Donald Trump on Monday chided the United Nations as “sad,” just days after the U.N. Security Council adopted a resolution demanding an end to Israeli settlements despite pressure by the U.S. president-elect for a veto by Washington. “The United Nations has such great potential but right now it is just a club for people to…
Vera Rubin, a U.S. astronomer who pioneered work on invisible dark matter in the universe and who some colleagues felt was overlooked for a Nobel Prize, has died at 88, her son said on Monday. Rubin died on Sunday at an assisted living facility in Princeton, New Jersey, and had suffered from dementia for several…
(JTA) — Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner and their three young children lit Hanukkah candles on their vacation in Hawaii. Trump tweeted a photo of her family lighting their menorahs on the first night of Hanukkah. This year is one of the rare and special occasions where Hanukkah and Christmas coincide. Merry Christmas & Happy…
(JTA) — Anti-Jewish and anti-Roma graffiti were drawn in black marker on the front gate and the mailbox of a suburban Paris Jewish school named for teenage Holocaust diarist Anne Frank. The graffiti on the Anne Frank School in Montreuil, an eastern suburb of Paris, was discovered on Sunday afternoon, the French daily Le Parisian…
(JTA) — The kingdom of Bahrain hosted a candlelighting ceremony for Hanukkah, which led to a video of local men wearing kaffiyehs and Orthodox Jews dancing together. The Muslim monarchy of King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa held a candle lighting ceremony on Saturday night attended by the local Jewish community, area businessmen and other…
Benjamin Netanyahu has been unrelenting in his criticism of the Obama administration over what he condemned as its “shameful” decision not to veto a U.N. Security Council resolution calling for a halt to Israeli settlement-building. But with the clock ticking down on Barack Obama’s presidency, a possibly more amenable Republican Donald Trump waiting in the…
(JTA) — Leaders of various faiths in Montana wrote statements in support of the Jewish community in local publications. “As leaders of Montana communities of faith and practice, we are called to respond to the recent surge of white supremacist and neo-Nazi activity in our state. Distribution of pro-Nazi, anti-Semitic flyers in Missoula and intimidation…
(JTA) — A German public broadcasting station must apologize to a survivor of Auschwitz for calling the Nazi death camps “Polish death camps.” An appeals court in Krakow, Poland, announced the ruling on Thursday. Ninety-five year old Polish Holocaust survivor Karol Tendera filed the lawsuit against the ZDF broadcaster over a 2013 promotional trailer for a…
After New Zealand was one of four countries to sponsor a resolution in the United Nations Security Council condemning Israel, the country’s Jewish community has called on the governments of New Zealand and Israel to work together to keep the Israeli Embassy in Wellington open. The plea follows the recall to Israel of its ambassador…
JERUSALEM (JTA) — About 1,000 Jewish pilgrims visited Joseph’s Tomb in Nablus in an area of the West Bank that is under the exclusive military and civilian control of the Palestinian Authority. The visit on Sunday night, the second Hanukkah light, lasted until just before dawn on Monday morning, under Israeli military escort. Residents of…
(JTA) — Pope Francis said he hopes for peace between Israel and the Palestinians during his Christmas message. “Peace to women and men of the beloved Holy Land, the land chosen and favored by God,” Francis said Sunday at noon from the balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican. The pope called on Israel…
