Новости за 13.01.2016

A sad, important question is being circulated in France these days: Should Jews be able to freely wear kippot around Marseille?

Looking to introduce some younger folks in your life to the famous golem that’s inspired the Jewish folklore for centuries? I thought so.

This week in Israel, a local Muslim family will have an engagement party in the stone courtyard of an Ottoman-era house recently purchased and renovated by a Jewish writer in the old coastal city of Akko. Since the family’s nearby home is too small to host such an event, Israeli-American writer Evan Fallenberg, at the request of the family, offered up his space. Fallenberg’s Akko home is central to a project he’s calling “Arabesque”—the house will serve as an artists’ retreat, exhibition space... Читать дальше...

On Wednesday, the Jewish Book Council announced the winners of the 2015 National Jewish Book Awards. An awards ceremony will take place in New York City on March 9.

In this week’s Torah portion, Parashat Bo, the Plagues of Egypt reach their climax with the death of the firstborn, and for the first time the Israelites are called upon to actively participate in their own deliverance. To be spared, they have to slaughter lambs, the very animals their oppressors revere as deities, and display the blood over their doors. Only by thus defying Egypt in the most public way possible could they attain their freedom. And only by individually declaring their independence... Читать дальше...

There have already been a few sightings of anemones in Israel, and that means it’s the start of wildflower season. Many Israelis track wildflowers with a passion. There are traffic jams near popular flower-carpeted hills and even websites that tell you what’s popped up where. But what Israelis (or at least the vast majority of them) don’t do is pick those flowers. That restraint does not stem from any particular zeal for following the law that forbids such picking. Rather, it is the product... Читать дальше...

Anyone who has ever dreamed of seeing the president of the United States smiling and laughing arm-in-arm with an Israeli head of state need look no further than Israeli President Reuven “Ruvi” Rivlin’s most recent visit to Washington last month. President Barack Obama couldn’t have looked more thrilled to have him at the White House, and President Rivlin made sure to show his excitement and to express his gratitude for “what you have done in the last six years: for the finance, for the diplomatic... Читать дальше...

The Academy of the Hebrew Language is a curious institution. Founded in 1953, in Israel’s socialist days, the AHL is Israel’s official state regulator of the Hebrew language: not only does it authorize the entry of new words into the dictionary, it also coins them. These new entries often occur at the request of a public frustrated by its reliance on using forms of bastardized English where no Hebrew alternative exists. But help is here.