October 8, 2014 edition of The Reporter

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VOLUME XII, NUMBER 20

October 9, 2014

How Jewish reporters in Muslim lands hide their identity

By Ron Kampeas WASHINGTON (JTA) – Don’t bring it up. If it comes up, change the subject.

If you can’t change the subject, consider an outright denial.

Those are some of the strategies used

by Jewish reporters working in the Arab and Muslim Middle East to conceal their religious heritage.

The dangers facing Jewish journalists in the region became evident recently after the beheading of a dual American-Israeli citizen, Steven Sotloff, by the jihadist group Islamic State, or ISIS. It’s not known whether ISIS was aware that Sotloff was Jewish. Colleagues believe his kidnapping by ISIS-affiliated terrorists in 2013 in Syria was one of opportunity and not a deliberate targeting.

James Foley, another journalist kidnapped

by ISIS and beheaded in August by the terror group, was Catholic.

However, Sotloff’s family in South Florida, his friends and colleagues – indeed much of the journalistic community – went to lengths to conceal his family’s deep involvement in the Jewish community and his Israeli citizenship in order not to draw his captors’ attention to a factor that may have exacerbated his ordeal.

JTA did not report on his captivity for the same reason.

The captors of Daniel Pearl, a Wall Street Journal correspondent kidnapped and beheaded by terrorists in Pakistan in 2002, made a point of his Jewishness. In the video showing his execution, they included Pearl saying “My father is Jewish, my mother is Jewish. I am a Jew” among his final words.

“We send our deepest condolences to the family of Steven Sotloff,” Pearl’s parents, Judea and Ruth, said in a statement e-mailed to JTA. “We know too well the pain of such horrific loss. Once again the world has seen the horror of terrorism in action. We continue to find strength in the belief that united, civilization will triumph and humanity will prevail.”

As ethnic and sectarian origins loom large in every encounter, keeping Sotloff’s

L-r: University of Central Florida student Melissa Catalanotto , president of the UCF Society of Professional Journalists, attended a candle light vigil held for journalist Stephen Sotloff on September 3 at the University of Central Florida in Orlando. (Photo by Gerardo Mora/Getty Images) Jewish identity under wraps made sense, said Janine Zacharia, who has reported in the region for The Washington Post. “For me, the first question whenever I met anyone in the Arab world was ‘where are you from,’ and they weren’t asking whether it was the United States or Canada – it was ‘are you a Muslim or a Jew?’” said Zacharia, who was based in Jerusalem for the Post from 2009-2011 and who now lectures at Stanford University.

“I would say, ‘I’m from New York or DC,’ and if they persisted, I would say ‘My grandfather is from Greece,’ which is true. I didn’t want to say what my religion was,” she said.

Another Jerusalem-based correspondent who asked not to be named because she is still reporting throughout the region said she drew on the experiences of extended family who are Christian to pretend she was as well. “You hear it in conversation. ‘You’re not a Jew, are you?’” said this correspondent, who knew Sotloff.

She said it was especially pronounced in Libya during the overthrow of Muammar Gadhafi there in 2011. “There was so much indoctrination against Jews, but they didn’t know Jews.”

Suspicion of Jews is not straightforward, correspondents said. Often it is wrapped into other issues – for instance,

being based at Jerusalem, which hundreds of foreign journalists are. Many governments in the region tend to ban entry to correspondents, regardless of religious heritage, who are based in Israel. When they are allowed in, Jerusalem correspondents traveling to Arab countries go to lengths to cover up any Israel ties: ripping tags out of clothes, leaving Israeli cash with trusted friends in transit cities, shutting down social media accounts.

It’s not just an Israel address that can raise mistrust. First impressions in the region often take into account one’s background and presumed loyalties.

Aaron Schachter, who was based in Lebanon and Jerusalem for the BBC in the last decade, said that in Lebanon, asking one’s background was a natural opening conversational gambit. But when the answer was “Jewish,” he said, there was a patina of suspicion that he called “creepy.”

“In Lebanon it was slightly threatening because everyone pays attention to what you are – Sunni, Shia – and it’s not unusual for someone to call attention to it, but at a point it’s vaguely threatening” for Jews, said Schachter, now an assignment editor for The World, a Public Radio International program.

“I know what you are,” he recalled an interlocutor affiliated with Hezbollah, the Lebanon-based group that repeatedly waged war with Israel, as saying. The man drew the conclusion, correctly, that Schachter was Jewish from his first name.

“I know they’re going to try to figure out who you are, whether a Maronite Christian or Orthodox Christian,” Schachter said. “But when you have someone say ‘I know what you are,’ what is the purpose of that in the course of the conversation we’re having?”

One thing journalists quickly learn is that the Jewish “tells” in the West don’t mean much in the Middle East. Jewish names obvious in the West are not at all so in the region, and stereotypical “Jewish looks” among westerners are indistinguishable from the Mediterranean and Middle Eastern features that are common

Rabbi Nosson Adler named as head of the Scranton Hebrew Day School Alex Gans, president of the Board of Directors of the Scranton Hebrew Day School, has announced the recent appointment of Rabbi Nosson Adler to the position of head of school. Adler’s background in education includes years as an instructor of Judaic studies at multiple levels and in many settings. He has also spent time in the rabbinate as a spiritual leader of Young Israel of Pittsburgh, and later he became principal at Yeshiva Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch in New York City.

Adler received his rabbinic ordination from the late Rabbi Moshe Feinstein and

his master’s in education from Duquense University. He continued his education in numerous multi-year fellowship programs.

As principal of Yeshiva Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch in upper Manhattan, Adler’s school was able to increase its enrollment by drawing students from the surrounding communities in the Bronx, as well as New Jersey, even though enrollment from their home-base neighborhood of Washington Heights was decreasing.

In his position, Adler also developed a “comprehensive, skill-based” Judaic curriculum. He created a “high standard of

operation,” allowing for “a more rigorous educational environment.”

Adler has been noted for generating a schoolwide “child-friendly and caring atmosphere” in conjunction with instituting many new programs. Said Adler, “We cannot educate our students before they realize that they are safe and cared for; once that is in place, education begins.”

The Board of Directors, staff and students of the day school have welcomed Adler and are said to be looking forward, under his guidance, to “a stimulating year of educational growth.”

INSIDE THIS ISSUE Shmita in Israel

Holidays

A look at the shmita year in Recipes for Sukkot; and a d’var Israel, and how Jewish farmers on saying the blessing for rain are affected by it. on Shemini Atzeret.

Story on page 4 Stories on pages 7 and 10

News in brief...

throughout the Middle East.

“My name might have been Miriam Leah Goldbergstein and I wouldn’t have worried,” said Lisa Goldman, who reported for various outlets in Lebanon and then in Cairo during the Arab Spring in 2011.

A non-Jewish Baghdad correspondent for a major U.S. outlet recalled that in 2009, she and another American staffer were alarmed when they learned that a U.S.-based staffer for the outlet was on his way in for a reporting stint. From his looks and name, she said, they immediately surmised he was Jewish. Stoking their alarm was the fact that local Iraqi hires were unabashed in their anti-Jewish hostility, at least in conversation with the non-Jewish American staffers, said this correspondent who asked not to be named to speak freely.

So she and the other American devised a plan: The incoming reporter would be met in Amman, Jordan, by the local Iraqi hires and taken out for dinner before traveling to Baghdad. Neither the incoming reporter nor the Iraqis knew the true agenda of the dinner, and the Iraqis were not told that the reporter was Jewish. Afterward, she recalled, she casually asked the local hires for their impressions of the newcomer – would he fit in? Their reactions were universally positive; no one had guessed he was Jewish.

“It’s an issue,” said this correspondent, who knew Sotloff and after his kidnapping tracked on the Internet whether his Jewishness was exposed. “There’s so much conspiracy indulgence,” she said.

“There’s so much suspicion about spies, Israeli spies.”

Jamie Tarabay, a senior staff writer for Al Jazeera who is not Jewish, said the anti-Jewish hostility alarmed her during her reporting in Baghdad for a number of major U.S. outlets. “All I know is that people who might have been Jewish in Baghdad, you kept it quiet, you did not talk about it,” she said.

Goldman said that the educated professionals she encountered in Lebanon and Egypt were at pains to distinguish between Jews and Zionists. “People’s minds are very muddled, they talk about the people of the book, the tolerance that See “Reporters” on page 12

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2

THE REPORTER ■ october 9, 2014

a matter of opinion “Judenrein”

This article, originally a lecture, was published on November 16, 2003, in response to comments made by a former prime minister of Malaysia, Mahathir Mohamad, to the Organization of Islamic Nations. With antisemitism rising dramatically across Europe and 6,000 French Jews expected to make aliyah by December 31 because of it, it remains as relevant today as it was a decade ago.

In 1862, the lord mayor of London hosted a dinner in honor of the visiting grand duke of Russia and among the invited guests was the famous Jewish philanthropist Sir Moses Montefiore. The grand duke was a rabid antisemite and, being true to his pathology, he could not let the moment pass without commenting to the lord mayor in a voice loud enough to be heard by the assembled guests that on his last visit to Japan, he noted that the country was unique in that it had neither Jews nor pigs! The assembled quests were clearly embarrassed, but Montefiore casually leaned forward and, looking the grand duke directly in the eyes, replied, “Well sir, perhaps you and I should visit Japan – that way, they would have a sample of each!”

