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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Confessions of a Cocky Kugl Champion
See this trophy? Other than academic achievement awards in school, this is the first contest I’ve ever won in my life. And I won it for Kugl. My mom and I planned to enter the third quadrennial Kugl Kukh-Off, put on by Los Angeles cultural organization Yiddishkayt at the Silverlake Independent Jewish Community Center, as…
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Do We Really Need Gifts on Hanukkah?
I forgot about Hanukah. If I weren’t ridiculously obsessed with social media, I would probably have continued to forget about it, but my Facebook feed was basically torn asunder by pictures of glowing hanukiot surrounded by smiling people spinning dreidels and cramming latkes into their mouths. Were it not also for my social media “problem”…
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Four Women Detained at Kotel For Wearing Tallit
In what those involved are calling an escalation of the war against women who pray at Judaism’s holiest site, four women were forced away from the Kotel and detained by police Friday morning when new rules were put in place just before they arrived with Women of the Wall. The rules prohibited women from entering…
The Latest
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Did Peeps Go Too Far with ‘Shiksa’ Ad?
Is the term shiksa as loaded as it used to be? Perhaps, since even a blogger who adopted the derisive Yiddish word meaning “non-Jewish woman” as her cooking website’s name found it an unfortunate choice when the maker of candy cane-flavored marshmallow chicks used it in an ad campaign. Then again, some may find the…
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Social Justice means Justice for Women
This year, I knew a month in advance what I would be doing to mark November 25 as the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. I am affiliated with a variety of feminist organizations, plus I am a graduate of Barnard College and a university faculty member in gender studies, but this…
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Books 8 Best Jewish YA Novels for Girls
I’m often that person who gives books to children as gifts. They probably groan when they open them, but I’m usually out of earshot by then. As a kid, I was thrilled when a relative made a tasteful selection for me. There are a few more nights left of Hanukkah, so if you’re in need…
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Women Leaders Take On Human Rights Struggles
As daily news stories like this New York Times report about the second assassination of a head of women’s affairs in Afghanistan tell us, women are often the canvas on which extremism and violence are played out. For three human rights activists who spoke at an American Jewish World Service benefit luncheon, “Leading the Way:…
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Let’s Blog About Sex
It has never been the Jewish way to avoid talking about sexuality. Even the Torah abounds with narratives of sex and desire. Sometimes the eroticism is subtle, as with Jael beckoning Sisera into her tent and covering him with a blanket before driving a stake into his head. Other times it is so blatant that…
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Shocking Decline in Ethiopian Israeli Birthrate
The birthrate among Ethiopians in Israel decreased by a dramatic 50% in the last decade, and Israeli journalist Gal Gabai wanted to know why. She investigated the issue for “Vacuum,” her documentary series on Israeli Educational Television, and she discovered some things that left her very uncomfortable — and will surely leave others equally so….
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December Angst and Hanukkah Manicures
December is a complicated time to be a Jew in America. I annually find that once the holiday season hits full swing, all the Christmas gushing, tree-trimming, “what do you want this year?” asking and red and green everything makes me a little… bah humbug. I start getting more sympathetic to Dickens’ Ebenezer Scrooge than…
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Hanukkah Miracles
I’m not even certain of the year, but it was sometime after the tattoo and before the death march. Aron Lieb was in his early twenties, but he felt elderly. He was working in a coal mine, forced by the Nazis to supply fuel for their war effort. Every night after he emerged from the…
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Yiddish ווידעאָ: יוטוב־פּערזענלעכקייט רעדט אויף ייִדיש וועגן אַ משפּחה־טראַגעדיעVIDEO: Youtube personality speaks in Yiddish about a tragedy in the family
מאַטי מענדלאָוויטשעס ברודער, וואָס האָט יאָרן לאַנג געליטן פֿון דעפּרעסיע, האָט הײַיאָר זיך גענומען דאָס לעבן. .
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