Ramadan Abu-Ragila receives a doctoral degree at Ben-Gurion University (Ran Dahan/TPS)
Among the graduates receiving their doctoral degrees at Ben Gurion University of the Negev on June 28, one stood out above the rest. Ramadan Abu-Ragila, 34, has muscular dystrophy, a disease that causes progressive weakness and loss of muscle mass, is wheelchair bound and relies on an oxygen machine… Read more »
Children wave Israeli and American flags at the Celebrate Israel parade in New York City, June 4, 2017. (Perry Bindelglass)
NEW YORK (JTA) — Six years ago, the Israeli government released a series of controversial ads to show its expatriates that they would never feel at home in the United States. But last year, Israeli Cabinet members lined up to address a Washington, D.C., conference celebrating Israeli-American identity.… Read more »
Talleen Abu Hana visited Washington, D.C., to speak about her experience being a transgender woman in Israel. (Ron Kampeas)
WASHINGTON, D.C. (JTA) — Last month, the Israeli Embassy marked LGBT Pride Month with a reception for Jewish and Israeli activists and leaders. About 100 people attended the event, which featured an address by Talleen Abu Hana, an Arab Christian from Nazareth who won the first Miss Trans Israel… Read more »
Maoz Yaakov, center, leads a session at the Shiva Festival. (Courtesy of the Shiva Festival)
TEL AVIV (JTA) – In a grove in northern Israel, several dozen sweaty, shirtless Israeli men circle one another other on all fours, growling like bears. They are acting out the occasionally surly stage of the menstrual cycle, just before menstruation begins. The bear is one of four… Read more »
Aerial footage of the Dead Sea (Kobi Richter)
Israeli and Palestinian negotiators announced a far-reaching agreement July 13 to provide the Palestinian Authority with 33 million cubic meters of water a year, as part of the Red Sea-Dead Sea Canal project. At a press conference hosted by United States Special Representative for International Negotiations Jason Greenblatt, Israel’s… Read more »
Tourists at Auschwitz photographing the "Arbeit Macht Frei" gate, July 2015. (Ruth Ellen Gruber)
JERUSALEM (JTA) — The Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum said it will file a complaint with the Polish prosecutor against an Israeli woman, the granddaughter of Holocaust survivors, who removed relics from site. Rotem Bides, 27, an art student at the Beit Berl College in Kfar Saba, visited the Auschwitz… Read more »
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses members of the Visegrad Group, the leaders of Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia, July 19, (Haim Zach / GPO)
Europe is undermining its own security by undermining Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday as he was caught on live microphone bashing the European Union at a meeting with the leaders of Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia in Budapest. “We have a peculiar situation here. The… Read more »
A security post at the Gate of the Moors/Mughrabi Gate. Jerusalem, July 19, 2017. (Mati Amar/TPS)
Summer in Jerusalem: As Israel continues to sweat through the hottest summer on record the Jewish Quarter of the Old City is full of tourists, seemingly oblivious to the heat. The restaurants leading from the Quarter towards the Western Wall pump with life, as does the Hurva Square, the… Read more »
The honorees from the first generation of Conservative women rabbis pose for a photo at the 2015 Conservative Rabbinical Assembly celebration of 30 years of women in the rabbinate. (Yossi Hoffman)
NEW YORK (JTA) – The Israeli Chief Rabbinate’s so-called “blacklist” of Diaspora rabbis runs the denominational gamut. The rabbis on the list, whose letters confirming the Jewish identities of immigrants were rejected by the Chief Rabbinate in 2016, are Orthodox, Conservative, Reform — and even from the smaller… Read more »
Nedal Sader sits on his United Hatzalah motor scooter in the Old City of Jerusalem, July 14, 2017. (Andrew Tobin)
JERUSALEM (JTA) – When Nedal Sader first heard the crackle of automatic weapon fire Friday morning, he couldn’t believe it was coming from the Temple Mount. As a Muslim, he regarded the complex just outside his apartment as a sacred and peaceful place. He prayed there nearly every week. But… Read more »
Alan Gross with some of his favorite things -- a pastrami sandwich and a Cuban cigar -- at Loeb's Deli in Washington, D.C., July 12, 2017. (Ron Kampeas)
