Forward.com

The Pragmatic President

A waffler to some is a pragmatist to others, and President Obama displayed his pragmatism most profoundly in his overdue, careful and ultimately persuasive argument defending the American airstrikes over Libya and our otherwise (at this writing) limited involvement in the uprising roiling the North African nation.Read More

Terror in Jerusalem

It had been more than three years since the last terrorist bombing targeting civilians in Israel — until a blast caused by an explosive pipe placed next to a telephone pole near the bus station in central Jerusalem on March 23 ended that period of relative quiet. Suddenly, the familiar images appeared across our screens, of shattered streets, frantic rescue efforts, harsh denunciations. And the familiar sorrow of lives lost and irreparably injured.Read More

Reform’s New Leader

Whoever leads the Union for Reform Judaism can really matter in American Jewish life. With 900 synagogues serving 1.5 million people, the Reform movement is the nation’s largest Jewish denomination and, despite its budgetary and organizational travails, remains the steadiest ship in the vast and sometimes inchoate sea of liberal Judaism. Its leaders tend to hold their jobs for a good, long while — Rabbi Alexander Schindler for 23 years, Rabbi Eric Yoffie for 16 years by the time he officially retires in 2012. So the selection of Rabbi Richard Jacobs as the next president of the URJ will have consequences far beyond his suburban synagogue and the movement he hopes to lead if, as expected, his selection is officially approved in June.Read More

The Courage of the Press

The horrific story of four journalists from The New York Times held captive in Libya underscores a brutal fact: Reporters and photographers place their lives on the line to deliver news and context so necessary for all of us to understand our world.Read More

The Fogel Photographs

Two images of the Fogel family are circulating after five of them were brutally murdered in their home in an Israeli settlement. One is a montage of their portraits, the other shows grisly details of their murders. Here’s why the Forward won’t publish the graphic photographs.Read More

The Triangle Legacy

A century later, why does a fire in a garment factory resonate so deeply? The deadly inferno at the Triangle Waist Company on March 25, 1911, is being commemorated in hundreds of different events, coast to coast, in word, song, poetry and deed, because it represents many of the touchstones of the American experienceRead More

Awards and Accolades

By Jane Eisner

It’s awards season in the journalism world, and I’m pleased to report that the Forward has already brought home a few. At its annual dinner March 10, the Community Media Alliance in New York gave two of its Ippies Awards to Josh Nathan-Kazis for writing about labor and education, and one to Nadja Spiegelman for her podcast interview with the leader of a group of gay Orthodox Jews.Read More

A Question of Loyalty

As a religious and ethnic minority, Jews have a special stake in ensuring that congressional hearings on Islamic radicalization do not provide a platform to those who would challenge an American’s loyalty because of where he prays or how she connects to causes overseas.Read More

Dear Congresswoman

This is addressed to the Republican members of the House of Representatives who are women. It’s not a large group — 24 to be exact — representing less than a third of all women in the House, and just shy of 10% of the GOP caucus. But they could potentially provide the decisive votes to undo one of the very bad ideas being promulgated by their party in its clumsy and disingenuous attempt to trim the federal budget.Read More

Talking Trash

There they go again. John Galliano. Charlie Sheen. And now maybe Julian Assange. The list is so obvious it needs no explanation, thanks to the saturated media coverage awarded these foul-mouthed celebrities. If there’s anything salutory about this parade of stories, it’s the rapid, direct way bad behavior is confronted. Sheen lost his lucrative television show for crudely criticizing the man who wrote and produced it. Galliano was dumped by fashion house Christian Dior after a scratchy video emerged with his unguarded, disgusting comments about loving Hitler and gassing ugly people.Read More