• Israel's President calls for return to peace talks
• Israel welcomes apparent Arab League softening of peace plan
• Mysterious Hebrew stone displayed in Jerusalem

• Creating peace in the Middle East with Transcendental Meditation: 'Not a matter of hope, we know how to do it'
• Israel: Violent school found peace with Consciousness-Based Education and Transcendental Meditation
• How Israel can have an 'invincible' military

• Hostilities flare along Israeli-Gaza border
• Israeli military responds to fire from Syria
• Israeli curbs harm Palestinian economy long-term - World Bank

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Positive Trends
Short Summaries of Top Stories

Israel's President calls for return to peace talks
26 May 2013 - Israel's President on Sunday urged Israeli and Palestinian leaders to overcome differences and resume peace negotiations, saying the sides could not afford 'to lose this opportunity'. President Shimon Peres issued his call ahead of a gathering of Mideast leaders on the sidelines of a World Economic Forum meeting on the shores of the Dead Sea in Jordan. Sunday's conference was expected to include a rare face-to-face meeting between Israeli and Palestinian leaders, with the participation of US Secretary of State John Kerry, who has devoted much of the past two months to restarting long-stalled peace talks. (more)

Israel welcomes apparent Arab League softening of peace plan
30 April 2013 - Israel responded favourably on Tuesday to an apparent softening by Arab states of their 2002 peace plan after a top Qatari official raised the possibility of land swaps in setting borders between the Jewish state and an independent Palestine. In the 1967 conflict, Israel captured the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip -- areas Palestinians are now seeking for a state of their own. US-hosted peace talks have been frozen since 2010 in a dispute over Israeli settlement expansion in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. (more)

Mysterious Hebrew stone displayed in Jerusalem
30 April 2013 - An ancient limestone tablet covered with a mysterious Hebrew text that features the archangel Gabriel is at the centre of a new exhibit in Jerusalem, even as scholars continue to argue about what it means. The so-called Gabriel Stone, a meter (three-foot)-tall tablet said to have been found 13 years ago on the banks of the Dead Sea, features 87 lines of an unknown prophetic text dated as early as the first century BC, at the time of the Second Jewish Temple. Curators at the Israel Museum say it is the most important document found in the area since the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls. (more)

President Peres invites Pope Francis to Israel
30 April 2013 - Israeli President Shimon Peres invited Pope Francis on Tuesday to visit Israel, at his first meeting with the new pontiff who has appealed for peace in the Middle East. 'I am expecting you in Jerusalem, not just me but the whole country of Israel,' Peres told the Pope in the presence of reporters after private talks in the Vatican's Apostolic Palace. (more)

Israel allows UNESCO mission into old Jerusalem
23 April 2013 - Israel has agreed to allow a mission from UNESCO, the UN's cultural arm, to visit sites within the Old City of Jerusalem starting 19 May, a small victory that carried big hopes for those hoping to end the deadlock between Israelis and Palestinians. The agreement represented a mini-breakthrough on cultural issues by two parties whose fierce differences have kept the world on edge. (more)

Natural gas from new Israeli fields begins flowing
30 March 2013 - Natural gas has started flowing from one of Israel's sizable gas fields. Israel's Energy Ministry says gas from the offshore Tamar field began flowing for the first time Saturday and would reach a processing facility on Israel's coast by Sunday afternoon. Israel has long relied on imports to meet most of its energy needs. The new gas finds are expected to supply Israel's domestic needs for decades and could transform the country into an energy exporter. (more)

'Peace is possible,' US President Obama insists in Middle East
22 March 2013 - Insisting 'peace is possible,' US President Barack Obama on Thursday prodded both Israelis and Palestinians to return to long-stalled negotiations with few, if any, pre-conditions, softening his earlier demands that Israel stop building settlements in disputed territory. Obama, on his second day in the Middle East, shuttled between Jerusalem and Ramallah, reaching out to the public as well as political leaders. He offered no new policies or plans for reopening peace talks but urged both sides to 'think anew' about the intractable conflict and break out of the 'formulas and habits that have blocked progress for so long'. Obama was awarded Israel's Medal of Distinction Thursday night during a lavish dinner. He is the first sitting US President to receive Israel's highest civilian honour. (more)

