About 20 per cent of Israelis remain undecided on who they will vote for, polling organisations say, and the leading candidates in the election are focusing their efforts on winning them over.
Gdn: in Umm al-Fahm, conflict between far-right and Arab-Israelis
If Lieberman [head of the far-right Israel Our Homeland Party] has his way - and his party has surged ahead of Labour to push it to a humiliating fourth place - Umm al-Fahm may be transferred out of Israel into the Palestinian Authority, something its residents forcefully oppose in exchange for Israeli "villages", or settlements.
Its young people may be required to serve in the army, which they currently resist as they consider that army is fighting their own people in the Palestinian Territories. They would, all in all, be required to demonstrate - in Lieberman's own words - their loyalty to the state, both ordinary people and politicians, in exchange for citizenship.
LAT: Livni works women, leftists for their vote
Gdn: and everyone goes clubbing for the youth vote in Tel Aviv
BBC: where a new party has emerged, advocating reform of the closed-list PR electoral system
"Every day he changes his dirty underwear... This is the way also he votes in elections - when there is a dirty government, he replaces it with a clean one.
"And when the second government is more dirty than the first, we swap them back."
With this sales pitch, Haisraelim, a new, single issue party has entered the political fray ahead of Israel's 10 February elections, pushing for a change in the electoral system...
While rockets from Gaza and potential nuclear bombs from Iran are looming large in the minds of Israeli voters, the party's leader, political science Professor Gideon Doron, says the voting system itself is a "threat to Israel's existence".
"We can't make peace and we can barely make war," he says, as he fields phone calls about election billboards.
Econ: parsing the election results in IraqIf confirmed—the final results are not expected for several weeks—Mr Maliki will be well placed to run for a second term in the general election due within a year. His success, though, did not reflect a trend towards voting along religious lines. Quite the opposite. The prime minister, who leads the Dawa Party, a Shia religious movement, seems to have benefited from his party’s decision to join with others to form the State of Law Coalition, which campaigned, in a non-religious way, on themes of national unity, law and order. Mr Maliki thus managed to profit from an apparent shift to secularism.
IHT: unlikely candidate, former Baathist, wins in Karbala
WP: how General Odierno shaped the surge
Sent back to Iraq in 2006 as second in command of U.S. forces, under orders to begin the withdrawal of American troops and shift fighting responsibilities to the Iraqis, Odierno found a situation that he recalled as "fairly desperate, frankly."
So that fall, he became the lone senior officer in the active-duty military to advocate a buildup of American troops in Iraq, a strategy rejected by the full chain of command above him, including Gen. George W. Casey Jr., then the top commander in Iraq and Odierno's immediate superior.
Communicating almost daily by phone with retired Gen. Jack Keane, an influential former Army vice chief of staff and his most important ally in Washington, Odierno launched a guerrilla campaign for a change in direction in Iraq, conducting his own strategic review and bypassing his superiors to talk through Keane to White House staff members and key figures in the military. It would prove one of the most audacious moves of the Iraq war, and one that eventually reversed almost every tenet of U.S. strategy.
NYT: the state of Iraq, after the invasion, surge and elections (not so enlightening analysis)
WP: unclear why presence of mani/pedi salon for soldiers in Mosul not considered, for example
TAL: Americans talk to an Iraqi (part 1; part 2)
"I think people here want me to say yes, that things will get better, so you will feel better."
Reuters: Bush shoe-thrower trial set; if convicted, faces 15 years in prison
WSJ: the tedious and dangerous work sniffing out roadside bombs in Afghanistan
Perhaps the most basic change is that suspects are presumed innocent, reversing the inquisitional system brought by Spanish colonizers. The arrested are no longer tossed straight into jail, but can remain free while prosecutors present evidence in hopes of winning an indictment.
Many residents question whether the reforms that include more rights for the accused may be to blame for a yearlong wave of killings in Chihuahua, especially in Ciudad Juarez. A little less than a year after the reforms debuted in the capital, lawmakers responded to public pressure and made more suspects subject to incarceration before appearing in court.
But killings tied to drug trafficking are federal offenses. Robberies, assaults and murders not linked to organized crime are handled in state courts.
LAT: witnesses are being killed in Colombian trial linked to former governor
Diaz, the reform-minded mayor of El Roble in northern Sucre state, had received death threats from paramilitary groups, and told [President] Uribe during a community meeting in February 2003 that he feared for his life.