WASHINGTON (JTA) — Alan Gross contacted me a couple of months ago over Facebook Messenger. There was something he thought I should know. I was pleasantly surprised. I’d only exchanged pleasantries with Gross in the several times I’d seen him since his release from a Cuban prison in December… Read more »
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu leading a Likud party meeting at the Knesset in Jerusalem, July 10, 2017. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)
JERUSALEM (JTA) – Facing mounting scandals, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused the “fake news” media and “leftists” of trying to take him down with a campaign of lies. In a hastily organized meeting with political allies Thursday, Netanyahu denied any wrongdoing in two erupting controversies involving his associates, the… Read more »
Morris Allen, the rabbi of the Conservative Beth Jacob Congregation in Minnesota, believes he was included on the list because of his opposition to the Chief Rabbinate. (Courtesy of the Masorti Foundation)
NEW YORK (JTA) — In 2012, Rabbi Jason Herman wrote a letter to Israel’s Chief Rabbinate certifying that a friend of his who wished to get married was Jewish and single. The letter was declared invalid. But several months later Herman, spiritual leader of the Orthodox West Side Jewish… Read more »
Avi Gabbay attending a press conference after winning the Labor Party primary in Tel Aviv, Israel, July 11, 2017. (Miriam Alster/Flash90)
TEL AVIV (JTA) — He’s charismatic. He’s an outsider. And he’s a political centrist. Some have hailed Avi Gabbay, the telecom exec who was elected Monday to lead the center-left Labor Party, as Israel’s version of French President Emmanuel Macron, the banker who recently swept to power with an… Read more »
David Lau, Ashkenazi chief rabbi of Israel, speaking to children about the Kristallnacht pogroms at the Or Avner Jewish school in Berlin, Nov. 8, 2013. (Sean Gallup/Getty Images)
(JTA) — The Israeli Chief Rabbinate says that its list of foreign rabbis has been misconstrued, and that the list does not imply that those rabbis cannot be trusted to vouch for the Jewish identities of their followers. On Saturday, JTA reported on a list of some 160 rabbis… Read more »
Haredi Orthodox men praying at the Western Wall in Jerusalem, Jan. 12, 2017. (Chris McGrath/Getty Images)
NEW YORK (JTA) — American Orthodox leaders have a message for their non-Orthodox friends: Take a deep breath. When Israel’s cabinet voted twice to further empower the country’s haredi Orthodox religious establishment last month, Reform, Conservative and non-Orthodox Zionist leaders were outraged. They cancelled meetings with Israel’s prime minister.… Read more »
A group of Jewish worshippers visiting the Temple Mount complex in Jerusalem, Nov. 7, 2016. (Sebi Berens/Flash90)
JERUSALEM (JTA) – Liberal American Jews are feeling thwarted in their years-long campaign for the right to pray as they wish at the Western Wall. Long frustrated that the plaza in front of the wall is run as an Orthodox synagogue, they were doubly incensed when Israel’s political establishment scrapped an… Read more »
(Idit Wagner)
JERUSALEM (JTA) — Over the weekend, JTA and others reported on a “blacklist of rabbis” maintained by Israel’s Chief Rabbinate. The list contains the names of more than 160 rabbis whom the rabbinate does not trust to confirm the Jewish identity of immigrants to Israel. The list, obtained by… Read more »
Members of the student-led ‘Puzzle’ youth program in Kiryat Malachi (Courtesy Jewish Community Foundation of Southern Arizona)
Leah Avuno has spent the last year in Tucson as one of Tucson’s first pair of shinshinim, teen emissaries from Israel. Three years ago, Avuno was a 15-year-old immigrant to Israel from Ethiopia living with her mother, aunt and siblings in Kiryat Malachi, a city known for its diversity.… Read more »
Bernadette Donfeld (left) and Esther Becker on a hill overlooking Shilo, where the Tabernacle was located for 369 years until destroyed by the Philistines. The photo was taken on a 2011 Southwest Torah Institute Israel trip. (Bob Donfeld).
Rabbi Israel and Esther Becker will hold an informational meeting about Southwest Torah Institute’s “Israel: Where the Past Shapes Your Soul” trip planned for October on Sunday, July 23 at 11 a.m. An Israeli-style brunch will be served. “Even if you have been to Israel before, every trip presents… Read more »
