by Rabbi Ken Spiro
These extraordinary sages defined the essence of Judaism for the Jews of Israel and the Diaspora.
The Men of the Great Assembly -- in Hebrew, Anshei Knesset HaGedolah -- was an unusual group of Jewish personalities who assumed the reigns of Jewish leadership between 410 BCE and 310 BCE. This time period follows the destruction of the First Temple, and includes the early decades of the Second Temple, up until the invasion of the Greeks, led by Alexander the Great.
Realizing that the Jewish people were growing weaker spiritually, a group of wise leaders came together -- expanding the Sanhedrin, the Jewish Supreme Court, from 70 to 120 members -- with a special aim of strengthening Judaism. Initially gathered together by Ezra, they defined Judaism in this tumultuous time when prophecy and kingship were all but gone from the Jewish people.
(Today's Israeli Parliament, which is called "the Knesset," also has 120 members in imitation of the Great Assembly although the Knesset of today serves an entirely different function of the Great Assembly of 2,500 years ago.
Among them we count the last of the prophets Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi, as well as the sages Mordechai, ...   more »

Ministry of Tourism's next target: Bringing gay and lesbian tourists to Israel. The means: A campaign featuring a same-sex couple on a camel, two men in yarmulkes kissing in Jerusalem
Nurit Felter
The proudest campaign ever was launched by the Tourism Ministry in cooperation with the Association for Civil Rights and the Israeli Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Association (the “Aguda”). The goal: To encourage GLBT tourism to Jerusalem.  
For the past few years, Tel Aviv, along with Berlin, Barcelona, and San Francisco, has established itself as a GLBT friendly city and a popular vacation site for the community's members.  As a result, the Tourism Ministry decided to launch a new campaign aimed at attracting "proud visitors" to the Holy Land. The campaign focuses on scenes from the Israeli gay community's lifestyle.   
Representatives of Israeli travel companies will distribute thousands of brochures to participants in pride events worldwide.  
The photos for the campaign was taken in many sites throughout Israel, including Jerusalem and the Dead Sea. "I chose sites that represent the country," said Eitan Tal, the campaign's photographer, "in Jerusalem the models wore yarmulkes for the religious GLBT crowd. In the Dead Sea I shot the ...   more »

New 'pink Jerusalem' campaign aimed at promoting gay tourism in capital and partly sponsored by state, angers religious legislators who threaten no-confidence motion over issue
Ronny Sofer
"This is a delusional campaign for a minority with a normative defect," Deputy Prime Minister Eli Yishai said Tuesday, responding to reports about a new Ministry of Tourism international campaign promoting gay tourism in Jerusalem.  
The campaign, produced by the Association for Civil Rights in Israel and the Homosexuals and Lesbians organization, together with the Tourism Ministry, features same-sex couples photographed at tourist attractions and places of historic interest in the capital.   
"I unequivocally reject the attempt to focus a state-sponsored campaign on a delusional minority that suffers from a normative defect," Yishai said, "Jerusalem and Amsterdam are the same for these people. Therefore, those who fail to recognize Jerusalem's holiness had better stay away from it."  
Tourism Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch said that the campaign was initiated by his predecessor, Abraham Hirchson, and then he himself rejected it strongly.  
'Campaign undermines status-quo' 
MK Benyamin Elon (National Union), a former tourism minister, harshly protested the issue to the tourism minister Tuesday, and received a reply from Aharonovitch that the campaign ...   more »

HILARY LEILA KRIEGER
As violence raged this week in the Gaza Strip between Hamas and Fatah, US officials stressed the importance of American efforts to bolster forces loyal to the latter and said further help was necessary.
"This chaotic situation is why the USSC [United States security coordinator] is focused on the legal, legitimate security forces in our attempts to reestablish law and order," said Lt.-Gen. Keith Dayton, the USCC working with the Palestinians, in testimony Wednesday before the House Subcommittee on the Middle East. But he added, "The legal security forces of the Palestinian president still lack what they need to achieve … law and order."
The State Department has in the past denied that America's non-lethal training of the presidential guard of Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas of Fatah - largely aimed at securing the Karni border crossing and protecting Abbas and other VIPs - amounted to the US taking sides in Fatah's fight with Hamas.
But at the hearing Dayton highlighted the US role in helping Fatah as it faces attacks from the Islamic radicals in Hamas.
"We are leading, through the acts of this Congress, the international effort to possibly affect this worrisome situation," he said. ...   more »