The legislation also provided for the creation of an unit to investigate the crimes.
Russian Jewish center robbed in possible anti-Semitic attack
MOSCOW (JTA) — A Jewish welfare center in central Russia was robbed this week in what Jewish leaders believe was an anti-Semitic attack.
Local police, who are treating the incident as an ordinary burglary, opened an investigation into the incident at the offices of the Chasdei Yerushalayim center, where office equipment and a small sum of money were stolen.
The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee and local donors give financial support to the center in the Volga region, which serves 1,500 elderly and poor Jews.
Malaysian censors ban showing of `The Prince of Egypt’ film
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (JTA) — Malaysian censors recently banned the film “The Prince of Egypt” without explaining their decision.
The move against the animated depiction of the life of Moses comes five years after Malaysia refused to show the Holocaust film “Schindler’s List” because filmmaker Steven Spielberg, who also made “The Prince of Egypt,” refused to make the cuts requested by the country’s censors.
Wiesenthal Center questions trials of 2 WWII-era suspects
VILNIUS, Lithuania (JTA) — The Simon Wiesenthal Center is calling on the United States and European Union to investigate Lithuania’s handling of two Nazi-era war crime trials.
Calling the country’s handling of the cases a “travesty of justice,” Efraim Zuroff, the head of the center’s Jerusalem office, said foreign nations should give the cases “major consideration” when determining whether Lithuania should be admitted to NATO or the European Union.
Lithuanian medical panels recently ruled that the two elderly defendants, Aleksandras Lileikis and Kazys Gimzauskas, are too ill to face charges that they turned Jews over to Nazi death squads.
Canadian Jewish family suing to reclaim land taken in Egypt
TORONTO (JTA) — A Jewish family living in Canada is seeking compensation for property confiscated by Egypt during the regime of Gamal Abdel Nasser in the 1950s and 1960s.
The lawsuit was recently brought before the U.S. Court of Appeals in New York against the Coca-Cola Company and one of its affiliates for acquiring the family’s property, including land and factories, despite knowing it had been confiscated. The American Section of the International Association of Jewish Lawyers and Jurists filed a friend-of-the-court brief to support the family’s claim.
Poor health gives Erich Priebke chance to serve sentence at home
ROME — Convicted Nazi war criminal Erich Priebke was given the right to serve out the rest of his life sentence under house arrest. A Rome court cited his poor health in its decision allowing him to leave a military prison in the Italian capital.
Priebke was convicted for his role in the March 1944 massacre of 335 Romans, including about 75 Jews, at the Ardeatine Caves south of Rome. Another former SS official, Karl Haas, was granted house arrest last year after being convicted on the same charges.
Monument for Jewish soldiers rededicated in Black Sea port
MOSCOW (JTA) — A monument to Jewish soldiers who died defending Imperial Russia was rededicated this week, 135 years after it was unveiled in a Black Sea port.
The 13-foot marble obelisk was built in Sevastopol, now Ukraine, with private Jewish donations to commemorate 500 Jewish servicemen in the Black Sea Fleet who were killed in the 1854-55 Crimean War. City authorities used the rededication ceremony to call for some $7,000 in donations needed to restore the unique memorial.