JC articles

Just how far will flight costs fall?

Sharron Livingston — Sat, 25 May 2013 21:45:43 +0100

I never thought I would say this, but British travellers can finally look forward to cheaper fares to Israel. This is because after eight years of negotiations, and incessant lobbying by former Tourism Minister Stas Misezhnikov, an Israel-European Union open skies agreement was signed last month.

From April 2014 any airline will be able to fly into Israel from any city in the 27 member states of the EU without restriction. Prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, finance minister Yair Lapid and economics minister Naftali Bennett have all said at different times that the price of flights will drop dramatically.

Currently, each airline has to negotiate separately to fly into Israel and can only fly from the country in which they are registered. This is why there are so few scheduled direct flights from the UK — just two from Luton (El Al and easyJet), two from Stansted (British Airways and El Al), two from Heathrow (El Al, BA) and one from Manchester (Jet2). And even though easyJet is known as a low-cost airline, fares across the board are pretty similar.

By the time the open skies roll-out is complete in 2017, the scene should look very different. A quick internet search brings up several airlines who fly to Israel from the UK but with a stop-off or two. These include Alitalia, Iberia, Air Berlin, Lufthansa, Air France and Vueling. Any one of them could take up the mantle to fly direct.

Ryanair’s Michael O’Leary may well be a contender, having only last week confirmed his airline’s interest.

The EU-USA open skies model, which was implemented in 2008, saw a huge increase in competition but also in fare categories, making it difficult to compare prices. Nevertheless, on average, international fares fell by 20 per cent and sometimes up to 40 per cent in the first half of 2009, mainly on the premium seats.

On that basis, a decrease of 20 to 30 per cent on ticket prices to Israel —as predicted by the director of Israel Government Tourism Office in the UK, Naama Oryan-Kaplan, last week — would not be an unreasonable expectation. However, reductions may well be seen more in business class fares, with their higher mark-up, rather than economy.

The question is whether open skies will create a price war similar to that which followed the deregulation of European airspace in the 1990s. At that time, full-service airlines such as BA, had their profits dented by a combination of competition from low-cost carriers and the economic downturn. Some national airlines (Swiss Air, for example) even had to be baled out.

Speculation abounds, but I believe that open skies could reap benefits for flyers who can look forward to both cheaper flights and improved service as the process unfolds.

Iranian troops are fighting in Syria, says US

Anshel Pfeffer — Fri, 24 May 2013 18:00:43 +0100

The US State Department finally acknowledged this week what has been common knowledge in the Middle East for months — that the Syrian civil war has become a conflict between regional and global players in which foreign fighters and proxies are playing a growing role.

An unnamed American official confirmed claims that have been made regularly over the past two years, that the Al-Qods force of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps is fighting alongside Syrian troops to prop up the regime of President Bashar al-Assad.

Russia has already announced that it is standing by its Syrian ally and will continue sending him advanced weapons.

The Russian government has insisted that the S-300 anti-aircraft missiles and the P-800 Yakhont anti-shipping cruise missiles are for “defensive purposes”, and that Moscow is merely completing contracts signed years ago.

Russia’s commitment to the al-Assad cause was emphasised this week when 11 of its warships performed manoeuvres off the Syrian coast. It was the largest exercise in the Mediterranean undertaken by the Russian navy since the dissolution of the Soviet Union.

If Russia supplies Syria with the S-300 missiles, capable of hitting multiple targets at ranges of up to 200 kilometres, retaliatory air-strikes against regime targets will become more difficult.

However former Israeli military intelligence chief, retired general Amos Yadlin, commented that Israel could defend itself against the S-300.

Many experts believe that in its current state, the Syrian army is not capable of operating such a complex system.

But the threat was deemed serious enough by Israel for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to urge Russian President Vladimir Putin at a brief meeting at the Black Sea resort of Sochi two weeks ago, not to transfer the missiles to Syria.

The Russians have so far refused the Israeli and western appeals.

Your child needs exercise

Fri, 24 May 2013 15:54:09 +0100

W e all know that having an active childhood is generally a good thing for our children, but there are genuine health benefits associated with getting into exercise at a young age. Enjoying an active childhood pays dividends both in a child’s current health and in their long-term attitude to exercise.

Obviously, keeping youngsters moving allows them to maintain a normal body weight, even if they’re eating some of the more sugary options children tend to go for. Statistics from the most recent survey in the UK show that as many as 25 per cent of boys and 33 per cent of girls are overweight or obese. Experts now believe parents are so accustomed to seeing overweight children, they don’t recognise obesity in their own offspring. But exercise has other physical health benefits for children: it contributes to the development of healthy muscles, bones and joints as well as a healthy heart and lungs. It is also good for children to help develop co-ordination and movement control.

Exercise for any age group releases hormones linked to an improvement in mood. But even in the long term, studies have shown that in those young people suffering with any anxiety or mood problems, exercise can help with symptoms. For all children, exercise and sports encourages self confidence, self expression and integration with others: these are important tools for social development in children.

According to the World Health Organisation, school age children should get an hour of activity a day. That includes “sport”, but also running around at school, walking home or anything that would be moderate intensity activity. A good activity will make them huff and puff! This doesn’t have to be in one go but can be built up through the day. In young children in primary school this is relatively easy to achieve, as their default play position is to run around. We know from the recent BMA report that more than a quarter of children are sadly not doing enough exercise.

Psychological studies show that attitudes to sport and exercise are determined by family and childhood experience: if a child is in the habit of being active, this stays with them long term with all the health benefits that confers.

www.Twitter.com/Dr_Ellie

Young Israelis claim squash silver

Fri, 24 May 2013 14:47:19 +0100

Israel’s under-15 team finished runners-up at a competition in Gerona, Spain.

Having knocked out the favourites and no. 1 seeds France in an earlier round, the young Israeli players drew praise, from all teams and their managers, for their sportsmanship and tenacity in a competition where they succumbed to England in the finals.

(Pictured from left:) Raz Friedman, Sahar Kedar, Yalli Shas, Ido Burshtein, Nadav Wilensky (coach), Stan Tannen (chairman of Israel Junior Squash)

Hague says UK ready to 'assist in any way' in quest for Middle East peace

Zoe Winograd — Fri, 24 May 2013 13:05:13 +0100

British Foreign Secretary William Hague has told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that the UK “stands ready to assist in any way” in advancing the peace process.

The two leaders met as part of Mr Hague’s visit to Israel this week alongside US Secretary of State John Kerry.

Mr Netanyahu and Mr Hague discussed peace negotiations , security concerns over Iran and Syria, and relations between the UK and Israel.

Mr Hague said after the meeting: “I reiterated the UK’s strong support for Mr Kerry’s efforts to relaunch the peace process and I welcomed Prime Minister Netanyahu’s commitment to a two-state solution. The UK’s position is well known, we want to see a two-state solution, with a secure and universally recognised Israel living alongside a viable State of Palestine, with Jerusalem as a shared capital. We stand ready to assist in any way we can to help make progress to this end.

“The UK and Israel are close friends and allies and I attach great importance to our bilateral relationship. Our collaboration on hi-tech and science is second to none and today we affirmed the UK and Israel’s co - operation on security issues, including Iran. As a friend and ally, Britain is fully committed to Israel’s security needs.”

Before he met Mr Netanyahu, Mr Hague told reporters that the building of settlements “on occupied land” was to blame for the decline in British support for Israel.

