(JTA) — A homeless man has been arrested for scratching swastikas into several cars in a Jewish neighborhood in Miami Beach. The swastikas were found keyed on the cars on Feb. 26, including on a car owned by a non-Jewish family. Timothy Merriam, 61, was arrested Tuesday and will be charged with criminal mischief. Police…
JERUSALEM (JTA) — The Sea of Galilee is at its lowest level in a century after northern Israel experienced the driest February ever recorded. The Israel Water Authority said Tuesday that the large freshwater lake, also known as Lake Kinneret, is 20 centimeters below the line experts consider acceptable for water quality. The sea received only 10…
JERUSALEM (JTA) — A majority of Israelis believe that President Donald Trump will not oppose settlement construction in the West Bank, a poll new found. Some 55 percent of Jewish Israelis told the monthly Israel Democracy Institute and Tel Aviv University Peace Index they do not believe Trump will oppose settlement construction. Some 77 percent of Arab…
WASHINGTON (JTA) — The American Jewish Committee said it was “troubled” by a new Israeli law banning entry to foreigners who publicly call for boycotting the Jewish state or its settlements. “Every nation, of course, is entitled to regulate who can enter,” AJC CEO David Harris, said Tuesday. “But barring entry to otherwise qualified visitors…
JERUSALEM (JTA) — Purim megillah readings and activities will come to over 400 neutral locations throughout Israel this year. The Tzohar Rabbinical Organization, which works to bridge the gap between the religious and secular in Israel, and Ohr Torah Stone’s Yachad, or Together, Program, will hold the Megillah BaKehilla, or Megillah in the Community programs…
(JTA) – A French court acquitted the Jewish historian Georges Bensoussan of hate speech charges over his assertion that Arabs receive anti-Semitism with their “mother’s milk.” Bensoussan was acquiteed on Tuesday, the AFP news agency reported, ending a polarizing trial that observers regarded as a significant test case for determining the boundaries of academic freedom…
(JTA) — When Cincinnati’s Mayerson Jewish Community Center was hit with a bomb threat on Jan. 18, Adam Bellows was satisfied with how the staff handled the preschool kids, including his two-year-old son. The kids, said Bellows, had no idea the threat had happened. They were evacuated and taken to a secure location where they watched…
The head of an Israeli pre-military academy said that Orthodox women who serve in the army are turned into “crazy” women with “confused” values. Yigal Levinstein, who heads the academy in the West Bank settlement Eli, made the inflammatory comments at a lecture to several hundred young male graduates of a different academy. Video of…
Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti clinched re-election on Tuesday in a landslide victory that handed him a second four-year term in charge of America’s second-largest city. Garcetti won 81 percent of the vote, according to a tally of all ballots early on Wednesday. The nearest of his 10 challengers Mitchell Schwartz, who was California state…
WASHINGTON (JTA) — Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman told U.S. Defense Secretary James Mattis that the United States needs to remain active in the Middle East to ensure security and stability. Liberman met Tuesday with Mattis at the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. According to an Israeli Defense Ministry readout, the meeting was friendly and covered strategic…
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman is planning to battle new travel restrictions President Donald Trump issued Monday. Schneiderman called the new order “MuslimBan2” and wrote on Twitter that he’ll see President Trump in court. While the White House may have made changes, the intent to discriminate against Muslims remains clear. #MuslimBan2 pic.twitter.com/6xi8QktBFW — Eric…
