PORTLAND, Maine (VosiZNeias) — Lewiston, which is the second-largest city in the state of Maine, has elected a Somali American to its city council following a campaign marred by racist attacks and social media threats.
Safiya Khalid, a 23-year-old immigrant from Somalia, soundly defeated a fellow Democrat on Tuesday for a seat on the Lewiston City Council, garnering nearly 70% of the vote to become possibly the youngest ever member of the city council and the first Somali immigrant.
Shrugging off attacks on her skin color and faith, Khalid declared that “community organizers beat internet trolls.”
“I worked really hard. I knocked on thousands of doors. That’s what paid off,” Khalid told The Associated Press(AP) in an interview Tuesday.
Despite being ...
MILAN (AP) – An 89-year-old Auschwitz survivor who is a senator-for-life in Italy has unwittingly provoked one of the country’s most intense confrontations with anti-Semitism since the end of Italy’s Fascist dictatorship during World War II.
In response to revelations that she is subject to 200 social media attacks each day, Liliana Segre called for the creation of a parliamentary committee to combat hate, racism and anti-Semitism. Parliament approved her motion — but without votes from Italy’s right-wing parties.
Matteo Salvini’s euroskeptic League party, Silvio Berlusconi’s center-right Forza Italia and Giorgia Meloni’s far-right Brothers of Italy all abstained, in a move that defied the social consensus that has marked Italian post-war p...
BERLIN (AP) — An escape tunnel underneath the Berlin Wall opened to the public on Thursday for the first time amid celebrations of the 30-year anniversary of the opening of communist East Germany’s border.
The tunnel at Bernauer Strasse, near the city’s main Wall memorial, was opened by Mayor Michael Mueller. He thanked those who started digging the 100-meter (yard) tunnel in late 1970, nine years after East Germany sealed its border.
“It’s great to see that the battle for freedom was also taken underground,” Mueller said before he took a tour of the new exhibit.
“One can authentically experience … the courage of the women and men who tried to take people to freedom and resisted the East German regime,” he added.
The tunnel was bui...
CHAPPAQUA, NY (VosIzNeias) – Residents of the New Castle community gathered on Wednesday to dedicate the New Castle Holocaust Memorial.
In a ceremony attended by more than 200 residents, elected officials, several local Holocaust survivors and Chappaqua resident and former President Bill Clinton, the town unveiled and dedicated the monument near the gazebo on South Greeley Avenue.
The opening of the Memorial coincide with and commemorate Kristallnacht.
The project is the fruit of the efforts initiated by New Castle residents Alexandra Rosenberg & Stacey Saiont.
Alexandra Rosenberg commented, “I proposed the idea for the New Castle Holocaust Memorial, the New Castle Holocaust & Human Rights Committee and the student run organization E.N.O.U.G.H. as a way to combat th...
SIDI KACEM (AP) – Ivanka Trump says families, communities and countries flourish when women are invested in and included in the economy.
President Donald Trump’s daughter and White House adviser saw real life examples in Morocco on Thursday when she met four women who are benefiting from changes that allow them to own land.
Ivanka Trump spearheads a U.S. drive to help women in developing countries with skills training, access to capital and land ownership.
One of the women, Aicha Bourkib, embraced Ivanka Trump and kissed her hands as the group met in an olive grove. The 59-year-old housewife and mother of four cultivates olive trees and vegetables on land she recently bought.
Bourkib also has two cows and wants to create a dairy cooperative in her village.
LONDON (AP) – Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn’s election campaign was hit Thursday by renewed claims that he is not fit to lead the country because of his tolerance of anti-Semitic attitudes.
The criticism came from a former member of the Labour Party’s inner circle who took the extraordinary step of urging British voters to instead elect Conservative Prime Minister Boris Johnson — Corbyn’s main rival — and from an influential Jewish newspaper that urged Britons not to back Corbyn in the country’s Dec. 12 general election.
Ian Austin, a close aide to the Labour Party’s last prime minister, told the BBC the left-wing party has been poisoned by “anti-Jewish racism” under Corbyn. Austin was one of seven lawmakers who left the Lab...
