A Jewish lens on the crisis in Ukraine + Marvel's new superhero is son of a rabbi

View this email in a browser

JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.

➤ Give a tax-deductible donation

Congregants accuse L.A. rabbi of hypocrisy on mask mandate, Black Orthodox celebrities send message to both communities, and a Rothschild is writing 'Jewish Space Lasers' book.

THE LATEST FROM UKRAINE

A wounded woman stands outside a hospital after the bombing of a town in Ukraine on Thursday. (AFP via Getty)

Ukraine’s Jewish president, Volodymyr Zelensky, addressed his nation for the second time in 12 hours early Friday morning, saying that Russia was targeting civilian areas with rockets but that his government would stand strong. Earlier, he had said that he was Moscow’s “target No. 1.” Here are several Jewish angles on the escalating conflict…

Ukraine has one of the Europe’s largest Jewish communities, with a 2020 estimate of 43,000 residents who identify as Jews, and perhaps quadruple that number with Jewish ancestry. Our colleagues at the Jewish Telegraphic Agency have put together this explainer about where they live, how they feel about the rising conflict, how Zelensky being a Jew plays into things and much more. Read the story ➤

Jewish young adults from Russia and Ukraine were in Israel this week on a Birthright trip. Instead of flying home on Thursday as planned, they’re now staying at a Tel Aviv hotel until further notice. “I feel scared that these things can happen in the 21st century,” Anastasia Bilig, who is from Kyiv, told Stewart Ain. “I have no words in my mind to describe it.” Read the story ➤

Israel has long had a good relationship with Vladimir Putin and now finds itself in an awkward position. When Russia invaded Ukraine in 2014, Israel did not join the United States and other countries in a United Nations resolution condemning the attack. It’s particularly troublesome for Israeli leaders like Natan Sharansky, himself a native of Ukraine. “I felt quite embarrassed in the last days that at this critical moment of the future of the world – at this moment of moral clarity, Israel is not ready to say it clearly,” Sharansky told JTA in an interview. Read the story ➤

And a few more tidbits…

FROM THE FORWARD

Moon Knight, a Marvel superhero, began his life as the son of an Orthodox rabbi.

He made Moon Knight Jewish. He doesn’t care if Disney has other ideas. Moon Knight, a Marvel superhero, is known for a few things: his white outfits, his penchant for extreme violence and him being the only major character in that universe whose father was a rabbi. His backstory came courtesy of a Jewish day-school principal-turned-comic book writer, Alan Zelenetz, who put him in two 1984 issues. Our PJ Grisar spoke to Zelenetz about his inspiration for Moon Knight’s Yiddishkeit, the character’s upcoming Disney+ series and the internet’s demands that he remain Jewish. “If he’s not Jewish because there’s a good artistic reason he’s not Jewish, that’s perfectly OK,” said Zelenetz. Read the story ➤

A maskless Los Angeles rabbi draws ire of parents angry over COVID-19 rules: When David Wolpe, one of the country’s best-known rabbis, accepted a free ticket to the Super Bowl, he never thought it would lead to weeks of turmoil at his Los Angeles synagogue. But Wolpe’s decision to pose maskless for a photo proved a tipping point for a small but vocal group of his congregants who are over the congregation’s pandemic policies requiring masks and vaccines, with some accusing Wolpe of hypocrisy and mocking him as Sinai Temple’s “supreme leader.”Read the story ➤

Meet the Jewish judge who sent Michael Avenatti to jail: The recent trial of Avenatti for defrauding his ex-client Stormy Daniels included the inconspicuous but influential presence of Shabbat. Each Friday, U.S. District Court Judge Jesse Furman ended testimony early so he could get home before sundown. During a 2018 trial, Furman shut down the courtroom for Rosh Hashanah. Now 10 years into his lifetime appointment, Furman has presided over cases involving Bernie Madoff and Donald Trump, and is among a handful of powerful judges who adhere to traditional Jewish practices. Read the story ➤

That’s Amar’e! Black Orthodox superstars making outreach to the masses:A rapper and a basketball player walk into a shul. No, this is not the start of a joke. “It’s a manifestation of the Black American spiritual experience that started with enslaved people on a plantation and has migrated to synagogues in Jerusalem,” Mordechai Ben Avraham, a rabbinical student in Jerusalem, writes in a new OpEd. And it’s the responsibility of the larger community, he argues, to “see the value in empowering African American Jews.” Read the essay ➤

As we close out Jewish Disability Awareness, Acceptance, and Inclusion Month, here are two important stories…

WHAT ELSE YOU NEED TO KNOW TODAY

Doug Emhoff and Vice President Kamala Harris said their joint values are rooted in their different faiths.

