UK rabbis unite to challenge global poverty

UK rabbis from across the community have joined together in signing a petition to alleviate global poverty and malnutrition.

A letter, recently published in the Financial Times, backing the Millennium Development Goals campaign to target extreme poverty, included signatories from the Liberal, Reform and strictly Orthodox movements.

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Kingston honours four community champions

Long-time members of the two Kingston synagogues have been honoured as community champions by the local mayor in an annual award scheme.

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Muslim aid for Bradford Reform

Bradford’s Muslim community has pledged financial support for urgent building work at Bradford Reform Synagogue.

Zulfiqar Karim, general secretary of Bradford’s Council for Mosques, accompanied shul chairman Rudi Leavor and council member Alan Harris to a Bradford Council meeting to apply for funding for the Moorish building in the city centre.

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Admiring words from Blair at Mill Hill opening

Tony Blair praised “what the Jewish community and faith represents in the world today” when addressing the 640 guests at Sunday’s opening of Mill Hill Synagogue’s £3.2 million community centre.

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Sale to Somalis secures survival of Leicester shul

The sale of the Leicester Hebrew Congregation communal hall to a local Somali group will ensure the viability of the diminishing community for the foreseeable future.

From a membership in the 300s in the congregation’s 1950s’ heyday, the shul now has less than 100 members, most of them elderly.

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Fine tuning at Belsize Square shul

Paul Heller will be a well travelled addition to Belsize Square Synagogue when he joins as cantor in June.

The Bogota-born chazan has led the Jewish community in Quito, Ecuador, and Medellin, Colombia, also serving Stockholm’s Great Synagogue for 11 years. Belsize Square’s Rabbi Stuart Altshuler officiated with him at the

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'Coffin tax' hits Southport shul

Merseyside’s Sefton Council is introducing a “coffin tax” which threatens the future of the small Southport Hebrew Congregation.

On Thursday of last week, the council’s cabinet passed budgetary measures which will see an increase in burial costs at the local authority’s Duke Street cemetery from £750 to £900.

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