The JEWISH
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Shabbos Bechukotai • June 3, 2016 • 26 Iyar 5776 • Candlelighting 8:03 pm (Luach page 18) • Vol 15, No 22
The Newspaper of our Orthodox communities
Joyful 49 for 3,000 year old city Jerusalem again celebrates its unity, may it be forever Rabbi binny FReedman The hearT of jerusalem Yom Yerushalayim, which commemorates the reunification of Jerusalem following the Six-Day War in June 1967, 49 years ago, is observed on 28 Iyar (this year, June 5). Jewish Star columnist Rabbi Binny Freedman is based in the Old City, where he is rosh yeshiva of Yeshivat Orayta. y earliest memory of Jerusalem was in the summer of 1968. My parents were leading a group of teenagers to Israel and my older brother and I were along for the ride. I was 5 years old, and I can still remember getting off the bus and walking to the Kotel. I could not understand why my mother was crying; it was the first time I had seen someone crying tears of joy. Her response to my query: “Because we have finally come home.” Home. Such a powerful word, especially for a people that has wandered the face of the globe for so long. What makes this city so special? Some will say its history — here the prophets walked, King David dreamed of the Temple his son Solomon finally built, and, according to Jewish tradition, Abraham was prepared to offer Isaac upon the altar. Some will say it is its diversity, as people from all backgrounds and faiths converge and find their place in this holy city. Just the other day as I was walking through the Jaffa gate, I passed groups from no less than 17 different countries and nationalities before I reached the steps to the Kotel. “Amim har yavo’u” (“Nations will come from all over the world to this mountain”) said the Prophet, and here we are 2,800 years later living the dream. All over the world Jews pray facing Israel. In Israel, Jews pray facing Jerusalem. In Jerusalem, Jews pray facing the Old City. In the Old City, they face the Temple Mount. On the Temple Mount, Jews pray facing the exact spot were the Temples once stood. ll the way back in the Song of the Sea sung by the Jewish people after G-d spilt the sea, we sang of the “Temple of G-d prepared by your hands…” Jerusalem ultimately became our holiest city because it housed the Temple. And what was that Temple? Continued on page 21
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The Five Towns turned out in big numbers to celebrate Lag Ba’Omer in Cedarhurst. See page 10.
Danon empowers students in bid to stop BDS
By Shalle’ McDonald Israeli Ambassador to the U.N. Danny Danon mobilized students this week for their campus battles against the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement. On Monday, Danon hosted an international conference in New York to empower more than 1,500 attendees—students as well as diplomats, academics, legal professionals and activists—to become “ambassadors against BDS.” The Permanent Mission of Israel to the U.N. has decided that it “cannot ignore BDS anymore,” Danon said, explaining
the motivation behind organizing the “Building Bridges, Not Boycotts” conference. While a report issued by Israel’s state comptroller this week said that Israeli Foreign Ministry projects intended to combat BDS “are lacking in their planning, management, and implementation, and are failing to achieve their designated goals,” the Danon-led U.N. Mission is trying its hand at the BDS fight. The event brought experts from around
This Sunday in Central Park
ISRAEL DAY CONCERT See Details On Page 2
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Lag Ba’Omer tug in C’hurst
the world to the international body to share their knowledge about legal issues, activism on campus, and the delegitimization of Israel. “I believe it will empower the students [and] the activists … to fight and win. I think we can win [against] BDS, but we have to fight back,” Danon said. It is important to give students “tools on how to fight and what to do on campus” and to Continued on page 21
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June 3, 2016 • 26 Iyar 5776 THE JEWISH STAR
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THE JEWISH STAR June 3, 2016 • 26 Iyar 5776
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Five Towns Community Collaborative Conference
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June 26, 2016 / 20 Sivan 5776 at The Young Israel of Woodmere Aish Kodesh, Ateres Yaakov, Beth Sholom, BA, BKNW, Central, DRS, HAFTR, HALB, Hakotel, HANC, HaRova, Kaylie, Kneseth Israel, Kulanu, Landers, Mesorah, Michlalah, M' Basya Rochel, M’ Lindenbaum, MMY, Morasha, Moshava (I.O.), MTVA, NCSY, Ohr Yerushalayim, OU – JLIC, Rambam, Shalhevet, SKA, SFW, Project YES, YILC, YIW, YIWH, Yeshiva University, YOSS 8:30 Shul Rabbonim
Shacharit, Keynote - Rabbi Yaakov Bender – Chinuch in Tumultuous Times, Breakfast Yeshivot and Speakers High Schools Speakers (Women) Seminaries
10:30
Rabbi Yehuda Kelemer The Super-Bright, Super Quiet Student: Why Do Our Yeshivas Ignore Him?
Rabbi Yisroel Kaminetsky Ten Torah Secrets to a Strong Marriage
Rabbi Reuven Taragin The Torah’s Solution to (Sibling) Rivalry
11:10
Rabbi Moshe Teitelbaum No Child Left Behind – the Jewish Way: How to Educate All Our Children
Rabbi Gedaliah Oppen Five Keys to Building an Everlasting Bond With Your Children
11:50
Rabbi Kenneth Hain TBA
Rabbi Zev Meir Friedman Lashon Hara – Causes and Cures
12:30
Rabbi Eytan Feiner The Husband / Wife Dynamic Duo: Best of “Friends” Forever
Mrs. C. B. Neugroschl Kabbalat HaTorah as Per Moshe Rabbeinu, Rabbi Akiva, and Rav Chiya
1:10
Rabbi Yoni Levin Helping Our Children Set Goals: Reach For the Stars But Always Remain Grounded
Mrs. Elisheva Kaminetsky :בשבילי נברא העולם Understanding Our Unique Mission
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Mrs. Michal Horowitz T.H.I.N.K. – An Acronym for Successful Interaction and Reaction
Mrs. Esther Wein Keeping Our Eyes on the Prize
Rebbetzin Shani Taragin The Princess and the Pea and the Prophets
Rebbetzin Lisa Septimus If I am Married, Why Do I Feel Alone?
Rabbi Mordechai Kaminetzky When Illness Strikes – Maintaining Strong Families through Medical Crisis
Rebbetzin Aviva Feiner How to Teach Children to Mourn for Yerushalayim (Though Not Part of the School Year)
Dr. Rona Novick Training Your Brain: How Parents and Children Can Understand and Harness the Power of Their Thinking
Rabbi Shalom Rosner Shalom Bayis: Your Most Important Relationship
Rabbi Shmuel Marcus Conveying Confidence in Self, Pride in Distinction
Mrs. Debbie Greenblatt TBA
Mr. David Sachs Utilizing Your Strengths: The Story of How a First Time Learner Came to Publish a Talmudic Reference
Dr. David Pelcovitz TBA
Dr. Beth Raskin “I Don’t Know Where My Homework Is!” Don’t Blame the Child, Blame the Brain
Rabbi Dovid Fohrman Intelligence, Creativity, and the Art of Listening
Keynote - Rabbi Mordechai Willig – Three Models of Chinuch, Mincha
Speakers Rabbi Aryeh Lebowitz The Proper Attitudes of Our Community and Our Children Toward Gedolei Yisrael Rabbi Dr. Edward Reichman Building a “Healthy” Jewish Family: What You Need to Know in the 21st Century Rabbi Tsvi Selengut Don’t Friend Me, Just Be My Friend: Fostering Torah Relationships in the Age of Social Media Rabbi Isaac Rice The Role of Seforim in Educating Our Children and Ourselves Rabbi Robby Charnoff From Dating to Marriage: A Parent’s Guide to a Child’s Successful Journey
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THE EVENT IS FREE OF CHARGE. Steering Committee- Sheri Hammer, Doba Isaacs, Naomi Kaszovitz, Syma Shulman Levine, Jay Lerman, Shani Lerman, Joel Steinmetz To continue receiving information or to sponsor the event, please contact office@hakotel.org.il. Follow the event online at: Facebook - 5TownsEducationConference / Twitter - @FTEDUCONF
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5 THE JEWISH STAR June 3, 2016 • 26 Iyar 5776
Celebrate Once a year our entire New York Jewish community comes together at the Celebrate Israel Parade to express our abiding commitment to the State of Israel and its people. Join tens of thousands of people from across our community on Sunday, June 5th as we march in the largest display of pro-Israel support in the world. We’ll be there with flags waving! Then join us for the after-party at the Celebrate Israel Unity Festival at Terminal 5 on West 56th street for live entertainment, food, and Israeli cultural activities for families. Let’s celebrate Israel together!
ujafedny.org
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facebook.com/ujafedny
instagram.com/ujafedny 841303
ujafedny.org/celebrate-israel
June 3, 2016 • 26 Iyar 5776 THE JEWISH STAR
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TheJewishStar.com
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Iran’s Holocaust cartoon contest no caricature of regime’s identity BEn CoHEn Viewpoint
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haredi Jew looks into a mirror and sees the face of Adolf Hitler gazing back at him. The walls and guard towers of Auschwitz are squeezed into a snow shaker, with flying dollar bills replacing the fake snowflakes. Another haredi Jew waves a swastika-shaped fan at an Israeli flag, which blows furiously atop a corpse draped in a Palestinian flag. Not enough? There’s more. The gates of Auschwitz, adorned with the deadly motto “Arbeit Macht Frei” (“work sets you free”), swing open to reveal the Al-Aqsa mosque, which sits on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, devils’ horns jutting from his forehead, gives a Nazi salute; instead of his usual business suit, he wears a bloodstained brown uniform, with a Star of David rendered as a swastika decorating the sleeve. These are just a selection of the entries submitted to Iran’s latest Holocaust cartoon contest, currently on display in Tehran at the none-too-subtly named Islamic Propaganda Organization. By and large, the cartoons are crudely drawn, in keeping with the themes that they promote. The imagery is hardly new; depictions of Jews in this exhibit are straight out of Nazi propaganda, while depictions of the State of Israel as Hitler’s inheritor had been pushed by the Soviet Union for almost half a century. The Islamist barbarians who run Iran may be many things, but creators of pathbreaking art they are definitely not. As fashionable as it is in President Barack Obama’s circle to pretend that the Iranian regime is in the throes of dramatic change, with a surging “moderate” wing that wants to engage the West, this latest cartoon contest—like last year’s contest, like the first cartoon contest in 2005, and like the conference of Holocaust deniers convened in 2006—demonstrates that the mullahs’ cannot kick their enduring pathology: striking a blow at the global Jewish conspiracy by wiping Israel off the map. Even if we accept for the sake of argument that the regime can be simply bifurcated into “moderates” and “hardliners,” those Iranian leaders identified in the West as “moderates” come out of this latest cartoon scandal looking far shabbier than their “hardline” rivals. The cartoon contest, backed to the hilt by the regime, is the natural outgrowth of Iran’s state policy of anti-Semitism, which holds that the Holocaust is a myth shamelessly used by the Jewish state to
Correction HANC headline
The cover of last week’s Schools section featured a story on the valedictorian and salutatorians from the Hebrew Academy of Nassau County High School. While the school was properly identified in the article, the headline was wrong. The school, of course, is HANC. The article, with the correct headline, is reprinted this week on page 15.
