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In a twist, German rabbi at scandal’s center cedes rabbinical school ownership to Berlin Jews
(JTA) — In a shocking development, the embattled founder of Germany’s non-Orthodox rabbinical schools has relinquished his ownership stake in them to the Jewish Community of Berlin.
The 25,000 euro transaction means that Rabbi Walter Homolka is no longer in control of the Reform Abraham Geiger College and the Conservative Zacharias Frankel College at the University of Potsdam.
The sale achieves a result that the Central Council of Jews in Germany, the seminaries’ main funder, has been trying to reach openly since late last year, after two investigations confirmed that Homolka had abused his power at the seminaries.
The Jewish Community of Berlin had not publicly been part of the efforts to overhaul the schools launched after allegations against Homolka broke into public view last May. The allegations initially related to a sexual harassment scandal involving his husband, who was also his employee, but widened to implicate other aspects of Homolka’s leadership.
The group’s announcement late Wednesday of the purchase, executed the day before, initially alarmed some who have been advocating for changes at the seminaries, because the plan did not clearly rule out a role for Homolka. The Central Council of Jews in Germany issued a statement lambasting the fact that the deal “took place without consultation with the students, employees, or the donors” and said the new arrangement would not improve rabbinical education in Germany.
But in a hastily arranged meeting Thursday, Berlin Jewish Community President Gideon Joffe assured Josef Schuster, the council’s head, that Homolka would not be part of the seminaries going forward. The meeting left Schuster prepared to collaborate with Joffe’s group, a spokesperson for the council confirmed.
Now, the path is clear for the official Jewish community to seize authority over non-Orthodox rabbinical training in the country where Reform Judaism was born in the 19th century.
“This may not be the ideal situation, but it is a compromise that allows almost everyone to live with the results,” Cantor Itamar Cohen, the graduate whose complaint kicked off the scandal, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. He said he would fully embrace the offer “if it is accepted by Klal Israel, the majority of the Jewish community as encapsulated in the main representing bodies.”
Concerns about the surprise announcement largely reflected worries that Homolka could have structured the deal in a way that benefits him.
Rabbi Walter Homolka, then rector of the Abraham Geiger College, in the Liberal Jewish community’s synagogue in Hanover, Germany in December 2016. (Julian Stratenschulte/picture alliance via Getty Images)
Two separate investigations — one by the university and the other by lawyers commissioned by the Central Council — recently determined that Homolka had created an “atmosphere of fear” among students and staff in the very institutions he launched more than 20 years ago. The final report from the Central Council investigation is expected to be released in the coming weeks. Homolka has steadfastly maintained his innocence.
In the wake of those findings, there was an increasing appearance of desperation on the part of the old guard to hold on to control of the two seminaries. In December, days after the damning Central Council interim report was issued, the Union of Progressive Judaism in Germany — with a newly elected board friendly to Homolka — announced it had replaced the interim director of the Geiger College with its own appointee. The Central Council promptly nixed that plan, calling the Union of Progressive Judaism a puppet of Homolka and announcing its appointment of the scholar Gerhard Robbers to work on restructuring the two colleges.
Skeptics of the latest development said they were sure Homolka’s influence would emerge somewhere, for example in appointments to the reconstituted institutions.
“I don’t find this reassuring,” said Nick Hoermann, a current student at Frankel College. “It has been clear for a while now that Homolka’s only way to act in the future would be through back doors.”
But for now at least, the Central Council — which initially called the sale announcement “astonishing” — says it is ready to work with the Jewish Community of Berlin.
Though the official community’s move came as a surprise to many, Joffe and his team had been considering some kind of rescue maneuver since the scandal broke last May, Ilan Kiesling, a spokesperson for the community, said in an email to JTA. The concrete plan emerged only after the damning preliminary expert opinion came out in December.
Joffe approached Homolka directly at that point and convinced him “that a completely fresh start at [Abraham Geiger College] was indispensable – together with a complete renunciation of all his leadership positions. Rabbi Homolka agreed to this renunciation and transferred all shares of the non-profit limited company to the community,” Kiesling wrote.
The legally binding takeover took place this week, and did not cost the community anything beyond “the capital contribution of the limited company in the amount of 25,000 euros,” Kiesling said.
He added that the community “guarantees a complete and transparent new start” for the Geiger seminary. “There will no longer be an accumulation of offices” under one person, one of the habits for which Homolka has been criticized. There was no specific reference to the Frankel College, which until now has appointed its own academic leadership.
The community plans to establish an international advisory board and an external contact point for students to report any problems. Early on in the scandal, it emerged that Cohen’s complaint had been investigated internally, by parties beholden to Homolka.
Kiesling also told the JTA that the community had engaged a former community president, Rabbi Andreas Nachama, chair of Germany’s liberal rabbinical conference, known as ARK, to advise them from a rabbinical perspective. Nachama was ordained by the U.S.-based Alliance for Jewish Renewal movement and leads an egalitarian Reform congregation in Berlin.
