Page 6 The Behrend College Collegian - Thursday. April 2, 1998
Clintons mingle with
beasts on African safaris
By William Douglas-=(c) 1998
Newsday
GABORONE, Botswana -- Presi
dent Clinton has been accused of fol
lowing the Republican road on policy
matters. Monday, he happily followed
the GOP's symbol down a dusty
jungle dirt trail.
Clinton saw the beauty and brutal
ity of nature on two picture-taking
safaris in Botswana's Chohe National
Park. Clad in a green short-sleeved
shirt and green cap, Clinton and first
lady Hillary Rodham Clinton bounced
along in a canvas-topped jeep, stop
ping along the trail to observe hippos,
baboons, impala, water buffalo and a
lioness and her cubs.
But what caught Clinton's eye was
the size and majesty of an elephant
with immense tusks. The Clintons'
safari vehicle slowly followed the
pachyderm from a respectful distance.
"It's amazing," Clinton said after a
30-mile ride around the park. "It's
been an amazing day."
During an afternoon safari ride, the
Clintons found more elephants cool
ing themselves on the banks of the
Chobe (pronounced CHOH-bay )
River. About 45,000 elephants roam
the park's 4,200-square-mile area.
The Democratic president expressed
a great admiration and respect for the
giant beast that is the symbol of his
political rivals.
"Yes, and I like to see them con
centrated here," Clinton said to laugh-
Witnesses
silent as
beaten man
dies
By Torn Kenworthy=(c) 1998, The
Washington Post
DENVER
Residents of a Denver
apartment house watched four men
beat a taxi driver early Sunday morn
ing and dump him in the trunk of his
cab without notifying authorities,
Denver police said. The man died.
Only after police, responding to a
911 call placed by a friend of the vic
tim, knocked on doors at random were
"Maybe if we had been
able to get there sooner,
we might have been able
to start some sort of
resuscitation. Numerous
people were looking out,
and nobody even came
down, nobody notified
the police until they went
door to door.-
Denver Dear( lite Virginia Lope:
they informed that the man had been
beaten and placed in the taxi's trunk,
said Denver police Detective Virginia
Nearly 50 minutes elapsed between
the time police arrived and when they
discovered the body, and Lopez said
the delay might have cost the man his
life.
"Forty to 50 minutes is a crucial
amount of time," said Lopez. "Maybe
if we had been able to get there sooner,
we might have been able to start some
sort of resuscitation. Numerous
people were looking out, and nobody
even came down, nobody notified the
police until they went door to door."
Mostapha Maarouf, 27, was driv
ing a cab in Denver to send money
back to his family in Youssofia, Mo
rocco, where he planned to return in
July to get married, his friends told
the Associated Press.
Police responded to the area after
Maarouf's friend called 911 from a
nearby store and reported he and his
friend were being beaten and robbed
by four men. Officers detained one
person as a possible suspect and were
looking for two or three others.
"I find it very disturbing and very
disappointing . ' that witnesses did not
immediately help police locate the
ter. "Actually, I was kind of jealous
that the Republicans appropriated
such a nice animal as their symbol. I
think they're fascinating, these el
ephants are."
Down by the water, the Clintons
were treated to a symphony of snorts
"Actually, I was kind of
jealous that the Republi
cans appropriated such a
nice animal as their sym
bol. I think they're fasci
nating, these elephants
are."
President BO Clinton
from nine hippos as a 12-foot croco
dile !umbered by.
The Clintons also saw nature's
somber side. They saw a water buf
falo that guides said had been severely
slashed by a lion, exposing the
animal's bright red stomach.
"He won't survive, will he?'
Clinton asked guide Richard Randall.
"Probably not," Randall said.
The Clintons began the day in the
morning darkness, hearing a
cacophany of birds near a safari lodge
that had few of the comforts of the
White House.
Dark woods dominated the decor
of the thatch-roofed lodge. The
Clintons' room was like every other,
TV series enrages
some Israelis for
unique perspective
By Marjorie Miller=(c) 1998, Los
Angeles Times
JERUSALEM History is written
by the victors, it is often said, hut in
Israel even the winners do not agree
on how to portray their past.
State-run Israel Television is airing
a 22-part documentary series for the
50th anniversary of the Jewish state
that has enraged many Israelis and
apparently enlightened others by tell
ing the story of their country's found
ing from the perspective of the van
quished as well as the victors.
Side by side with the country's he
roes, the series gives voice for the first
time on national television to
marginalized immigrants, Arab citi
zens who lost their land and identity
to the Jews, and Palestinians who en
gaged in terrorism to fight for the re
turn of their land.
To some viewers, the series is a
watershed event that exposes Israelis
to a different, more critical view of
their history. To others, it is simply
blasphemy.
