Southern New England Jewish Ledger • February 8, 2022 • 7 Adar 5782 by 2020 Media

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February 8, 2022

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SOUTHERN NEW ENGLAND

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FEBRUARY 8, 2022 • 7 ADAR 5782

PAGE 12 A Distorted ‘View’ 1

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Last week, Whoopi Goldberg inadvertently set off a firestorm with a remark about race and the Holocaust. That led to a charged discourse that has left open the question: Are Jews White? Many Jewish leaders and thinkers say that Goldberg’s comments reflect an emerging ideology that, by turning Jews into White people, tries to erase Jewish vulnerability and oppression. Whoopi Goldberg attends a benefit event in New York City, Sept. 13, 2021. (Sean Zanni/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images)

Features

Opinion

Around Southern New England

Briefs

In Memoriam

Synagogue Listings

Torah Portion

Crossword

What’s Happening

Obituaries February 8, 2022

Never Again. Again.

finest eateries to win the title of “Best Food in Worcester.”

As the Beijing Olympics got underway, Jewish groups took the lead in urging countries and athletes to sit this one out in protest over the Chinese horrific persecution of the Uyghurs. But was anyone listening?

Judgement Day

Deli to Die For

Author’s Corner

The competition was stiff, but not stiff enough for Chani’s Kosher TakeOut, which beat out 32 of Worcester’s

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A nonprofit controlled by imprisoned Rabbi Daniel Greer has until Feb. 22 to scrounge up $620,000 to pay the convicted sex offender’s victim and retain control of the historic yeshiva.

In her new book, Asylum, West Hartford native Judy BoltonFasman delves into

her family’s mysterious past… and uncovers a secret worth the telling.

On Campus

The Dept. of Education is investigating a complaint alleging Jewish students at Brooklyn College have been subjected to severe antisemitic harassment from both professors and peers.

CANDLE LIGHTING SHABBAT FRIDAY, FEB. 11 Hartford: New Haven: Bridgeport: Stamford:

5:01 p.m. 5:01 p.m. 5:02 p.m. 5:03 p.m.

Southern New England Jewish Ledger

SOUTHERN NEW ENGLAND

JEWISH LEDGER

TOM HICKEY PRESIDENT

JUDIE JACOBSON EDITOR IN CHIEF

STACEY DRESNER ASSOCIATE EDITOR

HILLARY PASTERNAK SARRASIN DIGITAL MEDIA MANAGER

CHRIS BONITO CREATIVE DIRECTOR/DESIGNER

INTRODUCING… THE NEW! SOUTHERN NEW ENGLAND JEWISH LEDGER A new day has dawned at both the Connecticut and Massachusetts Jewish Ledgers – and we couldn’t be more excited! On January 1, 2022, the two venerated New England publications joined forces to create the Southern New England Jewish Ledger. The first of its kind in New England, the new global Ledger publication will serve the Jewish communities of Connecticut, and Western and Central Massachusetts, covering Jewish news throughout the region, North America, Israel and the world. The launch of the Southern New England Jewish Ledger is made possible by 20/20 Media, a new full-service publishing and marketing concern based in West Hartford, Connecticut that, as of January 1, 2022, acquired the Connecticut Jewish Ledger and the Massachusetts Jewish Ledger. Tom Hickey, president of 20/20 Media and a founding partner of WeHa.com, welcomed the Ledger to the 20/20 Media family with open arms. “For almost 93 years, the Ledger has been a strong voice for the Jewish communities of Connecticut and Massachusetts,” said Tom in announcing the purchase. “It has invigorated and supported Jewish life locally, throughout North America and around the world, and it has opened and reinforced lines of communication with other local communities and communities of faith, helping to unite us all. We are grateful for this opportunity to now be a part of that long and distinguished legacy.” Of course, there’s more to the Southern New England Jewish Ledger than just a name change. In the coming months readers will see a slew of improvements designed to enhance the paper and further serve the community. A quick flip through the pages of this issue reveals the first of those improvements: An updated and stylish new look. In addition, the Ledger will switch from a weekly to a bi-weekly schedule, publishing online every other Tuesday. Of course, for those who will miss their weekly dose of Jewish news – not to worry! This month the Ledger introduces JL TODAY – a weekly online update of breaking news of interest to the local community, designed to complement the Ledger. In addition to Tom Hickey, who takes over as publisher, the new publication will be headed up by the same accomplished team of experienced professionals who have guided the Connecticut and Massachusetts Jewish Ledger. They include: Judie Jacobson (Editor in Chief), Stacey Dresner (Associate Editor), Hillary Pasternak Sarrasin (Digital Media Manager) and Chris Bonito (Creative Director/Graphic Designer), as well as a team of advertising representatives and event coordinators. “These are exciting times at 20/20 Media. We’ve got all sorts of exciting projects in the works that aim to enrich our community, and the new Southern New England Jewish Ledger is now among them. We encourage everyone to stay tuned,” says Tom, who take over as publisher of Southern New England Jewish Ledger. In purchasing the Ledger, 20/20 Media ensures the continued publication of Connecticut’s only statewide Jewish newspaper. Founded in April 1929 by the late Sam Neusner and the late Rabbi Abraham Feldman, the Ledger is one of the oldest Jewish weekly newspapers in North America. 20/20 Media purchased the Connecticut and Massachusetts Jewish Ledgers from Hartford area businessman and philanthropist Henry Zachs, who has owned it for the past eight years. The community is invited to share thoughts and comments with the Ledger by emailing Southern New England JL Editor in Chief Judie Jacobson at judiej@jewishledger.com.

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Front

SOUTHERN NEW ENGLAND JEWISH LEDGER | FEBRUARY 8, 2022 | 7 ADAR 5782

‘Never again,’ for the Uyghurs

Chani’s Kosher Take-Out beats out the competition in Worcester

Jews around the world ramp up China protests as Beijing Olympics start

BY TOBY AXELROD

ERLIN (JTA) – On a recent Friday afternoon, with the Beijing Olympic Games only three weeks away, Mischa Ushakov and Padma Wangyal chained themselves to the entrance of the Allianz insurance giant’s headquarters in Germany’s capital. They had two demands: that Allianz “drop their sponsorship of the games in China and comment on the human rights abuses of the Chinese government,” Ushakov said. “We gave them a one week deadline,” he added. Ushakov, 23, is a cofounder with Bini Guttmann of Never Again Right Now, a Jewish group dedicated to raising awareness about China’s persecution of

its Uyghur Muslim minority. Wangyal is a 73-year-old Tibetan exile; Never Again Right Now had joined forces with the Tibet Initiative Deutschland for the Allianz protest. Their protest failed to move Allianz. But when the Beijing Winter Olympic Games opened on Friday, they and other protesters were back, this time at the iconic Brandenburg Gate. At press time, they were also planning a “humanistic” torch relay in 15 German cities to mark the start of the Olympics – which they are calling the “genocide games.” Ushakov told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, “When Bini and I started this campaign we hoped that as Jews talking about genocide – and some of us are descendants of Holocaust

survivors – we would get more attention. I call it a disintegration of the narrative: People in Germany will always see the victim in me, so if they will, then I will talk about something they don’t want to hear.” Ushakov’s group is far from alone. In London, Jewish groups will join a demonstration at Piccadilly Circus. In other cities, there will be demonstrations outside Chinese embassies and consulates. Since 2015, China has cracked down on its Uyghur population – a Turkic Muslim minority with a presence in the country’s western Xinjiang region – placing them in so-called re-education camps, which can be spotted in satellite photos. Reports smuggled out of Continued on page 14

BY STACEY DRESNER

ORCESTER, Massachusetts – The Worcester Jewish community has known for years that Chani’s Kosher Take-Out & Catering is the place to go for home-cooked, mouthwateringly delicious food. Prepared and sold at Central Mass Chabad on Newton Avenue, the menu regularly includes dinner entrees like schnitzel, roast chicken, salmon, brisket and kugels; lunch fare including to-die-for pastrami and corned beef sandwiches, soups and salads; and baked goods like the fresh challah rolls Chani Fogelman herself whips up in abundance. Now Chani’s is becoming a name in the wider community after the kosher deli won an informal contest run by Cunningham & Associates, a Worcester tax firm. “It started one day back in May we received an order for 15 items – salmon plates, schnitzel plates, sandwiches, pastrami – all kinds of items. And it was a little bigger order than usual,” said Rabbi Fogelman, husband of Chani, and director of Central Mass Chabad. When a young man from Cunningham & Associates arrived to pick up the order, Rabbi Fogelman asked if the company was having a party.

MEMBERS OF NEVER AGAIN RIGHT NOW PROTEST AT ALLIANZ HEADQUARTERS IN BERLIN, JAN. 21, 2022. (TIBET INITIATIVE GERMANY)

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Continued on the next page

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Chani’s CONTINUED FROM PAGE 5

“He said, No, they were running a contest… seeing what was the best restaurant in Worcester. I joked around and said, ‘Great, I think I could win.’” Chani’s Kosher Take-Out “competed” with 31 other local restaurants. “He came back two months later and told us you came in first, in fact you decimated the Shrewsbury Street restaurants” referring to the area where many of the chicest of eateries are located. Chani’s then had to compete in the top 16. “From 16 we went to the final four, like March Madness, a bracket contest,” Rabbi Fogelman said. “Then they came here two weeks ago and let us know, “you have the best food in Worcester.” Anthony DeSimone of Cunningham & Associates said that Chani’s became part of the contest because the take-out’s Facebook page had so many posts from happy customers. But the food kept them coming back. “One, the food was absolutely incredible. The best we’ve had,” said DeSimone. “We keep going back and every time they just keep delivering. The chicken schnitzel, the pastrami – all of it was awesome. I think the mushroom barley was a big hit too. We even have a couple of co-workers go outside the office in their free time. “Two, we love the cause,” he continued. “I got a chance to walk around the synagogue and see everything – they were setting up rooms for preschool and an afterschool program. It was a really nice thing to see. And all of the proceeds are going to this non-profit.” In honor of Chani’s win in the contest, Cunningham & Associates’ charitable arm, C&A Cares, awarded Chabad a $500 donation. Just last week, after hearing about the restaurant contest, The Boston Globe did a profile of

Chani’s, bringing in even more customers and fans. But while they were excited to receive this attention – and more customers -- Rabbi Fogelman explains that the real purpose of Chani’s and Central Mass Chabad altogether, continues to be to provide Jewish programming and a warm sense of Yiddishkeit to the Worcester Jewish community. Chani’s Kosher Take-Out all began with the famous Shabbos dinners they have held for years. “Originally Chani and me on Friday nights would have 45 to 70 people at the house for Shabbos dinner. At one point Chani said, ‘Why don’t we cook in the shul kitchen, the commercial kitchen? It will be easier.’ So we cooked here and then would bring the food back home for Shabbos,” Rabbi Fogelman recalled. The coronavirus ended the Friday night dinners with guests, but in May of 2020, when Covid was in full swing, they began offering meals curbside, like many restaurants at the time. “That really took off,” Rabbi Fogelman said. By May of 2021, Chani’s Kosher Take-Out took off even more when they were listed in the local Worcester Gazette’s “Worcester Eats” website listing the best of the town’s eateries. Chani’s began holding Thursday night dinners in the social hall of the synagogue, pre-prepared by Chani and two workers. Families came in to enjoy their kosher dinners seated at one of the several round tables set up in the room, or to order and take their food home. Now Chani’s is open Monday through Thursday from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m., and Fridays from noon to 2 p.m. Customers can order online or in-person, and pick up their lunch and dinner meals or eat-in in the social hall. All meals are made while the diners wait. “We make everything fresh,” Rabbi Fogelman said. “On Thursdays, the line is out the door. We bring them free samples while they wait. It’s like a party

Southern New England Jewish Ledger

RABBI MENDEL FOGELMAN TAKES A PLATTER FILLED WITH DELI SANDWICHES TO WAITING CUSTOMERS.

atmosphere.” The money made from this endeavor – now totaling around $100,000 – goes toward Chabad’s programming, including their J-Fam program. J-Fam, through Chabad’s yeshiva, picks up Jewish children from their local public schools on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays and offers them food and activities from 2:30 – 5:30 p.m. “We offer them a snack when they get here, and then they do fitness, art or music. We do their homework with them. At 5 o’clock every day they are served a fleishig (meat) meal,” the rabbi said. “We don’t charge for that program because we feel at this time it is an absolute emergency to do whatever we can to attract Jewish children to Jewish programming.” The money also goes toward Chabad on Campus, which offers Jewish programming at local

colleges like Clark University and UConn Medical School. With all the new buzz, Chani’s is getting even busier. Orders are coming in from shuls in the Metrowest area of Massachusetts and as far down as New London, Connecticut. “We’re getting many more orders and new people are coming in, and they are very excited. Actually we are seeing people from Worcester who didn’t know about us,” Rabbi said. “The most exciting part of this is that we meet new Jewish people. The Jewish people walk in and the smell brings back memories of when they were younger. It brings back memories of their grandparents and their families. That’s what it is all about.” Chani’s Kosher Take-Out can be reached at https://koshertakeout.square. site/

February 8, 2022

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Around SNE Two Stamford students tapped for prestigious program STAMFORD, Conn. – Two 7th graders at Bi-Cultural Hebrew Academy of Connecticut (BCHA) have been selected as Truman Scholars by The Tikvah Fund, announced David Giver, principal of the BCHA Middle School. As Truman Scholars, Elliot Nerenberg and Sadie Palker will participate in a high-level learning program for outstanding Jewish day school and Yeshiva students nationwide. The two-year program will be highlighted by online seminars with master teachers on the theme of America and Israel as covenantal nations. Students will also have the opportunity to explore in depth the Hebraic influence on the American experiment, the Zionist longing in exile and the many voices of modern Israel. “While I know this will mean more work, I am looking forward to all that there is to be learned and where it will take me,” Nerenberg said. Likewise, Palker noted that the program would give her “a deeper look at how America and Israel are connected and how we connect to them both.” BCHA Head of School Rabbi Bernstein expressed great pride in the two middle schoolers and expected to share with the entire student body “what they learn about the special relationship between Israel and the United States.” “While much of the learning at BCHA happens inside the classroom, our students are constantly finding new opportunities to explore in the world beyond boundaries,” Giver noted. “We take enormous pride in their selection for this prestigious program which will broaden and challenge them intellectually, and enhance learning and discussion with their BCHA classmates.”

