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In a shift, Hebrew College will now admit and ordain rabbinical students whose partners are not Jewish
(JTA) — Hebrew College will begin admitting and ordaining rabbinical students in interfaith relationships, according to new admissions standards revealed on Tuesday.
The decision makes the pluralistic seminary outside of Boston the second major rabbinical school in the United States to do away with rules barring students from dating or marrying non-Jews. The Reconstructionist Rabbinical Seminary was the first to do so in 2015.
Hebrew College’s decision comes as rabbinical schools compete over a shrinking pool of applicants and after decades of rising rates of intermarriage among American Jews.
Rabbi Sharon Cohen Anisfeld, Hebrew College’s president, announced the policy change in an email to students and graduates on Tuesday evening. She said the decision, which followed a year and a half of review, came amid a broad revision of the seminary’s “guiding principles for admission and ordination.”
Those new guiding principles were published on the admissions page of Hebrew College’s website late Tuesday, replacing different language that had included the partner policy. “We do not admit or ordain rabbinical students with non-Jewish partners,” the page had previously said, adding that applicants whose partners were in the process of converting would be considered.
“This is a really exciting moment for Jewish communities everywhere,” said Jodi Bromberg, the CEO of 18Doors, a Jewish nonprofit that supports interfaith families. “We all will get to benefit from Jewish leaders in interfaith relationships who have been sidelined from major seminaries up to now.”
Hebrew College has set aside time on Wednesday for its roughly 80 rabbinical students and others to process their reactions about the change, which Anisfeld had previously said she expected to be intense no matter the decision. She declined to comment late Tuesday, saying that she was focused on communication with members of her community.
“This has not been a simple process and, in addition to the strong feelings raised by the policy itself, there have been complex feelings about various stages of the process we’ve undertaken over the past year,” Anisfeld wrote in a message to students in October, in a series of emails obtained by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
Hebrew College’s policy change reflects a longstanding and sometimes painful dynamic in American Jewish life: While nearly three-quarters of non-Orthodox Jews who married in the last decade did so to non-Jews, few traditional rabbinical schools have been willing to train or ordain rabbis in interfaith relationships. Their policies have roots in Jewish law, known as halacha, which prohibits marriages between Jews and non-Jews. But they also reflect anxiety among American Jewish leaders over whether high rates of intermarriage threaten the future of Judaism, and whether rabbis must model traditional practices in their families.
At Hebrew College, which launched its rabbinical school 20 years ago, the prohibition against interfaith relationships had been the only admissions requirement rooted in Jewish law beyond the rule that applicants must be considered Jewish according to at least one Jewish movement. There was no requirement that rabbinical students keep kosher or observe Shabbat.
When the school’s leadership first solicited feedback from students a year ago, several took aim at what they said was hypocrisy in the approach to Jewish law.
“This is the one area of students’ halachic life where I am acutely aware that the school does not trust us, does not think we are capable of navigating our own personal lives, and does not believe that the choices we may make for ourselves have the capacity to expand and enrich our Jewish practice,” wrote one student, according to a collection of anonymous comments shared among students at the time.
A chuppah at a Jewish wedding. More than 60% of American Jews who have married in the last decade have done so to non-Jewish partners, according to a 2021 study from the Pew Research Center. That proportion rises to nearly 75% for non-Orthodox American Jews. (Scott Rocher via Flickr Commons)
Most of the 15 comments that students and graduates shared with their peers called for doing away with the ban on interfaith student relationships, often citing the benefits of having Hebrew College-ordained rabbis reflect the families they are likely to serve.
“We should be training rabbis for the Jewish community that exists and that we want to cultivate, not the one we wish existed or that existed in the past,” one student wrote. “Having intermarried rabbis could do a lot of good: perhaps having role models for a fulfilling, active, intermarried Jewish can help people feel welcomed, not just grudgingly tolerated after the fact — and can increase the likelihood that those intermarried couples want to raise Jewish children.”
Several students and graduates wrote that the policy as it stood incentivized students to obscure their relationships, denying them dignity and preventing their mentors and teachers from fully supporting them. Several suggested that prohibiting students in interfaith partnerships could have a disproportionate effect on queer Jews and Jews of color.
At least one person argued against changing the policy, instead suggesting that the school strengthen enforcement and clarify expectations about other Jewish practices and values.
“By changing the policy Hebrew College is sending the message to the Jewish world that love-based marriages are more sacred than the covenant with which we made at Sinai,” that student wrote, referring to the moment in Jewish tradition when God first spoke to the Israelites. “However, by not changing the policy Hebrew College is affirming that students learn the art of lying. Therefore, my suggestion is to keep the policy but change the ethics on how it is enforced.”
