Tuesday, August 09, 2016
Israeli judoka Yarden Gerbi wins bronze at Rio
Israeli judoka Yarden Gerbi overcame an early loss to win the bronze medal at the Rio Olympics on Tuesday, becoming the first Israeli athlete to win a medal at the 2016 games, and the first Israeli Olympic medalist since windsurfer Shahar Tzuberi took home the bronze in the 2008 games in Beijing.
Gerbi defeated Japan’s Miku Tashiru in the repechage to claim the third place spot in the under-73 kg competition.
Gerbi, 27, and the 2013 world champion in her class, thus became the seventh Israeli athlete in history to be honored on the Olympic podium. She was also only the second woman to do so — the first being judoka Yael Arad, Israel’s first-ever medal winner, who took home the silver in Barcelona 1992.
She promptly received a call from President Reuven Rivlin, who called her a “champion” and said that “today, you are our hero.”
So why is it antisemitism at Westminster?Bernard-Henri Lévy: A Long-Awaited and Critical Appeal Falls Short
The antisemitism doesn’t exist in the supply, it exists in the demand. In theory, for every speech given by an anti-Zionist Jew, there would be scores of Zionist Jews lining up to respond. All things being equal, we should never have heard of these Jewish anti-Zionists. They are insignificant outliers whose presence would only be recognised by sociologists and statisticians before being cast off into the bin titled ‘not to be taken into consideration’. Perhaps a study or two could analyse them to try to find correlating variables that could push forward a theory into their very presence. Bullying at school? The trauma of children of holocaust survivors? I am certain an innovative list could be created.
Yet where these people are selected, for the specific purpose of attacking what it means to be Jewish to the absolute majority, there exists a problem. You cannot hide behind a Jewish anti-Zionist to deflect accusations of antisemitism because the very act of turning the insignificant into a weapon against Jews is an antisemitic act.
I have heard people suggest people like Blumenthal are antisemites themselves. This is a mistake. People like Blumenthal are simply oddities. A handful of people displaying bizarre and obscure thought. When you see their name in print, you see antisemitism at work. When you hear them speak, when you see them listed in a programme, when you see them quoted, shared or retweeted – all antisemitism.
So someone in the States is so messed up he believes you can overstate the Holocaust. A child of holocaust survivors, he dates the rising awareness of his fictitious industry to 1967. Nothing of course to do with the Eichmann trial of 1962, where finally the world got to hear the true horror of events. Nothing to do either with the trauma of the genocide. It’s a money thing, a power thing, don’t forget after all, it’s the Jews we are talking about.
The antisemitism isn’t in his train of thought, it is in those that take the absurd and reward him, fund him and applaud him. Antisemitism is the adoring crowd of the village idiot.
So yes, the appearance of two of the anti-Zionist clowns in a single conference at the University of Westminster that spent so much time dealing with Zionism, Israel and Jews is an antisemitic act. It is about time everyone started realising this is the case.
The letter begins with an enumeration of the recent terrorist acts that have beset France.Michael Lumish: This week on NOTHING LEFT (9 Aug 2016)
It does not omit Charlie (“the murder of cartoonists”), Bataclan (“the murder of young people listening to music”), of Magnanville (“the murder of a pair of police officers”). Nor, of course, does it fail to mention Nice (“the murder of men, women, and children celebrating the national holiday”) or Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray (“the murder of a priest celebrating Mass”). Clearly, it purported to present an exhaustive list of the attacks.
Except it left one out. And what it left out was the hostage-taking at the kosher supermarket on January 9, 2015, which occurred less than three years after Mohamed Merah’s murders at the Jewish school in Toulouse.
The omission was immediately noticed. I was disturbed by it, and said so on Twitter — which earned me (and others, I’m sure) an avalanche of insult: “You’re never satisfied … When Muslims are silent, that’s bad; when they speak up, that’s bad, too … What are you doing to national unity? Maybe you’re the one who’s trying to pit French people against one another?”
