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Addressing the protest, Jhinaoui said it ignored “the context” of his service in Tel Aviv as part of a mission representing Tunisia. The mission, which has since been closed down, was opened following progress in peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians during the Oslo Accords. “I served in Tel Aviv at the request of the Palestinians,” he said.
But a representative of the bloc of 29 lawmakers who opposed the nomination said Jhinaoui was not fit to serve as minister because “his name is suspected of being tied to normalization” of relations with Israel.
In 2014, Tunisia’s then-tourism minister, Amel Karboul, faced rebuke in parliament for having visited Israel. She resigned following the incident.
Peter Chianca: Giant Space Asteroids II - The Revenge!
Last week's column on giant space asteroids elicited a sudden flurry of asteroid-related activity. Not among the asteroids, which are notoriously stubborn and can’t read, but among certain people who, like myself, do not want to be crushed and incinerated by them, not necessarily in that order.
Like most columnists, I started in this business for one reason and one reason only: to win the Nobel Prize for Column Writing. Then I discovered there was no Nobel Prize for Column Writing, so I decided that I actually started doing it to effect positive change in society. Thus far that’s gone about as well as the Nobel Prize thing, as evidenced by the lack of traction in my campaign to get us all jetpacks.
Until last week, that is. That’s when my column on giant space asteroids elicited a sudden flurry of asteroid-related activity. Not among the asteroids, which are notoriously stubborn and can’t read, but among certain people who, like myself, do not want to be crushed and incinerated by them, not necessarily in that order.
Granted, not all of the activity was useful. For instance, NBC News (motto: “Wait, what?”) ran a story about how the 1998 asteroid movie “Armageddon” was, as it turns out, unrealistic. Fourteen years well spent, I-Team!
Actually, they were reporting on a study out of the University of Leicester, where one 22-year-old master’s student said of the film, “After watching it back, I found myself being more skeptical.” He also surmised that Hollywood might be guilty of “falsification of the science to make movies more interesting.” In response, the University of Leicester changed its name and left town in the middle of the night.
But on other fronts the news was more positive, especially among the one federal agency that might actually be equipped to do something about the problem of deadly giant space asteroids: the Grain Inspection, Packers and Stockyards Administration.
1) “Rush Hour 3” cost $140 million.
1) The motto “The Sky Is Falling Now!” over a picture of a Tyrannosaurus Rex running from falling meteors.
The Gaiashield people, incidentally, are not thrilled with how President Obama has handled the giant space asteroid crisis so far. They even have a personal letter to him on their website, which reads, in part, “The Next Large Asteroid on its way to strike Earth is closing at A Million Miles A Day. Time is simply not on our side here … Tic Toc!” Say what you will about the Gaiashield Group, you have to admit the “Tic Toc!” was a nice touch.
But at least Obama seems to have a general idea that we should probably be doing something about giant space asteroids. According to Dale Brownfield of Gaiashield, who wrote me after reading my column, “I’m sure Romney still needs to be taken to school on this.” Most likely a private preparatory school that frowns upon blacks, gays and giant space asteroids.
Still, that brings me back to my point of last week: If Romney wants to become president, it seems to me all he has to do is come up with the $50 million to fund NASA’s asteroid spotting project. He could probably do that entirely from money he could find today around his house, under the couch cushions and on top of the car under the dog. I bet he’d even have plenty left over to spend on other projects.
Environment AUSSIES went into meltdown when the supermarkets’ plastic bag bans came into effect, and with good reason — Woolies and Coles violated an important unwritten rule.
Smarter Shopping COLES will continue to offer its heavy-duty plastic bags for free to help customers transition away from … plastic bags.
Money IGA supermarkets are the centre of many suburbs and towns across Australia. But the way they operate might be their death knell.
The Kansas State Board of Education urged the Legislature Tuesday to follow the law on school funding, which could require a $471 million increase, the Lawrence Journal-World reported. Walt Chappell (in photo) of Wichita was the only board member to vote against the recommendation, predicting it would be "dead on arrival" at the Legislature. But Jana Shaver of Independence argued that the board needed to "stand firm for our students and schools to fund what the law has required."
LOUDON, NH (TheSpread) – The NASCAR Sprint Cup Series returns to racing on Sunday with the Camping World RV Sales 301 from New Hampshire.
According to oddsmakers at Bovada.lv, both Jimmie Johnson and Denny Hamlin each are favored to win with 5/1 odds. Other short odds to win are Clint Bowyer and Jeff Gordon, who each have 8/1 odds.
