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Newsletter : 9fax0303.txt
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>PD
>Israel Faxx
>JN March 3, 1999, Vol. 7, No. 43
IAI Employees Pass-On Classified Data
Israel Faxx Staff Report
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and his main challenger promised
voters Tuesday to try to get Israeli soldiers out of Lebanon within
a year after May 17 elections. The pledges by Netanyahu and
opposition Labor Party leader Ehud Barak placed the increasingly
heated debate over Israel's 17-year military presence in Lebanon at
the center of the election campaign. Barak's comments came after an
escalation of tensions in south Lebanon.
Pediatricians Say Medical Benefits Don't Justify Circumcision
By Jessica Berman (VOA-Washington)
Newborn boys born in hospitals in the United States are almost
always circumcised unless their parents express a different
preference. Now, after decades of circumcision operations, the
American Academy of Pediatrics issued a new recommendation, saying
the medical benefits do not justify circumcision as a routine
procedure.
Male circumcision is such an accepted part of American culture that
in 1995, an average 64 percent of newborns were routinely
circumcised, with the rate approaching 80 percent or more in some
areas. But whether the procedure is medically necessary has always
been questioned.
Alan Fleishman is a pediatrician and member of a task force on
circumcision appointed by the AAP. He says the panel reviewed the
academy's circumcision recommendation and policy in light of a
series of studies that have been done in the past 10-years.
"It is concluded that circumcision does have some potential medical
benefits for newborn boys. But those benefits are not so great as
to recommend that circumcision be done for all newborns -- but
rather that families ought to discuss the benefits and the
potential risks with their pediatrician, and make a decision
consistent with their cultural, and ethnic, and religious beliefs,
taking into account these medical benefits and risks."
Fleishman points to three main health benefits of circumcision --
studies have shown that circumcised boys have fewer urinary tract
infections than uncircumcised children; the risk of HIV infection
is less among circumcised men, although Fleishman stresses
circumcision by itself offers no protection against the Aids virus;
and he says cancer of the penis -- a rare disease -- almost never
occurs in men who have had their foreskins removed.
Father of Soldier Serving in Lebanon Requests to Take His Place
By IsraelWire
Gabi Canaan, 52, whose son is currently serving in the security
zone of southern Lebanon, sent a letter to Defense Minister Moshe
Arens, requesting to take his son's place in Lebanon.
Omer Canaan, 21, is currently serving in the security zone in a
combat position in the Givati Brigade. In the letter sent to Arens,
Omer's father told the defense minister that it was his generation
which started the situation in southern Lebanon and they were
required to finish it, not the generation of his son.
Canaan wrote that one of his sons has died in the past due to
illness, and he was unable to bear the thought of losing his other
son in Lebanon.
Jews and the World Wide Web
By IsraelWire
The Jewish community includes some of the foremost users of the Internet. And Great Britain's Chief Orthodox Rabbi, Dr. Jonathan Sacks is one of the most enthusiastic.
Since becoming Chief Rabbi in 1991, Sacks is more convinced than he
was 15 years ago when he first set eyes on a computer that the
Internet is changing the shape of human consciousness.
"The greatest revolutions in human consciousness have taken place
when there have been changes in the way we record and transmit
information. The invention of writing made possible the great
religions of the book...The Internet and the Web are truly changing
human consciousness. What the motor car has done to our material
world, the Internet is doing to our mental world."
As in most computer-literate families, Sacks has to compete for
computer time with his three children. His son Joshua and his elder
daughter, Dina, have both designed websites. His younger daughter,
Gila is an enthusiastic user of e- mail. Sacks says his brother,
Brian "has done an embarrassing page about me, and superimposed an
image of me over Superman." Appropriately, this is titled
'Superrav!' www.users.zetnet.co.uk/sacks-family
Sacks said he has made mistakes on the computer. "When I was
writing my book, The Politics of Hope, I was working against a very
tight deadline. Just as I completed the book, I lost an entire
chapter. I had to sit down for 24 hours without a break and rewrite
it from memory. But I don't blame the computer, I blame me."
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