I made a mistake. In the last paragraph, I meant to say "Excel" instead of "Word" in some places. The advice goes for either app. Also, I just noticed that Microsoft is calling Office plugins "Add-Ins" in Office 2007. I don't know when that change happened or if it's always been that way.

I've had that problem in Word but not in Excel. I just keep tinkering with it, achieving limited success. I get to the point where I don't care anymore whether Word "understands" that the text is supposed to be going RTL. Sometimes I cheat and use a tool to reverse the letters. (However, of course, this is a terrible solution if it's a document that's going to be edited with any frequency.) From what I understand, there is an invisible character that denotes when Word should begin to read text as RTL. Maybe there is a Word plugin to make this character appear.

What do they do in Israel??

For Hebrew word processing, one could try DavkaWriter or Dagesh Pro. I'm not aware of a Hebrew-centric spreadsheet program.

I might suggest trying a Hebrew version of Excel, but I can't say from experience (I haven't tried it) that it actually handles bi-directional-text documents better. I don't know if anything under the hood is really different or if it's just textual localization in the chrome and different default settings. Seeing as Microsoft has a large corporate presence in Israel, you'd think they would get RTL and BiDi issues smoothed out very well in their flagship products.

Another thought just hit me: I wonder if using a Hebrew version/language-pack of the Windows OS would make it work better. This close-reopen issue reminds me of a problem I had with either WordPress or Joomla -- I can't remember which. When you saved a document, it would attempt to "clean up" the markup, which ruined my work the first I encountered this default behavior. I wonder if Word is trying to "clean up" the document (i.e. reverse the text direction) based on the OS's LTR/Anglo-centric settings. In a similar vein, the person you're helping could try setting Word's spell-check feature to use Hebrew. Then, maybe it wouldn't "clean up" as for an Anglo user, if that is indeed the nature of the problem. You wouldn't think that such a setting would be a factor, but we are talking about usability bugs here. And Microsoft.

I decided not to give a hyper-literalistic reading to the text of the above post. Let's try a word.

"Christian" - In this context, it doesn't make sense that the normal definition of "Christian" could apply. What the author really means to tell us that he is a theist who may evolve into a Christian in ~4.5 billion years.

You should read up on the background of that phrase and the profound influence that John Locke's writings* had upon the Founding Fathers.

* Link: The Second Treatise of Civil Government, CHAP. V. "Of Property.," 1690.

I've enjoyed his book on trees and hierarchies in sql as well. Nice discussion of topics not often touched on in a lot of introductory db literature.

.... Sorry book!

IMHO: Joe Celko's SQL for Smarties (http://www.amazon.com/Joe-Celkos-SQL-Smarties-Programming/dp/0123693799/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books) has shown itself to be very nice book when the need to go beyond the basics to a little deeper understanding of SQL is needed.

There are many other books on the subject all the way to source material from Date and Dodd but Celko seems to be well informed and writes fairly well, I think.

What else should happen when you are descended upon while in international waters?

Dialogue? Non-violent resistance? These are peace activists, after all. A Nobel peace laureate was on board one of the ships (as well as a Hamas leader.. ha ha). They don't believe in violence, right? But it's now known that they had guns on board, which they used against the lightly-armed Israeli commandos. Other items on board: bulletproof vests, military-grade night vision equipment, a rifle scope, an assortment of knives, electric saws, metal rods and clubs.

Under the Oslo Accords and agreements with the Palestinian Authority, Israel maintains sovereignty over the international waters off the Gaza coast.

"Direct (aid) delivery by sea is neither appropriate nor responsible under the circumstances," said U.S. Deputy Permanent Representative to the U.N. Alejandro Wolff. While European and Arab countries castigated Israel for the killing of nine Muslim extremists who attacked Navy commandos, Wolff stated, "We are working to ascertain the facts [and] we expect a credible and transparent investigation."

Hamas has smuggled hundreds of tons of explosives, arms and ammunition, as well as terrorists, by land and sea, and Israel is determined to prevent further smuggling actions. Allowing boats to reach Gaza without inspection would give Hamas free passage to bring in advanced weapons, including long-range missiles.

I hate dirty stinky hippies as much as the next guy

I don't know if I'd categorize them as hippies. At least not in the classic sense. Neo-hippies? These were terror activists. The mission was funded and supported by Islamist terrorist organizations and terror-supporting governments.

but I don't think Israel should be dressed in white either.

