JTA just published my story on yesterday’s raid at Agriprocessors, which the Feds are calling the largest such operation in American history. The plant, the country’s largest kosher slaughterhouse, was back in business today without the 390 of its employees detained on immigration violations. Criminal charges are expected to follow.

The Des Moines Register has been all over this story. Click here for their full coverage, including links to video and photos.

UPDATE: Members of the Conservative movement’s Hekhsher Tzedek Commission have just weighed in.

We, the members of the Hekhsher Tzedek Commission, condemn the corrupt practices of Agriprocessors which resulted in a raid by government agents. The actions of this company have brought shame upon the entire Jewish community. Yesterday’s discovery, along with the other violations of the ethical standards set forth by our Torah and our tradition underscore the need for Hekhsher Tzedek. To be sure, Halacha has never limited its concern to the ritual elements of Kashrut alone.

The Hekhsher Tzedek seal will ensure that no one in the Jewish community will turn a blind eye toward the treatment of workers, the impact that the production of kosher food might have on the environment, the welfare of the animals during the shehitah process, and the integrity of the company producing our food. The HT seal will assure the Kosher consumer that products that they purchase reflect the highest standards of Kashrut on both the ritual and ethical level.

The alarm in Postville has sounded once again. It is our hope that the entire Jewish community will accept the need for change and will join us in this sacred effort. Kashrut should always symbolize the best of our tradition…not otherwise.

Ha’aretz reports on one community center’s quest to bring cheerleading to Israel:

It is afternoon in the large hall of the Kiryat Rishon Community Center, as about 20 high-school girls in tight leotards are practicing acrobatic exercises on the floor. As the music comes on, they break into dance steps that will be integrated into the somersaults and cartwheels. This is what a warm-up session looks like at the Cheer Dance Academy (CDA - Hamerkaz Hayisraeli Le’idud), the only place in Israel that trains girls in cheerleading - which combines dance, acrobatics and calisthenics.

Jay Lefkowitz, a onetime Bush adviser, argues in the New York Sun today that the president’s faith in democracy and belief in the sanctity of life have produced a revolutionary U.S. policy benefiting both Israel and the Palestinians:

But while Mr. Bush’s record on Israel surely has not been the product of any political debt he may have owed the Jewish community, he nonetheless proceeded to remake America’s Arab-Israeli policy in the most profound way. The signal event was his Rose Garden speech on June 24, 2002. The president called for establishment of a Palestinian state, but set reform and democracy and abandonment of terror as conditions for establishment of the state: “It is untenable for Israeli citizens to live in terror. It is untenable for Palestinians to live in squalor and occupation. … My vision is two states, living side by side in peace and security.”

Never before has a president articulated as forcefully that a Palestinian State was an objective of our foreign policy. As I listened to the president deliver the speech and heard him speak about it in the subsequent days, I realized that the president had turned United States policy on its head — in a way that was not only sympathetic to Israel, but also pro-Palestinian.

Over at the Washington Post, Michael Abromowitz reports on critics who say that despite Bush’s good intentions his policies have ultimately been bad for Israel:

Appearing at an Israeli Embassy reception last Thursday to mark the 60th anniversary of the Jewish state, Vice President Cheney voiced a sentiment that is common among many American Jews, evangelicals and others. “Israel has never had a better friend in the White House than the 43rd president of the United States,” he said.

Yet as President Bush prepares to return to Jerusalem this week to celebrate the milestone, that assessment is the subject of fierce debate both here and Israel. Few doubt the sincerity of Bush’s passion, which has translated into unprecedented backing for Israeli self-defense and the most clearly stated presidential commitment to protect Israel if it is attacked.

But from left to right, Bush also faces criticism for pursuing Middle East policies that, many diplomats and analysts believe, have left Israel more threatened than when he assumed office in January 2001.

President Bush’s approval may be low, but he sure has a pretty big honorary entourage for his trip to Israel: (more…)

Gideon Levy of Ha’aretz uses the Olmert-Talansky scandal to raise concerns about the role of Diaspora money in Israel:

Revealing the identity of the primary witness, Morris Talansky, in the lastest Ehud Olmert affair raises questions that go beyond the prime minister. Serious questions need to be asked about the relationship between American Jewry and Israel.