In his statement Wednesday, Joffe said, “The top priority for us at the moment is to bring the Abraham Geiger College into calm waters and pave the way for the students to continue their education in a stable structure.”
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The post In a twist, German rabbi at scandal’s center cedes rabbinical school ownership to Berlin Jews appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Mayor Reveals Site of Swiss Bar Fire That Killed 40, Including 3 Jewish Teens, Had No Safety Inspection for 5 Years
A woman looks at tributes placed outside the “Le Constellation” bar, after a deadly fire and explosion during a New Year’s Eve party in the upscale ski resort of Crans-Montana in southwestern Switzerland, Jan. 4, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Umit Bektas
The bar that caught fire at a ski resort in Crans-Montana, Switzerland, on New Year’s Eve, killing 40 people including three Jewish teens, had not been inspected by safety inspectors for the last five years, the mayor of the town said on Tuesday morning.
“Periodic inspections were not carried out between 2020 and 2025. We bitterly regret this,” Crans-Montana Mayor Nicolas Féraud said at a press conference held five days after the deadly fire at Le Constellation bar, which was renovated in 2015. “The municipal council became aware of this situation by consulting the documents submitted to the public prosecutor’s office this weekend. The courts will determine the influence that such a failure in the chain of events that led to the tragedy.”
The mayor told reporters he could not explain why the establishment was not annually inspected by safety officers every year as required by law.
“We’re profoundly sorry, and I know how hard that will be for the families,” Féraud added. He said the Crans-Montana municipality did not want to conceal any information regarding the fire last Wednesday because “we believe we owe it to the victims and their families.” The cause of the blaze has not been officially determined, but the mayor added that the public prosecutor’s office is in charge of the criminal investigation and is working with relevant judicial authorities.
The last of the 40 people who died in the fire were identified on Sunday, including 15-year-old Israeli citizen Charlotte Niddam. She was initially reported as missing. Niddam was a former student at Immanuel College, a private school in Hertfordshire in the UK, and the Jewish Free School in northwest London before she moved with her family back to their native France, according to the latter school. She worked as a babysitter for the resort during school break, according to the Crans-Montana resort website.
UK Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper mentioned Niddam’s death in a post on X, saying, “My thoughts are with all her family and friends after this devastating loss.” Niddam’s cousin is ZAKA International Rescue and Recovery Director-General Baruck Niddam, who participated in commanding the operation of identifying and recovering bodies of the deceased from the fire, according to The Jerusalem Post.
Jewish-Italian sisters Alicia and Diana Gunst, ages 15 and 14, respectively, were also identified on Sunday among those killed in the fire. The sisters lived in the Jewish community of Lausanne, Switzerland, and are the youngest victims of the fire. The 40 victims were all between the ages of 14 and 39, but 20 of them were minors. In addition, 116 people were injured in the blaze.
Swiss authorities so far have said they think the fire was set off by sparklers inside the bar that were raised too close to the ceiling during the New Year’s Eve celebrations. Féraud said at the press conference on Tuesday morning that the soundproof foam used in the Le Constellation ceiling was acceptable to safety officers at the time of the last inspection, before 2020. He announced that the municipal council has commissioned a specialized external firm that will conduct an audit of all public establishments in Crans-Montana “as quickly as possible.” The municipal has also banned sparklers, and all pyrotechnic or similar devices, inside public establishments.
The bar’s owners, French nationals Jacques and Jessica Moretti, are being investigated by authorities and are facing charges of homicide by negligence, bodily harm by negligence, and arson by negligence, a source told AFP. The mayor said the couple have not been arrested but a second business they own has been shut down.
The couple said in a statement to AFP they were “devastated and overwhelmed with grief” over the fire. They promised to full cooperate with investigators and added, “We will not attempt to shirk our responsibilities in any way.”
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Anti-Israel Congressional Candidate Michael Blake Has Deep Ties to Defense Contractor, Despite Campaign Rhetoric
Former New York State Assemblyman Michael Blake is running for US Congress in the Democratic primary in New York’s 15th Congressional District. Photo: Screenshot
Although Democratic congressional candidate Michael Blake has made opposition to US military spending and Israel’s war in Gaza a centerpiece of his insurgent left-wing campaign to unseat incumbent US Rep. Ritchie Torres in New York, newly surfaced documents reveal that Blake maintains deep ties to defense contractors.
Financial disclosures and employment records examined by New York Focus are complicating Blake’s message in the Democratic primary for New York’s 15th Congressional District, raising questions about whether his own professional history undercuts the left-wing, anti-militarism platform on which he is campaigning. The documents show that Blake himself has maintained a longstanding professional relationship with a defense contractor that has received millions of dollars in federal contracts, including from the US Department of Defense.
