Zionist Thought
The Trouble with Hitchens
When Christopher Hitchens passed away yesterday at the age of 62, the encomia started pouring in almost immediately. Most of this praise is deserved, as the acumen of Hitchens's muscular criticism and the wit of his ripostes will be with us for a long time to come.
Friday, December 16, 2011 by Benjamin Kerstein | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
When Christopher Hitchens passed away yesterday at the age of 62, the encomia started pouring in almost immediately. Most of this praise is deserved, as the acumen of Hitchens's muscular criticism and the wit of his ripostes will be with us for a long time to come.
Israel Studies 101
The modern American research university is a house of many rooms. The field of Israel Studies, which has emerged in the past decade, occupies one of the newest—and smallest—of those rooms.
Monday, October 3, 2011 by Alex Joffe | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
The modern American research university is a house of many rooms. The field of Israel Studies, which has emerged in the past decade, occupies one of the newest—and smallest—of those rooms.
The Wages of Durban
In the days just prior to the assault on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the World Conference Against Racism (WCAR) was very much in the news, and for reasons that are altogether relevant to the mass murder that took place on September 11, 2001.
Wednesday, September 21, 2011 by Arch Puddington | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
In the days just prior to the assault on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the World Conference Against Racism (WCAR) was very much in the news, and for reasons that are altogether relevant to the mass murder that took place on September 11, 2001.
Settling for Statehood
The 66th session of the United Nations General Assembly has just begun. Unless a diplomatic miracle happens, that body will soon be asked to approve what amounts to a unilateral declaration of Palestinian statehood. Palestinian spokesmen say they had no choice but to make their end run around serious negotiations with Israel.
Monday, September 19, 2011 by Diana Muir Appelbaum | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
The 66th session of the United Nations General Assembly has just begun. Unless a diplomatic miracle happens, that body will soon be asked to approve what amounts to a unilateral declaration of Palestinian statehood. Palestinian spokesmen say they had no choice but to make their end run around serious negotiations with Israel.
Enmity; or, Yiddish in America
He was irascible, neurotic, self-obsessed, and socially inept; a brilliant misfit and misanthropic dilettante. Upon his death in July 2010, Harvey Pekar's few close friends insisted that the underground comic-book writer was also a gem in the rough, an out-of-date socialist naïf.
Monday, September 12, 2011 by Allan Nadler | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
He was irascible, neurotic, self-obsessed, and socially inept; a brilliant misfit and misanthropic dilettante. Upon his death in July 2010, Harvey Pekar's few close friends insisted that the underground comic-book writer was also a gem in the rough, an out-of-date socialist naïf.
Reconstructing Judaism
At a time when all three major Jewish denominations in America—Orthodox, Conservative, and Reform—find themselves in a state of deep internal fracture, a fourth and much smaller movement, Reconstructionism, has just voted to create a unified body to coordinate the activities of its lay and rabbinical arms.
Wednesday, August 3, 2011 by Joseph J. Siev | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
At a time when all three major Jewish denominations in America—Orthodox, Conservative, and Reform—find themselves in a state of deep internal fracture, a fourth and much smaller movement, Reconstructionism, has just voted to create a unified body to coordinate the activities of its lay and rabbinical arms.
The Loyalties of the Sephardim
In a recent Haaretz column, Gideon Levy, the radical leftist polemicist, sounded the warning that Israel's religious Zionists—"the knitted skullcaps"—have joined hands with the ultra-Orthodox and the Sephardim to form "a united tribe of zealots."
Friday, July 22, 2011 by Aryeh Tepper | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
In a recent Haaretz column, Gideon Levy, the radical leftist polemicist, sounded the warning that Israel's religious Zionists—"the knitted skullcaps"—have joined hands with the ultra-Orthodox and the Sephardim to form "a united tribe of zealots."
Getting Birthright Wrong
In mid-June, The Nation magazine, which for decades has provided a special platform for Jewish critics of Zionism, published an article by a young alumna of Birthright Israel, the organization that since 1999 has sent 260,000 young Diaspora Jews (including this writer) on free ten-day tours of the Holy Land.
