Op-eds

Spitting in the well

Feb 21, 2019 1 Comment

It has always amazed me that South African expats around the world refer to themselves as “ex-South Africans”. Meet a Brit living in New York or an American living in Tel Aviv and ask them their nationality, and they will most likely answer “British” or “American”. And yet, South Africans add a prefix that is more appropriate to use when referring to a divorced spouse than a country and place of origin.
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Is there such a thing as too many babies?

Feb 21, 2019 Go comment!

South Africans take it for granted that they live in a large country where the population of 56 million fits easily, and they can drive for hours in the countryside and pass through only a few towns with a few people.
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Looking back at Ethiopia as more countrymen arrive in Israel

Feb 14, 2019 Go comment!

I often ponder about my simple life in Ethiopia. Sometimes I miss the uncomplicated life that we once had. I miss the days of being a shepherd boy. I miss the daily chores of collecting water and searching for food. Each and every one of us has a strong link to our past and a longing for what was.
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Looming elections: can the centre hold?

Feb 14, 2019 Go comment!

Two elections coming up will provoke serious arguments about values around South African Jewish dinner tables.
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Learned helplessness

Feb 14, 2019 Go comment!

South Africans do not need to be told that they are not happy. The only question is just how miserable they are. Luckily there is a way to determine just how bad this feeling is. At first glance, it is worse than one might have thought.
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Keep anti-Semitism in perspective

Feb 14, 2019 Go comment!

At the start of the new millennium, there was a widespread belief in global Jewish circles that anti-Semitism was a diminishing problem, and that it was likely to diminish further as the world moved into a hopeful new era of burgeoning democracy.
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Morasha goes from darkness to light with new Sefer Torah

Feb 07, 2019 Go comment!

Sunday, 3 February, was a day of intense emotion for the Beit Midrash Morasha and the Cape Town Jewish community. We began the day by burying the remains of six Sifrei Torah which were destroyed in the fire that engulfed the shul in December 2018, and ended it by completing and welcoming a new Sefer Torah.
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How to do good and reduce your tax bill – legally

Feb 07, 2019 1 Comment

Around the Shabbos table, I get asked the same question every week, “What is Section 12J?” It’s not an easy conversation to have, as most shtetl folk are stereotypically “experts” in tax, finance, investments, share portfolios, and offshore investments.
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Stellenbosch University denies being anti-Israel

Feb 07, 2019 Go comment!

In December 2018, the South African Jewish Board of Deputies (SAJBD) was involved in a public spat with Stellenbosch University after several Israeli academics, as well as a Palestinian peace activist, were removed from the speaking programme of an upcoming conference.
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Deciding who to vote for

Feb 07, 2019 Go comment!

It’s going to get ugly. It always does. Anywhere in the world, an election year unleashes a tsunami of negativity, as each party does their best to show why the other would make a very poor choice.
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Playing to the seekers of excellence

Feb 07, 2019 Go comment!

Is Eurocentricity still a proverbial four-letter word in today’s South Africa? After the coming of democracy in 1994, there was political and social pressure to be more Afrocentric. This was to counter eons of brutal white and colonial rule that emanated from Europe, and persecuted Africa’s people.
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Worldwide WIZO sisterhood in Israel in 2019

Feb 07, 2019 Go comment!

One hundred Women’s International Zionist Organisation (WIZO) leaders from across the globe assembled in Israel last month for the 2019 Meeting of Representatives. This week-long event expresses solidarity and support for the work WIZO does to advance all sectors of society in Israel. It sets the policies for the coming year in WIZO’s 800 institutions, projects, and programmes, and offers an excellent opportunity to share ideas.
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Bibi’s Africa strategy picks up steam

Jan 31, 2019 1 Comment

Last week, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu flew to the north-central African nation of Chad. The roundtrip took 23 hours. He met Chadian President Idriss Déby Itno in the vast landlocked country’s sweltering, dusty capital, N’Djamena (Arabic for “place of rest”).
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Imagine if I were sensitive?

Jan 31, 2019 1 Comment

I am no stranger to hate mail. I have been photoshopped into gas chambers because I am Jewish. I have been called a baby murderer sympathiser because I support Israel. I have been threatened overtly, and I have had very dangerous looking people arrive at the door of the studio and wait for me to end my show.
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Docility: our society’s quiet calamity

Jan 31, 2019 Go comment!

Where are the youth protestors, the “trouble-makers” who keep all societies alive? What on earth will it take for South Africans to become so riled up by the corruption revealed in the Zondo and other commissions that they take to the streets with placards, demonstrate outside the commission’s Parktown premises, and block off roads outside the homes of the people implicated in corruption?
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African Jewry comes out of the shadows

Jan 31, 2019 Go comment!

South Africa today is home to a Jewish community that is by far the largest in Africa, but up until comparatively recently, this was not the case. Rather, the main centre of Jewish life on the African continent was Morocco, with other North African countries like Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, and Egypt, as well as Ethiopia, for many centuries having a substantial Jewish presence.
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We must pass the torch of democracy to a new generation of voters

Jan 24, 2019 Go comment!

The 2019 national and provincial elections will be yet another milestone event in the history of our country.
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Are we biting the hand that helps the community?

Jan 24, 2019 Go comment!

There is no doubting the financial pressures that South Africans are experiencing across the country. Years of slow economic growth, a weakening currency, and the looting of resources has created a perfect storm. The cash crunch is tangible.
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Hero? Villain? Who gets to blow that strong whistle?

Jan 24, 2019 Go comment!

When a bold man raises his head too far above the parapet, he risks having his head chopped off. By either side.
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Poll-registration drive encourages Jewish youth to get on voters’ roll

Jan 24, 2019 Go comment!

As reported last week, the South African Jewish Board of Deputies has been conducting a nationwide voter-registration drive to encourage Jewish community members to make sure that they are registered to vote in the upcoming national and provincial elections.
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