by Dr. Joshua Shanes. Joshua Shanes is Associate Professor of Jewish Studies at the College of Charleston, Director of the Arnold Center for Israel Studies, and has published widely on modern Jewish politics, culture and religion. There may never have been a more interesting or dangerous time for American Jews. Jews sit...
by Sarah Brammer-Shlay On the morning of Wednesday August 21, I sat in my interfaith workplace and a conversation began about what it means to call yourself “Jewish.” And then, all of a sudden, I was crying. When I cry, I pay attention. My attention brought me to realize that over the...
If you are in the mainstream of American Jewry and rightly outraged by President Trump’s most recent comments about “disloyalty” to Israel (he’s made similar ones before, of course, as has his friend Prime Minister Netanyahu), then as you sign petitions, post on Facebook, or call your local synagogue or organization to...
This month, I took family leave. It is wonderful. It's a blessing. And everyone should have it. It is great for the financial security but the other benefits are much more important.
If our ritual life does not pulse with the passionate pull of the political, if our laments do not answer and reprise the cries of those who are oppressed and imprisoned, marginalized and silenced, if our communal liturgy can be confined within the walls of our institutions and not spill out into...
On Friday, August 23rd, a new documentary about the making and impact of Fiddler on the Roof hits cinemas. On the same day, a new Fiddler recording hits stores, featuring the score performed in Yiddish plus eleven rarely heard songs dropped from the score along the way performed in English. Meanwhile, a...
by Jacob Abolafia A picture hung (and perhaps still hangs) in the library of the Conservative synagogue where I spent my first conscious years attending services. It was of a soldier, standing on top of a tank, wearing a tallit, and shaking a lulav. The picture naturally aroused the curiosity of a...
Thoughts about internal and external criticisms of the Jewish immigrant justice movement in this moment.
This was never about undocumented immigration. It was always about racist policy...but this is a new low.
Pictures by Gili Getz; text by Salem Pearce On Sunday, more than 1,000 Jews in New York converged on Amazon’s bookstore in Midtown Manhattan to protest the company’s role in supporting the efforts of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to terrorize immigrant communities. On Tisha B’av, the saddest day in the Jewish...