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7 ways to offer support and Jewish strength to friends or loved ones facing cancer
When Shoshana Polakoff, 40, received an unexpected breast cancer diagnosis three years ago, the mother of three young children needed extra support. Her friends, family and Jewish community in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan immediately stepped up.
They organized help with after-school childcare, packed school lunches for her kids and sent her little notes of encouragement while Polakoff endured trying cancer treatments.
“I felt pounds lighter and overwhelmed by the chesed that mobilized so quickly,” said Polakoff, using the Hebrew term for kindness. “And the practical help was such an incredible gift.”
Too often, however, friends and loved ones of cancer patients are at a loss for how to respond when someone close to them is diagnosed with cancer.
“Often they feel just as thrown into this new reality as the woman herself and are not sure what to do next,” said Adina Fleischmann, chief services officer for Sharsheret, the national Jewish breast cancer and ovarian cancer organization.
This is especially the case for young people who might never have had a family member or friend diagnosed with cancer before.
Fleischmann — whose organization offers extensive resources for cancer patients, ranging from emotional support, mental health counseling and education to financial subsidies for women and their families facing breast and ovarian cancer — has some guidance for what to say, how to reach out and what kind of help might be appropriate to provide in the face of a friend or family member’s cancer diagnosis.
It’s all about providing chizuk – Hebrew for strength – to the person facing cancer.
1. Establish the “Kvetching Order”
The “Kvetching Order,” based on a concept called the Ring Theory developed by clinical psychologist Susan Silk, dictates that those close to someone struggling with a cancer diagnosis offer only support to the cancer patient, and any kvetching about their own stress outward.
Thus, the person with cancer is at the center of a circle surrounded by a ring of her or his most intimate friends and loved ones. More distant concentric rings include other friends, acquaintances, more distant family and community members.
Colloquially known as “comfort in, dump out,” the Kvetching Order establishes a flow of support directed toward the person facing cancer.
2. Be clear and specific with offers of help
Support can look and feel different to different people facing cancer; each person’s needs and life circumstances are unique. When younger women are diagnosed with cancer — as often is the case with ovarian or breast cancers, where 50% of new diagnoses are in women under age 63 — patients often need extra help managing their responsibilities as parents and/or career professionals.
“Let the woman guide the journey,” Fleischmann says of the cancer patient. “Follow her lead.”
Sharsheret suggests offering concrete, practical assistance, such as offering to take the patient’s child to after-school activities or helping with homework. Maybe offer to come over to help clean the house, do laundry, or pick up groceries and make dinner for the family.
“But give the woman the feeling of control,” Fleischmann said. “Let her be in control of your support.”
Thus, a concrete suggestion like, “Can I bring you pizza for dinner on Wednesday?” is better than a vague offer of “What can I do to help?”
3. Check in often but don’t expect a response
By all means reach out to the person facing cancer. But if they don’t respond to your phone calls, emails or texts, don’t be put off.
“Sometimes the woman may not have the time or energy to respond,” Fleischmann said. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t continue reaching out. “She will appreciate knowing that you’re thinking of her.”
Polakoff found small gestures particularly meaningful.
“Little things meant a lot,” she said. “Like just a note that said, ‘I’m thinking of you. Have a good Shabbos.’”
4. Leave cancer out of it sometimes and just be with them
Kristen Harvey, who at 23 was faced with an ovarian cancer diagnosis for the second time, said it was important to have friends around her with whom she could talk about the future.
“Just being there was the best thing,” said Harvey, who recently graduated from college and lives in Michigan. “We didn’t need to do anything. I appreciated when people came over and we just hung out and watched a movie.”
Alexis Wilson, a teacher in Jupiter, Florida, said her friendships were essential during her breast cancer treatment. Before starting chemotherapy, her friends threw her a big party to which everyone showed up in different-colored wigs and decorated her yard with signs.
“My friends played a big role,” said Wilson, 39. “I felt like I wasn’t alone.”
5. Continue your support throughout someone’s cancer journey
For some women, “maintenance treatment” can last for many years beyond the active treatments of chemotherapy, radiation or surgery. Women living with metastatic breast cancer, for example, usually continue treatment throughout their lives.
