RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/amnesty-international-hell-yes-we-want-to-destroy-the-jewish-state/?utm_

Amnesty International’s fixation on Israel veered into antisemitism with the publication of a “report” accusing the liberal democracy of employing “apartheid.” This ludicrous accusation — Arab Israelis, not without their own troubles, are perhaps the freest Arabs in the Middle East — is meant to associate the Jewish state with the defunct racist South African regime in mind of Westerners to help spark an effort to isolate and economically destroy it.

If you think this is an exaggeration, let Amnesty International’s United States director Paul O’Brien set you straight. Speaking to the Women’s National Democratic Club last week, O’Brien argued that Israel “shouldn’t exist as a Jewish state,” and that the purpose of Amnesty’s report was to “collectively change the conversation,” which “needs to start first and foremost with the Jewish community.”

O’Brien contends that “we are opposed to the idea — and this, I think, is an existential part of the debate — that Israel should be preserved as a state for the Jewish people.” Though polls still show support for Israel among Jews, O’Brien told the group, his “gut” tells him that most do not actually support the Jewish state, per se, but a “safe Jewish space” that is predicated on “core Jewish values.”

I missed last week’s good news from Israel. In an avalanche of grim world news, it is heartening to know how Israel’s outsize contributions to every aspect of human endeavor bring succor to those struggling with the ravages of illness, famines, epidemics, and wars…..rsk

https://verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com/

ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS

Stopping cancer spreading during chemotherapy. A Technion doctorate student has discovered that the LOX enzyme plays a major role in helping cancer spread (metastasis) when the patient is having chemotherapy. Inhibiting LOX protects the patient from this deadly effect.

https://www.technion.ac.il/en/2022/02/world-cancer-day-chemotherapy-metastasis/ 

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34666995/

Hope for when cancer has spread. Israel’s New Phase has developed hyperthermic treatment that kills up to 50% of metastatic cancer. In animal and human trials, iron-oxide nanoparticles, produced in a lab managed by three Druze Arab women, are injected into stage 4 cancer patients, and then heated to 45º C using RF radiation.

https://www.israel21c.org/novel-hyperthermic-treatment-offers-hope-for-stage-4-metastatic-cancer/

https://newphase.co.il/   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZ6h6szr4eM

Prostate cancer treatment is saving lives. (TY Don) Although not an Israeli treatment, Israel’s Sheba Medical Center is one of the few global hospitals treating prostate cancer patients with Lutetium-177 therapy. It attaches to prostate-specific membrane antigens (PSMAs) on tumors and emits beta radiation to neutralize them.

https://www.shebaonline.org/how-does-lutetium-177-therapy-work/ 

We have the cure inside us. Scientists at Israel’s Technion Institute have found that misfolding proteins in the brain cells of ALS and Huntingdon’s sufferers can be corrected by other proteins already in the cell, called “chaperones”. But the cell doesn’t activate them or activates the wrong ones! New treatments are anticipated.

https://www.technion.ac.il/en/2022/02/huntingtons-als-chaperone/

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-022-27982-w

Longer-lasting heart valves. An Israeli-led team of researchers has prevented the deterioration of bioprosthetic heart valves (of animal origin). These last only 10 years due to calcification of the tissues. They used hearts from pigs that were engineered to stop expressing foreign sugars and this prevented calcification.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-022-01682-w

Repairing heart valves without replacing. The calcification of heart valves is currently resolved by transplanting a new prosthetic valve (see above). Israel’s Pi-Cardia (see here previously) has been developing the Leaflex system to treat the calcification, and is currently conducting human clinical trials across Europe.

https://www.israel21c.org/novel-non-surgical-solutions-for-aortic-valve-stenosis/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NXQQ-Zqnes

Gut bacteria could prevent heart attacks. Scientists from Israel’s Rabin Medical Center and the Weizmann Institute studied the microbiome of 200 patients just hours after a heart attack. They found most were missing a Clostridiaceae family bacterium that was present in a control group. They are now isolating it into pill form.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-study-mines-donor-poop-for-bacteria-that-could-avert-heart-attacks/

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-022-01686-6

Helping preemies absorb food. The ELGN-GI insulin formulation developed by Israel’s Elgan can save the lives of preterm babies with immature stomachs that cause feeding intolerance. It will avoid the adverse effects of intravenous nutrition, which often leads to infection and liver problems. A Phase 3 trial is being planned.

