Click here to view this media Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) issued a stern warning Sunday that no Republican senators would vote to raise the debt ceiling if Democrats don’t take what he called a “credible effort” to deal with the country’s debt. “I don’t intend to support raising the debt ceiling and I don’t believe any Senate Republicans do, unless we do something important related to spending and debt,” he told Fox News’ Chris Wallace. “I think the administration understands that, that we’re just not going to bring up the debt ceiling and everybody say all right, he added. “It’s going to have to carry something with it that the markets, foreign countries, the American people believe is a credible effort to begin to get a handle on spending and debt.” Not every Republican leader has been willing to hold the debt limit hostage. “I think raising the debt limit is the responsible thing to do for our country, the responsible thing for our economy,” House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) told The Wall Street Journal earlier this month. “If we were to fail to increase the debt limit, we would send our economy into a tailspin.” When asked about Boehner’s remarks, McConnell said he was only speaking for Republican senators. “My prediction is not a single one of the 47 Republicans will vote to raise the debt ceiling unless it includes with it some credible effort to do something about our debt. Now, the House is another matter. I’m just predicting that the Senate Republican votes. I don’t believe Senate Republicans are going to vote to raise the debt ceiling,” he said.
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One of two brothers convicted of killing Damilola Taylor has been returned to prison after breaching licence conditions One of two brothers convicted of killing Damilola Taylor has been returned to prison after breaching licence conditions that were applied to him after he was released last year. Ricky Preddie, who was jailed at the same time as his brother Danny in 2006 for the manslaughter of 10-year-old Damilola, was released in September after serving two thirds of his eight-year sentence. He was arrested on Friday evening after he failed to conform to a curfew on a number of occasions. Damilola, who had moved to Britain from Nigeria a few months before his death, was stabbed with a broken bottle in November 2000 as he walked to his family’s home in Peckham, south London, and was found bleeding from a leg wound in a stairwell on a housing estate. The Preddies, south London gang members who were 12 and 13 at the time of the manslaughter, were convicted of his killing after two police inquiries and three trials which cost an estimated £16m. Police forces around the UK initiated reviews of scores of murders after serious failures at the government-run forensic science laboratory were exposed. A Ministry of Justice spokesman declined to confirm Preddie’s recall but said: “All offenders subject to probation supervision on release from prison have to adhere to a set of strict conditions.” “They are subject to recall to custody if they breach their conditions or their behaviour indicates that it is no longer safe for them or for the public if they remain in the community.” At the time of Preddie’s release, Gary Trowsdale, chief executive of the Damilola Taylor Trust, said the charity had urged the authorities to ensure he received the help he needed. Mr Trowsdale said: “We have very strongly recommended to the authorities that the boy is mentored. “We hope the Probation Service will do its job and he is properly mentored.” Danny Preddie remains in prison serving a sentence for another offence and is due to be released this year. Damilola Taylor Ben Quinn guardian.co.uk
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National Theatre’s revival of 1939 drama is night’s biggest success, alongside Legally Blonde and Stephen Sondheim A Terence Rattigan play that closed early and was largely neglected for 70 years until it was revived at the National Theatre has emerged as the biggest winner at the 2011 Olivier theatre awards. After the Dance, which portrays a group of ageing bright young things still drinking and partying as the nation slides to war, won four awards including best revival. The National was the biggest winner with seven prizes overall. This is Rattigan’s centenary year and there are revivals of his plays across the country, including the wartime tearjerker Flare Path , which opened to loud audience cheers last week. The other big winners at an unashamedly showbizzy ceremony in the West End were Legally Blonde the Musical and Stephen Sondheim. After the Dance opened in June 1939 to good reviews but closed early as the nation’s mood changed and has been staged only rarely since. Its four awards included best actress for Nancy Carroll, whose portrayal of the socialite Joan Scott-Fowler was described as “magnificent” by the Guardian and “almost unbearably moving” by the Telegraph. Adrian Scarborough won best actor in a supporting role