Episódios
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In the aftermath of Oct. 7, Canada's broadly left-wing literary community took aim at the Giller Prize, Canada's foremost award for fiction, for its title sponsorship coming from Scotiabank. The financial institution, they have argued, has millions of dollars invested in an Israeli arms dealer—leading to backlash from pro-Palestinian writers who began boycotting the Giller for taking $100,000 as prize money, withdrawing as entrants and judges.
The controversy has taken a lengthy, convoluted road since then, involving past winners speaking out critically of the Giller Prize; Elana Rabinovitch—the executive director of the prize and daughter of its founder—taking to traditional and social media to defend her organization's actions; and various half-measures by Scotiabank and Giller that have decreased (but not eliminated) their association with the Middle East conflict. Meanwhile, the competition is still going on, with a winner set to be announced on Nov. 18.
With Avi Finegold in Canada this week, he joins his Bonjour Chai co-host, Phoebe Maltz Bovy, in her living room to unpack this mess and discuss whether the criticism is legitimate or yet another example of antisemitism, framing big-money Jews as string-pulling villains.
They're joined by Michael Inzlicht, a professor of psychology at the University of Toronto and writer of the newsletter Speak Now Regret Later, who also happens to live in Phoebe's neighbourhood of Roncesvalles. Their community has seen a surge of pro-Palestinian signs in storefront windows over the past year, prompting the question: What do you do when controversial geopolitics come to your local coffee shop?
Credits
Hosts: Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy (@BovyMaltz)Production team: Michael Fraiman (producer), Zachary Kauffman (editor)Music: SocalledSupport The CJN
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With the U.S. election less than a week away, the hosts of Bonjour Chai are turning their attention south with a comprehensive pre-election primer. Pollsters tend to lump Jewish voters together in a bloc, but there are different priorities for Jewish communities across the United States—and Jewish residents of certain swing states, namely Pennsylvania, are seeing the brightest spotlight this year.
Besides, there are issues on the ballot beyond antisemitism and relations with Israel. Affordability, the economy and religious issues such as abortion rights all figure into Jewish voting patterns. Does Vice-President Kamala Harris's Jewish husband tip the scales? Do former president Donald Trump's Jewish daughter and son-in-law? How did Oct. 7 change things? Or does none of that matter in a presidential election that could be won more on vibes than facts?
To answer some of these questions, we're joined by William D. Adler, an associate professor at Northeastern Illinois University who specializes in American political development and the presidency.
Credits
Hosts: Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy (@BovyMaltz)Production team: Michael Fraiman (producer), Zachary Kauffman (editor)Music: SocalledSupport The CJN
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During our extended break for the High Holidays, we're bringing Bonjour Chai subscribers something different.
Sukkot is described as the holiday of joy—a time when the Israelites would gather together as one people in the temple to worship and to rejoice. The easy thing this year would be to say that we hope that we will be able to rejoice with everyone in sukkot, including all the returned hostages and all the soldiers home from the front. The truth is obviously more complicated, and one of things Avi keeps returning to is the complicated composition of world Jewry today.
That complicated relationship was what prompted him to write an extended piece in The CJN Magazine about the nature of Zionism and Jews' relationship to Israel and Zionism today, entitled, "What Do We Mean by Zion?" Today's podcast is an audio version of that article. Hopefully the joy this Sukkot is one of unity among Jews who once saw themselves far apart from those who they disagree with.
Credits
Hosts: Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy (@BovyMaltz)Production team: Michael Fraiman (producer), Zachary Kauffman (editor)Music: SocalledSupport The CJN
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Whenever there's a new mainstream TV show with a Jewish bent, Jewish audiences share a familiar reaction: excitement over representation, followed by dread over how bad that representation will be. The latest example is Nobody Wants This, the new Netflix rom-com series about a sex-advice podcast host (Kristen Bell) who, despite not being Jewish, falls for a hot young rabbi (Adam Brody). Gasp!
One key theme in the show is the nuance and viability of interfaith relationships, which, for Bonjour Chai co-host Phoebe Maltz Bovy, brought to mind the writer Meghan Daum. A prolific writer, Daum once penned a 1996 GQ piece called "American Shiksa", which appears in her 2001 collection of essays, My Misspent Youth, and which describes the common Jewish-guy-meets-non-Jewish-girl love story from the female perspective. On this week's episode, Daum joins to recall the origins of that article and helps dissects Netflix's new take on the age-old trope.
