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Guest Voices

The Charter of Values and Freedom of Religion in Quebec

The “Charter of Values,” or Bill 60, is being presented to the public by the present Quebec government as a “social project, “ essentially like that of the Charter of the French Language, or Bill 101 . Therefore, we must consider it in this light. In the case of the predominance of the French language […]

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Jewish Affairs

Heart-Felt Documentary probes Poland’s New Jewish Community

Poland’s Jewish community, the biggest in Europe before World War II, was virtually obliterated by the Nazis during the Holocaust. As if to rub salt into the wound, the Communist government, in 1967, launched an antisemitic campaign under the thinly-veiled guise of anti-Zionism, prompting many of the remaining Jews to emigrate. Since the advent of […]

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Guest Voices

Why is Obama Allowing Iran to Go Nuclear?

The so-called negotiations that the United States and the major world powers conducted with Iran in Geneva in the past few days were farcical.  The entire initiative was clearly designed to remove any deterrence of Iran’s development of a nuclear weapon. I say “so called” because a negotiation in which only one side gives meaningful […]

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Guest Voices

The Debate Over Quebec’s Charter of Values

On Nov. 7, the Quebec government tabled Bill 60, the so-called Charter of Quebec Values, in the province’s National Assembly.   The law would forbid all public employees from wearing “overt and conspicuous” religious symbols and headgear, including Muslim face veils, Jewish yarmulkes, Sikh turbans, or large crucifixes. The regulations would apply only to publicly-paid […]

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Arts

The Films of the Coen Brothers

Joel and Ethan Coen have made an indelible impression, to say the very least. Since the release of their first feature film, Blood Simple, the Coens have carved out a niche for themselves in American cinema. Their films, from Raising Arizona and Miller’s Crossing to Fargo and The Big Lebowski, are distinguished by memorable characters, laconic […]

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Arts

12 Years A Slave is Unaffected and Troubling

Steve McQueen’s 12 Years A Slave takes us into the ferocious maw of slavery in the years leading up to the U.S. Civil War. Based on a true story, it recounts the bitter experiences of Solomon Northup (Chiwetel Ejiofor), a free African American who was drugged, kidnapped and sold into bondage. This unadorned, unaffected and […]

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Arts

Lance Armstrong unmasked in documentary

There was no better cyclist than Lance Armstrong during his supremacy of the sport from 1999 to 2005, when he won seven successive Tour de France titles. Detractors claimed he owed his success to performance enhancing drugs, but Armstrong strenuously denied the accusation, reminding critics he had passed a succession of drug tests. In 2013, […]

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Jewish Affairs

Germany’s Moral and Legal Obligation

During the Nazi era in Germany, Jews were robbed of their valuable art collections or forced to sell them at ridiculously deflated prices. Paintings by such masters as Henri Matisse and Marc Chagall were shamelessly expropriated by Nazi officials like Hermann Goering, a self-styled art connoisseur, and by fellow travellers. In one of the most notorious […]

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Jewish Affairs

Antisemitism in Quebec

The historical relationship between Jews and French Canadians is fundamentally important in understanding the history of Jews in Canada, but as a topic it remains controversial due to the occurrence of antisemitism in the province of Quebec, Canadian historian Ira Robinson told a symposium in Toronto on Nov. 17. Robinson, a professor of Judaic Studies […]

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Jewish Affairs

Yiddish Scholarship in Canada

Pierre Anctil may well be an anomaly: a French Canadian scholar who has learned Yiddish and writes extensively on the history of the Jewish community in Montreal. But on second thought, as he suggested in a lecture on Yiddish scholarship in Canada today, he may not be an oddity at all. Speaking at a symposium […]