Sugar Cubes

Yesterday the 20th of November was the Universal Children’s Day. Happy anniversary children of the World, may you celebrate this year and every year with joy, health and peace…

Palestine Blogs took the opportunity to remember Palestine’s dear children who has been suffering under the Israeli occupation since as early as 1967 and wish them a happier anniversary next time.

By pharaoh.berger

On other issues, Palestine Blogs write about the withdrawal plan of UNRWA that is taking place after the Gaza Disengagement Plan. Refugees protested, claiming that aids are still needed as the city continues to live under occupation represented by the continuous air raids of the Israeli forces and the all-night-long terrorizing sound of Supersonic Booms.

“Creativity is a bless”, says I. Quoting Naseem Trawaneh, Palestinian refugees can be found now in Gumball Machanies.

Great news for Palestinians, you can now cross the borders to Egypt or move freely between Gaza and the West Bank. And on Novemebr 25 Gaza seaport construction would begin.

peacepalestine posted a very interesting story-like article by Zaki Boulos reflecting on the Palestinian elections. Zaki thinks maybe elections isn’t the answer.

Imaan from Living in Gaza City blogged Sheikhs who shake it!, thanks for the laugh Imaan. Also check photos of beautiful Gaza she took from her friend’s livingroom window.

Four days ago, the 17th of this month marked the day when Berlin Wall has fallen. It is now celebrated for two happy anniversaries, the falling of a wall and the day when Palestinian villagers united with Israeli and international activists to protest against the Apartheid Wall.

Hillary Clinton and Condoleeza Rice, two minds that think alike? well, at least when it comes to the Wall maybe. umkahlil says it is time the US taxpayers see the two ladies for what they are: “self-serving politicians with little regard for the human and civil rights of their fellow men and women.” As for Hillary, I’m not surprised a bit, not even if she suggested Palestinians eat cake. Besides, Hillary is fully aware of what she’s talking about, after all it is only to protect us all from terrorism, get it through your thick heads Palestinians, Israel occupational forces took only 5330 dunums of your land affecting more than 30% of your families, took full control of all your water supplies just to let terrorists (not you, terrorists!) die from thirst. They might also let you suffocate with gas everynow and then to calm you down. I’m sure the US can learn a lot about how to fight terrorism without torture from Israel. God help us…
Back to Hillary’s statement,Mike Odetalla, wrote a very profound letter to Hillary condemnig what she said.

On checkpoints, a must-see documentary filmed by Israelis is now available on DVD. Some parts of the reviews were really touching, I wonder what it’s like to watch it, or what it’s like to live it:

In a not particularly optimistic but entirely poignant conclusion, a group of young Palestinian men sit in the dark at a checkpoint, in the pouring rain and thunder. One of the men protests that he has been sitting there for ten hours…
By “The Electronic Intifada

The waiting is a central theme in this film. The Palestinians are waiting to go home, to go to work, to go to classes, to go anywhere, but they wait: anger and frustration fueling their discontent. Women and children turned away at the door and you hear a Palestinian man wondering out loud if these children are also terrorists. “Terrorists don’t come through the checkpoints. Isn’t that right?” he says.
By The Black Iris of Jordan

For another real story about checkpoints, read what the Bethlehem Blogger wrote about his visit to a zoo in Jerusalem.

Olympia sister of Rafah is building connections between the two cities right from Rafah. On November 29, the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, a video conference will be held with ORSCP delegates in Rafah. In Rafah Pundits also, Rachel Rebuilding Project in Gaza rebuilds hope in Gazans houses, one house at a time.

Some fresh news from the International Solidarity Movement says residents of Tubas area will hold an anti-checkpoint demonstration on tuesday.

Sheikh Ikrima Sabri, the Mufti of Jerusalem said that the walls surrounding Al-Haram Al-Sharif around Al-Aqsa mosque and the old city has been weakened by Israeli excavations. Rafah Pundits reported what Sheikh Sabri has said to Al-Jazeera.

On a follow up on Iman Al-Hams‘ case, her murderer was acquitted on the 16th of this month. The Israeli soldier shot Iman (13 year old) on her way to school putting 17 bullets into her body although was warned according to a tape that Iman was just a child who was scared to death. The soldier said he would have done the same even if she had been three years old, nevetheless, he was acquitted on all charges.

Related tags: Palestine, human rights, IOF, IDF, checkpoint, movie, Global Voices

According to a survey conducted by the WHO in 2004:

About 46% of the survey respondents stated that they had never smoked. 20% reported having successfully quit smoking, 7% smoked occasionally and only 27% smoked regularly. Those who smoked regularly consumed 19 cigarettes a day on average. Those who smoked occasionally smoked an average of 10 cigarettes per day. Among smokers who named a preferred brand, Viceroy and Marlboro were the most popular, named by 25% and 22% of respondents respectively. Rothmans and LM followed, at 10% each. The proportion of smokers among male respondents was almost twice as high as among female respondents, at 36.3% versus 19.3% respectively.

And on helping out patients by providing counselling, medications and assisting materials:

Physicians in Jordan agreed that health professionals should be and indeed are role models in their attitude to smoking. When combining the responses of those who “strongly agreed” and those who “agreed”, the opinion was nearly the same among smokers and non-smokers. Treated separately, agreement among non-smokers was stronger. There was a slight difference in agreement over the statement that physicians who smoke are less likely to advise their patients against smoking. While 77% of non-smokers “agreed” with this statement, only 70% of occasional or regular smokers did so.

On the availability of interventions to help patients stop smoking, counselling was the option reported as most available. Other interventions, such as medication or self-help materials were less readily available, with 3.3% and 21% of respondents reporting them as available, respectively. However, uptake, defined as use where available, was high for all three. The high uptake levels (69% for medications, 94% for self-help and 97% for counselling) suggest that health professionals use self-help, counselling and medication for their patients when they are available.

Health professionals’ assessment of their preparedness to offer smoking cessation counselling is a powerful predictor of whether they will offer it to patients. Among those who reported feeling “prepared” to counsel their patients on how to quit smoking, 86% did counsel their patients on the subject, 23% provided them with self-help material and 8% used medication. Of those who reported feeling “not at all prepared” to counsel their patients on smoking cessation, 36% counselled them, 10% provided self-help material and 4% used medication.

And what was the result of the survey?

Physicians in Jordan have excellent knowledge of the harms of smoking. They recognize the importance of non-smoking health professionals as role models to assist patients in quitting smoking. They also recognize the role models that health professionals represent to others.

When interventions are available, which was not usually the case in the survey, physicians offered a range of effective smoking cessation interventions to their patients. Expanding access to medication and self-help, coupled with improved smoking cessation counselling training for physicians, would expand coverage of effective smoking cessation interventions in Jordan.

More than 75% of health professionals in Jordan, both smokers and non-smokers, consistently agreed with the need to implement the elements of comprehensive tobacco control. For all but price increases, support was virtually unanimous. Thus, physicians (especially non-smokers) in Jordan are well positioned to advocate for and support the implementation of comprehensive tobacco control.

[Read the full article]

Related tags: Jordan, smoking, WHO