Category: News

Hamas and three other Palestinian terror groups on Friday condemned Paris talks aimed at restarting moribund peace negotiations with Israel. Palestinian Authority (PA) chairman Mahmoud Abbas and his Fatah movement have thrown their weight firmly behind the French initiative, which hosts representatives of some 25 countries, the United Nations, European Union and Arab League, on Friday. Israel has rejected the initiative and…

The annual statistics on the precise number of Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria (AKA the West Bank) have been released by former Knesset Member Yaakov “Ketzaleh” Katz. Based on the Population Registry of Israel’s Interior Ministry, there are 406,302 Jews in Judea and Samaria as of December 31, 2015. As clearly stated in the…

Police Yassam special forces and detectives conducted a nighttime raid on late Thursday night, descending upon a family home in a community in Samaria and detaining the mother of the family for investigation. The woman is a kindergarten teacher and a mother of four. In the raid the police forces came with a search warrant signed…

France prepared to host talks on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict Friday that have received a cool response from Washington, but diplomats say merely shining the spotlight onto the stalemate is a victory. After decades of failed negotiations, few believe the climate is right to bring together Israelis and Palestinians for another shot at solving one of the world’s longest-running conflicts. Indeed,…

The Jerusalem district prosecutor submitted an indictment to the district youth court against three 16-year-old Arab terrorists from Jabel Mukaber in the city’s southeast on Friday, for their stabbing attack on the Haas Promenade in the capital’s Armon Hanatziv in early May. In the attack the masked terrorists stabbed and moderately wounded two elderly women in…

Anti-Semitic incidents in New England are up more than 100% this year, according to numbers released this week by the Anti-Defamation League.  In 2015, an average of five such incidents occurred each month, while so far this year, there have been over 10 each month. The increase is “fueled by vandalism, harassment, and other acts at schools and colleges,”…

Kaytanot, or summer camps, are reaching exorbitant costs – to the expense of desperate parents, a report reveals Friday.  Kaytanot camps, usually three weeks long at most, are the savior for most working parents in Israel, who have fewer than two weeks’ vacation per year despite six to eight weeks of school holidays for their children. …

The US State Department released its annual report on global terror on Friday, and its findings for 2015 revealed that Iran remains the leading state sponsor of terrorism. The report detailed how Iran is active in the fighting in Syria, Iraq and Yemen, and is involved in violent Shi’ite attacks in Bahrain. Bahrain has accused…

In an ironic twist of fate, the same Friday that the international conference of the French initiative to force peace talks on Israel was launched in Paris, floodwaters in the capital city reached peak levels in what has been declared as a natural disaster. The River Seine in Paris is set to reach six meters (19 feet)…

The Knesset security captain on Friday decided to deploy a fixed security detail to Likud MK Amir Ohana, over fears that activists of the LGBT homosexual community would attack him during the “gay pride march” in Tel Aviv on Friday. Ohana, who is himself homosexual, announced that he would take part in the gay pride…

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is traveling to Moscow next week – possibly to realign Israel’s alliances with Russia after the Paris peace talk conference, a top political source claimed late Thursday.  “There’s a possibility that Binyamin Netanyahu will try to harness Russian President Vladimir Putin for the peace process,” the source stated to Maariv.  Whether or not Netanyahu…

Freshman Likud MK Yehuda Glick spoke with Arutz Sheva on Friday after speaking at Oz VeGaon nature preserve in Judea, a site established by Women in Green in memory of the three teens who were abducted and murdered by Hamas terrorists in June 2014. Glick began by praising Women in Green directors Nadia Matar and Yehudit Katsover…

David Lev and Dr. Sam Minskoff take a novel approach towards the implications of the boycott movement against Israel by questioning if Jews not making Aliyah helps the BDS boycott movement. Have your say! Loading… Click here to download the podcast

(JTA) — An intergovernmental body devoted to commemorating the Holocaust adopted a definition of anti-Semitism that includes some hate speech against Israel. The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, or IHRA, adopted the definition on May 26, according to a statement posted earlier this week on its website. The organization was launched in 1998 and has 31…

House Speaker Paul Ryan on Thursday finally declared his support for presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump. In an op-ed for the Janesville Gazette of Janesville, Wisconsin, Ryan wrote that he is now convinced Trump will advance the Republican agenda. “I feel confident he would help us turn the ideas in this agenda into laws…

The Islamic State (ISIS) remains the greatest worldwide terrorist threat, while Iran is still the leading state sponsor of terrorism, the State Department’s annual report finds. The U.S. said in the report, released Thursday and quoted by The Associated Press, that the number of global terrorist attacks declined slightly between 2014 and 2015, although ISIS…

(JTA) — A well-known French magazine was forced to close the online comment section of an article about a new film about anti-Semitism because it was inundated with anti-Semitic statements. Fifteen minutes after the article about “The Jews” was published Monday on the website of the weekly Marianne, “a flood of hysterical comments” appeared under…

More than 150 professors from McGill University in Montreal have signed a declaration condemning the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement and praising the university’s director denunciation of it. “Boycotts and intellectual bullying have no place at McGill or at any other institution of higher learning,” the professors wrote, noting there is a disproportionate…

Jay Shapiro claims that Hamas won the only election held in Gaza ten years ago and would win the only election that would be held in the Palestinian area in the heart of Israel. Loading… Click here to download the podcast

Jewish Home chairman and Education Minister Naftali Bennett on Thursday made clear that he will not allow a Palestinian state to be established. The comments came in response to this week’s statement by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman in which they expressed support for peace talks with the Palestinian Authority (PA)…

(JTA) – Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump is facing growing accusations that his campaign is countenancing anti-Semitism – if not encouraging it outright. Trump’s foreign policy slogan, “America First,” echoes the World War II-era noninterventionist movement championed by a notorious anti-Semite. During the height of the primary campaign, Trump delayed disavowing the support of white…

“The concert with a message”: Sunday’s Israel Day Concert in Central Park will focus on the Americans murdered by terrorists in Israel. It will be held right after the Israel Day parade, rain or shine. Organizers Dr. Paul Brody and Dr. Joe Frager noted that among the people attending the concert will by Israel’s UN…

Mike Huckabee told the attendees of the Ateret Cohanim dinner that “There is no such thing as a realistic two-state solution, in which two sovereign governments operate on the same real estate, especially when one of those governments doesn’t believe in the other’s right to exist.” The Jews who live in East Jerusalem are “a…

Hamas politburo member Mussa Abu Marzouk recently touted the “natural” ties between his Sunni terrorist organization and Shi’ite Iran, the leading state sponsor of terror in the world. Speaking to the Turkish Anadolu Agency, Marzouk claimed there was no contradiction in the ties – even though Iran is fighting Sunni factions in Syria, Iraq and Yemen, and has…

South Africa’s Chief Rabbi Warren Goldstein took the time to speak with Arutz Sheva about anti-Semitism in his country, and his remarkably successful Shabbat Project that has united Jews worldwide in Shabbat observance. The rabbi explained that anti-Semitism is low in South Africa because the country respects human rights and diversity, as part of the heritage of having experienced…

Palestinian human rights activist Bassem Ayyad, a former investigator for the radical leftist NGO B’Tselem, surprised a conference of Judea and Samaria researchers at Ariel University on Thursday when he revealed unofficial Palestinian views. Arutz Sheva got the chance to speak with Ayyad about how Palestinian Arabs view the Palestinian Authority (PA), and learned he thinks most would…

Arutz Sheva was on hand in New York to cover Young Israel of Jamaica Estates’ 15th annual L’Chaim 5K Run for Israel, and to witness an outpouring of support for the Jewish state. As of this year the annual run has raised a total of $1 million for Israel over the years, with the money being donated to humanitarian needs,…

On the sidelines of the Conference of European Rabbis Arutz Sheva got to speak with Rabbi Marc Meyer, chairman of the Hendon United Synagogue in London, about Jewish life in Europe. Regarding anti-Semitism in Europe, Rabbi Meyer – who is originally from a suburb of Paris and now resides in London – said that while the hatred appears…

Ateret Cohanim is a very significant organization,” said Dr. Rabbi Joe Stamm at the Ateret Cohanim dinner this week. What Ateret Cohanim are trying to do is “to reunite Jerusalem as the capital of Israel,” he said. “The bottom line is that the houses that AC are houses that really belonged to Jews in the…

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton on Thursday gave a speech in San Diego in which she reiterated her support for Israel. “Israel’s security is non-negotiable. They are our closest ally in the region and we have a moral obligation to defend them,” she said. In the speech, the former Secretary of State also blasted her…

Couples young and old heeded the call of famed singer Udi Davidi, sending in photos and film from their weddings to be used in a moving new music video released on Thursday, as part of his new seventh album “Orot Gvohim” (High Lights). Davidi and his wife Lilach, who live in the Har Hevron region, worked…

(AFP) Three Syrian men have been arrested in Germany over an alleged plan to launch a suicide attack there for the Islamic State jihadist group, federal prosecutors said Thursday. According to the suspects’ plan, two attackers were to detonate suicide vests while the others were to kill passersby with guns and explosives in the western…

A step too far? Recent years have seen some haredi rabbis competing over who can levy the most stringencies on their followers. But the rabbi of the Jerusalem neighborhood of Nahlaot has raised eyebrows among much of the haredi public after issuing a ban on girls aged 5 and up riding bicycles – because it’s “immodest.” The…

Police on Thursday closed a construction site in the coastal region city of Givatayim, after it was clarified that it illegally employed the Arab terrorist who stabbed and lightly wounded a 19-year-old soldier in Tel Aviv on Monday. The terrorist, a 19-year-old Arab resident of Salfit in Samaria, stabbed the soldier repeatedly with a screwdriver before being…

France’s controversial “peace initiative” heralds a serious diplomatic threat for Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, the Washington Post said in an editorial. According to the editorial published Wednesday evening on the newspaper’s website, the peace summit set to begin Friday in Paris without Palestinian or Israeli participation marks the beginning of a multilateral effort to formulate a plan for…

Ruti Hasno, the widow of terror victim Avraham Hasno, has turned to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu in a demand to demolish the house of the terrorist who murdered her husband in a car ramming attack near Hevron last October. Hasno spoke to Arutz Sheva on Thursday about how IDF engineering corps forces mapped out the home of…

Dear Jews for Justice for Palestinians, I write as a Jew for Justice for Palestinians. Unfortunately I feel that I have reached the point where I have to resign from the organization and have my name removed from the list of signatories. While I never agreed with every dot and comma of the JFJFP statement,…

Freshman Likud MK Yehuda Glick has been portrayed by media as an “extremist” for his activism pressing for Jewish prayer rights at the Temple Mount, but in an interview with the far left paper Haaretz on Thursday he revealed he has prayed at a Reform temple. “I was in a Reform synagogue several times,” Glick told the…

