Michael Berenbaum is director of the Sigi Ziering Institute and a professor of Jewish Studies at American Jewish University.
In the wake of the horrific terrorist killings in France, my heart took many turns. First there was shock, soon replaced by grief, then anger, followed by resolve. Now it may be time for reflection.
Much will have been written over the next few days about the massive contribution that Rabbi Harold Schulweis has made to Jewish life in our time.
Before there was Eichmann, there was Kasztner.
I began reading Rabbi Edward Feinstein’s “The Chutzpah Imperative: Empowering Today’s Jews for a Life that Matters” (Jewish Lights) with two conflicting emotions — admiration and skepticism.
The media has covered casino magnate Sheldon Adelson’s address to the Israeli-American Council, a recently formed organization of Israelis who live in the United States, many of whom have truthfully become Israeli Americans.
It is far too early to assess the impact of the latest war in Gaza, but still some preliminary thoughts are in order:
I have been in Israel for the past several days attending conferences on the Holocaust at Yad Vashem and at the Ghetto Fighters’ House, near Nahariya — all amid the shelling.
Ordinarily, Jews have little interest in whom the Roman Catholic Church canonizes as saints. Yet, on the Sunday after Easter, the day that coincides with Yom Ha-Shoah, the 27th of Nisan, two men, Pope John XXIII and Pope John Paul II, will be elevated to sainthood, and both of them bear notice.
In his new biography, “Menachem Begin: The Battle for Israel’s Soul” (New York: Next Book, Schocken), Daniel Gordis writes passionately…
The anguish of the believer is not the same as that of the renegade, and Ari Shavit writes as a believer in the Zionist enterprise.
