Sivan 5784
Jewish Calendar
Shavuot is coming up! As we count up to 49 I’m increasingly aware of how close we are to the holiday, which I suppose is the point.
Also, happy Pride month starting tomorrow to all my fellow queers &etc!
Israel/Palestine and Antisemitism
Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. Human rights expert Aryeh Neier agrees. It must stop.
"This Is in the Spirit of Our Tradition": The First Jewish Biden Appointee Resigns Over Gaza
Pro-israel liberal group J Street is now supporting an end to the war. I’m torn between “finally” and “huh, that’s interesting”.
Zionism Will Never Be a Solution to Antisemitism write Ben Lorber and Shane Burley in Truthout, providing an excerpt from their forthcoming book Safety through Solidarity: A Radical Guide to Fighting Antisemitism.
Jewish Currents provided us a blast from the past (1929 to be specific) with Yiddish Anarchists’ Break Over Palestine.
There is an open letter from Jews working in philanthropy calling, among other things, “to cease the harmful practice of withdrawing funding for and/or delaying payments to organizations that speak up for the lives and safety of the Palestinian people.”
I am not sufficiently in theory-reading mode to get through Shaul Magid’s latest, Judeopessimism: Antisemitism, History, and Critical Race Theory, but it is open access if that’s your vibe.
Books and Language
Check out an article from the “forverts in english” about a doykeit license plate and the friendship it’s launching—signifiers help us build community!
Yiddish Book Center’s feature length documentary Ver Vet Blaybn? (Who Will Remain?), about Avrom Sutzkever from the perspective of his granddaughter, is available to watch online.
John Scalzi’s blog regularly features other authors in its The Big Idea section, including this recent post from J.R. Dawson about judaism and the little things. Their historical circus novel The First Bright Thing, which features a queer jewish main character, sounds fascinating and comes well-recommended (though I haven’t yet read it).
CW shoah: “The Song Remains / Dos Lid iz Geblibn / דאָס ליד איז געבליבן is an anthology of over 160 Yiddish poems by 36 authors with English translations. The poems were written in Nazi German occupied Poland during the Second World War, compiled by Binem Heller, and originally published in book form in Warsaw in 1951.” Subscribe at The Song Remains to get an emailed poem a week.
Miscellaneous
Talia Lavin’s overview of the orthodox jewish sex strike for getting agunah Malky a get was a great window into a culture I’m not in, written well and comprehensively.
Lilith Magazine gave their most recent issue a disability focus, including an excerpt from Julia Watts Belser’s latest book and how to build an accessible synagogue.
JFREJ’s membership drive t-shirt rocks!
Diasporist T-Shirt - Pre-Order Now – JFREJ
This beautiful design was created for JFREJ by the Jewish illustrator Sarah Day. The term Diasporist, as in someone who practices Diasporism, is an idea that comes originally from the Jewish Social Labor Bund's principle of doikayt, or "here-ness" during the turn of the 20th Century. Doikayt means that wherever we liv
Tamar Paley has a very cool jewelry design inspired by tefillin on the Boston Museum of Fine Arts’ instagram
Being a Sephardic Jew Means Existing in the in Between, by Jesse Habif Rogers in HeyAlma
The American Jewish Historical Society has a new podcast showcasing historical stories of American Jews (shocking, i know) in the post-WWII era. I haven’t reviewed the content of the podcast due to not really listening to podcasts, but it seems neat!
Events
There’s some expensive but cool online classes through hebrew college’s adult ed this summer, including:
Lethal Literature: Wrestling with the Dark Side of Jewish Text
Considering God’s Body: The Divine Body & Jewish Historical Imagination
SVARA also has some classes starting mid-June, including Conjugation for Liberation and Understanding Rabbinic Innovation: Five Sources of Law.
6/4 Wild Outside in the Night: Queer Jewishness and Childhood Liminality in the Picture-Books of Maurice Sendak
6/6 Living Tefillat Trans, a trans/nonbinary only event from the trans halakha project
6/7 TransHallel
6/8-6/9 ShavuotLIVE with Judaism Unbound, a 24 hour teach-in series
6/12 Shavuot
7/11-7/14 yidstock online concert pass
Jewish Pet of the Month
The Jewish Pet of the Month this month is sideways Freya, belonging to friend of the newsletter (and poet) Rachel Edelman!
See you next month!
With love,
Meli