A Knesset committee has for the second time approved a bill allowing local rabbis to oversee conversions to Judaism in Israel. The bill is now slated to be returned to the full Knesset for its second and third readings. The Knesset Constitution, Law and Justice Committee on Monday approved the conversion bill by a vote…
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will expedite planning for some 1,000 settler homes in East Jerusalem, a government official said on Monday, in a bid to placate a restive coalition ally without further aggravating a dispute with Washington. The ultranationalist Jewish Home party, led by Economy Minister Naftali Bennett, has been issuing veiled threats to…
More than 75 anti-Israel events have been reported on U.S. college and university campuses this fall, more than twice as many as last year, according to a report by the Anti-Defamation League. The anti-Israel events have more than doubled in the wake of Israel’s 50-day operation in Gaza over the summer, according to an ADL…
An Illinois man has been charged with a hate crime for allegedly vandalizing a synagogue. John White, of Westmont, Ill., was charged Friday with a hate crime for allegedly vandalizing Congregation Etz Chaim, in Lombard, Ill., a suburb of Chicago. White, 40, was arrested Oct. 21 and accused of smashing the synagogue’s windows and writing…
Spain’s Socialist party announced a new motion to recognize Palestinian statehood. The Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party, the second largest party in Spanish congress with 110 seats out of 350, earlier this month had announced its intention to submit a draft motion calling for the recognition on Oct. 30, the 23rd anniversary of the Madrid talks…
A suspect in the execution-style murder of Jewish-American journalist Daniel Pearl in Pakistan was released by a Pakistani court due to lack of evidence. Qari Hashim was arrested in 2005, three years after Pearl’s murder. He was accused of introducing Pearl to British-born terrorist Omar Sheikh, who was sentenced to death in 2002 by a…
New guidelines issued by Israel Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon will prevent Palestinian workers from riding on Israeli public transportation in the West Bank. Under the new guidelines announced Sunday, all Palestinian workers must return to the West Bank through one crossing, the Eyal crossing located near Kalkilya in central Israel, and continue to their homes…
A woman critically injured in a terror attack in Jerusalem has died of her injuries. The 22-year-old tourist from Ecuador died Sunday at Hadassah Medical Center, four days after a Palestinian man drove his car into a light rail station near Ammunition Hill, in northern Jerusalem, as passengers were disembarking. Her death Sunday brings the…
Thousands of mourners attended the funeral of a Palestinian boy with American citizenship who was killed by Israel Defense Forces soldiers. The funeral for Orwa Hammad, 14, took place Sunday afternoon in the West Bank village of Silwad, near Ramallah. The funeral was delayed until Sunday so that Hammad’s father, who lives in the United…
Tiny cameras and memory cards capable of holding hundreds of thousands of images were found in the Towson University office of Rabbi Barry Freundel. The devices, memory cards and flash drives, as well as a photo of naked women and a handwritten list of names, were found in the rabbi’s office on the campus near…
Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon was denied meetings with senior Obama administration officials during his U.S. visit, according to media reports citing senior U.S. officials. While in Washington last week Yaalon requested and was denied meetings with Vice President Joe Biden, Secretary of State John Kerry and National Security Advisor Susan Rice, according to Israeli…
