ENTER TO WIN FLOWERS, CANDY OR A SPA DAY FOR YOUR MOTHER THIS MOTHER’S DAY.
Do Your Love And Appreciate Your Mother?
QUICK ARRESTS IN MILTON After police charge five high-schoolers in an incident of anti-Semitic graffiti, the targeted Jewish homeowner hopes the community and schools learn to fight hate. Page 14
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VOL. XCIII NO. 16
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APRIL 20, 2018 | 5 IYAR 5778
Triumphant Tourism Record numbers of visitors are giving Israel more than a big birthday to celebrate Food & Travel, Pages 20-29
INSIDE Candle Lighting �������������������������� 4 Israel News �����������������������������������6 Opinion ���������������������������������������10 Arts �����������������������������������������������19 Education ����������������������������������� 30 Yom HaShoah ����������������������������32 Obituaries �����������������������������������34 Marketplace �������������������������������36 Crossword �����������������������������������39 Photo by Noam Chen, Israeli Ministry of Tourism
APRIL 20 â–ª 2018
BEST OF JEWISH ATLANTA
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MA TOVU
Diving Between The Human and the Holy When scuba diving, suddenly going too deep can cause a great deal of pressure buildup and discomfort. Spending too much time in the deep end can cause drunklike behavior and confusion. And returning to the surface too quickly can cause decompression sickness and even an aneurism. So it’s important to find the right balance and pace at which to travel and always with a buddy nearby, just in case something funky happens.
Light & Bones By Marita Anderson
It’s important to know where the boundaries are and how to take care of yourself as you transition from depth to surface and back to depth. One of my favorite texts in the Torah is one in which the Israelites, a bedraggled mass of traumatized people who have lost their names, are given the status of a holy nation of priests. G-d has a message for the recently liberated slaves: You are holy because I am your G-d, and I am holy (Leviticus 19:2). What strikes me about this passage is that the designation of holiness is not reserved for the elite. It is not bestowed upon the few who pass a test, nor is it doled out to those who are without blemish. The status of holiness is inherently part of what it means to be human in relationship with G-d. Today, it is the Jewish rituals, contemplative practices, study of sacred texts and poetry, and deeds of lovingkindness that are the new offerings to G-d. These offerings bring us closer to our own essence, with all its nittygritty realities of being an embodied human, living in our times. “It is not our soul that makes us human,” said theologian and psychotherapist Thomas Moore. “It is when we are our most human that we have the greatest access to our soul.” So grab a buddy, a mentor, a teacher and explore the depths of your soul. What does it mean to you to be part of a nation of priests? What are your offerings? How are you living your holy life? How do you transition from surface to depth and back? What are the rituals for you to take care of yourself? Go ahead and take the plunge. ■
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
I have always had a difficult time understanding and relating to the Book of Leviticus. After all the family drama in Genesis and the escape from slavery in Exodus, it’s hard to sustain attention for the laundry list of priestly rules concerning the nitty-gritty of living bodies and their discharges. Frankly, I found the minutiae of sacrificial laws boring and the details of purity laws offensive and gross. Leviticus recently came alive to me when I read Dara Horn’s latest novel, “Eternal Life.” In most of her writing, Horn plays with concepts of permeability of time, generational patterns of behavior and the journeys of the Jewish soul. One of Horn’s gifts is her willingness to contemplate modern technologies in the context of ancient innovations. I held on to a snippet of “Eternal Life” in which Horn compares the priestly laws of purity described in Leviticus to the elaborate rituals of a modern-day medical lab. As a hospital chaplain, I find Horn’s comparison strangely familiar and accurate: “the intricate purifications of specially designed vessels, the delicately worded vows … the elite caste of select people imbued with arcane knowledge, the consulting of body parts as oracles, the long silent waiting for judgment, the obsessiveness involving blood.” Suddenly the halls of the Holy Temple didn’t sound so different from the hospital floors where the veil between life and death is lifted and people find themselves in liminal space. In both places, there is acute awareness that human life is infinitely precious. In both places, there is a preoccupation with protocols, checklists and boundaries designed to sustain the life of the individual and the community. One of my chaplaincy mentors likened the transition in and out of liminal spaces, or the times when we encounter the sacred, to scuba diving. I understood the metaphor as I am still learning to gauge the pace at which to accompany people in their soul work. Diving deep requires special gear and training. Plunging into the depths of the ocean is an amazing experience that opens up a fascinating, beautiful world otherwise inaccessible to us land creatures. But there are also precautions to consider.
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APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
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Artist in residence. Congregation Beth Shalom, 5303 Winters Chapel Road, Dunwoody, hosts Mordechai Rosenstein for a series of events through the weekend, including a free lunch-andlearn session on the Hebrew alphabet at 11:30 a.m. today. Details and registration at www.bethshalom.net/artist-inresidence-program.html. Aging discussion. AgeWell holds a table discussion on the programs and resources needed as people age at 11:30 a.m. at Whole Foods Market, 1131 Johnson Ferry Road, East Cobb. Free (food available for purchase); amaloy@ jfcsatl.org or tinyurl.com/yde22ukz.
FRIDAY, APRIL 20
Front Porch boot camp. The Jewish Federation of Greater Atlanta, 1440 Spring St., Midtown, holds two sessions, from 8 a.m. to noon and 1 to 5 p.m., to prototype innovative ideas to unleash the community’s potential. Free; jewishatlanta.org/prototype-bootcamp-registration or lgeorge@jewishatlanta.org. Holocaust reading. B’nai B’rith leads a reading of Holocaust victims’ names at 1 p.m. in the rotunda of the state Capitol, 206 Washington St., downtown. Free; dressler@jewishfuneralcare.com or 770-451-4999. Shabbat at the Park. Marcus JCC Young Adults holds a OneTable Shabbat dinner at 7 p.m. at the Garden Hills Recreation Center, 335 Pine Tree Drive, Buckhead. Free; tinyurl.com/yblh2q9d. “Keeping the Faith” Shabbat. InterfaithFamily/Atlanta and Honeymoon Israel hold a OneTable Shabbat dinner that includes a viewing of the film
CANDLE-LIGHTING TIMES
Tazria-Metzora Friday, April 20, light candles at 7:55 p.m. Saturday, April 21, Shabbat ends at 8:52 p.m. Acharei-Kedoshim Friday, April 27, light candles at 8 p.m. Saturday, April 28, Shabbat ends at 8:59 p.m.
Corrections & Clarifications
The McIntosh High School debate team of Samuel Ellis and Afra Abdul qualified for the final 16 in the Georgia Forensic Coaches Association state tournament, and Samuel finished first in speaker points. But they did not win the team championship, as an article March 30 reported. Instead, the team of Tyler Holt and Madison Hynson from another Fayette County high school, Starr’s Mill, won the title. “Keeping the Faith” at 7 p.m. at Industrious at Ponce City Markey, eighth floor, 675 Ponce de Leon Ave., Old Fourth Ward. Free; tinyurl.com/y7rfpxpw. Black Lives Matter discussion. Congregation Bet Haverim, 2074 La Vista Road, Toco Hills, hosts a panel of teen activists at 7:30 p.m. Free; www. congregationbethaverim.org/event/ BLMApril2018 or 404-455-8746.
SUNDAY, APRIL 22
JWV meeting. Air Force pilot Lt. Col. Waldo Waldman is the guest speaker at the monthly breakfast meeting of Jewish War Veterans Post 112, which includes a change of command from Robert Max to George Heart, at 10 a.m. at Berman Commons, 2026 Womack Road, Dunwoody. Admission is $10; RSVP to AtlantaJWV@gmail.com. Tot play time. Congregation Shearith Israel holds its monthly community program for 2-year-olds through prekindergartners at 10:30 a.m. Free; shearithisrael.com or 404-873-1743.
Bearing Witness. French Holocaust survivor Manuela Bornstein speaks at 2 p.m. at the Breman Museum, 1440 Spring St., Midtown. Free; 678-2223700 or www.thebreman.org. Art event. New York artist Hendel Futerfas is featured at a contemporary art sale to benefit Chaya Mushka Children’s House at 7:30 p.m. at Congregation Beth Tefillah, 5065 High Point Road, Sandy Springs. Tickets are $25; www.bethtefillah.org or 404-843-9582.
TUESDAY, APRIL 24
Parenthood. A panel discusses “Pathways to Parenthood” at 7 p.m. at Industrious at Ponce City Market, eighth floor, 675 Ponce de Leon Ave., Old Fourth Ward. Admission is $5; www.jewishfertilityfoundation.org/pathways. Silver lining. Dina Hurwitz speaks about love, faith and hope through her husband’s fight with ALS at 7:30 p.m. at the Intown Jewish Academy, 928 Ponce de Leon Ave., Poncey-Highland. Tickets are $18; intownjewishacademy.org.
Find more events and submit items for our online and print calendars at the Atlanta Jewish Connector, www.atlantajewishconnector.com.
Remember When
10 Years Ago April 18, 2008 ■ The Jewish Federation of Greater Atlanta is poised to create a student scholarship organization if Gov. Sonny Perdue signs newly passed legislation that would grant tax credits for donations to help families afford private schools. Torah Day School of Atlanta’s Rabbi David Kapenstein calls the bill a significant benefit to children at private schools. ■ The bar mitzvah ceremony of Eliot Ross Zerden of Atlanta, son of Ken and Susan Hammer and Robert and Connie Zerden, took place Saturday, Dec. 15, 2007, at Congregation B’nai Torah and Thursday, Dec. 27, 2007, at Masada. 25 Years Ago April 16, 1993 ■ The Atlanta Jewish Times has named its assistant editor, Neil Rubin, as the managing editor leading a seven-member editorial staff. The newspaper also hired Lisa Bograd as a writer. “We are poised to become an even greater part of this wonderful Atlanta Jewish community,” Associate Publisher
Daniel Chovenac said. ■ Jodi and Bill Garrett of Marietta announce the birth of a daughter, Anna Marie, on Feb. 25. 50 Years Ago April 19, 1968 ■ Rabbi Emanuel Feldman of Orthodox Congregation Rabbi David Kapenstein Beth Jacob has urged his sees his advocacy pay off congregants not to attend a with the passage of a tax DeKalb County School System credit benefiting private makeup day because it has school donors in 2008. been scheduled for Saturday, April 20. The makeup day falls not only on Shabbat, but also on the final day of Passover. The school system needs to make up a day lost to snow. ■ Mr. and Mrs. Jack Bryan of Savannah announce the engagement of daughter Maxine Susan to Mark Alan Sussman, son of Mr. and Mrs. Douglas M. Sussman of Boynton Beach, Fla. The wedding will be June 30.
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APRIL 20 â–ª 2018
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ISRAEL NEWS 1580 Spalding Drive, Sandy Springs, celebrates Israel’s birthday with funny stories and musical acts with its Beit Café at 7 p.m. Tickets are $18; RSVP by April 15 at templeemanuelatlanta.org/ calendar/temple-emanu-el-beit-cafe.
FRIDAY, APRIL 20
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 18
Hebrew talk. University of Georgia linguistics professor Jared Klein speaks about the history and distinguishing features of the Hebrew language at 7:30 p.m. at Congregation Shearith Israel, 1180 University Drive, Morningside. Free; shearithisrael.com.
THURSDAY, APRIL 19
JNF jubilee. Comedian Sarge entertains at Jewish National Fund’s gala celebration for Israel at the Buckhead Theatre, 3110 Roswell Road, Buckhead, with a VIP reception at 6 p.m., a champagne celebration at 6:45, the main program at 7:45 and a JNFuture afterparty at 9. Tickets are $118, $180 for patrons or $36 for JNFuture members; bit. ly/2GgioyG or 404-236-8990, ext. 851. Stories and music. Temple Emanu-El,
Infant party. PJ Baby and the Alefbet Preschool at Congregation Beth Shalom, 5303 Winters Chapel Road, Dunwoody, invite babies up to 1 year old and their caregivers to a celebration of Israel’s birthday at 10:30 a.m. Free; RSVP at alefbetpreschool.com/celebrate-israels-70th-birthday or to leahpjbaby@gmail.com.
SUNDAY, APRIL 22
Family celebration. PJ Library and Israel Bonds hold an Independence Day celebration with food, music and crafts from 4 to 6 p.m. at the Ocee Park pavilion, 10900 Buice Road, Johns Creek. Free (RSVP by April 19); www.facebook. com/events/851778421690255 or 404857-1066.
MONDAY, APRIL 23
Women at the Wall. Israel Religious Action Center Director Anat Hoffman speaks about the struggles for religious
rights for women at the Western Wall at 7 p.m. at The Temple, 1589 Peachtree St., Midtown. Free; www.the-temple. org or 404-873-1731.
THURSDAY, APRIL 26
Food trucks. Celebrate Yom HaAtzmaut with the Marcus JCC, including kosher food, Israeli dancing, live music, performances by day school students, games and crafts, at Liane Levetan Park at Brook Run, 4770 N. Peachtree Road, Dunwoody, from 5 to 8:30 p.m. Free admission; www.atlantajcc.org.
SUNDAY, APRIL 29
Israel@70 Atlanta. Jewish Atlanta holds a community celebration from 10:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. with games, exhibits, activities, food, and music from performers including the Billy Jonas Band, Joanie Leeds and Taking the Time at Park Tavern at Piedmont Park, 500 10th St., Midtown. Admission is $10 per or $18 per family in advance, $18 or $25 at the door; jewishatlanta.org/israel70. BeltLine bar crawl. Birthright Israel alumni have brunch at 11:30 a.m. at Mariposa Lofts, 100 Montag Circle, Inman Park, and stop at a few bars on the way to the community celebration
at Park Tavern. Tickets are $36, including brunch, four drinks and Israel@70 Atlanta admission; jewishatlanta.org/ birthright-bar-crawl or 678-222-3746.
FRIDAY, MAY 11
Scholar in residence. Avraham Infeld, who spoke to Federation’s leadership mission in Israel this winter, spends Shabbat at Congregation Shearith Israel, 1180 University Drive, Morningside. Details to come at shearithisrael.com.
MONDAY, MAY 14
FIDF gala. Friends of the IDF honors the men and women who have defended Israel for 70 years with a reception at 5:30 p.m. and a dinner program at 7 featuring Rep. Brian Mast at the InterContinental Buckhead Atlanta, 3315 Peachtree Road. Admission is $250 ($118 for ages 35 and under); fidfse. wixsite.com/atl70/event-details.
TUESDAY, JUNE 5
Perspectives on Israel. Journalist Alon Ben David speaks about Israel at 70 in an Israel Bonds-sponsored appearance at 7 p.m. at Temple Sinai, 5645 Dupree Drive, Sandy Springs. Free; www.templesinaiatlanta.org/event/israel-bondsspeaker.html.
Israel Pride: Good News From Our Jewish Home
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
Jewish suit in space. NASA and the Israel Space Agency have signed an agreement to test the AstroRad radiation protection vest on the last test flight of the Orion spacecraft before manned missions begin. AstroRad is made by Tel Aviv-based StemRad, which worked with Lockheed Martin to develop the vest from technology used in a StemRad protective belt for first responders. Lockheed Martin will test the ergonomics of the vest on International Space Station astronauts next year. The Orion test will use a Germanbuilt human model called Matroshka. NASA could make AstroRad required equipment for manned deep-space exploration, including a mission to Mars.
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Message from space. U.S. astronaut Drew Feustel, who flew to the International Space Station on March 21 with a facsimile of Petr Ginz’s “Moon Landscape” from Yad Vashem’s Art Collection, sent a message to Earth to mark Yom HaShoah. He mentioned Ginz’s sister, Holocaust survivor Chava Pressburger, who lives in Israel and who donated the original drawing to Yad Vashem. “I want her to know that the memory of her beloved brother
in Haifa has received a $50 million gift from the Helen Diller Family Foundation for its new quantum center, now named the Helen Diller Center for Quantum Science, Matter and Engineering. The center will advance the basic sciences and apply the principles of quantum mechanics to various engineering fields, with potential benefits for a wide range of industries. Research will focus on quantum computing and information processing, quantum communications, quantum sensing and detection, quantum simulations, simulators, and quantum materials.
Photo by Dani Machlis, Ben-Gurion University
Israel Photo of the Week
First Flag’s New Home The flag Rebecca Affachiner, known as the “Betsy Ross of Israel,” made and first flew after David Ben-Gurion proclaimed the state of Israel on May 14, 1948, has come home to the Ben-Gurion Archives at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev after being donated by Jerusalem collector Ezra Gorodesky (holding the flag) in honor of Israel’s 70th birthday. Affachiner left the flag to Gorodesky upon her death in 1966. He asked his friend Rabbi David Geffen, a former Atlantan and frequent AJT contributor, to help find a permanent home for the flag, and Rabbi Geffen made the connection to the university.
will live on in the hearts and minds of people around the world forever. May the memories of Petr Ginz, astronaut Ilan Ramon and the 6 million victims of the Holocaust always remain in our
thoughts.” Ramon carried a copy of the same picture on the fatal space shuttle Columbia mission in 2003. Big gift for tiny research. The Technion
Byzantine discovery. Students preparing the Sanhedrin Trail across the Lower Galilee for the Israel Antiquities Authority have uncovered a 1,400-year-old oil lamp decorated with an eight-branch menorah that dates to the Byzantine or Umayyad period. Other artifacts discovered include a chunk of glass from an industry mentioned in rabbinical texts and ornamental objects from 1,800 years ago. The 70-kilometer (43mile) trail is being dedicated on Israel’s 70th birthday to the 70 Sanhedrin sages who held the Jewish people together after the Bar Kochba Revolt.
ISRAEL NEWS
The prime ministers of Israel and Turkey, Benjamin Netanyahu and Recep Tayyip Erdogan, appear on a bus-stop sign in Ankara, Turkey, in March 2013, about a month before their diplomatic reconciliation.