And after that, the hosts turn south to examine how Donald Trump spent the one-year Oct. 7 anniversary... by visiting the grave of Lubavitcher Rebbe and allegedly offering to sign siddurs.
Credits
Hosts: Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy (@BovyMaltz)Production team: Michael Fraiman (producer), Zachary Kauffman (editor)Music: SocalledSupport The CJN
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The cover illustration of the fall issue of The Canadian Jewish News Magazine drew hundreds of responses from readers across the country.
The image depicted a fictional family gathered for Rosh Hashanah. This family included a matronly woman in an apron wearing a yellow ribbon in support of bringing the hostages home; a young girl with a dog tag necklace in support of the Israel Defense Forces; two bearded men in a heated discussion; someone looking at footage of an explosion posted to Instagram on their smartphone; one woman clutching her forehead in apparent disappointment or frustration; and, most controversially, a young woman sporting a keffiyeh and watermelon earrings—a symbol of Palestinian solidarity.
The magazine’s editor-in-chief, Hamutal Dotan, joined Rabbi Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy for a robust discussion of the logic behind the drawing. After that, they discuss Phoebe's and Avi's articles inside: one on what Judaism has to say about Zion as a historic homeland for Jewish people, and one on the new philosemitism that's arisen since Oct. 7.
Read a condensed transcript of this conversation here.
Credits
Hosts: Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy (@BovyMaltz)Production team: Michael Fraiman (producer), Zachary Kauffman (editor)Music: SocalledSupport The CJN
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Last week, Toronto's public school board came under fire after footage emerged on social media showing students partaking in a public protest for Indigenous water rights... that also happened to feature pro-Palestinian chants and signs. A provincial investigation ensued to learn how it happened and why teachers allegedly encouraged students to get involved in the demonstrations, but while those slow bureaucratic gears turn, parents—especially Jewish ones—are unhappy. Bonjour Chai hosts Avi and Phoebe ask: should students ever be taken to a public protest as part of a school curriculum, even if parents agree with the cause?
After that, they dig into the Indigo boycott/buycott fiasco, sparked after Indigo mounted a legal challenge against a grassroots movement claiming they kill kids. The movement began because Indigo CEO Heather Reisman operates a separate charity that supports Israelis without families (who are in all likelihood lone soldiers), but has spiralled into Jews and allies proudly supporting Canada's singular monolithic bookstore entity as a badge of honour. Remember when people used to proudly support their local indie bookstore?
Finally, Ta Nehisi Coates has re-entered the public discourse, years after breaking ground with his argument for reparations for Black Americans. His topic this time? Israel-Palestine, something that's being marketed as a "taboo" subject for discussion by a public intellectual. Except... it really isn't. Everyone's talking about it. So what's going on?
Credits
Hosts: Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy (@BovyMaltz)Production team: Michael Fraiman (producer), Zachary Kauffman (editor)Music: SocalledSupport The CJN
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On a recent trip to Poland, the writer Tanya Gold visited the Auschwitz concentration camp memorial site. In her lengthy travel essay on the visit, "My Auschwitz Vacation", published in the September 2024 edition of Harper's Magazine, she details the numerous absurdities of the Disneyfied extermination camp, from its notable lack of Jews to the oft-overlooked nearby castle, waterfall and theme park.
On today's episode of Bonjour Chai, Tanya Gold joins to discuss her deeply personal journey, intermingled with the shifting lens of Holocaust memory in Poland, rising antisemitism in Europe, and the trap of focusing Holocaust education on death instead of life.
After that, hosts Avi and Phoebe discuss exploding Hezbollah pagers (are the jokes and memes hypocritical?) and the swift implosion of the storied British publication, the Jewish Chronicle.
Credits
Hosts: Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy (@BovyMaltz)Production team: Michael Fraiman (producer), Zachary Kauffman (editor)Music: SocalledSupport The CJN
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The Toronto International Film Festival is going on, and while it only has a handful of Jewish-themed or Israeli-produced films, those films have drawn some of the biggest spotlights. Chiefly among them has been The Bibi Files, a new work-in-progress documentary that received its world debut this week, and which shows never-before-seen leaked footage of people admitting to bribing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The prime minister himself amplified the film's popularity even more when he tried to block the Toronto screening in Israeli courts mere days before the event itself. (It remains unclear how, even if the Israeli court agreed with Netanyahu, they would have prevented an American film by an Australian director from screening in a Canadian festival.)
