Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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(JNS) — The signing of the massive natural gas deal with Egypt goes far beyond its $34 billion price tag. One of the main reasons for the agreement’s delay was Egypt’s problematic approach to Israel on political and security issues. According to information gathered in recent years, Egypt has deployed forces in Sinai far beyond what is permitted under the security annex of the 1979 peace treaty. It has also built tunnels deep in the peninsula for storing weapons and has suspiciously extended runways at airfields. The understandings betwe...
(JNS) - Former U.S. senator Ben Sasse, who was president of University of Florida and of Midland University in Fremont, Neb., said on Tuesday that he has stage-four pancreatic cancer and is going to die. "Advanced pancreatic is nasty stuff. It's a death sentence. But I already had a death sentence before last week too-we all do," he said in a lengthy statement. "I'm blessed with amazing siblings and half-a-dozen buddies that are genuinely brothers. As one of them put it, 'Sure, you're on the...
(JNS) - An Israeli was found dead with signs of hypothermia, and two children sustained minor injuries from a falling tree, on Thursday, the second day of winter storm Byron. Emergency teams were also called to flooding incidents in the Judean Foothills (the Shfela), the Magen David Adom medical response group said. MDA says its first responders were deployed to several sites where cars became trapped in rising waters and were working alongside rescue teams, with medics on standby amid fears of...
(JNS) - Surgeons in Israel successfully removed a 2.3-inch tumor protruding from the upper jaw of a baby girl immediately after her birth, a Rabin Medical Center spokesperson said in a statement on Tuesday. The tumor was the largest of its kind and location ever described in the medical literature, nearly matching the size of the newborn's head. "It is a miracle. We told our baby she has used up all her drama for a lifetime," her family was quoted as saying by the hospital in Petach Tikvah. The...
(JNS) — House lawmakers responded to the attack on a Chanukah celebration in Sydney with new proposals to combat antisemitism in the United States and a measure condemning the shooting. On Wednesday, the chair and ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee introduced a bipartisan resolution calling on the Australian government to protect its Jewish community and affirming the support of the House to combat antisemitism domestically. “As a Christian, I stand in solidarity with Australia’s Jewish community and the families of those...
(Israel Hayom via JNS) — The Sydney Chanukah attack was exceptional in its scope, weaponry and planning, but it represents the peak of an antisemitic terror wave that has struck Australia, some with proven foreign involvement. Initial findings point to an ISIS connection, not Iran, which has been proven responsible for torching synagogues and Jewish businesses in the country. The distinction between streams of radical Islam does not diminish the threat: The Iranian model is sometimes replicated in other influence networks, both state and n...
Israel to open embassy in Fiji in 2026 By JNS Staff (JNS) — Israel will open an embassy in the South Pacific island nation of Fiji next year, Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar announced on Thursday, saying he informed Fiji’s Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sitiveni Rabuka of the move during a phone call. “Fiji is one of Israel’s most consistent supporters, also in the UN arena. In our call today, the PM again said: ‘We will always be with you,’” Sa’ar wrote on X following the call. Sa’ar said that opening the embassy will deepen relations be...
(Israel Hayom via JNS) — Twelve days have passed since a father and son carried out a murderous terrorist attack at Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia, and murdered 15 Jews during the lighting of the first Chanukah candle. These are the stories and legacies of the victims. Sofia and Boris Gurman Russian immigrants Boris Gurman, 69, and his wife, Sofia Gurman, 61, shared 34 years of marriage before terrorists killed them. Their relatives described the couple as honest and industrious individuals who extended kindness to everyone they e...
(JNS) - The surviving gunman in the Bondi Beach terrorist attack has been charged with 59 offenses, including 15 counts of murder and one count of committing a terrorist act, Australian authorities announced on Wednesday. Naveed Akram, 24, awoke from a medically induced coma on Tuesday and faced court via video conference from his hospital bed, where he remains under police guard after sustaining injuries during an exchange of gunfire with officers. Akram's father, Sajid, 50, the second gunman,...
(JNS) — A 1,300-year-old lead pendant decorated with a menorah was uncovered during an archaeological excavation beneath the southwestern corner of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, north of the City of David, the Israel Antiquities Authority revealed on Monday. Only one other ancient lead pendant bearing the menorah symbol is known in the world, the government agency added. The personal necklace dates to the 6th to early 7th centuries in the Late Byzantine period and was recently discovered in a large-scale archaeological excavation in the D...
(JNS) — If Hamas does not follow through with U.S. President Donald Trump’s peace plan that involves the terrorist group laying down arms, Israel “will have to deal with the problem,” Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar said in an interview with the Saudi state-owned channel Al Arabiya English on Wednesday. Israel’s top diplomat said he hopes the Islamist organization adheres to the plan, which both Israel and Hamas’s leadership agreed to, but that “unfortunately,” senior Hamas officials have issued public declarations saying that they have n...
New research is challenging long-held assumptions about how flight evolved in dinosaurs and birds, according to a study published on Tuesday in Communications Biology. Yosef Kiat of Tel Aviv University’s School of Zoology and the Steinhardt Museum of Natural History led an international team that examined 160-million-year-old fossils and found that some feathered dinosaurs had lost the ability to fly—suggesting the path to flight was more complex than scientists believed. The research focused on nine exceptionally preserved fossils of Anc...
(JNS) — New South Wales Police identified 50-year-old Adam Smyth as the 14th victim of the Dec. 14 terror attack at Sydney’s Bondi Beach that killed 15 people during a Chanukah celebration. Smyth and his wife, Katrina, were walking near the beach when two gunmen opened fire on more than a thousand people gathered for the event, according to family statements released by police. He was not Jewish and was not attending the celebration. We mourn the loss of Adam Smyth who was walking with his wife Katrina along the Bondi Beach, a passerby to the C...
