Seminar explores Saudi plan

A three-day seminar at a Quaker retreat centre in Oxford was this week due to explore whether a Saudi-led Arab peace initiative is the best hope for solving the Arab-Israeli conflict.

It was sponsored by the Oxford Research Group, an independent think-tank active in conflict resolution.

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Jesse Jackson: Obama would end decades of “zionist control”

Barack Obama's campaign has played down accusations by civil-rights leader the Rev Jesse Jackson that the Democrat candidate would end decades of "Zionist control" if he became president.

The New York Post quoted Rev Jackson, at the World Policy Forum in Evian, France, as saying an Obama presidency would weaken Zionists, who "have controlled American policy for decades".

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Pius XII may soon be a saint

Pope Benedict is expected to announce the beatification of controversial wartime pope Pius XII within the next year.

Conservative Catholic groups have been pressuring the Vatican to canonise Pius for decades, but major Jewish organisations have tried to oppose such a move since he has been accused of remaining silent over the extermination of the Jews.

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Deech reclaims her family silver

Sixteen knives and forks, the only remaining property of a prosperous Jewish family that lived until the Holocaust in a small town in southern Poland, have been returned to Baroness Deech.

A 101-year-old Polish painter, who had received the silver cutlery from Baroness Deech's aunt, contacted her following a report in the JC in June revealing that she plans to sue the Polish government for lost family assets.

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‘Fraud’ case man’s £2.6m barmitzvah

A businessman wanted on fraud charges in America has been allowed to attend his son's barmitzvah in Israel after rabbis pledged £2m in sureties.

Zev Saltsman, who lives in Hendon, North-West London, was arrested in London a year ago after he was named as one of six men accused by US federal prosecutors in Brooklyn.

He was alleged to have made $55m (£31.5m) in fraudulent profits through private share sales. He has not admitted the allegations in the USA.

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Ukraine body gets new head

A billionaire businessman was elected president of an umbrella Jewish group in Ukraine. Igor Kolomoisky will head the United Jewish Community of Ukraine, one of eight representative organisations. The high-profile media owner and philanthropist is a member of the Jewish community of Dnepropetrovsk and still heads the All-Ukrainian Jewish Congress.

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Lowy is richest australian

Frank Lowy has been named Australia's richest man after the credit crunch stripped billions from his rival. Mr Lowy amassed some £2.5 billion from mall empire the Westfield Group. His finances are being audited by the Australian Tax Office after he was named in a US Senate report on tax evasion, although he claims the disputed funds were donated to charities in Israel.

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Shimon samuels ‘justified’

 A charge of defamation brought against the Wiesenthal Centre's Shimon Samuels was dismissed by the Paris Appeal Court. It ruled that Dr Samuels had been justified in calling on the Minister of the Interior to conduct an in-depth inquiry into the Comité de Bienfaisance et de Secours aux Palestiniens (Committee for Welfare and Aid to the Palestinians).

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