Items provided by the Center for Israel Education (www.israeled.org), where you can find more details. April 20, 1953: The Israel Prize, an annual award presented in a variety of cultural and scientific categories and considered the highest honor in the country, is awarded for the first time to nine people in seven fields. April 21, 1984: Romanian born artist Marcel Janco, one of the founders of the Dada art movement, who made aliyah in 1941, dies at the age of 89. After settling in Tel Aviv, Janco became part of a budding Israeli art scene, and in 1953 he proposed developing Ein Hod, a cluster of homes near Haifa, into what is still Israel’s only artist village. April 22, 2013: A month after President Barack Obama brokers a reconciliation of Turkish-Israeli relations, a three-member Israeli delegation begins talks in Ankara under the auspices of Secretary of State John Kerry. April 23, 1963: Yitzhak Ben-Zvi, Israel’s second president and a celebrated historian, dies at the age of 78. A native of Ukraine, Ben-Zvi made aliyah in 1907 and signed the Declaration of Independence. April 24, 1950: Jordan formally annexes the West Bank and East Jerusalem, which it seized during the Israeli War of Independence, enabling Palestinians to obtain Jordanian citizenship. April 25, 1982: As stipulated in the 1979 peace agreement between the countries, Israel completes its evacuation of the Sinai and returns the peninsula to Egypt, two days after destroying the settlement city of Yamit over the opposition of much of the Israeli public. April 26, 2008: Yossi Harel, the commander of the Aliyah Bet ship Exodus, dies at the age of 90.
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
Today in Israeli History
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ISRAEL NEWS
Sniper Instructor: FIDF Donations Are Crucial By Sarah Moosazadeh sarah@atljewishtimes.com His military friends called him an idiot for eating sandwiches with sand and standing in the sun when he could be partying at college, but Israel Defense Forces Sgt. Yaniv’s cultural connection to Israel represented a stronger calling. The 22-year-old was born in Be’er Sheva and grew up in Jerusalem before moving to Seattle, where he lived for nine years. At 18, Yaniv joined Tzofim Garin Tzabar, one of many organizations affiliated with the Israeli Scouts, and performed his service as a lone soldier. Yaniv lived at Kibbutz Kissufim, a stone’s throw from the Gaza border — a great place to live, he said, during Operation Protective Edge in the summer of 2014. The rockets and mortars from Hamas, as well as its terror tunnels, heavily affected the kibbutz, Yaniv explained to a packed room at the Friends of the IDF Israel 70 Speakers Series event Wednesday, April 11, at Temple Sinai.
Israeli sniper instructor Yaniv speaks with lecture attendees April 11 at Temple Sinai.
Because Yaniv has a medical condition, he was excused from Israel’s mandatory military service, yet he decided to volunteer. He first served as special mission support staff for Yamas, an undercover unit that disguises soldiers as Arabs and operates in the West Bank. While on duty, Yaniv also helped plan and piece together intelligence to ensure that soldiers were well prepared for high-risk operations. In the military, Yaniv said, he served with soldiers from povertystricken neighborhoods in the South and with men who lived in rich areas in the North or Tel Aviv.
Israel is a huge melting pot, Yaniv said, so the soldiers come from every background. “Some are combat soldiers, some are combat support soldiers, and some are further away from the combat line. But we all share the common bond of being Israeli soldiers and serving to protect the state of Israel,” he said. With immigrants from Russia, Ethiopia and the United States, for example, a common language can be an issue. Civilians often don’t know how complex militaries are, Yaniv said. “Everything needs to be tightly coordinated, which makes for a controlled and efficient body during wartime.” Yaniv was transferred to a school for counterterrorism, where he received training to become a sniper instructor. He spent most of his service in the school, which is subordinate to the airborne and special forces command. The instructors teach soldiers specialized military jobs, which include hostage rescue, tunnel warfare and sniping. Within a year after Operation Protective Edge, Yaniv’s unit central-
ized, developed and instituted the armywide doctrine for tunnel warfare. Because Yaniv speaks English and Arabic, he also participated in some key projects that allowed him to crosstrain with American forces. He posed as a terrorist leader in a nationwide hostage rescue drill and held his own in negotiations with Israel’s elite counterterrorism units, Yamam and Sayeret Matkal. Recently, Yaniv wrote and implemented the sniper camouflage field manual. “IDF soldiers come from diverse cultures, speak many languages and perform different functions in the military,” Yaniv said. “Yet there is one thing that unites Israeli’s soldiers in the military, and that is support of organizations such as FIDF, which is funded through generous donors.” He added, “I really do appreciate all your donations, and, in the words of Naftali Bennett, 6 million is a price that we pay when we don’t have a nation. The relationship between Israel and the Jewish communities abroad is invaluable and irreplaceable.” ■
ENTER TO WIN FLOWERS, CANDY OR A SPA DAY FOR YOUR MOTHER THIS MOTHER’S DAY. Do Your Love And Appreciate Your Mother?
Submit 200 words or less telling us … Why your mother deserves flowers, candy or a day at the spa for Mother’s Day
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
Your entry will be entered in a drawing to win one of 5 awards. Your submission will be published by the AJT either in our upcoming Mother’s Day issue on May 11th or on-line. You must include a photo.
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ISRAEL NEWS
Trump, Obama Share Middle East Goals, Not Tactics When pro-Israel people evaluate the U.S. president, they focus on his attitude toward Israel, but his views on the Middle East as a whole determine policy on Israel, Michael Doran says. The Middle East expert said Syria is a key difference. President Barack Obama sought to build up Kurdish forces to defeat Islamic State but overlooked Iran’s military buildup in conjunction with Russia. President Donald Trump is keeping troops in the area to avoid losing Syria to Russia or Iran. Doran, a senior adviser in the State Department and deputy assistant secretary of defense under President George W. Bush, compared the Trump and Obama approaches to Syria, Israel and the Middle East during a Friends of the Israel Defense Forces event Wednesday, April 11, at Temple Sinai. Trump must keep forces in Syria to block the route from Tehran to Beirut and to mediate between the Syrian Kurds and Turkey, Doran said. “If we pick up and leave, the Syrian Kurds will go to the Russians and Iranians, and the Russians are going to exploit that position to become the primary interlocutors between the Turks and Kurds of Syria,” he said. “The Russians will then push the U.S. out once they have created a new order in the region and inevitably drive a wedge between Turkey and NATO.” Trump and Obama both wanted to keep the Middle East at arm’s length, Doran said. But Obama wanted to treat everyone equally at a round table, and Trump prefers more of a rectangular table with U.S. allies on one side and enemies on the other. Obama and Trump both made it a priority to defeat Islamic State, but Trump wants to contain Iran simultaneously, Doran said. “Everyone in Trump’s national security team regards Iran not just as a threat to Israel, but to the United States.” Both presidents wanted to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he said. For Obama, Israeli intransigence was the obstacle. For Trump, Palestinian instability keeps the conflict alive. Doran said the greatest threat to Israel now is the presence of Russia and Iran in Syria. To contain the threat, Israel has said no strategic weaponry should be moved from Syria to Hezbollah in Lebanon, no raids into Israel should come from Syria, and no Iranian soldiers should be permitted on the
IDF Sgt. Yaniv listens as Middle East expert Michael Doran discusses the difference between the Obama and Trump administration attitudes toward the Middle East.
Israeli-Syrian border. Israel has conducted military operations in Syria, risking conflict with Russia or Iran, to enforce its red lines, Doran said.
The Russians are in a military alliance with Iran and share the goal of reinforcing the Syrian regime of Bashar Al-Assad, Doran said. Israel has tried to strike an agreement with Russia by notifying it about efforts to enforce its red lines without asking for permission. “The theory that Israel has is that these operations will embarrass the Russians to the point they will put pressure on the Iranians, which will inevitably create tension between the two,” Doran said. “But it’s very dangerous because Israel could end up going to war with Russia.” Israel had little diplomatic support in this game from Obama, though
things have improved under Trump, Doran said. But Israel still seeks U.S. confirmation of a policy of military containment of Iran in Syria. One factor that could help Israel is Trump’s comfort with the use of force, as he showed in the mission with Britain and France to strike Syrian chemical weapon sites Friday, April 13. Doran said Israel and the United States should coordinate to contain Iran. “We are still a long way from that, but I think it would be better for the United States if we did this because it would send a very powerful message to Moscow and the Iranians that we are serious.” ■
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
By Sarah Moosazadeh sarah@atljewishtimes.com
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APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
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It’s not often that Georgia must look to South Carolina for guidance, but the Palmetto State has set an important example for the second time in three years. South Carolina in June 2015 became the first state with a law countering the anti-Israel boycott, divestment and sanctions movement. Then-Gov. Nikki Haley, who has been a forceful advocate for Israel as U.N. ambassador, signed the law, which says government contractors and suppliers must promise not to boycott Israel or any other country with which South Carolina enjoys open trade. Georgia enacted similar legislation — specifying Israel and excluding local governments — in 2016, and half the states in the nation now have some anti-BDS law. Such measures do not block First Amendment rights to express and act on opinions. That’s why a federal law barring contractors from participating in the Arab boycott of Israel has survived 40 years. Now South Carolina has become the first state to define anti-Semitism in law. A state budget bill that won final passage Thursday, April 12, Yom HaShoah, included the definition of anti-Semitism used by the State Department and most Western nations. Under that standard, antiSemitism can involve a call for violence against Jews, the advocacy of conspiracy theories surrounding Jews, Holocaust denial or the application of a double standard to Israel — that is, criticizing Israel for behavior that is common for other democratic nations. That last element is controversial. Israel’s foes charge that they are accused of anti-Semitism whenever they criticize Israel. Most American supporters of Israel, however, are not upset by legitimate criticism of the Jewish state; to the contrary, we all have policies and actions we criticize. The complaints, meanwhile, most often come from people who reject Israel’s existence. Defining anti-Semitism does not outlaw it. People who hate Jews or the Jewish homeland are free to say anything they want; South Carolina has not tried to override the First Amendment. Instead, the anti-Semitism definition provides a standard to help judge the motivation for actions that are already barred, such as violent crimes. It also makes a statement that the state government recognizes and opposes the enduring danger of anti-Semitism (at least for 12 months — because the measure was attached to the budget, it expires with the budget after a year). Colleges are a big concern for groups that cheered the South Carolina legislation, such as the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law and the Israel Allies Foundation. “This bill gives South Carolina the tools to protect Jewish students’ and all South Carolina students’ right to a learning environment free of unlawful discrimination,” said the Brandeis Center’s director of legal initiatives, Aviva Vogelstein. The Conference of Presidents’ leadership called the legislation “historic action in the fight against hatred and bigotry toward Jews at a time when antiSemitism is on the rise.” We urge candidates for the Georgia legislature to pledge to support similar legislation next year. ■
Above left: Hemshech President Karen Lansky Edlin recalls her friend Ben Hirsch, who served as Hemshech’s president for 13 years. Above right: The 10th anniversary of the Memorial to the Six Million’s placement on the National Register of Historic Places is next month. Left: The flames from the six torches in the memorial burn through the rain April 15.
A Monument to a Survivor The Atlanta Jewish community has commemoproudest accomplishment during his career,” Edlin rated Yom HaShoah at the Memorial to the Six said. “This was really his baby.” Million in Greenwood Cemetery every spring since I was lucky enough to interview Hirsch several 1965, and Sunday, April 15, continued that tradition, times. He was gracious enough to email feedback on despite weather ranging from bad to horrible all the AJT from time to time and to connect me with morning. one of his grandsons for a story. But the service also He was a fan of confronted a new reality: Jerusalem Post columnist The Memorial to the Six Isi Leibler’s work and a Editor’s Notebook Million now and forever skeptic about claims of By Michael Jacobs serves as a monument to parallels between Donald mjacobs@atljewishtimes.com one man, Ben Hirsch. Trump and Adolf Hitler. Hirsch died Feb. 11 He also had that rarest of at age 85, and it was only talents: an ability to admit right that the hundreds of people gathered at the when he was wrong. memorial spent some time thinking about the HoloI learned some things about Hirsch from Edlin’s caust survivor who was its architect. tribute, such as his love of playing and talking about “I know every day is a difficult day, but today is poker. I wish I’d gotten to sit at a poker table with particularly difficult,” Eternal-Life Hemshech Presihim; the education would have been worth the lost dent Karen Lansky Edlin told the Hirsch family. money. Edlin, the child of survivors, knew Hirsch most Education is one of his great legacies to Atlanta. of her life and had the task of paying tribute to a As Edlin said, tens of thousands have learned about man she saw as a mentor, an adviser, a friend and a the Holocaust from the permanent exhibit he deconfidant. signed for the Breman Museum. She recounted the key details of his life that “Hemshech, the survivors, the Atlanta comled him to attend a gathering of Atlanta survivors munity have so much to thank Ben for. He leaves us in April 1964 — born in Frankfurt, escaping on the with permanent legacies for generations to come,” Kindertransport with four of his six siblings after Edlin said. “Ben was a gift to all who knew him and Kristallnacht at age 6, reaching America in 1941, goloved him.” ing to high school and college in Atlanta, serving in We’ll soon have a chance to repay that gift. the U.S. Army, launching his architectural career. Not long before his death, Edlin and Hirsch talkThe survivors at that meeting voted to erect a ed about the restorative work needed to ensure that 6-foot-wide marble slab as a Holocaust memorial the Memorial to the Six Million stands for at least 53 and place where they could say Kaddish. Hirsch more years. They made a list, and she intends to see didn’t think that was good enough, and he asked, it through. begged and pleaded for a chance to do something The Folksbiene National Yiddish Theatre is better. coming to Atlanta from New York on Oct. 7 to help Given only two weeks to propose an alternative, raise money for that restoration, Edlin said. At a he designed the magnificent monument that earned time when too many people deny or minimize the a place on the National Register of Historic Places 10 Holocaust, the least we can do for Hirsch and the years ago. other survivors is shore up the physical reminders of “He often told me that this was his greatest and what we all lost to the Nazi evil. ■
OPINION
Keeping Up With Exhausting 70-Year-Old there as fast as we want it to. … Israel fatigue is the feeling of a Zionist rooting for his team to win, and sometimes feeling that the team is less motivated than the fans.” On a recent Sunday, a Jewish brunch group met at a Toco Hills restaurant. They talked about everything under the sun but little about Israel, and even then it wasn’t really about
From Where I Sit By Dave Schechter dschechter@atljewishtimes.com
Israel but about talking about Israel. The focal point of their Jewish lives is the United States, not an ancestral land of milk and honey. I suspect — and here I expect pushback — a significant percentage of American Jews regard Israel less as their personal Jewish homeland than as a primarily Jewish country, but not one they consider their own. That is not a distinction without a difference. I have wondered whether there is room for a post-Israel Judaism, whether the bulk of American Jews — and ever more with each passing generation — do not think of themselves as part of a diaspora. In Europe, anti-Semitic attitudes and increasing anti-Jewish violence have motivated a growing number of Jews to leave for Israel or at least think about making aliyah (“going up”). Even with a 57 percent increase in U.S. anti-Semitic incidents in 2017, as reported by the Anti-Defamation League, American Jews feel more secure than their European co-religionists. I don’t dismiss the naysayers, who insist that American Jewry is complacent and doesn’t understand its precarious position in this land of the free and home of the brave and who recommend that we all, figuratively, keep a bag packed. The 70-year-old’s local birthday party is scheduled for Sunday, April 29, from 10:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. at Park Tavern in Midtown Atlanta. Israel can be fascinating. And stimulating. And inspiring. And invigorating. And frustrating. And maddening. And upsetting. And, yes, exhausting. Israel can be all of these things — all at the same time. ■
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
This may not be the most considerate thing to say when you’re invited to a 70th birthday party, but the guest of honor wears me out. Some days I lack the stamina to keep up with the honoree, who stays active every hour of every day, even on designated days of rest. To keep track of this septuagenarian, I use email, Twitter, Facebook and other online forums, as well as newspapers, television and radio. But there is more material than I have time to consume, so I take in what interests me most and forgo the rest. Then there’s the extended family, bickering constantly over what constitutes proper behavior. They talk over each other, which they find preferable to listening to a contrary opinion. Frankly, I suffer from Israel fatigue. The investment of time and energy, not to mention emotion, necessary to stay up on affairs in Israel — no matter your religious or political leanings — can be exhausting. There is today’s crisis. Last week’s unresolved issue. Disputes that are measured in years. Resentments accumulated over decades. History that is counted in millennia. I sense that a significant percentage of American Jews — away from the online debates, where intelligent discourse is dwarfed by ad hominem attacks and the triumph of emotion over reason — have become, if not disinterested, then less interested in a story that, from afar, can appear to change little over time. Besides, there’s more than enough going on in this country that demands attention. Yehuda Kurtzer, the president of the Shalom Hartman Institute of North America, has spent years studying the relationship between Israel and American Jews. Several years ago, he offered this explanation: “Israel fatigue is not the controversial syndrome of ‘distancing’ or disengaging from Israel, nor is it the act of criticizing Israel from afar (whether it is in one’s own interest or altruistically on Israel’s behalf). Israel fatigue is a different syndrome whatsoever, and it stems from the combination of a desire to engage seriously with Israel together with a frustration that aspirational Israel is not getting
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OPINION
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
Recognizing Miracles In This Biblical Flood
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I first entered the gates of the Jewish Theological Seminary the summer before the new library building was dedicated. The tower that formerly housed the stacks was still closed. It had been 20 years since the fire. My professors, who were themselves students in 1966, told us stories of how the entire neighborhood came together to rescue the damaged books. Not long after I began my studies in the rabbinical school, “Fire! The Library Is Burning” was published, and the oral history was now accompanied by photographs of the courtyard filled with books drying in the sun. As I enter the exhibit at the Breman Museum, my mind is filled with thoughts of how quickly fire can consume a building and how, almost as quickly, water can destroy paper. It takes about an hour to view the “Discovery and Recovery: Preserving Iraqi Jewish Heritage” collection with a docent, who explains how this treasuretrove of more than 2,700 Jewish books and tens of thousands of documents was discovered and recovered from a flooded basement in Saddam Hussein’s intelligence headquarters in May 2003, how it arrived in the United States and was restored over the course of a decade at the National Archives in Washington, and how Iraqi Jews living here and in Israel are working to keep it from being returned to Iraq and instead to find it a permanent home. The exhibit both captivates my attention and ignites my imagination: • What if a pipe had not burst and the materials not floated in the floodwaters? • What if soldiers had not been looking for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq? • What if experts had not been consulted and offered instructions on freezing the moldering books and papers? Only a series of unfortunate, and sometimes fortunate, events led to this moment 15 years later of our viewing the exhibit. Only the Yiddish word beshert fully captures the experience of examining the brittle parchment of an Iraqi Torah fragment and learning
that dozens of destroyed sifrei Torah are now buried in a Jewish cemetery on Long Island, not far from where my grandparents, who hailed from longforgotten towns in Eastern Europe, are also buried. There is still time to see the exhibit before it leaves Atlanta on Sunday, April 29, for its next stop on the tour. I highly recommend visiting in person. However, if you miss it, don’t despair. The story of the flood that nearly destroyed these books and documents, which now form the Iraqi Jewish Archive, is preserved digitally. Perhaps the technological advances that allowed the recovery of this
Guest Column By Rabbi Pamela Jay Gottfried
chapter of Jewish history can be viewed as a small consolation: The once-vibrant Jewish community of Iraq of the 15th to 20th centuries is remembered and honored in the 21st century. ■ Rabbi Pamela Jay Gottfried is the dean of Jewish studies at the Weber School and a Rabbis Without Borders fellow.
