RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.frontpagemag.com/genocide-the-population-of-gaza-tripled-under-israeli-occupation/

What does Israel do in Gaza? Does the IDF deliberately rape, torture, and murder Palestinian civilians, as Hamas did to the Israelis at the dance party and in the kibbutzim? Does the IDF take delight in killing, in as sadistic a way as possible, as many Gazan civilians as it can? No, of course not. The IDF tries instead, to minimize civilian casualties. It has no desire to harm the truly innocent. Unfortunately, Hamas wants to maximize those civilian casualties, and to exploit that result to undermine Israel’s standing in the world.

Whenever it can, the IDF warns civilians away from areas about to be targeted. These warnings are enormous undertakings. When the IDF had concluded that it was first going to concentrate its war-making in northern Gaza, it dropped 1.5 leaflets on that area, urging inhabitants to move south of the Wadi Gaza, so as to avoid the most intense fighting that was about to begin in the north. 900,000 Gazans ultimately heeded the warning, and headed south on the north-south corridor of Salah al-Din Street. Hamas fired on, and killed, some of the Gazans trying to move south, in order to keep their civilian shields trapped in the north. Later, when the IDF began to attack Hamas in the south, it dropped both leaflets, and sent emails, with maps included, that showed Gazans the precise areas in the south, in and around Khan Yunis, where the IDF would not be attacking, and that, therefore, they should move to for safety’s sake. It was the same with buildings — schools, apartment buildings, mosques — where the IDF was about to attack. The IDF messaged, emailed, telephoned, and used the “knock-on-the-roof” technique to warn civilians living in or near those buildings soon to be targeted to leave them. Furthermore, Israeli pilots will call off an airstrike if they detect too many civilians near the target.

https://nationalinterest.org/feature/charging-israel-genocide-orwellian-208514

Three months after a genocidal, anti-semitic terrorist group slaughtered 1,200 of its citizens in a barbaric fashion, Israel sits in the docket of the International Court of Justice, accused of committing genocide because it hasn’t defended itself from future attack as pristinely as the world demands.

The court is holding hearings this week on an application that South Africa filed in late December, asking the court to begin proceedings against Israel for committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.

“Acts and omissions by Israel,” South Africa wrote, “… are genocidal in character, as they are committed with the requisite specific intent… to destroy Palestinians in Gaza as a part of the broader Palestinian national, racial and ethnical group,” putting Israel “in violation of its obligations under the Genocide Convention.”

It is a quintessentially Orwellian affair, a spectacle of the victim as the perpetrator, and it fits within a longstanding pattern of the global community holding the singular Jewish state to a singular human rights standard. No one should buy it.

In its “Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide,” the United Nations General Assembly defined genocide as action “committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.”

Ironically, it is Hamas, created in 1987 as the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood movement, which has set out to commit that very crime—against Israel and the Jewish people.

https://www.jns.org/surge-in-illegal-arab-building-along-green-line-a-security-threat/

 An alarming increase in illegal Arab construction along the Judea and Samaria security barrier has come to light thanks to research by Israeli NGO Regavim.

Analyzing photography obtained through aerial reconnaissance, Regavim discovered tens of thousands of illegal structures built along the barrier, which runs roughly along the Green Line, the 1949 armistice line that followed Israel’s War of Independence.

Much of the Arab construction is new, created within the last 10 months, reports the think tank, which focuses on land and sovereignty issues.

In the first stage of its research, Regavim studied three sample clusters, in the South Hebron Hills, Judea-Etzion, and Samaria, finding 7,675 illegal structures in those clusters alone.

It next looked at illegal construction along the entire security barrier, from the northern tip of the Jordan Valley to Ein Gedi in the south. It identified 16,866 illegal structures.

They were all within 1 kilometer of Israeli communities in the Central and Coastal Plain regions.

“Some of these structures are so close to the line that you can reach your arm out from them and touch homes in Jewish communities in Kokhav Ya’ir, Rosh HaAyin and Modi’in,” Naomi Kahn, director of the International Division at Regavim, told JNS.

https://dianebederman.com/two-flags-same-evil-only-one-is-condemned/

These two flags represent the death of Jews, as a people and as a country.

We are living in a time when Jew hatred is once again condoned. There is no difference in the messaging between the Nazis and Muslims, today, who carry their flag while screaming “Palestine will be free from the River to the Sea.”