The 47-year-old doctor had resisted the right-wing militias' efforts to take control of El Roble's treasury and health system for fear they would loot them, according to his son, Juan David.
Diaz had also denounced Arana at the 2003 meeting before Uribe, saying the then-governor backed paramilitary fighters.
Despite his warnings, two months later, in April, Diaz was kidnapped, tortured for five days and killed. The mayor had been on his way to a meeting supposedly to reconcile with Arana.
PCB: meanwhile, Uribe decries left-leaning leaders the 'intellectual bloc' of the FARC
CNN: ...as Colombians for Peace (the NGO organized by said leaders) negotiates release of politician kidnapped in 2002 by the FARC; he was the last politician held, though police officers and soldiers are still in captivity, as well as hundreds of civilians
BBC: reforms in Bolivia reveal regional divisions
There are two main areas where the opposition is likely to continue its fight.
The first is in Congress, where the ruling Movement to Socialism party (MAS) does not have a majority in the upper house.
It is likely that more than 100 new laws will need to be passed to make the constitution operational. Some members of Podemos, the main opposition party in Congress, are bound to try to block them.
The second area is how the various levels of autonomy will work.
AJE: opposition mounts massive demonstration against Chavez's proposed constitutional reforms
WP: Jews raise concerns about anti-Semitic attacks and rhetoric
Dominance by a single man or family was not uncommon in Brazil’s north-east. But it is fading away. The Sarney clan is becoming unusual. Mr Sarney’s daughter, Roseana, has been Maranhão’s governor and currently represents it in the Senate. His son was a minister in Brazil’s previous government. Other relatives are scattered in positions of authority in Maranhão’s courts and the civil service. One of his lieutenants, Edison Lobão, is Lula’s minister for mines and energy. When he took the job, Mr Lobão’s seat in the national Senate went to his son; his wife sits in the lower house. All three of Maranhão’s senators answer to Mr Sarney, as do his fellow senators from Amapá.
This control is aided by the Sarney family’s ownership of Maranhão’s biggest media company.
WP: economic downturn in Russia endangers immigrant laborers
Econ: the problem is likely under-reported, given the targeting of journalists
Both [human rights lawyer] Mr Markelov and [journalist] Ms Baburova were killed in broad daylight in the centre of Moscow. The next day, a party of Russian nationalists brought champagne to the murder scene to celebrate the “elimination” of their enemies. Her death was part of a continuing battle between fascists and anti-fascists in Russia, which is seldom so plainly revealed to the outside world...
[Baburova] and her friends rightly identified fascism as the biggest and most pressing threat to her country. She swore to fight it. She sensed accurately the social kinship between Stalinism and fascism: the link between attempts to portray Stalin as a “successful manager”, and the current upsurge of nationalism.
BBC: Poland, the Round Table Talks and communism's fall
Twenty years ago, Poland's communist government did something without precedent - it sat down with the banned Solidarity trade union to try to defuse growing social unrest.
What became known as the Round Table Talks led to the first multi-party elections in the Soviet bloc and a stunning victory by Solidarity, led by Lech Walesa, which heralded the collapse of communism across the eastern half of Europe.
NYT: the legacy of war in Bosnia
Today, the country known as Bosnia and Herzegovina has a new class of young entrepreneurs, a growing influx of tourists and new shopping malls selling everything from luxury ski equipment to mango bathing gel. But the country remains weighed down not just by a bloated bureaucracy, but also by a national brand inextricably linked with ethnic violence and an economy overly dependent on foreign aid.
BBC: technology and warfare: using cell phones to fight Maoists in India
The government in the eastern Indian state of Jharkhand has given free mobile phones to more than 200 village leaders to help fight Maoist rebels.
Police say the aim is to receive swift tip-offs about rebel movements...
Jharkhnd is under presidential rule, which ensures Delhi's direct control over its administration.
More than 6,000 people have died during the Maoists' 20-year fight for a communist state in parts of India.
The rebels say they are fighting for the rights of poor peasants and landless workers.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has said the Maoist insurgency is the "single biggest threat" to India's security.
