Restoring Jewish Sites Throughout Morocco Abraham Accords: The gift that keeps on giving. Hugh Fitzgerald

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2022/01/abraham-accords-gift-keeps-giving-hugh-fitzgerald/

Four Arab countries – the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan, and Morocco – have now joined the Abraham Accords and “normalized ties” with Israel. While much attention has been paid to the business deals – involving trade, technology, and tourism – made between Israel and the UAE, that in the first year now amount to $675 million worth of agreements, from Morocco comes another sort of tie that binds, and that transcends business: It Is the rediscovery and restoration of Morocco’s Jewish past. A report on this effort is here: “Moroccan King Orders Restoration of Hundreds of Jewish Sites,” Algemeiner, December 13, 2021:

King Mohammed VI of Morocco recently introduced an initiative to restore hundreds of historical Jewish sites in the kingdom, according to Arab media reports.

The move is part of the rapprochement between Rabat and Jerusalem, which resumed diplomatic relations earlier this year as part of the Abraham Accords, according to the reports.

The rapprochement was helped along by the Trump Administration, which persuaded Morocco to join the Abraham Accords and, by way of encouragement, announced that Washington recognized Morocco’s claim to the western Sahara, long disputed between, and fought over by, Morocco and the Algerian-backed Polisario Front.

Morocco’s recent royals have been well-disposed to Jews. The present king’s grandfather, King Mohammed V, protected the 250,000 Moroccan Jews during World War II from both the Nazis and Vichy authorities. He prevented roundups, most famously in Casablanca. He refused to enforce Vichy’s anti-Jewish legislation. He publicly declared that “There are no Jews in Morocco. There are only Moroccan subjects.” No Moroccan Jews were deported or killed during the war.

His son King Hassan II was similarly well-disposed to Jews, and employed a Moroccan Jew, Andre Azoulay, as one of his advisors. Azoulay has for many years been the senior adviser to his son, King Mohammed VI.

Campus Struggle Sessions USA The woke Maoist enforcers are coming for those who won’t bend the knee. Matthew Vadum

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2022/01/campus-struggle-sessions-matthew-vadum/

Ritualized humiliation and self-abasement are becoming the norm for those in higher education who defy the campus enforcers of wokeness.

In a scene out of Communist China’s Cultural Revolution, current law professor Jason Kilborn and former college administrator Jodi Shaw — both white people — are the latest victims of mandatory reeducation at the hands of the race-weaponizing radicals who run the academy.

This disturbing move in the direction of normalizing academic brainwashing comes as things go the opposite way for parents nationwide who, thanks to well-publicized examples of arrogant leftist educrats’ damaging public admissions, are making great strides attacking critical race theory (CRT) at the local and state levels.

But taking on school boards over CRT doesn’t help Kilborn, a professor at the University of Illinois Chicago School of Law. He has been ordered by his employer to endure mandatory reeducation as punishment for using an abbreviated version of a racial slur in a legal hypothetical about race-based employment discrimination on an exam. The issue was whether the information concerned in the hypothetical was work product.

Students whined that the use of the term, even with 5 of its 6 letters redacted, was hurtful, and the school’s Black Law Students Association demanded that Kilborn be fired.

Sydney Williams: “Knowledge versus Wisdom”

https://swtotd.blogspot.com/
Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?”

                                                                                                                                T.S. Eliot (1888-1965)

                                                                                                                                Choruses from “The Rock,” 1934

Eliot’s concern, during the dark days of 1930s Depression, was the loss of religious faith. While faith is still missing from many of our lives in these temporal times, the more pressing concern is the lack of wisdom amidst so much knowledge. Our leaders, not only in politics but in business, the media, schools, colleges, Hollywood, Wall Street and professional sports, are steeped in the knowledge that specific jobs require, but there is a paucity of wisdom. This concern is not new. The Book of Proverbs, written around 700 BC, addresses the issue in chapter 4, verse 7: “Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore, get wisdom. And in all your getting, get understanding.”

