DECEMBER 14, 2018

VOL. LXXXVIII NO. 13 $1.00 87 2018

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Wilco singer Jeff Tweedy tells
the story of his conversion to Judaism
● The news has been out there
for years, but for many rock and
folk music fans it might still be a
surprise.
Jeff Tweedy, the frontman and
songwriter for the beloved alterna-
tive rock band Wilco, has convert-
ed to Judaism.
Tweedy, who is doing interviews
these days to promote his new al-
bum “Warm” and his new memoir
“Let’s Go (So We Can Get Back),”
described the whole story in a
recent chat with Jewish comedian
Marc Maron on his “WTF” podcast.
And it’s a great story.
Tweedy, 51, is married to Sue
Miller, a former talent agent who
is Jewish. Both of their sons have
had bar mitzvahs.
“I find myself extremely comfort-
able and attracted to secular Juda-
ism,” he said.
When his older son, Spencer,
started to struggle with his bar
mitzvah training, Tweedy offered
to go to the synagogue with him to talk with the rabbi.
He said he offered to convert, if the rabbi let him, if
Spencer learned his Torah portion.
And convert he did.
4 of 10 finalists in U.N. travel-tech contest are Israeli
● Israeli startups Refundit, Pruvo,
SeeVoov, and Howazit captured
four of the 10 finalist slots in the
inaugural United Nations World
Tourism Organization startup
competition. They bested 3,000
other applicants from 132 countries.
“This is a significant achieve-
ment for companies in the field of
Tweedy said his wife says she can’t go to Germany
because “whenever she hears anyone saying anything
in German she thinks they’re saying, ‘Get in the oven.’”
tourism technology in Israel, which
positions Israel as a global leader in
the domain,” Economy Minister Eli
Cohen said.
The competition, run in partner-
ship with Globalia, Spain’s larg-
est tourism corporation, aims to
identify startups that will transform
tourism.
Page 3
Crooner’s kippah
fetches over
$9,000 at auction
● It was a very good yarmulke.
A hand-crocheted kippah that once belonged to
Frank Sinatra sold at auction for nearly $10,000.
The black head covering, with musical notes and the
name “Frank” decorating its border, was auctioned off
by Sotheby’s in New York on December 6. Sotheby’s
was selling items that once belonged to the singer’s late
wife Barbara.
The catalog did not indicate who made the kippah or
gave it to Sinatra, although it does note that he was “a
lifelong sympathizer with Jewish causes.”
The yarmulke sold for $9,375, shattering its original
estimate of $200 to $400. ANDREW SILOW-CARROLL/JTA
PHOTO COURTESY SOTHEBY’S
CONTENTS
NOSHES ..................................................................... 4
BRIEFLY LOCAL ..................................................... 12
COVER STORY ........................................................18
JEWISH WORLD ................................................... 25
OPINION .................................................................. 32
D’VAR TORAH ....................................................... 36
THE FRAZZLED HOUSEWIFE .......................... 37
CROSSWORD PUZZLE ....................................... 37
CALENDAR ............................................................. 38
OBITUARIES ............................................................41
CLASSIFIEDS ......................................................... 42
REAL ESTATE.........................................................45
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sored participation and networking ON THE COVER: Slawomir Grunberg
opportunities at FITUR, the Interna- films “Still Life” at the synagogue in
tional Tourism Trade Fair in Madrid Lodz earlier this year.
on January 23-27, 2019. ISRAEL21C.ORG COURTESY OF SLAWOMIR GRUNBERG
JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018 3
Noshes
‘THE MULE’S’ MENSCH:
Clint can boast
ties to the tribe
Clint Eastwood’s
“The Mule” is
opening on December
14. Eastwood, 88 (who
also directed), stars as
Earl Stone, a character
based on the late Leo
Sharp, a decorated WWII
veteran. After the war,
Sharp raised prize-win-
ning flowers on his farm.
But by 2000 the farm
was losing money, and
Sharp became a drug
mule for a Mexican drug
cartel. For 10 years, he
drove his cocaine-
packed car from the
Mexican border to
Detroit.
The film follows the
90-year-old Stone as he
transports cocaine. But
as he does, he comes
under the scrutiny of a
top DEA agent (Bradley
Cooper). Stone knows
that he may be arrested
or taken out by the cartel
before, as the film’s pub-
licity says, “He has time
to right past wrongs.”
There aren’t any major
Jewish connections to
this film. But, I thought,
after all the funeral
oratory last week, that
it would be good to list
some of Eastwood’s
Jewish-related nuggets
here, now, while he’s still
very much alive. Let this
short list enhance your
viewing: (1) Eastwood is
mostly a Republican. But
he endorsed DIANNE
FEINSTEIN in 1994, when
she first ran for the Sen-
ate. That first race was
tough, and Eastwood’s
Want to read more noshes? Visit facebook.com/jewishstandard
4 JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018
“Jew-who-few-clue-do-flew-grew-new-
rue-sue-too-you-zoo-slue-glue-view”
— From the blue 19 cent pocket notebook where Bob Dylan wrote
down his first notes for “Tangled Up in Blue” and other songs
from his 1975 “Blood on the Tracks” album, as reported from
the Bob Dylan archives by writer Anne Margaret Daniel
nod helped her. (2) The judge. The judge, a
only telephone calls liberal Democrat, did an
Eastwood always let oral history interview
though are ones from that is on YouTube. She
what Clint calls his Jew- was born in Birmingham,
ish mafia — his agent, Alabama, the daughter
his accountants, and of a Jewish father and a
his lawyers; (3) East- Protestant mother. She
wood calls director DON and her much-older
SIEGEL (1912-1991) one
brother, Russell, were
of his prime influences.
raised in no faith, and the
Siegel directed the films
judge, it seems, never
(“Dirty Harry” and four
others) that made East- became religious, but
Dianne Feinstein Don Siegel Frances Fisher
wood more than a star of identifies as Jewish. She
Westerns made in Italy, says that the intense
and he taught Eastwood social discrimination she
how to direct like him — faced as a young Jew in
briskly, with no nonsense Birmingham led her to
allowed. (4) From 1990 become a civil rights
to 1996, Eastwood’s lawyer. Her brother, she
romantic partner was ac- says, “went the other
tress FRANCES FISHER, way” — became a
now 66. Fisher’s father devout Christian — and
was Jewish. Their daugh- his son was President
ter is actress Francesca Bush’s pastor. She sort of
Eastwood, 26; and (5) In chuckled when she said
2004, a reporter start- her nephew was “Father
ed to ask Clint about Jake Tapper Alice Paul Tapper Johanna Levenson Levenson.”
the Oscar chances for Fitzpatrick Retired Senator Alan K.
“Mystic River” (2003), Simpson, who eulogized
can Valor” (2013). This coming out! It’s a picture book. (The profits will go
a film he directed. He
critically acclaimed book for children, called to the Girl Scouts.) President Bush, said that
exclaimed: “Kinehora!”
bestseller tells the story “Raise Your Hand.” Jake Bush never lost his sense
Clint then laughed and
of a horrendous attack explained that his daugh- Notes on a funeral of humor because he
explained it was a Jew-
on an American base in ter noticed that boys raise Wondering about knew that “humor is the
ish expression meant to
ward off a jinx. Afghanistan. Tapper their hand in class much the Episcopal universal solvent against
noted that it is being more than girls, even priest Russell Jones the abrasive elements
Jake kvells directed by ROD LURIE, if they don’t know the Levenson, Jr., who was of life.” I thought that al-
CNN anchor JAKE 56. Lurie, who was born answer. Last year, Tapper the late President Bush’s though it wasn’t his inten-
TAPPER, 49, had a in Israel, is a West Point tweeted about how Alice personal pastor? He tion, Simpson encapsulat-
lot to kvell about last graduate, and a former had created a new Girl spoke at both the funeral ed in one sentence why
week, when he was a U.S. Army officer. (Scott Scout badge, “Raise Your in Washington and the so many Jews are funny.
guest on “Late Night Eastwood, Clint’s son, is Hand,” to encourage class service in Texas. Well, the Simpson, I should add,
with Seth Meyers.” First, an “Outpost” co-star.) participation. N.Y. Times story of how a Levenson is one funny WASP, and
he and Meyers discussed The conversation editor BARI WEISS saw became a minister was if anyone creates a site
a movie now being shot then turned to Tapper’s the tweet and asked Alice told by his aunt, called “Old WASPs Telling
that’s based on Tapper’s daughter, ALICE PAUL to write a Times op-ed JOHANNA LEVENSON Jokes,” they should call
book, “The Outpost: An TAPPER, 11. Next March, on the subject, which she FITZPATRICK, 72, a on Simpson first.
Untold Story of Ameri- Alice has her first book did. That article led to the retired Virginia appellate –N.B.
California-based Nate Bloom can be reached at
Middleoftheroad1@aol.com
E L E V A T E Y O U R S T A N D A R D S
T W O L O C A T IO N S T O S ER V E Y O U B ET T E R - E N G L E W O O D , N J & H A RR IM A N , N Y - B E N Z E L B U S C H . C O M
The Jewish Community counts on us…
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JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018 5

Local
Jerusalem and Babylon
U.S.-born Israeli scholar examines Jewish connections across denominational divides
JOANNE PALMER Union adopted in 2017 that forbids female

T
Orthodoxy clergy,” Dr. Ferziger said. “I will
here’s something about seeing be looking at how, when you analyze the
things from more than one angle text, you can see that in responding nega-
at the same time that can lead to tively to the desire for innovation they are
both insight and discomfort. innovating themselves.” In the process
Insight, because truth is almost always of responding to a desire for innovation
more complicated than an either/or “they are redefining or reconceptualizing
assumption can allow; discomfort, what are the core characteristics of the
because it is almost always the case that Orthodox rabbinate.”
truth would be more palatable if it were On Shabbat morning, he will take on
just less, well, complicated. the often-barbed subject of the way
But sometimes insight and discomfort American and Israeli Jews see themselves
can combine to produce hope. And that and each other. After a long period when
kind of complicated alchemy is what Dr. Israelis just assumed that Americans sup-
Adam Ferziger does; next weekend, he’ll ported them no matter what, “the last
be scholar-in-residence at Congregation few years have been eye-opening on all
Rinat Yisrael in Teaneck, he’ll examine sides,” Dr. Ferziger said. “A lot of Ameri-
the relationships between Orthodox and cans have been very clear about their
liberal Jews, and American and Israeli feeling alienated from Israel in many
Jews, and he’ll manage to find some way ways, and Israelis are starting to come
to thread through the minefields. (See around to the idea that they have to think
box for details.) more creatively and with greater respect
Dr. Ferziger, who grew up in Riverdale about the nature of this relationship.”
and went to SAR and Ramaz and then This has been a tumultuous year for
to Yeshiva University, where he earned American Jews, capped by the murders
undergraduate and graduate degrees in Pittsburgh and the differences in the Dr. Adam Ferziger
as well as rabbinic ordination, moved American and Israeli reaction to it, he
to Israel 31 years ago. He now holds the said. This year, Natan Sharansky left idea that all America Jews will support a response to Pittsburgh. “The spirit was
Samson Raphael Hirsch Chair at Bar his position as the head of the Jewish specific Israeli government — that never quite remarkable,” Dr. Ferziger said.
Ilan’s Department of Jewish History and Agency; when he did, “the Western Wall was the case, whether the government “What happened was tragic, but it bred a
Contemporary Jewry and is the founding plaza issue exploded again.” (The issues was Labor or Likud or whatever. But on great deal of warmth and caring.
director of the new Center for the Study are the questions surrounding the men’s, religious issues, the sense of alienation “I know that in the Riverdale Jewish
of Judaism in Israel and North America. women’s, and mixed-gender areas of the regarding acknowledgement of Jewish- Center” — the Orthodox synagogue where
“I label myself an insider and an out- Kotel — the mixed-gender ones that are ness” — whether, for example, someone he grew up — “they put out 11 empty
sider,” he said. Even after more than far away, and the women’s section where whose father is a Jew but whose mother is chairs next to the bimah, with open sid-
three decades as an Israeli, “I’m still an women are not allowed to bring Torah not, and who is raised as a Jew, is Jewish, durs.” That despite the fact that the mur-
immigrant, not a sabra.” He is an Ortho- scrolls or tallitot — and the agreements as the Reform movement says, or is not ders were in a Conservative synagogue.
dox Jew, but “as an academic, I am trying that had been signed about them and Jewish, as the Conservative and Orthodox That didn’t matter at all. “Jewish people
to observe and provide insight.” then ignored.) establishments say — “and gender issues. were killed as they were praying to God.
On Friday night, Dr. Ferziger will Does this have anything to do with the These are things that have become more No one was denying that, even if they
talk about Orthodox feminism and the presidency of Donald J. Trump, about up front and more bothersome. didn’t agree with them theologically.”
response it has evoked from the Orthodox whom Orthodox and non-Orthodox Jews “There is some irony in this,” he contin- On the other hand, non-Orthodox
establishment. The discussions that center tend to disagree? “Some of this relates ued. “In the past, there was a tremendous American Jews’ willingness to believe
around the issue unsurprisingly tend to to Trump, but there have been divisions conflict between Orthodoxy and the other the worst of the Israeli rabbinate made
be tense, as comfortable longtime under- in the American Jewish community in denominations in the United States. Now, many of them quick to accept that when
standings about what halacha will and respect to Israel, whether between AIPAC in the United States, we have entered an the country’s Ashkenazi chief rabbi,
will not permit butt up against assump- and J Street or regarding the BDS move- increasingly post-denominational period, David Lau, seemed unwilling to call Tree
tions that have filtered into the commu- ment that have existed for a long time,” and a decline in fierce competition.” of Life, where the massacre took place, a
nity from the outside world in which its Dr. Ferziger said. Basically, he suggests, the local reli- synagogue, it was bias, not an unwieldly
members very much live. “I will focus on “When it comes to political issues, it gious environment is characterized by translation of someone genuinely trying
a major rabbinic decision the Orthodox is clear that there were divides, and the calm. “That said, some of the alienation to express not only sympathy but also
and animosity between denominations solidarity. “That was really fascinating to
Who: Dr. Adam Ferziger has manifested itself through non-Ortho- see,” Dr. Ferziger said. “It unfortunately
What: Will be scholar-in-residence at Congregation Rinat Yisrael dox alienation from Israel, because Israel is an example of how the animosity of
is viewed as the more aggressively Ortho- denominationalism is focused on Israel.”
When: The Shabbat that starts on Friday, December 21. At the oneg, at 7:30, he’ll talk
dox framework,” he said. The modern Orthodox world in which
about “Female Clergy and Male Space: The Ritualization of the Orthodox Rabbi.” At
the minyanim that begin at 8:30 and at 9 on Shabbat morning, he’ll take on “Jeru- The relative calm is a change. “There the 54-year-old Dr. Ferziger grew up was
salem and Babylon in the 21st Century.” And later that day, after Mincha, he’ll tackle were huge tensions in the 1980s, when the less insular than it is now, he said. “It
“Love and Death: Reform Marriage and Reform Burial in Contemporary Halacha.” patrilineal descent decision came out, and used to be that YU did outreach to the
Where: Rinat is at 389 West Englewood Ave., Teaneck Reuven Bulka wrote ‘The Coming Cata- broader Jewish population and the cha-
clysm.’ No one talks that way anymore.” redim focused on their own.” Now that
For more information: Go to www.rinat.org/adultednews or call (201) 837-2795
That change was evident in the seems to have changed; “not just Chabad

6 JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018

 Local

but Lakewood and Chofetz Chayim
types are more likely to engage with the
world; they’re more self-confident, and
also they need the funds.” On the other
hand, “the YU world has become more
insular socially, and so have places like
Teaneck, Englewood, Riverdale, and
the Five Towns. Everyone living there is
working, they have good educations and
good jobs, but rarely do they have close
social connections with Jews who aren’t
Orthodox.
“I went to Orthodox schools that were
more heterogeneous; in modern Orthodox
settings there was more diversity, more
overlapping with Conservative kids.”
Despite the growing lack of outreach,
Dr. Ferziger finds hope in the response
to Pittsburgh, which he thinks is more
than just symbolic. In his Shabbat morn-
ing talks, “I will propose a new model,
predicated on Jerusalem and Babylon.
“Even though Jerusalem had its par-
ticular elevation and holiness and pre-
eminence, there was a recognition that
there were other very culturally power-
ful and rich communities.” Those places,
particularly the profound and powerful
diaspora community of Babylon, “had to
be appreciated.”
How does that work for us today?
“Israelis often look at America, they
look at all the challenges of being a Jew
in America, and they are so perplexed,”
he said. “It doesn’t fit in their model of
what it means to be a Jew, about what a
synagogue means, and what it means to
create a Jewish family.” American Jews
similarly don’t understand what it means
to live in a mainly Jewish country. That
lack of understanding “isn’t a cognitive
thing,” he added quickly. “People are
very smart. They understand this cog-
nitively. But they don’t make the jump
from the cognitive to appreciating how
this manifests itself in such huge gaps in
how Judaism has evolved on the ground.”
When he takes on this large, unwieldy
subject, “I will talk about the alienation, and
about the move toward a more mutually
beneficial dynamic that the Center is trying
to identify and work out, using the finest fac-
ulty of Jewish studies in the world to focus
on it, in a laboratory-type environment.”
For his third talk, Dr. Ferziger will focus
on text — specifically about how Jews
look at cremation. “It deals with a major
number of halachic issues, but there are
huge social implications,” he said.
“Cremation is an issue that was debated
at the turn of the 20th century and then
took an unbelievably tragic turn after
Auschwitz,” when the Nazis and their
collaborators gassed and then burned
the bodies of millions of Jews. “One of
my areas of research is contemporary
Jewish law. There are huge debates in
Orthodoxy about what to do with some-
one who decides to be cremated. Can you
bury their ashes in a Jewish cemetery?
“These issues begin with a techni-
cal question, but when you read the dif-
ferent approaches of the decisors more
closely you see they perceive the ques-
tion in terms of whether people who are
cremated, or who act in a certain devi-
ant manner, have in some way abdicated
their Jewish identity. In the case we will
focus on, it turns out that looking at the
debate has tremendous implications for
how Orthodox rabbis perceive other issues
such as marriages done by Reform rabbis.
“I will look at some sources that talk
about the burial of Reform Jews who ask
to be cremated, and the marital status
of Reform Jews who were married by a
Reform rabbi.
“The reason these questions interest
me is not simply to note the divisions,
but to see that some of these authorities
of previous generations demonstrated a
great deal of thought and effort in try-
ing to appreciate the positive lessons of
religious behaviors that in principle they
found to be theologically problematic.
“So it is not coming from a place of
judgement or exclusion. Instead, I dis-
covered some inclusionary tropes that
were illuminating to me.
“My work in general is focused on
modern and contemporary Judaism,”
Dr. Ferziger summed up. “Much of it has
been looking at diversity on the one side,
and at the same time at the adjustments
that have been made in a wide vari-
ety of denominations, even among the
traditionalists.
“That is surprising to people, but they
did it in order to facilitate ongoing posi-
tive contact” with other Jews.
“I am a scholar, and I will not white-
wash,” he continued. “The world is com-
plicated.” In his first book, “Exclusion
and Hierarchy: Orthodoxy, Nonobser-
vance, and the Emergence of Modern
Jewish Identity,” published by the Univer-
sity of Pennsylvania in 2005, which “was
about the attitudes of Orthodox Jews
toward non-Orthodox Jews” in 19th and
early 20th century Europe, “I saw that
except for very fringe groups, there were
a lot of adjustments made in order not to
undermine the fundamental connections
SEE BABYLON PAGE 24