for his performance as a drunken hanger-on and Hildegard Bechtler won for best costume design. The National won three awards for its production of The White Guard including best director for Howard Davies, best lighting for Neil Austin and best set design for Bunny Christie. One of the strongest categories was best actor, with Derek Jacobi nominated for King Lear and Rory Kinnear for Hamlet. The winner – from a shortlist that also included Mark Rylance and David Suchet – was Roger Allam as Falstaff in Henry IV Parts 1 and 2 at Shakespeare’s Globe. Sheridan Smith’s portrayal of the pink-obsessed Elle in Legally Blonde won her best actress in a musical. Jill Halfpenny, who played hairdresser Paulette, won best supporting performer in a musical while the production itself won best new musical. It was also a good night for Stephen Sondheim, who turned 80 last year. He was presented with the equivalent of a lifetime achievement award, while productions of his work also took prizes. Into The Woods, at the Open Air Theatre in Regent’s Park, was named best musical revival and David Thaxton won best actor in a musical for Passion at the Donmar Warehouse. As widely tipped, Bruce Norris’s Clybourne Park, which opened at the Royal Court before transferring to the West End, won best new play. The theatre won three prizes in total with Michelle Terry named best supporting actress in a play for Tribes and Leon Baugh taking the theatre choreography award for Sucker Punch. Organisers of this year’s ceremony have tried to give it more pizzazz. It was held in the Theatre Royal Drury Lane, rather than a hotel ballroom, with performances by entertainers including Barry Manilow. It was also broadcast live for the first time, via the BBC’s red button. The awards were decided by panels apart from an audience prize voted by Radio 2 listeners which pitted long-running musicals against each other. We Will Rock You emerged as the winner from a list that included Jersey Boys, Les Miserables and Billy Elliot the Musical. The Railway Children, which was performed at Waterloo station, won best entertainment from a shortlist that also included Beauty and the Beast, Ghost Stories and Potted Panto. There had been annoyance in the dance community that the shortlist for outstanding achievement contained no actual dance performances and the winner last night was the artist Antony Gormley, for his set designs for Babel (Words) at Sadler’s Wells, a show that also won best new dance production. The German baritone Christian Gerhaher won an outstanding achievement award for his performance in Tannhäuser at the Royal Opera House, while OperaUpClose’s La Bohème at the Soho Theatre sprang a surprise by winning best new opera production. The Lyric Hammersmith’s revival of Sarah Kane’s Blasted won outstanding achievement in an affiliate theatre, while the Donmar’s King Lear won for sound design. Julian Bird, the chief executive of the Society of London Theatre, said it had been a good year. “The strength can be seen throughout the nominations across both drama and musicals. There were some very hard choices for the panels to make.” Olivier awards Awards and prizes Theatre Musicals Terence Rattigan Stephen Sondheim London Mark Brown guardian.co.uk
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Guardian/ICM survey in five EU countries shows people see a bleak economic future and don’t think their leaders will deliver Europe’s hope of a better future is faltering, as the financial crisis and spending cuts bite, according to a Guardian/ICM poll of five leading EU countries. It finds trust in government at rock bottom and widespread fear of further economic decline. Few people are convinced that the present signs of recovery can be sustained. The poll was carried out online using a representative sample of more than 5,000 people of working age in five leading EU states – Britain, France, Germany, Poland and Spain. It paints a picture of a continent confident in its liberal values and still mostly committed to EU institutions such as the euro and the free movement of people between states, but notably hostile to state spending and political leaders. Carried out at the start of a month-long Guardian series examining Europe in the wake of recession, the poll makes it clear that few Europeans believe the worst of the economic crisis is over. A majority are also against immediate cuts in government spending. The result is a crisis in European democracy. While people are divided on the need for state spending cuts and the speed with which they should take place, very few in the five states surveyed trust their politicians to deal with the problems facing their countries – or even their honesty. Only 6% of people across Europe say they have a great deal of trust in their government, 46% say they have not very much and 32% none at all. Only 9% of Europeans think their politicians – in opposition or in power – act with honesty and integrity. The lack of trust in government is greatest in Poland and France, where distrust outweighs trust by a net 82 