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‘Awakening of unity’: Hamas attack, war spark outpouring of support for Israel in haredi communities
(New York Jewish Week) –When 3,000 Orthodox men packed into a New Jersey event hall late last month to mark a milestone in their 7 1/2-year cycle of Talmud study, they added an unusual component to the celebration.
In addition to sermons from prominent rabbis and collective prayer and study, the men watched videos showing uniformed Israel Defense Forces soldiers studying, singing, dancing with haredi Orthodox men and visiting the Western Wall in Jerusalem.
“It was a remarkable evening and an expression of solidarity with the soldiers of the IDF, and with the people in Israel who are feeling besieged and of course those who have been taken hostage,” Rabbi Chaim Dovid Zwiebel, the executive vice president of Agudath Israel of America, the haredi umbrella group that organized the event, told the New York Jewish Week.
What was remarkable was the public celebration of Israel’s soldiers at the event. Haredi movements have a range of approaches to Israel and Zionism. Some believe a Jewish state should be established only with the coming of the Messiah, while others are ambivalent and still others vocally supportive of Israel.
But regardless of their attitude toward the state, haredi leaders in New York City emphasize that their communities have a deep affinity for the land of Israel and its Jewish residents, no matter their politics or religious observance. After Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel, they say that feeling has sparked an outpouring of support for Israel and its military at a level not seen in decades and — in at least one instance — active disavowal of an anti-Zionist protest group.
“The outrage and sheer brutality of the October 7th attacks has united the Jewish community in common cause in a way I personally have never seen before,” said Chaskel Bennett, a community leader and the co-founder of the Flatbush Jewish Community Coalition who was a pro-Israel activist prior to Oct. 7. “The Orthodox Jewish community always pulled together in times of crisis, but October 7th has touched a raw emotional nerve that has transformed how Jews identify and connect with their brethren in Israel in an unprecedented way.”
Haredi groups in New York do not typically hold organized street rallies, as some Jewish groups have done in recent weeks, but haredi communities have mobilized in their own ways, including by focusing on the traditional practices of prayer and charity.
“In virtually every synagogue people stay a few minutes later beyond the usual closing time of the prayer service and they recite psalms that are appropriate for the situation,” Zwiebel said.
Religious Jews at the March for Israel on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. on November 14, 2023. (Luke Tress)
In the days after Oct. 7, thousands of haredi Jews poured into the streets in Brooklyn’s Borough Park and Crown Heights in spontaneous gatherings to pray and show support for Israelis. In the weeks since, haredi communities in New York have collected supplies for the Israeli military, held vigils for hostages held by Hamas, flown the Israeli flag at events, demonstrated support for secular Jewish college students and organized prayers for the terror group’s victims. Several Hharedi groups, including Agudath Israel, attended a mass demonstration in support of Israel last week, alongside crowds of non-Orthodox Jews.
Haredi websites are raising funds, messages of mourning for fallen troops are spreading across haredi WhatsApp groups and haredi news outlets closely track the fighting in Gaza. In one widely shared clip, a large Israeli flag was hoisted above the crowd at a Hasidic wedding.
“The realization of brotherhood and sisterhood is really displayed in a way that I’ve never seen in my lifetime,” said Avi Greenstein, CEO of the Boro Park Jewish Community Council, a social services organization in the heavily haredi Brooklyn neighborhood, calling the moment an “awakening of unity.”
Even haredi opponents of Zionism have taken steps to disavow anti-Israel activism. A leader of the anti-Zionist Satmar Hasidic movement, Rabbi Zalman Leib Teitelbaum, decried the fringe Naturei Karta group for joining anti-Israel demonstrations, accusing the faction of supporting “haters of Israel and murderers.” Satmar rabbis have also pushed back against growing affinity for Israel and the IDF, however.
Religious events have shifted to focus on Israel, including Chabad-Lubavitch’s annual conference of thousands of male emissaries. A rabbi affiliated with Chabad, which often responds to crises by encouraging Jews to perform traditional rituals, is sending ritual fringes traditionally worn by Orthodox Jewish men to the front lines. The movement, which is more outwardly supportive of Israel, has been distributing charity to Israelis in need, and some members of its New York community are IDF veterans who rushed back to their units after the war broke out. At least one soldier from the movement was killed in the Oct. 7 attack.
