Lady with a Kippa damages Sefer Torah

A Houston synagogue is shoring up its security practices after a woman who said she was motivated to vandalize it by Messianic beliefs entered without being detected.

 Ezra Law broke into Congregation Emanu El in the early hours of Jan. 14, causing damage to both the building and a sacred Torah. After spending six hours in the building — including drinking wine and spilling it on one of the sacred Torahs — she was discovered by security personnel before Shabbat services and subsequently arrested.

Law was soon released on bond, but instead of showing up at her court arraignment, she returned to Emanu El on Friday to disrupt a preschool class, harassing young children before fleeing. Law was arrested again later that day and was released for a second time on Sunday.

That night, she posted online that she had targeted the synagogue in retaliation for being turned away previously because of her belief in Jesus.

The incident, which unfolded on the one-year anniversary of a gunman taking four people hostage at a synagogue in Colleyville, Texas, has shaken the Houston Jewish community. It has also prompted a review of the lapses that twice allowed Law to enter the Emanu El building.

How Soros is slowly bringing down the USA

 

George Soros is the most dangerous man in America. The investor is intent on remaking the country to his liberal image, from our foreign policy priorities to undermining our criminal-justice system. This week, The Post takes a look at the reach of Soros’ billions. In this second essay, Matt Palumbo, author of “The Man Behind the Curtain: Inside the Secret Network of George Soros,” examines Soros investments in liberal propaganda.

A new report from the Media Research Center has exposed connections between billionaire liberal financier George Soros and 54 prominent media figures. As documented by its authors Joseph Vazquez and Dan Schneider, these include reporters, anchors, columnists, editors, news executives, and journalists.

Among the highest profile media figures revealed to have connections to Soros, often due to them sitting on boards of organizations he funds, include:

• CNN’s Christiane Amanpour sits on the board of the Center for Public Integrity, a nonprofit investigative journalism group funded by Soros, that critics charge mainly targets Republican fundraisers.

• NBC’s Lester Holt, Washington Post’s Sally Buzbee, Associate Press Executive Editor Julie Pace, and Reuters Editor-in-Chief Alessandra Galloni all sit on the board of the Member of the Committee to Protect Journalists, a Soros-funded organization that purports to defend the rights of journalists.

• CBS’ Margaret Brennan and CNN’s Fareed Zakaria serve on the board of the massively influential Council on Foreign Relations, a Soros-backed think tank specializing in U.S. foreign policy.

• NBC’s Chairman Cesar Conde is on the Aspen Institute board, a Soros-backed think tank. In recent years they launched a left-leaning commission to combat so-called disinformation, and was implicated in the suppression of The New York Post’s Hunter Biden laptop story in the recently released Twitter Files.

• NPR’s President and CEO John Lansing is connected by the direct funding Soros gives his publication.

• PolitiFact Editor-in-Chief Angie Dronbic Holan serves on the board of the Soros-backed International Fact-Checking Network, which has openly pressed Facebook to censor what they consider to be misinformation (i.e. anything that goes against the liberal narrative), and serves as the “high body” for dozens of fact-checking organizations under its umbrella.

Cardiovascular benefits shown when wearing tefillin - study

 

The cardiovascular health of both men and women who wear tefillin (phylacteries) around their arms can improve, according to new research at the University of Cincinnati (UC). The study suggests those benefits are the result of ischemic, or reduced, blood-flow preconditioning that produces protection from the damage caused by heart attacks.

“Tefillin is used for morning prayers for Jewish men over the age of 13 on weekdays,” said clinical internal medicine Prof. Jack Rubinstein of the Division of Cardiovascular Health in UC’s College of Medicine.

“It is placed on the nondominant arm around the bicep and the forearm in a fairly tight manner,” he said. “It is never worn in a fashion as to occlude the blood flow. This is traditionally worn for about 30 minutes continuously during prayers, which involve sitting and standing, resulting in occasional retightening of the strap around your arm.”

The research was published in the peer-reviewed online journal PLOS ONE under the title “Tefillin use induces preconditioning associated changes in heart rate variability” and expands on similar research by Rubinstein from 2018 that enrolled only men in the study. This study included 14 men and 16 women.

Scientists Know what Pharaoh the King that Talked to Moshe Rabbeinu Looked Like

Scientists were able to reconstruct a facial rendering of Rameses II, the Pharaoh responsible for enslaving the Jews in the Book of Exodus, based on his mummified remains. This reverse-age rendering was made possible by the UK-based Liverpool John Moores University Face Lab.

The Pharaoh Rameses II was believed to have died in his 90s, but his facial rendering shows him as he was projected to look in his 40s. Researchers were able to create a three-dimensional age regression to reverse signs of aging to depict him as in his 40s - just when he had reached the highest point of his reign of power.

