Te Artistry of the
ETROG BOX
By David Olivestone
PHOTO ESSAY
A silver and gilt etrog box from Frankfurt, Germany in the early eighteenth century. Courtesy of a private collection in New York
AWAKENING THE GREAT JEWISH
COVER STORY
By Rachel Schwartzberg
Afer her bat mitzvah, Gracie Greenberg, who recently concluded her freshman year at Pace University, fgured she’d had enough of Judaism.
“My feeling was: I’m done! No more Judaism for me,” recalls the Long Island, New York, native.
But about a month into her frst semester studying musical theater, everything changed.
“October 7 was a real wake-up call,” she says, recalling her horror at the brazen attack in Israel and the rise in antisemitism that followed—particularly on college campuses like hers. “Being Jewish was part of my identity I hadn’t given much thought to. Why was everyone targeting me?”
As Greenberg was struggling to make sense of the hatred that suddenly surrounded her, she heard about a free dinner at Meor, a national outreach organization with a branch at nearby New York University (NYU). What she found there was overwhelming.
“I discovered a strong community of Jews that included all types,” she says—which she’d never experienced before. Tat dinner set her on a journey to explore Judaism more deeply.
Greenberg never expected that she would travel with Meor to both Poland and Israel in her freshman year of college, but those trips helped her clarify who she is and what’s important to her. It’s been transformative, she says, to discover the role of spirituality and the value of personal responsibility in Judaism.
“I decided I want to marry Jewish,” she says. “I’ve started talking to G-d once a day, and I’ve been taking on small mitzvot. I’ve learned that it’s what I’m doing for Hashem that really matters.”
While Jews the world over have been experiencing a reawakening, this particular article is focused on American Jewry.
October 7 shocked the Jewish world, and the outpouring of anti-Israel and anti-Jewish rhetoric that followed—both on social media and in real life—has sparked a religious awakening among Jews across the US. As counterintuitive as it may seem, the most common Jewish reaction to rising antisemitism has not been laying low and hiding one’s identity, but rather an increase in Torah learning and mitzvah observance and a stronger connection to the Jewish community.
In fact, a recent survey of American Jews by the Jewish Federations of North America noted the “explosion in Jewish belonging and participation,” referring to it as “ Te Surge.” According to the survey, “Of the 83 percent of Jews who were ‘only somewhat,’ ‘not very’ or ‘not at all engaged’ prior to October 7, a whopping 40 percent are now showing up in larger numbers in Jewish life. Tis group—equal to 30 percent of all Jewish adults and nearly double the
IHOW ONE year LATER: OCTOBER 7 changed me
With the first anniversary of October 7 approaching, we asked readers to tell us how they were impacted by a day that will live on forever in our hearts and souls.
Live More Jewishly
n the afermath of October 7, I am living my Judaism in a much more open way, wearing a Magen David necklace, studying Jewish history and feeling more connected to Israel as our indigenous homeland. I think about aliyah. I did not grow up Orthodox and my ex-husband isn’t Jewish. But since October 7, I’ve tried to have a daily infusion of Judaism in my life and in my children’s lives.
A few days afer the massacre, I saw a post for a program called
“Just One Ting,” in which you try to do one Jewish thing in the merit of a specifc soldier. I began saying Shema every night along with a Mi Sheberach for “my” soldier, and I started bringing in Shabbat ffeen minutes early.
I signed up with Partners in Torah as a merit as well. I was paired with Raquel from New York and felt that I’d found my sister. We study the teachings of the late Rabbi Jonathan Sacks on the parashah. October 7 changed my
relationship to Judaism, to the nonJewish world, to Israel, to parenting, to everything.
To me, the response to October 7 is to live more Jewishly.
By Ariella Silberman, as told to Barbara Bensoussan. Ms. Silberman lives in Dallas with her family. Ms. Bensoussan is a writer in Brooklyn and a frequent contributor to Jewish Action.
ICountering the Hate
’m a marketing professional, so social media is my bread and butter. Afer October 7, as I scrolled through X, I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. “You Jews deserve it,” some people wrote. “Stop occupying Palestine!” said others.
Te haters clearly had no grasp of the facts. How do you counteract a food of anti-Israel narratives that have more likes on social media than a cat meme?
