The next time Orquesta Kef gets invited to play in the United States, it may actually be able to get into the country.

The band of young musicians from Buenos Aires, who blend Klezmer music – traditional instrumental music of Eastern European Jews – with Argentine tango and folk, were denied entry in November 2009 by U.S. immigration officials. A U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services director recommended against issuing the group a so-called P-3 a visa to perform at a “Fiesta Hanukkah” concert in Los Angeles, saying there was no proof the group’s act was “culturally unique.”

After public blowback, an appeals board re-examined the case and reversed the decision – but by then Hanukkah had passed and Orquesta Kef never got to play in L.A.

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This week, Citizenship and Immigration Services announced it was officially clarifying its definition of “culturally unique” to specify that it “is not limited to traditional art forms, but may include artistic expression that is deemed to be a hybrid or fusion of more than one culture or region.”

The new definition will apply to reviews of future applications for P-3 visas from foreign performing artists and entertainers.

“It was something that needed to have a more fine-tuned definition,” said immigration services spokeswoman Sharon Rummery. “It’s going to make it easier for us to adjudicate cases like these in the future."

People who want to perform in the U.S. typically need one of the following: a P-1 visa, issued to internationally recognized athletes, artists and entertainers; a P-2, for artists or entertainers in a reciprocal exchange program; a P-3 visa, issued to entertainers participating in a culturally unique program; or an O-1, known as the “genius” visa, for individuals with extraordinary ability in the arts, athletics, education or sciences (NBA star Dirk Nowitski of Germany, for example, has an O-1).

In its original P-3 denial, an immigration official concluded of Orquesta Kef:

“The evidence repeatedly suggests that the group performs a hybrid or fusion style of music, incorporating musical styles from other cultures and regions. A hybrid or fusion style of music cannot be considered culturally unique to one particular country, nation, society, class, ethnicity, religion, tribe, or other group of persons.”

The band had been booked by the Skirball Cultural Center, a Jewish cultural institution in Los Angeles, to perform at its annual Hanukkah holiday concert. In the visa application, Skirball included a short biography of the band, describing the ensemble’s  “unique musical style” as “based on the millenary force of tradition and the powerful emotion of the Jewish culture, mixed in with Latin American sounds.”

Skirball also provided letters from music experts who testified to the group’s unique sound.

 “How more culturally specific can you get than Jewish music of Latin America?" Jordan Peimer, Skirball’s vice president and director of programs, thought at the time.

The visa denial was the topic of several scathing columns, including a blog post on Foreign Policy magazine’s website sarcastically titled “Keeping America safe from Latin Klezmer bands.”

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Peimer, who said the initial denial was “a huge missed opportunity,” called the latest decision “a vindication for the band … and also a vindication for the American people.” 

“It says our government works,” he told msnbc.com on Wednesday.

Alejandro Filippa, a New York immigration attorney who specializes in artist visa applications, said the immigration agency’s clarification of the definition of “culturally unique” was a positive step in a world of increasingly diverse and interdependent cultures.

“The door is now more open for an entire new wave of artists to perform in the United States,” Filippa said in an email to msnbc.com. “Unfortunately, the fact this application was initially denied is indicative of the cultural ignorance of some USCIS officers in adjudicating cases that are more reflective of the modern, diverse international community we now live in.”

As for when Orquesta Kef might finally play in the U.S., Peimer says he hopes to book the band for a future Hanukkah concert.

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A non-Jewish man can sue his former employers over anti-Semitic remarks made to him by his supervisors, an appeals court judge has decided.

Myron Cowher, 49, of Dingmans Ferry, Pa., says he was subjected to “the continual utterance of explicit slurs about Jews” for more than a year at Carson & Roberts Site Construction & Engineering until he left in May 2008, according to a New Jersey appeals court ruling.

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The ruling -- which overturned a previous court decision that Cowher could not sue because he was not Jewish -- detailed some of the alleged abuse, which included, “If you were a German, we would burn you in the oven,” “Only a Jew would argue over his hours,” and “I have friends in high places, not in f****** temple.”

Cowher produced DVDs of video recordings of the two alleged abusers, Jay Unangst and Nick Gingerelli, making those and other remarks.

In a deposition given after the DVDs emerged, Unangst admitted they “contained an accurate depiction of what occurred.” He also admitted using “the Hebrew folk song Hava Nagila as the ring tone for calls on his cell phone from the plaintiff,” according to the ruling.

