ISRAEL Comments turned off

How ‘The Collective Voice of the Muslim World’ Weaponizes the UN against Israel by Bassam Tawil

Posted By on February 7th, 2023

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19376/oic-un-israel

OPEC and the OIC are infused with nearly incalculable wealth and most member states of the OIC have found themselves upbraided for questionable ethics.

One critic suggested: “If the OIC Summiteers are serious about the burning issues of justice, freedom and good governance, then they should schedule a special debate on the Transparency International’s (TI) 2003 Corruption Perception Index (CPI) which ranked 38 of the 57 OIC member nations in its latest chart of the corruption levels of 133 countries… [it] is dismal reading for OIC as it is an overall indictment of the failures of the OIC countries to grapple with the problem of corruption…”

The UN itself is certainly not above reproach in the corruption department, as evidenced, among other cases, by the “Oil-for-Food Program;” the extensive history of “food for sex” with children by “peacekeepers” who enjoy immunity from prosecution; or the trial of Chinese executive Julia Wang, who attempted to purchase an influential UN post.

One may wonder why Nicaragua, not an Islamic country, and with significant problems on its own home front, would trouble itself with submitting the motion. A cursory investigation reveals some significant motivation: “With the majority vote of the Sandinista Caucus, the National Assembly today approved the Loan Agreement signed between the OPEC Fund for International Development (OFID) and the Republic of Nicaragua… The project, which has an estimated investment of 23 million dollars, of which the OPEC Fund will finance 20.5 million…”

The OIC even attempted to co-opt UN forces as a pretext for Islamic military support of Lebanon’s offensive against Israel.

Returning to the pre-1967 lines — simply the armistice lines from 1949 where fighting had happened to stop — is nothing short of suicide for Israel; it would be virtually indefensible, and the UN and all of its sponsors are well aware of that.

It would seem… that protecting freedom of religion, outside of Islamic fundamentalism, is not of any particular concern to the OIC or what now stands mostly as its legitimizing but rapidly crumbling front, the UN. The collaboration between the OIC and UN is simply a pretext to twist international law — and public opinion — to their own purposes, whether they are promoting themselves or delegitimizing the State of Israel.

It is already a tired truism to say that the United Nations has a distinctly anti-Israel bias. The US became exasperated with this laser-like focus and, in unequivocal condemnation of the agency, withdrew from the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in 2018 and, for the same reason, from UNESCO the following year.

HISTORY Comments turned off

Lauren Smith:Dr John Money and the sinister origins of gender ideology How a cruel, amoral experiment helped birth today’s trans movement.

Posted By on February 7th, 2023

https://www.spiked-online.com/2023/02/05/dr-john-money-and-the-sinister-origins-of-gender-ideology/

We are all too familiar today with the basics of trans ideology. That biological sex does not determine one’s ‘gender identity’. That someone born biologically male can become female. And that we need to affirm a person’s ‘gender identity’, even if that person is a small child. What few perhaps realise is that the intellectual origins of so much of trans ideology can be traced back to the work of one man – sexologist and psychologist Dr John Money (1921-2006).

New Zealand-born Money was a pioneer in his field of sexuality and gender. In 1955, he was the first person to use the word ‘gender’ as opposed to ‘sex’ to draw a distinction between the biological attributes and the behavioural characteristics that differentiate males from females. He subsequently popularised terms like ‘gender identity’ and even founded the world’s first gender-identity clinic at John Hopkins University in Baltimore in the US in 1966, specialising in the psychological and medical treatment of transgender patients. Above all, Money pushed the view, so central to today’s trans movement, that though we may be born with biologically determined sex characteristics, they do not determine whether we are male or female. Without Money, it’s unlikely that trans ideology, especially the phenomenon of ‘trans kids’, would exist today in the way that it does.

Not everything Money believed about gender has been absorbed by the trans movement. He believed, for instance, that when children are around two years old they pass through a ‘gender-identity gate’, which locks in their gender for the rest of their lives. Few trans activists would make such a claim today. But the central idea that Money first developed is still upheld by trans activists today – namely, that being male or female is not biologically determined. This is the idea that drives trans ideology, and the notion of trans kids, today. It means that someone can be born with male genitalia, but they can still ‘become’ female.

So why is Money rarely mentioned by those promoting trans ideology today? You won’t find him cited in Stonewall educational guides. You won’t see him quoted in any Mermaids documents. And you won’t hear the #BeKind brigade paying tribute to him. The reason for this is simple enough: John Money’s work was creepy, cruel and amoral – and left a trail of misery, pain and suicide in its wake.

