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Al Jaffee, iconic Mad Magazine cartoonist who also inked Chabad comic, dies at 102
(JTA) — Perhaps the greatest influence on Al Jaffee, known to readers of Mad Magazine as the creator of the “Fold-In,” was the time he spent living in a Lithuanian shtetl as a child.
Jaffee had been born in Savannah, Georgia, but returned to his mother’s native country with her after she became disillusioned by the irreligious character of life in America. Living in her small town, Zarasai, from ages 6 to 12, he became steeped in both the Yiddish and the “anti-adultism” that would infuse his work. He also gained fluency in comics through strips mailed by father, who remained in the United States.
Jaffee died Monday in New York City at 102, nine decades after returning from Lithuania and less than three years after the iconic cartoonist retired from Mad, where he had inked the end-page feature since 1964.
The “Fold-In” defined Mad Magazine ever since Jaffee invented it as a cartoon satire of the centerfold in publications like Playboy. The feature allowed readers to interact with the pages to form multiple images — the first one depicted Elizabeth Taylor’s divorce from Eddie Fisher and, after a fold, her subsequent marriage to Richard Burton.
A generation of comedians credited Jaffee and his fellow Mad contributors — the self-described “usual gang of idiots” — with shaping their comic sensibilities. “RIP Al Jaffee. He had a profound influence on my mind when I was a kid. One of the greats,” the Jewish comedian and podcaster Marc Maron tweeted Monday.
For a swath of cartoon consumers — those associated with the Chabad-Lubavitch Jewish movement — Jaffee’s most important contribution came not in Mad’s pages but in a different publication, The Moshiach Times. There, Jaffee for decades inked a strip for children called “The Shpy,” depicting a rabbinic secret agent who battles the forces of evil. It was, he told a Chabad publication in 2020, shortly after his retirement at 99, a deeply personal endeavor.
“‘The Shpy’ wasn’t just some superhero. I couldn’t do that,” Jaffee said. “I had to draw a character I could get into.”
Jaffee was born Abraham Jaffee on March 13, 1921 in Savannah, where his father, an immigrant from Lithuania, had been recruited from New York City to run a dry-goods shop. His mother, who had immigrated from the same town as his father, never took to life in the South, where Orthodox Judaism was unfamiliar and kosher food hard to come by. When Jaffee, the oldest of four brothers, was 6, she bundled the children up and took them back to Lithuania for a visit that stretched for six years.
Jaffee’s biography characterizes his time in Zarasai as one of both deprivation and invention, in which he was forced to come up with entertainment because there was little provided for the children. After Adolf Hitler’s rise to power in nearby Germany in 1933, his father retrieved him and two of his brothers, later sending for the third. Jaffee never saw his mother again after he returned to the United States; the Jews of Zarasai were executed by the Nazis and their Lithuanian collaborators on Aug. 26, 1941.
Back in New York, Jaffee’s artistic prowess earned him a spot in the first class of the High School of Music & Art, where he connected with classmates who would be his partners for many years to come. He would create comics for several shops before settling in as a freelancer at Mad, where his high school friend Harvey Kurtzman was the editor and where Yiddish peppered the pages even as the humor magazine reached a wide audience. While Mad was recognizably Jewish to many Jewish readers, it did not proclaim itself as such — an approach that Jaffee told an interviewer in 2016 was intentional.
“I lived through a period when Jewish people were very nervous about flaunting their Jewishness,” Jaffee said in the interview, published in the Forward, in which he explained that he still tended to think in Yiddish. “Even after the war, you were aware that there were people out there who wanted to kill you just because you were Jewish. And it’s still around.”
His side gig as the Chabad cartoonist began in 1984, after a young rabbi recruited him and other Mad contributors to add a contemporary aesthetic to a magazine with a circulation of about 10,000. Though Jaffee had a complicated relationship with Jewish observance, he signed on quickly, according to the Chabad feature about his tenure that was published in 2020.
In the story, Jaffee recalled highlights of his life in Zarasai, which had largely been described in negative terms in his earlier biography. “My brother Harry and I would spend the whole year sketching and planning what we’d do to improve the design of lanterns,” Jaffee recalled about celebrating the fall holiday of Simchat Torah. “Then when the holiday came, we’d march around the bimah [prayer platform]. It was so much fun.” He also said that he aspired to be like the Shpy, whose wispy beard resembled his own.
Jaffee announced his retirement in June 2020, months after the death of his wife of 42 years, Joyce Revenson. A previous marriage, to Ruth Ahlquist, with whom he had two children, ended in divorce. He is survived by his children, stepchildren, grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.
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Billie Eilish and the Erasure of Antisemitism After Australia’s Terror Attack
Police officers stand guard following the attack on a Jewish holiday celebration at Sydney’s Bondi Beach, in Sydney, Australia, Dec. 15, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Flavio Brancaleone
On Sunday, December 14, the Australian Jewish community was shattered by a horrific terrorist attack that claimed the lives of 15 people, including a Holocaust survivor, a rabbi, and a 10-year-old girl.
