This week in the news

August 31: At least 15 people were killed in twin suicide bus bombings in Beersheba. President Bush defended Ariel Sharon at a campaign rally in New Hampshire. An FBI probe into the alleged leaking of classified Pentagon material to pro-Israel lobbyists focuses on more than one man, media reports said.. Ariel Sharon presented Likud Party lawmakers with a timetable for the approval of his Gaza withdrawal plan. September 1: Israel implicated Syria in the double suicide bombing in Beersheba. Israeli troops imposed a closure on the West Bank city of Hebron. Muammar Gadhafi promised to compensate Jews who were forced out of Libya. September 2:. Israel's deputy defense minister hinted that Israel might strike Syria in retaliation for the double suicide bombing in Beersheba. Thousands of Palestinian security prisoners in Israel ended their hunger strike. September 3: President Bush mentioned the U.S.-Israel friendship in his speech accepting the Republican presidential nomination. The United Nations Security Council ordered Syria to withdraw its troops from Lebanon and called for Hezbollah to be disbanded. Some in Baghdad would like to establish diplomatic relations with Israel, Iraq's new ambassador in London said. The Anti-Defamation League called for a probe of leaks to the U.S. media regarding a Pentagon employee accused of passing documents to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. September 7: Israeli forces killed 14 Palestinians at a Hamas training camp in Gaza. Syria reportedly offered to resume peace talks with Israel. Magen David Adom is hosting counterparts from the Red Cross and Red Crescent in Israel.

TAKE ACTION: Media Monitoring Workshop to be held September 19

The A Team is proud to announce its participation in a special media workshop run by CAMERA, the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting.   To be held in conjunction with our next regularly scheduled meeting on September 19, and co-sponsored at no charge to Israeli advocates by our local media monitoring group PRIMER, this event is intended to enlarge the body of media-watchers in the country. Highlighted goals of the workshop include:  (1)  how to get people involved in responding to unfair reports about Israel, (2) the importance of "proactivism", (3)  how to get the media interested in your story ideas (4) how to include a local angle, (5) how to turn an anti-Israel event into publicity for our side, (6) how to generate videos for public access cable,  and (7) how to get politicians involved.

The workshop will be run by Lee Green, the Director of CAMERA's National Letter-Writing Group, part of an organization that is a non-denominational media watchdog with over 50,000 members. Lee analyzes news coverage regarding Israel and the Palestinian territories and organizes nationwide letter-writing campaigns to counter inaccurate and unbalanced reporting and to promote more complete context.  She founded the letter-writing group for CAMERA in 1990 and now has thousands of letter-writers in 44 states and 9 countries.

The symposium will take place at 11:00 am on Sunday September 19 at Philip Benjamin Tower, 250 58th Street North in St. Petersburg, just across the driveway from Congregation B’nai Israel. There is plenty of visitor parking, and we will meet just off the lobby, on ground floor.  Phone 347-5191.

Advocacy for Israel Committee Information

The Advocacy for Israel Committee was formed in September of 2001 to organize pro-Israeli activities and to rally support in the form of Hasbara. The A Team’s next meeting is Sunday September 19, at a special location and time: Menorah Manner / Phillip Benjamin Tower, 11:00 As noted above, along with PRIMER, we will host a media training workshop with a national expert on the topic. Please join us and make a difference for Israel! See the reverse for news on an exciting speaker coming to CBI on September 27. For more information, email A Team Chairmen Jay Epstein (jhe@tampabay.rr.com) or Sheldon Scheinert (Sheldo123@aol.com), or call the CBI office at 381-4900.