TEL AVIV — Monday’s dramatic scenes of synagogues being vandalized and, in some cases, destroyed by Palestinians in Gaza reminded Oded Tira of Israel’s pullout from the Sinai Desert nearly a quarter-century ago. Tira, a retired brigadier general in the Israeli army, was in charge of the 1982 evacuation of Yamit, the last Jewish settlement…
A grand jury in New York has indicted a longtime employee of one of the country’s most storied and influential Jewish organizations for diverting at least $1 million from the company, the Forward has learned. The employee, Donalde Fergus, worked in financial department of the American Jewish Committee. He was indicted August 24 for grand…
Security Up at L.A. Shuls The mayor and police chief of Los Angeles assured the Jewish community of a strong police presence during the High Holy Days. The move was meant to calm nerves following new threats from Al Qaeda and recent terrorism-related indictments. “We will raise our visibility to an even higher level than…
GOMA, Democratic Republic of Congo —When the bulky white United Nations trucks rumble into this dusty, hardscrabble town on the border with Rwanda, cars, motorcycles and bicycles move aside. Passersby gently wave at the peacekeepers — Pakistani soldiers with U.N. blue helmets — on board. It is a stark change from several months ago, when…
Dr. Arnold Richards of New York has a question concerning a passage in the European-born, American Jewish psychiatrist A. A. Brill’s “The Basic Writings of Sigmund Freud” — an anthology of Freud’s major essays, published by Brill in 1938. There, in his introduction, Brill wrote: “Alas! As these pages are going to the printer we…
After raising almost $10 million in response to Hurricane Katrina, Jewish organizations are facing the tricky question of how to divide the money among explicitly Jewish causes and general relief efforts. The Reform movement has led the way among Jewish religious groups, raising more than $1.5 million by the middle of this week. In its…
Tucked away in a far corner of Brooklyn, a graceful brick building houses an open secret among the Orthodox: a fertility clinic that sensitively caters to their needs as observant Jews. Earlier this year, its director and founder, Dr. Richard Grazi, reached out to the wider public with the publication of “Overcoming Infertility: A Guide…
LOS ANGELES — The strictest rabbinic authorities certify the kosher restaurants lining Pico Boulevard, but most of the people preparing the food are Latinos who never had met a rabbi before taking their current jobs. At the Pico Kosher Deli, the man behind the meat slicer, Rene Baraona, 31, grew up in a Catholic family…
‘It sucks being Iranian these days,” Iranian-born Jewish comedian Dan Ahdoot jokes in his stand-up act. “People ask me the dumbest questions… ‘Yo, Dan, level with me. Are they making the nuclear weapons or what?’ Like there’s this big e-mail list that goes out every month to anyone who’s Iranian, that reads, ‘Greetings from Tehran….
WASHINGTON — The Bush administration is seeking ways to bolster Israeli Prime Minister Sharon in his Likud primary fight against Benjamin Netanyahu, while trying to avoid the appearance of meddling in an Israeli election. Senior administration officials recently told Jewish communal leaders — many of whom privately back Sharon — that the White House intends…
Carol and Gila Daman share the same bright eyes and affable smile. And though they’re more than 30 years apart, they also have an academic home in common: Brandeis University. Carol graduated from the Waltham, Mass., school in 1973; her daughter, Gila, has just started her sophomore year. As she moves into her new room…
בײַ ייִדן איז פֿאַראַן אַן אַלטע טראַדיציע צו שרײַבן רײַסישע סגולות מיט ייִדישע אותיות.
