Welcome to the Forward’s coverage of the robust lives of American Jews. Here there’s a little of everything about the multifaceted world of Jewish life. There are light-hearted Jewish celebrity stories and shocking Jewish celebrity news. Food is also plentiful,…
Life
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Six Jewish Women We’d Like To See On The $10 Bill
With the Treasury Department’s decision to boot Alexander Hamilton off the $10 bill in place of a woman, we have until 2020 – a century after women achieved voting rights – to choose which lovely lady to take his place. While the decision is ultimately in the hands of Jack Lew, the Treasury secretary, he’s…
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The New Critical Mass of Orthodox Women Rabbis
The past two weeks have been historic for Jewish women. Orthodox women in both and New York were ordained as clergy – although with a variety of titles from Maharat to Rabba to Rabbi, but effectively all as rabbis. While Yeshivat Maharat is now the veteran institution with five years of experience at this, Yeshivat…
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Remembering Bonna Haberman
I first met Bonna in London in late 1985. She and Shmuel and Tiferet were living on the attic floor of an old house in Hampstead while she finished her Phd. I had never met a couple like Bonna and Shmuel before. They moved to their own beat. They were quirky, charming, funny, eclectic. I…
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Two Jewish LGBT Poets Remember Their Mothers
Aurora, the daughter of Rosario. Lesléa, the daughter of Florence. The mothers are invoked; their names are eternal. Aurora Levins Morales and Lesléa Newman came together on a recent Sunday afternoon in Boston under the auspices of Keshet—a national organization dedicated to the inclusion of LGBT Jews in all aspects of Jewish life — to…
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Will El Al Step Down From its High Heels?
At my cousin’s Israeli wedding, her groom made a single concession to formal dress: He agreed to keep his shirt tucked in during the huppah ceremony. Whether because of its socialist roots or the hot and sticky weather, Israeli style tends toward the casual. This can include sandals and t-shirts for business meetings, and short…
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A New ‘Way Forward’ For Israeli Mothers
Ever since I was a little kid, my mom used to tell me that I could be great. “Naava”, she would say to the frizzy haired, scabby kneed little girl, “Remember that nothing can stop you—the sky is the limit!” So, I decided to try and make my mark on the world. I would invent…
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Emma Sulkowicz and ‘The Hunting Ground’ of Campus Sexual Assault
In 2012, Amy Ziering’s documentary “The Invisible War” uncovered the epidemic of sexual assaults in the United States military, which earned her an Academy Award nomination. Earlier this year, Ziering along with longtime collaborator Kirby Dick released “The Hunting Ground,” a documentary that examines sexual assaults on college campuses. Through a series of stirring interviews…
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Newly Minted Orthodox Leaders Take ‘Rabba’ Title
Two women ordained as Orthodox rabbis this week will be entitled “rabba,” the female form of “rabbi.” They will be joining the only woman who had the title until now, Sara Hurwitz of the Hebrew Institute of Riverdale’s synagogue in the Bronx. Rahel Berkovits barely managed to say a couple of sentences from the short…
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Is Kim Kardashian’s Fertility My Business?
I don’t really follow the peregrinations of reality star Kim Kardashian, but the fact that she’s expecting her second child with music mogul Kanye West is only of note to people like me because she announced she’d achieved pregnancy through I.V.F. Apparently, Kim went through two I.V.F. cycles – one medicated, with hormones, and one…
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Reining In Our Rabbis
Though appalled, I laughed when I first heard about Rabbi Barry Freundel. How he hid cameras in the mikveh to watch his congregants and conversion protégés undress and prepare for ritual immersion. The image that came to my mind was that of the boy in my third grade class who tried to peek up my…
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How the Hasidic Driving Ban Drove Great Britain Batty
It’s one thing for religious fundamentalist leaders – whether Jewish, Muslim, or Christian – to preach that limiting the freedom and independence of women is acceptable in the name of preserving traditional values, and for women in their communities to voluntarily submit to such restrictions. But putting such limitations on women in writing and turning…
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