Polish deputy PM to resign after losing party election

WARSAW (Reuters) – Poland’s Deputy Prime Minister Waldemar Pawlak said he would resign from the government after unexpectedly losing a battle for the leadership of the junior coalition partner on Saturday, but there was no threat to the stability of the coalition.

Janusz Piechocinski, a 52-year-old member of parliament who beat Pawlak by 547 to 530 votes in the election at the PSL congress, said he wanted to keep the coalition with the Civic Platform (PO) intact.

Pawlak, who is also the economy minister in Prime Minister Donald Tusk‘s government, had led the PSL for seven years. Serving twice as a prime minister in the past two decades, he has been PSL’s most prominent politician. He said he would hand his resignation to Tusk on Monday.

“PSL will be a rational coalition partner, a rational and wise participant of the parliamentary debate,” Piechocinski told reporters after the vote, adding he wanted Pawlak to retain his position in government.

“Nothing that happened is a challenge to the government, to the coalition.”

The party hit the headlines in July after media released recordings that showed suspected corruption among its party members. It led to the resignation of Agriculture Minister Marek Sawicki.

PSL members quoted by local media said Piechocinski won largely because of a campaign that targeted delegates from outside Warsaw and other larger cities.

(Reporting by Maciej Onoszko; Editing by Alison Williams)

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Israel hits Hamas buildings, shoots down Tel Aviv-bound rocket

GAZA/JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israeli aircraft bombed Hamas government buildings in Gaza, and the “Iron Dome” defense system shot down a Tel Aviv-bound rocket on Saturday as Israel geared up for a possible ground invasion.

Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist group that runs the Gaza Strip, said Israeli missiles wrecked the office building of Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh – where he had met on Friday with the Egyptian prime minister – and struck a police headquarters.

Along the Tel Aviv beachfront, volleyball games came to an abrupt halt and people crouched as sirens sounded. Two interceptor rockets streaked into the sky. A flash and an explosion followed as Iron Dome, deployed only hours earlier near the city, destroyed the incoming projectile in mid-air.

With Israeli tanks and artillery positioned along the Gaza border and no end in sight to hostilities now in their fourth day, Tunisia’s foreign minister travelled to the enclave in a show of Arab solidarity.

In Cairo, a presidential source said Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi would hold four-way talks with the Qatari emir, the prime minister of Turkey and Hamas chief Khaled Meshaal in the Egyptian capital on Saturday to discuss the Gaza crisis.

Egypt has been working to reinstate calm between Israel and Hamas after an informal ceasefire brokered by Cairo unraveled over the past few weeks. Meshaal, who lives in exile, has already held a round of talks with Egyptian security officials.

Officials in Gaza said 43 Palestinians, nearly half of them civilians including eight children, had been killed since Israel began its air strikes. Three Israeli civilians were killed by a rocket on Thursday.

Israel unleashed its massive air campaign on Wednesday with the declared goal of deterring Hamas from launching rockets that have plagued its southern communities for years.

The Israeli army said it had zeroed in on a number of government buildings during the night, including Haniyeh’s office, the Hamas Interior Ministry and a police compound.

Taher al-Nono, a spokesman for the Hamas government, held a news conference near the rubble of the prime minister’s office and pledged: “We will declare victory from here.”

Hamas‘s armed wing claimed responsibility for Saturday’s rocket attack on Tel Aviv, the third against the city since Wednesday. It said it fired an Iranian-designed Fajr-5 at the coastal metropolis, some 70 km (43 miles) north of Gaza.

“Well that wasn’t such a big deal,” said one woman, who had watched the interception while clinging for protection to the trunk of a baby palm tree on a traffic island.

In the Israeli Mediterranean port of Ashdod, a rocket ripped into several balconies. Police said five people were hurt.

Among those killed in airstrikes on Gaza on Saturday were at least four suspected militants riding on motorcycles.

Israel’s operation has drawn Western support for what U.S. and European leaders have called Israel’s right to self-defense, along with appeals to avoid civilian casualties.

Hamas, shunned by the West over its refusal to recognize Israel, says its cross-border attacks have come in response to Israeli strikes against Palestinian fighters in Gaza.

