiations to achieve a Mideast peace with Israel and Palestine live side-by-side in peace. And he pledged to see the Afghans "through their long night" and stand as well with the people of Pakistan.

"Amid many crises — food, energy, recession and pandemic flu, hitting all at once — the world looks to us for answers," Ban said in the the opening address to the General Assembly's 64th ministerial session.

"If ever there were a time to act in a spirit of renewed multilateralism, a moment to create a United Nations of genuine collective action, it is now."

A host of new faces will follow Ban to the podium at this last General Assembly ministerial session in the U.N.'s landmark headquarters before it closes for renovation later this fall — U.S. President Barack Obama, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, China's President Hu Jintao and Japan's newly elected Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, to name a few.

A day after about 100 heads of state and government, in the largest-ever summit on global warming, exchanged views on how to reach a new global accord to combat climate change, Ban again exhorted the leaders to "rise to the greatest challenge we face as a human family."

"This year I have traveled from the ice rim of the Arctic to the steppes of Mongolia," Ban said. "I have seen, first-hand, the effects of climate change on our planet and its people."

The U.N. chief also urged leaders to "make this the year we agreed to banish the bomb," to address the "red flags of warning" about a global economic recovery and make a fresh push to achieve U.N. anti-poverty goals, especially reducing maternal and child mortality rates which remain very high, according to his prepared text.

General Assembly President Ali Treki, of Libya, echoed the need for international unity.

"The international community has learned from experience that transnational threats and the multiple crises facing the world today can only be addressed through responsible international cooperation," he told the audience in the assembly chamber that included about 120 world leaders.

Security around the sprawling U.N. complex and adjacent neighborhood was exceedingly tight because of the VIP participants, especially Obama who also spoke at Monday's climate summit and will be back here Thursday to chair a Security Council meeting on disarmament and curbing the spread of nuclear weapons.

Diplomats said the new U.S. president is almost certain to receive a standing ovation because of the new American commitment to working with countries rich and poor, large and small, to solve global problems and Obama's outreach to the Muslim world.

On Tuesday — in addition to focusing on reducing U.S. carbon emissions, a Mideast summit with the Palestinian and Israeli leaders and a meeting with China's president — Obama invited 25 African leaders and African Union Commissioner Jean Ping to lunch to discuss job creation, particularly for young people, increasing trade and investment and improving agricultural productivity.

Obama stressed that the lunch was not a one-off event but the start of a dialogue between his administration and African leaders, said Michelle Gavin, special assistant to the president and senior director for African affairs. She said she was certain that Obama — whose late father was Kenyan — would make a return visit to Africa "at some point," noting that he has received many invitations.

The U.S. president will chair a high-level meeting of the U.N. Security Council Thursday on disarmament and efforts to halt the spread of nuclear weapons and the leaders of the four other nuclear powers on the council will also speak — Medvedev, Hu, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

The council is expected to adopt a resolution calling for stepped up disarmament efforts and a more intense global campaign to reduce nuclear dangers and threats of proliferation. It doesn't name any countries but the draft resolution does refer to previous council resolutions that imposed sanctions on Iran and North Korea for their nuclear pursuits.

Foreign ministers from the five permanent council nations and Germany, who have been trying to curb Iran's nuclear ambitions, will meet with the European Union's top negotiator on Wednesday to discuss prospects and expectations for lower-level talks with Iranian officials on Oct. 1.

Demonstrators have announced protests against two heads of government: Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi who will be making his first U.N. appearance after 40 years as ruler of the oil-rich North African nation, and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

There has been much speculation on whether Obama will cross paths with Gadhafi and Ahmadinejad.

They are all invited to a lunch Wednesday hosted by Ban and then there is a group photo session. Gadhafi is almost certain to meet the U.S. leader if he attends Thursday's Security Council meeting on nuclear nonproliferation to represent Libya, which is a non-permanent council member.

Bath used by Temple pilgrims found in Jerusalem

JERUSALEM – Israeli archaeologists say they have uncovered a ritual bath in Jerusalem that was likely used by Jewish pilgrims coming to the temple two millenia ago.

The bath is located next to the Temple Mount, the compound in Jerusalem's Old City where two Biblical Temples stood. The second was destroyed by Roman legions in 70 A.D.

The Israel Antiquities Authority says the stone bath was likely used for ritual purification by pilgrims who came to the Temple three times a year.

Similar ritual baths are still used by Jews for purification.

The site that once housed the temples is now Islam's third-holiest site, known to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary. The ritual bath was found under homes in what is now the Old City's Muslim Quarter.

Indonesia's answer to Islamophobia: Fun

Farish Noor laments that Fun has been massacred from Pakistan to the Magreb, from Malaysia to Brunei. Which is why Indonesia is such a startling place for him, as it seems to be one of the few places in the Muslim world today where Muslims can actually be happy and have fun, despite their difficulties.

As the center of my universe has moved to Central Java, I find myself traveling to the cities of Jogjakarta and Surakarta quite a lot. The last time I was there was during the celebration of Eidul Firtri (or Lebaran) as its called in Indonesia, I was just in time to catch the celebrations that customarily take place on the last night of Ramadan and on the eve of the month of Shawal. On that night, I set by the road in the middle of Jogjakarta, camera in hand, to watch hundreds of kids from their respective schools and mosques parade in the streets in a myriad of funky and funny costumes: There were Pokemons and Doraemons, Sponge Bobs, Devils and Angels, dragons and monsters galore. I watched as the bands marched past blaring their horns and drums, and as the floats made of paper and plastic rolled past. As this colorful parade marched past, I wondered aloud about how and why there seems to be so much fun in this country, and so little elsewhere in the Muslim world today...

Now of course it is a well known and well established fact that Muslims celebrate Eidul Fitri all over the planet. Indonesia is not unique in this respect and one can make the rather facile point that celebrations are celebrations, wherever they may be. But one qualitative difference has always distinguished Indonesian Muslim celebrations from other celebrations I have seen elsewhere in the world, and it lies in one subjective factor that has to be seen and felt rather than theorized: Indonesian Muslim celebrations are fun. Yes, fun. Remember what it was like, to actually have some real fun during Eid?

I throw this question to the readers for the simple reason that, in my own accounting, I have suffered a deficit of fun over the past two decades or so.

As a child in Malaysia I recall celebrating the end of Ramadan with fireworks, oil lamps, music and a jolly dose of cake-eating, which kids are wont to do. Ramadan and Eid were fun then, during those days in the 1960s and 70s when the entire month of Ramadan was spent cleaning the oil lamps, filling them with kerosene, lighting them up every evening, buying (and hoarding) fireworks and having firework fights with my neighbors. Things however began to change as soon as the tone and tenor of normative Islam in Malaysia took a turn for the political, and the Mullah-wannabes began to preach from the pulpit about the evils of fun and happiness.

By the 1980s, as Malaysia went into full swing in the spirit of an Islamisation program that witnessed little fun but rather the rise of more and more conservative types in mosques and the Parliament, the element of fun was slowly but surely stamped out. We were told that music was haram, that the oil lamps were Hindu, that the fireworks were decadent and corrupt. Tell that to a seven-year-old and you kill his love for fun for the rest of his life.

As a researcher working on comparative religious politics across the Muslim world, I have witnessed the massacre of fun from Pakistan to the Magreb, from Malaysia to Brunei. Which is why Indonesia is such a startling place for me, as it seems to be one of the few places in the Muslim world today where Muslims can actually be happy and have fun, despite the difficulties - both economic and political - that the country faces.

As an academic-activist who has been engaged in the constant effort to improve the image of Islam in the international media for years, I have been recommending Indonesia as the antidote to Islamophobia for years. Yes, it cannot be denied that Indonesia has witnessed the violence of religious communitarian politics during the conflicts in Ambon. Yes, Indonesia has had its share of radical militant groups that go around harassing and even killing innocents when they can.

But at the same time these negative factors have constantly been balanced by an intangible factor that can only be accounted for through recourse to cultural essentialism: Indonesians are at the same time intensely proud of their cultural and heritage and will not compromise that for the sake of some radical fundamentalist sending out messages of Jihad from a cave in Afghanistan. It is that sense of self-confidence and the knowledge that Indonesians can be Muslims and Indonesians at the same time that perhaps accounts for how and why Indonesian society (particularly in Java) has not gone down the path of Arabisation as we have seen elsewhere; and that despite the millions of dollars that have been pumped into the countries by the Wahabbi and Gulf Arab states, it has not gone down the road of Pakistan, Bangladesh or even Malaysia.

