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Sunday, December 03, 2006
Some headlines and summaries from JTA
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Ghajar deal reached
Israel reached a decision on ceding the northern half of an Arab village straddling its border with Lebanon.
The Cabinet approved on Sunday a plan under which Israeli troops that occupied northern Ghajar since the summer war with Hezbollah would withdraw to the southern part of the village, to be replaced by UNIFIL peacekeepers and a small contingent of Lebanese police and troops.
UNIFIL also would monitor the Lebanese-Israeli border, which bisects Ghajar, to ensure that Hezbollah does not smuggle across drugs or arms, or carry out attacks.
There was no date immediately given for the Israeli withdrawal, which would be the last from land taken during the 34-day Lebanon war.
Ghajar was captured from Syria by Israel during the 1967 Six-Day War.
Its mostly Alawite residents claim allegiance to Damascus, but many of them also bear Israeli identity cards.
Hezbollah and Lebanon called Ghajar a Lebanese territory, while Israel and the United Nations say it is Syrian.
Jewish groups slam Prager for Koran remarks
Jewish groups slammed Dennis Prager for his attack on a congressman who plans to use a Koran in a private swearing-in ceremony.
In his column this week Prager, a conservative talk-show host and author of a number of books on Judaism, rapped the plan by U.S. Rep.-elect Keith Ellison (D-Minn.), saying it would do “more damage to the unity of America and to the value system that has formed this country than the terrorists of 9-11.”
Prager said that all members of Congress, including Jews, use a Christian Bible for swearing in.
In fact, members of the U.S. House of Representatives are sworn in en masse with no holy books. Some members later hold private, unofficial photo-op ceremonies holding a family Bible, the ceremony to which Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress, was referring.
Prager’s column was “intolerant, misinformed and downright un-American,” the Anti-Defamation League said, adding that Prager’s recent appointment to the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council holds him to a higher standard.
The Reform movement’s Religious Action Center said Prager’s was a “shameful argument” that would harm Jews were it to gain currency.
Harman gracious to successor
Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.) welcomed and praised her successor as the top Democrat on the U.S. House of Representatives Intelligence Committee.
Harman, who is Jewish, was the ranking Democrat and hoped to assume the chairmanship after Democrats won the midterm elections.
Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), set to become speaker, removed Harman, saying she favored a tradition of rotating members of the committee.
Pelosi reportedly was irked that Harman solicited lobbyist to help her keep the position, including from major Jewish donors to the party.
Pelosi also felt Harman was not assertive enough in opposing the Iraq war.
Harman said the replacement Pelosi named last Friday, Rep. Silvestre Reyes (D-Texas), “brings great experience to the position.”
She also said she was “disappointed” by the decision and would work to legislate one of the recommendations of the Sept. 11 commission — that members of the committee be made permanent in order to ensure consistency in intelligence oversight.
http://www.jta.org
posted by Somebody @ 11:03 PM Permanent Link
 
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