Category: Articles

Beit Romano, Kiryat Arba, Hebron
(Photo: Jewish Press)

Israeli media reports are stating that permits are being issued for the construction of approximately 4,000 new housing units within Judea and Samaria. if so, it’s about time, as real growth within Israel’s heartland has been stymied for so many years.

This spurt in growth could be part of the “Trump effect”, an understanding between Israel and the US that “settlements” are not a “barrier to peace”, and that Jews have a right to live throughout the Land of Israel.

Of course, Trump’s newly-stated position that the US embassy will not be moved to Jerusalem until the “peace process” is given another run on the hamster wheel, is frustrating, to say the least. And, the number of new housing units to be authorized barely addresses the real needs of the population. However, it is perhaps indicative that the Obama era is finally over and we could look forward with cautious optimism to real growth throughout the Land of Israel.

Israel Issues Permits for Close to 4,000 Housing Starts in Settlement Blocs, Isolated Settlements, Hebron

Like most of us football fans, we turn on our television sets and settle in to watch the games, not to see overpaid players make political statements on the football field.

IF YOU ARE ANGRY AT WHAT YOU ARE SEEING, THERE IS A RESPONSE!

(The beer) Bud Light’s brand parent company Anheuser-Busch InBev – one of the NFL’s biggest sponsors – is rethinking their NFL sponsorship, and they want your input.

The NFL player protests of the National Anthem have backfired in a major way on the league. It has seen sponsors pull out, ratings decline and teams play in front of practically empty stadiums.

In the wake of increased national anthem protests, Anheuser-Busch is reconsidering their NFL sponsorship, likely because the protests are very unpopular among everyday Americans. Bud Light currently serves as the official beer of the NFL. At the end of 2015, the company extended its current deal, which is slated to expire at the end of the 2016-17 season, for another six years through the 2022 season, but that might all change very quickly.

So the company set up a hotline for fans to call and give their thoughts about the protests and Anheuser-Busch’s sponsorship of the NFL. The number for the hotline is: 1-800-342-5283.

Call them and let them know what you think!

This Week in Arutz Sheva

There are two interesting pieces in Arutz Sheva this week, well worth reading.

The first is by AFSI’s Chairman Mark Langfan. In it, he exposes the actions (or non-actions) of two of America’s most influential news disseminators – the New York Times and CNN – to willfully not report on events in Afghanistan which were causing death and carnage to America’s fighting forces there, all in order to help save Obama’s Iran deal.

Langfan provides proof that these two news organizations omitted reporting that Russia and Iran were arming the Taliban in Afghanistan, a fact that was stated by the US Defense Secretary, in order to preserve the Iran nuclear deal that Obama was concocting. This wasn’t “fake news”, Langfan states, but willful omission of reporting the truth. A dastardly deed, indeed.

Exposé: CNN and NYT ignored US Defense Secretary revelation on Taliban

The second story is by Tom Mountain, who was the Massachusetts/New Hampshire Trump Campaign Director for Jewish Outreach, and a columnist for New England’s largest Jewish newspaper, The Jewish Advocate. In this thought-provoking piece, Mountain makes the case that in the United States today, there is no political party that supports both liberalism and Israel; that it is an either/or proposition. As a result, Jews in America are at a crossroads and must make critical decisions about whom they support, thus impacting their own lives, their Jewish community, the United States and Israel.

As Mountain concludes, at this point liberal American Jews need to answer one simple question- what matters to them most, their Jewish liberalism or the Jewish State?

US Jewry at the crossroads: LIberalism or the Jewish State

Tonight starts the Jewish holiday of Sukkot.

Sukkot has a double significance, one being agricultural (“Feast of the Ingathering”), and the second, religious, commemorating the Exodus and the dependence of the Israelites on G-d ‘s protection.

It is a joyous holiday where people eat (and some sleep) in a temporary, somewhat flimsy structure known as a sukkah (tabernacle; plural: sukkot), as a remembrance of the Israelites’ travels in the Sinai after the Exodus from Egypt.

Sukkot is one of the three pilgrimage holidays when Jews in Israel would travel to Jerusalem and present offerings at the Temple. It is a joyous time to be in Israel! But if you can’t be in Israel for Sukkot, consider going with AFSI this November! Be in Israel for the Torah portion Chaye Sarah, when AFSI will be experiencing Shabbat in Hebron! Join tens of thousands in a once-in-a-lifetime experience of visiting and praying at the Machpelah, the burial place where our Jewish ancestors are buried.

See the flyer above for details and contact the AFSI office!

Americans For a Safe Israel (AFSI) condemns the horrendous mass murder committed last night in Las Vegas.

Our hearts go out to the families of the victims, and we wish a full and speedy recovery to all those wounded.

ISIS has claimed responsibility for the attack, the deadliest gun massacre in modern US history. Although this claim has not been substantiated, there are reports that the gunman did convert to Islam several months ago.

We will continue to monitor this story.

Letter to the Editor
The Jewish Week

Dear Gary,
Your article on David Myers downplays his “leftist” leanings to which he readily admits, and attributes the calls for his ouster as being on “political grounds.” You speak about the “lunatic fringe” of the Israeli right, to which Americans for a Safe Israel must also belong. We joined with Ronn Torossian, ZOA and JCC Watch in demonstrating outside the Center for Jewish History on September 27 to educate attendees to the Center, and passers-by, about the reasons we are calling for Myers to be fired.

Those reasons include Myers’ writings which are revisionist versions of Jewish history. Instead of seeing the Israeli victory of 1948 as a great moment that precipitated the declaration of the Jewish state, Myers speaks about the “wound of the Naqba” – the Arab word for disaster.

Myers also sees Israel’s 1967 victories which restored lost lands to Israel as the “conquering” of those lands. He preaches “the inevitable demise of Israel” and he excuses Arab terrorism as “frustration driven.” Although he denies affiliation with SJP, he is silent about his support for J Street, the New Israel Fund, and groups that support BDS, which blame the “occupation” and “West Bank settlements” for their boycotts, divestments and sanctions against Israel.

A large protest is planned outside the Center on October 18 to make it clear that those calling for the firing of Myers are not going away. Tragically, his supporters and the editor of Jewish Week do not see that they themselves are driving wedges within the Jewish world. Gary Rosenblatt writes that the “current toxic political climate, when divisiveness is a White House goal, and distorting the news is a favored technique, it is normative behavior for those who disagree on an issue – in this case, what it means to be “pro-Israel” – to seek to marginalize, demonize and defeat those with a different point of view…”

How sad that legitimate criticism, backed by facts and quotes, is blamed on President Trump, a toxic political climate, and labels pro-Israel defenders as demonizers. Clearly, the “left” is ready to see the re-writing of Jewish history, erasing the truths, and substituting the PC “moral equivalency” version.

We, who see ourselves as the defenders of Israel refuse to stand silently by with folded hands. We will continue to protest, and those who can evaluate the truth, will join us.

Helen Freedman
Americans for a Safe Israel/AFSI
afsi.org