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Local
‘The word is very near to you’
Two Teaneck scholars report on their experiences as finalists
in the Champion of Champion rounds of the International Bible Contest
ABIGAIL KLEIN LEICHMAN
Y
air Shahak not only knows
how many proverbs King Solo-
mon was said to have written
— 3,000 — and which biblical
figure was described as “a maker of par-
ables” — Ezekiel — but he was able to con-
jure up those facts — quickly, on live TV, in
fluent Hebrew — as one of 16 contestants in
the International Bible Contest Champion
of Champions competition held in Jerusa-
lem during Chanukah.
Bergen County was well represented
among the 16 finalists; both Mr. Shahak
and fellow contestant Rabbi Ezra Frazer
live in Teaneck.
They were eligible to try out for the
contest by virtue of their achievements
in previous international adult Bible con-
tests. Mr. Shahak, 30, tied for first place
in 2016, and Rabbi Frazer, 40, placed
second in 2012. (Rabbi Frazer also won
the U.S. National Bible Contest for Youth
in 1994, placed fifth in the international
youth contest in 1995, and coordinated
the National Bible Contest from 2009
to 2016.)
In the end, neither of these serious Bible
buffs had enough accumulated points to
progress past the first round of the tele-
vised oral quiz, and Elior Yehuda Babian
Aleh’s new development director
Josh Pruzansky to raise funds for Israeli nonprofit helping children with complex disabilities
J
LOIS GOLDRICH
osh Pruzansky has served the Jewish
community in many ways.
“I’ve worked for 29 years in the
nonprofit world, whether in advo-
cacy, in a yeshiva, or as an OU state direc-
tor,” Mr. Pruzansky said. And now he has
a new job. He’s the development director
for Aleh, an Israeli organization that serves
children with complex disabilities.
His previous experience with Jewish non-
profits will prove invaluable, Mr. Pruzansky
said. “I’m used to working with bureau-
cracies and trying to get funding. This is
another challenge — an opportunity to work
with an organization that few people have
heard of, one of Israel’s best-kept secrets.”
The organization, which has interna-
tional offices in the United States, Great
Britain, Germany, Spain, Holland, Canada,
and Switzerland, “has changed the face of
rehabilitative care in Israel,” he continued.
“More than 750 children with complex dis-
abilities receive state-of-the-art medical,
8 JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018
Finalists in the International Bible Contest Champion of Champions onstage at the Jerusalem Convention Center on De-
cember 6. Rabbi Ezra Frazer is second from right in the top row; Yair Shahak is second from left in the bottom row.
from Beit Shemesh was crowned Cham-
pion of Champions.
However, they said they were thrilled to
take part in the one-of-a-kind event, staged
by the Education Ministry in honor of the
60th year of the Chidon HaTanach (Bible
Contest) and the 70th anniversary of the
State of Israel.
The syllabus was almost impossibly
broad, encompassing 842 of the Hebrew
Scriptures’ 929 chapters. “Neither of us
had that much time to study for it,” Rabbi
Frazer said. “We knew going in it was
Aleh volunteers help a child learn how to drum at one of the organizations’s
rehabilitative facilities.
educational, and rehabilitative care at the
organization’s four facilities. In addition,
Aleh provides thousands of outpatient
treatments annually.
“Without Aleh, many of these children
would be forced to spend their lives in
unlikely we would place that high. But I
knew if I had a good experience in Israel
I’d walk away happy, and we both had a
great time.” “Not much time” is quite an
understatement for these two busy teach-
ers and fathers.
Mr. Shahak and his wife, Yaelle Frohlich,
became first-time parents less than 30
days before the written qualifying test
was given in August. They had just moved
to Teaneck and Mr. Shahak was about to
start a new full-time job teaching Hebrew
at the Frisch School in Paramus. That’s in
hospitals, with no opportunities for reha-
bilitation, education, and the love and
warmth of a home.”
Mr. Pruzansky is eager to bring that
message to the United States and Canada.
And he wants people to go and see for
SHLOMI COHEN/FLASH90
addition to his bar/bat mitzvah and wed-
ding gigs as a vocalist and violinist (note
the violin on his tie in the photo) and his
duties as cantor of the Rimon Center for
Jewish Learning in East Windsor.
“The last half a year has been a whirl-
wind of changes, and I was fully aware that
my time for studying for the Chidon was
probably going to be an hour a week, so
why did I do this? I told my students that
Tanach is something that goes beyond
meaning a lot for me. It’s really part of who
I am,” Mr. Shahak said. “Every single day I
themselves what Aleh is doing. “I want
people to go and volunteer and see how
they can help the most vulnerable of chil-
dren,” he said. “It’s amazing if you have a
chance to see it. There’s a huge rehabilita-
tion center in the Negev, and they recently
received permission to build a town next
to the village, allowing family and staff to
live there. There’s also a huge facility in
Jerusalem. The original building was in
B’nai Brak, established in 1982. The fourth
branch is in Gedera.” A
Mr. Pruzansky said that while there are a
many special needs facilities in Israel,
“there are none like Aleh. It’s not just a
special ed school, but its operates 24/7.
Kids live there when they can’t live at
home because of severe disabilities. It has
hospital wings, doctors, nurses, and medi-
cine. But the kids are also able to go to spe-
cial ed classes. They’re not losing out.
“There are so many people who work
with these kids, not only staff but volun-
teers from all over the world.”
He cited, for example, high school
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find some time to study it. I especially love Job, Isaiah,
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in taking the initial qualifying quiz, he replied that
he was interested but didn’t know if he would have
adequate time to prepare.
“But then I figured it can’t hurt to take the test and
take advantage of an amazing opportunity to be able
SHLOMI COHEN/FLASH90

to go to Israel,” he said.
Both Mr. Shahak and Rabbi Frazer have married
siblings and nieces and nephews living in Israel, so
they were particularly pleased to qualify for the con-
test from among 18 diaspora hopefuls who tried out
in August.
In Israel over Chanukah, they had time to spend
with their relatives despite taking part in group activi-
ties and a written 40-question preliminary round with
the other 16 finalists, seven of whom came from out-
side Israel.
One of their activities was a visit to a state facil-
ity where they were shown fragments of Dead Sea
Scrolls not yet revealed to the public. Mr. Shahak
noted that one of the recently deciphered fragments
was inscribed with verse 14 of Deuteronomy 30,
which translates in part as “The word is very near
to you, in your mouth, and in your heart,” referring
to the Torah.
It was a singularly apt description of how near and
dear the words of the Bible are to these 16 masters of
the timeless text.

A volunteer assists a wheelchair-bound resident

at an Aleh center in Israel.

graduates from Holland who come for a few months to

work with Aleh children. “And this includes non-Jews
as well,” he said. “People walk around with a smile.
Some say we gain more from the kids than they get
from us.”
He noted as well Aleh’s Tikkun Olam program, in
partnership with Israel’s Ministry of Education, which
exposes tens of thousands of high school youth to
people with disabilities and to the concepts and prin-
ciples of accessibility. According to the organization’s
SEE ALEH PAGE 24

JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018 9

Local
Mysterious case of the Ritzeh prayer
Student from Teaneck investigates origins of the siddur
LARRY YUDELSON
W
here did the prayers in the
prayer book come from?
Answering that ques-
tion is the work of a detec-
tive — or a graduate student — or both. One
such detective is Yitz Landes, a Teaneck-
born doctoral student in the Department
of Religions of Mediterranean Antiquity at
Princeton University.
This summer, Hebrew University’s
Magnes Press published Mr. Landes’s
Hebrew-language book, “Studies in the
Development of Birkat ha-Avodah,” based
on the master’s thesis that he wrote there.
Birkat ha-Avodah is the prayer toward the
end of the Amida that begins, in Hebrew,
with the word “Ritzeh.” In English, the text
starts with “Be pleased, Lord our God, with
Your people Israel and with their prayer,
and restore the service to Your Holy Tem-
ple; be pleased to receive the prayers and
fire offerings of the people of Israel in love.”
In the mid-20th century, the Conserva-
tive movement tweaked the prayer to be
less full-throated in its call to revive worship
through animal sacrifices. But Mr. Landes is
looking at its earlier evolution, focusing on
its awkward balancing of Jewish worship
now, which is through prayer, and Jewish
worship in the past and hoped-for future, in
the Temple, which involves ritual sacrifice.
“I was very interested in the shift from
Second Temple Judaism to post-Temple
Judaism,” he said. “The ways in which Jews
dealt with that by imbuing ritual with new
meaning. I’m also interested in the longing
for the Temple in Jerusalem. This blessing in
particular was really a great text to focus on
to address those two issues.”
Mr. Landes said the detective work of
tracking the origins and history of the
prayer book is “interesting and exciting. In
general, the siddur is a very complicated
thing to understand. It’s hard to know
where it comes from.”
In a more boring world, the authors of the
prayers would have registered their work
with a copyright office; modifications also
would have been preserved for posterity.
History would be clear.
That, of course, is not how the Jewish
prayer book came to be.
There is an enormous gap between the first
descriptions of the structure of Jewish prayer,
in the Mishna from the second century, and
the first scraps of parchment with the text of
prayers, found in the Cairo Geniza and dating
from perhaps 800 years later.
That’s a lot of time.
And the two sets of data don’t always
align.
“There are references to Ritzeh in rab-
binic literature that don’t necessarily line
up with what we have in the siddur,” Mr.
Landes said.
10 JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018
Yitz Landes
Where the references do line up, that’s
also a problem, because the earliest Mishna
manuscripts are also long past the time of
the Mishna’s composition. If the prayers had
changed since the second century, it’s possi-
ble that the Mishna, which began as an oral
tradition, had been modified along those
lines by the time it was first written down.
So Mr. Landes has looked beyond the
usual sources of the Mishna and Tal-
mud, with their description of liturgy,
and the actual recorded prayers from
centuries later.
In one chapter, he looks at “a fascinating
Christian source from around the fourth
century, which seems to have incorporated
the Amida,” he said. “This prayer seems to
have been translated into Greek and Chris-
tian elements were embedded into it.”
Remove the Christian elements, and this
source might offer a glimpse at how the
Amida was prayed at this formative time.
Another source is piyyut, the elaborate
poems written precisely during those cen-
turies between the Mishna and the manu-
scripts. (The Hebrew word piyyut derives
from the Greek word poetis, meaning poet.)
“It’s fairly certain that the authors of the
piyyutim lived in the fifth century in the
Land of Israel,” Mr. Landes said. “Using
their work I’m able to reconstruct their ver-
sions of the Amida.”
And then there’s the question of what
can be learned from the existing, medieval
manuscripts. “I go through a lot of medieval
manuscripts in the book,” he said.
Different communities have different
texts. “The Persian siddur is very impor-
tant,” he said. “French and German sid-
durim as well.”
“By comparing them, we’re able to pay
attention to the common elements and iso-
late the common elements to reconstruct
the different kinds of kernels of earlier for-
mulations that are shared by multiple com-
munities. I put together a history where
those elements were there earlier than
other elements.
“One of the arguments I make is that the
blessing we have today is a combination of
two blessings joined together over time.
Essentially, the two themes were two sepa-
rate blessings. The first concerned the con-
tinued presence of God in Jerusalem. The
other was about the acceptance of sacrifice
and prayer. Then those two blessings were
joined together, a common thing we see
in Jewish liturgy. In another context, the
Gemara says, given there are alternate ver-
sions of a prayer, we say all of them. It’s a
very common operating mechanism in Jew-
ish liturgy. Instead of choosing one of com-
peting versions, we just say both.”
Did this research have any impact on his
day-to-day life as a praying Jew?
“Certainly,” he said. “In preparing the
book, I had to familiarize myself with the
scholarship in general on prayer. The
heightened attentiveness to the meaning
of prayer had an impact. Certainly when
I lead services.”
For his Ph.D. work at Princeton, Mr.
Landes is looking at the spread of rabbinic
Yitz Landes’s Hebrew language book
‘Studies in the Development of Birkat
ha-Avodah,’ above, has gone on sale
at bookstores in Israel.
Judaism. “I’m focusing specifically on the
transmission of rabbinic literature. How it
might have gotten from Place A to Place B.
How it got from the land of Israel to Babylo-
nia and North Africa.”
This research too is taking place among
manuscripts of the Mishna and piyyutim.
Mr. Landes went to Princeton for the
chance to learn from “scholars who don’t
do Jewish studies,” he said. “In Jerusalem,
I was used to talking about the Mishna or
Amida and people would know what it was
referring to. At Princeton, I’m having to
always explain these things to scholars of
the period who aren’t familiar with them.
It helps me realize things that are unique
about them.
“The Mishna is a very weird book — if you
can even call it a book. A very weird text.
A big thing in the current study of rabbinic
literature is orality. Most of it was transmit-
ted by heart for a long period of time. There
are a lot of assumptions within Jewish stud-
ies about how Jewish manuscripts are pro-
duced that strike outside scholars of the
period as odd and surprising. It has forced
me to question those claims as well.”
One example concerns the very nature
of the Mishna, which the rabbis who com-
posed and studied it described as the oral
law, too sacred to be written down. But
whatever the holiness, keeping the Mishna
oral had economic ramifications and per-
haps economic causes.
“Judaism never really had state-spon-
sored scriptoria, places where manu-
scripts were written,” Mr. Landes said.
“So who was paying for the manuscripts
to be written? It would take the hides of
dozens of cows to physically produce the
manuscript of the entire Mishna. One
could perhaps argue that oral transmis-
sion was cost-effective — in antiquity, it
was much cheaper to teach somebody
the entire Mishna by heart than to buy
them a written copy.”
“ Students explore how
data and personalization
will drive the marketing
“
of tomorrow.
Dr. Maria Blekher
Director, M.S. in Marketing
The Katz School

ACCELERATE YOUR CAREER

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JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018 11

Briefly Local

The mahjong fundraiser in Alpine will help women and children in need.

Mahjong aids philanthropy Historian speaks in Woodcliff Lake

More than 200 people about his Holocaust survival
attended the Jewish Fed- Norbert Strauss, historian and witness Holocaust survivor, has dedicated
eration of Northern New to Kristallnacht, spoke to the Bergen much of his life educating genera-
Jersey’s “Mah Jongg with County community at Temple Eman- tions about the Holocaust, specifically
Meaning” on November 27, uel of the Pascack Valley. Strauss, a Kristallnacht.
at the Montammy Country
Club in Alpine. They were
there for food, fun, and
philanthropy. Funds raised
Jewish community security forum
PHOTOS COURTESY JFNNJ

will support women and Jewish Federation of Northern New Delaney, and Paramus Police Chief
children in need. Jersey offers a forum of security, Kenneth Ehrenberg.
The event committee “Your Safety and Security Matter,” on The organiz ations sponsor ing
included, top row, from Wednesday, December 19, at 7 p.m., at the forum with JFNNJ include the
left, are Karen Farber, JFNNJ headquarters, 50 Eisenhower Paramus police department, the New
Shirley Altman, Iris Drive, Paramus. Jersey Office of the Attorney General,
Wormser, Ariel Jacobs, Topics include critical security 21/21 Community Policing Project,
Donna Weintraub, Geri Cantor, and Donna Kissler. Susan Benkel, Sarah Nanus, awareness, bias crimes synopsis, and Community Security Services (CSS), and
Rachel Harris, and Joy Shorr are in the middle, and Casey Halper, Karly Klein, security risk assessment. Guest speakers the Orthodox Union.
Stephanie Cohn, and Shira Feuerstein are in the front. Ariel Jacobs, Sarah Nanus, include acting Bergen County Prosecutor There will be limited seating. For
and Rachel Harris were the event chairs. Dennis Calo, Bergen County Assistant information, call Debbie Gottlieb at (201)
Prosecutor Vered Adoni, Bergen County 820-3928, or email her at DebbieG@
Senior Assistant Prosecutor Martin jfnnj.org.
JNF women’s event features celebrity
On Giving Tuesday, November 27, the Young leaders help the FIDF
Jewish National Fund held “The Power of
Women,” a special Women for Israel event with a gala gathering in N.Y.
in Livingston. Siggy Flicker of Tenafly, a Over 1,300 gathered to
relationship expert, motivational speaker, support Israeli soldiers at
television personality, and author, was the the Friends of the Israel
guest speaker at the fundraiser. Defense Forces Young
Ms. Flicker, the daughter of a Holocaust Leadership New York
survivor, Dr. Mordecai Paldiel, is a sup- gala earlier this month at
porter of Israel and the Jewish people who Metropolitan Pavilion. The
credits her strength to her Israeli roots. event, with gourmet food,
“We were so thrilled with the success of open bar, casino-style
our ‘Power of Women Event,’” said Marci games, and luxury prizes,
Robinson, a Central NJ Women for Israel which also celebrated
co-chair. “The warmth in the room was Alyson Chananie, left, a Power of Israel’s 70th birthday,
palpable; Siggy spoke beautifully and was Women event ambassador, with raised $500,000.
such a gracious guest. We thank her for speaker Siggy Flicker. “Throughout the year
her participation and welcome her to our  PERRY BINDELGLASS PHOTOGRAPHY we have the incredible Ali Faivus of Englewood, FIDF Young Leadership-
Sapphire Society.” oppor tunit y to meet New York board vice president, left, with Talia
dozens of soldiers from Hermesh, gala co-chair; a former unnamed IDF
the IDF, each one a soldier, and Alex Berman, FIDF YL-NY board
hero,” said FIDF Young president, at the New York FIDF gala. COURTESY FIDF
Keep us informed Leadership-New York
We welcome photos of community events. Photos must be high resolution jpg files. Please president Alex Berman. “And whenever young professionals coming together
include a detailed caption and a daytime telephone. Mailed photos will only be returned we do so, we want it to be a reminder to celebrate, honor and support our
with a self-addressed stamped envelope. Not every photo will be published.
to them that they have friends, family brothers and sisters in the IDF?”
PR@jewishmediagroup.com and supporters across the globe. Funds raised at this event will go
NJ Jewish Media Group
1086 Teaneck Rd., Teaneck, NJ 07666 What better example of that and what toward FIDF well-being and educational
(201) 837-8818 x 110 better show of strength than 1,300 programs for IDF soldiers.

12 JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018

“ Students translate
the latest quantitative
analysis techniques
“
to the real world.
Dr. James A. Kahn
Professor of Economics

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Collaborate with world- Apply innovative theoretical Access highly rewarding

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cutting-edge projects. market problems. through our Career Center.

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JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018 13

Chanukah around the Community

COURTESY LUBAVITCH ON THE PALISADES

COURTESY CHAI LIFELINE

COURTESY LOTP
Nearly 60 families from northern New Jersey

COURTESY TBT
celebrated Chanukah with Chai Lifeline at the Funplex
in East Hanover. Activities included bumper cars,
arcade games, and rides; food included pizza and Emma Katz with her Inger Wolff kindles the
sufganiyot. The party ended with the distribution of “Squishy Menorah,” above, menorah on the fourth night
dozens of toys collected for Chai Lifeline families as and the Kandy family’s Stephanie Shore and Jennifer of Chanukah at Sunrise of
part of the annual toy drive. Chai Lifeline will distribute “Scooter Menorah” were the Seligman at “Latkes and Vodkas,” an Cresskill as Arielle Gorbatov,
more than 50,000 toys to children and families battling winners in Lubavitch on the adult Chanukah celebration at Temple a Tenafly Chabad Academy
pediatric illness around the world this Chanukah Palisades’ menorah contest Beth Tikvah in Wayne.  student, observes.
season. Chai Lifeline is an international children’s health at its Chanukah Family 
support network, providing emotional, social, and Festival. Music, donuts, arts
financial support to children with life-threatening or and crafts, and a menorah
lifelong illnesses and to their families.  lighting were featured. SEE ADDITIONAL PHOTOS ON PAGE 16


MICHAEL LAVES
COURTESY GRJ

Chanukah festivities at Glen Rock Jewish Center included lots of About 100 children and adults attended the Jewish Center of Teaneck’s youth Chanukah party,
latke making.  which included magic by Alex Mehl, music, sufganiyot, and prizes. 

