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November 16, 2017 at 12:30 pm
Republicans are muscling their massive tax bill through the House, with President Donald Trump urging them on to a critically needed legislative victory and GOP House leaders exuding confidence they have the votes.
But the tax overhaul hit a roadblock Wednesday as Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin became the first Republican senator to say he opposes his party’s politically must-do tax legislation. That signaled potential problems for GOP leaders.
Passage of a similar package seemed assured Thursday in the House, where a handful of dissidents conceded they expected to be steamrolled by a GOP frantic to claim its first major legislative victory of the year.
“Big vote tomorrow in the House. Tax cuts are getting close!” Trump enthused in a tweet Wednesday night. “...
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November 16, 2017 at 12:07 pm
Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and U.S. Treasurer Jovita Carranza are now on the money, literally.
The two officials took a tour of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing on Wednesday to see firsthand the production of new $1 bills, the first currency that will bear their signatures.
Mnuchin’s signature is decidedly more legible than that of his predecessor Jacob Lew. Lew had handwriting that was so sloppy that former President Barack Obama once joked that unless he made his signature more legible, it might debase the currency.
Carranza and Mnuchin, accompanied by his wife Louise Linton, examined sheets of the $1 bills at the bureau’s Washington printing plant. The currency will be shipped to Federal Reserve regional banks around the country, and the new bills are exp...
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November 16, 2017 at 12:04 pm
A Los Angeles Shmira member was trailing a suspicious individual on Wednesday afternoon, when he observed the suspect attempt to break into his own home.
LAPD was called and quickly apprehended the suspect.
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November 16, 2017 at 12:04 pm
Three major violent acts, which are being attributed to criminal activity, took place in Israel on Wednesday. In the first incident, a 40-year-old man was shot and killed in Haifa at the Shikmona beach. “We transported the man in critical condition after being shot in the upper body to Rambam Medical Center while we attempting to resuscitate him. When we arrived at the medical center the staff there took over but were eventually forced to pronounce his death,” said Magen David Adom paramedic Itzik Shushan.
Magen David Adom EMTs and paramedics treated the man and then transported him while performing CPR in an attempt to resuscitate him. A Police spokesperson said that the incident is criminal in nature and that an investigation has been opened into the case and searches a...
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November 16, 2017 at 10:34 am
A conference room at a Paris middle school has been named in honor of two Jewish boys who were shot to death by an Islamic extremist in southern France more than five years ago.
The dedication of the room in memory of Ariel and Gabriel Sandler H”YD is part of an effort by the Georges Brassens school to fight racism and anti-Semitism in France, which is home to Europe’s biggest Muslim and Jewish populations.
The program seeks to make French values and the country’s various religions and cultures more familiar to the school’s students, many of whom are Muslim with roots in France’s former colonies. It includes visits to the Paris Museum of Jewish art and history and the Arab World Institute.
Samuel Sandler, whose grandsons were 3 and 5 years o...
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November 16, 2017 at 10:32 am
Hillary Clinton on Wednesday slammed what she described as the “politicization of the Justice Department” after reports that the Trump administration was considering a special counsel to probe the Uranium One deal and alleged conflicts with the Clinton Foundation.
President Trump has criticized the uranium deal and suggested that Clinton, who served as U.S. secretary of state in the Obama administration, may be implicated in wrongdoing.
But in an interview with Mother Jones, Clinton claimed that the Uranium One story has been “debunked” a number of times and that the Trump administration was merely using the story as a distraction.
“And if they send a signal that we’re going to be like some dictatorship, some authoritarian regimen where politica...
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November 16, 2017 at 10:08 am
The Knesset Research Center examined and found that there are gaps of tens of percent in the Ministry of Education’s investment in the recognized non-official schools in the chareidi and Arab sectors.
The report, published for the first time in Ynet, shows that while the Education Ministry’s budget for a class in a state-religious school is 446,278 NIS, a chareidi class in an unofficial/recognized school – not in Chinuch Atzmai or the Shas educational system, received 186,871 NIS – a gap of more than 250,000 NIS.
The results of the study were presented Wednesday morning at a meeting of the Committee for Distributive Justice and Social Equality in the Knesset on the inequality in the budgeting policy and wage conditions in the unofficial educational instituti...
