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February 20, 2019 at 10:26 am
London - An eighth lawmaker has quit Britain’s Labour Party over its handling of anti-Semitism and Brexit, boosting a new breakaway group from the U.K.‘s main opposition party.
Joan Ryan announced late Tuesday that after four decades in the party she was leaving Labour to sit with the newly formed Independent Group in Parliament.
Ryan said the party had become “infected with the scourge of anti-Jewish racism” under left-wing Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, a longtime supporter of the Palestinians.
Seven Labour legislators quit Monday, accusing Corbyn of failing to stamp out anti-Semitism in the party and of mounting a weak opposition to Conservative Prime Minister Theresa May’s plans for leaving the European Union.
The breakaway lawmakers hope to gain members...
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February 20, 2019 at 10:25 am
Miami - Former U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon says he’s impressed with Miami’s efforts to cope with rising sea levels— and he wishes President Donald Trump were paying attention, too.
Ban visited Miami on Tuesday with the Global Commission on Adaptation, which encourages the development of measures to manage the effects of climate change through technology, planning and investment. He leads the group with Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and World Bank CEO Kristalina Georgieva.
Ban toured two city pump stations and viewed seawall projects from a boat with Mayor Francis Suarez.
He said he was “deeply concerned” about Trump’s rollback of environmental protections and his dismissal of climate science.
But Ban said he’s encouraged by the c...
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February 20, 2019 at 10:25 am
Washington - The tension between supporters of Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton resurfaced on Tuesday after the Vermont senator announced his second run for the White House.
Longtime Clinton aide Philippe Reines tweeted that the media had given Sanders a “WELCOME BACK!” reception despite his 2016 primary loss while telling Clinton to “go away.”
Jess McIntosh, a communications adviser to Clinton’s 2016 campaign, focused on Sanders’ contention on Vermont Public Radio that “we have got to look at candidates, you know, not by the color of their skin, not by their sexual orientation or their gender and not by their age.”
McIntosh shot back on Twitter: “If Bernie is going to start this contest telling us he’s at a disadvantage as a...
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February 20, 2019 at 10:25 am
Gettysburg, PA - A Pennsylvania college trustee apologized and announced his resignation Tuesday after a student found a 1980 yearbook photo in which the trustee wore a Nazi uniform costume.
Gettysburg College President Janet Morgan Riggs said in an email to the college community that Bob Garthwait decided to step down from the board of trustees.
Garthwait is a financial donor to the college and helped found the Garthwait Leadership Center on campus.
A student brought the photo to the attention of a faculty member last week, and the administration was contacted.
The student newspaper, the Gettysburgian, published an image of the photo , which depicts Garthwait in a military uniform costume with a swastika armband and four other people, including at least one other who also appears to b...
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February 20, 2019 at 10:20 am
Paris - A French TV channel said on Wednesday it had been forced to cut short a live Facebook broadcast from a desecrated Jewish cemetery in eastern France because of an onslaught of anti-Semitic commentary.
France 3 said it went live from the cemetery in the village of Quatzenheim on Tuesday as President Emmanuel Macron was visiting to pay his respects after more than 90 graves were vandalized with swastikas and anti-Semitic abuse.
But as it broadcast footage online to its more than 1.3 million Facebook followers, the feed was inundated with anti-Semitic commentary and abuse.
“We are talking about explicit death threats, comments that were openly anti-Semitic and racist, including “Heil Hitler”, “dirty Jew” or “dirty Jews”, comments that ...
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February 20, 2019 at 10:20 am
World-famous and beloved Israeli peanut snack Bamba is set to hit the shelves of US retail giant Walmart this month, Osem CEO Avi Ben-Assayag announced Tuesday as he opened the company’s enormous new factory in Kiryat Gat.“Our dream is to see Bamba in every supermarket in the US and Europe,” said Ben-Assayag
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February 20, 2019 at 10:17 am
Paris - Paris officials say that an individual has been arrested for a torrent of hate speech directed at Jewish philosopher Alain Finkielkraut during a Saturday march by yellow vest protesters.
The Paris prosecutor’s office said Wednesday that the person was taken into custody Tuesday evening after a police inquiry was opened into a suspected public insult based on origin, ethnicity, nation, race or religion.
On Tuesday, thousands attended rallies across France to decry an uptick in anti-Semitic acts in recent months, including an attack on a cemetery where about 80 gravestones were spray-painted with swastikas. French President Emmanuel Macron observed a moment of silence with parliament leaders at the Holocaust museum in Paris.
