Plus One: George Allen
George Allen
The 20th century was a cataclysmic era for Jews — a time of cosmic tragedy, transcendent rebirth, mass migration and millions of individual journeys of every sort. Nobody knows that better this month than Senator George Allen of Virginia, a conservative Christian whose Jewish origins, hidden for a lifetime, popped out to ambush him in the midst of a critical re-election campaign. Allen’s inexplicable use of a North African Jewish slang insult on the campaign trail last summer was a rare bump in what promised to be an easy glide to victory. His clumsy response when he was asked about his rumored Jewish background — calling it an “aspersion” — turned a minor curiosity into a national embarrassment. Whether his political career will survive the gaffe was unclear at press time. What Allen, 54, ultimately makes of the discovery, only time will tell. But Allen’s back-story — the tale of how his mother, Etty, a Tunisian-born Jew, escaped the Nazis and vowed to leave behind her Jewishness — offers a sobering lesson for all of us. Nobody knows how many thousands or millions of Jews decided during World War II to discard the identity that Hitler had pronounced a capital crime. Some have since returned to their origins. Others never looked back. All of them are part of us, even the junior senator from Virginia.
Why I became the Forward’s Editor-in-Chief
You are surely a friend of the Forward if you’re reading this. And so it’s with excitement and awe — of all that the Forward is, was, and will be — that I introduce myself to you as the Forward’s newest editor-in-chief.
And what a time to step into the leadership of this storied Jewish institution! For 129 years, the Forward has shaped and told the American Jewish story. I’m stepping in at an intense time for Jews the world over. We urgently need the Forward’s courageous, unflinching journalism — not only as a source of reliable information, but to provide inspiration, healing and hope.
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