While the Swastika, the Nazi flag, represents the annihilation of all Jews, let us not forget that the Palestinian Flag, which represents a non-existent country, that according to the “Palestinians” includes the STATE OF ISRAEL. “Palestine will be free from the river to the sea.” Where is Israel? In other words, the flag is a call for the eradication of Israel. But that’s OK in Canada and apparently around the world.

The Nazi flag, the Swastika, as a symbol, became associated with the idea of a racially “pure” state. The swastika became the most recognizable symbol of Nazi propaganda. The Reich flag became associated with hateful laws against the Jews. The government passed the Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor, which prohibited marriages and sexual relations between citizens of “German or those of kindred blood” and Jews.

http://bit.ly/3tIU2eV

The Gaza theatre!

*The track record of the Gaza Strip reveals that it lends itself to terrorism, as contended by the June 29, 1967 memorandum submitted by General Earl Wheeler, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs-of-Staff, to Defense Secretary Robert McNamara.

*Gaza is contiguous to the largely lawless Sinai Peninsula, which has been a platform for
anti-US ISIS-supported and Iran-supported Palestinian, Syrian, Iraqi, Libyan, Egyptian terrorists and drug traffickers.

*The Gaza reality is impacted by the unpredictably volcanic Middle East, especially by Iran’s Ayatollahs, the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamic terror entities.  

*A postwar plan for the Gaza Strip must be based on exclusive Israeli military control, not on well-intentioned US guarantees and defense pacts, and not on non-Israeli peacekeepers, who would not be limited to observing compliance, but mostly to combatting terrorists. However, non-Israeli peacekeepers should not be expected to sacrifice their lives on the altar of Israel’s security.

*In 1983, Hezbollah terrorists car-bombed the US Marine barracks and US Embassy in Beirut, killing 260 Americans, prompting the withdrawal of US soldiers – who participated in the Multinational (peacekeeping) Force – from Lebanon.

US guarantees and defense pacts?

https://www.jns.org/with-blinken-in-tel-aviv-idf-mothers-protest-us-interference-in-war/

A group composed of some 7,000 mothers of Israeli soldiers fighting in the Gaza Strip held up huge posters depicting the children of senior U.S. officials as IDF recruits during a protest in front of U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s Tel Aviv hotel on Tuesday.

The message: What if it were your children fighting in the Gaza Strip? Would you continue to demand the resupply of the enemy?

The group behind the protest, Imahot HaLohamim (“Mothers of Combat Soldiers”) is demanding an end to U.S. pressure on Israel.

“Our message is very simple. Our soldiers’ lives have to come first and foremost, and be prioritized over those of enemy civilians,” Mirit Hoffman, the group’s spokesperson, told JNS.

Since the war’s start, the U.S. has insisted Israel permit humanitarian aid to enter the Gaza Strip. President Joe Biden promised during an October visit to Israel that aid would cease if it was found that Hamas had diverted it for its purposes.

It’s a promise that has not been kept. The U.S. has instead doubled down, demanding that aid increase, including the entry of fuel, something that Israel at first categorically refused to allow.

“Every time Blinken comes, he brings more and more demands that endanger our soldiers,” said Hoffman, who has a son and a son-in-law fighting in Gaza.

“It’s a total double standard. The demands that the U.S. administration put on our soldiers goes far beyond what America practiced after 9/11, or Pearl Harbor,” she said, adding, “We know the supplies go to Hamas. Hamas is telling everybody that it goes to Hamas. It’s not even a secret.”

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/20277/gaza-not-over

The usual suspects in the Middle East peacemaking industry are already beginning to recycle their old and discredited ideas. President Joe Biden, sounding like a dummy for the ventriloquist Barack Obama, is talking of “a two-state solution: one for the Israelis and one for the Palestinians.”

The optimists forget that what turned Gaza into the hell-hole it has become wasn’t economic hardship. Before October 7, Gaza had a lower unemployment rate than the West Bank, Jordan and Egypt. In the first two quarters of 2023, the Gaza economy grew by four percent while that of the West Bank remained almost static.

One Iranian IRGC analyst, writing in the force’s Fars News site last week, indicates that Tehran does not expect a Hamas victory but wants it to “continue fighting as long as possible” so that more and more Israelis see that the best option is to leave.

