Jerusalem Arabs shelter Homeless Jews

A touching clip is posted on Haaretz website, a tale of how a homeless Mizrahi family [Middle Eastern Jews] came to take refuge in the village of an Arab neighbour for the past two weeks after the government failed to give them aid. The family of four children and their mother were evicted from an illegal squat and are entitled to official welfare assistance, but this was not forthcoming.
Distraught, the mother complains about how most of her neighbors dispassionately watched her humiliating personal drama as police tossed their meager belongings into the street, as if it were "a play".
For a change, talkbacks for this post are not as full of invective as usual: they praise the kind-hearted Arab as an exception, a hero, an example. If people can reach across the divide in this way, maybe there is some hope for this fractured society to heal.

Bye-bye Ynet

Ynet, the spunky English language website of the Hebrew daily newspaper, Yedioth Ahronoth, will abruptly close down this week, after a two year run. It will be missed. They were quick off the mark to break stories and pulled few punches. Proprietors say that the website was not earning its keep, and most of its 11 journalists, who post news around the clock, are expected to be sacked rather than redeployed. It was known for its poisonous talkbacks, with dozens and sometimes hundreds of opinionated readers flaming one another over political or religious posturing. If you could wade through them, you'd get a cross section of the passion and delusion with which English-speakers around the world view this troubled region. Read it while you still can.