This one’s a hoot.

BERLIN (AP) - A truck spilled two tons of pigs’ heads on a road in western Germany, giving passing drivers a shock on the night before Halloween, police said Tuesday.

The accident happened Monday night after the truck turned off a highway in Herne, in the Ruhr region, police in Bochum said.

As the driver accelerated away from a traffic light, the door of his trailer opened, spilling the severed heads onto the road.

It took the fire service, helped by a fork-lift truck, an hour-and-a-half to load the heads back onto the truck

Happy Halloween, and what a great trick!

Yes, I called it in my last post: The UN is working on ways to screw Israel.

UNITED NATIONS, Oct 30 (Reuters) - U.N. cartographers are working at “full speed” to define where the disputed Shebaa Farms between Syria and Lebanon begin and end and which country has jurisdiction, a U.N. envoy said on Monday.

But Terje Roed-Larsen, the top diplomat on Syria and Lebanon relations, told reporters there was “no valid and acceptable geographical definition of what the area is.”

“This is why U.N. cartographers are now working full speed on analyzing if it is at all possible to define in geographical and territorial terms what this area actually encompasses,” Roed-Larsen said.

Working full speed… hm, in UN parlance that means it will take decades. Except that when the UN sees the chance to screw Israel, their timetable suddenly reaches light-speed.

The United Nations says the Shebaa Farms is Syrian territory captured by Israel in the Middle East war of 1967. Syria and Lebanon say it is Lebanese and the Lebanese villagers show visitors their deeds to land in the area.

But Damascus has not signed an agreement with Beirut to demarcate the frontier, which Lebanon’s Hizbollah militia has used as a “resistance” front to end Israeli occupation there.

However, the U.N. Security Council resolution in August that imposed a cease-fire on the Hizbollah-Israeli war asks Syria to sign with Lebanon a clear border agreement. Beirut has proposed that the Shebaa Farms should temporarily become an enclave controlled by the U.N. peacekeepers until a border agreement is reached.

“If we are going to ask, hypothetically, Israel to withdraw from this territory, we have to know what it is,” Roed-Larsen said. The Shebaa Farms area is about 15 square miles.

Toldja so.

But they never hurt anyone, really: You know those “crude, home-made rockets” that the media keep on yammering about? The ones that “rarely kill or hurt anyone”? Well, turns out that over the past two years, they’ve hurt over 300 Israelis—most of them, of course, civilians.

If it’s Friday, this must be the violent “peace” protest: Yes, the ISM and their league of peaceful protesters once again rioted against the fence in Bil’in, and once again hurt policemen and had to be forcibly repulsed. (They’re repulsive regardless, so that’s kind of redundant, but hey.)

The protesters threw stones at security forces and attempted to damage the fence using ladders.

So, the throwing of stones at security forces—how, exactly, does that constitute a protest against the fence? Just asking.

Be afraid. Be very afraid. The UN is going to map the Shebaa Farms area. Not, like, actually sending someone there to survey and map it. Nope. They’re gonna do it from UN HQ in NY. Hands up, anyone who reads this blog and doesn’t think Israel is going to get screwed over this.

Uh-huh.

Yeah. Pull the other one. The U.S. is once again teaching the palestinians how to shoot. Once again, Israeli civilians and soldiers will pay the price. Wait for it.

And by the way, Ha’aretz has that article under “Diplomacy.” Shyeah. Right. Diplomacy.

The Bush administration has undertaken efforts to arm and train the Presidential Guard of Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas in order to prepare it for a potential violent confrontation with Hamas forces in the Gaza Strip.

Uh-huh. Just like that civil war that broke out a few weeks ago. Oh, wait. It never did get to civil war. Because it won’t. The palestinians are united by a common hatred of Israel. It’s the glue that binds all the little sociopaths together. And now, Uncle Sam is teaching them how better to kill Israelis. Just like they did in the 1990s. Great.

You know, I always liked the title of that play. I also always liked the title of the play “Oh Dad Poor Dad Momma’s Hung You in the Closet and I’m Feeling so Bad.”

I have no idea what either of them are about. In fact, I have no idea if the second one is a play title or a song title, and have no desire to Google it.

But I gotta tell you, right now, inspiration is low. Repeat, inspiration is low.

I’m sorry for the lack of posting. I haven’t got much heart these days. Money worries, cat worries, job worries (still a temp, no end in sight), stress up the wazoo. I know there are bigger problems in the world, but y’know, these are my problems, and they seem pretty big to me.

If I could run away from home for a week, I’d do it. Unfortunately, that’s not an option.

Haveil Havalim #91 is up at Sweet Rose. Stop and read the roses.Thanks again, Meryl!

Well, I took Gracie to another vet today for a second opinion. I now have absolutely zero faith in my current vets. Second vet said I have to get the biopsies done, and they need to be surgical. The works, he said.

Since I’ve already spent an enormous amount of money at the vet who neglected to perform the biopsies during the exploratory surgery, my options are extremely limited. My original vets at least have the decency to do the surgery over again at no charge. So back Gracie goes to the original vet for surgery on Friday. I do not want this to happen, and I don’t want it to happen on the weekend, either. If she eats normally the rest of the week, I may wait until Monday, because there’s no one there on Sunday, and checking on her once during the day isn’t enough for me.