History tells us that the level of antisemitism in any society is a barometer of that society’s health. If so, I would say that the United States is in pretty good shape, that Europe is developing a serious case of Alzheimer’s and that the Muslim world is about as pathological as one could possibly imagine.

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Recently, a Gallup poll was taken by the European Union to determine the countries that Europeans felt represented the greatest threat to international peace. Israel placed number one; America came in a close second. Now understand, throughout the past decade, the North Korean regime has starved an estimated three million of its own people; established thousands

kings and emirs who would probably be the only audience on earth to applaud the damning of Jews for establishing human rights and democracy.

Ironically, these nations are hardly in a position to condemn human rights and democracy since they have never tried them! In fact, their only achievement has been that they have stolen their nations’ oil wealth and plundered the human capital of their own people. So, there’s something pathetic about a culture that is so ignorant and ill-prepared for the challenges of the 21st Mark silverberG century that even its pathologies – like antisemitism – have of slave labor camps, developed nuclear to be imported from Europe. weapons – in violation of every agreement The truth is, by not introducing human it has ever made – and is seeking to sell rights and democracy into their nations, them to the highest bidder. North Korea the Arab/Persian world has doomed itself has lobbed ballistic missiles over Japan, to live forever in the shadow of the greatthreatened a nuclear war of annihilation ness that was once the Moorish Empire of against its southern neighbor and supports Spain. Bin Laden once said he wanted it itself primarily by dealing in drugs and back. The problem is, he can’t deliver, and counterfeit currency. And yet, 60 percent only the West can show him how. of Europeans regard Israel as more threatA thousand years ago, the Islamic Emening than either North Korea or Iran, the pire in southern Spain produced leaders, second largest funder of terrorism in the philosophers, mathematicians, chemists world next to Saudi Arabia. So, if ever and astrologers who encouraged their there was proof that there was something followers to experiment and to challenge sinister lying behind Europe’s constant established norms; scholars who coined criticism of Israel and its support of Israel the terms al-gebr-wa (or algebra) and enemies other than pure antisemitism, this al-kamiya (or alchemy, the forerunner of poll now answers it. chemistry); who created the first celestial Antisemitism has evolved from an ir- map (the names of the stars and note rational hatred or jealousy of Jews to an that many are in Arabic); who adapted irrational hatred or jealousy of the Jewish Hindu numerals (now known as “Arabic state – Israel. numerals”) to mathematics; and who laid [In October 2003], Prime Minis- the foundations for the European Renaister Mahathir Mohamad of Malaysia sance. Moorish Spain was the greatest summed up the world’s problems with economic and military power on earth, his buddies in the Organization of Is- a symbol of the greatness of the Islamic lamic Nations. According to Mohamad, world at a time when Europe was lost in Jews should be condemned for having medieval feudalism. In fact, the great Jewinvented – among other things – such ish doctor and philosopher Maimonides concepts as human rights and democ- was a student who studied at the feet of racy, and then he added, “They and their Islamic scholars. ideas rule the world by proxy.”

Today, that same Islamic world has This is not a man who is especially descended into a stagnant cultural abyss interested in inter-faith dialogue. Yet, even whose social and economic develophis crudely antisemitic remarks aren’t the ment is about where Europe was in the real problem. The real problem is that 11th century. They are a sorry group of 57 other world leaders applauded him. failed states that have not produced one A politician making such remarks about single manufactured product of sufficient Jews at an international summit is a man quality to sell competitively on world with a problem, but when 57 Muslim markets; whose national productivity is world leaders applaud him, that’s a clash the lowest in the world, with the possible of civilizations. A mindset that dwells exception of sub-Saharan Africa; whose on the hatred of Jews and infidels leads capitals do not contain a single worlddirectly to a rejection of Western values class university; and whose countries and Western civilization. do not host a single true democracy that This should give us cause for concern respects human rights, permits a responbecause most of the 1.3 billion Muslims in sible media, or encourages the rights of the world have never even met a Jew. For women or minorities. example, there are 70 million Egyptians So, for the leader of a Muslim nation to today, 95 percent of whom have never condemn Jews because they are the foundcome within a mile of a Jew – unless they ers of human rights and democracy, and were in the Egyptian third army that was to attack them “as a people who think,” surrounded by the Israelis in the 1973 Yom can only be perceived as a compliment Kippur War, in which case, they would by any sentient human being. have seen plenty of Jews under less than Mohamad is wrong when he says that pleasant circumstances. But that aside, one Jews rule the world, but he is right when of the highest-rated Egyptian television he implies that we have made a differprograms in recent memory was a 41-epi- ence in it. The Arab Muslim world may sode series aired during Ramadan on the weave conspiracy theories about Jews, Jewish conspiracy to take over the world and cover its newspapers with excerpts and the methods used by “that accursed, from “The Protocols of the Elders of wicked race” to use Christian or Muslim Zion” and stories of Jewish blood libels, blood to bake into their Passover matzah but the truth remains that, as a people, the and hamantashen for the Purim holiday. ideas and concepts that Jews formulated It is amazing that the greatest hatred of have changed the face of virtually every Jews today exists in a country where only civilization known to man – and from a 28 Jews actually remain. people who represent less than one quarter The 57 countries present at the Muslim of one percent of the world’s population Summit did not notice, however, that – I’d say that was pretty damn good.

Mohamad was insulting them more than Ideas are the engines of history, so if the Jews, for he was addressing the leader- the Arab Muslim world wishes to foster ship of a group of failed states whose total this cult of Jew-hatred, it is shortsighted gross domestic product constitutes less if it believes that human rights and dethan the GDP of Spain. He was speaking mocracy are the only things that can be to a collection of aging jihadists, dictators, “blamed” (so to speak) on the Jews. Truth

from the desk of the executive director

be told, the Jews have contributed much more than that to mankind. In the pagan era, it was religion; in the Greco-Roman era, it was humanism; in the Islamic era, it was philosophy; and, in the modern era, the Jews gave the world the principles of theoretical science.

While Romans worked man and beast seven days a week until they died, it was the Jews who introduced the concept of the Sabbath and for this they were condemned as heretics. From the Jewish prophets arose the concepts of the right to trial, the right to confront one’s own accusers and the right to present evidence on one’s own behalf.

These principles were part of our culture from the time of Deborah and the Judges, a thousand years before the Common Era. These concepts were carried throughout the millennia by the Jews while what is now the Western world floated on a sea of superstition.

From the Jewish people sprang a Jewish Essene who became the messiah for Christianity. From the Jewish people came Saul of Tarsus, the organizer of the Christian church. Even the Mormons today claim they are the descendants of the Lost Tribes of Israel. So, if the Arab-Muslim world chooses to wallow in self-pity and Jew-hatred, they should understand the whole picture.

Ask historians like Arnold Toynbee and they will tell you that, by all historical standards, the Jewish people should be footnotes to history. They should not exist today. Technically, they should have died out thousands of years ago with the Hittites, the Ammonites, the Canaanites and the Philistines – their historical contemporaries. These great nations of antiquity left behind a record of their history in material things like tablets, monuments and ruins.

But the Jewish people survived the eons of time because of the ideas they taught and continue to teach, and the impact these ideas have had upon other people and other civilizations. Unlike the ancient tribes, we have survived because Judaism contained the seeds of its own rebirth and evolved as the world changed.

Alternatively, Islam has never had a Renaissance.

The Malaysian prime minister condemns Jews because, as he says, “they think.” And because “they think,” the Jews survived and prospered in Babylon, in the Hellenic world, during the Roman Empire, flourished in the Islamic era, emerged from a 1,200-year darkness known as the Middle Ages and have risen to new intellectual heights in the 21st century.

But we have paid dearly for these contributions. In fact, if pain and suffering could ennoble, the Jews could challenge the aristocracy of any nation on earth. In their eagerness to eradicate all vestiges of Judaism from the world, the Nazis of yesterday and the antisemites of today forget that from the Jewish Talmud came the principles of tort law, trade regulations, civil damages, real estate, commerce, the principles of credit and negotiable securities, the sanctity of oaths and the enforceability of civil contracts.

The Chinese have a saying – “be careful what you wish; it may come true.” So if the antisemites of the world are to condemn the Jews, let them imagine a world that is Judenrein – a world without Jews.

In the 1850s, Jewish medical researchers argued that micro-organisms caused contagious diseases. They laid the foundations of modern heart therapy, bacteriology, clinical pathology and endocrinology. It was the Jews who suggested serum immunity for contagious diseases, who pioneered the chemistry of muscles, and who made blood transfusions possible through the discovery of different blood types.

See “Judenrein” on page 12

october 9, 2014 ■

THE REPORTER

3

community news Scranton Hebrew Day School begins its 67th year The Scranton Hebrew Day School has announced it has begun the school year, its 67th year of “quality, comprehensive education, afforded and affordable” to all area children.

