At least five Israeli soldiers were killed Wednesday in Gaza while trying to retrieve the remains of six soldiers killed Tuesday. The new casualties came when the soldiers’ armored personnel carrier was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade.
Israeli forces hunting for the remains of six soldiers slain Tuesday in Gaza killed three Hamas terrorists. At least 12 bystanders also were wounded in Wednesday’s Israeli missile strike near a mosque in Gaza City’s Zeitoun neighborhood, a Hamas stronghold.
Jewish organizational officials met with Democratic representatives to discuss domestic and Israel-related issues. Hannah Rosenthal, executive director of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, said at least 35 Democratic members of the U.S. House of Representatives attended Tuesday’s meeting. It was planned for one hour, but lasted more than two.
Hezbollah reportedly disclosed the burial site of missing Israeli airman Ron Arad. Israel’s Channel Two television cited Lebanese reports that the militia had located Arad’s body in Nebi Sheet, a Shi’ite village east of Beirut, and intended to pass his remains to Israeli authorities for authentication.
Israeli conscientious objectors scuffled with settlers on the Gaza Strip boundary. Scores of Israelis who have refused to do mandatory military service held a demonstration at the Kissufim junction Wednesday, calling for Israeli troops to be withdrawn from Gaza.
The United States and Poland signed an agreement to protect sites associated with the Holocaust. “A special situation exists regarding Jewish cultural sites,” said Warren Miller, chairman of the U.S. Commission for the Preservation of America’s Heritage Abroad, who signed the agreement Tuesday with Poland’s ambassador to the United States, Prezemyslaw Grudzinski.
The Knesset rejected a bill banning Yitzhak Rabin’s assassin, Yigal Amir, from marrying. Only 14 lawmakers supported the bill proposed Wednesday by Eitan Cabel of the Labor Party; 60 opposed it. Amir, who is serving a life sentence in solitary confinement for killing the Israeli prime minister in 1995, recently got engaged and requested permission to marry.
Toronto’s Jewish federation recently launched a $250 million redevelopment project in the city. The project will include a public square, medical clinic and parkland project near the University of Toronto, as well as day camps, a Jewish high school and senior centers.
Israeli writers David Grossmann and Amos Elon won prestigious British literary prizes. The awards were presented last week. Grossmann won the 2004 Jewish Quarterly Wingate award for fiction for his novel “Someone to Run With,” which focuses on Israeli street kids by exploring the lives of two Israeli teenagers brought together by a labrador. Elon won the nonfiction award for “The Pity of it All: A Portrait of Jews in Germany, 1743-1933.”
The Israeli Embassy in New Zealand is investigating the detention at Auckland Airport of the treasurer of the Jewish Agency for Israel. Treasurer Shai Hermesh and his senior consultant, Yigal Sela, were detained by customs agents at the airport for several hours last week on suspicion that the two were Mossad agents or drug-runners or were illegally transporting food across borders.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
