Pilgrims in Mecca Protested vs. ISIS
By Rachel Avraham/www.jerusalemonline.com
The pilgrimage to Mecca culminated this weekend with more than two million Muslim believers crowding around the Kaaba and other holy sites in Mecca. Saudi leaders took advantage of the religious gathering to send out a message against ISIS and warn against evil organizations that recruit children to fight in Iraq and Syria.
A powerful Muslim demonstration against ISIS took place during Eid Al Adha. Over two million Muslim pilgrims came to observe the Haj yesterday in Mecca. The Saudi government sought to take advantage of the huge Muslim gathering not only to pray, but to prevent young Muslims from joining “evil organizations” like ISIS.
“We want to reach out to the hearts and minds of the people, to warn them of evil organizations that recruit children to fight in Syria and Iraq,” the Saudi Defense Minister stated, who claimed that the ceremonies passed this year without incidents, probably due to the heavy level of security in the extremely pious country.
The weekend’s activities culminated in Muslim believers visiting the holy sites in Saudi Arabia and ISIS being proclaimed a terrorist organization. The country was recruited to the US-led coalition against ISIS in Iraq and Syria. ISIS has stated in the past that Saudi Arabia is illegitimate and they have vowed to topple the government in Riyadh, which is controlled by the Saudi royal family.
About three million Muslims, among them a million and a half pilgrims from around the world, come every year to fulfill a journey that is described as one of the five pillars of Islam. Many of them reveal secret support for Sunni terrorist organizations, while others argue that ISIS is a western invention designed to weaken the Muslim world.
Report: Iran, Not Israel, Killed Nuclear Scientist in 2007
JNS.org–A new report by The Media Line news agency indicates that Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, not Israel, was behind the mysterious deaths of Iranian nuclear scientists in 2007. Since the incident, conspiracy theories have claimed that the Jewish state assassinated the scientists. Mahboobeh Hosseinpour–the sister of Iranian nuclear physicist Ardeshir Hosseinpour, who was allegedly “gassed” to death in 2007–says her brother was murdered by the Revolutionary Guard because he would not cooperate with its efforts to build an atomic bomb. Hosseinpour, 54, told The Media Line that her sister-in-law, Sara Araghi, went to her husband’s office at Shiraz University and found evidence that the room was searched and that items were missing, including a photo of the scientist with then-Iranian President Mohammed Khatami. Araghi also found a DVD of the late Hosseinpour’s nuclear research, containing formulas for building an atomic bomb 12 times more powerful than the Hiroshima bomb as well as methods for neutralizing it.
Israelis Tackle Hitchhiking
JNS.org–Following the abduction and murder of Jewish teens Eyal Yifrach, Gilad Shaar, and Naftali Frenkel while they were hitchhiking in Gush Etzion in June, the Israeli Education Ministry is working to prevent students at the 22 yeshivas and religious girls’ schools in Judea and Samaria from taking rides with strangers.One of the first projects is organized transportation for students, to which the ministry allocated about $2.7 million at the beginning of this school year. The transportation includes about 200 buses per week which on Sundays pick up students from nearby cities, including Jerusalem, Beersheba, Kfar Saba, and Netanya, and on Thursdays return them to their hometowns for the weekend. In cases where students live inside Judea and Samaria, the bus’s route will enter the town and drop the student off safely in a protected and well-lit area,” he said.
South African Group
Threatens to Bar Nurses
from Using Israeli Circumcision Device
JNS.org–The Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), an ally group of the country’s ruling African National Congress (ANC) party and a proponent of the movement to boycott Israel, is protesting South Africa’s consideration of approving an Israeli-developed circumcision device. “We have a problem that the device comes from Israel. We need to boycott everything that comes from that pariah state,” Sizwe Pamla, a spokesman for a public sector union that is part of COSATU, told Reuters. Many South Africans undergo traditional circumcision as a rite of passage to manhood, especially in the Xhosa culture, but many die as a result of blood loss or infection caused by the procedure. The South African government is studying the Israeli device, PrePex, to determine whether to officially sanction its use in the country. The device has not yet been used in South African hospitals. If the country approves the device, COSATU-affiliated nurses will refuse to perform circumcision procedures with it, Pamla said.
The Latest Polls in Israel
An annual report, released Monday by Hiddush, an organization lobbying for the promotion of religious freedom, and news site Ynet found that 61% of Israelis support religion-state separation and 78% are dissatisfied with the government’s actions on religion-and-state issues. 84% of the 800 participants in the poll said freedom of choice, allowing religious and secular citizens to live according to their personal views, should exist the in Israel Two-thirds of Israelis, or 66%, back legalizing civil marriage, up from 61% in 2010. 64% of Israelis support recognizing Conservative and Reform conversions to Judaism. Unsurprisingly, 100% of the ultra-Orthodox (haredim) Jews polled supported Israel’s longstanding policies in which the Orthodox Chief Rabbinate maintains control over Jewish marriages and recognizes only Orthodox conversions.
Asked about the controversial new law (which will take effect only three years from now), forcing the haredi population to comply with Israel’s mandatory draft, 61% of Israelis, including 98% of haredim, said they do not believe haredi Jews will ultimately be drafted. Haredi-secular tensions was viewed by 35% as the second worst internal conflict in Israel, with the political conflict between right and left seen as the worst by 45%.
Overall, among the 800 total respondents, 49% identified as secular, 17% as traditional-not-so-religious, 13% as traditional-religious, 12% as religious and 9% as haredi. According to the survey, 42% of Israelis observe the Sabbath in some way.
