BRUSSELS (JTA) — Belgium's prime minister says he is not opposed to amending the country's laws to allow Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to be indicted for war crimes.

Guy Verhofstadt's statement came after the nation's Senate gave preliminary approval to a bill that would enable the prosecution of war crimes regardless of where the defendant lives.

Sharon was sued in Belgium by Palestinians and Lebanese who accused him of responsibility for the 1982 Sabra and Shatila massacre in Lebanon, which was carried out by Lebanese Christian militias allied with Israel.

Jewish library fire in Canada was arson

TORONTO (JTA) — An arsonist was likely responsible for a blaze that caused roughly $5,000 damage to the exterior of the Jewish Youth Library in Ottawa, according to Canadian authorities.

After detecting the odor of gasoline, police and firefighters concluded that an accelerant was used to start Sunday night's fire, which was brought under control in 20 minutes and did not damage the library's 8,000 books.

The library is situated in a quiet residential district.

Russian vandals hit Jewish center

MOSCOW (JTA) — Windows were broken at a Jewish community center in Russia.

No injuries were reported in Sunday's attack, which took place in Ulyanovsk, 430 miles east of Moscow.

Police arrested one person who was allegedly a member of a neo-Nazi group, according to the Union of Councils for Jews in the Former Soviet Union.

Jewish leaders believe the attack came in response to a case being brought against a local editor whose newspaper has published anti-Semitic articles.

Shoah book by Kertesz shredded in Hungary

PRAGUE (JTA) — Dozens of copies of a Holocaust novel by Nobel Prize winner Imre Ketesz were found shredded in a Hungarian town.

The novel had been distributed for free to some 3,500 students in the southern town of Hodmezovasarhely just days before, a town official told JTA.

According to the police, however, the shredding was done by adults, not students.

Berlin's chief rabbi harassed by mail

BERLIN (JTA) — Berlin's chief rabbi received a threatening letter filled with ashes.

"Lie or Truth Holocaust II" was written on the envelope of the anonymous letter that enclosed a plastic bag with a black, ash-like powder, Der Tagesspiegel newspaper reported last Friday.

Rabbi Chaim Rozwaski, 67, a Holocaust survivor, told the paper, "It is tragic to have lived through this horror as a child and to experience now to what a frightening extent anti-Semitism has grown in Germany today."