One of the Israelis’ most famous
characteristics is a “can do” attitude – “Bitzua” in Hebrew. It is the concept that nothing is
impossible, if you have sufficient determination. And over the past few weeks, Israel has shown just what can be
done in the Jewish State.
The ultimate recognition of “can-do”
achievement is the Nobel
Prize and six of the 12 Israeli laureates feature in a new film entitled
“The Nobelists”,
which was screened on Israel’s Independence Day.
The path to these Nobel Prizes began at
Israeli universities. Even a citizen of
an Arab country can
do a degree in Israel as evidenced by Amer Sweity - the first Jordanian
citizen to graduate with a PhD from an Israeli University. Another PhD graduate is Rivka Ravitz, who is
Chief of Staff to Israeli President Reuven Rivlin. She defies stereotyping by showing that she can
do her demanding job, whilst at the same time being an ultra-orthodox
Jew and a mother of eleven children.
A group of leaders from Miami, Florida’s
budding start-up community recently visited Israel to learn from the Start-up
Nation. Appropriately, their number one
finding was that they needed to emulate Israel’s “can-do”
attitude. No doubt this attribute is
the reason why 5,400
Israeli startups that launched since 1999 are still operating. It is also the reason why Terra Venture
Partners has launched its “Create
Tel Aviv” accelerator, which invests in the ideas of Israeli
entrepreneurs, even before they are turned into startups. And Visa Europe
has simply been “overwhelmed”
by the “can do” enthusiasm from Israeli startups that want to partner in Visa’s
new Israeli
startup hub.
No wonder then that Israel’s hi-tech
exports total $18.4 billion and comprise a huge 45% of Israel’s
trade. Israelis prove time after time
that they can do almost any kind of technical work. This includes working in outer space,
thanks to the new agreement between Canada and Israel’s Space agencies to
develop advanced applications in satellite communications. Despite this “can do” anything attitude, I
expect that the workers at Israel Aerospace’s Bedek were rather surprised
on 5th May when a Saudi
Airbus landed at Ben Gurion Airport for a scheduled maintenance
service!
Other tasks that Israeli companies can
do include some spectacular ceramic ink printing on glass. Israel’s Dip-Tech has built the world’s
largest digital flatbed printer, which can print onto a single pane of
glass with an area of 64 sq meters. One
expert says that Dip-Tech is the only company that can
do the printing for the curved glass “spaceship” that will become
Apple’s new California HQ.
Israeli technology can do printing on the
largest scale or the smallest scale, as proved by the Technion scientists who
engraved the 1.2 million letters of the Hebrew Bible onto a
microscopic wafer of gold. Israel’s
advanced 3D printing technology can do items as diverse as full-size
automobiles or edible
pancakes.
Life in Israel isn’t all work and no play,
however. You can do hiking through
historic forests and uncover a 1400-year-old
wine press. Almost every week
you can do a concert by top International musicians, such as Robbie Williams,
the Backstreet
boys, Dionne
Warwick or One
Republic. You can do Dragon Boat racing, whilst
simultaneously raising money for medical
research into curing diseases that could save millions of lives.
If you want to get serious about helping
save lives, you can do
volunteer work and fly out with IsraAID to nearly every major international
natural disaster as part of an Israeli rescue team. If you have medical training, you can do even more good, as have
the Israeli doctors at Haifa’s Rambam
hospital and Tel Hashomer’s Sheba Medical Center
who have been working in Nepal.
But the Jewish Talmud states that whoever
saves one life, it is considered as if they saved an entire world. And
Hadassah hospital doctors from Neurosurgery, ICU, Orthopedics (and more)
certainly showed what they can
do by putting Shira Klein back on her feet only six weeks after she
almost died when run over by a terrorist in Jerusalem.
One final activity that you can do
in Israel, is practice your religion in safety. That’s what a record 1500 young French Jews will see when they
arrive in Israel this summer on the Taglit-Birthright Israel program to learn
about the Jewish State and their Jewish heritage.
So if you want more news of Israel’s
positive achievements.
Sure - can do!
Michael Ordman writes a free weekly
newsletter containing positive news stories about Israel.
For a free subscription, email a request to
michael.goodnewsisrael@gmail.com