Mr Hague told reporters: “Israel has lost some of its support in Britain and in other European countries over time — this is something I’ve often pointed out to Israeli leaders — because of settlement activity, which we condemn.”

“We strongly disagree with settlements on occupied land. Israel is a country we work with in many ways, but we do disapprove of settlements.”

He added: “We want to see both Israelis and Palestinians really commit themselves to the peace process while there is still a chance of a two-state solution.”

In a meeting with the Israeli president, Shimon Peres, Mr Hague emphasised his determination to make progress in securing a peace deal.

He said : “It is a crucial time in the entire region with the Iranian nuclear programme , the tragic situation in Syria , and our hope that we can, through supporting Mr Kerry and his work, really help to make some decisive moves forward for permanent peace.”

Mr Peres commended Mr Hague for making Britain's position on Iran, terror and peace extremely clear.

"In spite of all the difficulties the time is right for peace. I can see positive developments on our side, on the Palestinian side and on the Arab side.”

Mr Hague also stressed his support for Mr Kerry's efforts to relaunch the peace process at a meeting with Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah.

Meanwhile Mr Kerry has expressed his hope “to surprise people” in making positive steps towards peace.

Mr Kerry said: “There have been bitter years of disappointment. It is our hope that by being methodical, careful, patient - but detailed and tenacious - that we can lay on a path ahead that can conceivably surprise people and certainly exhaust the possibilities of peace."

Review: These Shining Lives

John Nathan — Fri, 24 May 2013 11:03:21 +0100

North London’s newest theatre, just a stone’s throw from Finsbury Park tube, is already being hailed as a miracle — and no wonder. The £2.5m build costs have been met without a penny of subsidy.

And with two performance spaces, the place has the feel of a serious venue capable of attracting equally serious talent. Maureen Lipman is slated to perform there in July in Oliver Cotton’s new play Daytona.

The theatre’s inaugural production is a worthy offering in both senses of the word. Written by Melanie Marnich, the play, first seen in Baltimore in 2008, tells the true story of a group of Chicago women factory workers whose job was to paint luminous clock and watch faces. They were given good wages and, it later emerged, fatal radium poisoning.

Loveday Ingram’s well-acted production lifts some solid, if at times stolid writing. Marnich rather clunkily uses narration as her storytelling technique. Her heroine, Catherine Donohue, quickly transmits that hers is a posthumously told story, which does nothing for the evening’s tension.

Still, the cast, led by Charity Wakefield as Donohue, strongly evokes the female camaraderie of women workers who had received the right to vote only a decade earlier.

It's all change at L'Equipe

Danny Caro — Fri, 24 May 2013 11:00:00 +0100

Josh Lewis and Daniel Cordell will lead L’Equipe FC in the 2013/14 season, the club has announced.

Both players have featured prominently for the club over the past six seasons and have been rewarded with two-year contracts.

A club statement said: "Josh and Daniel have given their all on the pitch and we have no doubt that even more time and energy will go into their new roles off the pitch. We wish them the best of luck."

The new management team replace David Prager who has stepped down after two years in the hotseat.

The statement continued: "David has put a great deal of blood and sweat into this job and the team are very grateful for all his hard work.

"We look forward to seeing his return to the pitch and at least five goals will be expected during the course of next season."

Review: Relatively Speaking

John Nathan — Fri, 24 May 2013 10:56:23 +0100

The conversation based on a misunderstanding is a well-used comedy device. You know the kind of thing, one person is talking about their dog while the other thinks he is talking about his wife. The genius of Alan Ayckbourn’s 1967 West End hit (his first) was that he managed to sustain this kind of gag for almost an entire play.

This comedy four-hander opens in a grubby London garret — love nest to twentysomethings Greg (Max Bennett) and Ginny (Kara Tointon). When the action moves to a sedate house in Buckinghamshire, it emerges that Ginny is trying to extricate herself from an affair with the older Philip (Jonathan Coy), who Greg mistakenly thinks is Ginny’s father. So when Greg turns up and asks Philip’s permission to marry his daughter, Philip is under the impression that Greg is asking his permission to marry his wife Sheila (Felicity Kendal), who Philip suspects is having her own affair. Got it? Never mind.

Ayckbourn’s structure quite brilliantly sustains misapprehensions for nearly two hours. Yet Lindsay Posner’s no more than solidly performed production is a comedy-free zone for much of this time. You can’t really blame the cast. As clever as Ayckbourn’s conceit is, the play is populated by characters immersed in attitudes that either date or diminish them.

Philip is your classic middle-aged chauvinist, Sheila is his meek housewife and although Ginny seems an independent-minded girl, in Greg she has hitched herself to an insecure whinger who wants to get married just a month after meeting her.

Interestingly, another revival playing in the West End — Peter Nichols’s Passion Play (1981) — is similarly brilliant in its construction and also features a man in late middle-age having an affair with a woman young enough to be his daughter. And that play is also almost fatally dated by the attitudes of its protagonists.

To be clear, this is not a call to ban plays with old fashioned opinions. It’s a call to rewrite them. Or at least revamp them. Why does a play have to be a Victorian romp before it can be honed into something that works as well now as it did originally? After all, when Richard Bean got his hands on Boucicault’s script for the National Theatre production of London Assurance a few years back, it was one of the funniest shows in London.

Bean not only made the play funnier — he took the opportunity to undermine its long-running antisemitic jokes.

And if Patrick Marber can polish a 100-year-old script such as Trelawny of the Wells as he successfully did for the Donmar recently, why can’t a script nearly half that age, such as Ayckbourn’s, receive similar treatment?

Football in brief: May 24

Danny Caro — Fri, 24 May 2013 10:38:08 +0100

Tom Rosenthal, the son of former Liverpool, Spurs and Israel striker Ronnie, has been awarded a full-time scholarship at Watford.

* Edgar Davids has agreed to stay on as head coach at Barnet FC following their relegation in the Blue Square Conference Premier.

* Former Chelsea striker Ben Sahar has been handed a two-year contract extension by Hertha Berlin who have been promoted to the Bundesliga.

Brilliant Bohn is the king of Herts

Danny Caro — Fri, 24 May 2013 10:36:26 +0100

Jeremy Bohn warmed up for this summer’s Maccabiah Games by winning the Herts Salver at Aldwickbury Park.

The Team GB captain, who is a member of Hartsbourne Golf Club, produced an excellent finish to edge out Luke Hynes of Porters Park.

Bohn said: "I had a poor 2012 but was pleased to qualify for the Maccabiah team once more, though I knew I would have to improve my game if I am to compete for medals out there.

"As the weather has been so poor this year, hardly any golf has been possible, so I have been concentrating on getting as fit as I can and practising with a new set of irons I acquired."

Bohn, 41, achieved the best score of the day, going round in a two-under-par 69. Starting his round on the 10th tee, he reached the turn in 32 shots (-3) and proceeded to cover the tougher front nine in 37 (+1) to win by one shot and qualify for the County Championship.

He said: “It’s great to win the County qualifier, especially as so many of the top amateur players are 20 years younger and full-time golfers once they leave school.

"Now I hope to compete well at the County Championships in June, as well as continue my form through the season in the Glancy and, most importantly, at the Maccabiah in Israel.

"I played really well, but the key is always to hole some putts and I did that at crucial times."

