So Israel doesn't appear to have an opinion or even exist as anything apart from a Palestinian-destroying junta, if you'd just landed on Earth and read this absurdly sycophantic "report" on the soon-to-be Paletinian PM Mahmoud Abbas's upcoming vote of confidence for his cabinet. We are told that not only was his speech "powerful" -- clearly a subjective statement if ever I saw one (and I just have, natch), hence one that shouldn't be in a BBC report -- but also that the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) is not a "rubber-stamp chamber". Do they mean the PLC that is described by David Schenker in 2001 [in "Palestinian Democracy & Governance: an appraisal of the [Palestinian] legislative council" (published by the Brookings Institution, though he himself is a member of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a well-respected thinktank) -- an extract of which can be found here] as a "peripheral institution", an "institutional paper tiger", whose "speaker, top officers, and leading administrators are strong supporters and benefactors [emphasis mine] of the ra'is [Arafat]". Sorry, BBC News Online: seems you couldn't take the ten minutes I did to do a little research to get some objective facts into you report. I hope you don't feel that it contradicts your "Producers' Guidelines", which claim that "All BBC programmes and services should be open minded, fair and show a respect for truth". I'm rapidly losing my long-held respect for you.