Former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn Former International Monetary Fund chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn was charged in France on Monday with "aggravated pimping" for his alleged participation in a prostitution ring, prosecutors said.
He is not allowed to have contact with other people involved in the investigation, nor is he permitted to talk to the media about the case. Strauss-Kahn was released under a 100,000-euro bail, according to prosecutors.
Earlier in the day, he was questioned by a judge about his alleged involvement in the ring. The meeting was initially scheduled for Wednesday.
A spokesperson for the judge told CNN it was the judge's decision to change the date, but did not say why the decision was made.
Last month, Strauss-Kahn was held for more than 24 hours by police in Lille and questioned about his alleged involvement in the prostitution ring.
His attorneys released a statement in November calling the allegations against their client "unhealthy, sensationalist and not without a political agenda."
The prostitution probe, nicknamed the "Carlton Affair" by the French press, kicked off in October.
It centers around the city of Lille, where investigators began looking into claims that luxury hotels, including the Carlton, served as a base for a high-profile prostitution network.
In December, Strauss-Kahn's attorney, Henri Leclerc, acknowledged in an interview with radio station Europe1 that his client attended sex parties, but said Strauss-Kahn was unaware the women in attendance were prostitutes.
While prostitution is not illegal in France, profiting from the prostitution of another person is against the law, according to the French Penal Code. Authorities are also investigating whether corporate funds were used to pay for the prostitutes.
In the December Europe1 interview, Leclerc said there is no evidence that such funds were misappropriated.
A hotel manager and four other men were arrested late last year in connection with the investigation.
The Carlton Affair continues a string of sexual allegations against Strauss-Kahn.
The former IMF chief has been linked with a number of sex scandals in the past year -- one of which torpedoed his expected plan to run for the French presidency this year. He has not been convicted of any crime.
He stepped down from the top job at the IMF after a New York hotel maid accused him of sexual assault and attempted rape in May.
The case ultimately fell apart after the alleged victim posed significant credibility issues for prosecutors, despite forensic evidence that showed a sexual encounter had occurred.
Strauss-Kahn also faced allegations of attempted rape from a young French writer. Tristane Banon filed a complaint, alleging a 2003 attack, though it could not be pursued because of a statute of limitations.
Strauss-Kahn denied the allegations and has since filed a countersuit in France, alleging slander.
The coffins containing the bodies of the victims of the French shooting arrive at Israel’s Ben Gurion Airport. The four victims of Monday’s shooting at a Jewish school in Toulouse, France, were buried Wednesday morning – not in their home community but, after an overnight flight from Paris, in Jerusalem.
Though two of the young victims were born in Israel, the Consistory of Paris, which represents Jewish communities, told CNN that all the victims were being buried there for reasons of faith, not nationality. Being laid to rest in Israel, the birthplace of Judaism, ensures that their remains will not be tampered with, the group said. It also added that 40% of practicing French Jews are buried in Israel.
French religious Jews aren’t alone in wanting this, and the reasons run deep.
“It goes all the way back to the Bible, when Jacob passed away,” explains Rabbi Shaul Ginsberg, who oversees Shomrei Hachomos, an Orthodox funeral chapel in Brooklyn – which he says is one of three Orthodox funeral homes in New York state.
Before Jacob passed away, Ginsberg says, “One of the things he said to Joseph is, ‘Don’t leave me in Egypt.’”
He wanted to join those who had died before him, including his grandfather, Abraham, who received the first Jewish burial, Ginsberg says.
In the Hebrew Bible, Genesis 47:28-30 reads:
And Jacob lived in the land of Egypt seventeen years; so the days of Jacob, the years of his life, were a hundred forty and seven years.
And the time drew near that Israel [Jacob] must die; and he called his son Joseph, and said unto him: "If now I have found favour in thy sight, put, I pray thee, thy hand under my thigh, and deal kindly and truly with me; bury me not, I pray thee, in Egypt.
But when I sleep with my fathers, thou shalt carry me out of Egypt, and bury me in their burying-place." And he said: "I will do as thou hast said."
Jacob would be buried in the Cave of the Patriarchs, known by Muslims as the Sanctuary of Abraham, in what’s now the West Bank city of Hebron.
Another incentive to be buried in Israel extends beyond the Bible - and beyond concerns, for some, about grave desecration. It’s rooted in the belief that when the Messiah comes, those buried in Jerusalem will be resurrected first.
Jews do believe that a figure will emerge to restore peace, save the righteous and judge those who've done wrong. But the Jewish concept of a Messiah is very different from Christianity's view. Christians believe the Messiah already came, in the divine form of Jesus Christ. Jews do not believe this. In fact, they don't believe that the Messiah will be divine - since God, from their perspective, cannot become human.
When the Messiah comes, Judaism teaches, he will shepherd in what's referred to as the "World to Come." There will be peace, no more evil and the reinstatement of the Temple in Jerusalem. And, apropos of this story, all Jews will return to Israel.
The significance of being buried in Israel is one Ginsberg both respects and anticipates for himself. He purchased his plot in Jerusalem years ago and says 60% of those he serves are being flown to Israel for burial.
That choice doesn’t come cheap.
When Ginsberg bought his plot in 2000, it cost him $4,500. But lack of land, demand and simple economics have changed things. The plot next to his, he says, recently sold for $25,000.
Granted, one can choose to be buried outside of Jerusalem at better rates. But once the cost for the flight over is factored in, the price is still steep.
