The first thing I thought when I learned that gender reveal parties exist was, “Oh, Jews do NOT do that.” My reaction was based on the fact that every pregnant Jewish woman I have ever known has delayed announcing her pregnancy until she’s past her first trimester (at the very least). In the Jewish community,…
I just explained the Holocaust to my daughter through the lens of food scarcity and kashrut. I hadn’t planned to explain the Holocaust to my daughter at age 4. However, after listening to Leah Johnson’s (Yonson) story of Holocaust survival in the Forests of Belarus (with the Bielski Brothers – see Daniel Craig in the…
The synagogue nearest to my new house is the second-oldest in Los Angeles. Recessed from the street in the largely Hispanic neighborhood of Highland Park, it’s so small that it nearly looks like a house — albeit one with lovely stained glass windows. The Rabbi, who used to be a dancer, seems to have brought…
One hundred and fifty: a number simultaneously enormous and tiny. One hundred and fifty Czech Jewish teenagers left behind everything and everyone — the lives they’d known, their parents, their siblings, their grandparents and aunts and uncles. One hundred and fifty Czech teens, selected by the Jewish Agency’s Youth Aliyah and the Denmark branch of…
A Jewish school teacher accused of child sex abuse was heckled in an Australian court by a victims advocate after being extradited from the U.S. David Kramer, 52, looked stunned when alleged child sexual abuse victim Manny Waks stood up and shouted at him. “Welcome back to Australia Rabbi Kramer,” Waks called out, according to…
An American Jew was extradited to Australia and charged with multiple counts of indecent assault and indecent acts with a minor at an Orthodox Jewish school. David Kramer was surrendered by U.S. authorities on Nov. 29 and extradited to Melbourne, where he is accused of sexually abusing children at Yeshivah College between 1989 and 1992…
Circumcision is one of Judaism’s most important laws and for generations of faithful it has symbolised a Biblical covenant with God. But in Israel, more and more Jewish parents are saying no to the blade. “It’s such a taboo in Israel and in Judaism,” said Gali, nursing her six-week-old son, about the decision not to…
Another major Jewish organization in Australia is embroiled in a child sex abuse scandal, adding to the trauma triggered by recent revelations of similar cases involving students at two schools in Melbourne, run by Chabad and Adass Israel, respectively. Because of a suppression order issued by an Australian court, the name of the organization, the…
