Bosnia's Jews, Muslims, Christians chide politicians

Bosnia's religious leaders say politicians are standing in the way of peaceful coexistence between Muslim, Jewish and Christian communities trying to forgive and forget after the atrocities of a devastating 1990s war.

Hundreds of churches, mosques and synagogues bear witness to more than five centuries of Bosnia's multi-faith past, and the capital Sarajevo is known locally as a "small Jerusalem" with its main ethnic groups—Orthodox Serbs, Catholic Croats and Muslim Bosniaks—all worshipping within meters of each other.

Rabbi's assistant Igor Kozemjakin, at Sarajevo Ashkenazi Synagogue in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina (Photo: Reuters)

But Mufti Husein Kavazovic, head of the Islamic community in Bosnia, says people of faith cannot achieve peace alone. "It is up to political elites to do more. For a start, it would be good that they stop their ideological manipulation of religion for their own political goals. It is up to us, of course, not to allow them to do that," he said. Even though nationalists from all three ethnic groups still insist on exclusivity for their own groups, religious leaders are keen to heal rifts after the 1992-1995 war in which about 100,000 civilians were killed and millions displaced. Friar Zeljko Brkic at Kraljeva Sutjeska—among the oldest Franciscan monasteries in Bosnia and dating from 1385—said: "Bosnia can only survive as a multi-ethnic state, no matter how much politicians try to convince us that this is not possible."

Friar Zeljko Brkic, at Kraljeva Sutjeska Franciscan monastery in Kraljeva Sutjeska, Bosnia and Herzegovina (Photo: Reuters)

His Orthodox, Jewish and Muslim peers agree. "It is very important that we have here different cultures and religions, and that based on that we can easily build and verify our own identities," said Nektarije, a deacon at the Orthodox monastery Zitomislici in what is now the Catholic Croat-dominated southern part of the country. Jakob Finci, the president of the Jewish community in Bosnia, gives Sarajevo as an example of close cooperation, citing Muslims there helping Jews to hide during World War Two and Jews providing food for people of all faiths in the three-year siege by Bosnian Serb forces.

Effendi Ibranovic Dzemail, at Sulejmanija Mosque in Travnik, Bosnia and Herzegovina (Photo: Reuters)

"Sarajevo is the best proof that living together is possible and that it represents the only way of life for us," he said. This week, about 120 leaders from 27 countries arrived in Sarajevo to take part in a meeting of the youth-led Muslim Jewish Conference, founded by Ilja Sichrovski in Vienna in 2010. "We feel at home here," Sichrovski said.

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Polish Jews ask far-right leader to denounce rising anti-Semitism

The leaders of Poland's Jewish community have written to the country's most powerful politician, urging him to denounce what they say is rising anti-Semitism that has left them fearing for their future in the country.

The letter, a rare voicing of concern, comes nearly two years after the election of Law and Justice, a deeply conservative, nationalistic and anti-migrant party that is backed by some groups with anti-Semitic views.

Members of the far-right group, the National-Radical Camp, marking the 83rd anniversary of their organization (Photo: AP)

Observers including the country's human rights commissioner have noted a rise in anti-Semitism and other hate speech and as well as attacks on dark-skinned people since the party came to power. "We are appalled by recent events and fearful for our security as the situation in our country is becoming more dangerous," Leslaw Piszewski, the head of the Jewish community in Poland, and Anna Chipczynska, the head of the Warsaw community, wrote in the letter. Chipczynska told The Associated Press on Thursday that the community sent the letter last week to Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the ruling party leader, but so far had no reply. The Associated Press made several attempts to reach the party spokeswoman but all calls went unanswered.

Jaroslaw Kaczynski (Photo: AP)

The letter says there has been a "rise of anti-Semitic attitudes in recent months, accompanied by aggressive hate speech and violent behavior that are directed towards our community" and asked Kaczynski to decisively condemn the anti-Semitism. Among examples it mentions the increasingly visible presence, even at state events, of members of an extremist right-wing group, the National Radical Camp, and an attack last week on a visiting Israeli soccer team. It also cited a recent comment by a lawmaker from Law and Justice, Bogdan Rzonca, who said on Twitter earlier this month that he wondered "why there are so many Jews among abortionists despite the Holocaust." Another incident that raised the community's concern was when a journalist for state television TVP, Magdalena Ogorek, highlighted the Jewish ancestry of a senator, Marek Borowski, when criticizing his politics. The incident sparked a wave of critical comments, and the head of TVP demanded an explanation from Ogorek.

Supporters of the far-right National-Radical Camp during anti EU protest (Photo: AP)

Some Polish observers have said the climate evokes the mood in the country in 1968, when the communist regime waged an anti-Semitic campaign against Jews that culminated in thousands being expelled from the country. "We are afraid for our security and our future in Poland," the Jewish leaders wrote to Kaczynski. "We do not want a return to the year 1968." Poland's Jewish community was the largest in Europe before the Holocaust, with some 3.3 million people. Today's community is much smaller but had been growing amid a new tolerance that came with the collapse of communism in 1989.

