Conference of European Rabbis

Members of the Belgian Jewish community seen walking on the streets in the Jewish quarter in Antwerp, Belgium, August 7, 2014. (Johanna Geron/FLASH90)

December 31, 2018, 1:22 pm

Kosher slaughter ends in northern Belgium, threatening supplies to Europe

Following ruling last year, animals must be stunned before they are killed, a measure that precludes traditional Jewish butchering method

By Agencies

Rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt, seen writing a new Torah scroll at an event attended by Israeli and European rabbis, marking the Hebrew date of 69 years since the liberation of Jews in Europe, in the Western Wall tunnels, in Jerusalem's Old City, May 21, 2014. (Flash90)

December 4, 2018, 3:25 am

Top European rabbi sounds alarm on rise of far right

‘We’re going back to 1914,’ says Pinchas Goldschmidt; laments EU’s instability and that the US ‘replaced the State Department with Twitter’

By Raphael Ahren

Illustrative: A mikveh immersion for the purpose of conversion to Judaism (Mayyim Hayyim/Tom Kates via JTA)

November 26, 2018, 10:06 pm

European rabbis to no longer recognize private Israeli conversions

In deal with Chief Rabbinate, Conference of European Rabbis’ conversions will be recognized by Israel’s state-run religious authorities; Israeli group appeals to block agreement

By Marissa Newman

November 24, 2018, 1:48 am

Top European rabbi urges Israel to end engagement with far-right parties

Pinchas Goldschmidt tells MKs that cozying up to populist groups, if even they espouse pro-Israel views, endangers local Jewish communities

By TOI staff

Illustrative: A Jewish couple stand underneath the 'chuppah' during their wedding in a synagogue in Paris, France, July 21, 2013. (Serge Attal/Flash90/via JTA)

March 16, 2018, 1:25 pm

New Israeli bill would punish Jewish foreigners with ‘chained’ wives

Move comes at behest of European rabbis looking to punish husbands who refuse to grant divorces; ‘Today among Jews in Europe, everyone has relatives in Israel’

By JTA

A vendor sets up his stall on the first day of the 30th Annual Meeting of France's Muslims, in Le Bourget, Paris, April 2013. (AP/Remy de la Mauviniere)

March 14, 2017, 6:03 pm

European rabbis pan ruling to prohibit religious garb in firms

Jewish leaders say ‘Europe is sending a clear message; its faith communities are no longer welcome’

By JTA

Schoolchildren and others brought to watch the burning of synagogue furnishings on Kristallnacht in Mosbach, Germany, November 1938 (courtesy)

March 14, 2017, 3:02 pm

German judges sanction Jew hatred

Op-ed: A recent court ruling on a synagogue attack has fanned the flames of anti-Semitism in Europe

By Abraham Cooper and Yitzchok Adlerstein

A Bahraini man scrubs the site of a Hanukkah party hosted by the nation's king (screen capture: MEMRI)

January 10, 2017, 10:26 am

Bahraini youths ‘clean’ site of king’s menorah-lighting party

Group calling itself ‘Bahrainis against normalization’ vows to ‘wipe this stain on the shining history of our lands’

By TOI staff

Jews and sheikhs celebrate Hanukkah in Bahrain, December 24, 2016 (Screen capture: YouTube)

December 26, 2016, 4:51 pm

Hamas slams Bahrain for hosting menorah-lighting ceremony

Islamist terror group castigates Muslim monarchy for celebrating with ‘extreme racist Zionists,’ says viral video of event was ‘humiliating and disgraceful spectacle’

By TOI staff

December 25, 2016, 10:12 pm

King of Bahrain hosts menorah-lighting ceremony

Video of rabbis and kaffiyeh-clad Muslims dancing to Hasidic songs in Arab monarchy goes viral

By TOI staff

King Felipe VI of Spain (R) shakes hands with CER President Rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt at the Royal Palace El Pardo near Madrid, Spain on December 13, 2016. (World Jewish Congress)

December 13, 2016, 10:35 pm

Rabbis honor Spanish king for efforts to restore Jewish life

King Felipe VI awarded 2016 Lord Jakobovits Prize for European Jewry for ‘extraordinary’ efforts to rectify past wrongs

By TOI staff

Marine Le Pen, head of France’s far-right party, attending a rally in Paris, May 1, 2011. (Franck Prevel/Getty Images)

November 21, 2016, 11:40 pm

Is Europe’s far right experiencing a ‘Trump effect’?

Mainstream media, having got Trump and Brexit wrong, wary when assessing impact for would-be populist presidents Le Pen, Wilders and Hofer

By Cnaan Liphshiz

In this Wednesday, Oct. 5, 2016 photo, author Thomas Harding shows passports of his grandparents in London. Harding is doing what other descendants of Holocaust victims would find unimaginable: applying for a German passport. (AP Photo/Frank Augstein)

October 17, 2016, 12:58 pm

For Jews in post-Brexit Britain, German citizenship is no longer verboten

Descendants of those who fled Hitler are rethinking long-held beliefs about a country that once sought to destroy their families

By DANICA KIRKA

Rabbi Moshe Levin lights Hanukkah candles in Bahrain with French Imam Hassan Chalghoumi, on December 8 2015. (Screen capture YouTube)

December 9, 2015, 5:40 pm

Bahrain’s king holds Hanukkah candle-lighting

French Rabbi Moshe Levin says King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa ‘truly loves’ the Jewish people; Bahrain Jewish population numbers about 50

By JTA

November 12, 2015, 6:27 am

European rabbis condemn Brussels’ labeling of settlement goods

Umbrella group’s president says move by EU to brand products from over the Green Line is case of ‘new anti-Semitism in Europe’

By TOI staff