Opinion

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  It’s Not About Leaving France — Our Question Is How To Stay

  “Is there a future for Jews in France?” I might just as well have poured a Dr Pepper into the wine glass of Nicolas Weill. The cultural and literary journalist for Le Monde looked at me from across our corner table in a small restaurant specializing in provincial fare. “This sort of question is an…

  By Robert Zaretsky

  18 min read
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  Opinion

  My Message to the Man Who Attacked Me at the Kotel

  On a sunny morning last month, I was swept into the women’s section of the Western Wall in Jerusalem in a flurry of aggression directed at the Women of the Wall, the Israeli group fighting for women’s prayer at Jerusalem’s holiest site. (JTA) One of the group’s male supporters, Charlie Kalech, was strangled and thrown…

  By Alden Solovy May 10, 2015 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  Dancing on George Galloway’s Grave

  Between the prospect of the break-up of the United Kingdom and five more years of Conservative-led austerity, there wasn’t much good news in the British election results. Except, that is, in Bradford. After an ugly campaign, the infamous and indefatigable George Galloway, who made headlines for declaring the down-on-its-luck northern town an “Israel-free zone,” lost…

  By Liam Hoare May 8, 2015 | 3 min read

Columnists View All

• Jay Michaelson What can really be done to prevent antisemitic attacks like Bondi Beach?

  

• Rob Eshman Australia shooting terrifies Jews worldwide — and strengthens the case for Israel

  

• Nora Berman Did crypto-Jews invent the modern tarot deck?

  

• Dan Perry The 3 responses to the Bondi Beach Hanukkah attack that could make Jews safer

  

• Emily Tamkin The fundamental miscalculation behind the GOP’s antisemitism crisis

  

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  Opinion

  My Jewish Nose Got Me Pulled Over — White Privilege Got Me Off

  One morning in early 1982, I was driving up Route 1 toward Newark Airport, borderline late for my flight. As I wove through morning traffic, calculating how fast I could go without risking a ticket, I suddenly saw the whirling red cap of a police car in my rearview mirror. I pulled over and waited…

  By Samuel G. Freedman May 8, 2015 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  Swipe Right If Israeli-Palestinian Peace Turns You On

  Are you in the mood to make love, not war? Then swipe right — right across the Green Line! Verona, a new Tinder-like dating app specially designed for Israelis and Palestinians, sounds like a joke. But for 1000 users and counting, it’s become a real way to find a hot hook-up and solve the Middle East…

  By Sigal Samuel May 7, 2015 | 2 min read
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  Opinion

  Bibi’s Nightmare: Unruly Coalition Might Fall — or Worse, Survive

  Right now, after finishing seven weeks of infuriating, hairpin coalition negotiations, Benjamin Netanyahu must be wondering what would be a worse fate for the impossibly shaky and extremist government he’s assembled: that it collapses the moment some disgruntled back-bencher decides to walk out — or that it survives and leads Israel into as-yet unimagined recesses…

  By J.J. Goldberg May 7, 2015 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  In Wartime, Who Comes First — Soldiers or Civilians?

  ‘My feeling after Operation Protective Edge was not so good. Mostly I felt bad from a moral perspective…. We shot at houses just because. We shot at cars, at ambulances — doing things I was raised not to do — not to kill the innocent…[but] here I was formally told ‘Kill everything in your proximity.’…

  By Elisheva Goldberg May 6, 2015 | 5 min read
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  Opinion

  Lindsey Graham Isn’t Racist — Some of His Favorite Words Start With ‘Al’!

  Senator Lindsey Graham, the Republican from South Carolina who hopes to win the White House in 2016, made headlines this week when an AIPAC dinner in Boston, “Everything that starts with ‘Al’ in the Middle East is bad news.” The senator then gave some examples: “Al-Qaida, Al-Nusra, Al-Qaida in the Arab Peninsula.” It was a…

  By Jesse Lempel May 6, 2015 | 2 min read
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  Opinion

  R-E-S-P-E-C-T: Why Lag B’Omer Matters

  Twenty four thousand students who studied with the famed 2nd Century Rabbi Akiva were killed by a terrible plague. What sin made them deserving of such a wipeout? “They did not treat each other with respect,” the Talmud says plainly. What does the holiday of Lag B’Omer, which arrives this evening, have to do with…

  By Abigail Pogrebin May 6, 2015 | 6 min read
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  Opinion

  As Coalition Deadline Nears, Bibi’s Choices Are All Bad

  Benjamin Netanyahu has barely a day left to complete what looked like a slam-dunk a month ago and now seems almost impossible: assembling a governing coalition of parties that control a majority of the 120 seats in Israel’s parliament. If he doesn’t finish the job by midnight Wednesday (5:00 p.m. Eastern), Israel’s figurehead president Reuven…

  By J.J. Goldberg May 5, 2015 | 5 min read
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  Opinion

  A Kidney Donor Who Wants No Help

  I donated my kidney. And I have to say that, with the exception of my marriage and the birth of my children, living donation was by far the most meaningful experience of my life. The only reason I write anonymously here is that I never wanted to broadcast what I did. The act was rewarding…

  By Anonymous May 5, 2015 | 3 min read