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JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.

WHAT’S DRIVING THE AMERICAN JEWISH CONVERSATION

U.S. to sanction IDF unit in West Bank; rabbi who hired hit men to kill wife dies in prison; cancellations skyrocket for Passover trips to and from Israel; and happy 127th birthday to the Forward!

Tonight, as Passover begins, we remember that we can’t take our freedom for granted. We are commanded to tell the Passover story in every generation so that we don’t forget our past.

We’re counting on Forward readers to step up and protect our freedom to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly, and to ensure that everyone has access to it. Become a member this Passover with a gift at any level!

ISRAEL AT WAR

Pro-Palestinian activists outside Columbia University’s bookstore on Saturday in New York City. (Getty)

Chaos at Columbia…

The news: Columbia University’s president canceled all in-person classes Monday and urged faculty and students who do not live on campus to stay away, after a weekend of anti-Israel protests included what the White House described as “physical intimidation targeting Jewish students.”

Why now? The school became a tinderbox of protests since Wednesday, when the school’s president, Nemat Shafik, testified before the House about campus antisemitism. In a mass demonstration on Thursday, more than 100 pro-Palestinian protesters were arrested in an escalation after months of tensions over the war.

Swift response: The White House and the New York City mayor’s office on Sunday both condemned the antisemitism and violence that erupted at Columbia. Members of Congress and local politicians pledged to escort Jewish students to class.

On campus: On Sunday, an Orthodox group at the school advised Jewish students to leave campus and stay home until “the reality in and around campus has dramatically improved.” The school said it will, among other things, add security to the Jewish student center during Passover. Chabad plans on hosting a Seder Monday evening on campus.

Also on campuses…

• At Yale, a Jewish student reporting on protests was jabbed in the eye with a Palestinian flag on Saturday night. The incident occurred after a group of Pro-Palestinian demonstrators allegedly formed a human chain around two visibly Jewish students trying to enter campus.

  
  

• The Anti-Defamation League’s new “report cards” scoring schools on antisemitism drew criticism from some of its partners, our Arno Rosenfeld explains in his weekly antisemitism newsletter. (If you don’t already subscribe, sign up here.)

Speaker of the House Mike Johnson walks toward the House Chamber to vote Saturday on a foreign aid package. (Getty)

U.S. aid package…

• A rare coalition of Democrats and Republicans in the House approved a $95 billion package of foreign aid bills that would provide funding for Israel, Taiwan and Ukraine.

  
  

• The House attached a bill to the package that could potentially ban TikTok in the U.S. Lawmakers are concerned that China, where TikTok is based, is spreading propaganda through the app. President Joe Biden previously said he would sign the TikTok legislation.

  
  

• Several reports since Oct. 7 found that TikTok is using its algorithm to promote pro-Palestinian content among young people in the U.S. Which is why the Jewish Federations of North America is supporting the new legislation. It’s also why some TikTok users, worried they might lose access to their favorite app, are blaming the Jews.

Plus…

• Israel’s head of military intelligence resigned, the most senior official to do so after the Oct. 7 attacks.

  
  

• In a first, the U.S. is expected to sanction an IDF unit for human rights violations in the occupied West Bank.

  
  

• A new poll found that 17% of those between 18-29 in the U.S. feel sympathy toward Hamas.

PASSOVER

Large-format wine bottles are named after kings from the Bible. (iStock)

A methuselah of Chardonnay? A solomon of Champagne? How big wine bottles got so biblical: Most people are only familiar with the standard wine bottle, or perhaps the magnum. But wine can be sold in much bigger sizes — all, oddly, named after biblical kings and characters. Culture writer Mira Fox dove into the history of wine to try to figure out why you can buy wine in jeroboams, solomons, methuselahs and melchizedeks. Read the story ➤

