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October 2023

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ISRAEL AT WAR: BEYOND THE HEADLINES FROM MICHAEL ORDMAN

By on October 29th, 2023

Dear E-pals,

Israel defends and helps during the struggle between pure evil and a benevolent nation. Those who are not holding arms in dangerous areas, flying airplanes to quell enemy rockets and missiles, or patrolling seas teeming with enemy vessels, are busy 24/7 in labs performing research and development to help all mankind to a better future for all. Here are some heartwarming stories about courage and patriotism in time of war from Michael Ordman.  rsk

AMAZING ISRAEL BEHIND THE WESTERN HEADLINES FROM MICHAEL ORDMAN

www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com 

POSITIVE NEWS DURING A WAR
 
More heroes. Many examples of brave Israelis confronting Hamas terrorists. A wounded battalion commander rescued an abducted French tourist and carried on fighting. A brigade commander got into three separate tanks, one after another, and then ran over Hamas vehicles to reach the Sderot police station besieged by Hamas.
https://www.ynetnews.com/magazine/article/rkuxomwb6
 
The few against the many. Less than ten brave young men on Kibbutz Kerem Shalom held 100 Hamas terrorists at bay for more than 6 hours, despite being low on ammunition, until the Israeli Army came in and rescued them.  https://www.israelunwired.com/heartbreaking-story-from-a-hero-who-saved-his-kibbutz-in-southern-israel-from-hamas/   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s20ECtAf0GA
 
Bedouin bus driver saves 30. On Oct 7, Bedouin Arab minibus driver Youssef Ziadna went to pick up one of his regular customers at the outdoor party near Gaza and came face to face with Hamas’ brutal massacre. He then dodged bullets and drove off-road to rescue 30 Jewish Israelis and bring them to safety.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/378869
 
Protestors metamorphose. Organizations that only weeks ago were protesting on the streets are now helping victims of Hamas. Some 15,000 volunteers at the Expo Tel Aviv International Convention Center are distributing donated equipment and food, finding accommodation for evacuees, and much more.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/in-stunning-response-15000-volunteers-fill-leadership-vacuum-to-help-victims-of-hamas/  
 
Tons of aid arrive. An EL AL 787 Dreamliner that landed on Oct 23 in Ben Gurion Airport was filled with 22 tons of supplies donated to assist with the ongoing war effort. Jointly sponsored by the Phoenix Group and NY-based Amudim Community Resources, plus El Al, the cargo hold was full of medical aid and clothing.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/379006  https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/article-769687
 
Vegan meals for 6,000 IDF soldiers. Israel’s Redefine Meat is producing thousands of nutritious protein-rich vegan dishes each week to feed the many vegan / flexitarian IDF soldiers serving on the front lines. Redefine Meat’s head chef has enlisted vegan startups, 100 volunteers, and private chefs to work at his Tel Aviv kitchen.
https://www.greenqueen.com.hk/israel-hamas-palestine-war-food-tech-founders-feed-6000-vegan-meals-soldiers/
 
US firefighters respond. 23 American firefighters from the Emergency Volunteers Project (EVP – see here previously) left their homes to join the response effort in Israel. 60 more are on standby, ready to fly over at a moment’s notice. Many of those stationed in Ashkelon were hosted in Kibbutz Be’eri during a previous visit.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/us-firefighters-in-israel-worried-about-fate-of-beeri-families-who-hosted-them/
https://www.evp.org.il/
 
8-year-old meets family of soldier who donated his liver. An emotional meeting was held at Schneider Pediatric Hospital between transplant patient 8-year-old Refael who received a liver lobe and the family of its donor – soldier Amichai Rubin – who was killed on Oct 7.  https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/379213
 
My home is your home. The World Zionist Organization has launched a project whereby owners of empty apartments in Israel release them to the WZO for evacuees from southern and northern Israel. The WZO will be the guarantor. The project includes a website, contact details, and global adverts in many languages.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/379109
 
 
ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS
 
Better cancer treatment. (TY OurCrowd) A trial of the PROphet blood test from Israel’s OncoHost (see here previously) has proved its accuracy and reliability in predicting the best treatment for metastatic non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients. OncoHost has received orders from 29 US cancer centers since its 2023 launch.
https://www.prnewswire.com/il/news-releases/journal-of-pharmaceutical–biomedical-analysis-publishes-study-analytically-validating-oncohosts-prophet-test-as-a-decision-support-tool-for-metastatic-nsclc-patients-301964509.html   https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0731708523005721
 
