Thursday, January 26, 2017
Never again
This Friday, Jan. 27, is International Holocaust Remembrance Day, marking the day the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp was liberated. David Harris: Remembering the Holocaust, Once Again
It is also worth noting that last week marked 75 years since the infamous Wannsee Conference in Germany, where the Nazis came together to form the Final Solution.
Incredulously, a week earlier, a German court ruled that the firebombing of a synagogue just outside Dusseldorf was not an act of anti-Semitism but a legitimate form of political protest against Israel. This same synagogue had previously been damaged during Kristallnacht.
This is the unfortunate and very dangerous reality facing Jewish communities across Europe today, many of which are forced to live their lives in the shadows, under fear of anti-Semitism.
This week, Israel's Diaspora Affairs Ministry published a new report detailing the alarming increase in global anti-Semitism, most notably in Germany, where the number of anti-Semitic incidents doubled in the past year, and the United Kingdom, which saw a 62% rise.
The fact is, we know the situation is bad. The Jewish communities of Europe know it is bad. We need another report to tell us that about as much as we need another report to say that smoking is bad for your health.
The UN designated January 27 as International Holocaust Remembrance Day. This was the day, in 1945, when the Soviet army liberated Auschwitz, the infamous Nazi German death camp that has come to symbolize the demonic depths to which the Third Reich descended in the “industrialization” of genocide.International Holocaust Remembrance Day: New Film Documents ‘Butterfly Project’ to Honor Each of 1.5 Million Children Killed by Hitler
In the Jewish tradition, we are commanded to remember (zachor) and not to forget (lo tishkach).
Let us remember...
...the six million Jews, including 1.5 million children, who were exterminated in the Holocaust (in Hebrew, Shoah).
...the entirely new alphabet created by the Nazis for the Final Solution — from the letter “A” for Auschwitz to the letter “Z” for Zyklon-B.
...not only the tragic deaths of the six million Jews, but also their vibrant lives—as shopkeepers and craftsmen, scientists and authors, teachers and students, parents and children, husbands and wives.
A documentary about a unique memorial for the children who perished at the hands of the Nazis premiered at the Manhattan Jewish Community Center this week, ahead of International Holocaust Remembrance Day on Friday.
“Not The Last Butterfly” – co-produced and -directed by Joe Fab of “Paperclips” fame — follows the path of a special project using ceramic butterflies to honor and remember each of the 1.5 million children who were murdered during World War II.
The film documents the journey that The Butterfly Project has taken since it was created in 2006 by clay mosaic artist Cheryl Rattner Price and Jan Landau, a former teacher at the San Diego Jewish Academy, who was looking for a new way to teach the kids in her class about the Holocaust.
The decision to use butterflies for the project was inspired by Frederika “Friedl” Dicker-Brandeis, an Austrian artist who, before being sent to the gas chambers at Auschwitz-Birkenau – was deported in 1942 to what the Nazis called the “model ghetto” of Terezin, where she used drawing and painting as a therapeutic tool to help the frightened and victimized children around her to express their emotions. She also taught them to see the butterfly as a symbol of hope – the way it is in many cultures: confined to an oppressive cocoon before it can spread its colorful wings and fly freely away.
New Research Reveals Extent of FDR Administration Knowledge of Nazi Euthanasia Gassings
The State Department ignored Beam’s pleas to publicly condemn the mass murder. This stance was consistent with President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s pre-war strategy of generally refraining from explicitly criticizing Hitler’s policies.Researchers uncover vast numbers of unknown Nazi killing fields
Roosevelt went to considerable lengths to avoid offending the Nazis during the early years. For example, he asked his ambassador in Berlin, William Dodd, to pressure Dodd’s Jewish acquaintances in Chicago to cancel plans, in 1934, for a public mock trial of Hitler. In 1938, FDR made Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes remove references to Hitler and Nazism from a speech Ickes planned to give about the suffering of Jews in Europe.
Perhaps the most egregious example of the administration’s approach occurred after furious German and Vichy French officials complained to Washington in late 1940 that US journalist Varian Fry was smuggling Jewish refugees out of France.
Secretary of State Cordell Hull warned Fry to stop “evading the laws of countries with which the United States maintains friendly relations.” When Fry ignored the warning, the administration refused to renew Fry’s passport, forcing him to leave France and end his rescue mission.
One could say that the sabotage of Fry’s rescue work, like the US silence regarding the euthanasia program, in some ways foreshadowed the Roosevelt administration’s response to the Holocaust itself.
