This is the Forward’s coverage of Israel, the Jewish state in the Middle East founded in 1948.
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The Schmooze Gay Israeli Teen Kidnapped by Family
With all the buzz about how hot Tel Aviv’s become for gay travelers, we still get the occasional reminder that not everyone’s on board with circuit parties, muscle boys and beach cruising. Take the family of a 19-year-old gay man living in Tel Aviv. Four people from his hometown of Tamra, an Arab enclave in…
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The Schmooze Officials: Israeli Light Rail Survey Is Racist
Dear New Yorkers: We’re expanding the subway. It’ll pass through some bad neighborhoods. And we’re allowing Muslim-Americans to ride without security checks. Is that OK? It sounds outrageous, but an Israeli company asked a very similar question of Jerusalemites after it won a city contract to run the city’s light rail system. Haaretz reported today…
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The Schmooze Canada Halts Mail to Gaza
First it was building materials, now it’s the mail. In the latest international Gaza blockade spat, Israel’s national mail carrier, Israel Post, told the Canada Post last week it would not deliver Canadian mail to the Strip, citing circumstances “beyond their control.” It’s not known what caused the mail stoppage. Just days after the embargo…
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The Schmooze Dead Sea Naked Photo Shoot in the Works
Are the people of Israel truly modern and progressive Israelis are about to undergo the ultimate test: Will thousands of them willingly gather at one of the country’s best-known sites, remove all their clothing and smile for the camera? Spencer Tunick, an internationally renowned Jewish photographer, has made a name for himself by rounding up…
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The Schmooze Israeli Wins Gold Medal by Default
It would have been a “Kumbaya” moment in Singapore on the first day of the inaugural Youth Olympic Games: a 17-year old Israeli locked in fierce but friendly battle with his Iranian counterpart in the under-106-pound tae kwon do competition. The scene of international sportsmanship was scuttled, however, when the Iranian contestant, Mohammad Soleimani, pulled…
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The Schmooze Israel at Center of Melbourne Film Festival Boycott Row
Crossposted from Haaretz The Melbourne International Film Festival is a marquee event on the cultural calendar of Australia, in what some would call the world’s most livable and multicultural city. Once again, it was struck by controversy with independent film makers threatening legal action if their own movie was not revoked from the set-list. The…
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The Schmooze 14-Year-Old Rabbinical Prodigy Denied Ordination
Just a year removed from his bar mitzvah, Netanya teenager Moshe Raziel Sharify is ready to become a rabbi. Thing is, Israel’s Chief Rabbinate won’t let him. At 14, Sharify has been hailed as a rabbinical prodigy, garnering the approval of at least 10 “well-respected” rabbis, including Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi Yona Metzger, the Jerusalem Post…
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The Schmooze Sefer Torah Thefts Baffle Israel’s Haredi Community
There is intrigue across Israel’s Haredi community, after the sector’s media has reported on what seems to be a case of serial sefer Torah theft. Several communities in and around the central-Israel city of Lod have had scrolls stolen in recent weeks. The criminals were seemingly not opportunists, but rather individuals or gangs who had…
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