AI2009_12_17

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009 30 KISLEV, 5770 SHABBAT: FRI 4:59 – SAT 5:59 CINCINNATI, OHIO VOL. 156 • NO. 21 SINGLE ISSUE PRICE $2.00

NATIONAL Did group raise funds for Hamas on college campuses?

Page 6

INTERNATIONAL Swiss anti-Islam vote draws protests from Jews and Christians Page 9

CINCINNATI JEWISH LIFE Women’s Philanthropy Lion of Judah Luncheon Page 11

NHS kicks off 50th anniversary celebration Fifty years ago, a group of young Jewish families who had moved into the Finneytown section of Springfield Township began meeting for social and religious activities.

They formed the Northern Hills Jewish Couples Club, which became the Northern Hills Jewish Community. To better meet their needs they formed a synagogue, holding their first service on July 8, 1960. From this service grew what is now know as Northern Hills Synagogue – Congregation B’nai Avraham.

The congregation will celebrate its 50th anniversary throughout 2010 with a series of social and educational events.

The celebration will kick off with a Golden Jubilee Gala on Saturday evening, Jan. 23. In addition to a wine reception and dinner, the Amazing Portable Circus Game Show will provide entertainment.

In keeping with the theme, a ‘50s Sock Hop will follow on

Johnny Chan 2 plans two buffets for Jewish diners Page 14

Resources for Mentoring and Leadership.”

Throughout the year, the congregation will honor the groups and individuals who have contributed to the development of Northern Hills.

In addition, the congregation will recognize members who have been part of the congregation for 50 years, married for 50 years, as well as those who are celebrating the 50th anniversary of their Bar or Bat Mitzvah. The contributions of the congregation’s youth will also be recognized.

There have been many milestones for the congregation over the years.

These include joining the Conservative Movement in 1963, the construction of its original building in Finneytown in 1964, merging with Congregation B’nai Avraham of Norwood in 1968, embracing egalitarianism in the 1980s, and moving to its current location in Deerfield Township in 2004.

Rabbi Gershom Barnard, the congregation’s spiritual leader since 1975, noted, “The excitement of the 50th anniversary has been building. This yearlong commemoration will give us an opportunity to reflect on aspects of the congregation which are particularly important – for example, our Conservative orientation and our unpretentious attitude. The preparations are turning up facts that even synagogue veterans did not know about, and we are appreciating anew the accomplishments of the founders and builders of the congregation, some of whom, fortunately, are still with us. Last but not least, we who are so proud of Northern Hills Synagogue will have many opportunities to share our excitement with the larger community.”

Co-chairs for the celebration are Joe Lazear and Karroll Miller.

For more information, contact the synagogue.

New JCC winter programs for kids, toddlers The winter youth programs at the J start the week of Jan. 4.

This year there are a number of new additions to programs for kids, from preschool through grade 12, in addition to the broad array of JCC winter activities in sports, the arts and other subjects, such as magic.

For sports there are a number of new programs.

For both boys and girls ages 35, there is ice skating at Northland Ice Center and “pick up” basketball for ages 13 – 16.

Also for both boys and girls, the J offers a new “3-D Power Tennis” program at the Mercy Health Plex in Fairfield (for grades 6 – 12). This program utilizes 3-D motion sensors to enrich the information used in training.

For girls, there is “Girls on the Run,” a nationally known motivational/fitness program for those in grades 6 – 8, and a new self defense class for girls in grades 4 – 8.

New JCC youth arts programs this winter include tryouts and

rehearsals for a Center Stage Musical Theater production designed for grades 3 – 6, theater dance style class for grades 5 – 8 and a junior magician program for ages 6 – 13.

For child and parent there are a number of new classes as well.

The “Magical Fingers” exploratory touch and feel toddler program for ages 18 months – 3 years, the imagination and music inspired “Creative Movement” class for ages 3 – 5 and for children,

ages 2 – 5 years, a new “Mats & Mates” class for motor and social skills.

A new session of popular “Gymboree Play & Learn” and “Music & Motion” classes also starts in January.

Finally, children ages 3 – 5 can learn basic cooking skills with creative snacks in the new “Book and Bake” class.

For more information on the new and regular activities, and for enrollment deadlines, contact the J.

Classical Reform revival pushes back against embrace of tradition

by Sue Fishkoff Jewish Telegraphic Agency

DINING OUT

Saturday evening, March 13.

Entertainment for this event will be The Four Hubcaps.

A special service on Friday evening, June 25, will commemorate the first service held by Northern Hills. Many long-term members will be honored for their service to the congregation.

The year of celebration will conclude with a scholar-in-residence weekend in November 2010. The featured scholar will be Rabbi Bradley Shavit Artson, dean of the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies at the American Jewish University in Los Angeles.

Rabbi Artson is one of the leading scholars in the Conservative Movement and the author of numerous articles on mitzvah observance, ethics and social justice. Most recently, he has published numerous books, including “The Bedside Torah: Wisdom, Visions & Dreams” and “Gift of Soul, Gift of Wisdom: Spiritual

SAN FRANCISCO (JTA) — Seventy-year-old Harold Eichenbaum doesn’t think much of kashrut.

He grew up in Texas, Reform like his parents and grandparents, and was confirmed at 16. If he’d wanted a bar mitzvah, he says, he would have joined the Conservatives.

Now there’s talk of kashering the kitchen at Temple Beit Torah,

his Reform congregation in Colorado Springs, Colo.

Eichenbaum wants no part of it, and is dismayed by what he calls the younger generation’s lack of respect for Reform Judaism’s ideological heritage.

“There are very few of us classical Reform Jews anymore,” he mourns. “People are listening to talk, they think you have to be kosher to be true Jewish people. I disagree. Kosher was fine 5,000 years ago, but in the modern day I don’t see any purpose to it.”

For more than a decade, the Reform movement has been moving toward greater observance of Jewish rituals from Shabbat to mikveh, and greater incorporation of Hebrew in worship services.

Meanwhile, a small but increasingly vocal core of Classical Reform adherents is digging in its heels, saying the growing coziness with Jewish tradition is taking the movement away from its original universalist message and rationalist approach to faith, away from the way Reform

Judaism was practiced until at least the 1940s.

A year-and-a-half ago, a handful of Reform rabbis committed to the Classical Reform credo created the Society for Classical Reform Judaism to preserve and promote the values and traditions of American Reform Judaism.

That includes its distinctive worship style — services conducted mainly in English, accompanied by organ music and a choir.

REVIVAL on page 22

CHANUKAH

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

3

Kosher Chinese buffet Kosher Chinese food is a oncea-year opportunity in Cincinnati.

Chabad Jewish Center held the first annual Kosher Chinese Buffet on Dec. 24, six years ago. The reputation of this much-awaited event has grown in popularity ever since.

The past three years alone have been sold out with over 150 people in attendance.

“On a night when the entire city shuts down, Chabad’s Chinese Buffet is where to be in the Jewish community,” said Rabbi Berel Cohen, Youth and Family Program Director at Chabad Jewish Center. “There’s

not much on TV or radio that is comfortable for a Jewish family to watch or listen to. It feels much better to have a place to go and spend time as a community.”

The event showcases an allyou-can-eat buffet with Chinese favorites such as Sesame Chicken, Beef with Broccoli, Egg Rolls, Vegetable Lo Mein, Fried Rice and more. Surprise family entertainment has become a highlight of the evening, as well. Past years have featured live game shows such as Jewpardy and Who Wants to Be a Mitzvahnaire Café Chabad is a series of

social events for Cincinnati’s Jewish community. Held several times throughout the year, each Café Chabad features delicious food, great entertainment and the opportunity to socialize with new and old friends.

Reservations are suggested to be made early. Space is limited and will sell out.

Kosher Chinese Buffet will take place on Thursday, Dec. 24, at 5 p.m. It will be held at the Chabad Jewish Center in Blue Ash. For reservations and more information, call the Chabad Jewish Center.

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News from B’nai Tikvah This fall, B’nai Tikvah had two major events, a “Noah Celebration” and a program that featured Biblical relics.

As an annual event, B’nai Tikvah brings the story of Noah and the Ark to the congregation by encouraging families to bring their pets to share with one another.

This year families brought dogs, cats, turtles, snakes, parrots, hedgehogs, gerbils, hamsters, hermit crabs and even a rat.

Also this year, as part of the Noah celebration, Val Nastole from the Cincinnati Zoo came to B’nai Tikvah with an assortment of live creatures to share and stories to tell.

Children from Northern Hills and Ohav Shalom joined B’nai Tikvah children to watch.

When B’nai Tikvah congregants met at Cedar Village, before their new synagogue was built last year, the children brought stuffed

Val Nastole describes a ball python as part of B’nai Tikvah’s Noah celebration.

animals, also precious to them.

Then this month, B’nai Tikvah hosted a presentation of bowls, pitchers, coins and weapons from

Biblical times.

After a brief Havdalah ceremony, Professor Paul Hesse shared a variety of relics in his collection.

Paul Hesse is a retired U.S. Air Force Officer and former assistant professor of chemistry at the U.S. Air Force Academy, currently living in Fairfield, Ohio.

In 2000, he began studying the history and archaeology of the Ancient Near East (Biblical Archaelogy) while living in Albuquerque, N.M. There Professor Hesse became a docent of the Museum of Archaeology and Biblical History and developed a series of hands-on presentations that use ancient artifacts to illuminate the events, cultures and peoples recorded in the Bible.

He is currently a graduate student of Archaeology at Trinity Southwest University.

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4

NATIONAL

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

LET THERE BE LIGHT

The oldest English-Jewish weekly in America Founded July 15, 1854

by Isaac M.Wise VOL. 156 • NO. 21 Thursday, December 17, 2009 30 Kislev, 5770 Shabbat begins Fri, 4:59 p.m.

Shabbat ends Sat, 5:59 p.m.

THE AMERICAN ISRAELITE CO., PUBLISHERS 18 WEST NINTH STREET, SUITE 2 CINCINNATI, OHIO 45202-2037 PHONE: (513) 621-3145 FAX: (513) 621-3744 publisher@americanisraelite.com editor@americanisraelite.com articles@americanisraelite.com production@americanisraelite.com HENRY C. SEGAL Editor & Publisher 1930-1985 MILLARD H. MACK Publisher Emeritus NETANEL (TED) DEUTSCH Editor & Publisher U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum / Scott Miller

Passengers board the SS St. Louis in Hamburg, Germany, in 1939, which ended with the Jewish refugees being turned away from the United States and returning to Europe.

For St. Louis passengers, 70th reunion could be their last

by Eric Fingerhut Jewish Telegraphic Agency WASHINGTON (JTA) — Seventy years after the SS St. Louis was turned away from the United States, the surviving passengers of the ill-fated voyage may have reunited for the last time near where their chance at freedom was denied.

Thirty-three of the 75 survivors — ranging in age from 71 to 91 and coming from more than two dozen U.S. cities, Canada and Israel — assembled in Miami Beach for the December 13 reunion. There they signed a U.S. Senate proclamation issued earlier this year marking the first time the United States officially acknowledged the suffering of those aboard the ship.

“It will be the last one,” said Herb Karliner, 83, of Aventura, Fla, about this reunion. “We’re getting smaller and smaller, and it’s difficult to organize.”

But his friend and fellow passenger, Phil Freund, 78, isn’t ready to say that yet.

“We treat each reunion as if it will be the last reunion — but there may be another one,” he said.

The story of the St. Louis is often recounted and lamented as a

missed opportunity to save Jewish lives during the Holocaust.

Filled with more than 900 mostly Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany, the ship left Hamburg in May 1939 bound for Cuba. The Cuban government would only take in a handful of passengers and the ship moved to South Florida, but the St. Louis was not allowed to dock by U.S. Coast Guard ships.

Eventually the ship had to return to Antwerp, Belgium, where 254 passengers — many of whom ended up in France and Belgium — died at the hands of the Nazis.

The signing of the Senate proclamation, sponsored by Sen. Herb Kohl (D-Wis.), is freighted with meaning for the surviving passengers.

“It is symbolic,” Freund said.

“The United States finally recognized that we weren’t treated right.”

Karliner said he was “very excited.”

The proclamation is “not strong enough,” he said, “but it’s better than nothing.”

Representatives from the National Archives, the Israeli government, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and a number of other Jewish organizations

were on hand to take the signed copies of the proclamation back to their respective headquarters.

The reunion was sponsored by the National Foundation for Jewish Continuity, a new group based in Boca Raton, Fla., started by 44-year-old Howard Kaye and designed to promote Jewish identity and continuity through the arts.

Thus, another major part of Sunday’s reunion was a performance of a play titled “The Trial of Franklin D. Roosevelt.” The work is a mythical “trial” of Roosevelt for being “complicit in crimes against humanity” by turning away the St. Louis, said its playwright, Robert Krakow of Florida.

