The Missing Ethic
A reader asks why I haven’t seen fit to address ethical concerns raised by news reports about a kosher slaughterhouse/meatpacking concern in Postville, Iowa that was the subject of an Immigration and Customs Enforcement...
Category: General
The Road Taken
As summer unfolds, we behold and endure graduation ceremonies – the recognition of academic milestones, the bestowing of diplomas, the conferring of awards and the delivery, to excess, of commencement addresses. Having had the...
The late Tommy Lapid and Dylan Thomas
29 b Iyyar For several years I was a part-time, self-appointed, undercover agent, infiltrating the Shinui party organization in Netanya. I thought about this on Sunday, 27 bIyyar, when during a two-hour drive south...
In praise of Normalcy
Just before Pesach, the front pages of all Israel’s major papers were filled for days with three cases of horrific child abuse. In two of the cases, some of the children involved will likely...
Terrified of Judicial Reform
Boxing may be dead but those who still savor the sight of heavyweights throwing roundhouse punches at a fast and furious pace could do worse than the current donnybroook between Justice Minister Daniel Friedmann...
Teaching Truth
Two familiar stories: “The Boy Who Cried Wolf,” and “George Washington and the Cherry Tree.” For argument’s sake, let’s take George Washington’s name out of the second story, because he’s so famous. In the...
It’s Not What the Neighbours Say
“The plural of anecdotes is not data” goes an old saying. Yet when one attempts to examine a wide variety of social phenomenon in the Israel Torah community, hard data is hard to come...
Yom Kippur Heroes
This past Yom Kippur Israeli security forces averted a major disaster when they uncovered a fully prepared explosive belt in the heart of Tel Aviv at the last moment. The drama worthy of a...
What the snake knew
The woman said to the Serpent, . . . “Of the fruit of the tree which is in the center of the garden, G-d has said: ‘You shall neither eat of it nor touch...
A Response to My Critics
My post on Noah Feldman’s recent essay in the New York Times provoked an unusually large number of responses — most critical of my post and many unflattering on a personal level. I was...
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