Nov 15, 2017

Sea of Galilee sinks to record low as drought dries up Israel’s natural water sourcesBy: Colin Wingfield

- Photo by Itamar Grinberg courtesy of israeltourism

Israel's water production is nothing short of miraculous. As a desert nation with an arid climate, there are parts of Israel (particularly in the South) that see less than 100mm of rain annually. Yet despite this, the people of Israel thrive. 

For many years, this was due to careful conservation and water management. Large public efforts to reduce water waste and raise awareness about the value of the precious resource and the collective responsibility to safeguard it. There was a time when practically every TV news broadcast ended with an update on the water level in the Sea of Galilee. 

However, those days are gone. Over the the past decade, technology has replaced conservation as the driving force behind Israel's aquatic abundance. 

Israel leads the world in water purification technology. Several of the most important water-related innovations over the past 60 years have originated either in Israel, or from Israeli minds. Perhaps the greatest triumph of these efforts are the massive water desalination plants that now provide around 70% of the nation's potable water. 

These five facilities located throughout the country are capable of taking millions upon millions of gallons of salt water per day and converting it into potable drinking water. The plants have become so effective and efficient, they've put an end to the entire idea of scarcity of drinking and agricultural water in the nation. Israel no longer suffers from a the near calamitously low levels of drinking water the old PSAs warned about,  but in fact enjoys a surplus, the evidence of which you can see in the land itself. Israel is the only desert nation in the world where the desert is actually receding in the face of expanding agriculture. 

This is fantastic news for the people living and working in Israel, but it comes with one major caveat – the desalination plants only provide water for the people. The natural resources of Israel are at as much risk due to drought then ever before. Only now, the people are not aware of the issue.

This is the concern being voiced by Israel's Water Authority who are now planning a 2018 revival of those old public knowledge campaigns. To make people aware of the growing natural crisis that threatens to dry up Israel's natural sources of water. As the Sea of Galilee recedes to record lows, there is a desperate sense of urgency to return to the cautious conservation of yesteryear.

The drought of the past year has not been kind to Israel’s natural water sources. Northern Israel, usually the part of the country that can depend on regular rainfall, has a deficit of 2.5 billion cubic liters of water when compared to average years. This water is what normally supplies the streams and underground aquifers that supply the Sea of Galilee. If the winter season is similarly unkind, there is a high risk that these sources will dry up completely, depriving the Sea and leading to irreparable harm. 

The Sea of Galilee is of course a resource of tremendous environmental and cultural significance, which by itself should be enough to justify widespread attempts to save it. However, the Sea also poses an important security issue for Israel as well. While the desalination plants provide the vast majority of the water to the nation, any disruptions in their production (such as a natural disaster, malfunction, or attack), and the country is left literally high and dry. The Sea of Galilee is the only freshwater source that exists in the nation without the need for outside resources or heavy processing. 

The challenge now facing the Water Authority is re-energizing the public on the value of conservation in a world where scarcity no longer immediately effects them. There needs to be a widespread recognition that no country, no matter how water-rich, can afford to take it for granted. 

It's a lesson those of us in the West should also take to heart. There is no guarantee that the abundance we enjoy today will be there tomorrow, and it is up to all of us to do what we can to act as good stewards of the gifts God has given us. 

[Comment]

Nov 10, 2017

Celebrating Jewish Icons: Moe Berg, baseball player and spy (Part 2)By: C4i

Attending lectures with a pistol 

Moe Berg didn't spend the war playing ball or hiding in a classroom. As befitting a man of his intelligence, Moe joined the Office of the Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs to support the war effort diplomatically. 

As the war dragged on, rumors of the Third Reich’s weapon programs grew disturbingly dark. An increasingly embattled Hitler who was now facing a losing two-front war and an eroding ability to direct and supply his forces was betting everything on theoretical super weapons. The so-called "wunderwaffe” that would swing the balance of power back in his favor. Massive cannons, new types of U-boats, experimental rockets with longer ranges and bigger payloads. And of course, the bomb.

In 1944, with America's own Manhattan project gathering steam and the full potential of what could happen if Hitler got the bomb first becoming apparent, there was panic in the OSS that America could be beaten to the punch. The Nazi's zeal for the bomb was surprisingly muted. While German scientists enthusiastically pursued rocket technology and outlandish land-based super-tanks, work on atomic weaponry seemed scattered and unfocused. But, was that a ruse? Could they be sure the German's wouldn't be the first to put it all together?

