Religion Dispatches
…Plus: just how influential is Sheldon Adelson on Israeli public opinion and bonus trivia about Newt Gingrich. In this clip, we discuss how young Israelis who have little or no memory of Israel pre-Second Intifada, view the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the negative consequences for the peace process: The full video is here. …
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…s as a new religion, he often sounds like Moses condemning the children of Israel for worshipping the golden calf of Black Power. In one breath, McWhorter hails the Black masses for not holding the same corrosive ideas as a Black leftist elite while assailing them for destructive cultural behaviors from which they must be saved, as his books describe in Losing the Race: Self-Sabotage in Black America and Winning the Race: Beyond the Crisis in Blac…
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…ferent reasons. Thus, what’s emerged is a kind of Hasidic anti-Zionist pro-Israelism; tacit support for Israel as an act of tribal fidelity rather than any form of Zionism. Ask a Hasidic Jew touting Trump’s moving the US Embassy to Jerusalem whether he is a “Zionist” and he will think you’re crazy. Anti-Zionism has been part of the very fabric of Hasidic Judaism for a long time, even now in muted form. But somehow without abandoning that, they fou…
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…ve disavowed Hagee during the 2008 campaign, but his Christians United for Israel continues to flourish, and institutional Jewish tolerance for his professed “love” of Israel, while dampened somewhat, continues nonetheless. So why is Beck getting the cold shoulder? I think he’s gone too far with the crazy talk. Conservatives want this sort of anti-Muslim stuff to be respectable — I’m not saying it is, I’m just saying they’re straining to present i…
Read More…m the signatories, twenty of whom were previous winners of the prestigious Israel Prize: Their statement, timed for Passover, said that: “The land of Israel is the birthplace of the Jewish people where its identity was shaped,” the statement begins. “The land of Palestine is the birthplace of the Palestinian people where its identity was formed.” It goes on to say that now is the time to live up to the commitment expressed by Israel’s founders in…
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…th as Jerusalem—the number of Hamas’ smuggling tunnels uncovered (31), the number of Israeli soldiers killed in action (29). These numbers will likely change every hour. In the weeks leading up to the Israeli invasion of Gaza and now as increasingly grisly accounts and bloody images emerge of Palestinian homes and hospitals blown apart, American Jews are conflicted—alternately protesting against or rallying behind the Israeli state, following each…
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…rust I have in the TSA before, Jillette’s rant in “Penn’s Bacon and a Kiss Airline” was like finding a long-lost brother; another guy who feels it is criminal to be viewed naked by strangers—involuntarily—is a true freedom fighter. This is a comedian with a conscience. He may come down on the wrong side of many traditional issues (global warming and sexual mores, e.g.), but he is keenly aware that too many people suffer. Theodicy in motion. In the…
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…ance-enhancing drugs. The sense of freedom and fun (and free food, even if airline food) was exhilarating. The airport has now become a place of horror. Do they have full-body scanners? I wonder as I’m herded into a long, bovine line. Abattoir or boudoir? Why is this bothering me so much? Don’t Touch Me There Even cursory reflection reveals my embodiment issues are buried deep in my religious upbringing. I was a teenage fundamentalist. That remark…
Read More…soul) damned.” To be lost is not merely a geographic problem for marooned airline passengers, or for men unwilling to stop and ask for directions—it’s a spiritual and moral condition. These days a google search turns up over 500,000,000 hits (that’s half a billion); not too surprising for a basic and often-used term. Similar numerical results come from google searches on terms like “run” and “hide.” Meanwhile, “found” yields over 1.3 trillion hit…
Read More…h ultra-Orthodox men interfering in your travel, you can just take another airline. If only it were as easy for female employees affected by the numerous lawsuits against the Affordable Care Act’s contraceptive coverage requirement to find a better job. *Correction: This post originally indicated that gender separation was due to concerns about women’s menstrual cycles. To read more about gender separation among Haredi Jews in Israel and in the U….
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