Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Sorted by date Results 3079 - 3103 of 3712
In his book on politics in the Arab world, “Cruelty and Silence,” the Iraqi intellectual Kanan Makiya made a telling point about the opposition to the first Gulf war of 1991, when a U.S.-led coalition ejected Saddam Hussein’s brutal regime from Kuwait. “A principled opposition to the Gulf war does not require,” Makiya wrote, “(a) denying that the Iraqi regime gassed its own citizens; (b) inventing dates to prove that the United States not only started the fighting on the ground (which it did) but that it sent Iraq into Kuwait (which it d... Full story
I am a member of the first post- “Sha, Still” generations. Those were the generations of Jews in the United States who wanted to remain quiet. “Don’t make a fuss.” That was there mantra. The Jews who came in waves during the latter part of the 19th century just wanted to “Fit In.” They did not want to be known as “Greenhorns”—a slang term for newly arrived immigrants. So, they did their best to learn English. My grandmother learned how to read and write English when she was 63. They changed their names. Greenblatt became Greene, Shapiro bec... Full story
While the global anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) campaign has officially hit America’s scholarly associations over the last two years, even considering academic boycotts is a dramatic rupture with the past. In 2005, the prestigious American Association of University Professors (AAUP) wrote that it “condemned any such boycotts as prima facie violations of academic freedom.” This bedrock principle was so valued that the AAUP opposed academic boycotts of apartheid South Africa. Three-hundred university presidents signed a lett... Full story
The White House’s announcement of its conference on “Countering Violent Extremism” names Boston as one of the pilot cities where law enforcement officials have developed partnerships with Muslim community leaders. Unfortunately, to counter “violent extremism,” federal agencies are working with the Islamic Society of Boston and its political arm, the Muslim American Society. Charles Jacobs, Americans for Peace and Tolerance (APT) recently said: “On Feb. 18, 2015, President Obama’s project to “combat violent extremism,” is to be showcased in a... Full story
Dear Editor: After reading the article in the Feb. 13 edition of The Heritage by Stephen Flatlow, “How to respond to honors for Palestinian killer,” I would like to make a suggestion. In the article, he notes that the terrorist Hussain Fayadh who was involved with the murder of an American and 36 Israelis in 1978 was released in a prisoner swap and is currently working for the PA and their television station. And then there is the terrorist, Sajda al-Rishawi who in 2005 in Amman, Jordan took part in the bomb attack that killed 57 people. ISIS w... Full story
A few months ago I asked William Schabas, the Canadian academic who this week resigned as head of the United Nations Human Rights Council’s probe into last summer’s war in Gaza because of a conflict of interest involving his work for the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), whether I could interview him for a magazine piece I was writing. He replied promptly and courteously, explaining that he couldn’t be interviewed because his commission hadn’t yet appointed a media relations officer. I remember being rather staggered by that admissi... Full story
I once met a woman who was born and raised in Iran and lived under the Shah, and later, under Ayatollah Khomeini. I remember how she spoke passionately, in her broken English, about just how terrible the Shah of Iran actually was. When I asked her about life under the Ayatollah, she replied, “Shah bad, Ayatollah worse, much worse!” Of course, the Iranian leadership has come a long way since their Ayatollah Khomeini days. Unfortunately for the world, most of their progress has been confined to their department of great ambitions. Back in October... Full story
One cannot help but wonder what it is about Obama that (a) makes him seemingly so hostile to Israel, (b) gives him so much trouble identifying killings such as those in the Hyper Cacher market in Paris last month as anti-Semitic and (c) impels him to give history lessons on the Crusades at a multicultural religious gathering as he did at the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington last week? That last item was later referred to by an African-American author in attendance as “verbal rape.” To begin to understand the president’s point of referenc... Full story
As the debate on vaccination heats up again in the U.S., some “anti-vaxxers” are requesting exemptions from vaccinating their children on religious grounds. But what do their faiths, including Judaism, actually say about the issue? The recent outbreak of measles that began in the Disneyland theme park in southern California has led to the infection of more than 100 people who then possibly exposed countless others to the disease around the country. This is not the first such outbreak of a disease thought to have been nearly eradicated in 200... Full story
MINNEAPOLIS (JTA)—Michael Paulson reported in The New York Times on the “Pay What You Want” model that some synagogues are implementing to reduce the financial barrier to membership. Paulson estimated that about 30 synagogues across the United States are trying voluntary dues. These changes, Paulson wrote Monday, have come from “an acknowledgement that many Jewish communal organizations are suffering the effects of growing secularization, declining affection for institutions, a dispersal of Jewish philanthropy and an end to the era in which m... Full story
My early days as a Jewish Federation professional were at a time when our system was evolving away from reliance on messages of combating anti-Semitism and statements of “never again,” to one of strengthening our communities through education and meaningful engagement. Yet reflecting on the turbulent and troubling start to 2015, I cannot help but be struck by the rapid change back in our global agenda. Last year, we were working with the Israeli government in exploring how to strengthen Jewish life and connection globally. Now, we are inc... Full story
I was walking out of Publix the other day, my arms full of groceries, my head tilted down as I looked at the pavement, deep in thought, when I heard someone call my name. “Mr. Bornstein,” a woman said. “Can you stop and talk?” I recognized her immediately, a member of my congregation and one of my mother’s peers. She spoke with the vestiges of a long-ago foreign accent, with all the seriousness and focus of someone intent on making an important point. “Mr. Bornstein,” she began. “I was just t... Full story
