Your Daily Spiel is The CJN‘s daily roundup of trending stories in the Jewish world
CANADA
After an investigation by The CJN as to why the Chicken Farmers of Ontario (CFO) hadn’t picked a company to provide local kosher chickens, Premier Kosher Inc. has officially been granted the rights to provide Ontario-raised and processed chickens to the kosher market.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel recently delivered an address to the Inter-Parliamentary Coalition for Combating Antisemitism (ICCA), which was created in part thanks to former Canadian MP Irwin Cotler. Cotler said a “common theme” that ran through the conference was that “anti-Semitism is the oldest and most enduring of hatreds, and most lethal, and it is rearing its ugly head again today.”
More boycott Israel stickers have been found in grocery stores throughout Canada, provided by Montreal-based Canadians for Justice & Peace in the Middle East, or CJPME. “Warning!” the stickers state. “Do not buy this product. Made in Israel: A country violating international law, the 4th Geneva Convention, and fundamental human rights…#BDS.”
UNITED STATES
Hillary Clinton ended her address at today’s AIPAC conference by calling Donald Trump a bully. “We need steady hands, not a president who says he is neutral on Monday, pro-Israel on Tuesday and who knows what on Wednesday,” she said. “America can’t ever be neutral when it comes to Israel’s security and survival.”
Rabbi Shmuley Boteach and anti-Israel journalist Max Blumenthal got into a heated debate about the Israel-Palestinian crisis yesterday, in front of the convention hall where the 2016 AIPAC conference is being held.
VERBALLY ATTACKED BY RABID ISRAEL HATER MAX BLUMENTHAL AT AIPACClearly our full page New York Times ad devastated him – https://shmuley.com/2016/03/20/nyt/
Posted by Rabbi Shmuley Boteach on Sunday, March 20, 2016
Violinist Joshua Bell will use a 300-year-old Stradivarius violin during his performance at the Lincoln Center in New York today. The violin used to belong to Bronislaw Huberman, a Jewish-Polish violinist who founded the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, which allowed him to provide refuge to an estimated 1,000 European Jews before the outbreak of World War II. “I am always touched to think how many of the orchestra and orchestra members are direct descendants of the musicians Huberman saved from the Holocaust — with funds raised by concerts performed on the same instrument I play every day,” Bell said.
New York police are investigating a possible anti-Semitic hate crime that took place in Brooklyn last week, after an African-American woman allegedly threw a rock at a Jewish man, yelling “Hitler should have killed you all.”
ISRAEL
In a “historic mission,” seventeen Yemenite Jews were secretly airlifted to Israel Monday, completing Israel’s bid to save Yemen’s Jewish community. Among of the Yemenite Jews was a rabbi who brought a Torah scroll “believed to be between 500 and 600 years old.”
After several months worth of complaints, TIME Magazine finally updated an article where it previously only referred to Palestinian terrorist Bahaa Allyan (who killed three) as a “graphic designer.” TIME did not issue an apology in its update, however.
One of the men killed by Allyan was American-Israeli citizen Richard Lakin. At a recent UN convention in Geneva, his son Micah Avni called on the UN to condemn Palestinian terror. “Your failure to condemn Palestinian violence and your continued rationalization of Palestinian terror is pushing peace away, making more death inevitable,” Avni said.
A 17-year-old Israeli ice skater, Daniel Samohin, won first place in the World Junior Skating Championship held in Debrecen, Hungary, taking home the gold. Samohin received an overall score of 236.65 points, and defeated silver medalist Canadian Nicolas Nadeau, who scored 224.76 points.
WORLD
According to new reports, the Istanbul suicide bomber who killed three Israelis and one Iranian (and left dozens injured) was targeting the Israeli group, following them as they made their way from their hotel to the restaurant and scene of the attack.
In Bulgaria, officials have claimed that Omar Nayef, a Palestinian terrorist wanted by Israel for murder who was seeking extradition, was likely not murdered, dispelling theories that Israel assassinated him.
The mayor of Athens has joined sixty other European mayors who have signed a declaration against anti-Semitism. “I chose to sign because it is my conviction that the first value in civilized society is human dignity,” said Mayor Giorgos Kaminis.
A Chabad rabbi in Nepal helped save two Israeli backpackers who were stranded on a ridge in the Himalayas and were suffering from hypothermia at an altitude of 15,500 feet. Rabbi Chezki Lifshitz and his wife are both Israeli, and have rescued dozens of backpackers over the last 16 years.
The Anne Frank Foundation is outraged after a Dutch company has launched an Anne Frank-themed “escape room.” The room is reportedly based on the apartment Frank and her family hid from the Nazis during World War II, and “shows little empathy” for the victims of the Holocaust, according to the Foundation.
CULTURE
Mister Gaga, a new documentary about Israeli choreographer Ohad Naharin, was a huge success at SXSW in Austin this weekend, winning the audience award in the Documentary Spotlight category.
Batman v Superman doesn’t come out until the end of the week, but some lucky fans got a first glimpse, and their praise for Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman appears to be unanimous. And people thought she didn’t fit the bill….
.@GalGadot‘s entrance as Wonder Woman in #BatmanvsSuperman was hands down the best part of the movie. #bvspremiere #whoruntheworld
— Erin Elizabeth Mizer (@EEMizer) March 21, 2016
Drake and his good friend Rihanna came together for a mitzvah, granting a Miami cancer patient’s wish to spend time with them together.
@ovomegann ❤️❤️ #Drake #Rihanna A photo posted by Drake’s #1 Fan (@aboodovo) on
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