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April 23, 2017 at 11:38 am
President Reuven Rivlin this morning (Sunday), held a working meeting at his residence in Jerusalem with Austrian Chancellor Christian Kern who was making his first visit to Israel. Later the Chancellor was due to visit Yad Vashem, and then participate in the Yom HaShoah commemorations, Israel’s national Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day.
President Rivlin thanked the Chancellor for his visit, and for his longstanding support for Israel. The President spoke of the importance of cooperation between Israel and Austria in many fields, especially in the field of sustainable energy in which he noted Austria was a world leader. He stated, “Cooperation between our two countries is growing stronger, and we know that under your leadership, Austria will contin...
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April 23, 2017 at 11:16 am
It is a tradition among many Jewish people that the child at a Bris Milah develops, in personality, to be like the Sandek that held him at a Bris Milah. This is perhaps another motivation as to the reason why an attempt is made to obtain a great Tzaddik to serve as the child’s Sandek. But from where did this idea originate? And what should someone do who has irreligious parents or grandparents and wishes to honor them with being Sandek?
The Ramah (YD 264:1) writes that a person should get a Mohel and a Baal Bris (i.e. a Sandek) who is yoser tov (very good) and a Tzaddik, a righteous person. It is unclear to this author whether the term “very good” as it applies to a Sandek is in terms of capability or in terms of moral character.
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April 23, 2017 at 11:14 am
An Iranian presidential candidate said Sunday the landmark 2015 nuclear agreement with world powers has failed to lift sanctions or improve the country’s economy.
Mostafa Mirsalim, a conservative, told a news conference that President Hassan Rouhani’s outreach to the West had failed, adding that “sanctions remained in place and were even intensified.”
Under the nuclear deal, international sanctions were lifted in exchange for Iran curbing its uranium enrichment, but separate U.S. sanctions related to Iran’s ballistic missile program have been tightened.
Mirsalim said that, if elected, he would abide by the nuclear deal. But he said U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration had already undermined the agreement, without elaborating.
Last week, the S...
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April 23, 2017 at 11:14 am
Amid heightened security, French voters began casting ballots for their next president Sunday in a first-round poll that’s seen as a litmus test for the spread of populism around the world and a vote on the future of Europe.
More than 50,000 police and gendarmes were deployed to the 66,000 polling stations for Sunday’s election, which comes after Thursday’s deadly attack on the Champs-Elysees in which a police officer and a gunman were slain. The presidential poll is the first ever to be held during a state of emergency, put in place since the Paris attacks of November 2015.
Voters are choosing between 11 candidates in the most unpredictable contest in decades.
The vote “is really important, mainly because we really need a change in this country with all the diff...
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April 23, 2017 at 11:13 am
About 1,100 terrorists imprisoned in Israel announced their participation in a hunger strike begun a week ago, demanding improved conditions. While organizers of the effort hoped to enlist thousands of the 6,000 imprisoned terrorists, this did not occur and it now appears that many of those taking part are not as committed as they thought would be the case.
About a hundred quit the strike in recent days, joining over 85 who have quit over the weekend. What was hoped to be a major effort to improve conditions and increase international pressure against Israel seems to be waning quicker than anticipated.
Imprisoned Fatah terrorist Marwan Barghouti, who is serving five life sentences for his heinous acts, organized the strike. He was optimistic after learning of widespread international med...
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April 23, 2017 at 8:51 am
Reports claim IDF bombed Syrian military base in retaliation for Friday strikes on the Golan.
Arab media on Sunday morning reported that Israel struck a military base under the control of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's forces.
Before the civil war, my friends on the left said that it is possible for us to leave the Golan Heights in return for peace [between Syria and] Israel," he added.The base was located in the village of Nbaa Al-Fawwar, on the outskirts of Quneitra.
According to Al Mayadeen TV, three people were killed and two were injured in the attack.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said the attack had targeted a "weapons warehouse" in the camp.
Additional details have not been released.
On Friday, just before the Sabbat, air raid s...
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April 23, 2017 at 8:49 am
18-year old Arab suspect arrested after 4 people stabbed in Tel Aviv. Police say stabbings likely act of terror.
