Uncategorized
An 1859 fight over how to make matzah has lessons about the threat of AI today
(JTA) — In the last few months the world has been dazzled by an astonishing sequence of AI systems capable of performing all kinds of difficult tasks — writing code, composing poetry, generating artwork, passing exams — with a level of competence that rivals or exceeds what humans can do. The existence of these AIs has prompted all manner of soul-searching about the nature of humanity. It has also made many people wonder which human tasks are about to be taken over by machines.
The capabilities of these AIs are new and revolutionary, but the story of machines taking over human jobs is not. In Jewish history the most important story of that transition has to do with matzah, and it’s a story that carries important lessons for the present day.
Starting 164 years ago, dozens of European rabbis engaged in a furious debate that would not be fully resolved until the beginning of the 20th century. Matzah, which for millennia had been made by human hands in accordance with the narrow constraints of Jewish law, could now be processed with a series of machines that promised huge savings of time and money. As town after town adopted these machines, opposition began to rise, until it exploded in 1859 with the publication of “An Alert for Israel,” a collection of letters from prestigious rabbis, who adamantly argued that for anyone interested in following the laws of Passover a matzah made with a machine was no better than a loaf of bread.
The arguments for this position were many, but all will sound familiar to anyone following the AI conversation. Like today, some objected to the machines just because they were new and different, but most had more specific concerns. First, there was the matter of lost jobs. In many parts of Europe matzah was made by the poorest members of society, who were given the job as a way to help them raise money before one of the most cost-intensive holidays of the year. Ceding this job to machines would take work from those who could least afford it.
It takes about 20 seconds in a 1,300-degree, coal-and-wood-fired oven to bake shmurah matzah to perfection. (Uriel Heilman)
Beyond economics, there was concern that the machines just weren’t as reliable as people, especially given the rules around matzah-making outlined in Jewish law. What if bits of dough got trapped in the gears, quietly leavening for hours and unknowingly ruining whole batches of matzah in the process? What if the trays warmed the dough too fast? Without proper oversight, how could you trust your own food?
Finally, some objected to the loss of a literal human touch. Jewish law stated that matzah was supposed to be made by people who knew they were baking matzah. A machine, no matter how sophisticated, didn’t “know” anything. How could you eat matzah on Passover knowing that this most important food was made by a mindless machine?
The responses didn’t take long to arrive. “A Cancellation of the Alert,” a collection published the very same yearr, forcefully argued that machine matzah was perfectly fine — and possibly even better than the human product. No, inventions aren’t inherently bad. No, the machines wouldn’t harm the poor, because the machines made matzah less expensive for everyone. No, the machines weren’t prone to error — and they certainly weren’t more error-prone than lazy, careless humans. No, the machines didn’t know what they were doing — but the people who built them did, and wasn’t that enough?
The machines eventually won, but then something happened that I don’t think either side anticipated. With Manichewitz’s machine matzahs claiming most of the American market by the early 20th century, it was now the handmade matzah makers who were on the back foot; it was they and not the machines who needed to demonstrate that they were up to the difficult task of preparing this food with the efficiency and reliability of the machines.
The result is more than a little tragic. Matzah is the Jewish food with the deepest origins of all — deeper than brisket, deeper than latkes, deeper even than challah — and yet it is the ritual food most likely to be picked up at the supermarket and least likely to be made at home. While there are still communities today that exclusively eat handmade matzah, even this job is now largely outsourced to just a few companies that resemble their machine-driven counterparts in scale. While teachers will sometimes demonstrate how to make matzah for educational purposes, across the religious spectrum the era of locally made matzah is over.
Despite the fact that it’s hard to imagine a simpler baked good — matzah is just flour and water, and it’s literally illegal to spend more than 18 minutes making it — its production is treated as though it is only slightly less complicated than constructing a jet engine, and people are worried about shortages as though matzah were a natural resource or an advanced microchip. The transition has been so complete that we barely remember there was a transition at all.
