The new Iran sanctions bill approved December 15 by the House of Representatives not only moved the United States one step closer to ratcheting up the pressure on Tehran, it also revealed a slight reshuffle in the political map of the Jewish community’s left wing. J Street, the dovish lobby that has become synonymous with…
Sigmund Rolat was a penniless orphan when Soviet troops freed him from a Nazi slave-labor camp in Czestochowa, Poland in January 1945. When he came to the United States in 1948, he had $8 in his pocket, which was stolen soon after he arrived. Today, he is a wealthy New York businessman, having made a…
A newly discovered piece of stained, wrinkled paper conjures up the details of a Jewish exorcism that appears to have been performed sometime in the 18th or 19th century. The ghostly document details the prayers that were performed on Qamar bat Rahmah to try to rid her of the spirit of her dead husband, Nissim…
The world of Jewish studies lost a towering figure on December 8 with the death of Yosef Hayim Yerushalmi at the age of 77. Yerushalmi was arguably the leading scholar of Jewish history in the post-Holocaust age, renowned for his rare combination of erudition, analytical brilliance, and literary elegance. His wide-ranging studies left a profound…
Defying the recession and concerns about Jewish philanthropy after Bernard Madoff, a group of anonymous donors recently gave $12.25 million to Gann Academy, a 13-year-old pluralistic Jewish high school in suburban Waltham, Mass., enabling the school to retire its building debt. School officials will say only that the donors are several families, some not from…
A growing gap between the size of the Orthodox Jewish population in Israel and the number of women who are receiving exemption from military service on religious grounds has prompted a move in the Knesset to clamp down on those who may be lying about their beliefs to avoid army service. In recent months, the…
From “Boom Town: How Wal-Mart Transformed an All-American Town Into an International Community” (Chicago Review Press, 2009) On a balmy Tuesday evening in December 2006, Sheldon Hirsch and his wife, Nicole, brought a menorah to the Christmas concert of their three-year-old son, Justin, at his preschool, the Helen R. Walton Children’s Enrichment Center. And a…
The movie credits were rolling, and so were my eyes. “See?” my mom was saying to me and my sister and to my dad, who was nodding distractedly as he tried to pick out the popcorn kernel from between his teeth. That “See?” referred to another one. Of us, that is. Jews. In the credits….
In bold letters, I write the word nakhes on the board. “How’s it pronounced again?” asks one of the five male students in the class. I say the word again, emphasizing the guttural sound in the middle of it. “Now you try it.” Amid much laughter and throat clearing, 22 African-American adults try coughing out…
By mid-way through Hanukkah, I’ve had my fill of oil-soaked, floppy, even rubbery latkes that seem to grace — a generous word — the plates of many Hanukkah parties. They’re a far cry from a food that is meant to celebrate the miracle of oil, a cook’s gold. A latke should be crisp and golden…
When my son Jeremy was 4, I took him to the Zimmer Children’s Museum, near my home in Los Angeles. The exhibit includes a replica of the Western Wall in Jerusalem, with paper for children to write their prayers and insert them between the stones of the wall. I explained this idea to Jeremy, and…
