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In Germany, a new group reflects a schism among liberal Jewish congregations
(JTA) — A new association of egalitarian Jewish congregations has launched in Germany, in the latest consequence of a scandal that has been unfolding within German Judaism for nearly a year.
The Jewish-Liberal Egalitarian Union, or JLEV according to its German acronym, marks a split with the existing body representing liberal Judaism in Germany, the Union of Progressive Jews.
The two groups both represent non-Orthodox synagogues in Germany, but the UPJ was created as a subsidiary of the World Union of Progressive Judaism, based in the United Kingdom. The new group, on the other hand, is overseen by the Central Council of Jews in Germany, whose role includes distributing government funding to Jewish institutions.
“A liberal association under the umbrella of the Central Council strengthens the idea of diversity in unity,” a spokesman for the organization told JTA in explaining the motivation behind the move.
The crucial difference between the two groups, however, is not who oversees them but that JLEV has no association with Walter Homolka, the rabbi at the center of the ongoing scandal.
Homolka was a founder of the UPJ in 1997, as well as of several other German Jewish organizations including its progressive seminaries. Since allegations broke last May that he had abused his power as the rector of the liberal Abraham Geiger College rabbinical school, Homolka has stepped back from his many roles in German Jewish organizations.
But after the embattled rabbi declined to run for another term as UPJ chair in the last election in December, a new board was elected that, critics said, was friendly to Homolka and showed little sympathy for those who claimed they had been harmed by him.
“We feel we are not represented any more by the UPJ,” Rebecca Seidler, head of the liberal Jewish communities of Hanover and chair of the State Association of the Jewish Communities of Lower Saxony, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency at the time.
Now, Seidler is a cofounder of the new organization, and her community is one of the nine to join it. The new group says it will offer adult education and youth programs. It also requires members to comply with a strict ethical code.
Seidler and other JLEV founders said in a statement that they determined it was “necessary to set up a separate umbrella organization” after the UPJ responded “in a strange way” to the accusations against Homolka.
“They trivialized, relativized and took a one-sided approach, failing to consider and pay attention to the critical voices of member communities,” the group’s statement said.
Exactly what it means for Germany to have two progressive Jewish congregational associations is uncertain.
The Germany split is not the first change in European progressive Jewish communities this week. Earlier, Britain’s liberal and Reform Jewish organizations merged into a new “Progressive Judaism” movement within the World Union of Progressive Judaism.
But while the group welcomed that development, a spokesperson told JTA in an email that it “isn’t making any comment at this time” about the changes in Germany.
It is estimated that, out of about 90,000 registered members of Jewish communities in Germany, about 5,000 affiliate with liberal or egalitarian congregations. There may be as many as 100,000 more people who identify as Jewish but don’t belong to a formal community.
The UPJ currently lists 32 member communities, including the nine defectors. It will continue to represent liberal communities across Germany — at least for now, and as long as communities choose to ally themselves with it.
“From an organizational logic, it does not make sense for communities to be members of both organizations,” the Central Council spokesperson told the JTA, adding that while the council has no legal obligation to support the UPJ, “as an organization of liberal Judaism, in which some member congregations of the Central Council are also members, it will continue to be supported according to the principles of the Central Council.”
Talks are underway about a formal funding agreement for JLEV.
As for the UPJ, concern about the competing organization appears to be slight.
“Every liberal Jew has the freedom to organize himself,” UPJ chair Irith Michelsohn told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in an email, noting that she had known about the launch of the new group “for some time already.” She added, “There are no changes for us.”
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The post In Germany, a new group reflects a schism among liberal Jewish congregations appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Israel Pounds Lebanon with Heaviest Airstrikes of the War as Hezbollah Pauses Attacks
Rescuers work at the site of an Israeli strike in Beirut, Lebanon, April 8, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir
Israel carried out its heaviest strikes on Lebanon since the conflict with Hezbollah broke out last month, even as the Iran-aligned group paused attacks on northern Israel and Israeli troops in Lebanon under a two-week US-Iran ceasefire.
Consecutive explosions shook Beirut, sending smoke billowing across the capital, as Israel’s military said it had launched the largest coordinated strike of the war. More than 100 Hezbollah command centers and military sites were targeted in Beirut, the Bekaa Valley and southern Lebanon, it said.
The strikes killed dozens and wounded hundreds, according to Lebanon’s health ministry. In Beirut, Reuters reporters saw people on motorcycles picking up wounded and transporting them to hospitals because there were not enough ambulances to get them in time. A group of firefighters worked to put out flames in a car park after one strike left more than a dozen cars scorched and mangled.
The head of Lebanon’s syndicate of doctors, Elias Chlela, called in a written statement for “all physicians from all specialties” to head to any hospital they could to offer help. One of Beirut’s biggest hospitals said it was in need of donations of all blood types.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said overnight that the ceasefire suspending the six-week-old US-Israeli war against Iran did not apply to Lebanon, and the Israeli military said operations against Hezbollah there would continue.
That position contradicted comments by Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, a key intermediary in the US-Iran ceasefire talks, who had said the truce would include Lebanon.
Lebanon’s state news agency NNA had reported continued Israeli strikes across southern Lebanon earlier in the day, including artillery shelling and a dawn airstrike on a building near a hospital that killed four people. An Israeli strike on the southern city of Sidon killed eight people and wounded 22 others, Lebanon’s health ministry said.
