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News Should Dutch Jews Speak Louder Against Racist ‘Black Pete’ — and Role in Slavery?
(JTA) — On a busy street near the Dutch Parliament, three white musicians in blackface regale passersby with holiday tunes about the Dutch Santa Claus, Sinterklaas, and his slave, Black Pete. Many native Dutchmen view dressing up as Black Pete in December as a venerable tradition, but others consider it a racist affront to victims…
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The Schmooze Shimon Peres Doesn’t Know Words to ‘Jingle Bells’
(JTA) — Israeli President Shimon Peres sent out a mostly boilerplate Christmas greeting yesterday, but what jumped out at me were the video’s first 22 seconds, where Peres stands at the center of a group of kids dressed in Santa suits, all singing “Jingle Bells,” accompanied by a piano. Discerning viewers will note, though, that…
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Fast Forward Boston Funeral Home Trades Orthodox Burial Society for Nondenominational Group
A new nondenominational Jewish burial society has replaced an Orthodox one at a Boston-area Jewish funeral home. Community Hevra Kadisha of Greater Boston, which launched this fall and is part of a growing movement of Jewish burial societies that include non-Orthodox volunteers, began performing tahara – the ritual preparation of bodies for burial – at…
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Fast Forward Three Israeli Actors Refuse to Star in West Bank Performance
Three Israeli stage actors asked to be excused from performing in a play staged at a cultural center in the West Bank settlement of Ariel. The cast members, employees of the Cameri and Beit Lessin theaters, will be replaced by understudies for the performances of the acclaimed play “Best Friends” taking place in Ariel in…
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The Schmooze David Broza a Hit at Reuth 75th Celebration
It was Israeli superstar David Broza, and leger de main mentalist Kenny who helped make the December 16 American Friends of Reuth’s — “Reuth at 75” — celebration an evening to remember. During the pre-dinner mingling, the 170 festively dressed guests at The New York Palace were amazed and distracted by illusionist Kenny, whose disarming…
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Israel News Tom Werner Juggles Roles as Red Sox and Liverpool Boss
What is like being the chairman of two of the biggest sports clubs in the world? Only one man can answer that. Tom Werner, a former television executive turned sports chairman, took control over the Boston Red Sox in 2002 when his Fenway Sports Group Company bought the storied club for an estimated $660 million….
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Fast Forward Warren Weinstein Pleads With Barack Obama: ‘I’ve Been Abandoned’
A U.S. development worker kidnapped in Pakistan by al Qaeda two years ago appealed to President Barack Obama to intervene and help negotiate his release, in a video released on Thursday. In a 13-minute clip issued by al Qaeda’s media wing and posted on several news websites, Warren Weinstein, 72, looked gaunt and tired. “I…
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Opinion As One Jewish Retail Empire Falls, Another Rises
Two retail empires with Jewish roots collided in New York this week — one on its deathbed, the other ready to take its place. Loehmann’s, the fashion discounter founded in 1921 by an enterprising department-store buyer named Frieda Loehmann, announced this week it will shut down its remaining 39 stores after its third bankruptcy filing….
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Film & TV The new ‘Superman’ is being called anti-Israel, but does that make it pro-Palestine?
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Fast Forward Tucker Carlson calls for stripping citizenship from Americans who served in the Israeli army
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Music ‘No matter what, I will always be a Jew.’ Billy Joel opens up about his family’s Holocaust history
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Culture She was my Hebrew school bully — and I finally learned what happened to her
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