Baked matzah coming out of the oven at Streit’s Matzo factory on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, date unknown. (Courtesy Streit’s Matzo)
Did the rabbis pushing for machine matzah know this was going to happen? Almost certainly not. The economic impact of machine labor is relatively easy to predict, but the psychological and cultural effects are a lot harder. There was probably no way of knowing how machines would change the way we thought about matzah in the long run, but today it’s clear that automating this ancient task has changed our own relationship to Passover’s central food — and because the change has resulted in a lot of alienation from matzah production, I’m not so sure it was a change for the better. Making matzah locally could have been a way to feel connected to the ancient Israelites, who left Egypt so fast that they didn’t have time to make anything else. Instead of emulating this ad-hoc food, we optimized it for cost and efficiency, in the process turning matzah into just another specialty cracker on the grocery store shelf. Was it really worth it?
It’s probably a bit much to say that OpenAI is just a modern Manischewitz, but the parallels between the debate about machine-generated matzah and the present debate about machine-generated everything are useful for considering how short-term policy choices around AI won’t necessarily capture all of the technology’s long-term effects on how human beings want to spend their time. When we relinquish an activity to an AI for economic reasons, we may eventually come to believe that humans are no longer qualified to do the task at all.
Then as now we must balance our economic needs against our ideas about what kinds of activities make for a good and fulfilling life.
—
The post An 1859 fight over how to make matzah has lessons about the threat of AI today appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
Uncategorized
Chicago Jewish theater drops Naomi Ragen play, saying actors feared repercussions of working with the Israeli writer
(JTA) — Naomi Ragen, the New York-born Israeli novelist and playwright known for her portrayals of Orthodox Jewish women in crisis, says the cancellation of a planned Chicago revival of one of her plays represents a “return to McCarthyism” in the American cultural scene.
Ragen, 77, has revealed that plans by a Jewish arts company in Chicago to revive her 2001 play “Women’s Minyan” have been shelved. In a post shared with her thousands of followers on Facebook, Ragen included an email from the company’s artistic director saying that she had been inundated by messages from actors, directors and designers who feared that working with a “a pro-Zionist Jew/Israeli” like Ragen could damage their careers.
Ragen told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that Chicago-based Arts Judaica first approached her in July with a request to stage her play about a haredi woman trying to flee her abusive marriage. Elayne LeTraunik, the company’s artistic director, told Ragen they intended to stage 13 performances next March.
Happy to collaborate, Ragen asked for a contract. She heard nothing until this week when she received a reply from LeTraunik, saying she “must sadly withdraw my intent to do the show.”
LeTraunik’s email continued: “People were seeing you were a pro Zionist Jew/Israeli and I was bombarded with actors, directors and designers who were actually afraid that doing a show with you as playwright would hurt their careers. I never have faced this before and I was stunned about all the accusations of ‘genocide’ flying around.”
The episode stands in contrast to Arts Judaica’s stated mission: Its website says that “American audiences need Jewish stories on stage more than ever.”
“In the past I have done plays about suicide bombers and never had a peep from anyone,” LeTraunik told Ragen. “This world is getting insane. Perhaps once all this dies down (if it ever does) I will try again. I am so sorry.”
Born in New York, Ragen emigrated to Israel in 1971, where she settled in Jerusalem. In addition to best-selling novels like “Sotah” and “The Sacrifice of Tamar,” she regularly writes opinion pieces sharing her hawkish views on Israel. On her website and on social media, she shares dispatches from her “Israel War Diary,” expressing strong support for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and IDF military action against Hamas. She has also spoken against what she describes as a worldwide “climate of hatred, fear, and intimidation.”
Some people, she said, have suggested the play was canceled because she is a right-wing Zionist. “Are we now back to McCarthyism, where you have to check the political credentials of an artist [before deciding] whether or not to promote their work?” she said.
“I thought all the progressives were against McCarthyism. Now we’re back there where I have to pass some kind of political test in order to have my work shown.”
LeTraunik told JTA she could never have predicted the pushback or the cancellation when she first approached Ragen. “This situation is one I have never faced before after a lifetime in theater,” she said.
“Since the play has nothing to do with politics I didn’t anticipate any problems,” she continued. “But unfortunately people had done research on Naomi and felt so triggered by her politics it appeared that there were concerns from would-be actors, etc. and even the person who had offered to put up some of the funding was not comfortable.
“As for me, I am almost 80 years old, [a] lifetime American and Jew and I have long decided not to get involved in the current political turmoil. I just want to do interesting theater.”
Ragen told JTA that while it is “strange to get such a response from a Jewish venue,” particularly one whose mission statement includes Holocaust education, she is not angry at LeTraunik.
