Posted on: July 3rd, 2012

I had the honor of spending an evening with the former Prime Minister. I was enthralled with his stories and life lessons, especially with his core conviction that a leader must truly believe in and be ready to defend his policies. If a leader does so, he told me, there is no need to worry about the criticism that will inevitably follow any brave decision.

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Posted on: July 3rd, 2012

Absurd, isn’t it - Israel should take a loan to support an organization that officially considers Jews the offspring of apes and pigs and venerates ‘heroes’ like Samir Kuntar and Dalal Mughrabi whose heroism consisted of murdering Jewish children?

Posted on: July 3rd, 2012

There I was, in dire gloom, cart frozen well distant from the cash register. I was sorely aggrieved. Until I remembered a flash of soul-searching during my flight when I promised I would try to improve my grumpiness a bit and seek alleged silver linings even in dismal circumstances. What could I do save give my commitment the old college try.

Posted on: July 3rd, 2012

A short response to Tzvi Fishman's (“Felafel on Rye”) recent blog posts on America and Jewish identity.

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Posted on: July 2nd, 2012

When Free Speech Collides with Hate Speech, Truth is the Remedy.

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Posted on: July 2nd, 2012

Had Mark Zuckerberg been told that the Jewish people have a mission to rebuild a Jewish state, and that his creative talents are needed, he may have harnessed his mind in that direction. Had he been offered an opportunity to take part in the most exciting project of the Jewish people in two-thousand years, he probably would have taken it.

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Posted on: June 27th, 2012

Disbelief and denial are two words that can describe the alcohol and drug problem in the Jewish community, and that is a problem in itself.

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Posted on: June 27th, 2012

I have tried to lead a life in which the core values are Ahavas Torah and Ahavas Yisrael. To the extent I have succeeded I did so by taking an unusual route – one I do not generally recommend. I moved into the Torah world and Torah learning after I already had a sophisticated secular education and a clear path to a wide choice of prestigious professional opportunities.

Posted on: June 27th, 2012

Worried about a nuclear Iran? Do you think such a development would not only threaten Israel's existence but would intimidate the Arab countries of the Gulf, put the radical Islamist regime in position to threaten the West, and lead to unmanageable nuclear proliferation? Have no fear! Kenneth N. Waltz, the highly respected professor of international relations at Columbia University, argues in a recent article of Foreign Affairs magazine that "Iran Should Get the Bomb."

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Posted on: June 27th, 2012

When Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney told the passionately pro-Israel members of the Faith and Freedom Coalition that he would “do the opposite” of the things that President Obama has done regarding Israel, the room erupted in applause. They understood exactly what he meant because they know the Obama administration has not strengthened the U.S.-Israel relationship. President Obama has brought that strategic alliance to its lowest point in decades.

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Posted on: June 27th, 2012

Gov. Mitt Romney has made some outrageous comments and taken some extreme positions in this presidential campaign. But few, if any, are more baffling than his latest statement on his plans for the U.S.-Israel relationship. Asked what he would do to strengthen America’s alliance with Israel, he said, “by and large, you can just look at the things the president has done and do the opposite.”

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Posted on: June 26th, 2012

Over the last decade, we've seen the convergence and alliance of Islamism with the far Left (and, with time, the not-so-far Left).  Today, there seems to be another supposedly "impossible" convergence underway:  We are witnessing the beginnings of an alliance between the radical Right (KKK, neo-Nazis, etc.) and the radical black Left (Black Panthers, Farrakhan, etc.) 

Posted on: June 26th, 2012

At the recent President's Conference in Jerusalem - though Shimon Peres and others spoke about the dearth of women in professional life in Israel, few spoke about the amazing lack of women presenters at the conference. I counted only about a hand-full. One was Ayaan Hirsi-Ali.

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Posted on: June 20th, 2012

Prior to the creation of the Kol Tzedek program, only a handful of sexual abuse allegations from the Orthodox community were reported to my office each year. Our information was that victims of sexual assault in the community were afraid to come forward and report to secular authorities due to enormous community disapproval and pressure. In an effort to overcome these obstacles and encourage reporting of these heinous crimes, and to ensure the continued cooperation of the victim with the prosecution, my office launched Project Kol Tzedek.

Posted on: June 20th, 2012

In February, Israel’s Supreme Court ruled the Tal Law discriminatory and unconstitutional in a vote of six to three. The law, which provides exemptions for young men studying in yeshiva full time, has been the subject of much criticism and controversy.

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Posted on: June 20th, 2012

The world famous economist John Kenneth Galbraith said it best: “There are few ironclad rules of diplomacy but to one there is no exception. When an official reports that talks were useful, it can safely be concluded that nothing was accomplished.”

Posted on: June 20th, 2012

Since Oslo we have had some Israeli governments emulate Neville Chamberlain’s foolish position. While the current government has not done so, there certainly is vast room for improvement in the presentation of Israel’s case to the world.

Posted on: June 17th, 2012

How do we rectify the sin of the spies? By doing the exact opposite of what they did. We need to love Israel with all our hearts, and to take every measure that is antithetical to rejecting it. Because the original sin was committed through slanderous speech and scare tactics, we can repair the damage by focusing on positive, empowering speech for Israel.

Posted on: June 14th, 2012

Notice the amazing historical confluence of the ingathering with the communications revolution: just as the Jewish people were set to start off on the adventure of building a state in the Middle East, so too did the technology to communicate and broadcast globally explode - from the wire, to the radio, to the TV, to the internet, to the iPhone - there are no boundaries to the exchange of information.

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Posted on: June 13th, 2012

On January 31, my family’s world was turned upside down. I received a phone call from my mother early in the morning. “Go to Baltimore, your sister is sick. Daddy and I are flying up today [from Florida]. Her organs are shutting down. It’s bad.”