(OPINION) When I moved to Israel, I couldn’t have foreseen the horror that would unfold less than two months later, when Hamas terrorists stormed the southern border, massacred 1,200 citizens, and took 251 others hostage on Oct. 7. In all the years I spent dreaming of my aliyah — the return to the homeland described in Jewish texts — I never accounted for the country being thrust into national disarray.
Read MoreThe Vatican’s doctrinal summit opened this week with one issue deemed to be out of bounds: female deacons. Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernandez, the Vatican’s prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, said that the church was not “rushing” on the issue.
Read MoreLev Kreitman has seen plenty of trauma. He was at the Nova festival on Oct. 7, when it was attacked by Hamas. Then, as a reserve soldier, he was sent into Gaza. On Tuesday, when two gunmen opened fire in Tel Aviv near his home, Kreitman leapt into action, shooting one of them. At least seven people were killed in the attack, which took place at a light rail station in Jaffa, in the south of the city.
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A Reddit forum led Tabitha Barnes to the Israel Program for Excellence in English, known by its Hebrew acronym TALMA. The organization was recruiting licensed educators for its summer fellowship to teach English to Israeli school children displaced by the Israel-Hamas war.
Read MoreIran launched a barrage of missiles at Israel Tuesday, inflicting no serious casualties, Israeli officials reported. But as missiles rained down on Tel Aviv, two men killed at least six people in a terror attack at the light rail station in nearby Jaffa.
Read More(OPINION) There is a Talmudic dictum that states, “If someone comes to kill you, rise up and kill him first.” This is part of a discussion of the laws of self-defense, but Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cited it with reference to the targeted killing of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah.
Read More(OPINION) Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is a good speaker with a very good case: Israel is under attack by Iranian-backed terrorists whom the world community is rather guilty of appeasing. If he had stuck to that message in his Friday address to the United Nations General Assembly and gone on to project some humanity and vision, it might have been a more effective speech.
Read MoreHezbollah rockets lit up the sky above Nazareth, Israel, as sirens wailed across the city. Windows shook from explosions as the Iron Dome — Israel’s missile defense system — intercepted the incoming projectiles.
Read MoreOver the last five years, a growing number of single Muslim women in their mid-30s in Islamic countries — including the UAE, Qatar and Egypt, among others — have been choosing to freeze their eggs to ensure motherhood later in life. It was previously not seen as an option in these countries — owing primarily to cultural beliefs and religious restrictions.
Read MoreThe pager attack that killed at least a dozen people and injured thousands in Lebanon is the latest high-tech subterfuge in a long history of covert ops attributed to Israel.
Read More(OPINION) Can you imagine the level of physical and psychological trauma throughout Lebanon and parts of Syria as thousands of Hezbollah pagers exploded, leaving many Islamic militants injured, hundreds of them critically, and several of them dead? It sounded like something out of a sci-fi movie more than real life, especially at the scale on which it occurred.
Read More(ANALYSIS) Two-thirds of college students do not hold views toward Israel or Jews “likely to threaten their relationship with their Jewish peers,” a new study from Brandeis University found. But what about the remaining third? Researchers found that group split roughly equally between those who expressed hostility toward Israel (but not Jews) and those who thought poorly of Jews, not Israel.
Read More(ANALYSIS) When the second installment in the blockbuster “Dune” franchise came out, it was hard not to see it as a not-very-subtle metaphor for the Israel-Hamas war. It was starnge to watch scenes of guerilla warriors in headscarves when I saw the same images on the news. Lately, people have been finding those same parallels in other movies or TV series about conflict.
Read MoreA new Taliban law restricting the rights of women even further has led to calls for prayer from Arabic church leaders as well as Afghans who have fled in recent years.
Read MoreMany people around the world are more likely to say it is important to have a nation's leader stand up for those who share their religious beliefs. The survey, conducted by Pew Research Center, found that in countries where faith is “perceived as very important” that citizens are overall “more likely to value each of these qualities in a leader.”
Read More(ANALYSIS) On Aug. 21, 2024, the Taliban published its new law to “promote virtue and eliminate vice” that sets up rules for everyday life and adds to the litany of restrictions on women. Over the last three years, the Taliban introduced tens and tens of decrees barring women and girls from all activities and engagements outside their homes.
Read More(ANALYSIS) In early August 2024, thousands of women and women’s rights campaigners took to the streets across Iraq to protest proposed legal changes that effectively would legalize child marriage. The proposed change is to allow citizens to choose between religious authorities or civil judiciary to decide on family matters.
Read MoreIn the midst of a conflict on three fronts — Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon and Iran — Israeli troops congregate on street corners, in cafes and around government buildings. Many are between 18 and 20 years old, recent draftees of the mandatory military service required of Israeli citizens.
Read MoreGovernment-fostered misinformation and disinformation are hindering religious liberty in several places globally, USCIRF said in an August factsheet, and spreading societal religious persecution including violence. USCIRF defined misinformation as a claim that is false or inaccurate, and disinformation as a false or inaccurate claim that the government deliberately disseminates.
Read MoreGidi Dar did not set out to be a prophet. When he began work on his film Legend of Destruction, in 2016, he was simply drawn to a collection of Talmudic stories about Jewish zealots revolting against their Roman rulers in the first century, a rebellion that triggered the destruction of the Temple. Then, during the seven years the film spent in production, things began to shift in Israeli society.
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