It was also interesting to note how the Indonesians are prone to jokes and self-derision: as a country that has suffered an inordinate amount of bad press thanks to the negative image of Indonesia created by the Bali bombings and groups like Jamaah Islamiyah, Indonesians have learned to deal with this image and play with it. One of the parade floats was in the form of a giant stick of dynamite, made of paper and plastic, with the slogan 'Islam is not Terrorism'. Humor has never been needed as much as it is now, and such irony and humor are perhaps the best foils against an Islamophobic media that can only see Muslims as murderers, fanatics and terrorists. Tell that to the boy in Jogja as he sings 'Allahuakbar' dressed as Sponge Bob.

Indonesia's Islamic Schools: More and More, Female Friendly

By CARLA POWER / CIREBON

When she was widowed two years ago, most people in the Javanese village of Babakan Ciwaringin expected Nyai Yu Masriyah Amva to marry again. They also assumed that the local pesantran, or traditional Indonesian Islamic boarding school, would close with the death of her husband, its head Islamic scholar. Neither happened. Bucking tradition, Amva decided that she would run the school. "If men can do it, then why can't I?" the 48-year-old recalls praying. "If you, Allah, are the source of all power, then why do I have to find someone else to run it? Just give me the power. I know that I can do it." After all, she reasoned Megawati Sukarnoputri, Indonesia's ex-president, was a woman, joining the ranks of "Benazir [Bhutto], and Elizabeth, and the woman Madonna played in that movie" - Evita Peron.

Straight-backed, in red lipstick and maroon-and-white polka dots, a sheer black veil slipping off her hair, Amva strides around the campus of Pesantran Kebon Jambu, which takes its name from the guava orchards that stood there before the school's mint-and-white mosque and tile-roofed dormitories. Born in the village to a family of respected kyais, or Islamic teachers, she learned her Arabic and the study of the Quran and the Islamic traditions at her father's pesantran. "My grandfather and parents always hoped someday I'd become a respected scholar," she smiles, pouring tea in her airy her on-campus house. "But since my husband died, people say I have become a superstar." She recalls addressing a nervous student body the week she took over: "You don't have to be afraid because the kyai has passed away," she says she told the 700-odd teenagers. "You still have the greatest thing in this world: Allah. He is with us, and you will be guided by his light."

This July's bombings at two five-star hotels in Jakarta and the 2002 bombings in Bali raised fears among counterterrorism experts that Indonesia's 12,000 pesantran were potential breeding grounds for radicalism. And while suicide bombers and radicals have been traced to a few schools notorious for their extremist teachings, others have been incubators for a more benign trend in the world's most populous Muslim nation: the development of feminist readings of the Quran and Islamic traditions. Indonesia's two largest Muslim political parties - the Nahdlatul Ulama and Muhammadiyah - have intricate campaigns promoting women's rights. Indonesian feminists, male and female alike, have worked with progressive pesantran to develop women-friendly interpretations of shari'a - a radical break with the conservative notions of shari'a across the Muslim world, which tend to be heavily reliant on the world views of medieval - and male - jurists.

Feminism has found fertile soil in Indonesia, whose Islamic traditions are relatively porous, and whose traditional agricultural culture often had men and women working together in the fields , in contrast, say, to the segregated tribal customs of Arabia. It's not that these ideas don't find resistance: There's a strong tradition of male authority in Indonesia, as well as a more recent trend towards fundamentalism, so feminists have to be careful to pick kyais who will be open to their teachings. Jakarta-based feminist activist Lies Marcoes-Natsir says much of her work is protecting indigenous Indonesian Islamic culture from the spread of stricter, Saudi-style Wahhabi interpretations of Islam. "The good thing is that [Indonesia's religious scholars] are also worried about Wahhabism, so we can work hand-in-hand with them," she says. Tellingly, Marcoes-Natsir finds that traditional scholars are easier to get through to than many middle-class urbanites. Where classically trained scholars know of the diversity of interpretations of Islamic law, those less versed tend to insist that it's far stricter than it really is.

Together with Indonesia's most prominent male feminist cleric, Kyai Husein Muhammad, Marcoes-Natsir has developed a course for teaching gender equality in Islam. On a hot summer morning in Cirebon, Northern Java, she taught a workshop on reproductive health, which had her gamely sketching fallopian tubes on a white-board, and parsing Quranic verses on reproductive rights. From the young men and women students, there were nods, furious scribblings, and the odd giggle. And then there was the group of young women, all majoring in gender studies at the local Islamic college, who were snapping pictures to post on their feminist blog. "The patriarchy is very strong," concedes one blogger, Asih Baet, in John Lennon specs and a black hijab. But across Indonesia, in mosques, on blogs, and in former guava orchards, there are rebellions against it.

Shaky support for Merkel coalition

A possible coalition by Germany's Christian Democrats (CDU) and Free Democrats (FDP) has received shaky support, two polls have indicated.

Two polls by pollsters Forsa and Allensbach showed a coalition of Chancellor Angela Merkel's CDU with the FDP has a total two-point lead over Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier's Social Democratic Party (SPD).

Similar polls conducted by other pollsters showed that Merkel has a high chance of winning the support for forming a center-right coalition against a center-left coalition to be led by SPD.

A center-right government would look for opportunities to cut income, corporate and inheritance taxes, probably starting in 2011.

However, a third poll, released by Berlin-based Info GmbH, showed a contrary result, giving CDU-FDP just 46 percent of votes, while the SPD, Greens and Left could jointly expect 49 percent of the vote with other smaller parties taking five percent.

The CDU's deputy leader, Roland Koch, appealed for his party to engage more in the final days of the election campaign.

"Nobody should think that we can win the parliamentary election from the spectators' stand," he said.

Iran enforces new dress code for shops

Iran has introduced a new Islamic dress code which forbids shopkeepers from displaying female mannequins without a hijab in shop windows, or showing bodily curves.

"Using unusual mannequins exposing body curves and with heads without a hijab [Muslim veils] are now prohibited to be used in the shops," police said in a statement on Tuesday.

The Iranian police have also banned the display of bowties and neckties, and the sale of women's underwear by men.

The move is part of a campaign against Western cultural influences in the Islamic Republic.

Four killed in fresh Kashmir clashes

Fresh clashes in the volatile Kashmir region have resulted in the death of an Indian soldier and three militants, Indian police say.

The three separate clashes in the northern districts of Kupwara, Baramulla and Bandipora have also wounded six soldiers, a police spokesman said on Wednesday.

Two of the gun battles that had started overnight were still raging in the area, he added.

India has been engaged in an armed battle with the rebels who since 1989 have resisted the country's rule over the area. The conflict has left more that 47,000 dead.

Violence in the region has generally declined since India and Pakistan embarked on a peace process in 2004. Ever since their partition in 1947, both Pakistan and India have laid claim on the entire Himalayan region, resulting in two wars between the two countries.

Talks were suspended in the wake of last November's militant attacks on India's financial capital Mumbai in which 166 people died.

Spain begins work to open Lorca mass grave

Madrid - Spanish experts are preparing to open a civil war mass grave believed to contain the bones of Federico Garcia Lorca (1898-1936), press reports said Wednesday. Spain's most beloved modern poet was shot dead by the right-wing supporters of dictator-to-be Francisco Franco at the start of Spain's 1936-39 civil war.

Technicians from Granada University were measuring and analysing the terrain, located between Alfacar and Viznar near Granada.

The opening of the grave, which is thought to contain the remains of several people, was due to begin in three weeks.

The Lorca family has asked for more time to determine its stance on the exhumation which it initially opposed, arguing that it would set the poet apart from anonymous civil war victims.

Many admirers of the author of Gipsy Ballads, however, feel shocked over the likelihood that his remains lie in an unmarked mass grave.

Most relatives of the others buried in the grave back the exhumation.

Officials earlier said DNA tests would be carried out only on the bones of those whose families requested it.

Francoists are believed to have targeted Lorca for being a leftist and a homosexual.

Associations representing Franco's victims have dug up the remains of thousands of people killed during the war and the dictatorship.

Iran's police warn shops against curvy mannequins

TEHRAN, Iran – Iranian police have warned shop owners not to display female mannequins wearing underwear or curve-revealing clothes.

A letter from the police published Wednesday in the state-owned IRAN daily also warned men should not sell women's underwear and advised shopkeepers against showing pictures authorities deem immoral.

Iranian officials have issued similar warnings in the past, but have ramped up their campaign against Western influence since President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad came to power in 2005.