Omri’s an example to us all

Danny Caro — Fri, 24 May 2013 10:32:52 +0100

In a week when hundreds of young Jewish footballers up and down the country are having trials for new clubs, it’s quite fitting that Omri Altman has been given the nod by Fulham.

Sadly, some of these boys will be told they haven’t made the grade and/or are not good enough. In essence, thanks, but no thanks.

Indeed, Omri was told precisely that by both Arsenal and Liverpool; two clubs who have produced some of the finest young talent this country has ever seen.

Omri’s progress at Craven Cottage is incredibly exciting news for Israel, especially ahead of the under-21 Euro finals. There’s no doubt he’s one of the ones to watch.

As I’ve mentioned before, attack is the one area where the Israel national football team lacks real class, a game-changer if you like.

I recall how there were high hopes for another young Israeli, Ben Sahar, when he joined Chelsea aged 17. He failed to cut it, although in fairness he wasn’t given much of a chance, but the early signs look good for Omri.

Together with the coaches at Fulham, he has transformed his game and if he can be even half the player that Dimitar Berbatov is, that can only be a good thing. Now the club is confident he can take his game up a level.

So there is a lesson for any youngster feeling sorry for themselves if they haven’t made the team, and their friends have. Get your chin up, keep working hard and do your best to prove people wrong.

Much like life, football is all about how you deal with knockbacks. It’s character-building and a case of trying to turn a negative into a positive. Rejection often leads to dejection, but Omri has already shown he has something about him.

Having been turned down by two of England’s top clubs, he could have walked away from the game with his tail between his legs, but he remodelled himself and I can’t wait to see him in action against Stuart Peace’s men next month.

* The JC MSFL season reaches its conclusion on Sunday, with the final game seeing Camden Park looking to wrap up the Division One title.

The team, managed by Josh Marks, requires a point against Temple Fortune, for whom Shai Davidi was recently named Player of the Year.

Glenthorne manager Sam Rosenthal this week pointed out that Camden’s title hopes have been boosted by several forfeited matches, so let’s hope for the sake of the league that they do it in style.

Super Sela on the up

Simon Griver — Fri, 24 May 2013 10:32:03 +0100

Dudi Sela regained his place in the top 100 after winning the Bosun Challenger tournament in South Korea.

The Israeli climbed to 88th place in the ATP rankings and although he has refused to play in the qualifying rounds of the French Open, he hopes to make the main draw as a lucky loser.

Sela will play in the Nottingham Challenger next month followed by the Wimbledon qualifiers.

In 2011, Sela won both competitions in Korea and Nottingham and was given a wild card entry to Wimbledon.

Minister to rule on alleged sex offender Grynhaus’s deportation

Jonathan Kalmus — Fri, 24 May 2013 10:30:59 +0100

A British man is waiting for Israel’s interior minister to decide whether he will be deported to face trial for sex offences in the UK.

Todros Grynhaus, 48, from Salford, fled to Israel on a false passport shortly after he pleaded not guilty to seven counts of the historic sexual or indecent assault of three children.

He was arrested in Jerusalem in February but has appealed against his deportation under Israel’s Law of Return.

This week, a Jerusalem judge gave interior minister Gideon Sa’ar until Sunday to decide whether concerns about public safety are strong enough to deny him Israeli citizenship. The ministry confirmed the decision would be made within “a few days”.

Mr Grynhaus would have to be released if his appeal for citizenship were granted. However, his lawyer has said that he expects the British Home Office to request an immediate re-arrest to return the former teacher to the UK under its bilateral extradition agreement with Israel.

Brilliant Brand fills his boots

Fri, 24 May 2013 10:29:12 +0100

Adam Brand continued his preparations for the 19th Maccabiah Games by blasting an incredible 200 not out to steer London Maccabi Vale to victory in the Middlesex Sunday League.

The Team GB captain came to the crease after 10 overs, joining opening batsman Danny Caro, and together the pair took the game away from Rajput Saraj, adding 261 for the second wicket.

Brand smashed 10 sixes and 25 boundaries in a belligerent innings and passed the 200-mark with an overthrow on the final ball of the 40th over as LMV finished on 329-3.

LMV went on to win by 199 runs, with Jonathan Freedman, Michael Ziff, Jordan Urban and Joseph Greenwall-Cohen each taking two wickets.

LMV captain Neil Lederman said: "It was a brilliant win to kickstart our Middlesex League season, showing that even though the club has put a lot of resources into the colts set-up over the last few seasons, sometimes it takes a couple of experienced players to get the job done.

"It was a great knock from our now senior statesman in the side. We can only hope he takes this form into the Chess Valley League, which we have entered for the first time this year, and on to the Maccabiah where we both hope to be bringing back a medal."

Altman on the up at Fulham

Simon Griver — Fri, 24 May 2013 10:26:54 +0100

Omri Altman has been handed an improved two-year contract by Fulham and promoted to the club’s first-team squad.

The 19-year-old Israeli impressed during 24 appearances for Fulham’s under-21 side this season and over the next two year he will be given an opportunity to prove if he is Premier League material.

A former captain of Maccabi Tel Aviv’s youth team, the Cottagers have converted Altman from an attacking midfielder into a striker. Altman joined the Fulham Academy in 2011 after trials with Liverpool and Arsenal and signed a two-year professional contract on turning 18 early last year.

Altman will be a key player for Israel at next month’s Euro under-21 Championships. Israel hosts the tournament and has been drawn in the same group as England, Norway and Italy.

Altman’s agent Ronen Katsav said: "Omri is continuing to progress and it is very exciting to see a 19-year-old doing so well at a club like Fulham.

"I hope we will be impressed by the progress he is making during the Euros."

Altman himself has said that he has been enormously influenced over the past season by the presence of Bulgarian star Dimitar Berbatov at Craven Cottage.

Scottish Jews condemn the Church of Scotland

JCReporter — Fri, 24 May 2013 10:06:00 +0100

Scottish Jews have condemned the Church of Scotlands decision to approve a controversial report on Israel, calling it an unacceptable attack on Judaism.

The Scottish Council of Jewish Communities said the Church had provided a veneer of theological respectability for what is effectively a call for the destruction of the state of Israel.

The Church adopted the report at its general assembly attended by more than 700 ministers and elders.

Welcoming the move, convener Rev Sally Foster-Fulton said the document highlighted the continued occupation by the state of Israel and injustices faced by the Palestinian people as a consequence.

She stressed it was not an attack on the Jewish people.

An initial version had questioned Jewish claims to the land of Israel but was rewritten after criticism from the Jewish community. Mrs Foster-Fulton acknowledged that some of the original language had been misguided.

Talking to Strangers

Stephen Pollard — Fri, 24 May 2013 09:33:37 +0100

If you're a regular JC reader, you'll have seen - and, I hope, laughed at - the columns of Peter Rosengard.

Peter's autobiography is effectively a book-length version of those columns. To me, that makes it an automatic recommendation. When I first came across Peter, I simply couldn't - still can't - understand why he wasn't writing regularly elsewhere. I've yet to read a piece of his that hasn't had me in stitches.

Peter is the British Larry David, with one big difference. He's not a journalist or a writer. He has a real job - and one at which he is astonishingly successful. Let me explain.

I'd been editing the JC for a few months when I got a call. "Hello, my name is Peter Rosengard. I am a life insurance salesman and I wondered if you would like to have breakfast with me at Claridge's."

