Israel Active

Second Lieutenant Nira Lee is the IDF’s assistant foreign liaison officer to international organizations in Gaza. During the latest conflict, she helped get a Gaza female aid worker to safety when sirens went off and the woman froze. The experience changed the woman’s perception of the IDF.

Israel has issued 20,000 permits to allow Christians to visit sites in Judea and Samaria during the upcoming Christmas holiday. This includes 500 for Palestinian Christians from Gaza. The Tourism Ministry is also providing free transportation by shuttle bus between Jerusalem and Bethlehem.

Of the 1,248 new graduate lawyers, 664 (53%) were female. Israeli Minister of Justice, Yaakov Neeman said, “It is moving to have all of you prepared to practice law in our Jewish democratic state”.

Maikel Nabil Sanad, a blogger and human rights activist in Egypt's Tahrir Square Uprising visits Israel for the first time to speak at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He was the first political prisoner of the post-revolutionary government and spent 302 days in an Egyptian jail.

Tal Zilker, from Southern Israel has the same type of cancer as his friend Qsuy Imran, from Gaza. Both are 17 years old and patients at the Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center where they play together on their playstations. Please read this amazing story.

Nearly three decades after immigrating to Israel, Belaynesh Zevadia returned to her village in Ethiopia, this time as Israel's ambassador. The local synagogue had been preserved, despite the fact that the village's Jewish population had left long ago.

A group of teenagers in the southern town of Yeruham have been making holders for Hanukkah candles out of the multicolored sands found in southern Israel. These have then been sold to a chain of convenience stores and to companies who present them to workers as Hanukkah gifts.

Jerusalem Village makes connections between young immigrants and Jerusalem’s existing young adult communities. It organizes Shabbat dinners for 200 people, Hebrew-speaking activities centered on photography, urban gardening, cooking, and even training for the Jerusalem Marathon.

Whilst the media drones on about threats to recall Ambassadors, the important news was that of the new Ambassadors of Croatia, Switzerland, India, Belgium and the Vatican who have just presented their credentials to Israel’s President Shimon Peres.

The head of the Navajo Nation, Ben Shelly, is in Israel learning about agriculture technology, tourism, capital infrastructure and government services in rural areas. Israel began helping the Native American Indians in 1986 by increasing crop yields through drip irrigation.