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NOVEMBER 28, 2019
Talk to your kids or someone else will.
LECTURE BY
THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
RABBI YAAKOV HOROWITZ FOLLOWED BY AN OPEN FORUM WITH
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THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
NEW LOGO!
NOVEMBER 28, 2019
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• Mail all donations • Drop off tzedaka boxes to the new office location
NEW UPDATED WEBSITE: www.ahavasyisrael.org
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CONTENTS
COMMUNITY
THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
NOVEMBER 28, 2019
Around the Community . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6 Community Calendar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
JEWISH THOUGHT Rabbi Zvi Teichman. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32 Rabbi Motty Rabinowitz. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
PEOPLE 613 Seconds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
FEATURE A Small Newspaper Ad . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40 Impeachment 2019. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
HUMOR & ENTERTAINMENT
Centerfold. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48 Notable Quotes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
LIFESTYLES Forgotten Heroes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54 Dating Dialogue. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56 Mental Health Corner. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60 Your Money. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67 Gluten Free Recipe Column. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68 Life Coach. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
NEWS
B A LT I M O R E J E W I S H H O M E . C O M
Israel News . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 National News. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 That’s Odd. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Dear Readers, It’s said that the Baal Hatanya once remarked that the arrival of Moshiach would be printed in the newspapers. In times past one may have wondered, What’s the big deal? Of course it would, don’t the papers report on what’s happened? That’s what they’re there for! I don’t think the question is still a good one. These past couple of years have shown us that all news organizations either root for the right or the left. No one’s in the middle. No one really tries to cover the truth, regardless of whether it confirms or contradicts their biases. Every story is further proof that the pre-determined bullseye is the correct one. Says the Baal Hatanya: Moshiach’s arrival will be different. It will be printed in all of the papers. He won’t belong to a specific group and will not be owned by a party. He is coming for all of humanity. Everyone will celebrate the triumph of good and truth over evil and falsehood. Maybe having a pre-determined bull’s eye isn’t such a bad idea after all. We have the Torah and mitzvos; everything that happens is an expression of its truth. If we just push ourselves hard enough, we can find how events seeming otherwise are actually the biggest proof. Don’t trust me, just ask your local news anchor. This country is torn and could really use the fulfillment of the Messianic prophecies of peace just about now. Hopefully we won’t have to wait much longer. Wishing you a wonderful Shabbos, Shalom
The Baltimore Jewish Home is an independent bi-weekly newspaper. All opinions expressed by the journalists, contributors and/or advertisers printed and/or quoted herein are solely their opinions and do not reflect the opinions of BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME, their parent company or affiliates, and may have been previously disseminated by them on television, radio, Internet or another medium. The Baltimore Jewish Home is not responsible for typographical errors, or for the kashrus of any product or business advertised within. The BJH contains words of Torah. Please treat accordingly.
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Around the Community
B A LT I M O R E J E W I S H H O M E . C O M
THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
NOVEMBER 28, 2019
Baltimore Well Represented at KosherFest 2019
Baltimore Chesed League - Girls Division Launches Second Season By: Staff Reporter BaltimoreJewishLife.com/Jeff Cohn
T
he Rosh HaYeshivah of Ner Yisroel, Harav Aharon Feldman, then On an early Sunday morning on October 27, the Suburban Orthodox social hall was brimming with the buzz of 60 middle-school age girls who were getting really excited about doing chesed (acts of kindness) in the Baltimore Community. That’s right! The girls and their volunteer coaches gathered to celebrate the launch of the 2nd year of the Baltimore Girls Chesed League. For the next 6 weeks, each team will be assigned chesed activities to perform around the community, and along with personal acts of chesed, they earn points that result in celebratory activities for the teams. During the opening event, Rabbi Silber shared a meaningful lesson about chesed that can be learned from the creation of the world. Hashem originally intended to create trees in such a way that the entire tree would taste like fruit. However, Hashem ended up creating trees where only the fruit is sweet, but not the rest of the tree. Hashem did this to demonstrate to us that the world was not created in total perfection. Hashem created an imperfect world, where things may seem broken, because that gives us the opportunity to help fix it. When we roll up our sleeves and help perfect the world by doing chesed, we are partnering with Hashem in creating a perfect world! The girls enjoyed a beautiful spread of bagels sponsored by Gold-
berg’s Bagels, danishes and muffins sponsored by Parisers Bakery, and delicious drinks sponsored by Coffee Bean. We would also like to acknowledge the following female owned businesses for their team sponsorships: Pompomz, The Salon by Ashley, Nina Elman Interiors, Perfect Piercing, Shell Li, Michal Katzir, Adina B. Cosmetics, Simcha Steps, The Mimi Botique and Chic Events by Shira Ocken, as well as the overall league sponsor Blue Ocean Realty. Thank you to all of our generous sponsors for your partnership with the Girls Chesed League! During the first 2 weeks of activities, the girls visited elderly residents
at Levindale, Tudor Heights and King David Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, they counted change for Jewish Caring network, baked desserts for Bikur Cholim and Suburban Orthodox, played BINGO with Menucha participants and educated community members about Cherish the Earth – Bal Tashchis, a local recycling initiative. The girls then got to celebrate and reflect on their accomplishments at a bonfire where they roasted marshmallows, sipped delicious hot chocolate and enjoyed a pizza dinner sponsored by Tov Pizza. During one of the activities, a 12 year old girl was overheard stating “the chesed league has shown me how lucky I am for all that I have.”
It is exactly these type of lessons that the chesed league hopes to impart upon the youngest members of the Baltimore community. We can’t wait to see what the next few weeks have in store! *Please note that the chesed league is run by a volunteer committee. Volunteer coaches, who are able to commit to the time and responsibilities involved, select their team members. If you have a daughter or relative in 5th – 8th grade and are interested in volunteering or coaching please send a message to the Baltimore Chesed League – Girls on Facebook.
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Around the Community
THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
NOVEMBER 28, 2019
STAR-K: Baltimore Barley Alert By: STAR-K BaltimoreJewishLife.com/Jeff Cohn
G
efen barley sold in the Baltimore area has been found to have infestation in vari-
ous batches. This barley must be checked as specified by these instructions as found on www.checkforinsects.com: Place all the barley you wish to use in a white bowl.
Fill the bowl with water, a few inches over the top of the barley. Allow to sit for 15-20 minutes. If there are insects present, they will float to the top.
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THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
NOVEMBER 28, 2019
B A LT I M O R E J E W I S H H O M E . C O M
B A LT I M O R E J E W I S H H O M E . C O M
THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
NOVEMBER 28, 2019
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Around the Community
YCC/TA Motzaei Shabbos Father-Son Attendees Treated to Presentation by Rabbi Shlomo Horwitz By: BJLife Newsroom BaltimoreJewishLife.com/Jeff Cohn
O
n Motzaei Shabbos, more than 100 6th grade Middle School talmidim of YCC/ TA and their fathers were treated in the TA Middle School Bais Medrash to an amazing presentation on The Hidden Mission to save the Jews of Ethiopia by Rabbi Shlomo Horwitz. To allow as many talmidim to attend as possible, the evening was scheduled to begin after the completion of all of the Motzaei Shabbos Kal HaNearim programs from around town. Rabbi Horwitz is well known in the community for his daily shiur in Cong. Shomrei Emunah, his wizardry on the guitar as a member of the Zemer Orchestra strings section and also a master storyteller (not to mention an accomplished writer as well).
Rabbi Yaakov Schwartz, Middle School Menahel, introduced Rabbi Horwitz and the attendees were very fortuante to hear his presentation. Rabbi Horwitz spoke about the mission, and his message was clear: Do Chesed for all those Yidden in need. Even if it is hard and outside your comfort zone. Rabbi Horwitz challenged the boys to find others who are new to the Yeshiva or to their neighborhood and bring them in, be kind to them and make them feel part of your sphere of friends. The crowd was also entertained as Rabbi Horwitz - on guitar - led everyone in niggun all singing with great emotion. Dr. Dovi Turner and son, Charlie, commented: “Rabbi Horowitz kept us at the edge of our seats while telling us about the amazing rescue of the Ethiopian Jews. He peppered the story
with great lessons of brotherhood and ahavas yisrael and ended with a very heartfelt singing of “Acheinu Kol Bais Yisroel”. It was an amazing event and we are both looking forward to the
next one!!! The evening ended with all gathered enjoying refreshments of ice cream and brownies.
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AT GRE UKAH N CHAGIFT!
This book is presented by “The Jewish World of Wonders” Shiri’s Kitchen
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KIDS COOKING with Chef Shiri
cream
½ cup milk
Measuring cups and spoons
1 teaspoon vanilla
extract
Ice cubes
R KOSHE C T IO N CONNE
by Efraim Harari Here are some amazing features in
of Cr eat ion
Kids Cooking with Chef Shiri:
Foods little ng” of All away, with e be eaten right Bread — “Ki the tree can hand, is a whol
d from the other starting Fresh fruit picke n. Making bread, on licated list of activities, ions. No a long, comp baking the bread. or no preparatio all other creat when we make . It includes with le are from like different story the grain and finishing different peop ted toward Hashem, shows how with growing from grain holy and direc d us, that person is called make bread actions are ande the world. The ability to that. When a person’s as He comm chos creatures of bera do all the other animal can is the “king” the “king” over animals, bread all of its own, HaMotzi . all over is king ate berachah first at a meal Just as man . It has a separ is the food that is eaten al blessing over all foods HaAretz. BreadBircas HaMazon, a speci ate during you Lechem Min you must recite all the other foods that Afterward, that includes ate bread. after the meal this is all because you that meal. And
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• Wonders of Creation: Let’s read about the awesome AL T A O N I world Hashem created IM T S for us. TE • Buzz the Brachos Bee: Buzz tells G Y about berachos. T A Nyou OS AC • A DashTof Humor: You’re going to love these jokes! CO
• Chef Shiri Says: Tips to make you an even better cook • Torah Tidbits: Short, interesting Torah thoughts • Kitchen FAQs: Find out about the laws of keeping kosher. • Fun Food Facts: Strange … but true!
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B A LT I M O R E J E W I S H H O M E . C O M
No one is really sure, but some people say milkshakes got their name from being served in restaurants. If the customer enjoyed the milkshake, he gave the waiter’s hand a shake, while giving him a tip. If the customer didn’t like it, the waiter didn’t get a “shake” of the hands, and he also didn’t get a tip!
T he W ond ers
MORE TH JUS AN COOK T A BOOK !
Whipped cream , for topping 4 Maraschino cherrie s, for topping
WHAT ’S IN A NAME ?
104
Easy Recipes, Fun Facts, Torah Tidbits, and More!
1 tablespoon honey
4 tall drinking glasses
Difficulty Level:
Real Life Kosher Cooking
Something Sweet
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Easy Shmeezy
THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
Two new cookbooks s t n e s e r P for the entire family
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THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
NOVEMBER 28, 2019
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Around the Community
Annual Shabbat Project Sees Unprecedented Participation In US, Israel And Worldwide By: JNS BaltimoreJewishLife.com/Jeff Cohn
T
he seventh annual international Shabbat Project reached 1,685 cities and 106 countries across the world this year, attracting record numbers of participants in many of those cities. The 2019 Shabbat Project that took place from Nov. 15-16 called on Jews to “Jump Together” in response to rising levels of violent anti-Semitism in the United States and worldwide. American Jews responded to the call through a dramatic uptick in participation, with events including challah bakes, Havdalah concerts, family and community dinners, festive prayer services and children’s activities taking place in 771 U.S. cities. Other major Diaspora communities such as France (51 cities), Russia (36 cities) and Argentina (21 cities) also continued to expand their involvement
in the effort. “The growing numbers of people and passionate level of engagement demonstrate the Jewish people’s connection to the values of Shabbat: faith, family, community and unity,” says South African Chief Rabbi Warren Goldstein, the founder and director of the project. “This past Shabbat, we showed the world and ourselves who we truly are.” The Shabbat Project and its partners facilitated thousands of events around the world, while reaching 210 new cities and seven new countries (Rwanda, Papua New Guinea, Antigua and Barbuda, United Arab Emirates, Latvia, Afghanistan, Luxembourg and Oman). “The 1,685 cities participating worldwide represent more than 10 percent growth from the 1,511 cities that took part in 2018,” says Tanya Harati, global director of operations. One marked example of Jewish unity occurred amid last week’s rock-
et attacks on southern Israel from the Gaza Strip. The longtime partner White City Shabbat in Tel Aviv expanded its already oversubscribed Friday-night dinner for more than 1,000 people to residents of southern Israel free of charge, while local Tel Avivians also opened their homes to families fleeing the line of fire. “There wasn’t even a question; this is what the Jewish people are all about,” said Deborah Danan, co-founder of White City Shabbat. “We support each other. We comfort each other. We make room at our table for one another. For us, there was no
better way to express our commitment to Jewish unity and the magic of Shabbat than inviting families from the south to join our mega-Shabbat table.” In North America, challah bakes exemplified a rallying point for the Shabbat Project with “pink challah bakes” to raise breast-cancer awareness in more than 20 U.S. cities, and a cross-border challah bake bringing together communities in San Diego and Tijuana. Perhaps most moving was a moment of silence across Pittsburgh in commemoration of the 11 Jewish worshippers shot and killed in the Tree of Life*Or L’Simcha synagogue last October, which occurred on the weekend of last year’s Shabbat Project. Such global involvement, said Goldstein, “points the way to the formula for a vibrant Jewish future: active participation. To be a Jew is not to be a passive spectator. It is about active involvement, real engagement, personal responsibility and leadership.”
Ex-Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh Indicted On Federal Charges Related To Self-Published Children’s Books
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ormer Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh is facing federal charges related to what prosecutors say was a plot to enrich herself through sales of her self-published children’s book series, according to a grand jury indictment made public Wednesday. Pugh, 69, is expected to self-surrender to U.S. Marshals Thursday before her first court appearance before U.S. District Judge Deborah K. Chasanow, according to a news release. The former mayor, who resigned her post in May amid the book sale controversy, is charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, seven counts of wire fraud, conspiracy to defraud the United States and two counts of tax evasion. The indictment was returned Nov. 14. Prosecutors say Pugh, who became Baltimore’s 50th mayor on Dec. 6, 2016, used her “Healthy Holly” book series in order to fund her lifestyle in addition
to her political campaign and political interests. She allegedly bought a house and paid down personal debt with the profits, according to The Baltimore Sun. The book scheme allegedly involved Pugh failing to print thousands of copies or double-selling titles in the series, the Sun reported. Prosecutors also allege Pugh listed her 2016 income as $31,000 when it actually exceeded $322,000. In April, Pugh announced she was taking an indefinite leave of absence after she had been “advised by her physicians that she needs to take time to recover and focus on her health.” She said she felt like she wasn’t able to fulfill her obligations as mayor because of her deteriorating health brought on by a recent case of pneumonia. Ultimately, Pugh resigned amid state and federal investigations about her book series, and apologized “for the harm that I have caused to the image of the city of Baltimore and to the credibility of the office of the mayor.”
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THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
NOVEMBER 28, 2019
B A LT I M O R E J E W I S H H O M E . C O M
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Around the Community
B A LT I M O R E J E W I S H H O M E . C O M
THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
NOVEMBER 28, 2019
N’shei Agudath Israel Welcome Newcomers Night
N
’shei Agudath Israel of Baltimore is hosting a Welcome Newcomers Night on Motzei Shabbos, December 7, 2019. This event will take place at Ohr Hamizrach Congregation, 6813 Park Heights Avenue, at 8:00 PM. This is a community-wide event to welcome newcomers to Baltimore. Any woman who has moved to Baltimore within the last year is considered a “newcomer”. We are thrilled to welcome these newcomers to Baltimore - they will be our guests, with no admission fee. The cost of admission
is $10.00 and only $5.00 for women who bring a newcomer to the event. Paid members are also welcome free of charge. N’shei membership is only $20.00. The program at this event includes an inspirational speech by Rebbetzin Bracha Goldberger, a light Melava Malka, a mini-Chinese auction, and activities to welcome the newcomers. There will also be a kumzitz led by Devorah Miller. On Wednesday, December 11, 2019, N’shei will host a shiur by a famous lecturer from Israel, Rebbetzin
Nechama Karlinsky. The lecture will take place at the Ari Fuld Building behind the Storch home, 3209 Fallstaff Road, at 8:30 PM. The topic of this important lecture is Emunah U’Bitachon: Seeing Miracles Every Day. A minimum donation of $10.00 to Yeshiva Be’er Avraham is recommended. N’shei Agudath Israel of Baltimore is part of an international organization of women dedicated to achdus, community service, education, and charity. Our members include women from different shuls, schools and organizations. N’shei provides the women in
our community with quality programs to enhance their homes and their families. N’shei organizes halacha and hashkafa shiurim, including our annual Teshuva and Pesach shiurim given by Rabbi Moshe Heinemann, shlita. Each year, N’shei officially welcomes the women who are new to the community at our Welcome Newcomers Night. N’shei is looking forward to greeting you at the Welcome Newcomers Night on Motzei Shabbos, December 7 and at Rebbetzin Karlinsky’s shiur on Wednesday, December 11.
Police: Baltimore City Reaches 300 Homicides This Year By: Staff Reporter BaltimoreJewishLife.com/Jeff Cohn
D
etective Donny Moses, with the Baltimore Police Department, has confirmed that as of Thursday morning November 14th, Baltimore City has reached 300 homicides so far this year.
