Five Towns Jewish Home 8.31.23

Dear Readers,

Last week, while in an office waiting room, I glanced down at a magazine that was open near me. On the page was a photo of someone driving a motorcycle off a cliff. The caption noted that this stunt was performed in a movie that was just released. It went on to explain that in the movie, the actor had to ride a motorcycle off a cliff, leap off the bike, and parachute to the ground. In an effort to get the stunt done right, the actor took 500 hours of skydiving training and did 13,000 motorcycle jumps before he tried to enact the stunt in front of the cameras. And still, after all that practice and training, he performed the stunt six times before it was perfect on set.

I was awed. This actor spent hundreds of hours just to get one stunt done right. His level of dedication and perseverance to perfect his craft is something to be admired, I thought.

But then, a few days later, while at a siyum, the words of the mesayem hit my heart: “Anu ameilim, v’heim ameilim,” we toil, and they toil. “Anu ameilim u’mekablim sachar, v’heim ameilim v’einam m’kablim sachar,” we toil and we receive reward, and they toil but they don’t receive reward.

True, this actor worked very hard. It took

him many hours of physical and mental endurance to execute this stunt flawlessly. And he should be commended for performing his craft at the highest level. But ultimately, all his hard work was a blip on the screen, less than a minute of adrenaline-fueled excitement.

For what were all those hours worth in the long run? As Jews, we know that there is more to this world than what we can physically see. We know that there is reward waiting for us at the very end. We know that our actions and our thoughts and our intentions are measured and evaluated. We toil, and they toil. But when we toil, our efforts count towards our ultimate reward; the struggles that we have, the determination that we possess, the hours that we invest – they’re all scrutinized and measured and counted towards to our eternity. And we also know that we have the power to elevate each action that we perform. We can turn a simple interaction with a neighbor into something higher. We can transform the mundane tasks in our lives into a spiritual pursuit. We toil, and they toil. But ultimately, our exertions are eternal diamonds that will sparkle forever.

Wishing you a wonderful week, Shoshana

Yitzy Halpern, PUBLISHER publisher@fivetownsjewishhome.com

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Shabbos Zemanim

Friday, September 1

Parshas Ki Savo

Candle Lighting: 7:09 pm

Shabbos Ends: 8:08 pm

Rabbeinu Tam: 8:38 pm

Dear Editor,

I am grateful to the camps and schools for the wonderful job they do teaching our children and helping them to grow and develop in so many ways. This time of year, though, is very challenging. As a mother who works full-time, I find the two-and-a-half weeks in between camp and school to be really hard. I am able to take off a day or two or sometimes three, depending on the year. But then my kids are really left on their own. I am able to get help for some part of the time, but the rest of the time, they are alone. What are they to do each day, day-in, day-out? There are so many times that I can tell them to go to the park or to go for pizza? They are constantly calling me that they are bored, and who can blame them? There is no structure, nothing for them to do.

I would like to call on the camps and schools to work together so that they end school/start camp/end camp/start school on a more regular schedule. There has to be a way for the schedules to work out so there is a max of a week-and-a-half in between camp/school in June and in August.

I am not the only person with this challenge. Many parents struggle during this time. And these are parents who don’t have two parents working; some of them are stay-at-home moms and are still tearing their hair out trying to entertain their little ones.

I beg, in the name of chinuch and helping our children to grow, that the schools and camp work something out for this week.

A Juggling Mom

Dear Editor,

I feel for Sarah, the widow who is now looking to remarry five years after her husband passed away. I was in that same type of predicament a few years ago. My husband had died (I was also his caretaker) and I felt so alone. I would go to shul events and feel as if no one really noticed me. It was a very hard time in my life. At one point, someone suggested that I date a gentleman who lives a few blocks from me. He had also lost his spouse. We went out together on a few dates, and I realized that I enjoyed his company. We ended up dating for six months. It was a joy. Ultimately, for reasons I don’t want to disclose, I realized that he wasn’t someone I would marry. But the situation really helped me. By going out with him, he made me realize that I was not alone in the world. In a way, he whet my appetite to live again and to enjoy the world around me.

Now, I am not yet remarried, but I feel comfortable in the place where I am. I keep myself busy with my children and many new-found friends who are also at my life stage.

Sincerely, Y.H.

