יום חמישי, כ״א אלול תשפ״וThursday, September 3, 2026
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It now remains to be seen whether the Salafi Jihadists will resort to violence to prevent or foil the parliamentary election.
By Rachel Burk
Why the closing of a small seminary serving less than 200 girls should be the concern of the entire Orthodox population.
The recent conviction of an unlicensed therapist in one of our communities has led to serious soul searching on the part of some and confusion for many others. The most strident argument of his supporters is that he was convicted without proof; that the accuser made up the story to get back at her community and directed her anger at this amateur counselor.
By Meir Indor
Moshko, the Holocaust-survivor-turned-legendary-builder-of-Gush-Etzion, once asked why Rabbi Moshe Levinger was shoving his way into Hevron and Kiryat Arba. “Here we work in consensus with the authorities. Let him come here!” Rabbi Levinger responded: “Tell Moshko he owes his consensus to the fact that we are here. Without us, Gush Etzion would become a matter of […]
Sometimes, pragmatism handily trumps belief. Back in the earliest days of Arab terrorism against Israel – going back to May 1948 and even earlier – many disparate groups were able to cooperate in a presumptively common war against the Jewish state.
By Ben Cohen
Like one of those telenovelas that are so popular on Latin American television stations, the slow yet inexorable deterioration of Venezuela’s president, Hugo Chavez, has been soaked in drama and cloying sentimentality.
By Steven Plaut
There is a widespread misconception that the Middle East conflict is complicated. In fact, it is really rather simple. Indeed, one can basically summarize and explain the entire conflict in the context of the words "occupation" or "occupied territories" and people’s beliefs about the effects of such "occupation."
Why would the Senator insist on the Biblical teachings regarding homosexuality but not those of protecting Israel?
By Dov Shurin
My most recent column elicited a fascinating response from an American woman. Before I share that letter and my reply, I will briefly reiterate the substance of that Dec. 28 column, which was titled “My Reasons to Be Jolly.”
The 2013 Israeli elections were supposed to have been boring. The pundits promised that the final result is already clear and there is nothing new under the sun. However, with less than two weeks to go until the polls open, we are in the throes of one of the most fascinating election campaigns that Israel has known. It is a campaign that faithfully reflects the deep currents of change in Israeli society. Nobody can yet predict its final outcome.
We join with Klal Yisrael in mourning the passing of Rabbi Abraham B. Hecht.
It was hardly surprising that Prime Minister Netanyahu’s announcement, made on Sunday, that Israel will build a fortified fence along its frontier with Syria was characterized by many of the usual suspects as yet another example of Israeli apartheid policies.
There are those who are taking delight in pointing out that former vice president Al Gore, perhaps the individual most identified with the movement to reduce greenhouse emissions, now stands to make a personal profit of $100 million in the sale of the TV station he headed to the Al Jazeera network, wholly owned by the oil-rich Qatari royal family.
We were taken by PA President Mahmoud Abbas’s television address to a large Gaza audience, which included both members of his own Fatah group and also the rival Hamas. Long hailed by world leaders as the only Palestinian “peace partner” on the horizon, Mr. Abbas actually revealed himself for what he really is.
The Al Jazeera television network has become a dominant force in Middle East communications as well as an expanding influence elsewhere, but up until now it has had trouble breaking through in the United States with a little watched English channel that is not widely available.
By Daniel Pipes
The time is well overdue to respond to IRGC atrocities with the language of force that Iranian leaders only understand.
The burden is now on Senator Hagel to persuade the Senate, the American people, and the leaders of Iran that he is fully supportive of the President's commitment to stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons.
By Barry Rubin
Smart people can make bad judgments; regular people with common sense often make bad judgments less often. But stupid, arrogant people with terrible ideas are a disaster.
By Daniel Pipes
The 25-minute show was the most hare-brained and loony of my 35 years going on television.
The Left has created an endless number of professional openings for professional idealists.
By Barry Rubin
The current voluntary, but not inevitable, decline of the United States places many US allies at risk.
There are many potential Ron Dermers at the world’s universities today, if only we can nurture their gifts in their formative years.
The Palestinian youth sees what has happened in the Arab world and despite the suffering, has the feeling of "yes, we can," even if it requires blood.
Prohibition is long gone but the consequences of it are still with us today.
By Barry Rubin
Al Gore has sold out his admittedly obscure channel to al-Jazeera and taken a position on its board.
Iraqi Jews had been genuine citizens for thousands of years -- even before Muslims and Christians.
In a 12 year struggle, we have led the Religious Zionists deep into the ruling party. The Likud, in turn, gladly opened its gates wide.
By Barry Rubin
If you are really being so hurt by the existence and growth of settlements then make peace fast and get rid of them.
By Yair Shamir
A Palestinian state would not only fail to bring peace and stability to the region, but would increase the tension and instability to the region.
Straight from the Jerusalem Boardroom #174.