Detecting too much calcium in the arteries. Israel’s Beilinson Hospital has completed a study of coronary artery calcium (CAC) levels using the HealthCCSng system from Israel’s Nanox.AI (see here previously) to review routine CT-scans. High CAC patients were referred to clinics for in-depth evaluation and treatment.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/377841   https://www.nanox.vision/ai
 
Partnering to develop IBD treatment. Israel’s Teva is partnering with France’s Sanofi (see also here) to develop and commercialize TEV 574, currently in Phase 2b clinical trials, for the anti-TL1A treatment of ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s Disease, two types of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).
https://en.globes.co.il/en/article-teva-teams-with-sanofi-on-inflammatory-bowel-treatment-1001459330
 
US approval for vision-correcting eye drops. The US FDA has approved the QLOSI eye drops, from Israel’s Orasis (see here previously), The prescription eye drops improve farsightedness (presbyopia) for up to eight hours without impacting distance or night vision. The treatment can benefit almost two billion sufferers.
https://nocamels.com/2023/10/eyedrops-that-temporarily-correct-vision-receive-fda-approval/
 
Sports tech to heal injured soldiers. The ElectroGear device from Israel’s Healables (see here previously) was designed to enhance performance and accelerate recovery among athletes. It is now being repurposed to treat pain and injuries suffered by IDF personnel. You can even help towards donating one to an Israeli soldier.
https://nocamels.com/2023/10/startup-repurposes-wearable-medtech-for-israeli-soldiers-in-battle/
https://electrogear.com/products/electrogear-military-hero
 
Treating war-related head trauma. Israel’s Sheba Medical Center is using innovative methods to treat the complex injuries suffered by those wounded by Hamas terrorists. One example is the AI systems from Israel’s Aidoc (see here previously), used to analyze brain aneurysms from gunshot wounds and rocket shrapnel.
https://nocamels.com/2023/10/israels-top-hospital-innovates-to-treat-war-related-head-trauma/
 
Using AI to speed up gene therapy development. Israel’s mana.bio harnesses the power of AI to significantly reduce development times for new nucleic acid therapeutics and vaccines. Mana.bio produces novel lipid nanoparticles (LNPs) that deliver RNA and gene therapies to specific tissues in the body near to the liver,
https://www.calcalistech.com/ctechnews/article/rjkyo2hzt  https://www.mana.bio/technology
 
Optimizing clinical trials. Israel’s PhaseV develops causal machine learning (ML) technology that optimizes clinical trial design and analysis. Its goal is to prevent bio-techs wasting money on failed or badly designed trials of new treatments.  It boosts clinical trial success rates while maximizing resource and time efficiency.
https://www.calcalistech.com/ctechnews/article/skymnbhf6    https://phasevtrials.com/
 

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Hamas and the Ruse That May Be Its Last by Amir Taheri

By on October 29th, 2023

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/20104/hamas-ruse

Hamas worked out a scheme to make Israelis focus on the West Bank and Lebanon as the two most immediate sources of threat while portraying Gaza as relatively calm.

Iran may have helped sell that narrative in a number of ways.

It is, perhaps, too early to have a full picture of what led to the recent Hamas attack on Israeli villages close to Gaza.

One thing, however, is certain: the attack came when and where Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Cabinet least expected.

But why? One answer adopted by Netanyahu’s team is “a failure of intelligence services”.

However, that answer, even if it contains a grain of truth, could not divert attention from a bigger failure: the Israeli leaders’ inability to correctly analyze the intelligence at their disposal and, and having bought into what looks like a ruse by Hamas, to imagine a worst-case scenario.

It now seems probable that Hamas carefully prepared a scheme to lull the Israelis into slumber as far as a threat from Gaza was concerned.

Iran’s Major-General Yahya Safavi, who wears the lofty title of “senior military advisor” to “Supreme Guide” Ali Khamenei, says Hamas planned the attack over two years with a view to divert Israeli attention from Gaza and make a surprise attack possible. He does not say whether Iranians were involved in the planning but drops hints that they knew about the plot.

“The most important element was surprise,” he says.

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‘Just Blind Hate’: The Persecution of Christians, September 2023 by Raymond Ibrahim

By on October 29th, 2023

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/20105/persecution-of-christians-september

[O]ne young seminarian, Brother Na’aman, 25, who was on the verge of completing his priesthood training, was burned alive. Police were contacted even before the attack, but came only after the terrorists had fled. — Morning Star News, September 8, 2023, Nigeria.