Unfortunately for Gracie, she seems to have the nausea back. She’s been eating somewhat. She eats a few minutes after I shove a Pepsid AC down her throat, leading me to believe that it is nausea that’s bothering her. I’ll be giving her one in the morning and one when I get home from work for the rest of the week.

We can’t do the surgery before Friday because Gracie got a steroid shot on Saturday, and second vet said that can interfere with the biopsy result. When I called my vet to tell her I wanted her to do the surgery, she said, “Fine, we can do it tomorrow if you like.” I asked “Won’t the steroids she got interfere with the biopsy?”

“Oh, yeah. We can schedule it for Friday.”

Zero confidence.

As soon as the surgery is done, Gracie is going to the new vet for all the aftercare. I’m switching vets. My new vet comes highly recommended by my manager at Large Company in Richmond.

We are so done with the old vet. And I am so tired of going to vets.

I’m trying to find another vet that performs endoscopies in the Richmond, VA area. I know of two clinics that will charge me well over $1,000. Can’t afford that.

Does anyone know how I can find out which vets in my area perform endoscopies?

Count the number of times that the words “hardliner” and “Avigdor Lieberman” will be used from now until he is no longer a part of the Olmert government.

I’ve never seen him described as anything but.

Israel Cabinet to integrate hardliners
JERUSALEM — The Israeli Cabinet voted overwhelmingly Monday to bring into the government a hawkish party that opposes ceding territory to the Palestinians and wants to redraw Israel’s borders to exclude many Israeli Arabs.

The vote, which still needs parliamentary approval, gives Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s coalition a commanding majority in parliament. But the inclusion of the hardline Yisrael Beiteinu party likely puts an end to Olmert’s election campaign promise to pull out of much of the West Bank.

By the way, that redrawing of borders? The offer is to trade some Israeli Arab towns to the palestinians in exchange for towns that Israel would like to keep. Love the way the AP puts it, eh?

And yet, the media will not call Hamas a terrorist organization directly. They will use the weasel words “called a terrorist organization by the U.S., the UN, and the EU” instead.

You see, everyone but Israelis get the benefit of the doubt, even though Hamas has claimed dozens of terrorist attacks that killed or wounded thousands of Israeli civilians. But that’s not enough to be known as a terrorist group by the AP.

Carnival of the Cats #136 is celebrating Halloween with a spooktacular roundup brewed in the kettle over at Watermark, which based on the Poet’s excellent track record I’m thinking out to be the go-to place for all holiday editions at this rate.

Don’t you agree?

So who is the Catmodel of the week this week?

It’s the wonderful cat reporter KC, glad to be a former feral over at Missy, KC and Bear.

The Robert Spencer two-parter on Shire Network News is over, but the reports on Jew-hatred continue with tales of the anti-Semitism at UC-Irvine, also featured at CampusJ. UC-Irvine, where the president of the university said—yes, really—”One person’s hate speech is another’s education.”

Listen, link it, send the link to your friends. I’ll post my contribution later, because I’m just that masochistic that I want yet another crazy discussion in my comments about it. Plus, I’m rewarding those of you who actually listen to the podcast. You get to hear me there first. Hey, this week I played with the echo effect in Audacity. I think it came out just fine.

Earlier this year, the first of my first class of fourth grade students began having their Bar and Bat Mitzvahs. There’s a post sitting in the spike file of my thoughts from the first Bar Mitzvah, because I couldn’t get it to work. In the meantime, next Saturday two of the last three (they’re twins) are having their Bar and Bat Mitzvah (they’re boy-girl twins). I’ve been helping them a bit with some of the Shabbat service prayers, mostly because they felt unsure and partly because they needed to attend more Shabbat services. But they’re kids, and kids absorb knowledge like a sponge absorbs water. I have no doubt they’ll do extremely well next Shabbat.

The last Bat Mitzvah will be sometime this spring, and then all of my first class—whom my ex-student M. calls my “lab rats”—will have achieved this milestone. They will have led the congregation in prayer, which is actually something that I have never done. I’m doing that in November of 2007. I’ve let a few people know to save the date, like Judith Weiss, and I also know that she can chant Torah, so I asked if she’d be interested in doing one of my Torah portions. I don’t think I”m up to doing seven. She said yes so quickly, I began to wonder who else I could get to help me. So at the latest Bat Mitzvah (last week, in fact), I asked M. if he’d be interested in learning one of my portions. I told him I wouldn’t be at all offended if he refused. He said yes. Then the kids started volunteering. A. asked if he could do a portion. A new boy, S., said he’d be interested. Another one just volunteered today, asking if any portions were left.

I cannot think of a better way to celebrate my adult Bat Mitzvah than to have my former students taking part in it, but I didn’t expect this degree of participation. If this keeps up, I’m going to have to rescind Judith’s invitation and give her portion to another student. Somehow, I don’t think she’ll mind.

Four years ago, when I said yes to the question, “Do you think you could teach Daled class in our religious school?”, I had no idea that I would fall in love with teaching as much as I have. And when my students do something like this, four years after graduating from my class, it makes me love teaching even more.

Like I told my A. last week: That first class taught me how to teach. Every class teaches me something new and different. But one thing they all have in common: They make me love teaching, and children, all over again.

They can be so funny, too. Last Tuesday, I was explaining the difference between patrilineal and matrilineal, trying to explain the laws about passing your Judaism on to your children. The students found much of it profoundly unfair, and at the end of the discussion, younger A. said, “Boys. Can’t live with ‘em, can’t live without ‘em.”

