On Sunday, April 7, the Marquette University chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) planted 41,000 flags on campus in recognition of the ongoing genocide in Gaza. They acted with the full knowledge and permission of the university administration. It was a solemn and nonviolent display of solidarity and humanity. That same night, the flags were vandalized by three individuals with no association with the university. The piece below is a response to these events, delivered orally at a press conference on April 22 on Marquette campus and revised for publication in Jewschool. The viole ..read more

This piece is part of a השתא הכא/Hashata Hakha, a justice-oriented Haggadah reader with contributions from members of Halachic Left, All That’s Left, and HaSmol HaEmuni, designed by Caroline Morganti, and edited by Liz Bentley, Max Buchdahl, Maya Rosen, Aron Wander, and Netanel Zellis-Paley. Jewschool is proud to partner with this publication in sharing some of the contributions.  The Shabbat before Passover is called “Shabbat HaGadol,” which is usually translated as “The Great Sabbath.” But according to Rabbi Joseph di Trani (1568-1639, Greece), perhaps it should be translated as “T ..read more

by Rabbi Lara Haft Yom Tov This piece is part of a השתא הכא/Hashata Hakha, a justice-oriented Haggadah reader with contributions from members of Halachic Left, All That’s Left, and HaSmol HaEmuni, designed by Caroline Morganti, and edited by Liz Bentley, Max Buchdahl, Maya Rosen, Aron Wander, and Netanel Zellis-Paley. Jewschool is proud to partner with this publication in sharing some of the contributions.  “This is the bread of affliction our ancestors ate in the land of Egypt. Let all who are hungry come and eat; let all who are in need come share our Passover ..read more

Moving from Purim to Pesach this year is hard. Purim hits too close to home—the threat of a massacre of the Jewish community, the massacre of the Shushanites, the instability at the end of the Megillah—who will next get the King’s ring and license for genocide? Pesach offers liberation, Divine intervention in the world, the appearance of God over the splitting sea (according to the midrash) when everybody could literally point and say “this is my God”, and God’s crushing of cruel oppression. This year, we did not see liberation on Simhat Torah and it is Jews, Israelis, who seem to be cruelly o ..read more

It was only a day or two into this war, long before the initial shock of the horrific October 7th attacks had even set in fully, that a new slogan came to symbolize the Israeli zeitgeist that would accompany this military campaign: Yachad nenatze’ach, together we will win. The slogan was, and remains, everywhere: from bumper stickers to large banners draped on buildings, residential and commercial alike; featured in every form of advertisement (I’ve seen it on a packet of frozen chicken wings); plastered on the sides of buses and trains, and so on. It’s unavoidable. Together we will win.   ..read more

Nathaniel Berman Brown University Should American Jewish critics of the Israeli government’s conduct of the war publicly express their views? This issue is now tearing apart the American Jewish community. Senator Charles Schumer’s unprecedented criticism of the Israeli government, including its willingness “to tolerate the civilian toll in Gaza,” has served as a lightining-rod for this controversy. The Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations condemned Schumer, declaring that now is not the “time for public criticisms …. when unity is so desperately needed.” While this s ..read more

by Sara Klugman, for All That’s Left All That’s Left, a Jerusalem-based, anti-Occupation collective, has published For a Time Such as This: 5784 Purim Reader, a series of six essays  from left-wing Torah scholars sharing their thoughts on Purim in this dark time. Jewschool is proud to partner with ATL in publishing some of these essays. You can access the full reader here.  Jerusalem is a costumed city everyday: a people of covered heads and submerged histories. The city wears multiple cloaks: names and histories of people layered on top of each other like shiva notice ..read more

by an anonymous Torah student, for All That’s Left All That’s Left, a Jerusalem-based, anti-Occupation collective, has published For a Time Such as This: 5784 Purim Reader, a series of six essays  from left-wing Torah scholars sharing their thoughts on Purim in this dark time. Jewschool is proud to partner with ATL in publishing some of these essays. You can access the full reader here.  The parshiyot that surround the holiday of Purim are often filled with long and tedious descriptions of the nature of ritual service in the Mishkan. Often the descriptions feel distant ..read more

by Lexie Botzum for All That’s Left All That’s Left, a Jerusalem-based, anti-Occupation collective, has published For a Time Such as This: 5784 Purim Reader, a series of six essays  from left-wing Torah scholars sharing their thoughts on Purim in this dark time. Jewschool is proud to partner with ATL in publishing some of these essays. You can access the full reader here.  “But the state of Israel was not created for the salvation of the Jews; it was created for the salvation of the Western interests.” – James Baldwin, 1979, The Nation Haman is the one whose effigy is hung fro ..read more

By Rabbi Robin Podolsky Every day in which President Biden acts as though he is helpless in the face of Netanyahu’s intransigence adds to the suffering of the Gazan people he claims to care about—and it also perpetuates a dangerous antisemitic trope. As Senator Bernie Sanders has reiterated over and over again with the willingness of a prophet to repeat himself relentlessly until his message is heard, President Biden doesn’t really have the dilemma he claims to have. With one phone call, he could end the bombardment and threats of invasion. He could open the door to the level of aid need to en ..read more