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Meet the Jewish woman who helped land a major LGBTQ victory
A Jewish lawyer who said her upbringing played a big role in her public-interest career was on the team that scored a big victory for gay rights on Monday when the Supreme Court ruled that federal laws prohibiting discrimination in the workplace also protect gay and transgender employees. “This case, and I feel like a…
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Jews, Christians sue Cuomo and de Blasio for violating religious freedom during pandemic
Five defendants, including three Orthodox Jews from Brooklyn, are suing New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, Attorney General Letitia James and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio for violating their civil rights by forbidding religious gatherings and requiring “oppressive conditions” that limit gathering sizes during the coronavirus pandemic, according to the complaint filed last Wednesday….
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Israel’s schools reopen, then some close, leaving parents flummoxed
“Put on your masks,” a security guard instructed backpack-wearing adolescents Sunday morning as they streamed into their middle school in in northern Tel Aviv. They lined up to show him the signed declarations by their parents that they are fever-free. When one maskless boy said he forgot his, the guard shouted, “Anyone have a spare…
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‘You read the Forward backward’: 15 readers recall their dads’ love for our paper (and that joke)
Pat Koch Thaler, whose brother Ed went on to become Mayor of New York, recalled their dad, an Austro-Hungarian immigrant furrier, falling asleep with The Forward on his lap. Their mother, she said, saved “the paper after it was read to put on the kitchen floor after she washed it before Shabbat. “ Richard Hammerman…
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Conference of Presidents’ liberal wing coalesces against Adelson’s ZOA
Sixteen of the 51 members of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations have signed onto a letter condemning a fellow member, the Zionist Organization of America, seizing on a moment of national outrage over racism to try to change the tone of the conversation at the umbrella group, which bills itself as…
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Minneapolis Jews are rethinking synagogue security in response to change in their city
The Minneapolis City Council is planning a major overhaul of the city’s police department — maybe even defunding it altogether. The debate has put the city’s Jewish mayor, Jacob Frey, on the hot seat. He says he is opposed to defunding the police, and got booed for saying so at a public rally. Now, with…
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Ultra-Orthodox children hold ‘Kid lives matter’ protest over summer camp closures
Hundreds of Haredi children in Brooklyn gathered in the early evening on Thursday to ask New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio and to open sleepaway camps and parks. Videos and photos showed a crowd of children, mostly boys with sidecurls and kippot, walking and biking along Bedford Avenue,…
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Bernard Israel, 90, Longtime Sexton Of Highland Park Synagogue
(JTA) — For more than 40 years, Bernard Israel served as the sexton of Ahavas Achim, an Orthodox synagogue in Highland Park, New Jersey. A man with a booming voice who would stand at the entrance greeting congregants, Israel was known for walking around during weekday prayers rattling a charity box to raise money for…
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Beyond statements of solidarity: how Jewish groups will combat police violence
After George Floyd’s death at the hands of Minneapolis police officers sparked nationwide protests at the end of May, almost every major American Jewish organization released a statement condemning racism and expressing solidarity with the black community. In the ensuing weeks, some Jewish leaders have advocated for specific policy reforms: Hundreds have signed a letter…
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Charlottesville lawsuit is hitting wealthy landowner Richard Spencer’s finances hard
White nationalist Richard Spencer comes from money, but he’s having financial trouble because of a lawsuit filed against him for his role as a leader of the 2017 “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville. “I’m in a very difficult situation in terms of getting funds,” as a result of being booted off a number of…
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N.C. rabbis: The ‘moral pandemic’ of racism is a Jewish problem
“I experience racism in the Jewish community on a regular basis,” said Rabbi Sandra Lawson, one of four North Carolina rabbis behind an urgent call for American Jews to take action against police violence. “As a black queer woman, I don’t see a lot of people who look like me.” Long before Lawson was ordained,…
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