Background on the IDF’s operation "Cast Lead" in Gaza during the winter of 2008/2009. Israel left Gaza in 2005 hoping for peace and a fresh start, but Hamas has destroyed that optimism through its continued support for terror against innocent civilians.
“Thank Israeli Soldiers” an Israeli charity, was founded by 3 young IDF reserve officers to give Israelis and Jews around the world a vehicle to show appreciation to the young men and women protecting Israel.
This morale-boosting relationship is created by people sending personal notes and a care package filled with supplies specifically requested by the soldiers themselves. We work together with the Friends of the IDF to deliver the packages to IDF bases throughout the country.
The campaign launched in Israel on November 16, 2008 when a professional advertising campaign, donated by Young & Rubican, rolled out on buses, newspapers and radio stations. A guerilla campaign and media coverage quickly put “L’Chayalim B’Ahava” , as it is called in Hebrew, on the map.
As the campaign moves into schools and youth groups across Israel, Thank You Israeli Soldiers was launched in an internet campaign on December 8, 2008. Volunteers in the USA and London are beginning to bring the project to their communities, with the goal of involving worldwide Jewry in this easy mitzvah of showing soldiers we care.
Thousands of young men and women chose to give years of their lives to defend Israel. You can choose to say thanks by choosing which size package to send, which area of the country to send the package, and what to say in your letter to a soldier. When you click send, we’ll take care of everything else.
This is how much they care about the children? No justification for this type of activity no matter what.
Israel Air Force assists IDF ground forces in striking Hamas targets, including gunman posts and launchers—some of which were located in populated areas. Hamas deliberately uses the Palestinian people, with whom Israel continues to seek peaceful coexistence, as human shields.
A new Facebook application developed by Researchers at the Technion’s Faculty of Computer Science, enables using a laptop computer, without being connected to the Internet, to detect Facebook friends who have also installed it. Imagine being stuck in an airport and still being able to network, chat, share files and directories, play collaborative games, or actually meet face-to-face with those previously "virtual friends". The Software enables one friend on Facebook to find another friend, or a friend of a friend, who happens to be in his or her vicinity. The Technion has applied for a patent for this innovative development.
A year ago, researchers from the Technion’s Faculty of Computer Science developed software that enables direct communication between computers and notebook computers using WiFi without an intermediary agent such as Internet service provider. The Technion researchers made the software available at no charge to computer users worldwide.
Back then, direct communication between computers was not widespread because it was very complicated, entailed a long process of data entering and clicking on many keys - so much that even professionals shied away from it. The Technion researchers’ new software also offers applications that did not exist previously.
The software was developed in the framework of the doctoral dissertation of Vadim Drabkin, Gabi Kliot and Alon Kama, under the direction of Prof. Roy Friedman of the Faculty of Computer Science. They built a user-friendly application platform that enables simple communication between computers in close proximity (a range of tens of meters or up to 900 ft). It can be used to transfer dozens of digital pictures from one computer to another in less than a minute, to carry on chats or to play multiplayer games, such as chess.
“For example, employees who go abroad on company business may be seated separately from one another in the airplane. With this software, they can work together on their presentation during their flight,” says Prof. Friedman.
The software is called WiPeer, and since it was published, 50,000 downloads have been registered.
Now, doctoral students Vadim Drabkin and Gabi Kliot, together with students Lior Biran and Tomer Einav, also under the direction of Prof. Roy Friedman, have added a new development, called “Peersonalizer” (personalizing a network friend). Peersonalizer uses a technology that can be applied to social networking sites other than Facebook, like MySpace, Friendster and LinkedIn
“Students can thus expand their network of acquaintances on campus,” the researchers explain. “A businessperson waiting in an airport can meet a friend of a friend who is also waiting in the terminal for his plane and thus expand his circle of business acquaintances. Of course, it is possible to implement this functionality for additional social networks.”
In the future, it will be possible to use this method on WiFi-enabled mobile phones, such as the iPhone, without the need for an intermediary such as a cellular phone company. Additional planned features include the ability to search for nearby Facebook users based on profile matching. The technology can also be used for dating applications that utilize both proximity and social profiles.
The Technion-Israel Institute of Technology is Israel’s leading science and technology university. Home to Israel’s winners of the Nobel Prize in science, it commands a worldwide reputation for its pioneering work in nanotechnology, computer science, biotechnology, water-resource management, materials engineering, aerospace and medicine. The majority of the founders and managers of Israel’s high-tech companies are alumni. Based in New York City, the American Technion Society (ATS) is the leading American organization supporting higher education in Israel, with 22 offices around the country.
you can download the WiPeer from here.
A historic visit to Israel of several members of the German government, lead by Chancellor Angela Merkel, was recently concluded. The visit included a joint cabinet meeting that was held in the Israeli Knesset, in which mutual praises were exchanged by the two heads of states, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Chancellor Merkel. Due to the sensitive history of the relationships between the Germans and the Jewish people, the visit has caused quite a lot of fuss both in Israel and in Germany.
Merkel, the first German head of government to address the Israeli Knesset, used the opportunity to pledge her unwavering support for the Jewish state on the eve of its 60’s birthday, having been founded shortly after the Nazi Holocaust in World War II. She also criticized Hamas’ rocket attacks on Israel and Iran’s threats against Israel’s existence.
In Germany, newspaper editorials actually praised Merkel’s conduct in Israel, but they also warned that Germany must not appear too pro-Israeli, as this might interfere with its ability to play a mediating role in bringing peace to the Middle East.
On the Israeli side, several angry voices were heard regarding Merkel’s speech in the Israeli Knesset, which was to be held in the German language. Several members of the Knesset voiced their opinion about the lack of sensitivity shown by the decision to enable that speech, especially toward the living Holocaust survivors, for whom the German language represents their worst oppressor. Those Knesset members chose to skip the event in order to stress their disapproval.
Perhaps in regards to that controversy, Merkel chose to open her Knesset address in a short speech in Hebrew, saying that the Nazi Holocaust causes her and her fellow Germans to be filled with shame. Her speech was made at the end of a 3 days trip to Israel which included a visit to Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Memorial in Jerusalem.
The historic visit was sealed with a joint statement by the two cabinets indicating the strengthening of the political, cultural, economic and social relations between Germany and Israel, which included a signed agreement instituting future annual meetings at prime ministerial, ministerial and cabinet levels.
