Israeli President Reuven Rivlin speaks at a memorial service for novelist Amos Oz in Tel Aviv, Dec.31, 2018. (Mark Neiman)
The young nation of Israel has witnessed in recent years a dwindling of its founding generation — from the passing of statesmen like Shimon Peres to the death last month of novelist and political activist Amos Oz. Oz was 79; Israel is but 70. Oz was old enough to… Read more »
Cnaan Liphshiz examines binned avocados at Amsterdam's Albert Cuyp Market, Jan. 5, 2018. (Cnaan Liphshiz)
AMSTERDAM — I was recently offered a handout while rummaging for food in a heap of trash as my two small children looked on. It happened all because I wanted to start attending synagogue regularly. To be clear, I’m writing this neither as a plea for pity nor an indictment against… Read more »
Israeli parliament members meet at the Knesset in Jerusalem, Dec. 30, 2018. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)
JERUSALEM (JTA) — Israeli politics looks like a big mess right now. In the past few weeks, three new parties have been launched and one party has kicked out a former partner. More changes are likely, too. It probably will get messier still if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is indicted… Read more »
One of the most important responses in the wake of a traumatic incident like the Oct. 27 Pittsburgh shooting is for the community to come together, experts say. (Jeff Swensen/Getty Images)
This article is sponsored by Hadassah. Within 24 hours of the shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh, Judith Cohen’s cellphone was ringing incessantly with offers of help from around the world. A psychiatrist who specializes in the treatment of trauma and grief in children and adolescents, Cohen is one… Read more »
BERKELEY, Calif. (JTA) — Ronald Reagan infamously described the “nine most terrifying words in the English language” as “I’m from the government and I’m here to help.” Right now, pro-Israel activists are recoiling from the unanticipated consequences of state laws which only sought to “help” them fight BDS, the… Read more »
President George Bush poses for photographers following his Oval Office address to the nation, Sept. 27, 1991. (Luke Frazza/AFP/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON (JTA) — George H.W. Bush was a man of uncommon decency. He also was a man of uncommon integrity. I worked for him for over 10 years, while he was the vice president and then president. My memories could fill a book (or at least a chapter of… Read more »
A Jewish woman casts her vote at the Yusef Abad Synagogue during elections in Tehran, Feb. 26, 2016. (Fatemeh Bahrami/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images)
(JTA) — Several days after the Jewish Daily Forward published the first-ever report from the Islamic Republic of Iran by a reporter openly representing a Jewish, pro-Israel news outlet, the host of CNN’s foreign affairs show “GPS” posed a vexing question. Citing the Forward’s surprisingly favorable account of the… Read more »
Lisa Silverstein Tzur (Courtesy of Tzur)
SAN FRANCISCO (JTA) — This is a story of gratitude. So much gratitude. In 1983, my local rabbi handed me his guitar and taught me four chords. He said (paraphrasing the first century sage Hillel) “Lisa, with these four chords you can play any Jewish song. All the rest is commentary.… Read more »
Many Jewish legal authorities have called for universal vaccination in response to measles outbreaks in the United States and Israel, according to two doctors associated with the Touro College system. (Hannah Smith/KOMU/Flickr)
NEW YORK (JTA) — Opposition to vaccination on political and religious grounds has been swaying parents across the country to refuse immunizations for their children. Recently this has resulted in two of the largest measles outbreaks in New York’s history, impacting haredi Orthodox Jewish neighborhoods. The opposition to vaccines… Read more »
Tova Hartman (Courtesy of Hartman) KIRYAT ONO, Israel (JTA) — Last year, at the diverse campuses of Ono Academic College, some of my students expressed concern and even dismay over the Christmas tree we had set up next to the Hanukkah menorah. The students were understandably wary of what such Christian symbols have meant to… Read more »
Jeanette Kern, left, receiving one of the two commendations she earned for her work during World War II as a clerk in the Army Signal Corps, July 27, 1944. (Orn Hayon)
After my grandmother Jeannette died in December 1996, the process of settling her estate worked in the same way it does in most families: There was a house to be sold and possessions to be distributed. The surviving family members were left with a few souvenirs of my grandparents’… Read more »
The Women's March leaders, from left, Carmen Perez, Tamika Mallory, Bob Bland and Linda Sarsour on stage at the BET's Social Awards at Tyler Perry Studio in Atlanta, Feb. 11, 2018. (Bennett Raglin/Getty Images for BET)
NEW YORK (JTA) — The same Jewish liberals who gave in to efforts by the Jewish right to divide the black and Jewish communities in the ’70s are back again to divide Jews from their would-be allies, and this time they’re dead set on being the breach in… Read more »
Women's March co-chairwomen Linda Sarsour, left, and Tamika Mallory at a voter registration rally at Sam Boyd Stadium in Las Vegas, Jan. 21, 2018. (Sam Morris/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON, D.C. (JTA) — On the heels of actress and activist Alyssa Milano’s remarkable statement indicating that she plans to boycott the upcoming 2019 Women’s March because of its leaders’ persistent anti-Semitic behavior, there has been a backlash in our own Jewish feminist ranks. Jewish women are being urged not… Read more »
Rabbi Laurie Zimmerman (Courtesy of Zimmerman)
Editor’s note: Last week, students at Baraboo High School in Wisconsin were seen in a photograph taken last spring in which they appeared to be giving the “Heil Hitler” salute. Although the photographer who took the photo on the steps of a county courthouse said the camera caught the boys… Read more »
(Kveller via JTA) – I was deep in my third trimester and sweating through the Tel Aviv heat when I thought to myself “Never again.” Seven years into my life in Israel, I just couldn’t spend another hot, intense and chaotic summer there. It’s not just the blistering… Read more »
JERUSALEM (JTA) — A couple of months ago I was waiting to use an ATM near my house, flicking through Twitter as the line inched its way forward. Finally, after about 10 minutes and several tweets, I reached the machine and was getting ready to insert my card when… Read more »
Marvel Comics Publisher, Stan Lee, poses with a book of "Spider Man" comics which he created along with comics on the "Hulk" and others. Photo from Washington Post Archive scanned on 2/17/2009. (Photo by Gerald Martineau/The Washington Post via Getty Images)
(JTA) — When Stan Lee died on Nov. 12 at 95, he left behind a vast legacy. Between 1961 and 1969, his greatest sustained burst of creative activity, he co-created a vast array of iconic characters, including Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four, the X-Men, the Avengers, the Incredible Hulk, Thor,… Read more »
From Wikipedia, eyewitness accounts and reports from Holocaust survivors While the initial purpose of Kristallnacht was the need of financing for the Nazi Party, there were underlying racial and social hatred. That hatred was expanded to include Gypsies, homosexuals and members/leaders of other religions. The international Evian Conference on… Read more »
On Friday night, Nov. 2, I entered a local synagogue with a feeling of trepidation. Could a copycat of the recent tragedy in Pittsburgh take place in Tucson? I wondered what I would do if the unthinkable happened again. Remembering how we were taught in elementary school to crouch… Read more »
The vast majority of Americans are not anti-Semites, nor anti-black, or anti-gay, etc. This may not have been the case when I was born in Chicago 80-plus years ago. At that time the gays hid in the closet, black people were seen and not heard, and we Jews could… Read more »
