Saving up fuel for a rainy day

We British (as opposed to we Jews) love a crisis. Which is just as well because there are two coming along at once.

You may have noticed, particularly if you live on the eastern side of the country, that the wet stuff that used to fall from the sky - I forget what it's called after all this time - has failed to do so for so long that the government has decided to ban all use of water.

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Donors who came to dinner

Lords Feldman and Wolfson (of Next) were among the Conservative donors who have enjoyed hospitality in high places, whose names were released this week.

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Budget scare for charities over tax relief cap

The chief executive of the Jewish Leadership Council has raised concerns about the impact on Jewish fundraising of the government's planned cap in tax relief claimed by charitable donors.

In Wednesday's Budget Chancellor George Osborne unveiled changes to the system that allows higher-rate taxpayers who donate to charity to reclaim some of the tax they would have paid, with some of it going to

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Sephardi rift sparks leadership battle

Sephardi leaders face a vote of confidence in the first elections since the aborted appointment of a new spiritual head.

The rift among members of the Spanish and Portuguese Jews' Congregation over the attempted recruitment of Rabbi David Bassous - who withdrew in January - appears to have had one silver lining.

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Funeral held for Jewish soldier who fought in Afghanistan

Family and friends of a Jewish American soldier who died in Afghanistan earlier this month have paid tribute to his bravery.

Airman Matthew Seidler, 24, from Maryland, was killed on January 5, by an improvised explosive device attack in the Helmand province.

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Attack is sign that 'war may spill into Israel'

The firing of two Katyusha rockets from Lebanon into Israel this week served as a reminder that the growing Syrian civil war could boil over into neighbouring countries.

The rockets, which landed in a village in the Western Galilee on Monday night, did not cause any casualties and succeeded only in setting light to a gas storage unit.

Over five years since the end of the Second Lebanon War,

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Catch 22 author Heller 'enjoyed' army service

The author of one of the most famous books ever written criticising war was actually excited to serve in the army.

Joseph Heller, whose novel Catch 22 is seen to this day as a vital part of the anti-war literature canon, did not share the attitude of the book's protagonist, Captain Yossarian.

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