My father taught me many things, but one of the most important was "if you don't ask, you don't get". That's how Peter works. He rings up total strangers and is completely upfront. He is after your business but if you're not interested in that, well, there's always breakfast at Claridge's. And, as he says in the book, who says no to that?

I didn't. The sheer chutzpah got me to say yes.

He told me that he used to have a column. I looked it up, and emailed him there and then to ask him to write for the JC.

You see, although Jews have a well deserved reputation for wit and comedy, there aren't that many who can do it on paper and regularly. Peter is one of them.

His life seems to have been one long definition of chutzpah. He is in the Guinness Book of Records for selling the largest life insurance policy ever, a story that has you breathless with admiration for the nous with which he pursued it.

The idea of reading the autobiography of a life insurance salesman isn't the easiest sell ever, but this is really a series of fabulous yarns, retold with wit and panache and which, if you enjoy his columns, you will love.

There's a serious and thoroughly admirable side to Peter, too. In recent years he has pushed his charity, the 9/11 London Project, like a dog with a bone and has brought over a sculpture crafted from steel from the World Trade Centre as a symbol of the charity's bigger project - an educational programme for schools.

My one worry is that in being so positive about his book, he will invite me to Claridge's for breakfast again.

Every time I say yes to scrambled eggs and smoked salmon, I end up with yet more bloody life insurance.

Expert on settlers settles at Oxford University

Simon Rocker — Fri, 24 May 2013 09:30:59 +0100

The Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies has finally filled a prestigious academic post after a previous candidate pulled out because of new immigration rules.

Dr Sara Hirschhorn, a post-doctoral fellow in Israel studies at Brandeis University in the United States, is due to become the new Sidney Brichto Fellow in Israel studies in September.

An expert on the settler movement, she will combine the role with a research lectureship at Oxford University.

Israeli academic, Dr Hizky Shoham, from Tel Aviv University, had initially been appointed to the post. But, according to the centre’s president, Dr David Ariel, regulations introduced by the UK Border Agency had meant it was “impossible” to obtain a work permit in time for him to start the job in January.

The university had then been required by the Border Agency to re-advertise the post. “At that point, Dr Shoham decided not to reapply and accepted a position in Israel,” Dr Ariel said. “This allowed the selection committee to consider a strong pool of new applicants, of which Dr Hirschhorn was the first choice.”

He said: “We are confident we have, at last, found the right candidate and look forward to her arrival in Oxford.”

How Hague’s visit can help keep peace process on track

Dermot Kehoe — Fri, 24 May 2013 09:30:29 +0100

'A friend is someone who knows all about you and still loves you" - Elbert Hubbard.

Israel and the UK are friends. William Hague has described the UK's relationship with Israel as going "far beyond the realm of diplomatic relations… It is based on bonds between families and communities as well as shared values and common interests. Israel is a friend and a strategic partner of this country." Therefore, his visit to Israel is important and welcome.

The UK-Israel partnership is based on shared values, an understanding that those values are challenged by common threats, and a determination to tackle those threats together.

The threats include Iran's nuclear ambitions, Syria's deteriorating civil war and the rise of Islamism across the Middle East. These issues will no doubt form a significant part of Hague's busy agenda. However, as he recently declared at a joint press conference with US Secretary of State John Kerry, "there is no more urgent foreign policy priority in 2013 than restarting negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians".

Clearly the UK and US share a similar perspective on this issue. President Obama's recent visit to Israel was widely seen as a success. I remember watching his speech to the packed hall of students in Jerusalem and getting goose bumps. It was the most cogent, passionate and clear-sighted articulation of the case for a two-state solution that I have heard, ever.

So what can Hague do this week, as a friend of Israel and supporter of two states for two peoples? First, he should take a leaf out of President Obama's book by investing personal capital in the bilateral relationship with Israel. The Foreign Secretary should show that he has a clear sight of Israel's legitimate concerns and interests and therefore demonstrably distance himself, and the wider British government, from the wholly retrograde campaign to boycott Israel.

He should also ensure Britain's position (and the EU's) is well co-ordinated with the US. To give Kerry's efforts the best chance of success, other international players need to send a consistent message to the parties that they will back them if they engage in the US-led process, and will not support alternatives.

This is a particularly important message for the Palestinians to hear. Certainly, Israel should be encouraged to act constructively: to continue its current quiet restraint on new settlement construction and demonstrate that diplomacy delivers improvements for Palestinians on the ground. But the Palestinians must reciprocate by not confronting Israel at the International Criminal Court or in other international forums.

Hague will be aware that there is currently little enthusiasm in the PA for negotiations with Israel. That being so, it is important to be realistic about what to expect at this stage. The priority is to secure a framework of reduced tensions, avoiding another negative spiral like the one set off by the UN resolution in November, and creating a political space where Abbas and Netanyahu can develop trust and explore what kind of bilateral progress might be possible.

In that context, Hague should also get behind Kerry's efforts to stabilise the Palestinian economy and breathe new life into the bottom-up development West Bank programme - a programme to which Britain has made a very positive contribution up to now.

Thirdly, he should choose his words carefully about the future. Both Hague and Kerry have recently warned that time is running out for a two-state solution - no doubt aiming to push those who want this to get on with it. But they may inadvertently be encouraging opponents by creating the impression that some alternative is around the corner. Palestinian rejectionists may mistakenly believe that the window closing on a two-state solution means there is hope for their campaign to secure rights of citizenship in Israel through international pressure, thereby replacing Israel with a single, Arab-majority state.

Such a belief is illusory, and Hague needs to send a clear message. He needs to stress to both publics that Britain sees no alternative to a solution of "two states for two peoples" as a way to reconcile the demands of the two sides. The alternative is no solution - only more pain, instability and conflict for both sides.

The best advice for Hague on his trip? It comes from Albert Camus: "Don't walk behind me; I may not lead. Don't walk in front of me; I may not follow. Just walk beside me and be my friend."

Music’s transcendent potential

Gloria Tessler — Fri, 24 May 2013 09:26:36 +0100

On Wednesday, it was the 200th anniversary of the birth of Richard Wagner. In his birth city of Leipzig he will be celebrated throughout the year. But many Germans have voiced their wariness about music that, to some, resonates with something harsher - Wagner's proclaimed antisemitism and his adoption by Hitler as a primal force behind Nazism.

Wagner lived five decades before the Nazi ideology was conceived. He could not have lent personal credence to Hitler's views. He is said to have refused to sign any public declaration against the Jews. Yet whether he was a theoretical or a practical antisemite, Wagner was conflicted.

He resented the success of Jewish composers Mendelssohn and Meyerbeer, but had a Jewish conductor, Hermann Levi and - to quote a cliché - some of his best friends were Jews. This did not stop him writing a pamphlet in 1850 deriding the work of Jewish musicians and blaming them for the decline in German culture. Yet he was admired by Theodor Herzl. He also wrote music of great beauty, even spirituality.

An informal, if controversial, boycott of the composer persists in Israel despite attempts by Daniel Barenboim and Zubin Mehta to include him on the grounds that great music transcends politics. His work was not performed in public there until 2000. Music is not ideological, Barenboim argues. Wagner was antisemitic. His music wasn't.

Still, Israeli concert planners are inclined to respect the anguish of Shoah survivors, who recall Wagner being played in the camps, or the raising of the SS banner when Meistersinger was played during the Nuremberg rallies. Mass protests led Tel Aviv University to cancel a Wagner concert last year.

