Israel Active

Over 500 supporters attended the 20th Anniversary Gala of American Friends of NATAL (see previously) hosted by Michael Rapaport in New York City. A record number of tickets were sold raising vital funds for trauma care and spotlighting Israel’s mental health crises.

Scientists at Israel’s Ben-Gurion University have discovered that when obese middle-aged mice lose weight, it aggravates inflammation in the hypothalamus, a brain region that governs appetite, energy balance, and numerous essential functions. And I don’t want to stop eating cheese.

Researchers at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and at the Stanford Center for Longevity has proved that older adults learn best when education taps into their motivations, connects new knowledge to previous experience, and allows for active engagement.

Throughout November, Israeli men were urged to get regular check-ups and screenings, and to lead healthier lifestyles. The Movember campaign began in Australia (Mo is Australian slang for moustache) and focuses on prostate cancer, testicular cancer, suicide prevention and men’s mental health.

Prof. Yifat Merbl, a systems biologist at Israel’s Weizmann Institute has been named to Nature’s 10, the journal’s annual list of the ten people who shaped science in 2025. It recognizes her work uncovering natural antibiotics in the “garbage” of the immune system’s proteasome (see previously)

Israeli startup New Phase (see previously) is conducting a clinical trial on 27 patients of its heat-activated, iron-oxide nanoparticles that use heat to destroy cancer cells from the inside. It provides a low-toxicity method of slowing down metastasis and extending life.

Surgeons at Haifa’s Rambam Medical Center saved the life of a critically wounded Israeli soldier evacuated from Syria with a bullet lodged in his heart. They made several incisions to stop the bleeding but left the bullet in place for later removal by catheterization.

Organs from six-year-old Israeli Ariel Hakakian, who died from influenza complications, saved the lives of two adults and two children. His intestine was used by surgeons at Beilinson Medical Center in one of the most rare and complex transplants ever performed in Israel (see second link).

Save a Child’s Heart, operating out of the International Pediatric Cardiac Center and Sylvan Adams Children’s Hospital at Wolfson Medical Center, has performed its 8,000th life-saving heart surgery for a child from Africa. Plus training African doctors to save lives. Please watch the video.

Physicians at Jerusalem’s Shaare Zedek Medical Center say a chicken bone lurking in a man’s soup caused a blockage in his lung. This led to an infection that nearly killed him. After medication failed to clear the infection and his severe cough, a bronchoscopy revealed the cause.