Archive for Jewish News

| December 18, 2012
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The UK drops Hebrew from officially recognized languages

The importance of classical Hebrew was recognized almost 600 years ago in England, according to official records.

By Eva Fett

 

The U.K. government has dropped Hebrew as an official recognized language for the purpose of teaching it to school children, according to press reports.


The government exclusion of Hebrew from the provided list of officially recognized languages for primary schools could damage Jewish education, the Board of Deputies warned this week.


Education Minister Elizabeth Truss last month announced plans to make it mandatory from September 2014, to teach a foreign language to children aged 7 to 11. Schools must offer at least one of seven recognized languages, excluding Hebrew. Continue Reading »

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| December 17, 2012
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Due to natural gas output projections, Israel raises 2013 growth forecast to 3.5%

Commencement of natural gas production cited for economic rise in forecast

Gas production from the Tamar field, which has an estimated 274 billion m³ of reserves, expected to start in early 2013.

Reuters and Israel Hayom Staff

 

The government raised its 2013 economic growth forecast to 3.5 percent from 3% on Sunday, citing the influence of the start of natural gas production.

The Bank of Israel projects 3% growth next year.

A natural gas rig west of Haifa, Israel. - Photo: Albatross Aerial Perspective/AP

The Finance Ministry expects gas production from the Tamar natural gas field to contribute 0.8% to GDP next year – – Photo: Albatross Aerial Perspective/AP

A U.S.-Israeli consortium led by Noble Energy and Delek Group is expected to start production from the Tamar field off Israel’s Mediterranean coast, which has an estimated 274 billion cubic metres (bcm) of reserves, in the first half of 2013.

Continue Reading »
Category: Jewish News |
| December 14, 2012
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IDF Shoots Palestinian who hurled firebomb in Hebron riot

Teenager who threw Molotov cocktail at IDF soldiers near checkpoint sent to local hospital with severe gunshot wound to the chest.

Elior Levy, Yoav Zitun

 

IDF soldiers opened fire on a 17-year-old Palestinian who apparently hurled a Molotov cocktail in their direction during clashes near the Hashoter checkpoint in Hebron Thursday evening. The Palestinian sustained severe injuries.

Day of riots in Hebron Photo: EPA

Day of riots in Hebron – Photo: EPA

Palestinian sources said the youngster was hit in the chest and was evacuated to a local hospital in serious condition. The army said the soldiers operated according to standard IDF protocol for engaging a suspicious individual. Continue Reading »

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| December 13, 2012
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Police Drop Charges of Artist Using Stolen Holocaust Victims’ Ashes

 

Swedish police commissioner said they dropped the investigation into an artist who claimed to use paint mixed from taken ashes of Holocaust victims.

By Rachel Hirshfeld

 

Swedish police said Tuesday they have dropped an investigation into an artist who used paint mixed from the ashes of Holocaust victims in a watercolor.

“The enquiry was closed on Monday,” police commissioner Stefan Soederholm told AFP, citing lack of evidence.

Swedish painter Carl Michael von Hausswolff, whose contentious work is on display in the town of Lund, said he visited the Majdanek concentration camp during a trip to Poland in 1989 and accumulated ashes of Jewish victims to use for his “art.” Continue Reading »

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| December 12, 2012
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German parliament passes federal law protecting circumcision ceremony

The new law, with restrictions for the 1st time, requires that the procedure be carried out by a medically trained and certified practitioner or by a medical professional, and that anesthetic be used if needed.

By JTA

 

BERLIN– The German parliament passed a law protecting the right of Jewish and Muslim parents to choose a ritual circumcision for their sons.

Brit ceremony – Photo: IsraelandStuff/PP

In all, 434 legislators voted Wednesday for the new law proposed by the federal government; there were 100 votes against, and 46 abstentions. The vote came after months of heated debate over the practice, spurred in large part by a German court ruled earlier this year that called into question the legality of ritual circumcision for children. Continue Reading »

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| December 12, 2012
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Jews in Copenhagen Warned Not to Wear Stars of David or Kippot

Denmark officials are warning Jews to avoid openly wearing Jewish & religious symbols, amid increasing ‘anti-Israel’ (anti-Semitic) sentiments.

