RUTHFULLY YOURS

Good manners should deter us from insulting other people over their faiths, but the right to offend and be offended remains an important right. Even if we are reluctant to admit the fact, it frees us from the prison of unconsidered opinion and the prejudices of our own religious-cum-ideological communities

Exactly eight weeks separate the Sydney siege in which the gunman and two of his innocent victims died and the Copenhagen shootings, occurring as we go to press, in which the victims so far number two dead and five injured (including several policemen). A lone gunman was apparently the murderer. He fled. Police have since killed him in a gun-battle.

In between these two events there have been at least fourteen other major terrorist attacks by Islamists accounting for approximately 1000 dead and many more wounded in countries including France, Iraq, Nigeria, Cameroon and Pakistan. All these murders are horrifying, but some more so than others. The murder of 132 children of army personnel in a Peshawar school by the local Taliban was unusually vicious, but the mass killing of 150 women by ISIS for refusing to marry their captors more or less matched it in cruelty.

What makes the Copenhagen murders, like the murders at Charlie Hebdo, stand out from the general ruck of Islamist massacres is neither the number of their victims (relatively few) nor the cruelty of their methods (shootings in the main) but their explicitly ideological and anti-liberal character. They belong to a mini-series of threats and murders, starting with the Ayatollah Khomeini’s fatwa against Salman Rushdie and the stabbing of Theo van Gogh in Amsterdam, that are justified by the murderers and their religious superiors as necessary to limit free speech and, in particular, to outlaw what Islam regards as blasphemy. These murders even aim to elevate blasphemy—long a dead-letter in Western societies (which smugly provide blasphemous art with state subsidies)—into a capital crime.

There has been some discussion about the D-word recently. The Science of Doom blog considered the historical implications of the word, and argues that its use in the climate debate trivialises the deaths of millions, and urged people to stop using it. Keith Kloor agreed, saying that the use of the word was needlessly ‘emotionally and politically charged’ and inflammatory. Lastly, Richard Betts has a guest post at And Then There’s Physics’ blog, urging the readers there to ‘Label the behaviour, not the person‘, which fell on deaf ears. More about those articles shortly.

I have never been particularly upset by the epithet, ‘denier’, for the simple reason that it says much about the person who utters it than it says about the putative ‘denier’. I don’t know who made the observation that ‘once you give something a name, you don’t have to argue with it’ (I think it was Lenin), but it seems to me to explain the use of the word. Once you call someone a denier, you don’t have to explain what it is they have denied. Anti-deniers deny debate.

For instance, climate scientists who have slightly lower estimates of climate sensitivity than the IPCC are called ‘deniers’. I’m thinking especially of scientists like Patrick Michaels and Richard Lindzen here. Rather than looking at the arguments about how and why Lindzen and Michaels’ analyses come out at the lower end of the spectrum (and it is a spectrum) of estimates of warming, many have chosen to see the expression of denial as a phenomenon in need of explanation. The likes of Naomi Orkeskes have sought to chart a history of a conspiracy of deniers and their strategies. Others, like psychologists such as Jon Krosnick and Stephan Lewandowsky, have sought to establish the pathology of denial. Building on this, Researchers in Cardiff University have sold their insight into ‘denial’ to the government, to suggest strategies for confronting sceptics’ influence in the public sphere.

OK, let’s take a little excursion into history:
When Barack Obama recently described Islam as being part of the “fabric” of the United States from the beginning of American independence, it’s safe to say that he was not thinking of the ransoming of American captives from enslavement in the Barbary States, though he might as well have been. It would have made more sense than his risible, ludicrous, politically-driven invention of history.
Not to mention his bare-faced denial of the Islamic nature of IS.
As is well-known, the phenomenon of Europeans enslaved in the Barbary States of North Africa had been known since Tudor times, when the Ottomans took control of the area,seafarers and travelling merchants (Jews among them) being especially vulnerable to capture, though inhabitants of certain coastal villages even as far north as Britain, the Netherlands, and Iceland were not immune to slave raids by Barbary pirates (corsairs).

Every murderous, totalitarian regime which kills gay people, treats women as chattels, practises apartheid, arrests dissidents without charge, tortures prisoners, executes for misdemeanours and where no freedom exists is preferred to Israel.
“If I can speak on behalf of the community tonight I would like to express my appreciation to the prime minister, Tony Abbott, who has been a staunch friend of both the Australian Jewish community and Israel”

So proclaimed Australian Jewish News publisher Robert Magid at the launch in Sydney of a book celebrating 120 years of his newspaper. Only yesterday it was revealed that at a rally in Sydney demonstrators chanted: “Khaibar ya yahud, jaish Muhammad saya’ud” – Look out Jews the armies of Mohammad are coming.”

While the chanting is seen on the streets of Sydney, the problem starts with the world’s media.

Hamas is a terrorist organisation that rules Gaza with an iron fist, tortures Palestinians, throws people from the roofs of buildings and executes citizens without due process. It diverts humanitarian aid to build rockets and terror tunnels. Its schools teach children to kill Jews.

Its aim is the extermination of the State of Israel. Yet none of this is reported by the media for fear of retribution by Hamas.

On the other hand, Israel is a free society. One can write the most mendacious reports about Israel with impunity and the international media takes full advantage. There is group-think among international journalists based in Israel which has contributed to the demonisation of Israel.

Insurgent group Boko Haram formalizes request to join Islamic State

Four bomb blasts on Saturday struck Maiduguri, northeastern Nigeria’s largest city, killing scores on the same day a terrorism monitor said Boko Haram had formalized a long-standing request to join Islamic State.

