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
Scary Sunday: Gingrich Says Obama’s Actions Are Shaped by a ‘Kenyan’ Mindset
It doesn’t get much slimier than this: Former House speaker Newt Gingrich, the GOP’s resident senior statesman, told the National Review Online late Saturday that President Obama’s actions might be “beyond our comprehension” — unless “you understand Kenyan, anti-colonial behavior.” To be fair, Gingrich phrased it as a hypothetical — “what if” Obama is incomprehensible…
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Opinion Mosque Madness: ADL Strikes Back, AJC Catches Up
In a nod, intentional or not, to the holiday spirit of atonement, the Anti-Defamation League announced just before Rosh Hashana that it has formed a task force, together with Christian and Muslim groups, to support Muslim congregations facing hostility around the country, particularly in connection with building mosques. The September 7 announcement came five weeks…
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Opinion Dismissing the New Paradigm Imperils Israel
After the Israeli raid on the Turkish blockade breakers’ boat off Gaza this summer, I kept running into the same question: Why does international condemnation of Israel continue to grow ever more virulent? Shouldn’t Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza in 2005, and the withdrawal from the Security Zone in Lebanon in 2000, have led to a…
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Opinion The Cost of Belonging
American Jews love to complain about how expensive it is to be Jewish, as if there were no choice in the matter, as if there were only costs associated with Jewish life and nothing on the benefits side of the equation. As if we were the only ones carrying such a burden. We look in…
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Opinion To Know a Muslim
Amid the discouraging news about public opinion around the planned construction of an Islamic cultural center in lower Manhattan, there is one positive, underlying theme. It’s a deeply American theme, and in these suspicious, often depressing times, it’s essential to remember: Education breeds respect. Familiarity begets trust. The theme was found in the latest New…
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Opinion Let Us Atone
For the sin of Refusing To Sacrifice By Sharon Brous Contrast President John F. Kennedy’s bold “ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country” with today’s prevailing ethos of “feed me, serve me, don’t tell me what to do.” After this year’s environmental disaster in…
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Opinion An Ode to ‘Feh’
An expletive beyond compare, And one which every Jew can share! We write of feh, a word robust That’s used to register disgust. It springs from distant tribal source Of salty verbal intercourse. (Quite similarly, we employ The noted lamentation, oy.) Ubiquitous, the feh is used Where’er the Yiddish tongue is schmoozed. It soars to…
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Opinion Jewish Studies Rises, but We Pay the Price
The flourishing of Jewish studies at secular American universities in recent decades is a remarkable and profoundly important development. As students return to their campuses, it is not only those who attend Yeshiva University, Hebrew Union College or the Jewish Theological Seminary who will have access to high-level teaching and scholarship on Jewish topics. Secular…
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Opinion Israel Needs a Separation Wall
We have long since become accustomed to the Israeli Haredi community’s version of roadside bombs. They come, they go, damaging Judaism’s dignity with their excesses, but inflicting no human casualties. Last week’s over-the-top outburst by Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, head of the Shas party’s Council of Torah Sages, was the sort of derangement we have come…
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Opinion A Worrisome Birthday for a Warming World
If I seem a little anxious lately, it’s because I’m having trouble picking out a birthday gift. I get caught every year around this time, first thinking about the upcoming New Year observance and the perennial thrill of hearing the call of the shofar, and then remembering the words that follow it: Hayom harat olam…
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Opinion Peretz-Wieseltier Smackdown! The Islam Menace! (Also, Yours Truly on NPR, Sunday)
(My NPR details: ‘On the Media,’ Sunday Sept. 5. In NYC, 10 am on 93.9 FM, 3 pm on 820 AM. Elsewhere, check the show’s schedule.) (Update: here is the broadcast, streaming audio plus transcript.) On to tachlis: The New Republic has a particularly seething confrontation on its website between the editor in chief, Martin…
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News That whites-only, no Jews allowed Arkansas community is legal, says state’s attorney general. How?
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Opinion Is starvation in Gaza really Israel’s fault? The facts are clear
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Film & TV How Jon Stewart evolved on Israel — at least on ‘The Daily Show’
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Opinion I have the answer to Jon Stewart’s toughest question about Israel
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Fast Forward After this teachers’ union endorsed Mamdani, some Jewish educators are withholding their dues in protest
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Fast Forward J Street head says he was ‘persuaded’ by arguments that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza
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Fast Forward France suspends Gaza evacuation program after it admits student accused of sharing antisemitic posts
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Antisemitism Decoded How Trump is banning DEI at universities — except for Jews
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