garner world sympathy. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and his cohorts are quite open about all this and don’t feel the need to rationalize or excuse the state-sponsored mockery of the genocide of Jews (Khamenei chose a Holocaust Remembrance Day to question whether the slaughter of 6 million Jews had in fact occurred). Not so with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, whose detestation of Israel doesn’t blind him to the fact that the countries he flirts with, like Germany, take a dim view of Iran’s Holocaust denial antics. Thus unlike the “hardliners,” who are disarmingly honest about their views on the Jewish people and their desire to eliminate Israel, Zarif speaks with a forked tongue. That shouldn’t mask the fact that Zarif is both a coward, since he refuses to condemn the cartoon contest, and a liar, since he insists that the regime he represents has nothing to do with it. “Don’t consider Iran a monolith,” Zarif clucked to the New Yorker. “The Iranian government does not support, nor does it organize, any cartoon festival of the nature that you’re talking about.” “The government and its varied set of institutions are the only ones that pay for these types of ideologically oriented activities, Iranian writer Majid Mohammadi pointed out in a detailed briefing published by the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. “There is no channel for private funds, and no provision in Iran’s tax code, to support these activities.” hy engage in such an activity? “The Islamic Republic seeks to be the most prominent global voice of anti-Semitic and anti-Israel sentiment and in doing so has made connections with and promoted individuals espousing these views from across the world,” Mohammadi says. This is not a recent development, nor is it related to Israeli policy or anything Israel actually does. Anti-Semitism among Iran’s Islamists in fact precedes the creation of the State of Israel. In his excellent book “Germany and Iran: From the Aryan Axis to the Nuclear Threshold,” German historian Matthias Kuentzel described the massive audience in Iran for Radio
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Zeesen, a Nazi propaganda outlet that broadcast programming in Farsi. Among the listeners was the figurehead of Iranian Islamism, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. According to Kuentzel, Khomeini was an enthusiastic “connoisseur” of European anti-Semitism. To disavow Khomeini would be unthinkable in the current context, as demonstrated by the recent election of Ayatollah Ahmed Jannati as head of the “Assembly of Experts,” a key ruling body that chooses the supreme leader. Jannati is a boilerplate fanatic who leads chants of “Death to America” and “Death to Israel” at Friday prayers. It was Jannati who, in 2009, backed then president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s blood-drenched crackdown against pro-democracy demonstrators. The regime that existed in 2009 still exists today, with the same mechanisms of fearsome repression at its disposal. It cannot be reformed, and certainly not from within. But — heretical as it is to say this — it can, and should, be overthrown. Ben Cohen, senior editor of TheTower.org, who appears regularly in The Star, is distributed by JNS.org.
Widening gap between left and right in Israel
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t’s amazing these days how controversial Israel has become. It’s hard for me to watch. Like a dear friend who is being thrown under the bus, I admit I take it personally. I lived in Israel through the Gaza disengagement in 2005 when thousands of Israelis, mostly a right-wing demographic, were displaced from their homes, their communities destroyed. The wound of this displacement, the sense of exile that these Gush Katif communities felt, ran deep. A tikkun leil learning program at a religious Zionist synagogue on the following Shavuot was dedicated to studying sources that would help the displaced cope with their sense that Zionism had failed them. There was a sense of crisis. Some leaders of that community even abandoned religious Zionism and embraced the more haredi, anti-Zionist point of view. The crisis was terrible. The hostility toward the government of Israel was profound. Internally, the gap between left- and rightwing communities widened frighteningly far. I detest labels, but for clarity’s sake, since it is the colloquial way of describing different ideologies, I’m using them. At the time of the disengagement, the left was smug. It had won. It succeeded in dismantling what in its view were detested settlements. While the right-wing community was bleeding, the left-wing community was celebrating. It was painful to watch. There were rumblings that Ariel Sharon, the prime minister at the time, only executed the Gaza disengagement to deflect the legal problems dogging him at time. Now, a right-wing Israeli government is in power, democratically elected. Not to compare the current disappointments of the left-wing community to a disengagement, but the left is now the vulnerable demographic that needs to cope with a government in power not to its liking. Decisions that feel like an anathema to the left-wing is the reality. Specifically, the appointment of Avigdor Liberman as defense minister has unhinged some people. Personally, I don’t like the appointment of Liberman. But the reaction in the leadership of the left-wing community has been over the top, leading media outlets and political leaders to compare Israel to a fascist state. One IDF leader went so far as to caricature the current Israeli government as akin to Germa-
*Manufacturer’s mail-in rebate offer valid for qualifying purchases made 4/12/16 – 6/27/16 from participating dealers in the U.S. only. A qualifying purchase is defined as a purchase of any of the product models set forth above in the quantities set forth above. If you purchase less than the specified quantity, you will not be entitled to a rebate. Offer excludes Nantucket™ Window Shadings, a collection of Silhouette® Window Shadings. Rebate will be issued in the form of a prepaid reward card and mailed within 6 weeks of rebate claim receipt. Funds do not expire. Subject to applicable law, a $2.00 monthly fee will be assessed against card balance 7 months after card issuance and each month thereafter. Additional limitations may apply. Ask participating dealer for details and rebate form. © 2016 Hunter Douglas. All rights reserved. All trademarks used herein are the property of Hunter Douglas or their respective owners.
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ny in the 1930s. It’s been especially rich considering that Bibi initially offered the defense post to the leader of the left, Bougie (Isaac) Herzog, who rejected it. Like the right-wing that claimed Sharon had an ulterior motive, the left now claims similar, sinister personal reasons motivated Bibi Netanyahu. I wonder, are the political differences and reactions really all that different? Is demagoguery all that different, be it right or left? Recent tensions have heightened due to IDF soldier Elor Azaryah, who shot a Palestinian terrorist who had just shot Azaryah’s IDF comrade. The terrorist had been neutralized and so Azaryah’s decision came under controversy. His case is going through the standard IDF legal protocol, under which his action was deemed wrong. The left wing is satisfied. The right wing, which sees the case as more complex because of the ongoing danger of a terrorist in close proximity, is enraged. ® WINDOW One thing seemsPIROUETTE clear. The nameSHADINGS of this PIROUETTE WINDOW SHADINGS soldier, Elor Azaryah, will be branded into APRIL 12—JUNE 27, 2016 modern Jewish history. The disagreement APRIL 12—JUNE 27, 2016 $100 REBATE over his case is becoming the crux of a sim** $ ON ANY OF THE FOLLOWING PURCHASES: mering tension and discussion that, when we ON ANY OF THE FOLLOWING PURCHASES: look back, I think will be defining. Sunlight, beautifully transformed 1 Luminette® Privacy Sheer (PLUS $100 REBATE EACH ADDITIONAL UNIT) As time is passing, the gap between right with Hunter Douglas window fashions. Sunlight, beautifully transformed 1 Luminette® Privacy Sheer and left in Israel is growing ever wider, and Enhance the beauty of your décor with light-transforming (PLUS $100 REBATE EACH®ADDITIONAL UNIT) 2 Pirouette Window Shadings with Hunter Douglas window fashions. Hunter Douglas window fashions. Soften, shift, and refine it genuinely worries me. (PLUS $50 REBATE EACH ADDITIONAL UNIT) the natural light that enters your home. Ask for details Enhance the beauty of your décor with light-transforming The left’s philosophy is becoming more ® ® about valuable rebate savings. 2 Pirouette Window Shadings 2 Silhouette Window Shadings and more reductionist, its starting position Hunter Douglas window fashions. Soften, shift, and refine (PLUS $50 REBATE EACH ADDITIONAL UNIT) (PLUS $50 REBATE EACH ADDITIONAL UNIT) ® in a peace negotiation simply to receive the the natural light that enters your home. AskWINDOW for details SHADINGS PIROUETTE world’s approval for Israel’s right to exist. about valuable rebate savings. 2 Silhouette® Window Shadings The national extremist right-wing worries (PLUS $50 REBATE EACH ADDITIONAL UNIT) me, too. While it’s not the mainstream of the right wing, there is an extremist group whose discourse is ugly and violent. A simple solution to the tensions does not exist, but I can tell you, the words of Abba Eban more than 30 years ago, couldn’t be truer now: “Nobody does Israel any service by proclaiming its ‘right to exist.’ Israel’s right to exist, like that of the US, Saudi Arabia, and 152 other states, is axiomatic and unreserved. Israel’s legitimacy is not suspended in midair awaiting acknowledgement. … There is certainly no other state, big or small, young or old, that *Manufacturer’s mail-in rebate offer valid for qualifying purchases made 4/12/16 – 6/27/16 from participating dealers in the U.S. only. A qualifying purchase is defined as a purchase of any of the product models set forth above in the quantities set forth above. If you purchase less than the specified quantity, you will not be entitled to a rebate. would consider mere recognition of its ‘right to PIROUETTE WINDOW SHADINGS Offer excludes Nantucket Window Shadings, a collection of Silhouette Window Shadings. Rebate will be issued in the form of a prepaid reward card and mailed within exist’ a favor, or a negotiable concession” (from 6 weeks of rebate claim receipt. Funds do not expire. Subject to applicable law, a $2.00 monthly fee will be assessed against card balance 7 months after card issuance and each month thereafter. Additional limitations may apply. Ask participating dealer for details and rebate form. © 2016 Hunter Douglas. All rights reserved. All27, trademarks The New York Times, Nov. 18, 1981). APRIL 12—JUNE 2016 used herein are the property of Hunter Douglas or their respective owners. Unlike today, when even people from $100 REBATE* within Israel seem to be foaming at the ON ANY OF THE FOLLOWING PURCHASES: mouth to demonize Israel, at least then it Sunlight, beautifully transformed 1 Luminette® Privacy Sheer seems that people penned articles in The (PLUS $100 REBATE EACH ADDITIONAL UNIT) with Hunter Douglas window fashions. Times in order to advocate for Israel. 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THE JEWISH STAR June 3, 2016 • 26 Iyar 5776
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5Towns parties on Lag Ba’Omer in C’hurst
The Five Towns celebrated Lag Ba’Omer with a kid-centric festival that drew countless families to Andrew J. Parise Cedarhurst Park last Thursday. There were rides, games, a petting zoo, fun and food, a display of acrobatic prowess by a performance team, a mitzvah-mobile and, of course, a bonfire. Pictured clockwise from top left: Noah Hochheiser 2, pets the cute bunnies; children emerge from the mitzvah-mobile through an exit promoting the new Grove Street mikvah; it wouldn’t be Lag Ba’Omer be without a bonfire!; 8-year-old Moshe Ross tries his hand at archary; the bubbles booth is always a big hit, and the Gubermans — Rafi, 8, and Michelle, 10 — try to knock each other down while wearing giant bouncy balls. On page 1, kids of all ages tested their strength with a tug of war.
