In the Forward’s opinion section, you’ll find analysis and essays from diverse corners of the Jewish world.
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Opinion
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Opinion
I’m a cantor in Texas and parent of a trans child. My state’s assault on trans youth is terrifying
I am sickened by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s recently announced nonbinding opinion regarding gender-affirming care, which states that medical treatments used in the transition process for transgender minors (ie: those whose gender identity does not correspond with the sex they were assigned at birth) ought to be defined as acts of child abuse. I…
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Opinion Babyn Yar is a site of Jewish death. Its memorial is a testament to a democratic Ukraine
“My sister, brothers, mother and father are all buried in Babi Yar,” Fania Khasidovich told me when I visited her in 2008 in Fastiv, a city of 40,000 people about 50 miles southwest of Kyiv. It was only a few days before her 92nd birthday. “I was with them,” she continued, “I lived through it,…
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Opinion The impossible is happening: Talking to Natan Sharansky about the crisis in Ukraine.
This is an adaptation of Looking Forward, a weekly email from our editor-in-chief sent on Friday afternoons. Sign up here to get the Forward’s free newsletters delivered to your inbox. Download and print our free magazine of our most memorable Ukraine stories so far. One of Natan Sharansky’s vivid early childhood memories is the 300th…
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Opinion Destroying the memory of what the Nazis did to us at Babyn Yar is de-Nazification
For over a decade, I lived down the street from a small urban park improbably named Babi Yar. It was located on the border of Brighton Beach, a community in Brooklyn primarily populated by Jewish members of the former Soviet Union since the 1920s, and Manhattan Beach at the southern tip of Brooklyn. A small…
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Opinion I’m a rabbi in Warsaw. I’m terrified for the future of Ukraine — and the free world
I live in Poland and work as a rabbi in the local Jewish community, but I’ve been paying close attention to Ukraine since Putin’s last invasion in 2014. I was invigorated by the election of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in 2019, and even more impressed when he stood up to President Donald Trump, refusing to take…
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Opinion What the two leading Jewish heroes of 2022 have in common
If there is one thing nearly every human being who is even remotely aware of world events would agree upon this week, it’s that Volodymyr Zelenskyy is a hero. Just as most reached the same consensus in January about Rabbi Charlie Cytron-Walker, who engineered escape for himself and several congregants after hours being held hostage…
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Opinion ‘The needs are so intense’: United Hatzalah medic speaks from Moldovan border
Linor Attias is a volunteer United Hatzalah medic and an emergency management specialist at the Israeli Ministry of Justice. She spoke by phone from Moldova’s border with Ukraine on Tuesday with our Nora Berman. At 3 a.m. on Tuesday, a bus full of refugees arrived. Everyone is working constantly — I rose at 3 to…
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Opinion I live in Ukraine. We’re under bombardment — but still working to serve our Jewish elders
Air raid sirens now set the rhythm of my life. This new reality, one of many that have emerged since the invasion of Ukraine, is marked by constant worry for relatives, friends and colleagues. We lose contact with those we love for many long hours between the blasts, and we’re forced to acquire the grim…
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Opinion I went to Ukraine to find my roots. The KGB found me first
The KGB men who took me into custody in Ukraine were straight out of central casting. The Bad Cop was older, with a porcine face. He wore a leather trench coat cinched tight to his fat frame, and spoke only Russian. The Good Cop was young and lean: Bobby Kennedy to J. Edgar Hoover. His…
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Opinion Israel can’t help Ukraine — and it’s America’s fault
Suddenly, everyone is helping the Ukrainians. The ferocity of the Russian assault on an outgunned neighbor has stiffened spines from Washington to London and sent post-Cold War taboos tumbling across Europe. Pacifist Germany is dispatching weaponry and has promised to spend 2% of GDP on defense going forward. The EU is suddenly in the arms…
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Opinion ‘Our own history will judge us’: Michael Oren on why Israel must take a stand for Ukraine
Supporters of Israel — indeed, Israelis themselves — might be surprised to learn that the country’s policy on Ukraine is virtually the same as that of Iran, Hezbollah and Hamas. All have refrained from openly condemning Putin. Why would the position of the area’s only Jewish state and its only democracy dovetail with that of…
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Fast Forward 7 major US Jewish groups decline meeting with French official after ‘premature Palestinian state recognition’
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Fast Forward Why Bard College’s orchestra performed Mendelssohn at the site of Hitler’s Nuremberg rallies
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Fast Forward Trump says Hamas didn’t want ceasefire deal after US, Israel pull out of negotiations: ‘I think they want to die’
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