In another event late last month, neighborhood organizers in Crown Heights, Chabad’s Brooklyn home base, set up an empty Shabbat table with 230 seats to symbolize the hostages held by Hamas in Gaza. The event was organized to counter a rally led by hardline pro-Palestinian groups the following day, and drew around 1,200 participants.
The Chabad conference annual gala, in Edison, New Jersey, November 12, 2023. (Luke Tress)
“We prayed, we sang, we cried and we stood in solidarity with both the hostages, the Israeli public and the IDF,” said Rabbi Yaacov Behrman, the president of the Jewish Future Alliance, a community advocacy group. Chabad has also held prayers with families of hostages at the grave of its former leader, the late Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, and at the movement’s headquarters at 770 Eastern Parkway.
The IDF is a largely secular institution, and Israel’s haredi men are mostly exempt from the country’s mandatory draft, a policy that has long caused friction in the country’s society and politics. But the outpouring of support for the military in the U.S. mirrors developments inside Israel, where thousands of haredim have enlisted in recent weeks and volunteers have provided meals and prayed with troops. A video showed dozens of haredim dancing in a city square after a female Israeli soldier was rescued from Hamas captivity.
A journalist for a haredi news outlet, Yanki Farber, shared the video on X, writing, “My son asked me right now why I’m crying.”
“Hasidim are dancing in the streets of Ashkelon after the release of a female soldier. I didn’t see anything like this when Gilad Shalit was released,” he wrote, referring to the Israeli soldier freed in a deal with Hamas in 2011. “There is an incredible sense of understanding among all of us that we must not return to being divided.”
The cross-community solidarity in Israel feeds back into the United States, Zwiebel said.
“Attitudes that are developed in Israel proper will have an impact on the broader international Jewish community,” he said. “We’re all in this together and that’s certainly being felt in Israel and yes I think there is some spillover and some sense of greater solidarity here in America.”
The surge in antisemitism in the U.S. has also spurred greater haredi solidarity with non-haredi Jewish communities. In an unusual message late last month, Agudath Israel issued a call to support Jewish college students as antisemitism and anti-Israel activism roiled U.S. campuses. The Chabad movement has a presence on hundreds of U.S. campuses and has also played a central role in supporting students.
“There are Orthodox Jews in the colleges, but if you’re not Orthodox, there are Jews in colleges and we care deeply about them,” Zwiebel said.
Despite the outpouring of support, the conversation about Zionism among haredim has not undergone a sea change, Zwiebel said. But he said antisemitism is leading some families to consider Israel as a future home.
“The hostility that we’re facing here in the United States, or even more so in Europe, is that reminding us that these are not necessarily ideal long-term homes for the Jewish people?” he said. “That kind of conversation is taking place. It’s taking place in homes where parents have sent their children to study in Israel and are wondering, ‘Should we bring them back? Should we let them stay there?’”
Several haredi community members said they hoped that the feeling of solidarity would last after the war ends.
“It took a vicious attack by merciless enemies to somehow bring people together,” Zwiebel said. “If we’re looking for a silver lining in this terrible cloud, I guess that would be it. If only we can keep this going beyond this war.”
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The post ‘Awakening of unity’: Hamas attack, war spark outpouring of support for Israel in haredi communities appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Alleged NYC terror plotter moved to Montreal detention pending extradition hearing
Muhammad Shahzeb Khan, the 20-year-old Pakistani national who was arrested by the RCMP in Quebec on Sept. 4 about 20 kilometres from the U.S. border while allegedly en route to conduct an attack on Jews in New York City, has been moved to a prison in Montreal.
Khan is alleged to have devised a plot for the large-scale murder of Jews on the anniversary of the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks in Israel and on Yom Kippur, in support of the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) terrorist group. According to U.S. Justice Department documents, Khan communicated to undercover agents that “if we succeed with our plan this would be the largest attack on U.S. soil since 9/11.”
Khan, also known as Shazeb Jadoon, was arrested and detained in Rimouski, 550 km east of Montreal, until his Dec. 19 transfer. The Mississauga, Ont., resident speaks no French, and his lawyer said he could not work with his client while he was held there, where he could not help him understand government documents, and the suspect could not communicate with French-speaking prison guards.
He appeared briefly at the Montreal courthouse Friday morning and will return to Superior Court on Jan. 17, when a date will be set for an extradition hearing. Ottawa agreed to a U.S. extradition request for Khan to stand trial in the Southern District of New York on charges of attempting to provide material support and resources to a foreign terrorist organization. If convicted, he faces up to 20 years in prison.
