Click on the thumbnail to the right for a larger version: Eli Valley is finishing his first novel. His column, “Comics Rescued From a Burning Synagogue in Bialystok and Hidden in a Salt Mine Until After the War,” appears monthly in the Forward. His Web site is www.evcomics.com. []: https://forward.com/backward-purim/
Sunday was my son Jeremy’s sixth birthday party, and I spent the few days prior baking his birthday cake. On Thursday, I bought ingredients and on Friday I baked four rectangular cakes. Saturday night, I decorated the cake. First, I made white, red and black frosting. I then assembled two layers, shaped the cake like…
American Friends of Magen David Adom is a staple of American Jewish charity for Israel. Children give their bar and bat mitzvah money to it, communities take group photos in front of ambulances they donated to Israel through it, and sons and daughters dedicate plaques at Israeli medical centers in memory of their parents. The…
The image of Israelis living outside Zion — the yordim, as they are sometimes derogatorily called — has come a long way since the 1970s, when Yitzhak Rabin referred to them as “fallen weaklings.” To such an extent, in fact, has this stigma faded that a controversial bill proposed in the Knesset in early February…
For Jewish Democrats vying to make 2010 the year in which they ascend to the national level, these midterm elections pose a special challenge. Coming from a community that voted overwhelmingly for Barack Obama and that is strongly aligned with the Democratic Party, Jewish Democrats are nevertheless seeking to strike a new tone this year….
If you’re trying to defend the Jewish deli to a roomful of locavores and food activists, it’s good to have Michael Pollan on your side. The Berkeley, Calif.-based author of the 2006 book “The Omnivore’s Dilemma” — often referred to as the bible of the sustainable food movement — was on hand February 9 for…
For decades after its Jews were rounded up and deported in 1944, Etz Hayyim in Hania, the only synagogue on this Aegean island, served as an informal rubbish dump. Little was left but the floor and walls when Nikos Stavroulakis began a long process of reclamation and reconstruction. Stavroulakis, founder of the Jewish Museum of…
The Forward’s list of 10 up-and-coming Jewish political hopefuls was compiled based on conversations with Republican and Democratic Jewish political activists. The list represents Jewish politicians who are either making their first steps on the national scene or are viewed as possible future leaders. Some, like Democratic congressional hopeful Ted Deutch in Florida, are vying…
DAVID ROSKIES OFF TO THE NEGEV TO TEACH YIDDISH TO ISRAELIS AND BEDOUINS L’chaim! to an American-Israeli Yiddish shidekh, or match! At the February 2 “Bridging Israel and American Jewry” reception celebrating the Yiddish Studies Partnership between Ben-Gurion University of the Negev & New York’s Jewish Theological Seminary, David Roskies, the newly appointed director of…
Craving a healthy Chinese meal for Shabbat? This is your answer
Oh, to use “appetizing” as a noun! Oh, to remember sunny summers spent splashing on the beach at Coney Island. Oh, to have a knish do for me what a madeleine did for Proust — unleash a torrent of memories, except instead of tortured and French, mine are warm and borough based. A violin fiddles…