This year, the school has attracted children from areas as near as Northeastern Pennsylvania and New York and as far away as Jerusalem. This year, amongst the student body, the school welcomes the children of an alumnus, Dr. Shmuel Ganz. Ganz, who has recently moved back to Scranton with his wife, Dina, links three generations in a day school family. “As his father, Jeff, class of 1968, before him, Shmuel personifies the tradition of Torah learning and values that the day school stresses,” noted a school representative. “It is a tradition of all Jews learning together and striving together to build a Torah-true society.”

A bulletin board designed by the students indicates, “We may all be different fish but in this school we swim together.”

“The day school looks forward to another year of great success,” said a school representative.

At right: In front of a student-made bulletin board at Scranton Hebrew Day School were Rabbi Dovid Rosenberg, director of development, and Rabbi Nosson Adler, head of school.

New year for Congregation B’nai Harim

By Lee Emerson Members of Congregation B’nai Harim recently elected and installed a new Board of Trustees for the coming year. New members of the board are Phyllis Miller, Barney Goldfinger and Barbara Freman. Rabbi Peg Kershenbaum thanked those whose terms have been completed and will be leaving the board, including Honi Gruenberg, Richard Kalmens and Kym Gavatt.

Al Wismer, Meredith Stemple, Joe Bedrick and Gene Schneider remain as trustees.

Officers for the coming year are President Irene Stolzenberg, Vice President Barbara Freman, Treasurer Steve Bram and Secretary Phyllis Miller.

Congregation B’nai Harim is a Reform Jewish congregation located in Pocono Pines. The congregation schedules services, social action activities, educational

U. of Scranton to hold Judaic Studies lecture

The Weinberg Judaic Studies Institute has announced a lecture

by Edmund Rosenblum, “From Vienna to Omaha Beach.” It will be held on Thursday, November 6, at 7:30 pm, at the University of Scranton, Loyola Science Center, Room 133.

Rosenblum, a Jewish native of Vienna who went on to serve in the United States Army during World Edmund War II, will share his experiences, Rosenblum which include his early life under the Nazis and his later experiences as a soldier in the American military confronting the Nazi regime.

opportunities and more. The Barbara Kapitansky Religious School is a Jewish and Hebrew program that utilizes both Internet and Skype learning, as well as family

involvement, during classes twice monthly.

For more information, call 570-646-0100 or visit www.bnaiharimpoconos.org.

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L-r: Rabbi Peg Kershenbaum, Barney Goldfinger, Al Wismer, Meredith Stemple and Steve Bram at Congregation B’nai Harim.

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THE REPORTER ■ october 9, 2014

Understanding shmita, Israel’s agricultural Shabbat

By Ben Sales TEL AVIV (JTA) – When Rosh Hashanah arrived, Israel’s Jewish farmers were not just be celebrating the start of a new year. They’ll be marking a year in which they are prohibited from doing their jobs.

Called shmita, the Torah-mandated, yearlong farming hiatus is felt across Israel, affecting its fields, supermarkets and, of course, its politics.

The genesis of shmita is Exodus, which commands the Israelites, “Plant your land and gather its produce for six years. But on the seventh let it lie fallow and it will rest.” Other biblical mandates prohibit planting, trimming or harvesting crops during shmita, amounting to a total prohibition on farming.

In advance of shmita, which takes place every seventh year, here are seven things you should know about Israel’s sabbatical year.

What is shmita? According to the Torah

mandates, the shmita year is something like an agricultural Shabbat. Just like everyone is commanded to rest for a day at the end of every week, shmita is a chance to let the land rest for a year after six years of work.

It’s easy to calculate when shmita comes around: Start from year zero in the Jewish calendar – that would be 5,775 years ago – and count off every seven years; this is Israel’s 466th shmita.

The concept of the sabbatical year has spread to academics and clergy, many of whom receive sabbaticals to travel and study. And the root of the word “shmita” has found contemporary usage in Hebrew.

Israelis use the word “mishtamet” to refer to someone who dodged mandatory military conscription.

How was shmita observed in the past?

Because the commandment applies only in the biblical land of Israel, it became largely theoretical once the Jews were exiled by

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the Roman Empire after the Bar Kochba revolt in 136 C.E. Generations of Jewish farmers in Europe, the Middle East and elsewhere had no religious imperative to let the land rest.

But once Jews started returning to Palestine in the 1880s and founding kibbutzim, shmita again became relevant – and problematic. At a time when Jewish farmers were struggling just to keep their farms viable, a year of no production would have been a deathblow.

To skirt that problem, rabbis in Israel created something called the “heter mechirah,” or sale permit,” similar

to the sale of leavened food before Passover. The permit allowed Jewish farmers to “sell” their land to local non-Jews for a token amount, then hire non-Jews to do the forbidden labor.

That way, because it wasn’t “their” land, Jews could keep their farms going without sin.

How is shmita observed in contemporary Israel? As Israel’s population and agricultural sector expanded, so too has the hand-wringing over shmita. Here are some of the Jewish legal acrobatics they use to get around it.

See “Shmita” on page 14

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A Thai worker picked decorative flower leaves on the Kibbutz Sde Nitzan flower farm, near Israel’s border with the Gaza Strip, on July 20. (Photo by Hadas Parush/Flash90)

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october 9, 2014 ■

THE REPORTER

5

Israel and Europe’s OCD (Obsessive Chicken Disorder)

By Michael Freund Reprinted with permission from Hamodia For a continent beset by problems, Europe sure seems to have a strange set of priorities. The region’s economy is faltering, Russian forces are threatening Ukraine, and the Muslim fanatics of the Islamic State are said to be plotting terror attacks on its soil. But none of that has distracted the European Union from a matter of paramount importance: whether to halt the import of poultry from Israel.

No, this isn’t a kashrut issue, nor are EU officials suddenly concerned about the sharpness of the knife used for shechitah. Simply put, it is age-old antisemitism fastidiously dressed up in the guise of policy.

Earlier this year, the Europeans notified the Jewish state that it did not recognize the authority of its health inspection agencies to operate in Jerusalem or in Yehudah and Shomron, since the EU considers these areas to be “occupied territory.”

As a result, Israeli produce such as chicken and meat would be barred from import into Europe unless the Israeli government would begin to distinguish between products exported from within pre-1967 Israel and those originating in Jerusalem or Yehudah and Shomron.

Though European officials are claiming this is simply a technical matter relating only to health inspections, no one is buying that explanation. Clearly, the goal of this measure is to harm the livelihood of Jewish businessmen and entrepreneurs as a way of undermining the settlement enterprise in Yehudah and Shomron. Needless to say, goods made

by Palestinian-run plants in the territories will not be affected.

This is an absolute outrage, one that is both morally obscene and historically indefensible, and the EU should be ashamed of itself for engaging in such a discriminatory practice. Whatever one may think of the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, it should be obvious that treating merchandise differently simply because the person who owns the factory where it was made is a Jew rather than a Muslim is an act of pure bigotry.

And in light of its own sordid anti-Jewish record throughout much of the past 1,000 years, Europe and its leadership have a special responsibility to be exceptionally sensitive to such issues, particularly when they relate to Jews.

Moreover, what makes this exercise particularly absurd is that those it harms the most are in fact the Palestinians. According to statistics compiled by Israel’s coordinator of government Activities in the territories, more than 23,000 permits were granted to Palestinians to work in Jewish communities in Yehudah and Shomron in 2012. Many Palestinian Arabs can be found working for Israeli companies based in one of the nearly 20 industrial zones located throughout the area.

As a recent Foreign Ministry report noted, nearly half of these Palestinian workers are between the ages of 18-29, which means that the Jewish communities in Yehudah and Shomron are a major source of employment and income for young Palestinians joining the workforce.

Moreover, their average daily pay is 88.3 percent higher than what their fellow Palestinians are making in the Palestinian-controlled areas. All told, their potential annual income, says

the ministry, amounts to nearly NIS 1 billion, or more than a quarter of a billion dollars.

This means that efforts by the EU to delegitimize Jewish-owned businesses in Yehudah and Shomron could end up impairing the Palestinian economy far more extensively and painfully than Israel’s.

So just who is it that the EU is really hurting here? The duplicity of its campaign targeting Yehudah and Shomron is all the more apparent when one considers that no such campaigns are being contemplated for Chinese products made in Tibet, Russian items manufactured in Chechnya or Spanish goods from Catalonia. Only when it comes to the Jewish state do the liberals of Europe insist on drawing a line in the sand. This is not only hypocrisy, it is hatred, pure and simple.

Clearly, the EU is suffering from a

form of OCD – “Obsessive Chicken Disorder” – which compels them to waste time and energy trying to block Israeli poultry from Yehudah and Shomron from making its way onto European menus.

Perhaps recognizing the absurdity of the situation, the EU recently decided to delay imposing the ban for another month. But Israeli officials fear that if the EU follows through on its threats, the ban could be extended to other items such as fruit and vegetables.

As the Anti-Defamation League’s Abraham Foxman has noted, “If the only country you want to single out is Israel, that’s antisemitism.” It sure is.

Michael Freund served as deputy communications director in the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office under Benjamin Netanyahu. He is the founder and chairman of Shavei Israel, which assists Nidhei Yisrael.

