National

WASHINGTON (JTA) — President Barack Obama will not alter the terms of Jonathan Pollard’s parole once he is released, a signal that Israel’s struggle to bring him to the country whose citizenship he has assumed will outlast his November release date. “Mr. Pollard will serve his sentence as mandated… Read more »

  TEL AVIV (JTA) — When the United States frees convicted spy Jonathan Pollard in November, many in Israel will celebrate the moment for which they have fought and hoped. What Pollard’s release won’t do, officials and analysts say, is make most Israelis feel any better about the nuclear deal with Iran. Pollard, who was convicted… Read more »

  WASHINGTON (JTA) – Call it a double miracle for the pastor who would be president: Mike Huckabee managed to unite Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Barack Obama while grabbing the spotlight from Donald Trump. Netanyahu’s ambassador to the United States, Ron Dermer, slammed Huckabee, a Republican… Read more »

NEW YORK (JTA) – When the Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles came out with a strongly worded statement last week opposing the Iran nuclear deal, it became one of a handful of federations across the country to stake out a clear position on the agreement. “This Iran deal… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) — The Obama administration is preparing to release Israeli spy Jonathan Pollard in the next few months, the Wall Street Journal reported. Pollard may be released in the next few weeks or by Nov. 21, the date he is officially eligible for parole under rules in place… Read more »

Editor’s note: If you live in Southern Arizona and apply for the “Under 30 Change-the-World”  prize, please contact the AJP and tell us about your project. NEW YORK, July 24 – Calling all young Jewish and Israeli social entrepreneurs: here is your chance to help change the world while competing for… Read more »

Vice President Joe Biden delivering remarks at the Good Jobs Green Jobs National Conference in Washington, D.C., April 13, 2015. This week he beseeched about a thousand Jewish leaders in a phone call on the Iran nuclear deal. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON (JTA) – Vice President Joe Biden had an intimate phone call this week with about a thousand Jewish leaders, beseeching, teaching and preaching the Iran nuclear deal. Biden’s imploring hourlong call on Monday typified how personal the campaign for and against the Iran nuclear deal is becoming. President… Read more »

(JTA) — New York Sen. Chuck Schumer was not actually in New York on Wednesday, but the Democrat’s influence on the fate of the Iran deal loomed large when several thousand people descended on Times Square to protest the agreement. Many of those demonstrating against the agreement chanted “Where… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) — The road to the Iran nuclear deal did not start in November 2013, when the major powers and Iran launched formal talks. It did not begin in 2010, when the U.S. Congress passed the far-reaching Iran sanctions and the U.N. Security Council approved its own set of… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) – Cancel your summer vacations. That was the order AIPAC’s executive director, Howard Kohr, gave his employees in a staff meeting convened this week at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee after the United States announced the Iran nuclear deal. With the influential pro-Israel lobby group pushing for Congress… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) – The nuclear deal with Iran, 20 months in the making, is now done — at least as far as negotiations go. The accord, announced early Tuesday, still faces hurdles, although they likely won’t keep the deal from going ahead. So what happens next? We read the laws, perused the… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) – When the Department of Homeland Security convened a terror attack simulation for national Jewish leaders, they returned again and again to last month’s deadly shooting attack on a historic black church in Charleston, South Carolina. Last week’s simulation, known as a “tabletop” exercise, posits a possible attack, depicted as… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) – Years before it is deemed a success or a failure, a nuclear deal between Iran and the major powers could unleash far-reaching changes in the region. Much of the focus in Congress and the media in recent weeks has been on whether the deal would inhibit… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) – A nuclear deal between Iran and the major world powers is due to be finalized by Tuesday. Until now, critics of the emerging deal have argued that it’s bad, getting worse, but it could be improved. Once negotiators on both sides come up with a final deal,… Read more »

PHILADELPHIA (JTA) — On July 4, 1965, 40 people gathered outside this city’s Independence Hall for the first Annual Reminder demonstration on behalf of civil rights for gays. For this weekend’s 50-year commemoration, thousands attended a ceremony that included a reenactment of the initial protest. The milestone, which comes… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) – How often do you get the opportunity to pack “109 years,” #LoveWins and the rainbow colors into 140 characters? That’s how the American Jewish Committee celebrated the Supreme Court ruling Friday extending marriage rights to gays throughout the United States. “For 109 years AJC has stood for liberty… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) – Israel’s former ambassador to Washington, Michael Oren, caused a stir last week by publicly accusing President Barack Obama of abandoning the two core principles that undergird the U.S.-Israel relationship: no public disagreements and no surprises. But should there be no public disagreements – “no daylight,” in diplomatic… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) – From the man who married her grandmother to the man who married her daughter, from working a room full of bar mitzvah guests on behalf of her husband’s political career to headlining major pro-Israel events during her own, Hillary Rodham Clinton’s journey has never wandered far from Jews. Clinton’s Jewish encounters have… Read more »

As Wednesday’s massacre in Charleston demonstrated,  houses of worship face a particularly difficult security challenge. Unlike schools, churches such as the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal, where nine people were gunned down by a lone shooter on Wednesday, need to stay open and accessible to carry out their mission of… Read more »

Though he's CEO of a major travel company, Stephen Kaufer says he doesn't really have wanderlust -- but he would like to revisit his favorite destination: Jerusalem. (Courtesy TripAdvisor)

NEW YORK (JTA) – When Stephen Kaufer, the CEO of TripAdvisor, an $11 billion company that runs America’s leading user-generated hotel review website, thinks back to all the places he has visited, one stands out as his favorite. Jerusalem. “Oh my gosh, looking at all of these amazing structures, the… Read more »