Photo courtesy of the Breman Museum
This Iraqi tik (Torah case) could date to the 19th century.
Why We Never Forget I don’t remember the first time I learned about the Holocaust. I went to a Jewish preschool and Hebrew school. I knew about the holidays and culture. But I didn’t know the dark history lurking beneath the celebrations. As I made my way through the youth section of my temple’s library, I started piecing things together. My mom told me I asked why a lot of the Jewish books were so sad. I remember reading “When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit,” based on the experiences of author Judith Kerr and her family. It’s a tale of fleeing Nazi Germany, from a child’s perspective. Anna, the little girl in the story, has to leave her pink rabbit. I couldn’t imagine leaving behind my own pink doll at that age. Now I realize it is a story of how Hitler not only killed, but also stole childhoods. The book has a happy ending: The family escapes. But the same isn’t true for the 6 million Jews killed by the Nazi regime or the millions more bearing the memories of trauma. That book was my first peek into a past some people try to forget or deny, while some people perpetuate the hatred that allowed it to happen. As Yom HaShoah reminds us, it is something we can never forget and never let happen again. “Never forget” and “never again” are two slogans the world uses about the Holocaust. In my first year at the University of Florida, I took a class called “Beyond the Memory of the Holocaust.” We analyzed historical and artistic presentations of the Shoah, but piecing together the destruction of lives and the spite with which it was done was nearly impossible. It is a time when it feels as if evil won, though stories of some heroes twinkle on. There’s Elie Wiesel, who told his story and spoke against silence in the face of wrong. I learned about Kashariyot, Jewish women in Germany who smuggled essential information to sequestered Jews. People recall Anne Frank, whose diary lives on, showing the humanity and strength of Jews trying to survive the unthinkable and live with a semblance of normalcy. I also think often of Petr Ginz, whose art and writing show a young boy grappling with what he saw as his certain end. We cannot let the lights of the Holocaust fade out. Our generation must carry on the story and keep saying,
“Never forget” and “Never again.” Relieving the Shoah is a crushing experience. It’s unfathomable. How could it happen? Why are Jews still targeted today? Recent events in Parkland, Fla.,
Guest Column By Sophie Feinberg
started a new movement. The slogan for Marjory Stoneman Douglas students’ March for Our Lives was “never again.” This phrase threads together two tragedies and highlights the power of young people to say, “We will not let this happen again.” In this age of social media and a whirring news cycle, hate happens. The story gets covered and fades out. But heroes today use the tactic of past heroes to overcome hatred. Just as the Parkland students relive the terror of Feb. 14 to make a difference, survivors of the Holocaust share their stories to say, “Never again” and “Never forget.” Their truths illustrate the worst and best of humanity. As society grapples with anti-Semitism, we are the generation activating against hatred. Though it is hard, we must remember and reflect. A few years ago I visited Yad Vashem. I remember standing in the Hall of Names, a circular room enveloping me in the faces of an event often remembered in numbers and dates. The subtle drips in the pool below were all I heard as I spun around the room. As I left the museum, I overlooked the landscape of Israel. The expanse reminded me of the future and the responsibility we hold to remember the stories that room holds. Unless you’re reminded, the Shoah is not something in your thoughts. Your attention is pulled to everyday life, not the Holocaust. Yom HaShoah reminds everyone to stop and think. Few survivors are left to tell their stories. It is on us to carry on their message and honor them. Think of those we lost and those who survived. Amplify your voice to tell their stories, inspire those around you and activate against people trying to deny history. It’s our turn to write history. ■ Sophie Feinberg of Miami, a sophomore at the University of Florida, is an intern at UF Hillel.
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OPINION
‘Enough With the Goyim and the Schvartzes’ in my defense, no words of consolation afterward, I knew my doom was sealed. I assumed that, despite the restraint and prudence of my pronouncements, it had been “enough!” for my Southern co-religionists.
Letters To The Editor
Muslims killing each other during their respective religious celebrations, Coptic churches being burned in Egypt, and anti-Jewish invective spewing from schoolrooms, mosques and media outlets throughout the Middle East. Not all Muslims are Islamist militants, but it is not surprising that many Muslims do take pride in the achievements (sic) of the militants in combating atheistic, immoral Westerners. Illiteracy and poverty are endemic in the Muslim countries of the Middle East, where corrupt rulers have long exploited their people, distracting them from their own miserable lives by inciting them against the Jews, Israel and modern civilization. We Westerners have abetted those rulers, fearing that we will be labeled Islamophobic if we speak out against political Islamism. Isn’t it time for Muslim rulers to be told to stop funding Islamist militants? Isn’t it time to demand that oil-rich countries contribute to the resettlement of many of the world’s 66 million people displaced by militant Islamists?
Muslim Militancy
I found the article on Shlomo Pill’s presentation (“Pill: Islam, Judaism Rooted in Political Separation,” April 6) to be beyond belief. Democratic societies in the Middle Ages? Recall elections? Maybe those terms meant something different in the old days than they mean today. But the hardest thing to swallow is the claim that Islam works pretty much the same way that Judaism does. To offer a meek “some modern Islamic states use force” just doesn’t cut it. And, frankly, ignoring Islamist militancy is downright dangerous to the continued existence of Western civilization. The Islamist militants truly want to rule the world, as evidenced not only by Islamic State attacks in the Middle East, but also by the kidnapping of Nigerian schoolgirls, Sunni and Shia
Guest Column By Rabbi Marc Wilson
It gave me a pretext, among others, to bail. So, after my rabbinate and lay leadership had ebbed and flowed and ebbed again, I penned an editorial on Facebook about Jews and gentiles learning Torah together. In fact, it was a measured lament of how many dedicated gentiles came to study Shmuel Aleph (I Samuel) in the original text, while the Jews were conspicuously absent. My readers were largely receptive, but one fellow Jew demurred. His words were more prudent, but they still smacked of “Enough with the goyim!” Actually, his opinion was well controlled, but it pushed my button (a la “A man who is bitten by a snake is afraid to pick up a stick”). So, right or wrong, it piqued me enough to write the following rejoin-
der. I think that my words are worthy, even if their context is contentious. Thus, they deserve to be heard, even if they chew like a shtickel raw brisket. So, gentiles attending our Nach class is a bad idea, the writer said, because it is offensive to many Jews and estranges “our people” from the class. Should receptive, eager gentiles be barred from studying Torah in its original tongue, with Jewish commentaries and allegiance, taught by a fairly knowledgeable rabbi, with Christian doctrine off limits? How much good could this do, by erasing so many ambiguities and misunderstandings and by reaffirming that Hashem has many, many mailboxes that receive the same message? Shall we defer to the ludicrous idea that gentiles attending classes are just loading up ammo for proselytizing? No! No! Ignorant Jews (I mean those who don’t know the difference between Kaddish and Kiddush) always seem to make repetitive excuses for their indifference. They are the ones, I say, who are priming the pump. Perhaps their only fear is that the gentiles will so outshine the Jews that we will be put to shame. I already have two gentile Nach scholars proving that to be true. One
consistently humbles me by his analysis of biblical “dikduk” (by the way, what is dikduk?) and knowledge of obscure “exegetes” (what is an exegete?). Linda said to just ignore it, and she is probably right. But my ulcer is crying out for relief. So I exhort anyone who is pelted by the barrage of fake news to stand up for mutual understanding among faith communities, whatever its form. For Jews and gentiles alike, now it is more urgent than ever to enlist in the fellowship of Hashem. If you land within 50 miles of Shoeless Joe’s hometown, we welcome you, be you Jew, Greek or Christian (in no particular order). Remember to bring your Bible/Tanach, Book of I Samuel, in whatever language that works for you: Chez Wilson, Mondays, 7:30 to 9 p.m. And, yes, relevant tangents are always welcome. (Note that I have not referred to gentiles as goyim. I am going to try to make that my policy. Goyim simply means “nations,” but it has taken on a derisive tone that sullies our speech. The same is even more true of sheigetz, shiksa and schvartzer, which I still hear too often — sadly, even from myself — when we are among ourselves.) ■
Isn’t it time to tell Muslim rulers to end the refugee limbo to which they have condemned the Palestinians? The first step toward bringing the Muslim Middle East into the modern world may very well be the admission by Muslim rulers that the nation-state of the Jews belongs in the Jews’ Middle Eastern ancestral homeland. — Toby F. Block, Atlanta
represented because they do not reflect the many people living with the disease but without a diagnosis or the growing population of younger adults experiencing early-onset Alzheimer’s disease. Congress has a chance to take decisive action, passing the Building Our Largest Dementia (BOLD) Infrastructure for Alzheimer’s Act (S. 2076/H.R. 4256). Endorsed by the Alzheimer’s Association, the BOLD Infrastructure for Alzheimer’s Act would create an Alzheimer’s public health infrastructure across the country to implement effective interventions, including increasing early detection and diagnosis, reducing risk, and preventing avoidable hospitalizations. Alzheimer’s is the most expensive disease in the United States and is expected to cost the country more than $277 billion in 2018, which is why we need the BOLD Infrastructure for Alzheimer’s Act. If we are going to end Alzheimer’s disease, then we must start treating it like the public health threat it is. — Deborah Levin, Atlanta 13
Act on Alzheimer’s
It is time we change our thinking on Alzheimer’s disease. Too often, Alzheimer’s is treated as an aging issue, ignoring the public health consequences of a disease someone in the United States develops every 66 seconds. And with two-thirds of its annual costs being borne by Medicare and Medicaid, it is one that demands more attention from our government. In 2016 in Georgia, more than 130,000 people over age 65 had Alzheimer’s disease. This number is expected to increase by more than 46 percent by 2025. Those numbers are vastly under-
Rabbi Marc H. Wilson, a former spiritual leader at Congregation Shearith Israel, lives in Greenville, S.C.
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
There’s a point when even a successful rabbi knows that he’s winning the battle but losing the war. I knew the tirade that marked the point of my departure, and there was no golden parachute waiting for me. Once upon a time, about nine years into the rabbinate, I slumped into another somnolent board meeting. A pregnant moment passed before one of our Holocaust survivors looked right through me as if I weren’t there. Then he ranted at the board and officers: “Tell the rabbi that it’s enough with the goyim and the schvartzes!” This was, of course, my crude death knell. What had I said wrong? I spoke from the pulpit occasionally about equality and the paucity of social justice. I once conducted a debate about affirmative action. Coretta Scott King delivered a conciliatory sermon on recementing the relationship of AfricanAmericans and Jews (followed by a cholent lunch at our home). A handful of gentiles, with honor and respect, attended our weekly Torah class. “Enough with the goyim and the schvartzes!” All right, I thought, he’s a survivor. But when the board and officers sat by impassively, not uttering a word
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LOCAL NEWS
5 Students Blamed for Anti-Semitic Graffiti in Milton By Sarah Moosazadeh sarah@atljewishtimes.com Milton police arrested five high school students Friday, April 13, in connection with anti-Semitic graffiti discovered on a Jewish family’s driveway four days earlier. Hilary Karp opened her garage door Monday morning, April 9, to find “(Expletive) you” written in shaving cream on her driveway above the Star of David with “Jew” in the middle. Blue glitter had been sprinkled on the star. “I felt like I was in Europe in the 1940s while cleaning my driveway,” Karp said. “Obviously, I have never lived in Europe, and I was not alive in 1940, but we all have families who were.” Trees at the home also were toiletpapered, police said. McKenna Blaine and Katherine Stein, both 17, are charged with vandalism under a city ordinance. They were issued citations and given court dates. By Georgia law, 17-year-olds are treated as adults in criminal cases. Three younger students are being charged with criminal trespass through the Georgia Department of Juvenile Justice and may not be identified under state law. “Everyone at the city of Milton was sickened to learn about what the Karp family woke up to on Monday morning, and many of our residents have shared similar feelings with both the family and our staff,” Milton Mayor Joe Lockwood said in a statement. “While this isn’t something we’ve ever experienced in our city, one time is simply too many. I’ve personally reached out to the family to express my sadness and offered the full support of our staff.” The Milton Police Department said it explored all local, state and federal laws that could apply to the case
Photo courtesy of Hilary Karp
This is what Hilary Karp found on the driveway of her Milton home Monday morning, April 9. The AJT has covered up the curse word for publication.
and contacted the FBI about the possibility of using the federal hate-crimes statute. Georgia is one of five states without a hate-crimes law. “We worked to make sure that these students fully understand the severity of their actions,” Milton police spokesman Capt. Charles Barstow said in a statement issued by City Hall. “All expressed remorse for their behavior to our detectives, and it’s also my understanding that some have even communicated directly with the Karp family.” Karp said the days after the antiSemitic discovery were hard for her family. “I served as a soldier in the Israeli army, and this was way harder than the two years that I served,” she said. “My son is very angry about this. He is 18 years old and is about to go play college baseball and has never run into something like this, ever.” Karp’s son, a Milton High School student, has some baseball opportuni-
ties because he is Jewish, which may have played a part in motivating the vandalism, she said. She publicized the incident on Facebook and spoke out about it to spare her neighbors from a similar ordeal, Karp told the AJT. “Whether they are Hindu, Muslim, black, Jewish, Christian, I don’t care. I don’t want anyone to experience it.” She wants the teen culprits to perform some form of community service and hopes that their high school conducts a presentation against bullying and hate. The Anti-Defamation League’s Southeast regional director, Allison Padilla-Goodman, said the ADL is talking with the high school’s principal, who is eager to adopt ADL educational programs. She said the high school is prepared to participate in No Place for Hate next year and to bring in more anti-bias education. “Any time we talk about addressing hatred, anti-Semitism or any kind
of bigotry, we need a holistic, multicog approach,” Padilla-Goodman said. “Yes, we need to have our schools take antibias education seriously and talk about diversity, inclusivity and bullying, but we also need parents to have these discussions at home. “It’s hard, especially when you are bombarded with news of what’s going on in Syria, in the U.S. or Israel. There are constant issues we are all dealing with, but we need to talk about them at home, in schools, and especially community centers, churches and synagogues.” Disturbing news can cause people to “feel a bit distraught at times, especially as a young person who is trying to understand themselves in the world,” she said. “But I think this is a time in our community where it’s all hands on deck. Everybody really needs to be engaged in these issues and talk about it with their colleagues, friends and family members and not avoid the topics because they are hard.” Atlanta Initiative Against AntiSemitism co-founder Lauren Menis in a written statement called the antiSemitic act “unacceptable” and praised the swift response of the Milton Police Department. “Anti-Semitism is not just a Jewish problem. It’s a community problem because when one group is targeted, all are at risk,” Menis said. “With acts of hate against diverse groups on the rise, our community must continue to come together and stand up against them. In addition to supporting our law enforcement, we, from parents, to educators, to religious and community leaders, must turn acts of hate into teachable moments that advance tolerance and respect for all the diverse people who call Atlanta home.” ■
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APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
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LOCAL NEWS
Gottschalk Reached His Limit in Growing AJMF By Kevin C. Madigan kmadigan@atljewishtimes.com Atlanta Jewish Music Festival Executive Director Russell Gottschalk, who announced last week he is leaving the organization in June, says a culmination of factors led to his decision. “It was me reaching the limit of what we could do with the community and not having any more real space to grow,” he said in a phone interview. “The fact of the matter is that our community is established, and I don’t think I’m able to continue growing it as I have been for the last nine years.” The festival launched in 2010 as one-day event with just four bands at a single location, and it sold out. The following year, with funding help from a Jewish foundation, it became a threeday festival at multiple venues, and it increased to five days in 2012. Year-round programming was added to the mix as well, increasing the number of people reached by AJMF events to nearly 18,000, compared with about 6,500 at the three-week spring festival alone. “As we continued to grow, we be-
Russell Gottschalk has led the Atlanta Jewish Music Festival from a one-day spring festival to the year-round, go-to resource for live Jewish music.
came the go-to resource for collaborators seeking the production and curatorial expertise needed to inspire community through live Jewish music experiences,” Gottschalk wrote on the AJMF website. “Since 2015, we’ve made our Fall calendar nearly as productive as our Spring Festival with large, community collaborations with The Shabbat Project and the Atlanta Kosher BBQ Festival.” But he also wrote that, over the years, early supporters started to fall off. “Some people that were instrumental in the first few seasons of AJMF no
longer attend the festival or support our development efforts. This bums me out because I partially blame myself for failing to maintain these relationships.” In the interview, Gottschalk elaborated: “It was not about people backing away, but more a case of maxing out.” What did he enjoy the most during his tenure as director? “What I’ve been most excited about is some of the international performers we’ve brought in. I think we’ve presented some really cool music. Yemen Blues was great (at this year’s festival). A-Wa is a similar band
we brought in a couple of years ago. That was a fun party,” he said. “These Israeli artists are so talented, and it’s so cool that AJMF gets to present them. I think there will continue to be a focus on international artists because it’s just a cool part of the festival. That type of event is something I’m really proud of.” The AJMF board is setting up a search for new director, “and I’m assuming they’re going to find some great candidate for the job,” Gottschalk said. “The plan is to have this next person in place by July 1, which would be the start of AJMF10, and then it’s back on the horse again: start to plan the festival and fundraising activities for the fall, getting the new board established and working well together. Fortunately, we have some people on the board who will still be involved this year, and we have enough people outside of me that I think will make the transition smooth.” Gottschalk is not sure what he will do next. “I will put some thought into it and hopefully have a better idea towards the summer. I’ll be involved with AJMF for several weeks still.” ■
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APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
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LOCAL NEWS
Pro-Civil-Rights, Pro-Israel Lawyer Defies Labels Watch “Hannity” on Fox News and you can see Atlanta lawyer David Schoen, 59, provide expert opinions ranging from the removal of the Jewish sheriff, Scott Israel, involved in the Parkland school shooting to the overreach of special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia probe. Schoen, who has offices in New York and Alabama, combines highprofile criminal defense work with civil rights cases involving fair housing, jails, voting rights, a voice for defenseless children and more. Known for being a pit bull, he also goes after Islamic terrorists for damages caused to Americans overseas. He has represented the Mafia, accused rapists, murderers and international narcotics dealers. Yet the sanctity and security of Israel remain among his priorities.
