Opinion

• Opinion

  Replacing @PresidentofIsrael

  The journalist Gershom Gorenberg says that in Israel the office of president is much like the Queen of England. Only much cheaper. In many ways, he’s right. The Israeli presidency is not an inherited position, of course, and it has none of the aristocratic presumptions built into the House of Windsor; the official president’s house…

  By Jane Eisner

  4 min read
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  Opinion

  AIPAC’s Times Op-Ed: Hold the Noose Steady, Bibi

  Senator Robert Menendez addresses AIPAC, March 2013 / Getty Images When I wrote last week that Israel’s Prime Minister Netanyahu had instructed AIPAC to go stick its head in a noose — specifically, to pick another fight with the White House over Iran sanctions legislation, a scant 11 days after its bruised retreat from the…

  By J.J. Goldberg Feb 25, 2014 | 5 min read
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  Opinion

  Introducing ‘The Seesaw’

  The Forward is launching The Seesaw, a new advice column which will focus on the real life issues faced by interfaith couples and families. While the Jewish establishment wrestles with the communal implications of interfaith relationships, a growing number of American Jews are simply living in one. For them, intermarriage isn’t a problem or a…

  By Elissa Strauss Feb 24, 2014 | 2 min read

Columnists View All

• Alyssa Katz Class assignment: Get to know your murdered Jewish neighbors

  

• Rob Eshman Liberal Zionists are under attack. A new book proves their work has never been more important

  

• Dan Perry How Israel became a country where teenagers murder each other in cold blood

  

• Emily Tamkin American Jews have a Hasan Piker problem. Solving it is going to hurt

  

• Jay Michaelson Epstein and Iran are an antisemitism mega-crisis. Here’s what Jewish organizations should do about it. 

  

The Latest

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  Opinion

  Ultra-Orthodox Jews Shouldn’t Have a Monopoly on Tradition

  Avi Shafran is unhappy with the term “ultra-Orthodox.” I am too. Both as a sociologist and as someone who identifies himself as an Orthodox Jew, I too find the message implied by the term “ultra-Orthodox” false, but for different reasons. The people who have been so identified are not “more” Orthodox, nor are they necessarily…

  By Samuel Heilman Feb 24, 2014 | 2 min read
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  Opinion

  Ukraine’s Reform Rabbi Cheers Protest’s Victory

  A man stands beside a military oven in Independence Square in Kiev, Ukraine. / Getty Images Over the weekend, the Forward contacted Ukraine’s chief Reform rabbi, Alexander Dukhovny, to ask him about how he felt seeing the months of protests on Kiev’s central square lead to a clear resolution in the president’s ouster. This is…

  By Alexander Dukhovny Feb 24, 2014 | 2 min read
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  Opinion

  British Jews: Showing Green Line Is Not ‘Insane’

  Young British Jews who support the Sign on the Green Line Campaign. / YouTube Throughout our history, young Jewish voices have played a vital role in shaping the Jewish story. Young people lead and teach other young people and take on significant leadership roles. Youth empowerment is highly valued, and it was with this feeling…

  By Jordan Marsh and Jess Weiss Feb 24, 2014 | 3 min read
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  Opinion

  Don’t Call Us ‘Ultra-Orthodox’

  My religious group is routinely referred to by a pejorative. That the name we are called is negative in only an indirect way doesn’t alter the fact that it is disparaging. It telegraphs a subconscious bias (and may well spawn from the same). I’m not quite Howard Beale-mad about the subtle slur, but I’m peeved…

  Feb 24, 2014 | 3 min read
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  Opinion

  The Disappearing Places of Our Jewish Past in the Old Country

  I was born in a city in eastern Slovakia, called Bardejov. When I was growing up, we Jews made up nearly a third of the city. We had synagogues, schools, a number of communal organizations, even a couple of Hebrew publishing houses. Then came the Holocaust. Only several hundred of us survived. Some of us…

  By Emil Fish Feb 24, 2014 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  Moving Toward a ‘Living Wage’

  There’s an active debate in America regarding the minimum wage. By and large, with President Obama’s endorsement and substantial public agreement, there’s widespread support for a bump upward, from the current national minimum of $7.25 and hour to $10.10 an hour. That sounds like a hefty hike, but it is actually about as stingy as…

  By Leonard Fein Feb 22, 2014 | 3 min read
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  Opinion

  Ukraine: Don’t Scapegoat Your Jews and Muslims

  Back in May 2011, the Foundation for Ethnic Understanding, which I serve as president, co-sponsored an international conference in Kiev together with the Ukrainian Jewish Committee to fight against anti-Semitism and Islamophobia in Ukraine and around the world. During the conference, I met many wonderful Jewish and Muslim Ukrainians — mainly from the Crimean Tatar…

  By Marc Schneier Feb 21, 2014 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  Benjamin Netanyahu Tells AIPAC To Put Its Head In a Noose

  Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu marked America’s Presidents Day February 17 by lecturing to a visiting group of American presidents in Jerusalem. No, Bibi didn’t have any actual occupants of the White House to wag his finger at this time. But he had the next best thing: the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish…

  By J.J. Goldberg Feb 21, 2014 | 4 min read