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Arthur Albert: Israel deserves U.S. support

Arthur Albert
Dillon

The editorial “It’s time to let Israel fend for itself” (SDN Sept. 18) raises the question: “Why should America be willing to support Israel?.”

In response, I offer the following map of the Middle East along with an abbreviated list of Israel’s contributions to scientific and humanistic progress since its inception 60 years ago.

– Israel, the 100th smallest country with less than 1/1000th of the world’s population, was one of the very first nations to offer substantial aid and to send medical rescue missions to Islamic people in the stricken tsunami areas. Israel mobilized 150 doctors and relief teams as well as an 82-ton planeload of supplies for Sri Lanka. Israel also sent aid to India and Thailand.



– “60 Minutes” focused on Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem where medical staff ” both Jewish and Arab ” work together to save Jewish and Arab lives.

– Israeli scientists developed the first fully computerized, no-radiation diagnostic instrumentation for breast cancer detection.



– An Israeli company developed a computerized system for ensuring proper administration of medications, thus removing human error from medical treatment. Every year in U.S. hospitals, 7,000 patients die from treatment mistakes.

– Researchers in Israel developed a new device that directly helps the heart pump blood, an innovation with the potential to save lives among those with heart disease. The new device is synchronized with a camera that helps doctors diagnose a heart’s mechanical operations through a sophisticated system of sensors.

– Israelis have developed very advanced hydrology technology that allows crops to grow in the most arid conditions. Israel has shared this technology with other peoples, including the Hopi Indians.

– The cell phone was developed in Israel by Israelis working in the Israeli branch of Motorola, which has its largest development center in Israel.

– Most of the Windows NT and XP operating systems were developed by Microsoft-Israel. The Pentium MMX chip technology was designed in Israel at Intel.

– Voice mail technology was also developed in Israel. The technology for the AOL Instant Messenger was developed in 1996 by four young Israelis.

– Twenty-four percent of Israel’s workforce holds university degrees, ranking third in the industrialized world, after the United States and Holland and 12 per cent hold advanced degrees.

– In 1984 and 1991, Israel airlifted a total of 22,000 Ethiopian Jews (Operation Solomon) at risk in Ethiopia, to safety in Israel.

– The Middle East has been growing date palms for centuries. The average tree is about 18 -20 feet tall and yields about 38 pounds of dates a year. Israeli trees are now yielding about 400 pounds a year and are short enough to be harvested from the ground or a short ladder.

– When the U. S. Embassy in Nairobi, Kenya was bombed in 1998, Israeli rescue teams were on the scene within a day-and saved three victims from the rubble.

– Israel has the highest ratio of university degrees to the population in the world.

– Israel is ranked #2 in the world for venture capital funds right behind the US. Outside the United States and Canada, Israel has the largest number of NASDAQ listed companies.

– Israel is the only liberal democracy in the Middle East.

– oWhen Golda Meir was elected Prime Minister of Israel in 1969, she became the world’s second elected female leader in modern time .

– Relative to its population, Israel is the largest immigrant-absorbing nation on earth.

– According to industry officials, Israel designed the airline industry’s most impenetrable flight security. U.S. officials now look to Israel for advice on how to handle airborne security threats.

– ‘Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers’ was produced by Haim Saban, an Israeli whose family fled persecution in Egypt.

– Israel has the world’s second highest per capita of new books.

– Israel is the only country in the world that entered the 21st century with a net gain in its number of trees.

– Israel has more museums per capita than any other country.

– Israel’s Givun imaging developed the first ingestible video camera, so small it fits inside a pill. Used to view the small intestine from the inside, the camera helps doctors diagnose cancer and digestive disorders.

– Israel has the highest percentage in the world of home computers per capita.

– Israel leads the world in the number of scientists and technicians in the workforce, with 145 per 10,000, as opposed to 85 in the U.S., over 70 in Japan, and less than 60 in Germany, with over 25 percent of its work force employed in technical professions.


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