Israel : Jerusalem, before U.S. visit....[ 768 ]

Netanyahu stands firm on Jerusalem before U.S. visit

Jeffrey Heller

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends the weekly cabinet meeting in his office in Jerusalem March 21, 2010.

Credit: Reuters/Uriel Sinai/Pool

JERUSALEM (Reuters) Sun Mar 21, 2010 9:35am EDT-

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday he had informed Washington in writing that Israel would not stop Jewish settlement in and around Jerusalem, setting the stage for a defiant visit to the United States this week.

World

The tinderbox settlement issue, accompanied by mounting violence in the West Bank where four Palestinians have been killed in the past two days, is challenging renewed efforts by a U.S. envoy to get indirect peace talks under way.

"Our policy on Jerusalem is the same policy followed by all Israeli governments for the 42 years, and it has not changed. As far as we are concerned, building in Jerusalem is the same as building in Tel Aviv," Netanyahu told his cabinet on Sunday.

"I believed it would be of great importance for these things not to remain in the context of commentary or speculation. I subsequently wrote a letter, at my own initiative, to the secretary of state so that things would be crystal clear."

Hillary Clinton and Netanyahu spoke by telephone on Thursday in an attempt to defuse a vocal U.S.-Israeli dispute over settlement in areas around East Jerusalem, captured by Israel captured in a 1967 war.

Israel's announcement -- during a visit by U.S. Vice President Joe Biden two weeks ago -- that it would build 1,600 homes for Jews near East Jerusalem embarrassed Washington and delayed the start of indirect peace talks with the Palestinians.

But in a softening of Washington's tone in the worst public spat with Israel since U.S. President Barack Obama came to office early last year, Clinton said last week that Netanyahu had given a "useful and productive" response to her concerns.

She gave no details. Israel media said Clinton failed to persuade Netanyahu to shelve the new housing project but that he agreed to several confidence-building steps such as freeing Palestinian prisoners and easing a Gaza blockade.

Netanyahu was to fly to the United States later on Sunday after talks with U.S. Middle East envoy George Mitchell on restarting peace talks that have been suspended since December 2008.

He planned to address the pro-Israel lobby group AIPAC on Monday. U.N. Secretary General Ban ki-Moon, on a visit to Gaza, said Netanyahu would also meet President Barack Obama, but there was no confirmation of that from Israel or the United States.

In the latest West Bank bloodshed, Israeli troops killed two Palestinians who tried to stab soldiers, the army said.

On Saturday, soldiers shot two Palestinian teenagers during a stone-throwing protest against Israeli settlement policy that Palestinians say will deny them a viable state. One was killed immediately and the other youth died of his wounds on Sunday.

Palestinians stuck publicly to their refusal to negotiate until Israel froze settlement building.

Israel's action "thwarts efforts by the Quartet (of international peace mediators) and the U.S. administration to return to the peace process," said Nabil Abu Rdainah, an aide to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

ISSUES

Israel regards all of Jerusalem as its capital, a claim that is not recognized internationally. The Palestinians want East Jerusalem as the capital of the state they want to establish in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

In his remarks at the weekly cabinet meeting, Netanyahu appeared to give Mitchell an opening in dealing with a Palestinian demand to negotiate core issues, such as borders and the future of Jerusalem," during indirect peace talks.

Netanyahu reaffirmed that each side was free to put forward its positions on all issues in dispute, but he said pointedly that "a real solution to the core problems ... can be reached only in direct peace negotiations."

Netanyahu had apologized to Washington for the timing of the announcement of the construction plans for the settlement of Ramat Shlomo, built on West Bank land that Israel annexed to Jerusalem in 1967.

But he told parliament last week there was a national consensus to build in "Jerusalem neighborhoods," Jewish apartment blocs in disputed areas under Israeli control.

"I believe that Israel's position is very clear. It will be clear during my visit to the U.S. capital, Netanyahu told his cabinet, which is comprised mainly of pro-settler parties, including his own.

At a meeting in Moscow on Friday, the Quartet -- the United States, the European Union, the United Nations and Russia -- called on Israel to halt all settlement building.

Israel has refused to do so, citing biblical and historical links to the West Bank and saying it intends to keep major settlement blocs in any future peace agreement.

Under U.S. and international pressure, Netanyahu announced a 10-month moratorium on new housing starts in Jewish settlements in November. But he excluded East Jerusalem and nearby annexed areas of the West Bank from the temporary building freeze, leading Palestinians to call it insufficient.

(Editing by Noah Barkin)

A sea of tranquility in Wakayama...[ 767 ]

'Dolphin house' a sea of tranquility in Wakayama Prefecture

Norio Oki and wife Yoko are pictured in the living room of their "dolphin house" in Susami, Wakayama Prefecture. (Mainichi)

(Mainichi Japan) March 21, 2010

In the midst of the tranquil countryside in southern Kii Peninsula, there is a unique house in the shape of a giant dolphin. Owner Norio Oki, 68, and his wife Yoko, 65, have been living in the dolphin's belly for nearly eight years.

