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The Jewish Home | JANUARY 5, 2023 Azerbaijan’s First Amb. to Israel

Azerbaijan appointed its first ambassador to Israel last week. According to Azerbaijan’s state news outlet Haqqin. az, Deputy Minister of Science and Education Mukhtar Mammadov has been appointed as the country’s first ambassador to the Jewish State.

“Congratulations and good luck to the first Azerbaijani ambassador to Israel!” tweeted George Deek, Israeli ambassador to Azerbaijan, upon news of the announcement.

Born in 1983 in Baku, Mammadov worked in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs from 2005 to 2013. This included his work at the Azerbaijani embassy in Belgium from 2009 to 2013. Since 2013, under the Ministry of Education, he has been head of the international cooperation department. In April 2021, he became the Deputy Minister of Science and Education. In this capacity, Mammadov supervised projects of innovative cooperation with Israel in the field of science and education.

Mammadov is fluent in Russian, English and Turkish.

“I warmly congratulate my colleague Mukhtar Mammadov on being appointed as the first ambassador of Azerbaijan to Israel,” tweeted Mammad Talibov, Azerbaijan’s ambassador to Mexico, Costa Rica, Colombia, Peru, Guatemala, and Honduras. “I wish you the best and greatest success in your endeavors and in your new role.”

The announcement comes after Azerbaijan announced in November that it would open an embassy in Israel. Former Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz visited Azerbaijan in October to discuss policy and foster defense cooperation.

Last April, Azerbaijan opened a tourism office in Israel for the first time and signed a cooperation agreement. The month also marked the 30th anniversary of establishing diplomatic ties between the two nations.

Both Israel and Azerbaijan see Iran as a threat. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, Israel buys 40% of its oil from Azerbaijan and supplied 27% of Azerbaijan’s major arms imports from 2011 to 2020, including 69% from 2016 to 2020. (JNS)

Barbara Walters Dies

Journalist Barbara Walters, known for her interviewing prowess, died this weekend at the age of 93.

Walters began her national broadcast career in 1961 as a reporter, writer and panel member for NBC’s “Today” show before being promoted to co-host in 1974. In 1976, Walters joined ABC News as the first female anchor on an evening news program.

At that network, Walters launched “The Barbara Walters Specials” and “10 Most Fascinating People” before becoming a co-host and correspondent for ABC News’ “20/20” in 1984. Along the way, she interviewed every U.S. president and first lady since Richard and Pat Nixon.

For more than five decades, Walters was in Americans’ home, speaking through the TV screen with world leaders and celebrities. Most recently, she launched “The View,” a daytime talk show with a panel of women. She left “The View” in 2014.

“I knew it was time,” Walters told CNN’s Chris Cuomo at the time. “I like all the celebration, that’s great, but in my heart, I thought, ‘I want to walk away while I’m still doing good work.’ So I will.”

Looking upon the numerous women who had looked up to her throughout her career, Walters said they were her legacy.

“How do you say goodbye to something like 50 years in television?” she said in conclusion. “How proud when I see all the young women who are making and reporting the news. If I did anything to help make that happen, that is my legacy. From the bottom of my heart, to all of you with whom I have worked and who have watched and been by my side, I can say: ‘Thank you.’”

Walters was married four times; she had one daughter, Jackie, whom she adopted with her husband Lee Guber.

Walters was born in Boston. Her father was a nightclub owner and so Barbara had plenty of contact with celebrities and was not fazed by them. She earned her college degree from Sarah Lawrence College.

Some of Walters’ most famous interviews included a historic 1977 joint sit-down with Egypt’s Anwar Sadat and Israel’s Menachem Begin.

Officers Targeted in Times Square

Three New York City police officers were attacked by a man wielding a machete on New Year’s Eve, just outside a security checkpoint for those viewing the ball drop in Times Square.

Trevor Bickford, 19, from Maine, is facing two counts of attempted murder along with two counts of attempted assault for the violent attack. Authorities say that he had expressed militant support for Islam prior to the attack.

The attack began when Bickford approached an officer and tried to strike him over the head with the machete before striking two officers in the head with the blade, Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell said. The assailant was then shot in the shoulder and apprehended by police, Sewell said.