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Shulamith 8th graders travel to Washington
A weekly section of The Jewish Star. In print, and online at TheJewishStar.com
Rambam sounds off in LI anti-BDS fight Three students from Rambam Mesivta in Lawrence were selected to address the Nassau County Legislature before the officials voted on barring firms that engage in BDS from doing business with the county. Juniors Avi Orlow, Noah Schwartz and Josef Silverstein argued in favor of the law which was sponsored by legislator Howard Koppel. Rambam students helped to fill the chamber. Rosh Mesivta, Rabbi Zev Meir Friedman, said he “felt it was important to bring the whole school down to support these most important efforts.” Two hours before the Legislature convened, the student speakers joined a press conference held on the steps of the county’s executive offices. The boys were well prepared by the assemblies they had at school and through learning Rabbi Yotav Eliach’s class in Zionism.
Avi, Noah and Josef outlined how BDS is a façade for anti-Semitism and is disingenuous. A number of other speakers, including prominent local rabbis, addressed the Legislature. The law passed unanimously, 19–0.
Darchei’s special learning centers cheered at b’kfast
Forty-five enthusiastic Schulamith eighth graders took part in a two-day trip to Washington last week, chaperoned by their principal, Rookie Billet, Director of Student Activities Rachel Steiner, teacher Yaffa Schreier, and parents Aviva Eichler and Batsheva Kramer. The girls, pictured on the steps of the Capitol
(where the rotunda is under renovation), visited the Lincoln Memorial, U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum (where they said a perek of tehillim in the Hall of Remembrance), Arlington National Cemetery, WWII Memorial. FDR Memorial and the Newseum. They also enjoyed a dinner cruise along the Potomac River.
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By Benzion Kaplan The Rabenstein Learning Center and Weiss Vocational Center of Yeshiva Darchei Torah in Far Rockaway have transformed not only the yeshiva of which they are an integral part but the entire community and the wider world of chinuch as well. Rabenstein center, founded in 1981, is a resource center for Darchei students, offering one-on-one instruction, self-contained classrooms and vital assistance for children with learning issues. The Weiss center, founded in 1995, provides From left: Rav Yaakov Bender, rosh haYeshiva of Yeshiva Darchei a select group of Mesivta Torah, host Nachum Futersak, and Rav Elya Brudny, R”M at the MirChaim Shlomo bachurim rer Yeshiva, at the annual breakfast for Darchei Torah’s Rabenstein Naftoli Goldgrab each year with courses in Learning Center and Weiss Vocational Center. plumbing, electrical wiring, construction and carpentry that complement encompass the highest standards of excellence the standard schedule of limudei kodesh in while ensuring that no talmid is left behind. Mr. and Mrs. Nachum Futersak opened the morning and evening and a modified their Lawrence home to host a benefit breakacademic syllabus in the afternoon. Together these two programs have set the fast for these Darchei programs. Rav Elya standard in the world of inclusionary chinuch Brudny, rosh yeshiva at the Mirrer Yeshiva in and have proven that a mainstream yeshiva can Brooklyn, was guest speaker.
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THE JEWISH STAR June 3, 2016 • 26 Iyar 5776
JEWISH STAR SCHOOLS
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June 3, 2016 • 26 Iyar 5776 THE JEWISH STAR
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JEWISH STAR SCHOOLS
HAFTR boys participate in ‘Mes Mitzvah’ Rebbeim and students from the Hebrew Academy of the Five Towns and Rockaway participated in a Mes Mitzvah last week, as they helped make a minyan and bury a Holocaust survivor. “Gam ki elech b’gei tzalmavet” (“As I walk through the valley of the shadow of death”) — Yechezkel ben Shlomo (Harry Feldinger) a”h, did not merely walk through that valley, he dwelled in the shadow of death for years, a victim of a humanity that had sunk to its lowest, most evil depths. Yet, he survived the hell of Auschwitz and Mauthausen. Feldinger was born in Munkach, Czechoslo-
vakia (currently Ukraine) in 1931. At age 14, he was taken to Auschwitz. He came from a family of nine — father, mother, four sisters and three brothers. Out of the three brothers, only he survived. And of his sisters, only two survived. Rabbi Gedaliah Oppen officiated and pointed out that the numbers tattooed on Feldinger’s arm, B14670, is the numeric value of Chai, 18, LIFE, and that Feldinger survived and was forever grateful and proud to call himself a survivor. The students were thankful to have had the opportunity to be part of such an amazing mitzvah.
Tefillah ‘reimagined’ at MDS on Upper West Side
MDS students experience prayer during an inspirational trip to Bear Mountain (above) and a student considers tefilla on his iPad (below).
From left: JEIC Managing Director Rabbi Shmuel Feld, Managing Director, Mayberg Family Foundation trustee Manette Mayberg, MDS Associate Principal Judith Melzer, MDS Director of Curriculum and Instruction Rabbi Michael Ribalt, Mayberg Executive Director Todd Sukol, and MDS Principal Rabbi Mordechai Besser.
DRS match benefits Chai DRS’s annual Green vs. White Game, pitting the Freshman and Senior Wildcats against the Juniors and Sophomores, raised money for Chai Lifeline, whose mission is to restore the light of childhood to children diagnosed with life-threatening or lifelong illness. After a member of the DRS hockey team was diagnosed with cancer several years ago, Coach Larry Gross took it upon himself to create a fundraising event for Chai Lifeline
every year. This year, team members raised $16,000, bringing the total of Green vs. White Game contributions to over $145,000! Before the game, Rabbi Kaminetsky applauded the tremendous chessed of the players, as well as paying tribute to coaches Gross and Rabbi Steven Genachowski, who teach the kids on the team that sportsmanship and “playing like a mentsch” always comes before winning.
Manhattan Day School on the Upper West Side, as one of two recipients of the Jewish Education Innovation Challenge (JEIC) grant, received $50,000 to implement a program called Tefillah Reimagined, incorporating a personalized digital siddur. Launched this year for MDS sixth graders, it is designed to encourage a personal commitment to tefillah now and in the future. Tefillah Reimagined proved more successful than MDS administrators anticipated. “It has given new meaning to the concept of davening and enhanced our students’ perspectives on what Judaism means to them personally,” said Associated Principal Judith Melzer. The program was carried out through weekly classes that focused on the meaning of the daily prayers. Weekly mentoring sessions dove into each student’s personal growth, self-discovery and enhanced appreciation of what being Jewish means. The program culminated with an inspirational trip to Bear Mountain where the students focused on the connectivity of nature to davening and an appreciation of Hashem’s creations. It was an eye-opening experience. “It was pretty amazing to me that I was able to use an iPad to daven but little did I know we would do so much more,” said Nenjy Hild. “[The program] has enhanced my concentration and understanding of tefilla.” This week, Mrs. Melzer and Rabbi Michael Ribalt, director of curriculum and instruction, will present a report on MDS’ experience with the program at the JEIC Innovator’s Retreat in Florida. At the conference, they will coach new applicants about navigating the application process and engage interested schools that would like to adapt the Tefillah Reimagined program.
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HAFTR does Lag Ba’Omer In honor of Lag B’Omer, the eleventh grade class at HAFTR High School welcomed Rabbi Shmuel Marcus (pictured), a magid shiur at Beis Medrash L’Talmud, Lander College for Men, who is also the rav of Kehillas Ishei Yis-
roel in Kew Gardens Hills. Rabbi Marcus is known both in Lander’s and in his shul for his inspiring shiurim, and the boys at HAFTR eagerly awaited his talk. Rabbi Marcus spoke to the boys about the holiness of Lag Ba’Omer and the nature of the happiness of the day, and what we are actually celebrating. Aren’t we being insensitive to the 24,000 dead talmidim if we celebrate? Rabbi Marcus answered that we are not celebrating the ending of the death
of Rabbi Akiva’s talmidim. Rather, we are celebrating Rabbi Akiva’s determination and commitment to picking himself up and immediately resuming his teaching and transmitting the mesorah of Torah Sh’Bal Peh. The lesson that the students received from this insight made its mark on them. They un-
derstood that even if there is sometimes a legitimate reason to not work hard, even if we can find an excuse to give up and call it quits, we have to keep at it. Rabbi Marcus exhorted the boys to identify a goal and then figure out how to achieve it, which would be living up to the lesson of the holiday.
Rambam joins 5K family run finish line to round out the top three. “Best Mom Runner” went to Rivky Orlow and “Best Child Runner” went to Abby Deutsch. Other notable runners included Sam Sicklick (20:19), Noah Schwartz (20:24), Natan Appel (20:25), Ethan Selevan 20:26), Daniel Moskovic (21: 40), and Benny Csillag (22:05). While the race was in progress, the younger children who stayed behind were entertained by a Rambam Entertainment Squad of Yoni Auerbach and Zev Granik.
