Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, April 13, 2020

04/13 Links Pt1: 8 new fatalities take Israel’s COVID-19 death toll to 113; The Mossad: Israel's Not-So-Secret Weapon in the Coronavirus Fight

From Ian:

8 new fatalities take Israel’s COVID-19 death toll to 113

Eight people died overnight and during Monday morning from COVID-19, bringing the coronavirus death toll in Israel to 113.

An 80-year-old resident of a senior living home was the 12th person from the assisted living facility in Yavne’el, in the north of the country, to die from the virus.

Additionally, an 81-year-old woman and a 96-year-old woman died at the Ichilov Medical Center in Tel Aviv, while a 78-year-old man with preexisting medical conditions died of the disease at Hadassah Hospital Ein Kerem in Jerusalem.

A 41-year-old woman succumbed at Kaplan Medical Center in Rehovot. The hospital said she had suffered from preexisting illnesses and that it shared the family’s grief.

In addition, an 80-year-old man died Monday afternoon at Laniado Hospital in Netanya, and an 85-year-old woman succumbed to the virus at Jerusalem’s Shaare Zedek Medical Center.

No further information on their identities were initially released, and there were no immediate details on the eighth fatality.

Former Sephardic chief rabbi Bakshi-Doron succumbs to coronavirus, aged 79

Rabbi Eliyahu Bakshi-Doron, the former Sephardic chief rabbi of Israel, died due to complications from the coronavirus at Jerusalem’s Shaare Zedek Medical Center on Sunday. Israeli leaders mourned his passing, hailing him a great spiritual guide.

Bakshi-Doron, 79, who served as chief rabbi from 1993 to 2003, succumbed to the virus five days after checking into the hospital with COVID-19 symptoms. He was tested shortly upon his arrival and found to be a carrier.

The hospital said his condition deteriorated during the day and efforts to revive him in the evening were unsuccessful.

With his death and that of another woman, Israel’s toll rose to 105 Sunday night.

Born in 1941 in Jerusalem, Bakshi was first chief rabbi in Bat Yam and then Haifa, before rising in 1993 to become the Rishon Lezion, a title given to the chief Sephardic rabbi.

During his time as chief rabbi, he devoted efforts to interfaith dialogue, and together with Ashkenazi chief rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau, met with Pope John Paul II during his 2000 visit to Israel.

NYTs: The Mossad: Israel's Not-So-Secret Weapon in the Coronavirus Fight

The Mossad, the storied Israeli spy service, has been deeply involved in Israel's fight against the virus, and has been one of the country's most valuable assets in acquiring medical equipment and manufacturing technology abroad, according to Israeli medical and security officials.

Prof. Yitshak Kreiss, the director general of Sheba Medical Center, said, "It is only in Israel that Sheba hospital could have enlisted the help of the Mossad. Can you imagine Mount Sinai Hospital going to the CIA for help?," referring to the New York medical center.

According to Israeli officials, the Mossad used international contacts to avert shortages that might have overwhelmed Israel's health system, enabling Israel to acquire ventilators and testing material that the health ministry had been unable to secure. In some instances, Mossad Director Yossi Cohen personally contacted his counterparts to expedite the purchase of goods. In other cases, Cohen spoke directly to the rulers of particular countries.

On this Passover, anti-Zionists should be ashamed.

Anti-Zionists should be ashamed that while they pretend to be tolerant, they cannot tolerate a Jewish state.

Anti-Zionists should be ashamed that while they pretend to be liberal, they support the most illiberal Arab politicians - leaders who are misogynist, anti-gay and intolerant of any dissent.

Anti-Zionists should be ashamed that on the very holiday where Jews celebrate their freedom from oppression, they want Jews to go back into exile.

Anti-Zionists should be ashamed that they claim to want people to be free but they are against the self-determination of only one people.

Anti-Zionists should be ashamed that they claim to be against antisemitism but they publicly and proudly support the world's worst antisemites.

Anti-Zionists should be ashamed that they pretend to hate racism, but in fact they hate people, and then justify that bigotry by labeling their opponents as racist.

Anti-Zionists should be ashamed that their supposed love for Arabs and Muslims disintegrates past Israel's borders.

Anti-Zionists should be ashamed that their arguments against "Zionists" echo centuries-old arguments against Jews, and that their cause is just the newest twist on the oldest hatred.

If you are anti-Zionist, you are against the fundamentals of the lessons of Passover - the freedom of a people to be a nation, to be unique, to chart their own course in history, to be a beacon of hope to the world.

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Lowlights of the "Jews for Rashida" "seder" by JVP

I suffered through the "seder" by Jewish Voice for Peace in support of Rashida Tlaib's election campaign so you won't have to.

Here are a few clips.

Their cleric, Rabbi Alissa Wise, is enamored that Jews have traditionally removed wine when mentioning the Ten Plagues because we should not be happy at Egyptian suffering. But she goes much further, saying that the Egyptians were "set up by an angry God eager to demonstrate his own superiority."