Iran's government originally imposed restrictions on dress after the Islamic Revolution in 1979. Women must cover their hair and are urged to wear a traditional head-to-toe garment known as a chador.

Gaza: laughter and tragedy: Eid day 1

Eva Bartlett, In Gaza

September 22, 2009

The streets are completely renewed with energy, filled with life and people no longer fasting. The sense of vitality, exuberance, is strangely similar to that of immediately post-massacre.

[That day, 19 January, the streets blossomed with throngs of people who'd been cooped up in homes, feeling death was imminent. The realization that the mass-Israeli-bombing (but not all!) had stopped was enough to send people onto the streets: to look, to find friends, to appraise the devastation of the massacre and see the new streetscape.

While my colleagues and I were mobile --going from Red Crescent shifts in Jabaliya to Ramattan news in Gaza to our seaside apartment --and thus saw and heard most of the bombing or the immediate aftermath, many Palestinians had kept holed up in their homes, feeling whereas no where was safe, they might as well live and die together, as so many did.]

On the first of three days of Eid, children are the most prominent sight, glittering and colourful in flash new clothes (even though in the end they are the poor-quality items that come through the tunnels… they are new, at least).

I walk up Shuhada street (martyrs street, found in many Palestinian cities and towns), first coming across a happy kid on a horse ride, horse itself decked out in colored tassles. This kind of thing is usually reserved for the beaches, but I recall seeing horse rides in Nablus during Eid 2007, at the time also a seriously encaged and cut off city, surrounded by Israeli military checkpoints.

The main street Rimal area is packed, packed with children. No more quieter, exhausted Ramadan streets. It’s chaotic revelery, making due with the littlest possible, and somehow having immense fun.

A vacant lot usually strewn with rubbish and debris has throngs of kids waiting their turn to jump on the inflatable castles, those universally-loved jumping areas. Music blasts, squeals of joy blast out.

The hand-pumped ferris wheels, miniature but still doing the trick, are out in various parts of the city.

I chat with the kids, as they’ve surrounded me and are begging to have their photos taken. I’m charmed by young Ibrahim, a kid with a bowl-cut hairstyle and huge grin. He utters the Gaza 'cluck’ (sounding somewhat like a disdainful 'tsk, tsk’ but really just a means of saying 'no’) when I ask if he’s gotten a shekel today. During Eid, relatives visit and hand out shekels to the kids, meaning with such large families kids can bring in 40 or 50 shekels for themselves, no small amount for a kid.

But Ibrahim hasn’t received any, not from uncles or other.

He and his friends walk with me as I escape the noise of the street party, walking east towards upper Rimal. I’m keeping my eyes out for a phone card and possibly sweets; I want to go visit families and don’t want to be empty-handed.

They banter, we walk, and eventually we part ways. I give them 5 shekels each, telling them I don’t have family here and they are like my brothers. Not sure if they get the idea, but it’s Eid and today every kid should get some shekels.

The taxis are few today, but I catch one going to Zaytoun. I want to visit Mousa Samouni and siblings and see how things are.

When I walk up the sandy lane -Samouni lane- I’m accosted by Mohammed, a youth I’d met a month or so earlier [kids always amaze me that they can remember my name, after 1 month, several months. Mohammed is no exception]. He and his friends had been busy chipping pieces of cement mortar off of cement blocks from their destroyed home. Cement being such a rarity in Gaza, people re-use whatever possible.

Since I’ve visited, the youths have cleaned off the bricks and (presumably with the help of some adults) re-formed a smaller version of their home. No cement enters Gaza, people here say halas, we aren’t going to wait for the world to dispense justice, we’ll rebuild how we can.

Mohammed is proud to show off their work, and insists I come meet his family. They are all grace. We enter via a corrugated tin door to the small yard behind their cement home. His mother, sisters and a younger brother –this boy has a new jacket, given by a visiting solidarity delegation, and is all smiles. Mohammed’s mother talks a bit of the destruction of their home, their trees, their agricultural land by the invading Israeli forces during the massacre of Gaza. They replanted a bit: mint, peppers, eggplant, but that’s more for their own consumption and small sales at the market.

Outside Mousa’s home, a funeral tent has been erected to remember the martyred (48 in the Samouni clan) during the Israeli massacre. A man tends a small fire, keeping coffee boiling and ready to serve to guests.

I visit with Mousa and his siblings, we pass over Eid talk –they have nothing to celebrate, parentless, lives destroyed –and move on to speaking of their destroyed chicken farm and trees. Mousa is stoic, although only in first year university, has the bearing of a man far beyond his years, not uncommon in Gaza.

We survey the land behind his house, once holding about 3,000 chickens and 1.5 dunams of fruit and olive trees.

"I remember exactly where every tree was. I used to water them every day," Mousa says as we walk amongst the stumps of former olive, lemon, Clementine and pomegranate trees. Few remain standing. Some of the bulldozed trees are re-surfacing, vying for life anew. "They will need at least 4 years before they are large enough to produce fruit," says Mousa.

"It was a beautiful place. You could sleep here," he recalls. "On Fridays we would come here, all my family. We’d sit amongst the trees with our lunch and relax."

"Now, there’s nothing left," he says, reality invading his memories.

He’s lost his parents, two siblings, their livelihoods, their history.

As I leave, Amal Samouni, a 10 year old survivor, pulls me to her family. Her widowed mother, Zeinat, welcomes me, bids me a happy Eid, and begins to share her story. The region has been visited by enough journalists that it is assumed foreigners who visit just want the story.

I let them talk, re-visit their tragedy, learn more first-hand of their terror. For me, it’s more to share with people outside Gaza. For them, it’s therapy of a sort: while Attiyeh, her husband, is dead, along with their 4 year old, Ahmed, both shot point-blank at close range by Israeli soldiers, telling their story is dealing with it, facing it. In addition to their grief, they worry about the 15 or so pieces of shrapnel in Amal’s head that Zeinat says have yet to be surgically removed.

“Free yourselves from the shackles of Israeli pressure”, the man said

Stuart Littlewood

September 22, 2009

When the former mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, interviewed Hamas chief Khaled Meshaal last week he was immediately attacked by Britain's Foreign Office Minister, Ivan Lewis.

Lewis said: "It is particularly regrettable that he [Livingstone] learned the wrong lessons from history by handing a propaganda coup to the leader of a terrorist organization. Hamas has not only breached international law by firing rockets at civilian populations in Israel but continues to violate the human rights of Palestinians in Gaza".

Perhaps they aren’t paying attention at the Foreign Office. The only people breaching international law in the Holy Land and violating the rights of Palestinians are the lawless Israelis.

As the MP for Bury South, near Manchester, and a former vice-chairman of Labour Friends of Israel, Lewis voted enthusiastically for the Iraq war and against any investigation. In January, with the stench of death and destruction caused by Israel's blitzkrieg on Gaza still in the world’s nostrils, he told a rally in Manchester: "This community stands shoulder to shoulder with the people of Israel in the good and the bad times. We do not apply double standards to Israel and the challenges that she faces. It's the first duty of any government in any democracy to protect the security of its citizens. No government in a democracy would survive if it allowed rockets to be fired from a neighboring territory on to its civilian population and did nothing in response."

He told the crowd that those who fired rockets "are no different to the terrorists who created murderous carnage in London on 7/7".

Even by the standards of today’s political class, it is pretty stupid to pledge Manchester's support to a vicious, racist regime like Israel, and claim equivalence between the perpetrators of the London bombings and a poorly armed resistance movement desperately trying to defend its 1.5 million citizens under blockade and daily bombardment by an illegal occupier.

In July Lewis told the House of Commons: "Israel is a close ally of the UK and we have regular warm and productive exchanges at all levels." Warm, no doubt, with the blood of 1,400 dead Gazans (including 320 children and 109 women) and thousands more maimed and wounded.

Lewis is also chief executive of the Manchester Jewish Federation and a trustee of the Holocaust Educational Trust. Along with Miliband, he is the unfortunate face of British diplomacy in the Middle East.

A victory for truth and common sense

Lewis claims Livingstone's conversation with Meshaal, published in the New Statesman was a propaganda coup for Hamas. Actually the interview was a victory for truth and common sense. The Hamas chief was able to speak openly and, for once, be heard in the British media.

One of the functions of a Zionist stooge is to condemn remarks by anyone they brand a terrorist or belonging to a terrorist organisation. But nobody buys that terrorist nonsense any more. Few people in the UK, apart from Israel’s hirelings, regard Hamas or Meshaal as terrorists. The general public have come to realize that the racist regime in Tel Aviv, of which Lewis is a devoted fan, tops the terror league.