Cancellations skyrocket for Passover trips to, from and within Israel: Tourism experts say Passover travel, which is normally one of the busiest and most lucrative times of the year, is down about 65% from last year, another blow to Israel’s economy, which has been reeling since Oct. 7. Read the story ➤

(Photo by Getty; illustration by Odeya Rosenband)

Opinions…

Opinion | If we can find the afikoman, maybe we can talk across our divides about the war:Our editor-in-chief, Jodi Rudoren, writes that her family tradition is to have the kids — instead of the parents — hide the Seder dessert. Jewish tradition, she writes, “is rife with such twists, with machlokot — disputes — over how to fulfill any given mitzvah, with people of good faith seeing the same situation through different, even opposing, lenses.” Read her column ➤

• As freed Hebrew slaves, we must always protect the oppressed, writes IDF reservist Naftali Oppenheimer.

  
  

• Celebrating Passover feels futile with hostages in Gaza. But we must, argues contributing columnist Sruli Fruchter.

  
  

• Here are 11 Haggadah supplements to print if you want to discuss Oct. 7 at your Seder.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy with students last week at the Simcha School in Kyiv for a model Passover Seder. (Courtesy)

Plus…

• “Many in Ukraine and Israel will celebrate Passover, the holiday of freedom, in shelters,” Ukrainian President Volodymyrr Zelenskyy said at a Jewish school in Kyiv.

  
  

• Why did a devout Mormon who never owned alcohol drive 10 hours to buy whiskey? To help out a Jewish friend for Passover.

  
  

• Did you know there’s such a thing as “soft matzo”? Our Sam Lin-Sommer trekked across Brooklyn in search of the elusive treat.

  
  

• Kosher-for-Passover dog food? I wouldn’t recommend it.

  
  

• Check out all of our Passover stories.

– From our Sponsor –

WHAT ELSE YOU NEED TO KNOW TODAY

Hebrew Union College’s Ohio campus. (Wikimedia)

🤔  When Hebrew Union College decided to close its 150-year-old rabbinical school in Cincinnati, it framed the move as a restructuring that would leave some local programs intact. But critics say the school is being “hollowed out” with a faculty exodus and more programs closing. (Cincy Jewfolk)

🤦  An Atlanta movie executive allegedly sent racist and antisemitic texts, calling one his colleagues “a greedy Israelite” and writing that another had “Jew jitsued” him. (ProPublica)

😲  Rabbi Fred Neulander, who was serving a life sentence for hiring hit men to kill his wife in 1994, died in prison at 82. (JTA)

🎒  Florida will open its public schools to volunteer chaplains. Critics worry the move mixes religion and state. (AP)

🎶  Taylor Swift released a highly anticipated new album over the weekend. “Underlying Swift’s ballads and bangers,” writes our music critic, is a sense of the “struggles with her own identity” and “perhaps most surprisingly, a few great figures in religious history.” (Forward)

Quotable ➤  “The ancient story of persecution against Jews in the Haggadah also reminds us that we must speak out against the alarming surge of antisemitism — in our schools, communities, and online. Silence is complicity.” — President Biden in a Passover message on Sunday

What else we’re reading ➤  The early kibbutz movement reimagined the Haggadah as more Zionist and communist … There’s an urgency to the Passover plea of helping “all who are in need” … “A Transylvanian-American klezmer blues bash right at home at a Brooklyn fiddle summit.”

VIDEO OF THE DAY

This day in history: The Forward published its first issue on April 22, 1897. Watch the video above for a short animated history of our publication, and let’s raise a glass of kosher-for-Passover sparkling wine to 127 years — and many more!

Thanks to Mira Fox, Jacob Kornbluh, Lauren Markoe and Jodi Rudoren for contributing to today’s newsletter, and to Talya Zax for editing it. You can reach the “Forwarding” team at [email protected].

Support the Forward the Passover

Passover reminds us that we can’t take our freedom for granted. Now is our time to step up and protect our freedom to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly, and to ensure that everyone has access to it.