ANTI-SEMITISM, NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Ilhan Omar’s Empire of Censorship The accusation of ‘Islamophobia’ is cynically being used to silence critics of woke. Brendan O’Neill

Posted By on February 7th, 2023

https://www.spiked-online.com/2023/02/06/ilhan-omars-empire-of-censorship/

It is now Islamophobic to talk about anti-Semitism. Dare to comment on anti-Jewish racism and you risk being called a racist yourself. Witness the media meltdown that followed Republicans’ ousting of Democrat congresswoman and Squad kween, Ilhan Omar, from the House Foreign Affairs Committee. It is not really Omar’s past dabbling in anti-Semitic tropes that Republicans are concerned about, the woke set say. No, the real reason they booted her out is because they hate Muslims. As Omar herself said, they just don’t want Muslims to ‘have a voice on that committee’. These people are ‘okay with Islamophobia’, she said.

You couldn’t have asked for a better, grimmer illustration of the social poison in identity politics. It’s like racial Top Trumps. Anyone who says they’re worried about Omar’s singular hostility to the Jewish state, and the possibility that it’s motored more by prejudice than principle, will swiftly be accused of prejudice themselves. We should give a ‘hearty eye-roll’ to the Republican handwringing over Omar’s past comments, says a writer for the Guardian. Apparently the real reason these people ‘vilify’ Omar is because she’s ‘outspoken, principled, black, a refugee, African, female and a hijab-wearing Muslim’. Count the points on that Top Trump card! Every identitarian victim category is marshalled to the task of rubbishing the right’s concerns about Squad anti-Semitism.

It all adds up to a sinister silencing tactic. There’s a constant search for ‘the real reason’ people criticise Omar. As a headline in Mother Jones put it, ‘The real reason House Republicans kicked Ilhan Omar off the Foreign Affairs Committee’. You can guess the real reason, right? It’s because ‘she is a black, Muslim woman’. This claim that a nefarious motive lurks behind every calling out of Omar is chilling. It casts aspersions on efforts to raise the issue of anti-Semitism. ‘Why are people really talking about anti-Semitism?’, the woke are encouraged to wonder. Opposition to anti-Jewish racism comes to be seen as a disguise worn by Islamophobes. Drip by drip, concern about anti-Semitism comes to be seen as something fraudulent.

In truth, there are many good reasons, ‘real reasons’, to be unsettled by Omar’s views on Israel. She once said Israel had ‘hypnotised the world’, playing into the trope about Jews, or in this case the Jewish state, being the shady manipulators of world affairs. She also said that American politicians’ support for Israel is all about ‘the Benjamins, baby’, hinting that the filthy-rich Jewish state is buying people off. Then there’s the sheer intensity of her Israel obsession. United With Israel reports that in 2021, 79 per cent of her tweets on foreign affairs were about Israel. In 2022, 48 per cent were about Israel. In contrast, 17.9 per cent were about Saudi Arabia and 3.8 per cent were about China.

HOMELAND SECURITY Comments turned off

Seen Any Other Spy Balloons Lately? An $850 billion defense budget, and we can’t detect a Chinese airship?

Posted By on February 7th, 2023

https://www.wsj.com/articles/chinese-spy-balloon-biden-administration-trump-administration-pentagon-glen-vanherck-11675724569?mod=opinion_lead_pos3

The U.S. Navy is fishing fragments of a Chinese spy balloon out of the Atlantic Ocean, and each fresh detail about this episode raises new and troubling questions. A striking example is the news from the Biden Administration that previous Chinese balloon incursions into the U.S. appear to have gone undetected. This suggests there’s a major hole in U.S. defenses that needs closing.

A senior defense official told reporters on Feb. 2 that a balloon incursion “has happened a handful of other times over the past few years, to include before this Administration. It is appearing to hang out for a long period of time this time around, more persistent than in previous instances.”

The Biden Team was leaking over the weekend that balloons had snuck into U.S. airspace during the Trump Administration, and the obvious implication was to absolve President Biden of political blame. More than one media outfit took the bait. But then Trump officials started denying on the record that they’d ever heard of such an event—from former national security adviser John Bolton to Defense Secretary Mark Esper to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

The Administration’s attempt to muddy responsibility is bad enough, but the revelation that at least three past balloon flights evaded U.S. notice is alarming. “I will tell you that we did not detect those threats,” Air Force Gen. Glen VanHerck of U.S. Northern Command told reporters on Monday. In Pentagon argot for the ages, he called it “a domain awareness gap.” The U.S. government ostensibly pieced the puzzle together later with the help of the intelligence community.

