Hasidic Jews from the Strikov dynasty celebrate
the writing of a new Torah scroll in Bnei Brak, Israel, March 26, 2017. (Yaakov Naumi/Flash90)
TEL AVIV (JTA) – Israel’s projected future looks a lot like a visit to the Jerusalem central bus station: crowded and very religious. According to a government report to be released in full next week, the Jewish state’s population will double in about 40 years. Some 29 percent —… Read more »
David Friedman, right, with Israeli President Reuven Rivlin at a ceremony for new ambassadors at the president's residence in Jerusalem, May 16, 2017. (Noam Revkin Fenton/Flash90)
JERUSALEM (JTA) — The new U.S. ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, presented his credentials to President Reuven Rivlin in Jerusalem. During the ceremony Tuesday morning, Rivlin identified himself as a seventh-generation Jerusalemite and noted.”Next week, we will celebrate 50 years since Jerusalem was united, and the Jewish people were… Read more »
A simulation of cars using Autotalks' vehicle-to-vehicle communication system. (Screenshot from YouTube)
TEL AVIV (JTA) – Israeli startups are revving their engines ahead of the country’s largest-ever “smart transportation” event. Over 200 local companies working in transportation technology will be at the EcoMotion Conference on Thursday at the Peres Center for Peace in Jaffa. The plan is to give auto industry… Read more »
Israeli Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked casts her vote in preliminary parliamentary elections in Jerusalem, April 27, 2017. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)
NEW YORK (JTA) — Ten days before Donald Trump was inaugurated, Israeli Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked visited the Jewish settlement in Hebron. A community of several hundred ensconced in a city of 150,000 Palestinians, Hebron’s Jewish residents are considered to be among the most extremist and controversial Israeli settlers.… Read more »
Israel’s victory in the Six-Day War energized the movement to free Soviet Jewry, leading to pro-Israel and anti-USSR demonstrations like this one in New York City in June 1967. (Roger Viollet Collection/Getty Images)
NEW YORK (JTA) — On the morning of June 5, 1967, as Arab armies and Israel clashed following weeks of tension, Rabbi Irving “Yitz” Greenberg sat anxious amid his congregants at daily prayers — fearful that the Jewish people would face extinction for the second time in 25 years.… Read more »
Linda Sarsour speaks during a Women for Syria gathering at Union Square in New York City, April 13, 2017. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
NEW YORK (JTA) — One of the best symbols of the current Jewish political divide is a Muslim woman. To Jews on the left, Linda Sarsour is a courageous and effective activist who builds bridges and breaks stereotypes. To Jews on the right and some in the center, she’s… Read more »
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas speaking to the media in Berlin, April 19, 2016. (Sean Gallup/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON (JTA) — President Donald Trump wants a deal with Israel and the Palestinians. The Israeli and Palestinian leaders say they want Trump to make the deal. What could go wrong? For all the good cheer guaranteed when Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas meets Wednesday with Trump at the… Read more »
Staff Sgt. Joana Chris Arpon on Israeli soldiers saving her grandmother in the Philippines: “I was like, “Whoa, that’s what I want to do.” (Courtesy of IDF Spokesperson)
JERUSALEM (JTA) – Staff. Sgt. Joana Chris Arpon isn’t Israeli, or even Jewish. Her service in the Israel Defense Forces is personal. Arpon, 20, is the daughter of Filipino parents who came to the Israel to find work. She said she enlisted as a combat soldier because an Israeli army team rescued her… Read more »
TEL AVIV (JTA) – To build a Jewish state in the Middle East, Israelis had to be innovators. Some of what they’ve come up with has been used mostly by their fellow citizens — think Hebrew slang, Bamba snacks and the Iron Dome missile defense system — at least so far.… Read more »
A map of Israeli Cabinet minister Yisrael Katz's proposed regional railway. (Courtesy of the Intelligence Ministry)
TEL AVIV (JTA) – Gaza is rebuilt. The West Bank is flourishing. And the trains run from Tel Aviv to Riyadh, the Saudi Arabian capital. This is the peaceful future being pitched by Israeli Intelligence Minister Yisrael Katz. In recent months, he has been shopping around a pair of ambitious economic… Read more »
