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JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.

WHAT’S DRIVING THE AMERICAN JEWISH CONVERSATION

Investigations underway over sexism complaints at rabbinical seminary, Netanyahu may address a joint session of Congress, all the Jewish players and coaches to watch in March Madness, and remembering the tailor to movie stars and presidents who learned to sew at Auschwitz.

ISRAEL AT WAR

An Israeli tank along the border with Gaza on Tuesday. (Getty)

Polls of Israelis and Palestinians can suggest two different realities. Here’s where they agree: Five months into the war, there is one matter where they seem to align: Both Palestinians and Israelis believe Israel is not going to win the war, prompting questions about the long-term goal for Gaza. Our Louis Keene looks at two recent polls from think tanks based in Ramallah and Jerusalem that reveal the common ground. Read the story ➤

First person | ‘If I were injured there, the best thing would be to die’: An ICU doctor’s mission to Gaza: Nothing in Vanita Gupta’s decades of experience prepared her for the harrowing 10-day mission she spent volunteering with a medical NGO. Gupta treated patients with gunshot wounds, blast injuries and burns. More than 60% of her patients were women and children, and the hospitals were so overrun that it was difficult to walk down the hallways. “Over a hundred people were lying on the floor begging for help and trying to grab at you,” she writes. “I saw several people die just in my first few hours there.” Read her essay ➤

A worker sorts flour bags Sunday during the distribution of humanitarian aid in Gaza City. (Getty)

The latest…

Israel is quietly developing a plan to put anti-Hamas Palestinians in charge of distributing aid in Gaza, and eventually creating a Palestinian-led government there.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken said “gaps are narrowing” between Israel and Hamas on an extended truce and hostage deal. Blinken arrived in Egypt Thursday for his sixth wartime trip to the region.

The U.S. government will shut down at midnight Friday if a new spending bill is not passed. The latest proposal eliminates funding through March 2025 for UNRWA, the United Nations agency accused of having some employees that aided Hamas.

House Speaker Mike Johnson confirmed on Wednesday that he’s considering inviting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address Congress. Johnson would need to get approval from Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer for the joint session speech.

Republicans have rushed to embrace Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer called for a change of leadership in Israel. (Getty)

New survey shows Biden voters share Schumer’s critique of Netanyahu: The poll showed that 57% of Democrats view Netanyahu critically and 53% of Republicans view him favorably. Among respondents who said they plan to vote for President Joe Biden in November, 69% expressed unfavorable views of Netanyahu. Among those who plan to vote for former President Donald Trump, 61% expressed a positive view of Netanyahu. Read the story ➤

Opinion | Silence your groggers, and five other ideas for Purim pivots in response to the war: “The chilling conclusion of the Esther story includes the Jews’ killing of 75,000 Persians,” write Amichai Lau-Lavie and Rachel Timoner. “This year, let us put down the noisemakers, lower our voices, or find other ways to conclude this story with sobriety. Let it serve as a moment of reflection on our impulse for revenge, on the grave responsibility that comes with holding power and on the moral consequences of failing to honor human life in the name of self-defense.” Read their essay ➤

Pro-Palestinian activists rally outside Columbia University in Nov. 2023. (Camillo Barone)

Plus…

New records from the Department of Education reveal details about Israel-related complaints at Columbia, Harvard, MIT and other schools, while a new investigation opens in Hawaii.

Israeli police have ordered all synagogues in the country to have at least one armed guard at their upcoming Purim services.

A number of prominent Jewish donors are included on a letter from more than 100 Democratic funders calling on President Biden to pull back his “unconditional” support for Israel’s war effort, and warning that it may harm his reelection prospects.

A group representing more than 1,000 American rabbis across denominations released a statement Wednesday opposing a ceasefire in Gaza and rejecting the conditioning of U.S. military aid to Israel.

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ALSO IN THE FORWARD

People watch a solar eclipse in Brazil in October 2023. (Getty)

On April 8, God will turn the sun into darkness and the moon into blood: Solar eclipses are rare and scientifically interesting, but Jewish texts say they’re punishment for sins. The Maharal, a renowned 16th century Talmudic scholar from Prague, said that if humanity did not sin, we would live in eternal light. “That’s why,” writes our Mira Fox, “while most natural phenomena have blessings in Judaism — there’s a specific bracha for rainbows, as well as thunder, lightning and earthquakes — eclipses don’t merit a prayer.”

A beautiful, Black, Queen Esther with braids — and readers like what they see:The Jewish Press, an Orthodox newspaper, used AI to create an illustration of Esther to accompany an article. The algorithm produced a dark-skinned Esther, perhaps historically and geographically accurate for the Persian empire. Whether intentionally or not, the newspaper made a diversity statement that was welcomed with open arms by Jews of color. Said one: “Keep it up and I’ll have to renew my subscription!”

A new William Shatner documentary is more meet-and-greet than film: In You Can Call Me Bill, the Star Trek icon offers his reflections of a life now in its 10th decade. Shatner opines about nature, the universe and the fragile nature of comedy. But, as our PJ Grisar writes in his review, missing from the film is any bigger picture view on just how Shatner emerged as such a meaningful figure. “As a Shatner skeptic,” Grisar writes, “it’s not quite the retrospective that I feel the culture is owed.”

NEW FROM THE FORWARD

WHAT ELSE YOU NEED TO KNOW TODAY

Left to right: Yarden Garzon, Todd Golden, Danny Wolf and Lindsay Gottlieb. (Getty/Design by Mollie Suss)

🏀 The 2024 NCAA Tournament, known as March Madness, tips off today with plenty of Jewish players and coaches to follow. Meanwhile, a Muslim player at a Mormon college will go through March Madness observing Ramadan, without food or water. (JTA, AP)

🏫 Two investigations are underway following complaints of sexism at the Ziegler rabbinical seminary at American Jewish University. The school plans to release a public report about the investigation in a matter of weeks. (JTA)

🎒 The U.S. Department of Education concluded its investigation into a public school district in Utah over reports of antisemitic harassment, with the district agreeing to improve its anti-bias training and report future incidents of hate. (JTA)

👮 Police in Newton, Massachusetts, said they are investigating a string of seven recent instances of vandalism targeting homes with pro-Israel signs as individual hate crimes. (JTA)

🤔 X, the website formerly known as Twitter, locked and suspended the accounts of journalists and researchers who shared the alleged identity of a neo-Nazi cartoonist after the cartoonist appealed to site owner Elon Musk. (Wired)

🇺🇸 Nine members of Congress said on Wednesday that they’re taking the first steps toward potentially moving Philadelphia’s National Museum of American Jewish History under the Smithsonian umbrella. (Jewish Insider)

Shiva calls ➤ Martin Greenfield — tailor to Sinatra, Obama, Trump and Shaq — died at 95. He learned to sew at Auschwitz. … Abigail Grafton, a longtime leader of the Aquarian Minyan in Berkeley, California, died at 83.

VIDEO OF THE DAY

Be the chochom at your megillah reading this weekend. Our Yiddish editor, Rukhl Schaechter, gives us a crash course on Purim sayings in the above video.

Thanks to Nora Berman, PJ Grisar, Chana Pollack and Talya Zax for contributing to today’s newsletter, and to Beth Harpaz for editing it. You can reach the “Forwarding” team at [email protected].

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