Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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Hillary Clinton is hoping for a “new tone” in the U.S.-Israel relationship, one Jewish leader recently claimed. But in the meantime, Israel is stuck dealing with the deadly consequences of her policies as secretary of state. Russia this week announced its intention to provide Iran with the S-300 advanced missile system. Russian president Vladimir Putin reportedly justified his action on the grounds that the missile system is for defensive purposes. In this case, however, “defensive” means that it could be used to “defend” Iran’s nuclear weapo...
(The authors are president and chairman, respectively, of the Religious Zionists of Philadelphia, and candidates on the Religious Zionist slate (www.VoteTorah.org) in the World Zionist Congress elections.) A sea change began within hours of the Israeli election returns. Thomas L. Friedman, who has devoted much of his life to promoting Palestinian statehood, declared in his New York Times column that the idea of a Palestinian state is “not possible anymore.” That was followed by his Times colleague David K. Shipler, another longtime adv...
American Jewish leaders who supported the Oslo Accords or have criticized Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are now strongly challenging the Obama administration’s policy toward Israel. It’s the latest sign of a growing consensus in the Jewish community that the president’s vindictive approach toward Israel is unfair and overreaching. Rabbi Haskel Lookstein, head of the Kehilath Jeshurun synagogue and the Ramaz Day School in Manhattan, was an early supporter of the left-leaning Israeli party Meimad, and its American equivalent, Shvil Hazah...
Who misled President Obama into his losing showdown over Prime Minister Netanyahu’s blockbuster speech to Congress? And how much of this week’s setback to the president should be blamed on the “progressive” Israel lobbying group J Street? When J Street was established, its leaders chose a football metaphor to describe their purpose: they said they would serve as “President Obama’s blocking back.” In other words, they would charge into the defensive line, pushing aside critics so that Obama would be able to dictate terms to Israel. But a...
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...
Lest anyone think, even for a moment, that there is even the slightest link between Islamic terror against Jews in Paris and Islamic terror against Jews in Jerusalem, the New York Times has rushed in to disabuse us of that notion. The Times’ Jerusalem bureau chief, Jodi Rudoren, authored a half-page article on Jan. 10 mocking the idea of such linkage. The editors helpfully added a huge color photograph of a scowling Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The image of the mean, angry Netanyahu is important to trying to discredit any sympathy for h...
Remember that “arson attack” last month by “Jewish extremists” against a West Bank mosque? Remember how that outrageous assault made headline news around the world? Remember how it showed that “both sides”—not just the Arabs—are guilty of violence, and “both sides”—not only Israelis—are suffering? Well, guess what: it was a lie. The period from late October through late November was a time of escalating Palestinian terrorism against Israelis. On Oct. 22, a terrorist (or, according to the Palestinian Authority, a “hero”) drove his car into a Jer...
For years, Palestinian leaders and their media allies have claimed that the “Second Intifada”—the mass violence of 2000-2001—was a “spontaneous” uprising against Israeli “oppression.” But occasionally they tell the truth: it wasn’t spontaneous at all. It was organized by the Palestinian Authority leadership itself. Last week Mahmoud al-Zahar, co-founder of Hamas and its former foreign minister, let the cat out of the bag in an interview with the Hamas television station, Al Aqsa TV, on Dec. 12. He revealed that PA chairman Yasir Arafat hims...
They don’t have plush offices or secretaries or gala dinners, but a group of 15-year-olds on Long Island are providing an inspiring model of leadership for the rest of the American Jewish community. Tenth graders at the Rambam Mesivta High School in Lawrence, New York, recently initiated an on-line crowd sourcing campaign, which has raised an astonishing $2.4-million for the families of the four American-Israeli rabbis, and the Druze police officer, who were murdered in a Jerusalem synagogue last month. We were all horrified and saddened by the...
By Another young American man has given his life while fighting in the ranks of Islamist terrorists abroad. But this time, instead of being met with universal condemnations and scorn, the young terrorist is being greeted with sympathetic news accounts and “even-handed” statements from the State Department – all because he joined a politically correct terror group affiliated with the Palestinians. Just think. When Eric Harroun of Arizona joined an Al Qaeda group fighting in Syria last year, he was arrested as soon as he tried to re-enter the U...
