A wave of outrage rippled through New York’s Haredi community, crossing the usual ultra-Orthodox divisions, in response to the June 21 announcement that Agriprocessors executive Sholom Rubashkin would be sent to a federal jail for 27 years for bank fraud, with no possibility of parole. The heated emotions were in evidence on the night of…
It was almost 11 p.m. on a Monday night, and Rabbi Yoshiyahu Yosef Pinto was two hours late. A crowd of about 200 packed the main hall of the mystically inclined rabbi’s Manhattan headquarters, a four-story building on a tony Upper East Side block just around the corner from Bloomingdale’s. A disciple of the rabbi…
“The relations are going off the cliff,” one Jewish leader warned. “It’s getting worse by the day,” another added. A member of Congress spoke of a “chasm” between Israel and Turkey, and a Turkish government official was the most colorful of all. “Relations between Israel and Turkey,” he said, “resemble two Formula 1 race cars…
Thousands of American Jews have assets in Israel they don’t know about, according to a new Israeli campaign for the restitution of Holocaust victims’ property. In the early-20th century, Jews from across the world invested in Palestine. They put money in Zionist enterprises there meant to develop the infrastructure for a future state. They bought…
In mid-20th-century Atlantic City, there was nothing like Teplitzky’s for the Jewish tourist. Mostly, those tourists came from Philadelphia, Baltimore or New York, maybe for a week, maybe for a weekend, maybe only for Cousin Sammy’s wedding. “Teplitzky’s started as nothing but a little guest house at Pacific and Chelsea Avenues, but then they made…
In an unusual move, prosecutors in the trial of kosher meatpacking executive Sholom Rubashkin have publicly decried a “concerted campaign” by Rubashkin’s defenders that they said aimed to portray them as “racists, Nazis, and zealots.” “This office followed the law, stood silent in the face of vicious and false accusations, and worked to the conclusion…
With their bunk-crowded cabins, unpredictable changes in shower temperature and air conditioning usually limited to the infirmary, summer sleepaway camps hardly conjure thoughts of luxury. But as the U.S. economic crunch continues, Jewish summer camp administrators, who say their programs are crucial to building Jewish identity, are concerned that financially strapped families may see them…
The deaths of nine Turkish nationals aboard the Mavi Marmara as it tried to breach the blockade of Gaza has brought a flood of attention to the coalition that co-sponsored the flotilla. But the deaths have also brought to light apparent contradictions between the public aims of the coalition and the views of some of…
The fourth round of Israeli-Palestinian proximity talks were just getting under way and George Mitchell, the Obama administration’s American special envoy to the Middle East, was a few miles away in Jerusalem, but you wouldn’t have guessed it in the control center for the Palestinian negotiating team. In the offices of the Palestine Liberation Organization’s…
Under a full moon in Bethlehem’s Manger Square, two lovers recite poetry — the late Palestinian national bard Mahmoud Darwish’s words of affection and longing. Shadows cast on the stones of Christ’s birthplace merge. The scene shifts to an acrimonious meeting at a sports club. Debate flares over which game to watch and over politics….
The Talmud tells us to teach our children to swim, I mused to my father as we watched a 3-year-old toddler melt down in hysterics while refusing to enter a hotel pool. (Granted, every kid has his bad days.) My parents were in town visiting my 17-month-old daughter, Orli, and me; my partner, Ian, was…
