The Lowy International School

The Global Connection - Episode #40: Israel’s Crisis Response

Israel’s military and civilian systems may have been prepared for a disaster the magnitude of October 7, but did the response match the preparation? And how is the state faring as it continues to manage the ongoing crisis?
 
In this episode of The Global Connection, Larry French, a master’s student at Tel Aviv University (TAU), interviews Bruria Adini, the head of TAU’s international Master of Disaster Management program. The two discuss ways to characterize the crisis, how different levels of society and government mobilized and responded to October 7, and what – from a disaster management perspective – the state should prioritize moving forward.
 
Interested in the Master of Disaster Management program at TAU? Visit www.international.tau.ac.il/International_Program_in_Disaster_Management

The Global Connection - Episode #39: Aliyah During a Time of War

In this episode of The Global Connection, Orit Coty from the Lowy International School interviews Jonti Shepherd about what it’s like to make Aliyah and begin a PhD at Tel Aviv University (TAU), only to have October 7 months later.
Jonti, who was born in South Africa but has lived around the world, is now working towards a PhD in hyperspectral remote sensing. He and Orit discuss South Africa’s political animosity towards Israel, his decision to immigrate and the role TAU has played, what his research entails, his hopes and dreams for the future, and why there’s no place he’d rather be than Israel.
 
DYK? TAU has launched academic integration tracks in English and French to help new olim find their way: www.international.tau.ac.il/academic-integration-tracks
 

The Global Connection - Episode #38: Engineering Access to Clean Water

Today, more than two billion people suffer from unsafe water. In the Water Energy (WE) Lab at Tel Aviv University (TAU), researchers not only develop technologies to purify water, wastewater and waste, but implement them in places like India and Uganda. 
 
This episode of The Global Connection features the head of the WE Lab, Prof. Hadas Mamane, in conversation with PhD candidate Dana Pousty. The two chat about life in the lab and the projects being developed, their clean-water venture SoLED and why it’s so important to make their sustainable technologies available to those in need.
 
Interested in environmental engineering research?  Check out TAU’s international MSc in Environmental Engineering: www.international.tau.ac.il/Environmental_Engineering_MSc/
 
Want to learn more about the WE Lab? Visit www.mamanelab.sites.tau.ac.il/
 
 
 

The Global Connection - Episode #37: Life (and Disease) in a TAU Lab

At the Maoz Lab, Tel Aviv University (TAU) researchers are revolutionizing how diseases and trial drugs can be studied, using human tissues and recreating organs via “organ-on-a-chip” technologies.
 
This episode of The Global Connection shares the experience of two international researchers in that lab: MSc student Emma Glickman and PhD candidate Neta Fibeesh. Along with Prof. Ben Maoz, they discuss what it’s like to research at TAU and how they’re using stem cells and simulating mini-organs to advance understanding of diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.
 
Interested in a career in biomedicine or engineering? Want to study in English?
Check out TAU’s MSc in Biomedical Engineering: www.international.tau.ac.il/Biomedical_Engineering_MSc
 
Want to learn more about research happening at the Maoz Lab? Visit www.maozlab.com

The Global Connection - Episode #36: Understanding the Brain

Dr. Sagi Jaffe-Dax is a researcher with the Sagol School of Neuroscience at Tel Aviv University (TAU), where he heads up the Cognitive Development Lab. In this episode of The Global Connection, Orit Coty from The Lowy International School interviews Sagi about the field of neuroscience; the differences between child and adult cognition; what neuroscience can tell us about the infant brain; and about Jaffe-Dax’s new role as head of the International MSc in Neuroscience program. 
 
Interested in the International MSc in Neuroscience program at TAU? Learn more at  www.international.tau.ac.il/Neuroscience_MSc.

The Global Connection - Episode #35 You’ve Got a Friend in Me

For a number of Jews around the world, one response to October 7 has been a deep desire to come to Israel and to give back. Sharon Fraenkel, executive director of Canadian Friends of Tel Aviv University (CFTAU) for Ottawa, Quebec and Atlantic Canada, is no exception.
 
In this episode of The Global Connection, Fraenkel is interviewed by Ben Bright – an international MA student at Tel Aviv University (TAU) and a member of the student-led movement @IsraelWarStory. They chat about  Jewish life and antisemitism in Montreal after October 7, Fraenkel’s trip to Israel in the wake of the atrocities, and the steps Tel Aviv University has taken since October 7 to help its students, as well as the country, to cope and begin the healing process.
 
Want to become a friend to Tel Aviv University? Find out more about the Friends Association in your country: english.tau.ac.il/friends_of_tau
 
Interested in getting an on-the-ground perspective on October 7 and the war from international students at TAU? Follow Ben and others on Instagram: www.instagram.com/israelwarstory/

The Global Connection - Episode #34: Startup Nation – Looking Back, Looking Forward

On October 7, everything in Israel changed, including for Startup Nation.
 