A view of the Suruc refugee camp in Turkey, which houses some 35,000 Syrian refugees. (Carl Court/Getty Images)
TEL AVIV (JTA) – At a Shabbat service in Tel Aviv on Friday evening, congregants recited the mourner’s prayer for those killed in Syria’s civil war. Standing before a mural of the Tree of Life, the rabbi of Beit Daniel, the largest Reform synagogue in Israel, delivered a sermon… Read more »
Hassan Dallal, a survivor of the chemical attack in Syria, receives medical treatment at a hospital in Idlib, April 5, 2017. (Mohammed Karkas/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images)
TEL AVIV (JTA) – In response to the alleged chemical attack in Syria on Tuesday, Israelis have donated hundreds of thousands of shekels to help children and others caught in the conflict raging on their northern border. With Israel maintaining a policy of noninterference, giving money has been a way for people here to… Read more »
Seated (L-R): Leah Avuno, Yoni Weiner, Bar Alkaher; standing: Téa, Tamir, Erin, Elana, Joshua, Jackie and Naomi Weiner
(Courtesy Naomi Weiner)
If your heart longs to visit Israel, but time doesn’t allow, consider the opportunity to bring a vibrant piece of Israel to your home. The Shinshinim Young Ambassadors Program sends Israeli high school graduates to communities all over the world to work in Jewish educational and cultural institutions (see… Read more »
Tucsonan Goggy Davidowitz takes part in a Partnership2Gether team- building exercise at the Tucson Jewish Community Center on Feb. 27. (David J. Del Grande)
Hosting the annual Partnership2Gether leadership mission in Tucson this year was ambitious and quite successful, says Oshrat Barel, director of the Weintraub Israel Center. Six partnership delegates from Israel, Tucson delegates and local community stakeholders spent a week, from Feb. 26-March 5, discussing the program, its strengths and ways… Read more »
Ricardo Horvath, manager of the Inter Aliyah soccer club, holds up a team jersey following a victory over Beitar Jaffa in Tel Aviv, March 17, 2017. (Andrew Tobin)
TEL AVIV (JTA) – “Vamos!” “Pass it!” “Ladrao!” For most of the match on a local field Friday, the Inter Aliyah Club soccer players speak a variety of languages. But when the ball hits the back of the opposing team’s net, they join in soccer’s universal victory cry: “Goooal!” Inter… Read more »
Michael Solomonov, left, stars in a new documentary about Israeli cuisine. (Florentine Films)
(JTA) — “I thought it was just going to be about falafel and hummus.” That was the perception of Israeli cuisine that filmmaker Roger Sherman had when he reluctantly decided to accompany his friend, the acclaimed Jewish cookbook writer Joan Nathan, on a food tour of Israel in 2010. But the reality exceeded… Read more »
The cast of “Nebsu,” the first Israeli prime-time show to feature a black actor in a lead role. (Reset)
TEL AVIV (JTA) – Last week, Israelis for the first time saw a black lead character on a homegrown, primetime television show. “Nebsu,” a half-hour comedy, focuses on an Ethiopian man who is married to an Ashkenazi Jewish woman. Misunderstanding ensues. “There is definitely a lot of cultural confusion in the… Read more »
Cody Decker of Team Israel holds team mascot the Mensch on a Bench after the World Baseball Classic game against the Netherlands in Seoul, South Korea, March 9, 2017. (Chung Sung-Jun/Getty Images)
TEL AVIV (JTA) — A couple weeks ago, Adam Atkins didn’t know Israel had a baseball team. But since the squad started winning games last week in the World Baseball Classic, he has become a fan. Atkins and his friends wanted team caps, but were frustrated to discover they were… Read more »
Shir Yorkevitz, right, and two other teachers dressed as Rosie the Riveter flexing at a middle school in Herzliya, Israel, March 8, 2017. (Courtesy of Yorkevitz)
TEL AVIV (JTA) – Wonder Woman, Rosie the Riveter and a female Israeli fighter pilot walked into a bar. They were just a few of the heroines out in Tel Aviv Saturday for the night of Purim. With International Women’s Day falling a day before the holiday weekend this… Read more »
Shahaf Ben-Yakov (Courtesy of Pride in Blue and White)
TEL AVIV (JTA) – Shahaf Ben-Yakov always found it maddening when her ability as a combat soldier was questioned just because of her gender. Nonetheless, she dismissed as nonsense the notion that army service “has driven our girls crazy” — as a rabbi who runs a pre-military academy in the Eli… Read more »