percentage points. In France, the net negative score is 78 points and in Germany 80 points. Only Britain breaks the consensus somewhat, with a net negative score of 66 points. Even fewer Europeans think their politicians are honest. In Poland, only 3% of those questioned agree; in Spain 8%; in Germany 10%; in France 11%; in Britain 12%. Overall, the percentage of those who think politicians are not at all, or not very, honest outweighs those who disagree by a massive 89 percentage points. Political anxiety appears to be fuelled by deep economic worries. Overall, 40% of those polled think their economy will get worse over the next 12 months, against 20% who think it will improve. Only in Germany are more people optimistic than pessimistic. Economic anxiety is greatest in France, where pessimists outnumber optimists by a net difference of 46 points. In Britain, the difference is 40 points and in Poland 30 points. Spain is more optimistic, with a net difference of 18 points – which could be explained by few people in the country thinking things can get worse than they already are. There are also signs of hope: except in Poland, people on balance are more likely to think things will get “a little worse” (26% of those polled) than “a lot worse” (21%). And others (31%) think things will simply stay the same. Europe is not in economic depression. But on the other hand there is limited hope for the future expressed in the EU’s traditional economic powerhouses of Germany and France. Almost three-quarters of the French questioned think they will be worse off in a decade than they are now. In Germany – despite its recovery – over half think the same. In Britain, a majority think the next decade will either leave them poorer or, at best, no better off. Only a quarter think Britain will get richer over the next 10 years. Only in the more recent EU entrants of Spain and Poland is there significant optimism. In Poland, almost half think they will end up better off in a decade; in Spain, a majority think this. Both countries have experienced rapid growth within recent memory as a result of EU entry. The poll focused on national attitudes rather than those to the EU as a whole. But despite economic worries and the cost of bailing out Greece and Ireland, EU states already using the euro want to keep it. Overall, 68% questioned in the three euro countries – France, Spain and Germany – are in favour of retaining it. Spain (71%) is keenest, followed by France (60%). But a majority of Germans (59%) also want to keep the euro despite national concern about the Greek bailout. However, a narrow plurality of Poles (48% to 40%) oppose their country joining the single currency as is planned. ICM interviewed a random sample of 5,023 adults in five EU states aged 18–64 from its online panel between 24 February and 8 March, 2011. In order to achieve a nationally representative sample within each country, quotas were set by gender, age and region. At the data analysis stage, data were weighted to the profile of all adults aged 18-64 in each country Europe European Union Euro France Germany Poland Spain Euro European debt crisis Recession Julian Glover guardian.co.uk
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Click here to view this media As Japan races to avert multiple nuclear meltdowns, one expert warned Sunday that radiation could spread to the U.S. Joe Cirincione, president of Ploughshares Fund, told Fox News’ Chris Wallace Japan’s nuclear crisis is unprecedented. “One reactor has had half the core exposed already,” he explained. “This is the one they’re flooding with sea water in a desperate effort to prevent it from a complete meltdown. They lost control of a second reactor next to it, a partial meltdown, and there is actually a third reactor at a related site 20-kilometers away they have also lost control over. We have never had a situation like this before.” “The worst case scenario is that the fuel rods fuse together, the temperatures get so hot that they melt together in a radioactive molten mass that bursts through the containment mechmisms and is exposed to the outside. So they spew radioactivity in the ground, into the air, into the water. Some of the radioactivity could carry in the atmosphere to the West Coast of the United States.” “Really?” a surprised Wallace asked. “I mean, thousands of miles across the Pacific?” “Oh, abosolutely. Chernobyl, which happened about 25 years ago, the radioactivity spread around the entire northern hemisphere. It depends how many of these cores melt down and how successful they are on containing it once this disaster happens,” Cirincione replied. The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission deployed two experts to Japan, but are downplaying the immediate danger. Michael Sicilia, spokesman for California Department of Public Health, told AFP that there was no danger to California at the present. “California does have radioactivity monitoring systems in place for air, water and the food supply and can enhance that monitoring if a danger exists,” he said.