Even so, for very observant Jews, and even for some others who are not Orthodox, the expense – if they can afford it – may be worth it, says David Zinner, the executive director of K’vod v’Nichum, an organization that provides education and resources about traditional Jewish funerals and burials.
One page on the organization's website is dedicated to burial in Israel, offering tips, links to articles and cemetery options.
Yet Zinner, who works with Jews of all denominations, also points to passages in the Talmud where Rabban Gamliel, a first century authority, argued against expensive burials. Zinner says Gamliel feared high prices deterred people from upholding traditions. To this day, Jews are traditionally not buried in fancy caskets.
By extension, Zinner says, there are many who argue that splurging for a burial in Israel makes little sense.
“Money is to help the living, to give to charity,” Zinner says, summarizing that school of thought.
As for those who are buried outside of Israel, Ginsberg says, the resurrection, when it comes, will not be lost on them. The process will just be more arduous and definitely less comfortable.
Tunnels will be created underground leading to Israel, he says, “and their bones will roll into Israel.”
Those already buried there “will save themselves that pain.”
Elizabeth Smart ties the knot in Hawaii Elizabeth Smart, the Utah woman abducted as a teenager and held captive for months, tied the knot at a private ceremony in Hawaii over the weekend.
Yes, Elizabeth did get married today and we are all thrilled," said Smart's father, Ed, on Saturday.
Smart and Matthew Gilmour exchanged vows Saturday on Oahu's North Shore before family and friends, CNN affiliate KSL said, citing a family spokesman.
They plan to honeymoon at an undisclosed location, according to Chris Thomas, the spokesman.
"Elizabeth's desire was for what most women want — to celebrate her nuptials in a private wedding with family and close friends," Thomas told the affiliate.
The pair got engaged last month and planned to get married in the summer, but moved up the wedding because of the media attention, the spokesman said.
Gilmour, a native of Scotland, met his bride while she was doing missionary work in France. Smart attends Brigham Young University and also works for ABC News.
Smart made headlines in 2002 when she was kidnapped from her Salt Lake home at age 14 and held captive for nine months. Her kidnapping stunned the nation, and the media covered the monthslong search to find her.
Her abductor, Brian David Mitchell, sexually abused her during her time in captivity, and is serving life in prison for the kidnapping and assault.
Authorities rescued Smart when she, her captor and his wife were spotted wandering in Sandy, Utah, in March 2003.
Smart described the ordeal as "my nine months in hell" during court testimony two years ago.
Some see signs of growing strife within American Jewry over the issue of Israel. Atlanta - When the editor of a Jewish newspaper here wrote this month that the Jewish state might consider assassinating an American president, his column made national headlines and provoked a Secret Service inquiry.
The most striking criticism came from the Jewish community itself, which collectively held its nose and harshly denounced the column by Andrew Adler, who is also the owner of the weekly paper, the Atlanta Jewish Times. Anti-Defamation League national director Abraham Foxman called Adler's words "irresponsible and extremist."
Adler apologized and resigned as editor, but some see the episode as the latest example of an increase in divisive, over-the-top rhetoric within American Jewish communal life, revolving largely around the hot-button issue of Israel and its policies toward the Palestinians.
The tensions have provoked Jewish groups across the country to launch programs aimed at lowering the political temperature in their own religious communities.
Israel is not "one of the great unifying factors" that it once was in the Jewish community, said Samuel Freedman, author of "Jew vs. Jew: the Struggle for the Soul of American Jewry.”
"Since the Lebanon invasion and the First Intifada, it has become a dividing line,” he said, referring to the Palestinian uprising against the Israeli occupation in the late 1980s. “It's probably deeper now than I've ever seen it."
Tensions within American Judaism are rising as some Jews detect an "existential threat" to Israel, with Iran's nuclear aspirations and Islamist parties coming to power during the Arab uprisings, he says.
Freedman also sees broader trends at work, including the fading line between private and public talk dissolving in the era of blogging and tweeting. The Atlanta Jewish Times incident, he says, is a reminder that words that sound bold in private will "resonate really differently when they are out in public."
Ethan Felson, vice president of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, says emotions have been much more "intense and destructive" lately as ideological camps within the American Jewish community harden their views over the contentious U.S. presidential campaign, tensions between Israel and Iran, and issues from health care to marriage.
"This is going to be a brutal year," he says. "We're looking at a scorched earth political environment."
Felson’s group spearheads a nationwide civility initiative and held a "civility institute" last year to help Jewish leaders with conflict resolution, listening and "communicating across polarized divides."
Leaders from 15 Jewish communities across the country participated.
The council recently issued a civility statement signed by a range of prominent Jewish entities, saying the effort has "deep roots in Torah," the Jewish sacred text, and "in our community's traditions."
But the statement also spoke to a troubled Jewish landscape. "The expression and exchange of views is often an uncivil, highly unpleasant experience,” it said. “Community events and public discussions are often interrupted by raised voices, personal insults, and outrageous charges."
Jane Schiff, a Jewish Council for Public Affairs board member who is also on the group’s civility task force, says she has seen the hostile atmosphere take its toll in her Atlanta community, with rabbis backing off from talking about Israel.
"They are afraid it will affect their employment. I'm seeing friends saying to each other, 'I'm not talking to you about that because I want to stay your friend,' " she said of controversial issues such as the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Judy Saks, the community relations director for the Jewish Federation of Nashville and editor of the federation-produced community newspaper, can attest to the vituperation.
In May, an online video surfaced about Muslims in Nashville that said they were fomenting pro-terrorist ideas. Called “Losing our Community,” the video was produced by a Boston-based group called Americans for Peace and Tolerance.
