In what may be a worldwide first, a rabbinical school has hired an Orthodox woman as its top official. The Academy for Jewish Religion, California, a small non-denominational Jewish seminary in Los Angeles, selected Tamar Frankiel as its new president effective this month. Frankiel, who is Orthodox, was previously the school’s provost. Orthodox communities don’t…
On the third floor of the Belgian capital’s oldest Jewish school, Jacquy Wajc pauses to listen to the eerie silence that hangs in the hallways. Established in 1947 as a testament to Belgian Jewry’s post-Holocaust revival, the Athenee Maimonides Bruxelles school once accommodated 600 students in its spacious building in downtown Brussels but now has…
The Toronto Jewish community has been stunned into a mournful silence by the murder of beloved educator Rochelle Wise and her husband David (Donny) Pichosky in Florida last week. Many turned inward with their grief as the couple was laid to rest on Monday at the Bathurst Lawn Memorial Park. However, one man, whose children…
Facebook Inc CEO Mark Zuckerberg unveiled on Tuesday a feature to help its billion-plus users search for people and places within the social network, in the company’s first major product launch event since its May initial public offering. Speaking to reporters at its Menlo Park, California headquarters, Zuckerberg described what he called “graph search,” which…
The 112th Congress’s failure to bring emergency disaster aid for New York and New Jersey to a vote before adjourning has left scores of synagogues and other places of worship — not to mention thousands of businesses and homeowners — in limbo following Hurricane Sandy. “The word ‘unconscionable’ comes to mind,” said Rabbi Scott Hoffman…
(All photos: Ari Jankelowitz) The American Jewish community today is a kaleidoscope of diversity. The fall of the Soviet Union, the decline of overt anti-Semitism in the United States, an influx of converts to Judaism and the acceptance of interracial and interfaith marriage have forever changed the face of American Jewry. Our community is wonderfully…
“To whom are you leaving the country?” entreats one poster for Balad, an Arab party, showing a photo of Avigdor Lieberman, head of the Yisrael Beiteinu party. The party has proposed stripping Arabs of their voting rights if they refuse to pledge loyalty to Israel as a Jewish state. But the pitch seems to be…
“ You call that a Kiddush?” whispered my husband, referring to the spread that synagogues offer after services. Except we were in a Catholic church. Congregants were receiving their communion wafers — a fact not lost on my darling. But there was just something about being in a church and watching the wedding of a…
In this week’s Reporters Roundtable podcast, host Josh Nathan-Kazis is joined by Forward staff writer Paul Berger to discuss his ongoing investigation into allegations of sex abuse at Yeshiva University’s high school for boys in New York and the recent announcement that YU will launch its own internal investigation. Then, opinion editor Gal Beckerman discusses…
As a child growing up in the Long Island suburb of Lawrence, N.Y., Richard Feldman, the National Rifle Association’s first Jewish lobbyist, did not encounter many gun owners. He first held a firearm at the age of 12, at a Jewish summer camp shooting range. It was only a decade later, when serving on the…
President Barack Obama broke the mold on Thursday by choosing a budget wonk to serve as U.S. Treasury secretary, leaving gaps on the international and financial side that could make for a rocky transition. Jack Lew, Obama’s chief of staff, was chosen to lead the Treasury Department as the White House heads into another round…
די „שלום־עליכם לעקציע“ וועט מען קענען הערן אויפֿן אָרט אָדער דורך דער אינטערנעץ.
