Tighter watch on smartphones at

PH airports
MANILA, PhilippinesThe Office for Transport
Security (OTS) on Thursday has directed its
airport personnel to require passengers to
present all their electronic gadgets, including
smartphones, on their persons and in their carryon luggage to be subjected to a separate
examination.
The OTS, an agency under the Department of
Transportation and Communications (DOTC),
issued the order on the heels of reports from the
United States that smartphones might be used by
terrorists to carry explosive devices that could
pass through airport security undetected.
Screeners in all our airports were directed to
screen all electronic gadgets, i.e., smartphones,
laptops, iPads, cameras with their batteries
separately by taking them out of their bags and
placing them on a tray for X-ray screening, the
OTS said in a statement issued Thursday.
The OTS said that, previously, only laptops were
taken from passengers bags to subject them to a
separate X-ray screening.
The inspection of electronic gadgets is not a new
policy but a precautionary measure we are
adopting
due
to
persistent
intelligence
information of terrorist attempts to blow up
aircraft
through
gadgets
of
passengers
specifically in flights entering the US, the OTS
said.
Jonathan Maliwat, OTS spokesman, said in a
phone interview the procedure is not new.
Airport security personnel have been checking
the gadgets of passengers through profiling.
Passengers will be required to remove the
batteries from their gadgets and submit them for
separate X-ray screening, unlike in the case of
US-bound passengers who must power up their
smartphones before boarding. This stricter
security measure will be done for both check-in
and carry-on baggage.
Maliwat explained that a separate X-ray screening
would allow security personnel to have an
unimpeded look at the gadgets.

Government
outclassed at
hearings

lawyers
Revilla et al.

MANILA, PhilippinesIt was like a law school

classroom scene with aspiring lawyers hearing a

mouthful from the professor who wanted them to

learn to think on their feet.
Except that the students were real state
prosecutors whom the Ombudsman had tasked to
exact justice from Sen. Bong Revilla, the member
of his legislative staff Richard Cambe and
businesswoman Janet Lim-Napoles for embezzling
billions of pesos in public funds.
And there was not just one but three professors
who were actually the justices in the
Sandiganbayan First Division who were trying the
three
accused on plunder and graft charges over the
P10-billion pork barrel scam.
It was the Philippines biggest official corruption
case in more than a decade and yet the
prosecutors were all thumbs, getting a trouncing
from the seasoned defense lawyers almost at
every turn during the initial presentation of
evidence in the bail hearings for Revilla, Cambe
and Napoles.
The justices couldnt conceal their impatience,
repeatedly panning the bumbling attempt of
Prosecutors Joefferson B. Torribio, Jacinto de la
Cruz Jr., Lyn G. Dimayuga and Emerita O. Francia
to stop the accused from walking out of jail.
Specifically, the division chair, Efren de la Cruz,
and Associate Justice Rodolfo A. Ponferrada
knocked the prosecutors choice and sequencing
of witnesses and their performance in extracting
testimony from their witnesses.
Ponferrada questioned the prosecutors decision
to put Commission on Audit (COA) Assistant
Commissioner Susan Garcia on the witness stand
first when they should have started with the main
protagonists in the case, whistle-blowers Benhur
Luy, Merlina Suas and Marina Sula.
Ponferrada likened the presentation of witnesses
to a telenovela where the audience wanted to
hear from the main players as early as possible.
Torribio argued that the prosecution started with
Garcia to provide the big picture, the P224.5million allegedly embezzled by Revilla, Cambe,
Napoles, her nephew Ronald John B. Lim and her
driver John Raymund de Asis (Lim and De Asis are
at large).
But Revillas lawyer Joel Bodegon, Cambes
lawyer Remigio Michael A. Ancheta II and
Napoles lawyer Stephen L. David countered that
Garcias testimony would be only hearsay.
Ponferrada said the prosecutors should bring their
witnesses to court to allow the magistrates to
question them at any time during the trial.

Justice De la Cruz showed annoyance at the

prosecutors amateurish ways in trying to make
Garcia state the amounts covered by the 12
special allotment release orders (Saro) that were
allegedly used to facilitate the release of Revillas
pork barrel funds to fake nongovernment
organizations controlled by Napoles, said to be
the mastermind of the pork barrel scam.
On several occasions, Ponferrada had to correct
the prosecutors each time they got their numbers
wrong in the Saros being presented by the
witness, drawing chuckles from people in the
courtroom.
You should
because it
documents
document,

have read the Ombudsman resolution

is all there. You brought a lot of
but you did not bring the basic
Ponferrada told the prosecutors.

