From the Old Country to Casablanca | 20,000 Leagues From Hillel

By Carly Silver September 30, 2011

Does Justin Timberlake look Jewish to you? The Tennessee-born hitmaker might not be a member of the Tribe, but he’s set to play one in Spinning Gold, an upcoming biopic about Neil Bogart. The late founder of Casablanca Records, Bogart was a Jew from Brooklyn who introduced the world to musical acts like KISS. The…

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“The Jew” in Rap | The Product

By mekeisler September 29, 2011

During my interview with Kosha Dillz, he mentioned how rappers often portray Jews as “record label executives and lawyers who hoard rappers’ cash.” I decided to do a bit of research, and it turns out that he’s right – pretty much all the references to Jews in hippity-hop are as lawyers or rich kids—in fact, Jewishness…

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Challah for Hunger | The Justice File

By awiner September 28, 2011

My name is Amanda Winer and I am a Jew. Sounds like I’m in an AA meeting or something, eh? The reason I introduce myself as such is twofold. Firstly, I fully acknowledge that this is an important part of my identity. Secondly, I helps to put this entire blog in context. This is who…

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Kneading for The Needy

By Robin Migdol September 27, 2011

It’s an idea so simple you may wonder why you didn’t think of it yourself: Grab a few friends and bake some deliciously eggy challah, then sell it and donate the proceeds to help feed the hungry around the world.
That idea was the inspiration behind Challah for Hunger, an organization with chapters at 44 colleges and universities across America–and two in Australia–dedicated to making and selling the much-loved traditional Shabbat bread to raise money for hunger and disaster relief organizations. CfH was founded in 2004 by students at the Claremont Colleges, a consortium of seven liberal arts colleges in Southern California. So far, the have raised over $250,000.

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New Year, New Hillel Machzor

By David A.M. Wilensky September 27, 2011

The High Holidays are upon us, and so is a newly updated and expanded edition of the Hillel machzor (High Holidays prayer book), “On Wings of Awe.” The original 1985 edition was ground-breaking in its inclusion of transliterations for many prayers, which was then a rarity even among liberal Jewish prayer books; the new edition’s cover boldly proclaims itself “A Fully Transliterated Machzor for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.”
While Bernard Scharfstein, vice president of “On Wings of Awe” publisher Ktav, told me, “We sold maybe 1,000 a year; it’s not a bestseller,” it has been a constant presence in many Hillels and in a handful of congregations for many years.
I spoke on the phone recently with the editor of both editions, Rabbi Richard Levy, about what makes “Wings” a Hillel machzor, what has changed in the new edition and how worship has changed over the last quarter-century.

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Irvine 11, Abbas at the UN, and some proud young Jews | Parsing

By Harpo Jaeger September 27, 2011

The Irvine 11 were convicted on Friday of conspiring to disrupt and then disrupting a speech by Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren at UC Irvine.  Our own Gabe Schivone interviewed one of them, Taher Herzallah. Making the rounds online: a nifty graphic showing which countries will support the PA’s statehood bid at the U.N. Finally, Jewish…

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Recently Convicted, 1 of the Irvine 10 | Other Voices

By gmschivone September 26, 2011

Taher Herzallah is one of the newly convicted students collectively known as the “Irvine 11”. Ten of the original eleven were prosecuted (one had his charges dropped) by the Orange County District Attorney’s Office and, this past Friday, convicted of “disruption” and “conspiracy to disrupt” a public lecture by Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren at the…

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1000 Tables: A Coming Out Party for Israeli Social Activism

By eglassenberg September 26, 2011

1000 tables. That’s right. You heard me. 1000 tables. Round ones. Picture this: A warm Tel Aviv September night. Motzaei Shabbat (Saturday night). The Tel Aviv Museum plaza is filled with round tables—several hundred of them, in fact. Sitting around the tables, in groups of about eight to 10, are several thousand people. Around the…

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Ahmadinejad vs. Columbia: Round Two

By Carly Silver September 25, 2011

Turns out there was no need for such a fuss.  On September 19th, two days before Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was scheduled to have dinner with 15 members of the Columbia International Relations Council and Association (CIRCA), the Iranian mission to the United Nations revoked the invitation due to the “media firestorm” surrounding the event, according to the…

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Hillel Recon | The Jew in the Boonies

By Laura Cooper September 25, 2011

On Saturday night, I went to our Hillel’s welcoming ceremony for the new rabbi.  I guess they decided it would be a good idea to start out with a Havdala ceremony, but no amount of gentle singing could compensate for the  lighting of yet another candle – under the luminous rays of the bright 7:00…

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How Do We/I Connect to God? | J-Studs

By dbloom September 24, 2011

The destruction of the Second Temple in 70 C.E. was a watershed moment in Jewish history.  With Roman control of Judea making the idea of rebuilding a third temple impossible, the question became not so much as where to meet God but as how to meet God, for the Temple’s destruction eliminated Jews’ ability to …

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Hillel’s ‘Talk Israel’ Tents Pop Up US Campuses

By David A.M. Wilensky September 23, 2011

A new Hillel International program (a little explanation from JTA here) called Talk Israel placed tents on 20 campuses yesterday and Tuesday. The tents were open to all for “conversation and not debate,” according to Columbia-Barnard Hillel Assistant Director Carrie Fischbein. “Dialogue is a key component of the day,” she said. Fischbein was also careful…

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Is Non-Orthodox Judaism Chillul Hashem? | The Godblogger

By John Propper September 22, 2011

“There seems to be a lot of talk that non-Orthodox Judaism is Chillul Hashem. Is Hashem angry?” –D.B., London, U.K. That’s a great question—and one with a messy answer. First off, let’s come to an understanding about what Chillul Hashem actually means. In Vayikra (Leviticus) 22:31-33, following an extensive legal document that dictates the terms…

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Surrounded by Jews, and That’s Just Fine | Modern Unorthodox

By Simi Lichtman September 21, 2011

I grew up in Baltimore, MD, where the one non-Jewish family within a 5-block radius was famous simply because they had Christmas decorations when the rest of us were lighting candles in our windows for Chanuka. I always felt bad for the kids in that house around Halloween–in the 15 years that I lived in…

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Poland: The Other Holy Land | Back to The Old Country

By hdilman September 21, 2011

This summer, I received an opportunity to travel to Poland, to study Jewish-Polish relations before, during and after the Holocaust, with nine other graduate students. The trip was three weeks. When I was asked what my plans were for the summer and I replied, “Three weeks in Poland,” the response was generally the same. “Three…

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