Monthly Archives: March 2014

Omar (Inexperienced & Unprotected) (Spoiler Alert)

Posted on March 23, 2014 by zjb

I saw Hany Abu-Assad’s Oscar nominated Omar the other week on a Monday afternoon. The movie tells the story of four young Palestinians somewhere in the West Bank: Omar, Amjad, Tareq, and his sister Nadia, who’s in love with Omar. … Continue reading →

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Hebron Ridiculous (Neighbors + Soldiers = 1 State Social Contract)

Posted on March 21, 2014 by zjb

This story made the rounds last week.You can watch both video here. Scene 1: A settler in Hebron, of course he’s religious, gets caught in barbed wire as he tries to climb up to remove a Palestinian flag from the rooftop … Continue reading →

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Judith Butler Liberal Zionist (Parting Ways at the AAR)

Posted on March 20, 2014 by zjb

“Judith Butler is a liberal Zionist.” Only a little tongue in cheek, I’ll make this claim on the basis of her remarks at a panel at the American Academy of Religion conference (2013). Organized by Ellen Armour and sponsored by … Continue reading →

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1 State Palestine (Tareq Abbas)

Posted on March 19, 2014 by zjb

This is how Israel loses the debate. As expressed by Tareq Abbas in this article in the NYT, the logic for a one-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is impeccable and human. Abbas is the son of the Palestine Authority … Continue reading →

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“Moderating Judith Butler” at the AJS (Zachary Braiterman)

Posted on March 19, 2014 by zjb

At the AJS annual conference last December, I was asked at the last minute to moderate a roundtable discussion of Judith Butler’s Parting Ways. The panel was organized by Larisa Reznik and included presentations by her, Peter Gordon, Sarah Hammerschlag, … Continue reading →

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Bourgeois Orientalist Synagogue (Heat Exchangers)

Posted on March 18, 2014 by zjb

The congregation should be comfortable. I think it was visiting the Neue Synagoge in Berlin that I read about how the nineteenth century neo-Moorish building incorporated modern design elements, simple things like heating systems. At Ansche Chesed in New York, … Continue reading →

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(American) Judaism (In the World) (New York Times)

Posted on March 18, 2014 by zjb

In this post, the tags come together: American Judaism, cosmopolitanism, literature, tourism. Is this unique to the United States, at least to New York, where Jews and Judaism have a very public profile, a profile represented with some frequency in … Continue reading →

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Harlem Renovation Gentrification Integration

Posted on March 17, 2014 by zjb

Just off of Manhattan Avenue near Morningside Park. New steel and glass + old brick. The bay windows fan out like an accordion. The new owners put up extra space with a garden on the roof. I’m pretty sure it’s … Continue reading →

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Tolerating (Publick) Religion (John Locke)

Posted on March 17, 2014 by zjb

Following the lead by Craig Martin in Masking Hegemony: A Genealogy of Liberalism, Religion, and the Private Sphere, I took a peek at John Locke’s A Letter Concerning Toleration. The standard version is that Locke represents a liberalism in which … Continue reading →

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Tatttoo Stamp (Auschwitz)

Posted on March 16, 2014 by zjb

I found this story at Ynet about a nasty bit of “material culture.” Apparently this device with the metal teeth was a stamp used to tattoo prisoners at Auschwitz. Looks like something out of Kafka’s “The Penal Colony.” It was recently discovered and identified. … Continue reading →

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