Yet while The Bibi Files got the most press attention, it didn't face the largest crowd of protests—that honour may go to Bliss, an actual Israeli film that is apolitical in nature, which debuted on the night of Sept. 11. That happened to be the same night Bari Weiss delivered a keynote address at the campaign launch of the UJA Federation of Greater Toronto—an event which also received an ample crowd of angry protesters.
Podcast producer Michael Fraiman joins Avi and Phoebe on Bonjour Chai to talk about these issues and more, including the minor political controversy that erupted when an NDP candidate in Montreal distributed leaflets depicting his smiling face before a Palestinian flag.
Credits
Hosts: Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy (@BovyMaltz)Production team: Michael Fraiman (producer), Zachary Kauffman (editor)Music: SocalledSupport The CJN
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Joshua Leifer made headline last month when he was slated to do a public talk at a Brooklyn bookstore about his debut book, Tablets Shattered: The End of an American Jewish Century and the Future of Jewish Life, and discovered, an hour before the event was scheduled to start, that the event had been unilaterally cancelled by an employee who didn't want to host a Zionist onstage. (The Zionist in question wasn't even Leifer—it was the Reform rabbi who would be interviewing Leifer, who, like Leifer, is quite progressive.) Leifer swiftly took to social media, and the story caught fire as the latest example of "cancel culture" silencing Jews in the real world.
To explain the real story of what happened and the fallout he's faced, Leifer joins Bonjour Chai to discuss the messy middle he's found himself in—how, despite writing a book that is critical of Israel, he's suddenly found himself supported by pro-Israel organizations and the Jewish community writ large.
And after that, he sticks around to help explain the recent wave of mass protests in Israel that erupted after six hostages were found murdered in Hamas tunnels. While North American spectators on both pro- and anti-Israel sides would like to map their viewpoints onto Middle Eastern politics, the realities are quite different—and more nuanced.
Credits
Hosts: Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy (@BovyMaltz)Production team: Michael Fraiman (producer), Zachary Kauffman (editor)Music: SocalledSupport The CJN
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It's time to head back to school—but this year, for some Jewish students in North America, school is going to look a little different. Some will be receiving what's known as a "classical" education: a curriculum based on a return to fundamentals, a focus on time-tested great books and a rejection of mandates that emphasize diversity and inclusion.
There are plenty of classical schools popping up, including Jewish ones. The Emet Classical Academy in Manhattan is welcoming its first-ever cohort of students this fall, with its founders kickstarting their work earlier than expected due to parents and students feeling unsafe in the public system. Rabbi Mark Gottlieb, the chief education officer of the Tikvah Fund, which operates the school, joins to explain why his team felt compelled to create a new space for Jewish students of all backgrounds.
And before that, Rabbi Eric Grossman, head of school at the Akiva School in Montreal, sits down with Avi and Phoebe to talk more broadly about this trend toward classical education in Jewish circles and beyond. To wit: if most of Jewish education is based on the Torah and Mishnah, how much more classical can you get?
Credits
Hosts: Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy (@BovyMaltz)Production team: Michael Fraiman (producer), Zachary Kauffman (editor)Music: SocalledSupport The CJN
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Canadian Jews may have noticed a trend in their communities this summer: Conservative politicians making the rounds. Leader Pierre Poilievre, Deputy Leader Melissa Lantsman and even former prime minister Stephen Harper have all made numerous appearances at synagogues, pro-Israel rallies and fundraising galas. It's nothing new to see the country's political right wing court Jewish voters—such a swing was cemented under Harper's government—but it feels especially pronounced this summer, coming up on the one-year anniversary of Oct. 7 and an approaching election.
But Jewish institutions have historically been apolitical, and the broad rightward shift almost certainly makes members of the community feel excluded. What are the ramifications of this tight-knit union? Here to dissect the issue is The CJN's political columnist Josh Lieblein. He joins Bonjour Chai co-hosts Avi and Phoebe, who return from their summer vacations—Phoebe's having been blissfully apolitical in Europe, while Avi's culminated in a drive back to Chicago during the Democratic National Convention.
