Monthly Archives: September 2016

Scatology, Iconoclasm, and Modern Art (This is Not An Ancient Israelite Toilet)

The Israeli press in English has been all over the recent discovery of this toilet at the gate-shrine at Lachish from the 8th C. BCE around the time of Hezekiah’s religious reforms . You can read about it here. I’m using … Continue reading

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(Israel in the World) Shimon Peres (Obituary by Juan Cole)

This obituary by Juan Cole is interesting. A professor of Middle East History, Cole is a critic of Israel, but by no means an unreasoning one. His words are not nasty, not snarky. They suggest how different and how much … Continue reading

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Shimon Peres z”l

There is something both remarkable and piteous about the passing of Shimon Peres. It marks the end of old Israel. Peres was not a sabra. He was born Szymon Perski in 1923 in Vishnev, Poland, and immigrated to British Mandate Palestine with … Continue reading

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I’m With Clinton

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Settlement Boycott Statement

Anyone interested in the settlement-boycott statement recently published at the New York Review of books can read it here. I’m of mixed mind. On the one hand, I support the statement. As a “liberal Zionist,” I think the most important … Continue reading

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(Red & White) Churches & Synagogue (Greenpoint)

The other week I stumbled across these red-brick and white brick churches and a synagogue in the Greenpoint section of Brooklyn. They are well preserved historical structures that are still-functioning religious institutions. The buildings reflect national and religious origins that … Continue reading

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Tacky & Lurid (Trump & Netanyahu)

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Palestinians & Jews & Israel (Another Interview with Ayman Odeh)

This has nothing to do with Zionism or anti-Zionism, but with something as simple as understanding other people and their “narratives.” Ayman Odeh is the leader of the Joint List, the third largest party in the Knesset. You read something … Continue reading

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Annexation Now (The West Bank & the “New Israeli Majority”)

With the Jewish left and liberal left out of power in Israel and with no foreseeable return to power, it is now incumbent upon the right to explain what they plan to do “with” the West Bank and with the … Continue reading

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What’s Divine About Divine Law is Human (Divorced from Reason, Truth, & Stasis) (Christine Hayes)

Oddly enough, so-called divine law for the rabbis has all the characteristics that Greco-Roman thinkers ascribed to positive (i.e. human) law but which they (the Greco-Roman thinkers) denied to divine-natural law. This would boil down to the capacity of law … Continue reading

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