Opinion

• Opinion

  Back to School On Education

  The big news in Jewish education these days is, of course, the dramatic expansion in day school enrollment. We are indebted to Marvin Schick and the Avi Chai Foundation for providing us the count as of the 2003-2004 school year: There were 759 schools and 205,035 students. For those of us in the non-Orthodox community,…

  By Leonard Fein

  4 min read
• Opinion

  Not Peace, but a Start

  Even the most enthusiastic boosters of this week’s Middle East summit in Sharm el-Sheikh aren’t claiming that the brief gathering signaled the dawn of some new era of harmony and peace. The meeting between Israeli and Palestinian leaders, together with the heads of neighboring states, did little more than ratify some practical understandings that might,…

  Feb 11, 2005 | 3 min read
• Opinion

  Bush’s Bad Budget

  President Bush is to be congratulated for recognizing in the new budget proposal he submitted to Congress this week that the gargantuan deficits he has engineered during the past four years represent a looming catastrophe. Inheriting a government that spent $1.8 trillion and ran an $86 billion surplus in the last year of Bill Clinton’s…

  Feb 11, 2005 | 2 min read

Columnists View All

• Alyssa Katz Class assignment: Get to know your murdered Jewish neighbors

  

• Rob Eshman Liberal Zionists are under attack. A new book proves their work has never been more important

  

• Dan Perry How Israel became a country where teenagers murder each other in cold blood

  

• Emily Tamkin American Jews have a Hasan Piker problem. Solving it is going to hurt

  

• Jay Michaelson Epstein and Iran are an antisemitism mega-crisis. Here’s what Jewish organizations should do about it. 

  

The Latest

• Opinion

  Confront the Extremists in Our Midst

  Why can’t American Jews call extremism by its name? Over the last year, I have looked on in dismay as Israeli settlers who openly oppose our most cherished values as Americans and as Jews have been treated by Jewish organizational leadership and the Jewish press with attitudes ranging from polite silence to sympathetic understanding. Even…

  By Eric Yoffie Feb 11, 2005 | 5 min read
• Opinion

  The Conservative Movement’s Double Standard

  For more than a decade, the Conservative movement has proclaimed its welcoming attitudes toward gay and lesbian Jews. As evidence, Conservative leaders have often cited the movement’s 1992 “Consensus Statement,” which affirms that “gays and lesbians are welcome in our congregations, youth groups, camps and schools.” They neglect to mention the other, less-than-inclusive portions of…

  By Ayelet Cohen Feb 11, 2005 | 3 min read
• Opinion

  Encourage ‘Ownership’ and Save Social Security

  The very first monthly Social Security check was sent out in January 1940 to Ida Mae Fuller, of Ludlow, Vermont, age 65. After paying Social Security taxes for three years, since the program began on January 1, 1937, Fuller collected Social Security benefits for 35 years until her death in 1975, at age 100. The…

  By Rachel Siegel Feb 4, 2005 | 4 min read
• Opinion

  A Light Unto the United Nations… And Israel

  On January 24, the United Nations General Assembly held a special session commemorating the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi death camps. Member states gathered in New York to recall how the world failed to prevent the most sadistic and maniacal element of Hitler’s war machine. But that is not all that was…

  By Roger Zakheim Feb 4, 2005 | 4 min read
• Letters

  February 4, 2005

  Call Modern Hebrew By Its Name: ‘Israeli’ In the December 24 On Language column, Philologos criticizes my glottonym “Israeli” as a “denigrating word for modern Hebrew” (“Hebrew vs. Israeli”). But I would argue that “Israeli” is not at all derogatory. It simply acknowledges that the marvelously complex language spoken by Israelis is very different from…

  Feb 4, 2005 | 5 min read
• Opinion

  Antisemitism Goes Public in Russia

  Hate crimes flourish in darkness. To name them and inform the public of their prevalence is the first step in shining a light. Natan Sharansky’s recent opinion article on this page describes how “classical” antisemitism used to be “easy to recognize,” “not only vulgar and illegal, but socially unacceptable throughout the free world.” Hardly a…

  By Mark B. Levin Feb 4, 2005 | 3 min read
• Opinion

  The Old Arab Pecking Order, Turned Upside Down in Iraq

  The Iraqi elections almost certainly created a government dominated by the country’s Shi’ite majority. For the first time in Iraq’s history, and the first time in several hundred years in the Arab world, an Arab state will be ruled by representatives of Shi’ite Islam, the same minority branch of Islam that rules Iran and is…

  By Yossi Alpher Feb 4, 2005 | 4 min read
• Opinion

  Silence in the Face of Torture

  Just before Alberto Gonzales’s testimony at his January confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, one wag noted, “Mr. Gonzales has directed members of his staff to revise the White House definition of torture to include torture.” Witty, but painful. In his prepared remarks, Gonzales said, “America stands against and will not tolerate torture under…

  By Kathleen Peratis Feb 4, 2005 | 4 min read