Human Rights Watch Lying About Israel…Again

NGO Monitor, points out that Human Rights Watch (HRW) is once again leveling false charges against Israel.

By David Lev

 

NGO Monitor, which studies the treatment of Israel by supposedly non-affiliated and apolitical volunteer and civic groups, has accused Human Rights Watch (HRW) of once again leveling false charges against Israel. According to NGO Monitor, HRW accused Israel of attacking “journalists” in Gaza during Operation Pillar of Defense, but the charge “is false both legally and factually, and the timing of this release appears to be a cynical attempt to divert attention from many scandals currently plaguing the organization,” NGO Monitor said. Continue Reading »

Palestinians plan to isolate Israel with new steps & more violence

Emboldened by upgraded UN status, Palestinian officials plan tough steps against Israel if Netanyahu is re-elected including ending all security cooperation

By Associated Press

 

Weeks ahead of Israeli elections, Palestinian officials are already plotting a series of tough steps against Israel to be taken if, as polls predict, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is re-elected and peace efforts remain stalled.

Riots in Hebron (Photo: AFP)

Riots in Hebron – Photo: AFP

Emboldened by their newly upgraded status at the United Nations, the Palestinians are talking of filing war crimes charges against Israel, staging mass demonstrations in the West Bank, encouraging the international community to impose sanctions, and ending the security cooperation that has helped preserve quiet in recent years. Continue Reading »

Echoing Jordanian warnings, UN agrees: Syria, battleground of ‘foreign fighters’

Jordanian officials say that jihadists are hijacking the Syrian revolution & may target Israel next.

UN also says Hezbollah fighting on behalf of Assad.

By Reuters

 

United Nations human rights investigators warned Thursday that fighters from around the world have filtered into Syria to join a civil war that has split along sectarian lines, increasingly pitting the ruling Alawite community against the majority Sunni Muslims.

The warning comes after senior Jordanian officials warned this week that Syria may devolve into a “black hole that sucks Jihadists from around the world.”

Damage in Syria Dec 18

A woman walks past a house destroyed by an airstrike by Syrian government forces.

Continue Reading »

Sea of Galilee water level rising sooner than expected

Israel is anticipating above-average rainfall this year, a pleasant contradiction to the past seven years of drought.

By Israel Today Staff

 

Israeli officials now believe that the region will receive more rain than expected this winter, bringing the Sea of Galilee back up to a level it has not been at in over 10 years.

The beach of the Sea of Galilee – Photo courtesy: Wikipedia

Speaking to Israel’s Ma’ariv newspaper, Israel Water Authority official Dr. Amir Givati noted that due to abundant rainfall already this winter, the Sea of Galilee already began to rise in late October, more than a month before is typically starts to rise in the annual rain cycle. Continue Reading »

Israel to receive first F-35 stealth fighter jets in 2016

Lockheed Martin official says Israel’s first F-35 stealth fighter jets will be given to the Israel Air Force in the 2nd half of 2016.

The IAF has ordered 19 F-35s, with option to purchase 75.

Pilots refer to F-35 as “the iPad-generation aircraft.”

By Aharon Lapidot and Israel Hayom Staff

 

 

The Israel Air Force will receive its first F-35 fighter jets in the second half of 2016, a Lockheed Martin official said.

Sleek and stealthy. The Israel Air Force will receive its first F-35 fighter jets in 2016, says Lockheed Martin. – Photo: AP

Israel has ordered 19 F-35s, for a total cost of $2.75 billion, and has the option to purchase a total of 75 F-35s.

Continue Reading »

In Jamaica, the Jewish future is in conversions & intermarriages

From 1849, there were enough Jews serving in the House of Assembly that it didn’t meet on Yom Kippur.

When Jamaica achieved independence from Britain in 1962, its 1st ambassador to the U.S. was a Jewish businessman & lawyer, Neville Ashenheim.

By Debra Rubin

 

KINGSTON, Jamaica (JTA) Marie Reynolds used the living waters of Kingston’s Rockford Mineral Baths for the ritual immersion required to complete her conversion to Judaism, formally becoming a member of one of the oldest Jewish communities in the Western Hemisphere: Jamaican Jewry.

ucija.org

The tiny, racially mixed community — “200 souls,” as Jewish community leader Ainsley Henriques puts it — may well depend on Jews by choice like Reynolds. Continue Reading »

Vandal arrested for smashing tiles in King David’s Tomb

Suspect says another man who fled the scene, told him his prayers would only be answered if he prayed directly to the stones, which were under the ceramic tiles.

Police arrested a 30-year-old haredi man in Jerusalem late on Wednesday night after police on patrol caught the man smashing ceramic tiles in King David’s Tomb near the Zion Gate.

 Rabbi of Western Wall, Rabbi Rabinowitz - Photo: Courtesy of Western Wall Heritage Fund

Rabbi of Western Wall, Rabbi Rabinowitz – Photo: Courtesy of Western Wall Heritage Fund

He was caught after police on patrol heard loud smashing noises coming from the tomb. They burst into the building and found the man holding an ax, hammer, and a screw driver.

Continue Reading »

Once Again, EU’s ‘Harping’ Ashton condemns Jerusalem construction plans

EU foreign policy head complains that Israel’s plans to build thousands of homes in Givat Hamatos & Ramat Shlomo are ‘extremely troubling,’ and undermine peace prospects.

By AFP

 

European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton has released a statement condemning Israel‘s decision to go forward with plans to build thousands of new homes in two Jerusalem neighborhoods, Givat Hamatos and Ramat Shlomo.

