Scribe, the Forward’s curated contributor network, is a place for showcasing personal experiences and perspective from across our Jewish communities. Here you will find a wide array of reflections on Jewish issues, life-cycle events, spirituality, culture and more.
Community
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You say matzah — and matzo and matzuh and matzee and more
Readers respond to our editor-in-chief’s column about a Passover copy-editing conundrum
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A Look Inside The Kakuma Refugee Camp
Last month, I had the rare opportunity to document life inside Kakuma Refugee Camp, located in Northwestern Kenya. This United Nations Refugee Agency camp opened in 1992 to accommodate the 23,000 “Lost Boys of Sudan.” During that year, the Second Sudanese Civil War gripped the continent, causing mass displacement across the region. When Kakuma was…
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Family Separation Is Never Humane — Even When Parents Are Inmates
It is a Monday afternoon in early June. Three black vans sit idling in front of the Children’s Museum of Manhattan; sitting inside are mothers waiting to enjoy two hours with their children — making art, singing and playing. For these mothers, this isn’t an experience they can take for granted. They are inmates from…
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Birthright Has An Agenda — And That’s Perfectly Okay
This summer, for the first time, I staffed a Birthright trip — and it was incredible. Ten action-packed days without more than a minute to breathe. But it wasn’t the itinerary that made the trip so amazing; it was the people. My bus was filled with forty young professionals with very little prior knowledge of…
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My Father Was A Reagan Appointee. Now, I’m Politically — And Religiously — Homeless.
Years ago, I came to the conclusion that, as a Jew, I am religiously homeless. While I am not very observant, I feel very Jewish — I just don’t perform all the rituals or believe in many of the archaic rules. But at the same time, I am unabashedly pro-Israel and believe that Jerusalem is…
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What The Torah Teaches Us About The Power Of The Powerless
Since President Trump was elected, I’ve taken to the streets of Washington, D.C. more times than I can count to protest the administration’s policies and the people stripping women, immigrants and marginalized communities of the rights that progressives spent decades fighting for. Each protest has been marked by a different call to action — but,…
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Anti-Semitism Is Real — And So Are White Jews
I am a white American Jew. If I look at my family tree for many generations back on either side, I will see white Europeans who look just like me. My mother’s family has been in the US for several generations. She has roots in Eastern Europe, but her parents, grandparents and great-grandparents were born…
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Our Selective Outrage Over Airplane Seat Change Requests
Last week, the Twitter world exploded as an in-flight romance was live tweeted at 35,000 feet on an Alaska Air flight from LaGuardia to Dallas. Over the course of the four-hour flight, we were treated to a play-by-play from two people who had switched seats in order to sit next to each other as they…
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At A Border Town In Mexico, Mothers Separated From Their Children Wait — And Wait
It’s July 4, and I’ve just come home after three days’ absence. My toddler puts his little arms around my neck, lays his head on my shoulder and doesn’t move for 15 minutes. He follows me all throughout the day, yells in distress if I leave the room, bites me if I don’t pay enough…
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Israeli And Aboriginal Australian: An Odyssey Of Self-Discovery
A version of this article originally appeared in Plus61J, an Australian-Jewish publication. Growing up in a Jewish household in suburban Sydney, Australia, Denise Langman always knew she was adopted. Her parents made no secret of the fact they first met her as a 10-month-old at the Scarba Welfare House for Children in Bondi, a Victorian…
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In Cologne, Archaeologists Unearth The History Of Germany’s Oldest Jewish Community
After attending the New Waves Day 2018 concert in Dusseldorf, Germany last month, I took a train to Köln, or what we know as Cologne. It was the nearest big city, and I wanted to see if the waterfront along the Rhine was as spectacular as Dusseldorf’s. But what I saw there was even grander….
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To The Israeli Government, The Only Kosher Wedding Is An Orthodox One
A version of this article originally appeared in Plus61J, an Australian-Jewish publication. Several years ago, when I was living in Tel Aviv, I attended the wedding of some Jewish friends. The bride and groom went out of their way to identify as secular Israelis rather than Jewish, and consistently struggled to understand my connection with…
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