Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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(JTA) – At a political rally in Berlin in June, a young Jewish gay man wearing a turquoise kippah launched his campaign to represent one of Germany's most ethnically diverse constituencies in parliament. The man, 34-year-old Marcel Yaron Goldhammer, promised to stoke the "embers of unity, justice and freedom" during his announcement speech in front of about 200 people in the southeastern Berlin neighborhood of Neukolln. But he's not running for a liberal party, or one promoting m...
(JNS) — A number of American Jewish organizations slammed a resolution adopted on Wednesday at a high-level meeting at the U.N. General Assembly that commemorated the 20th anniversary of the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action stemming from a notoriously anti-Semitic World Conference Against Racism in Durban, South Africa, in 2001. “The resolution predictably claimed that the DDPA offered ‘a comprehensive United Nations framework and solid foundation for combating racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intol...
Jewish security organization opens national command center in Chicago By Ben Sales (JTA) — The Secure Community Network, which coordinates security for Jewish institutions nationwide, has opened a command center in Chicago to monitor antisemitic threats. The center’s main room is a monitoring room with a 16-foot video screen that shows a map and tally of incident reports and potential threats across the country. It is staffed by some 10 people on a daily basis, but can be operational 24 hours a day, as it was over the High Holidays this mon...
WASHINGTON (JTA) - Wrapping up the feel-good-fest that marked the first anniversary of the Abraham Accords, the normalization agreements between Israel and four Arabs states, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken gave a shout-out to the big guy who started it all. No, not Donald Trump, but Abraham himself. "Abraham, in our Bible, had the temerity to engage God, to argue with God, to ask why, and maybe more important, to ask why not," Blinken said at the virtual get-together Friday that marked...
(JNS) — Jewish Democratic Rep. Andy Levin (D-Mich.) is introducing legislation that would make a two-state solution official U.S. policy. Named the “Two-State Solution Act,” it states that “only the outcome of a two-state solution can both ensure the state of Israel’s survival as a democratic state and a national home for the Jewish people and fulfill the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people for a state of their own,” Politico first reported. It further states that the West Bank, including eastern Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip, are...
(JTA) — Hundreds of Iraqi civic leaders and activists attended a conference calling for the country to establish full diplomatic relations with Israel. But Iraq’s government rejected the call and is now seeking to arrest the leaders of the conference and may also try to arrest other attendees for the crime, under Iraqi law, of aiding and abetting ideas that support Zionism, according to Haaretz. Earlier, governmental leaders had said in a statement that the demand for normalization of ties with Israel “was not representative of the population’s...
(JTA) - A century ago, communists shuttered the synagogues of Tomsk, one of the oldest cities in Siberia. It was a painful blow, especially to the local community of Jewish Cantonists - former soldiers who had been recruited against their will or abducted into the Russian Tsar's army and forbidden from practicing their faith. After many years of forced service and persecution, many of them returned to Judaism in Tomsk, a city of about 500,000. This week, local Jews feel a circle has been...
Netflix renews ‘My Unorthodox Life’ for second season By Gabe Friedman (JTA) — Netflix is bringing back “My Unorthodox Life,” the reality series about a formerly Orthodox fashion mogul and her family, the streaming giant announced Monday. No details about the content of season two or any approximate release date were disclosed. The series follows Julia Haart, who left the Orthodox community she grew up in in Monsey, New York, to become CEO of the Elite World Group fashion model agency. Over the course of nine episodes, she and her four chil...
(JTA) — Several Israeli philanthropists have helped bring to Abu Dhabi dozens of asylum seekers, including female athletes, fleeing Taliban rule in Afghanistan. The rescue operation led by Aaron G. Frenkel, an aviation professional who had helped airlift thousands of Jews out of the Soviet Union, ended on Sept. 6, as 41 asylum seekers from Afghanistan reached Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates. The Euro-Asian Jewish Congress detailed the operation in a statement Sunday. Frenkel, who is the chairman of the Congress, teamed up with the g...
(JNS)- A statue honoring Holocaust victim and teenage Jewish diarist Anne Frank was unveiled in Antigua, Guatemala, earlier this month, reported the San Diego Jewish World. The Anne Frank Children's Human Rights Memorial, which was dedicated on Sept. 3, rests in the San Sebastian Park across the street from the National School for Girls No. 2, Antonio Castro y Escobar. Saint Sebastian was murdered as a youngster by the Romans for being Christian. The site for the statute was chosen by Antigua...
WASHINGTON (JTA) — Jared Kushner had plenty of folks to praise at an event here last Tuesday marking the first anniversary of the Abraham Accords, the deals he brokered normalizing relations between Israel and four Arab countries. There were the ambassadors from Israel and two of the Arab lands, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates. There were his Trump administration colleagues who worked through the agreement. There were even some Democrats. “I also want to thank Congressman Ted Deutch of Florida for being here today as well as Acting Assista...
LONDON (JTA) — Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz was a teenager when she began to feel Judaism calling her back. Her family had left the synagogue behind, and in the mid-1970s she was living in Cornwall, about as far away from Britain’s Jewish centers as one can. She wrote letters to Jewish institutions and asked them to send her pamphlets. She pored over Jewish entries in the thin pages of an Encyclopedia Britannica. She began deciphering unfamiliar words and learning about Israel. She couldn’t yet visualize all the traditions, and there were thing...
Hundreds of pilgrims to Uman suspected of forging negative COVID tests By Shira Hanau (JTA) — Hundreds of Israelis who traveled to Ukraine for an annual Rosh Hashanah pilgrimage to the grave of a Hasidic rabbi are suspected of using forged negative COVID tests to return to Israel after testing positive for the virus. Tens of thousands of Israelis travel to Uman, Ukraine each year in a pilgrimage to the grave of Rabbi Nachman, the leader of the Breslov branch of Hasidism. The pilgrimage was essentially canceled last year when Israelis were b...
