Ben Sales Twitter Email RSS

Latest

• 19 rabbis arrested during protest at Trump hotel

  February 6, 2017 11:52pm

  NEW YORK (JTA) — Nineteen rabbis were arrested at a protest of President Donald Trump’s refugee ban in front of the Trump International Hotel in New York City. The rabbis, who had gathered as part of a conference hosted by T’ruah, a rabbinical human rights group, were arrested for obstructing traffic in front of the…

• Did Expedia’s Super Bowl ad feature an Israeli West Bank roadblock?

  February 6, 2017 11:18am

  (JTA) — The Israel Defense Forces may have made a brief appearance during Super Bowl LI. A 30-second ad by Expedia, the travel website, shows a montage of a woman traveling the world as she appears to age from a young girl to a middle-aged woman. At various stages of her life, she climbs a fence, traverses the Trans-Siberian railroad,…

• Facing OU synagogue ban, Orthodox women clergy say they’ll keep working

  February 3, 2017 3:36pm

  NEW YORK (JTA) — Rabba Ramie Smith of the Hebrew Institute of Riverdale, an Orthodox congregation, says she doesn’t have time to protest the Orthodox Union decision banning its synagogues from hiring women clergy like herself. This weekend, she’s busy organizing a Shabbat conference with Yachad, a group supporting Jews with disabilities. Then she has classes…

• In defending Israel, new strategy calls for embracing critics and cheerleaders

  February 2, 2017 6:40pm

  NEW YORK (JTA) — Oppose the settlements? You’re one of us. Believe Israel should control the West Bank indefinitely? Come right in. Criticize Israel’s Chief Rabbinate? Welcome home. Think Israel should privilege Orthodox Judaism? Sure, why not? That’s the approach advocated in a new strategic plan, released Thursday, to combat Israel’s delegitimization: Get more people…

• JCC bomb threat probe hindered by tech disguises

  February 1, 2017 6:10pm

  NEW YORK (JTA) — A person calls a Jewish institution, makes a bomb threat and hangs up. The call lasts no more than a minute, the caller’s voice is disguised and the call is made to look as if it came from inside the building. How do you catch the culprit? That’s the question the…

• This is what a JCC bomb threat sounds like

  January 31, 2017 5:59pm

  (JTA) — On Tuesday, for the third time this month, a string of Jewish community centers across the country received bomb threats. Many of the 17 JCCs that received the calls evacuated their facilities and contacted law enforcement, which is investigating the threats. JTA has obtained a recording of one of the bomb threats made…

• Did Shabbat keep Jared and Ivanka in the dark about ‘Muslim ban’ crisis?

  January 31, 2017 1:17pm

  (JTA) — Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump have been called the two most influential Jews in America, owing to their proximity to Ivanka’s dad. But is Shabbat preventing them from having the president’s ear? That’s the contention of an article in Vanity Fair, which claims that Jared and Ivanka were unaware of the growing protests over…

• In rare unity, Orthodox and liberal denominations are critical of Trump refugee ban

  January 30, 2017 1:49pm

  (JTA) — Two large groups representing Orthodox Jews responded to President Donald Trump’s executive order barring migrants from seven mostly Muslim countries and refugees from around the world by warning against policies that would place any limits on immigration based on religion. With the combined statement by the Orthodox Union and Rabbinical Council of America, all…

• After Trump ban, Chicago-area synagogue turns from welcoming refugees to protesting

  January 29, 2017 12:29pm

  CHICAGO (JTA) — Taylor Clearfield went to the airport Friday to welcome a Syrian refugee family. The next day, she returned with a sign to protest the ban on refugees entering the United States. President Donald Trump had enacted the prohibition via executive order on Friday afternoon, between Clearfield’s two trips. She had anticipated the development, but hearing…

• Conservative movement proposes allowing non-Jews as synagogue members

  January 27, 2017 3:24pm

  (JTA) — Responding to a rising number of interfaith families, Conservative synagogues will be voting on a measure from their umbrella body that would allow congregations to admit non-Jews as members. Currently, the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism’s Standards for Congregational Practice restrict synagogue membership to Jews. But the new language, which congregations will vote on in March,…