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"If my mother was here, she'd probably be saying, 'Dayenu, enough already,'" said Dr. Eugene Gettelman, who turned 100 in June. "She'd think I was meshugge for having a fourth bar mitzvah."
For those who have dreamed of going from an infinite iPod playlist to playing live on the ones and twos, the bar and bat mitzvah party scene is a great place to get your start. Setting up a DJ business takes practice, planning and professionalism, but it beats baby-sitting and burgers.
Have tough economic times forced you to scale back your child's bar or bat mitzvah party plans? With your 401(k) down, is the ice sculpture out? Is your resetting ARM making you reconsider that 18-piece orchestra?
"Yes we can," Rabbi Daniel Bouskila said, invoking President-elect Barack Obama's ubiquitous mantra.
One thing Rahm Emanuel is not, all agree, is the president-elect's conciliatory signal to the Jewish community after a campaign fraught with worries that Obama would tip toward even-handedness in dealing with the Middle East
" . . . It is troubling that some Orthodox rabbis have joined with the Christian right to eliminate same-sex civil marriage. Banning same-sex civil marriage is about as relevant to Orthodox Judaism as banning the sale of shellfish . . . "
[Jewish voters] are widely perceived as virtually single-issue in outlook, lacking nuance on complex matters and easily pleased. "Throw them a few bones, and they'll be happy," seems to be the operative assessment among the politicians who do the Jewish circuit.
Can fundraising success translate into Capitol Hill clout? That's the question facing J Street, the new liberal pro-Israel political action committee, which raised nearly $570,000 for 41 U.S. House and Senate candidates.
Secular businessman Nir Barkat appeared to be the new mayor of Jerusalem, according to exit polls.
Starting next week, 50 synagogues and 50 mosques throughout the United States and Canada will get together for three days of "twinning" and intensive discussions.
Jewish voices had joined both sides of the bitter and costly Proposition 8 debate leading up to Election Day. Reform and Conservative leaders largely condemned the stripping of civil rights from a fellow minority population, while Orthodox officials praised constitutional protection for the biblical definition of marriage.
Veteran Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) board members Julie Korenstein and Marlene Canter, both of whom are Jewish, announced in late October that they would not seek re-election for their terms, which expire in June.
Parshat Vayera (Genesis 18:1-22:24) May we, like Abraham the Patriarch, be comforted by the appearance of what Abraham Lincoln called, "the better angels of our nature" as they come to transform our country into the caring community for which we pray every day.
For now, we must leave the Lost Tribes of Obama on their own. If their ears could not hear and their eyes could not see all the pre-election warnings that a President Obama may cost Israel its very survival, and in a domino effect destabilize the Western world and America, I have yet to discover the magic words that would wake them from their trance.
Back in 2002, when the Second Intifada was raging, she would regularly put on a hijab and attend Islamic conferences all over Southern California. She was there to document the hateful venom that often permeated these events, reporting her findings to private investigators of radical Islam in America.
A Mount Gilboa town is set to be the first planned, eco-friendly community in Israel, with infrastructure and services designed not just to encourage, but to actually enforce environmentally responsible behavior.
David Wild wants you to know that he is an unabashed Neil Diamond fan. So much so that he has written a book titled, "He Is ... I Say: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Neil Diamond"
" . . . I'd met so many parents who are talented career people, but can be humbled to their knees by a 4-year-old. They'd say, 'Betsy, what do I say? What do I do? Help!' -- so I offer actual scripts that can be a starting point for parents . . . '
Its six members, known for their mix of funk, hip-hop, rock and reggae, rose to the top of the Israeli charts with smart, biting lyrics that reflect Israeli life and appeal to Israel's growing hip-hop scene. The songs often express a leftist point of view and are critical of everything Israeli.
Now that the election is over and campaign exaggerations can give way to reality, in schools, and everywhere else, people are making efforts to put things back into perspective. While a lot of healing may still be needed before that sort of unity can move beyond a Saturday night at the beach, one uniting factor all agree on is that this election brought a new level of political awareness and passion across party lines and across ages.
"People choose to remain gay, and people choose to remain Jewish," said an organizer. "Why should the majority of us be forced to honor that choice?"
As I drove across Los Angeles on election night, I saw clusters of teens and kids in their 20s celebrating on random street corners, high-fiving drivers at red lights. They may not have marched on the Pentagon to end the war in Iraq, but they have given the nation a new president who has pledged to do just that. For the first time since the springtime of the baby boomers, they have become not just consumers to be marketed to, but a political force to be reckoned with.
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11/20/08 6:30 pm
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The Jewish character has become the American Jewish character, disassociated from an ethnic history and assimilated into American culture. And the assimilation hasn't only been for Jews.
The kosher meat market is in a tailspin as production at the Agriprocessors' meatpacking plant in Postville, Iowa, which had been operating at a fraction of its normal capacity since May, finally ground to a halt this week. The company, whose meat was sold under the labels
Parshat Chayei Sarah (Genesis 23:1-25:18) God is present when two people commit their lives to each other and become one family.
The start of the event was running late -- did I mention it was a Jewish event? -- and midway through our green room conversation, Hitchens pulled out a small bottle of Johnnie Walker Black. He emptied it into a 16-ounce clear-plastic cup and drizzled in some Crystal Geyser