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Just in time for Hanukkah, an irreverent Jewish adaptation of ‘A Christmas Carol’ debuts on stage
(New York Jewish Week) — A selfish social media influencer, an all-knowing, benevolent ghost known as “Harry the Hanukkah Fairy” and “Tiny Tim” Cratchet, the good-natured ill child from Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol” may seem like they all come from different worlds, but each appears as a character in “A Hanukkah Carol, or GELT TRIP! The Musical” — a show its creators hope will become a winter tradition for years to come.
For co-creators Harrison Bryan, Rob Berliner and Aaron Kenny, the lighthearted “A Hanukkah Carol” is their answer to inundation of Christmas material and cheer throughout December.
“There is a plethora of Christmas entertainment options that we get every holiday season, especially in New York City,” said Jewish actor and playwright Bryan, a native of Brooklyn. “For me, growing up, there was a sense that Hanukkah is the second-place holiday.”
His new musical, however, “feels like this is an opportunity to join the party in a way that feels authentic,” he said. “It’s just allowing the season to feel more inclusive in a city that prides itself on being a melting pot.”
The plot of “A Hanukkah Carol” centers around Chava Kanipshin, a cruel and manipulative social media influencer who hides her Jewish identity because she was bullied as a child. But on one memorable Hanukkah, Chava is visited by spirits of the past, present and future to reckon with her life’s work — namely, her pursuit of internet fame by posting mean and embarrassing videos of her friends and family — before it is too late.
It’s a very obvious Jewish take on Dickens’ 1843 novella “A Christmas Carol” — which has already been adapted into various plays, movies and more in what feels like a thousand times over. (Did anyone else suffer through the 2009 Matthew McConaughey flick “Ghosts of Girlfriends Past”?) But to remake this classic in a Jewish way feels refreshing, adding new depth by exploring themes of Jewish pride, tradition, family and tikkun olam. After all, what is “A Christmas Carol” if not a guilt trip (or, erm, a “gelt trip”) — that stereotypical purview of Jewish mothers everywhere?
Bryan claims the show is “authentically Jewish, but not exclusively,” meaning he and partners want their version of “A Christmas Carol” to be something Jews can participate in and love for themselves. At the same time, however, due to the musical’s inclusive and heartwarming holiday message, it can be appreciated by anyone.
“There’s no Hanukkah classic yet — there’s not a Hanukkah film or show that people go to see as a matter of tradition,” lyricist Berliner told the New York Jewish Week. “We have the opportunity to take our decades of Jewish life and pop culture and comedic sensibilities and love of musical theater and sense of what’s commercial and merge it all together and see how we could present something that even non-Jewish friends would love.”
Perhaps unexpectedly, the show is rife with references to “Fiddler on the Roof,” both implicitly and explicitly. For example, main character Chava, the Scrooge-like social media maven, has nearly lost her parents’ goodwill due to continually blowing them off for holidays and acting superior to them. When Chava has a visit from the ghost of Hanukkah future, she hears her father say: “She’s dead to us.” This, of course, is a callback to “Fiddler,” when protagonist Tevye says something similar when his third daughter — also named Chava — marries a non-Jew.
The creators of “A Hanukkah Carol” see their musical as “in conversation” with the classic Jewish musical. “There are no smartphones in Anatevka, but exploring what it means to be Jewish — both in a contemporary moment and looking backwards and forwards — is a core part of ‘Fiddler,’” Berliner said. “It asks, ‘what is tradition and how can we change with the times?’ Oddly, the framework of ‘A Christmas Carol’ is perfectly aligned with that.”
Bryan, for his part, describes “A Hanukkah Carol” as “Dickens meets ‘Fiddler’ meets Mel Brooks.”
The show, which had an “industry reading” at a Midtown rehearsal studio on Tuesday, has been a long time coming — the trio has been working on it since 2018, all while juggling day jobs and navigating a hiatus during the worst months of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020.
Kenny, a composer, and Berliner, a lyricist, met as songwriters through the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop, which is considered a “top training ground” for up-and-coming theater artists. The two loved working together, and wanted to find a playwright to collaborate with. Kenny, an Australian — whom the group calls their “token goy” — reached out to Bryan, whom he had worked with on his masters thesis film at NYU. Bryan immediately sent over 20 short plays he had written — “A Hanukkah Carol” rose to the top.
