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A trans Jewish performing artist is throwing a ‘Queer Clown Bat Mitzvah’ on Coney Island for all
(New York Jewish Week) – Growing up in Brooklyn, Dylan Mars Greenberg went to Hebrew school and celebrated Shabbat and holidays with her family. But she never celebrated a bar or bat mitzvah — “it wasn’t something my dad really wanted me to do,” she said.
Instead, the 26-year-old filmmaker, musician, actor and writer began creating and performing art as a teenager with a group called the Art Stars based in the East Village, launching a varied career as a performance artist. Her current band, Theophobia, performs a “hybrid of music, performance art and comedy” — a mashup that’s right at home at Coney Island USA, a center for visual and performing arts with acts like clowning, circus, burlesque, sideshows and Vaudeville.
This weekend, Mars Greenberg will bring those two paths together, holding a communal Jewish coming-of-age ceremony at Coney Island Shooting Gallery Arts Annex, a gallery and performing arts venue that is part of Coney Island USA.
Queer Clown Bat Mitzvah will feature a live concert with spiritual moments, sideshow acts and spaces for queer expression — as well as a rabbi to coach attendees through the experience.
“The event as a whole is really supposed to be a celebration of identity and acceptance, both Jewish and LGBTQ identities and in particular queer and trans identities,” Mars Greenberg told the New York Jewish Week.
The Queer Clown Bat Mitzvah was partially inspired by how many Jewish and queer performers Mars Greenberg has encountered over the years, including during the period when she came out as transgender.
“I’ve met a lot of people who are both very openly trans and queer and gay and also very open about Judaism. That is inspiring to me because there was definitely a period where I wasn’t sure how welcome I’d be in the Jewish community,” she said. “I’m realizing now that the Jewish community encompasses so many different things.”
The show will be hosted by the artist Pink Velvet Witch, and the lineup includes Mars Greenberg’s band, Theophobia, as well as the band 95 Bulls and a performance from Maggie McMuffin, a sideshow and burlesque performer.
Rabbi Rachel Grant Meyer, the former rabbi-in-residence at HIAS and the founder of Rabbae Jewels, a jewelry business that celebrates queer Jewish and Yiddish culture, will oversee the evening’s explicit Jewish content. Meyer will deliver a short Torah commentary and share a blessing with the crowd. The event will be a new frontier for her, but one that she believes is deeply needed.
“I was brought in because we’re in a really difficult moment in this country, where trans people in particular, but queer people in general, are really under attack. There was a desire to have a celebration of queer identity and trans identity and to do that through a Jewish lens,” she explained.
In recent years, Republican lawmakers in dozens of states have sought, sometimes successfully, to limit or ban gender-affirming care for trans people, weaken nondiscrimination laws and prohibit drag and other expressions of queer identity, including in books children are allowed to read at school.
“One of the centerpieces of my Jewish life is the concept of Shabbat or rest. And inherent in that is the concept of Oneg Shabbat, or the joy and celebration of Shabbat. That’s what this is, a rest or a pause from a political moment that’s really devastating,” Meyer said. “This is meant to give people a taste of a different, joyful, celebratory world and a pause from so much of the hatred that is so demoralizing, debilitating and takes away our dignity.”
Meyer characterized the show as designed for Jews who “didn’t have access to or who felt really alienated from gendered rituals as children,” but also emphasized that it is open to anyone, regardless of their religious identity or gender expression.
“I really want to invite people into Jewish culture in ways that are non-proselytizing and show that there are actually ways to live values and to express your identity, whether that’s cultural or religious, that don’t limit or control other people’s behavior,” Meyer said. “I will be blessing everyone and everyone will really be blessing themselves and lifting each other up in community.”
“I wanted it to be something that anyone can participate in and for people to appreciate Judaism also while having a good time,” Mars Greenberg said.
Queer Clown Bat Mitzvah is on Saturday, Aug. 19 at 9 p.m. at the Coney Island Shooting Gallery (1214 Surf Avenue, Brooklyn). Tickets start at $20. Find more information here.
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The post A trans Jewish performing artist is throwing a ‘Queer Clown Bat Mitzvah’ on Coney Island for all appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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UN Security Council Meets on Iran as Russia, China Push for a Ceasefire
Members of the Security Council cast a vote during a United Nations Security Council meeting on the 3rd anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine at UN headquarters in New York, US, Feb. 24, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/David Dee Delgado
The U.N. Security Council met on Sunday to discuss US strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites as Russia, China and Pakistan proposed the 15-member body adopt a resolution calling for an immediate and unconditional ceasefire in the Middle East.
