A history of violence: The shooting in Jerusalem of British Assistant Police Superintendent Alan Sigrist, 12 June 1936

Copyright @ 2010 The Author. This is the author's accepted manuscript. The final published article is available from the link below.This article provides a narrative of the shooting in Jerusalem by two Palestinian gunmen — Bahjat Abu Gharbiyah and Sami al-Ansari — in June 1936 during the Arab revolt in Palestine of a British police officer, Alan Edward Sigrist. Abu Gharbiyah and al-Ansari specifically targeted Sigrist because of his violence towards Palestinians — an issue that has not been discussed fully in the literature. This study measures, against the contemporary record, Abu Gharbiyah’s account of why he shot Sigrist, using the shooting as a case study to open up debates on the British use of official and unofficial violence to maintain colonial rule, alongside one on the response of local people to such violence. While recognizing the partisan nature of Abu Gharbiyah’s memory of events in Palestine, the article gives voice to the Palestinians, explaining how and why rebels fighting British rule and Jewish immigration to Palestine used violence. Following the analysis of the shooting of Sigrist, the article details more general torture by British forces as recalled by Abu Gharbiyah, setting this against the extant evidence to test the traditional notion that Britain used ‘minimum force’ in countering colonial disturbances, tying Sigrist’s behaviour to that of British troops and police in Palestine more generally. Thus, while the article is narrow in its focus it has broader implications for contemporary imperial and military history.Marine Corps University Foundation and Mr and Mrs Thomas A. Saunders

Terror in Galilee: British-Jewish collaboration and the Special Night Squads in Palestine during the Arab revolt, 1938–39

This essay examines an aspect of British counter-insurgency in Palestine in the 1930s during the Arab revolt there against British colonial rule and Jewish settlement: the pro-British, anti-rebel Palestinian militia “peace bands,” associated with the Palestinian Nashashibi family and raised with British and Jewish military and financial assistance, and with support from the British Consul in Damascus, Gilbert MacKereth. Using Hebrew, Arabic and untapped local British regimental sources, it details how the British helped to raise the peace bands and the bands’ subsequent activities in the field; it assesses the impact of the bands on the course of the Arab revolt; and it sets out the views of the British Army towards those willing to work with them. In doing this, it extends the recent thesis of Hillel Cohen on Palestinian collaboration with Zionists to include the British and it augments the useful but dated work of Yehoshua Porath and Yuval Arnon-Ohanna on the subject. Such a study is significant for our understanding of British methods of imperial pacification methods, especially the British Army’s manipulation during colonial unrest of “turned” insurgents as a “loyalist” force against rebels, an early form of “pseudo” warfare. The collaboration by Palestinians resonates with broader histories of imperial and neo-imperial rule, it extends military histories on colonial pacification methods, and it provides rich, new texture on why colonial subjects resisted and collaborated with the emergency state, using the Palestinians as a case study

“Is Sarah a Bully or a Friend?”: Examining Students’ Text-based Written Expressions of Bullying

Bullying has been recognized as a complex phenomenon with potential for serious negative outcomes. Activities that address complex social situations of bullying, such as reading and writing to a pen pal about fictional literature, provide space for students to think and share about personal issues that they encounter and how characters deal with similar issues in productive ways. For this research, we used a critical literacy lens to explore bullying within the context of language, power and context. This research shares qualitative analysis of letters students wrote to adult pen pals after reading a fictional book with a plot addressing bullying. Letters from 32 students were analyzed and four themes emerged: 1) text-based interpretations about bullying; 2) personal experiences and perspectives about bullying; 3) bullying in relation to friendship and social positioning; and 4) lessons learned for addressing bullying via action and advocacy

Solar sailing

An introduction to solar sailing is presented. The physical principles are briefly reviewed along with an introduction to the historical context of solar sailing. Potential solar sail configurations are briefly introduced, while placing these in the context of the current hardware development programmes. Following the introduction to solar sailing we progress onto a discussion of solar sail orbital dynamics in a planet-centred environment. The development of solar sail trajectory generation is presented, from Earth escape trajectories through to lunar fly-by trajectories and more accurate Earth escape methods. Much of this work relies on assumptions to generate near-optimal solutions rather than true globally optimal solutions, which are computationally difficult to determine for multiple revolution trajectories. Many of these traditional planet-centred solar sail applications, such as Earth escape, also require rapid attitude slew manoeuvres to achieve. This first lecture is based on theory development and application with a view towards future missions, such as planetary sample return