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Members of the Rambam family came out to run for a good cause in the school’s third 5K and Family Day. After Rabbi Friedman sounded the shofar, students, alumni, parents, teachers and little children in strollers were off on a scenic run of the Five Towns. It took junior Avi Orlow just 19 minutes and 25 seconds to reach the finish line, followed 17 seconds later by his dad, Adam Orlow, and then at 20 minutes and 5 seconds, sophomore Akiva Schuck crossed the
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THE JEWISH STAR June 3, 2016 • 26 Iyar 5776
JEWISH STAR SCHOOLS
June 3, 2016 • 26 Iyar 5776 THE JEWISH STAR
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JEWISH STAR SCHOOLS
‘Good Deeds’ by 30 LI teens cheered by Chabad of Merrick Thirty Long Island teenagers were presented with Good Deed Awards last Thursday. The annual ceremony was organized in 1992 by Rabbi Anchelle Perl, director Chabad of Mineola. At a time when headlines focus on sadness and cruelty, Rabbi Perl set out to identify youngsters who, regardless of their race or religious orientation, have exhibited kindness and generous demeanor as positive role models. One of the students honored was Matthew Batnick of Roslyn High School. At age 13 for his Bar From left: Family Court judges Robin Kent and Ellen Greenberg; County Comptroller George Maragos; Town Mitzvah, he collected and distrib- Clerk of North Hempstead Wayne Wink; awards ceremony emcee Marna Moseson. Commissioner of Social uted special food products to help Services Dr. John Imhof; Chabad of Mineola Rabbi Anchelle Perl; Former County Executive Thomas Gullota, people facing life-threatening awards ceremony chairman Mickey Borak; Town of Hempstead Councilwoman Dorothy Goosby; James Carver, food allergies. Then he proceeded president, Nassau County Police PBA; Jeff Cohen, director, Familyres.com; awards ceremony director Leni to establish a non-profit founda- Goldsmith; former LIPA Chairman Richard Kessel; Roger Clayman of the LI Federation of Labor. tion, Matthews Vision, to provide allergy-free food and money to those in need. kitchens to be educated on food allergies and Libbie Sudweeks. JFK HS: Alexa Greenberg and Mark Reyes. John Glenn HS: Danielle Rubin. He has so far collected over 500 pounds how to handle emergency situations. Lynbrook HS: Ricardo Ortiz. Roslyn HS: Landon Rabbi Perl cited the Lubavitcher Rebbe of food and $15,000. In one family that he Allen, Matthew Batnick, Samantha Busch, Allison assisted, two of their three children have se- who “always encouraged acts of goodness Einberg, Evan Kirsh, Madison Lazar, Andrew Livere allergies to wheat, dairy and soy. The and kindness among humanity, to be the av- eblich, Andrew Meyerson, Jonathan Nissan and father had lost his job and suffered with ad- enue to bring the world to complete peace Robbie Pomerantz. Sacred Hearts Academy: Nicole Mawhirter and Colleen Sullivan. South Side vance sarcoidosis. Using the money donated, and harmony.” Here are the students who won this year’s HS: Charlotte Carver, Isabelle King and Madeline Batnick subsidized the family’s food bill for Good Deed Awards — Baldwin HS: David Zuck- Musnisky. Wantagh HS: Ruth Kupperberg. West months until the father found another job. He erman. Bethpage HS: Carly Licht. Chaminade Hempstead HS: Kelly Valerio. Wheatley School: is now lobbying with his congressmember for HS: Thomas De Simone and George Rettaliata. Joshua Golbari and Sydney Kotin. S.H. Calhoun legislation that would require chefs and soup Division Avenue HS: Christopher DeMilia and HS: Jacqueline Shand.
YOSS celebrates LagBa’Omer Six-thousand miles from Meron, Yeshiva of South Shore commemorated the Yom Hilula of the tanna Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai in each of its divisions. In the Mechina Division, boys joined around a flaming madurah and sang with their rebbes. Rabbi Yosef Newcomb was there with his spiritually elevating music and uplifting stories. The talmidim were treated to a barbecue lunch of hot dogs, fries and more. Inspired by the spirit and tales of the great tanna, the boys erupted in dance and in the spirit of achdus a large circle was made with talmidim dancing hand in hand along with their rabbeim. Approximately 80 boys from grades 3 to 7 joined together at the home of Rabbi Yitzky Ross for a spiritual hillula on Thursday night, to sing around a madurah in his large backyard in Lawrence. They celebrated Lag Ba’Omer with leibidik singing and dancing, divrei Torah, and stories about tzaddikim. The talmidim heard about the significance of a bonfire, and listened to a dvar Torah from the rosh yeshiva, Rabbi Mordechai Kamenetzky. Not to be outdone, the YOSS pre-school boys celebrated Lag Ba’Omer with a midos parade (pictured at right). They sang “Torah Tziva Lanu Moshe!” and “VaHavta L’Reiacha Kamocha” as they marched up and down Serena Road, proudly holding banners with Ve’ahavta Lereacha Kamochathemed messages. Pre-1A children were dressed in red and orange shirts, and kindergarten boys were dressed in green, as they waved their signs displaying pictures they made of themselves and their friends. Nursery children, dressed in blue, spread simcha all over the street, while wearing giant smiles on their hats and faces.
15 THE JEWISH STAR June 3, 2016 • 26 Iyar 5776
JEWISH STAR SCHOOLS
Shulamith Torah Bowl middle school champs Torah Bowl is an amazing opportunity for students who love the study of Chumash to indulge their passion for learning in an exciting, yearlong competition against like-minded peers from other schools. The Shulamith School for Girls in Cedarhurst is proud to report that it won the middle school championship. There are three geographic divisions for boys and three for girls. After four meets, the top team in each division competes in a “World Series” Torah Bowl. For each meet, team members study two or three parshiot — Chumash and Rashi — in great detail, completing an entire Chumash over the year. This year, sefer B’Midbar was studied, and the finals were on the entire sefer. “At Shulamith we have a really large number of students who want to be a part of the team, and so many actually qualify based on a competitive qualifying exam,” said Principal Rookie Billet. “We are happy to give the oppor-
tunity to study extra Torah lishmah to as many girls as we can.” This year’s captains, Rivka Bennun and Meira Steiner, as others before them, were extraordinarily motivated, diligent and gifted. They conducted two practices a week for the entire year, meaning that they and the other team members gave up lunch with their friends to study, answer practice questions, and prepare for the competitions. Every team member studied at least one parsha for each competition, and captains prepared all the parshiot each time. “This was a very special team,” observed Mrs. Billet. “The girls worked so hard, not only memorizing, but composing questions week after week, making connections in their learning and always wanting not only to memorize, but to really thoroughly understand all that they were learning. B’Midbar has tons of names, numbers, places, borders, korbanot, and tremendous detail. The girls were outstanding in their mastery of the material and they were un-
First Row: Anni Laufer, Rivka Bennun, Meira Steiner, Sara Stein, Miri Granik. Second row: Shoshana Brunner, Ilana Brunner, Leah Gerber, Essie Abittan, Rachee Ganchrow, Shira Zelefsky. Third Row: Arielle Yarmish, Ariella Borah, Yael Schreier. Top row: Rabbi Wolofsky (league commissioner) Mrs. Rookie Billet (team adviser), Tamar Stern, Chaya Malka Bokow, Ayelet Rosman, Leora Muskat.
defeated for the entire year, often by large margins. Still, their sportsmanship and respect for each other and the other teams was wonderful. “There is always tension between trying
to give members playing time and wanting to win, and the girls achieved a delicate balance of friendship, fairness and wholesome, competitive spirit.”
HANC announces its Val- and Salutatorians The Hebrew Academy of Nassau County has announced its class valedictorian and salutatorians. Valedictorian Ari Levine is a star both in the classroom and out. He is co-president of the National Honor Society, was designated as an AP Scholar with Honor, has been named to the Honor Roll during his entire high school career, and was selected as the recipient of the Bausch and Lomb Science Award in his junior year. Additionally, he was just awarded the NY State Scholarship for Academic Excellence. Ari has earned the respect and admiration of the entire faculty as he holds himself to a high standard both academically and morally. On Torah Bowl team, where was captain, Ari helped lead the team to two championships. His composure under pressure was an asset to the mock trial and basketball teams. In mock trial, Ari’s intellect, oral argument skills, and ability to think on his feet highlighted him as one of the stars within the competition. He has been a volunteer for the Friendship Circle, a popular tutor in our peer tutoring society, and a team Leader on the JUMP team. He
Valadictorian Ari Levine
Salutatorian Naomi Liviem
Salutatorian Rhonda Traub
presented at the Adelphi Human Rights Conference, is a member of Mathletes, and also plays the piano. Following a year of learning at Yeshivat Hakotel in Israel, Ari will be attending the Honors Program at Yeshiva University where he looks forward to studying Chemistry. Salutatorian Naomi Liviem is a young woman whose motivation, intelligence, self-confidence and drive will take her to great heights.
She is mature and respectful, and this resonates with her peers, the HANC faculty, and nearly everyone she meets. Academically, Naomi is a scholar of the highest caliber. Admired by her teachers for her determination, she is eager to learn. She serves as co-president of the National Honor Society, was recognized as an AP Scholar with Honor, has been an Honor Roll Student throughout
her high school career, and was selected as a recipient of the Rensselaer Medal Award for outstanding achievement in Mathematics and Science. Naomi is devoted to a range of extracurricular activities, including as as president of Peer Drug Educators, captain of the girls’ Torah Bowl Team, chairperson of the Jewish Elderly Committee, captain of Varsity Soccer, and vice president of the
Varsity Mathletes. Following a year at Baer Miriam in Israel, Naomi plans to attend Queens College where she looks forward to studying Psychology. Salutatorian Rhonda Traub is smart, kind, and confident yet and humble. Rhonda works hard because she has a passion for learning. She is deeply admired by her peers and teachers alike. Rhonda has been on General and Judaic Studies Honor Roll for four years and has been a three year member of the National Honor Society. She is also an AP Scholar and received the National Merit Scholarship Letter of Commendation. Rhonda shows leadership ability and commitment as editor-inchief of the yearbook and editor of Midreshei HANC, the school’s Jewish newsletter. She is a mathlete, peer tutor, peer drug educator, Torah Bowl team member, and an Israel Action Committee member. Next year, Rhonda will be attending Midreshet Harova in Israel followed by the University of Maryland at College Park University Honors program, where she plans to pursue a degree in Nursing.
HALB k’garten to White Post farm Children and morot alike had a blast at the annual Hebrew Academy of Long Beach spring trip to White Post Farm. Sunny skies accompanied the kindergarten children, morot and volunteer parents on HALB’s farm adventure. The children hand fed goats, alpaca, sheep, camels, and cows. Seeing the animals up close gave them an opportunity to observe what
Torah tells us are the two signs of a Kosher animal: splits hooves and chewing their cud. They saw bulls, pigs, kangaroos, lemurs and zebras too. The children enjoyed a pony ride, and walked on a bridge over a beautiful pond filled with fish, turtles and a big white swan. A delicious picnic lunch was enjoyed in a shaded tented area and there was play in a vast playground full
of massive wooden and plastic structures including a school bus and Noah’s Teyva, just to name a few. The children’s favorite part of the trip was the aviary. The large net-enclosed space housed many different birds flying freely and landing on feeding sticks held by the children. Some even landed on their arms and legs. The children were so brave and had an awesome time.