Six St. Louis passengers served as the “jurors” for the trial.

Some 400 people were expected to attend the reunion, at the Eden Roc Renaissance Resort.

Among the passengers expected to attend was a California man who cannot fly for health reasons — so he took a cruise through the Panama Canal in order to get to South Florida.

Kaye said he and Krakow hope an event like this — and its use of the arts — can inspire younger generations of Jews to realize the “sacrifices their ancestors made” and the “value of their Jewish

birthright.”

People know the story of the St. Louis, he said, but “they don’t really know of it, the significance behind it.”

The significance, Karliner said, is that “it was the beginning of the Holocaust,” because once the ship returned to Europe, the Nazis realized that no one would care if European Jews were murdered.

Freund, who was 8 years old when he sailed on the St. Louis, remembers seeing the Coast Guard not allow the ship to dock and asking, “Why are they turning us away? Because we’re Jewish?”

While Karliner acknowledges that the time is coming when there will be no remaining St. Louis survivors to tell their story, he is somewhat comforted by the fact that many passengers had their stories recorded by the U.S. Holocaust museum and Steven Spielberg’s Shoah Foundation.

And Krakow said he hopes that when the non-passengers attending the reunion hear the accounts, it will inspire them to keep the story alive and take pride in their heritage.

“It will certainly be my greatest hope,” he said, that it will create a sense of Jewish community and a “powerful communal spirit.”

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NATIONAL

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

5

Conservatives’ conference eyes a more inspiring way to pray

by Jewish Exponent Staff CHERRY HILL, N.J. (Jewish Exponent) — Do Conservative Jews need a new, perhaps jazzier way to pray?

Rabbi Steven Wernick, executive vice president of the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, apparently thinks so.

During his much-anticipated installation speech at the United Synagogue’s biennial gathering, which concluded earlier this week in Cherry Hill, N.J., he called for the immediate creation of a movement-wide task force to tackle the issue of prayer.

“Many of our congregations report that tefillot in many of our synagogues do not speak to them, do not inspire them, and do not reach their heart or their souls,” said Wernick, who took the helm of an organization that represents North American Conservative congregations in July.

Wernick said that many participants of Ramah camps and United Synagogue youth programs, for example, “come home to find the excitement and spiritual engagement they experience elsewhere missing in their own communities."

The four-day conference was held as United Synagogue undergoes a structural upheaval brought about in large part by the dissatisfaction of congregations claiming that they weren’t receiving enough programmatic and other kinds of guidance in exchange for their dues.

Many of the more than 500 lay

National Briefs Obama rebukes Turkey’s leader on Israel WASHINGTON (JTA) — President Obama rebuked the Turkish prime minister for belligerent anti-Israel rhetoric, saying it was harming Turkey’s profile.

“In the president’s meeting with Prime Minister Erdogan yesterday, the president told the prime minister that his anti-Israel rhetoric was eroding his nation’s ability to effectively lead on the issue as it had in the past,” said a statement relayed Tuesday to JTA by a U.S. official.

“The president pressed the prime minister to make rebuilding Turkey’s ties with Israel a priority.”

Obama and Tayyip Erdogan met Monday to discuss ties between the two nations. Turkey is seeking to reinforce its ties with the United States as it is increasingly isolated from Europe because of tensions over its candidacy for membership

leaders and professionals who came to the biennial from across the United States and Canada did express hope, though tinged with skepticism, that United Synagogue can transform itself into an entity that helps congregations become more dynamic, welcoming and fiscally stable.

At the conference, United Synagogue adopted a new set of bylaws with the aim of becoming more efficient. They included reducing the size of its board by about half and the number of offices from 15 to six.

Talks were held about changing the formula for determining the dues that congregations pay, but no formal proposals were made.

The biennial also served to jump-start a nine-month process in which United Synagogue will adopt a new long-range strategic plan.

“While we have considerable problems, I think we continue to have the best product,” said Rabbi Bradley Shavit Artson, dean of the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies in Los Angeles.

Artson sat on a panel about the future of the movement with Wernick; Rabbi Julie Schonfeld, the first woman to head the Rabbinical Assembly; and Cantor Stephen Stein, executive vice president of the Cantors Assembly.

During the hourlong discussion, the audience raised pressing questions confronting the movement.

Among them: What does it mean to be a Conservative Jew in an age when far fewer Jews identify with denominational labels? How can in the European Union and the Islamist tilt of Erdogan’s government.

Erdogan has heightened criticism of Israel more than any other Turkish leader since ties were established in the early 1950s, accusing Israel of war crimes during last winter’s Gaza war, and defending Iran’s nuclear program.

In remarks after the meeting, Erdogan said he hoped to resume Turkey’s role as a peace broker in the region; that role has been eroded in part because of tattered TurkeyIsrael ties. He also suggested he was more conciliatory about containing Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

“We have also had opportunity to discuss what we can do jointly in the region with regard to nuclear programs,” Erdogan said. “We as Turkey stand ready to do whatever we can to ensure a diplomatic solution to the nuclear issue in our region. And we stand ready as Turkey to do whatever we can do with respect to relations between Israel and the Palestinians, and Israel and Syria, because I do believe that, first and foremost, the United States, too, has important responsibility in trying to achieve global peace.”

the movement attract more members in their 20s and 30s? Is the name itself outmoded? How can the arms of the movement work together better?

On the issue of prayer, Stein took a slightly different tack than Wernick.

“You can start by coming to shul. It’s like any other skill set — if you don’t practice it, you aren’t going to be able to do it,” he said, adding that cantors are far more open to experimentation than many realize. “Come to shul and I’ll do anything; I’ll stand on my head and sing ‘Yankee Doodle’ to ‘Adon Olam.’ ” Wernick said that too often, worshipers feel they are “prisoners” to the traditional prayerbook, and diversity needs to be encouraged. He also said that clergy need to better explain the poetry and symbolism inherent in the liturgy.

“Adon Olam,” for example, is all about offering worshipers a measure of comfort as they leave sanctified space and head back into a world that can be tense and even frightening.

“We need to really open up the prayers in that kind of way,” he said.

“Whether we sing them to ‘Yankee Doodle’ or the melodies of the great chazzanim,” Wernick said, “they become more than just sing songs and more than just rushing through the words.”

Stein said that while synagogues must try to bring in as many new people as possible — while still appealing to its core — the move-

ment as a whole should only count as Conservative Jews those who follow Jewish law, as opposed to any individual that belongs to a United Synagogue affiliate.

The Cantors Assembly leader pushed some buttons when he suggested that spouses of clergy members — even those with highly demanding careers — need to contribute more time and energy to their congregations.

Schonfeld said that in an age

when many are asking if movements and denominations have outlived their usefulness, Conservative Judaism can offer up a new working definition of what a denomination can look like.

“That new denomination,” she said, “as opposed to being boxes in which we put people, is going to be more like an ecosystem — more like an interdependent and complex world in which there is room for all different kinds of Jews.”

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6

NATIONAL

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

Did group raise funds for Hamas on college campuses?

by Eric Fingerhut Jewish Telegraphic Agency WASHINGTON (JTA) — A U.S. congressman is the latest to call for a Justice Department investigation into whether a proPalestinian group has been raising money on college campuses for Hamas.

In a letter to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, Rep. Brad Sherman (D-Calif.) urged a probe into Viva Palestina USA, a humanitarian aid convoy led by British lawmaker George Galloway that brought medical supplies to Gaza last July.

Both the Zionist Organization of America and Anti-Defamation League in recent months have urged Holder to investigate reports about the convoy’s links to Hamas.

The groups made their requests after Galloway and other Viva Palestina USA members appeared and reportedly raised funds at some college campuses in the spring and summer.

“Clearly, people and organizations in the United States cannot be allowed to solicit funds for foreign terrorist organizations,” Sherman wrote in his letter to Holder. “That such solicitation is occurring during the middle of the day at a public university is truly

Vince Millett / Creative Commons

British Parliament member George Galloway, speaking at a proPalestinian demonstration in London earlier in 2009, leads the humanitarian aid group Viva Palestina USA, which has been accused of supporting Hamas.

frightening,” he said, referring to the University of California, Irvine.

Sherman wrote similar letters expressing concern about the reports on Viva Palestina USA to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, University of California, Irvine chancellor Michael Drake and Internal Revenue Service commissioner Douglas Shulman.

Viva Palestina USA was launched after the Viva Palestina group that Galloway set up in Britain sent a convoy to Gaza in

March. It did not respond to a request for comment.

At a meeting in Gaza with Hamas officials during the March trip, according to a report from terrorism expert Steve Emerson, Galloway held up a bag of cash and said “This is not charity. This is politics,” and “We are giving this money now to the government of Palestine. And, if I could, I would give them 10 times, 100 times more.”

FUNDS on page 22

Doves join forces

by Ron Kampeas Jewish Telegraphic Agency WASHINGTON (JTA) — A funny thing happened on the way to modifying punitive legislation targeting Palestinians — Jewish and non-Jewish groups backing aggressive peacemaking established a coalition.

The groups succeeded in toning down the Palestinian AntiTerrorism Act of 2006. In the process they forged an unofficial coalition of so-called “pro-peace” groups that now routinely consult on issues ranging from IsraelPalestinian matters to how best to deal with Iran — most participants oppose new sanctions.

Participants say the Jewish groups in the new coalition include Americans for Peace Now and the Israel Policy Forum, as well as two groups in the process of merging: J Street and Brit Tzedek V’Shalom. Officials with the groups unabashedly defend their growing ties with their nonJewish partners, insisting that the non-Jewish groups back a twostate solution and favor other policies that will help Israel by improving chances for peace in the region.

The list of organizations from outside the Jewish community includes narrow-interest groups such as the Arab American Institute, the American Task Force on Palestine, Churches for Middle East Peace and, more recently, the National Iranian American Council. At times the informal coalition also has included liberal think tanks such as the New America Foundation, the Open Society Institute and the Center for American Progress.

The loose-knit coalition has persisted and even expanded since the election of President Obama, who is friendly to its goals of active engagement. Many of the organizations had an active role, or even helped sponsor, J Street’s inaugural national conference in October. Participants attend each other’s strategy meetings and, during intense periods — for instance, in crafting the modifications to the 2006 Palestinian legislation — speak routinely in conference calls.

“It’s informal and it’s based on personal relationships that we’ve developed over the months and years,” said Warren Clark, the executive director of Churches for Middle East Peace, an umbrella body for mainstream church groups from Protestant, Roman Catholic and Orthodox streams.

For years, liberal activists — including some associated with the budding coalition — have protested the willingness of establish-

ment Jewish organizations to embrace pro-Israel Evangelical Christians, citing their conservative views on domestic social issues and hawkish foreign policy positions. In recent weeks, however, Conservative journalists and bloggers have criticized the willingness of dovish Jewish groups to work with non-Jewish groups that have been critical of Israeli policies and oppose Iran sanctions.

Many pro-Israel groups, including AIPAC and the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish organizations, have made sanctions a top priority, portraying them as a means of leveraging Iran into abandoning its suspected nuclear weapons program. Several members of the informal dovish coalition oppose such steps, with the National Iranian American Council leading the way.

Conservative critics have focused on alleged links between J Street and the Iranian group, lumping together the two organizations.

Yet J Street officials have always stopped short of publicly ruling out sanctions, arguing that the time was not right for tougher measures, but might be in the future to stop Iran’s nuclear ambitions. And, indeed, J Street this week came out in favor of proposed sanctions legislation being considered in the U.S. Congress.

Americans for Peace Now, on the other hand, has joined the Iranian group, known by the acronym NIAC, in portraying the sanctions as inhumane and likely to reinforce support for the regime.

In at least one mass e-mail, Americans for Peace Now directed readers to NIAC’s talking points outlining the case for opposing sanctions targeting Iran’s energy sector.

In the wake of Obama’s election, NIAC called a meeting to strategize among like minds on Iran sanctions.

Lara Friedman, an Americans for Peace Now lobbyist, attended the meeting. So did Joel Rubin, then a staffer at J Street, though participants say he took part in a personal capacity.

In any case, the proposed language that emerged from the Nov. 12, 2008 meeting is broad to the point of meaninglessness, underlining the difficulties of pleasing all parties in such coalitions.

“Obviously with such a diverse group, it will be difficult to coalesce behind any specific position,” the minutes of the meeting stated. “But we all share a view that advocates a diplomatic resolution to the conflict between the U.S. and Iran, opposes military action against Iran, and agrees that sanctions are no substitute for diplomatic engagement.”

NATIONAL

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

7

Girl talk, pearls of wisdom at Women to Watch gala

Michael Bennett Kress

Among the Women to Watch honorees on stage in Washington, from left to right, are Rabbi Sharon Brous, Estee Portnoy, Ellen Stovall, Ruth Marcus and Jillian Copeland, Dec. 7, 2009.

by Suzanne Kurtz Jewish Telegraphic Agency WASHINGTON (JTA) — “The CEO of what?” asked my friend Stewart, when I told him I was looking forward to an event in Washington honoring, among others, Laurie Ann Goldman, the chief executive officer of Spanx, Inc. He didn’t get my enthusiasm.

