If Martin Luther King Jr. and Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel were alive today, they would surely be standing arm in arm, condemning Alabama?s new anti-immigrant law. Under Alabama?s new law, House Bill 56, local law enforcement officers are required to obtain proof of legal status from anyone whom they stop and ?suspect? is in the…
A decade ago, during the height of the second intifada, Roz Rothstein, a family therapist and child of Holocaust survivors, watched the news coming from Israel from her home in Los Angeles with growing frustration. Feeling that Israel was not getting the backing it deserved in the United States, she and her husband, Jeremy, set…
As this year marks the 400th anniversary of the King James Version of the Bible, a new English translation might seem a bit late to the game. After all, the KJV is justly celebrated for its eloquence, and the shelves are packed with more recent translations, such as that of the Jewish Publication Society, that…
These days, the word “fascism” is used here in Israel almost casually. It is spoken sometimes with glee, often in sorrow. Yet while it is fair (and painful) to say that a crop of laws, recent and prospective, are anti-democratic, the word “fascism” simply does not fit the Israeli reality. Bibi Netanyahu makes a preposterous…
Among Righteous Men: A Tale of Vigilantes and Vindication in Hasidic Crown Heights By Matthew Shaer Wiley, 256 pages, $25.95 When 8-year-old Leiby Kletzky went missing in Brooklyn last June, it took two hours for anyone in Leiby?s ultra-Orthodox neighborhood to inform the police. The local volunteer Jewish security patrol heard almost immediately. The patrol,…
The recent controversy over Roman Catholic Cardinal Kurt Koch?s statements at a meeting at Seton Hall University in October with scholars and clergy offers Jews an opportunity to reflect on the challenges of wading into disputes with other religious groups. Koch, the Vatican?s emissary to the Jews, responding briefly to a question about the push…
They make up about 10% of the American Jewish community, but no one is entirely sure how many Russian-speaking Jews there are in the United States. At a recent conference at Harvard University, the answer fluctuated from as high as 750,000 people to fewer than 500,000, depending on which expert took the podium. Sam Kliger…
To appreciate what a wonderfully reckless Jew Peter Bergson was for his time (or really any time) it?s worth listening to him describe a meeting with Eleanor Roosevelt in the White House in the early 1940s. He was bringing his case to her as he had, tirelessly, to anyone who would listen in those years:…
As the Obama administration imposes new economic sanctions against Iran in an effort to get it to abandon its nuclear program, some state legislatures are ramping up sanctions of their own. Following the lead of California and Florida, New York state is now considering a ban on contracts with all companies doing business with Iran….
The Prague Cemetery By Umberto Eco Translated by Richard Dixon Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. 445 pages. $28 There?s no hiding it: Umberto Eco is a lousy novelist. Try as one may, it is difficult to make sense of his new novel, ?The Prague Cemetery.? As is often the case with him, the plot is built as…
Volkswagen AG Gives $1 Million to Anti-Defamation League at Annual Dinner At a November 8 awards dinner at the Waldorf-Astoria, the Anti-Defamation League honored Volkswagen AG, which that night announced a $1 million gift “to support ADL’s comprehensive diversity education programs,” said Christian Klingler, a Volkswagen AG board member. “Our cars are sold in 153…
100% of profits support our journalism