EDUCATION Comments turned off

How ‘Diversity’ Policing Fails Science An open-records request reveals that Texas Tech faculty penalize candidates for heterodox opinions. By John D. Sailer

Posted By on February 7th, 2023

https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-diversity-policing-fails-science-equality-equity-education-texas-tech-job-candidates-interview-dei-pronouns-11675722169?mod=opinion_lead_pos5

At Texas Tech University, a candidate for a faculty job in the department of biological sciences was flagged by the department’s search committee for not knowing the difference between “equality” and “equity.” Another was flagged for his repeated use of the pronoun “he” when referring to professors. Still another was praised for having made a “land acknowledgment” during the interview process. A land acknowledgment is a statement noting that Native Americans once lived in what is now the United States.

Amidst the explosion of university diversity, equity and inclusion policies, Texas Tech’s biology department adopted its own DEI motion promising to “require and strongly weight a diversity statement from all candidates.” These short, written declarations are meant to summarize an academic job seeker’s past and potential contributions to DEI efforts on campus.

The biology department’s motion mandates that every search committee issue a report on its diversity statement evaluations. Through a Freedom of Information Act request, I have acquired the evaluations of more than a dozen job candidates.

To my knowledge, these documents—published in redacted form by the National Association of Scholars—are the first evaluations of prospective faculty DEI contributions to be made publicly available. They confirm what critics of DEI statements have long argued: That they inevitably act as ideological litmus tests.

ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

A tale of two massacres The woke hatred for Israel is no longer just strange – it’s dangerous. Brendan O’Neill

Posted By on February 5th, 2023

https://www.spiked-online.com/2023/01/30/a-tale-of-two-massacres/

“So committed are some in the West to the narrative of Israeli evil and Palestinian good that they hold up Palestinians as the pitiable victims of massacres in the very week when it was Israelis, Jews in fact, who were the victims of a massacre. Their devotion to the ideology of Israel-hate clearly takes precedence over everything, even truth. That there has not been more moral and historical angst in the West over the massacre of praying Jews on Holocaust Memorial Day is abominable. It is a blot on the Western moral conscience. It tells us more about us than we would care to know.”

Truth is the first casualty of war, they say. It’s the first casualty of virtue-signalling, too. Over the past week we have seen just how estranged from truth the West’s fashionable anti-Israel set has become. Something extraordinary happened: woke commentators and activists expressed more fury over a massacre that didn’t happen than they did over one that did happen. They made more noise over a massacre that exists mostly in their imaginations than they did over a massacre that existed in the real world, that shattered people’s lives in the most violent, horrifying and bigoted fashion imaginable. This tale of two massacres, of the real and unreal, sheds a harsh and unforgiving light on anti-Israel sentiment today.

It starts with events in Jenin in the West Bank last Thursday. Following numerous clashes over the past month between Israeli security forces and Palestinian residents of the West Bank, the Israelis launched a raid in Jenin in which nine people were killed. It was a massacre, people say. Israeli security forces slaughtered Palestinians, we were told. Democratic US congresswoman and Squad member Rashida Tlaib led the charge: Israel is an ‘apartheid regime that is killing Palestinian children [and] families’, she said the day after the Jenin incident. We must ‘honour the victims of the Jenin massacre’, she said, ‘by telling the truth about the apartheid government’. The word ‘massacre’ was widely used in the left media. Electronic Intifada called it an ‘Israeli bloodbath’. ‘Jenin’ and ‘massacre’ trended online. British people were encouraged to write to their MPs to register their disgust with Israel’s ‘brutal’ behaviour.

What really happened in Jenin? For all the talk of hateful, racist Israel gunning down Palestinian families, in truth it was a fairly straightforward military clash between Israeli soldiers and Palestinian militants. Israel was pursuing militants that it believes are plotting attacks. Seven of the people killed were gunmen who had opened fire in response to Israel’s raid. You don’t have to take Israel’s word for it – Palestinian militants themselves have said it was mostly their people who died. Islamic Jihad said two of its members were killed while ‘battling’ the Israelis. Four of the slain gunmen were claimed by Hamas. And one was claimed by an armed wing of Fatah, the faction of Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas. Does this sound like a massacre, or like a bloody clash between opposing groups in a war-like situation?