🤝 Doug Emhoff, the Jewish husband of Vice President Kamala Harris, helped launch a project bringing together Black clergy from different faiths, including Rabbi Sandra Lawson, a member of The Forward Association, our governing board. “Faith and justice are very interrelated,” Emhoff said at the virtual launch event. “And as an interfaith family ourselves, we know that that same commitment to justice is a thread that runs through so many different religions.” (Religion News Service)

🕍 Federal prosecutors charged a teenager from Maine with planning a “mass murder” at a mosque, a synagogue and other houses of worship in Chicago. “It’s fair to say that based on the information that investigators received, that this was more than just talk,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Craig Wolff said Thursday. The 18-year-old, who officials say had three homemade explosive devices in a backpack when they searched his apartment, could face up to 10 years in prison. (AP)

👶 A prominent member of a Jewish supremacist group in Jerusalem has discovered that her biological parents are Muslim. Or Leibler, 22, confronted Arabs during Israel’s war with Gaza last May, and once said that “anyone who supports Palestine is a potential terrorist.” After giving birth to her son, Leibler decided to sift through the files of her own adoption. And that’s when she realized her Islamic roots. “At that moment, my whole world fell apart,” she said. (Times of Israel)

💻 When Sue Fishkoff started her job as editor-in-chief of J: The Jewish News of Northern California in 2011, she discovered bound volumes dating back to 1902. Fishkoff vowed that very day to “make it my business to see that precious material digitized and put online.” And she did: this month, the publication announced it had put online 6,151 issues dating back to 1895, when the paper was called the Emanu-El. (JTA)

📗 Author Mike Rothschild announced that his next book would be called “Jewish Space Lasers.” He described it as a “dive into 200 years of conspiracy theories about the Rothschild banking family,” and said it also looks “at how antisemitism has adapted to the internet.” The book is personal for Rothschild, who has been accused of being part of a “string-pulling cabal.” (Publisher’s Marketplace)

📺 The original “Law & Order” returned to NBC Thursday night after a 12-year hiatus. Many from the original cast have returned, and there are new faces: including Odelya Halevi, an up-and-coming actress from the same Israeli town as Gal Gadot, Rosh Ha’ayin. “These days, I can only truly express my emotion in emojis; I really don’t have words,” Halevi said. “Every day that I am doing this it feels more and more real and exciting, and someone please pinch me!” (WNY Papers)

Long weekend reads ➤ Every year, tens of thousands of religious Jews from around the world make a pilgrimage to a small Ukrainian town. Here’s why … What it’s like to be a Palestinian guide at the Museum of the Jewish People … Inside New Jersey’s Orthodox boomtown.

ON THE CALENDAR

On this day in history: Zeppo Marx, the straight man of the legendary Marx Brothers, was born Herbert Manfred Marx in Manhattan on Feb. 25, 1901. There are differing legends as to how he got his stage name. Groucho, his brother, and Barbara Sinatra, his ex-wife, both said it was inspired by the Zeppelin airship. Harpo, another brother, cited a chimp named Mr. Zippo. Zeppo eventually grew tired of being the punchline and retired from the family business, saying: “I’m sick and tired of being a stooge.”

Last year on this day, we wrote about a “Saturday Night Live” joke that was causing controversy: “Israel is reporting that they’ve vaccinated half of their population,” Michael Che said on the “Weekend Update” segment, “and I’m going to guess it’s the Jewish half.” Some deemed it antisemitic; other just anti-comedic. “What bugs me most about the joke is that it’s not creative,” said Joel Chasnoff, a Jewish comedian.

YOUR WEEKEND READS

This week’s issue of our free, printable magazine includes a book review exploring how the Hasidic village of Kiryas Joel has become the darling of Christian conservatives, a column on Indian-Jewish identity, and an opinion essay about a controversial IDF unit funded by American Jews. Plus: A ranking of all U.S. presidents … by their Jewishness. Get your copy ➤

–––

Thanks to PJ Grisar, Arno Rosenfeld, Eliya Smith and Robin Washington for contributing to today’s newsletter. You can reach the “Forwarding” team at editorial@forward.com.

Support Independent Jewish Journalism

The Forward is a non-profit 501(c)3 so our journalism depends on support from readers like you. You can support our work today by donating or subscribing. All donations are tax-deductible to the full extent of US law.

Make a donation ➤

Subscribe to Forward.com ➤

"America’s most prominent Jewish newspaper" — The New York Times, 2021

Copyright © 2021, The Forward Association, Inc. All rights reserved. The Forward Association, Inc., 125 Maiden Lane, New York, NY 10038

Click here to unsubscribe from this newsletter.

To stop receiving all emails from the Forward click here.