By Rabbi Haviva Horvitz , Temple Beth Sholom Middletown Stop anyone on the street and ask the question, “What is Israel?” The answer you will get might be: “Israel is a Middle Eastern country on the Mediterranean Sea.” Perhaps someone with a little more knowledge would include that Israel is

Barbara B. Flagel, 78 years old, passed away on April 12 after more than seven years of suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. Mrs. Flagel was born in, and was a long-term resident of Dayton before moving to Naples, Fla. more than 25 years ago. Mrs. Flagel was a wonderful, devoted wife

The faculty of United Theological Seminary, a United Methodist Church institution based in Dayton, issued a statement of solidarity with the Jewish community on March 24, saying it is “greatly disturbed” by the “uptick in antisemitic incidents since November” across the United States. “Not only does this activity evoke the

Opinion

Robert Kahn didn’t want to revisit memories of Nazi Germany. He had to. By Marshall Weiss, The Dayton Jewish Observer To a generation of Dayton-area schoolchildren, he is known as the boy the Nazis forced to play the violin on Kristallnacht while they beat his father with clubs, ransacked the

Speaker for Federation Presidents Dinner hopes film clarifies that ‘Holocaust denial is not an opinion’ By Anne Joseph, The Times of Israel “Oh, I’m having a good time!” laughs historian and professor Deborah Lipstadt when asked how she is. “Nothing I did prepared me for the trial and nothing I

By Michael Fox, Special To The Dayton Jewish Observer The Kind Words could be described as an exceptionally touching comedy or an unusually funny family drama. Israeli writer-director Shemi Zarhin won’t argue either way. “I write like a director and I direct like a novelist,” he says via Skype from

By Lucy Cohen Blatter, JTA “I thought it was just going to be about falafel and hummus.” That was the perception of Israeli cuisine that filmmaker Roger Sherman had when he reluctantly decided to accompany his friend, the acclaimed Jewish cookbook writer Joan Nathan, on a food tour of Israel in

By Michael Fox, Special To The Dayton Jewish Observer Americans of a certain age fervently recall the “miracle on ice” at the 1980 Olympics. Three years earlier, Israelis celebrated their own iconic sports moment — also involving the Soviet Union. Los Angeles-based filmmaker Dani Menkin grew up in Tel Aviv,