France chooses Africa intervention carefully

PARIS (AP) — France has a history of intervention in Africa, where it was a colonial power for decades and still maintains several military sites and has hundreds of troops across the continent, including Senegal, Ivory Coast, Chad and Gabon.
MALI
— January 2013: French helicopter gunships and fighter jets struck at Islamist fighters in Mali at the request of Mali's president, after the rebels began seizing territory well to the south of the strongholds they had held for the previous nine months. It was the first military intervention under French President Francois Hollande.
—January 2011: Two French hostages were killed on the Niger-Mali border by their captors as French rescue forces closed in.
SOMALI
—January 2013: A French commando was killed and another missing after a failed raid to rescue an intelligence agent held hostage in Somalia for more than three years.
—April 2009: French commandos stormed a sailboat off the Somali coast to rescue hostages held by pirates. One hostage was killed and four were freed in the operation, which was part of an EU-led anti-piracy operation.
IVORY COAST
—April 2011: French tanks and helicopters backed Ivory Coast troops trying to oust Laurent Gbagbo, who refused to leave power after disputed elections. A French armored advance in Abidjan allowed troops for Alassane Ouattara to secure the city and take Gbagbo into custody.
—November 2004: French troops fought soldiers from Ivory Coast and French jets all but destroyed the West African country's air force after its warplanes from killed at least nine French peacekeepers and an American civilian.
LIBYA
—March 2011: France was a leading force in the NATO operation against Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi's forces in 2011. Then-President Nicolas Sarkozy sent French jets to target Gadhafi's forces after pressing for a no-fly zone.
CHAD
—April 2006: France provided intelligence to government forces of President Idriss Deby, who himself received military training in France. The intelligence allowed Deby to keep power against a rebel force that threatened to seize control of the nation rich in oil reserves.

Read More..

More money, time needed to remove Concordia wreck

GIGLIO, Italy (AP) — More time and money will be needed to remove the Costa Concordia cruise ship from the rocks off Tuscany where it capsized last year, in part to ensure the toxic materials still trapped inside don't leak into the marine sanctuary when it is righted, officials said Saturday.
As shipwreck survivors and relatives of the 32 killed began arriving on the island of Giglio to mark Sunday's anniversary of the grounding, environmental and salvage experts gave an update on the unprecedented removal project under way.
They stressed the massive size of the ship — 112,000 tons — its precarious perch on the rocks off Giglio's port and the environmental concerns at play in explaining the delays and problems in rolling the ship off its side and towing it intact from its resting place.
The pristine waters surrounding Giglio are part of a protected marine sanctuary for dolphins, porpoises and whales, and are a favorite for scuba divers. Already, tourism was off 28 percent last year, thanks in part to the eyesore in Giglio's port.
Franco Gabrielli, the head of Italy's civil protection agency, told reporters that officials are now looking at September as the probable date to remove the ship, taking into account conservative estimates for poor weather and rough seas. Originally, officials had said they hoped to tow it from Giglio's waters by early 2013.
In addition, Gabriele and Costa officials said the cost might now reach €400 million ($530 million), up from the €300 million ($400 million) originally estimated.
The Concordia slammed into a reef off Giglio on Jan. 13, 2012, after the captain took it off course in a stunt to bring it closer to the island. As it took on water through the 70-meter (230-foot) gash in its hull, the Concordia rolled onto its side and came to rest on the rocks off Giglio's port. Thirty-two people were killed.
The captain, Francesco Schettino, remains under house arrest, accused of multiple manslaughter, causing a shipwreck and leaving the ship before all passengers were evacuated. He hasn't been charged. Schettino maintains he saved lives by bringing the ship closer to shore and claims the reef wasn't on his nautical charts.
Relatives of the dead and survivors began flocking to Giglio on Saturday ahead of Sunday's daylong commemoration to honor the 32 victims, those who rescued them and the residents of Giglio who opened their doors to the 4,200 passengers and crew who survived.
"Just seeing this boat has a powerful effect on me," said Albert Karianis, a 60-year-old cleaner from Marseille, France, who survived the shipwreck and returned Saturday to the island for the first time.
"I think about it every day, and I have nightmares," he said.
Hilaire Blemand, the father of victim Michael Blemand, said he came back to honor his son and take part in the commemoration Mass for the victims.
"You always have a feeling of apprehension when you return to where it all started, and when you see that the ship is still there, it is still just as painful," he said.
Also arriving on Giglio on Saturday was Capt. Gregorio De Falco of the Italian coast guard in Livorno, who became something of a hero to survivors after his recorded conversations with Schettino during the evacuation were made public. In the conversations, De Falco excoriates Schettino for having abandoned the ship before all passengers were off and orders him to return, shouting the now-infamous order "Go on board (expletive)!"
De Falco told RAI state television he wanted to go to Giglio to "embrace the victims, and the relatives of the victims." De Falco, who has shied from all media attention since the disaster, said he did so because he didn't want the "notoriety."
"I don't want notoriety for this tragedy. I have always avoided it."
While groups of survivors were arriving on the island — some on specially organized ferries — others received a letter from Costa urging them to stay away, saying there wasn't room for them and that the commemoration was for families of those who died. Those who received the letter speculated that Costa simply didn't want disgruntled passengers speaking to the media.
Nevertheless, some such passengers were on hand.
Violet Morra, a 65-year-old from Marseille, said she had rejected Costa's initial settlement offer of €11,000 euros per passenger, offered in the immediate aftermath of the grounding. Many survivors rejected the offer and are pursuing legal action against the company and its Miami-based parent company Carnival Corp., the world's largest cruise line.
Passengers recounted a harrowing and chaotic evacuation, with crew members giving contradictory instructions and the captain delaying the evacuation order for a full hour after impact. By the time he gave the order, the ship was at such a tilt that many lifeboats couldn't be lowered.
"It meant that our lives were only worth €11,000, just €11,000 euro for our lives," Morra said. "We are still facing psychological problems, and so we have rejected it."
Costa attorney Marco De Luca said the compensation procedures are going ahead "at a satisfactory pace." He said almost two-thirds of the passengers took Costa's compensation offer.
Costa is fighting legal efforts, particularly those in the United States, where damage awards are likely to be higher than in Italy. Costa is challenging the jurisdiction of U.S. courts to hear the cases, arguing among other things that in buying their cruise tickets, passengers entered into a contract with Costa that selects the courts of Genoa, Italy, as the exclusive forum for any claims against the company.
The plan to roll the Costa off its side and remove it from its resting place involves constructing an underwater platform and attaching empty cisterns on the exposed side of the ship. The cisterns will be filled with water, and cranes attached to the platform will be used to rotate the ship and pull it upright. Once upright, the ship will have cisterns attached to the other side. All the cisterns will be emptied of water and filled with air to help float the ship and free it from the seabed. Once it's properly afloat, it can then be towed to a nearby seaport for demolition.
Salvage crews successfully removed some 2,100 tons of fuel last year from the ship's tanks without any major spill. But Maria Sargentini, president of the environmental oversight group for the Concordia, said sewage, remaining fuel and tons of rotten food remain inside.
"Sure, there are still some risks," she said Saturday. "Especially during the rollover and floating operations, there could be some leaking.

