Islamisation of UK & Africa?

I recently attended a talk by  Baroness Cox from the House of Lords in the UK . Her insight into what is happening in the UK and Africa was quite startling. One has to wonder just when the world is going to wake up.

She began by stating that Britain is suffering from an onslaught on its values and consequently has lost its soul.The contributory factors leading up to this are

a)       The Hedonism and “Flower Power” of the 60’s

b)       The Marxist/Leninist influences in education in the 70’s and 80’s

Cox was employed as a lecturer at, what was, the Polytechnic of North London where the majority of the lecturers followed the ideology of Marx and Lenin. She was threatened if she continued to lecture without having the “content” of her lecture approved.

The situation today claims Cox is that many feel there is nothing worth defending and consequently this vacuum is being filled by ideologists.

Jihad is taking place in Britain on 5 fronts:-

-           Political

-           Cultural

-           Economic

-           Demographic

-           Legal

Political

Attempts are constantly being made to restrict freedom of speech by not allowing any criticism of Islam or allowing promotion of other faiths, banning jokes about Islam and making these criminal offences punishable by up to 6 years in jail.

One bill going through parliament was defeated by just a single vote and this shows the real danger to democracy.

Educational

Massive investment is taking place on campuses via Saudi and Qatari money in faculties of theology.

School heads are being put under tremendous pressure and threats if they are considered to be “anti Islamic”. Many have resigned and have been replaced by pro Islamists. This is on-going.

Demography

Although illegal according to UK law, polygamy is accepted in order to “avoid upsetting the immigrants”.

Legal

Elements of Sharia law have become accepted in many aspects of life in the UK, although the UK legal concept of “one law for all” is flouted.

Muslim arbitration tribunals and Sharia councils (today 80 of these exist around the country) have been set up making decisions which are totally against the existing UK laws on the statute book.

Decisions on matters of inheritance, divorce, bigamy and rape are totally against the values set out in UK law.

Intimidation is rife to avoid women turning to the British courts with threats of violence backed up with the ultimate sanction of death threats.

To counter this legal challenge, a private members bill is currently going through Parliament entitled “Arbitration and Mediation Services Equality Bill” which it is hoped will meet this challenge.

AFRICA

Cox has a lot of personal experience in Africa through her Humanitarian Aid Relief Trust (HART) www.hart-uk.org and spends several months a year in many different locations.

She states that Islam is working tirelessly to expand in throughout Africa. In Uganda there are a lot of economic pressures and it is openly stated that via polygamy Islam will take over the country.

In Sudan the war and intimidation of Christians to convert to Islam is backed by the country’s leadership. In many areas healthcare is only available to those who are prepared to convert.

Jihad via slavery of the Christians is rampant.

In South Sudan, Libya and Saudi Arabia are pouring money into the Islamisation of the country and again much humanitarian aid is conditional on the religion of the sick.

Cox stated emphatically that if South Sudan falls, Islam will run rampant all the way to Capetown,

Another country that must be protected is Nigeria since failure to do so would result in the Islamisation of the whole of east Africa.

In conclusion, she stressed “I can’t do everything but I must not do nothing”

Israeli Early Childhood Education Program for Accra

The1st Early Childhood Education training takes place in May in Accra.


This course marks the first stage in adopting the very successful Early Childhood Education program which was piloted in Kumasi 3 years ago by MASHAV (Israel’s Agency for International Development Cooperation) and the Millennium Cities Initiative (MCI).


The program focuses on using proven Israeli knowledge and experience in the field of Early Childhood Education to train qualified teachers in Ghana with skill sets that focus on studying through play. These techniques allow for a much better learning experience for the children, while maintaining the Ghana Education Service (GES) curriculum.


Lately, there has been much talk regarding the MASHAV Early Childhood Education program in Kumasi and the interest in the country seems to be high. The ECE success in Kumasi these past 3 years has generated attention from key stakeholders across Ghana.


