Aliyah from down under

        
Global "Aliyah" (ascent) from the Jewish diaspora to Israel is up only about one per cent to 19,200 in 2013, the J-Wire news service reports, citing data compiled by the Jewish Agency for Israel and the Ministry of Immigration and Absorption.
But 265 immigrants from Oceania, mainly Australia and New Zealand, in 2013 represented a 46 per cent increase on the 182 who migrated in 2012.
Continue reading: http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/breaking-news/jewish-migration-from-down-under-rises/story-fni0xqi4-1226792100228

Calls to ban Nicolas Anelka

European Jewish Congress President Moshe Kantor wants the Premier League to ban Nicolas Anelka after the bad boy of French football caused an outcry in his country by celebrating a goal scored with a gesture viewed as being anti-Semitic.
Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/jewish-group-asks-premier-league-ban-anelka-102801654--spt.html

Tweets and deletes

Foreign policy experts criticized reporter Laura Rozen for tweeting, and then deleting, controversial remarks about Jewish influence in American politics, the second time in recent weeks she has made such remarks.
Read more: http://freebeacon.com/rozen-jewish-senators-hold-sway-on-iran-debate/

UK Foreign Office reacts to tweet

The Foreign Office has reacted with disgust to a post from the Twitter account of Iran’s Supreme Leader saying: “The Zionists are just like the Nazis.”
...In an unusually strong reaction, a Foreign Office spokesperson said: “We deplore the tweet. The comments to which it referred were highly objectionable and offensive.”
Read more: http://jewishnews.co.uk/uk-slams-khamenei-tweet-linking-jews-to-nazis/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=uk-slams-khamenei-tweet-linking-jews-to-nazis

Jewish heirs' request refused

The German government has refused a request to hand back two paintings once owned by a Jewish businessman persecuted by the Nazis.

Germany's Finance Ministry says it won't return the 18th-century paintings by Bernardo Bellotto to the heirs of Max Emden because he had already fled to Switzerland when he sold them.

Continue reading: http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wireStory/german-govt-rejects-jewish-heirs-demand-art-21259652

French Aliyah

In an overcrowded conference room in the heart of Paris’ 14th arrondissement, a hundred French Jews are losing their patience.
They have gathered at the Paris office of the Jewish Agency for Israel for a lecture on immigrating to Israel, but the agency staff is running behind. Its 20 staffers are coping with a 57 percent jump in the number of French Jews moving to Israel over the last year and a surge of applications. In addition to four weekly public talks, they are struggling to finish 30 applicant interviews each day.
Read more: http://www.timesofisrael.com/surge-in-anti-semitic-attacks-drives-record-levels-of-french-aliyah/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

Revising a memorial plaque

The Russian city of Rostov-on-Don has agreed to acknowledge the Jewish identity of Holocaust victims killed there by the Nazis.
The municipality’s Memorial Council last week announced its decision to revise a memorial plaque at the Zmievskaya Balka mass grave to mention the Jewish identity of the majority of the approximately 27,000 bodies buried there in 1942, the Russian Jewish Congress said.
Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/12/17/news-opinion/world/russian-jews-win-rostov-holocaust-commemoration-fight#ixzz2nkqnoHcA

Lev Tahor and child welfare

Ontario child welfare authorities have taken two children into protective custody from the reclusive Jewish group Lev Tahor, the Toronto Star has learned.
Read more: http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2013/12/16/lev_tahor_two_children_sized_by_childrens_aid_from_orthodox_jewish_sect.html

Claim about Jewish bankers

A populist protest leader’s claim that Italy is “slave to Jewish bankers” has drawn condemnation.
Andrea Zunino, spokesman for the Forconi, or Pitchforks Movement, which spearheaded widespread anti-government and anti-austerity protests in Italy last week, made the comment in an interview with La Repubblica newspaper Friday.
Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/12/15/news-opinion/world/italy-is-slave-to-jewish-bankers-populist-leader-declares#ixzz2nY9x3kfK

Seized items

A Babylonian Talmud from 1793, a 16^th century Hebrew bible, a text of the mystical Zohar — among 2,400 great artifacts of the once flourishing Jewish community of Iraq went on exhibit on November 8 at the National Archives in Washington. Three days earlier, reports had surfaced of the existence of another near-priceless trove — 1,400 works of art unearthed in a Munich apartment building and belonging to Jews of Nazi Germany.
Read more: http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2013/12/12/seized-iraq-jews-column/3989173/

Light Unto the World Award

A Jewish organization based in the United States (US) will present an award to the Philippines in a ceremony that will recognize the country's gesture of opening its doors for 1,305 Jewish refugees during World War 2.
The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC), the world's leading Jewish humanitarian organization, will award the Philippines with the Or L’Olam or Light Unto the World Award on Thursday, on the occasion of its centennial anniversary.
Read more: http://www.philstar.com/headlines/2013/12/11/1266927/jewish-group-honor-phl-accepting-refugees-ww2

Blogger crticial of Hasidic leaders wins suit

A blogger who boasts that his critiques of Hasidic leaders in Outremont have revealed “revolting” practices and flushed out “bugs” from darkened corners has successfully defended a libel suit brought against him by three prominent community leaders.
Continue reading: http://news.nationalpost.com/2013/12/09/montreal-blogger-harshly-critical-of-hasidic-jews-wins-libel-suit-brought-against-him-by-three-prominent-leaders/

Vile tweets

Non-Jewish Olympian, Rebecca Adlington, Experiences Vile Antisemitism

5000$ Reward

​Leaders of the New York City Jewish community are calling for the capture of participants involved in the recent rash of violent “knockout” assaults, and are offering a cash award for information leading to their arrest.
The Jewish Community Relations Council of New York (JCRC-NY) announced this week that they’re willing to pay upwards of $5,000 to anyone who can assist local law enforcement to stop the wave of attacks, which have made national headlines in recent weeks and spawned a trend of similar assaults across the country.
Continue reading: http://rt.com/usa/nyc-jewish-knockout-award-864/

European Union regrets

The European Union regrets the attendance at an event it sponsored of an anti-Zionist rabbi who has been accused of Holocaust denial, the parliament spokeswoman has said.

Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/12/06/news-opinion/world/european-parliament-regrets-hosting-rabbi-accused-of-holocaust-denial#ixzz2mhoSgBLT

Cumbo's Facebook page

A newly elected New York City Council member has angered Jewish groups by linking “knockout game” attacks in Brooklyn to black resentment of Jews.
Councilwoman-elect Laurie Cumbo, who is black, wrote on her public Facebook page that black residents in Crown Heights feared being “pushed out by their Jewish landlords.”
Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/brooklyn/councilwoman-black-jewish-resentment-talk-slammed-article-1.1538099#ixzz2maBHXSih

Loosening restrictions

A top Conservative movement official thinks that Conservative rabbis should be allowed to participate in interfaith weddings.
Now explicitly barred by the movement, the proposal — put forward by Rabbi Charles Simon of the Federation of Jewish Men’s Clubs — is one of a handful of new efforts by Conservative rabbis to loosen restrictions on participation by non-Jews in synagogue life.
Read more: http://forward.com/articles/188511/conservative-rabbis-set-to-debate-opening-the-door/?p=all#ixzz2mLbcP59q

Hasidic man victim of KO game

A Hasidic man walking along a Williamsburg street Sunday night became the latest victim of the ugly “knockout game,’’ in which innocent people are sucker-punched by strangers.
Read more: http://nypost.com/2013/12/02/hasidic-man-targeted-in-knockout-attack/

Karate KO

He wants to pump Jew up! A cop-turned-rabbi is on a quest to toughen up city Jews being targeted by “knockout” thugs.
“If Jewish kids started fighting back, they wouldn’t get picked on so much,” said Gary Moskowitz, a seventh-degree karate black belt. “I’m just trying to encourage the Jewish community to do that.”
Continue reading: http://nypost.com/2013/12/01/karate-rabbi-wants-to-train-jewish-kids-to-combat-knockout-thugs/

Supreme leader of the Palestinian Muslims warns

The supreme leader of the Palestinian Muslims and guardian of Islam's most sacred shrine in the Old City of Jerusalem has warned of an uprising and regional war if Jews attempt to take greater control of the al Aqsa Mosque complex.

