Israel trails Jordan, Slovakia in academic broadband networking

The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan joined most of the developed countries this week, launching a nationwide broadband network that connects outlying locales with educational institutions and allows distance learning. The program to close the digital gap in Jordan budgets $2 million to connect its eight universities and 3,500 public schools.
In Israel - the last country in the Western world that still doesn't have a nationwide broadband network connecting academic centers to outlying areas - many saw the Jordanian launch as a painful reminder of Israel's deteriorating status and the national Internet steering committee's pitiful findings three years ago. That report stated "Israel now lags behind most of the developed nations in assimilating network use in broad sections of the population, resulting in an ever-widening digital gap between the well-off and the weaker populations."

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Seven years of efforts to establish a national public Internet infrastructure have failed here, due to bureaucracy, lack of budgets, and disputes between academia and the government over the network's ownership. Since the 2002 conclusion of the Internet2 project, which put Israel at the forefront in the establishment of broadband public network, any plans for a new nationwide network have been rejected.

The $40 million Internet2 project had been slated to connect schools and cultural and industrial centers to academic institutions, but only academic institutions currently utilize it. It was again decided three months ago to delay a planned nationwide network due to budget constraints, leaving Israel even further in the dust.

Haaretz

to have to depend upon Uncle Sam for your very existence. I really thought we were giving them enough money each year to pay for stuff like this, though.

They need to somehow recategorize this as "military" aid. Then it'll go through in a heartbeat.