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In Queens, a Jewish mourning ritual inspires a performance about memory
(New York Jewish Week) — What happens to the places that are no more? To the people who have died? To the events that meant so much but cannot ever reoccur? Is there a way to bring the intangible power of vanished spaces into the physical world?
On Friday, May 19, dancers, musicians, orators and spectators will come together for a performance of “Site: Yizkor” at King Manor Museum in Jamaica, Queens to explore these and other questions.
The brainchild of multimedia artist Maya Ciarrocchi and composer Andrew Conklin, the performance takes its name from the Jewish memorial service that is recited on major holidays. It combines live and pre-recorded readings with improvised music and dance, encouraging the performers and audience to summon their loved ones into the room, to commune with them in an intimate and visceral way.
“It’s about trying to make roots in a place, to map it, and also to honor the dead and the ghosts — not just the ghosts of people, but the layers of buried history, too,” Ciarrocchi told the New York Jewish Week. “It’s like, if you go to a small chapel in Italy and then realize it’s on three layers of pagan temples [and other] sacred sites.”
Ciarrocchi, who is of Ashkenazi Jewish and Italian descent, has long contemplated the spaces her own family lost and how that loss has impacted her lived experience as a queer Gen X New Yorker. “My grandparents were immigrants who tried to establish a home in the new world. My mother has had difficulties finding a place [within the] establishment,” she said. “Plus, growing up on the tail end of the AIDS plague, I really didn’t have any queer mentors. It did create an unmooring, a feeling of being ungrounded.”
Multimedia artist Maya Ciarrocchi. (Joanna Eldredge Morrissey)
The impetus for this specific piece was a confluence of events — people and places disappearing while remaining present in Ciarrocchi’s consciousness. In 2015, she lost both her mother-in-law and an elderly neighbor, the 1930s radio star Elia Braca Rose (aka Lynne Howard). “I was thinking a lot [during that time] about the things we leave behind,” said Ciarrochi. “Especially as I witnessed my neighbor’s apartment [getting] dismantled. I was grieving. Her children took things, the neighbors gathered things, the [demolition] team came in. There was something so devastating about all her history being sucked out of the apartment.”
She and her wife moved a year later, emptying out the apartment she had been raised in, a space in the Westbeth artist’s community. All this upheaval summoned grief and thoughts of the power of rites and ritual.
Yizkor, which means “may [God] remember” in Hebrew, is traditionally performed four times a year — on the three pilgrimage holidays of Shemini Atzeret, Passover and Shavuot, and on Yom Kippur. The communal Yizkor service includes a moment of private reflection during which worshipers can read a prayer that includes the name of a lost loved one and their relationship to the person praying.
“This particular viewpoint is inherently Jewish, but it’s a universal experience of displacement, loss, grief,” Ciarrocchi said. “Really, we’re doing a ritual together. And it doesn’t matter who you are or where you come from; we’re doing this together. Hopefully it brings everyone in, and we can have feelings together. The best way to connect with people is to have conversations with them, to open up space for people to hear each other. I hope that this project can do that.”
Each performance is site specific: Previously, “Site: Yizkor” has been performed at the Chutzpah! Festival in Vancouver and at the Roza Centre for International Art and Cooperation in Ruszcza, Poland, a short distance from where Ciarrochi’s grandmother’s house was burned to the ground during a pogrom.
For the New York iteration, the artist has created a series of videos incorporating drawings and maps specific to King Manor Museum, the former country estate of Rufus King, a 19th-century politician and early abolitionist. The museum says its mission is to highlight King’s antislavery activism and to “promote social change in today’s world.”
“Site: Yizkor” began taking its latest form a few weeks ago with a writing workshop, viewed by the artists as integral to the creative process. Participants were invited to respond to prompts such as “describe a vanished place of personal importance” and “describe your dreams of the future.” The artists then take these reflections and incorporate them into the performance.
The music, born of Conklin’s extensive work in the worlds of folk, bluegrass and traditional music, is improvised live from a graphic score. Similarly, the choreography contains specific modules and instructions but remains open to the interpretation of the performers.
“We come up with a score together but it’s a really open structure,” Ciarrochi said. “An element of a score for dancers might be to ‘walk the periphery of the house connecting with each other.’ You can do a lot of things inside of that, but that is the structure. Because these are skilled improvisers, they’re going to make that happen.”
“This particular viewpoint is inherently Jewish, but it’s a universal experience of displacement, loss, grief,” Ciarrocchi said of the piece. “Really, we’re doing a ritual together.”
“Site: Yizkor” will take place at King Manor (150-03 Jamaica Ave.) in Jamaica, Queens on Friday, May 19 at 8:00 p.m. Register here.