The warning came amid advancing efforts in the Israeli parliament to try to take administrative control of the sacred Islamic site which Jews also lay claim to as it sits on the remains of their Second Temple.
Read more: http://news.sky.com/story/1175709/sacred-shrines-become-ticking-time-bomb

Jewish outreach in Australia

As Jewish communities in major cites celebrate the start of the Chanukah festival this week, one group is heading into country Australia to support Jewish people living in isolated areas without a synagogue or connection to their culture.
The founder of Chabad of Rural and Remote Australia, Saul Spigler, says while the census lists only 3,600 Jews as living in remote areas, the work of his group indicates there could be between 7000 and 10,000 in regional areas.
Read more: http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/bushtelegraph/chabad-of-rara-takes-jewish-outreach-to-isolated-communities/5122448

Enrollment in French private schools

Most French Jewish parents enroll their children in private schools because of anti-Semitism, a leader of France’s Jewish community said.
Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/11/26/news-opinion/world/french-jewish-leader-majority-of-jews-too-afraid-to-put-kids-in-public-school#ixzz2lnFgxvnB

Reassurances

White House officials have held at least three conference calls with various leaders of the American-Jewish community to reassure them since the nuclear deal between Iran and the major Western powers was announced, CNN has learned.
Continue reading: http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2013/11/25/administration-tries-to-reassure-american-jewish-groups/

Hate crimes

The FBI has released their statistics for hate crimes in 2012 and the numbers show that almost 2/3 of religious hate crimes are committed by offenders with an anti-Jewish bias.
Continue reading: http://www.breitbart.com/InstaBlog/2013/11/25/Two-Thirds-of-Religious-Hate-Crimes-Come-from-Anti-Jewish-Bias

Thanksgiving Hanukkah overlap

Chicago-area Jews greet overlap of Thanksgiving, Hanukkah with gratitude

Thanksgiving Hanukkah overlap

Chicago-area Jews greet overlap of Thanksgiving, Hanukkah with gratitude

Suspending ties

Brandeis University has decided to suspend its partnership with a Palestinian university over what it calls a failure by leadership to condemn an on-campus demonstration in which marchers reportedly made what Brandeis officials said looked like Nazi salutes.
Read more: http://bigstory.ap.org/article/us-university-cuts-ties-palestinian-school

Knockout game and Jewish victims

A new and brutal "game" that appears to be gaining popularity among some teens has  targeted victims in several cities, reports CBS New York. 
It's called "knockout."
...
State Assemblyman Dov Hikind told the station, "It's 'knockout,' and it happens to be a Jew in each and every case."

Other "knockout" attack victims in Brooklyn include a 20-year-old man from Israel and a 12-year-old boy who was attacked on his way to Hebrew school.
Read more: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504083_162-57613157-504083/knockout-game-targeting-victims-in-several-cities-report-says/

Rare Jewish manuscript up for auction

JEwish manuscript up for auctionA rare Jewish manuscript created for the Oppenheimer banking dynasty is expected to be sold to a foreign collector when it comes up for auction next week. It was discovered forgotten in a soup box in a semi-detached house in north Manchester.
...The velum manuscript, which contains more than 50 coloured scenes from the Torah, was taken to Amsterdam where an expert concluded it was the work of Aaron Wolff Herlingen, scribe to the Imperial Court in Vienna in the mid-18th century.
Read more: http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/news/rare-jewish-manuscript-found-in-garage-expected-to-fetch-500000-8947620.html

Polish Forbes apologizes

The Polish edition of Forbes magazine apologized for three articles about the restitution of prewar property of Jewish communities that targeted the leaders of Poland’s organized Jewish community and several Jewish organizations.

Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/11/18/news-opinion/world/polish-forbes-magazine-apologizes-to-jewish-leaders#ixzz2l2wlL030

Hadassah celebrates

Hadassah’s Boston chapter marks 100th anniversary

100 years ago, group began its mission of aiding health care in Israel
Read more: http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2013/11/18/boston-chapter-hadassah-jewish-women-volunteer-organization-celebrates-centennial/XlaQc2512G8VkVxir22zcO/story.html

Jewish values

Below is an excerpt from an article titled Book excerpt: How New Tigers manager Brad Ausmus' Jewish heritage molded him.

Have Jewish values osmotically or otherwise filtered into Brad’s personality, which are expressed in the way he handles life situations?
“I think certainly some of my mother’s values have. She is Jewish, she was raised in a Jewish household, and those values have been instilled in me. I am able to tell you what my mother’s values are. Treating everyone the same, assuming the best in everyone, assuming everyone is a good person until they prove otherwise, just generally being kind. I see Judaism as my heritage. Not only was my mother born and raised Jewish, but both my grandparents, who were two of my favorite people, were very much practicing Jews.
http://www.freep.com/article/20131117/SPORTS02/311170119/detroit-tigers-brad-ausmus-jewish-heritage

Defying the charter

Montreal’s Jewish General Hospital, one of Quebec’s most prominent institutions, has fired a strong message to the Quebec government saying it will not play along with any part of the proposed religious dress code in the charter of values.
Read more: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/montreal-jewish-hospital-to-defy-quebec-secular-charters-dress-code/article15433805/

Israel breaks record

Israel has broken the Guinness world record for donating the most hair to cancer victims in a single drive, producing 53.1 kilograms (117 pounds) on Monday. The previous Guinness record was 48.7 kilograms (107 pounds).
Read more: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=13253&r=1

New legislation on non-medical circumcision in Norway

Norway will promote new legislation to “regulate ritual circumcision,” the country’s health minister said.
Bent Hoie said the new legislation on non-medical circumcision of boys under 18 will be introduced before April 20, according to a report by the Norwegian daily Aftenposten.

Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/11/12/news-opinion/world/norway-to-introduce-new-regulations-on-circumcision#ixzz2kTJnHNds

A mouthpiece for Bibi

Italian Jewish actor Moni Ovadia has distanced himself from Milan's Jewish community, calling it a mouthpiece for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government.
"I no longer want to be part of an entity called a Jewish community that is nothing but a government propaganda bureau," the 67-year-old actor told the daily Il Fatto Quotidiano last week.
Ovadia, an actor and musician who attracts thousands to his Yiddish cultural productions, is known for his left-wing politics and strong criticism of Israel's occupation and settlement policies.
Continue reading: http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/jewish-world-news/.premium-1.557307

Kristallnacht commemorated

Germans across the country on Saturday commemorated the 75th anniversary of Kristallnacht — the night of broken glass — during which the Nazis staged a wave of attacks on Jews in Germany and Austria.
Continue reading: http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Latest-News-Wires/2013/1109/Germans-mark-Kristallnacht-with-candle-light-vigils-tales-from-Jewish-survivors

In bad taste

A health spa has offered potential customers the chance to enjoy a ‘long romantic Kristallnacht’ - just days before the 75th anniversary of the Nazi atrocity with the same name.

The astonishing error was made by Kristall Sauna-Wellnesspark in Bad Klosterlausnitz, Germany, in an advert on its website which was accompanied by a photograph of candles.

The spa’s owners have apologised for their ‘insensitive naming of this event’ and admitted it was ‘extremely inappropriate’ - but claimed they often tagged part of their name, Kristall, onto events.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2488114/Shocking-Kristallnacht-advert-German-spa-eve-75th-anniversary-Nazi-atrocity.html#ixzz2jqey2Qoo

Holocaust items on eBay

Online auction site eBay is facing an international storm of outrage after it was revealed to be profiting from the repulsive trade in Holocaust memorabilia.

Items for sale include the clothes of concentration camp victims. Among dozens of sick souvenirs on offer last week was a striped uniform thought to have belonged to a Polish baker who died in Auschwitz, which was on sale for £11,200.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2485251/Ebays-sick-trade-Holocaust-souvenirs-Outrage-auctions-Death-Camp-relics.html#ixzz2jY2aLRij

South African Jewish cemetery vandalized

Dozens of gravestones were pushed over at a Jewish cemetery in South Africa.
Many of the 30 to 40 desecrated gravestones were broken in the Oct. 27 attack in Krugersdorp, according to Ryan Machet, a resident of the mining city in northwest South Africa.
Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/10/31/news-opinion/world/jewish-cemetery-in-south-africa-vandalized#ixzz2jP930bsf

The Jewish Cardinal

‘The Jewish Cardinal’ opens 17th UK film festival

Nazi loot

A major investigation into whether art hanging in Dutch museums may have once been Nazi loot has yielded an unexpectedly large result: 139 suspect works, including ones by masters like Matisse, Klee and Kandinsky.
Read more: http://www.ctvnews.ca/entertainment/dutch-museums-uncover-139-artworks-likely-looted-during-nazi-era-1.1518872#ixzz2j9HYP218

Mensch on a bench

A Massachusetts native says his ‘elf envy’ led to creating a holiday alternative to Elf on a Shelf for Jewish kids during Hanukkah.

