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
Knesset Poetry Slam: She Spilled a Kos & Ran Amok
Outrageous and, yes, hilarious: Knesset member (and onetime Arafat adviser) Dr. Ahmad Tibi got himself suspended for one week from Knesset debates (though not from votes) for reading an outrageous little poem he had made up in honor of fellow lawmaker Anastasia Michaeli. Michaeli, a member of Avigdor Lieberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu party, was herself suspended…
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Opinion The Quieter Upheavals
The narrative of last September from both sides of the Israeli-Palestinian divide is strikingly similar. The high point in Israel came September 3, when nearly half a million people took to the streets in peaceful protest against an economic system that they argued betrayed the Zionist dream. A few weeks later, the Palestinian Authority president…
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Opinion Day School Numbers Not So Bad
The Avi Chai Foundation’s newly released data on current day school enrollments has drawn attention from many, including J.J. Goldberg in a column on these pages. Like Goldberg’s, these assessments have been mostly pessimistic, a reflection of findings that show a decrease in attendance in all but the Orthodox day schools. What is missing, however,…
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Opinion Dems: Don’t Distort Prez. Blogger Distorts That, Too
Washington Post blogger Greg Sargent reported the unremarkable news January 7 that the Obama campaign is planning to “go on the offensive” against conservative critics of the president’s “stance on Israel.” Behind the plan, Sargent reports, is a worry that “conservatives are having some success in distorting his record.” In what was either an unconscious…
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Opinion Why Romney Tags Obama as ‘European’
Mitt Romney’s brilliant campaign strategy: Never ever mention Obama’s race, but find an alternative way to call attention to Obama’s fundamental alienness. So run against Obama the Europhile: “He wants to turn America into a European-style entitlement society. We want to ensure that we remain a free and prosperous land of opportunity.” Or: “This President…
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Opinion In Defense of 15-Year-Olds Shooting M-16s
More and more frequently, I am confronted with alarming examples of the growing chasm between Israeli Jews and American Jews. Sometimes it is the Israeli misperception of American Jewish life that rankles me. On other occasions, I am dumbfounded by the lack of understanding of Israeli realities and sensibilities on the part of American Jews….
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Opinion Hysterical ‘Anti-Semitic’ Claim Backfires
The decision in late December by Rachel Kleinfeld, founder of the Truman National Security Project, a defense-oriented Democratic think tank, to sever publicly all ties with former fellow and ex-AIPAC spokesman, Josh Block, brought to an end what was an ugly episode in Washington’s Israel-focused policy community. Block had orchestrated a sloppy smear campaign against…
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Opinion Is Fayyad On His Way Out?
Is Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad on his way out? Jonathan Tobin certainly seems to think so. In a blog post for Commentary, where he is the editor, he posits that Fayyad’s approach to governance and to foreign affairs places him outside the Palestinian mainstream. Citing Fayyad’s comments in an interview with the Jewish Chronicle…
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Opinion King’s Last Crusade
Had he lived, Martin Luther King Jr. would have turned 83 on January 15. Where would his career have led had he not been murdered in Memphis in April 1968? We can never know. He was just 39 when he died. That was 44 years ago. We know this, however: He had already succeeded in…
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Opinion Watch What You Wish For, GOP
Now that the New Hampshire GOP primary results are in, pro-Israel Republicans might want to sit back, take a deep breath and do some long, hard thinking. As much as they’d like to see President Obama booted from the White House next fall, they’d be wise to be careful what they wish for. Especially if…
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Letters Biology Shouldn’t Matter
Steve Greenberg’s plea for gay rights (“A Place for Gays and Lesbians in Orthodoxy,” January 13) includes a quote from “a beloved leader of Modern Orthodoxy” who wrote, “How can we deny a human being the expression of his physical and psychic being? Is it not cruel to condemn an individual for doing that which…
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