Earth is estimated to be 4.5 billion years old. Modern homo sapiens arrived about 160,000 years ago, and recorded history dates back 5000 years. Do we ever consider the shortness of our own lives within this continuum of life? The physical conveniences we take for granted – communication, transportation, flush toilets, medicine, heating and cooling, photography, recreational pursuits – date back only a little over 200 years. My three-greats grandparents lived lives more recognizable to those who lived a thousand years previously than to us today. We live in what is called “The Information Age,” an historical period that followed the industrial age, beginning in mid-20th Century. It is characterized by an epochal shift from an economy based on mining and manufacturing to one based on information technology and genetic modification. Unsurprisingly, growth in technologies have exceeded our ability to adapt. We have gained knowledge, but do we understand and appreciate its consequences?

As more time has been spent acquiring knowledge, we have become less wise. Buckminster Fuller (1895-1983) created the Knowledge Doubling Curve, which showed that until 1900 the amount of information extant doubled every century. By the end of World War II, information was doubling every twenty-five years. Today, data is estimated to be doubling every year, and IBM reckons the “internet of things” will lead to a doubling of knowledge every twelve hours.  Yet, the wisdom of the ancients is unchanged and is as relevant today as when the words were uttered: Tacitus, “The desire for safety stands against every great and noble enterprise;” Confucius, “Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in rising every time we fail;” Marcus Aurelius, “Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one.” Sadly, the classics, which are filled with wisdom – from the Bible to the Greek poets, from Roman philosophers to Shakespeare, from Aesop to J.R.R. Tolkien – are no longer required reading in schools and universities. STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) courses have replaced them. The latter are, of course, crucial disciplines in today’s competitive, technological world, but when they are not accompanied by classics the ability to place all that knowledge in perspective is lost.

Biden at 11 months: ‘One of the worst years ever’ by Paul Bedard

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/washington-secrets/biden-at-11-months-one-of-the-worst-years-ever

All of the hope in President Joe Biden’s 21-minute inaugural address, which promised “unity, unity,” has not only evaporated in his first 11 months but left people feeling that 2021 was “one of the worst years ever,” according to the latest Rasmussen Reports survey.

In the poll previewed by Secrets, likely voters said that they not only believe the year was a bust, but that a majority feel 2022 will be bad also.

“If there’s any bright spot in the public’s grim assessment of 2021, at least it was better than 2020, which Americans rated the worst year in more than a decade of surveying,” said Rasmussen in a not so uplifting analysis.

The numbers:

74% said 2021 was a fair to poor year, with most, 48%, calling it poor.
Just 23% called it a good to the best year ever, with just 2% dubbing it “one of the best years.”
63% of Democrats agreed that it was fair to poor.
50% expect 2022 to be fair to poor, and 41% believe it will be good to the best.

The Warren-Biden Bank Heist A coup at the FDIC breaks norms and signals more political control of finance.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-senator-elizabeth-warren-biden-bank-heist-fdic-jelena-mcwilliams-rohit-chopra-gruenberg-khan-cfpb-federal-reserve-nominee-11641155812?mod=opinion_lead_pos1

Elizabeth Warren finally got her woman—that is, the Senator and her many acolytes in the Biden Administration have succeeded in ousting Jelena McWilliams as chair of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. The coup deserves attention because of its norm-breaking precedent and what it signals for bank mergers and supposedly independent regulatory agencies.

Ms. McWilliams resigned on Dec. 31, effective Feb. 4, to avoid more turmoil at the bank regulator. But as she wrote in these pages on Dec. 16, her resignation comes amid a concerted and unprecedented political effort to strip her of authority before her term as chair expires in June 2023.

***

The coup has been led by Rohit Chopra, the Warren protege who now runs the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and is one of four current members of the FDIC board (one post is vacant). The FDIC’s longstanding practice and bylaws, based on its interpretation of the law, is that the chair sets the board’s agenda.