Hempstead Town Councilman Bruce Blakeman said Wednesday that he and his wife Sigal were “very honored” to be guests of honor at a dinner honoring Ateret Cohanim, to support a cause that “we really feel is important, reclamation of Jerusalem by Jewish families.”  “Ateret Cohanim is a wonderful organization that raises money to buy homes legally and to put Jewish…

Journalist Hanoch Daum on Thursday shared an emotional clip on Facebook, showing a visibly moved young Israeli police officer who made Aliyah from Uzbekistan after reconnecting with her Jewish roots completing her conversion process and officially rejoining the Jewish people. “This is the wonderful Yvgenya Batel Loroviya,” wrote Daum in an explanation accompanying the video. “She was…

A Tel Aviv court on Wednesday struck down dozens of restraining orders Israeli police had issued against opponents of this Friday’s planned gay pride parade. The orders, which would have barred the individuals from approaching the route of the parade in Tel Aviv, were issued against dozens of haredi and national religious activists. Police had…

Since the Second Intifada, more than 100 terrorists have used legal residency status gained through Israel’s family unification law to attack Israelis, a security establishment official revealed to a Knesset committee on Wednesday. The official also noted that such residents are playing an increasing active role in the wave of terror attacks that has left…

The Israeli Rabbinate’s kashrut department issued a warning ahead of the upcoming Shavuot holiday, cautioning shoppers that not all products labelled “kosher” had indeed been inspected by the Rabbinate and been certified as adhering to Jewish dietary laws. In particular, the Rabbinate noted that many imported cheeses lacked the Rabbinate’s kosher certification. This is true even of…

(AFP) When Hanin Radi tried to make her dream come true of staging a marathon in her hometown, the Arab Israeli received death threats from radical Islamists. “I’ve run marathons everywhere, but in the streets of my town I’m afraid to run,” said Radi, who is from the Arab town of Tirah in central Israel.…

When Trump nixed a possible visit to Israel back in December, the GOP frontrunner pledged he would visit Israel after he became president. Despite talk in March of a spring trip, Trump declared he would not be flying abroad in the midst of primary season. Now that he has clinched the 1,237 delegates needed to…

Loading… With the threat of Hezbollah looming in the north and Gazan terrorists in the south, the IDF continues to upgrade its already formidable armored capabilities adapted to guerrilla warfare. On Thursday, the Defense Ministry announced the first successful combat drill involving a new variant of the Namer (Tiger) Armored Personnel Carrier (APC), which is…

(AFP) It may be the world’s most unusual anti-theft operation, set in a cave high above a desert canyon, the blue of the Dead Sea visible in the distance.   Israeli authorities have been at work at the site, believed to have been used by ancient refugees, seeking to rescue important archaeological remains – possibly including…

The far-left NGO ‘Ir Amim’ filed an appeal on Thursday with the Supreme Court following a lower court decision permitting the annual ‘Rikudgalim’ march on Jerusalem Day to pass through the Damascus Gate in the Old City of Jerusalem. The annual event, held on the anniversary of the liberation of the Old City in 1967,…

(JTA) — The Anti-Defamation League has announced a task force to look into the anti-Semitic harassment online, including death threats, of journalists covering the 2016 presidential campaign. Its members will include at least two journalists who were targeted by self-described followers of Donald Trump after writing about the presumptive GOP candidate’s campaign for president. The…

The State Department has admitted that an official intentionally deleted several minutes of video footage from a 2013 press briefing, where a top spokeswoman seemed to acknowledge misleading the press over the Iran nuclear deal, Fox News reported Wednesday. “There was a deliberate request [to delete the footage] – this wasn’t a technical glitch,” State…

Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon (Kulanu) hinted on Wednesday that peace talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA) may soon resume. “The rumors and talk of a meaningful diplomatic process in our area have a much greater basis than some newspapers suggest. There is the possibility of a significant turnaround on the regional level,” Kahlon…

Hamas said on Wednesday that Egypt had temporarily reopened the Rafah border crossing with Gaza, reports The Associated Press. The opening of Rafah, Gaza’s main gateway to the outside world, is seen as a goodwill gesture ahead of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which starts next week. Hamas, which rules Gaza, says more than…

(JTA) — A legal adviser to the European Union supported a British firm’s contested ban on Muslim headscarves, citing the company’s policy against wearing a kippah. The European Court of Justice’s advocate general, Juliane Kokott, gave her opinion earlier this week on a lawsuit for alleged discrimination brought by a Belgian Muslim claimant against her…

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Wednesday discussed “the need for decisive joint action” against the Al-Nusra Front, an Al-Qaeda-linked jihadist group in Syria, Lavrov’s office said. The pair talked by phone about the situation in Syria, “particularly the need for decisive joint action against the Al-Nusra Front,…

(Kveller via JTA) — My camp duffel bags are 30 years old. This is the first time since 1986 that they will not make the trek with me from Chicago to Wisconsin for a summer filled with outdoor adventure and friendship. As a lifelong camper and now “retired” camp director, I have enough experience to…

Newly exposed letters reveal that British Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn in the past described Israel’s politicians as “criminals,” called for them to be banned from Britain and for trade sanctions to be imposed on the Jewish state. The letters, written by Corbyn before he was elected Labour leader, were released by the UK-based Jewish News…

Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu will visit Russia to discuss a wide range of international issues, including Syria, with Russian President Vladimir Putin next week, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Wednesday, according to the Russian Sputnik news agency. “This visit was planned long ago. The agenda is quite broad [and includes] advanced and partnership relations…

(JTA) — SodaStream, the Israeli company that brought homemade carbonated drinks to kitchens around the world, is making a bid to conquer the home pub with the introduction of Beer Bar, its first homemade brew. The company announced the addition in a news release Monday, spurring share prices to soar, according to the Israeli financial…

JTA – It was an incongruous sight: The U.N. General Assembly hall filled to capacity with 1,500 cheering people waving miniature Israeli flags and singing “Hatikvah,” Israel’s national anthem. No, hell hadn’t frozen over. The occasion was a one-day conference hosted by Israel’s U.N. mission devoted to fighting the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against…

Dozens of Iranian college students were arrested in the city of Qazvin, Iranian officials said, in what observers say is part of a wider crack-down on “immoral behavior”. According to the Mizan news agency, the students were arrested at an “immodest” graduation party which included both men and women. The students were questioned over their…

Yitzhak Weingot, the father of 15 month-old Eliya who died this week after being forgotten in a hot car, spoke in an emotional interview with haredi radio station Kol Hai about his ordeal.  Weingot noted he begged to be able to hold his son one last time, and he “would not wish upon any man in the…

Two babies were hospitalized at Schneider Children’s Hospital in Petach Tikva for being infected with herpes during circumcision, Kikar HaShabbat reports Wednesday night – and a prominent mohel has demanded that fellow mohels get checked for the disease before performing the ceremony.  Mohel Rabbi Shlomo Mahfoud told the daily that mohels must “check themselves first for cold sores – anyone infected could infect the…

A Border Police officer who last month was filmed drawing his side-arm and taking aim at haredi protesters was questioned under warning, police revealed on Wednesday. The incident in question took place during protests on May 4th by members of the Yerushalmi faction – followers of Rabbi Shmuel Auerbach, an outspoken opponent of haredi enlistment…

Archaeologist Dr. Gabi Barkai, a member of the Committee for Preventing the Destruction of Temple Mount Antiquities, welcomed a decision Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu made Tuesday to stop the Jordanian Waqf from building toilets at the foot of the Temple Mount. More measures are needed to save the site, however, he explained in a special…

JTA – Greek Defense Minister Panos Kammenos called on the Justice Ministry to take action against a neo-Nazi lawmaker after he made anti-Israel comments in parliament. Speaking during a debate in parliament on Monday, Christos Pappas, from the Golden Dawn party, called Israel an “eternal enemy of Greece and Orthodoxy.” Pappas was speaking during a…

Two people – both males – are dead in a murder-suicide at University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) Wednesday.  The shooter murdered his victim in Engineering Building 4, in Boelter Hall on the Westwood campus.  The student newspaper the Daily Bruin revealed in real-time that the shooter was wearing a black jacket and black pants; the site was…

Despite a high fertility rate and the relatively high proportion of new immigrants who settle in the city, Jerusalem’s Jewish majority has been in decline for decades. While Jews made up 72% of the city in 1990, the number fell to 68% in 2000 and just 62% in 2014. The decline has been fueled not…

The UN Security Council will hold an emergency meeting on Friday to decide whether to go ahead with air drops in Syria after the Damascus regime allowed convoys to enter two besieged towns. Russia’s Ambassador Vitaly Churkin welcomed the aid deliveries as a positive step and suggested that plans to air drop humanitarian relief could…

Dramatic new video footage has emerged from the scene of the shooting of a wounded terrorist in Hevron last March, which appears to show someone moving the terrorist’s knife closer to his body after he was killed. The video, retrieved by IDF investigators, allegedly shows an ambulance driver kicking the knife towards the terrorist, who…

US State Department officials welcomed comments by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu reaffirming his support of the two-state solution and the establishment of a Palestinian state in Judea and Samaria – but warned that Israeli leaders must take concrete steps to advance the negotiating process. Speaking at a State Department press briefing on Tuesday, spokesman John…

The French vessel Laplace has picked up signals from downed EgyptAir flight MS804’s black boxes, Egypt’s Civil Aviation Ministry announced Wednesday.  “Black boxes” are the crucial components of any aircraft which record the plane’s movements and technical settings at any given time in the Flight Data Recorder, as well as audio from the cockpit in the Cockpit…

Police have arrested Bassem al-Safadi, a reporter and photographer for the Iranian Arabic-language channel al-Alam, on suspicion of incitement and supporting terror. Al-Safadi has already been taken before a court for his initial sentencing. The judge declared that he will remain in custody until Sunday. Al-Alam claims that there was no justification for the arrest, though…

Could Donald Trump actually win the presidency? A slew of recent polls shows the presumptive Republican nominee closing in on former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in traditionally Democratic states, suggesting that this year’s race could scramble the presidential electoral map that has remained relatively stable since 1992. Since Trump became the presumptive GOP nominee…

The Dalai Lama says that “too many” refugees have already entered Europe, and that most should leave again once the danger in their home countries abates. “When we look into the face of every single refugee, especially the children and women, we can feel their suffering,” he told the German Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. “A human being…

IDF paratrooper recruits who were being bused to their induction ceremony at the Western Wall (Kotel) were told to close the curtains on the bus windows as they arrived at the Damascus Gate of Jerusalem’s Old City Tuesday night – ending a tradition honoring the route Paratroopers entered to liberate Jerusalem during the Six-Day War. …

It may yet become a TV movie, involving detectives, hideouts, false disguises, a dramatic arrest, and then the happy ending. So far, however, it is merely a true story that ended this morning – providing relief for a woman who was held “anchored” for ten years. The story began some ten years ago, when a…

