B’nai B’rith International has issued the following statement:

B’nai B’rith International is horrified after learning the news of an arson attack by Israeli settlers on a Palestinian home in the West Bank that killed a one-and-a-half year-old boy and injured three family members. The Israeli ministry of defense has called the attack “Jewish terror” and the government has been swift to forcefully condemn the act.

About 4 a.m. the suspects, as identified by Israeli authorities, vandalized and torched two homes in the village of Douma. One the of the homes was unoccupied, but the other was occupied by the Daobasa family, killing one-and-a-half year-old Ali Saad, and burning the father, mother and the baby’s four-year-old brother.

B’nai B’rith urges Israeli authorities to expeditiously bring the perpetrators to justice. These brazen and abominable actions cannot be tolerated in any society and those behind this killing should be swiftly punished to the full extent of the law. 

B’nai B’rith International is highly offended by the despicable Ohio State University marching band’s Holocaust-inspired song called “Goodbye Kramer.” The song, sung to the tune of Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’,” references Nazis looking for Jews living in attics and Jews traveling by way of cattle car, to their deaths at Nazi concentration camps.

The song was discovered in an updated version of the band’s highly controversial songbook exposed in 2014 after a school investigation into the band’s culture. An initial report discovered the book that had been a long held secret with songs centering on bestiality, rape and homophobia. A follow-up investigation revealed “Goodbye Kramer” was added to the band’s repulsive repertoire in 2012, as was another song denigrating the University of Nebraska.

It is never acceptable to trivialize Holocaust imagery. To do so in a jovial tone and completely for the sake of offending is even more abhorrent. The Ohio State marching band has long been dubbed “The Best Damn Band in the Land,” but this sort of behavior does nothing to back up that title.

B’nai B’rith applauds the university administration for digging deep on this issue and committing to “eradicating” this vile culture from one of its more celebrated programs. 

B’nai B’rith International commends Romania for legislation punishing anyone who denies the Holocaust.

Parliament had earlier voted for the legislation and President Klaus Iohannis signed the amendments into law this week.

We specifically commend the speaker of the Chamber of Deputies, the prime minister, the president and all those in the opposition who supported the measure and voted for moving this landmark legislation forward.

In a further recognition of human rights, the law also prohibits fascist, racist or xenophobic organizations and symbols.

The war-time Ion Antonescu regime was allied with Nazi Germany. The new law characterizes Holocaust denial as rejecting Romania’s role in the murders of some 400,000 Jews in Romania and Romanian-controlled territory.

Holocaust denial is an odious effort to undermine the unique, horrific genocide against the Jewish people. Punishing Holocaust denial recognizes that this calculated, systematic effort to wipe out the Jewish people must never be forgotten.

Urges Congress to Immediately Reallocate Funds Within Program to Avoid Disability Shortfall 

B’nai B’rith International has issued the following statement:

The 2015 Social Security and Medicare Trustees Report has been released and B’nai B’rith International is pleased to see continued stability in the program, but we are still concerned, as we were last year, about the immediate need to address the funding challenges facing the Social Security Disability Insurance (DI) program.

This year’s trustees report estimates that in 2016 the DI will only be able to pay about 80 percent of its benefits with its allocation of Social Security’s income. This can be easily addressed, as it has been nearly a dozen times before, in a bipartisan fashion by changing the allocation proportions slightly. This would put the two parts of Social Security back on an even footing where neither would face a shortfall before 2034.  

B’nai B’rith International urges Congress to increase the DI’s allocation from the payroll tax or consider combining it with the Old-Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI) fund into a single fund. The administrative separation of the funds has created an artificial danger to Social Security DI beneficiaries and could be fixed with reunification.

Also on July 22, Rep. Xavier Becerra introduced legislation to do just that, which would eliminate the fear and uncertainty DI recipients now have about a looming cut in their earned benefits. Eleven million people—70 percent of them ages 50 and older, and 10 percent veterans--collect Social Security benefits because of disability while the rest of Social Security’s benefits are paid to retirees and survivors. 

We must act, as potential cuts should not threaten vulnerable people while we debate broader Social Security issues. The Social Security program is strong, and the trustees continue to report the combined OASI-DI fund will face no short fall until 2034. We should work to extend that date, but we cannot do so at the expense of providing adequate benefits now. In fact, several bills already introduced in Congress this session would make modest expansions, while still extending the overall solvency date beyond 2034.