Why is this particular composer so hated? Can he really be blamed for Hitler's patronage? Does this make him worse than other composers, also outed as antisemitic? Carl Orff was a self-confessed card-carrying Nazi, and Richard Strauss managed to ban all Jewish performers from public view during the Nazi era. Writers from Charles Dickens to T S Eliot have derided Jews or cynically portrayed them in what could be seen as a kind of contemporary social antisemitism - the rejection of "the other". No one bans them.

But music works in more subtle ways. Wagner's opera cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen, about the downfall of the gods, includes Jewish caricatures, the dwarves Mime and Alberich. In its time, it was viewed almost as an antisemitic epiphany, an attempt to free German culture from Franco-Jewish influences, eagerly taken up in 1940s Germany.

Broadcaster Paul Mason considers that in his later works, Wagner developed depth and humanity. His three modernist operas are real human dramas, Mason feels. He claims that under the influence of the philosopher Schopenhauer, Wagner abandoned racial purity myths and began to incorporate strands of eastern thought. And Dominic Lawson, in the Independent, argues we should learn to love the music but hate the man.

Perhaps this is the point. Learning to love. Even without charges of antisemitism, some of Wagner's music is terrifying, suggesting the martial threat that made him Hitler's favourite composer, and also the brooding quality generated by the Second World War. But then there is the pure elegance of the finale to Tannhauser.

So did Wagner grow out of his small-minded racism and virulent antisemitism to create some of our greatest music? The two seem so contradictory. But in a way, does it really matter? Shouldn't great art be transcendental? Surely it comes from a different place within the soul of humanity, a place beyond the consciousness of even the greatest artist?

In Peter Shaffer's Amadeus, the composer Salieri complains that Mozart, base and unworthy, had been blessed with the musical genius Salieri himself so deeply craved.

Here is the disconnect: the only resolution lies in the eternal truth that, once the work is born, it is a separate entity from its creator, and must be allowed to live for its own sake.

Arab students aided by Pears Foundation £100,000 grant

Simon Rocker — Fri, 24 May 2013 08:30:59 +0100

A Jewish-run charity in the UK has pledged £100,000 to a project benefiting Arab students, one that a leading Israeli economist has described as vital to the future of his country.

The Pears Foundation is the first such organisation to contribute to a new scholarship fund for Arab students in Israel. The fund, to be jointly financed by the Israeli government and Jewish philanthropists, has a target of around £3.2 million a year, from which up to 1,800 students will benefit.

Professor Manuel Trajtenberg — who chairs the planning and budget committee of the Council for Higher Education in Israel — said that helping more students into degree-level education was “crucial for the future of Israel”.

Speaking at a lecture in London, he said the contribution of Jewish communities around the world “may make a big difference, not just because of the money, but the message that goes with it; which says the Jewish people in Israel and abroad understand that the Arab citizens of Israel are part and parcel of Israeli society, and we want to treat them as such”.

The key to improving the lot of less well-off groups in Israel such as the Charedim and Arab communities, was encouraging greater access to higher education, he said. “Nothing else will work if you don’t do that… In the 21st century, you cannot enter the labour force just by finishing high school.”

The number of Charedim in higher education institutions has risen from a handful to more than 7,000 in 12 years. Israel’s Arabs, while forming more than a quarter of the student-age population, represented only 12 per cent of students actually in higher education.

Prof Trajtenberg was in Britain to attend an event organised by the UK Task Force on issues relating to Arab citizens of Israel, and to meet philanthropists.

The joint chairmen of the task force, Trevor Pears — who is executive chairman of the Pears Foundation — and UJIA chief executive Michael Wegier, said that the scholarship fund was “a fantastic opportunity for the British Jewish community to address an issue which is fundamental to Israel’s future prosperity.”

Rabbi Chaim Halpern conducting a wedding a ‘serious error’, says United Synagogue

Simon Rocker — Fri, 24 May 2013 07:30:00 +0100

The United Synagogue has strongly criticised the Union of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations for allowing Rabbi Chaim Halpern, who is under police investigation over alleged sexual abuse of women, to officiate at a wedding.

Rabbi Halpern, the leader of the Divrei Chaim community, took part in a ceremony under the UOHC’s auspices on Wednesday afternoon at Finchley United Synagogue, which houses the Kinloss banqueting suite.

In a statement, a spokesman for the US said that it considered the UOHC’s approval of Rabbi Halpern’s participation as “wrong and a serious error of judgment”.

Rabbi Halpern, who has denied any wrongdoing in connection with counselling sessions for women, has been bailed to return to a police station in July.

A special Beth Din set up by the UOHC to look into the allegations against him has been suspended pending police inquiries.

No one was available from the UOHC to comment.

The US said that its synagogues were hired out for dozens of weddings each year under the Union’s auspices.

“The United Synagogue is not involved in the authorisation or solemnisation of such marriages and relies on the UOHC to ensure that a suitable person officiates,” a US spokesman said.

“The former head of the London Beth Din and two current dayanim in their capacity as north-west London rabbonim have already publicly made their views very clear concerning Rabbi Halpern.

“Rabbi Halpern’s own governing body, the UOHC, has seen fit to initiate a high-profile investigation that has not yet been concluded. In addition to which, he is under police investigation.

“We therefore consider his authorisation by the UOHC to officiate at this marriage wrong and a serious error of judgment.”

Culture Minister bid to keep tapestries in the UK

Zoe Winograd — Thu, 23 May 2013 23:30:59 +0100

Culture minister ed Vaizey has extended an export ban on rare silk tapestries depicting Jerusalem’s first and second temples. The move comes after a British buyer expressed a serious interest in purchasing the hangings which are on sale for £120,000. The ban will run until August 20.

Orthodox child-rape case back in court

Anna Sheinman — Thu, 23 May 2013 21:30:43 +0100

The retrial of a Chasidic man charged with the rape and sexual assault of a young Orthodox woman, opened this week, after an earlier jury failed to return a verdict.

Father of five Menachem Mendel Levy, 41, has pleaded not guilty to sexually abusing the young woman when she was aged between 14 and 21.

He claims that he had a consensual, extramarital affair with the young woman — who cannot be identified for legal reasons — and that the affair began when she was over the age of 16.

The prosecution alleges there was a “course of sexual abuse”. It was argued in court this week that what began as indecent assault escalated into a “continuous course of rape” that started when the young woman was legally a child.

David Markham, prosecuting, said: “Whenever the opportunity presented itself Mr Levy would, in her words, ‘pounce’, treating her ‘as if I were nothing’.”

He told Wood Green Crown Court that the young woman did not complain because “she thought she was to blame”.

This belief was “rooted in her upbringing in the Orthodox Jewish community”, and that Mr Levy exploited her naivety and fears.

Mr Markham said that, when the woman complained of abuse, she faced hostility from the community for having a relationship with a married man. “She found herself vilified for disclosing years of sexual abuse,” he said.

The trial continues.

Ashton’s Iran talks produce nothing

Thu, 23 May 2013 21:00:43 +0100

Nuclear talks between Iran and six world powers in Istanbul last week ended without producing any concrete results.

EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, who met Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili, described the talks as “useful” although she was unable to report any substantive development.

Labour councillor joins the Co-operative Group

Thu, 23 May 2013 20:30:43 +0100

Munir Malik, a supporter of the boycott of Israel, has joined the board of the Co-operative Group.

