Israeli and Palestinian leaders must decide soon on whether to revive long-dormant peace negotiations to end their decades-old conflict, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Friday.
On a new industrial park in Israel's largest Arab town, a software plant belonging to a multibillion-dollar U.S.-listed firm sits cheek-by-jowl with two small Arab-owned businesses: a metal factory and one producing tools for brain surgery.
Looks like FX is going to be injecting some humor into their lineup. Not a bad idea, we think, after many seasons of the awesome yet dark series “Justified” or…
In June 1965, during the most violent days of the civil rights movement, 21-year-old Paul Saltzman drove from Toronto to Mississippi to become a freedom fighter with the Student Nonviolent…
Microsoft Corp gave the world a first look at its new Xbox One on Tuesday, announcing that its first gaming console in eight years will come with exclusive video and…
Amy Salko Robertson — producer of such films as “The Oh in Ohio,” “Lab Rats” and “When Do We Eat?” a comedy set at a Passover seder —realized that she…
Champions Maccabi Tel Aviv have reasserted their dominance of Israeli soccer but media reports on Tuesday suggested they might have to continue their revival without coach Oscar Garcia.
Actress Angelina Jolie just announced that she underwent a preventive double mastectomy after learning that she was genetically predisposed to cancer. Her disclosure was a powerful show of solidarity with…
Muhammad al-Durrah, the little boy who became the symbol of the Al-Aqsa Intifada, is returning to the headlines after a decade. A photo of him, crying, leaning against a wall…
Recently, People Magazine came out with an article about Ashley Hamilton talking openly about his struggles with an eating disorder. I applaud Ashley for coming out about having an eating…
Last night, Showtime’s The Big C aired its final episode. After three seasons of half-hour installments, this comedy returned for a shortened final season consisting of four hour-long episodes. Subtitled…
I just got back from Shabbat in Kibbutz Nir-Am, which is located directly between Gaza and the Israeli town of Sderot. Nir-Am has been shelled for the past seven years with hundreds of Kassam rockets fired across the border, and I visited tonight to see how one family tries to live a normal life under abnormal circumstances.
I am blogging now, so I must have made it back safe. (Save a Kassam shot off five minutes after I arrived, the cab ride back, during which my driver entered the wrong side of a split highway, was more dangerous.) But I have to wonder what might have been had I gone into Jerusalem’s Old City today as I planned to.
I planned to walk from my hotel through the Jaffa Gate in the late morning but decided to go shopping for my wife and sister first. Fortunately, I ran out of time. Here’s what did happen at the Jaffa Gate:
A security guard shot and killed an Arab
attacker in the Old City of Jerusalem on Friday after the man shot and moderately wounded another security guard, police said.
Ten bystanders were lightly to moderately wounded in the shootout - apparently from the guard’s gunfire - including six Jews, two Armenians and two Muslims.
I’m waiting until tomorrow to go to the Old City.
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Marshall Allen is an old journalism friend of mine (by that I mean I’ve known him a little more than two years). He used to write about religion and crime—saints and sinners—for the Pasadena Star-News but moved last year to Sin City.
He has a story in the Las Vegas Sun that says the state insurance commissioner is shutting down Nevada operations a national Christian health care provider but they don’t have an insurance license. The company, Christian Care Medi-Share, argues that it doesn’t need a license because it’s not an insurance company; it’s a collective.
Medi-Share is a “mutually sharing ministry” among Christians who agree to help pay one another’s health costs, Sullivan said. Medi-Share members pay monthly “shares,” not premiums, ranging from $223 for singles younger than 40 to $459 for families. Members must profess to be Christians and adhere to a morally conservative lifestyle, including no tobacco and no abuse of drugs or alcohol. They risk having requests for money denied if their medical condition is the result of what is deemed a nonbiblical lifestyle.
Such conditions raise a red flag for the Nevada insurance commissioner’s office. For example, Medi-Share - whose guidelines are created by its members - provides coverage for pregnant married women but not for single mothers unless there’s evidence of a rape that has been reported to police.
Medi-Share membership is not open to non-Christians or to Christians with preexisting medical conditions.
Church leaders may be called to verify the testimony of applicants, the guidelines say.
