Israel News

Israel Journal: Language Barrier

10/02/1998 | by Michele Chabin | Israel Correspondent

Misgav, Galilee — It is the second week of first grade, and 6-year-old Faidi Mohammed looks as if he’d like to be anywhere but this classroom, listening to a teacher describe in Hebrew the Jewish holiday of Rosh HaShanah.

Like most of the 32 children enrolled in Israel’s first fully accredited bilingual school, Faidi, a dark-haired boy with an engaging smile, is in the grips of culture shock.

Bibi-Arafat Summit At UN?

09/25/1998 | by Stewart Ain | Staff Writer

There were a number of signals early this week that a meeting between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Yasir Arafat may take place while both men are here to address the United Nations General Assembly. It would be their first in 11 months.

Not Your Typical Beit Midrash

09/25/1998 | by Steve Lipman | Staff Writer

Jerusalem — Nine students are sitting around a table in a sunny classroom near the Old City, studying verses from the Midrash. Their bearded teacher, a knit kipa on his head, leads them in a discussion of the passage’s biblical roots and some possible interpretations.
Sounds like a typical yeshiva scene.
But most of the students are wearing blue jeans. The class includes bareheaded men — and several women.
Not a typical yeshiva scene.

Bibi: Still Committed To Oslo

09/18/1998 | by Michele Chabin | Israel Correspondent

Jerusalem — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday that Israel has no choice but to adhere to the Oslo peace accord, despite the fact that he considers it a “flawed deal.” Speaking to a group of journalists representing Jewish newspapers, Netanyahu said that Israel is committed to carrying out a second redeployment under the treaty’s interim stage. To do otherwise, he said, could jeopardize the country’s international treaties with other nations.

Off-Campus Awakening

09/04/1998 | by Michele Chabin | Israel Correspondent

Jerusalem — Eli Sanders, an incoming senior at Columbia University, never gave much thought to campus anti-Semitism — that is, until a fellow student submitted a controversial article to the Columbia Daily Spectator.

“It was an opinion piece, and it said that the hands of the Jews are stained in blood,” Sanders, the paper’s chief editor, recalls during a tour of the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial in Jerusalem.

‘Nothing Islamic About Bombing’

08/28/1998 | by Steve Lipman  | Staff Writer

Followers of Islam who kill civilians in the name of their faith, as the bombers of the U.S. embassies in Africa are suspected of doing, distort the literal words and interpreted meaning of the Koran, experts on Islam say.
The experts contacted by The Jewish Week, both Jewish and Muslim, point to the Koranic verse, “If you take an individual’s life, it is as if you have killed humanity.” The verse is similar to one in the Talmud.