In this special episode of The Global Connection, Jackie Goren, head of the Sofaer Global MBA program at Tel Aviv University (TAU), interviews Nimrod Cohen, the managing partner of TAU Ventures. The two discuss how Startup Nation has fared since October 7, its outlook moving forward and the lessons in agility and leadership to be learned from this time.
 
Want to learn more about the Sofaer Global MBA Program? Visit www.international.tau.ac.il/Sofaer_Global_MBA
 
Interested in TAU Ventures? Go to www.tauventures.co.il

TAU Unbound - Episode #47: Sexual violence against women as a weapon of war (by Hamas and beyond)

In this special episode, Ido Aharoni engages in a conversation with Prof. Tamar Herzig about the mass rape of women, and the mutilation of their bodies, during the October 7th atrocities. Prof. Herzig describes herself as a feminist historian and is shocked by the silence of some of her academic colleagues globally. She is the Konrad Adenauer Professor of Comparative European History at Tel Aviv University. She currently serves as Vice Dean for Research of the Faculty of Humanities, as Vice Chairperson of the Historical Society of Israel, and as a member of the Board of Directors of the Renaissance Society of America. In 2014-2021, she served as Director of Tel Aviv University's Morris E. Curiel Institute for European Studies. Her article “Slavery and Interethnic Sexual Violence: A Multiple Perpetrator Rape in Seventeenth-Century Livorno” (American Historical Review 127:1) won the 2022 Best Article Award of the Society for the Study of Early Modern Women and Gender, and was awarded the Mediterranean Seminar’s Article of the Month Award for July 2022. In 2021, she was awarded the Israel Institute for Advanced Studies’ Michael Bruno Memorial Award for groundbreaking research, for her contribution to the study of premodern history and especially of the Italian Renaissance. In 2020 she won the American Historical Association's Rosenberg Prize and later on was awarded Honorable Mention of the Renaissance Society of America's Gordan Book Prize in Renaissance Studies (2021) for her book A Convert’s Tale: Art, Crime, and Jewish Apostasy in Renaissance Italy. (Harvard University Press, 2019; Hebrew Translation: Magnes Press, 2023; Italian translation; Viella, 2023). For her work on religious conversion in early modern Italy, she also won the Kadar Award for Outstanding Research in 2019.
 
00:00 - Intro
01:55 - Italian history
02:19 - The dark side of the Renaissance
03:48 - Slave women, sexual violence, gang rape
05:26 - Livorno community Italy
08:20 - Crimes against Jews
12:00 - Rape of women as a weapon of war
15:00 - Rape as a strategy
15:00 - Rape and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
18:00 - Rape by Hamas and ISIS
20:00 - Global denial campaign of rape of Israeli women
21:00 - The silence of the leaders in the #Metoo movement
22:06 - The collapse of feminism
25:48 - Rape as slow murder
30:00 - Israeli rapes are not sexual impulses
Lowy International School TAU: https://international.tau.ac.il

TAU Unbound - Episode #46: what is bioethics and why it’s important in the context of October 7th

In this new episode of TAU Unbound, Ido Aharoni is hosting Dr. Oren Asman, a lawyer and Chair of Psychiatric Review Committees. Oren's academic work focuses on Bioethics and Health Law. He is a Senior Lecturer at the Nursing Department; Director of the Bioethics and Law Center at the Faculty of Medicine; and Director of the Samueli Initiative for Responsible AI (Artificial Intelligence) in Medicine at Tel Aviv University. Here, we discuss what is 'responsible Artificial Intelligence' in Medicine, how it is relevant in health care, the Samueli initiative for responsible AI in medicine, how it’s relevant to the current war in Israel, and what is the future of this exciting field.
 
01:00 - Bioethics
04:00 - The connection between medicine and law
05:00 - Legislation on medical issues
07:00 - Islamic law
07:29 - Abortions after rape
08:15 - Medical law versus medical ethics
13:00 - Morality and war
19:00 - AI and the connection to medicine
24:00 - The Samueli Initiative for Responsible AI in Medicine
34:40 - Healing VS Killing
 
Lowy International School TAU: https://international.tau.ac.il

TAU Unbound - Episode #45: - What can be learned from human fossils

Our new episode of TAU Unbound is about the science of physical anthropology, and more specifically, the role of human fossils in the process of identifying victims of the October 7th massacre. Our guest is Prof. Israel Hershkovitz, Emeritus in Anatomy and Anthropology in the School of Health Professions in the Faculty of Medicine. Here, Prof. Hershkovitz is discussing the essence of physical anthropology, as opposed to social anthropology, methodologies used in forensics, his volunteer work post 10/7 identifying massacre victims as well as the future of his field in the era of AI (Artificial Intelligence).