Issuu

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

Happy New Year

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

now, and for generations to come.

Thank you to our legacy donors for ensuring the future of Jewish Cincinnati.

createyourjewishlegacy.org/legacy

Strengthening Jewish Cincinnati To learn more about creating your own legacy, please contact Lisa Hacker at lhacker@jfedcin.org.

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

Dear Readers,

At work, a co-worker brought a dog in, I hid in my office the entire day. At Ira Younger’s siyum last year, his little dog Gigi came into the dining room (even though Ira promised me he locked her away) I grabbed the person next to me and jumped on to the closest chair. Then something strange happened. Six months ago, my good friend got a dog and decided he was going to break my fear. Coco is a maltese (dog people would say “adorable”), a tiny white shaggy of fluffiness. I don’t know why, but I was not scared to stay in the same room with it. Its eyes were pure, looking calm and just seeking attention and validation from the humans around him. Maybe it’s because if you push too hard, its neck would break, or hearing that families with young kids don’t have maltese dogs because of their tiny and frail bodies. Armed with that information perhaps eased some of the fear. Over the next few weeks, I got closer to touching it, and even petting Coco. A few weeks later we had Coco in our house to dog sit and sometime later I let it sit on my lap. I still jump if it makes sudden movements, but when I jump Coco jumps and gets scared too, so we are even. I send pictures to my sisters and get back “WHO ARE YOU” responses. Then another strange thing happened. Other dogs started getting less scary, even bigger ones. My neighbor with his blind dogs no longer has to stop and wait for me to pass. I played pickleball and there were some loose dogs meandering around within the gated courts, yet I continued playing (sent an anonymous email later to the parks department complaining). This whole sub-culture of dogs, I now looked at with a good eye, an ayin tovah. Instead of looking at dogs with disgust, I was open to getting to know them, what breeds they were, what their names were. Recently it hit me that we can do the same with humans too. Sometimes we look at someone in our orbit who acts differently, grew up very differently, with less than generous eyes, not looking to know their name, and their story. Yet, when I bring myself to engage, sometimes they have such interesting stories to tell. That’s the story of Coco, that no matter the personal history, there is always time to use the ayin tovah, to see the nikuda tovah, that inner spark in everyone and everything around us.

It was Spring of 2015. I was on an important call with my Rosh Yeshiva, pacing around the Cincinnati Hebrew Day School parking lot in Golf Manor while receiving sagely advice. As I hung up, charging at me across the parking lot was the scariest ugly black dog, a pit bull with a crazy look in its eyes, just running, getting closer and closer to where I was standing. After freezing for a second, I realized what was at stake and kicked into survival mode. I was racking my brain to remember the passuk, the one that would slow this madman down. I knew it was something with Yaakov or Yisroel, but that was all I got. Perhaps they should’ve had us memorize it alongside U’va L’tzion in Chaim Berlin’s hasmadah program. I ran around the yellow light pole trying to get as far away as possible, desperately trying to find a car or something to jump on to & get away from this death machine. There was no car to jump on. I heard kids voices coming from the CHDS playground. Rabbi AY Braunstein was outside with some older boys behind a gate. It was Thursday night and he was the Rebbe for the Mishmar program, Morah Kayla Berger made them pizza, and AY taught them and played football with them outside. I yelled for him to open the gate. In hindsight, maybe not the best idea, to put others at risk from this dog that just seemed to be looking for mayhem. Reb AY opened the gate and I escaped, perhaps losing it with my spylike quick maneuvers to evade this pit ball. I was safe. Growing up in Flatbush, no one I knew owned a dog. They were seen as bad creatures. The ones we saw were loose in the street and if you were on your bike and you encountered a pair of them, you pedaled as fast as you can or ran into the most Jewish looking house you see. That youthful fear of dogs stayed with me and my family for decades. We did not go apple picking because farms equaled dogs. On Chol Hamoed trips growing up, we looked for the parks with “no dogs allowed” signage. We had a hidden park we went to for years, a family secret you were not allowed to tell your friends about. Yes, it had ice skating and golf ranges, but more importantly Wishing you an amazing Yom Tov, there were no dogs. As a 6 foot big guy it is embarrassing. Crossing the street from a little Yosef chihuahua, fake sneezing to pretend I am allergic, the owners pretend to believe you, but they know. I was once walking over the bridge from Ohio to Kentucky in the pedestrian walkway, which is pretty narrow, when I saw a dog (and owner) coming towards me from the Kentucky side. I quickly pretended to get an Please send comments and feedback to important phone call and turned the other way and ran, just to avoid needing publisher@cincinnatijewishjournal.com. to pass it. I have used my kids (and strollers) as human shields to protect me from passing dogs hundreds of times over the years.

CJJ is distributed to the Jewish Community and available for pickup in Amberley, Blue Ash, Montgomery, Mason, Hyde Park, Golf Manor, Roselawn, and Deer Park.

The Cincinnati Jewish Journal (“CJJ”) is an independent publication printing monthly. The CJJ accepts no responsibility for typographical errors or reliability of the kashrus on anything advertised. The CJJ welcomes your signed letters and articles. All submissions become the property of the The CJJ and may be shortened and/or edited for length or clarity or for editorial sensitivities. All opinions expressed by the journalists, contributors and/or advertisers printed and/or quoted herein are solely their opinions and do not reflect the opinions of the The CJJ and may have been previously disseminated by them on television, radio, Internet or another medium. The CJJ reserves the right to reject any ad or article at their discretion. The information and material contained in this publication are for informational purposes only and are not intended to be a substitute for legal or medical advice.

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

mannsales.co | Nice & cool.

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

A breath of fresh wear Sukkah weather can be unpredictable. Hot, cold, hot, warm, cold, and then hot again. Good thing your shirt is built for it. Breathable, temperature-regulating fabric keeps you cool as a cucumber, from your first morning shake to your last evening drink.

THE WAREHOUSE

770 Vassar Ave #1, Lkwd, NJ 08701

THE STORE

732-746-5035 // aistone.com

21 S Hope Chapel Rd, Jksn, NJ 08527

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

Around the

Community Kollel Bechina from Rabbi Mendy Stern

fter spending a full year toiling in Yoreh Deah, Hilchos Basar V’chalav, the yungerlite of the Cincinnati Kollel took a Bechina from Rabbi Mendy Stern shlita, Rosh Kollel Milwaukee Kollel and passed with flying colors!

Kollel Welcomes Two New Families

he Kollel is excited to welcome two new families who arrived in Cincinnati over the summer. Rabbi Moshe and Mrs. Rivka Gerchikov joined the Kollel from Lakewood along with their children Yaakov Yitzchak and Miriam. Moshe, originally from Atlanta, Georgia learned in Ner Yisroel in Baltimore and then by R Asher Arielli in Yeshivas Mir before learning in Beis Medrash Govoha of Lakewood. Rivka, originally from Baltimore, enjoys working with young children and is teaching toddlers in CHDS’s Early Childhood Program. Rabbi Moishe and Mrs. Riva Dornstein moved from Lakewood with their children Leah and Yaakov. Moishe originally from Flatbush, New York learned for 3 years by R’ Yosef Elephant in Yeshivas Mir before moving on to Beis Medrash Govoha. After 4 years in BMG where he completed the Ner Li’Elef course, he chose to continue his learning in the Kollel’s semicha program. Riva, originally from Waterbury, Connecticut has a passion for teaching children and a degree in Special ED and has begun teaching Kindergarten in CHDS. Both families are enjoying their warm welcome, are eager to meet more neighbors and are excited to participate in the many opportunities the Cincinnati Community has to offer.

Around the Community

Mesivta of Cincinnati Grows to 70 Bochurim churim hitting 50 bochurim. These bochurim come from all over the United States, including 18 different cities, as well as Canada, Belgium, and Eretz Yisroel. Elul in Mesivta is an uplifting experience, and the sound of Limud Hatorah is emanating throughout

the building and from the beautiful new Bais Medrash. The Mesivta extends an open invite to come experience a Yeshiva seder in the Bais Medrash or a Tefillah either during the week or on Shabbos.

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

new zman begins at Mesivta. The Mesivta has now grown to over 70 bochurim with close to 30 new bochurim joining the Yeshiva this year. A 3rd dorm building was opened for the new year with the number of out-of-town bo-

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

Around the Community

CJX - Look How Far We’ve Come…And We’re Just Getting Started!

t has been incredible to watch CJX grow over the past several years—not simply in the number of programs on offer, but in the number of people who have become part of the CJX family. What started with the goal of creating opportunities for Jews in Cincinnati to connect more deeply with Judaism has grown into something that reaches college students, young professionals, families, and adults throughout our community. There are trips across the world and Torah learning sessions in our own neighborhood. There are Shabbos tables, retreats, fellowships, late-night conversations, and plenty of good food along the way. Most importantly, there are relationships being formed that continue long after any particular program ends. And judging by everything happening right now, there is plenty more to come. A New Home, A New Team, and a Big Year Ahead for Olami Ohio There’s a lot happening on campus this fall, but perhaps nothing has us more excited than welcoming Rabbi Moshe Chaim “MC” and Rivka Aidel Proctor to the CJX family! Rabbi MC joins Olami Ohio after spending years living, learning, and teaching in Jerusalem. A rabbi, speaker, mentor, podcaster, content creator, basketball fanatic and fitness enthusiast, Rabbi MC brings an infectious energy to everything he does. Whether he’s teaching Torah, shooting hoops, or making a reel, his goal is much the same: helping people discover who they are, what they’re capable of, and what they’re here to accomplish. And he is certainly not doing it alone. Rivka Aidel grew up in Lakewood as one of ten siblings and attended Bais Yaakov, but her own Jewish story has a fascinating twist. Both of her parents are Baalei Teshuva: her father’s journey toward Yiddishkeit began in Moscow, while her mother’s began with her first meaningful Jewish experience at a Pesach Seder. Growing up with those stories helped

shape her own appreciation for the beauty of a Jewish journey, and makes joining the Olami Ohio team particularly meaningful. An avid photographer who loves cooking and baking, Rivka Aidel sees food as one of the great ways of bringing people together. Together, the Proctors and their two little boys are looking forward to opening their home to students and creating the kind of warm, authentic environment where students know they are cared for, can ask real questions, and can develop their own relationships with Judaism and Hashem. Hitting the Ground Running at Miami Of course, Rabbi MC and Rivka Aidel aren’t wasting any time getting started! This fall marks the opening of the new Olami Center at Miami University in Oxford, a space that, IY”H, will serve Jewish students for many years to come. More than simply a building, our goal is for the Olami Center to become a Jewish home on campus—a place for learning, conversations, friendships, Shabbos meals, plenty of food, and all of the little moments in between that can ultimately change the trajectory of a Jewish life.

One of the first major programs launching in the new center will be Judaism Unlocked; a ten-week fellowship designed to give students an introduction to the fundamentals of Judaism and what it actually means to live a Jewish life. Together, students will have the opportunity to ask some of the big questions: What does it mean to be Jewish? What does Judaism have to say about the way we live our lives? And perhaps most importantly—what does any of this have to do with me? At the same time, recruitment is already underway for Olami Ohio’s December Poland Leadership Trip. This trip is about much more than visiting the sites of Jewish history. It is designed to help students confront both the tragedy and incredible resilience of our people and then ask a much more personal question: Now that I know this story, what responsibility do I have for what happens next? Our goal is for students to return not only with a stronger connection to the Jewish people, but with a greater sense that they have an important role to play in its future. But as exciting as fellowships, trips and new buildings are, we know that some of the most important moments at Olami will never appear on a

N AT I DO R

MIL

IES IN

CO R U O

FFERENC

campaign

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

MAKES A DI

C O N V E N I E N T LY

D O N AT E

VIA

OUR

WEBSITE

K U P A S C I N C I N N AT I . O R G



C L I C K “ M O N T H LY D O N AT I O N ” T O H E L P THROUGHOUT THE YEAR

If you or someone you know in our community may need assistance, please don't hesitate to confidentially contact the Rabbanim via our website.