The European Union’s senior legal advisor has declared that employers are within their rights to forbid workers from wearing religious articles, including kippot, headscarves and crucifixes. The issue arose when security company G4S fired a Muslim receptionist in Belgium, after she refused to remove her head covering. Lawyers representing the receptionist claimed that the move…

Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked (Jewish Home) is seeking alternatives to legislature that would completely decriminalize the personal use of soft drugs, Walla! News reports Wednesday, following a debate over a similar bill proposed by Meretz MK Tamar Zandberg.  Representatives of the Ministry of Justice confirmed that Shaked turned to the Ministry’s internal legal advisory office to examine…

Agriculture Minister Uri Ariel, the head of the Tekuma faction in the Jewish Home party, leveled unusually harsh criticism at his party chairperson Education Minister Naftali Bennett on Wednesday. In an interview with Army Radio, Ariel said Bennett was boasting in vain about obtaining achievements in his latest standoff against Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, in which he…

The Haifa District Court on Wednesday sentenced the Arab Israeli terrorist Alla Raeed Ahmed Zayud to 25 years in jail for launching a combo car ramming and stabbing attack at Gan Shmuel east of Hadera last October 11. The 20-year-old resident of Umm al-Fahm ran over two soldiers at a Gan Shmuel bus stop – including a female soldier who was…

Egypt has agreed to investigate allegations that one of its diplomats referred to Black Africans as “slaves and dogs” during a UN conference last week – while at the same time denying the incident ever took place. According to Kenyan diplomat Yvonne Khamati, who heads the Africa Diplomatic Corps technical committee, the racist remarks targeting Sub-Saharan Africans came at…

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s wife Sara Netanyahu is facing a longstanding court case alleging she verbally abused workers at the Prime Minister’s Residence, and after her lawyer defended her on Tuesday the Israel Bar Association issued rare criticism. The Jerusalem Labor Court on Tuesday awarded former employee Guy Eliyahu $30,000 in damages, after finding Sara Netanyahu guilty of abusive…

Israeli Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon spoke to Arutz Sheva on the sidelines of the Building Bridges Not Boycotts international summit at the UN General Assembly in New York on Tuesday, terming the anti-BDS boycott movement conference an “historic event.” Danon noted that over 2,000 “Jewish students and Christians came together in order to speak on behalf of the state…

MK Dr. Yifat Sasha-Biton (Kulanu), chairperson of the Children’s Rights Committee in the Knesset, has submitted a bill obligating kindergartens and infant day care centers to contact the parents of children who don’t show up. The bill comes in the shadow of an horrific case on Tuesday, in which 15-month-old Eliya Weingott tragically died after being forgotten in an…

US-backed Kurdish and Arab fighters have opened a new front against the Islamic State group in northern Syria, thrusting into a strategic jihadist pocket along the Turkish border, a monitor said on Wednesday. The swathe of territory controlled by ISIS on either side of the Euphrates River has long been a key target for Washington…

Two Arab men accused of raping a mentally handicapped Jewish girl are to be released from police custody, after their alleged victim suddenly withdrew her complaint. Police confirmed they will be releasing the men – both from the Palestinian Authority – representing the latest twist in an increasingly strange story. The girl had claimed that…

Oleg Ivanov, a member of the diplomacy and public policy group Jewish Diplomatic Corps (JDCorps), spoke to Arutz Sheva about his organization’s struggle against the BDS boycott movement targeting Israel, and about rising anti-Semitism on college campuses. Ivanov is a student at UCLA, where the BDS movement has a particularly strong presence. He noted on a rising trend on campus since…

Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, the Archbishop of Vienna who is considered second-in-line to Pope Francis, gave a special interview to Arutz Sheva at the sidelines of a convention of the Conference of European Rabbis in Vienna. Schönborn began by calling Jews and Catholics in Austria “neighbors” and “friends,” noting that “it’s less than half-a-kilometer between the synagogue and the…

Hamas authorities in Gaza on Tuesday executed three men for murder, the attorney general said, according to AFP. The three, who were not named and whose cases were unrelated, were put to death by firing squad behind closed doors, security sources said. The Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) said, however, that two of them…

(JTA) — American-Israeli basketball coach David Blatt reportedly is set to sign a deal with a Turkish team. The former Cleveland Cavaliers coach, who had tried to stay in the NBA after being fired midway through the 2015-16 season, will sign with Istanbul-based Darussafaka, the Europe-based basketball reporter David Pick reported Tuesday. Blatt’s deal is…

Mustafa Sarnic, the Turkish ambassador to the Palestinian Authority (PA), on Tuesday expressed optimism about the possibility of reaching a normalization agreement between Turkey and Israel. Speaking with Hamas’s Palestine newspaper, Sarnic estimated that the final agreement between the two countries will be reached in less than two months. He added that the sides have…

(JTA) – A teenager in Poland was arrested for allegedly smashing a Holocaust monument and scrawling anti-Semitic slogans and a neo-Nazi symbol on it. The 16-year-old had escaped from a state juvenile care center, the PAP news agency reported Tuesday, quoting a police spokeswoman. The teenager did not say why he smashed the Star of…

After the Holocaust denial cartoon contest, Iran’s Cultural-Art Masaf Institute has now announced a “Zionist Caliphate” cartoon contest, JNS.org reported Tuesday, citing Iran’s semiofficial Fars news agency. According to the Cultural-Art Masaf Institute, the latest contest’s themes focuses on “Zionism, terrorism and racism” and “ISIL (Islamic State) terrorism and genocide in the name of religion…

The Conference of European Rabbis gathered this week in Vienna, Austria, where they discussed political and halakhic issues currently on the agenda, including extreme rightist parties being elected to office in Europe, halakhic issues such as kosher slaughter, and others. Rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt, who was elected for a new five-year term as president of the…

(JTA) – Jewish groups welcomed a pledge by four internet giants to crack down on online hate speech, though some questioned the firms’ commitment to act. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Microsoft on Tuesday signed a code of conduct with the European Commission that requires them to delete the majority of reported illegal hate speech within…

This week in the Land of Israel, we begin to read the book of Numbers, which opens with the awesome iconography of Israel’s encampment in the desert around the tabernacle, each family, each tribe with its flag. In the light of the lessons of this week’s Torah portion and the upcoming celebration of Jerusalem Day…

Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister, Adel al-Jubeir, on Tuesday played down Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s remarks about the Arab peace initiative. In a joint statement on Monday, Netanyahu and newly sworn in Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman said they were ready “to negotiate with the Arab countries on updating the Arab peace initiative, to reflect the dramatic…

PLO Secretary-General Saeb Erekat on Tuesday rejected Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman’s statement in favor of peace talks and the two-state solution. Erekat said that the realization of the two-state solution requires an explicit and clear recognition of the pre-1967 borders by Israel, the WAFA news agency reported. He described the…

Bury Park in Luton is often viewed as a hotbed of Islamist extremism in the UK, and perhaps with good cause. Numerous terror suspects have come from the town, which has also seen clashes between far-right demonstrators and Muslim locals. So it might not seem like the wisest site for Zionist activists to set up…

The traditional Rikudegalim flag dance held in honor of Jerusalem Day (Sunday, June 5) will once again march through the Muslim Quarter of the Old City, the Israel Police decided Tuesday.  Police made the decision this year despite the fact that June 5 also marks the opening day of Ramadan.  To prevent friction between Jewish…

Amid a divisive debate in Ukraine on state honors for nationalists viewed as responsible for anti-Semitic pogroms, the country for the first time observed a minute of silence in memory of Symon Petliura, a 1920s statesman blamed for the murder of 50,000 Jewish compatriots. The minute was observed on May 25, the 90th anniversary of…

Asked how to avoid religion-based divisions between people, Pope Francis advised an Israeli musician to “never react” to provocations. The pontiff told this to Ofir Jacob on Monday at the Vatican during a meeting the pope had with several creators from different countries who are active on the YouTube video website. Jacob, who came to…

 A man slashed the throat of a London Underground passenger for his “Syrian brothers”, a court heard Tuesday. The aftermath of the incident in December was captured on mobile phone footage, and a bystander’s retort to the attacker – “You ain’t no Muslim, bruv” – became famous in Britain.   Muhiddin Mire, a 30-year-old Somali-born taxi driver,…

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (JTA) — Argentine judges reviewing treason charges against a former foreign minister admitted as evidence a recording of him speaking about Iranian involvement in the 1994 terrorist attack on the AMIA Jewish center in Buenos Aires. The justices of the federal appeals court ruled last week to admit the 2012 recording of…

Mosab Hassan Yousef, son of one Hamas founder Hassan Yousef who in the past served as an undercover agent for the Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet), attended the Building Bridges Not Boycotts international summit at the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in New York Tuesday, an event against the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement.  Yousef,…

Half a year ago, two-year-old Natan’s picture became an icon of the brutality of Arab terrorism, after a stabbing attack in Jerusalem’s Old City left his young father, Rabbi Aharon Banita-Bennett, dead and him and his mother Adelle injured. Rabbi Nehemia Lavi was also murdered in the attack, as he attempted to intervene after hearing…

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump attacked the media as “dishonest” Tuesday, calling one journalist a “sleaze” and another a “loser” for their coverage of the charity event he ran when he skipped a Fox News debate in January.  After controversy reigned over Fox‘s bias, Trump instead ran an event for veterans’ charities which he stated recently raised some…

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) on Tuesday laid terror charges against a Muslim man who stabbed soldiers at a Toronto military recruitment center in March, the CBC reports. The man, Ayanle Hassan Ali, is a 27-year-old born in Montreal. RCMP said they have charged Ali with three counts of attempted murder, two counts of…

The family of the infant who died in an overheated car in Ashdod Monday cleared his name for publication Tuesday: 15 month-old Eliya Weingott.  Weingott’s mother Odeya posted an emotional good-bye on Facebook Tuesday morning.  “My angel,” she said. “Please, please, please come back to mommy.”  “I am torn, I am half a person, I can’t…

US-backed Kurdish-led fighters have seized ground from the Islamic State jihadist group in Syria, a monitor said Tuesday, as the jihadists come under attack in their Fallujah bastion in neighboring Iraq. The Syrian Democratic Forces, who control a swathe of territory along the Turkish border, launched a push south towards the ISIS stronghold of Raqqa…

Jerusalem is the largest city in Israel, data from the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) reveals Tuesday, as part of data released in honor of Jerusalem Day (Sunday). 870,000 people lived in the Holy City in 2015, about 10% of the national population. Its population grew by over 20,000 people over last year, including 19,800…

Paris continues giving the Palestinian Authority (PA) funding despite the fact that it uses those funds for terror salaries, Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) revealed Tuesday.  PA official media recorded this month that Paris pays 8 million euro ($8.9 million) directly to state coffers. But the PA general budget also pays monthly salaries to terrorists like Hamas bomb…