Meshaal made it clear in the interview that Hamas, since it was formed 22 years ago, has confined its military operations to occupied Palestine. He explained the conflict simply and concisely. "Our struggle against the Israelis is not because they are Jewish, but because they invaded our homeland and dispossessed us. We do not accept that because the Jews were once persecuted in Europe they have the right to take our land and throw us out.

"The injustices suffered by the Jews in Europe were horrible and criminal, but were not perpetrated by the Palestinians or the Arabs or the Muslims. So, why should we be punished for the sins of others or be made to pay for their crimes?"

Asked how many elected representatives of Hamas were locked up in Israeli prisons, he replied that around 4,000 members were in Israeli detention out of a total of 12,000 Palestinian captives. "These include scores of ministers and parliamentarians (Palestinian Legislative Council members). Around ten have recently been released, but about 40 PLC members remain in detention. Some have been given sentences, but many are held in what the Israelis call administrative detention. The only crime these people are accused of is their association with Hamas' parliamentary group."

Will no-one offer a truce that lifts the blockade and opens the crossings?

Livingstone asked how the blockade of Gaza could be lifted. "The rule of international law must be respected," replied Meshaal. "The basic human rights of the Palestinians and their right to live in dignity and free from persecution would have to be acknowledged. There has to be an international will to serve justice and uphold the basic principles of international human rights law. The international community would have to free itself from the shackles of Israeli pressure, speak the truth and act accordingly."

Not a problem for honorable men, surely. But honor is not to be found among those who are bought and paid for.

What was the true cause of the bombing and invasion of Gaza, Livingstone wanted to know. Meshaal referred to the truce with Israel from 19 June to 19 December 2008. The deal entailed a bilateral ceasefire, lifting the blockade and opening the crossings. Hamas observed the ceasefire while Israel only partially did so and then resumed hostilities. "Throughout that period, Israel maintained the siege and only intermittently opened some of the crossings, allowing no more than 10 per cent of the basic needs of the Gazan population to get through."

Israel blew any chance of renewing the truce by deliberately and repeatedly violating it.
As soon as Hamas is offered a truce that lifts the blockade and opens the crossings, said Meshaal, they will respond positively. So far, no one had made such an offer. Meanwhile the blockade amounted to "a declaration of war that warrants self-defense".

Livingstone put it to him that Hamas's refusal to recognize Israel was an insurmountable obstacle to peace. "Israel does not recognize the rights of the Palestinian people," came the reply, "yet this is not raised as an obstacle to Israel being internationally recognized nor to it being allowed to take part in talks." He pointed out that both Arafat and Abbas recognized Israel but it hadn’t produced peace dividends. "Israel concedes only under pressure." In the absence of any tangible pressure by the international community, there could be no settlement.

Challenged to clarify whether Hamas wished to establish an Islamic state in Palestine, Meshaal replied that their priority as a national liberation movement was to end the Israeli occupation of their homeland. "Once our people are free in their land and enjoy the right to self-determination, they alone have the final say on what system of governance they wish to live under. It is our firm belief that Islam cannot be imposed on the people." However, Hamas would campaign for an Islamic agenda as part of the democratic process.


Implementing international law and human rights is the only solution

Does anyone seriously have a problem with the interview or the fact that it took place? It contains nothing to justify hysterical outbursts from the likes of Lewis. The exchanges showed Meshaal to be articulate and moderate in his language. But this doesn’t fit with the demonized picture carefully painted by Zionist propagandists, and it is easy to see why Israel and its chums wish to keep him isolated and muzzled.

As Meshaal pointed out, the conflict can only be resolved by implementing international law and the human rights charter, and putting pressure on Israel. Deep down, everyone knows that. But such a reminder is unwelcome because it requires action of the kind that would embarrass the major powers, whose leaders foolishly pledged undying loyalty to the Zionist entity and have turned a blind eye to its criminal behavior for 60 years.

The spectacle of the US House of Representatives voting 404 to 1 to condemn the Palestinians’ makeshift rocket attacks while saying nothing about Israel’s assassinations, ethnic cleansing and military assaults with the most modern weapons, killing women and children in their hundreds, gave us a glimpse of what passes for democracy in the 'Land of the Free’.

Netanyhu is now trumpeting louder than ever his determination to reject all codes of civilized conduct and continue the crime spree, believing he can do so with impunity. He pushes his luck too far. Obama may cave in but for decency’s sake, and for justice and reason, it is time the rest of us consigned that ridiculous pledge by the west to the wastepaper basket.

Obama meets Netanyahu and Abbas today. Let’s hope he remembers what the man said about implementing international law and upholding human rights. The idea is for Obama to free himself from Israeli pressure and turn the screws on Netanyahu, not the other way round. The idea is to show that there are serious consequences for lawlessness.

Israel's thirst for the Nile's water

Adib Kawar

September 22, 2009

The Nile Water… When would water go after gas to the Zionist state?
It is a declaration of war
WRITTEN BY Ali Hattar, TRANSLATED BY Adib S. Kawar

What is taking place regarding the Nile’s water is not a simple matter… Without exaggeration… It is as important as war itself…

Lieberman, the foreign minister of the wrathful Zionist entity, is taking a tour around African countries that are connected with the Nile… and before time elapses, and before those who are in charge of us take the initiative to beg peace from Zionists, they have to thoroughly read what is taking place.

All Arab nationalist forces have to read what is taking place… Because it only concerns the resistance… It is the starting point for controlling the entire region and its resources… It is a water war… We know the historic motto of the "state of the Jews"… From the Nile to the Euphrates… or from the Euphrates the Nile… Egypt’s great river as said in the Bible… The motto means water… water… And today it means gas and oil too.

Water is a basic necessity after the political and the military for the survival of the "state of the Jews"… which is not hidden from anybody… Zionists want water even if they have to steal it as they stole Arab land… And the Jordan River, the Litany River, Wadi Araba and the West Bank water is their business too, as well as interfering with Jordanian, Lebanese and Syrian water matters, which is well known by all.

Shall Zionism be able to fulfill the geographic dream of establishing a state from the Nile to the Euphrates? But they did not give up their will to achieve the "results of its establishments" even without establishing it… That is controlling the region and its resources, markets and decisions. And if they achieve it they shall control the Nile water and that of the Euphrates too… The Nile is nearer, that is why they want to control its waters.

The obstacles and prohibitions are not the Egyptian government… Sadat promised it to them.

The prohibitions and obstacles are due to the stance of the Egyptian people, and objections of some active states and the states of its sources.

The Egyptian popular stance, which could be handled by the Government tied with the Camp David Agreement, which forms an extension of the Sadat Government since his famous visit to the Zionist entity.

As for the opposition Africa countries, it is a matter that the Zionist entity shall handle, and for this reason Lieberman’s visit took place in Kenya, Ethiopia and Uganda.

Before commenting on the subject it we should give the reader some information:

The countries that have relations with the Nile River are: Ethiopia, Uganda, Kenya, The Sudan, Eritrea, Rwanda, Tanzania, Congo and Egypt the estuary state, that is the end of the river pouring into the Mediterranean sea, after irrigating the Nile Delta and giving it life. The Nile is 6,700 kms long and its arteries measure 3,700 kms, and there are more than ten dams constructed on it and its arteries.

Its volume is more than 84 million cubic meters/year, out of which Egypt’s share is 55 billion, and to know the significance of these figures we have to know that what Egypt takes is 83% of its requirements for irrigation… which forms 80% of its total requirements (which is fulfilled from underground water sources).

That is what is left for Egypt without sharing it with Zionists, which means that it is not enough for Egypt’s requirements, that is called "The Gift of the Nile". Egyptian experts figures that Egypt shall suffer a shortage of water by 2017 due to great increase in the population, and the change in environmental conditions, and a possible increase of the upper Nile population consumption.

Egypt has agreements and accords with the Nile basin countries, which gives Egypt the lion’s share of its waters, and as the 1929 agreements Egypt has a veto right on all future projects that are planned for the upper Nile.

But as for our region it is important to know the following:

· The Zionist individual who occupies our land consumes 15 times more water than the Arab individual. The ratio differs among Arab citizens between one part of the Arab homeland and another).

· The Zionist entity is in bad need of the Nile water, and its president Peres suggested to build a pipe from Egypt and the occupation Zionist entity instead of the far away Turkish water, Hertzl too spoke about the matter in 1903 that is, long before stealing Palestine…!

