RSS
Conservative rabbis endorse use of electric cars on Shabbat, but divisions over driving remain
(JTA) — When rabbis from the Conservative movement got together to decide whether it is permissible to drive electric cars on Shabbat, their conclusion might have been obvious.
After all, the Conservative movement famously adopted an opinion in 1950 saying that driving to synagogue on Shabbat is acceptable for Jews who have no other way to get there. And in 2012, the movement adopted an opinion saying that the use of electricity in activities that are permitted on Shabbat is acceptable according to Jewish law or halacha.
And yet the ultimate vote to permit the use of electric cars on Shabbat was deeply divided, with just 10 members of the movement’s 25-rabbi Committee on Jewish Law and Standards voting in favor and six voting against. Five rabbis abstained from voting. (All 25 rabbis need not attend a vote; six or more votes are needed to approve a paper.)
What’s more, the committee adopted a second, competing opinion, known as a responsum, outright rejecting the use of electric cars on Shabbat — by a very similar margin.
Two rabbis, including one of the committee’s co-chairs, voted for both papers, even though the responsa came to different conclusions.
“Both of these responsa articulate the preference for walking to and from the synagogue on Shabbat, and the more of us Jews who can do that, the better, not only for halakhic reasons, but also for creating a close-knit community on Shabbat,” Rabbi Elliot Dorff wrote to explain why he voted for both positions. “That said, Jewish law must be applied to the realities that Jews face.”
It’s not unusual for the committee, whose rulings guide the movement’s rabbis, to adopt competing opinions, as it did, for example, when ruling in 2006 on inclusion for gay and lesbian Jews.
The groundwork for the split rulings, published on Wednesday, was laid in a footnote to the 2012 ruling on electricity. “Those who accept the 1950 CJLS minority position permitting people to drive to synagogue in a gas powered car would be justified extending this permission to electric cars,” the opinion’s author, Rabbi Danny Nevins, wrote — implying that at least some in the movement rejected the 1950 decision.
Before the 1950 responsum, Orthodox and Conservative groups agreed that driving was prohibited on Shabbat, citing halacha, or Jewish law, that forbids a host of activities on the day of rest, including lighting a fire and traveling a long distance from one’s home. The 1950 responsum was a landmark in American Judaism because it effectively sanctioned the choices of many Jews who had moved to suburbs where walking to synagogue was all but impossible. In fact, the responsum did not say that driving to synagogue was halachically sound, only that it was a concession worth making to facilitate the public and communal observance of Shabbat.
Nearly 75 years later, the leniency reflects the practices of most Conservative congregants in the United States, but Conservative rabbis and institutions largely have not accepted it. The Jewish Theological Seminary, the movement’s flagship seminary, bars rabbinical students from traveling by car on Shabbat, for example, and the Conservative movement in Israel rejected the position fully.
The challenges to the use of cars on Shabbat according to Jewish law are extensive: One might travel beyond the borders of one’s community, for example, or be tempted to perform repairs, both prohibited on Shabbat. But the biggest obstacle for the cars that most American Jews were driving in 1950 and today is that gas-combustion engines create fire in the course of ignition.
The rise of the electric car offers a widely accessible way to drive without creating fire. Concerns about driving too far or needing repairs still apply, write the authors of the paper making the case for electric cars on Shabbat, but by sticking close to home and driving only for Shabbat-related reasons, Jews can use electric cars without violating Shabbat.
That paper was written by two rabbis with recent experience in U.S. pulpits, David Fine of Temple Israel in Ridgewood, New Jersey, and Barry Leff, who divides his time between Israel and the United States and recently completed an interim stint at a synagogue in Birmingham, Alabama.
“For those who drive to the synagogue on Shabbat, driving an all-electric car is preferable to driving a conventional car,” they write. But they add, “When possible, we encourage walking or riding a bicycle as they are at a slower pace and more conducive to the spirit of Shabbat.” (Looking ahead, they also note that self-driving cars are permitted, saying, “The more that can be taken out of direct human hands, the more the spirit of Shabbat is constructed and preserved. If the technology and capability of an autonomous driving car is available and safe and able to transport one to synagogue, then all the better.”)
