Ami Magazine

''Ami Magazine'' () is an international news magazine that caters to the Orthodox Jewish community. It is published weekly in New York and Israel. The magazine was launched in November 2010 by Rabbi Yitzchok Frankfurter (previously Torah Editor for ''Mishpacha'') and his wife Rechy Frankfurter (previously ''Mishpachas American Desk Editor).

Coverage

''Ami'' has featured interviews with politicians including President Donald Trump, Senator Ted Cruz, Senator Marco Rubio, Newt Gingrich, Ron Paul, George Pataki, Ben Carson, former White House Press secretaries Sean Spicer and Ari Fleischer and former White House counsel John Dean. ''Ami'' has also interviewed rabbis including Yissachar Dov Rokeach, Yisrael Horowitz of Kaliv, Dovid Soloveitchik, Baruch Mordechai Ezrachi, Nissan Kaplan, Manis Friedman, Reuven Feinstein, and Nosson Scherman.

''Amis former political correspondent Jake Turx became the magazine's first member of the White House press corps with the start of the first Donald Trump administration. During a February 16, 2017 press briefing, Turx began asking a question about the government's response to antisemitic threats across the United States, but was stopped in mid-question by Trump, who felt he was being personally attacked and denied being antisemitic. Merriam-Webster reported that searches for "anti-semitism" spiked in the week following the Trump-Turx exchange.

In January 2025, Shloime Zionce became the magazine's White House correspondent, replacing Turx.

''Ami'' also produces a women's magazine called ''Ami Living'' and a tween magazine called ''Aim!''. They publish a standalone food magazine ''Whisk'' that is packaged with the rest of the ''Ami Magazine'' sections, as well as ''Ami Business'', a section in the main magazine featuring ''LunchBreak'' - interviews by Nesanel Gantz with businessmen and entrepreneurs, ''JTank'' - "the Jewish version of Shark Tank", and more. The issue released in the week before a Jewish festival often include two different main magazines.

''Ami'' journalists and writers have traveled to several continents and numerous countries, spanning North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Malta, Cuba, Iraq, the Nevada desert surrounding Area 51, Chernobyl, Afghanistan, a possible location of Mount Sinai, the burial place of Aharon HaKohen in Jordan, Murphy Ranch in California, and more.

On December 11, 2019, shortly before the first impeachment trial of Donald Trump, ''Ami'' published a poll it had taken among 723 Orthodox Jews, asking five questions, four of them pertaining to the presidency of Donald Trump, with an overwhelming majority expressing support for President Trump. The poll gained much fame after Trump tweeted it.

Staff

* John Loftus, columnist
* Rafael Medoff, columnist
* Rabbi Mordechai Kamenetzky (''rosh yeshiva'' of Yeshiva of South Shore)
* Rabbi Moshe Taub, rabbinic editor and weekly contributor
* Nesanel Gantz, business editor
* Shloime Zionce, senior White House correspondent
* Isaac Horowitz

Controversy

Some rabbis in the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn asked that ''Ami'' (along with the Jewish publications of ''Mishpacha'' and ''Hamodia'') not be read after the magazine published a piece about Jewish religious terrorism perpetrated by Sikrikim and sympathizers of the Jerusalem-based Edah HaChareidis organization. The Satmar Rebbe of Kiryas Joel, Rav Aaron Teitelbaum, along with various other Jewish leaders, have since that time condemned some of the communities which make up the Edah HaChareidis for alleged extremism.

In 2014, Ami Magazine featured a positive profile of the abusive Jewish cult Lev Tahor. The article was written by Ami Magazine's Editor-in-Chief Rabbi Yitzchok Frankfurter.

References

External links

Official website

Zev Brenner interviews Rabbi Frankfurter, publisher of Ami magazine, on the topic of child sexual abuse within the charedi community (14 December 2011)

"How Ami Magazine Convinced Me to Celebrate Yom HaAtzmaut"

{{Organized Jewish Life in the United States

News magazines published in the United States
Weekly magazines published in the United States
Jewish magazines published in New York City
Magazines established in 2010
Orthodox Judaism in New York City