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Afghanistan lawmakers block women’s freedoms
Yesterday
Afghanistan’s parliament has blocked a law aimed at protecting women’s freedoms . This is a severe blow to women’s rights in the conservative Muslim country a dozen years after the ousting of the hard-line Taliban regime.
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Hundreds demonstrate against Malmo anti-Semitism
Yesterday
Several hundred Jews and people of other faiths and none have marched in the southern Swedish city of Malmo to bring attention to intolerance and anti-Semitic attacks in the Nordic country . The city has a large immigrant Muslim community and attacks on Jews have spiked in recent years.
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Germany proposes ban on EU citizens in Syria
Yesterday
Germany has proposed a two-year ban on EU citizens returning to the EU from Syria after fighting against the forces of embattled Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
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Trains serving New York collide in Connecticut
Yesterday
Two commuter trains serving New York City have collided in Connecticut during Friday's evening rush hour, sending 60 of the 250 people on board the trains to hospital, including five with critical injuries.
Border blockage: Egyptian police block another bordering crossing with the Gaza Strip as Egyptian police continue to attempt to secure the release of their colleagues, who were taken hostage last week
Assad no ally of Israel: PM Netanyahu says that it is untrue that Israel prefers Syrian President Bashar al Assad to the rebels he is fighting against
Iran hangs spies: Tehran announces that it has hung to death two spies who Iranian courts determined worked for the United States and Israel
Drone shopping: Reuters reports that France is currently in talks with the United States and Israel to buy intelligence-gathering drones to complement its growing fleet of unmanned aerial reconnaissance vehicles
Assad no ally of Israel: PM Netanyahu says that it is untrue that Israel prefers Syrian President Bashar al Assad to the rebels he is fighting against
Iran hangs spies: Tehran announces that it has hung to death two spies who Iranian courts determined worked for the United States and Israel
Drone shopping: Reuters reports that France is currently in talks with the United States and Israel to buy intelligence-gathering drones to complement its growing fleet of unmanned aerial reconnaissance vehicles
Militants bomb Egyptian diplomat’s car in Benghazi
A car belonging to an Egyptian diplomat has been blown up near his home in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi in the latest incident highlighting the continuing instability in the country following last year’s revolution.
The bombing took place a day after two people were killed in the capital Tripoli in attacks which authorities have blamed on supporters of deposed leader Muammar Gaddafi.
Meanwhile, police diffused more car bombs throughout the capital as security levels were raised across the country. The latest round of violence comes just days ahead of the anniversary of the capture of Tripoli by rebels and just weeks after the country’s first free election in more than four decades.
Authorities are still trying to disarm various militia groups throughout the country who have refused to lay down arms and cede power to the national government.
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First European Jewish Choir Festival makes a hit in Vienna
For hundreds of years, one of the great centres of culture and civilisation, and without question Europe’s capital of music . What better place can you imagine as a setting for the first ever European Jewish Choir Festival? Vienna!
Tonight at the magnificent Austria Center on the banks of the River Danube, with the patronage of the Austrian President and under the umbrella of the European Jewish Parliament, a gala concert is being held to celebrate the culmination of four days of Jewish choral excellence.
I spoke to festival organiser and Member of the European Jewish Parliament Roman Grinberg.
Choirmaster and MEJP Roman Grinberg:
"Over four hundred people, over four hundred singers, Jewish singers from Western and Eastern Europe came tonight to Vienna. United European Jewish choir here in Vienna on stage tonight, it was a very, very big experience."
I also spoke to Oskar Deutsch, President of the Jewish Community of Vienna.
Vienna Jewish Community President Oskar Deutsch:
"The European Jewish Parliament was of great help, in principle they gave so much money so that this could take place here in Vienna, and I would like them to sponsor some other Jewish cultural events here in Austria."
For the first time ever, Jewish choirs from Rome to St Petersburg, Paris to Amsterdam, Berlin to Belgrade have been rehearsing together to share a wealth of Jewish singing heritage.
In addition to workshops on anything from Yemenite songs to Yiddish pronunciation, participants have also been able to spend time getting to know each other at Klezmer jam sessions, Shabbat prayer meetings and by touring Jewish Vienna.
- What was your favourite song tonight?
Boys:
"Bei mir bist du schön maybe! The second one."
Elena Rabinovich, "EVA", St Petersburg:
"The whole festival went like this: it was noisy, great fun, it all went really well – and today’s concert was a true culmination of everything that happened here over the last 5 days."
The songs being sung tonight exemplify a wide range of Jewish musical tradition – from klezmer, to Ladino and Hebrew songs, hits of Yiddish theatre and film, as well as resistance and Hannukah songs.
Aleksandra Somish, "Varnitshkes", Ukraine:
"It’s not just a nice time, it’s an incredible time, it’s a time which we’ll never never forget, I promise!"
Some four hundred and four people have travelled here to sing at the concert, which is being enjoyed by an audience of one and a half thousand music-lovers – all building towards a dramatic finale including classics like Adon Olam.
Chief Cantor Shmuel Barzilai told me about one of the songs being sung by the children’s choir of Vienna’s main synagogue.
