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2 Israeli-Americans missing since Oct. 7 confirmed killed in Hamas attack
(JTA) — Two Israeli-Americans missing since the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel have been confirmed killed, their kibbutz announced.
Judith Weinstein, 70, a member of Kibbutz Nir Oz, was fatally wounded during the terrorist invasion of southern Israel, Nir Oz said on Thursday. The statement confirmed her death, but did not say if she had died the same day.
Last week, the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, a volunteer group that represents Israelis held captive by Hamas, said Weinstein’s husband, Gadi Haggai, 72, had been killed.
Their bodies are being held in Gaza. Before the news of their deaths, their family had hoped they were still alive while in captivity.
The kibbutz and hostage advocacy group did not provide information on how the couple’s deaths had been determined. Their deaths were confirmed by Israel’s Government Press Office, an official government body that coordinates between the Israeli government and media.
On the morning of Oct. 7, Weinstein and Haggai left Nir Oz to take their routine morning walk through the fields and orchards around the kibbutz. Security camera footage showed the pair walking out of a kibbutz gate shortly after 6 a.m. The attack started around an hour later.
During the Hamas attack, Weinstein sent a message to friends saying that she and Haggai had been wounded by gunfire, the Hostages and Missing Families Forum said. Weinstein also called the Magen David Adom emergency response corps after the couple had been wounded.
“They came on the road,” Weinstein, referring to the terrorists, said during the call, according to Israel’s Channel 12 news. “There were a lot of motorcyclists with live weapons and they shot us. We lied down and they shot me in the face and hand.”
Weinstein (referred to as “Judih” in some reports) was born in Goshen, New York and moved with her family to Toronto when she was 3. She also held Canadian citizenship, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation reported.
Weinstein was an English teacher for special needs students at the Nofei Habsor high school in the neighboring community of Magen. She also taught children to cope with anxiety caused by the conflict through meditation and mindfulness, said the Eshkol Regional Council, the local governing authority.
Haggai, whose mother was born and raised in Manhattan and whose father is from Detroit, was a flute player and composer who performed in a military band during his Israel Defense Forces service. He worked as Nir Oz’s dining hall chef. The couple met shortly after Haggai’s release from the military while Weinstein was volunteering on Kibbutz Ein Hashofet, Haggai’s hometown, Nir Oz said.
The pair performed together around Israel in a music ensemble called Jazz Alliance, the kibbutz said, describing them as a dedicated couple who “couldn’t be more perfect for each other.”
The couple had four children and seven grandchildren.
The couple’s daughter, Iris Haggai Liniado, mourned her parents in a Facebook post on Thursday. She described her frantic search for her parents’ whereabouts after the attack, but said she had suspected her mother had been killed because Weinstein was an elderly woman who was not released with other hostages in an exchange deal last month. Liniado said she realized her mother had been killed when she was informed that Haggai was dead.
“There isn’t a second of the day that I’m not in Oct. 7,” she wrote. “I need to process that I don’t have a mother and a father anymore. That I won’t hear your voices anymore.”
“What an inspiration you were together. You completed each other,” she wrote, adding that news of their deaths had at least brought the family some closure.
Liniado criticized Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, saying he had not spoken to her, while President Joe Biden had spoken with her twice.
Biden mourned Weinstein’s death in a Thursday statement, saying, “This tragic development cuts deep.”
“I will never forget what their daughter, and the family members of other Americans held hostage in Gaza, have shared with me,” Biden said. “They have been living through hell for weeks. No family should have to endure such an ordeal.”
Biden said in a statement last week that he was “heartbroken” by news of Haggai’s death.
Israeli authorities believe 129 hostages remain in Gaza, not all of whom are alive. Last month, 105 captives were released from Gaza during a brief truce. Four other hostages were released before the truce, and one was rescued by Israeli forces.
Nir Oz was one of the hardest-hit communities in the Hamas attack, with around 80 of its 400 residents taken hostage and 25 killed during the attack.
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University of Toronto is granted an injunction to dismantle a pro-Palestinian encampment that has been on campus for two months
The University of Toronto has received an injunction to dismantle the pro-Palestinian encampment on its property. The 98-page decision from Justice Markus Koehnen of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice said that members of the encampment must take down the tents within 24 hours, by 6 p.m. on Wednesday, July 3. Toronto Police will have […]
The post University of Toronto is granted an injunction to dismantle a pro-Palestinian encampment that has been on campus for two months appeared first on The Canadian Jewish News.