"Does Zionism really have to sit on
the defendant's bench in a series run
by public broadcasting in Israel?"
Communications Minister Limor
Livnat asked. "Do we have to produce
films that ... internalize the views of
the Arabs, who for 100 years have
been claiming that we are imperial
ists, colonialists and occupiers?"
Livnat, who has called for the se
ries to be canceled, was so furious
about the Sunday night shows that she
announced she has stopped allowing
her son to watch them.
Infrastructure Minister Ariel
Sharon, a key figure for most of
Israel's 50 years, wrote a letter to
Education Minister Yitzhak Levy
complaining that the series "distorts
the history of our redemption, aban
doning every moral basis for the es
tablishment and existence of the state
of Israel" and urging him not to use
the programs in Israeli schools.
And the host of the series, Yehoram
Gaon, quit halfway through the pro
gram rather than appear on a segment
that presents the views of Palestinians
who carried out terrorist attacks on
Israeli civilians.
"I felt good with the first episodes,
which discussed the past and re
minded me of my childhood," Gaon
wrote in his resignation letter, "hut I
find it hard to forget my feelings when
presenting 1)1,,
World and Nation
lodge officials said: a bedroom with
a large dressing table, a writing table
and a bathroom with separate shower.
To keep pesky mosquitoes at hay, a
hug net encircled their bed.
The lodge, with a restaurant that
overlooks the Chohe River, has no
television or radios because "if one
comes to experience the hush, you
need to experience the hush and tran
quillity," said Koos-Jerrard Louw, a
lodge consultant.
The Clintons ended the day with a
sunset river cruise, accompanied by
gunboats and frogmen.
Despite the hack-to-nature theme,
the Clintons could not totally escape
official Washington. Secret Service
agents followed their safari vehicle in
one of their own. Another vehicle con
tamed presidential spokesman Mike
McCurry none the worse for eat
ing a fried worm for reporters on Sun
day national security adviser
Sandy Berger and presidential attor
ney and first friend Bruce Lindsey.
Bringing up the rear was a small crew
of reporters who monitored the
Clintons' every move.
Unfortunately, a radio reporter at
another game park near Gaborone was
not watching the moves of a cheetah
it jumped him from behind while
he was taking a colleague's picture.
Shouts drove the animal away and a
White House physician gave the re
porter a tetanus shot and some antibi
otics. He returned to work, more em
barrassed than injured.
the present
Supporters of the series say its vir
tue is precisely that: It does not make
Israelis feel good with the official line
hut raises painful questions and pro
vokes debate.
"There is no objective history," said
Yoel Rappel, a historian and radio
To some viewers, the series is a watershed event
that exposes Israelis to a different, more critical
view of their history. To others, it is simply
blasphemy.
commentator. "The series is a trigger kind" for terrorist attacks in the 1950 s
so that young people will go to the The controversial segments of the
hooks and movies to learn about Is- television series, which begins in
raeli history. Whether or not you agree 1936 with a wave of Jewish settlement
with the programs, they are raising the in British-ruled Palestine and ends
right questions. The only way to find with the assassination of Prime Min
a solution between Israelis and Arabs ister Yitzhak Rabin by a Jewish law
on the land is to raise the right ques- student in 1995, adopt many of the
lions. That is the first step on a long views of the new historians that crit
ics have branded "post-Zionism."
The series accuses Israel's Euro
pean, or Ashkenazi, majority, of hav
ing mistreated Middle Eastern Jew
ish immigrants, known as Sephardim.
It accepts matter-of-factly that
about 700,000 Palestinians fled Pal
estine out of fear or under military
threat during the 1948 war to become
refugees. This goes far beyond other
mainstream accounts of history.
While officials such as Livnat and
Sharon see the "Tekuma" account of
history as destructive, series producer
Gideon Drori defends it as a healthy
step forward for a secure and mature
society.
"Criticism can be judged by the re
sults it yields. In my opinion, this is
constructive criticism," Drori told the
weekly newspaper Kol Hair. "What
is destructive about a society which
is examining itself and asking ques
tions? That weakens us? In my opin
ion, it strengthens. ... We are not less
patriotic Israelis than those people
who have trouble looking at them-
journey
The public controversy over
"Tekuma" ("Rebirth"), as the series
is called, mirrors a debate that has
been going on in Israeli academic
journals for more than a decade. At
issue is the story of the revival of the
Jewish nation in the Holy Land.
For traditional Israeli historians
and critics of the series the narra
tive of Israel's founding is this: Ide
alistic Jewish pioneers settled a wide
open land called Palestine that was
sparsely populated with Arab natives.
The Jews came to live peacefully with
the Arabs and to enhance the quality
of life for all. They believed in com
promise but were confronted with
Arab aggression and were forced to
fight hack.
