Taliban militants assassinate a Pakistani army brigadier and his driver. Brigadier Moin-ud-din Ahmed was deputy force commander of the United Nations Mission in Sudan, and was home in Islamabad on vacation when two assailants on a motorbike shot at his army jeep in rush-hour traffic.

Twenty-five years after a the famine that killed nearly a million people, Ethiopia’s government asks the international community for emergency food aid for 6.2 million people.

Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadizic announces that he will boycott his trial for genocide scheduled to start in the Hague next Monday, complaining that he has not been given enough time to prepare his defense.

Israeli sources report that Israel and Iran both attended nuclear talks in Cairo last month and that the Israeli and Iranian delegations met several times, the first direct contact between the two nations in 30 years. Iran denies that such talks took place.

The U.N.’s human rights chief endorses the Gladstone Report, which accuses both Israeli forces and Palestinian militants of committing war crimes during last winter’s conflict in Gaza.

Turkish police detain 50 suspected members of the Islamic Jihad League, a group linked to Al Qaeda, who were allegedly plotting attacks on NATO installation sin Turkey and Germany.

A 48-year-old France Telecom engineer hangs himself, becoming the 25 employee of the company to commit suicide in the past 20 months. Many of the employees have left notes blaming stress at work as the company undergoes major restructuring.

Ireland holds a second referendum on the Lisbon Treaty, an agreement aimed at strengthening the European Union by creating a full-time president and foreign-policy chief. The treaty must be unanimously accepted by all 27 member states. Ireland, which voted “no” in a similar referendum last year, is one of the last hold outs.

Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s appeal of her most recent sentencing is rejected. The pro-democracy leader was convicted and sentenced to 18 additional months of house arrest for having allowed an uninvited American to stay in her home while under a previous house arrest.

The International Olympic Committee hears final presentations from the four cities competing to host the 2016 Summer Olympics — Chicago, Tokyo, Madrid, and Rio de Janeiro. President Obama and first lady Michelle Obama give an emotional speech on behalf of their hometown, Chicago. A decision is expected by 12:30 p.m. Eastern time.

The U.S. will withdraw 4,000 troops from Iraq by the end of October and is on track to withdraw all combat troops by September 2010, according to an advanced copy of an address that General Ray Odierno, the U.S. military commander in Iraq, is expected to give to the House of Representatives Armed Services Committee today.

Israel plans to release 20 female Palestinian prisoners in exchange for a videotape that proves that an Israel soldier, Cpl. Gilad Shalit, who was captured by Palestinian militants in 2006, is still alive.

Pakistani and Indian reports obtained by The New York Times show that ten months after terrorists killed 163 people in Mumbai, Lashkar-e-Taiba, the Pakistani militant organization behind the attacks, is still intact and determined to strike India again.

Talks between Iran, the U.S. and five other world powers begin tomorrow in Geneva.

Earlier this morning, President Obama spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in a meeting which a senior administration source called “businesslike.” Expressing his impatience, Obama told the Israeli and Palestinian leaders, “We’ve had enough of talks….it’s time to move forward.”

Residents of Sydney, Australia awake to an eerie orange sky as the worst dust storms in at least 70 years engulf the city and move north towards Queensland.

Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah University of Science and Technology officially opens. The university, which boasts the world’s 14th fastest supercomputer and one of the world’s largest endowments, could also become a cultural battleground in this conservative country — the school is co-ed, and female students will mix freely with males and will not be required to wear veils.

World leaders gather in New York this week for the U.N. general assembly; among them are new presidents of the U.S., Russia and China, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi, attending for the first time. Issues to be discussed include climate change and nuclear proliferation.

President Obama will meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on the sidelines of the U.N. general assembly on Tuesday, but does not have “grand expectations” for the meeting.

More than 140 rebels are killed as the Yemeni army fights back a major offensive in the northern city of Sadah. The clash is the bloodiest since Houthi rebels began fighting with goverment forces in 2004.

Four U.S. soldiers operating under NATO are killed in a bomb blast in southern Afghanistan, making the 2009 death toll for foreign forces in Afghanistan the highest since the war began nearly eight years ago.

Negotiations to exchange an Israeli soldier held captive by Hamas for hundreds of jailed Palestinians are advanced by German involvement. Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is in London for talks with his U.K. counterpart Gordon Brown to discuss the Middle East peace process.

An Iranian prosecutor calls for “maximum punishment” of a senior reformer for acting against national security, in the fourth mass trial of moderates after Iran’s disputed election. Saeed Hajjarian, disabled by an assassination attempt in 2000, is accused of fomenting unrest and having contacts with British intelligence.

South Korea fails to send its scientific satellite into orbit after launching its first rocket into space. The rocket successfully lifted off from the country’s launch pad on the southern coast but failed to put an attached scientific satellite into the target orbit.