Moses confirmed with WBAL News Radio 1090 and FM 101.5’s Anne Kramer that the latest victims were a man and woman shot and killed at McHenry and Monroe streets in Southwest Baltimore. That happened around 3 a.m. Thursday. “Every homicide is a tragedy, no matter what number is assigned to it. My goal is zero homicides. The men
and women of the Baltimore Police Department are doing everything they
can to make Baltimore the city we all know it can be,” said Police Commissioner Michael Harrison. “But, as I made clear in my crime plan, we cannot do it alone, so I would once again ask my fellow Baltimore residents to help us in the fight against crime.” For all of 2018, there were 309 homicides and 342 in 2017.
Renovations Additions New Construction
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THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
NOVEMBER 28, 2019
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THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
NOVEMBER 28, 2019
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What additional products do you sell? There are a wide variety of products that the kashrus industry uses such as: truck seals, heat-proof labels and stickers, freezer labels, hologram stickers, and even “plumbas,” all customized according to the hechsher’s requirements. We also sell “Chometz” and “Kosher for Passover” stickers and tape for use in residential homes to mark areas of the kitchen! They can be found in local stores around Pesach time. As we learn more about the business and expand our product line, Mrs. Janine Chapman of the Star-K has been a great resource and advocate for Kosher Tape Plus, and we continue to value this relationship. What is the most important thing to remember when choosing tape for a kosher establishment? It is important for establishments to consider what they will be using the tape for. If they have large packages and heavy-duty boxes to seal, they are going to want thicker and wider tape. If they are just sealing paper bags or single-serve food containers, they can use a thinner tape or even some custom-printed stickers. I am always happy to help people decide which tape or stickers will work best for them. What type of clients do you cater to? Currently, our target markets are Kashrus organizations, take-out restaurants, supermarkets and the like. We have sold our tape to clients in
over 24 states, plus worked with international customers, such as those in St. Maarten, St. Lucia, Barbados, Australia and the UK. As with any growing business, how do you plan on expanding your client base? Since our current market is somewhat limited, we are looking to expand our business beyond the kosher industry. The most difficult part is trying to market to the non-kosher industry while having a name that has the word ‘kosher’ in it! As more and more restaurants use third-party delivery services, the need for securing the food is increasing within the food industry. Therefore, we are actually working on a sister brand to Kosher Tape Plus -- Duratach -- that offers custom tape and stickers for the non-kosher market. What do you like to do when you’re not working? I love spending time with my children. We love baking together, especially cake decorating on tier cakes, special occasion cakes, and cookies... a little bit of everything! I like to keep that as a hobby, though, rather than doing it professionally. And of course I love spending time with my grandmother, Mrs. Charlotte Levi. I wish I had more free time to do more, but for now, all this keeps me pretty busy! The Pasuk in last week’s 613 should have read: “”אל תקרי בּניך אלא בּוניך
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enjoyed this business (which is still in existence) but I sought new opportunities to grow and expand. One day while trying to sell my stickers, I went into the Star-K offices and met with Secure your product. Promote your business. Rabbi Holland. He immediately exWhat brought you to Baltimore? claimed “Stickers? I am originally from New York, Anyone can do stickers! You need to but after living there with a growing do something different!” and I knew it family we decided that it would be was time to seriously consider someadvantageous for our children to live thing creative. Rabbi Holland suggestin a place with a slower pace in an ed the idea of custom-printed kashrus out-of-town community. We began tape, and other security-related prodour search by looking for a school for ucts for the kosher and kashrus indusour daughters, who were young at the try. On a whim, Rabbi Holland said, time. My school search led me to Bnos “You can even name the business KoYisroel, where I met with the admin- sher Tape,” which led us to trademark istration and instantly knew that this our name Kosher Tape Plus. This busiwas the perfect school for us. So, we ness idea was unique since no one else packed up and moved to Baltimore! was marketing tape in the way that he I love this community and the people suggested, so I was excited to take on here. With our son in Torah Institute, the challenge. and our daughters in Bnos we are very Throughout my time running Kohappy in Baltimore and the move was sher Tape Plus, I have had immense a great choice for us. Plus, the fact that ongoing support both from the peoI already had a lot of family here made ple at Stark-K and from my family the transition much easier. as well. My husband in particular has been my rock through all the ups and We understand that you own a downs of owning a business over the custom tape business. How did you last 25 years. He has been a wonderful come to start such a unique busi- resource, helping me with all aspects ness? of my job and giving me the support I started a printing business in 1994 and motivation I need to keep going! where we designed and printed mar keting materials such as brochures, You mentioned products for the postcards, stickers, etc. I very much kashrus industry- other than tape.
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but Netanyahu will be charged with fraud and breach of trust, while Mozes will be charged with bribery. In Case 4000, Netanyahu is accused of having advanced regulatory decisions which benefited Shaul Elovitch, who holds large shares in Bezeq and owns the Walla! News site. Both Elovitch and Netanyahu will be charged with bribery.
Palestinian Day of Rage
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On Thursday, Israel’s Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit announced his decision to formally charge Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with bribery and corruption, marking the first time in Israel’s history that a sitting prime minister has faced charges. According to the indictment, Netanyahu will be charged with fraud and breach of trust in Cases 1000 and 2000, as well as bribery, fraud, and breach of trust in Case 4000. Mandelblit formally updated Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein (Likud) of his decision. Netanyahu now has 30 days to decide whether to request immunity from the Knesset. Though Mandelblit said the decision was “difficult” and that it was a “sad day,” he claimed the indictments were his “duty by law” and “not a choice.” He also reiterated that Netanyahu is “innocent until proven guilty.” Netanyahu, for his part, promised to continue leading Israel “in accordance with the law” and denied any u www.wherewhatwhen.com u wrongdoing. Case 1000 involves accusations that Netanyahu received gifts and u www.wherewhatwhen.com u benefits from Hollywood producer u www.wherewhatwhen.com u Arnon Milchan in exchange for favors. Alleged gifts included cigars – though Netanyahu does not smoke – and champagne. Milchan will not be charged. Case 2000 involves accusations that Netanyahu made an agreement with Yediot Aharonot publisher Arnon Mozes that he would weaken the rival Israel Hayom in exchange for more favorable coverage by Yediot Aharou www.wherewhatwhen.com u u www.wherewhatwhen.com u not. This deal was never concluded,
www.wherewhatwhen.com u
Thousands of Palestinians demonstrated across the West Bank on Tuesday to protest the recent U.S. announcement that it no longer believes Israeli settlements in the West Bank violate international law. As the so-called “day of rage” continued, groups of protesters clashed with Israeli security forces in several flashpoints, with at least 77 reported lightly injured. Around two thousand people gathered in the West Bank city of Ramallah. They set ablaze posters of U.S. President Donald Trump as well as Israeli and American flags. Schools, universities, and government offices were shuttered, and rallies were held in city centers around the West Bank.
“The biased American policy toward Israel, and the American support of the Israeli settlements and the Israeli occupation, leaves us with only one option: to go back to resistance,” Mahmoud Aloul, an official with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah movement, thundered at the crowd in Ramallah. Demonstrators held signs reading: “Trump to impeachment, [Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu to jail, the occupation will go and we will remain on our land.” At Israeli checkpoints near Ramallah, Bethlehem and Hebron, doz-
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The Week In News ens of protesters threw stones at Israeli forces who responded with tear gas. According to the Ma’an news agency, the Palestinian Red Crescent said it dealt with 77 injuries, which included tear gas inhalation, rubber bullet wounds and burns. The protests came just hours after the death from cancer of a Palestinian prisoner in Israeli custody. Organizers had also called for the demonstrations – first planned before his death – to call for the release of Sami Abu Diak, 35, who was involved in three deaths, to allow him to die at his family’s side. Israeli officials had denied the request. Abu Diak was serving three life sentences for voluntary manslaughter and kidnapping of Palestinians accused of “collaborating” with Israel, among other charges. He was linked to the armed wing of the Palestinian Fatah faction and was arrested in the early 2000s, during the second Palestinian intifada. He was allegedly involved in the killing of three Pales-
tinians accused of collaborating with Israeli security forces. Organized by Fatah, Tuesday’s protests focused on the Trump administration’s announcement on Israeli settlements last week. The decision upended four decades of American policy and embraced the Israeli government’s longtime view that settlements are legal, a move the Palestinians view as coming at the expense of their quest for statehood. Israel captured the West Bank and East Jerusalem in the 1967 Six Day War and quickly began settling the newly conquered territory. Today, some 700,000 Israelis live in the two areas, which are both claimed by the Palestinians for their state. Israel annexed East Jerusalem in 1980 in a move not recognized by the international community and considers the entirety of the city its capital. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had specifically announced that the U.S. was repudiating the 1978 legal opinion by the Carter administration’s State Department that settle-
ments were illegal, a view shared by most succeeding administrations.
King Abdullah II: Relations with Israel “At an AllTime Low”
In the latest sign of how low ties between the two countries have sunk, Jordan’s King Abdullah II warned this week that relations with Israel “are at its lowest point ever.” Abdullah, who has served as Jordan’s monarch since 1999, made his comments during a conference hosted
by The Washington Institute for Near East Policy in New York City marking 25 years since the Israeli-Jordan peace treaty was signed. When asked about the state of the treaty today, Abdullah replied that “they are at an all-time low right now, among other things, due to the internal situation in Israel.” “Part of it is because of the Israeli domestic matters,” Abdullah added, referring to Israel’s chronic inability to form a government. “We are hoping Israel will decide its future — whether it is in the next several weeks or three months.” He explained, “The problems that we have had with Israel [are] bilateral… Now I hope, whatever happens in Israel over the next two or three months, we can get back to talking to each other on simple issues that we haven’t been able to talk about for the past two years.” Israel and Jordan had once been enemies and fought each other in the 1948 War of Independence and the Six Day War in 1967. However, re-
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lations started improving in the late 1980s, and the two counties signed a peace deal in 1994. In recent years, however, relations have withered, with King Abdullah facing increasing pressure among Jordanians to nullify the peace agreement with Israel. Last month, the Tzofar and Naharayim enclaves that Israel leased from Jordan as part of the 1994 accords were returned to Jordan after Amman refused to extend the lease. Known as the “Islands of Peace” for the symbolism they invoked, the two villages had been expected to remain part of Israel forever. The king’s decision not to extend the lease after 25 years had major symbolism. Jordan also recalled its ambassador from Tel Aviv last month in protest over the continued imprisonment of two Jordanian citizens who had been arrested over suspicions of terrorism.
Terrorist Gets Life for Murder The Lod District Court sentenced Abdul Hakim Assi to life behind bars this week for murdering Rabbi Itamar Ben Gal last year near Ariel. Besides for the prison time, Assi will also pay Ben Gal’s family NIS 250,000. In the ruling, the judge wrote that the terrorist had decided to make Ben Gal his victim “only because of his appearance as a Jew.” Prior to the ruling, attorneys from the Honenu law firm, which represents the Ben Gal family, delivered a letter to the judge from the deceased’s children imploring him to throw the book at Assi and to prevent him from ever being included in a prisoner swap. “We are asking you to be sentenced to a prison sentence that will cause him to rot in prison until his final day, so that he will no longer be able to see daylight,” read the missive. “We ask that you in no way include him in any future terrorist release deal.” Assi had remained unrepentant throughout the trial and had sworn to commit similar acts in the future should he be given the opportunity. When his attorney tried to chalk up the murder to insanity, Assi interrupt-
ed him and said that he did not have any regret for killing Rabbi Ben Gal, something he said was revenge for the murders of Palestinians.
“Did you want us to sit quietly and watch?” he asked. Assi, an Israeli citizen employed in Nablus, had murdered Rabbi Ben Gal in 2018 while the rabbi waited for a bus in the Samarian city of Ariel. Purchasing the knife earlier in the day, the terrorist walked up to the rabbi and stabbed him several times in the heart before escaping. He then managed to successfully evade a massive manhunt for more than a month before being nabbed by IDF Special Forces.
Holland Cuts Aid to PA over “Pay to Slay” Policy The Netherlands has announced that it will cut the generous financial aid it awards the Palestinian Authority over its controversial policy of paying jailed terrorists who murdered Jews. Known as “Pay to Slay,” the PA has long lavished thousands of shekels every month to any terrorist who murdered Israelis, with the payment scale corresponding to the amount of casualties in the attack. In the event that the murderer was killed by Israeli security forces, the money goes to the family for the rest of their lives. In a statement, Holland’s humanitarian ministry said that the money it gives the PA “did not lead to the desired outcome.” The Netherlands had been giving the PA a monthly $1.6 million to spend at its discretion. Following the decision, however, any future funds will be earmarked for specific projects and will be closely scrutinized. The decision to scrap its aid to the PA is the result of a multi-year campaign by Dutch legislators. Led by
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The Week In News Dutch MP Joël Voordewind, the legislature heard a slew of presentations by organizations such as Palestinian Media Watch that highlighted the financial support the PA gives convicted murderers. In 2018, the Dutch parliament voted 94-56 to cut the funding it gives the PA to pressure it to abandon its “Pay to Slay” policy. The 7% cut was chosen after Palestinian Media Watch found that 7% of the PA’s yearly budget goes to terrorists and their families.
Navy Secretary Axed Over Navy SEAL Standoff Navy Secretary Richard Spencer was axed by the Pentagon on Sunday
amid continuing turmoil regarding the fate of disgraced Navy SEAL Eddie Gallagher. Defense Secretary Mark Esper said in a statement that he ordered Spencer to tender his resignation after losing “trust and confidence in him regarding his lack of candor.”
Esper was reportedly terminated by the Pentagon for going outside the chain of command to hatch a secret deal with President Trump regarding the return of Gallagher to the elite unit. Gallagher, who was pardoned by Trump for war crimes, had been prevented from rejoining the SEALs by Navy brass who objected to his behavior. The decision to remove Gallagh-
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er from his team infuriated Trump, who tweeted that the SEAL “had been treated very unfairly.” Trump then ordered that Gallagher be returned to his old team, leading to a standoff with Navy leadership. Spencer had reached out to Trump in an attempt to hatch a secret deal that would resolve the crisis between the president and the armed forces. According to reports, Spencer had proposed that Gallagher’s pre-expulsion review go forward while secretly promising that Gallagher would remain a Navy SEAL. As soon as Defense Secretary Esper heard of the deal, he ordered that Spencer tender his resignation under claims that he had violated the chain of command. In his resignation letter, however, Spencer insinuated that Trump’s order keeping Gallagher in the SEALs was illegal and seemingly took a swipe at the president. “I cannot in good conscience obey an order that I believe violates the sacred oath I took in the presence of my family, my flag and my faith to support and defend the Constitution of the
United States,” Spencer wrote.
LVMH to Buy Tiffany
Luxury begets more luxury. That’s what happened this week when LVMH and Tiffany & Co. announced that LVMH will buy the famous Manhattan jeweler. The French luxury group will pay $135 per share, valuing Tiffany at about $16.2 billion. A deal had been expected for weeks. Tiffany and LVMH both confirmed in October that they were in talks to combine after Paris-based LVMH reached out with an unsolicited
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The Week In News initial offer of $14.5 billion. That was already a premium over Tiffany’s stock price at the time. The deal is one of the largest in the history of the luxury sector and in the career of LVMH CEO Bernard Arnault, Europe’s richest man. LVMH is the world’s biggest luxury group and home to 75 different brands, including Christian Dior and Bulgari. Analysts have been bullish on its latest deal, saying that Tiffany is a good acquisition target because of its strong global brand. “A takeover of Tiffany could make a lot of sense,” analysts at Bernstein wrote in a research note last month. While Tiffany is one of the world’s best-known luxury brands, analysts say it still has room to grow, particularly in jewelry and watches. And LVMH’s deep pockets could help Tiffany turn around after a rocky few years, and fuel its effort to better connect with millennial consumers. In a statement Monday, Tiffany chairman Roger N. Farah said the deal would give the company “an exciting path forward with a group that appreciates and will invest in Tiffany’s unique assets and strong human capital.” The deal would also bolster LVMH’s jewelry and watch lineup, which already includes legacy brands such as Hublot and TAG Heuer. It would also boost the French company’s presence in the United States, which accounts for about a quarter of its revenue. Tiffany, a 182-year-old jeweler, employs 14,000 people and operates 300 stores around the globe. In recent years, however, its sales have slumped. LVMH, on the other hand,
has enjoyed much more success among millennials, attracting attention from prominent influencers. It owns major fashion houses such as Fendi and Louis Vuitton, as well as beverage brands Moet and Hennessy.
Smoothing the Process for Migrants
Acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf, who took over the Department of Homeland Security earlier this month, described an urgent and “exciting” plan to confront the gangs fueling the tide of illegal weapons, drugs, and people across the southern border. “The TCOs [transnational criminal organizations] and cartels, they control the southern side of the border — they have to be paid, they have to be compensated for any of these large flows coming across the border,” Wolf told Fox News. “You eliminate that, and you eliminate their ability to recruit in Central America and bring these folks up.” He added, “Targeting TCOs in a real way…is something that I will certainly push and work on from a
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DHS perspective, but we’ll also be working in the larger interagency to really start targeting these groups, because once you start eliminating their ability to bring migrants and the like then I think you’ll start seeing a different dynamic.” In order to ramp up the fight, the government will need to dedicate additional resources to it, Wolf said, noting that his predecessor, Kevin McAleenan, fought against “child recycling rings” at the border. Regarding the migrant crisis, Wolf said: “The department already has a number of resources dedicated to that. I think we can do more, we are doing more, and I think the U.S. government overall can do more and that’s the exciting part of this job.” The Migrant Protection Plan (MPP), which has reduced apprehensions by nearly 70% since May, allows would-be migrants to wait in Mexico while their papers are being processed. According to Wolf, it is this process which “allowed us to take control of the crisis that we saw in April and May. The idea is to make sure we process individuals in a timely manner but make sure they wait south of the border.” However, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals may strike the program down, making the “job of the men and women of Border Patrol as well as [Customs and Border Protection] and [Immigration and Customs Enforcement]…very difficult for them, so it really can’t be overstated how much the program means to the department in controlling the crisis.” He added, “We share a lot of intelligence [with Mexico], we share a lot of information between the two coun-
tries, and as long as they continue to take action to control the folks that are arriving at the southern border, I think we’ll be in a good place.”