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
Jaffe: How has your upbringing influenced you? Schoen: My father, an FBI agent
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Jaffe: Do you think the parents of Otto Warmbier, a Jewish student who was tortured in North Korea, have a case against that country? Schoen: From the publicly available facts, yes.
and draftee for the New York Yankees, died when I was 4. My stepfather died when I was 10. I watched my strong mother, Joan, who now lives next door to me, work long days and rear two children. She even ran a Ford dealership. I learned what it meant
Jaffe's Jewish Jive By Marcia Caller Jaffe mjaffe@atljewishtimes.com
to face adversity and to fight hard to earn something. Without a father figure, I did not have a firm religious background. That part has changed. Religion now has a larger role in my life. I associate with Young Israel and Congregation Beth Jacob. Jaffe: You have a case now against Broward County, Fla., Sheriff Scott Israel, well known from the Parkland school shooting. Schoen: I am suing him for the
David Schoen has been recognized for changing public institutions in the South with his legal work.
family of an African-American IT engineer whom one of his deputies killed in cold blood. The case alleges that Sheriff Israel helped cover up the true facts, which were only uncovered after I went into the neighborhood and found courageous eyewitnesses, one of whom took a photo showing part of the cover-up and ended up in The New York Times. Jaffe: Describe the situation where you sue terrorists. Schoen: In two of my most meaningful cases, I have advocated for Americans killed by terrorists working for or with the PLO and the PA. In one case I worked on, the jury returned a judgment of $655 million, but the Court of Appeals reversed it. The Supreme Court must decide whether to hear it. I have just uncovered documents in which the PLO decided, after meeting with Condoleezza Rice, then secretary of State, that they would accede to jurisdiction in the U.S. and wanted to fight the case. Now that they have lost, they are trying to manipulate the system and, for political reasons, sadly appear to be having success. Jaffe: You met with terrorists? Schoen: I flew to Israel and crossexamined one of the most dangerous and despicable terrorists in the world, Ahmad Sa’adat, the head of the PFLP. He is in prison for the murder of an Israeli Cabinet minister, among other crimes. After I finished, he sneered, “I’ve been arrested by the Israeli police many times, but even the Shabak has never treated me as badly as you.” I took it as a compliment. He testified that he serves on the PLO executive committee and has homes and chauffeur-driven limos, courtesy of American taxpayer money.
Jaffe: You have had some comments about the Mueller investigation. Schoen: Mr. Mueller has a questionable history, arising from his supervision of the corrupt relationship between an FBI agent (now in prison for murder) and an informant (Whitey Bulger). He has refused to answer questions about it. His deputy, Andrew Weissmann, was directly involved in the most troubling scandal in FBI history, and he was singled out by a federal judge for that role. Mueller put together a team full of conflicts of interest and from the same political party. I don’t think this is the group to conduct an objective investigation into the president if the whole world is to have confidence in the process and its outcome. Jaffe: I’m getting mixed vibes. You’re not sounding like a liberal, yet you champion liberal causes. Schoen: On many social and domestic issues, I am characterized as being on the left; on issues involving Israel, I am characterized as being on the right. My position on all issues is based on principles that I can defend using my understanding of the Constitution. My greatest professional honors were given by the ABA and Boston College Law School for my civil rights work. In honoring me with its national pro bono public award, the ABA announced that, according to federal judges it interviewed, my work has done more to change public institutions in the South than the work of any other lawyer of this era. I was very grateful for the thought. Jaffe: Tell us something personal about you that we don’t know. Schoen: I went through college on a full athletic scholarship and helped lead my team in the No. 1 singles and doubles tennis slots to its first NCAA Division I Atlantic 10 Conference championship and won medals in the Maccabiah Games. When I was younger, I was picked up by the William Morris Agency as a country singer and was invited to audition for Neil Simon’s play “Biloxi Blues.” I felt law was the work that would be most meaningful. ■
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LOCAL NEWS
Israel Is Unsurprisingly Unfinished at Age 70 Israel has done a lot in 70 years in comparison with the United States at the same age in 1846, said Ken Stein, the president of the Center for Israel Education, but it remains to be seen where the country is headed and how it will fit into the continuum of Jewish history. Like America at 70, Israel still hasn’t established its final borders or fully resolved how to operate as a democracy. Some ideas have stayed the same, he said, while others have transformed or remain unfinished. The Emory professor of contemporary Middle Eastern history expanded on various concepts that have influenced Israel’s development, such as the Diaspora, anti-Semitism and Jewish Orthodoxy, while addressing “Israel at 70: Unfinished” on Sunday, March 25, at Congregation Or Hadash. Political concepts that define a state, such as taking care of one another and providing services, help explain how Jews have survived in the
Photo by Sarah Moosazadeh
Ken Stein speaks about what Israel has accomplished in 70 years and what remains unfinished Sunday, March 25, at Congregation Or Hadash.
Diaspora, Stein said. Jews carried those survival skills to Palestine as they began to re-create a Jewish homeland in the early 20th century. To survive as a minority in the Diaspora, Stein said, Jews constantly compromised on rituals and traditions, determined whom they could trust, and learned how to protect themselves. Those practices have helped Jews endure and Israel survive. Assimilation, on the other hand, is transforming, Stein said. Israel has
hastened the practice because people feel they have more choices and are not forced to retain their identity. Israel’s effects on American Jewish religiosity can be seen through Jewish day schools, which help sustain traditions and keep Hebrew as a language that lives, Stein said. Likewise, Israel has shaped American institutions, Stein said. “Our political reality, which means to be left or right but never center, has been taken and put on Israel’s back, for better or
for worse.” Outside influences on Israel’s young history include its relationship with its neighbors, the collapse of Arab states and the rise of Islam as a political platform, Stein said. Since the Cold War, for instance, it has become harder for Israel to identify its allies. Israel’s neighborhood has changed dramatically over seven decades, leaving Israel unfinished, Stein said. Most notable, he argued, is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, in which autocratic leadership denies the Palestinian population a say in its future. Among other issues unresolved for Israel are how to integrate outsiders, how to practice democracy and how to include non-Jews, Stein said. To summarize everything Israel has accomplished in 70 years would take a long time, but Stein used Rabbi David Hartman’s response to a question about what has enabled Jews to survive for millennia: “It’s simple. Jews have always taken challenges and made them into opportunities, and if we lose that, then we have lost who we are.” ■
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
By Sarah Moosazadeh sarah@atljewishtimes.com
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LOCAL NEWS
Audrey Mande, Arlyne Delman, Iris Wynne, Susan Kaye and Debbie Miller enjoy the challenge and the socializing that canasta provides.
A pensive Harriet Berger has played canasta for just under two years.
Old Card Craze Canasta Is New Again By Marcia Caller Jaffe mjaffe@atljewishtimes.com
Coming on the scene from Brooklyn, Boynton Beach and now Brookhaven is Helen Fine, a 95-year-old canasta instructor who has three burgeoning groups learning on different weekdays. After 65 years of playing, Helen has mastered several rule changes. “Some people learn in two weeks; others need six months,” she said. “I teach out of pleasure. I tell everyone that it’s critical to learn how to play your sevens and aces. I want to pass along my experience.” Daughter Sandra said, “Mom has taught my circle of friends.” Men play too. Herb Migdon, a tax accountant, played canasta as a child and picked it back up two years ago. He found it simple to catch on. “I find canasta easier than bridge, which requires the extra complexity of bidding,” he said. “I like the canasta strategy of melding and the race for points. The challenge is to remember what cards have been played and not played. There is a variation in rules across the miles. … Florida vs. Pennsylvania may be different than Georgia. When we bought a canasta deck, the
rules included were not the same rules we play.” Harriet Berger, playing for less than two years, said: “Although I’m not a card player, I find canasta fun, social and stimulating. The players are extremely nice. Sure, I make boo-boos. Just last week, a player added a rule I had never heard of. Hmmm.” Arlyne Delman’s canasta group has quarterly birthday potluck lunches to spice up the game. “Although canasta is a good bit of luck, I enjoy thinking strategically,” she said. “How do I control the deck? Should I show early? Will my partner know when to help?” Debbie Miller and husband Richard taught their adult children, whom they visit in Tasmania. “I feel like learning is an ongoing process,” she said. “You just have to jump in and play.” Canasta is indeed the new old rage. But you’re not too old to learn the game’s new language. Is it dirty? Clean? Do you want to go out? Above all, know what to do with your sevens and aces. ■
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
Canasta, the 1950s card game, is back. Developed in 1939 in Uruguay, canasta (meaning “basket”) is the only game in the rummy family that in-
cludes a partnership. Using two card decks, the game comes in a variety of versions: Hand and Foot, Cuban, Boat, Italian, and, of course, U.S. American. Jewish clubhouses, condos and country clubs are teaming with avid players. Many are also mah-jongg and bridge players.
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Helen Fine, 95, teaches canasta to three groups in Brookhaven.
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ARTS
Murder Mystery Links Shoah, Cold War via Atlanta Award-winning journalist, historian and author Peter Golden’s new thriller, “Nothing Is Forgotten,” connects the Holocaust and the Cold War based on real events through the use of primary and secondary sources and extensive interviews. The story begins in 1965 when a woman is killed in her family candy store. Her grandson goes on a life-changing quest across Europe, the Soviet Union and the United States to find her murderer. He winds up in Atlanta, where he uncovers his grandmother’s connection to Soviet partisans in World War II, Dachau and Auschwitz, and the battle conducted by the CIA and KGB over prosecuting Nazi war criminals. Golden, who will have book signings April 23 and 24 in metro Atlanta, has interviewed Presidents Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush; Secretaries of State Henry Kissinger, Al Haig, George Shultz and Lawrence Eagleburger; Israeli Prime Ministers Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Shamir; and Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev. Golden makes the timely point that Americans have drastically underrated the impact of World War II on the Soviets, and this lack of insight makes it harder for Americans to understand Vladimir Putin and modern Russia. Q: You’ve met with some of the
most intellectual people in the world. How did you compartmentalize the leap to fiction? A: I take the attitude that narra-
Jaffe's Jewish Jive By Marcia Caller Jaffe mjaffe@atljewishtimes.com
tive is narrative — you must inform and entertain the reader. The difference is simple. In nonfiction, you look up things and footnote it. In fiction, or at least in “Nothing Is Forgotten,” I looked up the facts and reimagined them. And I added the source notes back in. Q: Why Georgia, our state? A: Georgia has always been a mix of old and new, a land of tradition that also sits on the cutting edge, a place settled in its ways and yet offering a second-chance to those roughed-up by life. And finally, like the Soviet Union,
Georgia has known its tragic share of war and widespread destruction. Q: In today’s political brew, what observation can you share about Putin that would enlighten us? A: Putin’s anger toward the West, I believe, is rooted in World War II. His older brother died during the siege of Leningrad. His father was terribly wounded. His mother’s brothers were killed. So Putin, like many citizens of Russia, is quite sensitive to any threats on his borders. It is too reminiscent of the 3 million soldiers Hitler sent to invade in June 1941 and cost the Soviets some 25 million killed — approximately 40 percent of those who died in the entire conflict. And NATO has been inching closer to Russian borders, though President Bush (41) and his secretary of state, James Baker, promised Gorbachev we wouldn’t do this. In Putin’s mind, he sees us attacking what is most precious in Russian life: security from outsiders. So I suspect he struck back at one of the sacred facets of American life: our
Who: Peter Golden What: Book talk and signing Where: FoxTale Book Shoppe, 105 E. Main St., Woodstock When: 6:30 p.m. Monday, April 23
elections. Q: Of all the folks you have interviewed, who was the most fascinating? A: In one way or another, they were all fascinating, but I’d say it was a three-way tie among Richard Nixon, Yitzhak Rabin and Mikhail Gorbachev. And for the same reason: Each leader had been intimately involved in his country’s history, and that history has shaped much of my life. Nixon from 1946 on, when he was elected to Congress, had a front-row seat at the Cold War. Yitzhak Rabin started out as a private in the Palmach in 1941, seven years before Israel became a state, and wound up prime minister. Listening to him talk was as though history had suddenly been given a voice. Gorbachev was born in 1931 to a peasant Ukrainian-Russian family and worked on a collective farm while Stalin was still in power. And he, too, would see history change — and would play a significant role in those changes. He is also, perhaps, the most deserving recipient ever of the Nobel Peace Prize. The breakup of the Soviet Union could have dragged the world to war. But Gorbachev refused to let that happen. ■
Admission: Free; www.foxtalebookshoppe.com/events Where: Margaret Mitchell House, 979 Crescent Ave., Midtown
Nothing Is Forgotten
When: 7 p.m. Tuesday, April 24 Admission: $10 ($5 for Atlanta History Center members); www.atlantahistorycenter.com/programs/peter-golden-nothing-is-forgotten
By Peter Golden Atria Books, 352 pages, $26
Jewish Artists Celebrate JCC Exhibit
Photos by Duane Stork, courtesy of the American Guild of Judaic Art
Above left: Guild President Shoshannah Brombacher (right), who came from New York for the March 21 program, enjoyed home hospitality from artist Lynette Joel (left) and her husband, Malcolm. Above: right: Artist Shoshanna Rosenthal, a newcomer to the Atlanta area from Huntsville, Ala., poses in front of her sculptural work “How Will You Play the Hand You’re Dealt” with her sister, Andrea Rosenthal of Marietta. Left: Kim Goodfriend (fifth from left), the Marcus JCC’s assistant arts and culture director, is thanked by artists (from left) Diane Kowalski, Shoshannah Brombacher, Barbara Rucket, Flora Rosefsky, Laurie Wohl, Miriam Karp, Frann Addison, Lynette Joel and Nancy Current.
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
Jewish artists and supporters gathered at the Marcus JCC on Wednesday, March 21, to celebrate the 28-artist exhibition “A Journey Through Time: Works of the American Guild of Judaic Art.” New York artist Laurie Wohl spoke about textiles as visual midrash. The exhibit is on display at the Marcus JCC’s Mainstreet Gallery through May 10. The AGJA’s mission is to celebrate the rich diversity and sacred beauty of Judaic art around the world and to establish a community for those who are inspired to fulfill the commandment of hiddur mitzvah (beautifying the commandment) by creating, collecting and exhibiting Jewish art. “The exhibit is fabulous. As one saunters down the gallery to get an overview, the color, texture and beauty of the pieces are dazzling,” Athens artist and guild member Abraham Tesser wrote in an email after the event. “But the real fun starts when you stop and examine each of the pieces in detail. The pieces speak for themselves, but blurbs describing each work and artist add meaning and depth. ■
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food
&
travel
Tourism to Israel Keeps Smashing Records
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
By Sarah Moosazadeh sarah@atljewishtimes.com
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With new hotels seemingly arising on every corner, a lively nightlife, and enough restaurants and museums to satisfy a range of appetites, Israel’s tourism has boomed the past few years. One of the reasons tourists flock to Israel is because people understand it’s a safe trip now, SRI Travel President Renee Werbin said. People are going about their daily lives with little interruption, and all the hotels and restaurants are full. Most seek to visit the holy sites and museums. Werbin cited the Holocaust center Yad Vashem in Jerusalem and the Palmach Museum in Tel Aviv, which focuses on the founding of Israel. The museums don’t just contain artifacts, she said, but teach visitors about history. Dana Shemesh, the Southeast director of public relations and communications for the Israeli Ministry of Tourism, said Israel has become a popular destination because it has something to offer people of different backgrounds and interests. In addition to cultural events, warm temperatures and a hospitable culture, people visit Israel for the sandy beaches and mix of cuisines, Shemesh said. Tourists relish visiting markets such as the Sarona and Carmel in Tel Aviv and the Machane Yehuda in Jerusalem. Shemesh said the rise in tourism also may be a result of more air routes than ever to Israel. People can fly directly from Iceland on WOW Air, Poland on LOT Polish Airlines and sites
Photo by Ricky Rachman
Outdoor markets such as Carmel in Tel Aviv attract tourists with a myriad of foods and spices.
Source: Israeli Ministry of Tourism
across Europe on Ryanair. El Al has a new direct route from Miami to Tel Aviv. February was a record month for tourism in Israel, with 28 percent more visitors than in February 2017, and the trend continued in March, which saw a 34 percent increase from March 2017. Shemesh noted that 2017 was a record year for tourism in Israel, with more than 3.6 million visitors. Israel welcomed 949,000 tourists
The new Independence Trail in Tel Aviv begins at the First Kiosk of Tel Aviv at Rothschild Boulevard and Herzl Street and includes the Nahum Gutman Fountain, the home of Akiva Aryeh Weiss, the Shalom Meir Tower, the Great Synagogue, the Hagana Museum, the Bank of Israel Visitor Center, the Tel Aviv Founders Monument, the Meir Dizengoff statue and Independence Hall.
Photo by Yoav Lavi, Israeli Ministry of Tourism
Cyclists in the Sodom Canyon are a reminder that not all of Israel’s attractions are in museums or cities.
in the first three months of 2018, up 29 percent from 770,000 in the same quarter of 2017 and up 58 percent from 2016, Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics reported. The biggest increases in March came from Poland (136 percent), Sweden (90 percent), Spain (68 percent), Germany (55 percent) and France (49 percent). “Further to the opening of new direct air routes and new markets from
India and Brazil in the last month, we are witnessing record levels of incoming tourists,” Tourism Minister Yariv Levin said. “This is a result of the marketing activities and the innovative steps we are taking, together with the incentives for airlines and investment in infrastructure. Tourism continues to contribute significantly to the Israeli economy and the labor market.” The ministry said tourism injected $1.4 billion into the Israeli economy
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FOOD & TRAVEL
Photo by Itamar Grinberg, Israeli Ministry of Tourism
Tourists are drawn to Masada for its history and its views.
Photo by Noam Chen, Israeli Ministry of Tourism
Photo by Noam Chen, Israeli Ministry of Tourism
The skyline of Jerusalem’s Old City shows part of the appeal for non-Jewish tourists.
