by Rebbetzin Tzipporah Heller
How Jewish women can unleash the holiness of bread.
There is something about making dough that can only be described with the old cliche, "real." I find that the rhythm of kneading and the fragrance of the loaves is as close as one can get to "experiencing" music. In homes where Shabbat is the soul of the week, bread-making becomes something more, something part and parcel of the way Shabbat bonds the two worlds -- spiritual and physical -- in which we all live. Most of us are familiar with the braided Shabbat loaves and call them challah." Literally, challah is a mitzvah in the Torah (Numbers 15:17-21), which enjoins us to set aside one piece of dough from each batch we make, as it says: "...It shall be that when you eat the bread of the land, you shall set aside a portion [of dough] for God." Actually, the word "challah" doesn't mean bread, dough, or any of the other words that seem to describe the aromatic loaves. The root of the word is chol which means ordinary or secular.Is Anything Really Ordinary?-When I went to camp as a child one of my ...   more »

by Rabbi Shraga Simmons
The most important time of the Jewish year is often the most misunderstood. Here's all the basics you need to know.
The High Holiday period actually begins in Elul, the Hebrew month preceding Rosh Hashana. Elul is an important period of introspection, of clarifying life's goals, and of coming closer to God. Because when the big day of Rosh Hashana comes, and each individual stands before the Almighty to ask for another year, we'll want to know what we're asking for!During Elul, many people perform a daily cheshbon - a spiritual accounting -- where we step back and look at ourselves critically and honestly, with the intention of improving. In order to arouse us to this task, it is the Ashkenazi custom to blow the shofar every morning after prayers during the month of Elul.Historically, this month has great significance, because it was on the first day of Elul that Moses -- following the sin of the Golden Calf -- ascended Mount Sinai to receive a new, second set of stone tablets. Forty days later -- on the seminal Yom Kippur -- Moses returned to the people with tablets in hand, signaling a repair of the ...   more »

Two years after pullout, suffering, wandering of Gush Katif evacuess contiues Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau
It’s been two years since the "disengagement.” At that time I wrote with pain about the tremendous life’s work of the residents of Gush Katif, which was collapsing before our very eyes. Yet with all my might I wanted at least to believe in the great white hope that awaits us just around the corner. I believed that quickly, really quickly, the gates of the heart would be opened. I prayed and I hoped that the gates of wisdom, mercy, and mutual responsibility would be opened, and that a remedy, even a partial one, would be found for the suffering and the terrible misery. Comparison  
I wanted to believe that at least the problem of uprooted families would be solved in the most correct way, the most intelligent way, and the quickest way. To our great sorrow that did not happen. Even today, two years later, the sad situation is very very far from that hope. The evacuees have been torn, through no fault of their own, from their home, from their land, from their livelihood, and from the scenery of their childhood. There’s no doubt that ...   more »

Special Knesset session will reenact fateful United Nations vote that led to Israel's creation. The UN secretary general has been invited to preside over the session, which the event planners hope will include the participation of ambassadors from the 33 nations who voted in favor of the partition Usually a scene of discord and strife – the Knesset soon plans to lend its halls to far more joyous fanfare. Essentially the event that will kick-off the celebrations commemorating Israel's 60's birthday, the Knesset plans to reenact the historic United Nations partition vote that led to the creation of a Jewish state. On November 29th, exactly six decades since the event, Israel's parliament will host the 1947 vote on the partition of western British Mandate Palestine into two states, Jewish and Arab. Most of the area under British governance had already been partitioned off as Transjordan decades earlier.
UN General Assembly vote - November 29th, 1947
Hopes are running high in Jerusalem that UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon will preside over the special session; an invitation has already been extended to him by Knesset Speaker Dalia Itzik during her meeting with Ban on Wednesday in New York City.Organizers said the event will ...   more »

Olmert's motorcade runs over 10-year-old girl
Prime minister's convoy traveling near Jerusalem continues driving after light changes to red, hits girl crossing street. Paramedics say girl lightly wounded. Olmert, informed later about accident – expressed his condolences
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's motorcade ran over a 10-year-old girl crossing the street near the entrance to Jerusalem on Thursday evening.Dangerous Roads 
Traffic control to be increased / Hillel Posek  
Police’s traffic department calls urgent meeting following deadly week on roads, decides to increase number of patrol vehicles, random license checks The girl was lightly wounded and evacuated to the Hadassah Ein Karem hospital for treatment. Olmert's office expressed their sorrow over the incident and wished the girl a speedy recovery. An initial probe into the incident conducted by the police indicates that the convoy was driving with its lights and sirens on. The traffic light changed to red as the motorcade was still making its way across while the girl began crossing the street after the crosswalk light turned green.
The motorcade car that hit the girl (Photo: Gil Yohanan)The car accompanying the motorcade which hit the girl remained at the scene while the rest of the convoy continued. The investigation into the incident ...   more »

