News

(JTA) — A decade ago, the tiny Jewish Community of Porto didn’t have enough money to hire a rabbi or even fix the roof of its synagogue. Today, this Orthodox congregation of 400 people in northern Portugal has enough for both, along with a kosher hotel, a ritual bath,… Read more »

RAMAPO, N.Y. (JTA) — On the street where a man was stabbed to within an inch of his life on Wednesday, yellow buses waited to ferry young children to elementary school. Steps away from where his blood had splattered on the asphalt, young men shuffled in and out of… Read more »

Erika Spivack

The Women’s Philanthropy Advisory Council of the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona is seeking nominations for the 14th annual Bryna Zehngut Mitzvot Award, recognizing an outstanding Jewish teenage girl. The award honors Zehngut, a community leader who died in 2005. Nominees should be high school juniors or seniors who… Read more »

Hadassah Southern Arizona will announce its Woman of the Year for 2019 and install its 2020 officers at a wine and chocolate philanthropy event on Sunday, Dec. 8 at 1:30 p.m. at the Ruth and Irving Olson Center for Jewish Life, 180 W. Magee Road, Suite 140. The Enchanted… Read more »

(JTA) — Violence erupted at a a protest by pro-Palestinian students against an appearance by Israeli army reservists at York University in Toronto on Wednesday night. Members of the university chapter of Students Against Israeli Apartheid, or SAIA, tried to shut down a university-approved panel discussion featuring Reservists on… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — The Satmar Rebbe distributed $5 million to 150 anti-Zionist institutions Zalman Teitelbaum was in Israel to present the heads of the institutions with checks made out in shekels, The Jerusalem Post reported. The checks were distributed on Thursday night in the Satmar stronghold of Beit Shemesh.… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — More than 30 heads of state will gather in Jerusalem on the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. The leaders will be attending the fifth World Holocaust Forum in January, which will coincide with the anniversary. Presidents Vladimir Putin of Russia and Emmanuel Macron of… Read more »

(JTA) — Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany will make her first visit to the site of the Auschwitz Nazi camp in her 14-year tenure. The visit to the former death camp in Poland is scheduled for Dec. 6, the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung reported Thursday. She will participate there… Read more »

(JTA) — Hitler’s top hate sold for more than $55,000 at a controversial auction in Germany of Nazi memorabilia. The auction at Hermann Historica began Wednesday in Munich and continues on Thursday. Other items that sold on the first day were a silver-plated copy of “Mein Kampf” that once… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — Israeli President Reuven Rivlin handed the mandate to form a government coalition to the Knesset for the first time. Rivlin met Thursday with Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein to hand him the formal notice a day after Blue and White party head Benny Gantz announced he was… Read more »

(JTA) — A judicial board in Tennessee cleared a judge who linked on social media to articles saying the Jews should “get the f*** over the Holocaust” of being anti-Semitic, racist and anti-immigrant. Shelby County Criminal Court Judge Jim Lammey, who had also called Muslim immigrants “foreign mud,” was… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — An Israeli Border Police officer who shot a Palestinian man in the back with a sponge-tipped bullet has been charged with assault and reckless use of a firearm. The Palestinian victim was walking away from the policewoman at a West Bank checkpoint when he was shot… Read more »

(JTA) — Marvel Comics has a message for a New York City candidate: The day has come for you to stop using Captain America in your campaign. Ben Kallos, a New York City councilman who is running for Manhattan Borough president in 2021, wears a Captain America costume on… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — Benjamin Netanyahu has been charged in three corruption cases, marking the first time a sitting Israeli prime minister has been indicted. The charges, announced on Thursday evening by the Justice Ministry and Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit, include bribery and breach of public trust. Netanyahu has denied… Read more »

NEW YORK (JTA) — Although it hasn’t yet been determined whether the brutal stabbing of a young father on his way to morning prayers in Ramapo, New York, was a an anti-Jewish hate crime, it was described by the local police chief as a “vicious, violent attack” and would… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — Blue and White party head Benny Gantz told Israeli President Reuven Rivlin that he is unable to form a government. Gantz made the announcement on Wednesday evening, about four hours before his mandate to form a government was scheduled to expire at midnight. Gantz spent the… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — The U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem issued a travel warning for visiting Americans in the aftermath of the U.S. announcement that the government does not consider the establishment of Israeli civilian settlements in the West Bank as illegal. The warning issued Monday said the visiting Americans could… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) — The Trump administration will no longer regard West Bank Jewish settlement as illegal, another dramatic change that aligns it with Israel’s right-wing government. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in reviewing the history of U.S. policy on settlements said that since 1978, the United States has regarded… Read more »

(JTA) — As an observant Jew, Yosef David was taught to believe in miracles. That’s a good thing since David, a social worker from London, is going to need one to succeed in his new mission: unseating Jeremy Corbyn from Parliament in the general election on Dec. 12. David… Read more »

(JTA) — The crowded field of Democratic 2020 hopefuls has welcomed another latecomer to the fray: Deval Patrick, the former Massachusetts governor. On Thursday, Patrick released an announcement video that recalled the struggles he faced growing up on Chicago’s South Side and said he wanted to make the American… Read more »