A Labour councillor in the London Borough of Bexley and twice an MEP candidate, in his campaign statement Mr Malik disclosed that he had been at the heart of the group’s policies on “international issues like banning products from illegal settlements in Palestine”.

Last year, the Co-op board agreed to boycott goods from four companies producing fruit and vegetables in West Bank settlements.

Hamas, fatah flirt with unity deal

Thu, 23 May 2013 20:00:43 +0100

Fatah and Hamas agreed to form a unity government within three months at talks in Cairo last week.

Similar agreements have been reached on several occasions over the past few years, but none have been implemented.

A Fatah official said both sides had agreed on a timetable that begins with creating laws to govern elections.

Hugo Bieber new chief at UK Israel Business

Sandy Rashty — Thu, 23 May 2013 19:30:59 +0100

A 29-year-old marketing expert has been named as the new chief executive of the leading organisation promoting trade links between Britain and Israel.

Hugo Bieber will take over at UK Israel Business on June 1. He said: “I am excited and feel honoured that the board of directors has given me the chance to continue to grow the organisation, creating opportunities for businesses in the UK and Israel.”

Mr Bieber, who was in charge of marketing for a US investment bank in London, is the current chair of the Young Norwood Business, Finance and Entrepreneurs fundraising committee.

He takes over at UK Israel Business from Daniel Seal, who will stand down at the end of June after a month-long handover to become the chief executive of AcreWhite, a company advising businesses on emerging markets.

Mr Seal said: “I am confident that Hugo Bieber will continue to grow the organisation.”

Hugo Bieber new chief at UK Israel Business

Sandy Rashty — Thu, 23 May 2013 19:30:59 +0100

A 29-year-old marketing expert has been named as the new chief executive of the leading organisation promoting trade links between Britain and Israel.

Mr Bieber, who was in charge of marketing for a US investment bank in London, is the current chair of the Young Norwood Business, Finance and Entrepreneurs fundraising committee.

Mr Seal said: “I am confident that Hugo Bieber will continue to grow the organisation.”

Gaza tunnels used to smuggle KFC

Thu, 23 May 2013 19:00:43 +0100

Palestinians have started smuggling Kentucky Fried Chicken into Gaza, Haaretz has reported.

Yamama, a Gaza-based delivery service, employs motorcycle couriers to pick the chicken up from the border tunnels and deliver it to customers. The meals are made at KFC outlets in cities around the Sinai Peninsula.

UK calls for EU to ban Hizbollah

Marcus Dysch — Thu, 23 May 2013 18:30:00 +0100

Anglo-Jewish leaders have welcomed Britain’s formal request to the European Union to outlaw Hizbollah as a terrorist organisation.

The government’s move increases the likelihood of the EU taking action against the Iranian-backed group and follows months of pressure from the Jewish community.

Prime Minister David Cameron requested that British Jews “make a noise” and help him persuade the EU to ban Hizbollah following a meeting with community leaders in January.

Board of Deputies vice-president Alex Brummer said Britain had now taken “a really important step” that would provide a “serious boost” to those seeking Hizbollah’s proscription.

Jeremy Newmark, Jewish Leadership Council chief executive, said Mr Cameron and Foreign Secretary William Hague must be “congratulated for taking a lead in pressing the EU to deliver this long-overdue designation as part of the fight against terror”.

The EU currently classifies Hizbollah as a social welfare organisation. To proscribe the organisation requires consensus among all 27 EU members. The move would freeze the group’s accounts and funding, hitting its European operations and terrorist activities. A special EU working group is due to meet next month, with a ban on the organisation possibly being introduced by the end of June.

A Foreign Office spokesman said: “We firmly believe that an appropriate EU response would be to designate Hizbollah’s military wing as a terrorist organisation.”

Board of Deputies leader admits: We can do better

Marcus Dysch — Thu, 23 May 2013 17:30:00 +0100

Chief Rabbi Lord Sacks has defended the Board of Deputies and predicted it will emerge “strengthened” following a period of “turbulence”.

In his final address to the Board, Lord Sacks praised the organisation’s work and paid tribute to former chief executive Jon Benjamin who left his post earlier this month.

The Board’s former senior vice-president Jerry Lewis launched a scathing attack on Mr Benjamin and the Board’s current leaders last week, claiming the organisation was “in a complete mess” and “increasingly irrelevant”.

But Lord Sacks backed the Board’s work to defend Israel, combat antisemitism and maintain standards of Jewish day schools, but acknowledged that it was “in a process of transition and of change”.

At Sunday’s plenary meeting he said: “The Board will rise, I predict and promise, to greater heights than it has known before. These are the birth pangs of something new. Turbulence is OK. The Board will come out of it strengthened.”

He said the organisation would “thrive” under a “new Anglo-Jewry” led by his successor, Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis.

President Vivian Wineman told deputies that the criticisms made by Mr Lewis were “unfortunate and crossed a red line”. He said the Board should “not be apologetic for doing terrific work. We are glueing the community together”.

He acknowledged that “there are areas where we can raise our game”, but said the community was “not about to witness the demise of the Board”.

During the meeting deputies repeatedly criticised Mr Lewis. Adrian Cohen, deputy for Highgate Synagogue, said: “There’s a tendency to play the man rather than the ball and to demonise people. We should be trying to avoid that kind of language. We should be discussing the issues, not having a go at individual deputies.”

Mr Wineman was asked about talks being held by the Board and Jewish Leadership Council over how the two organisations can work more closely together.

He said: “It has not gone very far at all. Details will have to be worked out with deputies. Nothing is going to happen unless deputies actually buy into it.”

Mr Benjamin last week declined to respond to Mr Lewis’s remarks, but on Twitter replied to deputies offering support , saying he “wasn’t about to start taking lessons from Jerry on people skills”.

During his address Lord Sacks also spoke of his “sadness” at the rise of antisemitism and criticism of Israel.

He said: “Ordinary, decent human beings who ought to know better — including some of our churches and academics — are picking up an attitude that’s out there and they do not realise how unacceptable and tragic that is.”

Historians would record current anti-Zionism as the antisemitism of the 21st century, claimed Lord Sacks.

The Board has appointed management consultant Andrea Kelmanson as interim chief of operations following the departure of chief executive Jon Benjamin.

Ms Kelmanson specialises in organisational development at not-for-profit organisations. She previously worked with Age Concern, the Alzheimer's Society and Liberty.

Described as a "troubleshooter", the former Jewish Aids Trust chair will start work next week.

Beha'alotecha

Thu, 23 May 2013 16:49:51 +0100

“And the people became complainers of evil in the ears of the Lord” Numbers 11:1

V Once again we find the people complaining about the hardships of their journey from Egypt towards the Promised Land. In this week’s parashah, the complaints are ostensibly about the bland regularity of the manna. The people demanded meat instead.

But can this really be the problem? Were the people so petty, so immature, as to launch a minor rebellion over the lack of gastronomic variety in their diet? After all, the manna was the miraculous bread provided by God.

Rabbi Matis Weinberg points out that people were actually complaining about Moses’s leadership. The Talmud teaches that the manna was given because of the merit of Moses and was therefore a useful proxy for him and his leadership. A rejection of the manna was in reality a rejection of Moses and his management style and God appears to agree that the people may have a point.

Indeed, shortly after this complaint, Moses is instructed to gather the seventy elders at the Tent of Meeting, where God will inspire them with the divine spirit. God seems to be responding to the people’s complaint by giving Moses’s management team more power and independence.

