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UK news

'Koran backs Jewish claims to Jerusalem,' Sheikh tells synagogue

By Simon Rocker, May 9, 2013

A Muslim preacher argued that the Koran backs Jewish claims to Jerusalem at a Jerusalem Day celebration in London this week.

Rome-based Sheikh Abdul Hadi Palazzi told an audience at Edgware Synagogue that he found it “intolerable” that “no one questions the rights of Catholics to St Peter’s, or of Muslims to Mecca, but so many question the rights of Jews to Jerusalem”.

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Extra police to tackle Golders Green crime rise

By Marcus Dysch, May 9, 2013

A leading police commander has encouraged Jewish groups to work with officers following a meeting with 50 residents in Golders Green.

Chief Superintendent Adrian Usher, commander of Barnet police, said that his “door was always open to those who have the best interests of the community at heart”.

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Wembley appearance for Israeli footballers

By Marcus Dysch, May 9, 2013

The high level of co-operation between England’s and Israel’s football governing bodies has been marked with a special tour of Wembley Stadium by Israeli players and anti-racism campaigners.

A delegation arrived in Britain on Tuesday and met leading officials from the English game to discuss anti-racism work carried out by both countries’ football associations.

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Students tell Israel to stop Bedouin ‘eviction’

By Simon Rocker, May 9, 2013

Jewish youth and students in Britain have protested to Israeli leaders over a proposed Knesset bill to relocate Bedouin families who live in the Negev desert.

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Oxfam has crossed ‘red line’ on Board project

By Marcus Dysch, May 9, 2013

Oxfam’s continued affiliation with a Palestinian charity could jeopardise its joint anti-hunger project with the Board of Deputies, it can be revealed.

A Board committee concluded on Tuesday that Oxfam’s decision to continue funding the West Bank-based Miftah group had “crossed a red line” in the relationship between the Jewish organisation and the NGO.

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Board of Deputies chief executive Jon Benjamin leaves

By Simon Rocker, May 9, 2013

Jon Benjamin, the chief executive of the Board of Deputies for the past eight years, is leaving the organisation, the JC has learned.

Mr Benjamin, who is 48 and came to the Board from the education fundraising charity British Ort, did not wish to comment at this stage.

But a statement from the Board on his departure is expected shortly.

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Wedding bells as Friday Night Dinner gets third series

By Jennifer Lipman, May 9, 2013

Tamsin Greig and Simon Bird will be back filming on location in north London this summer, after a third series of the television comedy Friday Night Dinner was commissioned.

The series, which visits the Goodman family as they eat their Shabbat meal and follows them as they face awkward and often uncomfortable situations and deal with troublesome visitors, is written by Robert Popper.

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Poem by celebrated Victorian feminist sold at auction

By Jennifer Lipman, May 9, 2013

One of the final writings of a Victorian Jew who Oscar Wilde praised as a "girl of genius" has been auctioned for £3,500.

The poem by Amy Levy, At Dawn, was sold at Bonhams on Wednesday for £500 more than anticipated.

Written around 1889, shortly before Levy's suicide, it is the first time any of her work had been made for sale.

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Progress for women at Federation synagogues

By Simon Rocker, May 9, 2013

Women in the Federation of Synagogues have for the first time been elected to the management board of a congregation.

Yeshurun Synagogue in Edgware took the historic step on Tuesday, voting five women to its 12-person board.

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No more talk of Gryn Affair, says Hugo's wife

By Simon Rocker, May 9, 2013

Jackie Gryn, the widow of the late Reform leader Rabbi Hugo Gryn, has insisted she has always enjoyed a warm relationship with Chief Rabbi Lord Sacks and appealed for no more talk of a “Hugo Gryn Affair”.

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