ÊVisit the Jewish Federation of Northeastern Pennsylvania on the web at www.jewishnepa.org or on Facebook

6

THE REPORTER ■ october 9, 2014

Friends of The Reporter Dear Friend of The Reporter, Each year at this time the Jewish Federation of Northeastern Pennsylvania calls upon members of our community to assist in defraying the expense of issuing our regional Jewish newspaper, The Reporter.

The newspaper is delivered twice of month (except for December and July which are single issue months) to each and every identifiable Jewish home in Northeastern Pennsylvania.

columns that cover everything from food to entertainment.

The Federation assumes the financial responsibility for funding the enterprise at a cost of $26,400 per year and asks only that we undertake a small letter writing mail campaign to our recipients in the hope of raising $10,000 from our readership to alleviate a share of that responsibility.

We would be grateful if you would care enough to take the time to make a donation for our efforts in bringing The Reporter to your door.

As the primary Jewish newspaper of our region, we have tried to produce a quality publication for you that offers our readership something on everythingfrom opinions and columns on controversial issues that affect our people and our times, to publicity for the events of our affiliated agencies and organizations to life cycle events, teen columns, personality profiles, letters to the editor, the Jewish community calendar and other

As always, your comments, opinions and suggestions are always welcome.

With best wishes, Mark Silverberg, Executive Director Jewish Federation of NE Pennsylvania 601 Jefferson Avenue Scranton, PA 18510

I WILL SUPPORT CONTINUATION OF OUR EXPANDED FEDERATION REPORTER BY CONTRIBUTING $36

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Name (s) (as you wish to appear on our list of “FRIENDS”) _______________________________________________________________________________________________ Address:________________________________________________________________________________________ Phone:_________________________________________________________________________________________ __Check here if you prefer your name not to be published Please write and send tax deductible checks to Jewish Federation, 601 Jefferson Avenue, Scranton, PA 18510

NEWS IN bRIEF From JNS.org

Report: Iran, not Israel, killed nuclear scientist in 2007

A new report by The Media Line news agency indicates that Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, not Israel, was behind the mysterious deaths of Iranian nuclear scientists in 2007.

Since the incident, conspiracy theories have claimed that the Jewish state assassinated the scientists. Mahboobeh Hosseinpour – the sister of Iranian nuclear physicist Ardeshir Hosseinpour, who was allegedly “gassed” to death in 2007 – says her brother was murdered by the Revolutionary Guard because he would not cooperate with its efforts to build an atomic bomb. Hosseinpour, 54, told The Media Line that her sister-in-law, Sara Araghi, went to her husband’s office at Shiraz University and found evidence that the room was searched and that items were missing, including a photo of the scientist with then-Iranian President Mohammed Khatami.Araghi also found a DVD of the late Hosseinpour’s nuclear research, containing formulas for building an atomic bomb 12 times more powerful than the Hiroshima bomb as well as methods for neutralizing it.

Groups urge colleges to protect Jewish students from antisemitism

A varied group of 14 organizations has issued a letter to more than 2,500 U.S. colleges and universities that urges them to protect Jewish students on campus in light of rising antisemitism in America and abroad. The organizations – including Alpha Epsilon Pi, AMCHA Initiative, American Association of Jewish Lawyers and Jurists, Americans for Peace and Tolerance, Christians United for Israel, Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (or CAMERA), David Horowitz Freedom Center, Hasbara Fellowships, Institute for Black Solidarity with Israel, Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, Scholars for Peace in the Middle East, Simon Wiesenthal Center Campus Outreach, StandWithUs and the Zionist Organization of America – say in the letter that “none of us should tolerate a campus climate of fear or disrespect, which can seriously impair the physical and psychological health of students and create conditions that negatively affect their learning and their ability to achieve their full potential.” In particular, the letter raises concern over the actions of the anti-Israel campus group called Students for Justice in Palestine, which the letter’s signatories note has a history of “harassing and intimidating Jewish students.” The letter goes on to cite several incidents on campuses, including a recent one at Temple University in which a pro-Israel student was physically and verbally assaulted by SJP members, as well as SJP’s planting of anti-Israel mock eviction notices under students’ dorm rooms. “While justifying its hatred and bigotry as protected under the First Amendment, the SJP employs tactics geared to silencing and marginalizing the views of Jewish students who support Israel,” the letter says. The letter also cited that these schools are responsible for protecting Jewish students from antisemitism under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act.

S. African group threatens to bar nurses from using Israeli circumcision device

The Congress of South African Trade Unions, an ally group of the country’s ruling African National Congress party and a proponent of the movement to boycott Israel, is protesting South Africa’s consideration of approving an Israeli-developed circumcision device. “We have a problem that the device comes from Israel. We need to boycott everything that comes from that pariah state,” Sizwe Pamla, a spokesman for a public sector union that is part of COSATU, told Reuters. Many South Africans undergo traditional circumcision as a right of passage to manhood, especially in the Xhosa culture, but many die as a result of blood loss or infection caused by the procedure. The South African government is studying the Israeli device, PrePex, to determine whether to officially sanction its use in the country. PrePex, developed by the Israeli company Circ MedTech, is a non-surgical and disposable device that has been endorsed by the World Health Organization.

PrePex is being used in several other African nations such as Rwanda, Uganda, and Kenya. The device has not yet been used in South African hospitals. If the country approves the device, COSATU-affiliated nurses will refuse to perform circumcision procedures with it, Pamla said.

Israeli gov’t tackles hitchhiking students

Following the abduction and murder of Jewish teens Eyal Yifrach, Gilad Shaar, and Naftali Frenkel while they were hitchhiking in Gush Etzion in June, the Israeli Education Ministry is working to prevent students at the 22 yeshivas and religious girls’ schools in Judea and Samaria from taking rides with strangers. One of the first projects is organized transportation for students, to which the ministry allocated about $2.7 million at the beginning of this school year. The transportation includes about 200 buses per week which on Sundays pick up students from nearby cities, including Jerusalem, Beersheba, Kfar Saba, and Netanya, and on Thursdays return them to their hometowns for the weekend.

october 9, 2014 ■

THE REPORTER

Take it outside: Hail kale (salad), bring on the beef (stew)

¼ cup chopped candied walnuts ¼ cup dried cherries or cranberries Olive oil Balsamic vinegar Salt and pepper Preheat the oven to 400°F. Wash and dry the beets. Place in tin foil and roast in oven for 45-60 minutes, or until soft.

Allow to cool. Remove the outer peel of beets using hands or a vegetable peeler.

Cut beets into bite-sized pieces.

Place chopped kale in a large salad bowl. Add beets, apple, candied walnuts and dried cherries or cranberries. Drizzle with olive oil and balsamic vinegar, or salad dressing of your choosing. Sprinkle with salt and pepper to taste.

Yield: 4 servings Apple Cider Beef Stew 3 lbs. beef chuck, cut into 2-inch cubes Salt and pepper All-purpose flour 3 Tbsp. olive oil 1 large onion, diced 3 medium carrots, peeled and diced 3-4 garlic cloves 2 bay leaves 1 tsp. cinnamon Pinch crushed red pepper 2 cups apple cider 1 cup red wine 1 cup vegetable or beef stock 2 Tbsp. balsamic vinegar 4-5 medium Yukon gold potatoes, peeled and cut into 1-inch pieces Salt and pepper to taste Preheat the oven to 300°F. Sprinkle salt and freshly ground pepper liberally over beef. Cover beef in light coating of flour.

Heat 2 tablespoons olive oil in a Dutch See “Stew” on page 11

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Then the autumn arrives, and we box up our plasticware and move indoors. But Sukkot offers us such a beautiful moment to extend our time outside and enjoy the tastes of early fall.

Give me a salad with some roasted beets and I am a happy lady. The Chopped Kale Salad recipe with apples and beets is satisfying and sweet, with crunch from some walnuts and a hint of tartness from dried cranberries. The kale is hearty and will hold up well if you need to transport it to someone’s sukkah for lunch or dinner.

Apple Cider Beef Stew uses one of my favorite fall treats, apple cider, to make a rich stew that is perfect to serve on a chilly fall day over some egg noodles or rice.

It’s also a great alternative to cholent for a hearty Shabbat lunch in the sukkah.

Sweet Potato Cupcakes with Toasted Marshmallow Frosting will have your guests asking incredulously, “are you sure these are nondairy?” And yes, they are. The sweet potato ensures a super moist cake even without milk or butter, and the slight spice sings of fall flavors. The marshmallow frosting is super easy to make and even more fun to toast using the oven broiler or a small hand torch if you have one.

Chopped Kale Salad with Apple and Roasted Beets 3 cups chopped fresh kale 2 medium beets ½ apple, diced

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2015 U J Amajor P Ogifts C Oattendees NO Scherzer enthralls

THE REPORTER ■ october 9, 2014

By Mark Silverberg The 2015 UJA Campaign Major Gifts Program was held on September 18 at the home of Bob and Laney Ufberg in Waverly, where Linda Scherzer, the guest speaker, conveyed a message to the Campaign’s major donors.