“I have only sympathy for her,” she said. “I think all these Jewish cultural organizations are now under fire and what we need is not to criticize them because they’re not brave enough, but to understand the pressures they’re under.”
Earlier this month the Anti-Defamation League published a report alleging “the systemic exclusion and marginalization of Jewish and Israeli artists across American cultural life.” In its examination of museums, publishing and live entertainment, the ADL said it found that Jewish, Israeli and Zionist artists have “faced growing scrutiny, organized protest activity, online targeting, event disruptions, reputational campaigns and, in some cases, cancellations or institutional distancing.”
Ragen said her play, originally commissioned by Habima, Israel’s national theater, has previously been staged in the United States. She is not taking the cancellation personally, she said, but as a symptom of a far greater problem.
“You had a situation in Germany in 1938 where you couldn’t produce a Jewish play or any play which didn’t toe the Nazi line,” she said. “Are we going back to that?”
In her conversation with JTA, Ragen called on “American Jews and good people” to “be a little brave,” adding: “It’s not time to build another Holocaust museum — it’s time to wake up, smell the coffee, and put your money and your time and your effort where your mouth is.
“If you are a person who wants to promote Holocaust education, well, you’re living in the middle of it.”
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post Chicago Jewish theater drops Naomi Ragen play, saying actors feared repercussions of working with the Israeli writer appeared first on The Forward.
Uncategorized
Jewish New Yorkers fault Mamdani on antisemitism but back his police commissioner, poll finds
Nearly two-thirds of Jewish voters in New York City disapprove of Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s handling of antisemitism, according to a new poll released on the third anniversary of the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel. Jewish voters also said Mamdani, a fierce critic of Israel, should not hold or attend an official city event marking the anniversary.
The Honan Strategy Group survey of 503 Jewish voters across the five boroughs, shared exclusively with the Forward, found that 65% disapprove of Mamdani’s handling of antisemitism, including 47% who strongly disapprove. Just 34% approve. Among 1,167 non-Jewish respondents, 46% approve of his handling of antisemitism and 43% disapprove.
The poll was conducted Oct. 2 through Oct. 6 via text-to-web and analyzed Jewish and non-Jewish respondents separately. The overall margin of error is plus or minus 2.8 percentage points, while the Jewish sample has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.3 points.
The survey offers a broader snapshot of Jewish opinion than previous polling on Mamdani. A Honan survey at the beginning of his term included only 131 Jewish respondents, while a poll published in July included a sample of 99 Jewish voters. The findings come a week after Mamdani rolled out a citywide strategy to combat hate and antisemitism, amid continued concerns about rising antisemitic incidents across the city and criticism that his rhetoric on Israel is causing harm.
Recent NYPD statistics showed that in the first nine months of 2026, hate crimes rose 13%, and 53% of those hate crimes involved Jewish victims. During the first nine months of this year, anti-Jewish hate crimes increased 1.2%.
Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch gets much higher marks
Jewish voters gave much higher marks to Jessica Tisch, the Jewish NYPD commissioner who was reappointed by Mamdani after serving a year under former Mayor Eric Adams. Tisch, who strongly supports Israel and is widely respected in the Jewish community, has frequently appeared alongside Mamdani to discuss the rise in hate crimes.
The survey showed that 75% of Jewish respondents approved of Tisch’s handling of antisemitism, while just 6% disapproved — the strongest rating of any official tested in the poll.
During a joint briefing on the latest crime statistics with Mamdani on Tuesday, Tisch remarked, “On the eve of the third anniversary of Oct. 7, we renew our pledge to Jewish institutions that they will not be left to protect themselves without a strong partner in the NYPD.”
City Council Speaker Julie Menin, the first Jewish speaker in history who many Jewish leaders see as a check on Mamdani and who has made combating antisemitism a focus of her tenure, received 57% approval and 13% disapproval. Gov. Kathy Hochul, who is running for reelection in November, received 54% approval.
Mamdani released his administration’s citywide strategy to combat antisemitism last week. The plan includes millions of dollars for security, education and hate-crime prevention, but does not adopt a definition of antisemitism — an issue that has divided the mayor and much of the Jewish community in the city with the largest Jewish population outside of Israel. Throughout his mayoral campaign and since, Mamdani has sought to draw a line between his opposition to Israel and Zionism and his commitment to protecting Jewish New Yorkers.
