Armed men stopping cars at checkpoints in the West Bank are usually Israeli security forces policing the occupied territory, but in some areas they are Palestinian civilians patrolling their own villages. Fears of attacks by far-right Jews have increased since a Palestinian man and his 18-month-old son were killed when their house in Duma village…
The Jewish community of Montpelier, Vermont is reeling in the aftermath of a violent shooting. Lara Sobel, 48, was outside her workplace at the Department for Children and Families (DCF) on August 7. Active in the Jewish community, Sobel was a member of Beth Jacob Synagogue in Montpelier. Barney Bloom, former President of Beth Jacob…
An Orthodox synagogue was opened officially a few blocks from the iconic Ipanema Beach in Brazil. Some 1,200 people attended Sunday’s inauguration of the four-story, 440-seat synagogue in Rio de Janeiro named for Edmond Safra, the late Brazilian Jewish billionaire and philanthropist whose foundation funded much of the project. The 20,000-square foot building, which replaces…
Israeli President Reuven Rivlin told a delegation of visiting Republican Congress members that Israel “can and will do all that is necessary to defend itself” in the wake of the Iran nuclear deal. “Along with Israelis on all sides of the political spectrum, I am deeply concerned about the recent nuclear deal signed with Iran,”…
Yishai Schlissel, who stabbed six marchers at the annual Jerusalem gay pride parade, will be admitted to a hospital psychiatric ward. The Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court on Tuesday ordered Schlissel’s transfer to a psychiatric institution and extended his police custody by 10 days. During his 48-hour stay in the psychiatric ward, doctors will observe Schlissel and…
The parents of a baby girl killed in a car-car ramming attack at a Jerusalem light rail station have given birth to a second baby girl. Chaya Zissel Braun, three months old, was returning from a visit to the Western Wall with her parents in October, when the car driven by a former Palestinian prisoner…
The chief rabbi of Lithuania said he is considering splitting the community over a disagreement with its lay leader about plans for construction atop what used to be a Jewish cemetery. Chaim Burshtein said last week that he may leave the Jewish Community of Lithuania as early as this month and set up a new…
A historic building that used to house a synagogue burned down in northeastern France. The circumstances surrounding the fire last week in the town of Maizières-lès-Vic, inside the 19th-century building that was utterly consumed by flames, are not yet known and are the subject of a police investigation, the news website www.republicain-lorrain.fr reported. The building…
A Vatican group is asking Israel’s attorney general to indict the head of a far-right Jewish group who recently expressed approval for destroying churches in Israel. The Custody of the Holy Land, in a letter sent to Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein on Sunday, said that Rabbi Benzi Gopstein of the group Lehava poses a threat…
A new study, which the Israeli Education Ministry has claimed is inaccurate, has found that the government spends nearly twice as much per Jewish student in isolated West Bank settlements as on the average Israeli pupil. According to the new study by the Tel Aviv-based Macro Center for Political Economics, which according to its website…
An Orthodox synagogue was opened officially a few blocks from the iconic Ipanema Beach in Brazil. Some 1,200 people attended Sunday’s inauguration of the four-story, 440-seat synagogue in Rio de Janeiro named for Edmond Safra, the late Brazilian Jewish billionaire and philanthropist whose foundation funded much of the project. The 20,000-square foot building, which replaces…