I sat down and began replying to these posts. But I’m no Ben Shapiro—I don’t have all the facts on the tip of my tongue. Afer an hour, I realized I’d only managed to reply to about four posts. Tere were hundreds of posts I wanted to respond to!
Ten it occurred to me that I could enlist virtual help. I’m a typical Flatbush guy who runs a no-frills ad agency out of a Brooklyn storefront. Recently, I’d begun using AI tools for marketing campaigns in my business. Why not create an AI engine to give factual, cohesive responses to social media? I thought. Why not harness the power of AI to negate the hate?
INo Longer Silent
was born in Chicago eighty-seven years ago.
In the 1930s and ‘40s, as the Holocaust was unfolding, I would listen to my American-born parents speaking about the German atrocities and about the Jews sufering in Europe.
But back then children were supposed to be quiet.
Dad was drafed into the US Army when I was six years old. He was captured by the Nazis and sent to a slave labor camp for Jews only. He was liberated and, thank G-d, came home.
I posted my idea on LinkedIn and on a few WhatsApp groups. Almost a dozen people from diferent points on the Jewish spectrum volunteered to help: a Chassidic developer in Toronto; a non-religious Sephardic full-stack coding engineer in Tel Aviv; a Modern Orthodox copywriter in Teaneck.
Our group held sessions on Zoom to create the app. Te goal was to train a data set to give forceful, factbased, pro-Israel responses to hate posts, circumventing systemic blocks to pro-Israel content. Afer four sleepless, cafeine-powered days, we had an app called ProjectTruthIsrael. com up and running.
I said to our group, “Under other circumstances, our paths would probably never have crossed. Yet here we are, all of us fellow Jews, giving our time and resources to help the Jewish nation.”
I sent out our app experimentally to a bunch of Jewish WhatsApp groups, expecting to garner a few hundred responses. Within one night, I had 3,000 users. Afer one month, 41,000 people were using the app, generating over 80,000 response points.
We were not religious, and did not observe any holidays except for Passover. We never belonged to a synagogue.
October 7 made me feel more Jewish. I felt I had to do something for the Jewish people. I realized I had to speak up.
Now I spend my time on Facebook and Instagram, sharing pro-Israel videos on a daily basis.
I bought a siddur with English translation; I don’t read Hebrew. I bought more Jewish books. I’m paying more attention. I must. I
Te app was really working well, churning out compelling factual messages to counteract misinformation and antisemitism. Ten, a few weeks ago, I opened my computer on Motzaei Shabbos to fnd a message: “Your AI token threshold is over the limit.”
“Hacktivists” from the Middle East had bombarded our site to the point where they shut it down. I have been working ever since to fnd a way to get my site up again and circumvent further attacks.
Despite this (hopefully temporary) setback, I am very proud of what we accomplished. While we made a small dent in the social media world, I think we made a much bigger dent in the heavens: a diverse group of Jews came together to help our brothers and sisters in Israel.
couldn’t speak up in the 1930s as the Holocaust approached, so I’m speaking up now on behalf of Israel and my fellow Jews.
By Maxine
Clamage, as told to Steve Lipman. Ms. Clamage is an eighty-sevenyear-old retired paralegal living in Mill Valley, California. Mr. Lipman is a frequent contributor to the magazine.
By Abraham Bree, as told to Barbara Bensoussan. Mr. Bree runs a marketing agency in Brooklyn, New York.
Brooklyn, New York
“We need to give people encouragement and reassure them that they are safe, especially here where there was so much psychological pressure,” added Rabbi Schrier. “Part of chizuk is fending of intimidation and harassment, but part of it also is leaning into it and using it to build Jewish pride. A lot of people are feeling more connected and more engaged, and the protest has made us prouder of who we are, prouder of our heritage, prouder of the State of Israel and prouder of the Jewish people.”
And what do rabbanim do when they themselves are in need of moral support?
“Supporting the rabbis is a term we have heard a lot since October 7,” admitted Rabbi Posy. “Te best tool in the arsenal of rabbanim is other rabbanim, and there has been a lot of networking and supporting going on among them. Te OU and personalities like OU Executive Vice President Rabbi Moshe Hauer are a great resource, and we let rabbanim know that we are there for them and their communities, providing chizuk on the communal level.”
In addition to turning to his family, his rebbeim and his peers when he is in need of a boost, Rabbi Schrier also focuses his attention across the Atlantic.
