With very few exceptions, Middle Eastern Muslim states have generally reacted cautiously to the current war in Ukraine. Until yesterday, the vast majority of Arab countries, plus Turkey, refrained from either condemning Russia’s invasion or siding with Ukraine, an ally of the United States and the West. Today, several Arab countries — Egypt, United Arab […]
He was, as an admirer succinctly put it, a “bolt of lightning.” Marty Glickman was probably the fastest Jewish sprinter of all time. A member of the U.S. track and field team at the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin, he was later the first Jewish broadcaster in major league sports. He’s the subject of James Freedman’s […]
A day after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24, the Russian ambassador to Israel, Anatoly Viktorov, issued several comments on Israel’s policy vis-a-vis the current crisis. “We took note of Israel’s position,” he told the Times of Israel in an interview. “Our Israeli colleagues have repeatedly spoken about their concern for the safety of […]
Regrettably, Russian President Vladimir Putin and his corps of diplomats around the world have explicitly raised the issue of neo-Nazism and implicitly invoked the Holocaust to justify Russia’s nation-wide invasion of Ukraine. In explaining his reasoning for invading Ukraine — a sovereign country which attained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991 — Putin said […]
David Friedman, the U.S. ambassador to Israel from 2017 to 2021, is a true believer. A committed Orthodox Jew, he fervently believed that U.S. policy toward Israel was insufficiently supportive. A hardliner, he thought that Israel was entitled to build settlements in the West Bank, annex parts of it, and block the creation of an […]
Russian President Vladimir Putin has willfully upended the international order that has been in place since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. With Russia’s land, sea and air invasion of Ukraine, Putin has smashed the political status quo and redrawn the map of eastern Europe, Russia’s former sphere of influence, in a bold, […]
Joe Balass was born in Baghdad in 1966, only four years before he and his family were forced to leave Iraq for good. He has few memories of his birthplace, but his mother, Valentine, remembers it vividly in his 33-minute documentary, Baghdad Twist, which was produced by the National Film Board of Canada. Available on […]
Turkey, in a remarkable volte-face, is trying to rehabilitate its battered bilateral relations with Israel. Only nine months ago, during the fourth cross-border war in and around the Gaza Strip, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan vigorously blasted Israel. An Islamist and a vocal champion of the Palestinian cause, he condemned Israel as a “terrorist state” […]
Police in riot gear are belatedly clearing the streets of Ottawa of Freedom Convoy protesters who have grossly abused their democratic right to stage peaceful demonstrations. The police are proceeding with extraordinary caution and deliberation despite the protestors’ stubborn refusal to comply with the law and disperse peacefully. Incredibly enough, several have assaulted policemen and even […]
Travelling around Ukraine with a phonograph and wax cylinders in hand, Moyshe Beregovsky methodically preserved the musical heritage of Ukrainian Jews before the Holocaust. A folklorist and ethnomusicologist, he recorded hundreds, if not thousands, of Yiddish, Russian and Ukrainian folk songs, love songs, revolutionary songs, klezmer music and wordless religious melodies (nigunim). He was also […]