In 2000, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC, tasked researchers with creating a comprehensive, single-source record that would accurately document the thousands of persecution sites the Nazis had established. The USHMM estimated that the team would uncover about 5,000 persecution sites, which would include forced labor camps, military brothels, ghettos, POW camps, and concentration camps.IsraellyCool: Holocaust Memorial Day Trust’s Offensive Video
But as the research got underway that number skyrocketed.
In 2001, the number had doubled. A few years after that, researchers had already discovered 20,000 sites. Now, the “Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos, 1933-1945” contains more than 42,500 sites that the Nazis used to persecute, exploit, and murder their victims.
“But quite frankly, you could put it much higher than that,” said Geoffrey Megargee, the project leader, who has coordinated the publication of the first two books of the seven-book series. The final encyclopedia book will be published in 2025.
“You could not turn a corner in Germany [during the war]… without finding someone there against their will,” said Megargee, speaking ahead of Friday’s International Holocaust Remembrance Day.
The Holocaust Memorial Day Trust (HMDT) has released this video for Holocaust Memorial Day 2017.David Collier: The Dhimmi Jews of SOAS
While I sympathize with all victims of discrimination and hate crimes, this video is offensive to me as a Jew.
There is clearly an agenda at play here to compare hate crimes against Muslims with the Holocaust, a state-sponsored genocide. And it is not at all subtle.
The video opens with a Muslim lady being harassed. She then appears two more times, in various stages of upset. In fact, she appears in approximately 30 seconds of the video.
In comparison, the Jewish hate crime of present day depicted in the video is a cemetery desecration, which features in approximately 20 seconds of the video.
Motion seven was a predictable tirade against the way Jews control everything, but I watched in fascination as motion eight was discussed. Clearly put forward by a Jewish student, it went to the heart of what SOAS would need to do to make Jews feel welcome. Then the amendments started. The definition of antisemitism was changed, so as to exclude all reference to Israel. Comments critical about the current SOAS attitude were removed. Then of course, Jewish students were denied the right to self-determination.Appalling treatment of Jewish students at SOAS Students Union
I think of the SOAS students present, the vast majority of students have parents or grandparents who arrived to the UK from nations such as Pakistan, Bangladesh, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Saudi Arabia. What they were willing to permit the Jews to do, was pray. Anything directly to do with practicing religious sensibilities was left almost unopposed. Anything to do with equality, self or national identity was removed. The Jews of SOAS are offered the status of ‘Dhimmi Jews’, a protected but second class citizenship. Jews are subordinate, they are tolerated.
Whether we choose to accept it or not, this is what is happening on campus. Jews are not equal here, nor are they treated as equal. This Dhimmi attitude from Muslim lands has been imported into the UK and applied on the SOAS campus. All elements of Jewish equality, such as their right to define themselves, is banned. Jews are told what is acceptable. They have a ruling class. The antisemitic ‘smob’.
As a Jew, all you have to do is pay them the Dhimmi tax and they will leave you alone, and the going rate is a total rejection of Zionism.
On Tuesday night, Jewish students at SOAS were treated differently from other minorities. They were told that unlike every other minority group, they are not allowed to define what constitutes their own antisemitism. They were also told that Zionists were not welcome on their campus.The Left Lost Its Logic On Israel
A motion called ‘Jewish Equality Act’ was debated at SOAS Students’ Union’s Union General Meeting on Tuesday. The motion aimed to create processes to make campus life more accessible for Jewish students. This included ensuring that there were prayer spaces for all students of faith, provision of kosher food, and not scheduling events on Jewish holidays or the Sabbath.
As part of the debate of the motion, the following line was removed after debate:
“Jewish students should be given the right to self-determination and be able to define what constitutes hatred against their group like all other minority groups”
This was, once again, a room full of students who do not identify as Jewish, explaining to Jewish students how to define their own oppression. This is in contrast to the way that other forms of oppression are defined, as per the Macpherson principle, allowing the victim to define their own oppression.
Support for Israel among Democrats has plummeted in recent years, a new Pew poll shows, with about as many – 31 percent – saying they sympathize more with the Palestinians than with Israel, which garnered 33 percent support.A Gap in Intersectionality at the Women’s March
By contrast, 74 percent of Republicans surveyed sympathize more with the Jewish state. That is the widest partisan gap since 1978.
A similar poll last year found a deep divide within the party, with conservative and moderate Democrats favoring Israel over the Palestinians by 53-19 percent.