It was not immediately clear when it could be put to a vote. The three countries circulated the draft text, said diplomats, and asked members to share their comments by Monday evening. A resolution needs at least nine votes in favor and no vetoes by the United States, France, Britain, Russia or China to pass.
The US is likely to oppose the draft resolution, seen by Reuters, which also condemns attacks on Iran’s nuclear sites and facilities. The text does not name the United States or Israel.
“The bombing of Iranian nuclear facilities by the United States marks a perilous turn in a region that is already reeling,” U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told the Security Council on Sunday. “We now risk descending into a rathole of retaliation after retaliation.”
“We must act – immediately and decisively – to halt the fighting and return to serious, sustained negotiations on the Iran nuclear program,” Guterres said.
The world awaited Iran’s response on Sunday after President Donald Trump said the US had “obliterated” Tehran’s key nuclear sites, joining Israel in the biggest Western military action against the Islamic Republic since its 1979 revolution.
U.N. nuclear watchdog chief Rafael Grossi told the Security Council that while craters were visible at Iran’s enrichment site buried into a mountain at Fordow, “no one – including the IAEA – is in a position to assess the underground damage.”
Grossi said entrances to tunnels used for the storage of enriched material appear to have been hit at Iran’s sprawling Isfahan nuclear complex, while the fuel enrichment plant at Natanz has been struck again.
“Iran has informed the IAEA there has been no increase in off-site radiation levels at all three sites,” said Grossi, who heads the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Iran requested the U.N. Security Council meeting, calling on the 15-member body “to address this blatant and unlawful act of aggression, to condemn it in the strongest possible terms.”
Israel‘s U.N. Ambassador Danny Danon said in a statement on Sunday that the U.S. and Israel “do not deserve any condemnation, but rather an expression of appreciation and gratitude for making the world a safer place.”
Danon told reporters before the council meeting that it was still early when it came to assessing the impact of the U.S. strikes. When asked if Israel was pursuing regime change in Iran, Danon said: “That’s for the Iranian people to decide, not for us.”
The post UN Security Council Meets on Iran as Russia, China Push for a Ceasefire first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Israel Rejects Critical EU Report Ahead of Ministers’ Meeting
FILE PHOTO: Smoke rises from Gaza after an explosion, as seen from the Israeli side of the border, June 11, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen/File Photo
Israel has rejected a European Union report saying it may be breaching human rights obligations in Gaza and the West Bank as a “moral and methodological failure,” according to a document seen by Reuters on Sunday.
The note, sent to EU officials ahead of a foreign ministers’ meeting on Monday, said the report by the bloc’s diplomatic service failed to consider Israel’s challenges and was based on inaccurate information.
“The Foreign Ministry of the State of Israel rejects the document … and finds it to be a complete moral and methodological failure,” the note said, adding that it should be dismissed entirely.
The post Israel Rejects Critical EU Report Ahead of Ministers’ Meeting first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Pope Leo Urges International Diplomacy to Prevent ‘Irreparable Abyss’
FILE PHOTO: Pope Leo XIV holds a Jubilee audience on the occasion of the Jubilee of Sport, at St. Peter’s Basilica, at the Vatican June 14, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Yara Nardi/File Photo
Pope Leo on Sunday said the international community must strive to avoid war that risks opening an “irreparable abyss,” and that diplomacy should take the place of conflict.
US forces struck Iran’s three main nuclear sites overnight, joining an Israeli assault in a major new escalation of conflict in the Middle East as Tehran vowed to defend itself.
“Every member of the international community has a moral responsibility: to stop the tragedy of war before it becomes an irreparable abyss,” Pope Leo said during his weekly prayer with pilgrims.
“No armed victory can compensate for the pain of mothers, the fear of children, the stolen future. Let diplomacy silence the weapons, let nations chart their future with peace efforts, not with violence and bloody conflicts,” he added.
“In this dramatic scenario, which includes Israel and Palestine, the daily suffering of the population, especially in Gaza and other territories, risks being forgotten, where the need for adequate humanitarian support is becoming increasingly urgent,” Pope Leo said.
The post Pope Leo Urges International Diplomacy to Prevent ‘Irreparable Abyss’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.