In the Forward’s opinion section, you’ll find analysis and essays from diverse corners of the Jewish world.
To pitch an opinion piece, email our Opinion Editor, Talya Zax.
In the Forward’s opinion section, you’ll find analysis and essays from diverse corners of the Jewish world.
To pitch an opinion piece, email our Opinion Editor, Talya Zax.
Israel has become a defining fact of Jewish life for Zionist and anti-Zionist Jews alike
With the appointment of Professor Deborah Lipstadt as the new Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism, attention will focus on the Biden Administration’s plans to confront the persistent scourge of antisemitism which has increased in the wake of the COVID pandemic and the recent conflict. She will have an enormous task taking on the…
It’s rare to be able to put a number on corporate tolerance of hate speech. But in a recent experiment, we were able to do so — and the results are chilling. During six weeks this summer, we flagged and reported hundreds of egregious posts containing antisemitism to social media platforms using their own user…
As someone long involved with Jewish youth groups, Shira Wolkenfeld’s recent “New Voices” investigation on the toxic sexual culture that exists within many of them was difficult to read. In the extensive article, Wolkenfeld documents incidents of groping during convention Shabbat dinners, over-sexualization, pressures to hookup and sexual assault. I struggled to reconcile this portrait…
This article is not about Bob Moses. By that I mean it’s a tribute to a man who insisted that his lifelong efforts to repair the world didn’t always have to be about him. What’s remarkable is that he did repair much of it — in a career dedicated to securing full citizenship rights and…
Sometime soon, President Biden will likely nominate a candidate for the Department of State’s Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism. Regardless of who is selected, the envoy-designee will be asked at their confirmation hearing what they think of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism, which has been adopted by many governments,…
Editor: I adamantly disagree with Dani Klein’s recent op-ed in these pages, “Kosher certification should not be a political weapon.” Yes, of course, rabbis and other Kashrut inspectors should be concerned about ingredients, but why should food companies that hurt our fellow Jews receive certification? The vast majority of those whom observe the laws of…
The recent uproar over Ben & Jerry’s’ decision to stop sales of its products in the Jewish communities of Judea and Samaria has many in the Jewish community enraged — along with the board of Ben & Jerry’s’ parent company, Unilever — and rightfully so. This blatant targeting of Israel and Jews is nothing new,…
Love or hate Julia Haart, the star of the Netflix reality show “My Unorthodox Life,” you have to admit that she has focused our attention on a very serious issue: you can’t leave the ultra-Orthodox world easily. Haart, relying on her secular education and business savvy, managed to propel her family into a Manhattan penthouse…
Ben and Jerry’s decision to stop selling their ice cream in the settlements caught the new Israeli government by surprise. After years of the Netanyahu-Trump quite effectively shelving the Palestinian issue and the (very welcomed) signing of normalization treaties between Israel and four Arab countries for the first time in over 25 years, the movement…
Ben & Jerry’s decision to stop distributing its products in West Bank settlements has unleashed a head-swirling discourse about BDS, ice cream and antisemitism that is quite disproportionate to the effect the Vermont-based company will actually have. But all this Chunky Monkey is hiding a more a concerning story: Despite the anger of some pro-Israel…
As Israel’s Olympic baseball team makes its way to Tokyo, they might capture more hearts here in America than back home. After all, it feels like there are more baseball diamonds in my town of Maple Glen, Penn., than there are in the entire country of Israel. But while baseball may not be at the…
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