In contrast, the defense lawyers were quick to

pounce on any shortcoming of the prosecution to
make their point that the bail hearings were
being unduly stretched.
At the heart of the defense teams argument was
the claim of forgery involving the signatures of
both Revilla and Cambe in the documents being
shown by the prosecution.
Bodegon, wearing round horn-rimmed glasses
and a paisley bow tie, said that with the way the
prosecutors were adding witnesses and evidence,
the bail hearings would take a year.
De la Cruz assured Bodegon, however, that the
court would not allow that to happen.
Aside from Garcia and the whistle-blowers, the
prosecution planned to bring more than a dozen
witnesses to the bail hearings.
They are National Bureau of Investigation special
investigator Joey I. Narciso; Department of
Budget and Management officials Lorenzo
Drapete and Orlando M. Magdaraog; Ombudsman
Field Investigation Office members Gerhard
Basco, Junelyn Pagunsun, Gialyn Yebron, Jose
Romano Francisco and Rholie Besona; managers
and representatives of Metrobanks Dasmarias,
T. Pinpin and Jose Abad Santos branches and
Land Bank of the Philippines Pasig Capitol branch;
a representative from the Anti-Money Laundering
Council Secretariat; and the records custodian of
the Senate blue ribbon committee.
The prosecutors amateur show at the First
Division on Thursday was a continuation of their
failure last month to amend the charges against
Revilla and Senators Jinggoy Estrada and Juan
Ponce Enrile to show the three lawmakers as the
central figures in the plundering of the Priority
Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) and not
Napoles.

The First Division handling Revillas case and the

Fifth Division hearing Estradas case rejected the
amendments, telling the prosecutors that the
changes could alter the finding of probable cause
to make the two senators stand trial and lead to
orders to release them from jail.
Trying to avoid a third failure, the prosecutors
withdrew a motion to amend the plunder charges
against Enrile in the Third Division.
The early setbacks for the prosecution drew
criticism of the governments handling of the pork
barrel cases, with University of the Philippines law
professor Harry Roque urging the Ombudsman to
revamp its prosecution teams.
Id like to think the Ombudsman wants to win
the cases in court, not just file them in court,
Roque said.
Roque suggested that the Ombudsman replace
Danilo Lopez, the lead prosecutor in Estradas
case, who he said could not afford to lose the
PDAF case the way he lost the P365-million
lamppost case in Cebu City in 2008.
He also criticized the cochair of the main
prosecution panel, Deputy Special Prosecutor
John Turalba, who he said moved for the dismissal
of graft charges against Reynaldo Varilla, a retired
deputy director general of the Philippine National
Police, and two others in 2008 in a defective case
involving the illegal provision of submachine guns
to the Philippine Marine Corps.
After the prosecutors early setbacks in court,
Roque wondered aloud where the pork barrel
scam cases were headed.

Obama offers US help negotiating

Israel cease-fire
WASHINGTON President Barack Obama offered
the help of the United States on Thursday in
negotiating a cease-fire to end escalating
violence between Israel and Hamas1, as world
leaders warned of an urgent need to avoid
another Israeli-Palestinian war that could engulf
the fragile region.
In a phone call with Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu, Obama lent his support to
Israel's efforts to defend itself against an
onslaught of rocket fire from the Hamascontrolled Gaza Strip, but he also called on both
Israel and the Palestinians to protect civilians and
restore calm. The White House said the U.S. was

1 Means "Islamic Resistance Movement"; a Palestinian Sunni

Islamist organization

willing to "facilitate a cessation of hostilities,"