Berliner, who is Jewish and grew up in Westchester, was sold immediately on Byran’s “A Hanukkah Carol” script. “The reaction that I had is the reaction that we’ve experienced a lot of folks have when we tell them the title of our show, which is, ‘how does this not exist yet?’” he said. “I would have been drawn to it at any point in my life. I certainly was in this moment.”
After working together on the script and songs, the trio put out an animated “proof of concept” trailer in early 2022. When they saw how much interest the trailer garnered, they opened up a crowdfunding campaign that raised over $33,000 in a month — which will allow them to stage a one-night-only performance at The Green Room 42 (570 10th Ave.) on Sunday, Dec. 18, the first night of Hanukkah. The concert will also be livestreamed.
Meanwhile, Bryan, Berliner and Kenny are in the process of searching for a producer — whether that be for Broadway, off-Broadway or an animated or live-action movie. During the Dec. 6 reading at Ripley-Grier Studios, where an all-Jewish cohort of eight Broadway actors played the more than 80 parts in the show, steady laughter throughout and a standing ovation at the end felt like finally seeing a dream come true.
“It felt amazing,” Bryan said about the first full run-through. “The sky’s the limit!”
“A Hanukkah Carol, or GELT TRIP! The Musical” will be performed at The Green Room 42, 570 10th Ave., on Sunday, Dec. 18. Livestream also available. Tickets from $15.
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The post Just in time for Hanukkah, an irreverent Jewish adaptation of ‘A Christmas Carol’ debuts on stage appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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US Aircraft Carrier Enters Middle East Region, Officials Say
The USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72), a Nimitz-class nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, at Naval Air Station North Island in San Diego, California, US, Aug. 11, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mike Blake
A US aircraft carrier and supporting warships have arrived in the Middle East, two US officials told Reuters on Monday, expanding President Donald Trump’s capabilities to defend US forces, or potentially take military action against Iran.
The aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and several guided-missile destroyers have crossed into the Middle East region, which comes under the US military’s Central Command, the officials told Reuters.
Trump said on Thursday that the United States had an “armada” heading toward Iran, but hoped he would not have to use it.
The warships began deploying from the Asia-Pacific region earlier this month, as tensions between Iran and the United States escalated following a crackdown on protests across Iran.
Trump had repeatedly threatened to intervene if Iran continued to kill protesters, but the countrywide demonstrations have since abated. The president said he had been told that killings were subsiding and that he believes there is currently no plan for the executions of prisoners.
The US military has in the past surged forces into the Middle East at times of heightened tensions, moves that were often defensive.
However, the US military staged a major buildup last year ahead of its June strikes against Iran’s nuclear program.
In addition to the carrier and warships, the Pentagon is also moving fighter jets and air-defense systems to the Middle East.
Over the weekend, the US military announced that it would carry out an exercise in the region “to demonstrate the ability to deploy, disperse, and sustain combat airpower.”
A senior Iranian official said last week that Tehran would consider any attack as an “all-out-war against us.”
The United Arab Emirates said on Monday that it will not let its airspace, territory or territorial waters be used for any hostile military actions against Iran.
The US military’s Al Dhafra Air Base is located south of the UAE capital Abu Dhabi and has been a critical US Air Force hub in support of key missions against the Islamic State, as well as reconnaissance deployments across the region.
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Wikipedia, Qatar, and the Future of Knowledge
Qatar’s Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al-Thani speaks on the first day of the 23rd edition of the annual Doha Forum, in Doha, Qatar, Dec. 6, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa
Imagine a world in which facts can be erased from one of society’s key sources of information.
A world where foreign governments and terror-supporters have a say in whether you should know something or not.
A world where truth is malleable and facts are twisted to fit pre-determined narratives.
No, this isn’t an Orwellian dystopia. It’s Wikipedia as it currently operates: one of the world’s most influential websites and a primary source of information for millions.
Because of how it crowd-sources information, Wikipedia is one of the most extensive sources of knowledge on the Internet (and possibly in the entire world). However, this same strength is also Wikipedia’s biggest weakness, leaving it vulnerable to manipulation by autocracies, terror supporters, and other bad actors.
