Harry's Place

I drove to the YMCA in Arlington, (fake) Virginia, this afternoon for my regular workout, only to be met by a sign on the door:
Due to power issues, the building is closed
Interesting choice of language. I wonder if there was an attempted coup or something by members of the staff?
Disappointing as it was, that should [...]

Anyone familiar with the UK telecom company FreedomCall?
Ynetnews.com reports the firm has terminated its cooperation with Israel’s MobileMax due to the IDF operation in Gaza.
“We received an email from the British company informing us that it is severing all ties with us and any other Israeli company following Israel’s strike in Gaza,” said CEO Raanan [...]

You’ll remember the case of Hicham Yezza, an Algerian student and ultimately employee of the University of Nottingham, who has lived in this country for 13 years.
Earlier this year Hich was arrested. The reason for his arrest, it transpired, was that he had received by email a heavily redacted Al Qaeda training manual, that another student [...]

You may remember that the fugitive Hamas commander, Mohammed Sawalha, attempted to sue us a few months back. He hired one of the dodgiest law firms around to do the deed: Dean and Dean.
Well, Dean and Dean has had its own problems:
The Solicitors Regulation Authority closed Dean and Dean after suspending founder and leading lawyer Shahrokh [...]

This is a guest post by Michelle Sieff of Z Word
Two prominent Israeli writers have published thought-provoking articles on the unfolding conflict in Gaza: the journalist Yossi Klein Halevi in The New Republic and historian Benny Morris in the New York Times.
Morris’ article is stirring and powerful. He describes a portentous shift in the collective [...]

In Iraq (via DSTFW).
On the two-year anniversary of Saddam’s death by hanging, Iraq is preparing to open a new museum that will allow Iraqis to see up close such macabre mementos of mass executions, torture, and other atrocities committed in Saddam’s decades-long rule.
Iraq’s High Tribunal, set up after the U.S.-led invasion to try major crimes [...]

AFP reports:
The Iranian press watchdog shut down leading reformist newspaper Kargozaran on Wednesday over publication of a piece criticising Palestinian militants, the official IRNA news agency reported.
“Kargozaran has been banned over a media offence and the case has been referred to the court,” Mohammad Parvizi, who is in charge of domestic media at the culture [...]

If there’s a bit of hope for the future in all that’s happened in Israel and Gaza in recent days, perhaps it comes from two clear-eyed Gazan children.
The New York Times reports from Gaza City:
The Nakhala family, which lives next to [Hamas government] compound, was inspecting the damage on Tuesday morning and recounting the utter [...]

Hamas apologist William Sieghart, who is behind the “think tank” Forward Thinking, is writing in The Times today giving the Islamist group’s PR image a bit of a shine. We have it all wrong. Hamas are just a bunch of well educated public servants.
Sieghart, who last year brought Hamas spokesman Ghazi Hamad to the Hay [...]

There is a hadith, popular among jihadis, that goes as follows:
When your brothers were struck at the Battle of Uhuh, Allah placed their spirits in the insides of green birds, who go to the rivers of paradise, eat from its produce, and then alight upon candles of gold in the shadow of the Throne. When [...]