Opinion

• Opinion

  Presumed Innocent

  Just when it seemed that the shockwaves caused by Bernard Madoff’s alleged $50 billion fraud had subsided, came word of a new and much longer list released as part of his firm’s bankruptcy-court proceedings. Go, search it online. The famous names are there — Spielberg, Wiesel, Koufax, even a former Miss America, even Zsa Zsa…

  2 min read
• Opinion

  What Happened to Israel’s Center?

  Nobody won the Israeli elections. Tzipi Livni’s Kadima managed to overcome the initial lead of Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud by siphoning off left-wing voters from Labor and Meretz. Kadima, however, would have great difficulty setting up a coalition. Likud lost many voters to Avigdor Lieberman’s more strident Yisrael Beiteinu party, but the right-wing and religious bloc…

  By Shlomo Avineri Feb 11, 2009 | 3 min read
• Opinion

  A Sect’s Unholy Views on Jews

  Pope Benedict XVI’s decision last month to revoke the excommunications of several renegade bishops from the Society of St. Pius X sparked outrage on the part of Jews and concerned Catholics alike. Most of the news reports on the controversy have focused on the Holocaust-denying comments of Bishop Richard Williamson, as well as similar remarks…

  By Mark Weitzman Feb 11, 2009 | 4 min read

Columnists View All

• Jodi Rudoren This is my last column as editor of the Forward

  

• Jay Michaelson American Jews were played — now what?

  

• Rob Eshman Charlie Kirk and Alan Berg: 2 murders, 41 years apart, show the painful perils of polarization

  

• Nora Berman ‘A long record of failure’: Is it time to put the two-state solution to rest?

  

• Dan Perry Israel’s strike in Qatar: An audacious bid for victory, or just another foolhardy provocation?

  

• Emily Tamkin Trump’s attack on George Soros is ludicrous. It also endangers Jews (and everyone else)

  

The Latest

• Opinion

  Scrambled Electoral Eggs

  Would-be peacemakers might want to wait before they start popping champagne corks in the wake of Kadima’s election victory. The outcome of the Israeli election has further complicated an already-muddled outlook for the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. Now, in addition to a Palestinian house divided against itself, we have a divided and dysfunctional Israeli house. Weak…

  By Aaron David Miller Feb 11, 2009 | 3 min read
• Opinion

  America Turns a Page, and Israel, Well…

  The contrast could hardly be more stark. In America, after a rough-and-tumble (and incredibly long) presidential campaign, a page has been turned. No, more than that: Volume 43 has been closed, shelved out of sight, while Volume 44, its newness discernible to touch and to smell, sits open, inviting, only a couple of pages so…

  By Leonard Fein Feb 11, 2009 | 4 min read
• Opinion

  Beyond ‘Evenhandedness’

  There has been a lot of talk about the need for the Obama administration to engage on Israeli-Palestinian issues early and often, unlike the Bush administration. This can be a productive approach, particularly in light of the split in the Palestinian camp, as long as expectations are not raised too high. The primary purpose of…

  By Abraham Foxman Feb 4, 2009 | 3 min read
• Opinion

  A Charter for Failure

  Michael Steinhardt has spent much of the past two decades funding some of the most important efforts to promote Jewish identity. From Jewish education initiatives to the free trips provided by the Birthright Israel program, the hedge fund mega-millionaire has helped prop up a host of worthy causes and been rightly celebrated as a visionary…

  By Jonathan S. Tobin Feb 4, 2009 | 4 min read
• Opinion

  Hillary Can Finish What She Started

  The way then-president Bill Clinton told it, Edgar Bronfman had “buttonholed Hillary.” The president, speaking at a World Jewish Congress gala at Manhattan’s Pierre Hotel in September 2000, was referring to a meeting in April 1996 between Bronfman and First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton. The WJC president had “buttonholed” the first lady at a fundraiser…

  By Marilyn Henry Feb 4, 2009 | 3 min read
• Opinion

  Why Israel Is Losing the Liberals

  You squirm, you wriggle, you deny, you denounce the methodology, but eventually there’s no escape: The data show quite decisively that here in America, Israel is considerably more popular among conservatives than among liberals. The most recent confirmation of that comes from the highly regarded Global Attitudes Project of the Pew Research Center for the…

  By Leonard Fein Feb 4, 2009 | 4 min read
• Letters

  February 13, 2009

  Jewish-Catholic Ties Don’t Face Apocalypse Your February 6 editorial “Betraying Vatican II” is mostly fair, but I think it does boil over into hyperbole in places. First, all Pope Benedict XVI has done is rescind the excommunication order for the four bishops from the Society of St. Pius X. Neither they nor their followers have…

  Feb 4, 2009 | 2 min read
• Opinion

  Uprooting the Rose

  The latest issue of the glossy magazine published by Brandeis University’s Office of the Arts includes a colorful, four-page spread about the goings-on at the Rose Art Museum — exhibitions, symposia, concerts and gallery tours with visiting artists. “The arts electrify the continuum of thought, experience, and action that makes Brandeis a global institution,” writes…

  Feb 4, 2009 | 2 min read