RSS
Robert Kraft Donates $1 Million to Yeshiva University for New Program, to Help Support Transferring Jewish Students
Robert Kraft. Photo: New England Patriots/Wikimedia Commons
Robert Kraft, the Jewish owner of the NFL’s New England Patriots and founder of the Foundation to Combat Antisemitism (FCAS), has donated $1 million to Yeshiva University in New York City to establish a new program aimed at promoting inclusivity.
The Blue Square Scholars program will also help Yeshiva University accommodate and support Jewish college students who are transferring to the school after feeling unsafe at their previous campuses due to the recent rise in antisemitism on college campuses across the country. The program will “help provide the necessary infrastructure to accommodate the best and the brightest students who are rooted in the university’s values of compassion and respect for all,” the university announced on Tuesday. “These students will become the leaders and bridge-builders our society so desperately needs.”
The name of the Blue Square Scholars program is inspired by FCAS’s Blue Square initiative, a multimedia campaign that addresses rising antisemitism.
“I am honored to establish the Blue Square Scholars program at Yeshiva University in order to give students a welcoming place to further their education and grow into leaders who will serve as advocates for unity and respect and will push back on all hate,” Kraft said in a statement. “At a time where hate has been unleashed across our universities, Jewish students are feeling isolated and unsafe. Yeshiva is providing a safe haven for these students and I look forward to seeing them thrive in an academic environment where they could live and study free of fear for being who they are.”
Yeshiva University President Rabbi Dr. Ari Berman thanked Kraft and FCAS for establishing the Blue Square Scholars program, “and for all they have done to foster a more inclusive society throughout our country.”
“Robert sets the standard for impactful leadership in this country and this program will support top tier students who will follow his example to become the leaders of tomorrow,” he added.
Following the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attack in Israel, more than 100 university and college presidents across the US — including from public, private, faith-based, and historically Black colleges and universities — joined Berman in expressing solidarity with Israel and condemning Hamas terrorism. Berman also led a group of university presidents on the March of the Living at the former Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland on Holocaust Memorial Day last month.
Kraft pulled funding from his alma mater, Columbia University, in April “over the treatment of Jewish students and faculty during pro-Palestinian protests at the campus.” In an op-ed for the New York Post, he said he was profoundly disappointed seeing Jewish students being targeted by anti-Israel student protesters at Columbia. “The Columbia I loved is no longer a place I know,” he said.
The post Robert Kraft Donates $1 Million to Yeshiva University for New Program, to Help Support Transferring Jewish Students first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Pro-Israel Stalwart Ritchie Torres Hints at Run for New York Governor
US Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) speaks during the House Financial Services Committee hearing in Washington, DC, Sept. 30, 2021. Photo: Al Drago/Pool via REUTERS
JNS.org – Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-N.Y.), one of Israel’s staunchest defenders in Congress, hinted at a run for higher office on Friday by taking aim at New York Gov. Kathy Hochul.
The Bronx Democrat said that like U.S. President Joe Biden, Hochul could be on the path to electoral defeat.
“Kathy Hochul is the new Joe Biden,” Torres wrote. “She may be in denial about the depth of her vulnerabilities as a Democratic nominee. A Democratic incumbent who is less popular in New York than Donald Trump is in grave danger of losing to a Republican in 2026–an outcome not seen in 30 years.”
“Waiting until it’s too late gave us a Republican President in 2024 and could give us a Republican governor in 2026,” he added. “Let’s avoid repeating history and avoid sleepwalking toward impending disaster and defeat.”
Torres in recent days has said that there is a “crisis of governance” in New York State and New York City.
“I think part of the story of the election is an indictment of misgovernance in New York state and New York City,” Torres said in an interview on Monday with Spectrum News NY1. “With few exceptions, nowhere was there a greater swing toward Donald Trump than in New York, which was a vote of no confidence in the leadership of New York state.”
U.S. President Joe Biden carried more than 60% of the vote in New York state in 2020, but in November, Trump narrowed that lead, with Harris winning just 56% of the vote to Trump’s 44%.
The largest swing of any county in New York towards Trump occurred in Torres’s Bronx county, driven by the massive shift towards Republicans among Latino voters.
A poll in September showed that Hochul had just a 34% job approval rating, and in 2022 she defeated then-congressman Lee Zeldin by just 6 percentage points, the worst performance by a Democrat in a statewide race in two decades.
Since taking his seat in Congress in 2021, Torres, 36, has been widely lauded by the Jewish community for his vocal efforts to combat Jew-hatred and his support for Israel in the House.
“I see my freedom as a Black Latino from the Bronx as inextricably bound to the freedom of the Jewish people,” Torres told pro-Israel rally-goers after he was awarded the Jewish Federations of North America’s Courageous Leadership Award earlier this month.
Though Torres has not directly criticized New York City Mayor Eric Adams by name in the way that he has called out Hochul, Torres could also make a run for Gracie Mansion in the 2025 election as Adams fights federal bribery charges.
A spokesman for Torres told JNS that “the congressman has yet to make a final decision regarding his future” as to whether he planned to announce a run for mayor or governor.
The post Pro-Israel Stalwart Ritchie Torres Hints at Run for New York Governor first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Mossad Looking Into Disappearance of Chabad Official in Abu Dhabi
Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.
i24 News – A member of a Jewish mission in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has been missing since Wednesday, fueling reports he could have been kidnapped or murdered by Iran-linked operatives, according to Israeli media.
According to the Walla News website, the Mossad and UAE intelligence services are looking into the the suspicious disappearance of a Chabad official in Abu Dhabi.
The post Mossad Looking Into Disappearance of Chabad Official in Abu Dhabi first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
ICC Warrants Are Binding, EU Cannot Pick and Choose, EU’s Borrell Says
An exterior view of the International Criminal Court in the Hague, Netherlands, March 31, 2021. Photo: REUTERS/Piroschka van de Wouw
European Union governments cannot pick and choose whether to execute arrest warrants issued by the International Criminal Court against two Israeli leaders and a Hamas commander, the EU’s foreign policy chief said on Saturday.
The ICC issued the warrants on Thursday against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his former defense minister Yoav Gallant and Hamas leader Ibrahim Al-Masri, for alleged crimes against humanity.
All EU member states are signatories to the ICC’s founding treaty, called the Rome Statute.
Several EU states have said they will meet their commitments under the statute if needed, but Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has invited Netanyahu to visit his country, assuring him he would face no risks if he did so.
“The states that signed the Rome convention are obliged to implement the decision of the court. It’s not optional,” Josep Borrell, the EU’s top diplomat, said during a visit to Cyprus for a workshop of Israeli and Palestinian peace activists.
Those same obligations were also binding on countries aspiring to join the EU, he said.
“It would be very funny that the newcomers have an obligation that current members don’t fulfil,” he told Reuters.
The United States rejected the ICC’s decision and Israel said the ICC move was antisemitic.
“Every time someone disagrees with the policy of one Israeli government – (they are) being accused of antisemitism,” said Borrell, whose term as EU foreign policy chief ends this month. “I have the right to criticize the decisions of the Israeli government, be it Mr. Netanyahu or someone else, without being accused of antisemitism. This is not acceptable. That’s enough.”
In their decision, the ICC judges said there were reasonable grounds to believe Netanyahu and Gallant were criminally responsible for acts including murder, persecution and starvation as a weapon of war as part of a “widespread and systematic attack against the civilian population of Gaza”.
The warrant for Masri lists charges of mass killings during the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks. Israel says it has killed Masri.
The post ICC Warrants Are Binding, EU Cannot Pick and Choose, EU’s Borrell Says first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
You must be logged in to post a comment Login