Contentious Border Shifts for BTR

By | October 29, 2004

Israeli and Jordanian officials met on Sunday to discuss border changes to make way for the Bridging the Rift Center, a science research facility that will be constructed in partnership with Cornell.

The Center will be a joint undertaking between Cornell, Stanford and the New York City-based Bridging the Rift Foundation. A groundbreaking ceremony, which was considered a small milestone in fostering friendly relations between Israel and Jordan, took place at the Israeli-Jordanian border this summer.

“The groundbreaking was a very special event because this was an opportunity for the leaders of both Jordan and Israel to publicly claim their support for the BTR initiative,” said Jim Haldeman ’65, senior associate director for international programs at the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. “So, for the first time in a very long time, there were two ministers from Jordan and two from Israel sitting on a stage together.” Haldeman has been acting as a liaison between Cornell and the BTR Foundation since 2000.

Actual construction of the Center is expected to begin sometime next year. Sunday’s discussions led to a mutual agreement between Israel and Jordan, in which each nation agreed to move their borders by approximately 1.2 miles in order to make room for the Center. This way, the Center will occupy land that is claimed by neither Israel nor Jordan.

Discussions of the border changes were very timely, as Oct. 26 marked the 10-year anniversary of the signing of a historic peace treaty between Israel and Jordan. People involved in the BTR initiative are hopeful that it will play a part in encouraging peace and stability in the volatile region.

“It’s a very, very small step, but the concept is to bring scientists, postdocs and students together from Jordan and Israel and eventually from any and all countries in the Middle East to come together and study together and to do research together, and part of that process is building camaraderie and trust,” said Haldeman.

The Center will feature a collection known as the Library of Life, the aim of which is to hold the genetic material of all forms of life on Earth. The project will begin with scientists and students collecting and cataloguing genetic material from the nearby Dead Sea.

Students on campus with an interest in Israel are hopeful that this week’s border agreement and the entire BTR initiative will foster positive Arab-Israeli relations in the Middle East.

“It makes me very proud to be a Cornellian,” said Dan Greenwald ’05, president of the Cornell-Israel Public Affairs Committee. “It’s a great model for future peacemaking in the region. A project like this shows what’s possible when leaders think outside of the box to make peace and build understanding between peoples.”

One of the major goals of BTR is to provide Israeli and Jordanian students with an opportunity to study together on neutral grounds. Planners have been discussing the possibility of using magnetic cards in lieu of passports to allow students and researchers to enter the facility.

“For us, one of the most important components is the student component,” said Haldeman. “The students are the future of this initiative and the future of the region.”

Archived article by Andrew Beckwith
Sun Senior Writer

Hockey Trounces Army

By November 1, 2004

In 2003, it took the men’s hockey team six games to register its first home win of the season. Also last season, the squad scored seven goals in a single game only once — a 7-0 drubbing of Princeton on the road. Friday night, the Red forcefully demonstrated that this year, things are going to be different. No. 14 Cornell opened the 2004-05 season with a fireworks display — collecting goals from six different players en route to a dominant 7-1 victory over an overmatched Army (2-3-1) team at Lynah Rink. Junior Chris Abbott led the explosive offensive effort with a career-high four points (two goals and two assists) and sophomore winger Mitch Carefoot added a short-handed goal — the first for Cornell in more than two years. “Our overall goal going into the game was to work hard,” said Cornell head coach Mike Schafer ’86. “We wanted to be a team that out-worked them. I thought we achieved that goal.” The Black Knights struggled to keep up with the nationally-ranked home team, finishing on the short end of a ludicrous 49-9 shot count. Army goaltender Treye Kettwick barely had time to catch his breath, making 42 saves — including 19 in the second period — during a game that played out almost exclusively on Army’s half of the ice. “[Cornell] was in the zone so much I got pretty worn down,” said Kettwick, who recorded a career-high in saves. “I felt pretty good overall, but there were a few shots that should have been stopped.” Head referee Alex Dell gave each squad ample opportunity to perfect their special teams play, calling 14 total penalties throughout the physical contest. Both the Red and the Black Knights had seven power-play chances, but only Cornell managed to capitalize — rookie defensemen Sasha Pokulok banged home the Red’s second goal of the game (the eventual game-winner) while Cornell held a man advantage early in the first period. Army was plagued by four penalties in the opening period alone. “It doesn’t help us when we have to kill penalties against teams like Cornell,” said Army head coach Brian Riley. “Those guys are on a different level than we are.” Sophomore netminder David McKee started for the Red, stopping six Army shots before being replaced by freshman Troy Davenport with 9:13 left in the third period. Although not nearly as busy as his counterpart Kettwick, McKee did not falter when the Black Knights were awarded a 5-on-3 power play roughly six minutes into the game. Nursing a 2-0 lead at that point, McKee turned away a number of quality Army scoring chances and preserved the Red’s momentum. “We have been working on playing shorthanded in practice a lot,” McKee said. “I felt prepared for the 5-on-3.” Cornell sprinted out of the gates in the first, obtaining goals from senior defenseman Jeremy Downs and Pokulok after only three and a half minutes of play. With just under two minutes remaining in the opening period, Abbott netted his first goal of the evening by sending a loose puck right outside the crease over a sprawling Kettwick. Sophomore winger Mark McCutcheon was credited with the assist, his only point of the evening. The second period appeared less eventful on the stat sheet, but the Red came inches away from adding to its lead multiple times in the initial ten minutes. Senior blueliner Charlie Cook blasted a rocket from outside the right circle four minutes into the period, a shot that beat Kettwick cleanly but clanked off the low left post. When Army’s Jeff Fearing took an interference call a minute later, Cornell’s line of Shane Hynes, Matt Moulson and Topher Scott delivered an onslaught of shots that Kettwick turned away. Finally, at the 14:13 mark of the second, defenseman Jon Gleed extended the Red’s lead by roofing a shot in close over Kettwick’s stacked pads. The junior finished the night with a goal and two assists. “[Scoring] is not really my role,” Gleed said. “But it is nice to start off the season with three points.” The Black Knights showed some signs of life early in the third, at last beating McKee 30 seconds into the period to make the score 4-1. Senior winger David Andros took a pass from Fearing and launched a low shot from the left circle between McKee’s pads. Yet, unfortunately for Army, the remainder of the contest belonged exclusively to the Red. “Coming into the game we knew it was going to be a challenge,” Riley said. “We simply ask our guys to work as hard as they can and never give up.” For Cornell, the highlight-reel worthy goal of the game came with a man down, when Gleed sailed a perfect pass across the front of Army’s net to an unguarded Carefoot. Kettwick hopelessly dived for the puck, but the Red’s sniper had little difficulty putting it away and cementing the Cornell lead. Abbott and Hynes also added goals in the third, ensuring that the Red’s first victory of the season was a blowout. However, the players were reluctant to gloat too much after the convincing win. “It was a nice way to get going,” Carefoot said. “But tomorrow is a new day.” Archived article by Kyle SheahenSun Assistant Sports Editor
Tel Aviv: 'The City that Never Sleeps'

