JERUSALEM (JTA) — Two hundred French Jews arrived in Israel on a special aliyah flight. The flight organized by The Jewish Agency for Israel, the Ministry of Aliyah and Immigrant Absorption, and Keren Hayesod-UIA arrived in Israel on Monday. Among the new immigrants to Israel were 74 children and teens. The youngest immigrant is two…
JERUSALEM (JTA) — Jason Greenblatt, President Donald Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East, met with the families of Israelis believed to be held by Hamas in Gaza. Greenblatt, who arrived in Israel this week, met Monday evening with the families of Avera Mengistu and Hisham al-Sayed to discuss the situation of the two men,…
An unidentified man was caught on camera carving dozens of swastikas into a sidewalk in Midwood, Brooklyn. Police in the area were alerted after property owners on on the 200 block of Newkirk Avenue reported the vandalism. A police spokesman did not say whether the NYPD’s Hate Crime Task Force was involved in the search….
(JTA) — A haredi Orthodox worker at a yeshiva in Borough Park was nearly crushed by a 2,500-pound steel safe installed to protect Torah scrolls. The worker at the Rabbinical College Yeshiva of Machzikai Hadas in Borough Park had just finished installing and cleaning the 8-foot-long, 3-foot-deep safe on Monday morning when it toppled over,…
(JTA) — The main rabbinical seminary in Europe for Reform and Masorti Jews ordained the first ever Spain-born Progressive rabbi, the seminary’s spokesperson said. Rabbi Haim Casas, who was born and raised in Cordoba, was ordained at a ceremony in London last week along with six other rabbis of the Leo Baeck College, the institution…
An anti-migrant billboard campaign by the Hungarian government that uses the image of U.S. financier George Soros is “reminiscent of Europe’s darkest hours,” Soros’ spokesman said on Tuesday. The billboards and full-page media ads that have appeared across Hungary depict a smiling Soros – a vocal critic of Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s right-wing government –…
(JTA) — The journalist who first reported the ejection of three Jewish women from the Chicago Dyke March has been stripped of her reporting duties. Gretchen Rachel Hammond, an award-winning reporter for the Windy City Times, a Chicago LGBT newspaper, has been moved full-time to the paper’s sales desk as of Monday. Hammond was the…
NEW YORK (JTA) — There’s another Jewish lawyer representing the Trump family. Donald Trump Jr. has hired New York-based attorney Alan Futerfas to represent him in investigations about Russia-related contacts and election meddling, Reuters reported Monday. The news came a day after The New York Times reported that Trump Jr. met with a Russian lawyer who…
Miracles can come in all shapes and sizes: The tiny hand of a newborn baby. A vibrant double rainbow that paints the sky after a storm. The fact that any of us are on this earth at all. Another form a miracle can take is that of Jack Black lip-syncing to the Talking Heads hit…
(JTA) — A historic 179-year-old Conservative synagogue in New York’s Upper West Side is moving forward with plans to house a 14-story apartment building. The proposed project for the Shaare Zedek synagogue on West 93rd Street includes 20 condominiums, with a community center for the synagogue in the building’s first three floors, The Real Deal,…
(JTA) — Avi Gabbai will lead Israel’s Labour party after defeating his opponent in the second round of primaries. On Monday evening, Gabbai, who switched to the center-left Labor party several months ago from Kulanu, a smaller center-right party, won the election to head the party, garnering 52 percent of the vote. His opponent, Amir Peretz, a…
