Bat Sheva Marcus resigns from seminary board in wake of harassment allegations

 https://www.timesofisrael.com/bat-sheva-marcus-resigns-from-seminary-board-in-wake-of-harassment-allegations/

Bat Sheva Marcus, the prominent Orthodox sex therapist whose history of alleged abuse broke into public view this week, has resigned from the board of a Modern Orthodox seminary and will no longer host a sex-focused podcast with the seminary’s top rabbi.

The board chair and the rabbi announced the changes separately Thursday, three days after Marcus published an explosive essay detailing allegations of harassment that had been made against her.

The essay, and subsequent comments by two former executive directors of the Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance who said Marcus had harassed them when she was president of the pioneering group’s board, has roiled the liberal Modern Orthodox community, including the seminary, Yeshivat Chovevei Torah in Riverdale, New York.

Behind new film ‘Operation Mincemeat,’ the true story of WWII’s greatest deception

 https://www.timesofisrael.com/behind-new-film-operation-mincemeat-the-true-story-of-wwiis-greatest-deception/

The fake documents — designed to convince the Nazis the attack would take place on Sardinia and Greece — eventually reached the desk of Adolf Hitler. Convinced by German intelligence that they were genuine, he fatally ordered his forces to reinforce the supposed targets, thus shifting attention from Sicily, where the Allies successfully landed just under two months later.

United Arab List to suspend cooperation with Bennett government

 https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/326003

The Islamic council which provides spiritual leadership for the Southern Islamic Movement and the United Arab List has instructed the party to halt all cooperation with the Bennett government, citing law enforcement efforts against Arab rioters on the Temple Mount.

The council held an emergency meeting Sunday afternoon after one of its leaders, Sheikh Mohammad Salameh Hassan, demanded the UAL party bolt the coalition and bring down the government.

At the urging of party chief MK Mansour Abbas, the council did not insist on the UAL’s immediate departure from the coalition, but instead instructed the faction to cease all cooperation with the government for the time being.

The meeting was called amid heavy pressure on the party from within the Southern Islamic Movement to bolt the government over the use of police forces to break up Arab rioting on the Temple Mount, including the insertion of Border Police officers to the Al Aqsa Mosque, after hundreds of rioters barricaded themselves inside the building last Friday.

Even some supporters of Abbas within the party have begun to express doubts about the UAL’s continued presence in the coalition.

Arab rioters stone buses en route to Western Wall

https://www.jpost.com/breaking-news/article-704375

Arab rioters threw stones at three Egged buses that were en route to the Western Wall on Sunday morning, Israeli media reported.

The buses, with windows smashed, continued their journey until they could stop at a safe place. The attack took place near Lions' Gate as tensions are still high between other rioters and police at the Temple Mount

The truth behind Joe Biden's GHOST handshake may not be that 'demented' at all

 https://meaww.com/joe-biden-ghost-handshake-demented-truth

Meanwhile, Biden also bizarrely claimed that he used to be a "full professor" at the University of Pennsylvania. "I've been at a lot of university campuses, matter of fact for four years, I was a full professor at the University of Pennsylvania," he told the audience. It's worth noting that the university named Biden as the Benjamin Franklin Presidential Practice Professor, the first to hold the position, in 2017. According to the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Delaware Democrat did not teach regular classes and only made about a dozen public appearances on the campus for notable events. Nonetheless, he collected full paychecks in 2017, 2018, and early 2019. In fact, Biden reportedly minted almost $1 million from the university despite his vague role and teaching no regular classes.

Fact check: No, Biden didn't shake hands with thin air; wasn't confused [see full clip]

 https://www.ibtimes.co.in/fact-check-no-biden-didnt-shake-hands-thin-air-wasnt-confused-see-full-clip-847509

Looking at the full video, which was live-streamed by WFMY News 2 on YouTube, gives more clarity. If you fast forward to the end of the video, it becomes clear that Biden wasn't shaking hands with thin air. In fact, he was gesturing at the people on the right and eventually behind him who were cheering. He even gestures toward the crowd on the left side of the dais, but it is covered by a mic stand.

How did Russian oligarchs get their wealth?

 https://www.jpost.com/jerusalem-report/article-704153

Instead of benefiting the people, Russia’s resources are confiscated by the rich oligarchs, in return for two ‘favors’: blind unqualified support of the despot Putin, and a rumored slice of the wealth for Putin himself. This is Kleptopia.

True, in the US, Jeff Bezos, with a net worth of $200 billion, makes Abramovich and Khodorkovsky seem like paupers. But Bezos is a tycoon, not an oligarch. He founded and built Amazon and remains its executive board chairman.

Tycoons create value. Oligarchs steal it and capture economic rent through political favors.

Redemption from Egypt by G-d or angel?