This was not random violence. The attackers did not open fire indiscriminately on beachgoers or people passing by, nor was this an abstract failure of gun control or public safety.
The shooters deliberately targeted Jews gathered for a Hanukkah event, firing toward a clearly identifiable Jewish celebration. The intent was unmistakable. This was a targeted, ideologically motivated antisemitic terror attack.
They didn’t shoot the surfers or swimmers, bathers running for their lives or the brave lifeguards at Bondi.
They just shot the Jews.
Only the Jews.That’s the issue. Everything else is spin and gaslighting
— Brian Carlton (@Spoonyman) December 15, 2025
Yet some public figures rushed to reframe it as something else.
Musician Billie Eilish, for example, described the attack as “devastating” while emphasizing the need for stricter gun control in the United States and Australia — a response that sidestepped both who was targeted and why.
That framing is difficult to separate from Eilish’s own record. She has publicly accused Israel of committing “genocide” and proudly worn the Artists4Ceasefire pin featuring a red hand, an image uncomfortably reminiscent of the blood-stained hands displayed by terrorists after the lynching of Israelis in Ramallah during the Second Intifada.
Australia already has some of the strictest gun laws in the world; its last mass shooting occurred in 1996.
In the wake of last week’s attack, the Australian government again pledged to enforce even tighter restrictions. Whether Eilish was aware of this context is ultimately beside the point. What matters is her refusal to acknowledge the antisemitic motivation of the attack and the Jewish community it targeted.
A similar omission appeared in Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s initial statement following the attack, which made no mention of Jews as the intended victims, despite the well-known presence of a large Hanukkah event nearby. Although Albanese later corrected course, that first statement helped set the framework through which much of the public understood the attack, blurring its antisemitic nature at the outset.
This instinct to default to safe political talking points while avoiding uncomfortable truths about antisemitic violence is increasingly common among celebrities and politicians alike. But the terror attack in Australia did not occur in a vacuum. It followed more than two years of escalating antisemitic incidents across the country, during which Jews have been physically threatened, verbally abused, and spiritually targeted.
Synagogues have been firebombed. and Jewish-owned businesses vandalized. Crowds openly chanted calls to “gas the Jews.”
Notably, some public figures did acknowledge this context. Film star Ashton Kutcher warned that antisemitic rhetoric “carries a cost.” Actor Josh Gad observed that the tragedy occurred because antisemitism has become “acceptable and cheered.” Their responses recognized a reality others chose to obscure.
Those who removed antisemitism from their condemnation of the attack did not merely omit context; they distorted it. By refusing to name the motive, they minimize the danger facing Jewish communities and help sustain a climate in which hatred can continue unchecked.
Naming the problem is not divisive. Refusing to do so is.
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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‘Furious but Not Surprised’: UK Jewish Groups React After Bob Vylan Not Charged for ‘Death to the IDF’ Chant
Bob Vylan lead singer Bobby Vylan. Photo: BANG Showbiz via Reuters Connect
The Embassy of Israel in London as well as British Jewish groups have lambasted the decision by the UK’s Avon and Somerset Police on Tuesday to conclude its investigation into “death to the IDF” chants made during a Bob Vylan performance at the Glastonbury Festival and to take no further action against the British punk rap duo.
The police force decided not to bring charges against the London-based band after its lead singer Pascal Robinson-Foster, known by his stage name Bobby Vylan, led the audience in repeatedly chanting “death, death to the IDF” during their set at Glastonbury on June 28. The set was broadcast live on BBC.
“We have concluded, after reviewing all the evidence, that it does not meet the criminal threshold outlined by the CPS [Crown Prosecution Service] for any person to be prosecuted,” Avon and Somerset Police said in a statement. The force added that every potential criminal offense “was thoroughly considered,” police “sought all the advice [it] could to ensure we made an informed decision,” and “no further action will be taken on the basis there is insufficient evidential for there to be a realistic prospect of conviction.”
In a statement posted to X, the Embassy of Israel in London said it was “deeply disappointing that vile calls for violence, repeated openly and without remorse, continue to fall on deaf ears.”
“Especially in the wake of the terror attacks in Manchester and Bondi, when will such calls finally be recognized for what they are: a real and dangerous instigator of bloodshed?” the embassy continued. “Pascal Robinson-Foster of Bob Vylan should have been held accountable for his bigotry and racism. Failing to act only emboldens those who seek to harm Jews.”
The British charity Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) also lamented the police’s decision in a statement, describing it as another blow to the Jewish community in the UK.
“British Jews will be furious but not in the least surprised,” a CAA spokesperson said.