Up in the Air
Marrying their love of their countries and aviation, a woman from New Zealand and a man from Australia celebrated their nuptials on an airplane halfway between those two countries. New Zealander Cathy Valliant and Australian David Valliant took Jetstar Flight 201 from Sydney to Auckland last week and exchanged vows at 37,000 feet when they hit the halfway point between the two countries. The ceremony was officiated by a Jetstar ground crew member. The high-flying couple said airplanes have always been a big part of their relationship – they met in 2011 as players of the Airport City computer game and first met in person at the Sydney airport two years later. “For our wedding we wanted something really memorable,” Cathy shared “We wanted it symbolize our love for aviation, our love for Australia and New Zealand, and our love for each other.”
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The Week In News She added, “Without telling Dave, I posted on Jetstar’s Facebook page and was so excited when they said they’d see what they could do.” Jetstar went the extra mile and worked with the couple to organize their mile-high nuptials, including arranging treats and a “guest book” for passengers to sign. Passengers on the flight were privileged to the sweet ceremony, in which the bride wore a white gown and veil and the groom wore a tuxedo. Can we say that they got married on the fly?
Fake Funerals In the hopes of improving and appreciating their lives, more than 25,000 people in South Korea have participated in mass “living funeral” services.
The funeral services are only for the living and are held at Hyowon Healing Center, which opened in 2012. “Once you become conscious of death, and experience it, you undertake a new approach to life,” said 75-year-old Cho Jae-hee, who participated in a recent living funeral as part of a “dying well” program offered by her senior welfare center. Part of the event includes donning funeral shrouds, taking funeral portraits, penning last testaments, and lying in a closed coffin for around ten minutes. Jeong Yong-mun, who heads the healing center, says he is heartened when people reconcile at a relative’s funeral, but is saddened they wait that long. “We don’t have forever,” he said. “That’s why I think this experience is so important – we can apologize and reconcile sooner and live the rest of
Benjamin Jessurun 410-443-0771 bjessurun@allstate.com
A Night at the Museum
Want to be part of a world-famous painting? The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond, Virginia, is producing an interactive exhibition involving famous American realist artist Edward Hopper. The special exhibit runs through February 23 and includes, for a lucky number of guests, an overnight stay in a Hopper painting. “Western Motel” is the painting-turned-hotel room at the center of the months-long exhibition titled “Hopper Hotel Experience.” In total, the museum is showing 60 works of art by the artist, who’s known for depicting American landscapes and cities – and often for capturing a certain loneliness or detachment one feels in a big, bustling city. One exhibit in particular catches museum-goers’ attention. It’s a three-dimensional living space, resurrected in minute detail from “Western Motel” – save for the woman dressed in a sleeveless burgundy dress with
matching pumps. In the painting, her attire is the same color as the dark wood of the bed’s head and baseboard as well as the bedspread. Guests are allowed – one at a time on Wednesday, Friday, or Saturday nights – to spend a night in the “painting.” They come from all over the world to enjoy this immersive experience which runs for $150 a night for an 11-hour stay. Oh, and that comes with a $25 gift card to the on-site cafe or Amuse restaurant, plus VIP exhibition tickets and golf at the nearby Hotel Greene. High rollers could opt for a pricier $500 package, which includes dinner for two and a private tour with the exhibition’s curator. Snacks are provided, with an emphasis on ones that were popular during Hopper’s time. And because there’s no bathroom en suite, guests are given complimentary slippers and VMFA bathrobes so they can stroll comfortably to the public restrooms nearby. Although the room is sold out, perhaps Hopper fans need not lose any sleep over the missed opportunity. Take it from the artist himself, who once said, “No amount of skillful invention can replace the essential element of imagination.”
Goat Squad A Florida school is hiring a bunch of new custodians to help tame their unruly grounds. These janitors are known to butt heads with other staff members, though, so be aware if they get in your way. The east side of Imperial Estates Elementary in Titusville hasn’t been
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30
THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
NOVEMBER 28, 2019
explored for decades. Rough terrain has made clearing and maintaining the dry pond bed there dangerous for human service crews, and tortoises that inhabit the area are a protected species under Florida law. To tame the wild acre, the Brevard School District has hit on a creative solution: a bunch of bramblemunching goats.
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“This is a perfect fit, because we really couldn’t get in there with other types of equipment,” said the district’s facilities chief, Assistant Superintendent Sue Hann. Starting next week, about two dozen of the hungry animals will bite back the problem shrubs in an effort to clear the unruly plot, which abuts a basketball court and puts students at risk of close encounters with snakes and other critters. The goats are on loan from the South Central Florida franchise of Rent-a-Ruminant, a national company that specializes in landscaping livestock. Goats are gentler on the environment, eliminate the need for hazardous chemicals, and are able get into places human crews just can’t. “Somehow, four legs is an advantage,” grounds supervisor Matt Nolle said. The animals will be housed in a special trailer at the school for about two weeks to complete the job, at a total cost of about $4,500. Authorities have successfully used goats as an eco-friendly and cost-effective alternative to clear flammable scrub in California, where they were credited with saving the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library from a wildfire that burned nearly 1,700 acres near Los Angeles this month.
Can Its Junk Make You Drunk? Indlovu Gin has a very unusual in-
gredient: elephant dung. Before you choke on the concept, the founders of the product say that the gin produced using elephant dung has a “lovely” flavor. Les and Paula Ansley, both scientists, came across the idea to use elephant byproducts a few years ago. Paula thought of it after they both went on a safari and learned that elephants eat a variety of fruits and flowers and yet digest less than a third of it. The first batch of elephant dung came by mail from the park where they had taken their safari. Now, they collect the dung, using their bare hands. According to the Ansleys, the gin tastes “lovely, wooded, almost spicy, earthy” and changes subtly with the seasons and location. The gin bottles are marked with the date and coordinates of where the elephant dung was collected. “So, you’re able to compare almost different vintages of the gin,” Ansley said. After about five sizeable bags of dung are collected for a batch of 3,000 to 4,000 bottles of the gin, the droppings are dried and crumbled, then washed to remove dirt and sand. Eventually only the remains of the fruits, flowers, leaves and bark eaten by the elephants are left behind. Those botanicals are then sterilized and dried again and placed in an airing cupboard. Eventually, the remains are infused in the gin.
The couple are not above testing the gin on friends before explaining its provenance. Even with an explanation in advance, they get raised eyebrows. They decided to name the gin Indlovu, which means “elephant” in the Zulu language. Considering a taste? A bottle sells for around 500 rand, or about $32. Tourists have been purchasing the product to bring back from South Africa, where it’s produced. After all, how many people can say their alcohol has elephant dung in it?
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32
Torah Thought
Face Off By Rabbi Zvi Teichman
Among the ‘Hall of Famers’ of biblical villains there is no doubt that Lavan the Deciever would vie for top billing. Yet remarkably, Yaakov and his family flourished in Lavan’s homestead for a total of twenty years! After having ‘paid’ his dues for his two brides by serving as the paradigm loyal shepherd, giving seven years of devoted service for each of his wives, for a total of fourteen arduous years, Yaakov is ready to go home empty-handed. Lavan won’t hear of it and ‘generously’ insists that Yaakov be given an opportunity to earn some profits from his future sheep tending. During the course of that time, Lavan, typically, renegotiates the terms of their agreement one hundred times. Despite Lavan implementing his most cunning business tactics in order to gain the advantage and edge out Yaakov from significant dividends, by the end of six years’ work, Yaakov is in possession of over a ‘million’ flock of sheep! Why did Yaakov continue to raise sheep for all those years? Was he expecting to become that wealthy? Why didn’t he call it quits much earlier? The verse never stipulates any time frame for their business deal; it would seem as if it was an open-ended deal. It seems quite odd that someone who six years earlier was ready to simply leave penniless, has now become entrenched in mining more profits from his successful endeavor. Could it possibly be that Yaakov was finally influenced by his Uncle Lavan and became greedy? Certainly not! So what was Yaakov waiting for? The Torah reports how Yaakov overhears Lavan’s sons’ resentment of his success and their slandering him with usurping their father’s wealth. Yaakov noticed, פני לבן, Lavan’s
face, and behold it was not toward him as in earlier days.)(בראשית לא ב So here we have it. It wasn’t Lavan’s trying to swindle him out of his profits. It wasn’t either the superhuman dedication during sleepless frigid nights and scorching hot days in the course of twenty years, of loyally tending to Lavan’s sheep that compelled Yaakov to finally leave. It was merely the inability to deal with the ‘sourpuss’ face of Lavan that convinced Yaakov it was time to finally set sail! The Midrash in fact reveals that the subsequent directive to Yaakov from G-d to ‘return to the land of your fathers and to your native land’, promising that He will accompany Yaakov there, was a direct result of this observation of Lavan’s face. אמר לו הקב"ה חמיך אינו מסביר לך ) ואת יושב כאן?! (ב"ר עג יב,פנים, The Holy One may He be blessed said to him, “Your father-in-law can’t display a favorable countenance and you can remain here?! The Midrash goes on to quote from the apocryphal writings of Ben Sira who taught that ‘the heart changes one’s face, either for good or for evil’. Apparently it is more difficult and distressing to live with someone who is incapable of displaying any favor or warmth on their face than to deal with a conniving thief who for twenty years demands unreasonable accountability and toil. It is simply intolerable to live with the negativity and distress that radiates from someone you must face daily. Until that moment Yaakov felt confident he was serving his noble mission in interacting with this devious criminal by promoting the values and morals of a living G-d, that might perhaps affect in extracting some ‘positive sparks’ of light in illuminating the world. As long as Lavan was
capable of some level of humanity, decency and kindness that was merely manifested in the smile on his face, there was hope. When it became evident that the cloud of self-interest and self-promotion that hovered over Lavan could no longer allow an iota of positivity towards others to penetrate through, it became clear it was high time to move on elsewhere, and Yaakov’s mission here was completed. When Yaakov first notices that Lavan’s facial expression is no longer favorable it describes it as, and behold he is, איננו עמו, not with ‘him’, whereas when he reports this discovery to Rochel and Leah, Yaakov states more accurately that Lavan’s disposition, איננו אלי, is not toward ‘me’. Perhaps the Torah seeks to reveal the underlying cause for man’s inability to look positively towards others. What Yaakov was implying in his first observation is that Lavan wasn’t with, עמו, ‘himself’, he was so frustrated and empty of any sense of self-worth. A person who has no wellspring of happiness with oneself is incapable of seeing, caring and appreciating others. The result of the vacuum that existed within Lavan disabled him from being ‘toward me’. Lavan was a tortured soul who exhibited an anti-social attitude that was fed by an artificially inflated ego. But he was one clever dude and ultimately understood his flaw, although he never invested any effort to improve. The last Menahel Ruchani of the famed Yeshiva of Grodna in Europe, who perished in the Holocaust, Rav Shlomo Harkavy, may his blood be avenged, offers a profound insight into Lavan’s complicated personality. When Lavan finally catches up with his fleeing son-in-law he castigates Yaakov for running away. First Lavan faults him for not letting him kiss his children goodbye. Lavan then goes on to blurt out and condemn Yaakov, )הסכלת עשו (שם שם כח, you have acted foolishly, by fleeing. What foolishness is he referring to? Lavan knew that G-d had told him not to harm Yaakov, but Yaakov wasn’t aware of that. Lavan was intimating that Yaakov’s running away, which thereby revealed his awareness of Lavan’s hatred for him, was a foolish tactic. As long as a person doesn’t reveal to the one he suspects of hating him that he is aware of the hatred, there is a chance the continued positive vibes that person will send, will prevent the
hater from acting on his hatred, seeing as his object of his enmity exhibits positive feelings towards him. The moment the tormented retreats from any attempt to influence his tormentor through kindness and acceptance, is the moment he is doomed to the hatred and evil intentions of the hater who will no longer feel compelled to hold back from unleashing his hatred. Yaakov doesn’t deny that truth, but merely says he fled because he didn’t trust Lavan would let his daughters ever leave. Lavan understood his complex psychological profile, but as the Torah concludes, he returned ‘to his place’, to his stubborn defiant stance, refusing to invest the effort to ‘relocate’ his thinking, succumbing once again to the easy path of no resistance. Rav Moshe Dovid Valli one of the primary students of the RaMChal, reveals that the first letters in the words describing Lavan’s countenance, את פני לבן, the face of Lavan, spell out the word אפל, ‘foggy’ gloom. This alludes to the extinguishing of any possible light that may emanate from this character. When the unbridled hatred became apparent, bereft of any redeeming sparks, that was the final signal to move on. He then adds: This serves as a sign for the Jewish nation in the days approaching the ultimate redemption, that His Name, may it be blessed, will initiate the birth pangs of Moshiach with the enraged faces of the foreign nations, to compel us to repent and hurriedly leave the lands of our enemies... We are living in momentous times facing enemies and entities that are intolerant of our success and all that we stand for. Whether it is high time to pick up and return home is an open question that must be resolved. In the interim it is certainly incumbent upon us to strengthen our own ranks by exhibiting radiant kindness and concern to our brothers and sisters, improving our relationships in bringing a unity amongst us that will bring to the world an awareness of the Holy One. Even when facing those among us who may display disdain and negativity, we can capture their hearts with a pervasive friendship and sincere concern for them, restoring their selfworth, transforming them into loving allies. May we overcome the flaw of our ancestor Lavan and brighten the world with sparks of positivity!
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34
The Big Picture
It Is A Very Thin Line
By Rabbi Motty Rabinowitz
Much of the book of Breishis deals with the challenges of intrafamilial relationships, specifically sibling rivalry. This week we read and delve into the tense and acrimonious relationship between Yaakov and Esav, who started their lives sharing the same nurturing womb, yet sped off in wildly different directions. A simple reading of the verses implies that Esav was almost from the outset an evil individual, who murdered the wicked king Nimrod and his family. Yaakov, on the other hand, was a pure person, minding his own business and focusing on more intellectual pursuits. They were, apparently, at opposite ends of the behavior spectrum, exhibiting extremely different temperaments. However, the Targum Yonasan describes the difference between these twins in a much more subtle manner. On the words vividly describing Esav
as, “A hunter, a man of the field” (Breishis 25:27), he explains that Esav was, “A man who was idle/bored”, and on the words describing Yaakov, “a simple person”, he elucidates this as “a person who desired to learn”. Given the straightforward understanding that we have of their behaviors from the verses, why does the Targum attempt to portray their personalities in a fundamentally different light? Rav Yeruchem Levovitz, the renowned Mashgiach of Mir Yeshiva, suggests that there was indeed more to their different trajectories in life than meets the eye. One could indeed superficially summarize their differences based on analysis of their actions. However, he contends, their behavior did not sprout out of nowhere. The seeds of their differing paths were based on seemingly innocuous traits. Esav was idle - he did not have anything to live for. He did not have
goals, ambitions or a drive for any substantial meaning in life. Naturally, in this state of boredom, he started exploring other avenues and behaviors, joining the enticing world of leisure, and this culminated with murder, rape, and becoming an outcast from civil society. Esav’s evil actions were merely a product of the fact that his value system and self-belief were running on empty. Yaakov, as Esav’s twin, was not intrinsically different. The only dissimilar trait was that Yaakov was always searching to learn, striving to advance, reaching for greatness. His internal dynamo was fully powered for growth, he had a purpose. Outwardly, they might have appeared quite similar, a picture-perfect set of twins. It was their internal workings that set them apart. This understanding elucidates another interesting Midrash, which compares Esav and Yaakov to the two goats brought to the Temple on Yom Kippur. Esav is compared to the scapegoat, flung off the cliff while bearing the sins of the people. Yaakov is compared to the goat sacrificed to G-d. Yet, while having opposite purposes, we are told in the Talmud that the two goats has to be alike in appearance and value. They are identical, and at the same time the opposite. Apparently, the line between Esav and Yaakov is not so clear or stark after all. Perhaps, we can even comprehend why Yitzchak was hoodwinked by Esav’s superficial and misleading
behavior. How did he miss the seemingly obvious? Well, was it that obvious? Both Yaakov and Esav could have perhaps become accomplished and great individuals - Esav was not congenitally evil. It was this small unseen deviation in spirit and values that split them apart. It is indeed the subtleties of Chinuch, not the external manifestations, that often determine the future path of our children. Looking at society around us, it is simple to visualize what happens when youth walk around aimlessly, with no family supporting them, no values or ambition, and an alluring world of leisure to distract them. It is therefore no surprise when juvenile detention centers are packed to the gills. But that generation is not to blame – that failure falls squarely on the society that let its youth mill around idly without a sense of purpose, or without a meaningful goal in mind. The seeds for failure or success are much more subtle and must be carefully considered from an early age. All of our children are destined for greatness. Esavs are not a foregone conclusion. All we need to do, as Rav Yeruchem contends, is to lovingly and individually sow the seeds of growth, a desire for learning, a belief in one’s goodness, and a yearning for greatness. The author can be reached at mottyrab@gmail.com
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THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
Light Up A Life JEWISH CARING NETWORK
CHANUKAH TOY DRIVE
NOVEMBER 28, 2019
JCN BRINGS COMFORT, SMILES AND JOY TO FAMILIES FACING SERIOUS ILLNESSES.
