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There’s no denying Barack Obama’s gifts, at least when it comes to a classic Democratic constituency teetering away from him — America’s Jews, who, as I noted yesterday, are showing signs of giving John McCain the largest share of their vote since Ronald Reagan in 1980. In a brilliant effort to shore up his support and stanch the bleeding, Obama held a conference call this morning with 900 rabbis to wish them a Happy New Year. The High Holy Days of the Jewish faith begin on the evening of the 29th of September with Rosh Hashanah, the first day of...

9/01/08 3:12PM EST: [UPDATES IN EXTENDED ARTICLE] Credible sources tell YWN that the missing body of 39-year-old Naftoli Smolyansky Z”L, who went missing while on a boating trip in Lake Piru, California has just been found. Naftoli was in a boat on the lake with his 9-year-old son and his two daughters, ages 5 and 7 last Monday afternoon, when his youngest daughter fell overboard. He jumped in to save her, and managed to push his daughter back into the boat, but he R”L went under and did not resurface. Hundreds of people joined the massive search by air, land,...

(IsraelNN.com) Two prominent Italian rabbis have sharply criticized the Vatican for its deleting two anti-Semitic remarks in Good Friday prayers and then replacing them with appeals for Jews to convert, according to the European Jewish Press. Pope Benedict earlier this week announced that the terms "blindness" and "darkness," referring to Jews, would be deleted. The Pope ordered the changes after complaints from an American "inter-religious" committee about the anti-Semitic words in the prayer.However, the new Latin text for the prayer states, "May the Lord enlighten them [the Jews] so that they recognize Jesus Christ as the savior of all men."...

From the Italian daily Corriere della Sera: Italian Rabbinical Assembly: "Pause for reflection in the dialogue" with CatholicsThe opinion on the change of the Good Friday prayer: "An abandonment of the very conditions for dialogue" ROME - And now, a rupture. The Italian Rabbinical Asseembly considers necessary a "pause for reflection in the dialogue" with Catholics after the modification of the Good Friday prayer for the Jews. And it underlines that the modification decided by Pope Ratzinger is "an abandonment of the very conditions for dialogue". The Assembly states so in a note signed by its president, Rabbi Giuseppe Laras.

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- On the eve of Super Tuesday, the oldest Orthodox Jewish Rabbinic organization in the country issued a historic declaration on voting and abortion. The Union of Orthodox Rabbis of the U.S. and Canada says Jewish voters should not vote for candidates who support abortion, calling them "antithetical" to Jewish values. Rabbi Yehuda Levin, a spokesman for the group, released a video message on Monday with the exhortation. "It is very important for our community to demonstrate its appreciation for our wonderful country by exercising our civic obligation to vote," he says. "However, it is even more...

Yesterday, Rav Avi Weiss and the Jewish activist organization he founded, AMCHA: the Coalition for Jewish Concerns, coordinated a civil disobedience protest at the United Nations. Around 50 rabbis and rabbinical students, as well as a lay communal leader or few, participated in the protest. They prepared themselves in a staging area near the Iranian Mission to the UN — putting on talleisim and distributing signs — and after a few short speeches and rounds of slogan-shouting, they marched, singing ‘Am Yisra’eil Hhai, to the steps that go down past the Isaiah Wall across the street from the UN buildings.

Rabbis for Human Rights Israel (RHRI) is at odds with its sister organization in North America over an issue that goes to the heart of the debate over Zionism's use and misuse of military might to defend itself. During a board meeting Monday in Jerusalem, some leading members of RHRI strongly criticized Rabbis for Human Rights North America (RHR-NA) for honoring a New York-based legal advocacy group that sued two senior Israeli security officials for perpetrating "war crimes." On December 11, RHR-NA honored the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) with the Raphael Lemkin Award for its work combating purported torture...

It was a bizarre sight: a cadre of Orthodox Jews, with their distinctive hats, beards and sidelocks, standing alongside President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran last month at a conference in Tehran debating the Holocaust. Among them was Rabbi Yisroel Dovid Weiss, spokesman and assistant director of a small anti-Zionist group with a foothold in this town in Rockland County, home to one of the nation’s largest communities of Hasidic Jews. Unlike Mr. Ahmadinejad and most of the others present, including the former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke, Rabbi Weiss does not deny or question the Holocaust; his grandparents died...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Leaders of the Conservative Jewish movement opened the door on Wednesday to the ordination of gay rabbis and the recognition of gay marriage, but made it clear the more orthodox in the faith may go on opposing such liberalization. "We as a movement see the advocacy of pluralism and we know that people come to different conclusions," said Rabbi Kassel Abelson, speaking for the 25-member Rabbinical Assembly Committee on Jewish Law and Standards which issued a series of advisory reports. "These ... are accepted as guides so that the gays and lesbians can be welcomed into...