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Police criticised for failing to secure single conviction as group warns known cases are the tip of the iceberg At least 80 children have been trafficked to Scotland to face sexual exploitation and other forms of abuse including forced labour, benefit fraud and domestic servitude, a report published on Monday says. The findings conclude that these cases are the tip of an iceberg, with many more child victims who have been sold, stolen and transported thousands of miles remaining unidentified. The report – Scotland: a safe place for child traffickers? – criticises police for failing to secure a single conviction for trafficking, and the authorities for their poor response to young victims’ needs. In November, it emerged that a young Nigerian girl had been trafficked to Scotland, held prisoner and gang-raped. Her case was just one of several documented by the Scottish Refugee Council. Some of the children identified have been forced to work in cannabis factories and private homes and pose as dependents for benefit scams. They came from a number of countries including China, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Vietnam. The youngest was 14 years old. Child trafficking has long been considered an issue of border control, the study said, leading to those who have been trafficked being regarded as part of a problem, rather than as victims. Scotland’s commissioner for children and young people, Tam Baillie, and the Centre for Rural Childhood at Perth College University of the Highlands and Islands produced the report, and made a number of urgent recommendations. They called on the UK government to review the national referral mechanism to strengthen co-operation between government agencies, and to appoint an independent human trafficking rapporteur accountable to the UK parliament. The authors recommended the Scottish government should ensure adequate resources are available to tackle the problem and act as a lead for local authorities to ensure that nationally agreed procedures are followed consistently at a local level. Baillie said: “When children are raped or exploited as slaves in households or businesses in Scotland it becomes our national scandal. When we fail to notice, fail to pick up the signs and fail to act on children’s trauma, it demands action. I hope this report, the first of its kind in Scotland, will take the issue out into the open and result in action and change for child victims of trafficking.” Professor Rebecca Wallace, director of the centre for rural childhood at Perth College UHI, said the report’s findings address the previous lack of an evidence base regarding child trafficking in Scotland. She added the study was an opportunity to “harness the very evident willingness of professionals encountered during the research to improve the identification and treatment of children trafficked into and within Scotland”. Human trafficking Children Scotland Child labour guardian.co.uk
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Third of calls to 24-hour helpline related to redundancies amid fears new English bac will lead to more losses Schools are preparing to make up to a fifth of their staff redundant in anticipation of huge budget cuts, it has emerged. The number of senior teachers seeking advice on how to dismiss colleagues – and keep their own jobs – has hit a peak last seen in the late 1990s, a headteachers’ association has warned. The Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL), which represents 15,000 heads and deputies, said some of its members planned to make 15 or 20 redundancies out of a workforce of about 100. A third of calls to a 24-hour helpline for senior teachers set up by the association are now related to redundancies – a big rise on a year ago, the association said. ASCL has run five courses on how to make redundancies in the last year, and all have been fully subscribed. Schools across the country are waiting to hear their budgets for the financial year starting on 1 April. Cuts to local authority budgets, in some cases falling numbers of pupils, and reductions to central government education grants will mean many schools are worse off. ASCL’s legal consultant, Richard Bird, warned that the government’s flagship new qualification – the English baccalaureate – would compound the problem. The qualification is awarded to pupils who achieve at least a C in their GCSEs in English, maths, two sciences, history or geography and a language. Schools are now measured on the proportion of pupils who obtain this and it is published in national league tables. Bird said teachers of some vocational courses or non-English bac subjects would be more likely to face redundancy. “If there is going to be a shift in the curriculum because of the English bac, it will quite likely cause restructuring and inevitably create redundancies,” he said. He said senior teachers were also at risk because making them redundant saved a school more money. Brian Lightman, ASCL’s general secretary, said: “People might, in a few years, say, ‘What’s happened to teachers in those subjects [that aren't in the English bac]?’” He added that his association had seen “massive demand for advice about redundancies”. The Department