 

 Entrepreneur Neal Hoffman, a former employee of Hasbro Toys in Rhode Island, is the creator of “The Mensch On A Bench,” a toy and book based on the character “Moshe the Mensch.”
Continue reading: http://boston.cbslocal.com/2013/10/28/mass-native-creates-jewish-alternative-to-elf-on-a-shelf/

Jury awards man $900,000

A delivery man for the midtown (Manhattan) restaurant Mangia 57 has won a $900,000 jury verdict, payback for the anti-Semitic harassment heaped upon him by three supervisors at the eatery.
“It’s a very happy ending — I’m in another world,” said an ecstatic Adam Wiercinski, of Washington Heights.
Continue reading: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/10/29/jewish-man-awarded-00g-over-nazi-gas-chamber-jokes/

Facing disciplinary hearing

A RELIGIOUS education teacher is facing a disciplinary hearing over claims he told a class of pupils that "Hitler was not all bad - he killed the Jews".
Continue reading: http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/home-news/hearing-for-teacher-over-hitler-remarks.22502512

Torah scroll returned

A Torah scroll previously kept at a museum has been returned to members of the Jewish community in Herefordshire.

Members of the community have raised more than £500 to conserve the Sefer Torah scroll, which was gifted to the county's museum in 1933.

Mark Walton, chair of the Jewish group, said the scroll - a handwritten copy of the holiest book within Judaism - was "hugely significant".
Continue reading: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hereford-worcester-24639921

Pope commits to further Jewish-Catholic dialogue

Pope Francis reaffirmed his commitment to fighting discrimination and furthering Jewish-Catholic dialogue.
Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/10/25/news-opinion/world/francis-pledges-to-further-jewish-catholic-dialogue#ixzz2ikMvRHVZ

Chuck Schumer's attempt

Sen. Chuck Schumer is trying to stop a State Department plan to return 2,700 ancient Jewish artifacts to Iraq.
The artifacts — including 2,700 books and tens of thousands of documents — were stolen from Baghdad's Jewish community by former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.
Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/schumer-halt-return-jewish-artifacts-iraq-article-1.1494171#ixzz2idQwnBoU

Egyptian family turns down Israeli award

A member of the family of the first Arab honored by Israel for risking his life to save Jews during the Holocaust says the family isn't interested in the recognition.
The Egyptian doctor Mohamed Helmy was honored posthumously last month by Israel's Holocaust memorial for hiding Jews in Berlin during the Nazis' genocide, but a family member tracked down by The Associated Press this week in Cairo said her relatives wouldn't accept the award, one of Israel's most prestigious.
Continue reading: http://news.yahoo.com/relative-egyptian-family-rejects-israel-honor-081738526.html

UC Berkley Jewish studies program

The University of California, Berkeley is launching a Center for Jewish Studies.
The university made the announcement of the center, for which it allotted $1 million, on Wednesday. The center will be inaugurated Oct. 30.
Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/10/16/news-opinion/united-states/cal-berkeley-starting-jewish-studies-center#ixzz2hwp9Y94f

Breitbart News - Norman Rosenbaum interview

On Monday, Breitbart News spoke with Norman Rosenbaum, brother of Yankel Rosenbaum, the Orthodox Jewish victim of a violent mob at the 1991 Crown Heights, who was killed within days of Al Sharpton stating, “If the Jews want to get it on, tell them to pin their yarmulkes back and come over to my house.”
Read more: http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Journalism/2013/10/14/Brother-Sharpton-Crown-Heights

I come to Alabama

Five years ago, a Jewish businessman who was worried that his synagogue was dying put up $1 million to fund a program to recruit fellow Jews to move to a corner of the Deep South best known for peanuts.
Alabama might not be the promised land, but the plan worked.

The menurkey

Never too young to become an entrepneur?

Asher Weintraub, a 9-year-old boy in New York City, has created and trademarked a “Menurkey,” which is a menorah in the shape of a turkey, and he’s selling ceramic and plaster versions online, ranging from $50 to $150.
Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2013/10/this-wont-happen-for-another-79000-years/#UJUTstyYu3y65s7i.99

Sunday events

Jewish book fair kicks off Sunday

The presentation at the JCC, 11155 SW 112th Ave., Kendall, begins with a photo exhibit and film at 2 p.m., with the authors appearing at 3 p.m.  (n South Florida)

Free helmet giveaway for Orthodox Jews in Brooklyn set for Sunday

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/10/12/3681557/jewish-book-fair-kicks-off-sunday.html#storylink=cpy

Sold under duress

A hoard of medieval gold church treasure in a Berlin museum faces conflicting claims from the heirs of Jewish art dealers who say their forefathers were pressured into selling it in 1935 by the Nazis.
Read more: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-10-08/jewish-dealers-heirs-claim-treasure-bought-by-goering.html

Anti-semite to be canonized?

Christians and Jews are mounting campaigns for and against a path to sainthood for British writer G.K. Chesterton (1874-1936), one of the world’s best-known Catholic converts.
...Chesterton’s views on Jews may have been best expressed in an essay titled “The Problem of Zionism,” in which he said that Jews holding high public office should dress as “orientals,” to remind people of their allegiance and origin.
Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/30/saint-gk-chesterton-canonization_n_4018858.html?utm_hp_ref=religion

Remembered in Malden

They are forgotten no more.
The 1,439 souls who are buried in a once-abandoned burial ground in Malden were recently recognized in a solemn ceremony that celebrated their lives and the restoration of the second-oldest Jewish cemetery in Massachusetts.
Read more and see video: http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/regionals/north/2013/10/05/jewish-cemetery-malden-restored-honor-its-forgotten-souls/JCHC7A3xHTXpdo6w0JdjNP/story.html

HaHa

A sweeping new survey from the Pew Research Center, "Portrait of Jewish Americans," finds humor is one of the main qualities that four in 10 of the nation's 5.3 million religious and cultural Jews say is essential to their Jewish identity. The survey was released Tuesday.
Read more: http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/10/01/survey-jewish-religion-humor/2902147/

The sniper grandfather

A steel-eyed Nazi killer picks off Jewish prisoners with a rifle from a balcony in a concentration camp in 1944.
More than six decades later, a Nigerian-German woman who has studied in Israel thumbs through a book about the sniper and is shocked to learn the man is her own grandfather.
 - See more at: http://www.vanguardngr.com/2013/09/nigerian-german-learns-grandfather-jewish-prisoners-killer/#sthash.4nuN3aY8.dpuf

President Peres to visit Potuguese Synagogue

Israeli President Shimon Peres will pay a 3-day official state visit to Holland at the invitation of King Willem-Alexander to reaffirm the good relations between the two countries.  

On Sunday, President Peres will visit the Hollandsche Schouwburg and the Portuguese Synagogue in Amsterdam.

Continue reading: http://www.ejpress.org/article/68117

Easing human suffering

Rabbi Jeffrey Kahn spent his 30-year career educating others and helping to ease human suffering, leading Jewish congregations in Australia, Illinois, his hometown of Miami and New Jersey.

Now, he is practicing his faith in a different line of work: Kahn runs a dispensary for medical marijuana.

Read more: http://abcnews.go.com/Health/rabbi-ties-jewish-faith-medical-marijuana-dispensary/story?id=20348883

Security cameras to be installled in Borough Park

A hundred security cameras will be installed on public lampposts throughout the Midwood and Borough Park neighborhoods in the coming months — the result of a $1 million state grant secured in the wake of a horrifying tragedy: the 2011 abduction, dismemberment and murder of an 8-year-old Hasidic boy named Leiby Kletzky.
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/09/22/next-big-nyc-camera-installation-set-for-jewish-neighborhood-where-boy-was/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+foxnews%2Fnational+%28Internal+-+US+Latest+-+Text%29#

Hawking his wares on Yom Kippur

Isaac Mizrahi was hawking his shirts, boots and bags Saturday on QVC during his show, “Isaac Mizrahi Live.” The only problem is the popular Jewish designer now has the city’s Jewish community in an uproar, since he was furiously working and tweeting on Yom Kippur.

