Last week the HBO drama “True Blood,” a fantastical variant of our world rife with supernatural beings, presented the children of a fairy-human union as progressing from infants to young adults in just a few days. The offspring grew up so fast they...

 “If you would see the man’s monument, look around.”— Translation of Latin inscription near the tomb of Sir Christopher Wren, LondonWilliam “Bill” Kahn was genetically “hard-wired” to devote his entire adult life to fighting for  social...

The problem with advocacy for a one-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is this: No one can posit a scenario that ends well.Recent utterances by Israeli and Palestinian voices alike suggesting the end of two-state efforts show a skepticism...

When the Arab Spring and Iran’s Green Revolution erupted in the Middle East, many Israel loyalists (including us) were concerned about the short-term conflagrations that would make things worse and more unsettled. Ascendance of the Muslim Brotherhood...

It’s a massive disappointment that the Illinois same-sex marriage law failed. It’s even more disappointing that this happened largely due to the actions of some African-American church leaders who apparently believe it’s acceptable for individuals...

As our 2013 Unsung Heroes event and accompanying OY! Magazine showed last week, it is not remotely necessary to be a financial juggernaut to help the community. Simple acts of loving kindness, in the Jewish tradition, ought be appreciated, and so we have...

Mergers, consolidations and collaborations have taken center stage in the local Jewish community over the past several years (see related story on Page 1).At the merger level, we’ve seen two Conservative synagogues come together to form a new entity,...

When Internal Revenue Service officials researched applications for tax-exempt status to ensure they were not overtly political groups in disguise, they were right.When the same officials apparently focused their attention on right-wing groups, as opposed...

The horrific collapse in Bangladesh of a garment factory building, for which the confirmed death toll has now reached 705, is a painful reminder of an American horror a century earlier — the 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire in New York City, causing...

The choices for the United States regarding Syrian intervention are hardly enviable, but the political pressure cooker seems ready to explode.It has now been all but definitively confirmed that the lethal chemical weapon of sarin gas has been used on...

Had the stakes not been so high, it would have been amusing to read the perverse set of opinions offered up in the Room for Debate section of the New York Times website last week about gun control.The fully predictable voice from the National Rifle Association...

Despite Middle East news taking a backseat to the provocations of North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un, diplomacy has been roiled by the resignation of Salam Fayyad, prime minster of the Palestinian Authority. Fayyad’s timing could not have been worse...