Posts By Jigsaw Digital

SAN FRANCISCO (JTA) — For three decades now, the American Jewish Reform movement has considered as Jewish the child of a Jewish father and non-Jewish mother who is raised as a Jew. But most Reform Jews in the rest of the world still do not accept “patrilineal descent.” That… Read more »

\NEW YORK (JTA) — Hosni Mubarak’s resignation Feb. 11 from Egypt’s presidency following three weeks of intense street demonstrations raises a host of questions not just for the future of Egypt and its peace treaty with Israel, but for the entire Middle East. The most remarkable feature of the… Read more »

WASHINGTON (Washington Jewish Week) — Is it anti-Semitic when someone defaces a photo of a Jew by adding devil horns, a mustache, goatee and a unibrow? Yes, says Redskins owner Dan Snyder. No, say numerous observers, including Redskins fans. The doctored photo of Snyder appeared in the Nov. 19… Read more »

NEW YORK (JTA) — In the latest attempt to reverse the fortunes of what was once America’s largest synagogue denomination, the congregational association of the Conservative movement has released a draft strategic plan that seeks to improve its governance, reduce the financial burden on member synagogues and refocus its… Read more »

The pro-Israel group StandWithUs was forced to revise this ad before it could be run on commuter rail platforms around san Francisco. (StandWithUs)

NEW YORK (JTA) — With public bickering over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict already having spilled over into university student senates, corporate pension boards and even local farmers markets, the latest battlefield in the debate over the conflict is municipal transit systems. In several major U.S. cities, advertisements on public buses… Read more »

Protesters pray in front of a tank in Cairo's Tahrir Square, Jan. 30, 2011. With the unrest in Egypt, a debate in Washington is emerging over whether to continue U.S. assistance to the country's military at $1.3 billion a year. (Iman Mosaad)

WASHINGTON (JTA) — The consensus on U.S. assistance to Egypt is that it has delivered bang for its buck: The $1.3 billion in annual defense aid has stabilized a key ally and strengthened America’s profile in the Middle East. But in the wake of massive unrest that could unseat… Read more »

Producer "Scooter" Braun, left, and Justin Bieber in "Never Say Never," a film the recounts the meteroric rise of the young singer. (Courtesy of Paramount Pictures)

LOS ANGELES (JTA) — Is “Never Say Never,” the biographical documentary and concert film that recounts the rise of Justin Bieber, also a message film of “Hear O Israel?” The film, which opens Feb. 11 in wide release, has a genuine Jewish backstory due to the onscreen presence and… Read more »

Avital Sharansky addresses the Prime Minister's Council at general Assembly of the Jewish Federations of North America in New Orleans on her struggle to achieve the release of her husband, Natan Sharansky, right, from the Soviet gulag, Nov. 7, 2010. (The Jewish Agency for Israel)

NEW YORK (JTA) — Feb. 11 marks 25 years since Natan Sharansky crossed the Glienicke Bridge from East to West Germany and became a free man. Countless stories have been told about Sharansky’s defiance of the Soviets and his courageous actions during his more than nine years of imprisonment.… Read more »

Rep. Jane Harmon, shown speaking at an October 2009 event of the Center for American Progress, hinted at her frustration with an increasingly polarized Congress in explaining her resignation to constituents. [Center for American Progress]

WASHINGTON (JTA) — Jane Harman, a Jewish Democrat who made her reputation in Congress as a tough-talking advocate for carrying a big stick, is transitioning to the world of speaking softly. Harman, 65, a tireless advocate in Congress of both the U.S.-Israel relationship and of strengthening the intelligence community’s… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — For Israel, the popular uprising against the Mubarak regime raises the specter of its worst strategic nightmare: collapse of the peace treaty with Egypt, the cornerstone of its regional policy for the past three decades. That is not the inevitable outcome of the unrest; a modified… Read more »

An Egyptian flag flies from an army outpost on the Egyptian side of the border with Israel near the moshav of Kadesh Barnea. (Dina Kraft)

BE’ER MILKA, Israel (JTA) — Driving along the Israel-Egypt border near this southern Israeli town, rusted metal posts strung with barbed wire give way to sand dunes and an exposed, open border as wide open as the question of what will become of the countries’ relations now that Egypt… Read more »

BERKELEY, Calif. (JTA) — The Chmielnicki massacres weren’t particularly funny. From 1648 to 1651, nearly 100,000 Jews were slaughtered throughout Ukraine by Bohdan Chmielnicki and his roving bands of Cossacks. It was arguably the worst pogrom in history, leaving hundreds of Jewish communities in ruins. Yet according to Mel… Read more »

LOS ANGELES (JTA) — On Super Sunday, the alefs and bets in Green Bay and Pittsburgh will be thinking about X’s and O’s. They’ll even be up for a little friendly wager. On the morning of Feb. 6, many hours before the NFC champion Green Bay Packers battle the… Read more »

Gabe Zimmerman at Kinderland Camp in the summer of 2001. [Photo courtesy Maria Falconi-Sachs]

It is, perhaps, only in America that a congresswoman named Gabrielle Giffords could reclaim the Jewish identity of her father’s family — originally named Hornstein — after living much of her life apart from the Jewish community. And it is no less of a tribute to American fluidity, however… Read more »

Smoke from a burning government building fills the sky above the Eyptian Museum in Cairo, Jan. 29. The photograph was taken from a tour bus window. (Joan Elder)

When Tucsonan Joan Elder signed up for a 10-day late-January trip to Egypt to celebrate her 70th birthday, she had no idea that her adventure would be interrupted by massive anti-government demonstrations. Apparently, the Egyptian people were just as stunned by the uprising. “No one expected anything like this… Read more »

Pro-Israel groups are caught in a dilemma over whether to back Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak or his opponents, such as those seen here gathering in Cairo on Jan. 25, 2011 to call for his ouster. (Muhammad Ghafari)

WASHINGTON (JTA) — As Egypt convulses, pro-Israel groups and U.S. Congress members are seized by the ancient maternal dilemma: If you have nothing nice to say, should you say anything at all? The question of whether to stake a claim in the protests against 30 years of President Hosni… Read more »

YEHUD, Israel (JTA) — The young would-be convert to Judaism with a gold Star of David pendant peeking through a buttoned shirt is still baffled by the summer afternoon he says he was called in and dismissed from an Israeli army conversion course for being gay. The 23-year old… Read more »

President Obama delivers the State of the Union address, Jan. 25, 2011. (The White House)

WASHINGTON (JTA) – Civility? Check. Clean energy? Check. Health care?  Check. Immigration? Check. Education? You bet. Isolating Iran? That’s in there. Poverty, guns, reproductive rights? Israel? Ummm … President Obama’s State of the Union speech Tuesday night was as notable for what it excluded as what made it in.… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) — This time there are maps — not that they necessarily will help. After the collapse of the Camp David talks in 2000, the Israeli and Palestinian sides bickered about who had offered what, and the competing historical narratives were adopted by either side and around the… Read more »

WEST BLOOMFIELD, Mich. (JTA) — As a Conservative rabbi and a member of the movement’s Rabbinical Assembly, I cannot officially consider Jewish descent to be determined patrilineally — from the father. In fact, in its Code of Professional Conduct, the section detailing the responsibilities for membership in the Rabbinical… Read more »