THE SEPTEMBER CONCERT: A MUSICAL TRIBUTE TO THE PAIN OF 9/11 This year, a misty September 11 began with a procession of family members reading the names of the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the Twin Towers. At day’s end, there was “The September Concert: An Evening of Remembrance and Celebration” at St….
Washington – The White House is facing a growing stream of criticism that it is not doing enough to prepare for an upcoming international conference that some hoped could reignite peace talks between the Israelis and Palestinians. The Bush administration was the impetus behind the November conference, which is supposed to show Arab and international…
Havana, Cuba – During the High Holy Days this year, an unlikely community is celebrating not just the start of a new year but also the beginning of a new era. At Rosh Hashanah services last week at Havana’s Beth Shalom synagogue, a record crowd of 200 people was in attendance, with children running in…
Rabat, Morocco – Last month Hicham Doukkali packed a gas canister with explosives and blew himself up next to a bus full of tourists in the imperial city of Meknes. No one was hurt besides Doukkali, who lost an arm, but the attack was particularly troubling nonetheless. Doukkali was not a young discontent from the…
American rabbis are routinely sent to weddings and funerals and fundraisers galore, but in 2008, one of them is asking to be sent where none has gone before: Congress. In a long-shot bid to oust one of New Jersey’s most conservative Republicans, Rabbi Dennis Shulman announced last Tuesday the formation of a congressional exploratory campaign…
Two members of an influential family in Brooklyn’s Chabad-Lubavitch community were arrested this week after being indicted by a federal grand jury. The indictment from the U.S. attorney in Philadelphia charges Moshe Rubashkin with leaving hazardous waste at a textile plant in Allentown, Pa. Rubashkin is a communal leader in the Crown Heights neighborhood of…
To those who know him, retired federal judge Michael Mukasey, an Orthodox Jew and political conservative, is a jurist who kept his politics and religion out of the courtroom. That’s in marked contrast to his predecessor, the scandal-plagued Alberto Gonzales, who resigned this month despite President Bush’s best efforts to retain him. Gonzales’s tenure was…
In a decision that dealt a sharp blow to the family of slain peace activist Rachel Corrie, a federal appeals panel ruled this week that Caterpillar Inc. cannot be held legally responsible for the use of its bulldozers by the Israeli government in the Palestinian territories. A three-judge panel in the San Francisco-based 9th Circuit…
Those who’d rather avoid the kitchen can purchase holiday sweets from The Chocolate Girl, a kosher candy shop recently opened in Brooklyn’s Park Slope. Owner Tziporah Avigayil Jaeger is making etrog jelly-filled chocolates for Sukkot. I’m “trying to draw on the holiday. This is something that captures [its] essence,” said Jaeger, an Orthodox Jew and…
You know you’re in for it when you’re still in New Jersey but you’re not on the map. The highway gave way to smaller streets with curious names: Gershal Avenue turned onto Eppinger, then Rosenfeldt, Shiff Avenue, then Isaacs, and, as Norma, N.J., gave way to Alliance, gave way to Brotmanville, there was narrow Brotman…
Sukkot gets a raw deal. So many marketing opportunities left on the table! You got your plagues masks for Passover, your chocolate gelt and cloying ceramic ballerina menorahs for Hanukkah, your hamantaschen for Purim. But where are the adorable sukkah dollhouses with Velcro branches and hanging fruit? Where’s the make-your-own-garlands craft kit? Why isn’t every…
דער מחבר איז אַן אַמעריקאַנער־געבוירענער ייִדיש־אַקטיוויסט, פּאָעט און איבערזעצער אין בערלין.