...The well-respected author Rabbi Shmuley Boteach, known as “America’s Rabbi,” weighed in on why the Jewish community is upset.
“It seems now G-d isn’t going to be one of his customers, because it is a pretty big account to lose,” Boteach told us. “Modern people have to learn to put values before money, and if Sandy Koufax could give up the World Series for Yom Kippur, then Isaac Mizrahi could give up a few hours of hawking some of his wares.”
Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/gossip/confidential/mizrahi-latest-proves-tough-fit-holiday-article-1.1457977#ixzz2fGLbds63

Allowing hate speech

Facebook, Inc. came under fire on Tuesday for allowing hate speech against Jews to proliferate in its online community.

A group called “Remove Hate From FB” said the online site has gone far in blocking pages denigrating other minority groups, but attacks against Jews are allowed to linger online.
Read more: http://www.algemeiner.com/2013/09/17/facebook-under-fire-for-allowing-hate-speech-against-jews-to-proliferate-online/

The Yiddish speaking model

Yoel Weisshaus, a 32-year-old student at New Jersey’s Bergen Community College who was raised in Brooklyn as a Satmar hasid, was featured this week American Apparel’s tumblr page with peyos (earlocks), a flowing beard, and traditional hasidic fur hat.
Read more: http://www.jpost.com/Jewish-World/Jewish-Features/American-Apparels-latest-campaign-A-peasant-with-chutzpah-325348

Call to condemn riots

The rabbi of the Western Wall called on the world to condemn riots by Muslims on the Temple Mount during Rosh Hashanah.
Palestinians threw rocks at police and at Jewish worshipers on Friday on the Temple Mount, the holiest site for Jews, following Muslim prayer services at the Al-Aksa Mosque there, as well as at sites in the Old City of Jerusalem. Some 15 rioters were arrested.
Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/09/08/news-opinion/israel-middle-east/condemn-muslim-riots-on-temple-mount-rabbi-says#ixzz2eL0X0VYk

Burnt Kensington Menorah

The most important Jewish holiday

Older and younger Jews agree that Yom Kippur tops Passover as the most important Jewish holiday. But the Jewish Day of Atonement, which falls on Sept. 13, is not as important to younger Jews.
Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/on-faith/survey-yom-kippur-passover-top-jewish-holiday-list/2013/09/03/2d12cd70-14d9-11e3-b220-2c950c7f3263_story.html

Financial incentives for Jews to move South

USAToday reports Jewish families offered incentives to move South.

As Jews prepare to celebrate Rosh Hashanah - the Jewish New Year - throughout the world starting at sundown Wednesday, congregations in Southern states including Mississippi, Alabama, North Carolina and Oklahoma and Jewish organizations are increasingly working to preserve Jewish identity in the South and to try to ensure it flourishes.
In some places, the effort is taking an unorthodox turn - and working.
In Dothan, Ala. - a city of about 67,000 near the Florida border - one group offers as much as $50,000 to Jewish families willing to move to the town and stay at least five years.
Read more: http://www.freep.com/usatoday/article/2759453

Petitioning Polish court to reverse shechita ban

The umbrella group representing Polish Jews petitioned Poland’s constitutional court to reverse a ban on ritual slaughter methods.
Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/09/02/news-opinion/world/polish-jews-take-kosher-slaughter-ban-to-court#ixzz2dkz5MEoO

Surviving a tormentor

By all accounts, Irene Hizme shouldn’t have lived through her three years at Auschwitz, where she suffered daily medical experiments at the hands of the Nazis’ Angel of Death — Dr. Josef Mengele.
Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/triumph_over_nazi_evil_dBv3juY4Dz370FRJIf0LzJ

Prince Charles will make history

Prince Charles will make history on Sunday (Sept. 1) when he attends the installation of Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis at a London synagogue.
It will be the first time a British royal has attended such a ceremony.
Continue reading: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/31/prince-charles-chief-rabbi-ephraim-mirvis_n_3845959.html

Lists of Jewish and black leaders found

Federal agents were tracking Ohio resident Richard Schmidt’s imports of counterfeit sports jerseys when they stumbled upon his arsenal of 18 guns, more than 40,000 rounds of ammunition, and bulletproof body armor. Besides the arsenal, he had lists of Jewish and black leaders in Detroit, MI.
Read more: http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2013/08/30/2556291/neo-nazi-felon-stockpiling-guns/

Dismissing Jewish students' complaints

The U.S. Department of Education has dismissed Jewish students' contentions that anti-Israel protests at UC Berkeley created an illegally hostile and anti-Semitic atmosphere on that campus.

The department's civil rights office has determined that the campus protests last year against Israel's treatment of Palestinians, which reportedly included mock military checkpoints, may be upsetting to Jews but "do not constitute actionable harassment," according to a letter from the department released by the University of California on Tuesday.
Read more: http://www.latimes.com/local/la-me-berkeley-probe-20130828,0,7918251.story

Probe of suspected Nazi guards

The head of the special German prosecutors' office that investigates Nazi crimes says a probe of 50 suspected former Auschwitz guards is near complete and may result in charges against many of them.
Continue reading: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/international/former_auschwitz_guards_investigated_ab40sd4sNf6lUeepak8xGO

Young boy mourned

Aaron Tepfer, 10, was supposed to start the sixth grade at a Far Rockaway Jewish school Monday. Instead, hundreds gathered at his funeral service at the school Sunday to mourn the Cedarhurst boy who died after his leg became stuck in a boat propeller Friday.
Continue reading: http://www.newsday.com/long-island/nassau/boy-whose-leg-was-stuck-in-boat-propeller-mourned-1.5952094

Swastikas in Toronto

An anti-semitic incident was reported Thursday in a neighborhood with many Jewish residents in Vaughan, a city in the York region, north of Toronto, Canada. According to Shalom Toronto, the swastikas were painted on parked cars off of Beverly Glen Road.
Read more: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/171239

Nixon on the Jews

Some Newly Uncovered Nixon Comments on the Subjects of Jews and Black People

Tradition tradition

The New York Times writes about "a pressure to accommodate traditions" in New York.

Two years ago, when the city transferred a female lifeguard at Williamsburg’s Metropolitan Pool to a beach and replaced her with a man, Hasidic women stopped going and felt cheated.

“It’s the only exercise I get,” said Rose Herschkowitz, a Satmar Hasid who swam with her 85-year-old mother.

They turned to their local councilman, Stephen Levin, explaining that wearing bathing suits under the eyes of a male lifeguard would violate the tradition of modestly clothing themselves before men who are not their husbands. Mr. Levin agreed that it was “a reasonable accommodation.” But parks officials did not see it that way, arguing that explicitly assigning lifeguards by gender could violate the First Amendment’s establishment of religion clause, not to mention union seniority rules.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/22/nyregion/hasidic-jews-turn-up-pressure-on-city-to-accommodate-their-traditions.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1& 

 

Blaming the Jews

Jeffrey Goldberg opines about Turkey's Erdogan: A Smart Man With Jews on the Brain.

Daily Mail profile of a Nazi hunter

A German-born Jewish refugee who served in the British Army during World War II has been unveiled as one of the leading investigators responsible for the capture of one of the worst Nazi criminals of the Holocaust.
Throughout his life in Britain, Hanns Alexander never spoke of his involvement in the hunt for Auschwitz commander Rudolph Höss, and the truth was not unveiled until after his death.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2397354/The-Nazi-Hunter-Story-Jewish-refugee-Hanns-Alexander-caught-Auschwitz-commandant.html#ixzz2cVgU3NKG

Calls for boycott not a hate crime

A French court acquitted three activists charged with discrimination and hate crimes for calling for a boycott of Israeli products.
Continue reading: http://www.timesofisrael.com/french-court-acquits-boycott-activists-of-hate-crime/

Incredibly disrespectful

On Thursday, a press release was sent by Hiddush, an organization for religious freedom and equality, to the International Tennis Federation to request that they respect the decision made by the Israel Davis Cup team not to compete on the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur.
...
The CEO of Hiddush, Reform Rabbi Uri Regev, wrote to the World Tennis Association saying:

"The notion that the Israeli Tennis Association needs to compensate the Belgian Tennis Association in order to respect the holiest day in the Jewish calendar is incredibly disrespectful to the team, their faith, and tradition.”
Read more: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/170962#.UhHllyz8Lcc

