Israel Active

Israel and Argentina on Monday marked 75 years of diplomatic relations at a gala event at the Israeli Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem. Mutual ties have reached unprecedented heights under Argentinian President Javier Milei. The Argentina-born father of Israel’s Foreign Minister was in the audience.

The three Tel Aviv University professors that won the $1 million Rousseeuw Prize for Statistics (see previously) received their awards at the Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium. Their work on the False Discovery Rate (FDR) is of major benefit to medical science.

With the fall of the Assad dynasty in Syria, the region’s Druze and Kurdish populations are looking to Israel for protection against Jihadists. Similarly, Christians in Syria and Lebanon seek an alliance with the Jewish State.

22-year old Maor Korsias, a Haredi Jew from Tiberias, has become an unconventional presence at the police station in Kafr Kanna, with his long sidelocks and black kippah; He has earned the respect of the local community, who affectionately call him “the Sheikh”.

Arab Israeli construction worker Imad Khirbawi saved dozens of Haredi girls after a fire that broke out in a Jerusalem boarding school. He had heard an explosion and, because he knew the building, he broke down a plaster wall to allow the girls to escape the flames.

Superintendent Avital Tzuriel runs the kennel and the 100 handlers that breed Israel Police guard/attack/sniffer dogs. She was one of the first female officers to undergo the 22-week handler course. The unit is separate from the Israel Defense Forces’ internationally acclaimed Oketz unit.

ADI Negev-Nahalat Eran’s team of gardeners with disabilities has cultivated an impressive crop of accessible organic and insect-free strawberries. Fittingly, the first strawberry harvest took place on Dec. 3, recognized annually as International Day of Persons with Disabilities.

Doa Al Aubra, a 30-year-old primary school teacher from the Israeli Bedouin city of Rahat, made history when she was appointed deputy head of United Hatzalah’s Rahat branch. She is the first Muslim woman to hold this leadership position in the emergency medical services organization.

Israel’s Eco Wave Power’s wave energy plant at Jaffa Port (see previously) has attracted enquiries from companies in Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and even Iran. And EWP’s CEO Inna Braverman, is another (see ) successful Israeli woman who nearly died when the Chernobyl nuclear reactor exploded.

Uruguay’s new president-elect Yamandu Orsi is left wing, but unlike many of his fellow Latin American leaders he has expressed admiration for Israel’s multicultural society after visiting last year. He even suggested he could self-identify as a Zionist.