Read More..

US troops arrive in Turkey for Patriot missiles

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — U.S. troops have started to arrive in Turkey to man Patriot missiles meant to protect the NATO ally from potential Syrian warheads, the U.S. military said Friday.
The United States, Germany and the Netherlands are each deploying two batteries of the U.S.-built defense system to boost ally Turkey's air defenses against any spillover from Syria's nearly 2-year civil war. The Patriot systems are expected to become operational later this month.
The Stuttgart, Germany-based U.S. European Command said in a statement that U.S. personnel and equipment had started arriving at Turkey's southern Incirlik Air Base. Some 400 personnel and equipment from the U.S. military's Fort Sill, Oklahoma-based 3rd Battalion were to be airlifted to Turkey over the coming days, while additional equipment was expected to reach Turkey by sea later in January, the Command said.
NATO endorsed Turkey's request for the Patriots on Nov. 30 after several Syrian shells landed on Turkish territory.
Last month, NATO said the Syrian military has continued to fire Scud-type missiles, although none had hit Turkish territory, and said the alliance was justified in deploying the anti-missile systems in Turkey. Ankara is supporting the Syrian opposition and rebels and is providing shelter to Syrian refugees.
More than 1,000 American, German and Dutch troops are to be based in Turkey to operate the batteries. NATO said the Americans will be based at Gaziantep, 50 kilometers (31 miles) north of Syria. The Germans will be based at Kahramanmaras, located about 100 kilometers (60 miles) north of the Syrian border; the Dutch at Adana, about 100 kilometers (66 miles) west of the border.
Navy Vice Adm. Charles Martoglio, the Command's deputy chief, reiterated that the Patriots' deployment is for defensive purposes only and would not support a no-fly zone "or any offensive operation," in Syria, according to the Command's statement.
"Turkey is an important NATO ally and we welcome the opportunity to support the Turkish government's request in accordance with the NATO standing defense plan," it quoted Martoglio as saying.
Syria is reported to have an array of artillery rockets, as well as medium-range missiles — some capable of carrying chemical warheads. These include Soviet-built SS-21 Scarabs and Scud-B missiles, originally designed to deliver nuclear warheads.
Last month, a top military commander from Iran — a key Syrian ally — warned Turkey against stationing the NATO systems on its territory, saying such a move risks conflict with Syria.

Read More..

