• Erel Margalit: Bringing 'Start-Up Nation' To Israeli Politics

    Erel Margalit: Bringing 'Start-Up Nation' To Israel... View Original Article

     Read More

  • Mr. Jerusalem: Nir Hasson of Haaretz's 'The Jerusalem Blog'

    Mr. Jerusalem: Nir Hasson of Haaretz's 'The Jerusal... View Original Article

     Read More

  • UCLA Israel Studies Honors Amoz Oz

    UCLA Israel Studies Honors Amoz OZ - Forbes View Original Article

     Read More

  • The Liar: the Four Personas of Adolf Eichmann

    Published in The Los Angeles Review of Books: The following essay/book review was just published in The Los Angeles Review of Books: http://lareviewofbooks.org/review/liar-four-personas-adolf-eichmann The Liar: The Four Personas of Adolf Eichmann April 19, 2015 By Tom Teicholz Eichmann Before Jerusalem: The Unexamined Life of a Mass Murderer By Bettina Stangneth (Knopf). LIKE A FOSSIL preserved in amber, Adolf Eichmann has become fixed in popular memory as “The Man in the Glass Booth,” the Nazi kidnapped in Argentina to stand trial…

     Read More

  • The Rothschild is a Mensch

    The Rothschild is a Mensch View Original Article

     Read More

  • Marx Brothers Make Merry in Tv Collection

    The Shout! Factory release of “The Marx Brothers TV Collection,” an omnibus of the Brothers Marx’s post-film career TV appearances, is occasion enough to celebrate once more the irrepressible talents of Groucho, Chico and Harpo Marx. I suppose there may be some readers who have never heard of the Marx Brothers, but I doubt it. In short, at the beginning of the 20th century, hailing from a German-Jewish family, Minnie Marx set her sons on a show-business career hoping to…

     Read More

  • Israel's artists of the Imagination: Orit Raff and Nir Evron

    Art — both making it and enjoying it — seems a luxury in times of war. Yet the work of two Israeli artists, Orit Raff and Nir Evron, showing at the contemporary art space LAXART through Aug. 23, is not only a worthy distraction from the psychic weight of current events but also a testament to the power of art to transcend national identities, challenge assumptions and transport viewers to landscapes heretofore unimagined. The exhibition is supported by Artis, a…

     Read More

  • Jewish Heroes of the Great Patriotic War

    “On the Way to the Patriotic War,” artists V. Vinogradov, Y. Nikolaev; postcard. Photos courtesy of the Blavatnik Archive Foundation “On the Way to the Patriotic War,” artists V. Vinogradov, Y. Nikolaev; postcard. Photos courtesy of the Blavatnik Archive Foundation At the University of Southern California (USC), in the lobby of the Doheny Library, a giant story of Jewish history has been writ large in a small exhibition titled “Lives of the Great Patriotic War: The Untold Story of Soviet…

     Read More

  • The Strength of Ma'aleh Film School

    A scene from the documentary film, “The Strength to Tell.” A black-and-white film shows a trial being called to session. In less than a second, it’s obvious this is the trial of Adolf Eichmann, in Jerusalem in April 1961, with Eichmann in the bulletproof glass booth. We watch as a witness takes the stand. We pull back now, in color, to a present-day room where a group of teenagers are watching the footage. A man asks them, “What does the…

     Read More

  • My Prediction for 2014: Peace in the Middle East

    This year, President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry will secure a peace agreement in the Middle East between Israel and the Palestinians, leading to the establishment of a Palestinian State. I understand that no one believes this will happen. Not the Israeli officials who are dismissive of Kerry; not the Palestinian officials who bristle with each proclamation Netanyahu makes. Certainly not the news media pundits who traffic in naysaying. Yet if recent history has proven anything, it is…

     Read More

  • Danny Sanderson in L.A., celebrating 40 years of Israeli pop music

    If you’ve been to Israel in the last 40 years or heard Israeli popular music, then you probably know Danny Sanderson, who will be performing with his band at the Gindi Auditorium at American Jewish University on Dec. 8. Sanderson was a founding member in 1973 of Kaveret (literally Beehive; also called Poogy), a band often referred to as “the Beatles of Israel.” Although Kaveret broke up in 1976, they have reunited successfully on several occasions. Last summer, for their…

     Read More

  • The People's Architect (Moshe Safdie)

      Moshe Safdie’s new Guerin Pavillion at the Skirball Cultural Center offers a light-filled natural setting for conferences and gatherings. Photo by Timothy Hursley                       The Skirball Cultural Center, which stands at the crest of Sepulveda and Mulholland just west of the 405 Freeway, was built on a dump. Literally. Who knew? Before the Skirball acquired the land, it was a garbage dump. With its opening in 1996, architect Moshe…

     Read More