A clandestine undertaking on behalf of Israel, the Jets and the Jews.

 
Jewish and Israeli Blog Awards

Nominations for the Jewish and Israeli blog awards have been announced and appear on the Jerusalem Post's web site. This blog has been nominated for best overall blog, best post, best series, and best politics and current affairs blog.

Here are my thoughts about some of the contenders in the various categories:

For best series, I've got to go with Hirhurim's informative, interesting and comprehensive series about The Religious Zionism Debate. At last count, Gil Student has posted seventeen times on this topic. Notwithstanding the nomination of a series that I wrote, Gil wins this category hands down.

For best post, I think my post about the Rabin murder and its impact on me is a pretty good candidate. Hopefully it'll get a few votes.

While there a number of strong blogs in the category of best Jewish religion blog, Hirhurim wins that one too.

I think Hirhurim also deserves strong consideration for best overall blog, but I could see some merit in voting for another blog in this category so that Gil doesn't hog the awards. Godol Hador and Bloghead will be among the leading candidates along with Hirhurim. There are lots of strong candidates, and I'm not sure who I'll vote for. Since I'm a big sports fan, can't stand the terrible coaching of Herm Edwards, have a moderate right-wing stance on Israel, find Steven Spielberg's 'Munich' to be objectionable, and am growing very frustrated by the increasing extremism among the right-wing charedi rabbinate, there's a possibility that I will vote for this blog. But I remain undecided.

In the best politics and current affairs blog, Bloghead and DovBear will likely duke it out, though I will probably vote for myself and invite those undecided between the Shavivs and DovBear to do the same.

In the best personal blog category, Elster's World, the blog of fellow Jets, Mets and Rangers (but not Nets) fan Elster, is a nominee, but I'll have to go with Robert Avrech's Seraphic Secret. It's too bad that MoChassid was not nominated in this category; some of MoC's personal posts have been outstanding.

In the competition for best group blog, I think Maven Yavin stands out. While I'm only an occasional reader due to time constraints, the quality of the participants and the posts are both extremely high and it is a compelling read.

Surprisingly, Godol Hador, while a nominee in several leading categories, is not a candidate for best humor blog, despite his excellent biting satire during the height of the Slifkin controversy.

Of course, there are many fine bloggers that have been nominated whom I haven't mentioned. There are now many Jblogs, of which I only read a handful, again because of time constraints.

The voting commences on January 9th. Best of luck to all of the candidates.
posted on 1/02/2006