Hezbollah stopped attacking Israeli targets early on Wednesday, three Lebanese sources close to the group told Reuters. The group’s last public statement on its military activity was posted at 1 a.m. (2200 GMT Tuesday), saying it had targeted Israeli troops inside Lebanon on Tuesday evening.
The group is likely to issue a statement outlining its formal position on the ceasefire and on Netanyahu’s assertion that Lebanon is not included, the three Lebanese sources said.
French President Emmanuel Macron said the situation in Lebanon, a former French protectorate, remained critical and called for Lebanon to be included in the deal. Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, welcoming the US-Iran ceasefire, said Beirut would continue its efforts to ensure that Lebanon was included in any lasting regional peace agreement.
“Hezbollah was informed that it is part of the ceasefire – so we abided by it, but Israel as usual has violated it and committed massacres all across Lebanon,” senior Hezbollah lawmaker Ibrahim al-Moussawi told Reuters.
‘LEBANON CAN’T TAKE IT ANYMORE’
Most of Wednesday’s strikes were in civilian-populated areas, Israel’s military said. Hours before the strike, the military had issued warnings for some areas of southern Beirut and southern Lebanon. No such warning was given for central Beirut, which was also hit.
Following the strikes, Israeli military spokesperson Avichay Adraee claimed on X that Hezbollah had moved out of its traditional Shi’ite stronghold in southern Beirut’s Dahiyeh neighbourhood to religiously mixed areas of the city, including in the north.
Addressing Hezbollah, he said, Israel’s military will “pursue you and act with great force against you wherever you are”.
More than 1,500 people have been killed in Israel’s air and ground campaign across Lebanon, including more than 130 children and more than 100 women, since March 2 when Hezbollah started firing rockets at Israel in solidarity with Tehran.
Israel has issued evacuation orders covering around 15 percent of Lebanese territory since then, mostly in the south and in suburbs south of Beirut. More than 1.2 million people have been displaced, according to Lebanese authorities.
Israel has also pledged to occupy southern Lebanon up to the Litani River as part of a “security zone” it says is intended to protect its northern residents.
“Hopefully a ceasefire will be reached,” said Ahmed Harm, a 54-year-old man displaced from Beirut’s southern suburbs. “Lebanon can’t take it anymore. The country is collapsing economically, and everything is collapsing.”
Outside a school sheltering displaced people in Sidon, pillows and blankets were piled onto cars as some families held out hope of returning home soon. On an astroturf football field, one family had packed plastic bags with clothes, pots and pans, towels, sheets and blankets.
“We’re just waiting for the official decision from the top, so we can go back,” said Samar al-Saibany, who was displaced from a village in the south.
Local mayor Mustafa al-Zein said more than 28,000 people were sheltering in the area as of Tuesday night. He cautioned residents against trying to return before an official signal.
“In the south, give someone a signal to return, and he’ll return,” Zein said.
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‘A Lot of Work to Do’ to Reopen Strait of Hormuz, UK’s Starmer Says on Gulf Trip
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and US President Donald Trump (not pictured) hold a bilateral meeting at Trump Turnberry golf course in Turnberry, Scotland, Britain, July 28, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said on Wednesday there was still a lot of work to do to reopen the Strait of Hormuz following the US-Iran ceasefire, speaking during a visit to the Gulf.
Starmer will hold talks with regional leaders during the visit, which had been planned before the ceasefire was announced.
“We now … have a ceasefire, but there’s a lot of work to do, as you will appreciate, a lot of work to make sure that that ceasefire becomes permanent and brings about the peace that we all want to see,” he said in a speech to military personnel at a base in Saudi Arabia.
“But also a lot of work to do in relation to the Strait of Hormuz, which has an impact everywhere across the world.”
Starmer, who has been heavily criticized by US President Donald Trump for failing to support the US and Israeli strikes on Iran, has hosted multinational meetings on how allies could support the reopening of the key strait that is fundamental to oil and gas trade.
“It’s our job to make sure that the Strait is open, that we’re able to get the energy that the world needs out and stabilize the prices back in the United Kingdom,” Starmer told reporters.
British Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper also spoke to her US counterpart, Marco Rubio, on Tuesday, about diplomatic measures to secure the reopening of the Strait, including last week’s UK-led meeting that brought together over 40 countries to discuss the issue.
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Netanyahu Backs US–Iran Ceasefire, Says Deal Excludes Lebanon
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu participates in the state memorial ceremony for the fallen of the Iron Swords War on Mount Herzl, Jerusalem on Oct. 16, 2025. Photo: Alex Kolomoisky/POOL/Pool via REUTERS
i24 News – The office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu released a statement in the hours following the ceasefire agreement, announcing Israel’s support for the US-brokered two-week truce with Iran while clarifying that it does not extend to Lebanon.
In the statement, Netanyahu’s office said Israel backs the decision by US President Trump to suspend strikes against Iran for two weeks, on the condition that Tehran immediately reopens the Strait of Hormuz and halts all attacks against the United States, Israel, and countries in the region.
The statement added that Israel supports Washington’s broader objective of ensuring Iran no longer poses a nuclear, missile, or terrorism-related threat to regional and global security. According to the Prime Minister’s Office, the United States has reassured Israel that these goals will remain central in the upcoming negotiations.
“The United States has told Israel that it is committed to achieving these goals,” the statement said, noting that these priorities are shared by the US, Israel, and their regional allies.
It also stressed that the ceasefire does not apply to Lebanon, stating explicitly that “the two-week ceasefire does not include Lebanon.”
In the hours following the announcement, Iran launched additional missile strikes targeting Israel and several Gulf states before tensions appeared to ease toward morning.