The paper rejecting driving on Shabbat altogether was written by two rabbis who do not work in synagogues: Marcus Mordecai Schwartz, who heads the study center at JTS, and Chaim Weiner, the head of Masorti Europe, the movement’s network of European congregations. They say they wanted to make sure that Conservative Jews who hold more traditional views about Jewish law — and who never accepted the 1950 ruling on Shabbat driving — could see their values in the movement’s legal literature.
“Some may think that we are attempting to exclude the less strictly-observant members of our communities,” they write. “Nothing could be further from our aim.”
Practically speaking, the impact of the legal opinions about electric cars is limited. Conservative congregants mostly drive to synagogue when they go — though the number of Jews affiliating with those synagogues is down sharply in recent decades, according to survey data. Few rely on the movement’s legal rulings to guide their daily activities.
But the rulings are influential among the movement’s rabbinic corps. And they can offer broad and needed messages, according to Rabbi Pamela Barmash, a professor at Washington University in St. Louis who chairs the CJLS with Dorff.
Barmash voted for the anti-driving opinion and abstained from voting on the one permitting electric cars on Shabbat. She said she wanted both positions to be available to Conservative Jews who are thinking about how to observe Shabbat.
“What is inspiring this is to emphasize the centrality of Shabbat to our lives as Jews, to our synagogue communities, and our personal relationships with God,” she said. “Restoring Shabbat and emphasizing Shabbat as so central is all the more urgent in the 21st century.”
—
The post Conservative rabbis endorse use of electric cars on Shabbat, but divisions over driving remain appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
RSS
US Clamps Sanctions on Israel-bashing UN Rights Monitor Albanese
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 Trump administration has imposed sweeping sanctions against Francesca Albanese, the United Nations Special Rapporteur for the Occupied Palestinian Territories, citing the UN official’s lengthy record of singling out Israel for condemnation.
In a post on X, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the sanctions under a February executive order targeting those who “prompt International Criminal Court (ICC) action against U.S. and Israeli officials, companies, and executives.” He accused Albanese of waging “political and economic warfare” against both nations and asserted that “such efforts will no longer be tolerated.”
“Today I am imposing sanctions on UN Human Rights Council Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese for her illegitimate and shameful efforts to prompt [International Criminal Court] action against U.S. and Israeli officials, companies, and executives,” Rubio announced on X/Twitter.
“Albanese’s campaign of political and economic warfare against the United States and Israel will no longer be tolerated,” declared the Trump administration’s top foreign affairs official. “We will always stand by our partners in their right to self-defense.”
Rubio concluded: “The United States will continue to take whatever actions we deem necessary to respond to lawfare and protect our sovereignty and that of our allies.”
The decision to impose sanctions on Albanese marks an escalation in the ongoing feud between the White House and the United Nations over Israel. The Trump administration has repeatedly accused the UN and Albanese of unfairly targeting Israel and mischaracterizing the Jewish state’s conduct in Gaza.
Albanese, an Italian lawyer and academic, has held the position of UN special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories since 2022. The position authorizes her to monitor and report on alleged “human rights violations” by Israel against Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.
Last week, Albanese issued a scathing report accusing companies of helping Israel maintain a so-called “genocide economy.” She called on the companies to cut off economic ties with Israel and warned that they might be guilty of “complicity” in the so-called “genocide” in Gaza.
Critics of Albanese have long accused her of exhibiting an excessive anti-Israel bias, calling into question her fairness and neutrality.
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 the months following the Palestinian terrorist group’s atrocities across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, Albanese accused the Jewish state of perpetrating a “genocide” against the Palestinian people in revenge for the attacks and circulated a widely derided and heavily disputed report alleging that 186,000 people had been killed in the Gaza war as a result of Israeli actions.
