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More on "Great Return March"

According to Hamas,this week  30,000 Hamas soldiers participated in “Steadfastness and Challenge”, a large-scale two-day military maneuver in the Gaza Strip.

The Hamas "military wing" is most certainly not a ragtag collection of amateur terrorists. They are both well equipped and well trained. And they benefit from the ongoing advice and support of professionals from Iran and elsewhere.

Bottom line: the last thing that Israeli decision makers should do is assume that Hamas has a transparent simple minded plan for the coming weeks.

The biggest fear?

Hamas is deploying troops to ostensibly prevent marchers from reaching Israel this Friday.

If the day passes with only minor incidents, Israeli decision makers may be lulled into doing what they almost always do:  assume that what happened today is going to repeat itself tomorrow.

Hamas troops defend our border? Fantastic.

Time to reinstate cancelled holiday leave.

And this goes on for a week. And another week.

So by the time we reach Israel Independence Day all the talking heads are discussing how we should reward Hamas and IDF preparations start winding down.

And then it happens.

A surge of tens of thousands towards Israel.

There could even be some Arab gunfire blamed on "radicals" trying to undermine Hamas. But then it happens.

After we quickly exhaust our non-lethal tools, we start shooting.

And those Hamas troops that have been deployed all this time on the line do the obvious:  start attacking Israeli forces.

And then? 

Suffice it to say that Hamas today has the men, equipment and training to do a lot more than just cross the line and murder some Israelis or drag back hostages.

It is sincerely hope that our security people have thought out of the box when considering what Hamas may do and how to prepare to foil these possible operations.

As for the obvious challenge of tens of thousands - or more - streaming over the line, here's one cynical but possibly critical observation:  the international consequences of killing 20 people or 2,000 is almost virtually identical.

The troops in the field need to be prepared to implement a devastatingly bloody "Plan B'  if sharpshooters neutralizing key leaders fail to halt the surging mob.

And that "Plan B" has got to be so ferociously effective that we will be able to honestly justify it for its efficacy.

MDA Creates Breast Milk Bank

While Magen David Adom is Israel's national blood bank, in charge of collecting, testing, and processing 97% of Israel's blood each year, MDA will be soon opening a breast milk bank to allow nursing mothers to donate surplus milk for babies who do not have access to it. Science has shown that breast milk protects babies from disease and helps build the immune system better than artificial formula.

Similar to the processing of blood donations, MDA will test and analyze the milk before being pasteurized and stored for future distribution.

Creating a milk bank is another way Magen David Adom is helping ensure Israel's future stays healthy and strong. 

“Great Return March”

Preparations continue in the Gaza Strip for a mass march to Israel’s border (the “great return march”). To that end the Palestinian organizations operating in the Gaza Strip have organized a “national committee” which in turn appointed professional committees to promote events in the internal Palestinian and international arenas. The organizers’ objective is to extend the scope of the events beyond the Gaza Strip and to promote marches not only in Gaza Strip but in Lebanon, Syria and Jordan. According to the organizers, they are currently coordinating with Palestinians abroad and with Israeli Arabs. One of the activists involved in media preparations is Zaher Birawi, a Palestinian activist based in Britain who is affiliated with Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood, and who in the past played a central role in organizing convoys and flotillas to the Gaza Strip.

Timing of the events

·       According to the plan currently being formulated, there will be a series of ongoing events which will take place over the course of six weeks, between March 30 (Land Day) and May 15 (Nakba Day). The plan includes the erection, on Land Day, of a tent camp (or camps) near the security fence on the Israeli border, where thousands of Palestinian families will stay. The campaign will peak with a march of thousands of Palestinians to the Israeli border, probably on Nakba Day (no time table is not final).

For more detail on this action read http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/en/preparations-great-return-march-update/  

New Israeli Technology Replaces Surgeon's Knife With No-Cut Alternative

 Judy Siegel-Itzkovich – February 15     https://tinyurl.com/ybx67ox7  

People who have to undergo surgery but fear the scalpel will have a less-frightening alternative, the enzymatic “blade.” Researchers at the Wolfson Faculty of Chemical Engineering at Haifa’s Technion-Israel Institute of Technology have developed a device that replaces the surgeon’s knife with natural biological materials.

In an article just published in ACS Nano of the American Chemical Society, the researchers present the application of this technology in a surgical procedure in the mouth. This application significantly reduces the pain associated with orthodontic surgery and significantly accelerates tissue restoration.

The research was conducted by Prof. Avi Schroeder, a nanotechnology expert who is head of the targeted drugs laboratory and personalized medicine technologies at the faculty. The “blade” is based on the intelligent use of enzymes – biological molecules by which the body restores itself – as well as nanoparticles and technology for controlled release of drugs.

Every year, about five million people in the US alone undergo orthodontic treatment; to speed up the treatment, which can take as long as two years, many of them undergo an invasive procedure in which the collagen fibers that connect the tooth to the bone tissue that holds it are cut for the laying of an orthodontic bridge.

