Times Online - A Goy In Israel I having some fellow feeling for this poor soul. What damage we do to Israel, marrying Israelis.

Part II. Future History -Israel -2010

Later that morning, the platoon was relieved. 12 men and woman, collected their belongings and said goodbye to the dirty holes and hast concrete trenches that had been their home for two weeks.

Amir marched at the back, as was his custom. Weary conscripts, called back for reserve duty had a tendency to ‘lose’ heavy items when there was a march to be done. The flak jackets they had were irreplaceable as were the empty boxes they carried.

Someone, Schlomo, no doubt, switched on a radio and they marched on heading north, listening to the Army radio and waiting for the news. Amir felt his legs starting to ache. Two weeks stuck in bunkers and trenches were bad for muscles. He knew they would all be limping by the time they arrived at the railway station.
It would hopefully be a few months before they were called upon again and Amir fervently hoped that the fighting wouldn’t flare up again. Every time the peace talks stalled in Cyprus, someone, somewhere, tried to stir things up again.

Around three they predictably limped into Hof Ha Carmel station and miracles of miracles; there was a train. Groaning, the platoon threw themselves onto the seats and dumped their equipment around the carriage. Amir and the sergeant started checking off the inventory and the train pulled out with a wrench.

I wasn't going to post anything more except stories until the New Year but I can't resist. First, the comments have gone wonky. It seems that Enetation who do the comments , went offline for a while, came back and found that one user had managed to change everybodys templates. hence the rather odd 'poseur' rather then 'comments'. I quite like it, so it stays.

Secondly, my ever so fragrant bossette pointed out the the Government had cancelled all science funding for 2003 and 2004. Not cut. Stopped dead. The Likud drive to make Israel yet another grubby Levantine country continues apace.

Lastly, a curioisity. A demo of our product at $LARGENETWORKPRODUCT$ company, turned up a security feature we'd coded in some while ago and promptly forgotten. The user accesses our site vie a browser and we check the IP address. During his session, the proxy changed the IP and our server promptly said ' Can't do it. Different IP address' This is an anti hacker measure.

Well, the Head of Security of $LARGENETWORKPRODUCT$ said, 'Great - nice feature'. The Head of IT Systems of $LARGENETWORKPRODUCT$ said, 'Our users won't like that' When our sales guy left, they were still arguing about it.

Future History – Israel 2010

Part 1.

Amir Derech slung his rifle back on his shoulder and dug into his pocket for a cigarette. Lighting up, he looked down the hill to the road below and noticed an early tractor moving slowly along. “Lucky guy’ he thought. Diesel was hard to come by these days and petrol a luxury.
Behind him, he heard signs of stirring as eleven sleeping men found their own ways to face a new dawn.

Soon, after manning the outpost and the radio for an hour, they would be relieved and another under strength platoon would come and sit for two weeks in the dirt and crumbling set of outposts.

‘On your feet’ he heard the sergeant say wearily. The nine men and two woman moved slowly into place and quiet returned to the hills.

Amir thought about his car. That was easier than thinking about anything else. With any luck, he could cash in the saved coupons he had and go north for a day, meet Schlumi and the girls. Work could wait; it wasn’t as if there was a queue for an electronics engineer anyway. Amir thought now on trying customs again. Perhaps they would release those TV tuner cards so he could repair the pile of non functioning TV,s he had in the garage. Assuming they hadn’t been stolen of course. He’d paid someone in the Wadi to mind the lockup but he had no illusions about the zeal of a 60 year old Haifa Arab. Not these days.

Amir Derech looked down the hill again and sighed. He wished it were Arabs they were standing-to for, at dawn, like armies had for centuries, waiting for an attack that never came.

No Arab fellahin, terrorists, Hamas, Islamic Jihad now though. Only another Jewish army to the south, dug in just like Amir’s platoon. For Israel had split again and brother had fought brother.

'I can spell Engineer so I must be one’ Part 4.

‘Things that go bang in the night’

One of the problems with working on a project with an inadequate budget is that people are tempted to take short cuts, hoping they will work out. Mostly they don’t. Visitors used to ask ‘Why are you using that expensive looking servo mechanism as a door stop?’ The answer went ‘ Well, its under powered for the job, the supplier doesn’t do returns and they won’t let us take it home and sell it down the market’. As a door stopper it was marginal in effectiveness but a snip at ₤6000. Now you know why defence projects cost so much.

Being a military project, there was paperwork of course. Lots of it. Reams of the stuff.
So we had word processing software on the computers. Only one registered copy though. For the whole department. One day very big PHB came slumming to cheers the troops up. My team leader was slightly concerned as to what I might say so tried to keep us apart. It was not to be. “Anything you guys need?’ he said on parting. ‘Yes, legal software ‘ I replied to a horrified crowd of bag holders and hangers on. The room cleared very fast. Later that week, a memo arrived decrying pirated software and urging us to go legitimate. We all got kosher copies of Word Perfect.

