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As Israel’s economy grows, more Israelis are giving to charity

At Hadassah\’s centennial celebration in October, 2,000 guests heard about two major philanthropic projects being undertaken by the women\’s Zionist group: a new tower and a new cardiovascular wellness center at its Jerusalem hospitals.

Hadassah awards grants to help women

The Hadassah Foundation has awarded $182,000 in grants for 2011 to help women from diverse cultural groups in Israel and the American Jewish community. This year, due to the global economic downturn, in addition to funding programs in the fields of economic security for low-income Israeli women and leadership and self-esteem programs for adolescent Jewish girls and young women in the United States, the foundation also funded economic empowerment and financial training programs in the United States.

Agudath Israel emphasizes outreach to non-Orthodox

Is it permissible for an Orthodox family to play host to a Jewish couple if they don\’t observe laws mandating sexual abstinence in the period surrounding menstruation?

That was among the questions posed to two leading rabbinic authorities in late November at the 85th national convention of Agudath Israel of America, the main umbrella body for ultra-Orthodox, or haredi, Jewry.

The answer: It is, if the room has two beds.

We must teach about Israel — warts and all

The focus on and radical identification with Israel, the substitution of relationship with Israel for relationship with Judaism or Jewishness, has bequeathed to the American Jewish community a blind spot of our own.

Books: Shoah satire crosses line into nasty territory

Condescension and shame make a toxic combination. As I read \”My Holocaust, \”howling — but aching — through page after page of relentlessly acerbic comedy, I was reminded of Masada and the Grand Canyon and found myself wondering: what makes good satire?

Delegation: Improve Israeli Arabs’ Status

A small group of American Jewish leaders that came to Israel recently is determined to put the issue of Israel\’s Arab minority higher on the American Jewish agenda.

Card-Table Tales

I confess that most of my childhood Passover memories have nothing to do with the Passover story itself. How could they when seders were family dramas enacted against a backdrop of matzah and gefilte fish? Like most American Jewish kids, I started out observing the proceedings from a card table, fidgeting while the grown-ups read from the haggadah.

Investigation of AIPAC Crosses Line

There have been hundreds, even thousands, of articles in the American press regarding an FBI investigation involving the American Israel Public Affairs Committee

An Artistic Homage to Big Brother

Not many artists begin an ambitious new series at 76, but Arnold Mesches did just that after receiving a large box stuffed with FBI documents in 1999. It had taken the Jewish American painter three years and dozens of letters to obtain the 760-page dossier, his FBI file from 1945 to 1972. The papers — obtained under the Freedom of Information Act — chronicle his left-wing activities from the Communist red scare of the 1950s to the Vietnam War era.\n\n

Pressure on Aiding Ethiopians Grows

Increased pressure from officials of American Jewish organizations is driving preliminary talks on a new deal to bring thousands of Ethiopian Jews to Israel before famine takes a heavy toll on the community remaining in Ethiopia.

Coming on the eve of a federation-sponsored trip to Ethiopia, federation leaders, advocates for Ethiopian Jews, representatives of Jewish humanitarian groups and Israeli government officials met recently in Jerusalem to discuss new ways of expediting the emigration process for thousands of Falash Mura left in Ethiopia. The Falash Mura are Ethiopians whose Jewish ancestors converted to Christianity, often under social pressure, but who have resumed practicing Judaism and whose Jewishness is accepted by all three major Jewish religious denominations, including Israel\’s chief rabbinate.

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More news and opinions than at a Shabbat dinner, right in your inbox.

More news and opinions than at a Shabbat dinner, right in your inbox.