From Ian:
Isi Leibler: Abusing the term ‘fascism’ in relation to Israel
NGO Monitor: The Role of EU Funding in UK “Lawfare” against MK Tzipi Livni
Alan Dershowitz: Kaine’s Boycott of Netanyahu a ‘Mark Against’ Candidate
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Isi Leibler: Abusing the term ‘fascism’ in relation to Israel
It is now a worldwide phenomenon that left-wingers and increasing numbers of liberals chant the mantra that Israel is led by extremists and becoming transformed into a full-fledged fascist state. Unfortunately, such unadulterated nonsense is expressed daily and is highlighted in Haaretz, illustrating the primitive measures even Jewish opponents of our government are willing to take in order to demonize the Jewish state.
Their defamation includes accusations of war crimes and deliberate killing of children, applying apartheid to the Arab Israeli minority, suppressing freedom of expression, maintaining an occupation and denying Palestinian statehood. In a nutshell – a fascist regime.
Joseph Goebbels demonstrated that if one constantly repeats a lie, people begin to accept the lie as truth.
My objective, without suggesting that we are perfect, is to briefly identify and rebut such lies and demonstrate that there is no country in the world that surpasses the level of democracy by which Israel is governed.
In addition, the extraordinary success of Israel’s democratic system is all the more impressive because it was achieved despite facing major obstacles.
From its inception, Israel has been surrounded by states committed to its destruction. These neighbor states are notorious for denying basic human rights to their own citizens and in most cases are Islamic dictatorships. Over the past five years, the region has reverted to the Dark Ages with hundreds of thousands being killed and millions displaced in intra-Arab conflicts. In this context, Israel represents an oasis of stability and peace.
Israel has been obliged to allot a greater proportion of its budget for defense than any other nation.
It is situated on the global front lines combating terrorism and must be in permanent readiness to face wars from its fanatical adversaries who remain committed to terminating Jewish sovereignty.
NGO Monitor: The Role of EU Funding in UK “Lawfare” against MK Tzipi Livni
At the end of June, the British police created a diplomatic furor by sending Israeli MK and former Minister of Foreign Affairs Tzipi Livni a summons ahead of a trip to the UK Purportedly, Livni was sought for questioning regarding her alleged involvement in “war crimes” during Operation Cast Lead (the December 2008-January 2009 Gaza conflict). According to news reports, the summons was canceled following “diplomatic contacts” between Israel and the UK, and Livni was granted diplomatic immunity for her trip.David Collier: Nicola Sturgeon, how welcome are Jews in Scotland?
The driving force behind the ongoing lawfare campaign against Livni and other senior Israeli officials is the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), which has been lobbying the UK, among other European countries, in an attempt to have Livni arrested.
New information reveals that this NGO is funded by the EU – specifically for lobbying European decision makers!
PCHR is funded by the EU, in conjunction with Oxfam-Novib, for a project aimed at helping “PCHR inform national and international discussions and policy actions with regards to the Israel-Palestine conflict” as well as to facilitate “the lobby visits of PCHR to the EU and EU member states.”
Total EU funding for this project was €123,354 for the period of March 2014-March 2016. PCHR also received $710,000 in core funding from Denmark, Sweden, Switzerland and the Netherlands (via a joint mechanism administered by the Ramallah-based Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law Secretariat).
As far back as 1997, during the Oslo peace talks, antizionists attacked Israeli performers at the festival. In 2008 the Jerusalem Quartet concert was disrupted, in 2012 it was the turn of the Batsheva Dance Troupe. In 2014, anti-Israel activists called on the venue to cancel a show with Israeli performers, and local police forced the venue to incur additional security costs. In turn, the venue demanded additional funds from the performers.
So in 2015, Haaretz reported that for the first time in years, Israeli performances were not hosted at the festival at all. This silencing of the Israeli voice is celebrated as a victory by the anti-Israel activists. The voice that seeks dialogue and accommodation is being silenced.
