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Jewish Author Finds Joy and Love in Book Exploring Hasidic Community in Israel
Tuvia Tenenbom has gone undercover to find out people’s real opinions about Jews in Germany, and also in Israel.
But for his new intriguing book, Careful, Beauties Ahead! My Year With the Ultra-Orthodox, the jovial journalist went to the Israeli town of Mea Shearim under his real identity.
Hasidic Jews have fascinated many for maintaining curls, black hats, black coats, the Yiddish language, and sometimes having insular communities. Tenenbom said that people warned him that Hasidim would throw stones at him. But that wasn’t the case when he spent about a year and a half with different members of the Haredi community in Mea Shearim.
Why did the community allow him to live with them, conduct interviews, and take pictures?
“I did not treat them as aliens or look at them like animals in the zoo,” Tenenbom told me in an interview. “I treated them as human beings. They responded in kind. It helped that I spoke Yiddish and that my great-grandfather was a great rabbi. But they know I’m not religious.”
The book is full of laughs and great scenes, including one where he jokes that he wonders if his egg salad would be poisoned, though he enjoys the food. He includes that there were some signs that said Zionists were not real Jews.
“I found out that was a minority of idiots that did that,” he said. “It was some extreme teenagers.”
He said there was great unity on October 7, and that the whole community prayed for those who were kidnapped.
Tenenbom stayed with numerous families and couples that were products of arranged marriages, known as shidduch. Did he feel that they really loved each other, or had learned “to love each other,” as sung in Fiddler on the Roof?
“I live on the Upper East Side and I’ve never seen love as I have in Mea Shearim,” he said. “I don’t see this kind of love in Manhattan. It doesn’t mean everything is perfect there, but the love there, it was beautiful to see, based on living there for a year and a half and seeing how they behave.”
He said that some people have only “kosher” phones, but he also saw that some had iPhones.
Tenenbom said that had his life unfolded differently, he might have been a rabbi there, as he was religious earlier in his life. He said members of the community told him they were betrayed by journalists in the past, who claimed to like them and then wrote material demonizing them.
“Most people who write books about Haredim don’t even speak Yiddish,” he said. “How can you write a book without knowing their language?
Tenenbom also said he found great humor during his experience.
“I spent my time laughing from morning to evening,” he said. “I came in thinking some might be nasty,” he said. “I have found they are the opposite of bitter people. Many Jews in New York are neurotic. I couldn’t find a neurotic Jew [there].”
Tenenbom, who has been married for many years, said he told the community there that Haredi women were beautiful. He said the people took the compliment without being offended or sensitive.
Different portions of the book have him asking questions you would not expect to be asked, and Tenenbom has the rare combination of knowledge, guts, and flair to write a book that can have elements of critique and respect at the same time.
Tenenbom, the author of Catch The Jew and I Sleep in Hitler’s Room, said it is easy to stereotype people if you only see them in films or in negative news stories, and don’t spend time with them. Known for his suspenders, his love of good food, and his time producing plays at The Triad Theater on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, Careful Beauties Ahead! is his best book yet.
Perhaps the only way to top this for his next book, is if he goes undercover as a college professor at Columbia University.
The author is a writer based in New York.
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Sweden Democrats Apologize for Past Nazi Links, Antisemitism as Election Nears
Mattias Karlsson, Sweden Democrats politicians, addresses party members after election in Stockholm, Sweden, Sept. 9, 2018. Photo: REUTERS/Ints Kalnins
The anti-immigration Sweden Democrats apologized on Thursday for the party’s past Nazi links and antisemitism, part of efforts to present a more moderate, mainstream image to voters ahead of a national election next year.
The Sweden Democrats were presenting the results of a specially commissioned study that found Nazi and antisemitic views to have been common at party functions and in its printed materials in the 1980s and 1990s.
“That there have been clear expressions of antisemitism and support for National Socialist ideas in my party’s history I think is disgusting and reprehensible,” Mattias Karlsson, a member of parliament often described as the party’s chief ideologist, told a news conference.
“I would like to reiterate the party’s apology, above all to Swedish citizens of Jewish descent who may have felt a strong sense of insecurity and fear for good reasons.”
