Cairo is Burning; Is Egyptian-Israeli Peace Next?

By Niv Elis As the world watches the unprecedented protests in Cairo unfold live on Al Jazeera, America and Israel face an intractable dilemma over who to support.  To  lovers of democracy and human rights, the Egyptian people’s uprising is a phenomenon to be encouraged; the Egyptian regime is a police state (though milder than, say, Iran or Saudi Arabia), which for nearly 60 years has held an iron grip on the country’s political institutions, limiting the media and sweeping aside opposition rights.  Like all people, Egyptians deserve better, and it seems incomprehensible that Western governments would fail to support them. Yet for decades, Egypt’s autocracy has contributed a modicum of geopolitical stability to the region. Having established itself as the leader of the Arab world during the Cold War, Egypt made waves when it broke from...

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Jewish Fanaticism

By Jeremy Gillick In the wake of the Manis Friedman controversy, some suggested that Moment should have censored itself in order to protect the Jewish community's image. Abe Foxman, for example, the controversial director of the Anti-Defamation League, told the Forward that, while he was "not shocked that there would be a rabbi who would have these views," he was "shocked that Moment would give up all editorial discretion and good sense to publish this as representative of Chabad." (In Moment's defense, Manis Friedman is a regular "Ask the Rabbis" contributor: see his former responses here, here and here.) But if it's fair to silence the extremism within when it's a merely a fringe phenomenon limited to a few radical rabbis, surely it's wrong not to publicize--and criticize--it when it appears to be widespread and cross-denominational. Here's...

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