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May 20, 2013

Richard A. Serrano: Is Meir Kahane's assassin now a changed man?

Hannan Adely: Town raises Palestinian flag at City Hall

Melissa Healy: Genetic copies of living people from embryos no longer science fiction
Morgan Housel: When smart investors do stupid things

Sharon Saloman, M.S., R.D.: Hunger games: Eat more, weigh less, without starving

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Jews Inducted into Rock Hall of Fame; Anton Yelchin co-stars in New "Trek" film; Kutcher (but not Kunis) visits Israel; Jewish TV Star Praises Jewish Rap Star

The Kosher Gourmet by Cathy Pollak: WARNING: This WALNUT CAKE WITH PRALINE FROSTING, perfect for afternoon coffee, is addicting
May 13, 2013

Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Why the giving of the document that would permanently change the world could only be done in desolation

David G. Savage: Church-state, literally? Supreme Court weighing public school graduation in a church

Emily Alpert: Recession dragged down birth rates for less-educated women
Morgan Housel: The deep downside of home ownership

Peter Teffer: Will Dutch police soon be stalking cybercriminals on your computer?

Heidi McIndoo, M.S., R.D.: Meatless 'meat' can have its own set of problems

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: Celebrate! This must-try appetizer is delicate yet has depth of flavor: Corn-Leek Cakes with Caviar, Smoked Salmon and Creme Fraiche

May 10, 2013

Rabbi Berel Wein: Be all that you should be

Caroline B. Glick: The dirty little secret about Israel's Arabs

Mona Charen: Hawking's Moral Calculus: The man and the movement he embraces
Morgan Housel: The biggest retirement myth ever told

Sandi Doughton: Eyes may provide new insight into brain problems

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : The Great Gatsby's Jewish Ties; Jews in the "Time 100 list" List; People's Most Beautiful Women

The Kosher Gourmet by Linda Gassenheimer: A sweet-hot meal: Pear salsa spices up salmon

May 8, 2013

Peter Ford: Why China is welcoming both Israel's Netanyahu and Palestinians' Abbas

Warren Richey: Obama administration quietly backs out of appeal over new contraceptive mandate

Fred Weir: At Kerry-Putin meeting, US-Russia relations thaw --- a tad
Amanda Paulson: Study reveals sad truths about community colleges

Harvard Health Letters: Evidence weak that zinc, echinacea are beneficial

The Kosher Gourmet by Leela Cyd Ross : Almost too pretty to eat, this colorful salad with Sicilian inspiration will tickle the taste buds and delight your visual sensibility

May 6, 2013

Edmund Sanders and Patrick J. McDonnell: Think Israel's objective in Syria is to weaken Assad or embolden the rebels? Think again

Brian Bennett: Israeli airstrikes may show weakness in Syrian defense

Michael Ollove: Millions of ex-felons, parolees and those on probation are about to be entitled to tax-payer paid health coverage
Karen Kaplan: Most men can skip PSA test for prostate cancer, urologists say

Kimberly Lankford: How to track down a lost life insurance policy

Dream of Mars exploration achievable, experts say

The Kosher Gourmet by Susan M. Selasky: EGGPLANT WRAPS are an easy, sumptuous and scrumptious meal

May 3, 2013

Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Human Courage and the Unavoidable, Disturbing Text

Steven Emerson: Attorney General Fights CAIR in Court, Lauds it in Public

Mediterranean diet helps beat dementia: study
Harvard Health Letters: When to be screened for a hearing problem

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Iron Man's Jewish Connections; Marc Maron's New TV Show; Martin Landau Grows Up with Israel; Shalom, Allan Arbus

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: A sweet surprise for Mother's Day dessert

May 1, 2013

Jonathan Rosenblum: An Improbable Journey to Orthodoxy

Jonathan Tobin: Blame Obama, Not Israel for Syria Push

Kids, kittens the Same? With employee perks at struggling Internet pioneer Yahoo! it's hard to tell
Halena M. Gazelka, M.D.: Mayo Clinic Medical Edge: What you need to know about implanted pain relief devices

Sandy Kleffman: Artificial kidney offers hope to patients tethered to a dialysis machine

Jessica Shugart: When it comes to math, MRIs may be better than IQs

The Kosher Gourmet by Mario Batali: The celebrated chef on how high-maintenance ASPARAGUS RISOTTO need not be

April 29, 2013

Roy Gutman: Poland's new Jewish museum celebrates life, doesn't revisit Holocaust

Mark Clayton: Terrorism in America: Is US missing a chance to learn from failed plots?

Kim Murphy: Boston Bomber's 'Svengali' Revealed
Morgan Housel: He's rich, smart and old: Listen to him

Thomas Salinas, D.D.S.: Mayo Clinic Medical Edge: The safety of amalgam fillings

Harvard Health Letters: Tomatoes and stroke protection

Pete Spotts: Tiny satellites + cellphones = cheaper 'eyes in the sky' for NASA

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: Swing into spring with lemon cream pie

April 26, 2013

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: The world is a mirror

Caroline B. Glick: Time to confront Obama

Clifford D. May: Defense in the Age of Jihadist Terrorism
Kimberly Lankford: New strategies ease pain of paying for long-term care insurance

Howard LeWine, M.D.: Ask the Harvard Experts: Too much ibuprofen?

