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Accepting Jewish values prize, Bloomberg strikes universalist tone By Ben Sales JERUSALEM (JTA) – Michael Bloomberg received the $1 million Genesis Prize for embodying Jewish values. The billionaire and former New York City mayor said they could just as well have been Christian, Muslim or Hindu values. In Jerusalem on Thursday for the first awarding of what some have called the Jewish Nobel, Bloomberg made a day of it. He appeared with
Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat to discuss urban innovation, spoke to the media and received the Genesis Prize from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at a grandiose ceremony hosted by Jay Leno. The prize honors a laureate “whose actions, in addition to their achievements, embody the character of the Jewish people through commitment to Jewish values, the Jewish community and/or to the State of Israel.” Bloomberg praised Israel and remarked fondly on his Jewish
upbringing that set him on the path to success, first as the founder of a major financial software and media company, then as a three-term mayor of America’s largest city. But he noted repeatedly that the values he absorbed as a child could have come from any culture or religion. “No one religion has a lock on great people or terrible people,” Bloomberg said at a news conference preceding the award ceremony. “The values I learned from my parents are probably the same values I hope
Christians and Muslims and Hindus and Buddhists teach to their people.” The Genesis Prize is a joint project of Israel’s Prime Minister’s Office, the Jewish Agency for Israel and the Genesis Philanthropy Group, a coalition of Russian Jewish philanthropists who funded the prize. The group also funds organizations and programs that engage Russian-speaking Jews in Israel, the United States and the former Soviet Union. In selecting Bloomberg, the Genesis group chose a fellow billion-
aire who is perhaps better known for defending Muslim rights than Jewish ones. As New York City mayor, Bloomberg was a strident defender of plans to build an Islamic cultural center near Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan, a controversy he brought up at the news conference. “There was a brouhaha in New York when they wanted to build a mosque near the World Trade Center,” he said. “If I’m going to be able to build my shul, they need to be able to build their mosque.”
Sleepless in Israel: Shavuot all-nighter comes to life in the Jewish state By Deborah Fineblum (JNS) – Regarding Shavuot – when Jews from around the world celebrate the receiving of the Torah at Mount Sinai – Rabbi Chayim Vital wrote on behalf of his master Rabbi Isaac Ben Solomon Luria (“Ha’Ari), “Know that one who does not sleep at all on this night, even for one moment, but rather immerses himself in [the waters of] Torah the entire night, can be assured that he will live out his year; no injury will befall him during this year.” That level of protection is certainly a draw, but those who have experienced all-night Shavuot learning in Israel will testify that the experience brings with it other, less tangible rewards. Less than a week after making aliyah to Ma’ale Adumim, Tanya Gusovsky was handed a list of the local all-night Shavuot learning “ops” by her new landlady, who also
Israel Briefs
Courtesy of atanya via Wikimedia Commons
Torah study like what is pictured in this scene at the Kol Torah yeshiva in Jerusalem is typical of the first night of Shavuot.
offered to act as her guide for the night. Gusovsky says she will never forget the sight she beheld when, coming around the corner from her home, she spied “a river of people
flowing in every direction, traveling from one shiur (lecture) to another.” Two years later, despite the late hour, she can still recall the take-away messages of many of the teachers she heard that night.
in the Knesset on Monday to have Jerusalem Day, which commemorates the reunification of Jerusalem in 1967, made into an official national holiday in Israel. This year’s Jerusalem Day was observed Wednesday.
the West Bank if the peace process fails. “The idea of taking unilateral steps is gaining ground, from the center-left to the center-right,” Netanyahu said in an interview with Bloomberg View columnist Jeffrey Goldberg.
IDF budget cuts mean no money for ‘elements that produce security,’ official says (JNS) – The Israel Defense Forces will begin ceasing various activities as of early June, while certain military functions such as vehicle repairs are expected to dwindle one after the other, defense officials said. “The significance of the emerging 2015 budgetary outline is that we will not be able to begin the year at all,” Defense Ministry DirectorGeneral Maj. Gen. (res.) Dan Harel told military correspondents at the IDF headquarters in Tel Aviv on Monday, Israel Hayom reported.
Peres and Abbas accept Pope Francis offer to pray for peace at the Vatican (JNS) – Israeli President Shimon Peres and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas accepted an invitation by Pope Francis to pray for peace at the Vatican. “In this, the birthplace of the prince of peace, I wish to invite you, President Mahmoud Abbas, together with Israeli President Shimon Peres, to join me in heartfelt prayer to God for the gift of peace,” Francis said on his Mideast trip. “I offer my home in the Vatican as a place for this encounter of prayer.”
