Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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Thousands of protesters took to the streets this weekend in cities throughout Iran to demonstrate against the Islamic Republic’s strained economy, corrupt regime and costly military expansion throughout the region, in what has been characterized as the country’s largest wave of anti-government protests since the “Green Revolution” erupted in 2009 following a controversial presidential election. Although experts believe it is too soon to tell how the renewed anti-regime protests will affect Israel, Meir Litvak, director of the Alliance Center...
The United Nations has earmarked some $1.3 billion to fund Palestinian legal campaigns against Israel and to support the creation of an independent Palestinian state, in what experts are calling an unprecedented act singling out the Jewish state at the world body. A document that was recently signed between the UN and the Palestinians outlines a “strategic programming framework” in the disputed territories from 2018-2022, and states that the UN will work to advise the Palestinian Authority on how to exploit “international accountability mecha...
The IDF struck three Syrian rocket launchers Saturday after five rockets from Syria entered the Israeli Golan Heights earlier that day, and as Iran’s military chief inked an agreement with Damascus pledging to combat “Zio-American schemes.” Meanwhile, Russia has reportedly agreed to slightly expand a buffer zone in southern Syria to prevent Iranian forces and the Lebanese terror group Hezbollah from operating near the Jewish state. The IDF located four of the five projectiles fired from Syria into Israeli territory. While all of the rocke...
In what turned out to be a timely announcement, dozens of bereaved families Sept. 26 unveiled a new organization that seeks to fight and deter terrorism in the Jewish state. On the same day, a Palestinian terrorist killed three Israelis in the community of Har Adar near Jerusalem. The nascent nonprofit organization, Choosing Life, brings together more than 40 families who have lost relatives in the ongoing Palestinian terror wave that began in 2015. Since the so-called “knife intifada” began in September of that year, 58 people have been kil...
At a time of warming relations between Israel and Arab states, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held his first public meeting Monday with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in New York. The meeting comes amid speculation of an historic shift in Arab policy towards the Jewish state. During the hour-and-a-half meeting at the Palace Hotel, the leaders engaged in "a comprehensive discussion about the problems of the...
Despite the raging civil war to Israel’s north and east in Syria, the Jewish state’s northern border has remained precariously quiet over the last decade. No stranger to looming threats, Israeli officials are planning and ready for several worst-case scenarios in the north as Iran and its terror proxy Hezbollah continue to forge their stranglehold on the region. In a possible war scenario with Hezbollah, the Israeli military can launch a “massive and overwhelming” operation that would effectively “neutralize” a significant part of the Lebanes...
The Trump administration has reportedly reached a new contract with the Israeli defense electronics company Elbit Systems to implement advanced security systems on the U.S. border with Mexico, similar to the security technology utilized along Israel's borders. According to reports that emerged last weekend in Hebrew- and English-language Israeli media, an American delegation recently visited Israel to tour the country's borders with the Gaza Strip and Egypt. Delegation members were pitched on a...
Before an Arab terror attack that killed two Israeli policemen ignited the latest wave of tension over the Temple Mount, much of the Jewish world’s attention had focused on an internal Jewish controversy surrounding prayer rights at the adjacent Western Wall. In June, American Judaism’s Reform and Conservative movements as well as other Jewish organizations reacted with outrage to the Israeli government’s decision to cancel the construction of a new egalitarian prayer pavilion at the Western Wall. Yet a mixed-gender prayer facility calle...
A Palestinian terrorist fatally stabbed an Israeli father and two of his adult children last Friday night in the Samaria community of Halamish, amid escalating tension over Jerusalem's Temple Mount. The terror attack in Halamish came on the heels of a Palestinian-incited "day of rage," in which riots erupted after Friday prayers in response to the installation of metal detectors at the entrance gates to the Temple Mount. Israel bolstered security following the July 14 Arab terror attack that...
Some 7,000 Jewish athletes from 80 countries prepared to head back to their home countries this week following the 20th Maccabiah Games, a two-week event that is being praised for helping create "positive connections" to Israel. The Jewish athletes from overseas had arrived in Israel in early July, joining 2,500 Israeli contestants in the world's third-largest sporting event, which convenes every four years and is often dubbed the "Jewish Olympics." This year's games, hosted in Jerusalem, had...
Mayim Bialik, a star on the CBS hit sitcom "The Big Bang Theory," launched a witty new video campaign this week for SodaStream, succeeding actress Scarlett Johansson as the official pitchwoman for the Israeli beverage carbonation company. Bialik, a self-described "observant-ish" Jew and a doctorate-holding neuroscientist, is uniquely suited for the new SodaStream promotion. In the video, the actress finds herself in the year 2136 working as a research scientist, deeply consumed in the study of...
Mortar shells fired from Syria into the Israeli Golan Heights Saturday prompted the IDF to respond with a retaliatory strike in Syria, purportedly killing Syrian soldiers. Despite the incidents, a military escalation between Israel and Syria is unlikely and is in neither side's interest, said Prof. Efraim Inbar, former director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Israel's Bar-Ilan University. "This is nothing new for the IDF to retaliate to spillover from Syria," Inbar told...
During the 20th Maccabiah Games next month, about 7,000 Jewish athletes from 80 countries will descend upon the Holy Land to join 2,500 Israeli athletes in the Olympic-style competition. Held every four years, the Jewish multi-sport competition is the world's third-largest sporting event. From July 4-18, the Maccabiah Games will have the added significance of coinciding with the 50th anniversary of the reunification of this year's host city, Jerusalem. "Fifty years after unification, we have fin...
Following Saturday night's terror attack that killed seven people and injured as many as 50 in London, British Prime Minister Theresa May said "enough is enough" and vowed to crack down on the "evil ideology of Islamist extremism." In response to the U.K.'s third major Islamist terror attack in recent months-prompting May to describe the attacks as a "new trend"-the prime minister asserted, "We cannot, and must not pretend that things can continue to carry on as they are." May also reiterated th...
A day after convicted Palestinian terrorist Marwan Barghouti wrote a New York Times op-ed that omitted his crimes and terrorist organization membership and sparked scathing rebuke from the international community, the newspaper added a brief editor's note acknowledging the murder and terror-related convictions that led to his imprisonment. The April 16 piece-where the Times referred to Barghouti as a "Palestinian leader and parliamentarian"-was slammed by Israeli officials and Jewish leaders in...
Israel's Knesset last week passed landmark legislation against the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, representing just one of several setbacks this month for BDS around the world. The Israeli bill, which passed its third and final reading with a 46-28 vote, grants the interior minister authority to deny entry visas to non-Israeli citizens who actively support boycotts of the Jewish state. Conveying the rationale for the anti-BDS measure, Member of Knesset David...