Israel’s 70th birthday is bound to be a big occasion for visitors to the Western Wall.
from January through March. The rise in tourism has boosted job opportunities, economic growth and positive international media coverage, Shemesh said. In addition, Israelis have more options to travel abroad at competitive rates. The impact of tourism on Israel is phenomenal, said Werbin, who cited the contrast with the Second Intifada, which cost jobs and closed shops and hotels because of the drop in foreign travelers. Werbin saw the effects firsthand,
visiting eight times during that period. With tourism flourishing, she said, the hotels are so full that there’s a building boom for new ones. Werbin said the only negative for tourists right now is the risk of overbooked hotels. Shemesh said Israel just doesn’t have enough hotel rooms to accommodate all the tourists during the high seasons, but several hotels have opened this year, ranging from inns for budget travelers to the high-end Setai, which opened recently in Tel Aviv and on the
Sea of Galilee. Werbin said she believes that about 40 percent of tourists are firsttime visitors to Israel and that about 80 percent of those who travel to Israel will return. She added that the number of firsttime visitors has increased the past two years. To mark its 70th birthday, Israel was set to launch the Independence Trail in Tel Aviv on Wednesday night, April 18, for Yom HaAtzmaut. The golden track is about half a
mile long, provides information on 10 national heritage sites through a mobile app and is illuminated at night. Maps for the trail are available in Hebrew, English, Arabic, French, German, Spanish, Russian and Chinese. “Israel is not a vacation; it’s an experience,” Werbin said. “We always have to remember, now that we have Israel, we have a place to go. It’s incumbent upon us to make sure that Israel survives, and the best way we can do that is for those of us who live here to support it financially and visit.” ■
Hadassah Plans Milestone Mission to Israel nization to bring modern medicine to the Middle East. For 100 years the Hadassah Medical Organization — now chaired by Atlantan Rachel Schonberger — has pioneered medical treatment and research for Israel and the world. Hadassah’s work has produced medical breakthroughs in such areas as autoimmune diseases, cancer, cardiac diseases, cell regeneration, genetic diseases and neurological diseases. Those joining the milestone mission from Oct. 7 to 15 will celebrate
Hadassah’s vision, learn about its accomplishments, see how Hadassah innovation is shaping the future and meet other Hadassah members. The itinerary for the trip, called “From Dream to Innovation,” includes an opening reception at the Eretz Israel Museum in Tel Aviv, an evening with Israeli opinion leaders at the Peres Center for Peace, a special program with HMO-trained doctors in the Israel Defense Forces, presentations by worldrenowned Hadassah researchers and
a walk in the footsteps of Hadassah’s nurses through the streets of Jerusalem. The cost of the tour, not including airfare, is $3,435, with an early-bird rate of $2,900. There are additional tours to the Tomb of the Patriarchs and a special program for nurses. For more information, contact Nancy Schwartz, Hadassah’s Southeast Region 2018 Celebration chair, at nshadassah2016@comcast.net. ■ 21 APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
Hadassah, the Women’s Zionist Organization of America, is planning a milestone trip to Israel in October to celebrate its own banner year in 2018: 100 years for the Hadassah Medical Organization, the Henrietta Szold Hadassah-Hebrew University School of Nursing and the Hadassah department of ophthalmology. Even before Israel became a state 70 years ago, Hadassah established a health care structure and a standard of excellence and was the first orga-
FOOD & TRAVEL
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3rd Red Pepper Sizzling From Start in Brookhaven By Sarah Moosazadeh sarah@atljewishtimes.com
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
Quality ingredients and a familyfriendly atmosphere are not the only reasons chef Mimmo Alboumeh’s Red Pepper Taqueria is doing well since opening in Town Brookhaven, but they are among the many. After launching four weeks ago, the third location of Alboumeh’s spicy local chain has attracted mass attention, which the chef-owner attributes to its location. “Brookhaven is a great neighborhood. There are a lot of young professionals, families and people who travel from Chamblee/Doraville to visit the variety of restaurants the area has to offer,” he said. All three of Alboumeh’s restaurants have pet-friendly patios and cater not only to young professionals, but also to families. “We try to create incentives so guests come back,” he said in a phone interview. In addition to daily specials, the restaurant offers a brunch with over 15 menu items and an assortment of mimosas. “I think the combination of the food, our staff and, not just our philosophy, but where we stand in providing consistent experiences is what makes this location so successful,” Alboumeh said. Before Alboumeh opened Red Pepper Taqueria in Brookhaven, he operated Maya Steaks & Seafood on Roswell Road just outside the Perimeter in Sandy Springs. That high-end restaurant closed about six months ago, after a couple of year in business, despite praise for the food. The issue was the location, which lacked parking and forced diners to contend with
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constant construction amid the City But he has tweaked the dishes to create make, I’m driven to create something genuine and unique.” Springs-related overhaul of the area, a more modern menu. The chef was born in Lebanon and “I am cooking the same food I was Alboumeh said. He said the high volume of traffic 10 years ago, but with more options moved to Europe at a young age when on Roswell Road was a big problem. and a diversified menu which includes his father decided to attend medical school in Spain, so Alboumeh was “Sandy Springs could be the next Buck- fresh, local ingredients,” he said. raised with Spanish and head, but our roads have to be Italian flavors, which he still ready for it.” uses to create dishes that reAlboumeh said Maya flect his passion for food. used to park around 20 cars “I’ve been surrounded in its lot, which left little by food since I was 14 years room for more guests. old, and now that I’m 44, Maya got more press I look back and think the coverage than all three Red last 30 years have been a Peppers combined, including great journey for me,” he in the AJT, but because the said. “Food is something I traffic was so bad, it never love and enjoy, but, like evtook off, Alboumeh said. The erything else, it also comes restaurant did generate busiwith its own unique chalness on the weekends, he said, lenges.” but it was not enough to stay While Alboumeh is not open or to devote the necesJewish, he has been involved sary time and energy to it. with the community in supEach Red Pepper locaport of several nonprofit ortion offers a great vibe with ganizations. more than 30 televisions to He is a partner of the entertain avid sports fans Chef Mimmo Alboumeh says customers keep Atlanta Jewish Film Festiand homemade margaritas coming back because he uses the highest-quality val and works with Second to please anyone. The homeingredients to prepare his Mexican dishes. Helpings Atlanta, which made approach is a key part started at Temple Sinai and of the experience, Alboumeh Because the younger generation’s battles hunger by rescuing and dissaid. “People expect fresh and unique standards, and that’s something we palate has changed, albeit for the bet- tributing leftover food that otherwise don’t want to jeopardize because, at the ter, many were having a hard time would be thrown away. For example, end of the day, providing your guests understanding the menu before he up- he donated 20 percent of diners’ bills at Maya on certain nights last spring to with the best is what will keep them dated it. “The new generation wants qual- Second Helpings. coming back.” He recently participated in the HaWhen he is not serving guests in ity, value and something fresh, but Brookhaven, Buckhead or Toco Hills, at the same time they don’t just want dassah competition “Almost Chopped,” which raised money for research into Alboumeh enjoys using unique flavors chips and salsa,” Alboumeh said. ‘That’s what so great about Red neurological diseases. and techniques to create Mediterra“I don’t like to take credit for nean and Mexican dishes or plates Pepper. You don’t just get an enchilada with red or green sauce. You have the anything I do in the community,” Alwith Spanish and Mexican roots. He said he mostly draws his in- option of a variety of lamb or fish ta- boumeh said. “I think it’s a blessing spiration from the old-school Mexican cos, blackened or grilled fresh salmon, that we are here, able to help others restaurants his family visited in the and smoked brisket. It’s a combination and enjoy sharing that blessing with early 1990s while living in Athens, Ga. of everything, and every single dish I others.” ■
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APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
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FOOD & TRAVEL
Get a Taste for Special Needs By Logan C. Ritchie lritchie@atljewishtimes.com For 19 years running, Pearlann and Jerry Horowitz have organized a culinary event to support metro Atlanta’s adult special needs community. The Tasting returns Thursday, May 17, at the Grand Hyatt Atlanta in Buckhead to benefit Jewish Family & Career Services’ Zimmerman-Horowitz Independent Living Program. The Tasting raises money and awareness about the work being done for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. This year’s event co-chairs are Amy Rosen and Arin Tritt. Rosen has been a JF&CS board member since 2013. She has chaired other JF&CS events, including the 2016 Community of Caring luncheon. “The Tasting is my favorite event each year. The Zimmerman-Horowitz Independent Living Program is the perfect cause to bring the whole community together,” Rosen said. “We can support this nonsectarian program in our community while tasting food
from over 20 top Atlanta restaurants, sampling liquors and wines, and bidding on unique auction items. The ZHILP residents will be there, and it’s a great chance to meet the people you are helping while enjoying a great event.” Tritt has been a JF&CS board member since 2015 and worked with the Zimmerman-Horowitz Independent Living Program as a case manager. “I’m so honored and proud to be chairing this wonderful event with Amy Rosen again this year,” Tritt said. “It is a spectacular evening of wine, food and auction, and everyone involved should be commended and celebrated for helping individuals with developmental disabilities live independently.” The event attracts people from across the community, Tritt said. People at The Tasting sample food and drinks from such Atlanta mainstays as Bistro Niko and La Grotta Ristorante. South African restaurant 10 Degrees South, upscale Thai from Nan Thai Fine Dining and Inman Park Indian from Amara are among the local gems participating.
Steaks, seafood and Southern fare are also on the menus prepared by two dozen restaurants. As for beverages, 200 wines and spirits are on tap to sample, and sober mixologist Cole Just is offering several sober mixed drinks. The Tasting last year raised $210,000 for the Zimmerman-Horo witz Independent Living Program. “Our fundraising goal is to reach the stars,” Pearlann Horowitz said. “Needs continue to grow as many individuals need more attention and services in older age.” Horowitz said it has become increasingly difficult to find qualified people to work in the program. In addition to wellness checks that include blood pressure and medication, program participants receive guidance on exercise, sleep, nutrition, therapies and meditative practices like yoga. ■ What: The Tasting Where: Grand Hyatt Atlanta, 3300 Peachtree Road, Buckhead When: 7 p.m. Thursday, May 17 Tickets: $100; www.thetasting.org
Formaggio Mio Opens
The long-awaited debut of kosher dairy restaurant Formaggio Mio (formaggiomio.com) arrived with a soft opening the week before Passover, and the restaurant resumed its chametzheavy operations Sunday, April 8, after closing for the holiday. Thursday, March 29, the night before Passover began, the casual Toco Hills eatery stayed open until midnight to fulfill final cravings for pizza. The restaurant is in the former Broadway Cafe space at 2157 Briarcliff Road, in a strip shopping center at the intersection of Briarcliff and LaVista. Scott Italiaander and chef/coowner Julie Meni secured the location in June and hoped to open as early as the end of July, then aimed for late 2017. Some equipment, such as the espresso machine, arrived only this month. The bistro is open 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Sunday through Thursday and 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Friday. It’s serving brick-oven pizza and other dairy food under Atlanta Kosher Commission supervision. “We don’t see ourselves as simply a kosher restaurant, but an Italian bistro that serves kosher food, simply because we want to compete and be the best in town,” Italiaander said in the fall.
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
4 Options at City Springs
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Sandy Springs and developers Selig Enterprises and Carter revealed the first retail tenants in the city’s new downtown project, City Springs, during a press conference and tasting Wednesday, April 11. The 14-acre mixed-use development between Roswell Road, Sandy Springs Circle, Johnson Ferry Road and Mount Vernon Highway is moving toward summer openings. While the initial lineup does not include any retail stores, it does feature four restaurants: • Café Vendôme, a French bakery with notable croissant and coffee. The eatery has another Sandy Springs location a few miles south on Roswell Road. • Flower Child, which serves a healthy menu “for a healthy world,” paying close attention to sourcing for all its food. Another location of the national chain is opening in Buckhead. • Nam Kitchen, a Vietnamese restaurant featuring recipes from the former Nam Midtown. • The Select, a new concept serving American comfort food from the team behind Paces and Vine in Vinings. Joining the restaurants are TURN Studio, an indoor cycling studio; SculptHouse, a gym featuring cardio and Megaformer sessions; and VidaFlo, a rehydration facility.
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FOOD & TRAVEL Photos courtesy of the Embassy Suites Riverfront Promenade
The Tower Bridge marks the start of Old Town’s restored waterfront.
The California State Railroad Museum excursion train passes the Embassy Suites as it returns to Old Town from downriver.
Old Town Sacramento Relives Rail, River History
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
Sacramento is justly renowned as the capital of California, the largest state in the nation. This attractive, tree-lined, fun-filled city has plenty of worthwhile attractions that can delight visitors year-round. While those are more than enough reasons to put Sacramento on your vacation bucket list, there is more. This beautiful city on the Sacramento River is the center of a region with a rich history and a knack for historical preservation. The epicenter is Old Town on the riverfront, officially known as the Old Sacramento Historic District, a U.S. National Historic Landmark District. It is a short walk from the Capitol. Filling 28 acres, this authentically restored area was the terminus of the transcontinental railroad and the Pony Express. It was also the Golden State’s first booming business district. It became the supply center for the California gold rush and remains a center of agricultural trade. The riverfront has endured through fire and flood and was restored to an authentic, mid-19thcentury ambience in the 1960s. Today, Old Town’s wooden-plank sidewalks and cobblestone streets are lined with shops, eateries upscale and casual, and entertainment and bustle with tourists and residents alike. Railroad tracks, trains, lovingly restored buildings dating back over a century and replica schoolhouses can be found. You are never far from the river in Old Town, and antique riverboats and steam tourist trains run through the area. The crown jewel of Old Town is the California State Railroad Museum. The modern main building showcases railroad history with period steam locomotives, and its roundhouse and 26 display areas are home to many giant
steam and early diesel-electric locomotives, passenger cars, dining car china, and even an open-to-the-public high-speed rail driver simulator that
Simply Smart Travel By Jeff and Virginia Orenstein jorenstein@SimplySmartTravel.com
is included with admission, as are the original Central Pacific railroad shops. An excursion train runs along the river on a 40-minute narrated journey that is well worth the extra $12 fare. Jewish Sacramento Sacramento has a lively Jewish history and a vibrant Jewish present. Jews have been involved in the city’s economy and civic life since the gold rush. Jewish merchants became suppliers to mines, miners and the growing town, and early rabbis served congregants throughout the region, including the mining towns. Sacramento’s Jewish population is about 25,000. Jews have an extensive institutional infrastructure, including houses of worship ranging from Reform to Orthodox. Each congregation has a religious school, although the community high school, Yachad, is run by the Jewish Federation of the Sacramento Region. There is one Jewish day school, Shalom School; a social service agency, Jewish Family Service; and a Hillel for California State University, Sacramento, and the University of California, Davis. The observant will find a mikvah, a kosher store and several kosher caterers. There is a Jewish cemetery, Home of Peace, in addition to designated areas in other cemeteries. Cultural events include a Jewish film festival, a Jewish food fair, and communitywide observances of Yom
HaShoah, Chanukah, Yom HaAtzmaut and other holidays. The city’s proximity to high-tech companies provides jobs for local Jews and attracts Israelis. Anti-Semitism is not unknown in Sacramento, but the community has rallied to support local Jewry when ugly acts have occurred. The mayor, Darrel Steinberg, is Jewish. Visit Before You Go • www.visitsacramento.com. • www.sacmag.com. • www.californiarailroad.museum. • oldsacramento.com/stay. Ginny O’s Clothing Tips Dress casually. Wear comfortable shoes for walking on wooden-plank sidewalks and cobblestone streets. Getting There • Major airlines serve Sacramento International Airport (SMF), which is 11 miles from Old Town, and San Francisco International Airport (SFO), which is about 98 miles away. • Amtrak operates frequent northsouth service the length of California and connects to the east. Sacramento’s station is a block from Old Town. • By car, Sacramento is 90 miles from San Francisco and served by Interstate 5 and I-80. Lake Tahoe is 118 miles away on I-80 and is reached over the Donner Pass. Napa, gateway to the Napa Valley and Sonoma wine regions, is 62 miles distant. No car is needed to explore Old Town. • The best choice for a cruise port is San Francisco. Must-Sees • Old Town and the California State Railroad Museum. • Capitol Park and the California Capitol, with free tours available. • Crocker Art Museum.
• Sacramento Southern railroad excursions, running 40 minutes along the river from Old Town and back. With Several Extra Days • Sacramento Zoo. • Discovery Museum Science and Space Center. • A Hornblower sunset or history cruise on the Sacramento River. • Sacramento Rivertrain, offering dinner trains, wine and beer trains, and murder mystery rides (not the museum train). • Napa or Sonoma Valley wineries. • San Francisco. At a Glance • Over 50 advantage — Fairly easy walking with many eateries and shops in Old Town. • Mobility level — Low to moderate. Old Town requires easy walking on cobblestone streets. • When to go — Sacramento’s climate is mild with hot summers and pleasant spring and fall weather. Winter can be rainy and cool. The best times are April to June or September to November. Festivals abound in May and June. • Where to stay — The Embassy Suites Sacramento Riverfront Promenade is on the river and just steps away from Old Town. Ask for a riverfront-view room. The Delta King riverboat has restaurants and hotel rooms. Other chain hotels are in Sacramento. • Special travel interests — History, vintage architecture and transportation. ■ Jeffrey Orenstein, Ph.D., and Virginia Orenstein are husband-and-wife travel writers from Sarasota, Fla. Their Simply Smart Travel column appears in newspapers and magazines in eight states and on major websites. They publish travel ideas, articles, photos and blog posts at www.SimplySmartTravel.com and www. facebook.com/SimplySmartTravel.
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FOOD & TRAVEL
A Caribbean Escape Is Always in Season By Robyn Spizman Gerson
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
A group of friends decided to dodge the cold weather in December and book a warm-weather Caribbean cruise on the Celebrity Silhouette. Scheduled long before Hurricane Irma tragically hit the Caribbean, the cruise rerouted the islands on the itinerary. With challenging weather still on our coattails, it was only an hour after our departure that 600 flights were canceled at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. That afternoon a snowstorm hit Atlanta, and we felt fortunate to escape the weather at each turn. As the cruise left Fort Lauderdale, the daily temperatures of 75 degrees, piña coladas and sleeveless walks while gazing at the aqua sea surely fit the bill. Celebrity Cruises was the choice of traveler Fred Katz’s relative and seasoned travel agent Fran Penn, who made the arrangements for our group. Traveling with friends made the trip extra-special, and rabbi-led Chanukah services with songs, festivities and latkes were a nice surprise and were packed to the brim. While the Caribbean islands had just been hit hard, cruises were still full. We never saw any hurricane effects, but each island we visited was deeply grateful for tourists and for its escape from the recent wrath of nature, though their hearts and ours surely stood by Puerto Rico and the smaller islands that were pummeled.
