Thursday 12 April 2012
Israeli group wants 'flytilla' activists put on trial
Between Saturday evening and Sunday, hundreds of activists, mainly from European countries, are expected to land at Israel's main international airport as part of a campaign called "Welcome to Palestine." The visitors are expected to openly declare their intent to visit the West Bank. But Israel has vowed to prevent them from arriving.
Nitsana Darshan-Leitner of the Israel Law Centre, said she had asked Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein "to put an end" to the campaign, now in its third year.
"We are asking him to put them on trial," she told Israeli public radio.
"This is criminal activity... (which is) a breach of several laws in Israel including unauthorised assembly and crossing the border when they have been specifically told not to come here." In previous years activists have been held in custody pending deportation but not charged with any offence.
"Israel must put an end to this," Darshan-Leitner said, "They don't learn because they don't pay the price." Hundreds of Israeli police are to be deployed in and around the airport from Saturday night, and the security establishment has already approached foreign carriers in an attempt to prevent known activists from travelling, press reports said.
Representatives of all the airlines which fly to Israel were summoned to a meeting last week with senior police and defence officials, at which they were told that the activists would not be allowed in, Maariv newspaper reported on Wednesday.
"It was made clear to those present that every activist that arrived in Israel would be detained, and the airline would be held responsible for returning him at its own expense," it said.
Israel is also planning to hand the airlines a list of activists who are expected to arrive shortly before the planes are scheduled to take off from their points of origin, it said.
Most of the flights defined as "problematic" would not arrive at the main Ben Gurion terminal, but would be rerouted to another part of the airport where they would be "isolated so that the police officers can check the passengers prior to disembarkation," the paper said.
During the first "Welcome to Palestine" campaign in 2010, organisers said around 100 activists managed to get in without incident and travel to the West Bank, access to which is controlled by Israel.
But last year, Israel worked with airlines to prevent hundreds of activists from boarding planes bound for Ben Gurion, and detained and later deported others who managed to arrive.
French organisers of the planned event said on Wednesday they still plan to travel despite Israeli opposition.
The campaign's organisers in the West Bank say they want to publicise Israel's control of movement into and out of the Palestinian territory and to boost solidarity with the Palestinian people.
April/12/2012
Turkey could seek NATO's help to deal with Syria
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan told reporters late yesterday that "NATO has responsibilities to protect the Turkish border according to Article 5." He was referring to the article in the alliance's treaty stating that an attack against one NATO member shall be considered an attack against all members.
Syrian forces have opened fire across the Turkish border Monday, killing two people in a Turkish refugee camp near the border.
Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu said today that Turkey, a NATO member, could seek help from the military alliance if there are future violations.
April/12/2012
Improbable
Author : Adam Fawer
Review :
This novel starts with the wildest game of Texas Hold’em and a most
improbable event. Sitting in the basement of a Russian Mafia king pin,
David Caine has been dealt a hand which includes two Aces – and there’s
one ace on the table. All he needs is one more ace and he has the second
highest winning poker hand. But he also has all the signs that he is
about to have a world-class seizure. He just needs to hang in there long
enough to win the pot. And luck is with him as he gets his ace. But
wait, his opponent seems awfully sure of himself too. Is he bluffing?
The only hand that can beat four aces is a royal straight flush. Caine,
whom his former professor has nicknamed “Rainman,” can run the
probability numbers on the whole card game in his head; he has an
unusual knack though most poker players have some talent in this area.
The stakes go higher and higher as Caine convinces himself that his
opponent is only bluffing and he ups the ante. The odds are too
improbable that his opponent has the higher hand.
Then just before he goes into full seizure, he realizes that
he’s into the Russian Mafia for $7,000. His hand was not the sure bet
that it should have been. The $400 in his savings account is hardly
going to cover this debt. He's in real trouble. Caine wakes in the
hospital with his twin brother, Joshua, patiently waiting for him. It
turns out that he hasn’t seen Joshua in some time – Joshua has been away
at a mental institute trying to get his schizophrenia under control.
Well now, Joshua is home again and seemingly all right, if you discount
that he tends to rhyme the last word of sentences, an odd tick
apparently expressed by schizophrenics.
Meanwhile, Dr. Tversky is conducting some experiments on his
student intern, Julia. She’s only too willing to help him; she is
naively in love. It seems that the government also has an interest in
Dr. Tversky’s work. Forsythe, the head of the government’s Science and
Technology Research Center, has managed to secure Nava, a CIA Agent, to
keep an eye on Dr. Tversky’s experiments. But Nava has her own problems.
She sells top secret information to other governments but on her last
deal, she inadvertently gives a bad disk to the Korean mafia and is
unable to give back the cash from her offshore account. No problem,
she’ll just steal the secret information again, or so she thinks. Not so
easy, when she is suddenly transferred to work under Forsyth and all
her security is revoked. So she needs another big secret, quickly. Turns
out her new assignment is worth quite a bit more. Whatever these
experiments are, the Koreans want the Alpha subject. So Nava plans on
kidnapping the student intern and getting out of the country as soon as
she hands her over to the Korean RDEI. But, this plan, too, goes afoul
when the Alpha subject suddenly dies – but not before revealing future
events to first Dr. Tversky and then to Nava – which lead both to
pursuing David Caine.