We had a full time tech author who couldn’t keep up. DOD-STD-2167A became required reading. The routine we got into was to print everything we had once a month, mark up changes in red ballpoint as we raised Change Orders, then update it all and reprint once before the end of the month.

This worked well until the new PHB who replaced the one now languishing in Wandsworth prison, came down , presumably after a nasty budget meeting. ‘What’s this stationery requisition then?’ The team leader , (we’ll call him Ron) said , ‘We’ve run out of pens and binders. ‘ Why do you use so many red pens? Running a stall down the market are you?’ Strong words followed. It was only later on, that the utter absurdity of arguing about one pounds worth of ballpoints in a multi million pound project struck us.

As the project progressed the paperwork grew. It got to the point where the sole daisy printer, which could manage a page a minute, evidently couldn’t cope. The solution? Pay the tech author overtime so he can oversee it weekends. We could work that one out. Even on his miserable rate, four weekends would have brought a new laser printer for the money. Still, that’s why I’m still an engineer I suppose.

[Aficionados of military standards and software design might be interested in this link: http://www.stsc.hill.af.mil/crosstalk/1995/04/Changes.asp]

Dow sues penniless Bhopal survivors

I'm amazed that Dow could even consider this....Obviously they don't eat their own dog food.

Merry Yuletide to all my Readers! Lets hope for peace in 2003.

Chief Rabbi warns Jews against Christmas, New Years.

Well, OK I suppose. However, I celebrate New Year and Christmas and I'd never heard of Sylvester until I came to Israel. New Years parties are as secular as they get.

Engineer is back after this one. Also , coming soon, Future History. If anybody knows a good sauce to go with turkey, I really want to hear from you. I'm doing my season bit.

Israel – A Retrospective – Part 3

I will never forget my first visit to Jerusalem the Golden. The Old City, Yad Vashem, the noise, hustle and bustle. My head had more hair then it does now and I was slimmer. To my surprise, the Arab guide who latched onto us in King Solomon’s stables, seemed to fancy me andproceeded to demonstrate what frottage is. Beating a hasty retreat, we stayed overnight at a hotel and that night I asked my fiancée to be to marry me. At the top of King David’s tower which I thought was romantic.

The next day, we drove south. My wife-to-be fought off incipient dehydration by feeding me cans of Guinness as we headed to south of Eilat. That evening, we found a room at a kibbutz and went to the attached restaurant. They had a fixed price menu, with all the fish and wine supplied as required. The place was empty so we fell to chatting with the Egyptian waiter. As he knew no English my wife had to translate as we discussed Middle East politics, refreshing herself with wine at intervals over three long and enjoyable hours.

On returning to the room, my wife discovered the perils of drinking beyond her capacity and then decorated the main shower block, two toilet stalls and several sinks before collapsing into a stupor onto the bed. It took quite an effort on my part to clean the place up, and eventually I resorted to using the handily supplied fire hose.

The next morning , full of Israeli sun, a morning swim, a camel ride and we were on our way , primarily to find a chemist.

The Liberty Log. Another good blog added to the blogroll. St Andrews is a wonderful place, I spent a very nice weekend there once. Well knowns as a seat of learning and great parties.

Israel – A Retrospective – Part 2

Arriving in Tel Aviv, in the bright morning light was very welcome after the nightmares back in London.

The airport was interesting and just as informative as the one in the UK. No, they didn’t mind that she didn’t have a passport, nice letter, get a new one while you’re here and have a nice holiday.

For those who boggle at all this, there is no (or wasn’t) any legal requirement to have paperwork to enter or leave your own country. After all, what can they do? Deport you? Every so often , a journalist tries this in the UK and normally succeeds. It all changed with the times of course. I would not care to do it again.

I cannot remember the first meeting with her parents though, not any of her relatives. It is all dim and misty now. What does come into very sharp focus was driving in Israel for the first time. My cousin had lent us his second car which was very nice of him. At the insistence of my partner’s Mother, he took me for a test drive to make sure the stranger could cope with such a complicated piece of machinery. Yes, it was a Subaru.

We now went to visit Schmulik’s parents. Schmulik hasn’t appeared before so here’s his part in the story.

He was a typical wheeler-dealer Israeli, out to make some money in the Big Smoke. We’d met him in a Jewish club in Finchley. Unfortunately, his passion to make some money lead to a disagreement with a business partner, harsh words and an attempted holdup. Schmulik was now doing three years at Her Majesty’s Pleasure and we’d visited him a lot, taking food parcels in the main. Now his parents wanted to say thanks.

