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The 'Coat of Many Colors' on display at Dolly Parton's Chasing Rainbows museum at Dollywood. The coat on display is a reproduction, made by Parton's mother, Avie Lee, of the original. (Wikipedia)

Rachel Sharansky Danziger

Dolly’s riches and my new-baby haze are improving Israel’s election season

When I can give all of my attention to Israeli politicking, I’m at risk of missing the important stuff, buried amid the barrages of ugly accusations.

An 80-year-old blonde baby doll belonging to a Holocaust survivor on display during the opening of an exhibition of 16 objects lent from Yad Vashem on display at the Paul-Loebe-Haus parliamentary building in Berlin, January 24, 2023. (Julien GATHELIER / AFP)

Katie Cunningham

Does it matter if kids learn about dead Jews?

Dara Horn is right that Holocaust education hasn’t reduced antisemitism. My research shows that it can

Illustrative: A soldier cast his vote for in the general elections for the 20th parliament, at the Navy military base in Haifa on March 15, 2015. (Flash90)

Elkana Bar Eitan

October 7 changed my mind about Israelis voting from abroad

Eligibility to cast an absentee ballot should depend on meaningful ties to Israel, not the ability to afford an Election Day plane ticket

Illustrative: Hoboken Police officers stand watch outside the United Synagogue of Hoboken, Nov. 3, 2022, in Hoboken, N.J. (AP Photo/Ryan Kryska, File)

The doors I wish we could keep open

This holiday season, US synagogues want to welcome new people, even as we’re cautious about who we let in. We’ve gotten used to the dance, but isn’t that part of the problem?

Young Jewish adults participate in the Tel Aviv Urban Experience track of Birthright in an undated photo (Courtesy)

Barry Shrage

Birthright is no longer just a gift. It’s a necessity

In a post-October 7 world that is pulling young Jews away from Israel and Judaism, research shows that firsthand experience gives them a story worth carrying forward

MK Dan Illouz (L) stands with Yisrael Beytenu chair Avigdor Liberman after joining the party following his resignation from Likud, on August 5, 2026. (Yisrael Beytenu)

Dan Illouz

Reclaiming the right: Why I left Likud and found my home in Yisrael Beytenu

The current leadership protected cartels, stifled economic competition, allowed Haredi draft evasion, and did too little to truly win the war. That’s no way to run a country

Shas party's election campaign kick-off event in Holon, central Israel, August 20, 2026. (Yaakov Cohen)

Rivka Ravitz

‘I have chosen the way of faith’

As President Rivlin’s chief of staff, I came to understand Haredi resilience: Don’t think you can frighten or embarrass the community into abandoning its principles

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Aug 29, 2026, 12:14 PM

The Celebrity Megaphone and the Morning After

The third and final installment in a three-part series examining what actually comes after “Delete Israel.” Terminology note: Wherever possible, I use “Gazans” when referring specifically to the people of Gaza. I use “Palestinian” primarily when quoting or referring to...

Vincent James Hooper

Aug 29, 2026, 12:08 PM

Information Cannot Be Destroyed

Leonard Susskind's The Black Hole War tells one of the great intellectual dramas of the twentieth century: a decades long battle between Susskind and Stephen Hawking over whether information swallowed by a black hole is lost forever. The book...

Aug 29, 2026, 12:06 PM

Why Anti-antizionists are wrong about the meaning of ‘Antisemitism’

Image-1. Standard vs. anti-antizionist categorizations

Over the last year or so, there has emerged a group of scholars and activists who advocate for a new strategy for responding to the barrage of anti-Israel and anti-Jewish sentiment we’ve been witnessing recently, especially since October 7....

Purna Lal Chakma

Aug 29, 2026, 12:00 PM

Could Bangladesh Become South Asia’s Next Ukraine?

Bangladesh is depicted inside a transparent shield associated with Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Pakistan, raising the central question: would the Makkah Pact provide real protection or only a political promise? (AI-assisted illustration created by the author for editorial purposes.)

The possibility of Bangladesh becoming South Asia’s next Ukraine may sound extreme, but two major security developments have made the question harder to dismiss. Dhaka is considering the Makkah Pact while preparing to buy Chinese J-10CE fighter jets. India...

Aug 29, 2026, 11:59 AM

Who Moved the Boundary?

How Propaganda Turns Neighbors Into Enemies. Image © Ivan Bassov, 2026. Licensed under CC BY 4.0.

How Propaganda Turns Neighbors Into Enemies Human beings divide the world into “us” and “them” in countless ways: family and outsiders, friends and strangers, neighbors and foreigners, people we trust and people we fear. Some boundaries are obvious. Others are invisible...

Aug 29, 2026, 11:57 AM

Who Has the Biggest…?

Photo Credits: Sabine Sterk ( Ai)

Human beings are rather narcissistic creatures. We like to believe that we are sophisticated. Cultivated. Intelligent. We have philosophy, science, literature, universities and technology. We build cities, send spacecraft into the universe and develop machines that can think alongside us. We...

Yochanan Schimmelpfennig

Aug 29, 2026, 11:55 AM

Rabbi Yehoram Ulman’s recent address in Australia deserves to be read with unusual seriousness: His distinction between security and safety reaches far beyond the immediate question of how Jewish communities should be protected. It asks whether a community...

Aug 29, 2026, 11:10 AM

Netanyahu and his coalition are Israel’s most dangerous threat

Israel weighs expelling UK officials from Gaza coordination center amid settlements row I’m damn tired of ‘pro-Israel’ being used by both media and, especially, in social media as an insult or point of indignation. It creates the assumption that the...

Aug 29, 2026, 11:07 AM

Why JD Vance shouldn’t complain about the interceptors spent on Israel

U.S. Vice President JD Vance delivers remarks during an event at Gold Coast Studios on June 17, 2026 in Bethpage, New York. Spencer Platt/Pool via REUTERS

Standing at the White House on June 18, answering Israeli cabinet ministers who had attacked the agreement his administration brokered with Tehran, JD Vance told them that over the previous three months, two-thirds of the defensive weapons that had...

Aug 29, 2026, 11:05 AM

No Civil War, Serendipity, and the Altalena

“No civil war,” Menahem Begin commanded after Yitzhak Rabin reported the command of the leader of the Haganah, Ben Gurion, to kill some Holocaust survivors, members of Irgun, being apparently more keen on brotherly competition than avoidance of shedding...

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