Israeli High Court freezes funds for yeshiva students deferring IDF enlistment
(Israel Hayom/Exclusive to JNS.org) Israel’s High Court of Justice issued an interim injunction Tuesday that suspended funding to yeshivot for students who are deferring enlistment in the Israel Defense Forces.
Widespread deferrals were issued beginning in August 2013 as the legislation process regarding the haredi draft continued after the Tal Law was struck down a year earlier. The law, which allowed the haredi public to defer military service, was deemed unconstitutional.
The injunction—applying to men ages 18-20 who were supposed to enlist after the Tal Law was nixed—was decided upon by nine judges under the authority of Supreme Court Justice Asher Grunis. Justice Neal Hendel was the only judge to oppose the ruling. The injuction will only affect yeshiva students who failed to show up at a recruitment office on their draft date because Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon deferred their draft date, despite the cancelation of the Tal Law.
In a statement, the haredi political party Shas said the High Court judges “have joined in the persecution of the religious community, crudely intervening in a sensitive legislative process that we will discuss in the coming days in the legislature.”
“The decision to impose economic sanctions is designed to add to the stigmatization and incitement against Torah students in Israel,” Shas said.
But Justice Minister Tzipi Livni said, “The High Court will be first to defend minority rights, including those of the haredim, but it will also be first to prevent distortion that allows for evading the law and inequality in the burden of service.”
Shahar Ilan, vice president of research and information for Hiddush – Freedom of Religion for Israel, estimated that the injunction will result in the immediate halt of funding to some 10,000 yeshiva students, adding up to about $7 million per year.
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IDF officer killed by friendly fire laid to rest
(Israel Hayom/Exclusive to JNS.org) Israel Defense Forces Captain Tal Nachman, who was killed in a friendly fire incident near Israel’s border with the Gaza Strip early Tuesday morning, was laid to rest later in the day at the Nes Ziona military cemetery. Hundreds attended the funeral.
Nachman’s father, Nesi, said Tuesday that a “21-year-old child’s life was lost for nothing.”
“I had a feeling that I would be getting terrible news I felt that something bad was coming and that’s exactly what happened,” Nesi Nachman said.
“We love you,” he told his late son. “We will never forget you.”
Nachman, an officer in the Field Intelligence Corps, was supposed to start a new position as a commander in a different unit, and Tuesday was to be his last day in his current unit. His training for his new role had been slated to begin on Thursday.
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Dead Sea Scrolls website upgraded with 10,000 new images, faster search engine
(JNS.org) The Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) has launched a newly upgraded version of its Dead Sea Scrolls digital library that includes more than 10,000 new photos of the famous ancient biblical texts.
Visitors to the www.deadseascrolls.org.il website will be about to view and explore 10,000 newly uploaded images of “unprecedented quality,” according to the IAA.
The Dead Sea Scrolls are hailed as one of the greatest archeological finds of the 20th century. Since the scrolls went digital last year, more than a half million people have visited their website, the IAA said. The upgraded website now features content available in Russian and German as well as a faster search engine, additional manuscript descriptions, and social media links.
“The website also offers accompanying explanations pertaining to a variety of manuscripts, such as the book of Exodus written in paleo-Hebrew script, the books of Samuel, the Temple Scroll, Songs of Shabbat Sacrifice, and New Jerusalem,” the IAA said.
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Natalie Portman joins efforts of Israeli groups aiding Syrian refugees
(JNS.org) Israeli-American actress Natalie Portman is donating money and clothes to help Syrian refugees through an initiative called Operation Human Warmth, which is working to “aid noncombatant women and children in Syria.” The effort is led by Israeli organizations including the youth group Hanoar Haoved Vehalomed, educational group Dror Israel, and humanitarian group Israeli Flying Aid.
Portman, her husband Benjamin Millipied, and their son Aleph are currently in Israel while she is filming A Tale of Love and Darkness.”
“When I heard about Operation Human Warmth I felt deeply moved and compelled to get involved,” Portman said in a statement, according to the Jerusalem Post.
The effort is led by Israeli organizations including the youth group Hanoar Haoved Vehalomed, educational group Dror Israel, and humanitarian group Israeli Flying Aid.