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“What people don’t know is that there can be a half inch of water in a child’s toy or in a bottle cap, a flowerpot saucer or water can,” Mangano said. “That half inch is enough for mosquitoes to hatch eggs and reproduce.” Eisenstein said it is imperative to remove standing water from any container or surface around the home. This way, mosquitoes that carry the Zika or West Nile viruses can be eliminated. Mangano said the Department of Health has begun testing sites around Nassau County. According to projecthope.org, the Zika virus first spread from Africa and Asia to a Pacific island in 2007. By May 15, 2015, Brazil reported its first case of the Zika virus and, in November, declared a national public health emergency. By January 20, 2016, almost 4,000 cases of skull deformities were reported around the world. Eisenstein urged people to watch for Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, which are known to carry the Zika virus. “The Aedes mosquito, unlike many others, is a daytime biter,” he said. Fortunately, the Aedes mosquito makes up only about 3 percent of the mosquito population, Eisenstein said.
By Stephany Reyes Nassau County Executive Edward Mangano, County Health Commissioner Lawrence Eisenstein and other local officials announced a mosquito trapping and surveillance plan in light of the Zika virus spread. The Zika action plan aims to help county residents identify spots around the home where mosquitoes are most likely to hatch eggs. “With the spread of the Zika virus overseas, we urge residents who travel to take precautions,” Mangano said. Officials urge residents to wear long socks and protective clothing while outside for long periods of time, filter ornamental ponds using a circulation pump, maintain lawns groomed to prevent overgrowth, check window or door screens and repair as needed to ensure mosquitoes cannot enter the home, clear leaves and debris to allow water to flow freely from drainage ditches and roof gutters, change the water and clean bird baths and empty water that collects in folds of tarps. Mangano also said the biggest breeding sites for mosquitoes are the ones homeowners least think are problematic.
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In response to the growing, and often overlooked drug and alcohol addiction dilemma in the Jewish community, a new kosher and rabbinically endorsed recovery program is being launched in the New York metropolitan area. Shalom Jewish Recovery Center will officially open its doors on June 14 in discreet locations in Long Beach and on Manhattan’s Central Park West. The center, offering drug/alcohol recovery and detoxification from a team of world-class doctors in a first-rate facility, will provide 30, 60 and 90 day in-patient programs, in addition to customized out-patient programs in which individuals can be restored to sobriety discreetly in the comfort of their own home. The program is the brainchild of its founder, Long Islander Matthew Belcher. Belcher explained the program’s simple philosophy. “Our unique, individual, personalized recovery regimen puts the Shalom center in a class all by itself,” he said. “We strongly believe that we will change the industry. “An 8 to 1 ratio of staff to client is our standard. Those eight professional LMSW/CASAC will focus on one client at a time for their whole stay with us. This personalized regimen has never been done before.” Belcher has dedicated the past 36 months to set up this treatment program after losing a pair of close friends to avoidable, tragic overdoses. “Through our intense studies in the field of recovery, we’ve discovered that the most proven program is personal, one-on-one recovery,” he said. “We have come to realize that no recovery center on earth takes this important approach to such a high level.
“We will lead the way in changing recovery for the better. And they will get to do so in a fully kosher environment.” Leading the rabbinical team for the center is Rabbi Dovid Goldwasser from Congregation Bnei Yitzchok in Brooklyn. Rabbi Goldwasser is the author of The Addicted Soul, a comprehensive analysis of the physical, spiritual and emotional conditions of the addicted individual. Rabbi Goldwasser’s personal exposition of the Twelve-Step Program, based on Torah values and philosophy, lays an effectual foundation for recovery from addiction and spiritual growth. At Shalom Jewish Recovery Center, clients
are kept separated for a variety of clinical reasons. The only time one would see another client would be at the banquet table for Shabbat dinner on Friday night, if the client chooses to attend. Privacy and confidentially is of the utmost importance. Programs are available for alcohol dependency, benzodiazepine detoxification, heroin and opiates addiction, and co-occurring disorders. In terms of accommodations, each client at the Manhattan location will stay in a 2,150 square foot suite. All rooms are outfitted with a bold and engaging style befitting New York City. Every detail is custom designed to create a relaxing experience.
Visually stunning 12 foot, floor-to-ceiling windows will give their clients precious views of Central Park and the New York City Skyline. The Long Beach treatment facility will provide similar comfort, but with beach and ocean views from the patient accommodations. Individuals battling addiction or their family members are encouraged to call the 24hour wellness hotline at 631-805-2928. You will speak to a staff member, never an answering service. All calls are kept completely confidential. Clients never need to worry about privacy, so they can focus on their recovery. Belcher can be reached by email at: Matthew@ShalomJewishRecovery.com
South Nassau Communities Hospital Respite Room
A HAVEN FOR HOSPITAL PATIENTS AND THEIR FAMILIES
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Super SpecialS This week on pages 8 and 9
SOUTH NASSAU AND ACHIEZER RECOGNIZE THE UNIQUE NEEDS OF THE LOCAL ORTHODOX JEWISH POPULATION AND ARE WORKING TOGETHER TO MAKE YOUR STAY MORE COMFORTABLE AND ENJOYABLE. We’re working with doctors, nurses and our entire hospital staff to raise awareness of the sensitivities and sensibilities of Orthodox Jews; and we are working closely with our Rabbinical consultants to anticipate our patients’ needs before they arise. To highlight these efforts, we are pleased to provide the Kosher Pantry/Respite Room co-sponsored by South Nassau and Achiezer. This room offers a quiet haven for patients to relax, rejuvenate and enjoy a variety of kosher amenities provided exclusively for their use. Thanks to Gourmet Glatt, the pantry is fully stocked throughout the week and has hot meals for Shabbos and Yom Tov. And with a MondayThursday Mincha Minyan on premises, and Young Israel of Oceanside nearby (walkable within the Eruv), we can always help meet your spiritual and medical needs.
For more information about the Respite Room or our other services, call 877-SOUTH-NASSAU, visit southnassau.org or call Achiezer at 516-791-4444.
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South Nassau also offers a convenient Shabbos elevator, and comfortable overnight accommodations are available year-round at our kosher Shabbat Hospitality House, which is complete with beds, linen, durable kosher food items and a refrigerator. Electric Sabbath candles are available. Access to the Shabbat Hospitality House is arranged through South Nassau’s Spiritual Care Program. When you find yourself in our hospital, visit the new Respite Room located on the Ground Floor G Wing adjacent to the Volunteer Office, and see for yourself why more and more Jewish families throughout the area are choosing South Nassau. 844146
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THE JEWISH STAR June 3, 2016 • 26 Iyar 5776
Shalom Jewish Recovery opens in Long Beach
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Stacking the Dem platform panel against Israel politics to go
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’ve been saying for a long time that the more liberal one is politically the less likely one is to support the Jewish state. The anti-Israel policy of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton offers anecdotal proof; the vote by Democrats in favor of the Iran deal provide another example, and then, back in 2012, there was the removal by the Democrats of four pro-Israel planks from their platform.. When the platform changes were reported by this columnist, Democrats restored one of the four — the Jerusalem-is-the-capitalof-Israel plank; but they failed to restore a promise not to negotiate with Hamas as long as it refused to renounce terrorism, or a position that in a final deal Palestinian refugees would be resettled in a Palestinian state rather than flooding Israel with the purpose of removing its Jewish character, or that the 1948 armistice lines should not represent the final boarders between Israel and Palestine. A Pew Poll released last week backs up the qualitative judgements with quantitative evidence, finding that “views of Israel and the Palestinians have become more ideologically polarized. In early September 2001, just before the 9/11 terrorist attacks, there were only modest partisan and ideological differences in Israeli-Palestinian sympathies. But since then, and especially over the past decade, the share sympathizing more with Israel than with the Palestinians has increased
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Hamas in 2014 because of its repeated terrorist attacks and the tunnels constructed to enable them to kill Israelis, Cornel West called Israeli actions a “crime against humanity” and said that there was “much blood on the hands of Prime Minister Netanyahu.” West, a long-time supporter of the BDS movement, has called President Obama a war criminal for supporting Israel. Sanders also placed Rep. Keith Ellison (DMN) on the committee. Ellison is certainly pro- Palestinian, however he is not the same kind of “froth at the mouth” Israel hater as Zogby and West. Zogby and West’s placement in such a prominent position within the Democratic Party highlights the changing face of the Democratic Party as does some of the appointments made by Clinton and Wasserman Schultz. Hillary’s haters: Ambassador Wendy Sherman, who is Jewish, may not be an Israel hater. But she is a supporter of the Obama/Clinton anti-Israel policies and was one of the chief negotiators of the P5+1 deal which enables Iran to remain an existential threat to Israel. Center for American Progress (CAP) head Neera Tanden is likewise not necessarily anti-Israel, but CAP has been accused of being anti-Israel and worse. In the lead-up to the last election, Politico published a piece about how CAP was fighting to change the Democratic Party to the anti-Israel party. Stories by CAP bloggers had appeared in the vehemently anti-Israel fringe publication The Electronic Intifada. Cap bloggers have also accused American Jews of a dual loyalty, calling them “Israel-Firsters.” The Simon Wiesenthal Center went beyond calling CAP anti-Israel, they
called it anti-Semitic. Perhaps CAP’s worst infraction was the creation of the anti-Israel group J-Street which is explained in the next section. Debbie’s downer: Rep. Barbara Lee tries to have it both ways. At times she votes for military aid and claims to be a supporter of Israel. But generally she looks at the Jewish State through the jaded lenses of the anti-Israel group J-Street that endorses her. J-Street was founded in 2008 with help from Center for American Progress and progressive sugar daddy George Soros. It markets itself as kind of left-wing AIPAC. Fellow progressive Alan Dershowitz said that while J Street says it is “pro-Israel, pro-peace,” J Street is “neither pro-Israel or pro peace.” Looking at the record of these people on the DNC platform committee and the liberal move away from support of Israel as shown by the Pew study, do not be surprised if the 2016 platform does more than remove proIsrael planks from the platform, and becomes more overtly anti-Israel. Columnist@TheJewishStar.com
Luach
Fri. June 3 • 26 Iyar
Parsha Bechukosai Shabbos Mevarchim
Candlelighting:8:03 pm Havdalah: 9:13 pm This week’s luach is according to the White Shul, Far Rockaway
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among all ideological groups, with the exception of liberal Democrats.” “The share of liberal Democrats who side more with the Palestinians than with Israel has nearly doubled since 2014 (from 21-percent to 40-percent) and is higher than at any point dating back to 2001,” according to Pew. ased on people appointed to the platform committee of the Democratic National Committee by Clinton, Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Bernie Sanders, we should expect that the Democratic Party will continue to back away from support for Israel. Sanders appointees included James Zogby, Cornel West, and Rep. Keith Ellison. Hillary’s picks include some who should be worrisome to Israel supporters — Ambassador Wendy Sherman and Center for American Progress head Neera Tanden. One of Wasserman Schultz’s picks was California Rep. Barbara Lee, a longtime critic of Israel. Bernie’s bashers: James Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute, has a long history of anti-Israel rhetoric. He has referred to Israelis as “Nazis” and has called Israel’s actions in protecting herself from terrorism “a Holocaust.” He has also described sitting members of Congress as “Israel Firsters,” an anti-Semitic charge that implies dual loyalty to the Jewish state. “Zogby has two goals: to make Arab Americans more powerful than Jewish Americans and to be their preeminent leader,” explained Yehudit Barsky, a fellow at the Institute for the Study of Global Anti-Semitism and Policy. In a 2014 column, Zogby pushed the falsehood that Arafat never turned down an offer from Israel in 2000 and turned to violence instead. When Israel launched an operation against
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June 3, 2016 • 26 Iyar 5776 THE JEWISH STAR
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alan Jay geRbeR Kosher BooKworm
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his week’s essay will be the first to deal with some of the latest thoughts and literature regarding the observance of Shavuot. Ohr Ha Tzafon, volume four, Nissan 5776, published by Beis Hakenesses of North Woodmere, has an essay by Elli Ganchrow titled, “Staying Up Late On Shavuot Night,” that includes an eloquent series of observations on the rituals and themes of the festival. I cite the following for your edification: “A cursory review of the Shulchan Aruch reveals an interesting fact with respect to Shavuot. Unlike its treatment of every major holiday, the Shulchan Aruch does not contain a separate section dedicated to this holiday. One possible reason for this omission by the Shulchan Aruch is that Shavuot, as opposed to all the other holidays, does not contain any stand-alone ritual commandments, and does not even have many minhagin. In fact, there are only three well-known, nearly universal minhagim which are observed on Shavuot: “1. The eating of dairy products “2. The placement of flowers in the shul “3. To stay up all night learning Torah on
the first night “While the first two minhagim are brought down by the Ramah, the third custom, while certainly universally followed in contemporary times, is not mentioned at all in the Shulchan Aruch.” This learned essay goes on to cite 19 valued sources to demonstrate the uniqueness of this holiday. The author, Mr. Ganchrow, concludes his teachings with the following observation: “All Jews … should recognize that Shavuot, which is the time of the anniversary of the giving of the Torah, is a fantastic opportunity to rededicate ourselves to a life that is focused on the concept of Torah, mitzvoth, and good deeds.” Another new work recently published by Koren Publishers together with the Rabbinical Council of America is the Koren Shavuot Machzor. Within this volume is an eloquent introductory commentary by Rabbi Jonathan Sacks on “Ruth: the Book of Loyalty and Love.” Rabbi Sacks makes the following observation: “The book itself is a literary masterpiece.
