September/October 2024

PEDIATRIC CARDIAC CRITICAL CARE UNIT (PCCCU)

delivering care. delivering hope.

360 Degrees of Healing is about much more than a building. It’s also about Israel’s children. Help keep the hearts of Israel’s most vulnerable patients beating strong.

With sustained support, the Pediatric Cardiac Critical Care Unit (PCCCU) in the Hadassah Heart Institute at Ein Kerem will be able to meet the demands of an ever-expanding patient base. Last year, the Unit admitted more than 700 patients, a 40 percent increase from the previous year. We expect to see 1,000 patients in the PCCCU by 2025. To accommodate this growing demand, more equipment, more staff-time, and more upkeep will be required to keep this indispensable unit running effectively. We are counting on you to help make this a reality for the children of Israel and the world beyond.

14 THE BROKEN AND THE WHOLE

By Rabbi Elliot Cosgrove

In the aftermath of October 7, “American Jews face both new questions and old ones asked with new urgency,” writes a prominent New York rabbi in an adapted excerpt from his upcoming book, For Such a Time as This . “Questions related to our hyphenated identities, the invisible string that ties us to Israel, our sense of home in America. Is it time for a new script or time to double down on the old one?”

18 WELCOME HOME

By Abby Horowitz

An American graphic storyteller and writer considers where she feels most at home—Israel or the United States—in a world of rising antisemitism and anti-Zionist sentiment.

22 ALIYAH IN THE SHADOW OF OCTOBER 7

By Maayan Hoffman

The thousands of families who have made aliyah since October 7 symbolize, according to Maj. Gen. (res.) Doron Almog, chairman of the Jewish Agency for Israel, “hope and the promise of growth and prosperity. With their arrival, we are strengthening and advancing the State of Israel, furthering the vision of the ingathering of exiles and reinforcing our nation’s resilience.”

33 HADASSAH IN LAS VEGAS

By Shari Harel

Hadassah leaders, members, donors and staff descended upon the desert oasis in July for three days of official business and fun: only-in-Vegas experiences, plenaries with top-tier speakers, workshops, networking opportunities and donor events.

DEPARTMENTS

12 COMMENTARY

The primacy of Torah

28 HEALTH

Stress and your diet

36 TRAVEL

Poland’s ghosts

40 FOOD

Plant-based for the High Holidays

44 ARTS

• Healing strains from the C armel Quartet

• N ikki Schreiber’s Humans of Judaism

50 BOOKS

• Ne w titles reflect on O ctober 7

• Ayelet Tsabari’s Songs for the Brokenh earted

Navigating Grief and Strength

This is our time and our moment |

As we approach the jewish New Year, I am again reminded that the Jewish calendar is a guide to our story as a people. In its pages we find holy days and holidays recalling the giving of the Torah at Sinai, our slavery in Egypt and near annihilation in Persia, the harvests in ancient Israel and the rededication of our desecrated Temple in Jerusalem.

Over the past century, we have added dates marking the Holocaust and modern Israel’s independence. And this year something else stands out: October 7—which in 2023 witnessed the worst loss of Jewish life on a single day since the Shoah— falls between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.

No one needs to remind us that our history is fraught with tragedy. Yet we are equally defined by our survival. We have outlived every enemy, and Israel’s rebirth nearly 2,000 years after its destruction was unique in human annals, a miracle and a tribute to Jewish action and faith.

Many factors can explain our resilience, but I think one element often overlooked is the flexibility that comes with living according to two calendars simultaneously—the Gregorian and the Hebrew. In good times and bad, we are conditioned to navigate parallel realms.

We can’t escape the overlapping of our concurrent worlds—not just Jewish and secular, but also everyday joys and existential threats. As we contemplate the lives shattered on October 7 and since, we also find solidarity in our sense of community. And we are strengthened by the knowledge that the generations that

By Carol Ann Schwartz

went before us not only overcame great sorrow but also prepared us for handling it.

I pray that today’s challenges are temporary, but I can’t help thinking that we have simply returned to normal: A world in which antisemitism thrives, in which Israel is threatened from every direction, in which Jewish students on college campuses fear wearing kippot or Stars of David in public view.

But this is our time and our moment. We can’t choose the world we live in, only the way we deal with it. We have the will, the organizational structure and the allies we need to defend ourselves. We are more fortunate than our ancestors, many of whom lived in nations that gave state sanction to antisemitism.

WE ARE BUSY, BUT WE ARE ALSO BLESSED.

From its inception, hadassah has been the premier voice for women in the Zionist movement. This organization was a critical force in building the Jewish state, laying the foundation for health care, for child rescue and education; our institutions remain bulwarks of Israel’s social welfare system today. The Hadassah Medical Organization was ready on October 7 and received some of those injured during the Hamas terror attacks and, ever since, soldiers from the battlefield. Our new Gandel Rehabilitation Center at Hadassah Hospital Mount Scopus—

the first of its kind in Jerusalem—was scheduled to open in mid-2024, but we accelerated its launch and began treating soldiers and other patients on January 15.

We have also redoubled our advocacy efforts, challenging the United Nations and the International Committee of the Red Cross, among others, for their apparent inability to recognize murder, torture and rape when it is perpetrated against Israeli victims.

Even as we pour our energy into defending Israel and Jewish lives, we embrace our responsibility as Americans. An election is coming in November and many of our signature issues are on the line, including defense of Israel, women’s reproductive rights and expanding health care and research, to mention just a few (hadassah.org/votes). Sitting out the election is not an option.

We are busy, but we are also blessed. Many of the women who built our infrastructure, living before the ubiquity of automobiles, went to their chapter meetings on foot. With our modern conveniences, juggling two calendars—and increasing our power rather than dividing it—is the least we can do.

May the New Year make us stronger, and may it bring peace. Shanah tovah u’metukah to you and your loved ones!

HOPE AND HEALING IN PEACE AND WAR GANDEL REHABILITATION CENTER

Recognizing the significant need for rehabilitation beds in Israel — and in Jerusalem in particular — Hadassah began construction on the large and innovative Gandel Rehabilitation Center at Hadassah Hospital Mount Scopus years ago. After October 7, with a country at war facing a critical shortage, the building’s first phase was accelerated and opened for treatment in January.

Now, we need your help to see this world-class facility through to completion.

Your support will allow Hadassah hospitals to offer a full range of special treatments including physical and occupational therapy, physiotherapy, hydrotherapy and respiratory and orthopedic rehabilitation. There will be a psychological rehabilitation program as well as facilities to provide rehabilitation for neurological problems caused by brain, spinal cord and nervous system injuries and illnesses. When construction is complete, the 323,000-square-foot eight-story center will care for 10,000 patients annually.

CHAIR Ellen Hershkin

EXECUTIVE EDITOR Lisa Hostein

DEPUTY EDITOR Libby Barnea

SENIOR EDITOR Leah Finkelshteyn

DIGITAL EDITOR Arielle Kaplan

EDITOR EMERITUS Alan M. Tigay

DESIGN/PRODUCTION Samantha Marsh

EDITORIAL BOARD

Roselyn Bell

Ruth G. Cole

Nancy Falchuk

Gloria Goldreich

Blu Greenberg

Dara Horn

Ruth B Hurwitz

Francine Klagsbrun

Anne Lapidus Lerner

Curt Leviant

Joy Levitt

Bonnie Lipton

Marcie Natan

Nessa Rapoport

Sima Schuster

Susan S. Smirnoff

Barbara Topol

Dancing in the New Year

A time to reclaim our spirit from the wreckage

By Lisa Hostein

We will dance again.”

chosen to tie their fate to Israel in the most concrete way. Maayan Hoffman portrays some of the county’s newest immigrants in “Aliyah in the Shadow of October 7” (page 22).

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This simple sentence was adopted quickly after October 7, a defiant declaration that, despite the massacre of hundreds at the Nova music festival and beyond, Israel and the Jewish people would find a way not only to rise from the wreckage but also to reclaim our spirit.

This is a sentiment we can all continue to aspire to as we approach the High Holidays and the one-year anniversary of the Hamas attacks, which occurred on Simchat Torah, the Jewish holiday typically celebrated with joyous dancing.

Indeed, that feeling of reclamation is infused throughout this issue.

It is invoked by Abigail Pogrebin, who, in her commentary “Let There Be Light” (page 12), writes, “No matter how viciously anyone tries to sever the Jewish story, we keep writing it.”

On this Simchat Torah, she continues, we will not be “robbed” of our Jewishness; rather “we’ll dance with the scrolls and insist on the light.”

In an excerpt from his new book, For Such a Time as This: On Being Jewish Today, Rabbi Elliot Cosgrove asserts that October 7 was an inflection point in Jewish history, and, as we move forward from the devastation of that day and its aftermath, “a new vision for American Judaism and American Zionism” is needed (page 14).

The spirit of reclamation is strong among Diaspora Jews who have

Writer and artist Abby Horowitz is less certain about where she finds herself at home, as she shares in Hadassah Magazine’s first-ever graphic essay, “Welcome Home” (page 18).

The spirit was also strong among the nearly 400 attendees at Hadassah’s National Conference in Las Vegas in July. Amid a sea of yellow dresses, scarves, pins and even painted fingernails—symbols of solidarity with the hostages languishing in Gaza— delegates heard from a wide array of speakers, including representatives of the Hadassah Medical Organization (page 33). Keynote speaker Montana Tucker, a social media influencer, in a separate Q&A insists, “We can dance again” (page 64).

We also mark the approaching one-year anniversary with reviews of several new books focused on the victims and the heroes of that fateful day (page 50).

To add to the spirit of the chagim, Adeena Sussman shares some innovative plant-based recipes (page 40) while the crossword puzzle riffs on one of the High Holidays’ central prayers (page 49).

Finally, we include an honor roll of donors to the Hadassah Magazine Circle. We truly appreciate your support and encourage all to join this special group (page 26).

All of us at the magazine wish you, our loyal readers, a sweet, peaceful and dance-filled new year. Shanah Tovah!

HADASSAH NATIONAL PRESIDENT Carol Ann Schwartz

Shanah Tovah!

A New Look for the New Year

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LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

FEMINIST AND ZIONIST PERSPECTIVES

I want to commend Hadassah Magazine for an excellent July/August 2024 issue. In particular, the feature “Ignored Until It Was Too Late,” about the female Israel Defense Forces soldiers whose reports of imminent Hamas activity were ignored by the higher-ups in their chain of command, was an important read. The gender biases that devalued their intelligence estimations and left them unarmed while close to the Gaza border on October 7 are an issue that must be examined by the IDF and Israeli society as a whole. Hadassah can contribute to this discussion by bringing its feminist and Zionist perspectives to a loving critique of this tragedy—which is

MAGAZINE DISCUSSION

Join us on Thursday, September 19 at 7:30 PM ET when  Hadassah Magazine

Executive Editor Lisa Hostein moderates a discussion with Rabbi Dov Linzer and journalist Abigail Pogrebin, co-authors of the soon-to-be released  It Takes Two to Torah: An Orthodox Rabbi and Reform Journalist Discuss and Debate Their Way Through the Five Books of Moses. As Jews prepare for the High Holidays, anticipate the one-year anniversary of Hamas’s October 7 terror attacks and reflect on the frightening, painful and tumultuous year that followed in Israel, America and around the world, Linzer and Pogrebin will share their observations and strategies for how American Jews might meet this moment with Jewish and spiritual resilience. Free and open to all. To register, scan the QR code or go online to hadassahmagazine. org .

what the article by Lisa Hostein, “Survivors Share Their Story,” did. Roselyn Bell Highland Park, N.J.

FROM THE BORSCHT BELT TO THE BERKSHIRES

I enjoyed reading “The Berkshires Beckon This Summer” in the July/ August issue, but I’d like to propose one addendum.

Since 2008, Kutsher’s Sports Academy has resided in the Berkshires (across Lake Buel from Half Moon) after moving from the Catskills. And while it doesn’t have the same Jewish affiliation as Eisner or Crane Lake— although we’ve kept our decades-long tradition of conducting a weekly Shabbat ceremony—it certainly keeps the echoes of the Borscht Belt alive.

David Resnick Great Barrington, Mass.

SAFE ON CAMPUS

I am writing in response to Bonnie Rochman’s essay, “We’re Not Crossing Off Schools,” in the July/August issue. While I understand the argument not to limit college choices for her daughter, this approach may not be suitable for all.

As a mental health professional, I have seen firsthand the severe impact that antisemitism has had on young adults’ mental health. Jewish students have been subjected to alarming levels of harassment and aggression on campuses.

I wish it were merely about exposure to “divergent opinions,” as the author suggests, rather than the yelling of antisemitic slurs such as “Zionist pig” and threats to murder students’ entire families, in the case of some reports.

It is essential for parents and stu-

dents to be aware of new realities when selecting a college. Ensuring that a student feels safe and supported should be a top priority. The ADL’s Campus Antisemitism Report Card offers information about the current state of antisemitism on campuses and how particular universities and colleges are responding.

Here’s to our next generation being proud of their Jewish identity while being safe—physically, mentally and emotionally.

Linda Block Sebastopol, Calif.

MY DAUGHTER-IN-LAW AND MY ALLY

Thank you, Jennifer Stefano, for writing “A Catholic Ally” in the July/ August issue.

On October 8, 2023, my Catholic daughter-in-law purchased and placed outside my front door an Israeli flag—and she made sure my outside light shines directly on it. It still stands.

Sonni Helmer Los Angeles, Calif.

WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU!

Please email letters to the editor to letters@hadassah.org. To read more letters, visit us online at hadassahmagazine.org

HAMAS’S USE OF SEXUAL VIOLENCE Survivors and activists fight for accountability

FEMALE RECRUITS

The tragic fate and future promise of women in the IDF

Pop-up Cafes Sell Coffee, Pastries and Hope

Thousands of displaced Israelis from the Gaza envelope region— Otef Aza , in Hebrew— report finding little reason to get out of bed every morning. The events of October 7 continue to leave them grieving and often unable to work.

In response, a group of entrepreneurs led by restaurateur Tamir Barelko dreamed up an antidote: Café Otef, a series of pop-up coffee shops selling a side of hope along with lattés, pastries and sandwiches.

Raising seed money from banks, corporations, nonprofits and crowdfunding, Barelko helped recruit professionals to train members of affected communities to run the cafes, whose profits will benefit those displaced residents.

The first, launched in May, is Café Otef-Netiv Ha’asara, a pop-up in donated space at Tel Aviv’s Sarona Market. The shop is run by displaced residents of Netiv Ha’asara, where 20 people were murdered on October 7 and more than 1,000 evacuated.

Café Otef-Re’im opened next, headed by Reut Karp, ex-wife and business partner of chocolatier Dvir Karp, one of seven Kibbutz Re’im members killed on October 7. This location, in Tel Aviv’s

Florentin neighborhood, sells Dvir Chocolates as well as standard coffee shop fare.

For the displaced, “I understood the main issue is community,” said Barelko, who has 35 years of experience running food and beverage chains in Israel and abroad. Finding employees and getting them to work well together is usually difficult in this business, he added, but “here, everyone knows each other already, so it

becomes very easy to build a team.”

The cafes give evacuees a purpose, an income and an opportunity to interact with others and tell their story. “Building a brand takes a long time,” he said, “but when you come with a story like what happened here, it spreads fast, and people want to support it.”

Each location will sell creations from its own community members—from the Dvir Chocolates to wines, jams, flowers, T-shirts, ceramics and more. There are plans for six additional Café Otef branches, including one supporting displaced residents of Kiryat Shmona on the Lebanese border. The goal is to locate these outlets as close to the original towns as possible in the hopes of making them permanent once residents return home.

Now, Barelko is fielding inquiries from Jewish federations in the United States about opening branches, staffed by displaced Israelis, in American cities. Selling mostly merchandise rather than food, the first such shop is likely to be a Netiv Ha’sara pop-up in New York City.

“Big things,” Barelko said, “start with small ideas.” —Jordana Benami

These Teenagers Are Sephardi and Proud

Last year, as Judah Roberts was putting up posters for a Ladino festival at Katz Hillel Day School in Boca Raton, Fla., he wished he could involve his peers in preserving the disappearing language. The 16-year-old, who traces his family ancestry to the Balkans, grew up hearing his mother sing songs in the traditional Sephardi language. His family attends

Maor David, a Sephardi synagogue in Boca Raton, and his grandmother makes the Sephardi specialty Pescado con Huevo y Limon (fish with eggs and lemon) for most Jewish holidays.

After posting on Facebook that he wanted more young people to learn Ladino, he connected with Ethan Marcus, the managing director of the Sephardic Jewish Brotherhood

Reut Karp at Café Otef-Re’im

Tamir Barelko

Judah Roberts (right) at a Bivas shabbaton

SIVAN FARAG (TOP AND BOTTOM LEFT)

Meet Pipi Langshtrimp

Astrid Lindgren’s beloved character, Pippi Longstocking, the Swedish girl with red braids and superhuman strength, may have found a new fanbase—Yiddish speakers.

Tsi Kenstu Pipi Langshtrimp? , based on the book Do You Know Pippi Longstocking? , has been published in its original picture book form, except in the Yiddish version, Lindgren’s lovable gingi is called Pipi Langshtrimp.

The man behind the translation is Arun Schaechter Viswanath, a New York City-based Yiddishist whose day job is as an algorithm strategist at Instagram. The 34-year-old grew

of America, who had been thinking about ways to engage younger generations. Their mutual enthusiasm led to the launch of Bivas, the Brotherhood’s fledgling youth organization whose name means “live” in Ladino. Roberts serves as national president of the organization, which is coed and open to anyone who identifies as Jewish, with or without Sephardi roots.

“Ladino is on the brink of extinction. It is unsettling to see a culture and history dying out like that, especially among the young generation,” Roberts said. “I was inspired to do something about it.”

Drawing on youth leaders like Roberts to recruit fellow students, Bivas now has clubs in two Boca Raton day schools as well as ones in Teaneck, N.J., Los Angeles and Seattle, with others set to launch in Philadelphia and Atlanta this year. Clubs host weekly extracurricular activities that feature movie screenings (e.g., Song of the Sephardi , a documentary film), holiday celebrations, boreka bakes or Ladino lessons.

up in a Modern Orthodox family in Teaneck, N.J., where he spoke Yiddish at home along with Tamil, learned from his Indian father.

Viswanath’s Yiddish yichus , or lineage, is impressive: His mother, Gitl Schaechter-Viswanath, edited a comprehensive English-Yiddish dictionary; his grandfather, Mordkhe Schaechter, was a Yiddish professor at Columbia University; and his aunt Rukhl Schaechter is the editor of the Yiddish Forverts . Despite having no academic training in Yiddish, Viswanath, a married father of two, has spent considerable time taking on ad hoc translation projects.

Viswanath, who graduated from Harvard with a degree in linguistics and a minor in Japanese, had previously translated Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone ( Harry Potter un der Filosofisher Shteyn), the first volume in J.K. Rowling’s series. That edition, which was released in 2020 and sold out its first run in 48 hours, was published by Olniansky Tekst Farlag, a Swedish-Jewish publishing house specializing in modern Yiddish literature. (Viswanath man -

In one example, Roberts organized his club’s biscochos bake, distributing the traditional ring-shaped pastries at the South Florida 10th Annual International Ladino Day Festival. He has also helped organize Bivas shabbatons in New York and Orlando.

Bivas’s quick growth bolsters the mission Marcus envisioned when he resolved to cultivate a younger generation, reversing generations of Sephardi assimilation into the Ashkenazi

aged to learn Swedish over the past five years.)

In July, he launched the second in the series, Harry Potter un di Kamer Fun Soydes ( Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets ).

