New rabbi to lead services at Bet Ha’am

Congregation Bet Ha’am in South Portland welcomes its new spiritual leader, Rabbi Jared Saks, 33, who will conduct his first services at the synagogue this weekend. Saks was selected from more than 30 applicants for the position and, for the past six years, has served as assistant and associate rabbi at Temple Israel in Minneapolis, a congregation of some 2,000 families.

A series of events will take place during the summer and fall to welcome Saks and his partner, Kirk Boettcher, and a formal installation weekend will be held in the fall.

Congregation Bet Ha’am , a Reform temple, holds services on Friday evening and Saturday morning and Torah study sessions on Saturday morning. They are located at 81 Westbrook St., South Portland. For more information, contact the office at 879-0028 or visit www.bethaam.org.

Challenge to minaret ban dismissed

The European Court of Human Rights on Friday dismissed a challenge by Muslim groups to Switzerland’s minaret building ban. A panel of seven judges with the Strasbourg, France-based court ruled that the people filing the lawsuits couldn’t claim to be victims.

Swiss voters overwhelmingly approved a constitutional ban on minarets in 2009 that barred any more construction of the iconic mosque towers.

The judges concluded that the people who filed the lawsuits — a former spokesman for a Geneva mosque and several Swiss Muslim groups — failed to show how the ban had harmed their human rights, the court said in a statement Friday.

— From staff and news services