Battle over Torah bells

Unsuccessful mediation to resolve an issue of ownership between New York City's Congregation Shearith Israel and Touro Synagogue in Rhode Island mean that lawsuits will be moving forward between the country's first Jewish congregation and the oldest synagogue in the U.S.
The dispute centers around a set of Colonial-era Torah finial bells, which Touro Synagogue agreed to sell to Boston's Museum of Fine Arts for $7.4 million in order to set up an endowment for the Touro building and a resident rabbi.
Continue reading: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/15/touro-synagogue-congregation-shearith-israel-torah-bells_n_3755759.html?ref=topbar

Legal dispute ends

A long-running legal dispute over the use of a Hancock Park home as an Orthodox Jewish prayer house ended Wednesday with the city of Los Angeles agreeing to pay $950,000 in attorney fees and costs to settle the case.
Read more: http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-attorneys-fees-etz-chaim-20130814,0,2856071.story

Rosh HaShanah in Uman

Jewish volunteers have finished building a kitchen the size of a basketball court in Uman, Ukraine, where they plan to prepare 105,000 meals to serve an expected 20,000 Jews visiting and praying at the burial site of Rabbi Nachman of Breslov.
Continue reading: http://www.jewishpress.com/news/jewish-news/new-super-size-kitchen-for-jews-in-uman-for-rosh-hashanah/2013/08/15/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=new-super-size-kitchen-for-jews-in-uman-for-rosh-hashanah

Censorship or subsidies

New government regulations are threatening the pedagogical autonomy of Antwerp’s haredi Orthodox schools and sowing division between hardliners and moderates over whether to bring the community’s school system into conformity with secular educational standards.

Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/08/14/news-opinion/world/antwerps-haredi-schools-forced-to-chose-between-censorship-and-their-subsidies#ixzz2byshFurH

An apology to Jewish brothers and sisters

Janita Poe writes about certain allegations regarding the Nation of Islam.

Is it true, that members have sent anti-Semitic emails to the Federation, my friends?
If so, I want to stand up as an African American in Alabama who is outraged by that behavior.
...If these charges are true -- if any Nation members have sent hate mail to the Federation – I believe an apology to our Jewish brothers and sisters is in order.
Read more: http://blog.al.com/montgomery/2013/08/anti-semitic_emails_from_natio.html

Protests against construction project

The Jerusalem suburb of Beit Shemesh looked like a battlefield on Monday after around 100 ultra-Orthodox Jews burned trash cans, smashed bus windows, set a field of wild bush on fire and threw rocks at police officers.

...The protesters were demonstrating against a construction project that would appear to be in their own interests – a new complex meant to house some 1,000 Jewish families. The trouble is, it's being built on top of what they say is a Jewish cemetery.
Continue reading: http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/08/13/20007042-ultra-orthodox-jewish-protesters-israel-housing-project-being-built-on-jewish-graves?lite

Jewish humor

Before there was Prozac, there was Jewish comedy.

There is only one fail-proof cure that I know of for enduring the trials of our times, and that is laughter.

Continue reading review of movie When Comedy Went to School: The Movie That Celebrates Jewish Humor over here.

Calls for boycott

The Nazi-hunting Simon Wiesenthal Centre has called for a global boycott of an Italian company that sells wines featuring images of Adolf Hitler and Nazi slogans on its labels.
Continue reading: http://www.theprovince.com/Hitler+wine+prompts+calls+global+Jewish+human+rights+group/8778986/story.html

Anti-semitic incidents at school

Two parents are suing the Carver public schools for allegedly turning a blind eye while they say their 13-year-old son endured repeated harassment and physical abuse from schoolmates for being Jewish.
Continue reading: http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/regionals/south/2013/08/10/parents-say-son-was-target-anti-semitic-attacks-carver-middle-high-school/vFl0VCjNHBMIPrLXjiuVJN/story.html

Targeted

Two girls who were the victims of a devastating acid attack on the island of Zanzibar Wednesday may have been targeted because they were Jewish, friends of the pair told police, the UK’s The Daily Mail reported.
Continue reading: http://www.algemeiner.com/2013/08/09/british-victims-of-zanzibar-acid-attack-may-have-been-targeted-because-they-were-jewish/

Banning Shabbos candles

Hasidim looking to vacation on the Welsh seaside are scrambling to find alternate arrangements after Aberystwyth University banned the use of candles in its residences.
Hundreds of Orthodox Jews have vacationed in the resort for over two decades, according to The Telegraph. Hasidim have traditionally taken up summer residence in Petre Jane Morgan, a university housing complex across a footbridge from the main campus.
Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/08/08/arts-entertainment/ban-on-shabbat-candles-drives-hasidim-from-welsh-seaside-resort#ixzz2bSCDhdXp

Three charged with hate crime

Three people, including a pregnant woman, were charged with a hate-crime Thursday after they shot a Hasidic man in the stomach with a paint-ball gun and yelled an ethnic slur about Jews as they drove through the Jewish community, Ramapo police said.
Read more: http://www.lohud.com/article/20130808/NEWS03/308080033/3-charged-hate-crime-Kaser-paint-ball-shooting?nclick_check=1

Non-kosher food in Poland

During a state visit to Poland in June, Jewish community members said they witnessed Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and other government officials eat non-kosher food – and the community is very angry and upset at the Prime Minister's behavior.

Two months after the visit by Netanyahu and his ministers, members of the community told Arutz Sheva that Netanyahu's eating non-kosher was perhaps the death blow to their efforts to prevent the Polish government from banning shechita, Jewish ritual slaughter – an effort that failed, when the government in Warsaw several weeks ago banned Jewish and Muslim ritual slaughter.
Read more: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/170702

Auction of Schindler documents

A New Hampshire auction house is offering a collection of documents from Oskar Schindler, the German industrialist who saved more than 1,000 Jewish workers at his factories during World War II, including a letter he signed that paved the way for the rescue chronicled in the 1993 movie "Schindler's List."
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/08/07/nh-auction-offers-schindler-documents-including-letter-paving-way-for-jewish/

Australian elections moved up

Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd on Sunday called an election for September 7, avoiding fears that Jews down under would have to choose between marking Judaism’s holiest day or casting their ballots.

The previous date for elections had coincided with Yom Kippur, provoking the ire of Jewish voters.
Continue reading: http://www.timesofisrael.com/australian-election-dodges-yom-kippur/

Attacking the Jewish lobby

A former deputy prime minister of Australia attacked the “Jewish lobby” for what he considers unfair treatment of pope Pius XII, prompting Jewish groups to accuse him of anti-Semitism.
Continue reading: http://www.timesofisrael.com/australian-ex-deputy-pm-slams-jewish-lobby-over-pius-criticism/

Desecration at the Tomb of the Patriarchs

For the third time this month of Ramadan, Muslims visiting the Tomb of Patriarchs in Hebron have desecrated Jewish religious objects at the site, tearing the Mezuzahs off the doorposts and stealing them. They took advantage of the special visiting privileges the Muslims receive from the IDF during the month of Ramadan, during which, on Fridays and a few special days, the Tomb of Patriarchs is open only to Muslims.
Read more: http://www.jewishpress.com/news/breaking-news/third-time-this-ramadan-tomb-of-the-patriarchs-desecrated-by-muslims/2013/08/04/

Anti-Semitic attacks in Malmo

The Swedish city of Malmo is reporting a record increase in documented anti-Semitic attacks.
Swedish police recorded 60 hate crimes against Jews in the city in 2012, up from an average of 22 in 2010 and 2011, the Sydsvenskan local daily reported. During the first six months of 2013, police reported 35 such attacks in Malmo, putting the city on a pace to break last year’s record.


Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/08/01/news-opinion/world/reported-anti-semitic-attacks-tripled-in-malmo#ixzz2aoTZABer

Retracting Nazi remarks

Japan's Deputy Prime Minister Taro Aso has retracted remarks suggesting that the country could learn from Nazi Germany's constitutional reform.

