Anti-Semitism
The Book of LifeTuesday, September 27, 2011 by Tevi Troy | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
The High Holy Days are traditionally a time for introspection. Even the sturdiest soul must pause with trepidation over the more harrowing passages in the somber liturgy of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. Who shall live, and who shall die?
Mel and the MaccabeeThursday, September 22, 2011 by Alex Joffe | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
Australian-American actor and director Mel Gibson—he of the anti-Semitic outbursts, the abused girlfriend, The Passion of the Christ—has just closed a deal to make a film for Warner Bros. with screenwriter Joe Eszterhas about the life of Judah Maccabee.
The Wages of DurbanWednesday, September 21, 2011 by Arch Puddington | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
In the days just prior to the assault on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the World Conference Against Racism (WCAR) was very much in the news, and for reasons that are altogether relevant to the mass murder that took place on September 11, 2001.
Settling for StatehoodMonday, September 19, 2011 by Diana Muir Appelbaum | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
The 66th session of the United Nations General Assembly has just begun. Unless a diplomatic miracle happens, that body will soon be asked to approve what amounts to a unilateral declaration of Palestinian statehood. Palestinian spokesmen say they had no choice but to make their end run around serious negotiations with Israel.
Israel’s Isolation ProblemThursday, September 15, 2011 by Elliot Jager | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
Aryeh Golan, the morning news anchor for Israeli public radio, summed up the feelings of Israelis on Sunday when he said, "In Turkey the government is against us, in Egypt the mob is against us, and at the UN the majority is against us."
West Bank BluesWednesday, September 14, 2011 by Aryeh Tepper | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
Few groups are as demonized in public discourse as "the Jewish settlers" of the West Bank. To listen to the pundits, these international outlaws are single-handedly preventing the achievement of a utopian peace in the Middle East.
Spying for ZionTuesday, September 13, 2011 by Alex Joffe | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
Spying goes on everywhere, all the time, 24/7. But the way spying is treated—when it is discovered, when it is publicized, when spies are arrested, tried, and jailed—is highly variable, especially in the United States. The timing is almost never a matter of chance.
Enmity; or, Yiddish in AmericaMonday, September 12, 2011 by Allan Nadler | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
He was irascible, neurotic, self-obsessed, and socially inept; a brilliant misfit and misanthropic dilettante. Upon his death in July 2010, Harvey Pekar's few close friends insisted that the underground comic-book writer was also a gem in the rough, an out-of-date socialist naïf.
Israel, America, and the Lessons of 9/11Friday, September 9, 2011 by Abe Greenwald | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
Two heads belonging to the same monster: This is the way a significant portion of the world saw America and Israel on September 11, 2001. On television that day, we watched people jump to their deaths to escape the flames engulfing the World Trade Center.
Mysteries of the MenorahThursday, September 8, 2011 by Meir Soloveichik | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
On the eve of Tisha b'Av, 2011, archeologists revealed artifacts newly unearthed from the great Jewish revolt against Rome (67–70 C.E.), including coins minted by the rebels and a stone incised with a sketch of the Temple menorah. But what is the menorah, and what does it symbolize?
Editors' Picks
The Munich Files Gunther Latsch, Klaus Wiegrefe, Spiegel. Files just released on the PLO massacre of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympics show that the terrorists received assistance from German neo-Nazis—who were let off virtually scot-free.
Return to Vienna Lisa Silverman, H-Net. Jews who grew up in cosmopolitan pre-war Vienna came back after the war to find themselves strangers at home. Yet Austria's capital still fascinates Jewish writers.
The More Deceived Alex Joffe, Middle East Quarterly. Palestinian rhetoric is not merely based on lies; it does not consider truth to be a value. And Western critical filters are more eroded than ever.
S/Z Benjamin Ivry, Forward. Was Stefan Zweig's habit of sending each of his new books to Sigmund Freud an amicable gesture or an invitation to diagnose and cure?
Anti-Semitism without Jews Ben Cohen, Tablet. A prominent challenger to Venezuela's Hugo Chávez isn't Jewish, but his roots are—reason enough for the regime to launch a smear campaign.
Wagner the Dog Jonathan S. Tobin, Contentions. What does it say about Jewish sensibilities that a month after Tel Aviv University hosted a "Nakba Day" commemoration, it judged a concert of Wagner's music to be beyond the pale?
Soccer in the Shoah Shira Rubin, Times of Israel. Before Euro 2012 began in Poland and Ukraine, the national soccer teams visited the concentration camps. But few know that soccer was one of the limited leisure activities permitted to the inmates.
Dr. Seuss's War Andres Jauregui, Huffington Post. While best known for works like The Cat in the Hat and Green Eggs and Ham, Dr. Seuss "was haunted by the war in Europe," and was a prolific political cartoonist during the 1940s. Here, a gallery.
The "Eikhah Problem" Dara Horn, ELI talks. Why do Jews persist in believing that anti-Semitism is their own fault? (Video)
Refugees Forever Asaf Romirowsky, Alexander Joffe, Haaretz. UNRWA says that grandchildren of Palestinian refugees remain "refugees." No other refugee group gets this treatment—but, then, no other group supplies the majority of UNRWA's staff.