PA upset over UNRWA official’s remark on refugees

JPost


The Palestinian Authority is extremely disappointed with a senior UNRWA official who recently said that Palestinian refugees should acknowledge that they will almost certainly not be returning to Israel, officials said last week.

Andrew Whitley, outgoing director of the United Nations Refugee and Works Agency's New York office, was quoted earlier this month as saying, "If one doesn't start a discussion soon with the refugees for them to consider what their own future might be – for them to start debating their own role in the societies where they are rather than being left in a state of limbo where they are helpless but preserve rather the cruel illusions that perhaps they will return one day to their homes – then we are storing up trouble for ourselves." [...]

Martin Gilbert - corrective history of Jewish-Islam "coexistence"

Jerusalem Post

Under Muslim rule, Jews have been a ‘protected’ group, but have nonetheless endured intolerable suffering.
 
Martin Gilbert’s In Ishmael’s House is a good corrective to all the ink that has been spilled to fabricate and deny history relating to the supposed coexistence between Jews and Muslims under Muslim rule. British-born Gilbert, a biographer of Winston Churchill and prolific writer on the Jews and the Holocaust, has only rarely directed his lens on the Jews who lived under Islam.

The subject has generally been left to Jewish Orientalists who, in the second half of the 19th and first half of the 20th century, wrote about the wondrous tolerance that Islam showed Jews in contrast to the brutality meted out to them in Russia and Europe.[...]

Child & Domestic Abuse Book - Almost there

The book is finished. Files need some technical corrections to pass
Amazon's test which should be next week.

The book is being published in two volumes. The second volume consists
of the halachic material (and Hebrew sources) that is the basis for the
conclusions presented in Volume I.

Rav Sternbuch: Considering others

4-Year-Old Can Be Sued, Judge Rules in Bike Case

New York Times

Citing cases dating back as far as 1928, a judge has ruled that a young girl accused of running down an elderly woman while racing a bicycle with training wheels on a Manhattan sidewalk two years ago can be sued for negligence.
The ruling by the judge, Justice Paul Wooten of State Supreme Court in Manhattan, did not find that the girl was liable, but merely permitted a lawsuit brought against her, another boy and their parents to move forward.
The suit that Justice Wooten allowed to proceed claims that in April 2009, Juliet Breitman and Jacob Kohn, who were both 4, were racing their bicycles, under the supervision of their mothers, Dana Breitman and Rachel Kohn, on the sidewalk of a building on East 52nd Street. At some point in the race, they struck an 87-year-old woman named Claire Menagh, who was walking in front of the building and, according to the complaint, was “seriously and severely injured,” suffering a hip fracture that required surgery. She died three weeks later. [...]

Breaking the Silence: Review by Jewish Star

Jewish Star

Has the Jewish community finally come to terms with sexual abuse? That is the question raised by the publication of a controversial new book, “Breaking the Silence: Sexual Abuse in the Jewish Community.” It is the first extensive treatment of sexual abuse among Jews aimed at a religious audience, and it faces the explosive topic head on — from advice on contacting police to filing abuse reports to halachic arguments about why reporting molesters is in keeping with Jewish law.

The editors, Dr. David Pelcovitz, the Straus Professor of Psychology and Education at the Azrieli Graduate School of Yeshiva University, and David Mandel, the CEO of Ohel, the largest Jewish social service agency, have no doubt about the book’s importance.

Eternal Jewish Family is now Tiferes Bais Yisrael of One Jewish Family

Eternal Jewish Family is now Tiferes Bais Yisrael and is holding a conference in Newark, New Jersey in December.

They state:The Role of Tiferes Bais Yisrael

           

                Well over half of all Jews worldwide choose to intermarry, yet some of these couples eventually decide to raise Jewish families.

                Proper guidance is crucial when a non-Jewish spouse sincerely seeks a halachic conversion.

                To assure full acceptance into any Jewish educational system or community throughout the world, including Israel, the conversion must adhere to the requirements and standards of Jewish law, as established by recognized Torah authorities.

                   

                TBY assists intermarried couples who display a sincere and strong commitment to live a Jewish lifestyle, in accordance with Torah and halacha.

                In this situation, the Jewish spouse is becoming a fully observant Jew while the non-Jewish partner is committed to become a sincere and fully observant convert.

           

Science Research- Dr. Hauser of Harvard - fraud or errors of judgment

New York Times

The still unresolved case of Marc Hauser, the researcher accused by Harvard of scientific misconduct, points to the painful slowness of the government-university procedure for resolving such charges. It also underscores the difficulty of defining error in a field like animal cognition where inconsistent results are common.

The case is unusual because Dr. Hauser is such a prominent researcher in his field, and is known to a wider audience through his writings on morality. There seemed little doubt of the seriousness of the case when Harvard announced on Aug. 20 that he had been found solely responsible for eight counts of scientific misconduct.

But last month two former colleagues, Bert Vaux and Jeffrey Watumull, both now at the University of Cambridge in England, wrote in the Harvard Crimson of Dr. Hauser’s “unimpeachable scientific integrity” and charged that his critics were “scholars known to be virulently opposed to his research program.” [...]

Obama claims political woes are result of neurological problem

JPost

In an increasingly desperate attempt to develop a narrative for their coming collapse, the Democrats have indulged themselves in what for half a century they’ve habitually attributed to the American Right – the paranoid style in American politics. The talk is of dark conspiracies – secret money, foreign influence, big corporations, with Karl Rove and, yes, Ed Gillespie lurking ominously behind the scenes. The only thing missing is the Halliburton-Cheney angle.

But after trotting out some of these with a noticeable lack of success, President Barack Obama has come up with something new, something less common, something more befitting his stature and intellect. He’s now offering a scientific, indeed neurological, explanation for his current political troubles. The electorate apparently is deranged by its anxieties and fears to the point where it can’t think straight. Part of the reason “facts and science and argument does not seem to be winning the day all the time,” he explained to a Massachusetts audience, “is because we’re hardwired not to always think clearly when we’re scared. And the country is scared.” Opening a whole new branch of cognitive science – liberal psychology – Obama has discovered a new principle: The fearful brain is hardwired to act befuddled, i.e., vote Republican. [...]

Defriending electonically on Facebook

New York Times

ENDING a friendship takes many forms: an ugly confrontation, a polite “I don’t think this is working out,” or just the fade-out with not returning phone calls or responding to e-mail.

Or it can be a simple click on your Facebook page.

As many know, it’s called “defriending,” a term that the New Oxford American Dictionary formally acknowledged this summer. But can technology mitigate the complicated emotions that are associated with a failed friendship? Maybe not.

What is a Jewish State?

New York Times

The more stridently Israel insists on Palestinian recognition of it as the nation-state of the Jewish people, the more adamantly the Palestinian leadership seems to refuse.

As a result, some senior Israeli officials are beginning to question the wisdom of the policy of their prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who has made recognition of the legitimacy of the Jewish nation-state a prerequisite for any final agreement with the Palestinians.

More recently, Mr. Netanyahu offered it as a quid pro quo for a temporary extension of a moratorium on building in Jewish settlements in the West Bank. Nascent Israeli-Palestinian peace talks have stalled since the moratorium expired last month.