And after that, Phoebe explains the bigger picture behind the abrupt cancellation of a book event in Brooklyn—not even because the author was Zionist, but because the interviewer was.
Credits
Hosts: Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy (@BovyMaltz)Production team: Michael Fraiman (producer), Zachary Kauffman (editor)Music: SocalledSupport The CJN
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Avi and Phoebe are taking a little summer vacation and will return soon. In the meantime, we're presenting an episode of The CJN Daily that Avi was on earlier this summer about kosher slaughter in Canada.
Last week, the Federal Court of Canada sided with Jewish communities in Montreal and Toronto in their dispute with the federal government over new biological guidelines covering how cows are slaughtered. On July 24, the judge granted kosher meat producers a temporary injunction, effectively pausing the enforcement of new guidelines that are aimed at ensuring animals don’t feel undue pain when they’re killed.
Jewish groups such as Montreal Kosher and the Kashruth Council of Canada argued in court that the guidelines not only were bad science, but were not in keeping with ritual practice, and were too costly. Which is why the judge felt he needed to act quickly so as to preserve the religious freedoms enjoyed by Canadian Jews who’ve been legally permitted to use handheld ritual slaughter methods for generations. The judge’s ruling took religion and culture into consideration, including how trained shochetim carry out a vital religious service for the Canadian Jewish community, and also the importance of eating meat on Jewish holidays.
But do Jews really need to eat meat? How many shochet jobs are actually at direct risk? And, perhaps most important to the majority of kosher-keeping Canadians, will the price for kosher meat go down? Rabbi Avi Finegold, host of The CJN’s weekly current affairs podcast Bonjour Chai, joins The CJN Daily to share his insight, and we’ll also hear from Shimon Koffler Fogel, the CEO of the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, who were directly involved in the case.
What we talked about
Why the Federal Court granted a temporary injunction July 24 allowing _shechita _to resume without subsequent bolt-stunning, in The CJNHear why MK Kosher and COR went to Federal Court over the CFIA’s new shechita _guidelines, on The CJN Daily_Read more about the science behind kosher animal slaughter and Canada’s new slaughtering guidelines for cattle, on The CJN DailyCredits
The CJN Daily is written and hosted by Ellin Bessner (@ebessner on Twitter). Zachary Kauffman is the producer. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Dov Beck-Levine. We’re a member of The CJN Podcast Network. To subscribe to this podcast, please watch this video. Donate to The CJN and receive a charitable tax receipt by clicking here. Hear why The CJN is important to me.
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This week, the hosts of Bonjour Chai are digging into the explosive world of U.S. politics. It began with President Joe Biden announcing on July 21 that he would, after significant pressure and plummeting poll numbers, drop his bid for re-election as the Democratic nominee for president. The next day, Vice-President Kamala Harris all but secured her spot as his replacement, raising historic amounts of money for her campaign within 24 hours. Immediately, questions were raised about her stance on Israel and Palestine, as well as her possible VP pick, Josh Shapiro.
Then, on July 24, Israel's leader, Benjamin Netanyahu, happened to be in Washington, D.C., for a visit. He met with Biden for 90 minutes and Harris for 40, all while angry crowds protested outside, raising effigies and Israeli flags slathered in painted blood. Netanyahu himself gave a mostly predictable speech to Congress, ensuring politicians how closely aligned Israeli and American interests are.
To help dissect the chaos, including ramifications for both American and Canadian Jews, Avi and Phoebe are joined for a second time by Gabby Deutch, senior national correspondent at Jewish Insider. Read her coverage here and follow her on Twitter.
Credits
Bonjour Chai is hosted by Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy. Zachary Kauffman is the producer and editor. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Socalled. The show is a co-production from The Jewish Learning Lab and The CJN, and is distributed by The CJN Podcast Network. Support the show by subscribing to this podcast, donating to The CJN and subscribing to the podcast's Substack.
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Last week, two very different sex-related 1980s icons passed away: Dr. Ruth Westheimer, the 4'7" German-born Holocaust survivor, who was 96; and Richard Simmons, whose mother was Jewish, and who rose to fame as a sweat-focused TV fitness guru whose personal sexuality was famously ambiguous .
