- UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon’s convoy was attacked as it entered Hamas-run Gaza, provoking condemnations from the Fatah-controlled Palestine Liberation Organization. Ban spoke yesterday at the Herzliyah conference in Israel, praising the Arab Spring for bringing democracy to the Arab people. (Euronews, Ynet, JPost)
- Today is the 30-year anniversary of the Hama massacre, the brutal end to the last major uprising in Syria, whose spirit is looming over the current uprising. Meanwhile, the UN is struggling to come to a consensus on the applicability of the “R2P” (responsibility to protect) doctrine to Syria in the wake of the doctrine’s first real application: the intervention in Libya. (AP, HuffPo)
- An Egyptian court sentenced a famous actor to prison for insulting Islam. (AP)
- Stanley Fischer, the governor of Israel’s Central Bank, highlighted the issue of the low workforce participation from Israel’s Arab and ultra-orthodox Jewish populations. (Tablet)
- Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman will meet with Hillary Clinton next week, the first such meeting in 18 months. (Haaretz)
- A delegation from the Chefs of the Heads of State group, including chefs from the White House, the Chancellery of Germany, the Kremlin and the Ellysee Palace, is preparing a gala dinner in Israel called “Cooking for Peace”. (JTA)
- A rare co-ed school in Afghanistan, even more rare as it is being run by impoverished rural Afghanis and is currently without independent support. Most Afghani schools are run by hardline Wahabbi Islamists. (HuffPo)
Daniel Meyerowitz-Katz