The commissioning of the study sought to acknowledge and break with a past that has long hindered its cooperation with Sweden‘s mainstream political parties. The Sweden Democrats hope to join a future coalition government after the 2026 election.
The party first entered parliament in 2010 and currently supports Sweden‘s governing right-wing coalition government but has no members in the cabinet.
Tony Gustafsson, the historian hired by the party to write the book, said the party had emerged in the 1980s out of neo-Nazi and white supremacist organizations and that it had continued to cooperate with them into the 1990s.
“The collaboration seems to have involved using these groups to help distribute election materials,” Gustafsson said, adding there were strong indications that one such group, the “White Aryan Resistance,” had served as security guards at party gatherings.
Gustafsson said there had been a clear connection to Nazism until 1995, the year that current party leader Jimmie Akesson joined the Sweden Democrats, but that the Sweden Democrats had begun distancing itself from such links thereafter.
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Supreme Leader, in First Appearance Since Ceasefire, Says Iran Would Strike Back if Attacked
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei speaks in a televised message, after the ceasefire between Iran and Israel, in Tehran, Iran, June 26, 2025. Photo: Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS
Iran would respond to any future US attack by striking American military bases in the Middle East, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Thursday, in his first televised remarks since a ceasefire was reached between Iran and Israel.
Khamenei, 86, claimed victory after 12 days of war, culminating in an Iranian attack on the largest US base in the region, located in Qatar, after Washington joined the Israeli strikes. No casualties were reported in the Iranian attack, which was coordinated with both US and Qatari authorities beforehand in an apparent effort to show a symbolic display of force without triggering retaliation.
“The Islamic Republic slapped America in the face. It attacked one of the important American bases in the region,” Khamenei said.
As in his last comments, released more than a week ago during the Israeli bombardment, he spoke from an undisclosed indoor location in front of a brown curtain, between an Iranian flag and a portrait of his predecessor Ruhollah Khomeini.
In his pre-recorded remarks, aired on state television, Khamenei promised that Iran would not surrender despite US President Donald Trump’s calls.
“The US President Trump unveiled the truth and made it clear that Americans won’t be satisfied with anything less than surrender… such an event will never happen,” Khamenei said.
“The fact that the Islamic Republic has access to important American centers in the region and can take action against them whenever it deems necessary is not a small incident, it is a major incident, and this incident can be repeated in the future if an attack is made,” he added.
Trump said “sure” on Wednesday when asked if the United States would strike again if Iran rebuilt its nuclear enrichment program.
Tehran has for decades denied accusations by Western leaders that it is seeking nuclear arms.
NO GAIN
Khamenei said the US “gained no achievement” after it attacked Iranian nuclear sites, but that it entered the war to “save” Israel after some of Tehran’s missiles broke through Israel’s multi-layered defense system.
“The US directly entered the war as it felt that if it did not get involved, the Zionist regime [Israel] would be fully destroyed. It entered the war to save it,” he said.
“The US attacked our nuclear facilities, but couldn’t do any important deed … The US president did abnormal showmanship and needed to do so,” he added.
Trump said over the weekend that the US deployment of 30,000-pound bombs had “obliterated” Iran‘s nuclear program. Officials and experts are still probing the extent of the damage.
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also declared “a historic victory” on Tuesday, after the fragile ceasefire took effect, saying Israel had achieved its goal of removing Tehran’s nuclear and ballistic missile threat.
Shortly after Khamenei’s speech, Netanyahu posted a message with a picture of himself and Trump holding hands with the message: “We will continue to work together to defeat our common enemies.”
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Warnings from Washington and Dresden: The Danger of Zohran Mamdani
Zohran Mamdani, a New York City mayoral candidate, speaks on Primary Day at a campaign news conference at Astoria Park in Queens, New York, United States, on June 24, 2025. Photo: Kyle Mazza vis Reuters Connect.
In September 1882, a coalition of political parties gathered in Dresden, Germany, for the Congress for the Safeguarding of Non-Jewish Interests. It marked a turning point in the convergence of traditional anti-Jewish sentiment with the emerging ideology of antisemitism.
