Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Sorted by date Results 1726 - 1750 of 3636
(JNS)—In response to the publication of an anti-Semitic cartoon in last Thursday’s International New York Times, protesters gathered outside the Manhattan office of the “Gray Lady” on Monday evening to demand that those responsible for the blatant display of Jew-hatred be fired. Among the speakers at the rally were former New York Assemblyman Dov Hikind and eminent law professor Alan Dershowitz, both Jewish Democrats. Hikind led the crowd in chanting, “Shame on The New York Times.” Dershowitz decried the paper’s bias against Israel, and i... Full story
MOSCOW (JTA)—Whether it’s a white supremacist targeting praying Jews, blacks or Muslims, or an Islamic radical committed to killing Christians on Easter Sunday, it has become very trendy to attack houses of worship. In Europe, synagogues unfortunately have been targeted by terrorists for quite some time, including deadly attacks at the Great Synagogue of Vienna in 1981 and the Great Synagogue of Rome in 1982. In the past 15 years, Jewish institutions have been targeted by Muslim radicals in France, Belgium and Denmark. In my own community, on... Full story
The bleeps on the oscilloscope, the respirator assisted breathing and the occasional movement of a leg or an arm are the only evidence that this peaceful old man is engaged in a fierce battle for his life. The fight for life began on a quiet tree-lined street in Central Florida, where the tranquility of a residential neighborhood was shattered by the crashing of an automobile and its unbelted passengers into a magnificent oak tree. The tree, a stately manifestation of nature’s wonders, had sustained life for so many years. She had provided s... Full story
A few months back, I had the opportunity to attend a Shabbat community discussion about the Middle East. Being a new father, it had been a while since engaging in such meaningful dialogue. As my wife and I take our seats with our 1-year-old, I notice a tired, gray-haired father sitting next to his daughter, a college freshman. I smile at the thought of that being us in 18 years. The rabbi turns the topic to the age-old question of Israel’s geographic existence and its right to exist there in the future. He asks the participants to think a... Full story
The horrific shooting attack on the Chabad synagogue in Poway, California has generated a variety of responses and recommendations, from tolerance education to firearms instruction to increasing synagogue attendance as a show of defiance. Remarkably, however, one of the most obvious possible responses to anti-Semitic violence has been almost completely absent from the post-shooting dialogue: Aliyah. Immigration by American Jews to Israel has never been more than a trickle—typically 2,000 to 3,000 annually, less than one-fourth of one percent o... Full story
(JNS)—There are no words for the experience of commemorating the horrific death, together with Holocaust survivors, on the sacred grounds of the Birkenau extermination camp, where more than 1 million Jews were sent to the gas chambers and crematoriums just 75 years ago. March of the Living, over the past 31 years, has brought nearly 300,000 Jews and members of nations around the world to see for themselves the site of one of the most heinous and sophisticated crimes in human history, and to walk the nearly two miles from Auschwitz to B... Full story
Dear friends: I usually don’t express myself on every subject, but the attack today in San Diego is different. This time I want my Jewish brothers and sisters around the world, and especially in the USA, to know that attacks against Jewish people, or against Jewish symbols, anywhere in the world, is hurting us in Israel as is if it was here. True, we have our differences, and yes, we find ourselves many times seeing thing differently—but we are one nation, and we feel the pain of the Jewish community of San Diego today as if it was ours. Few... Full story
(JNS)—You didn’t have to be French or Catholic to see the devastating fire at Notre-Dame de Paris as a tragedy for all humanity. The horrifying video of the flames engulfing the 13th-century structure and the iconic spire falling prompted heartfelt laments from a broad cross-section of persons, regardless of background or faith, who saw the great cathedral as a symbol of the best of Western civilization, or as many of them put it, “Judeo-Christian heritage.” Those words used to be considered an anodyne phrase that invoked the shared traditi... Full story