I do remember screaming at one time during the drive south. I also distinctly remember stopping once to let the trembling subside from my legs. This was my first encounter with Israelis on a main highway.

Well, we got to their apartment in Herzalyia, parked the car in the underground car park and stayed the night. In the morning, the Subaru threw a fit and flatly refused to climb the ramp out of there.
Finally we abandoned it and hired a car. Next stop, Jerusalem.

There will be a short intermission in ‘Engineer’. For your reading pleasure, I enclose Part 1 of ‘Israel –A Retrospective’.

Comments on life in Israel will be suspended until after the elections, or after the war with Iraq, the elections in the USA, Tony Blair’s mistress’s pregnancy bearing fruit, or the second coming, first coming, or the Mahdi, whichever appeals to you most.
In addition, I shall refrain from making dire predictions on the things to come, analysis on things that have been and links with comments. This is mainly because I’m very bad at it and there are other blogs that do it better.

If there is any point in blogging, it must be to appeal to an audience. which means your comments and visits are important and appreciated. Feel free to say what you think.
Visit the links down and to the left. Observant readers will note that all those blogs have comments enabled. A blog without comments is like a cockroach without an inner tube.

Have a nice weekend and if your father was a gooseberry, never mind, It could have been a lot worse.

Israel – A Retrospective – Part 1

My first visit to Israel, in the company of my fiancée-to-be, was memorable. Not for the normal reasons, but mainly due to the way the memories wake me up at night in a cold sweat.

We were living in the UK and the Post Office was having a strike. As my wife was an Israeli, the Home Office was in possession of her passport whilst they slowly thought about letting her continue to live in the UK.

I expressed a desire to visit Israel and meet her parents. As I planned to ask her to marry me, it seemed wise to meet the originators of this unique, wonderful human. I was also curious on how they had survived the experience.

The burning question of the day was therefore ‘How do we get the passport back from the Home Office’. Personal visits proved fruitless. Appeals over the phone led to promises that ‘It was posted last week’. As we had three weeks to go, we felt hopeful.

The Friday before we were due to go arrived and went without a passport. The flight left Saturday night and there we were, no passport.

My wife, who doesn’t let anything stand between her and the goal of the moment, spent some time on the phone and we discovered that as long as the Embassy would vouch for her, we could fly. When they coined the term ‘chutzpah’, I’m sure they had her in mind. She decides that it is perfectly acceptable to ring the Israeli Ambassador to the UK on Shabbat and ask for somebody to provide her with a letter. To my utter amazement, they agree.

Now, as well as a Post Office strike, the Irish were being troublesome again and the PLO was active. Security around the Embassy area in Knightbridge was discrete but there. The arrangement was that I would drive down to the Embassy, park outside and wait for a secretary to arrive, type a letter , then come out with it. You can imagine what the police thought of us. I was driving an old Mini at the time and they even looked inside the air filter.

Finally, the secretary emerged with the piece of paper which said she was an Israeli, really and truly and it wasn’t her fault she didn’t have a passport, it was all due to the perfidious British and their natural bias for Arabs (I made that last bit up).

So of we went. At the airport we discovered something interesting. Passport control couldn’t care a toss that we were one passport shy of a pair. They were spectacularly disinterested. The airlines were very interested indeed. The reason is that they get fined, heavily, if they deliver somebody, somewhere without proper documentation. It took a lot of fast-talking, pleases and even some tears before we were safely on the plane headed for Tel Aviv. My trip has only just started and I was exhausted.

‘I can spell Engineer so I must be one’ Part 3.

The project we were working on was classified ‘Secret’. Nothing unusual there, I was used to it. Most documents and software was ‘Confidential’ but one part, which muggins here, landed up with was ‘Secret’. Well, the rules are very clear on this point. It must be locked away at all times when not being worked on, in an approved security container, and the key must be handed into the security guard when leaving. Periodically, someone will come and check you have what you are supposed to have.

The Security Officer was, surprisingly, new and young. He obviously had budget problems because he spent a long time trying me to persuade me to share a cabinet two floors up. One visit convinced me that this was a quick road to serious trouble. I arrived during lunch break, no one in evidence, the cabinet was shut but unlocked and the key was on a desk. A quick check through the drawers and the document log showed months of neglect. Next year, a security audit showed 12 missing documents.

So, I dug my heels in and refused to start work until I had my cabinet. After much grumbling it eventually arrived. A full four-drawer filing cabinet with a nice shiny new padlock and key. One security log later and it then housed the grand total of:

Two floppy disks.
One 20 page document.