Scherzer is a former Middle East correspondent for CNN and Israel Television. In her presentation, she showed her experience in covering the Arab-Israeli conflict, which involved reporting on the first Palestinian uprising, or “intifada,” in the late 1980s, the Gulf War and the Middle East peace process. She is known for her interview with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, speaking with him through a gas mask during an Iraqi Scud missile attack.

At the program, she detailed her experiences in interviewing Arab leaders throughout the years, which included traveling to Damascus twice to report on Syrian attitudes toward the peace process. These interviews resulted in a one-hour documentary, “Through the Eyes of the Enemies – Is the Middle East Ready for Peace?”

It explored the opinions of Arab leaders in Jordan, Syria, Lebanon and Egypt toward Israel.

In her talk to the 25 assembled guests, she was said to have spoken “eloquently and honestly” about her personal feelings toward “the so-called peace process,” as gleaned from her many interviews with Arab leaders. She detailed the nature of Arab culture and emphasized the “vast dichotomy” that separates the Western democratic traditions of freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom of association and women’s rights with the “virtual absence” of these same rights, freedoms and cultural traditions in the Islamic world.

She added that Western leaders fail to understand the cultural mindset of the region and tend to base their foreign policies on these false paradigms. Scherzer explained that these erroneous policies have, in turn, led to numerous U.S. foreign policy blunders in the Arab Middle East. Part of the problem, she said, is the Western inclination to seek compromise on difficult issues with Islamic nations who view such “compromise” as appeasement and weakness, thereby making the peaceful resolution of such issues “problematic.” According to her, Islamic culture, for the most part, views the world in “zero-sum” terms – victory or defeat. Based on these cultural differences, she had serious doubts that peace with Israel – a Jewish state, the

Dinner

existence of which is viewed by the Islamic world as an “abomination” – is attainable for the foreseeable future.

The fact that new intelligence and logistical alliances between Israel and several of its Arab neighbors, including Saudi Arabia and Egypt, are being formed has more to do with the Arabs collective fear of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria and the Muslim Brotherhood, than any sudden change of heart that might lead to their recognition of Israel’s right to exist.

As to the atrocities committed by ISIS, she spoke of the end of the Sykes-Picot Agreement signed during World War I, wherein the British and French drew lines designating the boundaries for many Arab countries in the Middle East, including Syria, Lebanon, Jordan and Iraq. ISIS has “effectively destroyed” Sykes-Picot in Iraq and Syria and is setting its sights on expanding its “Islamic caliphate” to Jordan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and ultimately Israel and the West. She argued that ISIS intends to achieve its goals “through monstrous violence and slick media clips” designed not only to cause fear in the Western world, but to attract young radical Islamists from Western countries to be trained in the “art of terror” and then returned to their native lands to commit “unspeakable acts of horror.” She noted that Western survival depended upon the “degradation, destruction and humiliation of ISIS and its supporters” in what must be viewed as a religious war against Western civilization.

Scherzer also spoke of the plight of European Jewry in the aftermath of the recent Israeli-Gaza conflict.

Historically, “anti-Zionism” was used as a cover for “antisemitism,” but the demonization and defamation of Israel through the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, compounded by Arab and European media coverage that portrayed Israelis as “Nazis” and the Gazans as “victims” in Gaza, allowed hatred of Jews to surface “unapologetically” in the forms of anti-Israel demonstrations across Europe where participants bore signs and posters that were “clearly antisemitic in nature.”

She indicated that a nation is entitled to defend itself and its citizens from attack by any standard of international law, but when Israel exercises that right in Gaza in “the most humane manner possible,” Israel is attacked by the Western media as using “disproportionate force” – an argument that she said was never raised against the U.S. in its bombing of Fallujah during the Gulf War or against the Syrians in their

use of barrel bombs on civilian neighborhoods.

She concluded that if Israel is not permitted the right to defend its existence from missile attacks on its civilian population, then the only conclusion to be drawn is that Israel has no right to exist. She said this is the underlying message being communicated.

During the question-and-answer sessions that followed the presentation, it was noted that in France alone, there was a 483 percent increase in antisemitic acts of violence and vandalism against Jews and Jewish institutions throughout the past year, culminating in the Israel-Gaza war. These acts involved the fire-bombings of synagogues, Hebrew schools and other Jewish institutions, the desecration of cemeteries and physical assaults on Jews. The French Ministry for National Security has advised French Jews, for their own safety, not to wear the “outward trappings of their faith” in public places – kippot, talisim and even mezuzot on doors – lest that increase their risk of harm. A member of the European Union went so far as to suggest to French Jewish leaders that it would be in the best interests of the French Jewish community – totaling an estimated 600,000 members – to consider moving to America or Israel. He even stated that the future of Europe itself was in doubt, given the rising and largely unassimilated European Muslim population, many of whom are being radicalized through their mosques and the Internet.

As a result, it was noted that slightly more than 6,000 French Jews are expected to make aliyah to Israel by December 31. Unlike 70 years ago, however, there is a Jewish state that will accept and transport them, house them in absorption centers and teach them Hebrew, as well as facilitate their educational training and assist them in finding employment as Israeli citizens. This absorption process is funded entirely by UJA funds raised Northeastern Pennsylvania and around the world.

As to remedies, Scherzer believed that Federations should set aside funds to send journalists to Israel. She believed Israel information missions “would greatly assist” in understanding the Middle East and Israel’s “precarious position in the midst of genocidal enemies dedicated to its destruction.”

“All who attended this program were impressed with Scherzer’s knowledge, sincerity and dedication to her work, her people and to Israel,” said organizers of the program. “It was truly an event to remember.”

2015 UJA CAMPAIGN

Major Gifts Event

october 9, 2014 ■

THE REPORTER

2015 UJA COMMUNITY

opening

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THE REPORTER ■ october 9, 2014

d’var torah

Shemini Atzeret – humility and rain

by RABBI AMINADAV ADAMIT, BETH DAVID SYNAGOGUE, binghamton, ny Sukkot (Shabbat Chol Hamoed), Exodus 33:1234:26 When the Mishkan was built, the Torah states in the parasha of Pekudai (39:43), “And Moshe saw the entire work and behold, they had done it as Hashem had commanded, and so had they done! And Moshe blessed them.” When Moshe saw the Mishkan (Tabernacle) erected according to the wishes of Hashem, only then did he bless the nation.

According to Rashi, Moshe said to them, “May the spirit of Hashem settle in all of what you do.” This verse and what Rashi says explains what should be the right way of giving a bracha. There are people who, when they start a job, first look at Heaven and ask for a blessing for the next new task. Why? Because when you stand before a task that you did not start yet, you feel your weakness, and at that moment you ask for help from God. On the other hand, some people, when they finishetheir work, they look around at the people, with pride in themselves and forget to thank Hashem, who gave his blessing for the work to be successful, and forget to ask for His blessing for the future task. For that, we should note that Moshe asked for the blessing only when the work was done, and the blessing he asked for was that Hashem will bless the nation to receive wisdom to use in the Mishkan with the same right way that the Mishkan was built for the Almighty.

Thus, on Shemini Atzeret, we say the blessing for rain, because in Israel, the season of rain starts around Sukkot time. As we ask God for the first rain, we should not forget to thank Hashem after the rain season as well.

In the Talmud (Yevamot, 95B), Rabbi Ishmael says, “One who prays should direct his eyes downward and his heart toward Heaven.” Downward, toward people that you live with, so that the blessing and our request will

come from Heaven. Therefore, after the seasonal rain, we thank Hashem (in Pesach) only together with the whole congregation, but on Shemini Atzeret, we ask for the rain in our silent prayer. This prayer shows the dependence of men on nature, and also shows the blessings of Hashem that He grants us day by day. We don’t create the rain, we just ask Hashem to bring it down, with it which we can plant trees, flowers, etc. But it’s not we who cause them to grow, because for that we need the Almighty to do the job. We need to understand the source of the whole creation, to understand that nature does not work by our power, but we need to ask God to help us with our work.

The energy, which is in one seed and the creation power in small plants, all come into life only with the few drops of rain, and it shows how God watches his creation. This is what the Talmud states in tractate Ta’anit (8:71), “Rabbi Ami said, the prayer of a person is heard only if you put all your might into it.” Let us remember this, when on this Shemini Atzeret, we ask for the rain.

Tour of India

The Jewish Community Center of San Francisco is sponsoring the trip “Heart of India” from December 3-14. It will include visits to India’s Jewish legacy sites and the cities of Delhi, Agra, Jaipur, Mumbai and Pune. The trip can also be extended to include a visit to Chochin, home of an ancient Jewish community.

For more information, contact Ariel Goldstein at agoldstein@jccsf.org or 415-276-1506.

P A C E

Perpetual Annual Campaign Endowment

Your gift to the Annual Campaign DOES A WORLD OF GOOD. Endowing your gift allows you to be there for the Jewish community of NEPA forever.

A Perpetual Annual Campaign Endowment (PACE) is a permanent fund that endows your Jewish community Annual Campaign gift as a lasting legacy. A PACE fund will continue to make an annual gift in perpetuity on your behalf.

To determine the amount you need to endow your entire campaign gift, multiply your current annual gift by 20.