France is home to the world’s largest Jewish...
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February 20, 2019 at 10:17 am
Moscow - Russian President Vladimir Putin sternly warned the United States against deploying new missiles in Europe, saying Wednesday that Russia will retaliate by fielding new weapons that will take just as little time to reach their targets.
While the Russian leader didn’t say what specific new weapons Moscow could deploy, his statement further raised the ante in tense relations with Washington.
Speaking in his state-of-the-nation address, Putin charged that the U.S. has abandoned a key arms control pact to free up its hands to build new missiles and tried to shift the blame for the move to Russia.
“Our American partners should have honestly said it instead of making unfounded accusations against Russia to justify their withdrawal from the treaty,” Putin said.
The U...
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February 20, 2019 at 10:16 am
New York - New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio says he was happy to be a “citizen patrol” when he directed his police detail to pull over a texting driver.
The Democratic mayor says the traffic stop occurred Saturday while he was heading to a legislative event in Albany.
The New York Post reports de Blasio saw a driver texting in the car next to his on the FDR Drive in Manhattan.
De Blasio said on Tuesday that the woman needed an “on-the-spot education” about the dangers. The lesson included a ticket.
It is illegal for New York drivers to use mobile devices. Fines can range from $50 for a first offense to $400 for more than three violations.
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February 20, 2019 at 10:16 am
Jerusalem - An Israeli government official says a planned meeting in Moscow between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Russian President Vladimir Putin has been postponed.
The official, speaking on condition of anonymity Wednesday because of the sensitivity of the matter, says the meeting was delayed in mutual agreement. The two will have a telephone call Thursday and schedule a new meeting soon.
Netanyahu and Putin have been recently holding regular consultations to coordinate operations in war-torn Syria. The meeting was to be the first since a Russian plane was shot down in Syria by anti-aircraft fire.
Israeli media report the delay is due to Netanyahu’s domestic political concerns, saying he wants to oversee mergers in his nationalistic camp before a Thursday night deadline...
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February 19, 2019 at 8:58 pm
Hatzolah was called down to a wedding hall in Bnei Brak after a report was received about a civilian suffering from a cut in his leg.
The paramedics rushed to the hall and discovered that it was a chosson who had been wounded while breaking the glass under the chuppah. The chosson was taken to the hospital for a brief visit but was able to return to his wedding shortly after receiving stitches.
The hall manager told reporters that in an effort to stop such injuries, the hall is careful to use fragile glass that breaks quickly and easily, which prevents the shards from spreading too far upon cracking.
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February 19, 2019 at 8:50 pm
PM following Gantz remarks: 'I was wounded in battle with terrorists, almost lost my life in Suez Canal firefight for national security.'
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu responded to Benny Gantz's arguments in his speech this evening and mentioned his past as a combat soldier in the Sayeret Matkal commando unit.
"As a soldier and as an officer in the Sayeret Matkal commando unit, I risked my life time after time for the sake of the State," Netanyahu wrote in a Facebook post.
"I was wounded in battle with terrorists," Netanyahu said. "I almost lost my life in a firefight in the Suez Canal for the security of the country that you want to risk with unilateral withdrawals and support for the dangerous nuclear agreement with Iran. The citizens of Israel will choose between...
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February 19, 2019 at 8:44 pm
Rep. Ilhan Omar invites leaders of left-wing Jewish groups to conference call in order to apologize for her anti-Semitic tweets.
Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) plans to apologize for her anti-Semitic tweets, but has only invited leaders of left-wing Jewish groups to the conference call in which she will issue the apology, Haaretz reported on Tuesday.
According to the report, Omar’s office sent invitations to multiple Jewish groups, both in Washington and in New York, to the off-the-record phone call.
Omar’s office, said Haaretz, invited representatives mostly from Jewish groups that oppose Israeli communities in Judea and Samaria and are generally affiliated with progressive, left-wing politics, to participate in the conference call.
The invitation stated that the ...
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February 19, 2019 at 8:42 pm
Former acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe said Tuesday that officials briefed a bipartisan group of lawmakers after the bureau opened an investigation into President Donald Trump in May 2017, and that no one in the room pushed back.
“That’s the important part here, Savannah,” McCabe said in an interview with Savannah Guthrie on NBC’s “Today” show. “No one objected. Not on legal grounds, not on constitutional grounds and not based on the facts.”