It might surprise some that Sweden has become a popular hub for Yiddish publishing, but not Viswanath.

“Sweden is actually the only country in the world where Yiddish is recognized as an official language,” he said, noting its large post-World War II influx of Yiddish-speaking Jews. With government recognition comes eligibility for funding media projects. So after Viswanath was invited to present a translation seminar to a Yiddish institution there, a local suggested that he translate Pippi Longstocking

For Viswanath, Yiddish remains important to learn and to nurture even as Hebrew has become the common language for Jews.

“Part of what makes the Jewish people unique, aside from our unity, is our diversity, and it’s a really beautiful thing when people are able to connect with their ancestral Jewish communities,” Viswanath said. “There doesn’t have to be a competition between the two,” he said about the languages. “The more the better.”

—Lori Silberman Braune

mainstream in the United States.

“If we don’t do something now, we’re going to lose it,” Marcus said of a community with deep roots in America but few schools or youth institutions of its own. He described efforts to revitalize Sephardi pride as “staying in one’s tradition and being steeped in one’s identity, while fully engaging with the modern world. We want to make sure that’s something we offer to our next generation.”

—Hilary Danailova

Arun Schaechter Viswanath

An International Ladino Day exhibit at Katz Yeshiva High School

Let There Be Light

Our foundational text feels more urgent than ever

By Abigail Pogrebin

It shatters me every time i think about the fact that Hamas launched its massacre on Simchat Torah. Obviously, it’s impossible to fathom the barbarism happening at any time. But it’s extra harrowing that the slaughtering occurred on the annual celebration of the Jewish story.

As we approach the first painful anniversary, I’m revisiting what I learned in 2017 about Simchat Torah, during research for My Jewish Year, my book that dove deep into the Jewish calendar.

Simchat Torah—literally, “joy of the Torah”—is essentially a party for the seminal narrative of our people, not to mention civilization. It marks the completion of the last chapter of Deuteronomy and the start of the first chapter of Genesis. There is powerful symbolism in reading the first book as soon as we finish the last: beginning again, uninterrupted continuation, a rejoicing in the retelling.

But on October 7, 2023, instead of a restart, there was a standstill. Instead of continuation, there was termination. Instead of celebration, lamentation. For the inconsolable families whose loved ones were mur-

dered or abducted, the story stopped.

And yet, the Jewish people have never let the enemy author our last chapter. Torah is its own propellant and engine. We always proceed.

This holiday will now, undoubtedly, forever be embedded as a ritual of defiance. We return to Genesis no matter what: “God said, ‘Let there be light’; and there was light. God saw that the light was good, and God separated the light from the darkness”  (Genesis 1:3-4).

Let there be light.” i can’t think of a declaration more intrepid or poignant for this anniversary. No matter how viciously anyone tries to sever the Jewish story, we keep writing it.

“God separated the light from the darkness.” That has been our sacred task every day since October 7 last year, trying to find some optimism amid the anguish. So many people have mirrored God’s action—by volunteering, donating, supporting those who have lost family and those fighting for Israel’s survival and legitimacy.

It’s that resilience that brings me back to the primacy of Torah itself.

Not just in every generation, but especially in this moment. Even if Simchat Torah now bears unwashable bloodstains, the mandate to return to our foundational text feels more urgent than ever.

It is entirely by coincidence that my new book, It Takes Two to Torah—co-authored with Rabbi Dov Linzer—is being published this fall, based on two years of conversations in which we discussed and argued about every parsha in the Five Books of Moses.

Our constant discipline was to hold up the lens of the weekly verses to the facts of our world, despite deep differences of Jewish observance and viewpoints. Dov is Modern Orthodox and I consider myself a committed Jew, although I don’t follow strict Jewish law. Yet our mutual candor and respect kept us talking.

Dov and I initially conducted our dialogues as a Tablet podcast from 2018 to 2020, spanning the American convulsions over immigration, the global pandemic and then George Floyd’s murder.

I see how dated some of our assumptions seem in hindsight—for example, how mistakenly we characterized Jewish safety and Israel’s acceptance in the world.

Every Torah exchange is inevitably

Women dance with Torah scrolls at Midreshet Lindenbaum in Jerusalem.

of its time and blind to the future. But every verse is also an invitation— to ask what our foundational text requires of us now and what it’s teaching us.

How do we read about Amalek this year without echoes of how that name was invoked after October 7?  How do we read Leviticus 19:16— “Do not stand by at your neighbor’s blood”—without thinking about our fallen soldiers, captives and the hundreds cut down at the Nova music festival? How do we read Leviticus 19:34—“The strangers who reside with you shall be to you as your citizens”—without addressing coexistence with Palestinians?

Beyond any of the numerous challenging questions posed by the Torah is one large, overarching idea: Survival means returning to the same story. Our book will outlive any enemy.

In 1965, Elie Wiesel, Holocaust survivor and author of Night, wrote for the Yiddish Forward (Forverts) newspaper about visiting Russia on Simchat Torah and watching young Soviet Jews dance publicly despite the threat of the KGB.

Wiesel wrote, “Jewish youth refuse to inherit their elders’ terror…. Let their oppressors implode with anger. They refuse to be robbed of their Jewishness and have their annual yontef beneath the open skies ruined.”

On this Simchat Torah, we will not be “robbed” of our Jewishness.  We will read the end of Devarim (Deuteronomy), which features Moses’ dramatic death, and immediately open Bereishit (Genesis), with creation and the separation of night from day. We’ll dance with the scrolls and insist on the light.

Abigail Pogrebin is the co-author of It Takes Two to Torah: An Orthodox Rabbi and Reform Journalist Discuss and Debate Their Way Through the Five Books of Moses.

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The Broken and the Whole

Forging a new vision of American Judaism and American Zionism

History will remember October 7, 2023, as an inflection point. There will be a story of all that came before and all that came afterward.

The “post” of our post-October 7 reality continues to evolve. Our Israeli brothers and sisters struggle with how to prosecute war, secure peace, maintain the country’s international standing and address its internal divisions. So, too, American Jews face both new questions and old ones asked with new urgency. Questions related to our hyphenated identities, the invisible string that ties us to Israel, our sense of home in America. We told ourselves that we were different from the Jews of postwar Europe or ancient Egypt or Persia. Now, after October 7, we wonder if we have become but one more case study in the annals of the world’s most ancient hatred. As we move forward, what stays and what

By Rabbi Elliot Cosgrove

goes? Is it time for a new script or time to double down on the old one?

In a world with no easy answers, I find both wisdom and comfort in a rabbinic midrash told of the darkest moments of biblical Israel’s desert sojourn—the incident of the Golden Calf.

When Moses ascended Mount Sinai to receive the Ten Commandments, he stayed atop the mountain for 40 days and 40 nights. The newly emancipated children of Israel grew restless waiting for their leader to return and, needing something to worship, they built the Golden Calf.

When Moses descended the mountain and saw his people engaged in idolatry, he threw the tablets to the ground, shattering them. We know that a second set of tablets was constructed and placed in the Ark of the Covenant to accompany the Israelites on their journey forward. But what, the rabbis of the Talmud ask,

happened to the shattered fragments of the first set? Were the shards left on top of the mountain? Perhaps, like the Golden Calf itself, they were destroyed—fragments of a painful memory better left in the past? Some things are best left behind.

The rabbis suggest otherwise. “Luchot ve’shivrey luchot munachim be’aron,” states the Talmud. “The tablets and the broken tablets side-by-side in the Ark together” (Berachot 8b). The image is powerful —both the broken and the whole lead Israel on the journey forward. We pick up the pieces. We remember the hurt, hold on to the pain and nevertheless put one foot ahead of the other. Nothing is left behind. The forward momentum of our people actually depends on carrying both realities with us—shattered and whole, on our way to the Promised Land.

I believe the task of American Jewry is to find the means to bring

Demonstrators rally in Los Angeles in support of Israel.

both sets of tablets along on our journey. We can integrate the wisdom of everything that came before October 7, the newly learned wisdom of our post-October 7 reality, and most of all, the fact that the truth is not present exclusively in one or the other but in the integration of the two. A new vision for American Judaism and American Zionism, the shattered truths we held sacred and a bold new vision that embraces the complexity, paradoxes and even the internal contradictions of our time. Our engagement with Israel, our engagement with tradition and, perhaps most of all, our engagement with one another will lend us support.

So what should American Zionism look like, moving forward?

First and foremost, we need an American Zionism that begins with love for the Jewish people and teaches our children and grandchildren the story of our exile, the pitfalls of powerlessness, the dreams of every wave and every stage of our national longings and our right to the land. American Jewry has become woefully ahistorical. We need a “Marshall

THE COMING GENERATION OF AMERICAN ZIONISTS MUST BE GIVEN TOOLS THAT WILL HELP THEM BE RESILIENT, SELFCONFIDENT AND ADROIT DEFENDERS OF THE REAL, NOT THE IMAGINED, JEWISH STATE.

Plan” to rebuild our deficit of memory; you can’t love a country that you know only by way of social media. We need formal, informal and, most important, experiential curricula; our children should be in dialogue with Israeli children by way of technology, exchange programs, sister congregations, any means available. Israel educators, “reverse” Birthright programs that bring Israelis into contact with American Jews, and a redoubling of efforts on teaching the Hebrew language—perhaps our people’s most

effective bridge to one another, to our past and to our future.

Next, we need an American Zionism with a dose of humility. The Middle East is not New York City, and the democratically elected government of Israel has every right to make decisions in the best interests of Israel, even when these decisions run contrary to our sensibilities. Israel lives in a very rough neighborhood, and the community of nations holds Israel to a nasty double standard that is often, but not always, laced with explicit or implicit antisemitism. Lest we forget, Abraham was called Ha-Ivri, meaning “the other,” because he stood alone when the rest of the world stood on the other side. There is nothing wrong, in fact there is everything right, about standing at Israel’s side, even when, and sometimes especially when, it makes decisions we ourselves would not make. In school, on campus and on Capitol Hill, the coming generation of American Zionists must be given tools that will help them be resilient, self-confident and adroit defenders of the real, not the imagined, Jewish state.

But for the next chapter of American Zionism to ring true and stand the test of time, we must also be willing and able to integrate the universal and prophetic dimension of American Jewry. If the project of Zionism, as Martin Buber once reflected, is the Jewish use of power tempered by morality, it is a project that sometimes Israel gets right and sometimes gets wrong. If the dream of Israel is to serve as a homeland for all Jews and all forms of Jewish expression, we must confront the bitter truth that this dream is now threatened by the government of the Jewish state. There is bitter irony in the realization that, because of the stranglehold of the ultra-Orthodox Chief Rabbinate, many Jews cannot practice their Judaism freely in the Jewish state.

As evidenced by political infighting and the judicial reform protests prior to October 7, Israel faces this challenge: how to remain a liberal democracy without giving short shrift to security concerns. There is nothing wrong with helping, chiding or goading Israel toward achieving this complicated goal, as long as that nudging comes from a place of abiding concern for Israel’s safety and security. The “sane center” must not let those who have embraced the ideological and philanthropic extremes define the field of play and terms of debate. We can support religious pluralism, efforts to achieve Arab-Jewish coexistence and dialogue and constructive steps toward creating a two-state solution.

Finally, we need to understand that the new American Zionism is not a substitute for American Judaism. For far too many Jews, support for Israel became a vicarious faith, a civil religion masking the inadequacies of our actual religion. The only way Israel will learn from, listen to or care about American Jews is if we show ourselves to be living energetic Jewish lives. To be good Zionists, we must be better Jews. A robust American Jewish identity can weather policy differences with this or that Israeli government and withstand the indignity of being a punching bag for a campus culture run amok—something a paper-thin Jewish identity cannot do.

Build up your own Jewish identity and that of your children and grandchildren and do everything in your power to support individuals and institutions committed to nurturing and sustaining the global Jewish community.

Taking agency in our Jewish lives—this is the

North Star of my vocation as a rabbi. Not everyone will choose to be a rabbi. But the choice to take agency is something we all must face—asking whether to lean into the opportunity and blessing of being connected to a tradition, people and faith.

The future of American Zionism is contingent on the future of American Judaism—not the other way around. American Jewry must redouble its investment in Jewish life and living. As invested as we are in Israel, for the sake of our Jewish and Zionist future we must prioritize efforts to cultivate rich Jewish identities: synagogues, schools and Jewish summer camps filled with Jews living intentionally and joyfully, capable of producing the next generation of American Judaism and training the next generation of rabbis, cantors, Jewish educators and professionals.

An American Zionism filled with love, humility and intentional Jewish living will not be monolithic. It must be sufficiently supple and capacious to house many voices. Can an American Jew emphatically support Israel’s right to self-defense and self-determination and yet be critical of the Israeli

government? Can that person be vigilant on Israel’s behalf and empathetic on the Palestinians’ behalf? For far too long, American Jewry has been fed a series of binaries, a choice between one or the other only.

Such a narrow range of options must be called out as false; in a new American Zionism, it must be rejected outright. We who love Israel can be both critical and supportive of Israel. The hundreds of thousands of Israelis at the forefront of the protest against judicial reform became Israel’s most capable defenders following October 7. So, too, those American Jews who spoke out against Israel’s government and on behalf of Israeli democracy prior to October 7, myself included. We have now pivoted and are unflinching in our support for Israel. In American Jewry’s support of a Jewish and democratic State of Israel, criticism and love are not in opposition— they are two sides of the same coin. As American Jews witness the precipitous rise of anti-Israel sentiment and antisemitism today, should we be self-reflective or reach out? The

answer is not one or the other—it is both. As we find ourselves at odds with many educational, cultural and political institutions—should we recuse ourselves or rescue these institutions from within? The answer is not one or the other—it is both. Must American Jewry steadfastly advocate for Israel’s right to self-defense or express empathy for Palestinians, who are pawns in the inhuman strategy of Hamas? The answer is not one or the other—it is both. As we face a cross-generational schism concerning our obligations to Israel, American Jewry must construct a big tent capable of housing a plurality of voices. At all costs, our culture of debate must avoid the enemy within—baseless hatred, sinat hinam—in the form of ad hominem attacks intended to “cancel” others rather than focus on issues.

Not just the competing visions, but the manner by which those visions are negotiated—that is the task Israel faces, and American Jews have a critical role to play in shaping what will be. It is not easy to balance the binaries, especially when the stakes are high—but as a people, binaries are at the essence of who we are.

The 20th century scholar Simon Rawidowicz wrote a now-famous essay titled “Israel: The Ever-Dying People.” In it, he explains the belief held in every age and stage of Jewish existence: Surely this one was to be the last one. From Abraham to Rabbi Akiva, from Shushan to the former Soviet Union—whether because of persecution, dispersion or the forces of assimilation, we are a people marked by the perennial belief that we are at risk of extinction. Then, of course, the next generation arrives—utterly convinced of the same idea. Rawidowicz argues that our multimillennial against-the-odds survival as a people is not based on anxiety about this notion; rather, every generation has leveraged this mentality to respond and act, leading us from strength to strength and building bridges from one Jewish generation to the next.

And now our generation has its opportunity to respond to this idea, our people’s recurring cri de coeur, concerning its survival.

As a people, our faith is directed not just toward God or one another. Our faith is a combination of courage and hope wrought from within, which impels us to work feverishly toward a bright Jewish future. We are not unaware of the hurdles we face or the possibility of failure. We carry both sets of tablets with us. That which is broken and that which is whole lead us on our journey to the Promised Land, forging for ourselves and others a better life and a better world.

Rabbi Elliot Cosgrove, a leading voice of American Jewry, is senior rabbi of Park Avenue Synagogue in New York City.

Adapted excerpt from For Such a Time as This: On Being Jewish Today by Elliot Cosgrove (Harvest; September 24, 2024). © 2024 by Elliot Cosgrove, used with permission from the publisher.

Jewish pride and concerns are displayed at a Jewish solidarity march in New York City.

s t a l g i c , s e n t i m e n t a l ; y e s , i t

Welcome Home

B u t i t’ s s o c o m p e l l i n g : W h o d o e s n ’ t w a n t t o fe e l a t h o m e?

A g r a p h i c e s s a y b y

(JERUSALEM IS WAITING FOR YOU AT HOME) T

W h e r e v e r I t u r n e d , m y d i s t r e s s a b o u t t h e m e n , w o m e n a n d c h i l d r e n s t i l l

s t u c k i n G a z a w a s m i r r o r e d b a c

S o , w h i l e t h e r e w e r e s o m a n y t h i n g s a b o u t I s r a e l t h a t fe l t fo r e i g n …

s h i e l d a r o u n d m y h e a r t . WHERE ARE THE CHEERIOS?

W H AT D O YO U

M E A N , YO U

“ D O N ’ T RE A L LY ”

REC YC LE H E RE?

… t h e b i g g e s t t h i n g o f a l l w a s t h a t I c o u l d l e t d o w n

A t H o s t a g e s S q u a r e i n Te l A v i v o n e e v e n i n g , I fo u n d a l a r g e

g a t h e r i n g o f p e o p l e h o l d i n g a m e m o r i a l s e r v i c e .

I n I s r a e l , t h e w o r d “ Z i o n i s t”

w a s j u s t a n a d j e c t i v e , n o t a n

e p i t h e t . I p a s s e d p e o p l e o n t h e

s t r e e t w e a r i n g kippot a n d I d i d

n o t h a v e t o w o r r y a b o u t

w h e t h e r t h e y w e r e s a fe , a n d i f

t h e y fe l t a fr a i d

I c o u l d n o t s t o p t h i n k i n g a b o u t w h a t I d i d n ’ t s e e :

NO PROTESTERS…

N O P O L ICE …

I n t h e U n i t e d S t a t e s , e v e n t s r e l a t e d t o t h e w a r h a v e t o

b e c a r e fu l l y p l a n n e d a n d d i s c r e e t l y a d v e r t i s e d . I n I s r a e l ,

i t w a s u n c o m p l i c a t e d , e a s y : J e w i s h l i v e s h a d b e e n t a k e n

a n d y o u w e r e a l l o w e d t o m o u r n .

Aliyah in the Shadow of October 7

Feeling Israel’s unwavering pull amid war and uncertainty

By Maayan Hoffman

For jews in the diaspora who may have long dreamed of living in Israel—of finding love, career, family and a sense of religious or national belonging in the Jewish state—now might not seem like a fortuitous time to make aliyah.

But for 26-year-old Eitan Meyerowitz, the opposite proved true. After Hamas terrorists infiltrated southern Israel on October 7, slaughtering 1,200 people and kidnapping more than 250 hostages, he felt an unwavering pull to be in Israel, where history was unfolding.

“This is a Jewish war as much as it is an Israeli war,” said the Australian native, who moved to Israel in January. “I could be in Melbourne and witness this war from afar, or I could be in Israel and be a part of it.”

While his decision may seem unlikely, professionals involved in aliyah said that there has been an influx of applications from Jews worldwide who are interested in moving to Israel—some despite the conflict, others because of it. Even though aliyah has dipped from the previous two years, it continues even in the wake of October 7.

“Thousands of families have made aliyah since October 7,” said Maj. Gen. (res.) Doron Almog, chairman of the Jewish Agency for Israel (JAFI), the quasi-governmental organization that coordinates immigration to Israel for most Jews. “These newcomers symbolize hope and the promise of growth and prosperity. With their arrival, we are strengthening and advancing the State of Israel, furthering the vision of the ingathering of exiles and reinforcing our nation’s resilience.”

