World news-roundup: Russian Jews protest airing of Abbas ‘blood libel’

Country: Russia

Russian Jews have protested against a decision by state-funded network RT to air accusations made by Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas that a West Bank rabbi had approved the poisoning of Palestinian drinking water from wells. Chabad’s Rabbi Alexander Boroda said it was a modern-day blood libel.

Country: Canada

The Ontario-based owner of Maccabi Tel Aviv football club in Israel has been given permission to sue Israel’s Ha’aretz newspaper for allegedly impugning his reputation. The article said Mitchell Goldhar ran the club like he did his shopping centres, with ‘megalomania and penny-pinching.’

Country: Brazil

A second controversial Israeli ambassadorial nominee is to be sent to Brazil, after former settler leader Dani Dayan was rejected. Businessman Yossi Sheli, Benjamin Netanyahu’s choice, was once banned from public office for failing to declare his political affiliations to Netanyahu’s party.

Country: El Salvador

Israel has been urged not to shut its embassy in El Salvador in recognition of the tiny Latin American country’s acts of friendship. Diplomat Jose Castellanos saved 40,000 Jews during the Holocaust, and the state kept its embassy open in Jerusalem for decades, despite protests from its neighbours.

Country: Belgium

Advisors to the Belgian government say it would be unconstitutional to ban religious slaughter, after the minister for animal welfare recommended it. The legal notice, issued by the Council of State, was in response to a bill brought to parliament. Activists say the lack of pre-slaughter stunning is cruel.

Country: France

France’s highest court affirmed the latest prison sentence for a professor with a history of Holocaust revisionism. The court rejected an appeal by Vincent Reynouard, who is now on-the-run, against his one-year sentence, imposed in 2015. He was jailed in 2011, and convicted several times before that.