The only trial in the world which seems to have taken longer than the Amanda Knox one in Italy is the extended "trial" over the so-called "James Ossuary" in Jerusalem. Like the former, which still gives promise of carrying on into several stages of appeal anyhow, the latter is largely...

I first began writing this piece with only people of Jewish background in mind, since I was concerned about the unnecessary humiliation and suffering people from countries in the former Soviet Union, Ethiopia, Burma and elsewhere -- even "Christians" from the United States -- undergo in seeking conversion or when...

This is the second installment in a two-part series. Read part one here.

Wavell was now Commander-in-Chief of India and on the Governor's Council and the Japanese were pouring through the Malay Peninsula, Singapore, and Burma. Again, he realized he needed Wingate seconded to him in Rangoon as...

Orde Wingate is perhaps so famous that there is no need to summarize his life. There are a plethora of good biographies, pro and con, for these purposes; but just for the argument, let us summarize a few points here. His father was first cousin to Sir Reginald Wingate, Governor...

Last week I posted a piece (11/3/11): "The Power of Ultimatums -- The Forgotten Diplomatic Tool." In it, I pointed out that this could easily be applied to the Libyan situation -- though with a little more difficulty the Iranian, North Korean, and ultimately even the Pakistani.


Well,...

Ultimatums have gotten a bad name. This is probably because of what happened in the run-up to World War I when they were thrown around somewhat promiscuously and ended up being partly to blame for the ensuing world-wide catastrophe.

Then came the League of Nations which was supposedly going to...

As it has now turned out, Zahi Hawass is in Mubarak's new Cabinet as Minister for Cultural Affairs or some such thing. He reported to the press how the antiquities in the Cairo Museum were saved and how he told the beduin who stole some objects being stored in Sinai...

Now that the extended 'trial' over "the James Ossuary" or "James Bone Box" in Israel is nearing its conclusion and all that remains to be announced is the verdict -- which in the present writer's mind is a foregone conclusion, no evaluation of data having had to take this long...

If Menachem Begin had worn swim trunks, he would never have completely withdrawn from Sinai and kept Gaza. Actually everything was pretty clear when Begin -- with Ariel Sharon's help and approval -- basically unilaterally withdrew from Sinai, bulldozed Yamit, and kept Gaza. This was in response to "the mouse...

The awarding of the Wolf Prize for Architecture to my brother Peter Eisenman for his splendid Holocaust Memorial in Berlin is a well-deserved and noble gesture for extraordinary and brilliant efforts in memorialization. Having said this, let me observe that, while we Jews - 'we' in Israel and 'we' abroad...

"Judas Reconsidered -- Betrayal: Should We Hate Judas Iscariot"? These are the shout lines given the most recent article in the New Yorker magazine (8/3/09) on the Gospel of Judas by Joan Acocella (credentials unknown, though her specialty has mostly been dance), which burst upon the scene in 2006 via...

The New York Times is at work again and the "demonization" of Judas Iscariot is once more in play. The best example of this is the appearance at the beginning of the month of an op-ed piece, "Gospel Truth" by Prof. April DeConick of Rice University (The New York Times,...

Christiane Amanpour in her "God's Warriors: The Jews" broadcast on CNN this weekend - aside from giving voice to as many anti-Israel and anti-"settlement" critics as one might imagine and almost no "Jewish" (really?) God's Warriors, except to portray them in the most trivialized manner - must have used the...

The latest 'discovery' of the so-called "Jesus Tomb" or "Jesus Cave" is so preposterous that it has to be laughed out of court.

For starters one must say that one must be glad that ossuaries of this kind in Israel are finally getting the publicity they deserve and that...

'Trial Balloons' to rehabilitate 'Judas Iscariot' (evidently emanating from Vatican 'sources') are presently in the news with predictable outcries from both 'the Right' and 'the Left.' While this kind of proposal is all to the good -- regardless of the impact it might have on one's 'Faith' -- and, in...

Robert Fisk ("Telling it like it isn't," Los Angeles Times, 12/27/05) must be living in "cloud cuckoo-land." He objects to alleged pro-Jewish and what he seems to imply as "pro-Israel" or "pro-Zionist" bias in U. S. newspapers. He wants the West Bank to be referred to as "Occupied Palestine"...