Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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(JNS) — U.N. members held a conference last month to discuss the “Peaceful Settlement of the Question of Palestine and the Implementation of the Two-State Solution.” It was spearheaded by France and Saudi Arabia and sought to define the conditions that the Palestinian state must meet to be recognized. Regardless, French President Emmanuel Macron said that he will recognize a Palestinian state in September. Among those countries participating in the conference for statehood were Great Britain, Canada, Norway, Qatar, Spain and Turkey. Yet decla...
(JNS) — When Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich recently approved some 3,400 new housing units in Area E1, global condemnation was swift. Kaja Kallas, the foreign-policy chief for the European Union, denounced the move as “illegal under international law” and a mortal threat to the “viability of a future Palestinian state.” But there’s a glaring omission in this outrage: For years, the European Union has sponsored Palestinian construction across Area C, including E1 itself, without permits and in direct violation of the framework of the...
(JNS) — It’s time to acknowledge that in its 77-year history, Israel has made some critically painful mistakes. After the 1973 Yom Kippur War, during which as many as 2,800 Israeli soldiers had lost their lives, the Agranat Commission was established to investigate Israeli intelligence failures. It was found that the military and intelligence community failed to establish the gravity of the Egyptian military build-up along the Chaim Bar Lev Line. They also felt that they failed to establish that Syria would enter the war, assuming it would onl...
(JNS) — I’ve never been much of a flirt with people, but ideas? I flirt shamelessly. I don’t fall head over heels, but I linger. I’ll bat my lashes at a seductive concept, maybe take it out for coffee, but I rarely commit. One of my life mottos (possibly from Stephen Colbert?) is “Don’t believe everything you think.” It has served me well, especially when it comes to the thoughts that won’t leave me alone. Take “child of a Holocaust survivor.” My father was born in Germany in 1928. His teacher was a Nazi. He witnessed Kristallnacht in No...
(JNS) — I recently had the chance to speak with Kobi Samerano, the father of 21-year-old Yonatan Samerano, who was kidnapped on Oct. 7, 2023, by an employee of the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees and held in Gaza for 627 days. His body was found by the Israel Defense Forces in Gaza and returned to Israel. Kobi Samerano permitted me to share his story with the world. His words are not mine to keep; they are for all Jews to hear. During our exchange, he told me something that will haunt me forever: “Burying my son was a rel...
(JNS) — How is a two-state solution to the conflict between the Israelis and Palestinians like a cure for cancer? Consider the following: • Rational people of goodwill wish that there truly were “Y” today. • Rational people of goodwill hope that someday in the future there truly will be “Y”. • Rational people of goodwill understand that, notwithstanding their wishes and hopes, “Y” is not a reality today. If you substitute “Y” for either “a two-state solution for the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians” or “a cure for cancer,” you will ge...
(JNS) — Currently, there are a number of essential questions not being asked of nations that will recognize a planned Palestinian state. Journalists should pose these questions to the foreign ministers of France, the United Kingdom, Norway, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. • Will the planned Palestinian state abolish the Palestinian Charter, which mandates the destruction of Israel? • Will the planned Palestinian state revoke the law that guarantees salaries to anyone who murders a Jew? • Will the planned Palestinian state remove texts t...
(JNS) — Over the years, I must have read tens of thousands of pages devoted to the topic of antisemitism, and I’ve yet to find a better explanation for its persistence across the centuries than this one: “Everything seems impossible or terribly difficult without the providential appearance of antisemitism. It enables everything to be arranged, smoothed over and simplified. If one were not an antisemite through patriotism, one would become one through a simple sense of opportunity.” The author of those words was himself an antisemite — Charl...