Dear Editor,

I must commend Hershel Lieber on his “Wandering Jew” column in TJH. His articles are all so descriptive and leave the reader feeling as if they actually visited along with him! This week in particular made me feel as if I want to visit those beautiful states in the United States. If only I had the time (and the money!) to

Continued on page 10

Continued from page 10

Yossi Hartman

Dear Editor,

us – both in the world and in the people around us?

I would say that seeing everything in a more positive light would make us happier people – happier people inside and happier people to be around. And that’s a really good thing.

I want to ask

in the month of Elul, to please try to view their world in a more positive light. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we saw everyone and everything with a more positive view? What if we ignored every flaw and every mistake? What if we concentrated on the good that surrounds

But even more than that, I would hope that by seeing everyone and everything in a good light, we are showing Hashem that we are asking Him to ignore our flaws and foibles. We are asking Him, in this month of Elul, to only see our good and to highlight the positive traits that we have.

In that way, we can hope to have a good, sweet year!

Rachel Greenberg

China Healthcare Corruption

medical workers. Many experts have noted that hospitals are poorly funded and healthcare employees are paid very little.

“Given the economic slowdown and the shrinking fiscal revenue, the debt-ridden local governments really don’t have the capabilities to invest more in the medical sector and corruption continues to be an issue,” said Yanzhoung Huang, a senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.

“If you don’t invest in the medical sector … then the people’s dissatisfaction will continue to rise, so they need a scapegoat to solve that problem – medical representatives, hospital managers, doctors are forced to become that scapegoat,” Huang continued.

The Chinese government is waging a war against corruption in the healthcare industry in its country in an attempt to address the nation’s worsening economic situation. Since the beginning of this year, over 180 hospital officials, many of whom are a part of the communist party, have been subject to investigations as part of this effort, according to China News Service. Since June, ten or more of those officials have chosen to surrender themselves to the authorities. The amount of Chinese corruption cases has seemingly doubled in 2023 compared to the number of cases in 2022.

One of the suspects, a president of a southwestern Yunnan province hospital, has been accused of stealing more than $2.2 million in 2021 off the sales of a medical device used for cancer patients. The Chinese government believes that cases such as this, which involve fraud, bribery, and corruption, are responsible for the healthcare industry’s ever-increasing prices and the country’s worsening economy.

Local Chinese governments are complying with the campaign, and citizens are being promised money in exchange for relevant tips and information on the matter.

“The speed at which local governments carried out probes, and the severity of the penalties meted out, are impressive,” noted Ren Jianming, the head of the Center for Integrity Research and Education at China’s Beihang University.

The hope is to bring down healthcare costs and fix the country’s economy. However, some say that this campaign is merely a ploy to shift the blame for China’s issues from the government to

Children Can Sue Over Climate Change

Young people around the world are increasingly taking their governments to court for failing to reduce climate pollution, and on rare occasions, they are winning.

This week, their efforts received an endorsement from an independent panel of experts that interprets United Nations human rights law, the Committee on the Rights of the Child. In an expansive 20page document released Monday, the committee said all countries have a legal obligation to protect children from environmental degradation — including by “regulating business enterprises” — and to allow their underage citizens to seek legal recourse.

The committee’s opinion is not legally binding and is therefore impossible to enforce. But it is significant because it is based on a widely recognized international treaty and explicitly recognizes children’s right to go to court to force their government to slow down the climate crisis.

That treaty is the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which is considered the most widely ratified treaty in history because every country in the world except the United States has signed on to

it. In the past, courts in many countries, including on rare occasions the United States, have relied on the committee’s interpretations in their decisions.

“Children have the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment,” the committee wrote. “This right is implicit in the convention and directly linked to, in particular, the rights to life, survival and development.”

The committee is made up of 18 independent legal experts elected to four-year

terms by diplomats representing their countries in the United Nations. The current panel includes lawyers and law professors from countries including Barbados, Morocco and South Africa.

“A strong statement under this convention would add another brick to the growing edifice of international human rights law on climate change,” said Michael Gerrard, director of the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia University.

The committee went on to note that countries are responsible for safeguarding children from the harms of climate pollution now and in the future. “States bear the responsibility for foreseeable environment-related threats arising as a result of their acts or omissions now, the full implications of which may not manifest for years or even decades,” the committee wrote. (© The New York Times)

In an effort to curb polluting vehicles, London is charging cars that are considered more toxic than others. This is not a new initiative. This week, though, the Ultra-Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) expanded further to include all of Greater London. The daily toll is set at around $16, a fee that concerns many businesses in the area while Londoners grapple with soaring inflation and low economic growth.