You can fund your PACE by adding the JEWISH FEDERATION OF NORTHEASTERN PENNSYLVANIA to your will, or by making the Federation a beneficiary of your IRA. All contributions to establish a PACE are tax deductible.

Let your name be remembered as a blessing.

Endowments can be created through a variety of vehicles, some of which do not necessitate funding during your lifetime yet still provide your estate with considerable tax benefits.

They also enable you to perpetuate your commitment to the Annual Campaign in a way that best achieves your own personal financial and estate planning goals.

Examples Of Ways To Fund Your Pace Gift Are:

* outright contribution of cash, appreciated securities or other long-term * capital gain property such as real estate * charitable remainder trust * gift of life insurance * charitable lead trust * gift of IRA or pension plan assets * grant from your foundation * reserved life estate in your residence * bequest

Using appreciated property, such as securities or real estate, affords you the opportunity to eliminate the income tax on the long-term capital gain, will in some instances generate a full income tax charitable deduction and will remove those assets from your estate for estate tax purposes.

For more information contact Mark Silverberg at Mark.Silverberg@jewishnepa.org or call 570-961-2300, ext. 1.

october 9, 2014 ■

THE REPORTER

11

Halpern addresses Pocono UJA dinner attendees on the issues that Israel confronted in its war with Islamic extremists

By Mark Silverberg Political analyst and social commentator Micha Halpern addressed members of the Pocono Jewish communities at the Federation’s annual Pocono UJA Dinner held on September 14 at Temple Israel of the Poconos in Stroudsburg.

Halpern discussed many of the issues faced by Israel in its recent war with Hamas in Gaza, including Hamas’ double war crime of using civilians as human shields and using hospitals, nurseries, residential homes, mosques, playgrounds, ambulances and even UNRWA schools as weapons depots and bases from which to launch rockets into Israel’s civilian population centers.

He stated that no nation can allow a portion of its people to live under such conditions – sleeping in bomb shelters and separated from death only by the random nature of a missile’s flight. He emphasized that Hamas deliberately targeted Israeli civilians and celebrated when Jewish children died. “How long,” Halpern asked, “wouldAmericans put up with missile attacks on Dallas and Houston from Mexico?” He noted, “There is no question that Israeli attacks on Hamas targets were justified, so why blame Israel for the war as did much of the Western media?”

He added that Israel has always been scrupulous about protecting civilian life.

In addition to dropping leaflets, Israel took the unprecedented measure of amassing a complete list of cellular telephone numbers of Gazans and, through an automated system, warned residents in Arabic to evacuate targeted buildings containing weapons stashes prior to Israeli air strikes.

“I know of no other nation that announces where and when it will drop its bombs,

thus enabling civilians to evacuate the area,” Halpern said.

On the argument that Israel used “disproportional force,” he stated: “While some 60,000 civilians in British cities were killed

by Nazi bombers in World War II, the Allied aerial counter-offensive to eliminate that threat cost 600,000 German lives – a ratio of 10 to one. Yet the media attacked Israel for using ‘disproportionate force?’”

Stew

On the issue of Hamas using civilians as human shields, Halpern said, “I am appalled that anyone would use innocent children as human shields as a deliberate war strategy. I have no doubt that the Israelis are sickened by the loss of innocent lives even as Hamas delighted in its propaganda victory. Maybe that’s the difference between the Israelis and the Hamas terrorists. The Israelis are civilized

– even in war. I can’t say the same for Hamas. As Prime Minister Netanyahu said recently, ‘Israel uses rockets to protect their children. Hamas uses children to protect their rockets.’”

The Federation expressed its thanks to all who attended the annual Pocono UJA dinner and wished each of them, as well as every member of the community, “a sweet, healthy and happy New Year.”

Continued from page 7

oven or other large oven-safe pot. Brown meat on all sides and then remove from pot and set aside on a dish.

Add another tablespoon olive oil and saute onions, carrots and garlic cloves, scraping the brown bits from the bottom of the pan. Add cinnamon, bay leaves and pinch of red pepper flakes, continuing to stir. Saute vegetables until translucent.

Add apple cider, red wine, stock and balsamic vinegar and let come to simmer.

Add salt and pepper. Place beef back into the pot, stir and cover, cooking for 2 hours in preheated oven. At the 2-hour mark, add the potatoes. Taste the stew, and add more salt and pepper if necessary. Put stew back into the oven for another 45 minutes.

Serve with rice or noodles.

Yield: 6 servings Sweet Potato Cupcakes with Toasted Marshmallow Frosting 2 medium sweet potatoes 1½ cups flour 1 tsp. cinnamon ¾ tsp. ginger ¼ tsp. nutmeg

½ tsp. baking powder ½ tsp baking soda ¼ tsp. salt 1 cup sugar ½ cup vegetable oil 2 large eggs 1 tsp. vanilla extract Preheat oven to 400°F. Pierce sweet potatoes with a fork and wrap in tin foil. Roast for 40-50 minutes or until soft. Let cool.

Cut potatoes in half and scoop out flesh. Place in a food processor fitted with a blade and pulse until smooth.

In a medium bowl, sift together flour, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, baking soda, baking powder and salt.

Add pureed sweet potatoes, sugar and oil to a large bowl. Beat on medium-high speed with an electric mixer until smooth.

Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add vanilla. Add flour mixture in batches; beat just until blended.

Preheat oven to 325°F. Line and grease muffin tins. Fill muffin trays until ¾ full.

Bake for 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out cool. Allow to cool.

Make frosting (see recipe below). Pipe

frosting in a swirl on top of each cupcake.

Using a hand-held blow torch, gently drag the torch across the frosting, toasting the frosting until just lightly brown.

Yield: 12 cupcakes Marshmallow Frosting (half recipe) (from Jennifer Shea of Trophy Cupcakes) 8 large egg whites 2 cups sugar ½ tsp. cream of tartar 2 tsp. pure vanilla extract Place egg whites, sugar and cream of tartar in the heatproof bowl of an electric mixer. Set over a saucepan with simmering water. Whisk constantly until sugar is dissolved and whites are warm to the touch, 3-4 minutes.

Transfer bowl to electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment and beat, starting on low speed and gradually increasing to high, until stiff, glossy peaks form, 5-7 minutes. Add vanilla and mix until combined. Use immediately.

Yield: enough for 2 dozen cupcakes Shannon Sarna is editor of The Nosher blog on MyJewishLearning.com, where these recipes originally appeared.

2015 UJA POCONO

Dinner

ÊVisit the Jewish Federation of Northeastern Pennsylvania on the web at www.jewishnepa.org or on Facebook

12

THE REPORTER ■ october 9, 2014

Judenrein

Continued from page 2

It was Jewish scientists who measured the distances to the stars in the heavens, who contributed to the study of the internal combustion of stars and who discovered the planet Uranus.

It was Jewish chemists who created the modern chemical and dye industries; who worked out the theory of atomic valences; developed molecular theories; classified organic compounds based upon their molecular structure; determined the composition of chlorophyll; and determined the role of enzymes in the chemical processes of life. It was Jewish physicists who isolated isotopes, worked in electron kinetics and pried open the secrets of the atom.

The antisemites want a world that is Judenrein, but it will cost them. Let them remember that it was Jewish physicists who delineated the theory of relativity, discovered the photoelectric effect and discovered gamma rays that now scan for weapons of mass destruction in the millions of foreign cargo containers that arrive each day in America from foreign ports.

If Jews are to be hated for these contributions, then they must be hated for all their contributions.

In the 20th century, Sigmund Freud lifted the lid off

man’s mind, and with psycho-analysis revolutionized man’s concept of himself and the relationship of mind to matter. Three hundred years earlier, Baruch Spinoza was outcast and excommunicated because he pried philosophy loose from superstition and mysticism, and opened the path to rationalism and modern science.

Albert Michelson discovered the speed of light and won America’s first Nobel Prize in 1907. Selman Waksman isolated streptomycin. Casimir Funk discovered vitamins and Jonas Salk introduced the polio vaccine that saved my life when I was a child and billions of other since then.

So, to the antisemites of the world, I say beware what you wish, for this world would be a lesser place but for the contributions of the Jews. In truth, these contributions pale in the face of the contributions made by scientists of other faiths, but these contributions are no less significant when one takes into account that they come from a religious or cultural group of negligible size.

Jews are hated by the bin Ladens, the Khaddafis, the Khomeinis, the Assads, the Ahmedinejads and the petty dictators of the Islamic world not because of who they are, but because of what they have achieved.

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Jewish heritage has always respected learning and education, has always imparted justice and has always taught its doctrines in abstractions, never in absolutes like the jihadists whose greatest “contribution” to mankind has been to restore the pagan ritual of human sacrifice – suicide bombers – to the modern era.

So, if the bin Ladens of the world believe that by murdering Jews in synagogues, buses, restaurants and Passover seders they are killing our ideas, they are wrong.

Conclusion In the early 1980s, a letter appeared in the Colorado Gazette Telegraph, which is not a Jewish newspaper, nor was the author of the piece Jewish. It was written by a World War II veteran in response to some antisemitic graffiti that was scrawled on the walls of a Denver synagogue.

The graffiti consisted of a swastika and under it was written the words, “Jews Go Home.”