Dear Editor: Congratulations for your front-page news of the Arab League condemnation of the Oct. 7 attack and call on Hamas to disarm (Aug. 8, 2025). That news escaped the attention of most public “news sources” which usually reflect only the “information” provided by Hamas’ propaganda machine. Unfortunately, the same issue described in detail how mostly female “rabbis” wrestled with the Israeli war response in Gaza as to its “morality” in their Friday night sermons (“As images from Gaza spread, US rabbis wrestle with war’s morality from...
(JNS) — The long-running reality show “Survivor” is built on a simple, but ruthless premise: Outwit. Outlast. Outplay. In the end, the one who adapts, strategizes and executes wins. It’s not about who complains the loudest, writes the nicest letters or manages the most polite meetings, it’s about who has the will and the skill to take the prize. That’s not just a television concept. It’s the formula the Jewish people must embrace right now. We live during a time when antisemitism is not only resurgent but mainstream at a pace we have not seen...
(JNS) — From the “Israel is starving Gazans” hoax to the “settler violence” hoax, Hamas and other terrorist groups are playing Jewish leaders like a fiddle. And the Jewish community is paying for it. The impact of Hamas propaganda is on full display in “A protest letter to PM Netanyahu from world Jewry,” signed by more than 5,000 people, including “leaders of world Jewry from 20 countries.” The letter to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was “facilitated” by the London Initiative Action Group. Signatories include philanthropists such...
Traditionally, international diplomacy was conducted with a semblance of integrity, logic, truthfulness and sincerity. Diplomatic discussions and other interactions between and among nations was conducted in a formal, serious, thoughtful manner. Even when diplomatic treachery was the goal, a facade of adhering to these qualities was attempted. News and other media reporting on the affairs of nations, historically also followed these professional characteristics to a large extent. More often than not, critical-issue diplomacy, such as...
(JNS) — Since its establishment, life in Israel has resembled a grim trade-off. In return for the right to live as Jews in the one and only Jewish state, we have been expected to surrender something far more basic, our right to live in safety. From birth, Israelis enter into an unspoken agreement, one that demands we normalize existential threats. We are told it was our fate. That there is no alternative. That is the cost of living in the Jewish homeland. And so, we become desensitized. A stabbing in a supermarket parking lot no longer s...
(JNS) — Here’s a question that I’ve heard posed on occasion, often from rabbis on Friday evenings: How did our people, displaced from our homeland for two millennia, scattered to the winds, maintain their inherent, recognizable, collective Jewishness? Was it the mamaloshen of Yiddish? Or keeping Shabbat (inevitably, the rabbis’ favorite answer)? Or perhaps even direct influence from Hashem, confirming once again that we are chosen? All of these are worthy options and likely played a role in our survival as a people. And yet, cynic that I am, I...
(JNS) — As reports grow more harrowing of Israeli hostages starved, emaciated and forced to dig their own graves, the painful truth must be confronted: The “Bring Them Home Now” campaign has not only failed to free our people; it has served to entrench their suffering. What began as a unifying cry of anguish transformed into a moral and strategic disaster. The campaign’s well-intentioned, emotionally driven message quickly lost sight of the enemy — Hamas — and turned its fury inward, at the Israeli government. By doing so, it handed Hama...
My mother used to tell a story about how when she was in college, she believed that she had a professor who liked her so much that her papers were never checked but just given an “A” automatically. Of course, that’s a better problem than a teacher automatically failing a student without looking at their work, but it bothered her all the same. To prove it, one day she submitted a paper having inserted a full type-written page from Lewis Carroll’s “Alice in Wonderland” in the middle. The teacher didn’t look, and my mother got an A. I learned from...
Recently, Hamas released horrific videos depicting two Israeli hostages, Evytar David and Rom Braslavski, who have now been held in captivity in inhuman conditions for more than 670 days. One particularly harrowing video shows David, visibly emaciated, being forced to dig what appears to be his own grave in a Hamas tunnel beneath Gaza. These images evoke painful historical parallels to the Holocaust and the brutal conditions of Nazi concentration camps. Jews were rounded up throughout Europe and forced to dig their own graves before they were...
