Tag: Jewish People

The yartzeit of our Matriarch, Rachel, falls this year on Shabbat. Every year, more and more people gather at Rachel’s Tomb to pay respects to the Matriarch who is known as Rachel Emanu - Rachel Our Mother. Thousands of pilgrims will travel there today and tomorrow from all over the country, and perhaps 200,000 more will make the annual pilgrimage the day after Shabbat, every type of Jew there is, religious and non-religious, Haredim, Hasidim, and Dati Leumi, men, women, and children, busload after busload after busload, from far and near, waiting long hours for their turn to enter the small but beautifully renovated tomb near Betlechem on the way to Efrata .

Give this week’s Torah portion, “Lech Lecha,” to an eight-year old to read, ask him where God wants the Jewish People to live and he will answer “the Land of Israel” right away. Give it to a gentile to read and ask him the same question. “The Land of Israel” he will answer without batting an eye. Give it to a Jew in the Diaspora and ask him the same question, and you’ll get a dozen different answers.

If Eve had read www.jewishsexuality.com, she wouldn’t have followed after her eyes and got us all kicked out of the garden. If Adam had read jewishsexuality.com, he wouldn’t have eaten the “apple.” Today, we don’t have to make the same mistakes they did. We have the teachings of the Torah and the advice of the Sages to rely upon. While I won’t quote from the holy Zohar here, for people who enjoy the secrets of Torah, there’s a lot more to the snake than his pretty long tail.

If it did it would die. Just the way the Diaspora is destined to die. The etrog tree doesn’t belong in Brooklyn. The climate isn’t right for it. It’s the same with the lulav, hadasim, and aravot. The four species which we are commanded to take for ourselves on the Festival of Sukkot are indigenous to Eretz Yisrael, just as the Torah is indigenous to Eretz Yisrael, and the Jewish People are indigenous to Eretz Yisrael. We belong in Eretz Yisrael. All of the holidays are intrinsically connected to Eretz Yisrael. The Torah was designed and fashioned by the Almighty to be observed in Eretz Yisrael.

"Citizens of Israel, Tonight, I am leaving for New York to represent the State of Israel at the United Nations. On the issue of Iran, we...

L eading up to the holiday of Sukkot, we’ll wrap up our condensed look at Rabbi Kook’s teachings on t’shuva with a few blogs on two of the holidays most important themes – Eretz Yisrael and Torah.

Yishai and Rabbi Yohanan Danziger discuss recent Shabbat visitors, the Jewish need to remain positive, and America's weakening grip on the Jewish People.

Yishai is joined by the International Director of the Temple Institute, Rabbi Chaim Richman. Together, they discuss the Iranian nuclear threat and the need for the Jewish People to remain strong in the face of danger.

Doing my best to copy Sholom Aleichem’s gifted portrayal, and adding a bit on my own, I transformed the downtrodden Jew of galut into a proud pioneer in the Holy Land and a brave fighter for Jewish freedom. It’s a saga that I am sure you and your children will love. And now, thanks to The Jewish Press, it’s free!

Managing Editor if Jewish Press Online, Yishai Fleisher, is joined by activist Jack Berger. Together, they discuss a recent trip to Hebron and its importance to the Jewish People along with the situation in Beit El.

In a speech delivered in Tehran, Vice President Mohammad-Reza Rahimi accused the Jewish people of spreading illegal drugs around the world, killing Black babies, starting the Bolshevik Revolution and causing many of the world's other ills.

How can it be that outstanding Torah scholars in Europe, before the Holocaust, and even after it started, were against the Zionist movement and told their congregations not to uproot themselves from where they were and flee to Eretz Yisrael? Even today, there are Torah leaders who tell their followers that the time has not come to go to Israel. The question arises – can Gedolim err?

Rabbi Meir Kahane, perhaps the most dynamic Jewish orator of our time, a speaker capable of inflaming hearts and inspiring the masses, a par-excellence TV debater who chopped the glib intellectual banter of opponents into tiny insignificant scraps, he had a bothersome stutter in his youth, which had to be mastered in order to fulfill his dream of reaching out to the Jewish People.

An inspiring talk by Yishai Fleisher at the Knesset for AmShalem, an organization dedicated to restoring a moderate and Zionistic view to Judaism. Yishai talks about his move to Jerusalem from Beit El, the significance of his Jerusalem apartment, and the importance of Jerusalem to the Jewish People.

