RUTHFULLY YOURS

Barack Obama declared six years ago that the ultimate goal of his presidency was to fundamentally transform America. This has been not only his agenda, but for decades the goal of America’s political left wing. To transform a country one must first transform its people. Transformation takes place by changing the values by which people live and by changing their self-perception of who they are and what they are supposed to become.

Common Core does exactly that.

Common Core is to education what Obamacare is to healthcare. The purpose of both programs is to take away one’s individual choice, be it regarding healthcare or local influence on education. Both programs are transformative since they assault the most fundamental American liberties, the freedom to choose one’s doctor and medical remedies, and the freedom to educate one’s children by local values. Both programs give federal bureaucrats control over these most important aspects of life. They disenfranchise us as patients and parents. Controlling the lives of “those below” is the animating principle of Leftism and the elitists who wish to do the controlling.

A communist society takes choice away from the people and places it in the hands of a centralized apparatus removed from the people. In other words, it deprives the individual his liberty. Through centralization, the individual loses not only his liberty but is socially engineered to think a certain way and act in conformity and lock-step with how the ruling elite want its new underclass to act. Common Core seeks to create a common-ness among people, what the Communists refer to as “the masses.” America’s students are being groomed today to be future members of the “Commie Corps,” advocates and robots of a trans-individual system.

Americans have succeeded because of our special Judeo-Christian outlook on life, local control, and the confidence in a rugged individualism that inspired us to be the best we can be. Common Core changes all that. Our children will be trained by educators not to be rugged but common; not masters of our own fate but subjects of a ruling bureaucracy; not the possessors of a unique Judeo-Christian outlook but proponents of a transnational, socialist worldview.

One of the hallmarks and goals of socialist Marxism is to strip a country of its unique culture, history, attitudes, and self-perception. The first order of business for the Russian communists was to denude Russia of its Russo-ism as did Mao when stripping his country of its unique Chinese heritage. Thus, throughout the curriculum of Common Core, American heroes are minimized and castigated, our history maligned, our historic values seen as an affront to multiculturalism. Much of Common Core is an indictment of America. It indicts so as to remove.

Seldom do I venture outside the subject matter of constitutionalism, ideology and/or politics, but when I do it is either something personal, remarkable or both. The unique and innovative research and development taking place at Galectin Therapeutics™ is just such a subject. Should the scientists of this corporation succeed in bringing their product to market, the lives of millions of people in the United States – and potentially tens, if not hundreds of millions of people around the world – could be saved.

This issue is important to me because I have a personal experience with the evils of cancer and the fibrotic diseases. In 2000, my best friend from high school (a brother from the moment we met until the day he died) was taken from me, from his family, by the ravages of these diseases. He was diagnosed and taken in less than 30 days. The emotional toll on all his survivors was all encompassing and intense. It is with this personal understanding of the issue that the discovery of what Galectin Therapeutics is doing captivated my attention.

What would you say if I told you that a company – a gifted group of scientists – has developed a therapy that will save the lives of well over 15 million Americans suffering from diseases that currently have no cure, and that today can’t be detected until it is too late?

What would you say if I told you that the Food & Drug Administration is so impressed with the data surrounding this new drug therapy that they have awarded “Fast Track” status to this drug, and that, according to Morgan Brennan of CNBC Business News, there has never – never – been a Fast Tracked drug that has failed to come to market?

And what would you say if I told you that not only will this drug be extremely affordable when it comes to market, but that you – you – could be a part of this history-making endeavor?

Well, it is all true…and none-to-soon for the many people who suffer from fibrosis of the liver, kidneys and lungs, and some forms of cancer, thanks to groundbreaking work being done by the scientists at Galectin Therapeutics.

The UN Human Rights Council held a special session in Geneva on July 23, 2014 to declare effectively that Israelis do not have human rights. The vote was 29 in favor, 1 against and 17 abstentions.

The Obama administration voted against – after joining and legitimizing the virulently anti-Jewish Council for the past five years, and now feigning disappointment for American cameras.

