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Polish city throws children’s bubble party on top of Jewish graves
(JTA) — The chief rabbi of Poland sent an angry letter to the mayor of Kazimierz Dolny, condemning the eastern Polish town for throwing a festive children’s bubble party on the site of a former Jewish cemetery where the dead are still buried.
The Kazimierz Dolny authorities filled the former cemetery with bubbles for Children’s Day, a holiday celebrated on June 1 in many European countries.
In the letter sent to to Mayor Artur Pomianowski on Sunday, Michael Schudrich wrote, “the party organized on the yard, which was after all fun on the graves, proves that for the municipal authorities, respect for human burial is not an important value.”
Schudrich told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that it was “outrageous” that Pomianowski posted a video of the bubble party on his mayoral Facebook page.
“Is this what we want to teach our children about how we treat the dead, our ancestors?” Schudrich said.
Pomianowski’s office did not respond to a request for comment.
The former cemetery, now a children’s play area next to an elementary school, was demolished roughly 50 years ago, but the bodies were not removed. Jewish headstones were used to pave roads and used as building materials throughout Eastern Europe during the communist era.
Schudrich said that for the past five years, representatives of Polish Jewry have been trying to work with several mayors of Kazimierz Dolny, including the current one, as well as the town council, to move the cemetery so that it would not function as a playground. He estimated that a few hundred Jews are buried at the site.
“We offered a really nice solution that would involve us helping to fund a new playground and moving the cemetery to an empty field nearby,” said Schudrich. “But they keep stalling or canceling meetings and it seems like the town just doesn’t care.”
It is believed that the 19th-century Rabbi Yehezkel Taub of Kuzhmiri is buried in the former cemetery. Haredi Orthodox followers of the Modzitz Hasidic dynasty, founded by the rabbi, flock to the cemetery-turned-playground each year to pay their respects, but their demand to protect the site has not been met.
Jews have lived in Kazimierz Dolny since the 14th century. The town today is a major local tourist attraction known for its stunning architecture on the banks of the Vistula river. Before the Nazi invasion in World War II, there were 1,400 Jews in Kazimierz Dolny, roughly half of its population. Fewer than 20 of the town’s Jewish inhabitants are thought to have survived the Holocaust.
In his letter to the town’s mayor, Schudrich wrote that the bubble party “puts into question whether further talks about the site make sense, and casts doubt on whether, regardless of religion, both parties are guided by common values drawn from it.”
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The post Polish city throws children’s bubble party on top of Jewish graves appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Israel’s Netanyahu Hopes to ‘Taper’ Israel Off US Military Aid in Next Decade
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks to the press on Capitol Hill, Washington, DC, July 8, 2025. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in an interview published on Friday that he hopes to “taper off” Israeli dependence on US military aid in the next decade.
Netanyahu has said Israel should not be reliant on foreign military aid but has stopped short of declaring a firm timeline for when Israel would be fully independent from Washington.
“I want to taper off the military within the next 10 years,” Netanyahu told The Economist. Asked if that meant a tapering “down to zero,” he said: “Yes.”
Netanyahu said he told President Donald Trump during a recent visit that Israel “very deeply” appreciates “the military aid that America has given us over the years, but here too we’ve come of age and we’ve developed incredible capacities.”
In December, Netanyahu said Israel would spend 350 billion shekels ($110 billion) on developing an independent arms industry to reduce dependency on other countries.
In 2016, the US and Israeli governments signed a memorandum of understanding for the 10 years through September 2028 that provides $38 billion in military aid, $33 billion in grants to buy military equipment and $5 billion for missile defense systems.
Israeli defense exports rose 13 percent last year, with major contracts signed for Israeli defense technology including its advanced multi-layered aerial defense systems.
US Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, a staunch Israel supporter and close ally of Trump, said on X that “we need not wait ten years” to begin scaling back military aid to Israel.
“The billions in taxpayer dollars that would be saved by expediting the termination of military aid to Israel will and should be plowed back into the US military,” Graham said. “I will be presenting a proposal to Israel and the Trump administration to dramatically expedite the timetable.”
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In Rare Messages from Iran, Protesters ask West for Help, Speak of ‘Very High’ Death Toll
Protests in Tehran. Photo: Iran Photo from social media used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law, via i24 News
i24 News – Speaking to Western media from beyond the nationwide internet blackout imposed by the Islamic regime, Iranian protesters said they needed support amid a brutal crackdown.
“We’re standing up for a revolution, but we need help. Snipers have been stationed behind the Tajrish Arg area [a neighborhood in Tehran],” said a protester in Tehran speaking to the Guardian on the condition of anonymity. He added that “We saw hundreds of bodies.”
Another activist in Tehran spoke of witnessing security forces firing live ammunition at protesters resulting in a “very high” number killed.
On Friday, TIME magazine cited a Tehran doctor speaking on condition of anonymity that just six hospitals in the capital recorded at least 217 killed protesters, “most by live ammunition.”
Speaking to Reuters on Saturday, Setare Ghorbani, a French-Iranian national living in the suburbs of Paris, said that she became ill from worry for her friends inside Iran. She read out one of her friends’ last messages before losing contact: “I saw two government agents and they grabbed people, they fought so much, and I don’t know if they died or not.”
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Report: US Increasingly Regards Iran Protests as Having Potential to Overthrow Regime
United States President Donald J Trump in White House in Washington, DC, USA, on Thursday, December 18, 2025. Photo: Aaron Schwartz via Reuters Connect.
i24 News – The assessment in Washington of the strength and scope of the Iran protests has shifted after Thursday’s turnout, with US officials now inclined to grant the possibility that this could be a game changer, Axios reported on Friday.
“The protests are serious, and we will continue to monitor them,” an unnamed senior US official was quoted as saying in the report.
Iran was largely cut off from the outside world on Friday after the Islamic regime blacked out the internet to curb growing unrest, as videos circulating on social media showed buildings ablaze in anti-government protests raging across the country.
US President Donald Trump warned the Ayatollahs of a strong response if security forces escalate violence against protesters.
“We’re watching it very closely. If they start killing people like they have in the past, I think they’re going to get hit very hard by the United States,” Trump told reporters when asked about the unrest in Iran.
The latest reported death toll is at 51 protesters, including nine children.