Tony Blair will be moving to Jerusalem to become the Quartet's special peace envoy to the Middle East.
A statement released Wednesday by U.N. headquarters in New York confirmed Blair's appointment, which was reportedly agreed upon yesterday in Jerusalem at a meeting of the Quartet, the diplomatic grouping made up of the United States, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations.
As envoy, Blair is charged with mobilizing international assistance to the Palestinians, securing support for the institutional governance needs of the future Palestinian state, promoting Palestinian economic development, and coordinating Quartet objectives with other countries.
"As representative, Tony Blair will bring continuity and intensity of focus to the work of the Quartet in support of the Palestinians, within the broader framework of the Quartet's efforts to promote an end to the conflict in conformity with the roadmap," the statement said. "He will spend significant time in the region working with the parties and others to help create viable and lasting government institutions representing all Palestinians, a robust economy, and a climate of law and order for the Palestinian people."
Blair's new post will be based in Jerusalem, with a potential second office in the West Bank, and will ...   more »

By The Associated Press  
Tony Blair said in an interview published Thursday that he will begin his new job as special Middle East envoy for the Quartet immediately, and will probably travel to the region as early as next month.
The former British prime minister who officially stepped down on Wednesday said he would begin preparing the ground for a future Palestinian state in his new role, which he says is essential for a negotiated settlement in the region. He will represent the Quartet of peace negotiators comprised of the United Nations, the United States, the European Union and Russia.
"It is a fundamental issue. I will be starting straight away," he told The Northern Echo, a local newspaper which serves England's northeast. "I will probably go out in July." 
Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayad welcomed Blair's appointment as Mideast envoy.
"We welcome this appointment and look forward to working with him," Fayad told reporters in the West Bank city of Ramallah.
Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said Blair would be an asset to Palestinian attempts to establish an independent state alongside Israel.
"Mr. Blair's expertise and knowledge of the situation will enable him to help us in terms of ...   more »

ADL Director slams American Christian group for Israel divestment call
Yaakov Lappin
The United Methodist Church's call to divest from companies linked to Israel "is bordering on anti-Semitism," Anti-Defamation League Director Abraham Foxman told Ynetnews on Wednesday.  
Foxman furiously condemned recommendations made by the New England branch of the Methodist Church for its members to divest "from twenty companies identified as supporting the Israeli occupation in Palestine."  
The recommendations were made by a "task force" of clergy and church members set up to implement a "resolution to end the Israeli occupation," a statement by the Church added.  
Foxman, who is currently in Israel, said it was "sad that a religious institution whose job should be to reconcile continues to be biased and bigoted."
He added that in the past two years, "there has been a war perpetrated by Hizbullah, katyushas rockets, and terrorist acts. Now Hamas, that does not recognize Israel's right to exist and perpetrated violence, has gotten itself elected, and is in control of a million and a half Palestinians. And the Methodists are still there to teach Israel a lesson."  
"My reaction is one of outrage to this biased decision, which borders on ...   more »

AMMAN, 28 June 2007 — Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah, who arrived here yesterday on the last leg of his five-nation tour, urged Palestinian groups to stand united to protect their national interests. He warned that their continuing infighting would destroy all hope of setting up an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital.
The Saudi leader and his delegation received an unprecedented welcome from Jordan’s King Abdallah and other senior officials. Thousands of Jordanians, including tribal leaders in traditional dress, stood along roads to cheer the king and his entourage waving pictures of him and Saudi flags.
Amman had a festive look with colorful banners welcoming the Saudi ruler. King Abdullah enjoys wide popularity in Jordan because of his stand on Arab and Islamic issues.
Both kings later held a meeting and discussed major regional and international issues. Their talks covered the outcome of the four-party summit meeting in Sharm El-Sheikh and the efforts to achieve a just Middle East peace settlement, the situation in Iraq and Lebanon as well as ways to strengthen bilateral ties.
In an interview with Jordan’s Al-Rai Arabic daily, the Saudi king spoke about his brotherly relations with Jordan’s king. ...   more »

By Cal Thomas       
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | Sometimes, for those who pay attention, the stars align and produce spectacular effects in the cosmos and on earth. A similar effect can occasionally be produced through journalism.
On June 26, the Washington Post featured three stories on its World News page that should teach a lesson to anyone who wishes to pay attention. The top story was headlined, "Olmert Makes 'Gesture of Goodwill': At Summit in Egypt, Israeli Leader Pledges to Seek Release of 250 Palestinian Prisoners."
The story just below featured this headline: "Israeli Soldier, on Tape, Pleads for Prisoner Swap: A Year After Capture, (Gilad) Shalit Says He Needs To Be Hospitalized."
The third story's headline was "Hope Dims For Imminent Release of BBC Reporter."
Is Olmert self-deluded, or merely dumb, when he promises to engage in one more in a long list of "goodwill gestures" that have produced no reciprocity from Israel's enemies? I'm leaning toward the latter.
When Israel has previously released prisoners who were captured because many of them had killed, or tried to kill, Israelis, many returned to the company of their jihadist brothers and plotted to kill again. On occasion, Israel might have received one kidnapped ...   more »

