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I attended a bar mitzvah in Jerusalem on Saturday. At Kol HaNeshama, the Reform synagogue in Baka where I used to pray – or, more accurately, join in the singsong and close my eyes and pretend to meditate while other congregants were meditating (or pretending to) – after making Aliyah, 14 years ago.

And it really was very pleasant.

The "bible" Bible for Reform Jews is apparently W. Gunther Plaut's The Torah: A Modern Commentary. And its preface, describing the Torah's origins, certainly made a lot more sense to me on Saturday morning than any account I ever heard during my Orthodox upbringing, either in Britain's United Synagogue or (even more certainly) at Hasmonean Grammar School for Boys.

George Galloway plumbed new depths of mendacity and nastiness with his column on 28 December (“Dark Echoes of the Holocaust”)

Recently Professor Hiss, a forensic scientist in Israel , has said that in 1990 body parts were removed from corpses without the permission of relatives. When precisely similar news emerged about the Alder Hey hospital in Liverpool in the UK, balanced newspaper articles were written about how to avoid a recurrence.

By contrast Galloway in the case of Israel makes hateful comparisons with the Nazi Dr Mengele and suggests that Hiss’s news confirms the story that appeared in Swedish media earlier this year, notably in the newspaper Aftonbladet. (Making Holocaust references in the context of Israel is anti-Semitic, see EUMC Definition of Antisemitism).

English courts issuing an arrest warrant for Israel's former Foreign Minister, then defining for its Jews who shall and shall not be one of their number. Just another week for the Jews of England.

These decisions were so short-sighted – not to say absurd, discriminatory, and even dangerous – that they don't merit my time. And then readers of melchett mike will ask why I choose to live in Israel!

True, this blog highlights often disagreeable excesses of life here. But they are also largely comical. And I certainly wouldn't swap them for life back in Blighty, which is proving even less 'my' country than I had already thought.

http://www.mcb.org.uk/article_detail.php?article=announcement-850

The Muslim Council of Britain has written to Foreign Secretary David Miliband to protest at his seeming willingness to change the Universal Jurisdiction legislation to prevent individuals being able to achieve arrest warrants - as happened just over a week ago in the Tsipi Livni case.

The MCB's letter is full of inconsistencies and non-sequiturs. For example they argue that the change would "treat political friends differently and indeed more favourably than those who may face same allegations but for whom a different process will apply." What on earth do they mean - Universal Jurisdiction can be used on anyone from any country if they are suspected of certain crimes. It has nothing to do with "political friends".

Fantastic listening from the best show on religion and faith issues.

It is extremely seldom that any aspect of my religious education interferes with my relatively secular equilibrium. But Biblical lessons and warnings about the existential dangers to the People of Israel from certain of its own behaviours are starting to appear to me worryingly relevant for the modern State of Israel.

Last month, a real estate agent in Jaffa offered to bring me in on a deal, which was about to close, if I agreed to increase his commission from two to three percent (no little chutzpah in itself). In the end, no details of the property were revealed, but, last week, I was introduced to the seller by chance in the local supermarket. The deal had hit a hitch, and he brought me to the apartment to take a look.

The following day, the agent – who had somehow heard about this opportunistic meeting – called to inform me that, if I were to purchase the apartment, I would still owe him the commission. "Ata yechol likfotz" (literally "You can jump") I advised him in my most fluent Hebrew (i.e., that of abuse!), warning him to never call me again. (I am seriously considering obtaining an agent's license, in the – perhaps naive – belief that an honest practitioner will soon attract clients.)

Getting the message through to our local Community that we will not stand for the hatred being put out by the English Defence League and their ilk. The following was posted by the Harrow Central Mosque:

"Today’s demonstration by the Stop Islamisation of Europe and the English Defence League was in every measure a miserable defeat for the hate mongers and the Islamaphobes.

The Harrow Central Mosque is extremely grateful that people from so many backgrounds and faiths stood shoulder to shoulder in support of and in solidarity towards this great centre of peace and harmony."

Defra
Nobel House
17 Smith Square
London SW1P 3JR

Dear Hilary Benn

The Zionist Federation was very disturbed to see the ‘labelling’ advice released by DEFRA on 10 December. I set out below six reasons why the advice is misplaced.