Monday, October 24, 2022
An Inconvenient Truth: The Jewish People Never Left the Land of Israel
I just finished reading former US Ambassador David Friedman’s recent article, in which he makes the point that Judaism and Zionism are inseparable. It is a fine article and I agree with him, but I wonder if it places too much emphasis on the return of the Jewish people to their homeland after a lengthy absence. I have the same concern with an upbeat review of Israel’s achievements in a recent article by David Weinberg, which refers to two millennia of Jewish dispersion.David Collier: Pete Gregson’s campaigns. Just where are the Scottish police?
To imply that the Jews left the Land of Israel for 2,000 years, after the fall of Masada, is not accurate. It feeds into the view that the modern state of Israel is a European colonial enterprise with no historical connection to the land. What’s more, the Jewish return did not originate with the modern Zionist movement in the early 1880s. Aliyah has been continuous throughout the ages.
The Jewish people never really left the Holy Land. Certainly, many were killed or expelled at the time of Masada and later, but many Jews continued to live in “Palestine” (the name given by the Romans after the Bar Kochba revolt, 132-135 CE) for a considerable time afterward. The evidence is clear from the extensive archeological sites visible today, such as those at Beit Alpha, Beit She’arim, Tzippori (Sepphoris), Baram, and many others. Jews formed a majority of the population of Palestine until at least the fifth century CE, and an autonomous Roman-recognized Jewish patriarchate in Palestine existed until 429 CE.
Archeological ruins point to the establishment of more than 80 synagogues, particularly in the Galilee, during the six centuries after the destruction of the Temple. After Masada, the Jewish population was substantial enough for three serious revolts against Roman or Byzantine rule to occur; the last one, against the Emperor Heraclius, was in the seventh century.
Evidence from the Cairo Genizah, and the writings of the Spanish-Jewish traveler Benjamin of Tudela, indicate that Jews continued to inhabit a number of towns, including Jerusalem, after the Byzantine defeat by the Arabs under Omar Ibn Al Khattab in 637, and even during Crusader rule. In fact, the 12th century witnessed an upsurge in Jewish immigration from Europe; 300 rabbis from England and France, including a number of prominent Tosafists, immigrated to the Holy land in 1211, while the noted Spanish rabbi and philosopher Nachmanides (the Ramban) made aliyah in 1267.
A Holocaust denying antisemite created a partnership with a Gazan scammer who has family links to proscribed Islamic terrorist groups. They are still taking £1000s from people in Scotland for increasingly dubious and unbelievable campaigns. Why is it left to an independent Jewish journalist to investigate them? Just where are the Scottish police?
The unfortunate Mohammed Almadhoun
Mohammed Almadhoun is either scamming the people of Scotland or he is the unluckiest man alive.
About 18 months ago his house was bombed, and he ran a campaign to raise funds to rebuild it. The image he used for his ‘bombed-out’ house was a bombed out Hamas bank and had been swiped from the internet:
Mohammed Almadhoun houseTwo years before this he claimed that a school he teaches in was also bombed out – and once again he tried to raise funds to have it fixed. This time Almadhoun used an image of a school in Syria bombed during the Syrian civil war:
Mohammed also claimed he needed back surgery at the time – and once again ran a fundraising campaign to raise money to help him:
None of this was real – but nor did Mohammed succeed in raising much cash. What he lacked was a ‘sponsor’ in the UK so blinded by antisemitic hate – that he would promote every story that Mohammed gave him. Enter Pete Gregson – an antisemite who has bought into almost every conspiracy about Jews that can be found.
So earlier this year Gregson tells everyone that Mohammed would go to jail unless he could pay his debts – raising funds to help him. This despite the fact Almadhoun is a relatively wealthy man from a very powerful clan. Gregson was campaigning for a bogus story – and I told him so. Since then, things have only got worse.
London Centre Study of Contemporary Antisemitism: Alvin Rosenfeld: ‘The Jews are Guilty’: Contemporary Echoes of Old Religious Tropes
Alvin H Rosenfeld, the Director of the Indiana University Bloomington Institute for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism talks about how centuries old tropes of religious antisemitism are being recycled and expressed in today’s America.
