Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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(JNS) - Israel on Sunday, June 7, marked the 59th anniversary on the Gregorian calendar of its capture of eastern Jerusalem and reunification of the capital during the 1967 Six-Day War. June 7, 1967, marked the day "the Jewish people returned to the heart of their ancient capital," according to an Israeli Foreign Ministry X post. It described the reunification of the holy city as a moment of "historic joy and liberation." The MFA's statement highlighted the significance of Jerusalem in Jewish...
(JNS) - The Israel Defense Forces struck military targets in western and central Iran early Monday after the Islamic Republic launched ballistic missile barrages at the Jewish state overnight. The military said the Israeli Air Force, guided by Military Intelligence, carried out strikes on military targets belonging to the Iranian regime. IAF fighter jets "completed a large-scale strike on strategic defense systems," according to a statement. "Recently, defense systems were deployed in numerous...
(JNS) — As Israel prepared to mark the reunification of Jerusalem in the Six-Day War on June 7, the Tower of David Jerusalem Museum is asking the public to help uncover a visual record of one of Judaism’s most cherished sites—the Western Wall. The museum has launched a nationwide appeal for photographs, postcards and other visual materials documenting the Kotel from the earliest days of photography through 1968, ahead of a major exhibition to open in 2027, on the 60th anniversary of the war. The exhibition, titled “Eyes on the Wall,” will be t...
(JNS) — The House Armed Services Committee voted on Thursday to reject an amendment from Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) that would have stripped a provision from the annual defense authorization bill calling for greater defense cooperation with Israel. Khanna and other critics of section 224 of the National Defense Authorization Act have said that it would “fuse” the U.S. and Israeli militaries and was an example of Congress bowing to the wishes of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “The American people are tired of the arrogance and insolen...
(JNS) — Iran on Monday warned it would carry out “far more severe and crushing” missile attacks against Israel if the Jewish state continued military operations against Hezbollah, its Lebanese proxy. The Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, Iran’s highest operational military command, said Tehran delivered “heavy, targeted and costly blows” to Israel in its attacks on Sunday and Monday. “The cessation of armed forces operations is hereby announced,” the statement continued, according to a translation by Iran’s Press TV outlet. The annou...
U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee on Sunday praised former President Bill Clinton’s approach to the Arab-Israeli conflict, saying he wished more Democrats shared his understanding of the issue. Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) “is one of the few who do,” Huckabee tweeted, sharing footage of Clinton’s October 2024 remarks about negotiations he led between Israel and the PLO in the ’90s and early 2000s. PLO leader Yasser Arafat “didn’t tell me the truth ... when he promised me he was gonna accept the peace deal that we had worked out, which wo...
(JNS) — U.S. Ambassador to Lebanon Michel Issa discussed the ongoing high-level trilateral talks between Israel, Lebanon and the U.S., in a meeting with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun in Beirut on Monday. Issa, who was born in Lebanon, said the U.S.-brokered talks would resume in Washington, D.C. He praised the professionalism of Lebanon’s negotiating team. According to the State Department, talks will reconvene during the week of June 22. Israel and Lebanon agreed to a ceasefire on June 3. The ceasefire was to be contingent on Hezbollah, an...
The Wikipedia page for Hasan Piker, a far-left streamer who has called the Israel Defense Forces a “Nazi army” and Orthodox Jews “inbred,” has received more than 327,000 views in the past 30 days. At the top of the page, it states that he has “regularly spoken about the Gaza war, advocating for Palestinians and criticizing the Israeli government.” Readers must scroll down quite a bit to learn that he has praised Hamas, a U.S.-designated terror organization. Despite an editor recommending it, the page does not note that the U.S. Department...
(JNS) — A grandmother and her three grandchildren were stranded in a wadi near Meron in the Upper Galilee on a dark, rainy Lag B’Omer night. Unable to climb out and unsure how they would reach safety, they waited for help. Before rescuers could reach them on foot, a drone appeared overhead. Operated by United Hatzalah volunteers, the drone located the family, illuminated the area with onboard lights, delivered thermal blankets and flashlights, and guided rescue teams to their location. The fam...
(JNS) — Iran and its regional terrorist proxies fired more than two dozen ballistic missiles at Israel overnight on Sunday and into Monday, sending millions of civilians running for bomb shelters. An Israeli military official told reporters on Monday that 22 ballistic missiles were launched by Tehran overnight, in addition to two projectiles fired by Yemen’s Iranian-backed Houthi terrorists. As of Monday morning, 44 people had sustained injuries in the attacks, according to Israel’s Healt...
(JNS) - Rep. Max Miller (R-Ohio) was rebuked on the House floor on Wednesday after accusing Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) of supporting Hezbollah during debate over her War Powers resolution concerning U.S. forces in Lebanon. Tlaib's measure would direct the president to withdraw U.S. armed forces from Southern Lebanon, arguing the United States is acting without congressional authorization by providing intelligence and coordinating activities related to Israel's military actions against...
An old friend of mine, an academic who typically infuses his scholarly papers about such topics as economics and social trends with the perspective of Torah stories, Torah-based ethics and Torah scholars, challenged me the other day to write an essay about a subject that has increasingly bothered him in recent years — the growing uncivility in our culture. In politics. In religion. In journalism. In …. You get the idea. This increase in public hostility and decrease in mutual respect is evident in many venues: The standards of comedy roasts, wh...
10 evacuees from ‘Operation Roaring Lion’ still living in hotels By JNS Staff (JNS) — Sixty-four Israelis whose homes were damaged by Iranian missiles during “Operation Roaring Lion” against Tehran are still living in hotels, Knesset lawmakers heard on Wednesday. The evacuees are temporarily being housed in 11 hotels across the Jewish state, a representative of the Israel Tax Authority’s Compensation Fund told members of the Knesset Committee for Immigration, Absorption and Diaspora Affairs. “According to our projections, by mid-June ther...