The three officers were hospitalized; one had a fractured skull, and another had a bad cut. They were discharged from Bellevue Hospital overnight.

Paul Cozzolino, Jr. is the officer who suffered the fractured skull and had just graduated from the police academy the day before the attack.

Federal agents had interviewed Bickford in mid-December after a relative alerted them and said that he had expressed militant support for Islam. He was also known to investigators due to his social media postings, although he does not have a criminal record.

A diary found by investigators contained information about who should inherit his belongings and where he wanted to be buried should he die in the attack. It also said he regretted disappointing his mother and that he hoped his brothers would join him in his fight for Islam. Bickford also made pro-jihadist statements from his hospital bed after his arrest.

U.S. News to Change Ranking System

Under pressure amid a boycott by top law schools, U.S. News & World Report told law school deans on Monday that it will make several changes in the next edition of its influential ratings.

In a letter to American law school deans published on its site, U.S. News said its next list would give more credit to schools whose graduates go on to pursue advanced degrees or school-funded fellowships to work in public-service jobs that pay lower wages. The magazine, which has been publishing the ratings for decades, is responding to criticism that its rankings overvalue high-paying private-sector jobs.

The 2023-24 rankings, scheduled to be published this spring, will also rely less on surveys of schools’ reputations submitted by academics, lawyers and judges, the magazine said.

A spokesperson for U.S. News said the list will no longer consider indicators of student debt or the schools’ spending per student. Critics have said the magazine’s previous metric for measuring student debt encouraged schools to favor wealthy students over those with financial need and that its use of spending per student figures favors wealthier institutions.

“We realize that legal education is neither monolithic nor static and that the rankings, by becoming so widely accepted, may not capture the individual nuances of each school,” Robert Morse, chief data strategist at U.S. News, and Stephanie Salmon, senior vice president of data and information strategy, wrote in the letter.

U.S. News will continue to rank schools that have declined to participate, using publicly available data. But it will publish more detailed profiles of schools that respond, a possible incentive for lower-ranked institutions eager to attract the attention of students.

The U.S. News list, published annually since 1987, is as influential as it is inflexible. Roughly the same 14 law schools have held the top slots for 30 years, alternating only slightly and prompting headlines when they do. Its criteria for the rankings are watched almost as closely.

In recent months, however, a majority of those top 14 schools have announced that they will no longer participate. Among those dropping out are Yale, which has topped the list for decades, and Harvard, Stanford, Northwestern, Georgetown, Columbia, and Berkeley.

Drink More Water

We’ve been told to drink eight cups of water to maintain optimal health. Now, scientists are saying that drinking enough water is really important to stay healthy.

According to a National Institutes of Health study published this week in the journal eBioMedicene, drinking enough water is also associated with a significantly lower risk of developing chronic diseases, a lower risk of dying early, or a lower risk of being biologically older than your chronological age.

“The results suggest that proper hydration may slow down aging and prolong a disease-free life,” said study author Natalia Dmitrieva, a researcher in the Laboratory of Cardiovascular Regenerative Medicine at the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, a division of NIH.

Learning what preventive measures can slow down the aging process is “a major challenge of preventive medicine,” the authors said in the study. That’s because an epidemic of “age-dependent chronic diseases” is emerging as the world’s population rapidly ages. And extending a healthy life span can help improve quality of life and decrease health care costs more than just treating diseases can.

About half of people worldwide don’t meet recommendations for daily total water intake, according to several studies the authors of the new research cited.

“On the global level, this can have a big impact,” Dmitrieva noted. “Decreased body water content is the most common factor that increases serum sodium, which is why the results suggest that staying well hydrated may slow down the aging process and prevent or delay chronic disease.”

Our serum sodium levels are influenced by liquid intake from water, other liquids, and fruits and vegetables with high water content.

More than 50% of your body is made of water, which is also needed for multiple functions, including digesting food, creating hormones and neurotransmitters, and delivering oxygen throughout your body.

