(JTA) — In a strategic shift, the New Israel Fund is arming itself with a set of sharp political tools and picking a fight. Its target: Israel’s political right. Its weapons: Opposition research, media monitoring, and staking its claims to patriotism and Zionism. If NIF’s dramatic language, outlined in a Sept. 18 release, and its…
This article originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. He grew up among the ultra-Orthodox Satmar Jews in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, in a childhood with rules so strict that playing Frisbee at summer camp was considered a radical move. Today he serves as the spiritual leader of a small, relatively young, progressive Orthodox synagogue…
It worked for Democrats when they were underdogs in America during the last decade, and now some believe it can work for beleaguered liberals in Israel. The New Israel Fund, the largest funder of liberal causes in Israel, has announced that it will shift one-fifth of the $30 million in annual grants it provides mostly…
I feel a little like the widow but of course I am not. Leibel had two former wives and I was neither of them. But Leonard Fein and I had an enduring romance, the chastest of romances, and it lasted from the day I met him until last night when he died. We met —…
On the surface, it appears to be a historic gain for Reform Jewry in Europe. Ec Chaim, a congregation identified as Progressive – the European term for Conservative or Reform – is set to join the Orthodox-led umbrella organization of Warsaw’s Jewish community. Poland’s chief Orthodox rabbi is hailing the move as a potential model…
The World Union for Progressive Judaism will gather in Buenos Aires for the fourth Conference of the Jewish Communities of Latin America. The Mishkan Jewish Spirituality Center will host the event Aug. 8-12 for an umbrella group of 1,200 Progressive, Liberal and Reconstructionist congregations in 45 countries representing 1.8 million people. Mishkan is one the…
Moshe Kagan, a lifelong left-wing American Zionist who died May 3 at age 92, was a man of many talents, but none were more endearing than his talent for friendship; and none of his friendships were more surprising than his decades long warm relationship with Ariel Sharon. For an Israel that today appears to be…
‘Distancing” is the current favored word to describe the reaction of many American Jews, especially young Jews, to the ongoing situation in Israel. (Curiously, Peter Beinart’s essay in the New York Review of Books in May 2010, which catalyzed much of the conversation, nowhere uses the word.) But “distancing” is inadequate to describe the range…
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