Egypt’s Ministry of Education recently made an important announcement: a new course on common values from the three Abrahamic religions — Islam, Judaism and Christianity — had been approved and will be phased in at schools throughout the country. This is an encouraging development. For the first time ever, Muslim students in Egyptian schools will […]
Charles Wahl’s quirky Canadian movie, The Mohel, deals with an ancient religious tradition, the brit milah, the solemn yet joyous circumcision ceremony which initiates an eight-day-old Jewish male into the fraternity of Jewish peoplehood. Performed by a mohel, a rabbi trained in this specialized surgical procedure, it’s the oldest custom in Judaism. Wahl’s competently-crafted film, 14 […]
Poland emerged broken and destitute from the ashes of World War II. Six million of its inhabitants, Jews and Catholics alike, had been murdered or had died during the German and Russian invasions of September 1939. Several of its cities, notably Warsaw and Wroclaw, had been virtually destroyed. Polish journalist Magdalena Grzebalkowska offers an impressionistic […]
Israel’s chilly bilateral relations with Jordan may be thawing following a series of recent meetings between Israeli and Jordanian leaders. In the past few weeks, Defence Minister Benny Gantz has met King Abdullah II and Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi has conferred with Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi to discuss a range of political and economic issues […]
Of all of the thorny issues exacerbating Israel’s protracted conflict with the Palestinians, the “right of return” is doubtless the most complex one. It turns on the unwavering demand by Palestinian refugees to go back to their original homes in what was Palestine and what has been Israel since its declaration of statehood in 1948. This […]
The first image in Matthew Bissonnette’s reflective movie, Death of a Ladies’ Man, is a giant-sized mural of the late poet Leonard Cohen on the side of a building in Montreal. This is not a haphazard choice on the part of the director. The spirit of Cohen’s songs, at once melancholy and plaintive, permeates this […]
Germany’s neo-Nazi scene is at the center of David Wnendt’s wrenching movie, Combat Girls, which will be digitally screened from March 11-13 by the Goethe Institut in Toronto in conjunction with the Toronto Jewish Film Society and the Neuberger Holocaust Education Center. Wnendt focuses on two young, impressionable women who are drawn into a skinhead […]
It was recently announced that Jews in the Persian Gulf have formed the first communal organization, the Association of Gulf Jewish Communities. It will cater to the religious and educational needs of Jews in the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and Saudi Arabia, all of which are officially pro-Western and aligned with the […]
By an overwhelming margin of eight to one, the Israeli Supreme Court has belatedly but boldly challenged the blatantly unfair monopoly the Orthodox rabbinate has held regarding officially recognized conversions in Israel. On March 1, Chief Justice Esther Hayut ruled that non-Jews who convert to Judaism in Israel through the Reform and Conservative streams of […]
I used to be a big sports fan, but nowadays I seldom follow sporting events. When I do watch sports on television, I tune in to the track and field program at the summer Olympic Games or to the World Cup, the championship of soccer. So when I read that Netflix was planning to broadcast […]