This is a time of year that I dread, when I have to write about my three days at LimmudLA, a smorgasbord of everything Jewish. It’s like trying to squeeze 10 or 12 columns into one.
BERLIN — Israeli filmmaker Tomer Heymann almost never stops shooting. He shoots his mother. He shoots his relatives. And, most of all, he shoots his German boyfriend.\n\nHeymann’s latest documentary, “I Shot My Love,” tells the sometimes painful story about how his love affair with his German boyfriend, Andreas Merk, is complicated by the tortured German-Jewish past.\n\nThe film, which debuted last Saturday, is one of several Israeli offerings at the 60th Berlin International Film Festival, which runs through Feb. 21.\n
JERUSALEM — International calls to boycott Israeli goods have not posed a real threat to the country\’s economy, the Bank of Israel\’s governor said.\n\nStanley Fischer also told the annual leadership conference of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations Wednesday that Israel\’s economy has weathered the global recession well.\n\nFischer told the American Jewish leaders that by international standards, Israel\’s economy is relatively advanced.
JERUSALEM — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asked Russia\’s president to return a historic collection of ancient Jewish manuscripts.\n\nDuring a meeting Monday with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, Netanyahu requested that Russia return the Guenzberg collection, the second largest anthology of ancient Hebrew literature, collected by a Russian-Jewish family in the 1840s.
JERUSALEM — National religious Zionist leader Rabbi Mordechai \”Motti\” Elon has been accused of inappropriate conduct by a religious-Zionist forum that deals with complaints of sexual harassment in the religious school system.\n\nIn an announcement Monday, the Takana forum demanded that Elon step away from all rabbinic, teaching and community positions, saying he was a threat to the community.\n
The British government on Wednesday summoned Israel\’s Ambassador to explain the use of passports held by six British-born Israelis in the assassination of a Hamas official in Dubai.\n\nRon Prosor will meet British foreign office officials on Thursday morning. Ireland is also expected to summon Israel\’s Dublin envoy on Thursday, diplomatic sources told Haaretz.\n\nBritish Prime Minister Gordon Brown said on Wednesday he would launch a full investigation into the use of the forged passports by a hit squad that murdered Hamas commander Mahmoud al-Mabhouh last month.
They say we are all children of the same God, but it’s clear we don’t act like it. For centuries we’ve slaughtered one another in the name of God. We’ve enslaved, oppressed, reviled and ridiculed our fellow men and women because their god just looked at us funny. I belong to a people who, because we chose not to believe in somebody else’s idea of God, suffered 2,000 years of mayhem at the hands of true believers. I’m over it — sort of — but a quick glance in any history book makes me wary of those who say the path of human unity is through the Divine.
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