In other words, to JVP, God is an insecure, vain, Trump-like figure punishing Egyptians simply to boost his inflated ego.

Wise also added some "plagues" to the regular list of ten, what she calls plagues happening today. They include racism, antisemitism, sexism, homophobia, political oppression, and war.

Yet neither Wise nor her group has ever said a word against Arab states, including the Palestinian Authority and the Hamas terrorists they support, who proudly uphold every one of those "plagues" as ideals.

The Rashida Tlaib clips are actually boring, she says very little about Israel and talks a lot about water as a human right. But the person who introduced her prominently wore earrings that said "Fuck Trump."

This is part of a theme I've been exploring lately, that the hate that these far-Leftists exhibit is not hate for ideas or policies but hate for people. They claim to be anti-racist but they act exactly the way racists do - by basing their entire existence on hate for their political opponents, enemies that are 90% of the the Jewish community they pretend to be a part of.

Finally, the host of the fiasco gives a final blessing over the fourth cup of wine - but says the blessing for bread instead.

Which goes to show how little they actually care about Jewish ritual to begin with. This event was advertised for days but there was no preparation to even ensure that the host knew the basics. To them, a seder is a political event where they can subvert Judaism for their own agendas - they do it with havdalah and other Jewish rituals as well.

While I was watching on YouTube, I put in a snarky comment ("I came late - was your Kadesh the kiddush for Hamas terrorists?") and got banned from adding more. That's fine, but I noticed that during the live session, if I downvoted the video and then watched it with a different ID, my downvote disappeared. The JVP is so insecure about criticism that they even censor the downvotes during the session (they cannot do it afterwards.) This is how committed they are to free speech.

During the "seder" I wondered - how do they look at God telling the Children of Israel to inherit Canaan and to drive out the inhabitants? What do they think of the heartfelt, short prayer "Next Year in Jerusalem"? When it comes down to it, Passover is the most Zionist of holidays, celebrating the Jews freedom not only of fleeing slavery but of becoming a people and a nation in the land God promised to their forefathers. This is what Passover is about, and there is no freedom without the land where a people can determine their own future. Yet these "Jews" want to take that freedom away from today's Jews, in Israel and outside.

The idea of ripping Israel from Jews is offensive enough. But using Judaism as a cover to do that is reprehensible.

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Richard Landes is a brilliant academic and a strident critic of the Western response to Islamic terror. He is the person who coined the term "Pallywood" for the many staged photos and videos that Palestinians use to push their agenda.

We had a wide-ranging conversation on Sunday, and we would probably still be talking now if we didn't have connection problems after 45 minutes.

It was lots of fun and I hope to continue the conversation at another time.

Incidentally, I fixed the URL for adding my YouTube channel to your podcast software. Here it is if you want to subscribe.

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Saudis to provide holy Zamzam water for COVID-19 patients. (It might be poisonous.)

On Sunday, the Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz instructed the President of the Grand Mosque and the Prophet’s Mosque to distribute the water of the Zamzam well in Mecca to those who were infected with the novel coronavirus.

According to the official Saudi Press Agency, the head of the affairs of the Grand Mosque and the Prophet's Mosque, Abdul Rahman bin Abdul Aziz Al-Sudais, ordered that "Zamzam water" be distributed to coronavirus patients.

According to Islamic legend, the well, which is adjacent to the Kaaba in Mecca, was the one that God created for Ishmael when he was thirsty in the desert with his mother Hagar.

One would think that this is a harmless idea which could offer a significant placebo effect for patients, but a BBC investigation in 2011 found that the Zamzam well water contained high levels of nitrate, potentially harmful bacteria, and arsenic at levels three times the legal limit in the UK. So it is a mild poison.

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This year, in response to the pandemic, Koren Publishers offered a free download of their Haggadah with the commentary of the former Chief Rabbi of Britain, Lord Jonathan Sacks.

But they didn't offer the other half of the book, the one that opens from the left-to-right side. I didn't even realize that this haggada had such an extensive set of essays - nearly 190 pages, which is pretty much book-length itself.

I love Sacks' writings and his weekly divrei Torah. He has an astonishing ability to notice things that others have not. His essays on Passover truly shine.

Sack's fluency with a wide range of sources, whether they be ancient or modern, history or poetry, sacred or ordinary, allows him to come up with startling conclusions that strike you with the dual realizations that no one ever seems to have made these points before, and that they seem to be correct. Here is an enthusiastic celebration of the Torah and specifically the Exodus as not only a story but as a work of philosophy, history and morality that pre-dates all others, and that was far ahead of its time and that had unparalleled influence in modern Western civilization.

Just one stunning example. Up until after World War II, the concept that one is obligated to adhere to higher standards, and to disobey if necessary, ones own leaders was hardly considered mainstream. Only after the Holocaust was the defense of "just following orders" no longer considered valid. Everyone is expected to disobey commands, even at the risk of one's life, that violate the higher values of human rights - but that is a relatively new concept.

