Jewish leader: Over 40 percent of young Germans don’t know what Auschwitz is

More than 40 percent of young Germans have no idea what Auschwitz is and 20 percent of Hungarians hold anti-Semitic views, Jewish leaders said this week during the annual National Community Directors' Forum of the World Jewish Congress (WJC) held in Israel.

According to the Jewish leaders, anti-Semitism is on the rise in many parts of Europe not because of the governments’ policy, but because of feelings spreading among different parts of the public.

Robert Ejnes, the executive director of CRIF, an umbrella organization of French Jewish organizations, mentioned the French government’s strong support of the Jewish community.

Desecration of mass graves and Holocaust monuments in Ukraine

“Is France an anti-Semitic country? The answer is no,” he said. “Is there anti-Semitism in France? The answer is yes. President (Emmanuel) Macron has declared that anti-Zionism is a new form of anti-Semitism. Former Presidents Francois Hollande and Nicolas Sarkozy made strong statements on the matter too.

“We have the strongest legal system to fight anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial,” Ejnes added. “Are the laws always implemented efficiently? That’s a good question. In the past 20 years, 12 people have been murdered in France for being Jews. Anti-Semitic attacks make up 50 percent of hate crimes in the country.

“We have an undemocratic community which keeps growing and voting for extremists. We aren’t attacked merely because we are Jews, but also because of the values we represent. We are very concerned about the forces fighting democracy.”

Daniel Botmann, managing director of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, pointed at the rise of the far right and Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement as the main source of anti-Semitism. That fact, he said, along with the public’s surprising ignorance on Holocaust issues, has prompted the government to take significant steps to curb anti-Semitism.

“More than 40 percent of young Germans don’t know what Auschwitz is. That’s a thought-provoking situation. Good relation with the government are not enough. We have to work from the bottom, in schools, with young people, by holding a dialogue between Jews and non-Jews. We need stable relations with the civil society, because anti-Semitism is not just a Jewish problem. Anti-Semitism is anti-democratic and threatens the entire society, not just Jews.”

BDS protest in France (Photo: AP)

Péter Kunos the executive director of the Federation of Jewish Communities in Hungary, noted that recent surveys showed “20 percent of the population in Hungary—in other words, 2 million people—shares strong anti-Semitic sentiments, but the government is making efforts to guarantee that the country’s Jewish population will be able to live securely.”

The comments were made by members of a WJC delegation, which includes some 60 Jewish community directors from 50 countries around the world, as part of the organization’s annual National Community Directors' Forum.

This is the fifth time the forum convenes at the initiative of WJC CEO Robert Singer, and the first time it convenes in Israel, in honor of the state’s 70th anniversary.

The delegation members are the most senior professional representatives of Jewish communities around the world and they consider this conference the best stage for exchanging knowledge and experience on the representation of their communities in international forums.

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American Jews turn on Trump's senior advisor

A senior advisor to US President Donald Trump recently encountered a barrage of abusive remarks at a Mexican restaurant he was dining in. Other restaurant customers called Miller, who appeared unfaced by the abuse, a “fascist” and a “racist” among other things.

 

The incident comes at a time when the images of children being separated from their parents are filling up the screens and causing outrage among the general public in the US.

The policy of separating immigrant families was the advisor’s flagship program, and currently he’s living the dream. The same dream he’s had since he was a teenager in California: to preserve the superiority of the white population in the US and minimize the legal immigration to the country.

(Photo: Reuters)

Jane Eisner, editor-in-chief of liberal Jewish magazine Forward, wrote about Miller in an article “Jews should disown Stephen Miller over Trump’s family separation disgrace."

In the article she emphasized that the Jewish community in America must distance itself from Miller because his worldview "is nasty and unforgiving, devoid of hope, optimism and generosity, and so at odds with Jewish values and experiences that it’s hard to fathom this guy really had a bar mitzvah."

“Stephen really enjoyed seeing the images coming from the border. He’s from the Waffen SS,” said a source familiar with Miller on a personal level. Miller is one of the few Trump advisors who’s been there from the start—the other two being Ivanka and Jared Kushner. He’s always in Trump’s ear and he almost always gets his way. A smear campaign happening against Miller isn’t surprising since most of American Jews living in the US are liberal. They are not overly impressed by his gestures towards Israel or by Ivanka’s visit to the Western Wall. The Jewish community especially dislikes Trump’s use of expressions, which are associated with the Nazis, such as “infest”—a word which usually refers to either rats or cockroaches and was popular with Nazis. For now, the ire of the Jewish community is directed towards Miller, the man who they believe is behind all of this.

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Last opportunity for heirs of Polish Jews to claim restitution

Large law firms in Poland might have found a way for the descendants of the Jews who lived in the country during World War II to receive restitutions for nationalized property. The move comes in light of the legislation that would exclude all non-first-line-heirs from seeking potential inheritance, which is expected to pass soon. All potential heirs must prepare paperwork proving their ancestors in Poland had property which had been nationalized, which would allow them to receive a percentage of the property’s value.

Polish Holocaust museum (Photo: Reuters)

Attorneys in Poland say that this is the last opportunity for the descendants to claim restitutions since the law on the issue is frozen and not being promoted due to the political climate in the country.

The procedure could also be made possible by adopting Polish citizenship. A Polish EU passport could be issued when a birth certificate or a military or civil document proving the ancestors’ Polish citizenship is provided. The lawyers claim that the general public in Israel might not be fully aware of their rights when it comes to the issue. Poland’s biggest privatization law has been heavily criticized not only in Israel but in Poland as well. On the surface, it appears the law is intended to ease the process, for private owners or their families, of either retrieving the property or receiving financial compensation for property which had been nationalized.