Israel’s Supreme Court on Tuesday approved the demolition of the home of Murad Bader Abdullah Adais, who stabbed to death a Jewish mother in front of her children last January in the Judean community of Otniel. Dafna Meir was repeatedly stabbed as she fought desperately to prevent the young Arab terrorist from entering her house and…

Three Arabs suspected of raping a 20 year-old developmentally disabled Jewish woman for “nationalistic” reasons were known to the brother of the victim, he revealed to Channel 2 Tuesday.  “I knew them before… I can’t digest it could be them,” he stated. “These are people who sit with me almost every day.”  The brother of the victim would…

KATZRIN, Israel (JTA) — David Zibell is busy testing the alcohol level of the liquid flowing out of his outdoor copper still. Then, touching his head to ensure his kippah is in place, he heads inside to carefully place labels on the whiskey bottles lined up inside his distillery. The small warehouse in an industrial…

President Reuven Rivlin hosted representatives of the Board of Governors of Ariel University at the President’s Residence Tuesday, to mark the announcement of the establishment of a new joint Jewish-Palestinian regional medical center, with the support of the Helmsley Trust, in the framework of the Ariel University’s School of Health Sciences. The meeting was also addressed by Education…

Newly-appointed Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman met with the IDF’s top generals Tuesday afternoon, where he received his first briefing as defense minister from the military’s top brass. In the meeting, Liberman – who many have cast as a hardliner, but who has vowed to be “pragmatic” since coalition talks with the prime minister began – continued to…

When Alain Benhamou walked into his apartment near Paris in July 2015 and saw the words “dirty Jew” scrawled on the wall, he knew it was time to leave. It was his second such break-in in less than three months and the 71-year-old no longer felt welcome in Bondy, a Parisian suburb he had called…

A wide majority of Israeli Jews, including those both on the left and right, favor Israeli sovereignty over the city of Maale Adumim, according to a new poll conducted by the Midgam polling firm. A whopping 78% of Israeli Jews say they support the annexation of Maale Adumim even without a final status agreement with…

The local zoning and building committee is set to approve on Wednesday the construction of a new three-story building for the growing Jewish community in Silwan. The building will be built near Beit Yonatan, a seven-story apartment building owned by the Ateret Cohanim foundation, which seeks to reclaim Jewish properties in the Old City of…

Just three years after passing the “Law for the Protection of Literature and Writers”, commonly known as the “Book Law”, the Knesset repealed the legislation, removing restrictions on book sellers in force since 2014. The law, which was in a trial period and set to expire automatically in February 2017 unless renewed, was repealed by…

The Supreme Court responded to an appeal on Tuesday by Yonatan Heilo over his 2013 murder conviction stemming from the death of Yaron Eilin in 2010. The court altered the conviction from murder to manslaughter, and reduced Heilo’s sentence by 8 years, from 20 to just 12. Heilo claimed in his defense that Eilin, whom…

Likud MK Benny Begin on Tuesday blasted the appointment of Yisrael Beytenu chief Avigdor Liberman as Defense Minister, ridiculing right-wing supporters of the move as “fools”. “There are three kinds of right-wingers,” said Begin, “moderate right-wingers, extreme right-wingers, and foolish right-wingers.” “Just yesterday Liberman showed us his views,” said Begin, referring to Liberman’s call for…

MK Shuli Mualem (Jewish Home) played down fears on Tuesday, following Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman’s comments Monday night in favor of the establishment of a Palestinian state. “At this point I still do not see a reason to be concerned by these kinds of declarations regarding a peace [treaty] or others by the incoming Defense…

MK Yisrael Eichler (United Torah Judaism) had harsh criticism for the Israel Police on Monday at a discussion in the Knesset on police violence against Israelis during protests, searches of detainees and even while handing out traffic tickets. Eichler related specifically to police violence against the haredi community which, he claimed, routinely takes place and not…

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu told a delegation of visiting U.S. congressmen on Monday that an agreement on reconciliation with Turkey is very close, Haaretz reports. However, officials in Jerusalem are still waiting to set the decisive meeting between the two negotiating teams during which the remaining disagreements are meant to be closed. Israel and Turkey…

BOSTON (JTA) — Recent vandalism targeting three New England synagogues is aimed at intimidating the Jewish community, the director of the New England office of the Anti-Defamation League said. Robert Trestan said the attacks at two synagogues in the Boston area and one in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, are part of a spike in anti-Semitic incidents…

Can leading a religious lifestyle make you healthier? Recent research found that women who frequently attend religious services have a lower risk of death from all causes, including heart disease and cancer, than those who do not. The study, reported by CBS News and published by JAMA Internal Medicine, does not prove a cause and…

(JTA) — Donald Trump said he would not debate Bernie Sanders because it would be “inappropriate” in light of Sanders trailing Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primary fight. Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee for president, addressed the possibility of debating the Vermont senator on Friday in a statement, CNN reported. “Based on the fact that…

North Korea on Tuesday appeared to have tried and failed with a fresh ballistic missile launch in violation of existing United Nations resolutions, South Korea’s defense ministry said, according to AFP. The defense ministry in Seoul said the missile test took place at around 5:20 a.m. local time (2020 GMT Monday) near the eastern port…

The Arab-Israeli owner of a restaurant in Columbus, Ohio, which was attacked by a machete-wielding assailant in February, is shutting down operations. Hany Baransi, owner of the Nazareth Restaurant Deli, was initially unfazed by the attack and vowed he would not remove the Israeli flag from his door. But he has now announced that he has run…

Despite the hot weather, tens of thousands of supporters of Israel participated in the UJA Federation of Greater Toronto’s 46th annual Walk for Israel, which took place on Sunday. Before the walk began, a letter sent by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to the participants and expressing the government’s support for Israel was read. “For…

Education Minister Naftali Bennett, head of the Jewish Home party, on Monday expressed support for a proposed bill that would limit the tenure of a Prime Minister to two terms. The opposition bill was authored by MK Merav Michaeli (Zionist Union), who on Monday asked Bennett whether he would support the move during a discussion…

Jordan’s new Prime Minister, Hani Mulki, who was appointed by King Abdullah II on Sunday after he dissolved parliament, is being described by Arab media as “pro-Israel”. Husam Abdallat, a former senior government aide at the prime minister’s office, told the Al Jazeera network on Monday that Mulki will most likely be given the job…

A 19-year-old soldier was stabbed by an Arab assailant in Tel Aviv on Monday and left lightly to moderately wounded, in what police have indicated was a terrorist attack. Police were able to hunt down his attacker a short time later, and they identified that an initial investigation revealed the stabber is a 19-year-old Arab…

Border Police officers located a semi-automatic M-16 assault rifle on Monday in a home in the Arab Israeli village of Ain al-Sahla in the Wadi Ara region in the north. Making the finding of the M-16 all the more unusual was that the lethal weapon was inscribed with the logo of the US Navy SEALs, likely indicating it…

Omar Diaby, believed to be a leading French recruiter of jihadists in Syria, has declared himself alive after falsely announcing his death to receive medical treatment, France 2 television reported. Speaking on Skype, Diaby, who also goes by the name Omar Omsen, told a France 2 journalist: “The emir Omar Omsen is not dead. His death was announced for a very precise…

The Communist terror organization Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) has called for a “mass struggle” to stop the French initiative, which seeks to impose peace talks on Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA). Just last Sunday French Prime Minister Manuel Valls visited Israel in an attempt to garner support for the initiative, even…

The Knesset voted on Monday to approve Avigdor Liberman’s appointment as Defense Minister. The Yisrael Beytenu chief was approved 55 to 43 in a Knesset vote that largely followed party lines. One member of the governing Likud party, however, abstained from the vote – Benny Begin. Yisrael Beytenu’s other ministerial appointment was also approved by…

Chilling evidence was unearthed following the confiscation of the laptop of Salah Abdeslam, primary orchestrator of the Paris and Brussels terrorist attacks. Following Abdeslam’s capture, police discovered plans to attack football fans in Marseille where England will play Russia next month in the Euro 2016. Authorities fear that ISIS followers will execute the attacks outlined despite…

A group of anti-Zionist protesters affiliated with the Neturei Karta movement demonstrated against the Walk With Israel in Toronto on Sunday, at the Princes’ Gate entrance to Exhibition Place. The protesters waved PLO flags and erected signs reading “Jews Mourn 68 Years Existence of ‘Israel’ A Rebellion Against the Almighty and Disaster for Humanity,” and…

The father of the 19-year-old soldier who was stabbed and lightly wounded by an Arab terrorist in Tel Aviv on Monday evening later reenacted the moments of horror. “I’m still stressed from what I saw. I drove home and I saw him (my son) holding his head, shouting ‘dad, dad, a terrorist stabbed me, call an ambulance,’”…

Religious star Hanan Ben-Ari has sealed his fame gaining heavy rotation on Israeli radio with a variety of hit singles that are as skillfully crafted as they are diverse in their styles – now he has released a new instant classic to join the list. “Lama,” which was written and composed by the young virtuoso,…

Newly sworn in Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman was quick to announce on Monday evening that he supports the “two-state solution” to solve the Israeli-Palestinian Arab conflict. In a joint statement, Liberman and Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu expressed support for the recent call by Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi for the sides to reach a peace…

While some in the Zionist Union, like former Kibbutz Movement Secretary General Eitan Broshi, have sought to push the Labor faction towards the center in a bid to make the party competitive again, some leading Labor figures have refused to moderate their rhetoric, and appear intent on turning the party into a vehicle for radical…

Attorney David M. Friedman, one of Donald trump’s two advisors on Israel, told Arutz Sheva in an exclusive interview that Donald Trump has assured him he will not pressure Israel into “peace processes” and concessions that it does not want. “I’ve known Donald Trump for about 15 years,” he said, in a conversation with Dr. Joseph Frager.…

A new landmark poll has revealed that a full third of Americans believe the BDS movement’s boycott of the Jewish state is justified, in a sign of shifting support from the US which has traditionally been a staunch ally of Israel. A full 33% of Americans called a boycott of Israel justifiable, according to the…

The recently published IDF Ombudsman report, which was presented to IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eizenkot, reveals the success – and challenges – of the army’s ongoing efforts to improve the condition of Israel’s soldiers. The report, drafted by the IDF’s Ombudsman for Soldiers Yitzhak Brik, noted the heightened demands placed upon the IDF and…

Newly-erected Holocaust monuments in Poland and Italy were vandalized by individuals who wrote on them far-right and far-left slogans, respectively. The Polish monument, which was unveiled in 2014 in the country’s northeast, was hit for the second time in a little over a year by unidentified culprits who broke off part of its surface and…

Judge Itai Hermelin of the Tel Aviv court for local affairs issued an order on Monday temporarily closing a house of prostitution that has been engaged in a legal battle for over a year – but in the same order, he outlined conditions for legal prostitution in a shocking precedent. Hermelin ordered to close the brothel…