Fleischmann recommends checking in with a woman along every step of her cancer journey: not just the period of active treatment, but also during maintenance treatment, survivorship, and if she is living with metastatic or advanced cancer.
“It’s nice to know my friends and family continued to reach out once I was done with treatment,” Harvey said. “Back to normal doesn’t mean life is ever normal.”
There are often heightened emotional needs around anniversaries of certain cancer diagnoses or treatment dates, Fleischmann said, so marking these dates could be important.
6. Make sure you have your own support system
If you’re particularly close to the person with cancer, you may experience feelings of being overwhelmed yourself. It’s important to take care of your own emotional well-being and not dismiss it in the face of someone else’s more pressing illness.
“As a caregiver, you can be very easily drained without your own coping mechanisms,” Fleischmann said.
Make sure to take care of yourself physically and emotionally so that you have the capacity to attend to your friend or loved one’s needs.
7. Talk to your healthcare provider and safeguard your own health
Even while supporting a loved one or friend with breast or ovarian cancer, it’s important to safeguard your own health.
The BRCA genetic mutation that causes breast cancer and ovarian cancer is much more common among Ashkenazi Jewish women than in the general U.S. population. About 1 in 40 Ashkenazi Jewish women and men carry the mutation, compared to 1 in 400 in the general population. Ashkenazi Jewish men are also at elevated risk for melanoma and prostate and pancreatic cancer.
“Talk to your healthcare provider,” Fleischmann said. “Those whose family members are facing hereditary breast and ovarian cancer should speak with their doctor or genetic counselor to see how this may affect them, too, and learn about appropriate testing and precautions.”
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US Aircraft Carrier Enters Middle East Region, Officials Say
The USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72), a Nimitz-class nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, at Naval Air Station North Island in San Diego, California, US, Aug. 11, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mike Blake
A US aircraft carrier and supporting warships have arrived in the Middle East, two US officials told Reuters on Monday, expanding President Donald Trump’s capabilities to defend US forces, or potentially take military action against Iran.
The aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and several guided-missile destroyers have crossed into the Middle East region, which comes under the US military’s Central Command, the officials told Reuters.
Trump said on Thursday that the United States had an “armada” heading toward Iran, but hoped he would not have to use it.
The warships began deploying from the Asia-Pacific region earlier this month, as tensions between Iran and the United States escalated following a crackdown on protests across Iran.
Trump had repeatedly threatened to intervene if Iran continued to kill protesters, but the countrywide demonstrations have since abated. The president said he had been told that killings were subsiding and that he believes there is currently no plan for the executions of prisoners.
The US military has in the past surged forces into the Middle East at times of heightened tensions, moves that were often defensive.
However, the US military staged a major buildup last year ahead of its June strikes against Iran’s nuclear program.
In addition to the carrier and warships, the Pentagon is also moving fighter jets and air-defense systems to the Middle East.
Over the weekend, the US military announced that it would carry out an exercise in the region “to demonstrate the ability to deploy, disperse, and sustain combat airpower.”
A senior Iranian official said last week that Tehran would consider any attack as an “all-out-war against us.”
The United Arab Emirates said on Monday that it will not let its airspace, territory or territorial waters be used for any hostile military actions against Iran.
The US military’s Al Dhafra Air Base is located south of the UAE capital Abu Dhabi and has been a critical US Air Force hub in support of key missions against the Islamic State, as well as reconnaissance deployments across the region.
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Wikipedia, Qatar, and the Future of Knowledge
Qatar’s Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al-Thani speaks on the first day of the 23rd edition of the annual Doha Forum, in Doha, Qatar, Dec. 6, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa
Imagine a world in which facts can be erased from one of society’s key sources of information.
A world where foreign governments and terror-supporters have a say in whether you should know something or not.
A world where truth is malleable and facts are twisted to fit pre-determined narratives.
No, this isn’t an Orwellian dystopia. It’s Wikipedia as it currently operates: one of the world’s most influential websites and a primary source of information for millions.
Because of how it crowd-sources information, Wikipedia is one of the most extensive sources of knowledge on the Internet (and possibly in the entire world). However, this same strength is also Wikipedia’s biggest weakness, leaving it vulnerable to manipulation by autocracies, terror supporters, and other bad actors.