'Emotional toll'
Unangst and Gingerelli denied they thought Cowher was Jewish, saying they had “traced the origin of their comments to the fact that plaintiff and his wife took a cut on the proceeds of a Super Bowl pool that they were running, thereby conforming to the stereotype of Jews as avaricious.”

Robert Scirocco, attorney for Cowher, told msnbc.com that his client said he had undergone “this barrage of verbal attacks on a regular basis.”

“It certainly had an emotional toll on him, knowing he would be going in on a daily basis and facing this barrage of anti-Semitic insults,” he said.

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Cowher stayed at the firm “because he needed the work,” Scirocco said, adding that Cowher left in May 2008 because of a work-related injury. Cowher now works as a trucker for another firm.

Attorney Frederick Polak, who represents Carson & Roberts and the others, told msnbc.com that his clients had not yet decided whether to appeal the decision to the state's supreme court. If there is no appeal, the civil trial will go ahead.

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Polak sent msnbc.com a “counter-statement of facts” that was presented to the court on behalf of the defendants.

The statement said employees -- all men -- used to gather in the office where Gingerelli and Unangst had desks and engage in “joking, locker room banter.”

Defense: Cowher made anti-Semitic remarks
It said that Cowher would walk into the office, “pass gas and walk out, intending this action as a joke.”

“Plaintiff engaged in joking, bantering comments with defendants Gingerelli and Unangst (who is obese), including respectively directing slurs at them about Italians and obese people,” the statement said.

“In particular, Plaintiff specifically directed epithets relating to people of Italian heritage at Gingerelli,” it added. Gingerelli was “not offended” as he understood these remarks were part of this atmosphere of “friendly banter” and “childish behavior.”

“Neither Gingerelli nor Unangst believed that Plaintiff was Jewish. Other employees also knew that Plaintiff was not Jewish,” the statement said.

“Plaintiff’s incredible assertion that his co-workers actually thought he was Jewish and that he was emotionally distressed by their comments is nothing but an attempt to create a fact issue where there is none,” it added.

The statement said Cowher’s claim was “all the more disingenuous given that he too made anti-Semitic remarks at the office,” and had also “targeted blacks,” referring to an African-American employee with a well-known derogatory epithet.

The appeal judge's decision was previously reported by The Star-Ledger newspaper in New Jersey.

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TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- A painting – nearly five centuries old and worth millions - that was taken by the Nazis in World War II has been returned to the heirs of its original Jewish owner by U.S. officials.

"Christ Carrying the Cross Dragged By A Rascal" by Italian artist Girolamo de' Romani was stolen during the occupation of France from Frederico Gentili di Giuseppe, an Italian Jew who had lived in Paris, Reuters reported.

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He died of natural causes in 1940, a month before the Nazis invaded, and his children and grandchildren had already fled the country.

The painting was one of 70 items taken from his collection, Reuters said. It depicts Christ crowned in thorns, carrying a cross and dressed in a copper-colored silk robe, and dates back to circa 1538.

The collection was sold by the French Vichy government – allowed by the Nazis to run parts of France - in 1941 and Gentili's grandchildren filed suit in 1997 to get it back, according to the news service.

The painting had found its way to the Pinacoteca di Brera museum in Milan, Italy, which then loaned it to the Mary Brogan Museum of Art and Science in Tallahassee, Florida.

'Right a wrong'
Based on a tip from an employee of Christie's auction house in June 2011, Interpol investigators last summer alerted U.S. officials that the painting may have been stolen, Reuters reported.

Last September, U.S. Attorney Pamela Marsh ordered the Brogan museum to hold the painting instead of returning it to Italy, saying the federal government believed it rightfully belonged to the man's family, according to The Associated Press. It had been under the protection of the U.S. government since November.

"Seventy years is a very long time … But it shows that it is never too late to right a wrong,” U.S. Homeland Security Investigations Special Agent Susan McCormick told reporters Wednesday.

The piece is one of hundreds of thousands of works of art stolen from Jewish families throughout Europe by the Nazis. It is among nearly 2,500 works of art and antiquities that Homeland Security Investigations officials have repatriated to 23 countries since 2007.

Gentili's grandson, Lionel Salem, told reporters by telephone on Wednesday that the six heirs plan to sell the work, which he said was due to be auctioned at Christie's in New York on June 6. The painting has been insured for $2.5 million.

