The New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU) has filed suit against the city to keep police from searching the bags of passengers entering the subway. The suit, filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, claims the two-week old policy violates constitutional guarantees of equal protection and prohibitions against unlawful searches and seizures—while doing almost nothing to shield the city from terrorism.

In an Aug. 1 statement, Amnesty International expresses concern about the recent arrest and detention of six human rights defenders in Western Sahara, and reports that two of them had been tortured. Some of those arrested are former "disappeared", others are former prisoners of conscience.

Reuters: The plot in the Pentagon analyst/AIPAC scandal is about to thicken:

U.S. prosecutors plan to announce additional charges on Thursday against a Defense Department analyst accused of illegally disclosing classified defense information, and to charge two former officials of a pro-Israel lobbying group, government sources said.

The additional charges involve Lawrence Franklin, a Pentagon analyst already accused of giving the information to two former employees of the influential American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the two sources said.

They said prosectors planned to announce charges against Steve Rosen, formerly AIPAC's policy director, and Keith Weissman, formerly its senior analyst.

Shooter was IDF deserter from W. Bank settlement
By Jack Khoury, Haaretz Correspondent, Haaretz Service and Agencies

A Jewish Israeli man in Israel Defense Forces uniform opened fire on bus passengers in a Druze neighborhood of the Israeli Arab town of Shfaram Thursday afternoon. Four people and the gunman were killed and 12 wounded, two of them moderately.

Security forces said the shooting was apparently a Jewish terror attack and that the attacker was a newly religious man, an IDF deserter, from the West Bank settlement of Tapuah. Security forces said the gunman, Eran Tzuberi, 19, was a member of the outlawed right-wing extremist Kach movement. Tzuberi, who went AWOL a year ago, recently moved to the West Bank from Rishon Letzion.

Editor & Publisher reports on an outburst of integrity in Medialand.

The board of The American Society of Journalists and Authors (ASJA) has voted unanimously to reverse an earlier decision to give its annual Conscience in Media award to jailed New York Times reporter Judith Miller, E&P has learned.

The group's First Amendment committee had narrowly voted to give Miller the prize for her dedication to protecting sources, but the full board has now voted to overturn that decision, based on its opinion that her entire career, and even her current actions in the Plame/CIA leak case, cast doubt on her credentials for this award.

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The goodness of Israel is on display again.

The crossings to be built in Jerusalem as part of the separation fence will actually improve the lives of Palestinians in East Jerusalem, the city's police chief Ilan Franco has claimed.

During a High Court of Justice hearing yesterday on the separation fence, Franco told the court that "these are crossings, not the checkpoints we're used to seeing in the territories manned by three or four soldiers. The crossings will not only not harm the residents' lives - but will improve them."

No comments necessary.

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Well, don't this beat all. Islamic Jihad, the most rejectionist Palestinian faction, says it may recognize Israel, accept a 2-state solution:

Last update - 13:06 03/08/2005
Islamic Jihad head: We may recognize the State of Israel
By Gideon Levy, Haaretz Correspondent

An Islamic Jihad leader in the West Bank, Abdel Halim Izzedine, known as Abu Qassam, has told Haaretz that his organization supports the hudna - temporary cease-fire - but is forced to respond to Israeli provocations.

"Israel forces us to react. If Israel stops the assassinations and arrests, we will observe the hudna," he said, adding that if a young Palestinian were to approach him and tell him he was on his way to carry out a suicide attack, he would try to dissuade him.

From Scientific American, Aug. 4:

In the spring of 2002, a large chunk of the Larsen B ice shelf (LIS-B) on the Antarctic Peninsula broke off and tumbled into the Weddell Sea. A new analysis published today in the journal Nature suggests that the more than 3,200 square kilometer area that collapsed signifies an unprecedented loss in the past 10,000 years and can be attributed to accelerated climate warming in the region.