A Bribe for Which Both Parties Will Pay Your December 3 editorial, “A Dangerous Link,” is right on target. The Obama administration’s offer of military assistance to Israel in return for an Israeli commitment for a three-month settlement construction freeze is “not beneficial to either nation.” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appears bent on extracting…
Your Nov. 18 article, “Terror Expert Emerson Feels His Own Heat Over Finances,” continues to repeat the mistakes made last month by the Tennessean concerning the Investigative Project on Terrorism Foundation’s structure and finances. It perpetuates the fiction that Steve Emerson is somehow collecting more than $3 million for his private purposes and doing nothing…
Abandoning the Ezra Vision I was pleased to read your article about Project Ezra and Misha Avramoff, my friend and colleague at Project Ezra for almost 30 years (Old-School Jewish Activist Faces the Future as Project Ezra Prepares for Merger, November 12 issue). The article, however, missed the central part of the story. It did…
A Long Road Toward ‘Leading in a Jewish Way’ How sad that the Forward did not include a category for Jewish education in your list of leaders (“The Forward 50,” November 5 issue). So it goes in North America these days, as we continue to undervalue the very component of Jewish life that is essential…
Violence is an Obstacle to Modeling Jewish Behavior In Reza Aslan’s interesting op-ed piece, “Muslims: Make Like the Jews,” in the Nov. 5 issue, he correctly argues that education about Islam, alone — that is, acquiring facts about the religion — is insufficient to alter the negative perception most Americans appear to have about Muslims….
Opposed to Happiness? It is one thing to oppose gay marriage, but it is quite another to oppose the happiness of gay people. Your article “N.J. Jewish Paper in Knots over Gay Nuptials,” in the October 15 issue, identified an incredibly disconcerting trend among those against marriage equality. Not only do some oppose gay marriage,…
Pledging Our Troth As even your editorial (“An Unworthy Oath,” October 22) concedes, Israel’s self-definition as a Jewish state is hardly a new development. Israelis disagree as to whether that self-definition is a matter of religion, nationality or some combination of the two — but that’s not exactly breaking news, either. So why all the…
The Belarus Jews’ Story Continues Judith Matloff’s article, “The Last Shtetl Jews of Belarus” in the October 15 issue, is a moving account of a genuine human tragedy. However, her conclusion that “[w]hen these last people pass on, so will 350 years of vibrant Jewish tradition in Belarus,” is unwarranted. In fact, alongside these individual…
Arranged Marriages In the October 8 op-ed “Rabbi Searches Are Tough, but Are They Illegal?” Barak D. Richman is so correct in his analysis of the potential illegalities caused by the limitations set by rabbinical bodies involved in “monitoring” congregational searches. Having also been a member of a rabbinical search committee, I, too, ran into…
Of Rabbinical Pay and Congregational Possibility The issue isn’t that “Synagogue Dues Don’t Raise More Money Than Church Gifts,” as your September 17 headline states, but rather that synagogues and churches both do not receive more community support or new members. Perhaps the church approach makes it easier for one with financial hardship to participate…
We’re Fighting the Freeze The Jewish Telegraphic Agency report printed in the Forward of September 24, “The Right Waits for Netanyahu’s Move,” regarding the pressure being exerted on Israel to extend the 10-month freeze on Jewish construction in Judea and Samaria, incorrectly claims that even those American Jewish groups that support these communities are not…
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