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Oct. 7 Supernova Survivor Attends Cannes Film Festival in Gown Paying Tribute to Hamas Hostages
A survivor of the Hamas massacre at the Supernova Music Festival on Oct. 7 attended the Cannes Film Festival on Wednesday in a gown that drew attention to the hostages who have been held captive in the Gaza Strip for seven months.
Laura Blajman-Kadar wore a yellow gown that featured pictures of Israeli hostages held in Gaza, including Yarden Bibas, Liri Albag, and two of her friends, Elkana Bohbot and Eliya Cohen. On top of the gown she wore a black slash that read: “Bring Them Home.” She walked the red carpet during arrivals for the screening of the film “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga” and was accompanied by a woman who wore a white ensemble that had yellow ribbons on it.
The color yellow, and specifically a yellow ribbon, is a longstanding symbol of solidarity with prisoners or hostages — and in this case is a nod to the 132 Israeli hostages who remain in captivity in Gaza since being kidnapped on Oct. 7.
Blajman-Kadar shared on social media a photo of her wearing the gown at the Cannes Film Festival and wrote in the caption, “It wasn’t easy but with the help of amazing people we succeeded! We will not allow the world to forget you!!! BRING THEM HOME!!!” She also thanked the October 7 Collective, which is a French organization dedicated to raising awareness about the release of the hostages. The organization helped Blajman-Kadar with her appearance at the Cannes Film Festival.
“A lot of people participated in the design of the dress and in helping to get tickets for the ceremony,” she told Ynet. “I got them through someone who wants to stay behind the scenes and does not want to be involved in what is called ‘provocation’ here. There are many good people behind the scenes.”
Beljman-Kader also told the Israeli publication that people in charge at the festival did not allow her to walk on the red carpet like most of the celebrities and some other guests, but they did let her to walk the famous stairs and take a picture on them. She said once she was inside the hall, her dress garnered positive attention, with many guests congratulating her or voicing support for her efforts to raise awareness regarding the hostages.
“There were no bad reactions,” she explained. “It was very important for us to have representation to call for the release of the kidnapped, certainly in a year when there is also no adequate representation for Israeli cinema.”
The short film “It’s Not Time For Pop” by Amit Vaknin is the only film from Israel taking part in the Cannes Film Festival this year and it will compete in the La Cinéf section, which highlights projects from film schools.
Blajman-Kadar survived the Oct. 7 terrorist attack at the Supernova festival by hiding in a van with six others, including her husband, for six hours. Since the attack, she has traveled the globe advocating for the hostages and sharing her personal story of survival. She also published a memoir about her experience on Oct. 7 that is titled “Croire en la vie,” which in English means “Believing in Life.”
Hamas-led Palestinian terrorists murdered 1,200 people and abducted over 250 others during their surprise invasion of southern Israel on Oct. 7. Over 100 of the hostages were released in November as part of a temporary ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas.
After leaving the screening of “Furiosa: The Saga of Mad Max” starring Anya Taylor-Joy and Chris Hemsworth, Blajman-Kadar said the film was a “harsh” reminder of the Oct. 7 attacks.
“It’s not a movie to watch after the ordeal I went through,” she told Ynet. “It has scenes of people cutting off their limbs and kidnapping them on motorcycles. We experienced things not far from what happened in the movie. For me, personally, it was harsh.”
The post Oct. 7 Supernova Survivor Attends Cannes Film Festival in Gown Paying Tribute to Hamas Hostages first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Vancouver police raid a home linked to the director of Samidoun—which is now a terrorist entity in Canada
Vancouver police arrested and released one person at the home of Charlotte Kates, director of the terror group Samidoun, in a dramatic raid on Nov. 14. The raid was conducted […]
The post Vancouver police raid a home linked to the director of Samidoun—which is now a terrorist entity in Canada appeared first on The Canadian Jewish News.
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Trump Won A Majority of Votes In Heavily-Jewish New York City Precincts, Election Data Claims
President-elect Donald Trump won an overwhelming majority of the votes in New York City (NYC) precincts that were at least a quarter Jewish, according to a data analysis by the Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC), a prominent Washington DC-based political group.
RJC presented data on Friday affirming the notion that Trump won a higher proportion of the NYC Jewish vote than in previous elections, potentially signaling an ideological shift in the traditionally-liberal voting bloc. According to RJC data, Trump received the “overwhelming” majority of votes in precincts with a Jewish population of at least 25%.
Trump’s 2024 performance among Jews in NYC seems to mark a substantial improvement over the 2020 and 2016 elections, contests in which the president-elect struggled to make inroads among Jewish voters.
Voting data from the 2024 election also indicate that there was a significant shift among Jewish voters in Pennsylvania. President-elect Trump also enjoyed greater success in heavily-Jewish enclaves of deep-blue cities such as Chicago and Los Angeles, according to data compiled by the Chicago Board of Election Commissioners and the Los Angeles Times, respectively.
Trump’s increased success among Jewish voters in the Big Apple comes amid simmering anger over surging antisemitism across the country.
In the year following the Hamas slaughter of roughly 1200 people throughout southern Israel, college campuses have become embroiled in an unrelenting onslaught of protests opposing the Jewish state. Moreover, many Jews have expressed dissatisfaction with the Biden administration’s handling of the Israel-Hamas war, suggesting that the president has not been a firm ally of the Jewish state.
