Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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(JNS) — The third round of talks on Iran’s nuclear program took place in Oman last Saturday as the United States hopes to restrain the Islamic Republic through negotiations. The talks have garnered mixed reactions from Israel supporters, with some calling for a wait-and-see approach and others, viewing past as prologue, warning that Iran will only use the talks to buy time, rebuild its capabilities and persist in its malign activities. To Western thinking negotiation means compromise and reconciliation, but Iran’s ayatollahs see it as a way t...
(JNS) — Politicians, intellectuals and activists agreed on Sunday that applying Israeli sovereignty over Judea and Samaria is the only viable path to securing Jewish rights and safety in Israel. At the inaugural JNS International Policy Summit in Jerusalem, panelists said the Hamas attack on Oct. 7, 2023 signaled the dangers of allowing a Palestinian state to be established in Israel’s biblical heartland. Such a development, they warned, would expose Jewish communities to even greater threats. Knesset Member Ohad Tal (Religious Zionism Par...
(JNS) — Many terrorists released by Israel are millionaires, flush with cash from years of receiving monthly Palestinian Authority “pay for slay” stipends, an analysis by a Jerusalem-based watchdog group revealed on Wednesday. Palestinian Media Watch posted a list of all 734 terrorists scheduled for release from Israeli prisons in the first phase of the hostages-for-ceasefire agreement with Hamas, together with their “salaries”—the dollar amounts each terrorist had received from the Palestinian Authority’s “pay-for-slay” program, official...
(JNS) — Jewish groups have expressed outrage after a man was sentenced on Wednesday to community service for hassling New York City subway riders last summer. “A mere four hours of community service and an anti-bias course for blatant antisemitic harassment? This is not justice—it’s a disgrace,” Liora Rez, executive director of StopAntisemitism, a grassroots watchdog organization, told The New York Post. “Anas Saleh’s threats against fellow passengers on the NYC subway warranted real consequences, yet he walks away with a slap on the wrist. Th...
(JNS) — Seventy-one percent of Israelis oppose the establishment of a Palestinian state in Judea and Samaria, according to a poll conducted on Jan. 29. The survey comes on the background of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s departure on Sunday to meet with U.S. President Donald Trump in Washington, D.C. “The findings are public just in time for Prime Minister Netanyahu’s visit with President Trump. Bibi can now go to the president of the United States with a clear statement that this is the will of the people of Israel,” Avi Abelo...
(JNS) — Former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Galant announced his resignation from parliament in a national address on Wednesday evening, almost two months after being fired by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “This is a stop on a longer journey that has not yet been completed. As on the battlefield, so is the public service: there are moments when you have to stop to assess the situation and choose the direction of action,” the Knesset lawmaker began. Although he was leaving the Knesset, Gallant stressed that he was staying within Netan...
(JNS) - Israel Prime Minister Netanyahu, visiting the Syrian border on Sunday, hailed the collapse of the Assad regime, "a central link in Iran's axis of evil," describing it as a "historic day in the history of the Middle East." Netanyahu said the fall of Syrian President Bashar Assad, who fled the country after a coalition of rebel groups stormed Damascus on Sunday, was the direct result of blows Israel inflicted on Iran and Hezbollah, "the main supporters of the Assad regime." U.S. National...
(JNS) — The decision to extend Israeli sovereignty to Judea and Samaria is one “for Israel to make,” according to Mike Huckabee, who was tapped by President-elect Donald Trump last week for the post of U.S. ambassador to Israel. Speaking to Israel National News on Nov. 15, the former Arkansas governor said that the decision is not one the United States will impose. “I don’t think Donald Trump is the kind of president that wants to tell other countries what to do and how to do it. He wants to accommodate, help, encourage peaceful endeavors...
