Gershom Gorenberg Once, while writing an article on Abu Nidal, leader of the most extreme Palestinian faction in the 1970s and 80s, I went to speak to one of my favorite wise men, political scientist  Yaron Ezrahi.  I was asking about Franz Fanon, the revolutionary theorist of the Algerian revolution, whose views on the necessity [...]

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Haim Watzman “I haf seen dis before,” the psychiatrist sighed, “und I know its name. ILSS – Inter-Literary Stress Syntrome.” I’d sought out Dr. Tchernikovsky after a nearly sleepless week of a recurring nightmare in which I’d reverted to my army days. Except that instead of being dressed in my IDF fatigues, I had on [...]

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Haim Watzman Forget economic indicators, price indexes, and production figures. Here’s the most salient sign that Israel’s economy is plunging from exuberance into recession: today’s issue of Shamenet (in English the name would be Cream), Ha’aretz’s monthly supplement for conspicuous consumers, runs only 66 pages rather than the usual 80-100. But don’t be depressed—an economy [...]

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Gershom Gorenberg Michael Oren is an old friend of mine. I respect his scholarship (his Six Days of War is the best history of June 1967). He wrote an endorsement for my last book, The Accidental Empire. And when we (rarely) discuss politics, the differences are also respectful. So a I am not an unbiased [...]

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Gershom Gorenberg In my new article at The American Prospect, I argue that choosing either the Israeli or the Palestinian version of history as correct is no way to make peace. Spring is national trauma season in the land between the River and the Sea. The wildflowers that blossom briefly after the Mediterranean winter wilt, [...]

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Haim Watzman While we’re on the subject of Israeli-American behavioral stereotypes as parsed on the New York Times op-ed page, what about David Brooks’ “A Loud and Promised Land”, of April 16? (Brooks was discourteous enough to publish this the day after Pesach, when we were all exhausted from lugging boxes of dishes down to [...]

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Gershom Gorenberg Though I am thoroughly anti-messianic, I did briefly consider the possibility last week that I was seeing signs of redemption: Marty Peretz liked  a column by Roger Cohen, and I mostly liked it too. However, Peretz’s comment that the column is about diarrhea strikes me as akin to someone asserting that Pride and [...]

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Haim Watzman When Chaim Elbaum stood up to field questions last night, he said that Kehilat Yedidya, is the first Israeli Orthodox community to ask him to come to screen and speak about his short film And Thou Shalt Love , and about his personal decision to accept his homosexuality while insisting on remaining an [...]

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I wasn’t planning to post, given that it’s almost Shabbat, but I came across a bit of news that I must with SoJo’s readers: Trotsky’s ashes stolen and baked in cookies From the left-Zionist-Orthodox perspective, I’d just point out that: 1. These should not be consumed until the party of the revolutionary vanguard rules on [...]

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Haim Watzman If you skipped something in the Haggada last week it may well have been that page of disputations among the Sages in which they argue about precisely how many plagues the Egyptians suffered at the Red Sea. Was it 50, or 200, or 250? Since the book of Exodus only tells us about [...]

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Gershom Gorenberg My new piece about Netanyahu’s second term as a remake of the first is up at The American Prospect: Since my wife began writing screenplays, I get a lesson in the mechanics of a film each time we watch one together. First lesson: Pay rapt attention to the opening moments. Character is being [...]

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Gershom Gorenberg More suggestions for Seder discussion: We are, of course, the most free people in history. We can live where we want (even if the cars, streets, and shop signs make a thousand neighborhoods look the same); we can do what we want (though some days the choice seems to be between which brand [...]

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