The technology developed at the Technion softens the collagen fibers by means of a controlled release system of collagenase, an enzyme that breaks down the collagen. In methods developed in Schroeder’s lab, the collagenase is packed into liposomes – nanoscale particles with a spherical shape – that as long as they are there, cause the collagenase particles to be inactive. But when the gel is applied to the target site, the enzyme gradually begins to leak out of the liposome and soften the collagen fibers.

Dr. Assaf Zinger, who conducted his research emphasizes that the new approach can be applied in a variety of other surgical procedures. “For thousands of years, the surgeon’s scalpel has become more sophisticated, but the paradigm has not changed,” he said. “In our study we present a significant paradigmatic change – the replacement of a mechanical-physical process with a biological process.”

The researchers conducted a series of experiments in which optimal collagenase concentration was determined for the procedure and subsequent tissue rehabilitation.

In a preclinical study, the researchers compared the efficacy of the controlled-release system (combined with a bridge) to that of conventional orthodontic therapy. The conclusion is that the unique system shortens the time needed to straighten teeth by about two-thirds. The study was conducted in rats, using a special bridge built for the experiment.

The research included physicians from Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center; physicians and dentists from Haifa’s Rambam Medical Center; and the Moriah Veterinary Center.

Palestinians to claim Dead Sea Scrolls at next UNESCO meeting

The request to include the Qumran Caves and Dead Sea Scrolls as their own may be made at the next UNESCO meeting this July, the Simon Wiesenthal Center predicts.

The next “prize” the Palestinians will likely claim as their own at the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) will probably be the archeological site of Qumran and its Dead Sea Scrolls, Shimon Samuels of the Simon Wiesenthal Center said Wednesday, according to The Jerusalem Post.

Addressing a panel on the denial of Jewish history in international organizations at the Global Forum for Combating Antisemitism in Jerusalem, Samuels listed the Palestinians’ “success” at falsely claiming ownership of biblical and cultural sites, the Post reported.

UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee has ascribed to “Palestine” Bethlehem’s Church of the Nativity in 2012; the agricultural terraces of Battir, site of the ancient Jewish fortress at Betar, in 2014; and Hebron’s Tomb of the Patriarchs in 2017, the Post noted.

In October 2016, the Committee voted in favor of a resolution denying the millennia-old Jewish connection to Jerusalem, including the Temple Mount and the Western Wall.

“This is yet another absurd resolution against the State of Israel, the Jewish people and historical truth,” Israel’s ambassador to UNESCO Carmel Shama-Hacohen stated at the time. “There is no connection of another people to another place in the world that comes close to the strength and depth of our connection to Jerusalem from a religious, historical and national perspective, a connection that has stood the test of 2,000 years.”

The request to include the Qumran Caves and the Dead Sea Scrolls may be made at the next World Heritage Committee meeting this July in Bahrain, Samuels told the conference, the Post reported.

Already in November 2016, Israel Radio reported that the Palestinians were planning the next stage in their attempted denial of Israel’s history and heritage by preparing to lay claim to the Dead Sea Scrolls at UNESCO.

The scrolls, mostly Hebrew writings from the Second Temple period, were discovered in the Qumran Caves in the environs of the Dead Sea. They include many biblical texts and are believed to have been written by members of a Jewish sect known as the Essenes.

Europeans funding illegal Arab construction on Israeli land?

Arabs are using European Union funding to violate court orders and continue their illegal building near Hebron.

Arabs in the Hirbet Z’nutah outpost have apparently defied a court order by continuing to illegally build structures at the location. Hirbet Z’nutah is located in the middle of an archaeological site in the southern Hebron Hills region of Judea. This time, the Arabs’ illegal construction was reportedly completed using funding from the European Union (EU).

Just six months ago, the High Court suspended demolition of the outpost provided that no additional construction take place. Allegedly flouting that commitment, the Arabs responsible for construction in Hirbet Z’nutah apparently used EU funds to build yet another illegal structure, reported Arutz 7.

“Construction of a school on a protected archaeological site, with EU funding, is a gross and blatant violation of the High Court’s decision, as well as a violation of the European Convention on the Protection of Archaeological Heritage,” said Yishai Hemo to Arutz 7. Hemo serves as Field Coordinator for Judea and Samaria for the Regavim organization, a watchdog that monitors illegal Arab construction

As a result of the latest violation, the NGO Regavim plans to file another petition with the High Court of Justice in the following days.

“The offenders have sharpened their tactical skills, and have managed to pull the wool over the Court’s eyes. They never intended to uphold their commitments in this matter. We will also be petitioning the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to demand that decisive action is taken in light of the European Union’s illegal conduct,” Hemo explained.

While the illegal Arab outpost is located in Area C, and is thus under Israeli control and not subject to Palestinian Authority administration, the new structure flies PA flags.

It remains to be seen whether Israeli authorities will be required to remove the most recent structure, a course of action that has been required several times since the illegal outpost was first started several year ago. In 2012, for example, Israeli authorities had to eliminate makeshift stables and tents set up there.