Chinese President Hu Jintao makes his first trip to Xinjiang after last month’s deadly ethnic riots. At the same time, there is confusion about how many rioters will face criminal charges and when their trial will start.

“A heartbreaking doc…. What we see is a profoundly bitter confrontation
between the individual and the community.”
–Globe and Mail

How far can one young woman push a conservative culture? Duah Fares is an Arab-Israeli teenager and member of the Druze minority, a religious sect living predominantly in Israel, Syria and Lebanon. She longs to be an international superstar like Angelina Jolie.

But when she changes her name to Angelina and sets her sights on the Miss Israel pageant, her tight-knit religious community balks. Miss Israel requires a bathing suit competition, but to appear that way in public would disgrace her family and even put her in danger from those who would rather see her dead than see the community dishonored.

Contestant No. 2 follows Fares and her family as they navigate the boundaries of traditional values while she tries to achieve her dream.

This episode of WIDE ANGLE is the U.S. television premiere of the theatrical film Lady Kul el Arab.

Click on the photos below to learn more about the Druze faith, culture and history.

I embarked on this film out of curiosity about whether traditional societies and beauty pageants could mix. I chose to document the Arab beauty pageant because it attracts Arab girls of all religions – Muslim, Christian, and Druze – from towns and villages in Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza.

At first, I was nervous that I wouldn’t know how to communicate with the young girls. What would we talk about? Would they fit the universal stereotype that beauty queens are just pretty faces who are best kept quiet? My greatest fear was that I wouldn’t be able to develop a meaningful conversation with these contestants, who, I imagined, came to fulfill a naive dream or to sign a $10,000 modeling contract.

One of the events I remember most was on the day of the Arab beauty queen ceremony in Nazareth. I arrived two hours before the girls to shoot the ceremony. At 1 p.m. the girls were supposed to have a final rehearsal. At 2 p.m. they began getting ready for the ceremony. That’s when the rumors started circulating that Duah/Angelina wasn’t coming.

I realized I had to leave the ceremony immediately and drive two hours from Nazareth to her village to see what was going on with her and her family. When I got there I discovered that she had run off to Tel Aviv and wouldn’t take part in the ceremony because she had decided to compete in the Miss Israeli pageant.

Later on I drove back to Nazareth to continue shooting the final ceremony of the Arab beauty pageant. When it ended I drove to Tel Aviv, only to find that Angelina had caught the train back to her village. It was a day filled with fear alongside a glittery ceremony. I was concerned about Angelina, but I realized how much strength she had. It was then that I understood that she was not just a stereotypical beauty queen, but a young woman chasing hidden dreams.

PRODUCERS
Timna Goldstein Hattav
Barak Heymann

NARRATOR
Jay O. Sanders

EDITORS
Erez Laufer
Miri Laufer

ORIGINAL SCORE
Avi Balleli

PRODUCTION MANAGER/RESEARCHER
Laura Hawa

TRANSLATORS
Raffat Hattab
Mindi Margalit

ADDITIONAL CINEMATOGRAPHERS
Uri Akerman
Rami Katzav
Uri Levi
Yuval Postel
Itai Raziel
Shahar Reznik

SOUND RECORDISTS
Ravid Dvir
Haim Meir
Asher Milo
Idan Shemesh
Rami Yazkan

PRODUCTION COORDINATORS
Sarit Asnapi
Noa Elad

GRAPHICS
Adraba

ONLINE EDITOR
Dima Lydchov

SOUND DESIGN
Erez Eyni Shavit

SOUND EDITOR
Idan Rabed

SOUND EDITING & MIX
DB Studios

EDITING STUDIOS
Sasha Franklin

ACCOUNTANT
Moshe Afargon

INSURANCE
David Naftali

LEGAL ADVICE
Dror D.Nachum

COMMISSIONING ORGANIZATIONS
Channel 8/Noga Communications
Makor Foundation

WORLD SALES
Ruth Diskin Films

–

HOST INTRO

DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY
Kevin Cloutier

ADDITIONAL CAMERA
Adam Vardy

SOUND
daniel Brooks

GAFFER
Theo Caris

TELEPROMPTER
Mariclare Rivera

MAKEUP
Janet Cassidy

–

FOR WIDE ANGLE

STORY PRODUCERS
Charlotte Mangin
Jeff Seelbach

ASSOCIATE PRODUCERS
Lauren Geller
Rawan Jabaji
Lucy Kennedy

SERIES EDITOR
Mark Sutton

SOUND MIX
Doug Johnson

POST-PRODUCTION SUPERVISOR
Sonoko Aoyagi Leopold

PROJECT MANAGER
Rekha Menon

MULTIMEDIA PRODUCERS
Aaron Ernst
Lauren Feeney
Renee Feltz

PRODUCTION INTERNS
Yana Kunichoff
Meredith Milstein
Abby Selden
Pracheta Sharma
Ben Travers

ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT
Ronak Shah

ASSISTANT EDITOR
Mike Goren

GRAPHIC DESIGN
vanOs

SERIES TITLE DESIGN
David Chomowicz

MUSIC
Douglas J. Cuomo

ON-AIR PROMOTION
Rob Issen
Jed Parker

LEGAL
Ranfi Rivera
Blanche Robertson

PUBLICITY
Gloria Park
Kellie Specter

SENIOR PRODUCER
Nina Chaudry

EXECUTIVE PRODUCER
Tom Casciato

A production of Heymann Brothers Films in association with
THIRTEEN and WNET.ORG

© 2009 WNET.ORG Properties LLC and Heymann Brothers Films
All Rights Reserved

This program was produced by Heymann Brothers Films and THIRTEEN which are solely responsible for its content

That this story became news is partly the accomplishment of an award-winning Jordanian journalist who broke the silence about honor killings with her reports for the Jordan Times.

“The most surprising thing to me is how a person can kill a close relative,” Rana Husseini told WIDE ANGLE. She chronicles 15 years of her reporting and the resulting push for social and legal reform in Jordan in her new book, “Murder in the Name of Honor.”

Honor killings are relatively rare – numbering about 25 a year in Jordan, and about 5,000 a year worldwide (13 women a day). But the crime is one of the most brutal practices in the modern world. It occurs when a family feels its female relative has tarnished its reputation by her “immoral behavior” – which can range from being raped to having an unrecognized phone number on her cell phone – and is often carried out by the woman’s brother or father.

Husseini’s effort to report on the crime met resistance in Jordan when critics accused her of hurting the country’s reputation and of trying to devalue its culture by imposing Western values.

“I’ve been accused of being a Western agent,” said Husseini. “Its unfortunate, but you can’t stop, you have to fight.”

Her work received another blow in 2003, when an Iranian-American published a misleading book about honor killings, “Honor Lost,” that tells the story of the author’s childhood friend who was killed by her father after he discovered she was in love with a Christian. Husseini said the book was rife with errors and stereotypes (she counted eighty errors) about how Muslims treat women, and hurt efforts to change Muslim attitudes about the crime when Western conservatives in the United States and Australia used it to support an attack on Iraq. The publisher, Random House Australia, later acknowledged doubts of the author’s veracity and offered refunds on all returned books.

In fact, honor killings are most commonly associated with Muslims, but as Husseini notes in her book “while some Muslims do murder in the name of honor – and sometimes claim justification through the teachings of Islam – Christians, Hindus, Sikhs and others also maintain traditions and religious justifications that attempt to legitimize honor killings.”

In addition to Jordan, the practice occurs in Pakistan, Afghanistan, the Kurdish regions of Turkey, Egypt, Syria and even Israel, where honor killings have been documented among both Muslims and members of the Druze faith, although Hussieni notes they are “not in high numbers.”

Husseini has lent her support to campaigns in Jordan to amend laws that outline lenient punishment for perpetrators of honor killings. Article 340 of the country’s legal code mandates that “he who discovers his wife, or one of his female relatives with another in an adulterous situation, and kills, wounds or injures one or both of them, benefits from a reduction in penalty.” The campaign yielded a temporary amendment of a related law, and a longer lasting change in public awareness.

“The voices that oppose these crimes are getting more attention than before,” said Husseini.

As recently as this month, Jordan’s Justice Minister, Ayman Odeh, said perpetrators of honor crimes would get no legal exemptions. “A crime is a crime. There is no such thing as honor crimes. All people are equal before the law,” said Odeh.

Husseini says one of the most satisfying results of her reporting has been the change in attitude among men who feel pressured to defend the honor of their family.

“Two years ago at a public lecture in a full auditorium, I opened the floor for discussion,” Husseini recalled to WIDE ANGLE. “I had two men ask me in front of everyone, ‘I know killing my sister is wrong. What can I do to avoid committing this act if I’m ever put in this situation?’ This is a major shift.”

In this week’s WIDE ANGLE episode, Contestant No. 2, a young Druze woman who pushes the limits of her conservative culture in Israel faces a threat on her life from her uncle when her community expresses concern that her participation in a beauty pageant could damage her family’s honor.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Middle East envoy George Mitchell visit the Middle East this week in an attempt to revive the peace process there. Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak tells Gates that “no option should be removed from the table” regarding Israel’s response to Iran’s nuclear program, while Barak and Mitchell near an agreement on West Bank settlement activity.

North Korea says it is open to engaging in bilateral talks with the U.S. regarding its nuclear weapons program, but is not interested in reviving the six-party talks that included China, Japan, Russia, and South Korea.

As many as 100 people are killed in three attacks by Islamic militants in Nigeria, following yesterday’s clashes between militants and the police which killed dozens.