Jews are the most libertine religious group in America according to a new Gallup poll, and are more likely even than people with no religion to find same-sex relations and abortion to be morally acceptable. As a group, American Jews have long leaned towards the Democratic Party, a tendency which has persisted despite rising average…

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu on Monday called to expand the coalition even further during a Likud faction meeting, in an apparent overture to the leftist Zionist Union after Yisrael Beytenu was brought into the government. Netanyahu’s renewed invitation for a unity government was directed at any party that wants to “advance security and peace.” He said that…

Numerous Palestinian terror organizations spoke out in criticism of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) after it marked its 52nd anniversary on Saturday. The PLO was established by arch-terrorist Yasser Arafat in 1964 in order to wage “armed struggle” to “liberate Palestine.” The group’s pro-terror stance has remained constant, with one PLO official last October calling the murder of…

MK Haim Yellin (Yesh Atid), former head of the Eshkol Regional Council located adjacent to Gaza, harshly condemned the appointment of Yisrael Beytenu head Avigdor Liberman as Defense Minister at a Knesset plenum session on Monday. “It’s been a week that I’m walking around with a gas mask due to the political stench that is…

A significant majority of Stanford University students oppose the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement – despite an anti-Semitism and BDS crises that rocked the university student board earlier this year.  69% of students oppose the anti-Israel movement – including 65% of freshmen, 72% of sophomores, and 73% of juniors, the Stanford Review poll of 288 students revealed. …

The Israeli government on Monday morning formally approved the appointment of Yisrael Beytenu party leader Avigdor Liberman as defense minister. “The cabinet unanimously approved the appointment of Avigdor Liberman as minister of defense,” a statement from Netanyahu’s office said. The unanimous cabinet approval came after Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu finally secured the vital backing of the…

Former Bradford West MP Naz Shah was “ignorant about Judaism” when she made the anti-Semitic comments leading to her suspension, she stated at a Leeds synagogue Sunday night.  “It is my job in the Muslim Community to highlight the issues of anti-Semitism,” she stated, according to the Jewish News. “Going to Auschwitz is a fantastic idea but…

Three Arab terrorists who stabbed a group of elderly women in Jerusalem earlier this month have been arrested, it was cleared for publication Monday morning. The horrific attack in Armon Hanatziv on March 10, left two women in their 80s moderately wounded. It began when a group of five elderly women on a morning walk noticed two…

The European Jewish Congress (EJC) called on European Parliament President Martin Schulz to take action against MEP Martina Anderson on Monday, after she said Israeli lobbyists were “all over this place like a rash” during a parliament meeting last week. “Once again we hear deeply offensive statements about Jews from a European public figure and we demand…

The small Jewish community in Edirne, in northwest Turkey, has waited patiently since 1976 for a wedding in its local synagogue – and when it finally occurred yesterday, the response it drew from other Turks was less than celebratory. The wedding was set to be such a significant and joyous event that it was decided…

Defying BDS calls for a boycott of Israel, Italy has committed itself to bring the largest ever delegation of Italian academics to Israel. A series of conferences and events will take place across the country for four days this week. Italian and Israeli researchers will be invited to participate in an exchange of information and…

Rescue forces were called to the scene of a toddler forgotten in a car in Ashdod. The infant, aged about one and a half years old, showed no signs of life and MDA paramedics confirmed him dead on the scene.  The toddler was discovered in a vehicle parked on Millman Street, Ashdod, at noon on…

The US-led consortium leading the development of Israel’s offshore gas reserves has announced its first sales deal since a reworked agreement on a key offshore field was given the go-ahead. The consortium, led by US firm Noble Energy, Sunday announced a $3-billion deal to supply 13 billion cubic meters of natural gas from the Leviathan field to a power…

Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked (Jewish Home) welcomed Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s decision to keep the coalition intact, she stated in an Arutz Sheva interview Monday, following a last-minute compromise brokered by Health Minister Yaakov Litzman (United Torah Judaism) to pave the way for changes in the Security Cabinet.  “It was ultimately the Prime Minister’s decision” whether Jewish Home would…

Ex-Israeli ambassador in the U.S. Yoram Ettinger has compiled a list of sound bites that succinctly explain the background of the “Palestinian refugees.” One of the Palestinian Authority’s perpetual demands whenever talk of negotiations with Israel comes up is that the “Palestinian refugees” from 1948 be allowed to return to their former homes inside Israel.…

The Syrian opposition’s chief negotiator in stalled UN-brokered peace talks, Mohammed Alloush, announced his resignation on Sunday night. He cited the failure of the Geneva negotiations and the continued shelling of rebel-held areas by President Bashar Al-Assad’s regime as reasons for stepping down, according to AFP. “The three rounds of talks were unsuccessful because of…

Jordan’s King Abdullah on Sunday dissolved the country’s parliament and appointed veteran politician Hani Mulqi as caretaker prime minister, Reuters reported. Mulqi has been charged by the king with organizing new elections by October. The king accepted the resignation of Prime Minister Abdullah Ensour before appointing Mulqi by royal decree. Under the constitutional rules the…

Ali Larijani was re-elected on Sunday as the temporary speaker of Iran’s new parliament which is dominated by first-term deputies, Reuters reported.  Larijani, who is considered a “moderate conservative”, cooperated closely with the government of Iranian President Hassan Rouhani in approving Iran’s nuclear deal with world powers last year. He won 173 votes in the…

Fiji announced on Sunday it would be bringing home about 65 of the 300-plus peacekeepers it has stationed in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula, The Associated Press reported. The country also said it has closed remote bases in the Sinai as the security situation deteriorates. Commander Humphery Tawake, who heads the South Pacific nation’s foreign peacekeeping force,…

Kamal Al-Khatib, deputy leader of the outlawed northern branch of the Islamic Movement, believes that the appointment of MK Avigdor Liberman as Defense Minister means the “beginning of the end of the Zionist enterprise.” Khatib made the comments in an interview to the Shams News website, citing as proof an op-ed in the Yedioth Ahronoth…

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has narrowed his potential running mates to a “very small” list, his campaign manager Corey Lewandowski said Sunday. Speaking to “Fox News Sunday”, Lewandowski said the vetting team has “started to shrink down that pool.” “I can say that the list is very small and we have a very good…

Construction and Housing Minister Yoav Galant (Kulanu) admitted recently that the government’s policy is not to build in Judea and Samaria and that he abides by it. Galant made the comments in a meeting with the heads of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations in New York last week. The Haaretz newspaper…

A total of 54 flights were diverted on Sunday after an unexploded American bomb dropped during World War II was found at Hanover Airport in northern Germany, in a stark reminder of the war. Last week soundings of the airport’s soil ahead of apron resurfacing work picked up magnetic interference at two separate sites, leading local…

The New York City Police Department (NYPD) is searching for a man who spray-painted anti-Semitic graffiti on the side of a building in downtown Manhattan, according to local reports. According to police, the vandal painted a swastika, a Jewish star and what appears to be a pair of eyes underneath a halo, along with the…

A police traffic officer who was patrolling in Ramat Gan on Sunday spotted a motorcyclist driving recklessly, in what turned out to be a highly ironic arrest. The motorcyclist sped away, avoiding several attempts by the officer to stop him for a routine check. Then the rider abandoned his motorcycle at the side of the road and…

President Reuven Rivlin on Sunday was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from Hebrew University at a convocation ceremony held at the University’s Mt. Scopus campus in Jerusalem. Rivlin addressed the audience, which included 277 students who were awarded Doctor of Philosophy degrees, of the importance of academia in bringing together the different communities in Israel. “Within…

Health Minister Ya’akov Litzman (United Torah Judaism) suggested a compromise to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu in the coalition crisis with Education Minister Naftali Bennett (Jewish Home), it was revealed Sunday – but Netanyahu refused. Bennett has threatened to bolt the coalition over his demand to have military secretaries appointed to every minister on the Security Cabinet, following…

In response to the current standoff over Education Minister Naftali Bennett’s (Jewish Home) demand to appoint a military secretary to every Security Cabinet minister, Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely (Likud) on Sunday warned Bennett not to bring down the government. Bennett has threatened to bolt the coalition and not support the entry of Yisrael Beytenu over his…

Real estate mogul Donald Trump, who currently is the Republican presidential nominee, decided to launch his campaign due to the controversial Iran nuclear deal sealed last July, according to his son Eric. “I think, honestly, the Iran nuclear deal was one of the things that made him jump into the race,” Eric Trump told the…

The Education Department of the Beit Shemesh Municipality on Sunday held a discussion regarding student transportation for special education schools. The municipality invited all parents to attend at the summit, which was attended by the municipality Commissioner of Education, Rabbi Yeshayahu Ehrenreich, and the Director of Education, Rabbi Yohanan Kirshenbaum. However, secular parents were furious…

Jordan Justein, an 18-year-old high school student, was harassed and kicked by anti-Israel protesters after he defiantly counter-protested an anti-Israel rally, according to CIJnews. The anti-Israel protest was being held outside the Metro Toronto Convention Center, during the Canadian Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies Spirit of Hope gala, which included notable guests…

Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders on Sunday emphasized that he believes in Israel’s right to exist, but also said that in order to achieve peace in the Middle East, the United States would have to take the Palestinian Arabs into account as well. “I am 100 percent pro-Israel in the sense of Israel’s right to…

Beilinson Hospital’s Department of Organ Transplantation conducted a unique kidney transplant, setting a first in Israel. Nine years ago, a 55-year-old woman underwent a kidney transplant in the Philippines. Last week, the woman died of a stroke and the kidney was implanted for a second time into a new recipient – her brother. Professor Eytan Mor,…

Arab assailants from the village of Urif in Samaria set two fires adjacent to the Jewish town of Yitzhar last Friday afternoon, report residents of the Jewish town. The town’s firefighter team, together with soldiers and residents, struggled against the large blazes just west and south of Yitzhar for over two hours, until they finally…

Speaking at Harvard University’s commencement, filmmaker Steven Spielberg said he was “wrong” as a kid to think anti-Semitism “was fading.” Spielberg, whose 99-year-old father Arnold sat in one of the first rows at his address before the Ivy League university’s class of 2016, told the graduates Thursday that the world “is full of monsters” espousing…

Russian news outlet RT reported that Palestinian Authority (PA) chief Mahmoud Abbas wants NATO to replace IDF forces in Judea and Samaria as part of any long term peace deal with Israel. Meanwhile, the Arab League has welcomed a French initiative for peace talks between Israel and the PA. Abbas addressed a meeting of foreign ministers held…

Deputy Defense Minister Rabbi Eli Ben-Dahan met Sunday with the Elders’ Forum of National Religious Rabbis including chairman Rabbi Haim Druckman, who heads the Ohr Etzion Yeshiva, the Bnei Akiva Youth Movement and the Center for Bnei Akiva Yeshivot. During the meeting, the rabbis expressed their support for Jewish Home Chairman and Education Minister Naftali Bennett’s demands…