Later on, we used to keep the sweepstake money there and a bottle of rum for emergencies.

Towards the end of the project the company decided to have some repairs done to the roof of one of the building. This housed one of the clean rooms. Well, not exactly Class 10, more like ‘A less dirty working area than normal’ room.
Roofing contractors, for some reason, always like to work with tar and flame at some point in the job. Must be in their blood. These were no different and inevitably, the roof caught fire. My friend, Simon, was exiting the clean room at the time and being a wide awake contractor, immediately broke the glass with his elbow and pushed the button. Alarms went off and we all started streaming out.

It was at this point, that we were all treated to the sight of one of the cousins from
$VERYLARGEAMERICANDEFENCECOMPANY$ standing in front of 4 large incoming fire engines, who having got the call to ‘Fire in armaments factory’ had set off with everything they had.

‘Stop’ , said the cousin from across the waters. ‘They’re not security cleared’. I went to the pub.

‘I can spell Engineer so I must be one’ Part 2.

For once, the planners had got it right at the beginning. We were designing production line test equipment, always the poor relation and liable to end up sucking on the hind tit. A form of consultants had been called in, spent some time on the problem and came up with an detailed estimate and a set of outline project plans. Armed with this, the department had gone to the pointy haired bosses (PHBs) and proudly presented the 1.5 kilos of paper. ‘You asked us to deliver this by then and this is how much it will cost and this is how we do it’. Amazing stuff for a defence project.

Well, no surprise, the PHBs slashed the budget, kept the timescales and told the department to get on with it. Inevitably, faced with a diminished budget and an unchanging requirement, something had to give and this time around it was the timescales. There is a famous usenet signature around:

On time, on budget, or works;
Pick any two from three

As the time slipped, $VERYLARGEAMERICANDEFENCECOMPANY$. became alarmed and started shipping people over to ‘help out’. Their leader is/was a guy called ‘Chuck’. Later on , they started coming in groups, staying for a few weeks, then going again. They all had one thing, in fact, several things in common. To a man, they were all card carrying Republicans, male and various denominations of Christians. We began to think it was in the job requirements somewhere. Then one day, it all changed. Julie turned up.

She had three things going against her. First she was female, second she was a Democrat and lastly she was Jewish. I never did get to the bottom of how she ended up working for them. It was then, that I found out the practical difficulties of working with people who speak the same language but have subtly different usage. One day, we were having a paper work storm session, marking up specs etc. I was checking through a test spec with a pencil for a later meeting. I made a mistake, and without thinking said ‘Julie, have you got a rubber?’ I was puzzled why she left the room and why her colleagues were rolling about laughing. Pants and trousers I knew but rubber? Ah well, next time I said eraser and it seems to have stuck on me.

My partner, who I occasionally refer to as 'my first wife', read my post on spam and after some thought said 'Very nice dear. Wouldn't it have been nicer if all the text was the same colour?'
I was unable to speak for a while, but the muse has hit and this is the result.

I spent a great deal of my professional life as Electronics’ Engineer. I knew I was an engineer because I could spell it, which was a great deal more than most of my colleagues could do.

After a spell with Texas Instruments in Bedford and then with EMI in sleepy Somerset, the lovely county where I grew up, I became a contractor. I was far too inexperienced, full of expectations and about to have to learn to swim in the deep end.

Well, 25 years later and around 30 contracts, I’ve settled down for a while. During that time I met many people, worked on many projects and evidently survived albeit with a few scars and hang-ups.

I still have bad dreams about the project that ran very late, over budget for $VERYLARGEAMERICANDEFENCECOMPANY$. We were working in a building that was built during World War II and looked it. During a clean out of the stores department, they found several crates containing 20 mm Hispano cannon, left over from when they used to fit out night fighters. The main building had a preservation order on it.

Our part of the project was going well (engineers always say that). Our project manager was an old acquaintance, not a friend. The Chief Engineer was talented but unfortunately suffered a strong body odour and an apparent inability to shower. The eczema didn’t help. I should have known this could go wrong when, on my first day, I went to the loo and found a notice on the stall door saying ‘Would the person who smeared excrement all over the toilet please ring x456 in confidence. We can help’

Later on, the project manager got arrested for attempted rape. Things went downhill from there.

The Internet is full of interesting, up to date and accurate information. It’s discussion groups are jam-packed with people engaging in civilized discourse, respecting each other opinions and gently debating issues of vital concern to humanity. It is in this spirit, that I offer some lesser-known facts about Israel that might be of some use to non-Israeli readers and tourists in general. Israelis will be familiar with this material but may choose to refresh their memories.

IDF.

