SA JEWISH REPORT STAFF

Israeli gig for SA rave band Die Antwoord

RISHON LEZION – South African rave band Die Antwoord is the latest to join the roster of summer performers, with a concert this week Wednesday in the Rishon Lezion amphitheatre.

The offbeat, alternative group, which includes singers Ninja, Yolanda Vi$$er and DJ Hi-Tek is based on the South African “zef” countercultural movement, and was founded in 2008 in Cape Town.

The band has a cult following, first developed on social media platforms with the release of its earliest songs.

This is Die Antwoord’s first appearance in Israel. – Times of Israel

Revolutionary Israeli technology turns off the pain of periods

TEL AVIV – When female reporters from publications including Cosmopolitan, Seventeen and HuffPost opened packages containing a wearable device to relieve menstrual pain, they probably didn’t realise it was invented by an Israeli father and son.

iPulse Medical, the company behind Livia, was founded in April 2015 and is headed by Chen Nachum, a 36-year-old bachelor, using technology developed by his father.

Zvi Nachum, a medical patents developer, was experimenting with pain solutions for a different project and discovered how to fine-tune the frequency and wave shape of an existing technology called TENS (transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation) to block specific types of pain.

Nachum gathered a mostly female group of Israeli experts to birth Livia: industrial designers from Tenenbaum Hazan Design Studio in Herzliya; marketing and branding gurus from Tross Creative in Tel Aviv; and publicists from Blonde 2.0 in Tel Aviv.

It was the publicists who had the idea of 3D-printing 20 prototypes to send to influential women journalists.

The result is a small patent-pending wearable (available in a variety of fun colours) that claims to provide nearly instant relief from cramps in three easy steps: attach the electrodes via gel pads to the spot where pain is worst, clip the device onto a waistband or pocket and switch it on. – Israel 21c

Australia’s three richest are all Jewish

MELBOURNE – The three richest people in Australia have a combined wealth of more than A$29 billion… and they’re all Jewish.

The biggest celebrations have been in the house of property developer and Meriton owner Harry Triguboff, who topped the list with an estimated worth of $10,62 billion according to the Australian Financial Review.

Triguboff said that when he built his first apartment building in 1963 he never imagined he would one day be the richest person in Australia.

“I’m excited because it took a long time to get to the top, so it’s a big thing,” Triguboff said.

Despite his rise to the top of the list, Triguboff said that as he slowly approaches retirement he has realised some of the mistakes that he made along the way.

“I recently nominated some people as directors who had worked for me for a long time, and now they look upon the business as if they are the boss and it made a really big difference.

“I’m getting more people around me, which I probably should have done early because I did too much myself.”

Following Triguboff on the rich list is packaging, paper and recycling group, Visy, executive chairman Anthony Pratt with $10,35 billion and Westfield shopping centres’ founder Frank Lowy in third place with $8,26 billion. – Australian Jewish News

Judo is Israel’s most successful Olympic sport

TEL AVIV – Judo is arguably Israel’s most successful Olympic sport.

Three of Israel’s seven Olympic medals have come in judo (just like windsurfing), with the likes of Yael Arad, Oren Smadja and Arik Ze’evi regarded as some of the country’s all-time greatest athletes.

In recent years, it has been Yarden Gerbi who has taken over the mantle, becoming the first Israeli to be crowned judo world champion in 2013 and winning a silver medal in the competition a year later.

Seven Israeli judokas – three men and four women – officially secured their places in Rio when the new world rankings were released.

Israel has never sent more than five total representatives to the judo events at any Olympics, and no more than a single woman.

After a disappointing 2012 Olympics, the IJA decided to overhaul the way its athletes train. Rather than each judoka practising mainly with his personal coach, the IJA adopted a team-orientated format in which the athletes spend far more time training together under a joint head coach and his staff.

There were many doubters, but it is hard to argue with the results. – Jerusalem Post

Chassidim object to ‘overkill’ in school raid

MONTREAL – Spokesmen for the Chassidic community say a June 1 intervention by the Youth Protection Department (YPD), accompanied by police, at a school suspected of operating without a government permit, was unnecessary and excessive.

During the school day, about a dozen social workers from Batshaw Youth and Family Centres – apparently unannounced – came to the boys’ school, located in a commercial building at 6355 Park Ave. When they were refused entry, the police were called, according to reports.

The YPD has not made public why it took the action, citing confidentiality, but the education ministry confirmed that it has issued no permit for a school at that address.

“This was really overkill,” said Alex Werzberger, head of the Coalition of Outremont Chassidic Organisation. “If you want to use a stronger word: terrorism.”

He said there were maybe 30 police on the scene, and the approximately 60 elementary age learners were in “lockdown” for hours, “traumatising” them. “It looked like a drug raid,” he said.

Werzberger said the school is affiliated with the Vishnitzer community and was established last year.

Although the YPD was involved, there are no allegations of abuse. It is the role of the YPD to make inquiries on behalf of the education department when learners are to be interviewed.

Other Chassidic and Haredi schools are also under the scrutiny of the education department for not complying with the law, notably for failing to teach the mandatory curriculum and having unqualified teachers, but Werzberger said this is the first time an operation like this has occurred. – Canadian Jewish News

Suspended Leftist Labourite claims a conspiracy

BRIGHTON – Jacqueline Walker, the vice-chairman of the hard-left Momentum group loyal to British Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, has claimed she has been the victim of a conspiracy.

Walker, who was readmitted to the party after being suspended over allegations of making anti-Semitic comments, said: “There is a little bit of a conspiracy going on.”

Speaking at a meeting in Brighton, she told a 50-strong audience that she had been abroad when she was informed of her suspension last month.

She said: “Look at the date of the Jewish Chronicle when that came out. I was actually in Turkey.

“My letter suspending me was actually dated May 4. The Jewish Chronicle published the story about me on May 4.

“Now, you have to put two and two together. What you will know is that somebody in the [Labour] compliance unit, or around there, is leaking information out to the media.

“I want to ask who that is, why they are doing it, and what the political purpose of that is.”

She defended her Facebook post, in which she claimed that Jews were the “chief financiers of the sugar and slave trade”.

She attacked the Israel Advocacy Movement for exposing her comments, but added: “I don’t want to spend too long talking about it because what I am not going to do is be trapped. This was a private Facebook discussion, this was a discussion between me and two friends. One was an Israeli Jew, a Zionist, and we have been friends for a long time, ever since we studied the African Holocaust and the Jewish Holocaust together some years ago.” – Jewish Chronicle, London

Erin Schrode – pro-Israel and possibly youngest Congress member

SAN FRANCISCO –  Erin Schrode is a 25-year-old candidate for California’s Second Congressional District from Marin County. If elected she will be the youngest member of Congress.

“I’m an activist, an educator, a social entrepreneur,” she said.

“Public service has been my life for over a decade, but never did I think that I’d be a politician.

“I gave a speech two plus months ago – the through-line of which was: ‘If not here, where?’ about the impact of this place, of Northern California, of our CD-2 on my life, my values, my career. I walked off stage and people said: ‘How do we get you to run for office?!’

“I called up my mentors, those I respect most, dear friends, and expected them to smack me down to size, but they all said: ‘Run! We need that voice in government today’.

“I never had any connection to the State of Israel,” she said.

“A friend convinced me to go on Birthright. I landed at Ben-Gurion and had the most profound sense of homecoming, of belonging.” – Los Angeles Jewish Journal