potentially along the lines of a 2012 cease-fire
that the U.S. helped broker.
Mounting casualties and the growing prospect of
an Israeli ground incursion in Gaza drew alarm at
the United Nations, where Secretary-General Ban
Ki-moon told an emergency Security Council
meeting that it is more urgent than ever to avoid
another Israeli-Palestinian war that could engulf
the entire region. He called on both sides to agree
to a cease-fire.
"It is unacceptable for citizens on both sides to
permanently live in fear of the next aerial attack,"
Ban said.
More than 85 people have been killed, including
dozens of civilians, since Israel began an
offensive on Tuesday against the Hamas militant
group in Gaza. The offensive aims to put an end
to unrelenting rocket fire from Gaza that has
reached ever deeper into the Jewish state and
intensified amid spiraling tensions over the killing
of three Israeli teenagers and the apparent
revenge killing of a Palestinian teenager.
The offer to help bring about a cease-fire could
draw the U.S. deeper into a conflict the U.S. fears
could destabilize the region, but precisely what
role the U.S. would play remains unclear. The
United States considers Hamas to be a terrorist
organization and has a policy barring contact with
its leaders.
Headlines ( Article
sectionmatch: 1

MRec

),

pagematch:

1,

A senior Obama administration official said that

policy hasn't changed but that other players in
the Mideast could act as intermediaries, as was
the case when Egypt and former Secretary of
State Hillary Rodham Clinton worked to secure
the November 2012 cease-fire. Egypt, Turkey or
Qatar are all possibilities, said the official, who
demanded anonymity to discuss sensitive
diplomatic matters.
In the phone call, Obama condemned the rockets
and said Israel has the right to self-defense, the
White House said. Pro-Israel lawmakers in the
U.S. and the State Department have insisted that
Hamas is to blame for the fresh round of conflict.
Obama also raised his concerns about Tariq Abu
Khdeir, a Palestinian-American teenager who was
detained and apparently beaten by Israeli
authorities.
"The president expressed concern about the risk
of further escalation and emphasized the need for
all sides to do everything they can to protect the
lives of civilians and restore calm. But he also
urged both sides not to escalate the crisis," the
White House said in a statement.

In a moment of drama at the U.N., Israel's

ambassador suddenly played the piercing 15second siren that warns Israelis to run to bomb
shelters to escape rocket attacks to highlight the
threat his country faces. Ron Prosor told the
council that Hamas is "intentionally and
indiscriminately" threatening 3.5 million Israelis
and "no nation, no people and no government
could tolerate this."
Palestinian U.N. envoy Riyad Mansour had no
props for his appeal to the council "to stop the
bleeding" and revive the Palestinians' "dying
hopes" for an end to the conflict and peace with
freedom. "I speak on behalf of the suffering and
grieving Palestinian people, who are enduring yet
another barrage of death, destruction, trauma
and terror," he said.
Yet he rejected Israel's "audacious claims" that
Palestinians are being used as human shields
"while it knowingly and intentionally strikes at
densely
populated
civilian
areas."
The
Palestinians also reject Israel's claims to selfdefense while "it deliberately carries out reprisals
and collective punishment" for the three Israeli
teenagers'
deaths,
which
the
Palestinian
leadership has condemned, he said.
Diplomats said Jordan has circulated a press
statement, which is not legally binding, for the
Security Council's consideration that would call
for a cease-fire.
The draft, obtained by The Associated Press, calls
for "immediate calm and ending the hostilities in
Gaza including the launching of rocket attacks,"
restoration of the 2012 cease-fire and resumption
of direct Israeli-Palestinian negotiations aimed at
a comprehensive peace agreement and a twostate solution. It also calls for protection of
civilians.
The secretary-general, who is engaged in intense
global diplomacy over the crisis, called for "bold
thinking and creative ideas" to end the violence.

"Once again, Palestinian civilians are caught

between Hamas' irresponsibility and Israel's
tough response," Ban said.2

In early July, Hamas dramatically increased the number of

rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip into Israel. In response,
Israel launched Operation Protective Edge on July 6th and
expanded operations on July 9th against Hamas and the other
terrorist groups in Gaza according to further increase of
Palestinian terror rocket attacks on Israel. The IDF Chief of
Staff approved plans for a ground offensive into Gaza and
more intense IAF attacks on July 9th. German Chancellor
Angela Merkel condemned without reservation rocket fire on
Israel and said there is no justification for such attacks.
French President Francois Hollande "expressed France's
solidarity (with Israel) in the face of rocket fire from Gaza" and
said "that France strongly condemns these aggressions"; while
Hamas targets Israeli civilians and is hiding behind human
civil shields. In an interview with CNN Israels President Shimon
Peres said on July 9th that if the Hamas and the other terrorist
groups in Gaza "won't stop their missiles, there will be a
ground attack".