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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Books
9 Books Bret Stephens Should Read Before Saying Arabs Have a ‘Stunted Literary Culture’
Writing this week in The Wall Street Journal, columnist Bret Stephens had some strange things to say about Arab-majority countries. From an Egyptian’s refusal to shake hands with an Israeli after their Olympics judo match, the one-time editor of The Jerusalem Post extrapolates all of recent politics and history across 22 countries. He makes reference…
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Opinion Jews Who Hurt Gay Black Man Only Want To Do Community Service With Other Jews
Pinchas Braver and Abraham Winkler, two Hasidic men involved in the 2013 unlawful imprisonment and vicious beating of Taj Patterson, a then-22-year-old gay black man, are now attempting to shirk their sentence. Braver and Winkler, who pled guilty to unlawful imprisonment in a plea bargain, were sentenced to only three years probation, a $1400 restitution…
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Opinion What Talking to a Syrian Refugee Taught Me About Palestinian Anti-Normalization
I met Shirin, a refugee from a village near Aleppo, Syria, while I was on assignment in Berlin. Her husband was killed in the fighting; over a year ago, together with her two teenage daughters, she fled to Turkey, then across the sea to Greece, then trekked across Europe to shelter in Berlin. Shirin is…
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Opinion Ignoring Anti-Semitism in the BDS Movement Is Intellectually Dishonest
Within the Jewish community, there are people (albeit a minority) who genuinely believe that all criticism of Israel is rooted in anti-Semitism. They are wrong. But so too is the inversion of their position, as exemplified in a recent Forward column by Mira Sucharov, which shows the author’s apparent unwillingness to recognize any anti-Semitism within…
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Opinion Stop History From Repeating Itself: Trump’s 5 Biggest Immigration Myths Debunked
This election cycle, immigration has been a major focus issue. One candidate in particular has been using incendiary tropes and rhetoric in order to gain the votes of the fearful and the xenophobic. From allegations about the criminality of Mexican immigrants and the terrorist allegiances of Muslims to grand plans for delusional border walls, Donald…
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Opinion How Can Russian Jews Be So Naively in Love With Donald Trump?
“She is bad,” said a four-year old girl, pointing at the TV where a broadcast showed Hillary Clinton speaking to her supporters. “We don’t like her,” she continued and proceeded to dip her sushka, a Russian pretzel, into the tea my mother had made for her. The little girl is my mother’s friend. She is…
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Opinion In Israel, Let’s Destroy Jewish Fundamentalism Before It Destroys Us
This week we marked Tisha b’Av (the ninth of Av), a date commemorating a series of horrific events throughout Jewish history. According to rabbinic tradition, these spanned from the destruction of the first Temple in Jerusalem in 587 BCE to the 1942 liquidation of the Warsaw Ghetto. While one common thread binding these calamities is…
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Opinion Republicans Want To Teach the Bible in Public Schools. But Which Bible, Exactly?
The Republican Party’s new platform calls for teaching the Bible as literature in public schools. But which Bible, exactly, would the Republicans approve of? The idea of the Bible taught in public schools has a fraught Constitutional history. For the Jewish community, it can bring back memories of “prayer in the schools” or mandatory participation…
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Opinion Is Donald Trump Echoing the Incitement That Killed Yitzhak Rabin?
If we thought about it, most of us would probably assume we’d know incitement to violence when we see it. Most of us, unfortunately, would be kidding ourselves. Don’t believe me? Take this simple test. Which of the following statements looks like incitement to you? 1) “…to the men of the West Bank: Form stabbing…
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Opinion I’m a Jew of Color and Accusing Israel of ‘Genocide’ Disgusts Me
I was initially a proponent of the Black Lives Matter movement. As a person of color, I was startled and frightened when I watched video footage of young people of color being shot in the back, choked to death and beaten. It proved that the lives of people of color, particularly of African Americans, were…
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Opinion Tough Decisions: Reproductive Choice and Jewish Genetics
As Sarah and her husband were checking off last-minute wedding preparations and appointments, they got a suggestion from their rabbi. He asked them if they’d been genetically tested for diseases common among Ashkenazi Jews. The couple, both Ashkenazim, took the rabbi’s advice and headed to their local JCC for a blood test. They figured it…
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Film & TV Remembering Siskel and Ebert’s great debate: Mel Brooks or Woody Allen?
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Sports An Orthodox Jewish hooper famous for viral dunks aims to break Division-I boundaries
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Fast Forward Former Columbia professor tells NYU students to learn from Hamas at off-campus event
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Yiddish ווידעאָ: אַ שעפֿערישער מיטל צו באַלעבן די ייִדישע שפּראַך אין קלאַסצימערVIDEO: A creative way to make Yiddish come alive in the classroom
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News These states want to ban the term ‘West Bank’ and replace it with ‘Judea and Samaria’
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