Collage of candidates in March 17 Israeli election
1. It’s too close to call With Israelis heading to the polls March 17, the race remains tight. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party is trailing Isaac Herzog’s center-left Zionist Union by a few percentage points and is expected to come in second. Five of six polls released… Read more »
(JTA) — When Hillel International President Eric Fingerhut announced his decision to withdraw a commitment to speak to over 1,000 students at the upcoming J Street National Conference, he expressed only one major regret. In his statement last week, Fingerhut lamented that he would miss the opportunity to “thank… Read more »
Baked matzah coming out of the oven at the Streit's factory on Manhattan's Lower East Side, date unknown. (Courtesy of Streit's Matzos)
NEW YORK (JTA) — Seated in his Lower East Side office, in front of a large portrait of company patriarch Aron Streit, Alan Adler avoids becoming too nostalgic. “It’s like I tell my family members: none of you own a car from 1935, why do you think a matzah… Read more »
JERUSALEM (JTA) — Benjamin Netanyahu said in an interview that as long as he is Israel’s prime minister, a Palestinian state will not be established. The interview was published Monday on the Israeli news website NRG, a day before Israelis head to the polls, as Netanyahu attempts to shore… Read more »
LOS ANGELES (JTA) — What did I really learn at the seder table? That is, besides discovering that the white horseradish was way hotter than the red and that my very worldly uncles couldn’t read a word of Hebrew. It’s a question worth considering as we invite new generations… Read more »
Asher Levi, a retired Israeli brigadier general, appears in a video by Commanders for Israel's Security, a group of former generals who oppose Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
TEL AVIV (JTA) — Against a soundtrack of dramatic music, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lists his government’s security accomplishments, declaring over the shouts of opposition lawmakers that his Likud Party has stopped terrorists, stood up to Iran and secured Israel’s borders. Released Wednesday, the video is the latest… Read more »
TEL AVIV (JTA) — In Peter Jairus’ Nairobi neighborhood, almost nobody has a personal computer. Mathare is one of the Kenyan capital’s largest slums. Buildings are constructed from sheets of corrugated metal and Internet access is rare, found only in places like schools or community centers. Even then, the… Read more »
Twins return to the Egyptian desert in Kimmel's time travel adventure "Scarlet and Sam." (Courtesy of Kar-Ben Publishing)
BOSTON (JTA) — When Deborah Bodin Cohen immersed herself in rabbinical school in the early 1990s, she expected to spend a year in Israel as part of her studies with Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion. What she didn’t know was that a decade later, the experience of living… Read more »
Researcher Moshe Szyf in his lab at McGill University in Montreal. (Courtesy of McGill University)
(Washington Jewish Week via JTA) — In designing and testing theories on how the body programs its 19,000 genes, Moshe Szyf, a geneticist and molecular biologist at McGill University in Montreal, has expanded the notion of Jewish guilt. Sure, we might feel bad about passing along hereditary genes that… Read more »
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu campaigning at Jerusalem's Mahane Yehuda market, March 9, 2015. (Flash90)
TEL AVIV (JTA) — However much they disagree with his policies, opponents of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would surely admit he was right about one thing: These elections are all about him. When he called for new elections in December, Netanyahu said the vote would enable him “to… Read more »
Rabbi Jonah Pesner, left, the new head of the Reform movement's Religious Action Center, and Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.) in Selma, Ala. (Courtesy photo)
WASHINGTON (JTA) — It was not the first time John Lewis had invoked the Jewish-black alliance that fought for equality during the civil rights era. But it was the first time that the Georgia congressman, a civil rights hero, invoked it to explain why he was skipping a speech… Read more »
TEL AVIV (JTA) – When Israelis head to the polls for the March 17 elections, 26 parties will be vying for the Knesset’s 120 seats — including such fringe groups as the Pirate Party, which supports total government transparency and freedom of information on the Internet, and the Green… Read more »
WASHINGTON (JTA) — At the AIPAC conference, a sea of 16,000 Israel supporters spent their time talking Iran policy amid the swirling controversy over Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to Congress. To the sidelines fell discussion of the Israeli elections, the peace process and Israeli innovation — as well… Read more »
Helen Mirren in "Woman in Gold"
BERLIN (JTA) — Two starkly different images: a woman wrapped in shimmering gold, a man whipped and bleeding on a cold cement floor. The first, a 1907 painting by Austrian artist Gustav Klimt, is the centerpiece of “Woman in Gold,” a film starring Helen Mirren that had its world… Read more »
Now that the applause after Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s speech in Congress has faded away, we are left with the question: Was he right or wrong to deliver that speech? Opponents of the move (like myself) believe that the speech has accomplished nothing except to further alienate the White… Read more »
Leader of the Zionist Union faction Isaac Herzog speaking to foreign press in Jerusalem, Feb. 24, 2015. (Miriam Alster/Flash90)
TEL AVIV (JTA) — Isaac Herzog paces slowly up and down the stage, one hand in his suit pocket, a slight smile forming through his slender lips. Quietly, his heavy breath audible through the microphone, the center-left candidate for prime minister runs down a detailed a list of policy… Read more »
U.S. National Security Advisor Susan Rice, shown addressing Jewish leaders during the National Leadership Assembly for Israel in July 2014, called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's upcoming speech to Congress "destructive." (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON (JTA) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told top Senate Democrats he regretted that his planned address to the U.S. Congress is being perceived as partisan, as President Barack Obama’s top security adviser said the speech was “destructive.” Netanyahu wrote Tuesday to decline an invitation from Sens. Dick… Read more »
Eating disorders are associated with a higher rate of mortality than any other mental illness, a fact that may not be widely known among the general population. As many as 20 percent of people suffering from anorexia will prematurely die from complications related to their disorder, according to a… Read more »
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush has surrounded himself with foreign policy advisors who have worked for his father and brother as he eyes a run for the presidency. (Mark Wilson/Getty Images) WASHINGTON (JTA) — As clearly as Jeb Bush has stated that he does not want his foreign policy chops assessed against that of his brother — or his father — his choice in advisers has only made things murkier. Of 21 advisers to the former Florida governor and putative… Read more »
Students at Blich High School celebrating the victory of the center-left Zionist Union in the school's mock elections, Feb. 22, 2015. (Ben Sales) RAMAT GAN, Israel (JTA) — When Isaac Herzog learned that his Zionist Union party had won the election with 32 percent of the vote, he posted a triumphant status update on Facebook. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had failed, Herzog wrote on Sunday, and vowed that his center-left party would… Read more »