“They then proceeded to separate Christians from Muslims, apparently based on their names and ethnicity. They opened fire on the Christians, riddling them with bullets.” — acninternational.org, September 21, 2023, Mozambique.

“Today, I have nothing. I saw my house and my place of worship burn in front of my eyes. I was helpless. I saw my [Muslim] neighbours betray us. We have never done them any harm; we always respected them. Then why?” — Open Doors UK, September 6, 2023, Pakistan.

The following are among the murders and abuses inflicted on Christians by Muslims throughout the month of September 2023.

The Muslim Slaughter of Christians

Nigeria: As the genocide there of Christians continues, a Sept. 1 report found that “Of the 5,500 Christians who were killed last year because of their faith, 90 percent”—or about 4,950—”were Nigerian.”

On the night of Sept. 7, Muslims torched a Catholic seminary in Kaduna State. Although two priests managed to escape, one young seminarian, Brother Na’aman, 25, who was on the verge of completing his priesthood training, was burned alive. Police were contacted even before the attack, but came only after the terrorists had fled. “It is sad that killings and this type of evil against Christians are still going on in spite of our appeal and pleading to Nigerian government to take measures towards ending these attacks,” said the Rev. John Hayab, chairman of the Christian Association of Nigeria, Kaduna State Chapter Hayab. In a statement he elaborated:

“What is disheartening about this particular attack is the … Parish is located at the heart of Kamantan town…This causes us to wonder some more, ‘Where is the hope, how much more terrible could the situation get?…. [W]e invite the Governor of Kaduna State… [to]ensure that those responsible for the Kamantan evil night are apprehended and made to face the law. Security is everyone’s business; it is disappointing that this kind of unholy activity could be recorded at the heart of the… community, and the criminals will operate unchallenged.”

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On Scene at the Pro-Hamas Campus “Walkout”AT Berkeley Steven Hayward

By on October 29th, 2023

https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/author/steven

As noted earlier in the week, I was on campus at Berkeley yesterday to host a guest lecture at the law school from Hadley Arkes about his latest book Mere Natural Law (podcast forthcoming), but yesterday happened to coincide with the “National Walkout” in favor of Hamas called for on college campuses nationwide.

I decided to take in some of the scene down at Sproul Plaza, the main site for campus protest at Berkeley ever since the Free Speech Movement was born at that location back in 1964.

I’ll add that unlike Penn and other elite universities, a clear and unequivocal faculty statement against campus pro-Hamas protests has gained nearly 400 faculty signatures so far—over 10 percent of the faculty. Some excerpts:

Open Letter on Recent Events in Israel and Gaza to the UC-Berkeley Community

On the morning of October 7, Hamas terrorists launched a brutal and vicious attack, entering Israel from Gaza. In villages and towns near the Israel/Gaza border, they murdered by gun, knife, and fire more than 1,000 unarmed civilians, including babies, children, women, the elderly, and entire families, in their homes and on the street.

They went door-to-door annihilating whole families. They killed children in front of their parents and siblings. They abused women, and paraded their mistreated naked bodies. They massacred hundreds of young people attending a nature party in the desert. And they took captive over 150 children, infants, elderly in wheelchairs, women and men, to be used as human shields, and worse. . .

While we individually have many different views about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, we emphatically agree with President Biden’s characterization of this murderous attack – the purposeful annihilation, rape, kidnapping, and execution of civilians – as a violation of every code of human morality.

Some in our campus community have described these massacres perpetrated by Hamas as “resistance” to be “celebrated” in a “freedom struggle.” This is repugnant and indefensible. For many of us, as we went on social media on Sunday night and Monday morning, it was shocking to realize that literally while Hamas terrorists were going house-to-house seeking to murder as many Jews as they could, some pro-Palestinian organizations on our own campus were gathering petition signatures for statements that celebrated these Hamas terrorists as freedom fighters and rejected any critique of their actions. . .

Unlike the Harvard faculty statement that was signed mostly by faculty from the hard sciences, many of the Berkeley faculty signatories are from the humanities and social sciences, and included the chancellor, Carol Christ, and (the very left) law school Dean Erwin Chemerinsky.

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Analysis: ‘Reduction in US oil output under Biden from the Trump trend has cost the U.S. roughly $500 million a day’ By Marc Morano

By on October 29th, 2023

https://www.climatedepot.com/2023/10/26/analysis-reduction-in-us-oil-output-under-biden-from-the-trump-trend-has-cost-the-u-s-roughly-500-million-a-day/

We’ve been warning regularly on these pages that the Biden war on American fossil fuels is not just an economic calamity, but a national security threat as well. We have known for fifty years that terrorist organizations like Hamas are primarily financed with petro-dollars.