Four people were stabbed in northern Tel Aviv Sunday afternoon near Herods Hotel.
The victims included three men, two in their 50s and one in his early 70s, and a woman in her early 50s.
The four were treated on the scene by MDA paramedics before being evacuated to Ichilov Hospital in Tel Aviv. The injuries sustained by all four victims have been listed as light.
Police have taken an 18-year old Arab man suspected in the attacks into custody. Authorities say the suspect is a resident of the Palestinian Authority.
While police have yet to officially classify the incident, officials say it is most likely an act of nationalistic terrorism.
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April 22, 2017 at 10:13 pm
Russian chief rabbi says France’s Jews should leave if Le Pen wins elections.
Russian Chief Rabbi Berel Lazar called on French Jews to leave their country if the far right politician Marine Le Pen is elected president next month.
Lazar, a Chabad rabbi who was born in Italy and has lived in Russia for 25 years, made the remark on Friday while attending a conference on Jewish learning near Moscow organized by the Limmud FSU association.
“If Marine Le Pen is elected president of France, the Jews must leave,” Lazar said, according to a transcription of his address at the conference provided by Limmud FSU. Lazar was a keynote speaker of the event, which drew 2,500 participants — a record attendance since Limmud FSU began holding conferences across the former Soviet ...
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April 22, 2017 at 10:05 pm
Lawmakers returning to Washington this coming week will find a familiar quagmire on health care legislation and a budget deadline dramatized by the prospect of a protracted battle between President Donald Trump and Democrats over his border wall.
Trump’s GOP allies control Congress, but they’ve been unable to send him a single major bill as his presidency faces the symbolic 100-day mark on April 29 — the very day when the government, in a worst-case scenario, could shut down.
Feeling pressure to deliver results, Trump wants to revive a troubled health care measure from House Republicans to repeal and replace President Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act. Trump also hopes to use a $1 trillion catchall spending bill to salvage victories on his promised U.S.-Mexico bo...
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April 22, 2017 at 10:02 pm
Another day, another cellphone video of a conflict on an airplane.
American Airlines said it grounded a flight attendant who got into a verbal confrontation with a passenger on a Friday flight from San Francisco to Dallas-Fort Worth.
Spokeswoman Leslie Scott says the airline is looking into whether the male flight attendant violently took away a stroller from the female passenger just before she boarded a Friday flight from San Francisco to Dallas. He has been removed from duty in the meantime.
In an age of cellphone videos and social media, airlines are learning the hard way that it is essential to deescalate tense situations that occur during air travel, even as there are more passengers, less room and fewer flight attendants than ever before.
The incident comes less than two weeks a...
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April 22, 2017 at 10:02 pm
Early voting began overseas Saturday in France’s most nail-biting election in generations, and the 11 candidates seeking to become the country’s next president silenced their campaigns as required to give voters a period of reflection.
Opinion polls pointed to a tight race among the four top contenders vying to get into the May 7 presidential runoff that will decide who becomes France’s next head of state. But the polls also said that decision was largely in the hands of the one-in-three French voters who were still undecided.
Polls opened in France’s far-flung overseas territories but voting wouldn’t start until Sunday on the French mainland. France’s 10 percent unemployment, its lackluster economy and security issues topped voters’ concerns.
P...
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April 22, 2017 at 9:52 pm
CAIRO (AP) — Egyptian-American charity worker Aya Hijazi was released from prison after nearly three years of detention, her lawyer said Wednesday.
President Donald Trump met Hijazi Friday at the White House.
Trump was directly involved in negotiations to free Aya Hijazi, 30, said White House press secretary Sean Spicer. Hijazi and her husband, Mohamed Hassanein, an Egyptian, returned to the Washington area this week.
"We are very happy to have Aya back home and it's a great honor to have her in the Oval Office," Trump said.
Hijazi's brother, Basel Hijazi, also attended the White House meeting, along with Trump aides Ivanka Trump, Jared Kushner and Dina Powell.
Details of their arrival were first reported by The Washington Post. Their release and the freedom of four ot...