BARBARA BALKIN
COURTESY SSDS

Rabbi Fred Elias poses with Solomon Schechter Day School of Bergen County Temple Emeth in Teaneck’s religious school students are in Holy Name Medical
students as they prepare latkes for the school’s annual Chanukah Fry-Off. Center in Teaneck’s chapel during Chanukah. They lit the menorah, sang songs,
Students also tested their dreidel-spinning acumen, competing for chocolates, and shared Chanukah cheer. Another celebration was held at the shul during
and eating jelly donuts.  Shabbat services. 

14 JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018

 "Who will give me wings...I will fly..."
“ ‫אעופה‬...‫”מי יתן לי אבר‬
~ Tehillim/Psalms 55:7 ~

ANNUAL
BENEFIT DINNER
SUNDAY EVENING, FEBRUARY 24, 2019
Marriott Glenpointe Hotel, Teaneck NJ
Honoring

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Dr. Bin & Penina Rabbi Michael & Ayelet
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Special tribute in memory of
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JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018 15
Chanukah around the Community

COURTESY SHOMREI TORAH

COURTESY TBENV
PHOTO PROVIDED
Temple Emanuel of the Pascack Valley celebrated “Havdalah and Temple Beth El of Northern Valley in Closter held
Chanukah” on Saturday evening, December 8, the seventh night of its 22nd annual “101 Menorahs” multigenerational
Shomrei Torah in Wayne held a Chanukah, led by Matty Roxx. A latka party and dinner followed. Shabbat. Families brought their own menorahs and
Chanukah program that included a  candles to celebrate the sixth night of Chanukah.
menorah-making family workshop.  An oneg with latkes and donuts followed. 

COURTESY OF FIDF
COURTESY BCHSJS

Bergen County High School of Jewish Studies teacher Barnett
Goldman, left, with students Julia Holzsager, Brianna Leopold,
and Annabelle Simhon, at the BCHSJS Chanukah celebration with
sufganiyot, latke-making, chocolate gelt, and ugly Chanukah sweaters. 

Hundreds of Israel Defense Forces soldiers had Chanukah celebrations at the Ananot Base
thanks to Jack and Sheila Usdin, supporters of the New Jersey Friends of the Israel Defense
Forces. FIDF’s team in Israel brought messages of hope and light — and sufganiyot — to
the IDF’s Erez Battalion of the Military Police, which the Usdins adopted as part of the FIDF
Adopt-A-Battalion Program. 
COURTESY TEMPLE BETH SHOLOM

COURTESY CHABAD

On the eighth night of Chanukah, Temple Beth Sholom in Fair Lawn held its
annual ad journal dinner dance celebrating Israel’s 70th anniversary. Rabbi Dozens of children and parents enjoyed a menorah-building workshop at Home
Alberto Zeilicovich and Cantor Andrew Schultz led the chanting of the blessings Depot in Paramus coordinated by the Friendship Circle and Chabad of Paramus. 
while people at each table lit a chanukiah. 

16 JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018

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JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018 17
Cover Story
A documentarian’s life
Slawomir Grunberg talks about growing up
sort-of-Jewish in Poland, reclaiming it here
I
Joanne Palmer
s he a Polish-American film-
maker? An American-Jewish
filmmaker? A Polish-Jewish film-
maker? A Jewish-Polish film-
maker? Or maybe a Polish-Jewish-
American filmmaker? Or maybe…
okay. You get the idea.
Slawomir Grunberg, who was born in
Lublin, grew up in Warsaw, and now lives
in north Yonkers, just south of Hastings-
on-Hudson, plays with those questions. “It
depends on who asks the question,” he said.
“I consider myself a Polish-American
18 Jewish Standard DECEMBER 14, 2018
filmmaker when I am in Poland. Other
times, I think of myself as an American
with Polish roots.”
What about the Jewish part? “It doesn’t
matter,” he said. “People look at me and
see my last name, and already they assume
I am Jewish. But in Poland, people are
afraid to ask the question, because even
today the word Jew, among Poles who are
not Jewish, sounds like a bad word.
Mr. Grunberg, who will talk about his
most recent film, “Szymon’s Return,”
at the Kaplen JCC on the Palisades on
Wednesday (see box), grew up in Poland.
He was born in Poland, in 1951; the war had
been over for six years but “it was there, in
the air, in the streets of Warsaw. Having a
Polish education, you would go to concen-
tration camps. The war surrounded you,
even though it was over.”
Mr. Grunberg’s father, Karol Grünberg,
was 16 in 1941; he and his mother, Hancia
Levi, lived in the part of Poland controlled
by the Soviet Union. “When the Germans
invaded the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941,
they took a train and got off it at the last
stop.” That was in Armenia, they waited
out the war there, and returned to Poland
in 1945, the only survivors of an extended
family of 60 people. “My father worked
in a coal mine,” Mr. Grunberg said. “He
didn’t want to tell me much about that
time. What he remembered was hunger.
“But he came back with his mother,
and they stayed in Poland, and my father
became a professor of history, first in War-
saw, and then at the University of Torun,
his son said. He specialized in modern
European history. “The Second World
War was his subject. He wrote more than
20 books; the most well-known of them
is a biography of Adolph Hitler. He wrote
one about the SS, and about the Hitlerju-
gend,” the Nazis’ youth group. His work
never was translated into English, though.
Slawomir Grunberg shoots his
new documentary, “Still Life,” in
the Jewish cemetery in Lodz.
“He and his mother stayed in Poland,” Mr.
Grunberg said. “They never immigrated to
Israel, even after 1968, when a lot of Pol-
ish Jews were forced to leave.” But that was
when he left the University of Warsaw for
Torun, a much smaller, less visible school.
Mr. Grunberg’s mother, Jadwiga Nowicka,
meanwhile, was born to parents who had
converted to Catholicism around the turn
of the 20th century. “She was brought up

Both
grandmothers
loved me so much
that the Polish-
converted one
decided to
baptize me, and
the other one
decided to
circumcise me.
as a Catholic, but she and her mother both
had a very obviously Jewish look. During
the war, they had the right papers, but they
found it necessary to hide anyway.
“But my grandfather” — his name was
Stefan Czosnowski — “was arrested and exe-
cuted in Katyn Forest” — he was one of the
approximately 22,000 Poles slaughtered by
the Soviet Union in the spring of 1940. “My
grandmother had a boyfriend in the village.
That’s how she and my mother ended up
there,” and that’s how they survived.
His parents’ marriage ended in divorce,
and Mr. Grunberg was brought up mostly
by his mother’s parents. Even though
they nominally were Catholic, he wasn’t
brought up in that religion; his grand-
mother’s husband was a communist then,
so any kind of observance was seen as a
relic of more primitive times. He often
would see his other grandmother, though,
and she kept “a Jewish home. It wasn’t reli-
gious, but I would see there oranges and
other fruits from Israel.” His other grand-
parents were “quite poor,” so there was no
fruit of any kind.
“Both grandmothers loved me so much
that the Polish-converted one decided to
baptize me, and the other one decided to
circumcise me,” he said. “I was covered.
Slawomir Grunberg, now and then; above, filming “Szymon’s Return” in Ukraine; below, in film school in Lodz in 1979.
And you have to realize that at that time,
people were still afraid. They were afraid
that the war was not really over, that it
would come again in some form or other.
So it was better to be covered.”
Mr. Grunberg went to university in War-
saw, and then he moved to Lodz for film
school; he graduated five years later, in
1981. His first film was about one of the
founders of the Solidarity movement,
Anna Walentynowicz.
That film, “Anna Proletarian,” got him
noticed.
“The Museum of Modern Art in New
York sent me a letter that said that they
would be interested in screening the film,”
he said. “Using this letter, I was able to get
a passport from the Polish government to
premiere the film.”
But the government didn’t release the
film — “it was November 1981, and the gov-
ernment declared martial law six weeks
later,” he said. “The film was arrested,” he
said. “It was never released.”
But there was Slawomir Grunberg, a
married man with a new baby back in
Poland, adrift in New York, “with no film.
I had no idea that the film was arrested. I
was waiting for it to arrive.”

Jewish Standard DECEMBER 14, 2018 19

Cover Story
Luckily, he had spent some
time in Great Britain during
university. “I would travel
there to make money, working
for restaurants and construc-
tion and so on.” (That was way
pre-Brexit.) “So I spoke good
enough English.”
One problem down, but
many others to go.
That’s how he found himself
selling peanuts on 42nd Street.
“I arrived in an apartment
in Washington Heights,” he
Young Slawomir with his grandmother, Chancia Levi Chancia with Slawomir’s father, Karol Grünberg said. “I had no money. I had to
survive.
“I found an ad in the Village
Voice. It said ‘We are looking
for artists to become street
vendors.’”
What?
“Yes, it said exactly that.
“When I read that part, I like
it because of the part about
artists, but I didn’t know what
the word ‘vendor’ meant,” he
added. “It wasn’t a word I had
seen. So I went there without
knowing what vendor means.
It was an Indian guy from
HIs other grandmother, His mother, Karol Grünberg
Jadwiga Nowicka Danuta Czosnowska
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Bombay, who had a pushcart.
His office was in Hell’s Kitchen,
in a little restaurant. I went
there and he said ‘Okay, here is
a pushcart full of nuts. You can
sell it on the streets and keep
30 percent of what you sell.’”
Why did he want artists?
They’re flexible, Mr. Grunberg
said. “And he was kind of art-
ist, and he knew that artists are
always looking for work.” And
also it wasn’t entirely legal…
Mr. Grunberg stationed him-
self on Fifth Avenue, right by
the public library. “I was there
for nine months,” he said. “I
did great business.”
At the same time, he put
together “a group of young
Polish filmmakers who like
myself had ended up in New
York, and we started to screen
films that were already in the
States,” he said. “Poland was
front-page news at the time.
We would show these films
at universities, at Columbia,
at NYU, and we would travel
with them.
Phone
orders
accepted
 Cover Story

“I was here on a tourist visa, and at one filmmaking.”

point it expired. So now I am stuck. Since then, he’s made more than 40 films;
“You have to remember — when I left he also works as a cameraman, and he’s
Poland I was married, with a six-month- won many awards, including two Emmys,
old child, and I left for six weeks. And they and has been nominated for Oscars.
were there and I was here, and suddenly What about the Jewish part of his
there was martial law, and no communica- identity?
tion. No letters. No phones. No nothing. “When I came to the United States, I
“So I was stuck. I wanted to go back to could talk loudly about my Jewish past,
Poland. It was never my intention to immi- and I was not scared of using the word
grate. But I was getting information that Jew,” Mr. Grunberg said. “Suddenly my
my film and my name were on the front identity started to change. I got involved in
page of the military newspaper, as some- many documentaries that dealt with Jew-
one who used public money to support ish subjects.” He worked on a documen-
anti-communist propaganda. tary called “Shtetl,” directed by Marian
“When I got this information, I knew Marzynski. “That was in 1996, and it took
that I was not going back. So now the ques- me to this subject, and then I did close to
tion was how to bring my wife and daugh- a dozen films about Polish-Jewish relations
ter to the States.” or other Jewish subjects. One of the most
First, he had to fix his own immigration Mr. Grunberg, right, filming “Szymon’s Return” outside the syngogue in Lodz. important films I did was Karski,” about
status, Mr. Grunberg said. Applying for asy- the Polish resistance fighter. “Szymon’s
lum was the obvious choice, but it would no papers, and he said ‘I believe that I can daughters together. From Cincinnati, he Return,” the film that the JCC will screen,
have taken too long and would be subject get you visiting scholar status.’” He did. taught in Chicago and then in St. Louis, is another of his Jewish films.
to quotas and a nearly random system. So he became a visiting scholar, and and then spent four years at Ithaca College “Now I’m working on a film called ‘Still
“My chances were very small,” he said. then a professor of film and photography in upstate New York. Life,” he said.
Instead, he went to MIT, where he went at the University of Cincinnati. Eventually, “I was there from 1986 to 1990, but It’s a true story, the story of a still life, a
to see the influential documentarian Rich- his wife and daughter joined him. “My in 1990 I stopped teaching,” he said. painting of “a table with fruits and vegeta-
ard Leacock — “he was a guru in the docu- child was 4 ½ when I met her in Chicago,” “I resigned from a tenured position. I bles and flowers and a curtain, quite big,”
mentary world,” Mr. Grunberg said. “I told he said. That marriage eventually ended, thought, ‘My heart is somewhere else.’ that hung in an apartment in Lodz for more
him that I was in this situation, that I had but first he and his wife had two more And I went to full-time documentary than 100 years. “A Jewish family bought the

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Jewish World

In Brzezany, Ania Kontsevych, who saved Shimon,

sits with him.

painting and hung it and lived there with it until 1939,”

when the Germans forced them into the ghetto and
then to a concentration camp, where they died.
The next family to move in was German; “there
were empty apartments in Lodz, so when the Germans
moved in they moved to this apartment. They were den-
tists. When they left” — they were expelled at the war’s
end — “they couldn’t take it with them, it was too big, so
like the Jewish family they left the still life behind.
Shimon Redlich at Brzezany, Ukraine, where he survived during the war. “And then the family of a woman who lives in Bos-
ton — Lilka Elbaum — it ended up in her family’s hands
when they moved to this apartment. She is main nar-
rator. She is Jewish; she was thrown out in 1968.
Est. since 1991
“Her family was saved by Poles during the war.
“After that, a Polish family lived in the apartment.
Friends of Lilka’s family — business buddies — bought
Taking the painting with the rest of their furniture. They still
CHINESE CUISINE  COCKTAIL LOUNGE live in Lodz, but they have a summer house, and they
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22 Jewish Standard DECEMBER 14, 2018

 Jewish World

“Szymon’s Return” is the story of Simon
Redlich, a professor who retired from Ben
Gurion University. Dr. Redlich and Mr. Grunberg
met in Israel. “He was saved by a Polish family,
and he also was saved by a Ukrainian family,” Mr.
Grunberg said.
“He had been a child actor after the war; he
acted in a film called ‘Unzer Kinder’ — ‘Our Chil-
dren’ — the last film made in Yiddish in Poland,” he
continued. “He loves to travel back to the places
where he lived. He is a very energetic person. He
likes to sing. He likes to dance. He likes to enter-
tain. He is a perfect character for the documentary.
“We went to the village where he was saved, and
he went to Lvov, where he hid in an attic when the
Jews were gathered in the ghetto.
“He is a happy man.”
Mr. Grunberg also has a happy life. He has three
daughters — Karolina is an artist, Sarah teaches
sociology at Ithaca College, and Joanna is a pho-
tographer. Just as he and his wife both have been
married more than once and have children from
different marriages, so too did both of his parents
marry more than once. His family is both com-
plicated and close. He has two brothers and two
sisters, all from different marriages; all but one
brother live in the United States. They’re all formi-
dably well-educated and have impressive careers.
Mr. Grunberg goes back to Poland often; he’s an
active member of the JCC in Krakow and of the
Polin Museum of the History of Polish Jews. “I
go to Poland for the Jewish cultural festival there
every year,” he said. “Everyone in the Jewish com-
munity there knows my name. They know how to
find me.”
What: A photography exhibit, “They Risked
Their Lives: Poles Who Saved Jews During the
Holocaust”
Where: At the Waltuch Gallery at the Kaplen
JCC on the Palisades, 411 East Clinton Ave.,
Tenafly
When: Until December 31
What Is It: An exhibit, on loan from the Em-
bassy of the Republic of Poland in Washington,
showing images of stories that were collected
as part of the Warsaw-based Polin Museum
project called “The Polish Righteous — Recall-
ing Forgotten History.”
Also: A screening of Slawomir Grunberg’s
documentary “Szymon’s Return,” followed by a
discussion with Mr. Grunberg.
Where: At the JCC; the gallery’s on the second
floor.
When: Wednesday, December 19, from 6:30–
7:30 p.m.
How much: It’s free
For more information: Go to www.jccotp.org
Shimon Redlich at the apartment in Lodz where he lived after the
or call (201) 569-7900
war.

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Jewish Standard DECEMBER 14, 2018 23
Jewish World
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with Israel.
When he was in Israel recently, Mr.
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ture.” Because the work is so intensive,
he expected to find a stressful envi-
ronment. “But it was happy,” he said.
“Everyone walks around smiling. This
touched me. It was beautiful. I hope to
bring people there to see it firsthand and
to teach people why it’s important for
North Americans to support it.
“When you go through the doors of
Aleh, religion and politics stay on the
other side. It’s one big family. They also
take in Arab children. No one is denied if
the government places a child there. Our
job is to take care of them.”
1245 Teaneck Rd.
Teaneck
837-8700
 Jewish World
Sandi M. Malkin, LL C
Once a bane Interior Designer
of Germany’s Jews, (former interior designer of model
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MUNICH — Weeks after they emigrated from Russia
and moved to Germany, the Nedlin family sought to
join the local Jewish community.
Registering for membership in a Jewish community
— a practice common in European countries — was a
significant step for the Nedlins, who had grown up in
the repressive Soviet Union before they immigrated in
1992. In the Soviet Union, they were forced to hide or
downplay their Jewish identity because of the country’s
anti-Semitism and its discrimination against all religion.
But in 1992, the local community didn’t reciprocate
the family’s desire for contact.
“At first they told us we can’t join,” Anna Nedlin,
who was 5 at the time, recalled. “They didn’t want
anything to do with us.” But at her parents’ insistence,
“they sent our documents to Frankfurt to check if
we’re really Jewish.”
The experience of the Nedlins, who eventually were
allowed to join the synagogue, was a typical account
of many of the 170,000 Russian speakers who immi-
grated to Germany after the Soviet Union collapsed in
the early 1990s. The newcomers faced a rift with the
30,000 co-called postwar Jews whom many expected
to welcome them to Germany.
The split has had a deep, lasting, and polarizing
effect on a community re-established by Holocaust
survivors, distracting at times from the mission of
revival. It flares up in local communal politics, but
30 years on, it is mostly healed. Now, more often the
Russian-speaking immigrants and their children are
credited with energizing and strengthening a minor-
ity group whose viability used to be uncertain.
When the post-Soviet immigration began, Jews in
Germany suddenly found themselves struggling to
THE HOSPITAL WITH A HEART
cater to large numbers of people with little more than SAVES THEM BY THE THOUSANDS.
the shirts on their backs. It didn’t help that the new-
comers had little knowledge of Judaism and came with
attitudes shaped by decades of living under repres-
The Jesselson Heart Center at Shaare Zedek Medical Center in Jerusalem
sive governments.
is one of Israel’s leading providers of comprehensive cardiac care. Offering
Famously, many German Jews were shocked at how
revolutionary procedures not commonly performed elsewhere in the world,
some newcomers would take home food that was set
Shaare Zedek’s cardiology department is recognized as an international center
out at the kiddush at synagogue.
of excellence. For cardiac testing, diagnosis, treatment, and rehabilitation,
The postwar community, which largely was
“The Hospital With A Heart” is Israel’s primary destination.
descended from recent Eastern European immigrants,
would “look upon the Soviet Jews as maybe not even Shaare Zedek relies on the generosity of donors from around the world. Join
being Jews and being uneducated, yet taking over their us in our life-saving mission at www.acsz.org/donate.
communities,” said Esther Knochenhauer, 34, who
was born in East Germany one year after her parents
immigrated there from Russia.
Even before Germany was reunified in 1990, the
East German leader Lothar de Maiziere began wel-
coming Soviet Jews. Helmut Kohl, the former chan-
cellor, adopted the same policy after unification to
make amends for and reverse the Nazis’ annihilation
www.acsz.org | national@acsz.org | 212.764.8116
of the Jewish presence in Germany. After reunifica-
tion, Jews’ immigration requests were expedited and
given equal status to those made by ethnic Germans.
The Berlin Jewish community, under its president
SEE IMMIGRATION PAGE 44

JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018 25

Jewish World

Kushner keeps pushing for a peace process

that lacks both traction and adherents

GRAND
RON KAMPEAS
WASHINGTON — Jared Kushner, the presidential son-in-
law and adviser, rarely speaks in public. It was no surprise,
then, that a rare appearance on cable news TV was with a
friendly network, Fox News, and with a friendly interviewer,
Sean Hannity.
Kushner seemingly said little about the Israeli-Palestinian
peace deal he hopes to strike, but in reading between the
lines, some nuggets emerge: The release of the proposal is
not absolutely certain, and statehood for the Palestinians
seems to be a nonstarter for now. But Kushner also recog-
nizes that he can’t get much else done in the region without
an Israeli-Palestinian deal.
On Hannity’s show Monday night, the host and Kushner ran
through three issues. The first two were President Donald
Trump’s efforts to replace his chief of staff after nearly two
fraught years with John Kelly (Trump is looking for some-
one with “great chemistry,” Kushner said) and an impending
rare legislative win for Trump, passing prison reform.
Then Hannity asked whether tensions over the murder of
Saudi dissident Jamal Khashoggi were overwhelming Kush-
ner’s quest for what his dad-in-law calls the “deal of the cen-
tury” between Palestinians and Israelis.
Saudi officials murdered Khashoggi in Turkey, and U.S.
intelligence agencies believe the Saudi crown prince,
Mohammed bin Salman, ultimately was responsible for the
operation. Kushner reportedly has led the effort within the
administration to let the crown prince off the hook; the two
0003574344-01_0003574344-01 10/4/13 4:12 PM Page 1
Jared Kushner leaves a weekly Senate Republican pol-
icy luncheon at the U.S. Capitol, November 27, 2018.
 CHIP SOMODEVILLA/GETTY IMAGES
men have struck a close friendship and political alliance.
Kushner quickly got Khashoggi out of the way. “I think
our intelligence agencies are making their assessments
and we’re hoping to make sure that there’s justice brought
where that should be,” he said.
The intelligence agencies have already made their assess-
ment, holding the crown prince, known by his nickname,
MbS, responsible.
Pivoting to Middle East peace, Kushner said, “We’re
focused now on the broader region, which is figuring out
how to hopefully bring a deal together between the Israelis
and the Palestinians.”
Kushner and his team — top negotiator Jason Green-
blatt of Teaneck and U.S. Ambassador to Israel David
Friedman — have been focused on a deal for two years,
so this isn’t exactly new. Trump said in September that
he wants to see a deal by January.
There’s a not unsubstantial chance that we may
never see this thing. “And we’re hopeful in the next
couple of months we’ll put out our plan, which again
not every side is going to love, but there’s enough in
it, and enough reasons why people should take it and
move forward,” said Kushner, whose second “hopeful”
in 30 seconds sounded to many as less than hopeful.
Trump may want this deal, but insiders say its pros-
pects of success are virtually nil given the Palestinian
Authority’s unwillingness to participate since Trump
recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital a year ago, and
the continued pre-eminence of the rejectionist Hamas,
a terrorist group, in the Gaza Strip.
The Trump administration, reportedly at Kushner’s
behest, has severed all assistance to the Palestinians
as an incentive to get them back to the table. It hasn’t
worked. Kushner also hoped the Saudi crown prince
would get the Palestinians on board, but even before
his Khashoggi troubles, the Palestinian leadership was
disinclined to heed MbS.
So a dead-on-arrival peace process may be the last
thing Trump needs as he heads into a Congress in
which the Democrats control the U.S. House of Rep-
resentatives and are pledging many investigations,
including into Trump’s alleged Russian ties.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has
been close to Kushner’s family for years, also may be
less than enthused, for electoral reasons of his own.
Netanyahu must call a vote by next fall, and is feeling

GRAND OPENING
more pressure from his right flank than his left, at least
0003574344-01_0003574344-01 10/4/13 4:12 PM Page 1 for now. Giving in to the slightest of Trump-demanded
concessions could harm his prospects.
Don’t mention statehood. “I’ve been saying a

GRAND OPENING
lot that you shouldn’t be hijacking your children’s’
future because of your grandparents’ conflict,” Kush-
ner said. “This is a conflict that has been going on for
way too long, and the way that people are living in
Gaza and in the West Bank right now is not accept-
able and there’s a lot that we can be doing to improve
their quality of life, but it comes with resolving some
of these core issues.”
For decades, Palestinians have said that statehood
was a baseline for any deal. Trump has retreated from
years of U.S. policy that calls Palestinian statehood a
CHINESE CUISINE necessary outcome. Under Trump, alleviating Pales-
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Adamant about linkage, Kushner persists in the
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Visit our website at: www.imperialdynastynj.com  JTA WIRE SERVICE

26 JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018

 Jewish World

The latest poll on

anti-Semitism in
Europe looks bad.
Trust me: It’s true.
CNAAN LIPHSHIZ

MADS CLAUS RASMUSSEN/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

AMSTERDAM — The last time that a stranger directed an
anti-Semitic insult at me, I was carrying supplies for my
son’s birthday party.
It was on a Sunday afternoon on Dam Square. Carry-
ing Star of David party decorations in a see-through bag,
I paused to snap some pictures of an anti-Israel rally on
my cellphone.
I was busy sending them to a friend who had inquired
about such events in the Netherlands when a bearded man
with a Moroccan accent said loudly in my direction: “Can-
cer Jew. You’re all made up. You’re fake. You’re fake dogs.”
The incident was far from extraordinary — I have expe-
rienced much worse abuse during my years of covering Danish soldiers guard the Jewish Synagogue in Copenhagen, Denmark, on September 29, 2017.
European Jewry and its problems — but I found myself
recalling it last week following the publication of the this year said that they avoid Jewish events or places out was “the most pressing problem” facing them. Nearly 40
unsurprisingly grim results from Europe’s largest survey of fear for their safety. A similar number said they have percent said they had experienced an anti-Semitic inci-
of Jews on anti-Semitism. considered emigrating in the past five years because they dent over the past five years, and of those, 79 percent said
About a third of the 16,395 Jews in 12 countries that the did not feel safe as Jews. they didn’t report it because they thought doing so would
European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights polled More than 80 percent of respondents said anti-Semitism be a waste of time.

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JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018 27

 Join us for a Jewish World
JEWISH COMMUNITY
SECURITY FORUM Vera Jourova, the EU commissioner for
justice, consumers, and gender equality,
called some of the poll’s data “shocking”
in an address she delivered in Brussels as
• Critical Security the report was presented.
YOUR Awareness She vowed tougher action on anti-
SAFETY Semitic crimes, especially online, and
• Bias Crimes
AND called on all EU member states to adopt
Synopsis
SECURITY the International Holocaust Remem-
MATTER! brance Alliance definition of anti-Semi-
• Security Risk
tism, which includes some forms of anti-
Assessment
Israel rhetoric, because “you cannot
fight it if you can’t define it,” she said.
The respondents appeared more affil-
Wednesday, December 19, 2018 | 7-9 pm iated than the average European Jew,
with 45 percent saying they keep kosher
Jewish Federation of Northern New Jersey at home and 84 percent declaring they
50 Eisenhower Drive, Paramus fast on Yom Kippur. A sample with more
respondents for whom Judaism is a less
Guest Speakers central element of life may yield differ-
ent results.
Bergen County Acting Prosecutor Dennis Calo
But even for a secular Jew like me, the
Bergen County Assistant Prosecutor Vered Adoni report was no more shocking than the
Bergen County Senior Assistant Prosecutor Martin Delaney presence of the armed special forces
Chief of Police Kenneth Ehrenberg officers at our children’s Jewish kinder-
garten, where they block off the entire
road twice a day, during pickup and
drop-off hours.
My reporting has made me so used to
such sights — the result of several terror-
ist attacks by Islamists on Jewish institu-
Limited Seating | RSVP to Debbie Gottlieb debbieg@jfnnj.org | 201.820.3928 tions, including the 2012 bloodbath at a
Toulouse school — that I was genuinely
surprised by how disturbing this is to
my wife, who is Jewish but rarely attends
Jewish community events.
Certainly the head of the European
PREMIER Jewish Association wasn’t surprised by
the EU report.
CHECKING
Anyone who is shocked, Rabbi Men-
achem Margolin said in a statement, is
“disconnected from the reality on the
ground.”
Like so many of the poll’s respon-
Earn 2.55%
APY1 dents, I also brushed off the anti-Semitic
incident I had experienced without
reporting it to police.
After all, I do not believe Dutch police
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me that they have my back.
Access to over 75,000 Surcharge-Free ATMs and 5,000 The Dutch government’s resistance
shared branching locations (in the US and Overseas) to adopting an internationally accepted
definition of anti-Semitism also was of
little assurance. Nor was a Dutch court’s
Open an account online or visit one of our failure in July to charge a Syrian man
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greateralliance.org | 888-554-2328 x280 kosher restaurant while waving a Pales-
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1. APY = Annual Percentage Yield will be paid for all balances between $5,000 - $25,000 and for balances above $25,000 0.15% APY will be paid. 2. If the account balance These problems are not exclusive to
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In France, where half a million Jews
personal savings account after their first six months of becoming a member. Fees could reduce the earnings on the account. All terms are subject to change live and the volume of anti-Semitic
without notice and all members subject to review by ChexSystems. Accounts only available to members and membership in the credit union requires a
minimum deposit of $100. incidents increased by 69 percent in
2018, such events have become a “daily
28 JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018
occurrence,” Prime Minister Edouard
Philippe said last month.
In the United Kingdom, the country’s
former chief rabbi, Jonathan Sacks, said
that many people in his community feel
they are facing “an existential threat” in
the supporters of Labour Party leader
Jeremy Corbyn. Sacks, one of contem-
porary Judaism’s most eminent repre-
sentatives, called the far-left politician
an anti-Semite. Corbyn, who has called
Hamas and Hezbollah his “friends” and
who has suggested that British “Zionists”
are incapable of irony, has rejected the
allegation vociferously.
In Sweden, anti-Semitic harassment
by far-right activists led to the shuttering
of a Jewish community anywhere in the
European Union out of security concerns
for the first time since World War II. The
dissolution of Umea’s Jewish community
was a sad precedent in a country where
Jews are regularly assaulted by Muslim
extremists, often with Israel as a pretext.
Still, the news out of Brussels isn’t all
bad when it comes to the fight against
anti-Semitism.
Last week, the European Council — the
EU’s executive branch — made a declara-
tion against anti-Semitism, calling on EU
member states to shoulder Jewish com-
munities’ security costs and urging coor-
dinated action against anti-Semitism.
And while some European govern-
ments 20 years ago took pains to deny
the resurgence of anti-Semitism after the
Holocaust, as well as the reasons driv-
ing it forward, mainstream politicians
in Europe today seem to be more con-
scious of the problem’s nature and more
interested in confronting it.
Significantly, in her address Jourova
mentioned not only anti-Semitism, but
also anti-Zionism — a reference that
many believe would have been unthink-
able only several years ago, coming from
a high-ranking EU official. She also men-
tioned “Islamist anti-Semitism.”
Such rhetoric reflects a reluctant
acceptance in Europe of the effect of
the arrival to the continent of millions of
immigrants from anti-Semitic societies in
the Muslim world. Whereas many inte-
grated seamlessly into European societ-
ies and adopted their values, others have
rejected them and reintroduced into the
mainstream anti-Semitic sentiments that
have been suppressed in Europe as part
of the lessons of the Holocaust.
Labeled “new anti-Semitism,” this
mutation of Jew hatred has baffled Euro-
pean progressives, who struggled to
come to terms with the systemic target-
ing of one minority group by members
of another.
Watchdog groups say that the vast
majority of violent attacks on Jews in
Western Europe today come from peo-
ple with Muslim background. But accept-
ing or admitting this has proven difficult
for some advocates of Europe’s immigra-
tion policies.
 Jewish World

Yet last year, French President Emman-

uel Macron vowed that France will “not
surrender to anti-Zionism because it is a
reinvention of anti-Semitism.” It was the
first time that a French president made
such an equation.
Following France’s lead, Belgium, Ger-
many, the Netherlands, and several other
countries mounted formidable efforts to
protect Jewish community institutions,
in some cases leading to a reduction in
incidents.
Yet even under Macron, French authori-
ties, who in the early 2000s downplayed
the scale of anti-Semitic crimes, showed
signs of relapsing. Last year, France’s
National Consultative Commission on
Human Rights asserted that it “had no evi-
dence” to support what it called “the new
anti-Semitism hypothesis.”
In May, a study published by a German
federal entity said that anti-Semitism in
Europe is unaffected by recent Muslim
immigration, prompting a prominent critic
to call the report selective and flawed. European Union officials Frans Timmermans, left, and Vera Jourova at a news conference on the EU’s response to a new
As the debate rages on, many Jews like survey about anti-Semitism at the body’s headquarters in Brussels on December 10, 2018. JOHN THYS/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

me are increasingly contemplating their

futures in Europe — despite major steps Because amid polls, reports, discus- Jews “freedom of belief and the freedom of the EU Agency for Fundamental Rights,
designed to ensure our ability to live freely sions, and declarations about the need to to live without fear remain distant aspira- put it during his address in Brussels.
and safely here. balance freedoms, for too many European tions,” as Michael O’Flaherty, the director JTA WIRE SERVICE

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JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018 29

Jewish World
Israel has a bobsled team (U.S. based),
and it wants to compete in the Olympics
JOSEFIN DOLSTEN
In the span of just a couple of days, Chaim Raice went from
never having been on a bobsled to being a contender to rep-
resent Israel in the 2022 Winter Olympics.
And it all started with a Facebook post.
Raice, a house builder based in Pomona, New York, was
browsing the social media site in November when he saw
a post saying that the Israeli bobsled team needed another
athlete to compete in the North American Cup, beginning
that month.
He thought it was a joke, but still he reached out. Though
Raice, 46, didn’t know much about bobsledding, he had
participated in several other sports as an amateur, and his
Israeli citizenship meant that he would qualify to compete
for the country.
It turned out to be a perfect match.
So, just two days after having reached out, Raice was driv-
ing up to Lake Placid to compete.
“I was kind of shocked that it actually worked out,” he
said last week.
Raice had been told that he would be teaming with an
athlete whose partner had dropped out because of sched-
uling conflicts. The other competitor would be the team’s
pilot, sitting at the front of the racing sled and steering,
while Raice would be the brakeman, pulling a lever to get
the go-kart-like sleigh to slow down after it crossed the
finish line.
What he didn’t know was that his partner, Dave Nich-
olls, uses a wheelchair to get around. Though Nicholls had
30 JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018
been participating in the sport for
14 years, this was the first time the
disabled athlete would take part in a
competition for able-bodied people,
instead of competing in a para-ath-
lete competition.
“I was a little shocked,” Raice said
about finding out about Nicholl’s
status.
The rules of bobsled, which has
two- and four-person teams, actu-
ally make competing for wheel-
chair users less of a challenge than it
would be in most other sports. Team
members typically push the sled and
then jump in before going down the
track, but the rules allow an athlete
to start seated and the other team Dave Nicholls pilots the bobsled as Chaim Raice pushes.
members to push. (That’s less of a
disadvantage in the four-person sled than in pairs.)
Nicholls, who sustained spinal damage in a skiing acci-
dent 15 years ago, says it is the first time in the history of
the sport that a disabled person is competing against able-
bodied athletes. JTA reached out to the International Bob-
sleigh and Skeleton Federation to confirm the claim, but the
organization did not respond by publication time.
Raice arrived in Lake Placid on November 29, just a day
before the two-day competition. He and Nicholls, who is in
his 50s and based in Park City, Utah, were able to practice
on the racetrack twice before the big day.
COURTESY OF NICHOLLS
Before the first day’s run, Nicholls made what he
calls “a rookie mistake”: He loosened his helmet strap,
causing it to slide down over his eyes and block his line
of vision on the track. With Nicholls not able to steer
properly, the sled flipped on its side. He broke several
fingers, and the team could not complete the race.
But it didn’t stop the pair from competing the follow-
ing day. They finished in 11th place, ahead of two teams
that were unable to complete the race. But Nicholls still
will participate in additional races as he tries to qualify
for the World Cup, a prerequisite for the Olympics.
With seven athletes, the Israeli bobsled and skeleton
team has a record number of members. Though the
team is based in the United States, all the athletes have
Israeli citizenship — some from birth, others from mak-
ing aliyah to compete for the country.
Earlier this year, an Israeli sledder competed for the
first time in the Olympics, as American-Israeli A.J. Edel-
man represented the country in one-person men’s skel-
eton. David Greaves, who leads the team as head of the
Israeli Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation, hopes that in
2022, the team will compete not only in men’s skeleton
but in the women’s race and bobsled as well.
“There are a lot of small countries that are involved
in these sports who struggle every year to find ath-
letes to compete,” said Greaves, who is based in Win-
nipeg, Canada. “And we have done something in terms
of growing our program that most small nations have
not been able to do successfully.”
Raice said that competing for the first time was
“way more bone jarring and exhausting than I ever
imagined.”
“You think you’re getting into a sled and slide
down,” he said, “but it’s a really fast track and the
G-forces are unreal. You feel like you almost get black-
out on some of the curves.”
Still, he said he has become “slightly addicted” to
the sport and hopes to continue with the goal of par-
ticipating in the Olympics together with Nicholls. For
his part, Nicholls says that representing the Jewish
state holds a special significance.
“I’m wearing the Star of David when I compete,”
he said. “I’m wearing on my left hand a blue and
white glove, and on my right hand a USA red, white
and blue glove. People know now that I’m Team
Israel, and it’s great to hear that over the loud-
speaker when they’re announcing the different driv-
ers and the different countries.” JTA WIRE SERVICE
 Jewish World
BRIEFS

18 groups ask Mike Pompeo
to safeguard Jewish artifacts
in import restriction pacts
JOSEFIN DOLSTEN
Eighteen Jewish groups urged Secretary of State Mike
Pompeo to exclude Jewish artifacts when making import
restriction agreements with countries in the Middle East
and North Africa.
In a letter sent to Pompeo on Tuesday, the organiza-
tions said they were worried that deals meant to curb
looting would prevent Jews now living in the United
States from retrieving personal and community belong-
ings from their countries of origin.
Jews were forced out of countries in the Middle East
and North Africa amid heavy persecution after the estab-
lishment of the state of Israel in 1948.
The letter was organized by Jews Indigenous to the
Middle East and North Africa, or JIMENA, and signed
by organizations including the Anti-Defamation League,
the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish
Organizations, the Simon Wiesenthal Center, and the
World Jewish Congress North America.
It calls on Pompeo to ensure “that a policy is in place
that protects Jewish and Christian heritage by explicitly
excluding them from any import restrictions and rejecting
any state claims to individual and communal property.”
The letter references an import restriction request by
Algeria that the State Department is considering. Last
year, JIMENA protested an agreement that the United
States reached with Libya, saying it did not exclude Jew-
ish artifacts. The State Department later said that certain
Jewish artifacts were exempt from the deal.