“We’ve been urging the mayor of London to do a lot more so that businesses, particularly small businesses, are not hammered,” James Watkins, of the LCCI, explained.

He said bosses were “relieved” after Labour mayor Sadiq Khan announced increased financial support for owners of more polluting vehicles affected by his ULEZ extension.

Under the new support measures, owners of older petrol or diesel vans –many thought to be self-employed and small-business operators – can receive £7,000 in scrappage reimbursement, compared with the previous £5,000.

Meanwhile, every Londoner will now be eligible for grants of up to £2,000 to scrap their non-compliant vehicle.

Khan bowed to growing pressure to offer more financial support after his signature policy – aimed at cleaning up London’s “toxic” air – was accused of hitting those already struggling with their bills the hardest.

Low emission zones across Europe, from Berlin and Brussels to Paris and Rome, have attracted similar criticism, in particular from right-wing and far-right groups. They accuse the city’s authorities of making it “more expensive.”

Opponents say that those who wish to scrap their polluting vehicles will have to wait for an application process and may be paying the toll until then. Additionally, it will take them some time to find the right car to purchase, especially due to supply chain issues.

Facing sustained criticism over various aspects of the ULEZ expansion, Khan’s office has insisted that drivers compensat-

ed for scrapping their vehicles will be able to choose from “thousands” of compliant replacements available for sale.

Xi and Modi Meet

long conflict known today as the Sino-Indian War. China emerged victorious, which led to the formation of a newer, yet poorly-defined border known as the “Line of Actual Control (LAC).”

Nearly forty years later, in 2020, another conflict broke out in Aksai Chin-Ladakh, one of the disputed territories, which led to the death of at least twenty Indian soldiers. Since then, the leaders of China and India have rarely interacted, and India has retaliated against China by banning several Chinese apps and services, such as TikTok, Huawei, and ZTE, to protect the country’s “sovereignty and integrity.”

released a statement that the two leaders “had a candid and in-depth exchange of views on current China-India relations.”

“President Xi stressed that improving China-India relations serves the common interests of the two countries and peoples,” the statement added. “The two sides should bear in mind the overall interests of their bilateral relations and handle properly the border issue so as to jointly safeguard peace and tranquility in the border region.”

ernment agency, adding uncertainty to a process marred by legal disputes and accusations of foul play.

The Citizens’ Registry, an office within the country’s electoral authority, provisionally suspended Arevalo’s Semilla party pending an investigation by prosecutors into whether rules were breached during its formation in 2018.

Semilla is going to file an appeal against the decision.

Last week, leaders from Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa met as part of the annual BRICS summit, a meeting between the five countries for the purposes of economic discussion, in Johannesburg, South Africa.

On the side, Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi held informal meetings on the topic of China and India’s relationship, with both leaders expressing hope in resolving the two countries’ border dispute peacefully.

In 1962, a border dispute prompted China to attack India in a one-month-

However, these recent meetings between Xi and Modi have been constructive, according to Chinese and Indian officials.

“[Modi] underlined that the maintenance of peace and tranquility in the border areas, and observing and respecting the LAC are essential for the normalization of the India-China relationship,” said Indian Foreign Secretary Vinay Kwatra.

India’s Ministry of External Affairs added that “the two sides had a positive, constructive, and in-depth discussion on the resolution of the remaining issues along the LAC in the Western Sector.”

China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs

Uncertainty in Guatemala

Arevalo is due to take office in January. If his party dissolves, it may undermine his ability to govern since Semilla legislators might have to sit as independents, making them ineligible for some legislative committees.

Arevalo, 64, remained in contention during the election campaign amid repeated attempts to overturn the result, which led U.S. officials to warn that democracy was under threat in the country. He has pledged to weed out corruption and increase oversight of government spending in the graft-ridden nation.

On Monday, Bernardo Arevalo was formally confirmed as the winner of Guatemala’s August 20th elections. But this week also threw a wrench into his victory when his party was suspended by a gov-

On Monday, the president-elect said that the ruling will not affect his inauguration on January 14 and said the case is part of an “illegal political persecution led by those who refuse to accept that the people of Guatemala voted for change.”

France Bans Muslim Robes in Schools

wearing “ostentatious” symbols that have a clear religious meaning, such as a Catholic cross, a Jewish skullcap or a Muslim headscarf. French people broadly agree with those rules.

