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Claims Conference Blames Dead Official for Botched $57M Holocaust Fraud Probe
The Jewish organization that processes restitution claims for Holocaust survivors is blaming an official who has since died for its failure to act on a 2001 warning about a multi-million scam run by some of its own staff. A spokeswoman for the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany blamed the failure on Frankfurt-based Karl…
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Geza Vermes, Hungarian Bible Scholar Who Returned to Jewish Roots, Dies at 88
The renowned Hungarian Jewish biblical scholar Geza Vermes, who died of cancer May 8 at age 88, disproved the old canard “You can’t go home again,” at least when it comes to Judaism. Born in the town of Makó in southeastern Hungary in 1924, Vermes was 7 when his family converted to Catholicism in what…
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Joyce Brothers, Brought Jewish Sensibility to Suburbia Through TV, Dies at 85
The Jewish psychologist Joyce Brothers, who died May 13 of respiratory failure at age 85, was a peacemaker in the emotionally fraught field of pop media therapeutic counseling. Born in Brooklyn as Joyce Bauer to a married couple of attorneys, Brothers became a primary authority on how to live in the mid-century suburban age. Although…
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Jewish Women Call Angelina Jolie Inspiration for Breast Cancer Surgery
Joanna Rudnick was sitting in bed recovering from undergoing a double mastectomy when she read that Angelina Jolie had undergone the exact same procedure. The Hollywood superstar shocked the world by revealing that she had decided to have the surgery after testing positive for the BRCA1 gene mutation, which is unusually common among Ashkenazi Jews….
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Philadelphia Jewish Federation Faces Crisis as Ira Schwartz Abruptly Leaves
Philadelphia’s Jewish federation is facing a crisis of leadership. Home to the sixth-largest Jewish community in the country, Philadelphia has a new museum of American Jewish history, Jewish day schools, thriving synagogues, and a major liberal rabbinical seminary. Yet the CEO of the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia, Ira Schwartz, departed abruptly in early May,…
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Angelina Jolie’s Breast Surgery Decision and Perils of Being (Maybe) Over-Prepared
When Angelina Jolie decides to have her breasts removed because she carries the BRCA1 gene — a mutation that some Ashkenazi Jewish women also have and which has been linked to breast cancer — it’s a choice that must throw many, many women for a loop. If the world’s most famous and gorgeous woman/mother/Hollywood superstar…
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Claims Conference Officials Were Told of Massive $57M Fraud — But Didn’t Act
Top officials at the Jewish organization that processes Holocaust restitution claims were alerted to a fraud scheme being perpetrated by the group’s own employees nearly a decade before they moved to end it. The fraud scheme, which went on for 15 years and diverted $57 million to unqualified recipients, was first described in a detailed…
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African Island’s Lost Jewish Heritage
A Portuguese rabbi and a Moroccan diplomat stood shoulder to shoulder in a Catholic cemetery here while 200 mourners howled in grief as they buried a resident of this island off the western coast of Africa. The foreigners had come to Cape Verde’s main cemetery earlier this month not to bury a local, but for…
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Replacement for a Child Lost
When violence such as the Newtown, Conn., massacre or the Boston bombings erupts, the typical narrative tells us that the victims’ lives end or are forever altered. But sometimes, new life emerges from the ashes. Memoirist Judy Mandel was conceived after the sister she never knew perished. “I was born of fire,” begins her new…
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Modern-Day Rabbi Must Be CEO, Teacher and Spiritual Leader at Once
Last fall, Jessica Minnen, a rabbinical student at the Conservative movement’s Jewish Theological Seminary, was on her way to officiate at a wedding in Brooklyn. What started out as an ordinary ride on the A train turned into a spiritual revelation about the 21st-century rabbinate. Minnen was quietly reviewing a course catalog for a new…
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Synagogues Merge Across Denominations To Survive
The Jews of Corpus Christi knew a decade ago they had to act fast to save their two synagogues. With at most 1,000 Jews left in the Texas town and only 60 families making up its membership, the 60-year-old Conservative synagogue was in shaky financial shape. So in 2005, B’nai Israel Synagogue merged with Temple…
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