A video on the group’s website says one Nashville Muslim figure it regards as radical has been embraced by “self-described progressive Jewish religious leaders," including a rabbi, and is respected as an interfaith activist in the community.
Saks said that the original video blasted three Nashville rabbis but that two were removed after several weeks. Americans for Peace and Tolerance did not respond to a request for comment.
"It brought out such divisiveness in this community,” Saks said. “It pointed fingers at our rabbis for doing what rabbis do."
The organized Jewish community decided to draw up its own civility statement, which supports "robust and vigorous debate about critical issues – as long as it is civil and tolerant" and disagreement "without threats of reprisal."
"This willingness to listen to other points of view honors Nashville's spirit as an open, welcoming and friendly city, our nation's history and our Jewish heritage," it said. "We will not engage with those who threaten the safety and security of our community."
In California's San Francisco Bay Area, controversy erupted over a film about Rachel Corrie shown at a 2009 San Francisco Jewish film festival.
Corrie, an American member of the International Solidarity Movement who was killed in Gaza nine years ago by an Israel Defense Forces bulldozer, symbolizes for many the battle on the left against Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories.
Corrie's mother spoke at the event, angering some Jews, who said her appearance politicized what was supposed to be an artistic moment.
The reaction to the film reflected the political fissures in the Bay Area Jewish community. In response, two community leaders, Abby Michelson Porth and Rachel Eryn Kalish, co-founded Project Reconnections, which included an initiative called the Year of Civil Discourse.
The well-funded effort throughout 2011 worked to bring Jews of different political stripes together for dialogue and deliberation, study and workshops. It also focused on reconciliation in four synagogues beset by political enmity and engaged community leaders over issues such as the Middle East.
Porth, also associate director at the Bay Area Jewish Community Relations Council, says the project helped infuse the community "with the skills and the opportunity to have a rich, meaningful and civil discourse."
She says it got people on opposite ends of the spectrum to stay at the table to understand the other person's point of view and to to deliberate thoughtfully over disagreements.
Kalish, the Year of Civil Discourse project facilitator, saw people’s "fight or flight" instincts shift as they learned to communicate thoughtfully and gain a deeper understanding of issues such as Jewish settlements and the status of Jerusalem.
A healthy conversation, Kalish said, helps people think and understand that "maybe there's a third way" to approach a stubborn issue.
She recalls an interaction in one synagogue between an older man who lived through Israel's War of Independence in 1948 and the Six Day War in 1967 and a young woman who sees Israel through the prism of its criticized actions in Lebanon and the Palestinian territories.
The two synagogue members came to understand each other and now work side by side as dialogue "facilitators" at their congregation. Kalish cites this as an example of "pretty dramatic change" in learning how to listen and speak honesty and respectfully.
Mitch Chanin, executive director of the Jewish Dialogue Group in Philadelphia, offers dialogue programs for Jews in synagogues, colleges and other organizations and trains people as dialogue facilitators. The group formed in 2001 and has done work across North America.
Chanin, who says his group refrains from promoting political opinion, says the dialogues have included talking through the tough issues around the Middle East conflict.
"People grapple with the questions of what risks are we willing to take and what actions are ethical. Who can we trust and not trust?" Chanin said. "The likely consequences of Israeli policies. What are the intentions of Palestinian actors?
“What can we do to be safe? When is it OK to kill? When is it necessary? When is it wrong? When are there alternatives?"
Nasty surprise: A third of the 5,000 petitions filed with Divorce-Online in the past year mentioned Facebook Facebook is becoming a major factor in marriage breakdowns and is increasingly being used as a source of evidence in divorce cases, according to lawyers.
The social networking site was cited as a reason for a third of divorces last year in which unreasonable behaviour was a factor, according to law firm Divorce-Online.
The firm said it had seen a 50 per cent jump in the number of behaviour-based divorce petitions that contained the word ‘Facebook’ in the past two years.
Mark Keenan, managing director of Divorce-Online, said: ‘Facebook has become the primary method for communicating with friends for many people.
People contact ex-partners and the messages start as innocent, but lead to trouble.
If someone wants to have an affair or flirt with the opposite sex then it’s the easiest place to do it.
Thirty-three per cent of the 5,000 behaviour petitions filed with the firm in the past year mentioned the site.
The most common reasons for Facebook causing problems in relationships were a spouse finding flirty messages, photos of their partner at a party they did not know about or with someone they should not have been with.
Anne-Marie Hutchinson, at Dawson Cornwell Solicitors, said: ‘If you are keeping things from your partner, Facebook makes it so much easier for them to find out.
She said the site can be used as evidence of unreasonable behaviour, adding: ‘If you are complaining that they have a drinking problem and they have posted statuses about going out on the razzle... that could be used.
Mr Keenan said he warned his clients to keep off Facebook while going through divorce proceedings.
He added: ‘People need to be careful what they put on Facebook as the courts are now seeing a lot more evidence being introduced from people’s walls and posts in disputes over finances and children.
Were American tourists caught in the crossfire of a drug war? Or is there a more sinister twist to the story? Don't miss "Murder in Mexico: What Happened at Falcon Lake" at 8 p.m. ET Sunday on CNN.
It was planned as a day of recreation for the young couple but turned into tragedy. A 30-year-old man dead, his body lost -- possibly forever.
As his grieving widow waits for answers, suspicion is cast on her. Then an investigator is murdered as he looks into the crime.