The action comes as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits Washington, where he has received a warm reception from the Trump administration. Netanyahu has been meeting with US officials to discuss next steps in the ongoing Gaza military operation.
Gideon Sa’ar, Minister of Foreign Affairs for Israel, commended the Rubio announcement with his own post on X/Twitter, exclaiming: “A clear message. Time for the UN to pay attention!”
The post US Clamps Sanctions on Israel-bashing UN Rights Monitor Albanese first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Hardball: Trump Administration Reports Harvard to Accreditor Over Antisemitism Allegations
US President Donald Trump speaks during a Cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, DC, July 8, 2025. Photo: Kevin Lamarque via Reuters Connect.
The Trump administration escalated its showdown against Harvard University on Wednesday, reporting the institution to its accreditor for alleged civil rights violations resulting from its weak response to reports of antisemitic bullying, discrimination, and harassment following Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 massacre across southern Israel.
The US Department of Education (DOE) announced the action on Wednesday. Citing Harvard’s admitted failure to treat antisemitism as seriously as it treated others forms of hatred in the past, the DOE called on the New England Commission of Higher Education to review and, potentially, revoke its accreditation — a designation which qualifies Harvard for federal funding and attests to the quality of the educational services its provides.
“Accrediting bodies play a significant role in preserving academic integrity and a campus culture conducive to truth seeking and learning,” said Secretary of Education Linda McMahon. “Part of that is ensuring students are safe on campus and abiding by federal laws that guarantee educational opportunities to all students. By allowing anti-Semitic harassment and discrimination to persist unchecked on its campus, Harvard University has failed in its obligation to students, educators, and American taxpayers.”
The DOE, McMahon added, “expects the New England Commission of Higher Education to enforce its policies and practices, and to keep the Department fully informed of its efforts to ensure that Harvard is in compliance with federal law and accreditor standards.”
As previously reported by The Algemeiner, Harvard’s Presidential Task Force on Combating Antisemitism has acknowledged that the university administration’s handling of campus antisemitism fell well below its obligations under both Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and its own nondiscrimination policies.
In a 300-plus-page report, the task force compiled a comprehensive record of antisemitic incidents on Harvard’s campus in recent years — from the Harvard Palestine Solidarity Committee’s endorsement of the Oct. 7 terrorist atrocities to an anti-Zionist faculty group’s sharing an antisemitic cartoon depicting Jews as murderers of people of color. The report identified Harvard’s past refusal to afford Jews the same protections against discrimination enjoyed by other minority groups as a key source of its problem.
Coming several weeks after President Donald Trump ordered the freeze of $2.26 billion in federal research grants and contracts for Harvard, the task force report found it was “clear” that antisemitism and anti-Israel bias have been fomented, practiced, and tolerated not only at Harvard but also within academia more widely.”
The university is now suing the federal government over the funding halt.
President Trump has spoken scathingly of Harvard, calling it, for example, an “Anti-Semitic, Far Left Institute … with students being accepted from all over the world that want to rip our Country apart” in an April post to his Truth Social platform.
In recent weeks, however, both Trump and McMahon had commended Harvard’s constructive response in negotiations over reforms the administration has asked it to implement as a precondition for restoring federal funds. The requested reforms include hiring more conservative faculty, shuttering diversity, equity, and inclusion [DEI] programs, and slashing the size of administrative offices tangential to the university’s central educational mission.
The administration has since changed its tone in the wake of a report by The Harvard Crimson that interim Harvard President Alan Garber has said “behind closed doors” that he has no intention of doing anything that would make Harvard more palatable to conservatives.
Earlier this month, the Trump administration’s Joint Task Force to Combat Antisemitism issued Harvard a formal “notice of violation” of civil rights law. Charging that Harvard willfully exposed Jewish students to a flood of racist and antisemitic abuse both in and outside of the classroom, it threatened to strip whatever remains of Harvard’s federal funding.
