Category: World News

(JTA) — The Swiss government agreed Wednesday to help pay for the country’s first national memorial to honor the 6 million Jews and other victims of the Holocaust. Long known for its reputation of neutrality during World War II, Switzerland has seen its image undercut in recent decades by revelations that major Swiss banks played […]

(JTA) — Among the many honors accruing to King Charles III in advance of his coronation next week: a new version of a traditional prayer performed by a British-Jewish children’s choir. United Synagogue, the union of British Orthodox synagogues, commissioned a new recording of “Adon Olam,” a prayer perhaps most recognizable as the conclusion of […]

(JTA) — The oldest former Nazi camp guard ever put on trial in Germany has died while waiting for an appeal after being sentenced to five years in prison. He was 102. Josef Schütz was found guilty last year of more than 3,500 counts of accessory to murder for serving as a guard at the […]

(JTA) — Rugby’s global governing body has determined that the South African Rugby Union’s decision to disinvite an Israeli team from an international competition last month was not discriminatory. But the CEO of the Israeli team isn’t buying the argument that the cancelation had to do with security threats, as South Africa argued and World […]

(JTA) — Germany has boosted the annual subsidy to Germany’s Jewish umbrella organization by 70%, in a move intended to shore up security and support a new center for Jewish intellectual life inspired by one closed by the Nazis. The Central Council of Jews in Germany, which distributes government funds to Jewish communities and institutions, […]

(JTA) — The English Premier League club Arsenal has launched a new fan affiliate group called the “Jewish Gooners,” as part of its plan to address recent incidents of antisemitism. The club also announced that it had banned 31 fans for three years each over “abusive and discriminatory behaviour since the start of the 2021/22 […]

SOSUA, Dominican Republic (JTA) — Sitting inside a small wood-frame shul just around the corner from Playa Alicia, where tourists sip rum punch while watching catamarans glide by, Joe Benjamin recounted one of the most uplifting but often forgotten stories of Jewish survival during the Holocaust. “I was bar mitzvahed right here,” he said, pointing […]

MADRID (JTA) — Vandals defaced the area in front of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement’s Barcelona synagogue with graffiti that read “Why do you kill in Palestine” early on Wednesday. The incident, which occurred on Yom Haatzmaut, or Israel’s independence day, prompted outrage from the Federation of Jewish Communities of Spain, the Israelite Community of Barcelona and […]

(JTA) — As many as 50,000 Jews traveled to a Hungarian town for the anniversary of a noted rabbi’s death this week, marking significant growth for the annual pilgrimage and generating what the town’s mayor called “culture shock” for non-Jewish locals. Since the fall of communism in 1989, Jewish pilgrims have been visiting Bodrogkeresztur, known […]

(JTA) — Frankfurt’s administrative court ruled that the city can’t cancel a Roger Waters concert after calling him “one of the most widely known antisemites in the world.” Waters, the former frontman of the band Pink Floyd, took legal action and prevailed on Tuesday after Frankfurt officials said in February they would cancel his concert […]