Mr Aso said on Monday Japan could "learn the technique" Nazi Germany used to change the Weimar constitution.
Read more: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-23527300

Hollywood and the Nazis

In devastating detail, an excerpt from a controversial new book reveals how the big studios, desperate to protect German business, let Nazis censor scripts, remove credits from Jews, get movies stopped and even force one MGM executive to divorce his Jewish wife.
Continue reading: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/how-hollywood-helped-hitler-595684

Calls to shut down German magazine

Jewish campaigners are demanding a German pulp magazine be shut down for glorifying Nazi soldiers in World War II.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2381205/Jewish-campaigners-end-pulp-magazine-glorifies-Nazi-WWII-soldiers.html#ixzz2aX9fTJXr

Jewish girl wins writing contest

A Jewish girl won a national writing competition that was judged by Prime Minister David Cameron, according to an Anne Frank organization in London.
Continue reading: http://www.yourjewishnews.com/2013/07/n28474.html

Lost property during Holocaust

When Cati Holland checked her email a few weeks ago, she was surprised to find a message saying she was eligible for compensation for her grandmother's Berlin store that was seized by the Nazis more than 70 years ago.
It wasn't spam or a phishing attempt or even a legitimate note from a German official working to track down victims and their heirs. Rather, it was from an Israel-based social media genealogy company that is using the Internet to help match property stolen by the Nazis to heirs of the victims.
Continue reading: http://bigstory.ap.org/article/social-media-help-track-property-lost-holocaust

Throwing stones and pelted with eggs

Stones have been thrown at a coach carrying Jewish boys before they were egged in a sickening attack in Sheerness.
Read more: http://www.kentonline.co.uk/times_guardian/news/jewish-attack-3853/
H/T Algemeiner.com

Jewish Olympics

There’s a famous scene in the cult 1980 movie “Airplane!” when a passenger asks the flight attendant for something “light” to read and is handed a one-page leaflet entitled “Famous Jewish Sports Legends.” But a week into what is often billed as the Jewish Olympics, it might be time to rewrite the joke.

Some 9,000 Jewish athletes from more than 70 countries, including a 1,100-person U.S. delegation, descended on Israel to participate in the largest Maccabiah Games, now entering its second week. Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/07/25/israels-jewish-olympics-draw-athletes-from-around-the-world/

Operation Last Chance

Teen fun

Serbian police suspect three teenagers are responsible for desecrating 39 Jewish graves in the northern city of Subotica.
The teens are believed to have smashed the headstones on July 10 in the city’s Jewish cemetery, which is situated near the border with Hungary, the news site Subotica.com reported last week.
Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/07/22/news-opinion/world/serbian-teens-suspected-of-smashing-39-jewish-headstones#ixzz2Zsee8FPw

Alaska's first Jewish museum

Alaska opened its first Jewish museum in Anchorage, the state’s largest city.
The Esformes Jewish Campus of Alaska was dedicated this month.
“This is a museum about Alaska’s contribution to Jewish life and about the contribution of Jews to Alaska,” said Rabbi Yosef Greenberg, who with his wife, Esty, and a group of Alaskan Jews conceived of the project nearly a decade ago.
Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/07/21/news-opinion/united-states/alaska-gets-first-jewish-museum#ixzz2Zkp7glZu

Campaign contributions

Oy! Jewish leaders are kvetching over Anthony Weiner’s accepting campaign cash from a lobbyist for Al Jazeera — Osama bin Laden’s favorite TV network.
Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/more_heat_on_weiner_over_jazeera_7YA2d4XD5GFzwO3ipwrKjO

Sharing the good news

The Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition gathered in Cedar Rapids Monday night to hear from the three Republican candidates for the Senate nomination. The candidates had trouble differentiating themselves ideologically, as all hewed faithfully to the right-wing line, until David Young promised that "as a Senator, he would invite New York Senator Chuck Schumer to lunch so that he could share the good news of Jesus Christ."
Continue reading: http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2013/07/iowa-republican-has-good-news-for-chuck-schumer.html

Poland's in-thing

Poland's parliament recently voted to uphold a controversial ban on ritual Jewish butchering -- an otherwise lucrative international enterprise for the export hungry nation.
That not withstanding, everything else Jewish seems to have become decidedly kosher in the Polish Republic. Seven decades after more than 90 percent of Poland's Jewish population of 3.6 million was slaughtered by the Nazis (with an occasional assist from a few local anti-Semites) everything from Jewish history to Jewish food to Jewish music to Jewish art has suddenly become Poland's in-thing.
Continue reading: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/richard-z-chesnoff/post_5201_b_3604331.html

Dmitriy Salita talks religion and sport

Dmitriy Salita, New York's Orthodox Jewish Boxer, is profiled at the Atlantic.

Hit and run

BRUSSLES, Belgium — The 4-year-old son of a European Shliach is in critical condition and fighting for his life after a hit and run crash. The public is requested to please say Tehillim for Hillel ben Sara.
Read more: http://crownheights.info/accidents/393646/shliachs-son-critically-injured-in-hit-and-run-crash/

Totally unacceptable

Israel is condemning a recent decision by the Polish parliament to forbid the traditional Jewish slaughter that makes meat kosher.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2013/07/15/israel-calls-polish-ban-on-traditional-jewish-slaughter-practices-totally/#ixzz2Z8kOm4CX

Reports denied

Teachers from a Jewish school near Paris denied reports that their students had “mutinied” against the presence of female test watchers.

Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/07/14/news-opinion/world/french-jewish-school-denies-students-mutinied-over-female-chaperones#ixzz2Z5lMwgVS

Twitter turns over info

A French Jewish group says Twitter has turned over information that can help identify the authors of racist and anti-Semitic tweets that carried French hashtags.
Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/french-jewish-group-twitter-gives-data-case-143444642.html

Due to an anti-Semitic phone call

A 1943 vintage Danish fishing boat which rescued Danish Jews during the Holocaust is in the process of being moved and restored, ironically enough, thanks to an anti-Semitic phone call.
Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/07/11/news-opinion/the-telegraph/anti-semitic-phone-call-leads-to-restoration-of-historic-boat#ixzz2YoquyvQI

Rand Paul's conference

Continuing his outreach to the Jewish community, Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul held a private conference call this week with about 80 Jewish leaders from across the country, The Daily Caller has learned.
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2013/07/10/rand-paul-courts-jewish-leaders-during-conference-call/#ixzz2YnlwVagI

Jewish huts

An article titled Sukkah City: Revisiting the Crazy, High-Concept, Temporary Jewish Huts of NYC appears in the Atlantic.

Religious discrimination suit

A worker claims that his boss said he wanted to lock up 'Yids' like Apprentice star Lord Sugar's son and gas them and wore obscene t-shirts mocking Jewish football fans.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2359472/Engineering-boss-told-Jewish-worker-wanted-lock-Yids-like-Alan-Sugars-son-gas-them.html#ixzz2Yhpe4xxj

The royal visit

King Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands visited the offices of the Jewish Community of Amsterdam for the first time since his coronation in April.
Monday’s visit by Willem-Alexander to the representative organ of the city’s Jewish community, known by the Dutch acronym NIHS, came less than three months after his coronation, in which he replaced his mother, Queen Beatrix.
Dutch media reported in April that some Jews were upset because Beatrix’s official farewell party is scheduled to take place in Rotterdam on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar.
Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/07/09/news-opinion/world/new-dutch-monarch-visits-jewish-community#ixzz2YZmSHo5g

Click here to see photos of the king with a blue kippa.

Giving thanks

Below is Sheryl Sandberg's post on her Facebook page, after she planned to take the flight to San Franciso that crashed today, but switched flights.

Taking a minute to be thankful and explain what happened. My family, colleagues Debbie Frost, Charlton Gholson and Kelly Hoffman and I were originally going to take the Asiana flight that just crash-landed. We switched to United so we could use miles for my family's tickets. Our flight was scheduled to come in at the same time, but we were early and landed about 20 minutes before the crash. Our friend Dave David Eun was on the Asiana flight and he is fine.

Thank you to everyone who is reaching out - and sorry if we worried anyone.

Serious moment to give thanks.
https://www.facebook.com/sheryl/posts/10152997724435177

One mezuzah at a time

Montana's small Jewish population is scattered across a huge U.S. state that has more rodeos than rabbis, but one man is logging thousands of miles (kilometers) to seek out the faithful one doorway at a time.
Rabbi Chaim Bruk has set his sights on making sure each Jewish home in the state has a mezuzah at its entrance— and that those already hanging are kosher.
Continue reading: http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/07/04/rabbi-bruk-montana-jews/2490799/

Play ball

CrownHeights info reports on the Mezamrim choir singing the national anthem before a friendly game of softball between the NYPD and Hatzalah.

Knesset member Dov Lipman interview

Knesset member Dov Lipman interview.