Tehran also promises to throw more of its regional assets, including the Lebanese Hezbollah, the Yemeni Houthis and various outfits in Iraq and Syria into the fray, albeit in small doses so that Iran not be dragged into the war itself.

What turned Gaza into the hell-hole it has become wasn’t economic hardship. Thanks to international aid and donations, Gaza ranked ahead of Iran as percentage of GDP allocated to health and education. At the same time, Hamas did not need to fund its military and the tunnels it dug through taxation, as Tehran covered much of the cost.

As the war in Gaza enters its third month, the short-attention span syndrome that characterizes our age swings in full gear to reduce it to a version of background noise. You might have noticed that the war is bowing out of front pages and dropped down several slots in TV news bulletins.

www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com

While the “river to the sea” thugs harass diners and shop owners and disturb traffic on bridges and airports, and spoil holiday traditions here in America, in Israel, as Michael Ordman catalogs, research and developments in medicine, science and technology proceed beyond the sirens and screeching headlines of an ongoing war. rsk

“Several welcome potential cures were undergoing human trials last week. A stent for blocked leg arteries; Nitric Oxide for cancer; and a device to prevent delirium in immobile hospital patients.  New Israeli technology includes a system that welcomes you and then parks your car automatically. And now that welcome rains have arrived, a solar farm’s systems redirect the water to irrigate crops efficiently. “ Michael Ordman

POSITIVE NEWS DURING A WAR
 
More heroes of Oct 7. (TY UWI) Brothers Daniel and Neria Sharabi, saved dozens of lives at the Supernova music festival on Oct 7 by providing fire cover for escapees with weapons they found in a tank, while receiving instructions over the phone from an IDF officer. They also treated the wounded who were hiding with them.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/brothers-saved-dozens-at-nova-fighting-terrorists-with-commanders-phoned-in-advice/
 
Operation Hug. Some very emotional scenes as Nefesh b’Nefesh flies out parents to Israel to greet their lone soldier children serving in combat units. There is no guarantee that the IDF will release the soldiers to meet up with their parents but just see the reaction when they do! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yw8T6_lfvTk   
https://www.nbn.org.il/operation-hug/  https://twitter.com/i/status/1740680579639882126
https://worldisraelnews.com/watch-french-lone-soldier-reunites-with-family-after-9-months/
 
Support for parents of IDF soldiers. Parents Beyachad is a worldwide group of parents of IDF soldiers. They have enlisted famous personalities to record 60+ video messages of support.
https://www.jns.org/wire/video-messages-provide-support-to-parents-of-idf-soldiers/
https://www.parentsbeyachad.org/
 
Word of the Year – Resilience. Israel21c’s Word of the Year for 2023 is Resilience. Israeli NGO Eran defines it as “the ability to enlist internal resources such as flexible thinking, creativity and a willingness to receive help, together with external resources, in order to overcome the challenges and obstacles that always face us.”
https://www.israel21c.org/israels-word-of-the-year-for-2023-is-resilience/  https://en.eran.org.il/
 
Showers, tailor, laundry, beds. Not a John le Carre book, but some of the innovative mobile services that Israelis have developed to provide IDF soldiers with basic necessities. Thanks to Brothers and Sisters for Israel, (see here) the NGO Restart (see here), Rabbi Shai Graucher (see here), and Bentov Ellipsis.
https://nocamels.com/2023/12/beds-baths-beyond-israelis-get-creative-to-support-the-troops/  
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPIQpTKUg1k  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2eTya3ufLZo
https://www.bentov.net/  https://vimeo.com/882815262
 
The spirit of wounded soldiers. These brave soldiers send out such positive inspirational messages.
https://www.jns.org/a-rare-glimpse-into-the-recovery-of-wounded-soldiers/
 
Just see what Israelis can recycle. IDF reservist Dan Levit is VP of R&D at Israel’s U-Tron Parking. He assembled a team to rehabilitate 24 decommissioned IDF tanks and then trained volunteers to operate them. The appropriately named “Phoenix” tank battalion is already seeing action in Gaza. And the IDF wants more.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/fixing-up-old-tanks-and-recruiting-old-reservists-a-tech-vp-creates-a-new-battalion/  
 