Church of England ends ban on gay bishops

LONDON (Reuters) - The Church of England has lifted a ban on gay male clergy who live with their partners from becoming bishops on condition they pledge to stay celibate, threatening to reignite an issue that splits the 80-million-strong global Anglican community.
The issue of homosexuality has driven a rift between Western and African Anglicans since a Canadian diocese approved blessings for same-sex couples in 2002 and U.S. Anglicans in the Episcopal Church appointed an openly gay man as a bishop in 2003.
The Church of England, struggling to remain relevant in modern Britain despite falling numbers of believers, is already under pressure after voting narrowly last November to maintain a ban on women becoming bishops.
The church said the House of Bishops, one of its most senior bodies, had ended an 18-month moratorium on the appointment of gays in civil partnerships as bishops.
The decision was made in late December but received little attention until the church confirmed it on Friday.
Gay clergy in civil partnerships would be eligible for the episcopate - the position of bishop - if they make the pledge to remain celibate, as is already the case for gay deacons and priests.
"The House has confirmed that clergy in civil partnerships, and living in accordance with the teaching of the Church on human sexuality, can be considered as candidates for the episcopate," the Bishop of Norwich Graham James said.
"The House believed it would be unjust to exclude from consideration for the episcopate anyone seeking to live fully in conformity with the Church's teaching on sexual ethics or other areas of personal life and discipline," he added in a statement on behalf of the House of Bishops.
The church teaches that couples can only have sex within marriage, and that marriage can only be between a man and a woman.
CONSERVATIVE OUTCRY
Britain legalised civil partnerships in 2005, forcing the church to consider how to treat clergy living in same-sex unions.
The church ruled that a civil partnership was not a bar to a clerical position, provided the clergy remained celibate, but failed to specifically address the issue of when the appointment was of a bishop.
In July 2011 the church launched a review to deal with this omission, at the same time imposing the moratorium on nominating gays in such partnerships as bishops while the study was conducted.
The review came a year after a gay cleric living in a civil partnership was reportedly blocked from becoming a bishop in south London.
It was the second setback for the cleric, Jeffrey John, who would already have become a bishop in 2003 but was forced to withdraw from the nomination after an outcry from church conservatives.
Rod Thomas, chairman of the conservative evangelical group Reform, said the church's move on gay bishops would provoke further dispute.
"It will be much more divisive than what we have seen over women bishops. If you thought that was a furore, wait to see what will happen the first time a bishop in a civil partnership is appointed," he told BBC television.

Read More..

Christmas updates to shine light on UK retail prospects

LONDON (Reuters) - The prospects for consumer spending and the broader British economy will be in focus next week when a host of retailers, including Marks & Spencer and Tesco, report Christmas sales figures.
Many store groups found the going tough last year as consumers fretted over job security and a squeeze on incomes.
With wage rises failing to match inflation and another round of government spending cuts slated for 2013, retailers were expected to strike a downbeat tone on the outlook and say growth will be reliant on internal initiatives.
While grocers traditionally cope better in tough times thanks to their focus on essential goods, they are finding growth hard to come by even as they expand their offering into homewares and other non-food offerings.
Analysts think No. 4 grocer Wm Morrison Supermarkets will, on Monday, post the worst of the Christmas figures out of the food retailers reporting next week.
Sales at Morrison stores open over a year, excluding fuel, were seen down about 2 percent. That would follow a fiscal third-quarter fall of 2.1 percent and partly reflect the lack of an online presence and minimal convenience store presence.
Indeed, the retail sector's best Christmas performers - all helped by a strong online presence - may have reported already.
John Lewis - Britain's biggest department store group, and sister company Waitrose - an upmarket grocer, have both reported record Christmas sales, while clothing retailer Next posted a solid outcome and raised profit guidance.
MARKET LEADER
For retail market leader Tesco, which updates on Thursday, analysts forecast like-for-like sales, excluding fuel and VAT sales tax, to grow 0.5-1.5 percent in its home market, having fallen 0.6 percent in its third quarter.
That said, Tesco is up against a weak comparative - a dismal Christmas performance in 2011 resulted in its first profit warning in 20 years and a move to spend 1 billion pounds ($1.6 billion) on a recovery plan.
While the world's No. 3 retailer may show some progress in its home market, its overseas problems are mounting. Though the group has flagged an exit from the United States, in South Korea - its biggest overseas market, legislation allowing local governments to impose shorter trading hours is hurting. Also, trade in eastern Europe is being hit by euro zone instability.
Sainsbury, Britain's No. 3 grocer, has guided to second-half like-for-like sales growth similar to the 1.7 percent in its first half. For its third-quarter update, expected Wednesday, analysts forecast like-for-like growth of about 0.9 percent.
DISCIPLINED
Though pre-Christmas promotional activity among clothing groups was widespread it appears to have been less severe than in 2011.
"Anecdotally, it was hugely more disciplined than last year," Simon Wolfson, chief executive of Next - Britain's second-biggest clothing retailer, told Reuters on Thursday.
That should bode well for margins at Marks & Spencer, Britain's largest clothing retailer, which updates on Thursday.
Analysts expected M&S to report a 1.5 percent drop in fiscal third-quarter general merchandise sales from British stores open at least a year. That would be a small improvement on a second-quarter decline of 1.8 percent.
However, like-for-like food sales were seen up 0.5 percent, less than the 1.5 percent rise in the previous period.

Read More..