“Failure to institute adequate changes immediately will result in the loss of all federal financial resources and continue to affect Harvard’s relationship with the federal government,” wrote the federal officials comprising the multiagency Task Force. “Harvard may of course continue to operate free of federal privileges, and perhaps such an opportunity will spur a commitment to excellence that will help Harvard thrive once again.”
In Wednesday’s announcement, US Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said Harvard’s conduct “forfeits the legitimacy that accreditation is designed to uphold.”
“HHS and Department of Education will actively hold Harvard accountable through sustained oversight until it restores public trust and ensures a campus free of discrimination,” he said.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post Hardball: Trump Administration Reports Harvard to Accreditor Over Antisemitism Allegations first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
IDF Strikes Hezbollah Sites in South Lebanon as Terror Group Pushes to Rebuild Amid US Disarmament Talks
IDF operating in southern Lebanon. Photo: IDF Spokesperson
Israeli forces uncovered and destroyed Hezbollah weapons caches in southern Lebanon on Wednesday, as a new report indicated that despite ongoing U.S.-led efforts to secure a disarmament deal, the Iran-backed group is making repeated, largely concealed attempts to rebuild its military presence in the area.
Troops carried out several operations targeting Hezbollah infrastructure in southern Lebanon on Wednesday morning, destroying weapons depots, explosives and multibarrel launchers concealed in forested terrain, the IDF said, in violation of the November ceasefire, which requires Hezbollah to withdraw its forces 20 miles from the Israeli border.
A new report released this week by the Alma Research and Education Center found that Hezbollah is focused on rebuilding in three areas: operational deployment, weapons acquisition, and financial recovery.
“Hezbollah didn’t give up its resistance narrative and motivation,” Alma’s director, Lt. Col. (Res.) Sarit Zehavi, told The Algemeiner.
“It wants to rebuild its capabilities and infrastructures, whether it’s the villages that will be used as human shields or the military infrastructure in South Lebanon and in Lebanon in general.”
According to Zehavi, Hezbollah is attempting to return Radwan fighters to positions south of the Litani River as part of a wider plan to restore its elite forces to operational readiness. The IDF on Monday killed Radwan commander Ali Abd al-Hassan Haidar in a targeted strike. The action came hours after US Special Envoy for Syria Thomas Barrack met with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, Prime Minister Nawaf Salam and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri in Beirut to discuss a long-term deal that would include an Israeli withdrawal and complete disarmament of Hezbollah.
Barrack described the Lebanese response to the proposal as positive. Later, he issued a blunt warning to Hezbollah in response to a vow by the terror group’s leader, Naim Qassem, not to lay down its arms. “If they mess with us anywhere in the world, they will have a serious problem with us,” Barrack said in an interview with Lebanese news network LBCI. “They don’t want that.”
Zehavi said it was premature to predict the outcome of the diplomatic efforts. She warned that the challenge of disarming Hezbollah remains enormous and emphasized that the Lebanese Armed Forces have not demonstrated the capability or willingness to confront the group.
“It’s too soon to be optimistic or pessimistic,” she said, noting that no firm commitments have emerged from the Beirut talks.
Hezbollah’s efforts to smuggle and manufacture weapons have been complicated by both Israeli strikes and the regional realignment over recent months. While Israeli strikes have disrupted many supply routes, according to Zehavi, Syrian authorities have intercepted far more Hezbollah-bound weapons than the Lebanese Army, which claims to have uncovered 500 arms caches but has provided no evidence.
The financial front marks the third aspect of Hezbollah’s rebuilding effort. Last week, the group halted cash payments to Shiite civilians whose homes were damaged in the war, citing liquidity problems. Zehavi attributed the shortfall to disruptions in Iran’s funding networks — an outcome of the 12-day war against the regime in Tehran — and said the constraints would likely hamper Hezbollah’s ability to compensate its base and sustain operations.
“I hope they will continue to have problems with the cash flow, that way it will be very difficult for them to recover,” she said.
The post IDF Strikes Hezbollah Sites in South Lebanon as Terror Group Pushes to Rebuild Amid US Disarmament Talks first appeared on Algemeiner.com.