Although the people angered God by the ungrateful and aggressive manner of their complaint, they instinctively understood that a highly centralised form of personal leadership would be ineffective as they encountered new challenges when entering the Promised Land.

As Ronald Heifetz, founder of Harvard University’s Centre for Public Leadership, states, the most effective leadership in times of crisis is adaptive leadership. This style is flexible enough to listen to, and learn from, a range of opinions rather than relying on the limited vision of one person, even if they are as great as Moses himself.

Charity Commission rejects claim against JNF

Marcus Dysch — Thu, 23 May 2013 16:30:00 +0100

The Charity Commission has rejected a campaign group’s claim that the JNF should be stripped of its charitable status.

But the Commission will question JNF trustees on whether aspects of its work breach equality laws by dealing differently with Israelis and Palestinians.

After reviewing a complaint from Stop the JNF, the Commission concluded there were no grounds to remove the JNF, or a subsidiary group from its Israeli associate Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael (KKL), from the charities register.

However it agreed that there were “matters of potential regulatory interest” which should be considered.

The Commission will ask trustees to explain “operational and administrative issues” relating to restrictions on services available “to people defined by a protected characteristic”. It is thought the questions will refer to how JNF’s work affects Palestinians.

Stop the JNF had complained that JNF should not have been granted charitable status in Britain, had been set up for “improper use”, and had been involved in “violations of human rights and international law”. The Commission said Stop the JNF had provided no evidence to back up those claims.

Stop the JNF had accused the charity of being “complicit in the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians” and claimed the JNF’s “primary purpose” was to “remove Palestinians from their land and replace them with Jewish-only settlements”. More than 500 Stop the JNF supporters wrote to the Commission.

Stop the JNF’s Sofiah Macleod accused the Commission of “a wilful blindness”.The campaign group would take legal action to “force the Charity Commission to do its job”.

JNF spokesman Ari Soffer said: “As the Commission’s response clearly states, there were absolutely no grounds for the application. Any claims that JNF UK somehow discriminates in its operations are dispelled by even a curory glance at the work we do.”

Banning Hizbollah

Thu, 23 May 2013 16:21:16 +0100

In January we revealed that David Cameron had asked the Jewish community to "make a noise" over Hizbollah, to help him persuade the EU to ban the terrorist organization.

There was - to put it mildly - some disquiet from No 10 that some of the community leaders present had seen fit to make public the Prime Minister's request. Be that as it may, there has indeed been a lot of noise on the subject. And Mr Cameron has now done what he said he would and formally requested that the EU proscribes Hizbollah. Much as the Prime Minister should be praised, it is little of short of astonishing that Hizbollah has ever been allowed to operate within the EU.

Funded primarily by Iran, Hizbollah is a terrorist outfit pure and simple and those who argue otherwise are either fools or knaves. But its EU fundraising is far from negligible and a ban on its activities would be a welcome blow.

Stop the stoppers

Thu, 23 May 2013 16:19:56 +0100

Under its previous chairman, Dame Suzi Leather, the Charity Commission often behaved as if it was in thrall to whatever was the latest fashionable cause.

Its current chairman, William Shawcross, has stopped the politicisation and imposed some much-needed rigour on the commission's work. In that vein the commission has squashed the attempt by Stop The JNF to have the JNF stripped of its charitable status. Be in no doubt what the real agenda was here.

Stop The JNF is another of those organizations which just happens to focus exclusively on attacking Jewish causes. However great the human rights abuses in the Arab world may be, they are cannot rouse themselves into action to protest. But when the word Israel - or, in JNF's case, explicitly, Jewish - is involved, they suddenly develop a passion for campaigning.

Stop The JNF is a contemptible organization and the charity commission has done a service to the cause of justice in dismissing its demands.

Hague signs scientific collaboration deal between the UK and Israel

Sandy Rashty — Thu, 23 May 2013 16:19:05 +0100

UK Foreign Secretary William Hague has agreed an initiative that will promote co-operation on scientific issues between the UK and Israel.

The Today Memorandum of Understand on Scientific Cooperation was signed by Mr Hague and Yaakov Peri, the Israeli minister for science, technology and space.

Israel is well established in the scientific field. Four Israelis have won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry and Israel has the highest number of scientists and engineers per capital than any other country.

Mr Hague said: “Both the UK and Israel are scientific superpowers, and many of our universities and academics are already doing tremendous work together."

He also expressed support for the Britain Israel Research and Academic Exchange Partnership (BIRAX).

Mr Peri said: "Despite the fact that there are people in British academia who call to boycott Israel, the British government shows that it acknowledges the importance of scientific collaboration with Israel.”

Earlier this month, noted scientist Stephen Hawking said he would boycott the President's Conference in Israel.

The agreement outlined five areas of co-operation: neuroscience, space research, technology, regenerative medicine, agricultural science and nano-technology.

We don't 'marry out'. We are made to

Ben Rich — Thu, 23 May 2013 16:16:17 +0100

"Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God." - Ruth 1:16

About 15 years ago, my wife leapt on to a Routemaster bus as it was moving away. She was followed by a woman in a hijab, who tripped. My wife grabbed her arm and pulled her on. And as the woman straightened up, she noticed my wife's Chai, which I had bought her on a visit to Jerusalem, and cried: "Get your hands off me, you dirty Jew." Rather than be upset, my wife - Rachael - responded by deciding that the time had come to convert to Judaism.

It was another step on a long journey from a Catholic upbringing via Quakerism and half a dozen years attending shul with me. It would take her a further two years to complete her conversion through the Liberal Beit Din.

If conversion were as simple as in the Book of Ruth, which we read last week on Shavuot, then her journey may have been completed sooner and there might be many more "new Jews", but I support conversion processes that challenge and educate proselytes just as I support Jewish education for those who are genetic Jews. Nevertheless, our attitude there still has a very long way to go.

When my wife and I decided to get married, we spoke to a rabbi. That rabbi - to whom I will be forever grateful - asked whether Rachael wanted to convert. When she said "not really", the rabbi encouraged us to press ahead and let events take their course.

Of course, that was not what we should have been told. Dependent on our affiliations, it might have ranged from ripping cloth to a gentle encouragement to conversion and a sigh. But it was what we needed to hear at the time.

Now our Jewish family includes our two children, who attend Northwood and Pinner Liberal Synagogue cheder and RSY-Netzer summer camps. When my daughter switched schools, she made a friend who turned out to have a Jewish father and an incredibly supportive but non-Jewish mother. Now that child also attends cheder with my daughter, as a matter of choice.

Four new Jews, but how different it might have been. An estimated four out of every ten Jewish children in the UK will marry a non-Jew. If only a third of their kids grow up to regard themselves as Jewish then our small community will shrink by a further quarter in a generation.

The recent census masked a steady decline in mainstream Jewish communities offset by a massive growth in strictly Orthodox numbers. In reality, the intermarriage rate above is an under-estimate for the mainstream, whether Orthodox, Masorti or progressive. Within a few generations Anglo-Judaism, as it has been known for 300 years, will vanish, and we will be represented almost solely by exclusivist fundamentalists and cultural secularists.

Yet it is not intermarriage that is the existential threat, but our approach to it. Let's consider if the number of children of intermarried couples who grow up to identify as Jewish is not one-third, but two thirds. Within a generation, the community grows by a sixth. Shuls flourish. Youth movements grow. Mainstream Judaism thrives.