(JNS) — In a video message on Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asked the Iranian people to imagine how much better life would be without the ayatollahs, warning also that the “tyrants of Iran” were putting their families in danger. “I want you to imagine—just imagine—how your life could be different if Iran was free,” said the Israeli premier. “You could speak your mind without fear. You could make a joke without wondering if you’d be carted off to Evin prison.” He underscored how the fanatical Iranian regime spends vast...
(JNS) — The dismissal of Defense Minister Yoav Gallant by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday led to a battle of narratives as the Prime Minister’s Office said Gallant was fired over disagreements connected to the war’s conduct while the opposition tried to frame the move as petty politics. Four opposition leaders held a joint press conference at the Knesset in Jerusalem on Wednesday, accusing Netanyahu of dismissing Gallant in order to pass a “draft-dodger bill” needed to placate h...
(JNS) — A survivor of Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, Nova music festival massacre, Shirel Golan, took her own life on Oct. 20, her 22nd birthday. She was found lifeless in the yard of her home in Moshav Porat in central Israel. The exact cause of death was not made public. She was set to have visited the Western Wall in Jerusalem and the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron with her family. According to family members, despite suffering from post-trauma, the state failed to provide Shirel with mental health services. “She said she received no assis...
(JNS) — U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin spoke with his Israeli counterpart Yoav Gallant following the “outrageous act of aggression by Iran,” reaffirming that the United States is ready to aid its friends and partners in the region. America is “well-postured to defend U.S. personnel, allies, and partners in the face of threats from Iran and Iran-backed terrorist organizations and is determined to prevent any actor from exploiting tensions or expanding the conflict in the region,” said Austin, according to the U.S. Defense Departmen...
(JNS) — U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris, in her first solo interview, said she had wholly backed the Biden administration’s decision to pause the delivery of 2,000-pound bombs to Israel. Speaking to the National Association of Black Journalists in Philadelphia on Tuesday, the Democratic presidential nominee said that “one of the things that we’ve done that I’m entirely supportive of is the pause that we put on the 2000-pound bombs.” She offered this as an example of a concrete action the White House had taken to pressure Israel to agree to a...
(JNS) — Israeli Foreign Minister Yisrael Katz on Wednesday called for “the temporary evacuation of Palestinian residents and whatever steps are required,” after the IDF overnight on Aug. 27 launched a large-scale anti-terror operation in Judea and Samaria. “This is a war in every respect and we must win it,” Katz tweeted. “The IDF is working intensively starting tonight in the Jenin and Tulkarem refugee camps to thwart Islamic-Iranian terrorist infrastructures that have been established there,” he said. Iran is working “to establish an ea...
David Isaac (JNS) - While Israeli security officials have requested that the four hostages rescued by the Israel Defense Forces on Saturday keep their experiences secret, some details have nevertheless emerged. The four - Noa Argamani, 26, Almog Meir Jan, 21, Andrey Kozlov, 27, and Shlomi Ziv, 40 - appeared to be in good health when first seen on camera on June 8, the day of the raid. But two days later, Dr. Itay Pessach of the Sheba Medical Center revealed they were in a "state of severe...
(JNS) — Messages sent to mediators by Hamas leader in Gaza Yahya Sinwar show that as far as he’s concerned, the more civilians die in Gaza the better. He sees such deaths as working “to his advantage,” The Wall Street Journal reported on Monday. The Journal reviewed “dozens of messages” Sinwar sent to ceasefire negotiators and others in which “he’s shown a cold disregard for human life and made clear he believes Israel has more to lose from the war than Hamas.” “We have the Israelis right where we want them,” said Sinwar in a message sent rec...
(JNS) - BBC news anchor Helena Humphrey was ridiculed after asking former IDF International Spokesman Lt. Col. (res.) Jonathan Conricus on Sunday whether Israel should have warned Gaza's civilians before launching Saturday's rescue operation. Referring to the high Arab casualty count reported by Hamas sources, Humphrey asked, "Would there have been a warning to those civilians for them to get out on time?" Conricus, now a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a...
