S.Y. Agnon’s Passover Horror Story

April 14 2017

In “The Tale of Rabbi Gadiel,” the Nobel-Prize-winning Hebrew writer S.Y. Agnon, employing his signature pseudo-folktale style, draws on the books of Jonah and Esther, kabbalistic lore, and the legends of Elijah the Prophet to tell the story of a Tom Thumb-like rabbi who saves the Jews of his town from a blood libel. Herewith, Marcela Sulak’s reading of an excerpt of the story, translated by Evelyn Abel. (Audio, 8 minutes.)

Read more at TLV1

More about: Arts & Culture, Blood libel, Modern Hebrew literature, Passover, S. Y. Agnon

The Democratic Party Is Losing Its Grip on Jews

Since the 1930s, Jews have been one of America’s most solidly Democratic ethnic groups. Although, true to form, a majority again voted for Kamala Harris, something clearly has shifted. John Podhoretz writes:

Over the course of the past thirteen months, Jews in America have been harassed, threatened, seen their ancestral homeland derided as a settler-colonial genocidal state. They have seen Jewish kids mistreated on college campuses. And they have seen the Biden administration kowtow to Muslim populations hostile to Jews and the Jewish state in Michigan. They have heard the criticisms of Israel’s efforts to defend itself, and have noted the silence from the administration when it came to anti-Semitic assaults and the refusal of college presidents to condemn the treatment of Jews and Jewish topics under their ambit.

And Jews have acted.

The initial evidence from last night’s election is that there has been a significant shift in the Jewish vote from previous elections, a delta of anywhere from 10 to 40 percent overall.

Read more at Commentary

More about: 2024 Election, American Jewry, Anti-Semitism, Democrats, U.S. Politics