A group of rabbis has been ordained in Germany for the first time since World War II and the destruction by the Nazis of the country's Jewish seminaries. Three Jewish graduates from the Abraham Geiger College in Potsdam were ordained in the eastern city of Dresden. More than 100,000 Jews live in Germany but there is a dearth of rabbis - there are only about 25 of them serving 100 congregations, a BBC reporter says. For years Germany has had to rely on rabbis imported from abroad. The ordination took place in Dresden's new synagogue which was rebuilt after the...

Committee of Jewish scholars likely to roll back ban on ordaining gay rabbis. 'It is simply not natural to demand that they remain celibate,' one rabbi says, adding that movement has to 'interpret God's will' A key Conservative Jewish leader is organizing talks nationwide to tell synagogues that the movement will likely roll back its ban on ordaining openly gay rabbis by year's end. He and two religious law experts joining him at the meetings are trying to help congregations prepare for the confusion and discomfort to follow. Rabbi Jerome Epstein, executive vice president of the United Synagogue of Conservative...

The Rabbinical Council of America (RCA) has called on Israel to reevaluate its military rules of war in light of Hizbullah's "unconscionable use of civilians, hospitals, ambulances, mosques and the like as human shields, cannon fodder and weapons of asymmetric warfare." The RCA made the statement at the end of a three-day solidarity mission last week in conjunction with Emunah, the modern Orthodox women's organization, during which a contingent of RCA rabbis toured the North and South, visiting the injured and gathering impressions of the extent of the damage caused by the warfare. Rabbi Basil Herring, executive vice president of...

Rabbi Dr. Einat Ramon appointed to serve as dean of conservative Schechter Rabbinical Seminary The Board of the Schechter Rabbinical Seminary in Jerusalem has appointed Rabbi Dr. Einat Ramon to serve as dean of the Schechter Rabbinical Seminary . Ordained by the Jewish Theological Seminary of America in 1989, Rabbi Ramon was the first Israeli woman to be ordained as a rabbi. She is also the first woman to head a Conservative/Masorti rabbinical school. Rabbi Ramon has been a courageous spokesperson for the Masorti Movement on crucial issues such as the conversion bill and the right to hold egalitarian prayers...

Rabbis to Bush: Don't back West Bank withdrawal Say evacuation plan against Torah, U.S. interests Posted: June 29, 2006 1:00 a.m. Eastern By Aaron Klein KIBBUTZ NAHAL OZ, Israel – A group of prominent rabbis is calling on President Bush to refuse political and financial support for Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's plan to evacuate most of Judea and Samaria, stating the withdrawal is against U.S. interests, and that it violates basic tenets of Jewish law. "U.S. interests are being impacted by Israel's proposed retreat from terrorist strongholds in Judea and Samaria. In addition, as rabbis our obligation is to teach,...

Rabbis Forbid Hitchhiking at This Time 16:11 Jun 29, '06 / 3 Tammuz 5766 by Hillel Fendel "One who takes a dangerous chance at this time endangers the entire public," leading religious-Zionist rabbis ruled. Hamas terrorists threaten to kidnap more Israelis. A ruling issued today by Rabbis Avraham Shapira, Dov Lior and others states that one may not stand in dangerous places to wait for rides. "One who takes an unreasonable chance in this matter," the ruling states, "endangers the entire public - because the government is liable to be forced to release terrorists." The rabbis also place the onus...

Conservative and Masorti rabbinical organizations must decide about how inclusive they will be on full participation by gays in Jewish, congregational life The mainstream Jewish community has not been in a hurry to embrace gay Jews as full participants in Jewish communal life. A cursory reading of the Orthodox press reveals the vile and outrageous statements made by too many Orthodox rabbis. There are all too few Orthodox shuls where gays may feel comfortable if they are out of the closet. The Reform (and Reconstructionist) Movement has been far more open and welcoming. But many observant gay Jews prefer to...