Just as Biden has aided and abetted the Russian war machine in Ukraine, he has enriched Middle East oil-producing nations like Iran as well.

Our latest CTUP analysis finds that the reduction in US oil output under Biden from the Trump trend has cost the U.S. roughly $500 million a day. Much of that money has been transferred week after week from American producers to nations hostile to the U.S. and Israel.

Missing Under Biden:

This has helped fund the very missiles being fired on Israel.

Biden’s “green” energy policy is weakening America and strengthening our enemies making the world a much more dangerous place.

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The death of Democrat Jewish innocence By Sally Zelikovsky

By on October 29th, 2023

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2023/10/the_death_of_democrat_jewish_innocence.html
Having strived for centuries in America to be the best of good citizens, Jewish Democrats are discovering that their efforts are not appreciated, with dire consequences.

Jewish conservatives, while considered a bit of an oddity despite growing numbers, are commonly asked Why are so many Jews liberals?

From conservative luminaries like Norman Podhoretz and Dennis Prager to B-team influencers like me, Jewish conservatives have struggled to provide a satisfactory answer. Like any other group, we do not march in lockstep, certainly not when it comes to our religion and definitely not politically. Still, Jewish conservatives readily acknowledge that, like Black Americans, most of us tend to be liberal if not downright progressive and, regrettably, sometimes Marxist.

Books and articles have been written, and theories abound as to why this is, including, among others, the idea that Jews are liberal out of residual devotion to FDR and his pro-unionism; as pushback against the brutality they suffered under right-wing totalitarians like Hitler; and because, when Jews became secular, they replaced their religion with progressivism.

None of these quite hits the sweet spot, but they all resonate to some extent.

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Six Myths About Hamas ‘Hamas seeks peace.’ ‘Their rockets are harmless.’ And more lies we’ve been told for years that keep getting repeated today. By Alan Johnson (2014)

By on October 29th, 2023

https://www.thefp.com/p/six-myths-about-hamas

Alan Johnson gave this speech in 2014, after the 50-day military conflict between Israel and Hamas. We’re publishing it today, lightly edited for clarity, because we believe the myths are still with us and are still poisonous, radically misshaping the Western understanding of Hamas, Israel, and the history of the conflict, especially on the liberal left.

The horror of the 50-day conflict between Israel and Hamas is known to everyone here. You didn’t just watch it on TV. You had anguished conversations with your family and friends at home and in Israel.

You knew it was a legitimate act of self-defense by Israel against the rockets and the tunnels and the antisemitic hate of Hamas.

You knew Israel had offered Hamas “quiet for quiet” day after day in early July, holding back as the Hamas rockets rained down on Israeli civilians.

You knew that no one in Israel wanted this war. You knew Israel accepted an Egyptian cease-fire proposal seven days into the conflict while Hamas rejected it, fired more rockets, and used the terror tunnels to try and murder Israelis.

But on TV, we were presented with something quite different: a motiveless assault by a cruel IDF on Palestinian children. For a week or so, Israel’s right to self-defense was acknowledged. But then, as the number of casualties rose, Israel’s actions were called “disproportionate,” then “unjustifiable.” Then Israel was accused of “deliberately targeting civilians,” and a “slaughter of the innocents.” Before the conflict was over, the terms child killers and war criminals could be heard.

Make no mistake. Israel took a blow to the solar plexus when it came to global public opinion.

We saw several large demonstrations in London: criticism of Hamas was nowhere, but the demonization of Israel was everywhere.

We saw the National Union of Students vote to boycott Israel.

We saw the Labour Party abandon its balanced position. Ed Miliband “differentiated” the Labour Party from the Conservatives, condemning Israel’s necessary ground operation to deal with Hamas’s terror tunnels as “unacceptable and unjustifiable.” He attacked David Cameron day after day “for not condemning Israel’s unacceptable and unjustified killing of civilians in Gaza.” One of his MPs, Grahame Morris, asked the Prime Minister why returning lone IDF soldiers were not being treated in the same way as returning ISIS jihadis.

The low point was perhaps when Labour’s John Prescott, the former deputy prime minister of this country for many years, used his Daily Mirror column, twice, to say Gaza was akin to a “concentration camp” and Israel was akin to the guards.

We saw “Holocaust inversion” everywhere. You know the kind of thing—Bibi morphs into Hitler, the IDF into the SS, and so on.

And we had Vince Cable calling for a review of arms exports to Israel if. . . Israel responded one more time to those Hamas rocket attacks.

