In their response to my recent piece, “The Loneliness of the Liberal Zionist,” Harry Reis and Yoav Schaefer have argued that Israel bears responsibility for the decline (if not death) of liberal Zionism as a viable future path for the Jewish state. Because of five decades of occupation, unremitting settlement expansion beyond the Green Line,…
The American Jewish Committee’s recent survey has already sparked considerable debate over the future of the Jewish people — indeed, whether there even is a single Jewish people. Most concerning to many is the finding that American Jews and Israeli Jews have diverged to the point that while a majority of both groups see the…
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…
Once again, Kiryas Joel is in the news. The latest is that the Town of Monroe had voted overwhelmingly to agree to the secession of the Satmar enclave, which will form a new all-Hasidic town of Palm Tree. On the face of it, this seems like a bold new phase in the political history of…
A year ago, when the unthinkable happened and Donald Trump won the presidential election, many of his critics feared the worst. Even before the election, some had warned that a Trump win would mean the undoing of American democracy — an “extinction-level event,” as Andrew Sullivan put it — and a slide toward dictatorship. When…
Most American Jews awakened on Nov. 9, 2016, in a profound state of shock, fury, fear, bewilderment and disillusionment. That is not a partisan statement. It is a political fact. Donald Trump was passionately opposed by most American Jews. Trump’s administration finds even fewer supporters among them. What happened a year ago was unlike any…
The Public Religion Research Institute (PPRI) released a report last week on “America’s Changing Religious Identity.” Many of the findings were of particular interest to the Jewish community. Below are the 10 most fascinating things we learned about the changing nature of the American Jewish landscape: 1: Jews Are No Longer The Most Educated Religious…
As many Jewish Houstonians leave their homes for the relative safety of emergency facilities, the rabbi of Texas’ oldest Jewish community is staying put. His congregants — and their synagogue — need him. Congregation Beth Israel’s sanctuary is is filled with three feet of murky water, Rabbi David Lyon told the Forward. Founded in 1854,…
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