1. Immigration Bill Grants Illegals In-state Tuition After the Senate Judiciary Committee approved and distributed a proposal for granting legal status to many undocumented aliens, conservatives were alarmed to discover that the 471-page bill makes illegal aliens eligible for in-state tuition costs. Under the proposal, illegals could pay the low tuition charged students who attend state universities in their home state, while legal residents of the U.S. would still be required to pay the much higher costs charged students who attend schools outside their state, the Washington Times reports. "This means that while American citizens from Tennessee, Georgia, South Carolina,...

A group of anti-Zionist rabbis has visited the Palestinian parliament to pledge their support for the prospective Hamas-led government. The rabbis from the small ultra-Orthodox movement Neturei Karta, which this month sent a delegation to Iran, travelled to the West Bank town of Ram Allah to express their support for the Islamic group. The group rejects the existence of the state of Israel as contrary to Jewish law and believes the land should be returned to Palestinians. Neturei Karta believe that no Jewish state should be created before the coming of the messiah. "We are true Jews who have come...

In a closed-door meeting this week in an undisclosed site near Baltimore, a committee of Jewish legal experts who set policy for Conservative Judaism will consider whether to lift their movement's ban on gay rabbis and same-sex unions. In 1992, this same group, the Committee on Jewish Law and Standards, declared that Jewish law clearly prohibited commitment ceremonies for same-sex couples and the admission of openly gay people to rabbinical or cantorial schools. The vote was 19 to 3, with one abstention. Since then, Conservative Jewish leaders say, they have watched as relatives, congregation members and even fellow rabbis publicly...

Being kind to the cruel Caroline Glick, THE JERUSALEM POST Feb. 28, 2006 On February 6, the General Synod of the Church of England voted to impose a selective secondary boycott on Israel. Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams supported the motion. This was not Williams's first swipe against the Jewish state. To take just one example of his consistent anti-Israel bias, in June 2004, during a visit to Jerusalem, Williams dismissed protocol and harshly criticized Israel for building the security fence to protect its citizens from mass murder. Britain's Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks reacted angrily to the synod's decision. In...

Leaflets distributed at synagogues over weekend blast courts, permit violence against police Right-wing leaflets distributed in synagogues across the country over the weekend in the wake of violent clashes between settlers and security forces at the West Bank outpost of Amona featured scathing attacks against the government, courts, and police forces. "A government that acts against the people and its Torah is defined as a 'conspiracy of evil' and should be ignored," one such leaflet distributed across the nation read. The leaflet, entitled "Small World," also blasts High Court judges for allowing the evacuation of Amona to proceed and characterizes...

A knife-wielding man shouting "I will kill Jews!" attacked a synagogue in downtown Moscow Wednesday, slashing and stabbing at least eight people before the son of a rabbi wrestled him to the ground, officials and eyewitnesses said. Witnesses said the shaven-headed attacker yelled "Heil Hitler! as he aimed at victims' necks, heads or torsos in what appeared to be a well-planned attack. The attack at the Chabad Bronnaya synagogue came amid an increase in racist crimes and hate-group activity in Russia. Jewish leaders said it should send a message to Russian authorities and the public to fight prejudice. "If today's...

Rabbis convert 'lost tribe of Israel' Recognize 200 members of group believing it descended from Joseph ----------------------------------------------- Posted: September 26, 2005 11:03 p.m. Eastern By Aaron Klein © 2005 WorldNetDaily.com An official delegation of Israeli rabbis arrived in India last week and began converting to Judaism members of a group that believes it is one of the ten "lost tribes" of Israel, jump starting a process many hope will bring the tribe's remaining 7,000 members to the Jewish state. The Bnei Menashe say they are the descendants of Manasseh, one of biblical patriarch Joseph's two sons, and a grandson of...

Milwaukee Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan and six other Roman Catholic bishops from the United States will spend a day at the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camps later this month during a Jewish-Catholic study trip to Poland and Rome with three East Coast rabbis. I see (Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan) as a future cardinal and a very important leader of the Catholic community. - Rabbi Joseph Ehrenkranz,executive director of the Center for Christian-Jewish Understanding at Sacred Heart University This is not the first time U.S. bishops have visited the Auschwitz-area camps, the largest of the Nazi-run camps during World War II. Some 1.5...