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The post In Queens, a Jewish mourning ritual inspires a performance about memory appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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War with Iran puts the US-Israel alliance at grave risk
The Iran war is strategically sound yet politically unsupported — an unstable foundation for a gamble that could reshape the Middle East. That creates danger for Israel, which needs the support of an American public that is rapidly drifting away.
For decades, the country’s greatest strategic asset has not been its military technology or intelligence capabilities — spectacular as these are — but rather the political, diplomatic and military backing of the United States. That relationship has not been merely transactional. It was supposed to rest on shared values and deep public support across the American political spectrum.
If that support erodes or disappears, Israel’s strategic environment will fundamentally change. To be blunt: it will not be able to arm its military. This creates a paradox. A campaign that has so far demonstrated extraordinary value for the Jewish state also stands a risk of fundamentally weakening it.
An alliance at its strongest
The conflict has showcased the depth of the current U.S.–Israel alliance. To many observers, and critically to Israel’s enemies, the operation has underscored not only Israel’s capabilities but also the reality that it stands alongside the world’s most powerful state.
The strikes have projected deep into Iranian territory, revealed astonishing intelligence penetration, and destroyed or degraded key threats. Israel’s enemies across the region have already been weakened by previous rounds of fighting since Oct. 7, and the current operation has reinforced the impression that Israel can reach its adversaries wherever they operate.
Moreover, Iran’s regime has managed to isolate itself to the point where most Arab countries are in effect on the side of Israel and the U.S. That projection — of an unbreakable and strong alliance – may ultimately be the most important strategic element of this war.
But therein lies the rub.
The political foundations of American support for Israel are eroding, which means the very element that currently strengthens Israel’s deterrence — American participation — may also be the one most at risk.
A just war, unjustified
Americans do not understand why their country is at war.
A Reuters/Ipsos survey conducted at the start of the conflict found only 27% of Americans supported the U.S. action, while 43% opposed it. Other surveys show similar results, with roughly six in ten Americans against the military intervention.
In modern American history that is highly unusual. Most wars begin with a “rally around the flag” moment when public support surges. Even conflicts that later became controversial — from Afghanistan to Iraq — initially enjoyed majority backing.
This one did not — in part because the case for it has not been made clearly to the public.
That error is compounded by years of polarization in American politics; declining trust in institutions and leadership; and the record of President Donald Trump, who has spent years spreading conspiracy theories and demonstrating a remarkable indifference to factual truth. It is no exaggeration to say that many Americans do not believe a word he says – which is perhaps unprecedented.
When a president with that record launches a war, at least half the country assumes the worst. Even if the strategic logic is sound, the credibility deficit remains.
The tragedy is that the war is, in fact, eminently justifiable. The Islamic Republic has long since forfeited the moral legitimacy that normally shields states from outside force. It brutally suppresses its own population, jailing and killing protesters, policing women’s bodies, and crushing dissent with an apparatus of repression. Its foreign policy is not defensive but revolutionary. Through proxy militias it has destabilized Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Yemen, as well as the Palestinian areas, in some cases for decades.
The regime has pursued nuclear weapons through a series of transparent machinations, deceptions and brinkmanship. Negotiations have repeatedly been used as delaying tactics while enrichment continued. Any deal that relieved sanctions would not simply reduce tensions; it would also inject new resources into a system dedicated both to repression at home and aggression abroad — one that is despised by the vast majority of its own people, as murderous dictatorships inevitably will be.
There is a doctrine in international law known as the Responsibility to Protect — the principle that when a state systematically brutalizes its own population, the international community may have the right, even the obligation, to act. By that standard, the Iranian regime has been skating on thin ice for years.
But with this clear rationale left uncommunicated, the politically dangerous perception has spread that the U.S. was reacting to Israel rather than acting on its own strategic judgment.
A perilous future
If Americans come to believe that Israel caused a costly war that they did not support in the first place, the backlash could be severe.
For centuries, one of the most persistent antisemitic tropes has been the accusation that Jews manipulate powerful states into fighting wars on their behalf. The suggestion that Israel can pull the U.S. into conflict feeds directly into that mythology. Once such perceptions take hold, they can be extremely difficult to reverse.
Even people who reject antisemitism outright can absorb a softer version of the same idea: that American interests are being subordinated to Israeli ones. In a political environment already marked by growing skepticism toward Israel, that perception risks deepening the erosion of support that has been underway for years.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio seemed to inadvertently feed such notions by suggesting in recent days that the U.S. had to attack Iran because Israel was going to do so “anyway,” and then America would have been a target. It was a short path from that to conspiracy theorists like Tucker Carlson blaming Chabad for the war.
