News

Chechnya’s Jewish community doesn’t exist — but it’s angry at Israel

Mosei Yunayev speaking at the International Islamic Mission Forum in Makhachkala, Russia, March 22, 2017. (Courtesy of the International Islamic Mission)

  (JTA) — While Russia’s mainstream Jewish leaders in Moscow firmly backed Israel’s actions in clashes this week with Palestinians at Jerusalem’s Temple Mount, the small Jewish community of Chechnya broke ranks with them and boldly condemned the Jewish state’s “provocations” against Muslims in the holy city. At least that was… Read more »

Tucson J to host citizenship ceremony

 The Tucson Jewish Community Center (the Tucson J) will be the host of the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services naturalization ceremony on Wednesday, July 26 at 10 a.m. in the Tucson J’s Ballroom. One hundred new U.S. citizens will participate in the naturalization ceremony and originate from the… Read more »

Granddaughter of Holocaust survivors removed Auschwitz relics to use for art project

Tourists at Auschwitz photographing the "Arbeit Macht Frei" gate, July 2015. (Ruth Ellen Gruber)

JERUSALEM (JTA) — The Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum said it will file a complaint with the Polish prosecutor against an Israeli woman, the granddaughter of Holocaust survivors, who removed relics from site. Rotem Bides, 27, an art student at the Beit Berl College in Kfar Saba, visited the Auschwitz… Read more »

Netanyahu caught on live mic bashing EU over Israel

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses members of the Visegrad Group, the leaders of Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia, July 19, (Haim Zach / GPO)

Europe is undermining its own security by undermining Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday as he was caught on live microphone bashing the European Union at a meeting with the leaders of Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia in Budapest. “We have a peculiar situation here. The… Read more »

ANALYSIS: Arabs, Jews trade barbs as Temple Mount heads toward the abyss

A security post at the Gate of the Moors/Mughrabi Gate. Jerusalem, July 19, 2017. (Mati Amar/TPS)

Summer in Jerusalem: As Israel continues to sweat through the hottest summer on record the Jewish Quarter of the Old City is full of tourists, seemingly oblivious to the heat. The restaurants leading from the Quarter towards the Western Wall pump with life, as does the Hurva Square, the… Read more »

Christian Zionists still uncertain about Trump — but know they’re glad Obama is out

Pastor John Hagee, left, founder of Christians United for Israel, shakes hands with Vice President Mike Pence at CUFI's annual conference, July 17, 2017. (Kasim Hafeez/CUFI)

WASHINGTON (JTA) – Barack Obama is gone and the relief among the Christian Zionists and their Jewish friends who peopled certain corners of Washington, D.C., this week was palpable. Gary Bauer, the veteran evangelical activist, laid it out at the opening session of Christians United for Israel’s annual conference on… Read more »

This kippah could save the lives of kids with allergies

The "Allergy Alert" kippah is designed to alert adults who might not be aware of a child's allergies. (iKippah)

(JTA) — At 3 1/2, Peretz Apfelbaum may not completely understand it yet, but some kitchens can put his life in danger. The Brooklyn boy is allergic to peanuts, cashews, pistachios, flax seeds, mustard seeds, coconut, peas, eggs and beef. Some of the foods give him hives, but the nuts can… Read more »

Chicago Dyke March article cost me my job, reporter tweets

Gretchen Rachel Hammond first reported that three Jewish women carrying rainbow flags emblazoned with Jewish stars were kicked out of the June 24 march. (Courtesy of Hammond)

  NEW YORK (JTA) — The journalist who first reported the ejection of three Jewish women from Chicago’s Dyke March tweeted that she was removed from her reporting job because of that article. In a tweet Monday, Gretchen Rachel Hammond wrote to Dyke March’s Twitter account that “You attacked, humiliated… Read more »

Why are there no women on the Chief Rabbinate’s ‘blacklist’?

The honorees from the first generation of Conservative women rabbis pose for a photo at the 2015 Conservative Rabbinical Assembly celebration of 30 years of women in the rabbinate. (Yossi Hoffman)

  NEW YORK (JTA) – The Israeli Chief Rabbinate’s so-called “blacklist” of Diaspora rabbis runs the denominational gamut. The rabbis on the list, whose letters confirming the Jewish identities of immigrants were rejected by the Chief Rabbinate in 2016, are Orthodox, Conservative, Reform — and even from the smaller… Read more »

The first medic to respond to the Temple Mount terror attack was Muslim. Here’s his story.

