French comedian Dieudonne M’bala M’bala, who has multiple convictions for inciting racial hatred against Jews, wants to meet with representatives of France’s Jewish community. In an open letter sent last week, lawyers for Dieudonne asked Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve and Gilles Clavreul, the French government’s interministerial delegate for the fight against anti-Semitism, to organize the…
The European Parliament passed a resolution that supports in principle recognition of a Palestinian state as part of peace talks with Israel. The resolution, which was drawn up by five political groups, passed Wednesday in a 498-88 vote in Strasbourg, the European Parliament’s press service wrote in a statement. There were 111 abstentions. The measure…
President Barack Obama announced the United States would restore diplomatic relations it severed with Cuba more than 50 years ago, drawing resistance from lawmakers opposed to reconciling with the communist-run island. After 18 months of secret talks facilitated by the Vatican and Canada, Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro agreed by phone on Tuesday on…
An Australian Royal Commission will investigate how rabbis and senior leaders of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement in Sydney and Melbourne handled the child sex abuse scandal. The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse confirmed this week that Chabad in Sydney and Melbourne will be the focus of a public hearing, starting Feb. 2…
The Palestinian Islamist group Hamas should be removed from the European Union’s terrorist list, an EU court ruled on Wednesday, saying the decision to include it was based on media reports not considered analysis. However, in its ruling, the bloc’s second highest tribunal said member states could maintain their freeze on Hamas’s assets for three…
A Jewish World War I hero is eligible for the nation’s highest military honor. A congressional spending bill passed last week includes a provision extending redress for soldiers deserving the Medal of Honor to Sgt. William Shemin. Elsie Shemin-Roth, now 85, from suburban St. Louis, Mo., sought to have her father included under a law…
Jewish notions of religious freedom so informed the American ethos that it is “is fair to say that Jewish heritage is American heritage,” Vice President Joe Biden said at a menorah lighting in front of the White House. Biden, attending the event Tuesday organized by American Friends of Lubavitch, cited the work of Emma Lazarus,…
Jeb Bush announced his intention to “actively” explore the presidency in a Christmas and Hanukkah greeting message. “Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah!” the former Florida governor Bush said in a Facebook message posted Tuesday. He described conversations he had with his family over Thanksgiving. “As a result of these conversations and thoughtful consideration of the…
A Saudi-backed school in Vienna that allegedly used an anti-Jewish textbook was ordered to close after it refused to disclose information about its staff. The Austrian capital’s school board announced Tuesday that it decided to shut down the Saudi School Vienna after it ignored a Dec. 1 deadline to provide the names of its teaching…
Spanish prosecutors are investigating the actions of an imam from a town near Madrid who called for the destruction of Jews. Salahuddin al Mussaoui of Azuqueca de Henares made the statement in a video that appeared Aug. 25 on the YouTube channel of the Islamic Cultural Center of Azuqueca de Henares, but authorities only now…
Secretary of State John Kerry said on Tuesday the United States had made “no determinations” about any possible U.N. Security Council resolutions on Palestinian statehood. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday that he had sought reassurances from Kerry that Washington would block efforts by Palestinians and Europeans to set a time frame for…
