Matisyahus Latest video interview with CNN

Judaism without Jews?

Along the northern coast of Norway, not far from North Cape, Europe’s northernmost point, is the quaint city of Trondheim. There, among the troll dolls and fishing paraphernalia, one discovers a most unusual sight: a synagogue.

Though a minyan is hard to come by – the shul is open only on Friday nights, weather permitting – the president struggles valiantly to keep the institution open. A survivor of Auschwitz, he proudly displays the compact but concise Holocaust Museum housed in the synagogue’s anteroom, and explains that he returned after the war with the express purpose of keeping the tiny shul open.

Catching up with the Jewish basketball star

Whatever you do, don’t call Tamir Goodman “the Jewish Michael Jordan.”

He’s not fond of the nickname bestowed upon him by a Sports Illustrated basketball writer, and besides, it’s not even a very apt comparison. Magic Johnson would be more appropriate.

Billboard latest sign of Messianic fervor among some

Orthodox Boxer Packs a Punch

Dmitriy Salita’s stiff left-hand jab landed squarely on Louis Brown’s nose, forcing blood to flow down the boxer’s cheek. Salita’s crisp punches kept landing squarely, and as the fight wore on, his speed and toughness took the fight from sporting to laughable.

After the eighth round, the doctor at ringside had seen enough for one night, and stopped the bout before Salita could inflict any more damage.

Israel may lock up Jews who threaten disengagement

Israel may use administrative detention measures to neutralise threats from Israeli militants bent on disrupting its planned disengagement from occupied territory, Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz said on Saturday.

Mofaz said in a television interview that following last week’s killing of four Israeli Arabs by an ultra-rightist Jew, he would consider detention without trial for any individual whom security services recommended should be put behind bars. “We will consider … administrative detention of all those proposed by the Shin Bet (Israel’s internal security service),” Mofaz said.

UPDATE: NJ Turnpike Accident

Home values surging in Crown Heights,
once known for racial strife

For many years, what came to New Yorkers’ minds if you mentioned “Crown Heights” were riots and racial strife.

They thought of the dire days of August 1991 when riots lasted for three days following the deaths of a 7-year-old boy and a Hasidic scholar.

“If you would mention Crown Heights, people would say, ‘I don’t want to live there,'” explained Robert Matthews, the chairman of Community Board 8, in whose territory Crown Heights is partly located.

TRAFIC ADVISORY: Road Work on Route 17

All those of you who take Route 17 to get to your bungalow colonies, there is roadwork taking place between exits 129 and 124 from 6 PM today to 6 AM tomorrow.

If you’re going to be on the Rt. 17 today between those hours today you should consider continuing on the thruway to exit 17 and there take the 84 to Middletown and that would put you on exit 120 on the 17 thereby avoiding the road work but putting another 20 miles on your trip.

Good Shabbos and a safe ride up.

A March Against Hate Crimes in Crown Heights

Leaders from the Jewish and black communities in Crown Heights marched with city officials and NYPD hate crimes officers last night to condemn hate crime.

REPORTER: The move comes after a Hasidic man was allegedly attacked on Monday by three black men in Crown Heights who used anti-semitic slurs. The Crown Heights Jewsih Council’s Chanina Sperlin says the reaction to this attack is much different than in 1991, when rioting broke out.

Sperlin views Monday’s attack as an isolated incident:

SPERLIN: The march was unity. The African-American, the Carribean-American community stood with the Jewish community and said we’re not going to tolerate this from anybody of any community that you do this against.

REPORTER: Since 2000, hate crimes have dropped by 44 percent, mirroring the drop in overall crime.

J for J plans fall blitz on Montreal

Officials from the counter-missionary group Jews for Judaism vow they’ll confront Jews for Jesus on the streets of Montreal this fall when the Christian missionary group targets the city’s Jews for the first time.

“We will definitely be there,” said Julius Ciss, director of Toronto-based Jews for Judaism.

Jews for Jesus will be in Montreal from Sept. 18 to Oct. 8 as part of its “Behold Your God” campaign, a five-year, $22 million (US) international recruitment drive. Started in 2001, it aims to convert as many Jews as possible to Christianity in 65 cites worldwide with Jewish populations of 25,000 or more.