Let me clarify these misconceptions about Islam so that there is no excuse for warmongers and those who wish to shed oceans of blood.
I am writing these reflections on the Newtown, Connecticut massacre for The Jewish Press on December 20. Most likely, by the time these words have been published, we will have more information and greater insight and understanding as to what went wrong on that tragic day. Nevertheless, for the sake of my own catharsis, and hopefully for the benefit of the readers of this publication, I share my own humble perspective.
“When you are inexperienced and new to Yiddishkeit you figure, what do I have to lose? I think it’s called chutzpah!” With the honesty and good natured candor that have made her a much sought after lecturer across the Jewish spectrum, African-American convert Ahuvah Gray, recounts the remarkable story of her personal encounter with Rav Yosef Shalom Elyashiv, z”tl.
Is the man who ends a fight just as guilty as the one who started it? Is the man who kills a killer just as immoral as the killer himself?
The big question, of course, is where does the Jewish Home get its new votes?
Israelis know that neither Fatah in the West Bank nor Hamas in Gaza will ever recognize Israel’s legitimacy no matter where its borders are drawn
Leading up to Israel’s Knesset elections on January 22, here are more initiatives I hope to bring to the fore in the next Knesset:
Over the past few months the Jewish community in the New York metropolitan area has suffered great trauma and intense tragedy.
By Hillel Fendel and Chaim Silberstein / KeepJerusalem.org
We came across this startling headline in Haaretz:"Most Right-Wing Voters Support Establishment of Palestinian State and Division of Jerusalem." But Haaretz, as dovish and radical as it is, surely wouldn't lie straight out, would they? So how did they come up with such a headline?
Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics has released its population data for 2012, the year that just ended. As usual, the trends are favorable. The total Israeli population rose to just under eight million, while the Jewish population for the first time rose to just over six million.
It certainly is no secret that Great Britain is adamantly opposed to any construction by Israel on any land claimed by Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. So it was not all that surprising that the UK condemned recent announcements by Israel of construction plans in various areas over the green line. But its hyperbolic reaction to the announcement that the Israeli government is granting university status to Ariel College suggests that not a whole lot of thinking goes into its anti-settlement declarations.
This past Sunday, Israel’s Supreme Court overturned a decision by Israel’s Central Election Committee to disqualify MK Haneen Zoabi of the Balad Party from running for a seat in the January 22 parliamentary elections. The court rejected the committee’s ruling that she should be banned based on her involvement in the Gaza flotilla of May 2010.
“In that case, what makes you better than the terrorists?” I often hear this question. It usually comes up after someone suggests that Israel ruthlessly defeat its enemies instead of maintaining its current wishy-washy approach of hiding behind security walls, wearing the enemy down, and offering land in an effort to advance peace.
Out of prison since 2010, Abramoff is committed to reforming the lobbying industry that he helped tarnish.
By Mark Schulte
In the introduction to their recently published Jewish Jocks: An Unorthodox Hall of Fame, Franklin Foer and Marc Tracy hyperbolically describe American basketball between the world wars as a “majority-owned subsidiary of New York Jewish culture.”
By Daniel Pipes
It will be a long, hard road to traverse, but there is no short cut and it can succeed.
The EU has yet to appreciate the reality that the conflict continues because of the refusal of the Palestinians to accept the right of the State of Israel to exist.
The ability to perceive and make difficult choices is fundamental to the survival of a country.
Western journalists, donors and decision-makers need to know that many Palestinian-related truths are being ignored or hidden from them.
By Barry Rubin
Winston Churchill's statement that "a lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on," may still be true, but due to the internet revolution, the truth may have a chance.
U.S. influence is markedly less than we – or our enemies – think it is, or ever thought it was.
What Obama means by 'saving' the Middle Class is turning them into welfare clients.
By Daniel Pipes
Freed of the military's oversight only in mid-2011, Erdoğan could win enough dictatorial power for him (or a successor) to achieve his dream and fully implement the Shari'a.
Israel is redefining its concept of military victory in a Middle East dominated by terrorist organizations turned quasi-state actors. Once, decisive, unmistakable victories, accompanied by conquests of territory that had been used to stage attacks against Israel, provided all parties concerned with a "knockout" image. Victory was seen by the Israel Defense Forces as a […]
By David Wilder
This is nothing new: Netanyahu, following his election in 1996, divided Hebron and signed the Wye Accords.
The leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood top the Simon Wiesenthal Center's list of top ten anti-Semites of the year.
By Barry Rubin
A large part of the problem with Obama’s policy is that he not only treated enemies as friends and did not pressure supposed friends that acted like enemies, he joined them.
People can lose their liberty without feeling a thing. So guard it with the greatest vigilance and do not give anyone your biometric information.
What is it about Jacob that he seemingly can’t stop the favoritism?
By Ehud Tokatly
Hundreds of interest-free banks and credit unions, including Islamic banks, were largely unharmed by the current global crisis.