The festival is not the only place in Scotland such opposition is seen, less than two years ago a worker at an Israeli cosmetics stall in Glasgow had a ‘burning liquid’ thrown at her. The university space is also rabid, with events being called off due to protests, and Jewish students at universities are “denying or hiding” their identity because of discrimination. These events, including the protests at Edinburgh, are all connected.
Yet here is a simple fact. Israel is by far the most diverse nation in the Middle East. Despite the accusations of the protesters, there is not a single nation in the region that is as free, as democratic, as liberal or as diverse as Israel. Not one. What else sets it apart from all of its neighbours though, is another simple fact. It is the only nation in the world that is Jewish.
Alan Dershowitz: Kaine’s Boycott of Netanyahu a ‘Mark Against’ Candidate
Alan Dershowitz, a staunch Democrat and emeritus law professor at Harvard University, stated in an interview on Sunday that the decision by Hillary Clinton’s vice president pick, Virginia Senator Tim Kaine, to boycott Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to Congress was a “mark against” the candidate.Palestinian flag waved at Democratic National Convention
Still, Dershowitz maintained that the Clinton-Kaine ticket was “far better for America and for Israel” then the Donald Trump and Mike Pence ticket.
Dershowitz also sounded off about the decision by Kaine and other prominent democrats to support the international nuclear deal with Iran. Kaine helped generate support for the Obama administration’s nuclear deal with Iran by whipping senators into opposing a vote that prevented the Senate from blocking the deal.
Democratic congressman apologizes for calling West Bank settlers ‘termites’
Nevertheless, Senator Sanders did indeed call for his supporters to campaign and vote for Clinton on the first day of the convention, but the influence of his campaign in pulling the party to the left is still tangible.
One of the consequences of the leftward swing within the Democratic party has been a renewed questioning of its support for Israel. Support for the Jewish state has traditionally been a bipartisan issue in the US but Sanders had been associated with some anti-Israel sentiments, in spite of his being Jewish. He called for a "more balanced" Middle East policy, and greatly exaggerated the Palestinian death toll in operation Protective Edge. He even employed a "Jewish Outreach" staffer who made vehemently anti-Israel statement on the internet, ultimately suspending her.
The Sanders campaign has thus become associated with a new, more extremely "progressive" wing of the Democratic party, and that wing reared its head at the DNC yesterday.
Activists identifying themselves on twitter as being "Progressive for Palestine" raised a Palestinian flag in the middle of the convention floor, making it clearly visible to the overhead cameras, and held up signs reading: "I support Palestinian human rights."
A Georgia Democratic congressman apologized for calling West Bank settlers “termites” at an event near the Democratic national convention.Danny Glover: Clinton and Sanders united on Israel
“There has been a steady [stream], almost like termites can get into a residence and eat before you know that you’ve been eaten up and you fall in on yourself, there has been settlement activity that has marched forward with impunity and at an ever increasing rate to the point where it has become alarming,” Rep. Hank Johnson said Monday at a Philadelphia event organized by the US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation.
The Washington Free Beacon, a news website, first reported remarks. Special interest groups traditionally run events in and around both parties’ conventions. The Democrats’ convention runs through Thursday.
The Atlanta Journal Constitution picked up the report, and the Anti-Defamation League called on Twitter on Johnson to apologize.
“Poor choice of words – apologies for offense,” Johnson said. “Point is settlement activity continues slowly undermine 2-state solution.”
One of Senator Bernie Sanders’s most prominent celebrity supporters has taken his call to rally behind Hillary Clinton for the sake of defeating her Republican challenger.Cornel West to 'Post': The Palestinians 'will be free'
Actor Danny Glover, who has starred in films like “Lethal Weapon,” “The Color Purple,” “Angels in the Outfield” and “The Royal Tenenbaums,” arrived to the Philadelphia Convention Center Monday to stand with the Sanders base, while also doing his part to project an image of Democratic Party unity.
“Our responsibility is to defeat the far right,” he told The Times of Israel. “I’ve always said that. I’m going to do whatever I can here to defeat Donald Trump, because that fascist right that often raises its ugly head in our country at various times has also permeated the rest of the world. It’s important that the gains that were made by progressive forces — that we aggressively fight against those trying to change that.”