She’s not quite nine yet.

I didn’t laugh then, but boy, did I laugh when I relayed that anecdote to a friend.

Kids are great. Teaching is a blast, most of the time. I’m so glad I was dragged into this.

The AP sent out an article that describes a good dividend of the Hezbullah war, and it will probably not be running in your local paper.

On Israeli border, a surprising optimism
METULLA, Israel — For years, whenever Asher Greenberg left his home in this frontier town to work in the orchards along the Lebanon border, he took his M-16 rifle in case Hezbollah guerrillas attacked. Since Israel’s war with Hezbollah ended in August, Greenberg’s rifle hasn’t left his closet once.

At Zarit, a nearby farming village where chicken coops and red-roofed houses hug the border fence, farmers are beginning to return to orchards they abandoned during the years when Hezbollah guerrillas controlled the Lebanese side of the line.

More than two months after the war ended in stalemate, many Israelis have come to see it as a costly failure. Those who live closest to Lebanon, though, say it altered their lives dramatically for the better.

“The war erased a threat we lived with for years,” Greenberg said. “We aren’t afraid of snipers or kidnappings anymore. We can breathe.”

Today, he said, he sees more U.N. peacekeeping troops and, for the first time, Lebanese soldiers, 10,000 of whom have been deployed in south Lebanon since the war ended with a cease-fire on Aug. 14.

It goes on to add even more positives—for Israelis.

The mood is similarly upbeat at Manara, a kibbutz to the east. In May, its vulnerability was felt when a soldier in the kibbutz was wounded by a Hezbollah sniper.

The situation is different now. “I think the war critics are right in many ways, but they have created the impression that we lost,” said Shabtai Mayo, the kibbutz’s secretary general. “There were mistakes, but from here this looks very different from a defeat.”

Lt. Col. Ishai Efroni, a senior army officer in an Israeli border unit, said his men along the fence also feel a marked change for the better, now that Hezbollah men with grenade launchers are no longer a few yards from Israeli tanks.

Efroni said Israeli soldiers trade pleasantries with UNIFIL troops along the border, and that even the Lebanese soldiers sometimes wave. “They’re still hesitant _ this is new for them,” he said.

The army sometimes has to deal with Hezbollah supporters throwing stones over the fence at soldiers, but Efroni said he only has to call a U.N. liaison officer and “within half an hour” U.N. or Lebanese troops arrive.

The reasons you won’t see this in too many papers? Let me count the ways.

1. It’s good news about Israel. The mainstream media is uninterested in good things happening to Israelis.
2. It shows that Israel was right to go after Hezbullah. The mainstream media has been bashing Israel over the Hezbullah war since the second it began.
3. No palestinians were harmed in the making of this news article. What? A story where the Israelis are the victims? Sorry, but those racist, neo-colonial, imperialist, Zionist stooges of the United States can never be victims.

Feel free to add your reasons in the comments.

Say hello to Peekaboo Gracie, all happy in her tissue-paper nest. (Tissue paper compliments of Sarah a.k.a. the Pumpkin Goddess.)

She ate and ate and ate Saturday. It took a few hours for the steroids and anti-emetic to kick in, but when they did, hoo-boy, did she eat. She decided that she likes the Fancy Feast tuna flavor, and I will be buying more of those on the way home from religious school. Many more, as Tig hogged as much as he could.

She wasn’t eating much at first, but every time she went to the food dish, I sat with her and encouraged her. Hell, I got a spoon and spoon-fed her, that’s how she decided she liked the Fancy Feast. She ignored it when I put it in her food bowl, but when I put some on a spoon and gave it to her, you could see the “Holy cow, this is GOOD!” look on her face. Better for her than tunafish, too.

Tig’s been a brat to her all day. He slapped at her, and then he slapped at me when I yelled at him. Then I slapped at him, so we were even all around. I don’t really understand him. He and Gracie were six inches apart in my bed two nights ago, and she’s been back from the vet’s for quite some time. He needs to come around, because he’s trying to stop her from eating, and that is unacceptable. I threw him out a number of times today.

In any case, Gracie ate and ate and ate, and I’m extremely happy about that. I have pictures galore from Saturday. We stayed home all day together. I even have pictures of Gracie as Frankenkitty (Lair Simon’s moniker for her). She has a row of staples on her shaved belly. I can’t decide whether or not to post it, for fear of frightening the children. But I have a great Tig picture for Tummy Tuesday, one of the funniest ever, so I may put Gracie’s Frankenkitty tummy up that day.

This ailment is starting to seem more and more like feline inflammatory bowel disease. I will be calling a new vet on Monday to see if I can get an endoscopy performed, or if I should continue to treat Gracie like she has it. I’m not willing to have her opened up again. It’s going to cost a few hundred dollars more, but again—not really trusting my current vets any more. In fact, it’s highly likely I’m going to switch to a new vet. Lucky for me, one of you cat people out there lives in Richmond, and has made a recommendation for a new vet.

Gracie ate and ate and ate, and annoyed the hell out of me when she wasn’t eating. Things are getting back to normal around here.

Minor setback today. She seemed nauseous again, and would pick up a piece of food but spit it out, or hang with her nose in the food dish and not eat.

She has lost a lot of weight—at least a pound. Granted, she had the weight to lose, but still—she’s getting bony. I’m going to wait a while and then give her more Nutri-Cal and try to get her to eat. The drugs shouldn’t take that long to take effect. I’m waiting for the best effect of the steroid—it makes her hungry.