From recently-uncovered Qatari influence to a secret network of anti-Israel activists, we’ll take a look at how the truth is being manipulated on Wikipedia, and what this means for our understanding of the world.
Wikipedia was meant to democratize knowledge, but today it’s a hub for deliberate fake info and erasing documented history by rogue editors – what I call Knowledge Poisoning.
The list of victims is endless:
Iranian protestors in Iran, Iryna Zarutska, Women, Jews and more.The… pic.twitter.com/Ir7WzKfHGD
— Ella Kenan (@EllaTravelsLove) January 17, 2026
In Qatar’s case, the PR firm Portland Communications was hired after Qatar was selected to host the 2022 World Cup. Its job was to edit Wikipedia articles related to human rights, and to suppress other unflattering facts that threatened the state’s international image.
According to the report, between 2013 and 2024 Portland Communications directed a network of subcontractors to edit Wikipedia articles on human rights in Qatar, as well as entries on Qatari politicians and businessmen accused of corrupt or unethical conduct.
The edits were deliberately small and incremental, designed to evade detection and slip past the scrutiny of other Wikipedia editors.
In short, anyone researching Qatar on Wikipedia has not been presented with a full or nuanced picture of the Gulf state.
Instead, they encountered paid-for reputation management designed to polish its image and suppress unflattering facts. In the process, Wikipedia shifted from an information resource to a vehicle for indoctrination.
The @TBIJ just revealed a UK PR firm allegedly paid intermediaries to rewrite Wikipedia pages — burying criticism of Qatar and reshaping public perception.
Hidden edits like these launder reputations, making biased content appear neutral to millions. The Portland case is the… pic.twitter.com/EwZpwS2ODx
— Ashley Rindsberg (@AshleyRindsberg) January 17, 2026
Nor is Qatari influence confined to Wikipedia. Analyst Eitan Fischberger has noted that the Qatar Investment Authority has invested billions of dollars in Elon Musk’s xAI. This is a development that has potential implications for how Qatar is portrayed on Grokipedia, xAI’s alternative to Wikipedia.
If this pattern continues, the result is straightforward: future audiences may encounter a curated version of Qatar that downplays human rights abuses and other reputational liabilities. By strategically funding the platforms people rely on for information, a state need not censor facts outright, as it can simply ensure they are never meaningfully encountered.
I was about to tweet about how Grokipedia is already far better than Wikipedia.
And I was going to illustrate this by comparing their pages on Qatari foreign influence in American universities.
But it looks like Qatar noticed too. Hence the billions now being thrown at xAI, as… pic.twitter.com/0VcCrJlUpx
— Eitan Fischberger (@EFischberger) January 8, 2026
Wikipedia’s Untrustworthiness on Israel
For those who have followed developments around Wikipedia, the revelation that Qatar actively sought to edit articles in its favor came as little surprise. Abuse of the crowdsourced encyclopedia by bad-faith actors has been documented for years.
In 2024, investigative journalist Ashley Rindsberg published an in-depth exposé about a group of 40 activists who had engaged in a coordinated campaign of anti-Israel disinformation since 2020.
According to Rindsberg, this group accounted for 90 percent of the content on dozens of Israel-related articles and made a combined total of more than two million edits on over 10,000 articles.
This coordinated effort has transformed Wikipedia’s Middle East narrative: Zionism is increasingly framed as inherently evil, Hamas’ violent Islamist ideology is softened or obscured, Iranian human rights abuses are minimized, and the Jewish historical connection to the Land of Israel is routinely challenged or erased.
Rindsberg has also identified another coordinated effort: a group known as Tech for Palestine (TFP), which formed during the recent Israel–Hamas war and edited thousands of Wikipedia articles related to Israel.
In its own welcome message on the platform Discord, the group explained its focus on Wikipedia by noting that the encyclopedia’s “content influences public perception.”
Most recently, independent investigative journalist David Collier conducted a deep dive into a Wikipedia claim that the Israeli town of Ofakim was built on a depopulated Bedouin village. He found that the cited books and maps did not support the claim at all, and that the evidence had been effectively fabricated through misrepresentation.