The letter went like this: Jews go home Well there’s nothing really new in this. You’ve heard it all before. But suppose, just this once, you took the advice of these sick people, and actually packed your bags and left for parts unknown. Before you go, would you do me a favor?

Would you leave your formula for Salk vaccine behind? After all, you wouldn’t want my child to die from polio would you?

And would you leave your genius for science and physics and mathematics behind because if it wasn’t for your Einsteins, Fermis and Steinmetzs, we would be looking up from our chains to see a happy, aging Hitler drive by in one of our Cadillacs.

And would you leave your talent for humor and music and entertainment behind because I’m not too sure that I would want to live in a country where you weren’t here to share your genius with us.

You see if you go, if these stupid people force you to leave, then freedom goes with you, democracy goes with you, and everything my buddies and I fought for in World War II goes with you.

So when you go, would you do me a favor?

Would you slow down in front of my house and honk……because so help me God, I’m going with you too.”

Reporters

Continued from page 1

the Prophet had for the Jews, but they are aware most Jews support Israel as an identity issue,” said Goldman, now the director of the Israel-Palestine initiative at the New America Foundation, a think tank.

Goldman recalled a casual conversation she had in her pidgin Arabic with a cab driver in Cairo in 2011, during the uprising. The mood was festive and it began well, she said. “‘Where are you from?’ ‘Canada.’ ‘Walla! Are you a Christian?’ ‘No, I’m Jewish,’” Goldman recounted. “He must have changed color five times and went silent.”

She asked an Egyptian friend later about the encounter and was told that years of anti-Jewish government propaganda had left its mark. “‘He was probably wondering where your horns were,’” her friend told her.

october 9, 2014 ■

THE REPORTER

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NEWS IN bRIEF from israel From JTA

Netanyahu urges Obama to lead on preventing Iran nukes

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told President Barack Obama he hoped that Iran would not come close to acquiring a nuclear weapon under Obama’s watch.

Netanyahu, who met with Obama on Oct. 1 at the White House, said that a deal now under consideration providing sanctions relief for a nuclear rollback could leave Iran a “threshold nuclear power. ...I firmly hope that under your leadership that will not happen,” Netanyahu said at the outset of the meeting. Obama administration officials in recent weeks have said there has been progress in talks between Iran and the major powers aimed at keeping Iran from having the capacity to develop a nuclear weapon. Western officials say that Iran likely will be allowed to enrich uranium to limited amounts, not near weaponization, under a deal. Israel says any enrichment capability leaves Iran on the threshold of weapon making. The deadline for the talks is Nov. 24. Obama told Netanyahu that the Israeli-Palestinian peace process remains a priority, despite the collapse of talks in April.

The U.S. leader referred to this summer’s conflict between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip. “We have to find a way to change the status quo so that both Israeli citizens are safe in their own homes,” Obama said, “but also that we don’t have the tragedy of Palestinian children being killed as well. And so we’ll discuss extensively both the situation in rebuilding Gaza but also how can we find a more sustainable peace between Israelis and Palestinians.” Netanyahu thanked Obama for the “unflinching support you gave Israel during our difficult days” during Operation Protective Edge. The leaders also said they would discuss the threat posed to the region by the jihadist group ISIS.

Israeli official, P.A. PM meet on Gaza reconstruction

A senior Israeli official met with Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah to discuss the rehabilitation of Gaza, among other issues. Senior sources from Israel and the Palestinian Authority confirmed the Sept. 30 meeting in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Ynet reported on Oct. 1. A senior P.A. official told Ynet that the two discussed ways that Israel can help the Palestinians following Israel’s military operation this summer in Gaza. A source identified as a senior Israeli political official said the talks were “coordination intended to change the situation on the ground” and were “something happening in addition to truce talks in Cairo.” According to Ynet, the issues being discussed are changes in Israel’s restrictions on Gaza, including permitting men over 60 to enter Jerusalem for religious services during Muslim holy days and allowing Gaza goods to be exported to the West Bank. Israeli officials called the meeting part of Israel’s regular coordination efforts with the Palestinian Authority ahead of the Muslim holy days. This year, the Muslim festival of Eid al-Adha, or the Feast of the Sacrifice, occurs on the same day as Yom Kippur – on Oct. 4 – leading to concerns about violence.

Palestinians target Jewish preschool in Jerusalem

On Sept. 30, masked Palestinians reportedly threw rocks and fireworks at a preschool in a Jewish neighborhood of the Mount of Olives in eastern Jerusalem. The children, who were playing on the playground, were rushed into the building’s bomb shelter for protection, Ynet reported.

Palestinians targeting late 2016 for Israel’s West Bank withdrawal

The Palestinians will ask the United Nations Security Council to set a deadline of November 2016 for an Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank and eastern Jerusalem.

The request is part of a draft resolution that has been circulated to members of the Security Council, the Associated Press reported on Oct. 1. AP obtained a copy of the draft. Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said during his address to the U.N. General Assembly on Sept. 26 that he would ask the council to set a deadline for an Israeli withdrawal from territory captured by Israel in 1967. The resolution calls for a two-state solution based on the pre-1967 borders. It also seeks “a just resolution” of the status of Jerusalem as the capital of two states and of the Palestinian refugee problem, including through negotiations, AP reported. Abbas told a meeting of the Palestinian leadership in Ramallah on Oct. 1 that the resolution was submitted on Sept. 26, the day he addressed the General Assembly, according to AP.

Survey: One-quarter of Jewish-Israelis boycotting Arab businesses

One in four Jewish-Israeli consumers is boycotting Arab businesses in the wake of the summer’s Gaza conflict, according to an Israeli business daily. The 24 percent is down from the 29 percent who said they were boycotting Arab-owned businesses during the 50-day Operation Protective Edge, Globes reported, citing a telephone survey by the Tel Aviv-based Geocartography Knowledge Group research institute. The number was down significantly from the 47 percent of Jewish-Israelis who said during the operation that they planned to boycott such businesses. Some 51 percent of those surveyed also said that businesses that do not fire employees who criticize the Israel Defense Forces should be boycotted, and that some 11 percent of Jewish-Israelis are boycotting such businesses. Another 40 percent said they would boycott such businesses if they could identify them, the survey found. Globes quoted unnamed sources among suppliers who said that sales to Arab-owned markets are down substantially in recent months.

B’Tselem OK again as Israel national service stop

The Israeli human rights group B’Tselem will again be allowed to receive national service volunteers. On Sept. 30, Deputy Attorney General Dina Zilber overturned the ban instituted on the group in August by the head of Israel’s national service program.

Sar-Shalom Jerbi objected to B’Tselem’s actions during the Gaza conflict. The program coordinates placements for young Israelis doing national civilian service as an alternative to military service. Earlier this year, Jerbi said national civilian service would be available “only to bodies that do not subvert the existence of the state as a Jewish and democratic state.” Zilber said that Jerbi can only remove national service volunteers if the organization rejects Israel’s existence as a Jewish and democratic state, incites to violence, terror or racism, or supports terrorism or armed struggle against Israel, Haaretz reported. B’Tselem has received one volunteer each year through the program since 2012, according to Haaretz.

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THE REPORTER ■ october 9, 2014

Shmita

October 2014

• Non-Feature Films •

*NEW* Everything is a Present: The Wonder and Grace of Alice Sommer Hertz - This is the uplifting true story of the gifted pianist Alice Sommer Hertz who survived the Theresienstat concentration camp by playing classical piano concerts for Nazi dignitaries. Alice Sommer Hertz lived to the age of 106. Her story is an inspiration.

Follow Me: The Yoni Netanyahu Story - Yoni Netanyahu was a complex, passionate individual thrust into defending his country in a time of war and violence. The older brother of Benjamin Natanyahu, the current Israel Prime Minister, Yoni led the miraculous raid on Entebbe in 1976. Although almost all of the Entebbe hostages were saved, Yoni was the lone military fatality. Featuring three Israeli Prime Ministers and recently released audio from the Entebbe raid itself.

Hava Nagila (The Movie) - A documentary romp through the history, mystery and meaning of the great Jewish standard. Featuring interviews with Harry Belafonte, Leonard Nimoy and more, the film follows the ubiquitous party song on its fascinating journey from the shtetls of Eastern Europe to the kibbutzim of Palestine to the cul-de-sacs of America.

Inside Hana’s Suitcase - The delivery of a battered suitcase to Fumiko Ishioka at the Tokyo Holocaust Museum begins the true-life mystery that became the subject of Karen Levine’s best-selling book Hana’s Suitcase. The film follows Fumiko’s search to discover the details of Hana’s life, which leads to the discovery of her brother George in Toronto. *NEW* Israel: The Royal Tour - Travel editor Peter Greenberg (CBS News) takes us on magnificent tour of the Jewish homeland, Israel. The tour guide is none other than Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The viewer gets a chance to visit the land of Israel from his own home!