Vienna Oberkantor Shmuel Barzilai:
"It’s called Kadeschenu, it’s written by a friend of mine, Cantor Sol Zim from New York, and it’s yam-bam-bam-bam-bam, yam-bam-bam-bam-bam. He’s a very popular composer."
Choirmaster and MEJP Roman Grinberg:
" This event is maybe the base of something new, something that could be bigger and bigger from year to year, that could grow. We are not victims any more, we are proud, we sing, we meet together, we celebrate, we have our music and we have our culture. And our culture is present in Vienna and across all of Europe."
Roman Grinberg is well known for his new arrangements of traditional songs, transposing them so to speak into the 21 st Century, in order to continually develop the Jewish song repertoire.
Choirmaster and MEJP Roman Grinberg:
"It took a long time because such a project costs a lot of money, finally I found somebody who really supported us very generously, and it was the European Jewish Union, the European Jewish Parliament, who supported us doing this important job that we did."
Thanks to the Vienna Jewish Choir and the European Jewish Parliament, the four hundred participants in this year’s festival have had more than just a chance to show off their talent – they’ve made friends and strengthened links across the international Jewish community.
And this is a community which clearly loves to bring the joys of Yiddish song to audiences around the world.
So long may the singing continue!
Patrick Evans, JN 1 , European Jewish Choir Festival , Vienna
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Hundreds demonstrate against Malmo anti-Semitism
Several hundred Jews and people of other faiths and none have marched in the southern Swedish city of Malmo to bring attention to intolerance and anti-Semitic attacks in the Nordic country . The city has a large immigrant Muslim community and attacks on Jews have spiked in recent years.
Niklar Orrenius, local journalist:
"Malmo is an immigrant city which is a safe haven for refugees from all over the world, but the first refugee group that came here was Jews fleeing persecution from Russia, Poland and the Holocaust. But now what's happening now the last year is you see that Jews are moving out of Malmo because some of them don't feel safe."
In recent years Sweden's government has come under criticism for failing to provide adequate protection to the country's small Jewish community and address the issue of anti-Semitism even after an explosion rocked a building in a Jewish community in Malmo last year .
Niklar Orrenius, local journalist:
"For many years the authorities, especially here in the city of Malmo, it seemed like they turned a blind eye to this persecution really, or this harassment of Jews in the city, but last year they have, the government in Sweden have granted money to, for security, for Jewish security, so they have changed the windows in the synagogue to more safe windows and things like that, but obviously that's not the real solution to the problem of anti-Semitism, it's more like...a bandaid, really."
In 2010 a group of Jews were attacked during a peaceful demonstration in support of Israel and in August several hundred Jews and non-Jews marched in Stockholm in solidarity with Malmo's persecuted Jewish community. Malmo’s mayor, Ilmar Reepalu, said that a group of Jews who were attacked during the peaceful demonstration had brought the violence upon themselves for not distancing themselves from Israel and its actions during the month-long Gaza War in 2008-09 . One demonstrator spoke of how he was harassed while working as teacher.
Henryk Grynfeld, former teacher:
“At the time I was working as a teacher at a school in Rosengard, where the majority of my students are from the Middle East and there I was the target of harassment from the students which was only because I was Jewish.”
A local Jewish community leader attempted to put the problem into perspective for the country’s 20,000 Jews.
Willy Silberstein, Swedish Committee Against Anti-Semitism:
"I think that it is a small minority that harasses Jews in Malmo, the big majority is here with us, but still the enemies are strong enough to be a big problem, that's why I'm here."
Anti-Semitism in Malmo first drew international attention in 2009, when riots broke out due to the presence of Israeli professional tennis players in the city.
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Kremlin sends task force to operate off Syria
Russia is sending warships to patrol waters near its naval base in Tartous, Syria, in one of its biggest naval deployments in years.
According to Russian media, an anti-submarine ship, a frigate, and rescue tugs have entered the Eastern Mediterranean via the Suez Canal; marking the first time in decades elements of Russia’s Pacific Fleet have operated in the region.
Reportedly, a destroyer, amphibious warfare ships, and a tanker drawn from Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, and elsewhere, are scheduled to join the task force in coming days and weeks. Russian officials said the deployment was part of regularly-scheduled training, and also part of an ongoing effort to make sure Moscow’s forces can evacuate civilians from Syria, if necessary.
But some in western capitals have seen the deployment as part of a wider campaign of Kremlin military muscle-flexing in Syria. Russia recently ignored Israeli plea to cancel planned deliveries of new anti-aircraft missiles to the Syrian regime.
Now, according to a report in the New York Times newspaper, Russia has dispatched advanced Yakhont missiles to the Syrian government. The weapons, once operational, would deeply complicate an international intervention in the Syria. One analyst called the missile a "ship-killer".
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov earlier this week met with US Secretary of State John Kerry on Syria, and agreed their countries would for the first time jointly host Syrian peace talks, in June.
Kerry and the US leadership have struggled to find a side to back in Syria, with its officials saying Assad should go, but at the same time criticising the Syrian rebels for radicalism and links to al-Qaeda.
Washington recently declared the leader of the strongest Syrian rebel group, the Al-Nusra front, a terrorist. At the same time it blacklisted four Syrian government ministers for alleged complicity in the country’s violence, including ordering air strikes on civilians.