Israeli-Palestinian peace talks to resume after three years

By Arshad Mohammed and Ori Lewis

WASHINGTON/JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel and the Palestinians plan to resume peace negotiations this week for the first time in nearly three years after an intense effort by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry to bring them back to the table.

The talks are scheduled to resume in Washington on Monday evening and on Tuesday and will be conducted by senior aides to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, the State Department said.

"Both leaders have demonstrated a willingness to make difficult decisions that have been instrumental in getting to this point. We are grateful for their leadership," Kerry said in a statement.

Middle East analysts voiced skepticism that the talks might lead to a peace treaty to end the more than six-decade conflict that has defied two decades of U.S. efforts to broker a solution.

Still, the resumption of negotiations is a rare moment of good news in the Middle East for the Obama administration, which has struggled to formulate a policy to try to end the civil war in Syria or to facilitate a democratic transition in Egypt.

Even getting the Israelis and the Palestinians to agree to resume talks required great effort by Kerry, who made six peace-making trips to the region in the last four months - an unusual amount of time - to coax them back.

The last piece of the puzzle came together when the Israeli Cabinet on Sunday approved the release of 104 Palestinian prisoners, with 13 ministers voting for the release, seven against and two abstaining, an Israeli official said.

OBAMA'S INVOLVEMENT NEEDED?

The last round of direct negotiations broke down in late 2010 in a dispute over Jewish settlement construction in the West Bank, land that Israel seized in a 1967 war, along with the Gaza Strip, which the Palestinians want for a state.

It is unclear how the United States hopes to bridge the core issues in the dispute, including borders, the future of Jewish settlements on the West Bank, the fate of Palestinian refugees and the status of Jerusalem.

While commending Kerry for his determination, Shibley Telhami, Anwar Sadat Professor for Peace and Development at the University of Maryland, said President Barack Obama would have to get involved if the talks were ultimately to succeed and the United States would have to offer its own ideas for a solution.

"At some point, the central player in this saga is not going to be Netanyahu, it's not going to be Abu Mazen (Abbas), it's not going to be John Kerry, it's going to be Barack Obama," he said. "So far, it's not clear that ... the president is prepared to take the kind of risk that would move this forward."

In a statement, State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said initial talks were planned for Monday evening - Israeli media said these would take place over dinner at Kerry's home - and on Tuesday.

Psaki suggested the round of talks in Washington would be to chart a path forward, rather than to leap directly into the thorny issues that need to be resolved.

After his latest round of shuttle diplomacy, Kerry announced on July 19 in Amman, Jordan, that the parties had laid the ground to resume negotiations on the so-called "final status" issues that must be resolved to end the dispute.

"The meetings in Washington will mark the beginning of these talks," Psaki said. "They will serve as an opportunity to develop a procedural work plan for how the parties can proceed with the negotiations in the coming months."

PRISONER DEAL

Earlier on Sunday, Netanyahu had urged divided rightists in his Cabinet to back the prisoner deal.

"This moment is not easy for me, is not easy for the Cabinet ministers, and is not easy especially for the bereaved families, whose feelings I understand," he said when the Cabinet met, referring to families who have lost members in militant attacks.

"But there are moments in which tough decisions must be made for the good of the nation and this is one of those moments."

Israeli Channel 1 television said prisoners would be released in three stages, depending on progress in the talks, with a group of Israeli citizens left until the last stage.

Abbas has demanded the release of prisoners held since before a 1993 interim peace accord took effect. Israel has jailed thousands more Palestinians since then, many for carrying out deadly attacks.

The prisoner release would allow Netanyahu to sidestep other Palestinian demands, such as a halt to Jewish settlement expansion and a guarantee that negotiations over borders will be based on boundaries from before the 1967 Middle East war, when Israel captured the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem.

Hundreds of protesters from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) staged a rally against the resumption of peace talks, clashing with police in the West Bank city of Ramallah, the seat of Abbas's Palestinian Authority.

PFLP activists also demonstrated in Gaza and chanted: "Listen Abbas, our land is not for sale. ... The (Palestinian) cause will never be resolved except by the rifle."

Aaron David Miller, a former U.S. peace negotiator who works for the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars think tank in Washington, said he was impressed by Kerry's tenacity.

"He has invested so much in this now, and even through expectations are so low, he is in an investment trap, he really can't let it fail now," Miller said. "Which means he'll have to go to extreme lengths to keep this thing afloat."