The IDF were leaders in the field when it came to integrating females into the armed services. It is generally believed that this was due to the spirit of equal opportunities that infused Israel in the 1950’s but was, in fact, due to Playboy sponsoring the Army thus overcoming budget constraints of the time.

The latest Merkava tank, another world first from Israel, has been successfully modified to run on chicken soup reducing Israel’s dependence on imported diesel and cutting heavy particle pollution. Our neighbours in the North, Hizbollah, have welcomed this move and fire volleys of gunfire in celebration whenever one is seen.

Religion:

Israel is full of Jews from all the countries and cultures of the world. Israelis take great delight in visiting each other’s synagogues to sample alternative forms of worship. In Haifa, a popular synagogue comes from the Polynesian region and was setup by Tahitian Jews immigrating to Israel in the 1960s. Of note are the requirements for woman to appear topless in grass skirts and for the men to have Torah portions tattooed on their backs.

Driving:

Israelis have shaken off their image as a nation of impatient drivers. The Minister of Transport recently made an appeal for less politeness after a 16 kilometer traffic jam was caused by two drivers in Tiberias insisting that the other one went first.

History.
The recent unfortunate events in World War II have left Israelis feeling very vulnerable. After a visit to Yad Vashem, please take the time to visit the recently opened wild life refuge for anti semites, opened in the spirit of tolerance and reconciliation that Israel is so proud off. Containing real live fascists, these are kept alive as a service to the world so that generations to come can learn. You can experience the hatred so characteristic of the breed close up.
Note: For logistical reasons , this has been relocated to Gaza city. Booking required.


Law and Order:

The crime rate is Israel is very low as Israelis are obedient to authority and respectful of its laws. As a result, the police force is under worked (apart from a little local difficulty with the neighbours) and drives around with their flashing lights on all the time hoping to drum up business.

Food:

Israel has several national dishes, one being hummus, which is a pureed chickpea (Cicer arietinum) mix. New arrivals in Israel have been taught that this is not used to fill holes in walls but is a tasty, nutritious dip that can be used in many dishes.
Falafel is another tasty take-away snack made from chick peas, served in pita bread with various salads and dips. Most Israelis will keep one in their pocket just for visitors so don’t be shy to ask.


Environment:

Israelis respect their environment and work hard to minimize litter, noise and pollution. Please don’t use a mobile phone in public. Israelis are very quietly spoken so raising your voice is frowned on. Visitors are requested to take home all the garbage they generate. Your airline will be delighted to cooperate with this.


Politics

Politics is a sensitive subject in Israel. Over the years, this has become made Israelis ever more uncomfortable and nowadays, it is next to impossible to get the average Israeli to talk about it.

Travel:

When flying to Israel, remember that El Al is very conscious of the need of a traveler to take necessities on to the plane. Feel free to drag large bags as a carry on. Most visitors are expected to take home at least 30 kilos of oranges, 10 kilos of presents from Jerusalem and these are too valuable to be trusted as baggage in the hold.

Travel inside Israel is easy. The buses are very efficient and frequent. Try joining in the game locals play. When boarding the bus, the driver will take your money whilst simultaneously driving off. See if you can distract him or her long enough to make him or her miss the next stop. For extra points try to make the passenger next to you fall over.

Language:

Israelis are justifiably proud of having resurrected Hebrew, the language of the bible. Now this language has been brought fully up to date , making it ever easier for a new immigrant (Oleh Hadesh) like myself to learn. Recent changes have made all letters vowels thus eliminating the need to guess when reading. The Orthography has been revised with all letters having three forms depending on whether it is at the start of a word, the end of a word or just plain lost.

Warning: Hobbyhorse coming up.

One of my hobbies is dealing with spam. By spam, I mean Unsolicited Bulk Email rather then SPAM, the fine luncheon meat by Hormel corporation.

Here is one one definition of spam. Some people just hit delete (JHD), others filter and a few brave individuals try to unsubscribe. A very few, trace down the sending of the spam and complain to the abuse department of the relevant ISP.This excellent page contains a simple primer on how to do it. For the busy person of today, Spamcop may be a better resource. If you're not convinced then this page explains about the hidden costs of spam.Never reply to a spammer. He/she will mostly sell your email address on.

The Grauniad has a list of the top 10 spams of all time. Around 150 spammers generate around 90% of all spam and most of them are in the USA. Here's a story on Tom Cowles , the notorious Empire Towers spammer. The biggest one of all, Alan Ralsky has been inundated with junk snail mail thanks to Slashdot readers who would like to return the favour. Please don't fight abuse with abuse.

For the tiny brains who believe that the constitution of the USA allows them to peddle their crap into anybody's email box, any time and in any quantity, please read this and then feast your eyes on the finest collection of anti spammers anywhere.