“Over the last two years, trust in the authorities has collapsed,” the spokesperson added. “With most British Jews now considering whether they have a future in the UK at all, over and over again it falls to us to explore all legal avenues to take action because the authorities will not.”
The Community Security Trust (CST), which aims to provide safety for Jewish communities in the UK, said the decision is “incredibly disappointing” and “sends completely the wrong message at the worst possible time,” as reported by The Guardian.
Avon and Somerset Police said that as part of their investigation into the anti-IDF chants, they conducted “a voluntary police interview under caution” with a man in his mid-30s in November. Officers also spoke to “approximately 200” members of the public to see if they “may be a victim of a criminal offense.” In an effort to gain “an understanding of any legal precedents,” police additionally contacted other police forces in the UK who have investigated similar incidents and sought advice from the National Police Chiefs’ Council hate crime leads, the CPS, and an “independent barrister” before concluding its investigation.
“We sought specific consideration around the words stated, in terms of the intent behind them, the wider context of how people heard what was said, case law, and anything else potentially relevant, including freedom of speech,” the statement continued. “Every case must be treated on its own merits. Consistently the advice we have received has highlighted fundamental evidential difficulties that cannot be ignored,” police said.
“We believe it is right this matter was comprehensively investigated, every potential criminal offense was thoroughly considered, and we sought all the advice we could to ensure we made an informed decision,” authorities added. “We are committed to working positively with all our communities across Avon and Somerset in relation any matters that may arise in the future, because there is no place in society for hate of any kind.”
Bob Vylan commented on the police decision in a lengthy Instagram post on Tuesday. The band claimed the investigation was “never warranted in the first place” because the anti-IDF chant during their Glastonbury set was “evidently not hateful,” but rather “a display of solidarity with the Palestinian people.” They also falsely accused the IDF of wantonly murdering Palestinians.
“Over the past six months, the media and politicians have consistently attacked us for using our art and platform to take a stand against the actions of Israel and its illegal occupying military force,” they wrote. “We hope that this news inspires others in the UK and around the world to speak up, and continue speaking up, in support of the Palestinian people, without fear. We have had our shows cancelled, visas revoked, our names tarnished and our lives upended, but what we have lost in peace and security, we have gained tenfold in spirit and camaraderie. And that is unbreakable.”
The band concluded in part by declaring “Free Palestine” and saying that they hope “all oppressed people the world over, resist the boot of tyranny on the neck of freedom.”
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Netanyahu: Israel to Spend $110 Billion to Develop Independent Arms Industry in Next Decade
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks during a joint press conference with Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides and Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis (not pictured) after a trilateral meeting at the Citadel of David Hotel, in Jerusalem, Dec. 22, 2025. Photo: ABIR SULTAN/Pool via REUTERS
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday that Israel would spend 350 billion shekels ($110 billion) on developing an independent arms industry to reduce dependency on other countries.
“We will continue to acquire essential supplies while independently arming ourselves,” Netanyahu said at a ceremony for new pilots.
“I don’t know if a country can be completely independent, but we will strive … to ensure our arms are produced as much as possible in Israel,” he said. “Our goal is to build an independent arms industry for the State of Israel and reduce the dependency on any party, including allies.”
Netanyahu’s comments came about a month after he denied reports that his country was seeking a new 20-year military aid deal with the US, insisting that Israel was working to wean itself off American assistance.
“I don’t know what they’re talking about. My direction is the exact opposite,” Netanyahu said on “The Erin Molan Show” last month when asked by the Australian journalist about a new Axios report saying Israel was pursuing the security agreement.
According to Axios, the deal under discussion would include “America First” provisions to win the Trump administration’s support. The current 10-year memorandum of understanding between the two countries — the third such agreement signed — expires in 2028. It includes around $3.8 billion of annual military aid to Israel, which spends nearly all the assistance in the US to purchase American-made weapons and equipment.
Netanyahu’s latest comments come amid growing criticism in the US among progressives and, increasingly, some conservatives over American military support for Israel, especially among younger Americans.
“Now, I want to make our arms industry independent, totally as independent as possible,” Netanyahu said last month. “I think that it is time to ensure that Israel is independent.”
Netanyahu added that US defense aid to Israel is a “tiny fraction” of what Washington spends in the Middle East.
“We have a very strong economy, a very strong arms industry, and even though we get what we get, which we appreciate, 80 percent of that is spent in the US and produces jobs in the US,” he continued, saying he wants to see “an even more independent Israeli defense industry.”
The Israeli premier went on to stress that his country has never asked a single American solider to fight for Israel.
“Israel does not ask others to fight for us,” he said. “Israel is the one American ally in the world that says, ‘We don’t need boots on the ground, we don’t need American servicemen fighting on the ground for Israel or around Israel. We’re fine.’ We fight our own battles, but in doing so, we serve important American interests, like preventing countries that chant ‘Death to America’ from having nuclear bombs to throw at America.”