Opinion

• Opinion

  Supreme Court Rulings Show What We Care About

  Among the joys of late June, along with fine weather and happy children, is the annual opportunity to watch the Supreme Court close out its docket with a rush of last-minute rulings on the year’s toughest cases. It’s a grand national civics lesson that brings us together as few other events can do. It teaches…

  By J.J. Goldberg

  4 min read
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  Opinion

  How Do We Celebrate When July 4 Is Shabbat?

  Getty Images (JTA) — Part “God Bless America,” part “Shabbat Shalom,” the Fourth of July this year falls on a Friday. In this land of religious freedom, how do we plan to observe both? As the sun sets over the “fruited plain,” will we be lighting Shabbat candles and fireworks? How will the Sabbath Queen…

  By Edmon J. Rodman Jul 4, 2014 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  Did Bibi’s ‘Vengeance’ Tweets Provoke Violence?

  Getty Images In moments of national tension — Israelis know these all too well — one can expect a leader to measure every word on a scale that calms on one side and inflames on the other. So what are we to make of Benjamin Netanyahu’s tweets on Monday as the country was preparing to…

  By Gal Beckerman Jul 3, 2014 | 2 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 I have the answer to Jon Stewart’s toughest question about Israel

  

• Nora Berman ‘Eddington’ is full of conspiracy theories but it’s not about Jews. Or is it?

  

• Dan Perry A US official just made history in the West Bank — did he imperil prospects for peace?

  

• Emily Tamkin Is starvation in Gaza really Israel’s fault? The facts are clear

  

The Latest

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  Opinion

  When ‘Death to Arabs’ Rings Out in Holy City

  Israel is consumed with calls for revenge for the murders of three kidnapped students. But some are pushing back against the cycle of hate./Getty Images The headlines in Israel this week have been overwhelming. First the bodies of the three kidnapped Israeli teenagers — Naftali Frenkel, Gil-ad Shaer and Eyal Yifrach — were found, buried,…

  By Elisheva Goldberg Jul 3, 2014 | 5 min read
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  Opinion

  Three Jews and a Palestinian — All Just Boys

  One reason that the fate of the three kidnapped Israeli boys gripped our attention and stirred our concern is that they were immediately identifiable. Gilad, Naftali, Eyal. Names and faces, goofy grins, youthful exuberance, captured in grainy photos that quickly became ubiquitious on buttons, t-shirts, posters, billboards, Facebook posts, Twitter feeds. We didn’t know them…

  Jul 3, 2014 | 2 min read
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  Opinion

  Auschwitz Selfies? No Big Deal, IMHO

  Teenagers, selfies, and the Holocaust — you’d be hard-pressed to find anyone over the age of 30 who doesn’t have some thoughts on all three. Last week, though, the world was granted the chance to think about all three at the same time. It was reported in various places that some Jewish teenagers, while in…

  By Emily L. Hauser Jul 3, 2014 | 3 min read
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  Opinion

  Why Israeli Thirst for Revenge Is Profoundly Un-Jewish

  Palestinians clash with Israeli police in East Jerusalem after an Arab teen was killed / Getty Images The Torah sternly commands us to pursue justice (“Justice, justice, shall you pursue”) — but it leaves revenge to God. That thought should resonate in our ears like a thunderclap after the discovery of a body in the…

  By Hody Nemes Jul 2, 2014 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  What Are You First, Jew or Journalist?

  Are you a journalist first? Or a Jew first? Shmuel Rosner, who writes for The New York Times and the L.A. Jewish Journal, asked the provocative question at the opening panel of the Jewish Media Summit, which brought over a hundred journalists from around the Diaspora to Jerusalem in late June. Had the conference been…

  By Jane Eisner Jul 2, 2014 | 3 min read
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  Opinion

  Unruly Hebron Clan Pushes Hamas — and Israel — to Brink

  Mourners at the fresh grave of Naftali Fraenkel, one of three Israeli teens murdered, allegedly by members of the Hamas-linked Qawasmeh family of Hebron. / Getty Images Now that the bodies of the three kidnapped Israeli teenagers have been found and laid to rest, the crisis is rapidly turning into a wickedly complex, five-sided tug-of-war…

  By J.J. Goldberg Jul 2, 2014 | 5 min read
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  Opinion

  Teens’ Funeral Changed Israeli Youth Forever

  Funeral ceremony for the three Israeli teenagers / Getty Images When the city of Modi’in was built in 1993, I don’t think the planners envisioned the scene that took place here today. Tens of thousands of Israelis — nearly the equivalent of Modi’in’s entire population — descended on the modest cemetery at the outskirts of…

  By Elana Sztokman Jul 1, 2014 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  The Perks of Being a Lubavitcher

  Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, seen here (at left) in 1993 / Getty Images There’s a hidden perk to being a Lubavitcher, one often not talked about but widely experienced: People like to talk to you. I’ve been called out as a Lubavitcher and brought into impromptu conversations everywhere from a small bridge over the Bled…

  By Mordechai Lightstone Jul 1, 2014 | 4 min read