The “Red-Dead” Canal: Israeli-Arab Efforts to Restore the Dead Sea

See the CRS Report for Congress.

The Pope’s Visit Stateside

The pope held an unannounced meeting with several victims of abuse by priests in the Boston area. The pope himself had requested the meeting, said the official, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, which took place at the papal nuncio’s residence. The pope prayed and spoke personally to the handful of victims who attended, in a meeting that lasted about 25 minutes. Some wept, Father Lombardi said.

Best Fruit Ever??

The ‘Miracle Fruit” is a berry that rewires the way the palate perceives sour flavors for an hour or so, rendering lemons as sweet as candy. Who wants in??

40 Million Acres of Rain Forest for the Greenest Bidder

Guyana’s President Bharrat Jagdeo is trying to get the world’s rich nations to help save Guyana’s huge rain forest from chainsaws and prevent the release of billions of tons of carbon dioxide.

Friedman: Obama on the Nile

While Obama, who was raised a Christian, is constantly assuring Americans that he is not a Muslim, Egyptians are amazed, excited and agog that America might elect a black man whose father’s family was of Muslim heritage. They don’t really understand Obama’s family tree, but what they do know is that if America — despite being attacked by Muslim militants on 9/11 — were to elect as its president some guy with the middle name “Hussein,” it would mark a sea change in America-Muslim world relations.

Holocaust survivor finally issued warrant for sending Polish war hero Emil Fieldorf to his death

A tale of two Polish women: One, who is Jewish, escaped death by jumping from a train destined for Treblinka, where the rest of her family perished. The other, a Christian, risked death daily by nursing wounded soldiers from the Polish resistance and hiding them from the Germans.

There the similarities end. For these two women have spent the past two decades locked in deadly combat: one hoping that the other will be extradited from England and forced to face the Polish courts for what she believes was one of the most heinous and dishonourable crimes of the communist regime that ruled Poland after the war.

Neo-Nazis at Yad Vashem

Former neo-Nazis from Sweden visit Holocaust Memorial in Jerusalem.

Baghdad Jews Have Become a Fearful Few

The community of Jews in Baghdad is now all but vanished in a land where their heritage recedes back to Abraham of Ur, to Jonah’s prophesying to Nineveh, and to Nebuchadnezzar’s sending Jews into exile here more than 2,500 years ago.

Just over half a century ago, Iraq’s Jews numbered more than 130,000. But now, in the city that was once the community’s heart, they cannot muster even a minyan, the 10 Jewish men required to perform some of the most important rituals of their faith. They are scared even to publicize their exact number, which was recently estimated at seven by the Jewish Agency for Israel, and at eight by one Christian cleric. That is not enough to read the Torah in public, if there were anywhere in public they would dare to read it, and too few to recite a proper Kaddish for the dead.

What happenend to Raoul Wallenberg? Scholars Run Down More Clues to a Holocaust Mystery

The Russians say Wallenberg died in prison in 1947, but never produced a proper death certificate or his remains…But independent research suggests he may have lived many years — perhaps until the late 1980s. If true, he likely was held in isolation, stripped of his identity, known only by a number or a false name and moving like a phantom among Soviet prisons, labor camps and psychiatric institutions.

For Blacks in France, Obama’s Rise Is Reason to Rejoice, and to Hope

A new black consciousness is emerging in France, lately hastened by, of all things, the presumptive Democratic nominee for president of the United States. An article in Le Monde a few days ago described how Mr. Obama is “stirring up high hopes” among blacks here. Even seeing the word “noir” (“black”) in a French newspaper was an occasion for surprise until recently.