As part of my “bonkers news from Israel” season I give you the naked settler midriffs of Miss Samaria 2004.

Rabbi Daniel Shiloh, spokesman for the Committee of Rabbis in Judea and Samaria, the religious designation for the West Bank, said in an interview before the pageant. “It starts with beauty contests and ends with the escort parlors.”

(Over at Harry’s Place there are some promising noises from Palestine.)