Recognizing that western Jerusalem is Israel’s capital should not be controversial
As a Jerusalem Post editorial recently stated, “How ironic it is that the Russians, whose relationship with Israel is now being strained by the war in Ukraine, have not reversed their Jerusalem move, while Australia, considered among Israel’s best friends in the world, has done just that. … They have said that western Jerusalem, the country’s capital since 1948, is up for negotiations. … It reinforces the rejectionist tendency amid the Palestinians.”Labor leader faces backlash over 'Judea and Samaria will not be part of Israel' remark
Critics have claimed that to acknowledge any part of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital prejudges the final settlement of a sensitive issue. But if the western half of Jerusalem is considered up for negotiation, it means that not only are the Palestinians laying claim to the entire city, but the international community acknowledges Palestinian claims on Israel within the 1949 armistice lines.
The excuse that the U.N. partition plan of 1947 envisioned Jerusalem as an international city should have disappeared when the Arabs attacked Israel within five hours of its creation. Every part of Jerusalem the Arabs controlled was emptied of Jews. Almost all of eastern Jerusalem’s synagogues were destroyed and Jewish property was desecrated. Jewish tombstones from the Mount of Olives were used for building materials. Jews were not allowed to enter the Old City of Jerusalem, which contains their holiest sites, despite international guarantees that they would be able to do so. Under Israeli rule, Jews, Christians and Muslims can all visit and pray at their holy sites.
In short, Wong’s claim that recognizing western Jerusalem as Israel’s capital would undermine a final settlement to the conflict is disingenuous. Her government’s decision rewards a weak and corrupt Palestinian Authority, which is supporting an ongoing insurrection in Judea and Samaria and glorifies terrorists as martyrs.
Ms. Wong called for a two-state solution, not a two states for two peoples solution. The Palestinian goal is a one-state solution. For them, that means a de-Judaized state in Judea, Samaria and Gaza, and a binational state within the 1949 armistice lines with an unlimited right of return for descendants of Palestinian refugees.
The Australian move to end recognition of western Jerusalem as the Israeli capital rewards Palestinian maximalism while undermining the possibility of a resolution to the conflict in which both sides would have to make significant concessions.
Transportation Minister Merav Michaeli said Saturday that it would be a "shame" to invest in transportation in Judea and Samaria, also known as the West Bank, as she believes the area will not be part of Israel in the future.Danny Ayalon: Australia is out of touch regarding the Jewish connection to Jerusalem - opinion
During an audience exchange at Channel 12, Michaeli, who also heads the Labor Party, was asked why she "froze all the transportation planning" in Judea and Samaria, to which she responded, "I didn't stop anything that was already in progress."
"I didn't release new things, that's true. Because I think it's a shame to invest in a place that in the end... it won't be part of the sovereign state of Israel."
The audience member replied, "But right now, there are residents there. Israeli residents, like you and me, who want to receive service like every other Israeli citizen receives – and there is no reason to deprive them."
Michaeli clarified, "There was no deprivation. In terms of the basket of resources, the south and the north were much more deprived."
Shlomo Neeman, head of the Yesha Council in Judea and Samaria, accused Michaeli of halting work on vital areas in the region that serves both Israelis and Palestinians, and that he hoped a right-wing government would take power after the elections.
"On Nov. 1st, a government will be elected that believes in our right to this land and nothing less than the fact that, unlike you [Michaeli], it will take care of the citizens of Israel in every corner of the country," he said.
Michaeli doubled down on her comments on Twitter later on Sunday, saying, "The budget of government ministries is a limited resource. When one project is promoted it is always at the expense of another.
This was not to be, as the Palestinians consistently refused to acknowledge Israel’s right to exist and have continued daily terror attacks on Israel. It is specifically because of the Palestinian intransigence that the United States realized the Palestinians could not be given veto power on Israel’s security, stability and future.
After the recognition by the US of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, other countries, including Australia, followed suit. This was an important decision, showing an understanding of the history and the political reality of the Middle East. It also manifested the warm relations between Australia and Israel as two Western democracies, bound by common values and interests.
