We learn much about the final days of comics writer Harvey Pekar (whom Vanessa Davis graphically eulogized in Tablet Magazine) from a New York Times feature . Read More »
Tablet Magazine 
Self-Made Golem
Stop the presses! Are you sitting down? Can you handle the truth? According to Tom Segev’s new biography of Simon Wiesenthal—and I’m not making this up—the famed Nazi hunter was not a perfect human being! He was a media manipulator, a myth-maker, a publicity seeker. Read More »
‘In The Afterlife We Have To Be Married?’
On next week’s Vox Tablet podcast (which we’re actually posting tomorrow so you can enjoy it over Labor Day weekend), host Sara Ivry goes a-wandering through the century-old Mount Carmel Cemetery with Andy Bachman, the rabbi of Congregation Beth Elohim in Brooklyn. Read More »
The Macaroons Sing ‘Apples and Honey’
The video for our friends The Macaroons’ “Apples and Honey” dropped today. (“Dropped.” Look at me, talking like the youth.) Check out the delightful song, which I think sounds like Matthew Sweet (thus dating myself yet again), and the charming video, which is sure to entertain your tykes this holiday season. Read More »
Happy 90210 Day
Today is National 90210 Day (check your calendar), which is only an official holiday for those of who grew up watching Beverly Hills, 90210 and thinking it was an accurate representation of life on the West Coast. Read More »
Hapoelim of the World, Unite!
In the seaside suburb of Tel Aviv where I grew up, there were few insults more devastating to a young man’s pride than being called a fan of Hapoel. My friends and family all rooted for Maccabi Tel Aviv, Hapoel’s chief rival. Read More »
Today on Tablet
Today in Tablet Magazine, investigative reporter Peter Lance has a blockbuster showing that the murder of ultra-nationalist Meir Kahane in New York in 1990 may have been backed by al-Qaida. Music columnist Alexander Gelfand profiles Galeet Dardashti, whose music is inspired by her Persian Jewish heritage. Read More »
No Jews In Space
“Amanda left yesterday,” Kevin helpfully reminds us. “I didn’t think she’d make it this far.” So there are no more Jews, but as long as Top Chef D.C. goes on, so will these round-ups. And we have, like, three or four more episodes in D.C. to go. Right, guys? Wrong! “There’s one more challenge in D.C., before the finale,” someone says. Read More »
Daybreak: Hard Not To Feel the Hope
• Talks today at the State Department. Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Abbas seemed equal parts insistent and conciliatory in speeches at last night’s banquet. • Obama, meanwhile, pledged his “full weight” behind the peace effort while asserting that the United States “cannot impose a solution. Read More »
Together Again
The documentary Inventing Our Life: The Kibbutz Experiment looks at the kibbutz movement at 100. In the fifth and final installment of the work in progress, filmmaker Toby Perl Freilich considers the movement’s future. For a sneak peek of the film’s rough cut, please join us at the JCC in Manhattan on Tuesday, September 7, at 7: 30 p.m. Read More »
Redemption Songs
When I asked Galeet Dardashti what she had learned from the biblical, talmudic, and midrashic texts that she had mined for her latest project, The Naming —texts that deal with iconic and, in Dardashti’s opinion, misunderstood female figures like Sheba and Dinah and Michal—she paused for a moment. Read More »
First Blood
Last fall I received a cryptic email from Emad Salem, the ex-Egyptian Army major who was the FBI’s first undercover asset in what would become known as the war on terror. I’d told Salem’s remarkable story in my last three books, which were critical of the bureau’s counterterrorism record. Read More »
Sundown: Bibi Talks A New Talk
• “President Abbas,” Prime Minister Netanyahu will say tonight, “you are my partner in peace.” He will also concede the legitimacy of Palestinian claims to the land. • The U.S. government is funding an ad campaign in Israel touting moderate Palestinians as partners for peace. Read More »
U.S. Destroys Iranian Force
With four players scoring double-digits (and with the Minnesota Timberwolves’s Kevin Love stepping up for 13 points and 6 rebounds in only 11 minutes), the United States national basketball team crushed Iran’s 88-51 in the preliminary round of the 2010 FIBA World Championships, in Turkey. Read More »
