RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/13502/palestinians-hamas-fatah-conflict

The biggest losers from this internal bloodletting are the Palestinians living under these leaders in the Palestinian Authority (PA) and Hamas-ruled Gaza.

The dispute between Hamas and Fatah is not over who will bring democracy and a better economy to the Palestinians. They are not fighting over who will improve the living conditions of the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip by building new schools and hospitals. They are not fighting over who will introduce major reforms to the Palestinian government and end financial and administrative corruption. They are not fighting over the need for freedom of expression and a free media.

Mahmoud Abbas, the Hamas leaders correctly argue, is not a rightful or legitimate president. If Abbas were to sign a deal with Israel, people could come along later and say that he lacked the legal authority to do so; they would be right.

In order for any peace process to move forward, the Palestinians first need to stop attacking each other. Then, they need to come up with new leaders who actually give a damn about their people.

The Palestinians’ major ruling groups, Fatah and Hamas, are now saying they are done with each other: that the divorce is final.

Recent days and weeks have witnessed the two groups maligning each other beyond anything previously seen. Fatah and Hamas have reached a new level of mutual loathing. At times, it even seems as if Fatah and Hamas hate each other more than they hate Israel.

Many in the West say they would like to see Israel and the Palestinians return to the negotiating table. They want Israelis and Palestinians to resume the so-called peace process. They are hoping that Israel and the Palestinians will manage to reach a historic agreement that would end the Israeli-Arab conflict and bring real peace to the Middle East.

The region, however, does not need a “peace process” between Israel and the Palestinians. It needs one of a different type. The “peace process” that the Middle East is crying out for is one between Palestinians and Palestinians, one that would end their bloody, internecine war.

http://www.israelhayom.com/opinions/in-their-wildest-fantasies/

“The Palestinians are selling a combination of illusions, historical fiction and Israel hatred. Among Arab states, there are those who are now waking up from the brainwashing they’ve endured. It is only here in Israel that we continue to cooperate with the fraudulent ploy.”

The High Court of Justice is set to deliberate in the coming days whether the nation-state law should be changed so that “the right of return” will serve as a counterweight to the Law of Return, thereby allowing the Palestinians to drown Israel in hordes of “refugees” with knowledge of murder and rape that will “return” from the killing fields in Syria, Lebanon and Iraq to realize a peaceful state from the river to the sea. Funnily enough, that river of which they speak is located right here in Israel. While Arab countries maintain a partnership of interests with us against Iran and abandon the Palestinians’ illusions of a “return and a Palestinian capital in Jerusalem,” the Palestinians can take comfort in the Israel hatred popular in those countries of peace, where they stomp on our flag and defiantly oppose their dictatorial governments.

In the meantime, the Palestinians continue to engage in a collective battle against Israel’s survival. In the racist trial of Issam Akel, sentenced to life in prison and heavy labor, the Palestinians declared it forbidden to sell land to Jews.

This is absurd. All the man did was sell the land back to its legal owners. These are properties the Muslims conquered from the Byzantines in 638 C.E. and which were returned to their Jewish owners in 1967. But from the Islamists’ point of view, the rights of the owners of these forcibly conquered lands have expired. Now the Palestinian raiders pretend to be the landowners in our country.

Did the descendants of the Arab feudalists from Lebanon, who sold lands to Jews in the 19tth century, also put their parents on trial?

www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com

ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS

New ways to fight viruses & cancer. Parallel international research involving Haifa and Bar Ilan University scientists have discovered the key role of enzyme ADAR1 in the immune system and how it can become a new pathway for eradicating viruses and cancers.
https://www.israel21c.org/israeli-research-breaks-through-in-battle-against-viruses/
https://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.2006577
https://www.jewishpress.com/news/on-campus/bar-ilan-harvard-researchers-show-new-mechanism-to-activate-immune-system-against-cancer/2019/01/03/https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-018-0768-9

Cause of heart failure in pregnancy. Israeli researchers at Tel Aviv University and Sheba Medical Center have found the cause of PPCM (Peripartum cardiomyopathy) heart failure before and after giving birth. They discovered a functional defect in the heart cells that should lead to early diagnoses, prevention and treatments.
http://www.jewishpress.com/news/on-campus/israeli-scientists-identify-possible-cause-of-heart-failure-in-pregnancy/2019/01/02/

No more pain. (TY Atid-EDI) Israel’s ZygoFix has conducted the first human trial of its innovative zLOCK spinal facet joint fixation system. One day after the minimally invasive procedure, the 67-year-old woman’s back and leg pain went from level 9 to level 1 and after six months it was zero.
https://spinalnewsinternational.com/first-in-human-zlock/ https://www.zygofix.com/

Post-mastectomy surgical dressings. (TY Atid-EDI) Every year over 13 million mastectomies, lumpectomies, reconstruction and aesthetic breast operations are performed. Israel’s Ezbra is the first patented disposable dressing tailor-made for such operations. Comfortable, absorbent, time-saving and protective against infections.
https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/ezbra-breast-dressing-makes-us-debut-at-premier-aesthetic-surgery-conference-300757919.html https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Erv8r2C0rkg https://ezbra.net/