It was a race the free world could not afford to lose. Despite the uncertainty surrounding the German atomic project, the OSS made the bomb one of their top priorities. How close was the Reich to developing a bomb? What kind of materials were they using? Which scientists were driving development? How could they be sabotaged, neutralized, or captured? 

Project AZUSA was one of many secret missions dedicated to answering those questions. In this instance, the focus was on the minds behind the Nazis atomic projects. It would require an agent to take a tour of Europe's vaunted lecture halls and meet with any physicist who was speaking, holding office hours, or would agree to a cup of coffee. The job called for a spy who was also a scholar.

Given Moe's prodigious intellect and varied academic background, he stood out as the man for the job. A natural figure in a lecture hall, Moe not only understood the subject matter discussed, but the rhythms and social cues of the academic world. He knew how to infiltrate these circles, how to get close to faculty and academics, how to ask questions without tipping his hand and probe them for dirt. He attended lectures across Italy and interviewed dozens of scientists, piecing together what they knew, how far they were on their research, and anything they knew about the German wunderkind, Heisenberg.

Heisenberg was the key. The brain behind Hitler's bomb, the chief of the uranium club. If Germany was to have a bomb, Heisenberg would be the one to put it together. All eyes were on him.

In December, Moe would meet the man himself. Heisenberg, unbelievably, was holding a lecture in Zurich, neutral territory, the best chance the OSS would ever have to get close to him. Moe was to attend. The job would be the same as always, observe, assess, and dig - but with one notable exception. This time he was sent with a concealed pistol. This time his orders to observe and assess were amended. "If your assessment leads you to believe that the German's are close to a breakthrough or on the verge of developing the weapon, eliminate Heisenberg.”

Moe Berg listened to Heisenberg's lecture and studied the science. Moe Berg charmed and flattered his way into a post-lecture dinner party with Heisenberg and studied the man. Moe Berg successfully plotted and arranged to walk Heisenberg back to his hotel alone, just the spy and the scientist and the cold Swiss moon.

Moe Berg did not shoot. 

Good field work, no hit. 

The uncertainty principal

For all of his efforts during the war, Moe was offered the Medal of Freedom, but for reasons he never completely shared, he turned it down. His sister would accept it on his behalf posthumously, but it was an accolade Moe had no interest in during his life.

He was offered a chance to coach for the White Sox and the Red Sox shortly after the war as well. Both would have been dream positions for a retired ball player looking for a cozy life coming out of the war. But he turned them down too.

He never joined any firm or sought to do so. He never taught or accepted a teaching position at any of the institutions that would have gladly picked him up just to say they had such a storied man on their staff. 

The only thing Moe seemed to want to do after the war was continue intelligence work – but the OSS seemed done with him. He begged to be sent to Israel to monitor and report on the nascent country. He wrote in his journal that "a Jew must do this,” but his pleas fell on deaf ears. There were no scientists to watch, no academics to infiltrate in Israel, and the OSS (then reforming as the CIA) saw little use in sending a washed-up catcher and academic dabbler to the middle East.

After that, Moe drifted, listless. Even when the CIA, finally, called upon him again when the cold war began to heat up and they suddenly needed an academic who could assess and infiltrate Soviet scientific circles, his work lacked passion. He spent one year in Russia on the CIA's dime and never gathered a shred of substantial intelligence to justify it. At the end of his contract, they sent him home. 

Benched again, and for the last time.

Moe spent the best years of his adulthood as a professional ball player and a spy. His biography reads like the dreamy fantasy of a young boy imagining the coolest life possible. He was vastly over-educated for his baseball peers, and far too much of an everyman to ever truly feel comfortable in the elitist circles of his alma mater. He was a polyglot who traveled the world in the age of freight boats, a recurring start of a popular TV quiz show, and an almost-assassin. Just by his resume alone, the world should have been Moe's oyster. He should have gone on to wealth, fame, and recognition.

Instead, he spent the last years of his life adrift. The former pro ball player turned former spy never held down a steady job after his rocky year in Russian. He bumped from family member to family member, sleeping in guest rooms and on sofas. Slowly expending his reservoir of stories and charm until finally asked to leave, at which point he'd find another person willing to put him up. He would occasionally hint that he was still in the intelligence world, but as the years wore on, even his admires grew suspect. 

The ballgames were over, the exotic overseas trips a memory. Moe lived for his daily newspapers and to catch the occasional ball game on the radio. 

Moe Berg died, isolated from his family and remaining friends, in a nursing home. A sad end for a complicated man, but he would still have the last laugh. His last words, perfectly in character, were asking his nurse "how did the Mets do today?” He passed on before he ever heard an answer. One more question left hanging.