Shavuot is the holiday of the Torah, which impacted the US Constitution in particular and the state of Western morality, liberty, and democracy in general. Shavuot is celebrated by decorating homes and houses of worship with Land of Israel-related fruit, vegetables, herb and flowers, demonstrating the indigenous connection between the Torah of Israel, the People of Israel, and the Land of Israel.

Yes, the Ribono Shel Olam, the Master of the World is a Zionist. So was Avraham Avinu, Moshe Rabeinu, Yehoshua, King David, Rabbi Akiva, Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, the Macabbees, all the Prophets of Israel, including Ezra and Nechemia who led a seemingly motley crowd of sinners back to the Land of Israel from Babylon to rebuild the Holy Temple.

The bolstering of Jewish sovereignty generates negative world opinion - except in the U.S. and a few other countries - but enhances respect toward a conviction-driven Jewish state. On the other hand, when Jewish sovereignty retreats and Israel submits to world opinion, it merely projects weakness. Israel will never satisfy world opinion, and such action only further fuels global pressure.

It’s crunch time as Pesach is rapidly approaching. Yishai delves into deep thoughts on the holiday with Rabbi Shimshon Nadel. Then insights into the state of the Jewish world from Chicagoan Jack Berger, a scholar of Jewish history and experienced Israel advocate. Third up, a Migron insider (Aviela Deitch) walks us through the birth of the community up to the present. Don't miss the final segment featuring a powerful presentation from Yehuda HaKohen that will wake up and enliven the inner Jew among the pre-Pesach stress.

This week’s show kicks off with Yishai and Malkah talking about a recently released movie titled “Israel Inside”, which shows how Israel is leading the way in not only technology but also social innovation and creating a new atmosphere in the Middle East. Then, Yishai talks with Jeremy Sultan to understand the nitty gritty of the Migron saga.

Eva Sandler, wife of Rabbi Jonathan and mother of young boys Aryeh and Gavriel - 3 of the 4 Jews murdered in a shooting attack by Mohammed Merah in Toulouse on March 19 - has issued a public letter responding to the thousands of people seeking ways to support her in her time of suffering.

We are all aware of the terrible divisions among Israel’s Jewish population. My friends and colleagues in Israel tell me they cannot remember a time in recent years where so much fragmentation existed. All this when the external threats facing Israel grow greater by the day.

Shas MK: Torah protected Jews before there was a state, the IDF, and Shin Bet.

We too cannot be so capricious of nature, so weary of our national responsibility, as to give away what is, in truth, not ours alone to barter... We cannot be so selfish as to sacrifice a holy heritage for what is, at best, transitory expediency.

Eliezer, the faithful servant of Avraham, was charged with finding a wife for Yitzchak. Knowing full well the gravity of his mission, he also recognized its difficulty. The woman he would choose was to be the mother of the Je

Readers and nervous newshounds wondering how to become more spiritual in a hurry can take steps toward meeting that goal by studying The Light of Thirty-Six: Accessing the Hidden Light of Creation on a Daily Basis. Read and re-read the book. Invest time, effort and thought into your spirituality-seeking process so you can act on the book's lessons seriously, not superficially.

Speaking in the basement of Westminster Presbyterian Church (WPC) in Minneapolis on July 3, 2010, Jeff Halper, founder of the Israeli Committee Against Home Demolitions, offered a relentless denunciation of Israel to a group of Presbyterians.

ZOA -The Zionist Organization of America hosted its 112th Annual Gala Dinner in New York City last week, and since I happened to be in the "neighborhood," visiting the tri-State area for an upcoming simcha - I decided to attend.

If you love Eretz Yisrael, you must also feel overwhelmed by a sense of frustration. Why is Israel demonized all over the world? Why has she become the new source for the age-old canard of anti-Semitism? And why is it that Israel cannot present itself in its true light? The question is all the more puzzling, since we, the Jewish people, are renowned for our fidelity to justice, righteousness and truth. And more so, how is it that Israel has such dismal, horrible PR? How is it that we, who are masters of language, are so inept at imparting the glorious history and priestly calling of our nation? After all, we are the "People of the Book." Who, if not we, should be able to address the nations of the world and communicate our true essence?

One very cold, very dark evening in the middle of a particularly brutal Canadian winter, four cars were parked outside a home on a deserted side street of our Thornhill neighborhood.

These introductory lines capture the book's essence: "The land of Israel and the Jewish people are bound together in mysterious ways difficult to grasp. The relationship between them goes beyond the conventional"