Granted, Talansky is a mere individual, but he is not the only one. Jerusalem is full of wheeler-dealers, functionaries, lobbyists, donors and philanthropists. There are rich men and middlemen, envoys and delegations, many of them with good intentions, but some without.

They wheedle and schnorr and contribute to various causes. It’s the kind of schnorring that begins with Shaare Zedek Medical Center and could end in court. The question here is why did Talansky, or any other Jewish American, invest, allegedly, in Olmert? What do they receive in exchange for this pot stirring?

His conclusion:

No thank you, we’re doing all right. No thank you, some of you are causing us great damage. If you want to wield influence, do it in your own country. You have a lot of power and influence there. Perhaps too much; it’s none of our business. You are American, not Israeli citizens, and no amount of money can or should change this fact. War and peace, social justice and government, education and religion in Israel are a matter for its citizens alone.

Saree Makdisi, professor of English and comparative literature at UCLA and the author of “Palestine Inside Out: An Everyday Occupation,” says the two-state solution is dead — both sides must share the land, equally:

There is no longer a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Forget the endless arguments about who offered what and who spurned whom and whether the Oslo peace process died when Yasser Arafat walked away from the bargaining table or whether it was Ariel Sharon’s stroll through the Al Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem that did it in.

All that matters are the facts on the ground, of which the most important is that — after four decades of intensive Jewish settlement in the Palestinian territories it occupied during the 1967 war — Israel has irreversibly cemented its grip on the land on which a Palestinian state might have been created.

The New York Times had an article on Sunday suggesting that time might be just about out on President Bush’s plans for an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal:

When Israeli and Palestinian leaders committed themselves to peace talks after meeting in Annapolis, Md., last November, Mr. Bush had hopes of ending his presidency on a foreign policy high note, with a deal for the contours of a Palestinian state. But with Mr. Bush headed to the region this week for the second time in five months, peace seems as elusive as ever — and some are looking to his successor.

But in a lengthy interview with the Washington Post and Newsweek, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert argues that the best time to make a Syrian deal is with Bush still in office:

My personal view is that no one can be of better help to this process than President Bush. Because any new president in America, if confronted with this issue, will have to wait two years at least until he learns enough and finds the appropriate time to devote to this, while Bush knows, Bush is familiar, and Bush understands. Therefore, if one is interested in a [Syrian-Israeli] process that ultimately leads to a public endorsement by the United States of America, then he has to hurry up.

I believe, for reasons that I don’t want to go into, that for Syria, the road to Washington must cross Jerusalem. I know what I’m talking about.

Click here for the full Q & A with Olmert.

Some highlights from Heeb’s Hollywood issue:

Remember all the hoopla about two Orthodox Jews being on the Apprentice a few years back? Well, recently, BBC reports, one team lost a competition in the British version of the show because it failed in its quest to buy a kosher chicken:

As insults were traded among contestants on the losing team in this week’s Apprentice, Sir Alan Sugar berated the contestants for not knowing what a kosher chicken was.

It had to rank as one of the most peculiar spectacles in the history of the BBC reality game show, The Apprentice - a full-blown barney about what is and isn’t kosher. Contestants in this week’s episode had been flown to Marrakech in Morocco and instructed to bargain for a number of items on a shopping list, including a kosher chicken.

The media has been hungry for details about Long Island businessman Morris Talansky, the man whose questioning by Israeli police this week may bring down the Israeli prime minister. In case you’ve missed anything, here’s some highlights:

When the PM met Talansky: Olmert aides referred to him as “Mr. T.”

New details emerge about Talansky: The N.Y. Times reports that Talansky was twice accused of resorting to force to collect debts. Caught unshaven on a Jerusalem street (religious Jews don’t shave in the weeks after Passover), he denied being involved in politics.

U.S. financier at centre of Olmert case: Talansky flashes the thumbs-up sign, saying “I don’t understand what’s the big deal.”

Man in the mirror: A registered Democrat, Talansky is twice married and the father of three. One of his sons lives in Jerusalem, in the same neighborhood as former Chief Rabbi Ovadia Yosef.