It seems that Caine, unwittingly, is the Beta subject. And now
Nava must steal him for the Koreans – and for Forsyth. Though the
solution of how Nava gets around this problem might be obvious,
everything else about this novel is a surprise. Add in the fact that
Caine is now on a new seizure medication that has a slight chance of
causing schizophrenia as a side effect. Given his twin brother’s
condition and few other things that happen to him -- like predicting
future events -- Caine is not at all convinced that everything that is
happening is really, real. But he follows Jasper’s advice on how to deal
with schizophrenia – “try to make smart decisions within whatever world
you create. Eventually you will find your way back to reality.”
Despite all the action (of which there is plenty and all of it
tight without a single loose end), there is a serious scientific
hypothesis underneath the layers of the various subplots. This novel is
about chance, fate and determinism; specifically centered on Marquis
Pierre Simon de Lapace’s belief that cause-and-effect rules govern all
and if one had sufficient intellect they would be able to know the
future just as one knows the past. This intellect has become known as Laplace’s Demon.
Moreover, the novel explores how “free will” plays in a deterministic
theory (nicely done, I might add), which I believe is basically Chaos theory
and tosses in a bit of quantum mechanics. By the end of the novel,
Fawer has created a plausible setting for Laplace’s theory, which
includes a case for schizophrenia being a symptom rather than a disorder
and explaining the phenomenon of Déjà vu. And of course, as the title
implies, there is a lot of talk about probability theory. In fact, there
a number of mathematic formulas and examples that are very interesting,
if not outright fun, which is surprising for those of us who have a
deep rooted fear of this subject matter.
This is not "hard" science fiction like Gregory Benford writes. This is more on par with The DaVinci Code or any other thrillers that are destined for the big screen. Personally, I like Harper Collins description, "A Beautiful Mind meets Kill Bill."
All the math and physics are given to us with concrete everyday
examples and even though I can’t exactly recite any of the information I
learned, at least while I was reading I felt quite a bit smarter than
normal. I would hope that even a hardcore sci-fi fan would find this
book rewarding, though, that is hard for me to judge.
Also of interest, is the back story behind this novel. Adam Fawer is the person who challenged Stephanie Williams
to write a novel before she died of breast cancer, thus we have
Stephanie to thank for finally helping Fawer to realize his first novel
(of which I truly hope there are more to come) and to Fawer for
inspiring Williams to write her one and only novel. Both are talented
authors and we the reader or lucky for their friendship. If you had
asked me, the fact that they both had good novels within them, I would
have said that's improbable. But that would have been a gut level answer
without the math.
Assassin's Creed Revelations
Genre : Action-Adventure
Publisher : Ubisoft
Developer : Ubisoft Montreal
Web Site : assassinscreed.ubi.com/revelations/en-GB/home/
Review :
Assassin’s Creed Revelations lives up to its name. For those who have been following the journeys of Desmond, Altaïr, and Ezio, this newest installment makes good on the promise implied by the title and serves up some big reveals about the ever-growing fiction. The core missions offer a level of cinematic immersion and tight design that is new to the series, and the plotline pulls together dangling story threads into a satisfying whole while simultaneously setting up the next game. While some questionable side missions and new gameplay concepts slow down the fun, they are only small flaws against the backdrop of a thrilling adventure.
Though Revelations touches on all three of the major protagonists introduced in the story so far, Ezio is still the star. The boy who once sought revenge for his family has become a man in search of meaning and wisdom. Now a venerable mentor over the entire Assassin order, that quest for understanding takes him from his home in Italy to the distant metropolis of Constantinople. While there, his story follows a double path. One embroils him in the web of intrigue surrounding the power struggle between the conquering Ottoman Empire and the unseated Byzantines. The second thread traces his meeting of a beautiful stranger as she aids him in tracking down the lost legacy of his predecessor, Altaïr. Both story-driven quest lines are rewarding and excellently written, with a host of new characters and an entertaining narrative. Equally important, these missions are some of the best designed in the series so far. Action-packed chases mix with stealthy tails through busy city streets. Incite riots one moment and infiltrate an enemy fortress the next. New, cinematic camera angles occasionally accentuate the drama. It all comes together in the end through an extended conclusion that offers some of the most captivating moments in the series.
Along the way, an array of side missions and exploration gives players plenty of reasons to get distracted. A rich but simple economic simulation once again lets you revitalize a city and purchase new upgrades. Collectible items, purchasable upgrades, and task challenges offer a break from the mission content. Also like in Brotherhood, you’ll recruit a coalition of assassins to answer your commands. These troops not only answer your call to do battle around the city, but you’ll also send them out across the known world to level up and retake cities in the name of the Assassins. The expanded options for your trainees are a lot of fun, especially the new content that unlocks as they reach higher levels. You now gain special missions tied to your chief recruits and fight at their side as you lock down districts of the city.
