Transplant Brokers in Israel Lure Desperate Kidney Patients to Costa Rica – NYTimes.com

A broker who trades in human organs might seem a difficult thing to find. But Ms. Dorin’s mother began making inquiries around the hospital where she worked, and in short order the family came up with three names: Avigad Sandler, a former insurance agent long suspected of trafficking; Boris Volfman, a young Ukrainian émigré and Sandler protégé; and Yaacov Dayan, a wily businessman with interests in real estate and marketing.

The men were, The New York Times learned during an investigation of the global organ trade, among the central operators in Israel’s irrepressible underground kidney market. For years, they have pocketed enormous sums for arranging overseas transplants for patients who are paired with foreign donors, court filings and government documents show.

via Transplant Brokers in Israel Lure Desperate Kidney Patients to Costa Rica – NYTimes.com.

Resisting Nazis, He Saw Need for Israel. Now He Is Its Critic. – NYTimes.com

THE HAGUE — In 1943, Henk Zanoli took a dangerous train trip, slipping past Nazi guards and checkpoints to smuggle a Jewish boy from Amsterdam to the Dutch village of Eemnes. There, the Zanoli family, already under suspicion for resisting the Nazi occupation, hid the boy in their home for two years. The boy would be the only member of his family to survive the Holocaust.

Seventy-one years later, on July 20, an Israeli airstrike flattened a house in the Gaza Strip, killing six of Mr. Zanoli’s relatives by marriage. His grandniece, a Dutch diplomat, is married to a Palestinian economist, Ismail Ziadah, who lost three brothers, a sister-in-law, a nephew and his father’s first wife in the attack.

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On Thursday, Mr. Zanoli, 91, whose father died in a Nazi camp, went to the Israeli Embassy in The Hague and returned a medal he received honoring him as one of the Righteous Among the Nations — non-Jews honored by Israel for saving Jews during the Holocaust. In an anguished letter to the Israeli ambassador to the Netherlands, he described the terrible price his family had paid for opposing Nazi tyranny.

Photo

Hassan al-Zeyada, a Palestinian psychologist in Gaza, whose brother Ismail Ziadah is married to Mr. Zanoli’s grandniece. Credit Sergey Ponomarev for The New York Times

“My sister lost her husband, who was executed in the dunes of The Hague for his involvement in the resistance,” he wrote. “My brother lost his Jewish fiancée who was deported, never to return.”

Mr. Zanoli continued, “Against this background, it is particularly shocking and tragic that today, four generations on, our family is faced with the murder of our kin in Gaza. Murder carried out by the State of Israel.”

via Resisting Nazis, He Saw Need for Israel. Now He Is Its Critic. – NYTimes.com.

Man Dies After Bloody, 10-Minute Beating From LAPD Officers: LAist

“They were beating him real bad, and he died of the wounds,” said Yair Abrego, the victim’s brother.

Abrego suffered from a severe concussion and bruises to his face and body. He later died at the hospital. One of the sergeants had a broken hand, and another had a knee injury.

Los Angeles County coroner’s Chief Craig Harvey told the L.A. Times that they are still determining the cause of death and are looking into more tests. However, the initial coroner’s report said that Abrego was “combative and confused with acute cocaine intoxication.”

LAPD’s Force Investigation Division is investigating the incident further. Abrego’s funeral will take place on Saturday.

This incident happened just days before LAPD officers from the same Newton Division fatally shot 24-year-old Ezell Ford, whose family said was “mentally challenged” and complying with officers on Monday night.

via Man Dies After Bloody, 10-Minute Beating From LAPD Officers: LAist.

Where China and Kazakhstan Meet : Image of the Day

While people often say that borders aren’t visible from space, the line between Kazakhstan and China could not be more clear in this satellite image. Acquired by the Landsat 8 satellite on September 9, 2013, the image shows northwestern China around the city of Qoqek and far eastern Kazakhstan near Lake Balqash.

via Where China and Kazakhstan Meet : Image of the Day.

And which area will produce food longer? Maybe Kazakhstan because the Chinese are using up their water. If the Kazaks go for green house production, they may end up feed large parts of China.

LA Sparks Celebrated American Indians Appreciation Night with Shoni Schimmel

AMERICAN INDIANS LOVE SHONI AND SHE MAKES IT APPARENT THAT THE FEELING IS MUTUAL.

Some 300 Indian youth and families were able to attend the game with tickets donated by sponsors. In all, over 1,000 American Indians attended the game. Some of the American Indians traveled to Los Angeles from as far away as Reno, Nevada. Various tribal leaders also attended, as well as former Los Angeles Laker A.C. Green.

via LA Sparks Celebrated American Indians Appreciation Night with Shoni Schimmel.

Dutch man returns Israeli WWII honor after family killed in Gaza | News , Middle East | THE DAILY STAR

A 91-year-old Dutch man honoured by Israel for shielding a Jew from the Nazis has handed back his medal after six of his relatives were killed in a Gaza air strike.

Henk Zanoli returned his Righteous Among the Nations award to the Israeli ambassador in The Hague this week after an Israeli F-16 destroyed his great niece’s Gaza home, killing all inside.

“It is with great sorrow that I am herewith returning the medal I received as an honor and a token of appreciation from the State of Israel for the efforts and risks taken by my mother and her family in saving the life of a Jewish boy during the German occupation,” Zanoli said in a letter dated Monday.

According to Zanoli’s letter addressed to the Israeli ambassador, the bomb dropped by the Israeli military on July 20 during its massive Gaza offensive, flattened a four-story building at the Bureij Refugee Camp, killing all inside.

“The great-great grandchildren of my mother have lost their grandmother, three uncles, an aunt and a cousin at the hands of the Israeli military,” Zanoli said in the letter, published by liberal Israeli newspaper Haaretz and widely circulated in the Dutch media.

via Dutch man returns Israeli WWII honor after family killed in Gaza | News , Middle East | THE DAILY STAR.

Never in a Straight Line #poem #dpchallenge #photography

The ocean refuses no river

penned in moon dust

Water flows
circuitous route off mountains
it was a warm winter
the river never runs in a straight line
*
feelings flow
never making any sense
two hearts spring
the river never runs in a straight line
*
passion flows
dawn collides with day
heat beads off summer skin
the river never runs in a straight line
*
life flows
making confusing rules
fall of three streams
the river never runs in a straight line

river

Today’s prompt at DP photography challenge is Zigzag.

What zigzags in your life???

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