Opinion

• Opinion

  Rabbis weigh in: How should we respond to Bernie Madoff’s death?

  On Wednesday, Bernie Madoff, made infamous by an enormous Ponzi scheme that caused devastation throughout the Jewish world, died in a federal prison at age 82. While Jewish tradition puts serious emphasis on honoring the deceased, the death of someone like Madoff, who caused tremendous pain within the Jewish community, is an emotionally fraught challenge…

  By Forward Staff

  5 min read
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  Opinion

  An elusive search for the whole truth in the Chauvin trial

  Anyone searching for the truth — as in the whole truth — in the Derek Chauvin trial might be reminded of the Yiddish phrase: a halber emes iz a gantser lign — a half-truth is a whole lie. I’m not suggesting that witnesses have lied on the stand. But neither the prosecutors nor the defense…

  By Robin Washington Apr 14, 2021 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  Derek Chauvin trial: 3 questions America needs to ask about seeking racial justice in a court of law

  The following op-ed first appeared in The Conversation. There is a difference between enforcing the law and being the law. The world is now witnessing another in a long history of struggles for racial justice in which this distinction may be ignored. Derek Chauvin, a 45-year-old white former Minneapolis police officer, is on trial for…

  By Lewis R. Gordon Apr 14, 2021 | 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 I have the answer to Jon Stewart’s toughest question about Israel

  

• Nora Berman ‘Eddington’ is full of conspiracy theories but it’s not about Jews. Or is it?

  

• Dan Perry Netanyahu’s new Gaza plan is a disaster. But it contains a tiny kernel of wisdom

  

• Emily Tamkin Is starvation in Gaza really Israel’s fault? The facts are clear

  

The Latest

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  Opinion

  ‘A guy can be both’: Black and Jewish Like Jesus and Me

  Editor’s Note: This is an adapted version of an essay originally published in the 1997 book “Multi-America: Essays on Cultural Wars and Cultural Piece,” edited by Ishmael Reed. We are republishing it now, as the author, Robin Washington, joins the Forward as Editor-at-Large. While some circumstances and facts may have changed — such as the…

  By Robin Washington Apr 13, 2021 | 7 min read
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  Opinion

  Arkansas banned gender-affirming care for teens. That same care saved my life.

  Last week, the Arkansas legislature overrode the governor’s veto to implement a heinous law that would ban gender-affirming healthcare for transgender and non-binary youth in that state. I want to share my own gender story so you can hear how access to trans-affirming health care has allowed me to live my own authentic truth. Five…

  By Sawyer Goldsmith Apr 12, 2021 | 5 min read
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  Opinion

  Letter to my community: My faith in Judaism and my faith in unions are one and the same

  I’d like to clarify some comments I made in a recent interview with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. Those remarks sparked a controversy. Unfortunately, a few issues got conflated in the interview. For that, I apologize. In the interview, I intended to point out that while there was a time in our Jewish communal history in…

  By Randi Weingarten Apr 12, 2021 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  Eichmann’s trial set the stage for more battles over the Shoah — including my own

  Today, April 11, marks the 60th anniversary of the opening of Adolf Eichmann’s trial in Israel, a watershed moment in Jewish history. The Eichmann trial was the first time in 2,000 years that Jews, represented by the Jewish state, could call an oppressor to account. Ever since the destruction of the Second Temple in Jerusalem,…

  By Deborah E. Lipstadt Apr 11, 2021 | 5 min read
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  Opinion

  An open letter to Randi Weingarten: Poor Jews exist, too

  In a recent interview with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Randi Weingarten, the longtime president of the American Federation of Teachers, commented that “American Jews are now part of the ownership class.” She was responding to a question about why the AFT has advocated for teachers to stay out of classrooms, despite the drive to get…

  By Neil Goldstein Apr 9, 2021 | 3 min read
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  Opinion

  Looking Forward: Introducing a new format for our Editor-in-Chief’s weekly newsletter

  This is an adaptation of our weekly Shabbat newsletter, sent by our editor-in-chief on Friday afternoons. Sign up here to get the Forward’s free newsletters delivered to your inbox. And click here for a PDF of stories to savor over Shabbat and Sunday that you can download and print. Shortly after I took this job,…

  By Jodi Rudoren Apr 9, 2021 | 3 min read
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  Opinion

  How HIV-AIDS saved lives during COVID-19

  All four of my grandparents and all eight of my great grandparents survived the catastrophic influenza pandemic of 1918. But what if they hadn’t? What if that deadly pandemic a century ago — at least as deadly as the COVID-19 pandemic — had taken the life of even one of my forebears? I wouldn’t be…

  By Harley A. Rotbart Apr 7, 2021 | 5 min read
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  Opinion

  Biden is pushing us to rebuild society. Let’s take a cue from early Zionists, and do it.

  Standing at a podium at a carpenter training facility in western Pennsylvania, Joe Biden on Wednesday announced the most ambitious reimagining of the federal government since the New Deal. The American Jobs Plan, which comes on the heels of the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan that Biden signed into law in March, calls for an…

  By Ari Hoffman Apr 3, 2021 | 3 min read