‘Positive’ meeting with Columbia head, Israeli education minister says
(JNS) — Israeli Education Minister Yoav Kisch had a “positive” meeting with Katrina Armstrong, the interim president of Columbia University, on Monday, the Consulate General of Israel in New York stated.
The meeting focused on “combating antisemitism on campus and promoting academic collaborations between Israel and the United States,” per the consulate.
The two agreed “on the importance of taking firm action against antisemitism on campus and ensuring that academic institutions do not allow a hostile environment against Jews,” per an Israeli readout.
The university leader also “emphasized her commitment to fighting this phenomenon and noted that Columbia University has already taken significant steps to address the issue,” according to the consulate.
“The fight against antisemitism on American academic campuses is essential, and I am pleased to see that Columbia University interim president prof. Armstrong is committed to this issue and is taking decisive action to eradicate this phenomenon,” Kirsch stated.
Marian Turski, Holocaust survivor and co-founder of Warsaw’s landmark Jewish museum, dies at 98
(JTA) — Marian Turski, a Polish-born survivor of Auschwitz who helped found the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw, has died. He was 98.
His death was announced Tuesday by the Polish magazine Polityk, where he worked as a columnist.
A journalist and historian who documented the past and present of Poland and its Jews, he served from 2000–2011 as chair of the Association of the Jewish Historical Institute in Poland, an initiator of the museum that opened to acclaim in 2013. He also served as chairman of the museum’s Council.
In January 2020, he drew international attention at the commemorations of the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, delivering a speech in which he warned that the Nazi death camp and the Holocaust did not “fall from the sky.”
Moshe Turbowicz (he later changed his name at the suggestion of communist colleagues who felt it was too Jewish) was born in 1926 in Druskienniki, Poland, a city now part of Lithuania. As a teenager he and his family were confined to the Lodz ghetto from 1940 to 1944, when he was deported to Auschwitz. He survived death marches from Auschwitz to Buchenwald and later to Theresienstadt, where he was liberated.
Montreal synagogue defaced with swastika on Shabbat
(JTA) — A Montreal synagogue was graffitied with a swastika on Shabbat, drawing condemnation from Canadian officials as well as a defiant response from the synagogue’s rabbi.
A congregant at Temple Emanu-El Beth Sholom, a Reform congregation in the city, noticed the 3-foot-wide symbol on the synagogue’s side on Saturday afternoon. At the time, according to the Canadian Jewish News, members had been rehearsing the synagogue’s Purim spiel, a whimsical pageant performed on the holiday of Purim next month.
The swastika was removed by Corey Fleischer, an activist whose nonprofit, Erasing Hate, scrubs off hate speech graffiti. Police are investigating and have yet to identify a suspect.
The following morning, the synagogue’s Rabbi Lisa Grushcow said in a social media video that she wasn’t surprised by the graffiti, citing heightened levels of antisemitism in Canada and worldwide.
The graffiti is the latest antisemitic incident in Montreal over the past year-plus. In December, another synagogue in the city was firebombed for the second time in just over a year; the first such attack took place in November 2023, shortly after antisemitism began to spike following Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel. That same month, shots were fired at an Orthodox girls’ school in Montreal. Antisemitic incidents have occurred at other Jewish institutions throughout Canada as well.
Trump admin giving Arab states space to formulate their own Gaza plan
(JNS) — The Trump administration has yet to get the sense that any pan-Arab plan for Gaza is coming together, and it believes that the matter will become clearer after a five-nation meeting on the subject on Friday, JNS learned.
Saudi Arabia is set to host Egyptian, Jordanian, Qatari and Emirati leaders on Friday to work toward a plan for Gaza’s reconstruction while ensuring that Gazans aren’t relocated.
Several Arab countries reacted angrily to U.S. President Donald Trump’s surprise announcement earlier this month that he envisioned a U.S. takeover of Gaza to revitalize it after its destruction in the war between Israel and Hamas.
Trump demanded that Egypt and Jordan absorb nearly 2 million Gazans and has acknowledged that they may not be able to return to the Strip.
The Trump administration believes that the Saudis, Jordanians and Egyptians have ideas to bring to the table in offering an alternative to Trump’s plan, which the U.S. president said he would welcome. The White House aims to give the Arabs space to formulate their plan before weighing in further, JNS learned.