The abaya, however — a long dress that covers the legs and arms, but not the hands, feet or head — falls into a gray area. While it is popular in the Persian Gulf and in some Arab countries, it does not have a clear religious significance.

a “political maneuver” by President Emmanuel Macron to curry favor with the right. But, she added, abayas were a real issue that should neither be “overestimated nor underestimated.”

The French Council of the Muslim Faith said that the abaya was not religious in its nature but an ill-defined garment tied to Arab culture. The government shouldn’t decide what is religious or not, it said.

Around three hundred to five hundred people were killed during the protests that followed her death, while thousands were arrested and seven were executed by the government.

France will ban children in public schools from wearing the abaya, a loose-fitting, full-length robe worn by some Muslim women, the government said this week. It said the measure was necessary to stem a growing number of disputes in its secular school system.

But critics called the ban a discriminatory policing of teenagers’ clothing, fueling yet another debate in France over the way Muslim women dress, which has become a recurring flashpoint in the country’s relations with its Muslim minority.

Since 2004, middle and high school students in France have been barred from

In France, it is mostly worn by Muslim women who want to follow the Quran’s teachings on modesty. Headmasters had voiced concern over the past year that they needed clear instructions from the government on how to deal with a small but growing number of students coming to class wearing abayas.

This week, the government responded.

“The abaya has no place in schools,” Gabriel Attal, the education minister, said Monday.

Unions representing school administration officials welcomed the ban, arguing the matter shouldn’t have been left to the varying interpretations of headmasters scattered across roughly 10,000 middle and high schools. Teacher unions were more circumspect.

Sophie Vénétitay, the head of one of the main teacher unions, called the ban

“Unless all long dresses are banned altogether in schools, for students and teachers, regardless of their faith, it will be impossible to apply a measure specifically targeting the abaya without falling into the trap of discrimination and arbitrariness,” the council said in a statement. (© The New York Times)

Iran Preps for Anniversary of Amini’s Death

The Iranian government is preparing for protests to take place on the anniversary of Mahsa Amini’s death.

Amini died in police custody on September 16, 2022, after having been arrested for not wearing her hijab correctly.

As the anniversary of Amini’s death approaches, the Iranian Guidance Patrol, also known as the morality police, has arrested several individuals, including women’s rights activists and relatives of those killed during the 2022 protests.

Iran state-affiliated media reported that twelve individuals were arrested for “preparing unrest and insecurity.”

According to reports, two of the deceased victims’ fathers were arrested. Independent women’s rights group Bidarzani added that one man and eleven women’s rights activists were arrested.

“Iranian authorities are using their go-to playbook of putting maximum pressure on peaceful dissidents ahead of

the anniversary of Mahsa Amini’s death,” said Tara Sepehri Far, a senior Iran researcher who works for the Human Rights Watch. “The arbitrary arrests of a dozen activists are aimed at suppressing popular discontent with ongoing impunity and rights violations.”

It is not yet known if Iranians are indeed planning on demonstrating in September as the Iranian government suspects, or if the following months will come and go without more protests.

These measures come two months after the morality police’s return. Currently, the Iranian government is considering implementing stricter hijab laws which would include longer prison sentences, more expensive fines, and the building of surveillance systems that would use artificial intelligence to catch women who are not following the country’s extremely strict modesty laws.

Is Putin Behind Prigozhin’s Death?

Yevgeny Prigozhin, the notorious Wagner Group leader who staged a short-lived rebellion against Moscow two months ago, died last Wednesday in a fi-

ery plane crash.

The mercenary leader’s death has since sparked widespread suspicion of Kremlin involvement in the crash, with many speculating that Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered that the plane be shot down in order to punish Prigozhin for the Wagner Group’s less than 24-hour-long revolt.

bodies were found at the crash site, three of which belonged to the airplane’s crew members. It is not yet known why some of the Wagner Group’s highest-ranking officials would board the same plane when it is protocol for important officials of any organization to take separate flights for security purposes. With the death of Prigozhin and other top members, the future of the Wagner Group is now in question.

“The demise of Prigozhin almost certainly would have a deeply destabilizing effect on the Wagner Group. His personal attributes of hyperactivity, exceptional audacity, a drive for results and extreme brutality permeated Wagner and are unlikely to be matched by any successor,” said Britain’s defense ministry.

he needed – both for himself and, when I asked him about it, for the common cause, as in these last months. He was a talented man, a talented businessman.”

Russian authorities claim to be investigating the plane crash that took Prigozhin and others’ lives.

