Benjamin Rosloff, an aspiring Jewish filmmaker living with autism, was filming a bar mitzvah in Port Washington, NY. But the young boy getting bar mitzvahed didn’t say the prayers or read the Torah with his own voice. He also had autism, and relied on an augmentative speech device to communicate. “I couldn’t tell whether the…
When my late husband David Israel was diagnosed with ALS in 2010, I couldn’t imagine how I’d ever cope. Someone in his neurologist’s office handed me a manual called the “ALS Caregivers Guide.” There were sections for “Drooling,” “Choking,” and “Feeding Tubes.” The last one was “Saying Goodbye.” “How will I possibly handle this?” I…
Jewish groups and leaders took to social media following the Derek Chauvin verdict with expressions of relief, joy — and calls for systemic change in the wake of the trial. “Thank God justice has been served in this case,” Rabbi Jill Jacobs, executive director of T’ruah, a rabbinic organization for human rights, tweeted. “And there’s…
Dr. Ruth Westheimer has spent the better part of her life offering advice. So it should come as no surprise that when I called to interview her, she began by telling me what to do. “If you write a good piece,” she said to me in her raspy German-inflected voice, sounding a bit like Albert…
As Andrew Yang was putting together the final touches on the launch of his New York City mayoral campaign, a controversial stance he took against circumcision when he was running for president in 2020 resurfaced on social media. “I have attended multiple friends’ brises and felt privileged to do so,” Yang responded to a local…
Last weekend, one Orthodox synagogue in Atlanta launched a new opportunity for congregants. While Congregation Beth Jacob had been holding socially distanced and masked in-person prayer services for months, for those members who have been fully vaccinated, there would now be a chance to join a non-distanced, non-masked minyan. The synagogue is not requiring a…
(JTA) — BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (JTA) — Alberto Sonsol Cohen was one of the most popular sports commentators in Uruguay. For four decades he covered baseball games and soccer matches for some of the largest media outlets in the country, including the national broadcaster TNU. In 2018, Jews across the border in Argentina were disappointed…
(JTA) — Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said he was ready to “remove obstacles” to renewing U.S.-Israel ties, apparently signaling a willingness to stop the payments to the families of Palestinians who have killed Israelis that have proven to be a stumbling block. Speaking Sunday to J Street’s annual conference, Abbas also urged the participants…
When Ron Kagan closed the Detroit Zoo’s elephant exhibit, the elephants were happy, but a lot of humans weren’t. Elephants were a signature attraction that drove attendance, and no American zoo had ever given up the prized pachyderms on humanitarian grounds. But 16 years ago, Kagan, the zoo’s soon-to-retire executive director, decided that the harsh…
Looking up and down from their screens, concerned parents and grandparents scribbled notes as they listened to a Zoom presentation by Marjorie Swig, founder of Greenlight Clinic, a mental health facility for teens and young adults. The February event, hosted by Congregation Emanu-El, was billed as “Supporting Your School Age Child and Adolescent Through the…
At Tibor’s Kosher Meats, they chop the liver just so. That’s what has kept Shirley, an 84-year-old woman shopping there one recent day, coming back decade after decade. The gleaming silver case always has what she wants, Shirley explained, and until recently, the man who often reached in and wrapped it up for her was…
דאָס בוך איז גרונטיק געפֿאָרשט, לעבעדיק אָנגעשריבן — אָבער אידעאָלאָגיש באַפֿאַרבט
