Volume xiX, Issue XX | thejewishvoice.org Serving Rhode Island and Southeastern Massachusetts
19 Kislev 5774 | November 22, 2013
A Report from the JFNA General Assembly in Jerusalem
Transgender author featured at Alliance JCC presentation Joy Ladin discusses her life, her new book
Jeffrey K. Savit addresses Pew Report By Jeffrey Savit PROVIDENCE – The recently published Pew Report describing the interests, affiliations and concerns of our American Jewish population has sparked nonstop debates, worries and concerns. I suspect I occupy a minority position, but I believe there is very little that is newsworthy or novel about the findings. Is it shocking that we, as a “people,” have become increasingly secularized and intermarried, while correspondingly less observant and communityminded? Not remotely! Doesn’t this study merely confirm that many of us are living the Jewish American dream? As one of my wonderful mentors rather winsomely told me when we first met, “We won,” because, for decades, we have been the board chairs, donors and consumers of the very same nonJewish organizations, country clubs, hospitals and schools that used to deny us admission. Not surprisingly, our Jewish communal agencies and institutions are at risk of becoming increasingly irrelevant unless we react strategically, responsively and empathetically to this secularization phenomena and, hence, to the needs and wants of 21st PEW | 5
Happy Hanukkah
By Irina Missiuro IMissiuro@jewishallianceri.org PROVIDENCE – On Thursday, November 7, Dr. Joy Ladin, the first openly transgender employee of an Orthodox institution, discussed her newest book, “Through the Door of Life: A Jewish Journey Between Genders,” a National Jewish Book Award finalist, with more than thirty people who had come to hear the presentation at the Alliance JCC. Marty Cooper, of the Jewish Alliance Community Relations Council, began introducing Dr. Ladin to the audience, but when Cooper had trouble reading his notes, the guest of honor suggested, to laughter, “You can just make stuff up.” From that moment, it became apparent that, even though Joy Ladin taking questions from audience members
Arthur C. Norman
LADIN | 26
John Kerry reportedly tells U.S. senators to ignore Israel on Iran sanctions (JNS.org) – U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry reportedly told U.S. senators to ignore Israeli thinking when it comes to Iran sanctions. Describing Kerry’s testimony before the Senate Banking Committee on Wednesday, Kerry, a Senate aide told BuzzFeed that “every time anybody would say anything about ‘what would the Israelis say,’ they’d get cut off and Kerry would say, ‘You have
to ignore what they’re telling you, stop listening to the Israelis on this.’” Kerry’s closed-door briefing was “fairly anti-Israeli,” U.S. Sen. Mark Kirk (R-IL) told reporters. “I was supposed to disbelieve everything the Israelis had just told me, and I think the Israelis probably have a pretty good intelligence service,” Kirk said. U.S. Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) described
Kerry’s testimony as “an emotional appeal. I have to tell you, I was very disappointed in the presentation,” Corker said. Speaking to reporters before the briefing, Kerry said, “We now are negotiating [with Iran]. And the risk is that if Congress were to unilaterally move to raise sanctions, it could break faith in those negotiations, and actually stop them and break them apart.”