Please see our ad on Page 8.
Please confirm your birth date with us and get a chance to win one of our monthly gifts.
s i s i n M g e Out r ’ u o Y On Birthd ay Pr esen ts !
Celebrating Jewish Life in Sarasota and Manatee Counties, Israel and the World FEDERATION NEWS
Serving our community since 1971!
Published by The Jewish Federation of Sarasota-Manatee www.jfedsrq.org
August 2014 - Av/Elul 5774 INSIDE THIS ISSUE: 6 Community Focus 11 Jewish Happenings 15 Focus on Youth 21 Jewish Interest 25 Israel & the Jewish World 29 Commentary 31 Life Cycle
9 Keeping History Alive: The Todah Menorah Project
10 Drummers’ mitzvah at KobernickAnchinBenderson
Jewish Federation receives $1,000,000 bequest Staff Report
T
he Jewish Federation of Sarasota-Manatee recently received a generous gift of just over $1 million from Bradenton resident Semha Zimmerman, who passed away in March 2014. Mrs. Zimmerman requested that the funds be used in honor of her husband, Abraham, who passed away in 2002 from Lou Gehrig’s disease. “While Semha left our Federation an extremely generous gift upon her passing, her legacy is not about the money,” says Marty Haberer, Federation’s associate executive director. “Hers is a story of someone whose generosity and love for the Jewish people will have significant impact on Jewish life in our Sarasota-Manatee community.” Semha Zimmerman was born in Baghdad, Iraq, on March 10, 1922, the second of six children. Her ancestry dates to the first Jewish diaspora from the Kingdom of Judah to Babylon, where the Hebrews were allowed to remain a unified community for some 2,500 years. Selma and Semha Zimmerman As a young woman, Baghdad, Iraq, in 1947
she was a sought-after secretary, as she was fluent in Arabic, French, English and Hebrew, and was a self-taught typist. At the end of the British mandate of Iraq and the creation of the State of Israel, life for her family, and the Baghdad Jewish community as a whole, became very difficult. Semha’s father disappeared, likely shot by the Semha and Abraham Zimmerman Iraqis. Her only brother, Sasson, fled to Israel to avoid conscription into the Iraqi Army, leaving Semha, her mother and her youngest sister alone in an increasingly violent and anti‑Semitic Iraq. During this very frightening time, Semha and her family were saved by a heroic Muslim neighbor who turned back a mob looking for Jews, telling them there were no Jews on this street and to go away. In 1951, caught in the crossfire of the Israeli‑Arabic wars, Semha, her mother and her sister, along with some 150,000 Iraqi Jews, were “allowed” to barter their property and
continued on page 2
Community gathers to remember three Israeli teens
19 Hebrew School registration now open
Volume 44, Number 8
By Jessi Sheslow
T proof
the Family Jeweler 14276 Name: ________________________________________________ Invoice Ref #: ________________
hursday, July 3 was a somber time for Sarasota-Manatee. It was a sign of our strong community that many congregational rabbis and two non-Jewish leaders of the community came together to help soothe the sadness since hearing the news that the three kidnapped Israeli teens had been found murdered on Monday, June 30. Almost 500 people attended the memorial service onbethe Federation Campus, This Proof must signed and returned before in the Beatrice Friedman Shabbatwe can proceed with your This Jerusalem is your Theatre andorder. in the Room via video feed. Proof prior to printing. Please examine all spellLatecomers were able to sit in the lobby and listen to dinner with ing and information carefully. not be were filled to capacity. All the audio asRFJD bothwillrooms 2,226 diners held responsible for any unnoticed errors. Any were there to pray for the memories of Eyal Yifrach, errors found after printing will be customer’s sole in Tel Aviv responsibility. Gilad Shaar and Naftali Frenkel. breaks world These three teens were kidnapped while waitrecord Approval ing at a bus stop on their way home from Yeshiva. ApprovedTheir bodies were found 18 days after the abduction
28
Approved with Corrections New Proof Required A publication of The Jewish Federation of Sarasota-Manatee
NON-PROFIT ORG.
Klingenstein Jewish Center, 580 McIntosh Rd., Sarasota, FL 34232 U.S. POSTAGE Annual voluntary subscription: $25 Authorized Signature PAID
Date
MANASOTA FL PERMIT 167
and a call to the emergency line in which one of the boys whispered “We’ve been abducted.” The Israeli
continued on page 2
A panel of congregational rabbis and Christian clergy address the audience in the Beatrice Friedman Theatre
Keep it in the Family...
Murray Margolis
E x t r ao r d i n a ry S E l E c t i o n o f f i n E J E w E l ry
Telephone Number
Certified WatChmaker appraisals expert JeWelry repairs WatCh Batteries restringing all Work done on site
Your one-stop full-service jewelry center | Buying Precious Metals
Fax Number
T h e F a m i ly J e w e l e r
8342 market street • lakewood ranch • (941) 907-3418 • www.thefamilyjeweler.com