By Rachel Hirshfeld

 

Israeli and Jewish officials in Denmark on Wednesday warned Jews to avoid openly wearing religious symbols and dress when moving about Copenhagen amid rising anti-Israeli sentiments.

“We advise Israelis who come to Denmark and want to go to the synagogue to wait to don their skull caps until they enter the building and not to wear them in the street, irrespective of whether the areas they are visiting are seen as being safe,” Israel’s ambassador to Denmark, Arthur Avnon, told AFP. Continue Reading »

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| December 12, 2012
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Secular Kibbutz ‘Revolts’ by Dedicating New Torah Scroll – Mazel Tov!

 

Secular members of Kibbutz Givat Brenner dedicated a new Torah scroll on Tuesday.

There wasn’t a dry eye in the house.

By Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu

 

Kibbutz Givat Brenner, the largest kibbutz in Israel and one of the most secular, completed the first step in a “revolution” Tuesday night with the dedication of a new Torah scroll that kibbutz members paid for from their own pockets.

Torah dedication at Kibbutz Givat Brenner

Torah dedication at Kibbutz Givat Brenner
Israel news photo: Yaakov Felberbaum

The dedication of a new Torah scroll here is a major revolution, Givat Brenner Rabbi Ephraim Shteinkoller told Arutz Sheva.

“The public decided it wanted a new Torah scroll next to an old one that was donated years ago in memory of kibbutz members who fell in wars,” he added. Continue Reading »

Category: Israel News, Jewish News | Tags: , ,
| December 8, 2012
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Israelis are giving more to charity as Israel’s economy grows

Since 2009, Israeli nonprofits received a majority of their donations from Israelis, not from abroad — a departure from previous years.

By Ben Sales

 

TEL AVIV (JTA) — At Hadassah’s centennial celebration in October, 2,000 guests heard about two major philanthropic projects being undertaken by the women’s Zionist group: a new tower and a new cardiovascular wellness center at its Jerusalem hospitals.

Takdim volunteers painting with children in Ramat HaSharon. (Courtesy Takdim)

Takdim volunteers painting with children in Ramat HaSharon. – Courtesy Takdim

The tower, which was dedicated at the centennial, cost $363 million. And a $10 million gift from American philanthropist Irene Pollin came with the announcement of the cardiovascular center. Continue Reading »

Category: Israel News, Jewish News |
| December 8, 2012
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Rare Holocaust images from newly found Nazi albums

Here are the pictures of daily Jewish life during the Holocaust that were hidden in private albums of the Nazi Wehrmacht soldiers for years.

Dariusz Dekiert, a devout Christian from Poland, locates and hands them over to the Jewish, Shem Olam Institute. ‘I see it as rectification,’ he tells Yedioth Ahronoth, a Hebrew language Israeli newspaper

By Yehuda Shohat

 

Like children their age all over the world in recent decades, these children too stood in front of a photographer, followed his orders and smiled. The result appeared almost routine, but there is nothing routine about this photo.

It is a picture of Jewish children during the Holocaust. Continue Reading »

Category: Jewish News | Tags: , , ,
| December 8, 2012
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Artist who Used Ashes of Holocaust Victims is under Police Investigation

Swedish police launch an investigation into an artist who claimed to paint using the ashes of Holocaust victims in his painting.

By Elad Benari, Canada

 

Swedish police on Friday said they had launched an investigation into an artist who says he used paint mixed from the ashes of Holocaust victims in a picture, AFP reported.

 

Carl Michael von Hausswolff claims he used ashes he took from a crematorium at the Majdanek concentration camp in 1989, mixing them with water to create the painting entitled “Memory Works”.

The black-and-white work, featuring vertical brushstrokes in a rectangle representing the suffering of the victims, is on display at the Martin Bryder Gallery in the southern Swedish town of Lund. Continue Reading »

Category: Jewish News | Tags: ,
| December 3, 2012
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10 Thousand rally in Budapest after rightist demands list of Jewish ‘security risks’

On Tuesday, a Hungarian far-right politician urged the gov’t to draw up a list of Jews who pose ‘national security risk’, stirred outrage among Jewish leaders.

