US income inequality at record high

BBC News

10 September 2013 Last updated at 15:06 ET

One street in St Louis, Missouri, has been known to residents as the "dividing line"

The income gap between the richest 1% of Americans and the other 99% widened to a record margin in 2012, according to an analysis of tax filings.

The top 1% of US earners collected 19.3% of household income, breaking a record previously set in 1927.
Income inequality in the US has been growing for almost three decades.

Overall, the pre-tax incomes of the top 1% of households rose 19.6% compared to a 1% increase for the rest of Americans.

And the top 10% of richest households represented just under half of all income in the year, according to the analysis.

Emmanuel Saez at the University of California, Berkeley, one of the economists who analysed the tax data, said the rise may have been in part because of sales of stock to avoid higher capital gains taxes in January.
Mr Saez wrote in an analysis that despite recent policy changes aiming at lessening income inequality, the measures were relatively small in comparison to "policy changes that took place coming out of the Great Depression".

"Therefore, it seems unlikely that US income concentration will fall much in the coming years."

How the American dream is changing

Income counted in the analysis includes wages, private pension payments, dividends and capital gains from the sale of stocks and other assets, but it does not include unemployment benefits or federal public pension benefits, known as Social Security.

While the crash of 2007-09 adversely affected top earners, benefits of rising corporate profits and stock prices since then have largely gone to the richest, according to the study.

Incomes among the richest fell more than 36% between 2007-09, compared with a decrease of 11.6% for the rest of Americans. But in the last three years, 95% of all income gains have gone to the richest 1%. The top 1% of American households had income above $394,000 (£250,000) last year. The top 10% had income exceeding $114,000.

Is Israel running America? Who benefits from the False Flag poison gas attack being used to initiated war with Syria?

We Americans have lost our country now to Israel. Israel dictates U.S. foreign policy. Israel promotes the wars with Israel's enemies using Americans as cannon fodder and money and arms front for them. It's time to talk IMPEACHMENT for the President and all Congressional members fronting for the foreign government of Israel trying to whip up support for another Israel orchestrated False Flag event to push Americans into wars they cannot ever win.

News gets worse: The animals mistaken for spies

BBC Mews
4 September 2013 Last updated at 20:52 ET

Egyptian authorities detained a stork last week on suspicion of espionage, mistaking its migration tag for spying equipment. In fact the stork was innocent - like a number of other animals falsely accused over the years of undercover work, writes Mohamed Madi.

In 2011, Saudi authorities arrested a high-flying vulture on suspicion that it was flying missions for Israel's famously ingenious Mossad agency. And a spate of shark attacks near the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh in 2010 was blamed by one TV station on GPS-controlled predators planted by Israel in order to harm the Egyptian tourism industry.
Iran has also felt threatened by animal agents. In 2007 the Iranian army arrested a team of 14 "spy squirrels" found near a nuclear enrichment plant. Officials said they succeeded in apprehending the suspects "before they were able to take any action".

Licensed to nibble

“The CIA's attempt to implant listening devices into a cat ended in failure when the kitty was run over by a car ”

However, not all reports of pets on patrol are as far-fetched as they seem. Animals have been serving in the military as early as 1908, when Germans first attached cameras to pigeons to take aerial photographs.

Some programmes have been more successful than others. The CIA's attempt to implant listening devices into a cat - dubbed Operation Acoustic Kitty - ended in failure on day one, when the kitty was run over by a car outside the Soviet embassy in Washington DC. The project was estimated to have cost more than $14m.
Another failed project was the equally outlandish Bat Bomb, tried by the US in WWII, where bats were strapped to mini-incendiary devices and dropped over Japan. The idea was for them to roost inside wooden Japanese buildings before bursting into flames. The atomic bomb ultimately proved more effective.
Perhaps the most successful recruits from the animal world have been dolphins. The US and Russia have confirmed the existence of marine mammal training programmes, where dolphins and seals are trained to identify underwater mines and disable enemy swimmers. But just like young soldiers, dolphins have hormones, and can go awol. In March this year Ukraine's Defence Ministry had to deny reports that three military dolphins had escaped and were roaming the Black Sea in search of sex.

At last! Real News! Alaska feline mayor Stubbs the cat suffers dog attack

BBC News

5 September 2013 Last updated at 07:40 ET

Stubbs the cat was elected mayor of Talkeetna 15 years ago

A cat which was elected mayor of an Alaskan town 15 years ago has been badly injured in a dog attack.

Stubbs the cat, mayor of Talkeetna - which has no human mayor - is receiving veterinary care.
The cat, aged 16, was elected in a write-in campaign 15 years ago.
In the wake of Saturday's attack, Stubbs has been left with a punctured lung, bruised hips, a long deep gash on his side and a fractured sternum, the AP news agency reports.
Talkeetna, 115 miles (185km) north of the state's main city, Anchorage, is dotted with artist shops and is said to be the inspiration for the US TV series Northern Exposure.

Obama and global intifada

By Prof. Mazin Qumsiyeh
http://popular-resistance.blogspot.com/2013/08/obama-and-global-intifada.html

It is not difficult to understand the power-game being played in Syria
and no decent human being should stand on the sideline in a conflict
that will shape the future of our humanity.  The global intifada
(uprising) is spreading and it is rejecting war and hegemony and now
even President Obama is reeling under pressure.  It is an earthquake
that is shaking the very foundation of post-WWII world order (what
used to be referred to mistakenly as “the American century” when it
was really the Zionist century).  The British, French and American
public long exposed to Zionist propaganda have joined the revolution.
Politicians started to panic especially after the British parliament
voted against war. This was the first major and stunning defeat to the
US/Israel hegemony of British politics since WWII.

US President Obama was stuck after the British vote and the clear
solid position of Lebanon, Syria, Iran, Russia, China and even
overwhelming public opposition in the US despite the attempt to whip
frenzy by Israel media stooges like Wolf Blitzer of CNN.   Obama was
also stunned by what his own intelligence services told him about
potential repercussions of a military strike on Syria especially
without UN mandate and without US public support.  These repercussions
included presence of strong defensive and offensive capabilities in
Syria. There was intelligence leaks about downed “test” incursion. But
repercussions discussed include strengthening rather than weakening
Iran (after all, this is what happened after Iraq!).  President Obama
spent countless hours talking with his Zionist and non-Zionist
advisers and key government officials (there are no anti-Zionists in
his group). Faced with no good option in trying to maintain Israel/US
hegemony, Obama decided not to decide and shift the debate to Congress
to buy time. Now it is up to the American people who overwhelmingly
reject war on Syria to stand up and pressure the Israeli-occupied US
congress to do what is good for US citizens not what they perceive to
be good for Zionism.