(JNS) — The Israel Land Authority notified the U.N. relief agency UNRWA that it must immediately vacate state land and buildings in northern Jerusalem, which it had occupied illegally. The Israel Land Authority is also demanding retroactive compensation of $27 million shekels (~$7 million) for the years the United Nations Relief and Works Agency used the land. Yitzchak Goldknopf, minister of construction and housing, announced the decision on Wednesday afternoon, at the annual meeting of the Israel Bar Association in Eilat. In a letter sent W...
(JNS) — As Jewish comedian Jerry Seinfeld received an honorary degree during Duke University’s commencement celebration in Durham, N.C. on Sunday, anti-Israel protesters marched out, chanting “Free, free Palestine.” Many students booed the protesters. Outside the stadium where the ceremony took place, graduates walked around campus, chanting “Disclose. Divest. We will not stop. We will not rest,” The New York Times reported. “We understand the depth of feeling in our community, and as we have all year, we respect the right of everyone at D...
(JNS) — As tensions escalate at a Gaza Solidarity Encampment at the University of Pennsylvania, administrators are taking a dialogue and de-escalation approach, possibly because they have no choice. Penn asked the Philadelphia Police Department to dismantle the encampment, but the police refused, the student-run Daily Pennsylvanian claimed on May 2. Police asked that the university first provide proof that the encampment “presents an imminent danger,” reported the paper, citing a source familiar with the matter. If accurate (and the Phila...
(JNS) — In the latest example of a deep-seated anti-Israel bias within the International Committee of the Red Cross, the head of the ICRC’s office in Algeria and director of the Libya subdelegation has been outed as a pro-Hamas shill. Geneva-based, pro-Israel group U.N. Watch exposed the pro-terrorist sentiments of the ICRC official, who appears to be based in Montreal. “Meet Haythem ‘Ethan’ Abid. He runs the International Red Cross in Montreal. His job is to be neutral. But Abid marches in ‘Free Palestine’ rallies, posts Hamas videos saying...
(JNS) - The Popular Resistance Committees, a coalition composed of Hamas and other terrorist groups, recently announced price drops for food in the Gaza Strip. Gazan merchants said, "An average family can now buy products for a hearty meal with 100 shekels [$27.15], compared to 200 shekels required for such a meal just a few days ago," Ynet reported. The news is in line with a report issued last week by the Israeli Defense Ministry's Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories...
(JNS) — Despite heightened tensions five months into Israel’s war with Hamas, Jerusalem remains committed to upholding freedom of worship, Israeli officials told foreign press at a special Ramadan briefing in Jerusalem on Tuesday. “We take pride in being a nation that welcomes all faiths and protects freedom of religion and worship,” said Tal Heinrich, spokeswoman for the Prime Minister’s Office. While Israel hasn’t placed any restrictions on Arab-Israeli Muslims who wish to visit the Temple Mount during the month-long holiday, age restriction...
Palestinian terrorists in northern Samaria opened fire on Tuesday on the northern community of Kibbutz Meirav, located inside pre-1967 Israel. There were no injuries in the attack, but one home was damaged when a bullet penetrated a window. Israeli forces in the area returned fire, and troops launched a manhunt for the terrorists. “They fired a burst. One bullet hit our house,” kibbutz resident Oren Henig told JNS. Henig, who is director of the Liba Center, a group seeking to strengthen the Jewish identity of the state, has been serving for...
(JNS) — A video clip making the rounds in Hebrew media features Ofakim Mayor Yitzhak Danino revealing disturbing details of a conversation he had with Defense Minister Yoav Gallant as the Oct. 7 attack unfolded, in which he pleaded for army helicopters to save the small southern city, which Gallant promised but were never sent. Located 18 miles east of the Gaza Strip, Ofakim suffered more than 50 dead during the Hamas attack. The death toll would have been still worse but for the heroic actions of local residents, most armed only with h...
