Israel has approved plans for hundreds of new housing units for Jewish settlers in the West Bank, according to reports, prompting a swift condemnation from the White House.

Pope Francis denounced all religiously inspired violence during a visit to Rome’s main synagogue on Sunday, joining the oldest Jewish community in the diaspora in a sign of interfaith friendship at a time of Islamic extremist attacks around the globe.

A teenager armed with a machete has attacked a Jewish teacher in southern France, invoking IS group and saying he had also planned to go after police.

Italy has beefed up security around Jewish and Israeli sites after an unknown attacker stabbed an Orthodox Jew seven times near a kosher pizzeria in Milan.

Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has sparked uproar after suggesting a Second World War-era Palestinian leader convinced the Nazis to adopt the “final solution” to exterminate European Jews.

Israeli police armed with stun grenades and tear gas clashed with rock-throwing Palestinian youths who had barricaded themselves inside Jerusalem’s al-Aqsa mosque for a third day, police and witnesses said.

Amsterdam is to repay the families of Jewish people who were fined for late rents during World War II.

Israel has intensified its crackdown on Jewish extremists, jailing two high-profile ultranationalist Israelis for six months without charge and arresting additional suspects in West Bank settlement outposts, security authorities said.

Violent attacks against Jews worldwide dropped in 2013, but anti-Semitism is becoming more widespread in Europe amid a rise in popularity of extremist parties, according to a report released yesterday.

Shortly before Anne Frank and her family went into hiding from the Nazis, she gave some of her toys to a non-Jewish neighbourhood girlfriend for safekeeping.