Prigozhin, 62, was buried this week in a private ceremony in St. Petersburg.

Chinese Want to Boycott Japanese Goods

“Right now, of course, there are lots of speculations around this plane crash and the tragic deaths of the passengers of the plane, including Yevgeny Prigozhin,” said Putin’s spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov. “Of course, in the West, those speculations are put under a certain angle, and all of it is a complete lie.”

Along with Prigozhin, six Wagner Group officials were on the flight, including his second-in-command, the logistics chief, and one or more bodyguards, said Russia’s civil aviation authority. Ten

According to U.S. intelligence officials, preliminary reports suggest that Putin is “very likely” responsible for Prigozhin’s death. U.S. President Joe Biden has expressed similar views.

“I don’t know for a fact what happened, but I’m not surprised,” Biden said. “There’s not much that happens in Russia that Putin’s not behind.”

In a public statement, Putin said that those aboard the flight “made a significant contribution” to the invasion of Ukraine and that Prigozhin “made serious mistakes in life, and he achieved the results

Chinese customers are calling for boycotts of Japanese products in retaliation for the release of treated wastewater from the Fukushima nuclear power plant.

The effort is shaping up to be the largest campaign of state-supported nationalist outrage against Japan in more than

a decade and comes at a time of widening divisions between China and U.S.-aligned countries in the region.

Customers started returning Japanese-made cosmetics and goods over the weekend after lists of products to be boycotted were circulated widely online. Manufacturers were forced to declare products “radiation-free” after some buyers brought handheld Geiger counters to test products for radioactivity. Stores have run out of table salt because some fear that contaminated waters will make it impossible to produce more sea salt.

Beijing has, for years, tried to mobilize its citizens to retaliate against other countries for actions against China. That approach has been honed and amplified under Xi Jinping, China’s leader, who has played upon nationalist sentiments and fears of a dangerous world beyond China’s borders.

Yasuhiro Matsuda, a professor of international politics at the University of Tokyo, said China believes that “scapegoating” Japan is a useful distraction from its own problems, but if demonstrations escalate into violence that could “seriously damage China’s image.”

A ban on Japanese seafood on Friday was followed by a campaign of nuisance calls to Japanese businesses and government departments.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), after conducting a twoyear review, concluded last month that Japan’s plan to release the wastewater meets international safety standards and would have “negligible” radiological impact on people and the environment.

In a gesture of support for Japan, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and his staff had seafood for lunch on Monday to show that it was safe.

U.S. Marine Plane Crash In Australia

The crash took place on Melville Island, an uninhabited island situated off the coast of Australia’s Northern Territory, at 9:30 a.m. local time. As of Sunday, five of the survivors were rushed to the Royal Darwin Hospital and are currently in critical condition, said the Marine Rotational Force–Darwin, a Marine Corps task force based out of the Robertson Barracks and RAAF Base Darwin army bases in Australia. Others were treated at the scene of the crash, according to Northern Territory Chief Minister Natasha Fyles.

While the cause of the crash is not yet known, Osprey aircrafts have a history of mechanical failure, resulting in fatal crashes dating back to the 1980s when the craft was first created. Just a year ago, five U.S. Marines were killed in a crash while using the plane for training near Glamis, California. Just a few months prior, four U.S. servicemembers were killed in the same type of Osprey plane in Norway during NATO training sessions. Many more Osprey crashes have taken place, killing or injuring those on board, in the last few decades.

“These Marines served our country with courage and pride, and my thoughts and prayers are with their families today, with the other troops who were injured in the crash, and with the entire USMC family,” said U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on X, a social media platform formerly known as Twitter.

After a crash such as this, the military usually grounds planes in order to conduct an operational stand-down, a temporary pause of operations in order to ensure the safety of all aircrafts, said retired U.S. Air Force Col. Cedric Leighton.

Why were U.S. Marines in Australia? According to Leighton, international military training is done in order to strengthen ties between the U.S. and its partners.

“There’s a lot of coordination that goes along with these exercises,” he added. “The Australians are great partners, and those exercises are invaluable in providing for security in the Pacific region.”

Gas Protests in Colombia

On Sunday, U.S. Marines were conducting training exercises in Australia, during which an MV-22B Osprey plane, with twenty-three Marines inside, crashed, killing at least three and seriously injuring several others.

On Monday, the streets of Colombia’s main cities were choked with protesters on cars and bikes who came out in force to reject recent hikes in gasoline prices that have drastically increased the price of fuel in the South American country.