PLEASE HELP US THIS CHANUKAH BY DONATING A NEW TOY, GAME OR GIFT CARD.
❏ $18 Sponsor a Target gift card ❏ $54 Sponsor a pizza night for a family this Chanukah
410-602-6075
or www.jewishcaringnetwork.org
Name __________________________________ Address ________________________________ City ___________________________________
❏ $72 Sponsor a gift package filled to the brim with fun toys
State __________ Zip Code ________________
❏ $100 Sponsor a gift package filled to the brim with a menorah,
Email __________________________________
latkes, chocolate Chanuakh gelt, sufganiyot and draidles ❏ $180 Sponsor a family fun-day during Chanukah ❏ I would like to donate $________ and put a smile on a child’s face
Phone _________________________________ Please make donations to: Jewish Caring Netowork 122 Slade Ave., Suite 100A • Pikesville, MD 21208
www.jewishcaringnetwork.org
Jewish Caring Network is a non-profit, 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to providing a full range of support services to families facing life-threatening, lifelong, and serious illnesses while preserving their privacy and their dignity.
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YES! I WOULD LIKE TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE IN A FAMILY’S CHANUKAH THIS YEAR BY DONATING:
For More Information or To Make a Donation, Please Contact Us At
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Toy Drive Drop-off Locations:
Agudath Israel of Greenspring • Agudath Israel of Park Heights Bais Yaakov Elementary School • Bais Yaakov Middle School Bais Yaakov High School • Beth Tfiloh • Bnai Jacob Shaarei Zion Bnos Yisroel • Cong. Shomrei Emunah • Cong. Tiferes Yisroel Kehilath B’nei Torah • Ner Tamid Synagogue • Netivot Shalom Ohel Moshe Congregation • Ohr Chadash Academy Suburban Orthodox Congregation Toras Chaim
2019
2
9
Monday
Cheshvan 27
Kislev 4
Kislev 11
Kislev 25
Kislev 18
SHEMESH/YACHAD/CJE Parent Lecture @PHJCC 7:30pm - 9:15pm
16
23
3
10
Tuesday
Cheshvan 28
Kislev 5
Kislev 12
Kislev 26
Kislev 19
Councilman Schleifer's State of the District Address @Pimlico Race Track 7:30-9:30pm
17
24
Kislev 6
Cheshvan 29
Wednesday
27
4
Kislev 13
Chai Lifeline Trivia Panoply
11
Kislev 20
N’shei Shuir by Rebbetzin Karlinsky @3029 Fallstaff 8:30pm see page 15
18
Kislev 27
Chayeinu Presents: The New Talk Begins @Moses Montefiore 8pm see page 2
25
27
20
13
6
29
4:31 PM
Kislev 29
4:27 PM
Kislev 22
4:25 PM
Kislev 15
4:25 PM
Kislev 8
4:26 PM
Kislev 1
Friday
Cheshvan/Kislev 5780
Kislev 7
Cheshvan 30
Thursday
28
5
Kislev 28
Kislev 21
Next BJH Issue
Kislev 14
Bella Wigs Sale @6006 Berkeley Rd 8-10pm see page 18
12
19
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Next BJH Issue
Kislev 2
Saturday
30
Kislev 9
5:26 PM
Kol Torah Shiur for Ladies given by Rabbi Berger @8:15pm
7
Kislev 16
5:25 PM
N’shei Newcomers Night @ Ohr Hamizrach 8:00pm see page 15 Bella Wigs Sale @6006 Berkeley Rd 8-10pm see pg 18 Yeshivas Toras Simcha Women’s Melave Malka @8:30pm
14
Kislev 23
5:26 PM
WIT Melave Malka @BJSZ 8:00pm see page 13
21
B A LT I M O R E J E W I S H H O M E . C O M
5:33 PM
Kislev 30
5:28 PM
Bais Yaakov Mall Night @ BYHS 7:30-10:30pm
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THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
NOVEMBER 28, 2019
to have your future event listed in the Community Calendar please contact Ads@BaltimoreJewishHome.com
Kislev 24
26
Community Calendar November / December
Sunday
Kislev 3
24 Cheshvan 26 25
1
Kislev 10
Max Jacob Memorial Lecture @Ner Tamid 7:30pm
8
Kislev 17
Great Chanukah Cookie Bake Off @PHJCC 2-3:30pm
15
22
Ner Israel 86th Annual Dinner
36
37
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Barry Nabozny Broker/Realtor 410-977-7600
38
ERETZ YISRAEL NOVEMBER 28, 2019
Binyanei Haumah December 28, 2019 תש”פ,ל‘ כסלו
Yad Eliyahu January 9, 2020 תש”פ,י”ב טבת
ENGLAND Manchester
EventCity January 5, 2020
THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
תש”פ,ח׳ טבת
London
Heythrop Park Resort Hotel
January 10-12, 2020
תש”פ,ט״ו טבת-י״ג
FRANCE
Dome de Paris January 12, 2020
TO RESERVE, CALL:
תש”פ,ט”ו טבת
347.85.SIYUM DirshuWorldSiyum.org
SOUTH AFRICA The Deck January 15, 2020 תש”פ,י”ח טבת
NORTH AMERICA
Prudential Center, NJPAC and Newark Symphony Hall February 9, 2020
Eretz Yisrael: 02-560-9000 Europe: 020-8050-2615
תש”פ,י”ד שבט
Additional Siyumim to be held in:
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EASTERN EUROPE SOUTH AMERICA
W o Pr me ud n’s en Se So tia cti ld l C on Ou en at t! ter
THE DIRSHU WORLD SIYUM IN NORTH AMERICA
will בע"הbe held at The Prudential Center, NJPAC and Newark Symphony Hall in Newark, NJ on Sunday, Feb. 9, 2020. Additional locations worldwide.
39
NOVEMBER 28, 2019
DIRSHU HAS SECURED A THIRD LOCATION IN NORTH AMERICA
THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
Due to the overwhelming response and with the women’s section at Prudential Center completely sold out
which is in close proximity to the Prudential Center (a mere 10-minute walk).
Exclusive Women’s Venue
• A unique live program exclusive to NJPAC
This event at Newark Symphony Hall will feature a truly unique experience and uplifting hisoirirus, created and tailored for the neshei chayil of Torah yidden and their daughters. The program will feature live inspirational women speakers, exclusive musical performances and selected drashos from Gedolim at Prudential Center.
• Several of the Gedolim will attend both venues • Live highlights broadcast from Prudential Center • Live Musical Performance
ELEVATING THE TORAH LANDSCAPE FOREVER. Be part of an experience that will change your life!
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Exclusive Men’s Venue
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OCTOBER 29, 2015 | The Jewish Home
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NOVEMBER 28, 2019
A SMALL NEWSPAPER AD…
THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
50 Years Later
B A LT I M O R E J E W I S H H O M E . C O M
BY SUSAN SCHWAMM
IT
was forty-eight years ago when an advertisement was placed in a newspaper in Jerusalem. The posting announced openings in a yeshiva in town for people looking to learn about Yiddishkeit. The person placing the ad, Rabbi Dovid Refson, was looking for young men who needed chizuk and wanted to learn more about their heritage. “A ‘yeshiva’ in England is only for boys,” Rabbi Refson notes. A native of the United Kingdom, he was asked by his rosh kollel to start a program for these men who needed a softer, warmer touch and were thirsting to know more about Yiddishkeit. “I didn’t know that a yeshiva in Israel and in the United States could also be for women.” When a few women answered the ad that he had placed, Rabbi Refson ascertained that there was a need for
a yeshiva for women looking to know more about Judaism. And so, Neve Yerushalayim was born. That first year, there were four women in Neve. Since then, 27,000 women have passed through its doors.
R
abbi Refson, when opening the women’s school, understood where many of the women were coming from. He grew up in a small town in the northeast of England. There was no Jewish school there, and he went to a non-Jewish school until he was 17 years old. There was a cheder in town that he attended as well. “The good part of my public school education,” he quips, “is that I know how to speak English really well.” His father was a wealthy businessman who assumed that young Dovid would eventually take over his businesses. But fate intervened. When R’ Dovid finished high
school, he went to Israel. While there, his father asked him to give grus, regards, to Rav Elya Lopian. Rav Elya had spent twenty-five years in England. But life was hard in England, and R’ Dovid’s father would help Rav Elya financially and with the minutiae of life there. Eventually, in 1950, fulfilling a life-long dream, Rav Elya moved to Eretz Yisroel and assumed the role of menahel ruchani of Kfar Chassidim. When R’ Dovid met with Rav Elya, the esteemed menahel asked the young man which yeshiva he had attended. “Gateshead,” R’ Dovid replied, since he had learned in Gateshead for a few months. “For how long?” Rav Elya probed. “K’mat a yahr, almost a year,” R’ Dovid answered. “K’mat a yahr?” Rav Elya proclaimed. “Well, that means you’re an am ha’aretz!”
We don’t usually take in boys like you, Rav Elya told the young man – who was really there just to give regards – but I am appreciative of all that your father has done for me. As young Dovid sat in front of Rav Elya, his fate very rapidly shifted. Rav Elya called the rosh yeshiva, Harav Mishkovsky, and asked him to accept a young man with not much experience in learning into his elite yeshiva. When recounting the story, Rabbi Refson recalls that he didn’t hear much “simcha” on the other end of the line, but he was accepted into the yeshiva. “And that,” he states, “transformed my whole life.” Rabbi Refson learned in Kfar Chassidim for a few years. His father, at one point, visited him in the yeshiva and pointed out to Rav Elya that he had other plans for his son that did not include a shtender and an open sefer. Rav Elya asked him, “Do you want
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Learning in the early years of Neve
which eventually fell apart. Rav She’ar Yashuv asked Rabbi Refson to open a program for this young boy and his five friends, a program that would offer them chizuk and help them navigate their way in Yiddishkeit. Never one to shy away from a challenge, Rabbi Refson accepted the task and created a full-day program for these boys and other baalei teshuva, which eventually became Dvar Yerushalayim. The iconic advertisement that was placed in the Jerusalem paper forty-eight years ago was published to help drive attendance to this yeshiva. When women showed up yearning to learn and to be inspired, Rabbi Refson opened Neve.
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he first year of Neve Yerushalayim was painful but productive. The first few women who joined Neve had been searching for a long time. They each had been to myriad universities, flitting from one to the next. They all had their own “meshugenah” diet – this one was macrobiotic, this one was vegan, the other was gluten-free. And so, there was no dining room for them, as it would have been impossible to accommodate all their disparate dietary needs. But they were united with one goal: they all came to Neve searching for meaning and for answers. These women had questions. Questions, Rabbi Refson knew, to which he may not have known the answers. And so, he commissioned others who were “older and wiser” than him in these
Rabbi Refson and other rebbeim addressing students, circa 1970
matters. He worked with Rabbi Chalkowski, who is still his partner until today, and Mrs. Levy, a choshuve woman. For many years, Rabbi Munk, zt”l, taught every morning in Neve. He was extremely knowledgeable and was able to give over his ideas to the women and the rebbeim clearly. Once a week, Rabbi Refson and the other teachers in Neve would visit Rav Wolbe, zt”l, who had opened the first baal teshuva seminary after the war. Rav Wolbe would patiently answer their questions and give them his advice. Over the years, Neve became home to scores of rebbeim and teachers who understood their students and helped them learn about Judaism in an enlightening, inspirational way. The students developed a connection with their teachers both in and out of the classroom, many of them first experiencing a Shabbos meal or visiting
Rabbi Refson teaching a class, circa 1970
a frum home for the first time during their year in Neve. That first year entailed a lot of work. But the work was satisfying, as the staff at Neve realized that a semi-
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to see nachas from your son?” R’ Dovid’s father answered, “When Rav Elya says ‘nachas’ does he mean in this world or the next?” Rav Elya thought for a while before answering, “Both.” “In that case,” R’ Dovid’s father said, “he can stay.” R’ Dovid was taken by the values that were imparted at the yeshiva. On one Shabbos, for instance, the baal korei made a few mistakes when he was laining. One bochur “tsked” as another mistake was made. Rav Elya turned to Rabbi Dov Yaffe, his assistant, and told him, without knowing who the boy was, “The one who clucked like a chicken – he needs to leave the yeshiva.” Without knowing if the boy was an older bochur or someone new, Rav Elya declared that when a person is suffering and stumbling, you can’t make him feel worse and put him down – especially not in a time of pain – miskabed be’kalon chaveiro. R’ Dovid remembers writing to his parents, “They’re for real here. They really mean what they say.” R’ Dovid spent four formidable years in Kfar Chassidim and then went on to the Mir, where he received semicha. After marrying, Rabbi Refson joined Machon Harry Fischel, one of the top kollelim in Yerushalayim. After a few years, Rav She’ar Yashuv Cohen, who ran the yeshiva at the time, asked Rabbi Refson to help him with his nephew. Rav She’ar Yashuv’s nephew had come from Toronto with some friends to study in a program,
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Rabbi Refson giving a tour of the campus to U.S. Senator Daniel Inouye and philanthropist Mr. Zev Wolfson, a”h
Rabbi Chalkowski, Rabbi Geisler, Rabbi Kramer, Rabbi Refson, and Rabbi Abramov
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Rabbi Lawrence Kelemen giving a class
nary for women who were not yet frum was necessary for the Jewish nation. It was at the end of that first summer that they realized that Neve was here to stay.
he point of Neve is not merely to provide knowledge. Rabbi Refson asserts, “People don’t make life changes on the basis of knowledge. “Kiruv,” he says, “is about inspiration.” This was not a popular concept fifty years ago, but Rabbi Refson understood the psyche of those attending his school. He notes that Chazal say that no one ever worshipped avodah zara except to give themselves a heter for arayos. His rebbe, Rav Elya, explains that it means that philosophy is a project of psychology. In other words, if someone wants to be mechallel Shabbos, chas v’shalom, then instead of saying that they have a taiveh for doing melacha on Shabbos, they’ll excuse their behavior by saying that they don’t believe that Hashem created and runs the world. Their “philosophy” is their excuse to make
Rebbetzin Tziporah Heller giving a class
themselves feel better about committing aveiros. Philosophy is a very easy mechanism to use to get out of obligations and responsibilities. Take, for example, the young woman who came to Neve one year. She had been taking tennis lessons since the age of 12; her whole world was tennis. In fact, her family moved to Florida so she could attend a prestigious tennis academy in Fort Myers. She received a tennis scholarship to Stanford, and then, during her senior year, she fell and tore her tendon, ending her career in competitive tennis. Her spirit broken, her family took her on a trip to Israel, where she met the famous “Kosel kiruv rabbi,” Rav Meir Schuster, zt”l, who brought her to Neve. This young woman was doing won-
And then it all came pouring out. She had recently gone to Hadassah Hospital, where the doctor told her she would be able to play tennis after all. But then, after playing for a bit, she tore her tendon once again. It’s all what we want out of life, Rabbi Refson says, and then the philosophy arranges itself to fit. Was she questioning Hakadosh Baruch Hu? No, she was questioning herself and the unknown path that she will now have to navigate in life. In speaking about the concept of kiruv, Rabbi Refson points out, “The idea that you can ‘make people frum’ is ridiculous. How can you ‘make people’? What you can do, though, is present Yiddishkeit in a way which removes the klipos (shell) for them, and they can begin to see the truth. “Don’t think that it’s you. You’re
“The idea that you can ‘make people frum’ is ridiculous.” derfully in Neve. But one day, she approached Rabbi Refson and told him that she was not sure that the Torah is m’Sinai. Rabbi Refson looked at the young woman and sat her down, “What,” he asked, “is the real story here? What really are you questioning?”
just giving them the tools, removing the outer trappings, and shining the light on certain things. It’s not you – it’s them seeing the truth.” He adds that the young women who come to Neve nowadays are a different breed than those who came decades ago – or even four, five years ago. Ev-
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ery few years, the generations seem to change. Recently, a young donor came to Neve with his wife and met with a few women in Neve. Each woman had her own story to tell him about her life before Neve. They spoke of the universities they’d been to, the law firms they’d worked at, the cities they’d lived in. After fifteen minutes of speaking, the donor prodded, “But why did you come here? You had everything in life. Why did you want to become frum?” The women looked at each other, and each of them gave a powerful explanation of how ruchniyus enhances a person’s life. “There’s nothing else in life that can make your life more enriched,” they emphasized. You can have money and position and status, but if you want to feel good about yourself, Yiddishkeit is the answer, they said. “When you’re zocheh to meet someone who influences you and opens up your mind to things – that’s life-changing,” the women said. These are the types of women who come to Neve.
