The top U.S. military officer supported a proposed nuclear deal with Iran on Wednesday, saying it reduced the risk of Tehran developing atomic arms while buying time to work with allies to confront the Islamic Republic over other “malign activities.” Army General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told a Senate hearing…
The Vatican Museum opened an exhibit in Rome dedicated to the strong relationship between Pope John Paul II and the Jewish community. The exhibit, “A Blessing to One Another: Pope John Paul II and the Jewish People,” opened Tuesday and features photos, video footage, documents and artifacts. Rome’s Chief Rabbi Riccardo Di Segni, who attended…
Robert Kraft, the Jewish owner of the New England Patriots, slammed the National Football League for suspending Tom Brady, his team’s star quarterback, for the first four games of the upcoming season. In a statement Wednesday, Kraft called NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell’s decision the previous day to uphold Brady’s suspension announced five weeks earlier “unfathomable.”…
The City Council voted Wednesday to keep the ban on the memorials, known as stumbling blocks, ignoring a petition signed by 100,000 people calling for a lifting of the prohibition in the German city. Some local Jewish groups have joined the council in opposing the memorials, which are set into the street, saying they are…
The response of Israel’s military to the capture of an Israeli soldier during last summer’s Gaza conflict amounts to war crimes and crimes against humanity, Amnesty International said in a new report. Following the capture into a terror tunnel of Lt. Hadar Goldin, who later was declared dead based on evidence at the scene of…
Israel offered a cautious welcome on Wednesday to the planned U.S. release of former spy Jonathan Pollard, wary that too warm a celebration might hurt efforts to persuade the Obama administration to let him leave for Israel immediately. Under parole terms announced on Tuesday, Pollard, a former U.S. Navy intelligence analyst who was convicted in…
A neglected grove of date palms, their leaves long fallen, trunks drooping in the searing heat at the lowest point on earth, is the latest casualty of a dramatic rise in sinkholes wreaking havoc along the coast of the Dead Sea. Workers had stopped tending the date grove, fearing the earth might swallow them up….
As part of a major new initiative it is launching, the Jewish Agency plans to provide conversion services abroad not only to Orthodox communities – but also to Conservative and Reform communities. Speaking with Haaretz, Jewish Agency Chairman Natan Sharansky said: “We have no intention of discriminating between one stream of Judaism and another.” Last…
Israel gave final approval on Wednesday for plans to build 300 new homes in a Jewish settlement in the occupied West Bank, announcing the move as it carried out a court demolition order against two vacant apartment blocs at the site. Dozens of Jewish settlers have gathered over the past several days at Beit El…
Most Jewish undergraduates have encountered anti-Israel and/or anti-Semitic attitudes on campus, but they have not diminished their feelings of connection to Israel, a new study about anti-Semitism at North American universities found According to the Brandeis University study released Tuesday, a few schools, among them Canadian universities and schools in the California state system, have…
A key aide to Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump apologized for asserting that a husband cannot be charged with raping his wife. Michael Cohen, special counsel at the Trump Organization, said he was provoked into misspeaking by an aggressive reporter. “I made an inarticulate comment – which I do not believe — and which I…
