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
Israel’s Next Threat — A ‘Car Intifada’?
A #Drive4alAqsa meme, part of the “car intifada” campaign / Twitter The past few weeks have seen widespread incitement to violence among both Palestinians and Jewish Israelis. There have been stabbings, harassments, shootings, stone-throwings, hit-and-runs. And now, there’s the “car intifada.” This campaign, which is drawing significant media attention, calls on Palestinians to run over…
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Opinion 17 Ways Israel’s Anime Propaganda Video Creeped Me Out
Well, here’s something you don’t see every day. The Israeli Embassy in Tokyo has launched an anime web series to encourage Japanese tourists to visit the Holy Land — and it’s kind of amazing. “Israel, Like!” is an unusual blend of hasbara and manga — I hereby dub it “hasbaranga” — featuring two Japanese sisters,…
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Opinion Why We Chose Rabbi Barry Freundel for the Forward 50
So why is Rabbi Barry Freundel, who made national headlines when he was arrested on charges of secretly taping naked women in his synagogue’s ritual bath, included in this year’s Forward 50? Friends wanted to know. Readers commented on Facebook. Some were simply curious; others posed the question as a challenge. Does he really belong?…
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Opinion Rabbis on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown
Those of us who knew, or thought we knew, Rabbi Barry Freundel — recently arrested for spying on women in the mikveh, with a mountain of evidence suggesting his guilt — are still in shock. As much as I disagreed with many of his halachic positions, I always thought he was one of the good…
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Opinion Bibi’s Cabinet Rattled as Key Livni Ally Quits
The Netanyahu government’s most left-wing member, environmental defense minister Amir Peretz, quit the cabinet on Sunday and declared war on the prime minister, vowing to work for a new government committed to peace and economic justice. Peretz, a onetime Labor Party chairman and defense minister, is a member of Tzipi Livni’s Hatnuah party. The move…
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Opinion Judge Posner’s Delightfully Jewy Legal Ruling
An Orthodox Jew wears a reggae costume as he buys a bottle of wine on Purim / Getty Images Last Thursday, prominent judge and University of Chicago professor Richard Posner offered his decision on Lubavitch-Chabad v. Northwestern University. The case was brought against the university after it disaffiliated itself with its former Chabad organization. The…
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Opinion My Sephardic Guilt on Kristallnacht
Postcard of Madeira While other Jewish families suffered unimaginable brutality in the Holocaust, my family lived like royalty in the Portuguese paradise known for its wine, Madeira. I know: I sound like an entitled, unsympathetic brat. And what I’m trying to say is, I feel guilty about this. I always have. Every time a Holocaust…
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Opinion The Shrinking Jewish Middle
As the Jewish Federations of North America holds its annual General Assembly this week, newly emerging evidence from the Pew Research Center’s 2013 “Portrait of American Jewry” points to enormous challenges facing federations, Jewish philanthropy and organized Jewish life, more generally. Virtually every Jewish institution is contending with a sharply diminishing base of people who…
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Opinion More Dire Signs of Liberal Jewry’s Demise
There’s a pair of new studies just out that sheds important light on the future of Judaism in America. One paints an alarming picture of a population headed for precipitous decline, but offers hope that certain measures can turn things around. The other suggests that the most hopeful measure actually might not offer much hope…
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Opinion Adelson and Saban Try To Out-Hawk Each Other
Haim Saban and Sheldon Adelson / Getty Images What do you get when you put two of the largest pro-Israel donors — Sheldon Adelson and Haim Saban — on one stage? For participants at the Israeli American Council’s inaugural conference, this meeting of Jewish finance titans produced several historical insights about the roots of the…
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Opinion A New Kristallnacht for Today’s European Jews?
Protesters took to the streets of Paris this summer to demonstrate against Israel / Getty Images (JTA) — Each year on the anniversary of Kristallnacht, we recall the opening salvo of the violent assault on Jews that foreshadowed the Holocaust and ask ourselves what should have been done at that moment. In thinking about Kristallnacht,…
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