Here’s my question: So say someone has a crisis of faith that becomes known to Medi-Share—could they be barred from medical coverage?
JERUSALEM, Aug. 8—“You are not to directly quote the prime minister,” Ehud Olmert’s press handler told a group of American Jewish journalists I’ve been traveling with this week.
This directive came as we sat in a conference room in the leader of Israel’s Jerusalem offices. It seemed a ridiculous request, but the prime minister’s fears made more sense once the meeting was over.
When Olmert walked confidently into the conference room, he shook some hands, said ‘Shalom’ and posed for a photo with a few journalists. Dressed in a navy suit and red tie, he sat tall, speaking in fluent English as he cracked jokes and invited our questions—and that’s when the meeting went south.
Asked about the hundreds of millions of dollars sent by American Jews to help Israel during and after last summer’s war with Hezbollah, Olmert responded that the donations were very important—but he stopped short of calling it necessary.
If a giver wants to give and the receiver wants to get, Olmert said, God bless that situation. And as we’ve seen this week, God—or human resourcefulness—has blessed a quick reconstruction of northern Israel.
But Olmert’s comments seemed particularly ungrateful because he spoke not only to the American journalists, but also to some top officials of the United Jewish Communities (UJC).
Through the UJC’s Israel Emergency Campaign last summer, North American federations sent $360 million to Israel. UJC is also the sponsor of this media trip, which was designed to show reporters and editors how American donations have been used. UJC officials have shuttled our group, including editors and writers from major Jewish publications in Washington, New York, Philadelphia and L.A., to show us the pain inflicted by war.
They arranged this forum with the prime minister to allow him to speak to the most philanthropic Diaspora community—and this is what he says?
That is the beginning of a column I just filed from Jerusalem after meeting with the prime minister earlier today. Check out the rest at jewishjournal.com, and let me know what you think.
Last month, Matisyahu appeared on the cover of the Christian hipster magazine Relevant and said Jesus had “started a new wave of Judaism.” A few weeks later, he told the weekly Miami New Times that he’d broken from the Chabad-Lubavitch movement. Here is what the Forward had to say:
Matisyahu, however, maintains that heâs still âreally religious,â and says that he prays and meditates before every performance. But some Lubavitchers have cited another reason to worry: After he davens, Matisyahu turns on Jay-Z and drinks wine to relax.
I’m probably thinking this because I’m drinking a Maccabees beer as I type, but: Oh my G-d.
I knew this day would come. Actually, since I profiled blogger Luke Ford for the cover of The Jewish Journal (I was speaking with other Jewish journalists yesterday, and they were appalled by this reality), Luke has been up and down on how he’s felt about the story. But we talked Friday and he said he thought it was fair and that his inner-Amalek “loved it.”
Today he wrote on his blog, that I was, in fact, a major disappointment:
For a decade, Iâve fantasized about appearing on the cover of the Jewish Journal.
Iâve spent more time thinking about what Iâll say in that ultimate interview than Iâve spent trying to pick up chicks.
(I have a far richer inner life than social life.)
I always thought this article would come at the hands of Amy Klein. I pictured us over lunch and how I would whip out my tape recorder when she started the on-the-record part of our conversation and all the brilliant justifications Iâd give her for my abominable behavior. (Some people use their intelligence to make the world a better place. I use mine to rationalize my sins.)
But then my time came at the hands of 25-year-old Christian Brad A. Greenberg. Bradâs a good reporter but heâs no Amy Klein. And when he started asking me questions, well, I just answered them. The whole thing didnât run anything like my fantasies. We didnât even hook up afterwards because that wouldâve been against the Torah.
WASHINGTON (ABP)—Beginning with ancient Christians martyred by the Roman Empire and running through Thomas Becket, Dietrich Bonhoeffer and beyond, church leaders often have spoken truth to the secular powers—regardless of the consequences.But in the months leading up to the now-unpopular Iraq war, did the United Statesâ powerful conservative evangelical community step away from its responsibility to speak hard truths to the government?
Mark Pinsky, the religion reporter for the Orlando Sentinel, agreeswithThe God Blog (well not, me directly, but I can dream ...) that the evangelical Christian vote is up for grabs in the 2008 presidential election.