In the past, Glover has not been shy about voicing his political opinions, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been no exception. In May 2014, he protested the screening of a film in which he appeared, “American Revolutionary: the Evolution of Grace Lee Boggs,” in Tel Aviv.
West appeared at a rally at City Hall here in Philadelphia, on the periphery of the Democratic National Convention, where protesters are rallying against Clinton, the party's presumptive presidential nominee.Antisemitism Expert: WikiLeaks ‘Knew What It Was Doing’ When Invoking Antisemitic Tropes on Twitter (INTERVIEW)
"I don't feel like we lost– we did lose," West said, on the sidelines of the rally. "We got defeated. But we'll bounce back, though."
West, an American intellectual who self-identifies as a democratic socialist, was appointed to the platform committee by Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont. He has declared support in the general election for Jill Stein of the Green Party.
While West was lobbying for the platform to recognize Israel's "occupation" and "settlement activity" in historic Palestinian lands, neither term was adopted by the committee. The party did, however, add new language on the need for the establishment of a sovereign new state allowing Palestinians to live in "dignity."
"The Palestinians will be free, brother," West added. "Ain't no doubt about that."
Denials by WikiLeaks that it knowingly posted an antisemitic message on social media should not be believed, an expert told The Algemeiner on Monday.PreOccupiedTerritory: Rabbi Fills In At DNC After Khamenei Declines To Offer Benediction (satire)
Kenneth L. Marcus — president and general counsel of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law and author of The Definition of Anti-Semitism — was referring to a WikiLeaks tweet on Saturday that read, “Tribalist symbol for establishment climbers? Most of our critics have 3 (((brackets around their names))) & have black-rim glasses. Bizarre.”
Following backlash, WikiLeaks deleted the tweet and, in subsequent messages, attempted to offer explanations on what the postt meant. The group blamed “neo-liberal castle creepers” for turning (((echo))) into “a tribalist designator for establishment climbers,” adding that “pro-Clinton hacks and neo-Nazis” have intentionally misconstrued the original tweets meaning.
“The triple brackets have established themselves very quickly — you might say at internet speed — as both an antisemitic way of identifying Jews and and a Jewish way of expressing solidarity against antisemites,” Marcus said.
Viewers, attendees, and participants in the first evening of the Democratic National Convention experienced some moments of disorder and unpredictability, but organizers confessed that the smooth functioning of the event was an even closer call than most people realized: Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was supposed to deliver the closing benediction, canceled at the last minute, forcing them to replace him with a Conservative Rabbi.Netanyahu: “We Have Beaten” Boycott Campaign
Organizers scrambled in the two days before the convention to fill the void left by Khamenei’s change of plan, and managed to enlist Rabbi Julie Schonfeld, head of the Rabbinical Assembly of the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism – the first woman to hold that position.
By all accounts, say observers, Rabbi Schonfeld acquitted herself well and offered a suitable example for a campaign that seeks to install the first female president in the White House, but behind the scenes, Democratic leaders admitted they felt disappointment that the plan to have Khamenei offer a prayer fell through.
“Rabbi Schonfeld did a fine job,” said Doward Hean, one of the senior planners. “She would have been an excellent choice under almost any circumstances. But we had the opportunity to showcase the warming relations between the United States and Iran that President Obama has engineered, and it’s a letdown not to see that come to fruition on the grand stage.”
“We were this close,” agreed staff member Kohn Jerry. “We could have made everyone forget about the Republican convention that was dominating the news cycle. I mean, as it is, the controversies and shenanigans of various attendees made that happen anyway, but still.”
Khamenei declined to offer a reason for his eleventh-hour cancellation. “The Supreme leader is not in the habit of disclosing such information to pig Zionist Great Satan infidels,” said a spokesman.
Israel has defeated the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) campaign, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu proclaimed at a Knesset hearing on Monday.Independent Jewish Voices defends Toronto teacher who called for “liberation of all Palestine”
Under questioning from opposition Knesset members, Netanyahu defended his government’s handling of foreign relations despite serving as his own foreign minister since his reelection in March 2015. Netanyahu presented a color-coded map to illustrate the increasing number of nations that have forged (or are seeking) formal diplomatic relations with Israel. “People say we are isolated,” Netanyahu said. “What isolation are we talking about?”