The Queen of Wasilla
From Vanity Fair ’s blockbuster new profile : The e-mail came from pastor Lou Engle, a prominent right-wing activist who identifies himself as a prayer warrior and is a central figure in dominionist theology. Read More »
Our Favorite Senator Backs Park51
Here’s man bites dog for you: A prominent, conservative Republican senator has come out strongly against blocking the planned lower Manhattan Islamic center. Read More »
Obama’s Peace Offensive Is On
That picture was taken today. The Obama administration is already making it very, very clear just how enmeshed in the direct Israeli-Palestinian talks—which kick off tonight with a White House banquet featuring Prime Minister Netanyahu, President Abbas, President Mubarak of Egypt, and King Abdullah II of Jordan—it plans to be. Read More »
Our Rosh Hashanah Service
If you are looking for an unorthodox—and very un-Orthodox—way to ring in the new year, Tablet Magazine is co-sponsoring Hidden Melodies Revealed, a “mystery musical extravaganza” with The Sway Machinery, which bills itself “America’s only indie rock/Jewish cantorial music group. Read More »
Daybreak: After Hamas Attack, Massive Arrests
• After Hamas claimed responsibility for killing four Israelis (and promised further attacks), the Palestinian Authority proceeded on one of its largest-ever arrestings. • Thomas Friedman predicts that extremist efforts to thwart peace, from Rabbi Yosef’s comments about Palestinians to yesterday’s attack, are only going to get worse. Read More »
Today on Tablet
Today in Tablet Magazine, our Rosh Hashanah food coverage continues with contributing editor Joan Nathan’s profile of several mixed marriages and how they learned to negotiate the cookbook and Mark Oldman’s suggestions of six tasty kosher wines. Read More »
L’Chaim!
Kosher wine has come a long way, baby. I don’t mean that it has moved beyond Manischewitz to Merlot—that’s yesterday’s news. I’m talking about the kosher-wine market’s glorious expansion beyond the usual suspects—overly oaky Chardonnay and mediocre Merlot—to less-obvious wines of distinction and deliciousness from all over the world. Read More »
The Arab Lobby
One of the characteristic laments of the Arab intelligentsia in both Washington and the Middle East concerns the inability of Arab nations to make their cases to the U.S. public. Read More »
Kitchen Conversions
I was leading a tour of Jewish culinary sites in Philadelphia at a conference about 20 years ago when Julia Child showed up. “Why are you here?” I asked. Always direct, she told me that she was interested in what I was doing, and one of her relatives had married a Jew, and it was a very good marriage, so she wanted to learn more about Jewish food. Read More »
Sundown: The Talks Must Go On
• Prime Minister Netanyahu’s office vowed that the killers of four Israeli settlers “will pay,” though this week’s direct talks will go on as planned. • Mayor Bloomberg opposed a state investigation into Park51’s funding: “I think it’s a terrible precedent. You don’t want them investigating donations to religious organizations. Read More »
Goldberg Goes To Cuba
Oh hi, Jeff! Looks like Tablet Magazine contributing editor Jeffrey Goldberg (glasses, on the right) took a Caribbean vacation . Read More »
Four West Bank Settlers Killed
Four Israeli residents of the southern West Bank settlement of Beit Hagai—two men and two women, two couples (one woman was pregnant)—were killed today (tonight in Israel) by gunfire as they drove near the entrance of nearby settlement Kiryat Arba. Read More »
Early Prep for Early Yom Tovs
Yes, we know we say that Rosh Hashanah is “so early” or “so late” every year, but … Rosh Hashanah is really early this year! (Though actually, if you think September 8 is bad, just wait for 2013, when the new Jewish year will begin on September 5—the earliest that it can begin. Read More »
Rabbi Speaks at Glenn Beck Gathering
Glenn Beck’s “Restoring Honor” mega-rally Saturday, billed as a Christian religious revival, drew a crowd of between 50,000 and 600,000 (depending on who is counting). Read More »
Another View of ‘Cordoba’
