If you’re anything like me, when it comes to commemorating the Holocaust, you probably think: “I want my MTV!!”

Well, now you will. MTV has announced the airing of I’m Still Here, a celeb-studded documentary commemorating Yom Hashoah.

I’m Still Here, Real Diaries of Young People Who Lived During the Holocaust, presents the diaries of young people who experienced first-hand the terror of daily life during the Holocaust. Through an emotional montage of archival footage, personal photos, and text from the diaries themselves, the film tells the story of a group of young writers who refused to quietly disappear.
Academy Award nominated director Lauren Lazin has directed the hour-long documentary. The film is scored by Moby and the diaries are read by some of today’s most talented young actors including Elijah Wood, Ryan Gosling, Kate Hudson, Brittany Murphy and Joaquin Phoenix, among others. Original footage was shot in Vilnius, Lithuania in the remnants of the old Jewish ghetto. Actor, director, and writer Zach Braff will host the program when it airs on MTV.

(Side topic : Zach Braff is the most Jewlicious actor of his generation. Discuss.)

All kidding aside, having written a book about teens who survived the Holocaust and having worked at MTV, I think it’s great when a network known for its branding and marketing uses its informational power for good. True, most kids would just like to see the new J.Lo. video or download new ringtones for their cell phones, but with Zach as the lead voice and other young magazine-cover-gracing actors providing supporting dramatic roles, this film sounds like a good way to bend the ears of the tweens and teens who make MTV their life.

I’m Still Here airs May 4 at 8pm (EST). The film is part of MTV’s Fight For Your Rights anti-discrimination campaign. A study guide will be available on the Facing History website in July.

The trend ck spotted long ago is here with a vengeance.
What Yeshiva girl wouldn’t love wearing these new designs, hot off the runway from Belgian fashion designer Dries Van Noten?

Note the skirts, just below the knee or longer, sleeves covering the elbows, add a shirt underneath to cover up the provocative collar and you’re ready to make a splash at your next hotel lobby shidduch date!

Too much skin is fuggly. Tznius is the new sexy.

Tip of the sheitle to the I am Fashion blog for the comment.

This is getting ridiculous already…
There’s a new energy drink in town and the Red Bull people are cowering in fear! Not only do they have to contend with celebrity endorsements by either Madonna or Ashton Kutcher but Kabbalah Energy Drink is made of real genuine Kabbalah Water for that extra divine boost of energy when you’re out at a rave and munching on tabs of E like they’re M&Ms or when you’re coming down from a 3 day coke binge and need a little pick me up at work so your boss won’t figure out why you keep running off to the can every 5 minutes and you seem to have a cold in the middle of the summer.

But I digress.

So yeah. Kabbalah Energy Drink. Bad idea. Surely this will invite divine intervention from one of the less merciful of G*d’s 12 divine attributes. Surely it will. Uh… please let it? Please?? I mean this crap is already available on eBay! Is nothing sacred?

Mind you, if they had some of that in kosher for Passover format, it might have helped keep some of us awake through the seder….

Thanks to Cordelia for the heads up, if not for the semi-righteous indignation.

Two boys were suspended by a Michigan high school in Avondale for wearing Kippahs.

Outraged? About to phone the ACLU?

Muffti would be except but for the fact that offending kippah wearers Michael Stevens and Travis Jobe aren’t jewish. They aren’t trying to convert. One even put spikes in his kippah but took them out when he realized they were offending other students. In his words:

I was just decorating it because I thought I liked it, and I didn’t know I was being disrespectful at the time

Why on earth did these youngsters adopt the new headware?

My Jewish friend gave it to me and I was studying it a little bit, and I was getting interested in it…The principal strongly suggested that I don’t wear it because it may offend people because I’m not officially Jewish.

So says Stevens. Apparently his dad was called in to reveal his son’s religion to the assistant principle.

Go figure. Muffti supposes that if you can be suspended for wearing gang colours, why not for impersonating jews. Next thing you know Stevens and Jobe will be wearing payot and refusing pork.

Thanks to
WXYZ News for details.

First they pull you off rooftops, then they break your heart – the women of the Israel Police

Jewschool may have Suicide Girls but we promote strong women and positive role models – namely the fine, fine women of the Israel Police who will be the ones actually leading the evacuation of Gaza protesters this summer.

“We will not have any problem fighting women,” said one [right-wing protester]. “They can be policemen or policewoman, but for us they are desecrating God’s name and we will stop them.”