We'll never know exactly what kept Moe from pulling the trigger that night. Maybe he was able to guess that the German's weren't close enough to a bomb yet to merit an assassination. Maybe he suspected Heisenberg was purposely stalling the German's atomic program (which is a question all of it's own). Maybe he didn't want the blood on his hands, to be remembered as an assassin instead of a catcher. We'll never know. Just as we'll never know what shadow clung to him and darkened the last decades of his life.

What we do know is that Moe Berg is the only professional baseball player who's card is displayed at the headquarters of the CIA. That he put aside a promising career in both ball and law to help his country when it needed his unique talents. That Moe Berg was a man who gave it his all, whether he was on the diamond, in the classroom, or in the field. 
[Comment]

Nov 9, 2017

NIKKI HALEY: UNLESS UN RIGHTS COUNCIL REFORMS, USA IS OUT: By: Colin Wingfield

The United States is ready to pull out of the UN Human Rights Council unless it institutes reforms, including removing Israel as a permanent item on its agenda, USA Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley told an Israeli American audience. "The Human Rights Council will either adopt these reforms, or the United States will leave.” Haley said the USA proposed reforms include removing "Item 7,” which requires a report on Israeli actions in Judea & Samaria each time the panel convenes. She said the United States also wanted structural changes that would keep major human rights abusers from joining the council. Haley said the USA delegation was endeavoring to keep unpublished a list the UN Human Rights Council is compiling of companies doing business with Judea & Samaria settlements. Israel and the United States see the list as a blacklist for boycotters. She described one of the Obama administration’s last acts — allowing through a UN Security Council resolution condemning settlements — as a "betrayal” of Israel. (Times of Israel)
[Comment]

Nov 9, 2017

ARAB MEDIA: WESTERN INTELLIGENCE WARNED HARIRI OF DEATH PLOT: By: Colin Wingfield

 Western intelligence agencies warned former Lebanese prime minister Saad al-Hariri of an assassination plot against him, the Saudi-owned pan-Arab newspaper Asharq al-Awsat reported on 5 Nov. 2017. Asharq al-Awsat reported that the sources "revealed that he had received Western warnings of an assassination attempt that was prepared against him". Hariri announced his surprise resignation the previous day, citing a plot to kill him, and saying the climate in Lebanon resembled that before the assassination of his father Rafik al-Hariri, who was also prime minister, in 2005. He criticized Iran and its Lebanese ally Hezbollah for their role in Lebanon and other Arab countries. Hariri travelled to Riyadh on 4 Nov. 2017 and did not return to Lebanon. His resignation was made in a televised statement from an undisclosed location. Saudi Arabia is an arch rival of Iran. Asharq al-Awsat reported unnamed sources as speculating that Hariri would remain outside Lebanon because of the security threat against him. (J.Post) [Comment]

Nov 9, 2017

ISRAELI MILITARY SAYS IT WILL PREVENT JIHADIST TAKEOVER OF SYRIAN DRUZE VILLAGE ON GOLAN BORDER:By: Colin Wingfield

In an unusual public declaration on Friday 3 Nov. 2017 the Israeli military announced it would thwart a potential takeover of a Syrian Druze town by jihadists. The IDF statement came after a Nusra Front suicide bomber killed at least nine people in Hader, which is located just across the border from Majdal Shams in the Golan Heights. The IDF said Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Gadi Eizenkot and other top officers had conducted a situational assessment about what was transpiring in Hader. "The IDF is prepared and ready to assist the residents of the village and prevent damage to or capture of Hader, out of a commitment to the Druze population,” it said. Since the civil war in Syria erupted in 2011, Israel has largely sought to remain neutral in the bloody conflict. However, the IDF has responded with pinpoint strikes to occasional cross-border fire - both errant and intentional - in the Golan Heights and has reportedly bombed a number of Hezbollah-bound arms convoys and other targets in Syria tied to the Iran-backed, Lebanon-based Shia terror group in recent years. Israel has also provided medical treatment to thousands of people wounded in the fighting in Syria. (Algemeinger) Continue to pray for the safety of Israel’s northern borders. As scriptures describe it in Jer. 1:13, "a boiling pot” facing from the north is in danger of tipping over onto Israel’s land and communities. [Comment]