Philologos, the Forward ’s anonymous language columnist, tackles the name of the Cordoba Initiative, which is the force behind the planned lower Manhattan Islamic center (much as I did earlier this month). Read More »
Today on Tablet
Today in Tablet Magazine, books critic Adam Kirsch reviews a new book all about the famous 1917 Balfour Declaration, which committed Britain to a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Daniella Cheslow reports on a recent victory by Israel’s environmentalist movement. Read More »
The Uninvited Prime Minister
The ghost at the White House banquet tomorrow night—the most conspicuous non-guest—may well be Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, the man whom Israeli President Shimon Peres crowned the “Palestinian Ben-Gurion” and who, wrote Ben Smith in his Read More »
Last Resort
When Offir Asher returned to Israel after 18 years in Toronto, he dreamed of building a world-class resort village on the Mediterranean shore. Read More »
Daybreak: Abbas Walks the Tightrope
• The person risking the most in participating in upcoming talks is Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who could lose control of Fatah and whose Fatah could lose power to Hamas. • By contrast, Prime Minister Netanyahu reassured party members that he knows where the redlines are and he won’t cross them. Read More »
Founding Document
On October 31, 1917, the British Cabinet approved a one-sentence statement of policy regarding its plans for Palestine, which the British Army was just then in the process of conquering away from the Ottoman Empire: “His Majesty’s Government view Read More »
Market Value
There is a joke about the Jewish calendar that goes something like this, “While sitting in synagogue, one man turns to his friend and says, ‘When is Hanukkah this year?’ The other man smiles slyly and replies, ‘Same as always: the 25th of Kislev. Read More »
Sundown: Intellectuals Back Settlement Boycott
• The big left-wing Israeli novelists—Oz, Yehoshua, Grossman—spoke in support of actors’ refusal to perform in the West Bank settlement of Ariel. • Don’t be silly says, the U.S. State Department, we don’t think we’ll achieve peace in one meeting. Just in one year. Read More »
Travelin’ Men
Oh … look! It’s another issue of Text/Context , the supplement put together by Jewish Week and Nextbook Inc. Read More »
Settle This
Gadi Taub got one thousand words and prime Sunday op-ed page placement for a summary of his new book, The Settlers . The Israeli settlements, which are “looming over the direct talks,” are a threat to Israel’s simultaneously Jewish and democratic character, Taub believes. Read More »
More on the NFL’s Jews
In today’s Vox Tablet podcast , Ray Gustini, of the Atlantic Wire, and I figured out exactly how many NFL franchises are owned by Jews. The final answer is 10.5 or 11. Read More »
What We Talk About When We Talk About Talks
It’s direct talks week! Let’s look at some of the latest developments. • The best overview of what Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Abbas might be hoping to get out of the talks comes courtesy Jerusalem Post editor David Horovitz. If you read one article on the talks, read this one. Read More »
Today on Tablet
Today in Tablet Magazine, staff writer Marc Tracy and former football writer Ray Gustini, now at the Atlantic , discuss the upcoming NFL season with an eye toward anointing Tablet’s official team. Read More »
Blue, White, and Ebony
Your other favorite daily magazine of Jewish life and culture reported on the growing number of black Orthodox American Jews over the weekend. Read More »
Daybreak: Peace Talks Polka
• President Abbas clarified that if forthcoming direct talks falter, Israel and its continued settlement-building will be at fault. • That soon-to-expire settlement freeze really is the only issue worth trying to solve for now (but you already knew that). Read More »
On the Bookshelf
Once again: Even covering eight–10 titles each week, On the Bookshelf doesn’t always mention every book of Jewish interest that has been published. In the hopes of atoning to wronged authors and readers, On the Bookshelf’s Yom Kippur column will highlight a selection of such neglected titles. Read More »
Kosher Pigskin