Uh… stupid head? I’ve had the misfortune of rasslin with a few of these babes. They are tough as nails. Do not be fooled by the pony tails and coquettish demeanor – you and your overfed, pale skinned, molly coddled friends are in for a world of hurt. I strongly urge you to be a mentsch and move along. It’s what G*d and the concept of Ahavat Chinam would want you to do.

Okay, I have to admit that Ha’aretz’s website redesign is not working for me. I don’t like the layout of the news very much, and this is the minor problem.

The major problem is that they’ve enabled comments. The comments have become dominated by the type of rabid Israel haters of the Left that can talk all day and all night about apartheid regimes and Nazis. Everything Israel does is evil, etc., etc., etc., the birth of Israel came about in sin, etc., etc., etc., Zionazis, boycotts are good, universities offering academic freedom are evil, etc., etc., etc.

The sad thing is that Ha’aretz has quite a few employees who believe this crap and now they have found a way to promote it. Essentially, they have created a mini Electronic Intifadah website. At first I thought to join a couple of discussions, but then wondered what the point is if you’re talking to frothing loonies? I guess I might join in one day, if I can find some time, but in the meantime I’ll just give more of my reading time to Jerusalem Post, under new ownership over the past little while that has removed some of the biting right-wing sting of the writing, and with the excellent and balanced David Horovitz at their helm.

Why “Part One”? Because I’m sensin’ a series.

For some reason, I seem to get a lot of mail telling me why I’m not married. Sure, most of it is spam, urging me to check out “Chryztina and her hottt friends on their brand new webcam,” but sometimes, an email comes in that enlightens me in a whole new way.

Today’s email brought me this gospel: I’m too dang liberal. And I won’t date Republicans. And it’s not just me, it’s all Jewish women. No! In fact, it’s all single women.

Attention Single Jewish Women, the article’s title announces:

In fact, attention all single women who want to marry. Do you know why you wonderful ladies are still alone most nights? Because, in general today, the idea of dating a conservative, God forbid Republican male, is the equivalent of dating a chimpanzee!

As most men mature, they tend to depart from the secular college brainwash, based on 1960’s liberalism, and become somewhat more conservative. The macho caveman DNA starts to break down the indoctrinated feminization of the well educated male. Men are forced to go out into the real world to become corporate hunters, especially if they eventually plan to have a family.

Women are totally different, despite what elite college professors believe about the similar natures of men and women. As women get older they become more liberal, until they wed. Single men generally go towards the right, while single women head left; another one of God’s little tricks to make the mating process more complex.

Want proof? Me too! Let’s go to the experts in Jewish demographic data collection: JDate.

These results can be proven in real life by studying any of the most popular dating websites of the day; the present Jewish favorite being www.Jdate.com. With the exception of a majority of Orthodox women, virtually every woman’s political viewpoint in her “dating profile” is liberal or left.

Very interesting. So what are all poor, single female Democrats to do? Maybe we should just give into our natural reaction to being boyfriendlessness and resort to our standby mancatching techniques/comforts/indulgences: plastic surgery, expensive vacations, salon visits or shoe shopping.

So a little advice to all you single Jewish and non Jewish women who would like to get married. Forget the major cosmetic surgery, new hairstyle, Manolo Blahnik shoes, Club Med jaunts and new wardrobe. [Oh, crap. --EDK.] Just rethink your politics and world view, and perhaps a honeymoon will become a much greater possibility

“Perhaps”? “A much greater possibility”? You mean, all I have to do is change the way I think, and I’m not even guaranteed a honeymoon?? I think they call that “plausible deniability.” Or a “disclaimer.”

I’ll Take One!

I believe there is an image here that could be improved with some photoshop. It’s amazing how quickly this pending “mini-crisis” could be solved if an image was circulated of this man wearing a kippah. I’m positive he won’t have a problem putting one on at Yad Vashem at that point.

Yiddish Folk Tales! Klezmer music! Belly Dancing! No, this is not about my recent dating life, but rather it’s a show taking place from April 29th to June 5th at the Santa Monica Playhouse.

They sent me an email asking for a plug and they were just so cute and earnest, how could I say no? Also there’s an old-timey radio element involved, and if anything gets to me, it’s old-timey radio. Here’s what they said: she-devils from the underworld … unintentionally create scandal in the Shtetl – man those ashkenazim are just so darned compelling and exotic! Check it out at the Santa Monica Playhouse Web site.

