by Sara Yoheved Rigler
Pulling our misdeeds out by their roots.
It's not that I mind giving charity to all and sundry, but I do mind being rooked. That's why my "don't think you can fool me" persona went on high alert when the girl approached our table at an outdoor cafe one evening this summer.
My husband and I were having supper with another couple, distant relatives from America. The girl wore blue jeans, a halter-top, dangling pink earrings that must have been six inches long, and gobs of makeup. Her hair was streaked with purple. I guessed that she was probably 16 years old. She mumbled that she belonged to a religious youth group called B'nei Akiva and that she was collecting for disadvantaged children, and she limply displayed her receipt book.
As an American living in Israel, I often miss the cultural clues that would save me from being conned. This time, however, I was savvy. I knew plenty of B'nei Akiva girls, and they didn't dress like that. In fact, at their meetings and when on "official business," they wear a uniform of a white top, blue skirt, and blue neckerchief. Because we were speaking English, ...   more »

Washington boosts aid to Jordan to bolster the country's defenses, bringing this year's total assistance to $532 million
Washington on Monday gave Jordan, a staunch ally in the Middle East, a supplement of $78 million in mostly security aid to bolster the country's defenses, bringing total assistance this year to $532 million, officials said.  
Jordanian Planning Minister Suhair al-Ali told reporters after signing the agreement with US ambassador David Hale that the kingdom was lobbying to raise the amount of supplemental aid it received in recent years for its strong backing of US policies in the region.  
"As a government we continue to work with the US to increase that percentage of cash assistance to the budget," al-Ali said.    
The extra aid is beyond the annual economic and military aid package of $454 million that has been appropriated for the current fiscal year, which ends on September 30, 2007.  
Most of the supplemental aid is earmarked to boost border security and anti-terrorism training, officials said.  
After the US led invasion of Iraq in 2003, Washington doubled its annual grants to Jordan to around $450 million - $250 million in economic aid and $200 million in ...   more »

Animal rights activists slam traditional practice of kaparot
Animal rights group calls on Rabbi Ovadia Yosef to annul ritual killing of chickens as part of kaparot ceremony. 'Why should chickens pay for people's sins?' they ask
Neta Sela
Members of the animal rights organization Let the Animals Live (LAL) made their way to Rabbi Ovadia Yosef's home in Jerusalem Monday, in an attempt to convince him to support their efforts to nullify the traditional custom of kaparot, in which chickens are waved over a person's head before being slaughtered. In the ceremony, the person's sins are "transfered" to the chicken.  
Animal rights groups have been trying to meet with Rabbi Yosef for several years, but have always been turned down. This morning, they were finally able to deliver him a letter with their request.  
According to Etti Altman, chairwoman of LAL, the practice is extremely cruel: "Why should a chicken pay for a person's sins?" she asked.  
"Thousands of chickens are cramped together, with no food or water, for days before kaparot… they are abused and then they are slaughtered. People ask for their sins to be forgiven? They should be asking for the chicken's forgiveness."  ...   more »

By Yoav Stern, Haaretz Correspondent and The Associated Press
The United States has signed an accord with Jordan aimed at supporting the peaceful development of the kingdom's nascent nuclear program, the U.S. Embassy said Sunday.
The agreement comes at a time of heightened tensions over Iran's controversial nuclear program, which the U.S. suspects is a cover for weapons development - a charge Tehran denies.
Jordan and several other Sunni Arab countries have recently announced plans to develop peaceful nuclear programs.
U.S. Secretary of Energy Samuel Bodman and Jordanian Minister for Scientific Research Khaled Toukan signed Sunday's memorandum of understanding on the sidelines of a nuclear energy summit in Vienna.
Under the agreement, the two countries will work together to develop requirements for appropriate power reactors, fuel service arrangements, civilian training, nuclear safety, energy technology and other related areas, the U.S. Embassy said in a statement.
Jordanian King Abdullah II announced his intention to develop a peaceful nuclear program in January, saying alternative energy sources were needed to generate electricity and desalinate water in the kingdom.
Jordan has signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and has long called for a Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction.
Last month, Toukan said ...   more »

