The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
Wednesday, January 31,2007 - 3A
The Michigan Daily - michigandailycom Wednesday, January 31, 2007 - 3A
NEWS BRIEFS
WASHINGTON
Reporter testified
against Libby in
CIA-leak trial
Reporter Judith Miller testified
yesterday that former vice presi-
dential aide L Lewis "Scooter"
Libby identified a CIA operative to
her on two occasions on dates ear-
lier than he has told investigators
he first heard the information from
another reporter.
Miller, the former New York
Times reporter who spent 85 days
in jail trying to avoid revealing
these conversations, said Libby
identified the wife of a prominent
Iraq war critic as a CIA employee
in face-to-face meetings on June 23
and July 8, 2003.
Libby, then Vice President Dick
Cheney's chief of staff, told the FBI
and agrand jury that he thought he
was hearing Valerie Plame's CIA
job for the first time from NBC's
Tim Russert on July 10, 2003.
Earlier Tuesday, the jury saw
notes Libby took on or about June
12 that indicated Cheney himself
told Libby then that the war critic's
wife worked at the CIA.
The discrepancy over when
Libby learned about Plame is a
major element in the charges on
which he is being tried. He is not
accused of leaking her name but
rather of perjury and obstruc-
tion of the investigation into how
her name leaked. Libby now says
his memory failed him when he
spoke with Russert and other
reporters.
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip
Palestinian
factions agree to
truce after days of
bloodshed
Gaza's warring factions began to
hold their fire yesterday as a truce
took effect across the volatile terri-
tory and brought hopes for an end
to the infighting that has left 36
people dead in five days.
But the killing of a Hamas mili-
tant by rival Palestinians - com-
bined with an Israeli airstrike on a
smuggling tunnel following a sui-
cide bombing - underscored the
fragility of any lull in Gaza's blood-
shed.
Palestinian Prime Minister
Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas called
for a total halt to the violence.
Previous truces between Hamas
and Fatah militants in Gaza have
quickly collapsed into new fighting,
and it appeared unlikely the two
sides would comply with all the
terms of the current agreement,
such as handing over all those
involved in killings and abduc-
tions.
BAG HDA D
Scores dead after
attacks on Shiite
high holy day
Bombers struck Shiite worship-
pers in two cities yesterday and
gunmen ambushed a busload of
pilgrims in a series of attacks that
killed at least 58 people as more
than 2 million Shiites jammed
major shrines for ceremonies
marking Ashoura, the holiest day
of the Shiite calendar.
The bloodshed took place despite
heightened security following a
battle with messianic Shiites who
authorities said planned a large
assault on Ashoura ceremonies.
With security so intense at the
main venues, extremists chose tar-
gets in smaller cities where safety
measures were less stringent.
BRUSSELS
E.U. considering
Europe-wide ban
on public smoking
The European Union was
expected to launch a debate yes-
terday that could lead to a EU-wide
ban on smoking in public places.
EU Health Commission Markos
Kyprianou will unveil a discussion
paper favorable to calls for a ban on
smoking in work places including
restaurants and bars. After a debate
involving national authorities,
industry and consumer groups, the
EU's executive is expected to pro-
pose EU-wide legislation.
All 27 EU nations have rules
limiting smoking in public places,
but they vary widely from country
to country.
- Compiled from
Daily wire reports
14
The number of U.S. dollars it
costs for a six-hour tour across a
mock U.S.-Mexican border in one
Mexican town. Ninety percent of
the town's population is estimated
to have illegally crossed the real
border, Harpers reported.
An American road trip
through Arab eyes
Department of Public Safety officers remove a heckler during last night's speech by
three men billed as ex-terrorists in Rackham auditorium.
YAF
From page 1A
Once the auditorium reached
capacity, YAF Vice President Ryan
Fantuzzi took the microphone.
"I ask those who would like to
disrupt this event to leave as soon
as possible," he said. "There are
many who support peace and free-
dom who would like your seat."
But the protesters didn't get up.
The first speaker was Kamal
Saleem, who said he was recruit-
ed by the Palestine Liberation
Organization when he was 7 and
trained with live weapons to fight
Israelis.
A website for the three speakers
says Saleem converted to Chris-
tianity after being treated by a
Christian doctor.
"We should raise our flag, our
American flag, and say, Allah bless
America," Saleem said. "Because
- after all - if we don't like her,
we should leave her."
As Saleem finished this remark,
much of the crowd roared with
applause while others were silent
or voiced their disapproval.
"If we don't like her we should
change her," a woman in the back
of the auditorium yelled.
After 15 minutes of Saleem's
speech, the heckling intensified to
the point where Saleem stopped
speaking and asked the woman to
"shut up."
"Why aren't the moderate Mus-
lims protesting about the extrem-
ists of their faith?" he asked the
crowd again prompting loud
applause.
After 30 minutes, the protesters
in yellow stood up and walked out.
