History
Not Marc ChagallThursday, April 21, 2011 by Aryeh Tepper | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
In the annals of modernist art, three European Jewish names stand out: Marc Chagall, Chaim Soutine, and Amedeo Modigliani. A fourth should be added. This is Emmanuel Mané Katz. Born in 1894 to a traditional Jewish family in the Ukraine, he moved to Paris at the age of nineteen to pursue a career as a painter, and there joined the three more fabled artists named above. Together, they have been loosely called "the School of Paris."
Eichmann Goes DigitalMonday, April 18, 2011 by Alex Joffe | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
This year, on the fiftieth anniversary of the Eichmann trial, Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority, together with the Israel State Archives, has posted to YouTube an extraordinary series of videos: over 200 hours of courtroom sessions and testimonies in the original Hebrew, German, and Yiddish, as well as a parallel set with English voiceover. What do they tell us?
A New Germany?Thursday, April 14, 2011 by Elliot Jager | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
At a joint press conference in Berlin on April 7, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu thanked German Chancellor Angela Merkel for the atmosphere of mutual trust and friendship in which their just-concluded talks had taken place. Germany, he averred, was "a great friend" of Israel. Yet any sober assessment of the Germany-Israel relationship would have to come to a different conclusion.
Freedom TalesWednesday, April 13, 2011 by Yehudah Mirsky | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
An enslaved people, brutalized, voiceless except for groans and cries, comes into possession of a voice of their own: no wonder the tale itself sometimes seems to embody the whole meaning of the Exodus.
A Chosen People?Tuesday, April 12, 2011 by Aryeh Tepper | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
Within months of Israel's lightning victory in the June 1967 war, French President Charles de Gaulle was asked for his judgment of the dramatically new situation created by the triumph of the Jewish state over its enemies. Still smarting from Israel's refusal to heed his advice and wait passively for the Arab armies to attack, de Gaulle labeled the Jews "an elite people, sure of themselves and domineering."
Telling Jewish TimeMonday, April 11, 2011 by Allan Nadler | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
The most acclaimed Jewish Bible commentary opens with a question. Why, asks Rashi (1040–1105), does the Torah begin with the account of creation, when it should properly have begun with God's revelation of His very first law to Moses on the eve of the Exodus from Egypt: "This month shall be for you the first of months"?
Clash of CivilizationsFriday, April 8, 2011 by Alex Joffe | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
The death toll in Afghanistan has passed the two-dozen mark in the riots "inspired" by Pastor Terry Jones's burning of a Quran in Florida. The grisly political theater has served its purpose.
“We Love Death”Wednesday, April 6, 2011 by Aryeh Tepper | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
In 2007, two years before he killed thirteen people and wounded twenty-nine at Fort Hood, Texas, Nidal Malik Hasan prepared a slide show for his fellow Army doctors on the subject of Islam. One of his last points read: "We love death more than you love life!"
Gandhi and the JewsTuesday, April 5, 2011 by Elliot Jager | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
A new book about Mohandas Gandhi (1869–1948) has set off stormy protests in India for implying that the country's founding father was bisexual. That's only the beginning of it.
The Archeology WarThursday, March 31, 2011 by Alex Joffe | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
The Islamic Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (ISESCO) was founded in 1979 by the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC). It has three basic goals. The first is to spread a Saudi version of Koranic education throughout the Islamic world. The second is to publicize Islam to the non-Islamic world. The third goal is to oppose the "Judaization of Al-Quds"—i.e., Jerusalem.
Editors' Picks
Chained Melody Uri Zer Aviv, Haaretz. In its heyday, the Mizrahi Orchestra numbered 36 musicians, who uniquely preserved Jewish music from the Babylonian Diaspora. But amid financial woes, its future looks bleak.
Brag, Brag, Brag Greg B. Smith, Daily News. "I've been a thief all my life," said Julius Bernstein, a/k/a Spike, the Jewish mobster who spent decades extorting money from businesses, unions, and even medical clinics—and never spent a day in jail.
Russia's Jewish Composers Matt Kelly, UVA Today. For a brief period prior to the Revolution, Jews were among the rising stars of Russian classical music. But they soon discovered that while Russian culture liked Jewish music, it didn't like Jews.
The Frank Truth about the Mormons Rafael Medoff, JTA. Jews offended by the news that Mormons have posthumously baptized Anne Frank would do well to remember how many Jewish lives the Mormons saved during the War.
The Lost Left Michael C. Kotzin, New Republic. The eyewitness accounts of late Mandate Palestine by the journalist I. F. Stone recall a time when the Left was capable of sympathizing with Palestinians without attempting to delegitimize Israel.
Losing the Temple Mount Amir Shoan, Ynet. The Muslim waqf which oversees the Temple Mount is allowing archeological sites to be bulldozed, in contravention of the law. But instead of intervening, the Israeli government is covering it up.
Madness and Messianism Chris Nashawaty, Wired. Jerusalem Syndrome, whereby visitors to the city become convinced that they are the messiah, is a recognized psychological condition. Yet Jerusalem's go-to psychiatrist still hopes one of his patients is the real deal.
Berlin's Kosher Kitsch Mara Delius, Standpoint. Fewer than 70 years after World War II, eating kosher is Berlin's latest bohemian craze. But with restaurants inspired by German culture in the 20's and 30's, historical sensitivity is not on the menu.
Poison Ivy Rivkah Blau, Jewish Press. The thriving Jewish communities at America's elite universities seem entirely natural today, until we remember that just fifty years ago the Ivy League was no haven for Jews.
My Kingdom for a Horse! Ziony Zevit, Bible History Daily. The received wisdom holds that a horse was a rare sight in ancient Israel. But new scholarship reveals that a developed chariotry formed the military backbone of both the Judean and the Israelite monarchies.