World News roundup: New Zealand anti-Semitic attack condemned
Country: Yemen
Yemen’s minister of culture is donating an international human rights award to the country’s miniscule Jewish minority. Arwa Othman made the announcement in the capital Sana’a, where roughly half of the country’s persecuted Jewish population of less than 90 people live in a guarded compound.
Country: New Zealand
Officials in Auckland have condemned a ‘hate crime’ against a four-year old Jewish boy wearing a kippah. The boy was walking home from nursery school with his mother and brother when a man in his 20s slapped him hard on the top of his head before laughing as he left in a car with four other men.
Country: Italy
Italian Jews are expected to follow their French counterparts next year and migrate to Israel in record numbers. The Jewish Agency said the number of those making aliyah from Italy was expected to double in 2014, with the country’s economic situation considered a key factor in their choice to leave.
Country: China
Researchers have welcomed a decision to open the post-war US archives to reveal new information about Holocaust refugees in Shanghai. From 1938, up to 25,000 Jews from Germany, Austria and Poland escaped to Chinese city because it was the only place in the world that didn’t require a visa.
Country: Netherlands
A dozen non-Jews who risked their lives to save Jews during the Holocaust have been honoured as Righteous Among the Nations in Rotterdam. In addition, the title was conferred posthumously to Frederika-Maria and Christina Segboer, two sisters who hid and helped Jews reach safety in Spain.
Country: France
French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve has declared his love of French Jewry, saying: ‘I feel more close to you than you can imagine, through ties of affection, friendship, sentiment and spirit.’ Cazeneuve, who is not Jewish, cited the late French Jewish philosopher Vladimir Jankelevitch as an inspiration.
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