By Ira Sharkansky JERUSALEM — Mitt Romney and his crew were not at their best during the campaign trip outside of the United States. The candidate insulted the British in London, raised hackles of Palestinians and the politically correct everywhere with comments about the superiority of Jewish culture in Israel, and his press secretary lost
Friedman rebukes Romney for seeking ‘Jewish money’ Read More »
Ira Sharkansky, Middle East
By Rabbi Michael Leo Samuel SAN DIEGO — Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook writes in his famous mystical and moral tract, The Lights of Penitence: The greatest impediment to the human spirit, upon reaching maturity, results from the fact that the conception of God is crystallized among people in a particular form, which goes back to childish habit
Anthropomorphizing God does HaShem a disservice Read More »
Jewish Religion, Michael Leo Samuel-Rabbi
By Rabbi Ben Kamin SAN DIEGO — When the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, unsuccessfully pleaded for a state at the UN last year, many of us in the Jewish community noted with some bitterness: he failed to even mention either the historic Jewish association with the region of Palestine or the horrific Jewish suffering of
When politics erases basic human compassion Read More »
Jewish Religion, Middle East
By Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal SAN DIEGO — Is ignorance of the law an excuse? Should people be held responsible for things they do not know? The Ten Commandments appear twice in the Torah, first in parashat Yitro and again in parashat va-Etchanan. While the commandments themselves are substantially the same, there are variations in wording.
Torah’s 2 versons of 10 Commandments differ subtly Read More »
Jewish Religion
By Eva Trieger SAN DIEGO –Sure. Lots of kids build things out of Legos or Lincoln logs, but how many kids replicate a set from Music Man from alphabet blocks when they’re only five years old? I’d wager not many. Jay Heiserman, a two-time Emmy winner, has been designing sets ever since he began
Junior Theatre is a homecoming for acclaimed set designer Read More »
Travel and Food
. By Natasha Josefowitz, Ph.D. LA JOLLA, California –Once upon a time, long, long ago, in a faraway land, in a castle on top of a hill, lived a beautiful princess…. Well, we all know that there must be, somewhere, an equally handsome prince. But we also anticipate a witch, an ogre, or a dragon—preferably
A story about stories — why we love them Read More »
Natasha JosefowitzBy Peter Huessy WASHINGTON, D.C. — A small group of nuclear abolitionists are pushing for the United States to dramatically reduce its nuclear weapons and eliminate the strategic nuclear triad, which for half a century has maintained the peace. Global Zero, which bills itself as an international movement for the elimination of all nuclear weapons
Proposal to reduce U.S. nuclear force counter-productive Read More »
USA
By Eileen Wingard SAN DIEGO — Guitar virtuoso, recording artist, and arranger, Gregg Nestor, has moved back to San Diego after living a number of years in London and Los Angeles. He has recently released five CDs. One of them, Dancing On Air, is a delightful collection of works based on folksongs. The recording opens
Guitarist Nestor’s ‘Dancing on Air’ delightfully international Read More »
Eileen WingardCARLSBAD, California (Press Release) — In a most unusual combination, distinguished Rabbi Hillel Silverman will officiate at High Holiday services with his Cantor Grandson Matthew Rutta in Carlsbad, California. To enhance the generational ties, the Machzor Prayer book being used was edited by the Rabbi’s well known father, Rabbi Morris Silverman, who achieved national prominence with
Three Silvermans-the author, rabbi and cantor-to lead services Read More »
Jewish Religion
The Forgotten Zionist: The Life of Solomon (Sioma) Yankelevitch Jacobi by Rodney Benjamin and David Cebon; Jerusalem: Gefen Publishing House, ISBN 978-965-229-571-2, 248 pages including index, $24.95. By Donald H. Harrison SAN DIEGO — This is a loving biography, well researched historically by the son-in-law and grandson of Sioma Jacobi, who was an assistant to
Biography recounts struggles of General Zionists and Revisionists Read More »
Donald H. Harrison
By Shoshana Bryen WASHINGTON, D.C. –Mitt Romney is being castigated for praising the culture that has allowed a democratic, (mainly) free market Israel, operating under the rule of law, to thrive amid decades of threat and periodic open warfare and a heavy defense burden. Actually, he’s being castigated for what his praise of Israel implies
Palestinian mindset: better to slap Israel than to improve self Read More »
Middle East, Shoshana Bryen
By Dorothea Shefer-Vanson ZIKHRON YA’AKOV, Israel — It’s over twenty years since my own children were teenagers, and it was with some trepidation that my husband and I agreed to leave our home and spend a week in Zikhron Ya’akov attending to our three grandsons while their parents took a well-deserved break abroad. Like everywhere
Here’s Zikhron Ya’akov from grandma’s perspective Read More »
Dorothea Shefer-Vanson, Travel and Food
By Carol Davis SAN DIEGO — The more things change, the more they stay the same. When Luis Valdez wrote Zoot Suit in the 1970’s, he could never have imagined that it would make as much impact today as it did when it premiered at the Mark Taper Forum in 1978. Zoot Suit is the
Racist attitudes depicted in ‘Zoot Suit’ still plague us Read More »
Carol Davis, San Diego County, Theatre, Film & BroadcastBy Ira Sharkansky SAN DIEGO — Americans who identify with Israel, and who are looking for another reason to vote against Barack Obama, can find it in Monday’s headlines. “The White House: Romney must explain why he said that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel.” Palestinians responded even more forcefully. Not only did they object
White House questions Romney on status of Jerusalem Read More »
Ira Sharkansky, Middle East