Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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(Israel21c via JNS) Food security is emerging as a key area in which the United Arab Emirates is eager for Israeli expertise, investors in each country tell ISRAEL21c. The Gulf states import more than 90 percent of their food. This has long been a concern, but the issue intensified when pandemic-related transportation stoppages disrupted supply for several months. The UAE now has a food security minister and Food Security Council. The Abraham Accords announced between Israel and the UAE on Aug....
(JTA) — Facebook announced that it will now ban any posts that deny or distort the Holocaust, a landmark change from its previous policy. For years, Facebook and its CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, had defended Holocaust denial as a misguided but legitimate form of expression. In 2018, regarding Holocaust denial, he said, “I don’t believe that our platform should take that down because I think there are things that different people get wrong.” That approach garnered widespread outcry from scholars and anti-Semitism watchdogs. On Monday, Zuckerberg wrote...
(JNS) — A Jewish American economist was one of two winners of the 2020 Nobel Prize in economics for studying how auctions work, announced the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences on Monday. Paul Milgrom, along with American economist Robert Wilson, won the prestigious annual prize “for improvements to auction theory and inventions of new auction formats,” announced the academy. Both professors at Stanford University, they “have also used their insights to design new auction formats for goods a...
(JNS) — World Jewish Congress president Ronald S. Lauder met with Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas on Saturday, announced a Palestinian minister. In a Twitter post, P.A. Civil Affairs Minister Hussein al-Sheikh disclosed the information, though provided no specifics. The billionaire philanthropist and former U.S. ambassador to Austria went to the West Bank for what the WJC said was “a private visit at Abbas’s invitation to discuss a range of issues regarding Palestine and the Middle East.” A friend of U.S. President Donald Trump,...
(JNS) — The Etihad Airways flight carrying a ministerial delegation from the United Arab Emirates landed in Israel at noon on Tuesday, marking the first-ever official visit from the Gulf state, following the Sept. 15 signing of the U.S.-brokered Abraham Accords at the White House. Welcoming the delegation on the tarmac of Ben-Gurion International Airport, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—accompanied by Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi and Finance Minister Israel Katz—spoke about the preparation of his speech. “My staff wrote me some li...
(JTA) — A synagogue has opened for the first time in Obninsk, a city near Moscow that was built in 1945 to accommodate the staff of the world’s first nuclear power plant. Around 400 Jews, including some from Moscow seeking to move out of the city, make up the city’s Jewish population, according to the Federation of Jewish Communities in Russia. The nuclear plant had many Jewish employees and some of their families stayed in the Obninsk area. Russian Chief Rabbi Berel Lazar attended the opening of the synagogue on Thursday. “Or goal is not onl...
(JTA) — New U.S. sanctions on Iran, which target 18 Iranian financial institutions and penalize non-Iranian institutions who deal with them, effectively cut the Middle Eastern country off from the world finance system. The sanctions deprive “the Islamic Republic of Iran of funds to carry out its support for terrorist activities and nuclear extortion that threatens the world,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement. The sanctions effectively cut off Iran from world markets because of the preeminence worldwide of the U.S. dolla...
Israeli army opens two coronavirus wards for civilians in Rambam Hospital in Haifa By Marcy Oster (JTA) — The Israel Defense Forces opened two civilian coronavirus wards in an underground parking complex designed to be used for medical purposes during wartime. The opening of the wards at Rambam Hospital in Haifa mark the first time the military has opened medical wards for civilians. The wards, which opened to patients last month, are in a facility constructed after the hospital came under fire during the Second Lebanon War in 2006. The w...
(JNS) - A Greek court has deemed the neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn as a criminal organization disguised as a political party - a ruling applauded by Jewish groups. The five-and-a-half-year trial resulted in the convictions on Wednesday of 68 people, including 18 former lawmakers. The case, overseen by a three-judge panel, was sparked by the 2013 murder of 34-year-old anti-fascist rapper Pavlos Fyssas, who was chased down and stabbed to death by a Golden Dawn member. The killer, former truck driver...
(JTA) — Louise Glück, the American granddaughter of Hungarian Jews, was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature on Thursday. Glück, 77, was awarded “for her unmistakable poetic voice that with austere beauty makes individual existence universal,” the Nobel committee wrote in its announcement. Her collections of poetry — which explore broad and painful topics, such as family life, trauma and aging — include the books “The Wild Iris,” “Meadowlands,” “The Triumph of Achilles” and “Ararat.” For “The Wild Iris” she was awarded the 1993 Pulitzer Prize...
Top Hamas official enters quarantine after testing positive for COVID-19 By Neta Bar (Israel Hayom via JNS) — Deputy Hamas leader Saleh al-Arouri has contracted COVID-19, the terrorist group confirmed on Thursday. Arouri had entered quarantine and was “doing well,” Hamas said in an official statement. Arouri is believed to have contracted the disease while meeting with Fatah officials in Turkey two weeks ago to discuss ending longtime strife between the rival Palestinian factions, which have recently announced they would join forces. He also...
Congress members join global task force to combat online anti-Semitism By Marcy Oster (JTA) — Several U.S. Congress members are part of a new task force of international lawmakers trying to combat online anti-Semitism. Members of the national legislatures of Australia, Canada, Israel, the United Kingdom and the United States are part of the panel, according to an announcement from Rep. Ted Deutch, D-Fla., a members of the Inter-Parliamentary Task Force to Combat Online Anti-Semitism. The lawmakers decided to ban together since “social med...
