Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Sorted by date Results 1 - 25 of 33
(JNS) - Members of the Gvura Forum converged on the Prime Minister's Office in Jerusalem on Monday to protest against a general strike called by the Histadrut labor federation following the IDF's recovery over the weekend of six hostages' bodies from the Gaza Strip. "We call on the prime minister not to give up to [Hamas terror chief Yahya] Sinwar and instead to keep up military pressure to achieve total victory," Yehoshua Shani, a member of the forum whose son IDF Capt. Ori Shani was killed in...
(JNS) - The six hostages whose bodies were recovered by Israeli forces in a Rafah tunnel in southern Gaza overnight Saturday were shot multiple times at close range just days before their discovery, Israel's Health Ministry said on Sunday. According to examinations conducted by the Abu Kabir Forensic Institute in Tel Aviv, the captives were murdered 48 to 72 hours before the autopsies, which would place their deaths at some point between Thursday and Friday morning. That the captives were shot...
By (JTA) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu apologized for not freeing hostages as Israel woke up to the shattering news that Hamas terrorists murdered six captives who were on the verge of being rescued. Some of those killed had been slated for release under a failed deal in July, an anonymous Israeli official told the Israeli news outlet Ynet. Netanyahu’s apology, delivered Sunday to the parents of one of the six, Alex Lubnov, was a first for the prime minister who until now has said that accountability should come after Hamas is...
(JNS) - The U.S. Postal Service has announced a "Hanukkah Forever" stamp to commemorate the eight-day Jewish "Festival of Lights." Designed by Antonio Alcalá, it features a ocean-blue background, white hanukkiah and nine floating yellow lights. USPS says the design uses "irregular lines to suggest a more human presence." A first day of issue dedication ceremony will take place on Sept. 19, to be led by Michael Gordon, USPS government liaison director, at the Lillian and Albert Small Capital...
Jews today feel threatened with the rise of antisemitism and the increase in violent hate crimes that are happening in America and the world today. Yet we are a peaceful people and for many of us the thought of firing a gun, let alone going to a gun range to train is out of the question. How do we live up to the commitment of “Never Again” if we don’t have the skills to defend ourselves? Decision Tactical solves this problem. I have never seen or have experienced anything as creative, pract...
Chabad of South Orlando is hosting a Mega Challah Bake for the safety of families and soldiers in Israel and the return of the hostages. The event will be held Thursday, Sept. 12, at The Castle Hotel, 8602 Universal Blvd., Orlando. Doors open at 5 p.m. and the program begins at 6 p.m. and ends at 9:10 p.m. The cost is $36 online or $45 at the door. To register, visit JewishOrlando.com/megachallahbake. Registration closes on Sept. 10....
(JNS) — Where is the Air Force? This was the tragic question that did not have to be repeated yesterday. Those like this reporter who remember Oct. 7 minute by minute cannot forget how, from the moment of the opening missile barrage, everyone’s eyes fixed desperately on the sky, looking for the Israeli fighter planes. We expected them to finally flush out the terrorists, destroy the missile launchers, bomb the hundreds of invaders in the south and then those in Gaza, and cover the army’s retaliation. It didn’t happen. The desolation of the sil...
(JNS) — The U.S. State Department stated on Tuesday that it “strongly opposes” Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir’s call for construction of a synagogue on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount. The proposed Jewish house of worship “on the Haram al-Sharif/Temple Mount” would “would demonstrate blatant disregard for the historic status quo with respect to the holy sites in Jerusalem,” Matthew Miller, the State Department spokesman, said. “The ongoing reckless statements and actions of this minister only sow chaos and exacerbate tensions at a...
(JNS) — Israeli Foreign Minister Yisrael Katz on Wednesday called for “the temporary evacuation of Palestinian residents and whatever steps are required,” after the IDF overnight on Aug. 27 launched a large-scale anti-terror operation in Judea and Samaria. “This is a war in every respect and we must win it,” Katz tweeted. “The IDF is working intensively starting tonight in the Jenin and Tulkarem refugee camps to thwart Islamic-Iranian terrorist infrastructures that have been established there,” he said. Iran is working “to establish an ea...
