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
Why John Podhoretz Gets The Gun Reform Argument Totally Wrong
Welcome back to Jane Looking Forward. If you wish to continue reading this weekly newsletter, please subscribe here. And spread the word! Ever since we had a particularly unpleasant exchange at the 92Y some years ago, I have tried to stay clear of John Podhoretz, editor of Commentary magazine and columnist for the New York…
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Opinion The Cynical Scare Tactics Won’t Prevent Gun Control Forever
Ever since we had a particularly unpleasant exchange at the 92Y some years ago, I have tried to stay clear of John Podhoretz, editor of Commentary magazine and columnist for the New York Post. But occasionally he writes something that raises a provocative question worth tackling, and his column last Friday did just that. Are…
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Opinion Diaspora Philanthropy To Israel Is No Longer A One Way Street
I follow Anshel Pfeffer’s column in Haaretz with assiduity. I usually find his mordant analyses profound and insightful. But I can’t help but take exception to his recent article, “Help Israel. Stop Giving It Money.” Pfeffer makes a bizarre intellectual summersault to link the bribery allegations against Prime Minister Netanyahu with the corrupting influence that…
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Opinion It’s Time For The #MeToo Movement To Start Talking About Children
When the #MeToo movement began, I watched, stunned. While in despair to learn of so many high profile predators using their power to intimidate and abuse women, I was also exhilarated; finally the world was opening its blind eye. Maybe my daughters will be able call out men who try to sexually intimidate them, and…
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Opinion The Palestinians Just Might Accept Jared Kushner’s Peace Plan. That Would Be A Disaster For Israel.
At some point, Jared Kushner and Jason Greenblatt will reveal their Peace Plan for the Middle East (God only knows the reason for the delay; after all, no advance consent is required). In their eyes, it will be a deal which the Israeli right wing government could swallow, and the Palestinian side will have to…
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Letters Don’t Mansplain Vashti To Us
In a recent op-ed headlined “Actually, Feminists, Vashti Was The Harvey Weinstein Of Persia” published by The Forward, Rabbi Joshua Krisch attempted to sever Vashti, a character from the Book of Esther, from the men and women who love her. His argument hinged on the idea that feminists ignored the Talmudic “facts” (namely the Talmud’s…
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Opinion Vashti Was The First #MeToo Survivor
“Is Vashti the evil queen of the Purim story?” my daughter asked me after a recent Hebrew school class. Vashti, of course, was the erstwhile queen of Persia, according to the Bible’s Book of Esther. She was deposed and banned by King Ahasuerus, and then replaced by the story’s eponymous heroine, Queen Esther. “I don’t…
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Opinion Actually, Feminists, Vashti Was The Harvey Weinstein Of Persia
If Mordechai and Esther saw what 2018 had done to Purim, I like to think they’d be satisfied. The day is commemorated across Jewish denominations with celebration, exchanging of gifts, donations to the poor, and public Megillah readings—just as they requested. King Achashverosh, perhaps, would be less amused with how history remembered his reign. But…
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Opinion Why Do So Many Jewish Last Names Come From Women?
There’s a strange phenomenon that pops up surrounding the last names of Jews in the Russian Empire during the 19th century. A lot of them were derived from women’s first names, which is known as “matronymics.” The existence of last names like Belkin, Dvorkin, Malkin, and Rivkin, derived from Belka (Beyle), Dvorka (Deborah), Malka, and…
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Opinion I Was Alyssa Alhadeff’s Camp Counselor. No One Should Have To Go To 4 Funerals In One Day.
Standing in the cemetery, a heavy quiet suffocated the hundreds of mourners of Alyssa Alhadeff. Not a sound could be heard, not even the cicadas, with their ever-present chirp in the Florida humidity, made a noise. Then, the thump of dirt on a box too hollow. Thump. Thump. A piercing cry of anguish, “No! No…
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Opinion The NRA Has An Anti-Semitism Problem
Purim is right around the corner. It’s the holiday in which we commemorate a crazy, long-ago time when wealthy Jews were targeted by anti-Semites, and a vain, know-nothing ruler did nothing to stop it. Sorry, that’s this past week. First, of course, came the horrific mass-murder of 17 people, 14 of them students and five…
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