Around Day 2 of Operation Eternal Passover (begun a day early at my parents’ New Jersey home because of Shabbat), it hit me: there were 36 hours left until I could use my computer. Even then, I would need to add another hour to allow for post-Yom Tov travel time from NJ to NYC.

Not that I’m addicted, mind you. I’m perfectly capable of going a day or two without Internet, without AIM, MSN, Yahoo! Messenger, perusing Bloglines, or obsessively checking my fifty-seven email accounts. I’m even able to go without Jewlicious. Not that I choose that Internet-free existence often (and yes, mostly on Shabbat and Yom Tov), but that doesn’t necessarily translate to a Betty Fordable Addiction. I can quit anytime I want.

But I do admit to having had impure, technology-tainted thoughts over chag…I dreamed of liveblogging the seders, and comparing my accounts with others from my Jewlicious colleagues: I wondered what CK’s Sephardic sedarim looked like, and whether he’d have anything to contribute to my family’s annual academic contemplation titled “I Wish We Were Sephardic So That We Could Eat Kitniyot.” I wondered where Laya was for chag, and whether she was doing one seder or two this year. I wondered if TM had any cool stories of what his child did during the seder. And in contemplation of the Muffti, I was wondering what (if anything) Passover means to a self-proclaimed atheist.

Maybe it’s the channel surfer in me, but I can’t wait for teleportation technology to be developed, so I can visit other people and experience their sedarim without sacrificing the unique experience of being with my own family.

Which, just to clarify, is not to be confused with the desire to attend more seders, because two is more than enough for anyone.

How was your seder? How were your sedarim? Break the middle matzah and share with us.

Okay, so I’m reading the news and ynet has articles about cooking matzah brei replete with recipes and fond nostalgic memories.

Matzah brei?

That’s the best they can do?

Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy Ynet and read them regularly, but this is it? The height of gastronomic Jewish tradition? Matzah brei? What’s so great about some wet matza cooked with eggs? This is the Passover equivalent of Bagel Judaism.

Now folks, let’s be clear about this, god did not intend us to use stoves to cook matza brei. Since using a stove on Passover is inimical to the whole Pesach they-had-to-hurry-and-had-no-time-to-let-their-dough-leaven idea, if you’re going to use one, do it seriously.

(more…)

I fell in love with Judaism through a certain hippy spiritual branch of it, and many of my perspective on it are colored with that lens. It is only when I leave that environment or straighter people come into it that I realize not everybody thinks like we do.

To that end, here are some rambling last minute Pesach thoughts for you.

The exodus from Egypt is of the corner stones of the Jewish narritive. We return to its theme every Shabbat, every time we bentch after meals, in every amida. I always found it interesting that we celebrate and commemorate not finally getting to Israel, but the beginning of the journey there.

They say that while self refinements are possible any time, there are certain times of the year that are significantly more condusive to certain things. Like how Tshuva is easier to accomplish in Elul when “the King is in the field”. Pesach is the time of leaving things behind us. Leaving our own Mitzraim’s, or places or narrowness, to begin our journey to our own personal promised land.

It’s about getting free of slave mentalities, the attitudes and perceptions that we thing protect us but actually hold us back, and taking on the burden of freedom. The “insecurity of freedom” as Heschel called it.

The perpetual film geek in me also can’t help but revel in the story it self. Such drama! You get to see this amazing character arc of Moses, leaving home, finding his voice, going up against not only the most powerful empire in the world, but the very home that raised him in a heartbreaking effort to save a people who barely know they need saving. How can you not love that conflict?

I think Pesach may very well be my favorite of our holidays. There are so many themes, so much symbolism and so many questions to ask regarding the Pesach story and the Seder itself, I get excited every year anew when I remember what and intellectually stimulating holiday it is for me.

Here’s to us all leaving our narrowness, our baggage, and our insecurities behind us, and relishing the journey forward.

See you on the other side everybody!

There, got your attention.

But this is just a post wishing you all a happy Passover.

Everybody out there have a great chag that brings you closer to your family and friends, and of course to our fine traditions.

Remember that when you tire of matzah, there are always these.

Chag Sa’me’ach. and Shabbat Shalom

Yet another Passover-based animation, this time from the good folks at Jib Jab – thanks to BibleKing18 for the heads up. It’s pretty funny though a tad racy at times. Those of you with delicate sensibilities have been warned! For those of you who enjoy sacrilege, click here!

