German football trip to Auschwitz sparks row

Football fans in Germany are known for their "Auschwitz song", in which they vow to send the opposing team on a train ride to the death camp.

Now, a proposal to send Germany's national team to visit Auschwitz during this summer's Euro 2012 tournament in Poland and Ukraine has run into opposition, despite the best intentions of Germany's Jewish leadership.

Dieter Graumann, head of the Central

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German city votes for Jewish mayor

A German city has elected a Jewish mayor nearly 80 years after the Nazis came to power.

Peter Feldmann won 57 per cent of the vote to become Frankfurt's mayor, a position he will take on in July.

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Israel an apartheid state, says German party head

Sigmar Gabriel, the head of Germany's second largest party and a hopeful for Chancellor in the next federal election, last week called the Jewish state an "apartheid regime" after a visit to Hebron in the West Bank.

Writing on his Facebook page, the 52-year-old Social Democrat noted: "It's a zone without legal rights for Palestinians.

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Mein Kampf publisher fighting book ban

A British publisher, who wants to sell 100,000 copies of critical passages from Hitler's Mein Kampf on newsstands all over Germany, has vowed to fight a Munich court ban.

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Itay Shechter faces antisemitic jeers at German club

An Israeli footballer was the victim of antisemitic abuse after fans aimed a Nazi salute at him during a training session.

Itay Shechter, who plays for German side Kaiserslautern, was targeted by up to ten people chanting antisemitic jeers. They also made the Nazi salute, an illegal act under German law.

Mr Shechter, 24, moved to the club from Hapoel Tel Aviv last summer.

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Israeli Olympians return to Munich 40 years after massacre

Seven Israeli Olympians who lost their teammates in the Munich Games massacre nearly 40 years ago returned to the city this week.

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Court blocks cross-border Holocuast lawsuits

A ruling last week by the International Court of Justice in The Hague that victims of the Nazis will not have the right to sue Germany in foreign courts has dashed hopes for speedier justice for Holocaust survivors.

The judgment overturned a 2004 decision by the Italian Supreme Court, which ruled that Germany should pay reparations to an Italian former slave labourer, Luigi Ferrini.

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German fund pulls NGO cash

A German organisation which compensates survivors of Nazi labour camps has withdrawn funding for a Israeli NGO for its support of the Palestinian right of return.

The foundation - the Memory, Responsibility and Future Fund (EVZ) - said it would no longer support the educational work of Zochrot, a Tel-Aviv based NGO that also promotes the interpretation of the establishment of Israel as a "Naqb

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