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Ovadia Yosef

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Jan 5, 2025, 7:46 AM

Chabad and the Recognition of the Jewishness of Bete Israel

The Aliyah of Bete Israel, or Ethiopian Jewry, is a remarkable chapter in Israel's history. Their return to their ancestral homeland is a testament to the enduring power of Jewish identity. However, the question of their Jewishness, according to...

Oct 23, 2024, 1:22 PM

Hostages NOW: The infinite value of life even during war

Vigil in New York after the six hostages were murdered. (Liri Agami and Dani Tenenbaum)

The horrors of battle, the numbers, shifting focus to the north - too many factors chip away at our sense of urgency to bring our captives home from Gaza

Eliyahu Berkovits

Feb 29, 2024, 10:45 AM

Rabbinic elites vs. traditionalists: IDF conscription law reveals rifts in Shas

A letter was recently published, signed by leading rabbis in the Sephardi Haredi (ultra-Orthodox) community – two of whom are members of the Shas Council of Torah Sages – calling Moshe Arbel, a Shas-Party minister in Knesset, "one who...

Chana Yehudis Zahav

Oct 3, 2023, 5:57 AM

Flaming Headlines

Why are all the rabbis so evil? What do all Hareidim throw rocks at people? Why do all secular women wear mini skirts and drink all day? Why are all Tel Avivians anti religious bigots? Why are all settlers...

Mar 3, 2022, 5:32 PM

Book review: Bridging Traditions

I thought of the idiom "don't judge a book by its cover" after I started reading Bridging Traditions: Demystifying Differences Between Sephardic and Ashkenazic Jews (O-U Press) by Rabbi Haim Jachter. I thought that aside from kitniyot during Passover and starting selichot much earlier, Sephardic...

Elchanan Poupko

Oct 7, 2021, 6:42 AM

Our Blindspot for Rabbi Ovadia Yosef

As we mark the 3rd of Cheshvan, the day Rabbi Ovadia Yosef passed away, Jews worldwide will be remembering his outstanding scholarship, leadership, compassion, and knowledge. Yet from a general Jewish perspective, the Jewish community as a whole is...

Sharona Margolin Halickman

Jul 15, 2021, 1:36 PM

Should we update the Nachem prayer?

On Tisha B’Av afternoon, the Nachem prayer is added into the amida of the Mincha service: Console O Lord our God, The mourners of Zion The mourners of Jerusalem, And the city that is in sorrow, laid waste, Scorned and desolate; That grieves for the...

Sharona Margolin Halickman

Dec 31, 2019, 7:19 PM

The return of the lost tribes

After the jealousy and deceit that we read about over the last few weeks, in Parshat Vayigash, all of Yaakov’s children are reunited. Yosef reveals who he is and does not hold a grudge against his brothers for how...

Andy Blumenthal

Nov 8, 2019, 5:17 AM

Righting Wrongs To Sephardim

There was a beautiful "Arts and Ideas" event last night at the Bender Jewish Community Center of Greater Washington, co-sponsored by Magen David Sephardic Synagogue. It was the kickoff of the Fall Arts Festival, with a film screening of The...

Leonard Grunstein

Sep 19, 2019, 1:56 AM

Be Prepared to Save a Life; Don’t Shirk Responsibility

When I was a young boy, we regularly visited the Babbe, my mom’s mother and our only grandparent who survived the Holocaust. On one occasion, my dad, of blessed memory, and I were waiting at the elevator to go...

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