Only in Israel

New Girls Religious Schools To Shake Up Jerusalem Educational Landscape

October 3, 2007

Options for modern religious education for girls in Jerusalem just got a whole lot more interesting with the recent openings of two new schools this fall, both backed by immigrants from North America. The modern Orthodox Shalom Hartman Institute, which trains rabbis, teachers and scholars from Israel and the Diaspora in a pluralistic environment and […]

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New Minyan in Jerusalem Brings Jews, Christians and Muslims Together

September 26, 2007

A rabbi, a monk, and a Sufi walk into a minyan. It sounds like the set up to a bad Internet joke circulating by email. But it’s a reality every month at Nava Tehilla, Jerusalem’s first – and only – “multi-faith” Jewish renewal gathering. Started a year and a half ago in the living room […]

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Day Away 2: From Pre-State to Post-Modernism in Tel Aviv

August 31, 2007

After a successful day trip to Rehovot last week, we thought we’d try to recreate some of the family magic one more time. School starts next week and family days will soon be replaced by parent-teacher meetings. Our destination this week: Tel Aviv where we found another three gems somewhat off the beaten track but […]

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The Charms of Rehovot

August 24, 2007

  Downtown Rehovot For parents, the long days of summer become particularly arduous in August when all the day and overnight camps let out and kids (particularly the littler ones) find themselves with too many hours of free time spent in front of the television or computer screen. We’ve strived in the past to solve […]

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Fooya Focaccia

August 17, 2007

This column is a kvetch. A rant against bad service that turned a fondly anticipated evening into one of stress and disappointment. Fifteen-year-old Amir had just come back from camp and we promised to take the family out to dinner so we could hear about some of his adventures at the Kayitz b’Kibbutz program at […]

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The Wine Festival

August 9, 2007

A year ago my wife Jody and I attended a wine festival at the Israel Museum. It was the same night as katyusha rockets started to rain down on Haifa as the Second Lebanon War kicked into high gear. The experience was surreal – here we were hopping from winery to winery, sniffing and sipping […]

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Shabbat without Harry

July 27, 2007

“This is the longest Shabbat ever,” pouted thirteen-year-old Merav over the weekend. The reason for her distress was having to wait until Shabbat was over in order to claim her copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows from our local Steimatzky’s book store. Religious Jews around the world were at a distinct disadvantage in […]

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The Falafel Date

July 20, 2007

One of the benefits of working from home is that you can take time off whenever you want, as long as you get your work done, of course. For me, my one consistent break has been a weekly trip to our local falafel stand with my friend Bob. To my exceedingly good fortune, we have […]

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A Night in Jerusalem

July 12, 2007

This photo and other great ones like it can be found on the Jerusalem Shots website. This image is from the photographer RomKri. Click here for more. I was in Tel Aviv a few weeks ago to attend the first ever Israeli “Blogference,” – a blogging convention held at the Herzeliya Interdisciplinary Center. After the […]

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Running the Bases

July 5, 2007

It’s been over 30 years since I was at a baseball game, but that unintended hiatus ended this week when I joined my family to root, root, root for the home team as the Modi’in Miracle suited up to play the Ra’anana Express as part of the Holy Land’s first professional baseball league. The afternoon […]

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