Yearly Archives 2018

The World Economic Forum calls Israel a “tech titan.” Israeli tech companies raised $4.8 billion in venture capital last year. Things many of us use daily — the Intel PC processor, the USB flash drive and Google’s Suggestion function — all were invented in Israel. The Arizona Israel Technology… Read more »

The Israel Center has surpassed all our expectations, in terms of creating a connection between Tucsonans and Israel,” says Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona President and CEO Stuart Mellan. The Israel Center began as a way to bring the cultural richness of Israel to Arizona and engage the local… Read more »

On Wednesday, April 18, the State of Israel will honor its fallen sons and daughters. Those who have been in Israel on Yom Hazikaron know that it is a very special day. All stores, shops, and movie theaters are closed. There are no special sales, and no happy public… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) — Meeting last month with Donald Trump, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu came away satisfied that he and the American president were in agreement on a wide range of issues, including Syria, where Israel wants to limit Iranian influence as the Syrian civil war wraps up. “We… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) — It’s been a busy, confounding week for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel and the question of the African migrants. On Monday afternoon, after months of threats to deport the lot of them, Netanyahu said he reached an agreement with the United Nations that would have… Read more »

(The Nosher via JTA) — Kreplach seem like the kind of dish only your bubbe would make. Especially from scratch. And I always felt intimidated to even try it. You have to make the dough, make the filling and shape it just right. (Turns out, actually you don’t.) But… Read more »

NEW YORK (JTA) — Like Holocaust museums the world over, the Amud Aish Memorial Museum in Brooklyn focuses on European Jewish communities that thrived before the Nazis came to power, the killing machine that led to millions of deaths, and the resilience of survivors both during the war and… Read more »

(JTA) — This is a hypothetical memo from two members of the U.S. House of Representatives to the nominee for secretary of state, Mike Pompeo. To: Mike Pompeo From: Nita Lowey, Chris Smith Mr. Pompeo: Last week, many of our constituents, as well as Jewish families here and abroad,… Read more »

TEANECK, N.J. (JTA) — Mordechai Schachter didn’t know he would soon be a soldier when he traveled from his native Romania to prestate Israel in 1948. He was a 17-year-old with a passion for Zionism, leaving behind a country that was becoming increasingly anti-Semitic a few short years after… Read more »

NEW YORK (JTA) — Like Holocaust museums the world over, the Amud Aish Memorial Museum in Brooklyn focuses on European Jewish communities that thrived before the Nazis came to power, the killing machine that led to millions of deaths, and the resilience of survivors both during the war and… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — All too often, when I ask campus organizations that are pro-Israel and deeply Zionist why they avoid using the “Z-word” in their messaging and literature, I’m told, “Zionism doesn’t poll well.” True, not polling well is one of today’s great sins. But imagine what our world… Read more »

(JTA) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is freezing an agreement made with the United Nations that would have relocated thousands of African asylum seekers to Western countries. His decision leaves in limbo the fate of up to 40,000 African asylum seekers in Israel; an Israeli government plan… Read more »

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (JTA) — One of Argentina’s most popular soccer clubs is hosting an exhibition of harrowing stories about the sport from the Holocaust era. “It Wasn’t a Game” (or “No Fue un Juego”) opened last week at the River Plate museum in the team’s stadium building complex… Read more »

(JTA) — With Passover here, leaders of the Conservative movement are engaged in their own exodus. The CEOs of the movement’s rabbinic and congregational umbrella groups are both stepping down. Next month, for the first time in years, there will be a contested election for one of the top… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — When the smoke from the rifles of Israeli sharpshooters and the firebombs thrown by Gaza Palestinians cleared in the wake of the Palestinian March of Return, there were at least 15 Palestinians dead and hundreds of protesters injured. Israel, meanwhile, had a huge PR mess. Israeli… Read more »

WESTERBORK, Netherlands (JTA) — On a foggy Sunday, cheerful cabaret music pierces the silence that hangs over this former concentration camp, one of the largest facilities of its kind in Nazi-occupied Western Europe. Blasting from the recorder of an Israeli visitor last month, the music draws disapproving looks and… Read more »

(JTA) — One year after Israel’s establishment, in the dead of night, three students ascended a tower at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York and raised the Israeli flag. The next morning, the Conservative rabbinical school’s administration took it down. That act of surreptitious Zionist protest was one… Read more »

PARIS (JTA) – French Jews mourning a Holocaust survivor murdered in her Paris apartment welcomed the presence of France’s interior minister, Gérard Collomb, at a vigil in her memory. “We appreciate authorities’ swift action for justice and continued support,” Joel Mergui, the president of the Consistoire Jewish group, said… Read more »

(Kveller via JTA) — The car is our place. Many of our most poignant family memories are set in my blue, messy, high-mileage Toyota Highlander — it is where the magic happens. While in transit, we’ve had seated dance parties, lots of laughs and our fair share of conflicts.… Read more »

(The Nosher via JTA) — I must have been about 6 or 7 years old, and I remember being eye level to my grandmother’s stove. I saw these white, round things frying up in oil. What I vividly remember was the distinct hole on the edge of these round… Read more »