Protesters say that the monthly price hikes set by Colombia’s first leftist government are making it harder for small businesses to operate and could push up

the price of food.

But the government of President Gustavo Petro says the gasoline subsidies cost about $11 billion a year. It says it must eliminate the subsidies to pay debts to the national oil company Ecopetrol, which produces most of the country’s fuel, and to free up more funds for social programs.

Petro took office a year ago, and since then, many people have not been happy with his governing. He had promised to reduce poverty and make peace with the na-

tion’s rebel groups. But the country is still struggling to stop violence in rural parts of the nation and to boost the economy.

The price of gasoline in Colombia has risen from 9,000 pesos a gallon in August of last year (US $2.50) to more than 14,000 currently ($3.40) as Colombia’s government cuts back on subsidies each month.

Officials in Colombia’s Finance Ministry have said they want gasoline to reach a price of 16,000 pesos per gallon – about

$4 – by the end of the year, which would mirror current gas prices in the U.S., where the federal minimum wage, however, is more than four times greater than Colombia’s minimum wage of $280 a month.

In July, the ministry said that subsidies for diesel, which is used by most cargo trucks in Colombia, will be removed after municipal elections in October, and that the price of diesel fuel will double by the end of next year.

Over the weekend, Petro’s administration cut a deal with the nation’s taxi driver unions, under which gasoline prices will be frozen for the country’s estimated 200,000 yellow taxis. However, members of Colombia’s opposition say that the government needs to go further because gas hikes are also hurting delivery workers, drivers and small business owners who are struggling to recover from the pandemic.

Sierra Leone To Open Jerusalem Embassy

On Friday, Sierra Leone, a West African country, announced plans to open its embassy in Jerusalem, making the country the sixth to make this decision.

The announcement by President Julius Maada Bio of Sierra Leone was made after he and Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen had a conversation on the matter.

“They discussed the warm relations between both countries that date back to 1961 when Sierra Leone gained independence. As part of efforts to strengthen the relationship between the two nations, His Excellency President Bio expressed his government’s readiness to establish an Embassy of Sierra Leone in Jerusalem, the capital of the State of Israel,” said Bio’s statement.

“I was pleased to hear from the president of Sierra Leone of his intentions to open an embassy in Jerusalem,” Cohen said, praising the decision.

“We continue to put Jerusalem, our eternal capital, at the head of the diplomatic program of the State of Israel,” Cohen continued, adding that in September a state from the Asia Pacific region, which he did not name, would similarly open up an embassy in Jerusalem.

As of now, the only countries to have embassies in Jerusalem are the United States, Kosovo, Honduras, and Guatemala. Additionally, Paraguay is set to move its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

Both Israelis and Palestinians claim Jerusalem as their capital. However, most countries have not chosen a side and have thus established an Israeli embassy in or near Tel Aviv. In 2017, then-President Donald Trump moved the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem, a powerful statement to Israel and the world.

Israelis Land in Saudi Arabia

detour was praised by Israel as a sign of goodwill, as the two nations work towards formalizing relations.

It what was a surprise landing for both Israel and Saudi Arabia, a plane carrying Israelis back to the Jewish State from the island nation of Seychelles made an emergency landing in Saudi Arabia on Monday. On Tuesday, the passengers were flown to Tel Aviv. The unplanned

There were 128 passengers onboard the plane that had experienced an electrical malfunction. Israel’s Foreign Ministry said the passengers spent the night at an airport hotel in Jeddah and were flown back by the airline on an alternate plane. Passengers described a frightening stretch of time as an acrid burnt smell filled the cabin and the pilot came over the intercom to say the plane would be forced to make an emergency stop in Saudi Arabia, a kingdom with which Israel has no air links or diplomatic ties.

Passengers onboard reported feeling scared and uncertain, as the plane languished on the tarmac. Eventually, Saudi security forces escorted the Israelis to a hotel.

The passengers told The Associated Press their experience in Jeddah was pleasant, with some Saudis even greeting them in Hebrew.

Israel and Saudi Arabia do not have official ties, although they have developed strong but informal connections over recent years over their shared concerns about Iran’s growing influence in the region. Since Israel and four Arab states signed normalization deals in 2020 under the former Trump administration, the current U.S. administration says that it has been working to strike a similar agreement with Saudi Arabia.

