Posts tagged as:

Israel

Tisha B’av with Helicopters

July 20, 2010

Every year on Tisha B’av, there are pundits who write in the local newspapers that we should stop fasting and start celebrating.
Tisha B’av – the ninth day of the Jewish month of Av (which always falls somewhere in super-heated July or August) – commemorates various tragedies which have befallen the Jewish people, [...]

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Gaza: a Rock and Roll Response

July 14, 2010

With another ship of questionable humanitarian aid and activists on its way to Gaza this week, I thought I’d take a look back at what my wife Jody and I did during the original “Free Gaza flotilla” and near lynching of Israeli troops six weeks ago: we went to a concert.

Not just any concert, but [...]

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Will my Children Be Jewish?

June 29, 2010

New regulations from the Chief Rabbinate have non-Orthodox Israelis in a tizzy. According to the rules, anyone can have their Jewishness called into question at any time. But legislators in the Knesset aren’t taken the changes lying down with MK David Rotem vowing to fight.
The new rules appear to be part of [...]

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Anglo Community in Jerusalem Struck by Tragedy

June 11, 2010

The text message came in early Tuesday morning: “There are no words to express our thoughts and feelings at this time. Our darling daughter Lee Gabriella’s funeral will be at 11:15 PM tonight.”
By this time, of course, we already knew – half of Anglo Jerusalem did, whether by email, phone calls, [...]

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The Business of Jacob’s Ladder

May 13, 2010

When Yehudit Vinegrad took the stage at the close of the Spring 2009 Jacob’s Ladder folk festival and announced that she was stepping down and would, after 33 years, no longer produce the show, a palpable shock and shudder rippled through the crowd.
But then Vinegrad added, with a quiet wink [...]

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Can a Hookworm Make You Healthy?

April 22, 2010

Can a hookworm make you healthy? Jasper Lawrence seems to think so. And now his special therapeutic worm treatment is available for shipment to Israel.
I first heard about Lawrence and his worms when they were featured on an episode of WNYC’s Radio Lab (which was rebroadcast last week on This American Life [...]

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What Irked Me About the Simpsons in Israel

April 13, 2010

The Simpsons came to Israel last week. Not the actors themselves or large foam rubber versions of the popular yellow characters dancing on ice; rather the show itself, which after over 20 years as the longest running sitcom on television, finally had an Israel-themed episode. I enjoyed most of it but there was an ongoing [...]

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Vacation Tips for the Passover Holiday

March 31, 2010

It’s vacation time in Israel – the week of hol ha mod Pesach (the days in-between the Seder and the the seventh day of the chag) is a time when schools and many businesses close down and half the country seemingly takes to the parks and general great outdoors.
Our family traditionally heads [...]

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Running the Marathon – Israeli Style

March 24, 2010

My wife Jody and I ran the 10K in the Jerusalem Half Marathon last week. I’ve been running 3-4 times a week for over a decade already, but never in a competitive race. We didn’t come in first, but we were satisfied with a respectable time of an hour and six [...]

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Return to “The Settler from Jerusalem”

March 23, 2010

With Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s declaration before yesterday’s AIPAC conference that “Jerusalem is not a settlement” – a response to U.S. claims to the contrary regarding at least part of the city -  I thought it would be instructive to look at a personal incident that occurred nearly five years ago.
In July 2005, I was [...]

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