Israel and Turkey agree to restore diplomatic ties
22 March 2013 - Israel and Turkey agreed to restore full diplomatic relations on Friday after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu apologized in a phone call for a deadly naval raid against a Gaza-bound international flotilla in a dramatic turnaround partly brokered by President Barack Obama. It was a surprising turnaround for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu who had long rejected calls to apologize. He announced the breakthrough after a 20-minute phone conversation with his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Obama helped broker the fence-mending while visiting Israel, but the sides had been reaching out to each other before. (more)

Israel's Netanyahu says new government wants peace
18 March 2013 - Israel's Prime Minister says his new government is extending its hand in peace to the Palestinians. Benjamin Netanyahu told Israel's parliament Monday that he hopes to rejuvenate peace efforts in his new term. Negotiations remained frozen during Netanyahu's previous four-year term. He said that with goodwill from the Palestinians, Israel is 'ready for a historic concession that will end the conflict with the Palestinians once and for all'. (more)

Israel welcomes new Pope as friend of the Jews
15 March 2013 - Israeli leaders are welcoming the selection of Pope Francis and calling him a friend of the Jewish people. President Shimon Peres invited the new Pope to follow the lead of his two predecessors and visit Israel. In a meeting with Roman Catholic Church leaders in Poland Thursday, Peres called Francis 'a man of inspiration that can add to the attempt to bring peace in a stormy area'. (more)

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Success of Maharishi's Programmes
Short Summaries of Top Stories

Creating peace in the Middle East with Transcendental Meditation: 'Not a matter of hope, we know how to do it'
21 March 2013 - Recently a leading newspaper in Israel, Yediot Ahronot, published an extended article by an Israeli journalist who attended the Third Annual Middle East World Peace Assembly in Turkey. The journalist, Moshe Ronen, wrote about the 150 participants from 13 countries who came to practise Transcendental Meditation and its advanced programmes together every day--a programme designed by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi to reduce violence and war, and create peace and harmony in the world. 'One thing is certain,' Mr Ronen wrote, 'the atmosphere here is good. ''There is no point in just sitting and hoping for peace to come between us,'' a member of the Lebanese delegation explains to me. ''Once it was like that, we were hoping and praying for peace. Today we know how to do it. It is all a matter of doing, not of hope.'' ' (more)

Israel: Violent school found peace with Consciousness-Based Education and Transcendental Meditation
12 May 2012 - Consciousness-Based Education was introduced to a high school in Israel as a last resort, said Dr Bevan Morris, President of Maharishi University of Management, commenting on a recent visit to the country. 'The principal introduced [it] when he found that his school was about to be closed because of all the violence in the school. After he had introduced Transcendental Meditation to his children he found that they changed from inside, so now they were actually able to follow the directives and the rules of behaviour' and became happier and more at peace within themselves. (more)

How Israel can have an 'invincible' military
27 March 2012 - Over the years Iranian leaders such as President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad have repeatedly called for the destruction of Israel--raising fears about security and lasting peace for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other world leaders. Nearly 60 are attending the second Nuclear Security Summit (NSS) in Seoul, South Korea, focusing on the threat of global terrorism and how to keep atomic materials safe from rogue terrorists. However, there is new hope, writes Dr David Leffler--if these leaders act quickly now, and implement Invincible Defense Technology (IDT)--a scientifically field-tested brain-based technology to prevent crime, terrorism, and war. (more)

Peace-creating technologies of consciousness support harmony and positivity in Israel
6 September 2011 - Several days ago, over 400,000 people demonstrated for 'social justice' in Israel. The authorities feared vandalism by the huge crowds, but the events surprised everyone by turning out completely peaceful and harmonious. An administrator of the Transcendental Meditation Programme in Israel explained that six special Vedic performances have been organized for Israel and are taking place during this key period, to create peace and harmony in the nation. (more)