Just days before the start of classes this week, the trustees of a Conservative Jewish day school in suburban Detroit pulled the plug on its teachers' union. The controversial move followed an August 16 decision by the State of Michigan Court of Appeals, which said that teachers in religious schools throughout the state do not have the right to unionize. In the wake of the ruling, which came down in response to teachers seeking to unionize at a Catholic high school, the Hillel Day School of Metropolitan Detroit ended recognition of its own long-standing teachers' union. "Teachers can decide whether...

Jerrold Nadler's Two Faces on Terror By Jacob LaksinFrontPageMagazine.com | June 13, 2005Last Friday’s House Judiciary Committee hearing on the Patriot Act had already been adjourned, but Jerrold Nadler, the Democratic blimpish congressman from New York and one of the leftmost members of the House Judiciary Committee, was too wound up to care: “We are not besmirching the honor of the United States, we are trying to uphold it,” bellowed the hefty Nadler. By this, Nadler meant to defend his attacks on the alleged abuses of the (in fact) privileged  prisoners in Guantanamo Bay. Thanks to the efforts of the...

An exodus from the Promised Land has left Jewish religious leaders worried. Israeli youths, fresh out of their three-year mandatory army service, are leaving their strife-torn country and reaching India in droves in search of peace. More than 10,000 men and women make their way towards places like Manali, Dharamshala and Kasauli every year where they find peace in Hinduism, nature, and, sometimes, drugs. Many marry locals, convert to Hinduism and cut off all contact with family in Israel. “We find peace here. This is a nice place to unwind after facing hardships back in Israel which is facing a...

Prominent Jewish and Catholic leaders meeting in New York yesterday said the spirit of respect and cooperation between the two religions forged by Pope John Paul II is now so strong that it would continue beyond his papacy. "I am optimistic that what this pope has done for the last 26 years cannot be reversed," said Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Vatican council responsible for Jewish-Catholic relations. He added that "everyone can only be happy about the progress that has been made, which is so important for peace in the world." The World Jewish Congress is hosting the two-day...

In speeches and in open letters, respected rabbis and Hassidic leaders are calling upon Jews the world over to join the struggle against the government's plan to withdraw from parts of Israel. In speeches and in open letters, respected rabbis and Hassidic leaders are calling upon Jews the world over to join the struggle against the government's plan to withdraw from parts of the Land of Israel. In coming days, the Pikuach Nefesh organization, made up of rabbis opposed to relinquishing Israeli territory, will publicize a strongly-worded open letter calling upon rabbis and Jewish leaders worldwide to put pressure on...

Many leading rabbis in hesder yeshivas – which combine religious studies with military service – have lately endorsed appeals to their student-soldiers to shun participation in the implementation of the projected disengagement from Gaza and, more specifically, to play no part in evicting Jewish residents. This has instantly produced the expected political reactions, including demands from Labor's Amram Mitzna and Ophir Pines-Paz that special arrangements for hesder conscripts be abrogated. MK Matan Vilna'i (Labor) went a step further and urged in an Israel Radio interview last Thursday that the entire hesder framework be disbanded. There may be a kernel of...

A group of prominent right wing rabbis on Tuesday issued a potentially inflammatory public call on the government to fight terrorism more tenaciously and to heed no difference between civilian and combatant in battle. The call by West Bank, Gaza, and right wing rabbis from Israel proper, arrived just a few hours after an IDF strike in Gaza killed 15 people – all of them Hamas members, according to a Hamas spokesman. The group of rabbis, headed by former MK and Chairman of the popular Bnei Akiva youth movement Haim Drukman (National Religious Party), said the army's policy in Palestinian...

Leading rabbis, among them heads of hesder yeshivot and members of the Yesha Rabbis Council, issued a proclamation today stating that Israel's security needs override the welfare of Arab civilians living in the terror-infested Palestinian Authority. "There is no need to avoid hitting or even killing Palestinians who are not involved in terrorism when this will harm the efforts to defend Israeli lives," the statement reads. "Jewish Law provides that during war time, such as that which we are now experiencing, there is no difference between the populace and the army. If a danger arises to Israeli soldiers or to...

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Several rabbis weighed in on Wednesday against Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (news - web sites)'s idea for adding a distinguishing mark to driver's licenses that would be given to illegal immigrants, saying it harks back to Holocaust-era persecution of Jews. In an open letter to Arnold Schwarzenegger, six Los Angeles rabbis wrote that his suggestion for allowing undocumented aliens to obtain driver's permits with a special emblem denoting their immigration status would subject them to "scorn and ethnic discrimination." "You are a person of faith, an immigrant and one who has been a friend to the Jewish...

