A person was shot outside the Young Israel of North Miami Beach, Sunday afternoon.
It happened at around 7:00PM, when a man was shot while walking outside the Shul located at 10th Ave near 171st Street.
Hatzolah of Miami Dade was on the scene and treated the victim, reportedly in his 60’s, who suffered multiple gunshot wounds to his leg.
He was taken to Aventura Medical Center, and is reportedly in stable condition.
Law-enforcement sources confirm to YWN that the victim was sitting outside Shul waiting for Mincha, when a vehicle drove past and opened fire. Six shots were fired, and 4 struck the victim in his leg.
Police in North Miami Beach Police are on the scene, and possibly looking for a dark colored Camaro or Impala. Additional details on the vehicle police are looking for will be published when security camera footage provides that to law enforcement.
Please say Tehillim for Yosef Noach ben Leah Tzivyah.
A lecture by renowned Rabbi Manis Friedman recently reached a record number on YouTube, making it first time a single Shiur Torah was viewed 1 million times. See Video Below…
Office of Rabbi Manis Friedman:
The Rebbe taught us that G-d created us to actualize His burning desire to be with us together in this world. Since Torah is the cosmic, global force that will make it happen, we have been working with a sense of urgency to share the Torah and make it accessible to the widest possible audiences. From Torah-on-the-line phone programs to satellite Farbrengens, we have been made it our business to stay abreast of the newest means and methods of teaching Torah and reaching Jews.
Then came the internet. The internet has brought human communication to such an extraordinary level that things that were never possible before are now barely an inconvenience.
The internet is the greatest leap forward that ever happened to the promulgation Torah learning. Lectures and classes that were reaching tens and maybe hundreds of students are reaching exponentially more.
With our social network we can share information on a whole new scale, it is the best tool for bringing about Yeshayahu’s nevuah: “the land shall be full of knowledge of Hashem as water covers the sea bed.”
We would like to introduce you to the online talks of Rabbi Manis Friedman. Recently, a Torah class by Rabbi Manis Friedman was viewed one million times on YouTube. It is the first time ever that a single Shiur Torah was listened to by one million people.
Every single day, the office of Rabbi Manis Friedman posts new videos on two YouTube Channels. The videos are pure Torah and Chassidus for all. There’s the “Rabbi Manis Friedman” channel, and for those who are more familiar with Torah and Chassidus there is the “11213org” channel. Every day there is a brand-new video waiting just for you on both channels!
From Hollywood stars who almost forgot they were Jewish; to tribesmen in the hills of New Guinea; to ultra-orthodox Jews in the heart of Lakewood; the audience is growing by the hour.
The internet is indeed unprecedented, and using it, unprecedented holiness has been brought to the world. One need only read the comments after any video to see the miracles of Torah and Chassidus, and how a drop of Chassidus in a five-minute YouTube video brings light to a person and transforms their world.
Hopefully, the success of Rabbi Manis and others doing the same will inspire others to follow suit and use the internet and social media for their true purpose: to fill the world with the knowledge of G-d like water covers the sea bed.
Scientists revealed an asteroid dubbed by some as a “city killer” came closer to the Earth than the moon this week. The Washington Post reported scientists say they had no idea it was coming.
Asteroid 2019 OK came hurtling toward Earth at a speed of nearly 15 miles a second, before flying past. According to NASA, it was about 45,000 miles from Earth on Thursday.
“It would have hit with over 30 times the energy of the atomic blast at Hiroshima,” astronomer professor Alan Duffy told the Sydney Morning Herald. Duffy called the zooming space rock a “city killer”.
Astronomers say it posed no immediate threat but they admit they had no idea the giant rock was headed our way, because it came from the direction of the sun.
The asteroid, about the size of a large boulder, only became visible a few days ago.
There are 20,000 near-Earth asteroids and they do occasionally make an appearance. In 2013, one slammed into Russia, injuring 1,600 people.
At a conference in April, scientists from around the world were asked how to respond to a make-believe scenario in which an asteroid big enough to destroy a major city might be on track to strike the Earth in eight years.
The likely response would be using space ships to give the asteroid a nudge, one scientist said.
“All we have to do is change its speed a little faster or a little slower so that when it crosses Earth’s orbit, it crosses either in front of us or behind us,” said Dr. Lori Glaze, director of planetary science at NASA.