Or is it? More than three thousand years ago, two women named Shifra and Puah - who according to the literal text seem to have been Egyptian, not Jewish - refused to obey Pharaoh's direct orders to murder all Jewish males upon birth. To them, there was a moral imperative that outweighed the demands of a deity-king.

This was, Rabbi Sacks notes, the first known example of civil disobedience, and one that was thousands of years ahead of modern times and completely alien to all peoples before (Sacks argues that the example in the Greek tragedy of Antigone is in fact not based on a higher moral code but on family loyalty.)

That insight alone would be enough to make a book notable, but these essays are filled with them. Sacks' essay on antisemitism is as good a treatment of the topic as any and better than most. He shows how the Exodus story influenced the founding fathers of the US to build a completely new type of nation, based on a Biblical-style covenant and concepts of inalienable rights that were most definitely not self-evident in 1776, but that were first written in the Torah.

Other essays and insights are equally dazzling, from noticing that the first speech Moses gives to the people on the cusp of freedom is an exhortation to teach their children, to brilliantly pinpointing the exact timeframe of the rabbis' seder in Bnei Brak and the importance of the anecdote to Jewish history.

You do not have to wait until next Pesach to enjoy the insights from Rabbi Sacks.

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04/12 Links: Dr. Miriam Adelson: We shall shake off the dust and arise; Western Wall priestly blessing held with 10 worshipers, including US envoy

From Ian:

Dr. Miriam Adelson: We shall shake off the dust and arise

It is rare, at times like this, to begin the week – yet another week in the shadow of the coronavirus - on a note of joy and excitement. The crisis persists, and with it, heartrending stories of people lost, as well as of loneliness, of challenges to livelihood and of worries about what yet awaits us.

But it is precisely at such moments that the heart looks to the small stories, of individuals. And it is on one such story that I would like to embark – a story that heartens me in these dark days.

It is the story of Eli Beer, an esteemed friend of Sheldon and mine renowned for the fact that, at the age of 16, he founded "United Hatzalah" and runs it to this very day. Alas, Eli contracted the coronavirus during a visit to the United States and, last month, at the height of the attendant COVID-19 disease, his condition deteriorated and he was sedated and placed on a ventilator at a Miami hospital.

Three days ago, Eli's condition improved. He was taken off the ventilator and, with God's help, is on the path to a full recovery.

A person's convalescence is, in itself, excellent news. But here it is fitting to invoke the axiom of the Jewish sages which holds that every life is a world unto itself: For Eli is, to the fullest, the realization of this - a world unto himself who has been brought back to life, and to us.

Israel’s first 100 virus deaths: More men than women; nearly 1/4 from Jerusalem

Data released by the Health Ministry showed that a slight majority of Israel’s coronavirus fatalities were men, a statistic that appears in line with a global trend, and the city that saw the highest death rate was Jerusalem.

The Health Ministry figures are Israel’s official tally and only include deaths in hospitals or assisted living facilities. It is unknown whether there have been fatalities in private homes or other locations. As of Sunday, the ministry said 103 people have died of the virus.

According to the Health Ministry figures released Saturday, which are based on 96 fatalities and were collated last week, 51 men died in Israel from COVID-19, compared with 45 women. This appears to tally with statistics from Asia and Europe, where a slightly higher proportion of fatalities were male.

Globally, men are statistically more likely to smoke, which is thought to possibly play a role in susceptibility to COVID-19, and men are also more likely to have underlying problems that could act as a contributing factor, such as heart disease. In addition, there are some studies that suggest hormones may play a role in the severity of the disease.

Israel’s oldest victim was 98 years old and the youngest was 37 years old. The majority of those who died were over the age of 70, according to the figures. Almost all of those who have died from COVID-19 in Israel have suffered from preexisting conditions, according to hospital officials.

UN Watch: Amnesty International official gets Hamas to arrest peace activist

Amnesty International is being asked to fire a Gaza researcher after the New York Times reported that she got Hamas to arrest a Palestinian peace activist for holding a Zoom call with Israeli peace activists.

Gaza Youth Committee leader Rami Aman, 38, who organized the peace dialogue, has not been heard from since he surrendered Thursday morning at Hamas Internal Security headquarters in Gaza City, a family member said late Friday afternoon.

According to the Times, Hind Khoudary, who is described by the London-based human rights organization as an “Amnesty International Research Consultant” and “worker”, “posted angry denunciations on Facebook of Mr. Aman and others on the call, tagging three Hamas officials to ensure it got their attention.” Then Hamas arrested him for “betrayal of our people and their sacrifices.”

In wake of the controversy this weekend, at about 1:00 am Gaza time on April 12th Khoudary deleted the Facebook post where she had tagged the Hamas officials. Here is the screenshot:

See some of Khoudary’s numerous other Facebook posts from that day denouncing Aman here, here and here.