JTA WIRE SERVICE
Evelyn Berezin, who built
and marketed first word
processor, dies at 93
ANDREW SILOW-CARROLL
Evelyn Berezin, a Bronx-born daughter of Jewish immi-
grants from Russia who built and marketed the first com-
puterized word processor, died in Manhattan last Satur-
day. She was 93.
A founder in 1969 of the Long Island-based Redactron
Corp., Berezin created the Data Secretary, a processor-
enhanced typewriter that jump-started a market later to
be dominated by IBM and brands like Osborne, Wang,
Tandy, and Kaypro.
She sold the company to the Burroughs Corp. in 1976
and went on to careers in venture capital and consult-
ing, according to her obituary in the New York Times.
“Why is this woman not famous?” British writer Gwyn
Headley wrote in a 2010 blog post. “Without Ms. Berezin
there would be no Bill Gates, no Steve Jobs, no inter-
net, no word processors, no spreadsheets; nothing that
remotely connects business with the 21st century.”
 JTA WIRE SERVICE
Kirk Douglas, 102, honored
by his hometown in N.Y.
SAM SOKOL
The latest honor for Jewish actor Kirk Douglas came in
the upstate New York town where he was raised on his
102nd birthday.
Friends and relatives gathered in Amsterdam on Sun-
day to unveil a historic marker for a sign that will say
that Douglas “Rose From Poverty To Appear In Over 90
Films In Hollywood,” The Associated Press reported.
The sign will be erected near his home in the town,
which is about 30 miles from Albany, the state’s capital.
Douglas was born Issur Danielovitch to Yiddish-speak-
ing immigrant parents. He has starred in such films as
“Spartacus” and “Gunfight at the O.K. Corral.”
His son Michael Douglas also is an accomplished actor
and director who won the Genesis Prize, also called the
“Jewish Nobel,” in 2015. JTA WIRE SERVICE

BABYU
 
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JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018 31

Editorial
Anti-Semitism and radical empathy
F when it comes to
or those of us lucky enough to be born in
the New York/New Jersey metropolitan area
after the end of the World War II, anti-Sem-
itism is more or less an elusive thing, not a
memory for any of us, more a bogey than any kind
of reality.
It is to our horror that we see that we were wrong;
although still most of us have not experienced anti-
Semitism firsthand, we know that it has not gone away,
that it is not a leftover old European nightmare.
We also know that it is not only anti-Semitism that
seems to have resurged, or at least resurfaced from
the sewers where it hid and bred and festered here for
more than half a century. Racism is back. To be more
accurate, racism never has gone away, any more than
anti-Semitism has, but it’s become less hidden. Just
like anti-Semitism.
Is there any hope?
Yes, there does seem to be.
The murderer in Charlottesville, who rammed his
car into people peacefully protesting the moronically
evil tiki-torchlit march the night before, when the
brave thugs who did not wear masks but still tried to
hide their identities (and who suffered repercussions
when their IDs hit the internet, because most people
are horrified by them) paraded shouting “Jews will not
replace us,” the man who killed Heather Heyer, whose
presence in the world would have made the world a
better place, just was sentenced to life in prison. (To
be specific, his sentence was passed down by a jury, as
is done in Virginia; the judge has to ratify it. The jury
sentenced him to life plus 419 years in prison, along
with a fine of $480,000. And I am not using his name
because he does not deserved to be called by name.)
When the synagogue murderer killed 11 people in
Pittsburgh, the reaction was immediate and over-
whelming. It was of grief and disgust and appalled rec-
ognition that such evil was possible. It was not positive,
except perhaps in the nether reaches of the dark web.
We also know that there are some local institutions,
particularly schools, where anti-Semitism is a low-
level but hideous, joy-sapping thing, and that there
often is discussion about whether it is better or worse
to expose it, better or worse to go after the kids who
do it, better or worse for their victims to have to deal
with the aftermath of the exposure. Because yes, it
gets better, but often before it gets better it gets worse.
Dr. Shuly Rubin Schwartz, the professor of Jewish
history at the Jewish Theological Seminary who also
is the provost there, is feeling some hope. It’s a feeling
she planned to share at an open talk with her good
friend Dr. Mary C. Boys last Wednesday.
Dr. Boys is a professor of practical theology (what
Jewish Editor
Joanne Palmer
Standard Associate Editor
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32 JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018
a wonderful title!), a dean, and the vice president of
academic affairs at Union Theological Seminary, the
Protestant school right across Broadway from JTS in
upper Manhattan. She is also a Catholic nun.
The two women have taught together many times
over the course of just about a decade, Dr. Schwartz
said; last spring, they headed a course on Jewish
Christian relations to a class divided just about in
half between Christians and Jews. All were studying
for leadership positions, mainly but not entirely as
clergy members. “What grew out of that experience
was something very hopeful,” Ms. Schwartz said. “I
feel and Mary shares my feelings about confronting
the painful experiences and really working through
them together.”
Anti-Semitism more or less as we know it is just about
as old as Christianity, she said, and grew out of the
Christians’ need to differentiate themselves from the
religion with which at first it shared so much. “They had
a lot of nasty things to say, and once those words were
out, they were out,” she said. “Words matter.
“And so it became very much part and parcel of the
way the church understood Jews.” Soon enough that
base was mixed with the power politics of the medi-
eval period. Nothing good ensued.
“Once those anti-Semitic tropes are there, they are
available to be used as the basis for new theories of
anti-Semitism,” Dr. Schwartz continued. “Societies
are often looking for scapegoats. So all the forms of
modern anti-Semitism are overlaid on this foundation.
“Anti-Semitism is like the canary in the coal mine.
When societies begin tolerating anti-Semitism, it is
a very bad sign.” And it is not coincidental that the
upswing in anti-Semitism and violence began with the
presidential campaign of 2016 and gone upward ever
since then.
Still, she feels hope.
“Part of what gives me hope, and impelled Mary
and me to do this, is that thank God there have been
decades of interfaith dialogue, not only in this country
but particularly in this country.
“When I turned my phone back on after Shabbat
when Pittsburgh happened, and texted with my kids
and everyone else I know to see how everyone was
dealing with it, I found a text from Mary.
“It was beautiful. When there was a memorial ser-
vice at my shul the next night, she was there.
“I think that the experience of confronting pain
together, of being present for one another, of having
that kind of radical empathy, really matters.”
We all can use radical empathy, both directed at us
and beaming from us. It’s a practice; we can start to
work on it now. —JP
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KEEPING THE FAITH
The Torah nails it
leadership qualities
A
s 2018 heads for the history
books, national leadership
has risen to the front pages
in almost every corner of
the globe.
On Saturday, December 1, Andrés
Manuel López Obrador took office as
Mexico’s president. In the days that fol-
lowed, Angela Merkel signaled the end
of her reign as chancellor of Germany, Shammai
while in France, demonstrators took to Engelmayer
the streets in at times violent protests
against President Emmanuel Macron
and his government. This Wednesday, voters in Madagascar will
choose their next president. Brazil’s next president, Jair Bolsonaro,
takes office on New Year’s Day.
In Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who leads the
Likud party, is down to a tenuous one-vote Knesset majority, follow-
ing Avigdor Lieberman and his Yisrael Beiteinu party’s mid-Novem-
ber departure from the ruling coalition.
Exacerbating matters, on erev Chanukah, police recommended to
Attorney General Avichal Mandelblit that Bibi be indicted on charges
relating to fraud, bribery, and breach of trust. Police still are consid-
ering asking for indictments in two other cases. Finance Minister
Moshe Kahlon already has announced that he and his Kulanu party,
with its 10 Knesset seats, will leave the coalition if Bibi is indicted,
thereby assuring his government’s collapse.
In the United States, the new year will mark the beginning — hard
as it is to contemplate or even tolerate, given the length of time and
the nature of current political discourse — of the 2020 presiden-
tial campaign. Last weekend, for example, Senator Corey Booker
(D-N.J.) said in the first-in-the-nation primary state of New Hamp-
shire that he will decide about running by New Year’s.
Then there was the funeral of the late President George H.W. Bush,
in which the eulogies focused on the positive qualities he brought to
the White House, perhaps as a way of contrasting his style of leader-
ship to that of the current president.
Given all this, examining what Torah in its broadest sense (mean-
ing both the written and oral law) has to say about the nature of
leadership is in order.
While these laws apply to us alone in our own governance, as
God’s “kingdom of priests and holy nation,” our task is to dem-
onstrate by example how all people should conduct themselves,
including how leaders should lead.
The place to begin, of course, is with the ultimate Jewish leader,
Shammai Engelmayer is rabbi of Congregation Beth Israel of the
Palisades, now in Fort Lee.
Production Manager
Jerry Szubin
Founder
Morris J. Janoff (1911–1987)
Graphic Artists
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Editor Emeritus
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Mort Cornin (1915–1984)
Editorial Consultant
Max Milians (1908-2005)
Secretary
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Editor Emerita
Rebecca Kaplan Boroson

Moses. The Torah does not give us a stated reason why God chose
him, but we can glean the answer from the biography we are given.
Moses abhorred injustice. We see this in his attack on the Egyptian
overseer beating a Hebrew slave, his subsequent confrontation with
the two unnamed Hebrews fighting with each other, and his com-
ing to the rescue of Jethro’s daughters, who were being harassed
by male shepherds (see Exodus 2 for these three incidents). He had
no qualms about speaking truth to power, as witness his repeated
appearances before Pharaoh and his frequent challenges to God.
In Exodus 5:22, for example, he chastises God for making matters
worse for the Israelites rather than alleviating their suffering.
Moses also stood up for his people even when he knew them
to be in the wrong, notwithstanding an amazing offer from God.
Exodus 32:10, for example, tells us: “Now, therefore, let Me alone,
that My anger may burn hot against them, and that I may consume
them,” God says to Moses following the sin of the Golden Calf; “and
I will make of you a great nation.”
On this occasion, as on several others, Moses refuses the offer.
His job, given to him by God against his will, was to shepherd and
protect Israel. To accept God’s offer would be to violate a trust he
held sacred. (There is a wonderful midrash on this conversation to
be found in the Babylonian Talmud tractate B’rachot 32a.)
There also was Moses’ great humility (see Numbers 12:3). The
Sages of Blessed Memory ranked humility high on the list of lead-
ership qualities. Thus, we are told in BT Chagigah 5b: “Our rabbis
taught: Over three things the Holy One, Blessed Be He, weeps every
day...[including] over a leader who lords it over the community.”
The Midrash (Exodus Rabbah 27:9) also notes the need for humil-
ity when it quotes God as saying to the new leader: “[Now] go, hum-
ble yourself at the dust of the feet of princes and those greater than
you....”
The 19th century chasidic leader Rabbi Moses Ben Israel Polier of
Kobrin had this to say about a leader’s need for humility (as quoted
by Martin Buber in his “Tales of the chasidim”): “A leader must not
think that God chose him because he is a great man. Does a peg in
the wall, on which the king hangs his crown, boast that its beauty
attracted the king’s attention?”
The qualities we see in Moses are echoed in the so-called “king’s
law” in Deuteronomy 17:14-20. It makes clear that Judaism known
nothing of a “divine right of kings,” even if his appointment was
seen as having been made by God Himself. The king may not even
consider himself above everyone else; “his heart [may] not be lifted
up above his fellows,” the king’s law says, meaning the leader (male
or female; gender is not an issue) governs a nation of equals in the
eyes of the law, and is subject to the same law as everyone else. He
or she also must rule for the benefit of the people and the nation,
not for his or her own material profit.
Among other things, following the Torah’s enactment, the leader
at all times must respect the people he or she leads. “Rabbi Yitzchak
says: ‘The awe of the public should always be upon you.’” He then
cites the example of the kohanim, who, out of respect for the peo-
ple, would face them when blessing them, even though that meant
turning their backs on “the Divine Presence.” (See BT Sotah 40a.)
It follows, then, that the king also is not an absolute monarch
in any sense. He must share power in a tripartite system of gov-
ernance. Said the sage Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, there are “three
crowns” —priesthood, kingship, and Torah (in this case meaning
the prophets in biblical times and their spiritual heirs, the rabbis,
after them). (See Mishnah Avot 4:13.)
From a halachic standpoint and from tradition, then, our leaders
should be above reproach; they should put communal concerns
ahead of their own, they should not make themselves rich on the
backs of the people they lead, they should exemplify and spread
the traits required of “a kingdom of priests and a holy nation,” and
they should not let their posts go to their heads.
Finally, there is a discussion in BT Arachin 17a that deserves con-
sideration. According to one sage, Rabbi Yehudah Nesi’ah, “As the
generation, so the leader,” meaning that if a generation is virtuous,
its leader will be virtuous. His colleagues, however, saw it the other
way around: “As the leader, so the generation.”
Either way, we are being told that a generation gets the leaders
it deserves.
Opinion
Immune to reason?
Jewish anti-vaxxers and the resurgence of measles
T
he celebrated chasidic mas-
ter Rabbi Nachman of Brat-
zlav (1772-1811) is remem-
bered for timeless pearls
of wisdom and sage spiritual counsel,
such as “All the world is a very narrow
bridge, and the essential thing is not
to be afraid.” Also: “Every shepherd
has his own melody.” Rabbi Nachman
also was famously skeptical of physi- Rabbi Joseph
cians: “It was difficult for the Angel of H. Prouser
Death to kill everybody in the world,
so he appointed doctors to assist him”
(Sichot Ha-Ran #50). Nachman distrusted “modern”
medicine as spiritually objectionable, the contempo-
rary equivalent of magic and sorcery.
It is instructive that so jaded a critic of medical sci- associated with London’s Hambro Synagogue and
ence nevertheless issued a pointed and unambigu-
ous endorsement of immunization against infectious
disease, deeming such health protocols a non-nego-
tiable religious duty.
Rabbi Nachman wrote:
“We must be exceedingly careful about the health
of our children, especially when they are still small.
One should in no way be lax in this matter…. One
must vaccinate every baby against smallpox before
the age of three months, for if one does not do so,
he is like those who shed blood. And even if one
lives far from the city, one must travel there even if
the season is very cold, etc.” (See Kuntres Hanhagot
Yesharot, 5-6.)
Rabbi Nachman’s specific emphasis on smallpox
reflects his times. Edward Jenner’s effective vac-
cine against that disease was introduced in 1796.
Nachman’s warning not to be deterred by cold
weather reflected his personal experiences of the
Polish and Ukrainian winter in Medzhybizh, Bres-
low, and Uman.
Were Rabbi Nachman writing today, he would
note that more than 1,400 cases of measles were
reported in Israel just this year. More than half of
those cases were in Jerusalem, predominantly
among ultra-Orthodox families. He would observe
that rates of infection have risen dramatically here
in the United States as well, notwithstanding the
fact that in 2000, the Centers for Disease Control
declared that measles — like smallpox — had been
eradicated. Nachman would add that as of Novem-
ber 2018, 220 individual cases of measles had been
confirmed in 26 states (including New Jersey) and in
the District of Columbia. He would warn that that
number is rising daily to epidemic proportions.
Bratzlav chasidim presciently expanded upon
their founder’s principle to include more recent
developments in immunology: “So, too, in our time,
when children are given immunizations against all
kinds of serious illness, like paralytic poliomyelitis
(God save us!) or the like, we must act accordingly.
Let no one think himself clever for evading this, for
it is a matter of mortal peril.”
Joseph H. Prouser is the rabbi of Temple Emanuel of
North Jersey in Franklin Lakes.
The opinions expressed here are those of the authors, not necessarily those of the newspaper’s editors,
publishers, or other staffers. We welcome letters to the editor. Send them to jstandardletters@gmail.com.
Nachman was not alone in his avid
endorsement of Jenner’s vaccine.
According to the late British chief
rabbi (and renowned medical ethicist)
Lord Immanuel Jakobovitz, Jenner
was “hailed with enthusiasm by Israel
Lipschuetz and other leading rabbis.”
Lipschuetz, the author of Responsa
Tipheret Yisrael, also listed Jenner “as
a ‘Righteous Gentile’ for the develop-
ment of the smallpox vaccine that
saved hundreds of thousands of lives.”
Rabbinic authorities expressed
enthusiastic halachic support for immunization
protocols even before Jenner’s historic medical
breakthrough. Rabbi Abraham Nanzig, who was
its Ashkenazi beit midrash, wrote a brief but impas-
sioned treatise called Aleh Terufah, published in
London in 1785. Nanzig, who had lost a son and a
daughter to smallpox, endorsed the practice of
variolation, a precursor to the more effective vac-
cine. Variolation involved the deliberate infection of
patients with smallpox or cowpox to cause a mild
form of the disease, that would result in immunity to
smallpox upon recovery. That essentially is the same
principle operative in more refined and reliable vac-
cines. Nanzig deemed submission to variolation “an
eager act of religious devotion, which reflects the
Commandment to ‘be particularly careful of your
wellbeing’ (Deuteronomy 4:15).”
Nanzig cited a still earlier medical protocol aimed
at producing limited immunity against smallpox.
This was described to him by Rabbi Shalom Buza-
gli, a kabbalist who was born in Marakesh, Morocco,
in 1700 and served on London’s Ashkenazi beit din.
Buzagli reported that a child who survived small-
pox and was in the final stages of recovery would
be given a handful of raisins to hold until they were
warmed in his hands. The raisins would be given to
a healthy child to eat. That would produce the same
effect as variolation — a mild infection resulting in
immunity. Nanzig concludes by noting the implicit
support for this treatment by “men of renown
among the great scholars of Israel, and the yeshiva
of Rabbeinu Yitzchak Alfasi (the ‘Rif’)” in Fez.
Rabbi Nachman and Rabbi Nanzig and Rabbi
Buzagli and the Rif — that is to say, authoritative rep-
resentatives of the normative halachic and Jewish
ethical tradition — would, like their attentive disci-
ples today, all be aghast at the resurgence of vaccine-
preventable infectious diseases such as measles and
pertussis, among others – due to lagging immuniza-
tion rates and the refusal of many parents (religious
Jews conspicuously among them) to allow their chil-
dren to be vaccinated.
A number of leading contemporary Orthodox rab-
binic leaders have addressed this health crisis and
decried those who are negligent in securing vacci-
nations. Among these principled voices of rabbinic
reason that are raised in response to the spiking
rates of infection and resultant deaths in the United
SEE REASON PAGE 35
JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018 33
Opinion
I’VE BEEN THINKING
Life’s not a cabaret in this ‘My Fair Lady’
I
’ve always loved Broadway theater, especially musi-
cals. I went to my first show in sixth grade (more on
that below) and haven’t stopped since. When I was
in high school and college, living in dorms in Wash-
ington Heights, I often would go to revivals at City Center
(where I saw “The King & I” and “Brigadoon,” among other
great old shows), sitting in the nosebleed seats for about
$2.50. Indeed, my wife and I did not meet for the first time
at one of those shows. (No, that’s not a typo, but it’s a story
for another time.)
The summer after we were married, we spent a week in
London, where we saw eight shows for an average of about $5
each — still usually sitting way up high, though moving down
at intermission if possible. We didn’t go on Shabbat, of course,
but matinee days were, for us, two-show-a-day days.
Our visits to Broadway continued when we lived on the
Upper West Side, with TKTS becoming a second home. I often
would go to Duffy Square at lunchtime and could usually get
something decent for that evening. After (a) the arrival of kids,
(b) moving to Teaneck, and (c) sharply increased ticket prices,
theater became more difficult and expensive, so our show-
going tapered off somewhat. But it never stopped.
Now, however, with the advent of lotteries, rush tickets,
TDF (I have two daughters who are teachers), and retirement
— and having raised children to love Broadway as much as we
do and who know that birthday or anniversary presents of
tickets are appreciated — our visits are on the upswing. always
We have to fight for ourselves
“I know how comfortable it is to curl up with a nice, fat
book full of big words and think you’re going to solve all
the problems in the universe. But you’re not, you know. A
bit of action is required every now and then.”
D
 - CAROL BELDON, “MRS. MINIVER”
uring the last days of Chanukah, Partnership-
2Gether, the collaboration between the Jew-
ish Federation of Northern New Jersey and its
Israeli partner city, Nahariya, held its annual
steering committee meeting. We alternate sites, so this
year we met in New Jersey. As we meet, we reflect on cur-
rent programs and discuss how we will move forward in
the next few years. We also socialize.
Programs developed and executed over the years have
enriched both communities, in areas as far ranging as
youth leadership and STEM to security and the arts. In
fact, our partnership brought the practice of bloodless
medicine to Israel; it first was introduced at the Western
Galilee Hospital and now is part of the medical protocol
throughout the nation.
All of this is wonderful, but the deeper purpose of the
annual meeting is to bring Nahariyans and those in our
area closer together, to eliminate any misconceptions
or walls that may isolate us, given that we are a part of
two allied but different nations. Agreement is nice, and
we need it to green light a project, but it not the most
important goal. Understanding, mutual respect, and
the appreciation of each person and the character and
needs of each community is what is important. And in
many cases it leads to deep and lifelong friendships.
And so, in July 2014, when a 20-year-old man named
Adar Barsano was killed during the Gaza war, when
terrorists breached the Israeli border into Kibbutz
Beeri and at the same time our steering committee was
34 JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018
And so, two weeks ago I had good news
and less good news. The good news was that
I won the lottery. The less good news was that
it wasn’t for umpteen hundreds of millions of
dollars, but rather for two tickets (at $39 each
rather than for the list price of $182) to the
revival of “My Fair Lady” at Lincoln Center.
I’d been playing that lottery for a while, so we
were pretty excited.
When we got to the theater, though, our Joseph C.
excitement abated a bit. The role of Eliza Kaplan
recently had been taken over by Laura Benati,
who’d received rave reviews. In fact, my nephew
Steven, a theater professional, had seen the production when
it first opened, and he is planning to see it again. She’s sup-
posed to be that good. Unfortunately, she wasn’t able to go on enough soprano voice, was no better than adequate. She
that night and was replaced by her understudy.
The production was in many respects top-notch, with a
majestically beautiful Lerner & Loewe score and lyrics, great
featured actors (Mrs. Hudson and Mrs. Higgins were por-
trayed wonderfully, as the two formidable women they are,
and Alfred’s “Get Me to the Church on Time” and Freddy’s
“On the Street Where You Live” brought down the house),
a rousing ensemble, and (here my wife dissents) divine cos-
tumes (except for Eliza’s ball gown, which was a sickly shade
of peach and didn’t come close to the wow factor of her stun-
ning red satin ball coat and the Ascot gowns).
meeting in New Jersey, we had a personal
and painful understanding of this horrific
loss. Two of our committee members, who
had watched Adar grow up, talked about
their memories of Adar as a student, an
athlete and part of their community. We
did not grieve only as sympathetic Jews in
the diaspora, or as non-Jewish Americans,
but more like extended family. We may not
have known Adar personally, but we did Martha
know Ilan and Rachel. Through our friend- Cohen
ship with them and our relationship with
the people of Nahariya, we commiserated
on a much deeper level. So much so that even in the last
few days, more than four years later, we talked about
Adar during the committee meeting.
And it is tragic to realize that more than four years later,
there is still fighting, missiles and now fire balloons com-
ing from Gaza, terrorizing all Israelis who live in the south,
who wonder each day if they will make it to a shelter in
the few seconds they have before a missile explodes. Now
Hezbollah, Iran’s proxy in the Lebanon, is digging tunnels
in the north, using the southern tunnels as models, look-
ing to infiltrate and even take a community hostage. And
the fact that Russia is giving Syria the S-300 antiaircraft
system only further complicates Israel’s security.
Though the positive changes of the past two years on
the diplomatic front are welcome, there is still a strong
will to isolate Israel from the community of nations. As
in earlier years, more United Nations resolutions were
passed against Israel in 2018 than any other country and
by a large margin. Standard U.N. fare, but there was one
difference. This month, the United States offered a draft
resolution to condemn Hamas. As Ambassador Nikki
Haley said, “Peace must be built on truth.... Is the hatred
Henry was disappointing, though; the actor
playing him was much better suited in his role
of assistant private secretary to the queen on
“The Crown” (which, now having Netflix, I’m
up-to-date on).
And then there was the Eliza understudy.
If this were the plot of a movie, or, indeed, a
Broadway show, we all know the ending. She
would have seized her big opportunity and
been a smashing success, going from under-
study to star in one performance. Indeed, a
star would have been born before our very
own eyes. (Hey, with a bit of massaging that’s
not a bad title for a movie, don’t you think?)
But it was not to be. The understudy, with a pleasant
knew the score (as do I, though my wife, wisely, still refuses
to allow me to sing or even hum along), was a decent actress,
and if it had been summer stock we would have enjoyed it
well enough. But there was no oomph, no charm, no per-
sonal magnetism, no charisma, none of the oh-so-difficult to
describe star power that you know when you see it.
So back to my first Broadway show. It was, of course,
“My Fair Lady.” I didn’t see it with the original cast, Julie
Andrews and Rex Harrison. My Eliza and Henry were Sally
Ann Howes and Edward Mulhare, two young actors, worthy
successors to Julie and Rex, who went on to very successful
toward Israel so strong that you’ll protect a
terrorist organization doing harm to the Pal-
estinian people?”
The U.S. resolution passed 87 to 57,
with 33 abstentions, but it ultimately was
defeated when the Palestinians engineered a
two-thirds procedural vote. As frustrating as
the loss is, the trend is in the positive direc-
tion for Israel. This same procedural tool was
used this summer when Ambassador Haley
added an amendment condemning Hamas
to a U.N. resolution condemning Israel for
its actions when Gazans stormed Israel’s
southern border in June. The amendment passed, but it
was discarded when the two-thirds option was employed.
However, there were only 62 votes for that condemnation
of Hamas, as opposed to the more recent vote of 87. That’s
25 more votes standing with the United States and Israel,
and against Hamas and its supporters.
The relationships between Ambassador Haley and
and Israel’s ambassador to the U.N., Danny Danon, and
between President Donald J. Trump and Israel’s prime
minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, are very strong partner-
ships. We can only hope that if she is confirmed, Heather
Nauert, the State Department spokesperson who has been
nominated to replace Ambassador Haley, will continue in
the same manner.
The last two years have seen numerous actions by our
government in normalizing Israel in the world, including the
suspension of funding of UNWRA pending reform, and with-
drawal from the U.N. Human Rights Council, a true oxymo-
ron given that is has the likes of Venezuela, China, and Saudi
Arabia as members. Of course, we did not do this to be kind
to another nation but to support our own security needs
and in recognition of what Haley said — peace can only be

