The passing of Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks: “Today the world lost a Rabbi, a Lord, a wonderful philosopher. The world will miss him, I will miss him”

Posted on November 5, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

JERUSALEM POST
Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, former chief rabbi of Great Britain has died
by Jeremy Sharon
November 7, 2020

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, the much respected former chief rabbi of the UK, has died aged 72. Sacks was highly esteemed around the Jewish world for his erudition, his wisdom, and his prolific authorship of works on Jewish thought. Sacks announced in the middle of October that he had been diagnosed with cancer and was undergoing treatment, but passed away on Saturday morning. Rabbi Sacks served as the Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth from 1991 to 2013…READ MORE

Posted in Israel & Middle East, Jewish | Tagged | Leave a comment

Biden and Israel: “there are good reasons to worry about the chances for greater tension, but as Netanyahu showed Obama, the Jewish state knows how to say “no”

Posted on November 5, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

JNS
What a Biden presidency could mean for Israel
by Jonathan Tobin
November 5, 2020

…The alliances with the Arab states that have been forged with Trump’s help will become stronger, not weaker if Biden were to choose policies that would strengthen Iran. The Arab states that have embraced Israel have not done so as an act of charity or out of a sentimental attachment to Zionism; they did it in order to strengthen their security. And if Biden repeats Obama’s mistakes in the Mideast, they will need Israel as much if not more than ever. Similarly, Israel is both economically and militarily stronger than it was in 2009, and while the friendship of its sole superpower ally is still necessary, it need not quail before Biden any more than it did before Obama. READ MORE

Posted in Israel & Middle East, Politics | Tagged | Leave a comment

“The US Congress, which oversees weapons sales abroad, appears to grasp Israel’s predicament. But Israel does not have a veto”

Posted on November 5, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

NEWSWEEK
How To Maintain Israel’s Qualitative Military Edge
by Jacob Nagel and Jonathan Schanzer
November 4, 2020

The Arab-Israel conflict appears to be waning. Three Arab countries—the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain and Sudan—recently announced normalization agreements with Israel. More (Oman, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Kuwait and other African or Asian states) may soon follow. This suggests that Israel, an embattled country since its founding in 1948, is safer. But the reality is more complicated. One key to Israel’s survival can be summed up in the acronym “QME,” or “Qualitative Military Edge.” The concept is enshrined in American law: Israel must have qualitatively better weapons than its neighbors. READ MORE

Posted in Israel & Middle East, Politics | Leave a comment

“Unlike this chamber which is detached from reality, a growing number of nations are acknowledging Jerusalem,” said Gilad Erdan”

Posted on November 5, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

JERUSALEM POST
UN speaks of Temple Mount as solely Muslim site, ignores Jewish ties
by Tovah Lazaroff
November 5, 2020

Some 138 United Nations countries approved a draft resolution that spoke of the Temple Mount solely as an Islamic holy site, by referencing it only by its Muslim name of al-Haram al-Sharif. It was one of seven pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel resolutions that the UN General Assembly’s Fourth Committee in New York passed on Wednesday. The resolution was titled, “Israeli practices affecting the human rights of the Palestinian people in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including east Jerusalem.”…the reference in the text to the Temple Mount, the location of the ancient Jewish Temple and the most holy site in Judaism, solely by its Muslim name is viewed as an attempt by UN member states to delegitimize and erase that well known history. READ MORE

Posted in Israel & Middle East, Jewish, Politics | Tagged , | Leave a comment

There’s a world of difference between voting in Israel and voting in the US

Posted on November 5, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

SPIN, STRANGENESS, AND CHARM
US Elections 2020: vote count incompetence or malice?
by Nitay Arbel
November 7, 2020

  • There is no “voter registration”: all citizens in the national population registry who have come of voting age automatically get mailed voter summonses to their listed residence address, which list the location and polling station number where to show up
  • Voters are expected to show up with their national picture ID card (which lists citizenship status) or their passport, as well as the summons. If the summons went lost in the mail, there are procedures for ensuring you can vote: but no proof of identity and citizenship? No vote, no way, no how.
  • When you are given your ballot, your name is struck through on the voter list to indicate you voted. (Hence voting at a ballot station other than your designated one becomes, well, a procedure.)
  • The country of my birth had limited means of postal or proxy vote. Israel doesn’t allow any such thing. READ MORE
Posted in Israel & Middle East | Leave a comment

“Denying a people’s heritage to make a bogus claim on land is the Palestinian Arab invention, not a Jewish one”