From recently-uncovered Qatari influence to a secret network of anti-Israel activists, we’ll take a look at how the truth is being manipulated on Wikipedia, and what this means for our understanding of the world.
Wikipedia was meant to democratize knowledge, but today it’s a hub for deliberate fake info and erasing documented history by rogue editors – what I call Knowledge Poisoning.
The list of victims is endless:
Iranian protestors in Iran, Iryna Zarutska, Women, Jews and more.The… pic.twitter.com/Ir7WzKfHGD
— Ella Kenan (@EllaTravelsLove) January 17, 2026
In Qatar’s case, the PR firm Portland Communications was hired after Qatar was selected to host the 2022 World Cup. Its job was to edit Wikipedia articles related to human rights, and to suppress other unflattering facts that threatened the state’s international image.
According to the report, between 2013 and 2024 Portland Communications directed a network of subcontractors to edit Wikipedia articles on human rights in Qatar, as well as entries on Qatari politicians and businessmen accused of corrupt or unethical conduct.
The edits were deliberately small and incremental, designed to evade detection and slip past the scrutiny of other Wikipedia editors.
In short, anyone researching Qatar on Wikipedia has not been presented with a full or nuanced picture of the Gulf state.
Instead, they encountered paid-for reputation management designed to polish its image and suppress unflattering facts. In the process, Wikipedia shifted from an information resource to a vehicle for indoctrination.
The @TBIJ just revealed a UK PR firm allegedly paid intermediaries to rewrite Wikipedia pages — burying criticism of Qatar and reshaping public perception.
Hidden edits like these launder reputations, making biased content appear neutral to millions. The Portland case is the… pic.twitter.com/EwZpwS2ODx
— Ashley Rindsberg (@AshleyRindsberg) January 17, 2026
Nor is Qatari influence confined to Wikipedia. Analyst Eitan Fischberger has noted that the Qatar Investment Authority has invested billions of dollars in Elon Musk’s xAI. This is a development that has potential implications for how Qatar is portrayed on Grokipedia, xAI’s alternative to Wikipedia.
If this pattern continues, the result is straightforward: future audiences may encounter a curated version of Qatar that downplays human rights abuses and other reputational liabilities. By strategically funding the platforms people rely on for information, a state need not censor facts outright, as it can simply ensure they are never meaningfully encountered.
I was about to tweet about how Grokipedia is already far better than Wikipedia.
And I was going to illustrate this by comparing their pages on Qatari foreign influence in American universities.
But it looks like Qatar noticed too. Hence the billions now being thrown at xAI, as… pic.twitter.com/0VcCrJlUpx
— Eitan Fischberger (@EFischberger) January 8, 2026
Wikipedia’s Untrustworthiness on Israel
For those who have followed developments around Wikipedia, the revelation that Qatar actively sought to edit articles in its favor came as little surprise. Abuse of the crowdsourced encyclopedia by bad-faith actors has been documented for years.
In 2024, investigative journalist Ashley Rindsberg published an in-depth exposé about a group of 40 activists who had engaged in a coordinated campaign of anti-Israel disinformation since 2020.
According to Rindsberg, this group accounted for 90 percent of the content on dozens of Israel-related articles and made a combined total of more than two million edits on over 10,000 articles.
This coordinated effort has transformed Wikipedia’s Middle East narrative: Zionism is increasingly framed as inherently evil, Hamas’ violent Islamist ideology is softened or obscured, Iranian human rights abuses are minimized, and the Jewish historical connection to the Land of Israel is routinely challenged or erased.
Rindsberg has also identified another coordinated effort: a group known as Tech for Palestine (TFP), which formed during the recent Israel–Hamas war and edited thousands of Wikipedia articles related to Israel.
In its own welcome message on the platform Discord, the group explained its focus on Wikipedia by noting that the encyclopedia’s “content influences public perception.”
Most recently, independent investigative journalist David Collier conducted a deep dive into a Wikipedia claim that the Israeli town of Ofakim was built on a depopulated Bedouin village. He found that the cited books and maps did not support the claim at all, and that the evidence had been effectively fabricated through misrepresentation.