The Yesha rabbinical council of the West Bank and Gaza Strip issued a letter Wednesday attacking Likud ministers who support the disengagement plan and calling on them to oppose the plan in the Likud's internal referendum on May 2. The open letter called the Likud ministers "politicians who sell weakness and despair." The rabbis asked whether the ministers "agree that the children of Ophir Cohen's family, whose legs were cut off on their way to school and who have been rehabilitated and returned to Kfar Darom [a central Gaza Strip settlement], will be exiled from there, this time by Jews,...

Intelligence community officials have informed prominent rabbinical figures that they have been targeted by terrorists and instructed the rabbis to act accordingly. Chief Rabbis Yona Metzger and Shlomo Amar have been informed by intelligence community officials that they are potential targets for terrorists and must take the appropriate precautions. Also on the terrorists' lists are Shas spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, former Chief Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau and leading Kabbalist Rabbi Yitzhak Kaduri. Some of the rabbis have already made changes in their schedule in compliance with intelligence and security officials' recommendations. Rabbi Yosef, for instance, has canceled some of...

Why we are losing the 'gay marriage' battle Posted: February 24, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern Richard D. Ackerman © 2004 WorldNetDaily.com While everyone would like to claim that the homosexual "marriage" battle has energized the Christian majority in America, nothing could be further from the truth. The recent events in San Francisco and Massachusetts are the ultimate testimony to our lack of energy and desire to please God. We are currently losing this battle because we deserve to lose this battle. There are several reasons why we will not win this battle until we change our wicked ways. First, our...

Coming soon to a synagogue near you: "The Passion: The Counteroffensive." Jewish groups across the city are gearing up for the premiere of Mel Gibson's movie with sermons, forums and press conferences on the death of Christ. Their aim is to fight any suggestion that Jews - two millennia ago and today - are responsible for Jesus' crucifixion. "We are not into boycotts, but it's important to sensitize people to the concerns we have," said Joel Levy, regional director of the Anti-Defamation League. "The movie is a modern-day passion play, and passion plays historically have been the occasion for lots...

ISRAELI rabbinical authorities have given a man whose wife has been declared brain dead exceptional permission to take a second spouse, the Maariv daily reported Monday. The state of Israel normally forbids bigamy in accordance with the guidance of the Edict of Rabbi Gershom, a rabbinical text dating back to the Middle Ages. But if a woman is no longer of sound mind and cannot agree to a divorce, rabbis can authorise a second marriage. The paper said that the request had been submitted by a husband, who is in his late 50s, from a Jewish settlement in the northern...

Chief Rabbi Yonah Metzger spoke with Arutz-7 this morning about his visit last week, together with Chief Rabbi Rishon LeTzion Shlomo Amar, with Pope John Paul II in the Vatican. He told of "immediate and wondrous results." Chief Rabbi Yonah Metzger spoke with Arutz-7's Uzi Baruch this morning about his visit last week, together with Chief Rabbi Rishon LeTzion Shlomo Amar, with Pope John Paul II in the Vatican. He said that the meeting had more historic value than practical value, "but we were told in advance that this would be the case. In the Vatican, there is no such...

MUCH ABOUT HISTORYIsrael seeks returnof Temple artifacts Rabbis urge Vatican to permit search of storerooms for treasures Posted: January 16, 20041:00 a.m. Eastern © 2004 WorldNetDaily.com When Israel's chief rabbis meet Pope John Paul II today, they will seek permission to search Vatican storerooms for artifacts such as the huge golden menorah that stood in the Temple in Jerusalem 2,000 years ago. Vatican officials confirmed to the Associated Press the meeting would take place but declined comment on the rabbis' request. Yehuda Metzger and Shlomo Amar are to have an audience with Pope John Paul, the first by Israel's chief rabbis in...

ROME, Jan. 16 /PRNewswire/ -- The two Chief Rabbis of Israel, Yona Metzger and Shlomo Amar, met today with Pope John Paul II at the Vatican to discuss the need for the world's religious leaders to help stem a rising tide of anti- Semitism and terror throughout the world and to continue to decry attacks on the very sanctity of life. It was the first time both chief rabbis met together with His Holiness. Both Rabbis called the 30-minute talk with the Pope "historic" and productive. The meeting was arranged by the Vatican's Ambassador to Jerusalem Henazio Puerto Sambi amid...

