God is more than a vote winner

Sixty years have passed since Gandhi said: "those who say religion has nothing to do with politics do not know what religion is". Yet many of those most interested in politics still do not know. Much has changed since Alastair Campbell stated: "we don't do God" but politicians still don't "do God" very well.

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The Auschwitz papers could reveal a hidden Shoah story

Over the past three weeks the JC has been running a campaign to open the files held by the Ministry of Defence and the National Archives about British prisoners of war held at Auschwitz. To their credit, ministers have reacted quickly to pressure from MPs and offered to help in any way they can.

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Why I am broadcasting this positive message

I wanted to use my public profile on TV and online to communicate a positive message to young Jewish people. That message is simple: it's okay to be Jewish and gay, you don't have to sacrifice one part of your identity to remain true to the other.

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Israel's front-line in the South Caucasus

Aghdam is as far as you can go. Travel east, cross Turkey, pass the snow-capped twin peaks of Ararat, cross Armenia and finally you get to Nagorno-Karabakh. As the Soviet Union collapsed, this was the front-line in a brutal war pitting Armenians against Azerbaijanis, or Azeris. Thousands died and more than a million fled their homes. Today, Aghdam is an extraordinary place.

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Drew, our Jewish wedding singer

So Drew Barrymore may be converting to Judaism. Perhaps when she marries art consultant Will Kopelman in a traditional Jewish ceremony later this year, Adam Sandler will be the best man and seafood will be noticeable by its absence at the bridal buffet.

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Keeping kosher is good for us

When it comes to food fads, life can be terribly confusing. One minute the doctors are telling us that eating butter will blow our cholesterol sky high and we must avoid it like the plague. The next? Butter is hailed as a hero in a world of margarine scare stories.

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Must the chief be a Zionist?

Today the JC carries an advertisement for the top job in British Jewry: the Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth. Whether the post has been advertised before I don't know, although in 1965 the then selectors said "there should in no circumstances be any advertisement".

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Republicans have their own take on Israel policy

For once, Sheldon Adelson may have thrown his money at a lost cause.

As a man whose fortune is tied to the gambling industry, he bet on the wrong horse: he and his wife recently donated $5 million each to public interest organisations established to support Newt Gingrich in his bid to win the Republican nomination.

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I'm not prejudiced, some of my best friends are Mormon

The hottest ticket on Broadway at the moment is a biting musical comedy called The Book of Mormon.

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When the Shoah is stripped of its meaning, what then?

This month marks the 70th anniversary of the Wannsee Conference, the meeting convened in a Berlin suburb by the Nazi SS henchman Reinhard Heydrich to coordinate the liquidation and eventual extermination of Europe's Jews.

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When Jewry didn't meet Pally

How dare Benjamin Netanyahu ask Anglo-Jewry's leaders not to meet Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas!

Abbas was in London last week, and wished to meet the local Jewish community - something which Downing Street encouraged. But Netanyahu's office got in the way and complained that, since Abbas was refusing to meet him, Abbas did not deserve the honour.

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A Kopul of sporting heroes

Very soon it will be the 50th yahrzeit of Rabbi Kopul Rosen. He was an awe-inspiring man, dead at 48. Unforgettable to pupils of Carmel College (the Jewish boarding school he founded), I'm sure he's remembered by almost everyone who met him. There will be many tributes but here is a story you will get only from me.

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I'm gay, but I want a Jewish life

I swore I'd never tell anyone. Least of all my parents. The embarrassment. The awkwardness. The shame. I wondered if people would simply stop talking to me.

Five years on, my world hasn't come crashing down. My parents haven't disowned me. I haven't lost any friends. I'm one of the lucky ones.

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Ignorantly disgraceful use of 'apartheid'

I am driving along a well-remembered highway in Randburg. It is 2005 - the last time I visited South Africa (where I was born and, as they say, bred). Randburg is an anonymous conurbation on the outskirts of Johannesburg. As a student, I had a holiday job here as a cashier in a supermarket.

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Ethical choices during desperate times

We all have memories of events so important that we can identify exactly where we were when they happened, who was with us, what we wore, or where we sat. I remember the day my father told me about the Holocaust. We were in the car - a blue Chevrolet with plastic seat covers that cracked in the cold - driving to my weekly piano lesson.

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Historical understanding is essential

Last month, the House of Commons All-Party Group on History issued an alarming report showing that the subject was being increasingly neglected in comprehensive schools. In one Merseyside district, only four out of 2,000 18-year-olds passed the subject at A-level.

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In the shadow of Wannsee

The Holocaust is the most documented of genocides, yet the most covered up by its perpetrators and denied and distorted by its contemporary detractors.

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Rise above the internet parapet

My name is Marcus, and I'm a Twitter addict. I've been using the site for two-and-a-half years and, last week, sent my 18,000th tweet.

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Don't tour with your eyes shut

There is a wonderful talmudic story that goes something like this: a father and son go for a walk, get lost and find themselves in a terrible area where the sick and dying and impoverished languish on the streets.

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Why not Chief Rabbi Boteach?

Let's start with the obvious. It is not for a gentile to "endorse" any candidate for the position of chief rabbi. Nor did I, in my letter to the JC which, last week, inspired a leader and an article. What I said was that I welcomed the possible addition of Rabbi Shmuley Boteach to the list of candidates the community may consider for the post.

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