The new plan mentions the Oct. 7 Hamas attack and the war in Gaza that followed as part of the rise in antisemitism, but does not directly link them.
New York Jews don’t want Mamdani at an Oct. 7 event
Wednesday’s poll found that 64% of Jewish voters said Mamdani should not hold or attend an official city event marking the anniversary of the Oct. 7 attack. Twenty-four percent said he should. Mamdani is expected to attend a vigil in remembrance of Oct. 7 on Wednesday evening, according to his daily public schedule, followed by a meeting with Palestinian New Yorkers.
Meanwhile, City Council Speaker Menin and Jewish councilmembers Inna Vernikov and Eric Dinowitz, who lead the legislative body’s bipartisan task force to combat antisemitism, are expected to join other elected officials in Brooklyn to call for a permanent public memorial in Brooklyn to the victims of Oct. 7.
Mamdani has condemned violence and expressions of support for terrorist organizations, called the Hamas attack a “horrific war crime,” but also defended the constitutional right to protest.
Israel’s consul general in New York, Ofir Akunis, invited Mamdani on Monday to watch the 47-minute compilation of raw footage assembled by the Israeli military documenting the Oct. 7 attack. In a letter to the mayor, Akunis said he hoped seeing the footage would convey “the reality of what happened on October 7th in a way that words alone cannot.”
Members of New York City’s Young Democratic Socialists of America have promoted a demonstration at City Hall, accusing the mayor of capitulating to pro-Israel pressure since taking office. The chapter is the student offshoot of the DSA, in which Mamdani is a member. Mamdani’s spokesperson has said the group organizing the protest is separate from the local DSA chapter with which the mayor is affiliated, but declined to comment when asked by the Forward about the planned protest and whether Mamdani had a message for the protesters.
Worsening relations
The poll found an even broader sense of concern among Jewish New Yorkers about the city’s climate for Jews since Oct. 7.
Seventy-nine percent said antisemitism has increased since Oct. 7, including 55% who said it has increased “a lot.” And 86% said relations between Jewish and non-Jewish New Yorkers have gotten worse since the attack. Just 1% said they have improved, while 12% said they have stayed about the same. Among non-Jewish voters, 51% acknowledged that relations have gotten worse.
There was a larger divide when respondents were asked to compare antisemitism and Islamophobia. A majority of Jewish voters – 57% – said antisemitism is the bigger problem, while 10% said the two are equally serious. Among non-Jewish voters, 66% said antisemitism and Islamophobia are equal problems.
The post Jewish New Yorkers fault Mamdani on antisemitism but back his police commissioner, poll finds appeared first on The Forward.
Uncategorized
They survived Oct. 7. At Rock Camp, they found a way to feel alive again.
(JTA) — ”They tried to kill us. We survived. Let’s eat.”
Alan King’s joke about Jewish holidays gets to the essence of Jewish persistence in the face of horror. He might have added “Let’s sing.” Music has accompanied the Jewish people for millennia through periods of joy and sorrow. Moses and the Israelites praised God for His salvation from the Egyptians in the “Song of the Sea.” Weddings, the Shabbat table and kumsitzes all come with joyous soundtracks.
In times of overwhelming devastation, songs have served as expressions of survival, determination and memory. During the Holocaust, Jews continued to compose and perform it in ghettos and concentration camps, including Theresienstadt. ”The Partisan Hymn,” “Zog nit keyn mol” (“Never Say”), was composed in the Vilna Ghetto.
Three years ago this week, music and tragedy once again intertwined when Hamas-led terrorists attacked the Nova Music Festival as part of the Oct. 7 assault on Israel. Approximately 1,200 people, including 364 civilians at the Nova festival, were killed that day, and 251 were abducted to Gaza.
Two months later, David Fishof, who founded Rock ’n Roll Fantasy Camp, saw music and trauma bound together at the funeral for Yotam Haim, the red-headed hostage who escaped with two others but was killed by friendly fire.
“Yotam’s brother, Tuval, and father, Raviv, are drummers,” said Fishof, an L.A. sports agent and entertainment producer. “They performed a 20-minute drum solo in Yotam’s honor, after which Tuval threw the sticks in the grave. At that moment, it hit me: I wanted to bring Tuval and nine other Oct. 7 survivors to Rock Camp in L.A.”