For some this misses the point. These children are at best Jews from non-Jewish homes and at worst not Jews at all, dependent on which parent is kosher. To accept them fully is to divide the K'lal Yisrael, between those who believe in traditional matrilineality and those with more "flaky" [sic] definitions. Disregarding the fact that, in the Torah, it is patrilineal descent that matters - that's another essay - this approach is reminiscent of that of the Jews of Kerala: that ancient Indian community that, in its striving for purity, is now on the verge of extinction.

A strategy based on exclusivity might have its merits in the ghettos of the Pale or today in Stamford Hill, but it is repeatedly failing from Edgware to Essex, let alone in those far-flung corners of Liverpool, Sheffield and Southend. Jews in these areas inevitably spend much of their time with non-Jews and, of course, fall in love with them. It is the inevitable consequence of tearing down the ghetto walls. A blinkered approach, which sees every mixed-faith marriage as a failure and never as an opportunity, is a one way ticket down an ethnic cul-de-sac to extinction.

Yet there is another way: to ensure that, whatever decisions our kids take, we continue to include them in our community, always looking to provide them with pathways back to Judaism, rather than pushing them away.

In my previous role, I frequently visited small Reform communities, for example, in Harlow and Hull. The pattern was clear: in every case the majority of members were in mixed-faith relationships. It is unlikely that any of these communities would exist without these couples - the contrast with the closure of Orthodox shuls in Bradford and Blackpool is testament to this. Economically, closing these shuls makes perfect sense. Long term, it condemns mainstream Judaism to a handful of enclaves in north London, Hertfordshire and Manchester, and seals our community's decline.

Yet this is not a smug congratulation of progressive Judaism. Indeed, I saw the same complacency and narrow-mindedness in some Reform shuls: chederim that exclude the children of non-Jewish mothers for fear that they will be disappointed they cannot go on to Bnei Mitzvot (indeed, the universal rejection of the Bnei Mitzvot for such children) and convoluted burial arrangements. Even the "associate membership" and "friends" schemes on offer, ensure that - however welcoming the warden - mixed-faith families will see themselves as outsiders.

And then there is marriage. As one Reform rabbi put it to me: "Most of our synagogues do now make the right noises when it comes to non-Jewish partners. We welcome them into our services, allow them to participate in our events, bury them, bless their children, but the one time when such couples most often approach us - marriage - is the one time we unambiguously turn them away." Hardly surprising, then, that many choose not to come back.

The Assembly of Reform Rabbis recently took a small but key pigeon-step, ruling that "involvement in a mixed-faith marriage ceremony, would no longer be viewed as incompatible with membership of the Assembly". It will, no doubt, enable those who in the past have quietly participated in private blessings to do so openly.

Why is this a disaster? How does it threaten our community's integrity? My wife and I wrote and conducted our own service, a mixture of our two traditions. We built in elements that worked for our families and explained to guests the significance of each of these traditions. It was a public declaration of our commitment to our heritages, and our determination that they would be part of our married life. But why should that rabbi who provided us with such sound advice not have been able to be part of our celebration - as would still be the case today, whether the service was Reform or Liberal - because of our determination to include the ritual elements of a Jewish ceremony? What is the red line that we, as a community, are attempting to draw, and to what end?

Are we in search of the holy grail of common acceptance of Jewish status across all communities? If so, we have failed. Orthodox communities are no nearer to accepting the validity of progressive conversions. Are we attempting to defend some kind of racial purity? Surely not, not after the Holocaust when patrilineal Jews died alongside the matrilineal and neither was judged by their circumcision?

Are we concerned by the ability of mixed-faith couples to create a Jewish home for their children? If so why - in this day and age - have we such confidence in Jewish mothers but not in Jewish fathers? And why - even within the Liberal tradition - do we make the pretence of asking mixed-faith couples to sign up to providing a Jewish upbringing for children who do not yet exist? We seem to have such little faith in the integral value of our beliefs and customs, let alone the powers of a Jewish education, that we are constantly erecting barriers to prevent back-sliding, rather than tearing them down to welcome all those who wish to join us.

During my time at the Movement for Reform Judaism, people were often surprised to discover that my wife had not been born Jewish. Outside those smaller communities, some tactlessly wondered aloud that someone who "married out" was still so involved.

In fact, I never married out. My Judaism remained as strong as ever. Indeed, my relationship with my wife and the opportunity to re-engage with my identity through her eyes only enhanced my personal commitment.

We only "marry out" if that's what we choose for ourselves, or how our community judges us. Every part of the mainstream community needs urgently to re-evaluate its attitude and approach to intermarriage and seize the opportunity arising from hundreds and thousands of wives and husbands who are only too willing to marry in.

The clock is already ticking towards midnight. Pigeon-steps will never be enough to travel the road we must journey together if we are to survive.

Football star’s campaign for murdered journalist

Jonathan Gilbert — Thu, 23 May 2013 16:00:43 +0100

A sporting legend is demanding the resignation of Brazil’s football chief for inciting the murder of a Jewish journalist.

Romario, who scored 1,000 goals in a celebrated international career, has accused Jose Maria Marin, the president of the CBF, Brazilian football’s governing body, over the death of former BBC reporter Vladimir Herzog in 1975.

Together with Herzog’s son, Ivo, Romario, who is now a member of the Brazilian parliament, handed in a petition last month of 55,000 signatures calling on Mr Marin to step down.

Mr Marin, who is in charge of Brazil’s preparations for hosting the 2014 World Cup, responded by heading to the courts, where he accused Romario of defamation and slander.

Vladimir Herzog was a renowned journalist who, aged just 38, was tortured to death by intelligence agents working for the country’s military dictatorship of the time.

He was born in Yugoslavia to Jewish parents who fled to Italy, and then Brazil, to escape the Nazis. He lived in London for three years in the 1960s, where he worked for the BBC.

In 1975, he was director of journalism at Sao Paolo-based network TV Cultura when agents summoned him for questioning about his links to the Communist Party, which was outlawed. At the interrogation Mr Herzog was alleged to have been tortured to death, though his original death certificate indicated he had committed suicide.

Mr Marin, now 81, had criticised Mr Herzog in a speech he delivered at the Sao Paolo state legislature two weeks before his interrogation. The following year he made a speech praising Sergio Fleury, the head of a repressive police division who was reportedly involved in Mr Herzog’s torture. Mr Marin was a congressman for ARENA, which supported the military government.

“His past is linked to the dictatorship,” said Romario.

Ivo Herzog said: “It would be unacceptable for Marin to head the inaugural ceremony of our World Cup, watched by millions worldwide.”

The CBF has defended Mr Marin, branding the allegations “absolutely false”.

Temple Fortune jewellery burglary suspect charged

Anna Sheinman — Thu, 23 May 2013 15:12:38 +0100

Police have arrested and charged a 19-year-old man following Thursday’s burglary of a jewellery shop in Temple Fortune, north London.

D & M Cohen was raided by what community security group Shomrim called a “smash and grab motorcycle gang”.

Owner Robert Cohen confirmed that the thieves had broken into the shop by smashing in its front door.

Barnet police reported that an officer on patrol had made an arrest and that the property had been recovered and the suspect has now been charged.

The shop was previously targeted by thieves in 2009 when its windows were smashed and rings and necklaces stolen.