It was a visit to Jerusalem that inspired Frenchman Alexandre Sartene to start the world's third kosher vineyard outside Israel which, despite a rocky start, now exports as far as Brazil.

"I find the idea of kosher wine divine," says a proud Sartene, with a touch of the same humor that has seen him nickname his domain in southern France, his "kibbutz".

Locals in Bilbao say an art museum helped save their Spanish city from decline. Now they are glad to know their savior, the Guggenheim, will be staying for some time.

With the initial lease set to expire, the U.S.-based Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation on December 9 announced it was signing on to run its museum in the northern port city for another 20 years.

Jean Jude, glasses perched on the end of his nose, is practicing scales when his visitor arrives.

"Sorry there isn't much room in here," Jude says, getting up from one piano before wending his way among countless others filling his living room, part of a unique collection totalling around 150.

India's ruling party chief on Saturday called for a law to ban "forced religious conversions" amid increasing uproar over the right-wing government's perceived pro-Hindu tilt.

India's parliament has been paralyzed by opposition lawmakers protesting mass conversions to Hinduism which is the country's majority religion.

Just before midnight, the police navigated down the narrow alleys of an old downtown Cairo district and descended on a rundown bathhouse. They dragged out dozens of nearly naked men, who covered their faces as they struggled to hold up towels, and loaded them into police trucks.

There to film it all was an Egyptian television presenter, who claims she actually triggered the raid by tipping off police about alleged homosexual activity in the bathhouse. Days later, she aired what she boasted was an expose of "a den of mass perversion" spreading AIDS in Egypt.

Some of Tuscany's landmark historic buildings were closed to visitors Friday as part of the region was shaken by 80 mini-earthquakes centered on the Chianti wine region.

The tremors reached a maximum magnitude of 4.1 but were sufficiently powerful to result in some schools, houses and offices being evacuated.

Details on the identity of a mystery skeleton found in a massive tomb dating from the era of Alexander the Great in Greece are to be revealed next month, the culture ministry said Friday.

"The result of macroscopic study of the bone tissue (identifying) sex, age and height will be announced in January," the ministry said in a statement, adding that the research will be conducted by universities in Thessaloniki and Thrace.

The Falkland Islands are to erect a statue next year of former British premier Margaret Thatcher, who defended the territory against Argentina in 1982, Prime Minister David Cameron announced Thursday.

In his Christmas message to the 3,000 residents of the South Atlantic Ocean archipelago, Cameron revealed the bronze would be unveiled in 2015.

In a small village in western France, in makeshift shelters bared to the elements, a treasure trove of extremely rare cars has been discovered after lying forgotten for almost 50 years.

Under a pile of dusty old car magazines, one of only 37 Ferrari 250 GT SWB California Spiders ever made valued at up to 12 million euros ($14 million) is among some 60 classic gems discovered by the elite Artcurial auction house.

His new book has not even been released but Michel Houellebecq -- one of France's most provocative and widely translated writers -- is already attracting comment with his latest novel "Submission" in which he imagines a France in 2022 under Muslim rule.

To be published on January 7, "Soumission" is the sixth novel by the author of "The Map and the Territory", which won France's top literary prize, the Prix Goncourt, in 2010.