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A 1990s Israeli play is the feminist production NY needs right now
(New York Jewish Week) — When Anat Gov’s play “HaChaverot Hachi Tovot” (“Best Friends”) premiered in 1999, it was an anomaly among Israeli works of theater. In fact, Gov wrote it with anomalous intentions: In an interview before it opened, she called the piece a form of “compensation for the fact that there are no good roles for women.”
To remedy this, Gov wrote a play with no male roles — a 100-minute romp down memory lane which calls into question the very nature of friendship and whether or not the love between BFFs can stand the test of time.
At the time, the play was a smash, winning the Israel National Theater Award for best comedy of the year, and playing over 700 times during its initial run at the acclaimed Cameri Theatre in Tel Aviv. “Best Friends” was then rewritten as a TV miniseries for HOT, a popular Israeli TV network, and re-staged in 2013, after Gov’s death the previous year.
Today, the play is enjoying a new imagining here in New York: Through April 2, it’s being performed at the Rattlestick Theater in Manhattan, in alternating performances in both Hebrew and English, by the team at the Israeli Artists Project, a non-profit that presents Israeli theater, music and art in the greater New York area.
“Best Friends” is ostensibly about friendship but touches on broad themes of jealousy, fertility struggles, betrayal and much more. And yet, intentionally or not, its deep dive into the force and fury of the female experience comes at a time when the cause of women’s rights is seeing setbacks in Israel and the United States.
“There are so many facets to our work,” says Yoni Venridger, founder and producing artistic director of IAP. “But to put it simply, we want to be a home where people of any affiliation can come together, enjoy our common culture, and put politics aside. In a way, everything we do is inherently political. We are, after all, representing a country. That said, we’re interested in doing Israeli things, being Israeli people, without automatically politicizing our events.”
The play, which is both hilarious and heartbreaking, centers on three women — Leli, Sophie and Tirtza — who are at a breaking point in their lifelong friendship. In the opening scene, Leli calls her two ex-besties to gather; it’s a matter of life or death, she says, refusing to say which one it is. Despite an extended period of silence between the three and heightened tensions between Sophie and Tirtza, in particular, they come together, and begin to unpack every single piece of emotional baggage they have.
As is the case in actual lifelong friendships, there’s a lot to unpack here: high school crushes, first loves, heartbreak, professional successes and woes, births, marriages — no stone is left unturned. Shouting ensues, and laughter, and some awkward silences.
“We need more plays that give central roles to women,” said Vendriger. “It’s not necessarily about writing plays without any male roles, either. What’s critical is writing more lead roles for women, more well-rounded, rich roles for women.”
“Best Friends” is an extreme version of this, of course, by omitting all men from the cast, and it easily passes the Bechdel Test — that is to say, it includes at least two named female characters who discuss something other than a man — with flying colors. Leli, Sophie and Tirtza certainly talk about men, love and heartbreak, but the primary focus is on how they’ve let themselves, and each other, down.
One of the most effective choices Gov made was to have the drama play out in two decades simultaneously. There are two casts: a young version of the women, in the 1960s, and a middle-aged version, in the 1990s. Beyond the illustrative power of showing friendship instead of telling about it, Gov creates a fascinating dynamic between the two sets of women. At times, the two casts interact, holding one another, reminding one another of their various strengths and shortcomings. Who among us hasn’t wished to warn or encourage our younger selves, or that our younger selves could remind us of who we once were?
This revisited version of Gov’s classic was slated to run in New York in May 2020 — but the pandemic, of course, made that impossible. Instead, it arrives in time for Women’s History Month 2023. “The timing kind of just worked out for us,” explained Vendriger.
From left, Maia Karo, Adi Kozlovsky and Karin Hershkovitz Kochavi play a trio of BFFs in “Best Friends.” (Courtesy)
In Israel, a right-wing government is under siege by rivers of enraged citizens — primarily because of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s proposed judicial overhaul, now on pause. But there is pushback among liberal Israelis for other reasons as well. Recently, Betzalel Smotrich, a far-right member of Knesset and the current minister of finance, made sure that Israel would not sign the UN’s International Violence Against Women Act. Prior to this, Smotrich had called himself a “proud homophobe;” he organized a “bestiality parade” as a counter-parade to the Jerusalem Pride march in 2006.