According to financial disclosure forms and public records reviewed by the New York outlet, Blake began working in 2018 as a vice president at Eccalon, a Maryland-based defense firm that provides services to federal agencies, including the Pentagon. Public filings show that Eccalon secured millions in Pentagon contracts. Ethics filings list Blake’s compensation in ranges that in later years reached the $100,000 to $250,000 range. Blake’s Linkedin Page indicates that he started working at the firm in 2018 as a “senior advisor” and continues his employment with the firm to this day.
Blake, a former New York Assemblymember and past Democratic National Committee vice chair, has accused Torres of profiting from investments in major aerospace and defense firms that receive Pentagon contracts. His campaign has sought to link those holdings to Torres’s staunch support for Israel and robust US military assistance, positions that have drawn fierce criticism from progressive activists.
In a campaign launch video, Blake took aim at Torres’s alleged connections with weapons manufacturers.
“Ritchie Torres invested in weapon makers,” a narrator said in the campaign video. “He profited from it.”
“I will invest in the community. Ritchie invests in Bombs,” Blake wrote on social media.
The issue is especially salient as Blake courts voters aligned with the Democratic Party’s left flank, many of whom are mobilized around opposition to Israel’s military campaign in Gaza and broader skepticism of the US defense industry. Blake has embraced that rhetoric on the campaign trail, casting himself as part of a new generation willing to challenge the foreign policy consensus in the federal government.
Torres, for his part, has defended his positions as consistent with his long-standing support for Israel’s security and US strategic alliances, while noting that his financial disclosures comply fully with congressional ethics rules.
The clash underscores a broader tension within the Democratic Party, where candidates increasingly run against defense spending and US support for Israel.
The congressional district, one of the poorest in the nation, has a child poverty rate of 37 percent, according to the US Census Bureau, the highest in the country and a figure Blake has cited to argue for redirecting attention to the needs of working families.
Blake’s attacks have prompted backlash of their own. As reported by the New York Post, the challenger appears to have deleted years of social-media posts praising Israel and AIPAC, the influential pro-Israel lobbying group he once openly supported. Between 2014 and 2017, Blake attended AIPAC events and heaped praise on the Jewish state. Blake subsequently deleted photos of himself at AIPAC events after receiving criticism.
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Denver Jewish Community Center Starts Donation Drive for Firefighters After Massive Fire Nearby
Smoke and flames rise from the site of a burning building, in Denver, Colorado, US, Jan. 2, 2026, in this still image obtained from a social media video, video taken behind glass. Photo: X @DaLitiGator/via REUTERS
The Staenberg-Loup Jewish Community Center (JCC) in Denver, Colorado, is collecting items “of appreciation” to give to local fire stations that contained a massive fire in the area on Friday night that forced the JCC to temporarily close for several days.
The Jewish nonprofit organization has set up collection bins in its lobby and is also sponsoring fresh challahs for local fire crews who battled the fire that started at a nearby apartment complex under construction. Stephanie Herm, the JCC’s chief operating officer, told ABC’s Denver 7 the JCC is asking community members to donate snacks, beverages, and cards for local firefighters.
“They’ve been working since Friday night, around the clock, and we’re very fortunate that they kept it. We came to that site. And so, it’s the least we can do,” Herm said. “One of our lenses in our school is gratitude, and so we really focused on doing things for the community and making sure that the kids were engaged with what’s going on, and that was one way that we can show appreciation.”
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) announced on Tuesday that its National Response Team (NRT) has been deployed to help investigate the origin and cause of Friday’s five-alarm fire at the Harker Heights Apartments under construction near Leetsdale Drive and South Forest Street. The fire burned for several days, forcing evacuations of homes and businesses, power outages, and street closures. One firefighter was injured, according to an ATF press release.
“The NRT is bringing federal resources and expertise to this complex investigation,” said ATF Special Agent in Charge Chris Ashbridge. “It is a top priority for us because we understand the immense challenges this fire has created for residents and businesses.”
A total of 156 firefighters from several stations in the area worked to contain the inferno under “heavy fire conditions” due to the stage of construction, which helped the blaze spread quickly, the Denver Fire Department said in a Facebook post. The apartment complex, which was set to open in May, was fully engulfed in flames. The siding of a nearby home was partially melted from the heat, according to local reports, but no other damage to businesses, residences, or casualties has been reported.
The JCC closed shortly after the fire broke out on Friday and stayed closed through the weekend. It has since reopened, according to its website.
“We made the difficult decision to close both Saturday and Sunday because of the air quality and inside the building smelled like campfire,” Herm told CBS News. “When I was on site Saturday, going to and from the car was very difficult to breathe.”
The Denver Fire Department is asking anymore who wants to share a video or information about the fire to use their tip line by calling or texting 720-672-5101.