 

 

Thousands attended an anti-Nazi rally Sunday in Hungary organized by Jewish and civic groups to protest a far-right lawmaker’s call to screen Jews for national security risks.

Hungary - AP

Participants wave Hungarian national flags and a flag of Romas, right, as thousands of people attend a protest called Mass Demonstration Against Nazism in Budapest, Hungary, Sunday, Dec. 2, 2012. – Photo by AP

The rally was unusual because politicians from both the government and opposition parties shared a stage outside parliament. Continue Reading »

Category: Jewish News | Tags: , ,
| December 2, 2012
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Devoutly Anti-Israel Journalist to Host ABC’s Jewish Roots Program

ABC News has chosen overtly anti-Israel journalist Christiane Amanpour, to host prime-time TV special on the history of the Land of Israel.

By Rachel Hirshfeld

 

In what Breitbart.com has described as “an affront to religious Jews and religious Christians everywhere,” ABC News has chosen journalist Christiane Amanpour to host a two-part primetime special about the history of the land of Israel. Breitbart.com says Amanpour is vehemently anti-Israel and anti-Christian.

Titled “Back to the Beginning”, ABC News invites viewers to embark on “the ultimate road trip” as Amanpour “travels to the lands of the Bible to explore the powerful stories from Genesis to the Birth of Jesus.” Continue Reading »

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| November 30, 2012
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Hungary far-right MP attacks Israeli presence in Hungarian parliament

MP Elod Novak demands resignation of MP with (dual) Israeli citizenship, says ‘Israel has more deputies in Hungarian parliament than in the Knesset’

AFP

 

VIDEO – A storm over apparent anti-Semitic remarks in Hungary’s parliament continued unabated Thursday, as a far-right Jobbik deputy called publicly for the resignation of a fellow MP who claimed to have an Israeli citizenship.

תומכי "יוביק" האנטישמית מפגינים בבודפשט, ארכיון (צילום: AP)

Jobbik supporters march in Budapest – Photo: AP

At a press conference, Jobbik deputy Elod Novak said it was unacceptable that Katalin Ertsey, a deputy of the small opposition party LMP, had kept her dual Hungarian-Israeli citizenship secret and called for her resignation. Continue Reading »

Category: Jewish News | Tags: ,
| November 30, 2012
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Doctor euthanizes daughter then takes his own life

Police Report: Father in Nir Yisrael a community in Southern Israel, takes own life after rendering euthanasia to daughter suffering from terminal cancer.

 

Tragedy befell the southern Israel moshav of Nir Yisrael on Friday morning, when a local doctor killed his daughter, who was suffering from terminal cancer, before taking his own life, Lachish subdistrict police reported.

MDA

MDA Ambulance – Photo: WIkicommons

Lachish District Spokeswoman Shlomit Zachariya said that the father was a doctor in his 60s, who decided to euthanize his daughter, either with an injection or an overdose of some sort, rather than see her suffer a slow death from cancer. Continue Reading »

Category: Israel News, Jewish News | Tags:
| November 26, 2012
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Norway’s police chief apologizes over World War II deportations of Jews

During WWII, 772 Norwegian Jews & Jewish refugees were deported to Nazi concentration camps

A 91-year-old man charged with Nazi crimes in Germany

By

 

Norway’s chief of police Monday expressed “regret” over the police force’s role in the arrests and deportations of Jews from the German-occupied country during World War II.

“On behalf of Norwegian police and those involved in the deportations of Norwegian Jews, I wish to express regret,” Odd Reidar Humlegard said on public broadcaster NRK.

Anti-Semitic graffit on an Olso storefont in 1941.

Anti-Semitic graffit on an Olso storefont in 1941. – Photo: Wikimedia Commons

The apology coincided with the 70th anniversary of the deportation of 532 Norwegian Jews on a vessel named Donau. Continue Reading »

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