The National Academy of Medicine (formerly known as the Institute of Medicine) recommends women consume 2.7 liters (91 ounces) of fluids daily, and that men have 3.7 liters (125 ounces) daily. This recommendation includes all fluids and water-rich foods such as fruits, vegetables, and soups. Since the average water intake ratio of fluids to foods is around 80:20, that amounts to a daily amount of 9 cups for women and 12 ½ cups for men.

Human Composting Legal in NY

Human composting, thanks to Governor Kathy Hochul, is now legal in New York. The Big Apple became the sixth state in the nation to legalize a form of technology that turns human bodies into soil after death.

Author and mortician Caitlin Doughty explained the concept for the New York Times, “With human composting technology, our dead have the chance to become nutrient-rich soil that can be used to plant trees and regrow forests.”

Also known as “natural organic reduction,” the practice sees a body decompose over several weeks after being shut in a container.

The process happens in special above-ground facilities. A body is put in a closed vessel along with selected materials such as woodchips, alfalfa, and straw grass, and gradually breaks down under the action of microbes.

After a period of around a month – and a heating process to kill off any contagion – the deceased’s relatives are given the resulting soil. The soil can ostensibly be used in planting flowers, vegetables, or trees.

Catholic bishops in New York State

36 vociferously opposed the legislation in New York, arguing that human bodies should not be treated like “household The Jewish Home | JANUARY 5, 2023 waste.” In 2019, Washington was the first U.S. state to legalize it. Colorado, Oregon, Vermont, and California followed suit. New U.S. Citizens Hit High

Across the country, naturalization ceremonies are making a comeback after a long hiatus caused by Covid-19 lockdowns that suspended public gatherings, shuttered immigration offices, and put thousands of citizenship applications on hold.

Nearly 1 million immigrants became citizens in the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, the most in almost 15 years and the third-highest number ever, according to a recent Pew Research analysis, demonstrating the increasing effect of immigration on who lives and works in the United States — and who votes.

The total number of people seeking to become citizens is not reflected in the year-end data and is actually much higher because of the pileup of applications. Some 670,000 naturalizations are still pending.

The Biden administration has taken several steps to streamline the process, such as simplifying forms and redirecting interviewees from cities whose immigration offices are stretched to those that have capacity. That has helped reduce the backlog of pending applications from more than 1 million in December 2020.

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, the agency that handles the applications, also announced recently that it would soon conduct a trial of a redesigned naturalization test intended to be more fair and consistent. For the oral assessment, candidates will be asked to describe three photographs of everyday activities, the weather or food. The goal is to test ordinary use of English, rather than to rely on complex questions whose answers may differ considerably based on immigrants’ personal histories and countries of origin.

The Biden administration initiatives are a reversal from those of the Trump administration, which increased scrutiny of applications and made the citizenship test more cumbersome and challenging

But that administration’s immigration posture backfired, awakening many longtime legal residents to the fact that a green card does not shield them from deportation. And many felt compelled to seek citizenship in order to cast a ballot.

Immigrants who demonstrate continuous permanent lawful residence in the United States for at least five years, or three years if married to a U.S. citizen, are eligible to apply for citizenship. They must pass background checks, submit a bevy of supporting documents, and pass civics and English tests during an interview.

Newly minted voters could be crucial in states like Pennsylvania, Nevada, Michigan and Arizona, whose large naturalized-citizen electorates have been influential. Many more permanent residents in such battleground states are likely to naturalize in coming years. (© The New York Times)

The Buffalo Bills were trailing the Cincinnati Bengals 7-3 in the first quarter of Monday’s game when playing came to a halt.

Bills safety Damar Hamlin, 24, had been tackled by receiver Tee Higgins during a play. As Hamlin got to his feet, he then fell backward and hit the ground.

Immediately, it was obvious that something was wrong – really wrong. Emergency responders tended to Hamlin on the field, administering CPR for 15 minutes, before taking him to the hospital.

The game was postponed, then suspended.