The couple, who used to live in an apartment complex in Amagasaki, Hyogo Prefecture, decided to move to a quiet rural area after Norio retired from his work, and started looking for an ideal place with the help of their close friends. In the summer of 2000, they chose a small town in Wakayama Prefecture for its warm climate and abundant nature.

"It feels as if we are living inside the stomach of a large dolphin, and it's really relaxing," the couple said.

It was nothing but a coincidence that the couple, who had never had any special feelings for dolphins, modeled their new residence after the animal.

The idea came up when the couple became acquainted with Akifumi Konishi, an architect based in northern Wakayama Prefecture at the time who is engaged in housing development in harmony with the natural environment. Among the unique models of houses Konishi had designed, the couple especially liked the one in the shape of a dolphin.

"At first glance I said 'Oh, this one's so adorable', and thought it would be lots of fun to live in a house like that," Yoko recalls.

Located in the small town of Susami, Wakayama Prefecture, the construction of the 40-meter-long "dolphin house" started in the spring of 2001 and was completed in December the same year at a total construction cost of some 26 million yen. The 132-square-meter flat wooden structure is supported by curved beams and pillars, which look just like the bones of dolphins.

The head part of the dolphin is used as a bedroom with a roof skylight, and the belly as a spacious living/dining room with a high ceiling. The entrance is located at its right fin, and the bathroom on the other side. There is even a tatami room next to the living room and a guest room at the tail fin. The roof and the exterior wall were painted grey to look like a dolphin.

In spring the Japanese bush warblers sing and in summer fireflies dance around the nearby Wabuka River.

"I'm glad that friends who visit us enjoy themselves here, too," said Norio.

Russian Attack Causes Panic in Georgia [ 766 ]

Spoof Report of Russian Attack Causes Panic in Georgia

Reuters,,15 March 2010

By Alexander Bratersky

David Mdzinarishvili / Reuters

Georgian opposition supporters using loudspeakers in central Tbilisi on Sunday to protest a fake news report aired on pro-government Imedi television.

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Thousands of Georgians — including President Mikheil Saakashvili's grandmother — panicked Saturday night when a pro-government television station aired a hoax that Saakashvili had been killed and Russians tanks had invaded their country at the request of opposition parties.

Cell phone networks crashed, and long lines of worried people formed at gas stations and bank machines.

But by Sunday afternoon, the fear had given way to anger, and opposition supporters rallied in central Tbilisi to accuse Saakashvili of pulling off the hoax in an attempt to discredit the opposition.

Saakashvili described the fake report as “unpleasant" but “close to the real thing.”

"It was really an unpleasant film, but more unpleasant is the fact that report was maximally close to what could happen or what the enemy of Georgia has in mind,” Saakashvili said at a meeting with locals in one of the country's provinces, RIA-Novosti reported.

He did not say whether he had known about the report in advance. But if he had, he hid the information from his closest relatives.

Saakashvili said the report had scared his grandmother. "My grandmother, though she had seen me shortly before the report, got worried and nervous and, of course, a lot of people got nervous," he said.

Saakashvili's grandmother, Mzia Tsaretelli, is a retired doctor who sometimes travels with him on foreign trips.

Imedi television reported on its prime time news program Saturday night that opposition leaders had called on Russian soldiers stationed in Georgia's separatist region of South Ossetia to intervene after a Tbilisi mayoral election resulted in unrest. The city is to vote for a mayor in May.

The 20-minute report showed doctored images of President Dmitry Medvedev ordering the invasion and actual footage from the Russian-Georgian military conflict in 2008, when Moscow sent tanks deep into Georgia proper to stop an attempt by Saakashvili to retake South Ossetia by force.

The report said Saakashvili had been killed and a "people's government" had been formed under opposition leader Nino Burdzhanadze.

Imedi introduced the report as a simulation of "the worst day in Georgian history," but then broadcast it without providing any warning that the events being depicted were fictitious.

“It was a shocking report for many,” Levan Gabrichidze, a Tbilisi-based economist, said by telephone Sunday. "The possibility of a Russian invasion is part of daily life for us, and many took it for real."

Tbilisi resident Natalya Laliashvili said she missed the report but panicked when she saw long lines on Sunday morning. "I saw the lines of people near ATM machines and at gas stations, and I realized that something had happened," she told The Moscow Times.

Imedi, which apologized Sunday, made no secret in the report that it was in response to Prime Minister Vladimir Putin meeting with Burdzhanadze earlier this month and another opposition leader, former Georgian Prime Minister Zurab Nogaideli, late last year.