But the fact is that a slip like this cannot be allowed to go unremarked. And, given the prominence of those who signed the letter, it cannot fail to be upsetting.
What could have been going through the head of the person who (as is typical with this sort of group letter) composed the first draft? Or through the heads of the 41 others who, in the hours that followed, read and re-read the draft (as is also the usual practice), weighing each word, suggesting changes and talking things through before eventually signing?
This week Michael Burd and Alan Freedman, from Nothing Left of mighty J-Air, out of Melbourne give us:
3 min Editorial: World Vision /Gaza scandal
10 min Noni Darwish, former Muslim talks about Interfaith,Muslim immigration, Sharia Law & the Jews
38min Michael’s view on interfaith (inc R’ J Hausman's view on why his colleagues are not doing their homework/ clip)
46 min Mike Lumish, Israel Thrives blog, USA
51 min David Bedein, investigative journalist
1 hr 14 min Ron Jontoff-Hutter, Berlin based writer
My piece is the final in my Failures of Progressive-Left Zionism series and is concerned with the tendency, which we also see from the Obama administration and the progressive-left, more generally, is the tendency to join with enemies (such as, for example, Black Lives Matter) while spitting hatred at friends.
JPost Editorial: Yazidi genocide
In early August 2013 Islamic State managed to overcome Kurdish forces and conquer the town of Sinjar, near Mosul in northern Iraq, where one of the largest concentrations of Yazidis in the world was located.Fred Maroun: As a Lebanese, I demand that Lebanon be banned from the Olympics
What happened next – massacres, sex slavery and forced enlistment in Islamic State ranks – has been recognized since by the UN as a full-fledged genocide.
Two years later, the Yazidis, who number around 400,000 in northern Iraq and Syria, remain in danger of systemic murder at the hands of Islamic State jihadists.
The designation of genocide is rare under international law. And in the case of the Yazidis it marks the first recognized genocide carried out by non-state actors – Islamic State – not by a state or a military force acting on behalf of a state.
The Armenian Genocide of 1915, the Holocaust, the massacre of the Tutsis in Rwanda in 1994 and the systematic destruction of the Bosnian-Muslim population in Srebrenica in 1995 are the only other cases of recognized genocide.
The Lebanese delegation at the Olympics exposed its country’s bigotry when it refused to be on the same bus as Israelis and blocked them entry into the bus. The athletes may or may not be bigoted themselves, but they knew how their country reacts to any sign of “normalization” with Israelis.Brazil Nuts: Anti-Semitism at the Summer Olympics
The Lebanese Olympians knew that Miss Lebanon Saly Greige was demonized in January 2015 for taking a picture with an Israeli contestant, and they knew that they would be hailed as heroes in Lebanon for their act of cowardice.
The Olympic Charter pledges, “To fight against all other forms of discrimination”, but the International Olympic Committee’s response to this blatant incident of discrimination against Israelis was a slap on the wrist of the Lebanese delegation. On the same weekend, Saudi judo athlete Joud Fahmy forfeited a match to avoid facing Israeli Gili Cohen, and the IOC took no action against Saudi Arabia.
The IOC is the organization that refused in 2012 to commemorate the eleven Israeli Olympic athletes who were killed by Palestinian terrorists during the Munich Games of 1972, so its credibility in defending Israelis against discrimination is tainted. As a person of Lebanese origin, I want the IOC to know when it fails to uphold the Olympic spirit with regard to Israel, it is failing everyone, including Arabs who oppose terrorism and hatred.
If countries like Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, and others cannot put aside their hatred of Israel, or any other country, at least for the duration of the Olympics, they should not be allowed to compete.
The actions of Joud Fahmy are insulting, but also perplexing. Saudi Arabia is a male-dominated country, well-known for its misogyny. The Week lists Nine Things Women Can’t Do in Saudi Arabia, the first five being:David Horovitz: Watching from an Israel aghast, Trump is just unthinkable, while Clinton has started to look invaluable
- Drive a car;
- Wear clothes or make-up that “show off their beauty;”
- Interact with men;
- Go for a swim; and
- Compete freely in sports.