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 by Philip Getz | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
In mid-June, The Nation magazine, which for decades has provided a special platform for Jewish critics of Zionism, published an article by a young alumna of Birthright Israel, the organization that since 1999 has sent 260,000 young Diaspora Jews (including this writer) on free ten-day tours of the Holy Land.
Montreal, a Love Story
The second International Yiddish Theater Festival, an elaborate ten-day fete whose program ranges from carnavalesque performances to academic symposia, just wrapped up last week in Montreal. What is especially surprising about this celebration is that Montreal is a city with a Jewish population of less than 80,000.
Tuesday, June 28, 2011 by Allan Nadler | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
The second International Yiddish Theater Festival, an elaborate ten-day fete whose program ranges from carnavalesque performances to academic symposia, just wrapped up last week in Montreal. What is especially surprising about this celebration is that Montreal is a city with a Jewish population of less than 80,000.
One Woman Army
Andrei Sakharov, the great nuclear physicist and human-rights campaigner, had been dead for two years by the time I came to his Moscow apartment in the early summer of 1991. Elena Bonner, his widow, was there, still defiantly at war with the faceless foe that had slaughtered her family, exiled her and her husband, slandered her Jewish name, and lied about it all.
Monday, June 27, 2011 by Daniel Johnson | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
Andrei Sakharov, the great nuclear physicist and human-rights campaigner, had been dead for two years by the time I came to his Moscow apartment in the early summer of 1991. Elena Bonner, his widow, was there, still defiantly at war with the faceless foe that had slaughtered her family, exiled her and her husband, slandered her Jewish name, and lied about it all.
Editors' Picks
Theater of the Absurd Danny Ayalon, Foreign Policy. The world's worst human rights offenders have hijacked the UN Human Rights Council, and Israel isn't going to put up with it any more.
The End of the Land-for-Peace Era Moshe Arens, Haaretz. Livni's defeat indicates that Israel may be headed back to a political system based on two major parties—both with a focus on socioeconomic issues and a sadder-but-wiser skepticism about territorial concessions.
How the Left Turned against the Jews Nick Cohen, Standpoint. As Communism gave way to anti-colonialism, Israel remained a target for special rage on the Left, even though Zionism was both a settler movement and an anti-colonial movement.
A Vast Right-Wing Jewish Conspiracy? Rafael Medoff, Jerusalem Post. Hearing a prominent Jewish historian claim that criticism of FDR's inaction during the Holocaust is the handiwork of disgruntled Likudniks, a leftist blogger took it upon himself to prove her wrong.
Teach Your Tongue to Say “I Don't Know” David Wolpe, Jewish Journal. When a nation struggles with the threat of being vaporized in a nuclear conflict, to call its policies on the West Bank and Gaza "the great question of the age" is myopic at best.
Arendt in Jerusalem Sol Stern, City Journal. With their monumental errors of political and moral judgment, Hannah Arendt's writings on Zionism, Israel, and the Holocaust have metastasized into a destructive legacy.
The Perils of Self-Deception Colin Rubenstein, Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council. To imagine that anti-Semitism would evaporate if Israel signed a peace deal with the Palestinians is sheer fantasy. So why do pundits and policymakers regularly make this claim?
Is the Kotel Plaza a Synagogue? David Golinkin, G’vanim. How should the State of Israel respond to the increasing religious policing around the Western Wall that is slowly but surely turning the area into a Haredi synagogue? (PDF)
Whither Israeli Democracy? Jonathan S. Tobin, Contentions. Though Israel is beset with serious social problems and partisan clashes over a host of issues, the idea that democracy there is in any danger is a figment of the imagination of the country's left-wing critics.
Radical Orthodoxy Daniel Boyarin, Book of Doctrines and Opinions. The Talmud scholar imagines a religious practice, "free of the ethnocentrism and even racism that characterizes so much of contemporary orthodox language . . . that would authentically enable my own radical political commitments." (Interview with Alan Brill)