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Sunday, February 17, 2013

Sunday Links Part 2

From Ian:

Syrian refugees receive ongoing treatment in Israeli hospital for first time
They asked for our help and we gave it, says top Defense Ministry official of seven wounded Syrian nationals evacuated by IDF troops to Ziv Hospital in Safed
It was still not clear Sunday whether the wounded Syrian nationals were rebels fighting Assad’s forces or civilians desperate to escape a civil war which has cost the lives of tens of thousands of insurgents and troops. It was clear, however, that they had been injured in the fighting.
Hospital director Oscar Embon said one of the Syrians arrived at the hospital in critical condition, but was now in serious condition. The other six were said to be in moderate condition after undergoing surgery.

GOP Sen. Rubio Visits Israel, Eyes 2016 Presidential Run
Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) is visiting Israel and Jordan, in a trip that could bolster a possible 2016 presidential run.
Rubio plans to visit Israel and Jordan and will meet with Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad and Jordan's King Abdullah II.
“America's friendship with Israel is a truly special one, and we must continue to do all we can to support this beacon of democracy, religious freedom and free enterprise in the heart of an unstable region,” Rubio said in a statement announcing his trip.

Jewish groups call for further review of Hagel statements
AJC, ADL ask defense secretary nominee to clarify reports on 2007 quote saying ‘State Department has become adjunct to the Israeli foreign minister’s office’
Two centrist Jewish groups called for further review of Chuck Hagel’s record in light of an account of a 2007 speech in which he allegedly said the State Department acted as an “adjunct” of Israel’s foreign ministry.
Hagel, President Obama’s nominee for defense secretary, has the support of a majority of senators, but confirmation of his nomination was blocked on Feb. 14 by several Republican senators exercising their power to hold any vote.

The Washington Free Beacon reported, in a posting just hours before the failed bid in the Senate to advance Hagel’s nomination, a contemporaneous account of a Hagel speech delivered in 2007 at Rutgers University.
George Ajjan, a blogger sympathetic to Hagel’s foreign policy views, quoted him as saying “The State Department has become adjunct to the Israeli foreign minister’s office.”

David Ward’s Bulldozer
With this new article, Ward has swapped his spade for a bulldozer.
Old friends and (new) foes have advised David Ward MP that he is in a hole and really should stop digging. (For background, see here and here.) Unfortunately, whoever runs his website disagrees, and has posted an article that renders Ward unfit to serve as a Member of Parliament for so long as it remains there.
With this new article, Ward has swapped his spade for a bulldozer.
The article is entitled, “Guardian continues the hounding of David Ward”. It exemplifies the type of loose – and therefore dangerous and highly offensive – language about Jews, Israel and the Holocaust that got Ward exactly where he is today.

Stakelbeck Hosts Itamar's Mayor VIDEO
I recently hosted an event in Nashville for Mayor Moshe Goldsmith and his wife, Leah. The couple are longtime residents of Itamar, a town in Israel's Biblical heartland of Samaria where Moshe serves as mayor. They share the truth about Israel's so-called "settlements" and why it is so important for Jews to settle this sacred land.

Israeli water tech draws new European investment
Atlantium Technologies is the first cleantech firm in Israel to receive funding from Europe’s Aster Capital group
It’s a new era in water disinfection, declares Atlantium Technologies, which claims to have “re-invented ultraviolet-based water disinfection with unique Hydro-Optic Disinfection.” The experts will decide if that’s so or not – but Atlantium’s latest funding round represents a new era in cleantech funding in Israel. For the first time, Europe’s prestigious Aster Capital venture fund is investing in an Israeli company, giving $3 million to Atlantium to continue its development of its new products. The investment is part of a $9 million financing round which includes Aeris Capital A.G. (Switzerland) along with the current investor Benjamin Kahn.

The nose that can smell cancer goes commercial
Israeli professor’s revolutionary disease-detection device is on the road to changing how early, and how easily, lung cancer is diagnosed.
An Israeli invention that can detect lung cancer from exhaled breath will be commercialized in a joint venture between the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology and Alpha Szenszor, a Boston-based manufacturer of carbon nanotube sensing equipment.
As ISRAEL21c reported in 2011, Technion Prof. Hossam Haick has been working on what he calls “Na-Nose” (the “na” is for “nanotechnology”) since 2007, and the device has been proven in numerous international clinical trials to differentiate between different types and classifications of cancer with up to 95 percent accuracy.
Patients breathe into a tube; the Na-Nose analyzes the more than 1,000 different gases that are contained in the breath to identify those that may indicate that something’s wrong. It works by binding gases to specific nano-materials, a technique formally known as volatile organic compound (VOC) detection.