According to radiology professionals involved with the research project from Cairo University, Rameses II was quite a handsome fellow. In a radiology magazine, professor Sahar Saleem said that "Bringing Rameses' face to life in his old age and as a young man reminds the world of his legendary status." He was in power for 66 years.

Middle-Aged White Suicide, Alcohol Abuse Linked to Loss of Religion

 

The rise in “deaths of despair” among middle-aged white Americans may be linked to the decline in religious practice, according to new research.

Such an increase in deaths has also been highlighted by the opioid crisis, but new research argues skyrocketing suicide and deaths from alcohol abuse might be rooted in the loss of religion.

The paper, circulated by the National Bureau of Economic Research, found that the increase of “deaths of despair” among middle-aged white Americans starting in the early 1990s was the aftermath of a declining religiosity in the United States by the same group.

Authors Tyler Giles, Daniel Hungerman, and Tamar Oostrom “confirm that religious practice has significant effects on these mortality rates.”

“Our findings show that social factors such as organized religion can play an important role in understanding deaths of despair,” they write.

The group of economists looked at the impact of “blue laws” across the country, and how the increased repeal of such laws are quickly followed by a loss in church attendance and an increased secularization.

Although some have argued that blue laws — which restrict various kinds of commerce on Sabbath days (mostly Sundays in America) — get repealed following a secularization of a community, Giles, Hungerman, and Oostrom found that the trend is the reverse: secularization of a community actually follows the repeal of blue laws.

One of the more prominent blue laws is the sale of alcohol on Sabbath days, but the economists looked at blue laws not related to alcohol sales in order to get a full picture of their effects.

Since the blue law repeals and the aftermath starting in the 1990s, Giles and his colleagues found “the most religious states experienced the lowest mortality due to deaths of despair.”

By contrast, “states that had larger drops in religious attendance had larger increases in deaths of despair.”

When persons stop attending religious service, they are not only losing a connection to moral grounding or a relationship to God; they are also losing a sense of community.

In America, the church has always been the center of a community and civil society: friendships form; men and women meet, date, marry, and start families; and a sense of care and duty to your neighbor is cultivated.

As Breitbart News reported, religious practice is heavily linked to finding meaning in life, the happiest, most stable marriages, and personal and familial well-being.

In fact, studies show that individuals and families who practice religion both at home and in church achieve the highest levels of happiness and life satisfaction.

Breccan F. Thies is a reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow him on Twitter @BreccanFThies.

The Israeli Supreme Court's contempt for the public and its elected representatives

 

By

 Caroline B. Glick

Friday morning brought the first piece of good news from Israel’s Supreme Court in years. Yediot Ahronot’s top headline declared that Supreme Court President Esther Hayut intends to resign if the Knesset passes Justice Minister Yariv Levin’s judicial reform package. (DIN: The witch has since rescinded that statement)

Hayut’s stewardship of the court over the past six years has been disgraceful and destructive to both the court and the State of Israel. The Hayut court dropped even the pretense of judiciousness. Hayut cast the court on a course of ideological radicalism and politicization that has no parallel anywhere in the world.

Hayut’s radicalism was well known in the legal community. She wasn’t then-justice minister Ayelet Shaked’s first choice for the court’s top slot. But Shaked had no say in the matter. Israel’s current judicial selection process protects justices from accountability to the public and its elected representatives. Supreme Court justices have a veto over nominees to the court, so everyone who gets the nod from the Judicial Selection Committee, including ostensibly conservative jurists, must embrace the organizational culture and values of the sitting justices.

The Deri Fiasco and the Gedoiei Hador

 

Now that Aryeh Deri has been fired, it's important to not only know what actually transpired but to see what we can take away and learn from this story!

My humble opinion is, that if when voting, the public knows the background of a candidate such as Deri and also knows that he was convicted twice and nevertheless they decide to vote for him, then he should serve in whatever capacity he is appointed. 

The Israeli Supreme Court whose justices were never elected but appointed by other Supreme Court Justices (not like the USA where the President appoints the justices) should stay out of this, since this is none of their business. 

The people have spoken and that's who they want. 

Having said this, I want to address the Gedoilim!

In 1999, Aryeh Deri was convicted of bribery, fraud and breach of trust!

He was given a three-year jail sentence and served 22 months. 

His followers claim that he was set up and was completely innocent (I'll get back to that later), despite Rav Ovadia Yosef calling him a thief, and a rasha! 

Channel 2 actually released video footage where one can clearly hear the Rav saying this.

When I say that he was convicted, I forgot to mention that Deri himself admitted to his crimes in gruesome detail.

When he got out of jail, Deri, continued brazenly, heading the Shas party, and was subsequently appointed Minister of the Economy and Minister for the Development of the Negev and Galilee. He continued serving as Minister, on various other ministerial positions! 

Only in Israel!

Then on November 20, 2018, police ended a criminal investigation into Deri with a recommendation to state prosecutors that he be indicted for "committing fraud, breach of trust, obstructing court proceedings, money laundering, and tax offenses."