“I greatly appreciate the warm attitude of the Saudi authorities to the Israeli passengers whose flight was in distress,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a video recorded in Hebrew with Arabic subtitles, as he gestured toward a map of the region behind him. “I greatly appreciate the good neighborliness.”

Libya FM Axed After Meeting with Israeli FM

After a controversial encounter with Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen, Najla Mongoush, the foreign minister of Libya, was suspended from her position by the

North African country’s prime minister, Abdul Hamid al-Dbeibeh, and has since escaped to Turkey.

According to Cohen, the two had a “historic” meeting, which could serve as a “first step” in building ties between Israel and Libya.

covert diplomatic meetings must first be given a green light by the Prime Minister’s Office.

Israel’s High Cost of Living

“I spoke with the foreign minister about the great potential for our countries with such ties, as well as the importance of preserving the heritage of Libyan Jewry, including renovating synagogues and Jewish cemeteries in the country,” Cohen added.

However, in a somewhat confusing turn of events, it seems that Libya’s Foreign Ministry saw the interaction in a vastly different way.

“What happened in Rome was an unofficial and unprepared casual meeting, during a meeting with the Italian foreign minister, and it did not include any discussions, agreements or consultations,” asserted the Libyan Foreign Ministry. “Rather, the minister affirmed Libya’s constants on the Palestinian issue in a clear and unambiguous manner.”

The ministry went further in rejecting the notion of progress in Israel and Libya’s relations, adding that Libya “categorically denies the reported exploitation by the Hebrew and international press and their attempt to confer upon the incident the character of meetings, talks, or even arranging or just considering holding such meetings” and that it is still against “normalization with the Zionist entity” and is committed to supporting the “national constants on the issues of the Arab and Islamic nations, foremost of which is the Palestinian cause.”

Following news of what may or may not have been a meeting between the two countries’ foreign ministers, many citizens of Libya felt outraged and thus held protests against Mangoush while burning Israeli flags.

Libya does not have diplomatic relations with Israel, and normalization of ties remains a controversial issue in the country.

On Tuesday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued a directive requiring all secret diplomatic gatherings to be approved by his office. The premier also demanded that the publicizing of any

According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), Israel ranked first place in a list of developed countries with the highest cost of living in 2022, according to data published on Sunday.

In Israel, prices were 38 percent higher than the average in OECD member countries, according to the comparative index, which analyzes differences in the general price levels of countries as measured by consumer price indices and ratios of purchasing power parities to market exchange rates. Switzerland came in second place, followed by Iceland. The United States came in fourth place.

A lot of Israel’s economy is centered around a few sectors, such as the food and household goods sectors. From 2015 to 2020, the market share of the 10 largest suppliers in the food industry and in the field of consumer products was about 54% on average, and the supplier with the largest market share in 2020 held about 12% of the total food market, according to a State Comptroller report. The prices of some basic consumer goods, including milk, bread, and cheese, are between 50% to 70% more expensive in Israel as compaired to average price levels in OECD member countries.

In recent months, the right-wing government led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been harshly criticized for neglecting to address rising prices while focusing on its contentious judicial overhaul plans. In response, the government in June announced the formation of a ministerial committee to tackle the high cost of living.

Israelis are struggling to make ends meet with rising costs of living. According to a survey published by the Israel Democracy Institute earlier this year, two-thirds of respondents think food prices are the most significant factor in the increasing costs of living, and around

half blame housing costs, and 29% indirect taxation.

Biden’s Age, Trump’s Charges

and “dishonest.”

Seventy-seven percent of Americans – 89% of Republicans and 69% of Democrats – thought age would be a problem if Biden won the White House again. Significantly fewer said Trump’s age – he’s 77 years old now – would be a problem: 51%, with only 29% of Republicans concerned.

Trump had skipped the Republican debate last week, and his ratings dipped slightly after. Emerson College Polling showed Trump at 50% support, a sixpoint drop from a pre-debate poll. Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor widely held not to have performed strongly in Milwaukee, was second with a two-point bump to 12%.

and is already the oldest president ever elected. If re-elected, he would be 86 by the end of his second term.

Haley has repeatedly said Biden will probably die in office, warning voters of the dangers of Kamala Harris, the vice president, rising to power herself.

The AP/Norc poll said, “When asked about the first word that comes to mind when they think of each candidate, 26% of all adults cited Biden’s age and 15% mentioned words associated with being slow and confused, while only 1% and 3% did so for Trump.”

more than 50 U.S. attorneys offices and dozens of federal, state and local law enforcement agencies.

