journalist political scientist deputy
Jager was born and raised on New York City"s Lower East Side. His father was a Rumanian-born Holocaust survivor who left for Israel when Jager was eight. Raised by his mother Yvette, Jager received a strictly Orthodox Jewish education at Yeshiva Chasam Sofer and Mesiftha Tiffereth Jerusalem.
He obtained a Bachelor in Judaic Studies (cum laude) from Brooklyn College in 1977, and completed his Master of Arts (1988) and Doctor of Philosophy (1994) in political science at New York University.
He is a former editorial page editor of The Jerusalem Post and currently a senior contributing editor at The Jerusalem Report. He worked for the New York City Department of Health from 1973 until 1997 while attending college and university in the evening. Jager headed the control unit of the agency"s lead poisoning program and was office services director for the bureau of operations before he left the agency.
From 1984 until 1997 he regularly taught political science as an adjunct visiting professor at New York University, Baruch-City University of New York, Hofstra and Rutgers.
Jager"s dissertation, examined the activities of the organized American Jewish community in regard to the 1988 decision by the United States to enter into a diplomatic dialogue with the Palestine Liberation Organization. In 2015, Jager made the dissertation available in a digital form under the title "Leverage: How United States. Presidents Use the American Jewish Community to Pressure Israel".
Between 1997 and 1999 Jager was a contributor to The Connecticut Jewish Ledger and The Philadelphia Jewish Exponent. He joined the staff of The Jerusalem Post in 1999 holding various editorial positions at the paper including literary editor, week-in-review editor, op-ed editor, and— taking over from Saul Singer—editorial page editor reporting to editor-in-chief David Horovitz.
Jager left the Post to become the founding managing editor of Jewish Ideas Daily (now Mosaic).
He became a freelance writer in 2013 contributing regularly to such outlets as Newsmax and Israel My Glory magazine. The book has been favorably received in Haaretz, The Jerusalem Post, Times of Israel, Commentary, Huffington Post, Jewish News Service and referenced in various other outlets including Tablet, Mosaic, Contact, and the New York Jewish Week. Jager became a community activist in high-school serving as a fixer for Paul Cowan whose exposé series in The Village Voice called attention to the neglected plight of New York City"s 10,000 elderly Jewish poor.
In 1969, he was appointed deputy lower Manhattan youth coordinator of the Jewish Defense League under the late Eugene Singer.
In 1973, he co-founded with William Rapfogel Lower East Side People newspaper. Jager went on to serve on the boards of Americans for a Safe Israel, the Manhattan Region of the Zionist Organization of America, and became advertising director of the Coalition for Israel.