As Hate Crimes Escalates

The 2 reported incidents in the past week, slashing of the Hatzalah ambulances tires and the assault on the 50 year old man on Carroll and Schenectady, there was a meeting about all this with the local councilmen at the CHJCC on Kingston Ave. where we heard that we will get increased patrols and more security.

Now COL reported that Chanina Sperlin got a call from Mayor Bloomberg asking to be kept informed and that the police will take all necessary measures to capture these law beakers.

Mayor of New York Promises to Punish Lawbreakers

As a result of the recent rise in crime and damage done to residents of Crown Heights, Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York called Rabbi Chanina Sperlin, member of the Crown Heights Community Council yesterday, telling him that he ordered the police to take all necessary measures to locate the lawbreakers. The mayor also asked Sperlin to update date him as to ongoing developments and gave him the number of this cellular phone for this purpose.

But what’s really enraging is the fact that yesterday the NYPD “distributed” 1,500 police officers to the various precincts around New York City, and out of the 1,500 officers we only got SIX!!! Now that would scare them off, the 2 extra patrols we will get, and the police are really doing everything they can, which can’t be much.

Iraq to Jews: Do not Come Back!

A draft of the “Bill of Rights” in the forthcoming Constitution of Iraq, as of July 20, 2005, tells Jews who fled Iraq: you are not welcome to return. Jews from Iraq who fled before 1968 are not eligible to obtain Iraqi nationality and citizenship.

An earlier draft published in June 30 stated, “Any individual with another nationality (except for Israel) may obtain Iraqi nationality after a period of residency inside the borders of Iraq of not less than ten years for an Arab or twenty years for any other nationality.” The July 20 draft states that Iraqis who lost citizenship after 1968 may regain it, thus still excluding almost all Iraqi Jews, but at least not exclusively.

Jews Find Other Jews in Chiang Mai

Yaniv Koren does not consider himself religious. The 22-year-old Israeli eats non-Kosher food. He drives on the weekly holiday Shabbat. He does not wear a yamalka. Yet when he leaves his home in Haifa and travels abroad, he goes out of his way to find a little Judaism. In Chiang Mai, he visits Chabad, a place of worship and relaxation for Jews on Chang Klan Road.

“I come to Chabad because it is like home,” Yaniv said. He can eat kosher and Israeli-style food in their restaurant, pray in their synagogue, use their Internet for free, and celebrate the holidays.

Surfers Say They will End It All Over Gaza

Avid surfers from several Gush Katif communities are threatening to take their boards out to sea on evacuation day and commit mass suicide by drowning, Haaretz reported. Settlement groups, psychologists and social workers have known about the plans of the young men, aged 16-21, for several weeks.

Army Medic, Victim of Iraqi Suicide Attack,
Receives Jewish Burial

On July 25, family and friends of Benyahmin Ben Yahudah, a 24-year-old combat field medic who died in Baghdad two weeks earlier, gathered for a unique funeral in Evergreen Memorial Park in Athens, Ga.

The ceremony was presided over jointly by Jacob Goldstein, an Orthodox Jewish chaplain with the Army National Guard, and Elakhaz Hacohane, Ben Yahudah’s uncle, who is a priest with the African Hebrew Israelite community in Israel.

Ben Yahudah, a combat field medic with the Army’s 3rd Infantry Division, died when a suicide bomber drove into his patrol as it tried to clear out a crowd of children from the area being searched by the army, according to a soldier who spoke at the funeral. Ben Yahudah had reportedly been handing out candy and toys to the children. He was the only American soldier killed in the attack, but close to 20 Iraqi children and teenagers died, too. He was posthumously honored with the Purple Heart and the Bronze Star, which is given for “heroic or meritorious achievement” against an armed enemy.

Israeli Jew helped bomber

Israel’s Shin Bet security service has detained an Israeli Jew on suspicions that he helped Palestinian terrorists plan a suicide bombing that killed five Israelis last month, the organization said on Tuesday, marking the first time a Jew has been suspected of terrorism in the country.

Kfir Levy, a 25-year-old Jewish resident of the town of Ramat Gan, is suspected to have driven a Palestinian suicide bomber who killed five Israelis last month past a West Bank checkpoint into Israel, Shin Bet officials said