PM, Abbas meeting in recent months to resolve core issues, including Jerusalem, refugees and permanent borders before US-brokered conference of Mideast nations in Washington
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas have been meeting regularly in recent months with the aim of drafting the principles of a permanent agreement before the US-brokered conference of Mideast nations, which is scheduled to take place in Washington this coming November, Yedioth Ahronot reported on Thursday.Sources close to Abbas said the two leaders have been holding the talks in a genuine effort to resolve the core issues, mainly Jerusalem, the Palestinian refugees and the permanent borders between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. On Tuesday Olmert met with a House of Representatives delegation, headed by majority leader Steny Hoyer (Dem.) of Maryland, to discuss the peace process with the Palestinians. During the meeting the Israeli prime minister declared that he had been meeting with Abbas in order to “agree on principles regarding the core issues that will lead to the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel, including the borders, Jerusalem, the refugees, exchanges of land, the passageway between Gaza and the West Bank and the nature of the relations between Israel and the future ...   more »

Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni on Thursday commended the memorandum of understanding signed between Israel and the US outlining the $30 billion defense aid package Washington will provide Jerusalem over the next decade. Livni met with US Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Nicholas Burns and thanked him for the contribution to strengthening Israel's security, Israel Radio reported. The two also spoke of the need to block the Iranian threat. Burns and US Ambassador to Israel Richard Jones represented the US at the signing ceremony at the Foreign Ministry, while Bank of Israel Governor Stanley Fisher, Foreign Ministry Director-General Aaron Abramovich, Defense Ministry Director-General Pinchas Buchris and Ambassador to the US Salai Meridor represented Israel."We look at this region and we see that a secure and strong Israel is in the interest of the United States," Burns said in a press conference following the signing. "The Middle East is more dangerous today than it was 10, 20 year ago…The regional dangers seem only to increase as Iran develops nuclear technologies and along with Syria supports organizations like Hamas, Hizbullah and the Islamic Jihad." "We will continue to show the same support to our other allies in the region, like Egypt, Kuwait, ...   more »

TEL AVIV — Syria continues to deploy missiles supplied by Russia and has established an anti-aircraft umbrella around Damascus and the Golan Heights.
Israel's military has reported that the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad deployed a range of surface-to-air missile assets in southern Syria. The military said the assets were purchased over the last year from Russia and financed by Iran."The situation is tense," a senior Israeli officer said. On Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi met at the military's Northern Command headquarters near the Lebanese border. The three men, on the first anniversary of the conclusion of the 34-day war with Hizbullah, received briefings on Syrian military preparations.
"I don't think it is in Syria's interest to start a war," Israeli Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilnai said. "It is not in our interests to start war. This tension is unnecessary."Military sources said Syria has been deploying short- and medium-range missiles and rockets in southern and central Syria. They said the Assad regime has been engaged in accelerated deployment of the Scud C and D missiles, with ranges of 550 and 700 kilometers, respectively."There are more than 100 ...   more »

War tensions rise between Syria and Israel amid soothing words on both sides. Gen. Kaplinsky’s departure delayedDEBKAfile’s military sources report that the delay in Maj. Gen. Moshe Kaplinsky’s scheduled departure as Deputy Chief of Staff, announced by the IDF spokesman Wednesday night, Aug 15, is connected with the war tensions on Israel’s northern and Gaza borders and renewed threats from Iran. Defense minister Ehud Barak and chief of staff Lt. Gen. Gabby Ashkenazi prefer to keep in harness at this time a general with experience in managing warfronts.Barak inspected the IDF preparations on the northern front Wednesday the day after he escorted prime minister Ehud Olmert on a visit to the northern command. Both stressed that Israel does not seek war, echoed by Syria’s vice president Farouk a- Shara.Tuesday, Aug. 14, DEBKAfile reported: intelligence data and ground activity add up to the presumption that Syria is planning a campaign of hit-and-run cross-border attacks against Israeli border patrols and positions in Golan and attempts to take hostages. OC Northern Command Maj. Gen. Gad Eisenkott and senior officers briefed the prime minister on their preparations in anticipation of such attacks.They discussed ways of taking Syrian forces by surprise without provoking a full-scale ...   more »