(JNS)—For years, French daily Le Monde was one of the pillars of France’s large-scale campaign of silence regarding the greatest problem the country, Europe and the West in general have with radical Islam: Faced with increasing violence on the part of large immigrant Arab and Muslim communities in the Parisian suburbs, France’s elites and the local establishment have created an alternate reality in which one cannot call the problem by its name. Terrorism wasn’t really terrorism, but a reflection of an inferiority complex, cultural differences a... Full story
(JNS)—Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-Vt.), who intends to run for president again in 2020, has added another “pearl” to his library of remarks about Israel, characterizing its right-wing government as “racist.” As with his previous attacks, Sanders didn’t explain his use of one of the worst insults that exist in American and Western discourse. Average onlookers (and there were tens of millions of them because what he said was immediately disseminated via social media and printed in countless newspapers) were expected to simply believe him. The problem... Full story
(JTA)—On April 15, Notre Dame burned. The grief wracked not only Paris and the French nation, but quickly reverberated around the world. Under the gaze of its crumbling gargoyle guards, Notre Dame has witnessed nearly a millennium of Parisian history. Its altar was a site for the weddings of kings and queens. Napoleon Bonaparte crowned himself emperor beneath its buttressed ceiling. In 1944, celebrations marked the end of the German occupation. Underneath the stories of heartbreak over a global architectural wonder scarred by flames, h... Full story
(JNS)—Some liberal American Jewish organizations are urging U.S. President Donald Trump to oppose Israeli annexation of any part of Judea and Samaria. Some conservative Jewish organizations are urging the opposite. Good. It’s time we had a full debate in the American Jewish community about this issue. Serious dialogue and a meaningful conversation are long overdue. Unfortunately, the Anti-Defamation League has gotten the conversation off to a poor start by distorting and misrepresenting some of the key facts that need to be considered. In an... Full story
(JNS)—This coming June, upon the conclusion of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, the Trump administration will supposedly unveil details of its so-called “deal of the century” to bring an end to the century-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Even before its birth, however, many have already been quick to bury the plan. After all, many of the relevant parties aren’t hiding their reservations, some openly declaring they will refuse to accept it. The Palestinians are looking on forlornly as their dream of having all their demands of Israel deliver... Full story
The term nakba, originally coined to describe the magnitude of the self-inflicted Palestinian and Arab defeat in the 1948 war, has become in recent decades a synonym for Palestinian victimhood, with failed aggressors transformed into hapless victims and vice versa. Israel should do its utmost to uproot this false narrative by exposing its patently false historical basis. Nowadays, the failed Palestinian Arab attempt to destroy the State of Israel at birth, and the attendant flight of some 600,000 Palestinian Arabs, has come to be known internat... Full story
(JNS)—The Conservative and Reform rabbinical leadership, along with affiliated lay groups and tepid pro-Israel groups, have revealed their elitist contempt for democracy and disdain for Zionism by appealing to U.S. President Donald Trump to force Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to break his electoral pledges. They did this in a letter sent to a Jewish publication on Friday, Apr. 12, in which they called on Trump to stop Netanyahu from extending sovereignty over Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria. Why not ask Trump for what t... Full story
(JNS)—Dear (Former?) Friends, To: The ADL, Ameinu, ARZA, Central Conference of American Rabbis, Israel Policy Forum, MERCAZ USA, National Council of Jewish Women, Rabbinical Assembly, Union for Reform Judaism and United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism Your letter to U.S. President Donald Trump expressing your belief that peace must be “based on the principle of a negotiated two-state solution,” that it “is the only formulation to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that will ensure Israel’s future as Jewish, democratic and secure,... Full story
(JNS)—Socialism is cool again, thanks not least to septuagenarian Sen. Bernie Sanders and millennial Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (aka AOC). Socialism has been cool before, of course, notably during the Great Depression, and what became known as the ’60s, the era of Vietnam, the civil rights movement, hippies and the (old) New Left. As a reporter for my high school newspaper in the later period, I interviewed Earl Browder, who had been general secretary of the Communist Party USA during the 1930s. He coined the slogan: “Communism is 20th... Full story