This trend has accelerated during President Barack Obama's tenure. During Israel's 2014 war with Hamas, 61 percent of Democrats sympathized with Hamas and hundreds of left-wing historians openly sided with the terrorist group.
Bernie Sanders, whose liberal support nearly won him the 2016 Democratic primary, sought to empower anti-Israel figures like Cornel West – a supporter of the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement – and James Zogby of the Arab American Institute.
Linda Sarsour, one of the primary organizers of the Women’s March, identifies as a Palestinian-American activist. Although she adamantly claims to stand in alliance with all oppressed people, she is a participant in the erasure of Jewish history and a contributor to the colonization of the Jewish identity. She does this by promoting a one-state solution in which the ancient, historic connection of the Jews to the land of Israel would be obliterated. She additionally refers to the three-thousand year Hebrew presence in the land of Israel as an “occupation” by “Jewish colonizers.” Sarsour is also a strong proponent of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement, a Hamas-funded effort intended to ostracize Jewish and Israeli businesses, artists, musicians, and scholars, simply for being Jewish and Israeli. This is nothing but a socially-acceptable form of virulent anti-Semitism, a toxic hatred for an entire people.Beware of Linda Sarsour
As I tried to put this knowledge aside in order to stand in unification with my fellow females, I found myself surrounded by posters and banners sprinkled with images of Sarsour’s face; an unavoidable reminder that I, as a Zionist-Jewish woman, would only be welcome in this space to the extent that I hide who I really am. And who I am is someone who works to advocate, amongst a deluge of lies and slander from the media, from my peers, from my professors, for the truth about the sole multicultural democracy in the Middle East, a David in a sea of Goliath’s. I recognize my people’s ancient ties to the tiny land of Israel, and I draw pride from the fact that the Jewish people have re-established a home which is now a thriving, liberal democracy. I stood amongst a hundred thousand women and men campaigning against oppression from their own individual vantage points, and yet, I found myself too fearful to pull out my Israeli flag, my own symbol of liberation from oppression. And I found myself with a gut feeling that, if the part of myself that sings “Am Yisrael Chai”, the part of myself ingrained with the Shema prayer, were to come to the surface to march alongside the part of myself that is fiercely feminine, this March of inclusivity would render me wholly excluded.
At the intersection of my identity as a woman and my identity as a Zionist Jew, there is no conflict. There is no conflict because these facets of myself support one another and embrace one another. Who I am as a woman and who I am as a Jew cannot and should not be divided.
However, the reason she is on the end of legitimate criticism is not because she is Muslim. It’s because she is an apologist for oppressive Islamist fundamentalism and an identity politics poser, which many media sites failed to mention. There is an immense, and rather sick irony for someone who minimizes the oppression of her ‘fellow Muslim sisters’ to lead a Women’s March to defend the gains of feminism against Donald Trump.IsraellyCool: Linda Sarsour’s Takeaway From 9/11…And Other Disturbing Facts
You don’t believe me? Well, let us look at some of her previous tweets.
Her basic message is “Don’t worry! Women being barred from driving isn’t a big deal because they get 10 weeks of paid maternity leave, while women in America don’t have the benefit of paid maternity leave”.
The hardships of women in Saudi Arabia goes far beyond them not being allowed to drive. It’s to do with a state, a legal system and even a culture that doesn’t treat them as human beings of equal worth. That views motherhood and domestic surbordination as the only thing that is worthy of a woman. So yeah, it’s not a coincedence that Saudi women are compensated with a sort of generous maternity leave.
In this tweet she attempts to downplay the issue of forced veiling in Saudi Arabia. Of course, veiling is not THE issue for Saudi women, but it certainly is AN issue. The issue is the fundamental right of women to choose what they wish to wear, not for the nanny state acting in the name of Allah ordering women what to wear. As a “feminist” how does she fail to see this very simple principle?
Note how she begins with “I know many of you may be tired of hearing about 9/11,” which seems to be an acknowledgment that many of her audience not only are not moved by what happened on that fateful day, but are sick of hearing about it. She then continues to speak about 9/11 from her point of view as a Muslim, with not even a word of sympathy for the real victims of the terror attacks that day, nor any reflections from her as an American citizen. For her, that day seems only about the anxiety and apprehension of Muslims (including herself), and how it spurred her to fight for their rights. Yet even when speaking as a Muslim, there is no acknowledgement of the role of radical Islam.The Washington Post’s Biased Sources: Settlement Watch, J Street, the PLO and the PA
It speaks volumes that to a Muslim audience, she feels no need to talk about the real victims of 9/11, nor Islamic terrorism. It is as if neither exists.
