(New York Jewish Week) — The table at the center of the room, set for 16, was festooned with a rainbow tablecloth and sparkles, and surrounded by about a dozen college-age guests. At its head were two chairs decorated with rainbow necklaces and flags and set for the guests of honor: Both place settings came […]
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(New York Jewish Week) — The graffiti scrawled on public bathroom walls may not seem like the highest form of art. But for Jewish comedian and musician Caitlin Cook, a particular phrase she saw on a bathroom stall became the catalyst for a decade of creative inventiveness. “Since writing on bathroom walls is neither for […]
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(JR) — The U.S., Israeli and Ukrainian governments have all called it an extremely dangerous voyage into the heart of an ongoing war. But despite the warnings, tens of thousands of Jewish men and boys are expected to travel to Uman, Ukraine, for an annual Rosh Hashanah pilgrimage that pays tribute to the influential Hasidic […]
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MELBOURNE (JR) — Ruth Hannah has lived in the Australian coastal town of Mallacoota for more than 30 years. The 72-year-old daughter of Holocaust survivors knows of only one other Jewish person in her town, which has a population of 1,183 people. Known for its beautiful beaches and wildlife, Mallacoota is located near the middle […]
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((JR)) — A historic wartime photography partnership from the 1940s — often credited as the first to capture many of the horrors of the Holocaust — is getting the Hollywood treatment. Kate Winslet stars in “Lee” as model-turned-wartime-photojournalist Lee Miller, who often worked alongside David E. Scherman, a Jewish photographer portrayed in the film by […]
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(New York Jewish Week) — In the 1960s, a drag queen named Flawless Sabrina arrived in New York City during a time when drag performances were not only stigmatized in mainstream society, but within LGBTQ circles as well. But Flawless Sabrina had a plan: Her welcoming demeanor — which she described as a “bar mitzvah […]
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(JR) — A catalog of calamities is central to the liturgy of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, the Jewish High Holidays that begin later this week. We Jews are asked to imagine ourselves perched on the precipice of life and death. Nothing frames it as starkly as Unetaneh Tokef, the roll call of ruin enumerating various […]
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TAIPEI, Taiwan ((JR)) — Rabbi Akiva’s daughter was destined for death on her wedding day, at least according to the star-gazers. So the early Jewish sage seemed resigned to his daughter’s fate. But on the wedding day, Rabbi Akiva’s daughter offered a poor old man her portion of the wedding feast. That night, before going […]
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(JR) – A prominent member of an American neo-Nazi group has been extradited to the Netherlands, where he will stand trial for projecting an antisemitic message onto the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam. Robert Wilson is accused of being behind a February incident in which a message was laser-projected onto the house where Anne Frank […]
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(New York Jewish Week) — The corner of Ludlow and Rivington streets in New York City is now officially known as Beastie Boys Square. The co-naming of this Lower East Side street corner — where the shop featured on the Jewish rappers’ second album, “Paul’s Boutique,” once stood — was the result of a 10-year […]
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