Union of Right-Wing Parties leader says he will let New Right chief head the joint slate, clearing key obstacle to unity deal; fringe far-right parties merge
By TAMAR PILEGGI 7/28 8:28 pm
Union of Right-Wing Parties leader Rafi Peretz on Sunday said he agreed give New Right leader Ayelet Shaked the top spot on a joint electoral ticket for the September 17 elections.
In a tweet, Peretz said he and Shaked reached the agreement out of a sense of “national unity and concern for a right-wing government and religious Zionism.”
“Unity is the shared goal of all of us,” he said.
The announcement came ahead of Peretz’s meeting in Jerusalem with the New Right’s Shaked and No. 2, Naftali Bennett, to hammer out details of a possible merger.
In a statement, Shaked expressed hope a deal could be reached by Sunday night.
“I hope that we can finish this tonight and that white smoke will rise so that we can move on to the second stage: Trying to bring all right-wing parties into the fold of the united right,” the former justice minister said.
According to reports in Hebrew-language media, Peretz was expected to demand the alliance commit to endorsing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for a fourth consecutive term as premier. The prime minister had pressed Peretz to present this demand as a condition for the merger, reports said.
Peretz’s announcement came three days before the deadline for parties to register their electoral slates for the upcoming elections.
The New Right has been pushing for a tie-up with the URWP and others ahead of the election in a bid to prevent votes being split and possibly lost among the various right-wing factions.
But the negotiations between the two parties stalled over New Right’s demand that the secular Shaked lead the joint slate representing the national-religious community.
Ayelet Shaked and Naftali Bennett at a press conference in Ramat Gan, where the former was announced as the new head of the New Right party, on July 21, 2019. (Tomer Neuberg/Flash90)
Shaked, who earlier this week took the reins of the New Right, has been pushing for the URWP to merge with her party to avoid the factions splitting the right-wing bloc and risking one of them not clearing the electoral threshold. In April’s election, New Right fell about a thousand votes short of entering the Knesset, while URWP won five seats.
Shaked now appears poised to become the sole female party leader in the upcoming national vote.
Earlier on Sunday, Bennett, assured voters the URWP alliance would be a “technical bloc” solely for the purposes of the upcoming elections and the parties would part ways after entering the Knesset.
Bennett said in a Facebook livestream that he wanted the loose coalition to also include Moshe Feiglin’s quasi-libertarian Zehut party, and the extremist Otzma Yehudit which ran as a part of URWP in April’s elections.
Zehut party leader Moshe Feiglin attends a party conference in Tel Aviv on February 28, 2017. (Flash90)
“We decided to unite everyone, all the parties on the right, including Feiglin, to bring them under one umbrella,” Bennett said.
But Zehut’s Feiglin on Sunday night said his party would be running independently and accused Shaked of keeping him out of the loop.
Like New Right, Zehut fell short of the electoral threshold in the April vote.
Otzma Yehudit joined the URWP for the April vote, but has since said it was breaking its partnership with URWP’s Jewish Home sub-faction in a dispute over the party slate.
On Sunday night, Otzma Yehudit said it agreed on a joint run with the far-right fringe party Noam, which represents the Har HaMor yeshiva.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, right, speaks with Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked in the Knesset, December 21, 2016. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)
Three polls published on Thursday evening gave New Right nine to 11 Knesset seats, compared with just four for URWP.
Netanyahu was also pushing the URWP merger to prevent any right-wing party from falling below the electoral threshold.
Otzma Yehudit member Itamar Ben Gvir told The Times of Israel on Thursday that the prime minister was doing “everything in his power” to ensure the far-right party was included in any electoral alliance. Ben Gvir called on the other right-wing party heads to act with the same level of “responsibility.”
But according to reports, Netanyahu opposed Shaked leading the joint slate. Last week, Netanyahu reportedly offered URWP two ministerial posts in a possible future government if it joined with Otzma Yehudit and rejected Shaked.
The final Knesset slates must be presented to the Central Elections Committee by August 1.
YERUSHALAYIM – Presidential candidate Bernie Sanders said Sunday that he would consider withholding military aid to Israel in order to bring the country in line with what he perceives to be U.S. interests.
The Vermont senator, a leading Democratic presidential candidate, said that he would “absolutely” weigh aid cuts as a way of exercising “leverage” on Israel.
“Our policy cannot just be pro-Israel, pro-Israel, pro-Israel,” Sanders said. “It has got to be pro-region, working with all of the people, all of the countries in that area.”
He emphasized, however, that he believed in Israel’s “absolute” right to peace and security.
