By Uriel Heilman, JTA World News Service NEW YORK (JTA) – If they buy it, they will come. That’s the philosophy behind a new luxury apartment project in Israel called The Hamptons in Herzliya Pituach that’s attempting to link two very swanky locales in the service of strengthening Diaspora Jews’ connectionsContinue Reading
By Joel Magalnick, Editor, JTNews Nobody can blame us for not doing the heavy lifting. As we do every year, we bring far more kosher food than should be allowed by law, and taste all of them. Every single one. All so you, our dear reader, know the best foodsContinue Reading
By Janis Siegel, Jewish Sound Correspondent The Seattle premiere of “The J Street Challenge,” a documentary film critical of the self-described pro-Israel and pro-peace group J Street, drew over 250 adults to Congregation Ezra Bessaroth November 12, according to organizers, but the screening drew fire in a written letter ofContinue Reading
Emily K. Alhadeff, Associate Editor, The Jewish Sound Following the discovery of Washington, D.C. rabbi Barry Freundel’s breach of privacy for spying on women preparing for immersion in the mikvah and his subsequent arrest, the Rabbinical Council of America voted to appoint ombudswomen across the country to support women in theContinue Reading
By Ben Sales, JTA World News Service JERUSALEM (JTA) — Rawan Masalha and Inbar Shaked-Vardi were in their ninth-grade geography class earlier this year when a fight began over the name of their textbook, “Israel: Its People and Area.” “The Palestinian students started saying, ‘Why Israel? Why not Palestine?’ TheyContinue Reading
By Uriel Heilman, JTA World News Service NEW YORK (JTA) – If Rabbi Steven Pruzansky of Teaneck, N.J., had his way, Arab rioters and stone throwers would be shot with live ammunition. Arabs would be barred from the Temple Mount for six months. Any village from which two or moreContinue Reading
By Emily K., Alhadeff Associate Editor, The Jewish Sound The word on the Jewish street is “attrition.” Made painfully clear by last year’s Pew study, Jews — especially young Jews — are falling away from organized Jewish life. The one denomination that seems to defy the statistic is Orthodoxy; nevertheless,Continue Reading
(JNS.org) Yemenite Minister of Culture Arwa Othman is giving away Human Rights Watch’s Alison Des Forges Award, which she received in September, to Yemen’s dwindling Jewish community. The award honored Othman for her work promoting women’s rights and fighting extremism. On Nov. 20, she called for “tolerance,” dedicating her award to “brothers and friends from the Jewish community,”Continue Reading
JERUSALEM (JTA) — A shipment of knives, swords, fireworks and Tasers bound for eastern Jerusalem was intercepted by Israel Police. Police seized the two containers of weapons last week addressed to residents of the eastern Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Hanina, which has a large population of Christian Arabs. They wereContinue Reading
JERUSALEM (JTA) — The Israel Antiquities Authority has launched a free app to introduce archaeology to children using games and puzzles. The app Dig Quest: Israel is available through the App Store beginning Thursday. The games were developed in collaboration with Israel Antiquities Authority archaeologists and researchers. As they play,Continue Reading
By Sara K. Greenberg CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (JTA) — I never imagined that a day would come when some of the world’s leading corporations would fund calls for Israel’s destruction, let alone at one of the world’s most prestigious universities. But that is exactly what happened last week at Harvard. MyContinue Reading
By Ben Sales, JTA World News TEL AVIV (JTA) — On Sunday, Israel’s Cabinet is set to advance a controversial bill that if passed by the Knesset would enshrine into law Israel’s status as a Jewish state. The nation-state law, as it is being called, has support from much ofContinue Reading
(JNS.org) The undergraduate student government at University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) voted to divest from American companies that do business in Israel. According to the Daily Bruin, the Undergraduate Students Association Council (USAC) voted 8-2-2 for the measure that calls for the University of California to divest from AmericanContinue Reading
By Ben Sales, JTA World News Service TEL AVIV (JTA) — They all lived on the same street. They had all moved there from abroad. They were all rabbis. They all prayed at the same synagogue. And it was at that Jerusalem synagogue that they were all murdered on Tuesday morning. MoshehContinue Reading
(JNS.org) Israeli Public Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonvitch ordered a probe to examine easing restrictions on gun laws following the gruesome terror attack on a Jerusalem synagogue that left four dead and eight injured on Tuesday. According to a spokesperson for Aharonovitch, the minister would examine easing restrictions for security personnelContinue Reading
By Ben Sales, JTA World News Service TEL AVIV (JTA) — After a gruesome attack by two Palestinian cousins left four dead at a Jerusalem synagogue, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu singled out one person for blame: Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. In a statement issued by his office, Abbas denouncedContinue Reading
JERUSALEM (JTA) — Five Israelis were killed in a terror attack during morning prayers at a Jerusalem synagogue, including one Druze policeman who died hours after being injured in a shootout. Two Palestinian assailants entered the synagogue and rabbinical seminary in the Har Nof neighborhood of western Jerusalem and attacked worshippers onContinue Reading
JERUSALEM (JTA) — A Knesset committee vote on a law to officially make Israel the nation-state of all Jews was postponed. Justice Minister Tzipi Livni, head of the centrist Hatnua party, on Sunday postponed her ministerial committee for legislation’s vote on the bill known as the Nationality Law. “The explosiveContinue Reading
JERUSALEM (JTA) — A Jewish man was stabbed with a screwdriver in central Jerusalem. The victim, 32, was treated on the scene for stab wounds to his upper body before being taken to Shaarey Zedek Medical Center in the city. The assailant reportedly was a Palestinian youth who was seenContinue Reading
NEW YORK (JTA) — More than a dozen members of a prominent Satmar Hasidic family in New York were charged with lying to obtain $20 million in mortgages while also receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars in public benefits. Preet Bharara, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of NewContinue Reading