Australia, as Israel and other democracies, faces threats from aggressive non-democratic powers. Just as the two countries were gearing up for close cooperation in the high tech areas of sustainability in food security, water availability and defense technologies, including cyber and missile defense, Israel received a slap in the face with this unfriendly act.
The purpose of this act is incomprehensible, as it does not relate to any of Australia’s interests. Still, it definitely hurts Israel’s interests by encouraging and emboldening the Palestinians and other nefarious actors to step up their terror. Appeasement has never led to peace and only hardened an aggressor’s resolve.
It is not too late for the Australian government to correct its error. It should adhere to the universal conduct of respecting the right of a sovereign nation to decide its capital. To be sure, the fate of Jerusalem will not be determined by this irresponsible and weak decision. It may, however, adversely affect bilateral relations between Canberra and Jerusalem.
Australia just made the wrong move on Jerusalem. pic.twitter.com/74IFxrKZKI
— R?????? K??? ? (@COLRICHARDKEMP) October 23, 2022
— R?????? K??? ? (@COLRICHARDKEMP) October 23, 2022
New British PM has called Jerusalem Israel’s ‘historic capital,’ vowed to fight BDS
Rishi Sunak, who will be the new British new prime minister after becoming Conservative party leader on Monday, is considered a strong supporter of Israel and a friend of the UK’s Jewish community.
At a Conservative Friends of Israel event in August, Sunak declared Jerusalem was “indisputably the historic capital” of Israel and that there was a “very strong case” for moving the UK embassy from its current location in Tel Aviv.
“It’s something I’d like to do,” he said.
But Sunak, a former Treasury chief, also acknowledged “sensitivities” over the issue.
“If it was that easy, it would have been done by now,” he said.
The incoming premier made those remarks during his failed leadership bid against Liz Truss, whose resignation as prime minister last week after a tumultuous stint in office paved the way for Sunak’s elevation to leader, after his lone challenger for the post bowed out of the race.
Truss told Prime Minister Yair Lapid last month that she was reviewing the UK embassy’s potential relocation to Jerusalem, but did not end up acting on the matter during her record short term in office.
Also over the summer, Sunak hailed Israel as a “shining beacon of hope” in an interview with the Jewish Chronicle. And when writing for the UK Jewish News, a partner of The Times of Israel, he stated his opposition to the boycott movement.
“I will continue to support the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Bill, that will prevent public bodies engaging in boycotts that undermine community cohesion,” he wrote in July.
“The Jewish community is right to call out those who seek to damage the only Jewish state in the world,” he added.
Sunak voiced concern over a rise in antisemitic incidents in the first half of 2021.
Rishi #Sunak has been incredible friend of #Israel, calling the Jewish state "a shining beacon of hope".
— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) October 24, 2022
He has also reaffirmed Jerusalem is “indisputably the historic capital” of Israel, pledged to up funding to combat antisemitism & called apartheid lies "frankly offensive". pic.twitter.com/bqoTBV42W2
Today I signed the contract for the construction of our new home: Israel’s permanent new Embassy in Manama. pic.twitter.com/IojsNsG2aA
— Eitan Na'eh (@AmbassadorNaeh) October 24, 2022
JPost Editorial: Enough of the boycotts, they generally don't achieve their goals - editorial
Boycotts in general are flawed attempts to make nuanced issues into clearly defined lines in the sand. They generally don’t achieve their aims and attempts to impose thought control instead of letting people make up their own minds.US Anti-Israel Group’s Events Feature Jew-Hating Extremist’s Acolyte
In Israel, we know the cost of boycotts.
For decades, we were the victims of the Arab boycott, which greatly impacted on the country’s economic growth. In addition, global corporations, from Nestlé to McDonald’s to Pepsi, refused to sell their wares to Israel, in fear of antagonizing their massive trade in the Arab world.
And there’s no need to go that far back. The Ben & Jerry’s boycott of the West Bank and the resulting call by supporters of Israel’s presence in the territories to reciprocate by boycotting the ice cream makers has been playing out in headlines for the last year. But for some, the ice cream is just too good to boycott.
