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March 2025

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POSITIVE NEWS FROM ISRAEL FROM MICHAEL ORDMAN

By on March 2nd, 2025

www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com 

A new innovative Israeli medical system unblocks arteries from the heart to the brain. And Europe is funding an Israeli professor’s innovative treatments for atrial fibrillation of the heart.  Another new Israeli medical tool helps detect a mutant gene linked to autism and cancer in children. And three new Israeli medical schools have already enrolled nearly 200 future young Israeli doctors. Israel is also building a future of hi-tech engineers at Tel Aviv’s Afeka College. Meanwhile, Israel’s Tech It Forward is giving young college graduate immigrants tours to help them choose future careers in Israeli hi-tech.  Michael Ordman

The foregoing is a fraction of the positive news from a small, embattled nation. Israel is a gem in an archipelago of tyrants and barbarians. Israel’s medical research alleviates humanity, ironically, including the barbarians and tyrants poised to destroy the nation. rsk

ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS
 
Unblocking the carotid arteries. Israel’s Pylon Medical has developed a first-of-its-kind system for treating carotid artery disease, one of the leading risk factors for stroke. Pylon’s new “specialty kit” includes a balloon catheter, an artery closure device, and an aspiration system that removes plaque in clogged neck blood vessels.
https://www.israel21c.org/treating-clogged-arteries-will-soon-be-safer-and-faster/
https://www.pylonmedical.com/   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j4__4da9UWE
 
Brain on a chip is a game-changer. Israel’s Itay & Beyond is developing a medicine discovery and AI-based testing platform for psychiatric and neurological disorders. They generated stem cells from autistic individuals, grow brain cells on a chip, connect to a computer, teach it to play games and analyze changes from medicines.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-scientists-fuse-brain-tissue-and-electronic-chips-to-test-autism-treatment/
https://itayandbeyond.com/  https://itayandbeyond.com/Itay&Beyond-Video-Pitch-New-compressed.mp4
 
Rapid protection against viruses. Researchers at Israel’s Technion Institute have discovered a unique genetic mechanism that provides cells with rapid protection against viruses. Normally, molecules NORAD and STAT3 control the immune system. On virus attack, the cells eat NORAD, and STAT3 unleashes an immune response.
https://www.technion.ac.il/en/blog/article/viruses-and-the-human-cell-the-evolutionary-arms-race/
 
Breakthrough tool for gene mutation research. Tel Aviv University scientists have developed an innovative biosensor imaging tool for measuring the gene PTEN, whose mutations are linked to cancer and autism. It should help develop personalized treatments and aid early disease detection and more effective therapies.
https://www.jewishpress.com/news/health-and-medicine/tau-researchers-on-brink-of-unlocking-gene-linked-to-cancer-and-autism/2025/02/25/  https://www.nature.com/articles/s41592-025-02610-9
 
AI is your doctor’s best friend. Israel’s Lavaa Health’s platform can identify disease and hard-to-diagnose illnesses at the earliest stage, allowing doctors to quickly draw up efficient treatment plans. It uses AI to connect a person’s medical data with its own massive database and identify hard-to-diagnose or rare illnesses.
https://www.israel21c.org/the-ai-tech-that-can-spot-serious-illness-before-the-doctor/
https://lavaa.health/
 
Revolutionizing group therapy with VR & AI. (TY Sharon) One of the Israeli startups presenting at the Conference of Presidents’ “Resilience Panel” was neao – a pioneering Virtual Reality platform for remote group therapy. It features anonymity (with avatars), wider access and accessibility, and tailored environments.
https://neao.io/  https://www.meta.com/experiences/neao-group-therapy/8222701291141191/
 
No-mask solution for sleep apnea. (TY Sharon) Another Israeli startup presenting at the Conference of Presidents’ “Resilience Panel” was appscent medical. Its SCENTIFIC® device is the world’s first non-intrusive, contactless, drug-free home use solution for the potentially dangerous sleep apnea condition.
https://www.appscent.com/   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fV61Vnt3fx4
 
3 new medical schools. (TY WIN) Israel needs 2,000 new doctors every year but only gets 1,200. So it is opening three new medical schools, The private Reichman University in Herzliya (88 graduates) opened on 2nd Feb. Two others, at Haifa University (66) and Weizmann Institute of Science (40), are to open in Oct.
https://tps.co.il/articles/israel-launches-three-new-medical-schools-to-address-shortage-of-doctors/
 

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WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

‘A Variety of Tactics Designed to Induce Conversion’: The Persecution of Christians, January 2025 by Raymond Ibrahim

By on March 2nd, 2025

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/21440/persecution-of-christians-january

“Typically, kidnapped girls in Pakistan, some as young as 10, are abducted, forced to convert to Islam and raped under cover of Islamic ‘marriages’ and are then pressured to record false statements in favor of the kidnappers, rights advocates say. Judges routinely ignore documentary evidence related to the children’s ages, handing them back to kidnappers as their ‘legal wives.’ — Morning Star News, February 7, 2025, Pakistan.

In just the three weeks between Christmas 2024 and these attacks of Jan. 15, at least 128 Christians have been slaughtered in the North Kivu region alone. — Congo.