(Additional reporting by Allyn Fisher-Ilan and Ari Rabinovitch in Jerusalem, Ali Sawafta in Ramallah and Nidal al-Mughrabi in Gaza; Editing by Alistair Lyon and Stacey Joyce)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/israel-approve-prisoner-deal-push-revive-palestinian-talks-105131958.html

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Toyota struggles to maintain lead on rival GM

Autos

Paul A. Eisenstein The Detroit Bureau

3 hours ago

Toyota

It's been a tough year for Toyota, which hoped to boost its sales numbers with the rugged Toyota Tundra.

For a vehicle with a payload capacity of 2,000 pounds and the ability to tow a 10,000-pound trailer, the 2014 Toyota Tundra will be expected to do some heavy lifting -- and not just on the job site.

It?s been an unusually tough year for Toyota, both here and abroad. While the maker revealed Friday that it had narrowly retained its global sales lead, the gap between the Japanese giant and rival General Motors markedly narrowed and while GM gained 4 percent for the first six months of 2013, Toyota was down 1.2 percent.

It hasn?t helped to be caught up in an ongoing political dispute between China and Japan that even saw rioters burn a Toyota dealership. But the maker has also had some unexpected setbacks in what has long been its most profitable market, the U.S., where two key lines, the midsize Camry and the Prius hybrid ?family,? suffered unanticipated sales declines. Meanwhile, the outgoing Toyota Tundra pickup has failed to take advantage of the revival of the U.S. truck market, the fastest-growing segment in the industry this year.

?Toyota will be perfectly positioned to take advantage of that growth,? once it launches a major update of the Tundra next month, predicted Bill Fay, the head of the flagship Toyota division for the U.S. market, during a media drive of the new pickup. He expects a 30 percent jump in sales next year. In a market dominated by Detroit, that?s little more than an after-thought.

Read more: Ford Hangs Out Help Wanted Sign but Where are All the Applicants?

When the outgoing Tundra was introduced in 2007, many analysts had big expectations for the new truck. So did Toyota, which built a dedicated factory in San Antonio, Texas to handle production. But after initially topping 200,000, sales quickly plunged. While much of that was the result of the overall crash in pickup demand during the recession, Fay admits the truck has lagged the segment?s revival.

And it?s not the only product challenge the maker is facing. The Camry, which has been the nation?s best-selling passenger car for more than a decade, suffered a 2 percent decline during the first half of the year even as the rest of the market surged. Meanwhile, the Prius, itself the long-dominant hybrid model, was off 5 percent between January and June.

Fay downplayed both problems, though he acknowledged both of Toyota?s key models are facing tougher competition. Ford, in fact, has made a successful point of targeting the various Prius models with an assortment of its own gas-electric models, including the Fusion Hybrid and C-Max Hybrid, which set sales records for the first half.

The Japanese maker has had to respond by cutting prices on the Camry and by ramping up incentives on both the midsize sedan and the various Prius hybrids. But it can afford to do so, noted analyst George Peterson, chief analyst with AutoPacific, Inc., noting that the weakened yen has given the Japanese maker more cash to play with.

Read more: VW, GM Top Latest JD Power Survey of "Surprised, Delighted" Car Buyers

While Toyota has been increasing incentives selectively, it still has some of the lowest givebacks in the market, an average $1,660 per vehicle in June, according to TrueCar.com, compared to $2,537 for the industry overall.

And Fay suggested Toyota could further rein in that spending with the launch of four new models in 2014, a list that includes not just the Tundra but an all-new version of the Corolla, the 800-pound gorilla in the compact sedan segment.

Read more: Chevy Impala Wins Respect, Endorsement from Consumer Reports

But analyst Peterson says Toyota has other worries that aren?t so easy to dismiss. The maker has been lagging in recent AutoPacific studies that focus on not only quality, reliability and dependability ? traditional Toyota strengths ? but also on the factors that surprise and delight consumers.

That was echoed by the results of the new J.D. Power APEAL study which also focuses on what the industry calls ?things-gone-right? factors. While Volkswagen and Chevrolet led the industry, the Toyota brand landed fifth from the bottom. Perhaps equally disconcerting, GM also topped the more traditional J.D. Power Initial Quality Survey last month, handily outperforming Toyota.

?The competition isn?t standing still,? said Peterson. ?Toyota has been building acceptable appliances for decades. Now they have to make products that are exciting and sexy.?

Read more: Mini Vision Concept Offers Hint of All New Microcar Coming Later this Year

Indeed, the newly redesigned Toyota Avalon was supposed to be a prime example of what Toyota could do, underscoring the oft-stated goal of CEO Akio Toyoda to put more ?passion? into the brand. But that isn?t as easy as it might seem, as Toyota was reminded when influential Consumer Reports magazine ranked the new Chevrolet Impala tops in the full-size sedan segment, besting the new Avalon.

