An Overland Park
police vehicle sitting
White supremacist Frazier Glenn Miller, 73, kills a man and his grand-
son outside the Jewish Community Center of Greater Kansas City and
then shoots to death a woman at a Jewish assisted-living facility a few
blocks away. None of the victims are Jewish, highlighting the diverse
constituency served by America's Jewish institutions.
in front of the Jewish
Community Center
of Greater Kansas
City, Kan., following
shootings there and
After weeks of near breakdowns in Israeli-Palestinian peace talks
brokered by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, Israel suspends all
negotiations after Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas'
Fatah party signs a unity accord with Hamas, a designated terrorist
organization. President Obama responds by saying it may be time for
a pause in Middle East peacemaking. Kerry later expresses regret for
saying that Israel risks becoming an "apartheid" state or a non-Jewish
one if the two-state solution is not implemented. U.S. negotiators
blame Israel for the talks' collapse.
later at a nearby
assisted-living
complex that killed a
total of three people,
April 13, 2014.
Gennady Kernes, the Jewish mayor of Kharkiv, Ukraine's second-
largest city, is shot in a suspected assassination attempt, leaving him
in critical condition. The shooting comes amid growing violence
between Russian-backed Ukrainian separatists in eastern Ukraine and
forces loyal to the new Ukrainian government in Kiev. Kernes is air-
lifted to Israel for treatment.
The Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish
Organizations rejects J Street's bid for membership. J Street, the liberal
Washington group that lobbies for increased American pressure to
bring about a Mideast peace deal, lost its bid for membership in the
main communal group on foreign policy issues by a vote of 22-17,
with three abstentions. J Street needed the support of two-thirds of the
conference's 51 members to gain admission.
Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling is banned from the NBA
for life and fined $2.5 million after being caught on tape making racist
comments to his girlfriend. He is heard saying that his views reflect
the way the world works, and as evidence he says that black Jews in
Israel "are just treated like dogs." His girlfriend is heard countering
that as a Jew, Sterling should know better than to advocate discrimina-
tion, citing the Holocaust as an example of where racism can lead.
Secretary of State John Kerry
testifies during a Senate Foreign
Relations Committee hearing
on April 8, 2014, weeks before
the collapse of U.S.-led Israeli-
Palestinian peace talks.
Head of the Hamas government Ismail Haniyeh (right) and
senior Fatah official Azzam Al-Ahmed (left) attend a news
conference as they announce a reconciliation agreement
in Gaza City on April 23, 2014.
Former Los
Angeles
Clippers owner
Donald Sterling
is pictured here
with V. Stiviano
to his left at a
2013 basketball
game.
An arm of the private equity firm Bain Capital purchases the
Manischewitz Company, the iconic producer of kosher packaged
goods, for an undisclosed sum. According to the New York Times, the
new owners are expected to promote kosher as an indication of quality
food rather than just a religious designation.
Genealogical research reveals that the late archbishop of New York,
Cardinal John O'Connor, technically was Jewish. O'Connor's mother,
Dorothy Gumple O'Connor, was born Jewish but converted to
Catholicism before she met and married O'Connor's father.
MAY 2014
New York's 92nd Street Y, a Jewish center for arts and culture, names
its first non-Jewish executive director, Henry Timms. Shortly after-
ward, Sol Adler, the previous longtime executive director, who was
fired after revelations that he had a long-term affair with his assis-
tant, hangs himself in his Brooklyn home.
An Anti-Defamation League anti-Semitism survey finds "deeply anti-
Semitic views" are held by 26 percent of 53,000 people polled in 102
countries and territories covering approximately 86 percent of the
world's population. Critics say the survey's 11 questions are not accu-
rate gauges of anti-Semitism.
Maccabi Tel Aviv wins the Euroleague basketball championship by
beating favored Real Madrid, 98-86, in overtime.
Novelist Philip Roth receives an honorary doctorate from the Jewish
Theological Seminary. Now considered one of the greatest living
American writers, Roth had caused outrage early in his career with his
continued on page 92
Macabbi Tel Aviv wins the Euroleague basketball championship in May.
JN
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