 It is a clear message in the Haggada that the redemption was done by G-d and not an angel - but that seems to be contradicted by the Torah

Bamidbar (20:16) And when we cried to the Lord, he heard our voice, and sent an angel, and has brought us out of Egypt; and, behold, we are in Kadesh, a city in the edge of your border;)

Rashi (Bamidbar 20:16) A MESSENGER (or an angel) — This was Moses; 

Rabeinu Bachye (Bamidbar 20:16), “He dispatched an angel, etc.” A supernatural being, not an emissary such as Moses (Ibn Ezra).   It is also possible to see in the word מלאך a reference by Moses to himself (Rashi) as we find in Chagai 1,13: ויאמר חגי מלאך ה', “and Chagai, the Lord’s messenger said to the people.” In the eyes of the people Moses enjoyed the status of an angel in that he was so totally devoid of preoccupation with matters pertaining to the body. We have proof that this is how the people had viewed him as at the time when they thought he would not come back from Mount Sinai they said: “this man Moses who has taken us out of Egypt we do not know what happened to him.” Apparently, until Moses’ failure to return on time the thought that Moses could be an ordinary mortal had not occurred to them (compare Exodus 32,1)..

Why Jared Kushner’s Saudi Arabian money is impossible to defend

 https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/jared-kushners-saudi-arabian-money-impossible-defend-rcna24102

Either way, this appears awfully corrupt.

At this point, if you’ve shared my missive with your weird uncle who consumes conservative media all day, he’s probably already sent you a furious email that reads in part, “What about Hunter Biden? If we’re worried about presidential family members engaging in shady deals with foreign governments, why focus on this and not President Joe Biden’s son and his international efforts?”

On the surface, this may seem like a fair question, but just below the surface, there’s a problem: Hunter Biden never worked at any level in any presidential administration. He didn’t steer his father’s foreign policies toward any country. His role in U.S. foreign policy was, is, and has been literally non-existent.

Kushner, on the other hand, was Trump's right-hand man in the White House, taking a special interest in U.S. policy in the Middle East.

‘The lunacy is getting more intense’: how Birds Aren’t Real took on the conspiracy theorists

 https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/apr/14/the-lunacy-is-getting-more-intense-how-birds-arent-real-took-on-the-conspiracy-theorists

It’s the most perfect, playful distillation of where we are in relation to the media landscape we’ve built but can’t control, and which only half of us can find our way around. It’s a made-up conspiracy theory that is just realistic enough, as conspiracies go, to convince QAnon supporters that birds aren’t real, but has just enough satirical flags that generation Z recognises immediately what is going on. It’s a conspiracy-within-a-conspiracy, a little aneurysm of reality and mockery in the bloodstream of the mad pizzagate-style theories that animate the “alt-right”.

McCarthy faces grumbles from right over Biden impeachment remarks

 https://thehill.com/news/house/3266811-mccarthy-faces-grumbles-from-right-over-biden-impeachment-remarks/

Seventeen House Republicans have introduced or co-sponsored resolutions to impeach Biden, four of which are led by Greene. Several others have publicly called for impeachment, with Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-N.C.) doing so at a Trump rally over the weekend.

Rabbinical court fines female divorce refuser despite her ultimately approving move

 https://www.israelhayom.com/2022/04/13/rabbinical-court-fines-female-divorce-refuser-despite-her-ultimately-approving-move/

The Jerusalem Rabbinical Court recently ordered a woman who refused to divorce her cancer-stricken husband despite his pleas for three years to pay a fine of hundreds of thousands of shekels.

Although details of the case have not been made public, this is likely the first incident of a rabbinical court fining a female divorce refuser. The court first ordered the woman to pay a weekly 1,250 shekel (around $400) fine eight months ago until she agreed to a divorce.

Communications Minister: Kosher phone lines to be barred from blocking non-kosher content

 https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/325862

Despite multiple efforts made by representatives of the haredi community, Communications Minister Yoaz Hendel has decided to cancel a central feature of kosher phone lines, barring them from blocking access to content that the haredi community finds reprehensible. Access for those under the age of 18 will be partially restricted, Ministry sources say, although details are not forthcoming.

Intensive efforts have been made by haredi representatives, including Hassidic leaders, over the past months to persuade Hendel to relent, but Hendel has rebuffed all approaches. Key among those organizations pressuring the government to ban the kosher phone lines from restricting access to certain numbers have been those representing LGBT issues.

Why does NYC still honor two French Nazi collaborators? - opinion

 https://stgdesktopcore.jpost.com/opinion/article-704113?utm_source=spotim&utm_medium=spotim_recirculation

Petain and Laval, incidentally, are not the only World War II villains to be glorified in the United States. The Von Braun Center in Huntsville, Alabama, is named for Wernher von Braun, who, prior to reinventing himself as a key architect of the American space program in the 1950s and 1960s, was a Nazi major who lethally exploited inmates at the Dora-Mittelbau concentration camp to manufacture the Third Reich’s V-2 ballistic missiles. A large bust of von Braun stands prominently outside NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, also in Huntsville. My father, who was imprisoned at Dora for several months, said that conditions there were worse than he experienced at Auschwitz.