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Sailing With Celebrity It’s often hard to decide on a cruise line and a ship. Fran chose the Celebrity Silhouette, a luxurious, modern ship accommodating 3,000 travelers. Sounds overwhelming, but the staff ratio and layout of the ship made navigating the decks and amenities easy, and the ship felt cozy after a few days of getting our sea legs in motion. Celebrity offers modern luxury with its cool, contemporary design and warm spaces. Dining amid the décor of the specialty restaurants provides an unmatchable experience. Celebrity Cruises’ 12 ships visit all seven continents. Seasoned Master Captain Georgios Iatrou championed our cruise and made it a pleasure with smooth sailing. One highlight is the ship’s resemblance to a floating art gallery with a prestigious roster of modern artists on each floor, including Damien Hirst, Alex Katz, Ellsworth Kelly and Bennet
Photos by Robyn Spizman Gerson except where noted
It’s hard to beat the view of sunset on a Caribbean cruise.
Sea days offer many activities, but they’re about relaxation above all.
Bean. The line’s art tradition began in 1995. Staterooms vary with upgrades for inclusive packages. A butler? Private dining? Clubs? VIP invitations? Special cocktail parties and a private lounge? Whatever your budget or desires, Celebrity can meet your needs. Getting Ship Shape It’s vital to get informed about the ship details before you go on any cruise, including ways to cut costs if you’re budget-conscious. Excursions and specialty restaurants cost extra, though if you are a foodie, the charge is well worth it. Each night in your stateroom you’ll find an activity bulletin for the next day. The Canyon Ranch Spa Club on board offers fitness and healthy liv-
The Silhouette’s captain, Georgios Iatrou, poses with Robyn Spizman Gerson (third from left) and her traveling companions.
ing classes and a well-equipped exercise room. Spa services are also available from an itemized menu. Other offerings at sea include round-the-clock casino gambling, movies, lawn games, yoga, a sea camp for teens, culinary presentations, a lending library, and, before every port of call, a shopping presentation mostly focused on jewelry. One of my favorite activities at sea was the computer class I took from the Apple Store expert. Classes were taught about the iPhone and other Apple products. While we stayed casually dressed, each indulgent evening involved a twohour-plus dining experience followed by a variety show with nationally accomplished talent ranging from magicians to Broadway singers and dancers
to a famous pianist. Energetic cruise director Chris Sweets was a nonstop entertainer and ensured that we didn’t miss a moment. Chanukah services each evening included latkes, dreidels and jelly-filled doughnuts. In song and prayer, these gatherings were joyous and added a special touch. The nights were topped off by dancing to genres from Motown to classics to silent disco, in which we wore illuminated headphones and could program our own music choices. And after a day of nonstop eating, we always had the option of stopping at the after-hours dessert buffet. A few organized groups captured my attention on board, especially the Café Cinematheque International enthusiasts, led by film guru Shelly Isaacs
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FOOD & TRAVEL
Photo by Tim Bieber, Celebrity Cruises
Passengers on the Celebrity Silhouette take a cooking class at sea.
This chanukiah at the Barbados synagogue dates to at least 1696.
from Boca Raton, Fla. With about 100 movie lovers on the Silhouette, Shelly coordinated foreign films screened twice a day. We attended one called “Mr. Stein Goes Online,” a delightful film about an elderly man who discovers the computer and online dating. Shelly’s cruise efforts include a trip to the Cannes Film Festival in France in May. Synagogue Visit in Barbados Before sailing, we planned a tour of a synagogue in Barbados, Nidhe Is-
rael, which is the oldest synagogue in the Americas. In the 17th century Jews driven from former Dutch Brazil by the Portuguese Inquisition fled to the Caribbean as well as to Holland. Many Jews made their way to Barbados and the city of Bridgetown, where the synagogue was built in 1654. Next to the synagogue is a 350-year-old cemetery. Our private tour was quite interesting, and it was meaningful to see a menorah from the 17th century during the season of Chanukah.
A Fitting Farewell As our cruise ended and we landed back in freezing-cold Atlanta, the Caribbean sounds, fresh air and blue skies were a lovely memory. As fate would have it, another adventure began as soon as our plane landed: The lights went out in Georgia — well, actually, in the ATL. Fifteen minutes before, the power had gone out at the airport. We sat on the runway for over four hours, navigated the dark and boarded a hotel shuttle, which fortunately arrived just as a cab was about to depart.
This is the ark at Nidhe Israel in the Barbados city of Bridgetown.
We begged for a ride-share and, thanks to stranded passengers who shared their cab, we headed to our home sweet (cold) home. Despite Mother Nature, blackouts and snow, vacation accomplished! ■ Robyn Spizman Gerson (www. robynspizman.com) is a New York Times best-selling author and a media personality seen often on local and national television.
By Dee Thompson When it comes to once-in-a-lifetime occasions like weddings, or Bar and Bat Mitzvahs, the perfect cake should reflect the hopes and dreams of the honorees’ special day, both in taste and appearance. For cake artist Jenean Carlton, of Carlton’s Cakes, crafting unique cakes for such occasions requires a scientific mind as well as an artistic vision. “My cakes are science and art united. It can’t just be pretty,” she explains. Years ago, a college counselor tested her. The result? As Jenean explains, “I have one of those weird brains, a fifty-fifty art and science brain. I tend to like a lot of everything. I enjoy the chemistry of baking and also love the art involved in a creative cake. Our cakes start with from-scratch baking and finish with artistic techniques such as hand painting as well as edible sculptures made of sugar. I enjoy both the scientific elements of the project as well as the art involved. This is what makes our cakes unique. We are able to tailor them to the dietary needs of our clients with their design goals.” Most bakeries and cake artists use mixes. Jenean takes pride in making every cake from scratch. There is nothing artificial. The texture is not dry or coarse. Jenean uses only the top quality ingredients – European butter, pure vanilla from Madagascar, a Swiss type of fondant.
Carlton’s Cakes has crafted many wedding cakes, but they also create cakes for anniversaries, birthdays, bar and bat mitzvahs, graduations – any special occasion that requires a very special cake. Jenean started making cakes for friends years ago. She enjoyed seeing the happiness on the faces of people as they saw and tasted her cakes. Carlton’s Cakes was born only after Jenean tested recipes exhaustively. Her goal is to produce the best-tasting recipes that meet the dietary needs of clients while also being suitable for highly decorated cakes. Carlton’s Cakes also proudly offers gluten-free cakes, dairy-free cakes, and sugar-free cakes (sweetened with agave or honey). Jenean follows a gluten-free diet so she has dedicated herself to learning how to make delicious gluten-free cakes.
In just two years, Jenean Carlton has gone from hobbyist to celebrated professional, featured on sites like The Knot and Bridal Extravaganza of Atlanta. Modern Luxury Weddings named her as one of their Top Ten Wedding Experts in Atlanta in 2017. The Knot named Carlton’s Cakes the best wedding cakes in Atlanta in 2018. Jezebel magazine recently chose Carlton’s Cakes as Best Wedding Cakes in Atlanta. Bravo TV included Carlton’s Cakes in one of their upcoming television programs. Before her baking career, Jenean was in the optical business. For years, she made a homemade from-scratch cake for every single employee at her office, every year. Jenean has long viewed her baking as more than merely a hobby. As she explains, “It’s a way to give of yourself to
other people. I’ve made cakes for children whose father just died, and it’s their birthday. It’s a way to minister to people.” Jenean takes pride in the fact that each bride gets a cake that no-one else will ever have. “The most important thing about a wedding cake is that it’s theirs. Each cake design is unique for every couple. I offer a choice of about 4 cakes, and 9 fillings, and I offer different icings, when I have cake tastings with my wedding clients,” Jenean says. If the occasional calls for a very special cake, a unique, artisanal cake that also tastes delicious, call Jenean Carlton at Carlton’s Cakes, (404) 245-7971 or email her at Carltonscakes@gmail.com. Learn more about Carlton’s Cakes by visiting www.carltonscakestudio.com.
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
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EDUCATION
How to Prepare for Effective College Interviews “I just completed my essays after many drafts. Isn’t that enough?” a future college student said. “Didn’t you know that one of the colleges you want to attend stated on their website that an interview is not required but optional?” the student’s school counselor replied. Optional gives you the opportunity to add much to your application. Why waste that chance? There are two times a student can let a college learn more about the student: the dreaded essay and the interview. In addition, some scholarships and honors programs require an interview. The thought of an interview may be scary or cause nervousness. After all, students usually don’t have a lot of interviewing experience. But I encourage interviews of clients all the time. That is why we practice with simulation interviews. After the practice interviews and the real thing, a student usually gives me feedback that the actual interview was easier than the practice. That is great. Through an interview, a student shifts from being a transcript, scores and recommendations to becoming a real person to admissions personnel. And the college interviewer becomes someone who can respond to the stu-
dent’s questions over time, knowing who the student is. Moreover, the student can ask some good questions at the interview and learn more about the college while impressing the interviewer.
Hadassah to Honor 20 Teens
Levin. • Congregation B’nai Torah — Hildy Newman. • Congregation Dor Tamid — Jared Skyer. • Congregation Etz Chaim — Carly Judenberg. • Congregation Gesher L’Torah — Brandon Rubin. • Congregation Or Hadash — Naama Erez. • Congregation Or VeShalom — Ian Maman. • Congregation Shearith Israel — Miles Kirsh. • Davis Academy — Jacob Mirsky. • Epstein School — Zoe Siegel. • Temima High School — Eli Caplan. • The Temple — Max Maslia. • Temple Beth Tikvah — Ethan Asher. • Temple Emanu-El — Sydney Levy. • Temple Kehillat Chaim — Emily Glatter. • Temple Kol Emeth — Julia Maynard. • Temple Sinai — Dori Balser. • Torah Day School — Shalom Schulgasser.
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
Jewish Federation of Greater Atlanta CEO and President Eric Robbins will be the guest speaker at the presentation of the annual Marian F. Perling Hadassah Chesed Student Awards at 2 p.m. Sunday, May 6, at Congregation Dor Tamid, 11165 Parsons Road, Johns Creek. Hadassah Greater Atlanta honors Jewish seventh- through 12th-graders who are nominated by their day schools or synagogues based on love for Israel, concern for fellow Jews and Jewish culture and heritage, concern for fellow humans through manner and deed (menschlichkeit), and academic standing. The program is free and open to the public with kosher refreshments. RSVP by May 1 to 678-443-2961 or atlanta@hadassah.org. This year’s honorees: • Ahavath Achim Synagogue — Ethan Povlot. • Atlanta Jewish Academy — Jonathan “Nate” Linsider. 30 • Congregation Beth Shalom — Jeremy
The Admissions Game By Mark L. Fisher
Interviews could be with an admissions officer at the college, a student working in the admissions office or an alum in your area. What type of colleges really want to meet the student? Chances are that private, liberal arts colleges love interviews, but not so much for big state universities — there is only so much time a public university has for individual interviews. Of course, when you schedule an interview, the college knows you are interested in the school. Demonstrated interest is important. If you live in Georgia and the private, liberal arts college is in California, the admissions office knows that an interview on campus is difficult and will not hold it against you if you can’t arrange it. But an alum in your area might be available for an interview. Naturally, when you have an in-
terview on campus, you will schedule a campus tour. I addressed college visits in a recent AJT article. Schedule an interview for the summer after your junior year or the fall of your senior year. Don’t try to schedule your interview next week. Slots fill up fast for popular colleges. If the college responds that all slots of senior applicants are filled, just realize that you weren’t ahead of the rest of the applicants. You missed the flight; the doors of the plane closed. Much of the above holds true for honors programs, such as the Governor’s Honors Program in Georgia. The letter to students who make it to the interview stage offers general tips. Know what to expect and be prepared. Get a good night’s sleep, plan to arrive 20 to 30 minutes early, dress neatly and appropriately, read up on your subject (such as math) outside class, be yourself and have a conversation with your interviewer. Don’t answer questions with yes-or-no responses. Certain other items are important. Shake hands, but don’t shake like your hand is falling off. Sit up straight without folding your arms. Look the interviewer in the eye. Lean forward to show interest, and don’t fidget. Make sure you ask for a business card at the interview. After the interview, send a thankyou note to the interviewer. Add a
couple of sentences regarding how the interview helped you learn more about the college and your hope that the interviewer learned more about you and your interest in the college. Did I mention being on time? You never know what traffic will bring or whether you’ll have trouble finding a parking space. Sometimes, admissions has parking available for scheduled visitors. You will feel important if a parking space has your name welcoming you to campus. Arriving early is fine. You can relax knowing that you reached the campus. Don’t walk into the interview chewing gum or dressed for the beach after the interview. This is serious business. Use practice questions before the real interview. Tape your practice answers and listen to yourself. Or have a parent listen to your answers. Of course, you can make a video of a mock session and watch yourself. What types of questions are asked at interviews? What questions might the student ask the interviewer? My next column will address those topics. ■
• Weber School — Hannah Krinsky.
student government vice president, the co-chair of the Youth Board of the United Way of Greater Atlanta and the recipient of the Princeton Club’s 2017 Woodrow Wilson Community Service Award.
Balser Makes Top 2 At Riverwood
Riverwood International Charter School recently announced that Dori Balser is the high school’s 2018 salutatorian and Saya Abney is its valedictorian. Abney is Riverwood’s 2018 STAR student, a National Merit Scholarship finalist and a Harvard Prize Book Award recipient and has qualified for national debate championships this month. Balser, who plans to attend Washington University in St. Louis, is the
Dori Balser
Mark L. Fisher is a college and career consultant at Fisher Educational Consultants (www.fishereducationalconsultants.com) and a consultant for the College Planning Institute (www. GotoCPI.com).
Club J Signing Up After-School Pupils
The Marcus JCC is accepting registration for its after-school program, Club J, for the 2018-19 school year. Club J is open Monday through Friday from 2:30 to 6 p.m., starting Aug. 6 and ending May 20, 2019. The program serves pre-kindergartners to fifth-graders on the Zaban Park campus, 5342 Tilly Mill Road, Dunwoody. Bus transportation is provided from 10 schools in Sandy Springs and Dunwoody, including Atlanta Jewish Academy, the Davis Academy and the Epstein School. Call 678-812-3761, or visit atlantajcc.org/afterschool for more information and registration.
EDUCATION
Photos by Savannah Martin
UGA’s Israel Fest features a real camel staying calm and Mara Price, the engagement director for Hillel at UGA, getting excited about being dressed as a camel.
UGA Students Serve Facts With Food at Israel Fest A live camel content to stand for selfies drew the attention of many students passing through the University of Georgia’s Tate Center plaza Wednesday, April 11. It wasn’t clear how many students read a small poster on the camel’s wire corral, but Lee Setty, the president of Dawgs for Israel, said the poster addressed myths about camels and the Middle East. “There’s a misconception that Israel is a just a desert with camels,” Setty said with a laugh. “We want people to know that it’s a modern, diverse society with different religious groups and cultures.” That was one of the messages of this year’s Israel Fest, one of a series of similar programs held on college campuses in Georgia around the time of Yom HaAtzmaut, Israel’s Independence Day. Tables at the UGA Israel Fest were arranged in a semicircle, each one offering information about a different program or product from Israel. There were products from the Dead Sea and a table allowing participants to “ask an Israeli,” an Israel Defense Forces veteran. At the shuk, people were given “5 shekels” with which they could buy Israeli snacks. Aaron Brown, 23, a criminal justice major from Milledgeville, staffed the snack table and offered Cheeto-like treats that tasted like peanut butter. “We want people to know there’s a lot that Israel has to offer,” he said, pointing to chocolate wafers and some chocolate drops. “And there’s much more to Israel than what you might see in a news story.” At the Karma Coffee table, Ben Goldklang, 20, gave cups of Jittery Joe’s
coffee to people who first took slips of paper suggesting mitzvot. He said he had given away about 150 cups of coldbrewed coffee, and the day wasn’t done. Since he became involved with the program last fall, he estimates it has given out 3,000 cups of coffee. “It just promotes positivity,” Goldklang said. Karma Coffee can be found at various events on the UGA campus. Finance and economics major Alex Platt, 21, was encouraging passersby to sign a giant poster for peace in the Middle East. He wasn’t sure where the poster would be displayed but said it was the third poster to be covered with signatures that day. At the next table, Jake Estroff, 18, was busy writing people’s names in Hebrew. A graduate of the Epstein School, Estroff said he grew up learning Hebrew. He plans to visit Israel this summer for two weeks with his parents and siblings. Hannah Kemelmakher, 20, was writing names in Russian, her native language. She said her parents left Russia because of persecution. She plans to earn a veterinary degree and a doctorate to do research and teach in a vet school. Another table featured posters with information about Israeli companies. The country is home to 6,000 startups and has been the setting for the creation of unmanned drones, USB flash drives and the PillCam, a camera you can swallow so doctors can examine your digestive track. High-tech giants such as Intel, Microsoft and Apple have research centers in Israel, and the traffic app Waze was created there. Pro-Israel students gave away blue and white cupcakes to celebrate Israel’s birthday. If you stopped at three stations, you qualified for a plate of food, and six stations earned you a Tshirt as well. ■
THE SONENSHINE TEAM Atlanta’s Favorite Real Estate Team
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YOM HASHOAH
Photos by Sarah Moosazadeh
Ken Winkler helps Holocaust survivor Bernie Gross light the last candle as Margie Gelernter looks on.
The Atlanta Jewish Male choir, led by Barry Herman, chants El Maleh Rachamim.
Mindy Margolis leads community members in “The Star-Spangled Banner” and “Hatikvah.”
Helen Bissell recounts the hardships her father, Abram Korn, endured during the Holocaust. The memoir “Abe’s Story” tells the tale.
Marlene and Abe Besser begin the lighting of the memorial flames.