· The Nile doesn’t simply form a water source, but it forms a means of pressure and extortion that it uses to pressurize Egypt as the Nile forms its most vital element of national security. (More than Sami Shehab’s famous cell during the last Gaza war, which the Egyptian regime claims to be the leader of Hezbollah)! President Al-Bashir said in 1994 that the Zionist entity focuses on the Nile to practice its influence on Egypt. I mention this for the sake of documentation, and we all know what the enemy wants whether they say it or not.

· The Nile River is the nearest water source to the Zionist enemy, it is only a few dozen kilometers from the Gaza Strip, now the Nile water is 40 kms away from Rafah, that is almost on its border.

· Anwar As-Sadat promised Zionists in his speech in 1979 in Haifa to give them the Nile water, and said it is presented as a MONUMENT TO THE PEACE RECORD contributed by the Egyptian people in the name of millions of Muslims, and shall be like Zamzam water (which is from a well at the Kaaba compound) for believers!!! As-Sadat spoke about the peace canal that he wants to build under the Suez canal to transfer the Nile water to the Sinai and the Negev desert in the south of occupied Palestine. And he sent a letter to Begin who was the Zionist state’s Prime Minister at the time, promising to have it reach Jerusalem… Begin replied saying, "If the Nile water means that we have to give up Jerusalem, we don’t want it.")… More than one Zionist source commented about the presence of the Bilharzias in the Nile water, As-Sadat replied, "they want it with or without Bilharzias!!!"

The enemy experts presented studies and maps for the project, among whom Dr. Alisha Kelly, suggested to give the water to Arabs on the way (Gaza) so as to be a justification to be accepted by the Arab people. (That would be a generous sacrifice by the Zionist occupiers!!!)

All international and Arab observers and experts unanimously agreed that Lieberman’s visit targets Egypt and its relation with upper Nile states, as well as the Nile waters itself, and the enemy press confessed accordingly. Nobody rejected this clear message except for the ministers of the Egyptian government and its spokesmen, who believe in the good intentions of the enemy, especially Lieberman’s who threatened to bombard the High Dam during his first week in Netanyahu’s government.

Ambassador Ms. Muna Omar, deputy minister of Foreign Affairs for African affairs, said: "Egypt has no fears from this visit, because it has no relation in jeopardizing Egypt’s share in the Nile waters, and it doesn’t include the establishment of any projects or dams on the Nile in these states". (Poor one, she doesn’t have the time to read newspapers!!!!)

Muhammad Nasr El-Dine Allam, The Egyptian Minister of Water Resources and Irrigation, declared that Lieberman’s visit has no effect on his country’s relations with Nile basin states!!!

Khaled Othman, former ambassador in Zimbabwe, said: "Any state has the full right to move around in any region in the world". (Simple for athletic purposes!!!)

I don’t know if those people are fit for the responsibilities that are laid on their shoulders, and whether defending the enemy is a must for their employment responsibilities.

We return to the visit…

The Zionist minister’s visit was limited to the African states that the Nile runs through and its sources flow from. This is not just a coincidence!!!

Zionist affairs expert in Al-Ahram research center, Dr. Omar Jad said, "Lieberman aims at instigating the Nile basin states against Egypt." (We wonder whether the Camp David people read what their experts write?!)

We read in the Zionist press, Haaretz and others the following:

1) Lieberman was accompanied by economists in the field of arms industry and trade, aviation, ships, energy, communications and agriculture.

2) Lieberman discussed water matters and agriculture with these states.

3) In Ethiopia he discussed, as per Haaretz, possible Zionist assistance, because Ethiopia overlooks navigation routes, and has influence on Somalia because of the influence of Al-Qaida there, and has importance towards Iranian activities in Africa, and it looks towards permitting Zionist military men working there!

The French daily, Le Figaro, wrote under the title: "Lieberman’s visit to Africa threatens Egypt". The paper uncovered "Israeli" plans to reach the Nile waters after the temptations that it previously gave to African states to redistribute the river’s waters.

As is well known, the Zionist enemy doesn’t base its policies on its friendship with Arab rulers, its agreements with them or their sincerity to them. Examples are numerous, there are possibilities that the list is subject to permanent changes, and the possibilities of the coming of the rejectionists of the Zionist presence may occur at any time, as thus the enemy works on strategic basis to ensure its continuity, even if this would threaten the security of these rulers.

The enemy knows that the Nile water is a matter of life and death for Egypt throughout the ages:

The government of Muhammad Ali Pasha in the nineteenth century, put an emergency plan for military interference against any state that could form a threat for the flow of the Nile waters.

Even As-Sadat, as we know, who promised Zionists a share of the Nile water, ordered the military to lay down and emergency plan in 1979 when Ethiopia declared its intention of building a dam to irrigate 90 thousand fadans on the Blue Nile basin, and threatened to destroy this dam.

We shall have a quick review through media of the states Lieberman toured regarding the declared stances of these states.

· Kenya’s Prime Minster said that Egypt makes good use of the Nile for irrigation and agriculture, and it is a shame that Kenya would not do as Egypt does, and his country should make use of all available water sources to increase its production. (What the Kenyan Prime Minister said should be thoroughly read and analyzed by Egyptian officials).

· "The Daily Nation", a Kenyan newspaper wrote: "Lieberman signed with the Kenyan president a water sources management agreement for irrigation and construction between Kenya and 'Israel’, and added that Kenya is in bad need of water projects that shall be supported by 'Israel’. (So water with Kenya is a part of his visit).

· Paul Kemanzi a writer in the Kenyan paper said: "It is a shame that help should come from a desert country such as Egypt that uses the Nile waters the source of which is lake Victoria, which falls between Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania." (It is a shame that Arab rulers would not read about this shame this Kenyan journalist like his Prime Minister wrote and talked about…!!!)

· The Ghanaian daily "Statesman" wrote that Lieberman stressed during his tour on 'Israel’s strengthening relations with African countries especially the Nile basin states, which is a meaningful matter related to Tel Aviv’s to have a role in the Nile basin. (The Nile water again, you the rulers of Egypt).

· The Ethiopian "Jima Times" said: "’Israel’ can help African states to make use of the Nile waters against giving it a share of it, which shall affect Egypt’s share". (The Nile again and again… you…)

Those in power in the states visited by Lieberman and their press express the situation of the Camp David government).

I shall not talk about the distribution of the Nile waters between Egypt and other Nile basin states.

But I shall concentrate on the reaching of the Nile water’s to the Zionist enemy, which is the government complying with the Camp David agreement, which it is trying to hide!

While the enemy state is trying to fulfill its strategy, to take the water from the source, the summit Arab rulers pant running to advertise in the enemy’s press, ads in Hebrew to try to convince Zionists to accept the Arab summit’s view… even if they suffer thirst…

There are two sides to this case, laying siege over Egypt and the Sudan, the Nile waters, and laying siege over Egypt to dwarf its role and put pressure on it, and to receive a share of the Nile as per As-Sadat’s promise.

Egypt’s accords with the Nile basin states gives it the Lion’s share of its waters, the enemy instigates these states against Egypt; as Egypt will succumb and give it the water it had always had an eye on, because Egypt’s accords with these states give it the right to deal conclusively, and prevent them from constructing projects without its permission, when it was able to do so, and not when its rulers weakened it, and when the basin’s state got their independence, and if Egypt refused to give the enemy the water, "Israel" shall stir the African states to put pressure on it, and deprive it of old privileges reached in accords… the result shall be Egypt’s thirst.

Thus it is either the peace canal and the Nile water to the Zionist enemy, or a financially and technologically strong "Israel" shall instigate these states, and even if Egypt gives the Nile water to the Zionist enemy and Egypt will get thirsty, that matter shall remain an eternal sword that "Israel" owns, it shall raise whenever Egypt slows down in giving the water, this is how the Camp David "leaders" defend Lieberman’s good intentions, this same Lieberman who threatened to bombard the High Dam, and about his visits the intention of which is to close the Nile water to flow into the dam, after retreating from his threat to bombard it.

If the Zionist enemy takes the water after taking the gas from Egypt, then what use is the Arab "peace initiative"?

As for the Sudan, which reflects on Egypt, I give the following text, even though it is not directly connected to the subject.

"In an official speech that the Zionist minister of security, Avi Dichter, he gave in Tel Aviv on the 30th of October 2008, he stressed on the nicety of laying siege over Egypt by the Africans. He added: "When Israel specified its policy and strategy in relation to the Arab World it started a future exploration, and its dimensions and assessment that exceed the present and future scope. "Israel" targets the Sudan, because it forms a strategic depth for Egypt, thus we have to work to weaken the Sudan, because this is a must to support and strengthen the national Israeli security".