Theory of disorder-induced multiple coherent scattering in photonic crystal waveguides

We introduce a theoretical formalism to describe disorder-induced extrinsic scattering in slow-light photonic crystal waveguides. This work details and extends the optical scattering theory used in a recent \emph{Physical Review Letter} [M. Patterson \emph{et al.}, \emph{Phys. Rev. Lett.} \textbf{102}, 103901 (2009)] to describe coherent scattering phenomena and successfully explain complex experimental measurements. Our presented theory, that combines Green function and coupled mode methods, allows one to self-consistently account for arbitrary multiple scattering for the propagating electric field and recover experimental features such as resonances near the band edge. The technique is fully three-dimensional and can calculate the effects of disorder on the propagating field over thousands of unit cells. As an application of this theory, we explore various sample lengths and disordered instances, and demonstrate the profound effect of multiple scattering in the waveguide transmission. The spectra yield rich features associated with disorder-induced localization and multiple scattering, which are shown to be exasperated in the slow light propagation regime

Repeat and first time visitation in an experience specific context: The Valley of the Giants Tree Top Walk.

Communication with the public is a primary consideration in the design of natural area tourist attractions (Manfredo & Bright,1991; Roggenbuck, 1992; Vogt & Stewart, 1998). In a management context, communication is essential in ensuring a relevant and enjoyable experience on the part of the visiting tourists (Magill, 1995). Communication also serves as an important management aid in reminding visitors of appropriate behaviour while ensuring continued visitor interest in the attraction (Moscardo, 1998; Moscardo & Woods,2001). This paper presents the results of a .survey examining motivations and attitudes of repeat and first time visitors to the Tree Top Walk site in the context of the communication strategy used at the site

Utilizing expert systems for satellite monitoring and control

Spacecraft analysts in the spacecraft control center for the Cosmic Background Explorer (COBE) satellite are currently utilizing a fault-isolation expert system developed to assist in the isolation and correction of faults in the communications link. This system, the communication link expert assistance resource (CLEAR), monitors real time spacecraft and ground systems performance parameters in search of configuration discrepancies and communications link problems. If such a discrepancy or problem is isolated, CLEAR alerts the analyst and provides advice on how to resolve the problem swiftly and effectively. The CLEAR system is the first real time expert system to be used in the operational environment of a satellite control center at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. Clear has not only demonstrated the utility and potential of an expert system in the demanding environment of a satellite control center, but also has revealed many of the pitfalls and deficiencies of development of expert systems. One of the lessons learned from this and other initial expert system projects is that prototypes can often be developed quite rapidly, but operational expert systems require considerable effort. Development is generally a slow, tedious process that typically requires the special skills of trained programmers. Due to the success of CLEAR and several other systems in the control center domain, a large number of expert systems will certainly be developed to support control center operations during the early 1990's. To facilitate the development of these systems, a project was initiated to develop an integrated, domain-specific tool, the generic spacecraft analyst assistent (GenSAA), that alows the spacecraft analysts to rapidly create simple expert systems themselves. By providing a highly graphical point-and-select method of system development, GenSAA allows the analyst to utilize and/or modify previously developed rule bases and system components; thus, facilitating software reuse and reducing development time and effort

Impact of trail-side interpretive signs on visitor knowledge

Interpretive signs provide an important tool for enhancing visitor knowledge and understanding during a natural area experience. The Tree Top Walk (TTW) site in Western Australia adopted a minimal approach to interpretive signs to reduce distractions and allow the site to speak for itself. A 1999 pilot visitor survey indicated that many visitors were frustrated at this approach and wanted more signs installed along the walk trails despite the presence of information displays around the visitor kiosk. An interpretive sign trial was carried out in 2001 to assess the impact on visitor knowledge of the natural aspects of the site. While the trail-side interpretive signs provided no additional improvement in visitor knowledge, there appeared to be a positive increase in the perception of the site as providing a learning experience. The addition of trail-side interpretive signs also provided a point of interest for repeat visitors already familiar with the unique experience of the Tree Top Walk