Standing Silent in Baltimore [Washington Post]
Standing Silent, a new documentary exposing sexual abuse in the Jewish community in Baltimore, is Phil Jacobs’, a reporter for the Baltimore Jewish Times, healing project after he too was the victim of sexual abuse. The Washington Post offers haunting photo coverage of Jacobs as he speaks to other victims and their alleged attackers in an attempt to discover the root of this problem in his community.
“‘Standing Silent’ depicts a community struggling to come to terms with a problem that, Jacobs says, has remained underreported for years and seems only recently to have attracted the attention of advocates and lawmakers.”
The War Games [NY Times]
A recent United States military simulation played out the way a war between Israel and Iran might look like – and the alarming results show, as many would presume, that such action will not simply be a conflict between the two nations. The Pentagon’s assessment of the situation projected that the United States would swiftly be drawn into the conflict and leave hundreds of Americans dead.
“The initial Israeli attack was assessed to have set back the Iranian nuclear program by roughly a year, and the subsequent American strikes did not slow the Iranian nuclear program by more than an additional two years. However, other Pentagon planners have said that America’s arsenal of long-range bombers, refueling aircraft and precision missiles could do far more damage to the Iranian nuclear program — if President Obama were to decide on a full-scale retaliation.”
On how Cognitive Biases may be egging Israel and Iran towards War [+972]
Roi Ben-Yehuda discusses, in terms of cognitive phenomena, why Israelis might think war with Iran is a better idea than it actually is, in an insightful look into the process of human decision making as it pertains to current events.
“It is said that wars begin in the minds of men. Considering the people charged with running Israel and Iran today, this is indeed a frightening prospect. But it’s also a chilling insight into the workings of the human mind in general. Why? Because our minds are filled with biases – unconscious and systematic errors of judgment – that make war with Iran an increasing possibility.”
Dumped for God [Tablet]
Corinna da Fonseca-Wollheim discusses her conversion to Judaism, the man that led her there, and their subsequent estrangement as he became more and more ensconced in religious practice in beautiful, harrowing terms.
“We met during a youth music festival, flirting across the wind section of a large symphony orchestra. If there was an obstacle to our romance, it was not that he was Jewish and I wasn’t; it was that he played the tuba and I played the violin. There’s a reason why there are no duets for these two instruments.”