However, behind the rhetoric lies an attempt to minimize the number of potential heirs. For instance, the law does not include compensation to legal heirs of most landowners before the war, among them hundreds of thousands of Polish Jews who left Poland for either Israel or the US because of the war, lost their Polish citizenship in the Holocaust and left behind a lot of valuable property.

The draft legislation would only make it possible to claim restitutions for current Polish citizens whose property had been confiscated by the Communist government. This prevents most survivors from filing claims since they left the country before or during the Holocaust. The law does say the descendants would also be able to file claims however only the first and second generation. Following the publication of the draft legislation nearly 10 months ago, the World Jewish Restitution Organization (WJRO) expressed its "profound disappointment" and called on the Polish government to ensure that fair and just legislation would be implemented. Patrick Ryzbakiski, an attorney from JGBS BIERNAT & PARTNERS—a Polish law firm that specializes in Warsaw real estate, explains “We need the Israeli plaintiffs to provide us the documents which show that their family members were Polish citizens, then we’ll be able to speed up the process.”

JGBS BIERNAT & PARTNERS

He added that “the main part is collecting the relevant documents to prove the ownership of the property.” In addition, those who are eligible to file a claim as part of different post-war treaties signed between Poland and other countries, would not be able to do so under the bill proposal. The bill also says that the survivors would not be able to file a claim if the property they owned was through company shares. From the moment the law passes, a claim must be filed within a year before the government takes control of the Finance Ministry.

“We’re putting in place different, relevant procedures in order to approve Polish citizenships, including institutions documenting talks with the family members and presenting them in front of relevant Polish authorities until the citizenship is granted," Ryzbakiski added.  

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Sweden sentences 3 to prison for synagogue arson attack

A Swedish court has found three men guilty of attempted arson against the Jewish synagogue in Sweden's second-largest city of Gothenburg last year, causing minor damage.

Two men got two years in jail and the third was sentenced to 15 months.

Swedish police at the scene of the arson attack

The Gothenburg District Court says Monday the case involved two Palestinians and a Syrian.

The 22-year-old Palestinian had his asylum application turned down following the December 9 attack and will be deported after serving his sentence. The others, aged 19 and 24, have Swedish residency permits.

(photo: AP)

The court said they were part of a masked group who threw burning objects at the synagogue, which the prosecution said was a reaction to the US decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital.

All three pleaded innocent. They were the only people charged.

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Jews, Muslims in Berlin team up on bike rides against hatred

Some 25 Jews and Muslims teamed up on tandem bicycle rides through the German capital on Sunday in a protest against growing anti-Semitism and attacks on Muslims in the country.

Some were rabbis and imams, others included women in headscarves and Jewish community members donning skullcaps from Berlin and beyond who shared the bikes on a tour through the city.

Rabbi Elias Dray, one of the organizers of the ride that started at Berlin's Holocaust memorial, said the interfaith tour was intended to boost contacts between Jews and Muslims and other Germans.

A Muslim and a Jewish man ride a tandem together during a bicycle tandem tour of Jews and Muslems against anti-Semitism and hatred of Muslims in Berlin (Photo: AP)

"There's often prejudice in places where there's little contact," said Dray, who works as a community rabbi in the Bavarian town of Amberg. "Anywhere it's a big gain to get to know Judaism and Islam." He rode a tandem together with Berlin Imam Ender Cetin. They and others wore white vests with the words: "Jews and Muslims for respect and tolerance." In addition to the 25 interfaith-bikers, dozens of people joined the bicycle tour through Berlin's downtown in a show of solidarity. Anti-Semitism has been on the rise in Germany lately and while attacks on Muslims have increased. The rising tensions come as Germany grapples with an influx of more than 1 million mostly Muslim migrants, along with the rise of a nationalist party, the Alternative for Germany, which was elected to Parliament last year for the first time. Its leaders are known for their openly anti-Muslim stance, while anti-Semitism has also featured in their statements, but less often. To further complicate things, some of the newly arrived Muslim migrants have added a new strain of anti-Semitism by holding Jews responsible for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Reports of bullying of Jewish children by Muslim immigrant kids in schools across the country have scared many Jews, while Muslim women among others often report slurs and discrimination against them for wearing headscarves. Despite these tensions, Imam Cetin said, "the majority of Muslims and Jews want to live peacefully together."

"It must become a natural thing that we live together in this city and, that we can be able to express our religion openly," Cetin added.

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Retracting the journey to freedom from the Nazis on a bicycle

Paul Alexander was just a toddler when his mother handed him to a volunteer nurse on a train leaving Nazi Germany in 1939.

  Now 81, the former refugee child on Sunday began retracing that journey to freedom—but this time by bicycle as part of a commemorative ride to pay tribute to the Kindertransport scheme that saved him and thousands of Jewish children eight decades ago.

"I did this journey 79 years ago when I came out from the hatred of Nazi Germany to the safety in England. I'm going to do that ride," he told AFP.

Paul Alexander in Berlin (Photo: AP)

 "The thought that came to my head is that this is my answer to Hitler, to sort of prove to myself, to show the world and to express my thanks for succeeding in life and being a happy married man with a family." Alexander will be doing the 600-mile (1,000 km) bike journey with his 34-year-old son and 15-year-old grandson. Besides the trio, 39 other cyclists will be on the six-day journey taking them from Friedrichstrasse in Berlin to Liverpool Street in London, via the Netherlands then aboard an overnight ferry to Harwich in England. Some are descendants of children rescued 80 years ago, while others are cycling in memory of the escapees in the fund-raising ride initiated by the World Jewish Relief, an aid organization that grew out of the agency that carried out the rescue effort. "We have organized this ride as a tribute to the amazing life-saving work of our predecessors," said Rafi Cooper, director of communications for the charity, which maintains historical records from the period. "Tens of thousands of people would not be alive today were it not for their heroism back then."