As to this incident, I think Israel should be dressed in white, because there is no blood stain of murder on their hands. They did not use any weapon until they had incurred casualties from the "peace activists." Furthermore, I think the IDF soldiers of this mission should be awarded honorary medals of freedom! Their actions were heroic, responsible, and ethical. They complied with all laws, domestic and international, as well as IDF guidelines, which are the strictest and most restrained of any military in the world. It seems that even most left-wing, pacifist Israeli politicians see nothing wrong with what Israel did here. The united response of support across the Israeli political spectrum has been a remarkable phenomenon.

I mean... God forbid if Gaza has some concrete.

Foreign Ministry Legal Expert Explains Gaza Blockade:

Interviewer: "So how do we make sure that our actions [i.e., the blockade] are against the [Hamas] regime, but not against the citizens?"

[Sarah Weiss Maudi, the Foreign Ministry's expert on maritime and humanitarian law]: "Well, Israel has a humanitarian obligation to make sure that certain vital humanitarian interests are met and that supplies go in. But I want to emphasize that Israel is under no obligation to supply non-vital goods or goods that could give Hamas a military or economic advantage. That is why Israel limits, for example, the supply of concrete into the Gaza Strip. Concrete could be used to mold rockets. It could be used to build reinforced bunkers which are clearly for military purposes against Israel."

She emphasizes that Israel supplies Gaza with large quantities of humanitarian supplies, including baby formula, meat, dairy products, and more. "And in the last year and a half it has supplied Gaza with over a million tons of goods. The Israel Supreme Court constantly reviews these supplies to make sure that Israel is in line with its requirements under both Israeli domestic law and international law to supply vital civilian goods that are needed. And indeed, it has confirmed that Israel has been meeting its obligations under international and domestic law."

Try a mesh katan. They are cool, literally.

The activists wanted to create an incident. Their mission was not humanitarian; it was propaganda. They created a spectacle for the media to film, and cry, "A flotilla of six ships! See what extreme measures these humanitarians have to do to circumvent the evil Israeli blockade and get aid to the poor Gaza Arabs!!"

There would be no blockade in the first place if Hamastan (occupied Gaza) would stop attacking Israel.

The Israelis descended on the boat empty-handed with paintball guns on their backs. The "peace activists" acted like a pack of murderous savages, attacking the men with long knives and iron bars before their feet touched the deck. A DISPROPORTIONATE RESPONSE, I would say.

Whose fault were the deaths of nine activists?

Consider:

• Israel offered to transport the aid that was on board to Gaza Arabs by land, which is the normal means. (The "blockade" allows a nearly constant stream of trucks loaded with tons of humanitarian aid and supplies to Gaza. The blockade's purpose is mainly to restrict materials used for building weapons.) The activists refused.
• Israel warned them by radio and told them to turn around. The activists refused.
• Israel sent commandos to peacefully thwart the ship's course. Their only lethal weaponry were pistols intended only for emergency use. The activists refused an opportunity for civil discourse and brutally assaulted the Israelis as soon as possible. This caused the Israelis to feel that their lives were in imminent danger (five IDF soldiers are still hospitalized), and thus were forced to defend themselves with their emergency pistols.

.... Hence only the bust! NOT the whole thing!!!!.....
It is pretty cool!

I don't see Israelis being evicted and having their homes and land demolished to make way for Palestinian settlements.

Where were you in the summer of 2005?

See it here: The Expulsion of the Jews from Gush Katif (Gaza)

Palestinian police getting ready to take over after the Jews are expelled

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon ordered the expulsion of thousands of Jewish residents from their homes in Gaza. This was against the will of the people. He denied the country a chance at a referendum on the issue when he saw the polls going against him.

Here's what happened: IDF troops clad in ominous black uniforms, some mounted on horses (as if to purposefully evoke associations with Medieval inquisitions), literally dragged Jewish families, with wailing women and children, out of their homes. Jewish Gazans were bloodied during the destruction, including Member of Knesset Aryeh Eldad, whose head was gashed when he was trampled by a horse-mounted soldier. Entire communities were demolished. A beautiful synagogue was buried under sand. Graves were dug up and relocated. All so that the Palestinian Authority could set up its terror state in the Gaza Strip, aka now Hamastan.

During the 1930s, Jew haters in Europe used to tell Jews to "Go back to Palestine (Israel)!" What could they say in 2005? The Jews were in Israel!!

Here is the web site created by Israelis of the former Jewish communities in Gaza.

It's no coincidence that the expulsion was originally (accidentally?) scheduled for the 9th of Av, then delayed an extra day when the red-faced authorities realized their mistake. It's also not a coincidence that Ariel Sharon very soon afterward fell into a coma, which he is still in today. It's also not a coincidence that the last name of George W. Bush, who had been pushing the Saudi-devised Two-State Solution and then congratulated Sharon on the expulsion, means "to be ashamed" in Hebrew.