* Sheik Chic: Edward VIII gave up...

* Sheik Chic: Edward VIII gave up his throne to marry Wallis Simpson 53 years ago, but the Windsor romantic legend has come alive again at their Bois de Boulogne mansion. The wrought-iron gates of the final, favorite residence of the pair were thrown open recently for a high tea given by Egyptian tycoon Mohammed Al Fayed, who spent $8 million on renovations, with the blessings of the villa’s official owner, the city of Paris. One of the villa’s first visitors was actress Joan Collins, who asked Al Fayed if he planned to use the mansion for his own parties. “I will, indeed,” he said, adding he plans to keep it staffed and open to small group visits by special request.

* Beltway, Bah Humbug: John Fairchild, publisher of W and Women’s Wear Daily, doesn’t want anything resembling a Washington politician or political wife on the cover of his publications. “The kiss of death is Washington,” he told the Washington Post. How about First Lady Barbara Bush, a woman said to be much admired and something of a trend setter? “Absolutely no interest in it,” he said.

* Hostile Reactions: Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa urged Israelis to forgive the Nazis for killing 6 million Jews during World War II and condemned the Jewish state for oppressing Palestinians. Tutu, on a Christmas pilgrimage to the Holy Land, said he would keep criticizing Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip even if it meant others accused him of being an anti-Semite and worse. Vandals wrote “Tutu is a Nazi” on the wall of the Israeli Religious Affairs Ministry before the Nobel Prize-winning cleric met minister Zevulun Hammer there Tuesday. Graffiti containing racial slurs about Tutu were scrawled Monday on the wall of St. George’s Anglican Church in East Jerusalem where he celebrated Christmas Mass.

* Royal rap: Viscountess Althorp, Princess Diana’s sister-in-law, has some choice words about London’s tabloid journalists, some of whom have published photographs of the lady kissing an old flame. The journalists are “Evil, evil people,” she says, adding, “I don’t know how they go home to their wives and children and talk about their day with a clear conscience.”