The Russian president spoke of a number of key points that he called
“common sense” while Obama just lied.  Russia and the US had agreed to
the parameters of a political conference in which all sides were
invited. Russia talked the Syrian government into attending this
Geneva conference (even though most Syrians opposed a dialogue with
Western backed thugs and Western backed mercenaries). Under Israeli
pressure, the US administration started to rethink their agreement and
their stooges announced they cannot join discussion with their
opponents unless their opponents are defeated and surrender!  Syrian
government forces then gained momentum against the Western and Israeli
backed extremist rebels and cornered them in very few pockets.  Syria
was opening up and international inspectors were coming.   Putin
rightly points out that under such conditions: who has the benefit of
using chemical weapons: the Syrian government or the rebels trying to
provide excuses for Western defeat of a government they could not
defeat themselves? It is common sense. Syria, Russia and China and all
humanity ask logically: if the US has proof that the Syrian government
used chemical weapons to attack its own people (including its own
soldiers), then give us the proof. They rightly ask why the mandate of
UN inspectors was  limited to only find out if they were used but not
to explore who might have used them. After the lies Israeli and US
intelligence concocted to go the war on Iraq, they now seem rather
reluctant to manufacture evidence again.

Obama lied about many other things and perhaps the only part of his
speech that touched on reality is when he admitted that he is part of
a system and that he cannot make a decision by himself.  The
military-industrial complex is now too entrenched in US politics for
any president to challenge it.  In fact, no one would be allowed to
become president if they were to have even a slight chance of
potential to challenge it.  So Obama says: I am with the machine that
was in place before I came to power and will always be with the
machine.  By this he showed that his campaign rhetoric about “change”
was just what American call “bull-shit”.  That is why Obama is stuck.
When President Obama paid tribute to Martin Luther King Jr just a week
ago, he was being hypocritical. King had famously said that the US is
the greatest purveyor of violence on earth.  The US public can and
must push Obama and Congress to change just like they pushed previous
politicians to get civil rights, women’s right to vote, ending the war
on Vietnam, ending US support for Apartheid South Africa and more.

The fact remains that the most destabilizing country in the Middle
East is the one that receives unconditional billions of US taxpayer
money. It is the state that caused millions of refugees and that
introduced weapons of mass destruction including nuclear weapons to
the Middle East.  It is the state that used white phosphorous and
depleted uranium on civilian populations.  It is the state that
started five wars and that lobbied successfully to ge the US to go to
wars in places like Iraq and Afghanistan that caused millions of lives
lost and trillions of US taxpayer money spent. It is the state that
fits all the criteria discussed in the International convention
against the crimes of apartheid and racial discrimination.

The fact is that this latest Israel-inspired conflict is not about
form of government in Syria. The US/Israel backed dictators in a dozen
Arab countries are far, far worse than Bashar Assad of Syria. The fact
remains that this is a clear attempt by the US through ist secretary
of state under influence from the Zionist lobby and with the support
of puppet rulers in the Arab world to liquidate the Palestinian cause.
 The parameters of this are clear: liquidating Palestinian rights like
the right of refugees to return to their homes and lands, limited
Palestinian autonomy that Palestinian puppets can call a state in
parts of the occupied West Bank in confederation with Jordan.  This
will ensure the “Jewishness” of the apartheid state of Israel. Gaza
would be relegated to Egyptian administration or continuing to manage
it as one Israeli official said “by putting Gazan’s on a diet”.  To
get this program through, resistance must be made to look futile.
Israel set-up a high-level ministerial committee to fight boycotts,
divestment, and sanctions.  Israel told the US that the
Hizballah-Syria-Iran axis must be destroyed. Potentially developing
Arab countries will be broken up into sectarian and other conflicts
(divide and conquer) beginning with Iraq.  They thought Syria is the
next weak link that can be removed in the same way that Libya was
disposed of. They underestimated the level of rejection to their
demonic schemes of divide and conquer.

What happened actually is the opposite. A strengthening block evolved
starting in Iran, Iraq and Palestine and spreading globally.  The
counter-revolutionary efforts are failing and in some cases getting
the opposite effect of unifying and strengthening resistance.  The
attempts by some to ignite sectarian strife in Lebanon failed
miserably.  The positions of China, Russia, Venezuela and other
governments came to reflect the international consensus of resisting
US/Israeli hegemony.  No human being and no government can claim
neutrality.  Neutrality is rather meaningless when there is such an
evel attempt to dominate the world for the benefit of just a few
people at the expense of millions. The vast majority of people in all
countries (Palestine, USA, Britain, France, Russia, China etc) stand
on one side of this against the Zionist attempts to drag the world
into yet one more destructive conflict.  Clearly a win here is a win
for Palestine and a win for all people of the world.

Before we talk about democracy in Syria, we must respect the fact that
the vast majority of people on earth insist that Western governments
respect their own citizens’ will instead of trying to smother them or
shape them with propaganda or bypass them to serve the Israel lobby.
Before we talk about democracy in Syria, we must end apartheid in
Israel, and end the repressive regimes supported by the US especially
those in the oil producing Arab countries.  Perhaps this is the reason
gulf states are pouring billions to fund murderers in the so called
“Syrian rebels” (most of them turn out to be mercenaries).  It is the
same reason that Netanyahu and Obama are both very nervous.  When the
US/Israel program of liquidating the Palestinian cause and destroying
Syria fails (and it will), all bets are off.  People stand up to
tyranny and stand up for human rights and that is why governments (US,
Israeli, Saudi Arabia, Turkey etc) are starting to panic.  They do
have good reason to worry because people power is coming and each of
us must be part of it.  We ask you to join the global intifada which
will liberate oppressors and oppressed alike and create a better world
for all.

One of the great writers of modern times is gone

Elmore Leonard died today. He was 87. He looks remarkably similar to my friend Roger at 87 but they didn't look like each other before that. Elmore created a crisp spartan cinematic style of writing that I now see popping up in other younger writers such as Dennis Lehane, Mystic River author helping himself to the ease of description that relies on very few words and a whole lot of internalized national cultural perspectives. It worked for Leonard for years and years and I'm sorry to say the last book I read of his I didn't finish, a first for me for any Leonard book, because I didn't want to hear the Leonard lingo anymore, it rang false for the very first time and I took the book back to the library unread. Last week. And he died today. I'm sorry, Leonard, I didn't know you were becoming history..