Six hundred Iranian Shihab-3 missiles are pointed at targets throughout Israel, and will be launched if either Iran or Syria are attacked, an Iranian website affiliated with the regime reported on Monday.
"Iran will shoot at Israel 600 missiles if it is attacked," the Iranian news website, Assar Iran, reported. "600 missiles will only be the first reaction."
According to the report, dozens of locations throughout Iraq, which are being used by the US Army, have also been targeted.
The Shihab missile has a range of 1,300 km, and can reach anywhere in Israel.
On Sunday, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said that the nuclear Iranian crisis forces the world "to prepare for the worst," and said that in this case it "is war."
Kouchner emphasized, however, that negotiations should still be the preferred course of action.
Kouchner, quoted by French daily Le Figaro, added that "Iran does whatever it pleases in Iraq ... one cannot find in the entire world a crisis greater than this one."
In response to Kouchner's comments, Iran's state-owned news agency accused France of pandering to the interests of the United States.
"The new occupants of the Elysee (Presidential palace) want to copy the White ...   more »

Israeli officials say global jihad terrorists planning attack on Israeli cruise ship sailing in Mediterranean
Eitan Glickman
Israeli officials fear that terror groups are planning attacks against Israeli holidaymakers abroad, Yedioth Ahronoth reported on Monday.
An Israeli official told the newspaper that security officials believe terror groups plan to use a boat laden with explosives to sink an Israeli cruise ship in the Mediterranean.  
"We have warning about terror plans to carry out attacks abroad," the official said. "One scenario is an attack using a ship or a boat carrying explosives."  
'Ships attractive target'
The official said that security would be boosted onboard Israeli cruise ships whose sailing lines would be altered.  
"There are various scenarios: booby-trapped boats, using boats to fire explosives at passenger ships and more. Over Sukkot many Israelis are leaving for cruises from Haifa and Ashdod and we have to ensure that these ships are well protected," the official added.   
But officials at the counter-terrorism bureau said that global jihad terrorists were always planning attacks against Israelis abroad.  
"The intentions of members of the global jihad to attacks Israeli ships are well known. Over the last two years there were two ...   more »

Past experience shows Iran likely to retaliate for Syria incident
Zaki Shalom
On February 16, 1992 Israeli gunships attacked a convoy traveling in south Lebanon that included Hizbullah secretary-general Abbas Musawi, his wife, six-year-old son, and several escorts. All of them were killed in the attack.
The initial plan was to abduct Musawi in the framework of efforts to secure the release of Air Force navigator Ron Arad. However, it quickly became apparent that an abduction operation was impractical. Therefore, then Chief of Staff Ehud Barak decided to assassinate Musawi.  
Israel admitted it was behind the attack. Meanwhile, Musawi was quickly succeeded by a young cleric called Hassan Nasrallah.  
Iran, who views itself as Hizbullah's patron, could not have seen the IDF's operation as anything but a provocation and challenge. Therefore, so it seems, it decided to escalate matters, likely in consultation with its allies Syria and Hizbullah. On March 17, 1992, several weeks after Musawi's assassination, a serious terror attack targeted Israel's embassy in Argentina. A total of 29 people were killed and more than 240 were wounded.  
On May 21, 1994 an IDF force abducted Mustafa Dirani. Based on information available to Israel, he was ...   more »

WASHINGTON (AFP) — US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice heads to the Middle East next week to lay the groundwork for a US-sponsored regional peace conference, as talks between Israelis and Palestinians begin to intensify.
Rice will travel to Jerusalem and Ramallah from September 18-20, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Wednesday.
She will meet with top officials "in order to continue the discussions on advancing the development of a political horizon and the two-state solution," McCormack said.
During the long-anticipated trip, Rice "wants to build upon some of the progress the two parties themselves have made during their discussions recently," he added, referring to recent meeting between Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas.
US President George W. Bush has called for the international conference, expected to be held in November, in order to jumpstart Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.
Olmert and Abbas on Monday reaffirmed their commitment to a two-state solution to the Middle East conflict, and a senior Israeli government official told reporters that both sides would work "very intensely in the coming weeks to try to reach an understanding, preferably before the summit."
Israelis and Palestinians "decided to form some negotiating committees and that is ...   more »

Anita Finkelstein almost tossed the personally addressed letter from the "One House" movement warning that her home in the Tekoa settlement would soon be in "trapped in hostile territory" because it is located on the Palestinian side of the security barrier.
"I almost threw it in the rubbish before I even opened it because it looked like an advertisement," Finkelstein told The Jerusalem Post on Sunday.
But because she wasn't sure, she opened the one-page letter that was sent over the last few weeks to 10,000 residents of Judea and Samaria living outside the fence's boundaries. The letter was peppered with strong language explaining the "life-threatening reality" that awaited her should she stay in the settlement she has lived in for the last 21 years.
"We have already learned that military power cannot promise security for those stuck within Palestinian sovereignty. The terror threat that hovers over the heads of thousands of families will only increase," said the letter.
It added that settlers' lives outside of the fence were at a greater risk because of the growing unrest in the Palestinian Authority.
Time was of the essence, the letter warned, because "work on the fence will be completed in a ...   more »

