In the Forward’s opinion section, you’ll find analysis and essays from diverse corners of the Jewish world.
To pitch an opinion piece, email our Opinion Editor, Talya Zax.
Opinion
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Opinion
Letter | Why Is Everyone Lying About Bard? Every Other Account Proves Ungar-Sargon Right.
Ever since Batya Ungar-Sargon described being protested at Bard College’s recent conference on — irony alert — racism and anti-Semitism, the college and the Hannah Arendt Center which hosted the conference have been in engaged in a full-court PR effort to recast the events and impugn her integrity. In four letters to the Forward, some…
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Opinion Letter | What Will They Defend After Bard? Protesting Israel Outside A Holocaust Museum?
Why did so many on the left react so angrily to Batya Ungar-Sargon’s op-ed, in which she complained about the fact that anti-Israel activists demonstrated against Israel at a panel on anti-Semitism at Bard College? So far, the only argument I’ve read is that Ruth Wisse said something disrespectful about the Palestinians a couple of…
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Opinion Letter To The Editor: In This Unique Moment, Zioness Speaks For Us
Aiden Pink’s recent Forward article on Zioness piqued my interest because I was an early and enthusiastic supporter of the group. The timing of their launch was perfect. In recent years, several of my Temple Sinai students have returned from college shell-shocked by the virulent anti-Semitism masquerading as anti-Zionism they faced on campus. Israel, they…
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Opinion A Year Since The Pittsburgh Massacre, What Have We Learned? A Q&A With Abe Foxman
We are approaching the one year anniversary of the Tree of Life shooting in which Robert Bowers murdered 11 Jews at prayer. For the Yahrzeit, we will be rolling out a series of pieces reflecting on the tragedy, and what we’ve learned in the year since, beginning with an interview with Abe Foxman, the former…
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Opinion Dear Jewish Supporters of Donald Trump: What More Evidence Do You Need?
Dear Jewish Supporters of Donald Trump, The last few weeks have been deeply troubling ones for our country. There is, of course, the ongoing impeachment drama involving an American president who, in an act of remarkable audacity, appears to have recruited foreign allies to join in attacking his political rivals at home. This is profoundly…
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Letters Letter to the Editor: I Was Misrepresented in Column About Protest at Bard College
On Sunday, instead of building our family sukkah, instead of preparing for my daughter’s upcoming Bat Mitzvah, instead of doing the work that I needed to catch up on after traveling last week to present at the Hannah Arendt Center Conference on Racism and Antisemitism at Bard College, I spent the day fielding calls, texts,…
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Letters Letter to the Editor: Ungar-Sargon Chose to Leave Bard Conference
To the Editor, As the assistant director of the Hannah Arendt Center for Politics and Humanities at Bard College, I read Batya Ungar-Sargon’s recent column with dismay. She wrote: “But not one of my fellow speakers said a word. Two days later, I have not received a single note acknowledging what happened, which leaves me…
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Letters Letter to the Editor: I Organized the Bard Conference, and Batya Ungar-Sargon Misrepresented What Happened
To the Editor: I am the person who invited Batya Ungar-Sargon, the Opinion Editor of The Forward, to participate in a recent conference hosted by the Hannah Arendt Center at Bard College, a conference where she contends in a column published Oct. 12 that she was protested for being Jewish and, as a result, “couldn’t…
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Letters Letter to the Editor: I Was at the Bard Anti-Semitism Panel, and Saw Deep Disagreement, not Singling Out of Jews
This article is a response to an article one published on Saturday night by Batya Ungar Sargon, Opinion Editor of The Forward. You can read the original article here. Forty-eight years ago, as a first-year student at Bard College, I saw graffito in a bathroom stall: “If I didn’t believe it with my own mind,…
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Opinion ‘Oh My God, Why Are They Doing This?’ Northeastern Syrians Await Their Fate
A massive humanitarian crisis is unfolding in Syria. Over 130,000 civilians have been displaced in a once relatively stable region. Dozens of civilians have been killed or injured. Horrific videos showing field executions by Turkish-backed armed factions have begun to circulate on social media. The fate of the area, home to over three million people,…
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Opinion I Was Protested At Bard College For Being A Jew
When I was asked to speak at last week’s conference on racism and anti-Semitism at Bard College’s Hannah Arendt Center, I think my heart actually skipped a beat. Arendt, the German-born political philosopher who fled the Nazis in the 1930s and eventually settled in New York, is the thinker who has most deeply influenced me,…
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