(JNS) — The Israel Defense Forces launched a large-scale counterterrorism operation in the Jenin and Tulkarem areas of northern Samaria overnight Tuesday, involving hundreds of troops and air support. At least 11 Palestinians were killed, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry—including two in clashes with IDF troops in Jenin, three in a drone strike in a nearby village and another four in a drone strike in the Far’a camp in Tubas. Israel’s Channel 12 identified two of the fatalities as Kassam Jabarin, 25, and Atsam Belot, 39. Several...
(JNS) — “Let reason go before every enterprise and counsel before any action.” Ecclesiastes 32:23 At time of writing, negotiations between Israel and Hamas on a potential “ceasefire” are seemingly set to continue despite Hezbollah’s attempted attack on Israel followed by massive rocket fire and statements by officials that the ceasefire talks are near collapse. Even if an agreement is reached, however, it will almost certainly fail because Hamas still regards all of Israel as “Occupied Palestine.” For both Israel and the “international...
(JNS) — It’s very troubling that President Joe Biden said during his Democratic National Convention speech that “those [anti-Israel] protesters out in the street, they have a point.” Similarly, during her interview with The Nation in July, Vice President Kamala Harris stated that the anti-Israel “protesters” “are showing exactly what the human emotion should be, as a response to Gaza. … I understand the emotion behind it.” What exactly is the point of anti-Israel, anti-American terror-affiliated rioters? (“Protesters” is way too mild a term f...
(JNS) — On Aug. 18, a Palestinian Arab male blew himself up in central Tel Aviv with enough explosives to murder hundreds of Israelis but managed only to end his own life. Hours afterward, Hamas claimed responsibility and pledged more such attacks. For us, almost 23 years to the day when a Palestinian suicide bomber murdered our teenage daughter, Malki, this served as a jolting reminder that the scourge of Palestinian human-bomb attacks is still here. For Israelis and Americans, the “failed” bombing is a wake-up call, a harbinger of fresh...
(JNS) — Are you into the TV show “American Idols?” Do you enjoy watching all that talent on television? What about other “idols?” In last week’s Torah reading, Re’eh, Moses warns the Jewish people not to follow the pagan ways of the Canaanite nations when they inherit the Land of Israel. There is to be zero tolerance for idolatry and paganism. Those nations practiced the most outrageous forms of idolatry, including child sacrifice and other depravities. The great Torah scholar Rashi quotes Rabbi Akiva as saying he’d witnessed a pagan man tie up...
(JNS) — It is clear that opposition to the ability of Jews to peacefully pray on the holiest site in Judaism and the site of the first two Jewish Temples, namely the Temple Mount, is prompted by the virulent antisemitism of the Palestinian Authority and the Kingdom of Jordan. Their opposition is based upon the antisemitic view that there is no Jewish connection to the site. The previous uniform Muslim view of the Temple Mount was expressed in 1925 by the Supreme Muslim Council in their published guide to the Temple Mount for tourists. It s...
(JNS) — Now that the Democratic National Convention has ended, the dust is just beginning to settle. Maureen Dowd, who is a fixture at the very left-wing New York Times, titled an Aug. 18 article on President Joe Biden’s withdrawal from the presidential race in favor of Vice President Kamala Harris, “The Dems Are Delighted. But a Coup Is Still a Coup.” Dowd wrote: “It wasn’t exactly Julius Caesar in Rehoboth Beach. But it was a tectonic shift and, of course, there were going to be serious reverberations.” She called Biden’s removal “a jaw-...
MORNING MINYANS Chabad of South Orlando — Monday - Friday, 8 a.m. and 10 minutes before sunset; Saturday, 9:30 a.m.; Sunday, 8:15 a.m., 407-354-3660. Congregation Ahavas Yisrael — Monday - Friday, 7:30 a.m.; Saturday, 9:30 a.m.; Sunday, 9 a.m., 407-644-2500. Congregation Chabad Lubavitch of Greater Daytona — Monday, 8 a.m.; Thursday, 8 a.m., 904-672-9300. Congregation Ohev Shalom — Sunday, 9 a.m., 407-298-4650. GOBOR Community Minyan at Jewish Academy of Orlando — Monday – Friday, 7:45 a.m. – 8:30 a.m. Temple Israel — Sunday, 9 a.m., 407-647-30...