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abbi Refson is a builder and a visionary – and he builds concepts and institutions that are before their time. Just a few years after Neve opened, Rabbi Refson saw a need for a seminary for Bais Yaakov girls. There were many naysayers. After all, BJJ was open at the time, and the frum world didn’t see the need for more post-high school institutions for frum girls. When he spoke at the Torah Umesorah Convention about his vision, there were only two high school prin-
cipals who encouraged Rabbi Refson to move forward. One of them offered to send his daughter to Rabbi Refson’s new school. And so, Machon Devoroh was born. Each school that Rabbi Refson has opened throughout the years has two people at the helm in addition to himself. Eventually, if the school feels that it wants to become more independent, it moves off the Neve campus with Rabbi Refson’s blessing. When Rabbi Refson decided to open a seminary for Bais Yaakov girls, he thought that the frum girls on campus would influence the baalei teshuva, perhaps helping them learn Shabbos zemiros or experience a Shabbos atmosphere. “But this was a total miscalculation on my part,” he notes. “No Neve girl has ever been influenced by a frum girl. In fact, it’s the frum girls who have become transformed by seeing the inspiration in the Neve girls on campus.” Just a few months ago, a graduate of Bnos Sara, a current Bais Yaakov seminary on Neve campus, wrote a letter to Rabbi Refson. She told him how she loved seminary, how the classes were great, and that the girls were wonderful. “But the most transformative episode in my seminary year took place in the Neve shul,” she wrote. The girl came to shul to daven Shacharis and sat near a Neve girl who was davening – in English. Slowly, with meaning, the Neve girl davened, “How great is our lot in life” – the English translation of “Ashreinu mah tov chelkeinu.” “I heard this girl expressing her love
for Yiddishkeit with such meaning, and I said to myself, Why is it that I don’t do this? Why do I not daven and live my life the same way?” the girl wrote, expressing her admiration for this girl – filled with inspiration and enthusiasm – who was just beginning to learn about her heritage. Many Bais Yaakov graduates, Rabbi Refson notes, come out of high school with loads of information but they can’t integrate their piles of knowledge into their lives and bring it to bear on useful subjects. Learning from the same teachers who teach baalei teshuva helps to open their lives to the richness of Yiddishkeit and the meaning behind it all. Some of these girls, he says, are still incorporating lessons they learned years ago into their lives – when they should have grown past some of those ideas. Take tefillah, for example. Many Bais Yaakov girls believe that tefillah is an opportunity to ask Hashem for whatever we want. This, of course, is true. But tefillah is much deeper than that. It’s to connect with our Creator. Rabbi Refson shares, “I told the girls two weeks ago, ‘Imagine: your sister marries the best boy in Lakewood. You go to their house and you see gold stars on their fridge. “What are those gold stars for?” you ask your sister. “Oh,” she answers. “They’re for Moshe. Every time he takes out the garbage, I give him a gold star.” ‘“You tell your sister, “Are you out of your mind?” And she innocently answers, “But that’s what Mommy did with us.”’ “It’s the same concept here. There
are many ideas that are true and they were ideas that were taught in Pre-1A and throughout the years, but you’ve got to develop them. You’re a mature person, and your ideas and life outlook need to develop in the same way.” That, he says, is the challenge for countless Bais Yaakov students. Yiddishkeit, for many, has been reduced to “heimeshkeit.” The amount of religious inspiration in many girls’ lives is very little. It’s their teachers’ jobs to help them understand the deeper levels and intricacies that Yiddishkeit encompasses. Additionally, many girls adhere to other values in their lives than the values espoused by Yiddishkeit. And that’s a problem if you are looking to become a more developed Jew.
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ince opening Machon Devoroh, many other schools have called the Neve campus in Har Nof their home. In the ‘70s, Rabbi Refson opened a school for Russian baalei teshuva. Years later, he opened Midreshet Tehillah, a school for Modern Orthodox graduates. Maalot was started to give women a post-seminary degree. Offshoots of Maalot dot the globe. Twenty-eight years ago, Rabbi Refson noticed that the charedi community was not going for psychological assistance, fearing that psychologists would minimize and erode their Yiddishkeit. Hoping to give the community the help it needs, Rabbi Refson established a master’s program in clinical science. Now, the program offers master’s and post-master’s training in clinical psychology, along with a clinic that sees 450 patients a week. Lapidot was founded for those who
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CELEBRATING A GLOWING PAST. EMPOWERING A GROWING FUTURE.
INVITING. UNITING. IGNITING.
A FREE REUNITION WITH YOUR BELOVED STAFF
NEW JERSEY
NOVEMBER 28, 2019
You are cordially invited to a celebratory Neve alumnae event, 50 REUNITE. Please join us in honoring a glowing past and empowering a growing future. The event will reunite alumnae from all over, with the purpose of reflecting on our past memories and growing our future together. With Hashem’s blessing, Neve Yerushalayim is to launch a mega global campaign to celebrate its Jubilee anniversary and build an even brighter future.
SUNDAY, DECEMBER 1, 2019 AT 7PM
CONGREGATION BETH AARON 950 QUEEN ANNE ROAD TEANECK NJ, 07666 RSVP AT RSVP.NEVENJ@GMAIL.COM
RABBI DAVID REFSON
NEW YORK
MONDAY, DECEMBER 2, 2019 AT 7PM
CONGREGATION BETH SHALOM 390 WASHINGTON AVENUE LAWRENCE NY 11559 RSVP AT RSVP.NEVENY@GMAIL.COM
RABBI YONA REFSON
BALTIMORE
TUESDAY, DECEMBER 3, 2019 AT 7PM KOL TORAH 2929 FALLSTAFF ROAD BALTIMORE MD 21209 RSVP AT RSVP.NEVENMD@GMAIL.COM
FLORIDA
RABBI ELIEZER LIFF
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 4, 2019 AT 7PM CALIFORNIA
THURSDAY, DECEMBER 5, 2019 AT 7PM
THE LIGHT HOUSE LA 1026 S ROBERTSON BLVD. PENTHOUSE, LOS ANGELES, CA RSVP AT RSVP.NEVECA@GMAIL.COM
REBBETZIN TZIPORAH HELLER SPECIAL DEDICATION IN MEMORY OF RABBI YOSEF TZVI AZAR ZT”L
NEVE ALUMNI ONLY
A WALK THROUGH 5 DECADES AND PHOTO BOOTH CATERED BUFFET AND REFRESHMENTS FEATURING OUR NEW NEVE 50REUNITE VIDEO AND PRESENTATION FOR OUR UPCOMING CAMPAIGN
FOR WOMEN ONLY
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made aliyah whose children were not fitting into the Israeli high schools. Rabbi Refson opened it, he says, “because I saw the need and I saw that nobody else wanted to do it.” Bnos Sara and Bnos Avigayil are the two Bais Yaakov seminaries currently on the Neve campus. There’s a large Israeli program there as well. Rabbi Refson teaches at the schools on the Neve campus, connecting with the students in each one. He focuses on Mishlei, but, he stresses, he uses it as a springboard to impart life lessons to the students. And despite teaching Mishlei for years, Rabbi Refson notes that he never teaches the same subject matter. Every year he focuses on different pesukim, so as not to be imparting “stale” material to the women. He admits that preparing for the classes is a lot of work, but “it’s the most enjoyable part of my day.” He also advises that a good teacher shouldn’t be teaching the same subject matter over and over again – their lessons will become rote and insipid, a turn-off for students. Despite the successes of Rabbi Refson’s numerous programs, there have been failures as well. But Rabbi Refson says that the disappointments are not something he takes to heart. “My father, a”h, was an extremely successful person,” Rabbi Refson shares. “And I noticed very early on how makpid he was to talk about things which had gone well along with things that had failed. I grew up with the belief that failing is part of the process – sheva yipol tzaddik v’kam.”
He adds, “Rav Hutner, zt”l, used to say, ‘You don’t have to win the battles, you have to win the war.’” Nowadays, he notes, children are bred to be scared of failure. The emphasis on how every student is always right, always doing great, creates an environment where a student has never learned the pain of failure.
life, a parent needs to model proper behavior for their children. “I’m not a big fan of chinuch,” Rabbi Refson asserts. “I’m a big fan of modeling,” he says. He explains, “Kids do what their parents do. You don’t have to say much; you just have to do. Why do you have to tell a kid something? Why
“It’s the frum girls who have become transformed by seeing the inspiration in the Neve girls on campus.” They’ve never experienced a disappointment, and so the fear of failure looms large. Eventually, people refuse to take responsibility or be creative because their fear of failure is so engrained. But parents can help assuage their children’s fears in this area – and help bring up well-rounded individuals as well. The key, Rabbi Refson says, is about how a parent acts at home. Just as Rabbi Refson learned from his father to admit defeat and appreciate the disappointments in
isn’t it evident in your home? Well, because, many times, the parents aren’t doing it. They aren’t modeling the proper behavior. This goes for having hakaras hatov, for how you act at your Shabbos table, how you talk, for respecting rabbanim – it’s all how the parents model the correct behavior. The children will follow accordingly.”
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wenty-seven-thousand students is a lot of people to pass through a school’s doors. But
that’s how many women Neve has touched in the five decades since it’s opened. Rabbi Refson maintains that Neve needs to service its graduates after they leave Yerushalayim. Unlike Harvard and other institutions that milk their graduates for money, Neve wants to provide for their graduates to help them navigate the world when they come home. In New York, Esther Rosenbaum, who was a madreicha in Neve, is tasked with looking after alumni in the area. On any Shabbos, she knows where the women are for meals. She helps them with shidduchim and with other issues that may arise. Another woman is dedicated to helping alumni in the Los Angeles community. At a recent Shabbaton for ten couples, Rabbi Refson was taken by the strength of his graduates. But he noticed that these women, many times, need support. Baalei teshuva frequently do not have a family network that can help them with the myriad responsibilities that come along with raising a family. Perhaps, he says, Neve can set up a network, a community, to help these women with their challenges. He adds that Neve wants to increase its offerings in the world. That, he quips, “requires money.” But knowing Rabbi Refson, there’s little that’s going to stand in his way. “After all,” he says with a twinkle in his eye, “if you love what you do, you don’t work a day in your life.”
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TJH
Centerfold
You gotta be kidding “Waiter,” he shouted, “didn’t you hear me say ‘well done’?” he asked the waiter. “I can’t thank you enough, sir,” replied waiter. “We hardly ever get compliments here.” ••• Why did the turkey cross the road? Because it was Thanksgiving Day, and he wanted people to think he was a chicken!
1. Dankie
A. French
2. Aahalo
B. Latin
3. Köszönöm
C. Hungarian
4. Spasibo
D. Afrikaans
5. Grazie
E. Arabic
6. Gratias tibi
F. Yiddish
7. Merci
G. Italian
8. Adank
H. Hawaiian
9. Ngiyabonga
I.
10. Shukraan
J. Zulu
Russian
There was a man walking in the desert. It was an especially hot day that day. In the distance, the man suddenly saw a restaurant. He rejoiced and ran to the restaurant and immediately asked the waiter for a glass of water. Instead, the waiter pulled out a gun and pointed it at the man’s head. The man replied, “Thank you”. Why did the man say “thank you” to the man pointing the gun at him? See answer below
5. G
2. H
4. I
1. D Answers:
9. J 8. F 7. A
10. E
Answer to Riddle Me This: It was a water gun.
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Riddle me this?
Match the language with the corresponding word that they use for “thank you.”
6. B
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Moishe was furious when his steak arrived too rare.
The Language of Gratitude
3. C
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1. D. It means, “As though you are from those whom we may not be able to easily make into a maker of unsuccessful ones.” Huh? I think it’s easier to understand muvaffakiyetsizleştiricileştiriveremeyebile cekler imi zdenmişsinizcesine! 2. B 3. C. Erdogan’s home is 30 times the size of the White House and is believed to
6. B. At its height, the Ottoman Empire encompassed most of southeastern Europe to the gates of Vienna, including present-day Hungary, the Bal-
5. A. A small glass of water is
usually served with Turkish coffee because drinking water before coffee helps the taste buds feel the real taste of coffee, and after that it helps to rinse your throat from the unfiltered pieces of coffee.
be the largest palace built, anywhere in the world, for more than 100 years. $9 million was spent on red carpets and another $6.5 million was spent on 400 pairs of 10-ft-high double doors. 4. C. The eight countries that share a border with Turkey are Armenia, Azerbaijan, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Bulgaria, Greece, and Georgia.
kan region, Greece, and parts of Ukraine; portions of the Middle East now occupied by Iraq, Syria, Israel, and Egypt; North Africa as far west as Algeria; and large parts of the Arabian Peninsula. From 1914 to 1923, the Ottoman Empire exterminated and exiled 1.5 million Armenians (an ethnic group in Turkey), in a slaughter that is now known as the Armenian Genocide.
Answers 0-1 correct: How do you celebrate Thanksgiving if you don’t even know anything about the country that we are celebrating? 2-4 correct: You’re a little sleepy. You may want to try some Turkish coffee. 5-6 correct: Let me guess. You probably know how to spell muvaffakiyetsizleştiricileştiriveremeyebileceklerimizdenmişsinizcesine too.
Wisdom Key c. Tea biscuits b. Sugar cubes a. A glass of water
d. 1,500 years
5. What is traditionally served alongside Turkish coffee? d. 12 c. 8 b. 4
c. 1,200 years b. 600 years a. 30 years d. Snuff tobacco
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d. $1.2 billion c. $640 million b. $107 million a. $42 million 3. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan built himself a new palace in 2014. What was the approximate cost of building the palace? d. Jalalabad
4. How many countries border Turkey?
c. Izmir
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b. Ankara a. Istanbul 2. What is the capital of Turkey? d. Muvaffakiyetsizleştiricileştiriveremeyebileceklerimizdenmişsinizcesine c. Gulup b. Mifso
6. Modern day Turkey was created in 1923, when the Ottoman Empire ended. Approximately how long did the Ottoman Empire last for?
a. 3
a. Gülümk 1. Which of the following is a real Turkish word?
Let’s Talk Turkey
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Notable Quotes
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“Say What?!”
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Immediately after President Trump won election, opponents inaugurated what they called “The Resistance,” and they rallied around an explicit strategy of using every tool and maneuver available to sabotage the functioning of his Administration. Now, “resistance” is the language used to describe insurgency against rule imposed by an occupying military power. It obviously connotes that the government is not legitimate. This is a very dangerous – indeed, incendiary – notion to import into the politics of a democratic republic. What it means is that, instead of viewing themselves as the “loyal opposition,” as opposing parties have done in the past, they essentially see themselves as engaged in a war to cripple, by any means necessary, a duly elected government. I’m old but I’m tough. He picked the wrong house to break into. - 82-year-old Willie Murphy, who works out every day and can deadlift 225 pounds, telling a local Rochester, NY, TV station how she beat up a 28-year-old intruder who tried robbing her at home
I picked up the table, and I went to work on him, the table broke. And when he’s down, I’m jumping on him. I grabbed the shampoo. Guess what? He’s still on the ground. In his face, all of it, the whole thing. I got the broom. He’s pulling the broom. I’m hitting him with the broom.
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- Ibid
- U.S. Attorney General William Barr in a speech to the Federalist Society’s 2019 National Lawyers Convention
One of the ironies of today is that those who oppose this president constantly accuse this Administration of “shredding” constitutional norms and waging a war on the rule of law. When I ask my friends on the other side, “What exactly are you referring to?” I get vacuous stares, followed by sputtering about the Travel Ban or some such thing. While the president has certainly thrown out the traditional Beltway playbook, he was upfront about that beforehand, and the people voted for him. What I am talking about today are fundamental constitutional precepts. The fact is that this Administration’s policy initiatives and proposed rules, including the Travel Ban, have transgressed neither constitutional, nor traditional, norms, and have been amply supported by the law and patiently litigated through the Court system to vindication. - Ibid.
MORE QUOTES
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No man has a right to raise a hand to a woman in anger, other than self-defense and that rarely ever occurs. So we have to just change the culture. Period. And keep punching at it and punching at it and punching at it. – 2020 candidate Joe Biden using a poor choice of words at the last Democratic debate, while talking about domestic violence
No, I really mean it. - Ibid., when the audience began snickering
Nope. That’s not true. The other one is here. – 2020 presidential candidate Sen. Kamala Harris, who is AfricanAmerican, responding to Mr. Biden stating at the debate that he has been endorsed by Sen. Carol Moseley Braun (D-Ill.), “the only African-American woman that’s ever been elected to the U.S. Senate”
Yeah, Biden also caught heat for saying that he “came out of the black community.” When she heard that, Rachel Dolezal was like, “Well, he has my vote.” - Jimmy Fallon
Joe Biden had some pretty big blunders on issues of race and domestic violence — I don’t know if you saw this. Or as Biden’s campaign is calling it, “a pretty average night.” – Jimmy Fallon
Andrew Yang supporters are angry that their candidate didn’t get to talk very much last night. Yeah. And Joe Biden’s supporters are angry that theirs did. - Conan O’Brien
President Trump is somebody that sees something that’s wrong and fixes it and doesn’t care whose feelings it hurts. And that’s what I learned when I was talking to him on the phone. He said something along the lines of: “this is going to make a lot of people irritated at me. But I don’t care.” And to tell you the truth, small towns across America...that’s what they want in their commander-in-chief. That’s what I want in my commander-inchief. Somebody that will see something that’s broken and fix it. - Army First Lt. Clint Lorance, who served six years of a 19-year sentence for second-degree murder that took place when he was a commander in Afghanistan and ordered troops to open fire on three local men riding motorcycles in Afghanistan in July 2012 after his commanding officer had been injured, in his first interview upon being pardoned by President Trump last week
I love you, sir. You’re awesome. - Ibid., addressing the president directly
I’m tired of freeloading billionaires. - Sen. Elizabeth Warren defending her wealth tax at the Democratic debate last week
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The fossil fuel industry is probably criminally liable, because they have lied and lied and lied when they had the evidence that their carbon products were destroying the planet – and maybe we should think about prosecuting them, as well. - Sen. Bernie Sanders at the Democratic debate, in a statement which highlights a tactic often used by communist regimes
They don’t dwell on the past. You won’t hear them say, “Oh, if only it were 1952 again, everything would be great.” They are still making plans for their future together. - The nephew of John Henderson (age 106) and Charlotte Henderson (age 105), of Austin Texas, who will celebrate their 80th wedding anniversary this month, talking to “The Today Show” about what he thinks the secret to their longevity is
MORE QUOTES
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We’re so divided, it’s no longer enough to just make a point. You have to destroy. You have to own people. Except the person who gets owned doesn’t change their mind… We have to drop this fantasy that we can destroy the other side or crush or shred or pulverize them. Those aren’t real things. They’re the middle four settings on the blender that no one has ever used. America is a big country, filled with millions of people who don’t think the way you do and never will, and you can’t own, vanquish, or disappear them. We’re stuck with them, and they’re stuck with us. - Bill Maher, HBO
- Ibid.