I think we have to do the biopsy, but I am still extremely reluctant to go back in surgically. I may call around to other vets and price an endoscopy with them, and find out how much recovery time she will need from it. I don’t see the point in having my vet do it if they can’t get the needed tissue without going in surgically after trying the endoscopy. I have less faith in my vet than I had two weeks ago. Not the one that’s treating my cat—her, I like. Her biggest handicap is that she’s only a couple of years out of vet school. Her senior partners are much more at fault, in my opinion, for not making sure she took the biopsy. It’s a beginner’s mistake, but not a mistake an experienced vet should have made.

In any case, we’re treating Gracie empirically at the moment, and it seems to be working. She isn’t vomiting, she’s not lying all hunched up in one place all day, and she’s not miserable. She goes up and down the stairs, in and out of my bed, lies in the window when it’s sunny, and does what she wants, mostly. We just need to get rid of this nausea and bad stomach. And believe me, I know how she feels. I’ve had stress-related stomach problems my entire adult life.

She headed straight to the food dish when she got home, but didn’t eat. I think I’ll see if we can convince her otherwise.

The one that Lair Simon posted about Jimmy Webb? I deleted it. Sorry, but it’s not suitable for my weblog. It’s over on his if you care to read it.

Okay, it was there, but now it’s not. At least, he SAID it was there.

This may be an elaborate prank by Lair. He’s been trying to mess with me like this ever since I gave him co-blogging privileges.

Hm. Confused? Well, so am I.

Friday’s a good day for news about those tolerant, feminist Muslims.

First, let’s take a look at Yvonne Ridley’s claim that Islam is more feminist than the American feminist movement of the 1970s. I’m thinking not.

Women Under Attack in Iraq, Afghanistan
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - Women are facing increasing violence in Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia, especially when they speak out publicly to defend women’s rights, a senior U.N. official told the U.N. Security Council.

Noeleen Heyzer, executive director of the U.N. Development Fund for Women, called on for fresh efforts to ensure the safety of women in countries emerging from conflicts, to provide them with jobs, and ensure that they receive justice, including compensation for rape.

“What UNIFEM is seeing on the ground - in Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia - is that public space for women in these situations is shrinking,” Heyzer said Thursday. “Women are becoming assassination targets when they dare defend women’s rights in public decision-making.”

But they’re just cultural issues, right, Yvonne?

Then there’s the so-called “moderate” Australian imam who said that women are to blame for rape, and now says he was misinterpreted and his remarks were taken out of context.

Sheik Taj Aldin al Hilali denied he was condoning rape when he made the comments in a sermon last month, and apologized to any women he had offended, saying they were free to dress as they wished.

Um, no. You can read his remarks here. He was pretty clear about it being the fault of a woman who dares to go outside, alone, and not wearing the veil.

“But when it comes to this disaster, who started it? In his literature, writer al-Rafee says, if I came across a rape crime, I would discipline the man and order that the woman be jailed for life. Why would you do this, Rafee? He said because if she had not left the meat uncovered, the cat wouldn’t have snatched it.”

“If you get a kilo of meat, and you don’t put it in the fridge or in the pot or in the kitchen but you leave it on a plate in the backyard, and then you have a fight with the neighbour because his cats eat the meat, you’re crazy. Isn’t this true?”

“If you take uncovered meat and put it on the street, on the pavement, in a garden, in a park, or in the backyard, without a cover and the cats eat it, then whose fault will it be, the cats, or the uncovered meat’s? The uncovered meat is the disaster. If the meat was covered the cats wouldn’t roam around it. If the meat is inside the fridge, they won’t get it.”

“If the woman is in her boudoir, in her house and if she’s wearing the veil and if she shows modesty, disasters don’t happen.”

“Satan sees women as half his soldiers. You’re my messenger in necessity, Satan tells women you‘re my weapon to bring down any stubborn man. There are men that I fail with. But you’re the best of my weapons.”

And by the way: Ew. What a disgusting analogy. I have another one. When you take a man’s meat, and make it really tiny, he has all kinds of problems with women. Say, buddy, just how big are you?

In other news, Muslims are royally peeved that the newspaper that published the Danish Mohammed cartoons was found innocent of libel (and who, may I ask, could they have libeled, seeing as Mohammed is not alive to bring suit?). But here’s the part that is not getting much play.

“It is not up to the court to decide if Muslims will have hard feelings or not,” Ameer ul-Azeem, spokesman for Jamaat-e-Islami, told the Associated Press news agency.

The AP has actually dropped that quote from its later stories. Because it illustrates perfectly the absolutely arrogant attitude that the world must bend itself to Muslim beliefs, whether or not we follow them—or else. The threat is always implied.

However, he’s right. It’s not up to the court to decide if Muslims are offended. It is up to the court to decide whether offending Muslims has broken any laws. Guess what, bub? It didn’t.

Happy Friday, and tune into MEMRI for the translations of all the Friday sermons in Islamaland that call for the deaths of the sons of apes and pigs (that would be Jews and Christians, for those of you who haven’t been to MEMRI yet).

Because you all want to know, and because I am in SUCH a good mood this morning, we present the Gracie Morning News.

She ate again.

