Switzerland is renowned for its delectable chocolate bars and candies, precision-made watches, exquisite ski resorts and magnificent alpine scenery. Having visited the country several times, I can attest to its superlative qualities. Switzerland’s dark side is far less evident, but it emerges compellingly in Mike Shaerer’s six-part television series, Labyrinth of Peace, which will be screened […]
Arabs comprise 21 percent of Israel’s population, yet almost half of the players on the Israeli national soccer team are Arabs. Shuki Guzik’s interesting 52-minute documentary, A Common Goal, examines this curious phenomenon. It will be screened online by the Calgary Jewish Film Festival on November 17 at 7 p.m. The festival, now in its […]
Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett wants the best of both worlds. He seeks to enlarge Israel’s footprint in the West Bank by expanding Jewish settlements while, paradoxically enough, reducing friction with the Palestinians. Bennett’s policy is contradictory, aimed at consolidating Israel’s occupation of the contested West Bank, encouraging the Palestinians to accept autonomy rather than […]
The recreational use of cannabis is currently illegal in Israel, but medical marijuana is perfectly legal. Working within these parameters, Assaf Abiri and Mattan Guggenheim present Greener Pastures, a feature-length Hebrew-language movie that deals comedically with this contentious issue. Scheduled to be screened online by the Toronto Jewish Film Foundation from November 18-21, it stars […]
Ranked academically above all other secondary schools in San Francisco, Lowell High School is known as an “Asian excellency school.” Its relentless competitive environment forces its majority Asian student body to study hard and achieve high marks as to gain entry into the top universities in the United States. Debbie Lum’s interesting and sometimes heart-wrenching documentary, Try […]
The Gaza Strip, a densely-populated and impoverished enclave ruled by Hamas and blockaded by Israel and Egypt, evokes a sense of grimness and desperation. To outsiders, the everyday lives of its inhabitants are a blank, except when they’re filmed sorting through the ruins of buildings bombed by the Israeli Air Force after yet another cross-border […]
Irish novelist Sally Rooney is looking for a new Hebrew publisher, having decided she can no longer work with an Israeli publishing house. Rooney is entitled to her views, however skewed they may be. And she is not the first foreign author to boycott Israel. Alice Walker and Kamila Shamsie preceded her. But Rooney should […]
For Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s former prime minister, political survival is not only a means to an end, but an indicator of his true persona. Several days ago, Netanyahu — a secular Jew in every respect — showed his true colors when he retweeted an appallingly divisive message from Aryeh Deri, the leader of the ultra-Orthodox […]
It was the least conceivable assignment these American Jewish soldiers expected to receive as World War II raged. Having enlisted in the U.S. armed forces to fight Nazi Germany on the battlefield, they found themselves instead in a secluded camp in Virginia interrogating captured German prisoners of war and scientists and engineers. Most of the […]
A trial is currently under way in a U.S. federal court pitting 24 white supremacists and neo-Nazis against nine plaintiffs who suffered psychological and physical trauma during a violent Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, in the summer of 2017. The rally, which took place from August 11-12, began on a Friday night as hundreds of white […]