May 13, 2008 Jonathan Mark: For pro-Israel voters, Obama's middle name should be the least of their concerns Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: The Leaker Shield Act JWisdom: Why You & I Never Die: A Jewish View of Immortality, Part II by Rabbi David Aaron May 12, 2008 Chosen Words: A newsletter for personal and spiritual growth gleaned from classic biblical and other sources that will help you enhance your day to day life. Likely the most constructive three minutes you will spend today Mark Steyn: Israel's 'doom' could also be Europe's JWisdom: Holocaust in the Perspective of Faith by Rabbi Nosson Scherman: When Faith Meets Fate, Part One May 9, 2008 Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: Reverence, Yes; Worship, No Mona Charen: Did Israel Drive Out the Arabs 60 Years Ago? JWisdom: Ultimate opportunities by Rabbi Sroy Levitansky May 8, 2008 Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Israel at 3,500+ Jonathan Tobin: Still Fighting the Same War Steven Plaut: How ‘nakba’ proves the fiction of a Palestinian Nation JWisdom: Taking Israel for Granted? by Rabbi Mordechai Becher May 7, 2008 Rabbi Hillel Goldberg: Israel is irrelevant to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict Dion Nissenbaum: Latest Olmert scandal could derail efforts to force Israel's compromises JWisdom: My Inner Ventriloquist by Sara Yoheved Rigler May 6, 2008 Caroline B. Glick: Anti-Zionism at 60 The Kosher Gourmet By Ethel G. Hofman: In honor of Israel's 60th anniversary, the former president of the International Association of Culinary Professionals, whose members included the likes of Julia Child, is back with a smorgasbord featuring the taste and essence of the Jewish homeland JWisdom: Holocaust in the Perspective of Faith by Rabbi Nosson Scherman: Jewish Deer in Nazi Headlights May 5, 2008 The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Busy work Jonathan Mark: Remarkable half-century old Mike Wallace interview with Abba Eban puts current anti-Israel sentiment into perspective May 2, 2008 Rabbi Berel Wein: Rote religiosity Caroline B. Glick: Whitewashing Hamas JWisdom: Parent trap? May 1, 2008 David Zwiebel: Faith communities can learn from Orthodox Jews in stimulating private philanthropy for religious education George Friedman and Peter Zeihan of Stratfor: The Shift Toward an Israeli-Syrian Agreement JWisdom: It's time to wake up by Rebbetzin Esther Jungreis April 30, 2008 Jonathan Tobin: Pennsylvania's Democratic slugfest may leave some Jewish votes up for grabs The Kosher Gourmet by Linda Gassenheimer: Fresh herbs, sauteed veal and tiny creamer potatoes makes a light spring dinner JWisdom: How to Build a Mentch by Rabbi Mordechai Becher April 29, 2008 Daniel Pipes: Barack Obama's Muslim Childhood Joel Brinkley: On human rights, the U.N. once again strikes out JWisdom: Holocaust in the Perspective of Faith by Rabbi Nosson Scherman: When The Truth is Unbelievable April 28, 2008 The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Q: I'm often stuck in the doctor's waiting room for hours! Doesn't he owe me something for my wasted time? Steven Emerson: New U.S. government policy advises agencies to avoid using some of the very same words that make up terror groups' names JWisdom: Why You & I Never Die: A Jewish View of Immortality, Part I by Rabbi David Aaron April 25, 2008 Rabbi Mitchell Wohlberg: Schadenfreude isn't kosher for Passover --- or at any other time Rabbi Berel Wein: The secret of how the data bank of memory is transferred from one generation to the next JWisdom: Stepping Up to A Higher Spiritual Life by Rabbi Lawrence Kelemen, Part III April 24, 2008 Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: The successful failure Fred Burton and Scott Stewart of Stratfor: Placing the terrorist threat to the food supply in perspective JWisdom: Stepping Up to A Higher Spiritual Life by Rabbi Lawrence Kelemen, Part II April 23, 2008 Connie Ogle: An intricate game of a novel Jonathan Tobin: Making Sense of the 'J Street' Jive JWisdom: Stepping Up to A Higher Spiritual Life by Rabbi Lawrence Kelemen April 22, 2008 Jonathan Rosenblum: Why Israel's 'Leaven law' matters Caroline B. Glick: Obama the Savior April 18, 2008 Rabbi Harvey Belovski: Multimedia tool of antiquity Caroline B. Glick: Revealed Truths vs. revealed lies JWisdom: More than miracles by Rabbi Sroy Levitansky April 17, 2008 Rabbi Avi Shafran: Deconstructing Dayeinu Rabbi Elazar Meisels: Is innovation at the Seder a slap at tradition? JWisdom: Discovering Your Divine Mission, Part III by Rabbi David Aaron April 16, 2008 Jonathan Tobin: A Prayer for Sderot's Children Ethel G. Hofman: Sumptuous Seder JWisdom: The Divine is in the details by Rabbi Mordechai Becher April 15, 2008 Rabbi Dovid Zauderer: Let Charlton Heston Go! Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Jimma, tyranny's enabler JWisdom: Relationships: Beyond Mars & Venus, Part IV by Dr. Lisa Aiken April 14, 2008 The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: The Snitching Supervisor Jonathan Tobin: Forget the Fun and Games! JWisdom: Sincerity is Valued Most by Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski, M.D. April 11, 2008 Rabbi David Gutterman: A Mystery in the Middle East Caroline B. Glick: Why Ahmadinejad smiles JWisdom: Elevated illness by Rabbi Sroy Levitansky April 10, 2008 Stratfor Intelligence Briefing by George Friedman: A Mystery in the Middle East The Kosher Gourmet By Steve Petusevsky: The spring elegance of asparagus JWisdom: Holocaust in the Perspective of Faith by Rabbi Nosson Scherman: The Power of Rational Lies April 9, 2008 Michael Feldberg: An all but forgotten Colonial doctor who put his Jewish values before his life Jordan "Gorf" Gorfinkel's "Everything's Relative" gets philosophical JWisdom: Four Rabbis in Bnei Brak by Rabbi Mordechai Becher April 8, 2008 Caroline Glick: Covering for the enemy Elliot B. Gertel: 'House' goes Hasidic JWisdom: Relationships: Beyond Mars & Venus, Part III by Dr. Lisa Aiken April 7, 2008 The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Q: I have a translating business. Recently someone asked me to translate some financial documents that are clearly forged. Should I agree? Jonathan Rosenblum : Israel is unwittingly helping to fuel the international campaign of delegitimization against it JWisdom: Matzah and leaven as a life philosophy by Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski, M.D. April 4, 2008 Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: The Mystery of Suffering Caroline B. Glick: Fear of democracy JWisdom: Dirty Jews by Rabbi Sroy Levitansky April 3, 2008 Rabbi Y. Y. Rubinstein: Parents --- and the children who would be them The Kosher Gourmet by Kathy Manweiler: Tempted by restaurant dressings? Don't be. Here are recipes that can be made at home, healthier! JWisdom: The importance of retaining a 'slave mentality' by Rabbi Mordechai Becher April 2, 2008 Mitch Albom: Child abuse, disguised as faith Jonathan Tobin: Unreasonable Accommodations JWisdom: Holocaust in the Perspective of Faith with Rabbi Nosson Scherman: Eliminating Jewish Influence over Germans March 22, 2007 J-Rhythms with Avraham Rosenblum: JWR's cutting-edge music program showcasing performers -- singers, song writers, musicians, and bands -- who learn and live the Torah lifestyle (OUR NEWEST IGODCAST !) Oct. 29, 2003 Mortimer B. Zuckerman: Graffiti On History's Walls (MUST-READ!)

Jewish World Review April 23, 2008 / 18 Nissan 5768 An intricate game of a novel By Connie Ogle Wondrous Jewish icon inspired author http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | (MCT) Novelist Geraldine Brooks cannot forget her first glimpse of the "Sarajevo Haggadah." The book — a 14th century, illustrated Hebrew manuscript that miraculously survived religious purges, the Spanish Inquisition, the Holocaust and the Bosnian War — is housed at the National Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It "comes into the room, and they put it on the table," Brooks recalls. `It's very small, maybe 12-by-6; maybe not even that big. It's a ratty-looking thing. You wouldn't look twice at it. The cover is old and worn out and discolored, ... and you think, `The fuss is about this?' And then you open it, and boom! There's just this explosion of color and richness and imagination." The mysterious history of the ancient codex, with its traditional text of the Passover Haggadah and gorgeously vivid illustrations of key scenes from the Bible, fired a Big Bang of creativity in Brooks. She turned her interest in the manuscript's fascinating past into "People of the Book" , in which she reimagines the Haggadah's hazardous, centuries-long journey from Seville, Spain, to modern-day Bosnia. But even more important than the rare artifact are the novel's remarkable characters — Muslim, Christian, Jewish, some based on real people - who preserved it against incredible odds. The "Haggadah" is adorned with many startling images, including one illustration of a mysterious African woman sitting with a Jewish family at a Seder. Another image depicts the world as round, a concept guaranteed to incite burnings at the stake in 14th-century Europe. Brooks first learned of the "Haggadah" when she covered the Bosnian war for The Wall Street Journal (she also worked in Somalia and the Middle East and no longer misses foreign reporting, she says). The manuscript had vanished, and rumors of its fate were often bleak. "The Bosnian National Library was burned down, a shocking crime. ... They deliberately shelled the library. It was gutted, just like the Oriental Institute, a repository of ancient, rare manuscripts — Turkish, Persian, Slavic. ..." But the "Haggadah" turned up after the war. It had been