It was early in the morning and the hordes of people were already pushing and shoving, twitching and elbowing, preparing themselves for the instant the shop would open and they could finally, FINALLY, get their impatient hands on an iPhone.
While this scene should have taken place a few years ago, in Israel it was only a few months ago that D-day (i-Day?) arrived, despite the market already being flooded with the jailbroken versions of the device, sneaked in from Europe and the US.
It took the iPhone three years to get to Israel, providing Israeli hackers and device smugglers ample opportunity to jailbreak foreign bought phones, and even translate the entire interface into Hebrew. And now it’s happening again, with the iPad.
The Israeli Communications Ministry has blocked the import of iPads into Israel, and the customs authority has been given orders to confiscate them if found.
Several have already been app-rehended by the government agency, much to the dismay of their angry owners.
The argument is not, as many believe, about unpaid taxes, but rather that the Israeli telecommunications ministry claims that the iPad doesn’t reach the standards required for wireless devices and doesn’t tap into the correct broadcast levels.
Although, if this is indeed the case, Apple may have some trouble on its hands as the Israeli standards are the same as those in Europe.
Meanwhile the European launch of the iPad has been further delayed by a month time, although this is purportedly to do with depletion of inventory from the insatiable iFeeding frenzy in the US.
Poor old Israel, I have a strange feeling of D