After the Night of Broken Glass (Kristallnacht) pogroms on November 9, 1938, a group of Protestant, Jewish and Quaker leaders appealed to then British prime minister Neville Chamberlain to allow in unaccompanied Jewish children.

A rescue effort mobilized swiftly, and the first Kindertransport arrived at Harwich on December 2, 1938, carrying 196 children from a Berlin Jewish orphanage which had been torched by the Nazis on Kristallnacht.

Over 18 months, 10,000 children fleeing persecution in Germany, Austria, Poland and what was then Czechoslovakia, were brought to safety in Britain.

(Photo: AP)

Younger children were placed with families while those above 16 were given help to obtain training and employment. The last transport left from the Dutch port of Ymuiden on May 14, 1940—a day before the Netherlands surrendered. For many parents, leaving their children with strangers not knowing if they would see each other again was not an easy decision.

 Alexander's mother, who suffered two stillbirths previously, had agonized over what to do with her only child.

"Sending a child of one year and eight months away, you'll appreciate, is heartrending," said Alexander. What they did not know is that both his parents would soon join him in safety. His father arrived in England 13 days after him and his mother on September 1, 1939, the day the Nazis invaded Poland and launched World War II. The family was finally reunited for good three years later, having all escaped the Holocaust in which six million Jews were exterminated. Alexander himself later trained as a lawyer and married an Israeli living in London. They have three children and nine grandchildren and now live in Israel. The sprightly 81 year old retired from the bank where he worked as its legal counsel in 2002, but still works today as a notary. For him, Sunday's journey is "a symbolic victory ride". "It is a very meaningful and poignant way of celebrating my life. I thought it was poignant to do it with my child and grandson."

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US teacher honored for highlighting Polish Holocaust hero

An American teacher who together with his students shed light on the story of a Polish woman who saved hundreds of Jewish children during the Holocaust has been honored with the award that bears her name.

Irena Sendler and her story were largely unknown until Norman Conard and his high school students in rural Kansas began producing a play about her, “Life in a Jar,” in 1999 as part of a history project on unsung heroes.

The play has since been performed 375 times around the world, movies have been made, schools in Poland and Germany have been named after her and she was nominated for the Nobel Peace prize.

Holocaust survivor Irena Sendler (Photo: AP)

 

Poland’s Culture Ministry and the San Francisco-based Taube Philanthropies presented Conard with the 2018 Irena Sendler Memorial Award in Warsaw’s Royal Castle. Poland has designated 2018 the Year of Irena Sendler, to mark the 10th anniversary of her death at the age of 98.

Culture Minister Piotr Glinski described Sendler as a symbol of the many other brave Poles who risked their lives for others during World War II, many of whose names will never be known.

A social worker, Sendler directed an underground network that saved Jewish children by placing them in orphanages, convents and with Christian families. In many cases, the network’s volunteers smuggled children out of Warsaw’s ghetto after convincing parents it was the children’s only chance of survival.

Sendler and her collaborators buried the names of the children in jars, hoping to later reunite them with their parents. In most cases the parents were murdered in Treblinka.

Though recognized by Yad Vashem in 1965, Sendler was largely unknown before Conard became involved.

Poland’s chief rabbi, Michael Schudrich, said Sendler credited Conard and his students with the recognition she obtained late in life and often referred to the American students as her children.

In a chilling coincidence, the Kansas students began researching Sendler on the same day—Sept. 23, 1999—that Sendler’s beloved son Adam died of heart failure, Conard said. In letters to the students, Sendler used to address them as “my dear and beloved girls, very close to my heart.”

Conard described Sendler as a woman of courage and humility who always sought to deflect attention from herself.

“She would want all of her network to be recognized. And she also said that the real heroes were the Jewish parents and grandparents, who were making decisions that no one should have to make,” Conard told The Associated Press before the ceremony.

“Some of the parents refused to give their children up, and when she went back to talk to them again, the children and parents had been taken away on the trains,” he said.

“This is her award, and it’s to recognize her,” said Conard, now the director of the Lowell Milken Center for Unsung Heroes in Fort Scott, Kansas.

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Jewish artifacts disappear from Damascus in fog of Syria war

Jewish artifacts, including ancient parchment torahs from one of the world's oldest synagogues, have gone missing from the Syrian capital amid the tumult of ongoing civil war, with some precious items reportedly surfacing abroad.

Activists say the artifacts, moved from the now-destroyed Jobar Synagogue in Damascus' eastern Ghouta suburb when it was taken by rebels, were allegedly put into safe keeping to avoid theft and damage in 2013, but twice since then local officials have discovered some are missing.

(Photo: AP)

 

The main missing cache, they say, contained torahs written on gazelle leather as well as tapestries and chandeliers, and was given to a militia by a local council for safekeeping when rebels surrendered the neighborhood to government forces earlier this year. That group, the Islamist-inspired Failaq al-Rahman brigade, later said that it was not in possession of the items after the council arrived at a new rebel base in Syria's north after evacuating earlier this year.

Another set of objects appears to have been stolen by a Syrian guardian entrusted by the local council to hide the items in his home. The man, who officials involved declined to name, disappeared with the artifacts in 2014 before some allegedly resurfaced in Turkey.

Activists say antiquities theft is rife in Syria, and some even cast doubt over whether the missing items, including the valuable torahs, were even original works. 

