Clinton stands by her quote to defend Israel against Iran nuclear attack

JERUSALEM (Press Release)–U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was interviewed in Jerusalem by Israel Channel 10 personality Yaakov Eilon on Sept. 16.  The transcript of thier interview was just released.

QUESTION: Madam Secretary, thank you very much for speaking with us at Channel 10. Welcome to Jerusalem.

SECRETARY CLINTON: Thank you. It’s wonderful to be back.
QUESTION: With this beautiful backdrop of the Old City, I guess the question is will this city eventually be divided between the Palestinians and Israelis?
 

SECRETARY CLINTON: We are the beginning of what everyone in Israel knows are very difficult and intense negotiations on all of the core issues. And I’m not going to prejudge or predict what the outcome of those negotiations would be. But clearly, as I’ve watched the two leaders over the last few weeks, they’re not wasting any time. They’re getting right into talking about the most sensitive, most difficult issues. And the outcome is going to be what each thinks and is in the best interests of the Israeli and Palestinian people.

16 ways Jerusalemites know Sukkot is coming

By Judy Lash Balint

Judy Lash Balint

JERUSALEM — Sixteen ways Jerusalemites know Sukkot is coming:

1. The clang of metal poles and the sounds of hammering are practically constant as Jerusalem’s apartment dwellers hurry to erect their sukkot and squeeze them into small balconies, odd-shaped gardens and otherwise derelict rooftops.

2. The tourists have landed! Overwhelmingly religious, English and French speaking, they jam the city’s take-out places and restaurants, and may be seen in packs wandering up and down Emek Refaim Street and through the glitzy Mamilla Mall talking to their friends at top volume on their cell phones.

3. Almost every non-profit group worth tits salt has scheduled a fund-raising and/or familiarization event for the intermediate days of Sukkot, aimed at capturing the attention of the wealthy temporary Jerusalem residents.

Tel Aviv professor and Ph.D. student try to stay a step ahead of the hackers

TEL AVIV (Press Release) — Used in a variety of products from credit cards to satellite televisions, secure chips are designed to keep encoded data safe. But hackers continue to develop methods to crack the chips’ security codes and access the information within.

Thinking like hackers, Prof. Avishai Wool and his Ph.D. student Yossi Oren of Tel Aviv University’s School of Electrical Engineering have developed an innovative way of extracting information from chip technology. By combining modern cryptology methods with constraint programming ― an area of computer science designed to solve a series of complex equations ― Prof. Wool and Oren were able to extract more information from secure chips. Their research, which could lead to important new advances in computer security, was recently presented at the 12th Workshop on Cryptographic Hardware and Embedded Systems (CHES) in Santa Barbara, CA. 

San Diegan Ariana Neustein, 3 others, named inaugural Global Service Fellows

 WASHINGTON, DC  (Press Release)– Four inaugural fellows, including one from San Deigo,  have been selected to serve in a new overseas service initiative for BBYO alumni, the JDC-BBYO Global Service Fellowship, it was announced by The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) and BBYO, Inc., the world’s leading pluralistic Jewish teen movement.

This fall Ben Becker, Laura Himmelstein, Ariana Neustein and Paulina Zaharieva will join the JDC’s Jewish Service Corps for one year to help communities with their most pressing welfare, Jewish renewal and humanitarian needs while developing teen programming and connections to Jewish life through BBYO’s innovative leadership programming and international network.  The JDC-BBYO Global Service Fellowship is receiving initial support from the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation.

Becker, Himmelstein, Neustein and Zaharieva will serve respectively as BBYO experts in the Jewish communities of Turkey; Israel, Argentina, and Serbia.  They will work to assess the needs of the Jewish teen community in their respective countries, build relationships, and expose teens to BBYO and global Jewish teen programming.

Holocaust denier Irving now plans tours to Auschwitz

LONDON (WJC)–The convicted Holocaust denier David Irving is set to lead guided tours of former Nazi death camps, including Auschwitz and Treblinka, the British newspaper ‘Daily Mail’ reports.

The revisionist historian, who was convicted of Holocaust denial in 2006 by a court in Austria and sentenced to three years in jail, is scheduled to take a week-long tour on Tuesday to the former Nazi concentration camps and the site of the Warsaw Ghetto. The stunt is expected to attract a number of far-right sympathizers from across Europe. Advertising material for the tour promises an experience far removed from the “tourist attractions of Auschwitz.” Participants will be charged US$ 2,650 each.

