Tabby Refael
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Moment Magazine
Reboot
AISH
JJ Cover Stories
JJ Humor Columns
JJ October 7 Massacre
JJ Mizrahi Advocacy Columns
JJ Iran & the Middle East Columns
JJ Antisemitism
JJ Identity and Religion Columns
JJ Women
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Distinctions Sephardic/Mizrahi Journal
Back
About Tabby
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Death to Smarties
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On Doodool Tala Syndrome
Five Practices Our Persian Mothers Got Right
Thanks to Persian Music, I Have Issues
The Literal Glory of Persian
Why Do Persian Parents Call Their Kids 'Mom' and 'Dad'?
How to Navigate a Taarof
The Farce of Farsi
How To Make Perfect Persian Rice
Contact
Awards
Articles
Newsweek
Los Angeles Magazine
Los Angeles Review of Books
White Rose Magazine
Moment Magazine
Reboot
AISH
JJ Cover Stories
JJ Humor Columns
JJ October 7 Massacre
JJ Mizrahi Advocacy Columns
JJ Iran & the Middle East Columns
JJ Antisemitism
JJ Identity and Religion Columns
JJ Women
JJ Personality Profiles
JJ COVID-19 Columns
JJ General Musings
JJ Film & Book Reviews
JJ Miscellaneous Columns
JJ Teacher Tributes
JJ Dear Tabby
Distinctions Sephardic/Mizrahi Journal
Podcasts
About Tabby
About Tabby
Speaking Engagements
Profiles of Tabby
Memoir
Death to Smarties
Podcasts
Profiles of Tabby
Tabby Refael
"A prominent chronicler of Persian L.A."--Los Angeles Times
News
Blog
On Doodool Tala Syndrome
Five Practices Our Persian Mothers Got Right
Thanks to Persian Music, I Have Issues
The Literal Glory of Persian
Why Do Persian Parents Call Their Kids 'Mom' and 'Dad'?
How to Navigate a Taarof
The Farce of Farsi
How To Make Perfect Persian Rice
COLUMNS ON IRAN & THE MIDDLE EAST
A Prince Among Men
(an interview with Iran’s Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi)
Miniskirts and Miracles: Imagining a Free Iran
(possibly my favorite column)
Seven Things to Know About Iran Right Now
(they opened a clinic for what?!)
Raisi v. Satan: The Case for Relocation (A Satire-Part I)
Haniyeh Meets Satan (and Reunites with Raisi)
—Another Satire-Part II)
Hezbollah Learns That Having Pagers Is a Blast
(Still Another Satire-Part III)
The Satan Series (Part IV): Sinwar and Nasrallah Can’t Believe They’re in Hell
(Yet Another Satire Part IV)
Did Israeli Women Just Help Restore Deterrence to the Middle East?
(helmets versus clubs)
Let’s Play ‘Name That Tyrant!’ (A Quiz)
How Ancient Persians Essentially Saved Judaism As We Know It Today
(yes, Cyrus the Great was a Zionist)
Why Aren’t We Exposing More Palestinian Hate Against America?
In G-d (and Preemptive Strikes) We Trust
(and a reminder that scorpions are dangerous)
We Need to Talk about Iran
(it’s time)
“Go To Hell”: What Yemeni Jews in Israel Want the Houthis to Know
(also, their Jachnun is better)
What Will Become of the Jews of Iran? Part One
(they were forced to do
what
in Fall 2023?!)
What Will Become of the Jews of Iran? Part II
(and can they leave Iran?)
Next Year in Tehran
(dedicated to my Uncle Mansour, z”l)
Mahsa Amini and the Meaning of Rosh Hashanah
(what Amini taught me about how to live)
Why a New Jewish Documentary Podcast, ‘The Nightingale of Iran,’ Absolutely Soars
What If Israel Is the Most-Loved Country on Earth?
(no, really)
The Crown Prince in Israel
(and why the other shoe often drops)
It’s the Intifada, Stupid
(no, really)
It’s Been One Year Since Salman Rushdie Was Attacked. Does Anyone Still Care?
(and how is Rushdie doing today?)
The Man Whom So Many of Us Forgot to Thank
(and now, it’s too late)
For Iranians in the Diaspora, This Is the Most Important Moment of Our Lives
(and yes, it’s a revolution)
Want to Be Pro-Israel? Support Iranians
(a vital read for anyone concerned about Iran and Israel)
While Beijing Abuses Muslims, Palestinians Woo China
(what did Mahmoud Abbas just say?!)
Lost in Translation: Forty Years after the Iranian Revolution
[COVER STORY]
As Fear and Frustration Rise in Iran, What is Our President Doing?