“I have family in Israel. I am Jewish. I am not anti-Israel,” he said. “Okay, I believe that the people of Israel have, absolutely, the right to live in peace, independence and security. End of discussion—that is what I fervently believe.”
In April 2016, Sanders was one of 17 senators who did not sign a letter to President Barack Obama urging him to increase aid to Israel.
In 2017, Sanders recorded a five-minute video for a Meretz conference on “50 Years of Occupation” in which he said, “I know so many of you agree with me when I say: this occupation must end. Peace, real peace, means security not only for every Israeli, but for every Palestinian. It means supporting self-determination, civil rights and economic well-being for both peoples.”
Syria has made the final preparations to open the Albukamal border crossing with Iraq, which will ultimately serve as a land bridge between Iran and Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea.
According to a number of reports in the Arabic-language media, the crossing is supposed to open within two months. The preparations included security coordination meetings held in Damascus and attended by high-ranking Syrian, Iraqi and Iranian military commanders.
The upgraded crossing is expected to serve as an Iranian land bridge through Iraq to Syria and from there to Lebanon, posing a new threat to Israel’s security.
Iran routinely attempts to arm the Lebanon-based Hezbollah terror organization with advanced weapons. Israel has exposed and thwarted multiple attempts by Iran to transfer game-changing weapons to Hezbollah, and this new crossing could pose a new challenge to the Israeli efforts.
In its report on the pending threat to Israel, the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center (ITIC) wrote that satellite image analyses of the area show new foundations being laid at the new crossing site, including for large hangars and secured entrances. The crossing is being built with facilities at standards similar to those at international border crossings. The old border crossing is blocked, and on the Iraqi side, no similar construction has been identified, for reasons unclear to the ITIC.
The new border crossing between Syria and Iraq is strategically important to Iran, the ITIC noted, because the crossing is vital for the land bridge Iran seeks to establish between its territory and the Mediterranean Sea. The route allows Iran to send forces, supplies and weapons through Iraq to Syria and from there to Lebanon.
The ITIC assumes that Iran believes that a land bridge will enable it to reduce its dependence on risky aerial and naval routes, which Israel has exposed. The new crossing will enable larger numbers of vehicles to enter Syria and make it easier to maintain secrecy. Therefore, the ITIC concluded that it is likely that the new crossing is being constructed with Iranian aid, and possibly with Iranian involvement.
Additionally, Iran participates in securing the area between Albukamal in Syria and al-Qa’im in Iraq by using Shi’ite militias deployed permanently in the region.
Israel’s Ministry of Defense (MoD) announced Sunday that it had conducted another successful trial of the Arrow 3 anti-ballistic defense system.
The test was conducted at the Pacific Spaceport Complex-Alaska (PSCA) in Kodiak, Alaska and was led by the Israel Missile Defense Organization (IMDO) of the Directorate of Defense Research and Development (DDR&D), in collaboration with the US’ Missile Defense Agency (MDA) and the Israeli Air Force (IAF), the MoD stated.
The MDA stated Sunday that “Flight Test Arrow-01 demonstrated the Israeli Arrow Weapon System’s ability to conduct a high altitude hit-to-kill engagement.” Interceptor tests were conducted that successfully destroyed target missiles.
“The Arrow-3 Interceptor successfully demonstrated an engagement capability against the exo-atmospheric target during the test. Although not part of the Israeli architecture, a US AN-TPY2 radar participated in the test. Preliminary analysis indicates that test objectives were successfully achieved,” the MDA added.
The Arrow Weapon System is a central part of Israel’s multi-layer defense system. The defense system is based on four operational layers: the Iron Dome Defense System for close-range projectiles, David’s Sling Weapon System designed to contend with mid-range missiles, the Arrow-2, and the Arrow-3, for long-range missiles.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated Sunday that in the last few weeks, Israel has conducted “three pioneering secret experiments” on the Arrow 3 missile.
These experiments were conducted “in full cooperation with our great ally the US. They were successful beyond any imagination,” he said.
The Arrow 3 successfully intercepted ballistic missiles “intercepted ballistic missiles beyond the atmosphere at unprecedented altitudes and speeds,” he underscored.
“The execution was perfect – all precise hits,” he noted, stressing that “today Israel has the ability to act against ballistic missiles that could be launched against us from Iran or anywhere else. This is a great achievement for the security of Israel.”
“All of our enemies should know that we will overcome them in both defense and offense,” he concluded.