Even long-time Human Rights Watch official Peter Bouckaert, who always sided with Hamas in its wars with Israel, has condemned Amnesty International’s researcher, and removed her from a private Facebook group.

“You should be ashamed of yourself,” Bouckaert wrote to Khoudary.

In The Daily Californian, the group "Bears for Palestine" not only support terrorist Rasmea Odeh, but they also explicitly justify all Palestinian terrorism:

Regarding Leila Khaled and Fatima Bernawi, many individuals throughout history have demonstrated strategic means of resisting occupation and have been labeled as “terrorists.” ....And like Mandela, Khaled and Bernawi sought to bring attention to the brutal occupation of Palestinians. As millions of Palestinians have been expelled from their homeland and thousands of Palestinians have been killed during the Israeli occupation, it is only natural that Palestinians would militarize and resist the occupation.

It signals power and privilege to presume that individuals are “terrorists” without first asking what forces them to resort to protests. To individuals who seek to teach us oppressors’ morals, we respectfully say we do not take orders from colonizers. To quote the anti-colonial phenom Frantz Fanon: “When we revolt, it’s not for a particular culture. We revolt simply because, for many reasons, we can no longer breathe.”

Khaled was the notorious airplane hijacker involved in the 1969 TWA Flight 840 and El Al flight 219 in 1970. Bernawi attempted to bomb a cinema in Jerusalem.

Notice that the justification by the Bears of Palestine for the terror acts of these two women can extend to the most depraved acts of terror imaginable - if Bernawi is justified in her attempt to blow up people watching a movie, then any murderous act against any civilians is justifiable as long as it is called a mere "protest." ISIS beheadings are no different than suicide bombings which are no different than cinema bombings. 9/11 was justified by Osama Bin Laden for the US "occupation" of Arab lands. Every terrorist can justify his or her acts because of "oppression." And certainly all terrorists can claim that they are oppressed by the people they want to blow to smithereens.

If some acts of terror are justified, all acts of terror are justified. The question is why the University of California continues to allow students who have admitted that they consider terror to be justifiable to congregate on campus. After all, this article does not make a distinction between non-violent protests and crashing airplanes into buildings. Perhaps they would consider throwing grenades into the office of the Dean to "bring attention" to the high price of textbooks, that might be considered extremely offensive to those who cannot afford them. I can see nothing in the Bears for Palestine justification of murdering Israeli Jews that does not preclude justifying campus terrorism as well.

Students with such a twisted view of morality are a danger to everyone on campus. And those who read this letter and think there is nothing wrong with the sentiments expressed have already been brainwashed into accepting the Palestinian narrative that all violence is justified.

(h/t Andrew P)

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The PLO's Saeb Erekat has used Easter to send an anti-Israel, anti-Zionist, hateful political message under the guise of "love."

Palestine is the land of prophets and saints and Jerusalem represents the heart of all of them. For those marking Easter, it represents a message of hope where life defeats death. This message of hope was spread to the world from Jerusalem. The three monotheistic religions share a message of love, hope, and coexistence. The use of religion, holy books, and religious arguments to justify hatred, violations and war crimes goes against the tradition enshrined in the values of those religions. The Holy Bible, that teaches love, has been used by the Israeli and US officials to justify oppression against the land and the people of Palestine, and ultimately, to advocate the illegal annexation of our country. Those who believe in humanity and particularly those who celebrate the message of love and hope arising from Easter cannot but denounce such acts.

Really? Where was Erekat's denunciation of the statement by Naim Ateek, president of the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center, when he said in his Easter message - during a wave of deadly terror bombings against Jews in 2001:

As we approach Holy Week and Easter, the suffering of Jesus Christ at the hands of evil political and religious powers two thousand years ago is lived out again in Palestine. The number of innocent Palestinians and Israelis that have fallen victim to Israeli state policy is increasing.

Here in Palestine Jesus is again walking the via dolorosa. Jesus is the powerless Palestinian humiliated at a checkpoint, the woman trying to get through to the hospital for treatment, the young man whose dignity is trampled, the young student who cannot get to the university to study, the unemployed father who needs to find bread to feed his family; the list is tragically getting longer, and Jesus is there in their midst suffering with them. ...

In this season of Lent, it seems to many of us that Jesus is on the cross again with thousands of crucified Palestinians around him. It only takes people of insight to see the hundreds of thousands of crosses throughout the land, Palestinian men, women, and children being crucified. Palestine has become one huge golgotha. The Israeli government crucifixion system is operating daily. Palestine has become the place of the skull.

This is what "the use of religion, holy books, and religious arguments to justify hatred, violations and war crimes" looks like. This is thinly veiled incitement to kill Jews to avenge the death of Jesus. This is pure Christian antisemitism from mainstream Palestinian Christians - and neither Saeb Erekat nor the PLO ever said a word. In fact, only a year after this antisemitic message, a PLO official paid tribute to Sabeel.

