Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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(JTA) – A school district in suburban Fort Worth, Texas, has ordered its librarians to remove an illustrated adaptation of “The Diary of Anne Frank” from their shelves and digital libraries, along with the Bible and dozens of other books that were challenged by parents last year. The book purge at the Keller Independent School District in Keller, Texas, was requested Tuesday by a district executive in an email, a copy of which was obtained by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. A copy of the email also circulated on social media. “By the end of...
(JTA) — The superintendent of the Texas school district that this week ordered the removal of “Anne Frank’s Diary: The Graphic Adaptation” from its school’s shelves said Thursday that he expected the book, along with the Bible and other books that were removed following parental challenges, “will be on shelves very soon.” In a statement, Westfall also said that more than 50 copies of the original version of the diary remain in circulation in the Keller Independent School District outside Fort Worth. “Keller ISD is not banning the Bible or th...
New York police search for attacker who tried to choke Jewish woman at subway (JNS) — The New York Police Department’s Hate Crimes Task Force is investigating an antisemitic attack on a Jewish woman that took place at a subway station on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, reported the New York Post. The 44-year-old victim, whose identity was not revealed, was choked by an unidentified male suspect, who made antisemitic remarks while she waited on the subway platform of the No. 6 train at around 11:20 a.m. on Tuesday, according to police. The attac...
Eight people were injured, among them U.S. citizens after a Palestinian gunman open fired on civilians at a bus and a parking lot near Jerusalem's Old City. Following an intensive manhunt by Israel's security forces and several arrests, the suspected terrorist identified as east Jerusalem resident Amir Sidawi turned himself in to the Israeli police. "This was a lone assailant, a resident of the city with a criminal background," Prime Minister Yair Lapid stated. "Whoever harms Israeli citizens ha...
(JNS) — The pro-Israel nonprofit StandWithUs kickstarted its second national letter campaign last week, writing to roughly 3,000 universities across the United States about major issues Jewish students face on campus. “If your administration and [Diversity, Equity and Inclusion] offices prioritize social-justice issues, then combating anti-Semitism on campus should be a major focus,” said the Aug. 4 letter signed by StandWithUs CEO Roz Rothstein, StandWithUs Legal Department director Yael Lerman and Center for Combating Antisemitism direc...
Heritage Florida News award-winning columnist and Central Florida attorney Mel Pearlman was recently recognized by the Florida Bar Association at its Annual Convention for 50 years of distinctive service to the citizens of Florida as a member of the Florida Bar. Within the same time frame, Pearlman took second-place in the Louis Rapoport Award for Excellence in Commentary category from the American Jewish Press Association for his article in the Heritage titled "Mr. Biden's folly," (May 14,...
(New York Jewish Week) — Leaders of mostly left-wing Jewish groups and progressive New York Jewish politicians demanded an apology from the head of the Anti-Defamation League, saying he had maligned the progressive group Jews for Racial & Economic Justice. In a letter circulated by JFREJ, the signatories condemned “smear campaigns that seemed designed to isolate and divide progressive Jews from the rest of the Jewish community.” The letter is signed by City Comptroller Brad Lander, City Council member Lincoln Restler, former Manhattan Borou...
Lori Slutsky delivered a beautiful Shabbat service at the Cascade Heights community in Longwood. It was Erev Tishah B’Av so the service had an extra special feeling to it. All attendees were engaged and learned about the destruction of the two Temples in Jerusalem (the Bais Hamikdash). Blessings were made over wine and challah. All enjoyed and participated....
The Jewish Chamber met at Toojays on Colonial on Tuesday, Aug. 9, for networking and conversation. Many nice friendships were reunited or forged. The next Jewish Chamber event is Sept. 12 from 5-7 p.m. at the Roth Family JCC. Samantha Tayor, from J Life and Lake Mary Magazine, will be leading a session on speed networking. Visit https://jewish-chamber.com. Shown here Joshua Mizrachi (l) greets Scott Goldberg at the Jewish Chamber meet and greet....
(JTA) — A state senator who says the story of her grandfather’s murder during the Holocaust galvanizes her will be the Democratic candidate for Vermont’s single seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. Becca Balint, who has been a state senator since 2015, won Vermont’s Democratic primary on Tuesday, easily fending off her main competitor, Molly Gray, the state’s lieutenant governor. With Vermont a reliably blue state, Balint is all but certain to become the state’s first woman representative in Congress. Balint was endorsed by Vermont’s prog...
(JNS) — The United States, United Kingdom, France and the European Union have called for “restraint” following the launch by Israel on Friday of “Operation Breaking Dawn” against the Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror group in the Gaza Strip. The U.N. Security Council is scheduled to hold an emergency, closed-door meeting on Monday to discuss the matter. U.K. Foreign Secretary Liz Truss also issued a statement on Saturday expressing her country’s support for Israel and its right to self-defense, while condemning the terrorists. She called for...
(JTA) — One of Israel’s strongest critics in Congress narrowly survived a tough Democratic primary, as Rep. Ilhan Omar eked out a victory Tuesday in Minnesota’s 5th congressional district. Omar, a two-term member of Congress who supports the movement to boycott Israel and once grouped Israel and the United States with Hamas and the Taliban in a statement about human rights abuses, faced a challenge from Don Samuels, a former Minneapolis city councilman who courted pro-Israel and suburban support. He drew 48.2 percent of the vote in the distr...
(JNS) — Hamas issued and then withdrew sweeping restrictions on foreign journalists working in the Gaza Strip in the aftermath of this week’s conflict between Israel and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, according to the Associated Press. The restrictions included a ban on coverage about PIJ rockets falling short in Gaza and causing injuries and deaths, as well as a general rule requiring that Jerusalem be blamed for the latest escalation, according to the report. The Foreign Press Association, which represents international media in Israel, ann...
