Israeli-American men's basketball coach David Blatt led the Russian national team to the bronze medal at the 2012 London Olympic Games. (Christopher Johnson via CC) (JTA) – The London Olympics may have “lit up the world,” as organizing committee head Sebastian Coe put it, but for Jews the 2 1/2 weeks offered healthy doses of frustration and glory. On the plus side, new medalists such as America’s Aly Raisman gained the spotlight with her… Read more »
A troubling recent incident in the heart of Krakow’s old Jewish quarter, Kazimierz, has raised questions anew about the scope and impact of anti-Semitism in the age of instant response and interactive social media. The incident involved a waiter (or waiters) at a popular cafe, Moment, who rudely refused… Read more »
(L-R) Tucsonans Donna Moser, Audrey Brooks, Marlyne Freedman and Deanna Evenchik at the Birthright Israel Mega Event at Haifa Naval Base July 12 The faces of our grandparents are with me in early July as I leave for the Jewish Federations of North America Campaign Chairs and Directors Mission to Odessa and Israel with my sister, Donna Moser. Grandpa Nathan and Grandma Sadie came to the United States in 1899 from Odessa;… Read more »
WASHINGTON (JTA) — The U.S. State Department’s report on religious freedom described a “global increase” in anti-Semitism and said the “rising tide of anti-Semitism” was among the key trends of last year. The executive summary of the report for 2011, released July 30, also detailed the “impact of political… Read more »
Mitchell Flint standing in front of his P51 Mustang fighter plane in Israel in 1948. (Courtesy Tom Tugend) LOS ANGELES (JTA) — After a 64-year detour, Mitchell Flint, a former fighter pilot for the United States and Israel, has finally landed for the London Olympic Games. In the summer of 1948, Flint, with a four-year wartime stint as a U.S. Navy fighter pilot in the Pacific under… Read more »
LONDON (JTA) — Was the only Israeli on the International Olympic Committee instrumental in stopping a tribute to the Munich 11 at the opening ceremony of the 2012 London Games? In the past few weeks, a war of words has erupted between the official, Alex Gilady, and the families… Read more »
Alexandra "Aly" Raisman performing a leap on the balance beam at the 2010 World Championships. (John Cheng) (JTA) — Aly Raisman, a Jewish American, won the floor exercise in helping the U.S. women’s team to the gold medal in the gymnastics competition at the London Olympics. The Americans on Tuesday won their first team gold medal in women’s gymnastics since the Atlanta Games in 1996, finishing… Read more »
Sprinter Steven Solomon, the only Jewish member of the Australian Olympic team, playing for the Australian junior soccer team at the 2009 Maccabiah Games in Israel. (Peter Haskin) SYDNEY (JTA) — Moments after Steven Solomon walked into Ramat Gan Stadium for the opening of the 2009 Maccabiah Games in Israel, the Australian teenager sent his parents a photo with a message describing how amazing it was to be at his first “Jewish Olympics.” On July 27, Solomon,… Read more »
Leslie Lyndon, former cantor of the Masorti New North London Synagogue, carrying the Olympic torch in London, July 25, 2012. (Ian Ellis) LONDON (JTA) — For Leslie Lyndon and the London Jewish community, it was a minor miracle. When Lyndon carried the Olympic torch through a north London neighborhood last week, it was more than representative of how Jewish Londoners have embraced the Olympic spirit. This was five years since Lyndon,… Read more »
LONDON (JTA) — Typically on high alert, London’s Jewish community organizations are being advised to take additional security measures during the Olympics. The Community Security Trust, the charity that represents and recommends the community on matters of security, has told Jewish groups to implement or increase patrols around their… Read more »
TEL AVIV (JTA) — Hezbollah may have landed a strike against Israel with last week’s bus bombing in Bulgaria, but the Lebanese terrorist faction faces an uncertain future as one of its main sponsors — Syria’s Assad regime — faces a serious revolt and weakening support from once Arab… Read more »