New Israeli settlement homes anger Palestinians

BBC News

11 August 2013 Last updated at 10:42 ET

The issue of building settlements in occupied Palestinian areas halted the last direct peace talks in September 2010

Palestinians have reacted angrily to Israel's approval of nearly 1,200 new Jewish settlement homes, just days before peace talks are set to resume.

Palestinian negotiators said the approval cast doubt on Israel's sincerity in the peace process.
Israel's housing minister said no country in the world would take orders on where it could build its homes.
The issue of building settlements in occupied Palestinian areas halted the last direct talks in September 2010.
About 500,000 Jews live in more than 100 settlements built since Israel's 1967 occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem. The Palestinians want to establish their state in those areas, as well as the Gaza Strip.
The settlements are considered illegal under international law, although Israel disputes this.

'Dangerous policy'

  On Sunday, Israeli Housing Minister Uri Ariel confirmed that 793 apartments would be built in east Jerusalem and 394 in several large West Bank settlements.

Kevin Connolly BBC News, Jerusalem

 

Palestinians see continued Israeli construction on the land where they aspire to create a new state as one of the biggest obstacles to peace.

The timing of this announcement may deepen the sense of pessimism that surrounds renewed peace talks even before they've really begun.

Housing Minister Uri Ariel comes from a party which opposes the very idea of a Palestinian state bordering Israel on the West Bank of the River Jordan. He 's now invited private firms to tender for the construction work.

More liberal members of Israel's broad coalition government will be uncomfortable with the tone and timing of the news. Palestinian leaders will be angered but may well have factored the possibility of this type of announcement into their overall political calculations.

Israel is also preparing to free 26 Palestinian prisoners on the eve of this week's scheduled peace talks. Announcing the settlement construction at the same time may be intended as a sop to right-wing supporters of the government who oppose those prisoner releases.

Palestinians said the plans brought into question Israel's commitment to the peace process.

Palestinian negotiator Mohammed Shtayeh said Israel aimed "to destroy the basis of the solution called for by the international community, which aims to establish a Palestinian state on the 1967 borders".
He accused Israel of trying to "determine the negotiations in whichever way suits it best".

Chief negotiator Saeb Erekat told Reuters: "If the Israeli government believes that every week they're going to cross a red line by settlement activity, if they go with this behaviour, what they're advertising is the unsustainability of the negotiations."

PLO executive committee member Hanan Ashrawi told the BBC: "We believe that Israel is deliberately sending a message to the US, to the rest of the world that regardless of any attempt at launching negotiations, 'we are going to press ahead with stealing more land, building more settlements and destroying the two-state-solution'.

"This is an extremely dangerous policy, and if left unchecked it certainly would lead to greater conflict and the destruction of all chances of peace."

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas had previously insisted he would not resume talks without an Israeli settlement freeze, but relented during mediation by US Secretary of State John Kerry.

The BBC's Kevin Connolly in Jerusalem says Israel's announcement of the settlement construction may be intended as a sop to right-wing supporters of the government.

They had been angered by the government's approval of the release of more than 100 Palestinian prisoners - a condition set by the Palestinians for the talks to go ahead. The first group is due to be freed on 13 August.
The negotiations are scheduled to start in Jerusalem on Wednesday.

The latest Israeli settlement approval invites tenders for homes in Har Homa and Gilo, on East Jerusalem's southern outskirts, and in Pisgat Zeev, on the city's northern edge.

Tenders will also be invited for Ariel, in the northern West Bank, in Maaleh Adumim, east of Jerusalem, and in Efrata and Beitar Ilit, around Bethlehem.

A housing ministry spokesman told the BBC that construction would begin in one to two years' time.
Mr Ariel said in a statement: "No country in the world takes orders from other countries [about] where it can build and where it can't.

"We will continue to market housing and build in the entire country... This is the right thing at the present time, for Zionism and for the economy.''

Peace with Palestinians? Hah! Not when Eretz Yisrael is the goal all along: A single JEWISH STATE with Pals as houseboys and cleaning women for Zionist settlers in their settlements For Jews Only. And we Americans fund these Jewish racist projects that laws forbidding racial discrimination would never be allowed to be built in any Western nation.

Germany ends spy pact with US and UK after Snowden

 BBC News
2 August 2013 Last updated at 16:54 ET

Germans take data protection very seriously

Germany has cancelled a Cold War-era pact with the US and Britain in response to revelations about electronic surveillance operations.

Details of snooping programmes involving the transatlantic allies have been leaked to the media by former US intelligence analyst Edward Snowden.

The revelations have sparked widespread outrage in Germany, where elections are due next month.

The agreement dates from 1968-9, and its cancellation is largely symbolic.

German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said in a statement: "The cancellation of the administrative agreements, which we have pushed for in recent weeks, is a necessary and proper consequence of the recent debate about protecting personal privacy."

Germans' experience of mass surveillance under the Communist and Nazi dictatorships makes them particularly sensitive to perceived infringements of personal privacy, and the country has strong data protection laws.

The agreement cancelled on Friday gave the Western countries which had troops stationed in West Germany - the US, Britain and France - the right to request surveillance operations to protect those forces.
'No impact'

A German official told the Associated Press news agency that the agreement had not been invoked since the end of the Cold War, and admitted that the decision would have no impact on current intelligence co-operation.A spokesperson for Britain's Foreign Office told reporters that the agreement had not been in use since 1990.

Henning Riecke of the German Council on Foreign Relations told AP that the German government needed to do something to demonstrate at home that it was taking the issue seriously.

"Ending an agreement made in the pre-internet age gives the Germans a chance to show they're doing something, and at the same time the Americans know it's not going to hurt them. 

"Given the good relations between the intelligence agencies, they'll get the information they need anyway," he said.

Israel's New Chief Rabbi, David Lau, Accused Of Racism

 The Huffington Post  |  By Katherine Bindley 

Posted: 07/31/2013 3:30 pm EDT  |  Updated: 08/01/2013 5:18 am EDT

The newly elected Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi -- one of the two men who serve as spiritual authorities for the people of Israel -- is already under fire for making an apparently racist remark, several Israeli news outlets are reporting.