Johnson is the current points leader by 49 over Bowyer. He has four wins and eight top 5s on the year. Johnson has won three times at this track and his average finish there is 9.5. His driver rating at New Hampshire is 105.8, which ranks third in the series.
Hamlin is 26th in the point standings, 320 points out of first. Hamlin is winless this year with three top 5s. Hamlin has won twice in New Hampshire and he has an average finish of 7.9 at the track. His driver rating there is 104.8, which ranks fourth in the series.
Bowyer is second in the point standings. He is winless on the year, but has seven top 5s. Bowyer has two wins at New Hampshire, with an average finish of 15.1 at the track, while his driver rating is 97.2, which ranks fifth in the series.
Gordon is 14th in the point standings, 171 points out of first. Gordon is winless on the year with four top 5s. Gordon has won three times at New Hampshire, and his average finish at the track is 10.5. His driver rating in Loudon is 109.9, which ranks second amongst current drivers.
The Camping World RV Sales 301 will take place Sunday, July 14 at 1:15PM ET from New Hampshire Motor Speedway. For complete odds and track information on this year’s race, see below.
Lincolnshire Police and the AA reported that the A111 Sutton Road, between Bilsby and Markby, is closed due to an accident which took place shortly after 2pm today (Thursday, March 28).
A Lincolnshire Police spokesman told the Leader: “A collision (single car involved) has caused damage to a power cable.
“The road is closed whilst work is ongoing to secure and fix it.
According to AA reports, there is a ‘blocked road and slow traffic’ in the area between Bilsby and Markby.
• If you have any information about the incident, call Lincolnshire Police on 101, quoting incident 229 of March 28.
The Baltimore Ravens won Super Bowl XLVII Sunday over the San Francisco 49ers and will in all likelihood be the team that host the 2013 season opening game. Should that indeed be the case, the Pittsburgh Steelers and New England Patriots would be considered the front runners to be their opponent.
The Ravens 2013 home opponents include the Steelers, Cincinnati Bengals, Cleveland Browns, New England Patriots, New York Jets, Green Bay Packers, Minnesota Vikings, and the Houston Texans.
You can easily assume that the Browns, Jets and Vikings won\’t be the team as none of them add the draw that NBC will be looking for. You can also likely rule out the Packers in addition as only once since 2004 has the league scheduled a game between an AFC and an NFC team to kick off a season. Even though the Texans and the Bengals have made the playoffs the last two years, neither adds the sexiness factor, so that leaves us with the Steelers and the Patriots as the two remaining teams to pick from to be the Ravens opening night opponent.
A Steelers-Ravens game certainly would give the draw that NBC is looking for, with a Patriots-Ravens game running a close second. Keep in mind that Ravens have faced the Patriots in the AFC Championship game the last two seasons, so a built-in story line certainly would exist, especially being as the two teams split those games.
The Steelers have opened up their season four times against the Ravens dating back to 1996 and the two teams split those games.
Heather Watson added lustre to what was already a golden year for British tennis on Sunday when she became the UK’s first winner of a Women's Tennis Association Tour singles title in 24 years.
The 20-year-old from Guernsey was four match points down but battled back to defeat Chang Kai-chen of Chinese Taipei in the final of the Japan Open in Osaka.
No British woman had won a singles title on the WTA Tour since Sara Gomer managed the feat in California in 1988.
Gomer, 48, who retired from professional tennis in 1992, the year Watson was born, last night spoke of her surprise that it had taken so long for another Briton to match her achievement.
Gomer, who married a businessman called John Palumbo soon after leaving tennis and had three children with him, said her family took priority over the game. “Now I’m a fat housewife who plays a bit of golf,” she joked.
Watson missed out on the doubles title in Osaka hours after her singles win, but spoke of her pride at her victory, saying Sunday ranked as “one of the best days of my life”.
"I've worked so hard for this moment my whole career - that's why I practised so hard, ran all those miles and lifted all those weights, for moments like this,” she said.
"Britain has been breaking quite a few records recently, so I'm happy I could break another one today. I'm proud to do this for my country."
Watson, whose win takes her above Laura Robson to become the top British women’s player in the world rankings, has achieved her success without the pushy parents often associated with the game’s young prodigies.
Her parents, Ian and Michelle Watson, made huge sacrifices so she could get the best coaching in the world, paying for her to go to the prestigious Nick Bollettieri tennis academy in Florida when she was just 12 and later moving to the US themselves to support her flourishing career.