It owes much of its vividness to the fact that of all books of the Hebrew Bible, it has the highest proportion of direct speech to descriptive narrative: 55 of its 85 verses are in dialogue form. Its four chapters are structured as a chiasmus, a mirror … so that, for example, the end, with its account of births and genealogies, mirrors the beginning with its recitation of deaths and childlessness. It is held together by a series of key words and recurring themes, among then ‘return,’ ‘redemption,’ and ‘blessing.’ “Seven times people bless one another in the book, sustaining the sense that divine provi- dence is at work beneath the surface of events. Not always but often, good things happen to good people, even if they take time.” This observation is buttressed later on in the introduction to the text of Ruth itself: “The book of Ruth is read on Shavuot for seasonal and substantive reasons. The main events of the book take place at the time of the barley and wheat harvests, the period
that begins with the seven-week Counting of the Omer initiated by a barley offering, and culminates in Shavuot and its offering of two loaves of wheat. “Second, Ruth’s entry into the faith and the way of life of Israel recalls the entry of the Israelites into the covenant and its commandments at Mount Sinai, commemorated on Shevuot. The book of Ruth thus portrays in narrative form the two dimensions of Shavuot: the festival of the grain harvest and of the Sinai covenant.” FOR FURTHER STUDY A new commentary on Ruth, “Machat Shel Yad,” written in English by Rabbi Yitzchok Frankel, rav of the Agudath Yisrael of the Five Towns, was recently published by Judaica Press. This will be the subject of a full review, G-d willing, in the near future. Another work for your edification is, in English translation, “Moadim Lesimcha: Explorations into the Jewish Holidays” (Urim Publications) by Rabbi Shlomo Aviner, one of Israel’s leading interpreters of our religious faith. And last, but not least, is a heartfelt narrative by Yehuda Boruch Kamenetzky titled, “Brain Storm: A deadly Tumor. A young man. A Story of Medicine, Emunah — and Triumph” (ArtScroll Shaar Press). This book will surely reinforce your faith in the face of health-threatening adversity. A full review of this work will, IY”H, be forthcoming soon. Columnist@TheJewishStar.com
Shalom: That’s the purpose of the entire Torah Rabbi david etengoff
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arashat Bechukotai presents shalom as one of the greatest rewards that we will receive when we live lives dedicated to Hashem’s holy Torah: “And I will grant peace in the Land, and you will lie down with no one to frighten [you] … and no army will pass through your land” (Vayikra 26:6). Significantly, this statement is preceded by these pasukim: “If you follow My statutes and observe My commandments and perform them, I will give your rains in their time, the Land will yield its produce, and the tree of the field
will give forth its fruit. Your threshing will last until the vintage, and the vintage will last until the sowing; you will eat your food to satiety, and you will live in security in your land.” (26:3-5) In a real sense, this passage serves as a preamble to our pasuk, with its focus on the promise of a robust physical existence in our Promised Land. As such, it emphasizes ample rain, bountiful produce, abundant fruit, vast quantities of grain, great amounts of wine, and “food to satiety.” At the same time, however, the phrase, “and you will live in security in your land,” seems to be almost an afterthought. Therefore, the Torah utilizes our
pasuk, “And I will grant peace in the Land, and you will lie down with no one to frighten [you] … and no army will pass through your land,” to underscore the importance of peace in our land. Rashi, basing himself on both the Talmud and Midrash, expands upon this idea in the following fashion: “And I will grant peace: You might say, ‘Here is food, and here is drink, but if there is no peace, there is nothing!’ Scripture, therefore, states, after all this [blessing], ‘I will grant peace in the Land.’ From here, [we learn] that peace is equal to everything else. And so, [too, this is illustrated in our morning prayers,] when
We long for Hashem’s compassion and mercy and peace in the land.
we say: “[Blessed are You, O L-rd…] Who … makes peace and creates everything” (Yeshiyahu 45:7). Rashi is teaching us that all the bounty of the world is as naught without shalom, since “it is equal to everything else.” Little wonder, then, that the word, shalom is found over a dozen times in the Five Books of the Torah, and many hundreds of times in the works of our Sages. ne of the clearest sources within Rabbinic literature that speaks of the ultimate import of shalom is in the Rambam’s Mishneh Torah: “If [a person has the opportunity to fulfill only one of two mitzvot,] lighting a lamp for one’s home [Sabbath candles] or lighting a Chanukah lamp — or, alternatively, lighting a lamp for one’s home or reciting kiddush [over wine] — the Continued on page 20
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Do we really care, or do we merit a rebuke? Rabbi avi billet Parsha of the weeK
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ne of the words that stands out in the Tochacha (Rebuke) of Parshat B’chukotai, a word which very clearly refers to bad behavior that people will exhibit towards G-d, and the consequential response G-d will display towards those people, is “keri.” Leaving out all the jokes we could make about any government official who may have a similar sounding name, we must ask what the Hebrew word in this context means. In his Living Torah, Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan’s note on the word, which he translates as “If you are indifferent” towards Me, reads as follows: “Literally, ‘If you walk with Me with keri.’ Variously translated, ‘If you make Me
a temporary concern’ (Targum Yonathan; Sifra; Rashi; Chizzkuni); ‘If you harden yourselves against Me’ (Targum; Tosafoth, Rosh HaShanah16a, s.v. Keri); ‘If you refuse to walk My way’ (Menachem, quoted in Rashi, Rashbam); ‘If you become overconfident in your dealings with Me’ (Ibn Ezra); ‘If you become rebellious against Me’ (Saadia; Ibn Janach; Septuagint); ‘If you make it a burden to walk with Me’ (Targum, according to Rashi); or, ‘If You treat My [acts] as accident’ (Arukh; Moreh Nevukhim 3:36; Radak, Sherashim). The word keri can thus denote triviality, harshness, refusal, overconfidence, rebellion, a burden, or a natural accident.” This “comment” is pretty comprehensive,
though I will add two more interpretations: The Midrash Aggadah defines keri as meaning not committed to following My ways. K’tav Ve’Hakabbalah explains the term to refer to being stubborn – intending to strike at G-d’s honor and to provoke Him — the result of which will be that “G-d will reign down punishment that strikes at you, which you will feel strongly.” The prevailing argument is that there is no comparison between one who violates a sin for reasons of pleasure and one who violates just to anger G-d. The essence of all of these possibilities can be summarized in two words: Not caring. Not caring about G-d. Not caring about
if we care for one another and for g-d, torah, mitzvos and kiddush Hashem, the tochacha will not come true.