Yet the claim remains on Wikipedia, upheld by a decision from an anti-Israel activist editor, and it continues to feed into AI systems that treat Wikipedia as authoritative, compounding the misinformation.
Wikipedia’s Israel problem is no longer in dispute. As long as activist editors retain outsized control over key articles, the Internet’s largest encyclopedia remains an unreliable source for understanding Israel, the Palestinians, and the Middle East.
Exclusive: A detailed investigation exposes how false claims on @Wikipedia fabricate history – then get laundered into activist and media campaigns used to smear elected officials and demand resignations
Thread— David Collier (@mishtal) January 5, 2026
How Wikipedia Influences Your Life — Even Without Your Knowledge
According to Wikipedia’s own data, the site is viewed nearly 10,000 times per second, totaling close to 300 billion page views annually. In practice, this means a significant portion of the world’s population relies on Wikipedia for basic knowledge, often without realizing how susceptible it is to manipulation by bad-faith actors.
And opting out is not an escape. Even users who never consult Wikipedia themselves are still influenced by it, as many AI systems draw on Wikipedia as an authoritative source, recycling its distortions at scale. And to mark its 25th anniversary, Wikipedia has signed content partnerships with major AI companies, including Meta, Microsoft, Amazon, Perplexity, and Mistral AI.
This influence is already embedded in everyday technology. Google’s search results routinely draw on Wikipedia as a trusted reference, while voice assistants such as Alexa and Siri rely on it to answer basic factual queries.
In practice, Wikipedia now functions as a foundational layer of the modern information ecosystem.
At the center of everything is Wikipedia.
Wikipedia articles appear in 67%-84% of all search engine results & most info boxes
— Ethan Mollick (@emollick) May 30, 2023
Whether you consult Wikipedia directly, ask an AI system for information, or turn to Siri with a question, you are being shaped by the thousands of editors whose collective work forms Wikipedia.
Most of those editors are diligent volunteers committed to accuracy and the pursuit of knowledge. Some, however, are not. They omit facts, introduce disinformation, and quietly reshape narratives to fit an ideological agenda.
The real danger is not Wikipedia’s scale, but the trust it enjoys. Too often, it is treated as neutral while users have no reliable way to distinguish between an article written to inform and one designed to manipulate.
The author is a contributor to HonestReporting, a Jerusalem-based media watchdog with a focus on antisemitism and anti-Israel bias — where a version of this article first appeared.
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Italy Pushes for EU Clampdown on Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Over ‘Heinous Acts’
Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani speaks during an interview with Reuters in Rome, Italy, April 15, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Guglielmo Mangiapane
Italy will ask European Union partners this week to place Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) on the EU‘s terrorist register, Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said on Monday, signaling a shift in Rome’s position.
Until now, Rome had been among the governments resisting efforts to brand the IRGC as a terrorist group, but Tajani said a bloody Iranian crackdown on street protests this month that reportedly killed thousands of people could not be ignored.
“The losses suffered by the civilian population during the protests require a clear response,” Tajani wrote on X, adding he would raise the issue on Thursday at a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Brussels.
“I will propose, coordinating with other partners, the inclusion of the Revolutionary Guards on the list of terrorist organizations, as well as individual sanctions against those responsible for these heinous acts.”
Being branded a terrorist group would trigger a set of legal, financial, and diplomatic measures that would significantly constrain the IRGC’s ability to operate in Europe.
Set up after Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution, the IRGC holds great sway in the country, controlling swathes of the economy and armed forces, and is also in charge of Iran’s ballistic missile and nuclear programs.
While some EU member states have previously pushed for the IRGC to be listed, others have been more cautious, fearing that it could lead to a complete break in ties with Iran, harming any chance of reviving nuclear talks and jeopardizing any hope of getting EU nationals released from Iranian jails.
However, Iran’s violent crackdown on protests has revived the debate and added momentum to discussions about adding the IRGC, which is already included in the bloc’s human rights sanctions regime, to the EU terrorist list.
Italian, French, and Spanish diplomats raised qualms during a meeting in Brussels earlier this month about adding the IRGC to the list, EU diplomats told Reuters at the time.
If France continues to object, then the move to sanction the IRGC will fail, diplomats have said.