And this is just Christian Palestinian antisemitism. Do we even have to discuss the Muslim antisemitism, including from the PLO itself? Of Mahmoud Abbas invoking the libels of Jews poisoning wells?

Or of a Jerusalem cleric saying, a mere two months ago, that "Animosity towards the Jews is an obligatory religious duty, and one of the signs of the believers. Whoever does not show enmity towards the Jews is a total hypocrite"?

Or of Mahmoud Habbash, advisor to Abbas, last year calling Jews in Israel "foreigners who never had any religious or historical connection to this land and who would be told that this was the land of their forefathers"? While Erekat carefully says in English that the land is holy to Jews, the Palestinian Authority's top Sharia judge says the opposite in Arabic. Who is telling the truth? It sure isn't Erekat.

While Abbas walked back his "rabbis poisoning wells" statement when it hit the Western media, none of these were ever denounced or condemned by Saeb Erekat or the PLO. But now they suddenly pretend to care about people using religion to justify violence.

Spare us, Saeb. There is nothing that you don't politicize to incite hate against Israel and Jews, including Easter Sunday itself.

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The New York Times reported:

For five years, a small but feisty group of Palestinian peace activists in the blockaded Gaza Strip has been organizing small-scale video chats with Israelis under a bridge-building initiative it calls “Skype With Your Enemy.”

On Monday, the group, the Gaza Youth Committee, drew one of its biggest crowds yet — more than 200 participants — this time on Zoom, the newly popular teleconferencing platform.

But other Palestinians in Gaza, who took umbrage at the idea of befriending Israelis, were also listening in. And the resulting public uproar prompted Hamas, the militant group that controls Gaza, to arrest the youth committee’s leader and several other participants.

The charge: “holding a normalization activity” with Israelis, which a Hamas Interior Ministry spokesman, Iyad Al-Bozom, called a crime, saying it amounted to the “betrayal of our people and their sacrifices.”

...[E]arly Thursday morning, a freelance Gaza journalist, Hind Khoudary, posted angry denunciations on Facebook of Mr. [Rami] Aman and others on the call, tagging three Hamas officials, including Mr. Al-Bozom, to ensure it got their attention.

An arrest warrant was issued by the Hamas military prosecution, which handles accused collaborators with Israel, would-be suicide bombers and other serious security threats, Mr. Al-Bozom said. He did not identify or say how many other youth committee members had also been detained.

Hind Khoudary isn't just a "freelance journalist." She works for Amnesty International.

Yes, a person working for an organization that was founded to fight for the freedom of people imprisoned for free speech demanded that a terror group put people in prison for talking to Israelis.

Here is a post of hers still up on Facebook, autotranslated. where she denounces the "normalization" video, which can be downloaded here.

David Collier found a lot of other pro-terror posts from her, like these:

Even though this article about the Hamas arrests of people wanting to talk about how peace might be possible was prominent in the New York Times, I could not find a single "peace" group a day later that denounced Hamas. Nothing from B'Tselem or Peace Now or Gisha or IfNotNow or J-Street or Jewish Voice for Peace.

The one comment I did see was from Ken Roth of Human Rights Watch. But instead of a full throated denunciation of Hamas for arresting people speaking to Israelis, somehow he found a way to bash Israel, with an implication that is anything but compatible with human rights:

Roth seems to be saying that if Gazans had held a videochat with Israel's Foreign Ministry, then Hamas would be justified in arresting them. There are good Jews and bad Jews, and it is only a crime for Hamas to abduct people from speaking to good Jews.

This one incident shows the abject hypocrisy of the entire so-called "human rights" and "peace" communities. Amnesty hires a worker who explicitly supports terror, "peace groups" are silent when ordinary Gazans are arrested for speaking to Israelis online, and the head of HRW implies that Hamas' actions would be OK if only the Jews were more right wing.

It would be unbelievable if this sort of thing hasn't happened so many times before.

(h/t Petra)

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04/11 Links: Israel’s virus death toll jumps to 101; Passover in Israel Looks Like Yom Kippur; How JFK saved Passover for America's Jews

From Ian:

Israel’s virus death toll jumps to 101, with 10,743 confirmed cases

The Health Ministry announced late Saturday evening that Israel’s death toll from the coronavirus stood at 101, with five more deaths reported between Saturday morning and night.

According to Health Ministry figures late Saturday, Israel has 10,743 confirmed coronavirus cases, including 175 in serious condition and 129 people on ventilators.

Another 154 people were in moderate condition, the ministry said Saturday, with the rest having mild symptoms. Close to 7,000 of those diagnosed with the disease are hospitalized at home.

As of Saturday evening, 1,341 have recovered from the illness.

Israeli health officials are expecting a surge in coronavirus deaths in the next 10 days, according to a Friday report.

The rise in deaths does not signify an increase in infections, however. Patients who are already hospitalized and on respirators are likely to succumb to the virus in the coming days, according to predictive models from the Health Ministry, Channel 13 reported.

