Video: Pals fire rockets, mortars, guns at Israeli news crew

(Israel Channel 2 Television/YouTube)

An Israeli TV news crew reporting from Kibbutz Ein Hashlosha near Gaza on Jan. 15 was attacked and pinned down by Palestinian snipers shooting from Gaza.

Interestingly enough, this hasn't been featured in the mainstream media - either in Israel or abroad.

Were this to have been a foreign news crew - or any news team for that matter - other than Israelis it would have made headlines worldwide, as similar stories have been reported in the past.

Hmmm. Odd, that. Can't quite figure out why. Journo and editor colleagues - any ideas why the underportage here? Could it be because they're Je-... nahhhh. Couldn't be, right?

I don't know the individuals in that crew, but I can imagine that they aren't making a lot out of it because of professional pride. But who knows what's being said at morning editorial meetings, and around the bar after hours.

But I have covered that area, and have been present at similar locations when we (reporters) were warned not to venture into the open, for fear if sniping attacks like this.

It is a damning indictment of the international media based in the area, and Israel provincialism not to scream to the high heavens over this, and demand Reporters Without Borders intervene, or at least issue a statement denouncing the attack - pallid and neutered as it may well be.

HT: Backspin

Annapolis: Video Commentaries and Latest Headlines

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• Low grades for Israeli education system
• Government ministers want to fire Education Minister
• After Annapolis: IDF responds to Hamas violence
• Annapolis Special Commentaries:
• Mr. Alon Pinkas – Former Israel's Consul General, NY – click to watch
• Mr. Dov Weisglass – Former PM Ariel Sharon’s Bureau Chief - click to watch
• Mr. Benny Regev – Brother of Kidnapped Soldier, Eldad Regev - click to watch
  

Holocaust Survivor Tutors Palestinian Billy Elliot

From Canada's Globe and Mail:

KIBBUTZ GAATON, ISRAEL — The story could have been drawn straight from the Billy Elliot movie script: A young boy who was first transfixed by ballet on television, and would dance secretly in his room at night, practicing what he learned from films and Internet videos.

But Ayman Saffah is a young Palestinian-Israeli – as he prefers to be known – from a small village in the Galilee, and young men in traditional Arab Muslim villages don’t dance ballet, at least not publicly. And so Mr. Saffah’s path to a remote ballet school at Kibbutz Gaaton, the preparatory school for Israel’s prestigious Kibbutz Contemporary Dance Company, has been riddled with stops and starts.

“I always wanted to dance,” says the young-looking 17-year-old, wearing jeans and sneakers, a pair of sunglasses dangling at his neck. “[But] when I saw it on the TV or Internet, I saw many, many girls dance, but I never saw boys. So I thought I couldn’t do it.”

Read the rest (Gross posted what appears to be a large excerpt, since the G&M page is subscriber-only).

Web Of Life (original photograph)

'Web of Life' (Dave Bender)

Close-up of droplets of rainwater suspended in a spider's web in the grass. I shot this alongside the Chattahoochee River, just north of Atlanta, as a light misty rain began to fall on a cold Sunday afternoon. Click the pic for the hi-rez size -- it's worth a closer look.

"Cropped 'n' Shopped:" sharpened and color corrected.

And speaking of rain, here's a great site for those wanting accurate information about the weather in Israel: The Israeli Meteorological Service.

'Geekdad' Hacks Hannukah

From Wired:

History notwithstanding, Hanukkah still lags behind Christmas in the transition from traditional light sources like candles towards microcontroller driven arrays of LEDs. While that may be simply due to the relative flammability of dry pine trees versus that of metal menorahs, the irony is that Hanukkah -- unlike Christmas -- actually requires observers to light up specific lights in a specific order, which is exactly the sort of thing that you want a microcontroller for.

Umm, ahh, sure. That's what I always wanted a microcontroller for. Doesn't everyone? Fun for the whole family:

Finally. The US media get it right about dealing with terrorists!

And it's about damn time.


In The Know: War On Terror

Tackle Football Wallops Israel

Quick hands are followed by the chase as number 67 goes in for a tackle.
(Ariel Jerozolimski)

Colleague Sam Ser over at The Jerusalem Post has the local "gridiron" details:

As kickoffs go, the opening play of last Friday's game between Big Blue and the Pioneers was unexceptional - the only indication of any greater significance being that it ended, in what was undoubtedly a first for an American tackle football league, with a Levi tackling a Levy.

Israel Football League logo

Minutes into the Israel Football League's inaugural game on an unseasonably warm November afternoon at Jerusalem's Kraft Stadium, one of the more than 200 mostly American immigrants in attendance soaked in the sound of shoulder pads crunching against churning thighs as if listening to a long-lost rock'n'roll album he had just rediscovered at the back of his closet. "Wow," he said, turning to his friend and nodding with satisfaction, "it really brings you back to high school, doesn't it?"

But how do they say, "Hail Mary Play" in the language of the Prophets, and does, "throwing the bomb," rattle the receiver?

Read the rest here, and find out more about the Israel Football League here.

Earlier posts about baseball in the Holyland are here.

'Been away so long, I hardly knew the place...'

Columbus, GA., guitarist and songwriter Marshall Ruffin rockin' the crowd at The Loft. (Dave Bender)

"Gee it's great to be back home..."


High-altitude ice crystals bracket the setting sun on a Sunday evening, after a day trekking through the hills near Helen, Ga. Click the pics, or go here for more recent images. (Dave Bender)

Well, y'know: life; work, mainly covering stories, Shabbat, Chag; and especially, missing Israel... But in the meantime, covering events here, like this demo:


Two protesters at the annual SOA Watch protest outside the gates of the US Army's Ft. Benning, GA. facility, demonstrate "waterboarding," a controversial interrogation technique, opponents consider a form of torture. The willing subject of this simulation was unrestrained, and emerged unharmed from the brief exhibition. (Dave Bender)

I'll make a Thanksgiving vow to try to get back into blogging. Really, I will. Right after I finish a prison story I'm working on...


Staffers at Stewart County Detention Center, Lumpkin, Ga., removing handcuffs and leg irons from detained illegal aliens, in order to for transport them to hearings on their cases - or deportation. (Dave Bender)

San Diego blazes, Sodom, & the Jewish Question...

A fascinating, moving post from a San Diego resident, via Aish:

We live in La Jolla, which means "The Jewel." Our community is little more than a stone's throw from one of the prettiest pieces of coastline in the entire county and boasts the best weather too. We have a lovely shul with over 280 families, a spa-like mikvah, and an eruv on the way. This past Shabbat, as we do every week, we enjoyed our shul kiddush al fresco, socializing around the towering Torrey Pine tree that defines our shul's courtyard. We could not have predicted that such a short time later, our blue skies would turn toxic, the crisp ocean breezes replaced with menacing winds and our Torrey Pine and its courtyard laden with ash.

Thankfully, our normally idyllic coastal enclave seems to be out the path of the fire -- at least for now. But as the communities immediately to the North and to the East of us were steadily evacuated, my husband and I were increasingly concerned: What if we were next? What if a call comes in the middle of the night asking us -- telling us -- to leave?

Read the rest, and try to decide for yourself what you really care about.

Acco: Jumping for joy (Original photography)

Acco: Jumping For Joy. (Dave Bender)

Acco youth jumping into the sea at the end of a hot summer's day. He wasn't hurt by the razor-sharp barnacles, and stones of the wash. I b&w'ed the rocks in the background, in order to bring the kid to the forefront.

Click here for another image from this series.