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April 22, 2017 at 9:31 pm
New poll shows Likud with four seats more than Yesh Atid.
For the first time in six months, a poll showed the Likud party gaining strength and Yair Lapid's Yesh Atid party losing power.
The survey was done by Midgam for Channel 2's "Meet the Israeli Press" program, and showed Likud receiving 28 seats, while rival Yesh Atid received 24.
Former Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon's new party would not pass the minimum 4-seat threshold to receive a place in the Knesset, according to the results.
According to the poll, the Joint Arab List would be the third largest party, with 13 seats, while the Zionist Union would receive 12 seats, and the Jewish Home party 10.
Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon's Kulanu party, as well as the haredi parties UTJ and Shas, would ea...
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April 22, 2017 at 9:31 pm
12 years of Saturn research come to an end as scientists wait for the last few questions to be answered.
NASA's Cassini spacecraft on Saturday soared past Titan for the last time, using its gravitational pull to slingshot into a series of exploratory dives in the planet's rings.
Titan is Saturn's largest moon, and its northern latitudes are dominated by lakes and seas made of methane. Often, nitrogen gas bubbles up from below the seas' surface, producing a transient bumpiness on the seas' surfaces.
On another moon, Enceladus, the oceans contain all the necessary requirements for life to thrive.
When Cassini is finished exploring Saturn's rings, it will dive into the planet itself, in a "grand finale."
Cassini is expected to make the first of 22 explor...
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April 22, 2017 at 9:14 pm
A leading US-based Jewish human rights group praised the Trump administration this week for the “strong stand” it has taken against the Iranian regime’s ongoing support for terrorism and threats against Israel.
“The Jewish people have learned the brutal lesson from the Nazi Holocaust, that when a leader threatens you with genocide you take such threats seriously,” Rabbis Marvin Hier and Abraham Cooper — the dean and associate dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center — said in a statement. “The world, including many Jewish leaders, dismissed Hitler’s early threats against the Jewish people as bombast. The scope of death and destruction of WWII and the unspeakable horrors of the Shoah have taught us to never agai...
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April 22, 2017 at 9:08 pm
PLO leader says stability, security, and peace in the Middle East are dependent on ending the Israeli 'occupation.'
Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Secretary-General Saeb Erekat said the "state of Palestine" bases its stance on international law and legitimacy, and sees the international community as responsible for enforcing the pre-1967 borders.
According to Erekat, the international community has a responsibility to solve the Israeli-Arab conflict.
This, Erekat claimed, is because it is "a fact" that the Middle East's security, peace, and stability depends on ending the fifty-year Israeli "occupation."
In a Ramallah meeting with representative of the European Union, Japan, and Russia, Erekat praised Europe, Russia, and Japan for their support of a two-state ...
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April 22, 2017 at 9:08 pm
American Airlines suspends employee, issues apology, after flight attendant violently takes stroller off the plane.
A video posted on Facebook by Surain Adyanthaya shows a woman crying after a flight attendant reportedly violently took her stroller, accidentally hitting the woman and almost hitting her baby.
The woman was traveling on a flight from San Francisco to Dallas and traveling with her twin babies.
Other passengers immediately tried to calm the woman and condemn the staff. One of them can be heard, "Hey bud, hey bud, you do that to me and I'll knock you flat!"
A flight attendant responded, "Hey, you stay out of this!"
Adyanthaya posted an update on Facebook saying the crew "escorted the mother and her kids off the flight" and let the flight attendant back on.
Americ...
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April 21, 2017 at 5:57 pm
New York - A selfie reveals more than whether it’s a good hair day. Facial lines and contours, droops and dark spots could indicate how well you’re aging, and, when paired with other data, could someday help determine whether you qualify for life insurance.
“Your face is something you wear all your life, and it tells a very unique story about you,” says Karl Ricanek Jr., co-founder and chief data scientist at Lapetus Solutions Inc. in Wilmington, North Carolina.
Several life insurance companies are testing Lapetus technology that uses facial analytics and other data to estimate life expectancy, he says. (Lapetus would not disclose the names of companies testing its product.) Insurers use life expectancy estimates to make policy approval and pricing decisions. Lape...
