Opinion

• Opinion

  ‘Let’s roll!’: The daughter of the Jewish hero of Flight 93 was in “Fiddler on the Roof”

  This article is adapted from our weekly Shabbat newsletter, which is delivered on Friday afternoons. To get Forward newsletters delivered to your inbox, click here. When people ask where I was on 9/11, I always make sure to say also what I did on 9/12. Because I spent that awful Tuesday at Chelsea Piers, watching…

  By Jodi Rudoren

  4 min read
• 
  Opinion

  Billionaires: It’s time to give until it hurts.

  Recently, the Washington Post reviewed the charitable donations of the 50 wealthiest Americans during COVID. What they found was concerning: On average, America’s wealthiest families gave just 0.1% of their net worth. That’s equivalent to the median American family giving $97.30. Hardly a sacrifice. Compare this to the average donations make by working-class and middle-class…

  By Andrés Spokoiny Sep 11, 2020 | 3 min read
• 
  Opinion

  Letter | No, we at the ACLU have not lost our way

  To the editor: Regarding Zaid Jilani’s contention that “The ACLU Has Lost Its Way” published in these pages: We have not. We were too hasty in a tweet that proclaimed the shooting of Deon Kay a murder, but we acknowledged our mistake. To be clear, we believe in racial justice and due process. Mr. Jilani…

  By David Cole Sep 11, 2020 | 2 min read

Columnists View All

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

  

• Jay Michaelson Mamdani’s victory is an opportunity for Jews to relearn the art of disagreement

  

• Rob Eshman ‘Israel is seen as violent’ — and Israeli chefs, once global culinary icons, are feeling the heat

  

• Nora Berman Did Netanyahu coerce Trump into attacking Iran? No — but he tried with Obama

  

• Dan Perry Trump wants to control the Israeli judiciary. Uh, good luck

  

• Emily Tamkin Zohran Mamdani’s victory proves it: The ‘gotcha’ mode of fighting antisemitism has to go

  

The Latest

• 
  Opinion

  Is there room in Orthodoxy for satire?

  A joke was lately making the Orthodox WhatsApp circuits, via voice-note: “A guy went to daven mincha in Borough Park,” it said, meaning to say the afternoon prayer in one of Brooklyn’s religious neighborhoods. “And he walked into a shul, but he was embarrassed to put on a mask because no one else was wearing…

  By Avital Chizhik-Goldschmidt Sep 9, 2020 | 5 min read
• 
  Opinion

  The left and the right are both wrong: For American Jews, Zionism is not political.

  Among all the things Jewish students have missed out on in the age of COVID-19 is the Birthright trip. Since last spring, tens of thousands of young Jews haven’t been able to have that transformational moment, that “Aha” experience, that intense feeling of connectedness, that many didn’t even know they were missing. Not everyone speaks…

  By Gil Troy Sep 9, 2020 | 4 min read
• 
  Opinion

  The silver lining of Israel’s COVID-19 spike

  In recent weeks, Israel has gone from a Coronavirus success story to having the highest rate of infection in the world. In July, after months of successfully keeping cases and mortality rates down, the Israeli government was forced to close many of the country’s venues and businesses indefinitely in an attempt to control the virus’s…

  By Michael Blechman Sep 9, 2020 | 4 min read
• 
  Opinion

  Of course we should care about who rabbis think we should vote for

  Presidential campaigns, especially in the age of President Trump, tend to dominate the conversation. Everyone seems to have an opinion on the election, on who they will – and who everyone else should – be voting for. But there is a specific subset of Jews who are forbidden by popular decree from voicing their opinions…

  By Eli Steinberg Sep 8, 2020 | 4 min read
• 
  Opinion

  The ACLU has lost its way

  On September 2, the District of Columbia suffered a tragedy as an 18-year-old Black American man named Deon Kay was killed in a police shooting. As news spread of his death, protesters took to the streets to demand accountability. Thanks to a new D.C. law, the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) is required to release…

  By Zaid Jilani Sep 8, 2020 | 4 min read
• 
  Opinion

  Editorial | ‘Words create worlds:’ Some changes in our style regarding identity

  Perhaps it is cliche to use Abraham Joshua Heschel’s famous line “words create worlds” when writing about language in a Jewish publication. It is a phrase the great rabbi, scholar and activist of 20th century American Judaism invoked often to his daughter, Susannah, when she was growing up. A Holocaust survivor, Heschel said it in…

  By Jodi Rudoren Sep 8, 2020 | 5 min read
• 
  Opinion

  A summer of service — and your weekend reads

  This is an adapted version of our Shabbat newsletter. Sign up here to get future editions delivered to your inbox on Friday afternoons. This was the summer of canceled camp, thwarted travel, internships unwound. The pandemic left so many young people scrambling to fill their days. There were video games and backyard hangs. And there…

  By Jodi Rudoren Sep 4, 2020 | 4 min read
• 
  Opinion

  Of course we should cancel terrorists.

  Israel and the United Arab Emirates may have left the Palestinian cause in the dust of their recent peace agreement, but it continues to be championed on college campuses, even with quads and dorm rooms largely empty because of Covod-19. Two recent invitations spotlight the enduring appeal of pro-Palestinian politics for the tweed jacket set,…

  By Ari Hoffman Sep 4, 2020 | 4 min read