From PressTV
Bomb attack targets car of Hamas official in Gaza
A makeshift bomb has reportedly destroyed a vehicle belonging to an official of the Hamas resistance movement in a Palestinian refugee camp in the Gaza Strip.
The bomb attack targeted the car of Sheikh Sami Hams in Nuseirat refugee camp south of Gaza City on Friday, according to an unnamed security source, AFP reported.
The attack, however, left no casualties, the source said, adding that an investigation has been launched into the incident.
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From PressTV
Israeli forces attack anti-settlement Palestinian protesters
Israeli forces have attacked Palestinian protesters staging a demonstration against the regime’s illegal expansion of settlements in the occupied West Bank.
The attack left several demonstrators injured as Israeli forces used birdshots and teargas to disperse the anti-settlement marchers near the West Bank city of Ramallah on Friday.
Clashes were also reported to have broken out between Israeli troops and Palestinians in the West Bank villages of Nabi Saleh and Kafr Qaddum.
Palestinians hold weekly rallies against Israel’s construction activities in the occupied Palestinian territories and an illegal separation wall that runs across the West Bank.
Also on Friday, Israeli media reported that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ordered the destruction of some 400 newly-built Palestinian homes in West Bank.
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From Ynet News
Drugs and prostitution: Inside Tel Aviv’s dark underbelly of crime and abuse
Most people do not even know the name of the neighborhood, named Hasan Arfa, that is the center for prostitution, drugs, and gambling a mere five minutes from the heart of Tel Aviv. Most people living in Tel Aviv do not know the name of the area that is a mere five minute walk away from Rothschild Boulevard – an area which will soon undergo construction and be replaced with luxurious high-rises, and is currently home to prostitutes, makeshift casinos, and undocumented immigrants.
The Hassan Arfa neighborhood, named after an Arab sheikh who ruled the area in the beginning of the 20th century, has become a center for poverty and neglect. When the British took control of Israel they took over the villa that existed in the area and the only remnants of the once developed area are the eucalyptus trees that stand among the stolen bikes that are strewn in the streets of the now impoverished area.
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From Ynet News
Hearings begin into child abuse in Chabad Australia
Government-sponsored inquiry is questioning victims and officials of Orthodox Jewish centers in Melbourne and Sydney, as well as senior Orthodox rabbis. Victim tells commission he faced backlash for ‘breaking the Chabad code of silence.’ The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in Australia is holding a public hearing for Chabad institutions in the country after staff members were convicted of sexually abusing students.
According to JTA, the government-sponsored inquiry into institutional responses to child sexual abuse, which began in 2013, has allocated two weeks to interrogate victims and officials of the Yeshivah Center in Melbourne and its counterpart in Sydney, as well as senior Orthodox rabbis.
From the Jewish Daily Forward
Reform’s Rick Jacobs Calls On Benjamin Netanyahu To Scrap Speech to GOP Congress
Rabbi Joins Growing Chorus of Mainstream Leaders
Washington — Pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to cancel his planned speech to a joint meeting of Congress is building among mainstream pro-Israel leaders, leading to an increasingly divisive split in the Jewish community.
Mainstream leaders and organizations have begun speaking out, some publically and other privately, against the speech, scheduled for March 3, arguing the controversy is becoming a major distraction from their shared goal of stopping Iran from becoming a nuclear power.
Reform Movement leader Rabbi Rick Jacobs has joined Abraham Foxman of the Anti-Defamation League in urging Netanyahu to reconsider his visit to Washington, along with Seymour Reich, a former chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish American Organizations, the community’s umbrella organization on policy.
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From the Jewish Daily Forward
Your Intermarriage Obsession Is Just Plain Offensive
The Seesaw is a new kind of advice column in which a broad range of columnists will address the real life issues faced by interfaith couples and families. Read the discussion and vote below for what you think is the best response to this particular quandary. You can email your own questions, which will remain anonymous, to: [email protected]
I am a non-Jewish person who works for a Jewish organization. How do I politely tell my bosses and other colleagues how offensive I find their focus (un-Godly obsession?) on battling intermarriage? In my opinion it’s pretty much racist to focus on who anyone else should date or marry — and I would never tell my own child to do so.
If I was working with regular white people (or blacks or Puerto Ricans) who constantly discussed the need for their children or other members of their community to only date or marry within that community, I would tell them to keep their bigoted opinions to themselves. Why is it any different for Jews? Why do they think it’s at all appropriate to reveal their biases like that?
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From the Jewish Telegraphic Agency
Head of New York Jewish legal aid group resigns over financial scandal
NEW YORK (JTA) — The head of a Jewish legal aid charity for low-income New Yorkers has stepped down amid a federal investigation into his alleged “accounting irregularities.”
Yisroel Schulman, 51, has resigned as president and attorney-in-charge of NYLAG, the New York Law Journal reported Friday. Sources told the Law Journal that the case involves Schulman’s “handling of finances” but that “NYLAG’s financial stability was not at risk.”
“We are confident the matter involving our former CEO will not interfere with the important legal services our dedicated team provides New Yorkers on a daily basis,” NYLAG spokesperson Camilla Jenkins said in a statement.
NYLAG, which Schulman helped found in 1990, offers legal assistance to residents of the five New York City boroughs, Long Island, and Rockland and Westchester counties who cannot afford a private attorney. The organization, which is a member of the UJA Federation of New York’s agency network, employed 250 people in the 2014 fiscal year and had a budget of $20 million, the Law Journal reported.
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