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May 4, 2016 at 11:36 pm
Washington - The reaction of congressional Republicans to Donald Trump’s ascension ranged from subdued to silent on Wednesday, a day after the billionaire TV personality was all but anointed as the party’s presidential nominee.
A day after a decisive Indiana primary victory left Trump the sole GOP presidential contender standing, aides to House Speaker Paul Ryan, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and other top Republicans did not immediately return phone and email messages seeking comment.
Other Republicans offered less than full-throated promises to help him win the White House.
“I plan to put all of my support behind the Republican nominee and do whatever is asked of me to ensure a Republican is elected president,” said Rep. Michael Burgess, R-Texa...
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May 4, 2016 at 11:33 pm
New York - Aeropostale, once the vibrant epicenter of the U.S. mall scene, is seeking Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection and closing 20 percent of its stores in North America.
The New York company said Wednesday that it is closing 113 of its 739 U.S. stores and all 41 locations in Canada. Going-out-of-business sales at those U.S. stores will begin this weekend.
Aeropostale expects to emerge from bankruptcy protection within six months as a smaller company after renegotiating contracts and resolving an ongoing dispute with the investment firm Sycamore Partners, a major shareholder that pushed through changes in company leadership.
In the filing, CEO Julian Geiger lashed out at Sycamore, which he accused of hampering the company’s turnaround plans.
“The ripple effects of...
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May 4, 2016 at 10:13 pm
Jerusalem, Israel - May 4, 2016 – The official Opening Ceremony for Holocaust Martyrs’ and Heroes’ Remembrance Day 5776 took place on Wednesday, May 4, 2016, in Warsaw Ghetto Square, Yad Vashem, Mount of Remembrance, Jerusalem, Israel.
"Everything is Forbidden to Us, and Yet We do Everything":The Struggle to Maintain the Human Spirit during the Holocaust was the central theme for this year's commemoration.
Israeli President Reuven Rivlin and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu both delivered remarks. Rabbi Israel Meir Lau, Chairman of the Yad Vashem Council, lit the Memorial Torch. Zahava Roth spoke on behalf of the survivors.
During the ceremony, Holocaust survivors lit six torch...
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May 4, 2016 at 10:13 pm
Baltimore, MD - May. 4, 2016 26 Nissan 5776 - Daily Dvar Halacha - Coffee With Milk And Sugar Before Davening?
Brussels - NATO said on Wednesday it had agreed to non-member Israel setting up representation at its Brussels headquarters, a tentative sign of rapprochement between the Jewish state and NATO member Turkey.
Israel and Turkey have stepped up efforts to patch up a relationship badly damaged following an Israeli raid in 2010 on a Turkish boat, the Mavi Marmara, which had been trying to breach a blockade on the Gaza Strip.
NATO said in a statement that Israel’s ambassador to the European Union, David Walzer, would now also head its mission at alliance headquarters.
The foreign ministry of Israel, which is not a NATO member but has partner status as a participant in the alliance’s Mediterranean Dialogue programs together with six other non-NATO countries in the region, ...
Washington - A federal judge said Wednesday he may order Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Clinton to testify under oath about whether she used a private email server as secretary of state to evade public records disclosures.
U.S. District Court Judge Emmet G. Sullivan signed an order granting a request from the conservative legal advocacy group Judicial Watch to question six current and former State Department staffers about the creation and purpose of the private email system. Those on the list were some of Clinton’s closest aides during her tenure as the nation’s top diplomat, including former chief of staff Cheryl D. Mills, deputy chief of staff Huma Abedin and undersecretary Patrick F. Kennedy.
Also set to testify is Bryan Pagliano, the agency employe...
Jerusalem - Israel’s Yad Vashem Holocaust museum has kicked off its annual remembrance ceremonies with a special screening of the Oscar-winning film “Son of Saul,” acknowledging the unique role movies play in maintaining the memory of the Holocaust.
The Hungarian film, which tells the story of a Jewish Nazi death camp inmate who obsessively seeks a proper burial for a boy he believes to be his son, also mirrors Yad Vashem’s central theme this year — the struggle to maintain the human spirit amid inhumanity.
Israel will come to a standstill on Thursday as sirens wail for two minutes. In the annual ritual, pedestrians typically stop in their tracks, while cars and busses pull over and people step out to stand and bow their heads. Solemn events are hel...