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

Around the Community program calendar. They’ll happen over a cup of coffee, around a Shabbos table, during a late-night conversation at the Olami Center, or when a student decides there is something about Judaism they finally feel comfortable enough to ask. That’s what Rabbi MC and Rivka Aidel are most excited about: getting to know the students, building real and lasting relationships, and earning the opportunity to be there for them as they figure out where their own Jew-

ish journeys might lead. No Breaks for CJX Young Professionals! We’ll start with a huge Mazel Tov to our YP Mekareves, Mrs. Kayla Soroka, and her entire family, on the Bar Mitzvah of her son, Yisroel Meir! Between having a baby and making a Bar Mitzvah, you might think Mrs. Soroka would be ready to take a little break… but apparently, that isn’t the CJX way. CJX YPs is jumping right back into things with their Annual Rosh

Hashana Dinner on September 11th. Of course, there will be plenty of great food, but the evening is really about giving these young professionals an opportunity to prepare for the Yamim Noraim in a way that is meaningful and relevant to their lives. The night will feature plenty of learning and discussion, capped off with brachos and words of inspiration from Rabbi Weinrib as we head into the new year. CJX YP’s is also excited to launch a brand-new series this fall called The Feed. The goal is for every other week, Mrs Soroka and a group of young Jewish to meet for dinner and take something that is trending online, on social media, or in the broader culture and put it through a Jewish lens. The idea is simple: young Jewish professionals are already being bombarded by messages about what matters, what success looks like, how they should look, what they should want, and who they should be. The Feed gives them a chance to actually talk about those messages—and ask what Torah might have to say about them. The first planned conversation tackles “looksmaxxing,” the online obsession with optimizing physical appearance, and contrasts it with the Torah’s understanding of beauty, value, and what actually makes a person attractive. Of course, some of the most meaningful things happening at CJX YPs don’t come with a flyer or a big event. A growing number of CJX young professionals are taking time out of their busy schedules for one-on-one and small-group learning with Mrs. Soroka, creating opportunities to explore Torah on a more personal level, ask the questions that matter to them, and

continue growing at their own pace. Good food, interesting people, the craziness of the internet, meaningful Torah learning, and conversations that probably aren’t happening anywhere else. Sounds like CJX YP programming to us. Learning, Growing and Going Places If there is a common thread running through CJX Adult Programming lately, it might be that Jewish growth can happen just about anywhere— from a lunch table in Cincinnati to a retreat with the community to the streets of Jerusalem and Poland. Spearheading much of that growth is Mrs Lisa Cook, who continues to develop opportunities for adults throughout the Cincinnati Jewish community to learn, connect, travel, and think more deeply about their role in their families and community. This past May, Binyan Nashim, CJX’s speaker series created specifically for women in our Orthodox community, took things to the next level with a special retreat featuring Aliza Bulow and Rochel Goldbaum. The May 31st program focused on the idea of building—building ourselves, building our families, and ultimately building the community around us. It was an opportunity to step away from the bustle of everyday life and spend meaningful time thinking about the women we want to become and the impact we can have on those around us. CJX women also came together for Journey of the Soul with Elissa Felder, an opportunity to explore some of the deepest—and often least discussed—parts of Jewish life. The program opened conversations about the neshama, life and death, Jewish burial, grieving, and the Torah’s perspective on what happens at the end of life. It created a space for women to ask difficult questions, learn about topics we don’t always make time to discuss, and explore how Judaism brings meaning even to life’s most challenging moments. And sometimes Jewish growth requires a passport. This November, another group of Cincinnati women will head to Israel with Momentum for an immersive six-day journey through Eretz Yisrael. But for CJX, the trip isn’t meant to end when the plane lands back in Cincinnati. Our local cohort will spend an

Around the Community but who have since become part of each other’s lives. In many ways, that’s one of our favorite things to see. Trips end. Programs end. College eventually ends. But the friendships, relationships, and Jewish community built along the way don’t have to. And maybe that’s the best way to

describe the growth we’ve been privileged to see at CJX over these past several years. It isn’t only about adding another program, another trip, another class, or even another building. It’s about watching people who may have first walked through our doors for a dinner, a trip, a class, or a conversation become part of a communi-

ty—and, eventually, become part of each other’s lives. We couldn’t be happier for Shayna and Noam and wish them a lifetime together filled with bracha, happiness, and continued growth. Mazel Tov—and IY”H, here’s to many more simchas to come!

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

additional day together planning for the year ahead and thinking about how the inspiration and relationships created in Israel can translate into something meaningful right here at home. Plans are also already underway for the next CJX Journey to Poland, March 29–April 5. The trip offers participants an opportunity to encounter Jewish history in a way that simply can’t be replicated in a classroom— walking through centuries of vibrant Jewish life, confronting the devastation of the Holocaust, and considering what that history asks of us as Jews today. Those interested in learning more about eligibility for the upcoming trip can speak with Mrs Cook. Of course, you don’t have to cross an ocean to find meaningful Jewish learning at CJX. Our monthly CJX Lunch & Learns at The Orange Spot continue to bring people together right here in Cincinnati for good food, good company, and Torah conversations connected to the issues and rhythms of Jewish life. Most recently, participants explored the Jewish calendar and some of the ideas behind this unique time of year. Whether it’s over lunch, during a retreat, around a table with other women, or thousands of miles from Cincinnati, the goal remains the same: creating opportunities for people to keep learning, growing, connecting— and figuring out what comes next in their own Jewish journey. And One Very Special Mazel Tov! Of course, not everything happening at CJX fits neatly into a program description—and sometimes the best things happening aren’t programs at all. A huge Mazel Tov to Shayna Meere and Noam Rochman on their engagement! Following the engagement, Shayna and Noam celebrated with an engagement party at the Cook home, surrounded by the entire CJX staff family and more than 30 friends, family members, and fellow CJXers. What made the night particularly special was seeing just how many different parts of the CJX family were represented around one room. There were friends from the CJX Journey to Poland, Olami Ohio campus programs, and CJX Young Professionals—people whose paths into CJX may have begun in completely different places,

Around the Community

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

CZE Summer of Growth

his summer was an exciting and meaningful one at Congregation Zichron Eliezer, filled with opportunities for Torah, tefillah, connection, and community growth. A highlight of the summer was the CZE Annual Event, an evening celebrating the shul and the dedicated individuals who have helped it grow and flourish. This year, CZE presented awards to R’ Chaim Barry, R’ Eitan Laghie, and R’ Rafi Zuroff, recognizing their years of dedication and service to the shul. The evening also featured an auction, bringing an added element of excitement and participation to the event. A special video highlighting the past year at CZE gave attendees the opportunity to look back on the many programs, accomplishments, and meaningful moments that shaped the community throughout the year. The dinner, video, and auction brought together members and friends for an enjoyable evening while paying tribute to those who have invested so much in the CZE community. On Tisha B’Av, CZE offered a meaningful day of programming designed to bring the messages of the day to life. The Kinnos program featured spe-

cial introductions and insights from Rabbanim from Cincinnati and around the country, providing background and perspective to the Kinnos throughout the day. The day concluded with a kumzitz singing songs of our yearning for Geulah. During the break between camp and the start of school, CZE offered a special boys’ program for boys entering sixth, seventh, and eighth grade, centered around evening learning. After davening and breakfast, the boys gathered to learn with Rabbi Marchuck. The program combined meaningful learning with opportunities for the boys to spend time together and enjoy several exciting activities. After some of the evening learning sessions, the boys went on trips to Rita’s, bowling, and mini golf, creating a summer experience that was both productive and enjoyable. As the summer drew to a close, CZE turned its attention toward Elul, with this year’s programming centered around the timeless teachings of the Beis HaLevi on Ahavas Yisroel. Members were encouraged to participate in a daily learning program throughout Elul, using the Beis HaLevi’s words as

a springboard for strengthening the bonds between one another. But the theme was designed to extend well beyond the walls of the Beis Medrash. Families throughout the community were encouraged to invite others for Shabbos meals, with a special emphasis on reaching beyond their regular circles and connecting with people they may not ordinarily host. Children were also encouraged to participate, helping make Ahavas Yisroel not simply something being learned, but something being lived throughout the community. With a summer filled with meaningful programming behind us and a new year beginning, CZE looks forward to another year of continued growth — expanding opportunities for Torah learning, strengthening relationships within the community, and creating meaningful programming for every member of the kehilla. We look forward to a year of continued aliyah, achdus, and growth at CZE.

Around the Community

Naaleh Cincinnati Continues to Grow and Serve the Community - Meet the Team of Mrs. Tova Kirschner, Naaleh has also introduced Flourish, a women’s health and wellness initiative focused on physical health as a foundation for mental and emotional well-being. Flourish offers educational sessions and experiential workshops, including Paving the Path to Wellness, a group program addressing key areas of lifestyle medicine such as nutrition, sleep, physical activity, and stress management. Naaleh also offers mental health programming for both men and women. Recent programs have addressed topics including anxiety, OCD, parenting, postpartum depression, and safe technology use, providing community members with valuable information and practical tools. Recently joining the program-

ming team are Mrs. Yehudis Polsky and Mrs. Shifra Milevsky, who assist with planning and executing programs. Their involvement has helped Naaleh continue to expand its programming and reach. The impact of these efforts was reflected in Naaleh’s 2025 numbers: 75 meals delivered, 104 support and referral calls, and 24 programs held. Naaleh also opened a new health and wellness space at 6446 Stover Avenue, providing a dedicated location for health and wellness programming. Through its growing team, dedicated volunteers, and expanding range of services, Naaleh Cincinnati continues to respond to the needs of the community and provide support, resources, and opportunities for growth.

“Naaleh’s most recent event, featuring Leanne Dall from Dallhouse Speech - language based learning difficulties are the most common reason our children struggle in school, affecting mental health now andnin the future”

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

rector of Programming, together with Mrs. Chaya Spetner, Program Coordinator. They develop and coordinate a variety of educational, inspirational, and wellness programs throughout the year, addressing topics relevant to the needs and interests of the community. Naaleh Cincinnati has also expanded to include a Women’s Division, led by Mrs. Shaindel Roland. The division provides women with meaningful programming and resources, while Naaleh’s practical crisis support is available to individuals and families facing challenges such as perinatal needs, mental health concerns, divorce, and family crises. Support may include meals, care packages, case management, and referrals to community resources. With the guidance

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

aaleh Cincinnati, a branch of Naaleh Cleveland under the leadership of Rabbi Moshe Fuchs, continues to expand its services and programming for the Cincinnati Jewish community. Naaleh is committed to supporting individuals and families while creating opportunities for education, wellness, and connection. Naaleh’s primary service is offering high quality mental health referrals. Mental health referrals are facilitated through Naaleh Cleveland, which maintains a network of highly vetted therapists, psychologists, and psychiatrists and offers telehealth therapy, including services that accept Medicaid. Leading Naaleh Cincinnati’s programming is Mrs. Aliza Ancier, Di-

Around the Community

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

The Close of a Cincinnati Chapter: Menachem and Miriam Deutch Make Aliyah

ith Menachem and Miriam Deutch’s departure for Eretz Yisrael, Cincinnati’s Orthodox community bids farewell to a couple whose roots in the city reach back several generations to the Rabbi Silver era. Menachem and Miriam raised their family in Cincinnati, continuing a legacy established by Menachem’s parents, Sidney and Esther Deutch, and grandparents, Isadore and Dora Deutch and Shammai and Gittle Rubenstein. Over the course of decades, their family became deeply woven into the fabric of Cincinnati Jewish life. At Golf Manor Synagogue, Menachem served as Vice Chairman of the Board. For many years, he also assumed primary responsibility for the synagogue’s building and grounds. From routine maintenance to unexpected repairs and emergencies, Menachem approached each challenge with patience, determination, and a profound sense of responsibility. Yet for generations of GMS children, Menachem

will be remembered by a different title: “the Candyman.” His warm smile and ever-present supply of treats made him a beloved part of their Shabbos experience. Miriam also contributed her time and talents to numerous committees, programs, events, and communal initiatives throughout the years, supporting the mikvah, chevra kadisha, CHDS, and GMS. Her warmth, thoughtfulness, and willingness to help were matched by exceptional organizational skills, ensuring that everything entrusted to her was handled with care and precision. We wish Menachem and Miriam much bracha and hatzlacha as they now realize their lifelong dream of making aliyah. Cincinnati’s Jewish community will remain eternally grateful for the lasting impact that they and the generations of their family have made.

Camping Trip GMS recently embarked on its first-ever camping trip—a true back-to-nature experience, complete with tents and no cabins. The trip was the adventurous idea of GMS’ new Executive Director, Rabbi Naftali Savin. Despite forecasts of bad weather, the group took the plunge and enjoyed a memorable outdoor experience. Following the success of this inaugural outing, GMS looks forward to making the camping trip an annual tradition.

SEED 2026 For the third consecutive year, five bachurim from Ner Israel spent over two weeks at GMS, bringing a welcome boost of ruach and learning while offering older boys home from camp a lively mix of Torah and fun.

Around the Community The 2026-27 school year at the University of Cincinnati is well under way, and Chabad at UC has been busy! Mega-Challah, the UC Student Org Fair, Shabbat Under the Stars, the Freshmen BBQ, and more. At every opportunity, students have a chance to do a Mitzvah like wrap Tefillin, make a brocha, light Shabbos candles, eat kosher food, or learn some Torah.

Chabad looks forward to an amazing year ahead, connecting Jewish students to their campus community, family, heritage, and customs. Support for Chabad at UC is integral and welcome, and can be given at www.chabadatuc.com/ donate.

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

large cohort of freshmen and returning students have already come multiple times to the many fun and interesting events and programs that Chabad has made available. These include Freshmen Smores & Bonfire, Welcome (Back) Shabbat, Guess the Weight of the

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

Around the Community

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

Learning Begins Again at CHDS

Around the Community

Ohr Torah Welcomes Students Back the first days of school. You’d never know we’re only a few days in! Students are already engaged, classrooms are buzzing, and the year is off to a wonderful start. We look forward to a year filled with learning, growth, connection, and many brachos, and wish the entire community a Kesiva V’Chasima Tova!

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

hr Torah Cincinnati kicked off the new school year with its annual Popsicle Pop-In on Tuesday, August 25. Parents, students, and teachers gathered for an afternoon of popsicles, catching up, and reconnecting after the summer. New faces had the chance to meet, old friends reunited, and everyone came together as one Ohr Torah family. That feeling of connection has carried right into

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

Around the Community

Amberley Village Annual Ice Cream Social

Mulching at Sha’arei Torah

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

Piranhas are fascinating fish, with over 35 different species swimming through the waters of South America. The most famous of these is the notorious Red-bellied piranha. Piranhas have a fierce reputation for attacking large animals—such as horses—and even humans. As David Alderton notes in his book Aquarium and Pond Fish, “Few fish instill greater fear than piranhas. While most hunters live solitary lives, piranhas are like packs of wolves, living and hunting in groups and occasionally taking prey as large as horses or even people.” Piranhas as Hunters Living in shoals of up to 30 individuals, piranhas are highly effective group hunters. They possess an incredibly sharp sense of smell, allowing them to detect even a single drop of blood in the water. Once they locate their prey, they can descend into a rapid feeding frenzy, using their razor-sharp teeth to tear away mouthfuls of meat. Their anatomy is perfectly built for this: a short upper jaw anchors the fish firmly to its prey, while a powerful lower jaw provides the mechanical strength needed for their triangular teeth to shear through muscle and tissue with ease. Are Piranhas Really Man-Eaters? Despite their terrifying reputation, there is much controversy over how dangerous piranhas actually are to humans. Many marine biologists believe piranhas rarely attack unless they feel threatened, cornered, or are defending themselves. In fact, there is typically

one or fewer documented piranha-related deaths per year. In one famous case, the victim had already suffered a fatal heart attack before piranhas scavenged the body. Another notable incident occurred on November 14, 1976, when a passenger bus crashed into a river, tragically killing 39 people. While rescuers

Interestingly, the piranha’s closest lookalikes—the pacu and the silver dollar—are strict vegetarians and incredibly peaceful. The pacu can grow up to 16 inches long, making it highly unusual for a fish of that size to remain a gentle herbivore.

