(JTA) — Israel’s Health Ministry recommended barring Israelis from traveling to the United States due to the coronavirus outbreak of the Omicron variant there. The government is set to vote on the recommendation Sunday evening and, if the recommendation is accepted, the travel restrictions would go into effect Wednesday. Foreign travelers have been barred from…
(JTA) — (New York Jewish Week via JTA) — Twenty-one months after New York City synagogues and Jewish schools became some of the first to close because of the encroaching COVID-19 pandemic, a surge in cases is causing them to shut their doors again. Several Jewish day schools have switched to virtual learning for the…
BERLIN (JTA) — A German Protestant minister has handed over segments of a long lost Torah scroll to the city of Görlitz in southeast Germany, 83 years after his father, a town policeman, came into possession of them. While it is not unheard of for German non-Jews to turn over religious objects that have been lost or hidden…
(JTA) — The Greek-Jewish community is celebrating the return of a trove of manuscripts and community documents that the Nazis had stolen nearly 80 years ago. The Central Board of Jewish Communities in Greece (KIS) announced in a statement earlier this month that Russia, who was in possession of the archives, has agreed to return…
There’s no love lost between Rep. Josh Gottheimer and activists from the Working Families Party, who have assailed the New Jersey Democrat’s opposition to their progressive priorities. But that feud escalated this week, when Gottheimer said in a speech that party members had hurled antisemitic abuse at him during a protest. “Not long ago, I…
A federal judge on Thursday overturned Purdue Pharma’s $4.5 billion opioid settlement, which had shielded members of the Sackler family who own the company from future lawsuits related to the epidemic. U.S. District Judge Colleen McMahon in New York wrote in a 142-page opinion that the settlement that granted immunity to the Sacklers was “inconsistent”…
(New York Jewish Week via JTA) — Brad Lander, the incoming New York City comptroller, vowed to do everything in his power to coax Orthodox yeshivas to teach a secular curriculum. Lander, who is Jewish and a Democrat, discussed the issue Thursday night in a virtual Q-and-A with the New York Jewish Agenda, a progressive…
(JTA) — (New York Jewish Week via JTA) — When Andy Corren’s mother, Renay Mandel Corren, died on Saturday in El Paso, Tex., at age 84, he did what many bereaved children with a creative bent would do: He wrote an obituary. “A more disrespectful, trash-reading, talking and watching woman in NC, FL or TX…
(JTA) — Just after the conclusion of Hanukkah, the Worcester Academy varsity girls’ basketball team prepared to face a rival private school. Head coach Sherry Levin addressed her team before tipoff. The theme of her pregame pep talk? The shamash. “The shamash candle doesn’t lose any of its brightness by lighting all the rest,” Levin…
The American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the pro-Israel lobbying organization, is often described as “powerful,” but not because it showers dollars on political candidates. The group seeks influence by lobbying policymakers, and AIPAC members make political donations independently. But now AIPAC has launched political action committees that can send dollars directly to pro-Israel candidates. The…
(JTA) — “A plus-sized Jewish lady redneck died in El Paso on Saturday.” It’s considered poor journalistic form to begin an article with a quotation. But journalists are also supposed to show, not tell, and there’s no better way to explain the irreverent, hilarious obituary that Andy Corren wrote for his mother, Renay Mandel Corren,…