Khan arrived in Canada in June 2023 on a student visa, Immigration Minister Marc Miller confirmed a week after the arrest, which was pursuant to section 495 of Canada’s Criminal Code: attempting to leave Canada to commit an offence for a terrorist group, participating in the activities of a terrorist group, and conspiracy to commit an offence by violating United States immigration law.
He was then re-arrested on a provisional warrant under the Extradition Act as Canadian authorities were uncertain whether they could detain him based on existing evidence.
“The news of threats to the Jewish community is alarming,” read an RCMP statement. “We will not tolerate any form of threats, harassment or violence targeting Jewish communities. The RCMP continues to work in collaboration with our domestic and international partners to detect, investigate and disrupt criminal acts that are targeting Jewish communities.
“With the strong partnership between Canada and the U.S. we can reassure the public that as his actions escalated, at no point in time was Khan an immediate threat prior to his arrest.”
According to the U.S. Justice Department complaint drawn up by an FBI counterterrorism agent, Khan planned to use automatic and semi-automatic weapons to carry out a mass shooting at Chabad locations. Authorities say he began posting on social media and communicating with others around November 2023 on an encrypted messaging application about his support for ISIS, when he allegedly distributed ISIS propaganda videos and literature.
He then began communicating with two undercover law enforcement officers, the complaint reads. “During those conversations, Khan confirmed that he and a U.S.-based ISIS supporter had been planning to carry out an attack in a particular U.S. city. Among other things, Khan said that he had been actively attempting to create ‘a real offline cell’ of ISIS supporters to carry out a ‘coordinated assault’ using AR-style rifles to “target Israeli Jewish chabads… scattered all around” the city.
According to the document, Khan envisioned teams launching three attacks simultaneously “on diff[erent] locations maximizing casualty count” and repeatedly instructed undercover agents to obtain assault rifles, ammunition and “some good hunting [knives] so we can slit their throats,” identifying specific locations where attacks would take place.
He also instructed them to acquire burner cell phones and allegedly provided details about how he would cross into the United States. During conversations with the agents, he allegedly emphasized that Oct. 7 and 11 were the best days for targeting Jews “because ‘Oct 7 they will surely have some protests and Oct 11 is yom kippur’.”
The complaint alleges that, just a few weeks after the Hamas attack in Israel, he was posting support for jihad and images of weapons. The FBI also says Khan boasted that New York is perfect to target Jews because it has the “largest Jewish population In america” and, therefore, “even if we dont attack a event [sic], we could rack up easily a lot of jews.” Khan then allegedly proclaimed, “We are going to nyc to slaughter them,” and sent a photograph of the area he envisioned for the attack.
Khan attempted to reach the U.S-Canada border using three separate cars before being apprehended in Ormstown, after officers from different police forces followed him from the Toronto area.
U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland thanked Canadian law enforcement for their assistance, adding “Jewish communities—like all communities in this country—should not have to fear that they will be targeted by a hate-fueled terrorist attack.”
The post Alleged NYC terror plotter moved to Montreal detention pending extradition hearing appeared first on The Canadian Jewish News.
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Israel for First Time Claims Responsibility for Killing of Hamas Leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran
Iranians attend the funeral procession of assassinated Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, Iran, Aug. 1, 2024. Photo: Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz on Monday acknowledged for the first time that Israel killed Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran in July.
“These days, when the Houthi terrorist organization is firing missiles at Israel, I want to convey a clear message to them at the beginning of my remarks: We have defeated Hamas, we have defeated Hezbollah, we have blinded Iran’s defense systems and damaged the production systems, we have toppled the Assad regime in Syria, we have dealt a severe blow to the axis of evil, and we will also deal a severe blow to the Houthi terrorist organization in Yemen, which remains the last to stand,” Katz said during an event honoring defense ministry personnel.
Israel will “damage their strategic infrastructure, and we will behead their leaders. Just as we did to Haniyeh, [Hamas leader Yahya] Sinwar, and [Hezbollah leader Hassan] Nasrallah in Tehran, Gaza, and Lebanon [respectively] — we will do it in Hodeidah and Sana’a,” Katz continued. “Whoever raises a hand against Israel will have their hand cut off, and the long arm of the IDF [Israel Defense Forces] will strike them and settle the score.”
Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis are all internationally designated terrorist organizations backed by Iran. Katz’s comments came after the Houthi rebels in Yemen fired a ballistic missile at Tel Aviv over the weekend. The Houthis have also been attacking commercial shipping in the Red Sea for more than a year, saying they are acting in solidarity with the Palestinians in Gaza and will prevent all ships from heading to Israeli ports.
Haniyeh, the exiled political chief of Hamas, was killed in an explosion in Iran’s capital city on July 31. Iran had accused Israel of carrying out the assassination and vowed revenge; however, for months the Israeli government had neither confirmed nor denied responsibility for Haniyeh’s death.
Haniyeh was based in Qatar and had been the face of Hamas’s during the Israel-Hamas war, which the Palestinian terroris group launched with its invasion of and massacre across southern Israel last Oct. 7.
Following Haniyeh’s death, Sinwar was named the terrorist group’s overall leader after being its top official in Gaza. Sinwar, who masterminded the Oct. 7 attacks on Israel, was killed by Israeli forces in Gaza in October.
The post Israel for First Time Claims Responsibility for Killing of Hamas Leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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‘Should Scare Every American’: Top Trump Adviser Mike Waltz Explains Dangers of Iran Getting Nuclear Weapons
US Rep. Mike Waltz (R-FL) speaks on Day 1 of the Republican National Convention (RNC) at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, US, July 15, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Mike Segar
US Rep. Mike Waltz (R-FL), who was recently tapped to serve as the White House national security adviser for the incoming Trump administration, outlined in a new interview why Iran’s nuclear program could pose a major threat to the United States and must be stopped.
During an interview with Daily Wire co-founder and conservative podcast host Ben Shapiro, Waltz said that his constituents often do not understand how Iran’s nuclear ambitions impact American interests. The lawmaker explained that Iran obtaining nuclear weapons could kick-start an arms race and geopolitical firestorm in the Middle East, potentially forcing the US to become more involved in the region militarily.
“No. 1, if Iran gets a nuke, the Saudis are going to want a nuke, the Turks are going to want a nuke, and the Middle East exploding, not literally but figuratively, in a nuclear arms race should scare every American,” Waltz said.
Though Waltz conceded that nuclear proliferation in the Middle East would not necessarily result in “World War III,” he asserted that it would be “catastrophic for the world.”
The lawmaker added that a nuclear-armed Iran would endanger Israel, which he described as America’s “critical ally, morally and historically and geopolitically,” and that the US should take threats by Iranian leadership to eliminate Israel seriously.
“We should believe [Iran’s so-called ‘supreme leader,’ Ayatollah Ali Khamenei] who intends to wipe Israel off the face of the earth if they have nukes,” Waltz said.
Waltz also praised Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for “exposing Iran’s air defenses so that they literally are naked right now and on their back foot.” He appeared to be referring to Israel’s precision airstrikes on Iranian military and air defense sites in October which devastated the regime’s air-defense system and ballistic missile program. The strikes were in response to Iran’s ballistic missile barrage against Israel weeks earlier.
Waltz went on to say that the incoming Trump administration plans on “hitting” Iran’s finances throughout the Middle East and stopping the flow of money “out of Tehran into Beirut and into [Iran’s] proxies in Syria.”
Iran has supported several terrorist proxies throughout the Middle East, including Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon — both of which have been devastated by Israeli military operations in recent months. The Iranian regime also backed the recently ousted Assad regime in Syria, where Israel launched limited operations to ensure security at its northeastern amid uncertainty about Syria’s future.
“I hope that all of this has Hamas so isolated. They really thought the cavalry was coming from the north with Hezbollah. Now, that has been shown not to be true; Hamas has every exit blocked except one, and that is to release our hostages if you want to live,” Waltz said.
Harsh US sanctions levied on Iran under the Trump administration from 2017-2021 crippled the Iranian economy and led its foreign exchange reserves to plummet. US President-elect Donald Trump and his Republican supporters in the US Congress have criticized the Biden administration for renewing billions of dollars in US sanctions waivers, which had the effect of unlocking frozen funds and allowing the country to access previously inaccessible hard currency.
US intelligence agencies have for years labeled Iran as the world’s foremost state sponsor of terrorism, noting it devotes significant sums of money and weapons each year to supporting proxies across the Middle East such as Hamas and Hezbollah.
The post ‘Should Scare Every American’: Top Trump Adviser Mike Waltz Explains Dangers of Iran Getting Nuclear Weapons first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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