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

In the summer of 2014, my 17-year-old daughter knocked on my bedroom door late one night shortly after my wife and I had gone to sleep. She asked us not to come downstairs, saying that she had just brought two guys home. This was not an announcement...

(JNS) — President Joe Biden’s address yesterday on Israel’s war was almost everything you could have hoped for. It was tough. By naming Hamas as the enemy of civilization and condemning their acts of evil, it was unambiguous. It pledged uncon...

I am writing this because I have to. I am writing this for myself. If it gets read or answered, that’s fine. If it does not, I care not. I am writing this, but I have no words. I am writing this because I have not lived a day like this in my 93+ y...

(JNS) — Originally published on July 31, 2015. “The flagbearer of Jihad to liberate Jerusalem.” This is how the blurb of “Palestine,” published by Islamic Revolution Editions last week in Tehran, identifies the book’s author. The author is “Grand A...

Dear Editor: As an associate professor of Judaic Studies, I cannot speak officially on behalf of my university, but as a private citizen I can express my deepest solidarity with the State of Israel (where I resided for several years) during this...

Dear Editor: I am angry, disgusted, and most of all not surprised. The silence is deafening. The comparisons are gruesome, and the justification is just, well, I don’t have the words. If you believe that speaking about what is happening in Israel is...

Please note: The referenced book, compiled by Charles Jacobs and Avi Goldwasser just came to print in June. It is a compilation of Jewish thinkers and academics whose credibility warrants thoughtful consideration. It is my hope that the result will...

(JNS) — My neighbor doesn’t work in an office. He created a niche company that offers adventure experiences to Israelis and visiting tourists. His experience in the outdoors have taught him certain life skills that are needed by the IDF during eme...

On our return to Warsaw we took some time to rest from our day’s touring, to prepare for Kabbalat (Evening) Shabbat services at a local synagogue and Shabbat dinner at our hotel. We were advised at the last minute that we would not be attending the l...

(JNS) — Earlier this week, ultra-Orthodox Jews parading through Jerusalem’s Old City passed a group of Christians bearing a large wooden cross. Some of the Jews spat on the ground in the Christians’ direction. Two days later, Jerusalem police arres...

(JNS) — Saturday’s Hamas assault is the 2023 version of the 1973 Yom Kippur war. The complete surprise—the governing paradigm, the collapse of the lines of defense—is very reminiscent of what happened here exactly 50 years ago. In a well-sy...

The Feast of Tabernacles is how many Christians refer to Sukkot, the biblical festival we celebrated this past week. It is also a multi-day event known in shorthand as “the Feast,” organized by the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem, arg...

(JNS) — On that day 50 years ago, I was in the parking lot of my synagogue in Keene, N.H., taking a break from Yom Kippur services. Someone had the car radio on and tuned to the news. I heard that Israel had been the victim of a surprise attack on ou...

(JNS) — Depending on the pundit, the Oslo Accords were at best a broken dream, at worst a deadly disaster. No one calls them a success. Thirty years ago this month, in 1993, Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization signed the first of the O...

(JNS) — This Yom Kippur, one of my favorite songs came to mind, and it was not a happy occasion. Each year on the holiday, I take the opportunity to walk in a carless Tel Aviv. This time, I found myself returning home via Dizengoff Street. I knew t...

(JNS) — Palestinian Arab journalist Bassam Tawil recently described a “fierce crackdown” on Palestinian reporters by the Palestinian Authority, including arbitrary arrests and beatings. Meanwhile, U.S. President Joe Biden, in his recent meeti...

(JNS) — It’s become a cliché to say that Jews are our own worst enemies. Nowhere is that truer than in academia, where Jewish professors, often from the field of Jewish and Middle East studies, have become some of Israel’s most vitriolic critic...

(Israel Hayom via JNS) — I stood next to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when he said what he said about the protesters against him “joining forces” with Iran. He was simply trying to be cooperative and answer the journalists’ questions, which does...

It might be my age. It might be what our world has become. It might be weariness of the whole thing. This year’s High Holy Days had a whole different effect on me. I have written before that I was raised in a home that could be called “Not Jew...

(JNS) — In the wake of the devastating floods in Libya, the Palestinian Civil Defense Service, which operates under the auspices of the Palestinian Authority, announced that it was sending a 37-member team to assist with the humanitarian effort. T...

(JNS) — History is difficult to study because it is so often rewritten. As a result, it is difficult to separate myths from facts. Forgetting the unpleasant aspects of history demonstrates Hegel’s famous statement, “The only thing we learn from...

(JNS) — Once again (Sept. 5), New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman has offered his wisdom for a solution to the decades-long conflict between Israelis and Palestinians. He claims that “far-right Jewish supremacists,” also known as the “righ...

By Jonathan Feldstein Outside of Iran’s remaining several thousand member Jewish community, few Iranians will be engaged in prayers this weekend beseeching God for a year of health, happiness, prosperity, much less freedom. According to the a...

(JNS) — Dear Mr. Friedman, Our paths have crossed many times over the years, and I have always been struck by your evident passion for Israel, a passion that resonates in your writings and columns on the Jewish state and the Middle East. However, a...

Following our visit to the Jewish Historical Society Museum in Warsaw we took a walking tour of the Okopowa Jewish Cemetery (Cm. Zydorfski), the largest Jewish Cemetery in Europe with an estimated 250,000 graves dating back to 1806, when the Jewish...