for Education has said no school will see reductions in funding of more than 1.5% per pupil. This does not include the extra they will receive for each pupil on free school meals. The department has promised local authorities that they will not face a cut of more than 2%, even if they have a falling number of pupils. A spokesman for the DfE said: “Ministers are clear that this is the best possible settlement for schools considering the dire public finances. It protects cash levels nationally for every single pupil to cover rising numbers and demand for places, with the pupil premium on top for those that need the most support. “We know that hard decisions may have to be made locally – that’s why we’ve put in additional budget protections at school and local authority level. “Heads know the needs of their school and where their money needs to be spent to have the biggest impact on schools – that’s why we’re expanding the academy programme to give them complete autonomy over their budgets and stripping out ringfences from local authority schools funding so they can target cash where it is most needed.” Education policy Teaching Schools English baccalaureate GCSEs Public sector cuts Jessica Shepherd guardian.co.uk
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US senators who fled state are cheered by thousands despite Republicans removing collective bargaining rights Fourteen Democratic senators from Wisconsin have returned home from exile in Illinois at the end of a bruising clash with the Republicans in which the state capitol in Madison became a virtual battleground in a dispute over trade union rights. The senators had fled for three weeks across state lines in an attempt to prevent the new Republican governor Scott Walker from passing a bill to strip 175,000 public sector workers of almost all collective bargaining rights. Their ploy, designed to block the bill going to vote by making it impossible for the Republicans to gain a quorum, ultimately failed when the bill was signed into law on Friday. But the senators, dubbed the “Fab 14″, returned to a heroes’ welcome. Up to 70,000 trade union and Democratic supporters gathered in Capitol Square, chanting “Thank you! Thank you!” The crowd included many farmers who came into Madison to join the protest in a “tractorcade”. Local paper the Journal Sentinel spotted Tod Pulvermacher, a dairy farmer, driving a John Deere tractor with a sign attached to its rear manure spreader, saying “Walker’s bill belongs here”. Dave Hansen, the Democratic senator from Green Bay, told the crowd: “We lost the battle, but we’re going to win the war. I think we’ve got the momentum on our side.” However, Scott Fitzgerald, the leader of the Republicans in the Wisconsin senate, who orchestrated the passage of the bill, said the senators were “the most shameful 14 people in the state of Wisconsin”. He said: “To the senate Democrats: when you smile for the cameras today and pretend you’re heroes, I hope you look at that beautiful Capitol building you insulted and are embarrassed.” Although the bill has been passed – restricting public sector unions to negotations only over pay increases up to the rate of inflation – the battle in Wisconsin is far from over. Democrats across the country have vowed to use the scenes there as a stick with which to beat Republicans in next year’s presidential election. Democrats and Republicans in the state have declared their intention to seek revenge against each other in recall elections that will seek to unseat incumbent Wisconsin senators. Up to 16 senators, eight from each party, are vulnerable to such an attack, which can be triggered by a petition of voters. US politics United States Wisconsin Democrats Republicans Ed Pilkington guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Matthews Forgets to Mention O’Keefe in NPR ‘Sting’ and Asks if Network Could be Made More ‘Centrist’
March 13, 2011 No Comment
Click here to view this media (h/t Heather of VideoCafe ) The Republicans’ assault on public broadcasting touches something near and dear to my heart. Both my television and my car radio are likely to be tuned to a public broadcasting station as anything else. Wanting to defund such treasures as Terry Gross’ Fresh Air or Sesame Street just smacks of the ongoing campaign to dumb down the populace, much like their oh-so-reasonable suggestion to “teach the controversy” of creationism vs. evolution. So I find myself feeling very protective of public broadcasting…especially when Breitbart’s stooge James O’Keefe decided to take his puerile and staged flip cam aim at it. You would think that the Beltway crowd would circle their wagons around one of their own when O’Keefe started up with his antics, especially given his past history. But no, even the damn NPR talent themselves distance themselves . How frickin’ sad that even Glenn Beck’s Blaze blog takes a more skeptical eye than its own employees. No one–not a single person–on Chris Matthews’ program bothers to add this critical little bit of context to discussing NPR’s bias. No one points out that absolutely NOTHING O’Keefe alleges should be taken credibly. Seriously, if he says the sky is blue, one ought to go outside to check. No one points out that PBS and NPR only count federal