of Kotel rules. The incident, which is wit-
nessed by dozens of American participants
in town for the centennial celebration
of the women's Zionist group Hadassah,
stokes outrage among liberal American
Jewish groups.
Israel, a heated issue throughout the U.S.
presidential campaign, is mentioned 31
times by President Obama and Republican
nominee Mitt Romney at the final presi-

dential debate, which was devoted to for-
eign policy and held at Lynn University in
Boca Raton, Fla. Both candidates sought to
score points on the issue, but actual policy
differences seemed to be in short supply.
With a charter flight of some 240
Ethiopian immigrants, the Israeli govern-
ment launches what it says is the final
stage of mass immigration from Ethiopia
to Israel. The following summer, the

Jewish Agency for Israel announces that
the last Ethiopian aliyah flight will take
place in August 2013.
Hurricane Sandy hits the U.S. East
Coast, killing more than 100 and caus-
ing an estimated $50 billion in damages.
The populous Jewish areas of New York
and New Jersey see extreme damage, and
a Jewish man and woman are killed by
a falling tree in Brooklyn. Synagogues

Clockwise from

top left: Haredi

Orthodox Jews

watching the

victory speech

of President

Obama at the

American Center

in Jerusalem, Nov.

7, 2012. (Miriam

Alster/Flash90/

JTA)

Arlen Specter

Pinny Dembitzer

of the Seagate

Association, stand-

ing on the Brooklyn

community's shore,

OCTOBER

noting the long road

of cleanup that lies

ahead for the com-

munity, Nov. 18,

2012.

At Mazel Academy

in Brooklyn,

Torah scrolls were

unrolled to dry after

being damaged by

the floodwaters

from Hurricane

NSW

Sandy, Oct. 31,

1141irtit [iii
ups Ckpn V- I

044.44.4E40

2012. (Ben Harris)

Israeli police arrest

Anat Hoffman after

she said the Shema

1 1,411110
;7, 1 ri.rf [WiV'91*
h1
Jrri!'!'

rFi4

Israel prayer at

the Western Wall in

.!

Jerusalem, Oct. 16,

2012. (Women of

the Wall)

Ethiopian Jews

landing in Israel

and Jewish organizations nationwide join
efforts to raise money to help victims of
the superstorm.

NOVEMBER 2012
Moscow's Jewish Museum and Tolerance
Center opens to great fanfare.
President Obama is reelected, with
exit polls giving the incumbent about 68
percent of the Jewish vote — down from
the estimated 74 percent to 78 percent
in 2008. Many of the campaign battles
between Jewish surrogates were fought
over Middle East issues, but surveys
suggested that like most other voters,
American Jews were most concerned with
economic issues.
Major League Baseball's Delmon Young
pleads guilty to misdemeanor charges
related to an incident in New York in which
the Detroit Tigers' designated hitter yells
anti-Semitic slurs at a group of tourists
talking to a homeless panhandler wearing a
yarmulke. Young is sentenced in Manhattan
Criminal Court to 10 days of community
service and ordered to participate in a man-
datory restorative justice program run by
the Museum of Tolerance in New York.
After days of stepped-up rocket attacks
from Gaza, Israel launches Operation
Pillar of Defense with a missile strike that
kills the head of Hamas' military wing
in Gaza, Ahmed Jabari. In all, six Israelis
and an estimated 149 to 177 Palestinians
are killed during the weeklong exchange
of fire. Egypt helps broker the cease-fire
between the two sides.
A constitutional court in Poland bans
shechitah, Jewish ritual slaughter, along
with Muslim ritual slaughter. An effort in
July to overturn the ban fails.
The decision by Egyptian President
Mohamed Morsi to grant himself near-
absolute powers dismays U.S. and Israeli
observers just days after Morsi is lauded
for helping broker a Hamas-Israel cease-
fire. Morsi backtracks in December, but
the move helps stoke popular discontent in
Egypt with the country's first democrati-
cally elected president.
The U.N. General Assembly votes 138
to 9, with 41 abstentions, to recognize
Palestine as a state. Passage of the resolu-
tion, which does not have the force of law,
prompts condemnations from the United
States and warnings of possible penalties,
but none are invoked. Israel responds with
its own dire warnings and announces new
settlement construction in the West Bank.

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August 29 • 2013

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