Will Zara be the next boycott victim? The popular fashion chain with stores in most Israeli malls is getting some bad publicity because of a ‘hug bayit’ (informational evening) held last week with Itamar Ben-Gvir, the head of the ultra-nationalist Otzma Yehudit faction, which is running with the Religious Zionist Party in next week’s Knesset election.
A close confidante of a Muslim Brotherhood cleric who defended Hitler and called for murdering Jews, was a featured speaker at recent back-to-back events in New York discussing Palestinian activism in the United States.Bari Weiss: Kanye West's Dark, Twisted Fantasy And Jewish reality
“Palestine is Al Quds [Jerusalem], and Jerusalem is Al Aqsa Mosque,” speaker Akram Kassab claimed at an Oct. 1 workshop, “Palestine: The Growth & Future of Our Cause.” He quoted his former boss, extremist cleric Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi: “What would Palestine mean if it has no Jerusalem or Aqsa Mosque? Palestine without Jerusalem is like a body without a head.”
Qaradawi has endorsed suicide bombings, and called for Israel’s elimination and the killing of Jews. He also described Muslims killed fighting American forces in Iraq as “martyrs.”
“Palestine remains the cause of the Ummah [global Muslim community]; Palestine remains the basis,” Kassab said. He argued that “this cause has to be based on a religious nature,” because “your enemy is speaking to you from a religious perspective, so if you don’t speak to him from a religious perspective, then you are the loser.”
“When the other side comes in and … sanctifies the Torah, the Sabbath and Moses,” he added, “and you are not sanctifying the Quran or Muhammad … and you are not sanctifying the Ka’ba [Islam’s most sacred site in Mecca] and don’t sanctify Friday [Jummah], this is a flaw.”
The workshop was sponsored by the American Muslims for Palestine (AMP), at the Andalusia Islamic Center in New York.
The Islamic Center is a department of the Muslim American Society (MAS)’s New York chapter, and also runs an Arabic weekend school for children. MAS also was listed as a workshop co-sponsor.
If you are an American Jew who has been paying attention you have long since learned to lower your expectations. We have learned to live with the strange reality that ours is a culture in which major pop stars revise their lyrics when they are accused of committing microaggressions, but cannot muster a single tweet condemning West’s tirade. There will be no hashtags for the Jews.Bob Gersh Echoes Ari Emanuel‘s Call for Industry Leaders to Condemn Kanye West’s Antisemitism
Some have argued that we cannot judge West—that he is mentally ill, and therefore isn’t in full control of what is coming out of his mouth. Let’s grant that argument. What you are left with is the reality that West has been made into a vessel for antisemites keen to amplify and memeify the most destructive lies about Jews.
There is a moment in the interview when he says: “I want Jewish children to look at their Jewish daddies and say, ‘why is Ye mad at us?’” To which one of the hosts gives a Michael Barbaro-style “hmmm,” as if the musician has just made a profound and compelling point. The tens of thousands of comments on YouTube saying “great interview” and calling West a “genius” confirm it. More to the point: Ice Cube and Nick Cannon are not mentally ill. They have expressed the very same ideas as West with little consequence.
Theirs is just one variant of the ancient poison that has been unleashed and now nestles comfortably in so many corners of American life. In Brooklyn, where it’s now dangerous to be visibly Jewish. At U.C. Berkeley, where there are now nine major student groups that have banned any speaker who supports “the apartheid state of Israel”—in other words the vast majority of Jews who do not, in fact, want the Jewish state destroyed. (Under their rules, the current dean of the law school would be barred.) In Los Angeles last week, several billboards were defaced with a sign declaring, “Zionist Jews Control America”—Ye’s dark, twisted fantasy blaring in bold letters.
Hollywood talent agents are famously competitive with one another. Whether big or boutique, agencies parry and joust in wooing talent and sealing deals.
But some issues transcend money and ego. Hate speech is one of them.
Bob Gersh, longtime leader of the agency founded by his father in the 1960s, has watched Kanye West’s abhorrent outbursts of antisemitism over the past two weeks with dismay. On Saturday, the Gersh Agency chief reached out to Variety to express support for Endeavor CEO Ari Emanuel’s call for businesses to condemn and cut ties with West. That list includes Apple, Spotify and Adidas. West has already had accounts restricted on Twitter and Instagram because of the nature of his comments about Jewish people.
