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February 22, 2018 at 2:26 pm
National Rifle Association CEO Wayne LaPierre on Thursday said suggestions to limit guns are “completely ridiculous,” arguing more security measures is what is needed to increase safety in schools.
“Evil walks among us, and God help us if we don’t harden our schools and protect our kids,” the NRA leader told the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC).
“Everyday young children are being dropped off at schools that are wide-open, soft targets for people bent on mass murder. It should not be easier for a madman to shoot up a school than a bank or a jewelry store or some Hollywood gala.”
The top NRA executive promised that the NRA would provide ‘immediate assistance” to schools for security consulting free of charge.
Read more ...
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February 22, 2018 at 2:26 pm
Sen. Marco Rubio on Wednesday announced said he supports a law that would raise the age requirement to purchase a rifle, and would consider a ban of large-capacity magazines.
The father of a victim in last week’s Florida school shooting asked Rubio during a CNN town hall event what he would do to work with parents, students and gun control advocates to prevent future violence.
“I absolutely believe that in this country, if you are 18 years of age you should not be able to buy a rifle. I will support a law that takes that right away,” Rubio said.
Read more at The Hill.
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February 22, 2018 at 2:21 pm
We hate to spoil your breakfast, or supper, but a groundbreaking new study by French scientists has linked processed foods such as cereals and mass-produced bread to an increased chance of getting cancer.
The study, published by The British Medical Journal, suggests that the more “ultra-processed foods” — ones made in factories with lots of added preservatives and flavorings — a person consumes, the higher the risk of them developing certain types of cancer.
The risky foods also include chicken nuggets, chocolate bars, and sodas, basically all of the most delicious things in the world.
The team of scientists studied the medical records and eating habits of nearly 105,000 people for the project and said, while further study is needed and they didn&rsq...
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February 22, 2018 at 2:17 pm
President Trump in a series of tweets early Thursday denied that he suggested giving teachers guns to prevent mass school shootings, instead saying he would consider giving trained teachers concealed weapons.
“I never said ‘give teachers guns’ like was stated on Fake News @CNN & @NBC. What I said was to look at the possibility of giving ‘concealed guns to gun adept teachers with military or special training experience — only the best,” Trump tweeted.
“20% of teachers, a lot, would now be able to immediately fire back if a savage sicko came to a school with bad intentions. Highly trained teachers would also serve as a deterrent to the cowards that do this. Far more assets at much less cost than guards. A ‘gun free’ school is a magn...
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February 22, 2018 at 1:54 pm
Dep. Foreign Minister says Israel negotiating with 10 countries over embassy transfers following announcements by US, Guatemala.
Israel is currently holding talks with 10 different nations over the possible relocation of their embassies from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely revealed Thursday.
Following President Donald Trump’s December 6th announcement that he had ordered the US State Department to begin work transferring the US mission to Israel from Tel Aviv to the Israeli capital, just one other country, Guatemala, followed suit.
Later that month, however, Hotovely hinted that other countries may also be interested in transferring their embassies.
On Thursday, Hotovely told American Jewish leaders that Israel is currently engaged i...
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February 22, 2018 at 1:53 pm
The Icelandic lawmaker who proposed a controversial ban on circumcision told The Algemeiner in an interview this week that her bill does not violate religious freedom.
Silja Dögg Gunnarsdóttir of the Progressive party recently introduced the legislation in the Icelandic Parliament, where it is currently being debated. It proposes a blanket ban on male circumcision on the basis that it violates the rights of children. Violators of the law could receive up to six years in prison.
The bill has been widely condemned and opposed by Jewish groups across Europe.
Icelandic MP Silja Dögg Gunnarsdóttir. Photo: Framsókn via Flickr.
Defending the bill, Gunnarsdóttir compared male circumcision to female circumcision, saying, “In bo...
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February 22, 2018 at 1:43 pm
Originally posted on JewishInsider.comPalestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas was sighted on Wednesday in Baltimore, Maryland. According to a source, Abbas is receiving medical treatment at Johns Hopkins Hospital.
An impressive motorcade of Secret Service vehicles were seen parked outside the Four Seasons Hotel in the Harbor East neighborhood of Baltimore.
Abbas’ Boeing 737 landed at Baltimore–Washington International Airport at 3:00 PM EST after a short flight from White Plains, New York, according to the Flight Radar24 site.