 

(Photo: AP)

 

"Some of the items that went missing in 2014 and this year have started surfacing now in Turkey," said an activist who lived near the synagogue his whole life until fleeing the area in March after a crushing government offensive. The man, who goes by the name of Hassan al-Dimashqi, said the ensuing government airstrikes and bombardment destroyed most of the synagogue and the surrounding neighborhood, although some of the building's pillars remain standing.

The synagogue, also known as Eliyahu Hanavi, is one of the few Jewish places of worship in Syria that was functioning until shortly before conflict began in March 2011. Residents of the neighborhood remember how less than a dozen Jews, most of them over 50, came quietly once a week to pray.

Videos and photographs from the synagogue taken before the war show a main hall of arches lined with seats and tapestries. Chandeliers and lanterns hang from the ceiling as well as a marble stone with writing in Arabic, Hebrew and Latin. During a visit by an Associated Press photographer to the synagogue in January 2000, Youssef Jajati, a Jewish community leader in Syria at the time, showed the torahs stored in a silver container inside a cupboard. Al-Dimashqi said that for months after rebels seized the neighborhood in 2013, the synagogue was protected by the main local force in Jobar, known at the time as the Haroun al-Rashid Brigade. Later that year local officials formed a committee that decided to empty the building and hide its contents, he added.

 

(Photo: AP)

Some local officials say the man who disappeared in 2014 reached Europe and the artifacts he took ended up in Israel, according to al-Dimashqi, although his ultimate fate and that of the antiquities remain unknown. The whereabouts of the items entrusted with Failaq al-Rahman have not been verified, although al-Dimashqi and the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a war monitor, say some of the pieces, including carpets, chandeliers and historical scripts, have surfaced in Turkey. Turkish state media reported in May that authorities had detained five people in the country's northwest who were trying to sell two old Torahs for 8 million Turkish lira ($1.7 million). It said the manuscripts were written on gazelle leather.

Maamoun Abdul-Karim, who until recently was Syria's director-general of antiquities and museums, has publicly urged the Turks to verify the manuscripts' authenticity. In the 1990s, rumors circulated in Damascus that the originals had been stolen, switched with copies, and smuggled to Israel, he added.

(Photo: AP)

 

Failaq al-Rahman has denied having any role in the artifacts' disappearance, challenging accusers to present proof that would show otherwise. Meanwhile two officials from Jobar's Local Council, which had initially organized the hiding away of the artifacts, refused to speak to the AP, fearing for their safety.

In the Middle Ages, Syria was home to one of the largest Jewish settlements in the world, with most living in the Damascus area. The community dates back to Elijah's Damascus sojourn nearly 3,000 ago, but Jewish life really blossomed in the city after 1099, when Christian armies conquered Jerusalem in the First Crusade and massacred the city's inhabitants. Historians say 50,000 Jews fled to Damascus, making almost one in three Damascenes Jewish almost overnight. Some became government ministers and advisers, and the community grew to around 100,000 by the turn of the 20th century.

Tens of thousands of Jews fled following Israel's creation in 1948, while others held in Syria against their will finally emigrated once they were allowed to when Middle East peace talks began in the 1990s.

(Photo: AP)

  

Syria has accused Israel, with whom it has been in a state of war for 70 years, of stealing the artifacts with the help of Turkey, a more recent enemy. Syria's ambassador to the United Nations, Bashar al-Ja'afari, publicized the accusation with a letter in March, saying the two countries' intelligence services worked with the rebels to smuggle them to Istanbul, where experts confirmed them as "extremely valuable," then New York.

Israel denies involvement and accuses Syria of trying to distract world attention away from the civil war, where the Jewish state has intervened with several strikes that have killed Syrian troops.

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Anne Frank House museum unveils virtual reality tour

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Virtual reality tour 'offers an immersive experience' of the rooms in the Amsterdam house where Anne wrote her diary; VR will benefit people with restricted mobility, who can't climb the narrow stairs, and visitors to Anne Frank centers in Berlin and New York. Anne Frank House museum unveils virtual reality tour : https://ift.tt/2Mvv5sX

Poll shows deep divisions between Israelis and American Jews

An opinion poll published Sunday shows deep divisions between Israelis and American Jews, particularly in relation to US President Donald Trump, highlighting the growing rift between the world's two largest Jewish communities.

The survey of the American Jewish Committee showed 77 percent of Israelis approved of the president's handling of US-Israel relations, while only 34 percent of American Jews did. Fifty-seven percent of US Jews disapproved, while only 10 percent of Israelis did.

The polarizing Trump recently recognized Jerusalem as Israel's capital and relocated the American Embassy there, upending decades of US foreign policy and an international consensus that the city's fate should be decided through peace negotiations. The Palestinians, who claim east Jerusalem as their future capital, were outraged by the move and cut all contacts with the US in response.

Trump and Netanyahu during the US president's visit to Israel (Photo: AFP)

Eighty-five percent of Israelis supported the embassy move, while only 46 percent of American Jews did. The AJC surveyed 1,000 Israelis and 1,001 Jewish Americans over the age of 18 and had a margin of error of 3.1 and 3.9 percent, respectively. The survey was released ahead of the opening of the AJC Global Forum in Jerusalem, which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will address later Sunday. Netanyahu has forged a close bond with Trump, and their hard-line policies toward the Palestinians have strong support in Israel and among its Republican backers in the US. But most American Jews are Democrats who are highly critical of Trump and Netanyahu. Experts have been warning for years that the two communities are drifting in opposite directions politically, undermining the kinship between the two groups, which make up the vast majority of Jews in the world.

American Jews protesting outside Palestinian mission in New York (Photo: EPA)

The poll showed 59 percent of Americans favoring the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel but only 44 percent of Israelis supporting the idea. The communities share similar views on the importance of good ties between the "extended family." But they differ greatly on matters of religion and state, particularly on the ultra-Orthodox monopoly over religious affairs in Israel. The vast majority of American Jews identify as either Reform or Conservative, the more liberal streams of Judaism that have a very small foothold in Israel.