Almost all of those who have died from COVID-19 in Israel have been elderly and suffered from preexisting conditions, according to hospital officials. The novel coronavirus has been spreading quickly in nursing homes around the country, raising intense concern for the safety of elderly residents.

29-year-old COVID-19 patient treated with Israel's new ‘passive vaccine’

A 29-year-old haredi (ultra-Orthodox) coronavirus patient who is being treated at Samson Assuta Ashdod University Hospital has improved from serious to serious but stable condition, after receiving multiple doses of plasma over the weekend from a donor who recovered from coronavirus, a spokesperson for the hospital told The Jerusalem Post.

On Friday, “with the assistance of Health Minister Ya’acov Litzman and his assistant, a suitable donor, a resident of Jerusalem, was found,” explained MDA director-general Eli Bin.

MDA brought her in an ambulance to its blood service center before Shabbat. A special team was waiting for her and transferred the plasma units to the laboratories to perform all required tests and prepare them for transfusion.

Then, with the approval of the Health Ministry, the blood units were delivered to Assuta and given to the patient.

The man is among the country’s youngest severe patients. He has several underlying medical conditions, and has been hospitalized at Assuta for around a week-and-a-half.

The first patient who recovered from coronavirus donated plasma on April 1, according to MDA deputy director-general of blood services Prof.
Eilat Shinar. Since then, some six other patients have made donations and, in the last two days, plasma units were provided to three different hospitals.

Netanyahu-Modi Diplomacy: India Ships Hydroxychloroquine to Israel

Lifting a blanket export ban, India has shipped a huge consignment of coronavirus treatment drugs to Israel. New Delhi delivered a five-tonne cargo of medicines including chloroquine, the antiviral drug currently being used in the treatment of Wuhan coronavirus.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu thanked his Indian counterpart, Narendra Modi, for the move. “Thank you, my dear friend, Narendra Modi, Prime Minister of India, for sending hydroxychloroquine to Israel. All the citizens of Israel thank you!” the Israeli leader tweeted on Friday.

New Delhi had previously banned the export of hydroxychloroquine and other coronavirus-related medicines. India is reportedly the biggest manufacturer of the drug typically used in the treatment of malaria patients.

The Times of Israel news website reported New Delhi’s decision:
A plane from India carrying materials used to make medicines for treating coronavirus patients has arrived in Israel.

The five ton shipment, which the Ynet news site said arrived Tuesday, includes ingredients for the drugs hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine, which are used to treat malaria.

Several countries have been experimenting with hydroxychloroquine to treat coronavirus symptoms and US President Donald Trump has touted its potential. Experts, however, have urged caution until bigger trials validate hydroxychloroquine’s effectiveness, as it and chloroquine can have potentially serious side effects, especially in high doses or administered with other medications.

Chag Sameach!

In every generation we are obligated to look at ourselves as if we have gone from slavery to freedom. This year it is a little easier to imagine having little control over our own lives. And as before, we will emerge free.

I wish all my readers and their families a wonderful Passover, a chag kosher v'sameach, and a very healthy and happy holiday.

(I will not be blogging from Wednesday afternoon until Saturday night.)

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04/08 Links Pt2: Pres. Rivlin: Passover reminds us that the Jewish people are all one family; Melanie Phillips: The story Jews repeat on Passover is the secret of their survival

From Ian:

Rivlin: Passover reminds us that the Jewish people are all one family

President Reuven Rivlin addressed the State of Israel and Jewish communities around the world before the Passover holiday, as many communities prepare to celebrate the holiday in lockdown.

"Dear Israelis, this year we will mark Seder night in difficult circumstances because of the ‘corona plague’, the modern affliction that casts a dark shadow on us all," said Rivlin in a Hebrew video. "Suddenly, we realize how important the simple things that make up our daily lives are to us. Simple things like going outside, and breathing the spring air which is always part of Pesach; like the bustling and hurrying – that are so Israeli – of the preparations for the holiday; and like the gathering of the family, loved and familiar, together around the Pesach table."

"Suddenly, when we are faced with ‘social distancing’, closures and isolation at homes, we feel even more clearly importance of the obligation to ‘tell the story to your children’, of passing on the story from generation to generation, from grandparents to children to grandchildren to great-grandchildren. This is our story, our anchor, what binds us together – even when we need to be apart," added Rivlin.

The president stressed that it is still a holiday and "despite it all" we will get ready for the Passover seder and "tell the story to those who are sitting with us as well as to those who are no less close, but need to celebrate the holiday with us from afar."

"In these days, my dear ones, we are all praying, together or separately, young and old, secular and religious, for the better days ahead. We all ask ‘remember the covenant of our forefathers’. Chag Pesach Sameach, a happy Pesach. To next year, together. Am Yisrael Chai, the Jewish people lives,” concluded the president.