(and why one couple was arrested in Tehran)
Know Her Name: Mahsa Amini
(the women whose battered face launched a thousand burning headscarves)
In Honor of Israel’s Birthday, I Talked to Israeli Grandmothers
(yes, grandmothers)
What Israeli Grandmothers Had to Say About Israel on Its 75th Birthday (Part II)
Twenty-Five Head-Scratching Questions About Jews, Israel and the Middle East
(Canada did what?!)
In Iran, We Need a Bombardment of Imagery
(public diplomacy, Persian style)
One Israel Story You’ve Probably Never Heard (the unbelievable incident of September1994)
Have You Heard of the Farhud?
(why haven’t more people heard of the Nazi-era massacre of Iraqi Jews?)
Why Have So Many Jewish Siblings Been Taken from Us in Recent Months?
(is there a deeper message?)
An Irreplaceable Loss for Iranian Jewry
(on the incredible legacy of Faryar Nikbakht)
How Social Activists Came to Gang Up On Israel
(I should have seen it coming, but I didn’t)
Israel Sixteen Years Later: New Wars, New Hope
(same PA authority president)
An Interview With My Iranian Mother
(enough said)
For Father’s Day, I’m Interviewing My Iranian Father
(thanks, Dad)
Mordechai Ben-Porat Brought 130,000 Iraqi Jews to Israel. So Why Haven’t More Israelis Heard of Him?
One Celebrity I’d Really Like to Send to the Middle East
(specifically, to a beach in Gaza City)
Why Do Jews Have Such a Love Affair with the IDF?
(and that includes my mother)
Are We Ready to Talk About Slavery in the Middle East?
(a critical perspective)
Visionary Women Are Creating Groundbreaking STEAM Programs in Israel
(and two of them are Druze)
In the Dark: The Lesser-Known Struggles of Young Iranian-American Jews
(COVER STORY)
Where Were You on 9/11? (SEPTEMBER 2021 COVER STORY)
Are Jews in Iran Safe? Don’t Ask a Rabbi in Tehran
(exposing an unprecendented warning against Iran’s Jewish community)
Why Did So Many World Leaders Attend the Inauguration of Iran’s Murderous President?
(including an E.U leader)
Will Eco-Terrorism Become the New Threat to Israel?
(how a deliberate Iranian oil spill could spell disaster for Israel)
Menashe Amir: The Voice of a People
(how millions of people in Iran came to rely on a radio station in…Jerusalem)
America and Israel: A Tale of Two Memorial Days
(Americans could learn a thing or two from Israel’s Memorial Day)
Why Is Iran So Afraid of a Woman with Big Hair?
Because She Lives in America (the plot to kidnap a journalist in NY)
Picasso and Pollock in Tehran? Thank Donna Stein for That
(the world’s second biggest collection of modern art is
where
?!)
A Decade Later, Hope
(on the wedding of Tamar Fogel, who was left orphaned by Palestinian terrorists in 2011)
Where Was I on 9/11?
(how an Iranian refugee processed that horrifying day)
Something Tells me Hamas has More Rockets than Vaccines
(priorities of a terrorist regime)
Play It Again, Sam
(Iranian American Jews and civic action)
Life as a Female, Iranian Rabbi
(the first of her kind in Iranian Jewish history)
Trauma: From Tehran to the Capitol Breach
(how recent events remind me of a land I thought I’d left behind)
I’m Jealous of the Abraham Accords
(and that lovely, new bride)
Iran Arrested a Popular Rapper Anyone Care
(No. No, they don’t).
What Do You Do for the Man Who Saved Your Life Again and Again?
(gratitude for my father)
Al Jazeera and the Art of Deception
(when it comes to AJ+ tweets, seeing is believing)
Can Iran’s Ayatollah Tweet about Cats?
(it’d be such a welcome respite from tweeting about genocide)
America Held Hostage, 40 Years Ago
(on how little a new generation knows about the Iran hostage crisis)
Toto, We’re Not in Tehran Anymore
(a response to the anti-Semitic attack against a Persian synagogue in Beverly Hills)
Celebrating Persian New Year in LA, With a 1970s Twist
(also known as “Disco Jaan”)
I’ve Been Waiting 15 Years for this Wedding
(so have millions of Jews worldwide)
Persian and Jewish. American and Jewish. Jewish and American
(the blessings and woes of the triple identity)
Five Things to Know About Qassem Soleimani
(important consideration about an Iranian mass murderer)
Liar, Liar, Revolution on Fire
(reflections on one the worst terrorist attacks the world seldom remembers)
ADL Report Reveals Iranian Textbooks Are Seething with Anti-Semitism and Incitement
(oh, those pesky Iranian textbooks)
Trump’s Last Parting Gift Is One Even He Didn’t Anticipate
(and it’s a big one)
Meet the Iranian American Jew Running for California’s Democratic Party
(whose grandfather served in Iran’s pre-revolutionary parliament)
Iranian Women’s Rights Activist Masih Alinejad to Speak on Yom Kippur
(the critical importance of dialogue and storytelling)