In the United States, women’s rights are also threatened — including by the dismantling of Roe v. Wade, ensuring their right to an abortion.
Against this backdrop, the 1990s of “Best Friends” look downright progressive. To Vendriger, however, this play is about the timeless nature of friendship.
“Gov managed to write in a way that makes her work continuously relevant, regardless of the passage of time,” he said. “It’s the humanity of it. There are connections, power struggles, interpersonal attractions — that stuff will never change. Despite the fact that it’s originally from the ’90s, the meditation on the power and fragility of friendship, on the fact that we need to maintain and work on friendships, it all feels immediate and very appropriate for the present day.”
In fact, the IAP team made no changes to the original text.
The play works today, in 2023, because it leans on universal, wide-reaching themes. At the same time, there is a palpable Israeliness to the whole thing, whether it’s the prickly slang or the fact that one character, whose son is serving in the first Lebanon War, is jealous that her friend’s son has asthma, and therefore gets to stay home.
“‘Best Friends’ integrates the complexity of humanity, friendship and Israeli society, and brings them into the realm of humor,” said director Hamutal Posklinsky-Shehory. “It’s funny, but it’s also dramatic and very witty. [In this iteration] the whole staff is female. All the actresses are — six onstage and two understudies — plus the assistant director, play manager, lighting designer, and costume designer. I feel this is very appropriate for the age that we’re living in and really underlines the space we need to give for female identifying artists.”
When Posklinsky-Shehory isn’t directing, she’s a drama therapist at NYC Peace of Mind, a group psychotherapy practice that brings together drama therapists to support and enrich one another’s creative treatment approaches. Her work, she said, informed her directorial choices. “The relationships presented between the three friends are not the healthiest ones,” she said, “and we went through a process, truly trying to figure out and understand the motivations and [emotional landscapes] of the characters.”
To this end, the cast used therapeutic techniques alongside theatrical practices in order to deepen their connections and understanding. “We incorporated some writing activities, with the actors writing to their characters. Another time, we sought connections and differences between our actors and the characters that they play, as a group. In this way, we developed trust and deepened our bond with one another,” she said.
This is, in a sense, the bottom line of the play: the bonds that tie, and how they can unravel under the strains of a lifetime. “As humans, we’re complex,” said Posklinsky-Shehory. “Even in a play that’s all fantastic and sweet and nostalgic, there’s still the complexity and darkness [of life]. I’d like people to leave with an understanding that what we feel is perfect and complex, and that’s OK. We need to accept those parts of ourselves and our society.”
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We’re losing the fight against antisemitism. Here’s how to turn the tide
Why are we failing to effectively fight antisemitism?
When New York Times columnist Bret Stephens sparked a furor by making the case, earlier this month, that it’s time for the Jewish community to stop prioritizing that fight — because we’ve invested so much in trying to educate people about antisemitism, yet there is still antisemitism — he got the fundamental issue wrong.
The question is not whether we should try to fight antisemitism. It’s how. What if we took Stephens’s premise — that these efforts aren’t working — and imagined what could?
Since Stephens’ speech, our communal reaction has been too focused on the smaller-scale issues he raised. Was his critique of the ADL reasonable? Was he right that Jews are hated because of our “virtues and successes,” and that antisemitism is too powerful for appeals to tolerance and education to work? By focusing on such questions, we risk missing the bigger picture. Antisemitism will never be fully eradicated. Still, if, as one study suggests, some 45% of Republicans under the age of 44 feel that Jews are a threat to the American way of life, the answer can’t be to shrug.
But the fact that we have yet to make meaningful 21st-century strides in reducing antisemitism — and that, per most polls and studies, we’re going in the opposite direction — means that we need to rethink how to combat it in 21st-century terms. Here are three ideas for how to begin.