During Israel's 1948 War of Inde
pendence, local Arabs left their vil
lages in Palestine at the urging of the
region's Arab leaders, who promised
they would be able to return after Is
rael was destroyed. But the Jews won
the war for their homeland against the
Arab armies, just as David beat
Goliath.
That is the version taught in Israeli
schools and the one most Israelis be
But a group of "new historians" has
taken a skeptical look at that tradi
tional Zionist view and begun shat
tering what it calls "the myths" of the
loitikting the Jewish state. The new
Female substance may help fight AIDS
By David Brown=(c) 1998, The
Washington Post
A team of scientists is zeroing in
on a mysterious AIDS-fighting, can
cer-fighting, anemia-fighting sub
stance distilled from a distinctly un
likely source the urine of pregnant
women.
The existence of the substance has
been suspected for several years but
its precise chemical identity has
proved elusive. Now, a group of re
searchers headed by virologist Rob
ert C. Gallo report they've narrowed
the search, and eliminated the lead-
ing contender.
In Tuesday's issue of the journal
Nature Medicine, Gallo and his col
laborators say they've gotten crude
extracts of the protein, which they
name "hCG-associated factor," or
HAF.
The substance appears to he a pro
tein that clings tightly to human chori
onic gonadotropin (hCG), a hormone
produced in large quantity in the first
trimester of pregnancy, when hCG is
extracted from urine.
"When we have it in its pure form
and it's chemically identified, we will
be able to learn" how it works, said
Gallo, who heads the Institute of Hu
man Virology in Baltimore. "It may
open up a whole new area of anti-vi
ral research."
The first hint that hCG itself might
have unexpected properties came by
accident in 1995.
A group of male and female mice,
each injected with cells that cause the
rare blood vessel tumor called
Kaposi's sarcoma, were put in the
same cage by mistake. The animals
that didn't develop the cancer all had
thinkers say they portray Israeli he
roes such as Prime Ministers David
Ben-Gurion and Golda Meir as hu
man beings who made mistakes as
well as history.
The new historians accuse the
founders of having failed to do
enough to save European Jews dur
ing the Holocaust. They argue that
Israel passed up opportunities for
negotiations with Arab states and
evicted hundreds of thousands of Pal
estinians from their villages during the
1948 war. Israel implemented a tough
policy of no return and retaliated "in
selves."
Many Israelis feel that a series com
memorating Israel's 50 years should
be a festive event celebrating the
country's accomplishments and not a
critical one. Director Mouki Hadar's
segment, however, shows the physi
cal and spiritual conquest of the Ar
abs. It includes footage never before
aired on Israeli television of Palestin-
one thing in common they were
females that had become pregnant
soon after the tumor cell injection.
That finding eventually led Gallo's
team to try hCG in people with
Kaposi's sarcoma, which is relatively
common in AIDS patients, especially
ones who are gay men. This experi
ment produced another unexpected
result. The hormone not only shrunk
some of the tumors, it also also re
duced the amount of AIDS virus in
the bloodstreams of several patients.
Further research revealed the sub
stance had a third effect. It stimulated
the body's production of red blood
cells and white blood cells, both of
which dwindle to unhealthy levels in
people with advanced AIDS.
HCG is produced in large quanti
ties during the first 10 weeks of preg
nancy, when its main function is to
keep a pregnant woman's body from
rejecting the newly formed embryo.
Pharmaceutical companies extract the
hormone from the urine of women in
early stages of pregnancy for a vari
ety of medical uses, including the
treatment of infertility. Those "clini
cal grade" extracts, however, actually
include small amounts of dozens of
other proteins found in the urine.
Gallo's research team used those
impure extracts in their initial stud
ies, and concluded that hCG was caus
ing the observed effects. In the new
paper, however, they report that ex
tremely pure extracts of the hormone
don't do what the cruder samples did,
nor does hCG manufactured through
recombinant DNA technology.
The scientists found, however, that
when they filtered the crude hCG and
isolated the impurities by the weight
of the molecules they contained, two
ians who remained in Israel after the
war surrendering their weapons to
Jewish soldiers, and of Arab school
children dancing in the formation of
a Star of David, waving Israeli flags
on Independence Day.
It talks about the fact that Arab citi
zens of Israel lived under military rule
for 19 years, unable to leave their vil
lages without permits. The program
points out that about 60,000 Arabs
signed up for army service after an
Arab draft was announced in 1954 but
then were rejected when the govern
ment feared they would not fight
against their Arab brothers.
The Arabs' lack of army service has
often been used as a justification for
denying them equal rights.
Arab citizens also are heard protest
ing the confiscation of their lands, an
issue they raise each March 30 on the
anniversary of the day in 1976 that
Israeli troops opened fire on a land
demonstration, killing six Arabs.
Deputy Education Minister Moshe
Peled said he regretted that many
schools had bought the series.
