First responders have been, rightly so, the focus of national attention since the terrorist attacks at the finish line of the Boston Marathon this past April. We have marveled at men and women tearing down barricades, running in the direction of smoke and chaos, unmoved by possible personal injury, in order to care for the needs of others.
Shari Rosenman decided to homeschool her children because it gave her the freedom to set her family’s schedule. Leat Silvera does it because she wants her children to pursue their passions.
Robin Solomon stood in the Ponary Forest in Lithuania, surrounded by fellow educators who wore white and sang Yiddish songs, accompanied by a violinist.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said new Iranian President Hassan Rohani’s call for serious negotiations over his country’s nuclear program is a ploy to continue enriching uranium.
In a way, New Community Jewish High School’s Purim shpiels said it all. For the past several years, students at New Community Jewish High School (NCJHS) — founded in 2002 and commonly known as New Jew, for short — would use the opportunity of Purim, when it’s customary to perform humorous skits, to make fun of their school’s biggest shortcoming — namely that students ate lunch on a parking lot because, well, as tenants renting temporary space from a West Hills synagogue, there was nowhere else for them to eat.
“Why all these values, rabbi?” preteen Josh asked. “Can’t you just say we should be good people?” Often it is the most basic questions that set me thinking, and Josh’s query sure did.
Two weeks ago, the Dutch public learned of what appeared to be an unprecedented victory for European advocates of boycotting Israeli products. Four major supermarket chains reportedly declared a boycott of products from the West Bank, eastern Jerusalem and the Golan Heights.
Rabbi Aaron Panken, the newly announced president-elect of Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR), said just days after being named that he hopes to bring a fresh perspective to the Reform movement’s academic home by marrying technology, creativity and a renewed commitment to Reform values, including at the HUC-JIR Los Angeles campus.
Dorothy Greenstein — then Devorah Kirszenbaum — was upstairs in her family’s apartment in Otwock, Poland, preparing for her first day of third grade and coaxing her 2-year-old nephew to eat when suddenly the whole house shook. Bombs were falling.
“Arab Idol” winner Mohammed Assaf has received permission from Israel to move from the Gaza Strip to the West Bank in order to pursue his musical career.
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