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It’s a wonderful concept. A family flees from Russia in 1928. By 1933, they are running a lodge in Canada – the only place Jews can stay. Among their more known guests are the Marx brothers, in particular for the…
Basic Black with Pearls by Helen Weinzweig is having a second life as a 35th anniversary reissue. The novel won the 1981 Toronto Book Award and gained critical acclaim when it was first issued. Yet, it had been largely forgotten…
Serious topics are at the fore of the books for younger readers reviewed by the Jewish Independent this Chanukah. From the story of a Russian dancer whose life is cut short by pneumonia to Canadian teenagers who must work 13-hour…
Harpo Marx and the Bodnes in the Rose Room. The hotel’s list of illustrious guests is almost literally endless. (photo from Algonquin Kid) Michael Elihu Colby had the unique privilege to be brought up in New York’s legendary Algonquin Hotel. Well, not…
A Google search for latke recipes reveals 341,000 results, so popular is the Chanukah treat. My earliest memory of Chanukah catapults me back to Winnipeg’s North End of the 1940s and my grandparents’ cozy, clapboard house on the tree-lined boulevard…
I thought readers would get a kick out of this. The Arbutus Shopping Centre has winter signs that all have the identical scene – basically Christmas gingerbread houses and bears snowboarding – that say things in several different languages, like “Joyeuses…
Israeli politicians learn to sign on the day that the Institute for the Advancement of Deaf Persons in Israel inaugurated a new online dictionary at the Knesset on Oct. 21. (photo from Institute for the Advancement of Deaf Persons in…
The comedy team of Rabbi Bob Alpert and Ahmed Ahmed on their August 2015 Laugh in Peace Tour. (photo from Laugh in Peace) “Both Jews and Muslims have a lot in common. What are we fighting over? Jews and Muslims…
The Chabad-Lubavitch public chanukiyah in front of Karlsruhe Palace in Germany. When we light the candles, we are, in effect, praying that the light of renewal, love and peace will break out in the world. (photo by Michael Kauffmann via…
Dreidels for sale in Mahane Yehuda in Jerusalem. (photo by Adiel lo via commons.wikimedia.org) “Dreidel, dreidel, dreidel, I made it out of clay, and when it’s dry and ready, oh dreidel I shall play.” This children’s song has been sung…
Many Jews retain the custom of honoring Judith by eating cheese for Chanukah, and the custom of eating dishes like cheesecake and blintzes emerged from the story of Judith. Many Jews retain the custom of honoring Judith by eating cheese…
Fray Juan Ricci (1600-1681), sketch of the menorah as described in Exodus, undated. The number of lights on the chanukiyah – eight – is a break with the traditional seven-branched menorah. (photo by Ellen Prokop via commons.wikimedia.org) The Festival of…
The schools of Hillel and Shammai debated how the chanukiyah’s candles should be lit. (photo by Gil-Dekel via commons.wikimedia.org) The following is an excerpt from the Chanukah chapter of Inside Time: A Chassidic Perspective on the Jewish Calendar, published by…
Naomi Brounstein, left, and Vivi Mann working on Ten Gav. (photo by Hindy Lederman via Israel21c.org) In the Israeli port city of Ashdod, two families with blind babies were eager to take courses at the country’s sole training centre for…
Reb Cantor and Rabbi Yohon Abrahms paused at the top of the hill to watch the sun spread its warm red rays in a growing embrace across the Black Forest. (photo by Rainer Lück via commons.wikimedia.org) It was an ordinary…
At the Hands On Children’s Museu, children learn many things, including just how large a bald eagle’s nest is. (photo by Lauren Kramer) Most small Jewish communities decrease in size over the summer, but not Olympia, Wash. The city’s Jewish…
In the winter, the Yellow Submarine hosts a collection of shows, many of them jazz, as part of the International Music Showcase. (photo from itraveljerusalem.com) This article was written several months before the daily terrorist attacks began against Israel. While…
Teachers at CHW Hadassim with the new computers. (photo by Amir Alon) Last month, the Athena Fund announced that three Israeli youth villages – CHW Hadassim Children and Youth Village, Mosenson Youth Village and Ayelet Hashachar Youth Village for Girls…
Musical memorials to the Holocaust tread on sensitive ground. On one hand, they perform a crucial function for humanity’s collective memory. On the other hand, there is significant risk of belittling the topic in the name of artistic expression. Two…
Ben-Gurion University Prof. Iris Shai, principal investigator of the CArdiovaSCulAr Diabetes and Ethanol (CASCADE) trial. (photo by Dani Machlis/BGU) A glass of red wine every night may help people with type 2 diabetes manage their cholesterol and cardiac health,…
Locations of different opsins on the human sperm, viewed under a microscope, are revealed by labeling with a fluorescent antibody (bright yellow). (photo from wis-wander.weizmann.ac.il) In their journey to the egg, sperm “feel” the heat of the fallopian tube and…
Rabbi Shlomo Einhorn, dean of Yavneh Hebrew Academy, will attempt to deliver the longest uninterrupted Torah lecture ever from Dec. 23, 11:59 p.m., to Dec. 24, 6 p.m. PST. The goal of the record-setting attempt is to raise funds in…
Areyvut, a New Jersey-based nonprofit organization whose mission is to infuse the lives of Jewish youth and teens with the values of chesed (kindness), tzedakah (charity) and tikkun olam (repairing the world), has released its 2016 A Kindness a Day…
(צילום: רוני רחמני) המסיבה עלתה רק מיליון ורבע דולר: משטרת ונקובר מחפשת אחרי צעירה שגרמה נזק גדול למגדל המפואר של מלון ג’ורג’יה משטרת ונקובר מחפשת מזה מספר שבועות אחרי צעירה אלמונית שגרמה נזק גדול מאוד, למגדל דירות גבוה של אחד…
On Nov. 18, Robbie Waisman spoke at the Jewish Museum and Archives of British Columbia. (photo by Pat Johnson) The head of Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission is crediting Robbie Waisman, a Vancouver man and a child survivor of Buchenwald…
“Running Again” by Joyce Ozier, part of her current exhibit at Fazakas Gallery. (image from fazakasgallery.com) Chefchauen is a village in Morocco. Founded in 1471, it was home to many Jewish refugees escaping the Spanish Reconquista during medieval times. No…
Ambassador Dennis Ross was in Winnipeg as part of the city’s Tarbut Festival to promote his new book. (photo by Rebeca Kuropatwa) Ambassador Dennis Ross was in Winnipeg earlier this month to promote his latest book, Doomed to Succeed: The…
Tonight, the Canada Palestine Association, BDS Vancouver, Canadian Boat to Gaza, Independent Jewish Voices and a few other groups will come together to address the topic Stolen Land: First Nations and Palestinians at the Frontline of Resistance. The obvious intention…
Simon Fraser University professor Mark Winston’s book on his lifetime as a world-leading bee expert – Bee Time: Lessons from the Hive – won this year’s Governor General’s Literary Award for nonfiction. According to the awards jury, Winston’s book “distils…
A screenshot of the CIJA video What Would We Do? The continuing terrorist attacks in Israel against Jewish Israelis are becoming more frequent and more deadly. Palestinian political leaders, religious officials and media have applauded the attackers as “martyrs,” spread anti-Jewish…
