Islamic State beheading victim Steven Sotloff was Israeli citizen
(JNS.org) The Islamic State terrorist group on Tuesday released a video showing the beheading of American-Jewish journalist Steven Sotloff. The Israeli Foreign Ministry revealed on Wednesday that Sotloff also held Israeli citizenship.
A video released in August showed the Islamic State’s beheading of American journalist James Foley. In the new video, obtained by the SITE Intelligence Group, the 31-year-old Sotloff is seen in the desert bound and held at knifepoint by a terrorist dressed in black.
“I’m back, Obama, and I’m back because of your arrogant foreign policy towards the Islamic State,” the terrorist says in the video, citing American airstrikes on Iraq and warning that “just as your missiles continue to strike our people, our knife will continue to strike the necks of your people.”
The White House on Wednesday confirmed the authenticity of the video.
To protect Sotloff, his Jewish identity and Israeli citizenship had been under a gag order before the execution. A Miami native, he made aliyah in 2008 to pursue an undergraduate degree at the Interdisciplinary Center (IDC) in Herzliya. Kidnapped in August 2013 while reporting on the Syrian civil war, he pretended to be sick in order to fast for Yom Kippur that year.
“He told them he was ill and didn’t want to eat, even though they brought us eggs that day,” one of Sotloff’s fellow captives told told Yedioth Ahronoth. “It looked like he was praying in a hidden way towards Jerusalem. He noted what way the Muslims were praying in and changed his direction slightly.”
Ilene Prusher, Sotloff’s editor at the Jerusalem Report in 2011 and 2012, told the Times of Israel. “He was an excellent journalist, and he filed great work. He was our only guy who was filing [from the region], and he was filing for a bunch of different places… In addition to covering Libya, he was covering Arab uprisings. I felt like he really cared adbout it, he thought it was extremely important. He was very conscientious, enterprising and brave.”
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Poll: Hamas leader twice as popular among Palestinians as Abbas
(JNS.org) A new poll by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research that Ismail Haniyeh, a leader of the Hamas terrorist group, is nearly twice as popular as Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas among Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.
Abbas’s Fatah party and Hamas are currently part of a unity government. But if presidential elections were held today, 61 percent of Palestinians would vote for Haniyeh and only 32 percent would choose Abbas, according to the survey.
Before the 50-day conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, a poll by the same organization found that 41 percent of Palestinians backed Haniyeh and 53 percent supported Abbas. Both polls surveyed 1,270 Palestinians.
IDF chief: Gaza operation ‘another link’ in fight for Israeli independence
(JNS.org) While Operation Protective Edge has ended, “our days of fighting may not be over, as our long and ongoing struggle has not ended,” Israel Defense Forces (IDF) Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz wrote in a memorandum circulated to soldiers on Tuesday as part of the military’s conclusion of its Gaza campaign.
“Operation Protective Edge was another link in the fight for Israel’s independence, the same fight that began 66 years ago. … The terrorist groups in the Gaza Strip suffered a debilitating blow and they have lost many of their operatives and commanders, as well as weapons, infrastructure, and strategic capabilities they had spent years cultivating,” wrote Gantz.
“You, the troops on the ground, provided our enemies—be they near or far—with unequivocal proof of the IDF’s might and its ability to realize its mission as the Israel Defense Forces,” he added. “I am proud to be your commander.”
Palestinian driver killed after trying to run over IDF soldiers
(JNS.org) A Palestinian driver was shot dead on Tuesday afternoon after he tried to break through the Eyal checkpoint between Qalqiliya in the West Bank and Kfar Saba in central Israel, Israel Hayom reported.
The incident occurred around 4:30 p.m., after a vehicle with Israeli license plates arrived at the checkpoint from the Samaria region. Inside the vehicle were a number of Palestinians believed to have been illegally seeking work inside Israel. As the vehicle arrived at the checkpoint, the driver attempted to run over soldiers stationed there. An Israeli civilian at the checkpoint was hit by the vehicle and was lightly injured.
An alert Kfir Brigade soldier opened fire, critically wounding the driver, who later died at the Meir Medical Center in nearby Kfar Saba. A passenger in the front seat of the vehicle attempted to flee and was shot in the leg. The other occupants of the vehicle were detained for questioning.
The Kfir Brigade soldier said he opened fire because he felt his life was in danger.
Russia to deport Chabad emissary in Omsk
(JNS.org) Russian authorities are deporting Rabbi Asher Krichevsky, the Chabad-Lubavitch emissary in the southern Siberian city of Omsk since 2001.
According to reports, Krichevsky has also recently been subjected to fines and warnings regarding unhygienic food storage practices at a kosher grocery store operating under his authority.
Local news organizations reported that the reason for the rabbi’s deportation is an accusation of spying for Israel, but Russian authorities have not confirmed that claim.
Russian President Vladimir Putin is known for having a positive relationship with the country’s Jewish community, and particularly with Chabad. Putin personally appointed Rabbi Berel Lazar as the chief Chabad rabbi of Russia. Earlier this summer, Lazar and other Chabad rabbis participated in a state-sponsored Holocaust memorial for the murdered Jews of Crimea, the same region in Ukraine that was recently annexed by Russia.
In a separate incident in the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk—the scene of an ongoing conflict between pro-Ukrainians, pro-Russian rebels, and the Russian government—a Jewish man was killed on Friday. George (Eliyahu) Zilberbord, 47, was shot when retaliating against rebels who were trying to rob his neighbors’ house, the Ukrainian Jewish Committee and the Association of Jewish Organizations and Communities of Ukraine said, according to the Jerusalem Post.
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