Traditionally, anti-Jewishness was merely an attitude or prejudice. But antisemitism emerged as a political platform, arguing that Jews had undue influence following their European emancipation. Before long, figures in the antisemitic movement made their case explicit: “Antisemit [sic] means an opponent of the Jews.”
This historical convergence proves the fallacy of today’s “antisemitism is not anti-Zionism” assertion. Debates surrounding the terminology are immaterial; the repercussions of anti-Israel and anti-Jewish sentiment have already been witnessed in Boulder, Colorado, and Washington, D.C.
In Washington, D.C., two Israeli embassy staffers were murdered by an Islamist-inspired socialist radical. This wasn’t an isolated incident of extremism — it marked the end of a pipeline of hate that has normalized calls for the destruction of Israel and targeting Jews as a collective.
Under Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser’s leadership, the Nation’s capital has become a testing ground for what Democratic Socialist mayoral candidate Zoharn Mamdani advocates for in New York City.
Mamdani contends that anti-Zionism is not antisemitism. He started the Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) chapter at Bowdoin College, publicly supports the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement, defends the claim “globalize the intifada,” and declared that he would arrest Benjamin Netanyahu if he visits New York. Mamdani’s inner circle includes Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) and Linda Sarsour.
Mamdani refuses to recognize Israel as a Jewish state and seeks to “hold Israel accountable.” His dangerous positions and stance echoes the approach of those 1882 conference participants who sought to deny collective Jewry equal legal rights within their nations because of their perceived detrimental influence.
Mayor Bowser does not match up to Mamdani’s advocacy in this regard. Nevertheless, she has proven deliberately negligent to the aggressive anti-Israel activity in her city. Bowser has systematically refused to send police to discipline anti-Israel lawbreakers. Her administration has actively emboldened anti-Israel disruptors by instructing law enforcement not to act against increasingly aggressive demonstrations.
The impact of her negligence was evident in the assault of Rabbi Shmuel Herzfeld by anti-Israel actors while he prayed outside the Israeli embassy. It was also felt by George Washington University community members who faced weeks-long hostility at the unlawful Gaza encampment that originated at the campus and spread to D.C. streets. Only the night before she was slated to testify before the Congressional Oversight Committee, did Bowser finally send the Metropolitan Police Department to dismantle the encampment.
Mayor Bowser created a climate where anti-Jewish hostility and harassment were ripe for violence. Given the pre-existing intensity of antisemitism in New York, Mamdani’s endorsement of anti-Israel activity could produce a far more dangerous city landscape. The path from “globalize the intifada” chants to murders of Israeli embassy staffers illustrates what Mamdani’s supporters mean when they call for “resistance by any means necessary.”
Under Mamdani, New York would not merely follow the footsteps of what happened in D.C., but would surpass it. Where Bowser has shown deliberate negligence, Mamdani promises active encouragement of the very activity that seeded the murders in Washington. The consequences of transforming simple anti-Jewish attitudes into legal action or inaction are dire.
Mamdani’s defamatory comments about Israel are troubling — but so too is his radical platform, which appeals to voters drawn to a so-called “new” kind of politics. In reality, this politics is anything but new; it recycles decades-old socialist ideas that younger generations find novel and alluring only because they have not lived through their destructive consequences.
This kind of extremist politicking is a tactic of unification and mobilization. Mamdani’s socialism plays on anti-Enlightenment liberalism and disestablishmentarianism that was evident in late 19th-century Europe. Such ideologies lent, and continue to lend, anti-Jewish sentiments a broader appeal.
When progressive rhetoric masks age-old prejudices, and when calls for “justice” echo the very language used to promote systematic exclusion, we must recognize the pattern: The Dresden conference participants in 1882 believed they were defending their nations and values. They cloaked their agenda in the language of virtue, human rights, and protectionism.
The murders in Washington mark our contemporary Dresden moment — a dire warning of where political tolerance for hateful anti-Israel rhetoric leads. New York City, the city of dreams, deserves leadership that enforces the law to restore order. That governance must be committed to reducing hate, chaos, and crime. Americans cannot afford to let the spirit of 1882 find a home in 2025. While the voices of Democratic primary voters were heard on Tuesday night, the ultimate choice is up to New Yorkers in November.
Sabrina Soffer recently graduated from George Washington University and works with the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP).
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