Goldman’s innovative hosiery and undergarment company needed little introduction at the Jewish Women International’s 12th annual Women to Watch gala Monday afternoon at the Hilton Washington.

She joined fellow honorees Rabbi Sharon Brous, Yanina Fleysher, Ruth Marcus, Julie Morgenstern, Estee Portnoy, JJ Ramberg, Melissa Arbus Sherry, Ellen Stovall and Jillian Copeland for a girl-power celebration, equal parts light-hearted chatter and insightful rumination.

With accomplishments and contributions as wide ranging and diverse as their fashion accessories, the women on stage laughed and nodded in agreement and support.

During an “Up Close and Personal” symposium, they shared secrets to their respective successes, as well as the challenges of balancing family and communal responsibility with professional drive.

“You don’t have your life that you live and your life giving back.

It’s all the same thing,” said Ramberg, host of MSNBC’s “Your Business” and co-founder of GoodSearch and GoodShop Web sites.

Portnoy, the longtime spokesperson and business manager for Michael Jordan, mused that

while she doesn’t regularly light Shabbat candles with the basketball legend, charitable giving has been an integral part of their work together.

“In my work with Michael, the most fulfilling things I’ve done with him have really fallen in the charitable areas,” she said. “I’m not always surrounded by Jewish people on the basketball court, but off the court we share those same values.”

But perhaps the most moving personal share came from Stovall, president and CEO of the National Coalition of Cancer Survivorship and herself a three-time cancer survivor.

Reflecting on what might be her legacy, she said it is helping other survivors deal with their illness — one person at a time — that has given her the most satisfaction.

“Having cancer [may have been] my identity,” she said, “but it’s not my legacy to be the ‘cancer lady,’” — it’s her family and friends.

The honorees focused on family and friends when one audience member asked, “What do you do for fun? How do you sit and giggle with your girlfriends?”

“With manis and pedis!” exclaimed Morgenstern, the timemanagement guru and frequent Oprah Winfrey guest who bikes regularly in Central Park (and recently took up gymnastics at age 47). Yet she also said it was only recently that she learned “fun is a vital part of an inspired work life.”

Following the symposium, the honorees were introduced individually by actress Mayim Bialik, of “Beaches” and “Blossom” fame, during a luncheon. Each was

asked to share “pearls of wisdom” in 300 words.

As her company’s chief problem solver, Goldman cheekily con-

fessed to solving big “wardrobe problems for women like ‘muffin top,’ ‘grid butt’ and the dreaded BBS — dreaded bad bra syn-

drome.” But it’s accepting responsibility and accountability for your own problems that is the key to success, she said.

“The solutions are up to you,” Goldman said.

“Success is not luck,” she said.

“It’s believing you are lucky.”

Most astonishingly (at least for this reporter) was the assertion by Marcus, the Washington Post, Pulitzer Prize-nominated columnist, that she did not initially believe she had opinions worth sharing in print every week.

“It is not possible to get an A every week,” she acknowledged.

“Some of [my columns] are a Bplus, but it’s very important for us as women to get over the notion that we have to deliver perfection in everything we do. We need to learn to swagger, or at least get comfortable pretending to swagger.”

After listening to the 10 accomplished honorees get personal and introspective, show emotion and humility, I left the JWI luncheon reflecting on the “pearls of wisdom” that I also wear — each one given to me by an experience or an encounter that shaped my life.

So while I am still learning to perfect my swagger, when I told my girlfriends that I now have a free Spanx gift card from the Women to Watch gala, they totally got it. And that gets me an A, every week.

8

INTERNATIONAL

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

Danish Jews ponder bleak future

by Ben Harris Jewish Telegraphic Agency COPENHAGEN, Denmark (JTA) — Forty years ago, when a few thousand Polish Jewish refugees arrived in Denmark fleeing an anti-Semitic campaign orchestrated by Poland’s Communist government, Danish Jews welcomed the newcomers with high hopes.

Previous waves of Jewish immigrants had rejuvenated a community marked by high rates of intermarriage, assimilation and emigration, and Denmark’s Jews held out the same hopes for these new immigrants.

But many of the Polish Jews were assimilated and saw little value in Jewish affiliation, and even those who joined the active Jewish community have seen their children — following the example of generations of Danish Jews before them — intermarry and drift from Jewish life in Denmark.

“Our children, even some of them who went to Jewish school, most of them are getting assimilated,” said Jacob Zylber, who arrived in Denmark four decades ago at age 23. “You cannot do much about it.”

Today, Denmark’s Jewish community of some 2,000 members is scarcely bigger than it was 40 years ago. With no great wave of Jewish immigrants on the horizon, Jewish leaders fear they may be witnessing the death throes of a community that dates back to the 17th century.

“It will be a very, very small community, and probably a more cultural, social, friendship club,” said Bent Lexner, the country’s chief rabbi, when asked what he foresees for Danish Jewry. “You never know what’s going on tomorrow. But as I see it now, there will be very few people who are identifying themselves as traditional Jews.”

Denmark’s Jewish leaders are trying to figure out how to sustain a community whose active young

Jews decamp for better social and religious opportunities abroad and whose least committed melt into a society that has been, by European standards, remarkably welcoming of its Jewish minority.

“The answer is to try to hold on to the members that we can hold on, and try to get a lot of the potential members to join, which is very hard to do,” said Finn Schwarz, the president of Mosaiske Troessamfund, the community’s main umbrella group.

Schwarz recently took the unprecedented step of sending letters to 500 former community members urging them to return. Besides touting all the typical community offerings — the Jewish school, oldage home, the synagogue — he also noted the importance of fighting for Jewish rights, a point that these days has a particular potency in a country with a growing and restive Muslim minority.

Schwarz says he prefers to view the future of Danish Jewry with optimism. Other community leaders, however, are more accepting of the community’s declining numbers.

Lexner, the chief rabbi since 1996, caused a minor stir when a Danish newspaper quoted him as saying, in effect, that there was no law requiring Denmark to have a Jewish community. Lexner’s three children all live in Israel.

“I’m happy to see them there,” Lexner said. “I can see that my education has succeeded.”

The plight of Denmark’s Jews raises questions about the fate of scores of smaller European Jewish communities, many with distinguished histories that go back centuries. Though even stable Jewish communities in the United States face similar challenges of intermarriage and assimilation, the lack of a critical mass of members contributes to a self-reinforcing cycle: Each Jewish emigrant raises the incentive for others eager for a vibrant Jewish life to follow suit.

Ben Harris

The Danish Jewish Museum recently mounted an exhibition commemorating 40 years since the Polish immigration, the last significant group of Jewish immigrants to arrive in Denmark.

“That’s the fate of small communities,” said Sergio Della Pergola, one of the world’s foremost Jewish demographers and himself a European emigrant. Born in Italy, Della Pergola now lives in Israel. “[Community life] is not feasible below a certain threshold,” Della Pergola said. “And this is something that strangely enough people do not realize.”

About the only person who doesn’t fear for the community’s future is an outsider: Andrew Buckser, a professor of anthropology at Indiana’s Purdue University and the author of perhaps the most comprehensive academic study of Danish Jews, “After the Rescue.”

Buckser says Denmark’s Jews have worried about their communi-

ty’s disappearance for a century, yet the community is still around.

While he acknowledges the demographic challenges posed by emigration and assimilation, Buckser’s notion of what constitutes a Jewish community in the modern age leaves him confident that the predictions of Danish Jewry’s demise are overstated.

In “After the Rescue,” Buckser argues that Danish Jewry is not a community in the classical sense — a clearly defined group marked by a common set of beliefs and practices. Rather, Judaism in Denmark is more of a “toolbox,” a set of symbols from which individuals draw at will to construct their own identities. And that toolbox, he says, is as vital as ever.

Ben Harris

Former Danish minister and parliamentarian Arne Melchior, seen here at his home in Copenhagen on Nov. 11, 2009, fears the Jewish community will not be able to support its current infrastructure within a few years.

Ben Harris

Jewish community president Finn Schwarz, seen at his law office on Nov. 10, 2009, is trying to woo lapsed community members back into the fold.

The fear of communal demise in Denmark is “based on an assumption that assimilation and intermarriage will result in your community disappearing,” Buckser told JTA. “I’m not sure that’s a correct assumption.”

Though Buckser may be right, most Danish Jews are not thinking about Jewish symbolism when they ponder the fate of their community.

They are thinking about their institutions — the synagogues and schools and nursing homes they fear will no longer have a constituency to support them.

“I’m not an optimist,” said Arne Melchior, a seventh-generation Dane whose father and brother both served as chief rabbis.

A former parliamentarian and government minister, Melchior is a proud Danish patriot who sings the praises not only of his country’s best known achievements — the virtual absence of poverty and unemployment — but even its more dubious ones, like its skyhigh marginal tax rates.

But Melchior’s cheeriness about Denmark turns dark when he contemplates the future of the Jewish community. Some of the very things that make Denmark so attractive to Melchior are what threaten Jewish survival here, he acknowledges.

“We are very open towards the surrounding society,” Melchior said. “And the more contact you get, the more you will take over their customs. You are not an isolated group. You are a very open group.”

INTERNATIONAL

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

9

Swiss anti-Islam vote draws protests from Jews and Christians

by Ruth Ellen Gruber Jewish Telegraphic Agency BUDAPEST (JTA) — Swiss voters may have been taking aim at Islam, but Jewish and Catholic leaders are among those crying foul.

Jewish organizations have joined Muslims, the Vatican and other groups in warning that a Swiss referendum banning the construction of mosque minarets could fuel hatred, jeopardize religious freedom and further polarize an already divided society.

“Discriminatory laws like a ban on minarets are likely to alienate rather than ease integration,” the Board of Deputies of British Jews said in a statement following the Nov. 29 vote. “They also give succor to the unacceptable politics of unlimited hate being peddled around Europe by right-wing extremists.”

France’s chief rabbi also criticized the vote, as did two influential U.S. Jewish organizations, the AntiDefamation League and American Jewish Committee. Both the Swiss government and Switzerland’s Jewish community had strongly opposed the initiative.

Called by the far-right Swiss People’s Party — the country’s largest political party — the referendum won the support of nearly 58 percent of voters. The result, which stunned many observers, mandates a constitutional ban on the construction of minarets, or prayer towers, on newly built mosques.

The referendum is the latest round in a series of ongoing debates and controversies over how to deal with a growing Muslim population in Europe. In France, there have been sharp debates over whether Muslim women should be allowed to wear veils in public schools. And in the past few years, anti-immigrant protesters have demonstrated against the building of mosques in Germany, Italy and elsewhere in Western Europe.

Posters backing the Swiss referendum had blatantly played on fears of Islamist extremism. Some showed a sinister, black-veiled figure in front of black minarets arrayed to look like missiles rising out of a Swiss flag.

Martin Baltisser, the general secretary of the Swiss People’s Party, told the BBC, “This was a vote against minarets as symbols of Islamic power.”

About 400,000 Muslims live in Switzerland in a population of 7.5 million. Four mosques in the country have minarets.

Many Muslims in Switzerland are refugees from the Yugoslav wars in the 1990s. During those wars, Orthodox Serb and Catholic Croat fighters deliberately targeted hundreds of mosques for destruction.

Rytc / Creative Commons

Poster in Zurich backing the referendum banning the construction of mosque minarets that won handily in Switzerland.

In a joint statement ahead of the vote, the two main Swiss Jewish umbrella groups opposed the measure.

“Precisely because the Jewish community has firsthand experience of discrimination, it is committed to active opposition to discrimination and to action in favor of religious freedom and peaceful relations between the religions,” the two Swiss Jewish groups declared.

Swiss Jewry, the statement said, “takes seriously the fears of the population that extremist ideas could be disseminated in Switzerland. But banning minarets is no solution — it only creates in Muslims in Switzerland a sense of alienation and discrimination.”

The results of the referendum drew widespread criticism from the Vatican, Muslim leaders, the United Nations and other political and religious bodies around the world.

Jewish criticism focused on concern that the crackdown on Muslims could foster extremism and harm efforts to integrate Muslim communities. But Jewish leaders also warned of possible repercussions for Jews and other minorities.

“For the Swiss People’s Party, as for all far-right parties in Europe, any group that is different in terms of its appearance or its language or its cultural or religious traditions is regarded as a target,” said David Harris, the executive director of the American Jewish Committee. “We stand firmly against these rabblerousing politics in the name of pluralism and democracy.”

The Anti-Defamation League slammed the referendum as “a populist political campaign of religious

intolerance.”