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Notorious neo-Nazi Ernst Zundel dies in Germany

Ernst Zundel, a far-right activist who rose to notoriety over decades of public neo-Nazi activity in Canada and the US before being deported back to his native Germany on Holocaust denial charges, has died. He was 78.

Marina Lahmann, a spokeswoman for the community of Bad Wildbad in Baden-Wuerttemberg where Zundel lived, told The Associated Press on Monday that Zundel died over the weekend. She had no further information, saying the paperwork had not yet been processed.

Zundel (Photo: AP)

"We can only confirm at the moment that he died," she said. Media in Canada quoted a statement from his wife, Ingrid Zundel, saying that he died of a heart attack at his home on Sunday. His wife, who lives in the United States, told CTV news she had spoken to her husband "just hours before he passed on and he was as optimistic and upbeat as ever." Born in Germany in 1939, Zundel emigrated to Canada in 1958—allegedly to avoid German military service—and lived in Toronto and Montreal until 2001. He achieved international notoriety for his neo-Nazi beliefs and writings, including "The Hitler We Loved and Why," and operated Samisdat Publishers, a leading distributor of Nazi and Nazi-era propaganda. He also provided regular content for an eponymous far-right website. Canadian officials rejected his attempts to obtain citizenship in 1966 and 1994. After leaving Canada, he moved to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, where he had married fellow right-wing extremist Ingrid Rimland. But in 2003 he was deported back to Canada for alleged immigration violations. After he arrived in Toronto, he was arrested and held in detention until a judge ruled in 2005 that his activities posed a threat to national and international security and he was deported to Germany, where he was being sought for Holocaust denial. Denial of the Holocaust is illegal in Germany. Because Zundel's Holocaust-denying website was available in Germany, he was considered to have been spreading his message to Germans. Zundel, who portrayed himself as a peaceful campaigner being denied the right to free speech, was convicted in Mannheim in 2007 of 14 counts of inciting hatred for engaging in years of anti-Semitic activities and sentenced to five years in prison. After serving his sentence, a crowd of some 20 supporters clapped and shouted "bravo" as he was released from prison in Mannheim in 2010. Outside the prison, he refused to comment on his beliefs about the Holocaust, saying only "it's kind of a sad situation, there's a lot to say" before adding "I'll certainly be careful not to offend anyone and their draconian laws."

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Congregation at oldest US synagogue reviewing legal options

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German prosecutors say "bookkeeper of Auschwitz" fit for prison

A medical examination showed a 96-year-old German known as the "bookkeeper of Auschwitz" was fit to start serving his prison sentence, German prosecutors said on Wednesday, but his lawyer said a court should decide whether he was well enough. Oskar Groening was sentenced to four years in prison in 2015 for his role in the murder of 300,000 people at the Nazi death camp Auschwitz in what was seen as one of the last major Holocaust trials.

Oskar Groening, defendant and former Nazi SS officer dubbed the 'bookkeeper of Auschwitz' (Photo: AP)

 

He has not yet begun serving his sentence because his lawyer appealed the verdict—though the Federal Supreme Court in November upheld the 2015 ruling—and it has since taken time for the files to be transferred back, said Kathrin Soefker, a spokeswoman for prosecutors in Hanover.

Photo: Reuters

 Prosecutors have rejected Groening's request for a reprieve after a medical assessment determined he was fit for detention, she said. "After getting an official medical opinion we assume Mr. Groening is able to go to prison," Soefker said. "A 96-year-old has physical constraints but if he can get appropriate medical and nursing care in a prison or correctional facility, he is fit for prison," she added.

SS member and Auschwitz Guard Oskar Groening (Photo: EPA)

But Groening's lawyer, Hans Holtermann, told Reuters he did not think Groening can survive imprisonment.

Photo: Reuters

"We will apply for a decision to be made by the court," Holtermann said. "We think a sensible assessment (of Groening's health) should have been carried out and that has not happened yet," he said. Groening, who is physically frail, has said he was an enthusiastic Nazi when he was sent to work at Auschwitz in 1942, at the age of 21.

Photo: AP

In 2015 prosecutors argued that although Groening did not kill anyone himself while working at Auschwitz, in Nazi-occupied Poland, he helped support the regime responsible for mass murder by sorting bank notes seized from trainloads of arriving Jews. Many Germans want to draw a line under the Holocaust and instead focus on the country's post-war democratic identity.

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Israel National Library launches digital manuscript archive

Israel's National Library launched an online database on Wednesday aggregating tens of thousands of digitized Jewish manuscripts belonging to collections from across the globe.

Scholars and laypersons can access almost half of the known handwritten Jewish texts from Spain to Afghanistan, which have been digitized and catalogued online. In some cases, parts of a manuscript that have been long divided between collections will be reunited, digitally for the first time in centuries.