Gazans defy Israeli siege by smuggling cars

Not enough cars enter Gaza as Israeli war and siege destroyed hundreds of Palestinians' cars.

GAZA CITY - A shiny green Volkswagen, standing out among the rattletraps on Gaza's dilapidated roads, is the latest hot item to come out of the besieged territory's smuggling tunnels.

Cars are brought in piece by piece from Egypt, which only opens its sole crossing point into Gaza for humanitarian purposes, because of an embargo imposed by Israel two years ago.

A handful of the hundreds of smuggling tunnels in the Rafah border area are dedicated solely to the auto operation that started a few years ago. The entrepreneurs who run them say they've managed to bring in 30 to 40 vehicles in the past few months alone.

Hamas, the democratically elected movement in the Gaza Strip, controls at least two of the car tunnels, according to operators who spoke under pseudonyms because of the sensitive nature of their work.

"We receive a car in four sections plus the motor," says Abu Bilal, a mechanic who, like others involved in the enterprise, gave an assumed name.

"We verify that everything is OK and then we begin to reassemble it right away," he says, as his team prepares to get to work on a 2004 BMW fresh from the subterranean passages.

"We need two weeks to reassemble a car, since we have to solder the pieces and repaint the body," Abu Bilal says. "The client chooses the color."

Tunnel operators buy the sections in Egypt.

"Smuggling cars is more difficult than smuggling fuel, for example, since we are dealing with large pieces that can be detected and this means a lot more care has to be taken during transport, since Egyptian security on the other end are watching carefully," Abu Bilal says.

The business is lucrative, at least by the standards of the impoverished coastal strip.

"A car on the Egyptian side costs us 6,000 to 10,000 dollars on average," says Abu Saed, another trafficker. "Once we re-assemble and repaint it, we sell it for at least double that."

But it is also a risky business.

One of the tunnels was hit last week by the Israeli air force. "After that raid, car smuggling was briefly halted," a smuggler said.

The Israeli military usually targets smuggling tunnels to keep its siege of Gaza. The tunnels are used to bring in basic and essential supplies as well as weapons into the impoverished territory.

Tunnel operators say Egypt too is increasingly cracking down on the underground smuggling, by pumping sewage or gas or by throwing explosives into the tunnels.

In his Gaza City auto shop, Abdel Sattar is putting the final touches on a 2009 Mitsubishi four-by-four that has just been assembled and repainted gray.

"It's ready to be sold," he says, looking proudly over the paint job. "I think I can get 20,000 dollars for it."

"These cars are getting more and more expensive, but they are still cheaper than those registered in Gaza," prices of which have risen because of the blockade, he says.

The demand for cars in Gaza, home of 1.5 million people half of whom are under 18, has shot up after the 22-day war that Israel waged there at the turn of the year.

Out of 55,000 cars officially registered, several hundred were destroyed in the fighting and hundreds of others have stopped running because of lack of spare parts, says Adnan Abu Odeh, director general of the Hamas transport ministry.

The Hamas government says it will consider the tunnels legal until the blockade is lifted.

The Rafah municipality charges a 10,000 shekel (2,500 dollar/1,800 euro) fee to open a smuggling tunnel and while the transport ministry officially refuses to register the smuggled cars it is possible to obtain the necessary documents.

Owners of imported cars can obtain registration papers from a special department of the Hamas police, which issues temporary license plates.

Some U.S. Scholars Skip Talks With Iran's Leader

After President Obama addresses the United Nations General Assembly on Wednesday morning, the podium will be turned over in the evening to Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Ahmadinejad has been coming to New York for the annual gathering for several years now, and he is always met with protests. This year, those protests are stronger than ever following Iran's disputed presidential election in June and a harsh government crackdown on the opposition.

Some academics who normally meet with Ahmadinejad say they don't plan to have any contact with the Iranian leader.

The Iranian president generally sets aside several hours while he is in New York to meet with a group of academics. Columbia University professor Gary Sick — who was once a White House adviser on Iran — has gone for the past three years. This time, he made clear he wasn't interested — and, in the end, he wasn't invited anyway.

"My view is that Ahmadinejad is not really in charge of anything," Sick says. "I've concluded that talking to him is like talking to a wall."

Raising Concerns

Sick recalled his last run-in with Ahmadinejad, when the Columbia University professor raised concern about scholars who were languishing in Iranian jails.

"I said to him, you know, 'If you were not the president of Iran but you were a professor at Tehran University, and you were here meeting with precisely the group that is assembled around this table ... you would be subject to arrest when you went back to Iran,' " Sick recalls. "And again he just laughed it off and said, 'Oh, people go back and forth all the time, there's no problem about that.' Well, the reality is that there were people in jail at that moment being held for no other reason than that."

And this year it's even worse, says Sick, who knows several Iranians jailed in the wake of disputed presidential elections.

Iranian reformists claim widespread fraud robbed opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi of victory and re-elected Ahmadinejad. Tens of thousands of protesters in the streets denounced the election results, causing a crackdown that led to the arrest and detention of hundreds of Iranians.

"So I could go and say that to him, I mean that would be one possibility, but I've done that. I've done that several times now, and in each case not only was there no action on his part but there was no indication that he even cared," Sick says.

'Goes With The Territory'

Jim Walsh, a scholar at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, plans to meet Ahmadinejad this week and raise concerns about the jailed dissidents.

"I'm going to say: In past events, you've encouraged us scholars to meet with our Iranian counterparts, to exchange ideas, and then when we follow that advice, they get arrested and get accused of being part of a velvet revolution. How is that ethical, how is that logical — two words that are important in Iranian culture. How can you encourage us to do that and then turn around and arrest the very people who are our friends and who have done nothing wrong?" Walsh says.

Walsh says he is not expecting to break any new ground with the Iranian leader on this point, but he feels it is important for him as a scholar to at least get a sense of Ahmadinejad's thinking, especially on the nuclear issue.

"One year he was very combative; another year he was sort of professorial. There have been slight changes in his positions over time. So here we have a big event, the June 12 election, so this could be a very important point — it is an important point — in Iran's history. And for folks like me who study and write about Iran, it would seem to be important to show up and listen to this guy to see what, if anything, has changed in his behavior over the past year," Walsh says.

Accepting the invitation, he says, is a personal decision, but Walsh says he feels he has an obligation to listen if he wants to understand Iran.

"Scholars interview terrorists; they interview despots; they interview insurgents," he says. "It just sort of goes with the territory."

Israeli FM: Summit a victory for settlement stand

JERUSALEM – Israel's foreign minister said Wednesday that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's summit with the Palestinian and American leaders was a victory because it took place even though Israel rebuffed demands to freeze settlement in the West Bank.

Netanyahu met in New York on Tuesday with President Barack Obama and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. It was Netanyahu's first meeting with Abbas since the prime minister came to power in March, but peace negotiations have not officially resumed and there was no obvious progress.

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said the meeting showed Israel's firm stand against a settlement freeze was effective.

"This government has shown that you don't always need to get flustered, to surrender and give in," Lieberman told Israel Radio. "What's important for me is that this government kept its promises to the voter ... and the fact is that this meeting happened."

Obama and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton have previously demanded a full halt to construction in the settlements. The Palestinians, emboldened at least in part by the U.S. stand, said they would not resume negotiations without a freeze.

Past rounds of negotiations have been conducted while construction went on in Israeli settlements, where the population has more than doubled to 300,000 since Israel and the Palestinians signed a landmark agreement in 1993.

Obama did not explicitly call for a settlement freeze at Tuesday's meeting, and George Mitchell, the White House Mideast envoy, said afterward that the administration does not see a resolution of the settlement showdown as a precondition for resuming negotiations.

The U.S. position was a boost for Israel and rankled Palestinians, who are still demanding a settlement freeze as a condition for talks.

Seeking to simultaneously appease the U.S. and his hardline coalition government, Netanyahu has agreed to slow settlement construction for a limited time. He has said construction will continue on some 3,000 housing units.

Terrorism and nukes top General Assembly agenda

By EDITH M. LEDERER, Associated Press Writer



UNITED NATIONS – More than 120 world leaders meet Wednesday on the heels of a climate change summit to tackle other crucial issues on the international agenda from terrorism and the spread of nuclear weapons to growing poverty resulting from the global financial crisis.

"Amid many crises — food, energy, recession and pandemic flu, hitting all at once — the world looks to us for answers," U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in prepared remarks for the opening of the General Assembly's 64th ministerial session.

