Heritage Florida Jewish News - Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice

(JNS)—A horrific attack on the Jewish community in Monsey, N. Y., took place on Saturday, the seventh night of Chanukah, when a machete-wielding assailant entered and began wildly stabbing at worshippers during a crowded holiday celebration in a...

(JNS)—For many in the Middle East, Gen. Qassem Soleimani, commander of the Quds Force, the Islamic Republic’s elite extraterritorial black-ops arm, embodied Iran’s desires, aspirations and directives with respect to the country’s operations...

On Jan. 3, 2020, as their motorcade was exiting the Baghdad Airport, Major General Qasem Soleimani, the leader of the Quds Force of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps, along with other high ranking members of the IRGC were killed by an American...

(JNS)—Israel and many Jewish organizations around the world have responded strenuously to counter the Boycott, Divest and Sanctions movement. They have taken a strong defensive position, arguing that Israel is being unfairly singled out. But how...

(BESA Center via JNS)—Like clockwork, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s recent observation that “the establishment of Israeli civilian settlements in the West Bank is not, per se, inconsistent with international law” was immediately...

NEW YORK (JTA)—On Sunday, I joined tens of thousands of Jews and non-Jews who marched from downtown Manhattan over the Brooklyn Bridge in a show of commitment to fighting the recent violent rise of anti-Semitism. Last week, I stood in Jerusalem...

(JNS)—We’re still more than a month away from the first actual votes being cast in the Democratic presidential race. But an analysis piece published on the influential Politico website last week reminded observers of a possibility that many are i...

I remember it was the day after Christmas because I was struck and disappointed that my new friend had to work on Christmas. She was a Christian Israeli Arab and was working with an elderly Jewish philanthropist to counsel him on funding programs...

(JNS)—It’s no secret that Jewish kids on college campuses have been subjected to increasingly aggressive and intense intimidation, ranging from the placement of “eviction” notices on the doors of their dorm rooms to faculty members refusing...

From Nov. 4-8, 2019, I spent four days in the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) on an intensive experience meeting with leaders of Palestinian Civil Society. It was an incredibly challenging experience. One of the true highlights was listening to Ali...

(JTA)—This is the first op-ed in a series of pieces about anti-Semitism and Jewish issues written by 2020 presidential candidates. The Jewish Telegraphic Agency has sent five questions on the topic to all of the registered candidates from both part...

(JNS)—Chanukah’s popularity with American Jews was largely the result of a futile though determined effort to compete with Christmas. While enjoying freedom, prosperity and influence that was unprecedented in the history of the Diaspora,...

(JNS)—The problem of anti-Semitic intimidation on American college campuses is serious, and hopefully, U.S. President Donald Trump’s recent executive order will help combat it. But an equally significant problem is the deeply entrenched...

The head of the French Jewish community expressed fear that last week’s decision by prosecutors in Paris to excuse the murderer of a Jewish woman from a criminal trial symbolized a deeper reluctance to confront anti-Semitism among Muslims in...

On Tuesday, Dec. 10, 2019, in a premeditated attack, two shooters opened fire inside a kosher deli in Jersey City, New Jersey, and murdered four people. The killers included a former member of a notoriously anti-Semitic group and, reportedly, a...

For millennia, the Jewish people have overcome darkness. We have prevailed against those who sought to destroy us in each generation, by carrying our beliefs, traditions, culture, and most importantly our strong sense of peoplehood forward. Chanukah,...

(JNS)—Left, right and sideways, Jews in America are facing a major dilemma: Whose side should we take? Do we take the conservative point of view and accept our duly elected Republican president as the Jews’ knight in shining armor? After all,...

(JNS)—The past week clarified a lot of things about the state of the American Jewish community—and its antagonists. The two assailants who walked into the kosher supermarket in Jersey City on Tuesday and opened fire intentionally targeted Jews....

The horrific attack at the Jewish market near Newark a few weeks ago was intended to be a massacre of Jewish children in a Jewish Day School next door to the kosher market. Because of some courageous police work the actual scene of the carnage was...

WASHINGTON (JTA)—When I was about 19 years old, I took my first trip to Europe. I marveled at its beauty, its culture, its history and its architecture. On this trip and many others that followed, I shed many tears as I visited the numerous...

(JNS)—U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo returned fire on Monday to a large group of House Democrats who lambasted him last month for declaring that Israeli settlements in Judea and Samaria are not illegal. In a letter to Michigan Rep. Andy...

(JNS)—As America suffers through an impeachment circus, Great Britain on Dec. 13 acted decisively, voting overwhelmingly for Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his Conservative Party. The impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump had...

Dear Editor: I encourage everyone to read the article “ Political left fights Trump’s fight against anti-Semitism.” Next I ask you to write a letter to President Donald Trump expressing your great appreciation in his signing an executive...

A rabbi explained the benefits of making aliyah before the Messiah sends out the final call, noting that the recent anti-Semitic mass shooting in Jersey City may have been an end-of-days endgame wake-up call for Jews to come home to Israel. In the...

(JNS)—Demographers have spent a great deal of time in recent decades trying to learn more about the changing demographics of American Jewry. But whatever else he has accomplished, President Donald Trump has, albeit unwittingly, gone above and...