Supporting peace and harmony in Israel
17 July 2011 - In the last year there have been several initiatives to support peace and harmony in Israel. Hundreds of people learned the Transcendental Meditation Programme, and hundreds more attended peace-creating assemblies. (more)

New Maharishi Vastu blog in Hebrew
30 January 2011 - A blog page in Hebrew has been established for Maharishi Vastu (Vedic architecture) news. The blog began around the new year, and was started by one of the Maharishi Vastu Coordinators who completed the recent Phase 2 training programme in Europe. (more)

Calm, peaceful atmosphere replaces fighting at school in Israel
14 July 2010 - A calm, peaceful atmosphere has replaced fighting and other problems that once drove teachers, students, and parents away from a high school in Israel. The comments of administrators and teachers illustrate how the Transcendental Meditation Programme is creating a stress-free school. (more)

Discipline problems, violence recede in Middle East school where students practise Transcendental Meditation
14 July 2010 - At a high school in Israel that has implemented the Transcendental Meditation Programme, teachers, parents, and the students themselves are noticing marked improvements in their behaviour. Prior to introducing Consciousness-Based Education, the school struggled with discipline problems and violence. 'Before meditation I was an angry person,' one student said. 'I had a lot of problems. Now I almost don't have any problems . . . . My relationships are better, and I am much calmer now.' (more)

High school in Israel receives National Education Awards due to implementation of Consciousness-Based Education
14 July 2010 - After implementing Consciousness-Based Education, a high school in Israel that previously struggled with violence and poor academic achievement received the National Education Award in two consecutive years. Recognition was given to the school's approach to preventing violence and improving its environment, based on the Consciousness Based Education programme, including Transcendental Meditation. (more)

Israel: Students and teachers praise benefits of Transcendental Meditation
14 July 2010 - Students, teachers, and administrators at a high school in Israel say that the introduction of the Transcendental Meditation Programme has resulted in tremendous positive change in the school. 'You can really feel the quiet,' said a school official, commenting that the students are more focused and achieving more. 'I have become a lot calmer,' a student said. (more)

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Flops
Short Summaries of Top Stories

Hostilities flare along Israeli-Gaza border
3 April 2013 - Israel pressed Hamas on Wednesday to rein in rocket-firing militants in the Gaza Strip after the most serious outbreak of cross-border hostilities since a ceasefire ended an eight-day war in November. The Israeli military said two rockets fired from the Gaza Strip struck southern Israel on Wednesday, causing no casualties, hours after it launched its first air strikes in the Palestinian enclave in four months. Israeli planes had gone into action on Tuesday, targeting what the military described as 'two extensive terror sites in the northern Gaza Strip', after three rockets were fired into Israel earlier that day. An al Qaeda-linked group, Magles Shoura al-Mujahadeen, claimed responsibility for Tuesday's rocket salvo, saying it was responding to the death earlier in the day of a Palestinian prisoner in an Israel jail. There was no immediate claim for Wednesday's rocket fire. Palestinian officials accused Israel of failing to provide timely medical treatment for the prisoner, Maysara Abu Hamdeya, 64, who died of cancer in an Israeli hospital. Israel denied the allegation. (more)

Israeli military responds to fire from Syria
24 March 2013 - Israel's army said it fired a guided missile into Syria on Sunday, destroying a military post after gunfire flew across the border and struck an Israeli vehicle. The shooting along the frontier in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights was one of the most serious incidents between the countries since Syria's civil war erupted two years ago. Israel has carefully watched the violence from the sidelines, but has returned fire on several occasions. It was not immediately clear whether the Syrian troops had fired into the Golan intentionally or whether the vehicle had been hit by stray gunfire. In either case, Israel said it held Syrian President Bashar Assad's government responsible. Israel captured the Golan in the 1967 Middle East war and subsequently annexed the territory in a move that has not been internationally recognized. (more)