I hand-fed her some dry food—just a few pieces, but she ate them readily. While I was feeding her, Tig came up and said, “Whatcha doing? Are you giving Gracie food? Can I have some too? Me too? Me too?” So I gave him a piece and he said, “Oh. I thought it was something good.” I left Gracie cuddled in the comforter while I showered, and then gave her another large dab of the Nutri-Cal, because five pieces of kibble in the morning does not a breakfast make. She is lying a little less comfortably on the comforter, because she hates that stuff, but she now has kibble and nutrients in her, heading off that -osis thing her liver was doing as it tries to eat itself or whatever. There appears to be no sign of nausea. I’m going to call the vet in a few minutes and see if we should repeat the shots tomorrow.

I made up a song for Gracie while I was feeding her, but I’m not going to repeat it here. One of my talents is song parody, and the ability to make up songs on the spot. I amused my fourth graders last year no end by singing a song that started each line with their names, but I can’t remember what I sang to them. Gracie’s song was to the tune of “I’m Still Here” by Sondheim, and I’m still working on that parody about the history of the Jews to that tune. I think I’ll tackle it this weekend. I really want to get that done, and I have someone in mind to sing it for the podcast.

By the way, I am also convinced that the blogger’s daughter who is a small animal specialist managed to cure Gracie simply by consulting with me over the phone. She’s just THAT good. (Actually, she scared the crap out of me with the stomach tube thing, I conveyed that fear to Gracie, and Gracie obviously said, “Crap, I don’t want THAT in me!” and healed.)

My Sweetness had a good night last night, and is having a good morning this morning, and seems likely to have a good day today.

And that’s the Gracie Morning News.

I do believe I have reached my stress tolerance threshhold.

I was trying to find something to write a post about for tomorrow morning, but I’m thinking instead, I’m going to call it a night, play a game of Solitaire, and go to bed.

Last night, Gracie slept at the foot of the bed, Tig was at my right, and nobody hissed at anyone. Well, except for when I moved Gracie from my pillow to the foot of the bed, and pushed Tig from the middle to the end so I could, y’know, fit. In my own bed.

Today, Tig told Gracie she has vet smell and has been harassing her. She’s on a towel on the floor under the bathroom counter right now. But I think I’ll put her in her spot on the bed and throw out Tig if he doesn’t like it.

That’s right. Fluffy bunny and kitty posts. That’s all I’m up for at the moment.

See title.

I took Gracie to the vet this morning, feeling really down and depressed about her whole outlook. Because she vomited up the water that contained the quarter pill of Pepcid AC that I gave her via kitty syringe. Because she looked awful again. Because she still wasn’t eating.

When I got there, I told the vet to give her the works—anti-nausea, antibiotic, and steroids in case she has Inflammatory Bowel Disease (I’ve been doing my homework). The vet also gave Gracie IV (sub-q, as I had requested) and tried to feed her (but not force-feed). She said Gracie showed interest in the food, but didn’t eat any.

Meantime, a very nice blogger whose daughter is a small animal internist in the northeast gave me her number, and we chatted for a good twenty minutes. She had all but convinced me that it was time for a stomach tube for Gracie. I left work early to consult with my vet and pass along the specialist’s advice (which was well accepted by my vet, who is truly only trying to make Gracie better). I was still pretty worried, and thought that we’d take until Monday to decide whether to do the biopsy and insert a stomach tube. The vet gave Gracie one last shot that she’d wanted to give her (forgot which one), and we left.

So, we got home, and she immediately went to the food dishes and circled them. I tried to interest her in other foods, no dice. But finally, a while later, I was petting her near the upstairs food dish (put there to placate Tig when he was freaking over vet scent), and she got more and more interested. And she finally took a bite. She only ate three or so pieces, but it was enough. She kept it down. Half an hour later, she ate another couple of pieces. And again, a little while ago. Now she’s washing herself on the tissue paper on the sofa, which is something she has not done in two weeks—neither the washing nor the sitting on the tissue paper. She has mostly huddled on a towel or in a corner or on my bed. It’s so great to see her acting so normally.

I don’t know what happened today. I don’t know if Gracie turned a corner, or if the shots the vet gave her did the trick. All I know is she is no longer vomiting, she isn’t foaming, the fur beneath her mouth is dry for the first time in two weeks, she is cleaning herself up, and she is eating. Only a little bit, but she’s eating. And keeping it down.

We are very, very happy in the Yourish household today.

Thank you all so very, very much for all your help, good wishes, donations, and purr-ayers. Each and every one of them was appreciated.

If you read this story, and only this story, you’d think that the West Bank city of Nablus was specifically chosen by the Israelis to crush, kill, and destroy. Break out the hankies, folks, it’s gonna be a tearjerker.

Dying. Dead. A corpse. Isolated from the world.

That is how Palestinians describe the once thriving city of Nablus in the occupied West Bank.

Surrounded by sand-coloured rocky mountains, Nablus is also encircled by Israeli army checkpoints and military bases. For Palestinians, leaving means queuing for hours, unless you are a male aged 16 to 35. Then, exit is prohibited without a permit.

Palestinians brand the Israeli restrictions collective punishment.

A centre for trading olives, soap and other goods for thousands of years, Nablus should be the business hub of the West Bank. Instead, many entrepreneurs have left. Other residents say they want to leave. Depression is common.

At night, gunfire echoes from the ancient Old City: Israeli troops on a raid or rival militant factions settling scores.

“This is a story that should be written with tears,” said Hasan Abu Libdeh, head of the Palestinian stock market, which was set up here a decade ago amid optimism about peace.