Today, nearly six months later, some of the puzzle pieces are falling into place regarding what happened to Americans David and Tiffany Hartley that September day on Falcon Lake, which straddles the U.S.-Mexico border.
Even with the new information, however, authorities caution that the full picture of what happened that day, leading to David Hartley's death, may never be known.
"It didn't happen in the United States," said Zapata County, Texas, Sheriff Sigifredo Gonzalez.
And Mexican authorities, he told CNN, have "somewhat of a zero solvency rate, and a zero conviction rate."
"So unfortunately, this case may remain open forever, even though the information and the evidence may be there," according to Gonzalez.
A suspicious story
Tiffany Hartley has told police that she and her husband were on Sea-Doo personal watercraft on the lake on September 30, to visit a half-submerged church, when they were ambushed by assailants who shot David Hartley in the head.
She said she was unable to haul his body onto her watercraft before being forced to flee.
Early on, authorities surmised the couple had stumbled into a drug transaction, as the area is widely known as a Mexican drug cartel's stomping ground.
Tiffany Hartley's story was greeted with skepticism by some who believed that something more sinister was at work.
But Gonzalez's support of her never wavered.
"I still believe Tiffany," he said.
Gonzalez says what she told him in interviews after the shooting called to mind two similar incidents in April and May of last year -- incidents she had no way of knowing about.
Before David Hartley's killing, there were four reports of American fishermen running into Mexican pirates on Falcon Lake, authorities said. In each case, the fishermen were warned to stay off the Mexican side of the lake and sent on their way.
"Everything she's telling me has happened before in the other events, the other cases," Gonzalez said.
Doubts about Tiffany Hartley's story were somewhat lifted after the gruesome murder of Rolando Armando Flores Villegas, who was leading the Mexican investigation into her husband's death. His head was delivered in a suitcase to a Mexican military post shortly after David Hartley's death.
Mexican investigator beheaded
Gonzalez said he doesn't believe that the Hartleys were involved with drugs or that Tiffany Hartley was somehow involved in her husband's death to collect insurance money -- some of the theories that have been bandied about by those who doubt her story.
"There is no evidence to indicate any of that," he said.
Wrong place, wrong time
The new information, he said, seems to support investigators' theory that drug cartel members killed Hartley because the couple was seen as a threat.
Hartley could merely have fallen victim to an unlucky shot from assailants who intended to disable, not kill, according to Gonzalez and another expert.
"They opened up with automatic weapons or semiautomatic weapons and just started throwing rounds in the direction of the Hartleys," said Fred Burton, vice president of the global intelligence agency Stratfor.
"[By] sheer volume ... [the gunmen] could get lucky and hit your target."
A few informants have come forward in the case, Gonzalez said, although obviously, they fear for their safety.
One says he was told what transpired by those involved in the shooting. Another claimed they were on the water at the time the shooting occurred, and heard what they described as a "war zone" -- even from a couple of miles away.
The couple's decision use their personal watercraft on the lake where there had been several attacks on fishermen was "stupid," according to local fishing guide and resort owner "Speedy" Collett.
Collett says fishermen are completely safe on Falcon Lake as long as they follow the unwritten rules. Nevertheless, he says business has been down since Hartley's killing in September -- something Gonzalez echoed.
Tiffany Hartley admits she knew "there were attacks" on the lake, but she says "we didn't know where they were exactly."
"We hadn't heard anything for a while, and we were just there in August and enjoyed three, four hours that day on the [lake]."
Investigators believe there were seven gunmen on three boats, according to Gonzalez, who said it's his understanding that the cartel was "getting ready to cross a drug load" and saw the Hartleys as a threat.
The instruction was given to "go ahead and shoot at them," he said.
Parts of Falcon Lake are under direct control of the Zetas drug cartel, Burton said. The area is notorious for the moving or storage of thousands of pounds of marijuana, Gonzalez said.
"This was a very strong smuggling corridor for them," Gonzalez said. "Therefore, anybody that's an outsider that goes into that area is viewed as either working for another cartel or a possible informant for a government agency."
The Zetas police the area, Burton said, and are responsible for surveillance. Tiffany Hartley last year recounted for CNN seeing her husband shot, and the gunmen returning as she struggled to save him.
She said she was holding her husband by his life vest with one hand and her Sea-Doo with the other when she found herself staring down a gun barrel. She said she looked the two men in the eye and pleaded with them not to shoot her.
After a whispered conversation in Spanish, the two left, she said, and she took off on her Sea-Doo.
More shots rang out, she said, but she didn't look back.
New details emerge
Gonzalez said the first informant, who heard about the shooting from those involved, also said that Tiffany Hartley was briefly held at gunpoint.
The gunmen did fire at her as she fled, the informant said, but were not able to hit her because "she kept zigzagging all over the place."
Burton believes in a slightly different version of events, speculating there was a moment where the people involved realized they had made a mistake, and let Tiffany Hartley go after realizing she was not a threat.
"From all the individuals that I've spoken to that are very close to the investigation, not only inside the United States but in Mexico, they pinpoint nothing but a story of just a couple being in the wrong place at the wrong time," Burton said.
As for David Hartley's body, Gonzalez and Burton agree it will probably never be found.
Gonzalez said informants have told him how it was disposed of, but would not elaborate because he lacks concrete information.
The Sea-Doo, he said, was also destroyed.
"That body is evidence that they really don't want to come to light," Burton said.
Mexican authorities have identified two suspects in the case, and the U.S. has identified two more, Gonzalez said, leaving three others unidentified.
