Categories
Arts

Film Director Sidney Lumet Featured In PBS Biopic

He was one of Hollywood’s most prolific directors. In a 50-year career, from 1957 to 2007, he made 44 films, earning four Oscar nominations and winning an honorary Academy Award in 2005. “All I was ever interested in was the next job,” he says in Nancy Buirski’s documentary, American Masters: By Sidney Lumet, which will […]

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Middle East

Assad’s Tenacity Pays Dividends

With eastern Aleppo back in his hands after four years of fierce fighting, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has won a significant victory in Syria’s five-year-old civil war. As the last civilians and rebel fighters were evacuated from there on December 22, Assad could truthfully boast that every major city in Syria — Damascus, Aleppo, Homs, […]

Categories
Commentary

Former Nazis Served In West German Governments

It’s no secret that numerous members of Germany’s Nazi Party burnished their careers in postwar West German governments as high-ranking officials, Allied de-Nazification programs notwithstanding. This contentious issue is on the table again thanks to a recent decision by German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Heiko Maas, her justice minister, has established a commission to re-examine the […]

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Middle East

U.S. Supports A Justifiable UN Resolution

Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, Danny Danon, was demonstrably disappointed and upset by yesterday’s decision by the United States to abstain and thereby allow the UN Security Council to pass a unanimous resolution condemning Israeli settlement construction in the West Bank. “It was to be expected that Israel’s greatest ally would act in accordance […]

Categories
Guest Voices

Egypt’s Coptic Minority Faces Renewed Threats

On December 11, a bomb ripped through the chapel in the St. Mark’s Cathedral complex, the seat of Egypt’s ancient Coptic Orthodox Church. It killed 27 people and wounded another 49, mostly women and children, and was one of the deadliest attacks on the country’s Christian minority in recent memory. Responsibility for the attack was […]

Categories
Television

The Cuba Libre Story

Cuba usually comes to mind at this time of the year as the weather in Toronto goes from bad to worse. Holed up in my winter-bound house, I think of Cuba’s sunny weather, its sandy beaches, its turquoise waters and its tropical vegetation. Call it, if you wish, Cuba on the brain. But the lure […]

Categories
Arts

A Cornucopia Of Books …

It’s the holiday season, a time to read and reflect. These books, published recently, are eclectic and stimulating. Makers of Jewish Modernity (Princeton University Press) contains 43 thoughtful essays by leading scholars about thinkers, writers, artists and leaders who had a significant impact on the 20th century. There are well-crafted portraits of philosophers (Martin Buber), […]

Categories
Travel

Shanghai — A City On The Move

Shanghai is a city in transition. Before the 20th century, Shanghai was  China’s vibrant commercial and financial center, but following the communist takeover in 1949, it fell into a state of somnolence. Since the economic reforms of the 1990s, however, Shanghai has bounced back and taken its rightful place as one of Asia’s most dynamic […]

Categories
Arts

The Jews Of Harlem

The New York City neighborhood of Harlem, an African-American enclave for about the past century, used to be home to the second largest Jewish community in the United States. Only the Lower East Side had a greater Jewish population. During the penultimate years of the 19th century and the first two decades of the 20th […]

Categories
Jewish Affairs

Google Should Combat Holocaust Denial

It’s outrageous but true. If you type the word “Holocaust” on the Google search engine site, a wave of mostly reputable articles relating to this unprecedented event in European and Jewish history appears. But if you enter the phrase “Did the Holocaust happen?”, you’ll be taken by surprise. Incredibly enough, the first item that pops up […]