Weekly roundup of world briefs

Dead pig found outside rabbi’s door in heavily Orthodox New Jersey township

By Ben Sales

(JTA) — A dead pig’s body was found outside the door of a rabbi in the heavily Orthodox township of Lakewood, New Jersey.

The body was found on Shabbat, according to The Lakewood Scoop, and the local police department is treating the incident as a bias crime. Pigs are seen as the quintessentially unkosher animal and have long been used as an anti-Semitic symbol.

“We will not tolerate such acts in our town,” Lakewood Police Chief Greg Meyer told The Scoop, a local publication in the South Jersey township of 106,000.

The New York-New Jersey office of the Anti-Defamation League linked the incident to previous acts of anti-Semitism in Ocean County, which includes Lakewood.

“The alleged incident that took place in Lakewood on Saturday is absolutely horrifying,” ADL NY/NJ Regional Director Scott Richman said in a statement. “No individual or group deserves to be targeted in this way. ADL has been deeply concerned by the rising tide of antisemitism in Ocean County, and this matter is no exception.”

The Jewish Telegraphic Agency has reached out to the Lakewood Police for more information.

Israeli gymnast wins gold at European championships in category dominated by former Soviet countries

By Gabe Friedman

(JTA) — Israeli gymnast Linoy Ashram won a gold medal in the individual rhythmic category at the European Championships on Sunday, becoming the first athlete to win the prize in decades who was not from a former Soviet country or Bulgaria.

Ashram edged out Alina Harnasko of Bulgaria in a nearly unprecedentedly close tiebreaker.

Israel also won the group rhythmic gymnastics gold at the competition in Kyiv, Ukraine. Several highly rated teams from Russia, Bulgaria and Italy did not participate this year due to the logistical complications of the coronavirus pandemic.

Ashram, a 21-year-old Israeli defense forces veteran born to Mizrahi and Sephardic parents, will represent Israel at the Tokyo Olympics, which has been rescheduled to summer 2021.

The Israel Philharmonic is streaming a Hans Zimmer-themed Chanukah event

By Gabe Friedman

(JTA) — The Israel Philharmonic Foundation is streaming a pre-Chanukah concert event featuring music by and an interview with Hans Zimmer, one of Hollywood’s most prolific score composers.

The free event, which streams Sunday, will feature discussions with both Zimmer, who is Jewish, and the Israeli orchestra’s director, Lahav Shani. The group will perform music from “The Prince of Egypt,” “The Lion King” and the thriller “Inception” — just a few of the over 150 films Zimmer has worked on, most of them blockbusters.

Zimmer, 63, received an award from the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra in 2014 and is described in the event’s news release as a “close friend of the orchestra.”

He didn’t publicly discuss his Jewish identity until an appearance at the 1999 Berlin Film Festival. His mother, who used to visit Israel every year, escaped Germany in 1939. But as he said in 2014: “Quite honestly, I think my parents were always wary of me telling the neighbors.”

‘Homeland’ creators are adapting Nathan Englander’s ‘Dinner at the Center of the Earth’ into a TV series

By Curt Schleier

(JTA) — Showtime hopes it has found its next “Homeland” in the form of a Nathan Englander adaptation.

The network has “Homeland” co-creators Howard Gordon and Alex Gansa producing Englander’s 2017 novel “Dinner at the Center of the Earth” into a series, Deadline reports.

The book centers on a Prisoner Z who is being held at a secret prison site in Israel’s Negev Desert. He’s an Israeli spy who betrayed his native country to atone for actions that led to the death of innocent individuals — and perhaps break the cycle of violence in the region.

Gordon and Gansa have worked together on numerous shows, including “24,” and converted the hit Israeli series “Prisoners of War” into “Homeland” for American audiences. That show earned the pair two Emmys, including for best drama series.

Englander, who grew up Orthodox and usually writes on Jewish themes (he told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency last year that everything down to “the weather” in his books is Jewish), has published five acclaimed books. His latest, “Kaddish.com,” involves a haredi Orthodox man who leaves his religious community and then returns to it.

New York Young Republicans call Andrew Cuomo aide a ‘court Jew’

By Ben Sales

(JTA) — The New York Young Republican Club called Andrew Cuomo’s director of Jewish affairs a “court Jew” and tweeted that he is “working for the most anti-semitic governor in America.”

Responding to a tweet by the director, Jake Adler, disparaging an upcoming in-person conference hosted by the state’s Young Republicans, the GOP club was repeating a claim by Cuomo critics that he has been biased against Hasidic communities in Brooklyn during the coronavirus pandemic.

“Imagine being Jewish and working for the most anti-Semitic governor in America,” the group tweeted. “You are a disgrace and pathetic. Shouldn’t you guys be arresting Orthodox Jews in BK? Keep being a good boy for your failed corrupt boss.”