Eighty-one percent of American Jews want to see the Orthodox monopoly on marriage, divorce and conversion in Israel broken, while only 49 percent of Israelis support the change in status quo.

In addition, 81 percent of American Jews support civil marriage and divorce, while only 55 percent of Israelis want the same.

On one of the most contentious issues, regarding a mixed-gender prayer area next to Jerusalem's Western Wall, 73 percent of American Jews express support, compared to just 42 percent of Israelis.

Reform Jews pray at the Western Wall (Photo: AP)

"The conclusion from this poll is clear, the Jews in Israel and the Jews in the US are facing fundamental disagreement about fundamental issues," said Avital Leibovich, the director of the AJC in Israel. "If we don't address these issues today and handle the challenges, the distance between the communities could potentially grow, with US Jews feeling no connection to the State of Israel."

She further warned that "a growing part of the young generation in the US feels that the State of Israel doesn't represent any values they believe in. This situation puts the future of Jewish-American support of Israel is clear danger."

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Iraq extradites suspected killer of Jewish girl to Germany

Iraq has extradited a 20-year-old Iraqi suspected of raping and killing a 14-year-old girl in Germany last month, German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said on Saturday.

"I'm glad that the alleged perpetrator wanted by German authorities is back in Germany," Seehofer said in a statement, adding that the investigation of the case could now be accelerated.

"For the girl's family, that is only a small consolation, and my thoughts are with them during these difficult hours," Seehofer said. "But for the state and our society, it is important that crimes are cleared up and suspects are brought to justice."

 Police in the Kurdistan region of Iraq said on Saturday the Iraqi suspect had admitted to the murder of 14-year-old Susanna Feldman in Germany, where the case has stoked the immigration debate. The Jewish teenager from Mainz near Frankfurt was found dead on Wednesday in a wooded area in Wiesbaden, near a refugee centre where the alleged attacker had lived, German police said. An autopsy showed she had been the victim of a violent and sexual attack. Police said there was no evidence her religion had been a factor and the Central Council of Jews in Germany cautioned against attributing any anti-Semitic motive. Kurdish security forces had taken the suspect, identified by German authorities as Ali Bashar, into custody on Friday after he fled from Germany last week. "Officers in Zakho, in Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdish region, called me and said they had located the suspect and would arrest him as soon as he comes to the city," Dohuk city police chief Tariq Ahmed told Reuters. "He had been staying at a hotel in Dohuk and after realising the police were after him left for Zakho to stay at a relative's house. He was asleep there at night and was arrested in that house at 5:30 AM," Ahmed said.

He said the suspect had confessed to killing the German teenager during interrogation by Kurdish security authorities.

  German media reported earlier that Bashar was expected to be extradited to Germany on Saturday evening and questioned by German investigators on Sunday. German federal police declined to comment on the details emerging from the suspect's arrest or on the report on the timing of extradition. Chancellor Angela Merkel expressed her dismay at the crime and said it should be a reminder to Germans of the need to do whatever possible for the integration of immigrants. "The incredible suffering experienced by the family, the victim, affects everyone, including me," she said on the sidelines of a G7 summit meeting in Canada. "The cooperation in this regard between German and Kurdish security authorities worked well here ... It is good that the alleged perpetrator was caught, that he probably also will be returning to Germany," Merkel said. She added, "This is a reminder to all of us, first, to take the task of integration very seriously, to make our common values very clear, again and again. But also to punish any crime. We can only live together if we all stick to our laws." Merkel's decision to take in large numbers of asylum seekers during Europe's 2015 migrant crisis has stirred a political backlash, with many politicians calling for new rules to make it easier to deport immigrants. Bashar had been living in Germany as a refugee since 2015, German media have reported. German police set up a special call centre for tips from the public and issued releases in Arabic and Turkish. They said on Thursday that Bashar had likely fled to Erbil in the KRG.

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Holocaust survivor Gena Turgel, consoler of Anne Frank, dies

LONDON - Gena Turgel, a Holocaust survivor who comforted Anne Frank at the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp before the young diarist's death and the camp's liberation a month later, has died. She was 95.

Turgel died Thursday, Britain's chief rabbi, Ephraim Mirvis, said on Twitter. The news triggered tributes from some of the people the Polish native touched in the decades she shared her World War II experiences, including witnessing the horrors of the Nazi camps at Auschwitz, Buchenwald and Bergen-Belsen. After World War II, Turgel married one of Bergen-Belsen's British liberators, Norman Turgel, earning the nickname "The Bride of Belsen." Her wedding dress, made from parachute silk, is part of the collection of the Imperial War Museum in London.

Gena Turgel (Photo taken from Twitter)

Turgel attended Britain's annual Holocaust remembrance event two months ago, sitting in a wheelchair with a blanket draped over her knees. "My story is the story of one survivor, but it is also the story of 6 million who perished," she said at the event in London's Hyde Park. "Maybe that's why I was spared—so my testimony would serve as a memorial like that candle that I light, for the men, women and children who have no voice." Born in Krakow, Poland as Gena Goldfinger on Feb. 1, 1923, Turgel and her family were forced to move into a Jewish ghetto with only a sack of potatoes, some flour and a few belongings in late 1941. One brother was shot by SS police and another disappeared after trying to escape, according to the Holocaust Educational Trust in London. A sister of hers was shot while trying to smuggle food into a labor camp. In January 1945, Turgel and her mother were forced onto a death march from Auschwitz to Buchenwald, leaving her remaining sister behind. In February 1945, they arrived at Bergen-Belsen in Germany. It was in a hospital at Bergen-Belsen, where Turgel arrived in February 1945, that the 22-year-old Turgel cared for 15-year-old Anne Frank as she was dying from typhus.