RESERVIST CALL-UP

At a late night session on Friday, Israeli cabinet ministers decided to more than double the current reserve troop quota set for the Gaza offensive to 75,000, political sources said, in a signal Israel was edging closer to an invasion.

Around 16,000 reservists have already been called up.

Asked by reporters whether a ground operation was possible, Major-General Tal Russo, commander of the Israeli forces on the Gaza frontier, said: “Definitely.”

“We have a plan … it will take time. We need to have patience. It won’t be a day or two,” he added.

A possible move into the densely populated Gaza Strip and the risk of major casualties it brings would be a significant gamble for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, favorite to win a January national election.

Hamas fighters are no match for the Israeli military. The last Gaza war, involving a three-week long Israeli air blitz and ground invasion over the New Year period of 2008-09, killed over 1,400 Palestinians, mostly civilians. Thirteen Israelis died.

But the Gaza conflagration has stirred the pot of a Middle East already boiling from two years of Arab revolution and a civil war in Syria that threatens to spread beyond its borders.

“Israel should understand that many things have changed and that lots of water has run in the Arab river,” Tunisian Foreign Minister Rafik Abdesslem said as he surveyed the wreckage from a bomb-blast site in central Gaza.

One major change has been the election of an Islamist government in Cairo that is allied with Hamas, potentially narrowing Israel’s manoeuvering room in confronting the Palestinian group. Israel and Egypt made peace in 1979.

“DE-ESCALATION”

Netanyahu spoke late on Friday with U.S. President Barack Obama for the second time since the offensive began, the prime minister’s office said in a statement.

“(Netanyahu) expressed his deep appreciation for the U.S. position that Israel has a right to defend itself and thanked him for American aid in purchasing Iron Dome batteries,” the statement added.

The two leaders have had a testy relationship and have been at odds over how to curb Iran’s nuclear program.

A White House official said on Saturday Obama called Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan to discuss how the two countries could help bring an end to the Gaza conflict.

Ben Rhodes, White House deputy national security adviser, told reporters that Washington “wants the same thing as the Israelis want”, an end to rocket attacks from Gaza. He said the United States is emphasizing diplomacy and “de-escalation”.

In Berlin, a spokesman for German Chancellor Angela Merkel said she had spoken to Netanyahu and Egypt’s Mursi, stressing to the Israeli leader that Israel had a right to self-defense and that a ceasefire must be agreed as soon as possible to avoid more bloodshed.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is expected to visit Israel and Egypt next week to push for an end to the fighting in Gaza, U.N. diplomats said on Friday.

The Israeli military said 492 rockets fired from Gaza have hit Israel since the operation began. Iron Dome intercepted another 245.

In Jerusalem, targeted by a Palestinian rocket on Friday for the first time in 42 years, there was little outward sign on the Jewish Sabbath that the attack had any impact on the usually placid pace of life in the holy city.

Some families in Gaza have abandoned their homes – some of them damaged and others situated near potential Israeli targets – and packed into the houses of friends and relatives.

(Additional reporting by Dan Williams and Douglas Hamilton in Tel Aviv, Allyn Fisher-Ilan in Jerusalem, Jeff Mason aboard Air Force One, Writing by Jeffrey Heller; editing by Crispian Balmer)

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Wii U Will Launch With 24 Games This Sunday

Assassin’s Creed III

A version of the latest chapter in the Assassin’s Creed saga, a week after it was released on other console.

Click here to view this gallery.

[More from Mashable: Xbox Live Celebrates 10 Years of Connecting Gamers]

Nintendo’s newest console is out this Sunday, and there are already people lining up outside retailers to get one.

There are 24 games available for the Wii U at launch. Some are highly anticipated Nintendo staples, like New Super Mario Brothers U, and some are interesting and creative titles from third-party developers, like Scribblenauts Unlimited and ZombiU. Many games already out on other systems are being released for the Wii U as well, including Assassin’s Creed III and NBA 2K13; some of these games even have extra functionality that’s been added to take advantage of the Wii U GamePad.

[More from Mashable: Competitive Gaming Seeing TV-Levels of Viewership in 2012]

If you don’t see a game in the gallery above that you thought was coming to the Wii U, it’s because many announced games will be available in the “launch window”, a broad period from now until March. That’s when games like Pikmin 3 and LEGO City Undercover will come out.

