Category: Articles

Israeli Air Force F-15 fighter jets were photographed flying over Samaria Sunday while escorting a United States Air Force B-52 strategic bomber through Israeli airspace.

According to a statement released Sunday by an IDF spokesperson, Sunday’s flyover by the B-52 was an act of “joint strategic cooperation” between the American and Israeli militaries. “This flight is part of the joint strategic cooperation with US forces, which is pivotal in maintaining the security of Israeli and Middle Eastern skies.”

Yesha Council director-general Yigal Dilmoni wrote on his Facebook page Sunday that in the photographs released from the flight, a number of Israeli towns in Samaria could be seen. “Under the nose of the plane are the towns of Shiloh and Shvut Rachel and the site of biblical Shiloh, where the Tabernacle stood.”

What a breathtaking way to “tour” Samaria from the beautiful blue skies above. How amazing it would be to tour Judea and Samaria this way on our next Chizuk Mission. However, AFSI does prefer to tour the land and spend time with the people – giving and getting Chizuk – strength!

Source:
American B-52 bomber flies over Samaria, by Arutz Sheva Staff. Arutz Sheva, March 7, 2021

Environmental Protection Minister Gila Gamliel yesterday blamed a Libyan “pirate ship” flying a Panamanian flag that was smuggling oil from Iran for a massive oil spill that has polluted most of Israel’s Mediterranean beaches.

Gamliel called the oil leak, which has been described as Israel’s worst ecological disaster in decades, an act of “environmental terrorism.” She suggested the spill was orchestrated by Iran.

“Iran is initiating terrorism not only with nuclear weapons and efforts to entrench itself on our borders. Iran is initiating terrorism by harming the environment,” Gamliel wrote on Twitter.

Both the Mossad and the IDF were blindsided by Gamliel’s accusation that Iran was behind this oil spill but are looking into

Defense sources said they could not confirm the veracity of Gamliel’s claims and said that neither the IDF nor the Mossad had been part of the investigation of these allegations. Officials said they were frustrated by the lack of coordination within the government.

Whatever the case may be, we trust Israel’s defense agencies will not overlook this and act accordingly should it be confirmed that this was a terrorist act against Israel.

Sources:
Blaming Iran, environment minister calls oil spill ‘environmental terrorism’, by TOI Staff. Times of Israel, March 3, 2021

Mossad, IDF blindsided by Gamliel’s Iran ‘eco-terror’ accusation, by Yonah Jeremy Bob, Udi Shaham. Jerusalem Post, March 4, 2021

Progressive Marc Lamont Hill was famously fired from CNN in 2018 after he called for “a free Palestine…from the river to the sea” in the halls of the United Nations. That was one of many troubling statements.

“Palestine from the river to the sea” was a slogan of the PLO beginning with its founding in 1964, claiming a Palestinian state between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea and rejecting control by Israel of any land in the region, including areas controlled by Israel prior to 1967. It later became a popular political slogan used by Palestinians who reject compromise with Israel, including the terror group Hamas, which calls for the destruction of Israel.

Hill has just come out with a new book, released in mid-February, apparently designed to repair his public image. The book is entitled Except for Palestine – The Limits of Progressive Politics, co-authored with Mitchell Plitnick, the president of ReThinking Foreign Policy, former director of the U.S. Office of B’Tselem and co-director of Jewish Voice for Peace.

The book is self-touted as a “major work of daring criticism and analysis.” It argues progressives in America are not anti-Israel enough.

Hill’s record unambiguously shows that he has not stopped advocating for the destruction of Israel. He just tries to camouflage his anti-Semitism by a campaign of lying and denial, disguising his scandalous hatred of Jews in the form of a policy book.

Source:
IPT Video: Marc Lamont Hill’s Duplicitous New Book, by Steven Emerson. IPT News, March 4, 2021

This coming Wednesday, the Jerusalem District Court is expected to rule on the saga of accessibility for people with disabilities and the elderly at the Cave of the Patriarchs. This, after Defense Minister Benny Gantz also ordered promoting the accessibility program and the move was stopped in a petition by Leftist organizations to the court.

“There’s access to both the cave plaza and the roof of the building. The absurdity cries to heaven, the Sovereign state of Israel needs the approval of Taysir Abu Sneina, who was part of the cell that murdered six yeshiva students in 1980?” MK Halevi asks, and calls to fulfill the expression of kindness, the great symbol of our ancestor Abraham, and make the cave accessible.

It is our hope that a path will be created for the disabled to this holy site without further delay. And without terrorist approval.

