Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Sorted by date Results 1322 - 1346 of 1886
HOUSTON (JTA)-Over a four-day period at the end of August, Hurricane Harvey drenched this city with over 50 inches of rain, inflicting $125 billion in damages. The result of the flooding was especially devastating for the tight-knit and geographically close Jewish community of Houston. Seven major Jewish institutions have been severely impacted by Harvey, and an estimated 2,000 Jewish families were affected by the floodwaters. United Orthodox Synagogues was particularly hard hit, as...
(JNS)—Christians United For Israel, one of the nation’s largest pro-Israel organizations, announced new leadership team on Monday as the group seeks to build on its success in strengthening Christian support for Israel in the last decade. According to the organization, Diana Hagee and Shari Dollinger will take on the roles of co-executive directors. Hagee previously served as chief-of-staff to her husband, CUFI founder and chairman Pastor John Hagee. Dollinger has served as CUFI’s associate director since 2007. “With great success comes g...
NEW YORK (JTA)—Congregation Kolot Chayeinu in Brooklyn’s Park Slope neighborhood is removing its savings from JPMorgan Chase, making it the first U.S. synagogue to publicly divest from a bank or other corporation “to explicitly oppose the funding of fossil fuel and other related projects dangerous to the world in which we live,” according to a statement from the congregation. The move also puts Kolot at the forefront of Jewish organizations in doing “values-driven investing,” putting money where Jewish groups’ mouths are on climate chang...
(JNS)—South Carolina became the first state to pass legislation to protect students from anti-Semitic acts. The State Senate overwhelmingly approved the legislation, H3643, in a 37-4 vote on Thursday as part of a larger spending package. The bill passed the State House of Representatives in March in a 116-2 vote. South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster has expressed support for the bill and is expected to sign it into law. “Anti-Semitism, and the forces that have led to its resurgence, are not representative of the values of South Carolina,” said...
NEW YORK—The Blue Card, the only organization in the United States with the sole mission of providing ongoing support for medical care, rent subsidies, food and other basic needs to indigent Holocaust survivors, is urging that at the same time we remember the atrocities of the past, we act to secure the future well-being of Holocaust survivors. April 11-12 marked Holocaust Remembrance Day or Yom HaShoah, a memorial of the six million Jewish people who died during World War II. The time to “never forget” has never been more vital. The Anti-Defam...
(JNS)-As a child, I remember hearing the story of Noah in Hebrew school. In a class of 5-year-olds, we drew pictures of animals walking into the ark two-by-two in an orderly fashion. And I remember a rainbow. There was no ark the night of Aug. 26 as a flood of biblical proportions devastated Houston-a city that in no way could expect Hurricane Harvey's strength, breadth or destructive aftermath. Like many areas and neighborhoods, the Jewish community was hit hard. On a recent fly-in mission to H...
NEW YORK (JTA)—The Zionist Organization of America has filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court in support of President Donald Trump’s most recent ban on travel from a number of predominately Muslim countries. The group, which has been an outspoken supporter of many of Trump’s policies, in its brief said the action did not amount to a “Muslim ban” or violate the Constitution. On Wednesday, ZOA released a statement announcing its Feb. 28 filing of the brief. ZOA cited terror attacks by immigrants in Boston, San Bernardino, Orlando and Manha...
(JNS)—The White House published a proclamation by U.S. President Donald Trump honoring the memory of the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, stating that March 27 is recognized as “Education and Sharing Day, U.S.A.” An event was scheduled on March 27 in the Oval office with Chabad-Lubavitch representatives. The date marks the Jewish calendar birthday of the Rebbe on 11 Nissan, which fell on Tuesday. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also marked the day, posting on Facebook a link to a Hebrew article (English version here)...
WASHINGTON (JTA)-The organizers of the March for Our Lives, almost all of them under 20, had a gun control agenda packed with specifics. They were able to get 800,000 people on and off of this city's Pennsylvania Avenue in three hours. They attracted A-list celebrities. They turned out marchers at more than 800 satellite events held around the world. But the politics and logistics of the weekend often paled next to the simple, and harrowing, stories of the students who were inside Marjory...
(JTA)-The editor in chief of National Geographic Magazine made waves when she admitted that the magazine's past coverage was tinged with racism. "For decades, our coverage was racist. To rise above our past, we must acknowledge it," Susan Goldberg wrote in a letter for the magazine's April issue, which marks the 50th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s assassination. The letter forced readers and staff to grapple with the legacy of the magazine, which has been reporting on the world's...
Cedarhurst, NY—The Digital Citizenship Project, a Cedarhurst based organization dedicated to teaching digital responsibility in the age of technology has released their 2-year-long study (2015—2017) on the digital life of Jewish Day School students. “This study gives us the quantitative data needed to address the growing challenges and opportunities that digital technology presents in the world of education and Jewish education” said Temima Feldman, associate director of The Digital Citizenship Project. “Our goal is to empower parents, educator...
(JNS) Legislation to combat the Boycott, Divestment and Sanction movement against Israel has been adopted in more than 20 states in recent years, but it was derailed last month in Massachusetts. Pro-Israel activists are divided over the reasons why. The Massachusetts bill, known as the Act Prohibiting Discrimination in State Contracts, would have made it illegal for state agencies to do more than $10,000 worth of business with companies that discriminate on the basis of national origin, including, by implication, Israeli national origin. The bi...