FOREIGN POLICY Comments turned off

Biden Cannot Delay Sending Tanks to Ukraine by Con Coughlin

Posted By on February 5th, 2023

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19375/biden-tanks-ukraine

From the outset of the conflict, Russian President Vladimir Putin has calculated that Western support for Ukraine would eventually wane. And, with the Russians reported to be preparing a new spring offensive, any sign of hesitancy by Washington in terms of supporting Ukraine will encourage Putin in the belief that he will meet no meaningful resistance from the Western alliance….

The Ukrainian military says it is in desperate need of the heavy armour if it is to withstand a new offensive.

The Pentagon, which has been lukewarm about supplying the tanks from the outset, says the delays are due to the fact that it will need to purchase new Abrams tanks to supply Ukraine because the Defense Department doesn’t have any available spares, which seems remarkable given that the US Army and US Marine Corps currently operate nearly 5,000 Abrams.

The [F-16 fighter jets], just like the tanks, are deemed essential if the Ukrainian military is to stand any chance of withstanding a new Russian offensive. The supply of Western fighters such as the F-16 would significantly enhance Ukraine’s war-fighting capability, and would send a strong message to Putin that the West remains committed to ensuring Ukraine ultimately declares victory over Russia.

As with so many other issues relating to Ukraine, the Biden administration finds itself unable to reach any firm decision about whether or not to accede to Kyiv’s request….

As with the tanks request, it has been left to European politicians to increase the pressure on the Biden administration to respond positively to the Ukraine request for fighter jets, with former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson making a direct appeal for Washington to supply warplanes during his recent visit to the US.

“The faster Putin gets out of Ukraine and the quicker we return to stability and the more powerful the message we send to people like China that the West – America, the U.K. – will not tolerate aggressive attempts to change borders by force,” Johnson said.

Certainly, the Biden administration’s constant dithering over its military support for Ukraine is not only demoralising for the brave Ukrainian forces fighting to protect their country from Russian tyranny. It also encourages Putin in the belief that, despite the significant losses he has suffered during the past year, he can ultimately achieve victory.

President Joe Biden may feel that, by finally authorising the shipment of American tanks to Ukraine, he has demonstrated that he remains committed to the Ukrainian cause. But given the time it will take for the tanks to arrive in Ukraine, it could well prove to be an empty gesture.

Furthermore, with the White House resisting Ukrainian requests for F-16 fighter jets to protect the tanks, Biden risks sending mixed messages about just how committed his administration is to supporting Kyiv in its fight against the Russian invaders.

WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Iran: Selling Family Jewels to Buy Loyalty by Amir Taheri

Posted By on February 5th, 2023

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19374/iran-selling-family-jewels

What does an autocrat do when his support base is shaken by popular protests?

The standard answer is: he tries to reassure supporters by increasing their privileges, thus giving them a bigger stake in the preservation of the status quo.

Transfer of public assets to chosen supporters has a routine pattern.

The supporter, usually a senior IRGC officer or a senior mullah, secures a low-interest loan from a state-owned bank to buy a state-owned asset at rock-bottom price. Almost always this is just a formality. Once the asset is acquired, the new owner forms a company and sells parts of its shares to others, making a huge profit. Those who acquire prime real estate make especially big killings.

One problem remains: will retired or cashiered generals feel confident enough about the regime’s future to embark on the recycling scheme offered?

What does an autocrat do when his support base is shaken by popular protests?

The standard answer is: he tries to reassure supporters by increasing their privileges, thus giving them a bigger stake in the preservation of the status quo.

This is what Islamic Republic’s “Supreme Guide” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is trying to do with an edict for the largest privatization scheme in Iran’s history.

Unveiled last week, the scheme is the seventh of its kind since the first was launched 23 years ago.

ISRAEL Comments turned off

GOOD NEWS FROM AMAZING ISRAEL FROM MICHAEL ORDMAN

Posted By on February 5th, 2023

 www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com

Israel, which has developed myriad sleep therapies, never sleeps. Researchers there work 24/7 on  cell therapy and genetics; artificial Intelligence for innovations in medical diagnoses;  fusion energy; quantum communications; growth and storage of food; and intelligent robots to deliver customer service. As Michael Ordman who compiles this weekly list opines: ” It makes you think, doesn’t it?”