MKs propose bill to make Jerusalem Day a national holiday (JNS) – MK Yoni Chetboun (Habayit Hayehudi) proposed a bill
Netanyahu open to unilateral moves if peace process falters (JNS) – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would be open to entertaining ideas of unilateral annexation of certain areas of
Israel to rebuild synagogue demolished during 1948 war (JNS) – The Israeli government has made plans to allocate 50 million shekels ($14.3 million) for the reconstruction of Jerusalem’s Tiferet Yisrael Synagogue, which was destroyed by the Arab Legion during the War of Independence in 1948, Israel Hayom reported. Two synagogues that defined the Jerusalem skyline at the time were blown up: the Tiferet Yisrael Synagogue and the Hurva Synagogue. The Hurva Synagogue was rebuilt in 2010, but the Tiferet Yisrael ruins were left as they were. IDF suggests video of Palestinian deaths could be forgery (JNS) – A senior Israel Defense
In a way, the ancient tradition of all-night learning on Shavuot is designed to make up for some of our sleepy ancestors. The Midrash reports that, more than 3,000 years ago, our Israelite forebears slept in that morning when they were to receive the Torah. So in staying up all night learning Torah, we are trying to demonstrate their descendants’ level of excitement about – and gratitude for – the gift of Torah. The cheesecake, it seems, came much later. Also known as the Festival of Weeks (See Exodus 34:22, Deuteronomy 16:10 for the Torah origins), the Festival of Reaping (Check out Exodus 23:16), and Day of the First Fruits (as in Numbers 28:26), Shavuot is celebrated for just one day in Israel, as opposed to two in the Diaspora. The holiday numbers among the Shalosh Regalim, the three pilgrimage festivals when Jews everywhere finish up their seven weeks of Omer Forces official has cast doubt on the accuracy of a recently released video that purportedly shows the deaths of two Palestinian teens near the Ofer military prison on May 15. “Since I have a lot of experience with forgery, I won’t say anything unequivocal until we conclude the investigation,” the anonymous IDF official told Haaretz. Israeli transportation minister proposes expansion of Jerusalem’s borders (JNS) – Israeli Transportation Minister Yisrael Katz (Likud) announced Thursday that he intends to promote a bill that would expand the borders of Jerusalem. “This is the time to promote an initiative that will strengthen Jerusalem, expand its borders, and preserve its Jewish national character. I intend to support the Greater Jerusalem as Capital of Israel Bill,” Katz said. The bill calls for the communities of Ma’aleh Adumim, Givat Zeev, the Gush Etzion bloc, and Betar Illit to come under the jurisdiction of Jerusalem and the state of Israel.
counting, which begins on the second day of Passover. Tradition also teaches that on Shavuot, the Jews would bring their bikkurim (first fruits of Israel’s Seven Species: wheat, barley, grapes, figs, pomegranates, olives, and dates) to the Temple in Jerusalem. The custom of all-night Torah study goes back, it appears, to 1533, when Rabbi Joseph Caro, author of the “Shulchan Aruch,” a guidebook to Jewish law, invited many of his Kabbalistically minded colleagues to learn with him at a Shavuot allnighter. Besides Torah, Talmud, and Mishnah, many also learn the Tikkun Leil Shavuot (Rectification for Shavuot Night) with its excerpts from the 24 books of Tanakh. Legend has it that Rabbi Caro and others living in the Ottoman Empire at the time were able to keep awake thanks to the region’s fine – and SLEEPLESS on page 19
Maccabi Tel Aviv basketball title spurs Spanish antiSemitic tweets (JNS) – About 18,000 antiSemitic Spanish tweets were posted following Maccavi Tel Aviv’s recent win over Real Madrid in the Euroleague basketball finals. The Jewish community in Catalonia, Spain, now plans to file a legal complaint on the tweets. Pro-Palestinian activist Corrie's family takes legal battle to Israeli Supreme Court (JNS) – The family of the late American pro-Palestinian activist Rachel Corrie has appealed to the Israeli Supreme Court to overturn a lower court ruling that absolved the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) of blame in her 2003 death in Gaza. Corrie, 23, was killed while trying to block an Israeli bulldozer in operations in southern Gaza during the height of the Second Intifada. An Israeli court in 2012 supported the findings of an IDF investigation that said the bulldozer driver could not see Corrie and that her death was an accident.