This is the Forward’s coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic and its affect on Jewish communities around the world.
COVID-19
The Latest
-
Fast Forward WATCH: Hasidic cantors, standing on cars, serenade medical workers with national anthem
Two Hasidic cantors sang the Star-Spangled Banner for medical workers outside NYU Langone Medical Center on 33rd Street on Tuesday, according to a video posted on Twitter by a Chabad spokesman. Aron Gerstel and Yaakov Lemmer, the two cantors, can be seen standing on top of Gerstel’s car and singing as medical workers and spectators…
-
Fast Forward Shul that closed due to COVID punishes ‘rogue minyan’ members
A Florida synagogue that had shut its doors due to the coronavirus announced Tuesday that it was punishing members that arranged a “rogue minyan,” or prayer service, in defiance of rabbinic orders and medical advice. In concordance with directives issued by all of the major Orthodox Jewish synagogue associations, the Young Israel of Deerfield Beach…
-
Opinion Letter | Don’t let COVID prevent you from crucial genetic testing
Dear Editor, Hawkin Miller’s recent article “Do Jewish genetic diseases increase the risk of COVID-19?” brought back memories of my work as a genetic counselor and care coordinator for patients with Gaucher and other diseases common in Jewish communities. Many people with underlying health conditions are more susceptible to infectious diseases and complications, and they…
-
News High Holidays 2020: Rabbis start to think outside the synagogue
About 2,000 years ago, Judaism swapped animal sacrifice for prayer. This fall, it will face another challenge that, while not quite on the order of the destruction of the Second Temple, is still historic: How to conduct the faith’s holiest — and best-attended — services while maintaining enough physical distance between congregants to prevent the…
-
Fast Forward Reform movement cuts staff by 20%, citing existential threat
The Reform movement — the largest Jewish denomination in the country — announced layoffs today in its main umbrella organization, the Union for Reform Judaism, citing an existential threat brought on by the coronavirus economic crash. “Unfortunately, we are now at the point that the long-term viability of the URJ is at risk if we…
-
Community ‘How will our routines change when all of this is over?’
Routine is a construction, and so many of us are trying to construct some kind of routine amid days that blend together. In my house the routine used to be clear, crystallized by years of careful shaping and re-shaping. We learned to leave for the bus stop two minutes earlier. We pushed bedtime up or back…
-
Life ‘Somehow in the morning there’s something there:’ How one pastor is feeding the hungry
Pastor Joel Hubbard calls it the Manna Food Depot. “I get here and the room is empty,” he explained one recent morning as we sat in the so-called multipurpose room of his Park United Methodist Church in Bloomfield, N.J. “And then by 10:30, there’s food in it. And then by 1 o’clock there’s not.” Hubbard,…
-
Fast Forward A rabbi said shutdown rules violate his religious freedom. Police arrested him for hosting a bonfire.
Police in Lakewood, N.J. arrested an Orthodox rabbi for violating state shutdown and distancing rules, as well as obstruction of justice and resisting arrest, after he hosted a bonfire for the Jewish holiday Lag B’Omer on Monday night. The rabbi, Yisrael Knopfler, is suing the state over the shutdown rules, which he claim violate his…
Explore
Most Popular
In Case You Missed It
-
Culture Hidden in Central Park, a modest installation of Holocaust art — but what was it doing there?
-
Yiddish אַ היסטאָרישע פֿאָטאָ וואָס פֿאַרקערפּערט די כּלי־זמר באַנײַונגA historic photo that encapsulates the klezmer revival
אין 2007 האָט דער מוזיקער יעל סטראָם פֿאַרזאַמלט די גדולים פֿון ביידע דורות לטובֿת אַ פֿאָטאָ אינעם איסט סײַד.
-
Books How an ‘unlikely rabbi’ went from Korea to Colbert
-
Yiddish אַ ליבע צװישן צװײ ייִדישע דיכטער אין ניו־יאָרק A love affair between two Yiddish poets in New York City
ראַשעל װעפּרינסקיס ראָמאַן „דאָס קרײצן פֿון די הענט“ אַנטפּלעקט די אינטימקייט פֿון דער ייִדישער באָהעמישער סבֿיבֿה מיט 100 יאָר צוריק
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