Israeli curbs harm Palestinian economy long-term - World Bank
12 March 2013 - Israel's system of checkpoints and restrictions in the occupied West Bank inflicts long-term damage on Palestinians' ability to compete in the global market, the World Bank said on Tuesday. The policies are causing a contraction in manufacturing and agricultural sectors, 'alarmingly' high unemployment, and social problems that would outlive any Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement, the organization said in its report. Since the Oslo peace accords with Israel, Palestinians have exercised limited autonomy in the West Bank, but a final peace has not been reached. Almost a quarter of Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank are unemployed, contributing to shrinking productive sectors. (more)

Israel boycotts UN rights scrutiny session
29 January 2013 - Israel boycotted the United Nations' human rights forum on Tuesday, becoming the first country ever to decline to attend a session that was due to scrutinise its own rights record. Israel's no-show at the Human Rights Council drew widespread criticism, including a tacit rebuke from the United States which said the UN process of reviewing human rights was a 'valuable mechanism' as it was applied to all countries. The council had been due to examine Israel under the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of human rights in all UN member states. Its last review was in December 2008, when it attended. Israel, which would likely have faced criticism for its dealings with the Palestinians, suspended relations with the council last May because of what it called an inherent bias against it. 'As the only recalcitrant state among 193, Israel's deliberate absence would sabotage the principle of universality,' Peter Splinter, Amnesty International's representative to the UN in Geneva, said in a blog. (more)

Israel, Gaza fighting rages on as Egypt seeks truce
18 November 2012 - Israel bombed Palestinian militant targets in the Gaza Strip from air and sea for a fifth straight day on Sunday, preparing for a possible ground invasion while also spelling out its conditions for a truce. Palestinians launched dozens of rockets into Israel and targeted its commercial capital, Tel Aviv, for a fourth day. The 'Iron Dome' missile shield shot down two of the rockets fired toward Israel's biggest city but falling debris from the interception hit a car, which caught fire. Its driver was not hurt. In scenes recalling Israel's 2008-2009 winter invasion of the Gaza Strip, tanks, artillery and infantry massed in field encampments along the sandy border. Military convoys moved on roads in the area newly closed to civilian traffic. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel was ready to widen its offensive. 'We are exacting a heavy price from Hamas and the terrorist organisations and the Israel Defence Forces are prepared for a significant expansion of the operation,' Netanyahu said at a cabinet meeting, giving no further details. Palestinian officials said 56 Palestinians, most of them civilians, including 16 children, have been killed in small, densely populated Gaza since the Israeli offensive began, with hundreds wounded. More than 500 rockets fired from Gaza have hit Israel, killing three civilians and wounding dozens. (more)

Israeli air strike kills 11 civilians in Gaza: Hamas
18 November 2012 - An Israeli missile killed at least 11 Palestinian civilians including four children in Gaza on Sunday, medical officials said, in an apparent attack on a top militant that brought a three-storey home crashing down. International pressure for a ceasefire seemed certain to mount in response to the deadliest single incident in five days of Palestinian rocket attacks on Israel and Israeli air strikes on the Gaza Strip. Israel gave off signs of a possible ground invasion of the Hamas-run enclave as the next stage in its offensive, billed as a bid to stop Palestinian rocket fire into the Jewish state. It also spelt out its conditions for a truce. In other air raids on Sunday, two Gaza City media buildings were hit, witnesses said. Eight journalists were wounded and facilities belonging to Hamas's Al-Aqsa TV as well as Britain's Sky News were damaged. For their part, Gaza militants launched dozens of rockets into Israel and targeted its commercial capital, Tel Aviv, for a fourth day with one attack in the morning and another after nightfall. In scenes recalling Israel's 2008-2009 winter invasion of Gaza, tanks, artillery and infantry massed in field encampments along the sandy, fenced-off border. Military convoys moved on roads in the area newly closed to civilian traffic. Netanyahu said Israel was ready to widen its offensive. (more)