They continue:
Last year, Saudi Arabia proposed hosting an Olympic Games without women. “Our society can be very conservative,” said Prince Fahad bin Jalawi al-Saud, a consultant to the Saudi Olympic Committee. “It has a hard time accepting that women can compete in sports.”
When Saudi Arabia sent its female athletes to the London Games for the first time, hardline clerics denounced the competitors as “prostitutes.” The women also had to be accompanied by a male guardian and cover their hair.
Against overwhelming odds, Joud Fahmy is actually allowed to compete for her country, in the second Summer Olympic games that Saudi Arabia has ever allowed women to participate in. She takes this ostensible honor, and dishonors herself with her hatred of Jews, so overwhelming that she won’t compete against one. That is sickening behavior, that no amount of condemnation by the International Olympic Committee (which, is never coming) can excuse.
The above incidents, which easily qualify as international incidents, are barely media incidents. If you go to Google and search terms like “Lebanon Olympics bus” or “Saudi Arabia judo,” you’ll get maybe 10 or 11 results each. Most of the coverage is, unsurprisingly from Jewish news outlets and from few conservative websites. In its story, Yahoo News’ headline is “Israeli Olympic team met with apparent anti-Semitism in Rio de Janeiro.” I would love to see the definition of “apparent” in the dictionary that writer Ben Rohrbach uses.
Weeks ago, Netanyahu may have warily calculated that, were he to finalize the aid deal, this might leave President Obama better placed, as a freshly confirmed defender of Israel’s security, to utilize the end-of-year twilight zone between presidential elections and presidential handover in order to undermine the right-wing government in Jerusalem — by backing discomfiting Security Council resolutions, by speaking at a Paris peace summit, by publishing Palestinian parameters, or some such intervention. Now, clearly, the sheer, stark, untenable unpredictability of Trump, and the unlikely but severe prospect of Trump becoming president, outweighs such nuanced consideration. For in Trump, America has a presidential candidate potentially capable of doing anything and everything — Why don’t we use those nukes? — and demonstrably capable of turning on anyone and everyone — even on the bereaved parents of a casualty of war.Mike Pence confidant says Israel has no better friend
In this new and frankly insane reality, for a tiny Israel so dependent on mighty America amid the seething mass of Middle Eastern unpredictability, the ostensibly blinkered, Palestinian-empathizing, settlement-bashing, Iran-legitimating Barack Obama now appears quite the soul of temperate wisdom. And Hillary Clinton, previously tarred in right-wing Israeli circles for her association with and empowering of the unloved Obama, now looks responsible, serious, adult.
Compared to Donald Trump, indeed, Hillary Clinton now stands for Israel as the near epitome of presidential salvation. He wouldn’t have predicted it, but Netanyahu today likely finds himself hoping against hope that nothing dramatic befalls her, or America — nothing, that is, that might remake the current, Trump-is-finally-finished presidential election thinking.
The Republican pick for vice president, Indiana Governor Mike Pence, is “one of the best friends the State of Israel and the Jewish people have ever had,” according to Pence’s long-time friend and unofficial surrogate, Tom Rose, who was also the publisher of The Jerusalem Post in the early 2000s.Presidential candidates should pledge to end the UN’s onslaught against Israel
Rose spoke to the Post on Wednesday, wishing to counter recent reports stating that Pence would be a bad choice for the Jewish community.
In a piece published by Haaretz last week, Indianapolis Rabbi Dennis Sasso wrote that “Indiana Jews have long been repelled by Mike Pence’s anti-LGBT, anti-immigrant, anti-choice stances.”
According to Sasso, while he is a “pleasant and amiable person,” and has shown support for Israel by signing an anti- BDS bill into law this year, Pence has “countered the very foundations of religious and moral values he purports to advance.”