By Israel Insider staff    
  The independent Palestinian news agency Maan published a Hebrew document late last week that purports to represent the "principles" apparently agreed on in negotiations between Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. While the offices of both men denied any connection to it, comments by Israeli President Shimon Peres confirm some of the main points. On one of the most controversial points, that Israel has agreed to surrender sovereignty the Old City of Jerusalem, Peres pointedly refused to comment.
Despite the denials, then, there is reason to believe that the draft does represent or approximate, the emerging joint declaration between Olmert -- who has kept negotiations from almost all of this minister -- and Abbas, who has doubtful authority to negotiate a deal since his supporters were expelled from Gaza and his headquarters there conquered by Hamas. That apparently hasn't stop the Israeli Prime Minister, evidently with the blessing of eminence grise Peres, who long has pushed for a deal that would redivide Jerusalem.
In its first point, the document states -- adopting Arab language for the disputed territories of Judea and Samaria -- that Israel has agreed to "end ...   more »

Six hundred Iranian Shihab-3 missiles are pointed at targets throughout Israel, and will be launched if either Iran or Syria are attacked, an Iranian website affiliated with the regime reported on Monday.
"Iran will shoot at Israel 600 missiles if it is attacked," the Iranian news website, Assar Iran, reported. "600 missiles will only be the first reaction."
According to the report, dozens of locations throughout Iraq, which are being used by the US Army, have also been targeted.
The Shihab missile has a range of 1,300 km, and can reach anywhere in Israel.
On Sunday, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said that the nuclear Iranian crisis forces the world "to prepare for the worst," and said that in this case it "is war."
Kouchner emphasized, however, that negotiations should still be the preferred course of action.
Kouchner, quoted by French daily Le Figaro, added that "Iran does whatever it pleases in Iraq ... one cannot find in the entire world a crisis greater than this one."
In response to Kouchner's comments, Iran's state-owned news agency accused France of pandering to the interests of the United States.
"The new occupants of the Elysee (Presidential palace) want to copy the White ...   more »

By Barak Ravid, Avi Issacharoff and Amos Harel, Haaretz Correspondents, Haaretz Service and News Agencies   
Former United Nations ambassador John Bolton said Sunday that Israel's reported military operation inside Syria earlier this month should be regarded as a 'clear message to Iran' that its nuclear efforts will not be ignored by the international community.
"I think it would be unusual for Israel to conduct a military operation inside Syria other than for a very high value target, and certainly a Syrian effort in the nuclear weapons area would qualify," Bolton told Channel 10 in an interview broadcast Sunday.
"I think this is a clear message not only to Syria, I think it's a clear message to Iran as well, that its continued efforts to acquire nuclear weapons are not going to go unanswered," Bolton said    
Bolton, who has long called for a hard line against the Syrian and Iranian regimes, did not indicate that he had first-hand information about the incident.
The U.K. newspaper The Sunday Times quoted an Israeli source on Sunday as saying that Syria had been planning a "devastating surprise" for Israel, in the wake of reports that the Israel Air Force carried out an ...   more »

Latest in a series of violations as Israeli PM likely to pardon more gunmen
By Aaron Klein
JERUSALEM – Israel today arrested a terrorist from a group of over one hundred gunmen from Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah forces who were granted amnesty in July by Prime Minister Olmert.
In a gesture to Abbas', Olmert granted the amnesty to 178 West Bank-based members of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, Fatah's declared military wing which took responsibility along with the Islamic Jihad terror group for every suicide bombing in Israel the past two years.
In line with the amnesty agreement, most Brigades terrorists on Olmert's list pledged their resignation from any so-called paramilitary organizations and were required to disarm, spend a week in a PA holding area and restrict their movements to the area in which they reside for three months. After that, they would be allowed to move freely throughout the West Bank.
Today, the Israeli Defense Forces arrested Brigades member Fadi Al-Kene after he was caught smuggling explosives in the West Bank city of Nablus, or biblical Shechem. Al-Kene was carrying a small pistol at the time of his arrest.
The incident was the latest in a string ...   more »