The Europeans abstained because they did not want to upset their violent Muslim minorities, and because their sordid past didn’t leave the resolution’s message too foreign in any case. A few cowardly countries that Israelis have magnanimously befriended over the years also abstained.

But the majority of the UN world cheered – literally. Speakers during the procession of hatemongers at the Council were greeted with applause.

As is their wont, CNN, the New York Times and company derived from this spectacle the lesson that Israel is pathetic, isolated and doomed.

But the real takeaway is the polar opposite.

Israel really is a light unto the nations.

The light years between the UN “human rights” machinery and genuine human rights is actually pretty obvious. At least to folks without years of foreign policy wonking, diplomatic double-talk language schooling, or blinkered war correspondence training.

Here is how it went down.

The “Human Rights” Council session on Gaza was presided over by President Baudelaire Ndong Ella of Gabon, a member of the Islamic bloc of states (OIC), and UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay.

There you go again,” as Ronald Reagan said to Jimmy Carter. Once again the United Nations Human Rights Council has voted – with the United States dissenting – to conduct a so-called “investigation” of Israel’s military responses to Hamas’s double war crimes. Once again Israel will have to decide whether to feed the kangaroos that make up this court by cooperating with yet another phony investigation whose outcome is predetermined. Yet again Israel is presented with a Hobson’s choice: If it refuses to cooperate, it will blamed for denying the investigatory commission relevant information; if it cooperates it will lend credibility to a conclusion that has already been reached.

This Hamas-inspired investigation is an important part of Hamas’s double war crime strategy: By firing its rockets from civilian areas and buildings – even Ban Ki-moon acknowledges that it does – Hamas seeks to have Israel kill as many Palestinian civilians as possible. This Hamas-designed body count, and the accompanying photographs, inevitably leads to the kind of one-sided investigation in which the UNHRC specializes. The resulting one-sided condemnation, which Hamas can always count on, then helps it win support in Europe, South America and other parts of the world, as well as in the media and universities.

By joining in this Hamas strategy, indeed becoming a central part of it, the UNHRC encourages Hamas to repeat its rocket fire against Israeli civilians, its tunneling into Israel to kill and kidnap Israelis and its placement of rockets and tunnel entrances in civilian areas. The countries voting for this investigation are fully aware of what they are encouraging. They have the blood of future innocent Palestinians and Israelis on their hands.

Last time around the commission found a willing dupe in Richard Goldstone, who was prepared to put his personal ambition to elevate his status within the international community above any commitment to truth. Because Goldstone is Jewish and has spent time in Israel, his name attached to the commission’s report gave it an air of credibility. His dual conclusions – that Israel deliberately targeted Palestinian civilians and that Hamas did not use human shields – were so thoroughly discredited that they destroyed Goldstone’s career, and even his prospects of elevation within the international community. Eventually even Goldstone had to acknowledge his mistake and indicate that there was no evidentiary support for his widely cited conclusions.

This time around it will not be easy for the commission to find an ambitious dupe like Goldstone, because potential commission members now understand that their conclusions, methodologies and biases will be scrutinized with care and exposed for all to read.

US Secretary of State John FN Kerry went to see the parents of US citizen and fallen lone soldier Max Steinberg HY”D (May God Avenge his blood). Kerry put his foot so deeply into his mouth as to make it crystal clear why our rabbis decreed that one who goes to console a mourner should not speak until spoken to.

According to the Los Angeles Jewish Journal, “Kerry entered and exited the room swiftly, surrounded by men in black and refusing to take any questions from press.”

“How’s your day?” Kerry asked as he sat down. “How’s your day?” Evie [Steinberg’s mother] asked back. “My day’s going better than yours,” he said.

In the meantime, the Steinberg’s are overwhelmed with the support that they have received here in Israel.

Speaking to Arutz Sheva at Jerusalem’s Crowne Plaza Hotel, where the family are observing the seven-day shiva mourning period, Max’s mother expressed gratitude for “all the love” the family had received from complete strangers.

