The Global Citizen: I’d Like a Moat, Please

By jsiegel April 16, 2010

The Global Citizen is a joint project of New Voices and the American Jewish World Service (AJWS). Throughout the year, a group of former AJWS volunteers will offer their take on global justice, Judaism and international development. Opinions expressed by Global Citizen bloggers do not necessarily represent AJWS. I recently saw signs posted on my…

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Get Off Your High Horse

By Carly Silver April 14, 2010

Giddy up! The harness racing world put a Jewish spin on their April 5 races with the Monticello Raceway 12th Annual Passover Pace. The “run for the matzohs” (a pun on horse racing’s most famous contest, the Kentucky Derby, also known as the “Run for the Roses”) featured Jewish jockeys and top-notch horses. The sport…

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Igniting the Zionist Debate

By Ben Sales April 14, 2010

Sam Green has done it again. His opinion piece about the dangers of Jewish student anti-Zionism, “Don’t Hate the Jewish State,” has prompted a flurry of opposition from defenders of ideological pluralism when it comes to Zionism. Jewschool‘s Ben Murane has weighed in, as well as Harpo Jaeger and a range of other Twitterers and…

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Can we be done with Jewish exceptionalism, please?

By Harpo Jaeger April 13, 2010

This is a response to Evan Krasner’s Why is Yom HaShoah not recognized by my high school?, which was posted yesterday on this blog. Evan asks an important question: How could a school that is mostly comprised of Jewish students not commemorate Yom HaShoah? This certainly seems odd, if for no other reason than the…

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Yom Hashoah & the Genocide in Sudan

By kseeger April 13, 2010

One of the most famous poems expressing the devastation of the Holocaust comes from Pastor Martin Niemoller: THEY CAME FIRST for the Communists,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Communist. THEN THEY CAME for the Jews, 
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew. THEN THEY CAME for the trade unionists,
…

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Why is Yom HaShoah not recognized by my high school?

By ekrasner April 12, 2010

I cannot remember a time when my high school, the Ethical Culture Fieldston School in Riverdale, NY, commemorated Yom HaShoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day). Even though the school has a large percentage of minority students, the majority of the students are white and Jewish. Many of these students have grandparents or family members that were either…

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The Exploitative Power of Fear Or: How Bibi Defiled Yom Hashoah

By smelamed April 12, 2010

In South Africa, there’s a conspiracy theory that has spread among the white population since the fall of Apartheid. It goes by many names: Uhuru, Operation Vula, Operation White Clean-up, and – in a nod to Nazi Germany – Night of the Long Knives (in Afrikaans, Die Nag van die Lang Messe).  What it says…

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Don’t Hate the Jewish State

By Elizabeth Alpern April 12, 2010

A growing number of liberal Jewish students are rejecting Zionism and the state of Israel. Here’s why they’re wrong.

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The Last Living Jew in Afghanistan

By Carly Silver April 9, 2010

Farm Aid, Band-Aid….now, Passover Aid? There may not be an upcoming concert for Passover help (partially because the holiday has passed), but stories of individuals helping others during Pesach never cease. One recent story involves the “last living Jew in Afghanistan” celebrating Passover with the help of an American. Holliswood, Queens, resident Jack Abraham loaded…

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The New Newspaper War

By Carly Silver April 8, 2010

Bwog, a news blog at Columbia University, is taking readers away from the campus paper, the Columbia Spectator. Does this spell doom for the college newspaper industry, or can the Spectator keep up?

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A Cause for Celebration

By hdilman April 8, 2010

I’ve been given a unique experience in Israel: to partake in a conference, organized through the Jewish Agency for Israel, that is training Shlichim to go to American camps.  Shlichim are Israelis ages 18-40 (most are in their early 20’s but there is a speckle of older Israelis) who are being trained to understand American…

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Reflections on Pesach

By smelamed April 6, 2010

Forgive me for my late post. You see, like my ancestors before me, I too had an arduous exodus from Egypt.  And although mine involved less wandering through the desert and more riding in buses through the desert–not to mention waiting in security lines, enduring a ‘random’ bag search, and withstanding a heart-stopping bomb scare–I…

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Friday Night Fights

By Carly Silver April 2, 2010

“Never again” is the constant phrase we utter about the Holocaust. “Not again” are my words about the latest anti-Semitic scandal to hit. Today, on Good Friday, papal preacher Reverend Raniero Cantalamessa compared recent criticism of the pope to anti-Semitic abuse the Jews have suffered over millennia. There are many things wrong with the preacher’s statement,…

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The best friends in the world

By Ben Sales April 1, 2010

Much has been made lately about the current “crisis” in Israeli-American relations, wherein Israel’s announcement of new East Jerusalem construction during Joe Biden’s visit there has led to an impasse over the extent of the Israeli settlement freeze. Netanyahu says that Israel has never met American opposition to such construction, while Washington claims that the…

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