There was some jeering from the
remaining audience, but the exit
went off with little incident.
Roughly a quarter of the seats in
the auditorium emptied during the
walkout.
After an hour, Fantuzzi took
to the stage and issued a warning
HOPWOOD
From page 1A
from 1991to1995.
The underclassmen contest is
open to freshmen and sophomores
enrolled in writing classes at the
University. Nicholas Delbanco, an
English professor and member of
the Hopwood Committee, intro-
duced the ceremony to the students,
family members and friends in the
audience and exlained the judging
process that decides the awards.
A small panel of judges ranks
the submitted works in each cat-
egory. The score for high-ranking
works determines the size of the
award given. In this year's contest,
the awards ranged from $100 to
$1,500.
Many of the winners hail from
Michigan, but others came from
Missouri, New York and India.
Among the many English majors
were History of Art and Music
majors, as well. Most were present
to receive their award and check,
but several were absent, either
because they were studying abroad
- in Thailand and Italy, for exam-
ple - or simply didn't come.
In his introduction of Pastan,
Delbanco said her works are charac-
terized by their "succinctness - the
great claims are couched modestly,
the rhythms are unforced."
Pastan's readings were well-
received by an attentive audience.
Her poem "Ethics" drew a lot of
laughter. Pastan interrupted herself
in the middle of one of her poems:
'As if revision were the purest form
of love' - and as you all know by
now, it is."
reshmen Jessica Vosgerchian of
Westland, Mi., and Jennifer Leija of
St. Clair Shores, Mich., were both
awarded $1,250dollars inthe under-
classman nonfiction category.
In the underclassman fiction
category, LSA sophomore Rebecca
Shafter of Evanston, Ill., and RC
sophomore Clare Smith Marash of
New York City, both won $1,500
dollars.
LSA sophomore Keilor Kastella
from Gregory, Mich., won the top
$1,500 dollar award in the under-
classman poetry contest.
to the same woman who had con-
tinually heckled the speaker. She
ignored the warning, and Depart-
ment of Public Safety officers
escorted her from the building.
Sirene Abou-Chakra, one of
the organizers of the protest, con-
demned the woman's behavior.
Walid Shoebat, the last speaker,
drew cheers from the remaining
members of the audience with his
final remark.
"We will have peace when we
love our children more than we
love peace," he said.
After the event, about 30 people
lined up to meet the three men.
While the speakers at the root
of the controversy were answer-
ing questions, the protesters were
holding a meeting of their own.
The swarm of protesters, most-
ly students, made their way to the
Michigan League Ballroom to dis-
cuss the protest and the goals of
the Arab and Muslim community.
"The main purpose of the pro-
test is to really call out the fact
that this program is generaliz-
ing an entire group of people and
saying the actions of a few rep-
resent everyone," Abou-Chakra
said in an interview before the
event.
Muslim Student Association
Vice President Abdul-Rahman El
Sayed, who spoke at the protester's
counter event, said he was elated
at the success of the walkout.
"We've done something good
today, and we need to keep that
going in the future," he said.
Some in the audience, however,
found the walkout disruptive and
ineffective.
"The protesters deprived them-
selves of a voice," said LSA junior
Jasper Kigar. "They should not
have walked out."
The event's purpose was to edu-
cate the campus community about
the dangers of Muslim extremism,
not promote intolerance, Boyd
said in an interview before the
speeches.
Foundations try
reality TV diplomacy
in Middle East
By JACQUES STEINBERG
The New York Times
"On the Road in America"
looks, on first viewing, like the
sort of television show that Al-
Jazeera and MTV might produce
if they could be coaxed together in
front of an editing terminal. A 12-
part reality series, currently being
broadcast throughout the Middle
East, "On the Road" features a
caravan of young, good-looking
Arabs crisscrossing America on a
mission to educate themselves and
the people they encounter along
the way.
In reality, its list of production
credits reads more like the ros-
ter of the Iraq Study Group that
reported its findings to President
Bush in December. The co-chair-
men of that bipartisan effort
- James A. Baker III and Lee H.
Hamilton - are on the board of
advisers of Layalina Productions,
the nonprofit (and nonpartisan)
group that made "On the Road in
America" and licensed it to Middle
East Broadcasting Center (MBC),
an Arab satellite TV network.
(MBC is the parent company of Al-
Arabiya, a news channel that is a
rival of Al-Jazeera.)
Also on the advisory panel of
Layalina are a former president,
George H.W. Bush (listed as hon-
orarychairman ofwhatis officially
its board of counselors), and nearly
a dozen prominent members of
his and other administrations,
both Republican and Democratic,
including Henry A. Kissinger,
Brent Scowcroft, Zbigniew Brzez-
inski, Samuel R. Berger and Law-
rence S. Eagleburger.