Israeli undercover raid sets off violent protests

RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) — Israeli undercover troops broke into a West Bank apartment building in a failed arrest raid Thursday, igniting a violent protest and signaling that Israeli-Palestinian security coordination may be in trouble, officials said.
Thursday's raid targeted a suspected Islamic militant and marked the second time this week an army operation sparked clashes. Palestinians accused Israel of taking provocative actions in retaliation for their successful bid in November to win U.N. recognition of a state of Palestine in the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem, the territories Israel captured in 1967.
Israel's military denied it was walking away from coordination with the security forces of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, whose self-rule government administers just over one-third of the West Bank, where more than 90 percent of the Palestinians live.
Palestinian officials said Thursday's operation began when undercover troops, followed by uniformed soldiers in more than a dozen jeeps, broke into an apartment building on the outskirts of the West Bank town of Jenin. The apparent target, an activist in the militant Islamic Jihad group, was not in the area.
The Israeli military said several hundred Palestinians began throwing stones, and that some in the crowd hurled firebombs and rolled burning tires toward the soldiers. Troops fired warning shots, and also used tear gas, stun grenades and rubber-coated steel pellets to quell the protest, the military said.
Talal Dweikat, the Palestinian governor of the Jenin district, put the number of stone throwers at several dozen. He said a Palestinian was shot in the leg and an elderly woman was bitten by an army dog. The military confirmed a woman was bitten and taken for medical treatment.
In recent years, the West Bank has been relatively calm, in part because of Israeli-Palestinian coordination in tracking Islamic militants. The coordination came in response to the 2007 takeover of Gaza by the Islamic militant Hamas, Abbas' main political rival.
Trying to prevent a similar takeover in the West Bank, Abbas began cracking down on Hamas and found his interests aligned with Israel's. Abbas has long argued that violence is counterproductive, since Palestinians are bound to lose any armed confrontation with Israel. Hamas believes Israel will make concessions only in response to force.
Security coordination with Israel is unpopular in the West Bank, especially at a time when peace talks are frozen and Palestinian independence appears unlikely anytime soon. U.N. recognition gave the Palestinians a diplomatic boost but changed little on the ground.
Palestinian officials alleged Thursday that the recent Israeli raids are part of Israel's retaliation for the statehood bid. Israel strongly opposed the U.N. recognition, saying it was an attempt to bypass negotiations.
A Palestinian security official said Abbas has ordered his security forces to avoid any confrontations with Israeli troops. Abbas is concerned about an unwanted escalation he believes will not serve Palestinian interests, said the official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss internal deliberations with reporters.
Adnan Damiri, a spokesman for the Palestinian security forces, said Israeli troops have increasingly entered Palestinian-run areas without coordination since November. "There has been an escalation in Israeli raids into our territories since the U.N. bid," he said.
Earlier this week, another undercover raid targeting suspected Islamic Jihad militants in the West Bank prompted clashes that left 10 Palestinians wounded.
Lt. Col. Avital Leibovich, an Israeli army spokeswoman, said Israel has not abandoned security coordination with the Palestinians. "As far as we are concerned, the coordination has not changed," she said. "Our activities are in relation to threats (by militants), and nothing else.

Read More..

Israeli library unveils ancient Afghan manuscripts

JERUSALEM (AP) — A trove of ancient manuscripts in Hebrew characters rescued from caves in a Taliban stronghold in northern Afghanistan is providing the first physical evidence of a Jewish community that thrived there a thousand years ago.
On Thursday Israel's National Library unveiled the cache of recently purchased documents that run the gamut of life experiences, including biblical commentaries, personal letters and financial records.
Researchers say the "Afghan Genizah" marks the greatest such archive found since the "Cairo Genizah" was discovered in an Egyptian synagogue more than 100 years ago, a vast depository of medieval manuscripts considered to be among the most valuable collections of historical documents ever found.
Genizah, a Hebrew term that loosely translates as "storage," refers to a storeroom adjacent to a synagogue or Jewish cemetery where Hebrew-language books and papers are kept. Under Jewish law, it is forbidden to throw away writings containing the formal names of God, so they are either buried or stashed away.
The Afghan collection gives an unprecedented look into the lives of Jews in ancient Persia in the 11th century. The paper manuscripts, preserved over the centuries by the dry, shady conditions of the caves, include writings in Hebrew, Aramaic, Judea-Arabic and the unique Judeo-Persian language from that era, which was written in Hebrew letters.
"It was the Yiddish of Persian Jews," said Haggai Ben-Shammai, the library's academic director.
Holding the documents, protected by a laminated sheath, Ben-Shammai said they included mentions of distinctly Jewish names and evidence of their commercial activities along the "Silk road" connecting Europe and the East. The obscure Judeo-Persian language, along with carbon dating technology, helped verify the authenticity of the collection, he said.
"We've had many historical sources on Jewish settlements in that area," he said. "This is the first time that we have a large collection of manuscripts that represents the culture of the Jews that lived there. Until today we had nothing of this."
The documents are believed to have come from caves in the northeast region of modern-day Afghanistan, once at the outer reaches of the Persian empire. In recent years, the same caves have served as hideouts for Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan.
It remains unclear how the ancient manuscripts emerged. Ben-Shammai said the library was contacted by various antiquities dealers who got their hands on them.
Last month, the library purchased 29 out of hundreds of the documents believed to be floating around the world, after long negotiations with antiquities dealers. The library refused to say how much it paid for the collection, adding that it hoped to purchase more in the future and didn't want to drive up prices. The documents arrived in Israel last week.
Comparisons with the other find are inevitable.
The Cairo Genizah was discovered in the late 1800s in Cairo's Ben Ezra Synagogue, built in the ninth century. It included thousands of documents Jews stored there for more than 1,000 years.
Ben-Shammai said it was too early to compare the two, and it would take a long time to sift through the findings from Afghanistan. He said they were already significant since no other Hebrew writings had even been found so far from the Holy Land.
He said the Jewish community in the region at the time lived largely like others in the Muslim world, as a "tolerated minority" that was treated better than under Christian rule. Afghanistan's Jewish community numbered as many as 40,000 in the late 19th century, after Persian Jews fled forced conversion.
By the mid-20th century, only about 5,000 remained, and most emigrated after Israel's creation in 1948. A lone Jewish man remains in Afghanistan, while 25,000 Jews live in neighboring Iran — Israel's bitter enemy.
The library promises the finds will be digitized and uploaded to its website for all to see.
Aviad Stollman, curator of the library's Judaica collection, said much more would be gleaned after intense research on the papers, but already it tells a story of a previously little known community.
"First we can verify that they actually existed — that is the most important point," he said. "And of course their interests. They were not interested only in commerce and liturgy; they were interested also in the Talmud and the Bible," he said.
"They were Jews living a thousand years ago in this place. I think that is the most exciting part."