Nov 9, 2017

ISRAELI PM BENJAMIN NETANYAHU EXPRESSES SOLIDARITY WITH VICTIMS OF SHOOTING ‘SAVAGERY’:By: Colin Wingfield

Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu has expressed solidarity with the victims of Sunday’s 5 Nov. 2017 shooting attack on a Baptist church in Texas in which up to 27 people have been killed. Netanyahu said he was "horrified by the savagery in Texas. Our hearts are with the victims, their families and the American people,” the Israeli leader said. The mass shooting occurred at First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs, about 30 miles southeast of San Antonio. The gunman, who was later shot dead by police, walked in to the church at 11:30 on Sunday morning and began spraying the crowd with bullets. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said that on top of the 27 deaths, "many more” had been injured. Paxton said that "In a small town, I can imagine that these people are devastated. And everyone in the community is going to have some type of close relationship” to those either killed or injured in the shooting outrage. (J.Post) Many in Israel, including VFI staff members, join with PM Netanyahu’s shock and condolences regarding the Texas church shooting victims, their loved onesand community in this latest act of violence against the innocent. Please join us in prayer for the comforting and swift recovery of the injured, and for God’s closeness to those who are grieving. [Comment]

Nov 6, 2017

Celebrating Jewish Icons: Moe Berg, baseball player and spy (Part 1)By: C4i

- Boston Public Library photo
 
Spies are supposed to be unassuming. They're supposed to be drab, harmless looking sorts who don't stand out, who blend right in.

Moe Berg was none of these things. Moe Berg, a Jewish boy who grew up in Harlem was tall, handsome, a professional athlete, and a fierce intellectual. Kids collected his playing card. Families would watch him dazzle quiz show hosts on TV. The papers would write about him.

And yet, in WWII, when the country needed a special man to find out exactly how close Hitler was to cracking the atom, Moe Berg answered the call.

Good field, no hit

Moe Berg might just be the smartest man to have ever run the bases for money.  Born in 1902 to a pair of Jewish immigrants, Moe proved to be a prodigy from a young age. According to the stories, he begged his parents to let him attend school when he was three and never slowed down from there. He studied voraciously and outpaced his peers by leaps and bounds earning himself a scholarship in the ivy league. 

Princeton was a dream come true for the Jewish son of a pharmacist from a rough neighbourhood, but it wasn't easy. While Moe excelled in his studies, he felt alienated by the culture of Princeton. No matter how high his grades, or what clubs he was involved in, he was always held at arms length by his peers. He might have been a genius, he might have been good looking and charming, but he was also a Jew, and at Princeton, that identity trumped whatever else he might have been.

Frustrated by prejudice, Moe flung himself into his studies. He took extra classes, spent hours in the library, scheduled office hours with professors in courses he wasn't taking. While he formally pursued an education in law, he ravenously learned everything he could on a wide variety of topics. By the time he graduated, he could hang in conversations about anthropology, the ancient Greeks, modern physics, and geopolitics and speak twelve languages. His knowledge had the breadth and quirkiness of a true autodidact. 

But his real passion was the diamond.

Moe played the game like few others of his time. A self-admitted weak hitter, he made up for his lack of plate presence with his speed, dexterity, and game sense. Moe would make plays nobody else could make, could see strategies his coaches missed. 

He distinguished himself in as captain for the Princeton ball team where he drew the attention of scouts from the Giants and the Robins. Despite seemingly heading for a career in academia or law, Moe signed a contract with the Robins and begin his career as a professional ballplayer.

Baseball in the 1920's was a chaotic, beautiful mess. Players traded teams and positions frequently, and Moe was no different. He played for several teams over the next few years in several positions. 

He first found success as a shortstop. In between the bases, he was an octopus, snagging balls out of the air and tagging runners like his arms were six feet long. But it was as a catcher where he would truly find his home on the field. As a catcher, he was a fortress, a play-making secret weapon. It was here, working in tandem with his pitchers, calling plays, and correctly reading the field that Moe was able to make his biggest impact. Of course, it also helped that he seemed to never drop the ball. Despite having to catch against Ted Lyon's famous knuckleball (a slippery little comet that was as unpredictable for catchers as it was for the batters it bedeviled), Moe held a record 177 games with no errors before finally breaking the streak in 1934.

His intellectual acumen and bizarre field presence made him a curiosity in the dugout. He'd be interviewed in the sports pages quoting literature and referencing mathematicians. A Dodgers scout once evaluated him with the now famous line, "Good field, no hit." But there was so much more to Moe than a simple breakdown of his batting average could say.

