News and Politics
Saving Peace from the Peace Activists
Activism cannot be guided solely by passion. Activism without a serious political analysis can be just as damaging. Examining the British government’s decision this week to exempt Tzipi Livni from the threat of war crimes prosecution, Moshe Yaroni bemoans the damage caused to the principle of universal jurisdiction.
Arts and Culture
An Offensive Culture
A willingness to embrace the Jewish tradition of offensiveness, of awkwardness of refusing to fit in, safeguards the interests and dignity of those across the Jewish communal spectrum. If Jews see themselves as troublemakers, then perhaps the sterile debates about who has the right to speak for Jews will be replaced by a democratic and tolerant community of debate.
Faith and Practice
Angetevka: Hannukah, O Chanukah!
There’s nothing simple about being a Jew, and Hannukah is a good case in point. How to spell it, with or without the “C”? And then, who can remember from year to year how you light the menorah, left to right, or right to left? Potato latkes – cakey or crispy?
News and Politics
Why I Agree with Nasrallah (Well, Sort of...)
Israel would do well to look at the reflection before us, in Lebanon, and to listen to the Hezbollah leader’s call for unity, as though it were a warning from our future. But we shouldn’t follow his suggestion of uniting for the sake of confronting an enemy. Israelis—Jewish, Muslim, and Christian—must join hands in order to build a better country and a stronger Middle East.
Arts and Culture
From Yaz To Yas: Arabology Fleshes Out Dancefloor Dreams in a New Idiom
This record translates – and in a carefully pre-meditated way – the infectious pop sensibility of New Wave icons like Yaz into an Arabic idiom. Songs like “Get It Right”, “Mahi” and “Yaspop” have all the right moves for the dancefloor, but also remind us that the opportunities for someone like Yasmine Hamdan to strut her stuff are largely confined to the experience of exile. This is music for an Arab Diaspora missing the comforts of home, in a musical language it can only indulge publicly in hostile foreign lands.
News and Politics
Reclaiming Hanukah From the Occupation
This Hanukah, there is a fork in Israel’s road ahead. Is it going to confront the fundamentalists who threaten to turn the state into a theocracy, as its Justice Minister advocated last week? Or is it going to strive to find peace in secure borders, with a shared Jerusalem and good relations with the Palestinians and the rest of the Arab world?
Arts and Culture
My Year in Consumption
One of the great things about culture is that despite the occasional hiccup, you can always maintain your faith in it. When music starts to suck, films get better. When blogs start to read the same, we get to to shorten the experience with Twitter. 2009 was no different. In no specific order, here are the ten categorical imperatives which, for a brief moment, helped me make editorial sense of it all.
Life and Action
Al-Andalus: The Hidden Mirror
What if two men, two lovers, in medieval Andalusia found themselves reflected in Torah?
Arts and Culture
Unweavings
My Unweavings® fiber art pieces convey narratives through form, color, texture, and calligraphy. The words within each piece and the unwoven form that suggests these words serve as a visual midrash, evoking the poetry of various Biblical texts. The unwoven spaces form symbolic shapes – wings, prayer shawls, veils, falling waters, and the sacred architecture of windows, domes, and gates.
![[the current issue of ZEEK]](../../image/2/100/0/5/uploads/leftistethicistgraphic-52842c6a.png)
- 5000 Pages of Zeek
- Founded in 2001, Zeek was the first Jewish online magazine, and we have over 5000 pages online to prove it, all available free of charge. Read more in the Archive.
