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Conservative Ziegler rabbinical school to relocate to ‘heart of Jewish life’ in Los Angeles
(JTA) — Following the sale of its Bel Air campus last year, American Jewish University announced Monday that its rabbinical school will relocate to a commercial building in Beverly Hills, within walking distance of the heavily Jewish Pico-Robertson neighborhood, in 2024.
The Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies, which is affiliated with Conservative Judaism, will occupy 7,700 square feet in a building that is also home to a bank and other businesses. The leased space will include a library, faculty offices, classrooms and a conference room.
Pico-Robertson is home to a diverse set of Jews as well as many kosher restaurants, Judaica stores and the Simon Wiesenthal Center Holocaust museum. Multiple synagogues, including the Conservative Temple Beth Am, can be found within a few blocks. Earlier this year, the neighborhood was also the site of an antisemitic shooting spree that left two Jewish men wounded.
“With this move, American Jewish University begins a new chapter for the Ziegler School, providing our students with innovative opportunities to flourish in the heart of Jewish life in Los Angeles,” AJU president Jeffrey Herbst said in a statement.
AJU relinquished its historic 35-acre campus in 2022 amid financial pressures and years of declining enrollment, selling the property to a Swiss education company, which reportedly beat out other bidders with a $ 65 million offer.
University officials didn’t disclose the terms of the new lease, but at currently advertised rates for space in the building, the cost to AJU would come out to about $460,000 a year.
In addition to downsizing its real estate and, several years ago, closing its undergraduate program, AJU last year slashed Ziegler’s tuition by nearly 80% from about $31,000 to $7,000 in the hope of attracting more rabbinical students; only four were enrolled last year. New donations, rather than the revenue from the sale of its campus, are underwriting the reduced tuition structure, according to the school, which also recently announced the creation of a distance-learning doctoral program in Jewish early childhood education.
The ongoing shakeup at Ziegler comes amid changes across the rabbinic training landscape, as fewer students seek to enroll in traditional seminaries and fewer American Jews affiliate with synagogues and denominations. Hebrew College, a nondenominational seminary outside Boston, recently sold its suburban campus and began sharing space with a Conservative synagogue.
Meanwhile, the Conservative movement’s other U.S. rabbinical school, the Jewish Theological Seminary in Manhattan, recently shed real estate during a campus overhaul. And the Reform movement’s Hebrew Union College recently condensed its rabbinical training from three campuses to two.
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The post Conservative Ziegler rabbinical school to relocate to ‘heart of Jewish life’ in Los Angeles appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Exclusive: Israeli Officials Harshly Critical of Steve Witkoff’s Influence on US Policy on Gaza, Iran, i24NEWS Told
US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, Washington, DC, Jan. 20, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Carlos Barria
i24 News – Amid growing disagreements with the Trump administration over the composition of the Board of Peace for Gaza and the question of a strike on Iran, officials in Israel point to a key figure behind decisions seen as running counter to Israeli interests: Special Envoy Steve Witkoff.
The officials mention sustained dissatisfaction with Witkoff. Sources close to the PM Netanyahu told i24NEWS on Saturday evening: “For several months now, the feeling has been that envoy Steve Witkoff has strong ties, for his own reasons, across the Middle East, and that at times the Israeli interest does not truly prevail in his decision-making.”
This criticism relates both to the proposed inclusion of Turkey and Qatar in Gaza’s governing bodies and to the Iranian threat. A senior Israeli official put it bluntly: “If it turns out that he is among those blocking a strike on Iran, that is far more than a coincidence.”
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EU Warns of Downward Spiral After Trump Threatens Tariffs Over Greenland
European Union flags flutter outside the EU Commission headquarters in Brussels, Belgium, on June 17, 2022. Photo: Reuters/Yves Herman
European Union leaders on Saturday warned of a “dangerous downward spiral” over US President Donald Trump‘s vow to implement increasing tariffs on European allies until the US is allowed to buy Greenland.
“Tariffs would undermine transatlantic relations and risk a dangerous downward spiral. Europe will remain united, coordinated, and committed to upholding its sovereignty,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and EU Council President Antonio Costa said in posts on X.
The bloc’s top diplomat Kaja Kallas said tariffs would hurt prosperity on both sides of the Atlantic, while distracting the EU from its “core task” of ending Russia’s war in Ukraine.
“China and Russia must be having a field day. They are the ones who benefit from divisions among allies,” Kallas said on X.
“Tariffs risk making Europe and the United States poorer and undermine our shared prosperity. If Greenland’s security is at risk, we can address this inside NATO.”
Ambassadors from the European Union’s 27 countries will convene on Sunday for an emergency meeting to discuss their response to the tariff threat.
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Israel Says US Gaza Executive Board Composition Against Its Policy
FILE PHOTO: Displaced Palestinians shelter at a tent camp in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, January 14, 2026. REUTERS/Haseeb Alwazeer/File Photo
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said on Saturday that this week’s Trump administration announcement on the composition of a Gaza executive board was not coordinated with Israel and ran counter to government policy.
It said Foreign Minister Gideon Saar would raise the issue with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
The statement did not specify what part of the board’s composition contradicted Israeli policy. An Israeli government spokesperson declined to comment.
The board, unveiled by the White House on Friday, includes Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan. Israel has repeatedly opposed any Turkish role in Gaza.
Other members of the executive board include Sigrid Kaag, the U.N. special coordinator for the Middle East peace process; an Israeli‑Cypriot billionaire; and a minister from the United Arab Emirates, which established relations with Israel in 2020.
Washington this week also announced the start of the second phase of President Donald Trump’s plan, announced in September, to end the war in Gaza. This includes creating a transitional technocratic Palestinian administration in the enclave.
The first members of the so-called Board of Peace – to be chaired by Trump and tasked with supervising Gaza’s temporary governance – were also named. Members include Rubio, billionaire developer Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.