RUTHFULLY YOURS

Former U.S. President Barack Obama defied Republican opposition and quietly released $221 million to the Palestinian Authority (PA) in the final hours of his administration, officials toldThe Associated Press on Monday.

Republican members of Congress had been holding up the money to the PA, but a State Department official and several congressional aides said the outgoing administration formally notified Congress it would spend the money Friday morning, just before Donald Trump became president.

More than $227 million in foreign affairs funding was released at the time, including $4 million for climate change programs and $1.25 million for UN organizations, according to AP.

The Obama administration had for some time been pressing for the release of the money for the Palestinian Authority, which comes from the U.S. Agency for International Development and is to be used for humanitarian aid in Judea, Samaria and Gaza, to support political and security reforms as well as help prepare for good governance and the rule of law in a future Palestinian state, according to the notification sent to Congress quoted by the news agency.

The official and the aides spoke to AP on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to speak publicly on the matter.

Last March it was reported that members of Congress were delaying a payment of $159 million in aid allocated for the PA in an effort to pressure the PA to relaunch negotiations with Israel.

That was not the first time that the United States’ aid to the PA has made headlines in recent years. Washington has several times cut – and subsequently resumed – the financial aid to the PA.

Previously, this issue made headlines was when the PA unilaterally applied to join the International Criminal Court (ICC). The Obama administration indicated at the time it was reviewing its annual $440 million aid package to the PA because of the decision.

According to the reports, Syrian authorities are withholding the bodies of more than 456 Palestinians who died under torture in prison. No one knows exactly where the bodies are being held or why the Syrian authorities are refusing to hand them over to the relatives.

Mainstream media outlets seem to prefer turning a blind eye to the plight of Palestinians living in Arab countries. This evasion harms first and foremost the Palestinians themselves and allows Arab governments to continue their policies of persecution and repression.

It remains to be seen whether the UN Security Council will get its priorities straight and hold an emergency session to discuss the murderous campaign against Palestinians in Syria. Perhaps, somehow, this will overtake “settlement construction” as a topic worthy of world condemnation.

2016 was a tough year for the Palestinians. It was tough not only for those Palestinians living in the West Bank under the Palestinian Authority (PA) regime, or the Gaza Strip under Hamas. When Westerners hear about the “plight” and “suffering” of Palestinians, they instantly assume that the talk is about those living in the West Bank or Gaza Strip. Rarely does the international community hear about what is happening to Palestinians in the Arab countries. This lapse doubtless exists because the misery of Palestinians in the Arab countries is difficult to pin on Israel.

The international community and mainstream journalists only know of those Palestinians living in the West Bank or the Gaza Strip. Of course, life under the Palestinian Authority and Hamas is no box of dates, although this inconvenient fact might be rather unpleasant to the ears of Western journalists and human rights organizations.

In any event, mainstream media outlets seem to prefer turning a blind eye to the plight of Palestinians living in Arab countries. This evasion harms first and foremost the Palestinians themselves and allows Arab governments to continue their policies of persecution and repression.

The past few years have seen horror stories about the conditions of Palestinians in Syria. Where is the media attention for the Palestinians in this war-stricken country? Palestinians in Syria are being murdered, tortured, imprisoned and displaced. The West yawns.

Foreign journalists covering the Middle East swarm by the hundreds throughout Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. Yet they act as if Palestinians can only be found in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. These journalists have no desire to go to Syria or other Arab countries to report about the mistreatment and trespasses perpetrated by Arabs against their Palestinian brothers. For these journalists, Arabs killing and torturing other Arabs is not news. But when Israeli policemen shoot and kill a Palestinian terrorist who rams his truck into a group of soldiers and kills and wounds them, Western reporters rush to visit his family’s home to interview them and provide them with a platform to express their thoughts.

Palestinians living in Syria, however, are less fortunate. No one is asking how they feel about the devastation of their families, communities and lives. Especially not the hundreds of Middle East correspondents working in the region.

“The year 2016 was full of all forms of killings, torture and displacement of Palestinians in Syria,” according to recent reports published in a number of Arab media outlets.

“The last year was hell for these Palestinians and its harsh consequences will not be erased for many years to come. During 2016, Palestinians in Syria were subjected to the cruelest forms of torture and deprivation at the hands armed gangs and the ruling Syrian regime. It is hard to find one Palestinian family in Syria that has not been affected.”

ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS

Successful bone transplants. I reported previously (often) on the revolutionary method from Israel’s Bonus BioGroup for growing bone in the lab from a patient’s own fat cells. Latest trials show that bone, injected into the jaws of all 11 patients, successfully fused to existing bone and filled gaps in their deteriorating jawbones.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-company-performs-first-transplant-of-lab-grown-bones/
http://www.bonus-bio.com/index.php/press-room/press-releases
https://www.youtube.com/embed/WpXZUOD9j48?rel=0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AD7bwLhG7dU

European approval to grow bone from coral. (TY Harold G) I reported previously (twice) about Israel’s CoreBone which grows ultra-strong bone-graft material in the laboratory from corals. CoreBone recently received both CE and ISO 13485 certification to allow the company to sell the product in Europe.
http://www.israel21c.org/growing-new-bone-from-corals-raised-in-the-israeli-desert/