In 2019, this recommendation was adopted in full by the state prosecutor, but in 2021 the AG Avichai Mandelblit dropped all the charges except the tax offenses in a plea deal!

In January 2022, Deri resigned from the Knesset as part of that plea deal. Deri in his plea deal, admitted in detail to underreporting the value of property sold to his brother to avoid land tax, failure to report income from the sales and evading taxes on NIS 534,000 of income, by funneling payments from Green Ocean investment fund to his brother.

Deri received a year's suspended sentence and was also ordered to pay a NIS 180,000 fine. This latest deal (dropping the theft and fraud charges and staying out of jail) was contingent on Deri agreeing not to join the next Knesset, which is the one we are in now!

In the last election, Shas put Deri second position on the list, thus being re-elected to the Knesset. 

Last Friday the Supreme Court of Israel ruled that Deri was not allowed to hold a position as a cabinet minister due to his conviction for tax offenses. 

Yesterday PM Netanyahu dismissed Deri from his official posts in the Israeli cabinet. 

Below I show all the property that the Deri family owns, worth millions, and maybe even billions....... all this, working all his life for the "klall" in the Knesset! 

But as I said before, if that's what the public wants, then "kol ha'koved" If the public are a bunch of masochists, then they deserve what they got!

I'm, though, very disappointed in the Gedoilim, both Sephardim and Ashkanizim who not only didn't say one word against a man that Rav Ovadia Yosef publicly called "a thief and a Rasha" but actually supported him. 

Here is a guy who has become a multi-multi-millionaire on the public's dime and admitted under oath that he took bribes and committed fraud, and not only that, but agreed not to join the Knesset, and didn't care to put the entire new government in jeopardy. If it was up to him, he would put the country thru another election, costing billions just so that he could be a minister!

But forget about him, what are the Gedoilim thinking? 

What message is this to our children? 

How do we explain to teenagers that the Gedoilim are supporting a thief and fraudster?

This is not about the Supreme Court getting involved in politics, and it's not even about Deri....It's about our "manhigim" our "gedoilim" who are supposed to teach by example. 

Now look at the ad asking women to light Shabbos candles 10 minutes earlier to help this thief and fraudster!

Moshiach better come soon, because if he doesn't come soon, he won't have to whom to come to!

See below Deri's properties! 

A search for the lives and memories of an entire Jewish village lost in the Holocaust. (Aired 1996)

 

Netanyahu fires Aryeh Deri 'with a heavy heart'

 

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fired Shas chairman Aryeh Deri as Interior and Health Minister Sunday afternoon, four days after Deri was disqualified from serving as a minister by the Supreme Court.

At the weekly Cabinet meeting, Netanyahu read the dismissal letter: "As you know, I decided to appoint you as Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Interior and Health with the approval of the majority of Knesset members due to the fact that I see you as an anchor of experience, wisdom and responsibility that are important to the State of Israel at all times, and especially at this time."

"Yes, I thought it was important for you to serve the State of Israel as a member of the security-political cabinet in my government, where you could influence your many years of experience as a cabinet member in the governments of the late Prime Ministers Yitzhak Shamir and Yitzhak Rabin - you rich experience that contributes to the security and resilience of the State of Israel.

"Unfortunately, despite the above, on 18.1.23 the Supreme Court decided ... that I have an obligation to remove you from your position as Minister of the Interior and Health. This unfortunate decision ignores the will of the people, as reflected in the great trust that the public gave to the representatives of the people and their elected officials in my government, when it was clear to everyone that you would serve in the government as a senior minister.

Is Netanyahu seeking to bring Lapid, Gantz into government ?

 

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is seeking to bring either the Yesh Atid or National Unity parties into his government, a senior political official told Ynet.

According to the official, Netanyahu has not reined in the 'extremists' in his government in order to create the condition for Yair Lapid or Benny Gantz to join the government in the next few months to serve as a counterbalance to the far right.

According to the source, Netanyahu is expected to tell Lapid or Gantz to work with him to restore 'sanity' to the political scene.

The Religious Zionism party is threatening to boycott votes in the Knesset tomorrow in addition to the Cabinet meeting today in protest against the government's dismantling of an outpost erected in memory of Rabbi Chaim Druckman.

Reshet Bet reported that the party has accused Defense Minister Yoav Gallant is preventing the transfer of powers to Religious Zionism party chairman Bezalel Smotrich, including the establishment of the administration that is supposed to nationalize the Civil Administration.

Religious Zionism party officials even issued a threat to Likud members and stated that "if there is no progress in resolving the crisis, we will consider absenting ourselves from the Knesset votes on Monday."

This morning (Sunday) party ministers will be absent from the cabinet meeting in protest of what they called "the violation of the coalition agreement to evacuate the Or Haim outpost on Friday without coordination and contrary to Smotrich's directive to the civil administration."