Well before COVID-19 began its spread across the globe, an immunologist at Hebrew University named David Naor demonstrated the usefulness of mRNA vaccines, the novel form of inoculation that is now being used to combat the coronavirus pandemic. i24NEWS reports:

“I read [recently] that U.S. scientists suggested extrapolating from the mRNA technology used in the COVID-19 vaccine for use in autoimmune diseases and cancers,” said Naor. “I realized that I had already done this more than ten years ago. . . . Practically, we used cDNA vaccines, which were the first generation of mRNA vaccines, and they were efficient in the therapy of animal models of autoimmune diseases and cancer.”

“We published our findings in scientific literature,” he explained. “We wanted to encourage mRNA vaccinations—and the technology used to make them—to be used against infections and other diseases.” . . . Naor said that the technology showed that mRNA vaccines were able to ameliorate or even nearly cure the diseases under investigation.

While the therapeutic use of mRNA vaccines is now a focus of world attention, Naor pointed out that his laboratory’s research paper was one of the first that showed that mRNA could be used to treat a range of diseases. The professor maintained that he and his colleagues did the work “accidentally.” “At the time, we were not aware that our research in animals could definitely be transferred to use in humans, but the COVID-19 mRNA vaccine is the first successful mass use of the technology and we showed that it may be able to be used for other diseases too.”

Early Friday morning, Israel attacked military installations near the Iranian cities of Isfahan and nearby Natanz, the latter being one of the hubs of the country’s nuclear program. Jerusalem is not taking credit for the attack, and none of the details are too certain, but it seems that the attack involved multiple drones, likely launched from within Iran, as well as one or more missiles fired from Syrian or Iraqi airspace. Strikes on Syrian radar systems shortly beforehand probably helped make the attack possible, and there were reportedly strikes on Iraq as well.

Iran itself is downplaying the attack, but the S-300 air-defense batteries in Isfahan appear to have been destroyed or damaged. This is a sophisticated Russian-made system positioned to protect the Natanz nuclear installation. In other words, Israel has demonstrated that Iran’s best technology can’t protect the country’s skies from the IDF. As Yossi Kuperwasser puts it, the attack, combined with the response to the assault on April 13,

clarified to the Iranians that whereas we [Israelis] are not as vulnerable as they thought, they are more vulnerable than they thought. They have difficulty hitting us, but we have no difficulty hitting them.

Nobody knows exactly how the operation was carried out. . . . It is good that a question mark hovers over . . . what exactly Israel did. Let’s keep them wondering. It is good for deniability and good for keeping the enemy uncertain.

The fact that we chose targets that were in the vicinity of a major nuclear facility but were linked to the Iranian missile and air forces was a good message. It communicated that we can reach other targets as well but, as we don’t want escalation, we chose targets nearby that were involved in the attack against Israel. I think it sends the message that if we want to, we can send a stronger message. Israel is not seeking escalation at the moment.