In January 1778, what would be immortalized as the rag-tag Continental Army was at its raggiest and taggiest. The brutal winter at Valley Forge scared off many of the soldiers it hadn’t killed or broken. Mocked as “the Ragged Lousey Naked Regiment,” the 1st Rhode Island Regiment wasn’t recruiting many Continue Reading…
I propose a spelling change for the current prime minister’s English nickname. Just as Benjamin Netanyahu’s abandonment of the Western Wall compromise and rejection of fairer, more open conversion policies put a mark of Cain on the majority of Jews who are not haredim (ultra-Orthodox), he should be singled out Continue Reading…
The other day, I was visiting an older friend who is already a grandfather. Two of his grandchildren scampered into his house and went straight for the fridge – an almost Pavlovian response that likely happens in many of the warm, welcoming homes of the grandparents I know. Then, I Continue Reading…
Two seemingly disconnected news items this week illustrate the contrasting realities defining American Jewry and Israeli Jewry. In New York, rabbis from the post-denominational congregation B’nai Jeshrun announced they would perform intermarriages. Reaction seems quite muted. Meanwhile, in Jerusalem, Prof. Asa Kasher’s proposed Academic Code of Ethics discouraging professors from Continue Reading…
Celebrating Father’s Day, 2017 feels about as festive as celebrating May Day while Communism collapsed. America’s iconic father Bill Cosby is being tried for rape. The White House is overrun by a tantrum-prone, orange-haired, man-child. And the most popular modifier before the word “dad” is “deadbeat.” We’ve betrayed the Hallmark Continue Reading…
Mark Zuckerberg, who at 33 already ranks as one of the most influential Jews in American history, just delivered Harvard’s 2017 commencement address. Zuckerberg’s text should be required reading for anyone curious about Facebook’s agenda, millennial attitudes, modern elite college groupthink – and the challenges facing American Jewry. Here’s the Continue Reading…
There are three basic facts about the 1967 Six Day War. Knowing these politically incorrect, inconvenient truths will banish any ambivalence a reasonable person might have, and will encourage the celebration the 50th anniversary of this great Israeli victory. First, the threats to annihilate Israel were loud and numerous. Egyptian Continue Reading…
Welcome to Shavuot, the Most-Important-Least-Observed Jewish holiday. In a Torah-centered religion, celebrating the day the Jewish People received the Ten Commandments makes this holiday – perhaps more than Succot – “the” holiday. This is the fundamental one. And in a mission- driven nation built around the idea that belonging to Continue Reading…
The hoopla – and anxiety – building toward the Six Day War’s fiftieth anniversary has upstaged another Israeli milestone: the fortieth anniversary of the “Mahapach,” the reversal, Menachem Begin’s electoral upset on May 17, 1977, after 29 years in opposition. While ending the Labor Party’s dominance since 1948, Begin’s rise Continue Reading…
US President Donald Trump will visit Israel on May 22 as part of his “Three Big Religions Tour.” America’s showman-in-chief is launching presidential theme-travel now. Before Brussels and Sicily, he will visit Saudi Arabia, Israel, Bethlehem and the Vatican, contrasting peaceful religions with militant Islamism. Trump also hopes his deal-making Continue Reading…