Way paved for Israel's accession to Red Cross movement

[barb162]

http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=2&article_id=20305

Way paved for Israel's accession to Red Cross movement

By Agence France Presse (AFP)

Saturday, November 26, 2005


GENEVA: The Palestinian Red Crescent and Israel's equivalent, the Magen David Adom, will sign a landmark agreement in Geneva next week, the Swiss Foreign Ministry announced Friday. A spokesman for the ministry vehemently declined to give any details on the nature of the accord due on Monday, but Swiss media reports said it would amount to formal mutual recognition by the two groups.

The Foreign Ministry said in a statement that the agreement would be signed about a week before a conference which is due to pave the way for Israel's accession to the Red Cross movement by re-examining
an additional "neutral" emblem for the global humanitarian organization.

"An important step has therefore been taken on the way to the settlement of the emblem issue," the statement added. Switzerland has mediated the agreement between the Palestinian and Israeli humanitarian agencies.

The conference of the 189 signatories of the Geneva Conventions on December 5 and 6 will re-examine the decades-old political controversy and is widely expected to formally recognize a "red crystal" alongside the red cross or red crescent.

snip

[Lithos]

1. This is bigger than it appears

The cooperation and ability to conduct joint operations between these two organizations will be greatly increased as a result.

L-

[bemildred]

2. Another straw in the wind, I thought.

[Coastie for Truth]

4. Motivation ? Sure is - The "Big One" Is Coming

12. Near East

Since 1993, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) have been cooperating with Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMR) earth science organizations of Turkey, Lebanon, Cyprus, Syria, Jordan, Israel, Palestinian Authority, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Yemen under the program "Reduction of Earthquake Losses in the Eastern Mediterranean Region (RELEMR)". The European -Mediterranean Seismological Center (EMSC) has coordinated the exchange of seismicity data among these countries. Among the RELEMR goals was the compilation of the regional seismic hazard, which was performed under the GSHAP umbrella.

The Eastern Mediterranean Region, because of its geological structure, seismicity, topography, and climate, has been subjected to many earthquake disasters during the past two thousand years, resulting in great losses of life and property. Earthquake ground shaking and tsunamis, the main causes of past disasters, are expected to continue to be the most dangerous threats to the built environment of each EMR country. Seismicity in the EMR is mainly associated with the northward movement of the Arabian plate. The 1,000 km-long western boundary of the Arabian plate is a complex plate boundary, extending from zones of sea-floor spreading in the Red Sea to zones of plate convergence in Turkey, and lies along the line of the Gulf of Aqaba, the Dead Sea rift, and the Ghab depression. The sense of motion along the transform fault system is left lateral, with the east side moving northward relative to the west side. Total displacement is estimated at about 107 km since Oligocene time, with an annual rate of about 0.5 cm over the last 7 to 10 million years. Seven damaging earthquakes have occurred in the EMR in the last decade. The Ms 7.2 earthquake occurred in 1995 in the central Gulf of Aqaba region caused damage in nearby communities in Jordan, Egypt, Israel, and Saudi Arabia and was felt for more than 700 km; the aftershock sequence lasted for more than 1 year with numerous shocks exceeding Ms 5.0. For the first time, countries in the region worked together to process seismic data using various software packages and a unified data set. The magnitude of the main shock and the robust aftershock sequence demonstrate the threat that earthquakes continue to pose to the EMR.

The probabilistic ground shaking map for the EMR was assembled at ETH Zurich by D. Mayer-Rosa and S. Sellami, on the basis of maps contributions from G. Papakyriacou (Cyprus), S. Riad, E. Ibrahim and M. Sobaih (Egypt), A. Shapira (Israel), A. Amrat (Jordan), M. Al Haddad (Saudi Arabia; Al Haddad et al., 1994), C. Tabet (Lebabon), and M. El Khoubbi (Syria; El Khoubbi, 1997); the RELEMR coordination was ensured by W. Hays of USGS. The resulting regional map is not a calculated map, but rather a smoothed composite map based on the existing ground shaking hazard maps of individual EMR countries. The main difficulty was that the available sources are very different in term of mapping parameters, probability levels and exposure times. The result integrates all the information into a unified map expressing Peak Ground Acceleration expected at 10% probability of exceedance in 50 years (Figure 2). With modifications in both the level and spatial distribution of the peak ground acceleration values, especially at country boundaries, the map was presented at the 1998 ESC General Assembly in Tel Aviv and approved by RELEMR. A new RELEMR Task Group "Hazard Maps and Applications" has now been established to prepare future EMR probabilistic ground shaking hazard maps on a scale of 1:250,000, on the basis of available data on the EMR source, attenuation path, and local site geology parameters.

In plain English:The big earthquake is coming to the region - right up the Gulf of Aqaba and the Jordan Valley - up to Syria - Lebanon - Turkey



Us "Red Cross-Red Crescent - Red Crystal Volunteers out here on the San Andreas Fault ..... take this very seriously"

[barb162]

5. I had thought Saudi Arabia and several other countries were

geologically stable. Turkey, Cyprus, etc., I knew were earthquake prone areas. One thinks of how long these buildings have been standing in many of these countries (Petra, Jerusalem....)

[Coastie for Truth]

7. They get a lot of "little" 2.5-3.5 quakes.

The really active fault line goes along the eastern coast of Saudi Arabia, in the Persian Gulf, into Iran.

A lot of geologists-seismologists say that the Jordan Valley was the scene of eartquakes in Biblical Times, and still is a "potentially destructive" fault line.

[Coastie for Truth]

3. Note my avatar - the "Red Crystal"

[barb162]

6. Yes, I have noticed it. Why do you suppose both

the Israelis and Palestinians didn't use this crystal? I was thinking if they crossed into each other's territory that would be safer for people travelling in the vehicles. "...the crystal, which is regarded as being free of all religious, cultural or national connotations..."