London - Staff at an exclusive Jewish-owned boutique were threatened with a knife during a robbery. Three men stole handbags worth a total of around £10,000 during the raid at Larizia in Temple Fortune, North West London. Manager Marian Zandi said it was the 11th time the store had been targeted in the past three years. Police are investigating the incident and are believed to be viewing...

Los Angeles, CA - A federal appeals court denied a motion today by MGA Entertainment to temporarily halt the hotly contested Bratz trial over alleged racist remarks made by a juror. The Van Nuys toy maker asked the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to halt the trial being conducted in U.S. District Court in Riverside while the panel considers an appeal of a ruling by trial judge Stephen Larson...

Paris, France - T-shirts carrying an anti-Semitic slogan referring to a Nazi-era Jewish ghetto in Poland were seen on sale today in a multiethnic district of Paris. France's anti-Semitism watchdog found the women's T-shirts, printed with phrases in German and Polish which translate as "Jews forbidden from entering the park", in a store in the Belleville neighbourhood. The inscriptions ...

Washington - The federal government froze all approvals for new bus companies on Tuesday because a fatal crash in Texas last Friday had exposed a flaw in regulations that allows banned companies to come back under new names. The head of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, John H. Hill, said that the freeze would stay in place until his agency could find a way to detect when...

Westchester, NY - The county worried about teens and preteens getting high has passed two bills restricting access to alcohol and cough suppressants. One measure penalizes adults who knowingly permit gatherings wehre minors drink alcohol. Offenders could be punished by up to a year in prison. The other bill bans the sale to minors of over-the-counter cough medicines with the ingredient...

Perth, Australia - A court has extended the bail of an alleged Nazi war criminal who faces a hearing into his possible extradition on the war crimes charges. Charles Zentai, who is accused of torturing and murdering an 18-year-old Jewish man in World War II, supported himself with a walking stick and refused to talk to reporters after his appearance today in Perth Magistrates Court. The...

San Francisco, CA - At a Dell press event in San Francisco this morning, its Senior Vice President for the business products group, Jeffrey Clarke, filled in the biggest missing element in Dell's description of its completely redesigned Latitude product line to this point: Dell, he says, has developed a proprietary power cell technology that will enable Latitudes to run continuously while...

New York City - Council Members Simcha Felder (D-Brooklyn) and Gale A. Brewer (D-Manhattan), Chair of the Council’s Committee on Technology in Government, will announce legislation on Wednesday, August 13, 2008 that would modernize on-street parking in New York City by mandating citywide rollout of muni-meters while also creating a system by which drivers can pay for parking by phone. Felder...

Binghamton, NY - After more than 30 years in business, Wagner's Cakes & Cookies has closed its doors, leaving customers scrambling for kosher baked goods. The business, which has been closed for vacation for two weeks, was scheduled to reopen today, according to the business' answering machine. Attempts to contact owners Jim and Lori Wagner were unsuccessful. One local bakery -- The Black &...

Postville, IA - Rabbi Shmuel Herzfeld (he of NYTimes Op-Ed fame) and his congregant Nat Lewin (famed attorney and Agriprocessors defender are having a little intra-shul spat over the ethics of kosher slaughter. Lewin called Herzfeld (his own rabbi!) a “vigilante” in his response to Herzfeld’s Times article and described his reasoning there as “fallacious.” Now Herzfeld is back for...

Georgia - Georgian Premier Vladimir "Lado" Gurgenidze asked of Lithuanian Rabbi Aharon Leib Shteinman to bless Georgia, and the rabbi did indeed deliver. On Tuesday he voiced the blessing, intended for the war-stricken country's Jewish residents "and all who live in that place." It all started last winter when a delegation of rabbis from the Vaad L'Hatzolas Nidchei Yisroel met with the premier...

Goshen, NY - When Village Board member Susan Bloom asked who in the crowd favored a proposal to slow redevelopment of the Arden Hill hospital site, the applause was so overwhelming — several people stood — that she didn't have to ask who was opposed. More than 120 people filled every seat and lined three walls in the meeting room at the Goshen Senior Center for a public hearing on what...

Borough Park, NY - Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg today endorsed Councilman Simcha Felder in the Democratic Primary for the 21st State Senate District in Brooklyn. “Simcha Felder is an independent thinker who makes decisions the same way I do - by simply doing what he thinks is right for the people he represents. I rely on Simcha's advice on issues big and small because he is honest, fair, and...

Georgia - Yedioth Aharonoth reporter Tzadok Yehezkeli was seriously wounded Tuesday morning in Georgia. The 52-year-old had been covering the ongoing fighting in the city of Gori. He was evacuated to a hospital in Tbilisi and emerged from surgery in serious but stable condition. The man who evacuated Yehezkeli and got him to an ambulance was Dutch RTL reporter Jeroen Akkermans, who was also...

New York City - Popcorn, pistachios, Tic Tacs, and Skittles are the latest threat to local children that the City Council is moving to neutralize. Council Member Domenic Recchia, who represents parts of Brooklyn, has introduced a bill that would require store owners across the city to put up signs or labels warning that certain bite-size foods could endanger the lives of children under the age...