Olmert: Bush agreed to accept 100,000 Palestinian refugees

TEL AVIV (WJC)–Ehud Olmert, Israel’s former prime minister, has said in a speech that the Bush administration in the United States would have accepted 100,000 Palestinian refugees had Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas accepted his diplomatic overtures in 2008.

In a speech at Tel Aviv’s Eretz Israel Museum, Olmert outlined the offer he made the Palestinians at the end of his premiership, which included a contiguous Palestinian state, transferring control over Jerusalem’s “holy basin,” an area including the Old City, to the stewardship of five countries, and accepting thousands of Palestinian refugees into Israel on humanitarian grounds.

Olmert said that in all of his talks with world leaders, none expected Israel to accept all the Palestinian refugees. But he said he was proud to be the first Israeli prime minister to express sympathy with their plight. He said a limited number of refugees could be accepted on the basis of the Saudi diplomatic initiative. 

Venezuelan Jewish community leaders meet with Hugo Chavez

CARACAS (WJC)–The leadership of Venezuela’s Jewish community has met with President Hugo Chávez. The Jewish leaders raised the problem of anti-Semitism in state-owned media and asked Chávez to restore diplomatic relations with Israel.

During a meeting at the presidential palace in Caracas, Salomón Cohen Botbol, president of the Venezuelan Confederation of Jewish Associations (CAIV), the delegation had obtained a promise from Chávez that he would “study everything we presented to him.”

Cohen gave Chávez a dossier containing numerous examples of anti-Semitic messages that have appeared “almost daily, and for several years, in state media and government-friendly media.” 

World Jewish Congress wants EU monitor at Athens trial

ATHENS (WJC)–As three Greek human rights activists are going on trial for speaking out against judges who acquitted a notorious anti-Semite and extreme-right politician in Greece, the World Jewish Congress (WJC) has called on the president of the European Parliament to send an official envoy to watch this trial in Athens.

The WJC criticized the Greek judiciary for acquitting the self-declared anti-Semite Konstantinos Plevris last year and for now trying to silence the critics of this decision. WJC Vice President and Deputy Secretary-General Maram Stern stated: “We must not allow that people who speak out against bigots such as Mr. Plevris are being prosecuted whilst the hate mongers themselves are being acquitted by the courts.”

In a letter to Jerzy Buzek, the president of the European Parliament, Stern called the trial “a perversion of justice” and “an assault on fundamental European values.” He voiced suspicion that parts of the Greek judiciary were not inclined to defend fundamental European values, but consciously acted against them.

San Diego author tells the rest of the story of ‘The Odyssey’

Penelope’s Daughter by Laurel Corona, Berkeley Publishing Group, 2010, 358 pages including glossary, afterword and reader’s guide, $15.  

By Donald H. Harrison  

Donald H. Harrison

SAN DIEGO—Readers may be charmed by this story and yet find it controversial.  Prize-winning author Laurel Corona, who often writes book reviews for San Diego Jewish World, has written another novel, Penelope’s Daughter, in which she makes a major amendment to Homer’s Odyssey. 

Corona conjures up a daughter, born to Penelope and Odysseus after the latter has sailed off to war to bring Helen home from Troy.  The daughter, Xanthe, growing up without knowing her father, is very much in danger as suitors press their attentions on Penelope (true to Homer’s version).  Would one of these avaricious men seeking Odysseus’ throne rape Xanthe to force her into a marriage?

Fearing that one of these louts indeed might use rape as a political weapon, Penelope decides to fake Xanthe’s death and to send her away secretly to Sparta, where her old friend Helen (of Trojan war fame) rules as Menelaus’ queen.In such a way, Corona weaves for us a tale of a young girl growing to womanhood, and eventually falling in love, in two different cities of ancient Greece, while at the same time providing voices for the women who are otherwise silent in Homer’s enduring classic. 

The Jews Down Under~Roundup of Australian Jewish News

 

Garry Fabian

By Garry Fabian

Art Unites Youth and Seniors

MELBOURNE, 16 September – When Marianne Roth, a resident at Emmy Monash Aged Care, a Jewish retirement home,  heard about a unique artistic collaboration between the home and nearby Shelford Girls’ Grammar, she couldn’t contain her excitement.

The 90-year-old was a former teacher at the Caulfield school and decided she would pay it a visit ahead of the planned art class.

A few days before the year 8 class was scheduled to visit the aged-care facility, Mrs Roth
ventured over to the school, where she was warmly greeted by principal Polly Flanagan, teacher Rebecca Saunders and the year 8 girls.