Part of the National Library collection (Photo: National Library)

The archive contains nearly 4.5 million images from 45,000 manuscripts—slightly more than half of all known volumes. They include prayer books, biblical texts and commentary, philosophy, literature and scientific writings, in Hebrew, Yiddish, Ladino, Judeo-Arabic and more.

The database, called Ktiv, Hebrew for "written word," is the culmination of a project conceived by Israel's founding prime minister David Ben Gurion. In 1950, Ben Gurion launched the initiative of ingathering Jewish texts scattered in libraries and collections around the world and bringing them to the fledgling state in the form of microfilms. The new database, a joint venture with the Friedberg Jewish Manuscript Society, takes that endeavor into the 21st century, with multispectral and high-definition images and an internet search engine.

The National Library partnered with some of the world's largest collections of Jewish manuscripts, including the British Library, Parma's Palatina Library and the Vatican Library, in an effort to bring all the known texts under one digital roof. "To the best of my knowledge, this is unprecedented not only for Jewish studies and Judaica," National Library Director Aviad Stollman said. "There is no project with this scope that aggregated so many manuscripts from so many places in the world." Stollman said the project will continue to amass additional images of Jewish manuscripts held by other collections that haven't yet partnered with the library, and that their work is expected to continue for years to come. The library is also working to make the texts within the manuscripts searchable to users online.

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Jewish mothers’ Israel journey spotlighted in American media

A new trend of American Jewish mothers who decide to visit Israel for the first time in their lives has gotten significant coverage in American media in recent weeks.

Even major TV networks, such as Fox, ABC and NBC, reported about the “MOMentum” trips, a Zionist project organized by the Jewish Women’s Renaissance Project (JWRP) and Israel’s Ministry of Diaspora Affairs.

“MOMentum” is an eight-day subsidized journey in Israel. More than 11,000 Jewish mothers from 26 countries around the world—most coming from the United States—have already taken part in the project. To be eligible for the journey, women must have children under 18, not observe Shabbat, and have never been to Israel before.

According to JWRP, the “MOMentum” trip stretches from the mystical Galilee city of Safed to the ancient desert mountaintop fortress Masada, and features extensive itineraries and curated curricula encompassing everything from Jewish values to contemporary Israeli society. Among other things, the mothers climb Masada, bathe in the Dead Sea, travel to Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, pray at the Western Wall, and get photographed against the backdrop of the Temple Mount and the Dome of the Rock.

The trips inspire women to connect deeply with their Jewish heritage, and transform themselves, their families, and ultimately their communities and the wider world.

Photo: Aviram Valdman/JWRP

 During the journey, the Jewish mothers meet with mothers from Israel and from all over the Jewish world—meetings aimed at creating friendships across the continents. The mothers also meet soldiers and young Israelis who are about to enlist in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), and some of them receive Hebrew names during ceremonies in the Judean Desert. JWRP was founded in Maryland in 2008 to promote the empowerment of Jewish women, whom they realized could change the world through Jewish values.

Photo: Aviram Valdman/JWRP

The project, and the thousands of mothers who have already participated, have been covered by multiple US TV stations and newspapers, which dedicated reports to the Israel journeys and interviewed the Jewish mothers, who shared their incredible experiences with tearful eyes upon their return home.

One of them, Amanda Rothbard of Philadelphia, told a local Fox affiliate: “This was the first time I visited Israel. I was selected from over 40 applicants. I went there not knowing one person, and I left there with 23-plus sisters and family. We learned how to really empower ourselves as women, how to be better wives and mothers and friends.”

Rothbard added, “We went to a military base and met young Israelis before they enlisted in the army. In Israel you don’t have any choice—they graduate high school and go straight to the military. We got the chance to meet those who will be the next IDF leaders, the sergeants and lieutenants. They really love their country. As a mother, to not have a choice to send my child off to war—and I met with many of their mothers—it was such an empowering and emotional journey.”  

Photo: Aviram Valdman/JWRP

Israel’s Ministry of Diaspora Affairs partnered with JWRP in 2013 after identifying it as a strategic and important project.

“The ‘MOMentum’ trip emphasizes the Israeli government’s commitment towards the Jewish Diaspora and provides an unprecedented opportunity for Jewish women from different backgrounds to strengthen their Jewish identities and connections to Israel,” said Dvir Kahana, director general of the Ministry of Diaspora Affairs. “I see the partnership with JWRP as critical to our vision of empowering women while recognizing their unique role in raising and educating the next generation to ensure a thriving future for the Jewish people.”

 

Photo: Aviram Valdman/JWRP

“Women often express concern about leaving their children for eight days for a MOMentum trip,” said Lori Palatnik, JWRP’s founding director. “I explain that they are not leaving their kids, they are going for their kids. What they will gain on this life-changing trip will spill over into their homes in the most beautiful and profound way.”

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