Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu disbanded a state-sanctioned committee charged with forming a new law on drafting ultra-Orthodox men into the Israel Defense Forces on Monday, in an apparent blow to coalition partner Kadima, which joined the premier’s cabinet based on an agreement that the government would formulate a new Haredi enlistment law. The committee, headed…
The director of Ichilov Medical Center in Tel Aviv announced Monday that entry to the hospital will be denied to African migrants, unless they are in need of medical attention or hospitalization. Ichilov director Gabi Barbash issued the new instructions on Monday, in which migrant workers and refugees will only be granted access if they…
Avid followers of the Italian Jewish sports world need not despair following Italy’s loss in the European Soccer Championship final last night. Soccer star Mario Balotelli, foster son of an Italian Jewish mother, may not have delivered in the 4-0 loss to Spain, but another Italian Jewish athlete, tennis player Camila Giorgi, plays for a…
At the entrance to Yad Vashem, the visitor is greeted by an old clip of Jewish children in the Ukraine singing “Hatikva,” the national anthem. The visit ends with the establishment of the State of Israel. Still, one notable difference is that the Arabs are no longer presented as Nazis: the placing of the 1941…
The casket of former Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, who died Saturday at the age of 96, was placed at the Knesset on Monday, giving Israelis the opportunity to pay their final respects. Knesset chairman Reuven Rivlin eulogized Shamir beside his casket. “Yitzhak, here you come again to the Knesset, to the place which was your…
A German Jewish hospital has stopped allowing religious circumcisions in light of a court decision defining them as causing grievous bodily harm to young boys. Last week’s ruling by a Cologne district court did not outlaw circumcision, but still the Jewish Hospital in Berlin decided to stop allowing religious circumcisions, according to Ynet. Doctors may…
American Jewish activist Brian Lurie has been appointed president of the New Israel Fund, succeeding former Meretz MK Naomi Chazan, who served four tumultuous years in the post. Lurie, a rabbi by training, was CEO of the San Francisco Jewish Federation for 17 years and has also been involved in advancing Arab-Jewish relations. The New…
Florida International University has approved the school’s acquisition of the Jewish Museum of Florida. The school’s board of trustees passed the merger unanimously last Friday, according to the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. Pending approval from the state’s Board of Governors, the school would acquire the museum’s collection, library, endowment and two buildings of a former synagogue….
The seasonal swarm of jellyfish which arrived on Israeli beaches over the last weekend, made their way to the north of the country. According to reports by the Israel Oceanographic and Limnological Research Institute, jellyfish were sighted one kilometer off the beach of Hadera on Sunday. On Saturday, blooms were sighted west of Mikhmoret beach,…
Only two days after the school year ended, an Israel-born six-year-old girl was arrested along with her mother, a migrant worker from the Philippines, ahead of their deportation. This is the first time a child at such a young age, which is attending kindergarten and is a part of the education system, is arrested to…
I didn’t know Yitzhak Shamir, but he knew me – or at least tried to. In January 1989, HaIr editor Meir Schnitzer and I appealed against a Chief Military Censor’s decision to the Israeli High Court, and won. The court gave permission to publish an article I wrote on an upcoming change in the leadership…
