Update: Singer Debbie Friedman died Sunday, January 9 at a Southern California hospital. The Sunday gathering, at the JCC in Manhattan, which was to be a healing service, will go on as a memorial service. A worldwide effort is underway to bring about healing for one of American Judaism’s most beloved composers of healing and…
Under strong fire, the country’s major Modern Orthodox rabbinic body is seeking to clarify its position on a study by its own authorities that is seen as casting doubt on the permissibility of vital organ donation by Jews who are brain dead, yet upholding the right of Jews to receive such organs. In a statement…
They mess you up, your siblings. That’s one takeaway from a new book of essays on the subject of brothers and sisters, “Freud’s Blind Spot,” edited by Elisa Albert. In it, writers dissect what scientists call the horizontal relationships that so shape us but are often ignored. Etgar Keret, Steve Almond and Lauren Grodstein are…
From Forest Hills and Hillel to the International Debutante Ball “I was brought up Jewish. I went to Hebrew school at Forest Hills Jewish Center… and my father gets the Forward and Sports Illustrated,” Abigail Tufts, a 2008 International Debutante Ball alumna, told me at this year’s 56th ball, held last year, on December 29,…
The Israeli army’s alleged killing of Jawaher Abu Rahmah, the unarmed woman who reportedly died from tear gas inhalation during a protest of Israel’s West Bank separation barrier, is putting the army’s tactics at such demonstrations under greater scrutiny, along with its moral credibility. At the same time, the army is attacking the protesters’ credibility….
As Mikhail Khodorkovsky stood in a glass cage in a Moscow courtroom, listening to the judge extend his sentence in a Siberian prison by another six years, he smiled at times. It was a gesture that many of his supporters read as a sign that he accepted his fate and the role he was meant…
Soon after Scott Goldenberg’s birth, his parents began thinking about something that rarely preoccupies the parents of a newborn: What happens to him when we’re gone? Their infant son had survived meningitis, only to be left with multiple physical and intellectual problems: cerebral palsy, learning disabilities, limited vision and walking difficulties. When Joe and Zeena…
Birthright Israel NEXT, which follows up with young Jews after they return from the free trip to Israel offered by Birthright, is rewiring itself after a major shakeup of its top leadership. The multimillion-dollar nonprofit, founded three years ago to deepen the involvement of Birthright alumni in the Jewish community, is considering reducing and redirecting…
The Forward goes backstage at “702 Punchlines and Pregnant:” Every weekend, Ginger Reiter, a redheaded high school English teacher from South Florida, flies to New York to watch a stage production re-creating her 10-year love affair with Borscht Belt comedian Jackie Mason. Even stranger, her role in the production is played by the love child…
New York state, which represents the largest kosher market outside of Israel, announced in a January 3 statement that its 85 food safety inspectors will assume the responsibilities of the Division of Kosher Law Enforcement. The statement came two days after the 11-employee kosher law enforcement division was whittled down to just its director, Rabbi…
Republicans are all ready to assume their leadership roles as Congress convenes on Wednesday, but one Republican House staffer is probably less then thrilled with the amount of attention he is getting. Aharon Friedman, a 34-year-old tax expert on the Republican side of the House Ways and Means Committee, is in the midst of an…
דאָס בוך איז גרונטיק געפֿאָרשט, לעבעדיק אָנגעשריבן — אָבער אידעאָלאָגיש באַפֿאַרבט