Jews and Baseball: An American Love Story (narrated by Dustin Hoffman) - This documentary portrays the contributions of Jewish major leaguers and the special meaning that baseball has had in the lives of American Jews. More than a film about sports, this is a story of immigration, assimilation, bigotry, heroism, the passing on of traditions, the shattering of stereotypes and, most of all, the greatest American pastime. *NEW* Nicky’s Family - An enthralling documentary that artfully tells the story of how Sir Nicholas Winton, now 104, a British stockbroker, gave up a 1938 skiing holiday to answer a friend’s request for help in Prague and didn’t stop helping until the war’s beginning stopped him. He had saved the lives of 669 children in his own personal Kindertransport. *NEW*Shanghai Ghetto - One of the most amazing and captivating survival tales of WWII, this documentary recalls the strange-but-true story of thousands of European Jews who were shut out of country after country while trying to escape Nazi persecution. Left without options or entrance visa, a beacon of hope materialized for them on the other side of the world, and in the unlikeliest of places, Japanese-controlled Shanghai.

The Case for Israel - Democracy’s Outpost - This documentary presents a vigorous case for Israel- for its basic right to exist, to protect its citizens from terrorism, and to defend its borders from hostile enemies. *NEW* The Jewish Cardinal - This is the amazing true story of Jean-Marie Lustiger, the son of PolishJewish immigrants, who maintained his cultural identity as a Jew even after converting to Catholicism at a young age, and later joining the priesthood.

The Life and Times of Hank Greenberg - As baseball’s first Jewish star, Hammerin’ Hank Greenberg’s career contains all the makings of a true American success story.

Unmasked: Judaophobia - The Threat to Civilization – This documentary exposes the current political assault against the State of Israel fundamentally as a war against the Jewish people and their right to self-determination.

• Feature Films •

Fill the Void - This is the story of an eighteen-year-old, Shira, who is the youngest daughter of her family. Her dreams are about to come true as she is set to be married. Unexpectedly, her sister dies while giving birth to her first child. The drama of the story reaches its peak when the girls’ mother proposes a match between Shira and the young widower. Shira will have to choose between her heart’s wish and her family duty.

Footnote - The winner of the Cannes Film Festival (Best Screenplay) is the tale of a great rivalry between a father and son, two eccentric professors, who have both dedicated their lives to work in Talmudic Studies. Each has a need for recognition in his chosen field and the day comes when father and son must look deeply inside themselves for the truth- advancement of his own career or of the others.

Hidden in Silence - Przemysl, Poland, WWII. Germany emerges victorious over the Russians and the city comes under Nazi control. The Jews are sent to the ghettos. While some stand silent, Catholic teenager, Stefania Podgorska, chose the role of a savior and sneaks 13 Jews into her attic.

Noodle (compatible only on PAL – DVD players - Hebrew with English subtitles) This film was a beloved entry in the Jewish Federation of NEPA’s Jewish Film Festival. It tells the heartwarming story of an Israeli stewardess, Miri, whose personal life as a war widow leaves her without much joy. Everything changes for Miri when her Oriental housemaid disappears one day leaving her with her young Oriental child!

The Boy in the Striped Pajamas - Based on the best- selling novel, this movie is unforgettable. Set during WWII, the movie introduces us to Bruno, an innocent eight-year-old, ignores his mother and sets of on an adventure in the woods. Soon he meets a young boy and a surprising friendship develops. *NEW* The Concert - Andrei Filipov was prodigy- at 20 he was the celebrated conductior for Russia’s renowned Bolshoi Orchestra. Thirty years later, still at the Bolshoi, he works as a janitor. Ousted during the communist era when he refused to fire the Jewish members of the orchestra, a broken Andrei now cleans the auditorium where he once performed in front of thousands.

The Debt - In 1966, three Mossad agents were assigned to track down a feared Nazi war criminal hiding in East Berlin, a mission accomplished at great risk and personal cost- or was it?

The Other Son - As he is preparing to join the Israeli army for his national service, Joseph discovers he is not his parents’ biological son and that he was inadvertently switched at birth with Yacine, the son of a Palestinian family from the West Bank. This revelation turns the lives of these two families upsidedown, forcing them to reassess their respective identities, their values and beliefs. *Just added to the Jewish Federation’s Film Lending Library!

Continued from page 4

The sale permit: Israel’s Chief Rabbinate allows every farm to register for a sale permit like those allowed in the 1880s, and the Rabbinate “sells” all the land to a non-Jew for about $5,000 total, according to Rabbi Haggai Bar Giora, who oversaw shmita for Israel’s Chief Rabbinate seven years ago. At the end of the year, the Rabbinate buys back the land on the farmers’ behalf for a similar amount. Bar Giora chose a non-Jewish buyer who observes the seven Noahide laws – the Torah’s commandments for non-Jews.

Greenhouses: Shmita only applies if the crops are grown in the land itself. Therefore, growing vegetables on tables disconnected from the land steers clear of violating the commandment.

Religious courts: Farmers aren’t allowed to sell their crops, but if crops began growing before shmita started, people are allowed to take them for free. So through another legal mechanism, a Jewish religious court will hire farmers to harvest the produce and the religious court will sell it. But you won’t be paying for the produce itself; you’re only paying for the farmer’s labor. You get the produce for “free.” Wink. Nudge.

Not observing shmita: Most large-scale Israeli farmers use a sale permit in order to obtain rabbinic certification for their crops, Bar Giora says. But some small, nonreligious farmers who sell their produce independently ignore the sabbatical year completely and do not receive kosher certification.

What happens to fruits, vegetables and other plants that grow on their own during shmita? Just like Jewish environmentalists can connect to the idea of letting the land rest, social justice-minded Jews can appreciate that whatever grows on the land during shmita is, in theory, supposed to be free for anyone, especially the poor.

When shmita is first mentioned in Exodus, the Torah says the crops should be for “the poor of your nation, and the rest for wild animals.” But given that almost all farmers in Israel get around shmita in one way or another, walking onto a farm looking for a free lunch is ill-advised.

How does shmita affect you if you’re not a farmer?

Because all kosher-certified produce cannot violate shmita, Israelis shopping in major grocery stores and outdoor markets don’t have to worry about shmita. But religious Jews – and businesses – that don’t trust the legal loopholes just buy their produce from non-Jewish farmers in Israel. An organization called Otzar Haaretz, or Fruit of the Land, seeks to support Jewish farmers specifically and is organizing farmers who use religious courts and the greenhouse method to sell to supermarkets in Israel.

Customers who wish to buy from Otzar Haaretz can pay a monthly fee to get a discount on its produce.

Shmita has an impact beyond the produce stands, too. Mickey Gitzin, founder of the religious pluralism organization Be Free Israel, says that while the “the idea that the land should rest” is a positive one, shmita can have a negative effect on public parks. As public property, the parks cannot be sold to a non-Jew. And because they remain under Jewish ownership, some public community gardens don’t receive care during shmita.

What does this mean for Jews outside of Israel?

Although they’re not obligated to observe shmita, Jews outside of Israel have found ways of commemorating the year. At Hazon, a Jewish sustainability organization, the Shmita Project aims to engage in a study of the textual sources of shmita and develop programs to mark the year without letting the land lie completely fallow. Another group, the Shmitta Association, has purchased a grid of 4-square-foot plots of land in Israel that Jews abroad can purchase for $180 and then let lie idle, enabling them to observe shmita without being an Israeli or a farmer.

What does this have to do with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? Because they don’t want to buy from Jewish farmers during shmita, some haredi Orthodox Jews buy from Palestinian West Bank farms. But during the past couple of shmita cycles, there has been backlash against buying Palestinian-grown produce.

Jerusalem Post columnist David Weinberg recently urged Israelis to avoid supporting Palestinian farms.

“Primary reliance on Arab produce is neither realistic nor acceptable for health, nationalistic and religious reasons,” he wrote.

During the shmita year that began in 2007, Israel’s health and agriculture ministries said there was no elevated risk to eating produce grown in the Palestinian territories.

october 9, 2014 ■

THE REPORTER

I am: HUNGRY LOST IN DEBT WORKING PART TIME UNEMPLOYED COLD SICK LAID OFF SINGLE MARRIED HOMELESS DOWNSIZED ADDICTED ALONE A FATHER PROFESSIONAL SCARED AN IMMIGRANT A REFUGEE ESTABLISHED BROKE JEWISH

Though the economic crisis may have affected each of us differently, the Jewish Federation of Northeastern Pennsylvania is the one place we can all turn to for help. In fact, more of us are relying on the services of Federation-funded agencies to help make ends meet, feed our families, and pay our mortgages than ever before. Yet for every story of hardship and despair, there are countless stories of love and hope that you can be a part of.

You can help. You can make a difference. You can make the world a better place.

Yes, I can help. I want to make a donation and learn more at www.jewishnepa.org or call (570)961-2300

www.jewishnepa.org

601 Jefferson Ave., Scranton, PA 18510 • (570)961-2300

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THE REPORTER â– october 9, 2014

CAN ANYONE REALLY PUT A PRICE ON HOPE AND DIGNITY?

ACTUALLY, YES.

Everything has its price. A counseling session for an abused child costs $36. Groceries for a family in crisis cost $100. $50 serves hot meals to 10 homebound seniors.When you can't afford to take care of the most basic needs, it's easy to feel hopeless.

Sunday, October 26, 2014 when the phone rings make a generous gift to Federation and restore hope.