“This is as low as it can get,” Gersh told Variety of West’s recent comments. “This is the most blatant form of hatred and antisemitism one could imagine. It doesn’t get any worse than this. People really need to hammer these companies in business with him to impress upon them how wrong it is to support somebody like this.”
Gersh credited his longtime rival with making a strong case for why industry leaders need to step up and be vocal about hate speech in his op-ed in The Financial Times, “Business silence on Kanye West’s anti-Semitism is not an option.”
“This is a moment in history where the stakes are high and being open about our values, and living them, is essential. Silence and inaction are not an option,” Emanuel wrote. “This is why it is necessary for all of us to speak out. Hatred and anti-Semitism should have no place in our society, no matter how much money is at stake.”
More from @Variety @jordanmoreau_ here: https://t.co/S9JsBrieJt
— StopAntisemitism (@StopAntisemites) October 24, 2022
Adidas has cut business relationships with:
— StopAntisemitism (@StopAntisemites) October 23, 2022
???? singer/songwriter Teyana Taylor for bullying Rihanna
???? soccer star Kurt Zouma for animal abuse
WHY is @Adidas green lighting Kanye West’s Jew hatred and not dropping his branding deal?
Palestinian Journalists Jump to Defend Hitler-Loving Colleagues
On Saturday, the Palestinian Media Forum, in a letter to Thomson Reuters CEO Steve Hasker, had already urged the media conglomerate to reinstate the $5,000 prize to Shatha Hammad, saying Reuters’ withdrawal “undermines confidence in the integrity of the award.”Examining Associated Press’ Toothless Response to Photojournalist Who Called Zionists ‘Filthy Pigs’
In their appeal, the 304 Palestinian journalists explicitly rejected “oppressive scrutiny” of their comments — and a cursory look into some of the signatories reveals why.
Nawa News Agency reporter Shireen Khalifa, for example, lavished praise on Adolf Hitler in multiple social media posts. “You increased the love of Hitler in my heart, I love him and feel that history did him a great injustice,” she wrote to one of her Facebook friends, adding: “I am a lover of Hitler.”
Notably, Khalifa in June was awarded the Media Freedom Award by Press House – Palestine, a Gaza-based organization that claims to receive donations from UNESCO, the European Union, as well as the Canadian, French, Swiss and Norwegian governments. Khalifa received the prize at the hands of Torunn Viste, Norway’s representative to the Palestinian Authority.
Other signatories included Mariam Barghouti, who HonestReporting previously exposed for asserting that “Israel has been beating Hitler at his own game since 1948,” and firebrand antisemite Mohammed El-Kurd. The letter was also signed by Hind Khoudary, a freelance journalist who stands accused of getting Hamas to arrest a Palestinian peace activist for holding a Zoom call with Israelis. Rami Aman was subsequently imprisoned and subjected to torture.
Palestinian journalists are, of course, entitled to their personal views, however ignorant and hateful they may be. Western media outlets, however, must adequately vet their local hires if they want to uphold their professional commitment to objectivity.
As Jake Wallis Simons, one of the judges for the Reuters Foundation Kurt Schork Memorial Award, put it: “All of this shows how journalists with controversial views can make their way into major media organisations, raising questions about commitment to vetting — and the objectivity of reporting on Israel and the Middle East.”
Despite ongoing intimidation from the Iranian regime and Palestinian terror groups, we will continue to hold the media to account by ensuring accurate and impartial reportage as it relates to the Jewish state.
On May 10. 2021, Hamas sparked a short — yet deadly — war with Israel when it fired a barrage of rockets at Jerusalem following weeks of unrest and under the pretense that the Palestinian terror group was somehow “defending” the Al Aqsa Mosque.Canada’s Banning Press TV Deprives the Iranian Regime of a Key Tentacle in its Propaganda Toolbox
The conflict, which saw Israel unleash defensive airstrikes on terrorist infrastructure in the Gaza Strip, lasted just 11 days before a ceasefire was brokered with the help of mediators from Egypt, the United States, and Qatar.