“We are acting against BDS and this why they are on the defensive,” Netanyahu said. “They are taking hits of many fronts. We have beaten them.”
In a recent analysis for The Jerusalem Post, Benjamin Weinthal, a research fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, illustrated Netanyahu’s point by describing a number of ways that the BDS campaign was suffering from “economic warfare with financial assaults.” Much of this stems from anti-BDS legislation passed by a growing number of states, including Illinois and New York, where multinational corporations have their headquarters. In one instance, the threat of being boycotted by New York state prompted Commerzbank, Germany’s second-largest bank, to close out an account held by Germany’s BDS campaign.
Tyler Levitan, campaign coordinator of an anti-Israel group Independent Jewish Voices-Canada (IJV), came to the defence of a Toronto teacher that is being investigated by the Toronto police and the Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board for comments made at a Iran-backed Al-Quds Day rally in Toronto on July 2, 2016.New AMCHA Initiative Report reveals alarming surge in Campus anti-Semitic incidents
At the rally, Nadia Shoufani – who is affiliated with the Palestine Solidarity Movement and Actions4Palestine and is a director at the Arab Canadian Cultural Association – glorified Palestinian “martyrs” who were killed in the struggle against Israel and supported the “resistance by all means possible”.
“Glory to the martyrs”, Shoufani hollered into the megaphone to a crowd of radical Islamists and far-left anti-Israel activists. “Victory, freedom to the prisoners and liberation for the Palestinians, all Palestinians From the river [Jordan River] to the sea [Mediterranean Sea] Palestine will be free.”
On her Facebook page, she openly expressed her support for the Palestinian uprising (intifada). During the al-Quds/ Knife Intifada terrorists murdered 40 Israelis and foreigners and injured 511 people in 155 stabbing attacks, 96 shootings, 45 car ramming attacks, one bus bombing and hundreds of firebombing and rock throwing attacks.
She urged her followers to “join us in activities supporting the [Palestinian] intifada… Humiliate them. They all worth [not more than] the shoe of every fighter and every martyr”.
New AMCHA Initiative Report reveals alarming surge in Campus anti-Semitic incidentsNew report shows dramatic rise in US anti-Semitism
The Amcha Initiative is releasing a new report tomorrow that reveals a large surge in campus anti-Semitism during the 1st six months of 2016. It includes strong evidence linking student government divestment resolutions and anti-Jewish activity, a huge uptick in expression opposing Israel’s right to exist, and an alarming spike in shutdowns and suppression of speech compared with 2015. Specifically:
Incidents involving suppression of Jewish students’ rights, including the right to free speech and free assembly have doubled;
Expression denying Israel’s right to exist tripled and is highly correlated with conduct targeting Jewish students for harm;
Divestment resolutions are fueling an increase in campus anti-Semitism; and
Schools with the largest increase in anti-Semitic activity from 2015 to 2016 are Columbia, Vassar, U of Chicago, NYU, U of MN, UMass, U of WI, U of FL and U of WA.
These trends are frightening for Jewish students but also very illuminating to those battling this threat. Those who promote anti-Zionism on campus are becoming a great deal more brazen in their tactics and are exposing their true colors. Understanding this shift provides us valuable information on how to fight it.
A new report by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has been presented to the Knesset Committee for Diaspora Affairs which suggests a dramatic rise in anti-Semitic assaults in the US last year compared to previous years.MSM Paints Muslim Suicide Bomber as 'Syrian Migrant Killed in German Blast'
According the report, last year saw 941 reported anti-Semitic incidents in the US, a 3% increase from the 912 incidents the previous year.
Of these attacks, 56 were assaults - the most violent category of antisemitic activity covered in the report. This statistic represents a more than 50% increase from 36 recorded the year before.