Read More..

Brotherhood official urges Egypt's Jews to return

CAIRO (AP) — A leading Muslim Brotherhood member and adviser to Islamist President Mohammed Morsi created a stir in Egypt when he called on Egyptian Jews in Israel to return home because Egypt is now a democracy and because the Jewish state won't survive.
Essam el-Erian's remarks in a TV appearance put the Brotherhood, which holds power in Egypt, on the spot as opponents — and some allies — jumped on the comments to denounce the group. Morsi's office this week disassociated the president from the comments, saying they were el-Erian's personal opinion.
The criticism ran an unusual gamut of Egyptians' attitudes toward Jews, Israel and the Brotherhood itself.
Some denounced the Brotherhood for trying to put up a veneer of tolerance by inviting Jews to return while Egypt's other religious minorities, particularly Christians, are increasingly worried about persecution under the new Islamist rulers and an Islamist-slanted constitution.
Others saw the comments as a sort of outreach to Zionists, considered the enemy, and as a new example of how the Brotherhood has had a hard time melding its longtime anti-Israeli and anti-Jewish rhetoric with its new responsibilities since coming to power. Under Morsi — who hails from the Brotherhood — the government has continued cooperation with Israel, upheld the two countries' peace deal and Morsi last month helped mediate a cease-fire between Hamas and Israel.
Some warned that el-Erian was opening the door for Egyptian Jews to demand compensation for property taken from them or left behind in Egypt and could even undermine the Palestinians' right to return to homes in Israel. Still others were simply outraged that a Brotherhood official would invite back Jews, and one hardline Islamist politician threatened any Jews who come back.
And there were a few voices calling for Egypt to sincerely look at past treatment of its Jewish community — including why they left or were expelled — and whether they should have the right to return.
Speaking on private ONTV, historian Khaled Fahmy suggested taking el-Erian's comments at face value. "I am taking the call seriously. I would like to see it in part as respectable, as addressing morals and high principles." He said Egyptians should talk about the past "harm to Egyptian Jews" and consider them as still having Egyptian nationality.
"I wish this was put to a public discussion," he said.
Egypt's once thriving Jewish community largely left Egypt more than 60 years ago amid the hostilities between Egypt and Israel. Estimates say about 65,000 Jews left Egypt since the creation of the state of Israel in 1948, most of them to Europe and the West, with a small portion settling in Israel. Their departure was fueled by rising nationalist sentiment during the Arab-Israeli wars, harassment and some direct expulsions by then-President Gamal Abdel-Nasser, and attacks on Jewish properties, some of them blamed on the Brotherhood, which renounced violence in the 1970s.
Now only a handful of Jews, mostly elderly, remain in Egypt, along with a number of heavily guarded synagogues, open only to Jews.
El-Erian, who is also deputy of the Brotherhood's political party, made his comments last week on a late night talk show on the private station Dream TV.
"I wish our Jews return to our country, so they can make room for the Palestinians to return, and Jews return to their homeland in light of the democracy" evolving in Egypt, he said. "I call on them now. Egypt is more deserving of you."
"Why stay in a racist entity, an occupation, and be tainted with war crimes that will be punished, all occupation leaders will be punished," he said. He added in separate comments that the Zionist "project" will end.
The comments didn't make much of an impact in Israel, and there was no official comment about them and little discussion of them in the press. In contrast, they raised widespread ridicule and debate in Egypt on TV shows, newspapers and social websites.
Belal Fadl, a popular Egyptian columnist and satirical writer, said the comments were hypocritical given other Brotherhood officials' statements accusing Egypt's Christians of threatening Morsi's legitimacy as president, fueling anger against the minority community.
"How can we believe the tolerance of el-Erian amid all the sectarian statements by leaders of the groups and other sheiks that all seek to chase away Egypt's Christians in the footsteps of the Jews," Fadl wrote in the daily al-Shorouk Thursday.
Youssef el-Husseini, a prominent TV presenter known for his liberal views and harsh criticism of Morsi and the Brotherhood, said el-Erian was showing a fake tolerance for Jews to impress Israel and the United States — setting aside the anti-Israel parts of his statement. El-Husseini said that if a liberal made the comments he would be branded a traitor and would be accused of inviting Zionists back to Egypt.
"Is el-Erian flirting with the Zionist state to say we are fine and you are friends," el-Husseini said on a Sunday morning talk show. "Or is he flirting with Obama" because of U.S. aid to Egypt. "Is the group taking their political garb bit by bit?"
On Tuesday, Morsi's spokesman said the presidency is not responsible for comments made by el-Erian. "These are his personal opinion," Yasser Ali, the presidential spokesman said.
Mohammed Salmawy, the head of Egypt's Writers Union, called el-Erian's comments "delirium."
"What is this superficial understanding of matters that borders naiveté?" he wrote, saying the problem of Palestinian refugees is not one of "making room" for their return.
"What the Jews who were living in Egypt want is not to return, particularly in the current circumstances. What they want is compensation for their properties" they left behind.
He said el-Erian was recognizing a right of return for Israeli Jews of Arab origin, which he said would allow for a quid-pro-quo forcing Palestinians refugees to drop their demand to return to homes in Israel so that Jews drop demands to return to Arab nations.
"It seems the way to deny the Palestinians the right of return or compensation is to exchange that right for ... the right of the return of Jewish refugees to Arab countries," he wrote Thursday.
The leading member of a former Islamic militant group, Gamaa Islamiya, which is now a political party allied to the Brotherhood, simply said Jews were not welcome back.
Quoted in the Rose el-Youssef newspaper, Tarek el-Zumor said his group will not tolerate their return "except over our dead bodies or after they change their religion and become Muslims.