How viruses communicate. Weizmann Institute scientists have discovered that some viruses (phages) secrete small molecules that are read and updated by other copies of the same virus. Viruses use this to coordinate their attack and will go dormant if these molecules indicate that insufficient uninfected host cells remain.
http://wis-wander.weizmann.ac.il/life-sciences/viruses-overheard-talking-one-another

Pain relief for osteoarthritis. Israel’s Moebius Medical is developing MM-II, a novel treatment for osteoarthritis pain. MM-II’s proprietary liposomes lubricate arthritic knee joints, to reduce friction and wear, and pain in the joints. Moebius has contracted with India’s Sun Pharmaceutical to further develop MM-II.
http://www.globes.co.il/en/article-moebius-and-sun-sign-osteoarthritis-drug-licensing-deal-1001166429

Plant extract mimics insulin. (TY Liat) A new study in Austria has confirmed the anti-diabetic properties of the purslane herb extract Portulaca oleracea L. Israel’s Frutarom manufactures Portusana®, a scientifically supported and unique purslane extract.
http://www.frutaromhealth.com/2016/12/07/research-suggests-purslane-extract-mimics-insulin/

Improved ECG is saving lives. I reported previously (Nov 2014) about HyperQ from Israel’s Biological Signal Processing (BSP) that discovers heart problems that normal ECG tests cannot. BSP’s CEO Dr Yair Granot came on ILTV Daily and said HyperQ had been sold worldwide, including to anti-Israel Venezuela!
https://www.youtube.com/embed/ybAhnD8snUY?rel=0

Low-cost proton therapy to destroy tumors. I reported previously (twice) about Israel’s P-Cure which has developed low-cost Proton radiation therapy devices to kill cancer tumors. The revolutionary technology was explained recently on ILTV daily. https://www.youtube.com/embed/DPf2Hu616i8?rel=0

App to streamline emergency response. Magen David Adom, Israel’s national emergency service, has developed the My MDA app. It provides dispatchers and ambulance teams with advance information, including the exact location of the user, medical information, and photos or a live video feed from the scene.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/magen-david-adom-app-aims-to-streamline-emergency-response/

An excellent brain scientist. Professor Haim Sompolinsky of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem won Israel’s EMET prize for Excellence in Life Sciences (Brain Research) for his work on the principles of brain function and the behavior of neuronal networks, and for shaping brain theories into a systematic discipline.
http://en.emetprize.org/laureates/life-sciences/brain-research/haim-sompolinsky

Thank you for fighting Ebola. On the first ever state visit to Israel, the President Ernest Bai Koroma of the Muslim-majority Sierra Leone expressed his gratitude for the Jewish state’s assistance in fighting the Ebola virus. “That we have put the Ebola behind us is because of the support of this nation” he said.
http://www.thetower.org/4435-watch-president-of-sierra-leone-thanks-israel-for-help-fighting-ebola/
https://www.youtube.com/embed/ebeDTCQwNrs?rel=0

Last weekend’s Paris ‘summit’, which endorsed the hoary myth that the fabled ‘two-state solution’ is possible even as Hamas and Fatah remain at each other’s throats, was a parting ‘gift’ to Israel by Barack Obama. Once again, purported friends of the Jews’ betray them.

Representatives of more than 70 countries and organisations met in Paris last weekend to discuss and map out a way to a two-state resolution of the war between the Arabs and the Israelis, a war which the Arabs started in 1948 – the day after the Declaration of Independence by the newborn Jewish State. This is not the first time Jews are being betrayed by their ‘friends’.

This conference was not conducted in the French spa town Evian-les-Bains, where, in the Hotel Royal, on 6-15 of July, 1938, representatives of 32 countries slammed the door to safety in the face of desperate German Jewish refugees, under deadly threat from the Nazis. Every delegate rose to express sympathy for their plight, but no country, save the tiny Dominican Republic, offered refuge. The United States and Britain, citing economic concerns, were the undisputed leaders in refusing to admit people on the verge of the Nazi genocide. The other countries followed suit.

The significance of the Evian conference’s outcome, which astonished and delighted Adolf Hitler, was that it gave the Nazis carte blanche to conduct the Holocaust. The Evian conference conclusively demonstrated that no matter what Hitler did, Jews had neither powerful friends they could draw upon, nor could they resist his plans.

Despite the displeasure of some who feel that Jewish insistence on remembering the Holocaust is ‘too distressing’, history cannot be ignored nor forgotten. It certainly cannot be forgotten by the Jewish people, whose existence was threatened to the point of extinction.

The physical existence of the Jews has been threatened many times. It was threatened throughout their long, blood-spattered history in Europe: by Russian pogroms and the English, Spanish and Portuguese expulsions; by the 1506 massacre of Portuguese Jews in Lisbon; by the German gas chambers and by Polish hatred; by Hungarian deportations and Ukrainian massacres; by Vichy France’s collaboration with Hitler in expediting the transfer of Jews to the extermination camps; by the Lithuanian murder squads and many, many, many others, equally enthusiastic in manifesting their antisemitic hatred; and by the British Navy blockade, even after the horrors of the Holocaust, of the Palestine mandate.

And yet, and yet, even in the darkest hours of Jewish suffering, there were some decent people in every nation who helped Jews, placing themselves and their dear ones in mortal danger. That, along with the Jewish belief in One G-d, has confirmed the Jewish dream and the Jewish conviction that no matter what, there are people who refuse to behave like animals, and who deserve the high distinction of being called human – righteous amongst the nations.