New equipment options are also on display. A hook blade offers a few new tricks in both combat and navigation, including the ability to flip over enemy combatants, zoom across zip lines, and grab distant ledges. It doesn’t revolutionize gameplay, but the device is still a fun feature. A new bomb system is also a compelling addition, giving you new tools to distract enemies or kill them outright. I don’t have the same fondness for the crafting of the bombs themselves, a system that is pushed really hard through the presence of dozens of ingredients scattered through the world. While there may be hundreds of options for how to mix and match your bomb recipes, they all come down to just a few fundamental effects, so it’s hard to get excited about building new varieties.
Ezio’s role as a general to the Assassin order is a central theme this time around, but one of the manifestations of that idea turns out to be the worst feature to show up in the series so far. In an ill-advised departure from standard gameplay, you’ll regularly be called on to participate in a tower-defense style minigame to defend your Assassin dens from Templar attack. The gameplay for these sequences is sloppy and hard to control, and moreover feels inconsistent with the tone of secrecy and subterfuge that has always governed the battles between the Templars and the Assassins. Careful monitoring of your notoriety in the city can reduce the likelihood of dealing with these awkward battles, but the whole concept would have been better scrapped.
Even as Ezio’s adventure unfolds, our other two heroes each get to step into the light. In an interesting twist, Ezio’s investigations give him the unusual ability to look back through history and witness milestones in Altaïr’s lifetime. These brief but illuminating excursions finally show us the fate of the first game’s hero, and let us control him one more time. I would have been interested to see deeper dives into Altaïr’s experiences, not to mention some more variety to the locations for his scenes, but the short sequences we do see are some of the most memorable in the game.
Meanwhile, players also get some follow-through on Desmond after the dramatic events that concluded Brotherhood. A new and optional side trek follows Desmond’s journey as he repairs the shattered remnants of his mind that remain trapped within the Animus. We’re along for the ride to finally uncover the details of Desmond’s early life. These abstract sequences play out as first-person puzzles in a surreal landscape of geometric shapes. It’s a fascinating attempt to transform a character’s abstract, emotional memories into gameplay, but the action and puzzles themselves in these sequences are lackluster. First-person platforming is a tricky business, and these missions are limited because of that constraint.
The excellent multiplayer game introduced in Brotherhood returns in Revelations with some subtle but potent improvements. A new deathmatch mode offers tense stalking of targets with only small hints to enemy locations. Artifact assault plays similarly to capture the flag. New game modes like these join old returning styles of play, all set amid a variety of excellently designed maps, so there’s a lot of content to dig your teeth into. Outside of gameplay, the multiplayer system also feels more rooted in the story of the game world, with new secrets about the Templar order that get revealed as you level up. Throw in a much improved UI and increased customization, and I have nothing but praise to offer this installment’s multiplayer.
A number of new features have been attempted to make Revelations feel new and different from its predecessors. In that quest for broader variety and a unique identity from the earlier games, Revelations makes some missteps that are hard to ignore. However, the game offers more of what has been great about the franchise, and that should be enough to bring most fans to the table, even if it a poor starting point for new players.
The Matrix (1999)
Duration : 136 Minutes
Director : Andy Wachowski , Lana Wachowski
Writers : Andy Wachowski , Lana Wachowski
Stars : Keanu Reeves , Laurence Fishburne , Carrie-Anne Moss
Storyline :
Thomas A. Anderson is a man living two lives. By day he is an average computer programmer and by night a hacker known as Neo. Neo has always questioned his reality, but the truth is far beyond his imagination. Neo finds himself targeted by the police when he is contacted by Morpheus, a legendary computer hacker branded a terrorist by the government. Morpheus awakens Neo to the real world, a ravaged wasteland where most of humanity have been captured by a race of machines that live off of the humans' body heat and electrochemical energy and who imprison their minds within an artificial reality known as the Matrix. As a rebel against the machines, Neo must return to the Matrix and confront the agents: super-powerful computer programs devoted to snuffing out Neo and the entire human rebellion.
The Hunger Games (2012)
Duration : 142 Minutes
Director : Gary Ross
Writers : Gary Ross , Suzanne Collins , Billy Ray
Stars : Jennifer Lawrance , Josh Hutcherson and Liam Hemsworth
Storyline :
In a dystopian future, the totalitarian nation of Panem is divided between 12 districts and the Capitol. Each year two young representatives from each district are selected by lottery to participate in The Hunger Games. Part entertainment, part brutal retribution for a past rebellion, the televised games are broadcast throughout Panem. The 24 participants are forced to eliminate their competitors while the citizens of Panem are required to watch. When 16-year-old Katniss's young sister, Prim, is selected as District 12's female representative, Katniss volunteers to take her place. She and her male counterpart Peeta, are pitted against bigger, stronger representatives who have trained for this their whole lives.
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