For those you want to read about spam fighting there is always the SPAM_L mailing list which I'm not going to provide a link for. Spamcop has it's own usenet groups on news.spamcop.net. There is also the excellent news.admin.net-abuse.email which has plenty of entertainment value and a vocabulary of it's own. The FAQ can be found here. Beginners to usenet should read this before posting.
If you want to make a difference join your local branch of CAUCE, the The Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial Email . Advise on spam fighting and responsible marketing can be found here.. A useful general purpose tool is Sam Spade. A glossary of spam terms can be read on this page.

There are a large number of IP based blocklists around. You can find out if an IP is on a blocklist here.. One of the first was MAPS a little gone downhill now. The most fearsome is SPEWS, the SPAM Prevention Early Warning System. This is growing in popularity and some USA government departments have started using it. ISPs who ignore abuse reports end up here and large chunks of their IP space on it. Spamcop has it's own, based on submitted spam and can be found here
Steve Linford in the UK,does an excellent job of tracking spam support services and details can be located here. Spam support includes selling software designed to spam. He also has a blocklist. Blocklist have various criteria for being listed. Some list the IP addresses of known spammers, some unsecured mail relay points and other chunks of IP space belonging to bad netizens.

For entertainment value, there are a number of individuals who play games with 419 spammers.The Nigerian police have a page which defines 419 spam. Appropriate as it originated there. A Mr Land has a wonderful example here of the games people can play with them. Readers should note that people have been killed by 419 spammers. SpamRadio serves up an hourly helping of spam to your ears. Yes, there is a spam radio station.

For more on the law and spam, start here. Spam is illegal in several jurisdictions. It's a criminal offence in Finland for example. In your spam ends up in Washington State, there are people who will take you to court. Read more about that here..

Finally, spam is on the increase. It will overtake genuine emails unless we do something to stop it.Yet another link here.

[ExpatEgghead gets off hobbyhorse and goes for a lie down and a nice cup of tea]

Knesset member, Orit Noked This Likudnik would get my vote as she's very attractive and the same age as I am. Regretfully, she' in the wrong party.

Knesset Member, LimorLivnat This one you can use to frighten your children into instant submission.

ADSL has slowed to a crawl for the last day or so which discourages posting, but I have an irresistible urge to share the experiences of tonight’s vigil with you all.
Normally, the Gush Shalom vigil, up at a busy crossroads in Haifa passes very quietly. We all stand around with banners and placards and the opposition does the same.

This evening was different though. The opposition were frisky for some reason, It started with a silly game of wherever our supporters stood, they came and stood in front. This passed after a few words. Then, one of them tried to cut our banners down. Shouting started.
Finally, one produced a megaphone and amplifier and started shouting slogans. This goes against the sort of armistice we have on these occasions and Jo-Jo, our organiser went to reason with them. No response so the police were called. Just then, a BBC-2 TV crew pitched up and started interviewing people. They’d been out for the day with Mitzna seeing what goes on in Haifa. Both sides got a hearing but Mr LoudSpeaker insisted on shouting over the Gush Shalom interviewees. Finally the police turned up and he was silenced. It's supposed to be a static demo, not a march so you need a permit for a loudspeaker which he didn’t have.

Finally, as we left and went for a falafel, we were told we couldn't have one because he'd run out of the stuff to make the little crispy balls that go in them. A strange evening one way and another. Comments from passer bys were mixed as usual, some on our side and some on theirs. About even I would say.

I got to here from here and read about 'Why the Kyoto Protocol is a bad insurance policy'

Naturally, I disagree. Here's a view from Europe.


·The annual cost of implementing the Kyoto Protocol in Europe ranges from 3-8 billion Euros (0.06 to 0.15 per cent of total gross domestic product (GDP) in 2010). The lower cost refers to a situation in which there is close European co-operation in implementing least-cost options.

Assuming a least-cost approach for the European Union, the analysis shows that between 85 and 95 per cent of the Kyoto reduction target can be achieved without harming the EU’s competitiveness. This is because at least 75 per cent of the reduction options can be implemented in sectors that are sheltered from international competition. Many of the - mainly energy-intensive - industries in sectors exposed to international competition have access to relatively cheap reduction options. The remainder, those most-affected by increases in production costs, generally face limited exposure to international competition.

The competitiveness of the basic chemical industry in Europe, and to a lesser extent the glass industry, may be affected due to the implementation of climate change policies because they are exposed to international competition with the US. By implementing smart policies, however, these sectors can be compensated. Possible options are to achieve higher emission reductions in other sectors of the economy or to support implementation in the exposed sectors, for instance via tax incentives.