A future Democratic president, facing a base that appears to have abandoned Israel, may feel far less obligation to defend it diplomatically or militarily. Even a Republican successor could prove unreliable if the party continues its drift toward isolationism.
That likelihood is compounded by studies showing that a large part of the U.S. Jewish community itself no longer backs Zionism. That process is driven by Israel’s own policies, including the West Bank occupation and the deadly brutality of the war in Gaza.
So the very war that is showcasing the best the U.S.-Israel alliance has to offer is also at risk of fundamentally damaging that partnership. Particularly if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — the rightful object of much American ire — manipulates the Iran campaign into an electoral victory this year, the alliance’s greatest success could also be its undoing.
The post War with Iran puts the US-Israel alliance at grave risk appeared first on The Forward.
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Report: Iran’s New Military Plan Is Regime Survival Through Regional Escalation
Members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) attend an IRGC ground forces military drill in the Aras area, East Azerbaijan province, Iran, Oct. 17, 2022. Photo: IRGC/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS
i24 News – After last year’s devastating conflict with the United States and Israel, Iranian leaders have reportedly adopted a major strategic shift aimed at expanding the war across the Middle East to secure the regime’s survival, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Previously, Iran responded to foreign strikes with limited, targeted reprisals. The new doctrine abandons that approach, aiming instead to escalate the conflict regionally, particularly against Gulf Arab states and critical economic infrastructure. The goal is to disrupt the global economy and pressure Washington into shortening the war.
This decision followed the twelve-day war with Israel in June 2025, during which Israeli and US strikes eliminated senior Iranian military leaders, destroyed key air defense systems, and severely damaged nuclear facilities. In response, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei—before his elimination early in the current conflict—activated a strategy designed to maintain continuity even if top commanders were neutralized.
Central to this approach is the so-called “mosaic defense” doctrine: a decentralized military structure in which the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) operates through multiple regional command centers. Each center can conduct operations independently, allowing local commanders to continue fighting even if national leadership is incapacitated. This makes the military apparatus more resilient to targeted strikes.
Analysts cited by the Wall Street Journal suggest that Tehran’s calculation is to make the conflict costly enough for all parties to force the US and its allies into a diplomatic resolution.
However, the plan carries enormous risks. By escalating attacks on regional states and international economic interests, Iran could provoke a broader coalition against itself. Despite prior military losses, Iranian forces retain the capability to launch drone and missile strikes, maintaining their influence over the ongoing conflict.
For Iranian leaders, the immediate priority remains unchanged: the survival of the regime, even if it requires a major regional escalation.
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Katz Warns Lebanon to Disarm Hezbollah or ‘Pay a Heavy Price’
Israel’s Defense Minister Israel Katz and his Greek counterpart Nikos Dendias make statements to the press, at the Ministry of Defense in Athens Greece, Jan. 20, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Louisa Gouliamaki
i24 News – Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz on Saturday warned Lebanon’s leadership that it must act to disarm Hezbollah and enforce existing agreements, cautioning that failure to do so could lead to severe consequences for the Lebanese state.
Speaking after a high-level security assessment with senior military officials, Katz directed a message to Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, saying Beirut had committed to enforcing an agreement requiring Hezbollah’s disarmament but had failed to follow through.
“You pledged to uphold the agreement and disarm Hezbollah — and this is not happening,” Katz said. “Act and enforce it before we do even more.”
The meeting took place in Israel’s military command center and included Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir and other senior defense officials, as Israel continues operations on multiple fronts.
Katz emphasized that Israel would not tolerate attacks on its communities or soldiers from Lebanese territory.
“We will not allow harm to our communities or to our soldiers,” he said. “If the choice is between protecting our citizens and soldiers or protecting the State of Lebanon, we will choose our citizens and soldiers — and the Lebanese government and Lebanon will pay a very heavy price.”
The defense minister also referenced Hezbollah’s leadership, warning that the group’s current chief could lead Lebanon into further destruction.
“If Hassan Nasrallah destroyed Lebanon, then Naim Qassem will destroy it as well,” Katz said.
Katz stressed that Israel has no territorial ambitions in Lebanon but said it would not accept a return to the years in which Hezbollah launched repeated attacks on Israel from Lebanese territory.
“We have no territorial claims against Lebanon,” he said. “But we will not allow Lebanese territory to again become a platform for attacks against the State of Israel.”
He concluded with a warning to Lebanese authorities to take action against Hezbollah before Israel escalates its response.
“Do and act before we do even more,” Katz said.