World news-roundup: NY beach to host gender-segregated swim days for Jews and Muslims
Here's a snapshot of stories from around the Jewish world, including Romania, the United States, Venezuela and Russia!
Country: Romania
A new $1.3 million fund is to be distributed to up to 4,000 Romanian Holocaust survivors on low incomes. The extra money was announced by the World Jewish Restitution Organisation and is based on property wrongfully taken from Jews in Northern Bukovina or Bessarabia sometime between 1937 and 1944.
Country: United States
A New York City politician is renting a beach on Coney Island so he can host gender-segregated swim days for his Jewish and Muslim constituents. Brooklyn Democrat councilman Chaim Deutsch said he was doing it so the religious could enjoy some summer and still adhere to their religions’ modesty laws.
Country: Venezuela
A new study of Latin American Jews is to be launched in November. The project will look at immigration, the experience of Jewish women, Jewish identity and how Jews shaped the region. Part funded by the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute, it is being led by Venezuela-born Menachem Bandel and US-based Dalia Wassner.
Country: Russia
Police are investigating whether a fire that raged for hours in the city of Voronezh in north-west Russia and consumed large parts of its 19th century Jewish cemetery was started deliberately. The cemetery has been targeted by anti-Semitic vandals in the past. The local rabbi said: ‘We are very worried.’
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