FYI, a friend of mine who spends alot of time with 9/11 victims very much doubts Sarsour’s story that when she came home on 9/11, her mom was too scared to wear a hijab – nobody knew what was going on that day and it hadn’t been pinned on Muslims.
When the media use advocacy groups with political agendas as sources, they have an obligation to present the views of the other side. At the very least, they should make clear when their sources have political goals. Yet the Washington Post neglected to do so.Scottish soccer fans urge Rod Stewart to cancel Tel Aviv gig
In the article, “Israel Plans West Bank Settlement Expansion Amidst Policy Shifts in Washington,” it uses Settlement Watch and J Street as sources. Both groups have clear anti-settlement agendas and have been vocal in their opposition to the policies of the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Settlement Watch is an Israeli anti-settlement political organization. J Street is a far-left American political organization that supports the Iran nuclear agreement and continued US aid to the Palestinian Authority, and opposes anti-terror Israeli military actions. Neither group could be said to represent public opinion in its host country. In addition, J Street is constantly opposing polices advocated by the vast majority of American Jewish organizations that support Israel.
Yet these groups were not asked questions about their opposition to Israeli settlements. They were used to provide information and analysis about the Israeli move.
Fans of a UK soccer team have urged legendary rock musician and singer Rod Stewart to cancel his anticipated concert in Israel scheduled for June of this year.Jewish Students at U of Florida 'Shocked' by Cyclist Wearing Swastika Armband Riding Around Campus
"Dear Rod! We are shocked at your recent decision to breach the international cultural boycott of Israel and appeal to you to reconsider your decision," begins a petition posted by admirers of Scottish soccer club Celtic F.C. to the website change.org.
"As a life-long Celtic fan you must be well aware of the special affinity our fans have with the Palestinian people and their struggle for freedom. Israel openly uses culture as a form of propaganda to justify its illegal occupation of Palestine," adds the stated appeal.
Stewart announced his intention to play in Israel in a recorded statement filmed late last year, saying “I’m looking forward to performing in Tel Aviv," adding "I’ll be playing your favorite hits, with a few surprises too."
The 72-year-old musician last performed in Israel in 2010 at the Ramat Gan stadium.
Jewish students at the University of Florida (UF) were stunned Tuesday at the sight of a man with a swastika armband riding a bicycle around campus, the independent student newspaper The Alligator reported.Campus Watchdogs: Student Protesters Taking Advantage of Anti-Trump Rage to Attack Israel
“When I first saw it I was shocked,” said Avichaim Snyder, adding that he witnessed University Police stop the cyclist, question him and then “[share] a laugh,” before allowing him to ride away.
“I got very aggravated about what was happening. I would have preferred the cop to tell him to take off the swastika,” Snyder said. “The fact that he let him go on his merry way without saying anything was just wrong.”
Students promoting Jewish Heritage Month at an outdoor table said they saw the man ride by as they were packing up to leave. The vice president of the school’s Jewish Student Union, who said she was scared by the incident, added that she was “very thankful” that her peers were already moving away from the area.
Campus watchdogs accused student activists on Wednesday of taking advantage of the rage being expressed against the newly instated Trump administration in Washington to further an anti-Israel agenda.Islamic & African Nations Boycott Meeting With First U.N. Expert on Anti-Gay Violence
According to Aviva Slomich, international campus director for the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA), this is just the latest example of students across the US “hijacking political causes to demonize Israel.”
“This is dangerous,” Slomich told The Algemeiner, “because the protesters are receiving slanted information and most are not even aware that their particular cause has been co-opted by these extremist voices. Zionist students, who are well versed in anti-Israel propaganda, do understand what is happening, and at a minimum are made to feel uncomfortable or, even worse, are excluded from participating.”
Tammi Rossman-Benjamin, co-founder of the AMCHA Initiative, concurred. “Moves to align the issue of ‘Palestine’ with anti-Trump activism is part of a greater national platform push by anti-Israel groups,” she said. “There is no question that this is not just an ad-hoc attempt. Anti-Israel groups have made it a high priority to opportunistically use the growing anger and fear many are feeling against the administration to carry out their goal — the elimination of the Jewish state. They aren’t interested in the cause against President Donald Trump, per se, but rather to gain strength and support for their hateful and genocidal agenda.”
