This is the Forward’s coverage of Jerusalem, the holiest city in Judaism and the capital of Israel.
Jerusalem
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Culture Cartoonist Visits Most Contested City
Jerusalem: Chronicles From the Holy City By Guy Delisle Drawn & Quarterly, 320 pages, $24.95 A city so religiously and historically intense that it’s got its own eponymous syndrome for visitors who flip out under pressure, Jerusalem is the unequivocal go-to destination for anyone wanting a look at the world’s epicenter of multi-faith fanaticism. An…
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Fast Forward Boston Woman Detained Over Tallit at Western Wall
Jerusalem Police detained an American woman for nearly four hours on Thursday for wearing a tallit, or prayer shawl, “incorrectly” at the Western Wall. Deb Houben, a native of Boston, was taken aside by police after concluding a prayer service celebrating the beginning of the Hebrew month with 65 other people from Women of the…
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News Old Call for Old Things
Each Friday, a beat-up truck comes trundling down our Jerusalem block to collect used household items. “Alte zakhn! Alte zakhn!” the loudspeaker rings out. Then comes a list of items of interest: couches, chairs, tables, beds. All these are announced in Hebrew. Only that initial call, “Alte zakhn!” — literally, “old things” — is in…
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Opinion Warily, They Conquered East Jerusalem
Israel’s ministers had a lot on their minds when they woke, 45 years ago, on June 5, 1967. Jerusalem’s Old City, however, was not even a passing thought. The day before, at the regular Sunday Cabinet meeting, they had approved the launching of a pre-emptive air strike against Egypt within 24 hours — “To do…
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Fast Forward Lack of Shade Makes Western Wall Intolerable
It was a beautiful, partially cloudy spring day in Jerusalem on Tuesday, with temperatures reaching 25 degrees Celsius in the shade. A perfect day for strolling around nearly any part of the city, with one truly glaring exception: the Western Wall Plaza. The glaring whiteness of the plaza pavement reflected the heat, and the complete…
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The Schmooze Grumpy Frenchmen in the Holy Land
“Why do the wrong people travel when the right people stay back home?,” asked a Noël Coward song, but a century before such concerns, “le tout Paris” was eagerly visiting Jerusalem and reporting on what they had seen. “Exploring Palestine: 19th century French Travelers in the Holy Land”, published on September 29, 2011 by Les…
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The Schmooze Bono: ‘Hope Springs Eternal’
U2 front man Bono surprised Israeli passers-by earlier this month with his sudden visit to Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. On Wednesday, BuzzFeed published the note Bono left behind at Jerusalem’s King David Hotel, which consists of a poem about how “hope is like a faithful dog,” and his sketch of “a dog called Hope.” “In…
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The Schmooze Jerusalem Park Inspired by NYC’s High Line
An old train track on Manhattan’s West Side has been transformed into an urban-ecological paradise. Over the past decade, Jerusalem has been trying something similar with its Train Track Park, which links neighborhoods that would otherwise have little do with each other. Architect Yair Avigdor and landscape architect Shlomi Zeevi have been busy planning and…
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געוויסע עקספּערטן האַלטן, אַז מע דאַרף באַטראַכטן ל״ג־בעומר ווי אַ פֿרילינגדיקן מײַ־פֿעסטיוואַל
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News ‘Don’t give up on us now’: Israel peace summit convenes thousands to aim for elusive progress
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Fast Forward A GOP lawmaker tried to put a Holocaust denier on New Hampshire’s Holocaust education board