Pinsky, who recently wrote “A Jew Among the Evangelicals: A Guide for the Perplexed,” writes in USA Today:
On Sunday mornings, it’s now commonplace to see presidential candidates in church pulpits or pews, proclaiming their faith and â not coincidentally â jockeying furiously (but piously) for crucial “values voters.”So, with so much at stake, now might be a good time to ask, “Who speaks for America’s evangelicals?”Will it continue to be bombastic, GOP-leaning, Southern preachers, such as the late Jerry Falwell, and strident, hard-line broadcasters such as Pat Robertson and Focus on the Family’s James Dobson? I don’t think so. From my neighborhood in the suburban Sunbelt, it is clear that a subtle, incremental but nonetheless tectonic shift is underway. And this is more than what Freud called “the narcissism of small differences.” As Joel Hunter says, the evangelical vote is now a “jump ball.”
Earlier this week, Rob Eshman, The Jewish Journal‘s editor in chief, spent two days in Utah at a conference were leading thinkers of American Jewry tried to answer a seemingly simple question: Why be Jewish?
The answer, obviously, is not so easy.
But Jews like to talk. God talked to Moses and told him to talk to the people. The people talked back, and we really haven’t shut up since.
The Bronfman Foundation, which sponsored the conference last week in Deer Valley, Utah, is set to launch something called the Bronfman Vision Forum that will offer new ways to invigorate and revitalize Jewish life, and this conference was designed to help generate new ideas and programs, and, yes, more conferences. What an endearing and Jewish idea—that talking will save the Jewish people.
But long days of listening provided clarity when Rob listened to Rabbi David Wolpe of Sinai Temple in Westwood.
As he spoke—and as I stared at the back of his head going on hour three—the answer became clear. Why be Jewish? Four words. It’s good for you.
Deep community, spiritual succor, emotional comfort, a challenging intellectual framework for understanding why we’re here, a moral compass to guide you and your children, mental and spiritual discipline, an approach to the Infinite and a shared fate.
It may not always be easy, it may not always feel right, it may not always bring transcendence, it may not be right for everyone at every stage in life, but it’s good for you.
You, of course, may not agree. But we can talk about it.
I’ve offered my thoughts on this before, and I will again. There are varying degrees and ways by which people self-identify as Jewish. (I sipped tea yesterday with Rachel Levin, who has been very involved in addressing this through REBOOT.)
For a Christian named Greenberg, I’m more aware of the way others identify Jews—by their name, appearance, attire, profession. But that doesn’t change the fact that inside the tribe, Jewish paranoia guarantees that every generation will worry about whether the next will care about being Jewish.
Baghdad was once one of the great cradles of Jewish culture and wisdom, but now, according to the Christian priest who has been looking after them, there are only eight Jews left in the Iraqi capital, and their situation is “more than desperate.” The Rev. Canon Andrew White, the Anglican chaplain to Iraq, says that the small group is in considerable danger.
That is the opening of an uncharacteristically boring and uninspiring story in Time magazine.
Honestly, I’m surprised any Jews remain in Baghdad considering the sectarian violence that has riven the city. The Iraqi government doesn’t acknowledge them because of fears that it might incite violence and Jewish aid has remained out of the area. Israel’s not a far journey from Iraq, but the article says the entire group has not agreed to emigrate, and that they’re sticking together.
“I don’t want them to leave at all because the Jewish presence here is very important,” White says. “But unless we care for them, I dread for what is going to happen to them. I do not want them to leave, but I think that is the only way.”
Luke Ford has a few goodposts on his blog in response to my profile of him. (He also has audio of our six-hour interview.) In one titled “Unrequited Love,” you can feel Ford’s pain at being rejected by Orthodox congregations:
I read the Jewish Journal profile of me and I wince. Itâs embarrassing. There are four great shuls in Pico-Robertson that I love â Aish Ha Torah, Young Israel Century of City, Beth Jacob, and Chabad Bais Bazelel â but they, understandably, rejected me.
Itâs the same thing with the ladies. Iâve met great women in Los Angeles, but theyâve rejected me.
Google (aka reality) is my enemy.