According to jafi, between January 2024 and the end of July, the number of olim—new immigrants to Israel—stood at 19,885, representing a 43 percent decrease from the same period last year. In all of 2023, more than 46,000 Jews and others with Jewish heritage moved to Israel, representing a 39 percent decrease compared to the almost 75,000 the previous year, in 2022, mainly due to a decline in immigrants from Russia and Ukraine. There had been a spike in immigration from those countries since the start of the Russia-Ukraine war in 2022.

The number of new olim, however, doesn’t paint a complete picture of the current appeal of aliyah for Diaspora Jews. There has been a significant rise in Jews filing applications to move to Israel, though not all who file will ultimately make aliyah. Between October 7, 2023, and the end of June 2024, there was a 233 percent increase among French Jews filing applications; a 97 percent increase among Canadian Jews; a 62 percent increase among American Jews; and a 52 percent increase among British Jews.

Jews from the United States and Canada are usually supported in their aliyah journeys by the nonprofit Nefesh B’Nefesh (NBN), which works in conjunction with JAFI. According to NBN, more than 2,500 Jews from the two countries have relocated to Israel since October 7, with many settling in the center of the country in cities such as Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Holon, Ra’anana, Modi’in and Beit Shemesh. A recent NBN report stated that “around 50 percent of aliyah candidates cite Zionism as their primary motivation for moving to Israel”— not necessarily the rise in antisemitism throughout the Diaspora.

Meanwhile, Yigal Palmor, head of

Eitan Meyerowitz

JAFI’s International Relations Unit and foreign policy adviser to Almog, described antisemitism as only one factor in the surge in applications from Western countries. Potential immigrants have shared other motivations like Jewish heritage, personal growth and family connections.

What can newcomers to Israel expect during a time of war and existential crisis for the Jewish state? There is the financial assistance package provided by the Ministry of Aliyah and Integration, based on age and family status, that all olim receive.

But perhaps greater than any financial subsidy is the opportunity for these men, women and children to manifest their Zionism by joining their fates with that of the Jewish state. It is this resolve and determination that motivated Meyerowitz and the others interviewed for this story to make aliyah after October 7. Here are their stories.

‘IF

NOT NOW, WHEN?’

Rosie Sternberg bounces her cooing 11-month-old on her knee as the scorching Israeli sun beats down on them as they sit at a cafe table in Carmei Gat, a neighborhood of Kiryat Gat in southern Israel. Despite the relentless summer heat and the ongoing war in Gaza, Rosie, her husband, Meir, and their blue-eyed daughter, Liel, are all smiling.

“There are zero regrets,” Meir

said about their decision to move to Israel in April, seven months after the Hamas massacre.

Rosie, 27, grew up in New Jersey in what she described as a “stereotypical Modern Orthodox, Zionist family.” After attending day school, she spent a year at a seminary in Israel, an experience that “ignited” her love for the Jewish state. From then on, she said, she knew she would one day make Israel her home.

Meir’s mother is Israeli, and throughout his childhood in New York, he spent his summers visiting family in Israel. His mother has seven siblings, and Meir, who is also 27, has over 100 cousins in the country, all part of what he described as a large, close-knit family.

The couple, who are religiously observant, married three years ago and relocated to Florida for what they thought would be a short period, before their ultimate move to Israel. But both Rosie’s speech pathologist certification and the aliyah process took longer than expected.

“We were not in a rush, but when October 7 happened, moving to Israel became a constant conversation,” Rosie recalled. “We had our worries,” she admitted, “and a lot of honest talks and self-reflection. But we concluded, if not now, when?”

Meir said that as antisemitism surged across the United States and violence against Jews erupted, he realized he did not want to live in a

country where he was reliant on a non-Jewish police force.

“These are my brethren,” Meir said of Israel’s police and soldiers. “God forbid something happens, we’re a massive family. Israel is one community, and that stood out after October 7.”

Meir acknowledged that moving to Israel comes with financial challenges. He doesn’t expect to buy new cars, opting for used ones instead, or own a house with a big backyard like he might have in America. He also finds himself constantly needing to “relearn” basic tasks, such as ordering gas canisters for cooking and being mindful about water consumption in a country with water shortages.

But not making aliyah because of what he deemed to be minor discomforts “feels hypocritical and hard to reconcile,” he said.

The couple began their lives in Israel near a childhood friend of Rosie’s in Carmei Gat, a largely English-speaking community with around 200 other olim families. Rosie is working on her Hebrew while she continues her speech pathology job back in the United States remotely. Meir works for an American nonprofit. Their dream is to secure employment in Israel and, once the war ends, move to a moshav in the North.

‘SEXUAL ZIONISM’

Eitan Meyerowitz wants to be a part of the Jewish story.

“The Jewish story is happening here in Israel,” said the 26-year-old, who made aliyah from Melbourne, Australia, in January. “If I want to be part of it, I must be here.”

Although he said that he always knew he wanted to live in Israel, he had gotten comfortable in his local

Meir and Rosie Sternberg with their daughter, Liel

Jewish community, where he was an educator at the Leibler Yavneh College day school. One day, he said, he realized he had to move to Israel soon or get stuck. The attack on October 7 prompted him to reconsider—not out of fear, but because he wasn’t sure if he could contribute to the Jewish state meaningfully during wartime.

“My dad and I sat down, and he asked me, ‘Are you going to be in specific danger?’ and ‘Are you going to be a burden on Israel?’ ” Meyerowitz said over an almond milk latte at a cafe in central Jerusalem. “We even considered the financial aspect, as every new immigrant gets some government aid. But we understood that I wouldn’t be in immediate danger and that Israel specifically wanted olim during this time, so I decided to come.”

Meyerowitz, who recently com

North or South of the country.

Meyerowitz said that instead of physically fighting for Israel, he is engaged in combat online. He now dedicates his TikTok account (@the_chalutz) to sharing his aliyah experience and what he calls “authentic Judaism” as he tries to defend his new country and religion.

Meyerowitz, who is gay, said that he is also hoping to find love.

“I knew if I was going to find a religious [shomer Shabbat] gay companion, it was going to be here in Israel,” Meyerowitz said. “This is my sexual Zionism.”

So far, he said, he has been dating a lot. But he added that life in Israel is not a “magical fairyland.”

“You have to reimagine yourself,” said Meyerowitz, who hopes to move to Tel Aviv and study acting or directing. “It is a bit hard and disarming, but it is a good experience none-

‘I WANT TO STAY IN ISRAEL’

Sergei Naumenko is not Jewish according to religious law, but growing up in Moscow with his Jewish grandfather, he was introduced to Shabbat and the holidays. When he turned 18, he visited Israel through Birthright Israel. Then, he tried a longer-term program with Masa Israel Journey last year and decided to stay—even though the war had started by the end of the course and he had no family in the country.

The 23-year-old officially became a citizen in February and lives in Haifa.

Despite the city’s bustling noise, he said he enjoys his neighborhood, which has a large Russian immigrant population. The owners of the coffee shop where we spoke knew him by name and, during the interview,

served him his favorite sweets.

“I want to figure out what it is to be a Jew. I want to learn the language and the culture. Maybe then I’ll learn the religion,” Naumenko said, though he did not articulate if that meant official conversion.

Living in Haifa, where many displaced Israelis from northern towns have moved, Naumenko said he feels the impact of the war. But he is not scared, despite being only 40 miles from the Galilee, where Hezbollah has been launching rockets since October 8. Having witnessed the war between Russia and Ukraine and knowing he could have been drafted into the Russian army, he said he feels more secure in Israel. “At least here, I would be trained first,” he said with a laugh.

He emphasized that his move was not to escape the war back home but to “figure things out.” With a law degree earned in Russia, he is now attending ulpan to learn Hebrew. He does not work and is only casually dating. He has yet to enlist in the Israel Defense Forces, though he is open to serving. Olim over the age of 22 are exempt from the military draft, and up until age 28, they can volunteer for service.

“I wouldn’t want to force anyone to move during a war; it is tough,” he acknowledged. “But I plan to stay. I want to stay in Israel.”

‘YOUR OWN LITTLE FAMILY’

After October 7, Esther Bensusan moved to Israel from Spain with one purpose in mind. “I wanted to support Israel as much as possible and help it become even stronger,” she said. “When Israel’s existence was at stake, I realized how crucial it is to protect and support this country.”

The 23-year-old grew up in a Jew-

Sergei Naumenko

ish home in a small town in southern Spain. She describes her religious observance as traditional, but not Orthodox. After graduating from college in Madrid, she participated in a Masa program. Upon returning to Spain, she knew she would eventually move to Israel.

Bensusan arrived in March and settled in Ra’anana to attend ulpan. Her dorm-like accommodations are bright, cheerful and full of student artwork. She is preparing to join the Garin Tzabar program for lone soldiers in the IDF and hopes to join the Intelligence Corps.

“Whatever I do—work, study, military—I want to do it here,” Bensusan said.

She acknowledged missing her family, and the challenges of moving to a new country alone. Still, she admires the “amazing people” in Israel and feels a strong sense of togetherness and familiarity in her new community.

family. It’s incredible how you can build your own family here.”

‘WE MUST ACCEPT OUR FATE’

Kayla Marks’s dedication to Israel extends beyond personal conviction— it’s a tribute to the legacy of her grandfather, Marvin Marks. Raised in a Modern Orthodox family in Hollywood, Fla., Marks credits his love for Israel for shaping her journey toward Zionist education and advocacy.

The 23-year-old became involved with AIPAC—the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the largest pro-Israel lobby in the United States— when she was 13, three years after she first visited Israel with her family. She has attended its annual policy conference every year since. She was the president of her high school’s Israel advocacy club and even developed a course on media bias, which she taught to her classmates.

Her grandfather purchased apartments in Israel for his children decades ago. Marks currently lives in her parents’ Tel Aviv home, which they had previously rented out. The lush interior with its stark white walls and American-style kitchen counters and bathrooms is impressive and unique—even for Tel Aviv, which is increasingly known for architecture and interior design.

One day in 2014, her grandfather invited his granddaughter over to discuss Israel’s 2005 disengagement from Gush Katif, when the government dismantled 17 Israeli settlements in the southern Gaza Strip. Sitting at his dining room table, he asked Marks to someday carry on his pro-Israel efforts. A month later, he passed away unexpectedly.

“He basically left me to carry the torch,” Marks said, although she has two older cousins also living in

Israel. “I wanted to do it anyway, but his inspiration lit the fire within me. He truly wanted me here, so everything I do is because of him.”

She arrived in February after her original plan to make aliyah in early 2023 was delayed by a thyroid cancer diagnosis. Despite the setback, she persevered and made it to Israel, but the diagnosis does mean that she will not be able to volunteer for military service. Instead, Marks helps to arrange barbeques for soldiers serving in the South and is enrolled in a cybersecurity and intelligence master’s program at Bar-Ilan University.

Her advice to others considering aliyah amid the ongoing conflict is clear. “I would 100 percent recommend it,” she said. “The war wouldn’t deter me. Look at what’s happening in Europe and the United States,” she added, noting the rise in antisemitism.

“We must accept our fate as the Jewish people,” Marks concluded. “There is no other country for us other than Israel.”

Maayan Hoffman is editor-in-chief of ILTV, an Israeli daily English-language news program. She is also the host of the podcast Hadassah On Call: New Frontiers in Medicine.

Esther Bensusan

Kayla Marks

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Stress and Your Diet

Choosing to eat right in times of uncertainty

By Julie Wilcox

Recently, i connected with three female leaders of an art collective in Sderot, a city in Israel’s western Negev heavily impacted by the war with Hamas. They described how members of their collective had been consuming sugary foods and alcohol to cope with their anxiety and wanted to discuss how I could help reduce their stress through healthier eating.

Times of uncertainty and upheaval, like the nearly 12 months since the terror attack of October 7, can weigh heavily on our minds and bodies. Many of my Jewish clients in the United States and in Israel have reported feeling more overwhelmed and out of control than ever. As a nutritionist and wellness coach, I’ve been working with them to realize that even amid chaos, there are ways to reclaim agency over their well-being, starting with diet.

Turning to comfort food or drink is a common reaction to stress. While emotional eating is usually harmless in the short term, for many it can become part of their lifestyle and exact a toll on health and well-being. Too often, it takes a health scare to initiate change. In this case, the Sderot group realized that their nutrient-poor food choices had not been alleviating their anxiety and may even have exacerbated it.

My guidance in such situations is consistent: Instead of succumbing to helplessness, I encourage clients to

can control—making mindful, plantbased eating choices rather than relying on processed foods high in salt, sugar and saturated fat. Large population studies and randomized clinical trials show that plant-based eating is one of the most powerful ways to reduce stress and restore optimal functionality and balance—both physically and mentally. With this recognition, the Sderot women invited me to attend a retreat to educate their group on how plant-based nutrition could help rebuild their resilience.

Plant-based diets, from the Mediterranean and DASH diets (Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension) to the MIND diet (MediterraneanDASH Intervention for Neurodegenerative Delay), focus on a diverse array of fresh fruits and vegetables, whole grains, nuts, seeds, legumes and plant proteins. Some of these regimens include dairy, eggs and small amounts of fish, poultry and meat. Most call for reducing or eliminating processed foods—including desserts like cakes and cookies, fast food and deli meats—laden not only with salt, sugar and unhealthy fat, but also additives and preservatives that can contribute to systemic inflammation and chronic disease.

A 2023 article in the Journal of Internal Medicine highlights that

decreased systemic inflammation, enhanced cellular energy, bolstered immunity and improved cognitive health as well as reducing risk of type 2 diabetes, heart disease, cancer and other diseases. The benefits of these diets have been studied for decades. Though adopting dietary changes may seem challenging, there are strategies to make this shift gradual, achievable and sustainable.

Tali, a jewish physician with three young children under the age of 5, came to me last November. She described feeling overwhelmed by the demands of her work, childcare responsibilities and global affairs. She struggled to find time for nutritious meals. Fruits and vegetables were notably absent from her diet, even though she told me, “I feel better when I eat healthier. I deserve to find time to eat healthier foods I enjoy and that make me feel good.”

Tali’s statement aligns with current scientific studies. Research consistently shows that consuming unprocessed carbohydrates—whole grains, barley, oats and others—fuels our cells with energy. Antioxidants and phytochemicals in berries, fruits and nuts reduce inflammation and contain fiber that enhances our gut health by promoting a healthy balance of bacteria. They

also provide vitamins and minerals that play vital roles in supporting neuronal health and immunity.

Iencouraged tali, who asked that her last name not be shared, to begin modifying her diet by incorporating one fruit per day into her meal plan and then, if successful, one vegetable. Since Tali prioritizes advanced planning, writing checklists and setting reminders, the next step was devising a personalized meal plan. For weekday breakfasts, she decided to have yogurt with seasonal fruits and berries. For lunch and dinner, she would eat vegetable-based soups that she made and froze in batches over the weekend. In addition, she would set a timer for mealtimes and check off her daily successes in a food diary.

We also talked about managing obstacles. When daycare fell through and she couldn’t meet her goals, she felt burdened by a sense of failure. At times, she wanted to quit, but I reminded her that perfection was not the goal. Balance, self-love and resilience were the qualities she needed to cultivate for sustainable lifestyle changes. I also suggested she incorporate meditation and breathing into her routine, which she shared had been helpful in the past. Over time, Tali started to feel more in control of her well-being.

Different stages in life bring different obstacles. Another recent client, Rachel, who also preferred not to share her last name, is in her late 50s and going through menopause. Now that her children are adults, she spends much of her time socializing with friends and traveling. When we first met, Rachel explained that she felt she was drinking too much alcohol—at least a glass or two every night—and eating too much

processed food, energy bars, packaged snacks and candy. In the past year alone, she had gained about 10 pounds, and her fingers had become so swollen her rings no longer fit.

Rachel’s initial goal was the complete elimination of refined carbohydrates and alcohol from her diet. “Salads are super healthy, available and nutritious,” she said. “Though it requires planning to have them available daily, I really want to lose the weight, wear my rings again and feel better overall.”

PLANT-BASED EATING IS ONE OF THE MOST POWERFUL WAYS TO REDUCE STRESS AND RESTORE OPTIMAL FUNCTIONALITY AND BALANCE—BOTH PHYSICALLY AND MENTALLY.

For a few weeks, Rachel only drank half a glass of wine on Shabbat. She also ate more vegetables. Her puffiness went down, but at the same time, she realized she wanted more flexibility, preferring two drinks a week. We changed her goal to reflect this, and she has been able to stick to it and still lose weight.

Wanting to continue to strike a balance between enjoying herself and making healthy choices, Rachel asked that we come up with ways for her to be more conscientious in eating while traveling and at occasions such as weddings. For traveling, I advised her to pack healthy snacks, like dried mangos and nuts. For events, we

talked about selecting nutritious foods like salads and vegetables at a buffet before getting in line for the brisket.

Rachel even decided to sometimes forgo brisket and other fatty meats in favor of fish and chicken after we discussed the health benefits of lean protein, which studies show is crucial for cellular repair and regeneration in times of stress. Lean protein also helps regulate our bodies’ inflammatory response, mood and cognitive function. Finally, instead of taking several desserts for herself, Rachel learned to choose one or to take a few to share with friends.

Both Tali and Rachel learned that a flexitarian approach—an eating style that emphasizes plant-based foods, but also includes reduced amounts of dairy, eggs, meat, poultry and minimal processed foods—works for them. Other clients have chosen to become pescatarians, eating fish, eggs and dairy but no meat or chicken; vegetarians, who partake of eggs and/or cheese but no meat, poultry or fish; or vegans, who consume no animal products.

Eating patterns can be fluid. You can choose to eat vegetarian two days a week and flexitarian on the other days, or pescatarian generally, save for Rosh Hashanah, Sukkot and Passover, when tradition might call for meat or chicken. These choices can and should be personalized.

Even when times get tumultuous, you can take steps toward a plantbased diet, which in addition to reducing stress comes with innumerable benefits to your overall well-being.

Julie Wilcox, a nutritionist, holistic wellness coach and executive wellness director of the Jewish Orthodox Women’s Medical Association, is the author of The WinWin Diet: How to Be Plant-Based and Still Eat What You Love (juliewilcoxwellness.com).

Rescued by One Sister, Treated by Another

War stories from the extended Hadassah family

By Barbara Sofer

One year after a terrorist shot Michal Elon three times at close range as she was treating a wounded soldier, the nurse is still pondering the impacts of that day on her work and home life.

October 7 found Elon and her husband, Rabbi Omri Elon, and eight of their 10 children on the Zikim training base five miles south of Ashkelon, close to the Mediterranean Sea and just two miles north of the Gaza Strip. The base rabbi had asked the Elons to lead services and provide holiday cheer for Simchat Torah, something the couple had volunteered to do previously on other Israel Defense Forces bases. After deliberating about the offer, Michal Elon decided that spending Simchat Torah with the soldiers would be a meaningful way to cap the Sukkot week, which the family had spent mostly at home in Kochav Hashachar, a tiny town in the rocky center of the country overlooking the Jordan Valley.

“I even convinced the teenagers to come,” recalled Elon, an affable 45-year-old, her hair covered in a

swirling purple headscarf.

So popular with the soldiers were the Friday night prayer services, Simchat Torah dancing and festive meal that many stayed awake after dinner to hear Rabbi Elon’s talk about the Yom Kippur War, the 50-year anniversary of which was being marked throughout Israel.

At 6:29 on Saturday morning, air raid sirens blasted as an intense barrage of around 3,000 rockets began striking Israel from nearby Gaza. A soldier rushed to herd the Elons, still in their bunks, into the aboveground concrete shelter, called a migunit. Soon, amid the rocket attacks, word came that Noa Zeevi, a soldier at Zikim, was seriously injured.