careers. And having seen Rex light up the
screen in the movie version and Julie being
simply enchanting on stage in “Camelot,” I
know how a true star could have brought
Eliza to life and energized the audience —
which our understudy simply didn’t do.
Other headliners I’ve seen on stage — like
Zero Mostel, Danny Kaye (even playing Noah
with a broken leg), Lauren Bacall, Ethel Mer-
man (with a voice as recognizable and spine-
tingling on the telephone as it was on the
stage), Patti Lupone, Hume Cronyn and Jes-
sica Tandy, James Earl Jones, Mary Martin, or,
as I saw just recently, Janet McTeer — not only
take over the stage but their characters fill the
theater, transporting the audience to another
level of consciousness. Moments spent with
such artists in live theater are memorable
and endure for years. The only thing from
the show that I saw a few weeks ago that will
live on for me is, well, this column.
And so I learned once again that life is not a
Broadway musical or a movie. In real life, the
guy who loses the girl doesn’t always get her
back; happily ever after can turn into divorce;
the rookie sometimes strikes out in the bot-
tom of the ninth with the championship at
stake; Jimmy Stewart’s bank can go bust; and,
yes, the understudy can be a dud.
But who would want to live in a Broadway
musical or, for that matter, in a Hallmark
built on truth. That is a change in our policy
in the Middle East, and one that we should
never stray from.
And the lesson for us is one for the ages. As
the young Carol Beldon put it in “Mrs. Mini-
ver,” one of the finest movies made about the
British people under assault at the beginning
of WWII, it is never talk or lofty ideas that win
the day when lives are at stake. That is the
time when action is required.
And so, as we end 2018 and look toward
2019, I’m grateful for the United States’ rec-
ognition of Jerusalem as the eternal capi-
tal of Israel, the only home of the Jewish
people. I’m grateful for the opening of the
American embassy in Jerusalem, finally nor-
malizing for the state of Israel something
that every other nation has but was denied
only to the Jewish people, the right to select
their own capital.
As you may recall, a year ago this month,
the U.N.’s General Assembly voted on a reso-
lution castigating the United States for mov-
ing our embassy to Jerusalem. The response
to the vote was something these countries
had not heard, at least not recently. Haley
said, “the United States had the courage and
honesty to recognize a fundamental reality.
Jerusalem has been the political, cultural,
and spiritual homeland of the Jewish peo-
ple for thousands of years. They have had
no other capital city. But the United States’
recognition of the obvious — that Jerusalem
is the capital and seat of the modern Israeli
government — is too much for some.” Since
then, other countries plan to follow — the
latest is Brazil.
We cannot get hatred of the Jews to cease
movie, where all I need is about 60 seconds
to know exactly who is going to marry whom
after the obligatory problems arise and are
then resolved, often at the Christmas gala. In
these types of shows, there’s rarely true sus-
pense or the possibility of ultimate failure;
hearts may be broken but they’re repaired
by the final commercial or bow.
Success, though, is worthwhile only when
there can also be failure. It’s no big deal that
in the show “42nd Street” the understudy
didn’t return to Allentown (hi Tara!) but
went on stage and was a hit. Her success
was writ in stone; good music, great danc-
ing, but no real possibility of failure.
Some day in the future it will be truly
meaningful when an understudy in real life
will give a spectacular performance, deserve
the standing ovation she receives, and launch
a glorious career. But it will be meaningful
only because we know that, like in the “My
Fair Lady” we saw, she could have failed.
I love musicals for entertainment, but
give me real life for living.
Joseph C. Kaplan, a regular columnist, is
a longtime resident of Teaneck. His work
also has appeared in various publications
including Sh’ma magazine, the New York
Jewish Week, the Baltimore Jewish Times, and,
as letters to the editor, the New York Times.
if we fight it only on the world stage. How-
ever, if we are to stop the increasing anti-
Semitism that is beginning to grow in our
communities, our colleges, and within
some halls of power, we must exhibit the
same conviction and courage. We need to
speak publicly and frankly about baseless
hatred being promulgated on multiple lev-
els, beginning in schools and places of wor-
ship and within communities and even at
certain nonprofits.
Without taking on this responsibility and
testing our relationships now with frank
talk, things only will get worse, and the
isolation and harassment will continue to
grow, just as it has in France, England, and
many other European countries.
At the end of “Mrs. Miniver” the small
English town is bombed. Many civilians,
men, women, and children, are killed. In
response, the rector gives a stirring speech,
asking rhetorically why civilians were killed,
rather than soldiers. “This is the people’s
war!” he says. “It is our war! We are the
fighters! Fight it then! Fight with all that is in
us, and may God defend the right.”
The frustrating thing about the Jewish
people is that as much as we are ready to
fight for others, we find it hard to fight for
ourselves. There is still time to stop this
hatred from growing in our country, but
everyone must do their part. One thing is
certain, we all will lose if we remain on
the sidelines.
Martha Cohen is an award-winning
producer and creative executive. She lives in
Fort Lee with her husband and son.
Reason
FROM PAGE 33
States and Israel are the late Rabbi
Yosef Shalom Elyashiv, Rabbi Asher
Weiss, Rabbi Mordechai Halperin, and
Rabbi Hershel Schachter. All of them
have deemed vaccination a commu-
nal responsibility, a religious obliga-
tion, and a moral mandate. Ignoring
that mandate, they say, is met properly
with expressions of opprobrium and
rabbinic remonstrance.
To this list must be added Rabbi
Shlomo Zalman Auerbach, who until
his death in 1995 was the dean of
Israeli Orthodox poskim (halachic
decisors). Rabbi Auerbach tellingly
ruled that it is even permissible to set
aside observance of Shabbat to receive
an immunization, if foregoing the Sab-
bath opportunity would necessitate an
unacceptable delay, thus creating a life-
threatening situation.
Rabbinic agreement about the reli-
gious and moral obligation to immu-
nize against infectious disease tran-
scends denominational boundaries
and institutional affiliation. The
Responsa Committee of the Reform
movement’s Central Conference of
American Rabbis declares: “Jewish
tradition would define immunization
as part of the mitzvah of healing and
recognize it as a required measure….
There are no valid Jewish religious
grounds to support the refusal to
immunize as a general principle.”
The Conservative Rabbinical Assem-
bly’s Committee on Jewish Law and
Standards unanimously adopted the
position that failure to immunize
against vaccine-preventable disease
is “a serious, compound violation of
Jewish law,” noting that rabbinic lit-
erature has linked the halachic obliga-
tion to vaccinate with no fewer than
five positive and three negative Bibli-
cal commandments.
In 1905, the United States Supreme
Court, ruling in Jacobson v. Massachu-
setts, established the right of states
to compel citizens to submit to vac-
cination. The City of Cambridge had
fined Mr. Jacobson $5 (!) for refusing to
comply with a city ordinance requir-
ing residents to be vaccinated against
smallpox. Noting the danger to the
public weal inherent in Jacobson’s fail-
ure to immunize, and his consequent
potential as a source of contagion, the
Supreme Court described the alterna-
tive to compulsory vaccination: “The
spectacle would be presented of the
welfare and safety of an entire popula-
tion being subordinated to the notions
of a single individual who chooses to
remain part of that population.” Such
radical individualism should be anath-
ema to Jewish morality, which places
such value on community, and which
expresses both our loftiest prayerful
aspirations and confesses our darkest
JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018 35
Opinion
sins in the first person plural.
Some people who refuse to immunize
simply are negligent.
Some so-called anti-vaxxers claim
that immunizations pose an inherent
mortal risk and have been linked to
autism. This irresponsible and insidi-
ous latter claim has not been merely
disproven. It has been thoroughly
debunked as based on maliciously
fraudulent studies.
Such fears and spurious claims are
unworthy of members of the Jewish
community. We are heirs to the reli-
gious tradition that teaches humanity
reverence for human life, the tradi-
tion that asserts that truth is “the seal
of God,” the tradition in which God is
approached through intellectual rigor
and served through penetrating ana-
lytical study.
Other people fail to immunize
because — frankly speaking — they are
spoiled. As S. P. Calandrillo wrote in the
University of Michigan Journal of Law
Reform: “Vaccines are becoming a vic-
tim of their own success — many indi-
viduals have never witnessed the debil-
itating diseases that vaccines protect
against, allowing complacency toward
immunization requirements to build.”
In recent months we have witnessed
the devastating consequences of that
complacency. It has no place in the Jew-
ish community.
Rabbi Nachman and Rabbi Nanzig and
Rabbi Buzagli and the Rif all saw small-
pox and polio and measles and other
deadly diseases — and the suffering they
entailed — firsthand. So did our parents
and grandparents and many elders still
among us. They were not complacent.
The circumstances permitting our own
relative unfamiliarity with those diseases
and their catastrophic costs in human
lives and misery are all but miraculous.
I write these words even as we are cele-
brating Chanukah, thanking God repeat-
edly each day “al ha-nisim” — “for the
miracles, the wonders, the acts of salva-
tion, and the triumphs” of our history.
As Jews, we never should allow the hid-
den triumphs and miraculous conditions
under which we are profoundly privi-
leged to live to be taken for granted.
Or as Rabbi Nachman might put it,
even if we are all shepherds with our
own melodies, we have obligations to
others who have a song to sing, an obli-
gation to consider the needs and wellbe-
ing, the health and lives of those among
whom we live our lives. We have an obli-
gation to submit to safe and time-tested
vaccines, to contribute to the herd
immunity that protects us all from infec-
tion, shepherds and flock alike. “For
if one does not do so (as recent events
have made all too clear) he is like those
who shed blood.”
“All the world is a very narrow
bridge, and the essential thing is not to
be afraid.”
D’var Torah
Vayigash: When sorrow is embedded

I
wonder what it would have been like
to be Joseph at that moment. Was he
standing or was he seated? Did he
fall to the ground, shaking, as the
waves of incessant, uncontrollable tears
poured through him? Did anyone try to
comfort him, to offer any wisdom, to place
a hand on his shoulder, to stand by him as
the memory of the trauma that he had suf-
fered poured out of him?
With Joseph’s goblet having been found
in Benjamin’s bag (the conclusion of Mik-
etz, last week’s parasha), Joseph’s broth-
ers have rent their clothes (a sign of deep
mourning), and returned to Joseph’s
house, throwing themselves on the
ground, pleading for clemency. Joseph
holds the power; all the cards are in his
hand. He can imprison all of his broth-
ers, enslave them, and possibly go so far
as to put them to death. Joseph decides to
enslave Benjamin, sending the rest of the
brothers away. Until...
Judah approaches Joseph with the gen-
tlest of requests, a reminder that if Benja-
min were to leave his father Jacob forever,
then Jacob would die. Judah’s emotional
request, according to Dr. Meira Polliack,
lecturer in Biblical Studies at Tel Aviv Uni-
versity, in her paper “Joseph’s Trauma:
Memory and Resolution” “... in his heart.” He controls But who is Joseph? Joseph is still a son,
functions as...a display of gen- himself, until he can’t any- still a brother, and he is still afraid, filled
erosity, not only by endear- more, until the tears begin with grief, and deeply traumatized. The
ingly acknowledging the deep to flow and the flood- pain has never left him, and it never
bond between Jacob, Joseph gates open. will. Yet still, he is Joseph. In the fullness
and Benjamin (44:20), but Va-yitein et kolo biv-chi, and the glory of his deep wounding and
also by verbalizing yet again Genesis 45:2. And Joseph trauma, he is present before his brothers,
the traumatic event, this time brought forth his voice in and he knows who he is.
through the father’s eyes (vv. tears, and Egypt heard, And all Joseph can do, is offer the
27-29); and by its expression Rabbi Paul and the House of Pharaoh moments of his pain to God, because if
of binding commitment to Jacobson heard (my own transla- he holds on to the blame, the victimiza-
Jacob and Benjamin, even at Temple Avodat tion). There are those tion any longer, it will eat away at his soul
Shalom, River
the price of self-sacrifice (vv. Edge, Reform
among us, in our own way and destroy him. Even in the midst of a
30-34).” And it is this display of and our own right, who terrible emotional breakdown, a collapse
generosity, which leads Joseph know full well what crying that is heard far and wide, Joseph knows
to reveal his shattered truth. like that sounds like; gasping, breathless who he is. Saying Ani yosef, is a state-
The text, in Parashat Vayigash, is sobs that we think will never stop, tears of ment, that he is Joseph in his success, as
resplendent in the Hebrew. V’lo yachol deepest grief that rack us to the very core much as he is Joseph in his deepest sor-
yosef l’hitapek, Genesis 45:1. JPS trans- of who we are, all captured in four words row. No matter the time elapsed, no mat-
lates this phrase as “Joseph could no in Hebrew. ter the lessening of the wound, the pain
longer control himself before all his The expression of Joseph’s pain is so remains there, always lurking beneath
attendants.” The BDB Lexicon takes the raw, and so real, that the first words he can the surface, for some encounter, mali-
translation a step further, suggesting muster are very simply, very plainly, “Ani cious or inadvertent, that triggers the
that apek (aleph-pei-qoph), means that yosef, I am Joseph.” And who is Joseph? He feelings, leading them to bubble to the
Joseph couldn’t hold himself together is a dreamer, a visionary, a favorite child. surface once more.
or be strong any longer; he couldn’t He is someone who has been thrown No, Joseph reminds us. Life never
channel his emotions any further. Rabbi into a pit, left for dead, sold into slavery, leaves us. No matter how much we try to
Samuel ben Meir (Rashbam) comments, harassed, imprisoned, and who finally, in run away, no matter how far we might go,
“Because until now, Joseph was complet- a foreign country, found a way to ascend to body and soul always seems to have a way
ing all of his work by controlling himself a position of great importance. of remembering.