A beautiful and heartfelt #Pesach message from #Israel's @PresidentRuvi to Jewish communities around the world, many of whom will not be able to celebrate the #Passover Seder with their loved ones tonight due to #CoronaVirus. pic.twitter.com/KlDyTtZpOq
— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) April 8, 2020

Natan Sharansky: We will join forces and overcome this, together

Israel is a center of Jewish life, and a much safer, better-prepared society to handle world challenges. Now we need to think about how Israel can help the New York Jewish community, which is in a tough situation. In dangerous times, there is no place safer than Israel. In the past, when the plague struck Europe, millions died -- almost a third of Europe's population.

There were Jewish communities that were destroyed because people blamed them for the plague. The world has moved on, but even today there are some who blame the Jews for the current plague, and even say they are making money off it. This is a reminder to us all that prejudice does not die out. We need to be aware of it, and we must not stop our battle against anti-Semitism, whether it is aimed at Israel or at the Jews of the world.

As a former prisoner of Zion, I remember celebrating seder in solitary confinement. There were three slices of bread, three glasses of water, and a little salt. I decided that the warm water was wine, the dry bread was matza, and the salt was the bitter herbs. I tried to remember every sentence in the Haggada, and what I couldn't, I made up. "Next year in Jerusalem" was a very powerful sentence for me. I felt that I was with the rest of the Jewish people, on the right path. Then, Passover was a good opportunity to know just how much we weren't giving in and were continuing our battle.

I believe we will come out of this crisis stronger because we handled it correctly. The government made the right decisions before other countries did. It's important that we come out of this crisis more united, with a unity government.

A happy, healthy Passover to everyone, with much confidence in our role and our path.

Israelis Mark Passover, a Celebration of Freedom, in Virtual Isolation

The Jewish Passover holiday typically draws crowds of Israelis outside to burn heaps of leavened bread, commemorating the Biblical exodus from slavery in Egypt.

But on Wednesday a tightened coronavirus lockdown meant the streets of Jerusalem and other cities were nearly empty on the first day of the week-long holiday, when they would normally be dotted with fires and columns of smoke.

Israel this week imposed special holiday restrictions to try to halt the spread of the disease.

Jews may only celebrate the traditional “Seder” meal that kicks off the April 8-15 holiday season with immediate family.

And travel between cities is banned until Friday, with roadblocks erected at main junctions leading from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv.

A full curfew was due to take effect on Wednesday at 3 p.m. (1300 GMT), just before the Seder begins, and will last until Thursday morning. This prompted a dash for last-minute shopping, which saw long lines of Israelis wearing face masks outside grocery stores.

Some areas found workarounds to keep festive traditions alive in a month that will also see Christians celebrate Easter and Muslims mark the beginning of the holy month of Ramadan.

Vic Rosenthal's Weekly Column

It’s almost Pesach, when the thoughts of Jewish bloggers turn to plagues and freedom. Plagues we certainly have. In addition to the coronavirus, Africa (and possibly the Middle East) is about to experience one of the paradigmatic Biblical plagues, swarming locusts.

We have freedom, too. Leaving aside the corona-related restrictions – which are becoming significantly more severe in Israel around the holiday – Jews in Israel are among the most free peoples in the world. For example, academic freedom is almost unlimited, as illustrated by this article in the wonderful English Edition of Ha’aretz, in which seditious Ben Gurion University professor Neve Gordon argues that the coming impact of coronavirus in Gaza will be Israel’s fault. He’s right that there are few test kits and ventilators there, insufficient hospital beds, and countless other deficiencies that, if the virus spreads widely there, will prove deadly. But of course he’s wrong about whose fault it is.

Recently, Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar threatened that if Israel doesn’t give Gaza ventilators, they would take them by force and “stop the breathing of 6 million Israelis (apparently he means only the Jewish ones, since there are 8 million if you count Arabs).”

Gaza certainly doesn’t lack money. Europe, Turkey, and Qatar continue to send aid and invest in projects there. Israeli officials estimate that between 2014 and 2017 Hamas spent about $120 million on tunnels (which have now been neutralized by an even more expensive Israeli project of an anti-tunnel barrier along the border). That’s equivalent to quite a bit of medical equipment. And that’s just tunnels. It doesn’t include the rockets and the villas, malls, and resorts of the Hamas leadership.

Gordon says that Israel has “occupied” Gaza for 40 years, and “continues to control its borders.” His definition of “occupation” is strange, since normally you have to be present somewhere in order to occupy it; but leaving this aside, Israel does not limit the ingress of most medical equipment and supplies to Gaza. It’s true that some electronic equipment is considered “dual use,” (civilian and military) and therefore requires special permission to be imported. But that is a question of extra time, not prohibition. The rules about dual-use items came about from bitter experience, after (for example) chunks of metal pipe imported from Israel returned home in the form of Qassams, and steel rebar ended up reinforcing concrete tunnels.

