Bulldogs Open Valero Texas Collegiate in 10th – University of … Georgia Bulldogs
Day: September 11, 2023
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant accused Iran on Monday of setting up an airport in southern Lebanon to enable attacks against Israel.
Israel is troubled by arch-foe Iran’s nuclear program, missile buildup and support for militants in the region. The most powerful group, the Lebanese Hezbollah, fought a war with Israel in 2006. But this year, several incidents have taken place along the border, and angry words have been exchanged.
In televised remarks to an international security conference hosted by Reichman University, Gallant showed aerial images of what he described as an airport built by Iran with a view to pursuing what he called “terrorist objectives” against Israel.
He did not elaborate on these but said the site could accommodate mid-sized aircraft. The location he gave was near the Lebanese village of Birket Jabbour and the city of Jezzine, some 20 kilometers north of the Israeli border town of Metulla.
Neither Hezbollah nor Iranian officials had an immediate response to Gallant’s remarks.
A non-Israeli source with knowledge of the site said it could accommodate large drones — some of them weaponized — built off Iranian blueprints. The source said drones launched from the site could be used for both internal and external operational activities but added that the nature and direction of the runway suggested the former were more likely.
Hezbollah has been investing heavily in drone technology, the source said.
Gallant said there was an Iranian effort to create another dangerous front on Israel’s border with Jordan, which has a peace treaty with Israel, “through Shiite militias that operate and are based in Iraq.”
He did not elaborate on the scale or provide further details on how this was being accomplished.
Israel is widely believed to have its own nuclear arsenal, although it neither confirms nor denies this.
Gallant also mentioned divisions in Israeli society over planned judicial overhaul legislation, which has led to mass demonstrations, and some reservists saying they would refuse call-ups if the legislation passes.
“The continuation of the internal struggle is jeopardizing national resilience, the Israel Defense Forces and our ability to provide security to the State of Israel,” Gallant said.
British scientist Ian Wilmut, whose research was central to the creation of the cloned animal, Dolly the Sheep, has died at the age of 79, the University of Edinburgh said on Monday.
His death on Sunday, years after being diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, was announced by the University of Edinburgh, where he worked.
Wilmut, along with Keith Campbell from the Roslin animal sciences research institute in Scotland, generated news headlines and heated ethical debates in 1996 when they created Dolly, the first mammal to be cloned from an adult cell.
“He led efforts to develop cloning, or nuclear transfer, techniques that could be used to make genetically modified sheep. It was these efforts which led to the births of Megan and Morag in 1995 and Dolly in 1996,” the university said in a statement.
Dolly, named after country singer Dolly Parton, was the first mammal to be cloned from an adult cell, using a process called somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT).
This involved taking a sheep egg, removing its DNA and replacing it with DNA from a frozen udder cell of a sheep that died years before. The egg was then zapped with electricity to make it grow like a fertilized embryo. No sperm were involved.
Dolly’s creation triggered fears of human reproductive cloning, or producing genetic copies of living or dead people, but mainstream scientists have ruled this out as far too dangerous.
Wilmut, who was born near Stratford-upon-Avon, attended the University of Nottingham, initially to study agriculture, before switching to animal science.
He moved to the University of Edinburgh in 2005, received a knighthood in 2008 and retired from the university in 2012.
The recent visit of the delegation of the Iranian Armed Forces to Azerbaijan was marked by the discussion of a number of important issues. The fact that our southern neighbor has recently shown great interest in the melting of ice between official Baku and Tehran attracts special attention. This shows that the Tehran administration does not want to lose an ally like Azerbaijan in the South Caucasus.