Israeli ZAKA emergency rescue team examining the remains of the bus at the scene of the terrorist attack in Burgas, Bulgaria, July 19, 2012. (Dano Monkotovic/FLASH90/JTA) SOFIA, Bulgaria (JTA) — Until this week, leaders of Bulgaria’s small, generally placid Jewish community said felt untouched by hate crimes or terrorism. But after Wednesday’s apparent suicide bombing of a bus carrying Israeli tourists in the Black Sea city of Borgas, Jews in the country are speaking of… Read more »
Survivors of the terror attack on the Israeli tour bus in Burgas, Bulgaria, returning to Israel with the help of the Israeli Air Force, July 19, 2012. (Yossi Zeliger/FLASH90/JTA) TEL AVIV (JTA) — Vered Kuza was standing with her daughter, Amit, on an airport shuttle bus at Sarafovo International Airport in Burgas, Bulgaria, when she suddenly heard a blast. “It’s an attack!” Kuza, 54, shouted at Amit, 26. “We need to get out of here!” She pushed her… Read more »
CHISINAU, Moldova (JTA) — To tour the largely empty Jewish communities of Moldova and its capital, Chisinau — once known by Jews the world over as Kishinev — is not to wonder where did all the Jews go but why there are any remaining. Overgrown cemeteries are all that… Read more »
The Tower Bridge in London, decorated with the five Olympic rings in preparation for the 2012 Summer Games, June 2012. (Iain Farrell via CC) LONDON (JTA) — For the British Jewish community, the most memorable moment of the London Olympics may be a somber one. On Aug. 6, several hundred people are expected to attend a commemoration for the 11 Israeli athletes and coaches murdered by Palestinian terrorists during the 1972 Munich Olympics.… Read more »
Michael Fuerst enlisted in the Bundeswehr, West Germany’s armed forces paratroopers unit, in 1966. (Photo courtesy Michael Fuerst) In an office amid a labyrinth of hallways in Germany’s Ministry of Defense, a short jaunt from where Claus von Stauffenberg was executed in 1944 for trying to kill Adolf Hitler, sits Bernhard Fischer, lieutenant colonel and Jew. What’s a nice Jewish guy doing in a place like this?… Read more »
Peter Singer speaking at a Veritas Forum event on the Massachusetts Institute of technology campus, March 2009. (Joel Travis Sage via CC) SYDNEY, Australia (JTA) — He’s been brandished “the most dangerous man on earth,” accused of being a “public advocate of genocide” and likened to Josef Mengele, the notorious Nazi “Angel of Death.” Yet he’s also been hailed as “one of the world’s 100 most influential people” and “among the… Read more »
Students from the St. Ursula-Schule, a Catholic high school in Germany, view facsimiles of ads for Hitler's "Mein Kampf" at the House of the Wannsee Conference in Potsdam, site of the planning of the Final Solution. (Toby Axelrod) BERLIN (JTA) –- Does “Mein Kampf” belong in German high schools? With Adolf Hitler’s book due to come out of wraps here in 2015, freed after decades under copyright protection that prevented its publication in Germany, it’s a question that is being debated in classrooms and on German TV… Read more »
Kindergarten students in yellow caps run out into the school yard to rehearse for their end of year concert at the Athens Jewish Community School. (Gavin Rabinowitz/JTA) ATHENS, Greece (JTA) – When the bell rang, the sixth-graders who had been playing basketball rushed off to a computer class. Their place in the yard at Athens’ Jewish Community School was taken by two dozen giggling 4- and 5-year -olds practicing dance steps for the year-end concert. “One,… Read more »
Marika Weinberger, a Holocaust survivor and former president of the Australian Association of Jewish Holocaust Survivors and Descendants. (Henry Benjamin) SYDNEY, Australia (JTA) — When Australia’s highest court soon rules on whether the 90-year-old Karoly “Charles” Zentai should be extradited to Hungary, it likely will be passing judgment on the last known Nazi war criminal suspect residing in the country. The pending end of the drawn out legal proceedings is… Read more »
