Hillel Kuttler

Hillel Kuttler’s feature stories have appeared in the N.Y. Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Smithsonian Magazine, People, the magazines of the National Baseball Hall of Fame and of the National Football League and scores more publications. He’s interviewed an American president, an Israeli prime minister, diplomats, authors, athletes, musicians, a felon, Red Auerbach and even his own sons. Hillel also has edited books, newspapers and magazines. Above all, he’s a diehard fan of the New York Mets.

John F. Kennedy and Israel: A Look Back

Recalling the 35th president’s impact on American-Israeli relations.

Barney Dreyfuss, a Jewish Under-the-Radar Baseball Hall of Famer

The German immigrant arrived in America in 1881 and left an imprint on its national pastime, including launching the World Series championship.

The Singing Rabbi

Shlomo Carlebach’s musical influence endures across the Jewish world, more than a century after his birth.

George Gershwin: A Jewish Voice in the American Soundscape

“I think that many of my themes are Jewish in feeling, although they are purely American in style,” Gershwin, one of the greatest composers in U.S. history, said. His wondrous music still defies categorization.

The Inner Workings of a Library … and a Person

“To the Internal Libraries,” artist Hadassa Goldvicht’s new video exhibition at the NLI, is a behind-the-scenes journey through the stacks of the institution’s previous building, one that also serves as a meditation on pain, healing and the body’s own inner systems.

Remembering Jawad Amer: The War’s First Fallen Druze Soldier

On the third day of the ongoing war, Jawad, 23, was killed in battle, the first of 14 Druze-Israeli soldiers to fall. His family and his hometown of Hurfeish remember him with pride.

Leo Frank, 1915: The Case America Still Reckons With

More than a century after the lynching of a Jewish-American man in Georgia, rising antisemitism makes the tragedy’s warning painfully clear.

The Continuing Evolution of Tisha B’Av

Over the centuries, the most somber day in the Hebrew calendar has become associated with different tragedies across Jewish history. It is a process that still continues.

Emma Lazarus: Overlooked at the Statue of Liberty, But Hardly Forgotten

The 19th-century writer and social activist, a Jewish resident of New York, penned what became a legendary poem symbolizing America’s embrace of immigrants. She was born 176 years ago this month.

Between Tehran and Tel Aviv: The Diaspora Caught in the Middle

During the latest exchange of bombardments between Israel and Iran, Jewish and Muslim emigrants in the United States looked back toward their homeland — and checked on each other.