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November 16, 2017 at 10:03 am
The gag order has been lifted on the identity of the person killed and a second seriously injured in a car accident that took place on Wednesday near Ramot Naftali in Israel’s Galilee. The accident which took place claimed the life of an Israeli soldier and left an officer in serious condition. A third person who was driving a cement mixer that was involved in the accident was moderately injured.
The accident occurred on Highway 886 near the Metzudat Koach intersection in the upper Galilee. United Hatzalah volunteers and Magen David Adom ambulance crews provided medical treatment for the injured at the scene.
United Hatzalah volunteer EMT Itai Chinitz who was the first responder at the scene said: “This was a very difficult scene that involved a serious accident be...
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November 16, 2017 at 9:57 am
In light of the violent incidents on the light rail, and following numerous requests to the Public Inquiries Committee, the Knesset Ombudsman Committee met with the directors of CityPass, which operates the Jerusalem light rail. During the course of the discussion, many questions arose regarding the treatment by the inspectors and police officers. Among other things, the passengers who paid for the trip, and because they did not validate the ticket when entering the train, their bank account was fined directly in the amount of 360 NIS.
The committee chairman, MK Yisrael Eichler said at the start of the discussion: “The fact that the citizen must validate the ticket apart from the payment leads to a trap that creates an atmosphere saturated with tension on the train. The tr...
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November 16, 2017 at 9:51 am
The chairman of the Jerusalem Hotel Association and the director of the Yehuda Hotel, Yishai Barnea, calls on the hotel owners to abandon the rabbinate’s kashrus and to choose other options, Yisrael Hayom reports on Wednesday, 26 Cheshvan. Barnea also spoke to Noam Zeigman of Kol Berama Radio on Wednesday morning, confirming this.
A few months ago, the High Court of Justice ruled that a business that did not receive a kashrus certificate cannot present itself as kosher, but it can publish the kosher standards in which it stands, as long as it is clear that it did not receive the consent of the Chief Rabbinate for kashrus of said establishment.
The letter, which was published in Israel Hayom, states that “over the years we have seen and experienced the destructive damage...
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November 16, 2017 at 9:50 am
After falling out with Benjamin Netanyahu as a junior member of the Cabinet last year, Avi Gabbay is now a leading candidate to replace the scandal-plagued prime minister.
Buoyed by a rags-to-riches personal story and a centrist worldview that appeals to Israel’s traditional swing voters, the new leader of the opposition Labor Party has seen a big bump in the polls.
But the 50-year-old former telecom executive has his sights set on more than just victory at the ballot box: He believes his business background and everyman persona could enable him to reach a peace agreement with the Palestinians — something Netanyahu rarely even mentions anymore.
“I don’t know if we can reach a deal, but we have to exert energy into it again and not neglect it anymore,”...
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November 16, 2017 at 9:48 am
It now appears clear to all except officials in the Chief Rabbinate of Israel that the latter’s monopoly over kashrus supervision in Israel has come to an end. While the Chief Rabbinate continues to fight to maintain the status quo that existed in the past, others are looking to the future, including Tzohar Rabbis, with the organization offering training to certify one as a mashgiach kashrus.
The Tzohar Rabbinical Association, in cooperation with the Emunah movement, will soon develop a training course for mashgichim. The course said the two organizations will be subsidized and will take place in the form of seven weekly and intense meetings.
The course will consist of two stages, the first stage will be basic for the training of the students, and in the second stage the enro...
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November 16, 2017 at 9:44 am
Rav Lt.-Colonel Gil Gilad was appointed head of the Kashrus Branch of the IDF Rabbinate.
Lt.-Col. Amir Zuzut retired from the IDF Rabbinate after serving as head of the Kashrus Branch for two years, and Rabbi Gilad will replace him.
Rabbi Gilad served in the past as the rabbi of the Base 1, Officers’ Training Base, and the commander of the 162nd Division in the Southern Command.
IDF Chief Rabbi Brigadier-General Rabbi Eyal Karim, said during the ceremony that “Rabbi Goren began to observe the kashrus of 36 kitchens, and today we are firmly guarding kashrus throughout IDF bases.”
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November 16, 2017 at 9:43 am
The vibrant and influential history of New England’s Jewish population chronicled in a vast repository of documents stored at the New England Historic Genealogical Society is being celebrated Wednesday.