The fusillade of suicide bombs began around noon, killing and wounding people who were shopping, hawking goods and waiting for busses. The attacks—which hewed to Islamic insurgency Boko Haram’s style of targeting civilians—involved male and female suicide bombers, according to witnesses.

He had agreed to limit these donations during Hillary Clinton’s term as secretary of state

Former President Bill Clinton defended his foundation’s decision to accept money from foreign governments in an appearance Saturday, saying the charity does good work and that people can judge for themselves since the contributions are disclosed.

“You got to decide when you do this work whether it will do more good than harm if someone helps you from another country,” he said at the closing session of a Clinton Global Initiative event at the University of Miami in Coral Gables, Fla. “My theory about all this is disclose everything and then let people make their judgments.”

Last week Hamas once again launched a test rocket into the Mediterranean Sea.

A senior IDF officer said that over the past few months, Hamas has hardly launched a single test rocket that had a range longer than 30 kilometers, according to a Makor Rishon report.

The IDF believes that Hamas learned from Operation Protective Edge, that their long range rockets are easily shot down and ineffective against Iron Dome.

In additional the longer range rockets require more fuel and explosives, and Hamas is having a hard time acquiring both since the operation ended.

In a strange sequence of partisanship and bipartisanship, legislation to require Congressional approval of the Iran deal is only three votes away from a veto-proof majority.

In what may be the most significant direct result of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to the joint session of Congress last Tuesday, March 3, Democrats and Republicans are now within spitting distance of ensuring that Congress will be able to review the details of the nuclear capabilities agreement the administration and the other members of the P5+1 are currently negotiating with Iran.

Just a few days ago it did not look as if any bipartisan breakthrough was in the cards any time soon, especially given several real tangles between the parties before, during and immediately after Netanyahu’s speech.

ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS

Ovarian cancer treatment works for brain tumors too. I reported in Mar 2014 that Professor Dan Peer of Tel Aviv University had developed chemotherapy using nano-particles to target ovarian tumors. It has now been engineered to target Glioblastoma multiforme – the most aggressive of brain cancer.
http://jewishbusinessnews.com/2015/03/01/tel-aviv-u-researcher-stops-tumor-proliferation-with-nanoparticples/

Israeli snack prevents peanut allergy. Long ago, UK Professor Gideon Lack discovered that hardly any Israeli infants developed peanut allergy. Now his new study has proved that the reason is the common practice of feeding Israeli children the peanut snack Bamba. It reverses conventional “wisdom” of avoiding peanuts.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-kids-help-prove-early-exposure-to-peanuts-prevents-allergies/
http://www.israel21c.org/headlines/israels-top-snack-bamba-prevents-allergy/

Helping premature babies to hear. Without mentioning he is Israeli, the BBC World Service featured Dr Amir Lahav who has proved that the sound centers in preemies’ brains grow quicker when played recordings of their mothers’ voice. So follow Dr Lahav’s fascinating journey from the IDF, to volleyball coach, to musician, software designer, neuroscientist and Harvard pediatric professor.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02kbhq0#playt=0h19m49s
http://www.bu.edu/research/spotlight/magazine/06/students/lahav.html

Israelis are among the world’s healthiest eaters. A new study in February’s The Lancet Global Health Journal places the diet of the average Israeli the 9th healthiest out of 187 countries surveyed. The study, led by Dr Fumiaki Imamura of the University of Cambridge, covered 4.5 billion people.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/israelis-among-the-healthiest-eaters-study/

Understanding irregular heartbeats. Researchers at Israel’s Weizmann Institute have revealed the detailed mechanisms that control the beating of the heart. Heart disease can cause individual heart filaments to lose synchronization. Replacing diseased cells in a structured manner can re-establish a regular rhythm.
http://nocamels.com/2015/03/heart-disease-irregular-heartbeat-treatment/

Microlabs in space. (TY Michelle) Israeli innovations in space include SpacePharma’s laboratory that fits in the palm of your hand and will orbit in a nano-satellite, allowing scientists to conduct experiments and watch them happen on their smart phones.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/03/04/israel-space-idUSL5N0W040020150304
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xRX6MT_EWXs

Boost for ALS and diabetes treatment. Israel’s Kadimastem’s recent news includes success in pre-clinical tests of its stem cell treatment for ALS. The technology also induces pancreatic cells to produce insulin and Kadimastem has begun research with Ramot, Tel Aviv University’s technology transfer company.
http://www.israel21c.org/headlines/stem-cell-therapy-for-als-diabetes/

On the day that Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu was leaving for the United States to give what the Washington Post called “the most important speech of his life,” my grandchildren were watching Big Hero 6. When I heard the smallest of the animated characters say, “We didn’t set out to be super-heroes, but sometimes life doesn’t go the way you planned,” it sounded like the tagline for Bibi’s launch as hero of the free world.
Can such a hero prevail? Elected leaders of democratic societies can rarely rise to courage or bravery of heroic proportions because of the compromise it takes to get reelected and because critical electorates feel compelled to cut leaders down to their size. In his nine nonsuccessive years heading Israel’s government, Netanyahu has taken as much political firepower as Israel has from its enemies. Nonetheless, like the country he heads, Netanyahu has grown stronger in every round. Despite attacks against him from both sides of the Atlantic, he gave Congress one of the boldest speeches in its great history—a speech its audience knew was as consequential for America as it was for the Jews.