(JNS) — A new campaign by the Samaria Regional Council blames Israel’s 2005 disengagement from Gaza for Hamas’s Oct. 7 terrorist massacre of some 1,200 people, primarily civilians, in the Jewish state. As part of the effort, financed by friends of Samaria in Israel and abroad, the council put up billboards in Tel Aviv and other cities that read, “The reason—the result.” The ad shows a picture of the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, followed by a photo of the Oct. 7 attacks. “Oslo and the ‘disengagement’ brought this disaster upon us. Gush Kat...
(JNS) - A circle of yellow flags, symbolic of the hostages who remain captive in Gaza, greet you as you enter Kibbutz Nir Am-a painful reminder of that Black Sabbath of Oct. 7. Every so often, the dull boom of combat in the neighboring Strip punctuates the air. The cacophony of war continues. Nir Am is in the northwestern Negev, close to Sderot. The closest point of the kibbutz is less than a mile from the Gaza border. On Oct. 7, as Hamas-led terrorists invaded the communities of the "Gaza...
(JTA) — Israeli troops have rescued an Israeli hostage from southern Gaza, the military announced Tuesday. the eighth captive held by Hamas to be brought back alive by Israeli forces since Oct. 7. Qaid Farhan al-Qadi, 52, a Bedouin Israeli and father of 11 from the southern city of Rahat, worked as a security guard at Kibbutz Magen on the Gaza border and was captured by Hamas terrorists during their Oct. 7 attack. He was one of several Israeli Arabs to be taken hostage. Al-Qadi was rescued Tuesday morning by Israel’s elite Shayetet 13 unit fro...
(JNS) - Qaid Farhan Alkadi, who was rescued from Gaza by Israeli forces on Aug. 27, after 326 days in Hamas captivity, has begun to share details regarding the brutal conditions he experienced since his abduction on Oct. 7. "He spoke about the darkness, not being able to see. But, thank God, he's back with us, alive-it made us all rejoice," Alkadi's cousin Fayez al-Sana told the New York Times after visiting him in hospital. Ata Abu Medigm, the former mayor of Rahat, told Ynet that Alkadi was...
(JNS) — The following is the transcript, translated from Hebrew, of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s conversation on Aug. 27 with Farhan al-Qadi, who was rescued after being held hostage in the Gaza Strip since the Hamas terrorist attacks in Israel on Oct. 7. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu: “Farhan, hello to you my friend. Welcome back!” Farhan al-Qadi: “Hello, welcome. Hello Bibi, Abu [father of] Yair!” Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu: “Farhan, I am so happy to speak with you.” Farhan al-Qadi: “I am also happy. I have been waiti...
Not many people know much about Max Yasgur. Perhaps some do. I knew of him only because I was at the beautiful Bethel Woods Center for the Arts on Aug.17, the 55th anniversary of Woodstock. The Center is located on Max's former farm site in Bethel, N.Y. I came to Bethel to dedicate the eighth marker in the Borscht Belt Historical Marker Project system that the Jewish American Society for Historic Preservation was funding. That day, at both sites, the clock was pushed back to when American youth...
(JTA) - Hersh Goldberg-Polin's mother looked almost as the world has gotten to know her when she took the podium at her son's funeral in Jerusalem. Rachel Goldberg-Polin had her hair pulled back neatly and was wearing a crisp white shirt, the trademark piece of masking tape marking the number of days since her son and 250 others were taken hostage on Oct. 7 affixed to its breast. But the shirt was ripped, in keeping with the Jewish tradition of rending one's clothing upon learning of the death...
(Israel Hayom via JNS) - The vibrant Redhead Days Festival in Tilburg, Netherlands, known for celebrating auburn-haired individuals worldwide, struck a poignant note this year. Amid the sea of orange locks, participants were urged to remember the Bibas family-Shiri, Yarden and their young sons Ariel and Kfir-who were taken captive from Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. The event, which ran from Aug. 24-25, drew over 10,000 attendees, was transformed into a platform for raising awareness about the family's plight, with a spotlight on the two redheaded...
