Community welfare workshop held for ISF volunteers at Saudi
Dammam, September 9: The Indian Social Forum Karnataka (ISF) State Eastern Province conducted a community welfare activities workshop for the volunteers to deal with Indian community welfare cases in Saudi Arabia, at Rose Restaurant Auditorium here on September 7.
The objective of the workshop was to brief Indian social welfare activities and train ISF volunteer on how effectively they could get involved in the welfare activities of fellow NRIs in Saudi Arabia.
ISF secretary Mohammad Firoz explained the volunteers on the methods and techniques dealing with community welfare activities and highlighted the importance of coordinating with Indian Embassy while addressing the NRI issues. Naushad Katipalla, in-charge of the ISF community welfare team, conducted question and answer session for the audience. Being an authorized volunteer of the Indian Embassy, Naushad Katipalla has been assisting NRIs in several years in Saudi Arabia. ISF State Committee SWC member Arif Jokatte briefed about the Indian Social Forum activities.
Indian Social Forum volunteers Ibrahim Abdul Khader Alkhobar , Rafique Budoli AlHasa , Hasan Kinnigoli Jubail were felicitated for their excellent contributions to Indian community welfare activities in the recent past.
Earlier, general secretary of ISF Karnataka Muhammad Salahuddin welcomed the gathering and ISF president Mohammed Shareef appealed NRIs to join hands with Indian Social Forum to help the needy fellow Indians in Saudi Arabia.
General secretary of India Fraternity Forum, Sajid Valavoor, Tajamul Hussain Raichur Trust, Masada Nawin Bhandary, Mohammed Noumann, Sayyed Amir, Safeerul Haq Tamimi, Dr. Abhijit (Rahwda Hospital), Bandenawaz Bijapur, Anwar Sadath Mangaluru, Ibrahim Vasat Mangaluru, Suhail Mysuru, Iftikar Bangaluru, Mohammed Ashraf Helpy, Atik Mysuru, Hamid Hussain and syed Saifulla were present.
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Israel says rabbi who went missing in UAE was killed
Tel Aviv, Nov 24: Israel said Sunday that the body of an Israeli-Moldovan rabbi who went missing in the United Arab Emirates has been found after he was killed in what it described as a “heinous antisemitic terror incident.”
The statement from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said Israel “will act with all means to seek justice with the criminals responsible for his death.” There was no immediate comment from the UAE.
Zvi Kogan, 28, an ultra-Orthodox rabbi who went missing on Thursday, ran a Kosher grocery store in the futuristic city of Dubai, where Israelis have flocked for commerce and tourism since the two countries forged diplomatic ties in the 2020 Abraham Accords.
The agreement has held through more than a year of soaring regional tensions unleashed by Hamas' October 7, 2023 attack into southern Israel. But Israel's devastating retaliatory offensive in Gaza and its invasion of Lebanon, after months of fighting with the Hezbollah group, have stoked anger among Emiratis, Arab nationals and others living in the the UAE.
Iran, which supports Hamas and Hezbollah, has also been threatening to retaliate against Israel after a wave of airstrikes Israel carried out in October in response to an Iranian ballistic missile attack.
The Emirati government did not respond to a request for comment.
Early Sunday, the UAE's state-run WAM news agency acknowledged Kogan's disappearance but pointedly did not acknowledge he held Israeli citizenship, referring to him only as being Moldovan. The Emirati Interior Ministry described Kogan as being “missing and out of contact.”
“Specialised authorities immediately began search and investigation operations upon receiving the report,” the Interior Ministry said.
Netanyahu told a regular Cabinet meeting later Sunday that he was “deeply shocked” by Kogan's disappearance and death. He said he appreciated the cooperation of the UAE in the investigation and said that ties between the two countries would continue to be strengthened.
Israel's largely ceremonial president, Isaac Herzog, condemned the killing and thanked Emirati authorities for "their swift action." He said he trusts they “will work tirelessly to bring the perpetrators to justice.”
Kogan was an emissary of the Chabad Lubavitch movement, a prominent and highly observant branch of ultra-Orthodox Judaism based in Brooklyn's Crown Heights neighborhood in New York City. It said he was last seen in Dubai. The UAE has a burgeoning Jewish community, with synagogues and businesses catering to kosher diners.
The Rimon Market, a Kosher grocery store that Kogan managed on Dubai's busy Al Wasl Road, was shut Sunday. As the wars have roiled the region, the store has been the target of online protests by supporters of the Palestinians. Mezuzahs on the front and the back doors of the market appeared to have been ripped off when an Associated Press journalist stopped by on Sunday.
Kogan's wife, Rivky, is a US citizen who lived with him in the UAE. She is the niece of Rabbi Gavriel Holtzberg, who was killed in the 2008 Mumbai attacks.
The UAE is an autocratic federation of seven sheikhdoms on the Arabian Peninsula and is also home to Abu Dhabi. Local Jewish officials in the UAE declined to comment.
While the Israeli statement did not mention Iran, Iranian intelligence services have carried out past kidnappings in the UAE.
Western officials believe Iran runs intelligence operations in the UAE and keeps tabs on the hundreds of thousands of Iranians living across the country.
Iran is suspected of kidnapping and later killing British Iranian national Abbas Yazdi in Dubai in 2013, though Tehran has denied involvement. Iran also kidnapped Iranian German national Jamshid Sharmahd in 2020 from Dubai, taking him back to Tehran, where he was executed in October.
