Sorted by date Results 1148 - 1172 of 1920
(JNS)-In the aftermath of two synagogue shootings exactly six months apart, in addition to arson incidents at Chabad Houses in Massachusetts and an attempted arson attempt at a Chicago synagogue last month, the issue of security, specifically armed personnel, has been in the spotlight. Some have called for supporting the idea, while others, especially those who favor strict gun control, have expressed their opposition to the idea. Three arson incidents occurred in Massachusetts within a week... Full story
WASHINGTON (JTA)—The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum reiterated a strong rejection of analogies to the Holocaust in the wake of the debate surrounding the term “concentration camps” sparked by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y. The museum “unequivocally rejects efforts to create analogies between the Holocaust and other events, whether historical or contemporary,” the museum said in a statement. “That position has repeatedly and unambiguously been made clear in the Museum’s official statement on the matter.” The statement linked to one from D... Full story
(JNS)—Outrage from pro-Israel and Jewish groups is growing at U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) for her remarks on Monday on her Instagram account that the United States is “running concentration camps on our southern border,” in reference to the Trump administration’s policies regarding illegal immigration. “AOC should ask Holocaust survivors and ex-GIs who liberated Dachau what that charnel House was like,” Rabbi Abraham Cooper, the SWC’s associate dean and director of global social action for the leading international... Full story
BOSTON (JTA)-The Museum of Fine Arts bought two pairs of rare Torah finials, bidding $500,000 for the 17th-century German silver set. The set is considered among the earliest surviving examples of the ritual Torah ornaments. The final sale price exceeded the pre-auction estimate of between $300,000 and $400,000. A second pair, 18th-century English parcel-gilt silver, sold for $187,500, some $7,000 more than the high estimate. The finials, to which are attached tiny crowns and bells, are used to adorn the top handles on a Torah scroll. The two... Full story
(JNS)—The United States will send an additional 1,000 troops to the Middle East as tensions escalate between Washington and Tehran, the Pentagon announced on Monday evening. “In response to a request from the U.S. Central Command for additional forces, and with the advice of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and in consultation with the White House, I have authorized approximately 1,000 additional troops for defensive purposes to address air, naval and ground-based threats in the Middle East,” said Acting U.S. Defense Secretary Patri... Full story
(JTA)—The U.S. Department of Education will investigate a Middle East conference on Gaza co-sponsored by two North Carolina universities over allegations that it had an anti-Israel bias. Rep. George Holding, R-N.C., called on the department to check into the late March conference co-sponsored by Duke University and the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill held at the latter campus. Holding said he had seen “reports of severe anti-Israeli bias and anti-Semitic rhetoric at the taxpayer-funded conference,” The Raleigh News & Observer repor... Full story
WASHINGTON (JTA)-President Donald Trump says he is "very prepared" for Iran. "We're looking at Iran," he said Tuesday when a reporter asked him what he had planned beyond sending another 1,000 U.S. troops to the area as tensions there appear to be escalating. "We have a lot of things going with Iran. We have-we're very prepared for Iran. We'll see what happens. Let me just say this: We are very prepared. Regardless of what goes, we are very, very prepared." Trump was short on details, which has... Full story
(JNS)—In just a few weeks, tens of thousands of kids will be on the move, leaving home for Jewish overnight camps. This year though they’ll be doing so under the specter of heightened security concerns as anti-Semitism is at a near-record high nationwide and it has been just half a year since two deadly synagogue shootings. According to the Anti-Defamation League’s Audit of Anti-Semitic Incidents for 2018, 1,879 attacks were committed against Jews and Jewish institutions across the country last year, including the attack at the Tree of Life*... Full story
NEW YORK (JTA)—New York City is shuttering an Orthodox school in Brooklyn because it has continued to admit unvaccinated students in violation of a city order. The Central UTA Satmar School for Boys, a hasidic school in the Williamsburg neighborhood, is being closed Tuesday afternoon for violating city orders regarding vaccines and vaccination records, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency has learned. It is the tenth Orthodox school in New York City to be closed this year due to the issue, according to a city official with knowledge of the matter. W... Full story
It’s Yiddish for the win at the Scripps National Spelling Bee! OK, not quite, but last week, when the first rounds of the finals kicked off, the word “Yiddishkeit” nearly stumped contestant No. 5, Rishik Gandshari from San Jose, California. The seventh-grader didn’t quite know what to make of the quintessentially Jewish word, which the contest defined as “a Jewish way of life.” After asking what the language of origin of the word was, and receiving the answer “Yiddish,” Rishik chuckled nervou... Full story
NEW YORK (JTA)—The weirdest part of an Orthodox anti-vaccine conference here was probably when the emcee, a rabbi wearing a black hat and white beard, quoted the Gospel of Luke. “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do!” he cried, reciting the Gospels nearly verbatim. Rabbi Hillel Handler wasn’t referring to the 200 people gathered in the basement of a haredi Orthodox wedding hall in Brooklyn to hear about the alleged dangers of vaccines. Rather, he was talking about the doctors, rabbis and politicians who he says are all hoodwin... Full story
(JTA) — A large Orthodox synagogue in Atlanta is breaking away from the Young Israel synagogue movement. The exit comes months after its rabbi protested the movement’s right-wing political positions. In a statement provided Wednesday afternoon to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, the Young Israel of Toco Hills announced that its name would henceforth be Kehillat Ohr Hatorah, Hebrew for “light of the Torah.” An email sent to the congregation Wednesday said that 93 percent of voting synagogue members voted to disaffiliate from Young Israel. “After d... Full story