funding as less than 5% of the whole, but that smaller, rural stations will be greatly affected by the cuts, thereby making Schiller’s statement factually true, if a bit tactless. No one points out that the “explosive” charges O’Keefe are so much less than explosive when looked at in full context . Nope, all that is taken at face value (a measure of respect that should not ever be given to O’Keefe, Breitbart, et al–EVER), and instead the media pushes the ridiculous narrative of PBS being “elitist” and “liberal”. I’m sorry, but any channel that no longer employs Bill Moyers, but continues to give a platform to John McLaughlin & Co can hardly be called “liberal elitists”. Media Matters has compiled a list of conservative commentators and pundits who claim that they consider NPR’s editorial coverage “fair”. Apparently, “fair” is the new “liberal elitist” for Tweety and panel, thus coloring their own editorial slants as something less than that. Transcripts (courtesy of Heather) below the fold MATTHEWS: Welcome back. Talk about rotten timing. Republicans slashed funding for PBS and NPR two weeks ago. Defenders spent the last couple weeks trotting out Bert and Big Bird and calling for viewers and listeners to bombard Congress with protests. Well, and then this week’s disastrous undercover video of a National Public Radio fundraiser, not only did the fundraiser condemn tea partiers as racists; he said public funding isn’t even needed at NPR. Then another sting tape caught an NPR fundraiser claiming she could shield donations if they came from a group connected to terrorists. David (laughing), now, make your case. You’re one of the stars on really a great show, the Newshour, so many people watch and rely on for their hard news. Make the case for public money going to this organization. BROOKS: Well here’s the case. We have a common culture. If we’re going to assimilate people, if we’re going to be one nation, it helps to have a common culture and there are some things that do join us. And the reason and government has some role in help creating those things, or funding the things that join us. We have Smithsonian Museums that do some of that. I think public broadcasting with shows like The American Experience, they give us all something to clue into our history. They join us as a people, they assimilate immigrants and it’s worth the very small amount and you should see my paycheck, the very small amount that we pay to them. MATTHEWS: Well that’s your end. You don’t get much. I certainly accept that. But here, $200,000 to a small state, a small station in Missouri, $8 million to WGBH, a very big state. You would think in Boston they would have some money. They wouldn’t need a subsidy. You cover it. Is there enough votes from the Senate to keep that money flowing to NPR and PBS. O’DONNELL: Well because of the Big Bird affect and… MATTHEWS: There’s ten Republican Senators apparently who like this. O’DONNELL: Well Richard Shelby and Lindsey Graham are not among them. They really think that it’s time, especially government… uh… where government can act and the private sector can come in, that’s sort of the argument many Republicans make. You don’t need it because they can fundraise and they can do those things. But it is, the love’s part of the culture, so you’ve go that tension. It’s not a new argument. Conservatives have always said NPR is tilted. They don’t like that. They don’t want to have their people paying for it, meaning their voters and constituents. So there’s a lot of friction and it’s an easy argument to make, but Bert and Ernie are popular. MATTHEWS: Hey David, objectively, do you think that NPR could be made more centrist, if they make an effort at it? IGNATIUS: I think NPR’s a great news organization. I think its problem is not that it’s too liberal, but that it’s too elitist. In the culture wars, it’s high end, like the New York Times is high end. MATTHEWS: But the good part is… the good part is it covers the world, much better than a lot (crosstalk) KAY: It’s also seen as an elitist… the value of NPR is that it covers, it does have correspondents around the world and that’s very expensive and a lot of news organizations are cutting their funding. There are security arguments to be made that we need more foreign coverage in America. MATTHEWS: Well yes and that’s the best thing about it, because we don’t get that elsewhere. KAY: But it is still seen as an elitist… MATTHEWS: Yeah. KAY: …and a luxury. And I think, I don’t think actually most Republicans object so much to the sum, because as you point out they’re very small. It is the idea that you are funding public broadcasting that they believe has a bias. MATTHEWS: Yeah. KAY: There’s an argument for public broadcasting. You have to make very sure that your news reporting is seen as objective. BROOKS: I think NPR’s done a good job over the last ten years of reducing that bias. I thought it was really biased ten years ago, but now I think it’s pretty straight. And the federal money for NPR doesn’t so much go for the big stations. It goes so it can go out to the rural parts of the country which wouldn’t have those stations otherwise. MATTHEWS: It’s a hard thing to be honest about and I think we’ve had a good discussion on this for everybody.