Gilad Perry, Dror Israel’s director of international partnerships and collaborations, said the project has donated more than 20,000 items to Syrian refugees thus far.
“When we see the situation in Syria right now, we feel compelled to act. We feel that this operation is an expression of the Israeli public’s willingness to help those who need it most,” he said.
In addition to Operation Human Warmth, the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) is continuing its efforts to aid Syrian refugees as a leading member of the Jewish Coalition for Syrian Refugees in Jordan, a sub-coalition of 16 groups within the Jewish Coalition for Disaster Relief.
Dr. Georgette Bennett, a global philanthropist and leading supporter of the Jewish Coalition for Syrian Refugees in Jordan, and the Tanenbaum Center for Interreligious Understanding have convened the MultiFaith Alliance for Syrian Refugees in Jordan, a 31-member body raising funds for Syrian refugees whose participants include Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, and Sikh groups.
“As the Syrian refugee crisis continues to grow, JDC remains dedicated to ensuring a Jewish response to their harrowing plight. Driven by our shared ideal of arevut—responsibility to all those who suffer—we are a proud member of the Multifaith Alliance for Syrian Refugees in Jordan under Dr. Georgette Bennett’s leadership, whose cross-cutting inter-religious call to action on this issue is more resonant now than ever before,” Alan H. Gill, CEO of JDC, told JNS.org.
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Anne Frank childhood friend gives Holocaust diarist’s toys to museum
(JNS.org) A childhood friend of Anne Frank who kept some of the famous diarist’s toys has now donated them to the Anne Frank House Museum in Amsterdam. Toosje Kupers, 83, had kept a tin of marbles, a tea set, and a book that belonged to Frank. The items will go on display Wednesday at the Kunsthal art gallery in Rotterdam.
As children, Frank and Kupers frequently played together. Just before the Frank family left the residential area where they lived, the Merwedeplein, Anne Frank asked Kupers to keep her marbles for a while, Kupers told the Dutch public broadcaster NOS.
“‘I’m worried about my marbles, because I’m scared they might fall into the wrong hands,'” Kupers quoted Anne Frank as telling her.
The Frank family told nearly everyone they knew that they were going to stay with a family in Switzerland, but in fact they went into hiding in a now-famous Amsterdam house. In 1944, the Franks were caught by the Nazis. Anne Frank died of Typhus at the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in 1945.
“So many people know about Anne Frank because of the diary, which was written under such unusual circumstances… [But] the marbles are a reminder that she was just a little girl,” said the Anne Frank House Museum’s head of collections, Teresien da Silva, according to the Associated Press.
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Iranian official denies that foreign minister spoke out against the Holocaust
(JNS.org) The Iranian Foreign Ministry clarified the Islamic Republic’s stance on the Holocaust and Israel after Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif was quoted over the weekend as speaking out against the Holocaust.
According to reports, at a security conference in Munich, Germany on Sunday, Zarif remarked that the Holocaust “tragically cruel and should not happen again.”
“We have nothing against the Jews. We do not feel threatened by anyone,” Zarif said, Al-Arabiya reported.
But Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Hassan Qashqavi denied the reports about Zarif, saying that his boss was misquoted.
“In a phone conversation that I had with Mr. Zarif he completely rejected the remarks attributed to him and declared that the Islamic Republic’s stance about the [Zionist] regime is what has been repeatedly announced by the country’s diplomacy apparatus and this stance has not changed,” Qashqavi told Iran’s state-run Fars News Agency.
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John Kerry statement on Israeli deaths from terror contradicts Shin Bet report
(JNS.org) A recent statement by U.S. Secretary of John Kerry concerning Israeli deaths from terrorism contradicts a report on terrorism issued by the Israeli Security Agency (Shin Bet).
Speaking at a security conference in Munich, Germany on Saturday about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict negotiations, Kerry said that “last year, not one Israeli was killed by a Palestinian from the West Bank,” according to a State Department transcript.
But according to a recent report on terrorism in 2013 released by the Shin Bet, six Israelis were killed in terror attacks in 2013, including five in the West Bank. The Shin Bet report added that three of deaths were civilians, while the other three were members of the security forces.
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Preceding provided by JNS.org