What Abbas is not telling the Israeli public is that he simply does not have a mandate from his people to make any form of concessions to Israel.
In another time and place, a place called America, an attack on an American diplomatic mission would have been considered an act of war.
By Barry Rubin
You can learn from the Bible that people understood four thousand years ago about things that America's current leaders have forgotten today.
Outside Israel, Palestinian groups meddle in the affairs of other Arab states and are punished in the extreme.
Offending Islam has become a national security issue involving all levels of government.
By Yair Shamir
When my late father, Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, was in office, neither Ronald Reagan nor George Bush agreed with his ideology.
YUConnects fills the void by aiding individuals and communities in expanding their horizons and creating new opportunities.
Many forget that Netanyahu's score on his actions during the Disengagement was a floor hugging 14%.
By Barry Rubin
The problem nowadays is that an insane interpretation of international affairs seems to be a quality defining who 'the best people are.'
The glorious day of the inglorious man is here. And someone else is paying. Any someone else who isn't him.
Grieving requires a new language.
By Sandy Eller
For the last two years, Lipa Schmeltzer has traded his microphones for textbooks and the concert stage for the classroom.
My own experiences within the shidduch system has caused me to question it considerably.
"I won't go to her yoga training, she runs a program in Israel."
Terrorism and radicalism cannot be defeated by the force of arms, no matter how technologically sophisticated or overwhelming it may be.
It is amazing to see how the same people can be deceived time and again.
Mr. President, some foreign policies need to be carefully thought through a second time.
My father, businessman and philanthropist Irving Bunim, z”l, was one of the foremost leaders of American Orthodoxy during its formative years. When he passed away in December 1980, Reb Moshe Feinstein declared, “This is not an aveilus d’yachid [a private loss]; this has the halacha of aveilus d’rabim [a public loss] because [he] represented the rabim of Klal Yisrael [the Jewish pubic].”
By Mark Schulte
“His father, a sanitation worker who had never finished high school, moved his family to Jewish neighborhoods [in Brooklyn], so that his children might be instilled with the value that Jews place on learning.” – From Joseph Berger’s New York Times obituary of Dr. Frank Macchiarola Frank J. Macchiarola, the former New York City schools […]
In 1893, Rabbi Chaim Yaakov Vidrowitz was looking for an advantage in his struggle for leadership of the immigrant Orthodox community on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. Two other outstanding rabbinical sages also aspired to have the final say among downtown’s religious Jews.
Rebbetzin Esther Jungreis, standing on a stage recently in Baltimore, shone with grace. It wasn’t what she wore, it was how she wore it. Her inner grace and sheer presence made her simply stunning. The red velvet curtains that were her backdrop outlined the strength of character on her face and the dignity in her every motion.
By Jacob Kamaras Alina Dain Sharon and Sean Savage
This month some of Israel’s strongest friends in Europe – Britain, France and Germany – summoned their ambassadors to protest the Jewish state’s construction decisions.
In 1964 the eminent sociologist Marshall Sklare declared Orthodoxy to be irrelevant. His view was that Conservative Judaism was the wave of the future in America.
By Dov Shurin
I’m wrapping up my trip to the U.S., a visit that for the first time in many years happened to coincide with Christmas.
As we noted last week, President Obama’s apparent inclination to appoint former Republican senator Chuck Hagel as his new secretary of defense has been disturbing from the start, given Mr. Hagel’s record of opposing sanctions against Iran, his criticism of U.S. partiality toward Israel, and his reference to what he called “the Jewish lobby” in Washington, which, he suggested, unduly urges the U.S. government to act on behalf of Israel’s interests.
Two weeks ago we suggested that Hamas officials had seized on Israel’s decision not to invade Gaza in the course of Operation Pillar of Defense as somehow demonstrating that Hamas was quite capable of taking on the Israeli military, and that the world, particularly the Palestinian street, should take notice.
By Amin Farouk
"Palestine," shouted Mashaal to his audience, was Arabic, Islamic, from the Mediterranean Sea to the Jordan River; his audience chanted its support.
Using the term "Halacha" for policies which are not in fact Halacha, delegitimizes those who differ and causes ill-will towards Jewish law.
City officials in Englewood are hampering the development of a synagogue, but were nowhere to be found in opposing Kaddafi and the Libyan Embassy in Englewood.
The Star and Crescent flying at the World Trade Center did not prevent it from being targeted.
Have Feiglin and Hotoveli never heard about the Likud's expulsions of Jews and destruction of Jewish homes?
By Barry Rubin
The idea that Obama is now backing Israel is what American Jewish voters who supported him desperately need to believe.
Two years after the beginning of the upheaval in the Arab world, the picture does not arouse too much optimism.
Crowd culture expects everyone to follow the leader, to join the meme, to move with the flow, but that is something that crazy people cannot do.
September 4, 2026 
