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Israeli Student Trips to Poland Set to Continue Months After Cancellation Due to Gaza War
Worshipers wrapped in Israeli flags at a prayer service in Warsaw, Poland. Photo: Reuters/Kacper Pempel
Israel’s Education Ministry has announced the resumption of student trips to Poland, where millions of Jews were murdered during the Holocaust, months after the educational visits were halted due to the war with the Hamas terror group in Gaza.
The announcement asked schools to start preparing for the trips to Poland if they wish, but to be prepared if in the end security issues make them impossible.
“In light of the importance the ministry attaches to the preservation of the important concept for commemorating the memory of the Holocaust and the National Revival, it encourages the schools that want to take trips in the summer to start preparing the students and build it in such a way that the preparation is self-sustaining even if in the end the trip to Poland is not possible,” the ministry said a statement.
“The ministry sees the power in telling the stories of Holocaust survivors who chose to return, live, and rebuilt their lives and contributed greatly to the establishment of the State of Israel and the spirit and beauty of Israeli society,” the statement added.
The trips scheduled for last month were canceled in November after consultations with security officials who determined that it was unsafe for the groups to travel. This included 215 delegations comprising more than 24,000 students and teachers.
At the time, the ministry said it was “working on finding alternative solutions for these journeys, which will combine the memory of the Holocaust and the National Revival with the connection to the people, the homeland, and the values of volunteering and social cohesion.”
The announcement came amid the ongoing war with Hamas, which launched the conflict with its Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel. Since then, there has been a massive global surge in antisemitism, which has reached record levels in the US and Europe in recent months. Poland has experienced its share of antisemitic incidents since the outbreak of the war.
Israeli Education Minister Yoav Kisch praised the new decision about resuming visits to Poland.
“The trip to Poland allows the students to commemorate the victims of the Holocaust, to be exposed to the atrocities that took place, and to prove the victory and revival over the attempt to destroy the Jewish people,” he said. “Especially after Oct. 7, learning about the Jewish people, its events, and the importance of establishing a Jewish state” [is crucial].
The educational journeys to Poland include visits to Nazi concentration camps such as Auschwitz, where students hear first-hand testimonies from Holocaust survivors and put themselves in the shoes of one of the six million Jews killed during the Holocaust. Students also interact with the country’s remaining Jewish communities.
At the conclusion of these visits, students gather and sing Hatikvah, Israel’s national anthem. The trip is geared towards students in their second to last or final year of high school, prior to their enlistment in the Israeli army.
The postponement of the trips came as a disappointment to many, as they had only just resumed in the summer of 2023 after being canceled since 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic and issues pertaining to whether Israeli security guards accompanying the students would be allowed to carry weapons.
The post Israeli Student Trips to Poland Set to Continue Months After Cancellation Due to Gaza War first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Germany: 5 Killed, Scores Wounded after Saudi Man Plows Car Into Christmas crowd
Magdeburg Christmas market, December 21, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Christian Mang
i24 News – A suspected terrorist plowed a vehicle into a crowd at a Christmas market in the German city of Magdeburg, west of the capital Berlin, killing at least five and injuring dozens more.
Local police confirmed that the suspect was a Saudi national born in 1974 and acting alone.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz expressed his concern about the incident, saying that “reports from Magdeburg suggest something bad. My thoughts are with the victims and their families.”
Police declined to give casualty numbers, confirming only a large-scale operation at the market, where people had gathered to celebrate in the days leading up to the Christmas holidays.
The post Germany: 5 Killed, Scores Wounded after Saudi Man Plows Car Into Christmas crowd first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Syria’s New Rulers Name HTS Commander as Defense Minister
A person waves a flag adopted by the new Syrian rulers, as people gather during a celebration called by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) near the Umayyad Mosque, after the ousting of Syria’s Bashar al-Assad, in Damascus, Syria, Photo: December 20, 2024. REUTERS/Ammar Awad/File Photo
Syria’s new rulers have appointed Murhaf Abu Qasra, a leading figure in the insurgency which toppled Bashar al-Assad, as defense minister in the interim government, an official source said on Saturday.
Abu Qasra, who is also known by the nom de guerre Abu Hassan 600, is a senior figure in the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group which led the campaign that ousted Assad this month. He led numerous military operations during Syria’s revolution, the source said.
Syria’s de facto leader Ahmed al-Sharaa discussed “the form of the military institution in the new Syria” during a meeting with armed factions on Saturday, state news agency SANA reported.
Abu Qasra during the meeting sat next to Sharaa, also known by the nom de guerre Abu Mohammed al-Golani, photos published by SANA showed.
Prime Minister Mohammed al-Bashir said this week that the defense ministry would be restructured using former rebel factions and officers who defected from Assad’s army.
Bashir, who formerly led an HTS-affiliated administration in the northwestern province of Idlib, has said he will lead a three-month transitional government. The new administration has not declared plans for what will happen after that.
Earlier on Saturday, the ruling General Command named Asaad Hassan al-Shibani as foreign minister, SANA said. A source in the new administration told Reuters that this step “comes in response to the aspirations of the Syrian people to establish international relations that bring peace and stability.”
Shibani, a 37-year-old graduate of Damascus University, previously led the political department of the rebels’ Idlib government, the General Command said.
Sharaa’s group was part of al Qaeda until he broke ties in 2016. It had been confined to Idlib for years until going on the offensive in late November, sweeping through the cities of western Syria and into Damascus as the army melted away.
Sharaa has met with a number of international envoys this week. He has said his primary focus is on reconstruction and achieving economic development and that he is not interested in engaging in any new conflicts.
Syrian rebels seized control of Damascus on Dec. 8, forcing Assad to flee after more than 13 years of civil war and ending his family’s decades-long rule.
Washington designated Sharaa a terrorist in 2013, saying al Qaeda in Iraq had tasked him with overthrowing Assad’s rule and establishing Islamic sharia law in Syria. US officials said on Friday that Washington would remove a $10 million bounty on his head.
The war has killed hundreds of thousands of people, caused one of the biggest refugee crises of modern times and left cities bombed to rubble and the economy hollowed out by global sanctions.
The post Syria’s New Rulers Name HTS Commander as Defense Minister first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Sweden Ends Funding for UNRWA, Pledges to Seek Other Aid Channels
View of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) building in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. Photo: Abed Rahim Khatib / Flash90.
i24 News – Sweden will no longer fund the U.N. refugee agency for Palestinians (UNRWA) and will instead provide humanitarian assistance to Gaza via other channels, the Scandinavian country said on Friday.
The decision comes on the heels of multiple revelations regarding the agency’s employees’ involvement in the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led massacre in southern Israel that triggered the war in Gaza.
Sweden’s decision was in response to the Israeli ban, as it will make channeling aid via the agency more difficult, the country’s aid minister, Benjamin Dousa, said.
“Large parts of UNRWA’s operations in Gaza are either going to be severely weakened or completely impossible,” Dousa said. “For the government, the most important thing is that support gets through.”
The Palestinian embassy in Stockholm said in a statement: “We reject the idea of finding alternatives to UNRWA, which has a special mandate to provide services to Palestinian refugees.”
Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel thanked Dousa for a meeting they had this week and for Sweden’s decision to drop its support for UNRWA.
“There are worthy and viable alternatives for humanitarian aid, and I appreciate the willingness to listen and adopt a different approach,” she said.
The post Sweden Ends Funding for UNRWA, Pledges to Seek Other Aid Channels first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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