B’nai B’rith International remembers the 21st anniversary of the bombing attack on the Argentine-Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA) building—the Jewish center—in Buenos Aires. As we move farther away from that fateful day of July 18, 1994, when 85 people were killed and 300 were wounded in the blast, the story only becomes uglier and more complicated. The mysterious death of the prosecutor assigned to the case, Alberto Nisman, this past January only added to the perpetual uncertainly of resolving this case. 

B’nai B’rith participated in remembrance activities in Buenos Aires on July 16 and 17, with leaders and representatives of government, religion and non-governmental organizations from across Latin America descending on the Argentine capital to reflect on the past and discuss prospects for the future of the case. 

On July 16 B’nai B’rith Director of Latin America Affairs Eduardo Kohn joined participants from Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Panama, Paraguay, Perú, Uruguay and Venezuela to engage in roundtable discussions on a variety of topics, hosted by the Latin American Jewish Congress. B’nai B’rith Latin America Chair and Chilean Jewish community president Leon Cohen joined Kohn in Buenos Aires, as did Paraguay Jewish community chair and B’nai B’rith mentor Jack Fleischman.

Topics covered included AMIA case and the lack of justice 21 years removed from the bombing, the pervasive threat of the Islamic State, and new strategies and challenges for Jewish communities in Latin American and beyond. 

For the discussion of the AMIA bombing, attendees heard from Sofía Guterman, whose daughter, Andrea, perished in the bombing. During the ISIS roundtable Catholic nun Maria de Guadalupe Rodrigo addressed participants, having spent the last five years in Aleppo, Syria at a Catholic mission. She talked about the horrifying experiences she witnessed in the midst of the brutal civil war in Syria and lamented the conflict truly looks hopeless unless the international community decides to intervene in the war and take on the Islamic State head on. 

Following a full day of productive talks, Kohn then attended a dinner and met with the Israeli Ambassador to Argentina Dorit Shavit.

On July 17, Kohn attended the annual commemoration ceremony along with tens of thousands of others at the site of the AMIA building with a moment of silence at 9:53 a.m. local time, marking the exact moment of the explosion. 

Among those represented and in attendance, it was an absence that was most notable. For the first time in the 21 years since the bombing, shamefully, there were no members of the government at the commemoration, nor where there any officials from the Buenos Aires’ governor’s office.

Those who were present at the commemoration included Shavit, U.S. Ambassador to Argentina Noah Mamet, President of Latin American Jewish Congress Jack Terpins, World Jewish Congress CEO Robert Singer and several Argentinian congressmen.

B’nai B’rith International has issued the following statement:

B’nai B’rith International is frustrated over the unanimous passage of the Iran nuclear deal by the United Nations Security Council, with the Obama administration virtually bypassing agreed upon Congressional review and committing the United States to a deal.

Under compromise legislation between the administration and Congress, lawmakers have 60 days to review the Iran nuclear deal. By submitting and passing the deal at the U.N. Security Council, the move undermines and contradicts the spirit of this compromise arrangement.

The U.S. Congress should have the full 60 days to review the details of the agreement struck last week between the P5+1 (United States plus China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and Germany) and Iran. 

The deal in the Security Council was unanimously endorsed by a vote of 15-0. While it is expected that implementation of the U.N. resolution will be delayed 90 days and sanctions will not be lifted until after an initial International Atomic Energy Agency inspection, the legal rationale for stripping away a decade worth of nuclear sanctions will have already been fixed.

When the deal was announced last week, we reiterated our long-standing concerns about Iran’s history of deception and denial about its nuclear program.

Congress has an important role in the coming weeks. Lawmakers must ask tough questions about inspections, plutonium enrichment and sanctions relief, including Iran's demand to immediately begin acquiring conventional weapons. The distraction of a Security Council vote will loom over Congress as it fulfills this investigative role. B’nai B’rith hopes those on Capitol Hill can sift through the noise and, if it is unsatisfied with answers to it's questions about elements of the deal, it should reject it.

