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
Inspirational Yom Kippur at Occupy Wall St.
A large, open plaza across from Manhattan’s Zuccotti Park, where Occupy Wall Street has made its encampment for three weeks, proved to be the perfect setting for Kol Nidre on Friday night. Earlier in the week, when Daniel Sieradski, Occupy Wall Street protester and self-styled “new media activist,” wondered on Facebook and Twitter whether he…
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Opinion Congress Shows Lack of Leverage With Threat To Cut Off Aid
As an Israeli who sees the occupation as a plague both on Palestinians and on Israelis, I think it’s a good thing that Congress just held back $200 million in economic aid to the Palestinians as punishment for their statehood bid at the United Nations. It’s a good thing, because now that the Republican Party…
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Opinion Texas Death Row Snares Americans in Iran, Cuba
You’ve probably heard by now of Shane Bauer and Joshua Fattal, the American students imprisoned and abused in Iran for two years, virtually incommunicado, on flimsy espionage charges until they were finally “bailed out” (read: ransomed) by Oman and released last month. You may also know about Alan Gross, the ailing American computer specialist arrested…
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Opinion Fight for Justice Continues Against Violent Settlers
Two of my young Israeli friends, key activists in Solidarity, the folks who for nearly two years have demonstrated every Friday afternoon at Sheikh Jarrah, a Palestinian neighborhood in East Jerusalem where Israeli Jews have been buying up Palestinian property and claiming that the neighborhood is legally Jewish, were assaulted September 30. My friends, graduate…
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Opinion In Tough Times, Hoping to ‘Corner’ Market for Compassion
If you’ve glanced at the economic news lately, you’ve probably had one of two reactions. You’ve turned the page, struck a defensive pose of indifference and quietly given thanks that you’re still afloat. Or maybe you’ve cast about for a way to help, shuddered at the vastness of the misery and national paralysis and finally…
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Opinion Dangerous Sermons
On Sunday, October 2, the Revival Assembly Church in Manchester, N.H., was one of the 539 churches around the country participating in Pulpit Freedom Sunday, an increasingly popular form of civil disobedience on the religious right. Pastor Chris Anu urged the 80 parishioners in his Pentecostal church to reject same-sex marriage as an abomination and…
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Opinion Warts and All, Protests Was Israel at its Best
Shortly before landing in Tel Aviv in late August, the person in the airplane seat next to mine, a young, smart Israeli just awarded an Oxford post-doc, told me he was no longer convinced that Israel would last for more than another 50 or 60 years. By no means did he seem morbid: He had…
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Opinion Shin Bet on Mosque Fire: ‘Jewish Terror.’ Chief Rabbi: ‘It Means Nothing’
The Jerusalem Post reports today that Sunday’s torching of a Galilee mosque, believed by authorities to be the work of right-wing Jewish extremists, appears to be the latest sign that Jewish terrorism is “gaining steam” in Israel. The Post’s military correspondent, Yaakov Katz (bio) says the Shin Bet security service is worried that the phenomenon…
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Opinion Opposing Statehood Bid, Supporting a New Path to Peace
At college campuses across the country this fall, students are lining up on one side or the other of the most current fault line in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: To support the Palestinian statehood bid, or not? Lines have been drawn, talking points distributed. The narratives of each side are familiar, as each makes the case…
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Opinion British Union Chooses Sanctions Over Israeli Workers
The British Trades Union Congress this September passed a resolution reaffirming its position against the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories. There’s nothing wrong with, or unusual about, left-wing trade unionists showing solidarity with the dispossessed. What is unusual — and troubling — is the line dictating that TUC affiliates review their bilateral relations with all…
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Opinion Who Shall Die?
According to Amnesty International, the United States ranked fifth in the world in the number of its citizens who were executed in 2010. And what company we keep! China, Iran, North Korea and Yemen bested us in this dubious competition, but at least we beat out Saudi Arabia. How’s that for American exceptionalism? Ever since…
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