mitzvos. Not caring about the Torah. Not caring about other people. Looking to provoke, looking to anger, looking to overturn apple carts, looking to destroy relationships. The fundamental message in the Rebuke is warnings to avoid turning away from G-d. And maybe, this whole “not caring” bit is the hidden ingredient that puts a person in the bad camp. n the Tochacha, the word keri appears seven times: four times it refers to how the people will treat G-d, and three times G-d says that since you treated Me that way, “I will behave towards you with keri.” Seven is a significant number in the Torah – it reminds us of Shabbos (seven days), of the counting of the Omer (seven weeks), of the years of Shmittah (after 7 years), Yovel (Jubilee – fiftieth year after seven cycles of Shmittah). The Tochacha itself utilizes the number seven to declare how manifold G-d will punish for malfeasance and sin (you got it – seven times the violation!). Continued on page 20
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THE JEWISH STAR June 3, 2016 • 26 Iyar 5776
Latest literature relating to the Shavuot festival
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Shalom…
Continued from page 19 lamp for one’s home receives priority, since it generates peace within the home (shalom bayit).” Thus, shalom bayit trumps both the lighting of the Chanukah candles and the recitation of kiddush that ideally should be said over a glass of wine. Maimonides’ straightforward halachic presentation, however, does not complete his discussion of shalom. Instead, and uncharacteristically, he poetically praises the singular significance of peace: “[Peace is of primary importance, as reflected by the mitzvah requiring] G-d’s name to be blotted out to create peace between a husband and his wife [in the Sotah rite]. Peace is great, for the entire Torah was given to bring about peace within the world, as [Mishle 3:17] states: “[The Torah’s] ways are pleasant ways and all its paths are peace.” (Zemanim, Hilchot Megillah v’Chanukah, 4:14) Long ago, Iyov declared, “He makes peace in His heights” (Iyov 25:2). At some point and time, our Sages added to Iyov’s statement until we have the present-day closing words of many recitations of the Kaddish: “[May] He Who makes peace in His heights, may He, in His compassion, make peace upon us, and upon all the Jewish people.” Today, in the shadow of the Holocaust, and in the midst of an explosion of nearly universal vitriolic anti-Semitic diatribe, we long for Hashem’s compassion and mercy, and the fulfillment of this prayer, and our pasuk, “And I will grant peace in the Land, and you will lie down with no one to frighten [you] … and no army will pass through your land.” May this time come soon and in our days. V’chane yihi ratzon. Columnist@TheJewishStar.com
Caring… Continued from page 19 And so, we must ask ourselves, how often is a keri attitude the one which drives our M.O.? I think that most people are not going as far as sinning specifically to anger G-d. Typically, a person who has a bad moment or a bad episode is succumbing to the evil inclination, giving into a desire for momentary pleasure which happens to be a sin. Thank G-d there is plenty of pleasure for us to imbibe and enjoy without resorting to sinful behaviors and acts! So perhaps, with such a short amount of time before Shavuos, a time when many of us will crack open our Holy Books for our most dedicated hours of learning Torah in the year, we ought to ask ourselves if we care? If all that we do is merely say things and give lip service to how we are supposed to be, but we don’t put into action the things we learn in Pirkei Avot (Ethics of the Fathers), or take to heart the lesson we were supposed to learn when poor decisions came back to burn us, we are acting in a way that is a violation of keri. Let us take the number seven – whether from the perspective of the specific mitzvos that include the number seven or simply from noting how it is significant in the Torah — and let us aim to counter the seven “not carings” in the parsha, to aim to increase our own “caring” sevenfold. If we care for one another, if we care for our community, if we care for the global Jewish community, if we care for our brothers and sisters in Israel, if we care for G-d, Torah, mitzvos and kiddush Hashem, not only will the Tochacha not come true, but we will merit to be blessed sevenfold per the blessings that come from fulfilling “Bechukotai telechu,” following G-d’s ways. Columnist@TheJewishStar.com
Jerusalem before reunification: Defiant markings on prison wall By Maayan Jaffe-Hoffman n late fall 1947, Shmuel Matza, then a 20-year-old member of the Etzel (Irgun) Jewish underground paramilitary organization, was detained in the Kishle prison by the British on suspicion of possessing illegal arms. “I decided to show the British that I was not afraid of them, that I would continue to be a member of Etzel even after my prison term, that I would continue to challenge them,” Matza recalls. So one morning, Matza slipped his breakfast fork in his pocket just before the guards accompanied him back to his quarters—a tiny cell infested by rats and lice with only a mat of woven cloth on which to sleep. When the lights went out and everyone was sleeping, including the police officers, Matza quietly removed that fork from his pocket. Slowly and determinedly, he carved the following deep into the prison wall: the emblem of the Irgun, a map of the historic land of Israel; the Hebrew phrases for “only thus,” which suggested that the Jewish people would use force to achieve freedom in their land, and “long live the Hebrew state;” and his name. A few days later, Matza was transferred to the Latrun detention camp, from which he was released in April 1948, just ahead of the Israeli War of Independence. He fought for the state until the war ended in 1949. Then, Matza went to law school, married, had children and grandchildren, and quietly closed the previous chapter of his life. et that chapter was unexpectedly reopened more than 50 years later, when archaeologists discovered Matza’s carvings—still bold, confident, and defiant—on an interior wall of the Kishle. Archaeologists began excavating around the area of the Kishle after Israel’s 1967 Six-Day War, during which the Jewish state reunified Jerusalem following 19 years of Jordanian control in the city’s eastern portion. The capital’s reunification is celebrated by Israelis each year on Yom Yerushalayim (Jerusalem Day), which falls on June 5 this year. In the aftermath of the 1967 war, then Jerusalem mayor Teddy Kollek agreed to let the Israeli government develop Jerusalem’s Tower of David into a museum. But the Kishle, a 1,476-square-foot structure, was left untouched while archaeologists focused on the 1,000-year-old and much larger Tower of David. At the time, the Kishle—hidden behind a metal door and situated atop a winding spiral staircase next to the ancient ramparts of the Old City walls—was believed to have been built in the 19th century. In 2000, Eilat Lieber—now the Tower of David Museum’s general director and chief curator, and then its director of education— was looking for a site within the museum’s grounds to host children’s programming. She remembered the Kishle from when she was a student at the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design in the 1980s. “I had seen the plans for the museum and that the Kishle was part of the grounds,” Lieber tells JNS.org. “It was something that no one even remembered.” Lieber launched a search for the key to unlock the Kishle, and found it in its rusty state on the key ring of the museum’s caretaker. The caretaker opened the door, “and we saw this amazing space,” recalls Rose Ginosar, director of development and external relations for the Tower of David. The $1 million originally fundraised to
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Shmuel Matza, now 89, points to his carvings in the interior wall of Jerusalem’s Kishle prison decades earlier. Maayan Jaffe-Hoffman
produce the children’s center was instead funneled toward excavations in the Kishle. A team of Israel Antiquities Authority archaeologists led by Amit Re’em took everything out by hand until they hit bedrock. Along the way, they discovered layers revealing 2,800 years of history—a far cry for the previous assumption that the Kishle was constructed in the 19th century. At the lowest layer of the Kishle, archaeologists discovered walls that can be dated back to the 8th century BC, showing the character of Jerusalem in the times of the First Temple Period. Above those walls, archaeologists found remnants of Hasmonean walls built by the dynasty that preceded King Herod, who built the Second Temple. Even further above, they found the remains of the large foundation walls built to support King Herod’s palace, and the massive water system used to transfer water from outside the city walls into his palace and the surrounding area. The castle of the Crusader King of Jerusalem lies on top of Herod’s palace; archaeologists discovered a series of tubs likely used by Jews to dye cloth for the Crusader royalty. Atop that layer is a structure from the Ottoman era—the period when the Kishle got its name. “Kishle” is Turkish for “barracks.” The Kishle was used in the 19th century as a military compound by Egyptian ruler Ibrahim Pasha, before being taken over by the Ottomans. The Ottomans converted it into a jail, and the British continued to use the Kishle as such during the British Mandate period 1920 to 1948. atza remembers the day his carving was discovered. He received a call from the Hebrew daily newspaper Ma’ariv and from the archaeologist, Re’em, informing him of the finding. They located Matza through his younger brother, Yehoshua Matza, then a well-known Likud politician. Though Shmuel Matza was 75 at the time, he says he could still vividly remember his days in the Kishle. Today, at 89, his memory is equally as sharp. “There were about 20 of us packed into one jail cell—criminals of all kinds, Arabs,” Matza recalls. “The cells were dirty and smelly, with all kinds of rats and bugs. We’d go out to the patio for our meals, which consisted of olives, yogurt, pita bread, and tea. I still remember that they served the tea in these aluminum cups, which got so hot that it burned our mouths when we tried to drink from them.” Matza also remembers the period in which he fought for Israel. A Jerusalemite going back several generations, his first ar-
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rest came at age 17, when he was caught hanging flyers for the Irgun. He had joined the paramilitary group through a friend of a friend. “It was an underground, they didn’t have an office I could go to, say ‘Good morning,’ and tell them I want to join,” Matza explains. y 20, he was promoted to a combat role and oversaw a team of 12 young women. He was tasked with training them to use weapons: hand grenades and revolvers. The morning before their first training, Matza went to a room in a small shack in which fellow Irgun members had hidden firearms under the tile floor. He wanted to clean the shack ahead of that evening’s training. But just as Matza went outside of the shack to get a broom, a British security officer called to him, “Hey you, come over here.” “One officer took me into an armored car and the other went straight to the room—it was like they knew [about the underground operation],” says Matza. Though they could not prove Matza was guilty—after all, he was in the courtyard and not the room with the guns—they arrested him and sentenced him to six months of detention. The Kishle was his stopover. “Since childhood, I was nationalistic,” Matza says. “But when the Second World War was about to end and there was news coming about the burning of millions of Jews in Europe, and the British here didn’t want to give them any certificates to enter— they sent boats back to Europe knowing what would happen—that is what made me want to join Etzel and fight against them.” He adds, “I am now 89 years old and I am still excited about the State of Israel. … We survived then, and we continue to survive and even flourish.” The proof, says Matza, is in his carvings on the wall of the Kishle. JNS.org
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Continued from page 1 help them understand that they are not alone when they choose to fight BDS, he continued. “The State of Israel is involved, as well as major Jewish organizations.” The conference included a performance by Jewish reggae star Matisyahu, who experienced BDS firsthand in 2015 when a Spanish music festival initially decided to disinvite him in response to BDS pressure. The festival ultimately reinstated his performance. Attendees will hear from panelists including Ronald Lauder, president of the World Jewish Congress; Justice Elyakim Rubinstein, vice president of the Israeli Supreme Court; and Jay Sekulow, chief legal counsel of the American Center for Law and Justice. “The anti-Israel narrative on campuses and in diplomatic halls has spun out of control and has proven itself to be part and parcel with an anti-Semitic agenda, aimed at delegitimizing the Jewish state and its right to exist,” one of Monday’s panelist, Ronald Lauder, president of the World Jewish Congress, said in a statement. Danon called the BDS movement “a new form of anti-Semitism.” “It’s not politically correct to say that you’re an anti-Semite … and when you see graffiti in Europe calling for Jews to go home, it reminds me of 1938. So today we have our own state, we are a strong state for the Jewish people, but still when you see the content and the language, it reminds me of what happened in Europe in the late ’30s,” Danon said. Does Nazi Germany belong in the same sentence as BDS and other contemporary anti-Israel movements? “The views of Hamas are an echo of the
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From that point on, Herf explained, the Palestinians’ narrative of “utter innocence and victimization by an ‘evil’ Israel was diffused to international politics. BDS efforts in our time recycle these old and false accusations.” Yet Herf believes that BDS can be defeated with “determined opposition,” because the movement’s “arguments rest on lies.” “The denial of Palestinian terror is too blatant,” he said. “The Middle East is in flames and collapsing partly due to its preoccupation with hatred of Israel rather than building stable economies and political structures. A major problem does exist in European and American universities, where now several generations of young people have been miseducated about the history of the modern Middle East. “Where young people are given access to balanced accounts of the Arab-Zionist and Israeli-Palestinian conflict, there is every reason to think that BDS will fail.” Danon said that world leaders need to speak out publicly against BDS because “in the long run, we cannot anticipate what will be the consequences” of the movement, particularly as a result of the “hostile” atmosphere BDS creates in the academic and business sectors. While BDS has a “chilling effect on businesses that operate in Israel,” there is also the fear that college students “will feel disengaged and not want to be connected to Israel,” said Danon. “I think that they (BDS activists) are very organized, well-funded,” he said. “If we will recognize the threat and will fight back, we will prevail. But I wouldn’t underestimate their organization and efforts.” Distributed by JNS.org
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anti-Semitic conspiracy theories of Nazis. Its hatred of the Jews and the Jewish state is unambiguous. It makes no distinction between anti-Zionism and hatred of the Jews and Judaism,” Jeffrey Herf, a professor of modern European and German history at the University of Maryland, told JNS.org. “To the extent to which Hamas is involved in BDS efforts, then in that sense there is some echo of Nazi propaganda.” But putting Hamas aside, Herf—who has written extensively on the Weimar Republic, Nazi Germany, the Holocaust, and Germany during the Cold War era—said that the “main thrust of BDS comes from the Palestinian Authority.” “The main themes of BDS are identical to the main themes of Soviet bloc, communist state, and Western radical leftist attacks on Israel during the Cold War,” he said. “There is not a single idea expressed by BDS advocates that was not voiced in the United Nations in the 1970s, during which time the U.N. General Assembly labeled Zionism to be a form of racism. The difference is that what was once a set of lies and distortions in the PLO’s (Palestine Liberation Organization) political warfare has now gained a certain academic respectability and theoretical gloss in some universities in Europe and the United States.” The significance of holding the anti-BDS conference at the U.N. General Assembly can be understood against the historical backdrop of “mendacious” General Assembly resolutions on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, according to Herf. In particular, U.N. General Assembly 3379—adopted Nov. 10, 1975—determined that “Zionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination.”