Rose, who describes Pence as his “closest personal friend for over 25 years,” told the Post that Sasso’s effort to “smear and defame one of the best friends the State of Israel and the Jewish people have ever had” should be called out.
At the end of 2016, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon is expected to end his 10-year period as UN secretary general.Shmuley Boteach: Hillary’s deadly Iran deal
The America-Israel Friendship League welcomes the initiative of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations to oppose and protest the “escalating discriminatory practices against Israel at the United Nations.” The latest example of prejudice at the UN is revealed in the June visit to Israel by the soon-to-retire UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, during which he chose to generate a few headlines by calling on Israel to “end the collective punishment blockade of Gaza.” In his words, Ban has claimed that “the closure of Gaza suffocates its people, stifles its economy and impedes reconstruction effort. It is a collective punishment for which there must be accountability.”
Secretary Ban is misguided. He knows that the blockade is strategic and vital to the safety of Israel and its people, and does not impede humanitarian aid to Gaza via Israeli ports. In 2011, a report commissioned by the UN itself upheld the legality of the blockade. But Ban simply ignores it. The secretary general unfortunately reflects an ongoing bias of elements of the UN against Israel.
Here are some of the most recent examples: • UN General Assembly: Between 2012 and 2015, a total of 83 resolutions against Israel were adopted, compared to 15 for the other 192 member states of the UN.
Let’s focus for a moment on two major headlines that occurred on the same day this week. The first was that Donald Trump continued to feud with Khizr and Ghazala Khan, the parents of American war hero Humayun Khan, who was killed in Iraq during Operation Iraqi Freedom. The second was that President Barack Obama last January sent Iran $400 million in cash, which in all likelihood will be used to fund terrorism.No matter who wins, FSILOTUS will be a Jew
Now, I will never defend Trump’s gratuitous insults to so many groups, especially the grieving parents of a fallen American soldier. It’s unforgivable and Trump must apologize. The same is true of his immoral proposal to temporarily ban Islamic immigrants’ entry to the US, which I have repeatedly denounced.
But for all that, which is worse, Trump’s utterly offensive insults or Obama secretly giving a terrorist regime nearly half a billion dollars in cold cash? Hillary Clinton has vowed to continue Obama’s policies on Iran, handing over to the mullahs $150 billion and honoring the nuclear agreement that in about 10 years will make it legal for Iran to acquire nuclear weapons.
Are Trump’s unforgivable verbal put-downs of Mexicans, Muslims and parents of fallen US soldiers, disgusting as they are, worse than Clinton’s actions in funding the Iranian terrorist regime and facilitating the Iran nuclear agreement, whose architect she claims to be? Whether words or actions are more consequential is an age-old question in Judaism, to which the answer is clear: while words are always important, actions are infinitely more so.
No matter who wins in November, the First Son-in-Law of the United States (FSILOTUS) will be a Jew. The only question is will he be Orthodox or Conservative?Major British Jewish Organization: Antisemitic Fringe in Labour Emboldened by Rise of Jeremy Corbyn (INTERVIEW)
Ivanka Trump's husband, Jared Kushner, 35, is principal owner of the real estate holding and development company Kushner Properties, and the newspaper publishing company the New York Observer. He is the eldest son of Seryl (born Stadtmauer) and real estate developer Charles Kushner. He has a brother, Joshua, who is also a businessman, and two sisters, Nicole and Dara.
In 2007, at the age of 26, he made what was the most expensive single-building property purchase in US history, when he bought 666 Fifth Avenue for $1.8 billion.
Kushner was raised Orthodox in New Jersey.
Chelsea Clinton's husband, Marc Mezvinsky, is the son of former Democratic members of Congress Marjorie Margolies-Mezvinsky (PA) and Edward Mezvinsky (Iowa), and was raised in the Conservative Jewish tradition.
He worked for eight years as an investment banker at Goldman Sachs and in 2011, co-founded a Manhattan-based hedge fund with two partners.