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500 more homes to be built in West Bank in response to the murder of five members of a Jewish settler family Israel is to build hundreds of homes in West Bank settlements in response to the murder of five members of a Jewish settler family, including two children and a baby, believed to be the work of Palestinian militants. The events of the weekend are likely to further push back the prospects of renewed peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians. The decision to approve 500 housing units was taken on Saturday night, less than 24 hours after the Fogel family were attacked with knives as they slept in their home in the isolated settlement of Itamar, deep in the West Bank. All five had their throats slit. Thousands of people attended their funeral in Jerusalem on Sunday. Three children in the family survived. The homes are to be built in the large settlement blocks which Israel expects to keep under any peace agreement with the Palestinians. It is the biggest tranche of construction announced since the end of the settlement freeze almost six months ago. Some members of the Israeli cabinet pushed for a more radical response to the family’s murder. Interior minister Eli Yishai, of the pro-settlement, rightwing Shas party, said Israel should build “at least a thousand new homes for each person murdered”. Housing minister Ariel Atias, also of Shas, said: “We must strengthen the settlement, and the time is now.” The move signals a stiffening of the Israeli government’s stance in the face of international pressure for a gesture to encourage peace talks to resume. The prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, had been expected to propose an interim Palestinian state on temporary borders, but analysts suggested that may now be shelved. The Palestinian Authority said the construction announcement was aimed at addressing Netanyahu’s domestic political problems within his fragile coalition. It would not “cause the Palestinians to forego their right to independence and freedom,” said a spokesman, Ahmad Assaf. Further details of Friday night’s attack emerged amid criticism that security procedures at the settlement had not been properly observed. The attacker or attackers scaled Itamar’s perimeter fence, triggering an alarm. Settlement security investigated but failed to notify the Israeli military. The intruders waited inside the settlement for some time after identifying their target, then entered the Fogels’ house through a window. Two children were killed first, then the father, who was asleep with his baby daughter, and then the mother, who, it was reported, attempted to shoot the attackers with the family’s gun. The attackers then escaped over the perimeter fence, triggering a second alarm. The bodies were discovered by the Fogels’ 12-year-old daughter, who had been attending a youth event in the settlement. Two other children in the house were physically unharmed. The surviving children were being cared for by their grandparents and social workers. Graphic photographs of the bloodsoaked bodies were yesterday emailed to journalists by the settlers’ Yesha council and a Jerusalem public relations firm. Government officials considered distributing the photographs, but decided against the move. The hunt for the attackers continued for a second daywith a heavy police and military presence in Palestinian towns and villages around Itamar. At least 20 men were arrested in the nearby village of Awarta. Security forces were also on alert against reprisal attacks by hardline settlers. The defence minister, Ehud Barak, said the “iron fist of the IDF [Israeli Defence Force] and the Shin Bet [intelligence service] will quickly land on the murderers”. They will be caught, brought to justice and made to pay, he added. The funeral of the five victims drew thousands of people to a cemetery on the edge of Jerusalem, causing gridlock as hundreds tried to get to the burial site up to an hour after the scheduled start of the service. Helicopters passed overhead as Chief rabbi Yona Metzger told the crowd that the attackers had only succeeded in uniting Israelis. Settlement expansion should accelerate in response to the murders, he added. “Another neighbourhood, that’s the answer. More building, that’s the answer,” he said. Reuven Rivlin, the Knesset speaker, said: “We will live, we will continue to build and to plant, we will continue to grip on to the land of Israel. More construction, more life, more hanging on to the land. This is our answer to the murderers.” The Palestinian news agency, Maan, reported a number of incidents in the West Bank on Saturday night after the end of the Jewish sabbath, in which settlers attacked or harassed people in villages and towns. Itamar, which is home to about 100 families, is a deeply nationalist and religious settlement near the Palestinian city of Nablus. The area has seen frequent clashes in the past. Israel Middle East Palestinian territories Harriet Sherwood guardian.co.uk
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