Sharon Palmer, R.D.: How to feel your best -- with plenty of energy, a healthy weight and optimal mental and physical function -- without driving yourself batty

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom: Jewish Major Leaguers, 2013; New Movies and Comedy Show; Shalom, 'Lumpy' (Leave it to Beaver)

The Kosher Gourmet by Emily Ho : A bright and cheerful salad to herald the warmer months ahead

April 24, 2013

Steven Emerson: Boston Bomber Exposes Islamist Secret

Morgan Housel Admit it: No one has any idea what's going on
Harvard Health Letters: Can you get headaches from headache medication?

Kerri-Ann Jennings, M.S., R.D.: How to easily get more Omega-3s in your diet

Melissa Healy: Pot in a pill: All the pain relief without the smoke

The Kosher Gourmet by Susan Russo: Chipotle Chili Butternut Squash Soup is bold, zesty, hot

April 22, 2013

Ken Dilanian: Counterterrorism's future is unclear

US man departing country arrested on terror charges
Barbara Williams: An unorthodox but growing treatment in a 9-year-old's battle against cancer

P.J. Skerrett, M.D.: How to recognize a good whole grain product

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom: Teen actor Jonah Bobo in New Flick: Hunky James Wolk on Mad Men; Erich Segal's Daughter Writes Prize-Winning Jewish Novel


Jewish World Review Nov. 28, 2006 / 7 Kislev, 5767

A hit job worthy of the KGB

By Wesley Pruden


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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | When the wolf at the door is big enough, the easiest way to deal with him is to invite him in for supper and hope he's content to eat just the wife and kids.


This is the strategy much of the West, particularly Europe, has adopted for dealing with the threat of the Islamic fascists to put the world under Shariah law, and it may be the way the leaders of the West choose to deal with a resurgence of fascism in the remnants of the old Soviet Union.


Our English cousins are in justifiable dudgeon over the death of Alexander Litvinenko, the one-time colonel in the Russian secret police who fled Russia, landed in London and became an Englishman (sort of). When Mr. Litvinenko started asking too many questions about the murder of a Russian journalist who was making trouble for the Kremlin, he was poisoned with radioactive polonium 210 and doomed to an agonizing death.


Nearly everybody assumes, rightly or wrongly, that the Russian government, probably with the assent if not the encouragement of Vladimir Putin, ordered the hit and assigned the hit man. The hit has all the marks of a job by the KGB — or the Federal Security Service, as the Russians now call the KGB — even down to the sinister and esoteric choice of poison, polonium 210, which is familiar to nuclear scientists. Swallowed, breathed and taken through a wound, polonium 210 destroys the internal organs, and death is slow, painful and sure. There is no antidote.


There's speculation that Mr. Litvinenko's death will change the relationship between Russia and the West, or at least between Russia and the leaders of the West who still have a pulse. The incident recalls in dramatic fashion the bad old days of the Cold War, suggesting that the "new" Russia is not much different from the old one. The Putin-controlled Russian television networks reported the death in the same surreal way that the old communist commentators reported the sudden deaths of inconvenient critics of the state: Mr. Litvinenko did not die of poison, but of "intrigues" in the Russian exile community in London. Mr. Litvinenko was "a pawn in a game that he did not understand."


Murder becomes merely a bureaucratic exercise in Mr. Putin's "new" Russia. His secret police are known to take a close interest in critics of the "new" Russia. Boris Berezovsky, once the deputy chief of the Russian security council but now an exile in Britain, befriended Mr. Litvinenko when he arrived in London. He learned of the boast of the Russian security police that it "knows what he eats for breakfast, where he has lunch and where he buys his groceries."


Earlier this year, the Russian legislature enacted a law authorizing the Russian president to order the termination with extreme prejudice of "terrorists" in foreign countries. Unnecessary, but bureaucrats everywhere like to have a piece of paper in hand, duly signed and decorated with the appropriate signatures, ribbons and seals.


Vladimir Putin is clearly not the man the West imagined it saw when he assumed power, nor is he any longer likely the man George W. Bush once described as "a man I can do business with." Says David Satter, a Russian scholar at the Hoover Institution writing in the Wall Street Journal: "In the last six years, the makeup of the ruling elite in Russia has undergone a dramatic change. Once in power, Mr. Putin filled the majority of important posts with veterans of the security services, many with ties to him dating back to his work in St. Petersburg. ... Russia was already highly corrupt under Boris Yeltsin, but according to IDEM, an independent Russian think tank, with the rise of oil prices, the level of corruption in Russia between 2002 and 2005 increased 900 percent. The result of these developments was that Mr. Putin created [a state security apparatus] ruling class. As this class became rooted, the victims of contract killers began to include some of the most prominent political figures in the country."


Mr. Bush, like Tony Blair, may still regard Vladimir Putin as a man he can do business with. Presidents and prime ministers must have a certain polite tolerance for people they rightly loathe, however difficult civility may be. It's a cost, you might say, of doing business. The rest of us must hope that that civility is all it is. Mr. Putin presides over what looks like "a mafia of peace," which is about as harmless as "the religion of peace."

Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.

JWR contributor Wesley Pruden is editor in chief of The Washington Times. Comment by clicking here.

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