Justice & immigration

How Western anti-Muslim bigotry became respectable: The historic roots of a newly resilient ideology

By Editor | 1/3/2010

by ŞENER AKTÜRK & MUJEEB R. KHAN*

As scholars who work on the centuries-old Islamic presence in Europe and the continent’s first post-Holocaust genocide against, not coincidently, the Muslims of Bosnia and Herzegovina, we were deeply disturbed but not surprised that an ostensibly tolerant and pluralistic Western democracy like Switzerland would vote by a margin of 57 percent to ban the religious symbol of 400,000 of its Muslim residents because they felt “threatened” by the grand total of four minarets that exist there.
    Read more »

Printable PDF New Freedom Seder for the Earth, with full-color graphic cover!

The Shalom Center has created a 40th Anniversary New Interfaith Freedom Seder for the Earth to help us free ourselves from the greatest dangers of our time: What are the Ten Plagues endangering the earth and human life today, and what are the Ten Blessings we ourselves can bring to heal the earth and our own societies?

If you want to use this text, or part of it, for an Earth Seder in your own community -- perhaps a week before Pesach or for Earth Day on April 22, or the weekend before or after -- please do so -- and we ask you to make a contribution to The Shalom Center to help us do this and similar work. We suggest a donation of $18 plus $1 for each participant in your Seder. Click on the "Donate" headline near the top of the left-hand column on this page to contribute, and please let us know what you are doing by writing Office@shalomctr.org.

Click just below to download a full pdf of the New Freedom Seder for the Earth.! (It includes an amazing full-color graphic cover by Avi Katz.) If you prefer to have a text copy that you can easily edit, click here   Read more »

New Interfaith Freedom Seder for the Earth: Text of an Earth-Haggadah

By Rabbi Arthur Waskow | 2/3/2009

SEDER FOR THE EARTH: Facing the Plagues & Pharaohs of Our Generation

The Shalom Center has created the text and the organizing mechanisms for you to shape a new Freedom Seder for the Earth in your own community, challenging the plagues and pharaohs of our day and undertaking healing actions by us all.

Copyrights by the authors of their specific passages. Copyright © 2009 by The Shalom Center for the Seder as a whole.    Read more »

Shalom Center joins many Jewish groups in condemning Arizona anti-migrant law

By Rabbi Arthur Waskow | 5/2/2010

April 30, 2010
Jewish Community Condemns Arizona Law, Urges National Comprehensive Immigration
 Reform

In the aftermath of ill-advised legislation, Immigration; Law Enforcement; Safe Neighborhoods
Act (SB 1070), passed last week in Arizona and signed into law by Gov. Jan Brewer, we, as
members of We Were Strangers, Too: the Jewish Campaign for Immigration Reform, condemn the Arizona law and call upon Congress to immediately introduce comprehensive immigration
reform legislation with bipartisan support that will provide a path to citizenship for the 11   Read more »

Voting Our Values: Nonpartisan Guide to Election Issues

VOTING OUR VALUES
Judaism & American Life
“To be is to stand for.”
—Abraham Joshua Heschel
RIGHTEOUS INDIGNATION:
A JEWISH CALL FOR JUSTICE

Judaism & American Life
Elections offer us the opportunity to reflect upon, and
to recommit ourselves to, our core values. This Jewish
non-partisan election guide is intended as catalyst for
thought and action during the 2008 election season.

The guide includes seven topics that the Righteous
Indignation staff has identified as key election issues
based on our research and in consultation with religious   Read more »

Can Agriprocessors Do T'shuvah?"

By Rabbi Arthur Waskow | 9/6/2008

by Rabbi David Seidenberg   Read more »

Meta-ethical questions in the Agriprocessors debate

By Rabbi Arthur Waskow | 9/5/2008

BY RABBI HYIM SHAFNER

The current uproar in the Jewish community regarding Agriprocessors
(Rubashkin kosher meat products) is disturbing. I do not profess inside knowledge of
the company and its management. I do not know the extent to which they are
guilty or innocent of the violations of which they have been widely accused,
violation of labor and immigration laws and of environmental protection regulations,
as well as disregard for human dignity and issues regarding animal pain.

I would like to pose several questions. What instruction does Judaism offer
when the welfare of laborers is in conflict with the welfare and monetary risk   Read more »

Israel & Egypt deny asylum to at least 91 fleeing Darfur, etc., in sub-Saharan Africa

By Rabbi Arthur Waskow | 9/4/2008

[This urgent report by Amnesty International was circulated by Rabbis for Human Rights in Israel. Please note that the Israeli government is refusing to allow refugees from Darfur and other African countries where they are being oppressed to get any due process for review of their pleas for asylum in Israel. American Jewish groups that have close connections with the Israeli government and that claim to be opposing genocidal attacks in Darfur might want to take action on this matter. For action possibilities, see the end of the report. — ED. NOTE by Rabbi Arthur Waskow.]   Read more »

New Ways of Accessing Kosher Meat

By Rabbi Arthur Waskow | 8/28/2008

By Reb Zalman Schachter-Shalomi

It is very painful to read about a plant that was supposed to be Glatt kosher and manages this by squeaking by the narrowest definition of kosher that could be construed by Halakha [Jewish law]. They ignored many of the issues that had to do with Tza’ar Ba’aley Chayyim [giving pain to animals] and unfair treatment of laborers, as well as knowingly breaking immigration hiring laws.

In the meantime I have received a request from concerned people who would like to be able to engage a Shochet [ritual slaughterer] and find a way to address the needs to get their meat from free-range animals that were not fed hormones and grazed on land that was not polluted by herbicides.   Read more »

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