A friend did a great kindness for my family and me, so I went to buy her flowers. White hydrangeas, pale yellow roses and bright yellow spray roses adorned my cart at Trader Joe’s as I proceeded to do my weekly shop.  Somewhere along the way, I jarred the flowers while I was loading up. […]

Actress Sandra Bullock recently admitted on a podcast that she’s seen UFO’s. When people imagine UFOs, they almost always imagine a circle. The old language was “flying saucers,” a disc in the sky. The newer language is orbs, spheres, round lights, metallic balls. It is the same shape, seen across eighty years of witnesses, now […]

Following two decades of socio-political change (and pressure from the Arab-American community), the US Census Bureau appears to be on its way to establishing a new Middle Eastern/North African category — separate from the “White-American” category we had hitherto been included under — on the 2030 census. As things appear now, this category will encompass […]

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Upon looking for an image for this piece, our initial search was for blood splatter, but we kept coming across blood stained flowers. That set off an alarm, and we looked up their meaning. Apparently, blood stained flowers symbolize the martyrs of resistance. While we can’t be sure of this connection in the music […]

A marquee advertising Christopher Nolan’s “The Odyssey” recently declared: “Before there were the Jews, there was… The Odyssey.” The slogan has sparked backlash, and for good reason. It isn’t historically accurate. While “The Odyssey” was composed centuries later, its story is traditionally set around 1200 BCE, in the aftermath of the Trojan War. By that […]

Twenty-two years ago director Gidi Dar did something groundbreaking. He was part of a team that brought Ushpizin, a positive, nuanced, authentic depiction of Hasidic Jews to Tribeca. Ushpizin gave way to films like Rama Burshtein’s Fill The Void, shows like Shtisel and somewhat mainstreamed the idea that Hasidic and Haredi Jews are human, worthy […]