Source:
‘Absurd: Waiting for a terrorist’s approval’, by Shimon Cohen. Arutz Sheva, March 1, 2021

Residents of the Har Hevron Regional Council early today held a demonstration at the Tarqumiyah Crossing. Their demand: that the government ensure security near the separation wall.

“There’s complete chaos and we’re all suffering from it,” Council head Yochai Demeri said.

Thousands of Palestinian Authority Arabs enter Israel each day through gaps in the security fence, causing enormous traffic jams, and worse, upsetting the security of Israel’s citizens in Judea and Samaria and around the country.

“Our security is forfeit, and no one cares,” said Jacklyn Amar, a resident of Adora. “We see here, every morning, how people cross into here without anyone examining them to see whether they are bringing in coronavirus or any other security issue.”

Sovereignty NOW would end the lack of governance and provide the security the residents of Judea and Samaria so desperately need and are entitled to.

Source:
Har Hevron resident: ‘Our security is forfeit and no one cares’, by Arutz Sheva Staff. Arutz Sheva, March 1, 2021

The Regavim movement has petitioned the Jerusalem District Court, after the Civil Administration refused to provide data on the extent of electricity connections apparently supplied by the East Jerusalem Electric Company, an Israeli subsidiary of the Israel Electric Company which is subject to Israeli law, for thousands of illegal Palestinian structures in Judea and Samaria.

Source:
Regavim Freedom of Information Petition March 2, 2021

https://youtu.be/5nt8uBXpyAs

This was a particularly bad past couple of weeks. We’ve seen anti-Semitism becoming more and more mainstream from every direction on campuses and in schools.

Edler of Ziyon gives a detailed report on recent incidents that occurred at Tufts University, Columbia University, Germany, Sweden, Netherlands, and Massachusetts.

No amount of anti-Semitism should be tolerated in schools and a far greater outcry for action to combat this is needed. Schools are the places where indelible impressions are left on young and developing minds. Let’s make the new “Cancel Culture,” Cancel Anti-Semitism.

Source:
Recent Jew-hatred in schools worldwide, by Elder of Ziyon. Edler of Ziyon Blogspot, March 1, 2021

AFSI likes a recent article by Judean Rose that gives the reader an honest insider’s report on life without Sovereignty in Judea and Samaria. Not what life would be like without Sovereignty, but rather, what life is like now without it.

As we approached the northern entrance to Efrat, my husband gasped. A car with Palestinian Authority license plates had run a red light, right in front of us. It was nighttime and we were returning from Jerusalem to our home in the Judean Wilderness. We’d traveled there to receive the second of our two vaccination shots against COVID-19. Watching that car speeding past, the driver ignoring the stop light, my first thought was that this wouldn’t happen if Israel exercised Sovereignty here in this place, in Judea. My second thought was that people have no clue that Sovereignty is about more than land rights.

Source:
Sovereignty: It’s Not Just a Question of Land, by Varda Meyers Epstein (Judean Rose). Edler of Ziyon, February 24, 2021

For the first time, the Jewish communities of the six Gulf countries – Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates – will celebrate Purim together.

The event will include a keynote speech by Dr. Sh. Khalid bin Khalifa Al Khalifa, Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the King Hamad Global Centre for Peaceful Co-existence in Bahrain. Thoufeek Zakriya, the Arabic-Hebrew calligrapher living in Dubai, will take part in the event, creating a piece of Purim artwork live.

Rabbi Elie Abadie, Rabbi of the Association of Gulf Jewish Communities, will read the Purim Megillah (Scroll of Esther).

Source:
Tonight on Arutz Sheva: For the first time, Gulf Jews will celebrate Purim together, by Arutz Sheva Staff. Arutz Sheva, February 25, 2021

Hebron has the unique distinction of being one of the few cities in the world that celebrates Purim on two days. Jewish communities in walled cities celebrate Purim a day later. This is derived from the verses in the Scroll of Esther, which state that in the city of Shushan, where the Purim story took place, the holiday was celebrated on the 15th of Adar, rather than the 14th like the rest of the Jewish world.

“There is a safeq (doubt) as to whether Hebron was a walled city at the time of Joshua,” said Rabbi Schlissel, who is head of the Ohr Shlomo kollel, named in memory of his father-in-law Rabbi Shlomo Raanan.

Even if the walls no longer function as a demarcation of the city today, the Jewish sages of the Talmud defined a walled city as whether or not it had a wall at the time of the Biblical leader Joshua.

Thus the megillah, or Scroll of Esther, is read four times, the evening and day readings on the first day and then again on the second day.

Source:
Why is Purim Celebrated for Two Days in Hebron?, by Ben Bresky. Jewish Press, February 25, 2021