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Continued from page 1 The Temple, or Beit HaMikdash, was where one could feel G-d’s presence to such an intense degree that one could not help but be affected. Every Jew was obligated to frequent the Temple three times a year on the festivals, and when one arrived in Jerusalem and went up to the Temple Mount there were no Reform, Orthodox or Conservative sections, and no separation based on knowledge or Jewish background. In the Beit HaMikdash, we were meant to be one, to put our differences and judgments aside and taste the intensity and beauty of oneness. We felt a depth and intensity of Jewish unity. Just this week I was speaking with a few Yeshivat Orayta students about their experiences living in the Old City and studying in Israel this year, and they all agreed that one of their most powerful experiences was standing with 80,000 people as the siren went off at Har Herzl, Israel’s national military cemetery, on Yom Ha’Zikaron (Memorial Day). At exactly 11 am, a siren sounds, and for two minutes the entire country simply stops. And in that moment, in that place, there are no religious vs. irreligious; no left wing vs. right wing, or learned vs. beginners. On that day, in that place, we are all … one. That is what the Temple was all about, where we could feel the power of oneness — oneness with G-d and oneness with ourselves and with each other. It is this incredible environment for which we yearn, and for which we never gave up hope. We never stopped dreaming that one day we would come home. And incredibly, especially given the long challenging history of our people, we seem to have finally made it. And precisely because Jerusalem is the city of coming together (as its name, Shalem, meaning whole or complete, indicates), we must ensure it always remains one undivided city. Wishing all a meaningful Yom Yerushalayim and Shabbat shalom. Columnist@TheJewishStar.com
THE JEWISH STAR June 3, 2016 • 26 Iyar 5776
Jerusalem… Danon aids anti-BDS students…
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JEWISH
STAR CALENDAR
Send your events to Calendar@TheJewishStar.com • Deadline Sunday 10 am • Include price of admission and phone number • Hi-res photos welcomed • Compiled by Tiferet Schafler
After Sunday’s parade, celebrate Israel in park 20,000 people of all ages are expected at the 23rd Annual Israel Day Concert in Central Park, taking place on Yom Yerushalayim, this Sunday, June 5, following the Celebrate Israel Parade along Fifth Avenue. (The 52nd annual parade
runs from 57th to 74th streets, from 11 am to 3:30 pm.) The “Concert With A Message,” from 2:30 to 7:30 pm, rain or shine, will feature Lipa Schmeltzer (pictured drapped in blue and white at last year’s event) and other popular acts, and
include remarks by leading supporters of the Jewish state. This year’s concert is dedicated to the 10 American citizens, HY”D, murdered by terrorists in Israel over the past two years. Messages will be delivered by Israeli U.N. Ambassador Danny Danon, former U.S. ambassador to the U.N. John Bolton, FOX news analyst Major Pete Hegseth, ZOA President Morton Klein, activist Ken Abromowitz, NCYI President Farley Weiss, RZA President Martin Oliner, Assemblyman David Weprin, NYC Councilman Rory Lancman, Rabbi David Algazie, Rabbi Dr. Elie Abadie, and activists Jeff Wiesenfeld and Rivka Abbe. In addition to Lipa, headline entertainers include Eitan Katz, Shlomi Dachs with his orchestra and singers, Avi Kilimnick, Tal Vaknin accompanied by Shlomi Aharoni, Michoel Pruzansky, Israeli Mati Shriki, Dr. Meyer Abittan, Jerry Markovitz, Chaim Kiss, Izzy Kieffer and Heshy R., White Shabbos, Micha Gamerman from Brazil, and Matt Dubb.
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Food from Mendys will be sold. Due to tight security and because the park reaches capacity quickly, arrive early (enter at Fifth Avenue and 72nd Street). No large bags or backpacks permitted in the park.
WEDNESDAY JUNE 1
JEWISH FILM FESTIVAL features documentFIDF ANNUAL COMMUNITY EVENT: Join our collective efforts in supporting the soldiers of Israel and help our south shore community make a greater impact than ever! If you or are family members are a current or former Lone Soldier, please be in touch with us to be included in our tribute. $180 for family members of a Lone Soldier and $250 general admission, per person. Buffet dinner begins at 7 pm with 8:15 pm program to follow. To register visit www.fidf.org/FTGSS or email Deborah.Sason@fidf.org.
SHABBAT JUNE 3–4
DINE ‘N’ MEET SINGLES SHABBOS: The Young Israel of Woodmere is happy to host its fourth Shabbos for singles. This year’s event is geared towards “machmir” young professionals ages 22-30 and it is held in conjunction with YUConnects. A coed Friday night with eight compatible singles will take place in hosts’ homes, and on Shabbos day all participants have an afternoon dessert Oneg at the shul, 859 Peninsula Blvd., Woodmere, followed later by Shalosh Seudos. $45 per participant, which covers Friday night, dessert reception and shalosh seudos but may be around $10 to $20 more if participants needs housing and Shabbos lunch. To register visit support@dinenmeet.com or log into a YUConnects or SawYouAtSinai account. To sponsor, host Friday night, or to provide housing and Shabbos lunch to two participants, email malkygaller@gmail.com or yiwmeet@gmail.com.
SUNDAY JUNE 5
CELEBRATE ISRAEL PARADE: Along Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, from 57th to 74th streets, 11 am to 3:30 pm, rain or shin. It’s the word’s larges, annual pro-Israel event. For more info, visit celebrateisraelny.org
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CONCERT FOR ISRAEL: “For the Sake of Jerusalem, Be NOT Silent!” The concert, featuring Lipa Schmeltzer, Eitan Katz, Shloime Dachs and more, is in commemoration of 10 U.S. citizens murdered in Israel. U.N. ambassadors Danny Dan-
on and John Bolton will be present. Free, rain or shine. Central Park Summer Stage, 5th Avenue at 72nd Street, Manhattan. IsraelDayConcert.com. CELEBRATE ISRAEL UNITY FESTIVAL hoated by the Israeli-American Council and sponsored by the UJA federation of New York. $14 for adults and $10 for children 3–12. 2 to 7 pm at Terminal 5, 610 W 56 St., Manhattan.
MONDAY JUNE 6
OHEL SARA AMEN Sefirah Lecture Series presents Mrs. Chavi Alpert. Women only. Admission is free. Shiur begins at 1 pm at 2 Forest Lane, Lawrence. ohelsaraamen@gmail.com LIFE PROGRAM GOES GOLFING: This social/ recreational program brings together adults with special needs. Join your LIFE friends for Mini Golf and fun at the Batting Range! 12 per ticket, reservation required. We will meet at 7 pm Five Towns Mini Golf & Batting Range, 570 Rockaway Turnpike, Lawrence. Email debi.averbach@guraljcc.org to register.
WEDNESDAY JUNE 8
SPECIAL MORNING FOR ROSH CHODESH SIVAN: Join the “Ohel Sara” Bracha Amen Group in their Sefirah Lecture Series for Brachos at 8:15 am, Hallel at 9 am, and a shiur given by Rabbi Lazer Brody at 9:30 am. Women only. Free of charge. 2 Forest Lane, Lawrence. ohelsaraamen@gmail.com. CAREGIVER’S SUPPORT: Explore your options, obtain practical information and referrals, share your experiences. Come for free. 7 to 8:30 pm at the Gural JCC, 207 Grove Avenue, Cedarhurst. Judy Goldberg, LMSW at 516-569-6733..
MONDAY JUNE 20
14TH ANNUAL CONTORIAL CONCERT featuring Cantor Yitzchak Meier Helfgot, Cantor Yaakov Motzen, and Cantor Charles Muhlbauer, and Cantor Joel Kaplan. Tickets can be purchased for $36, %50, $100, $180 or $250 at Judaica Plus in Cedarhurst. The concert will begin at 7:45 pm at Congregation Beth Sholom, 390 Broadway, Lawrence. Visit the Judaica store or go to www. bethsholomlawrence.org.
23 THE JEWISH STAR June 3, 2016 • 26 Iyar 5776
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