CHICAGO (JTA)-If a pro-Israel activist were to conjure an image of an anti-Zionist synagogue, they'd probably come up with something like Tzedek Chicago. A congregation of 180 people that meets in a church basement, Tzedek Chicago's "Core Values" declare that it's non-Zionist. In practice, though, that means an explicit emphasis on advocating for Palestinian rights and criticizing Israel's conduct. Those themes were woven throughout its service last Yom Kippur-from the rabbi's sermon to the... Full story
(JNS)—A number of Massachusetts Jewish and pro-Israel groups are condemning several Democratic state lawmakers for participating in an Eid al-Fitr event at the Massachusetts State House that was co-hosted by the Massachusetts branch of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, which has a long history of anti-Israel and anti-Semitic sentiment. In response to an inquiry from JNS regarding the event, Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Boston executive director Jeremy Burton responded: “We welcome the efforts and intentions of our pol... Full story
WASHINGTON (JTA)—Everyone started by praising the American Jewish Committee, naturally enough. But in their video greetings to the group’s annual policy forum here, 13 Democratic candidates proceeded to demonstrate a party grappling with what story they should tell to one of its most important demographics: Jewish voters. Some candidates started by decrying anti-Semitism. Others started by holding up the U.S.-Israel relationship. A couple didn’t mention Israel at all. Some remarks lasted under... Full story
(JNS)—In a commencement speech on Thursday to Yeshiva University graduating students, U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman slammed the Obama administration’s treatment of Israel compared to that of the current one. “Should Israel still negotiate with the Palestinians even though Israel did not steal their land? Of course, it should, precisely because we are not suggesting, as our predecessor did—that Israel return to the bargaining table as a thief returning to the scene of a crime,” he said. “Precisely for that reason, there is a basis for... Full story
(JNS)—An Illinois school district is under fire for a course offered to teachers titled “Teaching Palestine.” The Niles Township High School District 219 serves Lincolnwood and parts of Morton Grove, Niles and Skokie in Cook County, home to Chicago. There are an estimated 291,800 Jews in Illinois with most of them living in the Chicagoland area. The district consists of Niles North High School and Niles West High School. The lesson, according to the course description obtained by JNS, “brings together critical educators who want to teach about... Full story
CHICAGO (JTA)—A high school district with a large Jewish population has withdrawn its recommendation of an optional training opportunity for teachers called “Teaching Palestine” after local teachers, synagogues and national organizations protested. The training was one of several offered to high school teachers in a section of north suburban Chicago. One of the schools, Niles North High, is the primary high school serving Skokie, a local Jewish population center. “The course presented an extremely one-sided view of a very complex situati... Full story
(JNS)—Hanan Ashrawi, longtime aide to Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas, met on Monday with Matthew Duss, the foreign-policy adviser for the presidential campaign of U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), according to a statement released by the Department of Public Diplomacy and Policy of the Palestine Liberation Organization. “The two parties discussed the Trump administration’s hostile approach in the region and its destructive policies that undermine the prospects of peace and the Palestinian people’s inalienable rights to freedom... Full story
(JTA)-Most of the year, Marty Rosenbluth lives alone in a small house in Lumpkin, a Georgia town with 2,000 residents and one restaurant. It's 500 miles away from his wife and community in North Carolina. Then he drives two miles down the road to a place even more isolated: the Stewart Detention Center, a private immigration detention facility surrounded by spools of barbed wire and housing nearly 2,000 undocumented immigrant men. Rosenbluth aims to reduce that number as much as possible. He's t... Full story
(JNS)-U.S. Ambassador to Israel David M. Friedman fired back at The New York Times on Wednesday over an article castigating him for claiming that Israel was "on the side of God" while speaking about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the upcoming U.S. peace proposal. Speaking to a group of evangelical faith leaders at the Aish Hatorah World Center, overlooking the Western Wall plaza and the Temple Mount, Friedman said that, "apparently, there was nothing more offensive I could have said to... Full story
(JNS)—A guest lecturer at the University of California, Los Angeles, last week labeled Zionists as white supremacists, reported Jewish Journal on Tuesday. A Jewish student in the class, Shayna Lavi, recalled to the Journal that San Francisco State University Arab and Muslim ethnicities’ professor Rabab Abdulhadi, told the some 100 students in the mandatory anthropology lecture on May 14 that U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) “was attacked by AIPAC and all these pro-Israel organization because [Omar is] Muslim,” and that America and Israel have “s... Full story
BOSTON (JTA)—A fire outside the suburban Boston home of a rabbi that serves as a Chabad center is being investigated as a possible hate crime. Police in Arlington, Massachusetts, have asked for the public’s help in identifying a person caught on a neighbor’s video camera walking away from the home Saturday night around the time of the fire. Firefighters put out the small fire that burned the shingles off one side of the Center for Jewish Life in Arlington-Belmont, home to Rabbi Avi Bukiet, his wife and their three children. Police and town... Full story
NEW YORK (JTA)-In the 1930s, Mortimer and Raymond Sackler both traveled to Scotland for medical school because, they said, American universities wouldn't admit them as Jews. Eighty years later, academic and cultural institutions the world over are deciding whether to reject the Sackler brothers' children-not because of their religion but because of their actions. Mortimer and Raymond Sackler are the late patriarchs of a family under fire now for its central role in the opioid addiction crisis, w... Full story
CLEVELAND (Cleveland Jewish News via JTA)-Eric Fingerhut is leaving his position as president and CEO of Hillel International to take the same posts at the Jewish Federations of North America. Fingerhut, who served one term in the U.S. House of Representatives representing Ohio in 1993 and 1994, will succeed Jerry Silverman. The Times of Israel reported in April 2018 that Silverman, who assumed the JFNA leadership in 2009, planned to step down at the end of his contract this September. Jared... Full story