Incidents on college campuses amounted to 10% of total recorded incidents, with a whopping 90 incidents recorded on 60 different college campuses. This statistic shows a dramatic increase from the 47 recorded incidents on 43 campuses recorded the previous year.
After the BBC received harsh mocking on social media for making the suicide bomber into a "refugee" victim, its headline was changed to "Syrian asylum seeker blows himself up in Germany," which is a little more accurate, yet still agenda-driven.BBC News finds terror (without quotation marks) in Europe
At this point, Reuters' headline remains unchanged and explains that the Syrian man was denied asylum last year. It also states he was denied entry into the music festival.
As Alex Griswold at Mediaite notes, German officials aren't helping the truth along, as they are unwilling to fully remark that this was indeed a terror attack. Though believing that it "likely" is, German Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann has said, "We don’t know if this man planned on suicide or if he had the intention of killing others."
What is undeniable is the abhorrent media bias on display by these two outlets. The longer the media pretend multiculturalism isn't failing and that Muslims aren't waging war on the West, the more innocents will die.
In other words, when it comes to terrorism in Europe the BBC apparently has no problem with “value judgements”.The New York Times Touts Mecca as a ‘City of the Future’
What this article shows us yet again is that those editorial guidelines on “Language when Reporting Terrorism” are not worth the virtual paper upon which they are written. When the BBC wants to use words such as ‘terror’, ‘terrorism’ or ‘terrorist’, it does. When it wants to make “value judgements”, it does and in fact what dictates the BBC’s choice of terminology is “a political position” of precisely the type it purports to avoid.
Absurdly, the corporation would still have its funding public believe that its coverage of terrorism is consistent, accurate and impartial.
The New York Times has finally found a religion it likes: Islam!Nazi hunter outraged by annulment of Ustasha collaborator’s verdict
Sure enough, today’s newspaper features a full-page color advertisement for “Pilgrimage: A new virtual-reality film from The New York Times Magazine.”
The breathless promotional copy touts: “Be transported by virtual-reality technology to Mecca, Islam’s holiest city and pilgrimage destination to the world’s 1.6 billion Muslims. Rarely seen by non-Muslim eyes, the Mecca of today is not only a place of faith — it is a city of the future.”
The Times video does indeed feature “virtual-reality technology,” but the “reality” it depicts is a kind of airbrushed, promotional, tourism ministry-type piece of propaganda.
The Times reports that “Saudi Arabia has spent billions of dollars” to improve the city’s infrastructure. But it doesn’t mention the stampedes that killed thousands of pilgrims in 2004, 2006, and 2015. Nor does it mention where these billions of dollars came from — almost certainly oil revenue that contributes to global warming of the sort that is usually of immense concern to the Times when its source is offshore drilling or hydraulic fracturing in America, rather than pumping from the sands of Saudi Arabia.
Instead, there’s a kind of gee-whiz tone that suffuses the Times video. Mecca features “impressive architecture,” and “ice cream trucks.” The Muslims are stuck with ice cream because they can’t grab a cold beer — it’s banned in Saudi Arabia, and if you are caught drinking one, the penalty is flogging. No word in this Times video about flogging or any of the other more colorful punishments in Saudi Arabia, such as beheading. No word, either, about women’s rights — or, more accurately, the lack of them — in the kingdom. All that might get in the way of the Times’ depiction of Mecca as a “city of the future,” making it sound more like a city of the past. Maybe that’s the difference between “virtual” reality and just plain old-fashioned real reality.
The Simon Wiesenthal Center has expressed outrage over the recent annulment of the 1946 conviction of Croatian Archbishop Alojzije Stepinac, for treason and collaboration with the Nazi-aligned Ustasha regime.WWII memorial plaques stolen from Rotterdam
“As the leading Catholic priest in the Independent State of Croatia (NDH), Stepinac’s responsibility was to speak out on behalf of the innocent victims of the Ustasha, not to lend spiritual support to their murderers,” said the Wiesenthal Center’s top Nazi-hunter, Dr. Efraim Zuroff. “The genocidal campaign waged by the Ustasha against Serbs, their active participation in Holocaust crimes against Jews, and the murder of Roma and anti-fascist Croatians carried out in their network of concentration camps are among the most heinous crimes of World War II. No person who supported that regime should have their conviction annulled.”