Lessons from piranhas We can learn a powerful lesson from the way piranhas cooperate. Just like wolves, they succeed because they work as a team. Similarly, whenwe learn to cooperate and get along with our peers, we can achieve true success and grow into the best versions of ourselves.

and news reports noted that the primary cause of death was drowning, many of the bodies were subsequently mutilated by piranhas. However, investigator Jeremy Wade discovered a critical detail: the bus had actually crashed directly into a piranha breeding ground. The fish weren’t hunting; they were fiercely protecting their young. Ultimately, most experts agree that piranhas are far less vicious than Hollywood movies make them out to be.

Habitat and Diet These opportunistic omnivores thrive in the freshwater rivers, lakes, and flooded forests of South America. Their populations are primarily concentrated in major river systems— including the Amazon, Orinoco, Paraguay-Paraná, and São Francisco— spanning countries like Brazil, Venezuela, Colombia, Peru, and Argentina. While they are famous for meat, they primarily eat smaller fish, insects, crustaceans, seeds, fruits, and carrion (decaying meat). In turn, piranhas must stay alert, as they are preyed upon by jaguars, caimans, herons, and the Boto (the pink Amazon River dolphin).

Piranhas are also a beautiful reminder that everything Hashem created serves a vital purpose. They act as nature’s garbage collectors, devouring rotting carrion that would otherwise pollute the water and create a terrible stench. Furthermore, they keep the entire ecosystem in check by preying on smaller fish and crustaceans. Without piranhas to control these populations, overpopulated marine life would consume and destroy the Amazon’s aquatic plants, triggering a collapse of the entire river system. Ultimately, the intricate design of the piranha reflects the unlimited wisdom and creative power of Hashem.

Peaceful Relatives Piranhas belong to the characoid group, a diverse family of fish that includes pencilfish, headstanders, hatchetfish, tetras, and distichodus.

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

By a Goldstein Child

LIVING KIDDUSH HASHEM

He Knew Arabs. He Had Never Met a Chareidi.

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

By Rabbi Shraga Freedman

oam Gil grew up in Kfar Saba in a secular home with virtually no exposure to Torah. Shabbos, tefillin, shul, and even Krias Shema were simply not part of his world. But Noam had always wanted to make a difference. A competitive tennis player who represented Israel at international championships, he was also known for organizing community initiatives. One of his projects brought Jews and Arabs together, based on a simple belief: stereotypes disappear when people sit down, talk, and get to know one another. Then a friend asked him a question that would change everything. “You have no problem bringing Jews and Arabs together,” Tzvika said. “Why not bring religious and secular Jews together too?” Noam laughed. “I don't know any chareidim. I've never really met one. I wouldn't even know where to find them.” The irony was striking. Noam had spent

time bringing Jews and Arabs together, yet the chareidi community was more foreign to him than the Arab community. Tzvika, who was involved with the Lev L'Achim Midrasha in Kfar Saba, knew exactly where to start. He contacted Rabbi Kellerman and explained that Noam simply wanted to meet religious Jews and understand their world. “Of course,” Rabbi Kellerman replied. “Bring him this Wednesday.” No one could have imagined what would happen next. Instead of leaving with plans for organizing dialogue between religious and secular Jews, he left with something entirely unexpected: a chavrusa. One week became two. Two weeks became months. Noam found himself drawn into Gemara, discovering a world he had never known existed. His original project quietly faded into the background. His own encounter with Torah had become far more significant.

Eventually, Noam approached the rabbi learning with him. “I want to learn halachah too,” he said. “If I'm studying Torah, I also want to know how to live it.” And his journey accelerated. Shabbos, once completely foreign to him, became a central part of his life. Then came another milestone. Noam spent a substantial amount of his own money on a beautiful pair of mehudar tefillin. Since then, he has put them on every day. Even when he travels overseas to represent Israel at international tennis championships, his tefillin travel with him. Noam thought he needed to build a bridge between religious and secular Jews. But the real bridge was much simpler: a genuine exposure to Torah and its way of life. No pressure. No arguments. No debates. Just a kiddush Hashem exposure. (Shared by Rabbi Aryeh Nelkin of Lev Lachim)

World Wide Living Kiddush Hashem Event This year’s presentation will explore a theme that is on all of our minds and felt deeply in our hearts: How can we be one? We are so different. There is so much conflict. The influences are so strong. Yet we know that our mission of Kiddush Hashem depends on it. Three true awe-inspiring stories and a musical presentation. Watch at LivingKiddushHashem.org

Rabbi Shraga Freedman is the author of sefer Mekadshei Shemecha, Living Kiddush Hashem, A Life Worth Living, Director of Living Kiddush Hashem Foundation. Please email LivingKiddushHashem@gmail. com for a free file of sefer Mekadshei Shemecha with a pesicha from Rav Matisyahu Salomon ZT”L, and a 30 day booklet of stories and inspiration. Visit LivingKiddushHashem. org for more resources

OUR FAMILY An awe-inspiring presentation that will transform the way you relate to every Jew. Rabbi Moshe Tuvia Lieff

Rabbi Yechiel Spero STORY 1

STORY 2

Written Off

Welcome Home

STORY 3

MUSICAL

One Heart

Soul Unity

Rabbi Shlomo Landau

Rabbi Shraga Freedman

PROGRAM IS FREE OF CHARGE

Beneath our differences, we are one.

To host a viewing in your shul or school contact LivingKiddushHashem@gmail.com

Join our virtual event. Launching Motzei Shabbos Selichos | September 5

Watch at LivingKiddushHashem.org

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

Messages of Meaning

‫ונקדשתי בתוך בני ישראל‬

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

THE WORLDWIDE KIDDUSH HASHEM EVENT

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

MILES WITH SMILES

Premium at the Big Three By Zalmy Reisman

irlines Go Premium One of the biggest shifts in the airline industry over the past couple of years is the push from airlines to be more premium. This doesn’t mean airlines are trying to be more luxurious - they are always trying to offer the bare minimum they can get away with. Rather, it means that airlines have been shifting to more of a focus on offering business class and premium economy seats on flights, and offering less economy seats. United recently unveiled a set up for some of its flights where there are actually more business class seats than economy seats on the plane. American finally rolled out premium economy in 2025, its last step toward a three class cabin on long-haul planes. Delta has been unveiling flights with more and more business class seats as well. The reasoning is simple: a premium economy or business seat takes up the space of two or three economy seats, but it doesn’t need to sell for two or three times as much to be worth it to the airline. On a recent Delta flight from New York to LA, basic economy started at $154 one way, while Delta One business class ran $1,599. For those of us flying out of Cincinnati, this is a mixed bag. CVG hasn’t been a hub since Delta pulled that status in 2017, and in the years since, low-cost carriers have filled in the gap: Frontier, Allegiant, Breeze, and Southwest. That competition has kept a lot of our domestic fares reasonable, even while the bigger airlines pull seats out of economy elsewhere in their networks. The catch is connections and international trips. Most of us connect through a legacy hub like New York, Charlotte, or Chicago to get overseas, and those

are e x actly the routes where economy is getting squeezed hardest. CVG does have two nonstop transatlantic options now, Delta to Paris and British Airways to London, which is more than we’ve had in years. But if your trip requires a connection on Delta, United, or American, you’re flying through hubs that are actively focused on premium travel. While there are no major changes right now, we’ll have to see if fewer economy seats means flights overseas end up costing a more than the flight to get you to the hub. Where the Big Three Stand For years Delta has been the airline everyone else was chasing, the most profitable and most reliable of the big three. Delta had an image that they were the top US airline, with the best reliability and on time performance. They also seemed to have the friendliest employees, and valued frequent flyers. That’s been starting to look shakier over the past few years. Delta is still making the most money on paper, but a lot of that comes from its American Express credit card deal, not from actually flying planes. Take that out and Delta’s core airline economics look a lot closer to United’s. United’s operating performance has been catching up to Delta’s, and it’s making smart moves on partnerships and its own premium buildout. Delta’s on-time reliability isn’t not close to what it used to be, and many of it’s planes flying international routes are 20+ years old and not in the best shape. The sense in the airline industry is that Delta is coasting, and relying on past success to win today.

American is in a different spot entirely. It’s still well behind both Delta and United on profitability, with a much smaller profit margin despite record revenue. But American has finally started to make some positive moves to become better. For those of us who fly all three, it’s worth watching how this plays out. If United keeps closing the gap on Delta and American keeps clawing back some of its lost ground, the competitive pressure could end up helping travelers, whether that’s better fares, better product, or all three of them fighting harder for our business. American Blocks Partner Awards If like many, you use miles instead of cash, this one’s worth knowing about. American Airlines has started blocking partner airlines from booking nonstop domestic saver awards within about six days of departure. That includes Alaska Airlines’ Atmos Rewards program, along with British Airways, Finnair, Japan Airlines, and Qantas. Here’s why that matters. Alaska’s program offers the lowest milage price for short flights such as to NY, Chicago, etc. Using Alaska miles just got harder. Once you’re inside the six-day window, those nonstop saver seats disappear from Alaska’s search results, even though the same flight is often still bookable directly through American, usually at a much higher price. Something to note is that connecting itineraries don’t seem to be affected so far, so routing through a hub instead of flying nonstop can still work, though you lose the convenience of a

direct flight. An example of this would be flying to Richmond, Virgina while connecting in NY, and then not taking your connecting flight from NY to Richmond. This is called Skiplagging (just using miles instead of cash) which leads us to the next piece of news. Skiplagging Crackdown Skiplagging, also called hidden-city ticketing, is a trick that’s been around for a while and is getting harder to pull off. The idea: sometimes a ticket from Cincinnati to Phoenix costs more than a ticket from Cincinnati to Phoenix to Tucson, because airlines price hub cities differently. So travelers book the cheaper itinerary to Tucson, get off in Phoenix, and skip the last leg. It’s not illegal, but airlines really don’t want people doing it, and American has been getting more aggressive about catching it. Recent reports say that American is getting stricter in flagging potential Skiplagged slights. Aside from looking at your flying history, it looks like American may be using AI to cross-reference who brought a ticket, the payment method you used, and address you are using, to see if people might be Skiplagging. As we get more into the age of AI, expect Skiplagging to become harder and harder. Aside from using AI to recognize who is skipping flights and flagging them, AI will probably be able to detect which routings are likely to be used to buy a cheaper ticket. Zalmy Reisman is a licensed independent social worker in private practice. He sees adolescent and adults ages 14+ and specializes in treating trauma and anxiety disorders. Some insurance plans are accepted. He can be reached at 513-400-4613 or at Sheldon@TherapyCincinnati.com

...BUT NOBODY ASKED ME

A Stream of Consciousness THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

By Bubby Edelman

osh Hashana approaches and for me gratitude for all of the good experienced this past year is a huge piece of my relationship with our Father our King. Continuing to share our Aliya process with you is endemic. Major gratitude...

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

When I had previously called our original Nefesh be Nefesh mentor he had suggested I call the Ashrot office every single day to see if there might be a sudden opening in their schedule. Sometimes people cancel their appointments... He also admitted that going there and crying might be part of our strategic plan. I attempted to call daily for about a week. Either no one answered, or i was put on hold and then the line would go dead. Dan and I decided it was worth a trip down there to check things out and ASK if there might be a sudden cancellation, could we be called. We wandered through a building, up a few flights of steps until we stumbled into the correct spot. There was a diverse group on line. We waited patiently to speak to the initial person ( a kipa wearing chayal, Ethiopian, with a machine gun) who directed us to wait in another line. We stood for 45 minutes waiting our turn. I said tehillim, and reminded myself that it was a gift to be here, and we were completely in Hashem’s hands. This allowed me to smile easily at each person who looked my way. When our turn came the young woman smiled back at me and said, “Sof sof!” I explained what we were asking. She took down our emails and gave the solid advice: “You must be patient.” This is something I’ve

been working on! May 27th, our Olim Advisor, Meir, said he would meet us for the 8 a.m. meeting at Ashrot. We were very grateful. Finding the place was a breeze as we had been there before. Waiting for the bus to get us there on time was an Emuna/bitachon muscle strengthener. We walked in and met Meir for the first time. He had been helping us via whatsapp for months with different questions, but it was a chizuk to have him with us. The guard could not find our name on the list of appointments. We had no documentation of an appointment - just Yitz’s assurance. We breathed in and out again, Hashem has this. Meir looked at the appointment sheet and pointed out our name which someone

had written Edelman with the daled as a tzadi. In we went. Our name was called in seconds, and we sat with a young woman named Aliza and became official Israeli citizens. Just like that. Meir helped here and there with language bumps. For a moment we thought all was lost when she said the date on our FBI background check was expired. Dan looked thunderstruck for a moment, then processed it all and pointed out that the month and day in Israel are in the reverse order from the way it is written in the states. Phew! We received a temporary mispar zehut, the ability to open a bank account and do half a dozen other things, and she put us in for biometric teudot that would be delivered to us in the mail. Streamlined!

