Media coverage of Stephen Wise Free Synagogue has included feature articles and highlights in the many local, national and international news outlets. Below is some select coverage that highlights the synagogue.
Press inquiries may be directed to Communications Director Ryan Greiss at rgreiss@swfs.org or (212) 877-4050, ext. 267.
Washington Examiner: Muslim-Americans push Harris for new Gaza commitment during debate
Sep 9, 2024
Joe Biden won a sweeping majority of the Jewish-American vote in 2020, but some members of the key Democratic voting bloc continue to view Harris with skepticism after she chose Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN) as her running mate. “There’s a kind of suspicion that was in the back of our minds, and it’s creeping more to the center of our minds, that maybe it had something to do with the Jewishness of Governor Shapiro,” Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch, who leads the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, told the New York Times last month. “Even if it didn’t, that perception is not healthy for the Democratic Party,” he added.
The New York Times: For Some Jewish Democrats, Heightened Worries About Antisemitism
Aug 11, 2024
In The New York Times, our Rabbi Ammi Hirsch expresses his concerns about the hard left: anti-Zionism “is not healthy for the Democratic Party, and it is not healthy for the well-being of the American polity.”
Israel Hayom: ‘We knew that the virus of antisemitism had not disappeared, but America has always been different’
Jul 8, 2024
“A Pandora’s box was opened on the day of the October 7 massacre, and all the evil and the antisemitism that was released from it — including the inextricable ties between anti-Zionism and antisemitism were completely exposed,” surprising the vast majority of American Jews “who define themselves as Zionists and regard Israel as an important part of their Jewish identity,” our Rabbi Ammi Hirsch told Makor Rishon in an interview about the “new” antisemitism that has roiled America and the western world. (This interview was originally conducted in Hebrew for Makor Rishon and an English translation was published in Israel Hayom.)
Makor Rishon (Hebrew): ‘We knew that the virus of antisemitism had not disappeared, but America has always been different’
Jul 7, 2024
“A Pandora’s Box was opened on the day of the October 7 massacre, and all the evil and the antisemitism that was released from it — including the inextricable ties between anti-Zionism and antisemitism were completely exposed,” surprising the vast majority of American Jews “who define themselves as Zionists and regard Israel as an important part of their Jewish identity,” our Rabbi Ammi Hirsch told Makor Rishon in an interview about the “new” antisemitism that has roiled America and the western world.
Haaretz: Jewish Denominations in America Grapple With Calls to Ban anti-Zionists From Rabbinical Schools
Jun 26, 2024
Can someone train to become a rabbi in America if they don’t believe in Israel’s right to exist? What about graduating in a keffiyeh? Some community leaders — like prominent Reform rabbi Rabbi Ammi Hirsch, who has emerged as a voice of dissent within the movement — categorically say no, but others are wary of it leading to a slippery slope of litmus tests…
Religion News Service: Should I stay or should I go?
Jun 14, 2024
“In the immortal words of The Clash: ‘Should I stay or should I go?'” writes Rabbi Jeffrey Salkin in his Religion News Service column. “That was a question that was on the lips of many of us participating in the “Re-Charging Reform Judaism” conference at the end of May at Stephen Wise Free Synagogue in New York. An intergenerational gathering of more than 250 leaders of the movement struggled with the essential questions of Reform Jewish identity — and most notably: What does it mean for us, as Reform Jews and liberals, to be Zionists?”
Jewish Journal: Soul Searching: Reform Movement Aims to Liberate Its Zionist Calling
Jun 5, 2024
“The question before us is the same one that splintered the Reform movement a century ago and almost broke us: Are we truly committed to Jewish peoplehood? If so, what are our obligations flowing from that commitment? Are we truly committed to the Zionist idea and the State of Israel?” asked Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch in his passionate keynote address at the second Re-Charging Reform Judaism Conference at the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue on NYC’s Upper West Side May 29-30. But some of the other speakers at the two-day conference did not share the same Zionist passion and moral clarity…
JNS: Reform Judaism event probes post-Oct. 7 course corrections
Jun 3, 2024
Reform Judaism may be the epicenter of the ways that Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre and its aftermath have changed the American Jewish landscape. “We haven’t moved on. It’s still Oct. 7 for us,” Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch, senior rabbi at Stephen Wise Free Synagogue, told JNS. Some 300 clergy, educators and lay leaders associated with Reform Judaism—the largest American Jewish denomination—addressed a visible rift in liberal Jewry, including some anti-Zionist Jews siding with antisemites at anti-Israel demonstrations across the country. “We have a challenge identifying what exactly we did wrong, so that we can identify what we can do right with the future generations,” Hirsch said.
Ynet (Hebrew): Senior Reform rabbi in the USA: “There are young anti-Zionist Jews who are already lost to us”
Jun 2, 2024
Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch, one of the most prominent rabbis in the Reform movement in the United States, thinks that the liberal Jewish communities should denounce the anti-Zionist voices that have been growing stronger among the members of Generation Z. In a special interview, he calls for soul-searching in the movement: “We didn’t put enough emphasis on the commitment we have towards the rest of the Jews.”
The Forward: Yes, we can talk to people we disagree with about Israel. Here’s how.
May 31, 2024
“Nearly eight months after the Oct. 7 terror attack, and more than 76 years after the founding of the Jewish state, how is it that we have not figured out how to talk about Israel with people who disagree?” asks Forward editor-in-chief Jodi Rudoren. An Atlanta rabbi, a Miami couple and a Manhattan synagogue president shared their stories of difficult conversations at a workshop she led this past week about dialogue across generational and ideological difference. It was part of a two-day conference called Re-CHARGING Reform Judaism where leaders debated, among other things, whether anti-Zionists should be admitted to the movement’s rabbinical school, given the challenges they might face finding a pulpit job.