Peace is still far away from Israel

Netanyahu given chance to rule | The Australian

Kadima won the most number of seats of any party in last week's election - 28 compared to Likud's 27 - but the Right bloc of parties, led by Likud, won more seats than the Centre-Left bloc, led by Kadima.

This left Mr Peres with the job of choosing which leader was most likely to form a stable coalition government.

But all leaders - including Mr Netanyahu and Mr Lieberman - have publicly said they want a broad coalition that includes Kadima. The two men have sufficient experience in Israeli politics to know that unless a coalition government is broad-based, it tends to be short-lived.

Ms Livni's political strategy appears to be to position herself in opposition to be ready to try to increase her support in any future election rather than be subject to the fortunes of a government dominated by Mr Netanyahu and influenced by Mr Lieberman.

Ms Livni and Mr Netanyahu have strongly different views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Ms Livni is more aligned to the position of the Obama administration, which wants to seek a two-state solution, while Mr Netanyahu is publicly very sceptical of any such solution.

Yesterday, Mr Peres met faction leaders from 10 parties that won seats last week. But given that two of the Centre-Left's largest parties - Kadima and Labour - have opted to go into opposition, it was inevitable Mr Netanyahu would be given the task.

Mr Lieberman yesterday met Mr Peres and told him he recommended Mr Netanyahu as leader. But he added: "We recommend Benjamin Netanyahu only in the framework of a broad government. We want a government of the three biggest parties, Likud, Kadima and Yisrael Beiteinu."

Outgoing Defence Minister Ehud Barak, leader of the Labour Party, added to the general sense of uncertainty when he told a meeting of Labour members of the Knesset: "The picture is complicated and disturbing when Yisrael Beiteinu is the one to recommend who Israel's next prime minister will be. We are left with only one option, and that is to decide not to recommend anyone for the premiership."

Meanwhile, US senator John Kerry, chair of the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, became the first senior US politician to visit Gaza since the 22-day war with Israel. He joined two other US congressmen, Keith Ellison of Minnesota and Brian Baird of Washington.

During talks with relief officials at the main UN compound in Gaza City, Senator Kerry was handed a letter from Hamas, addressed to President Barack Obama.

Senator Kerry did not meet any Hamas representatives and stressed that his trip to the impoverished territory, which no US official had visited for years, did not indicate a shift of policy towards Hamas, which is listed by the US as a terrorist organisation.

carpe diem

Enjoy the present! How so? anyway, I read a blog discussing about time and being. These two topics are heady to discuss. He said that time is not moving..anyway his thoughts brooded over me this afternoon...um...

Badvista campaign

What's wrong with Microsoft Windows Vista? — BadVista

Obama cartoon

BBC NEWS | Americas | NY Post sorry for 'Obama' cartoon

The New York Post newspaper has apologised to readers offended by a cartoon some people say was a racist depiction of President Barack Obama.

Cartoonist Sean Delonas drew police having shot dead a chimp, saying "they'll have to find someone else to write the stimulus bill".

The paper said it had been meant to "mock an ineptly written" bill.

Commentators had denounced the cartoon, and protesters picketed the newspaper's headquarters.

"To those who were offended by the image, we apologise," the paper said in an editorial.

However, the paper went on to accuse "some in the media and in public life who have had differences with the Post in the past" of using the row over the cartoon "as an opportunity for payback".

Facebook Mishaps

Facebook users force 'copyright' plan U-turn | Australian IT

FACEBOOK has withdrawn controversial changes to its terms of service after receiving a storm of complaints from users of the social networking website.
Tens of thousands of posters protested after an unannounced change seemed to grant Facebook the right to control and use the information posted by account holders on the site for ever, even if they had cancelled their accounts.

Users feared that the new terms gave Facebook the right in perpetuity to use their photos, messages and other content for marketing or to sell to advertisers.

Facebook announced last night that it was reverting immediately to the old terms of service, which included the crucial sentence: "You may remove your user content from the site at any time. If you choose to remove your user content, the license granted above will automatically expire, however you acknowledge that the company may retain archived copies of your user content."

Mark Zuckerberg, co-founder and CEO of Facebook , wrote on a blog: "A couple of weeks ago, we revised our terms of use, hoping to clarify some parts for our users. Over the past couple of days, we received a lot of questions and comments about the changes and what they mean for people and their information. Based on this feedback, we have decided to return to our previous terms of use while we resolve the issues that people have raised."

He added: "We think that a lot of the language in our terms is overly formal and protective."

The terms of use were updated on February 4 but the move was not noticed until a consumer rights blog pointed it out last Sunday.

Objections quickly mounted as it was noted that no other mainstream social network took such a hard line with their terms of use. There are more than 175 million regular users of Facebook.

Mr Zuckerberg added on the blog: "In reality, we wouldn't share your information in a way you wouldn't want. The trust you place in us as a safe place to share information is the most important part of what makes Facebook work. Our goal is to build great products and to communicate clearly to help people share more information in this trusted environment."