Welcome to your daily distraction, our recommendations for ways to stay engaged and entertained while we socially distance ourselves to combat the novel coronavirus outbreak. You can find our past recommendations here; many of the opportunities we’ve highlighted are ongoing. It’s Saturday. Whether or not you ordinarily observe Shabbat, as our work and home lives…
In our new era of social distancing, most people are focusing on what they can’t do. In New York and other cities, it’s now impossible to have dinner out or grab coffee with a coworker. You can’t get your nails done or see a film. But there’s one pastime that is proceeding without interruption: online…
The Forward’s youth writing contest seeks essays, prose and poetry of 1,000 words or less on the topic “What It Means To Be Free.” The contest is open to all middle and high school students attending public, private, parochial or home schools. Entries should be sent to [email protected]. They must be received by May 1,…
Israelis sheltering at home this week against the coronavirus were jostled by several minutes of loud clanging coming from balconies in Haifa, Tel Aviv, and Jerusalem. Demonstrators were crashing pots and pans. In typical times, pro-democracy activists would have stormed Tel Aviv’s Rabin Square. But with Israel’s strict restrictions on gathering in the time of…
Emboldened by overtures from the White House, Dr. Vladimir Zelenko, the Hasidic doctor pushing an unproven treatment for coronavirus, on Friday stepped up his campaign to build support for the controversial regimen, with a YouTube video and an email blast to conservative media and political figures touting his results. “CONCLUSION — TREAT AS EARLY AND…
On Thursday afternoon, Thryn Hare drove to a Minneapolis house where a cluster of seder plates was lying in the yard. They were a mismatched bunch — some engraved with flowery Hebrew letters, some sleek and modern, one patterned to look like matzah — but all would enliven a Passover table, and all were free…
Apropos of Nothing: Autobiography By Woody Allen Arcade Publishing, 400 pages, $40 Let’s get it out of the way: Here’s a list of terms Woody Allen uses to refer to women in the first chapter of his new memoir, “Apropos of Nothing.” His mother, one of five sisters: “arguably the homeliest of the swarm.” His…
The most compelling parts of “Unorthodox,” Deborah Feldman’s 2012 memoir about her scandalous exit from the Hasidic community don’t have anything to do with her exit at all. After a captivating look at her childhood, rich with sense memory and intimate detail, Feldman chronicles her exodus from Satmar Williamsburg for a less restrictive community in…
Cindy Goldberg, a school board president, was waiting for a virtual meeting to begin on Zoom Tuesday night when hackers started posting cartoon images of Hitler, photos of Nazi soldiers and swastikas to parents, board members and other staff for the school district sandwiched between Los Angeles and Santa Barbara. “Awful doesn’t begin to touch…
When President Trump’s new chief of staff contacted the Jewish doctor treating coronavirus symptoms in upstate New York, he found more than a creative medical professional whose off-label experiment had potential. He found an ardent defender of the president, as some of his recent social media activity indicates. Zelenko’s cocktail of anti-malarial drugs and antibiotics…
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