The Zagreb County Court Judge Ivan Turudic overturned the verdict last week, saying it had violated the right to a fair trial, the prohibition of forced labor, and the rule of law.
Zuroff was dismissive of accounts that Stepinac later condemned Ustasha atrocities against Jews and Serbs.
“Bottom line is, he was [NDH leader] Ante Pavelić’s priest – that says it all, and it’s totally unforgivable,” he told The Jerusalem Post on Monday. “He openly supported the regime which committed mass murder, and afforded them spiritual comfort and support.”
Zuroff said the stance Stepinac took was of “huge significance,” and that for this reason, the annulment of the verdict is cause for celebration for nationalist and ultra-rightwing Croatians.
Three so-called Stolpersteine were stolen from Graaf Florisstraat and Mathenesserlaan in Rotterdam, RTV Rijnmond reports. These memorial stones consist of plaques built into the sidewalk in front of houses where people lived who were deported in the Second World War. It mostly involves Jewish people.Lithuanian concentration camp is now a wedding venue
It is unclear exactly when the plaques were stolen. According to the local broadcaster, the police have no indication that other plaques are missing.
The first Stolpersteine were placed in Rotterdam in 2010. They are about 10 by 10 centimeters big and contain details of the deceased. There are currently over 200 of these memorial plaques in Rotterdam. Other Dutch cities, including Amsterdam, Tilburg and Hilversum, also have these stones.
In this drab city 55 miles west of Vilnius, there are few heritage sites as mysterious and lovely looking as the Seventh Fort.Wiesel Institute praises Moldova for condemning Holocaust
This 18-acre red-brick bunker complex, which dates to 1882, features massive underground passages that connect its halls and chambers. Above ground, the hilltop fortress is carpeted with lush grass and flowers whose yellow blooms attract bees and songbirds along with families who come here to frolic in the brief Baltic summer.
It’s also a popular venue for graduation parties and wedding receptions, complete with buffets and barbecues, as well as summer camps for children who enjoy the elaborate treasure hunts around the premises.
Most of the visitors are unaware that they are playing, dining and celebrating at a former concentration camp.
In 1941, thousands of Jews were imprisoned, starved and finally massacred by Lithuanian Nazi collaborators at the Seventh Fort in what was then the largest mass killing in the country’s history. The complex is believed to be the first concentration camp located on territory that Nazi Germany conquered following its eastward invasion.
Even by the unfortunate commemorative standards in Eastern Europe — where many Jewish cemeteries and Holocaust sites have been damaged or neglected — the Seventh Fort is unusual for its erasure of the recent past. It was privatized in 2009 and is now owned by the Military Heritage Center — a nongovernmental association run by a 37-year-old Lithuanian informatics specialist, Vladimir Orlov — which charges admission fees of approximately $4 to some parts of the compound and organizes parties at the venue.
The Elie Wiesel Institute for the Study of the Holocaust in Romania has praised Moldova’s parliament for condemning the Holocaust in the country.Rescued violins bring back Holocaust memories
An international commission said in a report published in 2004 that between 45,000 and 60,000 Jews were killed in regions controlled by today’s Moldova in 1941, and between 105,000 and 120,000 Jews died after being transported from there to Trans-Dniester, then a region to the east of Moldova.
The report was overseen by Wiesel, the late Romanian-born Nobel prize winner. It also said 50,000 Roma were deported to Trans-Dniester and 11,000 died.
Moldova’s Parliament approved the report on July 22, condemning the “persecution and extermination of Jews” on Moldovan territory, something the Romanian institute praised Monday.
Tucking the violin beneath his chin, the instrument’s wood glistening under the packed auditorium’s spotlights, Guy Braunstein’s hand trembled from the weight of history.Researchers find way to spot tumor cells invading the brain
“I have done thousands of concerts, but I have never been as emotional and trembled the way I did when I took that violin from Auschwitz in my hand,” Braunstein said backstage after the event.