(JNS) — Israeli President Isaac Herzog thanked Mike Waltz, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, on Wednesday for his role in advancing the recent U.N. Security Council resolution that codified U.S. President Donald Trump’s 20-point Gaza peace plan. “I want to thank you for supporting Israel at the United Nations with clear moral clarity,” Herzog told Waltz during their meeting in Jerusalem, according to a statement from the president’s office. Herzog emphasized the need to secure the release of the last hostage, Staff Sgt. Ran Gvili. “F...
(JNS) — Community leaders, scholars and Jewish advocacy groups largely welcomed New York City’s announcement of a planned Holocaust memorial to be constructed at Queens Borough Hall. But some cautioned that remembrance alone is insufficient to confront contemporary Jew-hatred. Edward Rothstein, critic-at-large at the Wall Street Journal, told JNS that he doesn’t have specific knowledge of the particular memorial, which Mayor Eric Adams and Donovan Richards, the Queens Borough president, announced last month, but there “is no question that es...
(JNS) - Four English-speaking Israeli writers convened in Jerusalem on Sunday night for a candid discussion on spirituality, creativity and resilience, reflecting on how Oct. 7, 2023, transformed their inner worlds and their work. The panel, one of several, was part of the first-ever "Book Shuk" at the Nefesh B'Nefesh Aliyah Campus in Cinema City, a literary fair featuring more than 50 "olim" (immigrant) authors who have written and published their own books since making aliyah, the majority...
(JNS) - The dozens of posters of hostages that once greeted arrivals and departures at Ben-Gurion International Airport have disappeared except for one of the last hostages whose body remains in Gaza, Israel Police officer Ran Gvili. The Hostages and Missing Families Forum on Tuesday shared a photo of Gvili's younger sister Shira, who stopped by the lone picture of the fallen hostage at the airport. "Until about two months ago, there were dozens of pictures of hostages there, and today a single...
(Israel Hayom via JNS) - Dramatic video evidence has surfaced of two individuals physically engaging one of the two armed terrorists who carried out Sunday's Bondi Beach shooting, before being shot and killed themselves, according to The Guardian. Family members confirmed their identities as Boris Gurman, 69, and Sofia Gurman, 61, in a statement to The Sydney Morning Herald, stating that they were "heartbroken by the sudden and senseless loss." Relatives added that the two "had been married for...
(JNS) - The National Library of Israel is displaying a rare 14th-century manuscript of Maimonides' Mishneh Torah for the first time as part of its permanent exhibition. The illuminated volume, copied in Provence between 1300 and 1350 C.E., represents one of Judaism's most significant legal texts. Italian artist Matteo di Ser Cambio later enhanced the manuscript in Spain with vivid illustrations, gold ornamentation and decorative motifs featuring figures, animals and plants. The manuscript shows...
Former Louisiana congressman with pro-Israel record sworn in as CDC deputy director Dr. Ralph Abraham was sworn in on Monday as principal deputy director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention following his most recent post as surgeon general of the Louisiana Department of Health. Abraham, 71, a Republican whose grandparents immigrated from Lebanon, previously represented Louisiana’s fifth congressional district in the U.S. House of Representatives from 2015 to 2021. As a legislator, Abraham co-sponsored resolutions against the b...
(JNS) - One of the Bondi Beach gunmen, 24-year-old Naveed Akram, came to the attention of Australia's domestic intelligence agency six years ago for his close ties to a Sydney-based Islamic State terrorism cell, ABC News Australia reported Monday. Naveed and his father, Sajid Akram, 50, killed 15 people Sunday evening when they opened fire on the "Chanukah by the Sea" event celebrating the first day of the Jewish festival. The attack on more than 1,000 people gathered at Bondi Beach's Archer...
(JNS) - Legendary Jewish film director and actor Rob Reiner and his wife Michele Singer were found dead in their Los Angeles home on Sunday afternoon, according to TMZ. The outlet cited law enforcement sources in reporting that the couple suffered lacerations consistent with a knife attack. A family member is being questioned by investigators, a law enforcement official told the Associated Press. Reports indicate that the suspect is the couple's son, Nick, who has a long history of drug...
(Israel Hayom via JNS) — As Australia mourns the victims of the Chanukah massacre at Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia, local media outlets searched for the hero seen in video footage struggling with one of the attackers and pulling the weapon from his hands. Australian network 7NEWS reported that the hero is a Bondi Beach stall owner named Ahmed Al-Ahmad. A family member of the hero who risked his life to snatch the weapon from one of the gunmen said he was shot twice. In a conversation with 7NEWS outside the hospital, Mostafa revealed that h...
JOIN welcomes Rabbi Sendy Freud as new Director of Impact The Orlando Jewish community welcomes a new leader to its growing network of educators and community builders. Rabbi Sendy Freud, his wife, and their four children recently joined the Jewish Outreach Initiative of Orlando where Freud has assumed the role of Director of Impact. JOIN was founded in 2014 to serve Orlando's growing Jewish population and expanding educational needs. Since it began, JOIN has built an engaged, thriving...
(JNS) — Israel placed third in The Economist’s ranking of the world’s strongest economies in 2025. The London-based magazine has conducted its search for the “economy of the year” for five years now. “Israel has continued its strong recovery from the chaos of 2023, and Ireland only just misses out on top spot,” The Economist reported. “Although Czech and South Korean firms have done well this year, nowhere has done better (in local-currency terms) than Israel. In the past year the share price of the country’s most valuable listed company, B...