“Perhaps it’s cliché, but I really derive much strength from our brothers and sisters in Israel,” said Rabbi Schrier. “You look at what they’re facing and the way they’ve risen to the occasion, and it helps contextualize the smaller challenges we deal with and gives me strength to do my part.”
Lessons Learned
Seeing community shuls used as lightning rods for political discontent has been an unsettling phenomenon. Protesters are well aware of that reality and use it to gain the upper hand.
“Tey have two ways to win,” explained Rabbi Trump. “One is when we hide in our basements in fear and are scared to be Americans because of their crazy extremism. Te other is for them to cause a reaction that they can reframe, something they did in Toronto, where they feigned getting attacked or injured, and made it seem like they were conducting a peaceful protest that was disrupted by Jews. Tey are trained to
FIVE TOWNS, NEW YORK
Having seen what transpired at previous legs of the Great Real Estate Event, the Young Israel of Lawrence-Cedarhurst’s Rabbi Ya’akov Trump found himself in a difcult position. It seemed like the two obvious choices—laying low and waiting for things to blow over, or organizing a counter-protest—both had the ability to backfre, so Rabbi Trump came up with an alternate plan. He reached out to every rabbi in the area and invited them to come with their congregants to the Young Israel’s simchah room to daven Minchah together, completely ignoring the protest that was taking place outside.
Decked out in Israeli fags, American fags and pictures of the hostages, the Young Israel became a center of Jewish pride. Well over 700 people came to daven at the shul and to hear words of chizuk from area rabbanim, while the proPalestinian protesters were relocated by the local police department to a nearby parking lot once their group reached 100 people, because they didn’t have the permits they needed for a public gathering of that size.
“The solution in our community came with siyata d’Shmaya,” said Rabbi Trump. “The failure of these protesters is when we carry on proudly, doing what we are supposed to do.”
I’m not going to try to sugarcoat it—this is the new normal for us, and a tiny taste of what our parents, grandparents and great grandparents experienced.
BROOKLYN, NEW YORK
The ffth and fnal event for the Great Real Estate Event was canceled due to what organizers described as serious threats. The expo was to be held at Congregation Bnei Avrohom Yaakov, located on Avenue N between East 26th and East 27th streets in the Flatbush section of Brooklyn.
In a statement that appeared in the Jewish Press, the Flatbush Jewish Community Council said
that the plug had been pulled on the expo at the advice of the New York Police Department, and that local rabbanim were urging counter-protesters to stay home. The event was to have taken place in the heart of a residential neighborhood, with the many children coming home from school during its scheduled 4:00 to 9:00 PM time frame raising serious security concerns.
A planned demonstration against a June 23 real estate event at Los Angeles’s Adas Torah had shul ofcials meeting with local law enforcement to create a game plan, but it was clear early on that the demonstration was deteriorating. Photo: Getty Images
do this, and this isn’t the frst time Jews have been singled out for things they didn’t actually do.”
Te shul protests have been particularly unsettling for North America’s Jewish communities for multiple reasons. While tragic incidents that impact the community are nothing new, viewing these demonstrations against the backdrop of the ongoing campus protests makes it painfully clear that antisemitic sentiments are spilling out into the community at large, explained Rabbi Yaakov Glasser, managing director for community engagement at the OU.
“Freedom of worship is what attracted Jews to settle and build communities in the United States.
It is highly disconcerting that these freedoms, which provided such a rich context for Jewish communal growth, have themselves become the subject of assault from our fellow citizens,” said Rabbi Glasser.
Rabbis have been hard-pressed to deal with this latest challenge, and the many hours they have focused on demonstrations and security measures have detracted from the time they can devote to other serious matters. Similarly, making fnancial investments in communal safety initiatives means there are fewer funds available for other important needs.
Te lackluster response by law enforcement and government ofcials at several of the shul protests has also
contributed to the climate of concern overshadowing Orthodox Jewish communities.
“Tat has created a real paradigm shif in people’s sense of stability and security in the United States, and it is diferent than what we have seen before,” said Rabbi Glasser. “Even though some of the antisemitic protests that happened in the United States in the past were far more violent in terms of their outcome, I think these protests are shifing people’s mindset in a real way, and that is a real point of transition for the community.”
Further increasing the levels of anxiety on the communal level is the knowledge that the demonstrations are being organized and attended by people