David Lau was addressing a group of ultra-orthodox yeshiva students when he made reference to young people who are observed watching basketball on television in public rather than spending time studying the Torah. His argument was meant to illustrate the point that such a display could undermine the case for youths not being drafted into the Israeli Defense Forces. But according to Israeli news outlet Hareetz, Lau went on to use a racial slur to describe some professional basketball players.

"Why do you care whether these [k]ushim [a derogatory Hebrew term for black people] who are paid in Tel Aviv beat the kushim who are paid in Greece?"

The comment quickly drew the ire of some members of the Israeli parliament. Nachman Shai, a representative of the Labor party, called for Lau to apologize and told the Jerusalem Post that the comment stands in unfortunate contrast to the relatively liberal remarks Pope Francis made earlier this week in reference to not judging gays.

But Naftali Bennett, a minister of religious services and economics, reportedly came to Lau's defense, telling the Post that the media shouldn't be stalking public figures and looking for harmful statements.

Basketball is a strong source of pride for many Israelis: President Shimon Peres recently invited Amare Stoudemire of the New York Nicks to play for Israel's national team. However, Tablet Magazine notes that Lau's controversial comment isn't the first ugly incident to publicly surface regarding the treatment of professional basketball players in Israel.

Pini Gershon, a former coach for Maccabi Tel Aviv, was caught on camera in 2000 saying he could tell the difference between the intelligence levels of his players by the color of their skin.

Of all the major religions in the world, only one is based on racism: Judaism. the founding Abrahamic religion is based on a blanket racial prejudice belief system, similar to the blanket racism of white supremist ideology. While white supremists believe all non-whites are inferior human beings, so too does rabbinical Judaism find all non-Jews to be inferior human beings. In fact, both bigotry systems believe they are the only real human beings, the others are sub-species. It's in the Talmud and also Judaism's most honored rabbi's theology, Maimonides. The Israeli government sponsored settlement building in Palestine "for Jews only" manifests this inherent racist theology within fundamentalist Judaism. America's government, being totally compromised by Zionist Jewish majority political and economic leadership at top government levels, makes all Americans accomplices to Israeli racist policies. These Jewish settlements, if built in any Western democracy would be instantly condemned for what they are: racism in government social policy.

Japan, Indyk and Negotiations--A Palestinian point of view from Mazin Qumsiyeh's Human Rights Journal

HumanRights]
From: Mazin Qumsiyeh
Tue, Jul 30, 2013 03:28 PM

I will be in Japan giving a series of lectures on Israel-Palestine
situation (explaining apartheid, popular resistance, nuclear weapons, and
advocating for the only viable sustainable solution: one democratic secular
state).  Please tell your Japanese friends that they can find my schedule
(in Japanese) at http://qumsiyeh.org/upcomingevents/

Public Negotiations began amid great fanfare in Washington DC. Saeb Ereklat
sat next to a war criminal (Tsipi Livni who is responsible for massacre of
hundreds of civilians in Gaza) and across from the Israeli lobbyist Indyk
(representing the US) after giving up on the requirement (that is part of
Oslo and the Road map) for a settlement freeze and settling for informal
verbal assurances.   This is the same Erekat who has been fruitlessly
 negotiating  for 20 years along the sa,e lines (hence his book titled
 Life is negotiations ). It is the same person who the Palestine Papers
leaked to AlJazeera was shown giving one after another concession while the
Israeli side yawned and asked for more (see
http://www.aljazeera.com/palestinepapers/).

But most disturbingly, Abbas and Erekat accepted Martin Indyk as a US key
broker in the talks.  Indyk was appointed as US envoy to the  peace
process .  Indyk will broker the deal between Erekat and Livni even though
Indyk is a Zionist Jew who was an Israeli lobbyist. Indyk took leave of
absence from the Zionist group the Brookings institute in Washington DC. A
major funder of this institute is Haim Saban (see more about Saban at
http://www.mediamonitors.net/mazin32.html).  Indyk first worked in
Washington for the 'Washington Institute for Near East Policy' (WINEP), an
offshoot of AIPAC (Israel s lobby). Indyk did not have US citizenship but
this was quickly corrected with a speeded up process of facilitation,
nomination, and approval (all in less than two weeks) by President Clinton
in order to appoint him (this is rather unberlievable) as US ambassador to
Israel. Appointing a lobbyist for a  foreign country as US ambassador to
that country is unprecedented. Now appointing a wolf to broker the deal
between another wolf and a chicken is quite a feat.  We will see how fast
this chicken will get fleeced.

Ya alon said,  Releasing prisoners came as a result of choosing a bad
option over a worse option  We reached the decision to avoid the worse
[option]. Many strategic considerations, which may be revealed in the
future, stood behind this, and hence we must go forward with a release of
pre-Oslo prisoners.

Netanyahu said it even more clearly: that he refused to accept borders of
1967 or a settlement freeze and that this move to negotiations is merely to
strengthen Israeli positions.

Palestinian Authority police prevent a Palestinian march and attack
demonstrators who object to the unilateral decision by Abu Mazen to return
to negotiations http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbAkYyw3u7c

Analysis: Palestinians should invest in a Plan B By Daoud Kuttab
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=598851

Mazin Qumsiyeh, PhD
http://qumsiyeh.org

From Mazin Qumsiyeh's Journal

HumanRights] Palestinian choices

From: Mazin Qumsiyeh


Mr. Abbas agreed to go back to public negotiations with a pathological liar
(Netanyahu, see below).  Private negotiations have been ongoing behind the
scenes.  Public and private negotiations for the past 20 years produced
nothing tangible except increasing the number of colonial Jewish settlers
in the West Bank from 200,000 in 1992 to 650,000 today and subcontracting
Israeli security to Palestinian security officials.  Israel will release
some prisoners (and replace them with others) and the US will give more
money to corrupt officials on all sides.  The question is whether the only
two choices available to us are sitting around not doing anything or going
to fruitless unbalanced negotiations intended to liquidate Palestinian
rights? Do we really give up on resistance, on democratizing the PLO or on
freedom or on human rights? Below are some news showing that the BDS
movement is working thanks to global and local activists even as it is not
supported by Mahmoud Abbas and high level officials who continue to meet
and normalize with Israeli officials (the last was a high level meeting
with Likud and Shas leadesr at the PLO headquarters).

