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Reporting on the Middle East, Science, and Education for July 28, 2010 - י"ז אב תש"ע
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This year, Tisha B’Av (the annual Jewish fast day commemorating the destruction of both the First and Second Temples in Jerusalem) once again reminded us of the dangers of “gratuitous hatred” without rhyme or reason for one’s fellow Jews; the kind of hatred for its own sake, which seems more recently to have become part of our everyday Israeli reality. Divisions between Ultra-Orthodox and Secular Jews or the bitter antagonism towards the settlers in the West Bank are of course not new, but they have lost nothing of their malevolent edge. No less distressing are the actions of those Israeli lecturers who defend the international anti-Israel boycott in the name of academic freedom and the much larger numbers of those who denounce any criticism or sanctions against these boycotters as “McCarthyism”.
Such harsh polemics are happening at a time of unprecedented hatred towards Israel as a nation within the international community. The hysteria surrounding the Gaza flotilla brought this trend to new heights of hypocrisy. It reflects the ongoing campaign of branding Israel as the “Jew” of nations – libeling it as a racist, bloodthirsty, pariah-state. At the same time, American Jewish support for Israel’s policies, especially among liberals, has also been increasingly eroded. This has potentially dangerous consequences for our relations with the Diaspora, already tense over the issue of non-Orthodox conversions.True, the majority of Americans still show remarkable empathy with Israel’s dilemmas and President Obama has more recently chosen to adopt a somewhat friendlier tone to Israel’s prime minister. Many European leaders, while less supportive than the United States, are by no means blind to Israel’s security needs, to the Iranian threat or to the disastrous implications of Hamas’s violent rule in Gaza. Nevertheless, the international weakening of Israel’s legitimacy as a state remains deeply troubling. It has been accompanied by an unprecedented explosion of global anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism during the past few years. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by CNP Webmaster as Education, Judaism, Middle East Report, Opinion, Recent Posts on July 28, 2010 - י"ז אב תש"ע at 9:43 am
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Av 16, 5770, July 27, 2010
by Rabbi Avi Shafran, Am Echad Resources
The proposed Israeli conversion-reform legislation known as the Rotem Bill – now on hold for several months – became a sort of Rorschach test for many Jews’ fears.
The bill was introduced by Yisrael Beiteinu, a nationalistic and not infrequently anti-religious political party representing a largely secular immigrant constituency. The legislation’s essential aim is to ease the conversion process for non-Jewish Israelis – like thousands of immigrants from the former Soviet Union – allowing them greater choice of religious courts than they currently have.
To advance the bill, Yisrael Beiteinu garnered the support of Israel’s hareidi, or so-called “Ultra-Orthodox,” parties. What allowed the religious parties to back the conversion reforms was the bill’s formalization of part of the decades-old religious status quo, placing conversion in Israel under the auspices of the country’s official Chief Rabbinate. That, the religious parties reasoned, would ensure that the bill’s reforms would not result in a conversion free-for-all.
When the bill passed its first procedural hurdle, a hue and cry rose up from Reform and Conservative leaders in America, who contended that it could potentially lead to a change in the definition of “Jewish” regarding qualification for automatic citizenship under the Law of Return. (Currently, any convert to any Jewish religious movement is registered as Jewish for civil purposes.) The bill’s sponsors vehemently deny that any such change could be effected by the legislation. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by CNP Webmaster as Judaism, Middle East Report, Recent Posts on July 27, 2010 - ט"ז אב תש"ע at 9:37 am
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The Palestinian Right to Israelby Dr. Alex Grobman
[Note: Readers who purchase through www.balfourstore.com will get a discount and an extra 10% discount on the price of the book, so it will cost $16. Please use the following password:INN2010 when purchasing]
The Arab/Israeli conflict is among the most intractable disputes in the world today. In this meticulously researched and well-written work, Dr. Alex Grobman, a renowned historian trained at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, systematically and methodically exposes the myths and lies about the Arab right to the land of Israel.
Grobman traces the historical, religious and spiritual connection of the Jewish people to the land of Israel after the end of Jewish sovereignty in 70 CE; dispels the Arab claim that Palestine is a “twice promised land,” because the British pledged it to both the Arabs and the Jews; examines the Arab reaction to the Balfour Declaration and Jewish immigration to Palestine that established a precedent for dealing with Arabs that continues to this day; and examines Arab activities during WWII to thwart an Allied victory.