Israel-OPT: Border communities prepare for the worst
16 November 2012 - On both sides of the border, residents of Israeli and Palestinian towns are tring to leave, looking for safer ground from whence to escape rocket fire. But neither are safe, as missiles and airstrikes continue raining down on both sides. Armed groups in Gaza have fired rockets into southern Israel for five consecutive days. On 15 November, a rocket landed in Tel Aviv for the first time since the Gulf War, with two more landing there today. The range of the new Fajr-5 rockets puts half of Israel's population within firing range. What was in the past nine years considered a 'local hassle' for communities bordering Gaza has, in minutes, turned into a major concern. Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) spokesperson Yoav Mordechai told Israel's Channel 10 that the military launched more than 200 air strikes in Gaza on 14-15 November, including one that killed Ahmad al-Jaabari, the military commander of Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip. There are differing accounts of how this round of violence started, but it is the most serious escalation since Israel's attack on Gaza in 2008-9, which killed some 1,400 people -- almost all of them Palestinian, and at least half of them civilians. With Israeli elections coming up, and Hamas empowered by an Islamist resurgence in the region, analysts say this violence could quickly spiral into another war. (more)

Rockets hits near Tel Aviv as Gaza death toll rises
15 November 2012 - Two rockets fired from the Gaza Strip targeted Tel Aviv on Thursday in the first attack on Israel's commercial capital in 20 years, raising the stakes in a showdown between Israel and the Palestinians that is moving towards all-out war. Earlier, a Hamas rocket killed three Israelis north of the Gaza Strip, drawing the first blood from Israel as the Palestinian death toll rose to 19, six of them children. The conflict, launched by Israel with the killing of Hamas's military chief, pours oil on the fire of a Middle East already ablaze with two years of revolution and an out-of-control civil war in Syria. Israel says its attack is in response to escalating missile strikes from Gaza. Israel's bombing has not yet reached the saturation level seen before it last invaded Gaza in 2008, but Israeli officials have said a ground assault is still possible. A second Gaza war has loomed on the horizon for months as waves of Palestinian rocket attacks and Israeli strikes grew increasingly intense and frequent. Netanyahu, favoured in polls to win a 22 January general election, said the Gaza operation could be stepped up. (more)

Israel considers resumption of Gaza assassinations
14 November 2012 - Israel is considering resuming its contentious practice of assassinating militant leaders in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip in an effort to halt intensified rocket attacks on Israel's south, according to defence officials. That Israel might renew a practice that brought it harsh international censure is evidence of the tight spot Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is in. With Israeli elections two months away, rocket barrages from Gaza are disrupting the lives of 1 million residents of southern Israel, pressuring the government to come up with an effective response. Critics say targeted killings invite retaliation by militants and encourage them to try to assassinate Israeli leaders. The policy of targeted killings, said Israeli opposition lawmaker Zehava Galon, 'didn't prove itself. We killed, and there were more attacks.' (more)

Israel drawn into Syria fighting for first time
11 November 2012 - Israel was drawn into the Syrian civil war for the first time on Sunday, firing warning shots into the neighbouring country after a stray mortar shell from across the border hit an Israeli military post. Violence also flared Sunday on Syria's northern border with Turkey, a common flashpoint. Syrian army forces backed by helicopter gunships and artillery attacked a border area with Turkey after rebels captured a crossing point, activists said. In recent weeks, incidents of errant fire from Syria to the north have multiplied, leading Israel to warn that it holds Syria responsible for fire on Israeli-held territory. The Israeli military also said it filed a complaint through United Nations forces operating in the area, stating that 'fire emanating from Syria into Israel will not be tolerated and shall be responded to with severity.' Israel returned fire with an anti-tank missile. Nineteen months of fighting and the mounting chaos engulfing the regime of President Bashar Assad have already spilled across borders with Lebanon, Turkey, and Jordan. The danger of drawing in Israel as well to a wider regional conflagration is one of the worst-case scenarios for the civil war. (more)