Islamic and African nations, where violence and discrimination against the LGBTI community are most prevalent, boycotted a session held yesterday and today with the first U.N. expert on anti-gay violence and discrimination.Fordham University Rejects SJP
Prof. Vitit Muntarbhorn, the UN’s new Independent Expert (IE) on violence and discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI), held his first public consultations with UN member states and NGOs yesterday and today.
No country from the 57-member Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) or the 54-member African Group took the floor, and barely a handful were even in the room.
The new mandate was adopted by the UNHRC in June 2016, and confirmed by the UN General Assembly in December 2016 amidst a heated vote in which the OIC and African Group made a failed bid to block passage of the new mandate.
During the June 2016 vote, the OIC, represented by Pakistan, submitted a total of 11 amendments to gut the resolution. Only 4 of these proposed amendments were adopted. But, while some of the most objectionable amendments – such as one which would have removed 6 out of the resolution’s 8 paragraphs and another seeking to erase completely the term sexual orientation and replace it with the term sexual disorientation – were rejected, those ultimately adopted significantly weakened the resolution.
Dean Eldredge’s email correctly points to several highly problematic facets of SJP’s mission and strategy including its policy of rejecting the “normalization” of relations with any pro-Israel individuals or groups, which stands in blatant opposition to the spirit of open discussion which liberal arts universities aim to foster. This policy has led SJP to reject overtures of cooperation from pro-Israel groups, even when the two organizations are agreed upon a common issue.More partial reporting on Israeli building permits from BBC News
At San Diego State University, for instance, the pro-Israel campus group Students Supporting Israel (SSI) attempted to co-sign a petition to make the campus more inclusive for Muslims after a Muslim student was assaulted on campus. SDSU-SJP refused to allow SSI to co-sign the petition claiming that it “didn’t serve the interests of the community.” According to members of SSI, “Out of the over 30 organizations that had signed the document, SSI was the only organization to be excluded from the statement.”
While he made the correct call to prevent SJP from forming a chapter on campus, Dean Eldredge’s email actually fails to present the most damning reason to exclude the organization from campus: SJP’s role as a front group for the anti-Israel terror group Hamas.
While SJP disguises itself as a typical campus cultural group—a strategy that has succeeded in gaining it acceptance and resources at prominent campuses across the nation— it is in truth a pro-terror organization that receives funding and support from Hamas terrorists for the purpose of destroying Israel, the world’s only Jewish state, and committing genocide against its Jewish population as prescribed in the Hamas charter.
In short, 44.5% of this article’s 593 words were allocated to unquestioned amplification of comment from interested parties.Anti-Semitism seen on the rise in Poland
A further 173 words related to the new US administration and of course no article concerning Israeli building permits would be complete without the obliteration of pre-1967 history and the BBC’s standard partial mantra on ‘international law’.
“About 500,000 Jews live in about 140 settlements built since Israel’s 1967 occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
The settlements are considered illegal under international law, although Israel disputes this.”
In contrast, the article devoted just 81 words to telling readers what the story is actually about and only in the thirteenth paragraph did they discover that most of the approved plans are located in “existing West Bank settlement blocs”.
Poland has seen a rise in anti-Semitism over the last two years, partly fueled by Europe’s migrant crisis, according to a study released on Tuesday.Citing success, creator takes down YOLOCAUST webpage
The University of Warsaw’s Center for Research on Prejudice found acceptance for anti-Semitic hate speech — especially among young Poles on the internet — rose from 2014 to 2016 compared to previous years.
Their study was based on a sample of 1,000 adults and 700 youths. The number of surveyed Poles who declared positive attitudes towards Jews dropped from 28 percent in 2015 to 23% in 2016.
Researchers attribute the increase to a spike in Islamophobia and anti-migrant sentiment triggered by Europe’s worst migrant crisis since World War II. Many of the migrants were from conflict-ridden countries like Syria and Libya.
Politicians in eastern EU states, notably Poland’s populist leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski, were quick to raise the specter of Islamic State militants carrying out terror attacks once inside the bloc.
The Israeli-German creator of an online project shaming Holocaust selfies has taken it down just one week after launching it.Israel, Croatia Agree to Cooperate on Disaster Prevention, Emergency Response
In an effort to challenge the younger generation’s commemorative culture, artist and satirist Shahak Shapira created the wildly viral web-based project YOLOCAUST in which he mashed appropriated social media selfies snapped at the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe in Berlin with shocking images of archival footage from Nazi extermination camps.
