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
How Benjamin Netanyahu’s Dangerously Twisted Words Hide the Truth
Last month, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued two public statements. When the United Nations Security Council passed a resolution criticizing settlements, Netanyahu attacked it for not condemning Syria. When Secretary of State John Kerry defended the Obama administration’s decision to let the resolution pass, Netanyahu attacked him for not sufficiently condemning the Palestinians. In both…
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Opinion Congrats on Burying the Two-State Solution, President Trump. Now What?
This is addressed to President-elect Donald Trump, his pick to be the next ambassador to Israel, the Republican National Committee, many Israeli government leaders and — judging from the recent outcry against the Obama administration — many in the American Jewish chattering class. That is, all of you on the resurgent political right who seem…
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Opinion About Fault Lines
Listen in on the Forward’s senior columnist Peter Beinart and Koret Distinguished Fellow Daniel Gordis explaining their new podcast. Listen to “Fault Lines” on Spreaker. Let the world know what you think about Fault Lines – rate our episodes, and share your thoughts in a review on iTunes. Download episodes here. Subscribe to Fault Lines…
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Opinion How and Why Tribes Are Taking Over
The world is going to hell, and it turns out Jean-Paul Sartre almost got it right. Sartre’s wartime play, “No Exit,” starts like a lame joke: a pacifist, a lesbian and a murderer die and go to hell. But the cruel joke is on them. There are no corporeal flames, only a conscious inferno: the…
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Opinion 50 Things To Fear From the Trump Administration
Looking toward 2017 can be overwhelming. The coming Trump administration presents so many potential risks, it’s hard to know which to feel anxious about. When I feel overwhelmed, I find that it helps to make lists. Here, then, in a rough order of danger, but also grouped by category, are 50 things for American Jews…
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Opinion ‘Jewish Youth, Learn To Shoot’?
In the communities I sing and pray with, Hanukkah is all about light, freedom and hope. Not so much about war. That was the choice of the ancient rabbis too. Instead of writing about the Maccabees’ war against the Hellenists, the Talmud chose to tell us only one thing: there was a miracle when oil…
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Opinion Intermarriage Will Shape a New American Judaism
When Rabbi Seymour Rosenbloom, a retired rabbi from Elkins Park, Pennsylvania, performed an intermarriage ceremony for his stepdaughter and her fiancé in 2014 more than a glass got shattered at the end of the wedding ceremony. Rabbi Rosenbloom’s membership in the Rabbinical Assembly wound up in pieces as well. In December 2016, the rabbinical body…
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Opinion The Top 10 Scribe Stories of 2016
2016 is almost behind us — and what a year it’s been for Scribe, the Forward’s contributor network. Since launching in July, nearly 250 contributors from 6 continents have shared their insightful, inspirational, and impactful stories, providing a 360 degree view of the world around us. Our Scribes not only come from all over the…
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Opinion What Progressive Jews Can Learn From David Friedman and Dani Dayan
In the northeast part of the settlement of Beit El, there is a building bearing the name of the newly appointed American ambassador to Israel — David Friedman. The Friedman edifice is located on the grounds of a girls’ high school (Ulpana), which was built in the late 1990s on privately owned Palestinian land from…
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Letters How You Can Help Us Help Refugees, From Syria and Beyond
In her recent piece, “Our Great Moral Failure in Syria,” Forward Editor-in-Chief Jane Eisner calls attention to the American Jewish community for “inexcusably turning our backs on those in need” in Syria. Like Eisner, we are all grappling with the unconscionable amount of death, suffering and displacement we’ve witnessed in Syria over the past few…
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Opinion Was John Kerry’s Speech a Swan Song to Israel — or a Last Gasp Peace Push?
There are two ways to interpret the speech (text here, video here) that Secretary of State John Kerry delivered December 28 on his vision of Israeli-Palestinian peace. One interpretation is that it was his swan song, his angry farewell to the global community and the Middle East that he tried to reshape, Through four years…
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Opinion The Gaza hostage crisis could forever change how American Jews relate to Israel — but it’s not too late to fix that
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Yiddish ווידעאָ: היסטאָריקערין וויווי לאַקס באַשרײַבט געשיכטע פֿון לאָנדאָנער ייִדישער פּרעסעVIDEO: Historian Vivi Laks tells history of the London Yiddish Press
שבֿע צוקער פֿירט דעם שמועס מיט וויווי לאַקס און ביידע לייענען פֿאָר עטלעכע פֿעליעטאָנען פֿון יענע צײַטן.
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Yiddish World Puppet Monty Pickle is guest on the Forward’s ‘Yiddish Word of the Day’
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Culture We tried to fix Hallmark’s Hanukkah problem. Here’s the movie we made instead
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