The Jewish Heritage Center at the Boston-based genealogical society is not just a resource for people tracing family roots, but a trove of information for scholars researching the Jewish influence on New England’s economy and the history of anti-Semitism. It also preserves the records of Jewish philanthropies and synagogues.
“The information archived here provides some context and shows what part Jewish immigrants played in growing the community,” said Stephanie Call, the center’s manager.
The Jewish Heritage Center oversees the archives of the America...
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November 16, 2017 at 9:41 am
Mk Oren Hazan said in a statement on Wednesday that he has decided to forgo his diplomatic immunity and is therefore expected to stand trial for assaulting a public official, embarrassing a public official, and misconduct in a public setting.
According to the law of immunity, Hazan could have asked the Knesset for diplomatic immunity within the first 30 days of the charges being filed against him, however, he decided to forgo that option.
In April, Hazan was accused of attacking a public official after he attacked the Director of City Hall of Ariel and embarrassed the city’s Mayor during a dispute over the outstanding property tax owed by his mother for a restaurant that she owns in the city.
The restaurant, which is called Baba Grill, is located in Ariel and in 2014 Hazan&r...
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November 16, 2017 at 9:33 am
Following President Donald Trump’s visit to Beijing, China said Wednesday that it would send a high-level special envoy to North Korea amid an extended chill in relations between the neighbors over Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons and missile programs.
Song Tao, the head of China’s ruling Communist Party’s International Department, will travel to Pyongyang on Friday to report on outcomes of the party’s national congress held last month, the official Xinhua News Agency said.
Xinhua said Song, as president and party leader Xi Jinping’s special envoy, would carry out a “visit” in addition to delivering his report, but gave no details about his itinerary or meetings. It also made no mention of Trump’s trip to Beijing or the North’s...
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November 16, 2017 at 9:29 am
NATO’s chief said Wednesday he is certain the alliance will have sufficient forces to fulfill its training mission in Afghanistan after months of lobbying allies to increase troop contributions.
Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said in an interview with The Associated Press on Wednesday that NATO will meet the requirements set out by Gen. John Nicholson, the top U.S. commander for Afghanistan, who has said he needs close to 16,000 troops to fill the NATO training mission. Stoltenberg said the troop level will go from 13,000 to around 16,000.
“I’m absolutely confident that we will have sufficient forces when we move into 2018,” Stoltenberg said. “We are still receiving pledges and announcements about more troop contributions from allies.”
Stolt...
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November 16, 2017 at 9:27 am
A tiny Northern California elementary school would have turned into a “bloodbath” if not for quick action by school workers who rushed small children inside and locked down the building, thwarting a gunman on a deadly mission, authorities said.
Kevin Janson Neal repeatedly shot into Rancho Tehama Elementary School while trying to get inside. He eventually got frustrated and left.
“There is no doubt that he did not want to give up,” Tehama County Assistant Sheriff Phil Johnston said Wednesday. “I really, truly believe we would have had a horrific bloodbath at that school if that school hadn’t taken the action that it did.”
The school has about 100 children in kindergarten through fifth grade and four certified teachers, according to its web...
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November 16, 2017 at 9:26 am
The United States government wants you to know: It really, truly doesn’t like Nazis.
At the United Nations this week, the U.S. plans to vote against a yearly resolution that condemns the glorification of Nazism, State Department officials said Wednesday. Although it may seem counterintuitive — who wouldn’t want to condemn Nazis? — officials said free speech protections and other problems with the resolution make it impossible for America to support.
Introduced by Russia, the resolution calls on all U.N. nations to ban pro-Nazi speech and organizations, and to implement other restrictions on speech and assembly. That’s a non-starter in the U.S., where First Amendment protections guarantee all the right to utter almost anything they want — even pra...
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November 16, 2017 at 9:24 am
Gov. Larry Hogan released a statement Wednesday night on the Baltimore Police detective that was shot in the line of duty.
Larry Hogan
11 hours ago
Tonight the First Lady and I are praying for the Baltimore Police Department Detective who is in Shock Trauma after being shot in the line of duty earlier this evening. Please join us in praying for his recovery.
The individual responsible for this heinous crime will be found, charged, and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. The Baltimore Police Department has our full support as they track down this violent criminal and bring him to justice.
May God bless the brave men and women of the Baltimore Police Department and all law enforcement who serve and protect us every single day.
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