Earlier this month, Israeli experts from the Golda Meir Mount Carmel International Training Center in Haifa (MCTC) were invited by the GES task force in charge of developing the long term up scaling of Early Childhood Education in Ghana. Israel is running the only successful program in Ghana at this time, and the two experts were considered invaluable to the process. MASHAV, with the assistance of Ambassador Bar-li was only too happy to assist with their arrival to Ghana.

From Israeli Soldier on Egyptian border

I am 25 years old, was born in Brooklyn NY, and raised in Efrat Israel. Though very busy, I don’t view my life as unusual. Most of the time, I am just another Israeli citizen. During the day I work as a paramedic in Magen David Adom, Israel’s national EMS service. At night, I’m in my first year of law school. I got married this October and am starting a new chapter of life together with my wonderful wife Shulamit.

15-20 days out of every year, I’m called up to the Israeli army to do my reserve duty. I serve as a paramedic in an IDF paratrooper unit. My squad is made up of others like me; people living normal lives who step up to serve whenever responsibility calls. The oldest in my squad is 58, a father of four girls and grandfather of two; there are two bankers, one engineer, a holistic healer, and my 24 year old commander who is still trying to figure out what to do with his life. Most of the year we are just normal people living our lives, but for 15-20 days each year we are soldiers on the front lines preparing for a war that we hope we never have to fight.

This year, our reserve unit was stationed on the border between Israel, Egypt and the Gaza Strip in an area called “Kerem Shalom.” Above and beyond the “typical” things for which we train – war, terrorism, border infiltration, etc., – this year we were confronted by a new challenge. Several years ago, a trend started of African refugees crossing the Egyptian border from Sinai into Israel to seek asylum from the atrocities in Darfur.

What started out as a small number of men, women and children fleeing from the machetes of the Janjaweed and violent fundamentalists to seek a better life elsewhere, turned into an organized industry of human trafficking. In return for huge sums of money, sometimes entire life savings paid to Bedouin “guides,” these refugees are promised to be transported from Sudan, Eritrea, and other African countries through Egypt and the Sinai desert, into the safe haven of Israel.
We increasingly hear horror stories of the atrocities these refugees suffer on their way to freedom. They are subject to, and victims of extortion, rape, murder, and even organ theft, their bodies left to rot in the desert. Then, if lucky, after surviving this gruesome experience whose prize is freedom, when only a barbed wire fence separates them from Israel and their goal, they must go through the final death run and try to evade the bullets of the Egyptian soldiers stationed along the border. Egypt’s soldiers are ordered to shoot to kill anyone trying to cross the border OUT of Egypt and into Israel. It’s an almost nightly event.

For those who finally get across the border, the first people they encounter are Israeli soldiers, people like me and those in my unit, who are tasked with a primary mission of defending the lives of the Israeli people. On one side of the border soldiers shoot to kill. On the other side, they know they will be treated with more respect than in any of the countries they crossed to get to this point.

The region where it all happens is highly sensitive and risky from a security point of view, an area stricken with terror at every turn. It’s just a few miles south of the place where Gilad Shalit was kidnapped. And yet the Israeli soldiers who are confronted with these refugees do it not with rifles aimed at them, but with a helping hand and an open heart. The refugees are taken to a nearby IDF base, given clean clothes, a hot drink, food and medical attention. They are finally safe.
Even though I live Israel and am aware through media reports of the events that take place on the Egyptian border, I never understood the intensity and complexity of the scenario until I experienced it myself.

In the course of the past few nights, I have witnessed much. At 9:00 PM last night, the first reports came in of gunfire heard from the Egyptian border. Minutes later, IDF scouts spotted small groups of people trying to get across the fence. In the period of about one hour, we picked up 13 men – cold, barefoot, dehydrated – some wearing nothing except underpants. Their bodies were covered with lacerations and other wounds. We gathered them in a room, gave them blankets, tea and treated their wounds. I don’t speak a word of their language, but the look on their faces said it all and reminded me once again why I am so proud to be a Jew and an Israeli. Sadly, it was later determined that the gunshots we heard were deadly, killing three others fleeing for their lives.