There are other challenges facing Toyota. For one thing, caution analysts, it has become almost wedded to the Baby Boom generation and is struggling to attract younger, hipper buyers. That was supposed to be the role of Scion. The ?brand-within-a-brand? has clearly been bringing in younger blood ? but despite scoring a hit with the new FR-S sports car, overall Scion sales have fallen sharply the last several years and Toyota is struggling to come up with a rescue strategy.

Read more: Acura Set to Reveal Running Prototype of Reborn NSX Supercar

Despite the challenges, Toyota brand boss Fay insisted he?s ?pleased with the position we?re in? going into the 2014 model-year.

And, indeed, the maker remains a significant force to be reckoned with, echoed analyst Peterson, noting that his research finds Toyota?s reputation has fully recovered from the hits it took during the unintended acceleration scandal of a few years back.

That said, Peterson and other observers warn that despite its size and power, the Japanese giant has some significant and mounting challenges ahead ? enough to strain even a heavy lifter like the new Toyota Tundra.

Copyright ? 2009-2013, The Detroit Bureau

Source: http://feeds.nbcnews.com/c/35002/f/663286/s/2f436664/sc/2/l/0L0Snbcnews0N0Cbusiness0Ctoyota0Estruggles0Emaintain0Elead0Erival0Egm0E6C10A765668/story01.htm

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Draco Hydra aluminum bumpers for the Galaxy S4 and HTC One

It's time for a quick look at the Draco aluminum bumpers for two of the hottest Android phones available?? the Samsung Galaxy S4 and the HTC One. These are nicely crafted combinations of plastic and metal that wrap around your smartphone in the usual bumper style, leaving the screen and the back of the phone exposed.?

And they do so with a premium price. You need to know that up front. The Hydra bumper for the Galaxy S4 runs $99 direct, and the Draco One bumper is $79. These aren't cheap. But neither do they feel cheap. That's evident as soon as you pull them from their boxes.

That's where a little bit of frustration comes in, however. Despite having different names, the bumpers for the GS4 and HTC One are pretty similar in design, as well as how you install them. Both come already put together, and there are no real instructions for how to take them apart. You're left having to reverse engineer the instructions on the back of the box. That's maybe not a huge deal, but neither is it all that intuitive. A simple piece of paper that says "Locate the hex wrench in the bottom compartment of this box and use it to remove the hex screws" would have gotten the job done.

Or maybe all that's obvious and I'm just used to less-complicated accessories. But I'd err on the side of helping folks out.

Anyhoo. You use the extremely small hex wrench to remove the extremely small screws that are pocketed into the corners of the bumpers. They could come out easily enough. From there, you work the two parts of the bumpers apart. Be careful not to lose any of the pads for the power button or volume rocker?? our HTC One power button pad is clear and managed to go missing for the first couple days. Side the two parts back together, and tighten the screws again. (Be sure not to overtighten them.) And that's it.?

What you have now is a rather odd-feeling bumper. It looks classy enough. But it drastically changes the shape and feel of the phone, particularly on the HTC One. The sides bow in ever so slightly, almost giving the impression that you just HULK SQUEEZED your phone. The bumpers are pretty angular, which affects the feel of the Galaxy S4 more than the HTC One. One way or another, this all takes some getting used to, especially since we're making a couple of pretty big phones even bigger here.?

Functionally speaking, things seem to work just fine. The buttons on the bumpers all work as you'd expect (again, so long as you don't manage to lose any in the installation process like I did, but I'm pretty sure that was operator error). Casual use didn't reveal interference from the aluminum. There's a little Ducati sticker that comes with the Hydra bumper for the Galaxy S4, but we have absolutely no intention of sticking it to our phone.

If you're willing to drop nearly $100 on a bumper that significantly chances the way your phone looks and feels, the Draco bumpers are stylish and nicely manufactured ways to do it. Just take care with the installation process, and you'll be good to go.

Source: http://www.androidcentral.com/draco-hydra-aluminum-bumpers-galaxy-s4-and-htc-one

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After crash, Spanish officials defend lucrative train industry

In the aftermath of last week?s deadly train derailment in Spain, as the human tragedy gives way to the security and legal investigations, all sides are working hard at defending their interests ? especially the state rail industry.

Spain has the world?s second biggest high-speed railway system with 3,100 kilometers (1,900 miles), trailing only China. It?s one of the country?s signature success stories that President Barack Obama lauded. It's also a profitable high-tech industry, precisely the kind Spain needs to remodel its construction-dependent economy.

