The FBI says hate crimes against Jews dropped last year. Is that true?

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In today's briefing: How deaf Jews hear the shofar, anti-Israel professor teaching class about Mideast conflict at UNC, 'Fauda' writer's new TV series, Rosh Hashanah recipes and more.

The Forward is closed for Labor Day and Rosh Hashanah. This newsletter will return on Thursday, Sept. 9. Happy New Year!

OUR LEAD STORY ✍️

Opinion: Our hate crime reporting system is broken

The FBI released its 2020 hate crime report this week, showing a 29% drop from 2019 in incidents targeting Jews. But the data, experts say, do not even begin to accurately reflect the size and scale of the problem. Our opinion editor, Laura E. Adkins, took a deeper dive.

The Jewish factor: Hate crimes against Blacks, Asians and LGBTQ people tend to happen to individuals. But hate crimes against Jews tend to target our institutions — synagogues, JCCs and day schools. The reason is readily apparent: most American Jews do not wear a kippah, or obviously religious attire, and are thus not as easily identified as members of many other groups.

Pandemic impact: One reason the number of hate crimes against Jews declined in 2020 could be social distancing. “There was less interaction,” said Deborah Lauter, head of New York’s hate crime office.

Flawed data: Not a single expert Adkins talked to expressed confidence in the FBI data’s accuracy: 1 in 5 police departments failed to provide hate-crime statistics, many others reported zero incidents, and many in the communities most vulnerable to attack do not trust the authorities. “The data is important,” said Lauter, “but it’s not pure.”

Read the OpEd >

ALSO IN THE FORWARD 🇮🇱

A CONTROVERSIAL UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA GRAD STUDENT IS TEACHING A CLASS ON THE MIDEAST.

Who gets to teach what about Israel? A UNC course ignites the debate: Some Jewish students and groups are protesting a class about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict whose new teacher has mocked “Zionist dirtbags” on social media and tweeted about the conflict: “There is only one legitimate side – the oppressed.” But proponents of academic freedom say there’s no requirement that college courses be balanced, and Dov Waxman, director of Israel studies at UCLA, said focus on individual instructors or syllabi can be problematic. “It suggests that support for Israel is somehow in tension with academic freedom,” he said. “That is a losing battle for the pro-Israel side.” Read the story >

How to make the shofar meaningful for deaf Jews – in a pandemic: The few American synagogues designed to serve a deaf congregation face a question every year: How to communicate the shofar service, one of the most spiritually resonant parts of the High Holidays? In the age of COVID, as many services will be socially distanced or remote for the second year in a row, that challenge is amplified. Read the story >

WHAT ELSE YOU NEED TO KNOW TODAY👇

🇺🇸 President Joe Biden reiterated his commitment to combating antisemitism and and to getting Deborah Lipstadt confirmed as special antisemitism envoy in an annual call with rabbis and other leaders on Thursday. President Donald Trump also hosted a conference call with religious leaders on Thursday, including some Jewish ones, to reflect on his record on Israel. Our Jacob Kornbluh listened in to both. (Forward)

🌧 Rabbi Shmuel David Weissmandl, 69, was one of at least 43 people who died from flooding that swept the New York region on Wednesday night. Weissmandl was driving home from Rockland County when his car was caught in high water near the Tappan Zee Bridge. (Forward)

📞 One surprising detail we learned in this profile of Sen. Chuck Schumer headlined “The great kibitzer:” The Majority Leader still uses a flip phone. “I bought 20 of them,” he said, showing off a since-discontinued LG. “I’m on No. 18.” (Time)

🏊 Israeli swimmers Iyad Shalabi and Ami Dadaon each won gold medals at the Paralympics on Thursday, adding to the country’s historic medal showing so far – nine medals, including six golds. (JTA)

🍞 Why do grocery stores get all the Jewish holidays wrong? Challah for Passover. Matzah for Rosh Hashanah. Cookbook author Leah Koenig tried to find out why these anomalous ingredients show up in the off-season and, along the way, discovered how chains stock their kosher aisles. (Tablet)

From the entertainment desk (aka, my desk)...

⚽️ A writer from “Fauda” has created a six-part drama, “Munich Match,” set in 2022 – 50 years after the massacre of 11 Israelis at the 1972 Olympics in Munich. The story revolves around a friendly soccer game between Israeli and German football teams, but danger may be lurking in the shadows. (Variety)

🎵 Canadian-Jewish rapper Drake has finally released his long-awaited sixth studio album. He made the announcement yesterday on billboards in New York, Chicago, L.A., Atlanta, Memphis, Houston, Toronto, Miami, Cleveland, and Lagos, Nigeria. (Pitchfork)

🍿 A little Friday treat for you: The first trailer dropped for Gal Gadot’s action-packed new Netflix thriller. Get your sneak peek here.

He said it > “Larry David and I are enormously grateful to Netflix for taking this chance on us.” – Jerry Seinfeld on the news that all 180 episodes of “Seinfeld” will soon be streaming on the platform.

Long weekend reads > Meet the Israeli activists who are literally putting Orthodox women back in the picture … Miami’s newest diaspora community is disaffected New Yorkers and Californians looking for a new start in a state with fewer COVID-related restrictions … An oral history of the most epic Jewish summer camp prank ever.

FROM OUR KITCHEN 🍏

Rob Eshman, who runs our food coverage, sent this note: For me, the New Year is always a good reason to try new recipes. Some use familiar ingredients but combine them in really interesting ways. Some allow you to explore ingredients that may be new to you, like silan or Persian spices, and add them to your kitchen repertoire. Experiment! And tag us @jdforward and @foodaism on Twitter or Instagram, so we can see how things turned out....

Our Rosh Hashanah recipes:

And some great holiday-cooking backstories:

A PODCAST WE RECOMMEND 🎧

Looking to listen to a smart conversation this weekend while you prep for Rosh Hashanah? Check out “Unholy: Two Jews on the News.” The two Jews are our friends and fellow journalists Yonit Levi of Israel’s Channel 12 and Jonathan Freedland of the Guardian. In this first episode of their second season, they ask how President Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett are doing on Afghanistan, Iran, COVID and ... each other. Plus: Sacha Baron Cohen and Gal Gadot choose their “Mensch of the Year.” Listen now >

ON THE CALENDAR 🗓

PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES

On this day in history: Kitty Carlisle, actress and singer, was born on Sept. 3, 1910. She is perhaps best remembered as a panelist on the game show “To Tell the Truth;” she also served 20 years on the New York State Council on the Arts. When Carlisle died in 2007 at 96, Abigail Pogrebin wrote about the time she interviewed the socialite, who recalled attending a Passover Seder at George Gershwin’s. “Gershwin and Oscar Levant decided to do the whole Seder in music,” she said. “It was so wonderful.”

It’s U.S. Bowling League Day! Of course, it goes without saying that we’ve got an article about the secret Jewish history of bowling.

Rosh Hashanah begins Monday night, and it turns out saying ‘L’Shana Tovah’ may not be the right greeting.

PHOTO OF THE DAY 📸

PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES

Israeli farmer Amir Argov collects Cabernet Franc grapes picked at dawn at the start of harvest for Bar Maor Winery in the Hanadiv Valley in central Israel. Workers at Israeli wineries are toiling under intense summer heat, with many reporting a smaller than normal crop following a mild and short winter.

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