Opinion

• Opinion

  How Studying Talmud Helped Me Understand Racism in America

  Every morning this summer my subway commute features roughly the same routine: Read the news and study the Talmud. From 238th street all the way to 72nd street, I am bombarded with the brutality of racism in America, and then with stories from a 1500-year-old Jewish text. Studying one page of Talmud a day, a…

  By Avi Killip

  3 min read
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  Opinion

  Human Biodiversity: the Pseudoscientific Racism of the Alt-Right

  There’s a piece of the “alt-right” puzzle of bigotry you need to know more about: “human biodiversity.” An ideological successor to eugenics, human biodiversity (HBD) is, like eugenics (from the Greek words for “good” and “breeding”) primarily a euphemism. Ostensibly, HBD refers to the scientifically proven (and therefore apolitical) genetic differences between groups of humans….

  By Ari Feldman Aug 5, 2016 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  An Evangelical Pastor Takes Trump to Task

  The good person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure produces evil, for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks. — Luke 6:45 This particular election cycle has been very very difficult for me. See, I’m a Pastor of a…

  By Adam Peek Aug 5, 2016 | 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 A new humanitarian outrage is unfolding in the Middle East. It’s not in Gaza

  

• Nora Berman The left is turning on AOC over Israel — and imperiling its own agenda

  

• Dan Perry Actually, Trump made things between Israel and Iran way worse

  

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

  

The Latest

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  Opinion

  Don’t Like Black Lives Matter? Get Ready To Lose Young Jews Like Us.

  Two days after the Movement for Black Lives — a coalition of more than 50 racial justice organizations from across the country — released its detailed, visionary policy platform, the Boston Jewish Community Relations Council released a statement to “disassociate from the Black Lives Matter platform and those BLM organizations that embrace it.” As members…

  By Ally Little and Michelle Weiser Aug 4, 2016 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  Black Lives Matter Lost Me With That Israel-Bashing Platform

  Why has ‪‎Black Lives Matter‬ let itself be co-opted? Black Lives Matter put out a policy platform this week, with demands for reforms in six areas, with specific policy proposals on the state and federal levels. It’s good that the leadership is moving from slogans and rallies to tangible policy, and there are many good…

  By Ari Hart Aug 4, 2016 | 2 min read
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  Opinion

  You Won’t Support Paid Parental Leave? Then We Won’t Give You a Grant.

  The Jewish Women’s Foundation of New York has decided that starting this year, we will only accept grant applications from organizations with paid parental leave policies that offer their employees — new mothers and new fathers — at least four weeks of paid leave at full salary. We are the first foundation in the Jewish…

  By Stephanie Blumenkranz and Avra Gordis and Nancy Schwartz Sternoff Aug 4, 2016 | 3 min read
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  Opinion

  How Did Zionism Become a Dirty Word on Campus?

  Sooner or later we’re going to have to face the facts: Zionism has become a dirty word in certain precincts — important and growing precincts — of the Western society that we call home. It’s unfair. It’s short-sighted. Given the way things are headed, the end could be tragic. But it is a reality. Zionism…

  By J.J. Goldberg Aug 4, 2016 | 6 min read
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  Opinion

  We Won’t Give Up On Israel, Even If American Jewish Historians Do

  Private Hasia Diner, overwhelmed by the pressures of war, abandoned the battlefield this week. Her resignation letter in Haaretz projects the death of her fighting spirit onto the state of Israel. She is wrong about Israel. The young state is doing fine. Her disqualifying critiques are exaggerated. They reflect the natural growing pains of a…

  By Ysoscher Katz Aug 3, 2016 | 3 min read
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  Opinion

  The Anti-Semitism Report That Britain’s Labour Party Didn’t Want You To See

  It’s difficult for straight white Americans to understand what it is to be Jewish in Britain. But it’s important to try if you want to make sense of the ongoing scandal of anti-Semitism in the Labour Party in the shadow of Brexit. Today, for example, Baroness Royall’s full report into allegations of anti-Semitism in the…

  By Dan Friedman Aug 3, 2016 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  42 French Muslims Condemn Terrorist Attacks — Except When Victims Are Jewish?

  Over the past two years, the debate among French Muslims over Islam’s place in France — who it represents, what it stands for, why a small minority murder in its name and how to stop them — has intensified with each new terrorist attack on French soil. Following last week’s appalling events in St Etienne…

  By Robert Zaretsky Aug 3, 2016 | 3 min read
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  Opinion

  Millennial Jews Want To Shout ‘Black Lives Matter’ — As Jews

  I am not worried about the future of the Jewish people. We spend our time, our brainpower and a significant amount of money attempting to solve the problem of Jewish continuity, but I am not concerned. Judaism moves, compels and speaks to a new generation of Jewish leaders. Most recently, I was heartened by the…

  By Hannah L. Goldstein Aug 2, 2016 | 3 min read