ELLIOT NERENBERG

SADIE PALKER

Jennifer Klau named communications manager of historical society WEST HARTFORD, Conn. – Jennifer Klau has been appointed communications and administrative manager of the Jewish Historical Society of Greater Hartford. Klau, who took over her post in December 2021, holds a B. S. in Communications from Boston University’s College of Communication. She also completed her Ph.D. in kinesiology and her M.A. in education at the University of Connecticut. Long active in the West Hartford Jewish community, Klau has held several leadership roles in the Jewish community, including as a board member of Beth David Synagogue.

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Bar/Bat Mitzvah prep begins early at Longmeadow school Though years away from chanting Torah at their bar or bat mitzvah, every year fourthgraders at Lander-Grinspoon Academy (LGA) learn to chant Torah – known as “leyning.” Each student leyns in front of family and teachers at the school’s Chaggigat Chumash ceremony. This year’s ceremony was held on Jan. 20. Lander-Grinspoon Academy is the pluralistic Jewish Day School in Northampton, MA, in the Upper Pioneer Valley.

A FOURTH-GRADER AT LGA IN LONGMEADOW, MASS. LEARNS TO ‘LEYN’ TORAH (TO RECITE FROM THE TORAH) USING A ‘YAD’ (A POINTER) JUST AS SHE WILL WHEN SHE BECOMES A BAT MITZVAH.

“Quarantine Survival Kits” come to the aid of Springfield JCC Families SPRINGFIELD, Mass. – The Springfield Jewish Community Center recently created and distributed “Quarantine Survival Kits” to the families of children in their youth programs. “We hope our Quarantine Survival Kits can provide families with a few moments of relief, levity, and joy” as they work to overcome the pressures placed upon them by school closures, said Springfield JCC CEO Sam Dubrinsky, herself a parent. The J’s Quarantine Survival Kits are packed with more than A SPRINGFIELD FAMILY PICKS UP a dozen items for parents and A “QUARANTINE SURVIVAL KIT” FROM THE SPRINGFIELD JCC. kids. For weary parents there is tea, wine, beer, and chocolates; for children, there are coloring books, crayons, bubbles, glow sticks, and more. Community partners who donated goods for the boxes included Home Depot, Jozev Products, Four Seasons Wine & Liquor, UNO’s, Northern Tool, and Sam Adams.

B’Nai Mitzvah COLE LANDSMAN, son of Eileen and David Landsman, celebrated his bar mitzvah on Saturday, Jan. 29 at Congregation B’nai Israel in Bridgeport. AUGUST RYLAND, son of Melissa and Nathaniel Ryland, will celebrate his bar mitzvah on Saturday, Feb. 19 at Congregation Beth Shalom in Westborough.

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Opinion

You can’t just swap out ‘Maus’ for another Holocaust book. It’s special. BY JENNIFER CAPLAN

(JTA) – Like many people, I encountered Maus as a middle schooler. But unlike many people, I can say that it set me on a direct path to my eventual career – as a scholar of religion, especially Judaism, and popular culture. I was 12 when the second volume of Maus was published, and I read both volumes in one long afternoon. It was the first graphic novel I had read, and like many 12-year-olds I was just starting to think of myself as a person able to have independent ideas and opinions. The very fact of Maus, the fact that I could hold in my hand something so simple and yet complicated, changed the way I thought about how we tell stories.

Art Spiegelman’s nonfiction graphic novel uses the conventions of comic books to tell the story of his parents’ experiences as Polish Jews before, during and after the Holocaust. It is also a secondgeneration story about the legacy of the Holocaust on Spiegelman, a survivor’s child. Spiegelman took a genre that many could not see as literature and turned it into a medium that could tell stories in a way no other book could. If a picture is worth a thousand words, then Maus may as well be Proust, because it contains words in the millions in under 300 pages. In college I took a class on the Holocaust. I wrote my final paper on Maus. For my PhD

comprehensive exams I needed to choose a text to study for one of my exams. I chose Maus. I had to convince people it was a worthy text, but convince them I did. When I began teaching Jewish graphic novels I referred to the course as “The House that Maus Built,” because I do not teach Maus in the course. Instead I teach about the entire industry built, in large part, on the legacy of Maus. The reason I feel comfortable excluding Maus from that syllabus is that every year, without fail, almost every student has already read it, many in an educational context. It is a modern classic. It prepares students to have so many important conversations and sets

ART SPIEGELMAN’S GRAPHIC NOVEL “MAUS” ON SALE AT A FRENCH BOOKSTORE IN 2017. (ACTUALITTÉ/FLICKR COMMONS)

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them up to jump into the canon of Jewish graphic novels. This is why the McMinn County, Tennessee, school board’s unanimous decision to remove Maus from the district’s eighth-grade curriculum concerns me as an educator. A text that has had such a positive impact on untold thousands of students, and that I count on a plurality of my students to have encountered before they arrive in my college classroom, is under threat. The idea that with each passing year fewer and fewer students may not have had the chance to wrestle with Maus is deeply troubling. Having to begin the course with a basic introduction to sequential art and Jewish themes would cost not only time, but also the ability to engage in more sophisticated conversations. Having to catch students up on Maus, for me, would mean losing other extraordinary titles such as Joe Kubert’s “Yossel” or Amy Kurzweil’s “Flying Couch,” and would substantially change the narrative arc of the semester. The McMinn school board says its decision was based on “rough language” and depictions of nudity. A great many mocking responses to this have pointed out that the characters in the book are anthropomorphized animals, including the Jewish victims of the Holocaust, who are depicted as mice. But it was not nude mice that spurred this criticism. The minutes of the school board meeting suggest that the images they’re reacting to are from the interstitial comic Prisoner on the Hell Planet, an earlier Spiegelman cartoon that appears midway through the graphic novel and uses a different graphic idiom. “Prisoner on the Hell Planet”

February 8, 2022

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was the initial comic Spiegelman drew to process his mother’s suicide, which its distraught narrator cannot separate from the horrors she endured under the Nazis. His mother died in 1968, when Spiegelman was 20, and he drew Prisoner on the Hell Planet in 1972. Maus was first serialized in 1980 and published in book form in 1986. The comic includes images of his mother slitting her wrists with a razor and of Anna Spiegelman’s naked body in a tub filled with her own blood. This is not vulgar nudity – and the rejection of of the book based on these images suggests that the McMinn County school board has not understood what Spiegelman did with these books, or what it means to be ongoing witnesses to horror. According to a taxonomy outlined by Scott McCloud, graphic novels can be “wordspecific,” “picture-specific” or “duo-specific” based on what element of the page is carrying the information the reader

needs to understand the story. The Prisoner on the Hell Planet section is particularly picturespecific. The pictures are the story. The story is the message. And the message is the teachable moment explaining what loss and grief and horror felt like to a child of survivors, showing readers emotions that words could never convey. One of the low points of a meeting full of low points came when a school board member said, “It looks like the entire curriculum is developed to normalize sexuality, normalize nudity and normalize vulgar language. If I was trying to indoctrinate somebody’s kids, this is how I would do it.” The idea that a depiction of the corpse of a young man’s mother is “sexual” says more about the school board member than it does about the book, and that he thinks such images are a way to “indoctrinate” children is the truly Orwellian element in this discussion. Allowing students to see visual

representations of things that are fundamentally unspeakable is not indoctrination; it is good pedagogy and it is a validation of the big feelings that adolescents are having and are unable to articulate. In Regarding the Pain of Others, Susan Sontag writes that photographs force us to face things we would otherwise try to minimize. Photographs do not allow us to hide from the reality of trauma, and – for some – the simpler and more straightforward the image the better. She writes that “photography that bears witness to the calamitous and the reprehensible is much criticized if it seems too ‘aesthetic’; that is, too much like art.” Maus forces the reader to bear witness in a way no written account can, and the picturespecific portions of the book are especially good at forcing the eye to see what the mind prefers to glide past. Maus forces the reader to confront reality with increasing pressure – it begins

with soft, color drawings of animals before it slaps the reader in the face with the Albrecht Durer-on-psychedelics blackand-white style of Prisoner on the Hell Planet, and ends with actual photographs of the Spiegelman family as a final reminder to the reader that these people lived and died in these terrible ways. The decision by the McMinn County board members was wrong, and they have received plenty of criticism for it – so much so that they issued a statement clarifying that they do not oppose instruction about the Holocaust. But that doesn’t change the fact that they uncritically accepted as sexual an image that is undeniably not, and ignored how visual records of atrocity serve as some of the most powerful teaching tools available. Jennifer Caplan is an assistant professor of philosophy at Towson University who teaches and researches Jewish comics and graphic novels.

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Are Jews white? ‘The View’ Holocaust controversy, explained’ BY GABE FRIEDMAN

(JTA) – She may not have meant to, but this week Whoopi Goldberg waded into a charged discourse that has polarized the Jewish community – and those who seek to discriminate against them – for centuries. The controversy began brewing on “The View,” the daytime talk show she co-hosts, during a discussion Monday over the recent controversy over a Tennessee school board’s decision to ban “Maus,” the iconic graphic memoir about the Holocaust. The genocide was “not about race,” she said, it was instead about “man’s inhumanity to man.” And it involved “two white groups of people.” The comments immediately went viral and struck a nerve, leading to what Goldberg described as a deluge of accusations of antisemitism and Holocaust denial, and criticism from groups like the AntiDefamation League. Despite multiple apologies, the storm reached a climax on Tuesday night when ABC decided to suspend Goldberg from “The

View” for two weeks “to take time to reflect and learn about the impact of her comments,” in the words of ABC News President Kim Godwin. Jews across the political spectrum, included many who objected to her original remarks, criticized the decision to suspend her. Why did the comments create such a firestorm? The answer extends well beyond the Holocaust.

Was the Holocaust ‘about race’? After her initial comments circulated, Goldberg went on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” on Monday and attempted to clarify the situation. In doing so, she dug deeper into the race issue. In her experience as a Black person, she said, race is something “I can see.” “If the [Ku Klux] Klan is coming down the street with a Jewish friend…I’m gonna run. But if my friend decides not to run, they’ll get passed by most times, because you can’t tell

WHOOPI GOLDBERG ARRIVES FOR THE 90TH ANNUAL ACADEMY AWARDS ON MARCH 4, 2018, IN HOLLYWOOD. (VALERIE MACON/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES)

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who’s Jewish,” she said. “It’s not something that people say, ‘Oh, that person is Jewish.’” “Race” is notoriously difficult to define. Is it, like Goldberg claimed, a group of people with shared physical characteristics? Can other social, economic and anthropological classifications factor in? Jews have long debated whether they are a “race” or something else. Judaism is a religion, practiced by people of all varieties and races across the globe. But Jews do not have to be practitioners to regard themselves or be accepted by other Jews as Jews. The Jewish tradition of “matrilineality” – defining as Jewish a child born of a Jewish mother – points to a biological definition of Jewish identity. But Judaism also accepts converts. Taken all together, these various understandings have led Jews to regard themselves (and others to regard Jews) variously as a people, a nation, a tribe, a family and a faith – sometimes in various combinations, sometimes all at the same time. But Hitler, like many antisemites before him, specifically – and repeatedly, in writings and laws and speeches – labeled Jews as a physically impure Slavic-descended race, in contrast to what he termed the blonde, blue-eyed genetically pure German Aryan race. Nazi propaganda promoted pseudoscientific ways to supposedly identify Jews – by the size of their nose and lips, or the shape of their heads, among other things. Hitler was obsessed by what he considered the biological fact of Jewish identity, and wrote that the “Final Solution” was inspired in part by his drive to create a more “pure” and singular human race, rid of “Jewish” and other impurities.