So, clearly, the hosts of Bonjour Chai had sex on the brain. What sexual-education lessons remain for Jews in different religious communities? What are the stigmas and secrets still hindering progress? What legacy does Dr. Ruth leave the world? To discuss these these themes and more, we're joined by Dr. Laurie Betito, a Montreal-based clinical psychologist with a specialty in sex therapy, who has also spent decades broadcasting on the radio and currently hosts the podcast Passion with Dr. Laurie Betito.
Credits
Bonjour Chai is hosted by Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy. Zachary Kauffman is the producer and editor. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Socalled. The show is a co-production from The Jewish Learning Lab and The CJN, and is distributed by The CJN Podcast Network. Support the show by subscribing to this podcast, donating to The CJN and subscribing to the podcast's Substack.
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This month, two major elections have changed the European political landscape. In both France and the United Kingdom, progressive parties have overcome significant right-wing counterparts, overthrowing 14 years of British Conservative power and staving off Marine Le Pen's far-right National Rally party in a surprising result. Jews, as they often are, find themselves caught in the middle. Should they be celebrating the victory of left-wing parties more likely to harbour anti-Israel members, or would a more pro-Israel right-wing result have been better—despite, in France's case, the National Rally having roots in Holocaust denial and hate speech?
Some have argued that Jews should simply pack up and move to Israel. (Canadian-born Israeli politician Sharren Haskel made this exact point on The CJN Daily earlier this week.) But Avi and Phoebe disagree: people can, and should, live wherever they like, and Israel is not exactly safer. The hosts of Bonjour Chai break down the Canadian takeaways and Jewish lessons from a tumultuous week in overseas elections.
Then, they take a lashon hara lens to the shocking revelations about the late Alice Munro's neutral stance toward her husband's abuse of her own daughter, and cap things off with a breakdown of all the hate mail that Phoebe "Matzo Ball" Maltz Bovy got for writing a column in the Globe and Mail questioning the statistics of modern-day bisexuals.
Credits
Bonjour Chai is hosted by Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy. Zachary Kauffman is the producer and editor. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Socalled. The show is a co-production from The Jewish Learning Lab and The CJN, and is distributed by The CJN Podcast Network. Support the show by subscribing to this podcast, donating to The CJN and subscribing to the podcast's Substack.
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It was true before Oct. 7, but especially afterwards: an increasing number of progressive-minded people are viewing Jews as settlers in Israel. "Go back to Europe," some especially antisemitic ones chant at rallies. But it begs the question: if Jews are settlers in Israel, where aren't we settlers?
Ben Wexler, a writer and academic who recently graduated from McGill University, has been thinking about this question a lot. He recently published an essay in the French Jewish magazine K. Les Juifs, l'Europe, le XXIe siècle, titled "The Eternal Settler". In it, Wexler discusses the troubling rise in antisemitic violence, often carried out under the guise of decolonization and conflated with criticism of the Israeli government.
To explore the topic more, Wexler joins to discuss colonization, settler identity and the perception of Jews as settlers. And after that, he joins hosts Avi and Phoebe in talking global political trends: the rightward shift of France, the United States and Canada may be good for Israel... but is it good for the Jews?
Credits
Bonjour Chai is hosted by Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy. Zachary Kauffman is the producer and editor. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Socalled. The show is a co-production from The Jewish Learning Lab and The CJN, and is distributed by The CJN Podcast Network. Support the show by subscribing to this podcast, donating to The CJN and subscribing to the podcast's Substack.
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What does Palestine have in common with climate change, gender equality and indigenous rights? The Omnicause, that's what. In the modern era of left-wing protests, these issues become conflated—think queer Palestinians, viewed as indigenous to their homeland, fighting climate change with organic farming practices. Or something.
Perhaps something not so cartoonish: indeed, there are clear links between, say, First Nations rights here in Canada and the fight for climate justice, given the First Nations' connection to the land and how their reserves are often disproportionately affected by climate change. Racial justice and police reform go hand-in-hand. But the ties that bind such progressive causes start to weaken when you add Middle Eastern politics to the mix. Would any member of "Queers Against Apartheid" actually visit Gaza after coming out? Is Hamas interested in climate justice?
It's a conflation that struck writer Hadley Freeman, who returns to Bonjour Chai to chat about all things Omnicause and the eternal plight of progressive Jews. Read her piece, "Welcome to The Omnicause, the fatberg of activism", in the Jewish Chronicle.