“I’m a nurse, and I offered to help,” Elon said. “I wasn’t afraid for myself leaving the shelter. No one imagined the magnitude of the attack. Even then, we assumed Noa had fallen from a watch tower. We didn’t know that the terrorists were already on the base.”

Attack boats manned by Hamas terrorists from Gaza had landed on

the neighboring Zikim beach. The Israeli navy fought back most of them, but 11 terrorists got through. One had shot Zeevi, wounding her in the head.

Elon had left the shelter and was caring for Zeevi when a terrorist shot the soldier guarding them. He died in front of her. The terrorist, disguised as an IDF soldier, looked Elon in the eye and shot her in the stomach and left arm.

Elon and Zeevi would meet again at Hadassah Hospital Ein Kerem, where both underwent complex and ultimately successful surgeries. Coincidentally, the two women knew the Hadassah Medical Organization well. Elon graduated from the Henrietta Szold Hadassah-Hebrew University School of Nursing, and she had worked for 10 years in the pediatric oncology department at Hadassah Ein Kerem. Zeevi’s father, Dr. Itai Zeevi, is a maxillofacial surgeon at the HMO.

Their story is one of many where heroism and tragedy on Israel’s battlefields are paralleled by resourcefulness and ingenuity in Hadassah’s hallways, and where patients find surprising connections within the Hadassah family.

Both Elon and Zeevi, after long hospitalizations, are still undergoing rehabilitation. Elon, who now works part time as a regional home nursing director for a health fund, travels 40 minutes from her home to Jerusalem twice a week to continue physical, occupational and aqua therapy at the new Gandel Rehabilitation Center at Hadassah Hospital Mount Scopus, which opened in January. Her greatest challenge is regaining full use of her left arm.

Michael Elon (right), a nurse who was injured helping others on October 7, with her twin sister, Yael Weissman, a midwife at Hadassah

At the Gandel center, she sometimes encounters her brother-in-law, Yotam Elon, a teacher, who was shot in the neck while fighting in Gaza and still needs rehabilitative care. Sometimes she has coffee with her twin sister, Yael Weissman, who works as a midwife in the Rady Mother and Child Center at Mount Scopus.

“We’ve experienced a lot of miracles,” Elon said. “Even more than getting shot myself, my worst nightmares are about seeing the soldier die near me. Considering what we know happened to so many others on the Gaza border, I am so thankful that my family emerged whole.”

When she first came home, she could do little by herself. “My husband and the children had to do everything,” she said. “I’m glad to release them from that responsibility now, and to spend more downtime at home. It’s making me think of restructuring my life so I have more simple downtime.”

Dr. sheer shabat is one of the rehabilitation physicians

her husband, Ori Shabat, and their two children, Dr. Shabat was at a kibbutz guest house in northern Israel. As soon as news of the Hamas attack broke, they began driving south with Dr. Shabat at the wheel. Ori, a strategic planner for the national water company, also serves as an infantry company commander in a Gaza division unit. For the three hours until they reached their home in Kibbutz Ma’ale HaHamisha near Jerusalem, he fielded alarming and desperate calls from IDF contacts.

“Our children are 7 and 4, but they could tell something bad was going on,” Dr. Shabat recalled. Once home, her husband dressed quickly in his uniform, grabbed his military gear and kissed his family goodbye.

He wasn’t Dr. Shabat’s only family member fighting in Gaza. Her first cousin, Staff Sgt. Itamar Ben-Yehuda, 21, a Golani army medic, was also on the front lines. And Dr. Shabat’s older sister, Lt. Col. Or Ben-Yehuda, is the commander of the 500-strong Caracal Infantry Battalion that patrols the border with Egypt. The mixed-gender combat battalion includes an all-women’s tank unit.

Dr. Shabat phoned the hospital to find out what was happening. More than 100 war-wounded soldiers and civilians arrived at HMO by ambulance and helicopter those first few days; in the following months, an additional 700 would be treated at Hadassah’s two

Dr. Sheer Shabat with her patient Staff Sgt. Amit Kazari, whose unit was rescued by Dr. Shabat’s older sister, Lt. Col. Or Ben-Yehuda

hospitals. One week after the war began, Dr. Shabat’s cousin Itamar, with whom she was very close, was named among the dead in the battle at Kibbutz Nahal Oz.

“As the time went on, my children came to me and asked if their daddy was dead, too,” she said, as her husband had been away for weeks and had not called, since cell phones were initially prohibited among those on active duty in Gaza. “He had to come all the distance from Gaza for one hour just to prove that he was alive.”

“There was no contact from my fighting family,” Dr. Shabat recalled. “Some of the wounded soldiers for whom I was caring served together with my husband. The strain was very great.”

Word came back that Dr. Shabat’s sister and her Caracal soldiers had joined the battles on October 7, supporting the thin line of soldiers along the Gaza border. The female tank crew had neutralized 100 terrorists.

And one of the hospitalized soldiers Dr. Shabat was caring for had met her sister.

On October 7, Staff Sgt. Amit Kazari, a handsome, dark-haired squad commander, remembered waking up before dawn on the Sufa base feeling exuberant. This was supposed to be the 21-year-old’s last Shabbat of compulsory service.

But then the sky began raining rockets, “purple rain” in military speak. By 7 a.m., Kazari found himself running to fetch arms and ammunition as his squad was fighting waves of terrorists. Outnumbered, the soldiers made a stand in the mess hall. They were taking heavy losses when reinforcements arrived: Lt. Col. Ben-Yehuda and her Caracal troops. Kazari remembered shrieking for urgent medical help for one of his soldiers. When Ben-Yehuda

wouldn’t assign a medic to the soldier, Kazari besieged her with angry curses. But the lieutenant colonel recognized what Kazari didn’t want to accept: His soldier was already dead.

Kazari himself was shot in the arm and the head. He received life-saving treatment at Hadassah Ein Kerem, and then was transferred for rehabilitation to Mount Scopus. When his doctor, none other than Dr. Shabat, was absent one day, Kazari was told she was home with her children because her husband was serving in Gaza. “Couldn’t her parents help?” Kazari asked a staff member.

But her parents—Dr. Dina BenYehuda, a hematologist and dean of the Hadassah-Hebrew University School of Medicine, and Dr. Arie Ben-Yehuda, the former head of internal medicine at HMO—were already busy. They were caring for the children of Dr. Shabat’s sister, whom he soon found out was the commander of the Caracal unit that had saved him and his squad.

Kazari then realized he had been rescued by one sister and now was being treated by the other.

When weeks later, Ben-Yehuda managed to visit her sister at work in the hospital, Kazari met both sisters and apologized to Ben-Yehuda for his expletives. “She said to me, ‘No hard feelings,’ ” Kazari recalled. “‘I’m glad to see that you’re flourishing under my sister’s care.’ ”

“I know every story, and every soldier I’ve met is a hero,” Dr. Shabat said. “I’m privileged to be part of their process of healing.”

Dr. shabat was able to share some of those stories of healing at Hadassah’s National Conference, held in July this year in Las Vegas (see story, opposite page), which she attended as part of an HMO delegation. Also with the group was Shlomo Demma, an IDF medic with the tank corps infantry who had been severely injured in Gaza. He came with his twin brother, Samuel.

At a major donors’ event at Las Vegas’s Mob Museum, Dr. Shabat talked about personally treating between 150 and 200 patients at the Gandel center since the beginning of the war. “We have faced unprecedented challenges dealing with each of these brave individuals,” she said at the event. “And we have witnessed great resilience and recovery. It gave us a lot of strength to treat Shlomo and other patients like him.”

Demma recounted how a Hamas squad opened heavy fire on his IDF unit near Jabalya in Gaza. An IED exploded close to him, causing a nearby wall to collapse. “At that moment, I saw black,” he said. “I thought I was dead.” When he came

to, he realized that he had been shot in both legs and arms and was trapped under the wall. “I had all the equipment for medical care, but I could not reach it.”

Members of his unit rushed to help, pulling him from beneath the wall, but they struggled with applying tourniquets. Demma had to calm them down and talk them through placing them on his limbs. “I was afraid I would lose an arm if they did it wrong,” he said. After he was evacuated, an evaluating doctor told him that he had also been shot in the chest, his lungs had collapsed and there was shrapnel in his head, neck and back. “I looked at the doctor and asked, ‘Am I going to die or be handicapped for life?’ ”

Demma underwent extensive surgery at Hadassah Ein Kerem before being transferred to Mount Scopus for rehabilitation. Initially unable to move, he can now walk, move his limbs and drive a car, though he still goes to Mount Scopus three times a week for ongoing treatment. He noted both how lucky he is to be alive and the care he received at Hadassah, calling Dr. Shabat “an angel in rehabilitation.”

Dr. Shabat acknowledges that it has been a tragic, difficult year. “Thankfully, my husband, who has returned home from the battlefield, and my sister in the field are unharmed,” she said. “I’m still mourning my cousin.”

“It’s thrilling to accompany the soldiers who are regaining the ability to walk, to use their hands and arms to pick up their newborn babies,” she added. “As they heal, I feel more confident day by day about our future.”

Barbara Sofer, an award-winning journalist and author, is Israel director of public relations for Hadassah.

Shlomo Demma, an IDF medic injured in Gaza, and Dr. Shabat at Hadassah’s National Conference in Las Vegas

Bet on Hadassah

Coming

together in Las Vegas to advocate, empower and inspire |

By Shari Harel

Hadassah national president Carol Ann Schwartz welcomed attendees to the 2024 National Conference at the Planet Hollywood Resort and Casino in Las Vegas by likening the current geopolitical moment to Charles Dickens’ “the best of times” and “the worst of times.” The worst of times: the inhumane atrocities of October 7 in Israel and the surge in global antisemitism. The best of times: the resilience of the Jewish people and the lifesaving work of Hadassah to heal Israel and the world.

Ever since Henrietta Szold founded Hadassah, Schwartz said, “We apply the best of our talents, our wisdom and our energy.”

“You who are here today are the changemakers,” she went on to say.

“You are the heirs…of this legacy. You are on the ground. And we are there in peace and war, ever ready for the worst of times that face us. And we are there together.”

Standing together in Las Vegas were close to 400 Hadassah leaders, members, donors, Associates and staff who descended upon the desert oasis from July 28 to 30 for official business and fun: only-in-Vegas experiences, plenaries with top-tier speakers, workshops, networking opportunities and donor events as well as business meetings.

At the opening event, Schwartz introduced the conference’s keynote speaker, award-winning actress, singer, dancer, philanthropist and social media activist Montana Tucker (see interview, page 64), who is known for speaking out for Israel and against antisemitism on the red carpet and beyond.

Recognizing the urgency of the moment in Israel, participants at the conference, including around 150 attendees at the Major Donor Experience at The Mob Museum, gave close to $2 million to support Hadassah’s life-changing work.

Bringing the conference to a close,

National Conference Vice Chair Geri Lipschitz led the audience in a prayer for Israel Defense Forces soldiers and the singing of “Hatikvah” and “The Star-Spangled Banner.”

“Our hope is that what just happened in Vegas, you tell everyone,” Michelle Hubertus, National Conference chair, said in her closing remarks. “Because the Diaspora needs Israel, Israel needs Hadassah and Hadassah needs you.”

Shari Harel is a copywriter in the Marketing & Communications division of Hadassah, The Women’s Zionist Organization of America. For more coverage of the conference, including videos and more photos, go to hadassah.org/page/vegas2024-highlights

Carol Ann Schwartz (right) with Dalia Itzik

Conference chairs (top, from left) Michelle Hubertus and Geri Lipschitz; an Evolve Hadassah gathering

At a plenary session devoted to the work of the Hadassah Medical Organization (HMO), Dalia Itzik, chair of HMO’s board of directors, expressed gratitude for the miracles Hadassah performs every day. “We pride ourselves on our world-leading specialists and cutting-edge equipment but, above all, on our soul, our  neshama ,” said Itzik, a former speaker of the Knesset.

Dr. Yoram Weiss, HMO director-general, stressed how hospital staff have persevered during the war, even with many out on reserve duty. “This shows you the dedication of the people who work at Hadassah,” he said. (Find an interview with Dr. Weiss at hadassah magazine.org .)

Conference attendees were wowed by Hadassah hospital staff who spoke of treating the wounded in the aftermath of October 7.

Dr. Oded Cohen Arazi, a trauma surgeon at Hadassah Hospital Ein Kerem, described treating his nephew, a soldier wounded by a bomb. He said that Hadassah had all the facilities needed to treat not only his nephew “but everybody else in the trauma bay and everybody else that came before and after him.”

“Thank you for enabling us to treat all these people,” he told the audience.

HMO Director-General

Dr. Yoram Weiss

Dr. Ruth Elimelech, who heads the psychological service at the Gandel Rehabilitation Center, said that mental health is becoming a greater priority in the medical world, and is crucial for war victims. “We want them to go and live full and meaningful lives,” she shared.

Hila Shmuel, an intensive care unit nurse at the Ein Kerem campus, spoke on behalf of the 2,350 HMO nurses. “I always knew how strong we can be, how united we can be,” she said. “We were fighting for each of our soldiers and each of our citizens.”

In an update about the United Nations, Ambassador Gilad Erdan, Israel’s permanent representative to the United Nations, spoke with Schwartz about the international body’s often biased treatment of Israel.

Assessing the makeup of the United Nations member countries, Erdan noted: “We all believe in democratic values. How many countries within the U.N. are democracies? I can tell you it’s less than half.”

On Israel’s war with Hamas, he said, “This war cannot end without the full obliteration of Hamas and the release of all of our hostages.”

Suzi Weiss-Fischmann (right), Emily Austin and Omri Sender

And directly addressing Hadassah, he lauded the End the Silence campaign and thanked the organization for “partnering with us on an important initiative to pressure not only the U.N. but the entire world to recognize the sexual atrocities that were committed by Hamas on October 7.”

Israeli-born master storyteller Talia Carner, a pro-Israel and women’s rights advocate, spoke with  Hadassah Magazine  Executive Editor Lisa Hostein about her newest novel,  The Boy with the Star Tattoo , during the One Book, One Hadassah event at the conference. An important look at Zionist and Jewish history, the novel portrays the rescue of Holocaust-era Jewish orphans by Youth Aliyah and a clandestine mission to acquire ships for Israel’s navy. Carner also spoke of her experiences being attacked on social media. “Antisemitism has become big in the publishing industry,” she lamented.

Antisemitism was the focus of two plenaries. At the Free Speech, Exclusion and Campus Climate session, David

Shlomo Demma (right) onstage with HMO staff (from left) Drs. Ruth Elimelech, Sheer Shabat and Oded Arazi and nurse Hila Shmuel.

NEW HADASSAH POLICY STATEMENTS

Ending the Silence on Gender-Based Violence —whether in Israel, Ukraine, Myanmar or anywhere else—is part of an effort to counter the denial of gender-based violence and to support investigation and consequences for entities that commit such brutal acts.

Safeguarding the Full Continuum of Reproductive Health Care  reaffirms “that every woman must have the right to control her own reproductive future, including if, when and how to have children.”

Denouncing Efforts to Exclude Jews and Zionists renews Hadassah’s “commitment to countering antisemitism, including antisemitism masked as anti-Zionism, and to denouncing the exclusion of Jews and Zionists from professional associations, publications and civil society groups in the U.S. and worldwide.”

Schizer, former dean of Columbia Law School and co-chair of Columbia University’s task force on antisemitism, highlighted students who have faced antisemitism and those who have stood up for them. Should we keep sending our children to Columbia, Hubertus, the conference chair, asked Schizer? “Absolutely, yes,” he replied. “What if Jewish students decide not to go to these schools anymore?... You then have very influential young people who are going to go on and do important things, not interacting with Jewish people or not meeting Jewish people.”

At the Responding to the Rise of Global Antisemitism and Anti-Zionism plenary, attorney Omri Sender of the international law group at S. Horowitz & Co. said that “it was incredibly painful” when asked how it felt as an Israeli Jew to defend Israel against South Africa’s allegations of genocide at the International Criminal Court. The session was led by Suzi Weiss-Fischmann, founder of the OPI brand nail polish, and included Emily Austin, a sports reporter, social media influencer and actor.

Still teenagers, Mina Levine and Shalhevetya Tannenwald were nevertheless the leading ladies at a session focused on Youth Aliyah. Interviewed by Youth Aliyah Co-Chairs Marcie Natan and Michele Rubin, the pair shared their experiences at Hadassah Neurim Youth Village.

“I was really depressed because my main bullies were my teachers and my peers. I was really lost,” 17-year-old Tannenwald said about her experiences before moving to Neurim. Now starting her third year at the village, she’s thriving, taking advantage of programs like training rescue dogs and surfing.

Levine was performing poorly in her previous school but now runs the village radio station and is student council president. The 16-year-old credits Neurim staff for her transformation.

“They help you. They teach you the ways, so it’s easy to succeed,” she said. “And they really care about you.”

The two were joined by Ami Magen, Hadassah Neurim’s CEO, who spoke about the village’s history and how it still provides refuge today, including to more than 100 students from southern Israel who have relocated there since October 7.

ANTISEMITISM: A CALL TO ACTION

Hadassah has launched Everyday Antisemitism: Women’s Stories, its first-ever antisemitism survey. Use this QR code to access the survey or go online to go.hadassah.org/tellyourstory.

Carol Ann Schwartz in conversation with Israeli U.N. representative Gilad Erdan (left); Lisa Hostein (far right) interviews author Talia Carner.

Montana Tucker (right) with Shalhevetya Tannenwald (center) and Mina Levine

Yellow nails honor the hostages.

Encountering Ghosts in Poland

Tragedy, beauty and storied Jewish heritage |

By Jennifer Wolf Kam

Here, they burned jews.”

Those words from our JRoots tour guide reverberated through the cold winter air as well as the empty spaces between us, a group of 50 American Jewish women traveling with Project Inspire Long Island.

We could have been in Basel, Switzerland, where in 1349 the Jewish population of the city was burned alive.

Or Cordoba, Spain, the seat of the Spanish Inquisition, where beginning in the late 15th century some of the Jews unwilling to convert to Christianity met flames on the stake.

We might have been standing in the ruins of Kibbutz Be’eri or Kfar Aza, attacked by Hamas on October 7.

Here, they burned Jews. In many places and periods, this statement holds true. As it happens, we were in probably the most famous, if not most efficient, region where Jews were ever burned: Poland. Specifically, we were standing before the crematorium of the Majdanek death camp.

I imagined my grandparents’ reaction had they lived to see me visit Poland: “You’re going where?”

Poland is a complicated place for

Jews, where centuries of rich, meaningful life was extinguished by the atrocities of the Shoah. Much of my grandfather’s extended family was murdered there between 1940 and 1944. Today, the size of the Jewish community is around 5,000, with thousands more having some Jewish heritage.

So why did i travel to Poland? The simple answer is that I wanted to connect with Jewish history, to mourn our people, to bear witness.

Along with my giant suitcase, I lugged around preconceived notions of a land where three million Jews were savagely murdered. To me, Poland had always seemed a gloomy place of lives lost and dreams unrealized, a hardened landscape where Jews got stuck in the late Middle Ages and remained until their near extermination.

What I hadn’t realized until my trip was how rich—academically, spiritually and culturally—Jewish life had been in Poland. I was awed when I learned of its infrastructure and traditions, progressive thought,

architecture and beauty. From the renowned early 20th century center of learning, Yeshivat Chachmei Lublin, to the indomitable Sarah Schnierer’s groundbreaking implementation of formalized Jewish education for girls, from the spiritual movement of Hasidism to the Jewish Enlightenment, Poland’s Jews—10 percent of its preWorld War II population—were a significant and impactful part of the country’s society.