Climate change policies have significant positive impacts on other environmental problems, meaning that other environmental targets will be easier to achieve. By implementing smart integrated climate policies, substantial cost reductions can be achieved in reaching targets set for tackling problems such as acidification.

Unilateral implementation of the Kyoto Protocol by the EU could give European industry a head start in the development of innovative technologies for reducing emissions of greenhouse gases in the longer term.

An ‘early’ start with climate change policies to reduce emissions could lead to substantial cost reductions for Europe in the future.

P.S Israel has signed but not ratified. Boo hiss.

DaghtatorBlog is very amusing and bites at the same time.

I very much like the term 'Paleosimian' to refer to Palestinians.
Now I need an equivalent for brain dead Israelis who want to 'humanely' expel all the Arabs.
Such as Avigdor Lieberman and Prof. Aryeh Eldad.
That reminds me. We spotted two more Moledet posters fly posted near our house last night. Must be good citizens and take a scraper with me next time.

Senor Alvaro Collazo is a busy man. As well as registering blogpot.com, he is also the proud owner of e-polo.com which is temporarily 'parked'.
This was the subject of a Wipo dispute earlier this year. See here for details.
E-polo.com is , or will be a commercial site and yet again, he uses a hotmail.com address, the sure and certain sign that this is not entirely legitimate.

Registrant:
Alvaro Collazo (E-POLO-COM-DOM)
Kennedy 123
Tarariras, Colonia 70000
R.O.U.
5985742641
alvcoll@hotmail.com

Domain Name: E-POLO.COM

He also appears to have somthing to do with hackteam.net, a security consultancy based in Turkey. A very busy man.
Another 'Alvaro Collazo' has also managed 530 registrations in the dot US domain with a hotmail address as well. A very very busy man.

I am grateful to Aryeh for pointing out that a supposed blog with an almost identical name to mine (except for an s) leads to some sort of bible university. Some people have more money than sense.

Anyway, Sam Spade, bless him, tells me that this domain ' blogpot.com' is registered to:

Alvaro Collazo (BLOGPOT-COM-DOM)
Kennedy 123
Tarariras, Colonia 70000
R.O.U.
5985742641
alvcoll@hotmail.com

Oh dear, Alvaro. Violation of Hotmails Terms and Conditions here. A suitable lart goes of to abuse@hotmail.com.

I shall investigate further.

I dislike party list systems intensely and this link says why. To quote "

With closed party lists, voters have little or no effective choice over candidates, they only get control over which party is in government, but with no control over the members of that government.
Party lists do nothing to ensure fair representation for traditionally under-represented groups in society, and in fact could do the opposite, since party leaders are most likely to choose people from a similar background to represent the party.
Parties can stifle independent and minority opinion within their ranks. Because of the very large constituencies, there is little chance for accountability to voters and no local connection between members and voters. The system keeps power out of the hands of voters and firmly in the hands of party leadership.

For those who argue the traditional case, I would like to point out that if the UK had had a party list system in the 1930's, Winston Churchill would never not have been available to be Prime Ministerin 1940 with all that that entails.

The news of more Scuds being caught shipped to somewhere does not make me feel happier at all. If these were caught, were there others? Either way, this could be the smoking gun that President Bush has been waiting for. I don't think they were intended for Yemen at all. What about the launchers?

Ha'aretz - Senior Likud members charge corruption. Somebody famously once said 'My vote is not for sale - but it is available for rent'.

Well, perhaps Harry was right. However, 1,000 NIS (around $220) seems a little on the low side.

Last night, my wife sent several emails, browsed the web and located a few worksheets for teaching English. These she downloaded and printed. Later she also had an instant chat session with a friend in the UK.
Nothing remarkable so far I hear you think. However, if I told you that my dog had driven the car 500 metres down the road and only fluffed the gear change between 2nd and 3rd, you'd be amazed.
That's how amazed my son and I were when my wife did these things. For years she has been technophobic to a degree that I didn't think a functioning human could be. Patient (and sometime not so patient) tuturing has brought her to this point. Now, of course, I have to drag here off by force when I need to do something.

I plan to introduce her to the wonderful world of computer graphics of which I know nothing. As she is an artist of some talent, I feel this will complete her move into my world. Fortunately she has abandoned her vain attempts to get me to appreciate atonal modern music for which may the deities be praised.

Suprising news from the Carmel Times. Who would have thought it? Viewer discretion advised.

Reuters -Blogs May Pierce the Fogs of War . I see VodkaPundit made it again even though he's busy with his real life at the moment. So now we have logwarrior blogging. Hang on a minute while I take a look.
Ah , the Url is wrong. Should be LogWarrior . I shall watch this with interest. The where_is_raed seems to have gone off the air. Never mind, I'll dig some more.