If you haven’t preordered a Wii U from a large retailer, many places will still have them available at launch day. Expect long lines at larger retailers though.

Are you planning on purchasing a Wii U this weekend, and what games do you most want to buy? Let us know in the comments.

This story originally published on Mashable here.

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RIM to spice BlackBerry 10 AppWorld with local flavors

WATERLOO, Ontario (Reuters) – Research In Motion is pushing for app quality, not quantity, with its make-or-break BlackBerry 10 devices set for launch on January 30, and targeting applications to customers in various regions.

RIM’s projected 100,000 apps – a record for any new platform at launch – will still be a fraction of those available on Apple Inc or Google Inc devices.

But it is a stronger showing than RIM’s PlayBook tablet computer which was slammed at its 2011 launch for a dearth of apps and incomplete software.

In an interview with Reuters on Wednesday, RIM Chief Executive Thorsten Heins admitted that app libraries play a crucial role in the success or failure of smartphones. But he said the game is not just about numbers.

“The tactic we are deploying is by country and by region. We are aiming to have the most important 200 to 400 apps available, because many applications are regional and they really do have a regional flavor,” Heins said.

RIM says it aims to offer both the most popular applications in the market, and also those most relevant to Blackberry aficionados – people Heins described as hyper-connected multi-taskers who need to get things done.

RIM’s ultra-secure BlackBerry was once the smartphone of choice for government and corporate elites. But rivals have taken giant bites out of RIM’s market share, especially in North America, and the company’s stock has slumped. The BlackBerry remains popular in many emerging markets, partly for its popular BBM messaging system.

With this in mind, RIM has hosted events with developers across the globe.

“We’ve done 30 jam conferences in various cities all around the world, to get the bucket filled with meaningful local apps and not just a huge bunch of applications that you collect and throw at your audience,” he said. “It is a very, very targeted approach.”

Heins, who has met with customers and carriers in a series of whirlwind global tours, came across as relaxed and confident in the interview, in RIM’s Waterloo headquarters.

Speaking rapid fire English with just a hint of an accent from his native Germany, he acknowledged that RIM’s fate may depend on the success of BB10, but he said feedback from clients has been very encouraging.

RIM hopes its new line of BB10 smartphones will help it claw back market share from Apple’s iPhone and devices powered by Google’s Android operating system. Developers say like what they see, but analysts are not convinced that RIM’s gamble on BB10 will succeed.

BIG NAME DRAWS

In terms of numbers, RIM’s app offering will remain far behind the Apple and Google app stores, each of which boast over 700,000 apps. But Heins said he was not worried.

“In my view it is really short-sighted to say, you have 600,000, you have 400,000 and you only have 100,000 apps, so you are not good,” he said.

“Look at how many actually get downloaded. … BlackBerry App World today is still the most profitable portal for application developers – it has the highest number of paid for downloads.”

In a small dig at his rivals, he added: “We don’t have 1,500 Solitaire apps. That is not what Blackberry is about.”

RIM has already said it plans business focused apps from the likes of Cisco WebEx, Box, SAP and Blackboard, as well as music and movie apps like TuneIn, Nobex and Popcornflix and gaming apps from developers like Gameloft, Halfbrick and Paw Print Games.

Heins has said social networks such as LinkedIn, Foursquare, Twitter and Facebook will all have apps for BB10 at launch. But he declined to name any of the other big name apps that RIM will have on board come launch day.

“Allow me to talk to you about this on January 30, otherwise I’m losing a lot of thunder,” he said.

(Editing by Janet Guttsman and Richard Chang)

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Scott Dadich Named Top Editor at Wired

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – Scott Dadich has been named editor-in-chief of Wired magazine, it was announced Friday by Condé Nast editorial director Tom Wallace.

The appointment marks a homecoming for Dadich, who served as Wired’s creative director from 2006 to 2010. He replaces Chris Anderson as the publication’s top editor.

Since 2010, Dadich has served as vice president, editorial platforms and design at Conde Nast. In this role, he oversaw the creative efforts to bring Condé Nast’s storied brand portfolio to emerging digital channels.

“Scott has been at the forefront of the company’s digital innovation for the past three years, developing the design for a digital magazine that has become an industry standard,” Wallace said. “His return to Wired, where he served as creative director and won three National Magazine Awards for Design, will ensure that it continues its pace-setting growth.”