The sheriff previously has said that at least some suspects may be dead. Burton believes they were killed by the Zetas.
"The killers were killed by the organization because, remember, this is bad for business," Burton said.
Like Gonzalez, he is skeptical that the Mexican investigation will bear fruit.
"There's so many homicides inside of Mexico that are unsolved that this is just another one," he said. "... I think politically, the Mexican government looks at this kind of case and says, 'We have thousands of unsolved homicides. Why is this one so important?' "
Some may find that shocking, he said, but "I think most people fail to recognize the scope of violence that we have seen over the past 18 to 24 months around the border."
"I think Mrs. Hartley is in a very difficult situation in that the likelihood of the Mexican government ever successfully resolving this case to where there's an arrest or prosecution of the people involved is highly remote," Burton said.
"If the Zetas have killed the people that are responsible for the crime, that's all the justice Mrs. Hartley could probably expect at this point in time."
Tiffany Hartley, meanwhile, said she is now thinking of starting a nonprofit organization "to fight for America and our borders."
She believes her husband was a victim "of terrorism, of politics and the way of life in Mexico," adding that she believes too much money flows back and forth across the border.
And she believes her husband's body, one day, will come home.
"God's word says, 'Whatever has been stolen from you will be given back to you a hundredfold,' " she said. "And I believe, a hundredfold, I will get everything that's been stolen from me. And that's my husband."
I am a person of faith. But sometimes I like to step outside of faith and just think about things rationally. Usually this oscillation between faith and skepticism serves me well, with faith giving reason its moral bearings, and reason keeping faith, well, reasonable.
It’s a nice balancing act — except when the question of who wrote the Bible comes up. My Jewish faith tells me that Moses wrote the first five books of the Bible, known as the Torah or the Pentateuch. Reason tells me to be open to the idea that somebody else had a hand in it.
And there are definitely a few glitches in the text that back up those suspicions - notably the last eight verses of Deuteronomy, which describe Moses’ own death.
But try as I might, I just can’t believe that the Five Books of Moses were written by J, E, P and D – the four main authors whose oral traditions, biblical scholars say, were cobbled together to make the Torah. (The letters stand for the Jahwist, the Elohist, the Priestly source and the Deuteronomist. Those, we may assume, were not their real names.)
Call me an academic infidel.
I know, it’s been generations now that Bible study scholars at universities around the world have accepted as true that:
(a) the Pentateuch was composed over many centuries through these four oral traditions, which were later written down;
(b) these main texts were woven together by an editor or series of editors living around the 6th century B.C.E.; and
(c) these different traditions are detectable by scholars today, to the point where you can justify entire conferences and an arena’s worth of endowed chairs to figure out not only the source document of every scrap of biblical text, but also the gender, political inclinations, subversive intentions, height, weight and personal traumas encumbering every one of its authors.
The first two are plausible, I suppose. But the third has always struck me as pure fantasy, the point where idle speculation gives way to heavily funded hubris. Of course, if I’m right about the third, the first two lose their authority as well.
Why don’t I buy it?
It’s not just because of how stark, uninspiring and vaguely European those four letters look in a byline. Nor is it the fact that in more than a century’s worth of digging up the Middle East by archaeologists, not a single trace of any of these postulated “source texts” has ever turned up. And it’s certainly not because the scholars’ approach contradicts my faith — after all, it was the willful suspension of faith that led me to consider it in the first place.
No, faith and skepticism dwell together in my confused bosom like pudding and pie.
Rather, my rebellion against these scholars comes from experience. Specifically, my experience as an editor.
It all started a few years back when, as the senior editor of a Jerusalem-based journal of public thought, I ran into trouble on a 10,000-word, brilliantly researched essay about Israeli social policy composed by the sweetest man on earth who, unfortunately wasn’t a stellar writer.
I spent a few weeks rewriting, moving things around, adding and cutting and sweating. Finally I passed it up the chain to Dan, my editor-in-chief.
"Hey Dan," I said. "Could you take a look at this? I added a whole paragraph in the conclusion. Tell me what you think."
A few days later I got it back, marked up in red ballpoint. On the last page, in the conclusion, he had written the words “This is the paragraph you added,” and drawn a huge red arrow.
But the arrow, alas, was pointing at the wrong paragraph.
You see, it turns out that it’s not very easy to reverse-engineer an editing job. To take an edited text and figure out, in retrospect, what changes it went through — it’s about a million times harder than those tenured, tortured Bible scholars will tell you.
Language is fluid and flexible, the product of the vagaries of the human soul. When an editor has free rein, he can make anything sound like he’d written it himself, or like the author’s own voice, or something else entirely. It all depends on his aims, his training, his talent and the quality of his coffee that morning. A good editor is a ventriloquist of the written word.
That’s when I started to suspect that what Bible scholars claim they’re doing — telling you what the “original” Bible looked like — might be, in fact, impossible to do.
Think about it. My case was one in which the author, editor and reader are all known entities (in fact, they all know each other personally); the reading takes place in the exact same cultural and social context as the writing and editing; and the reader is himself a really smart guy, Ivy-league Ph.D. and all, who had spent a decade training the editor to be a certain kind of editor, with specific tools unique to the specific publication’s aims.
Not only that, but he was even told what kind of edit to look for, in which section. And still he couldn’t identify the change.
Now compare that with what Bible scholars do when they talk about J, E, P, and D. Not only do the readers not know the writers and editors personally, or even their identities or when or where they lived. The readers live thousands of years later and know nothing about the editors’ goals, whims, tastes, passions or fears — they don’t even know for sure that the whole thing really went through an editorial process at all.