Every administration for 88 years has honored that understanding, including the supposedly norm-breaking Trump Administration. Democrat Martin Gruenberg was allowed to continue as chair until June 2018 after President Trump took office, and no one attempted to oust him.

Enter the Warren-Biden progressives in a hurry. The Senate confirmed Mr. Chopra on Sept. 30 on a 50-48 vote, and as soon as Oct. 31 he presented Ms. McWilliams with a request for information (RFI) on bank mergers. When she said the draft RFI would have to be vetted by FDIC staff, Mr. Chopra publicly released his own RFI without authority from his post at the CFPB, which the FDIC was obliged to contradict.

Biden Administration Must At Least Help Any Country Trying to Confront Iran’s Mullahs by Majid Rafizadeh

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/18084/confront-iran-mullahs

While the mullahs are using religion to justify their mission of taking over the region, they are more likely attempting to take control of all the oil in the region; they appear to be advancing their hegemonic ambitions to this end.

Iran has for decades been encircling the Middle East — in Syria, Lebanon and Iraq — by building a squeeze maneuver known as the “Shia Crescent; ” it has been trying to unseat the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia through Iran’s Houthi proxies in Yemen, and it long ago attached itself to South America’s most oil-rich country, Venezuela.

Please now imagine how much more destabilizing the Iranian regime would be if it had nuclear weapons, how much easier it would be for the regime to fulfill its constitutional mission of “extending the sovereignty of God’s law throughout the world.”

Biden’s legacy now looks as if will add up to surrendering Afghanistan to the Taliban; allowing Iran to acquire nuclear weapons; permitting China to take over Taiwan; enabling Russia to blackmail Europe with the Nord Stream 2 pipeline; failing to deter Russia from seizing Ukraine; harming the poorest Americans by forcing them pay more for everything by shutting off American oil and instead enriching Russia by buying it there at inflated prices; effectively cutting pay to the military and threatening to punish people who work by raising their taxes, all while paying millions of other people not to work; and to top it off, crippling the US military by diverting it from its core mission: winning wars.

If… any real response to Iran’s threats will have to wait until 2024, will that be too late to stop at least one of these imminent catastrophes?

The Iranian regime has made it clear that its mission is to take over the region and create a single community under its version of Islamic leadership. The Islamic Republic’s constitution states:

“The Constitution provides the necessary basis for ensuring the continuation of the Revolution at home and abroad. In particular, in the development of international relations, the Constitution will strive with other Islamic and popular movements to prepare the way for the formation of a single world community (in accordance with the Qur’anic verse: This, your community, is a single community, and I am your Lord, so worship Me).”

The Mystery Man of Sanaa by Amir Taheri

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/18087/sanaa-mystery-man

He [the late Ambassador Hassan Ayerloo] had reorganized Ansar Allah, the armed wing of the Houthi movement, raising the number of its fighters from 1,000 in 2005 to over 10,000 last year. Thanks to Ayerloo’s leadership, the Houthis, initially a small tribal group in Saada, northern Yemen, was built into a major political movement seeking to rule the whole of Yemen.

Ayatollah Ali Yunesi includes Sanaa among the four Arab capitals he claims Iran now controls, the others being Baghdad, Damascus and Beirut.

The news last week of the death in mysterious circumstances of the Iranian ambassador to Sanaa reminded me of a 19th century English limerick:

Who and where and when and what
Is the Akhund of Swat
Is he lean or is he fat
Is he cold or is he hot
The Akhund of Swat?

The Akhund of Swat was a cleric leading a tribal rebellion against the British Raj in the badlands of Pashstunistan. The questions posed in the limerick went unanswered as, one foggy day in the mountains, the Akhund disappeared. And since no one could claim to have actually seen the Akhund, an endless number of fables were woven around his name.