The soloist along with a group of Jerusalem chamber orchestra musicians performed in Tel Aviv as part of a project that collects and restores violins from the Holocaust.
The one that Braunstein played belonged to a man forced to perform at Auschwitz concentration camp as inmates left each morning for forced labor elsewhere and returned in the evenings.
At the auditorium in Tel Aviv, some in the audience were in tears as the musicians played a Gustav Mahler composition.
“Its smell was different,” said Braunstein, who has made his career with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra and has now performed twice as part of the project.
“I had the feeling while playing that someone was sticking a stake through my heart because I knew its story.”
Metastatic melanoma is the deadliest of the skin cancers; when malignant melanoma metastasizes to the brain, it is a death sentence for most patients. The mechanisms that govern early metastatic growth and interactions of metastatic cells with the brain’s microenvironment are still shrouded in mystery.Jerusalem-based Zore strives to make guns safer
Now, a Tel Aviv University study shows a new way of detecting brain micrometastases months before they transform into malignant and inoperable growths. According to the research, micro-tumor cells hijack astrogliosis, the brain’s natural response to damage or injury, to support metastatic growth. This knowledge may lead to the detection of brain cancer in its first stages and permit early intervention, the university said in a statement.
The study was led by Dr. Neta Erez of the Department of Pathology at TAU’s Sackler Faculty of Medicine and published in Cancer Research.
Erez and her team used mouse models to study and follow the spontaneous metastasis of melanoma in the brain. She and her partners went over all the stages of metastasis: the initial discovery of melanoma in the skin, the removal of the primary tumor, the micrometastatic dissemination of cancer cells across the body, the discovery of a tumor and eventual death.
Imaging techniques used today cannot detect micrometastases. Melanoma patients whose initial melanoma was removed may believe that everything is fine for months, or years, following the initial procedure.
Jerusalem-based Zore is one of a group of companies trying to make guns safer, and it has a personal reason to do so.Israeli Movie About ‘Underground’ Fighting Wins Best Action Film at Comic-Con 2016
The company, led by CEO Yonatan Zimmerman, was founded by a group of Israeli army veterans, who decided to tackle accidental deaths caused by the misuse of firearms after an army friend of theirs was shot by friendly fire.
The team has developed a gun lock, Zore X, that combines a gun’s original mechanism with technology to create a storage solution that is safe but still allows easy access for use when needed.
The product is a smart cartridge-shaped locking device for semiautomatic guns that prevents unauthorized use and alerts gun owners by phone if an attempt has been made to move or unlock their firearm. ZORE X’s design allows users to swiftly unlock and eject the cartridge, offering the quickest way for guns to go from locked to loaded.
The smart cartridge-shaped device can lock the majority of semiautomatic guns by just pressing a button. It can be unlocked manually, using a code that can be input without looking at the lock, by simply feeling the number of clicks between each turn of the lock. Once unlocked, charging the gun will eject ZORE X and chamber a fresh round immediately. ZORE also offers gun owners the option of unlocking the device via their smartphone. However, the device can only be locked manually by pressing the lock button and is not dependent on the phone in any way, the company said.
An Israeli movie about a promising new underground fighter won Best Action Film at the 2016 Comic-Con in San Diego.
The 2015 movie, Underground, tells the tale of 25-year-old Omer, who suffers from a rare condition that affects his nervous system and prevents him from feeling pain. The syndrome, called chronic intestinal pseudo-obstruction (CIP), plays to Omer’s advantage when he begins taking part in underground fighting to earn cash to help support his family members after his father abandons them, according to IMDb. He eventually fights in a mobster-run underground club, earning large sums of money for each win, and is then invited to partake in a VIP members-only battle for 20,000 Euros (close to $22,000). After he agrees to the bout, Omer finds out he was deceived into a “fight to the death” event against a man known as the club’s executioner.
The film’s director and lead actor, Amit Ruderman, posted a photo on Facebook with his award and captioned the shot, “We’re [sic] came. We saw. We had fun. We won!!!!!!!”
We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.