This unlikely coalition of unpaid
consultants - whose principal role
was to raise money and to knock on
diplomatic doors - has helped cre-
ate a series primarily intended to
reintroduce America to the Arab
world through the eyes of three
students (from Egypt, Saudi Ara-
bia and Lebanon) and a Palestinian
woman who serves both as a pro-
duction assistant and translator.
(The show can currently be seen
only in the Middle East, though its
producers are seeking an Ameri-
can distributor)
Implicit in the series' mission,
if not spoken aloud, is a desire to
correct whatever damage has been
done to America's standing in the
Middle East by the Iraq war and
the nearly four-year American
military presence in that country.
But the production, financed most-
ly through foundations and with-
out government help, also seeks
to counter the image of America
often conveyed to the Arab world
via Hollywood: that of an arrogant,
self-absorbed, bellicose nation.
Marc C. Ginsberg, the president
of Layalina and an ambassador
to Morocco during the Clinton
administration, said he wanted "On
the Road" to be a "warts and all"
portrayal of both sides of the divide
between the West and the Middle
East, to say nothing of the factions
within the Middle East itself.
In the first episode - set in
Washington and broadcast on
MBC on Jan. 18 - Ali Amr, 22, an
Egyptian accounting student, dis-
cusses his initial impressions of
the American people. "You will
tell me they are not responsible
for Bush's policies," he says, "and I
will tell you that they are the ones
who elected Bush, correct or not?"
Ginsberg said he had sent a copy
of the highlight reel to an aide to
Karen Hughes, a close adviser to
George W. Bush currently serv-
ing as an undersecretary of state.
"They want us to come over and
do a briefing at the State Depart-
ment," Ginsberg said.
Far more bracing than the par-
ticipants' occasional comments
about the current president,
though, is the frank discussion
throughout the series' first two
episodes - the second takes the
participants from Washington to
New York City - about the long-
frayed relations between Israel
and many of its Arab neighbors.
"Israelis, I hate Israelis," Lara
Abou Saifan, the series' produc-
tion assistant, a Palestinian from
Lebanon, says in Arabic after a
radio news report of Israeli bomb-
ing of her country last summer.
But this being an American-made
series Abou Saifan quickly (within
the span of that 24-minute epi-
sode) comes to temper her views,
mainly through a back-and-fortb
with a cameraman, Guy Livneh,
who turns out to be Israeli.
"You know, the Arab world
thinks that Israel wants to con-
quer the Middle East," he says
inside the production van. "That's
absurd, you know."
Later Abou Saifan tells Livneh:
"I never, never, never, never imag-
ined that I'd have this conversa-
tion with someone like you."
Layalina was founded by Rich-
ard Fairbanks, a Mideast peace
negotiator during the Reagan
administration, in the aftermath
of the 9/11 terrorism attacks, with
the hope of using mass media to
help soothe the rage on all sides.
Fairbanks' foundation is also
among the chief benefactors of "On
the Road in America." At about
$1.8 million, the series' budget is
relatively cheap by Hollywood
standards, considering that the
production hopscotched across
America last summer, with stops
in the Mississippi Delta for a les-
son on poverty, Montana (hiking
with cowgirls), as well as Wash-
ington (singing with a gospel choir
and campaigning for mayoral can-
didates) and New York (visiting
a bond trader and ground zero).
In the final episodes Americans
accompany the four back to the
Middle East.
The producers are also moving
ahead on several other projects
aimed at an Arab audience. One
is a situation comedy - the work-
ing title is "How's Your Arabic?"
- about an Arab-American trying
to teach Arabic to immigrants and
FBI agents at an American uni-
versity. Another project is aone-
hour, weekly news magazine that
MBC is considering. Its working
title is "Al Saat," which roughly
translates to "One Hour," a name
that is hardly surprising, consider-
ing Hewitt's role as a consultant.
MBC executives say it is too early
to know how much of the prime-
time audience of its main channel,
MBC 1- typically about 21 million
viewers, including in Saudi Arabia,
Egypt and Iraq - has tuned in for
the first two episodes of "On the
Road."
UAAO
From page 1A
IASA and SAAN hostage and
rejecting dialogue, is a practice
not appropriate for inter-student
group relations."
Yahkind said that when the
society offered to hold a dialogue
with UAAO last November, UAAO
did not respond.
On Jan. 9, UAAO formally
declined the offer in ane-mail sent
to the society by a member of the
UAAO governing board.
The e-mail said that discus-
sion would not be "fruitful"
because "certain organization-
al decisions regarding SAAN,
IASA, and (the) society" had
already been made.
Nafisah Ula, co-chair of UAAO,
said UAAO does not have a prob-
lem with IASA and SAAN, just the
members who are involved in the
honor society.
Ula said the organizations can
re-apply for membership when-
ever they want.
"But if the same circumstances
apply, it would be foolish for
them to re-apply today," she said.
Membership in the society has
been a problem for at least one
SAAN member in the past.
After then-SAAN co-chair Neal
Pancholi's membership in the soci-
ety became public in April 2005,
the group forced him to resign his
post.
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