CHICAGO (AP) — Chicago Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson announced Thursday that he’s retiring after more than three years as the city’s top cop, a post he took over during one of the most violent chapters in the city’s history and amid public outcry over the release of a video showing an officer shooting a black teen 16 times.
Johnson made the announcement at a news conference a couple hours after department spokesman Anthony Guglielmi confirmed the speculation that the 59-year-old Johnson would be stepping down. Mayor Lori Lightfoot said he’d agreed to serve through the end of the year.
“This is my home and it’s the only home I’ve ever known,” Johnson said at the news conference.
Guglielmi called Johnson a “true son of Chic...
President Andrés Manuel López Obrador on Wednesday rejected U.S. suggestions he get more aggressive against violence after this week’s massacre of fundamentalist Mormons in northern Mexico, saying the war-on-drugs approach has been a “disaster” in the past.
Authorities also noted that the bullets used in the killings of three women and six children in the northern state of Sonora on Monday were manufactured in the United States.
The slaying Monday of the members of the extended LeBaron family – dual U.S.-Mexican citizens – has raised pressure on López Obrador’s leftist government, which has pledged to use social programs to address the root causes of violence.
“It’s unfortunate, sad, because children died. This is pain...
Uber Technologies Inc.’s self-driving test car that struck and killed a pedestrian last year wasn’t programmed to recognize and react to jaywalkers, according to documents released by U.S. safety investigators.
The National Transportation Safety Board on Tuesday released more than 400 pages of reports and supporting documents on the March 2018 crash that killed 49-year-old Elaine Herzberg as she walked her bicycle across a road at night in Tempe, Arizona.
The documents painted a picture of safety and design lapses with tragic consequences but didn’t assign a cause for the crash. The safety board is scheduled to do that at a Nov. 19 meeting in Washington.
“We deeply value the thoroughness of the NTSB’s investigation into the crash and look forward to reviewi...
Sen. Rand Paul blocked a resolution Wednesday reaffirming the Senate’s support for whistleblower protections and accused Democrats of “fake outrage.”
Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer and Sen. Mazie Hirono had asked for unanimous consent to pass the resolution, which “acknowledges the contributions of whistleblowers” and throws the chamber’s support behind protecting whistleblowers from retaliation.
Paul objected to passing the resolution after Democrats refused to drop their resolution and instead pass whistleblower legislation that he introduced earlier that day.
He argued that his legislation would “make clear” that President Trump should be able to face his accuser. The measure also would expand current whistleblower protections f...
A New Jersey man caught on surveillance video faking a slip and fall was sentenced Monday to probation, community service and ordered to pay restitution, according to a report.
WABC-TV reported Alexander Goldinsky of Randolph received two years of probation and 14 hours of community service.
He also was ordered to pay $563.48 to an insurance company.
fall from BaltimoreJewishLife.com on Vimeo.
Read more at THE NY POST.
President Trump early Thursday pushed back on a report that he asked Attorney General William Barr to hold a news conference clearing him of wrongdoing in the Ukraine controversy that sparked an impeachment inquiry, calling the article “totally untrue.”
“The story in the Amazon Washington Post, of course picked up by Fake News CNN, saying ‘President Trump asked for AG Barr to host a news conference clearing him on Ukraine,’ is totally untrue and just another FAKE NEWS story with anonymous sources that don’t exist,” he tweeted.
“Years ago, when Media was legitimate, people known as “Fact Checkers” would always call to check and see if a story was accurate. Nowadays they don’t use “Fact Checkers” anymore, they ju...
President Trump has been ordered to pay $2 million to nonprofit groups as part of a settlement in a lawsuit alleging he used his charity’s funds for personal and political means.
The New York Supreme Court ordered Trump to pay $2 million in damages as part of a settlement stemming from a June 2018 civil lawsuit filed by the state attorney general’s office against him, his three eldest children and the Trump Foundation that alleged violations of campaign finance law. The dispute centers on $2.8 million raised by the Trump Foundation at an Iowa fundraiser for military veterans during the 2016 campaign cycle.
Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Saliann Scarpulla ruled Thursday that the money was used for Trump’s campaign and di...
VIENNA (AP) — Iran alleged Thursday that the U.N. inspector it blocked from a nuclear site last week tested positive for suspected traces of explosive nitrates. The U.N.’s nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, disputed Iran’s claim.
The allegation made by Iranian representative Kazem Gharib Abadi came as Iran injected uranium gas into centrifuges at its underground Fordo nuclear complex early Thursday, taking its most-significant step away from its 2015 nuclear deal with world powers. It also dominated an IAEA meeting that included discussions about alleged radioactive material found at an undeclared site in Iran.
These latest steps by Iran put additional pressure on Europe to offer Tehran a way to sell its crude oil abroad despite the U.S. sanctions...
UNITED NATIONS (JNS) Israel, the United States and Brazil were the only three countries to vote against a U.N. General Assembly resolution on Thursday to condemn the U.S. embargo of Cuba for the 28th year.
The measure passed 187-3, with Ukraine and Columbia abstaining.
Last year, the tally was 189-2 with only Israel and the United States voting in opposition, with no abstentions.
UNGA resolutions are not legally binding nor enforceable.
The U.S. embargo on Cuba was enacted in 1960 after the revolution led by Fidel Castro. Two years later, it was extended to include virtually all exports.
“Allies are those who stand shoulder-to-shoulder in support of one another. We are proud to be one of the few countries standing with the US against a resolution that calls for an end to its emb...
Market leading e-cigarette manufacturer Juul will stop selling its popular mint flavor, the company announced Thursday, following the release of two studies showing mint was one of the most popular flavors among teenagers who vape.
Studies published Tuesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association showed mint was the most popular flavor for high school students who used Juul in 2019. Juul CEO K.C. Crosthwaite said the decision to pull mint was made in light of those results.
“These results are unacceptable and that is why we must reset the vapor category in the U.S. and earn the trust of society by working cooperatively with regulators, Attorneys General, public health officials, and other stakeholders to combat underage use. We will support the upcoming [Food and Drug Ad...
NEW YORK (AP) – In the stock market, it’s all about trade now.
Stocks were jumping early Thursday after China said both sides in the U.S.-China trade war had agreed to roll back tariffs if their talks progress. But an afternoon report from Reuters citing fierce opposition within the White House to the agreement undercut the enthusiasm, and the majority of the market’s gains evaporated.
By the end of trading, the S&P 500 was up 8.40 points, or 0.3%, at 3,085.18. It managed to set a record for the second time this week, but it had been on pace for a bigger, 0.7% gain earlier in the day.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 182.24, or 0.7%, to 27,674.80 and also set a record. The Nasdaq composite finished just shy of its all-time high after rising 23.89, or 0.3%, ...
Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is preparing to enter the crowded 2020 Democratic primary after saying earlier this year he would not run for president.
People briefed on Bloomberg’s plans told The New York Times that he will file paperwork this week to declare himself a candidate in the Alabama presidential primary ahead of the state’s filing deadline Friday.
A Bloomberg adviser said the former mayor and billionaire businessman has been privately mulling a White House bid for weeks and has not yet made a final decision.
DEVELOPING
Baltimore, MD - Nov. 7, 2019 - BJL wishes a hearty Mazel Tov to Tzippora Israilov and Moshe Rapp on their engagement.
Mazel Tov to Gidon and Eliana Israilov
יה"ר שיזכו לבנות בית נאמן בישראל. אמן
Shin Bet Chief Minister Nadav Argaman today claimed that the organization he heads has thwarted hundreds of significant attacks since the beginning of the year.
“We try to watch Israeli citizens so they can quietly live their day-to-day lives,” Argaman clarified. “Israeli technology and industry are always close to our hearts. We buy Israeli technologies before anything else. Innovation and startups are part of what we are.”
“This is what allows us to maintain our qualitative advantage over challenging rivals,” he explained. “This is what allowed us to thwart over 450 significant attacks in the past year.”
Read more at Arutz Sheva.
