IDF rescues 2 Israeli soldiers mobbed in Qalandiya refugee camp
(JNS.org) Five Israeli Border Police officers were injured when security forces entered the Qalandiya refugee camp, north of Jerusalem, on Monday night to rescue two non-combat soldiers who had accidentally driven into the area and were attacked by a local Palestinian mob that stoned and firebombed their vehicle.
The two soldiers arrived in Qalandiya after having apparently taken a wrong turn when using a navigation app. The pair apparently split up in an effort to escape after their vehicle was set on fire by rioters.
“There was an issue here with technology, but the real issue was hatred,” Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon said Tuesday. “Two soldiers accidentally drove onto a road to Jerusalem that passes through Ramallah. They were pelted with stones and Molotov cocktails….Technology may have been involved in the incident, but it was also used in the rescue efforts. The soldiers who got lost were using Waze (a navigation app), and they took the shortest route, which passed through a hostile area.”
IDF troops sent to recover the non-combat soldiers were able to contact one of the soldiers almost immediately. He was hiding in a nearby yard and was found within half an hour. The second soldier could not be reached for about an hour, but was eventually found unharmed in the nearby town of Kochav Yaakov, where he had fled.
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Israel’s Shin Bet nabs Hebron sniper brothers responsible for multiple attacks
(JNS.org) Two Palestinian brothers suspected of multiple sniper attacks against Israeli civilians and security forces over the past few months were recently arrested, Israel’s Shin Bet security agency revealed Monday. Authorities believe the two were involved in attacks in which four Israelis were wounded.
The brothers—Nasser Faisal Mahmad Badawi, 23, who has known ties to the Palestinian terror group Hamas, and Akram Faisal Mehmed Badawi, 33, both residents of Hebron—were dubbed the “Hebron snipers” by the Israeli defense establishment. The Shin Bet said the brothers were found in possession of an improvised sniper rifle and other firearms.
According to authorities, the first sniper attack the brothers carried out took place on Nov. 6, 2015, when they met on the third floor of a building owned by their father, near the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron, and fired at a group of Jewish worshippers. One man was seriously wounded and another was moderately wounded in the attack.
According to the Shin Bet, Nasser was arrested Jan. 9. While he was in custody, Akram carried out another shooting attack, which he told investigators was meant to deflect suspicion from his brother.
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Holocaust film ‘Son of Saul’ wins Best Foreign Language Film Oscar
(JNS.org) The Hungarian Holocaust film “Son of Saul” won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film on Sunday, about a month after winning the Golden Globe in the same category.
The movie tells the story of Saul Auslander, a prisoner at the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp who was a member of the Sonderkommando, a unit of Jews who were forced to clear out corpses from gas chambers and move them to the crematoria.
Saul finds a body of a young boy whom he believes to be his dead son, and tries to save the corpse from burning in order to give his son a proper Jewish funeral, while the members of the Sonderkommando plan a rebellion. The actor who portrays Saul is a Hungarian Jew, Geza Rohrig, who also founded an underground punk band when Hungary was under Communist rule.
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Israeli-French singer to represent France at Eurovision contest
(JNS.org) Israeli singer Amir Haddad, who competed in the fourth season of the Israeli singing competition “A Star is Born” 10 years ago, will represent France at this year’s Eurovision singing contest this May in Stockholm, Sweden.
The 32-year-old Haddad was born in France but made aliyah to Israel with his family at the age of 8. Haddad’s family originally came to France from Tunisia and Morocco. In 2014, he competed in France’s version of “The Voice,” where he finished third place. He has since become a popular singer in France.
Haddad will likely sing his newly released French song “J’ai Cherché” (“I Searched For”), which debuted in France last week, at the European singing competition. Since France is one of the founding members of the contest, Haddad will advance straight to the finale without competing in the semifinals.
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Israel ‘very concerned’ over growing Iranian power in Syria, Ya’alon says
(JNS.org) Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon said Israel is “very concerned” about the growing Iranian presence in Syria amid the latter country’s five-year-old civil war.
Israel is “very concerned by the strengthening of Iran in Syria, which will lead to a strengthening of the Shi’ite axis, in a negative manner,” Ya’alon said in Tel Aviv on Monday.
“This could encourage Iran to continue to activate a terror front against us from the Golan Heights. Iran will also continue to invest the money it will receive from sanctions relief in the development and acquisition of new weapons systems, and the building and fortification of terror proxies in the Middle East, Europe, and America, to spread terrorism around the world,” he added.
While Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is a longtime ally of Iran, the ongoing Syrian civil war has allowed Iran to grow its military and economic presence in the country while the Syrian government’s resources have dwindled. Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed Shi’a Lebanese terror group, along with Shi’a Iraqi and Iranian militias, have been fighting alongside the Syrian government for the past few years.
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SodaStream, target of BDS, lays off last remaining Palestinian workers
(JNS.org) SodaStream, the Israel-based producer of a popular beverage carbonation machine, was forced to lay off its final 74 Palestinian workers after it had been the target of the international Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement. SodaStream had already relocated from its Judea and Samaria facility against the backdrop of BDS pressure.
“Today is their final day working with the company, sadly,” SodaStream spokesman Maayan Nave told AFP regarding the Palestinian workers, adding, “It is a tough day for us, and all the SodaStream workers, but this is not the end of the road.”
SodaStream’s former headquarters were in Mishor Adumim, which is located beyond Israel’s 1967 lines. Before the relocation, SodaStream had employed 1,300 workers, including 500 Palestinians who were given the same pay and benefits as their Jewish-Israeli colleagues.
Following SodaStream’s October 2015 relocation to Israel’s Negev Desert, the company was forced to lay off most of its Palestinian workers—retaining 74 of its most experienced Palestinian employees, who commuted to the new location. Yet after a permit dispute with the Israeli government, the company was forced to lay off those 74 Palestinians.
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U.K. Labour Party launches investigation into anti-Semitism at Oxford U. club
(JNS.org) The United Kingdom’s Labour Party has announced that it has launched an investigation into allegations of anti-Semitism at Oxford University’s Labour Club.
In mid-February, Oxford student Alex Chalmers resigned as co-chair of the school’s Labour Club after claiming that his colleagues “have some kind of problems with Jews.” Chalmers also alleged that some members had expressed support for the Palestinian terror group Hamas. The club recently decided to support “Israeli Apartheid Week.”
“Allegations relating to the conduct of individual Young Labour party members have been received by the Labour Party,” a Labour Party spokesman told London’s Jewish Chronicle.
The Labour Party announced the decision to appoint Baroness Janet Royall, Labour’s former leader in the U.K.’s House of Lords, to head the investigation, the Jewish Chronicle reported.
The allegations are just the latest concern over growing anti-Semitism within the U.K.’s second-largest political party. Last year, Labour elected MP Jeremy Corbin as the British opposition leader. The British Jewish community was alarmed at Corbin’s rise due to his past ties with a noted Holocaust denier as well as his characterization of the Hamas and Hezbollah terror groups as “friends.”
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