Despite all this, Poland is, for many Jews, a country of ghosts. We walked beside them in what was once the Warsaw Ghetto. Razed by the Nazis, only fragments of the ghetto remain, and now memorials and monuments stand amid the postwar, socialist-era buildings not far from modern Warsaw’s skyscrapers.

Ghosts followed us to Warsaw’s Jewish cemetery on Okopowa Street, with its hundreds of thousands of graves. That’s where I located my great-great-great-grandfather Zerach Zylberfadem’s headstone. Where, as I searched for his stone, set far from the paved path, I felt at once alone yet very much surrounded by the lingering and protective souls of a

Ariel restaurant in Krakow’s old Jewish district of Kazimierz

vanished community.

The ghosts joined us in Krakow, about 200 miles south of Warsaw, where “Jew-ish” restaurants bear an almost Hollywood-like countenance, perhaps none more so than Ariel, whose many dining rooms— bedecked with paintings of rabbis and other Jewish-themed art—occupy a onetime tenement house in Kazimierz, the old Jewish district.

At times, it felt as though our group were actors in our own history, “authentic” Jews wandering the well-preserved backdrop of our ancestors. We circumnavigated other tour groups in Kazimierz and discovered ersatz Judaica in a flea market, some of it offensive, such as postcards of Hasidic men counting coins.

Of course, ghosts were with us in Majdanek and Auschwitz, and as we welcomed Shabbat beside the women’s barracks in Birkenau. Arm in arm, we sang “Sholem Aleichem” in honor of the souls murdered there and who, against all odds, found ways and reasons to keep Shabbat as prisoners.

In 2023, more than 1.6 million people visited Auschwitz, about 70 miles east of Krakow in the town of Oswiecim. I watched crowds of retirees, students and all manner of tourists walk past the rows of brick buildings, the haunting gas chambers, the one-way train tracks. I had to wonder, “Do any of these visitors acknowledge that the victims about whom they are learning are the same living, breathing Jews who are once again under fire post-October 7, as antisemitism surges around the world?”

This was not an easy trip. Moving,

evocative, important, but not easy. The story of Jewish life in Poland is difficult—at times almost impossible—to digest. Yet, I’m profoundly grateful that I made this journey.

Grateful I could walk Krakow’s beautiful medieval cobblestoned streets past picturesque views of the Vistula River, and that many Jewish historical sites throughout Poland are meticulously maintained and visited.

Inspired by burgeoning Jewish communities in Warsaw and Krakow, where the thriving Jewish community center is nestled within the Kazimierz district, where centuries-old brick buildings mingle with trendy bars, coffeehouses, restaurants and shops. The neighborhood is also where modern graffiti recalls the district’s Jewish past. Galician Jewish Art Nouveau illustrator E.M. Lilien is

prayed Friday evening in Krakow’s stunning 19th-century Tempel Synagogue and Shabbat morning at the 17th-century Kupa Synagogue, where prayers are inscribed on the walls. We joined students from the United Kingdom to pray for the release of the hostages in Gaza, for Israel and for the Jewish people.

And I was deeply moved by my visit to Majdanek, two hours southeast of Warsaw in Lublin. Visitors to the camp observe the crematorium ovens from behind a protective glass, an experience that creates a jarring juxtaposition of the gazer against the oven: Me, a Jew from the future, mirrored upon the final corporeal resting place of tens of thousands of my people. Our guide suggested that we use this phenomenon to confront ourselves and our discomfort, to consider how we will carry forward our time at Majdanek.

So, why Poland? and why now? Observing Shabbat in this land of ghosts, I felt the songs, the prayers

The ‘Monument to the Ghetto Heroes’ (right) and the POLIN museum in Warsaw

Street art in Kazimierz honors Galician Jewish artist E.M. Lilien.

WHAT TO SEE

WARSAW

Walk through the area of the razed Warsaw Ghetto to discover sites of moving commemoration. At the Umschlagplatz , a memorial of towering granite walls evokes the loading area at the former rail station from which more than 300,000 Jews were deported to death camps. Sculpted by Polish Jew Nathan Rapoport in 1948, the Monument to the Ghetto Heroes commemorates the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of 1943 and is constructed partially from German materials originally intended for Nazi monuments. Its imposing 36-foot-high wall symbolizes both the Kotel in Jerusalem and the ghetto walls. One side features uprising leader Mordechai Anielewicz, in bronze, while the other memorializes the ghetto’s victims. An unassuming mound of earth with stairs leading to a squat stone marker, the Mila 18 Memorial is the burial place of some of the courageous young men and women who organized and led the uprising. The mound rises above what was once the central command of the group, located at the former 18 Mila Street.

Just across from the Monument to the Ghetto Heroes, the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews showcases 1,000 years of Polish Jewish life and culture as well as rotating temporary exhibits.

Opened in 1902, the light and airy neoRomanesque Nozyk Synagogue is the only Jewish house of worship in Warsaw to survive World War II. Today, it functions as a cultural center and active synagogue. During services, a focal point is the dark stone-columned and domed structure that houses the Ark.

Founded in 1806, the Okopowa Street Cemetery contains over 200,000 marked graves as well as one of the largest mass graves in Europe—the thousands of individuals murdered in the Warsaw Ghetto. Jews interred

there include L.L. Zamenhof (1859-1917), creator of the Esperanto language, and renowned writer and playwright I.L. Peretz (1852-1915).

LUBLIN

The Majdanek concentration camp is located on a main road only a few miles from Lublin’s city center. Approximately 60,000 Jews were murdered there, and today they are honored through various memorials, including The Monument to Struggle and Martyrdom , an enormous mausoleum in the shape of a Slavic urn that houses the ashes of Majdanek victims.

Yeshivat Chachmei Lublin was founded in 1930 by Rabbi Meir Shapiro, who initiated the idea of learning Daf Yomi, a page of Talmud a day. The building that housed the yeshiva is now a hotel, located in the former Jewish quarter, but the school’s synagogue was returned to the Jewish community in 2003 and, after restoration, reopened for worship in 2007. The spacious synagogue features soft yellow walls, warm wood floors and a central bimah, with a women’s section above.

OSWIECIM

The Auschwitz-Birkenau complex, with its infamous entrance sign that reads “ Arbeit Macht Frei” (Work Sets You Free), may be the most recognizable symbol of Nazi atrocities. Auschwitz I was established in 1940 as a concentration and labor camp. In 1942, Auschwitz II, or Birkenau, was built as a designated killing camp and became the main site for the extermination of the Jewish people. Approximately 1.1 million people were murdered at AuschwitzBirkenau, all but around 100,000 of whom were Jews. The ominous railroad tracks leading into the camps, looming guard towers, barracks with seemingly endless rows of thin wooden bunks and the stark, terrifying emptiness of abandoned gas chambers bear witness to the site’s unconscionable purpose and history.

KRAKOW

For centuries beginning in the 1300s, Krakow was the center of Jewish life in Poland as well as the capital city, a diverse place of learning and culture. By the late 15th century, however, as antisemitism increased, Jews moved into neighboring Kazimierz, where they found religious freedom.

Located in Kazimierz, the Galicia Jewish Museum presents exhibitions that celebrate and commemorate the Jewish history and culture of Polish Galicia, a region that spans southeastern Poland and Western Ukraine. The museum boasts one of the largest Jewish bookshops in Poland.

There are seven main synagogues in Kazimierz. The Baroque-style Izaak Synagogue , one of the largest, features a mysterious legend about its 17th century namesake and founder, Izaak Jakubowicz. It is currently an exhibition space.

Built in 1862, the Tempel Synagogue is a stunning blend of Moorish and neo-Romanesque styles and was initially home to a Reform congregation. The synagogue hosts celebrations and festivals throughout the year and occasional religious services.

Kupa Synagogue , completed in 1643, owes much of its gilded beauty to the craftmanship of local goldsmiths. Colorful paintings on the walls and ceiling surround a central bimah and pews as well as a women’s balcony. The sanctuary is rarely open to the public but does host concerts, exhibits and conferences as well as religious services for the community.

The tiny the mid-16th century and subsequently reno vated and restored many times. Charming in its simplicity, with its central bimah surrounded by an openwork, wrought-iron grate, Remuh is the only synagogue in Kazimierz that offers regular services. It is named for Rabbi Moses Isserles,

Kazimierz is home to seven main Jewish houses of worship, including the Moorish and neo-Romanesque Tempel Synagogue (left) and the 15th-century Remuh.

a renowned scholar and codifier of Ashkenazi law known by the acronym “Rema” and who is buried in the adjacent cemetery. His halachic commentary, Sefer HaMappah (The Tablecloth), is still in use.

Established in 1941 in the Podgorze district, the Krakow Ghetto features three important sights. Eagle Pharmacy , today a museum, was owned and operated by Tadeusz Pankiewicz, who was honored by Yad Vashem in Jerusalem as a Righteous Among the Nations for providing medicine to ghetto residents, often free of charge, and helping some of them escape. In Ghetto Heroes Square , a memorial of 70 larger-than-life iron and bronze chairs placed around paving stones commemorate the city’s Jews who were deported from this plaza. And Oskar Schindler’s Enamel Factory is housed in the former factory of Schindler, who saved his Jewish laborers from deportation to the Plaszow concentration camp.

TARNOW

On the eve of World War II, the Jewish population of Tarnow was approximately 25,000, which represented about half the residents of the city, located about 45 miles east of Krakow. Almost the entire community was murdered during the Holocaust.

While the city’s 17th-century synagogue was destroyed by the Nazis, its towering stone bimah survived and still stands, topped by

a green-roofed canopy, and has become an open-air memorial in the center of town.

Only a short drive from Tarnow, in the Buczyna forest village of Zbylitowska Gora , is arguably one of the most devastating sites in Poland. In an otherwise picturesque and tranquil park lie the remains of approximately 800 Tarnow children murdered by the Nazis and now memorialized with stone slabs encircled by blue fencing.

IF YOU GO

JRoots is among a number of tour operators that offer Jewish heritage and culture trips to Poland. Other outfits include Authentic Israel; Greetings from Poland; Momentum Tours and Travel; Ramah Israel Institute; Ayelet; and Melton Travel.

and the communal spirit in my bones. That we could recite our ancient entreaties to God in the crisp Polish air 80 years after the Shoah is nothing short of a miracle. I like to imagine that our prayers escaped the vaulted synagogue ceilings, caught a distant wind and drifted through time and place to those who most need to hear them.

We remember you. We honor you. Reclamation, renewal and resilience forever shape our collective identity. While as Jews, we often confront the darkness in our experience, we’re continuously compelled to find ways to sustain ourselves and contribute to the world through advocacy, community, tzedakah, prayer—and, when possible, joyful and meaningful travel.

Jennifer Wolf Kam writes books for children and young adults and freelances for various publications (jenniferwolfkam.com). She lives in New York with her family.

Vegetables Take Center Stage

Make room for plant-based dishes on your holiday table

By Adeena Sussman

Picture the scene: yom kippur is about to end, and you’ve spent the last 24 food-free hours dreaming of your post-fast meal. You may be fantasizing about a bagel piled high with cream cheese, smoked salmon, whitefish salad and all the fixings—an emotionally resonant Jewish food tradition that satisfies body and soul.

But what if that “smoked salmon” was in fact made with carrots, and what if the “whitefish” was actually hearts of palm? For vegetarian cookbook author Micah Siva, they always are.

Rolls as well as Savory Pulled Mushroom and Tofu “Brisket” are inspired additions to your holiday table, rather than deletions.

The idea of a vegetarian diet in Judaism traces back to the creation story. In the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve ate only plants. Now, many new cookbooks, like Siva’s, as well as organizations such as the Philadelphia-based Jewish Veg, which makes an ethical, environmental and religious argument for Jews to live a plant-based lifestyle, promote the connection between being Jewish and eschewing meat. And while environmental, ethical and health considerations around eating animals have popularized plant-based diets, home cooks are increasingly looking for vegetarian and vegan options for every day and holidays.

n her new book, Matzah and Flour: Recipes from the History of Sephardic , author Hélène Jawhara Piñer bases much of her research on records of trials of Jews in Spain and Mexico during the Inquisition that

A produce-filled holiday spread from ‘Jewish Holiday Table’

reference the foods they ate as evidence—or defense—in cases brought against them. “It’s how we know how central vegetables were to their holiday cooking,” Piñer said.

In many cases, instead of exposing their Jewish heritage by purchasing kosher meat, Jews in Spain would stick to vegetarian dishes. Piñer, who splits her time between France and Spain, also discovered that later, to avoid drinking nonkosher wine, conversos would use drinking chocolate—a relatively new delicacy thanks to the exploration of Christopher Columbus—for kiddush. (Go to hadassahmagazine.org/food for Piñer’s recipes for hot chocolate and biscuits that Spanish Jews would consume to mark the end of Yom Kippur.)

Although meat is still a central part of Jewish cooking for many, vegetables are increasingly taking center stage, allowing veggie lovers (and their families and friends) to have holiday harmony at the table.

In the case of Siva’s whitefish salad, she replaces regular mayo with a vegan version, adds liquid smoke flavoring and seaweed for “fishiness,” folds in white beans for protein and finishes off with dill. “It hits all the nostalgia points, and it’s a dish I can feel good about serving,” she said.

Sentimentality around food is something that Siva, who lives in San

Micah Siva

Francisco, understands. “No one knew what to do with me,” she said about becoming a vegetarian at age 12. Her grandmother was so heartbroken by the development that she slipped Siva some actual chopped liver under the guise of a vegetarian version.

“It took me—and them—a while to get over it, but my family came around,” she said.

For Jewish Food Society founder Naama Shefi, growing up on a kibbutz outside of Tel Aviv informed an early appreciation of the agrarian nature of Jewish and Israeli foodways.

“Late summer and early fall, when the Jewish holidays occur, are seasons that overflow with great abundance,” said Shefi, who is the co-author, with Devra Ferst, of the recently released Jewish Holiday Table: A World of Recipes, Traditions & Stories to Celebrate All Year Long. “There is so much room for culinary creativity.”

That creativity extends to the plant-based side dishes and main courses in the book, which features recipes for Jewish occasions curated by Jewish food-world luminaries. In the menu created by Ron and Leetal Arazi, the founders of spice company New York Shuk, there’s a creamy fava bean

Heart of Palm

‘Whitefish’ Salad

Serves 4

1 14-ounce can white beans , drained and rinsed

1 14- ounce can whole hear ts of palm, drained

1/4 c up finely chopped celery

1 tablespoon finely chopped r ed onion

soup as well as a cilantro carrot salad recipe that speak to their Moroccan and Lebanese heritage.

“The carrot salad is ideal for a holiday buffet,” said Shefi, who now lives in New York, “because it tastes great served room temperature and is even better after a night in the refrigerator.”

Shefi said she was ultimately surprised at the number of plant-based dishes in the final edit of the new book, noting recipes for Festive Rice With Nuts, Herbs and Onions as well as Fried Eggplant With Mint Dressing and Spinach Rissoles (fritters). “When we pulled back,” she said, “we realized that vegetables have been integral

to Jewish food traditions for a long, long time.”

It’s a point Michael Solomonov— chef and owner of Israeli restaurants in Philadelphia, New York and, soon, Miami—made when offering up his new Eggplant T’bit recipe. “Jews in Iraq have been eating eggplant since before the birth of Islam,” he said. “It speaks to the importance of eggplant in our cooking traditions.”

This t’bit comes from Solomonov’s new book, Zahav Home: Cooking for Friends & Family, written with his business partner, Steve Cook. Classic t’bit is a one-pot meal typically perfumed with clove- and

3 tablespoons vegan mayonnaise

1 t easpoon Dijon mustard

1 1/2 t easpoons liquid smoke

1/2 t easpoon lemon zest

1/2 t easpoon dulse flakes

1 t easpoon lemon juice

3 tablespoons minced fr esh dill, divided

1. In a medium bowl, roughly mash the beans with a fork. Using a fork, shred the hearts of palm into the bowl with the beans.

2. Add the celery, red onion, mayonnaise, Dijon mustard, liquid smoke, lemon zest, dulse flakes,

lemon juice and 2 tablespoons of the dill and mix until well combined. Season with salt and pepper, to taste.

3. Top with the remaining 1 tablespoon of dill and serve immediately.

S alt & black pepper

Siva’s ‘whitefish’ salad (bottom right) featured on a breakfast board

Eggplant T’bit

2 3/4 te aspoons salt, plus mor e for the eggplant

1 m edium eggplant, peeled and c ut into 1/2 -inch rounds

1 cup jasmine or basma ti rice

2 t ablespoons olive oil, plus mor e for brushing

1 h ead garlic, cloves separa ted and peeled

2 la rge carrots, c ut into rounds

1/2 head cauliflower, flor ets separated

1 cinnamon stick

1 3/4 c ups hot water

2 t easpoons tomato paste

1 t easpoon amba

1 t easpoon ground turmeric Serves 6

1. Generously salt the eggplant slices on top and let sit for about 30 minutes.

2. Meanwhile, soak the rice for 30 minutes. Drain and place in a large bowl.

3. Rinse the eggplant well. Squeeze by hand to remove as

cinnamon-laced Baharat and usually made by stuffing a chicken with rice before baking. Solomonov and Cook invented a vegetarian version by layering tender, meaty eggplant and cauliflower under a mound of turmeric- and cinnamon-scented rice. At the table, the dish gets inverted onto a platter for dramatic effect, with the vegetables taking their rightful place at the top of the dish.

“Festive platters that aren’t meat-

much water as possible.

4. Arrange the eggplant slices in a single layer on a sheet pan and brush the tops with olive oil. Set the oven to the low broiler setting. Cook until the eggplant is tender and reaches a deeply roasted color, 30 to 35 minutes.

5. In another bowl, stir together the garlic, carrots, cauliflower, 2 teaspoons of the salt and the 2 tablespoons of olive oil.

6. Transfer to a sheet pan and arrange in a single layer. Broil

Carrot Salad

With Cilantro

Serves 6 to 8

6 large carrots (about 1 1/2 pounds), peeled and trimmed 1/4 c up extra-virgin olive oil, or mor e to taste

1 t easpoon kosher salt

1 to 2 tablespoons harissa

1 tablespoon fr esh lemon juic e, or more to taste

2 tablespoons finely chopped fr esh cilantro

1. Preheat the oven to 400°.

based are becoming more and more important as we begin to see more vegetarians at our family tables,” Solomonov said. “And this way, your relatives can expect something other than Tofurky.”

Adeena Sussman lives in Tel Aviv. She is the author of Shabbat: Recipes and Rituals from My Kitchen to Yours and Sababa: Fresh, Sunny Flavors from My Israeli Kitchen. Sign up for her newsletter at adeenasussman.substack.com.

until tender and golden, about 20 minutes. Transfer to the bowl containing the drained rice, stirring together until evenly mixed.

7. Using olive oil, generously coat the sides and bottom of a medium (3- to 4-quart) enameled cast-iron pot. Line the bottom with the broiled eggplant and cover the sides as much as possible.

8. Spoon the vegetable-rice mixture on top of the eggplant, pressing it down to compress. Tuck the cinnamon stick into the rice like a buried treasure.

2.

baking sheet, drizzle with 2 table spoons of the olive oil, sprinkle with the salt and toss to coat. Cover the baking sheet with foil and bake until the carrots are very tender when pierced with a fork, 30 to 40 minutes.

3.

the carrots cool until you’re able to handle them, then slice them into 1/4-inch rounds.

4.

and add about 1 tablespoon of the harissa, the lemon juice and the remaining 2 tablespoons olive oil.

