This article is part of our morning briefing. Click here to get it delivered to your inbox each weekday. Is having a Jewish state worth it? A new book makes the case for optimism.
“Celebrating Israel’s 75th birthday this year feels a bit like popping open a bottle of Champagne at the scene of a car crash,” writes our opinion editor, Laura E. Adkins. Ahead of the milestone anniversary, she interviewed Daniel Gordis, a prominent American-Israeli thinker who has a new book out about what Israel looks like at 75, and what we should make of it. In their conversation, Gordis — a center-right, Modern Orthodox Zionist who has joined the protest movement against the Netanyahu government’s proposed judicial overhaul — maintained that Israel’s highly complex and in many ways troubling present shouldn’t preclude hope for its future. “One of the last sources of passion”: One reason for Jews who live outside Israel to care about it? Per Gordis, it’s an important factor in maintaining a sense of shared identity. “What else are American Jews going to get worked up about in the Jewish world? Tikkun olam?” he asked. “How does the majority protect the rights of the minority?”: Israel is never going to be a fully pluralistic society, Gordis said. But he wants to see it become a place where Israeli Arabs “have every single civil right that I have,” and thinks getting there is the kind of challenge that Israel has shown itself able to address. “We ought to learn our history”: In his book, Gordis points out that previous attempts to establish a Jewish state in Israel lasted, respectively, 73 and 74 years. “We have a huge responsibility not just to our children and grandchildren, but to the Jewish people writ large, not to screw this up,” he said. Read the interview ➤ |
This Jewish courtroom artist’s Trump sketch is The New Yorker’s latest cover: Jane Rosenberg was one of three artists to sit in on former President Donald Trump’s arraignment last week. Her sketch of Trump staring angrily at the prosecutor went viral. In an interview with our intern Rebecca Salzhauer, Rosenberg recalled the “total chaos” of Trump’s day in court — and called it “the most memorable thing in my career.” Read the story ➤ At one Seder in Nepal, I felt like the wicked son — but another kindled a flame. On the first night of Passover, Ethan Klaris attended a Seder with 1,000 guests at a Kathmandu hotel. Then he went to one led by a bluegrass band in an open-air courtyard. The two very different interpretations of the same storied ritual, Klaris wrote, helped him reconnect to Judaism through Buddhism, and left him contemplating “the way in which the trauma and salvation of our ancestors remains relevant to the affliction of multitudes today.” Read his essay ➤ But wait, there’s more … • In a touching remembrance, our PJ Grisar writes that the “artful social commentary” of Al Jaffee, the MAD Magazine cartoonist who died Monday at 102, “was as close as I got to reading a page of Talmud.” Read his essay ➤ • Does Passover wreak havoc on your digestive system? Our Adam Kovac breaks down the science behind the holiday’s most dreaded side effect. Read the story ➤ • And our Mira Fox was named a finalist for the 2023 Deadline Club award in Arts Reporting, for her 2022 feature about an all-Mormon production of Fiddler on the Roof at Brigham Young University. Revisit her story ➤ |
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Jewish visitors accompanied by Israeli security forces at the Al-Aqsa mosque compound, also known as the Temple Mount, in Jerusalem on Sunday. (AHMAD GHARABLI / AFP) |
? After a spate of recent violence, Israel’s government banned Jews from the Temple Mount for the last 10 days of Ramadan. Last week, Israel forces were filmed beating Muslim worshippers they had removed from the site, which is often the site of clashes during Jewish holidays and Islam’s holy month. (JTA) ✡️ New York City schools may soon observe a Jewish Heritage Day. The City Council passed a resolution asking the Department of Education to create the day, citing escalating antisemitism. ?️ A Palestinian man saved a Jewish couple whose drive home to a settlement in the occupied West Bank was disrupted by stone throwing last week. “It could have easily ended differently,” the Israeli man said. (Haaretz) ? The New York Times profiled Harlan Crow, the Dallas billionaire whose lavish gifts to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas have come under scrutiny — and tried to learn about the paintings by Adolf Hitler he keeps in his home. (New York Times) ? Yitzhak Rabin’s ancestral home lay on the route Russian troops took while attempting to reach Kyiv. A year later, the Israeli flag they looted has been replaced. (Haaretz) Mazel tov ➤ Abby Meyers, a former star basketball guard at the University of Maryland, was tapped by the Dallas Wings in the first round of the WNBA draft. Shiva call ➤ Israeli novelist Meir Shalev, whose work was translated into 20 languages, died at 74 … Rachel Pollack, fantasy author, activist and creator of one of the first transgender superheroes died at 77 … Oscar-nominated character actor Michael Lerner died at 81.
What else we’re reading ➤ Behind the scenes of the final season of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel … “I’m a Sephardic Jew. Where do I fit in Arab history?” … How Ted Lasso’s grouchiest (Jewish) star became a sex symbol. |
A child receives a polio vaccine while watching a broadcast of Dr. Jonas Salk performing an inoculation. (Getty) |
On this day in history (1955): Results of the first successful field trial for the polio vaccine were released. The vaccine created by Jonas Salk proved effective against polio in a trial of 2 million children. “When news that Salk’s vaccine testing was successful went public in 1955, he was hailed as a “miracle maker,” Anna Goldenberg wrote for the Forward in 2014, in honor of what would have been the doctor’s 100th birthday. |
Mira Fox wasn’t the first Forward journalist to be drawn to Brigham Young for a story. In 2011, Gabrielle Birkner, then our director of digital media, traveled to the school in Provo, Utah, to attend a Passover service that featured some distinctly un-Jewish elements. — Thanks to Benyamin Cohen and Sarah Nachimson for contributing to today’s newsletter. You can reach the “Forwarding” team at [email protected]. |
Support Independent Jewish Journalism The Forward is a non-profit 501(c)3 so our journalism depends on support from readers like you. You can support our work today by donating or subscribing. All donations are tax-deductible to the full extent of US law. Make a donation ➤ Subscribe to Forward.com ➤ “America’s most prominent Jewish newspaper” — The New York Times, 2021 | |