B’nai B’rith International remembers the 21st anniversary of the bombing attack on the Argentine-Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA) building—the Jewish center—in Buenos Aires. As we move farther away from that fateful day of July 18, 1994, when 85 people were killed and 300 were wounded in the blast, the story only becomes uglier and more complicated. The mysterious death of the prosecutor assigned to the case, Alberto Nisman, this past January only added to the perpetual uncertainly of resolving this case.

B’nai B’rith participated in remembrance activities in Buenos Aires on July 16 and 17, with leaders and representatives of government, religion and non-governmental organizations from across Latin America descending on the Argentine capital to reflect on the past and discuss prospects for the future of the case.

“In the 21 years since the worst terror attack in the history of South America, it’s amazing how we’re still sorting through the lies and deception of this case,” B’nai B’rith International President Allan J. Jacobs said.  “Alberto Nisman’s death was a huge blow to the procurement of justice and only added another murky layer to this seemingly never-ending story. But we will fight on, vowing to never forget the victims and committing ourselves to ultimately shining a light on the truth of this horrific crime.”

The current chapter of the AMIA-saga goes back to 2005 when then-President Néstor Kirchner issued a decree accepting the state’s share of the blame for the disastrous inaction and incompetent inquiry into the bombing, and assigned Nisman to review the case. Nisman heroically and doggedly followed evidence in the terror attack wherever it led, including detailing how top Iranian leaders including Hashemi Rafsanjani, Iran’s president at the time, and Ahmad Vahidi, Iran’s current minister of defense, ordered Hezbollah to kill Jews in Buenos Aires.

Despite the mountain of evidence pointing to the regime in Tehran as the perpetrators behind the attack, in 2012 Iran and Argentina signed a “Memorandum of Understanding,” creating a supposed “independent” group to investigate the 1994 bombing. It’s a farcical arrangement that still holds no promise of justice.

But Nisman continued to dig. And this time last year, it appeared that he was onto something big. Why? The Argentine government barred him from travelling to the United States to testify before the U.S. Congress on the investigation. Fast forward to January 2015 when Nisman filed a complaint against Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner and Foreign Minister Héctor Timerman alleging they offered Iran impunity before jointly creating the “Commission of Truth,” designed to find those responsible for the attack.  

The day before he was scheduled to speak before the Argentine congress about these enormous and pointed allegations, he was found dead in his apartment under mysterious circumstances. B’nai B’rith closely followed Nisman’s investigation over the years and strongly supported his efforts. His death created a gaping void in the pursuit of terrorists.

On July 16 B’nai B’rith Director of Latin America Affairs Eduardo Kohn joined participants from Argentina, Bolivia, Brasil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Panama, Paraguay, Perú, Uruguay and Venezuela to engage in roundtable discussions on a variety of topics. B’nai B’rith Latin America Chair Leon Cohen joined Kohn in Buenos Aires, as did the president of the Chilean Jewish community and Paraguay Jewish community chair and B’nai B’rith mentor Jack Fleischman.

Topics covered included AMIA case and the lack of justice 21 years removed from the bombing, the pervasive threat of the Islamic State, and new strategies and challenges for Jewish communities in Latin American and beyond.

For the discussion of the AMIA bombing, attendees heard from Sofía Guterman, whose daughter, Andrea, perished in the bombing. During the ISIS roundtable Catholic nun Maria de Guadalupe Rodrigo addressed participants, having spent the last five years in Aleppo, Syria at a Catholic mission. She talked about the horrifying experiences she witnessed in the midst of the brutal civil war in Syria and lamented the conflict truly looks hopeless unless the international community decides to intervene in the war and take on the Islamic State head on.

Following a full day of productive talks, Kohn then attended a dinner and met with the Israeli Ambassador to Argentina Dorit Shavit.

Today, Kohn attended the annual commemoration ceremony at the site of the AMIA building with a moment of silence at 9:53 a.m. local time, marking the exact moment of the explosion.

“Every year B’nai B’rith commemorates the AMIA anniversary, but this year is particularly difficult due to the death of Alberto Nisman. It seems with his death, the quest for justice in this case has been partially extinguished, for the time being. To lose a man committed to truth and closure for the victims’ families is truly heartbreaking,” B’nai B’rith International Executive Vice President Daniel S. Mariaschin said. “But his death is also a reminder that we must continue on, we must continue to fight those who seek to obfuscate what truly happened on July 18, 1994."

