A painful and moving tribute to those who gave their lives for Israel.

MJL has been nominated for a Jewish and Israeli Blog Award for Best New Blog.
Are you an avid reader of Mixed Multitudes? Just think that Daniel Septimus is really clever?
You can show your love by voting for us here.

Congratulations to MJL contributor Saul Austerlitz on the publications of his first book, Money for Nothing: A History of the Music Video from the Beatles to the White Stripes (Continuum).
You can purchase Saul’s book here.
After that, revisit some of Saul’s recent MJL articles on Contemporary Israeli Film; Sarah Silverman; Borat; and Steven Spielberg.

In light of Eli Stern’s op-ed about interfaith dialogue that I blogged about yesterday, this news story about Orthodox Christians confronting their theology is of note:
“Sadly, there are some Orthodox Christians who propagate disgusting anti-Semitism under the banner of Orthodoxy, which is incompatible with Christianity,” said Rev. Innokenty Pavlov, professor of theology at Moscow’s Biblical […]

Thanks to LastTrumpet over at Jewschool for weighing in with a critique of David Klinghoffer’s latest Forward op-ed.
It’s hard not to respond to every item that the uber-conservative Klinghoffer writes — but if someone else is doing it, I can take the week off — along with a deep breath.
I will say that LastTrumpet is […]

In this week’s Jewish Week, Rabbi Eliyahu Stern addresses an issue I raised a few weeks ago in reference to Meir Soloveichik’s recent rejection of theological interfaith dialogue.
Stern takes a similar approach to me, arguing that we must be allowed to criticize another person’s theology if that theology can potentially inspire hatred and violence. Stern […]

Michael Chabon’s new novel The Yiddish Policemen’s Union won’t be published until May 1, but the Forward has jumped the gun with an early review by Mark Oppenheimer.
Like Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America, Chabon’s novel has a counterfactual premise: The Jews in Palestine lost the 1948 war, and to mitigate this tragic event, they […]

Okay. This has nothing to do with anything Jewish, but it’s a great story, so here goes.
A friend of mine, in from England, was visiting her aunt in Washington DC the other night. They went to a Thai restaurant for dinner, and in walked none other than George W. Bush.
The funny part?
The President dined with […]

A lot has been written about the independent minyan movement, but most of that writing isn’t so funny. Not that it’s supposed to be.
But this review of Kehilat Romemu — New York’s self-described inspirational, Kabbalistic, transdenominational, integral congregation — on David Kelsey’s blog is beautifully hilarious — and helpfully evocative at the same time:
First of […]

Balkan Beat Box’s new album, NU MED, is available on iTunes today and will go on sale May 15th.

If you want a sneak preview, you can hear the first single — “Digital Monkey” — here.