Supporting Stimulus Package Is Pro-Growth In his September 19 column, “Our Economic Echo Chamber,” Noam Neusner unfairly attacks the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, United Jewish Communities and our Jewish community federations for supporting an economic stimulus package now before Congress. The truth is that many in America — and many in the Jewish community…
Military Action Should Only Be a Last Resort I would like to clarify my thoughts as expressed in your September 5 article “Specter of War Divides Iranian Jews in U.S.: Young and Old Split Over Using Force To Contain Tehran.” I have no conflict or worry with respect to how it might end for the…
Don’t Blame O’Reilly An August 22 editorial mentions that books by conservative talk show hosts Bill O’Reilly, Michael Savage and Sean Hannity were found in the home of alleged killer Jim Adkisson (“Terrorism and the Lone Gunman”). The Forward does not mention what other books or other types of literature were found in Adkisson’s home…
Hezbollah Holds Keys To Power in Lebanon Opinion writer Firas Maksad is surely right in asserting that many Lebanese deeply resent pervasive Hezbollah influence in their country (“All of Lebanon Is Not Hezbollah,” August 29). Unfortunately, they no longer have any ability to do anything about it. Hezbollah has achieved absolute veto status over the government;…
Train Teachers To Talk About Torah Authorship How to improve supplementary schools (“Study Provides Snapshot of Struggling Supplementary Schools,” August 22)? I recommend encouraging and training educators and rabbis to discuss authorship of the Torah, including archaeological findings, in order to listen to the theological beliefs and doubts of their congregants. And they shouldn’t forget…
What Did Kosher Plant Do for Migrants’ Kin? It’s difficult not to be cynical about Agriprocessors’ effort to improve its image in the Jewish community by hosting a contingent of Orthodox rabbis, supposedly for them to see first hand how the plant treats its animals and its employees (“Orthodox Leaders Tour Agriprocessors, Give Plant Clean…
Don’t Judge Orthodoxy By One Alleged Mistake An August 1 article about Shmarya Rosenberg’s anti-Orthodox blog terms FailedMessiah.com “one of the essential stops on the Jewish blogosphere” (“Blogger Focuses on Orthodox Foibles”). If I understand correctly, Rosenberg jettisoned Orthodoxy because 20 years after seeking help for Ethiopian Jewry from the Lubavitcher Rebbe, he discovered the…
Clinton Might Not Like The Seward Analogy Rabbi Menachem Genack argues that Senator Barack Obama should follow the example of Abraham Lincoln, who appointed political rival Senator William Seward as his secretary of state, and select his own rival, Senator Hillary Clinton, as his running mate (“The Man From Illinois and the Senator From New York,” August…
JDC Shell Corporation The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee’s shell corporation in Cyprus has drawn more than Russian scrutiny, as a July 25 article reports; it has also drawn indignation and anger in the Jewish communities of the former Soviet Union (“Charity’s Shell Corporation Draws Russian Scrutiny”). Asher Ostrin, the head of the JDC’s Russian…
Belke, Rivke and Gitl Philologos writes of children who took their mothers’ names (“How Did Jews Choose Their Last Names?”, July 18. I know of no other culture where there are surnames based on women’s first names. A remarkable number of names are based on Yiddish women’s names or diminutives of these names, which often…
Lithuania’s Obligations I find it both sickening and frustrating that the Lithuanian government still tolerates antisemitism (“Europe’s Shameful Honoring of Vilnius,” July 4). I was in Vilna the day the neo-Nazis mentioned by opinion writer Rabbi Andrew Baker made their march down Gedimino Prospekt. I did not know about the march until the next day,…
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