Is Biden’s Legacy Really Going to Be the Dismantling of Democracies and the Free World? by Richard Kemp

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/18089/biden-legacy-dismantling-democracies

Biden inflicted untold damage on the free world by his catastrophic surrender in Afghanistan, demonstrating to America’s enemies and friends alike that, under his administration, the US was no longer willing to stand by its allies nor to protect its own vital national interests.

Now Biden is planning discussions in early 2022 between Russia and selected NATO members to “defuse” the situation [Russia threatening the Ukraine]. Can he really believe that any negotiations short of capitulation to Russian demands would satisfy Putin or achieve anything? So-called diplomacy down the barrel of 90,000 Russian guns looks a lot like even more appeasement.

Biden has failed to respond to Iranian attacks on Saudi Arabia, Iranian aggression against Israel and even Iranian attacks on US forces in Syria and Iraq. Iran’s contempt for Biden was further displayed last week in the launch of multiple ballistic missiles during manoeuvres that Iranian commanders explicitly said were intended to threaten Israel.

In the face of Iranian nuclear provocation, Biden’s officials have refrained from any threat of military action — taking off the table the only truly effective deterrent against regimes that respect strength alone.

Biden’s policies of appeasement towards Iran and Russia are bad enough. But the greatest threat to the free world today comes from China. Biden has a long record of appeasing Beijing.

Biden’s administration has projected only confusion over China’s ambitions against Taiwan. The president twice suggested the US might be willing to defend the country in the event of Chinese invasion, with his comments immediately walked back by officials… Similarly mixed messages coming from London led the Argentinian junta to believe Britain, despite its vast military superiority, would not fight to defend the Falkland Islands on the other side of the world, and actually encouraged the 1982 invasion.

“One of [Biden’s] first acts on assuming the presidency was to shut down the investigations into the origins of Covid-19 — including the one I led at the State Department in 2020, which presented troubling scientific and circumstantial evidence on the secret activities of the WIV [Wuhan Institute of Virology] that bolster the lab-leak theory”. — Dr David Asher, who spearheaded the State Department task force investigating the origins of Covid-19 and the role of the Chinese government, Hudson Institute, November 17, 2021

None of Biden’s acts of appeasement are isolated to their targets alone; they are widely observed and cumulative in effect. They embolden America’s enemies and unnerve its friends, potentially fracturing alliances that are vital to defending democracy. So much damage has already been done in just one year that even were Biden to change course, his legacy might well be the dismantling of democracies and the free world.

When US President Joe Biden took office, he removed a bust of Winston Churchill from the Oval Office. He should have replaced it with one of Neville Chamberlain. After Chamberlain’s infamous appeasement of Hitler at Munich in 1938, Churchill told him: “You were given the choice between war and dishonour. You chose dishonour, and you will have war.”

GOOD NEWS FROM AMAZING ISRAEL FROM MICHAEL ORDMAN

www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com

 

At the start of a new calendar year, Israelis continue to bring new innovations into the world to benefit humanity. A new heart implant, a new treatment for Parkinson’s, a new sleep quality analyzer, and a successful Israeli cancer treatment is launched. New social initiatives include for the disabled, Arab-Israeli coexistence and public diplomacy. New technology for solar cells, renewable energy storage, smart mobility, cyber security, animal-free meat, healthy soil and optical lenses. New programs and deals to generate and expand Israeli businesses. New cultural, entertainment and sporting successes. There are so many new reasons to look forward to a Very Good 2022. Michael Ordman

 

ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS
 
Implant for congestive heart failure patients. Israel’s Restore Medical develops the ContraBand implant that uses the patient’s Left Ventrical to assist a failing Right Ventrical for the treatment of congestive heart failure (CHF). It has just announced promising preliminary results of its First-in-Human clinical trials.
https://www.israelhayom.com/2021/12/01/israels-restore-medical-announces-first-in-human-trial-of-heart-failure-treatment/   https://restoremedical.co/
 