While Dadich was creative director at Wired, the magazine received three consecutive National Magazine Awards for Design. He is the only creative director ever to win both the National Magazine Award for Design and the Society of Publication Designers Magazine of the Year Award for three consecutive years (2008-2010).

“I’m excited to return to Wired, which has had such a tremendous impact on my life and my career,” Dadich said. “I’m honored to have the chance to build on the legacy of innovation that Louis and Jane started some 20 years ago. And I am grateful to my friend and colleague Chris and the incredible Wired staff. I look forward to finding new opportunities to delight and surprise the Wired community, both with the stories we tell and in the ways in which we tell them.”

Prior to Wired, he was the creative director of Texas Monthly, which was nominated for 14 National Magazine Awards during his tenure and won for General Excellence in 2003.

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HIV-Positive Women Benefit from Human Papillomavirus Vaccination

Doctors don’t usually advise young women infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, to have the vaccine for human papillomavirus. The thinking is that these women, who are already sexually active, probably have already been exposed to HPV. Therefore, the vaccine is unlikely to do any good.

That approach may be a mistake, according to research published in the Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes.  In the study of HIV-positive women, researchers found that many are not infected with some of the most serious strains of HPV and could still benefit from vaccination.

HPV is the most common sexually transmitted virus. There are many strains of HPV, but four — types 16, 18, 6 and 11 — are linked to the development of disease. Types 19 and 19 account for about 70 percent of all cervical cancers while types 6 and 11 cause 90 percent of cases of genital warts. The vaccine protects against those four strains and is recommended for girls before they become sexually active, ages 11 through 26.

MORE: HPV Vaccine Benefits Those Who Do and Don’t Get the Shots

The new study, by Dr. Jessica A Kahn, an associate professor of pediatrics at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, examined 99 HIV-positive women ages 16 to 23 receiving their first HPV vaccination. She found that 75 percent of the women had an existing HPV infection with at least one type, with 54 percent testing positive for a high-risk type. However, when examining the two types that cause 70 percent of cervical cancers (HPV-16 and HPV-18), the researchers found that nearly half of the women had no existing infection with either type and showed no evidence of exposure to them.

“Health care providers may hesitate to recommend HPV vaccines after a girl starts having sex,” Kahn says. “However, our results show that for a significant number of young women, HPV vaccine can still offer benefits. This is especially important in light of their HIV status, which can make them even more vulnerable to HPV’s effects.”

MORE: Doctors Urge HPV Vaccine for Boys

Protection against developing cervical cancer is especially important in these women, she notes, because HIV status increases the risk of cervical cancer and makes it harder to treat.

HPV vaccination has only been available for about six years, and knowledge on the benefits of the  three-shot series is still emerging. Another study, published this week in the Journal of Infectious Diseases found a significant decrease of HPV prevalence in Australia since that country implemented widespread vaccination.

Women ages 18 to 24 were examined with Pap screening throughout the country in the two years (2005-07) before vaccination became available and in the two years after (2009-10). There was a 20 percent overall decrease in genital HPV prevalence and a whopping 77 percent decrease in the targeted strains — types 6, 11, 16 and 18 — following the advent of  the vaccine program.

MORE: HPV Vaccine Found to Have Minimal Side Effects

Moreover, HPV was detected in only 5 percent of vaccinated women in the post-vaccine era compared to 15.8 percent in unvaccinated women in the post-vaccine era and 28.7 percent of women in the pre-vaccine years.

Question: Do you think enough people who are eligible for the HPV vaccine get the shots? Tell us what you think in the comments.

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Shari Roan is an award-winning health writer based in Southern California. She is the author of three books on health and science subjects.

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Banks criticised over CPP sales

16 November 2012 Last updated at 19:00 ET

By Bob Howard Moneybox

Banks must share the blame for mis-sold card protection, after a regulator fined the firm CPP £10.5m, says an influential MP.

John Mann, who sits on the House of Commons Treasury Select Committee, said most policies were sold when bank customers rang up to activate their cards.

The products were supposed to protect people against identity theft.

CPP has apologised and said it has taken steps to change its practices.