Flint, MI - Showing support for the beleaguered residents of Flint, Michigan, President Barack Obama drank filtered city water on Wednesday to show that it is again safe following a lead-contamination crisis.
After officials briefed Obama on the federal government’s response to the contamination, a reporter asked if he would drink the water in a glass on the table. The president said he usually avoids publicity stunts. But he took a drink, saying he wanted to show the water must be safe if he’s drinking it.
“This used a filter,” Obama said of the water. “The water around this table was Flint water and it just confirms what we know scientifically, which is, if you’re using a filter, if you’re installing it, then Flint water at this point ...
Washington - With airlines worried that long security lines may discourage summer travelers, the U.S. government said on Wednesday it will add airport staff and bomb-sniffing dogs and ramp up pre-screening enrollment efforts.
The U.S. Transportation Security Administration (TSA) will add officers at airports expected to have the highest passenger volumes, said Jeh Johnson, secretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, in a statement on Wednesday.
He added that he has asked Congress to approve additional funds to pay for officers’ overtime and to meet “critical short-term needs.”
Security officials are on high alert for potential attacks by groups inspired by Islamic State. On March 22, suicide bombers killed 32 people in Brussels airport and a rush-ho...
Jerusalem - Israel is marking its annual Holocaust remembrance day, in memory of the 6 million Jews killed by Nazi Germany and its collaborators.
Ceremonies are held around the country on the solemn day, which is marked from Wednesday evening. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is attending the main ceremony at Jerusalem’s Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial.
On Thursday, Israelis will come to a mournful, two-minute standstill to remember the dead. A siren will sound, pedestrians will stop in their tracks and motorists will pull over on highways and roads. The names of those killed will be read out in parliament.
This year’s memorial day comes as a report by Tel Aviv University found a drop in violent attacks against Jews last year, but said the number remains hig...
Baltimore, MD - May 1, 2016 - It was a beautiful, albeit windy, morning at Pimlico Race Course as Baltimore's Jewish community members joined together to burn their chometz in preparation for the first Pesach Seder. This year marks the fourth annual Chometz Burning and Food Drive, sponsored by Baltimore City Council President Jack Young’s office, in partnership with Comprehensive Housing Assistance, Inc. (CHAI) and Park Heights Renaissance (PHR). The Chesed Fund worked with Jack Young’s office to coordinate the city agencies that were instrumental in helping to make this day possible.
The event was held at the Pimlico Race Course Clubhouse Parking Lot, from 6:30 – 11:30 a.m. and over 5,000 Jews from all denominations were on hand to participate. Park Hei...
Baltimore, MD – May 4, 2016 - It is with deep regret that BaltimoreJewishLife.com informs the community of the petirah in Lakewood of Mrs. Sheila Brisk, a'h, wife of Reb Shia Brisk, (formerly of Baltimore, MD) mother of Rochel Lea Tepfer, Tamara Schwed, Naomi Ellenbogen, Tova Hershkowitz
The Levaya will be taking place at 6:30 PM at the Country Place Shul, 124 Azalea Court. The Kevurah will take place in Lakewood.
Shiva at the home of the Brisks 75 Privet Way, Lakewood, NJ 08701
Bila HaMaves LaNetzach...
Belgium - An Orthodox Jewish toddler died this morning in a freak elevator accident in Antwerp.
According to reports the two and a half year old boy Chezky Gross, a member of a prominent family of Belzer chasidim in the city’s Jewish community fell when he entered the old-style elevator and his head somehow got caught in the doors when the elevator began to move.
The two year old boy was with his father and another child at the time of the accident, which took place in an apartment building on the Charlottei in the city’s diamond district, according to the Belgian news site Het Nieuwsblad.
Hatzolah was called to the scene to extricate the toddler but were unable to save the child, who was pronounced dead at the scene. Police sealed off the entire building...
Washington - Ohio Gov. John Kasich is leaving the Republican presidential contest, giving Donald Trump a clear path to his party’s nomination.
Kasich will announce the end of his underdog White House bid on Wednesday, according to three campaign officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the candidate’s plans. The decision comes a day after Trump’s only other rival, Ted Cruz, dropped out.
With no opponents left in the race, Trump becomes the Republican Party’s presumptive presidential nominee to take on the Democratic nominee in November — presumably Hillary Clinton.
