The battle between a New York Orthodox Jewish community and its neighbors over the local public school system took a drastic turn in late April as the school board’s Orthodox president resigned amid corruption allegations, and a federal official confirmed a civil rights investigation into the district. While the corruption allegations against the board president…
As Annie Schneiderman Valliere drove south from her home in Woolwich, Maine, to the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire’s centennial commemoration in New York City, friends began calling her cell phone with disturbing news: Her aunt, activist Rose Schneiderman, was about to be scrubbed from Maine’s labor history. The state’s pro-business Republican governor had ordered a…
Izzeldin Abuelaish, the Gazan doctor who lost four members of his family when an Israeli rocket destroyed his house during Operation Cast Lead, used a medical analogy to warn against hating those who cause us great harm. “Hatred is a chronic disease,” Abuelaish told a group of 60 people who had gathered at Central Connecticut…
How was the special seventh-night Seder at the University of Wisconsin’s Hillel Foundation different from all other Seders? Well to start with, the plague of boils became exploding landfills and destroyed wetlands defacing the earth. The plague of locusts, featuring insects traveling in a swarm? The symbol of a state public transportation system pulverized. Traditionalists…
Longtime garment union chief Bruce Raynor is resigning from his union leadership positions following allegations of misconduct regarding his union expense reports. Raynor’s resignations as president of Workers United and as executive vice president of the Service Employees International Union are effective May 7. He will retain leadership positions at union-affiliated financial institutions, including the…
My mother died exactly a week after her 79th birthday, and ever since, her birth and her death have been linked together for me in a weird existential equation. We Jews are good at commemorating death, having centuries of practice, and I know what to do when that anniversary rolls around: Stand up in synagogue…
The early 1960s was more than simply the revelry of TV’s “Mad Men.” It was also a time when international justice held court, and a certifiable madman found himself at the center of the world’s judgment. In 1961, a young American president read James Bond novels, while high-stakes espionage dominated popular culture and fed global…
On a recent Sunday morning at Canter’s, the legendary Los Angeles deli, business was brisk. As usual, the customers were an eclectic mix: hipsters, rockers, senior citizens. And, at a table near the front sat Simon Rutberg, a slim, graying man in glasses and a black T-shirt. Rutberg himself is something of a legend. The…
When Israel was invited to join the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared it an international “seal of approval.” But a year later, it’s clear that membership in the elite group has brought anything but approval of the country’s direction in one key area: inequality. Israel’s ascension last May to…
In this edition of the Women’s Roundtable podcast, a co-production of the Forward’s Sisterhood blog and Lilith magazine, panelists weigh in on what fashion has to say about piety, and they take a look at how feminist Passover rituals have evolved. Lilith editor Susan Weidman Schneider, Lilith associate editor Sonia Isard and Sisterhood contributor Debra…
On a recent Sunday morning at Canter’s, the legendary Los Angeles deli, business was brisk. As usual, the customers were an eclectic mix: hipsters, rockers, senior citizens. And, at a table near the front sat Simon Rutberg, a slim, graying man in glasses and a black T-shirt. Rutberg himself is something of a legend. The…