“This is not the first time a Swiss popular vote has been used to promote religious intolerance,” the ADL said in a statement. “A century ago, a Swiss referendum banned Jewish ritual slaughter in an attempt to drive out its Jewish population.

We share the … concern that those

who initiated the anti-minaret campaign could try to further erode religious freedom through similar means.”

France’s Chief Rabbi Gilles Bernheim called on leaders of “all religions” to work for “dialogue and openness.”

Bernhiem and others recalled

that until Jews were granted civil rights, European rulers often had imposed bans or regulations on the size or visibility of synagogues, frequently forbidding synagogues to stand taller than local churches.

“In many buildings in Budapest you find prayer rooms or synagogues hidden away in courtyards — you can’t see them from the outside,” said Mircea Cernov, who heads Haver, a foundation in the Hungarian capital that promotes education and dialogue between Jews and non-Jews.

Cernov joined Bernheim in calling for dialogue rather than legal restrictions to tackle the issue of the growing Muslim presence in Europe.

“The moment something is a formal restriction, debate and critical response to the issue is closed,” Cernov said. “This can lead in a very short time to a polarization or radicalization of the question.”

Philip Carmel, spokesman for the Conference of European Rabbis, also stressed the need for dialogue rather than restrictions. He said the group’s rabbis at their recent conference in Moscow had condemned the posters supporting the referendum.

“It is not by banning minarets that one combats Islamic fundamentalism in Europe,” Carmel said, “but by engaging in serious dialogue with moderate forces within Islam to build a united and democratic Europe.”

10

ISRAEL

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

Israel Briefs

Abir Sultan / Flash 90 / JTA

West Bank settlers and their supporters, including yeshiva students, try to block traffic entering Jerusalem to protest settlement freeze, Dec. 7, 2009.

Settlers step up protests, but Netanyahu politically strong

by Leslie Susser Jewish Telegraphic Agency JERUSALEM (JTA) — In the wake of the Israeli government’s freeze on building in West Bank settlements, Jewish settlers are planning widespread protests and demonstrations, including blocking roads in Israel proper.

Their aim is to delegitimize the freeze decision among the public.

The danger for the settlers, however, is if they are perceived as too extreme, their actions could actually hurt their public standing.

In a campaign reminiscent of actions by the far right in the aftermath of the Oslo agreements in the mid-1990s and the run-up to the Gaza disengagement in 2005, young radical settlers plan to keep the police guessing as they turn up randomly at major thoroughfares at different times to block the traffic.

Their first target was traffic to and from Jerusalem, where dozens of settler youths were quickly dispersed by police Monday after trying to block the main entrance to the city.

Settler youths also have been at the forefront of moves to harass government inspectors entering the settlements to issue warrants against further building. In several cases this has led to violent confrontations between settlers and police protecting the inspectors.

The worst settler violence, however, has been against Palestinians.

In what they call “the price tag” policy, extremists attack nearby

villages whenever they feel the government is trying to restrict settlement in any way. Over the weekend, settlers rampaged through the village of Einbus, near Nablus, torching vehicles and setting a home on fire.

Settler leaders have spoken out against violence.

Dani Dayan, head of the Judea and Samaria Settler Council, warned settlers Tuesday to keep the protest campaign free of violence, partly for moral reasons and partly in order not to alienate the vast bulk of non-settler Israelis.

But the settler leaders are not fully in control of the situation, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has warned the settler community not to cross the fine line between legitimate protest action and open rebellion. And while the mood is not as ominous as it was in the days leading up to the Rabin assassination in 1995, the Shin Bet security service has intensified its already close protection of the prime minister.

Besides the protests and demonstrations, the settlers plan legal and political action against the freeze.

They have petitioned the Supreme Court, arguing that the authorities had no right to implement a political freeze without the settlers first being given a hearing.

Their main hope, though, is in the political arena, where the settlers are banking on a rebellion within the Likud Party. Although the two most hawkish parties in the government, Yisrael Beiteinu and

Jewish Home, have expressed deep sympathy for the settlers, they show no sign of bolting the coalition over the freeze.

Inside Likud, there has been a degree of unrest, as government ministers and Knesset members criticized the freeze as antithetical to party ideology. No one, however, has threatened to resign over it, and the chances of a full-scale rebellion within the party — like the one against Ariel Sharon over the Gaza disengagement in 2005 — are remote.

In 2005, Sharon found himself under attack from leading Likudniks like Uzi Landau and Netanyahu himself, who were ready to resign their ministerial posts to throw in their lot with the settler cause. That is not the case today, and there seems to be little likelihood of Netanyahu’s government being shaken by internal party ferment.

Nevertheless, given the threat, Netanyahu has been working hard to cultivate wide party support. He has been able to play on the trauma of the break with Sharon and to urge the rebels not to take action that again could split the party.

His second argument has been to stress that the freeze is for 10 months only and will not be repeated. On the contrary, Netanyahu says, as soon as it lapses, building will be resumed at an accelerated rate.

PROTESTS on page 19

Israel to Britain: Watch your legal system JERUSALEM (JTA) — Israel’s Foreign Ministry called on the British government to stop allowing its legal system to be hijacked for political means.

The call Tuesday came a day after reports that a British court had issued an arrest warrant for opposition leader Tzipi Livni for war crimes at the request of proPalestinian activists. The warrant was canceled later when it became clear that Livni had not entered the United Kingdom.

“Israel calls on the British government to fulfill its promises, once and for all, to act in preventing the exploitation of the British legal system by anti-Israel elements against the State of Israel and its citizens,” said a statement released Tuesday by the Foreign Ministry. “The absence of immediate, determined action to correct this abuse harms relations between Britain and Israel.

“If Israeli leaders cannot visit Britain in proper, dignified fashion, this will, quite naturally, seriously compromise Britain’s ability to play the active role in the Middle East peace process that it desires.”

The warrant sought Livni’s arrest on suspicion of war crimes committed during Operation Cast Lead, Israel’s military offensive in Gaza last winter, according to diplomatic sources in London.

Livni had been invited to an event Dec. 13 in north London organized by the Jewish National Fund, then was to hold meetings with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and other government officials.

According to the Israeli Embassy in London, Livni had canceled her visit two weeks before the event due to scheduling problems, and not just days before the event because of the threat of a warrant.

Abbas urges PLO to reject violence J E R U S A L E M ( J TA ) — Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas rejected a return to violence in an address to the PLO. “What is required of us ... a return to violence? I won’t accept it,” he reportedly said Tuesday at a meeting of the Palestine Liberation Organization’s Central Council in Ramallah.

Abbas also said that Israel must halt all settlement building and recognize a Palestinian state in

pre-1967 borders to resume peace talks.

“When Israel stops settlement activity for a specific period and when it recognizes the borders we are calling for, and these are the legal borders, there would be nothing to prevent us from going to negotiations to complete what we agreed to at Annapolis,” Abbas said, according to Reuters.

The Annapolis conference in 2007 restarted Israel-Palestinian peace talks and called for the first time for a two-state solution, following the guidelines of the 2002 “road map” for peace that called for a settlement freeze and an end to Palestinian violence.

The PLO council was holding a two-day meeting to discuss extending Abbas’ presidential term, which expires Jan. 25.

Palestinian elections scheduled for next month were canceled when Hamas refused to allow the vote to go forward in Gaza.

Abbas, 74, has said he will not run for re-election.

Hamas balks at Miss Palestine contest JERUSALEM (JTA) — A Miss Palestine contest scheduled for later this month has drawn the ire of Hamas and other fundamentalist Islamic organizations.

Fifty-eight Palestinian women from the West Bank and from inside Israel will compete in the Dec. 26 contest, the Palestinian Ma’an news agency reported.

Women from Gaza are unable to participate due to Palestinian political discord and Israel’s blockade of the territory.

Two hundred women aged 18-22 vied to be contestants.

The Trip Fashion Company is sponsoring the event, which will feature each of the contestants modeling four dresses — but not swimsuits, in deference to Muslim sensibilities, Ma’an reported.

Judging will be on education, personality and beauty.

Some of the judges will come from the Palestinian Authority’s information and culture ministries, according to the news service.

In a statement, Hamas’ Culture Ministry in Gaza said the contest “is completely contradicting with the Palestinian values and traditions” and violates the current Palestinian status that is under the Israeli military occupation.

“Showing beautiful girls in front of the mass media and the audience while our people in Gaza are suffering and paying a high price due to the occupation is rejected and is considered as a blind imitation of the Western traditions,” the ministry said in a statement.

The ministry called on contest advisers to “stop it immediately.”

The winner will receive a 10day trip to Turkey and 10,000 Israeli shekels — about $2,650.

SOCIAL LIFE

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

Women's Philanthropy Lion of Judah Luncheon

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“SERVING THE LOCAL REAL ESTATE COMMUNITY FOR 23 YEARS.”

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— PHOTOS CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE —

The Cincinnati Lions gathered on September 15, 2009 for the annual Women's Philanthropy Lion of Judah Luncheon at the home of Marilyn Zemboch. The inspiring keynote speaker was Sue Fishkoff, national correspondent and editor. Sue is currently the contributing editor for the JTA Jewish news service, and the principal from the Paper Clips Project. The event, co-chaired by Janet Cohen and Cindy Guttman, raised $125,000 for the 2010 Community Campaign.

11

SOCIAL ANNOUNCEMENTS WEDDING ANNIVERSARY ichelle and Richard Gabbour will celebrate their “dynomite” 11th wedding anniversary on December 27, 2009.

M

REFUAH SHLEMAH GET WELLS Daniel Eliyahu Daniel ben Tikvah

Stan Schwartzberg Simcha Leib ben Devorah

Mel Fisher Moshe ben Hinda

Ravid Sulam Ravid Chaya bat Ayelet

Murray Kirschner Meir ben Basha

Edward Ziv Raphael Eliezer Aharon ben Esther Enya

Sue Fishkoff, Fran Coleman, Leslie Miller, Andi Levenson

Marcie Bachrach, Abby Schwartz

Joan Guttman, Ariella Cohen, Nicole Guttman

Janet Cohen and Sally Hiudt

12

CINCINNATI JEWISH LIFE

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

Janet Cohen, Event Co-Chair; Marilyn Zemboch, Event Host; Cindy Guttman, Event Co-Chair

Sherri Friedman, Evelyn Fisher, Tara Vigran

Patti Schneider, Sylvia Slovin, Amy Diamond, Pam Weber

Linda Greenberg, Pat Byer

Marilyn Zemboch, Dianne Rosenberg, April Davidow, Lauren Cohen

Anita Schneider, April Davidow, Ronna Schneider

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14

DINING OUT

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

Johnny Chan 2 plans two buffets for Jewish diners

by Bob Wilhelmy Restaurant Reporter Again this year, Johnny Chan 2 Chinese restaurant is extending a special invitation to the Jewish community on Dec. 24 and 25, and again on Dec. 31. The longtime Chinese eatery is planning another series of its holiday-season blockbuster buffets for these days, and the bill of fare will feature many favorites from the regular menu. Also, on Dec. 25, the restaurant will be open and offering the same buffet.

“We’re accepting reservations for each of these special days, so that makes it easier for a family to get in at the time they want,” said Frank Shi, general partner. The restaurant will open at 11 a.m. and close at 10:30 p.m. on both Dec. 24 and 25, so that diners can choose their times to fit the flow of their days.

The buffet for those days is loaded with really good selections and many of the most popular favorites from the regular menu, according to Shi. In addition to the shrimp and crab dishes on the buffet that Jewish diners would want to avoid, there will be sizzling beef black pepper, General Tao’s chicken, sweet and sour chicken, super vegetable delight in wine sauce, chicken fried rice, delight of three, sweet corn nut, pan-fried dumplings, and more.

You’ll find sesame balls, egg rolls, pot stickers, chicken wings, scallion pancakes, chicken teriyaki and other appetizers.

There will be hot and sour soup and sweet corn soup, along with fruit, Chinese donuts and other dessert items.

Adults pay $18.95, and for the kinder under 10, $9.95, for the Dec. 24 and 25 buffets.

“People will like the December 31st buffet also, because it has a lot of really special dishes on it,” Shi said. Hours for Dec. 31 are 4:30 to 10:30 p.m., and the cost is $19.95 for adults and $9.95 for children.

Again, top menu items will be featured, with crowd-pleaser favorites such as roast crispy duck, pineapple fried rice, sesame chicken, Mongolian sautéed beef, moo goo gai pan, sweet and sour chicken and happy family. In addition, there will be numerous seafood dishes, including sushi and sashimi.

In the appetizer area, there will be sesame balls, egg rolls, beef teriyaki, chicken teriyaki, scallion pancakes, pot stickers, chicken wings and more.

Also, hot and sour soup and winter melon soup will be part of the offering.

Frank Shi, owner of Johnny Chan 2 Chinese restaurant, and daughter Emily, make their way through the buffet line, which will be stocked with plenty of appealing choices at the all-you-can-eat offering available on the evenings of December 24th and 25th and again on the 31st.