Shapira issued a statement Thursday reporting that the webpage had been visited by 2.5 million people worldwide — including by all the individuals appearing in all its photo montages.
As part of the project, the artist had invited those pictured to contact him with a request to remove them by emailing him at undouche.me@yolocaust.de. After everyone depicted reached out to him, Shapira decided he had made his point and it was time to pull the plug on the website.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday welcomed Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenković to Jerusalem, where the two leaders signed a declaration of intent to cooperate in the fields of disaster prevention and emergency response.DarioHealth seeks sales bump for smart diabetes monitor
The agreement follows Croatia’s efforts to aid Israel when wildfires swept through the country in November.
“We cooperate in many fields and we spoke just now about the need to cooperate even further in the fields of economy, of technology, in every field of economic endeavor but also in the field that we’re already advancing, which is emergency disaster cooperation,” Netanyahu said. “The best example is firefighting – we are making progress in a joint international force that we’d like to make from countries in the Mediterranean region. We’re having an exercise, I think a joint exercise in May, that is a practical application of what we’re doing, and we’re going to sign a deceleration for cooperation in emergency situations.”
Israel agreed to form the regional emergency force for the eastern Mediterranean with Greece and Cyprus last month.
DarioHealth Corp., a Delaware-based firm that has developed a smart device to monitor glucose levels in the blood, is seeking to expand its sales in the US and Europe and in new markets, raising $5.1 million in a private placement of shares.Renault-Nissan to launch Israel R&D operations
The funding round was led by OurCrowd’s Qure Digital Health fund.
The company’s mobile monitor, developed in Israel, helps patients manage their diabetes on the go by providing them an all-in-one blood glucose meter. The plastic device, which looks a bit like a cigarette lighter, has a lancing device, a holder for 25 diabetes monitoring strips, and a fold-out, USB-like meter that connects to smartphones or tablets.
The users then just need to prick their fingers and press the blood over the strip that is inserted into the meter. The information is transmitted from the meter into the phone where the DarioHealth app reads the results which can be sent to doctors and healthcare systems. The app also issues real-time emergency alerts to family members via a text message, including the GPS location of the patient.
This year, Renault-Nissan Alliance will join the ranks of carmakers and automotive industry companies which have launched R&D operations in Israel, revealed Carasso Motors VP trading Avi Kenet in a panel discussion at the Cars 2017 conference in Tel Aviv.BravoTV: 8 Surprising Reasons Israel Just Became My Favorite Destination (And I’ve Been to 37 Countries)
Kenet said that, this month, an agreement was signed in France with Renault-Nissan Alliance to establish an independent Technology Innovation Center for the company in Israel. The center’s operations will include locating technologies and new companies pertinent to the automotive industry, and will provide entrepreneurs access to the company’s global activity, which is the third largest in the global automotive industry.
“The Better Place story is behind us, but the important thing is that the venture floated the electric car agenda, which is now considered the industry’s technology target and is closely linked to the development of the autonomous car,” said Kenet.
Many people, even seasoned travelers, may think of Israel as simply a conflict zone, too unstable for a visit. With that image firmly in mind, some folks may not even pause to consider what the vibe is like outside of that pervasive fear factor.Gal Gadot teams with Jason Statham for Wix Super Bowl ad
Well, I'd love to be the one to open your mind for a new year of travel possibilities: After spending time in Israel, it quickly became my new favorite destination in the world. It was hard to leave. The tiny country (about the size of New Jersey) offers more adventure than you would guess.
I'm a travel blogger living in India, and have been to more than three dozen countries, so the middle east destination had a bit of competition to make it to the top of my list. But boy did it soar! Here are eight reasons why Israel just became my new favorite travel destination and why you might want to head here in 2017.
Wix, a globally successful DIY web-development platform that is based in Tel Aviv, is taking on the Super Bowl again with an ad campaign featuring Gal Gadot and Jason Statham.
The new commercials are meant to show just how easy it is to create a web presence using the Wix platform.
The storyline follows Gadot, aka Wonder Woman, and Statham as they “take care” of some problematic customers at a restaurant and unintentionally blow up the eatery.
Felix, the chef, is “engulfed in his own world, building his restaurant’s website. Despite the unfortunate destruction of Chez Felix, he gets back on his feet with the help of Wix and revamped his stunning website, allowing him to never miss a beat,” reads the Wix blog.
