The landmark nuclear agreement signed by the six major powers and Iran on July 14 was fundamentally an exercise in compromise, requiring Iran to curb and mothball its nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief. According to U.S. President Barack Obama, it cuts off Iran’s pathway to joining the exclusive nuclear club, of which Israel […]
The late Saul Bellow was a colossus in American literature, the son of Yiddish-speaking Russian Jews who immigrated to the United States by way of Canada. In the estimation of his latest biographer, Zachary Leader, he was the most decorated writer in U.S. history, having won the Nobel Prize, the Pulitzer Prize and three National […]
Much to U.S. President Barack Obama’s annoyance and even anger, the Israeli government is pressing ahead with efforts to derail the nuclear agreement the United States and five other major powers signed with Iran in Vienna on July 14. Israel, having denounced the accord as a long-range threat to its national security, is working with […]
Bryce Canyon and Zion National Park, both in the state of Utah, stir the soul with their incandescent beauty. The rock formations and mountains in these parks north of the Grand Canyon, part of the 130,000 square-mile Colorado Plateau, speak eloquently of the power and glory of nature. My daughter and I travelled a long […]
Ten years after four homegrown Muslim radicals attacked London’s transportation system, killing 52 civilians and wounding more than 700, Prime Minister David Cameron has laid out a “counter-extremist strategy” to confront the scourge of Islamic radicalism in Britain. In an important speech in Birmingham on July 20, Cameron correctly described the ongoing battle against Islamic […]
Forty five years ago, Israel’s ambassador to the United States, Yitzhak Rabin, delivered a pep talk to a group of Jewish American teens in Washington, D.C. After he had finished speaking, Rabin — the future prime minister of Israel — gave 15-year-old Michael Bornstein of West Orange, New Jersey, a perfunctory handshake. Bornstein, a fervent […]
Woody Allen’s latest feature film, Irrational Man, turns on moral quandaries and dilemmas. Scheduled to open in Canadian theaters on July 24, it stars Joaquin Phoenix as a depressed professor of philosophy, Emma Stone as his infatuated student and Parker Posey as her older romantic rival. Allen, in this thoughtful movie about the frailties of […]
In a historic 12-week trial which ended in Germany on July 15, Oskar Groning — a former SS soldier who was posted to the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp from 1942 to 1944 — was convicted of complicity in mass murder and sentenced to four years in prison. Groning, now 94, was not a major figure in […]
Joseph Mitchell spent the greater part of his career at the intersection between journalism and creative writing. A reporter on the staff of The New Yorker for 58 years, he brought to his craft a boundless melange of curiosity, energy, observational powers and an understated, elegant prose style. Born and bred in North Carolina, the […]
The landmark nuclear agreement signed by the six major powers and Iran on July 14 in Vienna was forged on the anvil of compromise in incredibly complex negotiations extending over 20 months. Nonetheless, it’s replete with glaring uncertainties and nagging question marks. Designed to contain rather than to dismantle the Iranian nuclear program, it’s aimed […]