"I washed her face, gave her water to drink, and I can still see that face, her hair and how she looked," Turgel once told the BBC.

Anne Frank

Turgel published a memoir, "I Light a Candle," in 1987 and kept retelling her story in schools across Britain until the end of her life. "Gena dedicated her life to sharing her testimony to hundreds of thousands in schools across the country. Her story was difficult to hear—and difficult for her to tell—but no one who heard her speak will ever forget," Karen Pollock, chief executive of the Holocaust Educational Trust, said. London Mayor Sadiq Khan said he met Turgel at the Hyde Park event in April and was "inspired by her lifelong commitment to educating people about the horrors of the Holocaust." "Let us hope for a better future where anti-Semitism and all hatred should be demolished, shouldn't be tolerated," Turgel said at the time. "And I do beg you, don't forget those who are less fortunate than yourselves." She is survived by her three children, as well as grandchildren and great grandchildren.

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Iraqi suspect confesses to German Jewish teen's murder

A failed Iraqi asylum seeker has admitted murdering a Jewish teenage girl in Germany after being arrested back in his homeland, authorities in Iraq's Kurdistan region said on Saturday.

Ali Bashar, 20, is believed to have strangled 14-year-old Susanna Maria Feldman after raping her in the German city of Wiesbaden.

He was detained early Friday in northern Iraq following an outcry in Germany after police hunting the fugitive admitted he had fled with his family.

"During interrogation following his arrest, the young man originally from Kurdistan confessed to killing the German girl," said Tariq Ahmad, police chief for the Dohuk area of Iraqi Kurdistan. "He said that the two of them were friends but that they had a dispute, and that he killed her when the girl threatened to call the police," Ahmad said. On Friday a senior official in the autonomous Kurdistan region told AFP that authorities were working to transfer Bashar quickly back to Germany to face trial. That process could prove tricky as there is no official extradition treaty between Iraq and Germany.

The case has put renewed pressure on Chancellor Angela Merkel's government over the decision to open Germany's borders at the height of Europe's refugee crisis in 2015, resulting in the arrival of more than a million asylum seekers. Bashar arrived in Germany in 2015 along with his parents and five siblings. He should have been deported after his request for asylum was rejected in December 2016, but he obtained a temporary residence permit pending his appeal. During this time, he got into trouble with the police on several occasions, including for fights, alleged robbery and possession of an illegal switchblade. He was also among the suspects for the sexual assault of an 11-year-old girl living in the same refugee shelter.

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An American pioneer: A Jew in the middle of nowhere

It’s Friday. The sun is setting and Shabbat is about to start. At a time when traditional and religious Jews light candles and welcome Shabbat in synagogue, then say the kiddush and share a family meal, these Jews and non-Jews gather for a special ceremony at a remote farm in Manchester, Vermont.

Oliver Levis, a Jewish farmer on the isolated Earth Sky Time Farm, hosts the weekly reception that manages to attract not only the few Jews who live in the area, but also non-Jewish families and visitors, exposing them to a unique event that includes original music based on Shabbat prayers. The Levis family fosters an original type of communal Jewish life, open to different Jewish lifestyles and beliefs.

A bar mitzvah in the middle of nowhere. Oliver Levis with his son Guv

How can one live a Jewish life in the middle of nowhere?

“I grew up in Vermont, and we were never an isolated family,” says Oliver Levis. “My family always tried to celebrate Jewish holidays in an unconventional way, including, for example, when one of my sisters had a bat mitzvah. My parents organized a journey around the farm that spanned the biblical history of civilization and family.”

“My mother came up with Jewish dances and we wrote plays with a Jewish background. There was no traditional Jewish community around us, so my family invented its own way to realize our Judaism."

Bar mitzvah on a remote farm (Video: 70 Faces Media)    (צילום: 70 Faces Media)

What does your special Kabbalat Shabbat (welcoming the Sabbath) look like?

“We sit together in front of a wood stove in the winter, drink wine and play music, tell jokes about the week, and try to raise our spirits in any way. Sometimes it becomes a dance party. We don’t have a set program and we adapt. We take time out of our busy schedules to dedicate to just being togehter, without any defined goal.

“We also light Shabbat candles, sing ‘Shalom Aleichem’ and play musical instruments, and we’ve been having traditional Shabbat meals for 12 years – and everyone is invited.”

Levis is one of seven Jews from across the United States whose unique story was recorded as part of a special campaign for Israel’s 70th anniversary. As part pf the project, 70 Faces Media, together with UJA-Federation of New York, produced short videos that reflect a wide range of Jewish identities, both in Israel and the United States.

Oliver Levis on his farm (Photo: Oliver Levis)

“These documentaries are an opportunity for both American and Israeli audiences to learn from our often different experiences as Jews, and to come together over our common experiences and triumphs,” said UJA-Federation of New York CEO Eric S. Goldstein.

About his relationship with Israel, Levis says, “My family and I have been to Israel several times. My wife’s aunt has a vegetarian restaurant in Safed, and we may bring our children to Israel next year. At the farm we have a baker named Ziv, who arrived in Vermont from Israel a few years ago. He came to help out on the farm, but quickly realized that his real talent is baking, and he prepares challah with chocolate, cinnamon, honey, oranges, and raisins every week. It’s sticky—but it’s the best challah in the world.

