It was media preview day today for the extensively publicized new exhibit, The Dead Sea Scrolls: Words That Changed the World, at the Science Museum of Minnesota. The exhibit of the earliest version of the Hebrew Bible opens tomorrow at the museum in downtown St. Paul opens and runs through Oct. 24.

A fragment from the Genesis [...]

Rabbi Mordechai Yitzchok Friedman vents in Brooklyn
Although this “Jewish Tea Party” meeting took place on Purim, apparently it’s not a joke. In a report for the Forward, Gal Beckerman finds a small group, no more than 15 people, gathered in a Brooklyn synagogue basement for an interactive session with Rabbi Mordechai Yitzchok Friedman.
The rabbi sticks [...]

In its latest investigation into the demise of Home Valu, the home improvement firm founded by former Sen. Rudy Boschwitz, Fox 9 News reported last night that the Anoka County Attorney is investigating allegations that the company defrauded subcontractors hired to install products.
Here is an excerpt from Fox9.com:
Gary Miller, a subcontractor who installed floors [...]

Adath Jeshurun’s ‘Jews, Food and Planet Earth’ Synaplex Shabbat will feature environmentalist Nigel Savage

When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap all the way to the edges of your field, or gather the gleanings of your harvest. You shall not pick your vineyard bare, or gather the fallen fruit of your [...]

The sixth annual observance of anti-Israel activism, “Israel Apartheid Week,” is in full swing across the United States and around the world; a schedule of IAW events has been planned in Duluth, Minnesota.
Jewish pundits are weighing in about the consequences of these activities. Should Jews actively confront what they see as anti-Zionist and sometimes anti-Semitic [...]

Dozens of groups, from across the gamut of political ideologies, send e-mails to the American Jewish World. It’s hard to keep up.
Today, I checked out the links to an outfit called the Unity Coalition for Israel (UCI). Based in Shawnee Mission, Kansas, UCI displays a clear anti-Muslim bias; perhaps, in their minds, this constitutes support [...]

Ahead of the publication of a story in its Sunday magazine, Haaretz reported today that the son of a “leading Hamas figure who famously converted to Christianity, served for over a decade as the Shin Bet security service’s most valuable source in the militant organization’s leadership.”
The story specifies that Mosab Hassan Yousef, the son of Sheikh Hassan [...]

Larry Gopnik’s 1966 Dodge Coronet, from the Coen brothers’ film A Serious Man, will be auctioned online to benefit Variety – The Children’s Charity of Southern California. The auction starts Monday, Feb. 22 and ends Thursday, March 4 — to place a bid, go HERE.

Larry Gopnik’s 1966 Dodge Coronet from “A Serious Man.” (Photo: Wilson Webb)

Larry’s [...]

In the spirit of Purim frivolity, the front page of this week’s American Jewish World features an article about Jewish chefs cooking with pork, and there is a photo of a pig.

The pig. (Photo: Johnmuk / Creative Commons)

It was not our intention to offend Jewish readers — whether they observe kashrut (Jewish dietary laws) or not [...]

Bulgarian Jewry, which was saved in the Shoah then repressed during the Communist era, is enjoying a resurgence
By MORDECAI SPECKTOR
Dr. Alexander (“Alek”) Oscar, a neuro-ophthalmologist and president of the Sofia, Bulgaria, Jewish community, recently visited the AJW offices. Accompanied by Mort Naiman, campaign coordinator for the Minneapolis Jewish Federation, Oscar came to express his appreciation [...]