The Risks to Israel of a Palestinian State. Some truth here but it common with all opponents of a Palestinian State does not offer any alternative except 'more of the same'.

Rugby according to ScaryDuck. Ah.... the memories, how they come flooding back. Wednesday afternoons getting plastered with mud. How I hated it.

Before I go to bed, here are my last thoughts on Israel. At the recent Inter discplicnary Conference in Herzliya only one speaker spoke out. I am indebted to Thomas O'Dywer who mentioned it but I have lost the speakers name. In all the talk about security, the fight against terrorism, he quietly and without much notice by the press, pointed out that education is the real number one issue in Israel. Thisis one thing we must do without regard to the attack by Israel's enemies.

In 1940 , when Britain was faced with invasion, a commitee met to discuss the future of social services after the war (The Road to 1945 Paul Addison). Israel must follow suit and not give up on building a society that is strong enough to face the challenges to come. There are so many problem that we cannot wait until our enemies go away.
Israel should define its borders now and concentrate on the problems of the future.

That we have enemies is a constant. The variables are what we do about it.

Bless my sister and my partner. From the second, an English breakfast in bed.
From the first, three lovely books with a bonus pack of sixties fiction most of which I haven't read. I drooled when I saw the main titles.

A History of Britain Volume 1 At the Edge of the World 3000 BC-AD 1603
A History of Britain Volume 2 The fate of Empire 1776-2001
A History of Britain Volume 3 The British Wars 1603 1776

All by Simon Shusta.

I could taste the bindings, feel the pages, picture the fine detail of early Britain.

Unfortunately they were temporarily out of stock and all I got was a slip of paper.

Never mind. The breakfast was real.

It's just past midnight and another year rolls by. Yes, it's my birthday and I've hit the big 50. I don't feel it and I have no intention of behaving like it either.
Having a blog helps I find. Letting your feelings into a diary is a positive experience and I've enjoyed reading all the other blogs by a very varied group.
I wonder if this blog will still be here in a years time.

Dictionary.com/egghead. So now you know. It was , however, my nickname at school. Yes, one of those all boy places in England that take fairly normal kids and turn them into screaming neurotics.

Google Press Center: Zeitgeist. Amongst the welter of information that is google, there are gems worth a look. Here, for example, is the zetigeist page showing various facts and figures about Google.

Around the middle are some interesting stats. The most popular word was 'de'. Hmmmm. thinks .... no sex? No porn? Is google slyly being coy about all this.

The Languages graph is also interesting. Web access is spreading fast as can be seen by the non English rise. All this is a good thing of course. I wish I knew what the Japanese are searching for. Anybody read Japanese?

I see my blog is not showing up again. Must be those template changes. Lets see if this post makes it.

And finally, after much tooing and froing, the comments are back and links. I'm starting to get the hang of HTML although I'll never make , or want to be a web designer. I still struggle with the finer details of C++ and have recently spent a while delving into CTI (Computer Telephony Integration). Lets hear it for ANI and glare people.

Aussies tell of Brit girl's miraculous escape [The Rockall Times] British deep sarcasm at it's best. For those of you who missed this story, a British girl got lost in the Australian jungle.
Yes, Aussies do have a jungle too.

My partner noticed that the elections here in Israel are heating up. Tales of phone tapping from the Justice Ministry, accusations of using terror as
a election gimmick, disputed claim and we still have weeks to go. Will I stand it? Will I jump to somewhere nice like Kenya and sit it out?
When I can find some attributions, I'll tell the tale of the Israelis living in the Kenyan jungle and like it so much, they don't want to leave.

Well, it's getting better. Just need to change the link size, and republish the archives.

Bear with me while I change my template again.

For the lady who asked, here is part one of the answer.

What's the difference between England, the UK, Great Britain etc...

Preliminary: States and Nations

The British Isles are divided between two countries which are
independent states in international law, namely 1) the United Kingdom
of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (so called since 1925) and 2)
the Republic of Ireland. Unlike the states of the USA or Germany, or
the provinces of Canada, the constituent parts of the UK (England,
Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland) do not have legislatures with
their own areas of exclusive jurisdiction, and England has no
legislature at all.

It is not possible to have a federation without a constitution
prescribing the powers of the different levels of government, and the
UK has no such instrument. The primary principle of our constitutional
law is that the UK Parliament can do anything. The legislation which
created the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh and Northern Ireland
Assemblies carefully reserved power to the UK Parliament to legislate
in *all* matters. The powers of the subordinate legislatures are
*devolved* powers. So the UK is not a federation; it is a unitary
state.

Next:

England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland have all been regarded for
centuries as nations, and are still correctly re