B’nai B’rith urges the Obama administration to delay submitting the Iran nuclear deal to the United Nations Security Council for a vote, giving Congress time to review the agreement.

Under compromise legislation between the administration and Congress, lawmakers have 60 days to review the Iran nuclear deal. By submitting the agreement now to the United Nations Security Council, the move would undermine and contradict the spirit of this compromise arrangement.

The U.S. Congress should have the full 60 days to review the details of the agreement struck earlier this week between the P5+1 (United States plus China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and Germany) and Iran. 

The vote in the Security Council is scheduled for next week, where it is expected the deal will be endorsed.  While it is expected that implementation of the U.N. resolution will be delayed 90 days, the legal rationale for stripping away a decade worth of nuclear sanctions will have already been fixed.

When the deal was announced days ago, we reiterated our long-standing concerns about Iran’s history of deception and denial about its nuclear program.

Congress has an important role in the coming weeks. Lawmakers must ask tough questions about inspections, plutonium enrichment and sanctions relief, including Iran's demand to immediately begin acquiring conventional weapons. Congress needs to be able to fulfill this investigative role without the distraction of a Security Council vote. 

Congress Should Reject the Deal If Vital Benchmarks Have Been Pulled Back

The just-announced deal on Iran’s nuclear program has not erased the deep concern we have about Iran’s true intentions for its nuclear program.

It is impossible to look at Iran’s track record in so many areas and not be skeptical about Iran adhering to the terms of the deal. In the days leading up to the agreement, on “al-Quds Day,” government inspired crowds called for “death to America,” and U.S. and Israeli flags were burned across the country.  

The fact that verification has been a sticking point throughout this process is highly revealing. We fear that inspectors will never get managed, unfettered or spontaneous access, because Iran has consistently rejected this point all along.   

According to the terms of the deal, the arms embargo is being lifted in five years, but the arms race will begin sooner than that, as other countries will begin stockpiling weapons. Sanctions that are being lifted now will never be reinstated, because it was too difficult to get full coalition approval the first time around. Apparently, even some of the terrorism sanctions will be lifted because they will be classified as nuclear instead of non-nuclear.

All the basic components of Iran's nuclear infrastructure will now be allowed to solidify with the international community's blessing.  

At no point during the past nearly two years of negotiations has Iran lessened its support for terrorist organizations, its hegemonistic goals in the Persian Gulf and the Middle East, or its continued abuse of human rights.

The P5+1 (United States plus China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and Germany) worked hard during this time to secure a deal. But perhaps the hopeful quest for a breakthrough overshadowed Iran’s long record of deception and denial about its nuclear program. Tehran’s history underscores the likelihood that Iran will cheat again under this new deal.

Congress needs to ask tough questions about inspections, plutonium enrichment and sanctions relief, including Iran's demand to immediately begin acquiring conventional weapons. If upon inspecting the details, Congress discovers the agreement proves unsatisfactory on crucial issues, then Congress should reject the deal.

B’nai B’rith International is not surprised by the U.N. Human Rights Council's (UNHRC) decision to formally "welcome" a biased report on Israel’s defensive operations against Hamas in Gaza during the summer of 2014. The report, which accuses Israel of “possible war crimes,” was produced by the council’s own supposedly “independent, international commission of inquiry.”

The resolution embracing the report passed by a 41-1 vote, with only the United States voting against it, and Ethiopia, India, Kenya, Macedonia and Paraguay abstaining. B'nai B'rith commends all those who denied support to the biased "findings" of the commission of inquiry.

It is especially regrettable that European countries, such as Estonia, France, Germany, Ireland, Latvia, The Netherlands and the United Kingdom, voted to welcome this grossly lopsided report and failed to condemn the council for its effective denial of Israel’s right to defend itself against Palestinian terrorists.

In light of the UNHRC’s extensive track record of rote, anti-Israel attacks, this vote was entirely predictable. The council declared Israel guilty when it ordered the inquiry to begin with, and even pressed on when it was exposed that the original head of the commission, William Schabas, had been previously paid by the Palestine Liberation Organization for his legal services.

The commission of inquiry report, like so many other biased U.N. measures, is a farce and B’nai B’rith urges those serious about securing peace between Israelis and Palestinians, and about both human rights and counterterrorism, to treat it as such.