“Nablus, a magnificent city, is a corpse. It just breaks my heart.”

Say, are they going to get around to telling us why Nablus is ringed by IDF soldiers?

Israel clamped tight restrictions on Nablus, north of Jerusalem, during a Palestinian uprising that erupted six years ago.

Nope.

The army said there were six checkpoints around Nablus and its 200,000 people, noting that curbs were also in place on young men leaving.

Inside Nablus, militants are not hard to find.

Posters of gunmen killed in clashes with Israeli troops line the stone walls.

One shows Fadi Qafeesheh, 33, shot dead by Israeli soldiers on Aug. 31. In the picture, Qafeesheh strikes various poses, holding a pump-action shotgun, an assault rifle and a pistol.

Still nope.

Community leaders said the Israeli restrictions were having a counterproductive effect, encouraging more hardened attitudes toward the Jewish state.

“I meet Israelis all the time. I say you have to take the risk. By suffocating this city you are creating more fundamentalists, more terrorists,” said stock market chief Abu Libdeh, also a former Palestinian government minister.

Nope. Reuters can still find absolutely no reason why the IDF has six checkpoints surrounding Nablus.

I found a few.

1. In the course of the war against Hezbollah in Lebanon , the Israeli security forces thwarted suicide bombing attacks and attempts to abduct soldiers and civilians to negotiate the release of Palestinian prisoners. Some of these terrorist attacks were thwarted shortly before their planned execution.
2. The thwarted terrorist attacks were planned by the terrorist organizations’ cells in Gaza and the West Bank, the most prominent being the Fatah’s Tanzim cell in Nablus . Some of them (including the Fatah cell in Nablus ) are directed by Hezbollah, which instructed terrorist infrastructures in the West Bank to intensify their activity during the war in Lebanon and perpetrate suicide bombing attacks and abductions so as to open another front against Israel.
3. During the war, the Israeli security forces thwarted nine abduction and suicide bombing attacks on the verge of implementation (see details below). Also thwarted or disrupted were over twenty attack plans in various stages of development. Detained within the context of the counter-terrorism activities were 396 terrorist operatives, including 12 potential suicide bombers detained before embarking on their missions. The detainees belong to Fatah’s Tanzim (177), to Hamas (76), to the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (62), and to other terrorist organizations.

But wait, there’s more.

On August 9, the Israeli security forces detained a female suicide bomber and her collaborator at the Beit Iba roadblock in the vicinity of Nablus . The two were dispatched by a Fatah Tanzim cell.

[...] The security forces thwarted a suicide bombing attempt in the city of Rehovot , planned by the Hezbollah-directed Fatah Tanzim infrastructure from the Balata refugee camp in Nablus .

[...] Following a specific security alert, a 21-year-old female terrorist from Nablus was detained on the Tel-Aviv promenade. In her interrogation, she admitted that she had been dispatched by Ibrahim Nayba, the leader of the Hezbollah-directed Fatah Tanzim infrastructure in the Balata refugee camp ( Nablus ).

[...] A specific security alert led to the arrest in Hod Hasharon of Rami Abu Hajle, from the village of Azun near Qalqilya. He was supposed to lead a suicide bomber on behalf of the Hezbollah-directed Fatah Tanzim cell in the Balata refugee camp (Nablus), led by Ibrahim Nayba.

[...] On July 19, the Israeli security forces arrested Shaher Hajj, the head of a Fatah Tanzim cell in Ramallah. In his interrogation, he admitted to planning to abduct Israelis on the road between Ramallah and Nablus.

Nablus is also the home of Al-Najah University, the only university in the world that specializes in suicide bombers. And I don’t even have the time to Google the number of suicide bombers originating from Nablus. But there are a few. Actually, there are quite a lot more than a few. That’s why Nablus is surrounded by checkpoints. Because too many of the inhabitants of that “dying” city are trying to kill Israelis.

The city is not dying. It is committing suicide. Stop trying to murder Israelis, and watch the IDF checkpoints go away. It’s as simple as that, though most people refuse to believe it.

That’s according to a JP headline.

From the past experience, it’s more likely that Fatah is preparing a show of a showdown. With lots of enthusiastic “militants” (using PC lingo) in a variety of fancy uniforms running around horribly beweaponed, shooting off their Kalashnikovs in the air. Hitting mostly the air and, if they get lucky, an occasional bystander in a window on a higher floor.

So - what else is new?

Cross-posted on SimplyJews

AP (via Guardian) brings up a list of journalists kidnapped in Gaza during the last 2 years.

- Oct. 24, 2006: Morenatti is abducted in Gaza City and held for 15 hours.

- Aug. 14, 2006: Steve Centanni and Olaf Wiig of Fox News are kidnapped in Gaza City. They are released on Aug. 27.

- March 13, 2006: Yong Tae-young, a correspondent for Korean TV, is held for a day along with two aid workers.

- Oct. 12, 2005: Knight-Ridder Inc. reporter Dion Nissenbaum, an American, and British photographer Adam Pletts are held for several hours in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis.

- Sept. 19, 2005: Associated Press Television photographer Nicky De Blois escapes a kidnapping attempt in Gaza City with the help of a Palestinian colleague.

- Sept. 10, 2005: Italian journalist Lorenzo Cremonesi of Corriere della Sera newspaper is held for four hours in Gaza.

- Aug. 14, 2005: French TV reporter Mohamed Ouathi is kidnapped in Gaza City; he is set free Aug. 21.