Grobman shows that the Arabs have never accepted the right of Jews to re-establish their sovereignty in the land of Israel, and how they continually try to refute the Jewish connection to Israel, especially the city of Jerusalem: by destroying Temple Mount artifacts to eliminate any evidence of a Jewish past, by accusing Israeli archeologists of manipulating authentic archeological evidence to justify the Jewish people’s right to Israel and by charging that the Jews are not a people at all, and are consequently not entitled to a country of their own. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by CNP Webmaster as Education, Islam, Judaism, Middle East Report, Monotheistic Religions, News Articles, Opinion, Recent Posts on July 25, 2010 - י"ד אב תש"ע at 8:10 am
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From this week’s Jewish Journal
By David Suissa
If ever there were an Israeli who could lead Israel to peace with its Arab neighbors, it might be the Israeli diplomat I met the other day in the lobby of the Century Plaza Hotel. This is your classic Zionist. He stands tall and proud of his country, doesn’t ignore its faults, has a deep understanding of the issues from all sides and craves peace.
Of course, it helps that he’s a Muslim. Not just a Muslim, but a Bedouin Muslim.
Ishmael Khaldi’s official position is policy advisor to the Israeli foreign minister, but he’s a lot more than that. He has become a one-man hasbara machine for the Jewish state, traveling around the world to make the case for the country he loves. When he encounters anti-Israel hecklers who spout slanderous words like “apartheid state,” he has an easy answer:
“If Israel was a racist state, a Muslim like me would never have made it this far.”
This notion of going far came early for Khaldi. Until he was 8, he walked four miles to school from his tiny Bedouin village of Khawalid in the western Galilee, then the same distance to get home again. He has fond memories of the family tent, where he lived with his parents and 10 siblings. He calls the tent an “extraordinary thing,” because it was made of goat hair, which he says keeps you “warm and dry in the winters, and cool in the hot summers.” Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by CNP Webmaster as Islam, Judaism, Middle East Report, Monotheistic Religions, News Articles, Recent Posts on July 23, 2010 - י"ב אב תש"ע at 10:06 am
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Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 21 Jul 2010
DFM Ayalon and ODIHR Director Lenarcic sign agreement (Photo: MFA)
(Communicated by the Deputy Foreign Minister’s Bureau)
This morning (21 July 2010), a cooperation agreement between the ITF (Task Force for International Cooperation on Holocaust Education, Remembrance, and Research) and the ODIHR (Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights) was signed at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Jerusalem, in the presence of Deputy FM Daniel Ayalon. The ODIHR is an operative branch of the OSCE (Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe)
This year, Israel was chosen for the first time to head the ITF. Under the auspices of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, an agreement was signed today that boosts the strength of the forces in the global arena fighting against antisemitism and Holocaust denial. The agreement will bring about cooperation among 87 countries.
ITF Chairman Dan Tichon and ODIHR Director Janez Lenarcic signed the memorandum of understanding. DFM Ayalon welcomed the signing of the agreement and said that it gives an enormous boost to the fight against the delegitimization of Israel and antisemitism in the world, bringing 87 states for the first time into cooperation. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has acted, and will continue to act, against these manifestations of hate and will promote any initiative whose purpose is to eliminate them. Ayalon added that there are elements that deny the Holocaust and are preparing the next one. We must preserve the memory of the Holocaust so that similar horrors and hatred will never be repeated and the world will become a safer place.
Posted by CNP Webmaster as Judaism, Middle East Report, News Articles, Recent Posts on July 23, 2010 - י"ב אב תש"ע at 8:25 am
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By Tzofia Hirschfeld, YNet News, July 21, 2010
The Jewish people’s personal belongings are scattered all over the world: It has synagogues, prayer books, tombstones and cemeteries in various countries. Jews no longer reside in some of these places, and all they left behind is slowly disintegrating.
The “Journey to Jewish Heritage” project, initiated by Beit Avi Chai and the Zalman Shazar Center, aims to locate and document the remnants of Jewish life. Budgetary constraints now threaten the project’s existence, and if it is shut down, an entire world will be lost with it.
“We may be losing out last chance to document important evidence of Jewish existence in the Diaspora,” said Hannah Holland, the project’s director. “We are talking about disappearing communities – some of them diminished because of the Holocaust, some of them because of emigration. When we visit these places, we are met with remains of a splendid past and try to salvage last pieces of evidence of what once was, but now is gone. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by CNP Webmaster as Education, Judaism, News Articles, Recent Posts on July 21, 2010 - י' אב תש"ע at 10:21 am
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by Gil Ronen, Arutz Sheva
(Israelnationalnews.com) MK Danny Danon (Likud) toured the Temple Mount Tuesday in a visit timed for Tisha B’Av, 1940 years after the sacking of the Second Jewish Temple. He bemoaned the ongoing discrimination against Jews’ freedom of worship.
