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Jonathan Muskat

Alcohol in our synagogues: Should our shul go dry?

When the adults go bananas over a fancy bottle of Scotch for kiddush, our teens are watching and learning what we truly value

A man looks at the damage to a house in Sderot, Israel, after it was hit by a rocket fired from Gaza Strip, November 12 2019. (Tsafrir Abayov/AP)

Michelle Rojas-Tal

Disconnecting the app: An Israeli in America

So far away from home, we have the privilege of avoiding the minute-by-minute updates on rockets from Gaza, but can we? Should we?

Illustrative. An empty nametag. (belterz/Getty Images)

Sarah Halle Corey

Being a Jewish person without a Jewish last name

It took a canoe trip in Kentucky to make me realize how much of my family heritage lies in a name that is no longer ‘Cohen’

Sarah Ansbacher

When each chime means an incoming attack

And the ominous siren, when it comes, allows for about a minute to reach a safe space, before the rocket’s impact

Rockets fired from Gaza towards Israel, followed the targeted killing of Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror chief Baha Abu al-Ata, by an Israeli strike, on November 12, 2019. (Hassan Jedi/Flash90)

Liron Libman

Who is authorized to take Israel to 'war'?

There is a shocking vagueness about the authority to make fateful decisions for the country, including what even counts as war

Illustrative. A police sapper inspects a house in the southern Israeli town of Netivot on November 12, 2019, following a rocket attack from Gaza City. (MENAHEM KAHANA / AFP)

Nurit Dekel

Dispatch from a bomb shelter somewhere in Israel

A day under rocket attacks, driving between home and work, and praying not to get hit en route

A general view over the cemetery at the World War I Vieil Armand "Hartmannswillerkopf" battlefield in the Alsace region, eastern France, where around 30,000 French and German soldiers died in the Vosges mountain battles in 1915, Friday, Nov. 10, 2017. The presidents of France and Germany say Europeans must stand up to nationalism and build a “common future,” as they mark 99 years since the armistice ending World War I. (Patrick Seeger/Pool Photo via AP)

Eric Danon

It should have been the ‘last of the last’ war

As we mark Armistice Day, we also honor the soldiers who die in today’s battles to defend France’s core values of democracy, freedom and respect

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Nathan Lopes Cardozo

Nov 15, 2019, 10:22 AM

The Religious Challenge of Akedat Yitzchak

The most tragic figure in the Bible is God, said the famous Talmudic scholar Saul Lieberman. Indeed. No one has been more misunderstood than God. But let's be honest; it's His own fault. After all, one day He appears...

Nov 15, 2019, 9:45 AM

Sorry. Missiles were raining down on Israel this week, as thousands of Israeli citizens were rushing to the shelters, targets clearly marked on their backs by the Islamic Jihad, a notorious Palestinian terrorist organization, whose hands are drenched with the...

Nov 15, 2019, 9:45 AM

Parshat Vayera: Living in a World of Godliness

We create the world we live in. Our perspective on life, our conceptualization of everyday events, and our relationship with Hashem all affect how we perceive our environment. Charitable acts can be understood by one person as giving money...

Nov 15, 2019, 9:44 AM

Iran’s Laws Bias Against Jews & Religious Minorities

On a regular basis I am asked on social media outlets and at venues when I speak to different groups how troublesome life is for Iran’s religious minorities which include; Jews, Christians, Zoroastrians and people of the Baha'i faith....

Paula Mack Drill

Nov 15, 2019, 5:46 AM

Straight to the Heart

I would not suggest that it was a typical weekend. It is true that many Shabbatot and Sundays are jam-packed for rabbis, but this particular weekend was unusually busy. Here was the schedule: Shabbat morning, a bar mitzvah. Saturday...

Nov 15, 2019, 5:43 AM

Hineni…It Is Time For All Jews To Show Up

Michael: It’s just that you locked me into it. I mean my son, he’s gonna be a Jew but what does that mean? … Do I really feel like a Jew? What is a Jew supposed to feel like? Ben:...

Nov 15, 2019, 5:40 AM

Rapper Kosha Dillz: New Song, New Life

There’s an old Israeli song that goes “Good Jewish boy, go home”, telling the “good Jewish boy” from America to go back to America. There is no place for “good” boys in Israel. It is a place of harsh...

Nov 15, 2019, 5:37 AM

Your Children Are Not Your Children

“Your children are not your children. They are sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself. They come through you but not from you, And though they are with you yet they belong not to you. You may give them your love but...

Nov 15, 2019, 5:35 AM

‘Something Is Rotten in the State of Denmark’

I did not say it. Shakespeare did in his play, Hamlet. A palace guard, Marcellus is speaking to his friend Horatio and complains about the corruption in the palace. King Claudius had an incestuous marriage to Queen Gertrude and he...

Moshe-Mordechai van Zuiden

Nov 15, 2019, 5:33 AM

Trump uses the same tactic as the serial pedophile

The almost the oldest trick in the book. You treat some of the members of your target group outright superbly to cover up abuse done to the weaker ones. That's how Trump uses Orthodox Jews. Trump can't be a...

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