While buffets can be fun, at times other than these dates, GM Shi encourages patrons to order from the menu, because there is nothing better, he said, than food made to order and fresh from the wok.

Asked for the most popular

items on his menu, which features 133 numbered entrees in all, Shi mentioned several, with General Tao’s ($11.05) chicken leading the pack. Mongolian beef ($9.85), along with the fried rice selections ($6.95 to $7.95) are close behind.

Others are moo goo gai pan

($9.05), Hunan beef ($9.85), and Hunan crispy walleye (seasonal availability & market price).

Among my favorites are: eggplant Shanghai style ($8.25), in which the eggplant is deep-fried, then mixed with stir-fried veggies in a brown sauce; spicy Szechuan

string beans ($8.25), also in a brown sauce, but with a kick; and the house specialty of sizzling beef with black peppers ($11.95), featuring sautéed beef and “green” peppers with onions, served up in a black pepper sauce, again, on the spicy side.

One point you’ll notice on the face of the carry-out menu is a boxed area with a title of “Award Winning Fine Chinese Dining.”

There are two honors listed there: one, the top spot for Chinese Cuisine, awarded by Cincinnati Magazine; and two, a ranking among the top 100 Chinese restaurants in the United States, determined by Chinese News.

Johnny Chan 2 hours of operation are: Monday through Thursday, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. and Friday to 10:30 p.m.; Saturday, 11:30 a.m. to 10:30 p.m.; and Sunday, 11:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. Dine in or carry out.

Johnny Chan 2 11296 Montgomery Road In the Shops at Harper’s Point Cincinnati, OH 45249 513-489-2388

DINING OUT

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

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OPINION

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

The candle within

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Do you have something to say? E-mail your letter to editor@americanisraelite.com

Dear Editor, Thanksgiving day, Nov. 27, was the first yahrzeit (memorial) for my mother Fannie Warren. I want to thank the community for their support, sharing, and words of encouragement during this period. This time of year also holds special importance to me as a child of Holocaust survivors.

On Nov. 24, 1949 a husband and his wife and 1-year-old infant son disembarked from the USS Army Transport Ship General McRae to the shores of New York City from Germany. Thus began the new life for Max and Fannie and Rubin Worobejczyk. The ship was not a luxury liner and my mother had considerable seasickness. Both my parents lost their families during the war. For my father Max, this included his wife and son, his parents, and all five brothers and sisters. For my mother this included her husband, her parents, 3 of 4 brothers and sisters, and countless relatives.

Coming to America was filled with tremendous challenges that we can barely comprehend. Not knowing the language, the customs, not having money, not having close relatives, not having a job, meant the odds of being rehabilitated from their horrors were quite low.

Indeed, despite my father having a first cousin in Louisville, Ky., he was never invited there nor welcomed. This was yet another blow.

Although there was an alternative to go to the new State of Israel, and indeed they had sent belong-

ings to make aliyah, my mother’s younger brother who had just made aliyah counseled against it. Life was very difficult and being older (30s and 40s) would present considerable challenges. And, Israel was not terribly interested in older camp prisoners as opposed to Partisans and fighters. In the War for Independence, survivors had the highest casualty rate. So, many sought refuge in America.

Interestingly, during the darkest days at Bergen Belsen in 1945, my mother dreamed of coming to America. To quote, “In America there is no war.”

Despite the challenges, my parents were successful and were forever grateful to America. Although not wealthy, we never went hungry, there was a roof over our heads, we had access to Jewish and secular education, and we could be proud Jews. Our opportunities were truly profound. But to be clear and most importantly, my parents never felt threatened again.

This Nov. 27 was Thanksgiving Day. Although not a religious holiday, it is a special day to give formal thanks for the tremendous freedom we have in America. For Jews, we have a degree of freedom and creativity that is unparalleled in our history of dispersion. We sometimes refer to the so-called Golden Age of Spain. Do you know that during this period, Jews had to pay the dhimmi tax, had to wear garments that distinguished themselves as Jews? We know that Shmuel Ha-Nagid was Prime

Minister to two Moslem kings in Spain in the 11th century. He had to submit to dhimmi servitude. After his death, when his son refused to pay, both he and the residents of Grenada were murdered on Dec. 31, 1066. This was Golden Spain.

In some respects for Jews in America, it is the Best of Times and the Most Challenging of Times.

Who would ever think that a Joe Lieberman could become the Vice President of the U.S. and is among the most respected Senators? I saw Senator Lieberman give a talk from the pulpit on the weekly Torah portion at The Shul in Florida during the time he was running for President. Incredible. The growth of Jewish Day Schools and of Jewish Institutions is remarkable.

Non-Jews think incredibly highly of our Jewish minority. At the same time living in an open free society has its challenges. Exposure to pervasive hedonism threatens a modest Jewish lifestyle.

There are some who believe Thanksgiving is irrelevant to Jews.

It is a non-Jewish holiday. After all, we need to be thankful to God on a daily basis. Nonetheless, this should not take away from being thankful for our American citizenship, the freedoms we enjoy, and what we have collectively accomplished.

And yes, Nov., 24, 1949, the day of my mother’s arrival to the U.S. was Thanksgiving Day. Sincerely, Ray Warren

TEST YOUR KNOWLEDGE of this week’s Torah portion This Week’s Portion: Miketz (Braishith 41:1—44:17) 1. Who attempted to interpret Pharaoh's dream? a.) His wise man b.) Sorcerers c.) Architects d.) Doctors 2. What grain was in Pharaoh's dream? a.) Wheat b.) Barley c.) Corn d.) Verse does not say 3. How many different sheaves were on each stalk?

a.) One b.) Seven c.) Too many to count 4. What animal was in Pharaoh's dream? a.) Horse b.) Frogs c.) Cow 5. What was Joseph's main task when he first became viceroy? a.) Reunite with his family b.) Store grain for the seven years of famine c.) Expland Pharaoh's kingdom

Written by Rabbi Dov Aaron Wise

A,B 41:8 The sorcerers divined with bones of the dead.

D 41:5,6 B 41:5 C 41:3 B 41:34,35,36

It would make a good Chelm story. The resident philosopher sagely announces that since he can’t perceive his own face directly he must not have one. Besides, as anyone can plainly see, what seems to be his face clearly resides in his mirror.

The thought is inspired by “materialist” psychologists, who lament the persistence of the idea of “dualism,” the belief that human beings possess both physical and spiritual components. “The qualities of mental life that we associate with souls are purely corporeal,” asserts Professor Paul Bloom of Yale, for example. “They emerge from biochemical processes in the brain.”

Another would-be re-educator of the backward masses is Harvard professor Steven Pinker, who advises us to set aside “childlike intuitions and traditional dogmas” and recognize that what we conceive of as the soul is nothing more than “the activity of the brain.”

Or, as they might say back at the University of Chelm, since the soul seems perceptible only through the brain, the latter must define the former.

Sometimes, though, deep intuitions are right and interpretations of evidence (or the lack of it) wrong.

And scientists, as the noted British psychologist H. J. Eyesenck famously observed, can be “just as ordinary, pig-headed and unreasonable as anybody else, and their unusually high intelligence only makes their prejudices all the more dangerous.”

Were the contemporary dualism debate merely academic, we might just ignore it. Unfortunately, though, the denial of humanity’s specialness – the ghost in the Bloom/Pinker philosophy-machine – is of formidable import.

Negating the concept of a soul – what makes human beings special and requires us to take responsibility for our choices – yields deep repercussions in broader society. It bears impact on a slew of contemporary social issues, from animal rights to abortion; from marriage’s meaning to the treatment of the terminally ill.

In the absence of the concept of a human soul, there is nothing to justify considering humans inherently more worthy than animals, nothing to prevent us from casually terminating a yet-unborn life or a life no longer “useful”; no reason to consider any way of life less proper than any other. Neither would we be justified to consider any insect our inferior, nor bound to any ethical or moral system. Put succinctly, a society that denies the soul-idea is, in the word’s deepest sense, soulless.

The game’s zero-sum: Either we humans are qualitatively different from the rest of the biosphere, sublimated by our souls and the responsibilities that attend them; or we are not. A soul-denying world might

craft a utilitarian social contract. But right and wrong there could have no true meaning at all.

The materialist notion is not novel. De-spiritualizers of humanity’s essence served as the high priests of the Age of Reason and the glory days of Communism.

But the first “materialists” may have been the ancient Greeks, who placed capricious gods on the pedestal where, today, professors lay gray matter.

Hellas celebrated the physical world. The ancient Greeks developed geometry, calculated the earth’s circumference, proposed a heliocentric theory of the solar system and focused attention on the human being, too, but only as a physical specimen.

Accordingly, much of Hellenist thought revolved around the idea that the enjoyment of life was the most worthwhile goal of man. The words “cynic,” “epicurean,” and “hedonist” all stem from Greek philosophical schools.

And so it followed almost logically that the culture that was Greece saw the Jewish fixation on the divine as an affront. The Sabbath denied the unstopping nature of the physical world; circumcision implied that the body is imperfect; the Jewish calendar imparted holiness where there is only mundane periodicity; and modesty or any sort of limits on indulgence in physical pleasure were unnatural.

The Greeks had their “gods,” of course, but they were diametric to holiness, modeled entirely on the worst examples of human beings, evidencing the basest of inclinations.

And when Hellenist philosophers spoke of the “soul,” they referred only to what we would call the personality or intellect. The idea of a self that can make meaningful choices and merit eternal reward was indigestible to the Greek world-view.

As indispensable as it is to the Jewish one, which insists that humans are unique within creation, and that we are charged with living special lives; that our souls are eternal and that what we do makes a difference.

Chanukah celebrates the crucial difference between the ideals that embodied Hellenism and those that animate the Jewish people.

In recent years it has become fashionable among the ignorant to dismiss Chanukah as a “minor” festival on the Jewish calendar.

Anyone familiar with the centuriesold and voluminous mystical, conceptual and halachic Chanukah literature knows better.

The Hellenism/Judaism philosophical battle continues to this day and its stakes are high. Gazing at the Chanukah candles this year, we might want to recall the words (Proverbs, 20:27) of King Solomon, the wisest of all men: “A flame of G-d is the soul of man.”

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by Rabbi Avi Shafran Contributing Columnist

Answers

16

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

JEWISH LIFE

17

Sedra of the Week

by Rabbi Shlomo Riskin

Parshat Miketz Genesis 41:1 – 44:17

Efrat-Israel — “….Menashe, because the Lord has caused me to forget all of my toil and my father’s house (Gen 41:51).”

Despite his brothers’ callous behavior in casting him into a pit and then selling him into Egyptian enslavement, and despite Mrs. Potiphiar’s failed seduction and her subsequent revenge leading to his further imprisonment, Joseph once again lands on his feet. He even emerges as Grand Vizier, or CEO, of Pharaoh’s kingdom, specifically Minister of Agriculture and Provider of Emergency Food. We are left, however, with one agonizing question: why, at this high point in his career, does Joseph not contact his grieving father and inform him that he is not only still alive, but that he enjoys an exalted position?

Joseph must understand that he could put the aged patriarch’s fears to rest and simultaneously give him a bit of nachat!

In order to answer our question, we must first analyze the peregrinations of our patriarchs and their lengthy absences from their parents. The Bible seems to be teaching us that the recipient of the birthright blessings must have a profound, personal relationship with the G-d of the Covenant. This is virtually impossible to achieve until he has attained true selfunderstanding and laid to rest any tensions in his relationship with his parents. One must be at peace with oneself and one’s earthly father before one can truly relate to one’s Father in Heaven. In order to find that peace, many of our patriarchs left their father’s house and spent a long time living in an alien environment.

We have already analyzed how after the trauma of the Akeda, Isaac did not return home with his father. Isaac’s G-d is referred to as the “Fright of Isaac” – the God who seemed to command his earthly father, Abraham to lift the slaughterer’s knife to his throat resulting in awesome fear and trembling (Genesis 31:53). Isaac wanders around B’eer LaHai Ro’i, the place where God promised greatness to Ishmael, fearing that his father really favored his elder brother and wanted him to be the recipient of the blessings. So Isaac is overcome with his jealousy of the elder and more dynamic brother, until eventually Isaac appreciates that his father fully accepted G-d’s command to banish Ishmael.

Now Isaac sees that his father has bestowed everything of material and spiritual significance upon him, even though Abraham has fathered more children with Keturah (Hagar) (Gen 25:5). With this understanding, Isaac is able to move on and care for his aging father and eventually take his place as the next patriarch. G-d, however, and probably his father Abraham as well, always remain a source of “fright” for the more passive Isaac, who can only be the continuer par excellence of his more creative father’s pathways to G-d and to humanity.

