I too have a problem with The Jews

A documentary about Stamford Hill Chasidim took too many answers at face value

I was fascinated to learn of Chanoch Kesselman’s complaint to the BBC about the recently-screened documentary focusing on the life and ethos of the sectarian-Orthodox Jewish community of Stamford Hill.  Or rather, I was surprised to learn that his complaints addressed not so much the detailed content of the programme, as the fact that the documentary had been made without prior consultation with “community representatives”.

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A shameful silence over al Dura

A French court’s ruling that the al Dura ‘killing’ could be described as ‘staged’ was barely reported

Last May, the Paris Appeal Court delivered one of the most momentous of all libel judgments. It declared that a French media watchdog, Philippe Karsenty, was entitled to state that TV footage by the France 2 TV station purporting to show the killing of 12 year-old Palestinian Mohammed al Dura by Israeli troops in November 2000 was a staged piece of theatre and that the boy had not been killed at all.

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Take education more seriously

The community still isn’t making Jewish schools enough of a priority

Friends of mine recently phoned the local Jewish primary school to ask about entrance procedures. Their daughter is barely three months old.

But you can understand their worry. Two weeks ago, the JC revealed that at least 30 children in our neighbourhood of Borehamwood, Hertfordshire, did not get into a Jewish school this year.

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We must harass Jews for Jesus

The only way to defeat missionaries is to beat them at their own game

A funny thing happened to me on the Edgware branch of the Northern Line last week.

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The atheists can’t have Einstein

Even if he was conflicted about religion, Albert Einstein did not dismiss God

The crowds were enormous. They lined the streets even in the depths of night; they filled the theatres; they cheered and cheered. His US tour was an extraordinary success. A sell-out. A smash.

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The conversion row: pure politics

Religion is not the prime reason for the recent spate of conversion annulments

Three weeks ago, in a Shabbat sermon about which he must have thought a great deal, Naftali Brawer, rabbi of the United Synagogue at Borehamwood, launched a ferocious attack against those of his colleagues — in Israel and elsewhere — who have proudly claimed responsibility for, and enthusiastically supported, one of the most malevolent rabbinical decisions of recent times.

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Let them eat packed lunches

Why is a Jewish school stopping its students from bringing in food from home?

Next Friday I shall attend the formal opening of Yavneh College in Borehamwood. The ceremony will be graced by the presence of a host of Jewish and non-Jewish dignitaries, chief among whom will be the Secretary of State for Children, Families and Schools, Ed Balls.

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The JCC doesn't need a building

We are among the minnows of the Jewish world, a tiny community by comparison with those in Israel or the United States. And yet we do sometimes manage, as the Foreign Office diplomats might put it,

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Donors’ wishes must be heard

Was the Hebrew University right to deduct 20 per cent of a recent legacy to fund the office of its British Friends?

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And the UK's bottom Jew is...

Shunned by the JC Power 100, at least I’m not on the list of the 10 least influential people in the community

Each week last month I scanned the JC Power 100 list. I wasn’t in 60-100. The next week I wasn’t in 30-60. And finally I wasn’t in 1-30. For those slower readers, allow me to summarise by saying that I therefore wasn’t anywhere in the top 100 Jews or influencers of Jewish life in Britain. Which makes you wonder what I’m doing at the bottom of this page at all. Just a hang-over from the Ned Temko days, I suppose.

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