We floated out of there into Meir’s air conditioned comfortable car, and he drove us to Bank HaPoalim where we spent an hour signing many forms and successfully opened a bank account boruch Hashem. We learned that Meir had made aliya six years before from Mexico. Meir encouraged us to go straight to the Misrad Haklita to get our teudat oleh even though we did not have an appointment. When we had taken a bus earlier that morning for the 8 a.m. appointment, the app that tells when the next bus is coming had a few glitches and we arrived at exactly 8 a.m. even though we had planned to get there early. It was very nice to have Meir driving us here and there! We walked in to a long corridor to be greeted by a gentleman who looked like a jovial Zaide type. He imme-

diately offered us each a cup of water, introduced himself as Ayal, and wanted to know why we were there. Meir explained. We were granted permission to be seen once the person who had actually made an appointment was taken care of. While we waited Ayal showed Meir pictures of his children, grandchildren, and latest family simchas on his phone. For me the magical moment was when my husband made a shehakol on his water, Meir - who wore no kipa, said Amen. To be continued... Wishing/davening fo a healthy sweet year for each of you full of good news! Kesiva veChasima tova from artzeinu hakedosha!!

TJH

Centerfold

Labor Trivia 1. After approximately 5½ years on the job, what is the base salary of a New York City sanitation worker? a. $61,500 b. $73,200 c. $84,500 d. $95,316 2. What was the original meaning of the word “salary”? a. Money for shelter b. Payment for a day’s labor c. Money associated with salt d. A soldier’s spending money 3. The term “blue-collar worker” originally referred to what? a. Union membership cards being blue b. Blue denim/chambray work clothes c. Navy shipyard workers d. Depression-era government classification 4. Walter Orthmann holds the Guinness World Record for the longest career as an employee

at the same company (a textile company in Brazil). How long did he work there? a. 61 years b. 72 years c. 84 years d. 93 years 5. Which of these occupations has the highest median salary ($226,600)? a. Airline pilot b. Dentist c. Lawyer d. Pharmacist 6. Which of these was once a real job in American bowling alleys? a. Pinsetter b. Ball polisher c. Lane walker d. Strike judge 7. Which of the following is an actual job performed for NASA? a. Smelling objects before they’re sent into space

b. Tasting astronauts’ toothpaste c. Listening for cracks in moon rocks d. Measuring how loudly astronauts snore Answers: 1-C 2-B 3-B 4-C 5-A 6-A 7-A Wisdom Key: 6-7 correct: You are employee of the month! Congrats – you get a paper with a gold-colored ribbon to hang on your wall… Enjoy the next 40 years of your life at the company! 3-5 correct: You are a middleof-the-road type of person. You should drive a trolly. 0-2 correct: You lost your brain cells because you were NASA’s chief sniffer for too long.

One Job I’m Applying For Atlantic Beach Bridge Tower Lookout Guy- I’m 25 feet above the rest of you, people, looking out into the ocean for boats, and I get to lift the bridge up exactly at the moment when everyone needs to get home from The Sands because they told the babysitter that they would be home two hours ago!

With thanks to the Five Towns Jewish Home

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

1. *

Costco sampler attendant — Having to tell the guy who is eating all of the granola that this is really a sampler table.

Billy Bob wanted a job as a signalman on the railways. He

was

told

meet the inspector at the signal box. The inspector asked, “What would you do if you realized that two trains

School bus driver on the first day of school — 38 children, 23 stops, 19 mothers shouting, “WAIT! THAT’S NOT HIS STOP!”

were heading for each other on the

Person responsible for changing the office printer toner — You touched the printer, so whatever happens to it for the next six months is now your fault.

Billy Bob replied, “I would switch the

same track?” points for one of the trains.” “What if the lever broke?” asked the inspector.

Airline lost-luggage representative — “I have good news, Mr. Goldberg. We found your suitcase. Do you have any plans to visit Bolivia?” Porta-Potty cleaner — There is no salary high enough to make you say at dinner, “You wouldn’t BELIEVE the day I had.” Bomb squad technician — Any job where the performance review can begin with “Well, you’re alive…” is not for me. Wedding hall coat-check attendant — “It’s a black wool coat.” Excellent. That narrows it down to 147. Hotel front desk clerk at 1:00 A.M. — “I specifically requested an ocean view.” “Sir, we’re in the Sahara Desert. There is no ocean here.” Person who answers the complaint line at IKEA — “I followed all 37 steps, and I have six screws left.” “Sir, congratulations. You built it correctly.” Little League umpire — Making $40 to discover that twelve Five Towns fathers know the strike zone better than any Major League baseball player.

“Then I’d dash down out of the signal box,” said Billy Bob, “and I’d use the manual lever over there.” “What if that had been struck by lightning?” “Then,” Billy Bob continued, “I’d run back into the signal box and phone the next signal box.” “What if the phone was busy?” “Well, in that case,” persevered Billy Bob, “I’d rush down out of the box and use the public emergency phone at the level crossing up there.” “What if that was vandalized?” “Oh, well, then I’d run into town and go get my friend Jimbo.” This puzzled the inspector, so he asked, “Why would you do that?” Billy Bob answered, “Well, Jimbo ain’t never seen a train wreck!”

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

Airport TSA agent — Eight hours a day explaining that, yes, shampoo is a liquid and you have to remove your computer from the bag. (BTW – this is the only place in the world where they haven’t discovered recorded messages yet, at least at JFK and LGA.)

You Gotta Be Kidding Me!

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

10 Jobs You Couldn’t Pay Me Enough to Do

DIgItal WarrIor A Soldier Fighting Israel’s Information War By yehudit Kramer

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

Hebrew from a young age, and says she “basically grew up very Zionist.” It was in college when she began to understand just how important that Zionism would become. “I, for the first time, realized what they had been warning us about for all these years, about antisemitism and anti-Israel,” she recalls. “Once I saw it for myself, I really wanted to fight back.” At the time, Lester was studying cognitive science and digital studies. Her major was essentially a combination of psychology and video editing, but it was the latter that quickly consumed her attention. “I spent all my time doing my class projects for the video editing degree,” she says. And then she discovered something powerful: She could use that skill to tell Israel’s story.

From Harry Potter to Israel In 2015, Lester created a video for a class assignment that required students to combine two seemingly unrelated sources of media and create a narrative. Her choice was unconventional: Harry Potter and Israel. The result was a video titled Harry Potter and the Threats to Israel, using only Harry Potter visuals and audio clips to tell the story of Operation Protective Edge and the then-upcoming Iran deal. “You can find it on YouTube, and it’s still the video that I am the proudest of,” she says. The video attracted attention. Two months later, Lester entered an international Israel video contest and won the grand prize. Suddenly, she was known in her community as “Israel

With thanks to the Five Towns Jewish Home

or most people, a college video-editing assignment is just that: an assignment. Something to complete, submit, and move on from. For Rachel Lester, it became the beginning of a career and, eventually, a calling. Today, Lester describes herself as a “Digital Warrior,” using videos, social media, storytelling, and firsthand experience to advocate for Israel in an arena where battles are fought not only with weapons but with images, narratives, and information. Her path to that battlefield was anything but conventional. Lester grew up in Los Angeles’s Pico-Robertson neighborhood in a Modern Orthodox Jewish community. She attended Jewish schools throughout her childhood, learned

Lester packed up her life in Los Angeles and moved to Israel. But she insists that, at the time, her plan wasn’t necessarily to stay. “It wasn’t that I was making aliyah because I wanted to move to Israel and live in Israel for the rest of my life,” she explains. “I wanted to serve in the Spokesperson’s Unit, and in order to do that, I had to make aliyah.” She told her family and friends that she would be back. “I told my family and friends, ‘Okay, I’m going to go move to Israel, and I’ll be back in one or two years, maybe four if I do a master’s.’” Instead, she stayed. Lester served as a soldier for two years. Then, when the army created a position for her as a civilian employee, she stayed another two years. By then, the world had entered the Inside a Secret operation COVID-19 pandemic, and something One of Lester’s most memorable had changed. assignments came later that year, “I was just really proud of during Operation Northern “I was afraid to how Israel was behaving and Shield. didn’t want to leave,” she says. Israel had discovered that leave because then “It was home here.” the Hezbollah terror organiThe young woman who had zation had spent years conI felt like my sense moved to Israel to make vidstructing attack tunnels exeos for a few years had found tending from Lebanon into of purpose would a home—and a mission. Israeli territory. The tunnels represented a serious security be gone.” threat. Lester was brought into the learning the operation before it was publicly anInformation Battlefield nounced. Lester began her military service in She found herself sitting underground with November 2017 and started working in the IDF senior military commanders, working on materials that Spokesperson’s Unit in January 2018. would explain to the public why Israel was launching The first few months were relatively quiet. She the operation. filmed military exercises, learned about the different On December 4, 2018, at 7 a.m., Lester was at IDF units, and created videos showcasing what Israeli solheadquarters. diers were doing. Then came the massive Hamas-orShe pressed “post” on a video she had spent weeks ganized riots along the Gaza border. creating. Beginning in March 2018, the protests and attempt-

The video explained who Hezbollah was, why the organization was building tunnels, why the tunnels posed a threat to Israel, and why Israel was taking military action to neutralize them. It was a very different kind of military operation, but Lester’s role was clear: The military had to explain not only what it was doing, but why. That became increasingly important in the years that followed.

october 7 By October 7, 2023, Lester had been out of the army for approximately a year and a half. But the moment she saw what was happening, she knew where she belonged. “I immediately messaged my commander and said, ‘Call me in. I’m available. I can be there in 10 minutes.’” She began reserve duty on October 8. She would remain there for six months straight, returning for additional periods during the following year. The nature of the information war had changed overnight. For a brief moment, the world sympathized with Israel. Lester’s goal was to make that sympathy last long enough for the reality of what had happened to sink in. “The goal that I had was to lengthen the amount of time that we had sympathy for as much as possible,” she explains, “so that we would have legitimacy to start fighting back against Hamas.” But there was another problem. The atrocities of October 7 were being documented by the perpetrators themselves, along with footage from dashcams and security cameras. The question was what would happen to that footage over time. Lester realized that social media was not enough. “An Instagram or Twitter video only lasts a couple days, and then it’s not in the algorithm anymore,” she explains. “But everybody uses YouTube as basically the history of the internet.” So she began watching. And watching. And watching. She went through footage posted by Hamas and Islamic Jihad, as well as recovered footage from dashcams and CCTV cameras. She organized every recorded barbaric act, every murder caught on camera, every butchering and burning detailed on film. She categorized it, placed it in chronological order, and compiled what was then about ten minutes of material into a single video. Nobody had instructed her to do it. “Nobody thought about YouTube, because journalists live on Twitter,” she says. “I was the one who was going through the footage, making sure it was saved and categorized and easy to access.” The video received six million views in a single day. Today, it has nearly 10 million views. Her goal was simple: “I wanted the world to have a record of what Hamas did so that nobody could deny it, and people could use it as a resource when needed.”

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

“I’ll Be Back in one or two Years”

ed infiltrations became a weekly occurrence. For Lester, it was an early lesson in just how difficult Israel’s information battle could be. “We didn’t grasp the magnitude at the time, but it was essentially a pre-October 7th attempt every Friday for two years,” she says. The challenge wasn’t simply what was happening on the ground. It was how those events were being perceived around the world. Israel was being condemned for using force against what appeared to be “peaceful” protesters. But Lester says the reality was much more complicated, with violence, weapons, and attempts to infiltrate Israeli territory taking place under the cover of the demonstrations. She was called in to work virtually every weekend. “It was incredibly stressful,” she recalls. But it was also where she began to understand the unique role she could play. The International Social Media Department included scriptwriters, video editors, and graphic designers. “I’m all three,” Lester says with a laugh. “That’s why I was called in every Friday instead of calling in three soldiers. They only had to call in me.” She gathered footage from open sources and IDF combat photographers, wrote scripts, edited videos, and tried to show audiences what was actually happening. It was a job that required more than technical skill; it required understanding an audience. The material she created was designed primarily for English-speaking audiences, but she also translated it into Spanish and French.

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

Video Girl.” That nickname might have sounded cute at the time. But it was also a preview of what was coming. In the summer of 2016, Lester attended a conference for Christians United for Israel. There, she met another Jewish attendee who changed the direction of her life. “He told me that he loved his family, his wife, his kids, his life, but the one thing he regrets is not serving in the IDF while he could,” Lester recalls. The comment stayed with her. “Wow, I don’t want to regret not serving in the IDF while I can,” she remembers thinking. “The window is closing.” At that point, Lester was already making videos about Israel. So she had an idea. “If, after graduation, I’m going to make videos about Israel anyway, I want to do it for the place that matters the most—the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit.” There was just one problem. In order to serve in the IDF, she would have to make aliyah.

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

the Human Cost Behind the screen, however, was a human being. The footage Lester watched was horrific. Like many people who encountered the documentation of October 7, she found that the images did not simply disappear when the screen went dark. So how did she manage to watch it all? “Dissociation,” she explains. “The adrenaline kicks in, and the professionalism kicks in, and you don’t see things as real life. You feel like you’re watching a horror movie.” She had to make decisions about what belonged in the video and what did not. She deliberately excluded certain footage, such as images of soldiers being killed or dragged from tanks. Other footage, even of an animal being shot, she included because she believed it demonstrated the depravity of the attackers. For approximately 13 days, she kept working. Then the nightmares began. “It took, I think, about 13 days until I started having nightmares,” she says. Still, “I was afraid to leave because then I felt like my sense of purpose would be gone.” It took years before she began addressing the emotional impact of what she had experienced. “I only started going to therapy recently and addressing it recently,” she says. “It’s still with me.”

rachel in reserves During the war, Lester also created an Instagram account called “Rachel in Reserves.” She would walk home from the army base, turn on her camera, and speak directly to viewers. In whatever limited free time she had, she would add subtitles and post the videos. It was personal, immediate, and authentic. There was no studio. No elaborate production. Just a young woman walking home from military service and explaining what she was seeing. Today, Lester is no longer in the army, but she remains active online. Her goal is to create short, approximately one-minute videos addressing what is happening that day. “I want to be very current and talk about what’s going on on the given day and what I think about it,” she says. The videos will draw on her perspective as someone who lives in Israel and has military experience. And if nothing major is happening that day? She’ll talk about something else. “But always focusing on things that I think Jews and non-Jews should know, about what’s going on.”

turning a Diary Into a Book There was one more way Lester decided to preserve her experiences: A book.