CPP sold a card protection product, which cost about £35 a year, that was designed to cover losses if a card was lost or stolen.

It said customers would benefit from up to £100,000 of insurance cover, but customers were already covered by their banks. Generally, cardholders are not liable for unauthorised card payments on lost or stolen credit and debit cards.

A second product was sold for £84 a year which was designed to cover costs if the customer’s identity was stolen.

Continue reading the main story

“Start Quote

There’s no question there was deception in the way they were sold”

End Quote John Mann MP Treasury Select Committee member

Many customers were put in contact with CPP when they rang a number on their new bank card in order to activate it. Many thought they were talking to their bank, but they were in fact being put in touch with a salesperson from CPP.

CPP then used the opportunity of the call to offer card protection insurance. If the customer bought the product, the bank got a commission.

John Mann MP told Radio 4′s Money Box programme: “There’s no question there was deception in the way they were sold and there was deception on the profit margins which weren’t revealed to people. People were being diddled.”

The Financial Services Authority (FSA) found that CPP overstated the risks and consequences of ID theft when this insurance was being sold. During the period of mis-selling between January 2005 and March 2011, CPP sold 4.4 million policies and generated £354m in gross profit, the FSA said.

Bank scrutiny

Some 18.7 million policies were renewed during the same period, generating an income of £656m.

John Mann believes the regulator could have acted more quickly: “It’s taken an extremely long time. The amount of money which the banks were profiteering on was enormous. This was almost a way of banks printing profits for themselves.”

He welcomed the FSA’s action and hopes the regulator will take tough actions against any bank which acts against the interests of its customers: “I think they need to do more of this. I think they need to get underneath the behaviour of the banks. They have a duty to their customers to act openly, transparently and honestly.”

Santander, RBS/NatWest, Barclays and HSBC have all had business partnerships with CPP during the period the FSA investigated. They all said they were in discussions with the FSA over the issue.

However, the fine from the FSA does not include this and only relates to the hundreds of thousands of direct sales by CPP.

‘Sorry’

New CPP chief executive Paul Stobart said the company had taken steps to overhaul its practices.

Continue reading the main story

CPP products

• Card protection: Covers the cost of unauthorised use of lost or stolen cards. However, these costs are generally covered by a bank


• ID theft protection: Gives access to credit reports and various legal fees. The FSA says that risks and consequences of ID theft were overstated by CPP

“We are deeply sorry for the errors and wrongdoings of the past and are paying a heavy penalty through what is a large fine,” he said in a statement.

“The next steps for the team are to complete the transformation programme and to rebuild our business and our reputation in the market.”

It has adhered to a FSA request to stop sales of the insurance products, unless they are part of a package. It has also stopped trying to retain the business of customers who ring to cancel their policies.

Customers who are on auto-renewal of the product now have a 60-day cooling off period to change their mind over buying the insurance, compared with a 14-day option previously.

Details about compensation for customers are still being discussed by CPP, some of its main business partners, and the FSA. Some customers will be written to by CPP.

The FSA has agreed to CPP paying the fine in instalments, owing to the company’s financial position. It has been told to complete the payments by December 2014.

BBC News – Business

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Israel moves on reservists after rockets target cities

GAZA/JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israeli ministers were on Friday asked to endorse the call-up of up to 75,000 reservists after Palestinian militants nearly hit Jerusalem with a rocket for the first time in decades and fired at Tel Aviv for a second day.

The rocket attacks were a challenge to Israel‘s Gaza offensive and came just hours after Egypt‘s prime minister, denouncing what he described as Israeli aggression, visited the enclave and said Cairo was prepared to mediate.

Israel’s armed forces announced that a highway leading to the Gaza Strip and two roads bordering the enclave would be off-limits to civilian traffic until further notice.

Tanks and self-propelled guns were seen near the border area on Friday, and the military said it had already called 16,000 reservists to active duty.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu convened senior cabinet ministers in Tel Aviv after the rockets struck to decide on widening the Gaza campaign.

Political sources said ministers were asked to approve the mobilization of up to 75,000 reservists, in what could be preparation for a possible ground operation.

No decision was immediately announced and some commentators speculated in the Israeli media the move could be psychological warfare against Gaza’s Hamas rulers. A quota of 30,000 reservists had been set earlier.

