September 10, 2003
Israel and its neighbors

Here is a brief comparison of academia in Israel vs. academia in Arab countries. Israeli academics dedicate themselves to investigating difficult scientific problems in order to discover things that can benefit all of humanity. For example, Israel is one of the world's leading centers of stem cell research and is making progress treating severe spinal cord injuries.

Egyptian scholars, on the other hand, dedicate themselves to investigating this sort of thing:

An Egyptian lawyer said on Wednesday he was planning to sue the world's Jews for "plundering" gold during the Exodus from Pharaonic Egypt thousands of years ago, based on information in the Bible.

Nabil Hilmi, Dean of the Faculty of Law at Egypt's al-Zaqaziq University, said the legal basis for the case was under study by a group of lawyers in Egypt and Europe.

"This is serious, and should not be misread as being political against any race. We are just investigating if a debt is owed," Hilmi told Reuters in a telephone interview.

Investigate away, boys.


Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at September 10, 2003 11:08 AM
Comments

We should initiate a wrongful death suit against Saudi Arabia for the massacre by beheading all 800 Jewish residents of Medina, originally a Jewish city. We can seek to recover all economic damages, including wage loss, descendents share of oil revenue, and of course, punitive damages against all Muslims.

Posted by: Mossi Assiq on September 10, 2003 11:50 AM

This raises several interesting questions because, of course, in order to proceed, the suit has to assume the Old Testament is literally true:

(1) Countersuit for unpaid wages for all those indentured servants? Wrongful death suit for Jews killed?

(2) Does this mean he accepts Jewish claims to land based on the Old Testament?

Posted by: jeremy on September 10, 2003 04:45 PM

If we consider that Nobel prizes are given by an European country, which group of academics is more likely to get one this year?

Posted by: nelson ascher on September 10, 2003 08:32 PM
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