Invest in media literacy
Given that we know that antisemitism and conspiracy theories work together to sow distrust and paranoia and induce nihilism, perhaps Jewish leaders should spend more time pushing for greater investment in media literacy — not only about antisemitism, but in general.
A 2022 Stanford study found that “high school students who received only six 50-minute lessons in digital literacy were twice as likely to spot questionable websites as they were before the instruction took place.” At first glance, media literacy isn’t “about” or “for” Jews. But a 2025 study from Chapman University found that young people, like the rest of us, are being pushed by social media into echo chambers. Increasingly, and relatedly, they believe all information is suspect, or at least equally agenda-driven — a reality that makes pushing back on conspiracy theories more difficult, particularly when research has also found that teenagers are likely to believe content if they see it over and over again.
A country in which more people are taught how to be on guard against conspiracy and untruths is one in which people are more prepared to identify and critically react to the antisemitism being sprinkled into their media diet.
Rethink how we teach about the Holocaust
In his address, Stephens also essentially said that Holocaust education hasn’t worked. After all, we tried it, and yet, per the Claims Conference, “nearly 20% of Millennials and Gen Z in New York feel the Jews caused the Holocaust.”
But is it that teaching about the Holocaust doesn’t work — or that we need to teach it differently?
Some studies suggest that learning about the Holocaust increases tolerance toward minorities and people with different viewpoints. They also suggest, however, that mandating Holocaust education as an isolated item — rather than as part of a broader education in history and bigotry — doesn’t do much to help improve students’ knowledge.
The lesson here is that how we are teaching and learning about the Holocaust matters. Some, like scholars Jennifer Rich and William L. Smith, have suggested moving from a “learn from” approach to a “learn about” approach. Rather than use the Holocaust to teach students why they shouldn’t be antisemitic, the thinking goes, we should use it to teach them about the societal conditions that allowed the Holocaust to happen, and what actually transpired during it.
In other words, if we are too focused on Holocaust as an overarching moral lesson, we may fail to teach its concrete takeaways — about how hatred builds in a society, and the devastation that can follow — effectively.
Map the full network of hate
Finally, maybe we can’t fight antisemitism if we think about it in isolation. Our identity — and the suffering that can accompany it — does not exist in a silo.
There are good reasons to think that it’s more effective to fight antisemitism in tandem with other hatreds. In a 2016 study, researchers Maureen A. Craig and Jennifer A. Richeson looked at what they called “stigma-based solidarity.” What they found is that certain social conditions can push stigmatized group members to turn against other stigmatized groups, while other conditions can encourage them to turn toward one another. Consider how some Jewish and Muslim students became suspicious of one another during the Gaza war — and also how, as the Forward recently reported, some have found deeper connections since.
“One way to bridge the category divide,” Craig and Richeson wrote, “is by making an explicit connection between the in-group and another stigmatized group.…Common experiences or challenges are also associated with more coalitional attitudes among stigmatized groups.”
That means that pointing out the ways in which, say antisemitism and racism can play off each other can build solidarity between the targets of those hatreds. It is true that antisemitism is in some ways exceptional: it often functions in ways that look different from other forms of bigotry. But stressing its exceptionality may be working directly against the solidarity other minority groups feel for us.
In addition to hopefully building solidarity, explicitly drawing the link between antisemitism and other hatreds — and between Jews and other members of society — would be more honest and accurate. Antisemitism doesn’t only have negative consequences for Jews. We are seeing across the country, for instance, how the great replacement theory villainizes Jews and immigrants alike. When we embolden those who push conspiracy theories and nihilism, they hurt Jews, but they do not hurt Jews alone.
The pain of many persecuted groups in this country are bound up together. Maybe our way forward is, too.
The post We’re losing the fight against antisemitism. Here’s how to turn the tide appeared first on The Forward.
