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Bucking Trend, Poll Finds Americans Against Pullout
A new poll touted by a leading anti-disengagement group found that the majority of Americans do not support Israel’s Gaza withdrawal plan. But the figures fly in the face of other polls, which have found that a majority of American Jews and Americans in general support the Gaza pullout. The recent poll was commissioned by…
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Hezbollah May Open Second Front To Foil Withdrawal
WASHINGTON — With Israel’s planned Gaza pullout just weeks away, officials in Jerusalem and Washington fear that either Hezbollah attacks or inept Palestinian Authority policing could dash hopes for an orderly withdrawal. Israeli and American officials are cautioning that Hezbollah militants in Lebanon may be trying to open a “second front” to complicate Jerusalem’s plan…
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Interest and Usury
Reader Ed Morrow writes in an e-mail: “The recent U.S. Senate battle over a new personal bankruptcy law got me thinking about interest and usury. In Exodus, Leviticus and Deuteronomy, there are explicit prohibitions on making a profit on loans. There are two different Hebrew words used to describe such a profit, neshekh and tarbit….
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Settlers Overplay Hand With Violence, Protests
TEL AVIV — Ariel Sharon was in a confident, almost cheerful mood when he appeared this week before a joint meeting of two important Knesset committees. In a rare step, the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee was holding a public session, together with the Law and Constitution Committee, to discuss the state of preparations for…
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Confessions of a JCP (The ‘C’ Is for Cuban)
The following is an excerpt from Gigi Anders’s new book, “JUBANA: The Awkwardly True and Dazzling Adventures of a Jewish Cubana Goddess” (Rayo, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers). It’s the classic Latina position: Be pretty, get married, and shut up. I am not a classic Latina. I am a Jubana, a Cuban Jewess. And when…
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Study of Interfaith Kids Upends Ideas of Identity
Advocates of outreach to interfaith couples are touting a new survey that they say upends previous arguments against efforts to reach out to the children of mixed marriages. The survey, released last week by the Jewish Outreach Institute, found that young adult children of intermarried couples maintain strong cultural ties to the Jewish community, despite…
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Folk Tales Beyond Chelm
A Jew brought the first umbrella to Latin America. With all the attention paid to the hardy entrepreneurs who 350 years ago settled on the New World’s northern Atlantic coast, i.e., North America, it has been all too easy to overlook those Jews who instead schlepped their goods (including families and traditions) south — that…
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Judge To Rule on Commandments Display Given by Jewish Community
Like many judges following the Supreme Court’s split decision on displays of Ten Commandments monuments in Texas and Kentucky, Robert Freedberg is struggling to determine whether the display in his Pennsylvania courtroom passes constitutional muster. Yet, at least one fact stands out about the large plaque of the Ten Commandments that hangs directly behind the…
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Latin-Jewish Duo Bridges Cultures in Rhyme
Shout “1492” in a crowded bar, and some alter kocker may sing out, “Columbus sailed the ocean blue.” While the equally truthful “Ferdinand decreed killing Jews the thing to do” maintains the rhyme, it lacks the singsong syncopation necessary to indoctrinate generations of school children. Alas. Inquisitionally, 1492 was a banner year — 200,000 Spanish…
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African Poverty Surging on Communal Agenda
With a G-8 summit and a wave of worldwide protests shining a sudden global spotlight on African poverty, several major American Jewish organizations are taking steps to put the continent’s troubles high on the agenda of Jewish advocacy and planning in the months ahead. The American Jewish Committee confirmed this week that it is moving…
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Looking Out for the Evil Eye
Karen Schwartz was determined not to miss out on a baby shower. She’d passed on the bridal shower, thinking that a wedding shouldn’t be a celebration of materialism, but eventually came to regret her decision. However, one thing stood between her growing abdomen and a mound of bow-wrapped packages: that demonic spirit that seeks to…
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