So that we are reminded who we are dealing with:  Netanyahu, caught
of-camera speaking his mind (not hasbara) about how he scuttled peace etc
http://youtu.be/3-5hUG6Os68

Despite heavy Israeli pressure, the EU published new guidelines asking all
Eropean entities not to deal with any Israeli entity that works in the
areas occupied in 1967.  Future agreements between the European Union and
Israel must include the explicit exclusion of Jewish settlements in the
West Bank or East Jerusalem, according to a new EU directive described by
an Israeli official as an "earthquake". This include the illegally annexed
Golan and Jerusalem.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jul/16/eu-israel-settlement-exclusion-clause

Consensus wisdom: The boycott of Israel is working: The only way to stop
its spread is to end the occupation, say a growing number of prominent
voices (none of whom, by the way, support the boycott).
http://972mag.com/consensus-wisdom-the-boycott-of-israel-is-working/74297/

[USA] BDS Campaigns Nationwide: Use the map below to connect with groups
working on specific BDS (boycotts, divestment, and sanctions) campaigns.
You can also search groups by state and resources they offer. If you would
like your group's campaigns included, please email Ramah Kudaimi at
membership@endtheoccupation.org
http://www.endtheoccupation.org/article.php?id=3383

Kairos Palestine strongly condemns the planned displacement, dispossession
and eviction of tens of thousands of Palestinian Bedouin citizens of Israel
http://www.kairospalestine.ps/sites/default/Documents/Letter%20of%20Condemnation%20-%20Pra
wer%20Plan.pdf

 [action needed] Announcing the launch of the  Freedom Stitchers  project
to create self-sufficiency for marginalized and jobless women in Gaza.
http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/freedom-stitchers

Stop the racist Prawer-Begin plan to ethniocally cleanse Palestinians of
the Negev
http://adalah.org/eng/?mod=articles&ID=1589


A visit to Al-Araqib, the desert village that refuses to be erased by Alice
Rothchild on July 1, 2013
http://mondoweiss.net/2013/07/desert-village-refuses.html

Mazin Qumsiyeh
A Bedouin in cyberspace, a villager at home
http://qumsiyeh.org

Israel slams EU's decision

English.news.cn   2013-07-17 05:32:48                                   JERUSALEM, July 16 (Xinhua) -- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu blasted Tuesday the European Union's decision to add a clause to agreements between its members and Israel specifying they will not apply to Israeli occupied territories in the West Bank. In response, Netanyahu held an urgent meeting Tuesday afternoon with Justice Minister and chief peace negotiator Tzipi Livni, Economy and Trade Minister Naftali Bennet and Deputy Foreign Minister Ze'ev Elkin. According to the EU's decision, delivered as a guideline for its member states, it is prohibited for any country or companies located on their territories to do business with firms or bodies situated in the West Bank settlement. Slamming the EU's decision, the Israeli prime minister said he expected the body to focus on other worrying developments in the region, such as the Syrian crisis and the Iranian nuclear issue, instead of Israel's settlement policy. "As prime minister, I would not allow hundreds of thousands of Israelis living in Judea and Samaria (the biblical name of the West Bank) to be hurt, as well as those living in the Golan Heights and Jerusalem," said Netanyahu. "We will not accept anyone on the outside dictate our borders to us. This topic will only be determined by direct negotiation between the two parties." Peace talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority came to a halt in 2010 over Israel's settlement construction in the West Bank, which represents a key issue in the attempts to resume negotiations. Editor: Mu Xuequan

Eclectic group sues U.S. government over phone data surveillance

By Dan Levine

SAN FRANCISCO | Tue Jul 16, 2013 1:37pm EDT

(Reuters) - A diverse collection of groups, including a gun manufacturer and marijuana legalization advocates, sued the U.S. government on Tuesday, alleging that the National Security Agency conducts unlawful dragnet surveillance of telephone calls.

The lawsuit, filed in a Northern California federal court, follows disclosures about NSA surveillance programs by fugitive former U.S. spy agency contractor Edward Snowden.

The suit targets the NSA's "Associational Tracking Program," which collects phone information from all major American telecommunication companies, including time and duration of calls.

A U.S. Department of Justice spokesman could not immediately be reached for comment.

The group of 18 plaintiffs - including a Unitarian church, an Islamic advocacy group and a gun rights organization - subscribe to Verizon and other phone carriers, the lawsuit said.

They are represented by the Electronics Frontier Foundation, data privacy advocates who have already been litigating for years against warrantless wiretapping under former President George W. Bush.

Last week, a San Francisco federal judge rejected government arguments that the older case should be dismissed because it would compromise state secrets and damage national security.

The lawsuit filed on Tuesday seeks an injunction against the operation of the Associational Tracking Program, along with the return and destruction of communication information possessed by the NSA.

The NSA's bulk collection of communication information is done without probable cause that the plaintiffs are engaged in any crime or international terrorist activity, the lawsuit says.

The White House said on Tuesday that Snowden, who applied for temporary asylum in Russia after spending three weeks in limbo at a Moscow airport, should be returned to the United States to face trial on espionage charges.

The case in U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, is First Unitarian Church of Los Angeles et al. vs. National Security Agency et al., 13-cv-3287.

(Editing by Mohammad Zargham)

Could this mark the END of Israeli expansion into Palestine? McDonald's refuses to operate in West Bank settlement

The West Bank Jewish settlement of Ariel is seen in this Sept. 20, 2010 aerial photo. (AP / Ariel Schalit)


 Tia Goldenberg, The Associated Press
Published Thursday, June 27, 2013 2:46PM EDT

JERUSALEM -- The McDonald's restaurant chain refused to open a branch in a West Bank Jewish settlement, the company said Thursday, adding a prominent name to an international movement to boycott Israel's settlements.

Irina Shalmor, spokeswoman for McDonald's Israel, said the owners of a planned mall in the Ariel settlement asked McDonald's to open a branch there about six months ago. Shalmor said the chain refused because the owner of McDonald's Israel has a policy of staying out of the occupied territories. The decision was not co-ordinated with McDonald's headquarters in the U.S., she said. The headquarters were not immediately available for comment.

The Israeli branch's owner and franchisee, Omri Padan, is a founder of the dovish group Peace Now, which opposes all settlements and views them as obstacles to peace. The group said Padan is no longer a member.

The decision by such a well-known multinational company to boycott the West Bank deals settlers an unwelcome blow.

It also adds the name of an important international brand to a movement that has urged businesses to stay out of the West Bank. International companies like Caterpillar, France's Veolia and others have faced pressure from a global network of pro-Palestinian activists to sever links with the settlements.

