On Friday night, Aug. 14, an angry crowd gathered outside a new Chabad center in the Sri Lankan beach town of Hiriketiya as Jews were preparing to welcome Shabbat.

More than 100 protesters, including Buddhist monks, reportedly took part. They hurled stones and firecrackers at the building, and a window was shattered. The unrest resumed the following night.

What made the episode all the more striking is that Jewish life is hardly something new to Sri Lanka. Long before Israeli backpackers began flocking to its beaches, Jews had been finding their way to the island for centuries.

Continue to the full article  |  More articles

Long before there was a Jewish exile, the Torah already spoke of the Jewish return.

In Parshat Nitzavim, the first of this week's double portion, Moshe tells the Jewish people that a day will come when they will be scattered among the nations. But he also promises that exile will not last forever.

"Then the Lord your G-d will return your captivity and have compassion upon you, and He will return and gather you from all the peoples among whom the Lord your G-d has scattered you" (Devarim 30:3).

Two verses later, Moshe goes even further: "And the Lord your G-d will bring you to the Land which your fathers possessed, and you shall possess it" (30:5).

Continue to the full article  |  More articles

With millions facing hunger and displacement in Sudan, dissidents enduring prison and torture in Iran, and thousands of political prisoners languishing in Myanmar's jails, the world is hardly suffering from a shortage of worthy humanitarian causes.

Yet some of the biggest names in the movie business have decided that what the world really needs is the release of Marwan Barghouti, a Palestinian terrorist and convicted murderer serving five life sentences in an Israeli prison.

More than 20 actors associated with Marvel films have joined the "Free Marwan" campaign demanding his release, including Benedict Cumberbatch, Mark Ruffalo, Don Cheadle, and Cate Blanchett.

Continue to the full article  |  More articles

In a small museum in northern Azerbaijan sit two objects that tell a surprisingly long story. They are a pair of tefillin so tiny that the black boxes are barely a centimeter wide. During the Soviet era, when openly observing Judaism invited trouble, Jews could conceal them beneath a hat or sleeve.

Today, the tefillin are displayed in the Museum of Mountain Jews in Qırmızı Qəsəbə, or Red Village, across the Kudyal River from the Muslim city of Quba. The museum occupies the restored Karchag Synagogue and opened in 2020.

Continue to the full article  |  More articles

The final words of this week's Haftorah (Isaiah 60:1-22) contain one of the most intriguing contradictions in the prophecies of redemption.

Isaiah declares: "The smallest shall become a thousand, and the least a mighty nation; I am the Lord; in its time I will hasten it" (Isaiah 60:22).

Be'itah achishenah - "In its time - I will hasten it."

But how can both be true?

If redemption will come be'itah, at its appointed time, then how can G-d hasten it, achishena? And if He hastens it, then it would seem that it is no longer coming at its appointed time.

Continue to the full article  |  More articles