(JNS) — As reports grow more harrowing of Israeli hostages starved, emaciated and forced to dig their own graves, the painful truth must be confronted: The “Bring Them Home Now” campaign has not only failed to free our people; it has served to entrench their suffering. What began as a unifying cry of anguish transformed into a moral and strategic disaster. The campaign’s well-intentioned, emotionally driven message quickly lost sight of the enemy — Hamas — and turned its fury inward, at the Israeli government. By doing so, it handed Hama...
(JNS) — Following the decision in late May 2024, when Spain, Ireland and Norway formally recognized a Palestinian state in “an attempt to refocus attention on efforts to find a political solution to the war in the Middle East,” more countries have recently joined the bandwagon. French President Emmanuel Macron has declared so, but he is waiting for the U.N. Security Council in September. France will be “true to its historic commitment to a just and lasting peace in the Middle East.” Likewise, Britain’s Prime Minister, Keith Starmer, co...
(JNS) — Let’s be honest: Benjamin Netanyahu is not everyone’s favorite politician. That’s fair. Debate over policy, leadership and politics is healthy in any democracy, including Israel’s. But there comes a point in times of war when internal disagreements must be set aside. Because this war is not about Bibi. It is about Israel’s survival. And the Jewish people, especially American Jews, must not let personality distract from principle. Since the Hamas-led terrorist attacks on Oct. 7, 2023, Israel has faced a military, moral and psychologic...
Until a few years ago Princeton, N.J. was the place I spent the longest part of my life. Since 2004, I have lived in Israel, but Princeton is my legal U.S. address from which I and my family file taxes, vote, and to which we get notices for jury duty. Princeton is in the New Jersey 12th district, represented by Congresswoman Bonnie Watson-Coleman. I receive her monthly updates about issues that she cares about, and how she’s allocating federal dollars to projects in the district. I don’t know a lot about a lot of things, but I do know a lot...
(JNS) — A father and his six-year-old son were recently assaulted at a rest stop near Milan for the crime of wearing kippot. In today’s Europe, sadly, there’s little shocking about such incidents anymore. Nor is it surprising to see French President Emmanuel Macron leading a diplomatic charge to recognize a Palestinian state, rallying the usual bloc of Norway, Spain, Ireland, Slovenia and lobbying Saudi Arabia to add gravitas. What’s more, 34 former Italian ambassadors — some still holding influential posts — have urged Italy’s Prime Minister G...
This past Monday and Tuesday, July 28-29, 2025 a large number of United Nations member-states met in New York at the invitation of France and Saudi Arabia to try to revive the now discredited and diplomatically dead ”Two-State Solution.” The “Two-State Solution” has been the diplomatic mantra of world diplomacy, for many decades since the founding of the State of Israel, and was taken seriously by a large majority of the international community including some Israelis and misguided Jews in the Diaspora. In light of the continuing terrori...
(JNS) — In the first century, the Roman poet Juvenal disliked Jews. Besides circumcising themselves, he wrote, in the 14th chapter of his Satires, that they “revere the Sabbath … treating every seventh day as a day of idleness, separate from the rest of daily life.” They were, well, lazy. Marx, in his 1843 critique of Bernard Bauer, suggested that “the basis of the Jewish religion? Practical need, egoism. … Money is the jealous god of Israel. … The bill of exchange is the real god of the Jew.” Hating Jews for economic reasons seeks to tarnis...
(JNS) — The global information that we have today is overwhelming, but unfortunately, too many people in the free world and elsewhere are living in a fantasy of wishful thinking, not realizing that their own future is in danger. Let us look at a few critical points to help us identify some current trends and address them: 1. Turkey, led by the Muslim Brotherhood sympathizer Recep Tayyip Erdogan, is working hard on expanding its control over the Middle East and beyond, by killing Kurds, infiltrating Syria, trying to build strongholds in Jerusale...
