Francois Ozon’s romantic drama, Frantz, moves between national borders seamlessly. Languidly unfolding in Germany and France in 1919, a year after the end of World War I, it’s based on Ernst Lubitsch’s 1932 movie, Broken Lullaby. Scheduled to open in Canadian theatres on April 7, Ozon’s spare and affecting film is at once sweet and bitter. […]
Congratulations, Chrystia Freeland. You’ve won. You and your handlers not only buried a legitimate news story, but convinced a compliant media, a cowed Jewish leadership and a spineless Jewish press to ignore it, as if it never even existed. I’m referring, of course, to the short-lived Freeland affair, which broke in Canada several weeks ago. […]
There have been a flurry of reports in the Canadian media of late that mosques in Montreal and Toronto have been used as platforms to disseminate antisemitism. Muslim organizations have denounced the imams who’ve delivered these noxious sermons, but their denunciations will mean precious little if mosques continue to serve as venues of anti-Jewish diatribes. The […]
Probably the most infamous American gangster of all time, Alphonse (Al) Capone maintains an iron grip on the popular imagination. Seventy years after his death, Capone’s mystique seems undimmed and indestructible, even though his tempestuous reign lasted only six years. Celebrated and cursed in a cascade of books and movies and in a tsunami of […]
Bassem Youssef was the Jon Stewart of Egypt, a whip smart comedian who skewered authority and promoted the tenets of democracy in a country accustomed to authoritarian rule by despots. From 2011 to 2013, he hosted The Show, closely modelled after Stewart’s The Daily Show. A former heart surgeon, he was immensely successful, his nightly […]
It has been obvious, to some at least, that Israel’s protracted and bloody conflict with the Palestinians can best be resolved by means of a two-state solution. This would necessitate the creation of a Palestinian state in areas where Palestinians form a vast majority of the population, namely the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. […]
Tensions between two bitter old enemies, Israel and Syria, have flared up again. On March 17, Israeli F-16s struck a Syrian military site near the city of Palmyra, reportedly bombing a convoy of vehicles carrying Scud missiles to Hezbollah bases in Lebanon. Syria retaliated by firing several S-200 missiles at the Israeli jets flying back to […]
Tomer Heymann’s Mr. Gaga, a fast-moving and absorbing documentary about one of the world’s finest choreographers and dancers, takes flight from almost the moment it begins. As the camera pans on the protagonist, Ohad Naharin, he coaches a dancer in his studio. “Really beautiful,” he says before instructing her to loosen up and “let go.” A man […]
Women have always served in the Israeli armed forces and are an integral part of it, but in the past few years, they’ve played an increasingly important role in Israel’s defence. From training new recruits and flying aircraft to manning outposts and driving tanks, they form an indispensable component of Israel’s defence shield. “Since the […]
Three U.S. senators — Ben Cardin of Maryland, Richard Durbin of Illinois and Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut — were absolutely right to call for an investigation into of one of President Donald Trump’s top aides, Sebastian Gorka, who may have links to a notorious antisemitic Hungarian organization. Gorka, Trump’s adviser on counter-terrorism, was photographed at […]