A total of 13 people were killed in Israel, with at least 248 Palestinians left dead in Gaza.
One week into the war and when most of the world’s attention was focused on the countless rocket attacks emanating from the Strip, a short exposé about an Egyptian photojournalist working for the Associated Press was published by right-wing American news outlet Breitbart.
For obvious reasons in light of the more significant news dominating the headlines at the time, the story about Mosa’ab Elshamy went largely unnoticed as media watchdogs like HonestReporting focused on countering the deluge of misinformation that was published by the mainstream international media throughout the conflict.
Elshamy, who works for the global news agency’s Morocco desk, posted numerous antisemitic tweets over the years, such as one in which he labeled Zionists “filthy pigs.”
Other bigoted social media ramblings from Elshamy that were uncovered included:
In November 2010, he tweeted to a since-deleted account that, “the filthy pigs theory was, surprise surprise, a joke as well 🙂 I think it should only be applied to Zionists (and their women).”
In 2011, he slammed Jewish children and their families in two separate tweets that made light of the Holocaust, with one asserting that Jews play “the holocaust card” to “distract you from the slaughter [they] commit daily.”
Later in 2011, he invoked ancient, antisemitic blood libels when he responded to a tweet that asked what Twitter users would ask an Israeli soldier, claiming he would ask, “How many babies do you eat for breakfast?”
In 2011, he falsely accused Israel of upholding a system of apartheid and claimed he had burned Israeli flags on numerous occasions.
After nearly a month of anti-regime protests in Iran following the death of Mahsa Amini, a young Iranian woman arrested for allegedly improperly wearing her hijab, the demonstrations show no sign of stopping. And that’s meant increasing pressure on governments like Canada’s to take action. On October 7, the Trudeau government announced it was sanctioning Press TV, the official broadcast mouthpiece of the Islamic Republic of Iran. And while it represents an important step, it should not be the end of Canadian sanctions on Iran’s regime.Guardian repeats lie of Israeli 'ethnic cleansing' in Jerusalem
A Guardian op-ed by Australian academic Lana Tatour (“Australia’s decision not to recognise West Jerusalem as Israel’s capital is welcome – but hardly enough”, Oct. 22) included the charge that Israel is engaged in “ethnic cleansing” of Palestinains in Jerusalem.Israel has been engaging in ethnic cleansing of East Jerusalem since its occupation in 1967Tatour is an anti-Israel activist who considers all Israeli Jews (even those within 1949 boundaries) “settlers”, and expressed support for a Palestinian journalist named Shatha Hammad who was recently stripped of her Thomas Reuters Foundation award after it was revealed she praised Adolf Hitler.
The Old City and entire neighbourhoods in Jerusalem such as Sheikh Jarrah, Silwan and Jabal Al-Mukaber are facing ethnic cleansing policies, with hundreds of families facing the threat of expulsion.Regarding east Jerusalem, the area Tartour is referring to, the section of the city where all Jews were illegally expelled by the Arab Legion during the 1948-49 War, the suggestion that Palestinians there are being “ethnically cleansed” is completely untrue.
Why is @AP referring to the well-known and internationally recognized Israeli town of Rosh Hanikra as "Ras Hanikra"? Using semi-Arabicized spellings of Israeli places is a form of delegitimization. https://t.co/qUEug5XVMO pic.twitter.com/AgmPFF3PDZ
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) October 24, 2022
Windsor Municipal Candidate Spews Anti-Israel Venom On Facebook: Where Is The News Media?
Ontarians will vote on Monday, October 24 in municipal elections held across the province.Burger King Israel to serve vegan burger, nuggets developed by Israeli startup
From large cities to small towns, voters will choose elected representatives for a variety of positions, including mayors, members of council, as well as school board trustees.
In municipal elections, typical issues of concern are property tax rates, schooling and other related topics.
But that doesn’t mean all candidates across the province haven’t opined on a variety of other issues. In fact, one municipal candidate for Councillor in the southwestern city of Windsor has made a number of deeply problematic anti-Israel comments, and some that are in our view antisemitic in nature.
