RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/03/no_israeli_coronaivirus_vaccine_for_me_iranian_journalist_tweets.html

As coronavirus panic spreads, scientists around the world are working to develop a vaccine to combat the disease.  Along with scientists in other countries, scientists in Israel and the U.S. announced they’ve had some early successes in the development process, although obviously much more remains to be done before anything is ready for humans.  

Amid fears of a looming pandemic, scientists in the US and across the globe are scrambling to develop vaccines — including in Israel, where one group of researchers says it could be ready in just three weeks and available for use within 90 days.

The scientists at the Galilee Research Institute, known as MIGAL, are adapting its vaccine against the avian coronavirus infectious bronchitis virus, or IBV, to work for the novel coronavirus known as COVID-19, the Jerusalem Post reported.

“Congratulations to MIGAL on this exciting breakthrough. I am confident that there will be further rapid progress, enabling us to provide a needed response to the grave global COVID-19 threat,” said Ofir Akunis, Israel’s minister of science and technology. …

MIGAL CEO David Zigdon said the vaccine could “achieve safety approval in 90 days,” according to the Jerusalem Post.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15719/eu-closing-borders

Even Germany is unwilling to take any of the migrants shuttled by Erdogan to the Greek-Turkish border.

“I thank Greece for being our European ‘aspida’ [the Greek word for shield].” — European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, March 3, 2020.

The “solidarity” with Greece expressed by leading EU representatives seems to have come from having no alternatives other than relying on Greece to struggle with the situation.

Even if the EU manages to resolve its issues with Erdogan, which is doubtful and bound to be only temporary, Europe’s fundamental problem will remain: As long as migrants think that a better future awaits them in Europe, the welfare states, which have shown themselves extremely accommodating in receiving migrants and granting them all sorts of social rights, can continue expecting migrants to try breaching Europe’s borders.

On February 27, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan made good on his many threats to send millions of migrants and refugees to Europe, despite a 2016 dealbetween Europe and Turkey to hold them. Apparently seeking to make Europe experience the full force of his intentions, Turkish officials sent busloads of migrants — predominantly young men from Afghanistan and Iran, according to several reports — to Turkey’s border with Greece.

“We prepared a plan with our colleagues and we are committed to arranging free buses for the refugees in Bolu towards the border town of Edirne,” said Tanju Özcan, the mayor of Bolu, a town in northern Turkey, 550 kilometers from the border with Greece. “Refugees willing to go to Edirne can apply to the Bolu municipality and its branches. We are ready to assure the transport whatever the number [of refugees].”

https://quillette.com/2020/03/12/china-exploiting-false-accusations-of-racism/

When confronted, China frequently accuses its critics of racism. Last month, for example, Beijing expelled three Wall Street Journal reporters in retribution for an opinion column titled “China Is the Real Sick Man of Asia.” China Daily, a Communist Party mouthpiece, declared the headline “astonishingly racist”—despite the fact the term “sick man” is routinely used idiomatically to describe countries facing economic challenges, and isn’t connected to the Coronavirus outbreak.

In January, the Chinese embassy in Denmark demanded an apology after a Danish newspaper printed a cartoon related to the Coronavirus outbreak: a Chinese flag with virus icons where the stars should be. Embassy staff stated flatly that the cartoon “is an insult to China and hurts the feelings of the Chinese people.” In 2018, similarly, China’s ambassador in Ottawa said Canada’s arrest of a politically connected Chinese tech executive was motivated by “white supremacy.” (Beijing then retaliated by arresting two Canadians in China.)

To be clear, the Coronavirus outbreak truly has led to some racist attacks on Chinese people (and other Asians) around the world. The specter of an epidemic often brings out the worst in us. And even in the best of times, xenophobes need little provocation to rail against foreigners. Such prejudice is unacceptable, and should be condemned.

Yet we must also be aware that the Chinese government has learned to weaponize our own progressive tendencies, and has learned to exploit false accusations of racism against democratic societies. Ironically, this same Chinese regime encourages racism and xenophobia domestically.

https://thefederalist.com/2020/03/13/communist-chinese-propagandists-now-claim-u-s-military-made-wuhan-virus/

No country can afford to rely on its greatest adversaries for survival.

In case Americans were not already convinced Communist China constituted such a foe, since the Chinese coronavirus spread across the globe, the country threatened by way of its leading propaganda publication to impose pharmaceutical export controls that “plunge[] [America] into the mighty sea of coronavirus,” and now its senior propagandists are pinning the pandemic on the U.S. military.

Friendly nations do not falsely accuse their friends of spreading pandemics that originated on their own shores; nor do they steal hundreds of billions of dollars per year in intellectual property; nor do they demand that those who transact with them fastidiously toe their government line; nor do they engage in rampant national security-imperiling espionage efforts.

Therefore, when the fog of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) coronavirus chaos clears, the most important geopolitical takeaway for America ought to be the imperative to decouple from China in every strategically significant area, from medicine to military hardware.

This will not be possible if our media, political class, and business community prioritize political correctness and partisanship—not to mention profit—over the well-being of our country. Certainly not if they continue actively contributing to CCP information operations, like the one currently underway.

https://voiceofeurope.com/2020/03/czech-republic-follows-trumps-lead-and-bans-entry-of-citizens-from-15-nations/

(AP) Czech citizens coming home from 15 countries that are considered risky due to the virus outbreak will have to stay under quarantine for two weeks.

The announcement Friday by the Czech Republic’s government listed the following countries: China, Iran, Korea, Belgium, Denmark, France, Italy, Germany, Netherlands, Austria, Spain, Sweden, Norway, Switzerland and Britain.

Foreigners from those countries are barred from traveling to the Czech Republic and Czechs are not allowed to travel to those countries.

Those measures become effective Friday midnight when the country renews border checks with Austria and Germany.

The Czech Republic has 117 confirmed cases of COVID-19.