Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Sorted by date Results 26 - 50 of 75
(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...
(JNS) - In an exuberant display of support for re-establishing Jewish communities in the Gaza Strip, 5,000 activists filled three large halls to overflowing at the International Convention Center in Jerusalem on Sunday night. A kind of Zionist revival meeting, the conference featured music, a cheering crowd, and a parade of rabbis and politicians delivering speeches and prayers. Religious Zionists made up the vast majority of the participants, with a smattering of haredim or ultra-Orthodox....
(JNS) — A UN Watch report released this week further bolsters the assertions of UNRWA’s critics that the Palestinian aid agency, rife with terrorism supporters, is beyond repair. UNRWA, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, has come under fire after The New York Times broke the story on Sunday that 12 staff members took part in the Oct. 7 massacre in which Hamas terrorists rampaged through Israel’s south, murdering some 1,200 persons, mostly civilians. At least 15 countries, including the U.S., have suspended funding to the organ...
(JNS) — Hamas on Sunday released a statement denying its members committed atrocities on Oct. 7. The denial is a complete reversal for the terrorist group and a total disavowal of its own footage, after it supplied GoPro cameras to its operatives so that they could capture for posterity their horrific deeds on that day. “Avoiding harm to civilians, especially children, women and elderly people, is a religious and moral commitment by all the Al-Qassam Brigades’ fighters,” Hamas stated in the 16-page document, claiming it only targeted Israeli...
(JNS) - A group composed of some 7,000 mothers of Israeli soldiers fighting in the Gaza Strip held up huge posters depicting the children of senior U.S. officials as IDF recruits during a protest in front of U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken's Tel Aviv hotel on Tuesday. The message: What if it were your children fighting in the Gaza Strip? Would you continue to demand the resupply of the enemy? The group behind the protest, Imahot HaLohamim ("Mothers of Combat Soldiers") is demanding an...
(JNS) — South American and African countries have already expressed interest in taking in Palestinian Arab refugees from the Gaza Strip in return for monetary compensation, Likud Knesset member Danny Danon said on Monday. Israel’s former ambassador to the United Nations, who has floated the idea of the transfer of Gazans as part of his five-point plan for the post-war period, told Israeli broadcaster Kan Reshet Bet that Israel should “make it easier” on those Palestinians who wish to leave the Strip for other countries. Danon noted that Ca...
(JNS) — U.S. officials have quietly suggested ways Israel could reduce civilian casualties in its campaign to eradicate Hamas in the Gaza Strip, including using smaller munitions. During his second Middle East visit in less than a month, U.S. Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken spoke to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday about “concrete steps that can and should be taken” to minimize civilian deaths. Blinken didn’t go into detail about what those steps would be. State Department Spokesman Matthew Miller also wouldn...
(JNS) — The Jewish state is fighting a war against “the forces of barbarism” for itself and for all decent countries, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told foreign reporters on Monday. “It is a time for everyone to decide where they stand,” he said. Netanyahu hopes that the world will back Israel, because “Israel’s fight is your fight,” and should “Hamas and Iran’s axis of evil win, you will be their next target,” he said. The “horrors of Hamas” show that the 21st century has not moved “beyond the barbaric horrors of the past” toward...
(JNS) — The Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court on Wednesday rejected Knesset member Simcha Rothman’s request to issue a restraining order against 430 opponents of judicial reform, members of a WhatsApp messaging group called “Looking for and harassing Rothman.” “After weighing all the considerations, I found that the respondents’ activity apparently falls within the scope of a permissible political protest, in accordance with the rules of the democratic game,” said Judge Naeel Mohana. Such an order would restrict “the basic fundamental rights of the...
(JNS) - Israeli communities in Judea and Samaria are lining up to take a driving course that teaches survival skills in the event of a terrorist attack on the road. Courses began a month ago and 10 have been taught so far, with 24 additional communities requesting the course. "In each community, we'll teach it two to three times. We teach 20-to-25 people at a time," said Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, head of Shurat HaDin-Israel Law Center, which sponsors the course. Darshan-Leitner admits it's a litt...
(JNS) — Political heavyweights and prominent journalists discussed key issues affecting Israel and the Jewish people at the opening plenary of the American Jewish Committee’s second AJC Global Forum in Tel Aviv on Sunday evening. Those issues included rising antisemitism, the Abraham Accords and Israeli-Diaspora relations. As many as 1,000 people from 60 nations were in attendance at the opening event, with a total of 1,500 expected throughout the four-day forum. Ted Deutch, in his inaugural AJC Global Forum address as CEO, celebrated the suc...