Read More..

Activists: At least 9 killed by Damascus car bomb

BEIRUT (AP) — A car bomb blew up late Thursday in a Damascus gas station, killing at least nine people, a Syrian activist group said.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the death toll in the blast in the capital's Masakin Barzeh neighborhood is expected to rise because many of the wounded were in critical condition.
Syria's state news service also reported the blast but did not give a number of dead or wounded. It said the bomb targeted cars that were lined up to get gas and blamed the attack on "terrorists," the government's shorthand for rebels seeking to topple President Bashar Assad.
The pro-regime Ikhbariyeh TV station said some 30 civilians were killed or wounded in the blast.
Despite gains in other parts of Syria by rebels seeking to topple Assad, he has largely kept his grip on the capital.
But Damascus has been targeted by a number of large bombings, many of which appear to target government buildings. Some have been claimed by the jihadist group Jabhat al-Nusra, which the U.S. has designated a terrorist organization.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for Thursday's blast.
Masakin Barzeh is a middle-class neighborhood northeast of downtown that is home to many government employees.
The U.N. says more than 60,000 people have been killed in Syria since the start of the uprising in March 2011. The conflict has since evolved into a civil war.

Read More..

Rebel area shows limits of rebel push for Damascus

Twin airstrikes by government jets on a large, rebel-held suburb of Damascus on Thursday sheered the sides off apartment towers and left residents digging through rubble for the dead and wounded.
The bombing of Douma came amid a wave of attacks on rebellious districts of the Syrian capital, part of the government's efforts to keep rebel fighters out of President Bashar Assad's seat of power. Late Thursday, a car bomb exploded at a gas station inside the city itself, killing at least nine people, activists said.
Douma, the largest patch of rebel-held ground near Damascus, illustrates why the opposition's advance on the capital has bogged down. Despite capturing territory and setting up committees to provide basic services, the rebels lack the firepower to challenge Assad's forces and remain helpless before his air force.
That stalemate suggests the war will not end soon. The U.N. said Wednesday that more than 60,000 people have been killed since March 2011 — a figure much higher than previous opposition estimates.
Rebels took control of Douma, a suburb of some 200,000 located nine miles (15 kilometers) northwest of Damascus, in mid-October 2011, after launching attacks on military posts throughout the city, activists said.
Less than a week later, the rebels had taken over a half-dozen checkpoints and government buildings, said activist Mohammed Saeed. The army withdrew from others.
"Since then, the city has been totally liberated," he said. "There are no government troops left, but we still suffer from regime airstrikes almost every day."
Today, those entering Douma must pass through rebel checkpoints at the city's main entryways. Rebels with camouflage vests and Kalashnikov rifles zip about on motorcycles, communicating by walkie-talkie. Some belong to the security brigade, an improvised police force to catch looters that works with a judicial council of Muslim clerics and lawyers who run a prison.
In November, residents formed a civilian council to provide services for the estimated one-third of Douma's residents who have not fled the violence.
The council oversees committees for medical issues, bakeries, media relations and other tasks, said its head, Nizar Simadi. A former cleaner at city hall runs a cleanup crew that helps remove rubble from the streets after shell attacks and airstrikes.
The city's electricity went out in November — activists accuse the government of cutting it in revenge — but former electric company employees have strung in power from nearby areas still on the government network, returning power to some of the city.
Douma has more than a dozen rebel brigades, and the city's fighters have joined battles in many other areas around the capital. Most of their support comes from wealthy Syrians abroad who send money to buy arms, said the head of one rebel brigade, the Douma Martyrs, who goes by the name Abu Waleed.
In November, Douma's fighters raided two army bases in the nearby suburb of Otaya, he said, making away with arms that helped them push closer to Damascus. But they can do little about the government's airstrikes.
Rebel forces are currently fighting the government in areas on three sides of the capital. They are closest in the south, where they have pushed into the poor Damascus neighborhood of Hajar al-Aswad. Recent weeks have also seen fierce clashes in the southwestern suburb of Daraya, which the government says it is close to reclaiming.
During Thursday's airstrikes on Douma, a government fighter jet launched two bombing runs on a densely populated residential area near a prominent mosque, said Saeed, the activist.