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‘No Way’ to Disarm Hamas Without Israel Taking All of Gaza, Former General Says
Israeli military personnel operate on the Israeli side of the Israel-Gaza border, on the day the Israeli military said it had resumed enforcing the Gaza ceasefire agreement after a series of strikes across the Gaza Strip, in southern Israel, Oct. 29, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ammar Awad
Israel will need to take over all of Gaza to meet its war objectives, a senior reserve Israeli general said, as the United States moves ahead with plans to assemble a multinational stabilization force that is not expected to deploy in Hamas-controlled areas.
Brig. Gen. (res.) Amir Avivi, a former deputy commander of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF)’s Gaza Division, said the military aims of the war — including the disarmament of Hamas — cannot be achieved without moving into the remaining parts of the enclave still held by the Palestinian terrorist group.
“There is no way to reach the goals of war without conquering Gaza,” Avivi told The Algemeiner.
“Ninety-nine point nine percent, the IDF is going to be the [party] that will dismantle Hamas,” Avivi said, noting that the Trump administration’s International Stabilization Force is expected to deploy only in Israeli-held areas and avoid confronting Hamas directly.
A decisive campaign could be completed in a month or two, Avivi said, because the constraints that slowed earlier phases of the war — most notably the presence of Israeli hostages in Hamas-held areas — no longer apply. The IDF could expand from its current 53 percent control of Gaza to 75 percent in “as little as a week,” he said.
With the Israeli security cabinet focused on Iran, no final decision has been taken yet on the next phase in Gaza, Avivi said. The government is likely to give Hamas “a month or two” to see if a confrontation with Iran materializes before moving to conclude the campaign in Gaza.
Avivi is the founder and chairman of the Israel Defense and Security Forum, known in Hebrew as Habitchonistim, a hawkish group of former senior officers and security officials that has consistently pushed for maximal military objectives in Gaza and opposed negotiated compromises with Hamas.
According to US and Israeli officials, the stabilization force is expected to begin deploying in southern Gaza, starting in Rafah, and expand gradually as conditions allow. The force is intended to help establish governance and security conditions in cleared areas, rather than conduct combat operations or forcibly disarm armed groups. Its commander, US Army Major General Jasper Jeffers, has said five countries — Indonesia, Morocco, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, and Albania — have committed personnel so far, with longer-term planning envisioning a significantly larger deployment of up to 20,000 troops and police focused on policing, security coordination and aid facilitation.
The Guardian reported last week that US contracting documents describe plans for a 350-acre military base in Gaza designed to support 5,000 people that will include watchtowers, bunkers, and training facilities. A US official declined to discuss the contract and reiterated that Washington does not plan to deploy US combat troops to the enclave.
The stabilization effort was formally launched in Washington on Thursday, when US President Donald Trump convened the inaugural meeting of his Board of Peace. Trump said participating countries had pledged roughly $7 billion as an initial down payment for Gaza reconstruction, while making clear that broader rebuilding would be conditioned on Hamas’s disarmament.
US officials and regional partners acknowledge that demilitarization would likely be a long-term process and that reconstruction carries political risk. Some donor states have privately raised concerns about funding rebuilding efforts only for Israel to return to large-scale military operations.
Avivi said Israel’s takeover of the enclave would be followed by a technically complex cleanup phase focused on dismantling tunnels and weapons stockpiles. “The whole area is full of tunnels and munitions,” he said. “Finding and destroying them is complicated. That part takes time.”
A strategy gaining traction in the US framework would see Gaza divided into two zones, a Hamas-free “green zone,” where reconstruction and alternative civilian governance could begin, and a “red zone” comprising areas still held by Hamas.
Former Israeli national security adviser Yaakov Amidror said that while he understands the logic behind the approach, it carries risks. Rebuilding Gaza first in IDF-controlled areas, he said, could allow Hamas to survive politically and militarily elsewhere in the enclave.
“If you build only where the IDF controls, you are effectively telling Hamas: you can stay in Gaza,” Amidror told The Algemeiner.
Avivi agreed that reconstruction would not begin “until they lay down their weapons,” warning that doing otherwise would amount to tolerating Hamas’s continued presence.