As a curious man, it was unsurprising that Moe jumped at the chance to travel overseas to Japan to teach the game in universities in 1932. Touring with a few fellow ballplayers, Moe didn't return with them when the contract with the universities expired. He stayed long after the job, using the trip as a chance to hit other spots -  Manchuria, Shanghai, Peking, Indochina, Siam, India, Egypt and a pre-war Berlin. When he later returned to Japan, he'd address the Japanese legislature in their native tongue and took footage of Tsukiji, Tokyo, and other cities(that according to some reports may or may not have  been used by the department of defense when planning actions in the Pacific).

He even appeared on Information, Please, a popular quiz show where he gave a dominating performance. A bit of stunt casting that back fired on the show's producers. They thought the idea of a ballplayer who thought he was smart was cute and would get some ratings, they didn't expect him to crush the trivia game like an intellectual juggernaut. Moe would appear on the show three times and emerge as one of the best competitors the show ever hosted and a fan favorite. 

But then, like the rest of the world, his life would change with the beginning of the war.

(Continued in part 2)

[Comment]

Nov 1, 2017

UAE APOLOGIZES TO ISRAEL FOR JUDO HANDSHAKE SNUB:By: Colin Wingfield

The United Arab Emirates’ top judo official apologized to his Israeli counterpart last weekend after a tournament in Abu Dhabi saw Israeli athletes repeatedly snubbed by their hosts because of their nationality. Mohammad Bin Thaloub Al-Darei, president of the UAE’s Judo Federation, and Aref Al-Awani, another senior Emirates sports official, apologized to Israeli Judo Association head Moshe Ponte over the fact that an athlete from the UAE refused to shake hands with an Israeli judoka after a match during the several-day tournament. They also congratulated the Israel team for their success in the tournaments. IJF president Marius Vizer called the move a "gesture of courage.” On Friday 27 Oct. 2017 the UAE’s Rashad Almashjari refused to shake hands after losing to Israeli Tohar Butbul in the first round of the men’s lightweight (66-73 kg) category. Butbul went on to win bronze, one of several medals won by Israelis at the Abu Dhabi Grand Slam judo tournament. The group reportedly agreed that Israeli symbols would be permitted at the event next year, but there was no confirmation. Vizer only expressed hopes that "in the near future we can achieve the best condition of participation for the Israel teams.” (Koenig) [Comment]

Nov 1, 2017

‘BE PATIENT, JEWS COME LAST’:By: Colin Wingfield

A Jewish schoolgirl from the north London neighborhood of Stamford Hill neighborhood went to receive her package from a store providing internet mail services but was shocked by the racist slur she received from the salesperson. The girl reported that the salesperson stopped providing service for her while dealing with her order and started to address another customer. When she asked to receive her package, she was told: "Be patient, Jews come last." The girl, who was extremely insulted, informed the Hashomrim organization who reported the matter to local police. Police referred the incident to organizations working in England against anti-Semitism. (Arutz-7) "Those who hate me without reason outnumber the hairs of my head; many are my enemies without cause….” Ps. 69:4 [Comment]

Nov 1, 2017

WISCONSIN BECOMES LATEST STATE TO PASS ANTI-BOYCOTT ISRAELI LAW:By: Colin Wingfield

Governor Scott Walker issued an executive order on Friday 27 Oct. 2017 barring state agencies from engaging in business with entities that discriminate against the Jewish state. The Wisconsin governor's executive order came ahead of his departure for Israel on that same day with a 15-member trade group, running until 2 November 2017. "We stand firmly against discrimination in any form and we wholly support our friends in Israel,” said Walker, adding "I look forward to leading a trade delegation to Israel to foster new trade partnerships between Wisconsin and Israeli businesses.” Wisconsin becomes the 24th USA state to pass either an executive order or state law outlawing BDS activity targeting Israel. According to Walker's statement, Israel-Wisconsin trade relations are flourishing, with "Wisconsin exporting over $80 million annually to Israel and importing over $200 million annually from Israel." (J.Post) [Comment]

< Previous Next >
Blog categories
Latest Blog Posts
Contact Us

C4i America

L - 4097

Columbus, OH  43260-4097

USA

Tel: 1-888-206-1986

Fax : 1-519-720-6905

Email: info@c4iamerica.com

mastercard visa amex discover
All funds charged in US Dollars

The PURPOSE of C4i is to call Christians to express love in action to the people of Israel.

Our MISSION is to present a biblical perspective of God’s plan for Israel and the church.

Our VISION is to see God’s truth proclaimed so that nations will support and bless the people of Israel.

 

C4i America is a 501(c)(3) organization.  Tax Identification Number 46-1508029

Privacy Policy

© 2025 C4I. All rights reserved.

Site by: Lifeline