During the 350 days a year when I am not on active duty, when I am just another man trying to get by, the people tasked with doing this amazing job, this amazing deed, the people witnessing these events, are mostly young Israeli soldiers just out of high school, serving their compulsory time in the IDF, some only 18 years old.
The refugees flooding into Israel are a heavy burden on our small country. More than 100,000 refugees have fled this way, and hundreds more cross the border every month. The social, economic, and humanitarian issues created by this influx of refugees are immense. There are serious security consequences for Israel as well. This influx of African refugees poses a crisis for Israel. Israel has yet to come up with the solutions required to deal with this crisis effectively, balancing its’ sensitive social, economic, and security issues, at the same time striving to care for the refugees.

I don’t have the answers to these complex problems which desperately need to be resolved. I’m not writing these words with the intention of taking a political position or a tactical stand on the issue.

I am writing to tell you and the entire world what’s really happening down here on the Egyptian/Israeli border. And to tell you that despite all the serious problems created by this national crisis, these refugees have no reason to fear us. Because they know, as the entire world needs to know, that Israel has not shut its eyes to their suffering and pain. Israel has not looked the other way. The State of Israel has put politics aside to take the ethical and humane path as it has so often done before, in every instance of human suffering and natural disasters around the globe. We Jews know only too well about suffering and pain. The Jewish people have been there. We have been the refugees and the persecuted so many times, over thousands of years, all over the world.

Today, when African refugees flood our borders in search of freedom and better lives, and some for fear of their lives, it is particularly noteworthy how Israel deals with them, despite the enormous strain it puts on our country on so many levels. Our young and thriving Jewish people and country, built from the ashes of the Holocaust, do not turn their backs on humanity. Though I already knew that, this week I once again experienced it firsthand. I am overwhelmed with emotion and immensely proud to be a member of this nation.

With love of Israel,

Getting Out of the Slums

About one billion people across the planet live in slums. International development organizations have been investing resources and efforts in tackling this issue, as one of the United Nations' Millennium Development Goals is to "achieve significant improvement in lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers by 2020." But despite some successes, the situation has continued to worsen as rural-urban migration and natural demographic growth continue to aggravate the problem.

Enter Israel's Weitz Center for Development Studies in Rehovot, which provides month-long training courses on upgrading poor urban neighborhoods and communities. The program is sponsored by MASHAV, Israel's Agency for International Development Cooperation.

In July, a group of 31 participants from 15 African, Asian and Eastern European countries came for a session, representing such countries as Kosovo, Montenegro, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Uganda, Myanmar and Thailand.

Israel - working in cooperation with the United Nations agency UN-Habitat for the past two years - has made a name for itself on the international circuit for its experience in upgrading poor urban residential areas.For the full story, read http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/IsraelExperience/Out_of_slums-Sept_2011.htm

Israel brings treatment and training to Kenya

In just three weeks, a team of Israeli aid workers completed construction of a hospital emergency room - the only facility of its kind - in Kisumu, Kenya.

Sick and injured Kenyans can receive quality emergency care at Kisumu East District Hospital in Kenya’s third-largest city, now that a team of 10 Israeli engineers has completed construction of the hospital’s first, fully-equipped emergency room.

Planned and built under the auspices of MASHAV (the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Agency for International Development Cooperation), the ER will provide not only regional emergency treatment, but also regional medical training.

"There is no other such facility in a region of six million people,” says MASHAV director Haim Divon, who traveled to the East African republic at the beginning of November for a ceremony to inaugurate the ER.

Beyond building the state-of-the-art facility and donating all necessary supplies, MASHAV sent specialists to train local medical professionals in emergency medicine to raise the level of care available in the city and its periphery.


Sick and injured Kenyans can now receive quality emergency care thanks to Israel's MASHAV (Photo: MFA)

The project was initiated by MASHAV’s medical adviser, Dr. Yossi Baratz, who served as the agency’s representative in Kenya from 2003 to 2006. Baratz is in charge of MASHAV’s numerous public health missions, the newest of which include setting up a dialysis center in Micronesia and establishing an intensive care unit in Haiti.

The work was carried out - in a record three weeks’ time - by engineering and medical teams from the largest health organization in Israel and one of the most progressive public health associations in the world. MASHAV invested about a quarter of a million dollars, not including ongoing support and capacity building.