David Horovitz,
Sanctions and diplomacy have failed and it may be too late for internal opposition to oust the Islamist regime, leaving only military intervention to stop Iran's drive to nuclear weapons, the US's former ambassador to the UN, John Bolton, told The Jerusalem Post on Tuesday.
Worse still, according to Ambassador Bolton, the Bush administration does not recognize the urgency of the hour and that the options are now limited to only the possibility of regime change from within or a last-resort military intervention, and it is still clinging to the dangerous and misguided belief that sanctions can be effective.
As a consequence, Bolton said he was "very worried" about the well-being of Israel. If he were in Israel's predicament, he said, "I'd be pushing the US very hard. I am pushing the US [administration] very hard, from the outside, in Washington."
Opinion: An easy step toward tightening sanctions
For a nuclear-free world, by UK FM Beckett
Bolton, interviewed by telephone from Washington, was speaking a day after the International Atomic Energy Agency announced it would send a team to Teheran, at Iran's request, to work jointly on a plan ostensibly meant to clear up suspicions about the nuclear ...   more »

by Robert E. Rector
WebMemo #1523
Last week, the White House Council of Economic Advisers issued a report entitled "Immigration's Economic Impact" which defended the President's promotion of the Senate's "comprehensive" immigration legislation (S.1348).[1] On June 25, the White House issued a follow-up editorial elaborating on the points made in the CEA report.[2] These publications criticized Heritage Foundation research on the fiscal costs of low skill immigration and amnesty. 
The Heritage research criticized by the White House made the following basic points about immigration and its costs:
Individuals without a high school degree impose significant net costs (the extent to which benefits and services received exceed taxes paid) on taxpayers.
The net fiscal cost of families of immigrants who lack a high school degree is not markedly different from the net fiscal cost of families of non-immigrants who lack a high school degree.
Immigrants are disproportionately low skilled; one-third of all immigrants and 50 to 60 percent of illegal immigrants lack a high school degree.
Unlike low and moderate skill immigrants, immigrants with a college education will pay more in taxes than they receive in benefits; therefore. immigration policy should increase the number of high skill immigrants entering the country ...   more »

CHICAGO (AFP) - Doctors could soon be storing essential medical information under the skin of their patients, the American Medical Association says. 
Devices the size of a grain of rice that are implanted with a needle could give emergency room doctors quick access to the records of chronically ill patients, the nation's largest doctors group said in a report.
The association adopted a policy Monday stating that the devices can improve the "safety and efficiency of patient care" by helping to identify patients and enabling secure access to clinical information.
These radio frequency identification tags (RFIDs) are already used by Wal-Mart and other businesses to speed up their shipping systems by sending out small signals that can be scanned more easily than bar codes.
Implanting them in people "can improve the continuity and coordination of care with resulting reductions in adverse drug events and other medical errors," said the report prepared by the association's ethics committee.
But the devices "also may pose some physical risks, compromise patient privacy, or present other social hazards."
The main concern is protecting the privacy of the information stored on the devices.
There are also health concerns.
While the devices are removable and designed to ...   more »

The White House sent out a message to "Jewish Leaders" last Wednesday.
For some reason, I, an Arab-American Christian journalist, received a copy. (This won't surprise those who deride me as a "neocon," which has become a euphemism for Jew.)
The message came from Jeremy Katz of the Office of Public Liaison, who identifies himself as the White House liaison to the Jewish community. (I couldn't help but wonder how many other taxpayer-supported liaisons there might be.)
Katz offered that he wanted to ensure that recipients "didn't miss this important statement from the president."
Here's what it said: "I am strongly committed to Israel's security and viability as a Jewish state, and to the maintenance of its qualitative military edge. During our meeting today, I told Prime Minister [Ehud] Olmert that I am committed to reaching a new 10-year agreement that will give Israel the increased assistance it requires to meet the new threats and challenges it faces. The work on this new agreement was launched during the prime minister's previous visit. I will send Under Secretary of State Nick Burns and an interagency team to Israel in July to lead discussions aimed at concluding an agreement soon."
Translation?
(Column ...   more »

 America's movie industry is a potent weapon of global reach that has shaped the world's imagination for generations. In that sense, "A Mighty Heart," the movie that pretends to tell the story of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, who was kidnapped and beheaded in 2002 by Islamic jihadists in Pakistan, ranks as a travesty.
Pearl's story is a real-life yarn of multiple dimensions that, at its most grandiose, could have been spun as the tale of a great clash, a sort of collision between Nazi-like value systems and basic American ones — in the story of a working journalist on the chaotic streets of Pakistan.
It could have been treated as the story of a man who grew up believing in something — an American raised by liberal Jewish parents to accept everyone's beliefs — only to be killed in a far-away land by nihilists who believed in nothing.
It could also have been a sideways profile of the American press — which, for all its foibles, has introduced the world to the notions of freedom of expression and democracy.
It is also the story of many Muslim countries, an oft-enacted tale of how failed values pry open a ...   more »

By Dan Murphy, Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
Adnan Abbas – with his poor English, four young daughters, and little money to speak of – shrugs when told that making a new life in the US will be hard.
"I know that a new country, new language, is difficult and that America isn't going to say, 'Welcome, Adnan, here's a million dollars,' " he says. "But life in Iraq? That's impossible. We're one of the luckiest families in the world."
On Tuesday, the Abbas family will take their five small suitcases, close the door on the small flat they've rented for the past year in Amman, Jordan, and start a journey that will eventually taken them to Lansing, Mich. They are in the vanguard of what's likely to become – if the history of American wars is anything to go by – the latest wave of immigrants to have an impact on the demographics of the US.
In February, the US agreed to accept 7,000 Iraqi refugees this year, a large jump over the fewer than 700 Iraqis accepted by the US in the first three years of the war but a drop in the ocean when measured ...   more »