Many Israelis appeared strong and resilient when inThe idea came almost accidentally. terviewed. That strength was admirable—but it wasn’t After completing her six months of reserve duty, Lesnecessarily persuasive. ter returned to Los Angeles to rest. She began speaking “The Palestinians who went on the news...were cryin her community, telling the story of her aliyah, her ing, and that tugs on the heartstrings, and that’s military service, and her experience during the war. what wins people over.” After one speech, an elderly man apFor Lester, this is one of the central proached her. “Your story is so interestlessons of the information war. ing. You need to write a book.” Israel needs facts. But it also Lester looked at her mother. needs stories. “Should I write a book?” It needs people. It needs facHer mother agreed. “We’re trying So she did. es and voices that audiences For years, Lester had maincan relate to. to fight emotions tained a WhatsApp group of And it needs to meet people approximately 60 family memwhere they actually consume with facts.” bers and friends called “Rainformation. chel’s Israel Updates.” Whenever something significant happened, she would write about what she Everyone Could was doing and how she was feeling. Be a Warriorr That became the skeleton of her Perhaps Lester’s most important memoir. message is not directed at the Israeli govThe result is Digital Warrior, a firsthand acernment or the IDF. It is directed at ordinary Jews. The information war is no longer something hapcount of her experience fighting the social media war, pening somewhere else, on a television screen or in a beginning with October 7 and continuing through the government office. It is happening on college campuses, first Iran war. in workplaces, on social media, and in everyday conIt took her approximately a year and a half to write versations. the first draft. Lester herself discovered the importance of advocacy Eventually, after working with an editor and deas a college student. She believes the next generation ciding to self-publish, Lester completed the project. should be prepared before they find themselves in that And then came the moment every author dreams position. She recommends that parents expose their about. children to reliable Israel advocacy resources and IsraShe pressed “publish.” el-focused news outlets. Because the story revolves so heavily around digital And ideally, she says, American Jews should have media, she included QR codes throughout the book that access to advocacy training. allow readers to scan and watch the videos she discusses. “I wish every American Jew could go to advocacy training,” she says. “Because they’re all symbols for everybody. Everybody’s a symbol for Israel now.” Winning Hearts, Not Just arguments It is a daunting reality. But perhaps it is also an opFor Lester, the biggest challenge facing Israel isn’t portunity. simply getting the facts out. It’s understanding how peoRachel Lester did not begin her journey with a grand ple consume information. plan to become an advocate. She was a college student “Israel is losing the war for a number of who happened to love video editing. She made a creative reasons,” she says. class project about Harry Potter and Israel. She entered Some of those reasons, she bea contest. She won. lieves, are beyond Israel’s control. One opportunity led to another. Others are not. A conversation led her to the IDF. One of the biggest challenges The IDF led her into the information battlefield. is speed. October 7 pushed that mission into an entirely new “Whoever posts first wins,” dimension. she explains. And today, she is taking everything she has learned A false claim can race and bringing it to the public through social media, around the world while accuspeaking, and her new book. rate information is still being She may have started out as “Israel Video Girl.” But verified. the title she has chosen for herself now says much more: And there is another uncomDigital Warrior. fortable reality: Facts alone don’t Because in an age when a video can reach millions of necessarily win people over. people in a matter of hours, telling the truth is no longer “We’re trying to fight emotions with simply about having the right information. facts,” Lester says. “The whole Hasbara ecosysIt is about making sure the story is seen, heard, retem is based around facts, and we need an ecosystem membered—and passed on. that’s based around emotions and humanizing and stoAnd Rachel Lester, Israel’s Digital Warrior, intends rytelling and crying.” to keep pressing “post.” She points to the immediate aftermath of October 7.

With thanks to the Five Towns Jewish Home

Apple Hand Pies By Naomi Nachman

We made these delicious apple hand pies which were a hit with the viewers as well as with fa mily and friends.

Ingredients Special Equipment Needed: apple-shaped cookie cutter

Dough • 4 cups ﬂour • 1 teaspoon salt • 1 teaspoon baking powder • 4 sticks of margarine, cut into cubes • 1 cup parve sour cream

Filling • 4 cups Granny Smith apples (diced into corn-sized pieces) • 4 teaspoons fresh lemon juice • 1 teaspoon cinnamon • 1/2 cup sugar • 4 teaspoons all purpose ﬂour • Sprinkle of cornstarch • Caramel chips (optional) • Maldon sea salt (optional) • Egg Wash • 1 beaten egg • Clear crystal sugar (optional)

and repeat. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate the dough for at least 30 minutes while you prepare the filling. Prepare the Filling: In a small bowl, combine the apples, lemon juice, cinnamon, sugar, flour and cornstarch. Stir until thoroughly mixed. Set aside. Assemble the Pies: 1. Preheat the oven to 425°F. 2. Remove dough from the refrigerator and roll it out on a well-floured surface. 3. Using an apple-shaped cookie cutter, cut out as many apple shapes as possible. You can re-roll and cut out more until the dough is finished. Remember you need an even number of apples. 4. Place dough apples on a silpat or parchment-lined cookie sheets. Spoon a small portion of apple filling into the center of each apple-shaped dough. Be sure

Preparation

Prepare the Dough: 1. Whisk together the flour, salt, and baking powder in a large bowl. 2. Add the cubed margarine to the bowl and, using your fingers, work the margarine into the flour until the mixture is the consistency of wet sand. 3. Stir in the sour cream, and then turn out the dough onto a well-floured surface. 4. Knead the dough a few times until it comes together, adding more flour, one teaspoon at a time, if the dough is too sticky to handle. Roll the dough into a rectangle and dust both sides with flour before folding into thirds, similar to folding a letter. Rotate

to leave a border around the ﬁlling. Optionally, top the apple ﬁlling with caramel chips and a sprinkle of Maldon sea salt. 5. Place a second apple-shaped dough on top and, using a fork, crimp the ages together to seal each pie. 6. Brush each pie with egg wash and, using a sharp knife, cut two or three vents on top of each pie. Optionally, sprinkle the top with clear crystal sugar. 7. Bake the pies for about 15 minutes or until golden brown. Variation: Use a smaller circle cutter to make round pies (about two and a half inches) and insert a popsicle stick to make apple pie pops.

Naomi Nachman, the owner of The Aussie Gourmet, caters weekly and Shabbat/ Yom Tov meals for families and individuals within The Five Towns and neighboring communities, with a specialty in Pesach catering. Naomi is a contributing editor to this paper and also produces and hosts her own weekly radio show on the Nachum Segal Network stream called “A Table for Two with Naomi Nachman.” Naomi gives cooking presentations for organizations and private groups throughout the New York/New Jersey Metropolitan area. In addition, Naomi has been a guest host on the QVC TV network and has been featured in cookbooks, magazines as well as other media covering topics related to cuisine preparation and personal chefs. To obtain additional recipes, join The Aussie Gourmet on Facebook or visit Naomi’s blog. Naomi can be reached through her website, www.theaussiegourmet.com or at (516) 295-9669.

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

I invited my friend Joy Wilson to be a guest chef on my cooking show Sunny Side Up on Kosher.com a few years back for a Rosh Hashana episode. She is a professional baker and always comes up with fun twists of her baking products. Y ou can follow her baking adventures on Instagra m @joyofcakes.

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

In The K tchen

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

Shmooze & Muse

I Can Parent in My Sleep!

arenting is exhausting. And it’s not always great on your back. Obviously, kids are a tremendous bracha from Hashem. But what if I told you that there are games you can play with your kids while lying down? “How am I going to get them to lie down?” you ask. No, they don’t have to lie down. You do. And getting yourself to lie down is the easy part. The hard part is thinking of these games when you’re tired. Hence this article. (“Sheifeleh, can you please go get Totty the article?”) EXPERT PARENTING TIP: Keep this article under the couch where you can easily reach it. In this article, I’ve compiled a list of games, most of which you can play with your eyes closed, many of which your kids can play without your consent, and most of which can be played on Shabbos. They’re also great games for fast days. And any days that you had to get up for Selichos. This way, you can create happy memories that involve the two things you love most: your kids and lying down! Though some of them highly depend on where you’re willing to lie down. Other people complain that they have to chase their kids around all day, but you can be like, “What are you talking about?

You just have to work smarter, not harder.” “Who said that? Where did you go?” “I’m on the floor.” Note that many of these game titles say “Totty,” but mommies can play too, if they ever get exhausted. These are also probably a great idea for playgroup morahs. -How Tall is Totty? as measured against various household items. How many Cheerios long is he? How many rugelach? Have them line it up next to your body. Whoever guessed closest wins! And then, depending on the cleanliness of the surface on which you’re lying, you can nosh on the rugelach. And you can request whatever you’re in the mood of. (“Now do how many cheese sticks!”) -We Have a Giant Baby! that we can’t lift. But they can rock you to sleep and read you stories and teach you to say, “Mama.” They can also swaddle you. You can also provide them ahead of time with some kind of drink in a baby bottle that they can feed you whenever you cry, such as iced coffee or something that doesn’t stain. And you can have them attempt to feed you yogurt or applesauce or a banana that they’ve mashed with a fork (you hope). Make sure they put a bib on you first. -Operation! In actual size! You provide the tweezers ahead of time and also put some stickers on yourself. They have

to tweeze off the stickers, and if they accidentally pull out a hair and you shriek, it’s the next kid’s turn. -On a similar note, you can play lots of board games by drawing the board on the back of an old undershirt and then lying really still – Tic Tac Toe, Chess, Scrabble, Risk (depending on your drawing skills), Ticket to Ride, or even, um, Backgammon. (Sorry. Dad joke.) Or Twister! -Police Chalk Outline. You may have to lie in a weird position for this one to make it interesting and make the game take longer. -King of the Mountain. My kids always liked playing this when I needed someone to walk on my back, though I never requested it. -What’s on Totty’s Back? The game where Totty closes his eyes, and you put random household items on his back and he has to guess what they are. “Is it a stepstool?” “Is it a vase?” “Is it a goldfish?” -What’s on Totty’s Back? The game where they have to look at this thing that’s been bothering you and tell you whether it has a whitehead. -Finger or Toe? The kids give you various household items to smell, and you have to guess what they are. (“Is it a vase?” “Is it a goldfish?”) You may have to recline for this game, rather than laying flat on

your back, or someone is going to spill cinnamon in your face. -Hop on Pop. This is a classic game that is more popular with children than it is with parents. But you can still make rules like, “Ow! No shoes.” -Move Totty from One Side of the Room to Another. This is a physics challenge, and anything is fair game, from furniture dollies to dragging you around on a blanket to slathering the floor in oils and then figuring out how their own feet can get traction. For bonus points, they have to get you down the stairs. Or up the stairs. -Which Kids Can Totty Bench Press? Kids can guess the results and also try to weigh themselves down by putting whatever they want in their pockets. (“Ptth! Ptth! Is that sand?”) -Beauty Shop. They can do makeup, eye shadow, manicures, pedicures, face masks, cucumber slices, haircuts… Don’t fall asleep. -Let’s Draw Totty Sleeping! You have to lay perfectly still or it messes up the picture. Then you can hang these on your fridge and have Shabbos guests wonder what is going on in your house during the week. -Let’s Draw on Totty! Same. They can play connect the dots with your freckles! EXPERT PARENTING TIP: Before this

With thanks to the Five Towns Jewish Home

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

By Mordechai Schmutter

Youth Mental Health Matters

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

tall until such time as you get tired of being trapped under a blanket with his feet. -Get Your Coat On! In this game, both you and your spouse lie on the floor while your kids compete to get you guys ready to leave the house. Coat, shoes, hat, the works. Don’t forget Mommy’s sheitel! -Roll Totty Down the Hill. You can play this one with multiple totties from the neighborhood. -Hide and Scream. This is a version of hide-and-seek wherein the kids hide while Totty counts, and then, rather than getting up to find them, Totty calls out his guesses and the kids call back. “Are you behind the shades?” “Are you upstairs in the laundry basket?” Some families play a similar game with the afikoman. EXPERT PARENTING TIP: You should be in zero rush to get your answers right. -The Biggest Present. Lie down on a piece of wrapping paper and have the kids

This way, you can create happy memories that involve the two things you love most: your kids and lying down! all hanging out outside and you’re lying down, I’m not sure this column can help you. Though maybe if you’re camping. And for a more challenging game, you can play “Lay on Your Back and See Who Can Count the Most Stars – The Sukkos Edition,” in which you have to find them through the schach. On a cloudy night. -Can I Jump Over Totty? This game might not be so relaxing for you, especially if the answer is no. For older children, you can play it lengthwise. -What is That Noise in the Kitchen? You have to figure out what they’re making themselves, based on stepstools being dragged, pots and pans noises, what sounds like five straight seconds of light hailstones hitting the floor, and the sound of someone trying to get the last bit of ketchup out of a bottle by imitating a baseball pitcher. -Totty, the Giant Sled, but you might need to buy yourself snow pants for this one. -The Incredibly Tall Child! in which you throw a blanket over yourself so only your feet are showing, and then one child climbs under the blanket above you so that only his head and arms are showing, and he pretends to be ten feet

wrap and decorate you and then present you to your spouse as a Chanukah gift. (“Um, no thanks. We don’t do Chanukah gifts.”) Maybe make sure there’s a second adult home while you’re playing this, so you’re not stuck there until they get home from work. -Who Goes There? Have your kids go outside (of the room, or maybe the house) and then one of them sneaks in and you have to guess which one it is. (“Wrong! It’s a meshulach!”) -What are You Writing? Have the kids write words on your back with their fingers or one of the markers you forgot to hide, and you have to guess what they’re writing. For an extra challenge, use the kids who don’t know how to spell anything. -Spot the Difference. Scan the room and close your eyes. The kids have to make a couple of changes to the room, and when you open your eyes, you have to figure out what’s different. (“Wait, did you paint that wall? How long were my eyes closed?”)