Jacob deceives his father in order to acquire the blessings. As a result, he is forced to leave his home, and after his prophetic vision of the ladder ascending to the heavens, he stipulates that he will only establish a “House unto the Lord”, if he can “return in peace” to his father’s house and if the familial G-d of the Covenant will become his personal G-d (Gen 28:21). Jacob has great difficulty relating to the fact that his father favored his brother Esau, because he fed him the venison and because he knew how to “entrap” his aged father with his mellifluous and wily tongue (Gen 25:28, Rashi ad loc).

Jacob desperately desires his father’s favored embrace, and gladly acquiesces to Rebecca’s plan to disguise himself as Esau in order to obtain it. Indeed, from that moment on, and especially during his long reside with the deceitful Laban, Jacob stills his inner voice of the “whole-hearted man, a studious dweller in tents” taking on some of the characteristics of Esau. While Jacob is trying to be someone else, G-d is never described as being his G-d; He is only described as the G-d of his fathers (Genesis 27:20; 28:13; 31:53). Jacob needs to disgorge his inner Esau by leaving Laban and vanquishing Esau’s spirit during a nocturnal wrestling match. Only then can he stand securely as his own man, independent of the approval of other people with the necessary self confidence to build an altar to his own G-d in his own new name, “the Lord G-d of Israel” (Gen 33:20). At the end of this long journey, Jacob is finally able to forgive his father for his unwarranted favoritism of the older twin who sold and spurned the birthright as well as to feel his father’s forgiveness toward him for having deceived him. Jacob can finally come home to his father in peace and establish himself as the next patriarch.

Now we return to Joseph. The Bible has told us that he is the favorite son of Jacob (Gen 37: 3).

Joseph’s existential self seems to be bound up in his father’s adoring love. From his early teens, Joseph is already given the birthright of familial leadership with the tunic of colored stripes. The accompanying traditions and responsibilities seem to be a perfect fit for this beautiful, intelligent, ambitious and charismatic elder son of this father’s most beloved wife.

Joseph’s bitterly jealous siblings cast him into a pit and I would suggest that it was in that pit, that the son who has always basked in his father’s love, suddenly recognizes not only the jealous hatred of his brothers, but also the mistaken favoritism of his father which fanned that jealousy. There, Joseph vows that if he ever gets out of the pit alive, he will never contact his father or his father’s house again.

Joseph works hard to forget his formative, early years. He marries Osnat, the daughter of a Priest of On, and names his eldest son Menashe, because the G-d of the universe (Elohim) “has enabled him to forget all of his toil and his father’s house” (Gen 41:51). In this alien environment, estranged from his father as well as from the familial, covenantal G-d of his father, Joseph speaks and acts like an Egyptian. He certainly harbors no thoughts of contacting his family, until he sees his siblings, remembers his blameless and beloved brother Benjamin, and hears from Judah how his father is grieving for him. With this news, Joseph realizes that, if his father was guilty, it was because he loved him too much, not too little. Now Joseph reveals himself, and reunites with his estranged family.

The lesson is clear. Our relationship to G-d will always be bound up with our relationship to our parents, our family, and the sabbath and festival table of our childhood home. If these memories are filled with love, we will always return, no matter how far we may have wandered.

Meanwhile, until we return home, we cannot be true to ourselves, to our deepest DNA, to the essence of G-d within us. Only when we return in love because of loving memories toward our earthly parents will we be enabled to return in love to our Parent in Heaven as well.

Shabbat Shalom Shlomo Riskin Chancellor Ohr Torah Stone Chief Rabbi — Efrat Israel

Celebrating 125 years in Cincinnati and 10 years at Cornell.

8100 Cornell Rd, Cincinnati, OH 45249 (513) 489-3399 • www.ohavshalom.org

3100 LONGMEADOW LANE • CINCINNATI, OH 45236 791-1330 • www.templesholom.net Richard Shapiro, Interim Rabbi Marcy Ziek, President Gerry H. Walter, Rabbi Emeritus Friday December 18 6:00 pm Shabbat Nosh 6:30 pm Shabbat Evening Service

Friday December 25 6:00 pm Shabbat Nosh 6:30 pm Shabbat Evening Service

Saturday December 19 10:30 am Shabbat Morning Service Steve Stein will read Haftorah in celebration of the 50th anniversary of his Bar Mitzvah

Saturday December 26 10:30 am Shabbat Morning Service

SINCERE SYMPATHY TO: Sandra Manheimer Lewin and Sheila Freeman on the death of their mother, Bertha Charkins MAZEL TOV TO: Jack and Mary Better on the marriage of their daughter, Amber Rebecca Better to Michael Bloch

18

JEWZ IN THE NEWZ

Jewz in the Newz

by Nate Bloom Contributing Columnist Alien Planets: Avatar and Wyoming “Avatar” is the latest big-budget, special effects spectacular from director James Cameron (“Titanic,” “Aliens,” “Terminator”). Set in the future, the complex plot has Earth humans, genetically engineered to live on a planet called Avatar — invading Avatar and displacing the native, more primitive people. Jake Sully (played by newcomer Sam Worthington), a former U.S. Marine, starts off as an invader, but falls in love with an alien girl and helps lead her people’s resistance.

Sigourney Weaver plays Sully’s mentor, a botanist. Sully’s main antagonist is Col. Miles Quartrich (played by STEPHEN LANG, 57). (Opens Friday, Dec. 18.)

It’s a rare event, today, to see a new romantic comedy featuring a middle-aged couple. But Hugh Grant, 49, and SARAH JESSICA PARKER, 45, have enough “starpower” to get a studio to make their new flick, “Did You Hear About the Morgans?” Meryl and Paul Morgan (Parker and Grant) are an almost perfect Manhattan couple whose marriage is dissolving. Then they witness a murder and the Feds whisk them away to a tiny Wyoming town for their own protection. The question is whether the Morgans can rekindle their romance in their “slowed-down, Black Berry-free” Wyoming home.

Meanwhile, a contract killer is looking for them. (Opens Dec. 18.)

Hatch Does Hanukkah By now, you probably read or heard that Utah Republican Senator Orrin Hatch, a devout Mormon, has written a Hanukkah song, called “Eight Days of Hanukkah.” Hatch, who has written many Christian hymns and patriotic melodies, considers himself a great friend of the Jewish people, telling the NY Times: “Anything I can do for the Jewish people, I will do. Mormons believe the Jewish people are the chosen people, just like the Old Testament says.”

Hatch, who always wears a golden mezzuah necklace, is such a friend of the tribe that he says that he feels sorry that he is not Jewish sometimes. Hatch was inspired to write the song by a meeting with JEFFREY GOLDBERG, a Washington area journalist who has long chafed at the dearth of good Hanukkah music.

Hatch enlisted MADELINE STONE, a Manhattan Jewish songwriter, to help him with the song. Even though Stone is a liberal Democrat, the two became friends as they composed the song.

Hatch says that he wants another liberal Democrat, BARBRA STREISAND, to record his song.

The song begins: “Hanukkah, oh Hanukkah, /The festival of light/In Jerusalem, The oil burned bright.”

Hatch is not the first non-Jew to compose a Hanukkah song. The legendary folksinger Woody Guthrie composed at least two, “Hanukkah Dance” and “The Many and the Few.” In the 1940s, Woody moved to Brooklyn, and wed a Jewish woman, MARJORIE MAZIA. Their children, NORA GUTHRIE and famous folk singer ARLO GUTHRIE, were raised in their mother’s faith.

A few years ago, Nora discovered the lyrics to a bunch of Jewishthemed songs that Woody composed and sometimes sang back in the ‘40s. She turned them over to the Klezmatics, an American Klezmer band, and they’ve turned out two albums of Woody’s Jewish (lyric) songs. For the most part, the band has had to compose music to go along with Woody’s lyrics, since his original music was not notated anywhere. Woody did record “Hanukkah Dance,” however, and you can find it on complete collections of his recordings.

Returning Hatch’s Favor The American Society of Composers and Publishers (ASCAP) makes sure that composers get paid royalties when their music is played on the radio and elsewhere. Each year, ASCAP issues a list of the 25 most popular copyrighted Christmas-time songs as judged by radio airplay. About half of these 25 songs were composed by Jewish songwriters. The reason is simple — Christmas is a huge market and Jewish songwriters and their families have to eat, too.

So, if you’re talking to your nonJewish friends over the holidays— you might let drop that these classics were penned by Hebrew tunesmiths: “Winter Wonderland” (FELIX BERNARD); “The Christmas Song” (Chestnuts Roasting…) (MEL TORME and ROBT. WELLS); “Sleigh Ride” (MITCHELL PARISH); “Let It Snow” (JULIE STYNE and SAMMY CAHN); “White Christmas” (IRVING BERLIN); “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer,” “A Holly Jolly Christmas,” and “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree,” (all three written by JOHNNY MARKS); “It’s The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year” (GEORGE WYLE); “I’ll Be Home For Christmas” (WALTER KENT and BUCK RAM); “There’s No Place Like Home For The Holidays” (AL STILLMAN).

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

FROM THE PAGES 100 Years Ago Miss Hazel Wise is expected home from Vassar College to spend the holidays.

Meyer Goldsmith, a civil war veteran, died December 9, at his residence in the Barclay flats, Avondale, 82 years old. Mr. Goldsmith was born in Aurora (Ind.), and at the outbreak of the Civil War joined the Indiana regiment, in which he fought throughout the war. In 1887 he went to Omaha (Neb.), where he lived until four years

ago, when he came to Cincinnati and took up his residence in Avondale. He is survived by his widow and six children. Three sons and one daughter, Mrs. Marion S. Bloom, reside in this city. The funeral took place Friday afternoon.

Mr. and Mrs. N. Hartveld of 1859 Fairfax avenue, announce the engagement of their daughter, Pauline E., to Mr. Louis S. Iris of New York City.

Mr. and Mrs. Maurice Bracker

are the proud parents of a fine baby boy. Mrs. Bracker was formerly Miss Dorothy Baerlo, a wellknown soprano.

Officers of the Orthodox synagogue, on Kenyon avenue, notified police Saturday that a thief had entered the place during the week and made off with a silver hand, nine inches long; two small silver crowns and a Talith, in all valued at $75. — December 16, 1909

75 Years Ago Mr. and Mrs. Harry Harris, of New York, announce the engagement of their daughter, Miss DeSiree, to Mr. Philip Steiner, son of Mrs. Sig Steiner and the late Mr. Steiner, and brother of Mr. Albert and Mr. Joseph Steiner.

Miss Harris attended Columbia and has continued her interest in art and music. Mr. Steiner is president of the Tom Collins Corporation. He is a nationally known bridge player, having just been elected vice president of the American Bridge League and was a

member of the team-of-four, which won the American bridge championship in Cincinnati last winter. He is a graduate of the University of Michigan.

Mr. and Mrs. Isaac Apseloff, of Washington Avenue, announce the engagement of their daughter, Miss Mary, to Mr. Louis M. Scheinesson, son of Mrs. Fannie Scheinesson, of the Northern Apartments. Miss Apseloff is a member of the faculty of the Garfield School and Mr. Scheinesson is a pharmacist at the Jewish Hospital.

Mrs. Simon Kuhn entertained Wednesday evening in honor of Mr. Paul Wittgenstein, soloist at the Symphony Orchestra concerts last week. A number of other affairs were given for this talented pianist during his brief stay in Cincinnati.

Sheal Becker, son of Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Becker, 503 N. Ft. Thomas Avenue, Ft. Thomas, Ky., will be bar mitzvah Saturday, Dec. 29, at Avondale Synagogue. — December 20, 1934

50 Years Ago For eight years of “yesterdays,” Mrs. Lawrence M. Levine, 3990 Beechwood Avenue, was the dedicated volunteer who served as chairman of the Committee for Aid to the Visually Handicapped of the Council of Jewish Women.

A few weeks ago, Mrs. Levine was appointed a special education assistant in the Cincinnati Public Schools by the Cincinnati Board of Education.

Miss Jill Josselson, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Jack B. Josselson, was married at noon Sunday, Dec. 13, at the

Losantiville Country Club to Mr. Stanley Kamin, sn of Mr. and Mrs. Morris Kamin. The ceremony was performed by Rabbi Samuel Wohl.

Mrs. Robert Klein (Lois Sharon) was matron of honor. The other attendants were Mrs. Roy White, Mrs. Jerry Venn (Barbara Davis), Mary Siegel and Susan Bloom.

Mr. Roy White was best man.

Ushers were the Messrs. Jonas Katz, Howard Spahn and John and Frank Josselson, brothers of the bride.

Dr. Nathan Saltzman passed away Wednesday, Dec. 9.

He is survived by his wife Mrs. Lillian Salzman; two daughters, Mrs. Edward Miller and Mrs. Ruth S. Levine of Highland Park, Ill, and five grandsons.