(If anything, the same textual redundancies, narrative glitches, awkward word choices and so forth that the scholars claim are the telltale signs of an editing process are, in my experience, very often the opposite: the surest indicator that an author needs an editor, desperately. If the text was edited, it was done very poorly.)
As with any field of research that tries to reconstruct the distant past, biblical scholars get things wrong on a daily basis.
And that's OK: Getting things wrong is part of the nature of reconstruction. Whether you’re talking about the origins of galaxies, dinosaurs, ancient civilizations, medieval history or World War II, the conclusions of all historical research come with a big disclaimer: This is the best we’ve got so far. Stay tuned; we may revise our beliefs in a couple of years.
With biblical scholars, however, you often feel like they’re flying just a little blinder than everyone else. At what point does a scholar’s “best guess” become so foggy as to be meaningless?
The Five Books of Moses take place somewhere in the second millennium B.C.E., centuries before our earliest archeological corroborations for the biblical tales appearing in the Book of Joshua and onward. We have no other Hebrew writings of the time to compare it with. So all that scholars really have to go on is the text itself — a wild ride on a rickety, ancient, circular-reasoning roller-coaster with little external data to anchor our knowledge of anything.
This would be fine, of course, if there weren’t so much riding on it.
With other fields, we usually don’t have our own dinosaur in the fight. But with the Bible, it’s not just the scholars duking it out with the clergy. There’s all the rest of us trying to figure out what to do with this stupendously important book — either because it anchors our faith, or because it contains enduring wisdom and the foundations of our cultural identity.
Where does that leave us? Some people, sensing their most cherished beliefs are under siege, will retreat to the pillars of faith — whether that faith is religious or academic. Either it was Moses, or it was J, E, P, and D. End of discussion.
As for the rest of us, it may raise questions about whether we really ought to care that much about authorship at all, or instead just go with Mark Twain’s approach. “If the Ten Commandments were not written by Moses,” he once quipped, “then they were written by another fellow of the same name.”
Using our reason means sometimes admitting there are things we just don’t know, and maybe never will.
Maybe that’s all right. After all, isn’t it enough to know that the book is really important, that it has inspired love and hate and introspection and war for thousands of years, that it is full of interesting stories and wisdom, poetry and song, contradiction and fancy and an unparalleled belief in the importance of human endeavor - in the possibility of a better world - despite the enduring and tragic weaknesses that every biblical hero carries on his or her back? That it is an indelible part of who we are?
Isn’t that enough to make you just read the thing and hope for the best, forever grateful to Moses, or that other fellow by the same name?
An FBI employee shared confidential information with his girlfriend, who was a news reporter, then later threatened to release a sex tape the two had made.
A supervisor watched pornographic videos in his office during work hours while "satisfying himself."
And an employee in a "leadership position" misused a government database to check on two friends who were exotic dancers and allowed them into an FBI office after hours.
These are among confidential summaries of FBI disciplinary reports obtained by CNN, which describe misconduct by agency supervisors, agents and other employees over the last three years.
The reports, compiled by the FBI's Office of Professional Responsibility, are e-mailed quarterly to FBI employees, but are not released to the public.
And despite the bureau's very strict screening procedure for all prospective employees, the FBI confirms that about 325 to 350 employees a year receive some kind of discipline, ranging from a reprimand to suspension.
About 30 employees each year are fired.
"We do have a no-tolerance policy," FBI Assistant Director Candice Will told CNN. "We don't tolerate our employees engaging in misconduct. We expect them to behave pursuant to the standards of conduct imposed on all FBI employees."
However, she said, "It doesn't mean that we fire everybody. You know, our employees are human, as we all are. We all make mistakes. So, our discipline is intended to reflect that.
"We understand that employees can make mistakes, will make mistakes. When appropriate, we will decide to remove an employee. When we believe that an employee can be rehabilitated and should be given a second chance, we do that."
Will, who oversees the bureau's Office of Professional Responsibility, said most of the FBI's 34,300 employees, which include 13,700 agents, follow the rules.
"The vast majority of our employees do not lie," Will said. "The vast majority of our employees do not cheat. The vast majority of our employees do not steal. The vast majority of our employees do not engage in the type of misconduct you are describing. There is an occasional employee who will engage in such misconduct, and that employee will answer for it."
However, the internal summaries show that even with serious misconduct, employees can keep their job (names and locations of the employees are not listed in the reports):
-- An employee had "a sexual relationship with a source" over seven months. The punishment was a 40-day suspension.
-- The supervisor who viewed "pornographic movies in the office while sexually satisfying himself" during work hours received a 35-day suspension.
-- The employee in a "leadership position" who misused a "government database to conduct name checks on two friends who were foreign nationals employed as exotic dancers" and "brought the two friends into FBI space after-hours without proper authorization" received a 23-day suspension. The same employee had been previously suspended for misusing a government database.
-- An employee who was drunk "exploited his FBI employment at a strip club," falsely claiming he was "conducting an official investigation." His punishment was a 30-day suspension.
-- And an employee conducted "unauthorized searches on FBI databases" for "information on public celebrities the employee thought were 'hot'" received a 30-day suspension.
Will said she could not discuss individual cases, and added: "I can't even confirm whether or not your information is accurate."
She said the bureau follows established guidelines for punishing employees.