MDA Director Vice Adm. Jon Hill added that the successful tests “mark a major milestone in the development of the Arrow Weapon System. This unique success in Alaska provides confidence in future Israeli capabilities to defeat the developing threats in the region.”
“We are committed to assisting the Government of Israel in upgrading its national missile defense capability to defend the State of Israel from emerging threats,” he added.
IMDO Director Moshe Patel stated that “10 challenging years of development have culminated in this moment: the Arrow 3 weapon system completed a test campaign, during which an Arrow 3 interceptor completed full interception of the target. This is an extraordinary operational and technological achievement for the State of Israel, made possible by thousands of employees, engineers and officers from the Ministry of Defense, Israeli defense Industries, Israeli Air Force and our US partners.”
In addition, “the fact that the tests were conducted in Alaska, tens of thousands of kilometers away from Israel, is another significant achievement that demonstrates the operational capabilities of the Arrow 3 system to successfully face any threat,” he said.
Israel has previously conducted successful tests with the interceptor.
The system, jointly funded and developed by Israel and the MDA, provides outer-atmospheric interception of ballistic missiles. The Arrow 3 interceptor capabilities enable longer range, higher altitude exo-atmospheric interception, and more precise ballistic missile engagements.
The Arrow 3 is the only interceptor that does not carry a warhead but intercepts an incoming missile by crashing into it.
The Arrow 3 system became operational in January 2017. In March 2017, Israel deployed for the first time an Arrow 2 interceptor at an incoming missile from Syria. The Arrow 3 defense system was awarded Israel’s Defense Prize in June 2017.
The combined interception capabilities significantly reduce the possibilities of ballistic missiles striking the State of Israel. They provide an almost hermetic defense against a wide array of ballistic projectiles, with eyes on the Iranian ballistic threat and those posed by the Hezbollah terror organization in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza.
Iran test-launched a medium-range ballistic missile inside its borders, U.S. officials said Friday, defying Trump administration demands that it curtail the weapon program and demonstrating its intent to further push back against U.S. sanctions.
The test came amid heightened tensions between Iran and the West, mainly over the safety of commercial shipping in the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz.
A White House spokesman called the test launch an example of Iran “acting out” as a result of intense pressure from U.S. economic sanctions.
“You’ve seen their economy teetering on the verge of collapse for a while now. And when they’re backed into a corner, they’re acting out,” said spokesman Hogan Gidley, who also said President Donald Trump wants to begin conversations with Iran’s leaders.
Iran has responded to stepped-up U.S. economic sanctions with a variety of military moves, and the Shahab-3 missile test launch could be considered another signal from Tehran that it will not back down.
The U.S. officials who confirmed the missile launch spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive information.
Tensions have mounted with Iran over a 2015 nuclear accord it reached with world powers. The deal eased sanctions in exchange for Iran curbing its nuclear program. Trump withdrew the United States from the accord last year, reinstating sanctions on Iran and adding new ones. Iran has openly exceeded the uranium enrichment levels set in the accord to try to pressure Europe into offsetting the economic pain of U.S. sanctions.
Trump insists that Iran must agree to limits on its ballistic missile program, but Iran thus far has refused.
Nations still party to the nuclear deal plan to meet in Vienna on Sunday to see to what extent the agreement can be saved. The European Union said the meeting of officials from China, Russia, Britain, France and Germany will be chaired by the EU.
Behnam Ben Taleblu, an expert on Iranian defense at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, said the Shahab-3 is a liquid-fueled, medium-range ballistic missile capable of carrying a nuclear weapon.
“The Shahab-3 is the backbone of Iran’s class of medium-range ballistic missiles,” he said, adding that Iranian news outlets have previously called it one of the country’s “Israel-hitting” missiles.
It is derived from a North Korean missile called the Nodong-A and can fly 1,150 to 2,000 kilometers, or up to 1,242 miles, depending on the variant.
“Iran’s continued flight-testing has both political and military applications, functioning as a show of resolve against foreign adversaries and to improve the overall reliability of its missile force, which is the largest in the Middle East,” he said. “As Iran continues to escalate in response to the maximum-pressure campaign, Washington should expect more missile launches.”
The story of artist Yoram Raanan beginning to paint again after losing 40 years of work to Arab terror arson is told in this film by Lubavitch filmmaker Bentzi Avtzon.
