Daily Kickoff: Day 12 in search for kidnapped boys | Primaries Today | Huckabee in Israel – Proposes Scarlett Johansson for U.S. Secretary of State
By Jacob Kornbluh & JI StaffOperation Brother’s Keeper DAY 12: Four arrested overnight in West Bank as sweep continues [ToI] — Israel Nabs Suspects In Passover Shooting [AP] — U.N. urges Israeli restraint in hunt for teens, warns of violence [Reuters] — U.N. Fails to Agree on Condemnation of Israel [INS] — Bendouin Trackers Hunting for Clues to Kidnapped Boys [NYTimes] — Israelis Uncover Explosives Workshops, Tunnels During Search for Kidnapped Teens [FreeBeacon] — HAPPENING TODAY: Rachel Frenkel, mother of Naftali Frenkel, will address the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva. She will be joined by the mothers of the other two kidnapped teenagers in order to enlist international help in freeing their children.
(more…)
Daily Kickoff: Day 11 in search for kidnapped boys | Bibi Meets The Press | Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones Celebrate Son’s Bar Mitzvah
By Jacob Kornbluh & JI Staff
BIBI MEETS THE PRESS: Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu, speaking on NBC’s Meet the Press, said that both the radical Shi’ites, led by Iran, and the radical Sunnis, led by al-Qaida and ISIS, should be weakened: “Weaken Both Sides: I think that there are two actions you have to take. One is to take the actions that you deem necessary to counter the ISIS takeover of Iraq, and the second is not to allow Iran to dominate Iraq the way it dominated Lebanon and Syria. So you actually have to work on both sides. As I say, you try to weaken both. There are actions that could be taken. Whatever I have to say on specific actions, I’ll obviously pass along to President [Barack] Obama and the U.S. Administration in other means, not even on Meet the Press…” (more…)
Daily Kickoff: Day 8 in search for kidnapped boys | Drudge Headline: Jews flee… (France) | Rangel Compares Tea Party to Hamas | Cavs Want Blatt
By Jacob Kornbluh & JI Staff
DAY 8: “A week of raids and arrests, but no hard lead to the kidnappers” by Avi Issacharoff:“The terrorist group that was able to kidnap the three Israeli teens from the Alon Shvut hitchhiking stop last Thursday will likely go down in the annals of the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) and Israeli intelligence forces as one of the most dangerous and sophisticated cells to have been active in the West Bank in recent years.“To disappear for more than a week with the entire Israeli army and intelligence force in hot pursuit is no easy task. Clearly, much thought and many resources were dedicated to it. Which begs the question: could it be that all this was a local initiative by a local Hamas cell acting of its own accord? Or was it a case of a few terrorists who instigated an attack under explicit orders from the political leadership of Hamas or, alternatively, its senior military leadership?” [ToI] (more…)
Daily Kickoff: Day 6 in search for kidnapped boys | How Yeshiva University Lost $1B | US, Iran close to a deal? | NY Mistrial – No Yiddish Translation
By Jacob Kornbluh & JI Staff
DEEP DIVE: “How To Lose $1 Billion: Yeshiva University Blows Its Future on Loser Hedge Funds” by Steven I. Weiss in TakePart: “What they couldn’t have known… a decade ago was that the real danger in Yeshiva’s new leadership was not to the school’s spiritual welfare but to its very existence. Over the years to come, the new leadership at Yeshiva would ramp up risk in the school’s investment portfolio, vastly increase spending, and do little to insure against a rainy day. When rainy days did arrive, with the global financial meltdown of 2008, Yeshiva was heavily exposed. Today, its finances are overwhelmed by a sea of red ink. According to a recent announcement by credit ratings agency Moody’s, the school will run out of cash next year. (more…)
Daily Kickoff: Josh Mandel shatters his own Israel Bonds record; Cantor to the Hamptons for Shabbat; Starbucks brings Israeli powermat tech to stores
By Jacob Kornbluh & JI Staff
Heard On Michael Fragin’s ‘Spin Class’ Radio Show — BuzzFeed: Eric Cantor Blames Democrats For Defeat, Supporter Phil Rosen Says: “What we’ve discovered is that out of the 60,000 people who voted in the Republican primary, 15,000 of them were Democrats and all of those votes — 100% of those votes — went against Eric Cantor,” Rosen said. “That factor is giant.” “I’ve heard it not just from Eric, I’ve heard it from 2 other people involved in politics in Virginia,” Rosen said.[BuzzFeed] — Open Primary: With Virginia’s open primary system, Democrats could attempt to influence the outcome of the race—and it appears that they may have tried to some degree. Virginia has no party registration, so voters can easily vote in a Republican primary one year and a Democratic primary the next. [Politico] — Ben Smith gets back to writing inside Jewish politics baseball in his piece “Eric Cantor, Anomaly – Jewish Republicanism never amounted to much. But can anyone hold the Kock and Adelson wings of the party together now?” [BuzzFeed] (more…)