Bonnie Levis working on the farm (Photo: Oliver Levis)

“For me, Israel is the best example of Jewish life today, and it is undoubtedly the center of world Jewish life,” Levis said. “We visited Greece once and saw only remnants of a Jewish community. It emphasized how well off Israel is, and how important it is to strengthen and preserve it.”

How do you see Judaism as a certain value? As a way of life?

“I would not consider myself part of any specific Jewish stream—I’m just trying to do what I feel is right. I am definitely in a more liberal-progressive region of the religious spectrum, and happy to do anything that brings people closer to being Jewish.

Eliza Levis. ‘I don't impose anything on my children’ (Photo: Oliver Levis)

“Our father was originally from the Greek Jewish community, and we were able to meet with distant relatives and visit the towns and villages where my family and Jewish communities lived for hundreds of years. I have tremendous respect for Jewish traditions, but I also feel comfortable with different interpretations of Jewish tradition and religion.

“I hope that I am giving my children enough intellectual openness to encourage them to enjoy the contrast in life and the different aspects of Judaism, not to dwell too much on the details—unless they want to. My children are still young and they live with me. I want them to be part of the Jewish world, but, in the same breath, I also take care not to impose anything on them.”

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Iraqi suspect in murder of German Jewish teen detained

BERLIN - Kurdish authorities in northern Iraq detained a 20-year-old Iraqi man on Friday on suspicion of raping and murdering a 14-year-old Jewish girl in Germany, German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said.

Seehofer told reporters the Kurdish security forces had taken him into custody early on Friday at the request of the German police, who identified him as Ali Bashar. He had been living in Germany as a refugee since 2015, German media said.

The case has galvanized Germany at a time when its decision to take in large numbers of migrants and asylum seekers during Europe's 2015 migrant crisis is already stirring a political backlash. Many politicians are calling for new rules to make it easier to deport immigrants thought to be violent.

Victim Susanna Feldman, right

The victim, Susanna Feldman, was Jewish, although police said there was no evidence her religion had been a factor in the crime, and the Central Council of Jews in Germany cautioned against attributing any anti-Semitic motive to her attacker. "I am pleased to announce a successful manhunt in the case of Susanna F.," Seehofer told reporters after a meeting with state interior ministers. The teenager, from the city of Mainz near Frankfurt, was reported missing on May 22. She was found dead on Wednesday in a wooded area near train tracks in Wiesbaden on the opposite bank of the Rhine, near a refugee center where the suspected attacker had lived, police said. An autopsy showed she had been the victim of a sexual and violent attack.

Ali Bashar

Police told reporters on Thursday that Bashar had likely fled with his family to Erbil, Iraq, several days ago. They said they had set up a special call center for tips from the public, and had issued releases in Arabic and Turkish. The Iraqi suspect was already under investigation for a suspected robbery. He was appealing a December 2016 decision by German authorities to reject his asylum application. Germany does not have a general extradition agreement with Iraq but must negotiate such moves on an individual basis, said foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Adebahr. She declined to comment on the specific case of Bashar.

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German Jewish family 'destroyed' after daughter raped, murdered

The 1,000-strong Jewish community of Mainz in Germany has expressed shock over the rape and murder of a 14-year-old Jewish girl by a suspected Iraqi asylum seeker, which has left her family "destroyed." Susanna Feldman was found dead on Wednesday in a wooded area near train tracks in Wiesbaden on the opposite bank of the Rhine, near a refugee center where the suspected attacker lived, according to police. An autopsy showed she had been the victim of a sexual and violent attack. “Our community is in shock. We are trying to help the girl’s family,” said Mainz’s community Rabbi Aharon Ran Vernikovsky in an interview with Ynet.

Susanna Feldman

While Feldman was Jewish, police said there was no evidence her religion was a factor in the crime, and the Central Council of Jews in Germany cautioned against attributing any anti-Semitic motive to her attacker. Police said the Iraqi suspect, whom they identified as Ali Bashar, appears to have left abruptly with his family last week, flying to Erbil, Iraq via Istanbul using fake names. He was a suspect in a string of previous offenses in the area, including a robbery at knifepoint. A Turkish man who wasn't previously known to police was also arrested in the latest high-profile case involving migrants. Feldman went out with her friends two week ago in Wiesbaden 17 kilometers from Mainz, which is located near Frankfurt, and was not seen since. According to initial police assessments, she was sexually assaulted and then choked to death by Bashar, who is believed to have been in a relationship with Feldman. “Susanna was a member of the community,” said Rabbi Vernikovsky. “Her father is not Jewish. He left the family at some stage and now her mother lives with a partner who is also not Jewish. I have come to comfort the family and I have found that it is destroyed. The mother is in complete shock. “The religious community here is a minority. Generally Jews in the city lead quiet lives. There are immigrants in the city as there are in all other cities in Germany, and there were never any problems with them. Susanna had no Jewish appearance,” he noted

Ali Bashar

Officials involved in the ongoing investigation say that the teenager text her mother shortly before she was reported as missing, telling her that she was alright and that she should not come looking for her. The girl was last seen alive at the refugee center, broadcaster ARD reported. ARD said Bashar was known to police because he had become violent with officials over his asylum status, and had previously been suspected in the rape of an 11-year-old girl at the refugee home, although an investigation was inconclusive. The Central Council of Jews in Germany said: "Many of the details of the case are still unclear. We expect a rapid and comprehensive investigation from the prosecutorial authorities, and hard consequences for the perpetrator or perpetrators."

The Council has warned in recent months about an increase in anti-Semitic incidents, and the German government has created a new post to fight anti-Semitism.

Some German Jews have expressed concern about a perceived rise in anti-Jewish prejudice with the influx of mainly Muslim migrants, although German police blame most anti-Semitic incidents on followers of the German far-right.

