Tagged HEADLINES

(JTA) — President Donald Trump authorized sanctions against the International Criminal Court should it pursue cases against U.S. citizens and cited what he said was its anti-Israel bias. In an executive order issued Thursday, Trump approved economic sanctions and travel restrictions against ICC workers directly involved in investigating American… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — Israel’s Supreme Court struck down a 2017 law that would allow the expropriation of private Palestinian land on which illegal outpost homes were built. The ruling issued Tuesday in an 8-1 decision said the law “infringes on property rights and equality for Palestinian residents, and places… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — The number of deaths from the coronavirus in Israel reached 300 as a resurgence of COVID-19 followed the reopening of schools and many businesses. In recent days, the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 has topped 100 after it had been tamped down to under 20.… Read more »

(JTA) – In the  past few months, UJA-Federation of New York has awarded millions of dollars in emergency grants to help organizations survive the COVID-19 pandemic. Now it’s joining the ranks of organizations having to let go of its own staff members as it anticipates declining donations. And its… Read more »

(JTA) — More than 800 rabbis and cantors, including the leaders of three major denominations, signed a statement in support of peaceful protest against racism and in memory of George Floyd. The statement invoked Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, an iconic Jewish civil rights activist who marched with the Rev.… Read more »

(JTA) — The Department of Veterans Affairs announced that it will begin the process of replacing three gravestones bearing swastikas in cemeteries in Texas and Utah, less than a month after saying they would be preserved as “historic resources.” The VA told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency last month that… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held a conference call with Jared Kushner and other top White House officials to discuss slowing down West Bank annexation plans, an Israeli TV station reported. Channel 13  in its report Monday cited an unnamed senior Israeli source that the Trump… Read more »

(JTA) — Dozens of American Jewish groups have pledged to work to end systemic racism in the aftermath of the George Floyd killing in Minneapolis. In a statement Tuesday, 130 organizations said they were “outraged” by the killing of Floyd, a black man who died in police custody last… Read more »

(JTA) — Shuly Rubin Schwartz, an expert on Jewish American history and longtime professor, will be the first woman chancellor in the 134-year history of the Jewish Theological Seminary. Schwartz, who served as provost — also the first woman in that position — will be eighth chancellor in the… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — Thousands of students in Jerusalem and other cities across the country were sent home Monday to isolation after staff and students were found to have COVID-19. Schools in Israel began opening more than two weeks ago after isolating for nearly two months due to the coronavirus.… Read more »

(JTA) — Benjamin Netanyahu, the TV series, is coming to HBO. “Bibi,” the longtime Israeli prime minister’s ubiquitous nickname, will be based on the bestselling biography “The Netanyahu Years” written by veteran Israeli journalist Ben Caspit, Variety reported Thursday. The series is set to be produced by Tel Aviv-based… Read more »

BERLIN (JTA) — Rabbis can be military chaplains again in the German military for the first time since they were kicked out by the Nazis in the 1930s, nearly a century ago. The German Bundestag, or parliament, unanimously approved the move in a vote on Thursday. “The first clergymen… Read more »

Marc L. Dollinger (Courtesy)

Two summers ago, I published an academic book about blacks and Jews that did not include a single black Jew in the narrative. Ilana Kaufman, founder and president of the Jews of Color Field Building Initiative, encouraged me to open my eyes to my own implicit assumptions about Jews,… Read more »

Jewish Family & Children’s Services received a grant of $20,020 from Angel Charity for Children to renovate and refurnish a play therapy room with equipment and toys to help children heal and develop in healthy ways and to provide play therapy services to over 150 children each year who… Read more »

My beloved father and hero, Solomon Eisenberg, served on the USS Daly DD-519, a naval destroyer during World War II. He saved two men who fell overboard into the Bering Sea off the coast of Adak, when the Japanese occupied the Aleutian Islands of Alaska after the bombing of… Read more »

Rabbi Yehuda Ceitlin (Britta Van Vranken)

Jewish communities have a custom of reading the Book of Ruth on the holiday of Shavuot, which commemorates the receiving of the Torah on Mount Sinai. It is not an obvious selection. The Talmudist Rabbi Zeira asked, “This scroll does not contain the laws of impurity or purity, prohibitions or… Read more »

(JTA) — The coronavirus crisis closed a door on Jewish journalism in Canada but opened a window. When the Canadian Jewish News stopped publishing last month after 60 years, observers worried that the country’s Jewish population of some 400,000 would be underserved without a news outlet geared toward the… Read more »

(JTA) — The Museum of Jewish Montreal has been told it must vacate its premises by the end of June. The museum, which is being evicted by the building’s new owners, has been running online experiences since being forced to close due to the coronavirus crisis. “Our storefront has… Read more »

(JTA) – This upstate New York resort’s lake, bowling alleys and cabins were the setting for Mrs. Maisel’s Catskills summer retreat. Now it can be yours for a mere $6 million. The Scott’s Family Resort in Deposit, which has been operating for 150 years, is on the market. The… Read more »

SUFFERN, N.Y. (JTA) — My two children, aged 13 and 15, attend daily Zoom classes from designated corners of our suburban home. Slovenly habits aside, their workspaces are virtual classrooms in which they analyze George Orwell’s work and ponder Talmudic passages in equal measure. Online classes — the ones they… Read more »