Ronald Kessler
Karl Rove's decision to leave the White House at the end of the month makes perfect sense.
Besides getting a huge advance in a book deal, Rove will be contributing to President Bush's legacy by writing a book that will be more widely read if it comes out when Bush is still president.
As part of shaping Bush's legacy, he is going to be one of the key planners of the Bush library, where he will have a prominent position. Rove is a brilliant student of American history, surpassing the most erudite history professors. He will relish comparing Bush with other presidents.
Rove will still be available whenever the president needs his advice. In the meantime, Ed Gillespie, as counselor to the president, has begun to provide political advice that Karl otherwise might give.
At Gillespie's urging, Bush has responded more aggressively to attacks by the Democrats on his war policies and has taken them on over excessive spending. Pushed by Gillespie, Bush has made more public appearances. The fact that Bush flew to the site of the bridge collapse in Minneapolis shows he has learned since Hurricane Katrina that for political reasons, a president must make such ...   more »

By Patrick Goodenough
An estimated 80,000 Islamists packed a sports stadium in the Indonesian capital Sunday to call for the re-establishment of a single Islamic state or caliphate, uniting Muslims around the world under Islamic law.
Video footage posted on the group's websites showed tens of thousands of people, men and women seated apart in the stadium in Jakarta, waving black and white flags and shouting "Allah is greater."
The event was organized by Hizb ut-Tahrir (the Party of Liberation), which called it the biggest event calling for the revival of a caliphate since the last time one existed in the 1920s.
Hizb ut-Tahrir is a transnational Sunni group that says it shuns violence, but it has been outlawed or restricted in Germany, Russia and parts of the Middle East and Central Asia. The British government said it planned to ban the group after the July 2005 London bombings, although it has not yet happened.
Muhammad Ismail Yusanto, the group's Indonesian spokesman, said on the sidelines of the meeting that the group rejects democracy, because sovereignty is in the hands of Allah, not the people.
In a statement, he called secularism "the mother of all destruction," and he called on ...   more »

  The euro on Thursday slid under 1.34 dollars for the first time in nearly two months and struck a five-month low against the yen as the US and Japanese currencies gained from their safe-haven status.
In early European trade, the euro dropped to 1.3386 dollars -- the lowest point since June 22 -- as investors continued to pile into the US unit amid fears of a global economic slowdown caused by the weak US housing sector.
The euro has lost 3.36 percent of its value since hitting a record high of 1.3852 dollars on July 24.
The European single currency later stood at 1.3433 dollars, which compared with 1.3444 late in New York on Wednesday.
"As long as the market is dominated by fears that the crisis -- which is increasingly considered to be a global problem -- will continue or even intensify, the dollar will give up its recent gains very slowly," Commerzbank economist Gavin Friend said.
"Further losses (for the euro) towards 1.3320 (dollars) are possible," said Friend.
Elsewhere on Thursday, the euro tumbled to 155.01 yen -- a level last seen on March 19. The single currency has fallen 8.3 percent in value since reaching an ...   more »

By Douglas MacKinnon
1.) Tragically, horrifyingly, but quite predictably, it’s going to happen. The only question being which American city or cities?
In a recent conversation with a former high level intelligence operative of our government, I raised the possibility of terrorists successfully detonating a nuclear weapon within the United States. His response was sobering in its hopelessness.
First, he stressed how grateful he was that he did not work in Washington, DC, and that his family lived far enough out to survive the coming nuclear blast. When I pressed him as to why he was so sure that Islamic terrorists – with or without the help of Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez – would eventually hit DC or another American city with a nuclear weapon, his anger boiled out.
He pointed the finger squarely at our politicians and our politically correct, left-leaning media, who, in his opinion, have “sealed our fate.” He spoke of politicians from both sides of the aisle who consider border security nothing more than a cheap tool to be used for their reelection and enrichment. He despaired about a media that not only gleefully leaks our nation’s most trusted secrets for partisan gain, but then willingly ...   more »