Helmi Charif, who is running for Ward 3 in Windsor, posted on his Facebook page in March 2022 a bizarre theory in Arabic that “Zionists” are somehow orchestrating events taking place in Ukraine.
“From a comedian to the presidency of Ukraine, of course, with Zionist efforts led by the Ukrainian Jewish Zionist billionaire accused of corruption and actually ruling Ukraine, Ihor Kolomoisky and Zelensky is nothing but a puppet of Ihor’s hand. The Zionist lobby incited Ukraine to secede from Russia and join Europe,” Charif wrote on March 1.
The same day, Charif opined on Facebook that “Western media is now of course controlled by the Zionists.”
Writing on his Facebook page on March 30, he claimed that “Zionist mercenaries” are dedicated to destroying Christians and Muslims, writing “These Zionist mercenaries were not satisfied with occupying and destroying Palestine, but also went to Ukraine and ruined it. Wherever they go, devastation and destruction will occur. They consider themselves the masters of the world and, above all international laws, and their mission is to eliminate the Islamic and Christian religions.”
HonestReporting Canada has independently verified the translation of Helmi Charif’s words from the original Arabic.
Burger King’s Israeli franchise operator is partnering with a local food tech company developing plant-based meat alternatives to roll out meatless menu items starting this week at a pop-up branch in Tel Aviv.Israeli doctors reconstruct girl's facial nerve, lets her smile
Burger King Israel’s menu will feature a plant-based Whopper, the American fast food giant’s signature hamburger, and vegetarian “chicken” nuggets, the franchise said on Monday.
The food items were developed specifically for Burger King Israel by the Israeli startup, “Meat. The End” (MTE), a relative newcomer to the alternative proteins sector, founded in 2020. The startup’s stated mission is to solve the texture aspect of eating plant-based “meat” to make it closer to the real thing. MTE founder Dr. Yishai Mishor says that while many food tech companies out there, like Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat, have achieved success on the taste factor, the texture — the feel of the product in the mouth — has lots of room for improvement.
The not-quite-right texture of plant-based meat items is a “roadblock to consumer satisfaction,” specifically that of meat-eaters who are considering alternatives, Dr. Mishor told Big Idea Ventures on a podcast last year. He maintains that the texture question is a “bottleneck” in the alternative meat industry and a barrier to mass consumption.
“It’s a very complicated process to take plant protein, which has its own shape and body, and turn this into something that resembles animal protein. This is not an obvious task at all,” said Mishor, who serves as MTE CEO. Currently, in taste studies, “100% of [meat-eating] tasters can tell 100% of the time whether [a product] is real meat or alternative meat, and the reason is mostly in texture.”
A 17-year-old girl who was never able to smile or close her eye freely can now do so after surgeons at the Galilee Medical Center performed two microsurgical operations to fix the problem – nine months apart – for the first time in Israel.
The girl, who lives in a Western Galilee settlement, suffered from congenital paralysis of her left-side facial nerve, which caused facial asymmetry and her inability to perform basic actions on that side, such as smiling or closing an eye. The complex surgery was aimed at restoring function of her facial expression muscles and her lower eyelid.
The “facial reanimation” operations were performed by Dr. Amin Abu Jabal, director of the microsurgery unit and a senior physician in the plastic surgery and burns department at the hospital in Nahariya. He did the complex surgery in collaboration with Dr. Ohad Ronen, director of the head-and-neck-surgery unit in the otolaryngology (ear, nose and throat) department and Dr. Yanir Kassif from the ophthalmology department.
What was the surgery and why was it needed?
The microsurgery took place in two stages. In the first, the doctors removed a sensory (sural) nerve that is about 30 centimeters long, from the back of the patient’s leg, and divided it into two.
They transplanted one part from the area of the patient’s right cheek, with a connection to the nerves on the normal side, to the paralyzed left side. Then they transplanted the other part from the lower right eyelid on the normal side to the paralyzed left eyelid. The nerve was passed through a subcutaneous (below the skin) canal above the bridge of the nose and connected to the nerves of the lower eyelid on the normal side. The first operation lasted five hours, and after a two-day hospitalization, the girl was sent home.
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