Opinion

• Letters

  April 11, 2008

  Aliyah for Millionaires The idea of giving financial breaks to millionaires in order to encourage their aliyah is sickening in the extreme (“Israel Targets Millionaires in Bid to Up Aliyah,” April 4). These people need tax breaks? Talk about class warfare. I am constantly bombarded by charities who claim they need money for Israeli kids…

  4 min read
• Opinion

  Settlement Freeze

  A rash of reports coming out of Israel indicates that a spurt of new construction is under way in Israeli settlements in the West Bank. The development should be alarming to anyone who cares about Israel’s welfare. It’s a violation of Israel’s public commitments, most of all to the Bush administration. It’s damaging to Israel’s…

  Apr 3, 2008 | 3 min read
• Opinion

  The President in Wartime

  The Bush administration recently declassified a secret Justice Department memo from 2003 that shows just how serious a threat our democracy faces in the current war on terrorism. Unfortunately, the threat revealed in the memo is not from Al Qaeda, but from us. The memo was addressed to the legal department of the Pentagon. It…

  Apr 3, 2008 | 2 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 A billionaire Gen Z influencer is reinventing philanthropy — with this South African rabbi’s help

  

• Nora Berman Is Netflix’s new show the most Jewish cartoon ever?

  

• 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

  Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood Belongs on the Ballot, Not Behind Bars

  On April 8 municipal elections are scheduled to be held nationwide across Egypt, but they will hardly be a vote for the kind of democracy that America proclaims it supports here and elsewhere in the Arab world. Since a brief democratic opening in 2006, the Egyptian regime has become more hostile toward political opposition, showing…

  By Essam El Erian Apr 3, 2008 | 3 min read
• Opinion

  Of Inflated Biographies and Deflated Charity

  No one is perfect. Yet the high emotions of a political campaign are an inducement to idol worship. What follows is intended as an antidote to idolatry. I set John McCain to the side here. Many admire him; few idolize him. His strange plans for the economy, which would add some $400 billion to the…

  By Leonard Fein Apr 1, 2008 | 4 min read
• 
  Opinion

  A Story About a Tamil Called Tissa Tissainayagam

  A dissident columnist is hauled away on a meaningless “detention order.” His frantic wife says he has been beaten — and is, in all likelihood, being beaten at this moment. She begs a family friend with international ties to get word out; the friend fires off an email to an influential American acquaintance, begging him…

  By Eric Hübler Mar 27, 2008 | 3 min read
• Opinion

  A Defense of Marriage Divorced From Reality

  Same-sex couples that establish a legal relationship in a state that allows it and then move to a state that does not might be stuck in the relationship with no access to divorce. At least 10 states and the District of Columbia allow some form of “relationship recognition,” including marriage (Massachusetts), civil union (four states),…

  By Kathleen Peratis Mar 27, 2008 | 4 min read
• Opinion

  The Return of the Aristotelian Repressed

  Everything old is new again. For years I have argued that embracing evolutionary theory as Darwin formulated it makes nonsense of any coherent belief in God. As an analogy, I’ve cited a medieval philosophical debate pitting Aristotelians against religious traditionalists, notably Maimonides. I never dreamed that the debate itself would be revived — and within…

  By David Klinghoffer Mar 27, 2008 | 4 min read
• Opinion

  American Labor Can Help Right Anti-Israel Left

  For more than two years, Israelis living in Sderot and other towns near Gaza have been the target of choice for Hamas terrorists. Launching its arsenal of Qassam rockets from residential neighborhoods and even schoolyards, they have as much as dared Israel to fight back. Now it has. Predictably, much of the world is expressing…

  By Stuart Appelbaum Mar 27, 2008 | 3 min read
• Opinion

  If We Judge a Man by His Words

  Things are not always what they seem, but sometimes they are. Public rhetoric is sometimes over the top. The same person can speak hateful words and words of beauty. Context isn’t everything, but it is a lot. Herewith, some quotes of more than passing interest. You may want to see, as you’re reading, whether you…

  By Leonard Fein Mar 27, 2008 | 4 min read
• Letters

  April 4, 2008

  Spitzer Story Was No More Than Tribalism Boy am I relieved; it turns out that Eliot Spitzer wasn’t really Jewish after all (“Fallen Eliot Spitzer Was a Favorite Son of a Tribe He Never Quite Embraced,” March 21). Thank you to the Forward for publicly kicking him out of the community, so that now we…

  Mar 27, 2008 | 4 min read