"For a cake, it is relatively easy cutting it into six, not totally easy but quite easily," Salem said of the family's decision to sell. "But for a painting, you see, it is more difficult."

Marsh hailed the outcome of the investigations.

"This result happened only because people were courageous and willing to step up and do what they knew was right and good," she said, according to The Associated Press.

Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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STRATFORD, Conn. -- A Stratford condo association has ordered a resident to take down a religious artifact that adorns most Jewish homes or face a penalty of $50 a day.

Barbara Cadranel said the controversy began earlier this year when board members at the California Condominiums asked her to take down her mezuzah, a prayer scroll in a small clear plastic case, that she has affixed to the doorpost of her home – as Jewish law commands.

See the original video and story at NBCConnecticut.com

"I'm bullied and I'm saddened and it's changed my whole existence here," Cadranel said.

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The board notified Cadranel that she is in violation of the condo by-laws because the mezuzah is not on the door but the doorpost, which is considered a common area. She said she now feels intimidated.

“I don't go down there when everybody gets their mail because I don't want to go through this,” she said.

Susan Reid, who lives across the hall from Cadranel, has an Easter display on her door. She is in favor of the board's decision for Cadranel to remove the mezuzah.

"Everybody has different religions and if we all start to put things (up), it looks unsightly," Reid said.

The fact that the mezuzah is on the doorpost, and not the door, means it is in a common area, something that is against condo association rules, according to Reid.

Video from inside the complex showed several common areas adorned with Easter eggs and other Easter decorations.

Despite her discomfort, Cadranel is not considering moving, nor is she considering taking down the mezuzah.

The Connecticut office of the Anti-Defamation League has joined Cadranel in her fight. 

“Saying a mezuzah cannot be hung is tantamount to telling a Jew that they need to move,” ADL spokeswoman Randi Pincus said.

“You’ve heard her side of the story, but believe me, it is not totally valid,” Jerry Lawlor, a member of the condo board, said. He would not elaborate.

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For American Atheists, Tuesday was meant to be a big day for getting out their godless message — with the unveiling of a billboard in a heavily Jewish neighborhood in New York City. But plans to erect the sign in the Williamsburg area of Brooklyn were altered at the last minute when the owner of site refused access to the installers.

Written in Hebrew and English, the sign was to have read: "You know it’s a myth … and you have a choice." It is an advertisement for the upcoming "Reason Rally" in Washington, D.C., billed as the biggest atheist gathering in U.S. history, and for the American Atheists' convention immediately afterward.

It was also intended to urge non-believers to overcome their fears and "come out" in their heavily religious communities.

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"We believe that (these) communities are teeming with atheists due to the emails we regularly receive," said American Atheists President Dave Silverman, a nonprofit that seeks civil rights for non-believers and absolute separation of church and state. "We have received a dozen emails from Hasidic Atheist Jews since we announced the billboards. … They feel totally alone. We want to tell them they are not alone."

Silverman was at the site with the advertising company to erect the giant sign atop a residential building.

But landlord Kenny Stier refused to allow workers from the advertising company Clear Channel into the building, said Silverman. He told The Brooklyn Paper that he believes powerful rabbis in the largely ultra-Orthodox Hasidic Jewish area persuaded Stier to block the billboard.

"It has been very disconcerting to see that the traditional victims of religious bigotry have become the purveyors of religious bigotry," said Silverman, who was raised in the Jewish faith.

Stier could not immediately be reach for comment, but The Brooklyn Paper quoted him as saying, "I don’t want to get involved in this."

Williamsburg Rabbi David Niederman told the paper the sign is "a disgrace. ... The name of god is very holy to us and to the whole world."

Atheists bill big names for 'coming out' party in the capital

The atheist organization has already selected a new site along the Brooklyn-Queens expressway not far away, and will try again on Thursday to erect it there.

On Wednesday, American Atheists were slated to post another billboard to near the Islamic center of the heavily Muslim community in Paterson, N.J. — identical except written in Arabic and English. They have not received any blowback in that community, Silverman said.

"We’re not particularly disturbed about it,” said Ibrahim Hooper, spokesman for the Council on American Islamic Relations. "We believe it’s their First Amendment right to put them up. … Obviously they placed them to be provocative, but that’s also their right."

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