Ruben Shor, theater owner, passed away Thursday, Dec. 10, of a heart attack, at his home, 3614 E. Galbraith Road. He was 57 years old.

Mr. Shor is survived by his widow, Mrs. Rose Wiener Shor; a daughter, Mrs. Earl Goldsmith, Jr.; a sister, Mrs. Lester A. Jaffe; and four brothers, Leonard, David, Norman, and Dr. Adolph Shor. — December 17, 1959

25 Years Ago Ken and Linda (Padway) Manket announce the birth of a daughter, Linsey Brae, Nov. 19. Linsey has a brother, Michael Steven.

Maternal grandparents are Marv and Sue (Ockrant) Padway and Keith Steiner of Atlanta. Paternal grandparents are Beatrice and Oscar Manket of Hollywood, Fla. Mrs. Albert Mann will review and lead a discussion on Saul Friedlander’s book, “When Memory Comes,” at the next Labor Zionist

Alliance meeting to be held at 1:30 p.m. on Dec. 16 at the Summit East party room, 1581 Summit Road.

Mrs. Mann has served as national membership chairman of the LZA and as president and national seminar and study group chairman of Pioneer Women/Na’amat. A former vice president and executive board member of the Jewish Community Relations Council, she has served two consecutive terms as chairman of its Israel and Middle East Committee and is perma-

nent member of its speakers bureau.

Mrs. Fridea M. Pilder of 115 Summit East court passed away Dec. 3.

She is survived by two sons, Paul of Chula Vista, Calif. and Louis of Cincinnati; two sisters, Henrietta Einhorn and Judith Berg; a brother, Morris Milovsky and three grandchildren, Joel, Jennifer and Julia Pilder.

She was the wife of the late Harry Pilder and the sister of the late Elsie Levine. — December 13, 1984

10 Years Ago A recent lawsuit by Cincinnati lawyer Richard Ganulin questioning the legality of Christmas as a nationally observed holiday has prompted a renewal of discussion regarding the relationship between the spiritual and political aspects of society. Ganulin, a Hyde Park resident and practitioner of varied religious beliefs, asserts that Federal support of the holiday is tantamount to endorsement of the Christian faith and violates the separation between church and state guaranteed by the constitution.

Despite the efforts of Ganulin, U.S.

District Judge Susan Dlott disagreed, ruling in favor of maintaining the holiday’s current status on the grounds that Christmas has strayed so far from its religious foundations that it should be considered secular. Though the birth of Jesus Christ may pervade Christian observance, it is maintained by Dlott that this is not the entirety of the holiday’s significance.

Mary Scheinesson died Dec. 12, 1999. She was 91 years old. She is survived by children Nancy and Alfred Apfel; two grandchildren, Edward and

Lynn; her sisters, Freida Davidorf and Hannah Weindrop; and three brothers, Stanford, Sydney and Albert Apseloff.

Mrs. Scheinesson was a gifted teacher, teaching thousands of Cincinnati Public School children over the course of her nearly 40-year career.

She was a pioneer in mainstreaming blind and deaf children into regular classrooms. Mrs. Scheinesson helped write the kindergarten curriculum for Cincinnati Public Schools and was one of the first in the district to teach reading in kindergarten.— December 16, 1999

CLASSIFIEDS

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

COMMUNITY DIRECTORY COMMUNITY ORGANIZATIONS Big Brothers/Big Sisters Assoc.

(513) 761-3200 • bigbrobigsis.org Beth Tevilah Mikveh Society (513) 821-6679 Camp Ashreinu (513) 702-1513 Camp at the J (513) 722-7226 • mayersonjcc.org Camp Livingston (513) 793-5554 • camplivingston.com Cedar Village (513) 336-3183 • cedar-village.org Chevra Kadisha (513) 396-6426 Halom House (513) 791-2912 • halomhouse.com Hillel Jewish Student Center (513) 221-6728 • hillelcincinnati.org Jewish Community Center (513) 761-7500 • mayersonjcc.org Jewish Community Relations Council (513) 985-1501 Jewish Family Service (513) 469-1188 • jfscinti.org Jewish Federation of Cincinnati (513) 985-1500 • shalomcincy.org Jewish Foundation (513) 792-2715 Jewish Information Network (513) 985-1514 Jewish Vocational Service (513) 985-0515 • jvscinti.org Kesher (513) 766-3348 Plum Street Temple Historic Preservation Fund (513) 793-2556 The Center for Holocaust & Humanity Education (513) 487-3055 • holocaustandhumanity.org Vaad Hoier (513) 731-4671 Workum Summer Intern Program (513) 683-6670 • workum.org CONGREGATIONS Adath Israel Congregation (513) 793-1800 • adath-israel.org Beit Chaverim (513) 335-5812 Beth Israel Congregation (513) 868-2049 • bethisraelcongregation.net Congregation Beth Adam (513) 985-0400 • bethadam.org Congregation B’nai Tikvah (513) 759-5356 • bnai-tikvah.org Congregation B’nai Tzedek (513) 984-3393 • bnaitzedek.us Congregation Ohav Shalom (513) 489-3399 • ohavshalom.org Golf Manor Synagogue (513) 531-6654 • golfmanorsynagogue.org

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production@ americanisraelite.com PROTESTS from page 10 The prime minister also assured would-be rebels Sunday that there would be no second disengagement Gaza-style, and that the future of the West Bank would be decided only in a final peace deal with the Palestinians, who thus far are showing no interest in making peace.

Apart from the fact that no ministers or Knesset members have walked out on him, Netanyahu has received strong backing from some 50 of the Likud’s veteran mayors. His position in the party seems unassailable.

Despite all the settler agitation, the government has been unwavering in its determination to implement the freeze. It has taken satellite photographs of the region to make it easy to pick up any new building, and mobilized dozens of inspectors to monitor the situation on a daily basis. Seasoned officers in the Israel Defense Forces say that for the first time, the government has issued clear and serious instructions on how to implement a building freeze.

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(513) 474-4200 www.careminders.com The big question, though, is how serious Netanyahu is about using the freeze as a springboard for cutting a deal with the Palestinians. Serious implementation of the freeze doesn’t necessarily mean serious strategic intent, and several leading pundits see the freeze as nothing more than a tactic to blame the Palestinians for failure to make peace. Netanyahu himself has hinted as much, adding that the freeze also was necessary to get America in Israel’s corner on other key issues, like Iran.

His message to the settlers seems to be to wait out the 10 months, during which time nothing will happen on the Palestinian front, and then, together with the government, they can go back to the business of settlement building.

The trouble is, the settlers don’t trust Netanyahu and fear that under pressure from the international community, he will sell them out and the freeze will serve to prepare public opinion for a territorial compromise with the Palestinians at their expense.

20

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

The Third Jihad: a documentary on radical Islam in America

by Avi Milgrom Assistant Editor In The New York Times this past Saturday, Dec.12, Scott Shane wrote about changing attitudes toward the threat of terrorism in the United States.

Noted Shane, after Sept. 11 it was thought “American Muslims…were well assimilated in diverse communities with room for advancement. They showed little of the alienation often on display among European counterparts, let alone attraction to extremist violence.”

Thus the thinking has been that American Muslims are not vulnerable to radicalization.

But that is changing, as the possible causes for the increase in domestic terrorist activities are considered. The one now reaching the top of the charts is the matter of five young men from Virginia who allegedly went to Pakistan seeking jihad.

Robert S. Leiken, who studies terrorism at the Washington policy institute, the Nixon Center, told Shane, “These events certainly call the consensus into question.”

Leiken, who has just written a book, “Europe’s Angry Muslims,” continued, “The notion of a difference between Europe and United States remains relevant. But the continuing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the American operation like drone strikes in Pakistan, are fueling radicalization at home.”

“Just the length of U.S. involvement in these countries is provoking more Muslim Americans to react,” said Leiken.

Another student of terrorism agrees. Bruce Hoffman of Georgetown University told Shane that it is “myopic” to think “we could insulate ourselves from the currents affecting Muslims everywhere else.”

He elaborated, “The longer we’ve been in Iraq and Afghanistan, the more some susceptible young men are coming to believe that it’s their duty to take up arms to defend their fellow Muslims.”

To illustrate an apparent shift in consensus thinking, Shane introduced yet another expert who agrees that our military efforts to fight terrorism in Muslim lands is making this country increasingly vulnerable to terrorism.

Quoting Robert A. Pape, a political scientist at University of Chicago who spoke about President Obama’s escalation in Afghanistan, “This new deployment increases the risk of the next 9/11. It will not make this

country safer.”

According to Shane, Pape believes that “suicide attacks are almost always prompted by resentment of foreign troops, and that escalation in Afghanistan will fuel more plots.”

From the perspective of “The Third Jihad,” Shane’s report might be considered the media’s viewpoint on terrorism. As such it may be taken as encouraging; at least it shows movement toward their far more heightened sense of danger from radical Islam.

The film is narrated by Muslim

their own children for their cause, what will they do to yours? Indeed the mistreatment of children is a recurring theme.

Its message and considerations dovetail with another film that was reviewed here last year, “The Monster Among Us,” by Media Projects. In that film the plight of European Jews facing growing anti-Semitism is examined.

Various sources of anti-Semitism are identified — a cultural hatred of Jews that has been passed from one generation to another, guilt over the murder of 6 million Jews

organization intent upon infiltrating the United States in order to conquer it for Islam. The documents are from records in a Texas court that may be accessed on the film’s Web site.

Another example — there are over 1.3 billion Muslims in the world. They reproduce faster than any other religious group. The radical segment is a small percentage of the total Muslim population — still a formidable number.

Moreover, their numbers are growing at an increasing rate while the populations of other religious

The film is structured to alarm with visuals of beheadings, hangings and the massacre of over 150 children. There is one visual that is particularly troubling; it is of a 12-yearold boy beheading — or being trained to behead — a traitor of the Taliban.

American, Dr. Zuhdi Jasser. Jasser is in private practice in internal medicine and cardiology in Phoenix, Ariz. Earlier in his medical career, he served as a U.S. Navy physician and as an attending physician to the U.S. Congress.

The son of Syrian immigrants, Jasser is the immediate past president of the Arizona Medical Association. More relevant to his role as narrator of this film, Jasser is the founder of American Islamic Forum for Democracy, a start-up think tank that seeks to separate Islam from matters of state and, in general, to keep within the bounds of democratic principles.

At the very beginning of the film, Jasser emphasizes that the film is about Radical Islam, to be distinguished from the Islam he practices and promotes. Its purpose is to warn Americans that there are Muslim extremists living among us who want to supplant our way of life, our government and our various religions with the ways of Islam as they understand it.

The film is structured to alarm with visuals of beheadings, hangings and the massacre of over 150 children. There is one visual that is particularly troubling; it is of a 12year-old boy beheading — or being trained to behead — a traitor of the Taliban.

Then there are the many distinguished interviewees. One speaks of a “… war between the values of democracy and freedom, and the values of barbarism.” Another asks if the extremists are willing to kill

converted into anger and hatred — and the influence of Islam.

But in “The Monster Among Us,” the influence of Islam was largely unexplored. In this film it is the focus.

The alarm sounded by “The Third Jihad” will be taken undoubtedly at various levels by viewers, and there is material in the film to support them all.

From the interviewees, the conservative side of the spectrum is articulated by Senator Lieberman, “It is definitely here. I don’t want to overstate the problem, but there is a danger of understating the problem of homegrown Islamist terrorism.”

Former New York mayor, Rudolph Giulani weighs in on middle ground with, “A wake-up call for America.”

Finally, on the alarmist side is Bernard Lewis, the Cleveland E. Dodge Professor Emeritus of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton University. Lewis, who studies the history of Islam and its interaction with the West, warns that Europe has already fallen to radical Islam.

America is next, “If I’m asked to sum up my message to Americans at the present time, I would sum it up in two words: ‘Wake Up.’” Also, the film offers many facts that can be marshaled in support of the various levels of alarm.

For example, the film devotes much attention to documents from the FBI and from court proceedings that evidence the American Muslim Brotherhood as a radical

groups are in decline. At this rate they are projected to become the majority sometime between the century’s midpoint and end.

Or, according to the film, a Pew Research Center study found that 81 percent of British Muslims consider themselves Muslims first and British second. Another Pew study revealed that 25 percent of Muslims under age 30 in this country support suicide bombing.

The historical perspective addressed by Lewis is unsettling as well: The present Jihad is the third incarnation of one that began over 1,400 years ago. It is a way of life that has been passed from generation to generation.

But in the end, the real value of this film may be more the alarm it sounds.

The Third Jihad offers peeks into the radicals’ recruitment process and the psychology of its followers and converts.

Of utmost importance, however, are the difficult, ethical and moral questions raised by a movement that follows the line of least resistance created by voids of distrust. This is perhaps the film’s greatest value.

