More in ‘Orthodox’

Jewish drug peddlers are having their moment. In Holy Rollers, Jesse Eisenberg portrays a young Hasidic ecstasy smuggler who transitions, a little awkwardly, from hapless amateur to seasoned pro. Jonathan Braun, it seems, was a natural pusher. The New York resident was recently arrested by federal authorities for heading a major marijuana trafficking operation. His ...

This is what we’ll be talking about all week. Prominent liberal journalist Peter Beinart has predicted that Zionism among young American Jews is increasingly the exclusive reserve of the insensitive, illiberal Orthodox. Moreover, he blames this trend on AIPAC, the Anti-Defamation League, and the rest of the establishment. These organizations, by insisting on all-but-unquestioned support ...

Rabbi Avi Weiss is no stranger to pushing boundaries: Recently, and controversially, he gave Sara Hurwitz the term “rabba,” making her the highest-profile female cleric in the Orthodox community. But at a lecture series held last week at Yeshivat Chovevei Torah, the rabbinical school Rabbi Weiss founded in 1999, a different sort of inclusion was ...

• The International Atomic Energy Agency released a new report on Iran, disclosing that, due to a lack of Iranian cooperation, the agency could not “confirm that all nuclear material in Iran is in peaceful activities.” [JTA]
• The report also concluded, in stronger language than past agency statements, that the mystery Syrian compound that Israel ...

Over four articles (all of which you can find here), Tablet Magazine traced the scandal surrounding Leib Tropper. A one-time Monsey, New York, Orthodox rabbi, Tropper raised himself to the status of Jerusalem-based conversion guru by dint of powerful connections, only to fall from grace after audiotapes purportedly recorded him making sexual advances toward prospective ...

• In a formal complaint to the United Nations, Jordan accused Israel of illegally seizing the Dead Sea Scrolls during the Six Day War, and demanded that they be returned. [JPost]
• Columnist Yossi Melman suspects that the Iranian physicist killed in Tehran yesterday was likely done in by some entity that wanted to slow the ...

Tucked away above a bustling swap-meet of jewelry purveyors in midtown Manhattan’s diamond district, blintzes and gefilte fish have attracted kosher-keeping visitors from around the country since at least 1955. But no more: at the beginning of this month, Diamond Dairy closed down after failing to renegotiate a lease with the building’s new owners, ABS ...

Yesterday, one (Jewish) writer accused Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Connecticut), perhaps the Senate’s most famous Semite, of possessing an un-Jewish lack of intelligence. Since then, Lieberman has proved himself, if not smart, then at least influential: his objections to certain progressive features of the U.S. Senate health-care reform bill—albeit features he supported only a few months ...

A New York Times article about the Midwood neighborhood of Brooklyn—specifically, the way in which the feel of the neighborhood has been altered by a recent influx of wealthy Orthodox Jews—has prompted a rather profound debate about Jewish identity on a neighborhood blog. On Saturday, The Ditmas Park Blog mentioned the article—the post was written ...

In New York, the State Senate is set to vote imminently on legalizing gay marriage. In New Jersey, gay-rights activists are seeking to bring a marriage bill to a vote before January 19th, when Republican Chris Christie (an opponent) assumes the governorship from Democratic Gov. John Corzine (a supporter). In both cases, Orthodox rabbis and ...