By Ron Kampeas WASHINGTON (JTA)—An omnibus spending bill approved by Congress more than doubles spending for security grants that have been overwhelmingly tapped by Jewish institutions. The $1.3 trillion bill approved Thursday includes $60 million for the security grants, up from $25 million last year. More than 90 percent of the grants have been used to harden security at Jewish institutions since the nonprofit security grant program was launched in 2005. Nathan Diament, the Washington director of the Orthodox Union, one of the lead a...
Charging ahead with the dramatic remaking of his White House, President Donald Trump announced the ouster of National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster, to be replaced by former Ambassador to the UN John Bolton, a foreign policy hawk entering a White House facing key decisions on Iran and North Korea. After weeks of speculation about McMaster’s future, Trump and the respected three-star general put a positive face on the Thursday departure, making no reference to the growing public friction between them. Trump tweeted that McMaster had done ...
(Cleveland Jewish News via JNS)-Judge Dan Aaron Polster of the Northern District of Ohio is presiding over a case involving more than 400 federal lawsuits brought by communities around the country against drug companies and pharmacy chains for their role in perpetuating the opioid epidemic. The case and Polster-a member of Congregation Shaarey Tikvah in Beachwood, and Park Synagogue in Cleveland Heights and Pepper Pike-were covered in a March 6 front-page story in The New York Times It...
Thanks to the leadership of the Orlando Jewish community, UCF brought the fourth largest student delegation in the country to the AIPAC Policy Conference, which was held Sunday, March 4 through Tuesday, March 6....
(JTA)—The heads of 139 Jewish day schools have signed an open letter urging action following last month’s deadly shooting at a Florida high school. The letter released Tuesday expresses support for the student movement calling for gun reform and seeks political change. Prizmah, a group representing over 300 Jewish day schools, organized the letter. The schools that signed on are from the United States and Canada, and represent various denominations and affiliations. They include those with students from early childhood through high school. “As...
WASHINGTON (JTA)—On the second floor of the downtown convention center here, hundreds attending the annual policy conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee packed a standing-room-only hall. A bouncer stood outside to control the overflow crowd. It wasn’t a session on boycotts, Iran or the peace process. It was mincha, the Jewish afternoon prayer service. Outside, smaller groups of Orthodox men gathered to form their own prayer quorums. High school students in kippahs and long skirts sat against the walls chatting. Meir Raskas k...
WASHINGTON (JTA)—The U.S. ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, decried the phrase “pro-Israel, pro-peace”—a motto closely associated with J Street—as “blasphemous.” “Pro-Israel and pro-peace sounds like a completely reasonable position,” Friedman said Tuesday addressing the annual policy conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. “My friends, it is not. Using that praise plainly implies that there are people who are pro-Israel and anti-peace.” Friedman, formerly a lawyer for President Donald Trump, came under fire during his...
NEW YORK (JTA)-Organizers of the Women's March renounced the anti-Semitic views of Louis Farrakhan, but they stood behind one of its co-presidents who attended a speech last month by the Nation of Islam leader and seemed unperturbed by his attacks on Jews. Tamika Mallory, co-president of the Women's March, sparked an outcry when she posted a photo of herself and Farrakhan on Instagram following his Saviours' Day speech in Chicago on Feb. 25. In that speech, Farrakhan declared that "powerful Jews...
(JTA)-Seven survivors of the Parkland school shooting were among thousands of Jewish high school students who attended the annual conference of the Chabad movement's youth group. Responding to the Feb. 14 shooting became an impromptu theme of the conference, which was hosted in New York City by CTeen, the teen arm of the Hasidic outreach movement. CTeen, which has 100,000 members worldwide, has eight chapters in the South Florida area surrounding Parkland. The shooting, which killed 17 students...
(JNS)-The number of anti-Semitic incidents in the United States soared in 2017, according to the annual report by the Anti-Defamation League. There were 1,986 acts classified as anti-Semitic in 2017, up 57 percent from 2016 at 1,267 and more than double the 2,015 total of 941. That makes 2017 the second-most anti-Semitic year since the ADL began tracking the incidents almost 40 years ago, and the highest-ever single-year spike. "It had been trending in the right direction for a long time," Jonat...
WASHINGTON (JTA)—When candidate Donald Trump spoke at AIPAC’s Policy Conference in 2016 and said Barack Obama may be the worst thing that ever happened to Israel, many cheered, many choked and the organization apologized. The fallout from that event will haunt the proceedings when 18,000 activists, including 3,500 students, attend the American Israel Public Affairs Committee conference here this week. Navigating an increasingly polarized political landscape is the new reality for the lobby, which remains pre-eminent among pro-Israel groups and...
(JNS)—Major American Jewish organizations are calling for stricter gun-control laws in the wake of the Feb. 14 mass school shooting in Parkland, Fla., that left 14 students and three staff members dead. A spokesperson for the women’s organization Hadassah told JNS that the group supports all three of the legislative proposals under discussion in the aftermath of the shooting. One is a bill sponsored by U.S. Sens. Jon Cornyn (R-Texas) and Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) to expand criminal background checks on prospective purchasers of guns. A second leg...
WASHINGTON (JTA)—President Donald Trump spoke of the anguish of a Jewish family in commemorating last week’s school shooting in Florida. “I had them in the Oval Office, incredible people,” Trump said Friday at CPAC, an influential annual conference for conservatives, describing his meeting with the family of Meadow Pollack. “She had a beautiful, beautiful smile, a beautiful life.” Meadow Pollack was 18 and a senior at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, where an expelled classmate opened fire last week, killing 17 people. Her father, And...
