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Press Review N 48 - By Gilberte Jacaret

Jerusalem Post, January 3 - We have thieves in Israel. We have hoodlums and even organized crime. But that doesn't
mean the whole country is corrupt or that all the leaders are bumbling fools. At most, our government norms and political
culture are wobbly...

This country can't afford to go limp because of political squabbling or an overly fussy attorney general. Corruption is
being fought, thank God, no matter how high up on the ladder it is found. Even the president is not immune. The
Winograds and the Lindenstrausses are evidence of a society that wants to reform itself. Going into a funk is a luxury we
don't have. Israel has the energy and the emotional strength to make solid decisions and carry them out quickly. There is
no excuse whatsoever for crippling the country.

Haaretz, January 3 - Don't cripple the country - By Yoel Marcus - With all due respect to the public censure of bungles
and briberies, with all due respect to the pursuit of honesty, the eagerness to punish those who are guilty and the fiery
rhetoric in the media, please, for God's sake, do us a favor: Don't cripple the country.

Okay, so we aren't solid gold. We have losers. We have leaders who screw up. Not everything ticks with clockwork
precision. We need to fix what needs fixing through proper administration, and when the time comes, through general
elections, which no one supports right now.

World Jewish Congress - Jordanian king warns Israel over Old City digging - 06 February 2006 - Jordan’s king
Abdullah II has warned Israel against digging near the Al-Aksa Mosque in Jerusalem's Old City. “Any attempts to
change the nature of such holy sites and remove its Islamic characteristics are condemned,” Abdullah II told
Israeli Arab lawmakers, according to Monday’s "Jordan Times". Hundreds of Palestinians demonstrated on
Monday at the Old City mosque to protest against the digging, which Israeli archaeological officials say was uncovering a
main road of ancient Jerusalem and was not taking place near the holy site. The Jordanian Royal Committee for
Jerusalem Affairs called Israel’s actions “a flagrant aggression on an Islamic shrine and Jordan’s
sovereignty over it, a violation of the Jordanian-Israeli Peace Treaty and a challenge for the UN resolutions.”
Khaled Mashaal, exiled leader of the radical Hamas movement, said the digging was aimed at making it easier for Israeli
troops to attack the mosque, and warned of a repeat of violence when an existing Old City tunnel was expanded in 1996.
Arab leaders often incite their followers by warning of imaginary Israeli plots to destabilize the mosque, including in 1996,
when bloody confrontations fanned by the Palestinian Authority left 70 people dead, although the tunnel in question did
not go under the Muslim shrine.

Saudi envoy at Jewish event on Capitol Hill - 05 February, 2007 - The Saudi ambassador to the United States, Prince
Turki al-Faisal (photo: www.saudicommercialoffice.com)
The outgoing Saudi Arabian ambassador to the United States, Prince Turki al-Faisal, has attended a Jewish community
reception co-hosted by the World Jewish Congress and several other Jewish groups. The function was held in honor of
the US special envoy on anti-Semitism, Gregg Rickman. Al-Faisal's appearance at a event was the first of time that a
Saudi diplomat attended an event sponsored by Jewish groups. Al-Faisal met privately in recent weeks with two proIsrael groups. He had announced his resignation last month. Some speculate he might bid at home to become foreign
minister. A Saudi diplomatic official who accompanied Al-Faisal to the event told the "Jerusalem Post" that the Holocaust
was a "historical fact. It did happen." He also said: "It should be a known fact that the Arabs never had a problem with
anti-Semitism, but we need to state that over and over again." Officials hosting the function also noted the presence of
the ambassadors of Bahrain, Jordan, Morocco and Tunisia, and an official from the Egyptian embassy.
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Antisemitism

Der Spiegel January 31 - Concentration camp photo archive - “Buchenwald mobilizes against Holocaust
deniers” - Gruesome Holocaust photos are often used as a sort of pedagogical shock therapy. But they are
frequently poorly documented, providing ammunition to historical revisionists. Now, though, the Buchenwald Memorial is
doing something about it.

The ceremonies devoted to the memory of the Holocaust went on all weekend. Across Europe, victims of Nazi violence
gathered on Saturday to remember mass murder visited on the continent by the Third Reich. And on Monday, the UN in
Geneva and the German Bundestag likewise commemorated the slaughter.
But what is the best way to remember the victims 62 years after the liberation of Auschwitz? The Buchenwald
concentrated camp memorial this week came up with a unique answer of their own: it is making some 600 images of the
former concentration camp available on the Internet…Researchers meticulously checked the source of each and
every picture.
…A picture would be attributed to Buchenwald one time, to Dachau another time, and then to
Nordhausen…Such inconsistency in how images of Nazi crimes are used has made the work of revisionists and
Holocaust deniers that much easier, say historians.
…Today’s scientists have reason to hope that by exposing such manipulations and inconsistencies, the
strength of the evidence provided by the remaining photographs will be further increased. They hope, in short, to make
the work of Holocaust deniers that much more difficult.

Iran

Jerusalem Post, January 31 - “The Iranians do not expect to be attacked” - Seating himself in the center of
The Jerusalem Post’s conference room, Prof. Bernard Lewis, the preeminent Islamic historian and scholar of his
age, who turned 90 last May, preferred to eschew any kind of opening remarks, and instead simply invited our questions.
For President M. Ahmadinejad’s Iran, he noted dryly, the notion of mutual assured destruction…was
“not a deterrent”, but rather “an inducement”. Given the apocalyptic messianism of
Ahmadinejad and his supporters, “if they kill large numbers of their own people, they are doing them a favor. They
are giving them a quick free pass to heaven and all its delights, the divine brothel in the skies.”
…He argued that Iran’s goals could yet be thwarted by encouraging the Iranian people to turn against their
regime. “There is a level of discontent at home, which could be exploited” he said strikingly. “I do not
think it would be too difficult to bring it to the point when the regime could be overthrown.”…
I am told that the Israeli daily radio program in Persian is widely listened to all over Iran with rapt attention and it is the
only one that they believe.
Iranians were furious over the Lebanese war, feeling that they had been dragged into it and their resources were being
squandered on promoting this dubious cause when things are deteriorating from bad to worse at home.
…My guess is that they do not expect to be attacked. Remember, they have no experience of the functioning of a
free society…What we see as free debate, they see as weakness and division and fear.
…The Arab states are very concerned about the Shia revolution. They see a militant, expansionist Shia movement
which already seems to be spreading from Iran to Iraq, through Syria to Lebanon all the way across to the Mediterranean
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an eastward to Afghanistan and Pakistan and so on.

In Jordan, Israel television is widely watched and they get the message of how a free society works.
…I do not think that Arab nationalism is faring very well now. It has failed monumentally in every country. It has
brought them greater tyranny, worse government and, in many places lowered standards of living.
What I hope might be a more positive development is not nationalism but patriotism. It is a very different thing, which is
much more compatible with the development of democratic institutions and liberal values.
…There are things that can be done in Iran.

Haaretz, January 26 - Iran is almost ready to launch spy satellite into space.

Times online, January 28 - Iran plans next month to begin installing equipment that will enrich uranium on an industrial
scale…
American officials say that that there may be an element of bluff in the Iranian statement of intention as the regime had
promised a year ago to have 3,000 centrifuges in operation by now.

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