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.
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.
It’s undoubtedly just coincidence. Then again, once you enter the shadowy world of international skullduggery, few things are coincidence and nothing is what it seems. So let’s just look at the known facts in these two simultaneously unfolding stories and see if we can’t spot any points of intersection. It’s probably all just coincidence. Consider…
The national release of the film “Selma” during the week leading up to Martin Luther King Day, has led to a national moment of heshbon hanefesh (soul searching) over the dramatic series of events during the first three months of 1965 in which indelible images of brutal police violence against peaceful marchers convened by Dr….
(JTA) — The latest strategy being used by those who make a career of assaulting the good name of the State of Israel is to link the issue of full equality for African-Americans, as symbolized by the word “Ferguson,” with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. There is a long history of using legitimate American social justice issues…
David Sookne, front left, and Bruce Hartford, third from right, register voters in 1965 / Courtesy (JTA) — Since the nationwide release of “Selma” a week before the national holiday commemorating the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., I have wondered about the extent of Jewish participation in the civil rights movement. Was it just the Selma…
It’s not easy to be a Jew or Muslim in Europe these days. French Jews are still reeling from the Charlie Hebdo and kosher grocery store attack, with their Muslim counterparts facing a spate of hate crimes aimed at them and an expected surge of support for the anti-Islamic (and historically anti-Jewish) National Front, now…
With two months to go before Israelis go to the polls, the Labor Party opened a statistically significant lead over Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud for the first time since its mid-December alliance with Tzipi Livni’s Hatnuah. Of six polls released last Thursday and Friday, January 15 and 16, one — also the largest poll, with 830…
Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, right, marches with Dr. Martin Luther King and other civil rights leaders / Getty Images (JTA) — The 50th anniversary of the 1965 march at Selma is being commemorated this year with the release of the film “Selma.” Regrettably, the film represents the march as many see it today, only as an…
Life sure is hard when you’re a contestant at the Miss Universe pageant. In addition to wowing the judges with your swimsuit, your evening gown and your talent, you also have to be constantly on the lookout for quick-footed, iPhone-toting Israeli beauty queens who are dead-set on squeezing themselves into a selfie with you. Or…
After any great tragedy, especially if it involves a sensational crime, people invariably set to work. Societies erect symbolic monuments of affinity and empathy. Narratives are constructed to make sense of the cataclysm. A sense of order is restored through theatrical displays of civic unity and common purpose. And the collective hunt is on for…
Michael Douglas poses with Michael Bloomberg after winning the $1M Genesis Prize. / Getty Images When Michael Bloomberg was named the first recipient of the Genesis Prize last year, I wasn’t alone in wondering why a billionaire businessman and politician whose Jewishness was mostly hidden and whose ties to Israel were tenuous at best was…
Yair Lapid (Getty Images); Moshe Kahlon (Facebook When Yair Lapid skyrocketed to the top of Israeli politics during the last election campaign in 2013, he did it by positioning himself as the most “hevrati” (socio-economically conscious) candidate. He and his party, Yesh Atid, capitalized on the momentum of the “tent protests” that brought half a…
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