Daily Archives: December 2, 2013

Netanyahu Gives Pope Book by Father on Inquisition

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Նաթանյահու, պապ,ինկվիզիցիա

 

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has given Pope Francis a book about the Inquisition in Spain that was written by his late father.

Netanyahu presented a Spanish translation of the 1995 book, “The Origins of the Inquisition,” to Francis during their 25-minute private audience Monday.

Netanyahu’s father, Ben-Zion Netanyahu, was an Israeli historian who died last year. A Zionist activist who opposed partitioning Palestine between Arabs and Jews, he was best known in academic circles for his research into the Catholic Church’s medieval inquisition against the Jews of Spain.

“To his Holiness Pope Franciscus, a great shepherd of our common heritage,” the Israeli leader wrote on the inside front page of the book.

Later Monday, Netanyahu met with Italian Premier Enrico Letta.

 

Falling stars! Aerial photographs show the moment 65 women jumped out of planes from 18,000 feet to join in formation and break vertical skydiving record

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Ուղղահայաց սքայդայվինգի ռեկորդ

 

Sixty-three women from around the world linked hands as they plunged head first toward the Arizona desert on Saturday, shattering the female vertical formation skydiving record, the U.S. Parachute Association said.

The skydivers leaped from three aircraft at 18,000 feet near Eloy, about 65 miles southeast of Phoenix, said Nancy Koreen, the association’s director of sport promotion.

The women were from countries that included the United States, the UK, Canada, Australia, Mexico, France, Norway, Sweden and Germany.

The record came on the twelfth attempt.

It shattered the all-women head-first record set by 41 women in 2010, Koreen said.

‘Everyone has to perform together, which is what makes the record so challenging,’ Koreen, who took part in the successful attempt, told Reuters.

 

Ուղղահայաց սքայդայվինգի ռեկորդ

Judges of the Swiss-based Federation Aeronautique Internationale verified the record attempt at the site, she said.

Vertical skydiving is regarded as more difficult than freefall, belly-to-earth skydiving.

Skydivers hurtle toward the earth at higher speeds – some times as fast as 170mph – in a position that makes control more of a challenge.

 

THE SECRETARY-GENERAL — MESSAGE ON The International Day

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պանգի մունof Persons with Disabilities

“Break Barriers, Open Doors: For An Inclusive Society For All”

3 December 2013

 

More than 1 billion of us live with disabilities.  We must remove all barriers that affect the inclusion and participation of persons with disabilities in society, including through changing attitudes that fuel stigma and institutionalize discrimination.

 

In September, during the High-Level Meeting of the General Assembly on Disability and Development, United Nations Member States discussed the many ways that exclusion not only impacts the lives of persons with disabilities, but affects the development of communities and society as a whole.  They re-committed to taking national and international action to support disability-inclusive development.  The UN system will continue to support those efforts. We need to work harder to ensure that infrastructure and services support inclusive, equitable and sustainable development for all.

 

This includes guaranteeing meaningful participation in processes that affect the rights and interests of persons with disabilities by providing an enabling environment.  To that end, we are inaugurating a UN Accessibility Centre at the UN headquarters.  I call on the rest of the UN system and our partners to follow this lead.

 

On this International Day of Persons with Disabilities, I call on Governments, members of the UN system, businesses and civil society to break barriers and open doors of opportunity for all persons with disability.  Together, let us build an inclusive society for all.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Israeli Troops Return Fire After Attack From Syria

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The Israeli military says its troops have come under attack from Syria and have fired back in retaliation.

The military says a mortar round landed on the Israeli side of the frontier Monday and then gunfire targeted an Israeli patrol. There were no injuries on the Israeli side. The troops returned fire toward their attackers in Syria.

Gunfire and mortar rounds from Syria have periodically hit inside the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights. Israel believes most of the fire is errant spillover from the Syrian civil war. But in some cases, it has accused forces in Syria of intentionally firing into the Golan.

Israel has generally kept its distance from the civil war, saying it has no interest getting dragged into a conflict where nearly all factions involved are hostile to Israel.

 

China launches first moon mission

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China launched its first lunar probe early Monday, which, if all goes well, will make it only the third nation — after the United States and the Soviet Union — to soft-land on the moon.

The Chang’e-3 blasted off from a Long March 3B rocket in Sichuan province located in southwest China and is expected to land on the moon’s surface in mid-December.

The new space effort comes just over a decade after the country first sent an astronaut into space.

Unlike the soft-landing of the U.S. and the Soviet Union’s unmanned spacecraft, Chang’e-3 will be able to survey the landscape first and determine the safest spot.

Researchers say an impact crater named Sinus Iridum, or Bay of Rainbows, is its likely destination. In 2010, China’s previous lunar mission captured images of the crater while scouting potential landing sites for the 2013 probe.

On landing, the spacecraft will release Jade Rabbit (called Yutu in Chinese) — a six-wheeled lunar rover equipped with four cameras and two mechanical legs that can dig up soil samples, a designer for the rover told Xinhua last month. The slow-moving rover will patrol the moon’s surface for at least three months, according to Xinhua.