With the help of Sam Grundwerg, former world chairman of Keren Hayesod – United Israel Appeal, the 10 survivors were flown to Los Angeles in March 2024 to participate in the sold-out camp.
Now, their experience is chronicled in “The Bridge,” a new documentary produced by “Friends” executive producer Kevin Bright that highlights how music can become a pathway from trauma to healing. Its message: “When tragedy strikes the Jewish people, we play louder.” Ahead of a wider theatrical release in November, the film is now playing at select North American venues.
Rock Camp, founded by Fishof in 1997, brings amateur rockers alongside music legends for four days of mentorship, rehearsals and performances at such iconic clubs as Whisky a Go Go and The Viper Room.
Music, memory and trauma informed Fishof’s upbringing. Music saved the life of his father, Mark, a survivor of Auschwitz and Buchenwald.
“My dad would sing to the Nazis, just to entertain them,” Fishof said. “They would say, ‘Sing this song,’ and he would. Music saved him. It was a way for him to take his mind off of what he was going through.”
His father served as a cantor in Hackensack, New Jersey, for 33 years.
Fishof said his memories of his father’s sufferings made Oct. 7 the worst day of his life.
By contrast, their four days at Rock Camp offered the Oct. 7 survivors a rare respite from their trauma and a chance to reconnect with the joy of making music. The Israelis jammed with rock legends Michael Anthony of Van Halen, Sebastian Bach of Skid Row, Warren DeMartini of Ratt and Tommy Aldridge of Whitesnake, and met Richard Fortus and Slash of Guns N’ Roses.
Among the Israeli rockers was 27-year-old vocalist and guitarist Raz Shifer of Ramat Gan, a Nova Festival survivor who was close friends with two hostages, including Inbar Hayman, who was murdered in captivity.
After that Black Saturday, Shifer says in the film, “I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t eat. I just sat on my couch, literally in shock, trying to figure out what the f— had happened. I forgot who I was — the happy, smiley, energetic Raz. Rock Camp was my first time getting back on stage and letting it all out. For me, it was a really big step. I was able to remember myself again. Music is my victory. It’s the reason I get out of bed every day and the power that keeps me alive.”
Also among the group was 28-year-old vocalist and guitarist Bar Rudaeff of Tel Aviv, the son of Kibbutz Nir Yitzhak’s former deputy security coordinator Lior Rudaeff, who was murdered while defending the kibbutz on Oct. 7. His remains were returned to Israel in November 2025.
For Rudaeff, performing with Tommy Aldridge, the legendary hard rock and heavy metal drummer who played with Ozzy Osbourne and Whitesnake, was a way of reaching his father — through a joy they shared.
“My dad really liked ’80s rock, like Deep Purple, Bon Jovi, Foreigner and Ozzy Osbourne, so when we played with Tommy, it was really meaningful and emotional,” he says in “The Bridge.” “Rock Camp gave me the opportunity to stop thinking, for a little while, about my dad not being here. Music really helped me cope and pulled out a lot of feelings that I was repressing. It was a ray of hope in the middle of one of our darkest periods and gave me the strength to move on.”
At Rock Camp, Fishof said, “Each survivor played on behalf of loved ones — whether family members or friends who had been killed or were still being held in captivity. Every note meant something to them.”
Bright added, “Music enabled them to take a break from Oct. 7 for a week. I think it was a well-deserved respite from everything that was going on in Israel at the time. One of the survivors says in the film, ‘I’m still living Oct. 7. The trauma doesn’t go away.’ At the time that ‘The Bridge’ was made, their trauma was even stronger, and so their ability just to participate was really impressive.”
Three years after that devastating day in October, the survivors are continuing to do what their people have done in the face of adversity for millennia: sing and make music.
Tuval performs regularly and has released two albums, including “Ahim” (“Brothers”), a nod to Yotam. Bar now produces music, including a fellow camper’s upcoming album. And Raz is touring as a full-time vocalist.
“Music is what kept my father alive during the Holocaust,” said Fishof. “It’s what kept him going, and it’s what keeps me and many others going. Because no matter what happens, no one can ever take away our music. If we have that, we have life.”
They tried to kill us. We survived.
Let’s sing.
And eat.
To find local screenings, visit thebridgedoc.com
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post They survived Oct. 7. At Rock Camp, they found a way to feel alive again. appeared first on The Forward.