- Jan. 8, 2005: Spanish journalists Ramon Lobo and Carmen Secanella from El Pais are held for an hour and a half in the Khan Younis refugee camp.

- Sept. 27, 2004: CNN producer Riad Ali is held for one day in Gaza City.

- May 20, 2004: New York Times correspondent James Bennet escapes a kidnapping attempt in Gaza City.

After perusing the list, trying to find a fault with it, I have to admit: there is no visible preference of any race, nation, religion or political persuasion. This is what I call unbiased.

There is still hope for the Middle East, ladies and gentlemen!

Cross-posted on SimplyJews

This cat simply Will. Not. Eat.

I bought a tube of Nutri-Cal. I put it on her paw. She tucked her paw underneath her, ignoring the sticky stuff all over it. I washed it off, then went for the bigger guns. I opened the can of salmon Fancy Feast. She was still interested in the smell, but did not eat. She started making those retching motions and licking her lips, which the vet said means she’s still nauseous, so I let her be. I called some friends, who urged me to try the Nutri-Cal again. I put a little bit on my finger and rubbed it inside her mouth, which forced her to eat it. She made the retching moves, but she also ate it. And kept it down. So I started giving her a small bit every half hour or so. Then I brought out the next big gun: The tuna Fancy Feast. She seemed REALLY interested in that, I held it up to her, and she actuallly licked it once or twice. But didn’t eat. More Nutri-Cal. Then final big gun: Real tunafish. Tig went nuts. She came over while I was opening the can. But she wouldn’t eat it. I put some in her mouth. She ate that, but then walked away offended. So. One last glob of Nutri-Cal, and now I’m going to bed, because they had me up at five a.m. and I never did get back to sleep.

Tig’s still hissing at her, but he isn’t trying to attack her. And she’s walking away. She goes up and down the stairs with impunity. I never found her hiding place, but I shut the door to the guest room so she can’t hide in there again. She was on the sofa when I got home. She jumps up and down with no apparent problems. In fact, I just followed her upstairs and found her trying to hide in my closet again. So I got her to jump on my bed again, and we stopped for a petting and purring break.

So here’s the problem: It’s as if Gracie has utterly forgotten how to eat. How do I get her to remember? And please believe me when I tell you she will NOT eat any of the foods your cats eat. She is one of the world’s pickiest cats. She likes dry food of almost any brand, some wet foods, tunafish, and that is it. She doesn’t eat table scraps. If I give her chicken broth, it’s going to be with a syringe and squirted down her throat. I tried pouring tuna water on her dry food. No luck.

The good news is she’s drinking on her own, and I see her use the litterbox regularly (only to pee, of course, not having eaten anything in nearly two weeks). She’s lost about half a pound. But she’s not at death’s door yet, and I don’t think that -osis thing that’s supposed to affect her liver has set in. (Like I’m going to remember medical terms. All I know is that all the vets are scaring me to death with visions of Gracie’s liver suddenly going “Chug… chug… kaff… kaff… kek.”)

Anyway. For now, putting Nutri-Cal glop down her throat is the way I’m going, and I’m thinking chicken broth via syringe tomorrow if I can’t get her to eat anything else. Any other ideas? Anyone else have the pickiest cat eater in the world?

The UN, NGOs, and even meddling members of the State Department repeatedly screamed for Karni Crossing to be reopened for “humanitarian reasons.”

Here’s what happens when humanitarian gestures are offered to the Palestinians:

The Shin Bet foiled an attempt early this week by Palestinian militants to smuggle six kilograms of explosive materials from the Gaza Strip to the West Bank, it was revealed Wednesday.

Shin Bet forces found six kilograms of TNT hidden in a cage, after the smugglers managed to get them through the heavily guarded Karni crossing. The explosives were headed for the West Bank town of Tul Karm.

Forces arrested three Israeli Arabs who were allegedly meant to receive the package on the Israeli side of the border and transport it to the West Bank.

Perhaps those screaming for Karni to be reopened ought to be put in a room with those explosives?

No need to set them off… just let them get a good look at them. Let them see what results their blind calls for humanitarian gestures without considerations for security generate.

The Dorktator’s wetting his pants: Syria says the IDF is making them nervous.

According to one source, Syria expressed concern over the “the unusual military maneuvers” conducted by the IDF in the Golan Heights.

The Qatar-based Al-Watan newspaper, which reported this, also quoted Syrian Defense Minister Hassan Tourkmani, who called on the Syrian military to increase preparedness in order to resist anti-Syrian aggression.

According to the report, a Syrian source added that Israel’s military activity is increasing tensions in the region. He mentioned Chief of Staff Dan Halutz’s Monday to a Golan Heights division exercise as contributing to the heightened tensions.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. They’re folding up paper airplanes in a frenzy, I’m sure.

IDF kills terrorists, world screams “massacre”: Here we go again. Please note the words in bold.

BEIT HANOUN, Gaza (CNN) — Israeli forces killed a senior Palestinian militant commander and six others Monday in northern Gaza, Palestinian security sources said.

The raid happened in Beit Hanoun, the sources said.

The Israeli military confirmed its forces exchanged fire with militants around Beit Lahiya, a Palestinian village near Beit Hanoun, and hit 10 of them. The military did not give the conditions of those shot.

