A dozen Jewish organizations sent a letter to US Secretary of State John Kerry expressing their concern over the rise of anti-Semitism in Hungary. The May 14 letter commended Kerry for his offices’ recent human rights report that detailed the rise of the xenophobic and anti-Semitic Jobbik party and encouraged Kerry “to keep the issue of intolerance and discrimination squarely on the US-Hungarian bilateral agenda.” The Jobbik party has called for the creation of a list of Jewish public officials …More

US Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice, honored last week with the Distinguished Public Service Award of the American Jewish Committee (AJC), praised her former Israeli counterpart, Israeli Ambassador to the UN Gabriela Shalev. “Gabby was a great friend and partner and colleague,” Rice told JNS.org. “I miss her. We had a wonderful working relationship.” Shalev served in the UN ambassador from 2008-10. The current Israeli ambassador to the UN—whose resolutions on the …More

A preeminent journalism museum seems to have reversed its controversial decision to honor two Hamas reporters. DC’s Newseum announced last week that it would add Hussam Salama and Mahmoud Al-Kumi to its memorial wall of journalists slain in the line of duty. Salama and Al-Kumi died in Gaza last November during Operation Pillar of Defense. Both men were members of Al-Aqsa, Hamas’s media arm and a US-designated terrorist group unto itself. The decision was criticized almost immediately, particularly …More

Tzipi Livni joined a score of leaders at Mauthausen Sunday, commemorating the 68th anniversary of the death camp’s liberation. "We who weren't there cannot and may not forget. The numbers engraved on the arms in Auschwitz are engraved on each of our souls," the Israeli justice minister said. "I came today as justice minister of the Jewish state to say together with you ‘never again.’” Livni added: "It is not for us that we do not want the world to forget, it is for the future of …More

Greece’s neo-Nazi political party, the Golden Dawn, posted an article on its website condemning Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras for a planned visit to Washington, DC, next month, during which he will address the American Jewish Committee’s (AJC) Global Forum. Golden Dawn, which currently holds 18 seats in Greece’s national parliament, maintains that “Zionists” control American and Greek politics. A cartoon accompanied the article, showing Prime Minister Samaras under a bloody …More

Jewish leaders are already expressing concern over Guatemala’s decision to officially recognize Palestine as a nation state. A Guatemala statement on the decision claims the move was made to “gain new momentum” in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. "The decision in no way alters Guatemala's long tradition of friendship and cooperation with the State of Israel, a relationship the Guatemalan government highly values," the statement said. Several other Latin American nations have made the …More

The Teachers' Union of Ireland adopted a resolution backing an academic and cultural boycott of Israel. Israel was characterized as an “apartheid state” in the motion passed unanimously on April 4 during the union’s annual congress. The union represents more than 14,000 teachers and lecturers. The measure called for members "to cease all cultural and academic collaboration with Israel, including the exchange of scientists, students and academic personalities, as well as all cooperation in …More

Today marks the 110-year anniversary of the Kishinev pogrom, an anti-Jewish riot in today’s Republic of Moldova that left approximately 49 Jewish citizens dead, over 500 wounded and 2,000 families homeless. The riot was triggered when a popular anti-Semitic newspaper in Russia reported the death of a small Christian boy and suicide of a young girl as caused by the hands of Jews. It was believed that the murders were committed in the name of blood libel, an archaic belief that the blood of children was …More

The American Jewish Committee (AJC) Berlin Office recently expressed frustration that the German government rejected a draft resolution that would have backdated Holocaust pensions to 1997. In 2002, the parliament unanimously approved giving ghetto survivors their payments but 90 percent of applications received were denied by the German social security system. When the pension criterion was revised in 2009, half of the 50,000 applicants were approved but back payments were only awarded for the previous four …More

Foreign aid to Palestine must not be used to promote terrorism, AJC urged the European Union. The Jewish advocacy group called on the EU to investigate how funding to the Palestinian Authority is used, to ensure terrorist activity is not rewarded. The warning came after a Norwegian broadcaster reported the PA uses foreign aid to financially reward terrorists jailed in Israeli prisons. “These shocking revelations suggest that the more violent and deadly the crime, the more money the perpetrator …More

On page 15 of the most recent edition of the Kansas Independent Oil and Gas Association's newsletter, beneath griping about perceived threats to the industry posed by President Obama’s tax and energy policies, was a nugget of positive news: A new coalition had formed between the Domestic Energy Producers Alliance, a national umbrella group, and the American Jewish community. “We have been able to agree that there is common interest between our two groups regarding efforts to increase domestic oil and …More

Alina Dain Sharon, JNS.org Last October, the hashtag #unbonjuif (#agoodjew) was trending as the third-most tweeted subject in France. Users jumped on the chance to tweet phrases like “a good Jew is a dead Jew,” ultimately forcing the French Jewish students’ union (UEJF) to file a lawsuit against Twitter for allowing that content to appear. When a French court decided this January that Twitter must reveal the identities of users who sent out those anti-Semitic tweets, a cross-continental debate …More