Israel’s only crematorium was torched.
Unknown arsonists set fire Wednesday to an outdoor oven belonging to Alei Shalehet, the only Israeli mortuary to offer cremation as an alternative to burial. The attack took place hours after the crematorium’s previously secret location, on farmland outside Tel Aviv, was published in a fervently Orthodox newspaper.
Alei Shalehet’s owner blamed religious zealots angered at the availability of cremation, which is against Jewish law, in Israel. Police had no immediate comment on the suspects.
A survey found that staff from Imperial College London overwhelmingly oppose an academic boycott of Israel.
The survey, conducted by the University and College Union, the union which proposed the boycott earlier this year, found that 82 percent Imperial College UCU members do not support a boycott of Israeli academic institutions.
Imperial College is one of Britain’s premier scientific and medical institutions, with over a dozen Nobel laureates in its 170-year history. The survey also found that 90 percent of the college’s UCU members think there should be a national ballot of all members before UCU adopts any international boycott.
Michael McGarvey, a molecular virology instructor, said, “In conjunction with the very similar results from the recent ballots of members at the University of Oxford and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, this clearly demonstrates that the vast majority of ordinary members of UCU are against a boycott and the damaging effects that this could have on British Academia.”
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
