Jon Stewart’s Shout-Outs to the Tribe
At the 92nd Street Y last night, Jon Stewart talked with Terry Gross about politics, the media and — of course — himself. In the meantime, he was sure to play to his core 92Y audience: the Jews.
Simon Weisenthal Was a Mossad Agent, A New Book Says
A new biography of Simon Weisenthal reveals that the famed Nazi hunter may have had some heretofore-unknown friends in high places. According to author Tom Segev, who was granted unprecedented access, Wiesenthal was not just a crusading individual acting alone — he was on the payroll of Mossad.
'Oh Lord': Iran at Work on a Search Engine
People ask for Divine guidance on life decisions and matters of the heart, so why not on more mundane questions like: What is the capital of Azerbaijan?
Jewish Hospital Live Tweets Hand Transplant Surgery
Doctors at the Jewish Hospital Hand Care Center in Louisville successfully performed a double-hand transplant earlier this week. As Med City News reported, it was the third double-hand transplant (that’s right: the patient got two new hands) in the U.S. and the first ever to be live-tweeted.
Iran Declares War — On Pets
Dogs may be man’s best friend, but they have now been added to Iran’s ever-growing list of enemies.
The Western Wall's Makeover
The Western Wall is very, very old, and no one seems to mind. (In, fact, that’s kind of the point.) But it’s about to get two decidedly un-Biblical upgrades.
Brooklyn Yeshiva Plays Big Brother
At Yeshiva Tiferes Yisroel, an all-boys yeshiva in the Flatbush section of Brooklyn, everything — food, behavior, clothing — must be kosher. If school officials get their way, they’ll soon be adding one more thing to that list: at-home Internet browsing.
A "Ground Zero Mosque" Protest Jingle
Trade Martin — a country singer who will surely go from obscurity to notoriety and back to obscurity before you can say “publicity stunt” — did something that is either too offensive to be hilarious or too hilarious to be offensive, depending on where you stand: He recorded a completely serious ditty called, ever-so-subtly, “We’ve Got To Stop the Mosque at Ground Zero.”
A Peaceful Coexistence Remains, Despite Student Turnover
In the days since Jews first put down roots in the Midwood section of Brooklyn, much has changed. The population — once mostly Ashkenazi — is now dominated by Sephardic Jews, most of whom emigrated from Syria. Avenue J, the main drag, offers sushi as well as kosher meat, and the synagogues of Coney Island Avenue sit alongside auto body shops, a discount movie theater and a Pakistani community center.
Hiking Little Hitler
A little crag near Stockholm is causing a minor uproar in the Jewish world, thanks to the inconveniently named Cordelia Hess, a historian who, on a recent hike, took issue with several Nazi-inspired trail names. “I thought it rather unpleasant to climb through the ‘Crematorium’ or say that ‘now I am going to do Kristallnacht,’” she told Dagens Nyheter, a Swedish newspaper. “The use of such names on the climbing routes trivializes the Holocaust.”