The Nazis drew on a tradition of “racially” stereotyping Jews that scholars have traced at least to 1000 CE. The long, hooked nosed trope, for example, appeared in everything from medieval paintings to fictional characters, like the villain Shylock from Shakespeare’s “The Merchant of Venice.” So the Jews were persecuted as a “race” by their neighbors in Europe and elsewhere for centuries before Hitler outlined many of his ideas in “Mein Kampf” in a jail cell in 1925. In her next-day apology on “The View” on Tuesday, Goldberg said the Holocaust “is indeed about race because Hitler and the Nazis considered Jews to be an inferior race.”

Are Jews white? Goldberg also stumbled into an ongoing debate within and beyond the Jewish community: Are Jews “white people”? Behind the question is another stereotype – that a Jew is a person with white skin, descended from European ancestors. In other words, an average Ashkenazi Jew. In reality, the Jewish community is considerably more diverse than that. The majority of Jews in North America may be Ashkenazi Jews with roots in Eastern Europe, but Jews also descend from ancient communities in Ethiopia, India, China and beyond. Sephardic Jews come from communities in Northern Africa and what is now Spain and Portugal, while Mizrahi Jews come from the Middle East, including once vital communities in Iraq, Iran, Yemen, Syria and other countries. Consciousness of that diversity has grown in part thanks to the advocacy of Jews of color in this country and

February 8, 2022

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WHOOPI GOLDBERG SPOKE WITH ANTI-DEFAMATION LEAGUE CEO JONATHAN GREENBLATT ON “THE VIEW,” FEB. 1, 2022. (SCREENSHOT)

Sephardic and Mizrahi Jews in Israel. Thousands of Jews come from mixed-race and interfaith backgrounds, so even many Jews with Ashkenazi roots are not white. Estimates of the proportion of U.S. Jews who are Jews of color range from 6% to 15% depending on the study and definition, and the Jews of Color Initiative argued in 2019 that the community has been chronically undercounted because of poor study designs. (Last year’s Pew Research Center report about U.S. Jews concluded that 92% of Jews identify as white.) Add on people from all types of racial and ethnic backgrounds who convert to Judaism, those who practice Jewish traditions without having undergone formal conversions and people around the world who strongly identify with some aspects of Jewish culture, and “Jew” quickly becomes an extremely hard-todefine term. The Atlantic’s Yair Rosenberg argued on Tuesday that “family” is a more accurate way than “race” to encapsulate the community. In my experience, mistakes like [Goldberg’s] often happen because well-meaning people have trouble fitting Jews into their usual boxes. They don’t know how to define Jews, and so they resort to their own frames of reference, like “race” or “religion,” and project them onto the Jewish experience. But February 8, 2022

Jewish identity doesn’t conform to Western categories, despite centuries of attempts by society to shoehorn it in. This makes sense, because Judaism predates Western categories. It’s not quite a religion, because one can be Jewish regardless of observance or specific belief. (Einstein, for example, was proudly Jewish but not religiously observant.) But it’s also not quite a race, because people can convert in! It’s not merely a culture or an ethnicity, because that leaves out all the religious components. Still, even as more recognize Jewish diversity, stereotypes persist. White supremacist, hypernationalist and other far right streams, stemming from the post-2016 rise of the “altright,” see Jews as toxic “others,” regardless of what they believe or practice. And on the other end of the political spectrum, some leftwing progressives lump all Jews in with a largely white oppressor class.

With that last name, is Whoopi Jewish? The extra thick layer of irony underlining this controversy is that it involves a celebrity who was not born Jewish, but who adopted a Jewish stage name because of what she has described as her positive feelings toward Jews and Jewish culture, not for religious reasons. The EGOT winner – one of

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very few performers to have won an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony – was born Caryn Elaine Johnson in New York City to a Baptist clergyman father and a nurse mother. In 1994, her publicist told the Orlando Sentinel that her stage name Goldberg came from her mother’s side of the family (her first name is a nod to the whoopee cushion). But DNA tests and family trees constructed by the likes of Henry Louis Gates, Jr. trace her lineage back to non-Jewish roots in West Africa. Nevertheless, in her words, she “feels” Jewish. She told the London Jewish Chronicle in 2016 that she “remembers” Jewish holidays, even if she is not regularly observant in any way. When people would ask if she were Jewish, Goldberg said she had a standard reply: “I always say ‘Would you ask me that if I was white? I bet not,’” Goldberg told the Chronicle. “The name is wonderful for starting conversations.” Mission accomplished.

Why does any of this matter? The Holocaust has stamped its legacy on nearly every Jew who has lived and been born in the 77 years since the liberation of Auschwitz. Because so many antisemites and European ultranationalists are intent on denying

that the genocide happened, or insist that it has been exaggerated, Jewish groups are adamant that the facts of history not be distorted, intentionally or not. Such “accidental” distortion, many argue, can be antisemitic in effect, even if not in intent. Others suggest that Goldberg’s comments reflect an emerging ideology that is trying to downplay the historic persecution of the Jews. As Daniella Greenbaum, a former producer at “The View,” wrote in The Washington Post on Wednesday, “It’s an ideology that tries to turn Jews into White people, that tries to erase Jewish vulnerability and oppression, to squeeze Jews who have light skin into modern American categories of race and ethnicity, and which also myopically categorizes the hatred against them into American considerations of what racism looks like.” And yet many prominent Jews were willing to give Goldberg, if not a pass, then a second or third chance, especially in the name of using the controversy as a teachable moment. As Rabbi Sharon Brous of the Ikar community in Los Angeles tweeted, “If what you want is to change someone’s mind, I have to think education is more effective than public shaming and punishment. Particularly when that person shows a sincere willingness to learn and apologize.”

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Uyghurs CONTINUED FROM PAGE 5

China and spread in mainstream media tell of police and military brutality, sexual crimes and forced sterilizations. Members of the Uyghur diaspora have been cut off from their families in China for years and some reportedly have been pressed to spy for China, under threat of harm being done to their relatives. The Pentagon reported in 2019 that at least one million people out of a total population of some 10 million Uyghurs had been rounded up and put through the camps since 2015. The United States, Britain, Canada and Australia are holding a diplomatic boycott of the games. While Israel has remained largely silent, ostensibly due to warm relations with China, prominent Jews elsewhere have raised their voices: British Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis last year joined a British Jewish

protest campaign, calling on the public to “taint the [Olympic] brand… in protest against the unspeakable atrocities that are being committed today against the Uyghur Muslims.” European Parliament Member Raphaël Glucksmann of France, who is Jewish, launched a campaign to boycott international retailers linked to Uyghur forced labor. The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum has published information about the persecution on its website and major U.S. Jewish organizations like the American Jewish Committee and the AntiDefamation League have spoken out on the issue. “This is not the Holocaust: There is no perfect comparison,” said Serena Oberstein, 42, executive director of Jewish World Watch, a California-based organization established to raise awareness about genocide. “But

for me personally, the stories we are hearing coming out of the region are too familiar to the stories I heard growing up from my grandfather” – a soldier who helped liberate the Dachau concentration camp in Germany. Oberstein helped form an interfaith “Berlin-Beijing Coalition,” which draws a parallel between the Olympic games in China today and the ones held in Nazi Germany in 1936. “The Nazi party used the Berlin games to strengthen its reputation in the world. Two years later came Kristallnacht. [Today,] we know what authoritarian regimes that systemically persecute people do, when they build concentration camps and ghettos and forced labor camps,” she said. The level of Jewish protest has ramped up as the Games have drawn closer. Two weeks ago, the Elie Wiesel Foundation

for Humanity took out a full page ad in The New York times, signed by the French Jewish philosopher Bernard-Henri Levy, the former Soviet refusenik Natan Sharansky and Wiesel’s son Elisha, urging athletes and corporate sponsors to “walk away from these games unless Beijing takes steps to reunite Uyghur families. And we urge the world’s citizens to embrace the cause of this persecuted population.” Of all the groups taking up this issue, none have been more active than Jewish ones, said Washington, D.C.-based attorney Nury Turkel, chair and cofounder of the Uyghur Human Rights Project. “‘Never again’ is relatable to what the Uyghurs are going through,” said Turkel, 50, who was born during the Cultural Revolution in a Chinese reeducation camp for Uyghurs and came to the United States

PROTESTERS AGAINST CHINA’S POLICIES TOWARD THE UYGHURS DEMONSTRATE OUTSIDE U.N. HEADQUARTERS IN NEW YORK CITY, MARCH 22, 2021. THE PROTESTER IN THE FOREGROUND IS WEARING A KIPPAH. (TAYFUN COSKUN/ANADOLU AGENCY VIA GETTY IMAGES)

Southern New England Jewish Ledger

February 8, 2022

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in 1997. “It looks like [Chinese leader] Xi Jinping is using Hitler’s playbook: targeting the social elites, the intellectuals, religious leaders, going after women and children, using slave labor, and using the fanfare around global events to normalize their behavior. When the Berlin Olympics took place, Hitler had already built [the concentration camp] Dachau.” “I talk to my Jewish friends and supporters and have been deeply touched listening to their passionate remarks,” added Turkel, who has been invited to brief members of the AJC and other Jewish organizations. “They told me, ‘We cannot tolerate that this happens.’” The call to action is urgent, says Mia Hasenson-Gross, executive director of the Londonbased Jewish charity René Cassin, which has been a major force galvanizing Jewish activism in the United Kingdom on the Uyghur issue. The organization is named for the French-Jewish co-author of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Nobel Peace Prize recipient René Samuel Cassin (1887-1976). “Uyghur women are forcibly sterilized; children are forced to denounce their language and culture tradition, they are under surveillance,” Hasenson-Gross said. “If we stop the Chinese government now from its acts of preventing births, from acts of future destruction, then we have a chance at preventing the genocide of the Uyghur people.” There are also lone Jews standing up, like Andrew, a 50-something Orthodox Jewish businessman in London who did not reveal his full name over privacy concerns. Twice weekly for the last year and half, he has been protesting outside a Volkswagen showroom on a busy street in Southgate, asking the German company to leave the Uyghur area, where it has a factory. He and a friend named Daniel even recently stood quietly with signs outside February 8, 2022

MISCHA USHAKOV, THE FOUNDER OF NEVER AGAIN RIGHT NOW, AT THE ALLIANZ HEADQUARTERS PROTEST IN BERLIN, JAN. 21, 2022. (TIBET INITIATIVE GERMANY)

a Holocaust Remembrance ceremony at Middlesex University, with the approval of Andrew’s mother-in-law, a Holocaust survivor. Andrew occasionally faces harassment – both “anti-Muslim hatred” and “antisemitism,” he said. “I am the victim of antiMuslim hatred for holding up a sign that says ‘3 million Muslims in Chinese concentration camps and in slave labor,’ and I get quite a bit of antisemitic abuse,” he said. “I am trying to save women’s and children’s lives, and they shout at me, ‘Free Palestine.’ That is pure antisemitism. For athletes, protest has its own challenges. First of all, Olympic athletes have no say in where Olympic games will be held, says former Olympic skier Noah Hoffmann, who is Jewish. He recently co-founded Global Athlete, which aims to correct what he describes as an imbalance of power between sports administration and athletes. “The power that the International Olympic Committee wields is immense,” said Hoffmann, 32, who is finishing an undergraduate degree at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, after moving on from his sports career. The other challenge is the

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danger of speaking up in China. “I believe in the power of athletes to be forces of good… so I hate telling them to stay silent in China, but the risks are just too high there,” he said, noting the recent disappearance of Chinese tennis star Peng Shuai after she accused a retired Chinese Communist Party official of sexual assault. “The Women’s Tennis Association canceled all 2022 tournaments in China, they walked away,” he said. The IOC did not follow suit, and they have been reluctant to comment on human rights abuses in China. “The use of sport to distract from genocide is not new,” added Hoffmann, whose greatgrandmother left Holland before the Holocaust. The IOC “has never been held to account for its strange affinity with totalitarian regimes around the world,” said Turkel, who urges the public to denounce corporate sponsors and refuse to watch the games. Back in Berlin, Ushakov said he and Wangyal unchained themselves from the Allianz doors last month after a security official told them their concerns would be discussed at company headquarters in Munich. But “that information is not accurate,” Allianz spokeswoman

Anja Rechenberg told JTA in a phone call later that day. “The initiative has been in contact with us for many months, and their demands are known… For us, this is a long-term commitment. Allianz is a strong supporter of sport, and in this framework we have an eight-year commitment to the Olympic Games.” Allianz is one of many German firms that have uncovered and publicized their Nazi past. But the company hasn’t learned the right lessons, said Berliner Tenzin Yangzom, 30, executive director of the Tibet Initiative Deutschland, who contacted Never Again Right Now for help with its Allianz protest. “It is very important to have the voices of the Jewish campaign.” “This world was given the promise of ‘Never Again,’ and that means on one hand combating all forms of antisemitism and standing with Jews – of course,” the Never Again Right Now co-founder Guttmann said in a call from Vienna. “But the promise also meant preventing genocide and mass atrocities around the world. The world has failed in that mission again and again.”

