Front Lines
ROUNDUP
Roundup from page 9
The list, dated April 18, 1945, is 13 pages
and contains 801 names. It was compiled
by Schindler and his accountant, Itzak
Stern, and made famous decades later in
the Oscar-winning film Schindler's List.
Several copies of the list were written;
the four surviving original lists are in
the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in
Washington, the German federal archives
in Koblenz and two at the Yad Vashem in
Jerusalem.
SS Soldier Sentenced
Berlin/JTA — Former SS member
Heinrich Boere was convicted and sen-
tenced to life in prison for killing three
civilians in Nazi-occupied Holland.
Boere, 88, had admitted to the district
court in Aachen, Germany, that he shot the
three in 1944, but insisted he was follow-
ing military orders and could have faced
imprisonment in a concentration camp or
the death penalty if he refused.
The shootings were ordered in reprisal
for attacks carried out by the Dutch resis-
tance.
Lead judge Gerd Nohl said that the
murders were of "practically incomparable
maliciousness and cowardice — beyond
the decency of any soldier," according to
German news reports.
The defendant, who is half German and
half Dutch, was an enthusiastic National
Socialist and handed over fellow citizens
to be executed, the judge said.
Efraim Zuroff, Israel director and chief
Nazi hunter for the Los Angeles-based
Simon Wiesenthal Center, praised the
efforts of prosecutor Ulrich Maas and said
the trial proved that Holocaust perpetra-
tors could still be held accountable for
their crimes.
Zuroff has been among many observ-
ers of the ongoing trial in Munich of John
Demjanjuk, 89, for involvement in more
than 29,000 murders in the Sobibor death
camp.
Boere had told Focus magazine last year
that he was following orders: "It was not
difficult: You just had to bend a finger."
After the war, Boere was found guilty of
murder in Holland and fled to Germany,
where he took on German citizenship.
Meanwhile, the Dutch death sentence was
commuted to a life sentence.
613 Mitzvot
New York/JTA — A daily e-mail about the
613 commandments will soon be available
under a new initiative by the Orthodox
Union.
Taryag, the acronym for 613, will pro-
vide a daily e-mail with a concise, but
insightful explanation of a Torah com-
mandment, according to an OU news
release.
10 April 1 • 2010
Rabbis Jack Abramowitz and Joseph
Karasick will author the explanations.The
daily e-mails will become available after
Shavuot; enrollment is at www.ou.org/
taryag.
The OU already provides daily online
lessons in Nach Yomi, the biblical books
of the Prophets, and Shnayim Mikra, an
online Torah-study program.
Berkeley Vetos Divestment
Berkeley/JTA — The student government
president at the University of California
vetoed a bill calling for divestment from
two companies doing business with
Israel.
Will Smelko, the president of the
Associated Students of the University of
California, Berkeley, shot down the bill on
March 24, the Daily Californian reported.
The association's Senate had passed
the bill last week by a 16-4 margin.
The bill, which singled out United
Technologies and General Electric for
supplying Israel with technology used to
perpetrate war crimes, was widely con-
demned by Jewish campus groups.
"While the ASUC as a body has stated
convincingly that it does not want ASUC
and UC dollars going to fund weapons,
war crimes or human rights violations,
this veto has to do with the mechanism
by which the ASUC achieves its mission
of building peace and goodwill in a way
that avoids the shortcomings of the bill,
[such as a] ... selective, one-sided focus
on a specific country that lacks impor-
tant historical context and understand-
ing," Smelko said in a statement.
Smelko also said that the bill was per-
ceived "as a symbolic attack on a specific
community of our fellow students."
Though divestment efforts are a cor-
nerstone of the so-called BDS movement
—shorthand for boycott, divestment and
sanctions — the Berkeley bill was the
closest any American campus has come
to divesting specifically from companies
doing business with Israel.
Hamas Sets Executions
Gaza City/JTA — The Hamas govern-
ment in Gaza announced that it would
execute Palestinians found guilty of col-
laborating with Israel.
Despite protests in the Gaza Strip and
the West Bank, the announcement was
made March 24 by the Hamas Interior
Minister Fathi Hammad, according to
reports.
