Welcome to the Forward’s coverage of eruv enclosures, outdoor public areas marked off by wire that symbolically extend the private domain of Jewish households so that Jews can carry items in public, an activity otherwise forbidden on Shabbat.
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The Latest
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News Hasidic Store Targeted By ‘Watch’ Group In New Jersey Town Roiled By Eruv Dispute
World of Appliances is a small strip mall operation, sandwiched between a Dunkin’ Donuts and a sushi joint. Four days a week, it sells refrigerators, washing machines and vacuums to residents of a New Jersey suburb. But since opening this summer, the store has been targeted by a self-styled neighborhood watch group. The group has…
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News Why A Sleepy New Jersey Suburb Targeted Hasidic Jews With ‘Anti-Semitic’ Laws
When a Holocaust survivor took the microphone last summer at a city council meeting in Mahwah, New Jersey, tensions were already running high. Hundreds of people filled the hall as Sami Steigmann, 78, sat before the township’s mayor and council. The meeting happened amid rising concerns by residents that ultra-Orthodox Jews were “infiltrating” their town…
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News What Is An Eruv?
It’s a fence, but it doesn’t exist six days out of the week. It’s a symbolic extension of the home, but not an extension of private property. It’s an ingenious legal loophole, but it’s been Jewish law for 1,500 years. It’s not a riddle, it’s an eruv: a boundary used by Orthodox Jews to expand…
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Fast Forward Controversial New Jersey Eruv Wins Backing From Muslims
The country’s largest Muslim civil liberties organization is rallying to support a controversial Jewish religious boundary known as an eruv, which officials in two New Jersey towns have demanded be removed. The New Jersey branch of the Council on American-Islamic Relations said local resistance to the boundary amounted to religious intolerance, NewJersey.com reported. The eruv…
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Fast Forward Orthodox Group Sues New Jersey Town For Ordering Eruv Removal
(JTA) — An Orthodox Jewish group has sued a town in New Jersey for ordering it to remove an eruv, or religious boundary, from utility poles in the town. The Bergen Rockland Eruv Association and two residents of Rockland County on Friday filed a federal lawsuit against the town of Mahwah, saying the town is…
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Fast Forward Controversial New Jersey Eruv Vandalized — Police Probe Bias Crime
A controversial ritual boundary built by Orthodox Jews in the suburban New Jersey town of Mahwah has been vandalized —and police are investigating the incident as a bias crime. The damage to the enclosure, called an eruv, is being probed as a bias incident because of the religious nature of the installation, NewJersey.com reported. The…
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Opinion When You Protest An Eruv, You Protest Women’s Rights
For the young Orthodox woman living in a community without an eruv boundary, motherhood comes with a high cost. The moment that newborn arrives, it’s goodbye to Sabbath mornings in synagogue, goodbye to afternoon social outings, and goodbye to nice dresses. Instead, say hello to living in a robe in a claustrophobic apartment for a…
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News As Mahwah Eruv Debate Roils, Some Orthodox See ‘Secular Jews’ As Opposition
The New Jersey hamlet of Mahwah has become the latest flashpoint in tensions between locals and a growing Orthodox population in the far northeast corner of the state along the border with New York. A symbolic boundary that allows religious Jews to carry objects outside on the Sabbath, called an eruv, is at the heart…
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