Though armed with an extensive resume in politics, the second-term Ohio governor struggled to connect with Republican primary voters ...
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May 4, 2016 at 12:55 pm
Jerusalem - A Tel Aviv University report has found a drop in violent attacks against Jews last year, but said the number remains high and that “institutional anti-Semitism” is on the rise.
The university’s Kantor Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry says it tracked 410 violent cases of anti-Semitism across the globe last year, down nearly 50 percent from 2014.
The study was prepared with the European Jewish Congress.
Moshe Kantor, president of the group, says the results were not all encouraging. He says that 2014 was the worst year on record. He believes attacks went down because of heightened security following a deadly attack at a kosher market in Paris in January 2015.
Kantor also said that nonviolent attacks and slander against Jews in Europ...
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May 4, 2016 at 12:19 pm
London - It’s a rock for the ages.
A 3-billion-year-old diamond the size of a tennis ball — the largest discovered in over a century — could sell for more than $70 million, auctioneer Sotheby’s said Wednesday.
The auction house plans to offer the Lesedi la Rona diamond in London on June 29.
The diamond was unearthed in November in Botswana at a mine owned by Canada’s Lucara Diamond Corporation. It measured 1,109 carats, the second-largest gem-quality rough diamond ever discovered. Its name means “our light” in the Tswana language of southern Africa.
The auctioneer said the rough gemstone “of exceptional transparency” could yield the largest top-quality diamond ever cut and polished.
David Bennett, chairman of Sotheby’s ...
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May 4, 2016 at 12:12 pm
Washington - One of Ted Cruz’s staunchest financial backers is signaling support for Donald Trump now that he is the presumptive Republican nominee.
Mica Mosbacher writes in an email to The Associated Press that she is calling “on fellow conservatives to unite and support our new nominee Trump.”
Mosbacher was a key part of Cruz’s finance team. She is the widow of Bob Mosbacher, a Houston oilman who served as President George H.W. Bush’s Secretary of Commerce.
She says she supported her senator, Cruz, because she saw him as giving voice to the American people. Trump, she says, “also listened to the people.”
Cruz abruptly quit the race after Trump won a resounding victory over him in Indiana Tuesday night.
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May 4, 2016 at 12:11 pm
(CNN)John Kasich is dropping out of the Republican presidential race, two sources familiar with the plan confirmed to CNN.
Kasich's decision came after he improbably became the last challenger to Donald Trump, who emerged as the presumptive GOP nominee Tuesday night when Ted Cruz dropped out.
Even before winning his home state of Ohio in March, Kasich was facing pressure to get out of the race, with no clear path to victory. His campaign never became more than a spoiler run, designed to keep Trump from getting the 1,237 delegates needed to win the nomination before a contested convention.
Kasich was a somewhat offbeat Republican contender, who laughed at himself on the trail, occasionally took positions more in line with Democrats (like expanding Medicaid in Ohio) a...
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May 4, 2016 at 11:44 am
Helsinki - Social media giant Facebook has paid a $10,000 reward to a 10-year-old Finnish boy for finding a glitch in its picture sharing app Instagram.
Jani, whose last name was not released for privacy reasons, is the youngest ever recipient of Facebook’s “bug bounty”, paid to users who find bugs or weaknesses in its platforms.
“I wanted to see if Instagram’s comment field could stand malicious code. Turns out it couldn’t,” Jani told Finland’s Iltalehti newspaper.
Facebook said the glitch was fixed in February and the reward was paid in March.
Jani, who is still too young to have a Facebook or Instagram account of his own, said he learned coding from Youtube videos and found a way to delete user comments from Instagram accounts.
&...
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May 4, 2016 at 11:42 am
Beijing - Apple Inc. has lost a legal fight with a Chinese company that a Beijing court says is allowed to use the iPhone name on wallets and handbags.
The court said Apple failed to prove iPhone was a “famous brand” in China before the local company applied for a trademark in 2007, an official legal newspaper reported. Such status under Chinese law might limit its use on other products.
The ruling in late April allows Xintong Tiandi Technology to keep using the iPhone name, according to the Legal Daily, which is published by the ruling Communist Party’s legal affairs committee. The company registered the name for use on handbags, mobile phone cases and other leather goods.
Phone calls to the Beijing Higher Level People’s Court were not answered.
China ...