“I cannot believe that all of these people are here for our son, and all the people that are here are giving us strength to get through this horrible time for our family,” she said.

She recalled how her son had been inspired to join the IDF after visiting the grave of another fallen lone soldier from America: Michael Levin, who died fighting with the IDF’s Paratrooper Brigade during the 2006 Second Lebanon War.

Max’s father told how the Israeli people had “done everything they can to help us live through this very trying time.”

Addressing the family’s decision to bury Max in Israel – and not in LA as originally planned – he said they felt their decision had been validated after visiting Israel.

“…Once we got here and once we’ve been embraced by so many wonderful people.. and the beauty of the country and what it all stands for, there is no other decision.”

Some 30,000 people showed up at Steinberg’s funeral on Wednesday night.

The 3-mile-long tunnel from Gaza was designed for launching murder and kidnapping raids.

Americans are understandably concerned when they hear that the majority of Palestinian casualties in the fighting between Israel and Hamas have been civilians and when they see images of houses in Gaza reduced to rubble and women wailing. Given the lack of corresponding Israeli civilian casualties to date, this creates the impression of an unequal—and hence immoral—fight between Israel and Hamas.

Although American empathy for noncombatants is a critical component of who we are as a people, it should not blind us to reality: Israel’s military exists to protect its civilian population and seeks to avoid harming noncombatants, while its adversary cynically uses Palestinian civilians as human shields while deliberately targeting Israeli civilians.

I recently had the opportunity to see for myself the moral chasm between how the Israeli Defense Forces and Hamas treat civilians during military operations. In May I joined a dozen other retired U.S. generals and admirals on a trip to Israel with the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs.

Just outside Hamas-ruled Gaza, we toured a tunnel discovered less than one kilometer from an Israeli kindergarten. Unlike tunnels that I had seen during the Iraq war that were designed for smuggling, this Hamas tunnel was designed for launching murder and kidnapping raids. The 3-mile-long tunnel was reinforced with concrete, lined with telephone wires, and included cabins unnecessary for infiltration operations but useful for holding hostages.

Israel, fearing just such tunnel-building, has long tried to limit imports of concrete to Gaza for anything but humanitarian projects, yet somehow thousands of tons of the material have been diverted for terror use rather than building hospitals or housing for Palestinians. Since the beginning of ground operations into Gaza, the IDF has uncovered approximately 30 similar tunnels leading into Israel, in addition to the more than two dozen discovered prior to Operation Protective Edge. Hamas operatives have been intercepted emerging from such tunnels in Israel carrying tranquilizers and handcuffs, apparently hoping to replicate the successful 2006 kidnapping of IDF soldier Gilad Shalit, for whom Israel exchanged 1,000 Palestinian prisoners in 2011.

The two big international headlines of the moment are the downing of the Malaysian jet over Ukraine and Israel’s incursion into Gaza. On the face of it, these two stories don’t have much in common, but they are in fact part of the same story. To know Israel it helps to know Ukraine, and to know Ukraine it helps to know Israel.

This weekend will mark the 70th anniversary of the day the Soviets re-took the city of Lviv (or Lvov, or Lemberg, according to taste) in western Ukraine, and ended a three-year German occupation. Before the Germans arrived, there were well over 100,000 Jews in the city and just shy of 50 synagogues. On July 26th 1944, when the Soviets returned, there were a couple of hundred Jews left.

Lviv had been, variously, Polish, Hungarian, Ukrainian, Habsburg, Soviet — but always, across the centuries, Jewish. All gone.

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Same with any number of Ukrainian cities. Chernivtsi, or Czernowitz, was once known as “Jerusalem on the Prut.” There were 50,000 Jews out of a population of approximately 100,000, and they dominated the city’s commercial life. “There is not a shop that has not a Jewish name painted above its windows,” wrote Sir Sacheverell Sitwell in 1937, when it was part of the Kingdom of Roumania. “The entire commerce of the place is in the hands of the Jews. Yiddish is spoken here more than German.” Not anymore. Today, the city’s population is over a quarter of a million, but only 2,000 are Jews.

