BDE. We are sad to report that Rabbi Dr. Raymond Apple was niftar on Jan. 19. He was the Senior Rabbi of The Great Synagogue of Sydney between 1972 and 2005 and one of Australia’s highest … more

I s Israel on the cusp of political upheaval? In recent days, evidence has grown that two key actors — the Biden administration and Israel’s security establishment — are both … more

The South African government’s application to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on grotesquely false allegations of genocide against Israel needs to be seen for what it is: A defamatory … more

One of the more irritating and frankly offensive developments in the wake of the Israel-Hamas war has been the infection of the public discourse by the word “Palestine.” Slogans like … more

As unsettling and painful as the current wave of global antisemitism that followed the Oct. 7 Hamas pogrom in Israel is, it’s still important to remember that those bestial atrocities were an … more

Islamophobia struck again in the US Senate’s Judiciary Committee this week. Or so we’re supposed to believe. During the confirmation hearings for Adeel Mangi, a nominee to the … more

The concluding section of our parasha, Beshalach, contains the account of our ancestors’ mortal combat with Amalek, the marauding desert tribe that sought to destroy us following our departure … more

This coming Shabbat is called Shabbat Shira inasmuch as the Torah reading is Parashat Beshalach whose centerpiece is Az Yashir, the Song of the Sea. What is least known of this Shabbat is the reading … more

May 1948. Tough times for the Jewish people, particularly for Jews struggling to claw out a place for themselves in a land they hoped to claim as their own. A few months after the United Nations … more

Jewish history is a series of encounters with evil rulers. Pharaoh, whom we have been reading about up until this week’s Torah portion of Beshalach, was just the first tyrant who persecuted us. … more