When David Greenfield, an Orthodox Jew who is CEO of the Met Council on Jewish Poverty, vouched for Adler on Twitter, the Young Republicans responded by deriding “court Jews.” The reference was to Jews who would work in royal courts in exchange for special privileges not afforded other Jews. It has become a slur disparaging Jews who are seen as selling out communal interests to advance their own status.

“Court Jews defending the blatant anti-Semitism of Cuomo is so repugnant & vile its almost too unreal to behold,” the Young Republicans tweeted. “Thankfully our Club leadership is full of proud Jews who are happy to call a spade a spade and not cover up the systemic discrimination and persecution of Hasidic Jews.”

The Anti-Defamation League’s regional office tweeted in response that “Everyone has the right to disagree w/ public policy & political positions, but resorting to tropes should be off limits.”

In response, the Young Republicans tweeted that the ADL is a “sham” and told the civil rights group to “shut up.”

Palestinian Authority teaches kids to identify as ‘refugees’

(JNS) — Palestinian children born decades after Israel’s establishment in 1948 are being educated by the authorities in Ramallah to envision themselves as residents of the cities “stolen by the Jews” and as “refugees” temporarily living in the Palestinian territories, Palestinian Media Watch reported on Tuesday.

In “A Child and a Refugee Camp”—a children’s program aired Nov. 3 on official P.A. TV—kids were taught, 12-year-old Abd Al-Rahman Baba tells viewers to see themselves as suffering victims of “the Jews,” according to the PMW report.

Israelis were not mentioned at all on the broadcast.

“The Jews stole our land from us, and I have been waiting 12 years already, my father 40 years, and my grandfather has been waiting 70 years. … The Jews took our land by force and settled us in the [refugee] camps. I hope to return to Lod, my city,” said Baba.

Asked by the host of the program whether he feels that “tomorrow we will return” [to the land stolen by the Jews], Baba replied: “Yes. I feel that tomorrow I will return and liberate Palestine. … Every day, every minute and every year, I imagine that I’m in Lod … I imagine that I’m playing with my friends, my neighbors, in our backyard. I imagine our home, how it will be. … I imagine the Lod Airport that the occupation [Israel] Judaized and called ‘Ben-Gurion [Airport].’ …  Of course, we will return and live in those houses.”

Czech Republic announces plans to open diplomatic office in Jerusalem

(JNS) — The Czech Republic plans to open a diplomatic office in Jerusalem, announced Israel’s Foreign Affairs Minister Gabi Ashkenazi on Wednesday after speaking with his counterpart, Tomáš Petříček.

Ashkenazi tweeted: “I just spoke with my colleague, the Czech FM @TPetricek, and congratulated him on the decision to open an official diplomatic office in Jerusalem. This decision as well as recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital emphasizes our strong friendship and strategic partnership.”

Petříček confirmed the news in a similar tweet.

Neither Ashkenazi nor Petříček provided a time frame as to when the diplomatic office would actually open.

Europeans pushed back on US sanctions, helped Iranian banks circumvent them

(JNS) — Germany, France and Britain urged the Trump administration in late October to reconsider sanctions imposed earlier in the month on Iranian banks, arguing that new sanctions would hurt humanitarian efforts and their mutual interests, Reuters reported on Tuesday.

At the same time, Germany’s Bundesbank kept more than $3 billion on deposit for five Iranian banks, including two that fell under the new U.S. sanctions, to facilitate transactions with companies doing business with the Islamic State, according to the report.

U.S. officials had raised the issue of these Bundesbank accounts with their German counterparts in recent years, one U.S. official told Reuters. However, the extent of Germany’s support for Iranian trade has not been previously reported.

A Bundesbank spokesman confirmed that Iranian banks held accounts with it, the report noted.

Sudan-Israel deal could cave unless Congress passes immunity bill

(Israel Hayom via JNS) — The U.S.-brokered normalization agreement between Israel and Sudan from October may not be implemented unless Sudan is granted legal immunity over its terrorist past, The New York Times reported on Tuesday.

According to the report, which cites several officials involved in talks between Washington and Khartoum, Sudan has made it clear that unless the U.S. Congress passes legislation that would grant it immunity from legal action over the years in which it sponsored Al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups, it would not proceed towards full normalization with Israel as it had agreed under the Abraham Accords.

Those accords have been hailed as a landmark achievement in cementing the de facto alliance between Israel and the Sunni moderate Arab states in recent months. The agreements have already led to almost full normalization between Israel and two Arab states—the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain—and to the warming of relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia, culminating with a reported visit by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the kingdom in November.

