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JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT. Give a tax-deductible donation Facebook bias in the Middle East, Afghanistan's last Jew moving to Queens, Naftali Bennett addressing U.N., Jewish teen may be best beatboxer in the world and more. LET'S START THE WEEK I’m often amazed at the breadth of topics covered by our digital culture reporter Mira Fox. One day it’ll be about online conspiracy theorists appropriating Anne Frank’s image and the next it’ll be an interview with a former Disney star who launched a Torah podcast. Here are three of her recent articles...
The antisemitic conspiracy behind the anti-porn movement: Many white-supremacist movements allege a direct connections between the porn industry and Jews. David Duke, the former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard, posted a diatribe claiming Jews “see pornography as a weapon of revenge for real or imagined European wrongs against Jews from the time of Romans to the modern day.” John Earnest, the man who opened fire on the Poway Chabad in 2019, blamed Jews in a manifesto for “causing many to fall into sin with their role in peddling pornography.” Read the story >
Is Facebook biased against Palestinians?People on both sides of the Mideast conflict have accused the social-media giant of censorship. Now, Facebook’s own oversight board says in a new report that it may disproportionately remove Palestinian content. Read the story >
ALSO FROM THE FORWARD (Getty Images) The gorgeous desperation of Tony Curtis — an actor who never played it straight:Our most popular article over the weekend was this one about Bernard Schwartz, born to Hungarian-Jewish parents in the Bronx in the depths of the Depression. Schwartz became Curtis, who “was as gorgeous as they come,” according to our culture critic Jackson Arn. Yet he never seems to take his beauty for granted; he’s constantly putting it to work, wielding it like a rusty old tool.”Read the story >
The secret Jewish history of Rolling Stone’s 500 greatest songs:After the music magazine published its list of the best of the best, our culture contributor Seth Rogovoy found 70 instances where members of the tribe played an integral role. “These songs may not be the be-all and end-all of Jewish contributions to popular music in the rock era,” he writes. “But they do serve convincingly to suggest that contribution was significant and influential, as well as provide fodder for plenty of well-meaning, good-natured argument and debate.” Read the story >
And one more: How Ingmar Bergman’s ‘Scenes From a Marriage’ converted to Judaism
WHAT ELSE YOU NEED TO KNOW 'I would like to be a U.S. citizen,' said Zebulon Simantov, Afghanistan's last Jew. (Getty Images) 🗽 Zebulon Simantov, the famed last Jew of Afghanistan, is heading to New York. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is working on the arrangements. Simantov, a former carpet dealer, said hopes to “do business” in the Big Apple and looks forward to enjoying a shot of Johnnie Walker Blue Label scotch. (NY Post, JTA)
👦 1 in 4 Israeli kids became more violent during the pandemic, according to a new study. Children were under more stress and needed help from their parents to reconnect with friends after lockdown; 10% of them required psychological treatment. Among older kids, 83% became addicted to screens. (Times of Israel)
🤝 North America’s first permanent Anne Frank Center opened in Columbia, S.C., the birthplace of Dylann Roof, the white supremacist who in 2015 killed nine members of a historic Black church in Charleston. The new center is the brainchild of Doyle Stevick, a non-Jewish expert on Holocaust education, who notes that Frank was born in 1929 — the same year as Martin Luther King Jr. (Religion News Service)
🎤 An Israeli teenager is competing at the Grand Beatbox Battle in Warsaw next month. (Times of Israel)
🍺 Shmaltz Brewing Company, an upstate New York company that began in 1996 with “The Chosen Beer,” announced that it will soon close. The final version of its “Jewish beer” is called Bittersweet Lenny’s RIPA. (Times Union)
🚀 “Star Trek” actor William Shatner is set to boldly go to space next month. At 90, he will be the oldest person to ever take such a trip, surpassing the 82-year-old Wally Funk, who went up with Jeff Bezos this summer. (Forward)
🤔 Andrew Yang, late of the 2020 Democratic presidential primary and the 2021 New York mayoral one, is launching a third party, and he’s going to call it “The Forward Party.” To be clear, we have nothing to do with it … but speaking of Forward parties, please make sure to register for our virtual gala. (Business Insider)
Shiva call > Jules Chametzky, founding editor of The Massachusetts Review, died at 93. A week before, the magazine he first envisioned in 1958 received the top prize for literary magazines from the Whiting Foundation. Chametzky was also co-editor of the Norton Anthology of Jewish American Literature, and author of a book on Abraham Cahan, the founding editor of the Forward.
NOTES FROM THE TONYS Danny Burstein accepts the Tony award for his role in 'Moulin Rogue! The Musical.' (Getty Images) Our culture reporter PJ Grisar sent in these dispatches after last night’s Tony Awards…
The first award, for Best Actor in a Featured Role in a Play went to David Alan Grier – his first win after many nominations. Grier is not Jewish, but was part of this indelible sketch from “In Living Color.”
Best Performance by a Featured Actor in a Musical went to Danny Burstein, who played club owner Harold Zidler in “Moulin Rouge.” It was Burstein’s first win and eighth nomination. The actor, remembered for playing Tevye in “Fiddler” and Luther Billis in “South Pacific,” had a very difficult pandemic, being hospitalized for COVID and losing his wife, Rebecca Luker, to ALS. “You all showed up for us,” a grateful Burstein told the Broadway community. “You sent your love, sent your prayers, sent bagels. It meant the world to us.”
Lauren Patten took Featured Actress in a Musical for “Jagged Little Pill.” Patten once said she first “truly experienced the ability of theater to create change and make audience members feel seen” while performing as Anne Frank and having talkbacks with Jewish communities and school groups. In her acceptance speech, Patten made an appeal for change beginning with her own show, now mired in a controversy surrounding inclusion and alleged mistreatment of transgender performers.
Best Orchestration went to the team of Katie Kresek, Charlie Rosen, Matt Stine and Justin Levine for “Moulin Rouge” (they had to go up to accept two-by-two, like Noah’s animals, for health and safety reasons). Rosen thanked his parents, like a good boychik, along with everyone who ever shared music or art with him.
Kicking off the concert portion of the evening, Leslie Odom Jr. led a rousing number in front of the Winter Garden – it was almost as good as his version of Ma’Oz Tzur.
Matthew Lopez’s “The Inheritance” won Best Play, making him the first Latinx writer to take home the award. Lopez found early success with “The Whipping Man,” which imagined an encounter between recently-freed Black Jewish men and their former Jewish enslavers on Passover 1865.
ON THE CALENDAR (Getty Images) On this day in history: We’re celebrating the birth of some of our favorite members of the tribe. Comedian and podcast host Marc Maron turns 58, U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz turns 55, actress Gwyneth Paltrow turns 49, and musician and actress Carrie Brownstein turns 47. Would love to be a fly on the wall at that birthday party.
Also on this day: In 1791, France voted to award full citizenship Jews.
Mark your calendar: Here’s your chance to see a rare 1988 documentary called “The Forward: From Immigrants to Americans.” At 6 p.m. ET on Thursday, our editor-in-chief, Jodi Rudoren, will interview the filmmakers, Marlene Booth and Linda Matchan. Register now and receive a link to watch the film.
PHOTO OF THE DAY A sukkah built atop an IDF vehicle during the Yom Kippur War. (Nathan Fendrich/National Library of Israel) Jessica Steinberg reports in the Times of Israel: Rare photos newly released by Israel’s national library show soldiers observing Sukkot during the Yom Kippur War in 1973, on the tops of military vehicles in the Sinai Desert and the Golan Heights. Find out more >
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