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Jewish Cemeteries Vandalized in Cincinnati, Montreal
Vandals in Canada targeted a Jewish cemetery. Photo: Screenshot
Vandals have targeted notable Jewish cemeteries in Cincinnati, Ohio and Montreal, Canada, sparking outcry and concern over mounting threats of antisemitism.
Vandals at Montreal’s Kehal Yisrael Cemetery placed memorial stones in the shape of a Nazi swastika on top of tombstones. Ones with the last names Eichler and Herman were targeted in the antisemitic attack.
Placing memorial stones on graves is an ancient Jewish custom to memorialize the dead. Jewish cemeteries oftentimes have stones nearby tombstones for mourners.
Canadian leaders decried the vandalism.
“It is absolutely abhorrent and revolting to defile the dead with swastikas,” Jeremy Levi, the Jewish mayor of a Jewish-majority suburb of Montreal, commented on X/Twitter. “This desecration at the Kehal Israel cemetery in Montreal is beyond contempt. [Canadian Prime Minister] Justin Trudeau, step aside and get out of the way so we can reclaim our country. May this Kohen’s neshama have an Aliyah on high.” One of the tombstones vandalized belonged to a Kohen.
The leader of the Conservative Party in Canada’s parliament and candidate for prime minister, Pierre Poilievre, lambasted Trudeau and denounced antisemitism. “We cannot close our eyes to the disgusting acts of antisemitism that are happening in our country everyday,” he posted on X/Twitter. “The prime minister must finally act to stop these displays of antisemitism. If he won’t, a common sense Conservative government will.”
Canada, like many countries around the world, has experienced a surge in antisemitic incidents since the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’ massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7.
Meanwhile in Cincinnati, vandals targeted two historic Jewish cemeteries this past week, toppling and shattering ancient tombstones — some dating back to the 1800s.
According to a statement from the Jewish Federation of Cincinnati, 176 gravesites in Cincinnati’s West Side were ruined “in an act of antisemitic vandalism.”
“Due to the extensive damage and the historical nature of many of the gravestones, we have not yet been able to identify all the families affected by this act,” the statement continued. “Our community [is] heartbroken.”
The Cincinnati Police Department and the FBI are investigating the incidents.
The destruction of monuments is the latest in a greater trend of antisemitic vandalism. In an incident over the weekend, vandals in Australia targeted war memorials dedicated to Australian veterans who sacrificed their lives in Korea and Vietnam with pro-Hamas graffiti.
A couple weeks earlier, vandals in Belgium defaced two memorials for Holocaust victims with swastikas and a phrase calling for violence against Israel. In Germany, meanwhile, at least seven stolpersteine, or stumbling blocks in the sidewalk meant to mark Jewish homes seized by the Nazis, were defaced with the message “Jews are perpetrators.”
The US, Canada, Europe, and Australia have all experienced an explosion of antisemitic incidents in the wake of the Hamas atrocities of Oct. 7, and amid the ensuing war in Gaza. In many countries, anti-Jewish hate crimes have spiked to record levels.
According to the B’nai Brith, antisemitic incidents in Canada more than doubled in 2023 compared to the prior year.
The post Jewish Cemeteries Vandalized in Cincinnati, Montreal first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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UN Launches Probe Into Anti-Israel Rapporteur for Allegedly Accepting Trip Funded by Pro-Hamas Organizations
Francesca Albanese, UN special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories, attends a side event during the Human Rights Council at the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, March 26, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Denis Balibouse
The United Nations has opened an investigation into allegations that its special rapporteur on the human rights situation in the Palestinian territories accepted an all-expense paid trip to Australia from various pro-Hamas groups.
In November 2023, Francesca Albanese allegedly traversed around the Australian continent on a trip whose high price tag was covered by anti-Israel organizations, according to documentation acquired by UN Watch, a Geneva-based NGO that monitors the UN.
Albanese initially landed in Sydney and subsequently enjoyed flights into Melbourne, Adelaide, and Canberra, as well as Auckland and Wellington in New Zealand. The glamorous excursion is estimated to have cost a staggering $22,500.
The UN Investigations Division of the Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS) told UN Watch last week that it had alerted the High Commissioner for Human Rights of the allegations of financial impropriety levied at Albanese.
