Prior to the ceasefire that ended the eleven-day cross-border war between Israel and Hamas, the fourth in 13 years, the Democratic Party in the United States was torn asunder by the fierce fighting. Mainstream Democrats in the House of Representatives, like Ted Deutch and Elaine Luria, denounced Hamas’ brazen aggression and spoke up in defence […]
Saul Bellow was in the privileged and enviable position of knowing he was the most acclaimed American novelist of his generation. The winner of the 1976 Nobel Prize for literature, he was the author of critically praised novels that may yet stand the test of time: Seize the Day, Herzog, Mr. Sammler’s Planet, Ravelstein and […]
Until Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan opened his big mouth recently, his Islamist government seemed headed toward some sort of a rapprochement with Israel after years of acrimony. But with the outbreak of the fourth Gaza border war on May 10, Turkey’s attempts to mend its frayed bilateral ties with Israel have crashed and burned. From […]
Ansis is a simple sign painter in a small town in Latvia, a Baltic republic that won its independence after World War I, but lost it after being occupied by the Soviet Union and Germany within the space of a few years in the early 1940s. In Viesturs Kairish’s endearing movie, The Sign Painter, which […]
Antisemitism may have been temporarily discredited in post-Holocaust Germany, but in Leo Khasin’s dark and cutting comedy, The Un-Word, it continues to seethe and spread like a deadly virus that no vaccination, however potent, can eradicate. Due to be screened online by the Toronto Jewish Film Festival, which runs from June 3-13, it unfolds in a […]
The explosive Palestinian problem should be addressed by the international community so that the Palestinians achieve statehood and Israel attains security and legitimacy from its Arab neighbors, says Yair Hirschfeld, one of the architects of the Oslo peace process. Only a gradual approach to this complex issue will work, he told a Canadian Friends of […]
Shirel Peleg’s enjoyable and well-crafted romantic comedy, Kiss Me Kosher, surveys the wonders and agonies of the oldest and most durable human passion, love, through the prism of German-Jewish relations and Israel’s conflict with the Palestinians. It will be presented online by the annual Toronto Jewish Film Festival, which runs from June 3-13. A co-Israeli-German production […]
Trevor Noah, the host of the popular television program, The Daily Show, got himself into hot water the other day by implicitly advising Israel to lie down and play dead in reacting to naked aggression by Hamas. In the past seven days, Hamas has fired more than 3,000 rockets at Israel, twice as many as […]
Itamar Ben-Gvir is a disgrace to himself and Israel. This extreme right-wing member of the Knesset is a malignant agitator who has been fanning the flames of the most serious outbreak of civil unrest in Israel since its establishment as an independent state. As Jews and Arabs clash in inter-communal violence of the sort that […]
Germany’s foreign minister, Heiko Maas, made a good point a couple of days ago when he said that the Jewish community in Germany should not be held responsible, “either in the street or on social media,” for Israel’s current armed conflict with Hamas in the Gaza Strip. His comment was prompted by several developments. With […]