World Report

SYDNEY (JTA) -- An Australian will stand trial for allegedly plotting to blow up Israeli diplomatic missions in Australia.

Muslim convert Jack Roche, who says he was trained to use explosives by al-Qaida, was ordered July 31 to be charged with conspiring in 2000 to bomb the Israeli Embassy in Canberra and the consulate in Sydney, according to Agence France-Presse.

The prosecution alleges Roche hatched the plot during trips to Malaysia, Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Anti-Semitic sign is concealed bomb

MOSCOW (JTA) -- Police dismantled a booby-trapped, anti-Semitic sign next to a Moscow highway.

After a telephone tip, Moscow police defused a bomb wired to a placard that read, "Death to Jews." In May 2002, another booby-trapped anti-Semitic sign detonated in the face of a woman who tried to remove it from a road outside Moscow.

Since then, several such signs have been placed in Russia, wounding those who attempted to remove them. Last year, a bomb planted in a pipe bearing an anti-Semitic slur exploded in a Moscow residential area, shattering windows but causing no injuries.

Flooded Prague shul prepares to reopen

PRAGUE (JTA) -- Prague's Pinkas Synagogue, which was seriously damaged by flooding a year ago, could reopen to visitors in October.

Leo Pavlat, director of the Jewish Museum in Prague, said work will continue after the reopening to re-inscribe some of the 80,000 names of Holocaust victims on the synagogue walls.

The synagogue is the only Jewish museum site that remains closed to visitors.

El Al flight has scare above Netherlands

LONDON (JTA) -- An El Al cargo plane lost several metal plates while flying above Holland.

But the plane landed safely Sunday at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport.

In 1992, an El Al cargo plane crashed shortly after takeoff in Amsterdam, killing 43 people.

Russian Jewish leader sentenced to 12 years

MOSCOW (JTA) -- A Russian Jewish leader has been sentenced to 12 years in jail.

Mikhail Mirilashvili, the president of the St. Petersburg branch of the Russian Jewish Congress, received the sentence last Friday for his role in the kidnapping of individuals who he believed had previously kidnapped his father. Jewish leaders in St. Petersburg said they are shocked by the sentence.

Many prominent Jewish leaders in Russia's second largest community have previously said they believe Mirilashvili is innocent. Mirilashvili's lawyers said they would appeal.

Sydney Shoah exhibit is defaced by racists

SYDNEY (JTA) -- White supremacists defaced an Australian museum housing an exhibit paying tribute to Righteous Gentiles.

Staff arriving at the Liverpool Regional Museum on the outskirts of Sydney on Monday found the building's outside walls plastered with anti-Semitic leaflets.

Other posters declared "Death to Israel."

An Australian minister reacted to the incident by saying, "This attack is disgusting and has no place in Australia. It is an affront to those who risked their lives to save Jews and to those Jews who perished in the Holocaust."