The formerly marginalized antisemitic fringe in Britain’s Labour Party has been emboldened by the rise of leader Jeremy Corbyn, the head of a major UK Jewish organization told The Algemeiner on Monday.The tourist Trojan horse
Paul Charney, chairman of the Zionist Federation UK (ZFUK), was giving his perspective on latest expression of anti-Israel sentiment in Labour – one many episodes that have come to light.
“Part of the problem is that while we recognize the classical version of anti-Jewish prejudice from the far-Right, collectively we are struggling to come to terms with its variant on the hard Left,” said Charney, following a report in the Daily Mail on Sunday about comments made by Communities spokesman Grahame Morris – who issued a call to treat British Jews serving in the Israeli army as suspected terrorists – and by Justice spokesman Richard Burgon, who declared Zionism the “enemy of peace,” and urged party members to dissociate from the parliamentary group Labour Friends of Israel. “This new antisemitism, often dressed up as anti-Zionism, unfortunately seems to be part and parcel of the totemic obsession with the Palestinian cause.”
The Daily Mail also reported on Sunday that an anti-Israel organization — whose leader openly praised Hamas — donated £10,000 to Corbyn’s campaign. In response, a Labour spokesman said that the donation, made by Friends of Al-Aqsa, was never cashed, because it was “made out to the wrong person.”
This was not the first time that Corbyn came under fire for alleged associations with terrorist groups, and was castigated for previous statements in which he referred to Hamas and Hezbollah as “friends.”
The NGO Monitor research institute recently issued an investigative report revealing that a number of anti-Israel organizations carry humanitarian visas issued by the Israeli government. One of these is the Quaker group the American Friends Service Committee, among the leaders of the BDS movement in the U.S., which has openly declared that its goal is to boycott Israel and encourage Israelis to become conscientious objectors. The group has an office in Jerusalem, and it even transfers funds to organizations registered in Israel that work toward the same purpose.Canada pulls logo from World Social Forum in Montreal after MPs complain of anti-Semitic events
Every sovereign state has the full prerogative to decide who enters it. Europe decides which refugees will return to their countries of origin, and only a few days ago Australia deported refugees and tourists who were filmed speaking out against the country. That's how it should be in Israel, especially in light of the many threats we face and the exploitation of humanitarian frameworks for political purposes.
The government gambit on humanitarian visas will have a number of ramifications. First, a line will be drawn over the absurdity of people who seek to hurt Israel being able to enjoy its hospitality. Second, it will create deterrence. Just as any tourist knows that provoking the security forces in Japan or the U.S. will get him or her kicked out of the country, anti-Israel activists need to understand that their activity carries a price. Third, striking the core activity of groups that promote nothing other than hatred and anti-Semitism will significantly reduce their influence abroad.
Lest there be any doubt, the World Council of Churches doesn't operate an envoy program anywhere in the world but Israel. It, and organizations like it, use the flimsy excuse that they cannot operate in non-democratic countries and closed societies. Of course not. Why put themselves at risk in Syria when they can demonstrate in Bil'in in the morning and drink beer in Tel Aviv later that night?
The federal government has distanced itself from a major international gathering opening Tuesday in Montreal following complaints that its programming included anti-Semitic content.September showdown over convicted bomber Rasmea Odeh’s mental exam in immigration case
The World Social Forum, expected to draw more than 10,000 participants, was told last week to remove the Canadian government logo from its list of partners after two Liberal MPs expressed disgust over what they called a “blatantly anti-Semitic cartoon” on the event’s website.
MPs Anthony Housefather, representing the Montreal riding of Mount Royal, and Michael Levitt, representing the Toronto riding of York Centre, also took exception to the World Social Forum’s heavy emphasis on the anti-Israel BDS movement.
“The Prime Minister, the Government of Canada, and the Canadian Parliament have been very clear that we oppose the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement and that anti-Semitism is never acceptable,” the MPs said in a statement.
