Should Iran Be Contained, or Defeated?
The perils of bad historical analogies.
June 26, 2025
An Outbreak of Austrian Anti-Semitism Helped to Create the First “Modern” Rabbi
Israel Isserlein and the beginning of the aharonim.
Traditional Talmud study makes an important distinction between two categories of commentators: the rishonim (“first ones”) and the aharonim (“latter ones”), terms that refer, respectively, to medieval and modern rabbis. While the exact chronology is imprecise, it’s abundantly clear that the talmudists of the 17th and 18th centuries saw their medieval predecessors as possessing greater authority than more recent sages.
June 26, 2025
Why the President Didn’t Need Congress’s Permission to Attack Iran
The Constitution, international law, and the twelve-day war.
Zohran Mamdani Makes the Case for Zionism
Hatred for Israel helped his campaign.
How Tel Aviv Became Home to One of World’s Greatest Collections of Modern Art
“A new Hebrew city should exhibit new Hebrew art.”
An Outbreak of Austrian Anti-Semitism Helped to Create the First “Modern” Rabbi
Israel Isserlein and the beginning of the aharonim.