Videos posted online showed residents rushing though a smoke-filled street and loading wounded people into cars and pickup trucks. One man was buried up to his thigh in debris and helped rescuers dig himself out. Another man emerged from a pile of rubble with blood on his face and covered head-to-toe in gray cement dust.
One group provided videos of 12 people they said were killed in the attack. The videos appeared genuine and corresponded to other AP reporting on the strike.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least 10 rebel fighters and 32 civilians were killed Thursday in clashes, shelling and airstrikes in the Damascus Countryside province that surrounds the capital, more than anywhere else in Syria.
Late Thursday, a car bomb exploded at a gas station inside the city itself, killing at least nine people, activists said. Syria's state news agency blamed the attack on "terrorists," its shorthand for the rebels, but did not give numbers for the dead and wounded. There was no immediate claim of responsibility.
Despite rebel advances near Damascus, it remains unclear whether they'll be able to turn the tables on Assad's forces. Rebels launched a hasty offensive on Damascus last summer but were swiftly routed by government forces.
Before attempting to take Damascus again, Saeed said the rebels must gather enough ammunition to sustain the battle, take over nearby army bases to prevent attacks from behind and increase coordination between rebel brigades.
He guessed that could take six months.
The Syrian government has not commented on the fall of Douma to rebels, whom it characterizes as terrorists backed by foreign powers seeking to destroy the country.
The chief of staff of Syria's armed forces called on the army to continue its "holy and national task to crush the armed terrorist groups and their hideout," the state news agency reported.
Gen. Abdullah Ayoub said the "conspiracy" against Syria would fail "thanks to the bravery of the Syrian army and the coherence of the Syrian people."
Activists reported clashes in a number of other parts of Syria on Thursday, including inside the Taftanaz helicopter base in the north.
In Jordan, the U.N. refugee agency said that around 1,200 people have fled across Syria's southern border each day for the past three days, an increase reflecting fresh violence in the south. UNHCR reporting officer Danita Topcagic said many shops in the area were shut, making it hard for people to find food, and that electricity and water supplies were short.
About a half-million Syrians have sought refuge from the war in neighboring countries, and many more are displaced inside Syria.
Meanwhile, the parents of an American journalist who has been missing in Syria since he was kidnapped Nov. 22 appealed to his captors for compassion and any information about their son's health and welfare. Thirty-nine-year-old James Foley was in the country contributing videos to Agence France-Press, which has vowed to help secure his release.
Twenty-eight journalists were killed in Syria in 2012, prompting the Committee to Protect Journalists to name Syria the most dangerous country in the world to work in last year.

Read More..

Purported photo of new BlackBerry phone with QWERTY keyboard leaks

Research In Motion (RIMM) CEO Thorsten Heins recently said during the company’s Q3 earnings call that BlackBerry 7 is still a “strong success” in the Asian-Pacific markets. Despite the company putting most of its weight behind BlackBerry 10 and the Z10 and X10, Heins said RIM will continue supporting BB7 and consumers “might expect us to even build one of the other new products” based on it. Heins suggested on the earnings call new BB7 phones will target entry-level markets with lower price points over its BB10 devices; now, MobileSyrup has posted a photo of a mystery BlackBerry phone sitting next to the BB10-powered Z10 and X10. Could this HTC (2498) Status/ChaCha look-alike be a new BB7 smartphone? It could be, but then again, it could also be a prototype that will never be released or another new BB10-powered QWERTY phone.

Read More..

Microsoft Surface trampled at the bottom of the tablet pile this Christmas

While it does have drawbacks just like anything else, Microsoft’s (MSFT) Surface is a great slate for those looking for a fresh new take on the modern tablet. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like very many people were looking for a fresh new take on the modern tablet this holiday season. In a recent note to investors, R.W. Baird analyst William Power recounted recent conversations had at retailers including Best Buy (BBY) and Staples (SPLS). While speaking with sales reps at the stores, Apple’s (AAPL) iPad was the most highly recommended tablet while Amazon’s (AMZN) Kindle Fire line and Samsung’s (005930) Galaxy Tab line were both recommended as alternatives. Microsoft’s Surface tablet, on the other hand, was not pushed by reps at either chain.