"If ever there were a time to act in a spirit of renewed multilateralism, a moment to create a United Nations of genuine collective action, it is now."

A host of new faces will step to the podium at this last General Assembly ministerial session in the U.N.'s landmark headquarters before it closes for renovation later this fall — U.S. President Barack Obama, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, China's President Hu Jintao and Japan's newly elected Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama.

A day after some 100 heads of state and government, in the largest-ever summit on global warming, exchanged views on how to reach a new global accord to combat climate change, Ban will again exhort the leaders to "rise to the greatest challenge we face as a human family."

The U.N. chief will also urge leaders to take steps to free the world of nuclear weapons, to address the "red flags of warning" about a global economic recovery and make a fresh push to achieve U.N. anti-poverty goals especially reducing maternal and child mortality rates which remain very high, according to his prepared text.

Ban will call for a revival of negotiations to achieve a comprehensive settlement in the Mideast and a two-state solution where Israel and Palestine live side-by-side in peace. And he will pledge to see the Afghans "through their long night" and stand as well with the people of Pakistan.

Security around the sprawling U.N. complex and adjacent neighborhood is exceedingly tight because of the VIP participants, especially Obama who spoke at Monday's climate summit and will be back in the assembly chamber Wednesday morning to address ministers and diplomats from the 191 other U.N. member states.

Diplomats said the new U.S. president is almost certain to receive a standing ovation because of the new American commitment to working with countries rich and poor, large and small, to solve global problems and Obama's outreach to the Muslim world.

On Tuesday — in addition to focusing on reducing U.S. carbon emissions, a Mideast summit with the Palestinian and Israeli leaders and a meeting with China's president — Obama invited 25 African leaders and African Union Commissioner Jean Ping to lunch to discuss job creation, particularly for young people, increasing trade and investment and improving agricultural productivity.

Obama stressed that the lunch was not a one-off event but the start of a dialogue between his administration and African leaders, said Michelle Gavin, special assistant to the president and senior director for African affairs. She said she was certain that Obama — whose late father was Kenyan — would make a return visit to Africa "at some point," noting that he has received many invitations.

The U.S. president will chair a high-level meeting of the U.N. Security Council Thursday on disarmament and efforts to halt the spread of nuclear weapons and the leaders of the four other nuclear powers on the council will also speak — Medvedev, Hu, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

The council is expected to adopt a resolution calling for stepped up disarmament efforts and a more intense global campaign to reduce nuclear dangers and threats of proliferation. It doesn't name any countries but the draft resolution does refer to previous council resolutions that imposed sanctions on Iran and North Korea for their nuclear pursuits.

Foreign ministers from the five permanent council nations and Germany, who have been trying to curb Iran's nuclear ambitions, will meet with the European Union's top negotiator on Wednesday to discuss prospects and expectations for lower-level talks with Iranian officials on Oct. 1.

Demonstrators have announced protests against two heads of government: Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi who will be making his first U.N. appearance after 40 years as ruler of the oil-rich North African nation, and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

There has been much speculation on whether Obama will cross paths with Gadhafi and Ahmadinejad.

They are all invited to a lunch Wednesday hosted by Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and then there is a group photo session. Gadhafi is almost certain to meet the U.S. leader if he attends Thursday's Security Council meeting on nuclear nonproliferation to represent Libya, which is a non-permanent council member.

There are many other meetings scheduled on the sidelines of the General Assembly.

Countries concerned with Myanmar, Pakistan and Afghanistan will hold closed-door talks. There will be commemorations of the 60th anniversary of the U.N. agency that deals with Palestinian refugees and of the Geneva Conventions. And there will be a two-day meeting starting Thursday to press for ratification of the nuclear test ban treaty, to name a few.

Ban called in the draft of his speech for urgent support to achieve broad stability in Sudan. He again called for the release of Myanmar's pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi and for fresh efforts to stop the bloodshed in Gaza.

And he urged all nations to take risks and "rise to an exceptional moment."

Archaeologists find suspected Trojan war-era couple

ANKARA (Reuters) – Archaeologists in the ancient city of Troy in Turkey have found the remains of a man and a woman believed to have died in 1,200 B.C., the time of the legendary war chronicled by Homer, a leading German professor said on Tuesday.

Ernst Pernicka, a University of Tubingen professor of archaeometry who is leading excavations on the site in northwestern Turkey, said the bodies were found near a defense line within the city built in the late Bronze age.

The discovery could add to evidence that Troy's lower area was bigger in the late Bronze Age than previously thought, changing scholars' perceptions about the city of the "Iliad."

"If the remains are confirmed to be from 1,200 B.C. it would coincide with the Trojan war period. These people were buried near a mote. We are conducting radiocarbon testing, but the finding is electrifying," Pernicka told Reuters in a telephone interview.

Ancient Troy, located in the northwest of modern-day Turkey at the mouth of the Dardanelles not far south of Istanbul, was unearthed in the 1870s by Heinrich Schliemann, the German entrepreneur and pioneering archaeologist who discovered the steep and windy city described by Homer.

Pernicka said pottery found near the bodies, which had their lower parts missing, was confirmed to be from 1,200 BC, but added the couple could have been buried 400 years later in a burial site in what archaeologists call Troy VI or Troy VII, different layers of ruins at Troy.

Tens of thousands of visitors flock every year to the ruins of Troy, where a huge replica of the famous wooden horse stands along with an array of excavated ruins.

Turkey, Syria Launch Strategic Cooperation

ANKARA [MENL] -- After decades of enmity, Syria and Turkey have launched strategic cooperation.

In September, the two neighbors signed an agreement meant to launch strategic cooperation, including in the defense and military sectors. The accord also saw the removal of restrictions along the border between Syria and Turkey.

Judge Sawan interrogates Fatah al-Islam detainees

BEIRUT: Military Examining Magistrate Fadi Sawwan on Tuesday interrogated five Fatah al-Islam militants accused of planning terrorist activities and manufacturing explosives in south Lebanon, the National News Agency (NNA) reported on Tuesday. Sawwan formally arrested the five, the report added. NNA said the five terrorists were seized in south Lebanon for belonging to an armed organization and planning to carry out terrorist activities and making bombs. Sawan also issued arrest warrants against Palestinian national Ali al-Far and Wissam Thaybish for the same crimes. Authorities will question Thaybish on Wednesday about his possible involvement in the 1999 assassination of four Lebanese judges at Sidon’s Justice Palace.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad threatened with UN walk out if Holocaust comments repeated

British officials plan to walk out of a United Nations session if Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Iranian president, repeats comments which deny the Holocaust.

Andrew Porter, Political Editor

A succession of world leaders including President Barack Obama and Gordon Brown will address the UN in New York today. But Mr Ahmadinejad's presence in America has caused consternation.

Many fear he will provoke outrage by discussing Holocaust denial while the world's media attention is on him. Earlier this year, a similar statement in Geneva saw officials from several countries walk out.

A Number 10 source traveling with the Prime Minister said: "If he does get into Holocaust denial territory or say something that's not compatible with human rights that we work to uphold then we would consider walking out."

Mr Brown will also come face to face with Muammar Gaddafi, the Libyan leader, at a meeting of the UN security council. Libya is a non permanent member of the council.

It will be the first time they have met since the release of the Lockerbie bomber last month. That has led to tension between London and Washington with Mr Obama telling Mr Brown that he was disappointed with the prisoner's release.

Number 10 did not indicate whether the two men would shake hands but it is expected they will if they come face-to-face.

That could further inflame opinion in America where families of Lockerbie victims have protested at Megrahi's release.

On the first day of his four-day trip to America Mr Brown will tell the UN: "Once again we are at a point of no return. And just as the collapse of the banks focused our minds a year ago - so we must now grasp this next set of issues."

Last night the Prime Minister took part in a dinner discussing climate change. He called on leaders to take seriously the drive to secure a new global warming reduction target at Copenhagen in December.

He will say today: "This is the moment, now, to limit and reverse the climate change we are inflicting on future generations. Not later, at another conference, in another decade, after we have lost 10 years to inaction and delay".

His speech will also address nuclear proliferation, poverty in Africa and terrorism.

Canada to boycott Iran's UN speech

UNITED NATIONS - Canada will boycott Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's speech at the United Nations on Wednesday, saying his outbursts about the Holocaust and Israel are "shameful."

Foreign Minister Lawrence Cannon will be at the world body to attend the opening of the UN General Assembly's annual debate, but officials signal he and other members of the Canadian delegation will vacate the Canadian seats when the Islamic republic's president approaches the podium.

