Welcome to the Forward’s coverage of the kibbutz movement and kibbutzim which are collective communities traditionally based around agriculture in Israel.
Kibbutz
The Latest
-
Israel News Inside the Kibbutz Where Bernie Sanders Lived and Learned Socialism
The mystery of Bernie Sanders’ missing months on a socialist commune in Israel has now been solved. The Democratic Party’s socialist presidential candidate, it turns out, volunteered at Kibbutz Sha’ar HaAmakim, near Haifa in northern Israel, in 1963. Now, the small agrarian commune could have a big influence on American politics as one spot where…
-
News My Quixotic Hunt for Bernie Sanders’ Kibbutz
It’s a constant of virtually every profile written about Bernie Sanders: Shortly after college, the Vermont senator now running for president volunteered at an Israeli kibbutz. Depending on the writer, this detail might speak to Sanders’s Jewish identity, his stance on Israel, or his socialist values. Were any or all of these honed in the…
-
News At Kibbutz Near Gaza, Wounds Are Still Healing 1 Year After War
When Arnon Avni gives tours of Kibbutz Nirim, he always stops several yards short of a small electrical tower near the preschool. That was where a Hamas mortar struck three of his friends at the tail end of last summer’s war between Israel and Gaza. Two died, and the third lost both of his legs….
-
Israel News Foreign Workers Now Teach Jews How To Farm — on the Kibbutz
The four date farmers stood atop their palm tree, breathing in the humid air and wiping the sweat from their foreheads under the glaring July sun. It was about 1 p.m. Taking a short break, the workers looked out at the thousands of date palm trees spread before them below the Arava desert’s dusty pink…
-
Culture Jewish Enviro-Artists Have the Whole World in Their Hands
Mierle Laderman Ukeles seemed overwhelmed. She had just returned from a month-long stay in Israel at the height of the horrors, and was now playing catch-up as the official, but unsalaried, artist-in-residence at the New York City Sanitation Department, a gig she has held since 1977. As a longtime champion of the department, Ukeles has…
-
Israel News Israeli Kibbutzniks On Gaza Border Push For Diplomacy
If there were one community in Israel most likely to support Israel’s recent war in Gaza, it would be the kibbutzim sitting right on the border with the Hamas-run territory. That’s where the mortars fell so quickly that there was little time to run for shelter, where Hamas fighters attempted to infiltrate the Israeli border…
-
Life How Parenting Came to Be a Group Effort in Israel
The author (left) and her son in the Dead Sea, Israel. / Copyright Avital Norman Nathman There’s a certain sense of overwhelming fatigue that comes from spending hours traipsing along the streets of Tel Aviv under the hot summer sun. Even my mother, who accompanied my almost 8-year-old son and me on this outing and…
-
Breaking News 5 Israeli Soldiers Killed During Thwarted Attack on Kibbutz Nahal Oz
The Israel Defense Forces confirmed the death of five more Israeli soldiers, which occurred during the infiltration of gunmen into a southern kibbutz through a tunnel from Gaza. The five soldiers were killed during the previously reported thwarted attack on Kibbutz Nahal Oz, located near the Gaza border, on Monday afternoon, during which one of…
Explore
Most Popular
- 1
Fast Forward ‘Rabbi rebellion’: 33 Orthodox rabbis endorse Harris
- 2
Opinion Here’s why Orthodox Jews are loyal to Trump — even if they don’t love him
- 3
Opinion I was a Bernie supporter. This year, I’m voting Trump. Here’s why liberal Jews like me made the switch
- 4
FIRST PERSON As a rabbi, he helped others mourn. So why wouldn’t his daughter say kaddish for him?
In Case You Missed It
-
Opinion This election, I finally understand the undecided Jewish voter
-
Fast Forward Haaretz faces blowback after liberal Israeli paper’s publisher praises ‘Palestinian freedom fighters’
-
Fast Forward American Airlines won’t fly to Israel again until at least September 2025
-
Fast Forward Trump and Harris both tell Michigan voters they’re aiming to end the war in Gaza
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