Read More..

iPad is a Christmas graveyard for ‘Grand Theft Auto’ and ‘Modern Combat’

At the beginning of December, the traditional video game industry attempted another iPad invasion. New versions of “Grand Theft Auto,” “Modern Combat” and “Baldur’s Gate” hit the iOS app market priced between $5 and $10. Over the past years, we have seen repeated attempts by major console and PC industry franchises to tailor their blockbuster games for iPhone and iPad platforms. None have succeeded. As the iOS app market increasingly favors free games with in-app purchases, the old-timers have started failing spectacularly.
[More from BGR: Microsoft Surface trampled at the bottom of the tablet pile this Christmas]
December is the most important month of the year for the iOS app market and the days around Christmas are the hottest period. As consumers upgrade their iPhones or receive their very first iOS devices, they tend to go on mobile app buying binges. That is why mega franchises like GTA and “Modern Combat” launched their latest iOS products at the beginning of the month. The games were supposed to stay alive for at least three weeks. They did not.
[More from BGR: Mark Cuban: Nokia Lumia 920 ‘crushes’ the iPhone 5]
The lavishly marketed “Grand Theft Auto: Vice City” peaked on iPhone app chart at No.2 on December 8th and plunged to No.36 by December 22nd. It rebounded to No.25 on December 25th. On the iPad, the game plummeted to a shocking No.52 by the all-important Christmas Day, when new iPad owners go berserk on iTunes.
Here is the kicker: on the revenue chart for U.S. iPad apps, the new GTA game had tanked to No.75 by December 25th. This is even worse than the No.52 position on the download chart. I find that genuinely fascinating, because it means that a game with a very stiff download price of $5 is showing weaker revenue performance than on raw download volume.
The GTA title is priced at $5 at a time when 80% of the top-grossing iPad games are free downloads. The top free apps have compelling in-game purchase strategies — “Grand Theft Auto: Vice City” does not. As a result, it is getting beaten by titles such as “Fairway Solitaire” and “My Little Pony” in revenue generation. Having massive name recognition and hundreds of millions of units in console game sales helps very little in the brutally competitive iOS game market.
“Modern Combat 4″ has also plunged out of top-50 on the iPad revenue chart just three weeks after its high-profile debut. The $10 update of “Baldur’s Gate” is out of top-200, brought low by its ridiculously high sticker price.
The proud console and PC game champions keep repeating the same gambit in the iOS market: price ‘em high and ignore the in-app purchase angle. They keep failing. When are we going to see a major console game franchise finally adapt to the Apple (AAPL) ecosystem and create an iOS game that is free to download but lures users into an in-app purchase trap effectively?

Read More..

Apple still can’t build enough iPad minis

A common issue often presents itself when Apple (AAPL) launches new products: it can’t build them fast enough. We’ve seen it time and time again, most recently when Apple launched the iPhone 5 and 150,000 dedicated factory workers still couldn’t keep up with demand. Now, a report has surfaced claiming that Apple’s manufacturing partners in the Far East can’t build units fast enough to keep pace with Apple’s iPad mini orders.
[More from BGR: Microsoft Surface trampled at the bottom of the tablet pile this Christmas]
According to Digitimes’ supply chain sources, Apple’s parts suppliers have prepared enough components to build between 10 million and 12 million iPad mini tablets in the fourth quarter to accomodate heavy demand. Apple’s manufacturing partners are only expected to ship 8 million assembled units, however.
[More from BGR: Mark Cuban: Nokia Lumia 920 ‘crushes’ the iPhone 5]
The report states that yield rates are improving though, and Apple is expected to ship 13 million iPad mini tablets in the first quarter of 2013.

Read More..

Lack of low-end BlackBerry 10 phone could be a serious stumbling block in RIM comeback bid

South Africa is one of Research In Motion’s (RIMM) top five markets in the world, and it is a decent proxy for the entire African market. Leading regional carrier Vodacom’s November smartphone statistics illustrate exactly why BlackBerry 10 cannot arrive soon enough… and why RIM badly needs a cheap new BlackBerry 10 model by spring.
[More from BGR: Apple CEO Tim Cook sees pay drop 99% in 2012]
Vodacom holds more than 50% of the South African handset market and South Africa is the largest mobile phone market in the continent.
[More from BGR: Microsoft Surface trampled at the bottom of the tablet pile this Christmas]
On November 12th, Vodacom announced that it had 2.7 million BlackBerry users on its South African network, a number that increased by 300,000 in three months. The number of Android users grew by 200,000 to 700,000 subscribers. The number of iPhone users grew by 250,000 to 500,000.
Of course, there are many ways at looking at these trends but it’s striking that the growth of the BlackBerry user base has slowed down to 12% in a quarter while Android growth is now at 40% and iPhone growth is 100%. Even though the pool of BlackBerry users is still expanding in the most important African market, we are now close to the tip-off point where the absolute number of both Android and iPhone users added each quarter is going to be larger than the number of new BlackBerry subs.
RIM announced last week that its global customer base has finally started shrinking — the BlackBerry subscriber pool dropped from 80 million to 79 million between the August and November quarters.
During the August quarter, RIM still managed to add 2 million BlackBerry subscribers. The non-U.S. BlackBerry subscriber base is still growing, but too slowly to offset the U.S. erosion. This is the trend that the Vodacom November numbers also reflect. In Africa and Asia, that BlackBerry growth slowdown is unlikely to reverse until RIM launches a cheap, sub-$250 model with the new BlackBerry 10 OS.
In South Africa, affluent buyers are now flocking under the iPhone banner, while Samsung (005930) and Chinese vendors are mopping up middle class consumers with cheap Android models. New high-end phones in the $600 range are not going to change this equation.
RIM must strike hard in the low-end market to regain its African momentum. By Easter, Android and iPhone camps will have pulled ahead of RIM in new subscriber additions at Vodacom. Next spring, South Africa could well be the most important global bellwether of RIM’s struggle to recapture subscriber growth.

Read More..