Israel

What is the Israel-Hamas war about? Dov Lerner of Yeshiva University, Young Israel of Jamaica Estates, and the Sacks Legacy shares his perspective on the source of evil.

In this essay, Weinberg reflects on the symbolic significance of tefillin and its message for our Jewish future.

Leah Sarna argues that this is the Passover to tell the stories of enslaved Jewish women: of the victims of October 7, who were and likely still are subjected to sexual violence, and of the heroic women in the era of the Exodus, who fought to ensure the perpetuation of the Jewish people.

Aryeh Klapper analyzes Rav Shaul Yisraeli’s classic work on civilian casualties in Halakhah.

Twelve years after the passing of R. Menachem Froman, his daughter-in-law, the scholar and activist Tchiya Froman, considers R. Froman’s literary critique of the Gush Emunim settlement enterprise and his determination that Judaism requires a feminine revolution.

Joshua Leifer’s new book illustrates the collapse of several paradigms that long sustained American Jewish life. In his review, Steven Gotlib notes that Leifer’s search for a viable, non-separatist, traditional Judaism overlooks several existing models of Jewish life and practice.

Alex Ozar explores wartime law in the Rambam.

Tamar Weissman shows how the Druze minority in Israel remarkably resemble the biblical Kenites.

This war diary, presented by Susan Weingarten, relates her experience in a kibbutz on the Gazan border on October 7th and the days following her return to Jerusalem after the Hamas massacre.

Hillel Rapp explores how Israel education has changed in a post-Oct. 7 world.