BRIEFS

On last day of Chanukah,
archaeologists find an
ancient wick in the Negev
A unique lamp wick dating back to the Byzantine period
was uncovered by the Antiquities Authority at the Negev
Desert Roman Empire settlement of Shivta, according to
an announcement on the last day of Chanukah.
This wick, which is just a few centimeters long, is esti-
mated to be 1,500 years old. According to archaeologist
Dr. Naama Sukenik, the wick, which is confirmed to have
been made of linen, managed to survive because of the
dry climate of the Negev.
Christians lived in the town of Shivta (also known as
Subeita) during the Roman and Byzantine periods. It is
believed to have been a stop for Nabatean spice trades
until the region was conquered by the Romans in 106 C.E.
and transformed into wealthy towns with churches.
In the 1930s, the excavation of Shivta began under Har-
ris Dunscombe Colt — leader of the American Colt expedi-
tion — and was revived by the University of Haifa in 2015
under Professor Guy Bar-Oz and Dr. Yotam Tepper.
The Colt team erected a stone-housing edifice out of large
blocks taken from the ruins of Shivta, which now houses a
family that operates a bed-and-breakfast from the site.
The adjacent Shivta national park is open to visitors,
who can see ancient churches, government edifices, and
other buildings. While the excavation has managed to
uncover many of the large structures, complete with stone
etchings and even mosaics, a significant part of the site
still lays in ruin and has not yet been excavated.
“The Mishnah, tractate Shabbat, discusses what mate-
rials may and may not be used as wicks to light Shabbat
lamps,” Sukenik said in a statement. “There, too, linen is
mentioned as a high-quality material for wicks because
it burns long and beautifully.” Although the ancient res-
idents of Shivta were Christians, linen was a common
material for wick-making at the time.
According to the archaeologists, the use of linen wicks
in a location where flax does not grow indicates that the
linen or the wicks themselves were likely imported.
The wick, along with other objects recovered from the
Colt expedition at Shivta, will be on public display at the
Hecht Museum in Haifa beginning on January 24. JNS.ORG
Zionist group uses conference
to put emphasis on human rights
At conference, Israeli minorities praise Jewish state
The Zionist organization Im Tirtzu held its sixth annual
Zionist Conference for Human Rights Tuesday in Tel Aviv.
During the conference, which takes place annually on
international Human Rights Day, Im Tirtzu CEO Matan
Peleg explained that the conference aims to underscore
the unbreakable connection between Zionism and human
rights, and to counter those who use the call of human
rights to slander and delegitimize Israel.
The event opened with a panel on the topic of the inte-
gration of minorities in Israel and featured the chairman
of the Christian IDF Officers Forum, Capt. (res.) Shadi
Halul; Muslim social activist Kazim Khalilieh; and Druze
attorney and activist Hazar Gadben.
“There is no country that is more just than Israel, which
provides full and equal rights to all of its citizens,” Halul
said. “As a minority, I can testify to all the horrors that Chris-
tians experienced and continue to experience in Lebanon,
Syria, Iraq and Egypt. But in Israel, we live freely in peace.”
Kazim Khalilieh, who presents pro-Israel lectures
around the world, discussed the difficulties of advocating
for Israel as a member of the Muslim community.
“It’s not easy to go against the current,” Khalilieh said.
“Two years ago, my parents stopped talking to me because
of my support for Israel. But that is who I am; I need to
stand up for the truth.”
Hazar Gadben said “all the radical-left Jews who slander
and demonize Israel need to wake up and understand that if
they were the minority in Israel, they would go back to being
‘Jews with big noses’ and would be oppressed to no end.”
The panel was followed by a discussion on the topic of
Israel’s legal rights, featuring Ze’ev Jabotinsky, grandson of
the famous Revisionist Zionist leader, and Yishai Fleisher,
spokesperson of the Jewish Community of Hebron.
The conference concluded with an award ceremony,
in which Im Tirtzu’s Zionist Prize for Human Rights was
awarded to social activist and bereaved father Boaz Kokia,
whose son Ron was murdered last year in a terror attack,
and Rabbi Arie Levy, the founder of Rescuers Without Bor-
ders, which provides medical assistance to those in need
throughout the world.  JNS.ORG

36 JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018

 The Frazzled Housewife
To Cleveland, to Cleveland,
to Cleveland we go!
L
ittle kids, little problems; big waking them up. They are so excited that
kids, big problems. When I
first heard this saying and my
kids were little, I thought, “Ha, ably really were excited that they were
ha. You don’t know what you are talking
about.” After all, once you finish toilet
training your kids, what problems could
you possibly have after that? I think
someone should write a book and list all
of these problems. In age order. Solving
each problem with specific answers and
techniques.
What to do when your child is a biter?
(I only had one child bitten once by
another child, so that wasn’t my prob-
lem.) What to do when your child isn’t a
good sharer? (Also not a problem I had
with my perfect progeny.)
What to do when your child
uses bad language? (Hmm, I
think that is actually a prob-
lem that I have.) And an all-
time favorite — what to do
when your child likes wear-
ing the same item of cloth-
ing every single day? (Again,
not a problem I had…. I am
so blessed.) Banji
Then there are the more Ganchrow
complex problems, which
aren’t really problems, but
are issues. Like what do you do when
your child becomes more religious than
you are? What do you do when your
child becomes less religious than you
are? What do you do when your child
drops out of high school and wants to
sell watermelons by the highway? What
do you do when your child votes for
Trump? Yup, someone really needs to
write a book of solutions.
And then, there is this. What do you
do when two of your boys tell you that
they want to drive 13 hours to and from
Cleveland to go to a football game?
Of course, the game is the Cleveland
Browns against the Carolina Panthers.
For those of you who have been paying
attention to past columns, son #3 has
been a Carolina Panthers fan since his
problems included carrying his “boppy”
around EVERYWHERE…. (After he
finally relinquished it, we ripped off a
piece and put it in the freezer, where it
will stay for all eternity.)
Son #1 and son #3 were so excited
about this plan — a plan that only two
clueless boys would find exciting. Driv-
ing six and a half hours after Shabbos,
showing up in Cleveland at 2:30 in the
morning, and staying at a friend’s par-
ents’ house. “Don’t worry, we won’t be
Kosher Crossword
“Jerusalem: Top to Bottom” By Yoni Glatt
koshercrosswords@gmail.com
Difficultly Level: Medium
we are coming to stay with them!” (And
since they are out-of-towners, they prob-
coming to stay with them!) In true my-
son-form, they found a Shacharit (morn-
ing prayer) minyan, a Mincha (afternoon
prayer) minyan, and last but not least, a
Maariv (evening prayer) minyan.
Of course there was a catch. The
game started at 1, and Mincha was at
4:30. What happened if the game went
into extra innings? (Oops, wrong sport.)
What happened if the game went into
overtime? What happened if the game
ran late due to circumstances beyond
anyone’s control? The possibilities of
missing a minyan were
endless — and husband
#1 wanted nothing to do
with it. Because the other
catch was that husband
#1 and crazy mom didn’t
really want the boys to
go. You get nervous when
your kids drive around
the block, but letting
them drive to Cleveland,
Across Down
by themselves, was too
1. Sephardic character on “Srugim” 1. Room at the top
much for our delicate
5. “ASAP!” 2. Taj ___
stomachs to handle. 9. Winston Churchill’s “___ Country” 3. Sendler who rescued Warsaw children
But no one was listening to us, because 13. Trendy chips 4. Go bad
the boys were so excited about going 14. It grows on you 5. Eye-covered prayer: Var.
— but more importantly, about going 15. Org. in “Interstellar” 6. Items on some shoes
16. Elevated spot in the Old City 7. Isn’t well
together. And very few things make a
19. Baseball All-Star Kinsler 8. ___ Asar (12 Prophets)
boymom happier than having her boys 20. Collie of TV 9. “Wheel of Fortune” request
want to spend quality time together. 21. Word before a maiden name 10. Animals, collectively
Except, of course, if those same boys 22. Music symbols 11. “Mary Tyler Moore Show” co-star
want to spend quality time with each 24. Former Russian VIPs 12. Insurance and interest
26. Albania currency unit 17. “Is there anyone ___?”
other AND their mom….
28. ___ Air 18. Administer, with “out”
The sun set over Teaneck, the Chanu- 29. Looney Tunes brand 23. Jetted
kah candles were lit, and off they went. 32. “Laugh-In” comedian Johnson 25. Cabbage, carrots and mayo
Twenty-nine hours later, my beauti- 35. A Biblical king and a Gray 27. “Hard” in Hebrew
ful boys were back and were chock full 39. Locale lower than 16-Across 28. He said “It gets late early out there”
42. “Velvet” or “cant” ending 29. George Peppard TV series, with “The”
of stories of things that I knew noth-
43. Rabbi Isaac Luria 30. Some Jeeps
ing about, but I was so happy that they 44. “The way” of the East 31. Cited formally
were talking to me that I pretended I 45. Gallery display 33. Israel’s 6 and 20: Abbr.
had some idea what they were talking 46. Electric autos 34. Blue hue
about. Because with all of the prob- 47. Fall back, as the ocean 36. Space relayer
48. Moses alternative 37. Vase material
lems and issues, it’s nice to know that,
50. He’s got the whole world on 38. Shlumps
every once in a while, you do some- his shoulders 40. “ ___ Extra-Terrestrial”
thing right… 52. Locales lower than 39-Across 41. Hebrew month
57. ___ (Hilario), Brazilian-born 49. Court figure, for short
Banji Ganchrow of Teaneck is sad to 57-Down player 51. Brief and to the point
58. As a result 53. Lose air, as a tire
say that the Carolina Panthers are not
59. Bar or bat mitzvah, e.g. 54. Word with “crime” or “believer”
making it to playoffs this season, after 61. Has attachment? 55. Like the Giants’ season
five consecutive losses. I couldn’t tell you 62. “Lang Syne” preceder 56. Says “yes” without saying a word
what the Rams were doing because the 63. Thorn site, on a flower 57. See 57-Across
son who followed them has been in a 64. “___ I” (“Ditto”) 60. Dark and depressing, as music
65. Command and Control
beit medrash learning for the entirety of
66. Gateway Arch designer Saarinen
football season. Not that there is anything
wrong with that….
The solution to last week’s puzzle is on page 42.
Jewish Standard DECEMBER 14, 2018 37
Calendar
Judge Rachel Freier
Shabbat in Teaneck:
Judge Rachel Freier
discusses “ My Journey
to the Bench” at
Congregation Rinat
Yisrael in Teaneck, 4 p.m.
Judge Freier, whose
career was highlighted
in the documentary
film “93Queen,” was
elected as a civil court
judge in Brooklyn. 389
West Englewood Ave.
(201) 837-2795.
Sunday  daytime series at
DECEMBER 16
Laurence Fine, leader
DEC.
of Students Demand
Blood Services, a Shalom presents visiting
Tuesday  division of New York
Blood Center, 2-8 p.m.
scholar Rabbi David
Fine of Temple Israel &
DECEMBER 18 389 W. Englewood Ave. JCC in Ridgewood with
(800) 933-2566 or www. a new series, “Jews in
nybloodcenter.org. Germany: A Complicated
Legacy.” Refreshments
Documentary in at 12:30 p.m., program at
Tenafly: In collaboration 12:45. Series continues
with the art exhibit December 27, January
“They Risked Their Lives: 3, 10, 17, and 24. 1449
Poles Who Saved Jews Anderson Ave., Fort Lee.
During the Holocaust,” (201) 947 1735 or www.
the Kaplen JCC on geshershalom.org.
the Palisades screens
“Szymon’s Return,”
6:30 p.m. The film’s Friday 
Book talk in Fort Lee: director, Sławomir DECEMBER 21
The sisterhood of the Grünberg, will introduce
JCC of Fort Lee’s Book the film and host a Shabbat in Teaneck:
Club meets to discuss Q&A after. Dr. Maria H. Temple Emeth offers
Antonio Iturbe’s “The Makowiecka of Bergen musical services with
Librarian of Auschwitz,” Community College, who the Temple Emeth Band,
1 p.m. Refreshments. helped curate the exhibit Cantor Ellen Tilem and
1449 Anderson Ave. at the JCC’s Waltuch Rabbi Steven Sirbu,
(201) 947-1735. Gallery, also will speak. 8 p.m. 1666 Windsor
In conjunction with the Road. (201) 833-1322 or
Senior program in POLIN Museum of the www.Emeth.org.
Wayne: The senior
History of Polish Jews
in Warsaw. 411 E. Clinton
Temple Beth Tikvah Ave. (201) 408-1406 or Sunday 
meets to discuss the nbachrach@jccotp.org. DECEMBER 23
life of Elie Wiesel,
1 p.m. Refreshments.
950 Preakness Ave. Thursday  Book discussion in
Teaneck: The Jewish
(973) 595-6565 or www. DECEMBER 20 Center of Teaneck hosts
templebethtikvahnj.org.
the Leaves of Faith Book
Parkinson’s support: Club with a discussion
Hebrew in Jersey
City: Temple Emanuel
The Jewish Home of Isaac Bashevis
Family continues a Singer’s “Gimpel the

15
of Bayonne and
monthly support group Fool: And Other Stories,”
Action Bergen Congregation B’nai
for patients with a focusing on “Gimpel the
Jacob of Jersey City
County, speaks at Book club in Paramus: host the 21st annual
diagnosis of Parkinson’s Fool,” “The Gentleman
the kiddush after 9 a.m. Shabbat Phyllis Waterstone Read Hebrew America
disease, their families, from Cracow,” “The
facilitates a discussion on and caregivers, with Little Shoemakers,”
services at Temple Israel & JCC in Tara Westover’s memoir,
and Canada, a free
Kavannah yoga at and “The Unseen,”
five-week, nationwide
Ridgewood to mark National Gun “Educated,” at the JCC of Hebrew reading crash
the Jewish Home at 8 p.m. 70 Sterling
Violence Prevention Shabbat. 475 Paramus/Congregation course, at B’nai Jacob,
Rockleigh, 10 a.m. At
10:30, Howard Katz will
Place. (201) 833-0515
Beth Tikvah, 10 a.m. or jcot.org.
Grove St. (201) 444-9320 or www. Refreshments. East
6:30 p.m. 176 West Side
discuss “Kavannah Yoga
Ave. (201) 435-5725 or
synagogue.org. 304 Midland Ave. bnaijacobjc.com.
for Mood Enhancement.”
(201) 262-7691 or www.
jccparamus.org. Film in Teaneck:
Refreshments. 10 Link
Drive. (201) 750-4246 Singles
Temple Emeth’s adult or parkinsons@
Friday  Saturday  Film in Franklin Lakes:
Temple Emanuel of North
education group screens jewishhomefamily.org.
Thursday 
a Jewish-themed movie
DECEMBER 14 DECEMBER 15 Jersey screens the 1945 as part of its “Movies
DECEMBER 20
classic musical “Ziegfeld That Matter” series,
Shabbat in Fort Lee: Shabbat in Wayne: Follies,” 1:30 p.m. 7:30 p.m. Refreshments. Widows and widowers
JCC of Fort Lee/ Congregation Shomrei Popcorn and ice cream. 1666 Windsor Road. meet: Movin’ On, a
Congregation Gesher Torah holds a learners 558 High Mountain Road. (201) 833-1322 or emeth. monthly luncheon
Shalom hosts a post- minyan where (201) 560-0200 or www. org. group for widows and
Chanukah Shabbat participants can explore tenjfl.org. widowers, meets at
dinner, 6 p.m., and the prayer service the Glen Rock Jewish
musical service at and ask questions, Wednesday  Center, 12:30 p.m.
7:15. 1449 Anderson 10:45 a.m. 30 Hinchman DECEMBER 19 682 Harristown Road.
Ave. Reservations, Ave. (973) 696-2500, Rabbi David J. Fine (201) 652-6624 or
(201) 947-1735. ShomreiTorahWCC.org, Blood drive in Teaneck: arbgr@aol.com.
Jews in Germany: The
Congregation Rinat CSI Scholar Fund of
Yisrael holds a blood the JCC of Fort Lee/
drive with New Jersey Congregation Gesher

38 JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018

 Calendar

Young family Shabbat in Englewood

Join young families at Congregation lunch follows services. The shul is on the
Kol HaNeshamah for services led by premises of St. Paul’s Campus, 113 Engle
Rabbi Lindsey Healey-Pollack, Saturday, St. For more information send an email
December 15, 11:15 a.m. Kiddush and to Rabbi@KHNJ.org or www.KHNJ.org.

