Jonathan S. Tobin
Jonathan S. Tobin is editor in chief of JNS. Follow him on Twitter at: @jonathans_tobin.
Jews need to opt out of the ‘woke victim’ competition
Maybe the problem is that we should stop paying so much attention to what comedians say. Too much of our national discourse has become the function of what writers for late-night comedy shows say...
Is it ever OK to praise the ‘truth’ of an anti-Semitic blood libel?
Does it matter if politicians let lies told by people they meet publicly go unanswered? That’s the question that many in the Jewish community, especially the majority who regularly vote for Democrats, are asking...
A cautionary tale about Arab-Israeli normalization
Those picking up The Wall Street Journal on Sept. 24 got some good news about the cause of peace in the Middle East. On its opinion page was an article by Sheikh Wisam Al-Harden, an influential tribal leader...
The complicated politics of hating Israel
Thursday, Sept. 23 was a banner day for pro-Israel Democrats. But in the aftermath of the party leadership’s swift move to undo what had seemed like a stunning triumph on the part of their...
How a budget standoff demonstrated the partisan split over Israel
The Iron Dome missile-defense system has long been one of the least controversial aspects of the U.S.-Israel relationship. Funding for the idea was approved in principle by the George W. Bush administration in 2007...
The obligation to remember, even on a day when we look inward
It comes in a part of the Yom Kippur service that even many of those who are more than three-day-a-year synagogue-goers often skip in the late afternoon as the daylong fast heads towards its...
Time for both parties to repent for their Nazi analogies
After a generation in which Holocaust education has proliferated in the United States, it’s fair to ask whether all that lip service paid to the memory of the Six Million has done as much...
In addressing anti-Semitism, honesty matters
A couple of years ago after giving a speech, I was confronted with what struck me as a bizarre query during the question-and-answer period. Why, I was asked, hadn’t then-President Donald Trump ever expressed...
Will the plight of Afghanis recast the debate about refugees?
In recent years, many Jewish groups have redoubled their advocacy for more liberal immigration laws. This was rooted in remembrance of the immigrant forebears of the Jewish community, as well as a belief that...
Flattery and empty promises won’t preserve an alliance
The reviews at home were mixed for Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s first meeting with President Joe Biden. Many of those who despise Bennett’s right-wing principles thought he did a good job, while most...