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Newsletter : 1fax0118.txt
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>Israel Faxx
>JN Jan. 18, 2001, Vol. 9, No. 8
Lebanon Accuses Israel of Wounding Teenage Shepherd
By VOA News
Lebanese police say that shelling from Israeli forces has wounded a 17-year-old shepherd in southern Lebanon. They say the youth was hit in the legs with shrapnel and that the firing came from the Israeli-occupied Shabaa Farms area.
Arafat, Ben-Ami Meet in Egypt
By VOA News
Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat had a hastily arranged meeting Wednesday with Israeli Foreign Minister Shlomo Ben-Ami in Cairo.
The meeting was set up following Cairo talks earlier in the day between Ben-Ami and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. The two discussed ways to revive the peace process and to reduce Israeli-Palestinian violence that has killed more than 365 people since late September.
In light of the meeting between Arafat and Ben-Ami, scheduled talks between Israeli and Palestinian peace negotiators in Gaza were canceled for the day. Both sides say that chances for a peace deal are slim before President Bill Clinton leaves office Saturday and Israel holds elections for a new prime minister on Feb. 6.
Earlier Wednesday, Israel eased its closure of the Gaza Strip. Re-openings included the Palestinian airport, as well as crossing points from Gaza into Egypt and Israel. Israel had imposed a complete closure following the abduction and killing of a Jewish settler earlier this week.
Palestinians Vow to Capture Killers
By Ross Dunn (VOA-Jerusalem)
The Palestinian Authority has vowed to hunt down those responsible for Wednesday's murder of the chief of Palestinian state television. Hisham Mekki was gunned down at a hotel in Gaza City, and the Palestinian Authority has accused "collaborators" working for Israel of being responsible for Mekki's murder, a charge that Israel has denied.
The slaying of Mekki, one of the most prominent people in Palestinian society, has shocked residents of the Gaza Strip and West Bank.
The Palestinian Authority has blamed the slaying on traitors working for the Israeli security forces. In a statement, the authority says that its security forces are "now hunting the criminal collaborators who committed this cowardly attack." Israel has vehemently denied any involvement in the murder.
Palestinian officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, say Mekki had been under suspicion for corruption and mismanagement and was known to have enemies within the Palestinian Authority itself. Despite this, he was also known to be close to Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat and a member of the powerful Fatah faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization.
Scientists Isolate a Gene Suspected in Schizophrenia
Israel Faxx Staff Report
Researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, south of Tel Aviv, may have found a genetic marker for schizophrenia that will enable simple blood-test diagnosis of the mental illness, instead of the behavioral diagnosis currently applied to patients.
The team's head, Prof. Sara Fuchs, said preliminary results are based on 14 patients and that more will have to be tested to confirm the results. A detailed report of the study was published Tuesday in Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.
An estimated 60,000 people with schizophrenia live in Israel today. "Despite the terrible stigma attached to this disease, we think it is probably a biological-biochemical problem, just like all other illnesses," Fuchs told Ha'aretz.
The Raoul Wallenberg-Jonathan Pollard Connection
By Arutz-7 News
Wednesday, Jan. 17, was the 55th anniversary of Raoul Wallenberg's arrest by Soviet forces in Hungary. The fate of Wallenberg, a Swedish diplomat who is credited with saving the lives of at least 100,000 Jews, has never been clarified - although Russia recently admitted that it executed him in 1947.
Swedish investigators studying Wallenberg's fate concluded last Friday that its government should have pressed harder for answers decades ago, and that "now the truth may never be known." Others say that the Jewish people should also have done more to help Wallenberg.
Eli Joseph, a former school principal in Ma'aleh Adumim, says that when Wallenberg's half-brother - "probably the only person in the world actively seeking information on his fate" - came to Israel a few years ago, "not one Knesset Member or government official agreed to meet with him... I pleaded with them, saying that he saved 100,000 Jews - but in vain..." Joseph has had some experience with what he calls the "abandonment of those who have helped us." Several months ago, Joseph completed a 150-day hunger strike on behalf of Jonathan Pollard; he consumed only juice and light soup during that time. "The press totally ignored me, and so did the officials.
"Pollard's actions saved Israel from nuclear attack from Iraq. I believe that this phenomenon, of ignoring those who have helped us, is a plague of the Diaspora mentality that still exists within us. We must, and we will, purge ourselves of it."
(A biography of Raoul Wallenberg can be seen at "www.us-israel.org/jsource/biography/wallenberg.html" Information on Jonathan Pollard can be seen at "www.jonathanpollard.org/")
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