"I am afraid that in a year or two or
10, the students won't even under
stand what happened here," Peled
said. "This is not a program about the
resurrection and foundation of the
state of Israel. Everything we have
been through in the 50 years of the
state is presented as though we are the
murderers and the Palestinians are the
victims."
Many of the segments still to be
broadcast are likely to prove at least
as controversial as the Arab-Israeli
segment. On Sunday, a show on the
construction of Jewish settlements in
the West Bank aired, and soon to fol
low are segments on Israel's 1982 war
in Lebanon and the Palestinian upris
ing, or "intifada," that ended earlier
this decade.
The segment on Palestine Libera
tion Organization attacks, scheduled
to run next Sunday, is called "Biladi,
Biladi" ("My Country, My Country"),
the name of the Palestinian anthem
that was banned in Israel until Rabin
and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat
signed the Oslo, Norway, peace ac
cords in 1993.
The title raised such a red flag for
Israelis that many officials urged that
the piece be eliminated. In response,
the Israel Broadcasting Authority al
tered the name to "In the Road of Ter
ror: Biladi, Biladi" and decided that
the broadcast would be followed by a
televised debate.
Host Gaon, who turned over the
segment, said that it gives "the heroic
story of the terror organizations." But
the director, Ronit Weiss-Berkowitz,
said she feels the piecc is balanced.
of the "fractions" had the activity they
were looking for. Specifically, when
those fractions were injected into
mice, both the activity of AIDS virus
genes and the growth of Kaposi's sar
coma tumors were reduced by about
80 percent, compared to untreated ani
mals. In cell culture experiments, the
fractions stimulated the growth of
blood cells 1.5- to three-fold.
Isolating and testing the substance
"are high priorities," the authors
wrote.
Gallo's collaborators included
Yanto Lunardi-Iskandar and Joseph L.
Bryant, both of the Institute of Hu
man Virology, and Steven Birken of
Columbia University in New York.
In a second, unrelated paper, Gallo
and another group of collaborators
report that people whose immune sys
tems produce unusually large quanti
ties of biochemicals called
chemokines are resistant to HIV in-
fection, in some cases even after mas-
sive exposure to the virus.
Gallo, Daniel Zagury of the Pierre
and Marie Curie University in Paris,
and 12 other collaborators, studied
128 hemophiliacs from Milan, Italy.
The patients had been repeatedly ex
posed to HIV in blood products be
tween 1980 and 1985, before a test
was available to detect viral contami
nation. Despite massive doses of vi
rus, 14 of the hemophiliacs never got
infected. Those patients lymphocytes
produced about 2.5 times the normal
level of chemokines, which are hor
mone-like substances that help direct
the body's immune response.
Their report appears in the current
Proceedings of the National Academy
of Sciences.
Changing diet,
lifestyle linked to
increase in allergies
By &ull Efrolf=(c) 1998, Los Ante_
les Times
TOKYO The sharp increase in Ja
pan in adult and child allergies, which
is common to most industrial coun
tries, is believed to be the result of a
combination of factors. Those include
particulate air pollution from diesel
exhaust and other sources; an increase
in the amount of pollen as more and
more cedar trees reach maturity; the
advent of Western-style housing that
traps pollen, dust and mold; and the
changing Japanese diet and lifestyle.
Traditionally, Japanese babies were
never fed red meat or eggs, because
such foods were rare and expensive.
But there is growing evidence that the
kind of protein an infant is first ex
posed to produces a kind of immuno
logical "imprinting," said Dr. Sakae
Inouye, one of Japan's leading experts
on the cedar problem. He said that
ingesting meat and eggs before the
age of 1 may make children more
vulnerable to allergies later on. The
Japanese diet became richer in meat
and eggs after the 19605, and the ma
jority of Japanese allergy sufferers are
under age 44, according to a Tokyo
metropolitan government survey.
There is also growing evidence that
people who are exposed to germs and
viruses in early childhood are less
susceptible to allergies later in life.
The rates of allergies in developing
nations are considerably lower than
in industrial societies. Moreover, a
recent study in England found that
eldest children, who tend to spend
their early years at home and are not
exposed to a torrent of infections, are
more than twice as likely to develop
allergies as third-born children in the
same families, who are bombarded in
early childhood with the rich soup of
viruses their older siblings bring home
from school, Inouye said.
Another study, conducted in the
former East and West Germany, found
that East German children, who were
typically in day care by the age of 1,
had far lower allergy rates than their
stay-at-home West German counter
parts, even though the East German
children were exposed to more pollu
tion. Because Japanese families typi
cally have one or two children, who
are kept at home until kindergarten,
this finding has prompted research
ers to explore whether a "dirty" im
munological environment may actu
ally be beneficial, said Inouye .