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In Memoriam

Frances Jacobson was a lifelong educator and patron of the arts

BY STACEY DRESNER

ENTRAL MASS – Susan Jacobson fondly recalls the day in 2013 when she and her mother Frances attended an event at The White House for the Israeli Ambassador. During a conversation in which Frances Jacobson told Michelle Obama of her many years teaching underprivileged children in the city of Worcester, Massachusetts, the First Lady called her “an inspiration to us all.” “I said to my mother, ‘Did you hear that?’” Susan says. “And she said, ‘This is something I’ll never forget.’” The countless children that Frances Jacobson taught and inspired over her many years will undoubtedly never forget Jacobson, who on January 28 died at the age of 87. The lifelong educator and patron of the arts and humanities, who dedicated her life to children, especially those at risk, was called by many, “The Child Whisperer.” “Children gravitated to her,” said Howard Jacobson, her husband of 63 years. “I’m looking at a photograph as we are speaking, and I don’t know the event, but she’s standing there with her camera and there are [several] children standing around staring at what she was showing them, and she had that smile on her face. There is a certain warmth in the photograph that shows exactly who she was.” Born and raised in Brookline, Massachusetts, Frances was the daughter of Eleanor and Julius Freedman, both natives of Boston. While not wealthy, her parents instilled in her the importance of giving back to the Jewish community. February 8, 2022

“They gave back to the community to places like Beth Israel Hospital and were committed to the community. That was certainly a part of her upbringing,” Howard said. As a teenager, Frances underwent two daunting surgeries for scoliosis. “She was eventually put into a giant body cast and had to lie on her back for an entire year and couldn’t move,” Susan explained. “My grandmother would bring the whole class to visit with my mom every day after school. I wonder if that had some affect… she just had this unbelievable EQ [Emotional Quotient]. My sister Joanne says our mom invented the term EQ before it was actually invented. She just had this ability with children…She was in-tune with children.” Frances graduated from Connecticut College and began her teaching career as a secondgrade teacher in Newton, Massachusetts. She also earned a master’s in psychology from Clark University and was a family therapist for 25 years. Howard first met Frances when she was teaching in Newton. Set up by a friend, one day he arrived at the elementary school where she worked to pick her up for a date. “I waited outside in the hall and the class wasn’t dispersing,” Howard said. “Finally, the children came out and I said, ‘What happened? What was the delay?’” She said, ‘The children didn’t want to leave. They were so involved in what we were doing, they didn’t want to go home.’” Frances and Howard were married in 1958 and moved to his native Worcester, where they lived for several decades and where they raised their four daughters. The Jacobson’s

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belonged to Temple Emanuel where their children were b’not mitzvah and where Frances at one time taught religious school. In her professional life, Frances helped create the Worcester Arts Magnet School and the Multiple Intelligences School in Worcester. She was the first director of the Worcester Arts and Humanities Educational Collaborative, an initiative to bring cultural institutions into schools. She was Chair of the Board at Worcester Youth Guidance and was appointed by the Governor to serve on the Massachusetts Cultural Council. Together, Frances and Howard supported institutions like Mechanics Hall, the Worcester Art Museum, and the Jewish Federation of Central Massachusetts. “Frances Jacobson was a kindhearted, caring and committed philanthropist,” said Steven Schimmel, executive director of the Jewish Federation of Central Massachusetts. “Her support of our Jewish community shined through and her legacy lives on in all of Federation’s activities and work on behalf of the Jewish people.” Jacobson was also a passionate supporter of Tower Hill Botanic Garden and was involved in the creation of the Children’s Garden. “To me, Tower Hill represents beauty, peace, an oasis,” Jacobson once said in an article in Tower Hill’s magazine. “I love sharing that and have always enjoyed bringing my family here so they can experience it. Now it’s wonderful to see all those young children enjoying it too. To them, the garden is a wonderful adventure and place to explore and they absorb so much.” Jacobson was recognized by

the Worcester Public Schools for her efforts to make arts accessible to every student and was celebrated by the City of Worcester with a key to the city. After living in Westborough for several years after their children grew up, the Jacobsons moved to Needham, Massachusetts. In the past couple of years, Frances presided over “Grammy’s Chit Chat” a Sunday Zoom call with their daughters and grandchildren; she and Howard would sit together on their couch holding hands to catch up with whichever family members could make it that day. “During the Jacobsons’ more than 60 years of marriage, Frances remained deeply committed to her husband, her daughters, their spouses and especially to her grandchildren,” said Rabbi Joseph Eiduson of Congregation B’nai Shalom in Westborough. “She became what one daughter described as ‘the human resources department of the family’ always there to support and lift up, always ready with good, solid advice. She exhibited boundless devotion to her family, the greater Worcester community and held unconditional regard for everyone she encountered on life’s path. Truly a woman of valor, she will be greatly missed.” In addition to her husband, she is survived by four daughters Susan and her husband Michael; Sally and her husband Marc; Joanne and her wife, Sara; Leslie and her husband Richard; her grandchildren Elizabeth, Robert, Frank, Melody, Sam, Ruth and Rose; and sisters Marilyn Ullian and Barbara Freedman.

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Arts & Entertainment

A love letter to Haifa’s multicultural humanity BY ABIGAIL KLEIN LEICHMAN

(Israel21c via JNS) “In today’s world, where we are bombarded with stories about division, I was driven to tell the story of “Breaking Bread,” which is about commonality,” said Beth Elise Hawk, writer and director of a newly released documentary about Haifa’s A-Sham Arabic Food Festival. Founded in 2015 by microbiologist Nof AtamnaIsmaeel, the first Israeli Arab to win Israel’s MasterChef reality show, the festival brings together Arab and Jewish chefs who work jointly on creating dishes in a city known for multicultural coexistence. Each chef puts a personal spin on traditional recipes handed down over generations. “When the chefs cook together in the kitchen, political and religious labels fall to the wayside, and what’s left in their wake are human beings with

striking similarities,” said Hawk. She heard about the annual festival on a radio show that she was listening to while sitting in Los Angeles traffic. When she got home, she messaged AtamnaIsmaeel on Facebook. Hawk came to Haifa for five weeks to prepare for the filming and get acquainted with Arabic cuisine. “Many of the film’s featured dishes are unfamiliar to sophisticated foodies,” she said. “Dishes like mussakhan (a traditional Palestinian dish of roasted sumac chicken, atop caramelized onions and laffa bread), taashimi (Levantine whole fish baked in a crust) and manti (lamb dumplings) are not well known here in the United States. So it has been a joy to help generate interest in these dishes.” Hawk also got acquainted with the city itself.

Jewish ‘IfNotNow’ co-founder wins on ‘Jeopardy!’ (JTA) – Activists on the Jewish left celebrated over the weekend as Emma Saltzberg, a Jewish activist who helped co-found the Jewish anti-occupation group IfNotNow, extended a “Jeopardy!” winning streak that has some comparing her to the game show’s most successful contestants. At press time, Saltzberg had taken the lead for three episodes in a row and currently has a total of $54,199 in prize money. Saltzberg, a consultant who lives in Brooklyn, is a senior fellow at Data for Progress, a progressive think tank, according to her Twitter bio. Several progressive Jewish organizations celebrated Saltzberg’s wins on social media Saturday. “We’re so proud of @EmmaSaltzberg, one of our movement co-founders, who is officially a two-time winner of @Jeopardy! Some good news in these dark times,” a statement released by IfNotNow read. Jews for Racial & Economic Justice, a social justice organization based in Brooklyn, even broke with its usual policy of refraining from posting to social media on Shabbat to celebrate Saltzberg. The left-wing magazine Jewish Currents also celebrated Saltzberg, who has contributed to the magazine. Saltzberg’s streak comes amid a string of notable Jewish appearances on the beloved game show. Recently, the show devoted an entire category to Yiddish theater, and cholent, the slow-cooked Shabbat stew, was featured in a clue near the beginning of the season. And Mayim Bilalik, the Jewish actor who is sharing hosting duties while the show seeks a permanent replacement for the late Alex Trek, this week is hosting the show’s college tournament. February 8, 2022

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CHEFS ILAN FERRON AND OSAMA DALAL PREPARE TO FLIP OCTOPUS MAQLUBA IN A SCENE FROM “BREAKING BREAD.” PHOTO COURTESY OF COHEN MEDIA GROUP.

“Little did I know that once I’d arrive in Haifa, the chefs, the city, the food, the humanity would provide a magical narrative far exceeding my expectations,” she said. “In a way, ‘Breaking Bread’ is a love letter to Haifa.” Atamna-Ismaeel, the film’s primary subject, “believes encouraging contact between opposing sides leads to a better understanding and improved relations. She exudes charm and wit, is creative and talented,” said Hawk. “But it’s her quips, like, ‘I don’t believe there’s any room for politics in the kitchen,’ and her tenacity to bridge the gap, to make small steps, hoping that they will lead to huge ones, that make her an inspirational protagonist.” Atamna-Ismaeel selected the chefs and paired them up for the festival. “I would film a pair of chefs, and it would become obvious, in the moment, that they would be stars of the film,” said Hawk. “For example, the pairing of chefs Shlomi Meir and Ali Khattib was a gift from the cinema heavens. Their natural bond over parallel missions was emotional and organically embodied the themes of the film. “You have Shlomi, a thirdgeneration owner of Haifa’s

Maayan Habira restaurant, propelled by his mission to continue the legacy of his deceased grandfather’s cooking. Everything Shlomi touches in his kitchen, from the meat smoker to the antiquated refrigerator he refuses to update, resurrects the memory of his grandfather,” said Hawk. “And then you have Ali, propelled by his desire to continue the legacy of his grandmother’s unique Syrian dishes, by introducing them into the Israeli culinary scene. And the first step in this journey is to teach Shlomi, at the festival, how to make his grandmother’s yogurt, bulgur and lamb soup, named kishek. Shlomi and Ali are mirror images. They recognize themselves in each other.” Hawk engaged Jewish Israeli cinematographer Ofer Ben Yehuda, and Egyptian-born composer Omar El-Deeb. “Breaking Bread” won an audience award at the Napa Valley Film Festival. This month, the film is premiering at theaters in cities throughout the United States, beginning with New York and Los Angeles. For details, click here. This article first appeared in Israel21c.

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Briefs

and institutions abroad and at home.”

Citing Colleyille, Jewish orgs urge confirmation of Deborah Lipstadt (JTA) – Close to 100 local Jewish federations and Jewish community relations councils are urging the Senate to confirm Deborah Lipstadt as antisemitism monitor, citing the attack on a Colleyville, Texas synagogue last month. “This latest, horrific attack makes clear that the Senate must expeditiously confirm this position so that America’s diplomatic corps has an able leader to combat the global threat of antisemitism,” the organizations said in a letter sent Monday, Jan. 31, that was initiated by the Jewish Federations of North America, an umbrella group. The letter was addressed to Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, and Sen. James Risch, R-Idaho, its senior Republican. But the real target was Risch, who has been holding up Lipstadt’s confirmation because of her past sharp criticisms of Republicans. Jewish groups have multiple times called on the Senate to press forward with Lipstadt’s confirmation hearings. The position of antisemitism monitor tracks antisemitism overseas and consults with governments about how to stem it. The man who held a rabbi and three congregants hostage on Jan. 15 for 15 hours was a British Muslim who appeared to buy into antisemitic tropes about Jewish control. “We may not know everything that led to this attack, but the congregants held hostage that day report a series of antisemitic tropes from the gunman,” the letter said. “It is undeniable that a rising tide of antisemitic speech and physical attacks have targeted the Jewish community across the world, creating the dangerous preconditions to attacks on Jewish individuals February 8, 2022

Dutch publisher stops printing book alleging a Jew betrayed Anne Frank (JTA) – Ambo Anthos, the Amsterdam-based publishing house that printed the Dutchlanguage translation of a controversial book alleging that a Jew had betrayed Anne Frank, has apologized for not reviewing the material more critically and ceased printing new copies of it on Monday, Jan. 31. The book The Betrayal of Anne Frank, published earlier this month by the Canadian author Rosemary Sullivan, hypothesizes that the teenage diarist and her family were turned over to the Nazis by Arnold van den Bergh, a notary and a member of the Jewish Council, which the Nazis established to better control Dutch Jews. The book documents the work of a cold case investigation team set up six years ago. But soon after it was published, several critics, including well-known historians who specialize in the history of the Frank family, dismissed the probe’s conclusion as inconclusive and irresponsible. Bart van der Boom, a Leiden University historian who has written extensively about the Jewish Council, called the findings “libelous nonsense.” David Barnouw, one of the bestrespected historians of World War II in the Netherlands, said he had considered van den Bergh but dismissed him as a suspect and called the book’s allegation “lacking in evidence.” The main piece of evidence in the investigation is an anonymous letter naming van den Bergh sent to Otto Frank, Anne’s father and the only member of the family of four to survive the Holocaust. NOS reported that some experts do not believe van den Bergh had access to a list of addresses of Jews in hiding at the time. Ambo Anthos, the Amsterdam-based publisher,

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apologized in a statement to “anyone felt offended” by Sullivan’s book. Editing was not possible ahead of publication under the Dutch publisher’s deal with HarperCollins, which owns the copyright for the book, the statement added. The book is still available in other languages.