French Jews are experiencing the most difficult situation they have encountered since the end of World War II, the newly-elected president of France’s umbrella of Jewish communities said. Francis Kalifat, 64, said Sunday that his first priority as president of CRIF is to fight against the anti-Semitism that he said was responsible for the situation…

In an unprecedented move, Homefront Commander Maj. Gen. Yoel Strick has forbidden a Jewish youth from contacting a whopping 87 people, all of whom were listed by name in an administrative order. The youth received two administrative orders last Friday – the orders are a relic from the British Mandate which do not require any evidence,…

Israel sent $20,000 worth of supplies to the Disaster Relief Management Ministry of Sri Lanka, following recent floods and landslides that have caused countless deaths and much damage in the island nation. The disaster relief supplies included water pumps, water filters, solar lighting kits and LED torches, as well as 50,000 tablets for water purification, to people…

The Health Ministry has warned of an outbreak of the West Nile virus in Israel, after four cases were reported in the last two months since March. One patient was diagnosed as having the virus, while the other three cases were estimated as being the illness but were not diagnosed. This is not the first…

The Palestinian Authority’s Ministry of Health submitted a report that was used in formulating the UN World Health Organization’s (WHO) discriminatory resolution last week, which singled out Israel as the world’s only “health rights violator.” That report included numerous claims and photographs negatively portraying Israel. There’s just one problem – many of the pictures were blatantly…

Senior IDF officials believed that the terror tunnel operation during Operation Protective Edge was incomplete at the war’s end, a report revealed Sunday – long before the military uncovered two terror tunnels earlier this year proving that fact.  Several officers involved in the operation spoke to Army Radio reporters early Sunday, where they stated that the blanket…

Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked (Jewish Home) spoke out on Army Radio on Sunday regarding her party’s demands for security cabinet reforms, saying that the Jewish Home was not prepared to compromise on the issue. “If we, as the members of the security cabinet, have at the end of the day the responsibility during wartime, we…

An American Palestinian Arab activist made bold statements against the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), the watchdog revealed this week, claiming that MEMRI is part of a ‘Zionist plot.’  “As part of the Zionist movement’s cultural infiltration (into American society), it has managed to convince a large part of American public opinion that the two countries…

The ‘nationalistic rape’ of a mentally handicapped Israeli woman may not have been terror-related at all, Israel Police sources claimed Sunday.  “It looks like we aren’t talking about a nationalistic crime,” Police spokesperson Merav Lapidot told Army Radio Sunday. “From the beginning, the investigation team realized that this story is more complex than it looks.” Lapidot stressed that the…

A unique Bar Mitzvah celebration took place at the Yeshivat Hesder Meir Harel in Modi’in Thursday, on Lag Ba’Omer. The Bar Mitzvah boy, an autistic teen, was the first to celebrate the milestone since the inception of the Bar Mitzvah program Shahak LeBnei Mitzvah eight years ago, complete with an Aliyah to the Torah.  The Bar Mitzvah boy…

Its every parent’s worst nightmare: a small child goes to sleep with no apparent signs of life-threatening illness – but never wakes up. That’s the sad story of a grief-stricken family in the Kiryat HaYovel neighborhood of Jerusalem, who discovered their three-year old son had not woken up Sunday morning – and could not be…

Israeli security forces have apprehended the Hamas terrorist cell responsible for the bombing of a number 12 bus in Jerusalem on April 18 which left 19 people injured, many of them seriously, it has been cleared for publication. The six-man terror cell was based in the Palestinian Authority city of Bethlehem, just south of the Israeli capital,…

Some 2,000 left-wing activists demonstrated in Tel Aviv on Saturday night, protesting Yisrael Beytenu chief Avigdor Liberman’s appointment as Defense Minister. The protest was led by Zahava Gal-On, head of the far-left Meretz party, and Ayman Odeh, chairman of the predominantly Arab Joint List party. The pair praised what they called the joint demonstration, saying…

An anxious job-seeker in the Ukrainian town of Medzhybizh tried finding work at the local synagogue, but when he was told to come back later he became incensed – and tried to stab the rabbi. The rabbi in question says it was a miracle no one was hurt and that the man could have murdered…

An advanced missile defense system was installed on Israeli Air Force (IAF) CH-53 Yasur transport helicopters, the military confirmed last week, as part of its target to upgrade the helicopters by 2025.  The Dragon Block 3 defense system provides 360° coverage against missile attacks and provide faster countermeasure service.  CH-53 helicopters, in service since 2006, have…

It’s the old, “I’d like to say a few words before I speak” line. Bear with me… I recently spent Shabbat with a daughter and grandchildren while my son-in-law the doctor was in miluim (reserve duty). My eight-year-old grandson asked me to learn with him in shul after Mincha. Momentarily surprised, I found out that…

Canada once again backed Israel at the UN this week when it voted against the World Health Organization’s (WHO) resolution singling out only Israel for “mental, physical and environmental health” rights abuse. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Liberal government joined the Israel, the United States, Australia, Paraguay, Guatemala, Micronesia and Papua New Guinea as the only…

Education Minister and Jewish Home chairman Naftali Bennett on Saturday night elaborated on his demands to optimize the Security Cabinet as a precondition for the Jewish Home to support the expansion of the coalition. Writing on Facebook, Bennett recalled leaving the world of high-tech and entering politics following the Second Lebanon War, where he saw…

British Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn is once again in hot water, this time over his failure to reply to Israeli Labor leader MK Yitzhak Herzog’s concerns of the anti-Semitism in the British party. The Guardian reported on Saturday that Corbyn is facing criticism from members of his own party over his handling of anti-Semitism allegations,…

Arab League chief Nabil al-Arabi blasted Israel as a bastion of “fascism and racial discrimination” on Saturday at a meeting of foreign ministers to discuss a French Middle East peace initiative. The Arab ministers are expected to adopt a resolution on the plan to revivenegotiations between Israel and President Mahmoud Abbas’s Palestinian Authority. In his…

The suspect in the double murder of a couple in Rishon Letzion last week was killed in a shootout with police Saturday. Yaan Gavrielov was shot dead by Central District Commander Moti Cohen, after a police chase in the central Israeli city of Lod, near Tel Aviv. The chase began at around 6:30 p.m., when a…

A leader of the left-wing ‘Momentum’ political action committee and member of the UK’s Labour party has been reinstated, following an investigation into what were described as anti-Semitic statements that had led to her suspension. Jackie Walker, who was suspended earlier this month following controversial comments condemning Jews as enablers of the “African holocaust”, was…

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Saturday condemned the United States’ support of Kurdish fighters in Syria after AFP pictures revealed US commandos wearing the insignia of a militia branded a terror group by Ankara.   “The support they give to… the YPG (militia)… I condemn it,” said Erdogan. “Those who are our friends, who…

The family of Abedel Fattah al-Sharif, the Arab terrorist who was neutralized and later killed by IDF soldier Elor Azariya during a terror attack in Hevron in March, buried al-Sharif in Hevron on Saturday, amid demands for revenge. The body of al-Sharif was returned to his family on Friday, before it was examined at the…

Former Mayor of London Ken Livingstone has been fired from his radio show, in response to anti-Semitic comments made last month. Livingstone has already been suspended from the Labour Party, where he was until recently a senior policymaker, after claiming in an interview that Adolf Hitler was a Zionist, and appearing to back some of…

The US State Department has been caught employing a stunning double-standards vis-a-vis Israel and Iran, shedding a light on the antagonism towards the Jewish state by the Obama administration, even as it cozies up to the Islamic Republic. Last week, State Department spokesman Mark Toner angered officials in Israel, after he criticized the Israeli coalition deal…

An elderly Coptic Christian woman was attacked by a wild mob last week, who stripped her naked and paraded her down the streets of Minya, south of Cairo. Rioters also attacked Christian homes in Minya, raiding at least seven before burning them to the ground. Local police say the incident was sparked by rumors of…

A 24-year old Lodi, New Jersey man was convicted of terrorism on Friday for his 2012 attacks on two synagogues and the home of a local rabbi. Anthony Graziano, who carried out the attacks in January 2012 with an accomplice, Aakash Dalal, is the first person convicted under New Jersey’s anti-terrorism law, which was enacted…

Amnesty International warned on Friday that a surge in executions carried out by Saudi authorities could see more than 100 people put to death in the first six months of 2016, AFP reported. The London-based watchdog said that the kingdom carried out at least 158 death sentences last year, making it the third most prolific…

Former Yisrael Beytenu MK Sharon Gal, who unexpectedly resigned from the Knesset just a short time after becoming an MK, on Friday expressed confidence that Avigdor Liberman would have success as Defense Minister. “I am 100 percent confident that Liberman will be a responsible Defense Minister,” Gal told Channel 10 News, adding, “Israel elected a rightist-nationalist…

Several dozen entrepreneurs, activists and journalists from New York, New Jersey and Maryland descended upon the Russell Senate Building in Washington, DC, on Wednesday as part of the Orthodox Jewish Chamber of Commerce (OJC) delegation to the Jewish Heritage Month celebration luncheon in the nation’s capital. At the Glatt Kosher event, Duvi Honig, founder and director of…

A new party led by former Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon, former Minister Gideon Sa’ar and Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon could topple the Likud, a poll released Friday found. According to the poll, which was conducted for Kol Yisrael radio, such a party would win the next election and achieve 25 Knesset seats. Likud would come…

Warplanes from the American-led coalition on Friday pounded the Islamic State (ISIS) group with at least 150 strikes to bolster a major offensive on the jihadists’ Syrian stronghold of Raqa, a monitor said. The U.S. is backing twin assaults against ISIS — one in Raqa province and another which aims to retake the Iraqi city…

Palestinian Authority-based media reported on Friday evening that Israel had returned the body of Abdel-Fattah al-Sharif, the terrorist who was shot by IDF soldier Elor Azariya in Hevron. Al-Sharif’s funeral will reportedly be held on Saturday in Hevron. According to the PA reports, his body was transferred through the Tarqumiyah crossing. Azariya, of course, is currently…

American air strikes have killed a leader of the Islamic State (ISIS) in the Iraqi city of Fallujah, The Independent reported Friday. Maher al-Bilawi, the commander of ISIS in Falluajh, was killed on May 25, the report quoted the spokesperson of the U.S. military campaign leading the fight against ISIS in Iraq and Syria as…

Terrorists from Gaza on Friday night fired rockets towards southern Israel, but missed the mark as three rockets exploded on the Gazan side of the border. There were no reports of injuries or damages on the Palestinian side. Earlier this week, a rocket from Gaza was fired towards southern Israel, exploding in an open area…

The search for the EgyptAir plane which crashed last week killing all 66 people on board has narrowed to a five-kilometer-wide area in the Mediterranean Sea, based on signals from the craft’s emergency beacon, Egypt’s chief investigator said Friday, according to The Associated Press. The chief investigator, Ayman al-Moqadem, said Airbus had given Egyptian authorities…