Anti-Semitism, Forgetfulness Haunt Yom HaShoah By Sarah Moosazadeh sarah@atljewishtimes.com
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
A crowd of young and old community members gathered on a rainy day to commemorate Yom HaShoah and honor the lives of 6 million Jews murdered in the Holocaust. The weather forced the Marcus Jewish Community Center ceremony inside from the Besser Holocaust Memorial Garden. Marcus JCC Rabbi Brian Glusman recounted the story of a seder plate relayed by his colleague Rabbi Benjamin Blech. The Jewish artifact was buried and recovered after World War II by a Holocaust survivor, Shmuel. The plate symbolized Shmuel’s connection to Judaism and his liberation from Auschwitz, Rabbi Glusman said, but those ties were severed when Shmuel’s children sold the heirloom in an estate sale. “The seder is all about memory,” Rabbi Glusman said. “We were there. 32 We knew what it was like and faced
degradation, humiliation and starvation, and harsh labor. It’s because of those hardships that we are able to address those challenges in today’s world and hope to have a better future.” Rabbi Glusman referenced a recent incident in Milton in which five high school students have been charged with putting anti-Semitic graffiti on a Jewish family’s driveway (see Page 14). “We are here more than 73 years later to remind the world that Jew-hatred is alive and well, once again rearing its ugly head all over the world, even right here in Atlanta.” He also noted the statistics in a survey released on Yom HaShoah in which 22 percent of U.S. millennials hadn’t heard of or were not sure they had heard of the Holocaust. The same figure for all American adults is 11 percent. Two-thirds of millennials in the survey could not identify what Ausch witz is. “That should be unsettling. That should be scary,” Rabbi Glusman said. “Unfortunately, not everyone remem-
bers or knows about the Holocaust, and tragically some choose to forget.” He said the people gathered at the JCC memorial “are here to remind the world that 6 million Jews, 1.5 million of them children, were murdered. One out of every three Jews then alive. That countries in Europe lost more than 90 percent of their Jewish population in the Shoah.” Helen Bissell, a Savannah resident who is the daughter of a Holocaust survivor, presented the keynote address about her father, Abram Korn. At 16 he escaped one ghetto in Poland but was recaptured and sent to another. He spent time in eight concentration camps. Bissell said he was beaten and tortured and survived the war by performing different tasks for the Nazis. Korn was liberated April 11, 1945, at Buchenwald. He later married and had three children. “He lived life with such joy,” Bissell said as she fought back tears. “He did not give up then, and he did not give up
at the end of his life. He showed us in the way he lived every single day that he viewed life as a gift, and instead of being angry and bitter for what he had been through, he was grateful, and I am grateful that G-d gave me to him.” Marlene and Abe Besser, who donated the memorial garden and its monument, led a procession of people who lighted memorial candles: Spencer Gelernter, Michelle and Sid Gelernter, Margie and Andy Gelernter, Ken Winkler, and Holocaust survivor Bernie Gross. The Atlanta Jewish Male choir, led by Barry Herman, performed El Maleh Rachamim (memorial prayer), followed by the Mourner’s Kaddish, led by Rabbi Glusman. “No, we will not forget,” Rabbi Glusman said. “Even though our neighbors might, even though the rest of the world might, even though communities might, we will not forget. We will fight, and we will speak out and will continue to remind the world, because that is our job, that is our mandate, that is our commandment. Lo tishkasch, we will never forget.” ■
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YOM HASHOAH
Love Conquers Nazis, Hungarian Anti-Semites By Kevin C. Madigan kmadigan@atljewishtimes.com An American journalist with deep roots in Jewish Hungary visited Atlanta the week of Yom HaShoah and spoke to the AJT about her unusual family history. Marianne Szegedy-Maszak, a senior editor at Mother Jones, wrote the book “I Kiss Your Hands Many Times: Hearts, Souls, and Wars in Hungary,” a harrowing account of her parents’ turbulent life there before their escape to the United States. Szegedy-Maszak was in Atlanta to attend the Gathering for Gardner Conference and to host a Georgia Tech event featuring Ernő Rubik, the Hungarian inventor of the iconic Rubik’s Cube, with whom she is collaborating on a book. “I’m helping him write a proposed memoir,” she said as we sat in the lobby of the downtown RitzCarlton, where much of the conference took place. “Because of my Hungarian connections, I got to know Rubik. He is a great thinker, and they sometimes need writers a little bit.”
Marianne Szegedy-Maszak is the daughter of a Christian father who once hated Jews and a Christian mother who was born Jewish.
Her parents, Aladár and Hanna, met in Budapest in 1940, but it took five years for them to be together and marry after significant struggles. Her father, a gentile and an upand-coming diplomat, was arrested for anti-Fascist activities and sent to Dachau when Hitler’s army invaded Hungary in March 1944. He had grown up in a culture of anti-Semitism but made a dramatic about-face after witnessing the reality of Nazism in the early 1930s. “He was born in 1903 and grew up in a very Christian family in this milieu of anti-Semitism, which was blaming
Jews for being responsible for a lot of Hungary’s ills and seeing them as the enemy,” Szegedy-Maszak said. “His first posting was in Berlin in 1932, coincidentally during the start of the rise of Hitler, and he attended the Nuremberg rallies and receptions where Hitler was present. But any vestiges of anti-Semitism that remained in him disappeared when he saw what this regime was doing,” she said. In addition, she said, “desperate Hungarians who had businesses in Berlin” were seeking the help of the Hungarian diplomatic mission because the Nazis were taking their guns and threatening them with jail. “He realized how poisonous this all was. So that all made him philo-Semitic, eventually quite literally, and anti-Nazi. A very dramatic eye opening.” Szegedy-Maszak said her mother was born Jewish but converted to Christianity, along with her family, to avoid persecution. They fled to Portugal when the Nazi army arrived in Hungary, while Aladár languished in Dachau. “There was a brief communism
period right after World War I, and the head of the red terror was a man named Béla Kun, from the provinces, and so the Communists in Hungary were mostly identified as being Jews. This was a period of tremendous antiSemitism in Hungary. It was always festering, but now it started coming into full flower,” Szegedy-Maszak said. “My mother was part of the largest Jewish industrialist family in Hungary, that of Manfréd Weiss. At a certain point, 10 percent of the Hungarian GDP was the family’s,” she said. “The largest national minority in Hungary was the Jews, who also happened to hold a lot of the professional positions: lawyers, doctors, factory owners, industrialists. That, combined with the Communists’ defeat, ended up triggering an extraordinary period of anti-Semitism which the Jewish aristocracy was faced with.” Aladár and Hanna reunited in Budapest at war’s end, and after their wedding they moved to Washington, D.C., where their three children were born. Aladár Szegedy-Maszak went on to become Hungary’s ambassador to the United States. ■
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OBITUARIES
Cindy Alberhasky
Penny Bowman
Cindy Massie Alberhasky, age 65, passed away at her home in Sandy Springs surrounded by family on Wednesday, April 11, 2018. Cindy was born to Harold and Shirley Massie on Nov. 4, 1952, in Skokie, Ill. She was the first of three sisters. She grew up in Chicago, moving to Louisville, Ky., late in high school. As a senior in high school, she met Mark Alberhasky, whom she would later marry and with whom she would raise two sons, Brandon and Evan. Cindy taught hearing-impaired children for 10 years, first at the Louisville Deaf Oral School and later in the Louisville public school system. She lived in Bowling Green, Ky., for nearly 25 years and was active in the community with a wide circle of friends. When her husband retired from medicine, the family moved to Atlanta to be close to family when she was not traveling the world with Mark. Diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in January 2017, she was determined to savor every minute, welcoming her first granddaughter the following July, celebrating her 65th birthday with family in November, and bravely battling cancer until the end, participating in an experimental clinical trial. TEAM Cindy/Fearless Warriors was a support group formed in her honor that raised over $15,000 for pancreatic cancer research. Cindy brightened every room she entered and every friendship. She was an avid reader, loved piano and was idolized by her dogs. Cindy is survived by her mother, Shirley Massie; her husband, Mark; son Brandon and his wife, Sarah; son Evan and his wife, Marina; granddaughter Katherine; and sisters Lori Kessler and Dawn Zachariah. Donations may be made to the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network (pancan. org) or the American Cancer Society (cancer.org).
Penina “Penny” Weisz Bowman, age 90, of Dunwoody passed away Thursday, March 30, 2018, Erev Pesach. She joined her late husband, Harold, for eternity on what would have been their 71st wedding anniversary. Survivors include her daughter and sonin-law Leora and Herb Wollner; son Allan Bowman; daughter Deborah Bowman; grandchildren Matthew and Barbra Wollner, Robert and Jill Wollner, and Mollie Bowman; great-grandchildren Hudson and Tessa Wollner and Eloise and Oliver Wollner; brother-in-law Zvi Baer; and many nieces and nephews in the United States and in Israel. She was predeceased by her beloved husband of 61 years, Harold, as well as her siblings, Yaffa, Miriam and Mordecai, who all survived the Holocaust. Penny was born in Cluj, Romania, on April 19, 1927. In May 1944 her family was transported to Auschwitz-Birkenau. Penina survived six months in Auschwitz and six months in Mahrisch-Weisswasser, where she worked as a slave laborer in an electronics factory until the end of the war. She was fortunate to remain together with her two sisters, but she lost 42 members of her family in the Shoah, including her mother and father. After the war, Penina and her sister Miriam joined a youth group that traveled from one displaced persons camp to another, each time getting closer to the Mediterranean, where they were hoping to board a ship and travel to Palestine. One of the stops was Salzburg, Austria, where Penina met her future husband, Harold Bowman, who was stationed nearby with the American Army. Because they had no language in common, they needed an interpreter until Penina learned enough Hebrew to communicate. They knew each other for six months when Harold went back to the United States to be discharged from the Army. Upon parting, Harold gave Penina his Magen David necklace, which he received for his bar mitzvah, and a package that contained 3 yards of silk parachute fabric, which he told her to use for her wedding dress. That’s how Penina found out she was engaged. To prevent the seizure of the fabric, she basted it under the lining of her coat. Harold, a Chicago native, applied to study at the Technion in Haifa on the GI Bill and waited for her to reach Palestine. Finally, 18 months from the time they met, they married in Binyamina on March 30, 1947. She wore the dress that she had hand-sewn from the parachute silk. The dress now hangs on permanent display at the William Breman Jewish Heritage and Holocaust Museum, Penny’s gift to her adopted community of Atlanta. Her many hobbies included gardening, reading, playing mah-jongg, cooking, baking, needlepointing, sewing, knitting and bowling. She was involved in many Jewish and civic organizations throughout her life in Chicago, Clearwater, Fla., Houston and finally Atlanta. She and Harold moved here in 1993 to be near their children and grandchildren, who loved to spend time with them. Penny dedicated much of her life to sharing her story by speaking to thousands of students and adults. She was frequently asked how she could relive the atrocities of the Holocaust, and she would answer with the following statement: “I would live a life in equilibrium. I would remember my past and keep it alive so that future generations would not allow another Holocaust to happen anywhere in the world. But, at the same time, I would live each day to the fullest and enjoy life and try to be happy.” Sign the online guestbook at dresslerjewishfunerals.com. In lieu of flowers, memorial donations may be made to the Breman Museum, Congregation Etz Chaim and the Epstein School. A graveside service was held Monday, April 2, at Arlington Memorial Park with Rabbi Shalom Lewis officiating. Arrangements by Dressler’s Jewish Funeral Care, 770-451-4999.
65, Sandy Springs
Jeanne Antebi
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
93, Atlanta
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Jeanne Antebi, 93, died Friday, April 6, 2018. Born in Cairo, Egypt, on May 1, 1924, to Joseph and Suzanne Hanein, Jeanne was the oldest of seven children. She was married to Maurice Antebi in 1945 in Cairo. With four children ages 3 to 11 in tow, they left Cairo on a refugee ship and sailed to Paris. After three years of waiting, visas to the United States allowed the family to relocate and settle in Atlanta. She was the family matriarch, an example to be followed and revered. She was a chef, a world traveler and a great friend. Most important, she was a beloved and devoted wife, mother, grandmother and great-grandmother. She was predeceased by her husband, Morris, in 1972. She is survived by her children, Judy and Mark Bernath, Suzanne and Dan Dinur, Mark and Lilly Antebi, and Leah and Larry Kaplan, and her grandchildren, Brent and Rebecca Bernath, Greg Dinur, Eric and Dana Bernath, Michael and Rena Antebi, Joanna and Andy Kobylivker, Joe Bernath, Jake and Deborah Kaplan, Ben and Ariella Kaplan, Alex and Dara Dinur, and Hannah Kaplan. She is also survived her siblings, Yaacob Hanein of Ra’anana, Sarah Mekamel of Haifa and Etty Azhari of Ra’anana. She was a great-grandmother to 15 great-grandchildren. In lieu of flowers, memorial donations may be made to the William Breman Jewish Home, Weinstein Hospice or Congregation Or VeShalom. Sign the online guestbook at dresslerjewishfunerals.com. A graveside service was held Monday, April 9, at Arlington Memorial Park. Arrangements by Dressler’s Jewish Funeral Care, 770-451-4999.
90, Dunwoody
Adele Burnham 79, Birmingham, Ala.
Adele S. Burnham, age 79, of Birmingham, Ala., died Wednesday, April 11,
OBITUARIES 2018, after a battle with esophageal and brain cancer. Adele loved to travel with her husband. Cruises were her favorite way to see a new country, learn about its culture and meet people. As she traveled the world, her favorite cruises always coincided with a beach excursion. She never left a country without making new friends who later became travel companions on her adventures. She had a profound love for family and friends. She was known for “adopting” couples so they could have a place to spend the holidays and would not be alone. Adele was a congregant of Ahavath Achim Synagogue, a member of the Sisterhood and a life member of Hadassah. She attended Shabbat services nearly every Saturday until she fell ill. A loving wife, an attentive mother and a doting grandmother, Adele was known to family and friends alike for her candor, chocolate-chip pound cake, and love of needlepoint, musicals, reading and a good cup of coffee. All these attributes and others she exemplified will be missed. Born in Birmingham on April 18, 1938, to the late Jacob Sidney Sarasohn and Sarah Euchvitz Sarasohn, Adele was the oldest of their two children. During World War II the family moved to Jacksonville, Fla., where her father served in the U.S. Navy. After the war the Sarasohns moved briefly to Mountain Brook, Ala., before settling in Bessemer, Ala., where she attended grade school. She graduated from Bessemer High School, where she was inducted into the National Honor Society. She was a member of the thespian society, the pep club and honor rolls. She attended religious school at Temple Beth-El in Birmingham, where she was confirmed. She briefly attended the University of Alabama before moving to Atlanta, where she met her husband, Alan Burnham. Adele’s first career was in mortgage banking. She later parlayed her gift of gab and experience into a notable real estate career. She worked for Northside Realty, Prudential and Coldwell Banker; she was a member of the Million Dollar Club. Adele is survived by her beloved husband of 51 years, Alan Burnham; a brother, Howard Sarasohn; children Stephanie (Burnham) Aftergut and son-in-law Brian Aftergut, Laurie Burnham, and Dr. Jeremy Burnham and daughter-in-law Dr. Danielle Dever; and grandchildren Ethan Aftergut, Matthew Aftergut and Mack Burnham. Adele will never be forgotten as long as there are beaches to visit, songs to be sung, books to read and cups of coffee to enjoy. Sign the online guestbook at dresslerjewishfunerals.com. A graveside service was held Friday, April 13, at Arlington Memorial Park with Rabbi Laurence Rosenthal officiating. Arrangements by Dressler’s Jewish Funeral Care, 770-451-4999.
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Murray D. Friedman Murray D. Friedman, age 77, of Atlanta died Wednesday, April 4, 2018, after a yearlong battle with lymphoma. Murray’s adventurous spirit led him on trips through six of the seven continents, including whitewater rafting out West, hiking in Central and South America, visiting the Australian Outback, participating in African safaris, and taking trips through the leading cities of Europe, the Far East and North America. He made his first trip to Israel in 1960 and returned many times to the Jewish land he loved so much. Deeply held values of fairness, honesty and kindness guided Murray’s life and work. His devotion to Jewish education grew out of his children’s experiences at the Epstein School, Yeshiva Atlanta and Camp Ramah in New England and came into full bloom in his service on the boards of Camp Ramah Darom, the Weber School and the Epstein School. Later in life, Murray became particularly interested in the emotional and spiritual dynamics of teshuvah, atonement and forgiveness. A loving husband, attentive father and fun-loving grandfather, Murray was known to family and friends alike for his generous heart, sense of humor, passionate storytelling and warm hugs. We miss him. Born in Mobile, Ala., to the late Aaron and Sarah Friedman, Murray graduated from the University of Pennsylvania, served in the United States Army and received an international M.B.A. from Georgia State University. After retiring from the Coca-Cola Co. in 1993, Murray devoted his considerable energy and insight to Jewish and other nonprofit organizations, including the William Breman Jewish Heritage Museum, Ahavath Achim Synagogue, the Southern Order of Storytellers’ Buckhead Cluster and the Georgia Radio Reading Service. Murray is survived by his beloved wife of 50 years, Lynn Friedman; brothers
Continued on page 37
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
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Continued from page 35 Dr. Dr. Leonard Leonard (Colleen) (Colleen) Friedman, Friedman, Dr. Dr. William William (Jill) (Jill) Friedman Friedman and and Jere Jere (Ellen) (Ellen) FriedFriedman; man; children children Rachel Rachel (Carson) (Carson) Milgroom, Milgroom, Rabbi Rabbi Abe Abe (Rebecca (Rebecca Krasner) Krasner) Friedman, Friedman, Anna Anna (Warren) (Warren) Fridley, Fridley, Yesenia Yesenia Quezada-Friedman Quezada-Friedman and and Brenda Brenda Quezada-FriedQuezada-Friedman; man; and and grandchildren grandchildren Isaiah, Isaiah, Simon, Simon, Odelia, Odelia, Azriel, Azriel, Yonah, Yonah, Adam Adam and and Vincent. Vincent. In In lieu lieu of of flowers, flowers, memorial memorial donations donations may may be be made made to to Camp Camp Ramah Ramah Darom, Darom, Ahavath Ahavath Achim Achim Synagogue Synagogue or or the the charity charity of of your your choice. choice. Sign Sign the the online online guestguestbook book at at dresslerjewishfunerals.com. dresslerjewishfunerals.com. A A graveside graveside service service was was held held Thursday, Thursday, April April 5, 5, at at Crest Crest Lawn Lawn Memorial Memorial Park. Park. Arrangements Arrangements by by Dressler’s Dressler’s Jewish Jewish Funeral Funeral Care, Care, 770-451-4999. 770-451-4999.