As Yom Kippur sermons go, Martin Indyk’s was a doozy. Speaking at the Adas Israel synagogue in Washington, D.C. on the holiest day of the Jewish year, the former U.S. envoy to the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations accused Israel of showing “total disrespect” for the Obama administration. Indyk said many things in his Yom Kippur address with which one might take issue, but one analogy in particular stands out as especially disturbing. He said that he “discovered” in the most recent round of failed negotiations “that we would crack the whip, b...
A major American university is currently hosting a visiting novelist who says that Israel is a deeply racist country and that its creation was a “catastrophe.” And the Chicago Jewish Federation is helping to foot the bill. The Israel Studies Project at the University of Illinois, which was created by, and is funded in part by, the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan of Chicago, invites Israeli writers and academics to spend time at American universities. This year’s choice, Sayed Kashua, certainly has some interesting things to say. Kashua is an...
Prominent supporters of both Israel and the Palestinian cause are now saying that the solution to the current Gaza conflict is for the Palestinian Authority to be handed control there in place of Hamas. Such thinking fails to account for the PA’s long history of sheltering, assisting, and even collaborating with Hamas and other terrorist groups. Writing on the op-ed page of the Washington Post on Aug. 21, former national security advisers Samuel (“Sandy”) Berger (who served under Bill Clinton) and Stephen Hadley (under George W. Bush) argue...
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo is refusing to meet with Palestinian leaders during his visit to Israel this week. Maybe that’s a mistake. The Palestinian Authority has invited him to visit the areas under its control, and the New York Times and others are quick to accuse the governor of bias for refusing. In our view, the governor would actually be performing a great public service if he did visit certain PA-controlled areas—some of the ones they don’t want him to see. That would help clarify many of the issues that need to be considered befor...
A simple cease-fire in Gaza would give Hamas time to re-arm and renew its terrorist activities. The demilitarization of Gaza would put an end to Hamas’s terrorist activities. Which goal makes more sense? President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry have been working hard to achieve a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas. This effort is shortsighted and worse. A simple cease-fire would be a de-facto victory for Hamas. It would give Hamas the time and breathing space it needs to smuggle in more weapons, repair its terror tunnels, a...
Among the many heartbreaking images associated with the kidnap-murder of three Israeli teenagers was a televised interview on June 29 with the mother of one of the Hamas terrorists named as a prime suspect in the killings. “If they [the Israelis] accuse him of this [the kidnapping], and if it is a true accusation, I will be proud of him until Judgment Day,” she declared. “If the accusation that he did it is true... My boys are all righteous, pious and pure. The goal of my children is the triumph of Islam.” Not that she is the first Middle...
One of the most important, but least-reported stories connected to the recent kidnapping of three Israeli teenagers by Palestinian terrorists is the discovery of numerous terrorist tunnels and weapons depots in areas ruled by the “peaceful” Palestinian Authority. The conventional wisdom is that Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas is a “moderate” who opposes terrorism and wants to make peace with Israel. PA spokesmen have assured Western reporters that they oppose the Hamas terrorists and were “cooperating” with Israel in the search...
The Algemeiner) The State Department’s demand that Israel “exercise restraint” in its search for the Hamas kidnappers makes a mockery of President Obama’s pledge two years ago that he “will always have Israel’s back.” State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki declared on June 20 that the Obama Administration is “urging all parties to exercise restraint and avoid steps that could destabilize the situation.” That phrase “all parties” was a thin veneer of even-handedness. Everyone knows the call for “restraint” was aimed at Israel. In fact, Psaki ma...
The thin line dividing criticism of Israel from anti-Semitism just got a little thinner. BBC journalist Chris Rogers this week was revealed to have amused himself by giving the Nazi salute and strutting about in a Hitler-style goose-step while filming a documentary—on, of all things, anti-Semitic soccer fans in eastern Europe. The British Daily Mail newspaper first reported on Rogers’ vile actions on their website on May 19. Rogers’ “defense” was that his behavior was “intended as a joke.” Humor can be very revealing. Is it just a coincidence...