The activists have also pushed consumers to shun products made in settlements. Israeli academics and unions have also been boycotted because of Israel's settlement policies and European countries are considering stepping up efforts to label settlement-made products sold in Europe.

The Palestinians want the West Bank, along with the Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem, as part of their future state. Israel captured those areas, along with the Golan Heights, in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians and most of the international community consider Israel's West Bank settlements illegal or illegitimate.

The mall's owners, settlers and politicians who back them chided McDonald's for its decision.

"McDonald's has gone from being a for-profit company to an organization with an anti-Israeli political agenda," said Yigal Dilmoni, a leader of the Yesha Council, a settler umbrella group. He urged Israelis to think twice before they buy a meal at McDonald's following its decision. Pro-settler lawmaker Ayelet Shaked said she would boycott the fast food chain.

Tzahi Nehimias, a co-owner of the Ariel mall, said an Israeli burger chain, Burger Ranch, had offered to take McDonald's spot. He also said Burger King had shown interest, but Miguel Piedra, a spokesman for Burger King Worldwide Inc. said the company had no plans to re-enter Israel. The company closed its restaurants in Israel in 2010 and turned them over to Burger Ranch.

Nehimias said other international companies who were asked to open a branch at the mall also declined, but none cited the mall's location in a settlement as a reason. He declined to identify the other companies. Some 19,000 Jewish settlers live in Ariel and it has a large student population.

Peace Now welcomed McDonald's decision.

"We totally understand and support people who think settlements are bad for Israel's interests," said Yariv Oppenheimer, who heads Peace Now. "They don't want to take an active role by opening a business there and helping to expand and to contribute to the settlement idea."

Rafeef Ziadah of the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement said McDonald's move "will encourage other corporations to end their complicity in Israel's occupation."

This is not the first time McDonald's has stirred controversy in Israel. The company didn't open a branch in Israel until 1993 due to the Arab League boycott of the country.

A year later, McDonalds built a branch near a memorial to Israel's Golani military brigade, and Israelis objected to the large double arches sign there, saying it desecrated the site. The sign was later made smaller. In 2004, McDonalds was criticized for telling its Arabic and Russian speaking staff not to speak those languages at work.

Ecuador waives U.S. trade rights over Snowden case

(Reuters) - Ecuador said on Thursday it was waiving preferential rights under a U.S. trade agreement to demonstrate its principled approach to the asylum request of former American spy agency contractor Edward Snowden.

Officials in Quito added that the U.S. fugitive's case had still not been processed because he had not reached any of its diplomatic premises.

In a deliberately cheeky touch from the leftist government of President Rafael Correa, Ecuador also offered a multimillion donation for human rights training in the United States.

Snowden, 30, is believed to be at Moscow's international airport.

"The petitioner is not in Ecuadorean territory as the law requires," government official Betty Tola said at an early morning news conference in Ecuador.

Bristling at suggestions Quito was weighing the pros and cons of Snowden's case in terms of its own interests, officials also said Ecuador would not base its decision on its desire to renew the Andean Trade Preferences Act with Washington.

"Ecuador gives up, unilaterally and irrevocably, the said customs benefits," said another official, Fernando Alvarado.

"What's more, Ecuador offers the United States economic aid of $23 million annually, similar to what we received with the trade benefits, with the intention of providing education about human rights," Alvarado added.

"Ecuador does not accept pressure or threats from anyone, nor does it trade with principles or submit them to mercantile interests, however important those may be."

(Reporting by Brian Ellsworth and Alexandra Valencia; Writing by Andrew Cawthorne; Editing by Doina Chiacu)

New Eco-Friendly Battery Made of Wood And Sodium

New Eco-Friendly Battery Made of Wood And Sodium Can Be Charged More Than 400 Times

By Kukil Bora | June 20 2013 1:56 AM

Using only wood, tin and sodium as raw material, scientists at the University of Maryland have come up with a tiny, long-lasting, eco-friendly battery, which can be charged hundreds of times.

The scientists build the battery by using a very thin piece of wood, which they say is “a thousand times thinner than a piece of paper,” coated with tin. And, instead of lithium, which is found in many rechargeable batteries, they chose to use sodium to make it environmentally friendly.

Photo: ACS Publications Scientists have developed a very small long-lasting eco-friendly battery, using wood, tin and sodium, which can be charged hundreds of times. 
 

According to the scientists, lithium can be more efficient than sodium in storing energy. But sodium, wood and tin are more readily available, making them the ideal materials to build a cheap battery that will stock huge amounts of energy at once, not unlike solar energy at a power plant.

“Sodium (Na)-ion batteries offer an attractive option for low cost grid scale storage due to the abundance of Na. Tin (Sn) is touted as a high capacity anode for Na-ion batteries with a high theoretical capacity of 847 mAh/g,” scientists said in a research paper that appeared in ACS Publications.

The ubiquitous lithium-ion batteries are generally inflexible making them too fragile and susceptible to swelling and shrinking. But, the new sodium-ion battery is capable of withstanding extreme conditions, the scientists say, thanks to the wood fibers that are supple enough to let it survive more than 400 charging cycles, putting the new battery in the company of the longest-lasting nanobatteries.

“The soft nature of wood fibers effectively releases the mechanical stresses associated with the sodiation process, and the mesoporous structure functions as an electrolyte reservoir that allows for ion transport through the outer and inner surface of the fiber,” scientists said.

Liangbing Hu, an assistant professor of materials science at the University of Maryland, said that the idea of a wood-sodium battery was inspired by trees. According to him, wood fibers from trees are capable of storing mineral-rich water, and so are ideal for storing liquid electrolytes, making them not only the base but an active part of the battery.

Scientists observed that after charging and discharging the battery for hundreds of times, the wood used in it got wrinkled but remained intact, and that the wrinkles helped relax stress on the battery during the process.
"Pushing sodium ions through tin anodes often weaken the tin’s connection to its base material,” said Teng Li, an associate professor of mechanical engineering. "But the wood fibers are soft enough to serve as a mechanical buffer, and thus can accommodate tin’s changes.  This is the key to our long-lasting sodium-ion batteries."

According to the new research, which was funded by the University of Maryland and the National Science Foundation, the soft and mesoporous wood fiber substrate can be utilized as a new platform for low-cost, sodium-ion batteries.

