U.S. Report

NEW YORK (JTA) -- Jewish students at the University of Iowa were blocked from lighting Chanukah menorot in their dorms because of a school regulation preventing students from lighting candles in residence halls.

Some students questioned the regulation, pointing to the fact that the school allows cigarette smoking in the rooms.

Public school cancels play for Christmas

NEW YORK (JTA) -- A public elementary school in Indiana has canceled its Christmas play after the Jewish father of one of the students there complained that his son was forced to appear in the play.

School officials at the Eldon Ready Elementary School in Griffith said they were concerned about a potential legal battle ensuing from Glenn Landsman's complaint.

Demjanjuk wants U.S. to pay legal fees

NEW YORK (JTA) -- Alleged Nazi death camp guard John Demjanjuk filed papers to have the U.S. government pay the legal fees he incurred while trying to clear his name.

In papers filed Dec. 9, he said he has been reduced to poverty by "22 years of fraudulent" litigation charging that he was the notorious guard "Ivan the Terrible," who operated a gas chamber at the Treblinka extermination camp in Nazi-occupied Poland in 1942-1943.