By KIM GAMEL | AP TRIPOLI, Libya: A Libyan Jewish man who returned from exile in Italy to join the revolution against Muammar Qaddafi has been blocked from trying to restore Tripoli’s main synagogue. David Gerbi said he went to clean garbage from the synagogue on Monday, a day after […]
JERUSALEM — Two thousand years after they were written and decades after they were found in desert caves, some of the world-famous Dead Sea Scrolls went online for the first time this week in a project launched by Israel’s national museum and the web giant Google. The appearance of five of the […]
If politics are personal, then let me say this. I love almost everything about the Judaism I practice: Born into a Jewish family, but raised without any formal religious education, I have in recent years become a member of a Reform synagogue in Brooklyn. I love singing the ancient prayers. […]
Rosh Hashana 5772: Hope and the Social Justice Movement While right-wing politicians are rolling back democratic rights in Israel, a new generation of protesters is demanding more powers for the people. The Jewish year 5771 brought two diametrically opposed developments in Israel. One was the flood of anti-democratic laws passed […]
Source: The Jerusalem Post Author: Melanie Lidman When the Second Temple period scribes wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls on parchment 2,000 years ago and rolled them up in a clay jug in the Qumran caves, they probably weren’t expecting that a curious student in Guangzhou, China would be able to […]
The Dead Sea Scrolls are some of the most valuable religious texts known to man. Discovered between 1947 and 1956 at Khirbet Qumran, they form the oldest known versions of Biblical documents and take the form of 972 texts. Their age dates them at somewhere between 150 BCE and 70CE […]
FM Jimenez’s UN speech is particularly dramatic since Spain is considered a leading EU country to support Palestinian rights. Spain’s Foreign Minister Trinidad Jimenez presented a new policy for the Palestinian-Israeli conflict on Saturday, declaring Israel as the homeland of the Jews for the first time and saying that the […]
Rand Dalgamouni, JORDAN TIMES ZURICH – One young Jordanian is working to share her experience in interfaith tolerance and dialogue in the Kingdom with the rest of the world. Fresh graduate Ayah Alfawaris has represented Jordan at international summits, speaking as an ambassador for interfaith dialogue. In 2010, she was […]
By Jessica Ravitz, CNN Showing that modernity might, just might, find its place even in a world predisposed to the most traditional of customs, in walks FaceGlat: an ultra-Orthodox Jewish answer, at least for some, to Facebook. Among the most conservative of Orthodox Jews, often referred to as Haredi Jews, modesty reigns. […]
Haaretz: Here destruction is met with a resolve to do good. Rabban Yohanan ben Zakkai is able to look past the tragedy. He seeks to rebuild his broken world on hesed, loving kindness, as it teaches in the book of Psalms. His words of comfort lay out a vision for […]
Co-editor of a new collection of writings of the Egyptian-born Jewish writer Jacqueline Shohet Kahanoff, who believed Israel would never find peace until it recognized that it was in the Middle East………. She spent time in New York (earning a journalism degree at Columbia University ) and in Paris, before […]
Source: Qantara Lewis Gropp reviews a documentary that shines the spotlight on two 12th century philosophers – one Muslim, one Jewish – whose messages of positive coexistence resonate very strongly even today, refuting the “Clash of Civilizations” theory Out of Córdoba is a documentary film about the greatest but least known […]
Source/Credit: Huffington Post By Joshuha Stanton Contrary to common assumptions, many Jewish and Muslim Americans enjoy warm relations. Yet we are only beginning to understand how and why this is so. A Gallup report released last week goes a long way to explaining this unexpected trend and shows that the […]
The following is the statement of apology Mel Gibson issued for his anti-semite slurs when he was being arrested for DUI. It can serve as a good template for not only every anti-semite but also every Islamophobe who stereotypes and labels all or most Muslims with a broad brush: “There is no excuse, nor should […]
Source/Credit: NPR In the 1890s, Russian Jews fleeing anti-Semitic violence and discrimination arrived by the thousands to a remote corner of the Argentine Pampas. They founded hamlets similar to the shtetls they left behind. They spoke Yiddish, built synagogues and traditional Jewish schools — and became farmers and gauchos, the […]
And the Jews say, ‘The Christians stand on nothing;’ and the Christians say, ‘The Jews stand on nothing;’ while they both read the same Book. Even thus said those who had no knowledge, like what they say. But Allah shall judge between them on the Day of Resurrection concerning that […]
Dr Ghassan Khatib, the Special Envoy of the Palestinian Authority President, last week addressed the Capital Jewish Forum in the Victorian Parliament House. (J-Wire, Jewish online news from Australia and New Zealand) Dr Khatib spoke on ‘Statehood: Palestine and Israel’ and was introduced by Mr Izzat Abdulhadi, Palestinian Authority Head […]
Scholars from different religions answer the question Question: What role does humour play in life? ABDUL RASHID is a member of the Ottawa Muslim community, the Christian-Muslim Dialogue and the Capital Region Interfaith Council. Humour is a natural human characteristic and an essential component of a complete human personality. Although […]
Source: The New York Times Go ahead, picture a religious Jew. Now picture a Muslim cleric. Now an Amish farmer. What do they have in common? Beards. And not neatly trimmed beards, but, in the popular stereotype, long, unruly beards, which connote piety, spiritual intensity and a life so hard […]
Very interesting documentary. First episode: Kingdom of David: Rivers of Babylon: http://video.pbs.org/video/1354541084/ Watch all four parts in Youtube Wikipedia has a page about the Documentary: Kingdom of David was a part of the Empire Series of history documentaries for the [Public Broadcasting Service] (PBS) Public television stations produced by Oregon […]