"The death penalty will be implement-
ed for [Israeli] agents who have been
sentenced to death, regardless of the
position of rights groups that reject these
kinds of sentences:' Hammad said.
Hammad said the executions would
occur in the near future. It is unknown
how many Gaza Palestinians have been
sentenced to death for "collaboration
with the enemy:' according to reports.
The sentences have been handed down
in the last two months, according to the
French news agency AFP.
Israeli security forces use Palestinians
informants to assist in combating terror-
ist attacks.
Israel Condemned
Jerusalem/JTA — The United Nations
Human Rights Council passed three reso-
lutions that condemn Israel and another
seeking reparations for Gaza Palestinians.
The United States opposed the resolu-
tions, which passed by a large margin
last week.
The 47-member council passed resolu-
tions that condemn Israel's "grave human
rights violations' in the West Bank and
Gaza, and call on Israel to pull out of ter-
ritory claimed by the Palestinians; call
on Israel to stop settlement building and
evacuate existing settlements; and con-
demn Israel for the 'systematic violation
of the rights of the people of the occu-
pied Syrian Golan Heights:' according to
Reuters.
A resolution called on Israel to com-
pensate Palestinians in Gaza for damage
and loss incurred during Operation Cast
Lead.
Israel has been censured by the coun-
cil, which was formed in 2006, more
times than any other country.
Easter Mass for Jewish Girl?
Chicago/KTA — A court in Chicago
has ruled that a father may not take his
Jewish daughter to Catholic Mass on
Easter.
Joseph Reyes grabbed headlines
when he took his daughter to church and
had her baptized despite a temporary
restraining order filed by his estranged
wife that bars him from exposing their
daughter to anything but the Jewish faith.
On March 24, during divorce proceed-
ing hearings, Reyes asked Cook County
Court Judge Renee Goldfarb if he could
take his daughter, Ela, to Catholic Mass
on Easter Sunday.
The judge denied his request, citing the
restraining order.
The judges' final ruling in the divorce
case is expected to be delivered in a
couple weeks.
Reyes converted to Judaism when he
married his wife, Rebecca, and according
to her promised to raise their daughter in
the Jewish faith. But after the couple filed
for divorce he baptized Ela without his
wife's knowledge.
Israeli Travel Season
Jerusalem/JTA — One of Israel's heavi-
est travel seasons began. Some 47,000
passengers passed through Ben Gurion
International Airport Sunday on about
300 flights.
Some 555,000 air travelers arriving and
departing on 3,500 flights are expected
to pass through the airport's Terminal 3
throughout the week of Passover.
In addition, about 60,000 tourists, most-
ly Israeli Arabs, are expected to visit the
Sinai, entering at the Taba crossing.
April 8 will be the busiest travel day of
Passover, with about 48,000 passengers
arriving and departing on more than 300
flights.
The Passover holiday destinations for
most Israelis are the United States, France,
Italy, Germany and Turkey.
Arab League Backs Peace
Tripoli/JTA — The Arab League voted at its
annual summit to continue backing an ini-
tiative that would give Israel land for peace.
The renewed support for the Arab
peace initiative announced Sunday in
Libya came despite efforts by Syria and
Lebanon to convince the league to with-
draw from peace efforts.
Continued Israeli building and build-
ing approvals in east Jerusalem, which
the Palestinians claim as the capital of a
future state, has angered league members.
Palestinian Authority President
Mahmoud Abbas called on world lead-
ers to demand that Israel stop building
settlements and said he would not sign
a peace deal with Israel without east
Jerusalem in Palestinian hands.
Libyan leader Muammar Gadhafi
hosted the summit in Sirte.
Obamas' White House Seder
Washington/JTA — The Obama family
hosted a seder in the White House.The
seder, launched during the 2008 cam-
paign when candidate Barack Obama
joined three Jewish staffers mounting an
improvised seder while on the road, has
become a private affair, with a focus on
black-Jewish relations.
The only announcement this year was
on Obama's schedule: On Monday eve-
ning, it said, "the president and the first
lady will mark the beginning of Passover
with a seder at the White House with
friends and staff."
According to reports, African-
American and Jewish staffers were invit-
ed to participate, contribute recipes and
read through the Haggadah.
Obama's 2009 seder is believed to be
the first conducted in the White House.