Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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Former U.S. President George W. Bush made a surprise appearance at the 50th anniversary tribute gala of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations in New York, saying Iran cannot be trusted when it says its nuclear program has peaceful intentions. One attendee of the event, speaking anonymously because Bush’s comments were off the record, said Bush quoted from his May 2008 speech to the Israeli Knesset. In that speech—one that he called a highlight of his pre...
In a story of “what goes around, comes around” in the pro-Israel world, Jacob Baime will seek to empower Jewish students through a group that empowered him. Baime credits a $2,500 grant from the Israel on Campus Coalition (ICC)—enabling him to charter a bus of fellow Brandeis University students to Washington, DC, to lobby some 25 members of Congress from 12 states—with helping to launch his pro-Israel career. After working in multiple capacities for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the 28-year-old Baime was recentl...
The “red line” associated with Iran’s nuclear program or Syria’s use of chemical weapons has sparked an ongoing international debate, in which both Israeli and Diaspora Jews have made their voices heard. But a debate that hits closer to home for American Jews is about where Jewish federations in their communities draw the line on funding programs associated with varying opinions about Israel. Boston In the Boston area, a recent test case for the local Jewish federation—Combined Jewish Philanthr...
LOS ANGELES—The holiest days on the Jewish calendar, Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, are largely spent in synagogue. Yet prayer isn’t usually the focus when Jews prepare for the High Holidays, observes Cantor Arik Wollheim. “Hopefully people go through this process of repentance, and they give charity, but what about prayer?” Wollheim tells JNS.org. “People neglect that. How many people open the prayer book before Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur and go over the davening?” The answer, Wollheim says, is almost no one. But he is looking to change that...
HAIFA—Jay Ruderman has observed for years that when American Jewish leaders visit Israel or when Israeli leaders visit the United States, the conversation is “always about Israel” and how the Jewish state relates to Iran, Syria, the Palestinians, and others. “What’s happening in the American Jewish community?” and how those events impact future support for Israel never seem to enter the conversation, according to Ruderman, who worked for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) in...
On June 1, 2010, the day after the Gaza flotilla incident in which nine Turkish militants were killed after attacking Israeli soldiers aboard the Mavi Marmara, famed reporter Helen Thomas didn’t hide her opinions about Israel in a briefing with White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs. “The initial reaction to the flotilla massacre, deliberate massacre, an international crime, was pitiful. What do you mean you regret something that should be so strongly condemned? And if any other nation in the...
June 28 will mark the start of the 23rd annual Jewish Culture Festival in Krakow, Poland, whose closing event is a concert that routinely draws 20,000-25,000 people and exemplifies the re-emerging broad appeal of Jewish culture in a country that was home to 3 million Jews who died during the Holocaust. “Probably less than 10 percent of the people that are at that concert are Jewish,” San Francisco-based and Poland-born philanthropist Tad Taube tells JNS.org. But now, the Jewish Culture Fes...
Samantha Power, President Barack Obama’s replacement for Susan Rice as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, has a history of controversial comments about Israel, reigniting concerns regarding the Obama administration’s support for the Jewish state that were raised after the nomination of Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel. Morton Klein, national president of the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA), told JNS.org last Wednesday that a look at the list of Obama’s nominees and appointments to po...
The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and Americans for Peace and Tolerance (APT) are at odds over the presence of anti-Israel materials in the public school system of Newton, Mass. APT—a Boston-based nonprofit “dedicated to promoting peaceful coexistence in an ethnically diverse America by educating the American public about the need for a moderate political leadership that supports tolerance and core American values in communities across the nation”—is calling for reforms in Newton schools to prevent the reappearance of those materials, most no...
WASHINGTON, D.C.—Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system intercepted nearly 400 Gaza rockets last November alone, with an 85 percent success rate, amid the Israel Defense Forces’ Operation Pillar of Defense. But the brains behind the system isn’t resting on his laurels. “I’m realistic, so I’m not putting all the eggs in one system, [even though] it had much success,” IDF Brig. Gen. Dr. Danny Gold, who had the initial idea for the Iron Dome, said in an interview with JNS.org at the 2013 Americ...
