Another teenager has just been murdered. Even as we -and in this post, I am speaking directly to Israeli and Diaspora Jews, although the content could be applicable to other groups- even as we mourn the […]
Author: Moriel Rothman-Zecher
American-Israeli writer, poet and novelist.
How do you punish murderers?
The news of the murder of the three kids is horrific. No qualifications, no rationalizations, nothing. The murder of children is one of the most horrific things imaginable. I found myself staring again at the pictures […]
Introducing: The Leftern Wall July Story Journal
Recently, I went for a run (which is something I do a lot, as I am training for another ultramarathon). While running, I listened to a podcast (which is also something I do a lot). […]
How Mentioning the word “Occupation” Sent Secret Tel Aviv into Mayhem and Panic
So, earlier this evening, as I was twiddling around Facebook, I had the idea of posting in Secret Tel Aviv, a Facebook group of 41,000+, mostly anglo-Jewish folks living in the Tel Aviv area. Most […]
Young Leftist Jews Standing with the Black South in 1964 and in 2014
Yesterday, I wrote a piece called “The Jewish Left is Alive and Vibrant” in the Jewish Daily Forward as a response to Jay Michaelson’s piece in the same paper, “Death of the Jewish Left.” In my piece, […]
War is Terrorism: Three Reflections on Silence, “the” Crisis & Hanin Zuabi
1. Break the Silence. The events of the past two weeks are raw, emotional, divisive- and there is a part of me that wants to keep quiet, to “wait until things calm down.” But that is not […]
How Moving to the Jewish State Made me Stop Wearing a Kippah
This piece is a very personal one, and one that I decided not to publish when I first wrote it, as a letter to two friends, almost three years ago. Now, with time forging a buffer between me, in the present, and the rawness of this experience then, I have decided I am ready to retroactively publish it, and to see where its resonances land. I reread this with a measure of sadness, and also with compassion for myself then, and also with admiration for those who are able to constantly hold the contradictions that I did not feel strong enough to hold, and also with relief that this is no longer a struggle that tears me up on a daily basis. Here is:
Fall, 2011
I woke up Thursday morning, the first day of Rosh HaShana, the Jewish new year, a time of renewal and rebirth and reawakening and reevaluating and re-being. I woke up Thursday morning, and I put on my kippah, and I looked in the mirror, and I thought to myself:
“What is this thing I am putting on my head?”
Why Ein Prat is more like the Hebron Fund than a group of teachers from Bat Ayin
I was recently asked by a few friends and colleagues for my opinion on studying at an Ein Prat program within the Green Line. The questions came to me as a followup to the post I’d […]
The Shooter from Bitunya Speaks*
In the third grade Liam stood on the top of the playtoy and Told the class my arms were skinny and Looked like like a girl’s, like Talia’s, and The next week I pushed his chest […]
5 Poems and Pictures from Jerusalem Day 2014
1. I have nothing new to say about violence. It feels sad and electric to see, like usual. By evening, satisfied some of the policemen eat sandwiches. 2. Speaking of sad: the nine year olds wearing Kahana […]
The Leftern Wall 