Israel protests Jordanian support of synagogue terrorists’ families
(JNS.org) The Israeli Embassy in Amman on Monday issued a letter of protest to the Jordanian Foreign Ministry in reaction to Jordanian Prime Minister Abdullah Ensour’s letter of support to the families of the two Palestinian terrorists behind the Nov. 18 synagogue massacre in Jerusa-lem.
The terrorists entered a synagogue in the Har Nof neighborhood armed with guns and axes, kill-ing four Jewish worshippers and a Druze police officer, before being shot dead by police. On Monday, Israeli diplomats presented their Jordanian counterparts with several examples of anti-Semitic and anti-Israel cartoons that were recently published in Jordan, pointing to the scope of the ongoing Arab incitement that results in the escalation of attacks against Jews.
Jordan and Egypt are the only Arab nations that have diplomatic relations with Israel.
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Israeli officials tell U.S. that ‘Jewish state’ bill debate is internal matter
(JNS.org) Reacting to the Israeli cabinet’s approval of the “Jewish state” bill, which formalizes Israel’s status as the national home of the Jewish people, U.S. State Department spokesman Jeffrey Rathke said Monday, “We would expect any final legislation to continue Israel’s commitment to democratic principles.”
In response to the American expression of concern, the bill’s initiator, MK Zeev Elkin (Likud), said Israel “can preserve the principles of democracy just fine without the help of our partners from across the ocean.”
Similarly, Israeli Economy Minister Naftali Bennett told Army Radio, “I say to the Americans: We will handle the affairs of the state of Israel ourselves.”
“We need to deal with the implications of what kind of state we want to have,” Bennett said. “In the end it will only be our problem. It is an internal issue and I don’t think anyone has a right to intervene.”
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2 yeshiva students stabbed by Arabs in Jerusalem
(JNS.org) Two yeshiva students were stabbed by Arabs on Monday night in Jerusalem’s Old City near an entrance to the Temple Mount in what they said was a nationalistically motivated terror attack. The Magen David Adom ambulance service reported that one of the men (in his mid-40s) was moderately wounded and that the other (in his early 30s) was lightly wounded.
After the attack, the two Jewish students walked to the Old City police station, where police called the ambulance service after seeing that the older man was bleeding from his upper torso. A paramedic who arrived on scene said the students were evacuated to the trauma unit at Shaare Zedek Medical Center.
Jerusalem police arrested three Arab suspects—an adult and two minors—in connection with the attack, and took them in for questioning.
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Temple Mount activist Yehuda Glick released from hospital
(JNS.org) Activist Yehuda Glick, a promoter of Jewish access to the Temple Mount who was shot and seriously wounded by a Palestinian terrorist from eastern Jerusalem in late October, has been released from the hospital.
The motorcycle-riding gunman, Islamic Jihad activist Moatez Hijazi, shot Glick outside of a Jerusalem conference and was later shot dead by Israeli police.
Upon being released from Shaare Zedek Medical Center, Glick praised the staff there.
“The Muslim doctors and nurses that work in the hospital are the ones who respect their religion, and not the man who shot me,” he said.
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Yemenite culture minister dedicates award to country’s 90 remaining Jews
(JNS.org) Yemenite Minister of Culture Arwa Othman is giving away Human Rights Watch’s Alison Des Forges Award, which she received in September, to Yemen’s dwindling Jewish community.
The award honored Othman for her work promoting women’s rights and fighting extremism. On Nov. 20, she called for “tolerance,” dedicating her award to “brothers and friends from the Jew-ish community,” the Associated Press reported.
There are fewer than 90 Jews left in Yemen, according to the Jewish Agency for Israel, and half of them live in a guarded compound that also protects the U.S. Embassy in the capital city of Sanaa due to threats from Islamic terror groups such as al-Qaeda. Othman has been targeted with a smear campaign by hardline Salafi jihadist groups in the country over her support of Yemenite Jews.
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