Israel and Kenya have enjoyed close and friendly relations since the 1950s, when MASHAV set up ophthalmology "camps" there as one of its first endeavors. "We have a special sentiment for Kenya because it was one of the first countries we established diplomatic relations with.

This model to be replicated in Uganda and Tanzania

Kisumu is best known today as the region encompassing the village where US President Barack Obama’s father was born. But long before most people had ever heard of this area, Israel was helping to improve its citizens’ quality of life.
During a visit last year from Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, local officials expressed their interest in upgrading the services of the district hospital. Baratz determined that an ER and provision of emergency medical training would be a good starting point.

Divon, who has visited Kenya many times in an official capacity, promises that MASHAV will next help to train emergency medical responders. "When Kenya’s minister of health was in Israel recently, he expressed interest in our Magen David Adom system, [Israel’s equivalent of the Red Cross]. In Kenya, they don’t have adequate medical knowledge or facilities to treat victims at the site of accidents, so ambulances are mainly just for transport. In our system, the ambulance squad is already administering emergency care and this is a concept they want to adopt," he explains.

Divon cites "respect and appreciation," as the benefit Israel derives from such projects. "The mayor, the minister of health and all the other officials pour praise on us and salute Israel and our embassy. This opens doors. When our ambassador calls, they will pick up the phone because they see him as relevant to the development of Kenya. That is the immediate dividend we receive."

Yet another Rambam hospital success

In the western world, cataract operations are considered routine procedures. In Israel alone, some 40,000 such operations are performed yearly. Just a few hours’ flight from here, however, thousands of people suffer from cataracts and blindness. Two Rambam ophthalmologists, returned from a mission to Yaounde, capital of the Republic of Cameroon in Africa, where they restored vision to tens of patients, and instructed local medical teams performing the same procedures.


The mission was sponsored by MASHAV, the Center for International Cooperation of Israel’s foreign ministry. For two weeks, the doctors diagnosed and operated on patients with different eye ailments in the city’s main medical center, Centre H'ospitalier D'Essos. Some of the operations were performed using a phacoemulsifiaction machine, a device for cataract procedures that was brought specially from Israel for the mission. The Israeli doctors also supervised local teams in treating glaucoma patients by laser.

News of the Israeli doctors’ arrival drew patients seeking treatment and advice. Hospitals in Cameroon attend only to insured or paying patients and those without adequate means remain untreated. During their short stay, Drs. Berger and Socea conducted 55 cataract and glaucoma operations primarily for patients in need , ranging in age from five to over 80. Putting this in perspective, the local department carries out only 100 operations yearly.

The procedures were performed with help of the hospital’s staff, along with teams from other cities who arrived to take part in the operation and to learn from the Israeli doctors.

“One of the most moving cases involved a 15-year old boy,” recalls Dr. Berger. “At a young age, this boy had received treatment that left him with cataracts in both eyes and with reversible blindness. We operated on his eyes and he recovered his sight.” Another case involved an elderly man who had been blinded in both eyes as the result of traditional methods of cataract surgery . The RHCC doctors also succeeded in restoring his vision. “This is an ailment that can be treated effectively, ” says Dr. Berger. “Only the absence of proper diagnosis and treatment allows so many people to remain blind.”

The farewell ceremony for the Rambam doctors took place in the presence of Israel’s ambassador to Cameroon, the director and deputy-director of Cameroon’s social security program (CNPS) ,representatives of the Israel foreign ministry, hospital staff and treated patients.

The Department of Ophthalmology, under the direction of Prof. Benjamin Miller, has a tradition of assistance in Africa. “In Israel, medical care is taken for granted, but in Africa you feel you are helping people who live with great difficulties. The results are quick and exciting,” says Dr. Berger. “The operations and guidance we provided are a contribution of Israel to Cameroon. This is part of a long-term, successful Israeli initiative in developing countries, especially Africa.”

For a video presentation see http://www.youtube.com/user/rambamhospital#p/u/5/G0WOUM4azbE