At least 79 people lost their lives, and more than two dozen remain in critical condition, after the train connecting Madrid and the northwestern Galician city of Ferrol on the Atlantic Ocean derailed just minutes from entering the Santiago station with more than 220 on board.

The train was reportedly traveling at more than twice the speed limit and the driver, who is under police custody, is due to testify in court Sunday. It was Spain?s worst train accident in more than 40 years, although rail travel here, and generally in Europe, is statistically safer than any other mode of transportation.

Behind the scenes though, the rail industry and officials are going out of their way to defend the safety and record of the high-speed system given the economic stakes. Many others, including rail unions and fellow train drivers, are disputing the sole responsibility of the Santiago driver, even if there is little doubt the train was speeding.

The court will weigh these and other narratives, often conflicting, that have emerged from the tragedy.

The investigation into the accident has only begun: The train equivalent to black boxes haven?t been reviewed. But Transport Minister Ana Pastor said drivers are responsible for disregarding safety guidelines, echoing the broader government conclusion that human error caused the tragedy.

The two state railway companies, Renfe in charge of trains and Adif in charge of rail infrastructure, have also publicly ruled out safety issues and suggested the accident was the driver?s fault. The train makers, which include state-owned companies, also suggested speed was the cause.

PROTECTING A CASH COW?

Indeed, some of the preemptive defense of Spain?s railway industry is coming from officials, to the point that some are raising conspiracy theories.

?IT?S OBVIOUS THERE ARE A LOT INTERESTS INVOLVED, INCLUDING A LOT OF ECONOMIC INTERESTS FROM SOME COMPANIES OR HIGH-SPEED [SYSTEM] SUPPLIERS,? ALBERTO NU?EZ FEIJ?O, REGIONAL LEADER OF GALICIA, SAID CANDIDLY ON SATURDAY.

Mr. Feij?o was referring to several multi-billion euro contracts that Spanish consortia are competing for around the globe, including a 12 billion euro plan to connect Rio de Janerio and Sao Paulo in Brazil ahead of the 2016 Olympics.

Some mega projects that have been awarded include one in Kazakhstan and a 6.8 billion euro line to connect Medina and Mecca in Saudi Arabia. Spanish companies are eyeing a 14 billion euro connection between Moscow and St. Petersburg in Russia and one in California to connect Sacramento and San Diego, along with other proposed projects.

BIGGER INVESTMENT THAN ROADS

The Spanish rail industry?s combined revenue in 2012 was 4.8 billion euros, of which it exported 2.8 billion euros, after 21 percent growth. The industry employs 18,000 people. And the government has allocated some 25 billion euros in state investment in its infrastructure plan until 2024, more than in road infrastructure.

The stakes for both private and public interests is best illustrated through the prized Brazil contract. One of the conditions to qualify to tender offers is to have had no fatal accidents in the previous five years.

That explains why Renfe, Adif, and other companies, along with government officials have all insisted that the Santiago derailment is not technically a high-speed one because it happened on conventional tracks that the train switched into a few kilometers back as it entered Santiago.

Indeed, the train and tracks involved don?t travel at the top velocities of other high-speed rails in the country. The locomotives used in this route are specially designed to be able to switch between conventional and high-speed tracks ?which are wider and slower.

Still, the state railway companies include the segment as part of its high-speed rail system, the first leg of work to connect Madrid and Galicia that will end in 2018.

RECOMMENDED: Test your Iberia IQ: How much do you know about Spain and Portugal?

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Source: http://news.yahoo.com/crash-spanish-officials-defend-lucrative-train-industry-155549403.html

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Intent to harm: Willful acts seem more damaging

[unable to retrieve full-text content]How harmful we perceive an act to be depends on whether we see the act as intentional, reveals new research.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_health/~3/n7Nea9swENg/130729083354.htm

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Dos ejemplares se imponen en Cl?sico 'Tito' Neuman

Los caballos 'El Kalibre' y 'El Quiche' cruzaron a la par la l?nea de meta para ganar el Cl?sico Augusto 'Tito' Neuman realizado en la tarde de hoy en el Hip?dromo Presidente Rem?n.

Los equinos, montados por los jinetes Omar Hern?ndez y Luis Arango, llegaron a la meta y repartieron $2.80 y $2.20 a boleto ganador. Ambos fueron escoltados por los ejemplares'El Respetuoso' y 'El Morisqueto'.

La carrera se realiz? en distancia de 1800 metros y reparti? $22,400 en premios.

Source: http://www.tvmax-9.com/deportes/noticias_detalle.asp?id_news=114772

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