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Chassidic Gang Wars

“Supporters of rival candidates for the new spiritual head of the Satmar Chassidim clash on the streets of Williamsburg.” The outcome of the struggle now depends largely on the proceedings of civil courts. They have been asked to decide who the heir to the Satmar real estate empire is. Meanwhile we are left with a negative impression of the mix…

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World Cup, Jewish Style

How can I justify to you or to myself wasting hours in front of a television set watching two teams of bipeds struggle for possession of a lump of leather and no sooner do they get it then they try to get rid of it. They battle like tigers, pull bodies and shirts, kick each other’s groins, feign agony, jostle…

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Jeremy and the JC

Last week I let fly at the Jewish Chronicle. I received a lot of support from so many of my readers, with offers of good offices. But as is often the case, things have moved on. So here’s an update. This whole business started when I wrote in my weekly essay that the JC’s treatment of the Richard Desmond affair…

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Jewish Chronic

You remember last week I criticized the Jewish Chronicle (together with Anglo-Jewry, in general) for making an unnecessarily lurid item out of the Richard Desmond case? Well, they didn’t like it. Not one bit. So much so that I have been informed by email that I have been banned, excluded and blackballed from writing occasional pieces for them! Well, if…

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Richard Desmond

Richard Desmond is a wealthy English Jew. He is the publisher of the Daily Express, the Daily Star and OK Magazine (another one of those publications that succeed on the basis of the common man’s insatiable appetite for pictures and information about nonentities). He made his initial fortune through pornography, and he still runs TV Channels such as “Television X”,…

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American Idol

Britain has made some positive contributions to world culture over the years. But all this counts for very little compared to the impact of Britain’s rude, bad-tempered export, Simon Cowell, and his show Pop Idol, now transformed into American Idol. A whopping 34 million Americans watch American Idol weekly on television and (don’t ask me how or why), casting as…

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