Regulating the ritual practice of a small number of New Yorkers is hardly the top priority of the city’s new mayor, nor should it be, not with the myriad of challenges facing Bill de Blasio, who is slowly remaking city government after 12 years of Michael Bloomberg’s highly successful, though occasionally problematic tenure. But neither…
It has been more than a year since New York City introduced a regulation requiring mohels to obtain written consent before performing a controversial rite that risks infecting infants with neonatal herpes. The regulation put Mayor Michael Bloomberg at loggerheads with the ultra-Orthodox community. And it promises to be a headache for his successor, Bill…
A baby boy has been infected with neonatal herpes following a Jewish ritual circumcision in New York — the third such infection in two years tied to a controversial rite that involves the direct application of the ritual circumciser’s mouth to the baby’s genitals to suction blood from the wound. The baby was treated for…
Representatives of European Jewish groups defended ritual circumcision at a hearing of the Council of Europe. Officials from the European Jewish Congress and the Conference of European Rabbis presented facts and defenses of Jewish male ritual circumcision during the hearing on Tuesday. The hearing was called after the council’s Parliamentary Assembly, or PACE, passed a…
Large medical associations in Sweden and Denmark recommended banning non-medical circumcision of boys. In Sweden, the recommendation came in a resolution that was unanimously adopted last week by the ethics council of the Sweden Medical Association – a union whose members constitute 85 percent of the country’s physicians, the Svenska Dagbladet daily reported on Saturday….
(JTA) — The Israeli government is wading into the burgeoning European debate over circumcision and receiving a mixed reception from the continent’s Jews. On Dec. 11, Israel initiated a motion in defense of circumcision at the Council of Europe, an intergovernmental organization devoted to enhancing cooperation among its 47 member states. Intended to offset a…
Encouraged by Israeli diplomats, parliamentarians from the Council of Europe have submitted a motion opposing an earlier resolution condemning ritual circumcision of boys. The motion was submitted last week by 101 members of the Parliamentary Assembly of the council, according to Micaela Catalano, a spokeswoman for the assembly, which has 318 parliamentarians and whose resolutions…
A Pittsburgh-area rabbi who performed a bris is being sued for causing what the parents claim are “catastrophic and life-changing injury” to their baby. The parents in their lawsuit filed Tuesday said Rabbi Mordechai Rosenberg acted “with a total disregard” for their son, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reported. The suit, which identifies the parents and the…
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