Forum organizers cancelled a session that had been scheduled to show how Islamist terrorists are “in the service of world Zionism-capitalism.” The page for the event had featured a cartoon of a hook-nosed orthodox Jew with a Star of David on his hat, a drawing that Reuben Poupko, co-chairman of Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA) Quebec, said was “not so different from those that appeared in Nazi papers.”
The Court will hear argument on the motion for mental examination on September 22.Boston protesters call on Jewish group to retract criticism of Black Lives Matter
As in the past, Rasmea’s supporters are organizing to “pack” the courtroom to support her. This is a tactic they used at the original trial so aggressively the Court issued orders of protection so that potential and selected jurors would not be influenced, Judge orders jurors protected from pro-Palestinian activists.
As a backdrop to the eventual hearing, keep in mind that Rasmea asserts that she only was convicted in Israel because she falsely confessed after 25 days of horrific sexual torture. In fact, records show she confessed just one day after arrest. (There also was substantial physical and corroborating evidence, she had legal counsel, and an International Red Cross representative in attendance at the trial termed it fair.)
Another aspect of the case is that the PTSD defense is an attempt at jury nullification — the hope that if a jury hears Rasmea’s testimony as to torture, the jury will disregard other evidence of the preposterous claim that Rasmea didn’t understand the word “EVER.”
Rasmea’s supporters even admit that they seek to turn the immigration fraud trial against Rasmea into a trial of Israel. As I previously reported, Rasmea is now a campus hero for anti-Israel groups, and has aligned herself with Black Lives Matter, The Sickening Deification of Rasmea Odeh.
A group of activists has demanded the Boston Jewish Community Relations Council retract its recent statement criticizing the Black Lives Matter movement’s platform.Hamas again largely missing from Sophie McNeill's latest Gaza expedition
According to a statement from the Jewish anti-occupation group IfNotNow, some 50 people gathered at the council’s Boston offices on Monday to express their support for Black Lives Matter.
“We refuse to follow leaders that force us to choose between Jewish community and one of the most powerful movements of our time,” said Ally Little, one of the protest organizers, according to the IfNotNow statement. “We recognize the explicit links between Black, Palestinian, and Jewish liberation.”
Last week, the council issued a statement condemning the recently released platform of the Movement for Black Lives coalition, which called Israel an “apartheid state” and accused the United States of complicity in Israel’s “genocide” against the Palestinians.
“JCRC cannot and will not align ourselves with organizations that falsely and maliciously assert that Israel is committing ‘genocide,’” the statement read.
Australia - McNeill could of course argue that this latest story was not about culpability for the damage or specifics of the blockade but this is disingenuous given that its focus was overwhelmingly, yet again, on presenting Israel front and centre as the responsible party. And as always, McNeill chose not to include a spokesman from Hamas the provocateur that ignited the spark of the last war and the governing authority in Gaza, to explain and justify why Gaza reconstruction is so slow.Flaws in BBC’s ‘explanation’ of Palestinian terror again exposed
For over a year she has consistently refused to ask hard questions about Hamas. This story was a classic example of how McNeill's reporting typically operates - ordinary Palestinians suffering are presented. The story is framed to imply that Israel is the sole cause of that suffering. An Israeli spokesperson is briefly allowed a sentence or two in defence so that the story can be said to have "balance." The Palestinians are given the last word supported by McNeill's largely sympathetic commentary. Hamas and other Palestinian leaders barely exist unless the Israeli spokesperson mentions them.
McNeill's stubborn refusal to expose Hamas' rightful place in the firmament of terror and destructive effect upon the welfare of Gazans in the story on July 30 was starkly laid out by Israel's arrest of Mohammad El Halabi, the head of World Vision in Gaza.
As her own report on "AM" last Friday stated, El Halabi is "charged with giving millions of dollars of World Vision funds to Hamas to pay fighters, buy weapons, and build fortifications in Gaza." In other words, here is more evidence Hamas is stealing much of the aid Israel is facilitating getting into Gaza - so no wonder Gaza's reconstruction is going slowly and ordinary families are suffering. Ideally, this should be a wake-up call to McNeill.