By COLlive reporter
One of the most provoking arguments Chassidus makes is that the deepest light not only overcomes darkness but transforms it. And that on the truly deepest levels light and darkness are not opposites because darkness itself is a source of the most intense light.
And while this argument appears to be more theoretical than practical, more mystical than tangible, there is a Jewish artist who experienced this idea firsthand and not only experienced it internally but visualized it on the canvas.
This artist, and his story about turning darkness into light, is told in a documentary film by Bentzi Avtzon, “The Light of Fire.”
The film tells the story of Yoram Raanan, an American-Israeli artist who begins painting again after losing 40 years of work in a sudden fire. The fire took place in Moshav Bet Meir, a picturesque community atop the mountains surrounding Jerusalem, during the spate of terrorist arson fires that gripped Israel in the fall of 2016, but the circumstances of how the fire began is almost beside the point. By the time the fire was brought under control, it had claimed Yoram’s studio, which housed hundreds of paintings and many other priceless artifacts.
Raanan’s tragedy was covered in many publications both within and outside of Israel. Something about a man losing not only his possessions but the fruit of his very personal labor, his life’s work, resonated around the world, often with people who hadn’t ever heard of Yoram before.
But it was no more than a couple months later that Yoram started painting again, at the time in a makeshift studio, and began sharing his new works online. For him to paint anything after such loss was impressive but what was truly remarkable was that his new paintings were very different than his paintings from before the fire. Where his old paintings had been full of color, his new paintings were less colorful, painted in earth and gray tones, often on a black canvas. These were colors of soil, wood, smoke, ash.
But against these colors of destruction there was also a striking gold, a color Yoram hadn’t used in his earlier paintings. And the gold was unbelievably intense, portraying a light that Yoram had never found in his earlier works. It was as if Yoram was being forced to look into darkness itself and find there, and only there, the deepest light and colors. To find in the ashes of destruction the bright light of fire.
“When I saw these new paintings,” Avtzon recalls, “something about them spoke very deeply to me. I felt like there was something very powerful, almost mystical, about his new work, and that it was universal, something that went beyond art. I reached out to Yoram, and a few months later I visited him together with an Israeli crew to spend a few days with him and his family and document his amazing story.”
The resulting film, The Light of Fire, which runs for 33 minutes, has been shown in over a dozen communities already, and is scheduled to be shown in a number of Chabad Houses and communities this Tisha b’Av.
“This film wasn’t made as a Tisha b’Av film,” Avtzon explains, “but its themes of rebuilding in the face of destruction, coupled with the story of artist guided by his faith, definitely make it an appropriate story for such a day.”
To screen this film in your community, contact: bentzi@yuvlamedia.com
LONDON (Reuters) – Britain’s Conservative Party has opened up a 10-point lead over the opposition Labour Party since Boris Johnson took over as prime minister, an opinion poll showed.
The Sunday Times newspaper said the “Boris bounce” had pushed support for Johnson’s Conservatives to 31%, up six percentage points from the previous poll, while Labour was on 21%, up two points.
The newspaper said the poll by YouGov could fuel speculation that Johnson, who faces a Brexit deadlock in Britain’s parliament, will call an early election.
The poll gave the Conservatives their biggest lead over the opposition in five months and it was the first time their support has risen above 30% since April, the Sunday Times said.
The Liberal Democrats were down three points on 20% and the new Brexit Party, led by veteran eurosceptic Nigel Farage, was down four points on 13%, half its peak level in May.
YouGov questioned 1,697 adults on July 25 and 26.
A second poll showed a smaller increase in support for the Conservatives.
The poll by ComRes showed Johnson’s party with 28%, up three points and only one percentage point ahead of Labour.
The ComRes poll, conducted for the Sunday Express newspaper, showed the Conservatives would fall further short of a majority in parliament than they are now.
While preferred as a leader to Labour’s Jeremy Corbyn, most voters think Johnson will be a bad prime minister, ComRes said.
“As Boris Johnson begins his premiership we have seen an anticipated bump in Conservative support, generally at the expense of the Brexit Party,” Chris Hopkins, head of politics at ComRes, said.
“However, while the public agree that he should be given the necessary time to deliver Brexit, a majority are skeptical as to how good he may be as prime minister.”
If the poll figures were replicated at a national election, the Conservatives would be the largest party but would fall 48 seats short of a majority, ComRes said.
The poll was conducted for the Sunday Express newspaper and interviewed 2,029 British adults on July 24 and 25.
Writing by William Schomberg; Editing by Daniel Wallis
