InDepth

Influence Of The Press    It's hard to believe it's been seven years since the passing of Rabbi Sholom Klass, zt"l, thanks to whom a...

It pains me to tell you this, but Ehud Olmert has actually done something right.

With Presidents Day coming up next Monday, it seemed like the ideal time to chat with Paul Kengor, associate professor of political science and executive director of the Center for Vision & Values at Grove City College in Grove City, Pennsylvania.

When questioned by non-Jews or the unaffiliated about the role of women in Orthodox life, I have sometimes found it helpful to explain how the Torah approach diverges from a seminal principle of American jurisprudence.

It’s no secret to those who know me that I have a great appreciation for chazzanut. I have written many articles about the wonderful cantorial concerts I’ve attended sponsored by Cantors World, an organization dedicated to bringing back the great role of the chazzan in Jewish life. But as enjoyable as those events are, it’s almost impossible to equal the amazing experience of the annual Shabbat Chazzanut.

I have been hooked on movies from the moment I saw “Fantasia” and “The Red Shoes” at the Windsor Movie Theatre in Boro Park when I was six or seven years old. Movie-going, like book-reading, became permanent habits and I eventually turned to foreign films in the same way that I turned to classical theatre, music, poetry, and literature: in order to understand the human condition. A little bit of dazzle and drama were fine too.

As President Bush likely realized in his recent speech, the true state of our union is intimately intertwined with the state of our whole world. Our fate as Americans will depend upon our willing identification as citizens on an imperiled planet. Surely we now have the Iraq War to re-evaluate, but even so substantial and overwhelming a problem is just the tip of much larger iceberg. This "iceberg" is the always-universal nature of humankind.

Outstanding Community   Re "Memphis, Tennessee: The Jerusalem of the South" (Contemporary Jewish Kehilla, Jan. 26):    My family and I moved to Memphis after being...

   I. We are neo-Nazis who strive for the complete destruction of Israel and of the Jewish people. We think this destruction can be...

One of the factors that hindered the proper early development of Judaism in America was a lack of qualified religious functionaries.

It was one of those American Jewish dust-ups that play out along predictable lines and concluded with a predictable outcome. The left outrages the right, and the right responds in knee-jerk fashion by calling for banning the left from something that most people had never heard of. In the end, the left emerges with its right to speak triumphantly undiminished while the right skulks away muttering. Seen that movie already? So have we all. Ad nauseam.

On January 29, the southern Israeli resort city of Eilat was shaken by the explosion of a Palestinian suicide bomber that killed three Israeli civilians and wounded several others.

Governments around the world seem to believe the solution to the Arab war against Israel is to create a sovereign Palestinian Arab state in Judea, Samaria and Gaza alongside Israel. The idea is completely flawed and mistaken. Under current conditions, a Palestinian state would be a terrorist state, bringing more war and terrorism. After all, sovereignty does not make a population and its leaders peaceful. Iran, North Korea and Syria are all sovereign states – are they peaceful and lovely?

Jews' categorical identification with parties of the Left became commonplace throughout Central and Western Europe. For some, this identification went beyond liberal parties to socialist and communist groups.

Question: Have you ever visited Israel?

Jews and justice can never be uttered in the same breath. So it is too for the Jewish State, always the individual Jew in macrocosm. Whether it wishes to acknowledge the existential danger or not, Israel's only hope for survival now lies in a well-reasoned and coherent nuclear strategy for dealing with nuclearizing enemies.

I am upset. I am embarrassed. I am touched by the righteous anger of the average man. I am saddened by the lessons being learned by our children.

With the upcoming anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, I thought it would be appropriate to write about Yizkor Books.

Dreamer Vs. Realist    It is clear that Eli Chomsky ("For Israeli-Syrian Talks," op-ed, Jan. 26) lives in America and Steven Plaut ("Israel Should Offer...

Last week I delivered a sermon based on the Torah portion of the week and which compared Moses, the great Jewish redeemer, with Abraham Lincoln, the martyred American emancipator.

Prof. Amnon Rubinstein is an interesting guy.

Former presidents hold a place like no other politicians in a democracy. Regardless of their politics, they are honored for their service. And their choice of activities after their presidencies immediately raises the profile of the debate and calls us to arms for good causes.

The throngs of tourists passing Big Ben are unaware of the tunnel beneath their feet, which connects the parliamentary committee rooms in Portcullis House to the British House of Commons. When the division bells ring, members of parliament sprint along the passage to cast their votes in the chamber. It was in one of those committee rooms last Thursday evening that a group of MPs met with foreign lawmakers to discuss boycott, divestment and the indictment of a sovereign nation with the arrest of its officials for breach of international law.

The winner of the Monitor’s third annual Henry Schwarzschild Award for most offensive comments by a Jew in the public spotlight goes to Michael Lerner, publisher of the far-left Tikkun magazine.

Following the Iraq Study Group report, it seems clear that legally-binding non-proliferation expectations for Iran may soon be abandoned, and that Israel - once again - may be offered as a convenient sacrifice to civilization's irremediable enemies.

I am often asked, "Where do you get all the information that you write about in your weekly column?"

Many Thanks    We must take this opportunity to express our tremendous hakoras hatov to Hakodesh Baruch Hu for performing an open miracle during the...

Dr. Steven Fries was just 55. He was my pediatrician, personal doctor, adviser and friend for fifteen years.

Just when it looked like Ehud Olmert could not mess things up any worse than he already had, it was reported that he and his mates had been secretly negotiating a deal with Syria.

For all the talk in recent years about problems with the way shidduchim are happening or not happening, not nearly enough attention has been given to the disordered state of shadchanus.