How is the current situation in Israel/Palestine similar to that of apartheid-era South Africa? How is it different? Is Zionism a form of racism? What can we learn from the South African experience to strengthen and empower the movement for justice and peace in Palestine and Israel? Leading South African Muslim Theologian and anti-apartheid activist Farid Esack addressed these questions in a timely engaging and moving lecture at Oak Park Public Library in Illinois on September 6, 2006, an event hosted and sponsored by the The Committee for a Just Peace in Israel and Palestine.

JERUSALEM, Sept. 20 (Xinhua) -- The Israeli army won't complete its withdrawal from Lebanon by the Jewish New Year holiday which begins at sundown Friday, said Israel Defense Forces (IDF) Chief of Staff Dan Halutz Wednesday.

The IDF chief's remark contradicts his earlier prediction made on Tuesday that all Israeli troops will come back home before the holiday starts.

SOUTH LEBANON: Israeli bulldozers started to level the soil and cut down olive trees in Yarin in the Tyre region on Monday, spoiling several cultivated fields and preventing farmers from inspecting their lands. "Israeli bulldozers have spoiled my land, cutting down the fruit trees I've planted," said farmer Shaker Afleh on Tuesday, as he and his daughter watched the bulldozers on his land from a kilometer away.

Tactical nuclear weapons would be required to penetrate the defenses Iran has constructed around its nuclear facilities, according to Col. (res.) Shlomo Mofaz, an international consultant on terrorism and intelligence and a research fellow at the Institute of Counterterrorism at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya.

Mofaz argued that any preemptive action - not necessarily launched by Israel - against Iran's nuclear facilities would need to employ tactical nuclear weapons.

"The Iranians have invested a lot of money to hide their weapons and infrastructure underground. The most sensitive items are below the surface," he said.

"American experts have said they are not sure that conventional weapons would be able to infiltrate these sites," he said. "Based on information from public sources, any attack should use tactical nuclear weapons."

As reported in Time magazine on Monday, a recent Pentagon report outlining US military options to the Iranian threat mentions the difficulty of locating all targets. It also states that Iran's reinforced facilities constitute a strategic challenge to any military action. The report suggests that repeated air strikes using laser and satellite guided missiles would be necessary.

Mofaz added that the Iranians have studied US and Israeli techniques for destroying infrastructure and weapons stores, and therefore have built these bunkers as a response.

As the UN Security Council begins the process of bringing potential sanctions against Iran to a vote, Mofaz stressed that the Iranian strategy in relation to the UN was one of foot-dragging, an attempt to buy time while the nuclear drive advances.

"The Iranian administration is gaining more time to push forward to finish its program," said Mofaz, adding that the sanction moves had come too late.

According to Mofaz, there are two essential aspects to an Israeli response to the threat from Iran: The need to deploy the Arrow antimissile system - which would be effective only if Teheran were to employ a small number of missiles, but not against larger volleys - and to develop a second-strike capability.

"Second-strike capabilities are based on the assumption that Israel has nuclear weapons," he noted, "something which has not been confirmed by the Israeli government."

Regarding a preemptive strike against Iranian nuclear facilities, Mofaz said that according to the principles of the IDF, as first set out by David Ben-Gurion, "Israel must have full capability to defend itself; there must be a program and plan to deal with the Iranian threat... The IDF needs to have the capability to eliminate this threat."

Mofaz warned, however, that both the appropriate timing for such a strike and whether the IDF was capable of destroying Iran's nuclear program were unknown.

"The difficulty of such a strike stems from the possibility that there are many unidentified nuclear development sites and the limited usefulness of conventional air strikes against nuclear facilities," he said.

Nearly seven out of 10 Israelis are dissatisfied with prime minister Ehud Olmert's performance and his greatest political rival would win an election, according to an opinion poll today

Nearly seven out of 10 Israelis are dissatisfied with prime minister Ehud Olmert's performance and his greatest political rival would win an election, according to an opinion poll today

The poll seems to be evidence that the Israeli leader's popularity was eroded by the war he waged in Lebanon over the summer.

JERUSALEM, Sept. 21 (Xinhua) -- An eighth allegation of sexual assault has been filed against Israeli President Moshe Katsav on Wednesday, Israel's daily Ha'aretz reported on Thursday.

Former Israel Defense Forces commandos secretly trained Kurdish soldiers in Northern Iraq to protect a new international airport and in counter-terrorism operations, the BBC reported on Tuesday.

Former Israeli special forces soldiers crossed into Iraq from Turkey in 2004 to train two sets of Kurdish troops, one of the former Israeli trainers told the BBC's Newsnight program.

The former trainer, whose name was not disclosed, said IDF soldiers trained Kurds to act as a security force for the new airport in the northern Iraqi city of Irbil.

They also trained more than 100 Peshmerga or Kurdish fighters for "special assignments" that included how to use rifles and how to shoot militants in a crowd, he said.

The former soldier said he believed Kurdish officials knew the trainers were Israelis although the troops did not.