Mordechai Schmutter is a freelance writer and a humor columnist for Hamodia and other magazines. He has also published eight books and does stand-up comedy. He can be contacted at mschmutter@gmail.com.

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

game, make sure to hide all the non-washable markers. -Let’s Clean the Marker Off Totty! This is a great follow-up game that can be played on the kitchen floor or in the bathroom or the backyard. They can use washcloths, soaps, brushes, cleansers, and so on. (Licking their thumbs and rubbing?) If they can’t clean it off before you have to go to shul, everyone loses. -Driving Construction Vehicles on Totty’s Body. Maybe they can do some excavating while they’re on there. -Burying Totty in the Sandbox. Then you can have the kids uncover you with little brushes, like they’re archeologists. You can also do this game in the snow. -Lay on Your Back and See Who Can Count the Most Stars. This can only really be played at night, and if your kids are that awake at night and you’re

Our licensed therapists offer:

∙ Support for building successful relationships ∙ One-on-one therapy for children, teens, and young adults ∙ Access to care and resources for parents

Help your child thrive today jfscinti.org 513-469-1188

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

Exclusively at artscroll.com: Pay Later with 0% APR

FREE SHIPPING

Split your purchase into multiple payments

On Purchases over $79 ONLY IN THE USA

Flash Sales, Introductory Prices, Seasonal Sales and More

Want something truly personal? FOR EXPERT ADVICE AND CUSTOM OPTIONS: 800.MESORAH | ORDERS@ARTSCROLL.COM

urdoo yo

Special Discounts

AFFIRM IS A FULLY INDEPENDENT “BUY NOW, PAY LATER” SERVICE

@YOURDOOR

Your books delivered automatically. Never miss a daf.

SPECIAL OFFER FOR CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL READERS Use coupon code CINJJ at checkout for $10 off your purchase. OFFER EXPIRES OCTOBER 6, 2026

New Selichos

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

Make the Most of Elul with These New Titles

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

New Elul Titles

New YearRound Titles

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

nspiration Nation

Or Levy

Finding Faith in Darkness and Doubt By Eliyahu RosEnBERg

uring the first 51 days of his captivity, confined to a terrorist-controlled Gaza apartment, Or Levy and the other hostages he was with weren’t allowed to speak. So, he did a lot of thinking. Every night, Or would stare at a crack in the ceiling and have a quiet conversation with it, telling it his hopes and dreams, his memories, and his plans for the day he’s free. But then, on their 52nd day in Gaza, he, Eliya Cohen, and Alon Ohel were

moved underground, and in the darkness, he started having the same nightly talks with the tiny LED light suspended over his head. Before he knew it, however, the terrorists moved them again, this time to a pitch-black tunnel. And in the oppressive darkness, with no ceiling cracks or LED lights to chat with, Or, for the first time in his life, began speaking with G-d. And through his conversations with Hashem, he began to believe. Once a skeptic and a self-described

In His Words… When hersh was with me, he told me a quote. he told me, ‘he who has a ‘why’ can bear any ‘how.’ and it became my mantra in life.” if you’re going through challenging times, think about your ‘why.’ Think about why you’re doing what you’re doing. and you will find a reason.” you know, i had this one quote that i said over and over again. i said, ‘i don’t know what the negotiations are. i don’t know if there is a deal. i don’t know if it’s closer to 10% or closer to 100%. i don’t know.’ so, i believed that it was closer to 100% every day, because i didn’t know. i thought about the good possibility, not the bad possibility. i thought every day, ‘Tomorrow, i’m going home.’ and i might’ve been mistaken, but at least i went through each day with hope.

overthinker, Or Levy found faith in the darkness. “I never felt angry. I don’t know why, but I believed that being angry wouldn’t do me any good,” Or shares. “Before October 7, after anything bad that would happen, I would get into a mental loop where I’d try to understand everything.” It’s a classic overthinking pattern: the conscious or unconscious belief that you could think yourself out of stress; that if you just think long enough about your problems, you’ll find a solution. When you feel powerless, you exert control in the only way you know how: by thinking. Meanwhile, overthinking fuels rather than helps our problems. But in Gaza, Or embraced powerlessness and leaned on Hashem. Indeed, the phrase that brought him comfort was, “I don’t know.” He found solace in uncertainty. “You know, I had this one quote that I said over and over again. I said, ‘I don’t know what the negotiations are. I don’t know if there is a deal. I don’t know if it’s closer to 10% or closer to 100%. I don’t know,’” Or recalls. “So, I believed that it was closer to 100% every day, because I didn’t know. I thought about the good possibility, not the bad possibility. I thought every day, ‘Tomorrow, I’m going home.’ And I might’ve been mistaken, but at least I went through each day with hope.” * * * Or Levy was 33 years old on October 7, happily married to his wife Einav, with whom he had an adorable two-year-old son, Almog. The content family lived in Givatayim, a city east of Tel Aviv, and he worked as a software engineer. Their life was normal. Or and Einav loved attending music festivals together. A month before October

7, they went to their first one in years, after a long hiatus due to COVID. So, with the Israeli summer drawing to a close, the couple decided to attend one more party for the season: the Supernova music festival. They dropped their son off at Einav’s mother’s house and headed for the festival on the morning of October 7. No more than a minute after they arrived, rockets began raining down. The next thing Or remembers is fleeing to a tiny bomb shelter, hiding there with his wife and 27 people, hearing shooting and grenades exploding. Moments later, the bomb shelter door flung open, and Hamas terrorists entered, laughing, videoing and aiming their guns at the frightened Jews. “Please don’t shoot me,” Or pleaded desperately. “I’m a father to a little boy.” Surprisingly, the terrorist lowered his gun, grabbed Or, dragged him away, and tossed him in the back of a pickup truck. “The last thing I saw was the Hamas terrorists shooting inside the bomb shelter. So I knew that something happened, but I didn’t know what. I didn’t know if Einav was alive,” Or recalls. “And from that moment, I made a pact with myself to not know. I told myself, ‘I’ll know what happened to her once I get home.’” Only 491 days later, when he returned to Israel, did Or learn that his beloved wife, Einav, was tragically murdered during the massacre. While in Gaza, Or was held with Eliya Cohen and Alon Ohel, and for three days, they were also held captive with Hersh Goldberg-Polin, Ori Danino, and Almog Sarusi, three hostages who were later killed. Those days were, according to Or, filled with some of the most meaningful moments in his captivity. Ori, who was raised in a religious home, would recite Birkas Hamazon and Eishes Chayil with Or.

Or remembers the moment he left the tunnels: his first time breathing fresh air and feeling the sun on his skin in over 400 days. It was February 8, 2025. He remembers his blindfold falling, seeing daylight again after over a year in darkness. Like other hostages, he went along with Hamas’s sadistic release ceremony. And then, he was free. Upon arriving in Israel, Or was greeted by a senior IDF officer, and he immediately asked about his wife, Einav. That’s the moment he learned that Hamas murdered her on October 7. But before Or had the chance to process his unspeakable loss, the officer showed him a video of little Almog, Or’s three-and-a-half-year-old son. “Before October 7, my son was 2 years and 3 months old. And when I came back, he was 3 and a half, or older. And you see a kid with crazy long hair — when I left him, he had baby hair! It was crazy; it was so surreal. And I knew that this day might simultaneously be the best and worst day of my life,” Or observes. “And it wasn’t just the day; it was the best and worst moment. I was reunited with my son, not feeling afraid anymore. But the love of my life…was dead.” Or didn’t think his son would remember him, since children don’t remember much at age two, and they hadn’t seen each other in well over a year. So, he thought he’d have to start all over again, become a father from scratch. You could imagine Or’s shock when the little boy, upon seeing his father again, shouted “Abba,” ran to him, and gave him the biggest hug. “And then, I understood that he knows me. He remembers me. Not from stories. Because, as grown-ups, you can fake warmth, but kids can’t. They don’t know how to fake warmth. I understood that he remembers me, and it was the most emotional moment of my life,” Or recalls. “The first question that Almog asked me was why it took so long for me to get back. And then he asked, ‘Where’s Mom?’ And I had just found out what happened to her, and I started crying. And then he answered it himself... He said, ‘Mom’s dead.’ And I cried even more, and he hugged me…

“The thing that I always promise Einav is that I will work every day so that our son remembers her, so he knows who his mother was. Recently, I discovered that the last message that Einav sent to her mother (who Almog was staying with) was, ‘How’s Almog?’ She didn’t think about herself in her final moments. She was thinking about him,” he shares. “I talk with her every day. I tell her that Almog is growing up. And with everything he does, I think about how she would be happy to see him. And I really hope that she’s happy the way I’m raising Almog. Everything I do with Almog, I think in my head, ‘What would Einav do?’ I just want her to look at us and be happy, and to be proud of Almog. And that’s how I know I’ve succeeded as a dad and as a husband.” The Or Levy of October 6, 2023, is not the Or Levy of today. Or sees his life after captivity as a brand new chapter. Once a reserved software engineer, he now speaks to crowds of over 1,000 people, recounting his story. Most of all, he now values every moment, focusing more on today than tomorrow. Before October 7, Or made many plans for the future. Today, he believes that the “future is now.” “Everyone knows about PTSD. When I came back, this doctor was talking with me, and she mentioned ‘PTG,’ which almost no one knows,” Or Levy shares. “PTG means Post-Traumatic Growth. You must choose to live, and if people choose to live from the bottom of their heart, it can make them stronger once they’re out of the trauma. I know it’s hard to push for another day, another bad day, and it happened to me for 491 days. But when you finally get out, you will understand that it was all worth it. And right now, I know I’ve been through the worst, but to be honest, I could have done 800 days — because...I knew that people were waiting for me; I knew that I had my ‘why.’ “If you’re going through challenging times, think about your ‘why.’ Think about why you’re doing what you’re doing. “And you will find a reason.”

This article is based on a podcast, “Inspiration For the Nation,” hosted by Yaakov Langer. To catch more of this conversation, you can watch it on LivingLchaim. com or YouTube.com/LivingLchaim or listen wherever you listen to podcasts (just search for “Inspiration For The Nation”) or call our free hotline: 605-477-2100

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

their captors ate like gluttons. Once, the terrorists even had a meal in Or’s tunnel, eating behind a thin cloth room divider while the hostages starved. “They were eating, and they were deliberately making noise so we could hear, so we could smell their food,” he recalls. “And you could see them gaining weight. Some of them had arms that were the same width as my entire body.” The metal chains on the hostages’ legs restricted their movements and cut into their flesh. Their bathroom access was limited, the darkness was oppressive, and they were frequently beaten. The terrorists wouldn’t even let them sleep; at 4 a.m., the captors would holler to mark the start of the day’s first Islamic prayer, waking the hostages up. During the month of Ramadan, the terrorists would pray and shout all night long, preventing the hostages from falling asleep. Their captors also wouldn’t let them sleep during the day. “You can’t think about where you are, because if you do, you’ll lose your mind. You’ll become crazy. You’ll be afraid of dying the entire time, so you don’t think about it,” Or says. During the three days that Or, Eliya, and Alon spent with Hersh, Ori, and Almog Sarusi, Hersh gave Or an English book called Shadow and Bone. “In the beginning, it wasn’t my cup of tea with regard to the genre. And I thought, ‘Yeah, maybe I’ll read it once.’ After five times, I stopped counting. It came well over 10,” Or recalls. “We even taught Eliya English with it. We used to read sentence by sentence, translating every word. I remember reading every page, trying to think about the scenes. I’ve imagined the book completely in my mind. I think I’m one of the people who know the book the best!” * * * “When Hersh was with me, he told me a quote,” Or recalls. “He told me, ‘He who has a ‘why’ can bear any ‘how.’ And it became my mantra in life.” For Or, his “why” — the reason he maintained hope in the darkness —was simple: his son, Almog, who was waiting for him back home.

