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Talyah Ginsberg

Jul 25, 2026, 9:32 AM

With All Your Heart…

This week’s parashah, Va’etchanan, contains one of the best-known instructions in Judaism and, on close inspection, one of the most unreasonable. “You shall love Hashem your G‑D with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your might.” All...

Michael Gencher

Jul 23, 2026, 5:46 AM

The question I couldn’t answer

People gather outside the Adass Israel Synagogue, December 9, 2024, after a firebombing in Melbourne, Australia. (Con Chronis/AAP Image via AP)

For a long time, I assumed Australia's greatest challenge was recognizing antisemitism. Now, I think we see it, but rationalize it away before we confront it

Jul 20, 2026, 5:08 AM

Jews and Palestinians are modelling the cohesion Australia seeks

In September 2023, I travelled to Israel as Chair of New Israel Fund Australia. One day was spent in the West Bank with a Bedouin herding community near the illegal settlement in the north Jordan Valley of the West...

Talyah Ginsberg

Jul 20, 2026, 5:03 AM

Swastika on High Street, Hamsa on the Wall, Script That Refused to Behave

There are certain Friday rituals observed by Jewish women across continents and with wildly varying levels of spiritual enthusiasm: challah, candles, and enough food to sustain a small Balkan republic until Tuesday, even though only six people are coming....

Patricia Levinson

Jul 16, 2026, 5:17 AM

Celebrating My Independence 60 Years Ago Was Lifechanging

As I celebrated America's 250th Independence Day in Florida, I could not help but think back to my own celebration of independence 60 years ago. Escaping South Africa, a country then deeply embroiled in the cruelty of apartheid and seeking...

Jul 14, 2026, 11:05 AM

Halakha’s Kármán Line: Imagined and Real Jews in Space

Ilan Ramon, November 2001, NASA, https://science.ksc.nasa.gov/shuttle/missions/sts-107/images/high/KSC-02PP-0490.jpg, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ilan_Ramon,_NASA_photo_portrait_in_orange_suit.jpg, cropped

In the late 1960s or early 1970s, when Rabbi Solomon B. Freehof – the most prolific author of responsa in the American Reform movement – was asked for sources in Jewish law in preparation for “a discussion of the...

Talyah Ginsberg

Jul 13, 2026, 1:25 PM

Tomorrow, I Fly to Dubai on an Israeli Passport. Naturally, I Have Pneumonia.

Jerusalem viewed from the Mount of Olives. Photo: Robert Bye / Unsplash

The Abraham Accords promised normalisation. My lungs have lodged a formal objection. Tomorrow, I am flying to Australia through Dubai. It will be my first international journey on an Israeli passport, assuming I survive packing, pneumonia, and the discovery that airlines...

Michael Savvakis

Jul 13, 2026, 7:39 AM

Israeli Ambassador Exposes Australia’s Antisemitism Problem

Photo of antisemitic graffiti inn Queensland (Photo sent to author from an Australian Jew).

“I have never seen such levels of hatred of...Jews, as I experience and witness here in Australia.” Those are the words of Hillel Newman, Israel’s ambassador to Australia. Even worse, Newman has previously served as the Israeli ambassador to...

Jul 12, 2026, 9:33 PM

‘Whose Land?’ Tribute to Christian Zionist Filmmaker Hugh Kitson

A Farewell in Australia to Filmmaker Hugh Kitson, Who Devoted His Life to Telling the Truth of History & Israel's Rights to the Land Under International Law British documentary film-maker Hugh Kitson devoted his life to making films about Israel...

Jun 29, 2026, 6:24 PM

Bankstown Nurses Ruling is No Vindication — Just the Law at Work

The exclusion of the viral video is a setback for the prosecution, but it does not erase what was said, what was admitted, or the deeper fear the case has unleashed in the Jewish community. The exclusion of the Bankstown...

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