"What we try is the holistic approach of the total employee," she said. "You look at the full record of that employee's career. You look at whatever the division has to say about the employee and you look at the facts in the particular case. You look at the employee's disciplinary history as to whether or not they have ever been in trouble. You look at how well they performed in the past, and you try to get a sense of whether or not this is an employee who can be rehabilitated, and if so, a period of suspension is imposed and if not, the employee is removed."
The employee who made the sex tape with the reporter, for instance, resigned before being fired, according to the report.
That employee "misused administrative leave, misused his credentials to get into a night club, misused a government vehicle, provided law-enforcement-sensitive documents to his girlfriend, who was a news reporter, improperly stored secret documents in a hotel room, which were viewed by his girlfriend, and following their break-up, threatened his girlfriend with the release of a sex tape the two had made, which threats she referred to a U.S. attorney's office," the internal summary report said.
Another employee, who used a "video camera to record (a) co-worker changing in (the) women's bathroom," also resigned, according to the report. The employee "lied about his conduct to (a) co-worker and attempted to erase the video when asked to relinquish the camera upon being caught."
And an employee who harassed a "former boyfriend, his mother and his new girlfriend" with "repeated phone calls, text messages, e-mail" was fired, the report said.
"If you lie under oath, you are gone," Wills told CNN. "If you tell the truth --- it's sort of Watergate 101. It's not always the behavior itself that results in a seriously adverse finding. It can just be the cover-up."
Konrad Motyka, the president of the FBI Agents Association, said, "Specifically, demonstrable, incorrect conduct or criminal conduct is not acceptable and never should be. But...our rate of conduct is actually less than in a lot of places, and human beings, being what they are, with the size of the organization we have, occasionally there will be some issues that come up."
Asked if there should be zero tolerance for serious misconduct, Motyka told CNN: "I believe there is zero tolerance for serious misconduct. Once it is adjudicated and proven to be a fact, just as anywhere else, people have the right to a fair hearing to determine whether the facts actually meet the circumstances."
James Wedick, a former veteran FBI supervisor who owns a consulting firm, said the misconduct is an embarrassment to the bureau.
"We are horrified, we're embarrassed. It bothers every official. It bothers everyone who works for the bureau. But law enforcement, the FBI, is made up of men and women. Men and women do make mistakes, and unfortunately, sometimes the mistakes are little bit more egregious than others."
Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, said the behavior described in the disciplinary summaries obtained by CNN is surprising.
"People in government, particularly the federal government, ought to be the best people that you can ever have, and people want to respect federal government employees. And most respected would be FBI agents," Grassley said.
Israeli medics and volunteers carry the body of Kristine Luken near Mata, Israel, on Sunday
Jerusalem (CNN) -- Israeli authorities are investigating whether the attack that left an American woman dead and her friend injured was "nationalistic," a police spokesman said Monday, using a term for crimes in which a victim is targeted based on an Arab or Israeli background.
American Kristine Luken died in the attack.
Her body was found Sunday after Kay Susan Wilson, Luken's friend and co-worker at a Christian ministry, stumbled into a picnic area with her hands bound, bleeding from multiple stab wounds and asking for help.
Wilson told authorities the two were hiking in a forest near Beit Shemesh, west of Jerusalem, when two men attacked them, tied them to a tree and stabbed them, according to police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld.
Wilson told reporters from her hospital bed Sunday that one of the men was armed with a long serrated knife and that she believes they were Arab.
"It was clear that they came to kill," the Israeli newspaper Haaretz quoted Wilson as saying. "Who carries around a knife like that?"
Wilson said she was wearing a Star of David on a necklace when she was attacked, according to the newspaper.
"He took it off like a gentleman and then turned me around and stabbed in the place where the Star of David had been," Haaretz quoted her as saying.
Rosenfeld confirmed Monday that investigators' primary focus is that the attacks may have involved nationalistic intent, but he said investigators have not yet completely ruled out other possibilities.
Luken and Wilson both worked for CMJ UK, a Christian ministry based in England. Wilson, a British citizen living in Israel, was a senior tour guide for the group, according to a statement posted to the group's website by its CEO, Robin Aldridge.
Luken was an administrator for the group and had recently taken over responsibility for managing the group's tour operations in Israel, Aldridge said.
"She had a beautiful and gentle spirit as well as a strong and vibrant faith," Aldridge said of Luken. "She loved Israel and had visited on several occasions both as a tourist and as a member of CMJ."
"It is a tragedy that such a lively, caring and faith-filled person should have been struck down in such a way," he said.
The Foreign Office in London said it was "aware of the hospitalization of a British national" and was ready to provide assistance if needed.
Luken had worked for CMJ UK for one year, having previously been a government employee, according to Aldridge.
"She had to cope with a move to a new country as well as a new job but quickly made the adjustment and became a key member of our team," Aldridge said.
He said the group's work sharing the Christian faith with the Jewish people in Israel would continue despite the attack.
Parents are being warned that a new Barbie doll that features a built-in video camera could be used as a tool by paedophiles to make child pornography.
The Barbie 'Video Girl', which is on sale in the UK and the U.S., has a hidden camera in the chest and a small LCD screen video display in her back.
A 'cyber crime alert' from the FBI has said the doll, which went on sale in July, could be used to record footage used for distribution by paedophiles.
It said: 'FBI investigation has revealed instances where an individual convicted of distributing child pornography had given a Barbie doll to a six-year-old girl.
The document went on to cite the findings of another investigation which found 'examples where a concealed video camera had recorded child pornography'.
That camera did not involve a doll, FBI agent Frederick Gutt said, but the possible combination of the two in a single device presents concerns for investigators.