Schumer recites the Shema at National Prayer Breakfast (JTA) – Sen. Chuck Schumer, the most senior Jewish elected official in U.S. history, recited the Shema prayer at the National Prayer Breakfast on Thursday. The New York Democrat added a reading from Leviticus that emphasized unity, echoing the message President Joe Biden emphasized in his remarks at the same event. Biden in his remarks referred to the recent synagogue hostage crisis in Texas as an example of courage in the face of divisiveness. Schumer, the majority leader in the Senate, appeared with Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., the body’s minority leader. Schumer began, reading the first line of the Shema, which mandates that Jews internalize the oneness of God, in Hebrew. Schumer then said he would read from Leviticus 19:8. “Don’t take vengeance on or bear a grudge against any of your people, rather love your neighbor as yourself, I am Adonai,” he said in English. That was of a piece with Biden’s appeal at the breakfast, the first since 2020 in person, for cross-partisan unity. Former President Donald Trump had shocked participants at his own appearances for divisive comments. In 2020, Trump, a Protestant, questioned the faith of Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives who is a Roman Catholic, and Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, one of Trump’s most prominent GOP critics, who is a Mormon. Biden in his own remarks referred to the violent Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection that sought to keep Congress from affirming

Biden as president. “As I stand in this citadel of democracy that was attacked one year ago, the issue for us is unity,” Biden said in the Capitol Visitor Center, where this year’s prayer breakfast took place. Biden also devoted a lengthy portion of his speech to the bravery a rabbi and three congregants displayed held hostage last month at a synagogue in Colleyville, Texas. The rabbi, Charlie CytronWalker, had invited in the assailant, who had presented himself as someone in need of shelter. “When asked later if he would change anything, the rabbi said, quote, ‘We will do what we always do, which is the best we can.’ Which is the best we can,” Biden said. “I had a long conversation with the rabbi. It was interesting to hear him describe the scene and how faith mattered: Whether you’re in a synagogue or a church or a mosque or a temple, whether you’re religious or not, we’re all imperfect human beings, trying our best – the best we can, because we can’t know the future.” Nominally hosted by a senator from each party, the National Prayer Breakfast, a tradition dating back almost a hundred years, is organized by a secretive Christian group, the Fellowship Foundation.

Israel to test for COVID-19 using noninvasive eye exam (JNS) An Israeli hospital has started recruiting volunteers for the world’s largest known study for the detection of COVID-19 within the surface of the eye, announced Sheba Medical Center at Tel Hashomer on Thursday. The hospital will be testing if the Tear Film Imager (TFI) developed by the Israeli company AdOM Advanced Optical Technologies, which takes a noninvasive measurement of the tear film, can effectively diagnose and Continued on page 31

Southern New England Jewish Ledger

Deadline Set On Yeshiva Foreclosure BY THOMAS BREEN

New Haven, CT – A nonprofit controlled by imprisoned Rabbi Daniel Greer has until Feb. 22 to scrounge up $620,000 to pay the convicted sex offender’s victim and retain control of the historic yeshiva building at the corner of Elm Street and Norton Street. That was the outcome of two recent decisions by two different judges in separate but related state and federal court cases. The first decision came down Friday, Jan. 21 from federal Judge Charles Haight, Jr. in the so-called “reverse veil-piercing” case Eliyahu Mirlis v. Edgewood Corners Inc, Edgewood Elm Housing Inc, Edgewood Village Inc, F.O.H. Inc, and Yedidei Hagan Inc. The second decision came down the following Monday from state Superior Court Judge John Cirello in the foreclosure case Eliyahu Mirlis v. Yeshiva of New Haven Inc. Both concerned Mirlis’s ongoing attempt to take control of the red-brick yeshiva school building at 765 Elm St. as part of a long-stymied attempt to collect on a largely unpaid $22 million civil judgment against Greer. Greer, meanwhile, remains in prison, where he is serving a 20-year sentence for raping Mirlis while the latter was a student at that very same

Edgewood Yeshiva. (Greer has appealed the criminal case.) At question in the relevant parts of these two federal and state judicial decisions is whether or not Mirlis should be able to take ownership of the foreclosedupon Elm Street school building, or whether the Greer-controlled nonprofit Yeshiva of New Haven Inc. can retain ownership by paying cash directly to Mirlis through the court. Cirello’s state court decision confirmed that the Greercontrolled Yeshiva of New Haven nonprofit can continue owning and operating the school property if it pays Mirlis $620,000 in cash by Feb. 22. Mirlis’s attorney argued during the hearing that the property is worth far more than $620,000, and that the nonprofit should instead have to hand over the foreclosed property to Mirlis so that he can sell it at whatever price he can fetch. The attorney for the Greercontrolled nonprofit, meanwhile, asked the court for six extra months to be able to raise $620,000 in cash to allow it to retain ownership and allegedly continue to host a Jewish educational program which the organization claims to have “somewhere north of 10” adult

GREER COMPANY-OWNED YESHIVA BUILDING: WORTH $6.5M, ACCORDING TO CITY. WORTH $620K, ACCORDING TO COURT (THOMAS BREEN PHOTO)

Southern New England Jewish Ledger

students currently attending classes at the Elm Street building.

Federal Judge Signs Off On Sales The city sold the building, the former Roger Sherman School, to Greer’s organization in the 1980s. It became a religious school and prayer gathering place that served as the centerpiece of his organization’s efforts, through a variety of technically separate nonprofits, to rebuild the surrounding neighborhood. The school closed as the larger enterprise fell apart upon Greer’s arrest and conviction. Haight’s federal court ruling on Friday came in a decision dealing with an attempt by Greer’s housing nonprofits to modify a temporary restraining order (TRO) in such a way that they could redirect money meant for housing towards paying Greer’s and the yeshiva’s lawyers. While Haight turned down the five nonprofits’ request to use housing money on legal fees, he did permit the nonprofit to potentially sell off some of their 50 two- and threebedroom rental properties in the Edgewood neighborhood in order to raise enough cash to keep the yeshiva out of foreclosure. Haight was convinced enough, for now, by the housing nonprofits’ arguments that: 1) they exist in part to raise money to support the religious school, and 2) their providing money to the yeshiva to keep the building out of foreclosure will not materially hurt Mirlis’s bid to collect on the unpaid $22 million civil judgment, because it would see Mirlis get paid in cash the equivalent of the “fair market value” of the Elm Street property itself. Haight included a key caveat in his federal decision, however. He ruled that Greer’s nonprofit can pay Mirlis $620,000 in cash and retain control of the Yeshiva

building only if the Connecticut state court judge overseeing a parallel foreclosure action on that same property signs off on such a deal.

State Court’s “Hot Potato” In the state court foreclosure case, State Superior Court Judge Cirello heard arguments from Mirlis attorney John Cesaroni and Yeshiva of New Haven attorney Jeffrey Sklarz on whether or not to grant the yeshiva’s request to reopen an existing judgment of strict foreclosure against the Elm Street property for the sake of extending the “law day” from Jan. 31. “I feel like this is a hot potato that nobody really wants to enter a decision on,” Cirello said at the top of the hearing, referring to Haight’s federal court ruling. The federal court “essentially kind of dumped it in my lap as to how to proceed.” Cirello asked Cesaroni if his client, Mirlis, would be OK with accepting $620,000 in cash from the yeshiva instead of taking control of the building itself. Cesaroni objected for two reasons: First, this foreclosure action on the yeshiva property has gone on for over four years. In that entire time, during state court and appellate proceedings, the yeshiva nonprofit has never pointed specifically to the funds it plans to use to pay Mirlis, or the rental properties its related nonprofits plan to sell to raise such funds. Cesaroni also said his client thinks that the $620,000 valuation of the Elm Street school building property is now “stale,” having been set in 2020. The city, meanwhile, last appraised the property as worth over $6.5 million. “The property has appreciated in value, and we Continued on page 29

February 8, 2022

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Author’s Corner

West Hartford native Judy Bolton-Fasman spills family secrets in a new memoir

BY STACEY DRESNER

EST HARTFORD – Judy BoltonFasman grew up in West Hartford, Connecticut in a house on Asylum Avenue, a fitting address for the home that BoltonFasman admits contained more than a little insanity – and the perfect name for her new book. For Asylum: A Memoir of Family Secrets, Bolton-Fasman delved into the mystery that surrounded her parents: Matilde Alboukrek, her beautiful, vibrant Cuban-born Sephardic mother, and Harold Bolton, her serious, patriotic, Yale-educated Ashkenazi father, who was 10 years older than his glamorous wife. Bolton-Fasman will discuss her memoir on Zoom, in a talk presented by the Jewish Historical Society of Greater Hartford on Thursday, Feb. 17 at 7:30 p.m. Born in her father’s native New Haven, Bolton-Fasman’s family moved to West Hartford on Judy’s third birthday to be closer to Harold’s job as a CPA at Pratt & Whitney. She attended a public elementary school before enrolling in the Hebrew Academy for middle school. Her family attended Temple Sinai in Newington. Curiously, when she was 24 and in grad school, her father mailed her a letter. Then, after reconsidering, called her to say that not only should she not open it, but she should burn it. And so she did. After her father’s death at the age of 90, Bolton-Fasman began to take a deeper look into his past, contacting former associates, relatives, and friends, accessing records through the

Freedom of Information Act, traveling to Cuba to search for clues. The result, after nearly 10 years, is Asylum: A Memoir of Family Secrets. In it, BoltonFasman comes to learn a big secret about her father, which people can find out by reading the book or attending the Zoom presentation. A graduate of Trinity College in Hartford, she received her master’s degree from Columbia University and has written essays and reviews for several publications including the New York Times and The Boston Globe. She is a four-time winner of the Simon Rockower Award for Essay from the American Jewish Press Association. A resident of Newton, Massachusetts, she and her husband are the parents of two grown children. Judy Bolton-Fasman recently talked about her memoir and her upbringing in West Hartford with the Southern New England Jewish Ledger JEWISH LEDGER: You lived on the corner of Asylum Avenue and Ballar Drive in West Hartford – is that how the book got it’s name? JUDY BOLTON-FASMAN: The book is named actually for Asylum Avenue and the cover of the book has a picture of the house. The title for me was really a gift from the universe. I mean it couldn’t have been more perfect for my circumstances. My mother immigrated [to America] from Cuba in the late 1950s, but the rest of her family came after Castro took over the island, and they literally sought asylum. So asylum was very much a feature of my childhood and very much a feeling that I grew up with.

Southern New England Jewish Ledger

JUDY BOLTON-FASMAN

And then, for those who read the book, there is that connotation of insanity and there was a lot of insanity going on in that house. So, it works on multiple levels. What do you mean by insanity? I think it was really hard for my mother. She really tried to transplant from sunny Havana to cold, wintery West Hartford. That engendered a lot of challenges and a lot of difficulties. And if you read through the book, you’ll see that family dynamics were strained and there was a cultural and age difference between my parents and in that gap a lot of issues sort of took root. How did the two different cultures impact or influence your Jewish? My father grew up completely assimilated and was not in any way attached to Jewish practice.

And my mother grew up very traditional in Havana. She grew up in a tight-knit Sephardic community. She went to a Jewish day school called Theodor Herzl. But I will say one thing about my dad -- he was very Zionist. He loved Israel. So, I guess that was how he identified as a Jew. But he never went to synagogue [growing up]. He didn’t know a Hebrew letter to save his life. I think that I say in the book, “he was a Jew who lip-synched the Shema.” So they grew up very differently in terms of faith traditions, that’s for sure. My parents belonged to reform temples, first Congregation Beth Israel [in West Hartford] and then Temple Sinai [in Newington], so my father could feel more comfortable and we could get a chance of getting him to synagogue. But my mother wasn’t happy with the extent of Jewish

February 8, 2022

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education I was getting and decided that I should go to a Jewish day school… I ended up going to what was then called the Hebrew Academy of Greater Hartford [now part of West Hartford’s New England Jewish Academy]. It was it was a challenge because I didn’t come from a house that was necessarily observant. So there was that clash for me and that confusion, but I did get a thorough Jewish education. Yet you went on to attend a Catholic high school. It’s a crazy story. I came out of the Hebrew Academy sort of newly observant Orthodox, and that really did not please my parents. They were scared of it; they thought they were losing me. And there was not a Jewish high school [in West Hartford] at the time when I was growing up. My only options were to go to New York or to Providence, Rhode Island and my parents didn’t want to send me away. And frankly, it frightened them that I didn’t eat in their kitchen and that I was kind of detaching myself from the family. So I said, “Fine, I’ll go only to an all-girls school.” And they gave me a couple of options, one of which was Mount Saint Joseph Academy. And I said, “I’m going to go to Mount Saint Joseph Academy” in a very teenager-y, kind of tantrum way. I thought it would last two weeks and that they would eventually give in to me [and send me to a Jewish high school]. Well, I ended up loving it. I loved the camaraderie; I loved being in a single-sex school; the nuns were wonderful to me. And I ended up making lifelong friends and doing ecumenical programming with teachers there and inviting my rabbi to come for a Thanksgiving assembly. It ended up being a win-win situation for me, ironically enough.