However, they never put pressure on her to win and have even stayed away from some of her biggest tournaments, including this year’s Wimbledon, to avoid unsettling her.
Her mother, who is originally from Papua New Guinea, met her Manchester-born father when he was working in the Pacific nation’s capital, Port Moresby, in 1988.
Watson first became interested in tennis when she was a toddler watching her parents play at their club in Guernsey, and took up the sport when she was seven.
Aged nine, she asked her mother and father for £10, which without telling them she used to enter a softball tennis contest at a local funfair. Her parents were astonished when she came back home a few days later with a trophy, having won the competition.
Watson left home at 12 to board at the Bollettieri academy, now known as the IMG Academy, but never suffered from the homesickness that some other leading players, including Maria Sharapova, experienced on arriving there as young children.
The player has described her father, a former managing director of Guernsey Electricity, as her “idol”. “He’s just always so calm, and he says no matter how I do, he’ll be proud of me,” she has said.
Mr Watson has described how he “cried his eyes out” at Guernsey airport when his wife flew out to Florida to live with their daughter in 2008 after she began travelling the world on the international tennis circuit.
However, the family remained very close. They talked every day over the internet and Mr Watson visited America as often as he could before moving there full-time after he retired in 2010.
Watson became the British under-14 champion but her real breakthrough came when she won the US Open girls’ junior singles title in 2009.
She has charmed tennis fans with her passion on the court and sense of humour off it: after becoming the first British woman to make it through to the third round of Wimbledon for a decade this year, she put her success down to a week of eating smoked salmon and eggs for breakfast.
Watson combines her brilliance as a player with brains. She graduated top of her class from Pendleton High School in Florida in 2009, and says she would have studied business at university if she had not made a success of her sport.
Away from tennis, she is passionate about fashion, and describes Serena Williams and Beyonce as her style icons.
(Reuters) - Johnson & Johnson said on Wednesday it would buy Auris Health Inc for $3.4 billion in cash, gaining access to the privately held company’s surgical robotic scope used in respiratory procedures and the detection of lung cancer.
The deal marks J&J’s expansion into the healthcare robotics market that is expected to reach nearly $12 billion by 2023, and pushed down shares of Intuitive Surgical Inc , the current leader in minimally-invasive robotic surgery.
J&J has sold some divisions such as diabetes care, as it tries to focus on and improve sales at better-performing businesses like cancer treatments.
“We are encouraged to see J&J moving more aggressively in the robotics field, which has been a gap for its medical device business,” Wells Fargo analyst Larry Biegelsen said.
Sales in J&J’s medical device unit have been recovering since turnaround efforts began in 2016, and the company now expects that unit to achieve above-market growth in 2020.
Auris was founded by surgical robotics pioneer Frederic Moll, who also co-founded Intuitive Surgical. Moll will join J&J after its acquisition closes, the company said, but did not disclose what role he would play.
J&J’s shares were up marginally at $134.24 in midday trade, while Intuitive Surgical fell as much as 2.5 percent to $526.36 as analysts said Auris could become a formidable competitor given J&J’s commercial scale.
Auris’s flagship product is a robot used by surgeons via a controller to direct a scope through a patient’s body with cameras.
The device, called Monarch, was approved by U.S. regulators last year for diagnostic and therapeutic bronchoscopic procedures, where an instrument is inserted into the nose or mouth.
Auris initially focused on lung cancer, the leading cause of cancer death worldwide.
J&J said the acquisition would complement its purchase last year of Orthotaxy, a privately held developer of software-enabled robotic technology for surgery.
J&J’s Ethicon unit, which will absorb Auris, has a partnership with Alphabet Inc’s Verily Life Sciences, under which the companies formed a surgery-focused company called Verb Surgical Inc in 2015.
“Investors have been yearning for an acquisition for JNJ’s MedTech and while this entity may not have been top of mind, it complements JNJ’s Ethicon franchise and its respiratory health focus,” BMO Capital Markets analyst Joanne Wuensch said.
J&J’s agreement also includes additional payments to Auris of $2.35 billion, based upon Auris hitting certain milestones, which J&J did not specify.
The Justice Department announced charges against two for making a Connecticut ATM spit out cash.
How Long Did the US Government Know about Spectre and Meltdown?
The largest CPU bug in history caught the Defense Department by surprise. Or not.
