It is Rosh Chodesh Iyar, and over one hundred women have come prepared with Israeli flags and strong singing voices. After a last-minute deliberation, we made the decision to enter the dreaded metal “cage” (the barriers set up for Women of the Wall for the Western Wall Heritage Foundation and police, “quarantining” us on the…
Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu’s son Yair (can we call him Baby Bibi?) is embroiled in scandal yet again. A 2015 recording of him that surfaced today on Israeli news. He is recorded on tape outside a strip club telling a friend that his father’s help pushing a $20 billion oil deal that benefited the…
“My third favorite sister, you guys!” Sarah Silverman exclaimed, welcoming one of her three sisters, the Jerusalem-based Reform rabbi Susan Silverman, to the talk show “I Love You, America.” In a brief, but stunningly specific, discussion on Sarah Silverman’s new Hulu show that aired around Thanksgiving, the sisters spent eight minutes lying on a bed,…
The sky was cloudless when the group gathered in the Old City of Jerusalem on Thursday morning to celebrate the ordination of four new Reform rabbis. But when they tried to enter the Western Wall complex, security guards physically accosted them, attempting to keep them from bringing Torahs onto the main plaza. In the ensuing…
Of all prayers in the world, the rabbi of my congregation asked me to write something about Avinu Malkeinu — Our Father, Our King. This prayer, said three times on Yom Kippur has always been a challenge for me. I have a very complex history with so-called fathers and kings, and I’ve dedicated my adult…
It was Wednesday morning of finals week. The thought of waking up at 5:30 AM was not the most thrilling of thoughts; but, Rosh Chodesh aligns with the cycle of the moon, not with the cycle of my school year. I had committed to welcoming in Elul at the Kotel with my Hebrew Union College-Jewish…
JERUSALEM (JTA) — Hundreds of people gathered in front of the Prime Minister’s Residence in Jerusalem to protest government moves seen as targeting liberal streams of Judaism. The protesters who gathered in Jerusalem on Saturday night carried signs including “Judaism without coercion,” and “We are all Women of the Wall.” The demonstration was organized by…
Seventeen months after a historic deal was reached that would allow egalitarian and non-Orthodox prayer spaces at the Western Wall, Israel’s governing cabinet suspended the agreement, bowing to pressure from Haredi parties in the government who wish to maintain the status quo. Reaction throughout the Jewish world has been swift and loud. Diaspora Jews, particularly…
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