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

“I didn’t know whether my wife was alive or not, and Almog Sarusi had a similar story. He was kidnapped without knowing what ended up happening to his wife. She was also killed. So, Almog and I broke into tears, because it felt so deep,” Or remembers. “And I remembered Einav, and I thought about her, and I thought about all the sentences in Eishes Chayil. And I understood that she’s my Eishes Chayil.” * * * When Or arrived in Gaza, a mob of civilians, including many children, tried to lynch him. Having sustained injuries from explosions in the bomb shelter, he was quickly “treated” for his wounds, of course in the cruelest way. “We moved to an apartment where I was finally stitched up. I was stitched up in seven different places, without anesthesia, of course,” Or recalls. “And I was so afraid of the mob outside that I couldn’t make a noise. I put a shirt in my mouth so I wouldn’t shout from the pain. I remember, when it was finished, I collapsed.” Soon, he, Eliya, and Alon were moved to a dark tunnel with no food or electricity, where their legs were linked with a metal chain. They barely received a meal a day — just a little bit more than one pita. Whereas most adults need 1,600 to 3,000 calories a day, they consumed just 500 to 600 calories daily, the equivalent of a snack or small meal, and they became emaciated. To pass the time, he often thought about sports and all the basketball players he admired. The three hostages also spoke a lot, mostly about food. “The most masochistic thing that we did — it was automatic — was we always talked about food. About what we’ll eat, what we want to eat, about how to make food,” he recounts. “And it’s crazy, because…I don’t know how to describe how hungry you are. You’re starving. Essentially, it’s like doing Tisha B’Av over and over and over again for well over a year. But you can’t stop talking about food.” Me a nw h i le ,

Marked

Reading Jewish History in the Parasha By Tzvi Adler

f you subscribe to 18Forty’s podcast, as I do, then Rabbi Dovid Bashevkin’s voice already keeps you company. If you don’t, he’s the one who wrote a book about sin and failure in Jewish thought, which tells you something about the kind of history he is drawn to. As of this week, the familiar voice can adorn the Shabbos table, too. When a review copy showed up just before it came out, I took it straight into Shabbos. That happened to be Ki Savo. The tochacha. The one week of the year when nobody at my table fights over who gets to say the dvar Torah. When the table cleared, I opened it. The first line: “Do you want the good news or the bad news first?” Twenty minutes later, I was somewhere I’ve never been on a Shabbos night: deep in the story of Bambi. Bambi, the deer. I’m not going to spoil how he gets there, partly because half the pleasure is the route and partly because you wouldn’t believe me. What I can tell you is where the essay lands: at hagbaha, of all places, at the vision of every Jew finding their own letter in the scroll. In the morning, when the Torah went up, I looked longer than I usually do. At lunch, I read a chunk of it out loud, and my kids put down their forks. The sefer hasn’t made it back to the shelf since. Because every essay ends with a “Shabbos Reads” list of the books and articles it mentions, there’s also a translation of the original Bambi on its way to my house. I am apparently helpless before a good reading list. As far as I can tell, he does this with every single parsha. Each essay starts with an honest question on the parsha, the kind you half noticed in shul and never chased. Then he says, “Let’s explore,” and you’re off, three centuries and two continents from Chumash, having the time of your life in a story that happens to come with footnotes. Then comes the sentence he writes repeatedly, the one I’m

already waiting for: “And this brings us back to our parsha.” The journey comes home, the dvar Torah lands, and it lands harder because of everything you now know, the way the best shiur you ever heard made you sit through the whole sugya before it all came together. He grounds the sefer in R’ Yaakov Emden’s claim, tucked into the introduction to his siddur, that the survival of the Jewish people through exile is a greater miracle than the Splitting of the Sea, and in a confession: “We have forgotten our story – how did we even end up here?” An essay for every parsha answers: not anymore. He notes in the introduction that the parsha shelf already holds works on halacha, on lomdus, on stories, on chassidus, and that apart from a single predecessor he credits by name, nobody has read the parsha through Jewish history. His opening essay, on shnayim mikra, ends with a promise: “We are about to begin an exciting journey.” If anything, he undersells it. One essay was supposed to be enough. Instead, I spent the week cheating, dipping into parshiyot that won’t come up for months. No two weeks go anywhere near the same place. In Noach, you meet R’ Yehuda Alkalai, a lonely rav whose printed sefarim reached the grandson of one of his congregants; the grandson was named Theodor Herzl. The small alef in Vayikra opens into the history of infinity itself. Metzora arrives, improbably and convincingly, at the machine matzah wars. Korach asks whether socialism is kabbalistic and takes the question seriously. Bamidbar takes you to Bnei Brak on the October morning of 1952 when Ben-Gurion came to see the Chazon Ish. Ki Teitzei puts Henry VIII’s divorce next to the Get of Cleves. Re’eh traces the Hungarian schism to the birth of the word Orthodox itself, a label most of us wear without ever asking where it came from.

Some of those journeys go to hard places. Rabbis accusing other rabbis of heresy. Letters people wished they had never sent. Does that belong at a Shabbos table? He asked himself the same question aloud. The essay on Tazria is devoted entirely to whether the study of Jewish history is lashon hara, and Rabbi Bashevkin answers it with sources and seriousness. The gedolim in these pages are treated with the kavod of a talmid, not the cool distance of a historian, and I came away from the difficult chapters prouder of our story. It’s 540 pages in Koren’s clean typeset, and I mean the number as good news: there’s a whole year here. This is not a sefer you read ahead or read through, and I say that as someone who spent the week trying. Each parsha is its own journey, and it waits for its week. Which means the sefer ends up wherever you learn the parsha, next to your Chumash at the table, in the beit midrash or in your bag on the train. Mine is going to live next to my coffee on Shabbos morning before shul. The reading lists are how a sefer quietly turns into a library. The title, as anyone who’s spent a Motzei Shabbos online already knows, is the line he’s been posting with a photo of a book for years. He writes in the introduction that it began by accident. He shared a biography he loved, had no plans to do it weekly, then forgot to post again for months. When he picked it back up, he stopped bothering with commentary and just wrote, “I read this over Shabbos.” It caught on, and it got teased, which he seems to enjoy at least as much. People post their siddurim, their cereal boxes, and the instructions on a can of Febreze. Poking fun at it, he writes, is part of building it. The sefer makes the argument the habit was always pointing at. The original Shabbos read, as he puts it, was and always has been the weekly parsha.

Before any of the essays, Teaneck readers should find the section of the introduction called “Finding a Home: Between the Five Towns and Teaneck.” The contents of this book, he writes, were born in one shiur in the Five Towns, raised in another, and “finally matured at the Young Israel of Teaneck,” at a parsha shiur a half-hour before davening. This sefer grew up down the road. Which brings me back to my own table, and to yours. This Shabbos is Nitzavim-Vayelech, the double portion, and Nitzavim is the comfort that same Ki Savo essay points to by name. The sefer pairs the double reading with a single essay, called “The Rebbe of Teshuva,” days before Rosh Hashana. It’s the story of the Yabloner Rebbe, who led a chassidus at twenty-four, brought his chassidim to the land of Israel, and then disappeared into California under the name George Nagel, until the very end of a long life brought him home. Longtime 18Forty listeners will recognize it; he devoted an episode to the story and says so right in the essay. It loses nothing on the page, and with Selichot starting that very night, I’m not spoiling the ending for anyone else. I have a shelf of parsha sefarim, and I love them, and I can usually see the dvar Torah coming from the soup. What I have now is different. It’s our history, and it lands where a dvar Torah lands. For the first time in a long time, I know exactly what I’ll be reading this upcoming Shabbos, and the one after that, and so on. His invitation in the introduction is the best summary I can offer: let’s learn to fall in love with the story of the Jewish people. The sefer reached the stores this week, and Bereishis is a few weeks off, but there’s no reason to wait. Consider this column my own “I read this over Shabbos.” Start yours with the rebbe who came home.

With thanks to the Five Towns Jewish Home

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

Book

udith Zilversmit, a journalist in Amsterdam, was checking her Instagram in October 2023 when she noticed a new message. A woman she did not know said she had information about Zilversmit’s family. “For several months now, I’ve had a knot in my stomach,” the message read. “I would like to share something with you, but I am so afraid of writing something wrong. Two years ago, I discovered in an old newspaper article that my grandmother, who lived at home until I was 18, had a dark past. She betrayed your father and the rest of the family, among others.” The writer identified herself as Ingeborg Boelen, a Belgian woman who lived near the Dutch border. She talked of how she had obtained her “sweet grandma’s” criminal file from a Belgian judicial archive and that it included the details of her grandmother’s collaboration with the Nazis during World War II. She invited Zilversmit to contact her if she wanted more information. Zilversmit, 49, remembers being so startled that she swiped the message off her screen. Who was this stranger reaching out about the wartime betrayal of her family? What did she know? What did she want?

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

By Nina Siegal

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

As the Old Files Open, One Family Confronts Another’s Dark Nazi Past

“My first reaction was, ‘What am I supposed to do with this?’” Zilversmit said in an interview. Zilversmit already knew the broad outlines of her family’s Holocaust history. Her father, Hans, who died in 2014, told her that as a child, he, his parents and his sister had fled to Belgium when Germany invaded Holland in 1940. They were hiding in a town near the border in 1943 when someone betrayed the family. The Gestapo showed up suddenly at their hiding place. The family tried to escape by climbing onto the roof and dropping into the yard. Hans, then 14, and his parents got away. His sister, Helga, 19, was captured and, like some 1 million other Jews across Europe, sent to Auschwitz. Did Zilversmit need to know more precise details about who, exactly, had betrayed them? She wasn’t sure. These sorts of questions have become increasingly relevant as some European governments create access to enormous, once-sealed archives related to the postwar judicial trials of accused and suspected Nazi collaborators. For many, the trauma of the Holocaust has lived beneath the surface of daily life for decades, too painful to confront. But now second- and third-generation family members are getting access to archives of collaboration. In some cases, it’s opening old wounds. In Zilversmit’s case it is also inflicting new ones, as her renewed curiosity about her family’s past has erupted into a dispute over who has the right to tell their story, and how.

Hidden History Months after the Instagram message, Zilversmit decided as a journalist that there might be value in sharing her family history and her interactions with a collaborator’s granddaughter. Others might be grappling with similar encounters. She discussed it with Annet Röst, who makes podcasts for Dutch newspapers including Het Parool, where Zilversmit then worked. They decided to make a podcast that would end up being six parts — “The Betrayal of the Zilversmit Family.” It would focus not just on the past, but on events of the present as well. To prepare, Zilversmit began her own research, scouring her mother’s cellar for boxes with her grandfather’s and father’s files and talking to relatives, historians and other experts. Boelen had already filled her in on some basics about her grandmother, Maria-Elisabeth Stratermans-Coenegrachts, the informant, who went by Betsy. There was other material online. Boelen’s grandmother and her husband, Lambert, had run a cafe in Vroenhoven, on the Belgian side of the Dutch-Belgian border. But her grandmother had also worked as an undercover informant for a leading German Gestapo agent, Richard Nitsch. She infiltrated resistance groups, turned in their members and caught at least one Jewish family in her net — the Zilversmits. Tried and convicted after the war, Stratermans-Coenegrachts was sentenced to life in prison, but gained clemency and was released in 1951. Boelen had gone to some lengths to learn about her grandmother. In Belgium, those seeking such records from judicial archives must petition the state to see them. Usually, they need to prove a direct familial link to the accused collaborator, or approval from a family member — with a few exceptions for researchers and the like.

Such restrictions are designed to protect the families of collaborators, who after the war had been vilified, their heads sometimes shaved, their clothes torn off. But descendants of the Holocaust victims must request permission from the collaborator’s family members. In her Instagram note to Zilversmit, Boelen effused about what she had found in the files. “I also have the voluminous testimonies of your grandparents, M. Zilversmit and Th. Lebenstein, your aunt Helga, and those to whom she entrusted items, Hazelet, Kraay, Franssen, etc.” She added encouragingly, “Should you wish to know more, you are always welcome.”

A photo in a newspaper of Maria Elisabeth Betsy, the Nazi collaborator

Who Gets to Tell the Story? Zilversmit was not the only person interested in reviewing Boelen’s materials. When Boelen realized what was in the documents, she had asked a historian to read them because the historian had published a book that touched on some of the same figures. The Dutch historian, Marie-Cécile van Hintum, had decided to write a book, with the tentative title “The Betrayal of the Zilversmit Family.” Van Hintum has asserted she came up with the title first; Zilversmit said Röst came up with it independently for the podcast. Van Hintum, a well-regarded author who specializes in World War II topics, co-authored two books edited by Dutch historian Ad van Liempt. He described her as “a very talented writer and a very good and serious researcher.” Her 2019 book, “Lokerman,” focused on a Dutch resistance leader from the southern Netherlands, in the region where Boelen lives. Zilversmit said van Hintum reached out to her, and they met at a local cafe, then at Zilversmit’s home, where they discussed their backgrounds and looked at Zilversmit’s family photos together. Months later, van Hintum biked over to Zilversmit’s mother’s house in a leafy district of Amsterdam. The two women and Zilversmit’s mother, 80, sat in the living room with Röst, going through her father’s and grandfather’s boxes. There were letters, newspaper clippings, a yellow Jewish star, documents stamped with swastikas, and lists of looted property. Zilversmit agreed to let the historian take the boxes as research for her book. “I thought we would work together, each on our own separate projects,” Zilversmit said. She said she assumed van Hintum would write a book focusing on Boelen’s grandmother and she would tell a personal story in her podcast. Van Hintum declined to give an interview to The New York Times until after her book is published (no date has been set). But Zilversmit and Röst recorded their conversations with her and allowed the Times to hear the tapes. During the conversation, some of which was included in the podcast, van Hintum said the material was fascinating

but much more than she had anticipated or could carry off on a bicycle. She called a friend with a car to pick her up. While they waited, Zilversmit mentioned that she looked forward to hearing from van Hintum if she discovered something exciting in the boxes. Van Hintum paused. “I don’t know what you expect,” she said. “What you’re expecting from me. I can’t contribute much in terms of content. So it depends on the focus of your podcast.” Van Hintum explained that she was on a tight schedule with her book and could not simultaneously do research for the podcast. The collegial tone of the conversation quickly evaporated. “You can probably tell what would be interesting for us,” Zilversmit said. “If you come across something interesting, you could just say, ‘Hey, look at this letter ...’ That would be enough for us.” Van Hintum repeated her concerns about her book and said she didn’t have enough time to “report to you about what I come across.” Zilversmit took offense. “I find it strange that I’m giving you all this information, all this stuff,” she said, “and you won’t share with me what you find. That’s crazy.” “I’m going to share it,” van Hintum replied. “But in my book.” Zilversmit described in her podcast what happened next. “I looked at the table,” she narrated, “at these boxes that were so carefully preserved by my grandfather and then by my father.” She continued, “I understand what’s she’s saying, but I can’t comprehend it. She would rather keep anything that she finds for her own research. She’s not going to do any work for us.” “I’m sure you can imagine how I feel,” van Hintum said in the recording. “Actually, I can’t,” Zilversmit replied. “It is my family, my material, and you want to hold onto it so you can have success for your book. I find that very unpleasant.” The argument escalated. The podcaster, Röst, turned off the recording device. When van Hintum’s ride arrived, she walked out, leaving the boxes on the table.