9. In another bowl, whisk together the hot water, tomato paste, amba, turmeric and the remaining 3/4 teaspoon of salt.

10. Pour the spiced liquid on top of the rice. Cover and place the pot over medium-high heat. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat to low. Cook for 25 minutes.

11. Remove the pot from the heat and let the t’bit rest, covered, for an hour.

12. Carefully(!) invert onto a large platter.

Eggplant T’bit

“YOU’LL LAUGH YOUR TUCHAS OFF!”

The Huffington Post

“Delicious! DISTINCTLY ORIGINAL & POWERFULLY POIGNANT. Great Comedy!” - New York Times

This hilarious & poignant story is universal in its message: The journey to follow one’s DREAM, and the parents who SUFFER thru it!

Actor/Comedian Brad Zimmerman’s moving & hilarious story is about the grit & passion required to ‘make it’ as an artist, and the sweet rewards that come from never giving up. Brad graduated from college with a theater degree and moved to New York where he ‘temporarily’ waited tables for 29 years while pursuing his career as an actor. Finally, he found success with a role on the Sopranos, and as the opening act for Joan Rivers (for 8 years), Brad Garrett and George Carlin. He now stars in his own hit Off Broadway show that is as profound and touching as it is entertaining.

“AnMust-See!Absolute IF YOU CAN FIND SOMETHING THAT YOU TRULY LOVE, IT GIVES YOUR LIFE MEANING.“ Palm Beach Arts Paper

The

By Rebecca Cypess Mozart

Fin a Time of Terror

Carmel Quartet and its loyal audiences

ollowing the horrific attacks of October 7, 2023, when all performances in Israel’s classical music scene ground to a halt, it was violinist Rachel Ringelstein who broke the silence. Ringelstein is a founding member of the Carmel Quartet, an award-winning string chamber group. Just weeks after the terror attacks, she insisted that the group return to rehearsing works by Mozart, Mendelssohn, Beethoven, Shostakovich and other classical composers and, eventually, to performing them for their loyal audiences.

At the time, Ringelstein and her family were waiting anxiously for information about her niece, Staff Sgt. Yam Glass, one of the female observer soldiers, or tatzpitaniyot, stationed at the Nahal Oz military base near the border with Gaza. When Hamas terrorists overran the base, 15 tatzpitaniyot were murdered and seven were taken hostage. Glass’s fate was unknown until November

3, when the Israel Defense Forces announced that she had been murdered on October 7.

Yet Ringelstein found that bringing the quartet together gave her a sense of purpose amid the chaos. “Playing with the quartet was healing,” Ringelstein, who lives in Givatayim, recalled of those first terrible weeks. “It gave me the strength to keep going and to support my family and Yam’s family. I would go to quartet rehearsals and then drive to their house in Modi’in and sit with them. I could do that because of the music.”

On October 26, the Carmel Quartet became the first Israeli classical ensemble to play publicly after the attack. With Israel at war and many Israelis traumatized and disoriented, the quartet brought classical music to their country and audiences back to the concert hall.

Now, almost one year later, amid the exhaustion and fears of the ongoing war, they are preparing for a new

season of concerts that will offer refuge and moments of musical beauty for listeners.

Based in tel aviv, the Carmel Quartet consists of first violinist Ringelstein, second violinist Tali Goldberg, violist Yoel Greenberg and cellist Tami Waterman. Each season, the quartet, which was founded in 2000, presents about 30 concerts and participates in another 20 hosted by other ensembles and music festivals.

The quartet is dedicated to music education. In its main concert series, Strings and More, Greenberg, a professor of music at Hebrew University, speaks during the program. In addition to describing the compositions, he places them within a cultural and aesthetic context by juxtaposing the music with discussions of history, literature and visual art.

Over the years, the quartet has built not just an audience, but a community. It is the only chamber group in Israel with an annual subscription series—season tickets for five performances, each presented at intimate venues nationwide with crowds of 100 to 150 people.

Carmel Quartet musicians (from left) Tali Goldberg, Rachel Ringelstein, Yoel Greenberg and Tami Waterman

“We fell in love with the quartet right from the beginning, not only because of the music they play, and the way they play,” said Orna Reshef, a software developer from Jerusalem, reflecting on the 10 years that she and her family have been quartet subscribers. “We also felt close to the people in the quartet themselves.”

This connection with the audience proved crucial in the aftermath of the Hamas attack.

Greenberg, Ringelstein and their colleagues changed little about the planned programming for the 20232024 season—a few additions and some reframing allowed them to create an experience that spoke to the moment. For that first October program, which took place at the Jerusalem Music Centre, they performed Musical Maps, part of the Strings and More series. Its theme explored storytelling through musical composition and included works by

‘THEIR PORTRAITS’ DEPICTS LOSS, REMEMBRANCE AND FAMILY

Mozart and Mendelssohn—standard repertoire for the group—as well as a recitation of “Jabberwocky,” Lewis Carol’s well-known poem, accompanied by illustrations from his book Through the Looking Glass.

Greenberg used the poem, famed for its nonsense words, as an example of how meter and repetition can create a sense of orientation, or narrative, in poetry or instrumental music, and he compared “Jabberwocky” to Mozart’s string quartet in A major, K. 464. (This and other concert excerpts can be heard through links in the online version of this article, at hadassahmagazine.org/arts.)

To acknowledge the pain all Israelis were feeling, the quartet opened Musical Maps with two added pieces: string arrangements of “Lu Yehi” (May It Be So) and “Al Kol Eleh” (For All These Things), both by iconic Israeli composer Naomi Shemer. These pieces—familiar, evoc-

In the months after October 7, a group of eight Jewish artists from Philadelphia with family and friends in Israel decided to use their art to express their fears and pain, hope and grieving. The result is a series of 200 paintings of men, women and children captured by Hamas on that day. Called “Their Portraits,” the exhibition is currently on display at the

ative, simultaneously mournful and hopeful—created a bridge between the plight of Israel post-October 7 and the suspended, imagined reality of the concert.

Speaking before a full audience at the music center, Greenberg acknowledged that the four of them had never imagined beginning a season under such circumstances, during a period when “everything we recognize seems missing.” He added that that the concert was intended to provide “a moment of escape—not to deny the problems, but simply to be in another place.”

The idea worked. Author and law professor Orit Kamir of Jerusalem, a longtime subscriber, doesn’t remember which pieces of music she heard at the concert. Instead, she recalls only the sense of normality and community. “The first two months [after October 7], I was in complete shock. I was out of it. I

The exhibition includes information about the current status of each hostage, and visitors can participate in writing prayers or poems to the hostage families, which will be forwarded by the museum.

“As I painted, I put each portrait on my wall, so that they could watch me paint their friends, family and fellow Israelis,” said Nancy Gordon, one of the artists and one of several Hadassah members in the group. “They became a part of my family.”

Aviv Katz-Asher, painted by Judy Rothbart Agam Berger, painted by Nancy Gordon Eitan Horn, painted by Sivia Braunstein

Museum of Biblical Art in Dallas.

NIKKI SCHREIBER SHARES THE POSITIVE

Humans of Judaism fights hate with love |

By Curt Schleier

An August 2024 post on Humans of Judaism ( @humansofjudaism ) shares photographs of the Israeli athletes who won Olympic medals in Paris even as their country faced the threat of an Iranian attack. Another celebrates Martin Cooper, the Jewish American engineer who invented the first personal cell phone, and a third memorializes sex therapist Dr. Ruth, who passed away in July.

With its tagline “Everyone has a story. What’s Yours?,” Humans of Judaism is creator Nikki Schreiber’s way of finding an upbeat counter to the grief and heartache many Jews are experiencing these days. Through its posts on Instagram, X (the former Twitter), TikTok, Facebook and other social media platforms, the popular social media brand shares daily Jewish mini-profiles, stories and photographs with its nearly 800,000 followers across all its platforms.

Why do you think your feeds have become so popular?

I did nothing to promote it, other than to tell a few friends and family. But I started the Instagram page on June 8, 2014, and that month, three Israeli boys—Eyal Yifrach, Gilad Shaer and Naftali Fraenkel—were kidnapped by Hamas terrorists. And that started a war with Gaza, so the summer was a little like October 7 in terms of people yearning for some type of strength while they were mourning.

Why did you decide to publish your book now?

It was bashert . The book was always meant to be a meaningful read with Jewish stories. However, following October 7, a greater purpose emerged in sharing Jewish pride, resulting in profound timing for the book’s publication.

How did your social media focus develop?

For many Jews, one of our favorite things is to find out that a celebrity is Jewish. I’m a big pop culture fan, so it was thrilling for me to be able to dig a little deeper into this. One of my early posts was about Jewish fashion designer

Schreiber, who grew up in a Modern Orthodox family in Highland Park, N.J., was close with her father, Bayrish, a part-time cantor and senior executive with a large accounting firm. When he died unexpectedly in November 2013, at 67, she was devastated.

Several months into her year of mourning, she decided to do “something meaningful in his memory,” Schreiber said. She started Humans of Judaism (a riff on the popular Humans of New York photoblog) to “share positive moments within the Jewish community.”

“If even one person appreciates the post of the day, that’s success,” said Schreiber, who lives in Teaneck, N.J., and works for a health care management company. “I’m not looking for millions of likes. I just want to reach the people who want this type of content.”

Max Azria, who delayed a show during New York Couture Fashion Week because it fell on Rosh Hashanah. I’m constantly growing, trying out new things. Over the last few years, I’ve been focusing on biography, history, Holocaust survivors, Righteous Among the Nations.

Has October 7 impacted what you share online?

It changed everything. After the Hamas attack, there was greater public focus on Jewish content, some seeking to connect with Judaism and others looking to tear it down. This, for me,

Schreiber’s latest project is Humans of Judaism , the book, scheduled for release on October 22. It features some 300 inspirational stories and photographs from Schreiber’s posts as well as original material. This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.

resulted in a high volume of hate speech/bots and a sizable boost in new followers.

Prior to October 7, the comments section wasn’t an echo chamber, but comments were very much in the tenor of the post. Today, every post has a certain number of negative comments. I keep most up, even disagreements. But I won’t allow hate speech.

What was it like sharing those first posts after the Hamas attacks?

There was a great deal of sensitivity to providing content that would give followers a space of comfort that highlights unity, strength, perseverance and the support of our friends.

It was also important for me to share facts and history of Israel, which were being wildly distorted. My mother’s family had to flee the Old City of Jerusalem in the 1920s [during the Arab riots]; they had been there for seven generations. I strive to fight hate with love, address misinformation with education and maintain a safe online space to celebrate Judaism.

Curt Schleier, a freelance writer, teaches business writing to corporate executives.

A captured moment of joy in Jerusalem

wasn’t functioning. I wasn’t working. I wasn’t doing anything,” she said. In this context, the quartet’s concerts provided “a small space of sanity.”

Oded Zehavi, one of Israel’s foremost composers and a frequent collaborator with the quartet, described those first performances as a brave reminder of what exists beyond the pain of the moment. “The Carmels took it upon themselves to give a point of reference to normality by continuing to play—not forcing anyone to listen, but saying, just remember there is a universe within the universe, and there is beauty within these days, and please come and share it with us.”

The second program of the season, themed Women in Music, included works by female composers Amy Beach and Maddalena Lombardini Sirmen as well as “Shira” (Song), a composition by contemporary Israeli composer Sarit Shley Zondiner, and Beethoven’s famous string quartet Op. 95, “Serioso.” In his commentary, Greenberg dedicated the concert to Ringelstein’s niece and all other Israeli women who fell in battle or were tortured or murdered on October 7.

“The whole audience was in tears,” Kamir recalled.

As part of their schedule over the past year, the quartet has performed for children in the Dizengoff shopping center in Tel Aviv as well as in hotels throughout the country where evacuees from the Gaza envelope have lived as refugees.

Bringing joy to even a few of these evacuees made the performances worthwhile, Greenberg said. “Once we went to a hotel to play, and it was clearly not something that interested most people there,” he recalled frankly. “But every now and again someone would walk past with a little child, and the little child would sit

and listen and would respond, and then move on. But there were two women who sat there and listened from beginning to end. And our sense was, if we’ve done that for two people who don’t have a home at the moment and have been through something terrible, then that’s a big thing.”

The quartet has continued incorporating work by Israeli composers into their performances. At the Tel Aviv Art Museum in June, they performed a string quartet by Zehavi, the second movement of which Greenberg described as “sort of a prayer.” Composed in 2001, Zehavi’s work nevertheless captures the pain of a post-October 7 world.

The quartet also performed at Yam Glass’s funeral.

Looking ahead, even as it gets

ready for a new season of concerts, the quartet is preparing to play at a memorial concert that Ringelstein is organizing for Glass in November.

Reflecting on why the quartet’s wordless music has spoken to so many so profoundly in the last year, Ringelstein said, sometimes “we can’t express what we feel with words. There are no words. Words like ‘sadness’ are nothing compared to what we feel. And it’s all in the music—all our emotions are there in the music.”

Rebecca Cypess is a musicologist and the Mordecai D. Katz and Dr. Monique C. Katz Dean of the Undergraduate Faculty of Arts and Sciences at Yeshiva University. She is the author or editor of seven books, including Women and Musical Salons in the Enlightenment, and has written extensively about music in Jewish history.

Bring your heart home to Israel with Hadassah. We’re offering several trips next year, each one offering an exciting lineup of activities. Here’s just a taste:

• Israel in Full Bloom: Tu B’Shevat & Darom Adom February 9–20

• Celebrate the Miracles of Israel: Purim & Hadassah March 9–19

• Yom Ha’atzmaut: Illuminating Israel’s Tomorrow! April 27–May 7

Check out all the 2025 trips at go.hadassah.org/travel or contact Ayelet Tours at hadassah@ayelet.com or 800.237.1517

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Across Tony Soprano's wife, for short

Who by Fire

By Jonathan Schmalzbach

Like Papa Bear's porridge, to Goldilocks

ACROSS

Discouraging words

La Scala solo

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5. Like Papa Bear’s porridge, to Goldilocks

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Who by Fire

47. NYSE symbol for the c ompany that keeps going...and going...

48. “S impsons” stalwart Harry

49. “And who shall ” (last line of title song)

52. N eighbor of Libya

55. D eity featured in “Aida”

Much covered classic from -across

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911 respondent

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Apportion, with "out"

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Word used in many Baptist church names

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24. Much c overed classic from 17-across

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And so forth "Billions" network, briefly

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NYSE symbol for the company that keeps going ...and going...

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46. “B illions” network, briefly

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57. S econd question of title song

60. “ My man!”

62. N ormal

63. Yosemite’s setting

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67. Song and dance, e.g.

13. Jets coach Robert

67. S ong and dance, e.g.

68. When 31-across is recited

72. Pray, to René

68. W hen 31-across is recited

73. Hot, in Vegas

72. P ray, to René

74. Genesis setting

73. H ot, in Vegas

75. French watch brand

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DOWN

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22. Hebrew leader

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33. A-list ers

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63. Musical notes

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40. Puppeteer Tony

70. C harlemagne’s domain: abbr.

70. Charlemagne's domain: abbr.

71. S anta’s syllables

71. Santa's syllables

Heroism and Raw Trauma

New books examine our post-10/7 landscape

By Bryan Schwartzman

On august 6, 1945, the Enola Gay, an American B-29 bomber, dropped a nearly 10,000-pound atomic bomb on Hiroshima, leveling the Japanese city, killing some 146,000 people and ushering in the nuclear age. A year later, the American public had only a vague sense of the human misery caused by the war-ending mushroom clouds at Hiroshima and, the next day, over Nagasaki. The public had only seen images that had passed through United States military censors.

Enter Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist John Hersey. In spare prose devoid of commentary, he described the lives of six individuals before, during and after the “terrible flash.” The resulting New Yorker article and landmark book, Hiroshima, both published in 1946, completely changed the American conversation about the use of atomic weapons.

Beyond unfathomable destruction and loss of life, there are few similarities between the American bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki—many still debate the justness of the bombings—and the sadistic, unprovoked murders and kidnappings launched on October 7, 2023, by Hamas and allied terror groups. And the first batch of books to reflect on October 7 have arrived in a vastly different world from 1946. Today, we have

an abundance of sounds and images: The perpetrators filmed and broadcasted their barbarous acts. The film Screams Before Silence, documenting Hamas’s unspeakable acts of sexual violence as acts of war, can be seen on YouTube.

We can’t expect even the most powerful book to impact the conversation on the Israel-Hamas war to the degree that Hersey’s did—or to engender any sympathy for Israel among those who oppose its very existence. So, what kind of impact can books possibly have on our wrecked landscape?

Quite a lot, it turns out. A trio of new volumes—10/7 by Lee Yaron, One Day in October by Yair Agmon and Oriya Mevorach and October 7 compiled by Tal Chaika— manage, like Hiroshima, to rescue individual stories from the anonymity of statistics. They also do something else.

Very much like Donna Rosenthal’s underrated 2003 gem, The Israelis: Ordinary People in an Extraordinary Land, these three books paint a portrait of Israelis in all their diversity: ravers, idealistic kibbutzniks,

Netanyahu supporters, Religious Zionists, Bedouins, Druze, foreign workers, police and soldiers, parents and kids.

Yaron’s 10/7: 100 Human Stories (St. Martin’s Press) draws most directly from the bottom-up reporting techniques employed by Hersey. It also is the only one originally published in English. In the afterword, Yaron’s husband, Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Joshua Cohen, likens the work to the Yizkor books that memorialized whole towns eradicated in the Shoah. Yaron, a correspondent for Ha’aretz, describes herself in the book as “the daughter and granddaughter of refugees and survivors of the Holocaust. I am a Jew; I am an Israeli; I am also a woman, a feminist, a journalist, and a proud adherent of the camp that supports the rights of all peoples between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.”

Through scores of interviews, Yaron immerses the reader in the utter confusion of the assault and the terror of not knowing. Different chapters offer snapshots of how this awful day was experienced in towns such as Sderot and Ofakim, in kibbutzim like Be’eri and Kfar Aza and at the Nova music festival.

At its best, the book powerfully relays human stories, often ones that haven’t received wide attention. Like the account of Amar Abu Sabila, a Bedouin who died in Sderot saving two young girls who had seen their mother gunned down only to have his own body remain unidentified for weeks because he was mistakenly buried with terrorists.

Until now, I hadn’t heard much about how at least 1,000 Ukrainians, refugees from the 2022 Russian invasion of their home country, were

A memorial at Kibbutz Re’im honors the Israelis killed at the Nova music festival.

forced to flee the southern city of Ashkelon on October 7. One of the most memorable tales in 10/7 involves Eitan, one of those refugees, a Jewish boy raised in an Odessa orphanage and now living in Ashkelon. We learn of his harrowing flight, first to Moldova with members of his extended family and ultimately to Israel and his heartbreaking reaction once the rockets started on that Shabbat morning.

“Eitan was sure he was going to die, he just didn’t know whether by a missile strike or a terrorist’s bullet,” Yaron writes. By chance, he lived.

This important work has a few flaws. Yaron attempts to link so many stories that the reader has to strain to keep the names straight. Further, the two sections that provide historical and political context, while thoughtful and balanced, carry a rushed quality and take the reader away from the human accounts that are the book’s essence.

By highlighting victims and survivors, One Day in October: Forty Heroes, Forty Stories (Maggid Books) accomplishes many of the same things as 10/7, though it approaches the telling from another perspective. While Yaron comes from the secular left, Agmon and Mevorach are associated with the Religious Zionist right. They wish to celebrate heroism, those who “emerged from the shelter of their homes, charged into the inferno and fought like lions to save lives.” They seek to change the October 7 narrative from victimization to heroism.