In the meantime, McNeill's reporting raises serious questions of whether she meets the statutory requirements as the ABC's Middle East correspondent of her professional obligations.
Despite at least one BBC News producer being aware of the incident, the corporation chose not to report a narrowly averted terror attack against travellers on the Jerusalem light rail system last month.Why BBC News website audiences might be confused
“Police in downtown Jerusalem on Sunday morning arrested a Palestinian man who was found to be carrying explosives and knives in his backpack.
The suspect, identified as a West Bank resident, was detained near the light rail stop on Jaffa Road after he raised the suspicions of a security guard.
Police said the man was standing “behind the stop, with a bag in his hand.” When the guard asked to examine the contents of the bag, he noticed a bomb and called police.”
Over the past ten months the BBC has promoted a standard ‘explanation’ for Palestinian terrorism which funnels audience attentions towards the subject of ‘the occupation’. As has been noted here throughout that time, that selective framing removes from view issues such as official Palestinian Authority incitement and glorification of terrorism and downplays or erases the often relevant factor of religious ideology.
That report, however, was titled “Iranian nuclear scientist Shahram Amiri executed for treason“.British actor removed from 'Big Brother' over anti-Semitism
“An Iranian scientist who provided the US with information about the country’s nuclear programme has been hanged for treason, the government has confirmed.
Shahram Amiri was executed for giving “vital information to the enemy”, a judiciary spokesman said. […]
On Sunday a spokesman for Iranian judiciary, Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei, told reporters: “Through his connection with the United States, Amiri gave vital information about the country to the enemy,”
BBC News website audiences might well now be pondering the question of why Iran found it necessary to hand down a death sentence to a scientist who allegedly gave “vital information” about a programme they have for years been informed was “peaceful” and aimed solely at “pursuing civilian nuclear energy”.
A British actor who was removed from that country's "Celebrity Big Brother" reality program has apologized for a Holocaust joke directed at a Jewish contestant, JTA reported Monday.Pentagon Seeks to Incorporate Israeli Iron Dome Interceptor to Defend U.S. Bases Overseas
The actor, Christopher Biggins, also said he would visit Auschwitz during a visit to Poland.
Biggins was removed from the popular reality television show on Friday after three warnings about tasteless remarks about bisexuals and the Holocaust, according to British news reports.
Among his remarks on the program, Biggins reportedly said to fellow housemate Katie Waissel, who is Jewish, while she was waiting to use the bathroom in the Big Brother house, "You better be careful or they'll be putting you in a shower and taking you to a room."
He later admitted in interviews that he was referring to the Nazi gas chambers.
Biggins said he apologized to Waissel and "Big Brother" for the”trite, ridiculous remark" and said he would visit Auschwitz during a trip to Poland in October.
Israel’s state-owned Rafael Advanced Defense Systems and Raytheon, its US partner for Iron Dome production, are working to transform the combat-proven Israeli interceptor into a fully American system in defense of forward-deployed US forces.NRGene eyes human genomes with ‘game changing’ tech
Americanized versions of the Iron Dome’s Tamir interceptors are being offered under the Raytheon-trademarked SkyHunter brand for a US Army program aimed at defending against a spectrum of threats, from cruise missiles and UAVs to rockets, artillery and mortars.
The Israeli-designed Tamir interceptor has already been adapted for launch from the US Army’s developmental Multi-Missile Launcher (MML), part of the service’s Indirect Fire Protection Capability Increment 2 — Intercept (IFPC Inc 2-I) program.
In an April IFPC program test at the Army’s White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico, the MML-launched Tamir scored its first intercept on US soil against a target drone.
Israeli government and industry sources say half of US production funds funneled into Israel’s Iron Dome program in recent years is already going to Raytheon, which produces major components for the Rafael-designed Tamir interceptor in multiple facilities throughout the US.