According to Times report, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo spoke on Monday with Sudan’s leader, Lt. Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, “who made clear that the East African nation would not move forward with warming ties with Israel before Congress passes the so-called legal peace legislation.”

This article first appeared in Israel Hayom.

Knesset moves towards dissolving unity government, possible new elections

(JNS) — The Israeli Knesset passed a preliminary bill to dissolve the government, paving the way for a fourth round of elections within the last two years.

The bill, which passed with 61 lawmakers voting in favor and 54 against, came as Defense Minister Benny Gantz and his Blue and White Party broke with its coalition partners, including Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud Party, and voted in favor of the measure.

Opposition Leader Yair Lapid, who proposed the measure, posted on Twitter that “the dissolution of the Knesset is not a victory, it’s the first step towards a different government, which will deal with the coronavirus and the economy and won’t cause Israelis to hate each other.”

Despite the vote on Wednesday, it still remains unclear if the Knesset will head to elections or if the move by Gantz is a warning to Netanyahu. The measure must still go through committee and pass three more readings in the Knesset for new elections, which would likely come next spring or summer.

On Tuesday night, Gantz announced his intention to side with the opposition and vote in favor of dissolving the Knesset.

Gantz accused Netanyahu of undermining the unity government that both Likud, and Blue and White, had formed earlier this year, which includes a power-sharing agreement that would theoretically make Gantz prime minister starting November 2021.

“I entered this government with a heavy heart but without qualms; I did this after I could not form a government based on my values and worldviews in the wake of three election campaigns, and under the threat of coronavirus that has put our health and the future of our children and the livelihood of so many Israelis in jeopardy,” said Gantz.

In particular, he accused Netanyahu of reneging on the coalition deal by refusing to pass a two-year budget that would ensure a rotating premiership. If a budget is not passed by its deadline later this month, the government would also dissolve, paving the way for elections as well.

In a press briefing after the vote, Netanyahu said that the Israeli people “want unity, not elections. They want vaccines, not election broadcasts.”

“We need to put politics aside, there’s enough time for politics,” adds Netanyahu. “Benny Gantz needs to slam on the brakes” and not drag the country to elections, he added.

Democratic centrists succeed pro-Israel stalwarts Engel and Lowey as chairs of key House panels

By Ron Kampeas

WASHINGTON (JTA) — Democratic Party centrists with solid Israel bona fides defeated progressives as the chairs of two key House committees, succeeding pro-Israel stalwarts Eliot Engel and Nita Lowey.

Rep. Gregory Meeks of New York will replace Engel, also of New York, as chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee. Engel, for decades one of the Democrats closest to the centrist and right-wing pro-Israel communities, was defeated in a primary by a progressive challenger.

Meeks in the caucus vote defeated Joaquin Castro, a Texas Democrat who has been critical of the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, going so far as to suggest that Netanyahu had undercut U.S.-Israel ties. Meeks is the first Black chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee.

Meeks has co-sponsored pro-Israel legislation, including a bill that would further enhance Israel-U.S. defense cooperation, and told a Jewish Democratic group that defense assistance to Israel was sacrosanct. He also said that under U.S. law, Israel is not allowed to use American defense assistance on West Bank spending.

Rep. Rosa DeLauro, a Connecticut Democrat close to the party establishment, defeated Marcy Kaptur of Ohio and will replace New York’s Lowey as chairwoman of the powerful Appropriations Committee. Lowey is retiring this year and, like Engel, has long been close to the pro-Israel community. Both Engel and Lowey are Jewish.

DeLauro is married to Stanley Greenberg, a prominent Democratic pollster who has advised Israel’s Labor Party.

In Republican caucus elections, Kay Granger and Mike McCaul, both of Texas, kept their positions as ranking members of the Appropriations and Foreign Affairs committees, respectively.

British soccer’s Premier League endorses international Holocaust group’s definition of anti-Semitism

By Cnaan Liphshiz

(JTA) — The Premier League, a consortium comprising the United Kingdom’s top 20 soccer clubs, has endorsed the definition of anti-Semitism established by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, or IHRA.

In a statement Thursday, the league said it “adopted” the definition to “enable us to be more effective in dealing with any antisemitic behaviour targeting our clubs or personnel.”

The highest ethics body in the world of British soccer is the Football Association, which has not adopted the definition. The Premier League, which is not part of the Football Association, has no disciplinary committee.

The IHRA working definition describes various forms of anti-Semitism, including hatred and discrimination against Jews and Holocaust denial. It also includes examples of anti-Israel language it defines as anti-Semitic, including comparing the country’s policies to those of Nazi Germany.

The British government adopted the IHRA definition in 2018. Since its adoption in 2016 by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, a body made up of more than 30 countries, the definition has been adopted also by 18 members of the European Union and the United States.