This is not the first time scientists have developed small batteries that can store huge amounts of power.
In April, scientists at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign developed new microbatteries, which they claimed could “pack such a punch that a driver could use a cellphone powered by these batteries to jump-start a dead car battery – and then recharge the phone in the blink of an eye.”

NSA is collecting phone records of Verizon

 

 

By Joseph Menn and Sinead Carew

SAN FRANCISCO/NEW YORK | Wed Jun 5, 2013 11:01pm EDT
 

(Reuters) - The U.S. National Security Agency is collecting telephone records of millions of Verizon Communications customers, according to a secret court order obtained and published by the Guardian newspaper's website.

The order marked "Top Secret" and issued by the U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court directs Verizon's Business Network Services Inc and Verizon Business Services units to hand over electronic data including all calling records on an "ongoing, daily basis" until the order expires on July 19, 2013.
The order can be seen at: r.reuters.com/kap68t

Signed by Judge Roger Vinson at the request of the FBI, the order covers each phone number dialed by all customers and location and routing data, along with the duration and frequency of the calls, but not the contents of the communications.

The disclosure comes as the Obama administration is already under fire on other privacy and First Amendment issues. In particular, it is being criticized for a search of Associated Press journalists' calling records and the emails of a Fox television reporter in leak inquiries.

Officials at the White House and the NSA declined immediate comment. Verizon spokesman Ed McFadden declined to comment.

Verizon's biggest rival, AT&T Inc, did not provide any immediate comment when asked if the government had made a similar request for its data.

"That's not the society we've built in the United States," said Kurt Opsahl, an attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which is suing the NSA over surveillance inside the country. "It's not the society we set forth in the Constitution, and it's not the society we should have."
 
MOBILE AND LANDLINE NUMBERS

The order expressly compels Verizon to turn over both international calling records and strictly domestic records, and it forbids disclosure of the order's existence. It refers to mobile and landline numbers, though not explicitly to Verizon's consumer business.

The order is the first concrete evidence that U.S. intelligence officials are continuing a broad campaign of domestic surveillance that began under President George W. Bush and caused great controversy when it was first exposed.

In 2005, the New York Times reported that the NSA was wiretapping Americans without warrants on international calls. Los Angeles Times and USA Today later reported that the agency also had unchecked access to records on domestic calls.

In addition, a former AT&T technician, Mark Klein, said that a room accessible only with NSA clearance in the carrier's main San Francisco hub received perfect copies of all transmissions.

Privacy lawsuits against the government are continuing, though cases filed against the phone carriers were dismissed after Congress passed a 2008 law immunizing the companies that complied with government requests. That law also allowed for broader information-seeking, though methods must be approved by the special court handling foreign intelligence matters.

The new order cites legal language from the 2001 U.S. Patriot Act, passed soon after the September 11 attacks, that allows the FBI to seek an order to obtain "any tangible thing," including business records, in pursuit of "foreign intelligence information."

Verizon is the second biggest U.S. telephone company behind AT&T in terms of revenue. The vast majority of Verizon's overseas operations come from its acquisition of MCI Communications, which is also covered by the order although foreign-to-foreign calls are exempted from it.

Opsahl said it was unlikely that Verizon would be the only subject of such an order and that the other major carriers probably had similar orders against them.

It is unclear what the NSA and FBI do with the phone records they collect. If past practices have continued, though, Opsahl said, they are probably mined with sophisticated software in an attempt to figure out close connections between people the agencies consider to be terrorism suspects and their associates.

(Editing by Mohammad Zargham)

Economic pacification

From: Mazin Qumsiyeh's Journal
 

The meeting in Jordan of the World Economic Forum (WEF) is a shameful
spectacle of self-described  World business and political leaders.
 Millions are spent to have good food, smiles and handshakes between  elite
Arabs  and war criminals like Shimon Peres and Israeli business tycoons.
John Kerry suggested $4 billion  investment  to improve life under Israeli
occupation via  economic peace  [pacification]. Israeli industries would
benefit from cheap Palestinian (slave) labor after having taken our
country, our natural resources, and dispossessed most of us. This to
fulfill the biblical message of  Let them live; but let them  [the
remaining non-Israelites] be hewers of wood and drawers of water unto all
the congregation  (Joshua 9:21).  As soon as the WEF meeting ended,  The
Peres Center for Peace  [read for Pacification] hosted a conference
bringing Israeli chambers of commerce and Israeli business leaders with
some (shameless) Palestinian high tech business leaders for normalizing and
business relations (undermining the widespread call for BDS among
Palestinians).  Nine years ago, I managed to get an article in the magazine
of the WEF that caused an uproar and a public apology from Klaus Schwab,
the founder of the WEF.  My article was titled  Boycott Israel  and I urge
all to read it to see why boycott is the way to go to achieve real peace
and not normalization and cheeky relationship with an apartheid regime
built on ethnic cleansing: http://qumsiyeh.org/boycottisrael/

Every week I share with you more reasons for such boycotts, divestment and
sanctions (BDS) rather than normalize relations with Israel (which today
was psychologically preparing its population for yet another offensive war
while it continues its colonization activities).  In this week s mailing
you find articles and action calls about ongoing ethnic cleansing, ongoing
human rights violations (including especially rights of children), and
ongoing denial of refugee rightsm but also two pieces of good news at the
bottom.

>From Al-Araqib to Susiya: Forced Displacement on Both Sides of the Green
Line. Adalah captures the stories of two Palestinian villages, Al-Araqib
and Susiya -- one in Israel, one in the West Bank -- that share a single
story of struggle against forced displacement.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HtF3rOdSbr4

The Israeli  Knesset  is about to vote on a bill that would force up to
40,000 Bedouin citizens out of their homes [destroying 45 communities and
taking over 800,000 dunums of the land of the Negerv from its owners] You
have a last chance to stop it by sending a direct message to heads of
coalition factions, calling them to and vote against the government bill
and by writing to your country representatives to urhge them to push Israel
to stop its ethnic cleansing practices. See
http://www.avaaz.org/en/no_to_forced_eviction_of_negev_bedouins/?ktikOab

Huffington Post features discussions with elderly Palestinians on Nakba
http://mondoweiss.net/2013/05/grandmother-discussion-palestinians.html

 Our friend Sireen was abducted by Israeli soldiers and we ask you to help
free her.  She was active in promoting Palestinian life in the Jordan
valley, an area targeted for more ethnic cleansing.  Send messages of
solidarity and support https://www.facebook.com/FreeSireenKhudiri (ENGLISH)
https://www.facebook.com/Welcome.toOo.Palestine (ARAB)
and Write to your politicians and ask them to make representations to the
Israeli government calling for Sireen's release