On January 14th, during a fiery speech in Ramallah, Abbas declared “Damn your money!” to the United States following President Trump’s decision on Jerusalem. “We will not accept for the U.S. to be a mediato...
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February 22, 2018 at 9:15 am
The Ohio Treasurer’s Office purchased $52.8 million in Israel bonds on Feb. 15 to increase the state’s holding to a whopping $200 million—the first time a state has reached that figure in U.S. history, according to the treasurer’s office.
“First and foremost, we’re making this investment because it’s a good investment for the taxpayers of Ohio,” Ohio Treasurer Josh Mandel told the Cleveland Jewish News. “Second, we’re making this investment to combat the bigotry of the [BDS] movement. Third, we’re making this investment to stand with the only country in the Middle East that shares American values.”
Israel bonds are the only foreign bond held by the Ohio Treasurer’s Office, said Mandel, adding that he believes I...
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February 22, 2018 at 9:13 am
The social media service Twitter is believed to have suspended thousands of accounts for being automated bots, or for other policy violations, drawing outcry from fringe conservative media figures who lost followers in the move.
Many of these figures, such as host Bill Mitchell and white nationalist Richard Spencer, took to the service to complain about losing a small portion of their followers in the move. Other conservative accounts were suspended until verifying that they were run by people.
Twitter did not confirm the number of accounts that it suspended but released a statement saying that it was continuing to identify “suspicious account behaviors” that represented automated activity or other violations of its terms of service.
(c) 2018, The Washington Post · El...
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February 22, 2018 at 9:11 am
Sen. Marco Rubio on Wednesday night said he opposes arming teachers with weapons to prevent future school shootings, hours after President Trump indicated his administration would look into the idea.
“I don’t support that, and I would admit to your right now I answer that as much as a father as I do as a senator. The notion that my kids are going to school with teachers that are armed with a weapon is not something that, quite frankly, I’m comfortable with,” Rubio said at a CNN town hall event in the aftermath of last week’s Florida high school shooting.
Read more at The Hill.
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February 22, 2018 at 12:49 am
Israel's elite 8200 intelligence unit played a key role in thwarting an attempted aerial terror attack in Australia by the ISIS terror group this past year.
Cooperation with the Israeli intelligence community enabled the transfer of information to the security authorities in Australia and led to the arrest of the terrorists after they were already in advanced stages of planning execution of the attack at the end of 2017.
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February 22, 2018 at 12:47 am
A religious soldier was attacked Sunday evening as he prayed in a synagogue in the Beit Yisrael neighborhood of Jerusalem.
The soldier, a member of the national religious community, arrived at the Beit Yisrael Shtibel Sunday night for evening prayers when he was attacked by anti-draft radicals, Kikar Hashabbat reported.
The Beit Yisrael Shtibel, located in the predominantly haredi neighborhood Beit Yisrael, near Meah Sharim, includes multiple prayer rooms, allowing locals to form impromptu prayer services at all times.
During the evening prayer services, haredi extremists assaulted the soldier and forced him to flee the synagogue and call for assistance.
While his attackers pursued him, the soldier managed to escape when an ambulance arrived at the scene.
It is unclear if th...
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February 22, 2018 at 12:43 am
There was a "small explosion" near the U.S. embassy compound in Podgorica, the capital of the Balkan nation of Montenegro, at approximately midnight local time Thursday, the State Department has confirmed to ABC News.
"At 00:30, in front of the @USEmbassyMNE building in #Podgorica, #Montenegro an unknown person committed suicide with an explosive device," the government of Montenegro tweeted. "Immediately before, that person threw an explosive device from the intersection near the Sport Center into the US Embassy compound."
A subsequent tweet read, "Most probably, the device was a hand grenade. Police investigation and identification is under way directed by the prosecutor."
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February 22, 2018 at 12:41 am
Rep. Frederica Wilson praised the survivors of last week’s shooting at a South Florida high school for speaking out on gun control, estimating that “80 percent” of the U.S. is “on their side.”
“Their voices are permeating through this nation and I think people are listening, and I think that 80 percent of the citizens in this country are on their side,” Wilson told MSNBC’s Ali Velshi on Wednesday.
Read more at The Hill.