(JTA) - Negotiating the bomb-scarred roads of eastern Ukraine is the easy part of Ilya Pulin's day as he delivers food and medicine across eastern Ukraine as a volunteer. The difficult part, he told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, is finding and paying for fuel in the war-torn country. Since Russia invaded in February, "fuel prices have doubled. There are hour-long lines at petrol stations. And until a few days ago there was a five-gallon ration per person," said Pulin, a 38-year-old Jewish...
(Israel Hayom via JNS) - A 16-dunam (four-acre) noncontiguous parcel of land on a green hilltop in eastern Jerusalem, which lies between the security barrier and the eastern border of the Jabel Mukaber neighborhood, could soon become the most volatile in the city. The Israeli Justice Ministry has completed the process, conducted secretly, of transferring ownership of the land to the state, on a temporary basis. Civil researchers hired by the ministry's Custodian of Absentee Properties...
(JNS) British Foreign Secretary of State and Parliament member Liz Truss promised to consider moving the British embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem if she is elected Tory leader and becomes prime minister in September. The Conservative Party leadership candidate-one of two; she is vying against fellow Parliament member Rishi Sunak-made the promise in a letter written to members of Conservative Friends of Israel (CFI). She also participated in a CFI event on Monday night in which she...
(JTA) - A century ago, German philosopher Franz Rosenzweig spearheaded the revival of intellectual Jewish life in the city of Frankfurt am Main with the "Freies Jüdisches Lehrhaus" - the Jewish House of Free Study. As many as 1,100 adult students would attend lectures tailored to secular Jews and aimed at democratizing the kind of Jewish learning that was typically restricted to the beit midrash, or formal house of Jewish study. Now, a Lehrhaus in the spirit of 1920s Frankfurt is coming to the...
(JTA) - Could the new owner of Ben & Jerry's Israeli business interests rename a flavor "Judea and Samaria"? Avi Zinger, who bought the company's Hebrew and Arabic branding from parent company Unilever last month, recently told an Israeli news outlet that he had the right to do so, and even proposed renaming "Chunky Monkey" to the biblical name for the West Bank. And that threat, Ben & Jerry's lawyers say, is reason enough why the sale shouldn't legally go through. "If Ben & Jerry's wanted to pr...
(JNS) — Newfound technology enables the use of nanoparticles to assist the body’s own immune system to fight cancer. The technology, developed by a research team at Bar-Ilan University, uses nanoparticles to eliminate obstacles in the malignant tumor’s environment that impede the normal activity of natural killer cells (a special sub-type of white blood cells called lymphocytes). The research was published in the journal EMBO Molecular Medicine. Natural killer cells are a potent defense weapon of the body that assists the immune system in it...
The judge who signed the FBI’s Mar-a-Lago warrant is facing violent antisemitic threats By Madeline Fixler (JTA) — Bruce Reinhart, the federal judge in Florida who signed the warrant allowing the FBI to raid former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago property on Tuesday, has been hit with a wave of antisemitic threats online. The outburst has appeared on right-wing social media platforms and message boards, where users have published the judge’s name, address and personal information. Threats have been directed at his children and supposed fami...
(JNS) — Shortly after Cairo helped broker a ceasefire between Israel and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, an Egyptian diplomat let loose a barrage on Israel on the international stage. At Monday afternoon’s emergency session at the U.N. Security Council, Egyptian Ambassador to the United Nations Osama Abdel Khalek surprisingly tore into Israel, hours after his Israeli counterpart praised Egypt for mediating a halt of violence. Abdel Khalek made no mention of PIJ during his speech, labeling all Gazans killed in the weekend’s clashes as “martyrs,” with...
(JTA) — When Deborah Lipstadt recently met with a Saudi diplomat, she recalled, “He stood up and he said to me, ‘I come from a city where there were Jews.’” That interaction in Saudi Arabia, a country that has been widely criticized for its human rights abuses, was a highlight of Lipstadt’s recent Middle East trip, her first tour as the U.S. State Department’s special envoy for antisemitism, which she recounted in a virtual briefing Monday. She characterized the interaction as cordial — but it also spoke to the costs of the sentiments that...
The Jewish Foundation for the Righteous has appointed veteran educator Andrew Buchanan as its senior education program associate. Buchanan joins the foundation after more than 21 years teaching middle and high school students about the Holocaust. He will report to JFR Executive Vice President Stanlee Stahl. The JFR continues its work of providing monthly financial assistance to more than 130 aged and needy Righteous Gentiles, living in 13 countries. Since its founding, the JFR has provided more than $42 million to aged and needy rescuers – h...
(JNS) - A total of 700 Jewish teens from 32 communities in seven countries completed a life-changing seminar in Israel as part of a year-long Diller Teen Fellowship, an immersive leadership program for teenagers from across the world. The three-week program included a Shabbaton retreat, a "Community Week" and a "Global Congress" with all 700 teens (including 350 international Fellows gathering with 350 Israeli Fellows) for a period of cultural exchange, exploration of Jewish peoplehood and...
(JTA) - All but one of the family members of the 11 Israeli athletes murdered during the 1972 Munich Olympics are planning to boycott a ceremony marking the 50th anniversary of the incident, calling the financial compensation that the German government will offer them "a joke." According to a German government memo obtained by The New York Times, various agencies have thus far paid a total of 4.6 million euros ($4.8 million) to the families, and Germany is expected to offer an additional 5.4...
