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News Can American Jews Rescue Western Wall Prayer Deal?
The deadline for resolving the crisis over the new egalitarian prayer space at the Western Wall in Jerusalem has been extended indefinitely, after an aide to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu failed to draft a solution acceptable to the opposing sides within the 60 days he was allotted. Meanwhile, leaders of the Reform and Conservative movements…
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Breaking News Rockland County Reform Temple Goes on Auction Block for $6.7M
NEW YORK (JTA) — A 51-year-old Reform temple in New York’s Rockland County — an area whose liberal Jewish population has plummeted in recent decades as its haredi Orthodox community has rapidly grown — is closing its doors. Temple Beth El will in June vacate its building in Spring Valley, 3 miles from the Hasidic…
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Opinion Why Are Israelis Lashing Out at Reform Jews? Because We’ve Reached the Tipping Point!
Malcolm Gladwell had it right: “There comes a time when an idea, trend or social behavior crosses a threshold, tips, and spreads like wildfire.” Thomas Kuhn, a historian of science who wrote of similar tendencies in his classic “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions,” would have called this the moment of “paradigm change.” Whichever author’s construction…
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Opinion Can Reform Jews Win Battle for the Soul of Israel?
The attacks continue. I am speaking not of the violent physical attacks that have dominated the news in Israel lately, but rather the attacks by the Israeli Orthodox establishment upon Jews standing up for their rights. Jews striving to bring to fruition the words of Israel’s Declaration of Independence, which call for “complete equality of…
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News Ultra-Orthodox Rabbi Slams Reform Jews as ‘Heretics’ — but Backs Western Wall Prayer Deal Anyway
(JTA) — Rabbi Avigdor Nebenzahl, former chief rabbi of Jerusalem’s Old City, is no fan of Reform and Conservative Judaism. In a letter sent Thursday to Israel’s chief rabbis, the haredi Orthodox Nebenzahl calls the movements “heretical religions.” They are “uprooting the religion and hurting everything holy to us,” he writes. “Their war against the…
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Breaking News Ultra-Orthodox Lawmaker Compares Reform Jews to Mentally Ill
A haredi Orthodox lawmaker in Israel reportedly compared the Reform movement to a mentally ill person. Israel Eichler of the United Torah Judaism party made his remarks Tuesday in the lead-up to a Knesset debate the next day on the Supreme Court’s decision that non-Orthodox converts can immerse in a public mikvah, according to the…
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Breaking News Reform Jews Thank Bibi for Western Wall Prayer Deal
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met in Jerusalem with leaders of the American Reform movement, who thanked him for the decision to expand the egalitarian prayer section at the Western Wall. The leaders, in Israel for the annual meeting of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, the Reform movement’s rabbinical organization, met with Netanyahu on…
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Life Is the Kotel Compromise Another ‘Status Quo’ Agreement?
Yesterday the leaders of the Reform Movement in Israel and the U.S. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for the deal to expand the egalitarian prayer plaza at Robinson’s Arch. Less than a year ago, on the day I was viciously stomped in the stomach at the Kotel, a friend cynically asked: “Why did you put yourself…
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News Scoop: Heritage Foundation plans to ‘identify and target’ Wikipedia editors
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Fast Forward Their Pacific Palisades synagogue is standing, but all three rabbis lost their homes
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Music For Bob Dylan’s biographer, ‘A Complete Unknown’ is a dream come true — even if it’s mostly fiction
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News LA fires won’t stop bar mitzvahs this Shabbat, as joy and pain meet
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News HIAS cuts 22 staff even as it braces for Trump immigration crackdown
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Fast Forward A synagogue that survived the Palisades fire has become a ‘refuge’ for many who lost their homes
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News When fire spread to West Hollywood, a rabbi’s mom chose to grab candlesticks
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