(JTA) - In a significant move, Israel and the United States have set up a joint team at the national security adviser level to contain Iran, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett told U.S. Jewish leaders in a Rosh Hashanah call. Bennett and his predecessor Benjamin Netanyahu have vehemently opposed negotiating a deal with Iran to contain its nuclear program. But in his first meeting with Bennett last week, President Joe Biden looked to appease Israel's fears by signaling an openness to using a...
(JNS) Algeria’s decision last week to sever diplomatic ties with its neighbor, Morocco, put the spotlight on the strengthening Israeli-Moroccan relations that were born out of the Abraham Accords. Prof. Bruce Maddy-Weitzman, an expert on North Africa and senior fellow at Tel Aviv University’s Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies, told JNS that Algeria and Morocco have been “geopolitical and ideological rivals for more than a half-century on the morrow of attaining independence.” The future of Spain’s ex-colony, Western S...
Birthright trips to resume in October without quarantines for the vaccinated By Gabe Friedman (JTA) — Birthright Israel is resuming its trips after a month of cancellations over Israeli COVID-19 quarantine rules, the organization announced Thursday. Participants who have been fully vaccinated in the past six months will not have to quarantine on arrival for the trips, which will likely resume Oct. 3. However, they will still be subject to PCR and serological tests upon arrival and wait for the PCR results before beginning the trip. That c...
(JNS) — Hadassah, the Women’s Zionist Organization of America has picked a veteran Jewish and nonprofit communal leader as its new CEO. Naomi Adler, most recently the president and CEO of the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia, will assume her new position on Tuesday. She replaces Janice Weinman, who retired at the end of June. “Hadassah’s ability to assemble and engage a diverse membership is second to none,” said Adler, who also led two different United Way organizations in New York. “Whether it’s advancing Zionism, fighting anti...
(JNS) — The shockwaves from the Taliban’s lightning-quick takeover of Afghanistan are continuing to reverberate throughout the Middle East, and Islamist forces are feeling energized by the U.S. withdrawal. But according to Prof. Eyal Zisser, a lecturer in the Middle East History Department at Tel Aviv University, that boost in morale isn’t translating into rash attacks and warfare. “I think that while the extremist forces are seeking to build on the American withdrawal from Afghanistan and the Taliban’s victory for morale purposes, they are...
(JTA) - Reports of the demise of the Canadian Jewish News have been, not for the first time, greatly exaggerated. On Sept. 1, the publication - the largest Jewish news organization in Canada - will rebrand as a digital-first enterprise after abruptly shutting down operations in April 2020 and then resuming a trickle of content over the last year. It is the second relaunch for the 61-year-old nonprofit, which previously shut its doors in 2013 before garnering enough community support to restart...
NEW YORK — This summer, 498 participants took part in Yachad programs across the United States, Canada and Israel. Yachad, a division of the Orthodox Union, is a leading organization for individuals with disabilities in the Jewish community and is one of the only organizations to offer summer programs for Orthodox individuals with disabilities ages 8 to 65 years old. This summer, the group ran its Yachad Integration Program (YIP) for campers in camps Lavi, Morasha and Nesher. The YIP program allows campers to enjoy a separate bunk while j...
Israeli swimmer Mark Malyar wins a second gold and sets another world record at Tokyo Paralympics By Emily Burack (JTA) — Israeli swimmer Mark Malyar continued his historic Paralympics on Sunday, winning another gold medal and breaking his own world record. Malyar won the 400-meter freestyle race in the S7 category, days after winning gold in the men’s 200-meter individual medley in the SM7 category. He set a new world record in that race, too. Malyar, 21, completed Sunday’s race in 4:31.06, two seconds better than his previous record, which he...
WASHINGTON (JTA) - In his first meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, President Joe Biden said that although he prefers diplomatic means to keep Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon, he is not afraid to "turn to other options" on the issue. The pledge captured what both men, who are in varying degrees of political precariousness right now, hoped to extract from the meeting: A bigger focus on what they agree on than what they disagree on, and the start of a new era in relations...
(JTA) — Israeli leaders rarely criticize a law passed by an ally government as outright “antisemitic.” But that’s what Foreign Minister Yair Lapid did on Aug. 14 in response to a newly passed law in Poland that indirectly makes it impossible for Jews and others to sue for property stolen from their families in World War II. “Poland today approved — not for the first time — an immoral, antisemitic law,” he said in a statement. Poland, which faces continual criticism throughout the European Union for its restrictive abortion and media policies,...
(JTA) — Israel’s Chief Rabbinate has asked Pope Francis to retract a recent comment about Jewish law that it said might lead Catholic listeners to “derogatory conclusions” about Jews. Rabbi Ratzon Arusi, chair of the Chief Rabbinate’s Commission for Interreligious Affairs, sent a letter to the Vatican expressing concerns about an Aug. 11 lecture there on God giving the Torah to the Jews, Reuters reported Wednesday. The Torah is the name given to the first five books of the Jewish Bible. “God offered them the Torah, the Law, so they could under...
(JTA) — The owners of a Ukrainian cafe housed in a former synagogue said they worked two lightning bolts into the logo to advertise the reenergizing qualities of the coffee there. Instead they waded into a political minefield because they ended up reproducing the symbol of the SS, Nazi Germany’s murderous elite force. On Tuesday, the owners said the whole thing “is a case of a font gone wrong” and apologized to “anyone whose feelings may have been hurt.” It was a trial that was never fully implemented, they said, and will drop the logo. Cafe...
