Categories
Film

Bad Nazi, Good Nazi

Wilm Hosenfeld, a German army officer during World War II, was a silent hero. Once a fervent Nazi, Hosenfeld parted ways with Adolf Hitler’s fascist regime while serving in German-occupied Poland from 1939 to 1945. During this period, he kept a secret diary in which he expressed his rage toward Germany’s mistreatment of Polish Catholics […]

Categories
Commentary

Trump Would Be Wise To Cancel Tariffs

President Donald Trump has unwisely declared economic warfare on Canada. In doing so, he is recklessly upending and potentially ruining the United States’ historically cordial and mutually profitable relationship with its closest neighbor and ally. Trump’s destabilizing policy is causing volatility, chaos, pain, puzzlement and uncertainty in both countries. True to his threats, he has […]

Categories
Commentary

Trump Cozies Up To Russia

Donald Trump seems to have abandoned Ukraine, a U.S. ally, in pursuit of his “America First” policy and sided unequivocally with Russia, one of America’s adversaries. It is a jaw-dropping moment. Six weeks after his inauguration as the 47th president of the United States, Trump has revealed his true colors as a self-centred, disruptive and […]

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Middle East

The Gaza Ceasefire Hangs By A Thread

Israel’s three-part ceasefire agreement with Hamas, brokered by the United States, Qatar and Egypt in January, is crumbling, raising the distinct possibility that Israel may well resume the war in the Gaza Strip. Negotiations on the second phase were supposed to begin a month ago, before the first phase ended on March 1. But the […]

Categories
Film

A Real Pain

Two American Jewish cousins embark on a road trip in Poland, their ancestral homeland, in the quest to connect with their family roots. This is the alluring theme of Jesse Eisenberg’s enticing feature film, A Real Pain, which is a contender for two Oscars at tonight’s Academy Awards ceremony in Hollywood. Their odyssey is facilitated […]

Categories
Commentary

The President Of York University’s Student Union Must Be Replaced

It goes without saying that the president of a university student union should be a measured and circumspect person, not a polarizing figure who angers and alienates students, besmirches the university’s image, and generates heated controversy. Somar Abuaziza, the newly installed president of the York Federation of Students (YFS) at York University in Toronto, has […]

Categories
Television

Kugel — The Appealing Prequel To Shtistel

Before Shtisel there was Kugel. Shtisel, the award-winning Israeli television series that enjoyed a three-year run from 2013 onward, was about the trials, tribulations and joyous interludes of an ultra-Orthodox family in Jerusalem. Although it was laser focused on haredi Jews, a cloistered sect, it exuded universal appeal, drawing in a secular Jewish audience as […]

Categories
Commentary

A New Chapter In Postwar Germany

A massive political earthquake jolted Germany as the final results of its federal election on February 23 poured in. The tremors are still being felt. For the first time since the Nazi era, that 12-year interregnum during which Germany persecuted its Jewish minority and launched a genocidal murder campaign on a European scale, the unthinkable […]

Categories
Commentary

Donald Trump’s Shameless Ukraine Policy

Donald Trump, in his second four-year term as president, is upending the United States’ alliance with Ukraine in favor of a rapprochement with Ukraine’s mortal enemy, Russia. Some might say he is ruthlessly and shamelessly abandoning Ukraine in its hour of duress. In recent days, Trump, an admirer of Russian President Vladimir Putin, has blamed […]

Categories
Middle East

Israel Creates A Buffer Zone In Southern Lebanon

Israeli troops remain on the ground in southern Lebanon, despite a ceasefire agreement that required Israel to withdraw from all Lebanese territory following its recent war with Hezbollah. Israel pulled out of Lebanese towns and villages on February 18, two weeks after it was supposed to do so under a two-month truce that began on […]