A religious group wants to euthanize a dead baby girl

At a meeting held recently at a hotel in Montreal, Canada, the leader of an unknown sect, which advocates the idea that cloning is the key to eternal life, informed his believers that a wealthy American couple had been found to finance the first human cloning.

Ra-El follows God

by Tamara Traubman

Ra-El, the leader of the cult. Claims that the description of Jesus' resurrection is actually a description of a clone made by extraterrestrials called "God". On the right: the symbol of the Ra-Alinim sect

At a meeting held recently at a hotel in Montreal, Canada, the leader of an unknown sect, which advocates the idea that cloning is the key to eternal life, informed his believers that a wealthy American couple had been found to finance the first human cloning. The leader of the cult, a former racing driver who today calls himself Ra-El, told the Washington Post newspaper that "the clone will be a ten-month-old baby, who recently died due to medical negligence, and samples from her cells were saved."

According to Ra-El, the sect already has 50 members in 85 countries. On the sect's website (www.clonaid.co) Ra-El explains that the first cloned human was actually born about two thousand years ago. The description of Jesus' resurrection is actually a description of a clone made by extraterrestrials called "God" (in Hebrew). God also used methods of genetic engineering to create life on Earth, the site claims.

"The couple will pay about 500 dollars to clone their daughter," said Ra-El, who until 1973, when he said he had an encounter with extraterrestrials, was known as Claude Verilhon. After the method is perfected, the website of the Ra-Alinim promises, "cloning a baby will cost 200 thousand dollars".

Brigitte Boslier, the sect's scientific director, said they had a team of three scientists and a French doctor, but declined to name them. "We plan to start in a few days and expect to have a baby in 18 months," she told the UPI news agency.

Scientists, however, still do not know if it is even possible to clone a person. Many researchers, including a professional British committee that recently recommended to Parliament to allow human cloning, support the cloning of embryos, which will only be grown until a few days old. At this age the fetus still does not feel anything and has no human physical characteristics. It is actually just a small block of stem cells, cells that have the potential to develop into any of the body's tissues. The goal is to use these cells to replace damaged tissues in patients with diseases such as Parkinson's or diabetes. Some scientists also believe that in the future it may be possible to use cloning as a substitute for existing IVF methods.

But Ra-El's statement seems more like a publicity stunt. The Ra-Alins did not present any evidence that they indeed have the technical ability to clone. The representatives of the sect are also unwilling to reveal the identity of the American couple who wish to clone their dead daughter, or where the laboratory of "Clonaid" the cloning company that Ra'el founded three years ago is located, on the grounds that the sect fears harassment from groups opposed to abortion.

One of the problems is that a live and healthy clone is born only once in many attempts, which involve repeating the process with dozens of eggs and many pregnancies that end in miscarriage. Ra-El claims to have recruited fifty women, who will serve as surrogate mothers who will mercifully carry the cloned embryos. According to scientists, theoretically such a number would probably be enough to obtain one healthy human clone.

Although it seems that the various animals that have been cloned to date do not suffer from special health problems, although according to some reports their body cells may be aging prematurely. However, if the scientists, whose consent Ra-El claims to have obtained, do manage to clone the couple's dead daughter, she may certainly suffer from the great burden of expectations that the parents will surely place on her, to replace the daughter they lost.
{Appeared in Haaretz newspaper, 16/10/2000}