Free Republic

Jewish neighborhoods in east Jerusalem are included in the US demand that Israel halt "settlement" construction, including for natural growth, State Department spokesman Ian Kelly told 'The Jerusalem' Post during a press briefing on Monday.

Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon (Likud) announced on Friday morning that he is quitting politics, following Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's decision to hand his portfolio over to Yisrael Beytenu head MK Avigdor Liberman so as to bring his party into the coalition. "This morning I let the Prime Minister know that due to his conduct and recent developments, and due to a lack of confidence in him, I am resigning from the government and from the Knesset and taking a timeout from political life," said Ya'alon. Ya'alon's resignation is particularly dramatic as Liberman has not yet formally been given his portfolio...

Just below the walls of the Old City of Jerusalem, a team of archaeologists, scholars and students will soon be busy at work excavating one of Jerusalem's most important archaeological sites... a wealthy residential area that saw its heyday during the time of Herod and Jesus. Directing the operation is Shimon Gibson, a British-born Israeli archaeologist and adjunct professor at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte... Referred to as the Mount Zion excavation because of its location in the sacred elevated area at the center of ancient Jerusalem near the historical Temple Mount, the work here is important because...

TAU–Cornell collaboration provides insight into unique community whose history is largely unknown A new study from Tel Aviv University, Cornell University and the Albert Einstein College of Medicine reveals genetic proof of the Jewish roots of the Bene Israel community in the western part of India. They have always considered themselves Jewish. "Almost nothing is known about the Bene Israel community before the 18th century, when Cochin Jews and later Christian missionaries first came into contact with it," says first author Yedael Waldman of both TAU's Department of Molecular Microbiology and Cornell's Department of Biological Statistics and Computational Biology. "Beyond...

Now that his administration has reached its final months, and little can be done to him personally, Barack Obama is pushing a harder line against Israel in an upcoming report about the 'settlements.' The report, which is likely to be released in late May or early June, will focus heavily on Israeli construction in Judea, Samaria, and Jerusalem, senior diplomats told AP. The Quartet’s report will also take Israel to task for the demolition of illegal Arab buildings – many of which were built with the support of the European Union. While in the past the US worked to...

Birdwatcher Alexander Ternopolsky made a remarkable discovery one day at the archaeological site of Tel Dor on Israel's Carmel Coast -- not a bird, but a rare Egyptian scarab seal. The stone scarab -- an ancient Egyptian object shaped like a scarab beetle -- belonged to a high-ranking official of the 13th Dynasty (18th-17th centuries B.C.E.) in Middle Kingdom Egypt... The name of the scarab's owner, his position, and ankh and djed symbols (representing eternal life and stability, respectively) are engraved on the Egyptian scarab seal. While the owner's name hasn't been deciphered yet, he is described on the scarab...

Thousands of Christians have gathered in Jerusalem for an ancient fire ceremony that celebrates Jesus' resurrection. In a ritual dating back at least 1,200 years, they crowded Saturday into the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, where Christian tradition holds that Jesus was crucified, buried and resurrected. During the annual ceremony, top Eastern Orthodox clerics enter the Edicule, the small chamber marking the site of Jesus' tomb. They then emerge to reveal candles said to be miraculously lit with "holy fire" as a message to the faithful from heaven. The details of the flame's source are a closely guarded secret. Roman...

Around 6,000 Egyptians, almost all of them Coptic Christians, have entered Israel to attend the annual Holy Fire ceremony at Jerusalem’s Church of the Holy Sepulchre on Saturday. There has been a sharp rise recently in pilgrimages to Jerusalem by Egyptian Copts, after the Coptic patriarch, Pope Tawadros II, in effect rolled back a ban imposed by a predecessor in 1980, in the wake of the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty. Tawadros himself visited Israel in November for the funeral of Archbishop Anba Abraham, the Coptic Orthodox Metropolitan Archbishop of Jerusalem and the Near East.
The accession of President Abdel-Fattah al-Sissi in June 2014...

Cairo (Agenzia Fides) - Palm Sunday, celebrated the day before yesterday by the Churches that follow the Julian calendar, saw an exponential increase of Egyptian Coptic pilgrims who have come to celebrate the rites of Holy Week in Jerusalem. According to the Egyptian media, in the current year already at least 5,700 Coptic Orthodox Christians have reached the Holy City, an increase of more than a thousand units compared to the Coptic pilgrims who had carried out a pilgrimage to the Holy Places of Jerusalem in 2015. The growing presence of the Egyptian Coptic Orthodox in the Holy City marks...

Sunday, April 24, 2016 From Slavery to Freedom Posted by Daniel Greenfield As another Passover begins, the echoes of "Once we were slaves and now we are free" and "Next year in Jerusalem" resound briefly and then fade into the background noise of everyday life. We can board a plane tomorrow and fly off to Jerusalem. Some of us are already there now. But will that make us free? Since Egypt we have become slaves again, lived under the rule of iron-fisted tyrants and forgotten what the very idea of freedom means. And that will likely happen again and again...