Rescheduled

Musician Leonard Cohen has rescheduled two dates on his UK tour after he realised they fell on Jewish holy days.
Continue reading: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-23142845

Mandela's message

Mandela family’s message to Jews

Deceptive editing

Warner Todd Huston writes:
In a June 24 report for NBC’s Rock Center, video for a story was deceptively edited and misleading voice overs added to quotes from an Hasidic Rabbi that made it seem as if the Rabbi was insisting that allegations of sex abuse should only be handled internally, within the community, and should not be taken to police. But in fact Rabbi Avraham Berkowitz did not say that at all.
Read more at http://www.rightwingnews.com/democrats/nbcs-deceptive-editing-makes-rabbi-appear-to-be-covering-up-sex-abuse/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rightwingnews%2FhGmL+%28Right+Wing+News%29#E1BE0aEB6zHkoHD4.99

The Nazi flag

Joseph Sincavage hangs a Nazi flag outside his Connecticut home not because he despises Jews but because he hates President Barack Obama.
Read more: http://www.torontosun.com/2013/06/29/man-says-nazi-flag-outside-home-is-anti-obama-not-anti-jewish

Belgian motorist convicted of intimidation

A Belgian court convicted a man who intentionally drove his car into a group of Jews of intimidation but cleared him of attempted murder.
Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/06/28/news-opinion/world/belgian-motorist-who-drove-toward-jews-convicted-of-intimidation#ixzz2XVavaZnm

Shalom, angel

Bette Midler fulfills a dying patient's request over here.

Shomrim to help Muslims

A Jewish community-based citizen patrol in London says it wants to help its Muslim neighbors protect their mosques.
Read more: http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/06/25/jewish-security-patrol-to-protect-london-mosques-following-anti-muslim-incidents/

David Miliband addresses crowd

David Miliband spoke at an event marking the 75th anniversary of the Kindertransport.

In a emotional address to the 600-strong extended Kindertransport family, the former foreign secretary David Miliband, the eldest son of Jewish immigrants, said he had "very personal reasons" to celebrate the lives and contributions of Holocaust survivors. His father and grandfather escaped to Britain in 1940, and his grandmother was sheltered by a Catholic farmer in Belgium. "As the chain of memory is broken, so history and its lessons become more important," he said. "When we ask whose responsibility is it to save lives, the answer must be: ours."
Miliband said that in taking up his new job as president of the New York-based charity International Rescue Committee, founded by the Jewish refugee Albert Einstein, he felt he was "in a small way repaying a personal debt to those who helped my parents".
Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/23/kindertransport-75th-anniversary-second-world-war

Going to school

Kikar Hashabat has reported that the Belgian Supreme Court has ruled in favor of Moshe Aryeh Friedman and that his children must be accepted at the Yesodei HaTorah school in Antwerp.
http://www.kikarhashabat.co.il/ניצחון-לפרידמן-יחוייבו-לקבל-את.html

Wiping the record clean

Philadelphia Phillie outfielder Delmon Young has wiped his criminal record clean of a year-old, drunken Midtown beatdown in which he shouted, “F--king Jews!” while pummeling a random male tourist.
The right fielder came to Manhattan Criminal Court yesterday to dispose of the misdemeanor aggravated-harassment charge.
His lawyer, Daniel Ollen, told the judge that the slugger had completed 10 days of community service and a one-day program at the New York Museum of Tolerance.
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/jew_bait_slugger_in_clear_K0tmlS9s675tHPIQu0WhuL

Hero or collaborator?

He has been called the Italian Schindler, credited with helping to save 5,000 Jews during the Holocaust.
Giovanni Palatucci, a wartime police official, has been honored in Israel, in New York and in Italy, where squares and promenades have been named in his honor, and in the Vatican, where Pope John Paul II declared him a martyr, a step toward potential sainthood.
But at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, the tale of his heroic exploits is being removed from an exhibition after officials there learned of new evidence suggesting that, far from being a hero, he was an enthusiastic Nazi collaborator involved in the deportation of Jews to Auschwitz.
read more: http://www.nbcnews.com/id/52261328/ns/world_news-the_new_york_times/

Secretly taught Judaism

Rabbi Moshe Greenberg, a religious educator who survived a brutal Gulag in Siberia and secretly taught Judaism under an oppressive Soviet regime, has died in Israel. He was 84.
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2013/06/20/rabbi-moshe-greenberg-prominent-jewish-educator-who-survived-soviet-gulag-dies/#ixzz2Wjw385Qv

Permission for a bris

A Jewish inmate at the Blackwater River Correctional Facility in Milton is asking the state's corrections department for permission to be circumcised. An earlier request was turned down by the prison's warden.
Continue reading: http://www.weartv.com/news/features/top-stories/stories/jewish-inmate-milton-requests-circumcision-32773.shtml

The righteous Gentile

An Italian Catholic activist and journalist who was declared a Righteous Gentile by Yad Vashem was put on the road to sainthood.

Odoardo Focherini was beatified — the step before sainthood — at a ceremony Saturday in his hometown of Carpi, near Modena, in northern Italy.

Declared a martyr by the Roman Catholic Church, Focherini is believed to be the first Righteous Gentile, and the first person to be killed for saving Jews, to be beatified.

Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/06/16/news-opinion/world/italian-righteous-gentile-killed-for-saving-jews-beatified#ixzz2WOqgVNpV

Living in Minnesota

A top commander of a Nazi SS-led unit accused of burning villages filled with women and children lied to American immigration officials to get into the United States and has been living in Minnesota since shortly after World War II, according to evidence uncovered by The Associated Press.
Read more: http://apnews.myway.com/article/20130614/DA6TETCO2.html

The Schneerson collection

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday that a years-long spat with the United States over thousands of Jewish religious writings should end now that some are on display in Moscow's new Jewish museum.
Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/06/14/us-russia-usa-jewish-collection-idUSBRE95C12O20130614

FAU to promote diversity

Florida Atlantic University launched a website promoting diversity following complaints from Jewish groups about activities on campus by a pro-Palestinian group.
Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/06/12/news-opinion/united-states/following-complaints-from-jewish-students-florida-atlantic-u-launches-diversity-website#ixzz2W27JxWeA

Brooklyn bike robbery

A Jewish boy fell victim to a violent robbery on busy Kingston Avenue, when two Black teens shoved him off his bike and fled. Police managed to apprehend the pair – who were later released into the custody of their parents.
Continue reading: http://crownheights.info/crime/389561/two-apprehended-for-brazen-kingston-bike-robbery/

Long-lost diary found

The U.S. government has recovered 400 pages from the long-lost diary of Alfred Rosenberg, a confidant of Adolf Hitler who played a central role in the extermination of millions of Jews and others during World War Two.
Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/06/10/us-nazi-diary-idUSBRE9590MG20130610

A social experiment

As a social experiment, media analyst Mark Dice asked California beach goers to sign a petition to prevent the Holocaust Beach Party from being canceled due to budget cuts, calling the Holocaust a "Jewish festival" to see if people are so out of touch with reality that they don't understand or remember what the Holocaust was.

Shomrim aid in arrest

The collective power of the press, community and volunteers led today to the apprehension of the three individuals who assaulted young Jewish girls Tuesday afternoon, and the arrest of one of them – a 12-year-old who was charged with a hate crime.
Read more: http://crownheights.info/crime/388496/community-shomrim-assist-police-in-apprehending-assailants/

Le Chayim

For avid whiskey lovers, few events are more eagerly anticipated than WhiskyFest, an enormous tasting that touches down in several American cities throughout the year. But when sponsors of the New York festival suddenly moved it last year from Tuesday to Friday and Saturday, many regulars were unable to attend.
...These whiskey devotees, it turned out, were Jews shut out of the big event because they observe the Sabbath.
Read full article: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/05/dining/whiskey-producers-court-their-jewish-market.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

Kosovo's Jewish heritage

In the Balkan republic of Kosovo, with a Muslim majority around 80 percent, a different spirit is visible. On May 23, during a week of events promoting "tolerance and reconciliation," the Kosovar Albanian government dedicated a monument of remembrance to the nearly unknown place of Kosovo in Jewish history.