Yet the claim remains on Wikipedia, upheld by a decision from an anti-Israel activist editor, and it continues to feed into AI systems that treat Wikipedia as authoritative, compounding the misinformation.
Wikipedia’s Israel problem is no longer in dispute. As long as activist editors retain outsized control over key articles, the Internet’s largest encyclopedia remains an unreliable source for understanding Israel, the Palestinians, and the Middle East.
Exclusive: A detailed investigation exposes how false claims on @Wikipedia fabricate history – then get laundered into activist and media campaigns used to smear elected officials and demand resignations
Thread— David Collier (@mishtal) January 5, 2026
How Wikipedia Influences Your Life — Even Without Your Knowledge
According to Wikipedia’s own data, the site is viewed nearly 10,000 times per second, totaling close to 300 billion page views annually. In practice, this means a significant portion of the world’s population relies on Wikipedia for basic knowledge, often without realizing how susceptible it is to manipulation by bad-faith actors.
And opting out is not an escape. Even users who never consult Wikipedia themselves are still influenced by it, as many AI systems draw on Wikipedia as an authoritative source, recycling its distortions at scale. And to mark its 25th anniversary, Wikipedia has signed content partnerships with major AI companies, including Meta, Microsoft, Amazon, Perplexity, and Mistral AI.
This influence is already embedded in everyday technology. Google’s search results routinely draw on Wikipedia as a trusted reference, while voice assistants such as Alexa and Siri rely on it to answer basic factual queries.
In practice, Wikipedia now functions as a foundational layer of the modern information ecosystem.
At the center of everything is Wikipedia.
Wikipedia articles appear in 67%-84% of all search engine results & most info boxes
— Ethan Mollick (@emollick) May 30, 2023
Whether you consult Wikipedia directly, ask an AI system for information, or turn to Siri with a question, you are being shaped by the thousands of editors whose collective work forms Wikipedia.
Most of those editors are diligent volunteers committed to accuracy and the pursuit of knowledge. Some, however, are not. They omit facts, introduce disinformation, and quietly reshape narratives to fit an ideological agenda.
The real danger is not Wikipedia’s scale, but the trust it enjoys. Too often, it is treated as neutral while users have no reliable way to distinguish between an article written to inform and one designed to manipulate.
The author is a contributor to HonestReporting, a Jerusalem-based media watchdog with a focus on antisemitism and anti-Israel bias — where a version of this article first appeared.
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Italy Pushes for EU Clampdown on Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Over ‘Heinous Acts’
Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani speaks during an interview with Reuters in Rome, Italy, April 15, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Guglielmo Mangiapane
Italy will ask European Union partners this week to place Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) on the EU‘s terrorist register, Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said on Monday, signaling a shift in Rome’s position.
Until now, Rome had been among the governments resisting efforts to brand the IRGC as a terrorist group, but Tajani said a bloody Iranian crackdown on street protests this month that reportedly killed thousands of people could not be ignored.
“The losses suffered by the civilian population during the protests require a clear response,” Tajani wrote on X, adding he would raise the issue on Thursday at a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Brussels.
“I will propose, coordinating with other partners, the inclusion of the Revolutionary Guards on the list of terrorist organizations, as well as individual sanctions against those responsible for these heinous acts.”
Being branded a terrorist group would trigger a set of legal, financial, and diplomatic measures that would significantly constrain the IRGC’s ability to operate in Europe.
Set up after Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution, the IRGC holds great sway in the country, controlling swathes of the economy and armed forces, and is also in charge of Iran’s ballistic missile and nuclear programs.
While some EU member states have previously pushed for the IRGC to be listed, others have been more cautious, fearing that it could lead to a complete break in ties with Iran, harming any chance of reviving nuclear talks and jeopardizing any hope of getting EU nationals released from Iranian jails.
However, Iran’s violent crackdown on protests has revived the debate and added momentum to discussions about adding the IRGC, which is already included in the bloc’s human rights sanctions regime, to the EU terrorist list.
Italian, French, and Spanish diplomats raised qualms during a meeting in Brussels earlier this month about adding the IRGC to the list, EU diplomats told Reuters at the time.
If France continues to object, then the move to sanction the IRGC will fail, diplomats have said.