A provocative $4-million documentary by Toronto filmmaker Simcha Jacobovici claims to have found archeological evidence verifying the story of the biblical Exodus from Egypt, 3,500 years ago. Religious Jews consider the biblical account incontrovertible — the foundation story of the creation of the nation of Israel. Indeed, they celebrated the Exodus Wednesday night and last night with the annual Passover recitation of the Haggadah. But among scholars, the question of if and when Moses led an estimated two million Israelite slaves out of pharaonic Egypt, miraculously crossed the Red Sea ahead of the pursuing Egyptian army and received the Ten...

The eviction of Israeli families from Migron on Sunday brought back painful memories for many of the 9,000 citizens expelled from Gush Katif in 2005. Now Katif expellees are asking the government for just one thing: leave the synagogue standing. “We, who seven years ago felt on our flesh the Israeli government’s decision to uproot our lives and our towns in Gush Katif, are pained and shocked today at the fact that the Israeli government is repeating the terrible mistake, and crime, of demolishing settlement and uprooting homes in Migron,” wrote Eliezer Orbach of the Gush Katif Residents’ Committee, in...

The caves in which the purification baths were found were 'caves of refuge,' where Jews who lived in the area sought shelter under Roman rule. A fifth mikveh has been found in the caves on the Galilee's Cliffs of Arbel, indicating that the people who lived there under Roman rule were most likely kohanim, Jews of the priestly class, said Yinon Shivtiel, one of the researchers who found the ritual bath... The caves in which the purification baths were found were "caves of refuge," where Jews who lived in the area sought shelter under Roman rule, particularly during the Jewish...

AP: Group Discovers John the Baptist Cave KIBBUTZ TZUBA, Israel (AP) KARIN LAUB Archaeologists said Monday they have found a cave where they believe John the Baptist anointed many of his disciples - a huge cistern with 28 steps leading to an underground pool of water. During an exclusive tour of the cave by The Associated Press, archaeologists presented wall carvings they said tell the story of the fiery New Testament preacher, as well as a stone they believe was used for ceremonial foot washing. They also pulled about 250,000 pottery shards from the cave, the apparent remnants of small...

The Israeli government and Jewish groups have expressed outrage at a resolution adopted by the U.N. cultural agency that put the Western Wall Plaza in quotation marks, described Jewish sites as “so-called” and even claimed that some Jewish graves were bogus. The resolution, sponsored by several Arab countries and adopted by UNESCO’s 58-nation executive board last week, condemned the Israeli government’s stewardship of east Jerusalem, home to the city’s most sensitive holy sites. The April 15 document also decried the renovation of “so-called Jewish ritual baths” and the alleged creation of “Jewish fake graves.” Sites were either referred to by...

The amulet was discovered by Neshama Spielman, a twelve year-old girl from Jerusalem who came with her family to participate in the Temple Mount Sifting Project. “While I was sifting, I came across a piece of pottery that was different from others I had seen, and I immediately thought that maybe I had found something special,” said Spielman. “It’s amazing to find something thousands of years old from ancient Egypt all the way here in Jerusalem! Celebrating Passover this year is going to be extra meaningful to me.” The Passover festival, commemorating the Biblical account of the ancient Israelites Exodus...

[IMRA: The State Information Service (SIS) is the public information organ of the government of the Arab Republic of Egypt. It is not clear where the Egyptians think the Second Temple was built.] http://www.sis.gov.eg/jerusalem/html/jintro.htm   Introduction Jerusalem in history     All along human history, Jerusalem has always been an Arab Palestinian city. There is no clearer evidence than the events and incidents of history that prove this Arab right with documents and scientific facts. Thus, all relevant UN resolutions, especially Resolutions no. 181/1947 and no. 194/1949, which called for preserving Jerusalem and its international status under the UN Mandate Council...

On Wednesday, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah party paid homage to a young woman who killed six people and wounded dozens more, when she detonated the homemade bomb in her handbag at the Mahane Yehuda outdoor market in Jerusalem 14 years ago. As was reported by Palestinian Media Watch, Fatah posted this tribute to the suicide terrorist on its official Facebook page. The post reads: “Today is the anniversary of the death as a martyr (shahida) of the martyrdom-seeker (istish’hadiya), the hero Andalib Takatka from the town of Beit Fajjar, daughter of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades — Fatah’s military...

A Jerusalem court has convicted Yosef Haim Ben-David of murdering Mohammed Abu Khder, as well as a number of other crimes. The judge accepted prosecutors' claims that Ben-David led his two nephews, aged 17 and 16, in kidnapping 16-year-old Abu Khder, dousing him in gasoline and burning him to death in 2014. They then attempted to destroy any evidence of their crimes. One of the nephews received a life sentence, while the second was given 21 years in prison. While the judge rejected Ben-David's plea of insanity, he put off the sentencing in light of the defendant's mental state. Ben-David...

"Thus saith the LORD: I return unto Tzion and will dwell in the midst of Yerushalayim; and Yerushalayim shall be called the city of truth; and the mountain of the LORD of hosts the holy mountain." Zechariah 8:3 (The Israel BibleTM) On Friday, the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization's (UNESCO) Executive Board in Paris adopted a resolution erasing Israel's ties to the Temple Mount and the Western Wall. The UNESCO resolution referred to the Temple Mount area solely as the Al-Aqsa Mosque or Al-Haram Al Sharif, ignoring the Jewish claim to the site. The resolution called Israel "the...