(JNS) - Trans activists failed in their efforts to cancel a talk by U.S. journalist Abigail Shrier to promote the Hebrew-language translation of her 2020 book "Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters." Activists' threats did succeed in driving the May 28 event out of Tel Aviv. Sella Meir, the Hebrew publisher, first intended to hold the book launch at the ZOA House cultural center, then moved it to Social Space, another Tel Aviv location, before transferring it to the c...
(JNS) - The Israeli right is determined to prove that the majority of the nation supports judicial reform with a "March of the Million" rally on Thursday evening, April 27, outside the Knesset in Jerusalem. According to organizers, 6 million shekels ($1.65 million) have been raised for the protest, 1 million shekels of that through crowdfunding and the rest through large donors and coalition parties. The Religious Zionism Party contributed 1.2 million shekels and the Likud Party 600,000...
(JNS) - While "dialogue" was a central theme of the "Israel at 75 General Assembly," the annual gathering of the Jewish Federations of North America, held this week in Tel Aviv to coincide with the 75th anniversary of Israel's birth, several of the key discussion topics appeared overwhelmingly one-sided. This was especially evident when it came to the foremost political issue of the day-judicial reform-a topic that has consumed Israel's political landscape for the past three months. Federation...
(JNS) - This year's March of the Living, the annual tribute to the 6 million held at the site of the former German death camp Auschwitz in Poland, was conducted under the theme of "Honoring Jewish heroism in the Holocaust." The event took place April 19, on Israel's Holocaust Remembrance Day. It was the first time since the global pandemic that the March was held in its full format, with delegations from well over 25 countries and 10,000 participating. It falls one day before the historical...
(JNS) - Concerned Israeli parents are complaining that their children aren't learning even the basics of Judaism in the country's public schools. Activists say the issue goes beyond a failure to teach, claiming that there's a concerted effort to replace Jewish content with progressive material, financed largely by foreign actors. Still in its early stages, the movement echoes the fight against "wokeism" in the United States, where parents battle school boards over what they see as left-wing...
(JNS) - Imam Mohammad Tawhidi, an Islamic scholar and thinker, has dedicated his life to fighting Islamic extremism. Physically attacked for his positions and forced to flee his home in Australia when it was vandalized by extremists, it is perhaps no wonder he began the preface to his 2018 book, "The Tragedy of Islam: Admissions of a Muslim Imam," with the words: "It is highly likely that you will one day hear that I have been murdered." Tawhidi, who describes himself as the "Imam of Peace,"...
(JNS) — “Today, Theodor Herzl is best known for his beard, not his books,” laments Gil Troy, editor of “The Zionist Writings of Theodor Herzl,” in his introductory essay to a new edition of Herzl’s diaries. Troy, a professor of history at Canada’s McGill University now living in Israel, wants to make Zionism’s founders come alive for the next generation. His latest effort is a three-volume collection of Herzl’s writings. The brainchild behind the series is Matthew Miller, owner of Koren Publishers, a Jerusalem publishing house producing m...
(JNS) — Even before taking power, Benjamin Netanyahu has found himself on the defensive over his prospective coalition’s “fringe elements.” During an NBC interview on Sunday, Netanyahu felt obliged to declare, “I’m going to safeguard Israeli democracy.” However, legal analysts told JNS the danger to democracy may come from another corner, namely the actions of outgoing Prime Minister Yair Lapid, who called on local authorities to flout the incoming government’s directives. In a Dec. 1 open letter, Lapid urged Israeli municipalities...
(JNS) — In a Nov. 16 open letter to Twitter CEO Elon Musk and Twitter management, 180 nonprofit and civil rights organizations called on the social media giant to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance Working Definition of Antisemitism. “Jewish users are subject to unrelenting harassment on Twitter,” the letter said. “Twitter’s guidelines should afford protection to Jewish Twitter users from antisemitic content and harassment,” said the letter, signed by groups such as StopAntisemitism, The Lawfare Project, Students Su...
(JNS) — The recently struck Lebanon-Israel maritime border agreement may prove beneficial economically, but it will not benefit Israel’s security, analysts said during a policy webinar organized by the Jewish Institute for National Security of America on Thursday. Their take suggests that Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid overstated the benefits of the deal. “I think economically it’s a good deal. Strategically, we might face many problems as a consequence of this,” said IDF Maj. Gen. (ret.) Yaakov Amidror, former Israeli national security...
(JNS) — Israel has rebuffed repeated Ukrainian requests to supply the war-torn country with its Iron Dome system and other military equipment. This week, Israel’s refusal came into the spotlight as Russia attacked Ukraine’s civilian centers using Iranian “kamikaze” drones. Ukraine said on Tuesday that it will formally request Israel to supply air defense systems. It had made informal requests until now. Israel has provided Ukraine with humanitarian aid, including a fully staffed $6.5 million field hospital. But its desire to maintain a delicat...