https://www.jpost.com/health-and-wellness/pregnancy-and-birth/article-699123 https://www.elganpharma.com/

http://www.ngt3vc.com/elgan-pharma/

A physical therapist on your smartphone. Israel’s OneStep uses the power of the smartphone to analyze gait (how you walk) and provide feedback directly to patients and their physical therapists. OneStep is partnering with Kinomatic in the US to bring OneStep’s app to all patients using Kinomatic’s Virtual Reality solution.

https://www.prnewswire.com/il/news-releases/digital-physical-therapy-company-onestep-partners-with-smart-surgery-provider-kinomatic-to-enhance-physical-therapy-for-surgery-patients-301477411.html

https://www.onestep.co/   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=335FEpK2y7Y

Successful trials for portable eye test. Israel’s AEYE Health (see here previously) has just completed Phase 3 clinical trials of its hand-held retinal analysis system. The hand-held fundus camera and single-image AI software detected diabetic retinopathy with high accuracy, far better than current expensive specialist cameras.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/spotlight/seeing-straight-with-the-help-of-artificial-intelligence/

The best partners for innovation. Israel’s Sheba Medical Center has again been ranked as the 10th best hospital in the world by Newsweek Magazine. Sheba also announced a partnership with GE Healthcare to develop digital healthcare solutions in cardiology, remote pregnancy monitoring and molecular imaging.

https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/323198 

https://www.jns.org/israels-sheba-ge-team-up-to-advance-digital-healthcare/

Global DNA sequencing center. Illumina – the world’s leading DNA sequencing company, worth over $50 billion, is opening a Center of Excellence in Tel Aviv. It will develop Artificial Intelligence (AI) solutions that dramatically shorten genome analysis time for diagnosing rare diseases and transform lives.

https://www.calcalistech.com/ctechnews/article/ryfdj7ce5

Advanced Materials. Several issues of the international journal Advanced Materials, including cover pages, feature the breakthrough skin patches developed in the lab of Israel’s Technion Arab Professor Hossam Haick (see here previously). They include Strain sensors, Wound dressing (and cover), Micro-needles sensor, Electronic skin and more.  https://www.technion.ac.il/en/2022/02/hossam-haick-diagnosis-micro-needles/

www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com 

The news affecting the United States is grim….war in the Ukraine, threats and taunts from China, North Korea, and Iran. Michael Ordman compiles a a ray of sunshine and hope from our most dependable ally. Israel’s daily innovations in science, technology, medicine, agriculture, and social institutions continue to flourish and enrich the entire world including the human termites whose libels and baseless enmity are designed  to bring down the walls of the Jewish state. rsk

ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS
 
Innovative heart treatment. After 68 years, Yair’s complex congenital heart defect finally caught up with him. Luckily, the years also brought new advances and, for the first time in Israel, instead of open-heart surgery, his irregular pulse could be resolved at Jerusalem’s Hadassah Medical Center using cardiac catheterization.
https://www.jpost.com/health-and-wellness/article-698121
 
Portable lung tests. Israel’s PulmOne (see here previously) has developed the MiniBox+, a revolutionary lung function device about the size of a desktop computer. It has the potential to help diagnose many of the half a billion people around the world who suffer from lung disease.  The MiniBox+ is FDA approved.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/spotlight/portable-lung-tests-help-patients-breathe-easier/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RvUadvOJb3U   https://www.pulm-one.com/
 
Hyperbaric oxygen relieves PTSD. Israeli scientists are the first to have used hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) to reduce post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms. The pressurized pure oxygen treatment successfully relieved IDF veterans with treatment-resistant PTSD that had lasted for at least four years.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/world-first-israeli-study-shows-oxygen-therapy-can-dramatically-reduce-ptsd-symptoms/  https://www.jpost.com/health-and-wellness/article-698327
 
Electric pulses to fight cancer. Technion Professor Yoram Palti has been awarded the Israel Prize in the Field of Entrepreneurship and Technological Innovation. Prof Palti founded Israel’s Novocure (see here previously) that developed a groundbreaking cancer treatment (especially brain cancer) using electric pulses.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/yoram-palti-awarded-israel-prize-for-groundbreaking-cancer-treatment/
https://en.globes.co.il/en/article-novocure-uses-electrodes-to-treat-brain-tumors-1001120662
 