February 8, 2022

Without giving away any spoilers, I knew something was afoot. [My father] had this very complex history and he had been to many kinds of mysterious places. What added to the complexity of our family life was that my mother was from a country that was on lockdown. We had absolutely no contact, no way to go there. And Cuba was a very big presence in our lives. There was nothing that I wanted more than to go there and I couldn’t, and that really influenced a lot of my childhood.

places. I held on to it for an hour or so, looking at it in the light and trying to figure it out, but I decided that the only [thing to do] was to honor my father’s wishes, A lot of people ask me do I regret burning the letter. I don’t, because it sent me on this journey. There’s an important strand [of the book about] saying Kaddish for my father for a year and of having this posthumous relationship with him. And I might not have had any of that if I had read the letter. And who knows? Maybe the letter was just really mundane!

But you knew “something was afoot,” as you put it?

When did you start really looking into your dad’s past?

I knew that there were things about my father that he wouldn’t tell us. He was very silent. He never was a character in his own stories. He was kind of a strict dad. He was an older dad, so that already engendered mystery about him. I knew he had pictures from Latin America where he traveled. I knew he visited his best friend there a number of times and that [the friend’s] family had relocated to the what I call in the book “suburban New York, and we visited them every other month. So, there were all these things to kind of put together as I got older.

The year I said Kaddish was a very important year for me. I journalled about it and I decided I was going to write a book about that year. I worked on that for two or three years, and it really didn’t go anywhere. It was a very internal document; I think it would have been an interest only to my siblings and my kids. So, I realized that what I needed was a good old-fashioned story – an arc and a narrative. I was visiting my best friend in Israel and she said, you have to go out and find people who knew your father. Which was not so easy because at that point he was already almost 90. Many of his contemporaries had passed on. But I knew just the person to contact and I found my way to him. He was an old family friend, and it went from there.

Your book is a subtitled A Memoir of Family Secrets. Did your parents have big secrets?

Did he ever tell you why he travelled to Latin America so much? No, he said he was on vacation (Laughs). Tell us about the letter that your father sent you and then changed his mind and told you to burn. I think I burned it out of fear. I didn’t want to know what was in there because at the time he was getting sicker with Parkinson’s Disease and he and my mother were not having a good time of it. And I was afraid that it might have been a suicide note. My mind went to a lot of dark

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Was it difficult emotionally to learn some of these things about your father? No, I was curious as a kid. I took on the persona of Judy Bolton, Girl Detective. Judy Bolton had her own series of books in the 40s and 50s -- not as popular as Nancy Drew, but nevertheless, she had a series. So, the name came to me naturally. I think that I was always curious about my father because the first stirrings of Asylum were

in a master’s thesis I did which was a collection of short stories. I got my MFA from Columbia University. And I had to write a thesis and the name of my thesis was “The 90-Day Wonder,” which was very much alluding to my father during the Second World War. I later learned while I was doing research that that is a pejorative term. Basically it was a program that fast-tracked young college graduates to be officers in three months. Where it becomes pejorative is that a lot of the sailors, or corporals or whoever they were commanding were resentful. You know, they had socks older than these guys. And they called them ‘90-Day Wonder’ in a pejorative way. My father was a 90-Day Wonder. I believe he went almost immediately after he graduated from Yale to the Brooklyn Naval Yard to train. He was a lieutenant commander in the Navy and he was stationed in the South Pacific during World II. So that thesis was the first stirrings of Asylum. Without revealing any spoilers for those who haven’t read the book yet, does your book reveal your father’s secrets? I did. I want to backtrack a little. The book is non-fiction, but speculative non-fiction, and for me, that means that I mixed speculative non-fiction, my own speculations with the facts I had in hand. And it yielded for me a profound unshakable truth. Will you share that “unshakeable truth” with the Zoom audience on Feb. 17? As my kids say, I’ll take the temperature of the Zoom room and see what happens. Author Judy Bolton-Fasman will speak on Zoom, THursday, Feb. 17, 7:30 p.m., presented by the Jewish Historical Society of Greater Hartford. For information, visit jhsgh.org.

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On Campus

Feds to probe students’ complaints of antisemitism at Brooklyn College (New York Jewish Week via JTA) – A federal investigation has been launched into complaints by Jewish students at Brooklyn College that they have been subjected to “severe and persistent harassment” in the Mental Health Counseling master’s program. The Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights last week informed the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, which prepared the complaint, that it had opened the probe. The complaint alleges that Jewish students in the MHC program have been “bullied and harassed in class discussions and on social media by student peers, who target Jewish students using the same ethnic stereotypes, antisemitic tropes and divisive concepts that faculty members promote in their courses.” The complaint cites the example of a professor who claimed that Ashkenazi Jews who immigrated to America have become “oppressors.” In another, a professor allegedly rebuked a Jewish student for ranking the student’s Jewish identity before their white identity, suggesting the student “did not understand oppression.” The students’ names were redacted from the Brandeis Center’s filing. A spokesman for the Office for Civil Rights confirmed the probe but would not discuss any details of the case, which could cost Brooklyn College its federal funding if the allegations are confirmed. Denise Katz-Prober, the Brandeis Center’s director of legal initiatives, told The New York Jewish Week that the harassment campaign was “part of an effort to erase and misunderstand Jewish identity. That is dangerous February 8, 2022

because of the misunderstanding we saw with Whoopi Goldberg, and it is an attempt to whitewash the Jewish historical experience, which results in the downplaying of antisemitism.” The actress was suspended from her role on the “The View” earlier this week for suggesting the Holocaust was “not about race.” Katz-Prober said that colleges and universities have an obligation under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to prohibit discrimination on the basis of race, color or national origin in any program or activity that receives federal financial assistance. The 10-page complaint was filed in behalf of two unnamed students and cites the actions of two unnamed professors and two unnamed administrators. It alleges that since the beginning of the 2020-2021 academic year, professors “maligned Jews on the basis of race and ethnic identity by advancing the narrative that all Jews are white and privileged and therefore contribute to the systemic oppression of people of color.” When the Jewish students complained to administrators, they were allegedly told to “get your whiteness in check” and to “keep your head down.” One of the students who filed the complaint, who asked not to be named, told The New York Jewish Week it was “the hardest thing I ever did in my life.… I wouldn’t be doing this if it wasn’t so blatant.” “This is a very Jewish school and Jews shouldn’t have to go to school and be scared. This shouldn’t happen,” the student said. “Class participation is a very big part of your grade and the fact I have been told

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THE LAGUARDIA TOWER AND CARILLON AT BROOKLYN COLLEGE. (FLICKR COMMONS)

by a white teacher to keep my head down and to get your whiteness in check … It really upset me because this has been an ongoing situation in the classroom.” According to Hillel International, there are 500 Jewish students among the 2,841 graduate students at Brooklyn College, which is part of the City University of New York. In a classroom discussion of how people of color feel vulnerable in public, the student said, fellow students downplayed the accounts of Jews who fear being targeted as well. “People have said, ‘You are not scared when you go to the store or walk down the street, but black people have to be.’ I said, ‘No, I am scared,’” said the Jewish student. Two of the 10 Jewish students have dropped out of the program, one just recently, due to stress, according to one of the two students who filed the

complaint. The complaint also asserts that Jewish students were bullied on a WhatsApp group chat. In that chat group, a female student expressed a desire to strangle a Jewish student and others showed support, according to the complaint. A Jewish student who objected was accused of being racist. On its web site, the Brandeis Center has linked antisemitism on college campuses to an emphasis on identity politics in the classroom. “The campaign against Jewish students comes at a time when virtually every other group which claims an identity of its own is permitted to define its identity which then can neither be questioned nor commented upon by outsiders,” wrote Diane Kunz, a scholar-in-residence at the center, in a recent blog post. “Only Jews are denied that Continued on page 29

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Greer

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CONTINUED FROM PAGE 22

would really need another hearing to determine what is a sufficient bond,” Cesaroni said. “The plaintiff’s best interest is to take title and then he could sell the property and get whatever it’s worth,” Cesaroni said. Cirello then turned to Sklarz. Where is this money going to come from? he asked. “You haven’t presented anything along those lines to inform the court what assurances you’re giving Attorney Cesaroni’s client that they’re going to get paid.” Sklarz explained that the money would take the form of cash. If the yeshiva nonprofit doesn’t have adequate funds on hand, he said, then the related housing nonprofits – per Haight’s federal court order – would likely sell off some properties to raise those funds. “I was going to ask for six months,” Sklarz said, to give the nonprofit time to “sell the property or get a mortgage on the property.” Six months is a long time, Cirello said, especially in an everfluctuating real estate market. “Where are interest rates going to go? What’s the value of the property? Has it increased in value?” Sklarz said that the rental properties that the related housing nonprofits would sell are “all income-producing property, some retail and office space. It’s valuable property. It’s not a bunch of dilapidated lots. These are valuable pieces of property.” Skalrz and Colbert estimated that the roughly 50 two- and three-bedroom rental properties owned by the related housing nonprofits are valued by the city at around $10 million in total. Colbert told the state judge that the yeshiva, with the help of the related housing nonprofits, could likely put down 20 percent, “maybe more,” of the $620,000 court-set cash bond value soon, and then raise the rest of the money over the next few months. Cesaroni pushed back again February 8, 2022

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 27

on that request for more time to raise $620,000.

What’s Happening In School Building Now? “I have no idea to what extent or how they’re using” the Elm Street building today, Cesaroni said about the Greer-controlled yeshiva nonprofit. “It appears it’s still operated as a school building.” Cesaroni said that, if Mirlis takes ownership of the Elm Street building, “there is interest in the building as a school, especially within the Orthodox Jewish community, which we think adds substantial value to it.” ,Cirello’s three-page decision handed down January 24 was clear in its denial of Greer’s nonprofit’s request to reopen the strict foreclosure judgment. And it appeared to affirm the propriety of the yeshiva paying Mirlis $620,000 in cash in exchange for retaining control of the Elm Street school property. He did so be referring to Judge Baio’s order from February 2020 permitting such a cash-bond substitution. Cirello concluded his decision by turning down the Yeshiva nonprofit’s request to reopen the strict foreclosure judgment and extend the law day by six months. He explained his decision by writing that “there are no assurances provided to ELIYAHU when and how the cash bond would come into being, or any assurances that the debt owed would be paid.” “Nevertheless,” Cirello wrote, “the court must extend the law day to February 22, 2022.” This story is reprinted from New Haven Independent (www. newhavenindependent) with permission.

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right. Ironically proliferating safe speech/safe spaces regimes on campuses have made the problem worse for Jews.” In January, after a Brooklyn College student wearing an Israeli army sweatshirt and a friend were assaulted and called “dirty Jews” in an off-campus incident in Bay Ridge, the college released a statement saying it “denounces hatred and stands in solidarity with the student and members of the Jewish community, as well as any community that is subjected to acts of targeted hate. Antisemitism has no place at Brooklyn College.” The Office of Civil Rights has investigated several complaints against universities alleging antisemitic harassment and discrimination on campus. Among them are New York University, the University of Illinois, Williams College, the University of North Carolina and Duke University. All have entered resolution agreements promising to take steps to combat antisemitic harassment and discrimination against Jewish students on campus. Pro-Palestinian influence at center of congressional bribery allegations Rep. Marie Newman, a Chicago-area Democrat, is under investigation by the Office of Congressional Ethics for allegedly promising Iymen Chehade, a Palestinian-American academic, a job on her congressional staff if he agreed not to run against her in a primary. The Daily Beast on Thursday reported on an email from Chehade in which he outlines his conditions for assuming a role on her staff, should she be elected in 2020. Chehade requested a role as a foreign policy adviser with an emphasis on the IsraelPalestinian conflict. The October 2018 email asks Newman to “commit” to a number of Israel-critical and pro-Palestinian postures, including opposing legislation targeting the boycott Israel movement, opposing defense funding to Israel in addition to funds that are required by law and ending Israel’s detention of Palestinian minors. The promise allegedly came in 2018, after Newman failed to unseat Dan Lipinski, a conservative Democrat, in a primary challenge. Newman, who is backed by a political action committee affiliated with J Street, the liberal Jewish Middle East policy group, ousted Lipinski in 2020. Newman failed to hire Chehade as her congressional adviser, a job that is paid for with government funds, and he sued her last year. They settled for undisclosed terms, and he subsequently signed onto her campaign as a foreign affairs adviser. Campaign advisers are paid out of donations to candidates. Newman has denied any improprieties. Chehade will not comment, citing the non-disclosure component of his settlement with Newman. Chehade is currently running for Congress in Illinois’ redrawn third district. Newman notably has embraced some of the policies Chehade outlined in his 2018 email: She was one of just nine members of the U.S. House of Representatives who voted last year against $1 billion in additional funds for Israel’s Iron Dome antimissile system. She also backs a bill by Rep. Betty McCollum, D-Minn., that would withhold funds from Israel based on the number of Palestinian minors in detention. Because of redistricting, Newman will likely face another Democratic incumbent, Sean Casten, in a primary this year.