The biggest hospital in Gaza, al-Shifa Hospital – which boasts a Hamas military command center in its basement – was built by the British in 1946 and was Gaza’s only hospital until after 1948. It was greatly expanded and renovated by Israel during the period 1967-1993. Other hospitals were built with money from various foreign sources (indeed, I haven’t found evidence of any hospitals built by Hamas; if anyone knows of any, please comment).

Gordon refers to the “de-development” of Gaza, a concept attributed to the deranged misozionist Harvard “scholar” Sara Roy. It is certainly true that the conditions of life in Gaza have deteriorated recently – they were much better in the 1967-1993 period than before or after – but the simple and correct explanation that this is due to the diversion of resources away from the welfare of the general population and toward weapons and infrastructure, as well as the enrichment of the Hamas elite, escapes him.

Gordon insists that Arabs in “occupied” Gaza don’t have freedom. But their leaders are doing exactly what they want. Does anyone doubt for a moment that if, through some miracle, they would stop trying to kill us, Israel wouldn’t fall over herself trying to improve the lives of the people there?

Gordon has been fighting against the State of Israel for years while living in it and working at a state-supported university (he is currently on sabbatical in London, but he retains his position in Israel). And we let him do it.

Here are a few short takes on other important freedoms that we have in Israel:

What about freedom of the press? Yes, Israel has military censorship, which sometimes unjustifiably holds up the publication of embarrassing facts. But Israel also has (in Ha’aretz, naturally), Gideon Levy, the anti-Jewish Jewish journalist. Can anybody imagine what would happen to a Russian Gideon Levy? Actually, we don’t need to imagine – the dangers of being a journalist in Russia are well known (to be fair, Russian journalists are as often murdered by local hoods as by the government).

Israel also shines in the area of freedom of religion. The Temple Mount, the holiest site in Judaism, is accessible to Jews through one entrance for limited hours. Jews (and Christians) are not permitted to bring any “religious objects,” and are subject to arrest if they are caught praying, which can include moving one’s lips or even crying (I recommend that you read the link to get the full flavor of the situation). If they are thirsty, they may not drink from the water faucets on site, which are reserved for Muslims to wash themselves.

Muslims, on the other hand, have several entrances available, and unless there is tension related to terrorism, unlimited hours during which they can visit. They can pray, and sometimes Arab kids play soccer there. Freedom.

Now consider freedom to bear arms. That is an interesting one. It is hard for a private citizen to get a pistol permit, and long guns are almost unheard of in civilian hands. But almost every male Jewish Israeli between the ages of 19 and 40 has the right, more correctly the obligation, to take a month out of his life every year and, er, bear arms (when I was here in the 1980s, it was six weeks a year until age 55). And that is in addition to two years of mandatory service, which women also serve.

But what about Arabs? Although Druze and Bedouin citizens serve in the IDF, most Arab citizens are not required to do so. But – here Israel proves to be special again – illegal weapons are rife in Israel’s Arab towns. Even automatic weapons. So they can bear arms whenever they want to, and are not limited to one month a year.

The American Bill of Rights includes the right to be free of unreasonable search and seizure. And in Israel you have nothing to worry about – unless someone claims you owe them money! If that happens, they have recourse to a system called hotza’a lefoal by which a creditor can lock up a debtor’s bank account, make it impossible for them to leave the country, and charge outrageous fees and interest. But as long as you pay your cellphone bills and don’t have an angry ex-spouse, you have nothing to worry about.

So you see, here in Israel we have so much freedom that we can afford to give it to academics and writers who take the side of our enemies, to Muslims who deny our right to worship at our holy places, to members of the various Arab mafias, and to mobile phone providers.

We have so much freedom, in fact, that we don’t need the more traditional plagues.

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Followup on International Crisis Group's error-ridden story blaming Israel for Gaza

Last week, I showed that a report by the International Crisis Group NGO seemed to knowingly misrepresent the facts about medical aid Israel allows into Gaza.

A tweeter, Inquisitive Native, published a thread that exposed far more lies in the report that was retweeted by influential figures.

The report hasn't been corrected, which makes one wonder about the integrity and honesty of the International Crisis Group. It is acting far more like Amnesty and Human Rights Watch, who steadfastly refuse to acknowledge any errors let alone correct them, and far less like a truly apolitical independent NGO.

A quick look at its officers shows that there is nothing apolitical about the ICG.

It is headed by Robert Malley, one of Obama's architects of the policy to weaken America's allies and strengthen its enemies. He has a long history of anti-Israel writings, and was the main proponent of the theory rejected by everyone at Camp David and Taba that it was Israel that was at fault for the failed peace negotiations with the Palestinians. He has met with Hamas several times from his earlier tenure at ICG and there are reports that he has met Hamas within recent months. His father was a key figure in Egypt's Communist Party.

And it looks like ICG was co-founded and funded by George Soros, who funds every single anti-Israel organization he can find.

No wonder it is not willing to correct its falsehoods. It never meant to be accurate to begin with.

(h/t David A)

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.