Oxford, England - Oxford University students who planned an outrageous party night have been accused of anti-semitism and has sparked an investigation by the Proctors. Players from the university’s under-21 rugby squad were specifically told to come to the event dressed in stereotypical Jewish costumes, including sidelocks and carrying big bags of money, which was due to be held on Wednesday...

White Plains, NY - Police are stepping up patrols around the Solomon Schechter School after swastikas and a hate slogan were discovered scrawled on the Jewish day school's kindergarten wall. "We're working closely with the school and, given the nature of this incident, we're paying particular attention to the area,'' Deputy White Plains Public Safety Commissioner Daniel Jackson said...

Washington - Rahm Emanuel is his own man, with an identity distinct from his father's. He is not responsible for the actions or opinions of Benjamin Emanuel, a Chicago pediatrician who worked in the 1940s with Irgun, the militant Zionist group that committed acts against Palestinian and British targets that have been widely categorized as terrorism. (In 1938, according to the scholar Avi Shlaim...

Jerusalem, Israel - As the nation voted in municipal elections on Tuesday, police said around 420 election irregularities were reported across the country, including 20 cases of suspected fraud, one of which involved a campaign employee for haredi Jerusalem mayoral candidate Meir Porush. In the incident, four haredi men were detained for questioning after they were caught with forged...

Washington Heights, NY - New York police have arrested a 27 year old New Square man accused of molesting an elderly hospital patient. It happened at New York Presbyterian Hospital in Washington Heights. Investigators say the man was visiting at the hospital - when he went into the room of a 72-year-old man he did not know - the patient claims that he was sexually assaulted. He was...

New York - Stocks closed sharply higher as investors went bargain-hunting after the market tested its 2008 lows. Wall Street bounced back after the S&P 500 and Nasdaq fell past their lows for the year and the Dow briefly dipped below 8,000 but then closed up above 8,800, a swing of nearly 900 points in one day. Some on the floor saw the Dow's recovery as technically significant. "I...

Quebec, Canada - Canadian police have captured a man suspected of bombing a Paris synagogue in 1980. The man, Hassan Diab, was nabbed today in the city of Gatineau. French judges issued an international arrest warrant for Diab several days earlier. Diab, 54, is accused of planting a bomb on a motorbike on Rue Copernic in Paris, outside a synagogue. The resulting explosion killed four people...

Chicago, IL - Barack Obama said in a 2004 interview that Judaism was as influential a factor "as any other faith" in defining his beliefs. The transcript of the interview of the president-elect by Cathleen Falsani, a religion writer, was published Thursday in its entirety for the first time by the Web site beliefnet. Falsani interviewed Obama just after he won the Illinois Democratic...

New York - Gov. David Paterson, who has made it very clear he plans to run in 2010 for the post to which he accidentally ascended, is reaching out to the Jewish community in at least one way his predecessor did not. Almost a full month in advance, Paterson has already sent out an invitation to a Dec. 9 event that will celebrate both the 60th anniversary of the founding of the state of Israel...

New York - The world's biggest Jewish outreach group faces a cash crisis fuelled by fears that its biggest donor, billionaire diamond mogul Lev Leviev, may slash funding due to his own financial difficulties. Chabad has around 4,000 emissaries in 70 countries, running 3,300 community centres worldwide. Sources within the movement say many of the emissaries in charge of running Jewish...

Brooklyn, NY - Held aloft by mourners, the simple pine coffin that carried the body of a slain meals on wheels deliveryman wound through the streets of Brooklyn. A dozen wailing women, including the dead man's widow, walked 50 feet behind. Hundreds filled the streets outside the Schwartz Brothers Funeral Home in Forest Hills, Queens, yesterday, grieving for Imonil Aminov, who was shot in the...

Washington - Federal health officials Thursday slapped a sweeping detention order on dozens of imported foods from China, from snacks and drinks to chocolates and candies. It's unusual for the Food and Drug Administration to put such a broad hold on goods from an entire country, not just a few rogue manufacturers. The agency said the action was needed as a precaution to keep out foods...

New York - If you would like to know if your marriage is relationship-centered or not, the way to find out is to ask yourself about your core values. For example, what is the most important principle of your marriage? Is it your desire for money or pleasure? Do you dream about being comfortable, being honored by your spouse, and having a lot of fun? Experience has shown that couples who place...

Secaucus, NJ - Kosherfest is an annual trade event that attracts hundreds if not thousand of Jewish vendors, business people, retailers and wholesalers alike in a massive display of frum Jewish trade, entrepreneurship and ingenuity related to kosher food and beyond. The trade show was held this Tuesday and Wednesday. VIN News caught up with more than a few companies and individuals in...

Brooklyn, NY - Kings County may be Barack-lyn now, but the President-elect’s unorthodox candidacy turned many Democratic south Williamsburg voters into McCainiacs. While Barack Obama won the vast majority of Brooklyn votes in the Nov. 4 election, McCain drew more than four times as many voters than Obama in the largely Hasidic neighborhood between Flushing Avenue and the Brooklyn-Queens...