Palestinian terrorists continue to fire rockets at Israel after a brief three-hour respite. [Times of Israel] Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called wounded Israeli soldier Ziv Shilon’s mother. [JPost] A few new key faces have been added to the political parties with the Israeli elections fast approaching. [Times of Israel] The Zionist Organization of America has canceled its annual fundraising dinner because it lost its tax-exempt status. [Forward] The Nevada Gaming Control Board could …More

More than half of all donations made to Israeli politicians’ campaigns over the past two years came from overseas contributors. Donations to political campaigns by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during that period amounted to $311,000, with 96.8 percent coming from outside Israel, according to Haaretz in a front page report on Friday. The paper wrote that Netanyahu received donations from several members of the Falick family from Miami, Florida. In total, the paper found that Israeli politicians raised …More

Incumbent Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez was reelected last night, narrowly beating out a challenger with Jewish heritage. Henrique Capriles, the grandson of Holocaust survivors, was closely watched within the Jewish community both locally and abroad. His race to the presidency opened new conversations about the Jewish voice in Venezuela, where anti-Semitism often makes headlines. Chavez has notoriously criticized the US and Israel, and has been seen as a friend of Iran and Palestine. Some media has reported …More

Ron Barber, a former aide to US Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, won her seat in a special election. Barber, who decided to run after Giffords formerly resigned her seat earlier this year to recover from a shooting in January 2011, defeated Jesse Kelly, a Republican who suffered a narrow defeat to Giffords in the 2010 election for the swing district in Arizona. Barber was wounded in the assassination attempt on Giffords, a Jewish Democrat. Jared Loughner, the acknowledged shooter, killed six others attending a …More

Jewish Republicans nationwide are hoping that a heated congressional race rematch in the New York suburbs puts a second Jewish Republican in the US House of Representatives. Following a narrow 593-vote defeat two years ago to Rep. Tim Bishop (D-NY), Jewish businessman Randy Altschuler again is running against the incumbent in New York’s 1st Congressional District, which encompasses parts of Suffolk County. Two years ago the New York Jewish Week reported that the district’s Jewish population was at 6 …More

Rob Lattin is Jspace News' Foreign Affairs Correspondent. In addition to covering foreign affairs for Jspace, Rob is a blogger on Israeli and Middle Eastern foreign policy for the Foreign Policy Association, as well as a freelance writer. He can be reached by email at rob@jspacecorp.com. Several weeks ago Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu successfully built the largest government coalition in Israeli history. By bringing in the centrist Kadima party, Netanyahu’s coalition holds an unprecedented 92 …More

Jimmy Carter said after what he called long discussions with Muslim Brotherhood leaders in Egypt that the group will try to modify the country's peace treaty with Israel. The former US president said May 26 following the conclusion of the first round of voting in Egypt's free presidential elections that the Muslim Brotherhood would seek to modify, but not destroy, the pact signed between Israel's Menachem Begin and Egypt's Anwar Sadat in 1979, Reuters reported. The Carter Center helped monitor the …More

Republican US Senate candidate Josh Mandel is returning campaign donations under investigation by federal authorities. Mandel's spokesman told the Cleveland Jewish News on Thursday that Mandel returned $105,000 from 21 donors from Suarez Corp. Industries, a marketing firm. Benjamin Suarez, the firm's Canton-based owner, may have reimbursed his employees for giving campaign contributions to the campaigns of Mandel and US Rep. Jim Renacci (R-Ohio), according to reports last week in the New Republic and the Toledo …More

On Sunday more than 50,000 ultra-Orthadox men gathered in CitiField Stadium to rally against the internet. Find out what organizer Eytan Kobre has to say about it. [The Atlantic] Israeli gunboats and an Egyptian clampdown of fuel smuggling into the Gaza strip are strangling the Palestinian enclave’s fishing area, harming fishermen. [Reuters] Israel continues to warn the international community not to be fooled by Iran apparently inching closer to entertaining concessions on its nuclear programs. [The …More

Israeli elections are likely to come a year earlier than scheduled. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reportedly has asked his advisers to look into holding new national elections in August or September, according to Ynet. October, right after the High Holidays, also is a possibility, according to reports. There has been no official announcement of early elections. The reasons for early elections include Netanyahu's desire to consolidate his position ahead of US elections in November, as well as the looming …More

Washington Mayor Vincent Gray has settled a lawsuit brought against the District of Columbia by a local rabbi over the date of special elections. Gray, a Democrat, agreed last week to introduce legislation to the City Council that would allow discretion by the district's Board of Elections and Ethics to schedule a special election to avoid conflicts with religious holidays. Rabbi Shmuel Herzfeld in his class-action suit against the board had called on the city to adopt a procedure that ensures that elections are …More

A shamed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu postponed the vote on the Trajtenberg Committee's recommendations until next week after he failed to muster majority support behind the controversial proposals. Political leaders from all parties fired back at Netanyahu’s decision, unofficially marking the beginning of campaign season for the next national elections. The report’s recommendations for social change, which include expanding early childhood education, raising employers’ share in national …More