Two Hasidic cantors sang the Star-Spangled Banner for medical workers outside NYU Langone Medical Center on 33rd Street on Tuesday, according to a video posted on Twitter by a Chabad spokesman. Aron Gerstel and Yaakov Lemmer, the two cantors, can be seen standing on top of Gerstel’s car and singing as medical workers and spectators…
I can recite most words of Birkat Hamazon, a Hebrew blessing can take up to eight minutes to complete, but I can’t sing a single verse of “God Bless America.” Neither can President Donald Trump, apparently, who was caught on tape fumbling the lyrics at his “Celebrate America” event on Tuesday. I feel fine about…
Our new president, Donald Trump, used his inaugural address to enunciate his particular view of American patriotism — dark, assertive, exclusionary, exceptional, supremely populist. “And this, the United States of America, is your country,” he said, pointing his finger at the throngs assembled on the mall in Washington but clearly speaking to the Americans who…
San Francisco 49er Colin Kaepernick made waves this week by declining to stand during the national anthem at a pre-season game. Kaepernick, who has sat out the national anthem during at least one previous pre-season game, has faced backlash from those who see the refusal to stand as unpatriotic, disrespectful, and worse — specifically, that…
It’s July 4 weekend, and we’re all watching the fireworks together: my partner and I, and a few hundred strangers. And it occurs to me: What I love about America is not what the loudest America-lovers love. In fact, I have a sense that it’s the opposite. I love the threads of American multiculturalism, the…
Abigail Minis was a widow, in her eighties and Jewish, but that didn’t stop her from doing her part to fight the British during the Revolutionary War. She put her skills and resources as an innkeeper to use and paid for food for soldiers fighting for American independence in 1779 in Savannah, Georgia. “Here’s a…
When we first met we had many conversations like this one. “Help me place your accent,” you say. “I’m from Austria,” I answer. “Oh,” you reply, “My grandmother is from there. She left on a Kindertransport.” And then you add, “Vienna is supposed to be beautiful.” I notice some discomfort. I wonder if you’re wondering…
100% of profits support our journalism
