Your daily spiel for Thursday, Sept. 1

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Your Daily Spiel is The CJN’s daily roundup of trending stories in the Jewish world. Sign up to receive it in your inbox by clicking here.


Teaching Israelis proper etiquette. A hilarious new video hinting that Israelis should adopt manners akin to their U.K. brethren is going viral in Israel, with nearly 250,000 views on Facebook. The satirical clip shows a British Israeli explaining to his friend how subway and train etiquette works in England and that Israelis should consider being more orderly and polite when hopping on and off buses and trains (while disobeying his own suggestions, mind you). Sorry, Hebrew speakers only for this one:

Klezfunk hop. The musical genres of klezmer, hip hop and funk will intertwine at the mercy of Abraham Inc., a supergroup consisting of Jewish rap star Socalled (Josh Dolgin), klezmer clarinetist David Krakauer, hand funk trombonist Fred Wesley. The group will rock out following Shabbos Sept. 3 with other six musicians in a funky klezmer dance party brought to you by Ashkenaz Festival in Toronto. Make sure to check it out if you’re in the city this weekend.

Oscar-worthy. A filmmaker and Tel Aviv university graduate’s film based on the true story of a love affair between an Auschwitz guard and a Jewish inmate will be entered in the race for best Foreign Documentary at the 89th Academy Awards ceremony. Maya Sarfaty will also receive a gold medal for her film, The Most Beautiful Woman, based on the story of Jewish prisoner Helena Citronova, who fell in love with SS guard Franz Wunsch. Wunsch reportedly saved Citronova and her sister from the death camp, but was unable to save her sister’s children.

Nazis in the news. Argentinians from a German school reportedly attacked Jewish students while covered with swastikas and Adolf Hitler moustaches at a nightclub last weekend, a property originally destined to be a Nazi propaganda “camp” is being transformed into a luxury playground, and a Jewish “Avenger” does not at all regret targeting Nazis following the end of World War II. His only regret is that he didn’t successfully kill any of them.

Not fit for the podium. York University is investigating one of its staff members after B’nai Brith Canada discovered a series of anti-Semitic and anti-Zionist Facebook posts by a lab technologist by the name of Nikolaos Balaskas empoyed with the university.  

According to reports, Balaskas accused Zionists of conspiring with the Nazis during the Holocaust to commit genocide, referred to the story of Anne Frank as a ‘hoax’ and called the Sept. 11 attacks a “Zionist attack on New York City.” B’nai Brith campus affairs coordinator Aidan Fishman said it is extremely important for strong measures to be taken against the professor, given York’s failure in conducting previous investigations into anti-Semitism on campus.

$375 (U.S.) for a hipster tallit. High-end hipster brand rag & bone is selling new “ponchos” that strongly resemble the Jewish prayer shawl known as the tallit, and for a whopping $375 (U.S.!!) no less. That’s $490 Cdn, just so you know. According to the poncho’s tallit’s description on Nordstrom’s, the department store selling it, it’s “oversized,” “bohemian,” and “offers effortless layering in transitioning seasons.”

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