There have been no recorded incidents of paedophiles using the Barbie 'Video Girl' to prey on young children.
The alert adds: 'Law enforcement is encouraged to be aware of unconventional avenues for possible production and possession of child pornography, such as the Barbie Video Girl.'
Video Girl can capture up to 30 minutes of footage and the video can be downloaded and streamed live to a computer. There is no indication it can be streamed directly to the internet.
The alert was written in the U.S. for law agencies only, but was mistakenly sent to media outlets in Seattle.
Agent Steve Dupre told CNN: 'It was an inadvertent dissemination of the document. 'There have been no reported incidents of this doll being used as anything other than as intended.'
William Porress, from Tacoma, Washington, said he would not buy one of the dolls for his six-year-old granddaughter.
'That plays into these people who prey upon our children's ideals. It frightens me.
'Oh, she would love it, but she's more important to me than a giggle on Christmas morning.'
A statement from Mattel Inc, which makes the doll, said: 'The FBI is not reporting that anything has happened.
Steve Dupre from the FBI Sacramento field office has confirmed there have been no incidents of this doll being used as anything other than its intent.
'Mattel products are designed with children and their best interests in mind. Many of Mattel's employees are parents themselves and we understand the importance of child safety - it is our number one priority.'
The Barbie doll, which costs $49.99 (£32), is aimed at children six and above and has been nominated for the 2011 Toy of the Year Award.
It's quite clear. No guns may be brought to school. Period. It's the law.
So, when Samuel Burgos brought a gun to school last November in Broward County, Florida, the zero tolerance policy kicked in, and Samuel was suspended and then expelled.
A just punishment? Did he deserve it?
Well, here's more. The gun wasn't real. It was a toy gun that never left his book bag. And Samuel -- he was 7 years old at the time.
A just punishment? Did he deserve it?
"No child should be disciplined in this manner," said Magdiel Burgos, Samuel's father. "He made an honest mistake, OK. And he's paying dear life for it, and it just isn't fair."
Samuel, now 8, has been out of school for almost a year. His parents have home-schooled him since he was expelled for bringing a clear plastic, spring-action toy gun to school, which fired plastic beads.
"He has been deprived of an education. My son made a mistake, and they kept him out a year," said Samuel's mother, Karen Burgos.
And it may be longer than that before Samuel is permitted to rejoin his classmates. A hearing will be held this month as his family fights his expulsion. Because the school board's order has not yet been finalized, his punishment could be extended into next year.
"I miss my friends," Samuel said.
Samuel spends his days playing baseball and practicing his studies with his parents. He should be in third grade now, but he's already missed most of second grade and may find himself two years behind by the time this matter is resolved.
In an interview with CNN correspondent John Zarrella, Samuel said that he was playing "army" with his friends one weekend, and he decided to hide the toy gun from his brother, so he placed it in his school bag. He went to school on Monday and said that he forgot he had the toy with him.
Samuel told one of his friends the gun was there but said he never took it out.
When the toy gun was discovered, according to school board records, the principal of Pembroke Pines Charter Elementary School West determined the gun to be a toy, but she felt compelled to report the incident to the school board. The school board classified the toy gun as a weapon because it fired a projectile device. The punishment: mandatory expulsion.
According to school records, school district Superintendent James Notter recommended the boy be expelled. Samuel was not charged criminally.
Notter did not consent to CNN's request for an interview. However, a school board spokeswoman e-mailed this statement to CNN.
"A hearing officer ruled in favor of the School Board of Broward County to uphold [its] recommendation of expulsion. ... Students have the right to personal privacy and the District is exercising responsibility of respecting this right."
Zero tolerance policies, such as this one in Florida, exist in some form in all 50 states, according to the Education Commission of the States.
In the post-Columbine world, schools have taken a hard line in increasing safety by increasing punishments. But the laws are constantly evolving, according to experts, so that the less serious, often petty cases of misconduct are not handled the same as the serious ones.
In Louisiana, a child who brings a knife to school with a blade 2 inches or longer will be expelled, except when the student is under 11 in pre-kindergarten through fifth grade, according to the Education Commission of the States.
And, in Broward County, where Samuel lives, school officials have amended their policies this school year and require mandatory expulsion only for possession of a firearm.
But it comes a year too late for Samuel. One expert said there's been a definite error of judgment, and now Samuel has missed a large part of two school years.
"This is a 7-year-old child," said Kathy Christie of the Education Commission of the States. "This is a case where it was not brandished. It's a plastic gun. ... It just seems a long time to penalize a young man like that, a long time to take him out of that educational experience."
During their son's expulsion, Samuel's parents were offered the chance to send their son to an alternative school. The school, for "at risk" kids, has about 200 students in kindergarten through 12th grade.
"We said this is not an option, this is unacceptable," Samuel's father said. "I cannot, as a concerned parent, send my child, to a correctional school at 7 years old, who committed a mistake."
The Burgoses worry that this blemish on Samuel's permanent record will follow him, so the family is challenging the school board's ruling. Samuel could also be penalized for not attending the alternative school, according to his attorney.
"If he applies to certain colleges and universities, they too will be aware of an expulsion that happened in second grade," said Burgos family attorney, Alfreda Coward. "They'll know that he was expelled from school for having a class 'A' weapon, and the No. 1 item on that is a firearm."
For now, Samuel spends his days at home, but he said he misses going to school and doing his homework.
While that may be hard to believe, his mother works with him and helps him with his lessons each day. But is she a good teacher?