In a letter sent to UN leadership last month, UN Watch executive director Hillel Neuer outlined evidence based on multiple sources indicating that Hamas-supporting organizations funded Albanese’s trip to Australia, which has been experiencing an alarming spike in antisemitic incidents since the start of the Israel-Hamas war in October.
Australian Friends of Palestine Association (AFOPA), an organization that lobbies Australian politicians on behalf of the pro-Palestinian cause, claimed on its website that it “sponsored Ms. Albanese’s visit to Australia” to speak at its annual Edward Said Memorial Lecture in Adelaide. During the lecture, Albanese thanked AFOPA for “organizing such a busy visit,” in which she met with numerous Australian politicians and foreign ministry officials.
Free Palestine Melbourne (FPM) and Palestinian Christians in Australia (PCIA) both claimed to have “supported her visit to Victoria, ACT [Australian Capital Territory] and NSW [New South Wales].” Both groups also publicly declare that they participate in explicit lobbying of Australian politicians in an attempt to “change their minds” on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
While on her visit, Albanese served as a keynote speaker at a PCIA fundraiser. FPM encourages politicians to endorse the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement, which seeks to isolate Israel on the international stage economically and politically as the first step toward the Jewish state’s eventual elimination.
Australian Palestinian Advocacy Network (APAN) said it was “honored to support” Albanese’s visit. The organization’s president, Nasser Mashni, openly endorses the terrorist group Hamas and has stated that the eradication of Israel is necessary to secure “the liberation of earth.” APAN states that it “facilitated a range of meetings” for Albanese with Australian parliamentarians.
Palestinians in Aotearoa Co-ordinating Committee (PACC) and Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA) both organized and likely bankrolled Albanese’s trip to New Zealand, according to UN Watch. At the behest of these groups, Albanese helped lobby a New Zealand sovereign wealth fund to divest from Israel-linked companies.
Albanese outright denied that her trip was funded by Palestinian lobbying organizations, insisting that the UN footed the bill.
“Yet another trail of egregiously false claims agst me,” she tweeted. “My trip to Australia was paid by the UN as part of my mandate’s activities. Continuous defamation agst my mandate may be well remunerated,but won’t work. It just wastes time that should be used to help stop violence in [the Palestinian territories].”
Albanese did not present any documentation confirming that the UN paid for her travel and accommodations. Rather, she pointed at a statement from AFOPA reading, “Ms. Albanese was authorized by the UN to accept AFOPA’s invitation to deliver the Edward Said Memorial Lecture. The UN funded Ms. Albanese’s travel & accommodation costs. No Palestinian Solidarity group paid for this trip.”
Albanese has an extensive history of using her role at the UN to denigrate Israel and seemingly rationalize Hamas’ attacks on the Jewish state.
In April, Albanese issued public support for the pro-Hamas protests and encampments on American university campuses, saying that they gave her “hope.” She has also repeatedly falsely accused the Jewish state of committing “genocide” against Palestinians in Gaza and enacting “apartheid” in the West Bank without condemning Hamas’ terrorism against Israelis.
In February, Albanese claimed Israelis were “colonialists” who had “fake identities.” Previously, she defended Palestinians’ “right to resist” Israeli “occupation” at a time when over 1,100 rockets were fired by Gaza terrorists at Israel. Last year, US lawmakers called for the firing of Albanese for what they described as her “outrageous” antisemitic statements, including a 2014 letter in which she claimed America was “subjugated by the Jewish lobby.”
Albanese’s anti-Israel comments have earned her the praise of Hamas officials in the past.
Additionally, in response to French President Emmanuel Macron calling Hamas’ Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel the “largest antisemitic massacre of the 21st century,” Albanese said, “No, Mr. Macron. The victims of Oct. 7 were not killed because of their Judaism, but in response to Israel’s oppression.”
Video footage of the Oct. 7 onslaught showed Palestinian terrorists led by Hamas celebrating the fact that they were murdering Jews.
Nevertheless, Albanese has argued that Israel should make peace with Hamas, saying that it “needs to make peace with Hamas in order to not be threatened by Hamas.”
The UN did not respond to a request for comment for this story.
The post UN Launches Probe Into Anti-Israel Rapporteur for Allegedly Accepting Trip Funded by Pro-Hamas Organizations first appeared on Algemeiner.com.