Louis Keene is a reporter for the Forward. His work has also been published in The New York Times, New York magazine and Vice. He is based in Los Angeles.
Louis Keene
By Louis Keene
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News For Israel-bound travelers, violence throws long-awaited plans into doubt
To get her flight to Israel approved by Los Angeles’ consul general, Maure Gardner had to provide her passport, her husband’s Israeli passport, and their marriage certificate, which required a special stamp from the county clerk’s office. A minor inconvenience to endure for a wedding she had waited over two years to attend. But with…
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News Intermarriage increasingly leads to Jewish children, Pew study shows
Surveys of the American Jewish population have never failed to elicit panic over intermarriage. In response to the first National Jewish Population Study in 1970, an Intermarriage Crisis Conference convened in New York. Two decades later, after the second NJPS put the intermarriage rate at 52%, some called it a “Second Holocaust.” But a new…
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News High school flunks Jewish Heritage Month, picking Meir Kahane as honoree
It had to be a mistake. Or perhaps some kind of prank? The email from Montclair High School stunned parents in the famously liberal New Jersey enclave Monday afternoon: Its pick to honor for Jewish American Heritage Month was the late ultra-nationalist radical Rabbi Meir Kahane. The “daily announcements” email sent to students, parents and…
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Culture ‘They Own The Media’: New Van Morrison song amplifies antisemitic trope
Legendary singer-songwriter Van Morrison released a new song on streaming platforms Thursday whose title espouses a classic antisemitic trope. The lyrics of the song, “They Own The Media,” never indicate who the pronoun in its title refers to. But Morrison, a two-time Grammy winner, was also accused of antisemitism for the 2005 track “They Sold…
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News ‘His voice was the sound of music:’ An American Hasid lost on Mt. Meron
Rabbi Shragi Gestetner was born to make music. He started composing when he was 12. He sold his first song at 18. His debut album, Shragee, pulsates with the joy of a man who has found his calling. The year after it came out, Tablet called Gestetner one of the “rising talents of the current…
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News Memories of my teenage self at Mount Meron on Lag B’Omer
Within seconds of getting off the bus a bag of chocolate milk came flying at me. I caught it, bit it open, recited the shehakol blessing — that was the point, to make a blessing on this holy ground — and sucked down the whole thing. I looked at my friends in awe: What was…
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News Israeli NBA forward Deni Avdija suffers injury, ending promising rookie season
Israeli NBA rookie Deni Avdija suffered a hairline fracture in his right ankle during a game Wednesday, cutting short his rookie season for the Washington Wizards. Avdija, the ninth overall draft pick in 2020, was coming down from a layup attempt when he awkwardly twisted his ankle. He was wheel-chaired off the floor to an…
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News Emily Grodin typed her first sentence at 25. Now she has her first book.
For the first 25 years of her life, Emily Grodin’s vocabulary was limited to her name and just a couple of words. Then she got a new speech therapy aide — and an iPad that opened floodgates of personal expression. Now Grodin, a 29-year-old with nonverbal autism, and her mother Valerie Gilpeer have written a…
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