The point is this: we mostly lost the war to interpret the war.

Why?

I want to suggest that one important reason was that six myths about Hamas and Gaza took hold. These myths gave people a framework of understanding that hurt Israel, badly. Many people could not see Israel plainly. They could only see the evil caricature constructed by the six myths.

First Myth: The Israeli Blockade of Gaza Is Motiveless and Cruel, and It Is the Cause of the Hamas Rockets.

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Thanks, to a Politician Who Did His Job When the IRS visited my home, Jim Jordan actually did something about it. Why couldn’t I call a Democrat? Matt Taibbi

By on October 29th, 2023

https://www.racket.news/p/thanks-to-a-politician-who-did-his

A new report about IRS home visits has just been released by the House Weaponization of Government Committee, chaired by Ohio congressman Jim Jordan. It outlines disturbing issues, including confirmation that IRS agents making home visits may come without warning, using aliases, and without informing local enforcement agencies of their presence.

One of the cases outlined is my own. My home was visited by the IRS while I was testifying before Jordan’s Committee about the Twitter Files on March 9th. Sincere thanks are due to Chairman Jordan, whose staff not only demanded and got answers in my case, but achieved a concrete policy change, as IRS Commissioner Daniel Werfel announced in July new procedures that would “end most” home visits.

Anticipating criticism for expressing public thanks to a Republican congressman, I’d like to ask Democratic Party partisans: to which elected Democrat should I have appealed for help in this matter? The one who called me a “so-called journalist” on the House floor? The one who told me to take off my “tinfoil hat” and put greater trust in intelligence services? The ones in leadership who threatened me with jail time? I gave votes to the party for thirty years. Which elected Democrat would have performed basic constituent services in my case? Feel free to raise a hand.

If silence is the answer, why should I ever vote for a Democrat again?

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Amy Klobuchar, You Are the Worst By Matt Taibbi

By on October 29th, 2023

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2023/10/28/amy_klobuchar_you_are_the_worst.html

Note: The following is reprinted with permission from Racket News.

Minnesota Senator and Hindenburg presidential candidacy Amy Klobuchar sent a letter (h/t ReclaimTheNet.org) to Jeff Bezos demanding that he enjoin Alexa from citing “unvetted sources,” specifically Substack and Rumble. No hell is hot enough for this person.

Referring to a Washington Post story complaining that Alexa cited Substack, she wrote: “When asked about the 2020 presidential election, it appears that some answers were provided by contributors instead of verified news sources.”

Amy Klobuchar is the absolute fave of the national media consensus. They love her so much, they speak in italics. “Oh, my God. She’s great. And funny, too!” gushed a cameraman to me in Winterset, Iowa, birthplace of John Wayne, four years ago. He was standing astride an AMY AMY AMY banner in a diner packed with press admirers, who are legion, everywhere. The “funny” legend came courtesy mostly of one joke she repeated everywhere she went, over and over, clinging to the one time Donald Trump bothered to mention her, tweeting about her looking like a “Snow woman.” Funny Amy’s retort?

“I wonder how your hair would fare in a blizzard,” she’d say, in a nasal voice, laugh-snorting at her own joke. In my time following her I heard the joke about five times. By the last I was ready to drive a railroad spike through my foot.

National press tried endlessly to sell the public on “funny” Amy, always emphasizing her geographic origin, as if she were the media’s running mate. The New York Times, in an interview over “dumplings” in which Klobuchar talked about how she thinks about “her own humor and power,” described her act as a “clean, ‘aw, shucks’ approach that conveys her own background as a Midwesterner.” The paper noted: Klobuchar could remember many times when people laughed at her jokes! “She laughs easily… and can recall dozens of her successful zingers.”

NPR did a segment on how “Amy Klobuchar Turns To Humor To Distinguish Herself Among Candidates,” with Mary Louise Kelly abasing herself with the intro, “In the 24-person Democratic presidential field, Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota has distinguished herself as a comedian.” U.S. News and World Report went with, “How Amy Klobuchar’s Humor Sets Her Apart,” and claimed her ability to “savagely deploy a zinger” would be a “critical element in taking on Donald Trump” (!). Barack Obama gushed that Al Franken was now Minnesota’s “second-funniest Senator,” while the hometown Minnesota Post went with “Amy Klobuchar is Hilarious,” adding — this is real — the following deck:

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Amy Klobuchar can legislate, but can she tell a joke? The answer is a resounding “yes” — as in bring-down-the-house, my-stomach-hurts-from-laughing, “yes.”

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