38 On Tuesday, the Buffalo Bills issued a statement confirming Hamlin’s heartbeat was “restored” on the field: The Jewish Home | JANUARY 5, 2023 “Damar Hamlin suffered a cardiac arrest following a hit in the Buffalo Bills’ game versus the Cincinnati Bengals. His heartbeat was restored on the field, and he was transferred to the University of Cincinnati Medical Center for further testing and treatment. He is currently sedated and listed in critical condition.” Although extremely rare, an occurrence like this has happened before. Christian Eriksen was playing in the European Championship in June 2021 on the Denmark soccer team. He collapsed in the 43rd minute of a match against Finland, with doctors later revealing how incredibly close he came to death. Several medics worked frantically to give Eriksen chest compressions while his teammates formed a circle around the midfielder to shield the scene from public view. A defibrillator was needed to restart his heart. Eriksen eventually recovered and played in the most recent World Cup. There have been other, rare instances of players collapsing mid-game. Most of those players managed to survive, although some of them never played again.

The states with the largest populations usually score the most headlines, but every state in the Union is an integral part of our country.

According to the 2020 census, the United States, including the 50 states and the District of Columbia, has a population of over 331 million. Since the 2010 census, there has been a population increase of 7.4%, notes the Census Bureau.

Wyoming is the least populated state in the U.S. According to the 2020 census, Wyoming has a population of 576,851 people. Since the 2010 census, the state had a population change of 2.3%.

What other states are really low on the population scale?

According to the 2020 census, here are the top 10 least populated states in the U.S.:

Wyoming - 576,851

Vermont - 643,077

Alaska - 733,391

North Dakota - 779,094

South Dakota - 886,667

Delaware - 989,948

Montana - 1,084,225

Rhode Island - 1,097,379

Maine - 1,362,359

New Hampshire - 1,377,529

Washington, D.C., had a population of 689,545, according to the 2020 census.

California has the largest population in the U.S. with more than 39 million people living in the state.

Kaptur is LongestServing Woman in Congress

Most of us have never heard of Rep. Marcy Kaptur, but on Tuesday she made history by being the longest-serving woman in congressional history.

The Ohio Democrat won her 21st term in office in November, after fighting off a challenge from Republican J.R. Majewski. The 76-year-old lawmaker first won election to Congress in 1982.

Former Sen. Barbara Mikulski (DMd.) previously held the record as the country’s longest-serving woman in Congress. Mikulski retired in 2017 after serving in the House and Senate for a combined 40 years.

There were 23 women in Congress when Kaptur began her tenure in the House four decades ago. The 118th Congress includes a record 149 female lawmakers.

In 1983, the year that Kaptur was first sworn in, Microsoft introduced its first computer mouse, “Star Wars: Return of the Jedi” was a box office blockbuster, and then-President Reagan and Soviet leader Yuri Andropov were co-named Time magazine’s “Man of the Year” — before the recognition was changed to “Person of the Year” in 1999.

While acknowledging that “America is becoming more and more representative” in a recent interview with the Associated Press, Kaptur said that her gender didn’t have anything to do with her decision to first run for office.

“I always say I ran as a person from the working class,” she said.

Migrants Flood FL Town

A remote archipelago and national park off the coast of Key West, Florida, was closed Monday after a group of about 300 migrants arrived by boat on the islands’ shores, park officials said.

The cluster of mostly uninhabited islands, known as the Dry Tortugas National Park, is about 100 miles north of Havana and is known for its crystalline waters and coral reefs. But over the past few days, the islands have become a different kind of refuge.

In addition to the 300 migrants who arrived on the archipelago, more than 160 other migrants have arrived in other parts of the Florida Keys over the past several days, according to the local and federal authorities. Officials did not specify countries of origin but said in a statement that the park and region had recently “seen an increase in people arriving by boat from Cuba.”

The influx of migrants began around New Year’s Eve, authorities said, and come amid a surge in seaborne migration. In the one-year period ending in September, the U. S. Coast Guard apprehended more than 6,000 Cubans, compared with close to 840 migrants the previous year, the authority said in a recent statement.

The archipelago temporarily closed starting at 8 a.m. Monday, so that authorities and medical workers could evaluate, care for, and transport the migrants to Key West, park officials said. The park’s own responders would provide food, water, and basic medical attention to the migrants until the arrival of the Department of Homeland Security, they added.

“The effort now is to try to get them transferred off the island via boat to mainland Key West and the Florida Keys, so they can then be transferred to feder-