And after that, Avi and Phoebe discuss Israel's new court ruling insisting Haredi men serve in the army, and the centre-right shift in North American politics following electoral upsets in Toronto and New York.
Credits
Bonjour Chai is hosted by Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy. Zachary Kauffman is the producer and editor. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Socalled. The show is a co-production from The Jewish Learning Lab and The CJN, and is distributed by The CJN Podcast Network. Support the show by subscribing to this podcast, donating to The CJN and subscribing to the podcast's Substack.
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The trope of Hasidic women leaving their communities—particularly during a journey of queer self-discovery—is not exactly unique. And yet, memoirs and documentaries continue to come out, the latest being Kissing Girls on Shabbat by Sara Glass, who is now a therapist. After Phoebe Maltz Bovy reviewed the book for The CJN, she had more questions—so we invited Glass on to ask them directly. The three discuss the nature of choice in a world dictated by authority figures, queer spaces in Judaism and how the community can change in the future.
After that, Phoebe and Avi discuss whether the trend of attractive "rat-like" men is antisemitic, as well as a problematic essay about motherhood recently published in Tablet, "How Babies Are Made".
Credits
Bonjour Chai is hosted by Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy. Zachary Kauffman is the producer and editor. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Socalled. The show is a co-production from The Jewish Learning Lab and The CJN, and is distributed by The CJN Podcast Network. Support the show by subscribing to this podcast, donating to The CJN and subscribing to the podcast's Substack.
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We're taking the week off for Shavuot. Instead, we're airing a new episode of a podcast miniseries from our friends at the Jewish Public Library, called recollections. Avi and Phoebe will be back next week.
May 2024 marks the 110th anniversary of the Jewish Public Library. Our opening season is a celebration of our Jewish Leftist roots in Montreal. In this podcast, we weave together interviews with scholars, activists, teachers, and fellow archivists that discuss topics such as Jewish immigration to Canada, Jewish languages and culture, labour and feminist movements in the 20th century, and the diversity of political ideologies that existed within the 'left'.
Labour organizing, unions, and activism: Episode 3, "Labour of Love", highlights the impact language, culture, and Jewish identity had on Montreal's progressive labour history with a special focus on famed organizer Lea Roback.
Thank you to our featured guests, in order of appearance: Pierre Anctil, Ester Reiter, Sam Bick, Moishe Dolman, Aaron Krishtalka, Melanie Leavitt, Eiran Harris, Lea Roback, Eddie Paul, and Shannon Hodge.
recollections with the JPL is a production of the Jewish Public Library Archives and Special Collections. Visit JPL Curates to see licensing info, guest bios, related materials from the JPL Archives and Special Collections, and our further reading guide featuring works from JPL's catalogue.
Donate to the Jewish Public LibraryFollow @jplarchives and @jpl_montreal on InstagramJPLArchives.orgJewishPublicLibrary.orgProduction and editing by Ezell Carter and Ellen BelshawResearch support by Leah Graham, Sam Pappas, Maya Pasternak, and Eddie PaulMastering by Josh BoguskiTheme song and music by Danijel ZamboSound effects provided by Pixabay and the JPL ArchivesThank you to our sponsors, the Azrieli Foundation and Federation CJA
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Israel had some strange bedfellows in the news this week. The New York Times unveiled that country's Ministry of Diaspora Affairs created social media bots that posted AI-generated comments to influence American lawmakers and the general public; meanwhile, a rally against antisemitism in Manhattan drew headlines when it was revealed that the organization behind the rally was a Messianic Jewish group that aims to convert Jews to believe in Jesus.
While the stories are different, the underlying theme is the same: Israel is increasingly isolated around the world, with ever-sinking public opinion and international allies growing distant. When good PR is hard to come by, you end up with AI-created bots and Jews for Jesus as suddenly noteworthy friends.
Avi and Phoebe discuss these topics on this week's episode of Bonjour Chai, with special guest Rabbi Michael Skobac of Jews for Judaism, an organization created in direct response to Jews for Jesus.
Credits
Bonjour Chai is hosted by Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy. Zachary Kauffman is the producer and editor. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Socalled. The show is a co-production from The Jewish Learning Lab and The CJN, and is distributed by The CJN Podcast Network. Support the show by subscribing to this podcast, donating to The CJN and subscribing to the podcast's Substack.
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