The United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Jordan are planning for a post-Mahmoud Abbas era in the Palestinian Authority, which would leave Abbas’s arch-rival Mohammed Dahlan in control of the PA, the Middle East Eye website exposed on Friday. Senior Palestinian and Jordanian sources told MEE separately of the plan. Although there were differences in emphasis…

US President Barack Obama’s administration has not exercised its right under US law to sanction the Russian sale of an advanced weapon system to Iran, leading some in Congress to demand clarifications and accuse the administration of appeasing Tehran. Obama can declare Russia’s sale of the S-300 missile defense system as illegal and enact sanctions…

US President Barack Obama on Friday became the first sitting president to visit the site of the atomic bombing in Hiroshima, Japan, where he called on world nations to “escape the logic of fear” and reduce their nuclear arsenals. Obama, who was in the country while attending a G7 summit, visited the Hiroshima Peace Memorial…

Gilad Ach, chairman of the Ad Kan nationalist group that has infiltrated and exposed radical leftist organizations, responded on Friday to the announcement of B’Tselem from Wednesday when it said it was cutting its cooperation with the IDF. In the announcement the far leftist group said it will no longer work with the military prosecution to submit complaints on “war crimes”…

Outgoing Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon (Likud) addressed the resignation of Environmental Protection Minister Avi Gabay (Kulanu) from politics Friday, praising the move as taking a stand against Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s leadership.   “In our politics, standing firm on principles has become subject to ridicule, whereas flip-flopping and deceit are considered ‘sophisticated,’” Ya’alon tweeted Friday. “The full…

The Palestinian Authority (PA) responded furiously to a declaration by Hamas late Thursday, according to which they can execute Palestinian Arabs in Gaza without the consent of PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas.  Such a declaration is “illegal” and “against basic Palestinian law,” Ramallah stated Friday – adding that death sentences can only be handed down by the…

Arab MK Taleb Abu Arar (Joint List) on Friday declared in an interview with the Hamas paper Palestine that his party’s Arab MKs will defy Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s order not to visit the Temple Mount. Last October, Netanyahu instructed Jerusalem police not to allow any ministers or MKs, either Jewish or Arab, to visit the Mount, which is the holiest…

“Hashem spoke to Moshe on Mount Sinai saying: Speak to the Children of Israel and say to them: When you come into the Land that I give you, the Land shall observe a Sabbath Rest for Hashem.”(25:1-2) Rashi immediately jumps on the opening Posuk of Parshat Behar and asks “Were not all the commandments stated…

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu announced changes to the intelligence sharing process in the Security Cabinet, in a move to placate demands by Jewish Home leader and Education Minister Naftali Bennett, who has threatened not to support the coalition agreement with Yisrael Beytenu if changes aren’t made.  The PM’s office announced the formation of a committee “to recommend…

Former MK Nissim Ze’ev, one of the founders of the Shas party, is calling on Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat to cancel the dance performance “More than Naked” which is scheduled for Friday at the Jerusalem Theater as part of the Israel Festival. In an interview with Arutz Sheva, Ze’ev noted that during the performance 12 completely…

Environmental Protection Minister Avi Gabay (Kulanu) resigned from his post Friday, in protest over the appointment of Yisrael Beytenu chairman Avigdor Liberman to the post of Defense Minister.  “Despite the great importance I see in the office and the significant actions we have furthered to reduce air pollution […] the latest political moves and the replacement of…

A senior Saudi cleric has banned selfie photos with cats, even as another leading cleric in the oil-rich Gulf state has banned the use of Snapchat filters for selfies – in a ruling evidently meant for those who failed to heed the first cleric’s admonitions. Cleric Saleh Al-Fawzan, a member of the Saudi Council of…

Finance Minister and Kulanu party chairman Moshe Kahlon released an official statement Friday, after Environmental Protection Minister Avi Gabay (Kulanu) resigned from politics in protest of Yisrael Beytenu joining the government.  “Yesterday, Environmental Protection Minister Avi Gabay informed me of his intention to resign from the government,” he revealed. “I updated the Prime Minister on…

Yesh Atid chairperson MK Yair Lapid backed Jewish Home chairperson Education Minister Naftali Bennett on Friday, over his demand to have military secretaries appointed to every member of the Security Cabinet as a condition for supporting an expansion of the coalition. “Bennett is right. As a condition to expand the coalition he is demanding only one…

Dorit Sherman, a resident of the mixed Jewish and Arab city of Lod, was walking on the streets of her city several months ago when two Arab youths rode past her on bicycles and spat on her. Sherman told Arutz Sheva on Friday about the shocking incident, and the even more shocking lack of enforcement by the…

Temperatures will drop significantly over the weekend, forecasters say, after a few days of hot weather. Temperatures will range Friday from 15°C (59°F) – 22°C (71.6°F) in Jerusalem;  20°C (68°F) – 24°C (75.2°F) in Tel Aviv; 20°C (68°F) – 24°C (75.2°F) in Ashdod; 18°C (64.4°F) – 23°C (73.4°F) in Haifa; 12°C (53.6°F) – 20°C (68°F) in Tzfat (Safed); 15°C (59°F) – 25°C (77°F) in the Golan Heights; 19°C (66.2°F)…

A sixth man was charged Friday in connection to Australia’s so-called “tinnie terror” case, in which a group of young men allegedly hoped to travel overseas on a small boat to join jihadists. Australian Federal Police said a 25-year-old Melbourne man was charged on suspicion of preparing to enter a foreign country to engage in hostile activities. “There is no current…

US President Barack Obama’s administration has not exercised its right under US law to sanction the Russian sale of an advanced weapon system to Iran, leading some in Congress to demand clarifications and accuse the administration of appeasing Tehran. Obama can declare Russia’s sale of the S-300 missile defense system as illegal and enact sanctions…

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu apologized for condemning an incident which three Arabs raped a 20-year-old mentally disabled Jewish girl for “nationalistic” motives Thursday night, saying Friday that he “regretted” commenting on it. “As reported, the incident caused me deep pain and shock,” Netanyahu posted on Facebook Friday. “With that, I had no right to relate to it until the…

Bangladesh police Thursday on charged a senior opposition official with sedition for allegedly plotting against the state when he met an Israeli government adviser, an official said, according to AFP. The move comes as Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s government is stepping up a crackdown on political opponents in the Muslim-majority country, which is reeling from…

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton on Thursday was unfazed by a State Department inspector general’s report that concluded she violated agency rules by using a private email server. Speaking in a television interview and quoted by Politico, Clinton said the report it will not be an issue “that is going to affect either the campaign…

(JTA) — A New Jersey court has ruled unconstitutional state grants to two religious institutions — including $10.6 million to one of North America’s largest haredi Orthodox yeshivas. The ruling was made Thursday by a New Jersey appellate court, the Asbury Park Press reported. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s administration announced the grants in 2013…

Police in Germany are investigating two suspected British neo-Nazis photographed giving a Hitler salute in Buchenwald concentration camp, where more than 56,000 people were murdered, The Telegraph reported Thursday. The investigation centers on a photograph published on Twitter by National Action, a known British neo-Nazi group. In the picture, two men are seen holding a…

Despite their previous disagreements, Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) said Thursday that he will attend the Republican convention and, if asked, speak on the behalf of presumptive nominee Donald Trump. “My sense is that I will go to the convention,” Rubio told CNN, in comments quoted by The Blaze. “I don’t know if I will have…

WASHINGTON (JTA) — Non-nuclear U.S. sanctions against Iran and its allies have led to Hezbollah being in “its worst financial shape in decades,” the top sanctions enforcement official told Congress. “After many years of sanctions targeting Hezbollah, today the group is in its worst financial shape in decades,” Adam Szubin, the acting Treasury undersecretary for…

Syria’s devastating war has killed more than 280,000 people, a monitoring group said on Thursday in a new toll for the five-year conflict. The toll of 282,283 includes 81,436 civilians, among them 14,040 children and 9,106 women, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Non-jihadist rebel fighters accounted for 48,568 of those killed, while extremist…

Officials in the Israeli political system are trying to convince Jewish Home chairman Naftali Bennett to back the appointment of Avigdor Liberman as Defense Minister, Channel 2 News reported Thursday night. According to the report, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is considering firing Jewish Home’s ministers – Bennett, Ayelet Shaked and Uri Ariel – if they…

(JTA) — A New York Times editor who has received a deluge of anti-Semitic tweets from supporters of Donald Trump is calling on the presumptive Republican presidential nominee to denounce the invective and support its targets. In an article published in the paper’s Sunday edition, Jonathan Weisman summarizes the deluge of tweets he has received…

A federal judge on Thursday backed a request by one of Hillary Clinton’s top aides from her time at the State Department to prevent video of her testimony in ongoing legal proceedings from being released to the public, CNN reports. In a filing Wednesday, attorneys for former State Department chief of staff Cheryl Mills asked…

(JTA) An employee of a Rockland County Hassidic grand rebbe has been arrested and charged with secretly taking photos of couples having intercourse in a New Jersey motel. Nachman Breier, a driver and former chef for Skverer rebbe David Twersky, was arrested Monday night in Fort Lee, New Jersey, on a charge of third-degree invasion of privacy,…

What Kivi Bernhard has to say is intriguing enough for Bill Gates to postpone the date of a prestigious Microsoft conference. You too can hear Kivi speak, and talk to him personally, on Wednesday, June 1, at the J-Biz Expo and Business Conference. The business conference, where Kivi will deliver the keynote address, will take…

Deputy Chief of Jerusalem’s Romema neighborhood fire station, Rashaf Roni Sonino, accused the haredi community for the numerous fires which broke out across the capital on Thursday. Dozens of fire crews were able to control the raging blazes. “These fires are the unequivocal result of Lag B’Omer bonfires and negligence on behalf of the citizens,”…

Real estate mogul Donald Trump has now officially been crowned as the Republican presidential candidate for 2016, as delegate counts show he has passed the 1,237 threshold needed to secure the nomination. Trump has 1,238 delegates backing him according to counts by Associated Press and CNN on Thursday, after unbounded delegates announced their support for him. With his last major…

Unnamed diplomatic sources in Jerusalem were quoted on Thursday night revealing that Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi is shifting ever closer to the Palestinian Authority (PA) and against Israel – and they blamed Yisrael Beytenu chair Avigdor Liberman for it. The sources, quoted by Channel 2, pointed to Liberman’s new appointment as Defense Minister as part of…

The World Health Organization (WHO) called for an investigation into alleged abuses of “mental, physical and environmental health” rights by Israel, the only country singled out during the U.N. agency’s annual assembly in Geneva. The motion was co-sponsored by the Arab Group of States and the Palestinian delegation, and it commissioned a WHO delegation to…