The Israeli general pointed to the period leading up to the October ceasefire, when Israeli forces advanced deep into Gaza City and took control of roughly half the city, as an example of how Hamas responds when the IDF enters its core terrain. He said Israel’s subsequent pullback to about 53 percent control of the Gaza Strip was driven by hostage negotiations rather than operational limits.
“It’s going to happen the nice way or the hard way,” Avivi said. “The hard way is the IDF. So, they either lay down the weapons and get out of Gaza or the IDF will go in and impose demilitarization.”
Amidror rejected arguments that Hamas is emerging from the war in a stronger position because of potential involvement by countries such as Qatar or Turkey, calling the claim disconnected from current military realities.
“It’s a stupid argument because Hamas is surrounded on all sides by the IDF — 300 degrees by land and 60 degrees by sea, which the IDF also controls,” Amidror told The Algemeiner. The terrorist group, he explained, cannot receive weapons because it has no land border with Egypt, cannot manufacture arms because Israel has destroyed its production infrastructure, and is surrounded on all sides by Israeli forces.
“The most it can do is fire a missile, probably once every six months,” Amidror said.
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Paris Kosher Restaurant Doused With Acid Amid Surge in Antisemitism Across France
Procession arrives at Place des Terreaux with a banner reading, “Against Antisemitism, for the Republic,” during the march against antisemitism, in Lyon, France, June 25, 2024. Photo: Romain Costaseca / Hans Lucas via Reuters Connect
A kosher restaurant in Paris has been vandalized with acid, damaging the facility and leading the prosecutor’s office to open an investigation into what authorities suspect was an antisemitism attack.
Employees at Kokoriko, an eatery located in the French capital’s 17th arrondissement, discovered on Friday morning that the acid had been sprayed overnight on the tables, walls, and floor, according to French media.
The crockery, cutlery, and glasses were rendered unusable. White dust was found on the tables from where the acid corroded the surfaces.
The Paris public prosecutor’s office immediately opened an investigation for “damage to the property of others by a means dangerous … committed because of race, ethnicity, nation, or religion.” The crime is punishable by a sentence of 15 years in prison and a fine of 150,000 euros.
Last week was not the first time that Kokoriko was targeted, according to French media. In October, the Kosher restaurant’s façade was sprayed with sulfuric acid. However, the investigation was closed, as authorities were unable to identify the perpetrators.
The most recent attack came one week after the French Interior Ministry released its annual report on anti-religious acts, revealing a troubling rise in antisemitic incidents documented in a joint dataset compiled with the Jewish Community Protection Service.
Antisemitism in France remained at alarmingly high levels last year, with 1,320 incidents recorded nationwide, as Jews and Israelis faced several targeted attacks amid a relentlessly hostile climate despite heightened security measures, according to the newly published data.
Although the total number of antisemitic outrages in 2025 fell by 16 percent compared to 2024’s second highest ever total of 1,570 cases, the newly released report warned that antisemitism remained “historically high,” with more than 3.5 attacks occurring every day.
Over the past 25 years, antisemitic acts “have never been as numerous as in the past three years,” the report said, noting a dramatic spike following the Hamas-led invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
Even though Jews make up less than 1 percent of France’s population, they accounted for 53 percent of all religiously motivated crimes last year.
Between 2022 and 2025, antisemitic attacks across France quadrupled, leaving the Jewish community more exposed than ever.
The most recent figure of total antisemitic incidents represents a 21 percent decline from 2023’s record high of 1,676 incidents, but a 203 percent increase from the 436 antisemitic acts recorded in 2022, before the Oct. 7 atrocities.
According to French officials, this latest report, which was based on documented cases and official complaints, still underestimated the true scope of the problem, largely due to widespread underreporting.
The rise in antisemitism appears to have carried into this year. Earlier this month, for example, a 13-year-old boy on his way to synagogue in Paris was brutally beaten by a knife-wielding assailant.
Days earlier, three Jewish men wearing kippahs were physically threatened with a knife and forced to flee after leaving their Shabbat services.
That incident came shortly after a Jewish primary school was vandalized, with windows smashed and security equipment damaged.
All three incidents took place in Paris.