rescued by Muslim librarian Enver Imamovic and hidden in a bank vault. This wasn't the first time a Muslim had saved the Jewish icon. During World War II, Islamic scholar Dervis Korkut had smuggled it out of the museum right under the nose of a Nazi general. BUY THE BOOK AT A DISCOUNT BY ... clicking HERE. (Sales help fund JWR.). Brooks relates that story in a recent New Yorker article that also tells of a near-miraculous reunion of descendants of two of the real-life players in the Haggadah's astonishing past. "I got so many surprises," says Brooks from Martha's Vineyard where she lives with her journalist husband Tony Horwitz, son Nathaniel and a passel of dogs. "The fact that a Muslim librarian risked his life to save the book captured my imagination. But the other thing that made me think there was a subject here for me was imagining a character who was an illuminator and thinking about how artists and miniaturists have incredible access in the court. They're the kind of people I like. They cross between two worlds. They're artists in a position to see what the decision makers are up to. ... The idea made me look into this history to see what kind of scaffolding was there to build a story." Brooks, 55 and the author of the nonfiction "Nine Parts of Desire" and "Foreign Correspondence," is an Australian native like her smart, prickly narrator, rare book expert Hanna Heath. "I was inspired to become a novelist in Miami," she says. "I was at my first book fair with `Foreign Correspondence,' and I met Charles Frazier (author of `Cold Mountain') and felt so inspired to try this. It was scary. It was a big jump, and I thought there was a good chance I'd end up a big, wet splat in the crevasse." There was no splattage. Brooks' second novel, "March," earned a Pulitzer. "March" witnesses the Civil War through the eyes of the patriarch of the Little Women clan; Brooks' first novel, "Year of Wonders," is set during Europe's plague years. Brooks isn't sure why history's intrigues and perspectives seem so alluring; she just knows that the past is where she likes to work. "I liked history OK when I was at school, but I majored in political science," Brooks says. "I was engaged with contemporary events in journalism. But I'm not drawn to writing contemporary fiction. I love reading it, but historical themes speak most ardently to me. I don't know why, but they do. My next book is set in 1666, so I'm back in a comfy rut." Stretching, as it does, through the centuries, People of the Book required more research than Brooks' other novels, which were largely completed on a Harvard fellowship. So Brooks relished the relative ease of writing the contemporary segments of People, in which Hanna discovers clues inside the "Haggadah" — grains of salt, an insect wing, a white hair - that lead the reader through each phase of its history. The forensic detail was fueled by the "immense privilege" of watching book conservationist Andrea Pataki work on the manuscript in Sarajevo. "It was fun to use places I actually know," Brooks says. "But I come back to the same themes: How are people changed by catastrophe? What is the role of faith in people's lives? What does it do for you and to you? I guess the past is a fertile place for that." Above all, though, "People of the Book" is an impassioned plea for religious and cultural tolerance, which perhaps makes its factual aspects more relevant. Brooks writes eloquently about the Convivencia, a period during the Spanish Middle Ages when Muslims, Jews and Christians coexisted. Purges and terror would come later, but for centuries, there was a sort of peace. It's vital to remind people of such times, says Lucette Lagnado, whose memoir "The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit" chronicles her Jewish family's life in a multicultural Cairo until they were forced into exile. "Once upon a time, these cultures coexisted in a way we cannot imagine in this post-9/11 universe," Lagnado says. "I've had to explain the idea, which is central to Geraldine's book, that Muslims and Jews and Christians could get along. There was this extraordinary harmony that typical Americans can't even fathom. ... We have lost the possibility of believing that. It's so important to have stories like this to remind people of another world and another possibility." Adds Brooks: "It's just really tragic to me to see how we have to learn the same lesson over and over again. We're all better off and richer and intellectually stimulated more if we work together. When we divide into our tribes, things go bleak. I guess we're just slow learners." Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in Washinton and the media consider must reading. Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here. To comment, please click here. © 2008, The Miami Herald Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services