BUDAPEST (JTA)—Architecture and built heritage can be powerful symbols. Notre-Dame de Paris is one of the most famous and familiar buildings in the world, visited by an astonishing 30,000 people a day, or 13 million people a year. It is embedded in global collective consciousness and immortalized around the world in a zillion holiday snaps, videos, works of fine art and memories. My Facebook and Twitter feeds this week have been full of posts grieving over the great cathedral’s fiery fate and... Full story
(JNS)—In the space of 48 hours last week, four Jewish Democrats in Congress denounced Israel’s prime minister, two more Democrats wrote an op-ed in The Washington Post denouncing Israel’s prime minister, and 10 Jewish liberal groups issued a statement denouncing Israel’s prime minister. What a remarkable coincidence! The allegedly spontaneous three-pronged media assault began with Representatives Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) and Gerald E. Connolly (D-Va.), on the op-ed page of The Washington Post on April 10, absurdly accusing Israeli Prime M... Full story
Jewish Media Resources www.jewishmediaresources.org In the political realm, power is roughly divided between Democrats and Republicans in the United States. But the cultural realm—mainstream media, the entertainment industry, and higher education—tilts dramatically left. And the latter is likely to be far more determinative of the environment in which Orthodox parents raise their children, as Stephen Prothero documents in Why Liberals Win the Culture Wars (Even When They Lose Elections). That pattern applies even as the left grows ever mor... Full story
When Democrats failed to explicitly rebuke Congresswoman Ilhan Omar (D-MN) for her anti-Semitic remarks, they sent a disturbing message beyond the Beltway—namely, that it is acceptable to use anti-Semitic tropes without facing any consequences. This was the latest sign of the normalization of anti-Semitism, which is also reflected in the tolerance of anti-Semitism on college campuses, and the effect that it is beginning to have on younger Jews. I recently met with a group of high school students, and asked if any of them had experienced a... Full story
As the sun goes down this evening, Jewish people in our own community and throughout the world will be sitting down with their families and friends to participate in the ancient Jewish ritual of a free people known as the Seder, the traditional feast and story telling that ushers in the Passover holiday. Unlike most festive meals in the Jewish holiday calendar, this festive meal unfolds in a specific order and ritual. Food and tradition are inextricably bound up in the story and commemoration of the Jewish people’s exodus from Egypt, an e... Full story
My mother, Tess Wise, a Holocaust survivor and an indomitable force in Central Florida, founded the Holocaust Center in the early 1980s, along with my father, Abe. Today I lead that same organization as board president at a pivotal time when we have a chance to imagine a new museum, reinvigorate our mission and significantly broaden our impact. It is an extraordinary opportunity and one that we are meeting with thoughtful deliberation, widespread community input and deep respect for our roots. Our mission is to use the history and lessons of... Full story
Dear Editor; The American Jewish Congress applauds the Trump Administration’s decision to classify Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a Foreign Terrorist Organization. This marks a dramatic step forward in properly identifying the Iranian threat. Until now, the U.S. has never named an entire entity of a foreign government as a Foreign Terrorist Organization; it is entirely fitting and necessary that Iran is the first. Iran’s state sponsorship of terrorism goes far beyond that of any other country on Earth, in scale, ambition, and blata... Full story
Ryan Stone, adult son of Mark and Susie Stone, attended the Kenan-Flagler Business School at the University of North Carolina, where he earned his master’s degree. He shared on Facebook a letter he wrote to the school and wanted to share it with Heritage readers. I’m so sad to have to write this post. Wanted to share a letter I just wrote on why I’m stopping recurring donations to the school. To whom it may concern, Please stop my recurring gift to UNC, specifically the Penny Oslund EMBA Fellowship Fund. Several recent events at UNC have me BE... Full story
