Yearly Archives 2019

JERUSALEM (JTA) — A new left-wing alliance including former Prime Minister Ehud Barak has formed to take on Benjamin Netanyahu and the right wing that backs him in Israel’s September elections. The united slate announced Thursday has the far-left Meretz party running with Barak’s new Israel Democratic Party and… Read more »

(JTA) — A former Nazi SS soldier was charged with denying the Holocaust in Germany. Karl Munter, 96, was indicted in the German state of Lower Saxony on Wednesday for questioning the extent of the Holocaust and offensive comments he made about the victims of a massacre of civilians… Read more »

(JTA) — Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority, reiterated statements about terminating his government’s dealings with Israel. Abbas’ announcement Thursday followed an emergency meeting after Israel razed Palestinian buildings built without permit on the edge of Jerusalem, near the security barrier that Israel built in the West… Read more »

(JTA) — Following protests, authorities in eastern France rescinded a ban they had issued forbidding soccer fans from Israel from flying their country’s flag in the streets of Strasbourg. The prohibitions, which are unusual and provoked vociferous criticism, came in a four-page order Thursday from the head of the Bas-Rhin… Read more »

(JTA) — Yuval Noah Harari, an internationally celebrated historian from Israel, omitted criticism of Russia from a translation of a book to avoid censorship there, he said. The criticism was “liable to be censored by the Russian government,” Harari told Haaretz in an interview published Thursday about the Russian-language… Read more »

(JTA) — A CNN photo editor resigned after some anti-Semitic tweets he made in 2011 were discovered. Mohammed Elshamy, a 25-year-old former photojournalist with the Anadolu news agency, quit Thursday night after an employee of Israel’s Government Press Office flagged on Twitter some of the anti-Semitic statements by Elshamy,… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) — Civil rights icon Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., explained why he backed a resolution upholding the right to boycott “at home and abroad” — even though he also voted to condemn the boycott, divestment and sanction movement aimed at Israel Lewis was a cosponsor of a House… Read more »

NEW YORK (JTA) — There are few remnants of the once flourishing Jewish community of the town of Colmar, in France. Jews were blamed for the outbreak of the Black Death plague there in 1348-49, and many were burned to death. A Roman emperor who then controlled the area… Read more »

(JTA) — Norway and six EU countries voted at the United Nations in favor of two resolutions that singled out Israel for criticism as a violator of women’s and human rights. Israel was the only country named Tuesday as a violator or trouble spot by the 54-nation UN Economic… Read more »

(JTA) — A campaign on a Jewish crowdfunding website raised more than $2 million in five days to provide a “miracle drug” to help a 2-year-old Florida girl. Eliana Cohen, daughter of Ariel and Shani Cohen of Aventura, was diagnosed with an extremely rare disease called spinal muscular atrophy… Read more »

(JTA) — In 2007, Sgt. Daniel Somers returned home after two tours in Iraq, where he worked in intelligence and special operations. For years he struggled to get on with his life, but his Army service had left him with deep scars, including post-traumatic stress disorder, traumatic brain injury… Read more »

Edith S. Makler, 91, died July 12, 2019, of pancreatic cancer. Born in New York on April 18, 1928, Mrs. Makler graduated from the University of Arizona in 1948, married Howard Makler in 1949, and returned to New York to start a family. The family resettled in Tucson in… Read more »

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (JTA) — On July 18, 1994, at 9:53 a.m. local time here, a car bomb destroyed the city’s AMIA Jewish center, killing 85 people and injuring more than 300. The 25th anniversary of the bombing is Thursday, and commemorations are planned throughout Argentina to pay tribute to… Read more »

NEW YORK (JTA) — If you’re going to physically block an entrance to an ICE detention center, the handbook says, don’t act nice about it. Do chant in Yiddish. Do sing Hebrew prayers. “Defiant, angry, urgent, Jewish,” reads the #NeverAgainIsNow Action Toolkit, a six-page Google Doc meant for Jews… Read more »

BOSTON (JTA) — Two anti-Semitic fliers that deny the Holocaust were posted at a Massachusetts synagogue, with reports of similar incidents at synagogues in two other states. Police are investigating what the Anti-Defamation League described as a coordinated campaign by a national online white supremacist group. The fliers at… Read more »

NEW YORK (JTA) — President Donald Trump’s comments on Sunday calling for some Democratic congresswomen to “go back” to their countries of origin have been widely condemned as racist. “Why don’t they go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came,” the… Read more »

(JTA) — Rhoda Smolow was officially elected as national president of Hadassah. The new president, the organization’s 27th in its 107 years, will lead over 300,000 members, associates and supporters claimed by the world’s largest women’s Zionist organization, Hadassah announced Tuesday. The announcement camed during Hadassah’s convention at the… Read more »

SAN FRANCISCO (JTA) — When the last Lubavitcher Rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson, died in July 1994, I was one of many journalists in the Jewish media who did not see how the Hasidic movement he led could survive, much less thrive, in his absence. It has, of course. That… Read more »

If you think only young people rock out at concerts, think again. This summer marks the 50th anniversary of the Woodstock Music Festival. Many music lovers will return to the site of the original concert to enjoy the music of such rock icons as Santana, the Doobie Brothers, and… Read more »

(JTA) — Abraham Lichtenbaum was getting ready to leave his house on July 18, 1994 when, at 9:53 a.m., he heard an explosion: The headquarters of Argentina’s 200,000-strong Jewish community, the AMIA, located less than four miles from his home, had been bombed. Eighty-five people died and 300 were injured… Read more »