Those comments followed a two-day workshop, facilitated by experts in conflict resolution, about the policy a year ago. The experience was challenging for many of those in attendance, according to the student comments.
“The pain of the need to hide was on full display during Winter Seminar, and I found myself wondering if I could remain in a community whose first response was anything other than to seek healing for the hurt that the policy has inflicted,” one wrote at the time.
With tensions high, an initial deadline to decide whether to keep the policy came and went last June. In late October, Anisfeld wrote to students with an update. A special committee including both rabbinic and academic faculty members had been meeting regularly since July, she said, and would be presenting their recommendation by the end of January.
Last week, she said in her message to students and graduates on Tuesday, Hebrew College’s board approved the policy change and admissions principles revisions.
The decision could renew pressure on other rabbinical schools amid steep competition for students. Several non-traditional rabbinical schools that do not have a requirement about the identities of students’ spouses have grown in recent years, while Hebrew College; the Reform movement’s Hebrew Union College; and the Jewish Theological Seminary and the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies in the Conservative movement all shrunk. Hebrew College recently completed a move to a shared campus after selling its building under financial duress.
“We continue to hear from folks who want to be rabbis and up until this moment had really limited choices,” said Bromberg. “I can’t help but think that this will have a really positive impact on the enrollment in Hebrew College’s rabbinic program.”
The pressure could be especially acute for Hebrew Union College, the Reform seminary with three campuses in the United States. (Because of declining enrollment, the school is phasing out its Cincinnati program.) HUC does not admit or ordain students in interfaith relationships, even though the Reform movement, which does not consider halacha to be binding, permits its rabbis to officiate at intermarriages and to be intermarried themselves.
That policy, which the movement reaffirmed after extensive debate in 2014, has drawn resentment and scorn from some who say it is the only thing holding them back from pursuing Reform ordination.
“All my life, my community had told me that no matter who you are or who you love, you are equal in our community and according to the Divine. But now it feels like I’ve been betrayed, lied to, misled,” Ezra Samuels, an aspiring rabbinical student in a queer relationship with a non-Jewish man, wrote on Hey Alma in 2020, expanding on a viral Twitter thread.
But even the Conservative movement, which bars rabbis from officiating at intermarriages and only recently began permitting members of its rabbinical association to attend intermarriages, is grappling openly with how to balance Jewish law and tradition against the reality around interfaith relationships.
The movement recently held a series of online meetings for members of its Rabbinical Assembly to discuss intermarriage, sparking rumors that the movement could be headed toward policy changes. That’s not the case, according to movement leaders — though they say other shifts may be needed.
“There are no proposals at present to change our standard,” said Rabbi Jacob Blumenthal, the CEO of the RA and United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, the movement’s congregational arm. “But there is a conversation about what are the ways that we can provide more pastoral guidance to colleagues, especially around moments of marriage.”
The Pew study found new high rates of intermarriage in the Jewish community. (iStock/Getty Images)
Keren McGinity, the USCJ’s interfaith specialist, previously directed the Interfaith Families Engagement Program, a now-defunct part of Hebrew College’s education school. She declined to comment on the internal conversations underway within the Conservative movement. But in 2015, she argued in an op-ed that the Jewish world would benefit from more rabbis who were intermarried.
“Seeing rabbis — who have committed their careers, indeed their lives to Judaism — intermarry, create Jewish homes and raise Jewish children should convincingly illustrate how intermarriage does not inhibit Jewish involvement,” she wrote, citing her research on intermarried couples.
That argument got a boost two years ago, when a major survey of American Jews found that most children of intermarried couples were being raised Jewish. And on Tuesday, McGinity said she was glad to hear that Hebrew College was dropping its partner requirement, which she said she knew had caused students to leave the program in the past.
“The decision to admit rabbinical students who have beloveds of other faith backgrounds is a tremendous way of leading in the 21st century, illustrating that interpartnered Jews can be exemplars of Jewish leaders,” she said.
She added, “Knowing my colleagues, I can only imagine the hours and hours of thought that went into this decision.”
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The post In a shift, Hebrew College will now admit and ordain rabbinical students whose partners are not Jewish appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Beijing Tells Chinese Firms to Stop Using US and Israeli Cybersecurity Software, Sources Say
US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping talk as they leave after a bilateral meeting at Gimhae International Airport, on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit, in Busan, South Korea, Oct. 30, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein
Chinese authorities have told domestic companies to stop using cybersecurity software made by roughly a dozen firms from the US and Israel due to national security concerns, two people briefed on the matter said.
As trade and diplomatic tensions flare between China and the US and both sides vie for tech supremacy, Beijing has been keen to replace Western-made technology with domestic alternatives.
The US companies whose cybersecurity software has been banned include Broadcom-owned VMware, Palo Alto Networks and Fortinet, while the Israeli companies include Check Point Software Technologies, the sources said.
