We’re hoping the school bus will know to pick up our twins at the right address when school starts. They’re starting Grade 6 this fall. We’ve finally gotten good at figuring out the back-to-school letter, so we send them with…
Team Canada’s 600-strong contingent marched into the opening ceremonies of the quadrennial Maccabiah Games July 14 at Jerusalem’s Teddy Coliseum. They were led by a trio of flagbearers – Toronto’s Molly Tissenbaum, a hockey goalie who has overcome serious health…
Entire Jewish families were rounded up and interned in the Vel d’Hiv and other places in France, when La Grande Rafle began on July 16, 1942. (unattributed image) It is 80 years this summer since La Grande Rafle (the Great…
The author with her grandmother. (photo from Becca Wertman-Traub) In the story of the Jewish people, it is not just about our patriarchs but the matriarchs, too. I grew up knowing that both my grandparents, Babi and Zaida, were Holocaust survivors.…
I was driving down the back lane, kids in the car, when I saw a neighbour. I stopped and rolled down the window for a chat. The neighbour’s children lived nearby and they were looking for flooring to refinish the…
The explosive debate around abortion spurred by the U.S. Supreme Court’s rejection of a woman’s right to reproductive self-determination reminds us that the Jewish perspective on the topic is nuanced. “Jewish law approaches each case according to its particular circumstances,”…
Winnipeg has had a bagel renaissance. It’s not exactly a bagel mecca, and these are definitely not the New York City bagels my husband was raised eating. However, the recent bagel trends here are a step forward. In the earlier…
Last week, John Horgan sent a welcome letter to the Pacific regional office of CIJA, the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs. The British Columbia premier committed to fighting antisemitism, including using the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance Working Definition of…
There’s a story in the Babylonian Talmud, in Tractate Yevamot 96b, that cut close to home when I studied it. It’s a brief episode but it addresses modern interpersonal issues. It features Rabbi Elazar, who goes to the beit midrash…
Yom Yerushalayim took place Sunday, commemorating the reunification of the city during the 1967 Six Day War. The liberation of the Western Wall, a moment captured so powerfully through an iconic photo of three awe-struck young soldiers, is an unforgettable…