By Ira Sharkansky We can’t avoid it. There are a billion or so Muslims, and the rest of us are more or less dependent on what they do. Oil and gas is one dependence, which we should not minimize despite the current dip in price. Physical presence is another dependence, even in places where non-Muslims are large majorities and control government. Israel’s 20 percent Muslim population, with Muslim dominant countries all around is one setting with a disproportionate influence on world politics. European percentages between 5 and 10, higher in maj... Full story
Did you know that the United States Senate has been underwriting a series of events publicly glorifying a Palestinian terrorist who murdered an American citizen—in fact, a senator’s niece? Well, it is, and this outrage must come to an end. The terrorist’s name is Dalal Mughrabi. On March 9, 1978, she headed a squad of 13 Palestinian terrorists who set out from Lebanon towards Israel, in several small boats. They were members of Fatah, the largest faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). At the time, Yasser Arafat was chair... Full story
Amid the numerous studies and analyses regarding Jewish American life, a simple fact remains: part-time Jewish education is the most popular vehicle for Jewish education in North America. Whenever and wherever parents choose Jewish education for their children, we have a communal responsibility to devote the necessary time and resources to deliver dynamic, effective learning experiences. The only way we can do this is by creating space for conversations and knowledge-sharing around innovative new education models. That also means making the... Full story
The supposedly unprecedented step taken by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in his plan to speak directly before Congress about the Iranian nuclear threat on March 3, rather than working exclusively with the White House on the issue, actually has an interesting precedent—established in 1975 by none other than Yitzhak Rabin and America’s Democratic Party. That spring, Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger undertook a round of shuttle diplomacy aimed at reaching a peace agreement between Israel and Egypt. The negotiations quickly ran... Full story
(Kveller via JTA) Since the news of the recent Disneyland measles outbreak and the subsequent chatter on Facebook began, I discovered I have at least four Facebook friends (and likely a few more) with healthy, non-immunocompromised, vaccine-aged children who have decided, for non-medical reasons, to not vaccinate. For some of these friends and acquaintances, the news was not surprising considering their views on other issues. With one friend in particular, though, it felt like a betrayal, one that I just can’t get past. Here this person wa... Full story
You have to hand it to the United Nations, I guess. It’s hard to think of another body that would organize a special meeting on the subject of rising anti-Semitism with anti-Semites not just in attendance, but making speeches as well. The Jan. 22 meeting on the subject at the U.N. General Assembly, organized in the run-up to International Holocaust Remembrance Day, started well enough. The keynote speaker was French philosopher and author Bernard-Henri Levy, who used the occasion to mount a forthright denunciation of what he called “the del... Full story
It didn’t take even a week to be refuted. On Jan. 15, noted Israel critic Peter Beinart declared that Palestinians who hate Israel never claim that they were inspired by anti-Israel incitement. Just six days later, on Jan. 21, a Palestinian who stabbed twelve Israelis on a Tel Aviv bus said he was inspired by “radical Islamic broadcasts.” Beinart is a CNN commentator, a columnist for Ha’aretz, and a fellow at a liberal think think, the New America Foundation. He made a splash in 2012 in the Jewish world with his book The Crisis of Zionism... Full story
The UN may do good somewhere, but the case would take some convincing. Its people are spread throughout the Third World. All told, they are probably not worse than the governments they are meant to help. We often see UN vehicles and personnel in our neighborhood. They are here to help the Palestinians, but living in Israel because it is more desirable. The UN reached the limit of its peacekeeping role in Korea, and has not returned to anything close. That exercise, like later ventures in Vietnam and elsewhere, was managed by the U.S., and... Full story
For a look at the voter’s guide, please see page 2. (Forward)—Fed up with the American Jewish community and the big-mouth nobodies who think they own it? Good news: There’s an election going on. And you can vote. No, really. An actual, honest-to-goodness election. Until April 30 you can go online, pay $10 to register and cast a vote for a delegation that will represent the Jews of America at an international convention in Jerusalem next fall. The convention, in turn, will choose officers and set budgets and policies for several major Israe... Full story
NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. (JTA)—While nascent talk of the Holocaust was in the air when I was growing up in New York City, we did not learn about it in school, even in lessons about World War II or the waves of immigration to America’s shores. There were no public memorials or museums to the murdered millions, and the genocide of European Jewry was subsumed under talk of “the war.” My father was a somber man who arrived here from Poland after the war and, like many survivors, kept to himself, trying his best to block out the past. Growing up, my... Full story
(JTA)—Three weeks ago, my wife and I were shopping in a Parisian kosher butcher store several miles west of the supermarket where four Jews were murdered on Jan. 9. The shop in our neighborhood was well patronized, with lines stretching out to the sidewalk before Shabbat. We were staying in an apartment in Paris’ 12th district while I promoted a new book about the treatment of Jews in France during World War II. During our stay, we spoke with dozens of our Parisian friends, including some who are Jewish, about whether the year 2015 evokes for t... Full story
Dear Editor: Upon a world marred by Islamic turmoil, terror, and violence, a gift of inestimable value has been bestowed. On Dec. 28, 2014, in a speech directed at Islamic religious scholars and clerics, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi said, “It is inconceivable that the ideology we sanctify should make our entire nation a source of concern, danger, killing, and destruction all over the world. Honorable Imam (the Grand Sheik of Al-Azhar), you bear responsibility before Allah. The world in its entirety awaits your words, because the I... Full story
Waiting for someone in authority to say Kadish. It isn’t prominent in any of the major party platforms. To be sure, one must be wary of making any conclusions about what candidates say and write in the midst of a political campaign. If they are not lying outright, the chances are that they are not telling all the truth. In a context such as Israel, where a coalition government is inevitable, the importance of campaign promises is even dicier. No matter what politicians really think and intend, the unpredictable politics of a coalition may m... Full story