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February 22, 2018 at 12:41 am
Sen. Jeff Flake said Wednesday that he supports increasing the minimum age to buy a rifle and is working on legislation with Sen. Dianne Feinstein after last week’s Florida school shooting.
Flake wrote in a tweet that he is “working with [Feinstein] on a bipartisan bill that will raise the minimum purchase age for non-military buyers from 18 to 21 — the same age you currently have to be to purchase a handgun.”
The GOP senator tweeted that a “kid too young [to] buy a handgun should be too young to buy an #AR15.”
Read more at The Hill.
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February 21, 2018 at 11:56 pm
Updated as of Feb. 21, 2018 11:53 PM - Rabbi Aaron Gross will be sitting until noon on Friday at 6005 Western Run Drive, Baltimore, MD 21209.Minyanim: Beginning Wed Shacharis 7:00 AMMincha/Maariv: 5:35 Baltimore, MD – Feb. 16, 2018 – It is with sadness that BaltimoreJewishLife.com (BJL) informs the community of the petirah of Chazzan Yehuda Leib Gross, z’l, father of Rabbi Aaron (Devorah) Gross, Mrs. Chani (Peretz) Neustatter, Mrs. Chedva (Ari) Epstein and Mrs. Bracha (Shloime) Gombo.
The levaya and kevurah will be held Sunday, Feb. 18, 2018, Graveside at Cong. Sons of Israel - Mt. Sinai Cemetery, 782 E. 7th St., Lakewood, NJ 08701
Shiva will be observed at 1870 Dino Blvd. Toms River, NJ 08755
Rabbi Gross will return to Baltimore for the end of S...
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February 21, 2018 at 7:58 pm
Washington - The number of U.S. hate groups rose again in 2017, during President Donald Trump’s first year in office, and has surged 20 percent since 2014, a U.S. civil rights watchdog said on Wednesday.
The Southern Poverty Law Center’s annual census identified 954 hate groups in 2017, a 4 percent rise from the year before. The increase followed a 2.8 increase in 2016, and the most recent number represents a jump of one-fifth from 2014.
Among the more than 600 U.S. white supremacist groups, neo-Nazi organizations rose to 121 from 99. Anti-Muslim groups increased for a third year in a row, to 114 from 101 in 2016, after tripling in number a year earlier, the report said.
“President Trump in 2017 reflected what white supremacist groups want to see: a country where racis...
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February 21, 2018 at 7:50 pm
Washington - U.S. President Donald Trump suggested on Wednesday that arming teachers could help prevent massacres such as last week’s mass shooting at a Florida high school.
Trump voiced support for the idea during an emotional White House meeting with students who survived the shooting and a parent whose child did not.
“If you had a teacher ... who was adept at firearms, it could very well end the attack very quickly,” said Trump, who acknowledged the idea would be controversial.
He sat in the middle of a semi-circle in the State Dining Room of the White House, listening intently as students wept and pleaded for change. He vowed to take steps to improve background checks for gun buyers.
The meeting included six students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Pa...
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February 21, 2018 at 7:43 pm
A trial exposing a unit of wildly corrupt Baltimore detectives has wrapped up in a courtroom, but federal and police investigators are still digging into possible offshoots of one of the worst police corruption scandals in memory.
Baltimore police monitored testimony during the jury trial of two officers who last week were found guilty of racketeering and robbery in an explosive federal investigation that's seen six former law enforcers plead guilty. Four disgraced detectives named over a dozen current and former police officers and supervisors during testimony detailing instances of sordid police misconduct over years.
In addition, the trial revealed that the out-of-control police unit was tipped off multiple times as the noose tightened, including one leak that U.S. investigators ...
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February 21, 2018 at 7:41 pm
(NEW YORK) -- Florida school shooting suspect Nikolas Cruz may have been left a large inheritance by his late parents, meaning he could potentially afford to hire private counsel and may not be allowed to use a court-appointed defender.
Howard Finkelstein, the public defender of Broward County, Florida, filed a motion on Tuesday asking a judge to conduct an "indigency determination" on the 19-year-old suspect after reports surfaced that he could stand to inherit $800,000 from his parents.
"It could result in us being removed from the case," Finkelstein told ABC News in a telephone interview this morning. "The question here is, are there enough resources to pay for a lawyer?"
Finkelstein said his office was assigned by the court to defend Cruz after he filled out an application for crimi...