“Paki establishment has created a nation where the rights of minorities are trampled upon with alarming regularity. By empowering hardline groups and allowing them free rein, the Army has nurtured a culture of extremism that targets Christians, Hindus, Ahmadis, and other minorities with brutal precision…. Police rarely act to protect victims, while legal loopholes and vague religious laws, such as the infamous blasphemy law, are weaponized against them. These tools of oppression serve not only to silence dissent but also to provide cover for the perpetrators of violence. In the case of minority girls, the judicial system often works to retain victims against their will, legitimizing forced conversions and marriages under the pretext of religious freedom. This legal framework is no accident—it is the product of an establishment that has long relied on radical Islamists as a tool of power. These alliances have turned Pakistan into a hotbed of extremism, destabilizing not just its internal fabric but the entire region. The unchecked violence against minorities is not an aberration but the inevitable outcome of decades of Army-sponsored radicalization.” — News Intervention, January 7, 2025, Pakistan.

“There is also a new emphasis on targeting Coptic women who suffer physical or mental health problems, which make them doubly vulnerable. This enables the abductors to create confusion regarding the circumstances of a disappeared Coptic girl, creating a narrative of a love story utilizing existing relationships and communications, despite orchestrating the entire situation…” — Coptic Solidarity, January 29, 2025, Egypt.

Court documents make clear that these sentencings revolve around religion. — Iran.

According to multiple sources, non-Muslim students, many of whom are Christian, are being “subjected to a variety of tactics designed to induce conversion.” — Malaysia.

“Somalia’s constitution establishes Islam as the state religion and prohibits the propagation of any other religion, according to the U.S. State Department. It also requires that laws comply with sharia (Islamic law) principles, with no exceptions in application for non-Muslims. The death penalty for apostasy is part of Islamic law according to mainstream schools of Islamic jurisprudence. An Islamic extremist group in Somalia, Al Shabaab, is allied with Al Qaeda and adheres to the teaching.” — Morning Star News, February 7, 2025.

“Christians in Indonesia say they are routinely pressured to make extra payments known as ‘grease’ to local officials or residents in order to obtain construction permits in the 83.3-percent Muslim country. When Muslim residents opposed to the St. Anthony church construction demonstrated in the street, one Catholic commented on social media, ‘Those who demonstrate do it because there was no grease available.'” — Morning Star News, February 8, 2025.

According to an Indonesian attorney speaking on condition of anonymity, this “grease” is “a kind of bribery paid to protestors to keep them from blocking church construction, though not legally acknowledged even when it is paid in full view of police.”

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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Dressing for the Role: Zelensky, Polonius, and the Theater of Politics Zelensky’s refusal to wear a suit in the Oval Office wasn’t just a fashion choice—it was theater, signaling defiance, playing to his audience, and raising questions about respect and diplomacy. By Roger Kimball

By on March 2nd, 2025

https://amgreatness.com/2025/03/02/dressing-for-the-role-zelensky-polonius-and-the-theater-of-politics/

I believe that most students, when first reading Hamlet, are inclined to regard Polonius as a sententious fool, present mostly for comic relief.

Sententious he may be. But it strikes me that most of his advice is wise and to the point.

Consider, to take one example, his famous speech to his son Laertes as the young man prepares to sail for France.

Is there a single item among Polonius’s “few precepts” that rings false?

I think that the speech, though pitched a bit high rhetorically, is full of good advice, from the bits at the beginning about holding one’s tongue to the concluding “to thine own self be true” admonition at the end.

Thinking about Volodymyr Zelensky’s performance in the Oval Office on Friday, it occurred to me that the Ukrainian president might profit by emulating certain of Polonius’s strictures. I am not thinking of Dane’s advice that one should “Give thy thoughts no tongue, nor any unproportioned thought his act.” Nor am I thinking of Polonius’s sage advice, “Neither a borrower nor a lender be.” Both, to be sure, are sound prescriptions that the President of Ukraine might practice to his advantage.

But no: what impressed me as I digested the theater of the Zelensky Oval Office outing was something apparently more trivial. It revolved around what Polonius said about clothes, especially his observation that “the apparel oft proclaims the man.” Before the fireworks really started, at about minute 40 of the 50-minute Oval Office press conference when Zelensky and J.D. Vance got into it, someone asked why the President of Ukraine was not wearing a suit.

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MOVIES AND TELEVISION Comments turned off

What the Red-Hand Pin Means to Jews, and Why It Matters Michael Kaplan

By on March 2nd, 2025

https://www.thewrap.com/what-the-red-hand-pin-means-for-jews/

At last year’s Oscars ceremony, a number of celebrities, including Billie Eilish, Ramy Youssef and Mark Ruffalo, wore the red-hand pin provided by an organization called Artists4Ceasefire. 

Artists4Ceasefire is again calling upon Hollywood luminaries to wear their pin at this Sunday’s Oscars.

Artists4Ceasefire describes itself as calling for “an immediate and permanent ceasefire, full hostage release, and delivery of lifesaving aid in Gaza” and claims that their pin, which depicts a red hand with a black heart in its center, “symbolizes support for universal human rights and lasting peace.”

Let’s ignore the fact that there currently is a ceasefire, that hostages are being released, and that aid is being delivered in Gaza (as it has been throughout the war). What could possibly be problematic in a call for “human rights and lasting peace?”

The problem is in the symbolism of the red hand itself. For many Jews, this symbol is an explicit reference to a 2000 incident in which a group of Palestinians in Ramallah brutally murdered two captured Israeli military reservists. The murderers then held up their bloody, red hands to the delight of a cheering crowd.

Thus, for many Jews, the red hand pin is a symbol of the murder of Jews, and those wearing it are, whether they know it or not, calling for and supporting such murder.

So what do Artists4Ceasefire and those who will wear the pins on Sunday think that the pins mean?

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