The Belgian parliament is considering a widespread ban on the wearing of burqas that cover the entire body and/or niqabs that cover the entire face in public spaces, preparing to be the first European country to enact such a ban. This follows a similar debate in France that has not yet led to a widespread law, although a woman was recently arrested for driving while fully veiled.

When the Obama administration decided to get tough with PM Netanyahu and his cabinet colleagues over settlements in Jerusalem and generalized noncooperation with American national security interests vis-à-vis peace in the Middle East, the big challenge always was holding Congress. The President has a majority in both houses, and therefore control by his supporters of key committees, in addition to strong support from the Jewish community generally which is almost entirely Democratic.

The other day I wrote on the Ibishblog that Richard II is my favorite of the early Shakespeare plays, and that I thought it was the one about which he was most careful and into which he put most work. I feel the need to explain this in a little bit more detail in a posting that no longer pays any attention to the Shakespeare Theater Company's misguided adaptation that has now closed. First of all, I see more care, and indeed carefulness, in Richard II than in not only the early comedies, but also the four history plays that preceded it: Henry VI, Parts One, Two and Three, and Richard III.

A couple weeks ago I had the privilege of being invited to chair a panel at a major conference on secularism and the future of Iran at Lake Forest College in Illinois. In February, as regular readers of the Ibishblog will recall, I spoke at a conference on Iran and the Arab world at Rutgers University organized by Prof. Golbarg Bashi and her outstanding students, and I found it to be a most inspiring and uplifting event. The Lake Forest College conference, organized by Prof. Ahmed Sadri who I have known and admired for many years, was a completely different but also extraordinary event.

Recent efforts by student activists and others to convince the University of California Berkeley to divest from two companies with strong ties to Israel and its defense establishment is the first really powerful test of the "BDS" movement in the United States. The bottom line is this: if you can't get divestment through UC Berkeley, you're done. UC Berkeley is the epicenter of not only liberalism, but even radicalism, in American academia and indeed American social life in general. Frankly, I'm surprised it's proving so difficult.

Yesterday Pres. Obama gave the first clear indication of exactly where he stands in disputes embroiling the administration on how to go forward with Middle East peace in the context of the standoff with PM Netanyahu over settlements in Jerusalem. The President said that resolving the conflict is a "vital national interest of the United States," and, echoing points made with varying degrees of emphasis by Gen. Petraeus, Adm. Mullen and Sec.

A few days ago a David Ignatius column in the Washington Post introduced a new Obama administration concept in the standoff with PM Netanyahu: the idea that the United States might develop and begin promoting its own specified plan for a Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement. In effect, this plays on Israel's deep concern about a settlement that is "imposed" by outside powers rather than one that is negotiated with the Palestinians.

Anyone who went to see the Shakespeare Theater Company's production of Richard II, which is wrapping up this weekend, and who knows their Shakespeare, was in for quite a nasty surprise at its outset. The first several scenes, running more than 20 minutes into the production, are not Richard II at all, they're not even Shakespeare. They are from an incomplete manuscript usually referred to as Thomas of Woodstock that is contemporaneous with early Shakespeare, but possibly slightly earlier.

For anyone with the least doubts about exactly why there is a political crisis between the United States government and the Netanyahu Cabinet in Israel -- although not a strategic crisis between the two countries -- or why this crisis may deepen dramatically in the coming months and years, Vice Prime Minister and Minister for Strategic Affairs Moshe (Boogie) Ya'alon has been kind enough to clarify everything in today's issue of Yedioth Ahronoth in Hebrew.

By now, everyone who thinks the present confrontation between Pres. Obama and his administration and Prime Minister Netanyahu and his right-wing coalition allies is meaningless, a "charade," or even more ridiculously, a "joke," should be feeling pretty silly.