(MEMRI via JNS) - The BDS movement is monitoring the activity of Arab companies regarding Israel in the wake of the peace deals signed last month between the Jewish state, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, according to BDS co-founder Omar Barghouti. In a video uploaded to the YouTube channel of the Bahraini Society Against Normalization on Sept. 17, Barghouti singled out First Abu Dhabi Bank, which he said has been in dialogue with Israeli banks Leumi and Hapoalim. "With the help of our...
NEW YORK (JTA) — After an initial first wave that devastated New York City’s Orthodox Jewish communities, the coronavirus is on the rise again. Meanwhile, Israelis are back under lockdown after new infections there reached crisis levels. As we did this spring, we’re tracking the news flowing in from across Jewish communities here. And as always, we want to hear from you. Have questions, tips or insights about how your community is responding to the pandemic more than six months in? Get in touch. Tuesday, Sept. 29 10:34 a.m. Israel’s per cap...
(JNS) — The United States has reimposed United Nations sanctions on Iran, in addition to imposing “new sanctions and export control measures on 27 entities and individuals connected to Iran’s proliferation networks,” according to a statement released by the White House on Monday. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo called the reimposition a step towards “international peace and security.” The United States activated the mechanism last month to enact U.N. snapback sanctions on the regime under U.N. Security Council Resolution 2231, which endor...
(Israel21C via JNS) - Mazal tov to Hannah and Methuselah on their 111 miracle babies! The proud parents are date palms grown from ancient seeds uncovered in archeological excavations in Israel. These dates, recently picked at the Arava Institute at Kibbutz Ketura in southern Israel, are a type that hasn't been tasted since the times of Jesus and the Maccabees. "Dr. Elaine Solowey, our director of the Center for Sustainable Agriculture, grew our first ancient date tree, Methuselah, in 2005," expl...
Film agencies in Israel and UAE reach cooperation deal (JNS) — The Abu Dhabi Film Commission of the United Arab Emirates and the Israeli Film Fund announced a cooperation agreement on Monday. A government agency, the Abu Dhabi Film Commission said the agreement would lead to training programs for film and TV co-production, in addition to joint film festivals, reported the AP. Under the agreement, Emirati students will study in Jerusalem at the Sam Spiegel Film and Television School. It is the latest news of warming ties since the UAE and B...
WASHINGTON (JTA) - Benjamin Netanyahu has complained for years about Arab leaders telling their people one thing in Arabic and diplomats saying another to Western audiences in English. Not on Tuesday. Abdullah bin Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, the foreign minister of the United Arab Emirates, was on the White House lawn speaking - in Arabic - about the "innate principle" of peace and thanking the Israeli prime minister for helping to bring it about. If the agreements signed Tuesday by leaders of t...
(JNS) - The Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, better known as HIAS, was for the better part of a century responsible for helping settle generations of Jewish refugees in their new homes in the United States. From 1881 through the release of Jews from the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, the organization worked not only to resettle the new arrivals, but was involved in assisting them legally as well. Yet in a way, HIAS was a product of its own success and the success of the American Jewish...
(JTA) — The main foreign policy umbrella for the U.S. Jewish community came to a decision to not come to a decision on whether its members inappropriately disparage one another. Earlier this year, HIAS, the Jewish community’s lead immigration advocacy group, accused the Zionist Organization of America, its fellow member of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, of disparagement. Klein had among other things said HIAS was not a Jewish organization. HIAS sought redress under the Conference’s rules, which could result...
(JTA) - For Flori Dedoni, a member of the tiny Jewish community of Kosovo, the news that his country is establishing formal diplomatic ties with Israel is cause for celebration. Until last week, Israel was among the dozens of countries that had not recognized the Muslim-majority territory sandwiched between Albania and Serbia. "When someone learns I'm Jewish, they usually ask sometime during the conversation why Israel doesn't recognize us," Dedoni said. "Now, finally it's happening and the...
(JTA) - On the border of Belarus and Ukraine, Avremi Vitman tried to shake off the morning chill as he prayed earlier this week. Vitman was hungry and uncomfortable after yet another night sleeping in his coat, two weeks after arriving in Belarus en route, he hoped, to Uman, the Ukrainian city that is the site of an annual Rosh Hashanah pilgrimage for followers of Rabbi Nachman, founder of the Breslov Hasidic movement. "Nights are cold here, we sleep in our coats," Vitman told the Jewish...
Polish auction house selling possessions of Holocaust survivor behind ‘The Pianist’ story By Cnaan Liphshiz (JTA) — A Polish auction house has announced the sale of 51 objects that belonged to the Holocaust survivor whose life story served as the basis for the 2002 film “The Pianist.” Desa Unicum will start selling Władysław Szpilman’s objects, including bowties, an antique metronome and a death mask of the Polish composer Fryderyk Chopin, on Sept. 22, the Warsaw-based firm said on its website. Szpilman was one of Poland’s foremost compos...
(JTA) - Ebrahim Dahood Nonoo, the leader of Bahrain's tiny Jewish community, was among the Gulf country's approximately 50 Jews who thought peace with Israel would never arrive "in our lifetimes." "It just didn't seem possible," Nonoo told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency from Manama, the capital city where he lives with his wife. Tuesday's signing of the agreements called the Abraham Accords is expected to open up routes for collaboration, trade and travel between Bahrain and Israel, which had...
(JNS) — U.S. President Donald Trump has been nominated for the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize, in part for helping to broker the treaty between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, dubbed the “Abraham Accord.” He was nominated by Norwegian Parliament member Christian Tybring-Gjedde, who wrote in his letter to the Nobel committee: “As it is expected other Middle Eastern countries will follow in the footsteps of the UAE, this agreement could be a game-changer that will turn the Middle East into a region of cooperation and prosperity.” In an exclusive...