The comments seemed designed to rebut criticism that McCabe has faced from Trump and other Republicans for initiating the investigation into Trump and participating in conversations about other, more dramatic steps against the president. McCabe told CBS’ “60 Minutes” over the weekend...
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February 19, 2019 at 8:37 pm
BALTIMORE —
Gov. Larry Hogan's approval among Marylanders remains strong in the second part of the latest Goucher Poll, released Tuesday morning.
The poll asked Maryland residents about their opinions toward Hogan, the state of Maryland and their trust in President Donald Trump and Congress.
Governor Hogan
The support the governor enjoys from Marylanders has not changed since the last Goucher Poll with 69 percent of those surveyed approving of the job he is doing. Only 14 percent of those polled disapprove and another 14 percent said they don't know.
Broken down by party, Hogan's approval rating is 89 percent among Republicans, 71 percent among Independents and 65 percent among Democrats.
The latest Goucher Poll also asked about how Marylanders felt about a numbe...
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February 19, 2019 at 8:29 pm
ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP) — The U.S. Supreme Court has denied a Maryland appeal to uphold the state's law against pharmaceutical price gouging.
The high court on Tuesday denied Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh's appeal without comment, letting a lower court ruling against the law stand.
The law approved in 2017 enabled the state's attorney general to sue makers of off-patent or generic drugs for price increases that state officials considered "unconscionable." That was defined as an excessive increase, unjustified by the cost of producing or distributing the drugs.
The Richmond-based 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 2-1 last year that the law was unconstitutional, because it forces manufactures and wholesalers to act in accordance with Maryland law outside of ...
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February 19, 2019 at 8:27 pm
Baltimore County Executive John Olszewski Jr.'s transition team released its final report, with more than 200 recommendations to streamline county government.
“We have a lot of work to do to address our fiscal challenges while also advancing our shared priorities to move Baltimore County forward, and I’m grateful to our entire transition team for helping to chart the course,” Olszewski said in a statement. “Over the next four years, these recommendations will help guide our work to make county government more open and transparent, and to ensure we are providing the top notch services and programs that our residents expect and deserve.”
The report is available online.
The transition team began its work before Olszewski's inauguration in December an...
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February 19, 2019 at 8:24 pm
Baltimore County police say they are investigating a police-involved shooting at a shopping center in Randallstown.
According to officials, officers responded to a shoplifting call from a Dollar Tree in the area.
Officers chased the suspect from the shoplifting call into the Aldi's store at the Liberty Court Shopping Center in the 8600 block of Liberty Road in Randallstown.
"The initial call that we got was for a shoplifting related from the Dollar Tree store. Our officers saw the suspect in the parking lot -- there was a small chase in the parking lot, between the officers and the suspect that led back to the Aldi store," said Shawn Vinson from Baltimore County police.
According to Vinson, the suspect had a number of weapons in his hands. Officers feared for their safety during...
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February 19, 2019 at 8:19 pm
BALTIMORE (AP) — Baltimore has filed a lawsuit against the agrochemical giant Monsanto and two other companies, accusing them of polluting city waterways and stormwater.
The legal effort focuses on PCBs, the industrial chemicals that have long accumulated in animals, plants and people around the globe. Baltimore alleges Monsanto knew its PCB chemicals were toxic and didn't degrade in nature.
Baltimore Solicitor Andre Davis says Maryland's biggest city intends to "hold corporations accountable for cleaning up their toxic messes."
In a Tuesday statement, Baltimore said its lawsuit is the first of its kind on the East Coast and the 15th nationally. Places such as San Diego and Seattle have filed similar suits.
Monsanto says it believes that Baltimore's complaint is wi...
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February 19, 2019 at 8:13 pm
More than 2,000 children and adults are taking part in the ‘City of Light’ march in memory of Ori Ansbacher, H'yd, Tuesday evening.
One of the initiators of the event, Eliasaf Peretz, the son of Israel Prize laureate Miriam Peretz, who lost his two brothers in Israel’s wars, said during the event: “We gathered here tonight because of a terrible heartbreak. We gathered to cry, and to knock on the doors of the heart, and to grab onto those sparks of hope.”
“We have gathered here because we do not agree to let the wicked win,” said Peretz.
“We stand here in Jerusalem, different people, different faces and different opinions, in order to take responsibility. Unfortunately, we could not prevent this murder, but we managed to prevent the in...