I found myself uncomfortable with the attempt to draw redemption from the carnage. Or with defining heroism or separating heroes from the rest of those directly affected by the attacks. How can anyone judge the behavior of someone frightened for their life?

Still, the power of these 40 monologues made me reconsider. Perhaps miraculous things did happen. Again and again, we read accounts of men, women and those not much older than children sacrificing themselves to save family members, of police and soldiers choosing again and again to go into harm’s way to try and save others.

One example is the story of Amit Mann, a paramedic from Kibbutz Be’eri, told by her sister, Miri. On that day, amid the booming of missiles and the sirens, a friend invited her to leave for Netivot. She “insisted on staying in the kibbutz to treat the wounded,” which she did for hours with little equipment and little help until she herself was killed by terrorists. “From her perspective, if she could save just one or two or three people, then she did what she had to do in this world. That was Amit.”

October 7: Voices of Survivors and Witnesses (Prospecta Press) was compiled by Tal Chaika, an Israeli product manager at a high-tech firm, with an introduction by Israeli President Isaac Herzog. The book represents an effort by the Israeli public itself to capture the feelings and emotions of traumatized people in the days, weeks and months after

October 7.

“The turmoil, both personal and national,” Herzog writes, “will continue to haunt us for years to come.”

On that level, the book succeeds. I have not traveled to Israel since October 7, yet I suspect this book gives some semblance of what it must feel like to be there, to encounter such raw trauma.

Nevertheless, the gathered blog posts, poems, journal entries and eulogies lack the immediacy of the other works. Though not without moments of inspiration and heartbreak, the reader feels weeks removed from the events and sometimes is not provided

ONE BOOK, ONE HADASSAH

Join us on October 30 at 12:30 PM ET as best-selling Israeli novelist, activist and photojournalist Lihi Lapid discusses her recently translated book, On Her Own , with Hadassah Magazine Executive Editor Lisa Hostein. Set between Passover and Israel’s Independence Day, the gripping novel about two women from different segments of Israeli society explores the universal intricacies of family relationships while telling a distinctly Israeli story. Free and open to all. To register, use the QR code here or go to hadassahmagazine.org.

(From left) Amit Mann, Aner Shapira, Awad Darawshe and Ben Shimoni all died saving lives on October 7.

basic information or context.

After reading these three heartbreaking books, I was reminded of the remarkable nature of all Israelis and Israel itself. Whether or not the government can project any sense of vision or competence, after reading hundreds of pages about the worst moments in the country’s history, I was left with the feeling that the people who managed to create such full lives and vibrant communities will endure this and whatever is to come. These works made me think that, just maybe, Israelis can rekindle the hope for peace. That thought flickered for just a moment.

Bryan Schwartzman, a writer living outside Philadelphia, hosts the podcast Evolve: Groundbreaking Jewish Conversations.

MORE OCTOBER 7 READS

Israel Alone By Bernard-Henri Lévy. Translated by

Steven B. Kennedy (Wicked Son)

Passion, anger, fear, sadness, steadfastness—a score of emotions— pour out of French philosopher Bernard-Henri Lévy in his concise, impactful new book, Israel Alone The prominent public intellectual, known simply as BHL in France, flew to Israel on October 8, 2023, a day after the Hamas terror attacks. He has returned numerous times since to chronicle the ensuing war and its ramifications for Israel, the Jewish people and what he calls the “Global West”—Europe, America and those countries in the world that “have faith in Western Enlightenment.”

This is Lévy’s first book about Israel in a nearly 50-year career that has spawned books, films, articles, essays and countless media appearances. Over the past year, he has been a steadfast supporter of

Israel in his native country, despite significant pushback in the media and among the intelligentsia. Indeed, this book resulted from his promise to survivors, former hostages and their families that he would use his platform to bear witness and defend the State of Israel.

And defend it he does. In three chapters titled “October 7 and After,” “Negation in Our Time” and “History and Truth,” he offers erudite and cogent arguments to support Israel against charges of racism, apartheid, “colonial settlerism,” military overreaction, genocide and Islamophobia. Along the way, he references philosophers, arcane French politics, even his own works, as he marshals his sources to support his main theses.

The first is that Israel is alone in this conflict because of moral and intellectual turpitude of the Global West. “Today, there is no question more pressing for humanity than that of the evil that one man can do to another. The question has been off the West’s radar for a long time,” he writes. “The banishment [of that question] was the work of religions teaching that evil will be redeemed and that we must not settle for the idea that the world is a vale of tears.”

The second is that the anti-democratic axis of Russia, China, Iran, Turkey and Islamist Arab nations is abetting and delighting in the spectacle of Israel’s estrangement.

He also discusses how the realities of Hamas’s depredations are already being whitewashed and covered up.

And finally, he determines that antisemitism, that hatred of the Jews that Lévy calls Amalek, is behind it all. “No land on this planet is a shelter for Jews; that is what the Event of October 7 proclaims. Never and

nowhere will it be possible to say that Jews can live in the world the way the French live in France, the English in England, and the Americans in America—and that will be true until the end of time….”

Nevertheless, he insists, Israel and the Jews must never deny their exceptionalism and unique characteristics, which he describes as “rejection of anything resembling contempt for the stranger, hate for the other, racism, or chauvinism, all of which are forms of idolatry.”

For Lévy, the term “chosen people” means that Israel and the Jewish people are “the secret treasure needed by nations that wish to renounce their part in inhumanity and join others on the path of redemption…. The task of the Jews is to repair the world.”

He also doesn’t mince words about the violence done by Hamas, describing his visits to towns and kibbutzim near the Gaza border. “I will never forget my first impressions,” he writes. “The smell of sour milk that filled the bullet-pocked, blasted, half-burned houses; the contents of their kitchen cabinets scattered in the rooms, as if blown away by a hurricane.… Or, finally, the vegetable storage shed where unidentified body parts that had just been collected were stacked in a small pile of flesh, indistinct except for the stench.”

First published in France in March, Lévy’s book earned a plethora of reviews and debates, due to his national celebrity, with responses varying based on the political leanings of the outlets. He is less well known in the United States, so it is uncertain whether the new English-language version of the book will cause the same sort of ripples. Regardless, it is an important read, for those familiar with Lévy and those who are not.

—Alan D. Abbey

Alan D. Abbey is a research fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute with a 40-year career as a journalist, teacher and media professional in the United States and Israel. Born in Brooklyn, he moved to Jerusalem in 1999.

How Isn’t It Going? Conversations After October 7

By Delphine Horvilleur. Translated by Lisa Appignanesi (Europa Compass)

A personal essay collection filled with cries of pain, attempts to reconcile the time before and after October 7 and, perhaps most surprisingly, moments of humor, Delphine Horvilleur’s latest is her powerful response to the shock and fracturing of the past year—as a Jew, a woman, a mother and a leader of a Jewish community—in just 91 pages.

Horvilleur is the rabbi of Synagogue Beaugrenelle in Paris and co-leader of France’s Liberal Jewish Movement. Her opening essay, “Conversation with My Pain,” describes the impossibility of responding to the query, “How are you?” from anyone, including congregants and friends at this moment.

“Since October 7th, I carefully avoid answering it. I rid myself of all the rules of politeness,” she writes. “Or better still, I dream that the entire world understood that from now on nothing is said except in Yiddish.” All interactions, she says, should start with “Oy a broch” or “Oy vay is mir”: “Oy vay—a small espresso, as usual, thank you.”

Each title of the book’s 10 chapters begins with “Conversation”—Horvilleur’s real or imagined interactions with a host of individuals and groups. For example, “Conversation with Antiracists” unravels how antisemitism is fueled by so-called antiracism; “Conversation with My Children” explores responding to the question, “Why is this happening to the Jews again?” after her children saw images

ON YOUR SHELF: MEMOIRS, POETRY AND REFLECTIVE READING FOR THE START OF THE JEWISH YEAR

By Sandee Brawarsky

Third Ear: Reflections on the Art and Science of Listening

By Elizabeth Rosner (Counterpoint)

In this work of scientific inquiry, observation and memoir told in brief takes, novelist and poet Elizabeth Rosner tunes her attention to the soundscape of life. The idea of deep listening, she explains, is the sonic version of reading between the lines and listening with heart and empathy. The daughter of Holocaust survivors, she grew up in a home where six languages were spoken and, in this new work, shares stories about learning to interpret whispers, accents, hums and silence and, as she writes, “eavesdrop on the world.”

The

Concealment of Endless Light

By Yehoshua November (Orison Books)

Yehoshua November is an award-winning poet who writes with rare ease, honesty, humility and beauty about the Divine as well as the mundane; worlds come together in his writing. His poems tell stories drawn from his life and are sometimes laced with mystical Hasidic teachings. This collection of spiritual poetry is one that even secularists and skeptics will find engaging and powerful.

Still Life with Remorse: Family Stories

By Maira Kalman (Harper)

Through poetic words and vibrant illustrations, Maira Kalman expresses complicated thoughts about family, love, regret, remorse and the possibility of joy and hope. She shares short, illustrated stories of relatives transplanted from shtetls in Belarus to Tel Aviv, of brothers who didn’t speak,

of love that was silent and of iconic artists, such as writers Leo Tolstoy and Franz Kafka and composer Gustav Mahler. She is playful and bittersweet, as she understands that we can’t change the past. In her distinctive style, her paintings—of arrangements of flowers, furniture, hats and books, empty rooms and rooms with people—burst with details and evoke memories both personal and collective.

Roman Year: A Memoir By André Aciman

(Farrar, Straus and Giroux)

André Aciman’s latest book follows his lyrical 1994 memoir, Out of Egypt , and picks up after his family is expelled from Egypt and he arrives in Rome, along with his deaf mother and younger brother, in 1964. In richly detailed and intimate prose, Aciman returns to the themes that compel him: exile, identity, language, love, loss and memory. In books and bookshops, he finds comfort and challenge. Then a young teen, he comes to love the timeless nature of Rome and writes of its narrow streets, the rhythms and rituals of daily life and the habits of his eccentric extended family.

Only in America: Al Jolson and The Jazz Singer

By Richard Bernstein (Knopf)

For distinguished journalist Richard Bernstein, Al Jolson’s story is the American immigration story at its finest. In his heyday, from about 1912 to 1934, the Lithuanian-born Jewish star of stage and film was the most famous and highest-paid entertainer in America. Bernstein looks into Jolson’s life story as well as the making of the 1927 film, The Jazz Singer , a national sensation that was groundbreaking for its time.

Sandee Brawarsky is a longtime columnist in the Jewish book world as well as an award-winning journalist, editor and author of several books, most recently of 212 Views of Central Park: Experiencing New York City’s Jewel From Every Angle.

from the Hamas attacks on their phones.

In “Conversation with Jewish Paranoia,” she writes about talking with congregants frightened by the rise of French antisemitism and how the police, in their response to the harassment of Jews, have exacerbated fears. As one congregant told her: “The police knock at the door of my apartment, and they say: ‘Ok, what if you took that Mezuzah that’s hanging there down straightaway?

For more books that touch on October 7, including a Q&A with Aviva Klompas, author of Stand-Up Nation: Israeli Resilience in the Wake of Disaster, go to hadassahmagazine.org/books .

And if not, couldn’t you perhaps change the name on your mailbox?’”

The rabbi also injects elegiac moments of optimism that lean on Jewish and Israeli traditions and on reaching out to others: a talk with an Algerian Muslim writer ends as a conversation on antisemitism and how the free thinkers in his world are pejoratively called “Jews.”

In another section, she describes why she bookended How Isn’t It Going? with a poem from Palestinian writer Mahmoud Darwish and one from Yehuda Amichai to allow readers to imagine the two deceased poets in dialogue, in a future messianic time that has them not just sharing their verses but also seeing each other’s humanity. An acknowl-

A Sweet and Happy New Year

Select unique Rosh Hashanah cards, calendars, and more from the Jewish Museum Shop.

edgment that, even at a time of oy veys, we need a little hope to cling to.

—Leah Finkelshteyn

Leah Finkelshteyn is the senior editor of Hadassah Magazine.

NONFICTION

Biblical Judgments: New Legal Readings in the Hebrew Bible By Daphne Barak-Erez (University of Michigan Press)

Israel’s Declaration of Independence calls the Hebrew Bible, or the Tanach, “the eternal Book of Books” because of its singular impact on Jews and Western Civilization.

Israeli Supreme Court Justice

Daphne BarakErez in Biblical Judgments mines her extensive knowledge of that “Book of Books” as well as her experiences as a jurist, a professor of law and a dean of Tel Aviv University to offer starting points for discussions on the Tanach regardless of prior Jewish knowledge.

This is a book that exceeds all expectations. Organized into six sections covering themes such as “Law and Government,” “Judges and Judging” and “Criminal Law,” Biblical Judgments explores broad legal topics through various biblical episodes.

To offer an example: In the Solomonic Solution, two women claim to be the mother of a newborn. With no witnesses or objective evidence, King Solomon proposes cutting the baby in half to resolve the claims. One woman offers to abandon her claim to save the infant; the other agrees to the death so neither will have the child. Solomon then declares the true mother to be the one who wants the infant to live.

In “Judges and Judging,” BarakErez takes issue with Solomon’s process. Is it fair to use the threat of death and the real mother’s reactive fear to resolve the question of maternity? This story, she notes, “raises seminal questions that confront every legal system: What is more important—a fair process or a just outcome?”

In the “Criminal Law” section, she discusses the obligation and limits of obedience to a legal system. Exodus describes how midwives under the Egyptian government refused to obey an order to commit an ”immoral act”—kill all Hebrew males at birth.

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©2024 Hadassah, The Women’s Zionist Organization of America, Inc. Hadassah®, the H logo, and Hadassah the Power of Women Who Do are registered trademarks of Hadassah, The Women’s Zionist Organization of America, Inc. The solicitation disclosure on page 62 is incorporated in this advertisement.

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“Every legal system is premised on the obligation to obey the law,” Barak-Erez notes. Yet what about orders and laws that negate “basic precepts of morality and humanity,” she writes, referencing more modern cases and trials that address this issue, including the Nuremberg trials and the American military courts that investigated the My Lai massacre during the Vietnam War.

My advice is not to read the book in the order it is printed. Rather, jump around, choose a topic and discuss. And go back again and again. Not only will you be engaged, but you will also develop your own technique for mining biblical text for challenging topics.

I would have liked to see an index

that lists all the biblical stories Barak-Erez explores in the order they appear in the Tanach, with the page numbers where she elaborates on them. But even without such an index, the book is accessible and serves a profound purpose—making the Hebrew Bible a font of ethical and moral knowledge.

—David

Epstein

David Epstein is the co-author of Torah With Love: A Guide for Strengthening Jewish Values Within the Family.

Living with Our Dead: On Loss and Consolation By Delphine Horvilleur. Translated by

Lisa Appignanesi (Europa Compass)

In times of great uncertainty, don’t we all need answers? Rabbi Delphine

Horvilleur is too wise to give in to our desire for definitive answers. Rather, she does the holy work of translating the wisdom of the Jewish tradition for those in need. The rabbi, a prominent voice within French Jewry who has spoken out against rising antisemitism and anti-Israel sentiment in her country, provides solace through metaphors and stories rather than simple explanations.

As she writes in the first chapter of this book, originally published in 2021 and translated into English this year, “Knowing how to narrate what has been said a thousand times before, while giving the person who hears the story for the first time unique keys with which to unlock the meaning for themselves—that is my function.”

She does this through short poetic chapters framed largely around the eulogies and funeral ceremonies she has officiated. These include some wellknown personalities such as Simone Veil, the politician and Holocaust survivor who had served as president of the European Parliament, and Elsa Cayat, a psychoanalyst killed in the shooting at the Charlie Hebdo magazine headquarters in 2015. There is even a eulogy for the living—an older woman whose family staged her funeral to enable her to stop thinking obsessively about her own death—and meditations on the passing of figures such as the biblical Moses and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.

One of the many lovely aspects of this slim collection is the rabbi’s explication of Hebrew words. The small stone placed on a grave, she writes in the chapter discussing Cayat’s death, is an ebben. “This word, split into its parts, reveals a combination of ab and ben, meaning parent and child. To place a stone on a tomb is to declare to the one who lies there that he or she is being written into a line of heritage, placed in a chain of generations that prolongs their history.”

Horvilleur carefully combined personal stories, Biblical and rabbinic texts and terms and Jewish history to create this thoughtful volume. This is one of the most powerful and beautifully written books on Judaism that I have been fortunate enough to read.

FICTION

Songs for the Brokenhearted By Ayelet Tsabari (Random House)

Ayelet Tsabari’s debut novel, Songs for

the Brokenhearted, is a richly layered tale of family, love and identity. It’s also a long, meaty read, but one that should be savored to fully appreciate the prose and multiple narratives.

—Beth Kissileff

Beth Kissileff is co-editor of Bound in the Bond of Life: Pittsburgh Writers Reflect on the Tree of Life Tragedy and author of the novel Questioning Return.

Braiding together two storylines, one that starts in 1950 with the rescue of Yemenite Jews as part of Operation Magic Carpet and a second set in the mid-1990s in a tumultuous Israel debating the Oslo Accords, Tsabari creates a cohesive plot with clear storytelling and compelling characters.

In 1950, thousands of Yemenite Jews were airlifted to Israel in search of freedom from persecution and a better life. Among them are Saida, who loves singing, and Yaqub. The two meet in the overcrowded Rosh Ha’ayin refugee camp and fall in love. However, Saida is already married to an older man with whom she has a child, and the affair has disastrous consequences.

In 1995, Saida’s daughter, Zohara, who has moved to New York City, finds herself back in Israel after her sister, Lizzie, calls with the news that their mother has died.

Life in Israel never felt easy to Zohara. Her skin was too dark, her

family too poor and her mother’s traditional music embarrassing. Returning in 1995, she still feels awkward. Her relationship with her sister is strained, and she’s worried about her nephew Yoni’s involvement with right-wing groups protesting Oslo. She also renews her friendship with her childhood friend Nir, despite her discomfort with his embrace of their shared Yemenite heritage.

When Zohara discovers cassette tapes of her mother singing traditional Yemenite songs and an envelope filled with handwritten stories of the past, Zohara realizes that there is much about her mother that she never knew. Soon, she finds herself wanting to uncover more about her mother, who was “more complicated than I had given her credit for, filled

with contradictions. A woman who was content with her role…but also committed the worst crime a woman of her generation and culture could have committed: falling in love, having an affair, wanting, desiring, dreaming.”

Tsabari has crafted a beautiful, complex story about internalized racism, religious-secular tensions and the connections that tie one to the past. She captures Israel at two different yet equally fraught eras, placing the overarching personal stories deftly in both. —Jaime Herndon

Jaime Herndon is a writer and avid reader. Her work can be found at Book Riot, Kveller and other places.

The Whisper Sister By Jennifer S. Brown (Lake Union Publishing)

Did you know that during Prohibition, a woman who ran a secret speakeasy was known as a “Whisper Sister”? In The Whisper Sister, author Jennifer S. Brown revisits the era explored in her debut novel, Modern Girls, introducing Minnie Soffer, a Jewish immigrant who becomes one of the “sisters” when she takes over her father’s illegal bar.

Brown’s novel spans the years of Prohibition (1920-1933), starting with 10-year-old Malka—later Minnie—arriving in America with her mother and brother in 1920. Malka barely recognizes her father, Yitzhak, who had immigrated years earlier and who reunites with his family at Ellis Island. He has shaved his beard and changed his name to Ike, and he has a mysterious job in New York City’s Jewish underground.

The first half of the book portrays life on the Lower East Side and the family’s poverty. At age 12, Minnie works a miserable job in a textile

(continues on page 62)

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Guide to Jewish Literature

Order these books directly through the Hadassah Magazine website! Just go to Hadassahmagazine.org and click on Guide to Jewish Literature.