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THE BEAUTY QUEEN OF JERUSALEM NEW ENGLAND PREMIERE

SCREENING OF TWO TV EPISODES Directed by: Oded Davidoff, 2021 Speaker: Avner Shavit, Jewish Studies Silverberg Scholar in Residence

Wednesday, February 16, 2022, 8:00 PM The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem is a melodramatic series about three generations of Jerusalem's Ermosa family stretching from the early days of the 20th century against the backdrop of resistance to the Turkish regime, through the underground war with the British and the establishment of the State of Israel. Based on a novel by Sarit Yishai-Levy, The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem is a colorful, passionate and tragic series interwoven with Judeo-Spanish traditions and the history of a nascent country.

Goldsmith Family Cinema, Center for Film Studies 301 Washington Terrace, Middletown, Connecticut Free Admission, Free On-Site Parking, Open to the Public More information: iff.site.wesleyan.edu Sponsored by the Center for Jewish Studies Organized by Dalit Katz, Director

Co-Sponsored by the College of Film and the Moving Image, The Wesleyan Film Series

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February 8, 2022

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Briefs CONTINUED FROM PAGE 21

determine if a person is infected with COVID. The tear film is a thin fluid layer that covers the outer mucosal surfaces of the eye. TFI quantifies the dynamic properties of the tear-film inner layers using a single non-contact measurement while allowing individuals to blink naturally. The whole measurement process takes about 40 seconds per eye. The first patient has already been enrolled in the study, which is expected to last 30 days. At least 500 people are expected to participate. Specifically, the study will compare the accuracy of using the TFI to taking a PCR test. If successful, the company would apply for regulatory approval. “Our goal is to have hundreds of patients who are asymptomatic or symptomatic with COVID-19, irrespective of the variant and even those who have recovered, to see how the TFI device compares to the existing PCR standard of care,” said Professor Eyal Zimlichman, deputy director general and chief transformation officer at Sheba’s ARC Innovation Center and chief investigator of the trial. A previous proof-of-concept study conducted at Wolfson Medical Center in Holon demonstrated that the TFI could correctly identify COVID or negative patients when compared to a PCR test. The new study will validate the TFI in an “all-comers” setting to see if it continues to be equally as effective as the PCR, while being faster and non-invasive. As Gefen explained, “if proven to have a high correlation to PCR, this can be a game-changer, as the TFI device can be utilized as a point-of-care diagnostic in many venues such as airports, sporting arenas and businesses that want to have a simple, noninvasive test to determine the status of entering crowds.”

February 8, 2022

Bipartisan outrage directed at Amnesty Int’l report accusing Israel of apartheid (JNS) Lawmakers and pro-Israel political groups from across the political spectrum are slamming what they consider a biased report released Tuesday, Feb. 1, by the international human-rights organization Amnesty International. It is Amnesty International’s 208th report on Israel since the 1970s, which goes as far as rejecting the establishment of modernday Israel in 1948 while calling Israel an “apartheid state” and associating it with a long list of crimes. In a joint letter sent on Tuesday, Reps. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.), Brad Schneider (D-Ill.), Lois Frankel (D-Fla.), Elaine Luria (D-Va.), Kathy Manning (D-N.C.), Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.), Dean Phillips (D-Minn.), Brad Sherman (D-Calif.) and Jake Auchincloss (D-Mass.) said the report is steeped in antisemitic tropes, and that it is part of a decades-long campaign to criminalize and delegitimize the world’s only Jewish state. The members also pointed out that Amnesty International has only released 40 reports on North Korea and 61 on Venezuela. “The ‘apartheid’ accusations against Israel misrepresent and diminish the actual tyranny, segregation and dehumanization perpetrated in apartheid South Africa. South Africa’s institutionalized racial segregation of the past bears no equivalence to Israel’s vibrant democracy where all citizens, regardless of religion or race, have rights and are represented at the highest levels of government, education, health care, business and the courts,” the members wrote. In fact, they continue, “Israel currently has perhaps the most diverse governing coalition in the world, made up of parties across

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the political spectrum, including the United Arab List. The government ministers include Jews and Muslims, religious and secular, Arabs, Ethiopians and LGBTQ people. Israel is the only country in the Middle East where Jews and Arabs govern together.” The Congress members, all Democrats, said the report has the potential to have “tragic consequences,” further fueling antisemitism by those seeking to delegitimize Israel and undermine the prospects for peace between Israelis and Palestinians. “In a region where religious intolerance and authoritarianism is too often the norm, Israel stands out as a pluralistic exception. Israel is not perfect, nor is any nation, and Palestinians’ rights must be respected,” wrote the lawmakers. “Amnesty International could work to strengthen Israel’s democracy for all Israeli citizens, Jewish and Arab, while also promoting the national aspirations of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. Instead, they do the exact opposite.” Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, also denounced the apartheid accusation, saying it “belies history, facts and common sense. Israel remains the only democracy in a region of autocrats and human-rights abusers; one that values human rights, individual liberty and where protest, dissent and civil society are vibrant.” Opposition to the report crossed party lines, with Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) recalling Natan Sharansky’s test for when criticism of Israel turns into antsemitism, calling it the “3D” test: demonization, double standard and delegitimization. “All three of these manifestations of antsemitic hate are on full display in the Amnesty International report,” Smith said in a statement to JNS. “No other country in the region–nor the Gaza under Hamas–comes

close to Israel’s commitment to fundamental human rights and freedoms,” said Smith, co-chair of the Bipartisan Task Force for Combating Anti-Semitism. “Christians and Muslims can worship freely, and can enjoy Israeli citizenship and the benefits of equal protection of the law.” Rep. Lee Zeldin (R-N.Y.), who is Jewish and co-chairs the House Republican Israel Caucus, not only condemned Amnesty International but called for recipients of campaign contributions linked to the organization to be returned. These recipients include U.S. President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic National Committee and others. A number of other Republican lawmakers also slammed the report, including Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.). Pro-Israel America executive director Jeff Mendelsohn said, “The report proposes that Israel’s very existence as a Jewish state and a homeland to the Jewish people is alone an act of ‘apartheid,’ ” he said. Democratic Majority for Israel said Amnesty International “has become a propaganda tool to spread vicious lies with the goal of delegitimizing and demonizing the State of Israel.” Still, not everyone in Congress was outraged at the report. Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) wrote on Twitter simply that “U.S. foreign aid shouldn’t go to apartheid governments, period.”

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CT SYNAGOGUE DIRECTORY To join our synagogue directory of paid advertisers, call (860) 231-2424 BLOOMFIELD

B’nai Tikvoh-Sholom/ Neshama Center for Lifelong Learning Conservative Rabbi Debra Cantor (860) 243-3576 office@BTSonline.org www.btsonline.org

BRIDGEPORT

Congregation B’nai Israel Reform Rabbi Evan Schultz (203) 336-1858 info@cbibpt.org www.cbibpt.org Congregation Rodeph Sholom Conservative (203) 334-0159 Rabbi Richard Eisenberg, Cantor Niema Hirsch info@rodephsholom.com www.rodephsholom.com

CHESHIRE

Temple Beth David Reform Rabbi Micah Ellenson (203) 272-0037 office@TBDCheshire.org www.TBDCheshire.org

CHESTER

Congregation Beth Shalom Rodfe Zedek Reform Rabbi Marci Bellows (860) 526-8920 rabbibellows@cbsrz.org www.cbsrz.org

EAST HARTFORD

Temple Beth Tefilah Conservative Rabbi Yisroel Snyder (860) 569-0670 templebetht@yahoo.com

FAIRFIELD

Congregation Beth El, Fairfield Conservative Rabbi Joshua Ratner (203) 374-5544 office@bethelfairfield.org www.bethelfairfield.org

GLASTONBURY

Congregation Kol Haverim Reform Rabbi Dr. Kari Tuling (860) 633-3966 office@kolhaverim.org www.kolhaverim.org

GREENWICH

Greenwich Reform Synagogue Reform Rabbi Jordie Gerson (203) 629-0018 WendyBarr@grs.com www.grs.org Temple Sholom Conservative Rabbi Mitchell M. Hurvitz Rabbi Kevin Peters (203) 869-7191 info@templesholom.com www.templesholom.com

HAMDEN

Congregation Mishkan Israel Reform Rabbi Brian P. Immerman (203) 288-3877 tepstein@cmihamden.org www.cmihamden.org Temple Beth Sholom Conservative Rabbi Benjamin Edidin Scolnic (203) 288-7748 tbsoffice@tbshamden.com www.tbshamden.com

MADISON

Temple Beth Tikvah Reform Rabbi Danny Moss (203) 245-7028 office@tbtshoreline.org www.tbtshoreline.org

MANCHESTER

Beth Sholom B’nai Israel Conservative Rabbi Randall Konigsburg (860) 643-9563 Rabbenu@myshul.org admin@myshul.org www.myshul.org

MIDDLETOWN

Adath Israel Conservative Rabbi Nelly Altenburger (860) 346-4709 office@adathisraelct.org www.adathisraelct.org

NEW HAVEN

The Towers at Tower Lane Conservative Ruth Greenblatt, Spiritual Leader Sarah Moskowitz, Spiritual Leader (203) 772-1816 rebecca@towerlane.org www.towerlane.org

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Congregation Beth El-Keser Israel Conservative Rabbi Eric Woodward rabbi@beki.org (203) 389-2108 office@BEKI.org www.BEKI.org

ORANGE

WASHINGTON

Congregation Or Shalom Conservative Rabbi Alvin Wainhaus (203) 799-2341 info@orshalomct.org www.orshalomct.org

Greater Washington Coalition for Jewish Life Rabbi James Greene (860) 868-2434 jewishlifect@gmail.com www.jewishlifect.org

Orchard Street ShulCongregation Beth Israel Orthodox Rabbi Mendy Hecht 203-776-1468 www.orchardstreetshul.org

PUTNAM

WATERFORD

Congregation B’nai Shalom Conservative Rabbi Eliana Falk - Visiting Rabbi (860) 315-5181 susandstern@gmail.com www.congregationbnaishalom.org

Temple Emanu - El Reform Rabbi Marc Ekstrand Rabbi Emeritus Aaron Rosenberg (860) 443-3005 office@tewaterfrord.org www.tewaterford.org

SIMSBURY

WEST HARTFORD

Young Israel of West Hartford Orthodox Rabbi Tuvia Brander (860) 233-3084 info@youngisraelwh.org www.youngisraelwh.org

Beth El Temple Conservative Rabbi James Rosen Rabbi Rachel Zerin Cantor Joseph Ness (860) 233-9696 info@bethelwh.org www.bethelwesthartford. org

WESTPORT

NEW LONDON

Ahavath Chesed Synagogue Orthodox Rabbi Avrohom Sternberg 860-442-3234 Ahavath.chesed@att.net Congregation Beth El Conservative Rabbi Earl Kideckel (860) 442-0418 office@bethel-nl.org www.bethel-nl.org

NEWINGTON

Temple Sinai Reform Rabbi Jeffrey Bennett (860) 561-1055 templesinaict@gmail.com www.sinaict.org

NEWTOWN

Congregation Adath Israel Conservative Rabbi Barukh Schectman (203) 426-5188 office@congadathisrael.org www.congadathisrael.org

NORWALK

Beth Israel Synagogue – Chabad of Westport/ Norwalk Orthodox-Chabad Rabbi Yehoshua S. Hecht (203) 866-0534 info@bethisraelchabad.org bethisraelchabad.org Temple Shalom Reform Rabbi Cantor Shirah Sklar (203) 866-0148 admin@templeshalomweb. org www.templeshalomweb.org

NORWICH

Congregation Brothers of Joseph Modern Orthodox Rabbi Yosef Resnick (781 )201-0377 yosef.resnick@gmail.com https://brofjo.tripod.com

Chabad of the Farmington Valley Chabad Rabbi Mendel Samuels (860) 658-4903 chabadsimsbury@gmail.com www.chabadotvalley.org Farmington Valley Jewish Congregation, Emek Shalom Reform Rabbi Rebekah Goldman Mag (860) 658-1075 admin@fvjc.org www.fvjc.org

SOUTH WINDSOR

Temple Beth Hillel of South Windsor Reform Rabbi Jeffrey Glickman (860) 282-8466 tbhrabbi@gmail.com www.tbhsw.org

SOUTHINGTON

Gishrei Shalom Jewish Congregation Reform Rabbi Alana Wasserman (860) 276-9113 President@gsjc.org www.gsjc.org