By November 1, 2004

Avi Tabib, Hero of Mike’s Place Suicide Bombing Looking at Avi Tabib, I would never have known he had survived a suicide bombing only months earlier on April 29, 2003. Without a scratch on his muscular figure, he speaks with the confidence of a man who has never suffered a setback in his life. His attitude: “Fuck Trauma.” Tabib, son of Yemenite immigrants, is the security guard at Mike’s Place, an English-speaking bar located directly behind the American Embassy on Tel Aviv’s beach boardwalk amid a myriad of other bars, restaurants and shops. I sat with Tabib outside the bar on a breezy evening as he spoke between bites of dinner. “It was Tuesday Jams night,” he remembered, “when all the guys bring their guitars on stage and have a good time. I was outside, as usual, checking people as they came in. Then a guy I didn’t recognize came by, saying he just wanted to get a drink. I didn’t like the look in his eyes — he seemed like a troublemaker. So I told him, ‘Sorry, pal, not tonight.’ To my surprise, he tried to force his way in, and I started to block him. I managed to push him all the way back to the sidewalk, and then it happened … he detonated.” “I woke up in a hospital room four days later,” he continued. “I was so disoriented you could’ve told me I’d been hit by a truck, and I’d have believed you.” Mike’s Place is the Israeli “Cheers” — the bar where “everybody knows your name.” Then again, many of the Mike’s Place employees and regulars have the same name — Dave — and are known instead by their nicknames — “Outdoor Dave,” “Indoor Dave,” “Behind-the-bar Dave,” “Uptown Dave,” “Downtown Dave,” “Outback Dave” and “UK Dave.” The “Mike’s Place family,” as the regulars called it, lost three of its members that night: Ron Baron, 23, Yanai Weiss, 46, and Dominique Hass, 29. One of the regulars, Zeev, had shared his memories with me earlier: “I didn’t know Ron, but I knew Yanai and Dominique very well. Yanai was just an all-around good guy, great guitar player. He could jam with anybody. And Dom …” he said, holding back tears. “You know those people who can light up a room with just their presence? She was one of them.” A plaque hangs outside in their memory. “We had a packed house that night,” said Tabib. “60 or 70 people. Had that guy made it inside, they’d all have been dead — not injured, dead.” There was something unusual about the Mike’s Place bomber, Asif Muhammad Hanif. He wasn’t a Palestinian; he wasn’t even an Arab. Hanif was a Pakistani-Muslim from Britain who had flown in to carry out the attack. He had been an active member of the International Solidarity Movement, a left-wing pro-Palestinian organization. A few months after the bombing, Hanif’s wife was acquitted by a British court on charges that she had aided and abetted him. Before I left Mike’s Place that night, Tabib reflected on his past military service in the Gaza Strip: “You know, Benjy, it doesn’t make you feel big inside to break into a family’s house in the middle of the night to search for weapons. To those kids you are the fucking devil. Self-defense is rarely pleasant or pretty. But, tell me … what other choice do we have?” After hearing that question asked repeatedly with frustration, the Israeli government gave its answer — a 10-foot high, 380-mile long answer. The Israeli Los Angeles Suicide bombings in Tel Aviv are only the latest chapter in a history that includes aerial bombardment from Egyptian planes in the 1948 War of Independence and 39 Scud Missiles shot at the city from Iraq during the 1991 Gulf War. But Tel Aviv, like Israel itself, doesn’t look like a war zone. It’s a bustling Western city with skyscrapers, universities, museums and a stock exchange. One century ago, it was nothing but a sand dune. First settled in 1909 by 60 Jewish families, Tel Aviv is today home to 360,000 people and a million more in its surrounding metropolitan area. While Jerusalem is Israel’s diplomatic and spiritual capitol, Tel Aviv remains its commercial and cultural center. If Jerusalem is Israel’s Rome, then Tel Aviv is its Milan; Jerusalem the heart, Tel Aviv the brain. In this self-proclaimed “city that never sleeps,” it’s easy to forget you’re not in America, and not just because most Israelis are fluent in English. You look around and see Planet Hollywood and the Hard Rock Caf