World news-roundup!

Country: Netherlands

A Jewish cemetery east of Amsterdam has allowed the first burial there for almost 100 years, to honour a Jewish lady’s dying wish. Juliana Slaat-Luycx, who was born during the Nazi occupation in 1941, became the first person to be buried at Den Ham since 1920. Her father was the cemetery’s caretaker.

Country: Morocco

King Mohammed VI of Morocco has thanked a Jewish composer from Casablanca who wrote a song in his honour. Albert Cohen, who wrote ‘Stay Away From My King,’ received the royal thank-you by post. Mohammed, who is worth £2 billion, is known as a reformer, but his critics are still imprisoned.

Country: Czech Republic

An atlas showing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel is to be withdrawn from Czech schools after a complaint from the Palestinian ambassador. The publisher’s chief executive said it was up to Israel to decide what its capital is, but said he would make the changes ‘even if it’s something I don’t agree with’.

Country: United States

Outspoken rabbi Shmuley Boteach has co-written an opinion piece with former Playboy model and Baywatch star Pamela Anderson about online pornography and its ‘corrosive effect on a man’s soul’. Boteach authored ‘Kosher Sex’ while Anderson is known for a sex tape with her former husband.

Country: China

The Shanghai Jewish Refugees Museum has unveiled a new sculpture of a Chinese diplomat who saved hundreds of Jews from the Holocaust. Ho Feng-Shan, then Chinese Consul-General in Vienna, issued ‘hundreds, perhaps even thousands’ of Chinese visas to Jews, against the orders of his boss.

Country:  Lithuania

The Lithuanian president held a moving remembrance service commemorating 75 years since the 1941 massacre of Jewish residents in Moletai. He said: ‘Their memory is an uncompromising obligation for all Lithuanian people to fight against hatred, violence, discrimination and indifference.’