Thousands of Jews visited the tomb of Shimon Hatzadik located north of the Old City in Jerusalem on Wednesday night and Thursday for Lag B’Omer, which marks the passing of Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai (Rashbi). Shimon Hatzadik was a High Priest in the Second Temple period and among the last members of the Great Assembly. The…

President Reuven Rivlin marked Jordan’s Independence Day on Thursday by speaking at a reception hosted in Tel Aviv by Jordanian Ambassador to Israel Walid Obeidat. Rivlin began by speaking in Arabic, sending his regards to the Jordanian King and Queen and all the citizens of Jordan – which the British established by fiat in 1946 when…

Germany’s Culture Minister Monika Grutters has announced her idea to integrate Rabbi Yehuda Teichtal, rabbi of Berlin’s Jewish community, in the commission seeking to return art stolen by the Nazis to the rightful Jewish owners. The Advisory Commission on the return of cultural property seized as a result of Nazi persecution, especially Jewish property, is also known…

Donald Trump, who has passed the number of delegates needed to secure the Republican presidential nomination, on Thursday fired back at President Barack Obama, after the latter said that Trump has “rattled” world leaders. “When you rattle someone, that’s good,” Trump told reporters in North Dakota, according to The Washington Times. “As you know, many…

Fire broke out in the famous Mir yeshiva in Jerusalem on Thursday, forcing students to evacuate the study hall. Three teams of firefighters arrived in the Beit Yisrael neighborhood in the capital Thursday morning to extinguish the blaze. While the building was in no danger structurally, nevertheless, firefighters evacuated students from the building due to…

Border Police officers stationed near Hevron’s Cave of the Patriarchs thwarted a stabbing attack Thursday, arresting an Arab man found with a concealed knife. Officers noticed the 26-year-old Hevron resident loitering suspiciously near the Jewish holy site, and stopped him for questioning. Upon searching him, they discovered a knife, apparently intended for use in a…

Rescue forces were dispatched on Wednesday night to the Ashdod home of Rabbi Yoshiyahu Pinto, the head of the Shuvu Yisrael sect who is currently in jail for corruption, after his wife Rabbanit Devorah Pinto was found unconscious and in serious condition. The on-call medics who arrived at the home gave her initial medical treatment and…

The Ministry of Environmental Protection published their “Clean Coast” Index revealing that only 37% of Israel’s beaches are considered “clean” or “very clean,” while 20% were categorized as “dirty” or “very dirty.” The number of beaches categorized as clean has dropped significantly compared to the previous index in which 57% of beaches were defined as…

Johannesburg’s Randburg Magistrates Court ruled on Thursday that Rabbi Eliezer Berland is to be extradited to Israel, reports Walla news. Berland, who heads the Shuvu Banim sect, fled from Israel in 2012 after several women as well as a 15-year-old girl laid charges of sexual assault against him. He evaded capture in the United States, Switzerland, Morocco and Zimbabwe and managed…

Israeli media raised an uproar after security cameras apparently showed an Arab Israeli supermarket worker in Tel Aviv being hit by eight police officers – but a closer investigation of the footage has debunked the claims of unprovoked police brutality, and even caused some in the media to apologize. Maysam Abu Alqian, 19, a Bedouin Arab from…

Kes Aviyahu Azariya, chairperson of the Council of Kohanim of the Ethiopian Jews in Israel, issued a letter on Wednesday to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and other ministers, warning about the planned immigration of 1,300 Ethiopian Jews. The Kes, a term referring to Ethiopian Jewish spiritual leaders, called for caution in making sure that Ethiopian Christians were not…

A new report by the grassroots Zionist group Im Tirtzu on Thursday exposed the leading role played by top Israeli academics in promoting the BDS boycott movement – which includes an academic boycott of Israel aiming to harm research in the Jewish state. The report focuses on the Israeli Anthropological Association as a case study so as…

Minister of Justice Ayelet Shaked (Jewish Home) and Minister of Social Affairs Haim Katz (Likud) are initiating a new law that would provide greater protection of Youth Laws – including trial, punishment and treatment methods. According to the initiative, a minor’s parents or legal guardian will have full rights to be present during all stages…

There is a Jewish tradition to give boys their first haircut – known as halake – at age three on Lag B’Omer which falls on Thursday, and in order to capitalize on the trimming, one organization is calling to donate the hair to children suffering from cancer. Lev Malka is calling on the public not to let…

Some 3.2 million people have immigrated to Israel since the founding of the state in 1948, according to a report released on Wednesday by the Central Bureau of Statistics. The immigration figures, which reflect Aliyah from 1948 to 2015, show that immigration was heavily concentrated in two major waves: the first from 1948 through 1951,…

The Amman-based Arab Bank on Tuesday agreed to settle a class action lawsuit brought by the families of terror victims killed in attacks the plaintiffs say the Arab Bank helped fund. The settlement stems from a 2014 decision by a New York jury finding the bank liable for damages. According to the lawsuit, the bank…

A report presented to the United Nations Security Council on Wednesday sharply criticized the Hamas terror organization – not for its recent rocket attacks on Israel, but for extra-judicial killings of Gaza Arabs. Nickolay Mladenov, the United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, reported to the Security Council on Wednesday that Hamas…

The stabbing of a woman at a kosher restaurant here was not a hate crime, police said. The attack Monday night at Grand Cafe Rimon, which resulted in moderate injuries to the victim and ended with the arrest of the suspected assailant, was the act of a person who appeared mentally unstable, a spokesman for the police told…

Knesset Guard Sergeant-at-Arms Brigadier General Yossi Grif warned Knesset Members from the predominantly Arab Joint List party not to ascend the Temple Mount, including during the upcoming Ramadan holiday. The admonition came following a declaration by Joint List MKs on Wednesday of their intention to visit the Temple Mount during the month of Ramadan, despite…

Feeling the heat over her clashes with Bernie Sanders, Debbie Wasserman Schultz is at the center of a debate among Democratic lawmakers over whether to push for her ouster as party chair. The Hill reported Tuesday that about 12 senators have been discussing what to do about Wasserman Schultz, a Florida congresswoman and one of the most prominent Jewish members of the…

Taylor Swift may look every bit the all-American girl-next-door, but according to white supremacists, she’s actually a Nazi at heart, feeding her legions of followers racist messages coated in the saccharine lyrics and sick beats of Grammy-winning songs. The Vice blog Broadly explored the extent and origins of that conspiracy theory in a post Monday, speaking to Andre Anglin,…

An Israeli delegation led by a top diplomat arrived in Turkey to represent Israel at the first World Humanitarian Summit. Dore Gold, the director-general of Israel’s Foreign Ministry, cut the ribbon of the Israeli pavilion at the summit on Tuesday. The summit takes place in Istanbul, is organized by the United Nations and aims to reinvigorate and provide…

Border control agents, working in conjunction with the Shin Bet internal security agency, confiscated a large shipment at the Tarkumia Crossing in the Hevron region. The shipment, bound for Gaza via Israel, carried a large quantity of building materials for rockets and mortars, along with heavy-duty electric motors, used to construct and fortify underground facilities.…

Last October, Bezeq employee Alaa Abu Jamal went on a murderous rampage in the Malchei Yisrael neighborhood of Jerusalem. Ramming his car into a bus stop, Abu Jamal then exited his vehicle and proceeded to stab bystanders. One of Abu Jamal’s victims, Rabbi Yeshiyahu Krishevsky, was killed in the attack. Abu Jamal was later shot…

Israeli aircraft overnight Wednesday attacked two terrorist infrastructures belonging to Hamas in Gaza, the IDF Spokesperson said in a statement. According to the statement, the airstrike was in response to an earlier rocket attack on the Gaza Belt. “The IDF holds the Hamas terrorist organization solely responsible for Gaza and will continue to act with…

Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah on Wednesday attacked Israel’s incoming Defense Minister, Avigdor Liberman, referring to him as “crazy”. Nasrallah made the comments in a speech marking 16 years since the IDF evacuated south Lebanon. “In occupied Palestine, the crazy and coarse Liberman has been made war minister by Netanyahu the extremist. I don’t want to…

Politicians often quote unemployment data, especially around elections, in order to gain votes. But what do these figures mean?  Does the term “unemployed” refer to everyone who doesn’t have a job, including students and stay-at-home mothers, or only to those who are jobless but are actively seeking work?  Professor David Howden of St. Louis University…

Top Israeli public officials and leaders gathered on Wednesday at the Knesset to honor 100 years of American Jewry’s contribution to the State of Israel. Attendees included Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, opposition leader MK Yitzhak Herzog, Chairman of the Jewish Agency Natan Sharansky and United States Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro. The ceremony, the first…

The UN envoy for the Middle East on Wednesday expressed alarm after Hamas authorities in Gaza moved to hold public executions, and urged them to change course, AFP reports. Hamas announced earlier this week that it plans to carry out a series of public executions of convicted criminals, an unusual move as the group has rarely…

The Lag Ba’Omer celebration in the town of Meron in northern Israel was truly an expression of Jewish unity, as hundreds of thousands of Jews from around the world gathered for the bonfire at the Tomb of the ancient Jewish scholar and mystic Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai. Arutz Sheva caught up with three worshippers from…

The Ottoman war effort in Palestine in World War I was led by German officers, and their involvement was recorded by the American Colony photographers.  German General Erich von Falkenhayn, an able Prussian officer who served as the Chief of Staff of the German Army, was the commander of the Turkish and German troops during…

Arab Knesset Members from the Joint List declared on Wednesday that they intend to ignore Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s directive and visit the Temple Mount for Ramadan next month. Last October, Netanyahu instructed Jerusalem police not to allow all ministers and MKs, either Jewish or Arab, to visit the Temple Mount. However, Arab MK Basel Ghattas (Joint…

As scientists “stare” at the world we live in, they are discovering things about reality that totally revamp our previous understanding of what it is. Surprisingly, Kabbalah knew that long ago, and Pardes, which we celebrate this Lag Ba’Omer, shows us what to do about it. But first, an article that is really mind-altering, unless of course…

Belgian prosecutors on Wednesday said they have detained four suspected Islamic State (ISIS) group recruiters, who they say may have planned new attacks in the country, The Associated Press reports. The Federal Prosecutor’s Office said in a statement that all four were charged with participating in the activities of a terrorist group. Two were ordered…

Palestinian Authority schools have long been used to foster anti-Semitic sentiments in young Arabs. Some schools, however, have taken the messages of hate – printed in official Palestinian Authority textbooks and broadcast on public television – to the next level, openly inciting violence to produce the next generation of murderous terrorists. An expose by the…

MK Orly Levy Abekasis (Independent) disparaged her former party, Yisrael Beytenu, on Wednesday night, noting it “did not set social goals when it entered the government” earlier in the day.  “When things promised have not been fulfilled within the framework of negotiations, I realized that they are not fulfilled completely, and are of no interest…