 
ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS
 
Cure for Peripheral Artery Disease sounds good. Israel’s NovaPulse has developed a “virtual” stent that opens blocked arteries in the legs. The implant sits just under the skin on the leg; when the patient moves, they generate ultrasound waves that dilate the implant, allowing oxygenated blood to flow from the heart.
https://nocamels.com/2023/12/virtual-stent-uses-sound-waves-to-open-blocked-leg-arteries/
https://medxelerator.com/almeda-ventures-joins-medx-xelerator-and-israel-innovation-authority-in-vascular-medtech-startup-novapulse-investment/
 
Nitric Oxide for cancer. Israel’s Beyond Air (see here previously) has partnered with US-based Beyond Cancer to produce a form of immunotherapy for solid tumors known as ultra-high concentration nitric oxide (UNO). The ultra-high concentration of UNO is undergoing Phase 1 human trials.
https://nocamels.com/category/news-briefs/#post-126279
 
Restoring sanity in the ICU. Two Israeli hospitals (Beilinson and Assuta Ashdod) are trialing the innovative communication headset for locked-in patients developed by Israel’s EyeControl (see here previously). They want to see if it can reduce the incidences of delirium (nightmares & hallucinations) in ICU patients.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-med-tech-companys-innovative-headset-could-reduce-delirium-in-icu-patients/
 
Computer games can lift depression. Neuroscientist Prof. Moshe Bar co-founded Israel’s Hedonia and created the computer game Mood Bloom to reduce negative feelings. It is based on a therapy called Facilitating Thought Progression (FTP) in which mini games require the player to focus less on circular thoughts.  
https://nocamels.com/2023/12/hedonia-mood-bloomanxiety-depression-mobile-app/
 
Rehabilitating wounded soldiers. More on the Kemtai AI-powered virtual physiotherapist (see here previously) that Israel’s medical institutions and organizations are using to help get wounded IDF service people on the journey back to health.  https://vimeo.com/707320029
https://nocamels.com/2024/01/virtual-physio-helping-wounded-soldiers-on-road-to-recovery/
 
 
ISRAEL IS INCLUSIVE AND GLOBAL
 
Guardian angels. (TY UWI) The all-female IDF Sky Rider unit operates the drones (UAVs) that protect troops on the ground.  Read here about a battle where they were the eyes in the sky for the 13th Battalion in one of the major battles of the ground incursion Gaza and helped the soldiers on the ground emerge unscathed.
https://www.jns.org/the-guardian-angels-of-golanis-13th-battalion-recall-dramatic-encounter/
 
Friends despite the war. (TY Diana Bletter) Two Jews and two Muslims share an apartment run by Kivunim, an organization that helps young adults with disabilities. Despite Oct 7, the four flat mates get along just as before. Kivunim’s 45 apartments in Nahariya and Haifa house some 120 residents with disabilities.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/at-group-home-in-nahariya-bond-between-muslim-and-jewish-young-adults-survives-oct-7/   https://www.kvn.org.il/en/about/  
 
No cycle of violence here. (TY Diana Bletter) Zippy Schrager, a 56-year-old Rabbi’s daughter, manages a cycle repair shop in Mailiya, a Christian Arab village in the Western Galilee, just 12 miles from Lebanon. Zippy learned how to fix bikes from the shop co-owner Ron Boutillier who is currently on IDF reserve duty.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/amid-gaza-war-a-us-born-jewish-woman-mans-a-christian-arab-towns-bike-shop/
 
Man of the Year. (TY UWI) Frontpage Magazine’s Man of the Year is the IDF Soldier. It writes, “In a year of defeatism and surrender, he is fighting back… The men on the front lines are not the politicians or the generals, they’re among the 360,000 reservists … who left behind their homes, families, and jobs to go and fight.”
https://www.frontpagemag.com/frontpage-magazines-man-of-the-year-the-idf-soldier/  
 
Zionist Leadership Academy. (TY Sharon) KKL-JNF and the WZO’s Zionist Leadership Academy is a 10-month program to develop young global leaders who will strengthen connections between their communities and Israeli institutions. Read about the recent mission to Israel of 18 program graduates from 14 countries.
https://baltimorejewishlife.com/news/news-detail.php?SECTION_ID=37&ARTICLE_ID=169222
https://www.wzo.org.il/department/pioneering-youth-and-future-generations/zionist-leadership-academy/en
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jh5xnJ5cnzk