Welcome to the Forward’s coverage of Brooklyn, a borough of New York City home to a major population of Hasidic Jews.
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Fast Forward Ken Thompson, Brooklyn Prosecutor Who Vowed Shift in Hasidic Sex Abuse Probes, Dies at 50
Ken Thompson, the first African-American to be elected district attorney of Brooklyn, has died at age 50 of complications from cancer, his office said. Thompsson trounced longtime incumbent Charles Hynes in a bitter 2013 Democratic primary part on promises to shake up his approach to child sex abuse crimes in the borough’s large ultra-Orthodox Jewish…
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News Brooklyn Man’s $2K Tefillin Set Swiped on Subway
A Jewish man’s bag that included a valuable set of tefillin, a pair of ritual boxes attached to leather straps used during prayer, was stolen in Brooklyn on Friday, September 30. The 25-year-old victim told police that his bag was taken from the mezzanine of the DeKalb Avenue subway station at 7:36 p.m., the website…
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Yiddish World The Making Of The First Female Hasidic Civic Court Judge
This article originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. In the final countdown before the election, Ruchie Freier was still uncertain whether she would win the race for Civil Court Judge. But win she did, and starting in January 2017, she’ll become the first Hasidic woman ever elected to this high position. Sipping hot tea with…
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Fast Forward Did Brooklyn Mother Live With Dead Son For Decade Without Knowing?
An elderly Brooklyn woman was found living with the skeletal remains of her dead son — and police say she might not even have known he was there. Rita Wolfensohn, a widow from the predominantly Jewish Midwood neighborhood, is legally blind and her house was found full of belongings and trash that she has been…
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Fast Forward Trailblazing Hasidic Woman Elected as Brooklyn Judge
NEW YORK — Rachel “Ruchie” Freier of Brooklyn was elected a Civil Court judge in New York state, reportedly a first for a Hasidic woman in the state. Freier won Tuesday’s vote in Kings County’s 5th judicial district, which encompasses the Brooklyn communities of Kensington, Sunset Park and Windsor Terrace, among others, according to Patch. Patch cited…
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Opinion That Time I Came Face to Face With an Anti-Semite in Brooklyn
It’s not often that I get an opportunity to come face-to-face with one of the extremists whose activities, in my work as a research fellow at the Anti-Defamation League, I am charged with following and exposing. But on Wednesday night it happened that one of the most ardent spokespeople for anti-Semitic 9/11 conspiracy theories was…
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News 9/11 Conspiracy Theorist Blames Terror Attack on ‘Zionist War Agenda’ in Brooklyn Speech
At a trendy community space in Brooklyn, a controversial 9/11 conspiracy theorist spoke Wednesday to a group of around two dozen listeners about the “Zionist war agenda” that he says was behind the attack 15 years ago that killed 3,000. The crowd filed past a sleek bar serving drinks, some carrying Palestinian flags and flyers…
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News Jewish Seniors Get Payments From ‘Greedy’ Brooklyn Developer — at Last
Seniors in a Brooklyn assisted living facility are finally receiving their settlement money from a prominent developer, DNAinfo reported. Hayma Deitsch, a real estate developer who is turning Prospect Park Residence, on Grand Army Plaza in Brooklyn, into luxury apartments, completed the payment of $3.35 million to five elderly women who refused to leave their…
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Fast Forward A federal agency survey reportedly asks Barnard employees if they’re Jewish
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Fast Forward NIH bans grants for schools that boycott Israeli companies
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Fast Forward An elite Jewish society at Yale fractures over its director’s embrace of Itamar Ben-Gvir
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