Israel began bombing Gaza on Wednesday with an attack that killed the Hamas military chief. It says its campaign is in response to Hamas missiles fired on its territory. Hamas stepped up rocket attacks in response.

Israeli police said a rocket fired from Gaza landed in the Jerusalem area, outside the city, on Friday.

It was the first Palestinian rocket since 1970 to reach the vicinity of the holy city, which Israel claims as its capital, and was likely to spur an escalation in its three-day old air war against militants in Gaza.

Rockets nearly hit Tel Aviv on Thursday for the first time since Saddam Hussein’s Iraq fired them during the 1991 Gulf War. An air raid siren rang out on Friday when the commercial centre was targeted again. Motorists crouched next to cars, many with their hands protecting their heads, while pedestrians scurried for cover in building stairwells.

The Jerusalem and Tel Aviv strikes have so far caused no casualties or damage, but could be political poison for Netanyahu, a conservative favored to win re-election in January on the strength of his ability to guarantee security.

“The Israel Defence Forces will continue to hit Hamas hard and are prepared to broaden the action inside Gaza,” Netanyahu said before the rocket attacks on the two cities.

Asked about Israel massing forces for a possible Gaza invasion, Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said: “The Israelis should be aware of the grave results of such a raid and they should bring their body bags.”

Officials in Gaza said 28 Palestinians had been killed in the enclave since Israel began the air offensive with the declared aim of stemming surges of rocket strikes that have disrupted life in southern Israeli towns.

The Palestinian dead include 12 militants and 16 civilians, among them eight children and a pregnant woman. Three Israelis were killed by a rocket on Thursday. A Hamas source said the Israeli air force launched an attack on the house of Hamas’s commander for southern Gaza which resulted in the death of two civilians, one a child.

SOLIDARITY VISIT

A solidarity visit to Gaza by Egyptian Prime Minister Hisham Kandil, whose Islamist government is allied with Hamas but also party to a 1979 peace treaty with Israel, had appeared to open a tiny window to emergency peace diplomacy.

Kandil said: “Egypt will spare no effort … to stop the aggression and to achieve a truce.”

But a three-hour truce that Israel declared for the duration of Kandil’s visit never took hold. Israel said 66 rockets launched from the Gaza Strip hit its territory on Friday and a further 99 were intercepted by the Iron Dome anti-missile system.

Israel denied Palestinian assertions that its aircraft struck while Kandil was in the enclave.

Israel Radio’s military affairs correspondent said the army’s Homefront Command had told municipal officials to make civil defence preparations for the possibility that fighting could drag on for seven weeks. An Israeli military spokeswoman declined to comment on the report.

The Gaza conflagration has stoked the flames of a Middle East already ablaze with two years of Arab revolution and a civil war in Syria that threatens to leap across borders.

It is the biggest test yet for Egypt’s new President Mohamed Mursi, a veteran Islamist politician from the Muslim Brotherhood who was elected this year after last year’s protests ousted military autocrat Hosni Mubarak.

Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood are spiritual mentors of Hamas, yet Mursi has also pledged to respect Cairo’s 1979 peace treaty with Israel, seen in the West as the cornerstone of regional security. Egypt and Israel both receive billions of dollars in U.S. military aid to underwrite their treaty.

Mursi has vocally denounced the Israeli military action while promoting Egypt as a mediator, a mission that his prime minister’s visit was intended to further.

A Palestinian official close to Egypt’s mediators told Reuters Kandil’s visit “was the beginning of a process to explore the possibility of reaching a truce. It is early to speak of any details or of how things will evolve”.

Hamas fighters are no match for the Israeli military. The last Gaza war, involving a three-week long Israeli air blitz and ground invasion over the New Year period of 2008-2009, killed more than 1,400 Palestinians, mostly civilians. Thirteen Israelis died.

Tunisia’s foreign minister was due to visit Gaza on Saturday “to provide all political support for Gaza” the spokesman for the Tunisian president, Moncef Marzouki, said in a statement.

The United States asked countries that have contact with Hamas to urge the Islamist movement to stop its rocket attacks.

Hamas refuses to recognize Israel’s right to exist. By contrast, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who rules in the nearby West Bank, does recognize Israel, but peace talks between the two sides have been frozen since 2010.

