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 highlight the synagogue.
Press inquiries may be directed to Communications Director Ryan Greiss at rgreiss@swfs.org or (212) 877-4050, ext. 267.
Tablet: The Believer
Jan 25, 2022
“Ammiel Hirsch is the most prominent Reform rabbi who is willing to publicly challenge his colleagues’ alleged complacency toward the movement’s commitment to Israel,” writes Tablet’s Armin Rosen in a profile of our senior rabbi.
JTA: Desmond Tutu, anti-apartheid leader who identified with Jews and criticized Israel’s treatment of Palestinians, dies at 90
Dec 26, 2021
Desmond Tutu, the archbishop who identified closely with the historical suffering of the Jewish people in his forceful advocacy against apartheid in South Africa, has died at age 90. In 1989, Stephen Wise Free Synagogue honored him for his work fighting racial discrimination.
Jewish Journal: Does Radical Ignorance Deserve a Seat at the Table?
Dec 22, 2021
Writing in the Jewish Journal about American Jews’ “radical ignorance” of their own history, Josh Feldman quotes our Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch, who lambasted the idea that Israel is committing genocide as “a colossal, catastrophic failure of the American Jewish establishment: Rabbis, teachers, schools—all of us.”
Jewish Insider: Diaspora affairs minister ‘doesn’t accept’ delays to Kotel plan
Dec 15, 2021
Following a report that the Israeli government has frozen the implementation of a deal for a state-recognized egalitarian prayer section at the Western Wall, our Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch told Jewish Insider he was “disappointed” but not surprised just days after positive discussions he and others had with Israeli Diaspora Affairs Minister Nachman Shai on the subject.
MacaroniKID: Early Childhood Education Is More Important Now Than Ever
Dec 6, 2021
Children who missed out on a year of schooling are at a disadvantage, writes Miriam Kalmar, our ECC’s director. “Your children’s futures – and our future as a society – depend on their developing healthy social emotional skills that will ensure their lifelong success.”
CNN: Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch with Alisyn Camerota and Victor Black
Dec 2, 2021
On CNN Newsroom, our Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch discussed Fox News host Lara Logan’s comparisons of Dr. Fauci to Josef Mengele: “It’s demoralizing, despicable and depressing that our culture has deteriorated to the point that we can’t disagree without equating each other with the worst evil we can think of.”
Times of Israel: For the love of Israel, we need to say: The Reform Movement is Zionist
Nov 30, 2021
In The Times of Israel, our Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch urges the Reform movement to respond to recent publicity around seminary students’ anti-Zionist sentiments and clarify its values and principles: “For the record, the Reform movement is a Zionist movement. Every single branch of our movement – the synagogue arm, the rabbinic union, and our seminary – is Zionist and committed ideologically and theologically to Israel.”
JTA: This catchy ‘West Side Story’ Hanukkah parody was filmed on location in New York
Nov 23, 2021
New York-based Jewish a cappella group Six13’s latest “A West Side Chanukah Story” was filmed on location in New York, including here at Stephen Wise Free Synagogue.
Times of Israel: It Ain’t Necessarily So: Guy Mintus Sings Gershwin
Nov 20, 2021
In his Times of Israel blog, our Cantor Dan Singer analyzes Israeli jazz musician Guy Minuts’s unique take on “It Ain’t Necessarily So” from “Porgy and Bess.”