Donald H. Harrison

Who converts, who sells newspapers roil Knesset

  By Tzvi Zucker JERUSALEM (Tazpit)–After much political backroom dealing, a highly controversial conversion bill will be enacted by Cabinet decision, instead of becoming law through Knesset vote. MK Elazar Stern (Hatnuah) had proposed a bill to the Knesset that would completely change how conversions were processed in Israel. Among the changes were the kind of […]

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Jewish Religion, Middle East

Ban Jews from Temple Mount, Arab areas?

By Ira Sharkansky JERUSALEM–Politics is the essence of civilization, It’s the ideal way to deal with inevitable disagreements. Lots of argument, then voting (either mass electorate or within a governmental forum) and accepting the results.. Until the next opportunity to argue and vote. Criticism is welcome, and essential. All this separates the civilized from those

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Ira Sharkansky, Middle East

There’s sex, and there’s intimacy

Silent Bird by Reina Lisa Menasche, © 2014, ISBN978-14944-08831, 251 pages. By Donald H. Harrison SAN DIEGO—Back when I was an undergraduate at UCLA—has it already been more than 50 years?—college men talked hopefully about the mythic “Yale date,” which supposedly had been agreed upon by male and female students at that august institution across

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Donald H. Harrison, San Diego County

Orthodox day schools enrollment increases

NEW YORK (Press Release)– The fourth census of Jewish day schools in the United States conducted by Dr. Marvin Schick was released Thursday, Oct. 30, by The AVI CHAI Foundation, which sponsored the research. Conducted at five-year intervals, beginning with the 1998-99 school year, this research provides a clear picture of trends in the day school

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Science, Medicine, & Education, USA

SDJA to host contest in math, science, engineering

SAN DIEGO (Press Release)– The first 2014-15 Rendezvous Engineering Mathematics Science (REMS) Academic Competition will be held November 5, 2014 at San Diego Jewish Academy and will include students in the 3rd, 4th, and 5th grades. REMS competitions are a series of Jeopardy-like events that happen throughout the school year. They are meant to be fun

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San Diego County, Science, Medicine, & Education

Tensions escalate in Glick shooting aftermath

By Ira Sharkansky JERUSALEM — Police statistics were showing a decline in the incidence of violence associated with Jerusalem until a Palestinian activist took upon himself a motorcycle shooting of Yehuda Glick. The immediate response was celebrations in Arab sections of Jerusalem, followed by an uptick of violence when the police and their colleagues in other

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Ira Sharkansky, Middle East

JNS news briefs: October 31, 2014

Haaretz cartoon depicts Netanyahu flying plane into World Trade Center (JNS.org) The Israeli newspaper Haaretz is drawing condemnation for publishing a cartoon depicting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu flying a plane marked “Israel” into a building that resembles a World Trade Center tower. Underneath artist Amos Biderman’s cartoon, Haaretz provides a link to a story on

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Travel and Food

Kerry wants religious status quo at Temple Mount

WASHINGTON, D.C. (Press Release)–U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry issued the following statement concerning the aftermath to the shooting of Temple Mount advocate  Rabbi Yehudah Glick by a Palestinian terrorist on Wednesday, Oct. 29: “I strongly condemn yesterday’s shooting of a U.S. citizen outside the Menachem Begin Heritage Center in Jerusalem. My thoughts and prayers are

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Jewish Religion, Middle East, USA

Chinese investors laud Israel’s high tech

By Anav Silverman JERUSALEM (Tazpit) — One of Israel’s most influential business meetings, the 12th Go4Israel Conference, was held this week on Tuesday, October 27, at the Hilton Tel Aviv, and paid particular attention to China. Over 1,000 participants took part in the conference including international and local entrepreneurs, investors and business leaders. “The conference reflects

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International, Middle East

Netanyahu: Abbas partly responsible for Glick shooting

JERUSALEM (WJC) — Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that incitement by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas was partly to blame for the shooting of a Temple Mount activist a night earlier. Netanyahu convened a meeting of top security officials on Thursday morning, a day after Rabbi Yehudah Glick, a prominent activist for Jewish

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Middle East

Novel tells of Vilna and Brooklyn in 1940s

The Sweetness by Sande Boritz Berger, shewritespress.com, 2014, 978-1-63152-907-8, 301 pgs.,$16.95 By Eva Trieger ENCINITAS, California — Recently nominated by The American Library Association for its yearly Sophie Brody Award for Jewish Literature, this moving novel revisits one of the bleakest periods, not just in Jewish memory, but in world history.  In this debut work, Sande

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Travel and Food