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Dallas-area church targets 'dangerous isms,' such as Judaism

A Dallas-area church recently distributed flyers advertising a series of weekly seminars it plans to host condemning "dangerous isms" like Judaism, Islamism and liberalism.

Greenville Avenue Church of Christ in Richardson says in the flyers that the Wednesday seminars, being held through August, will "provide a proper response for the Christian."

Pulpit minister Shelton Gibbs III told The Dallas Morning News that while the wording used in advertising could have been better, other faiths run counter to God's order to follow Jesus Christ.

Church says will be more careful of phrasing when promoting future events (Photo: Visual/Photos)

The flyers prompted a social media backlash but Gibbs said the predominantly African-American church doesn't mean to condemn others.

"We're not here to criticize or be antagonistic toward people and to beat them down," he told the newspaper. "There's no threat. The people in the community should not feel a threat."

Atheism, alcoholism and "emotionalism" are some of the other seminar topics. Gibbs said topics such as racism or sexism won't be discussed because "there are only so many Wednesdays in a summer."

The church will be more careful of phrasing when promoting future events, he said.

"We're living in an age where every word means something, and you have to be very careful about the words that you use," Gibbs said. "And I think going forward, I'm sure we'll be able to phrase it where people are drawn in, and not that we have somehow marginalized them and caused them to fear."

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UN releases first education guide on fighting anti-Semitism

The United Nations has released its first ever guidelines on fighting anti-Semitism in education.

UNESCO, the UN's cultural body, launched the publication on Monday in Paris in collaboration with the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, the OSCE.

The guide, aimed to be used by young people, the teaching world, as well as political leaders, was presented by Audrey Azoulay, UNESCO's first Jewish director general.

Audrey Azoulay, UNESCO's first Jewish director general (Photo: Reuters)

Azoulay said that the need for an educational guide has become imperative in today's schools, universities, and other educational institutions.

"Many Jewish communities across the world are facing increasing threats. (Jews) have become targets for terror attacks in Paris, Brussels, and Copenhagen," she elaborated.

"Fear of anti-Semitism, harassment, and even physical assault has grown particularly near Jewish culture centers, religious sites including synagogue, museums, and schools," Azoulay lamented.

"This is a warning call for those who survived the Holocaust. Europe's Jewish communities sense a renewed danger of anti-Semitic attacks," UNESCO's first Jewish director general warned.

"Anti-Semitism is neither the problems of the Jewish communities, nor it requires the communities to deal with it. Anti-Semitism exists in religions and diverse political groups ranging across the entire political spectrum. It is a symptom of a wider social or political problem that indicates tendencies of (social) regression which dangerously harms the social fabric," she added.

UNESCO's director general also underlined that anti-Semitism is usually accompanied by additional displays of hatred, which are based on differences between the sexes as well as on fear of homosexuality.

UNESCO (Photo: AP)

Azoulay added that training educators who are capable of dealing with live discriminative phenomena in educational institutes with the help of the practical guidelines presented in the guide, is the way to fight it online as well.

UNESCO said the guide provides tools to strengthen the resilience of young people to anti-Semitic ideas and violent extremism, such as how to respond to anti-Semitic acts and words in school settings.

It also familiarizes educators with anti-Semitic stereotypes and conspiracy theories as well as developing media skills to help students resist manipulation.

The guide's focuses on three main issues—the connection between anti-Semitism and other human rights matters, encouragement of critical thinking as a means to deal with anti-Semitic contents, and the connection of anti-Semitism and other discriminative groups on the backdrop of religion, ethnic origin, sex and sexual tendency.

In the chapter of "Fighting anti-Semitism through education—guidelines for policy makers," applicable specific instructions of how to battle anti-Semitism as part of human rights promotion are presented as well as ways to protect the young generations from being influenced by anti-Semitic ideas.

Diaspora Jews exposed to anti-Semitism (Photo: EPA)

Personnel from the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam and the Simon Wiesenthal Center in the United States were among those who advised the UN on writing the guide.

The guide is about 100 pages long and is displayed on the UN's website.

Israel had declared its desire to withdraw from UNESCO in 2017 claiming the organization is biased against it following the controversial statements about the Western Wall and the Cave of the Patriarchs issued by UNESCO.

The US was the first to announce it is leaving UNESCO in the wake of the ongoing discrimination against Israel.

UNESCO's initiative to release an education guide meant to fight anti-Semitism seems as an attempt to turn over a new leaf on its relationship with Israel.

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Danes seek to limit male circumcision to those 18 and over

A Danish group says petition seeking to set a minimum age of 18 for non-medical male circumcision in the country has gathered the required 50,000 signatures to send the proposal to Parliament for debate later this year.

Lena Nyhus of the group Intact Denmark told The Associated Press on Saturday that her children’s welfare organization believes “we need to respect a person’s right to decide for themselves” on a possible circumcision when they become an adult.

Circumcision ceremony. 'We need to respect a person’s right to decide for themselves' (Photo: Shutterstock)

The ritual of removing an infant boy’s foreskin is common among Jews and Muslims for religious reasons.

The American Academy of Pediatrics says the health benefits of male circumcision outweigh the risks but not by enough to recommend universal male circumcision. The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says doctors should educate infant boys’ parents about the health benefits of circumcision, which it says reduces the transmission of sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV.

A recent poll commissioned by Danish TV2 broadcaster found that 83 percent of respondents supported such an age limit on circumcising boys.

However, the proposal is unlikely to pass since none of Denmark’s main political parties support it.

Earlier this year, Icelandic lawmakers initially backed a plan to ban circumcisions for minors and to give those who performed the procedure possible jail sentences. But after an outpouring of criticism, including from European Jewish leaders, the proposal was dropped.

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