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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Was Contraception Move a Master Stroke?
Like many other feminist political junkies this morning, my emotions were sent back and forth. At first I was dismayed by the announcement that President Obama had agreed to a compromise (or was it an “accommodation”) on his smart policy that would have required employers, even most religiously affiliated ones, to consent to employee insurance…
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Sexy Photo Shoot Mocks Haredim
Israeli fashion magazine BelleMode is publishing a provocative spread in its February issue, featuring sexy young women wearing see-through clothes on what appears to be a gender-segregated bus in Israel. Blogger Kung Fu Jew, better known to his friends as Ben Murane, wrote about it on Jewschool, and it was picked up by Gawker, which…
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Building My Own Shabbat Dinner Community
The problem facing Jews in their 20s and early 30s is not assimilation. It is the fact that we can’t find a meaningful Jewish community once we graduate from college. For Russian-speaking Jews, this problem can be especially hard since many of us were brought up culturally Jewish. As an undergrad, I did everything Jewish…
The Latest
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What We Are Reading at the Blognik Beat
The Chabad Russian Center of South Florida announced plans to open a $7.7 million Jewish Russian community house in Isles Beach, Fla., for the 20,000 Russian Jews living in the area. The center will offer members educational and social programming services. Actress and comedienne Janeane Garofalo plays a Russian Jewish mother in “Russian Transport”, a…
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Moving Past A Stereotype
When “Russian Dolls,” the since canceled Lifetime reality show about a gaggle of Russian women living in Brighton Beach, premiered on the Lifetime Network, my Brighton friends and I gathered around a television to mark the occasion. What we were expecting was something akin to a Russiafied “Jersey Shore.” What we saw was, remarkably, much…
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Bill Targets Israeli ‘Johns’
Update, February 12, 2012 Visiting a prostitute in Israel is expected to become a crime in coming days, after a bill that will make the use of sexual services in Israel illegal passed the Ministerial Committee for Legislation on Sunday. According to the Jerusalem Post: “The bill, which was also supported by a large number…
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The Real Husbands of Salt Lake City
In my piece, published this week on Salon, I wrote about Mormon gender roles being highly prescribed, with men defining themselves “in contrast to women but also against other men in the secular world.” From the outside, Mormon family norms might seem like a throwback to the 1950s, and Romney certainly garners his fair share…
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Mossad Daughter Keeps Me Glued to ‘NCIS’
This week marked the landmark 200th episode of the CBS procedural “NCIS.” The drama is about a team of agents at the Naval Criminal Investigative Service. (In one early episode, they’re described as “the Internal Affairs of the Navy.”) Led by Special Agent Jethro Gibbs (Mark Harmon), the team members balance their personal lives with…
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The Birth Control Wars
Online feminism’s victory in the Susan G. Komen/Planned Parenthood controversy — and the victory for gay marriage in California — shouldn’t obscure another fight over cultural issues that’s gearing up: birth control is going to be the hot topic in the coming days. This battleground is the tussle over whether religiously affiliated institutions should be…
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Political Dissonance Among Russian Jews
My boyfriend and I are standing on the downtown B express, hand in hand, laughing over the idle chatter of passengers and metal shrieks of the train car as it scrapes over the tracks beneath it. We are two young Russian-speaking Americans — that much I can say with certainty. To say that we are…
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Reclaiming a Sense of Community
Growing up, I rarely contemplated my Jewish identity. I was part of a Council for Unity chapter at Edward R. Murrow High School, where I was busy working on projects that would unite individuals from a wide range of backgrounds. Somewhere along the way I realized that it was important to understand where I came…
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In Case You Missed It
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Yiddish קאָנצערט לכּבֿוד דעם ייִדישן שרײַבער און רעדאַקטאָר באָריס סאַנדלערConcert honoring Yiddish writer and editor Boris Sandler
דער בעל־שׂימחה האָט יאָרן לאַנג געדינט ווי דער רעדאַקטאָר פֿונעם ייִדישן פֿאָרווערטס.
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Fast Forward Trump’s new pick for surgeon general blames the Nazis for pesticides on our food
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Fast Forward Jewish feud over Trump escalates with open letter in The New York Times
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Fast Forward First American pope, Leo XIV, studied under a leader in Jewish-Catholic relations
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