What do you do with that most embarrassing of feelings â unrequited love? I canât intellectualize it. I can only cop to it.
P.S. Rabbi Aryeh Markman is my Unkind Jew of the Month. Read the article and youâll see why.
Heâs a blunt, no-nonsense bloke who gets things done.
Like other rabbis at Aish, he opened his home to me when I was a lost soul.
Loyal readers are familiar with the name Luke Ford. He is an LA blogger who writes about kinky porn, Orthodox Judaism and sinful politicians. But Luke is a contentious figure in the Jewish community, of which he is a convert into, and is both loved and loathed by people in the porn industry.
“Ford is an interesting cat—a nice guy and a snake, all at the same time,” a friend told me.
Of late, Luke has been receiving quite a bit more attention. He was the one who first reported that Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa had stopped wearing his wedding rings, that the nuptials were failing. And in June his reporting was vindicated.
Luke is a complex character, a man of many layers, and I set out last week to profile him for the cover of this week’s Jewish Journal. I spent six hours with him—eating together, praying together—and tomorrow I’ll put some of the audio online. Here’s a snippet from the print story:
His techniques were unorthodox, and not simply because he kept kosher and Shabbat while profiting from pornography. Trading in rumor and innuendo, lawsuits became part of the gig because he was willing to publish one-source stories and anonymous accusations as fact.
“There are three reasons why people come into the adult industry and two of them are wrong. The first is sex, which is mechanical, and the second is money, which is incidental. The primary reason is for the glory, and Luke has made himself glorious,” said Bill “Papa Bear” Margold, once dubbed “the renaissance man of porn” by Playboy. “He is the first site you go to see what is going on. Even if he doesn’t know what is going on, you go there to see that he doesn’t know what is going on.”
But his notoriety as an adult-industry blogger complicated Ford’s search for a spiritual home in Los Angeles’ Orthodox community. The first shul to give him the boot was Aish HaTorah in 1995 for being too antagonistic and again in 1998 when Rabbi Moshe Cohen discovered Ford’s double life as a porn journalist.
“He was one of the Torah weirdos,” said Rabbi Aryeh Markman, the shul’s executive director. “You get all sorts of people showing up in shul and we bust them. ‘I’m happy you’re looking for a place to daven. But this isn’t one of them.’ And you throw them out. ... The antithesis of Torah is porn.”
(skip)
He lives in a guesthouse occupying half a converted garage. In a narrow room smaller than a college dorm, a few blankets—Ford’s bed—lay on the ground between his desk and the bathroom door, against which two white pillows rest. A bookshelf is lined with Judaica items and books on the Talmud, Jewish history and English literature; most of the books he reads come from the library.
There is a fridge and microwave; cassette tapes of recorded phone conversations are piled on the floor, a smorgasbord of bottled vitamins and medication cover a white dresser with gilded accents. “The Hovel,” as Ford endearingly refers to it, feels dank and smells worse, but for $600 a month, it’s home.
Ford posts the story, slips into the bathroom to wash his hands, then locks up and begins the half-mile schlep to shul.
“This is a good place,” an elderly man says to a teenage boy as Ford reads a Talmud commentary before a minyan has arrived. “You’re welcome here. You can come in the morning; you can come in the evening. You will feel good here.”
Certainly, that is true for Ford. This is the place that gives his life structure and purpose and stability. This is the only shul that’s let him continue davening there after discovering the depraved world within which he works. Judaism is not about a personal relationship with God, and without an accepting community there is no religious observance. For a convert like Ford, there is no Jewish identity absent Judaism.
“Orthodox Judaism in general, not just going to shul, gives me much needed structure,” Ford says after the service ended. “I have no core. I’m way too flexible on the things I do. This gives me some structure, and it’s important for me to bounce off the same people everyday…. It gives my life meaning, it gives my life rhythm, it gives my day a beginning and end. And it reminds me that there is a God.”
He returns home and hops in his van—a distinctly dented and rusted old GTE work van—and heads out to the Valley. He’s got a porn party to infiltrate.
The Luke Ford post has been taken down temporarily. It will be reposted Thursday afternoon, when The Jewish Journal cover story on Ford goes live. Sorry for the inconvenience.
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