Queens Jewish Link
Connecting the Queens Jewish Community I would often half-jokingly tell my children that it’s good that Hashem made me a Jew, or I would...
This may seem like a frivolous topic, but to me it is not. It may not be up there with the weighty and pivotal issues facing the United States and Israel today, but it is very reflective of our character as a community.
I’ll admit, I’m a big kvetch. I am too often bothered by things around me. When my kids and wife ask me why I’m so often annoyed, I cynically tell them that it’s because I set a high bar of standards for myself, which I expect of others. They go crazy when I say that.
We are all familiar with the oft-quoted Gemara (Yoma 9b) that the Second Beis HaMikdash was destroyed due to baseless hatred amongst the Jews. But it is well worth citing the Gemara’s full statement in that regard.
If you bet that the Democrats are against judging people using race as a factor and the Republicans support using the color of a person’s skin to make such judgments…You lost!
We are in the throes of the Nine Days, with the most solemn day of Tish’ah B’Av almost upon us. These were the most tragic of times when we lost both Holy Temples, and the destruction of Jerusalem with the expulsion of the Jewish People.
Melanie Phillips is a highly respected, conservative-leaning journalist in the UK. She had a very Jewish background, though not Orthodox, to the best of my knowledge. She has written for The Guardian, the New Statesman, The Times of London, and is periodically featured in The Jerusalem Post.