Shares of Broadcom and Palo Alto Networks were down more than 1% in premarket trading, while those of Fortinet fell nearly 3%.
Reuters was not able to establish how many Chinese companies received the notice that the sources said was issued in recent days.
Chinese authorities expressed concern that the software could collect and transmit confidential information abroad, the sources said. They declined to be named due to the sensitivity of the situation.
China’s internet regulator, the Cyberspace Administration of China, and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology had not responded to requests for comment at the time of publication. The four companies also did not reply to Reuters queries.
PREPARATIONS ARE UNDERWAY FOR TRUMP VISIT
The United States and China, which have been locked in an uneasy trade truce, are preparing for a visit by US President Donald Trump to Beijing in April.
Even before Trump’s return to power at the start of last year, the politics around foreign cybersecurity vendors has long been fraught.
While the West and China have clashed over China’s efforts to build up its semiconductor and artificial intelligence sectors, Chinese analysts have said Beijing has become increasingly concerned that any Western equipment could be hacked by foreign powers.
It has therefore sought to replace Western computer equipment and word processing software.
The country’s largest cybersecurity providers include 360 Security Technology and Neusoft.
Some of the US and Israeli companies facing a ban for their part have repeatedly alleged Chinese hacking operations, which China has denied.
Last month, Check Point published a report on an allegedly Chinese-linked hacking operation against an unidentified “European government office.” In September, Palo Alto published a report alleging a Chinese hacking effort targeted diplomats worldwide.
SIGNIFICANT CHINESE FOOTPRINT
The companies have built a significant footprint in China over the years.
Fortinet has three offices in mainland China and one in Hong Kong, according to its website. Check Point’s website lists support addresses in Shanghai and Hong Kong. Broadcom lists six China locations, while Palo Alto lists five local offices in China, including one in Macau.
Cybersecurity firms are often staffed with intelligence veterans, they typically work closely with their respective national defense establishments, and their software products have sweeping access to corporate networks and individual devices – all of which at least theoretically provides a springboard for spying or sabotage, analysts say.
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Strong start for Virginia’s first Yiddish culture festival
It’s not every day that you encounter a man in a Stetson hat singing Yiddish folksongs in the former capital of the Confederacy.
Yet that wasn’t the most unexpected thing this reporter experienced over Richmond Yiddish Week’s opening weekend. The grassroots Yiddish cultural festival, which began on Saturday, got off to an energetic, well-attended start.
The festival’s opening concert, a double billing of local klezmer bands The Vulgar Bulgars and My Son The Doctor, took place Saturday night at Gold Lion Community Café, an art-space in Richmond’s up-and-coming Manchester neighborhood.
Even before the concert began, the venue was standing-room only. “This is clearly the place to be in Manchester tonight,” remarked one attendee as he squeezed into a seat.
Before the first set, festival co-founder Sam Shokin addressed the audience, expressing her delight at the large turnout. “We weren’t sure how many like-minded people we were going to find for a Yiddish culture festival,” she said, “but judging by the crowd it seems like there are a lot of you.” Her remark elicited enthusiastic applause.
Thirty minutes into the first set, the space was so crowded that service staff had difficulty delivering customers’ food and drink orders to the tables. At least one woman gave up waiting in line to place her order until the break between sets.
The Vulgar Bulgars opened with several tightly harmonized and adventurously arranged klezmer instrumentals. Local singer Nina Lankin then joined in for a power ballad-esque and refreshingly non-maudlin rendition of the Yiddish theater classic Papirosn (Cigarettes).
She and the band also shined with a heartfelt rendition of the messianic Yiddish song Shnirele Perele (Ribbons and Pearls). Between sets, as attendees reordered food and drinks, this reporter had a chance to speak with a few attendees.
“I’ve been here for three years or so,” Rachel Enders, a local preschool teacher who told me she’s Catholic, said. “But I had no idea there was this big, vibrant Jewish community here.”
Festival co-founder Danny Kraft said that the local community has some “conservative and insular” tendencies. But at a time when many Jewish communities are retreating into explicitly Jewish spaces, the organizers of RYW chose more public venues for their programming. The local Jewish Federation lent support by funding security. One of Shokin’s and Kraft’s stated goals was to “bring some Yiddishkayt into the local arts community.”
Maribel Moheno — a language instructor at a local university who recently discovered her Jewish ancestry — was the first to start dancing. The rest of the audience got on their feet and joined Moheno during the second set. That set, played by My Son The Doctor, was less polished or interestingly arranged, but far more danceable.
Having finished the circle dance called a freylekhs with Moheno and a dozen or so others, this reporter refueled with a bagel made by local bakery Cupertino’s NY Bagels. It wasn’t bad. Also on offer was an unexpected soft drink called Palestine Cola.