Posted on November 5, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

ELDER OF ZIYON
Keynote speaker at Palestine Book Fair says Jews made up their history
November 6, 2020

The keynote speaker at the Palestine Book Fair was Rima Khalaf, the former UN official with a history of making up lies about Israel who was forced to resign when she issued a report calling Israel an apartheid state, something even the UN couldn’t countenance. Previously she had – as a UN official – supported BDS, praised Arab regimes that were against normalizing relations with Israel, praised Egypt for launching the Yom Kippur War, and supported terror attacks by calling them “resistance.”  At the book fair, Khalaf said that “Zionists” made up history and that European Jews have nothing to do with Israel…” READ MORE

Posted in Islam, Israel & Middle East | Tagged , | Leave a comment

“Equally important, Amnesty International, HRW and Oxfam all have links to, or actively support, groups involved in the #BDS movement”

Posted on November 5, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

CAMERA BLOG
Politico Plays Defense for Anti-Israel Groups
by Sean Durns
October 30, 2020

On Oct. 21, 2020 Politico magazine reported that “the Trump administration is considering declaring that several prominent international NGOs — including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and Oxfam — are anti-Semitic and that governments should not support them.” The ruling, Politico reporter Nahal Toosi wrote, would come from the U.S. State Department. Yet instead of providing readers with the troubling background of these organizations, Politico played defense for them. The anti-Israel—indeed, often antisemitic—history of these groups is undeniable. Yet, Politico omits a very long list of disturbing behavior. READ MORE

Posted in Israel & Middle East, Politics | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

“To love your relative while you reject his/her politics is a feat that requires tremendous inner strength”

Posted on November 5, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

AISH
After the Election, Choosing Connection
by Sara Yoheved Rigler
November 4, 2020

Now that the election is over, it’s time to put down the hatchet and pick up the phone to connect to those on the other side of the political divide….So severe has the rupture been that most people believe that reconciliation will be impossible even now that the election is over. Rabbi Shlomo Wolbe, z”l, offers us a life-changing teaching that can heal and transform us. He taught that there are two “worlds” or spiritual dimensions: The World of Connection and the World of Estrangement. The World of Connection is characterized by love, joy, peace, generosity, and optimism. The World of Estrangement is characterized by animosity, disharmony, sadness, anger, fear, resentment, and criticism. READ MORE

Posted in Jewish, Politics | Leave a comment

“Angered by Cuomo and de Blasio, powerful Orthodox and Hasidic communities break ranks with the Democrats and challenge NYC’s political math”

Posted on November 5, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

TABLET MAG
The New Jewish Vote
by Armin Rosen
November 5, 2020

…Even before precinct data was available, there was strong circumstantial evidence that there had been historic turnout in Orthodox communities across New York and New Jersey and that the benefits had been largely—though by no means solely—reaped by the Republican Party. Republicans have likely flipped a state Senate seat in a South Brooklyn district that includes Orthodox and Syrian Jewish areas, as well as state Senate  and Assembly districts in Rockland County that include large Hasidic enclaves. A Republican took an unexpected election night lead for an open state Assembly seat in disproportionately Orthodox Great Neck. READ MORE

NEW YORK POST Josh Hammer: Despite ‘racist’ charges, Trump did better with minorities than any GOP candidate in 60 years For four years now, Democrats and their media allies have tarred President Trump as a reprehensible white supremacist leading a dying party. The Trumpian, populist GOP, they claimed, was doomed to become a regional rump party, whose electoral prospects were tied to a shrinking share of bitter, downscale whites. That narrative was always bunk. It finally died, once and for all, on Tuesday evening.

Posted in Jewish, Politics | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

“Islamist gunman began shooting spree outside kosher restaurant, Jewish community headquarters, killing four people before being shot dead”

Posted on November 1, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

TIMES OF ISRAEL
Vienna attack shatters sense of security for city’s Jewish community
by Daphne Rousseau
November 4, 2020

Shalom Berntholz never closes his kosher restaurant in central Vienna, but as a new coronavirus-induced lockdown approached, he decided to shut early. That saved his life. A gunman who supported the Islamic State (IS) group kicked off his shooting rampage on Monday evening right in front of his closed restaurant, killing a waitress opposite. “Normally, we’re open 365 days a year, even for Shabbat and Jewish holidays. Exceptionally, we closed. That’s what saved our lives,” Berntholz tells AFP….The gunman, named as 20-year-old dual Austrian-Macedonian national Kujtim Fejzulai who was shot dead by police after killing four people, “started right at the foot of this building,” says Berntholz. READ MORE

Posted in Islam | Leave a comment