Two Pesachs ago I went to a Festival in Israel called Boombamela and had a truly transformative experience. Boombamela is kind of a cross between Burning Man and Woodstock, except proudly proudly Jewish. My first Pesach in Israel, still honeymooning with the country, friends and I went early and had the best Seder ever right there on the beach. When the people started filing in and the music didn’t stop playing for days I spent the whole time in a dazed state of utopian bliss marveling from behind my camera at just how sexy the Jewish people can be.

Like Burning Man or Rainbow, everything is divided into villages. I spent most of my time with the religious camp (Kfar Tefilla) in part because I found the tension of religious people in a sea of hedonism more complex and interesting than the hedonism itself. But also because that was the only kosher kitchen running.

Anyway, here are some of the photos I took that year when it was still good. The next year they started advertising for it in Israeli high schools and the average age dropped to 15 and it became so much less fun. But ahh, those were the days.

(more…)

The New Yorker reproduced notes taken by Philip Roth during informal conversations he had with Saul Bellow. The focus is on Bellow’s early works but the verbatim nature of the notes are reflective of an informal conversation between two Jewish literary giants – this is truly remarkable reading:

On France:

O.K., the Americans had liberated Paris, now it was time for Paris to do something for me. The city lay under a black depression. The year, if I haven’t said so before, was 1948. The gloom everywhere was heavy and vile. The Seine looked and smelled like some medical mixture. Bread and coal were still being rationed. The French hated us. I had a Jewish explanation for this: bad conscience. Not only had they been overrun by the Germans in three weeks, but they had collaborated. Vichy had made them cynical. They pretended that there was a vast underground throughout the war, but the fact seemed to be that they had spent the war years scrounging for food in the countryside. And these fuckers were also patriots. La France had been humiliated and it was all the fault of their liberators, the Brits and the G.I.s.

(more…)

Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the water…here’s a story to cure us all of our appetite for the foreseeable future.

Three sharks were caught in Ashdod by local fishermen. One of them was so big (how big was he) that when the fishermen sliced the sucker open, he had a friggin’ baby dolphin inside him.

Maybe this is just a set of “Nesting Babushka Dolls: Ocean Wildlife Version.” Now I’m wondering what’s inside the dolphin.

The fishermen cut the shark up and passed the pieces on to their colleagues from Gaza, since they said there is no demand for shark meat in Israel.

(And Gaza says we never give them anything…)

In recent years, especially in spring, sightings increase of schools of sharks off Ashdod and Ashkelon, as the sharks seek out the warm water emerging from the power stations at these two cities.

(Plus, with all those kids peeing in the ocean…)

Good news? The sharks are “not aggressive.” Still, say it with me: “I think they’re going to need a bigger boat.”

We’ve been covering this story for a while. Here. Here. And here.

Unbelievably, the third worst scenario is now playing out. AIPAC has fired the two men who are under investigation by the FBI, policy director Steve Rosen and senior analyst Keith Weissman. Their lawyers are strongly denying any wrongdoing by the two men, but AIPAC seems to be distancing itself aggressively.

The government employee, Larry Franklin, used by the FBI to entrap the two AIPAC officers has returned to work for the government in a new job, but has stopped cooperating with law enforcement and, I presume, prosecutors. He’s also secured an attorney who specializes in “spy” cases. It seems the FBI set him up and then offered him a way out by suggesting a way to entrap Rosen and Weissman. Franklin apparently provided them with information about an imminent Iranian attack on Israelis and information about a Presidential directive as to how the matter might be handled. The two AIPAC officers are accused of having illegally passed the information on to Israeli officials.

The lawyers representing Rosen and Weissman are publicly stating that, “”Contrary to press accounts, they have never solicited, received, or passed on any classified documents.” One can only hope they are telling the truth.

The second worst scenario would happen if this matter actually goes to trial and would be doubly bad if they are convicted of the crime. The worst scenario would have them go to trial and lose, but have AIPAC itself implicated in some way.

I keep hoping this isn’t true, but as time marches on the situation is looking grimmer.

C.K. Williams, who has already won a Pulitzer Prize for his poetry, today won the Lilly Prize which is awarded to one U.S. poet annually to represent an extraordinary career’s accomplishments.

A quick glance at the names of all the previous winners of the Lilly Prize reveals some likely Jewlicious poets: Adrienne Rich, Philip Levine, Anthony Hecht, Mona Van Duyn, Hayden Carruth, David Wagoner, John Ashbery, Charles Wright, Donald Hall, A. R. Ammons, Gerald Stern, William Matthews, W. S. Merwin, Maxine Kumin, Carl Dennis, Yusef Komunyakaa, Lisel Mueller, and Linda Pastan.

