Rest O’ the Roundup
• JTA: A US federal appeals court will begin hearings on whether American passports issued to citizens born in Jerusalem can list Israel as the place of birth. The Zivotofsky family’s legal campaign resumes on March 19.
• Here’s a Boycott-Divestment-Sanctions you probably didn’t hear about. Algemeiner takes note of an Austrian company no longer doing business with Iran after Tehran used their cranes to publicly hang people.
• Israel HaYom: Eight UN peacekeepers based in Syria fled to Israel after fighting forced them to abandon their post. Meanwhile, 21 Filipino peacekeepers kidnapped by Syrian rebels were released to Jordan. More on that at AP.
• Rioting in Cairo and Port Said after court upheld 21 death sentences from last year’s fatal soccer riots. Protesters tried to disrupt Suez Canal shipping. Take your pick of Deutsche Welle, AP, or BBC coverage.
• The Times of Israel says Cairo’s marketing Sinai vacation packages to Israeli-Arabs. Just what we need: Israeli Arabs on holiday being recruited by Global Jihad Inc.
Egypt is aware that Israel has imposed a severe travel warning discouraging Israelis from traveling to the peninsula, most recently on Friday when the Counter-Terrorism Bureau reiterated the threat ahead of the Passover holiday. The peninsula has seen a period of lawlessness following the revolution, highlighted by kidnappings of Westerners and terror attacks against Egyptian and international security forces. For that reason, its tourism officials are trying to start by luring the Arab-Israeli population, a public perhaps less likely to heed the strict warning.
• Times of Israel: Let’s just say Vladimir Putin’s United Russia party billboards tanked. Turns out the billboards honoring soldiers on “Defender of the Fatherland Day” used an image of an Israeli soldier on an Israeli tank lifted from the IDF’s Flickr stream. Not wanting to be Putin’s party pooper, the IDF spokesperson simply said they’re aware of this and left it at that.
• Can a group of savvy, can-do engineers put Israel on the moon?
“Think about it,” Margalit tells TIME. “Three countries will have landed on the moon: The United States, Russia and Israel. What fun to be able to say that.”
• Israeli, Greek and the US began a two-week naval exercise. More at the JTA.
• For more commentaries on Turkey, Iran and the Arab Spring, see the Wall St. Journal, Christian Science Monitor, Charles Krauthammer and Jonathan Tobin.
(Image of passport via Flickr/seantoyer)
For more, see Thursday’s Israel Daily News Stream.
