With the launch of Operation Barbarossa, Nazi Germany’s invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941, the Holocaust entered a new and much more deadly phase. As the German army conquered vast swaths of territory, coming perilously close to capturing Moscow, mobile killing squads, known as Einsatzgruppen, were set loose to murder communist officials and […]
The majority of Arabs regard Jews as enemies because much of the scholarship about pre-1948 Muslim-Jewish relations is refracted through the lens of the Arab-Israeli conflict, says an American scholar who specializes in the topic. Typically, such Arabs have never met a Jew, nor can they imagine a time when Jews were an indigenous and […]
Shortly before Ban Ki-moon stepped down as secretary-general of the United Nations recently, he received a remarkably blunt and bitter letter from the UN ambassadors of eleven Arab countries. The envoys — representing the predominantly Sunni Muslim nations of Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Yemen, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman, Sudan and the United Arab Emirates […]
I spent my last few hours in Vancouver recently in Granville Island Market, one of the city’s greatest attractions, and I enjoyed every bit of it. I’ve always been attracted to food markets. During my travels abroad, I’ve visited markets in Thailand, Laos, China, Vietnam, Brazil, Russia, Ukraine, France, Morocco and Israel, among other countries. […]
A heavy pall hangs over Kenneth Lonergan’s serious-minded movie, Manchester By The Sea, which opens in Canadian theaters on November 25. A contemporary family drama set mainly in a New England fishing town, it’s invariably earnest. It’s carried on the capable shoulders of Casey Affleck, who plays Lee Chandler, a janitor who’s summoned back to his […]
The Israeli-American relationship, already under strain during the Obama presidency, enters a new period of uncertainty with the election of Donald Trump. Jerusalem’s ties with Europe have also deteriorated. As a consequence, Israel seeks closer bonds with other major powers. One of these is India. Twenty-first century geopolitics are bringing Israel and India closer together. […]
By a margin of 58-50, the Knesset on November 16 took the first step to retroactively legalize Jewish settlements and outposts in the West Bank built on privately owned Palestinian lands. The proposed legislation, known as the Regulation Bill, is the brainchild of Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked and Education Minister Naftali Bennett, leaders of the […]
Maybe the astounding result in the 2016 American presidential election, which saw the most improbable of candidates, Donald Trump, beat the seasoned pro, Hillary Clinton, should not have been the shock it was. A system that had completely failed tens of millions of people for decades, and especially after 2008, needed a rude awakening. The […]
Yotam Ottolenghi, the internationally renowned chef and James Beard award winner, has written cookbooks that have put him and his co-author, Sami Tamimi, on the culinary map. His latest book, Plenty More (Random House), is dedicated to vegetarian food. Plenty More is richly illustrated, with 150 innovative yet simple recipes. It’s divided into several chapters — cooking […]
President -elect Donald Trump announced his first top-level appointments on November 12, three days after routing Hillary Clinton in the U.S. presidential election. He chose Reince Priebus, the head of the Republican National Committee, as his chief of staff, and Stephen Bannon, his campaign manager, as his senior counsellor and chief strategist. Bannon’s appointment was […]