Concerning recruitment practices, the film forthrightly contradicts the notion that happy American Muslims will not support radical Islam. It provides evidence that many Muslim moderates in America support Hamas and other terrorist groups; that many approved of 9/11 and quietly, if not deceptively, support radical Islam.

But the existing population of Muslims as a source of recruits may be eclipsed by the legions in our prisons who are angry and alienated from America. Radical Islam successfully recruits from this population, according to the film. Perhaps the greatest threat to America is not unhappy Muslims but unhappy Americans?

What is the attraction of a movement that so many view as barbaric and steadfastly against human rights?

There is one scene that reveals much about the attraction.

In it a young American man explains what Islam’s position is on homosexuality: If homosexuals don’t right their ways, they are to be thrown off a cliff. The swell of emotion as this young man, in Muslim garb, makes this proclamation like statement is ghoulish. He appears to relish contemplating such a barbaric scene and to derive a sense of power and pride from it.

The film promotes the thought that radical Islam may be viewed as a gigantic pyramid scheme of hate: As converts move up the pyramid, they gather converts beneath them whom they command in an ever- expanding radius of targets for their anger, their frustrations, their hate.

Finally there is the troubling matter of how this movement affects all lives.

The radicals believe “war is deception,” according to the film.

Thus they incessantly seek new ground in voids of distrust. Suicide bombers try to fade into crowds; radicals cloak themselves in the costume of moderates and radicals establish Arab study programs in universities from which they launch non-violent aggressions into their host country.

The leaders of this movement understand that they cannot win ground militarily. Indeed, it would seem from the experts cited at the beginning of this article, that they may be using our military actions against us.

Of all their strategies, the one that may do the most damage is their use of tolerance of ethnic and religious backgrounds —and of core democratic values — as cover for their own agenda.

As Mark Steyn, journalist and author of a New York Times bestseller on radical Islam explains it in an interview, the radicals use slights against them — cartoons and Burger King’s swirl were some of his examples — to gain ground incrementally. They use the ideals and tolerance of democracies to convert our way of life to theirs.

DOCUMENTARY on page 22

AUTOS

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

21

Jaguar introduces substantial changes on the 2010 XK Jaguar has made significant changes to the 2010 XK coupe and convertible. Now powered by a direct-injected 5.0-liter V8, the XK boasts the rotary-style gear selector that was first available on the XF. New styling details make both the exterior and interior more attractive and some equipment that was optional on earlier models is standard for 2010.

The changes to the exterior give the car a more aggressive look. The interior has been upgraded with new materials. And when starting the car, the rotary gear selection knob rises smoothly out of the console and into the driver’s hand. At this point, the driver has total control of six-speed automatic transmission.

As mentioned, the 5.0 liter V8 is new. The base engine produces 385 horsepower and 380 lb ft of torque.

The supercharged engine produces 510 hp and 461 lb ft of torque — more lb ft of torque than others in its class.

For 2010, Jaguar offers Drive Control. This new feature enables the driver to choose among three different modes that alter the car’s sporting responses for items such as throttle response, shift speed and suspension settings. The suspension is adjustable and maximizes both comfort and handling.

The 2010 Jaguar XK may be purchased in coupe and convertible body styles. Each style is offered in XK and XKR trim levels.

Standard equipment on the base car includes: 19-inch alloy wheels, bi-xenon headlights, front and rear parking sensors, keyless ignition/entry, leather upholstery, power-adjustable (16-way) front seats, a heated power tilt-and-telescoping steering wheel, heated and cooled front seats and automatic dual-zone climate control. Standard electronic “goodies” include: a touchscreen control interface, Bluetooth, a navigation system and a Bowers & Wilkins premium surround-sound system with in-dash six-CD changer, satellite radio and USB audio interface. The DVD based system is voice activated and provides directions in the navigation system. The Bluetooth provides real-time traffic updates. The soft top on the convertible is power retractable.

Safety features on the 2010 XK include: front and rear ventilated disc brakes; traction and stability control; dual side-mounted airbags; emergency interior trunk release; remote anti-theft alarm system;

daytime running lights; tire pressure monitoring; turn signal mirrors; and self-leveling headlights.

Some of the convenience features on the 2010 Jaguar XK are: cruise control; tilt and telescopic steering wheel; remote trunk release; 12V front power outlet(s); and keyless ignition.

Jaguar has dramatically changed the XK’s interior, giving it a modern dashboard design and aluminum trim in place of the traditional wood. Jaguar has also improved the cabin through the use of higher-quality materials — contrast-stitched leather now covers more surfaces than in the past.

The supercharged engine produces 510 hp and 461 lb ft of torque — more lb ft of torque than others in its class.

As mentioned, the rotary shifter is new, as well as the “Handshake” start-up. Upon unlocking the car, the driver sees the console-mounted start/stop button pulsing red.

Once this button is pushed, the engine comes to life and the round shifter glides into the driver’s hand.

The multipurpose touchscreen operates an abundance of features, including: audio, climate, navigation and phone.

Comfort has always been a trademark of Jaguar. The 2010 XK is no exception. The adjustable front feature heating and cooling.

The power tilt-and-telescoping wheel is also heated. The trunk in the coupe can hold about 11 cubic feet of cargo; with the top down, the convertible can still hold about 8 cubic feet. The new XK and XKR are both agile and superior in handling to their predecessors.

Available options include: 20” Kalimnos-Style Wheels; An Advanced Technology Package; 19” Chromed-Artura Style Wheels w/Dunlop Runflat Tires; NonStandard Paint Colors; HD Radio; Knurled Aluminum Finish Trim; Rich Oak Veneer Finish; Figured Ebony Veneer Finish; and Burl Walnut Wood Veneer Finish.

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OBITUARIES

DEATH NOTICES NAGLER, Allen, age 83, died on December 11, 2009; 24 Kislev 5770.

REVIVAL from page 1 “One of the most common misperceptions we face is that Classical Reform Judaism is a phase of history that is now over rather than a vital movement within Reform Judaism today,” said the society’s executive director, Rabbi Howard Berman. “We want to reassert the place at the Reform table of our historic Reform heritage.”

Berman was speaking at one of two sessions he led at the Union for Reform Judaism’s biennial last month in Toronto.

While Berman celebrated his group’s inclusion in the conference agenda, other supporters of the Classical Reform approach grumbled that the movement as a whole doesn’t take them seriously.

In a session on the topic led by Michael Meyer, a professor at the movement’s Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, a question about “the socalled revival of Classical Reform” was met with widespread chuckles.

Berman and his colleagues aren’t laughing.

Fifty Reform rabbis and cantors, as well as nine Reform rabbinical students, sit on the society’s advisory board, and the group works with three dozen North American congregations. Some of them are “explicitly Classical

FUNDS from page 6 When the Viva Palestina USA convoy arrived in Gaza months later, there was no similar public event with Hamas, although the group reportedly did meet with Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh.

Giving humanitarian aid to Gaza is legal under U.S. law, but providing it to Hamas officials or the Hamas government in Gaza would likely be considered illegal because Hamas is on the list of

DOCUMENTARY from page 20 Specifically, cartoons can no longer parody Islam, especially not The Prophet. Parodies of Israel seem ever-present and are punished by letters to editors. Cartoons of The Prophet cause major demonstrations and calls for death to those responsible. Such expressions are now seen as wrongly intolerant of their religion —perhaps soon to become illegally so.

Incrementally, shariah law— Koran based law—is supplanting the law of democratic countries in Europe. The following examples

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2009

Reform,” Berman said, while the others are “mainstream Reform” that run separate services along Classical Reform lines regularly or occasionally to serve mainly older congregants “who are often pushed aside, marginalized” by guitar-playing, kipah-wearing, younger Reform rabbis.

The split is largely generational, with most Classical Reform aficionados old enough to remember the movement’s original siddur, the Union Prayer Book, which downplayed the idea that Jews were “chosen” by God. It was replaced in 1975 by Gates of Prayer and is rarely used today.

The society is releasing a new version of the Union Prayer Book next year in partnership with the Chicago Sinai Congregation, one of the country’s two main Classical Reform holdouts, along with Temple Emanu-El in New York.

Louise Ziretta of Har Sinai Congregation in Owing Mills, Md., says her 167-year-old synagogue maintains a choir and organ, and occasionally holds Classical Reform services on Friday nights for those who are more comfortable with that liturgy and style.

“It’s part of our heritage,” she says.

Much of the appeal of Classical Reform is aesthetic.

During his session at the biennial, Berman played the first song on the society’s newly released CD of Classical Reform music, “Come, O Sabbath Day,” by early 20th-century composer A.W. Binder. As the stately organ tones and sonorous male baritone fill the room, there is a respectful silence. Berman nods his head

appreciatively.

The Classical Reform revival carries a strong intellectual component, too.

Meyer, one of the foremost authorities on the history of Reform Judaism, noted that the movement’s 1999 Pittsburgh Platform, which advocated a more open approach to rituals discouraged by the early Reform leaders, has its own problems.

“It does not deal sufficiently with the problem of evil, and pays insufficient attention to the chal-

lenges posed by biology and astrophysics, harmonizing the idea of a personal God with the vastness of the universe,” he said. “We have come to a point in Reform Judaism where we stress the personal, emotional connection more than is perhaps sustainable.”

While Meyer does not view Classical Reform as a growing tendency, he does consider it a valuable check on the movement’s growing pietism.

“There is a place for reason in religion, and sometimes in Reform

Judaism today we don’t give that enough attention,” he said.

Berman said the society he heads doesn’t want to replace the warmer, more devotional worship style popular in Reform congregations today. He and his colleagues just don’t want their approach to be shoved aside.

“In the contemporary Reform movement there is a broad variety of interpretations and practice.

That is appropriate,” Berman said.

“We Classical Reform Jews are coming out of the closet.”

foreign terrorist organizations.

The most controversial appearance by Viva Palestina USA and Galloway in the United States came May 21 at the University of California, Irvine, a campus that has experienced tensions between Jewish and Muslim students and where a civil rights complaint was filed earlier this decade claiming a hostile environment for Jewish students. (A federal investigation found that the university acted appropriately.)

UC-Irvine has referred information about the event, which was sponsored by the Muslim Student Union, to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. ZOA leaders said they had obtained a video of the event and, at the bureau’s request, passed it on to law enforcement officials.

The university also says it is investigating whether the Muslim Student Union had violated university policy by raising money without the university’s authoriza-

tion.

In a letter to the university’s campus counsel, the Muslim Student Union acknowledged that it may have “unknowingly breached university policy (as undoubtedly have every student organization on campus as well as university administrators).” But the student group rejected ZOA’s accusations that it may have raised money for Hamas as “nothing short of libel.”

“ZOA seeks to smear MSU’s

reputation by maliciously accusing MSU of breaking U.S. laws without providing any real evidentiary backing,” the group said in its letter.

The ZOA praised the university’s decision to forward information on the Viva Palestina fundraising.

“They’ve done the right thing,” said Susan Tuchman, director of the ZOA’s Center for Law and Justice. “All groups should be held accountable.”

came from news reports this fall.

On Dec. 14 of this year, a London court issued an arrest warrant against Israel’s opposition leader, Tzipi Livni, at the request of pro-Palestinian activists, according to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

In the end, the warrant was cancelled.

On Oct. 5 of this year, the same source reported that an Israeli deputy prime minister cancelled a planned trip to Britain for fear he would be arrested. Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe Ya’alon was to attend a fundraiser when proPalestinian groups asked a British

court to have him arrested and put on trial for war crimes.

Ya’alon had served as chief of staff of the Israel Defense Force during the period when a senior Hamas terrorist was assassinated in 2002 — the crime with which he was to be charged. His legal staff thought he would not be granted diplomatic immunity.

This came only a week after Ehud Barak, Israel’s Defense Minister, was threatened with arrest for “suspicion of war crimes” in an action brought by a British attorney on behalf of Palestinian families who were allegedly victims of

Israel’s military actions in Gaza earlier this year.

These actions clearly signal significant penetration of the British legal system — where 80 percent of the Muslims identify with Islam, not with Britain.

All of this raises the question of when will U.S. officials be subject to the same actions? After all, it could soon be argued, doesn’t the U.S. military commit war crimes with drone attacks?

What Steyn urges for consideration is a retraction of tolerance with respect to Islam – what might be considered “measured intoler-

ance.” But where will that lead?

Where will the line be drawn between tolerance and intolerance?

Radical Islam has put us all on a path that is dangerous to democracies, namely that our very actions to defend against it may ultimately be injurious to the way of life we seek to protect.

It is in the consideration of such matters, and the wealth of information on radical Islam offered by “The Third Jihad” that make it rise above alarmist media.

It is surely a film worth seeing— especially for the radicals’ most hated enemy—Jews.

Mark Blinch / Union for Reform Judaism

Rabbi Howard Berman promoting Classical Reform Judaism at the Union for Reform Judaism biennial in Toronto in November 2009.