After becoming the only company in the world to map the genome for bread, pasta and wild emmer wheat — which a global consortium of scientists had worked on without success for 10 years – the Ness Ziona, Israel-based NRGene is confident it will have hundreds more plant and animal genomes sequenced by the end of the year and is looking to expand its focus from agriculture to humans.When Queen comes to town, show goes on with local singers
“A huge public effort is underway to sequence the genomes of individual humans,” said Dr. Gil Ronen, the CEO of NRGene, in an interview from the company’s offices. “But there is no tool available to make sense of all of this available data out there. This is our next big opportunity.”
The company has held very initial talks with diagnostic and health firms to license its genome sequencing software and algorithms for the analysis of human DNA, in an effort to help diagnose genetic disorders at an early stage and strive to personalize medications, Ronen said.
But to understand what this is all about, it is necessary to take a step back. To the genetics of seeds.
It all started with seeds.
With about a month before the members of legendary rock band Queen — with Adam Lambert standing in for the late, great Freddie Mercury — arrive for their first Israel concert on September 12, local promoters announced that Israeli singers Arkadi Duchin and Leena Makhoul will open the show at Tel Aviv’s Yarkon Park.What the U.S. Is Learning From How Israel Treats Transgender Soldiers
Duchin, a Russian-born Israeli pop and rock singer, said it is a huge honor to open for Queen.
“I first heard Queen in 1977 when I was a 13-year-old boy in Russia,” said Duchin, who first sang with fellow musician Micha Shitrit in the popular 1990s rock band, The Friends of Natasha. “This is a closing of a circle for me that wraps my heart, body and soul.”
Makhoul, an Arab Christian born in the US and raised in Acre, said she also grew up listening to Queen, and was bowled over by the thought of opening for them. The young singer won the second season of the Israeli version of reality music show “The Voice.”
On June 30, the U.S. military announced it would accept transgender soldiers and it has been looking at the experience of other armies for guidanceIsraeli aid worker wins Muhammad Ali Humanitarian Award
Amy always knew she was a girl in a boy’s body, as she always knew she would serve in the army. She grew up in a religious family in Israel and attended a school that prepared students to enter the air force. But after coming out to her family, whose reactions ranged from fear to denial and rejection, she wasn’t sure if and how the military would accept her.
Amy, who preferred not to use her real name for this story, decided not to go into the air force, which she felt might be too “macho” and less welcoming to a transgender woman. Instead she enlisted in Caracal, a co-ed combat unit, which is tasked with patrolling Israel’s border with Egypt. To Amy’s surprise, the army was more than just accepting.
“They were empowering,” she says of her fellow soldiers and commanders. “The girls and guys in my platoon were so sweet and supportive, and all the staff tried to make it as smooth as possible. I didn’t even notice.”
From the start, they treated her as female, addressing her in female pronouns, giving her a female uniform, and allowing her to keep her long wavy hair (male soldiers must keep their hair short). Amy was permitted to sleep in the women’s sleeping quarters, and received permission to shower separately. The army also pays for her hormone treatments, just as they cover the medical needs of any soldier.
The head of Israeli international aid group IsraAID has won the Muhammad Ali Humanitarian Award for 2016, for his work to provide relief in areas of crisis throughout the world.Stand With Us: Israeli Kindergarten
Twenty-nine-year-old Navonel Glick will be presented the annual award in September, the Jewish Chronicle reported, along with five other under-thirty humanitarians who the Muhammad Ali Center deems to be role models “transforming communities and bringing about positive change in the world.”
IsraAID, founded in 2001, is known for its response to high profile disasters around the globe. The genesis of its work goes back to the Rwandan genocide, and it was the first international team on the ground in Haiti.
In addition to serving in Japan, the Philippines, and South Sudan, IsraAID was in the United States during Hurricane Katrina, Hurricane Sandy, the Colorado floods and the Arkansas tornado. In recent years it has assisted Syrian refugees landing on Europe’s beaches after perilous voyages at sea.
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.