With thanks to the Five Towns Jewish Home

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

Across the Border

The Podcast

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

al: Helga’s mother jumping from the roof, hitting an electrical pole and plunging the neighborhood into darkness. Her father hiding behind a chimney. Helga falling to the ground, hurt and captured. Her brother, Hans, able to escape and climb on a passing train. Imprisoned for time in a military barracks, Helga was later sent to the Nazi death camp Auschwitz-Birkenau, where, healthy and young, she was picked to make hand grenades and to move the baby carriages of murdered children. Some of the carriages held teddy bears and milk bottles. Judith Zilversmit with family documents and photos at her home “We still heard their screams,” she wrote. One Boelen painting showed in the podcast and said some of the recordings had been the carriages in flames. Another the gates of Auschwitz. “partly covert.” Hans was depicted running for the train, Helga at her typeOn the tapes, there is no discussion of whether van writer. “I found it completely surrealistic, to find that there Hintum consents to being in the podcast. But Zilversmit says the historian was fully aware she was being taped, were pictures of my family, here in a Belgian attic,” Zilveras van Hintum spoke into the microphone and introsmit said in an interview. duced herself. Röst has a photo of what she said was their meeting in Zilversmit’s apartment and the recording equipment is visible in front of van Hintum. At De Balie, the discussion in the theater began with Zilversmit’s podcast began streaming last November. Zilversmit discussing her podcast with the moderator, The episodes drew more than 500,000 listeners, which Ianthe Mosselman. She outlined her concerns over acranks as very popular in the Netherlands, a country of cess to her family’s records and spoke of her surprise at 18 million people. seeing “hundreds” of paintings of her family members Zilversmit told her listeners that her family’s greatest in Boelen’s house. betrayal was initiated by Boelen’s grandmother. But she Suddenly someone began shouting from the audisaid she thought they had been mistreated again. She ence. It was Boelen. She wanted to correct something could not make sense of van Hintum’s unwillingness to Zilversmit had said. share information with her. And why would Boelen reach Tension filled the room. Mosselman asked Boelen to out to offer access to the records only to withhold them? reserve her comments and questions for the end of the Yes, she said in an interview, she might be able to discussion. access the records herself through a researcher — and Roughly an hour later, Boelen was given the opportustill might — but that wasn’t the point. nity to speak from the audience. She said she thought the In May, Zilversmit was invited to participate in the podcast was well done and effective in creating drama panel on intergenerational trauma and shame. The discussion, “Descendants: Dealing with a loaded family and drawing in listeners. “But there are things where I think that, well, this past,” was held at De Balie, a prominent Amsterdam is no longer an objective representation of realities,” cultural venue that hosts lectures and debates. Boelen said, “but a subjective work that you have creatBefore the event, van Hintum wrote to De Balie, to Zilversmit and to other members of the panel to express ed, and in some parts that no longer corresponds with reality at all.” her feelings. Zilversmit and the organization shared copThere weren’t hundreds of paintings, she added, just ies with the Times. 30 or so. They weren’t about the Zilversmit family, just Van Hintum said she felt that she had shown respect images from Helga’s book. She went on for a bit, and then for Zilversmit as a descendant of Holocaust victims and the moderator stepped back in. did not think she had been treated fairly. “You have, of course, your story, and Judith has her “It is, of course, not a question that Judith has a right story,” Mosselman said. “It will never be one story, and to her family’s war history,” she wrote. “However, she maybe these two stories can never really come together.” seems to think that she is also automatically the owner Zilversmit, onstage, took stock. of many hours of research work by someone else — in “Maybe it’s what Esti Cohen said in the podcast,” she this case, mine.” “Against my will and without my permission,” she offered. “Maybe the time is just not yet ripe in this generation, for this kind of conversation. Maybe in the next continued, “I play a significant role in her podcast that is damaging to my reputation as a researcher and as a generation.” human being.” She disputed that she had given her permission to be © The New York Times

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

Van Hintum has argued that Zilversmit’s podcast, which streamed in the Netherlands last year, mischaracterized her as “someone who does not want to share and cooperate and who wants to run off with her family archive.” “I shared my initial research results with Judith in confidence, long before she came up with the idea of making a podcast,” she said in a statement she sent in May to members of a panel in Amsterdam that invited Zilversmit to speak about intergenerational feelings of World War II trauma and shame. “My information and book outline titled ‘The Betrayal of the Zilversmit Family’ played a crucial role in her plan for a podcast,” van Hintum said in her statement. Zilversmit, who disagrees with that contention, still had another avenue to learn more about her family’s history — Boelen. After the initial Instagram message, Zilversmit said she and Boelen continued to chat online, and that Boelen kept promising Zilversmit could “come with all your questions,” and look at the judicial dossier. Before visiting Boelen in Belgium, Zilversmit spoke with Esti Cohen at Jewish Social Work in the Netherlands, which helps descendants of Holocaust victims with research and with the processing of difficult histories. She advised Zilversmit to set appropriate expectations. “Sometimes people want to have some kind of acknowledgment from the Jewish side that they have also suffered, or that they also have trans-generational trauma,” Cohen said in an interview. “While that may be true, most of the Jewish people from the second or third generation are not ready to give that. We see here that it’s too painful.” Boelen declined to speak with the Times until van Hintum’s book is published. But Zilversmit and Röst recorded their conversations with her during their visit. At Boelen’s home, a spacious, three-story house, she served Zilversmit and Röst an enormous lunch — egg salad, fish, salads and other dishes that she had been preparing for days. While they ate, Boelen talked nonstop about her family, her childhood and her health, which she said wasn’t good. After lunch, she led them upstairs to a library full of books, where they continued talking. Zilversmit asked Boelen about looking at the archival material she had received from the government. Boelen balked. “Oh, yeah, I’m going to keep that closed for now,” she said, according to the recording. She explained that she had promised van Hintum that she would not let Zilversmit see it until the historian was finished with her book. “I hope that the trust between you returns,” Boelen said. Zilversmit said her project would not interfere with van Hintum’s book, that she only wanted to tell her own family story. Boelen said at one point that perhaps the argument between the historian and the journalist boiled down to who should make them public first. “The two things can exist completely side by side,” Zilversmit replied. But Boelen would not budge. When the conversation was over, Boelen took the women upstairs to the attic and showed them paintings she had made. Zilversmit was surprised — some depicted scenes from a book that Zilversmit’s aunt, Helga, had written about her experience in surviving the Holocaust. The memoir, “Through the Eye of the Needle,” published in 2006, describes the terror of the family’s betray-

40 90

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

The Jewish Home | AUGUST 13, 2026

Health & F tness

A Fabulous Field Trip

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

By Hylton I. Lightman, MD, DCH (SA), FAAP

Dr. Lightman studying Sefer Yeshayahu from the scroll written by the Navi Yeshayahu himself

What are the Dead Sea Scrolls? The Dead Sea Scrolls is a collection of about 900 ancient manuscripts and thousands of fragments thereof from the era of the second Beis HaMikdash. Copies of every book in Tanach (except for Megillas Esther) are contained therein. Additional writings include community rules and religious calendars.

They were found in the area known as Qumran, which means “moon” or “riverbed.” This was an area where Essenes people had settled in the 2nd century. Their daily life was structured around sunrise prayers, manual labor, ritual bathing, silent meals and evening study. Its core principles included common wealth, whereby all clothing, food and earnings went into a community pot; extreme cleanliness as physical cleanliness was viewed as a direction reflection of spiritual holiness; strict discipline, including a three-year probation for new members before they could join communal meals; and observing Shabbos as a day of prayer, meditation and rest. Roman troops destroyed the settlement around 68 CE. Because some of the Scrolls were in poor condition, scholars have not been able to identify all their texts.

Discovering the Dead Sea Scrolls The Scrolls were discovered by

chance in late 1946 or early 1947 by Muhammed edh-Dhib, a Bedouin shepherd and his cousins. Looking for a lost goat near the ruins of Qumran, he tossed a rock into a rocky crevice and heard a jar break. Curious, he crawled inside where he found several tall cylindrical clay jars containing leather and papyrus scrolls wrapped in linen. He brought them back to the family’s camp, and amazingly, none were destroyed in the process. They hung the parchments on a tent pole, contemplating what to do with them. Sefer Yeshayahu was one of the seven major manuscripts in this initial discovery. Word got out about the Scrolls. Bedouins and others started searching for caves. Between 1947 and 1956, they found 11 caves with both entire scrolls and tiny fragments of scrolls. The shepherds tried selling the “initial” scrolls to an antique dealer in Bethlehem, but he deemed them worthless. They eventually left them with a shoemaker and antique dealer named Khalil

Eskander Shahin, also known as Kando, who bought four scrolls. Mar Athanasius Samuel, the Archbishop of the Syrian Orthodox Church, bought the other four scrolls for the princely sum of $100 and returned to Jerusalem. In November 1947, Eliezer Sukenik, a pioneering Israeli archaeologist, purchased three of the scrolls from the antiques dealer in Bethlehem. A hashgacha pratis moment: Sukenik examined the texts in his Jerusalem study on November 29, 1947 – the exact night the United Nations voted on the partition plan that led to the creation of the Jewish state.

Drama Violence was escalating as the British Mandate was ending, and the establishment of the State of Israel was dawning. Believing the scrolls were unsafe in Jerusalem, Mar Samuel smuggled his trove of four scrolls out of the country and brought them to the United States. For several years, he tried selling them to American museums and universities

With thanks to the Five Towns Jewish Home

n recent trip to Israel, my wife insisted we visit the Israel Museum’s exhibition “Comfort from the Desert: The Complete Isaiah Scroll.” I’m glad she did. The Israel Museum is celebrating its 60th anniversary, and to mark this milestone, it has chosen to display for four months one of the world’s most important treasures in its collection and, in my opinion, the world: the original scroll of Sefer Yeshayahu in its entirety. It was perhaps the only opportunity we will ever have to see it all its glory the oldest Biblical manuscript ever discovered.

Why is This Exhibition Significant?

They are historical proof of the accurate, careful transmission of Tanach over two millennia.

I consider this a field trip. Field trips are not limited to school age children or teenagers only. Field trips provide real-world experiences. They can expand one’s world, stimulating the desire to learn more about a topic. They can connect parts of one’s life, making for a richer, stimulating picture. Studies actually show that field trips can increase

Dr. Hylton Lightman MD DCH(SA) FAAP is a board-certified pediatrician and the Medical Director of Suffolk Health Five Towns. He adores his patients and tolerates their parents. His life’s mission is to deliver quality health care to babies, children, teenagers and young adults so they bring their children and grandchildren (and great-grandchildren) to him. He loves what he does.

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

The experience of being with 20 other people in a very controlled room with only seven minutes (this exhibition is highly regulated by the Israel Museum in order to protect the scrolls) to see and read Sefer Yeshayahu in the prophet’s handwriting was quite heady. My wife was especially thrilled as the OU Woman’s Initiative Nach Yomi is learning this

critical thinking skills. There is also a social aspect. We showed our grandchildren pictures of the Navi Yeshayahu’s actual writing and how he added in sentences. They were fascinated. I promise this is true. We connected with our grandchildren through yet another dimension and told them highlights of the story of the Dead Sea Scrolls. We expanded their world. I can only imagine what they might say if the topic ever comes up in their classrooms. This is called handing over the mesorah. I hope the Navi himself is schepping nachas from his place in Olam Haba. As always, daven.

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

The Dead Sea Scrolls provide a direct physical link to Jewish life, faith and history during the period of Bayis Sheni. Further, they are historical proof of the accurate, careful transmission of Tanach over two millennia.

sefer at this very moment. Why am I, a pediatrician, writing about this exhibition and advocating for field trips? For all the reasons listed above, I am writing about this exhibition and urging people to see it before it closed in the middle of September.

AUGUST 13, 2026 | The Jewish Home

but to no avail. Buyers feared legal and authenticity issues. On June 1, 1954, The Wall Street Journal had an advertisement under miscellaneous items for sale: “Biblical Manuscripts dating back to at least 200 BCE.” An American bought them for $250,000. Unbeknownst to Mar Samuel, who refused to sell them directly to Israel for political reasons, the American Jewish philanthropist D. Samuel Gottesman (as in Yeshiva University’s Gottesman Library) gave the money. The purchaser was Yigal Yadin, Sukenik’s son and a former military commander who turned to archaeology full-time after his military service. Yadin had negotiated the transaction through secret intermediaries. He returned to Israel with them, uniting all seven original manuscripts at The Hebrew University and later housing them in the Israel Museum’s Shrine of the Book. Kando spent the rest of his life in Bethlehem, leveraging his reputation to become the main middleman between the Bedouin community and archaeologists. He facilitated the recovery of thousands more scroll fragments over the next decade.

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

THE CINCINNATI JEWISH JOURNAL

SEPTEMBER 8, 2026

Davenning Davenning Davenningtimes times times