Monthly Archives: July 2014

Critical Normalization (Muslim Leadership Initiative at the Shalom Hartman Institute)

Posted on July 9, 2014 by zjb

About the Muslim Leadership Initiative, I saw a couple of things a couple weeks ago, before the new violence in Gaza, and before the murders of Naftali Frankel, Eyal Yifrach, Gilad Shaar, and Muhammed Khdeir. I was going to let it drop, … Continue reading →

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No Cause and Effect (Event Politics in Israel & Palestine)

Posted on July 8, 2014 by zjb

The new round of conflict now unrolling between Israel and Palestine is a complex phenomenon composed of multiple parts –the recent kidnap-murder of young people, the suppression of Hamas by Israel in the West Bank, racist incitement and anti-Arab attacks, … Continue reading →

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Weltuntergang (End of the World) (Uriel Birnbaum) (1921)

Posted on July 7, 2014 by zjb

I saw this illustrated book by Uriel Birnbaum at Marilyn Braiterman Books a month or so ago. Birnbaum was a Jewish expressionist artist from Vienna working in the late teens and twenties of the 20th century. An orientalist (Mesopotamian?) setting dominates … Continue reading →

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Zalman z”l

Posted on July 4, 2014 by zjb

The Jewish world becomes a smaller place. On the passing of Reb Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, an icon on the American Jewish scene, read the obituary written by Shaul Magid here in the Daily Forward. Fusing world religions, LSD, cosmic consciousness, and … Continue reading →

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4 Dead Kids — Hard (Political) Truths & Soft (Human) Truths (Israel-Palestine)

Posted on July 4, 2014 by zjb

The news out of Israel looks as bad as I think a lot of us have ever seen it, and while, truly, I don’t think I have a lot to say about the actual events themselves, I’ve been trying very … Continue reading →

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(Bulldoze Their Homes) Halakhic Red Lines (Anti-Racism) (Israel)

Posted on July 3, 2014 by zjb

I’ve seen people online ask with lots of snark if the government of Israel or Israeli-Jewish public figures will react to the wave of anti-Arab hatred and incitement, the budding Jewish terrorism, with the same severity as the government reacts … Continue reading →

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Bright Red Lines (Anti-Racism) (Israel)

Posted on July 3, 2014 by zjb

After the funeral of Eyal Yifrach, Naftali Fraenkel, Gilad Shaar, and then the anti-Arab racist riots in Jerusalem, and now after what appears to be the politically motivated murder of 16-year-old Muhammad Hussein Abu Khdeir it should be clear that an organized … Continue reading →

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Hating Arabs (Israel) (Racist Facebook Page)

Posted on July 2, 2014 by zjb

With the murder of 16-year-old Muhammad Hussein Abu Khdeir, most likely for nationalist reasons, the Israel-Palestine conflict has now scraped the bottom of the barrel. Somewhere near that bottom, posted on FB, these two young women hold up a sign that … Continue reading →

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(Forensic) Eyal Yifrach, Naftali Fraenkel, Gilad Shaar (z”l)

Posted on July 1, 2014 by zjb

Against all the grotesque political-moralists posturing on the left and the right, what constitutes and what does not constitute a despicable act, according to whom, and under what conditions? Why were these three boys murdered? Because they were Jewish? Because of … Continue reading →

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