The CounCil of Wise Women Izzy Abrahmson

The powerful new novel from the National Jewish Book Award Finalist author of Winter Blessings

With a secret society, magical chicken soup, and a young girl who is wise beyond her years.… When Rachel Cohen’s village teeters on the brink, she and The Council of Wise Women must cook up a plan. Between family breakdowns, the threat of famine, and the challenges of a beloved community, how much meddling is too much? “Abrahmson’s prose savvily mixes the homey and the surreal… He’s a master” — Publishers Weekly. A spellbinding tale of love, loss, independence, reconciliation, and the power of women.

Order print, e-book and audiobook (narrated by Kate Reading) from Amazon, Audible, Apple, Bookshop.org and lightpublications.com/council.

The BorsChT-

m eisTer

of BaBi Yar Roger Levine

Babi Yar was not an Indian Mystic and the Einzatzgruppen a German Pop Group, but rather the prelude to Auschwitz. Two young lovers, Yakov Levin and Katya Luvshenko, living at the edge of the Babi Yar ravine in Kyiv, witness the murder of 35,000 Jews in September 29, 1941, from the hidden love-nest they had previously built there. The forgotten war against the Jews in Ukraine in 1941-2 is finally brought to light. One hundred years of horrifying and unbelievable events right up to Putin’s present-day invasion, are captured here in this spellbinding novel of love, war and the Holocaust.

Available on Amazon.

Clara’s seCreT

Stephan R. Frenkel

This critically-acclaimed bestseller presents the captivating story of Clara Prinz, a remarkable woman forced to leave her native Berlin in 1939. As Clara traveled alone on a voyage into the unknown, she turned to memories of her adolescence during La Belle Époque – the Beautiful Era filled with optimism and cultural transformation at the dawn of the twentieth century. Through Clara’s chance encounters with notable personalities of the period, Clara’s Secret weaves an unforgettable tapestry of personal and historic events. Clara’s Secret is ultimately a compelling story of the advancement of humankind and the survival of its decline. Available on Amazon and www.laevnotes.com.

The Ballerina of ausChWiTz

Dr. Edith Eva Eger

In this young adult edition of the bestselling, awardwinning memoir The Choice, Holocaust survivor and renowned psychologist Dr. Edith Eger shares her harrowing experiences and gives readers the gift of hope and strength. Through it all, Edie recognized her choice: she can’t change the past, but she can choose how to live and even to love again. Available from Simon and Schuster.

o ne small spark

Ruth Spiro

This lyrical and very personal text from beloved author Ruth Spiro, with breathtaking and imaginative illustrations from Victoria Tentler-Krylov, explores the Jewish concept of tikkun olam, or taking part to repair the world. It’s sure to inspire young readers to nurture their own small spark, taking action today that will change the world tomorrow. Available on Bookshop.org.

The G irls of J erusalem and o Ther sTories

Marsha Lee Berkman

From the opening vignette in which a photograph is a silent witness to history to the powerful coda “Miracles,” a novella set against the vibrant panorama of the Yiddish theater in America, the fifteen memorable narratives in The Girls of Jerusalem and Other Stories span continents and eras as they chronicle love and loss, piety and heresy, mysticism and rationality to reinterpret ancient tropes of exile, dislocation, and profound change, revealing a new understanding of Jewish history and memory. “Luminous tales of exile and loss that bequeath new life” Kirkus Reviews (starred review). A best book of the year selection.

Available on Amazon and wherever books are sold.

sTreeT Corner d reams

Florence Reiss Kraut

Set between the World Wars, this suspenseful family saga, love story and gangster tale brings to life the Feinsteins, a family forged in tragedy and hope, dreaming of success while living amidst the Jewish and Italian gangs who ruled Brooklyn’s teeming streets. The unforgettable descriptions of Ben, Golda, Morty and Sylvia captivate readers as the family struggles with loss, dangerous choices, financial disaster and passionate love. Like Kraut’s acclaimed novel, How to Make a Life, this well-researched page-turner is a great book club read, perfect for holiday gift giving. Author will meet in person or Zoom with book clubs.

Available in paperback, audio and e-book on Amazon, Bookshop.org or wherever you buy books. www.florencereisskraut.com; florencekraut@gmail.com.

e nTer These GaTes: mediTaTions for The daYs of aWe Alden Solovy

New from CCAR Press, Enter These Gates is a High Holy Day companion for our times, with over one hundred new poems, prayers, and meditations for Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur. Poet-liturgist Alden Solovy blends today’s struggles and joys with classic themes, layering a contemporary voice into beloved motifs. Paperback, 212 pages, $18.95. Order at enterthesegates.ccarpress.org or (800) 621-2736.

BuBBie’s BaBY: 15Th anniversarY e diTion

Elaine Serling

A musical story celebrating the relationship between grandparents and grandchildren. This book features fresh lyrics and a toe-tapping melody. The colorful illustrations mirror the joy of this special bond. Use the QR code printed inside the book to download the song. Prepare to make memories to last a lifetime—listening, reading and singing together!

Available on Amazon or at www.elaineserling.com. 800-457-2157; $19.95 + $3 shipping

i like Your ChuTzpah

Suzy Ultman

This modern and whimsical Jewishthemed board book is the first of its kind incorporating both Jewish traditions and Jewish culture. Author and artist Suzy Ultman melds her own Jewish upbringing with her current trendsetting aesthetic to create a gorgeous, appealing, and simple book that will validate Jewish readers, and inform and entertain Jews and non-Jews alike. Available on Bookshop.org.

The J udGmenT of YoYo G old

Isaac Blum

A smart and powerful story set in the Orthodox Jewish community about what it means to fit in, break out, and find your own way, by the award-winning author of The Life and Crimes of Hoodie Rosen. Available on Bookshop.org.

souTh of mY d reams: findinG mY a meriCan h ome , a m emoir F. K. Clementi

South of My Dreams follows the adventures and misadventures of Fania who always dreamed of making it big in New York City. Growing up in 1970s Italy, she felt constrained by a stale environment and culture hostile to women’s independence. In pursuit of her childhood fantasy, she flees to New York where she thinks her American dream awaits. Instead, her American nightmare begins. Entertaining, original, and poetic, this memoir will resonate with those who fight for what they want and refuse to abandon their dreams.

Hardcover, $27.99 | 6x9, 376 pages. To purchase, visit uscpress.com/South-of-My-Dreams, or call HFS at 1-800-537-5487.

h idinG m enGele : h oW a nazi n eTWork harBored The anGel of d eaTh

Betina Anton

A Brazilian journalist’s investigation unearths the story of a network of people responsible for hiding Josef Mengele, better known as “The Angel of Death,” the infamous Nazi doctor who fled to South America and escaped justice for over thirty years. Read the international sensation already translated into nine languages! Available on Bookshop.org.

from h ere : lessons i n love & loss from 9/11

Felice Zaslow

Felice and Ira Zaslow’s love story spanned almost four decades, from the beaches of Far Rockaway to a comfortable suburban existence on the south shore of Long Island. Then came the morning of September 11, 2001. Through the days, weeks, and months that followed, Felice had to find her way through unfathomable trauma, on a path she had to forge herself, seeking guidance and role models along the way. This remarkable and inspiring memoir puts a very personal face on a national tragedy, facing down the darkness by looking for the light that is always present. Available on Amazon and Bookshop.org.

ausChWiTz–a moTher’s sTorY: hoW i fouGhT To survive and see mY dauGhTer aGain

Rosa De Winter-Levy

The unforgettable, heart-breaking true story of a mother who survived Auschwitz and fought to be reunited with her daughter once again. Written immediately in the months after the war, Auschwitz - A Mother’s Story tells Rosa de Winter-Levy’s unique and heartbreaking personal story - from the atrocities of the camp to her journey out of hell. Powerful and affecting, it is the testimony of a mother, and the pain she will endure for the chance to hold her child again. Mobius - Paperback, 144 pages. $14.99 USD.

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factory. By 16, she’s pouring drinks at her father’s bar.

The second half of The Whisper Sister is a page-turner, as Minnie takes over her father’s bar due to circumstances I won’t spoil here. Suffice

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Hadassah shall have full dominion, control and discretion over all gifts (and shall be under no legal obligation to transfer any portion of a gift to or for the use or benefit of any other entity or organization).  All decisions regarding the use of funds for any purpose, or the transfer of funds to or for the benefit of any other entity or organization, shall be subject to the approval of the Board or other governing body of Hadassah. The Hadassah Foundation, Inc. is a supporting organization of Hadassah, The Women’s Zionist Organization of America, Inc. September 2023

it to say that, mid-book, I was reading through tears. Forced to leave school before graduation, Minnie is caught between the expectation of marriage and motherhood and the independence and escape from poverty allowed by her illicit career. “You will be a secretary, Mama had always told her. Good matches you will make. Beautiful grandchildren you will give me.”

How can there be marriage and children, Minnie thinks to herself, if there’s no money?

Minnie’s entrée into New York City’s underworld, “the Under Shtik” as Ike calls it, is peppered with real-life personalities, among them gangsters Meyer Lansky and Lucky Luciano. She visits famous nightspots, like the Cotton Club, to learn how to convert Ike’s bar—“a gritty gin joint, a blind pig, with…sawdust littering the ground”—into a true speakeasy.

Full of excitement and forbidden love, Brown’s novel also sensitively portrays Minnie’s deep connection with her religion and culture. She struggles with choices that lead to a lifestyle outside the confines of Jewish society, but she also stops by synagogue every Friday to secretly drop some of her ill-gotten profits into the tzedakah box.

Minnie’s story concludes in a mostly happy, albeit unexpected, way. If Brown’s first two novels are any indication, I eagerly look forward to more tales from this author.

—Elizabeth Edelglass

Elizabeth Edelglass is a fiction writer, poet and book reviewer living in Connecticut.

Cause and Effect

Scholars, conspiracy theories and comic books

By Joseph Lowin

Antisemitism, shockingly but somehow not surprisingly, has resurfaced from dormancy. A contagious disease, some of its side effects can be found in the Hebrew root ל-ל-ע (ayin-lamed-lamed), to cause or effect, as well as many other meanings.

Today’s news reminds us starkly that in addition to the vicious תוּלְלְַּעְַתִהִ (hitalelut), brutality, wrought against Israel by Hamas, we have also witnessed at the International Court of Justice an אְוְָשָׁ תַלילעַ (alilat shav , false indict- ) ment, of the country. In addition, there is the viral growth of wild accusations against Israel that amount to םָדָּ תַלילעַ (alilat dam), blood libel. Yet, as can be seen from Scripture, the Talmud and on the streets of Israel, an even wider gamut of usages of the root can be found.

The Torah uses our root to teach an ethical lesson about charity. In Leviticus 19:10, grape growers are told לֵלועת אֹ ל ךְָמְְרְַכְַוְ (ve-kharmekha lo te-olel), “You shall not pick your vineyard bare”; rather, you must leave some fruits for the poor. The expression “from the mouths of babes” repurposes a verse in Psalms 8:3 that describes an לֵלע (olel), infant, with the power of speech. While imprisoned, the prophet Jeremiah (32:19) chants, despite his plight, that God is הִיִָּלילעַהִ ברְ (rav ha-aliliyah), “mighty in deeds.” In 1 Samuel 31:4, King Saul, critically wounded in a battle with the Philistines, orders his arms bearer to kill him before they can come יִב

(ve-hitallelu bi), “and will toy with me.” In a story in Judges (19:25), which highlights the anarchy and immorality of that time, a depraved man, to save his own life, casts his concubine outdoors toward a gathering crowd. There, הָּב וּלְלְַּעַ ת וְ (va-yitallelu bah), “[local townsmen] rape and abuse her.”

Rabbinic literature extends the usage of the root to reflect the culture of its times. A scholar יֵמְייַקַ ליִלעַ (alil kaimei), presents himself to his teacher. As 19th-century lexicographer Marcus Jastrow shows in a number of instances in the Talmud, לַלעַ (alal), to go in, becomes ליִלעַ (alil , entryway. The rab- ) bis, discussing laws of finance, treat what “enters” into the merchant’s purse as אָתְָּללעַ (alalta), income.

Modern Hebrew adopts rabbinical Hebrew’s usages ליִלעַַבַּ (ba-alil), clearly. The adjective לוּלָעַ (alul), liable to, is used for something negative that is likely to ensue. Today, we also find the root in הִלילעַ (alilah), the plot of a play; רְישָׁ הִלילעַ (shir alilah), epic poem; לוּלֲעַתָּ (ta’alul), hoax or prank; and ןליִלעַ (alilon), comic book.

And finally, for those with a philosophical approach to causality in theology or in science, there is the concept of הִָנָ

(ha-illah ha-rishonah), The Prime Cause, i.e., the originator of everything, whether it be God or the Big Bang.

Joseph Lowin’s columns for Hadassah Magazine are collected in HebrewSpeak, Hebrew Talk and his most recent book, Hebrew Matters, available at gcrr.org/gcrr-press/hebrew-matters

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ANSWER QUESTION Montana Tucker

‘We’ve got to keep fighting’ the digital war

By Lisa Hostein

When montana tucker got invited to walk

the red carpet at the Grammy Awards in February, she felt she had to do something “big” to showcase her concern for the hostages being held in Gaza. So the singer, dancer, actress, activist and social media influencer contacted an Israeli designer and, within a week, they came up with a gown that featured a large yellow ribbon with “Bring Them Home” blazoned across the front.

“It was one of the scariest moments of my life,” Tucker said, but she knew that walking the red carpet with a bold symbol was nothing compared to what the hostages and

How do you feel about the artists and entertainers unwilling to openly support Israel?

I understand the real fears of those not wanting to publicly show support, of those who worry about their careers and their livelihoods. But I also tell people who are more advanced in their careers than me: “If you stepped up and said something, it would make such a difference.”

How crazy is it that we are living in a time when you can’t share publicly that you’re Jewish or that you support the only Jewish state? With my blonde hair and not very Jewishsounding name, people don’t know I’m Jewish. I want to make sure everyone knows.

What influenced you to become a Jewish activist?

I had heard my grandparents’ Holocaust stories my whole life. When my zaydie, who was a huge part of my life, passed away four years ago, I rewatched their Shoah Foundation

their families were going through. “It really made an impact, and I’m so thankful that it did,” she said of the headlines that her action garnered, and the response from former hostages and hostage family members who wrote to thank her.

Tucker, 31, is still speaking out, posting regularly about Israel and antisemitism to her 14 million followers across her social media platforms. She was the keynote speaker at Hadassah’s National Conference in Las Vegas in July and even recorded a dance video for TikTok with two Israeli teenage girls representing Hadassah’s Youth Aliyah villages at the conference. This interview, conducted after her keynote, has been edited for brevity and clarity.

testimonials. They motivated me to go to Auschwitz and Poland, and I did a TikTok docuseries on their stories and the Holocaust. When I released that series, it was the first time many of my followers found out I was Jewish. Once October 7 happened, this is now my purpose— to educate my huge following, who started with me because of my music and dance, not because of my activism. I have to do everything I can, with visits to Israel and sharing personal stories, to show people the truth.

What kind of reaction have you gotten to your activism?

My videos come with a lot of hate—and I have lost thousands and thousands and thousands of followers. But I also have people message me who aren’t even Jewish or pro-Israel saying, “I never saw it that way. Thank you for educating me, thank you for sharing.” What’s the point of being an influencer if you can’t speak about what you believe in?

What have been the most meaningful moments you have had in Israel?

I’ve become very close to some of the released hostages, including Moran Stella Yanai, who was taken from the Nova music festival and held captive for 54 days. We did a dance video at the Nova site with a bunch of Nova survivors, called “We Can Dance Again.” A dance video is going to relate to a different audience than me just speaking to a camera. That’s the power of social media, you truly don’t know whose page it’s going to land on and you don’t know who’s going to be impacted by it.

After October 7, there’s the on-the-ground war and then the digital war. It’s a huge war that we need to fight. We’re losing it, unfortunately, but we’ve got to keep fighting.

Lisa Hostein is the executive editor of Hadassah Magazine.

A Love for Israel, a Heart for Hadassah

“It’s not a question of wealth—where there’s a will, there’s a way. If your heart goes out to Israel like mine does, you should explore CGAs.”

— Chaim Freiberg St. Petersburg, Florida

As a longtime, passionate Hadassah supporter, Chaim Freiberg believes in the power of strengthening Hadassah’s support of life-saving work. He and Israel share the same birth year: 1948. “My mother escaped the Nazis in Poland and came to Palestine (before it became Israel) with several of her peers. She lost the rest of her family in Poland,” he recalls. His mother’s extraordinary courage brought four sons—all proud Israeli sabras—into the world.

His love of country never waned after moving to the United States in his 20s. “I will always consider myself an Israeli,” he declares proudly. By establishing charitable gift annuities (CGAs) with Hadassah, Chaim supports initiatives that are close to his heart and central to his identity, while ensuring his financial security.

Personalized Example

The payments you and/or someone you designate will receive depend on your age (or the age of the annuitant) and the amount of your gift. Contact us for a personalized example or to learn about ways to include Hadassah in your estate plan.

*Rates as of Jan. 1, 2024. Rates are fixed when annuity is established. Rates are also available for two-life gift annuities. Minimum age: 65 | Minimum contribution: $10,000.

The information and content contained herein are intended for educational purposes only and are not intended to provide legal, tax or other professional advice or to be relied upon. Reliance on any information contained herein is at the reader’s own risk. For such advice, please consult with an attorney, tax advisor, or accountant. Figures cited in any examples are for illustrative purposes only.

References to estate and income taxes include federal taxes only and are subject to change. State income/estate taxes and/or other state laws may impact your individual results.

The solicitation disclosure on page 62 is incorporated in this advertisement.

Charitable deductions are allowed to the extent provided by law. Hadassah shall have full dominion, control and discretion over all gifts (and shall be under no legal obligation to transfer any portion of a gift to or for the use or benefit of any other entity or organization). All decisions regarding the use of funds for any purpose, or the transfer of funds to or for the benefit of any other entity or organization, shall be subject to the approval of the Board or other governing body of Hadassah.

California residents: Annuities are subject to regulation by the State of California. Payments under such agreements, however, are not protected or otherwise guaranteed by any government agency or the California Life and Health Insurance Guarantee Association. Oklahoma residents: A charitable gift annuity is not regulated by the Oklahoma Insurance Department and is not protected by a guaranty association affiliated with the Oklahoma Insurance Department. South Dakota residents: Charitable gift annuities are not regulated by and are not under the jurisdiction of the South Dakota Division of Insurance. Charitable gift annuities are not available in all states.

INC.

OCTOBER IS GAUCHER AWARENESS MONTH

In the Ashkenazi Jewish population there are at least 19 times more cases of type 1 Gaucher disease than in the general population – that’s about one in every 600 Ashkenazi births.

Takeda recognizes the importance of raising the profile of this rare genetic condition to help people receive an earlier diagnosis.

WHAT IS GAUCHER DISEASE?

Gaucher — pronounced GO SHEY — disease is caused when waste materials that are usually broken down cannot be, and instead slowly accumulate in different organs. Over time, this causes damage that can lead to a range of symptoms.

WHAT ARE THE SYMPTOMS?

Symptoms vary from person to person and can develop at any age.

Genetic screening can show you the risk of having Gaucher disease and is recommended if you are of Ashkenazi Jewish descent. It is often assumed that Gaucher disease is covered by standard screenings, but this is not always the case and specialized screening may be needed. Talk to your doctor if you think you have symptoms or to learn more about genetic screening.