Burdzhanadze, a former parliamentary speaker, accused Saakashvili of masterminding Saturday's report. “Nobody at the channel would have been able to carry out this provocation without his knowledge,” Burdzhandze said, Russia 24 television reported.

Burdzhanadze said the opposition's lawyers were studying the report and intended to file a suit against Imedi within days.

Georgia's telecommunications watchdog will review sanctions against Imedi, watchdog official Irakly Mosiashvily told reporters, without elaborating.

Imedi, formerly owned by opposition-minded businessman Badri Patarkatsishvili, who died of a heart attack in murky circumstances in 2008, was sold last year by distant relatives to an investment fund controlled by the United Arab Emirate of Ras Al Khaimah, one of the leading foreign investors in Georgia.

The channel’s deputy director, Georgy Arveladze, is a former head of the presidential administration and a stanch ally of Saakashvili.

Saakashvili's office had no immediate comment on whether the president had known about the report before it aired.

But Russian politicians joined the Georgian opposition in insisting that Saakashvili had played a role in the debacle.

“This report appeared months after the Imedi station was taken under Saakashvili's control, so everything has been agreed with him,” said Sergei Markov, a senior State Duma deputy with United Russia.

Markov said the report appeared to be aimed at the opposition, not Russia. "Hatred toward Russia is Saakashvili’s political agenda, and it is important for him to discredit those who are crossing him by seeking contacts with Russia,” Markov said by telephone.

Saakashvili and Putin are openly hostile toward each other.

Konstanin Kosachev, head of the Duma's International Relations Committee, said Saakashvili was following “the same playbook" as he used in 2008 to justify the attempt to retake South Ossetia, Channel One television reported.

Markov suggested that the report offered Russian officials with an opportunity to discredit Saakashvili's democratic credentials in the eyes of the West. He said the report called into question Georgia's media freedoms.

The hoax and the resulting panic were reminiscent of the mass hysteria witnessed in the United States in 1938 when actor Orson Welles read simulated news bulletins on the radio about the world being invaded by aliens as part of the play, "The War of the Worlds."

But Gabrichidze, the Tbilisi economist, said there was one big difference between the Orson Welles' play and the Imedi report. The report, he said, was "badly made."

"Bombshell"..in Shocking Photos..[ 765 ]

Michelle "Bombshell" McGee Nazi Pics

Jesse James' Self-Proclaimed Mistress Captured in Shocking Photographs

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(CBS) NEW YORK, March 19, 2010
The bombs keep dropping from Jesse James' self-proclaimed mistress, tattoo fetish model Michelle "Bombshell" McGee.

TMZ has obtained shocking photos of a bikini clad McGee wearing a Nazi armband and hat. The site says the images were taken almost a year ago.

In one image, she is licking a dagger. In another, she is holding a massive gun.




According to the site, the photographer came up with the idea, but McGee was happy to play along.

TMZ also reports that in child custody documents filed in January, McGee's ex-husband says the tattoo model "makes the Nazi salute," and has a swastika tattooed on her stomach. CBS has seen many photos of McGee and has not seen a swastika there.

McGee does have a tattoo of a "w" on one leg and a "p" on the other, which TMZ claims stands for white power.

McGee, who did not respond to repeated email requests for comment, claims that she had an 11-month sexual affair with Monster Garage host Jesse James that continued while James' wife, Sandra Bullock was filming "The Blind Side."

On Thursday, James apologized for his poor behavior without specifics. People has reported that Bullock moved out of the house shortly after winning an Oscar for Best Actress for her Blind Side work. A few days later, McGee's claims were published in In Touch Weekly.

Iran Trains Taliban bombers[ 764 ]

Iran Trains Taliban to Use Roadside Bombs

Sunday Times/FOX News,,Updated March 21, 2010

According to Taliban commanders, Iranian officials paid them to attend three-month courses during the winter on how to attack convoys and escape before NATO forces could respond.

Taliban commanders have revealed that hundreds of insurgents have been trained in Iran to kill NATO forces in Afghanistan.

The commanders said they had learned to mount complex ambushes and lay improvised explosive devices (IEDs).

The accounts of two commanders, in interviews with The Sunday Times, are the first descriptions of training of the Taliban in Iran.

According to the commanders, Iranian officials paid them to attend three-month courses during the winter.

They were smuggled across the border to the city of Zahidan, in southeast Iran, an hour’s drive from training camps in the desert.

Instructors in plain clothes provided daily exercises in live firing. The first month was devoted largely to teaching the Taliban how to attack convoys and how to escape before NATO forces could respond.

During their second month they were shown how to plant IEDs in sequence so that the rescuers of soldiers wounded in one blast would be caught in further explosions.

Continue reading at the Sunday Times