President Bush marked the Jewish New Year by telling a roomful of rabbis about his faith and how it helped make him a better man. Some 15 rabbis representing the three main denominations spent an hour at the White House on Monday discussing a range of topics, including Iraq, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, poverty and faith-based initiatives. Rabbi Steven Pruzanski of Teaneck, N.J., said Bush twice became emotional: while discussing his recent trip to the site of the Auschwitz death camp and when he talked about how people pray for him. Bush spoke openly about his drinking problem of years past,...

Maj. David Rosner, shown here in a C-130 tranport plane, has worked on both the military and post-war operations in Iraq. When Rabbi Mitchell Ackerson blew the shofar this past Rosh Hashanah, it reverberated throughout one of Saddam Hussein´s former palaces. More than 100 Jewish members of the U.S. forces stationed in Iraq attended the High Holiday services at the former Iraqi dictator´s Baghdad compound. They seemed shocked and awed, not least by the echo. "It was a 25-foot ceiling, so it really goes," Ackerson said, describing the shofar´s blast in a telephone interview from Baghdad on Monday. Many of...

On Sunday night I wrote that our rabbi (Jonathan Ginsburg of St. Paul's Temple of Aaron) would be meeting with the president on Monday afternoon. Here is Rabbi Ginsburg's account of his meeting yesterday with President Bush, retaining Rabbi Ginsburg's subject headings: "It started with a phone call from Senator Coleman the Monday night before Rosh Hashanah telling me that the President wanted to meet with a few rabbis right after Rosh Hashanah, and asking me if I could go to Washington to meet with him. Senator Coleman told me about his recent trip to Cuba and meeting with the...

Raised a Southern Baptist who later converted to Roman Catholicism, Gen. Wesley Clark knew just what to say when he strode into a Brooklyn yeshiva in 1999, ostensibly to discuss his leadership of NATO's victory in Yugoslavia. "I feel a tremendous amount in common with you," the uniformed four-star general told the stunned roomful of students. "I am the oldest son, of the oldest son, of the oldest son -- at least five generations, and they were all rabbis." The incident could be a signal of how Clark, who became the 10th contender in the Democratic run for the presidency...

BEHIND THE HEADLINES Latest contender for president comes from long line of rabbis By Ron Kampeas WASHINGTON, Sept. 17 (JTA) — Raised a Southern Baptist who later converted to Roman Catholicism, Gen. Wesley Clark knew just what to say when he strode into a Brooklyn yeshiva in 1999, ostensibly to discuss his leadership of NATO´s victory in Yugoslavia. "I feel a tremendous amount in common with you," the uniformed four-star general told the stunned roomful of students. "I am the oldest son, of the oldest son, of the oldest son — at least five generations, and they were all rabbis."

Rabbi tells Moore Jews support display 08/18/03 STAN BAILEY News staff writer MONTGOMERY - Thousands of American Jews support Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore's display of the Ten Commandments in the state judicial building rotunda, an Orthodox rabbi from New York told him Friday. Rabbi Yehuda Levin, saying he represents 1,000 rabbis and 750,000 Orthodox Jews in two national organizations, gave Moore an embroidered likeness of the Ten Commandments and blessed him in a special prayer. "May the Author of the Decalogue give you the strength and the fortitude to be successful in your righteous struggle and be an effective...

Please click on the hyperlink to read the press release. (And my apologies if this has already been posted.)

Two major Rabbinical organizations, representing over 1000 Orthodox Rabbis, today declared their support for Alabama Chief Judge Roy Moore in his battle to keep the Ten Commandments on display in the Supreme Court building in Montgomery, Alabama.Lawyer groups, led by the ACLU, have demanded that Judge Moore remove the display, citing church-state concerns; and Federal Judge Myron Thompson has given Judge Moore a deadline of August 20 to remove the display. But Judge Moore is refusing to be intimidated.Rabbi Hirsch Ginsberg of the Union of Orthodox Rabbis said: "The Ten Commandments are the basis of civilized society and the rule...

Yesha Council of rabbis: Gay pride parade in Tel Aviv is `shameful and bowing to the inferior culture of ancient Greece`