Boost for Parkinson’s treatment. Back in 2013 (see here previously) Tel Aviv University researchers found that the sugar substitute mannitol could protect the brain against Parkinson’s disease. But a trial could not get funding. So, entrepreneur and Parkinson’s sufferer Dan Vesely co-founded and crowdfunded CliniCrowd.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/318928    https://clinicrowd.info/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vo6z6OQsBRM
 
Israel starts trial of 4th vaccination. Israel’s Sheba Medical Center has begun the first study in the world of the efficacy of administering a fourth dose of the coronavirus vaccine. The 6,000 participants include 150 medical personnel who had a 3rd dose in August. They will receive the Pfizer vaccine.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-hospital-to-begin-study-on-efficacy-of-4th-covid-vaccine-dose/
 
How plants fight infections. Scientists at Israel’s Weizmann Institute have identified the complex way that plant bacteria fight off infections from viruses known as phages. A protein in the bacteria calls another protein to destroy a molecule inside itself that the phage needs to replicate. The cell dies but it stops the infection.
https://wis-wander.weizmann.ac.il/life-sciences/bacteria-and-plants-fight-alike
 
Monitor your sleep at home. (TY Hazel) No need to go to a sleep lab to analyze your sleep problems. The electrophysiological measurement solution from Israel’s X-trodes (see here previously) is ideal for home use. Its smart skin electrodes measure brainwaves, eye movement, skeletal muscles, cardiac activity and more.
https://www.israel21c.org/skip-the-sleep-lab-and-go-wireless-at-home/
 
9 top digital health companies. (TY Hazel) CB Insights has named nine Israeli-based health-tech startups in its 2021 Top 150 Digital Health Companies transforming healthcare. They include Vocalis, Sweetch, DiA Imaging, B.Well, C2I Genomics, Lumen, Nym Health, Theator and Empathy.
https://www.israel21c.org/8-israeli-startups-make-cb-insights-top-150-list/   https://b-well.co.il/  (Hebrew)
 
Israeli startups transforming telehealth. Some more innovative Israeli healthcare startups. Those not previously reported in this newsletter are medFlyt (caregiver management) and Sivan Innovation (Moovcare patient / physician communications) https://www.calcalistech.com/ctech/articles/0,7340,L-3921246,00.html  
https://www.medflyt.com/  https://vimeo.com/469424965  https://www.sivan-innovation.com/
 
$17 million for digital health. Israel has budgeted NIS 55 million for hospitals and health organizations etc., to build the digital infrastructure required for anonymized medical data sharing. It will spearhead major advances in groundbreaking research and innovative development by Israeli healthcare startups and research scientists.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-earmarks-17m-for-new-digital-health-innovation-program/
 
Cancer treatment goes into space. A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket took off for the International Space Station carrying a smart laboratory developed by Israel’s SpacePharma. It will test Doxil from Israel’s Ayana to see its effect on cells in zero gravity. Doxil is the first nanotechnology cancer treatment approved by the US FDA.
https://www.calcalistech.com/ctech/articles/0,7340,L-3925795,00.html

U.S. Brings a Pea-Shooter to a Gunfight With China BY David P. Goldman

https://pjmedia.com/spengler/2021/12/31/u-s-brings-a-pea-shooter-to-a-gunfight-with-china-n1545733

Many of my conservative friends are spinning their wheels with pea-shooter-gauge measures against China—kicking Chinese companies out of the U.S. stock market, for example. On Dec. 10 the U.S. government canceled an initial public offering for the Chinese AI startup SenseTime, whose facial recognition software may help Chinese authorities identify Uyghurs. Two weeks later SenseTime moved its IPO to Hong Kong; it rose 44% in the first two days of trading. China has a trade surplus, $3.2 trillion in reserves, and a 40% savings rate. It is an exporter, not an importer of capital. American capital markets are a convenience, not a necessity for Chinese companies.

We’ve brought a pea-shooter to a gunfight. There’s a big difference between winning, and making ourselves feel better while we’re losing.