Using nanotech to create the impossible. (TY WIN) Great feature by VeryGoodNewsIsrael subscriber Diana Bletter about Technion Professor Hossam Haick (see here previously). His expertise in nanotechnology has led to 42 patents and the inventions of the cancer SniffPhone, NaNose, molecular sutures, skin sensors and more.
https://www.israel21c.org/the-scientist-using-nanotech-to-create-the-impossible/
 
Robots to help rehabilitation. Ben Gurion University’s 46th Webinar Wednesday featured BGU Professor Shelly Levy-Tzedek, who discussed how robots can help in the process of rehabilitation. This includes physical assistance (e.g., post-stroke, Parkinson’s, or aging) and social assistance. The video also stars Pepper the robot.  https://americansforbgu.org/video/future-of-rehabilitation/#  
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ms6wFLmnqNg  https://shelly453.wixsite.com/levy-tzedek-lab
 
Relaxation to boost radiation benefits. (TY UWI) Neuroscientist Amir Amedi from Israel’s Reichman University, has invented multisensory devices to relax patients awaiting cancer radiation therapy at Israeli hospitals. These include 3D VR glasses, smart tables and chairs, breathing sensors, and in-ear recordings.
https://www.israel21c.org/futuristic-tech-brings-healing-relaxation-to-radiotherapy/
 
Siblings of special needs children may be more empathic. Researchers at Jerusalem’s Hebrew University studied 1,657 families of twins born in 2004/5. In 63 cases, one of the twins had a development delay or disability. The other twin was found to have a higher cognitive empathy than those with a normal twin.
https://www.jpost.com/health-and-wellness/article-698420
https://srcd.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/cdev.13740

https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-698294

For 50 years, Israeli leftists and many in the international community portrayed Jews who moved to eastern Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gush Katif in the Gaza Strip (until Israel’s withdrawal from the Strip in 2005) as criminals, violating international law, and immorally building communities on land captured in 1967 by the IDF, which Palestinians claim as the basis of a state dedicated to destroying Israel.

Supported by the international community, they assert that Israel is occupying Palestinian territory, which is not limited to the areas which the IDF conquered in the 1967 Six Day War, for many Arabs, it’s everything from the river to the sea. That is what Palestinianism means.

Following the 1967 war, Jewish communities were built on uninhabited state land, often in places where Jewish communities had existed before 1948, such as those in Gush Etzion, south of Jerusalem. No Arabs were evicted or displaced as a result of the 1967 war; in fact, they flourished under Israeli rule.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2022/02/can-israel-anchor-defense-alliance-moderate-arab-joseph-puder/

The Biden administration debacle in Afghanistan has convinced America’s enemies of the administration’s weakness and vulnerability. The timing of Vladimir Putin’s march on Ukraine is undoubtedly connected to the perception in Moscow of Washington’s lack of will to engage in a confrontation. Communist China is astutely waiting for the right time to seize Taiwan. Should Moscow achieve its objectives, Xi Jinping, China’s dictator would follow Putin’s example and act, knowing full well that the Biden administration would pay lip service to the violation of Taiwanese sovereignty, and perhaps demand UN sanctions, but ultimately, Washington would live with the new reality.

The radical and theocratic Ayatollahs also sense an opportunity to take advantage of the Biden administration’s willingness to have a deal at all costs, and thus have been successfully pressing their demands, and it appears that the Biden administration might cave in. Tehran also realized that there will not be military consequences from the US with their continued advancement toward a nuclear bomb. Iran continues to develop its ballistic missiles range and payload, to possibly carry a nuclear device. At the same time, the Iranians have continued their adventurism and terror throughout the region. Tehran also considered the fact that North Korea has never suffered the military consequences of becoming nuclear. Economic boycotts by the West are clearly no longer a deterrent against Iran, North Korea, China, or Russia.

www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com

Israel is truly growing up in its role as a major benefit to the world. Its relations with Arab states grow each week, with Israel’s Prime Minister arriving in Bahrain, Egypt’s President honoring Israel’s wheelchair-bound Energy Minister and an Israeli healthcare startup winning a major contract in the UAE. Israel’s economy grew at a phenomenal 8.1% rate in 2021; the UK is determined to grow bilateral trade with Israel, and the Jewish State has grown into the country of choice for international conferences. Israeli agriculture and food-tech successes include growing the world’s largest strawberry; a system for home-grown vegetables, and new reduced-sugar foods to help grown-ups from growing horizontally!  New initiatives are encouraging the growth of Israeli health-tech startups in the USA, water-tech startups in the Galilee and Netflix is helping the growth of film makers in Jerusalem. And it was my privilege to meet some of the growing number of Israeli scientists and talk with pro-Israel student ambassadors growing up in Haifa.  Michael Ordman

ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS
 
Non-invasive eye test for Covid-19. (TY UWI) Israel’s AdOM Advanced Optical Technologies has developed the Tear Film Imager (TFI) which, in 40 seconds, measures the tear film layer of the eye to detect if someone has coronavirus. Israel’s Sheba Medical Center is now recruiting volunteers for a clinical study of the TFI.
https://www.jns.org/israel-to-test-for-covid-19-using-non-invasive-eye-exam/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZTuQ1R7nZjU
 
Nasal spray effective against coronavirus. Phase 3 clinical trials confirmed that the Nitric Oxide Nasal Spray (NONS) from Israel’s SaNOtize represents a safe and effective antiviral treatment that shortens the course of COVID-19 and could prevent the transmission of COVID-19. It also received regulatory approval in India.
https://www.bloomberg.com/press-releases/2022-02-09/phase-3-clinical-trial-confirms-sanotize-s-breakthrough-treatment-is-99-effective-against-covid-19-receives-regulatory
 
Cutting the cost of cancer laser treatment. Israel’s HIL Applied Medical (see here previously) is poised to deliver proton-beam radiotherapy to millions of cancer patients who cannot afford it today. HIL plans to produce 200-250 much lower cost proton therapy rooms every year.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/spotlight/israeli-startup-uses-hebrew-u-breakthrough-to-cut-the-cost-of-treating-cancer/   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9MA-9Rh1EE8
 
Routine prenatal ultrasound to detect autism. Researchers from Ben Gurion University have shown that routine prenatal ultrasound in the second trimester can identify early signs of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Anomalies occurred in 30% of fetuses who later developed ASD. It means autism could be treated from birth.
https://in.bgu.ac.il/en/pages/news/autism_ultrasound.aspx
https://academic.oup.com/brain/advance-article/doi/10.1093/brain/awac008/6509260
 
Brain Monitor rolls out. Israel’s Montfort (Mon4t – see here previously) is expanding the operation of its brain monitor device in the US. It is already in use at Baltimore’s John Hopkins Medicine and the Henry Ford Health System in Detroit. It could benefit the million and more Parkinson’s sufferers in the US.
https://www.jns.org/the-israeli-company-turning-smartphones-into-brain-monitors/
 
Taking smart health tech to the UAE. Israel’s Healthy.io (see here previously) has been authorized to deploy its smartphone image diagnostic technology in the United Arab Emirates. It has finalized a deal with Dubai’s Royal family-founded Seed Group, to sell its self-performed kidney disease urine analysis kits in the UAE.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/medical-selfie-company-healthy-io-to-bring-innovative-health-tech-to-uae/
 
A boot camp for wellness tech. Several Israeli health-tech startups have applied to participate in the Wellness Tech Bootcamp, an international program supporting startups developing technologies to improve physical and mental health. New to this newsletter include Happy Things, CoBe Labs, and Kai (personal wellness coach)
https://www.calcalistech.com/ctech/articles/0,7340,L-3929332,00.html
https://www.happythings.app/  https://www.cobelabs.com/  https://kai.ai/
 

Israeli animal-rights and vegan activist Tal Gilboa was treated to a social-media slaughter this week, and it wasn’t a kosher one.

Despite her dedication to typically liberal causes, Gilboa couldn’t possibly be considered one of “them” when she joined former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud Party prior to the 2019 Knesset elections and later became his adviser on animal rights.

Nor was this her only crime against the Hebrew version of Orwellian doublethink. Expressing opposition last December to a program launched on January 1 in 77 kindergartens across the country to “promote gender equality and inculcate gender thinking from an early age, when perceptions, beliefs and stereotypes begin to take shape” put her smack in the doghouse – pun intended.

Having a complex view of the joint Education/Social Equality Ministries’ plan, she was accused of “contradicting herself.” The real reason for the attack, however, was that she violated a key rule of political correctness: daring to suggest that “we women don’t want men who play with dolls; we want men who play soccer.”