Over the past year, NYC has been ravaged with raucous, often-violent anti-Israel demonstrations and an unrelenting spate of antisemitic hate crimes.
Columbia University, one of the most prestigious higher education institutions in the world, became a poster-child for the anti-Israel campus movement, erecting encampments and holding protests calling for the destruction of the Jewish state. Many NYC public schools came embroiled in scandal after teachers presented students with lesson plans that accused Israel of committing “apartheid” and “genocide” against the Palestinians.
Though most national Democrats continue to express support for Israel’s right to defend itself from Hamas terrorists, some figures in the party have, over the past year, adopted a more adversarial posture toward the Jewish state, often citing the humanitarian situation in Gaza as a key reason.
High-profile Democrats such as Sen. Elizabeth Warren (MA) have suggested that Israel has perpetrated a “genocide” against Palestinians in Hamas-ruled Gaza, where Israel has been waging a military campaign targeting terrorists since the Oct. 7 atrocities. Earlier this year, a group of dozens of Democratic lawmakers, including former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), sent a letter to US President Joe Biden, urging him to “reconsider” approving offensive arms shipments to Israel.
Over the course of his campaign, Trump repeatedly touted his support for the Jewish state during his singular term in office. While courting Jewish voters, Trump has boasted about his administration’s work in fostering the Abraham Accords, promising to resume efforts to strengthen them once he retains office in January.
Trump also recognized Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights, a strategic region on Israel’s northern border previously controlled by Syria, and also moved the US embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, recognizing the city as the Jewish state’s capital.
The post Trump Won A Majority of Votes In Heavily-Jewish New York City Precincts, Election Data Claims first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Attempted Robbery of Jewish Man in Brooklyn Puts Orthodox Community on Edge
The Jewish community in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn, New York was the target of another attack on Thursday evening, as three men attempted to rob a Hasidic man after stalking him through the neighborhood.
Footage of the incident was shared on X/Twitter by Yaacov Behrman, liaison of Chabad Headquarters and founder of the Jewish Future Alliance (JFA) nonprofit. It shows the men, whose faces were concealed by hoods and ski masks, chasing the man into the street and through the neighborhood after attempting to accost him.
No arrests have been made.
“He doesn’t give in easily, and I don’t think they got anything,” Behrman tweeted. “The Jewish Future Alliance is deeply concerned not only about the increase in crime but also the fact that, once again, the perpetrators were wearing masks. We need to reinstate mask laws.”
The explosion of an antisemitic hate crime spree in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn has set the Orthodox Jewish community on edge in recent weeks.
Last Tuesday, two men beat a middle-aged Hasidic man after he refused to surrender his cell phone in compliance with what appears to have been an attempted robbery. According to multiple accounts, the assailants were two Black teenagers.
That incident was the third time in eight days that an Orthodox resident of Crown Heights was targeted for violence and humiliation. Before then, an African American male smacked a 13-year-old Jewish boy who was commuting to school on his bike in the heavily neighborhood, which is heavily Jewish, and less than a week earlier, an assailant slashed a visibly Jewish man in the face.
Most recently, a masked man was caught on video approaching a visibly Jewish father walking with his two sons and grabbing one of the children in broad daylight. He was unable to secure possession of the child, whose father fought back immediately and did not let go of his son. Police later identified the man as Stephan Stowe, 28 — a suspect gang member with an extensive criminal history which includes 33 prior arrests — and charged arrested him attempted kidnapping and endangering the welfare of a child.
In each case, the suspect was allegedly a Black male, a pattern of conduct which continues to strain Black-Jewish relations across the Five Boroughs.
Black-on-Jewish crime is a social issue which has been studied before. In 2022, a report published by Americans Against Antisemitism (AAA) showed that Orthodox Jews were the minority group most victimized by hate crimes in New York City and that 69 percent of their assailants were African American. Seventy-seven percent of the incidents took place taking in predominantly Orthodox Jewish neighborhoods in Brooklyn. Of all assaults that prompted criminal proceedings, just two resulted in convictions.
“We’ve never seen anything like this,” AAA founder and former New York State Assemblyman Dov Hikind (D) told The Algemeiner. “Shouldn’t there be a plan for how we’re going to deal with it? What’s the answer? Education? We’ve been educating everybody forever for God’s sake, and things are just getting worse.”
The problem has become acute in recent years. In July 2023, for example, a 22-year-old Israeli Yeshiva student, who was identifiably Orthodox and visiting New York City for the summer holiday, was stabbed with a screwdriver by one of two men who attacked him after asking whether he was Jewish and had any money. The other punched him in the face. Earlier that year, 10- and 12-year-olds were attacked on Albany Avenue by four African American teens.
According to a report issued in August by New York state comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, antisemitic incidents accounted for a striking 65 percent of all felony hate crimes in New York City last year. The report added that throughout the state, nearly 44 percent of all recorded hate crime incidents and 88 percent of religious-based hate crimes targeted Jewish victims.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post Attempted Robbery of Jewish Man in Brooklyn Puts Orthodox Community on Edge first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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