But then today, C.K. won the Prize, and I thought that it would be nice to mention him here.

(more…)

Uh.. so is this a new trend or what? A Palestinian singles site advertising on CampusJ, a Jewish collegiate blog? What’s that all about? Is this some kind of new trend?

Maybe it’s the lure of the forbidden? What could be more astonishing than a Jew and a Palestinian getting it on? I mean… it’s so wrong. So wrong… and yet … so, so right …

Or maybe it’s just Google Ad Words being wonky. I thought it was kind of funny and thought provoking. Well, mostly funny in a stupid way, but just a little thought provoking. Plus now I kind of have a valid reason to link to CampusJ.

Muffti is always amazed at the meaningless statistics that are ‘newsworthy’. Of course this will confirm what many of you already thought, so you’ll believe it. And it goes against what Muffti thinks, so he’ll find problems with it. Anyhow…

An anonymous phone-in centre named ERAN turned overs statistics about their callers, who typically claim to suffer depression. ERAN received nearly 140,000 callers* of which 73% claimed to be unmarried, while 61% were women. Many apparently called seeking relief from severe loneliness. All of which is very sad, of course.

The statistics were made public for Tuesday’s National Depression Awareness Day. Depression, according to Psagot Institute for mental disorders, costs Israel some NIS 3 billion annually.

*Jpost says ‘people’, but Muffti isn’t sure if they mean distinct people or just callers. Obviously the number of callers need not equal the number of different people who called.

Future Pope Ratzinger and IDF Paratroopers Liberate Jerusalem

Jerusalem Post provides these recorded remarks from the new Pope Benedict XVI nee Ratzinger:

“I think it is very important that Jews, even if they live all over the world, have a homeland, a point of reference, live in the land of their fathers as a people in continuity with their own history and the promise given to their forefathers.”

A short while after this, Pope John Paul II uncoincidentally stated that “the Jewish people have a right to a land of their own” – adding that Palestinians too have a right to their own state.

Asked…whether Israel had special meaning for Christianity, he replied, “I think yes, certainly, but without rushing to theological conclusions, because the State of Israel was created by secular thought and is in itself a secular state. However, this fact has a great religious value because this people is not simply a people like any other. They have always maintained ties with their great history and therefore find themselves in this Holy Land, the Holy Land of the history of all three monotheistic religions. This, of course, also bears a message for Christians.”

Sounds like the kind of person who has an affinity for the Jewish people and who understands the need for a Jewish state.

(more…)

In an amazing interview to a Dubai publication, Moussa Abu Marzouq, deputy head of the group’s political bureau, informs the world that Hamas is willing to consider entering into negotiations with Israel if:

* Israel withdraws from Palestinian lands without unilaterally deciding on the final borders.

and that

* Hamas is “not in favor of establishing a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip while relinquishing the right to the rest of Palestine.”

He also pointed out that Hamas is prepared to talk to anybody…except for Israel!

This is an Ha’aretz article. That’s right, somebody who is paid to be a reporter heard or read the info, typed out a story, spellchecked it, ran it by an editor, and managed to get it published.

Better yet, they got me to waste wisely spend my time reading it and now to have wasted wisely spent your time as well.

and Jewschoolicious as well…
So imagine you’re at the airport in Kansas, on your way to catch a flight to New York, when all of a sudden some total idiot shows up wearing a giant swastika on his t-shirt, all la-dee-da “I’m just here to drop off a colleague and this is just some shirt I’m wearing, what’s it to you?” What do you do?

Well, if you’re Rabbi David S. Fine 36, Rabbi of Orthodox Congregation Beth Israel Abraham & Voliner in Overland Park, Kansas City, you tell the idiot, Steven T. Boswell, 30, that he should be ashamed for wearing swastikas in public. And then when the fucker gives you some lip and tells you that you are inhuman, you throw your coffee in his face and proceed to pummel the twit.

Both Rabbi Fine and Mr. Stupid Head Boswell were eventually separated and charged with disorderly conduct. Both are scheduled to appear in court on June 22.

What’s interesting is that Rabbi Fine received his rabbinic ordination from Yeshivat Hamivtar in Efrat. You know … where some of those those awful settler dudes come from? And while his fervent response to provocation is OK and even celebrated by Jewschool when it occurs at an airport in the midwest, similar fervent responses to provocation in the Midwest Bank… not so celebrated.

Whatever. Good job Rabbi!