Eudice D. Goodman 92, Atlanta
Eudice Eudice D. D. Goodman, Goodman, devoted devoted wife, wife, mother, mother, grandmother grandmother and and great-grandgreat-grandmother, mother, died died Thursday, Thursday, April April 12, 12, 2018. 2018. Born Born and and raised raised in in Norfolk, Norfolk, Va., Va., she she lived lived in in Atlanta Atlanta for for over over 60 60 years. years. She She was was aa member member of of The The Temple Temple and and active active in in the the Sisterhood Sisterhood for for many many years. years. Later Later in in life, life, she she joined joined Temple Temple Sinai. Sinai. She She spent spent her her life life devoted devoted to to caring caring for for her her family family and and was was aa loyal loyal friend. friend. She She enjoyed enjoyed traveling, traveling, especially especially to to beach beach locations, locations, and and was was an an avid avid mah-jongg mah-jongg player. player. She She was was predeceased predeceased by by her her husband, husband, William William S. S. Goodman; Goodman; her her parents, parents, Bessie Bessie and and Louis Louis Deitch; Deitch; her her sister, sister, Frances Frances Swartz; Swartz; and and her her grandson grandson William William B. B. Goodman. Goodman. Eudice Eudice is is survived survived by by daughter daughter Deborah Deborah Goodman; Goodman; son son Lon Lon Goodman; Goodman; grandchildren grandchildren Ashley Ashley Goodman Goodman (Donna (Donna Robertson), Robertson), Lauren Lauren Goodman Goodman (Mark (Mark Muenster), Muenster), Melissa Melissa Goodman Goodman and and Lisa Lisa Lewin Lewin (Robert (Robert Lewin); Lewin); and and seven seven greatgreatgrandchildren. grandchildren. The The family family would would like like to to express express their their appreciation appreciation and and gratitude gratitude to to the the nursnurses es and and staff staff of of Weinstein Weinstein Hospice Hospice and and all all the the caregivers caregivers for for their their kindness kindness and and devotion, devotion, including including Nekeisha Nekeisha Miles, Miles, Musu Musu Sesay, Sesay, Lasonji Lasonji Turner, Turner, Katie Katie Young, Young, Maureen Maureen Ruffin, Ruffin, Eloise Eloise Levine, Levine, Simone Simone Glover Glover and and many many others. others. A A graveside graveside service service was was held held at at Arlington Arlington Memorial Memorial Park Park on on Friday, Friday, April April 13, 13, with with Rabbi Rabbi Brad Brad Levenberg Levenberg and and Rabbi Rabbi Steven Steven Lebow Lebow presiding. presiding. In In lieu lieu of of flowers, flowers, the the family family requests requests donations donations to to Weinstein Weinstein Hospice, Hospice, Temple Temple Sinai, Sinai, Temple Temple Kol Kol Emeth Emeth or or Shriners Shriners Hospitals Hospitals for for Children. Children. Sign Sign the the online online guestbook guestbook at at dresslerdresslerjewishfunerals.com. jewishfunerals.com. Arrangements Arrangements by by Dressler’s Dressler’s Jewish Jewish Funeral Funeral Care, Care, 770-451770-4514999. 4999.
Carol Bivins Gouzie 74, Atlanta
She She was was born born Sept. Sept. 17, 17, 1943, 1943, to to David David and and Helen Helen Wall Wall in in North North Bergen, Bergen, N.J. N.J. Across Across the the Hudson Hudson River, River, she she could could see see New New York York City City from from her her bedroom bedroom window window and and never never lost lost her her love love for for that that town. town. A A graduate graduate of of Weehauken Weehauken High High School, School, she she went went on on to to Carnegie Carnegie Mellon Mellon in in Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, where where she she earned earned her her degree degree in in English, English, and and later later earned earned her her master’s master’s at at Syracuse. Syracuse. She She was was aa gifted gifted and and published published poet poet and and writer writer and and used used those those skills skills to to create create aa career career in in public public relations, relations, first first working working in in the the airline airline industry industry as as an an executive executive and and later later creating creating the the public public relarelations tions department department for for what what was was at at the the time time the the largest largest hotel hotel company company in in the the world, world, with with brands brands such such as as Ramada Ramada Inn, Inn, Howard Howard Johnson, Johnson, Days Days Inn, Inn, Super Super Eight Eight and and Wingate. Wingate. She She won won numerous numerous awards awards and and was was admired admired by by her her competitors. competitors. She She then then became became one one of of the the first first women women to to sit sit on on the the operating operating board board of of aa major major corpocorporation, ration, but but her her greatest greatest joy joy came came from from raising raising her her daughter daughter and and son son to to appreciate appreciate life. Later, she devoted all her energy to her four grandsons. life. Later, she devoted all her energy to her four grandsons. She She is is survived survived by by her her husband husband of of 27 27 years, years, David David Gouzie; Gouzie; her her children, children, MiriMiriam Bivins Warchol (Alex) and Danny Bivins (Kelli); and her grandchildren, am Bivins Warchol (Alex) and Danny Bivins (Kelli); and her grandchildren, Mason Mason Bivins, Bivins, Clayton Clayton Bivins, Bivins, Gabriel Gabriel Warchol Warchol and and Michael Michael Warchol. Warchol. The family wishes to grieve privately and The family wishes to grieve privately and asks asks only only that that those those who who knew knew her her well say prayers for her. Arrangements by Dressler’s Jewish Funeral Care, well say prayers for her. Arrangements by Dressler’s Jewish Funeral Care, 770770451-4999. 451-4999.
Kenneth Levenstiem 87, 87, Atlanta Atlanta
Kenneth Kenneth Levenstiem, Levenstiem, 87, 87, died died Saturday, Saturday, April April 14, 14, 2018. 2018. He is survived by his wife, Dale, with whom he shared his life for 66 years; He is survived by his wife, Dale, with whom he shared his life for 66 years; sons Marty and Barry; daughter Robyn (Steve) Cooper; grandchildren Michelle sons Marty and Barry; daughter Robyn (Steve) Cooper; grandchildren Michelle (Andy) Miller, Ryan Cooper, Rachel Levenstiem and Jason Levenstiem; and two (Andy) Miller, Ryan Cooper, Rachel Levenstiem and Jason Levenstiem; and two great-grandchildren, Jacob and Cooper Miller. great-grandchildren, Jacob and Cooper Miller. He attended Boys’ High School and graduated from the first class at Grady He attended Boys’ High School and graduated from the first class at Grady High School in Atlanta. He attended the University of Georgia and was a memHigh School in Atlanta. He attended the University of Georgia and was a member of AEPi fraternity. He was a lifetime member of Congregation Shearith Israel, ber of AEPi fraternity. He was a lifetime member of Congregation Shearith Israel, where he served as the president of the congregation for three years. Kenneth where he served as the president of the congregation for three years. Kenneth spent his life working in the restaurant equipment industry and was the owner spent his life working in the restaurant equipment industry and was the owner and operator of Murry Fixture Co. until 1997. and operator of Murry Fixture Co. until 1997. A graveside service was held Monday, April 16, at Crest Lawn Memorial Park. A graveside service was held Monday, April 16, at Crest Lawn Memorial Park. In lieu of flowers, contributions may be made to Weinstein Hospice, CongregaIn lieu of flowers, contributions may be made to Weinstein Hospice, Congregation Shearith Israel or the charity of your choice. Sign the online guestbook at tion Shearith Israel or the charity of your choice. Sign the online guestbook at dresslerjewishfunerals.com. Arrangements by Dressler’s Jewish Funeral Care, dresslerjewishfunerals.com. Arrangements by Dressler’s Jewish Funeral Care, 770-451-4999. 770-451-4999.
Continued on page 38
Carol Carol Bivins Bivins Gouzie, Gouzie, 74, 74, died died Monday, Monday, April April 16, 16, 2018. 2018.
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APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
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OBITUARIES
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Ann Rudisch 77, Atlanta
Mrs. Ann Marilyn Rudisch passed away peacefully Monday, April 9, 2018, at the age of 77. She is survived by her two sons, Douglas and Bruce; daughter-in-law Adina; and two loving grandchildren. Mrs. Rudisch was predeceased by her dedicated husband of 50 years, Frederick, who passed away in the summer of 2015. She is also survived by her brother, Alan, her two first cousins, Muriel and Barbara, and her brother-in-law and sister-in-law, David and Mary. Mrs. Rudisch was born in 1941 in Yonkers, N.Y., the firstborn child of Dr. Dean Lederfeind of New York and Mrs. Mirrie Yoffee of Edinburgh, Scotland. Mrs. Rudisch grew up in a loving home, though she suffered the unfortunate loss of her father at the age of 19. She went on to receive her bachelor’s degree in education from New York University, and she began her master’s degree at Columbia University, later finishing it at Florida International University in North Miami, Fla. Mrs. Rudisch and her husband, Dr. Frederick Rudisch, were married in New York in 1965. They settled in North Miami, where they lived and raised their family. Ann and Frederick moved to Atlanta in 2010 to be closer to their grandchildren. Mrs. Rudisch was a dedicated public school educator in the Miami area for many years, focusing her work on helping children with learning disorders. Mrs. Rudisch was known for her kindness and her patience, both with her students and with her husband, Frederick, and her sons, Douglas and Bruce, which was much needed. She was a loving mother and wonderful person and will be dearly missed. In lieu of flowers, donations may be sent to the Geriatric Mental Health Foundation (www.gmhfonline.org). A graveside service was held Wednesday, April 11, 2018. Arrangements by Dressler’s Jewish Funeral Care, 770-451-4999.
Olga Schreck
APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
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Olga Schreck, age 97, of Atlanta passed away peacefully Wednesday, April 4, 2018, from pancreatic cancer. Olga was born in Vienna, Austria, the youngest of eight children; she had six sisters and one brother. The entire family fled when the Nazis invaded in 1938. The family members all managed fortunately to survive for several years in Europe, with some then fleeing to Cuba, some to Israel and the majority to the United States. Olga finally reached the United States via Lisbon, Portugal. Olga married Adolph Schreck in 1945 in New York City. They moved in 1957 to Atlanta, where they made a wonderful life for themselves until Adolph died suddenly in 1980. Olga married Fred Schuster of New York City several years later, until his unfortunate death from cancer. Olga determinedly pursued a full life with her family and with her engaging friends at The Barclay. Her biggest passions were traveling, exercising and playing bridge. Olga’s travels proudly included cruising worldwide. She loved to share her many life experiences. Olga was adamant in encouraging others to lead healthy, full lives, as her caretakers humorously will attest to. We are most grateful to Fatou Manneh and Khadi Sankoh for the loving care they provided. Survivors include her daughters, Rita (Michael) LeVine and Linda (Richard) Hoffenson; her 109-year-old sister, Rita Biron; her grandchildren, Leslie (Jason) Charney, Julie (Benjamin) Taube, Greg LeVine, Andrea Hoffenson and Steven Hoffenson; and her great-grandchildren, Emma and Piper Charney and Leah and Mason Taube. In lieu of flowers, memorial donations may be made to Weinstein Hospice, Jewish Family & Career Services or the Jewish Federation of Greater Atlanta’s Holocaust Survivor Support Fund. Sign the online guestbook at dresslerjewishfunerals.com. A graveside service was held Sunday, April 8, at Greenwood Cemetery. Arrangements by Dressler’s Jewish Funeral Care, 770-451-4999.
Richard Tauber 73, Atlanta
Richard Harold Tauber, 73, died Tuesday, April 10, 2018. He was born June 30, 1944, in Paterson, N.J., alongside his fraternal twin brother, Bob. He was welcomed home by his mother, Carolyn (Midge) Greenberg, his father, Eugene Tauber, and his older brother, Stuart. Dick spent most of his childhood in South Orange, N.J. He developed a love for theater, became the president of New Jersey Temple Youth and graduated from Columbia High School in 1963. In 1967 he graduated with a B.A. in theater from Denison University, where he was a member of Beta Theta Pi. He studied at the University of Michigan and Columbia University and began pursuing technical theater work in addition to acting in New York City. He worked at Shakespeare in the Park under the direction of the famed Joseph Papp and later joined the crew for the original Broadway production of “Godspell,” where he ran lights on over 800 shows. He met Marjorie Hirschberg in an acting class in Greenwich Village, and they were married in 1973. Dick then became the dean of students and Marjorie the head of the drama program at the Darrow School in New Lebanon, N.Y. In 1978 they celebrated the birth of their first child, Ethan. In 1981 they moved to Atlanta, where Dick had been hired to work at the newly established CNN and where he would continue to work for the next 32 years. Dick and Marjorie bought a house and had their second child, Elizabeth, in 1983. The family spent many happy days together until 1997, when Marjorie passed away from ALS. During his time at CNN, Dick ran the satellite desk and became vice president of transmission systems and new technology. In 2013, after retiring from CNN, he was inducted into the Space & Satellite Hall of Fame. He became the president of the board of directors of the Southeast Chapter of Space & Satellite Professionals International (SSPI), which he helped found in 2005. He received three Emmy Awards for his work at CNN. The first was in 1986 for his part in Turner Broadcasting System’s Goodwill Games coverage, the second in 2002 for CNN’s coverage of 9/11; and the third, a Technical Emmy, in 2007 for CNN’s mobile, IP news-gathering system. Dick was also vital in CNN’s groundbreaking coverage of the First Gulf War. In addition to being very passionate about his work, Dick was an avid movie lover and delighted in blaring classic rock from his car speakers. He loved to tell jokes and anecdotes and had a wonderful sense of humor. He was an incredibly kind soul, extremely generous and helpful to everyone he knew, and mentored many people over the years. He is survived by his two children and two brothers. He will be greatly missed by colleagues, friends and family. A memorial service was held Friday, April 13, at Dressler’s Jewish Funeral Care with interment afterward at Crest Lawn Memorial Park. Arrangements by Dressler’s Jewish Funeral Care, 770-451-4999.
Death Notices
Doris Benator, 87, of Atlanta, Congregation Or VeShalom member and mother of Bruce Benator and Sheri Benator, on April 8. Thomas Bohrer, 78, of Sandy Springs on April 5. Paul Gans, 88, of Atlanta, husband of Lila Gans and father of Temple Sinai member Dale Blass, on April 10. George Perlman, 91, of Washington, husband of Elaine Perlman and father of Temple Sinai member Amy Bubes and Abby Blunt, on April 10. Barbara Riff, 90, of Atlanta, member of The Temple and mother of Paul Weinberg, Marc Weinberg and Lynn Valentino, on April 8. Obituaries in the AJT are written and paid for by the families; contact Associate Publisher Kaylene Ladinsky at kaylene@atljewishtimes.com or 404-883-2130, ext. 100, for details about submission, rates and payments. Death notices, which provide basic details, are free and run as space is available; send submissions to editor@ atljewishtimes.com.
CLOSING THOUGHTS
CROSSWORD
It’s Amazing I Get Through the Day
Overboard
By Yoni Glatt, koshercrosswords@gmail.com Difficulty Level: Medium
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There was a time when the future revolved around blue books.
Yankee Stadium, and Jahn’s, where I just happened to get engaged, so of course I remember it well. So how do I get through a day? Well, I hope you are dying to know, given that this entire missive leads to this burning question. It takes a village! I have my peeps tapping on my desk (virtually) to keep me straight. My hubby, my girls, my son-in-loves, my grandbabies, my two adored sisters, 37 years of patient colleagues, devoted friends (you surely know who you are) and Post-It notes. Oh, lest we forget, the proctor who, by the mere tapping of his pencil, made it possible for me to pursue higher education. One of the rules of the regent exams: READ CAREFULLY. All information on the first page of the booklet MUST BE CORRECT. You may not put your first name where your last name is required. This would lead to automatic failure. Need I say more? To this very day, I can hear the tap-tap-tapping, and it usually arrives in the nick of time. To this very day, if I see a blue exam booklet, I do not walk, but run home to inhale my Paxil. ■
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I did not forget anyone — my rememberings are not what they used to be). I Grew Up in the Bronx is a fun Facebook group I’ve joined. Members ask questions that challenge the memory, like tracks for the trolley car, radio alarm clocks, the vegetable peeler, schoolyard, Lowe’s Paradise,
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ACROSS 1. Prepare for surgery 6. Flu symptoms 11. “Mean Girls” screenwriter and costar 14. “La Bohème,” e.g. 15. 9-Down, in Hebrew 16. Game whose name is said near its end 17. Status for one splitting time between Israel and America 19. City close to BenGurion Airport 20. Basic monetary unit of Sweden 21. “La ___ Vita” (1960 film) 23. Fighting back 27. Weekly reading 28. Gives a new lease 29. Lavender bloom 30. Not ___ in the world 31. Like the Zohar, to some 33. Lose weight 36. Part of a breath mint 37. Ben (Cohen) & Jerry (Greenfield), e.g. 40. “Good Grips” kitchenware brand 41. 6-foot-11 Kanter of the Knicks 43. Have guests for Shabbat 44. Five-pillared faith 46. Spice’s partner 48. Clinton claimed he didn’t do it 49. Israeli novelist of “A Perfect Peace” 51. Bobka and meltaway cake, often 53. Dietetic, on packages 54. Majority of those that observe 44-Across 55. The Dead Sea,
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APRIL 20 ▪ 2018
For the life of me, I could not figure out why the proctor walked by my desk and tap, tap, tapped on the edge with his pencil. Then he did it again. As early as high school, it would sometimes amaze me how I made it through the day. We had just been instructed to open the blue booklet for one of my four — or was it five? — regent exams. Regents were and still are required of all graduating high school seniors in New York who hoped to pursue a higher education. Regent exams are nothing to joke about or laugh at. Each exam covers the four years you spent cramming in high school. Each covers four years of one major topic: science, foreign language, math and so on. The assumption (and we all know what this means) made by the Board of Regents is students not only learned, but also maintained what we learned. This board also assumed that the information being eagerly disseminated by our teachers took hold in our brains. Brains that were still in their developmental, sometimes fluctuating, always hormonal stages. The brains’ changes were so quick that whiplash was a real concern. I can happily share a few memories my brain did absorb: • Gang wars between the Fordham Baldies and anyone else. • Seeing and holding my first zip gun (remember those?). • Cheering my heart out for our basketball team. • Basketball players trying to open the locked door to our changing room. • Waiting for an even number of nuns or an odd number of fathers to pass by while we studied on the Fordham University campus. Wonder why this was important? For good luck, of course. • Receiving accolades and flowers for our theater performances. • Gathering after school with friends to talk about other friends. What else does a teenager talk about? Well, boys of course; however, this could also cause angst. We were looking for giggles. I had a wonderful group of friends, with names like Miriam, Diane (z”l), Jana, Janet, Judy (OMG, I hope
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