One afternoon during the second Intifada, our unit responded to heavy gunfire coming from El Khader, one of the Arab villages along …
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By Rabbi Binny Freedman
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12/30/20
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There is war, and then there is madness. In war, one has to fight, but when madness sets in, sometimes has to run. Such was the question on a dark October afternoon in 1973, when the quiet beauty …
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By Rabbi Binny Freedman
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11/25/20
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If you would have asked me what Abir would end up doing with his life, I would have imagined him as a bouncer....
Abir, an ex-paratrooper, is one of the unsung heroes of the battle of the …
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By Rabbi Binny Freedman
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11/19/20
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His eyes haunt me. His name was Martin Shtiebel, and his picture is one of many on display in the museum at Dachau, the first and longest standing concentration camp.
In 1933, the year Hitler …
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By Rabbi Binny Freedman
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11/12/20
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There are few feelings that leave us more challenged, hurt and insecure than the feeling we get from being ignored. Part of this may stem from our need to feel we have what to contribute.
One …
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By Rabbi Binny Freedman
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11/4/20
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In 2005, Steve Jobs delivered the commencement address at Stanford University. In it, he described how he had started Apple in a garage at age 20, and after ten years of hard work, built it into …
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By Rabbi Binny Freedman
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10/1/20
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If you would have collected a group of world-renowned military strategists on Yom Kippur in 1973 and asked them, at 4 pm Israel time, for a prognosis on the status of the events unfolding on the …
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By Rabbi Binny Freedman
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9/23/20
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I hadn’t planned on stopping to watch, but something about him caught my attention. It was Tisha B’Av, the anniversary of the day our Temples were destroyed, the city of …
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By Rabbi Binny Freedman
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9/9/20
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I remember the first Mishnah I ever learned, and it wasn’t in a classroom.
The synagogue we attended when I was five years old had a strict decorum, and I recall the challenges this …
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By Rabbi Binny Freedman
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9/2/20
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It was the height of the intifada, and we were in the midst of a month’s reserve duty. Deep in the heart of Hebron an Israeli lookout was meant to spot trouble on the road below and protect …
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By Rabbi Binny Freedman
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8/26/20
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