Saving lives in Massachusetts. (TY Atid-EDI) I reported previously (see here)on Israel’s Clew Medical and its AI system to warn of deteriorating ICU patients. Clew is now partnered with UMass Memorial Medical Center in Massachusetts, using its advanced analytics engine to enhance UMass’ patient care.
https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/clew-collaborates-with-umass-memorial-medical-center-to-bring-predictive-analytics-to-tele-icus-300757529.html

Hadassah accelerates with IBM. (TY Atid-EDI) Jerusalem’s Hadassah Medical Center and IBM Israel have established a special accelerator for startups to develop advanced technological solutions and services in digital medicine. They will have access to IBM and hospital resources and staff.
https://en.globes.co.il/en/article-hadassah-ibm-set-up-digital-health-accelerator-1001262831

World’s leading DBS company. I reported previously (see here) on Israel’s (Arab-owned) Alpha Omega and its Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) device for treating disorders such as Parkinson’s disease. Alpha Omega has 100% market share in Israel and is active in the US, Europe and now (thanks to a $7 million investment) China.
https://en.globes.co.il/en/article-israeli-medical-device-co-alpha-omega-in-chinese-jv-1001264279

Gut reaction in treating IBD. (TY Calcalistech) I reported previously (see here)on BiomX. The Israeli biotech has now partnered with Janssen – the therapy R&D arm of Johnson & Johnson. BiomX’s XMarker microbiome-based platform will be used to classify responders to inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) therapies.
https://en.globes.co.il/en/article-israeli-microbiome-co-biomx-teams-with-jj-1001264660
http://www.biomx.com/

Why is LDL cholesterol bad? Researchers at Israel’s Weizmann Institute have identified that the problem with LDL (low-density lipoprotein) cholesterol is when excess LDL is deposited on blood vessel walls. It oxidizes into a toxic substance that triggers immune cells to form crystals, leading to inflammation and arterial disease.
https://www.israel21c.org/how-does-a-helpful-substance-like-cholesterol-turn-deadly/

https://worldisraelnews.com/analysis-who-will-replace-aging-abbas/?utm_source=browser&utm_medium=push_notification&utm_campaign=PushCrew_notification_1546800310&pushcrew_powered=1

The 83-year-old and ailing Mahmoud Abbas has been heading the Palestine Liberation Organization since Arafat passed away in 2004. Now it’s Abbas’s deteriorating health that has triggered speculations about his replacement.

While Ramallah officially claims business as usual, there is intense rivalry among possible claimants to the PA’s throne, as Abbas suffers from heart problems, prostate cancer and has been hospitalized several times. He’s a heavy smoker to boot.

Who are the potential successors?

One of the main candidates to emerge is Saeb Erekat. Based in Jericho, PLO official Erekat served for many years as a chief negotiator in negotiations with Israel. While officially advocating the two-state solution, Erekat embraces anti-Jewish historical revisionism and rejects Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state.

Erekat makes the ridiculous claim that his family lived in Israel for 10.000 years. In reality, Erekat’s family immigrated to Israel approximately 100 years ago from the area that is now Saudi Arabia.

Erekat also created headlines by telling Nikki Haley, former U.S. ambassador to the U.N. to “shut up” when she criticized Ramallah for undermining peace with Israel. Part of the inner Abbas circle, Erekat is actually considered more extreme than the current PA leader.

Another potential successor is senior Fatah official Mahmoud al-Aloul. During the First Lebanon War in the 1980s, al-Aloul participated in terrorism against the Jewish state. During the Second Intifada, his oldest son Jihad was killed in clashes with IDF soldiers.

Mahmoud al-Aloul is said to share the political outlook of Mahmoud Abbas. Like Abbas, he rejects Washington as a peace mediator and advocates a boycott of Israeli goods.

Majid Faraj is another possible successor. Faraj is the head of the Palestinian General Intelligence Service. He enjoys American and Israeli support. But this puts Faraj at risk of being branded a “collaborator,” diminishing his chances of replacing Abbas.

Mohammed Dahlan stands out among the contenders struggling to replace Abbas in that his main power base is not in Ramallah, but the Gaza Strip, where he enjoys close relations with the Hamas regime. He is therefore not popular with the PA and less likely to take over after Abbas.

https://www.jns.org/opinion/the-prison-partys-over-for-hamas-and-fatah/

At a press conference in Tel Aviv on Wednesday, Israeli Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan announced that the “party was over” for Palestinian terrorists in Israeli prisons.

It may be hard to believe that 6,000 Hamas and Fatah killers and handlers are living it up behind bars, particularly since they go on periodical hunger strikes to obtain better conditions. But Erdan’s list of new restrictions should put to rest any skepticism on that score.

The main bombshell he dropped on the failed suicide-bombers and successful stabbers who didn’t make it to Allah’s paradise was that they would stop being grouped in cell blocks according to their terrorist-organization affiliations.