It sure does! B.D.S. for Israel really is: Brilliant. Developing. Solutions.  rsk

ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS
 
Cell therapy to treat disease. (TY UWI) Israel’s Minovia Therapeutics (see here previously) is testing mitochondria augmentation therapy (MAT) on children with rare, untreatable mitochondrial diseases. It has had some success with Pearson’s Disease sufferers. It may eventually also be able to treat age-related diseases.
https://www.israel21c.org/new-cell-therapy-may-be-key-to-curing-disease/
 
Diagnosing cancer and the mutation causing it. The AI digital biopsy from Israel’s Imagene (see here previously) not only identifies if someone has cancer but also what mutation is responsible for the anomaly. This is something pathologists cannot determine using a microscope. With results in minutes, not weeks.
https://nocamels.com/2023/01/ai-cuts-cancer-wait-from-four-weeks-to-two-minutes/
 
The world’s first “smart inventory” operating room. Israel’s Galilee Medical Center has inaugurated the first operating room to automatically manage medical inventory. The system from Israel’s Autonomi tracks and manages all medical equipment, reduces waste, conducts patient-safety recalls and issues expiration warnings.
https://www.jpost.com/health-and-wellness/article-729641  https://www.autonomi.xyz/
 
Sheba alliance with futuristic Bahraini hospital. Israel’s Sheba Medical Center is helping set up the King Hamad American Mission Hospital (KHAMH) in Manama, Bahrain. Specifically, Sheba is helping establish ARC (Accelerate, Redesign, Collaborate) medical start-up innovations for doctors to provide advanced care.
https://www.jpost.com/health-and-wellness/article-729985
 
AI in Healthcare conference. The Medical AI Roadmap Conference at Israel’s Beilinson Hospital assembled Israel’s leading doctors, academics, scientists and entrepreneurs to discuss the impact of artificial intelligence (AI) on the healthcare industry.  https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/366750
 
Look into my AIs. Professor Irit Bahar is director of the ophthalmology department at Beilinson Hospital. She described how AI is fundamental to her work. As part of fundus photography (imaging of the retina) AI not only helps detect eye problems but also diagnoses (for example) whether the patient is at risk of diabetes.
https://www.calcalistech.com/ctechnews/article/o0hyw7g9q
 
More benefits of AI. Israel’s Nanox (see here previously) is using data from CT-scans taken for a particular reason, for early detection of other medical issues. A scan for pneumonia can then be further analyzed using AI to discover (for example) osteoporosis. If calcium is discovered in the arteries, it can indicate heart problems.
https://www.calcalistech.com/ctechnews/article/9pj3x0bx4

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Peace Through Strength or Chaos Through Senility? The Chinese would not have been deploying spy balloons over U.S. nuclear installations if Donald Trump was still president. By Roger Kimball

Posted By on February 5th, 2023

https://amgreatness.com/2023/02/04/peace-through-strength-or-chaos-through-senility/

Where’s Laocoön when you need him? News that the Chinese have a huge balloon loitering high above the middle of the country—just where, wouldn’t you know, we have a bunch of ICBM silos sited—reminded me about the reaction of the ill-fated Trojan prince when he saw the gigantic wooden horse sitting on the beach in front of Troy. At the beginning of book two of the Aeneid, our hero, with a heavy heart, accedes to Queen Dido’s request that he tell her the story of Troy’s downfall and his ill-starred voyage to her court. Infandum, Regina, iubes renovare dolorem: “O Queen, you bid me renew an unspeakable grief.”  

But he does as she asks, beginning with the story of the Trojan horse. The Trojans were divided in their opinion about the monstrous equine. Some thought it was a Greek gift or trophy or memorial to commemorate their departure. Laocoön knew better. Rushing down from the town to the beach, he cried

Poor Trojans, have you lost your minds? . . .

‘You think they’re gone? Are any Greek gifts given

Sincerely? Don’t you know Ulysses better?

The Greeks are hiding in this wooden gadget, 

Or else this is a siege machine they’ve built 

For spying or alighting on our homes,

Or some such trick. Don’t trust the horse, my people.’

Then comes the famous line: timeo Danaos et dona ferentis: “I fear Greeks even when they are bearing gifts.” 

Well, nobody thinks the Chinese are bearing gifts. But the response to that minatory skyborne bladder has ranged from Laocoön-like alarm to amused indifference. The Pentagon says it doesn’t think the blimp poses a threat, but then the Pentagon is home to General Mark “White Rage” Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Secretary of Defense Lloyd “Stand Down” Austin. Not much joy from that Keystone-Kop quarter. 

News that a second Chinese balloon—I wonder if these dirigibles have the likeness of President Xi painted on them—is wafting about somewhere over “Latin America” (not a terribly precise designation) raised eyebrows, but again not much is known about its purpose. The Chinese said the first balloon was an errant weather balloon that was blown off course and wound up over highly sensitive American military installations. Imagine that.