If I am in the White House, she will play a very, very important role, no question.
We came into the White House – I’ll tell you something. Every office was filled with Obama books, and we had notes left behind that said, “You will fail,” “You aren’t going to make it.”
- 2020 hopeful Sen. Bernie Sanders talking about Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY-Democrat Socialist)
- White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham, during a recent radio interview, disclosing taunts left by President Obama’s aides for the incoming new Trump staff in 2017
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We all talk about Trump as an existential threat, but his side sees Democratic control of government the exact same way. And when both sides believe the other guy taking over means the end of the world, yes, you can have a civil war. … We are going to have to learn to live with each other…
My Israel Home
Have I Really Bought Only Half an Apartment?
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The Jewish Home | OCTOBER 29, 2015
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By Gedaliah Borvick
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ttorney Shlomi Ashkenazi recently shared with me a distressing story of a couple who bought an apartment “on paper” in a new project under construction in Jerusalem. The couple – let’s call them David and Yael – did not hire an attorney to represent them and relied on the developer’s lawyer to draft the contract and guide them in the transaction. Init ia lly, ever y t hing went smoothly. The couple moved into the apartment and, over the next decade, their family grew. Twelve years after purchasing the unit, Yael and David decided to sell their apartment and purchase a bigger home to suit their larger family’s needs. They found a buyer, agreed on a fair price, and the apartment was sold – or so they thought. After receiving the first few payments from the buyer, Yael and David started the process of purchasing the larger apartment. They once again bought an apartment “on paper” and received a mortgage. A few weeks later, David received a phone call from the buyer of his apartment who informed him that he wanted to cancel the deal. The buyer explained that he received initial approval for a mortgage and that the bank hired an appraiser to inspect the apartment. The appraiser first checked the deed, and everything looked kosher, as the square meter-
age recorded on the deed matched the apartment’s actual size. Then the appraiser checked the building permit and discovered that the apartment was not properly recorded on the permit. The unit was actually half of a big apartment that the developer had illegally divided into two smaller apartments. The developer never informed David and Yael that the apartment was illegally divided into two smaller units and that the building permit was never revised.
one such situation. The developer had built the maximum number of apartments permitted and was prohibited from creating the additional unit. Accordingly, the building permit could not be modified to reflect the revised apartment count. The lack of a correct building permit lowers the value of an apartment, as there are significantly less purchasers for a unit that cannot be financed. Unfortunately, as we learned in Economics 101, decreased demand and unchanged
Unfortunately, as we learned in Economics 101, decreased demand and unchanged supply leads to lower prices.
When information in the deed does not match the building permit, it is difficult to obtain a mortgage. In the best case scenario, a bank would lend the value of the smaller apartment less the cost to change the building permit. However, sometimes the building permit cannot be altered, which makes the property unfinanceable, and this was
supply leads to lower prices. This disaster could have been avoided altogether had David and Yael initially retained their own attorney who had no conflict of interest, as opposed to the developer’s lawyer who represented both parties. In the course of performing due diligence, their lawyer would have checked the building permits
and discovered this issue before a contract of sale was executed. It is true that sometimes developers sell apartments prior to receiving the final building permit; in that situation, your lawyer can insert language in the contract to protect your interests and, even more important, will monitor the situation to ensure the final building permit has been received and is correct. The key is to hire an attorney who will guide you and advocate on your behalf should any surprises arise during – and after – the construction process. There are many good places to save money when purchasing a home; not retaining legal counsel is definitely not one of them. As I always say, a good lawyer is worth her weight in gold. Shlomi Ashkenazi is one of the excellent lawyers I recommend to overseas purchasers. If this article inspires any follow-up questions, please contact him at a6744467@ gmail.com. This article is meant for informational purposes only. Please contact an attorney should you require legal counsel. Gedaliah Borvick is the founder of My Israel Home (www.myisraelhome.com), a real estate agency focused on helping people from abroad buy and sell homes in Israel. To sign up for his monthly market updates, contact him at gborvick@gmail.com.
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OCTOBER 29, 2015 | The Jewish Home
Dating
Dialogue
What Would You Do If… Moderated by Jennifer Mann, LCSW of The Navidaters
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Dear Navidaters, As a girl in shidduchim, I’m constantly asked for my picture. Shadchanim often ask for a picture before setting me up, prospective boys’ mothers ask for a picture, and well-meaning friends ask for a picture. I’m a little uncomfortable sending my picture, but when I don’t, people ask more questions and assume I am hiding something negative or find a way to get one on their own. I am not an unattractive girl, I just never felt it was a necessary thing to do. I don’t have social media, and I don’t usually send pictures of myself around town. However, if I don’t, I fear they will suspect something nonexistent or find a different picture themselves which may be more unflattering. My question is: should I go against my principles and send my own picture to prevent people from holding back suggestions or dates? Do I need to conform to society as part of proper hishtadlus in shidduchim? P.S. Is it fair to ask for a picture of the boy if they receive a picture of me?
Don’t miss it! A single man sounds off on a recent Dating Dialogue column. See page 108 for Meir Jacobs’ op-ed in this week’s issue.
Disclaimer: This column is not intended to diagnose or otherwise conclude resolutions to any questions.
Our intention is not to offer any definitive
conclusions to any particular question, rather offer areas of exploration for the author and reader. Due to the nature of the column receiving only a short snapshot of an issue, without the benefit of an actual discussion, the panel’s role is to offer a range of possibilities. We hope to open up meaningful dialogue and individual exploration.
The Jewish Home | OCTOBER 29, 2015
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The Mother
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The Shadchan Michelle Mond admire you for your stance on the topic and your obvious sensitivity for modesty.Unfortunately, gone are the days when shidduchim were simple. It used to be, someone would give a suggestion and the couple would go out. I remember one of my rabbeim from seminary relaying the story of how he and his wife met in the library at Queens College. Years later, when I asked if I could use his story as a platform to encourage couples to meet on their own, he wouldn’t grant permission. Why, you may ask? Because, to quote him anonymously, “Times have changed.” Note that back then there was no discussion about the color of the man’s shirt, whether parents and grandparents were yeshivish, whether the boy was planning on learning for 2-3 years or 5-7 years or long term and how the girl plans on supporting him until he goes into some type of business. Nowadays, he must have this type of yeshiva background, for this many years, and wear this type of clothing. Sound complicated? It sure is. Today, shadchanim are responsible for keeping endless information on
hand about every man and woman he/she meets. If this is what is expected of thousands of volunteer matchmakers worldwide, we need ways to keep lots of information on hand to jog our memory. The path to redting a shidduch is no longer the following simple procedure. Person: Has an idea and brings it to the parents. Parents: Nice, boy/girl, nice family, let’s have them go out Sunday night and see if they like each other. It is now a system comprised of research into both singles’ backgrounds, their pasts, their present, their future, their social media presence, their future plans mapped out, and how it fits perfectly into the other person’s vision of the future. People these days also go “Flag-Fishing” – which is a term to describe the common habit of calling anyone
A photograph sucks the personality out of a living, breathing, dynamic individual and flattens her into a twodimensional 5x7 printed facsimile.
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ATTENTION DONATORS + PHILANTHROPISTS
Please support Yeshivos that the students are in Shidduchim @ age 21 !!!
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Sarah Schwartz Schreiber, P.A. unt Toby (lovingly): I’m telling you, Perel. I’ve known him practically since his bris. He’s a wonderful boy and he’s ready to give you a “yes.” Peri (tentatively): Okay, so what’s holding him back? Aunt Toby (tenderly): Oh, nothing really, mamme shaina. Um, well…there is one thing. He just needs to see a recent photograph of your shaina punim before he takes you out. Peri (exasperatedly): Tante Toby, with all due respect! You know my opinion on that subject. A picture is so two-dimensional! So superficial! So demeaning! I’d like to see his picture before I go out… Aunt Toby (sternly): Perel Raizel, it’s time you got with the program! Years ago, it was “resumes.” Then came shidduch websites and singles’ events. So now everyone needs a picture. What’s the big deal? Is it so much to ask a pretty girl to submit a photograph so the young man can correctly identify her when he comes to her doorstep? Peri (defeated): (Sighs—argghh!) I give up… They used to say, “A picture is worth a thousand words.” And then came Photoshop. You are not the first young lady to balk at submitting a picture along with her resume. And you are not wrong. A photograph sucks the personality out of a living, breathing, dynamic individual and flattens her into a two-dimensional 5 X 7 printed facsimile. It’s a superficial portrait; an objectification of a many-faceted human being. And today, through the miracle or Photoshop or other photo-enhancing apps, pictures can and do lie. Still, as the very wise Aunt Toby chastened, it’s the socially accepted new normal. I agree with you: it’s wiser to submit a tasteful portrait of yourself
– where you get to choose the setting and hairstyle – than your friend’s picture of you hamming it up on that tiyul in seminary or dangling from a precipice on a recent road trip. As for requesting the guy’s picture: no harm in asking. He will either refuse (on the grounds he’s not photogenic); submit his yearbook picture (the one with the acne and solemn expression); or offer a more recent likeness (computer enhanced to appear taller and dimpled). And if you do get a sneak peek, be honest with yourself; judge the guy for all his wonderful attributes and not merely his physical features.
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The Panel
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58 prospects who will be traveling far distances to meet you, and for the people setting you up, it is your hishtadlus to do what is commonly done and send a picture, just as it is the boys hishtadlus to send one as well. Lastly, please don’t make the mistake of sending a picture in your purim costume (something I have seen), facing sideways looking away, a mirror selfie, a super close up shot,
Pulling It All Together The Navidaters Dating and Relationship Coaches and Therapists
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mug shot (kidding), or a picture from a wedding that is cropped out on both sides. If you live in Baltimore, there is a photographer offering her services to take shidduch-portraits free of charge. If you would like more information about this, please contact me through the editor. Thank you for bringing this important issue to light!
hank you for writing in! I meet with many women who feel the same way you do. It is upsetting to be asked to send in a picture, as if you can possibly be captured in one or two photos. People find sharing pictures upsetting for numerous reasons. The therapist in me wants to explore this with you. She also wants to acknowledge that there is very little that is natural about shidduch dating. She also wants to high-five you for staying off of social media. I find it incredibly commendable and amazing that you’ve chosen to completely stay out of that world. If men and women met on their own, someone would see you and, if interested, approach you. You would be animated and it would be authentically you. The dating coach in me wants you to approach this very practically. People request a picture, and my advice is to send one or two, going against your principles. A resume, or dating profile online for that matter, that comes with no picture(s) raises an eyebrow. What is this person trying to hide? Is there something he/she doesn’t want me to see? It’s human nature. Once you’ve made the decision to send the picture, you have
to decide if you are going to filter it. We live in a world where a lot of people “cheat.” I have only seen this method of photoshopping backfire on the women and men who do it. When the date opens the door and the eyes aren’t quite as big, the nose a touch larger, etc., people report feeling duped. Good relationships can’t start with a lie. But I also understand the urge to do it. It’s kind of like when you know that all the kids in class are getting A’s because their parents are doing their reports, and you want to encourage your child to do it himself but he’s up against the parent body’s work…. This is a personal decision that you will make for yourself. I have seen beautiful, professional shots (and many unprofessional as well), with fantastic lighting, whether staged or natural. Personally, those are my favorites. I understand that women are now asked to send a glamorous shot and a natural shot. In my opinion, this is the least offensive part of the shidduch system. Piggybacking on what the other panelists mentioned, no selfies, no duck face, no peace signs, no hang-gliding and no friends in the pictures.
Michael Freed ol hakavod. It is your internal tznius that makes you uncomfortable – kol kavoda bas melech penima. I am against the whole resume system (and hoping we can get rid of it – wouldn’t that be amazing!?), and photos are one of the tragedies of the system. The only way I know to get around this is to have an advocate who knows you really well and who knows enough men who would trust them without a picture. When someone sees a resume, the assumption is that since you have thousands of pictures of yourself on your phone, whichever photo you are sending with
your resume is the best representation of you – this is for men and women. Therefore, I would like to now list some tips on taking a good shidduch picture: 1) Don’t send a selfie (it is not as dignified/mature as you can be). 2) Be the only person in your picture. 3) Show your chein, smile. 4) Do not send a closeup or a picture so far away that one can’t see what you look like at all. 5) Do not send a blurry picture, or a picture with your eyes facing away from the camera. 6) If possible, ask a friend who does this professionally to take a nice one for you. To answer your question: I would “conform” to society as part of your proper hishtadlus, but I would not suggest you to break your principles. I believe Hashem rewards us for doing His ratzon, and as it seems like you are doing such, I give you a bracha that you find your bashert speedily.
I immediately sense the authentic person you are. Presenting the physical before presenting the spiritual or the personality can feel wrong and backwards. My hope for you is that you are going to find someone so fabulous who appreciates this quality in you! It will be admirable and attractive to the right man. Do not dull this part of you. Trust it. But learn to be flexible with it. You don’t need to “work the system” but you do need to work with the system. After all, you’ve got to be in it to win it. All the best, Jennifer
Jennifer Mann, LCSW is a licensed psychotherapist and dating and relationship coach working with individuals, couples and families in private practice in Hewlett, NY. She is looking forward to teaching a psychology course at Touro College in the fall. To set up a consultation or to ask questions, please call 516.224.7779. Press 2 for Jennifer. Visit www.thenavidaters.com for more information. If you would like to submit a dating or relationship question to the panel anonymously, please email thenavidaters@gmail.com. You can follow The Navidaters on FB and Instagram for dating and relationship advice.
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Hi Readers! Receiving your enthusiastic emails wanting to participate in the Reader’s Respond section has been wonderful! Just a reminder about how Reader Response works. Email thenavidaters@gmail. com with the subject line “Reader Response.” We will then ask you, in the order we receive your email, if you would like to respond to the coming week’s email. If you would like to respond to an already printed Navidaters Panel, please submit your answer to the editor at editor@fivetownsjewishhome.com. You can also join us on our FB page @thenavidaters on Sunday evenings to post your response to the week’s column. Interacting with you has been a pleasure! Thank you for all of your feedback. Jennifer
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the shadchan. Do not mistake this with an endorsement for guys to collect women’s resumes and pictures to sort through which can be another problem. For parents of potential
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Proposing we should go back to the old ways while adapting to today’s society is akin to attempting to put Wi-Fi on a corded rotary phone.
