January 10, 2020

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SPONSORED BY THE BENJAMIN AND ANNA E. WIESMAN FAMILY ENDOWMENT FUND C E L E B R AT I N G

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The Jewish Press AN AGENCY OF THE JEWISH FEDERATION OF OMAHA | WWW.JEWISHOMAHA.ORG

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JA N UA RY 1 0, 2 020 | 1 3 TE V E T 578 0 | VO L. 1 00 | NO. 1 3 | CANDLELIGHTING | FRIDAY, JANUARY 10, 4:56 P.M.

Rebecca Erbelding to speak in Omaha Specials Classes at Friedel Jewish Academy Page 2

SCOTT LITTKY Executive Director, Institute for Holocaust Education n Thursday, Jan. 23 at 7 p.m. at Central High School, Rebecca Erbelding the author of RESCUE BOARD: The Untold Story of America’s Efforts to Save the Jews of Europe, will be speaking. Central High School is located at 124 North 20th Street. America has long been criticized for refusing to give harbor to the Jews during World War II as Hitler and the Nazis closed in. Now in RESCUE BOARD: The Untold Story of America’s Efforts to Save the Jews of Europe (Doubleday; 4/10/18), U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum scholar Rebecca Erbelding tells the extraordinary unknown story of the War Refugee Board, President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s unpublicized effort late in the war to save the remaining Jews. In January 1944, a young Treasury lawyer and Omaha native named John Pehle accompanied his boss to a meeting with the president. For more than a decade, the Jews of Germany had sought refuge in the United States and had been stymied by Congress harsh immigration policy. Now the State Department was refusing to authorize the relief funds Pehle wanted to use to help Jews escape Nazi territory. At the meeting, Pehle

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JBL Bagels & Business presents Dr. Joel and Nancy Schlessinnger Page 5

A fragrant one-pot meal with a generations-old recipe Page 12

Spotlight Voices Synagogues Life cycles

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KRIPKE JEWISH FEDERATION LIBRARY STAFF On Jan. 16, the Dorothy Kaplan Book Discussion Group begins the new year reading the novel Henna House by Naomi Eve. Henna House introduces us as readers to the fascinating world and customs of Yemenite Jewry.

Rebecca Erbelding

made his best case — and prevailed. Within days, FDR created the War Refugee Board, empowering it to rescue the victims of Nazi persecution and put John Pehle in charge. Over the next 20 months, Pehle pulled together a team of D.C. pencil pushers, international relief workers, smugglers, diplomats, millionaires and rabble-rousers to run operations across four continents and a dozen countries. Together, they tricked the Nazis, forged identity papers, maneuvered food and medicine into concentration See Rebecca Erbelding page 2

Yoel Sykes brings Shabbat weekend of renewal and song to Beth El

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Kaplan Book Group reads Henna House

OZZIE NOGG Beth El Synagogue will welcome Yoel Sykes as musical Scholar-in-Residence on Friday, Jan. 24 and Saturday, Jan. 25. Sykes is a main prayer leader in the Nava Tehila Jerusalembased community that highlights the joy, soulfulness and spiritually uplifting nature inherent in Jewish liturgical tradition. Sykes has composed many new melodies to traditional prayers, now sung in synagogues across Israel and across the globe, which he shares in his travels to JewYoel Sykes

ish communities internationally to lead musical prayer services, concerts and workshops. “I am extremely excited to host Yoel as I have been a longtime fan of his work,” said Beth El’s Hazzan Michael Krausman. “Yoel will be working with a team of Beth El singers and instrumentalists to craft meaningful services for both Friday night and

Shabbat morning — memorable services that will leave a smile in your soul that will last for weeks. Those who regularly attend our services at Beth El will be familiar with Yoel Sykes’s music as it is heard at Six String Shabbat, Shabbat B’Yachad and Shabbat Zimrah services. Our youth already sing Yoel’s songs with great enthusiasm.” On Friday, evening, Jan. 24, Sykes will lead a Kabbalat Shabbat Experience that begins with a PreNeg Reception at 5:30 p.m. Services start at 6 p.m. and include chanted Psalms and Shabbat prayers with original melodies and guided intentions that will help congregants connect with spirit, allowing it to fill our hearts and uplift our souls as we welcome Shabbat. Shabbat Morning Encounter on Jan. 25 begins at 10 a.m., with a kiddush luncheon to follow. “Yoel and his Beth El musical team will lead this See Yoel Sykes page 3

In 1920, a very young Adele Damari and her family live in Qaraah, a small village in the mountain region of northern Yemen where the Confiscator, a Muslim official is in charge of enforcing the Orphan’s Decree. This decree in effect allows the government to kidnap any “orphaned” Jewish child and give it up for adoption to Muslim families and ultimately convert to Islam. The loophole to this situation is for the families of such young children to arrange an “engagement” of their children as young as seven or eight years old to occur. With her parents in failing health, Adela is promised in marriage to her cousin Assaf. Assaf and his elderly father, a spice trader, have come to their town of Qaraah to ply his trade. Several years later, Assaf and his father leave Qaraah and Adele’s parents break off the engagement. Adele’s safety is once more in flux. Shortly afterwards, another uncle, Barhun, his wife Rahel, and daughter Hani move to Qaraah. Adele’s life changes as she is introduced to a world she never knew existed: literacy and the art of henna dying. When a severe drought hits the region surrounding Qarrah, Adele and her new extended family flee to the modern and progressive city of Aden. After a year of waiting daily by the city’s port for the return of her beloved Assaf, Adele is finally reunited with him. What ensues is Adele’s self-discovery of who she is See Kaplan Book Group page 3


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