The stone slab was erected within the gated courtyard facing the country's parliament, in the capital, Pristina. It reads, "This is the place where the last Synagogue [in] Kosovo stood until 1963. This plaque is raised in memory of Kosovo Jews that perished in Nazi camps during [the] Holocaust. [The] People of Kosovo will never forget them."
Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/stephen-schwartz/kosovo-revives-its-jewish-heritage_b_3379896.html

The mayoral race

Until former U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner upended the New York City mayoral race, this year's campaign was set to be the first in decades without a well-known Jewish candidate. But Mr. Weiner hardly has the Jewish vote in the bag.
Interviews with Jewish voters on Sunday, many of them at the Celebrate Israel parade on Fifth Avenue, show they have the same reservations and mixed feelings about Mr. Weiner as the wider electorate.
Read more: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324563004578521610568193042.html

Bullet holes at a Jewish community center

French police found bullet holes at the entrance to a Jewish community center near Paris, authorities in France said.
Three bullet holes were found Saturday in a door and in the wall of a center belonging to the Jewish community of Garges-les-Gonesse north of the French capital, according to a report Sunday by the AFP news agency, which quoted unnamed police officials.
Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/06/02/news-opinion/world/bullet-holes-found-in-jewish-center-near-paris#ixzz2V5lXzbV3

The spelling bee and JAPs

Rabbi Jason Miller writes Jewish Word Wins Spelling Bee, But 'Princesses' TV Show Will Offend.

Google glass Jewish applications

Yaffa Klugerman asks Can Google Glass transform Jewish life?

 

Senator Lautenberg honored

U.S. Sen. Frank Lautenberg was honored Wednesday for his contributions to the Jewish community and Israel.

The New Jersey Democrat was feted at New York's Pierre Hotel at the annual gala for Hillel: The Foundation for Jewish Campus life.

Read more: http://www.seattlepi.com/news/us/article/NJ-senator-honored-for-service-to-Jewish-community-4558485.php#ixzz2UlEO8KVo

Stoning emergency workers

An Israeli fire fighting rescue team came under a bombing attack while they were attempting to fight a fire that broke out near Muslim homes, according to a statement released by an Israeli fire department.
Read more: http://www.yourjewishnews.com/2013/05/27375.html

Harnessing technology

One scholar likened it to finding the orphaned socks for generations of a family. Another compared it to law-enforcement’s use of DNA databases and face-recognition software.
The idea is to harness technology to help reassemble more than 100,000 document fragments collected across 1,000 years that reveal details of Jewish life along the Mediterranean, including marriage, medicine and mysticism.
Continue reading: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/27/world/middleeast/computers-piecing-together-jigsaw-of-jewish-lore.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

Serving one year in prison for murder

Arab sources are saying that the IDF has arrested the three Palestinian Authority (PA) policemen who murdered yeshiva student Ben Yosef Livnat.

According to the reports, the three were freed from a PA jail after just one year's imprisonment. The IDF arrested them immediately upon their release.

The men had served a year in jail for the murder, and had returned to their police jobs 10 days ago after being freed last month, the PA official said.
Read more: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/168225#.UaG1Wiz8Lcc

The Teleki Square shul

Too often recently, Hungary has been in the news for all the wrong reasons. The elevation of the ultranationalist Jobbik party to the parliament in 2010 and the provocative, anti-Semitic statements made by their members that followed has led many to wonder: Who would want to be Jewish in this Central European, former Communist state?

However, hidden away through a courtyard in Budapest’s ramshackle District VIII, an area of the Hungarian capital known for its high population of Roma gypsies and immigrants, the shul ("synagogue" in Yiddish) on Teleki Square is quietly challenging this notion. It is one of the very last surviving "apartment synagogues" in the country and may well represent the spirited renewal of Jewish life that is currently sweeping the city.
Read more: http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Europe/2013/0525/A-Jewish-renaissance-tucked-away-in-a-Budapest-apartment

Church of Scotland rejects call

THE Church of Scotland has set itself on an international collision course with Jewish leaders after rejecting outright a call to rethink its Israel stance.
Read more: http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/home-news/church-clashes-with-jewish-leaders-on-stance-over-israel.21172528

Turning a blind eye

The leading Jewish civil rights group in the U.S. slammed anti-Semitic comments made in a Detroit church by Minister Louis Farrakhan, the head of the Nation of Islam.
..."It is deeply disappointing that so many Detroit leaders are apparently so willing to turn a blind eye to Farrakhan's anti-Semitism," said Heidi Budaj, regional director of the Michigan branch of the Anti-Defamation League. "Where are the voices in our community who are willing to stand up and say 'no' to racism and anti-Semitism?"
Read more: http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/05/22/jewish-group-denounces-farrakhan/2352937/

Jewish Time Jump

Shot dead by the FBI and the triple murder connection

Ibragim Todashev attacked the FBI agent who shot him after he had confessed to a direct role in the 2011 triple homicide in Waltham, Massachusetts, a federal law enforcement official with direct knowledge of the case told CNN on Wednesday.
Continue reading: http://edition.cnn.com/2013/05/22/justice/florida-fbi-shooting-boston/index.html

The victims were Brendan H. Mess, 25, Erik Weissman, 31, and Rafael M. Teken, 37.
The Forward reported on April 23 that  Weissman, "was outspoken about his Jewish faith" and Teken "attended predominantly Jewish Brandeis."

Anti-Semitism on the rise

Anti-Semitism is on the rise in many parts of the Middle East and in pockets of South America while corresponding Anti-Muslim sentiments are increasing in Europe an Asia, according to an annual US State Department report.


The 2012 report on religious freedom said expressions of anti-Semitism by government officials and religious leaders were of great concern, particularly in Venezuela, Egypt and Iran. At times, such statements led to desecration and violence, the report said.
Continue reading: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/international/anti_semitism_and_anti_isl_fxioHBMlE75o03R8vCoSIM

Racist rant

Tuesday night, just as Jews began celebrating the holiday of Shavuos, police officers were arresting two people for selling and buying illegal drugs just a few blocks away from 770. The incident then turned into a despicable racists rant by some of the residents.
Read more: http://crownheights.info/chabad-news/386077/video-narcotics-arrest-turns-into-anti-semitic-tirade/

Jewish life in Poland before the Holocaust

Polish Museum Conjures Jewish Life Before the Holocaust

Newseum honorees

Inspire is a glossy, English-language, online magazine published by al-Qaeda. It was conceived by Anwar al-Awlaki, the American-born cleric and al-Qaeda leader, who also contributed editorials. In 2011, President Obama ordered a drone strike against al-Awlaki as he was riding in a car in Yemen along with Samir Khan, Inspire’s Pakistani-American editor and publisher. So why hasn’t the Newseum — the interactive Washington museum of news and journalism — honored al-Awlaki and Kahn in its Journalist Memorial?
If your answer is “because the Newseum would never honor terrorists,” you’re on shakier ground than you might think.
- See more at: http://www.defenddemocracy.org/media-hit/night-at-the-newseum/#sthash.0qlpHgVB.dpuf

Moroccan sentenced

A 22-year-old Moroccan man has been sentenced to more than five years in prison for planning terrorist attacks on Milan’s main synagogue and Jewish school.

Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/05/17/news-opinion/world/moroccan-jailed-for-five-years-for-plotting-to-bomb-milan-synagogue#ixzz2ThC52c4P

Prof. Karabus lands in Cape Town

Loud cheers echoed through the arrivals hall of Cape Town International Airport when Cyril Karabus's plane landed just before noon on Friday.

His family, old colleagues and members of the public scrambled to the viewing glass to witness the SA Airways plane taxi along the runway.

A group of Cape minstrels spontaneously broke into a jovial song, causing SA Zionist Federation members to grab hands and dance around in circles.

Read more: http://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/western-cape/karabus-arrives-in-cape-town-1.1517584#.UZYpGSz8Lcc

A good Jewish investment

Marrying Jewish is a good investment.  Marriages between Jews tend to end in divorce less. The marriages tend to last longer and partners in marriages to Jews report less experiences with Antisemitism and by comparison to other major religious groups, are less likely to divorce.
Continue reading: http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/marrying-jewish-is-a-good-investment/

Mounting evidence

Authorities in Massachusetts have developed "mounting evidence" against the alleged Boston Marathon bombers that would place them near the scene of a grisly 2011 triple homicide that has remained unsolved.
Officials told ABC News that preliminary forensic tests link Tamerlan Tsarnaev and his younger brother, Dzhokhar, to the scene of the murders in Waltham, Mass.
Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/authorities-link-tsarnaev-brothers-2011-triple-homicide-report-article-1.1341207#ixzz2T1p7aeUM

Forced to pay legal costs

The leader of Rome's Jewish community has launched a stinging attack on Italy's judicial system after he was forced to pay the legal costs of a Nazi war criminal who unsuccessfully sued him.
Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/may/09/rome-jewish-legal-nazi-war