Nedal Sader sits on his United Hatzalah motor scooter in the Old City of Jerusalem, July 14, 2017. (Andrew Tobin)

  JERUSALEM (JTA) – When Nedal Sader first heard the crackle of automatic weapon fire Friday morning, he couldn’t believe it was coming from the Temple Mount. As a Muslim, he regarded the complex just outside his apartment as a sacred and peaceful place. He prayed there nearly every week. But… Read more »

6 reasons why Macron’s speech about the Holocaust in France was groundbreaking

Emmanuel Macron speaks at a ceremony commemorating the 75th anniversary of the Vel d'Hiv Holocaust roundup in Paris, July 16, 2017. (Kamil ZihnIoglu/AFP/Getty Images)

  PARIS (JTA) — It wasn’t the first time that a French president acknowledged his nation’s Holocaust-era guilt, but Emmanuel Macron’s speech Sunday was nonetheless groundbreaking in format, content and style. Delivered during a ceremony at the Vel d’Hiv Holocaust memorial monument exactly 75 years after French police officers rounded up 13,152… Read more »

Alan Gross, after spending 5 years in a Cuban prison, is starting over in Israel

Alan Gross with some of his favorite things -- a pastrami sandwich and a Cuban cigar -- at Loeb's Deli in Washington, D.C., July 12, 2017. (Ron Kampeas)

WASHINGTON (JTA) — Alan Gross contacted me a couple of months ago over Facebook Messenger. There was something he thought I should know. I was pleasantly surprised. I’d only exchanged pleasantries with Gross in the several times I’d seen him since his release from a Cuban prison in December… Read more »

Yiddish comes alive in Warsaw every summer

Golda Tencer, standing, at a Shabbat dinner during the International Seminar in Yiddish Language and Culture in Warsaw, July 7, 2017. (Katarzyna Markusz)

WARSAW, Poland (JTA) — When Gołda Tencer, the director of the Shalom Foundation and the Jewish Theater in Warsaw, lit the Sabbath candles last Friday, she was accompanied by dozens of people from various countries. Though their mother tongues differed, the voices at the table were united by a common… Read more »

As scandals mount, Netanyahu launches Trumpian attacks against ‘fake news’ and ‘leftists’

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu leading a Likud party meeting at the Knesset in Jerusalem, July 10, 2017. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

JERUSALEM (JTA) – Facing mounting scandals, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused the “fake news” media and “leftists” of trying to take him down with a campaign of lies. In a hastily organized meeting with political allies Thursday, Netanyahu denied any wrongdoing in two erupting controversies involving his associates, the… Read more »

How this 650-year-old French synagogue withstood centuries of anti-Semitism

Women from the Jewish community of Carpentras chatting while preparing for Shabbat at the town's synagogue, July 7, 2017. (Cnaan Liphshiz)

CARPENTRAS, France (JTA) — The synagogue in this Provence town is Western Europe’s oldest functioning Jewish house of worship — and one of the prettiest on the continent. The Synagogue of Carpentras, which this year is celebrating its 650th anniversary, has a Baroque-style interior and a gold-ornamented hall with a blue… Read more »

These rabbis have no idea why they’re on the Israeli Chief Rabbinate’s ‘blacklist’

Morris Allen, the rabbi of the Conservative Beth Jacob Congregation in Minnesota, believes he was included on the list because of his opposition to the Chief Rabbinate. (Courtesy of the Masorti Foundation)

NEW YORK (JTA) — In 2012, Rabbi Jason Herman wrote a letter to Israel’s Chief Rabbinate certifying that a friend of his who wished to get married was Jewish and single. The letter was declared invalid. But several months later Herman, spiritual leader of the Orthodox West Side Jewish… Read more »

Avi Gabbay, ‘Israel’s Macron,’ wants to lead Labor party from the center

Avi Gabbay attending a press conference after winning the Labor Party primary in Tel Aviv, Israel, July 11, 2017. (Miriam Alster/Flash90)

TEL AVIV (JTA) — He’s charismatic. He’s an outsider. And he’s a political centrist. Some have hailed Avi Gabbay, the telecom exec who was elected Monday to lead the center-left Labor Party, as Israel’s version of French President Emmanuel Macron, the banker who recently swept to power with an… Read more »

Trump’s lack of State Department appointments can hurt Israel, experts say

U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley testifying during a hearing before the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., June 28, 2017. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON (JTA) — Carmel Shama HaCohen, Israel’s ambassador to UNESCO, is second to none in his admiration for the Trump administration’s United Nations envoy, Nikki Haley. In fact, he’d like to clone her. Shama HaCohen appreciated Haley’s efforts in trying to head off last week’s vote by UNESCO’s Heritage… Read more »