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Child Sex-Abuse Scandal in Australia’s Jewish Community Spills Into U.S.
A child sex abuse scandal in Australia’s Jewish community has spilled into America, as a pending extradition, arrests in Australia and a slew of cover-up allegations put that community’s response to molestation under scrutiny. Australian police are seeking to extradite convicted child molester David Kramer, currently in jail in Farmington, Mo., on suspicion of having…
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Vitka Kempner Kovner, Vilna Partisan, Dies
The legendary Vilna partisan Vitka Kempner Kovner died on February 15. Widow of the poet and partisan leader Abba Kovner, she was born in the Polish town of Kalisz in 1920 and escaped from there to Vilna when the Germans invaded Poland. Vitka Kovner was among the founding members of Abba Kovner‘s partisan organization, the…
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Remembering Kutsher’s, a Many Splendored Resort
“Russian Transport”: An American Dream Derailed “Russian Transport,” a new play by Erika Sheffer and presented off-Broadway by The New Group at the Acorn Theatre, deals with a scenario that could not have been imagined at the time of Soviet Jewry’s “Let My People Go!” movement of 1967–1989. In the play, Diana (Janeane Garofalo) and…
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W. Gunter Plaut, Noted Reform Scholar
Those Reform Jews fortunate enough to have met Rabbi W. Gunther Plaut even once never forgot him. He was a tall, imposing, self-confident figure who spoke impeccable, precise, German-accented English that commanded attention in every setting — in classes, at conferences and in public debates. On February 9, the Reform movement and, more broadly, American…
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What Did Alan Gross Do in Cuba?
Alan Gross, the American Jewish contractor jailed in Cuba, has maintained for more than two years that he was guilty of nothing more than naiveté when he smuggled contraband electronic equipment into the communist nation. But official trip reports he filed for an American government agency, revealed by The Associated Press on February 12, paint…
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Transatlantic Jewish Meeting Triggers Row
A recent meeting between American Jewry’s primary umbrella group for Israel and other foreign affairs, and a controversial new European group has sparked heated exchanges among European and American Jewish leaders. In the days leading up to the meeting, communal officials on both continents warned the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations against…
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Orthodox Women Form Volunteer Service
A group of women who have been seeking to join Brooklyn’s all-male Orthodox ambulance corps has now dropped its campaign, opting instead to establish a separate women’s service to tend to emergency births. “We are not looking to create litigation or controversy, we are just looking to find a way to serve other women,” said…
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Be My Israeli Valentine
Valentine’s Day is our annual chance to signal how much we love someone or perhaps would like to start a relationship. Such gestures can be tricky, though, in a place like Israel, where cultural differences complicate the back and forth of romance. That is especially true for American-Israeli couples. Aliyah among single American Jews was…
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Lauder Slams Obama for Israel ‘Disconnect’
The leader of the World Jewish Congress has harshly rebuked President Obama for allowing a “disconnect” in relations between the U.S. and Israel. WJC President Ronald Lauder said in a Friday address to the National Press Club in Washington that all U.S. presidents, including Obama, are supporters of Israel, but the current president has sent…
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Loophole Puts Pension Plans at Risk
Seeking to cut pension costs, Jewish social service groups are using an obscure tax loophole to skirt federal rules that protect workers from being left out in the cold if their retirement plans collapse. Jewish organizations, including federations and hospitals, have filed for the special “church status” that strips workers and retirees of legal protections…
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Reaching Out To Save Lives
The image of Israel’s Haredim has taken a public battering over the past few months, particularly over the issue of discriminatory conduct toward women, which even a few Haredi groups have disavowed. But in an unusual act of outreach, some of these ultra-Orthodox Jews have recently found an original way of engaging with people outside…
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Yiddish ווידעאָ: היסטאָריקערין וויווי לאַקס באַשרײַבט געשיכטע פֿון לאָנדאָנער ייִדישער פּרעסעVIDEO: Historian Vivi Laks tells history of the London Yiddish Press
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