From the Jewish Telegrapic Agency
Dempsey: Israel went to extraordinary lengths to avoid civilian deaths in Gaza
(JTA) — The United States’ top military chief said Israel went to “extraordinary lengths” to avoid civilian casualties in its summer war with Hamas in Gaza.
General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the highest ranking military officer in the United States, made the statement Thursday at an event organized by the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs in New York, Voice of America reported.
“I actually do think that Israel went to extraordinary lengths to limit collateral damage and civilian casualties,” Dempsey said in responding to a question from the audience during the event.
He called civilian deaths from the conflict “tragic,” but he added that Israeli forces “did what they could” during the 50-day war, which began July 8 and ended with a cease-fire in August.
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From PressTV
Syria militants receiving medical care in Israel: Report
According to the documents from Israeli hospitals, Israel’s army paid USD 10 million up until September this year for the costs of treatment to the foreign-sponsored militants injured during battles with Syrian government forces, and the money has come from the Israeli military’s budget.
The papers further revealed that a total of 398 injured militants have been treated at Galil Hospital in Israel’s northern coastal city of Nahariya in the past couple of years.
Another hospital in the city of Safed has provided treatment for hundreds of other militants.
From Haaretz
Has Israel become the black sheep of the North American Jewish family?
Nothing brings a family together like a new baby. The tiny, fragile miracle that once was merely an idea becomes a reality and starts to grow and develop. All who are connected to it guard and nurture the new creation as it grows, marvelling together at every milestone. Their mutual love and concern is a sturdy glue that helps bond their relationships to one another as strongly as their attachment to the child
The State of Israel has long played the role of beloved common project for North American Jewish communities.
Support and concern for it has brought together Jewish communities. They may have been divided between Reform, Conservative and Orthodox, in prayer, and between those who choose day school and those who send their children to public schools when it comes to Jewish education. But they have traditionally come together to rally and stand together for Israel, to raise money for emergency campaigns to help distressed Jewish immigrants settle there or rebuild after war and strife took its toll. Their precise views on Israel may not have been identical, but basic underlying support of the state of Israel was something most everyone in the family of Jews could agree on.
Israel has also been used as an appealing tool to bring young people into the community. Religion can be complicated and demanding, Holocaust guilt – while compelling – is dark and sad. Israel programming has been the fun and sexy side of Jewish communal life – falafel, flag-waving and folk-dancing and David Broza songs around the campfire. The whole premise of the Birthright program is the belief that dynamic young Israel is an attractive gateway drug into Jewish life, a uniting and bonding experience.
Tens of thousands of Yemeni people have taken to the streets to protest against US interference in the country’s internal affairs.
On Friday, the people in Yemen held a rally in the capital city of Sana’a to express their anger at US meddling in the Arab country’s affairs, saying the interference has only fueled instability and turmoil all over Yemen.
The demonstrators called for the expulsion of US ambassador to Sana’a over Washington’s campaign to impose sanctions on two leaders of Yemen’s Shia Ansarullah movement, as well as the ousted Yemeni dictator, Ali Abdullah Saleh.
On Wednesday, Saleh’s political party, General People’s Congress (GPC), said in a statement that the US ambassador to Yemen, Matthew H. Tueller, had said that the former ruler had to leave Yemen before 5:00 p.m. local time (1400 GMT) on Friday, otherwise “sanctions will be imposed against him.”
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From PressTV
Hamas creates ‘popular army’ in Gaza to confront Israel
The Palestinian resistance movement Hamas has announced the formation of a “popular army” in the besieged Gaza Strip to counter the Israeli regime’s aggression.
A spokesman for the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, said at a ceremony at the Jabaliya refugee camp on Friday that “the first section of the popular army for the liberation of al-Aqsa and of Palestine” would consist of 2,500 recruits.
Hamas said the new force is tasked with confronting any future Israeli aggression, particularly against the al-Aqsa Mosque in East al-Quds (Jerusalem).
Mohammed Abu Askar, a Hamas official, also noted that individuals over 20 years old could sign up “to be prepared for any confrontation” with Israel, adding that the popular force has been created “at a moment when the al-Aqsa Mosque is subject to serious Israeli violations.”
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From the Jewish Daily Forward
‘Shadow Jews’ Outnumber Recognized Members of Tribe
From Asia to Zimbabwe, 14 Million Claim Jewish Blood
Speaking at a Jerusalem conference, the British historian Tudor Parfitt suggested that what he called a shadow community of Jews numbers between 13.5 million and 14 million.
In many cases, he said, this voluntary affiliation with the Jewish people is a relatively new phenomenon. Members of these newly identified Jewish communities could be found in places as diverse as northeastern India, Papua New Guinea, Nicaragua, the jungles of South America and southern and central Africa, he said. Many also can be found in black communities in the U.S.