Abbas’s supporters say they will push ahead with a plan to have Palestine declared an “observer state” rather than a mere “entity” at the United Nations later this month.

(Additional reporting by Maayan Lubell, Jeffrey Heller and Crispian Balmer in Jerusalem; Writing by Jeffrey Heller; Editing by Giles Elgood)

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News Summary: UK court overturns Facebook demotion

PUNISHED: Britain‘s High Court ruled Friday that a man had been unfairly stripped of a management position and demoted for saying in a Facebook post that he was opposed to gay marriage.

COURT RULING: The court said the Trafford Housing Trust breached Adrian Smith‘s contract and a judge added that Smith had not done anything wrong. Smith had written on Facebook that gay weddings in churches would be “an equality too far.”

EVOLVING LAW: In Britain, same-sex couples can form civil partnerships that carry the same legal rights marriages do. The government plans to introduce legislation allowing civil marriages as well.

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Psy, Drake, Gotye join American Music Awards birthday bash

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – The American Music Awards rings in its 40th year on Sunday, with top nominees like Rihanna and Nicki Minaj battling for the top trophies and Stevie Wonder leading a tribute to the show’s late founder, Dick Clark.

Variety is the key to this year’s three-hour ceremony from Los Angeles, with performers including Canadian pop star Justin Bieber, 1990s ska-punk band No Doubt, alt-rockers Linkin Park, country-pop darling Taylor Swift, Korean Internet sensation Psy and British-Irish boyband The Wanted.

“The AMAs reflects pop culture, which is all forms of music, all genres, pop, rock, country, hip hop, alternative … all these things that normally don’t together. It’s our job to make it flow,” producer Larry Klein told Reuters.

R&B star Rihanna, 24, and Minaj, 29, tied for the most nominations this year, with four apiece, and will battle each other in the hotly contested female pop-rock category.

Rihanna will also face stiff competition for the top award of the night, the artist of the year accolade, where she will compete with Bieber, Katy Perry, Maroon 5 and Drake.

The new artist category is expected to be a tight race between rapper J. Cole, indie-pop band fun., Australian singer Gotye, British boyband One Direction and Canadian popstar Carly Rae Jepsen, who will also be performing on Sunday. The ceremony will be shown live on ABC Television.

Unlike the Grammy Awards, which are decided on by music producers, songwriters and others working in the industry, the American Music Awards are determined by fans.

“It’s the public who watches, who decides, who votes. This is an awards show where the public decides the nominees and winners, so our shows are more about pop culture,” Klein said.

This year sees a new category for the growing electronic dance music market, which Klein said he couldn’t ignore. DJs David Guetta, Skrillex and Calvin Harris will compete for the trophy.

REMEMBERING DICK CLARK

This is the first time Klein will be running the show without the input of influential music and TV producer Dick Clark, who died in April at the age of 82. Clark created the American Music Awards in 1973 as an alternative to the Grammys, and Klein said his absence felt bizarre.

“Last year, he loved the show, he was very happy. He loved LMFAO when they closed the show, it was all a fun party of music, dance music, Dick loved it,” Klein said.

Clark, who also hosted “American Bandstand” and “New Year’s Rockin’ Eve,” will be remembered on Sunday in a tribute led by Wonder and “American Idol” host Ryan Seacrest.

“I wanted to make it classy, elegant and meaningful, with something that truly summoned the relationship that Dick had with so many people,” said Klein, who has been involved in the show since its inception.

Klein said the show will look back on its 40-year history, showcasing some of its most memorable moments. Klein’s personal picks included performances from late singer Michael Jackson, funk-pop star Prince, and Jay-Z and Alicia Keys’ rendition in 2009 of “Empire State of Mind.”

“I was very close to Michael Jackson, so every time Michael was on the show, it always made me happy. The Prince number we did was outrageous, Jay-Z and Alicia Keys…it really was epic, it was just extraordinary,” Klein said.

With more than fifteen individual performances, or “mini-shows” scheduled for Sunday, Klein said audiences can expect surprises.

“Live TV is the best, it’s unpredictable. Without a doubt there will be some unpredictable moments, I promise you,” the producer said.

(Reporting By Piya Sinha-Roy, editing by Jill Serjeant)

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