Sderot inaugurates rocket-proof train station
(JNS.org) A new train station in the southern Israeli city of Sderot was inaugurated on Tuesday in a festive ceremony attended by top government officials, Israel Hayom reported. By linking up to Israel’s national railway system, Sderot residents will be able to reach Tel Aviv in just under an hour.
The Sderot station—which cost 56 million shekels (around $16 million)—is the first in Israel built to withstand a rocket strike. Sderot, located adjacent to the Gaza Strip, has been subjected to thousands of rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip over the past decade.
The opening of the Sderot Station marks the completion of the first stage of the Ashkelon-Beersheba rail project. As part of this project, other train stations are currently under construction in Netivot and Ofakim. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Transportation Minister Yisrael Katz attended Tuesday’s ceremony.
“We are marking a milestone in the realization of the vision of connecting all of the State of Israel, from Kiryat Shmona to Eilat, eliminating the periphery,” Netanyahu said.
U.S. officials in Israel ordered to avoid public transportation
(Israel Hayom/Exclusive to JNS.org) Following the recent uptick in Palestinian terrorism, the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv has issued an Emergency Message for U.S. Citizens, prohibiting U.S. citizen embassy employees and their families from taking public transportation—including shared minibus taxis—and urging Americans in Israel to “exercise caution and take appropriate measures to ensure their safety and security.”
The message, published on the embassy’s website and Facebook page, comes in the wake of the bus bombing in Bat Yam on Sunday, in which passenger vigilance averted a tragedy. The restriction on taking shared minibus taxis is in place for two weeks to allow U.S. officials to assess the security situation.
Meanwhile, Israeli tourist organizations are also concerned by the recent increase in Palestinian terrorist activities, fearing an impact on Israel’s tourism sector.
“The sense is that we have to expand our efforts to market Israel to the world,” said Israel Hotels Association Director-General Shmuel Tzurel.
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Israeli court reaffirms Ariel University’s accreditation
(JNS.org) Israel’s High Court of Justice on Tuesday rejected a petition filed by the Council of Presidents of Israeli Universities seeking to overturn a 2012 decision by the Council for Higher Education to upgrade the status of the Ariel University Center to that of a full-fledged university.
The decision was made upon the recommendation of former Defense Minister Ehud Barak and the review of Attorney-General Yehuda Weinstein, who ruled that there was no legal reason to prevent the move, thus declaring Ariel the first Israeli university beyond the Green Line, Israel Hayom reported.
The heads of Israel’s seven other universities attempted to torpedo the college’s accreditation upgrade, saying that Israel did not need another university and that upgrading Ariel would harm Israel’s higher-education system. Bar-Ilan University, which was originally part of the petition, later asked to have its name removed from it.
The court ruled that the Council for Higher Education in Judea and Samaria, which is independent from the Council for Higher Education, had satisfied the latter’s accreditation requirements, and therefore was not obligated by the recommendations of its zoning and budgets committee, which opposed the move.
One-sided BDS roundtable scheduled for Modern Language Association confab
(JNS.org) As part of its 129th annual convention from Jan. 9-12 in Chicago, the Modern Language Association (MLA) is holding a roundtable discussion titled “Academic Boycotts: A Conversation about Israel and Palestine.” The discussion, to feature supporters but no opponents of the global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, is a possible precursor to an MLA academic boycott of Israel that would mirror recent boycotts by the American Studies Association (ASA) and the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association.
The MLA session’s speakers will include BDS movement co-founder Omar Barghouti; University of Texas professor Barbara Jane Harlow, who has stated her support for the ASA boycott of Israel, University of Southern California professor of English David Lloyd , a well-known BDS activist; and Wesleyan University professor Richard Ohmann, who signed a 2009 letter that described Israeli treatment of Palestinians as “one of the most massive, ethnocidal atrocities of modern times.” University of Texas professor Samer M. Ali, who publicly defended the ASA boycott, organized the roundtable.
“Once the roundtable, whose audience will no doubt be packed with boycott supporters, has come off, a boycott resolution will be proposed [by the MLA] for next year, justified in part by the strength of support evident at the roundtable. Many members will be caught by surprise, just as members of the ASA were, because few academics pay attention to what their professional associations are doing,” Jonathan Marks wrote for Commentary magazine.
Ali told The Chronicle of Higher Education that the roundtable assumes that Israel violates the rights of Palestinians, and that the debate will center on what to do about it.
“If people want to come and debate occupation, I think it will be a waste of their time, because that’s not what the roundtable is about,” Ali said.
Israel to display selection of ancient Jewish texts found in Afghanistan
(JNS.org) A special event next week at the National Library of Israel will debut a display of ancient Jewish texts found in a cave in Afghanistan. The library purchased 29 of the discovered texts.
The texts are approximately 1,000 years old and were written in either ancient Persian or Arabic. They are predominantly legal or commercial documents, except for an Arabic commentary on the book of Isaiah, attributed to post-Talmudic Jewish leader Rabbi Saadiah Gaon.
Archeologists verified the documents’ date by carbon-dating microscopic portions. Despite being written on paper, rather than parchment, the documents remain well preserved, most likely due to the climate in the cave, reported Israel National News.
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