Palestinian kids swept up in wave of Israeli arrests : According to Defence
for Children International (DCI), an independent non-governmental
organization based in Geneva, Switzerland, since the beginning of this year
there has been a 17 percent increase in arrests of Palestinian children. An
average of 198 children were arrested each month in 2012; that average has
risen to 232 arrests during the first three months of 2013, DCI reported.
http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/05/19/18322645-palestinian-kids-swept-up-in-wave-o
f-israeli-arrests

B Tselem video: Israel bans Gaza children from seeing their fathers
http://youtu.be/W4z8GvtmrCI

US Secretary of State John Kerry visited Ramallah and even shut down whole
streets so that he can eat a Shawerma sandwitch and claim connection with
common people who were not allowed anywhere near him (next time, please try
a Falafel sandwich in a refugee camp not emptied).
http://youtu.be/5RPcD2Av6Lg
there were demonstrations against his visit
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=USt9xKAAImE

Two pieces of Good news:
- Palestinian-American Plants Flag on top of Everest, Dedicates Climb to
Political Prisoners
http://palestinechronicle.com/palestinian-american-plants-flag-on-top-of-everest-dedicates
-climb-to-political-prisoners/#.UZ-4N6IweNI
- Two Palestinian titles compete at Cannes (Film Festival)
http://euromedaudiovisuel.net/p.aspx?t=news&mid=21&l=en&did=1380

PS: And on personal good news, four of us were doing some environmental
field work in Wadi Mikhmas (between Ramallah and the Jordan Valley) in a
very hot day and we underestimated the distance and ruggedness of the
valley and ran out of water after 10-15 km hike.  Israeli  rescue team  was
apparently called by a colleague and they came late to the edge of the
valley from the settlement side (refusing to come close to the Arab
village) and spent time chatting and laughing about our situation (I could
hear their loud laughs on the phone). Meanwhile, young Palestinian men of
Mihkmas (and two colleagues who happened to be in Ramallah) came and helped
us. One man (Yousef) brought water first and then guided us up the
cliff-side and we were met half way up the cliff with several young
energetic men for the climb up the steeper part of the valley.  Three days
later, we are still  sore  but recovering from the 14 hour ordeal and are
grateful to these great Mihkmasi Palestinians.

Mazin Qumsiyeh
http://qumsiyeh.org

(Caving into Israeli pressure) Church of Scotland revises controversial Israel report

17 May 2013 Last updated at 12:38 ET

The report was critical of settlement expansion

A controversial Church of Scotland report which questioned the divine right of Jews to the land of Israel has been rewritten.

The 10-page discussion paper is due to be debated and voted on at the Kirk's general assembly next week.
Last week Israel's ambassador to the UK described it as "truly hurtful".

The Kirk said its revised version of The Inheritance of Abraham? paid attention to the concern over some of the language in the earlier report.

The Church of Scotland made the changes following a meeting with representatives of the Jewish community in Britain facilitated by the Council of Christians and Jews.

'Peace and security'

  Reverend Sally Foster-Fulton, convener of the Kirk's church and society council which compiled the report, said: "We are grateful for the dialogue that has grown out of the questions being asked of our report.
"We believe that this new version has paid attention to the concern some of the language of the previous version caused amongst the Jewish community whilst holding true to our concerns about the injustices being perpetrated because of policies of the government of Israel against the Palestinian people that we wanted to highlight.

"The views of this report are consistent with the views held by the Church of Scotland over many years."
She added: "We are clear that the citizens of the State of Israel have a right to live in peace and security. We are clear that there should be a Palestinian State which also can live in peace and security.

"We condemn anti-Semitism and Islamophobia. We will always condemn acts of terrorism, violence and intimidation whether the perpetrator is an individual, a community or a government."

'Fairer claim'

  Last week the Israeli ambassador to the UK, Daniel Taub, said the report "plays into extremist political positions" and "belittles the deeply held Jewish attachment to the land of Israel in a way which is truly hurtful".
The report stated there had been a widespread assumption by many Christians, as well as many Jewish people, that the Bible "supports an essentially Jewish state of Israel".

But its authors said an "increasing number of difficulties and current Israeli policies regarding the Palestinians" had led to this viewpoint being questioned.

They wrote: "Possession of any land is clearly conditional. The question that arises is this: Would the Jewish people today have a fairer claim to the land if they dealt justly with the Palestinians?"

Palestinian scales Mt. Everest

Mountaineering trailblazers include first Saudi woman to scale soaring summit, man of Palestinian extraction who dedicates trip to compatriots languishing in Israeli prisons

Elior Levi
Published:     05.19.13, 13:14 /
Israel News

Four alpinists from Arab countries scaled Mount Everest as part of a 64-man group, thus setting a triple mountain-conquering precedent: The first Palestinian, the first Saudi woman and the first Qatari national to climb to the top of the world's highest mountain. The group dubbed themselves "Arabs with Altitude."

Tilak Padney of Nepal's Mountaineering Department said 35 foreigners accompanied by 29 Nepalese Sherpa guides reached the 8,850-meter (29,035-foot) peak on Saturday morning after climbing all night from the highest camp on South Col. All were reported to be safe.

They began the arduous journey last April, intent on raising $1,000,000 for projects aimed to promote education in Nepal. Among them was Raha Moharrak, who became the first Saudi Arabian woman to scale the world's highest peak. At 25, she is also the youngest ever Arab to achieve the feat.

 Arab alpinists with a Palestinian flag atop Mount Everest (photo: www.palweather.ps)

In a country such as Saudi Arabia, where women are not allowed to drive, her participation in the expedition was far from a given. She said she faced tough time trying to convince her family to allow her take the treacherous trip, but that she doesn't set store by being a trailblazer as long as it inspires other Arab women to follow in her steps. Everest can be climbed from either Nepal or Tibet.

Dedicated climb to prisoners. Raed Zidan



Raed Zidan was born in Kuwait to Palestinian parents who immigrated from a village near Qalqilya. Zidan, who is living in the US, is a seasoned mountaineer who had previously scaled Mount Kilimanjaro. There, as on top of Nepal, he erected a Palestinian flag, saying he dedicates his feat to Palestinians, especially those "languishing" in Israeli prisons.