An Israeli mother whom a rabbinical court declared to be not Jewish said in an appeal that the judges failed to satisfactorily explain their unusual decision. Sarit Azoulay’s appeal, which she filed this month with the High Rabbinical Court, concerns a 2012 ruling by the Jerusalem Rabbinical Court that nullified her mother’s 1983 conversion to…
(JTA) – Brandeis University announced Thursday that its next president will be Ronald Liebowitz, the former president of Middlebury College. Though he won’t start until next July, Liebowitz shared some of his ideas about the challenges he faces: Uriel Heilman: How do you anticipate the challenges of leading Brandeis will differ from those you faced…
Brazil is refusing to confirm Dani Dayan, who was named as Israeli ambassador to the country. Citing an unnamed senior Brazilian official, the Times of Israel reported Thursday that Brazil plans not to respond to Israel’s request for confirmation in hopes that the Jewish state will eventually name another ambassador. Dayan, a native of Argentina,…
Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev visited the synagogue of Vladivostok in Russia’s far east shortly after its reopening. Built in 1916, the synagogue, which is located 350 miles west of Russia’s maritime border with Japan and 9o miles from Russia’s land border with North Korea, was confiscated by communist authorities in 1932 and turned into…
The Dutch owner of land that was once a village for Jews fleeing the Nazis offered to house there refugees from Syria and Iraq. Joep Karel, the owner of the area in Slootdorp, 35 miles north of Amsterdam, made the offer earlier this month to the government’s Central Agency for the Reception of Asylum Seekers,…
Rabbi Jay “Yaakov” Goldstein was sentenced to eight years in prison for his participation in a ring that violently attempted to coerce Jewish men to grant their wives religious divorces. Goldstein, 61, of Brooklyn, New York, was sentenced Wednesday in federal court in Trenton, New Jersey, U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman announced in a statement….
JERUSALEM — An Israeli teen who was stabbed by two Palestinian teens while riding his bike in Jerusalem celebrated his bar mitzvah at the Western Wall. Naor Ben-Ezra was joined at the celebration by members of the medical team who treated him at Hadassah Hospital after the October 12 attack in the Pisgat Zeev neighborhood…
The United Auto Workers International Union struck down a boycott resolution against Israel. The University of California Student Workers Union, UAW Local 2865, which represents more than 13,000 teaching assistants, tutors and other student workers in the UC system, approved a resolution in December 2014 to join the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, or BDS,…
Developers are a step closer to building condominiums on the historic former site of Streit’s Mazo factory in Manhattan. Manhattan-based Cogswell Realty filed tentative plans with the New York attorney general’s office to build 45 residential condo units, a commercial condo and 26 storage units on the property, The Real Deal reported. According to the…
Israel and Turkey have reached a preliminary agreement to normalize relations, including the return of ambassadors to both countries, an Israeli official said on Thursday. The deal was reached during a recent meeting in Switzerland between the incoming head of Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency, Yossi Cohen, Israeli envoy Joseph Ciechanover and Turkish foreign ministry under-secretary…
Termination proceedings have begun against a faculty member of Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton who has been advocating conspiracy theories about the 2012 Sandy Hook massacre in Newtown, Connecticut. written by Lenny and Veronique Pozner, whose 6-year-old son Noah was one of the victims of the tragedy. In a short statement, Lenny Pozner expressed…