Rabbi leads mystical look

at weekly Torah portion
Rabbi Leiah Moser leads “Mystical Parshat HaShavua,”
an ongoing class at Temple Israel & JCC in Ridgewood, on
Thursdays at 2 p.m.
Rabbi Moser delves into the Torah portion as seen through
Temple Emanuel of the Pascack Valley choir the lens of some of the classics of Jewish mysticism. Partici-
pants read a part of the parasha alongside commentary from
Chanukah music in Woodcliff Lake the Zohar or the chasidic masters and discuss the insights
they learn. For information, email rabbileiah@synagogue.
Rabbi Leiah Moser

Voices in Harmony, an ensemble of
synagogue choirs and guests from
Temple Emanuel of the Pascack Valley,
Temple Beth Rishon in Wyckoff, Beth
Haverim Shir Shalom in Mahwah, and
Temple Beth Or in Washington Town-
ship, gather at Temple Emanuel for
Seeking artists to exhibit at the JCC
The Kaplen JCC on the Palisades is looking
for painters, photographers, digital artists,
and other creative designers to exhibit at
its Waltuch Art Gallery, located on the cen-
ter’s second floor. The focus of the gallery
is to exhibit thematically Jewish artwork or
art produced by Jewish artists.
To be considered for a solo exhibition,
submit a brief bio and artist’s statement;
show title and theme; three or four high
resolution jpegs of pieces that you’d plan
to include in the show; price range; and
website, if you have one.
Exhibits typically run monthly for four
“Light the Lights, a Chanukah Choral
Celebration.” The concert is on Sunday,
December 16, at 4 p.m. The synagogue
is at 87 Overlook Drive in Woodcliff
Lake. For more information, call (201)
391-0801 or go to www.tepv.org.
weeks and include a meet-the-artist recep-
tion hosted by the artist, who purchases
food through the JCC Cafe. The JCC will
provide coffee, tea, and paper goods.
All exhibit work should be for sale,
allowing a portion of the proceeds to sup-
port JCC programming. The JCC publicizes
all shows and receptions in local newspa-
pers and websites, as well as in JCC mar-
keting materials and on its website.
Submissions should be sent to Nina
Bachrach at nbachrach@jccotp.org.
For more information, call Nina at
(201) 408-1406.
org or call (201) 444-9320.
Herring lovers, take note
Congregation Netivot Shalom in Teaneck
will host the Bergen County Herring Fes-
tival on Saturday, December 15, 8 p.m.
Herring selections from Ma’adan of
Teaneck, Rockland Kosher of Monsey,
and Raskin’s of Brooklyn, will be show-
cased for tasting along with vodka and
Jewish homes need volunteers
to bring cheer to residents
Volunteers are needed to entertain resi-
dents of the Jewish Home at Rockleigh
and the Jewish Home Assisted Living in
River Vale on December 25.
Activities include wrapping and
delivering homemade chocolate cookies
to residents, crafts, sandwich-making,
select single malt scotches.
Ten percent of the net proceeds will be
donated to Jewish Family and Children’s
Services of Northern New Jersey.
The shul is at 811 Palisade Ave.,
Teaneck. For information, go to www.
netivotshalomnj.org/herring.
cookie decorating, and a balloon toss;
there will be a concert too. Volunteer
opportunities are from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
For more information, email Stacey Orden
at sorden@jewishhomefamily.org. or call
her at (201) 518-1175

Yiddish concert
at Bronx center
The Jewish People’s Philharmonic Chorus,
conducted by Binyumen Schaechter and
accompanied by pianist Seth Weinstein,
performs a Yiddish-language concert, “To
Everything There Is a Season: The Year
in Yiddish Song” at the Sholem Aleichem
Cultural Center. The concert is set for
Sunday, December 16, at 1:30 p.m. The
center is at 3301 Bainbridge Ave., at 208th
Street. For information, go to thejppc.org.
DAVID KHABINSKY

JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018 39

Jewish World
Key scene from ‘Beale Street’ features
a kippah-clad and very ‘loving’ Dave Franco
STEPHEN SILVER
“If Beale Street Could Talk,” the new film
from “Moonlight” director Barry Jenkins,
is at heart a film about African-American
love during a time of rampant racism.
It’s an adaption of James Baldwin’s heart-
breaking 1974 novel of the same name,
which depicts a young African-American
couple in 1970s New York whose love
story is derailed unjustly.
But one of the film’s most powerful —
and most talked about — scenes begins
with a close-up of the back of the head of
a kippah-wearing man as he walks up the
stairs of a Manhattan apartment.
The narrative of “Beale Street,” which
opens today and is considered an award
season contender, alternates between
the present and various stages of the
couple’s life together. The scene in ques-
tion takes place almost two-thirds of the
way through, and the kippah wearer is
named Levy.
Levy, played by Dave Franco, is a pro-
spective landlord for Fonny (Stephan
James) and Tish (Kiki Layne). It has been
established in an earlier scene that Fonny
and Tish, who are looking for an apart-
ment together after learning they are
expecting a child, have been rejected
repeatedly by other landlords because
they are black.
“Sometimes Tish and I go together,
sometimes I go alone, but it’s always the
same story, man,” Fonny tells a friend,
played by Brian Tyree Henry, in the ear-
lier scene.
Levy is different — not only does he not
reject them, he plays along with Fonny as
he mimes moving a refrigerator into the
unfurnished space. Later, in a discussion
on the roof, Fonny asks what the catch is,
why he is willing to rent the apartment to
them when no one else would.
“We’ve been looking for a long time,
and there’s no reason for you to treat two
Negroes so nicely,” Fonny says.
Levy responds with an impassioned
speech about love.
“Look, man, with me it’s pretty simple —
I dig people who love each other,” he says.
“Black, white, green, purple, it doesn’t
matter to me. Just spread the love.”
When Fonny asks if he’s a hippie, Levy
replies, “I don’t know. I’m just my moth-
er’s son. Sometimes that’s all that makes
the difference between us and them.”
A version of the scene exists in Bald-
win’s novel, although it’s a bit different
there. Levy is described on the page
as an “an olive-skinned, curly-haired,
merry-forced” 33-year-old from the
Bronx. Franco (the younger brother of
James) happens to be 33 and Jewish in
real life, but the speech is an invention
of the movie, and an older version of the
40 JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018
Barry Jenkins, right, directing Stephan James, center, and Dave Franco on the set of “If Beale Street Could Talk.”
Dave Franco at the 24th Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Au-
ditorium in Los Angeles on January 21, 2018. Franco plays a Jewish landlord in
“If Beale Street Could Talk.”
screenplay floating around online did not
include it.
The novel puts the “he dug people who
loved each other” line in the mouth of nar-
rator Tish rather than in Levy’s.
Jenkins — the film’s writer and direc-
tor, whose debut “Moonlight” won three
Oscars, including for best picture, in 2017
— has described the scene as one of the
most pivotal in the movie.
“There’s this very simple scene where
his character walks into the film and is
appointed this very important task,” Jen-
kins said of Franco in an interview with
Vulture at the Toronto Film Festival. “I was
really careful about writing into the source
material too much, but it just felt like there
was something that this character needed
to say to our main characters.
“You would assume black people are
one of us and white people are one them.
FRAZER HARRISON/GETTY IMAGES
But it’s like no, there are us [sic], people
raised right by our mothers, and there
are them, who maybe haven’t been. We
can’t even blame them for that because
maybe their mothers didn’t have the
capability to raise them the way that we
were raised.”
Despite his good intentions, some on
the festival circuit found the scene a little
corny and even jarring — mostly, as Vulture
also pointed out, because of the casting of
Franco, who has come to be associated
with the many wacky comedies in which
he has starred in recent years, like “Neigh-
bors” and “The Little Hours.”
“Is this scene a poignant moment under-
lining the necessity of human connection
to cut through oppressive power struc-
tures, as Jenkins clearly intends?” Nate
Jones wrote. “Or, as some viewers who
found it pretty corny argued at the movie’s
ANNAPURNA PICTURES
premiere party, is it a disruption of the
movie’s carefully considered tone to hand
one of the most pivotal emotional beats to
the guy from ‘Neighbors’?”
The scene also paints a rosy portrait of
the black-Jewish relationship at the time,
when in reality it was far more compli-
cated. In the 20th century, and especially
in New York City, tensions between blacks
and Jews often manifested through land-
lord-tenant relations — a topic addressed
elsewhere by James Baldwin himself.
“When we were growing up in Harlem,
our demoralizing series of landlords were
Jewish, and we hated them,” Baldwin
wrote in the New York Times in 1967 in
an essay titled “Negroes Are Anti-Semitic
Because They’re Anti-White.”
“We hated them because they were
terrible landlords, and did not take care
of the building. A coat of paint, a broken
window, a stopped sink, a stopped toilet,
a sagging floor, a broken ceiling, a dan-
gerous stairwell, the question of garbage
disposal, the question of heat and cold, of
roaches and rats — all questions of life and
death for the poor, and especially for those
with children — we had to cope with all of
these as best we could.”
But Baldwin goes on to note in the same
essay that most of the white people who
had treated him poorly probably weren’t
Jewish, and after all, “it is not the Jew
who controls the American drama. It is
the Christian.… The crisis taking place in
the world, and in the minds and hearts of
black men everywhere, is not produced
by the Star of David, but by the old, rug-
ged Roman cross on which Christendom’s
most celebrated Jew was murdered. And
not by Jews.”
So in the end, the Franco scene is just
a touching moment meant to remind us
of the kindness of people of all races. And
it adheres not only to Jenkins’ vision, but
also to Baldwin’s. JTA WIRE SERVICE
 Obituaries Helene Rich Emanuel
Helene Rich Emanuel died on
Sunday, November 25, 2018.
Helene was loving wife to Paul
Linda Bogdanow Funeral Planning Simplified
for 68 years. Loving mother to
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She attended Suffolk University, Bergen to Sarah, David, Joshua, Daniel, 201.261.2900 | 789 Teaneck Road, Teaneck, NJ 07666
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an accountant at Benjamin Moore headquarters. mother-in-law to Rich, Artie, and Phil.
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Predeceased by her husband, Robert, she is
survived by a daughter, Melissa Anne Gorash
(Michael); siblings, Barbara Hale (Thomas) and
Barry (Larraine); three grandchildren; one great-
grandchild, and nieces and nephews.
Donations can be made to Brain Aneurysm
Foundation or Jewish National Fund. Arrangements
were by Louis Suburban Chapel, Fair Lawn.
Frederick Levine
Frederick I. Levine, 95, of Fair Lawn, formerly of
Paterson, died December 11.
During World War II, he was a lieutenant with the
Born in Brooklyn, Helene attended Music and
Art High School, and graduated from University of
Robert Schoem’s Menorah Chapel, Inc
Michigan.
Jewish Funeral Directors
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Pacific Theater and Japan. He graduated Columbia Donations welcomed to the Bergen Philharmonic
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degree from Seton Hall University. A patent and civil Funeral arrangements were under the supervison of The Christopher Family
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and was a real estate broker. He was a member of the — Paid Obituary —
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of Pythias Lodge #163, both of Fair Lawn.
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RESTAURANT INC. d/b/a BENJYS,
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Jewish Standard DECEMBER 14, 2018 43

Jewish World

Immigration
FROM PAGE 25

until 1992, Heinz Galinski, hired dozens

of Russian-speaking Jews to help with
the absorption of others. And many Jew-
ish communities tried to assist penniless
newcomers however they could — includ-
ing charity.
But these well-intended steps sometimes
stoked tensions.
It made some “wrongly frame” commu-
nal politics as “a struggle between Russian
speakers in power who do shady things and
German-speaking opposition,” according
to Sergey Lagodinsky, a Russia-born jurist
who has run for leadership roles in the Ber-
lin Jewish community’s elections.
And some dismissed Russian-speaking
Jews’ desire for contact with Jewish life as
utilitarian, he added. In the European con-
text, joining the community allows a mem-
ber access to facilities as well as free or
subsidized services for weddings, circumci-
sions, and b’nai mitzvah.
That suggestion was especially insulting
to families like Knochenhauer’s. Her moth-
er’s family was so attached to their Jewish
identity that they continued holding Pass-
over seder dinners in communist Russia
(though, out of caution, they neither read
the Haggadah nor told the children what
the bizarre dishes and customs were all
about, she said).
Yet Nedlin and Knochenhauer’s own life Children place white roses on a Star of David sculpture at the construction site of a new synagogue in Potsdam, Germany,
stories reflect their divided community’s on November 9, 2018, the 80th anniversary of Kristallnacht. BERND SETTNIK/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

ability to transcend the challenges of this

culture clash, which ended up becoming
the community’s lifeline.
This year, both women married Jewish
men descended from postwar families.
Anna Nedlin was married at a Cologne
synagogue to Roni Lehrer, whom she met
10 years ago at the Mahane Jewish camp.
The couple, both historians, are expecting
their first child.
Lehrer, 30, credits the Russian-speak-
ing influx with more than just continuing
his own Jewish family. “We wouldn’t be
around if not for their arrival,” he said. “We
would’ve been doomed as a community.”
Lehrer’s mother, he said, joined the
Jewish community of Cologne in the early
1980s, when it was “a dwindling group of
1,000 people.” She did not expect Jew-
ish life to survive in Cologne, planning to
move to Israel at some point so that her
children would grow up with Judaism, her
son said. But a decade later, “we’re a com-
munity of 5,500 people.”
This resulted in the 2002 re-establish-
ment of a Jewish school in Cologne, the
Lauder Morijah School, and the opening of
other Jewish institutions. Two-thirds of the
60 counselors trained annually by the com-
munity for youth work in Cologne come
from Jewish homes with at least one Rus-
sian-speaking parent, Lehrer said.
Language and food differences are some
of the minor issues younger mixed couples
can expect, according to Knochenhauer’s
Berlin-born husband, who asked not to
Sergey Lagodinsky and Dana Golan are at a discussion in Berlin about Israel,
April 30, 2015.
be identified by name in the article. (Kno-
chenhauer said his preference for keeping
a low profile was typical of postwar Jews,
and it is one of the things that sets them
apart from Russian speakers who “won’t
stay silent.”)
Her family “makes enough food for an
army, which always makes me wonder
just how many people they plan on host-
ing,” Knochenhauer’s husband said. But
these minor differences are not compara-
ble to the challenges of interfaith marriages
with partners from very different cultures,
HEINRICH-BÖLL-STIFTUNG/FRANK ROEHL
Knochenhauer said.
Still, the arrival of many thousands
of Russian speakers has had a lasting
and often divisive effect on communal
politics, shaping the processes of some
communities to this day, everyone inter-
viewed for this article agreed.
One of the first parties representing Rus-
sian speakers in the internal elections of the
Berlin Jewish Community was called “Silent
Majority.” Its main platform was the mem-
bers’ identify as Russian speakers.
From the mid-1990s onward, the
Russian-German divide became a perma-
nent issue in internal elections campaigns,
according to Lagodinsky, the jurist. “There
was a lot of disappointment” among Rus-
sian speakers over how they were received
by German-speaking Jews, he said.
Some politicians “played up” this senti-
ment, he said, naming the current presi-
dent of the Berlin Jewish Community,
Gideon Joffe. Born to Soviet immigrant
Jews in Israel, he moved to Germany
when he was a child. According to Lago-
dinsky, Joffe has “in Trumpian style played
up the Russian-speaking identity card”
in elections.
Lagodinsky and others accused Joffe of
rigging the internal elections of 2015 and
clinging to power with “tricks right out of
the Soviet period,” as Lagodinsky put it.
Joffe, who has denied the allega-
tions, did not reply to many requests for
an interview.
But the fact that Joffe’s main chal-
lenger, Lagodinsky, also speaks Russian
as a mother tongue “shows we’ve moved
as a community passed the language
divide and are focusing on the main
issues,” Lagodinsky said.
To Lehrer, the historian, the internal
divide “is a generational issue.”
“People aged 20 to 40 don’t care about
this anymore,” he said. And whereas some
aspects of the problem are “alive, it is quite
literally dying out.”
 JTA WIRE SERVICE

44 JEWISH STANDARD DECEMBER 14, 2018

 Real Estate & Business

Maricris Salazar joins Miron Properties as transaction coordinator

Miron Properties announces the addition of Maricris Salazar to its team
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Real Estate & Business

Tel Aviv boasts a host of new hotels

Tourism is booming and here are some exciting additions
to the most intriguing neighborhoods of the White City

ISRAEL21C STAFF
A whole new crop of remarkable hotels
opened this year in Tel Aviv-Jaffa, mainly in
the trendy southern neighborhoods near the
Jaffa flea market and port, Carmel Market,
Nahalat Binyamin artisans fair, high-tech
Rothschild Boulevard, artsy Neve Tzedek
and hip Florentin.
Other new hotels are sited in central or
“Old North” Tel Aviv for a more traditional
taste of the city. All are just a hop, skip and
jump from the city’s famous Mediterranean
beaches and vibrant nightlife options.
Here are some of the
best new hotels in Tel Aviv:
DAVE GORDON HOTEL: Best new low-bud-
get boutique hotel
If you’re looking for relatively low-cost
accommodations in Tel Aviv, this quirky
property from Brown Hotels’ new “Son of
a Brown” brand fits the bill. Its central loca-
tion near the beach gives equal access to the
NVE-3560 Fall Mortgage $549 Ad 5x6.5_NVE-3560 Fall Mortgage $549 Ad 5x6.5 9/27/18 10:43 AM Page 1 hood saloon” featuring a rough, indus-
artistic and professional faces of Tel Aviv in in South Tel Aviv’s American-German
a prime shopping district. Colony, The Drisco has 42 rooms, some
Dave Gordon’s no-elevator four-story pre- offering views of the Mediterranean and
served Bauhaus building is furnished with others overlooking Jaffa or the hotel’s
flea-market finds and “funky, weird, daring courtyard.
and fun” novelties. Guests get vouchers for A second historic building, the Nor-
meals at two neighborhood cafés and a dis- ton House, is part of the complex. This
count on a nearby gym. three-story wood structure, renamed
Address: 17 Gordon St. The Villa Drisco, has a five-room suite
Amenities: Video game console, library, and Maine-style porches.
sitting courtyard, bike rentals Address: 6 Auerbach St.
Parking: In nearby public lot on Frishman Amenities: Lounge bar, rooftop bar,
Street and chef restaurant Zada featuring a con-
temporary spin on the Ottoman cuisine
THE DRISCO: Best new restored hotel Parking: Valet
The Hardegg Jerusalem Hotel, built in the
FABRIC: Best new theme hotel
1860s by John and George Drisco, was the
Bunk-bed room at the Fabric. Each
region’s first luxury hotel until it was taken
bed has own TV screen and a privacy
over in 1940 as a British military headquar-
ters and later as a shelter for Jewish refugees
curtain.
from Europe. The Atlas boutique hotel chain’s 10th
A $35 million investment and 10-year res-
Tel Aviv property takes its name from
toration project brought the hotel back to
the fabric district concentrated in this
life earlier this year as The Drisco, part of the
vivacious area of South Tel Aviv.
Leading Hotels of the World group. Situated
Fabric was designed as a “neighbor-
trial design and furniture along with
colorful art throughout its 43 rooms.
In keeping with Tel Aviv’s dog-friendly
ambiance, pets are allowed on request.
A variety of room configurations
includes those with bunk beds — rare for
a hotel that’s not a youth hostel. Fabric’s
all-day bar (“from coffee till cocktail”),
the Bushwick, is a joint collaboration
with Tel Aviv’s famous Imperial Cocktail
Bar group.
Address: 28 Nahalat Binyamin St.
Amenities: All-day cocktail bar, free
happy hour, free bicycle rental
Parking: In nearby public lot
Pawson and Ramy Gill transformed
the original structure into a blend of
modern-meets-historic.
In the lobby you can see the remains
of a 12-century Crusader-era wall uncov-
ered during more than two decades of
renovations. The hotel offers 120 rooms
and suites overlooking Jaffa, the Mediter-
ranean, and a hotel courtyard.
Address: 2 Louis Pasteur St.
Amenities: Don Camillo Italian restau-
rant, L. Raphael Beauty Spa, The Chapel
meeting/reception/party space
Parking: Valet, underground parking
garage
LIGHTHOUSE BY BROWN HOTELS:
Best new youthful hotel
Soft-opened in September, Brown’s
Lighthouse Hotel is located in a 1970s
Brutalist-style former office tower at
the corner of Ben Yehuda and Allenby
near the beach.
The 100-room property eventually
will include 60 additional rooms and
suites, outdoor swimming pool, addi-
tional cocktail bar, gym and a sprawling
18th-floor rooftop with an active line of
events.
Brown Hotels describes Lighthouse
as “a high-energy hotel” geared to
“young and fun-seeking” guests. To
help set the mood, new arrivals check
in at a hybrid reception-bar area, where
you get a cocktail along with your room
key. Twelve terrace rooms offer expan-
sive balconies with outdoor Jacuzzis
surrounded by greenery.
Address: Corner of Ben Yehuda and
Allenby streets
Amenities: Rooftop Sky Bar, 2 sun-
deck terraces, spa, kosher Mediterra-

CASH BACK AT CLOSING THE JAFFA HOTEL: Best new Jaffa hotel
The Jaffa was built within the walls of a
19th century complex that once housed
Jaffa’s French Hospital. Architects John
nean-style dairy/fish restaurant, con-
ference and event facilities
Parking: In nearby lot 
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