It was thus that her subsequent clarification – that “girls and boys can play with whatever they wish; enough of this madness already” – became fodder for ridicule.

THE ABOVE was a feminist storm in a teacup compared to the LGBTQ tsunami she unleashed this week by coming out against educational activities in schools to enlighten kids about the gay community.

The hysteria ensued after she participated in Channel 14’s The Patriots panel on Tuesday and explained: “The science says that about 10% of animals are homosexual; it’s innate. But today we’re already talking about its being acquired, as well. My 13-year-old daughter came out of the closet. I phoned her teacher to tell her about it, and she told me that people from the entire LGBTQ spectrum, transgender people and others, regularly visit the school and spend whole days talking to the students and teaching them what they can and cannot be. I said to her, “Excuse me? What [gives you the right] to put such things in my daughter’s head?”

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/18237/palestinians-five-star-jihad

Hamas leaders are not sitting among their people in the Gaza Strip or the West Bank. It is easier and safer for them to call on the Palestinians to send their children to carry out terrorist attacks against Israel while they are relaxing in the comfort of their hotel rooms, villas and gyms in the Qatari capital of Doha. The Hamas leaders are not going to send their own sons and daughters to engage in the jihad against Israel.

The Iranian-backed Hamas and PIJ are the two largest groups in the Gaza Strip. Instead of investing their resources and efforts in improving the living conditions of their people, the Hamas and PIJ leaders have brought on them one disaster after the other. They have brought war and destruction on the people of the Gaza Strip by firing thousands of rockets towards Israel, forcing Israel to fire back to defend itself.

Instead of building schools and hospitals, the Hamas and PIJ leaders have chosen to invest tens of millions of dollars in a network of tunnels along Gaza’s border with Israel, to attack and kill Jews.

The leaders of Hamas and PIJ left scorched earth behind them and chose to lead luxurious lives in Doha, Istanbul and Beirut. Strangely, however, instead of hiding their faces in shame, they are calling from their gyms, jets, and jacuzzis for the Palestinians to pursue the fight against Israel.

Some Palestinians, it seems, refuse to be duped by the deception of the Hamas and PIJ leaders. These Palestinians have finally realized that their leaders care only about their personal interest and the well-being of their families and are enjoying the good life in Doha and Istanbul.

Above all, the Palestinians need to boot out the thieves who masquerade as their leaders, the butchers responsible for the deaths of the young men and women in the Hamas-incited jihad against Israel. The Palestinians will never move forward with their lives as long as their leaders are relaxing in hot tubs in Qatar and Turkey while sending them orders to bathe themselves in yet more Jewish blood.

The leaders of the Palestinian terror groups Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad are continuing to urge Palestinians to take to the streets to engage in the jihad (holy war) against Israel.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2022/02/has-israel-finally-secured-peace-its-arab-joseph-puder/

The Jewish state’s dream of warm peace with its Arab neighbors has eluded it for more than 72 years. In September 2020, President Donald Trump helped engineer the Abraham Accords between Israel, Bahrain, and the United Arab Emirates. The very treaty signing on the White House lawn projected human warmth, and signaled a warm peace. Subsequently, Sudan and Morocco joined the normalization of relations with Israel.

It is true that peace, as opposed to war, came much earlier than September 2020. Israel signed a peace treaty with Egypt in 1979 and with Jordan in 1994. These peace treaties, however, were essentially between governments, coldly exchanging territory for peace. Israel gave up the entire Sinai Peninsula; it received a cold peace in return. The late Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak avoided visiting Israel. In his 30-year reign as Egypt’s dictator, he visited Israel only once, and only for three hours, to attend the funeral of the assassinated Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995. He did not encourage Israeli-Egyptian trade or tourism. 

Although Mubarak fulfilled the security commitments under the Camp David Accords, he deliberately perpetuated the cold peace. Mubarak was motivated by the desire to reduce Egypt’s massive military burden, and cement Egypt’s relationship with the US. He also sought to return Egypt to the bosom of the Arab world that expelled Egypt from the Arab League and leadership in the Arab world following Anwar Sadat’s Camp David Peace Accords with Israel. Israelis were not welcomed in Cairo, and the majority of the Egyptian population has been hostile to Israel and peace. The Egyptian media in particular has displayed frequent bursts of anti-Semitism. Israel’s consolation was that it didn’t have to allocate burdensome resources in manpower and treasure.