Users were worried about more than just typos.
Defense leaders won’t completely rule out the possibility. But it’s a very, very, very remote possibility.
The notorious form of cyber theft has reached the United States.
And most of them could have been avoided with basic cyber hygiene.
The nation-state-run campaign being called Dark Caracal has been ongoing, undetected for years, despite not being all that sophisticated.
Future nuclear weapons will be more sophisticated and better integrated with other equipment. That has benefits and drawbacks.
Sen. Ben Sasse wants Attorney General Jeff Sessions to testify on the issue.
The potential footprint makes 2014’s Heartbleed look like an op-forces training exercise.
Russian-backed psychological cyber warfare will only get better.
OK, Say Someone Hacks into the US Power Grid. Then What?
A joint research project between the Department of Energy and a geographic analytics company is mapping just how far the repercussions could spread.
The iPhone X is easily Apple's most hyped device in years, and now that preorders for the new phone are starting, we're taking a second look at another new iPhone that's already available to buy: the iPhone 8 Plus.
Credit: AppleSure, it doesn't have the overhauled design or a few of the cutting-edge features that make the iPhone X so compelling, but the 8 Plus is a worthy device in its own right. Plus, you don't have to wait in line to snag one.
We compared the iPhone X and iPhone 8 Plus in six categories to see which is worth your money.
The iPhone X's edge-to-edge display has captured most of the attention this iPhone launch season, but the elegant glass back is just as stunning as the nearly bezel-free front. Apple extended that all-glass aesthetic to its entire 2017 lineup, including the iPhone 8 Plus.
The 8 Plus wins bonus points for coming in three colors, as opposed to the iPhone X's limited range of two: silver and space gray. The iPhone 8 Plus comes in those two colors plus gold, which is more of a pearlescent champagne tone compared to the gold shades of past iPhones.
Close-up of the iPhone X's thin bezels. Credit: AppleBut the iPhone X packs a larger, 5.8-inch screen in a smaller, sleeker package than the iPhone 8 Plus, which sports a 5.5-inch display. The X weighs 6.1 ounces and measures 5.6 x 2.8 x 0.3 inches. The 7.1-ounce 8 Plus is considerably larger by comparison, with a 6.2 x 3.1 x 0.3-inch frame. This means the X is easier to hold and use with one hand.
Our Pick: iPhone X. We wish it came in more colors, but the X packs a larger display in a smaller frame with practically no bezels. It's a brand-new look for the iPhone, and it's undeniably better than the 8 Plus' design.
The iPhone X delivers Apple's first OLED smartphone display, and there's no contest: It figures to be the best iPhone display ever.
On paper, the X's 5.8-inch, Super Retina (2436 x 1125 pixels) display is impressive. The 5.5-inch LCD Retina HD (1920 x 1080 pixels) display in the 8 Plus is smaller than the X's but in a bigger package. The 8 Plus' display isn't low-quality by any standard — in fact, it's still one of the best out there — but it pales in comparison to the display on the iPhone X. We went hands-on with the X in September and discovered that the next-gen iPhone display is even more stunning in real life than it is on a spec sheet.
iPhone X. Credit: AppleApple brought the iPad's True Tone display to the iPhone X, which means the device senses ambient light and adjusts its brightness accordingly.
The iPhone X display does have one controversial feature: a black notch where the front-facing camera is housed. That notch intrudes on the display and could make watching videos or playing games a little awkward, but we're going to spend more time with the X to see if the notch is noticeable enough to make a difference.
Our Pick: iPhone X. The high-res OLED display is pretty close to perfect, and the notch isn't a deal breaker (at least not for us).
The iPhone X and 8 Plus both sport rear-facing 12-megapixel wide-angle and telephoto lenses; the X stacks its cameras vertically, while the 8 Plus cameras are side by side. Both phones also offer a new Portrait Lighting feature, which takes Portrait Mode's bokeh effects to the next level with post-processing light effects such as Natural, Studio, Stage Light and Contour.
iPhone 8 Plus portrait mode. Credit: Tom's GuideBut the X shines when it comes to the new 7-MP TrueDepth front-facing camera. That lens enables Face ID, the facial recognition unlocking mechanism that replaces Touch ID. Its capabilities are also more fun — just look at iMessage's new Animoji, animated emoji whose facial expressions mirror your own. Developers such as Snapchat can take advantage of the TrueDepth camera, too, so you'll see more augmented-reality features come to life.