Palestinian witnesses said a small unit of Israeli special forces entered Beit Hanoun in search of Ata Shanbari, senior commander of the Nasr Salah Al-Din Brigades, the armed wing of the Popular Resistance Committees.

Shanbari was visiting his father’s home at the time, Palestinian sources said.

Gunbattles ensued when residents discovered the Israeli special forces unit, the sources said. Israeli tanks entered the area shortly afterward and shelled the house of Shanbari’s father, killing the senior commander and two of his brothers, the sources said.

So, let me get this straight. IDF Special Forces come to Beit Hanoun, are discovered by terrorists, who then fire upon them. A battle ensues, in which some of those firing on the IDF are killed, and possibly civilians whom they are hiding behind. And this is a massacre?

No. This is a massacre.

She’s currently hiding somewhere upstairs, probably thinking I’m going to bring her to the vet again. I really need to find her to separate her from Tig while I’m gone, but that may not be possible.

The good news is she came upstairs and drank some water. Didn’t eat, but I’m thinking we’re close.

Gotta go. Work calls.

And no, I’m still not getting much sleep. Up around (sigh) five this morning.

Helen Boaden, director of BBC news, addresses or, rather, tries to address the accusations of bias. It is significant that, instead of using the big guns at her disposal - an editorial or an article on the main site, she chooses instead the low profile Editors blog. Hardly the caliber matching the artillery used against BBC, but so be it.

So what are the points of contention Ms. Boaden found necessary to counterattack?

1. There was no “official” admission of bias of BBC by BBC, she claims - the quotes of Andrew Marr and Jeff Randal are no more than their personal opinion. The answer is a poor attempt to wiggle out: after all, aren’t Andrew Marr and Jeff Randal loyal enough to BBC and part of the establishment? Why disown them so suddenly?
2. The mere use of the poll on BBC truthfulness is a feint, poor at that. An experienced newsperson, Ms. Boaden cannot ignore the fact that the other side of the coin was not questioned: whether BBC is telling the whole truth? In any case, being truthful (partially or not) does not equal being unbiased, and I am more than sure that Ms. Boaden is fully aware of this. Falling back on the poll re truthfulness is another unsuccessful maneuver.
3. “The situations aren’t real; the discussions aren’t binding and they certainly don’t define BBC policy.” Another feint: the people present who, when discussing a hypothetical situation with Ali G. throwing some cult objects into a dustbin, agreed they could all be thrown into the bin, except the Koran for fear of offending Muslims - these same people will prevent it from happening in any BBC production. It is so painfully clear to all, so why even try?
4. “The seminar was part of a bigger project kicked off by Michael Grade earlier this year to re-examine the underlying principles of impartiality in the digital age when boundaries between conventional broadcasting and the new platforms will increasingly disappear.” I have tried to give my best to this quote. No matter how much good will I poured on it, it stubbornly remained in my eyes what it, most probably, is: a dose of meaningless tranquilizer. What the heck does impartiality have to do with the nature of the media used? Is digital bias significantly different from the analog one?

But all the points above pale into insignificance compared with the main question: why this lighthouse of impartiality (according to Ms. Boaden) fights so fiercely (and expensively) against the publication of the report? Isn’t the free uninhibited flow of information one of the principles of free and impartial press? For some obscure reason Ms. Boaden does not mention this confusing fact.

All in all - poor show, Ms. Boaden.

Cross-posted on SimplyJews

So we get to the specialist’s office very early this morning, because I was up early this morning, what with having gone to bed early last night, what with being exhausted from a week and a half of sleep debt, and also because I figured it was better to sit around the vet’s office waiting and worrying than to stay home waiting and worrying and on top of that, wondering if I was going to be late. I brought Gracie’s series of X-Rays, and my vet had faxed over her charts.

The specialist’s office looks like nothing less than a fancy clinic for wealthy people who would never deign to use medical insurance to pay their bills. It did not look like a vet’s office, well, except for all of the cat and dog paintings (really tacky ones) all over, and the coverings on the benches. Apparently there are seven vets in the morning, and a staff of three office workers is necessary. I filled out the forms, leaving blank, as always, the space for my SSN (and eff them for even thinking of asking it, and in fact, eff the people who seem to think an SSN belongs on any kind of veterinary patient information to begin with), signed in, waited in the office while various and sundry dogs went in and out, then it was our turn. We were shown to a room and left. I opened the door to Gracie’s carrier. She stuck her head out, said, “Shit! It’s another vet’s office!” and immediately turned around and went to the far end of the carrier, which made me laugh for a good two minutes. Maybe you had to be there, but I found it hilarious.

The vet came in and Gracie refused to come out. We tried upending the carrier. She used her claws and spread her back legs. We wound up having to take it apart, which made me remember that it came in two pieces. I’d forgotten it even did that. The vet palpated this and listened to that, checked her gums and her mouth, declared her not to be dehydrated at all, and we discussed the case. Once again the fact that my vet didn’t do the biopsy came into play. I’m beginning to understand that it was a major screw-up, and yet, I have no desire whatsoever to let them go back into my Sweetness with a knife, because she’s getting better. I asked how much an endoscopy would cost (which would also get a biopsy), and she told me they’d charge about $1400. That’s about $1000 more than most places would charge for one. Pass.

“I can’t afford you,” I told her. “At all.” (Not true, I could afford the one-time visit fee, which is all they’re getting from me. And thanks again, those of you who have hit the tipjars. Very, VERY helpful.)

She talked about the vario