(JNS) — Israel “hit back” after Iran targeted it with missiles, U.S. President Donald Trump emphasized early on Tuesday, saying that he “can’t blame” Jerusalem for retaliating against the Islamic Republic. Trump told reporters after attending the NBA Finals in New York City that he had a “very good conversation” with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu following the latest flare-up in hostilities. “He hit back, and I can’t blame him for that,” said the president. “Now they’ve called it quits, so they’re going to just leave each other al...
(JNS) - HAIFA, Israel-"You're from the Jewish school?" the French Ministry of Education official quizzed the teenage girl who had come for her post-high school baccalaureate exam. The examiner began firing off the most difficult questions on the physics test, seemingly seeking to trip up the high school senior, but Noa Uziel, 18, who was at the top of her class at Paris's Yabne school, stood her ground. "Are you going to cry?" the Education Ministry official pressed her. "I am the one who...
(JNS) — The Israel Day on Fifth parade in Manhattan on May 31 made a statement both for who was and was not present, according to Ofir Akunis, Israeli consul general in New York. “To all our enemies all around the world, but specifically here in New York City, we are here to stay, we are strong, we are proud and my suggestion to all of these elected officials, who are thinking that we will disappear, the answer is ‘no,’” Akunis told JNS after the parade. “The opposite is the truth,” the...
(JNS) - Hundreds of New Yorkers filled the normally quiet and bucolic Upper East Side street adjacent to Gracie Mansion, the official home of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, on Tuesday evening, chanting "Hey, hey, no, no, Mayor Mamdani's got to go" and "stop Mamdani." Lilly Icikson was among the demonstrators-a group of mostly Jews with a few Muslims and Christians-and handed out stickers, which she prints at home and affixes to light poles and other surfaces outside Gracie Mansion and in...
Almost half of American Jews under 35 say the Israeli-Palestinian conflict should be solved by creating a single country in Israel, the “West Bank” and Gaza with a government elected by both Israelis and Palestinians, according to a poll conducted by the Jewish Voter Resource Center. The findings signal a generational shift in U.S. support for a binational state in Israel, reflecting a core demand of anti-Zionist protests on college campuses and beyond — even as most major Jewish organizations classify calls for a single state as an expre...
(JNS) — Reported anti-Jewish hate crimes in Chicago declined from 79 in 2024 to 47 in 2025, and so far this year, there have been nine recorded in the Windy City, per Chicago Police Department data. In 2023, the year Brandon Johnson became mayor, Chicago had 50 anti-Jewish hate crimes, and the prior year, before Oct. 7, there were 39, according to a city crime dashboard. In 2026 so far, there has been one anti-Muslim hate crime—the same number as in 2025. In 2024 there were six, and in 2023, 16, according to police data. In 2022, there wer...
(JNS) — The Islamic Republic of Iran is likely to “double-cross” U.S. President Donald Trump in any agreement it reaches with Washington, and he will eventually retaliate, American evangelical leader Mike Evans said on Monday. The remarks by Evans, founder of Jerusalem’s Friends of Zion Museum, come amid high-stakes negotiations aimed at ending the war and addressing Iran’s nuclear ambitions. “If Iran double-crosses Trump and makes a fool out of him—and I believe they will—he will get his revenge and he will finish the job,” Evans told JNS in...
(JNS) — Members of NGO Monitor, an Israel-based research institute, signed an open letter on Sunday calling for an independent investigation of The New York Times following its publishing of an opinion column alleging Israeli authorities sexually assaulted Palestinian security prisoners. The column, penned by Nicholas Kristof, drew a flurry of criticism worldwide, culminating in the recent United Nation’s decision to place Israel on a list of parties suspected of committing sexual violence in conflict. The members of NGO Monitor’s Inter...
(JNS) — The UJA-Federation of New York said that it purchased 20,000 bags of Bamba in response to the Park Slope Food Coop’s recent decision to boycott Israeli products. The UJA, the largest Federation in the world, which distributes $275 million in grants annually, described the co-op boycott as “divisive and hate-driven.” Food co-op members voted 67 percent to 31percent to boycott Israeli products. Some 8,400 members, out of 17,000, reportedly voted at the meeting, which was moved online due to security concerns. The Federation said it will...
(JNS) — New York lawmakers rolled a proposal for a 50-foot “buffer zone” around Jewish day schools and community centers into the state budget on Tuesday. Sam Sutton, a Democratic state senator who is Jewish, stated that “after the horrific incident outside Park East Synagogue, I became the first legislator to introduce this proposal.” “Today, buffer zone protections were included in the final state budget,” he said. Noam Abrahams, Sutton’s communications director, told JNS that the proposal was included in the budget bill that’s being discusse...
(JNS) — No rabbinic seminary has a future in the United States if it ordains anti-Zionist clergy, Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch, senior rabbi at the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue, a Reform congregation in New York City, said at the third “Re-Charging Reform Judaism” conference. “We have an obligation to discuss what we mean by ‘Zionism,’” the rabbi, who is president of the New York Board of Rabbis, said in a keynote address opening the two-day conference on Wednesday. “We have an interest to establish the biggest possible tent. I am a liberal plurali...
(JNS) - The House Judiciary Committee said that it has uncovered new funding links between the Biden administration and left-wing groups that oppose the Israeli government, as well as groups with ties to terrorist organizations A May 29 committee memorandum, which JNS obtained exclusively, and which was addressed to committee members from the Republican-led committee staff, addresses "new information about the Biden-Harris administration helping to fund protests against the Netanyahu...