There are cities like Lviv or Chernivtsi all over the world, where within living memory the streets were full of Jews — people went to school with Jews, lived next door to Jews, accompanied their mothers as they shopped from Jews. And now there are no Jews. In his what-if? novel Fatherland, Robert Harris captures very well the silence that settles in such communities: no one ever asks, “Do you remember the such-and-such family across the street?” — or what happened to them. Just as, a few years hence, everyone in Sarcelles, France will agree not to ask whatever happened to a Jewish-owned pharmacy, set ablaze during a “pro-Palestinian” protest last weekend.

Israel is dedicated to the proposition that there should be one place on Earth where what happened to the Jews in Lviv and Chernivtsi and Baghdad and all over the map will not happen here

1. $1.6bn was raised by Israeli high tech companies during the first half of 2014, 81% higher than the first half of 2013. Israeli high tech companies raised $930mn during 2014’s 2nd quarter – the highest total since 2000, 30% higher than the 1st quarter and 109% higher than 2013’s 2nd quarter (Globes Business Daily, July 16, 2014).

2. Israel’s new investment Angels’ Law – introduced by the Minister of Economy, Naftali Bennett – is the world’s most daring, including a 100% deduction for tax purposes during the first year (Globes, July 17). The $86bn Los Angeles-headquartered Oaktree Capital Management acquired the Israel operations of France’s Veolia Environment for $341mn (Bloomberg, July 10). The $36bn San Diego-based Qualcomm acquired Israel’s Wilocity for $300mn, made its 5th Israeli acquisition following DesignArt ($130mn), iSkoot ($75mn), CSR’s camera division ($45mn) and EPOS for $30mn Globes, July 4). Germany’s Altana invested $135mn in Israel’s Landa Digital Printing (Globes, June 26, 2014). Santa Clara-based ServiceNow acquired Israel’s Neebula Systems for $100mn (Globes, July 10). NASDAQ’s best Initial Public Offering (IPO) during 2014’s 2nd quarter was Israel’s $630mn Kite Pharma which raised $78mn (Globes, June 30). The British York Investment Fund is investing up to $50mn in Israel’s InSightec (Globes, June 30). The Foxborough, MA-based Kraft Group and the Boston-based Canepa Advanced healthcare Fund led a $21mn round of private placement in Israel’s Dune Medical (Globes, June 27). Boston Scientific extended a $15mn loan – with a stock option – to Israel’s MValve (Globes, July 7).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjW_H1ydFas&list=PL8E1BA727A0E2DFC0

Published on Jul 23, 2014

Dictatorships attempt to silence UN Watch’s Hillel Neuer at the July 23, 2014 UNHRC emergency session on Gaza. Interruptions came from Iran, Syria, Egypt, the “State of Palestine,” Cuba and Venezuela. The U.S. and Canada defended Neuer’s right to speak.
Lear more: http://www.unwatch.org/isignup

Palestinian protest stops Haifa match
Punches and profanities were exchanged between the handful of youngsters and the Haifa players.fallen soldier
Palestinian protesters attack Maccabi Haifa players during match in Austria Photo: Courtesy
Maccabi Haifa’s pre-season match against French club Lille in Austria had to be abandoned in the 85th minute on Wednesday after pro-Palestinian protesters stormed the pitch and confronted the players.

Punches and profanities were exchanged between the handful of youngsters, who waved Palestinian and Turkish flags throughout the match, and the Haifa players, who were mainly stunned by the scenes.

The security stewards on hand were slow to react, but ultimately the situation calmed down, with several of the protesters being escorted out of the stadium and the Haifa players leaving the pitch unscathed.
Lille was leading 2-0 when the match was stopped.

Haifa only finally made its way back to the hotel with a police escort after more than an hour, with some of the protesters waiting for the team outside the stadium.

“Maccabi Haifa Football Club believes in co-existence, tolerance and is against violence,” a club statement read. “We denounce the violence that was used against us. This didn’t happen because of sport or football, it happened because we are a team which represents Israel.”