News

(JTA) — Jews are being persecuted as disease carriers amid the outbreak of measles, a New York haredi Orthodox rabbi said at a symposium with leaders of the anti-vaccination movement attended by hundreds of haredim. “We Hasidim have been chosen as the target,” said Rabbi Hillel Handler, a Holocaust… Read more »

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,… Read more »

KIEV, Ukraine (JTA) — Walking on the scorched and scarred sidewalks of this capital city’s main square five years ago, Eduard Dolinsky felt hopeful and proud. A member of Kiev’s large Jewish population and a longtime activist for its communal causes, Dolinsky had hoped that the bloody street fights… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) — Reps. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., and Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill., joined in an appeal to confront a rise in deadly expressions of white nationalism. “As a Muslim American and a Jewish American elected to the United States Congress, we can no longer sit silently as terror strikes our… Read more »

KIEV, Ukraine (JTA) — Jews have lived in Ukraine for such a long time that their arrival here predates even the first recorded use of the country’s name. Starting in the ninth century, Jews began settling between Uzhgorod and Lugansk — respectively the westernmost and easternmost cities of what… Read more »

(JTA) — A jogger was arrested for allegedly verbally threatening and spitting on elderly Jews in Florida as they walked home from synagogue. Daniel Valerivich Starikov, 33, of Hollywood, Florida and who is originally from Britain, was arrested on Wednesday on two charges of battery on persons 65 years… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — A 65-year-old Israeli man has been indicted for banging on the roof of the car of Polish Ambassador Marek Magierowski and spitting at him. According to the indictment filed Thursday by police with the Tel Aviv Magistrates’ Court, Arik Lederman of Herzliya stood in the middle… Read more »

(JTA) — New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced his candidacy for president in the 2020 election, calling President Donald Trump a “bully.” De Blasio, the mayor since 2014, made the announcement early Thursday morning in a 3-minute video posted on YouTube and becomes the 23rd candidate for the… Read more »

(JTA) — A St. Louis Jewish teen who writes a daily politics newsletter scooped New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio’s presidential candidacy announcement. De Blasio officially made the announcement early Thursday morning in a 3-minute video posted on YouTube, and followed it up with an appearance on ABC’s “Good… Read more »

BOSTON (JTA) — A fire outside the suburban Boston home of a rabbi that serves at 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… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — Rest easy, Madonna fans, it’s official: The pop icon will sing at the Eurovision Song Contest finals in Tel Aviv. She signed her contract on Thursday morning, two days before her performance, Israel’s Kan public broadcaster reported. Madonna is scheduled to perform two songs on Saturday night. Though… Read more »

(JTA) — A teenager has turned himself in for punching an identifiably Jewish man in the head in Brooklyn. It was one of two attacks on haredi Orthodox men in the largely haredi Williamsburg neighborhood in less than two weeks. Police are withholding the 16-year-old’s name because he is… Read more »

(JTA) — President Donald Trump granted a full pardon to Conrad Black, the former owner and publisher of The Jerusalem Post who had spent three years in prison for stealing $60 million from his own company, Hollinger International. Black was found guilty of fraud and obstruction of justice in… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — NASA released a photo of what it says is the crash site of Israel’s Beresheet lunar lander. The image taken some 56 miles from the surface of the moon by NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter on April 22, 11 days after the crash, shows a dark smudge… Read more »

(JTA) — Viewers of soccer on Telemundo are likely familiar with the “gooooooooaaaal” call that their announcers helped make famous. Those who’ve watched that American Spanish language network during a World Cup, Olympics or other major soccer tournament have probably heard Sammy Sadovnik call a game. Sadovnik is a… Read more »

(JTA) — On Tuesday night, the NBA held its draft lottery, determining in which order each of its teams would pick players in next month’s draft. It made headlines for a couple of reasons: First, the consensus No. 1 pick, Zion Williamson of Duke, is the most hyped basketball player… Read more »

(JTA) — Early Tuesday, a man wielding a large knife approached the secretary of the Jewish community of Helsingborg, Sweden, from the back and delivered near-fatal stab wounds to her upper body. The victim, a woman in her 60s whose family asked not be named in the media, was… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) — An American administration is issuing dire warnings about a Persian Gulf nation, there’s talk of war and questions about the quality of intelligence. And those who back confronting Iran and those who don’t are citing Israel as a factor. If the Iran war talk sounds familiar,… Read more »

NEW YORK (JTA) — On April 16, Dzanc Books announced its latest release, “The Siege of Tel Aviv,” a novel that imagines an Iran-led attack on Israel that leaves the country decimated. Author Hesh Kestin, a former journalist who had already published two novels with the small independent press,… Read more »

A daughter, Maya Klari Neuman, was born on April 8, 2019 to Eszter and Ariel Neuman of Los Angeles. Maya joins brothers Zev and Louis Neuman. Grandparents are Shlomo and Yael Neuman of Tucson, and Eva and Tamas Lengyel of Los Angeles.… Read more »