October 26, 2012 | 1:08 am

October 26, 2012

Posted by Shmuel Rosner

Barack Obama with chief of staff Jack Lew at the White House, July 2010. (Photo: Reuters)

In-depth

In Saudi Arabia and Israel, Signals That Iran Has Retaliation in Works

With the drone over Israel and a cyberattack on a Saudi oil company, Iran is sending a clear message to its foes, writes Bruce Riedel in the Daily Beast.

Iran’s capabilities to inflict substantial damage on the Saudi and other gulf-state oil industries by cyberwarfare are difficult for outsiders to assess. Iran is a relative newcomer; until now, it has been mostly a victim. Iranian and Hizbullah abilities to penetrate Israel’s anti-missile defenses are also hard to estimate. Those defenses are among the best in the world, thanks to years of U.S. military assistance and Israeli ingenuity.

Jack Lew's Shabbat Helper

The president's Orthodox chief of staff explains to Nathan Guttman of the Forward how he manages to both observe his faith and do his job. 

In practice, this arrangement has worked out well. On Fridays, Lew leaves the White House before Shabbat begins and he is off on Saturdays. In the cases where his presence was needed on Shabbat, the chief of staff usually walked to the White House and back. Rabbis he consulted with assured Lew that when there is a real necessity, Jewish tradition approves of working on the Sabbath.

George Allen, Born Again

 The Republican Senate candidate from Virginia has incorporated his newly revealed Jewish ancestry into his campaign, writes Allison Hoffman for Tablet Magazine.

“It’s something he knows is a fact, and he’s not exactly sure what to do with it,” said Levi Shemtov, the head of Chabad’s Washington office, who met Allen at a 2010 retreat in Virginia where the candidate was given a shofar that he now displays in his office. The speech Allen gave this June was a distilled version of the half-hour talk he gave at that Chabad event—a discourse into the various ways his mother’s wartime experience as a Jewish girl in Tunis warped her own Jewish identity and in turn effectively robbed her children of theirs.

Daily Digest

• Times of Israel: Deputy PM praises Likud’s merger with Yisrael Beytenu
• Haaretz: With Lieberman at his side, Netanyahu's war cabinet is on a one-way track to Iran
• Jerusalem Post: Rabin memorial canceled over groups' dispute
• Ynet: Sudan-Iran links under scrutiny after arms factory blast
• New York Times: Israeli Officials Asked to Be Silent on Issue of U.S.-Iran Talks
• Washington Post: Syria observes holiday cease-fire as rebels gain in Aleppo
• Wall Street Journal: The Islamist Threat Isn't Going Away

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