The rebels operate in 182 districts in India, mainly in the states of Jharkhand, Bihar, Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and West Bengal.Ind: Burmese seeking opportunities risk enslavement
It appears that the businesswoman's potential customers are middlemen, probably Chinese. Through a translator, they discuss placing the men on boats in the South China Sea, trawling for tuna. First, they will be flown to a Chinese city. In echoes of the slave trade, she describes a selection process worthy of a livestock market. In a 21st-century twist, she does so with the aid of pictures on her laptop.
"We make them stand in the sun for one hour," she says. "In the middle of the day when it is very hot. We see how they manage, if they look uncomfortable." The group leans in to see the pictures on her computer. "We make them carry 20 kilos, like this," she continues, showing them photographs I cannot see. "For deep-sea fishing, they may need to carry very big fish for long distances across the ship."
Then comes the seasickness test. "We put them in here," the woman says, but I can't see the picture. I think it must be an enclosed truck or some sort of container on water. "Then we start to move them around. If they are sick or find it hard to breathe we don't select them. This is how we select the best bodies."
The group nods. The images of Burma's Rohingya boat people, fleeing oppression only to be allegedly abused and cast adrift by the Thai military, has drawn international attention to the plight of one of the world's most downtrodden people. The Muslim Rohingyas face particular persecution in military-ruled Burma, but throughout the country, impoverished men and women who see no future at home are embarking on risky journeys abroad in search of an income for their families.
Econ: HRW accuses Ethiopia of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Ogaden[Human Rights Watch] says that Ethiopian troops burned down villages and killed, raped and tortured civilians in a counter-insurgency campaign against the separatist Ogaden National Liberation Front after its fighters had killed 74 Ethiopian and Chinese oil-exploration workers in 2007. Ethiopia’s government was so incensed by the description of “systematic atrocities” in the Ogaden that it commissioned a report of its own that dismissed Human Rights Watch’s allegations as hearsay and its methods as slapdash.
AJE: opposition in Madagascar undeterred by state violence
LAT: the accord in Zimbabwe and power sharing in general
Critics argue that African-brokered power-sharing deals such as those signed after Kenya's violent 2007 elections and Zimbabwe's disputed vote last year have set a precedent that leaders in Africa can cling to power when voted out, just by refusing to leave office.
They say bodies such as SADC [the Southern African Development Community] and the African Union have done little to protect democracy or stop violence and human rights abuses, tending to side with incumbent leaders such as the long-ruling Mugabe, whose regime has been accused of unleashing violence to stay in power and denying food to opposition villagers.
BBC: water vendors in Abuja
The urban poor in developing world cities including Abuja pay much more for their water than citizens of rich cities such as New York or Tokyo, precisely because the poor have to depend on private providers rather a piped municipal supply.
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NYT: satirizing politics in Lebanon
Although direct political satire is virtually impossible in most of the Arab world, the impulse has long thrived in more oblique and private forms. “Basmat Watan” draws on the live comedy and song performances known as chansonières, which started in Beirut theaters in the early 1960s and continue today. For centuries before that, villagers here would gather to sing “zajal” — an indigenous form of poetry that is partly improvisatory, a kind of ancient Levantine rap.
The actors in “Basmat Watan” often break into zajals, which by tradition often include satire and plays on words. The name “Basmat Watan” is itself a play on words, with the sounds meaning both “The Smile of the Nation” and “But the Nation Died.”...
Mr. Bou-Gedeon becomes grim when asked about the role of comedy, and dramatic art in general, in Lebanon. Only shallow work is possible, he said, because the Lebanese are always trying to escape themselves.“Shakespeare said, ‘Show a mirror to the people,’ ” he said. “But people do not want to see themselves here. They want an image that is false, not the truth.”
Mr. Khalil, who cites Woody Allen and Mel Brooks as two of his chief influences, concedes that satire is not a very powerful weapon in a country where politics is still largely a matter of feudal allegiance. But he seems willing to settle for making people laugh.
LAT: celebrating Darwin, evolving faster than ever
As it happens, the pace of evolution has been speeding up -- not slowing down -- in the 40,000 years since our ancestors fanned out from Ethiopia to populate the globe.
And in the 5,000 to 10,000 years since agriculture triggered the growth of large societies, the pace has accelerated to 100 times historical levels.
"When there's more people, there are more mutations," [paleoanthropologist] Wolpoff said. "And when there are more mutations, there's more selection."
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