I

World

Year In Review

Tzvi Kahn

OCTOBER 2004
Geneva — Col. Muammar
Gadhafi's son meets Israeli diplo-
mats.
Romania — On the country's
first Holocaust Remembrance
Day, Romania's president admits
that Romanian Jews suffered
during the Holocaust.
Jerusalem — The Knesset for-
mally authorizes Israel's with-
drawal from the Gaza Strip.

points from the 19 percent who
voted for Al Gore in 2000 — in
defeating Sen. John Kerry, D-
Mass., to retain the presidency.
Jewish Rep. Martin Frost, R-
Texas, loses his seat to another
incumbent, Pete Sessions, R-
Texas, in a new district, while
Reps. Debbie Wasserman
Schultz, D-Fla., and Allyson
Schwartz, D-Pa., gain new seats.
After the election, there are 11
Jews in the Senate and 26 in the
House.
Paris — Longtime Palestinian
leader Yasser Arafat dies in a
Paris hospital after spending sev-
eral days on life support.
Boston — The City Council of
Somerville, Mass., considers a
resolution to divest city holdings
in Israel. The local Jewish com-
munity and national Jewish
organizations mobilize to defeat
the initiative.
Jerusalem — Israel passes a
law restricting Shin Bet inter-
rogators from using force against
suspected terrorists.
Jerusalem — An Israeli mili-
tary court sentences Azziz
Mustafa Salha, 23, to life in
prison for his involvement in the
murder of two Israeli reserve sol-
diers in a Ramallah police sta-
tion in October 2000. Footage of
Salha holding up his blood-
stained hands for the Palestinian
mob gathered outside the police
station was shown around the
world.

NOVEMBER 2004
Jerusalem — Israel offers a
$10 million reward for informa-
tion on the whereabouts of the
airman Ron Arad, who has been
missing since he was shot down
in a 1986 battle in Lebanon.
Jerusalem — About 20,000
protestors rally against the gov-
ernment's plan to withdraw from
the Gaza Strip.
Washington — George Bush
earns about 24 percent of the
Jewish vote — up 5 percentage

DECEMBER 2004
Jerusalem — Prime Minister
Ariel Sharon fires four Cabinet
ministers after they vote against
Israel's 2005 budget.
Washington — President Bush
signs a bill touted by Jewish
organizations that would provide
federal funding for disabled stu-
dents in religious schools.
• New York — The FBI subpoe-
nas four senior staffers at the
American Israel Public Affairs
Committee to appear before a

Jewish Telegraphic Agency

SEPTEMBER 2004
Chicago — MRIs are found to
be more effective at detecting
breast cancer caused by gene
mutations than are mammogra-
phies.
Berlin — For the first time
since 1968, the extreme right-
wing National Democratic Party
and the German People's Union
qualify for representation in state
parliaments.
Jerusalem — Two Israelis are
killed when a suicide bomber
strikes near a bus stop.
Gaza — Palestinian gunmen
kill three Israeli soldiers.
Washington — U.S. officials
revoke the visa of a controversial
Swiss Muslim who was to be a
visiting scholar at the University
of Notre Dame, in Indiana.
Damascus, Syria — Hamas
blames Israel for the assassina-
tion of one of its top members.

AUSCWtNITZ , SNIgk)

Some of the roughly 7,000 people gathered for ceremonies marking the 60th anniversary of Auschwitz's

liberation in Oswiecim, Poland, Jan. 27, 2005.

grand jury. The subpoenas follow
suspicions that a former
Pentagon official passed a classi-
fied draft policy statement on
Iran to AIPAC, which allegedly
then passed it on to Israel.
Atlanta — A U.S. court rules
in favor of an inmate who wants
to wear a yarmulke and receive
kosher food in jail.
Chicago — A jury in a federal
courthouse rules that three
Islamic organizations — the
Islamic Association for Palestine,
the Holy Land Foundation for
Relief and Development and the
Quranic Literary Institute —
and an individual named
Muhammad Salah must pay a
Jewish family $156 million in
damages for the 1996 murder of
its son in Israel. The defendants
had provided financial support
to Hamas, the group responsible
for the murder.
Southeast Asia — A tsunami
claims more than 100,000 lives,

Rabbi Barry Weinstein plays with a young evacuee from New

Orleans in the yard of B'nai Israel Synagogue in Baton Rouge

after Hurricane Katrina struck Aug. 29, 2005.

September 29 2005

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