A threatening email was sent early Wednesday morning to dozens of Jewish institutions across Canada, including several in Montreal, prompting an RCMP investigation.

The email was sent at 5:11 a.m. to roughly 125 organizations, many of them synagogues and nearly all of them linked to Jewish communities, according to RCMP Sgt. Charles Poirier.

Via Instagram.

Tisha B'Av, the Fast of the Ninth of Av, is a day of mourning to commemorate the many tragedies that have befallen the Jewish people, many of which have occurred on the ninth of Av.

Tisha B'Av means "the ninth (day) of Av." It occurs in July or August.

Queenie Hallegua was the warden and managing trustee of the Paradesi Synagogue, a 450-year-old landmark, from 2012 to 2018.

She and her late husband Sammy hosted Queen Elizabeth and her husband, Prince Philip, when they came to the Paradesi Synagogue in the Mattancherry neighborhood in October 1997.

The first Jews to arrive on the Malabar coast of India, on the Arabian Sea, came in the first century BCE as sailors — on King Solomon’s boats, as legend has it. Known as Malabari Jews, the families of traders moved south to present-day Kochi, previously known as Cochin, where they built the Kochangadi Synagogue, the area’s first Jewish house of worship.

Elor, the granddaughter of Holocaust survivors who moved to Israel, experienced both online antisemitism and the sudden deaths of both her father and a brother during the years when she broke into the elite ranks of U.S. women’s wrestlers. She wrestles at the 68-kilogram weight class and in October became the youngest American wrestler — male or female — ever to win a senior world title.

Shapiro repeated a saying from Pirke Avot, a Jewish text, which he has used on the campaign trail before: “I’m not here to preach at y’all. But I want to tell you what my faith teaches,” he said. “My faith teaches me that no one is required to complete the task, but neither are we free to refrain from it. That means that each of us has a responsibility to get off the sidelines, to get in the game and to do our part.”

During the Holocaust and its aftermath, the Forward’s Seeking Relatives helped thousands when no one else could

Nearly 180 gravestones at two Jewish cemeteries in Cincinnati have been vandalized, according to the Jewish Cemeteries of Greater Cincinnati and the Jewish Federation of Cincinnati.

Many of the gravestones – some dating back to the late 1800s – have been knocked face-down, with some cracked in half, at the Tifereth Israel and the Beth Hamedrash Hagadol cemeteries in the Covedale Cemetery complex.

On August 21, 1790, President George Washington composed a letter to the Hebrew Congregation of Newport, Rhode Island, and to its leader, Moses Seixas. Washington incorporated Seixas' own phrasing, which describes the vision of the young nation as one which "gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance."

The close relationship between Washington and the Jewish community already in the United States helped to enshrine the principles of separation between Religion and State, as well as the freedom of religion that would soon become part of the First Amendment to the Constitution.

As we celebrate this anniversary of our nation's independence, one hopes that we might continue to hold hope for this cherished vision. Let all good patriots recall the aspirations of our country's founders and work to fight against the evils that conspire to compromise and undermine them. In an age of rising intolerance and renewed Christian nationalism, may we be the beacons of light illuminating and eliminating the darkness creeping from the corners. Then every one shall sit in safety under his own vine and figtree, and there shall be none to make him afraid. 🇺🇲

David Baddiel is a British comedian and the author of the book Jews Don't Count. He, much like the interviewer here (Andrew Gold) convinced me to stop being ashamed of the fact that I'm Jewish and hiding it.

News that the South had lost the Civil War and that the Emancipation Proclamation had freed all enslaved people came late to Texas — June 19, 1865. Since then, Black communities in the South have celebrated what came to be called Juneteenth on the anniversary of the day. “America’s second Independence Day” was recognized as a federal holiday in 2021.

For many Jews, Juneteenth is an opportunity to celebrate and commemorate both Black and Jewish history and culture — and the places where they intersect. Here is a sampling of Jewish Juneteenth events this season.

Sheinbaum’s family background is one of culturally Jewish but atheist progressive activists. A similar background has defined the past century of Jewish communities in Mexico, many of which were built by European Jews who, fleeing pogroms and the Nazis, brought with them socialist values that they would seek to foster in their lives in Mexico.But such connections between Jewish values and political action in countries of refuge are often downplayed or even contested. Sheinbaum herself has not made much of her Jewish identity in her political life. She has often described the family in which she was raised as not particularly observant. Yet Sheinbaum is also only the second Jewish head of state throughout all of Latin America. So, no matter what kind of Jewish political leader she is, the fact that she identifies as Jewish is material to her public profile.

In fact, and strikingly, our Jewish legal tradition identifies no fewer than six distinct “genders”, certainly assuming as normative the male and female, but including as well designations which we now refer to as “intersex” identities.

Pride feels different this year. As Jews, many of us are concerned about rising antisemitism. Some of us worry about antisemitism during Pride.

As LGBTQ+ people, our lives, communities, and families continue to be attacked. Over 500 anti-LGBTQ+ bills have been proposed or passed in the United States. Our humanity is being debated in the public sphere.

As queer and trans Jews, we are vulnerable on multiple fronts. And yet, Pride is a time to celebrate our resistance and resilience. We stand on the shoulders of our LGBTQ+ Jewish ancestors who survived so that we could thrive. And one of the ways to not give in to harmful rhetoric is to show those who don’t believe we should exist that we are here, proudly and joyously. We aren’t going anywhere. Our communities are beautiful, exuberant, generative spaces of love and belonging.

The news is overwhelming and unending. But we know the truth: queer people and queer Jews have always been here and will always be here. We are your friends, family, and neighbors. We need your support.

Today is 23 days, which is 3 weeks and 2 days of the Omer. It's a little early, but Shabbat Shalom everyone!

Today is 14 days, which is 2 weeks of the Omer.

It is also National Teacher Day. Rambam, the 12th Century philosopher, physician, and legalist, wrote the following about the moral obligation to employ teachers:

מוֹשִׁיבִין מְלַמְּדֵי תִּינוֹקוֹת בְּכָל מְדִינָה וּמְדִינָה וּבְכָל פֶּלֶךְ וּפֶלֶךְ וּבְכָל עִיר וָעִיר. וְכָל עִיר שֶׁאֵין בָּהּ תִּינוֹקוֹת שֶׁל בֵּית רַבָּן מַחְרִימִין אֶת אַנְשֵׁי הָעִיר עַד שֶׁמּוֹשִׁיבִין מְלַמְּדֵי תִּינוֹקוֹת. וְאִם לֹא הוֹשִׁיבוּ מַחְרִימִין אֶת הָעִיר. שֶׁאֵין הָעוֹלָם מִתְקַיֵּם אֶלָּא בְּהֶבֶל פִּיהֶם שֶׁל תִּינוֹקוֹת שֶׁל בֵּית רַבָּן:

Teachers of young children are to be appointed in each province, district and town. If a city has made no provision for the education of the young, its inhabitants are placed under a ban, till such teachers have been engaged. And if they persistently neglect this duty, the city is excommunicated, for the world is only sustained by the breath of school children.

Rambam, Mishneh Torah, Torah Study 2-1