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Some thingS only an expert can detect.
the country on a daily basis it has become the norm to send a professional looking picture with it to put a face to the name. There is an intuitive feeling when seeing a person that depicts more than what the person physically looks like. There have been many times I personally have gotten an intuition about a shidduch for someone I never would have physically met due to geographic limitations. However, by merely seeing someone’s information and picture, a shidduch idea struck right away. Obviously, I then follow up with correspondence and conversations, which then led to the dating process, and then, baruch Hashem, engagements and marriages followed. Perhaps this is Hashem’s way of working with our current ‘‘system’’ to make things possible within the laws of tevah (nature). It is for this reason that I believe it is important to do what has become the norm and send a nice professional picture to
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(aka any matchmaker, friend, or shadchan) then we must do what we can to simplify the process for our volunteers taking on the already taxing and time-consuming challenge. In this day and age, with all the slew of information which needs to be passed along, the solution seems to be having on-hand a basic profile. Proposing we should go back to the old ways while adapting to today’s society is akin to attempting to put Wi-Fi on a corded rotary phone. If we want to change things, we must go to the root and work on shifting completely back to the more simple way things used to be (which I think would be an excellent idea!). This background information is crucial to answer your very apropos question about pictures. In my opinion, sending a bekovodig picture to a shadchan with your information has nothing to do with judgments, looks, or beauty. Since there are so many people sending out basic information to matchmakers around
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and everyone who might possibly know or might have met this person to acquire as much background and beef as possible. Note that this is not demanded by any third party to do but it is what parents and singles worldwide have accepted upon themselves as standard protocol. It is almost a thrill to find out from a third party all the presumed skeletons in the closet from the single’s high school days. Adding singles’ outspoken discussions with each other about their opinions on the guys and girls they have dated to the mix and you get an even more complex situation. This is what I call the SDE (Shidduch Domino Effect). When one guy goes out with one girl from the same “circle of friends” and it does not work out this guy is automatically nixed by that entire group of friends, based on personal information shared. If society deems the only culturally appropriate way to find a bashert to be through a middle man
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Mental Health Corner
Adult Separation Anxiety Disorder By Rabbi Azriel Hauptman
Adult Separation Anxiety Disorder (ASAD) has only recently been recognized by the American Psychiatric Association in the DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders). Until 2013, when the fifth edition of the DSM was published, one needed to have been suffering from the disorder during childhood or adolescence in order to receive a diagnosis. However, research has shown that seven percent of adults will suffer from ASAD at some point in their life, with at least two-thirds of them hav-
ing their first onset in adulthood! So, if you are an adult with ASAD you are not alone. What exactly is ASAD and how does it affect people’s lives? This can be a little complicated as not every anxious person is feeling anxiety due to a separation. The best way to approach this is to get an overview of this disorder in general, and then discuss some of the unique attributes of this disorder in adults. Here are the symptoms of Separation Anxiety Disorder as recorded in
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the DSM: • Recurrent excessive distress when anticipating or experiencing separation from home or from major attachment figures • Persistent and excessive worry about losing major attachment figures or about possible harm to them, such as illness, injury, disasters, or death • Persistent and excessive worry about experiencing an untoward event (e.g., getting lost, being kidnapped, having an accident, becoming ill) that causes separation from a major attachment figure • Persistent reluctance or refusal to go out, away from home, to school, to work, or elsewhere because of fear of separation • Persistent and excessive fear of or reluctance about being alone or without major attachment figures at home or in other settings • Persistent reluctance or refusal to sleep away from home or to go to sleep without being near a major attachment figure • Repeated nightmares involving the theme of separation • Repeated complaints of physical symptoms (e.g., headaches, stomachaches, nausea, vomiting) when separation from major attachment figures occurs or is anticipated A diagnosis is only warranted if the anxiety causes significant distress or impairment and cannot be better explained by another disorder. An adult can receive a diagnosis if at least three of these symptoms have been present for at least six months. The six-month requirement was established to avoid over-diagnosis as it is very normal to experience acute symptoms during the initial period after a separation. As we become habituated to the separation,
the symptoms tend to subside. Separation anxiety manifests itself in a variety of ways based on one’s age. A child might fear being alone in the house without a parent or even be afraid to be alone in a room. They also might be unable to go to sleep unless someone stays with them in the room. Children can also become very clingy as they shadow a parent out of fear of becoming separated. School refusal in children can also be related to separation anxiety. Adults with separation anxiety experience this disorder in very similar ways but in an adult version. The anxiety can be regarding a spouse, child, parent, or anyone else who plays a significant role in their life. When there is an adult onset of separation anxiety, it is often related to a major life event such as when children move away from home, a death, or a significant change of location. ASAD can cause major stress to a marriage as a spouse might get worn out if every two hours their spouse calls or texts “just to check on them”. It can interfere with employment, as most forms of work involve being separated for most of the day from their family. Treatment for ASAD is similar to treatment of any anxiety disorder. Psychotherapy delivered by a clinician who has training in treatment of anxiety disorders and/or medication can be very helpful in managing this disorder. This is a service of Relief Resources. Relief is an organization that provides mental health referrals, education, and support to the frum community. Rabbi Yisrael Slansky is director of the Baltimore branch of Relief. He can be contacted at 410-448-8356 or at yslansky@reliefhelp.org
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OCTOBER 29, 2015 | The Jewish Home
IMPEACHMENT
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2019 How It Came About and Where It’s Going
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s the Democrat-led House of Representatives wades into impeachment waters, the picture of “treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors” that is required to impeach a sitting president is still murky to most Americans – although Democrats in Congress point to it with conviction, while Republicans scoff at its existence at all. Is this what Founding Father Alexander Hamilton feared when he expressed his concern in the Federalist Papers that “in many cases [impeachment] will connect itself with the pre-existing factions, and will enlist all their animosities, partialities, influence, and interest on one side or on the other; and in such cases there will always be the greatest danger that the decision will be regulated more by the comparative strength of parties, than by the real demonstrations of innocence or guilt”?
Again, Democrats will say absolutely not – “[impeachment] is something we do with a heavy heart. This is very prayerful,” intoned House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to reporters last week, before going on to say, “What the president did was so much worse than even what Richard Nixon did.” Republicans, on the other hand, argue that what is taking place is exactly what Hamilton was concerned about – “Democrats have been vowing to oust President Trump since the day he was elected,” according to Rep. Devin Nunez, who is the ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, and are using the impeachment inquiry to “fulfill their Watergate fantasies.” If this sounds confusing, it’s because it is.
How Impeachment Works Although the first word that often comes to mind when people think of
impeachment is “Nixon,” the 37 th U.S. president, Richard Milhous Nixon, ended up resigning in 1974 before the House of Representatives formally voted to impeach him. The impeachment of a president has only happened twice in the history of the United States: in 1868 when President Andrew Johnson was impeached, and in 1998 when President Bill Clinton was impeached. Neither of them was removed from office though, as neither was ultimately convicted by the Senate. Although to some it may feel like the Clinton impeachment just happened, there are many adults who were too young or were not even alive during the Clinton impeachment (feel old?). Thus, how impeachment works is unclear to many people. An impeachment proceeding starts with an impeachment inquiry. That is the phase that the current proceeding
is in right now. During an impeachment inquiry, a Congressional committee, or multiple congressional committees, investigate whether the president engaged in impeachable offenses. Once the investigation is complete, the committee votes by a simple majority (50% plus one) whether to pass articles of impeachment, which are formal charges being brought against the president. Since the House Judiciary Committee consists of 41 members – 24 Democrats and 17 Republicans – it’s likely that the Democrats will be able to garner at least 21 votes to pass one or more articles of impeachment. Once that happens, the matter will advance to the full House of Representatives, where a vote is taken whether to uphold any or all of the articles of impeachment. At this point as well, the Democrats will likely succeed, as they have a 233-to-197 majority and only need 218 votes in order to uphold the
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The Whistleblower and Trump’s Wrongdoing The current impeachment inquiry kicked into motion when, in early September, Rep. Schiff announced that the Inspector General at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence had informed him of a whistleblower’s complaint against President Trump. Schiff, however claimed not to know any details of the complaint. He announced that he would convene hearings to determine what the complaint was about. He promised that the whistleblower would be called to testify. It was later learned that Schiff’s office was already well aware of the whistleblower’s complaint when this “bombshell story” came out and that he knew a lot more information that he initially led the public to believe. In fact, the whistleblower had contacted Schiff’s office directly and raised concerns about a phone call between President Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on July 25 of this year. According to the whistleblower, the president pressed Zelensky to open an investigation into Ukrainian meddling in the 2016 presidential election and into former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden’s dealings in Ukraine. At that time, it was believed that the whistleblower had firsthand knowledge of the call because he was on it. However, it was later revealed that the whistleblower was not on the call but was reporting what he was told by others who were on the call. As such, Republicans have noted that the whistleblower is actually not a whistleblower but a leaker.
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articles of impeachment. Once the House votes by a simple majority to uphold the articles of impeachment, the president has been impeached. At this point, though, the president is not removed from office. The matter then advances to the Senate, where a trial is held. If a two-thirds majority in the Senate find the president guilty, then he is removed from office – something that has never occurred in the history of the United States. It is in the Senate that the march to remove Mr. Trump from office will likely end, as 67 Senators would need to find the president guilty in order to remove him from office. The Republicans hold a majority of 53-to-47 Democrats in the Senate. In order to remove the president from office, the Democrats would have to get 20 Republicans to vote with them, a feat that is close to insurmountable.
there was no Russian collusion, leaving Schiff dejected. But not for long. Within weeks of the Mueller investigation into Trump’s 2016 collusion with Russia grinding to a halt, the wheels were set in motion for the current proceedings to commence. Rep. Adam Schiff now has the crack at Trump that he has been waiting for. And he has a lot of power to call the shots. According to the Democrats’ rules devised for the current impeachment inquiry, it is Schiff’s decision to choose who testifies at the hearings. Additionally, he has been holding secret classified hearings of witnesses, auditioning those witnesses for the public hearings. This has led to Republicans charging that he is cherry-picking witness testimony and only presenting testimony that is damaging to the president. Whereas in both the Nixon and Clinton inquiries lawyers for the presidents were involved in the inquiry and were allowed to question witnesses and present their own witnesses, Schiff and the Democrats have barred President Trump’s attorneys from anything other than responding to evidence and testimony in writing. “Maybe in the Soviet Union, you do things like this where only you make the rules, where you reject the ability for the person you’re accusing to even be in the room,” House Minority Whip Steve Scalise mused in response to the Democrats’ draconian rules. As such, if Schiff can “get the goods,” he may finally achieve his goal of taking down President Trump, assuring his place on the Mt. Rushmore of resisters.
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By Tzvi Dear
The impeachment inquiry is being led by Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, who has been a vocal critic of President Trump since, as Trump would say, Trump “came down the escalator” to announce his candidacy for president in 2015. For several years now, Schiff has been the face of the Trump resistance in the House of Representatives. In an audio posted online last year by two Russian comedians nicknamed Vovan and Lexus, who have become notorious for their phony calls to high-ranking American officials and celebrities including UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, Rep. Adam Schiff can be heard discussing information asserting that the Russian intelligence services has compromising pictures of President Trump. The pranksters claimed to be Russian intelligence officials and claimed to also have recordings of nefarious behavior by Trump from before his presidency. When the prank call was made public, Schiff stated that he notified authorities after the call that he thought it was bogus, although in the call itself he appeared to be incredulous and even discussed making arrangements to obtain the material. “Obviously we would welcome the chance to get copies of those recordings,” Schiff said in the recorded call, adding, “I’ll be in touch with the FBI about this, and we’ll make arrangements with your staff. I think it would be best to provide these materials to both our committee and the FBI. We’ll make arrangements between my staff and yours on how to facilitate that.” Although that call only gave shortlived hope to Rep. Schiff in quest to fell the president, the investigation into Russian collusion of the 2016 presidential election is what he really hung his hat on. Schiff declared on numerous occasions that he had seen “ample evidence of Russian collusion” with the Trump campaign. But Schiff’s promise of downing Trump fell flat after the several-year multi-million-dollar Mueller investigation found no evidence of Russian collusion. When Schiff publicly called Mueller in front of the House Intelligence Committee to obtain additional information, Mueller reiterated his report’s conclusion that
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It was also later learned that the whistleblower is being represented by an attorney who, in January 2017, several days after Mr. Trump was inaugurated, tweeted conspicuously that a “coup has started” and that “impeachment will follow ultimately.” Once the July 25th phone call came into focus, Schiff promised hearings to learn exactly what was said on the call. But on September 24, President Trump – much to the shock of Washington – released a transcript of his July 25th call with the Ukrainian president. In a sense, this pulled the rug out from under Rep. Schiff because now the American people could learn the contents of the call without relying on witnesses who would characterize it in a congressional hearing. According to the released transcript, after discussing trade with the Ukrainian president, Mr. Trump mentioned the possibility that Ukraine was involved in creating, what Trump calls, “The Russia Hoax.” “I would like you to do us a favor though because our country has been through a lot and Ukraine knows a lot about it,” said the president to Zelensky. “I would like you to find out what happened with this whole situation with Ukraine, they say CrowdStrike... I guess you have one of your wealthy people... The server, they say Ukraine has it. There are a lot of things that went on, the whole situation... I think you are surrounding yourself with some of the same people. I would like to have the Attorney General call you or your people, and I would like you to get to the bottom of it. As you saw yesterday, that whole nonsense ended with a very poor performance by
a man named Robert Mueller, an incompetent performance, but they say a lot of it started with Ukraine. Whatever you can do, it’s very important that you do it if that’s possible.” It is roundly believed that Trump
a possible scandal involving former vice president and 2020 presidential candidate Joe Biden. “There’s a lot of talk about Biden’s son, that Biden stopped the prosecution, and a lot of people want to find
ALTHOUGH THE FIRST WORD THAT OFTEN COMES TO MIND WHEN PEOPLE THINK OF IMPEACHMENT IS “NIXON,” THE 37TH U.S. PRESIDENT, RICHARD MILHOUS NIXON, ENDED UP RESIGNING IN 1974 BEFORE THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES FORMALLY VOTED TO IMPEACH HIM.
brought up CrowdStrike because the company helped the Democratic National Committee investigate an intrusion of its systems during the 2016 presidential campaign. CrowdStrike eventually blamed the hack on the Russians. However, there is a theory that Ukraine was involved in the hacking, not Russia. President Trump also brought up
out about that, so whatever you can do with the Attorney General would be great. Biden went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution so if you can look into it.... It sounds horrible to me.” The scandal that President Trump was referring to involves Joe Biden, his son, and a Ukrainian energy company called Burisma. In 2014, then-
Vice President Biden’s son, Hunter, was placed on the board of Ukrainian energy company Burisma. He was paid approximately $83,000 per month despite having no background in energy or Ukraine. At the time, Burisma was facing foreign scrutiny over its business practices and was also being investigated for wrongdoing by Ukraine’s main prosecutor. However, in 2016, the prosecutor investigating Burisma was fired when then-Vice President Biden visited Ukraine and demanded that the president of Ukraine fire the prosecutor. While recalling the incident in 2018 – before announcing his candidacy for the Democrat nomination in 2020 – Mr. Biden spoke about his activities in Ukraine and boasted that he threatened to withhold one billion dollars in aid to Ukraine if Ukraine did not fire the main prosecutor. “I looked at them and said: ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money. Well, son of a [gun] – he got fired,” Biden said. That was the very prosecutor investigating Burisma. Mr. Biden maintains that that incident has nothing to do with his son having been on the Burisma board and that the prosecutor was corrupt. Others – including Mr. Trump – see something more nefarious here.
A Perfect Call, An Improper Call, An Impeachable Call President Trump has repeatedly referred to the July 25th call as “a perfect call” and has repeatedly said that “there was no pressure put on them whatsoever.” Some Republicans aren’t as gung-
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Quid Pro Quo & Hearsay Buttressing Democrats’ concern about the call is the fact that in mid-July the Trump administration placed a temporary hold on $391 million in military aid to Ukraine. They argue that on his July 25th call with
in September, even though Ukraine never committed to the investigations. Even if President Trump was striking a deal, it’s impossible, the Republicans note, to put forth a quid pro quo if one side isn’t even aware that the process is happening. According to the White House, the funds were held up while President Trump looked into whether Zelensky
Zelensky, Mr. Trump, without mentioning it directly, was essentially saying that unless Ukraine committed to the investigations that Trump wanted, Ukraine would not get the U.S. aid. That, they argue, is a quid pro quo and grounds for impeachment. Although the timing of the freeze is suspicious, the Trump administration points out that when the call took place, Ukraine didn’t even know about the hold on the military aid and that the aid was eventually released
was serious about fighting corruption. While Democrats allege that Mr. Trump improperly used his office to try to get a foreign government to investigate a political rival, Republicans argue that the president’s opponents are trying to connect unrelated events, based largely on hearsay, to undo the results of the 2016 election. According to the public testimony so far, numerous government officials have given their opinion as to why President Trump held up the aid, but
From Quid Pro Quo to Bribery to Food Fight After several days of testimony that has not produced any clear evidence either way of whether the president engaged in a quid pro quo, Democrats have changed their messaging
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IF SCHIFF CAN “GET THE GOODS,” HE MAY FINALLY ACHIEVE HIS GOAL OF TAKING DOWN PRESIDENT TRUMP, ASSURING HIS PLACE ON THE MT. RUSHMORE OF RESISTERS.
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president’s call was meant to be at least part in parody.”
no witnesses had any actual firsthand knowledge as to why the aid was held up. For example, on the first day of the public hearings, William Taylor, the top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine, told the committee that one of his staffers was in a restaurant in Kyiv, Ukraine, when he overheard a call between EU Ambassador Sondland and President Trump. Following that call with Trump, the staffer asked Sondland what the president thought about Ukraine. “Ambassador Sondland responded that President Trump cares more about the investigations of Biden,” which Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani had been “pressing for,” Taylor said. Taylor’s hearsay-riddled testimony prompted Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) to quip, “I’ve seen church prayer chains that are easier to understand than this.” Although the impeachment inquiry is not technically bound by federal or state rules on evidence, one of the foundations of the American legal system is that barring certain exceptions – which are not pertinent here – hearsay testimony is inadmissible. However, Democrats are not concerned by hearsay-reliant testimony. As Democrat Rep. Mike Quigley said, “Hearsay can be much better evidence than direct.” Although this comment flies in the face of everything that the U.S. legal system stands for, to those who support the impeachment of Mr. Trump the statement is true…for now. Rep. Schiff has also presented a number of witnesses who, while admitting that they do not have any knowledge about whether there was a quid pro quo, do have an opinion that President Trump is engaged in bad foreign policy and that by having Rudy Giuliani serve as his proxy, he is undermining the career foreign policy diplomats. The Republican response to that argument is that, as president, Mr. Trump is free to carry out his foreign policy however he pleases.