Catherine Ashton – Photo: EPA

“The approval of an additional 2,610 housing units in the settlement of Givat Hamatos is extremely troubling, coming in addition to announcements made at the end of November and Monday’s approval of 1500 units in Ramat Shlomo,” Ashton said. Continue Reading »

Israeli Court rejects Israeli Arab suit over airport ‘profiling’

Nazareth District Court Judge explains that only Supreme Court justices are privy to materials relating to secret security checks & suggests that the plaintiffs each file a personal lawsuits rather than seeking to represent entire Arab sector.

 

The Nazareth District Court last week rejected a request from three Israeli Arabs pursuing a billion-shekel class-action suit to seek compensation for humiliating inspections at Ben Gurion International Airport.

Airport security in Israel - David Bachar

Security staff questioning Israeli Arab passengers at Ben-Gurion Airport. – Photo: David Bachar

The three had sought to sue the Shin Bet Security Service, the Airports Authority, and Israeli airlines El Al, Arkia, and Israir, on behalf the entire Israeli Arab sector. Continue Reading »

Egyptian Media Reports Morsi Suffering From Brain Tumor

Egyptian media reported Thursday that recently installed Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi is suffering from a brain tumor.

By David Lev

 

Already saddled with a restive population that appears set on repeating last year’s revolution against the regime and mass protests against his style of governing, recently installed Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi is apparently suffering from a brain tumor, Egyptian media reported Thursday. The Al-Wafed newspaper said that the tumor in his brain was currently small, but spreading, and that Morsi needed to have it removed before February. If it was not taken out, his life would be in danger.

Mohammed Morsi

Mohammed Morsi – AFP photo

The report quoted medical officials said to be familiar with the president’s condition, but did not name any specific doctors, and no independent verification was cited. Continue Reading »

Syrian defector reports: Assad’s regime transferred WMDs to Lebanon

Syrian defector says forces moved 100 kilos of lethal sarin gas from secret base in the direction of Lebanon

Yitzhak Benhorin

 

Syrian war escalates: According to Syrian sources, President Bashar Assad’s regime has developed special vehicles for moving and mixing chemical weapons, the Washington Post reported.

בסיס נשק כימי בספירה. קרבות ניטשו סביב המקום

Chemical weapon Syrian base

Post commentator, David Ignatius spoke to a Syrian source who received information from a Syrian defector who worked inside a chemical weapons network.

The source was speaking with Ignatius from his hiding place in an Arab country outside Syria, with the “hope of encouraging greater American involvement with the opposition.” Continue Reading »

Imam Accused of Inciting Hatred Against Jews in Tunisia

Tunisian association for minorities has lodged a complaint against Sheikh Ahmed S’hili, accusing him of inciting hatred against Jews in a televised sermon.

By Rachel Hirshfeld

 

A Tunisian support group for minorities said Wednesday that it has lodged a complaint against an imam, accusing him of inciting hatred against Jews in a fiery television sermon.

Tunisia's Prime Minister Hamadi Jebali

Tunisia’s Prime Minister Hamadi Jebali – Reuters

“We have lodged a complaint with the court of the first instance in Ben Arous against the imam of Rades mosque, Sheikh Ahmed S’hili, for inciting hatred,” the association’s lawyer Kais Baltagi told AFP.

The complaint is based on legislation which stipulates that anyone using media to “incite hatred between races, religions and people” can be jailed for up to three years. Continue Reading »

Palestinian refugees flood into Lebanon from Syria

Control of the Yarmouk refugee camp south of Damascus has pitted Palestinians fighting with rebels against Palestinians from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command loyal to Assad

Over 1,000 Palestinian refugees crossed into Lebanon in the past 24 hours.

By News Agencies and Israel Hayom Staff

 

 

Videos published on the Internet appear to show people streaming out of the Yarmouk refugee camp near Damascus on Monday, which Syrian rebels claim to have captured.

Reuters is unable to independently verify the video content, but one shows a steady stream of people carrying bundles and luggage as they walk down a street covered with debris.

Continue Reading »

U.N. General Assembly adopts 9 resolutions condemning Israel…so far.

By the end of this week, the UNGA session is set to adopt 22 country-specific resolutions on Israel — and only 4 on the rest of the world combined.

 

By JTA

 

The United Nations General Assembly adopted nine resolutions on the topics of Palestinian rights and the Golan Heights.

United Nations General Assembly

The resolutions adopted Tuesday criticized Israel for “the continuing systematic violation of the human rights of the Palestinian people,” and focused on “the extremely difficult socioeconomic conditions being faced by the Palestine refugees” in the West Bank and eastern Jerusalem. One resolution condemned Israel for continuing to hold the Golan Heights, and demanded Israel to return the land to Syria. Continue Reading »

Dush the Clown, Helps Nepal & Gives Israel Good PR on the side

Dush the Clown is not a medical doctor but if laughter is the best medicine, then he’s a great Doctor. His work also reflex well on Israel.

By Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu

 

He may not be much of a doctor but the children’s faces light up when Dush The Clown shuffles onto their ward in his floppy shoes and red nose to prescribe his unique brand of medical care.

Medical clowns

Medical clowns – INN TV

Dush — alias 36-year-old Israeli David Barashi — is in Nepal to teach doctors and nurses that laughter really can be the best medicine, with the latest evidence suggesting clowning around in hospitals can boost patient care. Continue Reading »