“If not us, then who:” ‘Nana’ aims to help millennials relate to the Holocaust

By Alexa Kempner January 28, 2016

From a young age, Serena Dykman, a young European filmmaker, has known about the Holocaust. As the granddaughter of three survivors, she not only received a school education on the Holocaust, but a very personal one as well. She has witnessed the rise of anti-Semitism in Europe with the attack on the Jewish Museum of Belgium…

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On French Anti-Semitism and Conflicting Identities

By Ari Bloom April 8, 2015

My first experience with anti-Semitism was at 6 years old. Someone painted a swastika on the front gate of my school and I remember asking my dad why it upset him so much. I had a limited understanding of Nazism at that age, but I knew enough to understand when he told me simply that…

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The Language of Angels

By Josh Morrel February 5, 2015

  As I sit across from her over a plate of chocolate chip cookies and a cup of dark coffee in the newly renovated faculty cafeteria, I think to myself: “I have so much respect for her.” Truth be told, I have so much respect for all of my colleagues because they’ve been doing this…

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On (Re-)Building the Proud Diaspora Jew

By Amram Altzman January 26, 2015

Growing up in my sheltered, American, religious Zionist, Orthodox bubble, I was told that there were two options for me, especially in light of the Holocaust: I could live in Israel, or I could live in America. The term “Diaspora Jew,” or the idea that there could exist a group of Jews outside of Israel…

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Baruch Dayan ha-Emet: A D’var Torah For a Shabbat Seeking Shalom

By Evan Goldstein January 9, 2015

As I write this Friday night, several things are true. A prolonged manhunt continues in France, pursuing suspects involved with an attack on a kosher supermarket. The Grand Synagogue of Paris is closed on Shabbat for the first time since World War II, a harrowing start to 2015 following a year of resurgent, ugly anti-Semitism….

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‘Muse of Fire’ Imagines Comedy in Auschwitz

By Derek M. Kwait November 4, 2014

It was already maybe the smallest stage I’ve ever seen, and much of it was taken up by black spray painted stepladders with boards between them and black theater blocks; the wall behind it painted to look like a brick wall with shadows of barracks on the sides.  The woman seated next to me remarked…

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From Italy, A Bridge to Anne Frank

By Sofia Domino October 1, 2014

My name is Sofia, I’m 26 years old, and I live in Italy. Like any young woman, I have many interests: I love traveling, reading, listening to music, eating, and living new experiences. I have been to the Unites States several times, and also to France and Spain, and I also lived in London for…

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Mourning the American-Jewish Political Middle

By Amram Altzman August 18, 2014

  If nothing else, the over-discussed Pew Report from almost a year ago (almost a year ago — and here we are, still quoting it like it’s the Bible itself!) heralded the death of the American-Jewish religious middle. This summer’s Operation Protective Edge seems to have heralded the death of the American-Jewish political middle, as…

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Bring Back Our Boys, Not Just Our Boy

By Amram Altzman June 23, 2014

In response to the abduction of three teenagers, Eyal Yifrah, Gil-ad Shaar, and Naftali Frankel, over a week ago in the West Bank, a petition to President Obama has been circulating around the Internet asking for the Executive Office to pressure the Palestinian Authority to release the one American citizen of the three kidnapped teenagers….

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Strauss-Kahn Gate II; Hitler used to advertise shampoo; Media does media, and more [Required Reading]

By pkessler March 27, 2012

Jewish Community protests Hitler Shampoo Ad [BusinessWeek] Turkey’s Jewish community is up in arms after an advertising agency used old film footage of the Nazi dictator to promote a woman’s shampoo. The video created for Biomen shampoo, embedded above, has sparked international outrage. “The Jewish community and the Chief Rabbi’s office on Monday called Hitler “the most…

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Après Merah, le Déluge [Terrorism]

By pkessler March 22, 2012

Mohammad Merah, the 23-year-old French-Algerian accused of going on a spree of killings culminating in Monday’s deadly assault on a Jewish school in Toulouse, France, was killed trying to evade police after a 30+ hour stand off with law enforcement at his apartment. With Merah apprehended, France and Jewish communities everywhere can lick their wounds,…

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Reform prayer app gets upgrade; France killings; Jewish women; and more. [Required Reading]

By John Propper March 21, 2012

Daily Reform prayer? There’s an app for that [Forward] Following the recent release of the Reform movement’s Kabbalat Shabbat siddur in iPad form, the movement has now released an update featuring daily morning prayers. The Jewish Daily Forward reports: “The new application, which costs less than $5, was launched at the annual gathering of the…

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