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ho about the call as the president. Republican Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio echoed the sentiment of many Republicans when he said that “I thought it was inappropriate for the president to ask a foreign government to investigate a political opponent,” while adding, “I also do not think it’s an impeachable offense.” Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) echoed, “I think some of the things that were done were not wise. I think some of the statements may lack judgment. That’s different than being illegal.” But Democrats see the call as a lot more sinister than just bad judgment. One day after the call transcript was released, Rep. Schiff opened a hearing into the matter by broadcasting what happened on the call. “It reads like a classic organized crime shakedown,” Schiff declared. “In essence, what the President Trump communicates is this: We’ve been very good to your country. Very good. No other country has done as much as we have. But you know what? I don’t see much reciprocity here. You know what I mean? I hear what you want. I have a favor I want from you, though. And I’m going to say this only seven times, so you better listen good. I want you to make up dirt on my political opponent, understand? Lots of dirt, on this and on that. I’m going to put you in touch with people, and not just any people. I’m going to put you in touch with the Attorney General of the United States — my Attorney General Bill Barr — he’s got the whole weight of American law enforcement behind him. And I’m going to put you in touch with Rudy; you’re going to love him. Trust me. You know what I’m asking, so I’m only going to say this a few more times, in a few more ways. And don’t call me again. I’ll call you when you’ve done what I asked.” After Rep. Schiff’s false characterization of the phone call, President Trump promptly tweeted, “Rep. Adam Schiff totally made up my conversation with Ukraine President and read it to Congress and Millions. He must resign and be investigated. He has been doing this for two years. He is a sick man!” When Republicans on the committee called Schiff out for lying and making up a conversation out of thin air, Schiff said, “My summary of the
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and are now claiming that President Trump attempted to bribe Ukraine. Although there is no practical difference in the underlying charge, according to focus groups conducted by the Democrats, most Americans were not familiar with the definition of “quid pro quo” and the term “bribery” is easier to understand. Will this change of messaging work? According to Michael Goodwin of The New York Post, it won’t. “Dems throw words at walls, hoping something will stick. Quid pro quo, bribery, extortion, abuse of power, obstruction and witness intimidation are all getting a tryout,” he wrote. “The search for buzzwords proves the entire enterprise is 100% political. If impeachment were justified by facts, the right words would be obvious to the vast majority of Americans.” In the meantime, within the hearing room where the proceedings are taking place, the partisanship and bickering between both parties has accelerated to DEFCON 1. Democrats accuse the Republicans of a coverup, while Republicans accuse the Democrats of staging a kangaroo court. And, of course, every once in a while, when President Trump does his daily thumb exercises and sends out a tweet to his millions of followers, the whole proceeding goes sideways. On Friday, Rep. Schiff brought in the former Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch to testify. She had been fired long before the July 25 th phone call and admitted that she could shed no light on whether there was a quid pro quo between the president and Ukraine. However, she had a gripe about being fired and blamed Rudy Giuliani for pushing Trump to give her the pink slip. Even though Trump’s predecessor summarily fired all of George W. Bush’s ambassadors upon assuming office, Yovanovitch thought that it was bad policy for Trump to fire her. While she was testifying, Mr. Trump tweeted, “Everywhere Marie Yovanovitch went turned bad. She started off in Somalia, how did that go? Then fast forward to Ukraine, where the new Ukrainian President spoke unfavorably about her in my second phone call with him. It is a
U.S. President’s absolute right to appoint ambassadors.” Mr. Trump added, “They call it ‘serving at the pleasure of the President.’ The U.S. now has a very strong and powerful foreign policy, much different than proceeding administrations. It is called, quite simply, America First!
she was testifying if Schiff would not have seized the moment to tell her about it while she was testifying; if there’s a crime, they say, Mr. Schiff is then an accessory to that crime. Additionally, they argue, there was nothing intimidating in the tweet, and Mr. Trump was merely exercis-
“DEMS THROW WORDS AT WALLS, HOPING SOMETHING WILL STICK…. IF IMPEACHMENT WERE JUSTIFIED BY FACTS, THE RIGHT WORDS WOULD BE OBVIOUS TO THE VAST MAJORITY OF AMERICANS.”
With all of that, however, I have done FAR more for Ukraine than O.” Rep. Schiff promptly and dramatically read the tweet aloud and asked Yovanovitch how the president’s tweets made her feel. “It’s very intimidating,” Yovanovitch said. Mr. Schiff then declared that he would consider an article of impeachment for witness intimidation. Republicans called out Rep. Schiff’s charade and pointed out that Yovanovitch would never have even known about the tweets while
ing his First Amendment rights and was defending himself against accusations in a proceeding in which he inexplicably has been prevented from presenting a defense.
America Doesn’t Care A recent poll by NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll, shows that half of Americans say that they approve of the impeachment inquiry — about the same as the poll found last month. Respondents are also split on whether they think Trump should be impeached and removed
from office. 65% of Americans say they can’t imagine any information or circumstances during the impeachment inquiry where they might change their minds about their position on impeachment. Americans’ viewpoints have hardened in this matter, and regardless of any bombshell results, their opinions about the president will not change much. This presents the Democrats with a dilemma. If they don’t go through with impeachment, regardless of its flimsy foundation, their base, which has been clamoring for impeachment, will be dejected. This may temper their turnout in 2020. And if they do go through with impeachment, they will be cast as partisan Trump haters who are in Washington not to create productive policies for the American people but merely to try and nip at the president’s heels and clip his wings. Generally, voters – other than those that are heavily engaged already – tend to migrate to the party which at least claims to be putting forth good policies. Republicans too face risks during these proceedings. Even if the Democrats pass tenuous articles of impeachment, there are many who will have Trump fatigue by the time 2020 comes around and the fact that he was impeached may convince them to vote against him. This may also cause down-ballot harm to Republicans in Congress as they may be given a black mark for supporting Trump. On the other hand, if they abandon him, they will certainly lose as the core Republican-Trump base would be infuriated when they didn’t stand by the president’s side. Impeachment, Schiff, quid pro quo, bribery – there’s a lot going on in Washington. Americans, though, send their politicians to Washington so they can help the American people and create sound policies for the nation. The bipartisan bickering has made Americans tired. So tired, perhaps, that if the gavel goes down and President Trump ends up being impeached, they’ll look up blearily from their iPhones and say, “Who cares?”
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TurboTaxed By Allan Rolnick, CPA
NOVEMBER 28, 2019
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forms, sharpen up that pencil, and stab yourself in the aorta.” Then Intuit came along with TurboTax and moved the whole messy exercise to your laptop. It’s hardly foolproof – back in 2009, former Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner blamed TurboTax for his failure to pay tax on his International Monetary Fund
forms for them. That’s how it works in much of Europe. But it would cost Intuit millions of customers. So, Intuit spends millions lobbying Congress to keep the IRS out of the 21st century. Intuit helped establish the IRS’s own Free File program, which offers free filing for some families in ex-
Millions of filers wind up “TurboTaxed” when they don’t even use the software.
income. But it sure beats turning your dining room table into a paper-choked war room every year. That may sound like state-ofthe-art DIY tech in an age when most Americans count Dr. Google as their primary care physician. But millions of taxpayers with simple returns could skip the tax-filing hassle entirely. How? Just let the IRS take the information they already get from employers and fill out the
change for an IRS promise not to compete for the rest. But if you visit TurboTax’s “Free Edition” page – the one advertising “free, free, free” – you’ll discover it doesn’t even link to the IRS system. In fact, they’ve even dropped code into that site to hide it from Google. Back on their own turf, they use programming “dark patterns” to reinforce “fear, uncertainty, and doubt” and upsell users to paid add-ons like state
returns and audit defense. (Bait & switch, anyone?) Intuit is even more aggressive on Capitol Hill. The company’s longtime chief lobbyist describes himself as a Darth Vader character, and he supervises an operation that contributes millions to elected officials and interest groups. And just like that, millions of filers wind up “TurboTaxed” when they don’t even use the software! Here’s the ironic bottom line: sometimes, just having the tool to do something doesn’t mean you should actually use it. Fire up amazon.com and search for “orthopedic bone saw.” You’ll see them for as low as $12, with two-day shipping included. But just because you can buy the tool to, say, amputate your injured dachshund’s leg, doesn’t mean you have any business doing it. And when it comes to taxes, that’s where we come in. We don’t just have the tools. We have the knowhow to put them to work to create the savings you really want.
Allan J Rolnick is a CPA who has been in practice for over 30 years in Queens, NY. He welcomes your comments and can be reached at 718-896-8715 or at allanjrcpa@aol.com.
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urn the dial on the Wayback Machine to 1849 and join us in California, where “there’s gold in them thar hills!” Two kinds of people are getting fabulously rich. Obviously, there are the prospectors, grabbing their shovels and racing for the latest strike. Then there are the shovel sellers getting rich on the prospectors’ dreams. 170 years later, shovel-selling is still big business. In fact, the richest gold-rush descendants started out as shovel sellers: the billionaire Haas family, heirs of the original Levi Strauss. You’d probably be happy to pony up for a shovel if your neighbor found gold in their backyard. But what would you do if you learned that someone was working overtime to make one of your least-favorite jobs harder, just to make a few bucks selling you the shovel to do it? (Or force you to hire someone to do it?) That someone is called Intuit, and an ongoing investigation blows the whistle on their continued scheming to make tax-filing season “holiday season in April” for the company headquartered less than 200 miles from the original gold strike at Sutter’s Mill. Columnist Dave Barry once described April 15 as “time to gather up those receipts, get out those tax
Gluten Free Recipe Column by Mrs. Elaine Bodenheimer
GlutenFree@BaltimoreJewishHome.com
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Chocolate Drizzle Cake What You Will Need:
Preparation:
6 eggs 1 ½ cups sugar 1 ½ cups oil ¾ cup cocoa ¾ cup potato starch ½ tsp. baking soda 1 tsp. gluten free vanilla ½ tsp. salt ½ cup confectioner’s sugar 2 tsp. water
1. Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees. 2. In a large mixing bowl, mix all ingredients until well- blended. Pour into a greased bundt pan. 3. Bake 45 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. When cool, remove cake from pan. 4. Mix confectioner’s sugar and water in a small bowl, and drizzle icing over cake in a pretty design. Enjoy!
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Life C ach
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Momma Mia By Rivki D. Rosenwald Esq., MFT, CLC
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hear the sweet, melodic sound of your title wafting toward you – continuously – “Mommy!” “Mommy!” “Mommy!” It’s totally etched into your brain. Interestingly though, sometimes still, you can go out with friends or other couples and have a really fun time. Even, perhaps start to think you are a person again, one that actually has her own identity.
you are in the mood to do. They’ll look you straight in the eyes and add those lethal words, that clearly identify your role forever, “You’re embarrassing me!” And in that moment, you realize you do not exist any longer as an independent entity. You are forever officially someone’s job to monitor. You are now aware that you are under surveillance, microscopically ob-
You are now aware that you are under surveillance, microscopically observed, almost 24/7.
So, when is it that you find out you’re not that person you used to be – at all? I think it happens around the bar and bat mitzvah years. It will happen organically. You’ll be somewhere, just thinking you are being you. And suddenly someone will run up to you and tell you to stop being you – to stop acting, talking, or behaving some way you think is just fine, or even not so fine, but what
served, almost 24/7. You are being watched to make sure that you are living up to your role as a bonafide version of a mom. It is right then and there, in that time and space, that you realize – in no uncertain terms – that you have truly and completely become- a mother! So what does all this mean moving forward? For kids: realize there is a real
person in there behind the title, who was once a kid like you, with independent thoughts, dreams, and feelings, who gladly became a mom for you. And with that job, she took on the responsibility to be a role model. Yet, at times, she wants to be free just like you. For moms: realize it was inevitable you’d get deeper and deeper into this the minute that kid entered the world. The writing was on the wall – you were, thankfully, destined to be a full-fledged mom. But no one says you don’t need a vacation. Just make sure that if on that vacation you want to wiggle out of mom mode for a bit there’s not a kid of yours or a friend of theirs for miles around because they’ll whip you back into mom-shape so fast you won’t know who else you still had the potential to be! Moms, I’m just saying that I understand. It’s not always as easy as we make it look (wink, wink) being a mom. And kids, I get it. It’s not always easy having a mom. But so far, it’s the best we’ve come up with. So give moms a break. One day you will, iy”H, be one too! Rivki Rosenwald is a certified relationship counselor, and career and life coach. She can be contacted at 917-7052004 or rivki@rosenwalds.com.
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hen exactly is it that you really know that you have become a full-fledged mom? There are these epiphany moments that occur again and again throughout your life. The first time probably is when they hand you that tiny, newly born bundle of joy – that helpless little baby. And then, when what happens is that no matter how long you wait, nobody comes to take it back. Ever! That kind of is the beginning of when you have your first real flash. Coincidentally, it’s also when you realize how integral the dad piece is! Because you become immediately aware that he is a valuable partner in all this. And if you’ve chosen wisely, he gets that, too. However, let me not digress. Then what follows are all those nights that you don’t get to be what you use to be: “a sleeper.” And you start to really catch on that because you are now a mom. But it doesn’t end there... Because, eventually, as time marches on, “they” look for something to call you. And you, proudly believing that you have earned the title and that you’ll enjoy being called it, sweetly say, “Call me Mama!” Then, after that, every day, one hundred times a day, even if it could slip your mind, they don’t let it! You
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Dirshu Dirshu Kinyan Chochma Program Nears the End of First Machzor Beginning of Second Machzor to Coincide with Dirshu World Siyum at Binyanei Haumah in Yerushalayim By Chaim Gold
“We are all obligated to learn mussar,” said Rabbi Dovid Meisels, a Dirshu Kinyan Chochma participant, “but unless we have something that compels us to do it, a set program with tests, it often falls by the wayside. Our lives are so busy that unless we really prioritize, mussar learning simply won’t get done. That is what I have found so amazing about the Dirshu Kinyan Chochma program! It forces me to learn mussar and as a result of this learning, I have seen such a dramatic transformation in my personal life, my avoas hamiddos and my general avodas Hashem.” As Dirshu’s Kinyan Chochma mussar program nears the end of its first machzor, participants in the program are reflecting on the tremendous benefits that they have reaped in their personal lives as a result of being part of such a program. In addition, the end of the first machzor and the beginning of the second machzor scheduled to commence at the beginning of the upcoming month of Teves with the learning of Masechta Avos with Rabbeinu Yonah, offers the chance for new participants to join and experience the life-altering impact of bringing daily mussar learning into their lives. The new machzor will coincide with Dirshu World Siyum at Binyanei Haumah Convention Center in Yerushalayim. The Primary Avodah: Working on One’s Avodah! In Dirshu’s Sefer Chizuk, published in honor of Dirshu’s 10th Anniversary, the Mashgiach of Yeshiva Knesses Beis Chizkiyahu in Kfar Chassidim, Rav Dov Yaffe, zt”l, wrote about this very matter. He wrote, “A person must remember that the yetzer hara always tries to minimize, in a person’s own eyes, the importance of inner avodah, of working on oneself and improving
HaRav Matisyahu Salomon speaking at Dirshu’s 10th Anniversary
one’s middos. Often the yetzer hara magnifies the importance in one’s eyes of things that are not directly related to one’s inner avodah, such as assisting others or reaching out to estranged Jews. These are all important, but the daily inner work of avodas Hashem is the primary task that each person has and that is why the yetzer hara always tries to minimize its importance and convince a person not to engage in learning Torah and mussar… [Sefer Chizuk, Chapter 7].” The Rosh Yeshiva of the Chevron Yeshiva, HaGaon HaRav Dovid Cohen, shlita, said, “In our generation it is impossible to maintain and sustain one’s spiritual achievements with Torah learning alone. One needs to combine Torah learning with mussar learning. Masechta Avos contains the mussar lessons that Chazal have taught us and thus learning them brings tremendous benefit. In the commentary of Rabbeinu Yonah there are many foundational mussar lessons that strengthen a person in his avodas hammusar.” Rabbi Meisels, pointed out that “everyone knows the famed words of the Mesilas Yeshorim that his sefer is not coming to relate new chiddushim, rather it comes to reiterate that which people know already but seem to for-
Rav Dovid Hofstedter introducing the Kinyan Chochma program at Dirshu’s 2017 Shabbos Convention
get or gloss over because it is not on their mind. When you start learning Mesilas Yesharim daily in the way we did in the Kinyan Chochma program, you actually experience what the Mesilas Yesharim said. We have such busy lives and the nature of life is that if you don’t stop and think, you will just keep running through life without thinking. The Mesilas Yesharim that I was forced to learn in order to keep up with the Kinyan Chochma program added so much to my life. It was not a large investment of time, just a few minutes a day, but I felt that my entire day was different as a result.” America’s Senior Mashgichim Urge Participation Indeed, the program was enthusiastically welcomed by two of America’s venerated senior Mashgichim, HaGaon HaRav Moshe Wolfson, shlita and HaGaon HaRav Mattisyahu Salomon, shlita. In his warm letter praising the Kinyan Chochma program, Rav Salomon wrote, “The obligation to learn mussar daily is well known, as Rav Yisrael Salanter explains at length in his sefer Ohr Yisrael, in the name of the poskim. It does not require a haskama. Nevertheless, because of its
great benefit, the yetzer hara tries to find all kinds of excuses to deter a person from learning mussar. “Therefore, how great is the joy that the Dirshu organization has added a mussar program to its existing programs to encourage and make it easier to learn mussar every day…” Rav Wolfson stressed how, “The importance that our earlier sages attached to learning works of yiras shomayim and mussar is well known. Nevertheless, the yetzer hara tries to get us to neglect learning mussar, to the extent that even bnei Torah overlook it. “We must therefore feel indebted to Dirshu for encouraging Jews the world over to strengthen themselves in this…” As the Kinyan Chochma approaches the beginning of the second machzor in just over a month, featuring Masechta Avos with the commentary of Rabbeinu Yonah, now is the time to join and experience how just a few minutes of mussar daily can enrich your life in areas of both bein adam l’chaveiro and bein adam l’Makom. To join, please contact Dirshu at 1-888-5Dirshu or info@kolleldirshu. org
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