“There will no longer be separate Hamas and Fatah wards,” he said, explaining that the current situation enables each group to become even more radicalized, to use their power against wardens and to make Israeli intelligence-gathering on their organizations’ activities extremely difficult.

Another terrorist prisoner benefit that is going to be revoked, according to Erdan, involves the flow of money that the prisoners receive from outside sources, such as the Palestinian Authority, which pays stipends to terrorists and their families from a “Martyrs’ Fund.” Today, each prisoner is allowed to receive up to NIS 1,600 (about $430) per month. What the prisoners have been doing is pooling the cash, and collectively purchasing groceries and other equipment with which to prepare their own meals, rather than eat the food provided by the Israel Prison Service (IPS).

https://zoa.org/2019/01/10383901-zoa-ny-times-bret-stephens-wrong-pres-trump-ha

The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) has criticized New York Times columnist Bret Stephen’s latest column condemning the Trump Administration as being bad for Israel. ZOA National President Morton A. Klein and Director of the ZOA’s Center for Middle East Policy Dr. Daniel Mandel have issued the following statement in response:

“The ZOA believes that the Trump Administration’s record in this regard is remarkably good and refutes Mr. Stephens’ charge. Indeed, Mr. Stephens himself admits that, ‘I write this as someone who supported Trump moving the U.S. Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, and who praised his decision to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal as courageous and correct.’
Mr. Stephens failed to note that the Trump Administration has done far more in the way of being pro-Israel than merely moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, taking numerous steps, both symbolic and substantive, many of which President Obama refused to do or about which he did the opposite.

“So, if President Trump has executed these two steps, both of which Mr. Stephens agrees are pro-Israel, what then are Mr. Stephens’ charges?

“Basically, that moving the embassy is ‘mostly a matter of symbolism’ and thus, presumably, not all that important; and that the withdrawal from the 2015 Iran nuclear deal makes things only ‘marginally’ better for Israel.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-true-state-solution-11546473263

The Trump administration has offered tantalizing clues about its forthcoming “Deal of the Century” for Mideast peace. It could be a bold new concept—replacing the failed “two-state solution” with a Jordan-Israel confederacy, in which Jordan would be recognized as the Palestinian state. Call it the true-state solution.

Palestinians have always been the majority in Jordan, though they haven’t been treated as such since its creation as a British-appointed Hashemite monarchy in 1921. The true-state solution would enfranchise the Palestinians. Jordan would extend citizenship to, and assume administrative responsibility for, Arabs now living on the West Bank of the Jordan River—including the cities of Jenin, Nablus, Ramallah, Bethlehem and Jericho—which would be Israeli territory. West Bank Jordanians could receive financial support to relocate across the river to Jordan itself if they wish, or remain as permanent residents (but not citizens) of Israel. Israelis would be free to live anywhere west of the Jordan River. Variations of this “Jordan option” have received increasing attention across the region in recent years.

Why would King Abdullah II accept such an arrangement? To be blunt, it would be his best option. His rule—and his family’s security and fortune—already teeters under pressure of regional migration and domestic Palestinian discontent. The king’s acquiescence—or possibly U.S.-guided abdication—would probably buy his family’s protection.

Trump administration officials have promised their plan will take advantage of Israel’s recent unprecedented collaboration with its Arab neighbors and other developments that suggest “things can be done today that were previously unthinkable,” as then-Ambassador Nikki Haley said last month. The administration promises a new approach based on practical realities.

https://bit.ly/2R5TZVL

Israel is the 8th most powerful country in the world – as it was in 2017 – according to the 2018 Power Rankings, published by the US News & World Report in partnership with the world renowned Wharton School of Business (Pennsylvania University) and the global strategic consultancy Y&R’s BAV Group. Israel follows the USA, Russia, China, Germany, the United Kingdom, France and Japan, ahead of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, South Korea, Canada, Iran, Turkey, India, Australia, Switzerland, etc.. The ranking reflects the regional and global clout of national leadership and economic, political, diplomatic and military networking/alliances.

The NY-based Trading Economics – an online platform that provides economic data and forecasts and trading recommendations – highlights a surge of Israel’s Economic Optimism Index from a record low 21.70 in 1976 to all time high 131.40 index points in November 2018, ahead of South Korea’s 113.5, the European Union’s 109.60, the USA’s 104.80 and Japan’s 99.6.

Israel is ranked 8th in the November 2018 Global Consumer Confidence Index, conducted by the Paris-based global market research Ipsos, which operates in 88 countries, employing 16,530 persons. Israel follows China, USA, India, Saudi Arabia, Sweden, Germany and Canada, ahead of Australia, Britain, Belgium, France, Italy, Japan, South Korea, etc..

The major engines, which have generated Israel’s demographic, economic, scientific, technological, agricultural, diplomatic and military growth – in addition to the engine of Israel’s brainpower, and the resulting innovative, cutting-edge commercial and defense industries – have been Israel’s relatively high level of optimism and patriotism/resilience, in the face of lethal challenges and threats menacing the Jewish State from its reestablishment in 1948.