As it turns out, the Gold Lion cafe has, like many such establishments of late, hosted pro-Palestine events. After some community members expressed concern about the festival being held there, the organizers explained that the festival had no stance vis-à-vis Israel-Palestine.
“People on both the left and the right who don’t know much about Yiddish think it’s synonymous with queer, anti-Zionist culture,” Kraft said. “That’s very reductive. Some people in the mainstream community saw this Yiddish event as a dog-whistle or code-word for anti-Zionism. Once we clarified this with the local Federation, that cleared the air a bit.”
“This is a week of celebrating Yiddishkeit,” said Shokin. “We’re focusing on arts and culture — politics, not so much.”
Despite this shturem in a glezl tey (tempest in a teacup), the opening concert had more than 100 people in attendance. Young families with toddlers and tweens mingled with elegantly dressed retirees, long-haired baby boomers, and 20- and 30-something hipsters.
The evening closed out with two lively songs that the audience joined in for: Ale Brider (We’re All Brothers), a popular anthem about Jewish unity, and the Yiddish birthday song Tsu Dayn Geburtstog in honor of an audience member’s birthday.
On Sunday afternoon, the Richmond Public Library’s main branch hosted a Yiddish story time event, which Kraft, who is also a poet and Yiddish translator, led. More than a dozen young families attended.
The program began with a brief Yiddish lesson. Kraft, himself the father of a toddler, then regaled children and parents with the unique Yiddish-Spanish-English picture book Beautiful Yetta: the Yiddish Chicken, using the book’s dialogue to teach more Yiddish phrases.
One high point of the afternoon was an interactive game called “Guess the Animal” where the audience learned the Yiddish terms for familiar animals, including the non-kosher khazer (pig), which got plenty of laughs.
A lot of Yiddish programming today tends to be adult-focused, often geared toward retirees. So a Yiddish festival for children and young parents seems like an expression of hope for Yiddish continuity — a leap of faith, even. Yet despite a small budget and all-volunteer staff, Kraft and Shokin seem to have stuck the landing.
The post Strong start for Virginia’s first Yiddish culture festival appeared first on The Forward.
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UK Prosecutors Try to Reinstate Terrorism Charge Against Kneecap Rapper
Member of Kneecap Liam O’Hanna, also known as Liam Og O hAnnaidh and performing under the name of Mo Chara, speaks to supporters outside Woolwich Crown Court, after a UK court threw out his prosecution for a terrorism offense, in London, Britain, Sept. 26, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Hannah McKay
British prosecutors sought to reinstate a terrorism charge against a member of Irish rap group Kneecap on Wednesday for displaying a flag of Iran-backed Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah at a London gig, after a court threw out the case last year.
Liam Óg Ó hAnnaidh, whose stage name is Mo Chara, was accused of having waved the flag of the banned Islamist group Hezbollah during a November 2024 gig.
The charge was thrown out in September after a court ruled it had originally been brought without the permission of the Director of Public Prosecutions and the Attorney General, and also one day outside the six-month statutory limit.
But the Crown Prosecution Service said it would challenge the ruling and its lawyer Paul Jarvis told London’s High Court on Wednesday that permission was only required by the time Ó hAnnaidh first appeared in court, meaning the case can proceed.
Kneecap – known for their politically charged lyrics and anti-Israel activism – have said the case is an attempt to distract from what they described as British complicity in Israel’s so-called “genocide” in Gaza. Israel strongly denies committing a genocide in the coastal territory, where it launched a military campaign against Hamas after the Palestinian terrorist group invaded Israeli territory.
J.J. Ó Dochartaigh, who goes by DJ Próvaí, was in court but Ó hAnnaidh was not required to attend and was not present.
KNEECAP SAYS PROSECUTION A DISTRACTION
Ó hAnnaidh was charged in May with displaying the Hezbollah flag in such a way that aroused reasonable suspicion that he supported the banned group, after footage emerged of him holding the flag on stage while saying “Up Hamas, up Hezbollah.”
Kneecap have previously said the flag was thrown on stage during their performance and that they “do not, and have never, supported Hamas or Hezbollah.”
The group, who rap about Irish identity and support the republican cause of uniting Northern Ireland with the Republic of Ireland, have become increasingly vocal about the war in Gaza, particularly after Ó hAnnaidh was charged in May.
During their performance at June’s Glastonbury Festival in England, Ó hAnnaidh accused Israel of committing war crimes, after Kneecap displayed pro-Palestinian messages during their set at the Coachella Festival in California in April.
Kneecap have since been banned from Hungary and Canada, also canceling a tour of the United States due to a clash with Ó hAnnaidh’s court appearances.