Football season is upon us once again—it kicks off on Rosh Hashanah, with a game between the Super Bowl champion New Orleans Saints and the Minnesota Vikings , a team that boasts the only Jewish quarterback in the NFL, Sage Rosenfels . (His playing time has been eclipsed mightily by Brett Favre. Read More »
In With the In Crowd
As I write this, kids are going back to school almost everywhere but in New York City. The first day of school isn’t until September 8 here, and thanks to Rosh Hashanah, our second day isn’t until September 13. I think our last day of school this year will be around Tisha B’Av. Read More »
Sundown: Write Your Own Punch-Line
• Abraham Foxman calls for civility in public discourse. • Joseph O’Neil has a great essay on novelist Muriel Spark, who—who knew?—had a Jewish father. Read More »
‘I Learned A Lot From My Father’s Lawyer’
On next week’s Vox Tablet podcast, staff writer Marc Tracy discusses the upcoming NFL season with former football writer Ray Gustini (now at The Atlantic Wire ). Read More »
Expert Argues For Accepting Nuclear Iran
Your weekend reading assignment is this essay by Bruce Riedel, an intelligence, security, and foreign affairs expert who though officially in the world of think tanks has close to ties to the Obama administration (he has been a crucial player in its Afghanistan strategy). “The United States needs to send a clear red light to Israel,” Riedel writes. Read More »
Obama Sees Approval Rating Drop
One probably shouldn’t make too, too much of the new Gallup poll on President Obama’s approval rating among various religious groups (which is being most widely touted because it shows that the religious group in which he enjoys the highest support is Muslims). Read More »
Today on Tablet
Today in Tablet Magazine, it’s five years after Katrina, and Rodger Kamenetz is celebrating Rosh Hashanah in New Orleans. Prompted by Daniel Luban’s essay on Islamophobia last week, David Horowitz and Luban debate the Ground Zero Islamic center. In his weekly haftorah column, Liel Leibovitz says that chosenness is what you make of it. Read More »
A Yidisher Pop
This week’s installment is about male regression and female transgression. Let’s get right to it: טײַגער װוּדס האָט לעצטנס פֿאַרלאָרן אַ שפּיל און איצט אַ װײַב. שװער צו זאָגן וואָס איז וויכטיקער פֿאַר אים. Transliteration: Tayger Vuds hot letstns farlorn a shpil un itst a vayb. Shver tsu zogn vos iz vikhtiker far im. Read More »
Daybreak: What They’re Trying To Say
• A great explanation of what’s really going on with these seemingly bound-to-fail direct talks. • And the best bit of optimism you’ll read concerning them, courtesy former U.N. Ambassador Martin Indyk. Read More »
Haters
Our youthful selves, it sometimes seems, exist in our minds primarily to mortify us. We inhabit the present, dignified and mature, when all of a sudden a wraith emerges from the bowels of the past and disturbs our subtle sophistication with an icy whisper of youthful folly. Read More »
Islamophobia or Reality?
When Daniel Luban published an essay in Tablet Magazine last week finding resonances between what he called Islamophobic opposition to the Park51 Islamic center and past anti-Semitism, one comment on the piece jumped out at us. Read More »
Sundown: Ross Looks To Thaw Things
• Dennis Ross, President Obama’s National Security Council Mideast point-man, is in Israel trying to solve the settlement freeze conundrum in advance of next week’s planned talks. (Bonus! Shmuel Rosner agrees with everyone else and says the talks won’t produce anything any time soon. Read More »
A Schmutz for a Sanders
All in all, it is probably a positive sign that immigrants to America no longer feel the need or desire to change their surnames to more “American” (re: Anglo, or at least intelligible-to-English) variants. At the same time, one can’t help but feel that something is being lost, particularly in the Jewish community. Read More »
Israel and the Youngs
Theodore Sassoon and Leonard Saxe, who wrote about American Jewish attitudes toward Israel for Tablet Magazine, published an updated study that finds much the same thing at their previous ones: That where younger American Jews are found to feel less Read More »
‘Heeb’ Goes Online-Only
As was first rumored nearly nine months ago, Heeb , the irreverent (you have to use that adjective) Jewish magazine, announced that it is going online-only. Read More »