“It is unacceptable that Muslims can ascend the Mount 24 hours a day, while Jews’ freedom of worship is limited,” he said, after touring the Mount with a police escort, and under the watchful eyes of Muslim Wakf representatives
“It was very exciting to visit the Temple Mount, on Tisha B’Av, the day of mourning for the Temple Mount. I received the impression that freedom of worship is fully implemented toward the Muslims,” Danon said. “They can enter the Mount 24 hours a day, from nine gates. Whereas the Jews can only enter from one gate, under severe restrictions.”
“Religious Jews, who wear kippahs, can only ascend the Mount in groups of fifteen people, with police escort,” he noted, “and they are forbidden from praying on the Mount. Secular [Jews] or tourists, on the other hand, can ascend freely.” Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by CNP Webmaster as Judaism, Middle East Report, Monotheistic Religions, Opinion, Recent Posts on July 20, 2010 - ט' אב תש"ע at 6:43 pm
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THE YIDDISH VOICE, Boston’s weekly Yiddish-language radio show, will feature a conversation in Yiddish with historian David Fishman, who edited _Droshes un Ksovim_, the 2009 book of writings in Yiddish by Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, on Wednesday, July 21, 2010, 7:30-8:30 PM, on WUNR-1600 AM. Info at yiddishvoice.com, or email radio@yv.org, or call 617-730-8484.
Dos Yidishe Kol: Prof’ Fishman Vegn Horav Soloveitchiks Yidishe Ksovim
Dos Yidishe Kol, di vekhntlekhe Bostoner radio-program af Yidish, vet transmitirn a shmues mitn historiker Prof’ Dovid-Elyohu Fishman, redaktor fun nay aroysgegebenem band _Droshes un Ksovim_ fun Horav Yosef-Ber Soloveitchik, kumedikn Mitvokh, dem 21stn Yuli 2010 fun 7:30 biz 8:30 in ovnt af radio-stantsye WUNR 1600 AM. Vayterdike informatsye ken men dergeyn afn vebzaytl: yiddishvoice.com, oder telefonish: 1-617-730-8484, oder durkh blitspost afn adres: radio@yv.org Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by CNP Webmaster as Education, Judaism, Recent Posts on July 19, 2010 - ח' אב תש"ע at 11:04 am
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by Rabbi Eliezer Melamed
(Israelnationalnews.com) Judaism’s Positive Approach to Converts
The laws relating to Jewish converts are among the most astounding laws in the Torah. The Torah (Bible) teaches us clearly that any non-Jew who truly seeks to join the Jewish people may do so according to Jewish law, putting the lie to those who have called the Jewish people or their laws racist.
The Nazis ruled out the possibility of joining the Aryan “race.” Jews who had converted to Christianity were viewed as Jewish in the eyes of the racist Nazis. This, however, is not the way of Judaism. In fact, if a German or an Arab should seek to join the Jewish People, even if he is the son of a fierce anti-Semite, he is accepted. Moreover, we are to love him more than other Jews, in keeping with the commandment to “love the convert, for you too were strangers in the land of Egypt” (Deuteronomy 10:19).
Relating to Converts
After a person converts to Judaism, he is like any other Jew. One must be more sensitive to his feelings than those of other Jews because of the extreme difficulties that he faces. It is not easy to leave one’s people and one’s home in order to join a nation with an ancient culture, shared history and rich tradition which is not easily absorbed even after many years of study. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by CNP Webmaster as Judaism, Monotheistic Religions, Recent Posts on July 19, 2010 - ח' אב תש"ע at 6:13 am
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Av 5, 5770, 16 July 10 08:19
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu, (Israelnationalnews.com)
Note to our readers: The following video is intended for women only. It features a woman singer and clips of her performing, which involves halakhic issues for men. Israel National News is posting this important statement by the performer in order not to deprive women viewers from seeing and hearing it.
A young woman from Gush Etzion, south of Jerusalem, has succeeded the Latma website’s “We Can Con the World” spoof on the IHH flotilla terror activists as Israel’s best PR representative.
Yedida Freilich, a daughter of Australian immigrants, plays the piano and sings an original song that decries international hypocrisy towards Israel as the video shows scenes of terrorists and their attacks on Israelis. The video, produced by photographer Daniel Sass, also features screenshots of kidnapped soldier Gilad Shalit and retired South African Judge Richard Goldstone, who authored a scathing report on Israel’s self-defensive Operation Cast Lead against the Hamas terrorist infrastructure.
The lyrics were composed with the help of her father and brother, and the joint effort resulted from an assignment at the Rubin Academy of Music and dance, where Yedida, age 22, is studying.
Posted by CNP Webmaster as Judaism, Middle East Report, Opinion, Recent Posts on July 16, 2010 - ה' אב תש"ע at 7:26 am
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