TRUMBULL

Congregation B’nai Torah Conservative Rabbi Colin Brodie (203) 268-6940 office@bnaitorahct.org www.bnaitorahct.org

WALLINGFORD

Beth Israel Synagogue Conservative Rabbi Bruce Alpert (203) 269-5983 info@bethisraelwallingford. org www.bethisraelwallingford. org

Beth David Synagogue Modern Orthodox Rabbi Yitzchok Adler (860) 236-1241 office@bethdavidwh.org www.bethdavidwh.org

Chabad House of Greater Hartford Rabbi Joseph Gopin Rabbi Shaya Gopin, Director of Education (860) 232-1116 info@chabadhartford.com www.chabadhartford.com Congregation Beth Israel Reform Rabbi Michael Pincus Rabbi Andi Fliegel Cantor Stephanie Kupfer (860) 233-8215 bethisrael@cbict.org www.cbict.org Congregation P’nai Or Jewish Renewal Shabbat Services & Holidays Rabbi Andrea CohenKiener (860) 561-5905 pnaiorct@gmail.com www.jewishrenewalct.org

The Emanuel Synagogue Conservative Rabbi David J. Small (860) 236-1275 communications@emanuelsynagogue.org www.emanuelsynagogue. org United Synagogues of Greater Hartford Orthodox Rabbi Eli Ostrozynsk i synagogue voice mail (860) 586-8067 Rabbi’s mobile (718) 679-4446 ostro770@hotmail.com

Temple Israel of Westport Reform Rabbi Michael Friedman, Senior Rabbi Cantor Julia Cadrain, Senior Cantor Rabbi Elana Nemitoff-Bresler, Rabbi Educator Rabbi Zach Plesent, Assistant Rabbi (203) 227-1293 info@tiwestport.org www.tiwestport.org

WETHERSFIELD

Temple Beth Torah Unaffiliated Rabbi Alan Lefkowitz 860-529-2410 tbt.w.ct@gmail.com templebethtorahwethersfield.org

WOODBRIDGE

Congregation B’nai Jacob Conservative Rabbi Rona Shapiro (203) 389-2111 info@bnaijacob.org www.bnaijacob.org

Kehilat Chaverim of Greater Hartford Chavurah Adm. - Nancy Malley (860) 951-6877 mnmalley@yahoo.com www.kehilatchaverim.org

February 8, 2022

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SYNAGOGUE DIRECTORY WESTERN AND CENTRAL MASSACHUSETTS

AMHERST

FLORENCE

LONGMEADOW

Jewish Community of Amherst Reconstructionist Rabbi Benjamin Weiner (413) 256-0160 info@jcamherst.org www.jcamherst.org 742 Main St., Amherst, MA 01002

Beit Ahavah, The Reform Synagogue of Greater Northampton Reform Rabbi Riqi Kosovske (413) 587-3770 info@beitahavah.org www.beitahavah.org 130 Pine St. Florence, MA 01062

Congregation B’nai Torah Orthodox Rabbi Shlomo Yaffe Rabbi Yakov Wolff (413) 567-0036 office@bnaitorahma.org rabbi@bnaitorahma.org www.bnaitorahma.org 2 Eunice Drive Longmeadow, MA 01106 Neighborhood Minyan 124 Sumner Avenue Springfield, MA 01108

ATHOL Temple Israel Unaﬃliated/Egalitarian Reb Sarah Noyovitz (978) 249-9481 templeisraelathol@gmail.com 107 Walnut Street Athol, MA 01331

GREENFIELD Temple Israel of Greenfield Unaffiliated Rabbi Andrea Cohen-Kiener (413) 773-5884 office@templeisraelgreenfield.org www.templeisraelgreenfield.org 27 Pierce St. Greenfield, MA 01301

BENNINGTON, VT Congregation Beth El Reconstructionist Rabbi Micah Becker Klein (802) 442-9645 cbevtoﬃce@gmail.com www.cbevermont.org 225 North St., Bennington, VT 05201

HOLYOKE

CLINTON Congregation Shaarei Zedeck Conservative Lay Leadership - Elena Feinberg (978) 501-2744 sherryesq@yahoo.com www.shaareizedeck.org 104 Water St., Clinton, MA 01510

Congregation Rodphey Sholom Orthodox Rabbi Tuvia Helfen Religious Leader (413) 534-5262 djs1818@aol.com 1800 Northampton St., Holyoke, MA 01040 Congregation Sons of Zion Conservative Rabbi Saul Perlmutter (413) 534-3369 oﬃce@sonsofzionholyoke.org www.sonsofzionholyoke.org 378 Maple St. Holyoke, MA 01040

LEOMINSTER Congregation Agudat Achim Conservative Rabbi Eve Eichenholtz (978) 534-6121 oﬃce@agudat-achim.org www.agudat-achim.org 268 Washington St., Leominster, MA 01453

NORTHAMPTON Congregation B’nai Israel Conservative Rabbi Justin David (413) 584-3593 oﬃce@CBINorthampton.org www.CBINorthampton.org 253 Prospect St. Northampton, MA 01060

PITTSFIELD Temple Anshe Amunim Reform Rabbi Liz P.G. Hirsch (413) 442-5910 rabbiliz@ansheamunim.org www.ansheamunim.org 26 Broad St., Pittsﬁeld, MA 01201

SPRINGFIELD Sinai Temple Reform Rabbi Jeremy Master (413) 736-3619 rblanchettegage@sinai-temple.org www.sinai-temple.org 1100 Dickinson St., Springﬁeld, MA 01108

Temple Beth El Conservative Rabbi Amy Walk (413) 733-4149 office@tbesprinfield.org www.tbespringfield.org 979 Dickinson St., Springfield, MA 01108

WESTBOROUGH Beth Tikvah Synagogue Independent Rabbi Michael Swarttz (508) 616-9037 president@bethtikvahsynagogue. org www.bethtikvahsynagogue.org 45 Oak St., Westborough, MA 01581 Congregation B’nai Shalom Reform Rabbi Rachel Gurevitz/ Rabbi-Educator Joseph Eiduson (508) 366-7191 info@cbnaishalom.org www.cbnaishalom.org 117 East Main St., PO Box 1019, Westborough, MA 01581

WESTFIELD Congregation Ahavas Achim Unaffiliated Rabbi Dawn Rose (413) 642-1797 ahavasachiminquiry@gmail.com www.congregationahavasachim. org Ferst Interfaith Center, Westfield State University PO Box 334, 577 Western Avenue, Westfield, MA 01086 Find us on Facebook: https://www. facebook.com/AhavasAchimWestfield/

WORCESTER Central Mass Chabad Rabbi Mendel Fogelman, Rabbi Chaim Fishman, Rabbi Michael Phillips, Cantor Eli Abramowitz (508) 752-0904 rabbi@centralmasschabad.com www.centralmasschabad.com 22 Newton Avenue, Worcester, MA 01602 Congregation Beth Israel Conservative Rabbi Aviva Fellman (508) 756-6204 receptionist@bethisraelworc.org www.bethisraelworc.org 15 Jamesbury Drive Worcester, MA 01609 Congregation Shaarai Torah West Orthodox Rabbi Yakov Blotner (508) 791-0013 Brotman156@aol.com www.shaaraitorah.org 835 Pleasant St. Worcester, MA 01602 Temple Emanuel Sinai Reform Rabbi Valerie Cohen (508) 755-1257 amayou@emanuelsinai.org www.emanuelsinai.org 661 Salisbury St., Worcester, MA 01609

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February 8, 2022

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TORAH PORTION – TETZAVEH

BY RABBI TZVI HERSH WEINREB

y interest in the relationship between a person and his or her clothing goes back to my early days in graduate school. I was taking a course on human personality, under the tutelage of a remarkably insightful and erudite woman, Dr. Mary Henle, whom I asked to supervise my master’s degree thesis. I remember the morning I shared my proposed topic with her. I thought that one of the ways to assess personality was to take note of the kind of clothing that a person wore. I further postulated that not only does a person’s clothing tell us a lot about him or her, but the clothing that we wear actually has an impact upon us. Our clothing helps make us who we are. Dr. Henle tactfully deflated my ego that morning. She said, “That’s just an old wives’ tale. Our personalities are very profound, subtle, and complex. At most, our clothing reflects just a superficial aspect of our identity. You give too much credit to the saying, ‘Clothes make the man.’ It is really only a wisecrack attributed to Mark Twain. There is nothing more to it than that.” I subsequently chose another topic for my master’s degree thesis. Many years have passed since that disappointing encounter and, although I remember her respectfully, I have learned that the late Dr. Henle was mistaken on many grounds. For one thing, the saying, “Clothes make the man,” did not originate with Mark Twain. Centuries before the American humorist, the 16th century Catholic theologian Desiderius Erasmus wrote: “Vestis virum facit,” which translates as, “Clothes make the man.” Not long afterwards, none other than William Shakespeare put these words into the mouth of the

character Polonius in his famous play Hamlet: “The apparel oft proclaims the man.” Truth to tell, statements about the relationship between a person and his clothing go back much further than a mere several centuries. Such statements originate in the Bible, and a passage in this week’s Torah portion, Tetzaveh (Exodus 27:2030:10), is a case in point. We read: “You shall bring forward your brother, Aaron, with his sons, from among the Israelites, to serve Me as priests…Make sacral vestments for your brother Aaron, for dignity and adornment. Next you shall instruct all who are wise of heart… to make Aaron’s vestments, for consecrating him to serve Me as priest.” Maimonides, codifying the concepts which emerge from the Biblical text, writes: “A High Priest who serves in the Temple with less than his eight vestments, or an ordinary priest who serves with less than his four required vestments...invalidates the service performed and is subject to punishment by death at the hands of Heaven, as if he were an alien who served in the Temple… When their vestments are upon them, their priestly status is upon them, but without their vestments their priestly status is removed from them…” (Hilchot Klei HaMikdash, 10:4). We are left with the clear impression that these vestments are external manifestations of the royalty and majesty of the priestly role. Without the clothing, each priest is “ordinary”–one of God’s subjects for sure, but without any regal status. With the clothing, he is not only bedecked with “dignity and adornment”, but has become a prince, and can play a royal role. Rabbi Moses ben Nachman – Ramban – makes this even more explicit. He writes, “These are royal garments. These cloaks and robes, tunics and turbans

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are even today (he lived in 13th century Spain) the apparel of nobility…and no one would dare to wear the crown…or the tekhelet (blue yarn) except for royalty.” From this perspective, clothes make the man. With them, he is imbued with the spirit of royalty and can carry himself with regal bearing. Others interpret the function of the sacred garments differently, but all agree that garments influence the wearer in some fashion. For example, Rashi, commenting on the verse, “Put these on your brother Aaron, and on his sons as well; anoint them, and fill their hands” (Exodus 28:41), points out that in the Old French language with which he was familiar, when a person received a new official position the nobleman would put gloves upon him, indicating that he now had the authority of a new position. Rashi uses the Old French word gant, which reference books translate as a “decorative glove.” This indicates that the garments were a type of official uniform, not necessarily regal, but symbolic of a specialized responsibility. With the donning of the gant the person himself gained the self-assurance of authority and power. The late 15th century commentator Rabbi Isaac Arama, in his classic Akedat Yitzchak, provides even stronger support for our contention that clothes make the man. He identifies a similarity between the Hebrew word for the Kohen’s uniform and the Hebrew word for ethical character. The Hebrew word for uniform is mad, plural madim, and the Hebrew word for a character trait is midah, plural midot. Rabbi Arama notes that in Latin, too, the word habitus refers to both a special garment (e.g., a nun’s habit) and a character trait (e.g. a good habit). He persuasively argues that “just

as it can be determined from a person’s external appearance as to whether he is a merchant or a soldier or a monk, so too, the discovery of our hidden inner personality begins with our external behaviors.” According to Rabbi Arama, that our clothing is metaphor for our moral standing is evident in this biblical verse: “Now Joshua was clothed in filthy garments when he stood before the angel. The latter stood up and spoke to his attendants: ‘Take the filthy garments off him!’ And he said to him: ‘See, I have removed your guilt from you…’” (Zechariah 3:3-4). Another biblical verse that demonstrates the central role of clothing in “making the man” goes all the way back to the first parsha in the Torah, Bereishit: “And the Lord God made garments of skins for Adam and his wife and clothed them” (Genesis 3:21). Nechama Leibowitz comments: “Everything in the way of culture and civilization was given to man to discover and develop on his own, with his own capacities. Nothing in the way of repairing the world and settling it was given to him by God. Neither the discovery of fire nor farming nor building houses was revealed to man by God. Rather, he was required to invent all these procedures on his own. Only clothing was given to him from Above. “And the Lord…made garments.” God made clothing for man. And clothing makes the man. Rabbi Tzvi Hersh Weinreb is executive vice president, emeritus of the Orthodox Union.

February 8, 2022

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THE KOSHER CROSSWORD FEB. 8, 2022

SOUTHERN NEW ENGLAND

“It’s All Greek To Me”

By: Yoni Glatt

Difficulty Level: Manageable