Walking out of the chamber is seen as a strong diplomatic show of disgust at the UN - and since the chamber is generally packed on the first day of the annual summit, Canada's empty seats will not go unnoticed.

One of the first speakers of the day will be U.S. President Barack Obama, who is making his debut address before the assembly.

"President Ahmadinejad's repeated denial of the Holocaust and his anti-Israel comments run counter to the values of the UN General Assembly, and they're shameful," said one Canadian official.

"He uses his public appearances to provoke the international community, and that is why Canada's seats will be empty."

The gesture is a step stronger than one announced Tuesday by the German Foreign Ministry, which asked other European Union member states to walk out of the General Assembly chamber if Ahmadinejad again denies the Holocaust, or makes anti-Semitic statements.

The Canadian initiative will be welcomed by Israel, which Tuesday urged all delegates in the 192-member chamber to stay away when Ahmadinejad speaks.

"A few days ago, he gave a new speech of hate," Gabriela Shalev, Israeli ambassador to the UN, told Israeli army radio.

"The simple fact of leaving the room during his speech, or not to be present during it, is a symbolic act."

Shalev insisted Israel had not been asking countries to "promise" they would boycott Ahmadinejad's address.

"We are simply reminding them of how dangerous this person and the country that he leads are," she said.

Iranian officials said this week that Ahmadinejad intended to use his speech to offer a message of "peace and friendship."

But Ahmadinejad sparked new outrage just last week by again calling Nazi Germany's murder of six million Jews in the Holocaust a "myth," then saying the angry reaction he provoked was a "source of pride" to him. His anti-Israel statements have included calling for the country - created by the UN shortly after the Second World War - to be "wiped of the map."

Canada annually leads a multi-nation effort in the UN General Assembly to highlight in successive resolutions Iran's poor human-rights record. The effort infuriates Iran, which pulls out all the diplomatic stops to try to block it.

On the front burner at the moment is the fate of hundreds of people arrested in the violent crackdown Ahmadinejad and his supporters ordered as opposition rose to his disputed re-election as president in June.

Among those jailed was Canadian journalist Maziar Bahari, an internationally recognized documentary filmmaker, who was in the Islamic republic for Newsweek magazine to cover the election and ensuing protests.

"We remain deeply concerned by the human-rights situation in Iran, and the crackdown on legitimate democratic protests, and the arrests of Iranians and foreign nationals, are unacceptable," added the Canadian official.

"We will continue to demand the release of those unjustly detained, including Canadian Newsweek reporter, Maziar Bahari."

The Canadian boycott comes as the Obama administration has sought to launch a dialogue with Iran, and direct talks between the two countries over Western opposition to Iran's nuclear program are scheduled for Oct. 1.

However, Obama officials, among them U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, denounced Ahmadinejad's comments on the Holocaust.

Obama is expected to try to avoid Ahmadinejad at the UN, even though he said in a 2007 campaign debate he was prepared to meet personally with the Iranian leader - without preconditions.

The West suspects Iran's nuclear program is aimed at developing a nuclear bomb, though Iran, despite being oil-rich, said it wants to produce nuclear energy only.

Iranian leader says he'll seek leniency for hikers

By ROBERT BURNS and ANNE GEARAN, AP National Security Writers

NEW YORK – Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Tuesday in an Associated Press interview that he will seek leniency for three American hikers who strayed across the Iranian border, and he urged President Barack Obama to see Iran as a potential friend.

The Iranian leader also said he expects "free and open" discussion of nuclear issues at a meeting next week with six world powers, but stressed that his country would not negotiate on its own nuclear plans. He sought to open a wider nuclear dialogue with the West, and said the onus should be on the United States and other major nuclear powers to give up their weapons and to expand opportunities for all countries to make peaceful use of nuclear power.

He dismissed last week's U.S. shift away from a planned long-range missile shield in Europe, meant to guard against an Iranian strike, as "a respectful way of buying out" Russian objections.

"I heard Mr. Obama saying the next threat is Iran. Iran is an opportunity for everyone," Ahmadinejad said.

The Iranian leader's remarks on those and other issues in an hour-long interview at his New York hotel, just hours after he arrived in the U.S., appeared designed to present his country as open to a broad international dialogue and to soften Iran's image as a rogue nation bent on spreading its Islamic revolution.

The Iranian leader is in New York to address the United Nations General Assembly on Wednesday. Obama is also speaking Wednesday.

Ahmadinejad remained soft-spoken and almost completely still in his chair as he politely fielded questions on a wide range of controversies rankling Iran's relationship with the West. He would occasionally nod or offer a small smile, particularly when he appeared pleased with a point he had made, but the Iranian leader never gestured or raised his voice. A few questions prompted an animated flurry of conversation in Farsi among members of his delegation before he gave a response that was translated into English.

He reiterated explicitly that Iran is not building nuclear weapons.

"I hope that Mr. Obama will move in the direction of change," Ahmadinejad said. At another point he said, "The sources of insecurity around the world need to be discussed."

The United States has agreed for the first time to fully join European-led talks with Iran, fulfilling an Obama campaign pledge to engage adversaries but risking a gambit that Iran will hijack the talks and yield nothing.

The United States, Israel and the European Union fear that Iran is using its nuclear program to covertly develop nuclear weapons. But Tehran says the program serves purely civilian purposes and asserts its right to enrich uranium for use in nuclear power plants to generate electricity.

The Bush administration had refused to negotiate further with Iran until it agreed to freeze its uranium enrichment efforts, which it has refused to do.

When asked in the interview about the three American hikers, the Iranian leader said they broke the law by illegally entering Iran. Nevertheless, Ahmadinejad said he will ask the Iranian judiciary to treat the case with "maximum leniency."

Speaking on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly, the Iranian leader did not elaborate on what that might mean for the fate of the three Americans. Families of the imprisoned hikers have said they hope Ahmadinejad's visit to New York might yield a breakthrough in the case.

The three have been held for 52 days since they apparently strayed into Iran while hiking in northern Iraq's Kurdistan region in July. Their case has become the latest source of friction between the U.S. and Iran.

Ahmadinejad also was asked about the case of an Iranian-Canadian journalist, Maziar Bahari, who was working for Newsweek magazine and imprisoned while covering the social unrest in Iran after the disputed June presidential election. Ahmadinejad did not reply about Bahari, limiting his remarks to the case of the hikers.

The ambassador at Iran's mission at the United Nations, Mohammad Khazee, said later that he hoped the case of Bahari would also be resolved.

Ahmadinejad said he regrets the deaths of protesters in the violence that followed his country's disputed presidential elections, but denied that his government had any role in the killings.

Ahmadinejad said those who died were "not at fault." He instead said the responsibility lies with Iranian opposition politicians and with "European and American politicians" who he said fueled the violence.

"We believe what they did was very wrong," he said.

Pro-reform opposition has staged dramatic protests, claiming that Ahmadinejad's victory in the June voting was fraudulent. The Iranian government waged a bloody crackdown and opposition groups say at least 72 protesters were killed. Government officials maintain that only 36 people died, and Ahmadinejad repeated that claim.

"It is all very regrettable," Ahmadinejad said, adding that he has directed Iran's judicial system to investigate each death. "The government has no role in these events."

Ahmadinejad muted his remarks on the Holocaust, an event he has frequently questioned as a matter of historical fact. As recently as last Friday, Ahmadinejad questioned whether the Holocaust was "a real event" and said it was used by Jews to trick the West into backing the creation of Israel. In a speech in Tehran, he said the Jewish state was created out of "a lie and a mythical claim."

In a lengthy exchange, he did not repeat those outright denials.

Using markedly less confrontational language than he has in the past, Ahmadinejad said he is not interested in debating historical details. Instead, he said he wants to focus on what he calls the wrong done to Palestinians who lost their land when the state of Israel was formed.

Ahmadinejad said the Holocaust is used as a pretext for the repression of Palestinians. He grouped the deaths of Jews during World War II with those of millions of others who died.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu planned to boycott the Iranian's address.

Ahmadinejad repeated his nation's interest in cooperating to help stabilize Afghanistan and help Iraq, but blamed the United States for having created chaos in the war-torn country on Iran's eastern border.

"The occupying forces or the groups that have sent in the military to these two states, if indeed their policy has led to further instability, what do they want us to do?" Ahmadinejad said. "What exactly can we do for a car that has decided to speed up and basically crash down the hill? I don't see exactly what we can do under that scenario."