The sweep resulted in criminal charges against 371 defendants, with 119 convicted or pleading guilty. The Justice Department claimed 63 defendants had connections to violent crime and 25 had purported connections to transnational crime networks.

In a recent poll released from Associated Press and Norc Center for Public Affairs, more than three-quarters of respondents said that President Joe Biden would be too old to be effective if re-elected president next year. But people aren’t just done with Biden. Many of them also saw Biden’s likely challenger, former President Donald Trump, as “corrupt”

The investor Vivek Ramaswamy, who barged into the spotlight with an angry debate display, dropped one point to 9%. Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor and United Nations ambassador who confronted Ramaswamy, climbed five to 7%.

Although Trump faces criminal charges, with his trial set for March 4 in the federal elections case, those allegations do not seem to have dented his popularity with Republicans.

Biden won a U.S. Senate seat in 1972, ran for president in 1988 and 2008,

The survey noted, “For Trump, nearly a quarter mentioned words associated with corruption, crime, lying, or untrustworthiness, while only 8% mentioned those traits for Biden.”

Two-thirds of respondents supported age limits for presidents, members of Congress, and Supreme Court justices.

Pandemic-Related Fraud

The exact amount stolen is unknown, but the Small Business Administration’s inspector general estimated that more than $200 billion — or at least 17% of the roughly $1.2 trillion in pandemic loans the agency doled out — was disbursed to “potentially fraudulent actors.”

The Justice Department does not have a specific goal for the amount of money it is trying to recoup, but prosecutors and investigators are working to “claw back as much of that money as possible,” said Michael Galdo, the department’s acting director of COVID-19 fraud enforcement.

For more than two years, Leon Haynes, a New Jersey tax preparer, told some of his clients that the federal government was giving out “free money” in the form of pandemic relief to people who owned businesses. According to federal prosecutors, Haynes filed more than 1,000 false tax forms, fraudulently claiming more than $124 million in COVID-19 employment tax credits for businesses that he and others owned.

Haynes was arrested at the end of July.

The complaint is one of several COVID-19 fraud cases detailed last week by the Justice Department, which has been cracking down on businesses and individuals who inappropriately pocketed federal relief aid.

As of last week, the federal government has charged 3,195 defendants for offenses related to pandemic fraud and seized more than $1.4 billion in relief funds, according to data released by the department.

That included the results of a threemonth “sweep” to combat COVID-19 fraud, which ended in July and involved

The cases highlighted by the Justice Department revealed the scope of fraud that occurred at a moment when the federal government, in an attempt to keep the economy afloat, rushed to get money out the door quickly and with little oversight. A flood of criminals exploited many of those programs, taking advantage of what they saw as easy money. The Justice Department listed a range of fraud schemes, including defendants who were accused of using the money to solicit a murder and individuals who laundered funds by shipping cars to Nigeria. (© The New York Times)

10 Meds Under Medicare Pricing

This week, the Biden administration unveiled the first 10 prescription drugs that will be subject to price negotiations between manufacturers and Medicare, kicking off a controversial process that aims to make costly medications more affordable for older Americans.

President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act, which passed in a party-line vote last year, gave Medicare the power to directly hash out drug prices with manufacturers

for the first time in the federal program’s nearly 60-year history. The agreed-upon prices for the first round of drugs are scheduled to go into effect in 2026.

Among those drugs are Eliquis and Xarelto, which are used to prevent blood clotting and reduce the risk of stroke; Jardiance and Januvia, which are used to lower blood sugar for those suffering from Type 2 diabetes; and Stelara, which is used to treat Crohn’s disease.

Although some Democrats have pushed for this change, those in the pharmaceutical industry view the process as a threat to its revenue growth, profits and drug innovation. Drugmakers such as Merck and Johnson & Johnson and their supporters aim to derail the negotiations, filing at least eight lawsuits in recent months seeking to declare the policy unconstitutional.

The drugs listed Tuesday are among the top 50 with the highest spending for Medicare Part D, which covers prescription medications that seniors fill at retail pharmacies. The 10 medicines accounted for $50.5 billion, or about 20%, of total Part D prescription drug costs from June 1, 2022, to May 31, 2023, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, or CMS.

The drugs have been on the market for

at least seven years without generic competitors, or 11 years in the case of biological products such as vaccines.

Medicare covers roughly 66 million people in the U.S., and 50.5 million patients are currently enrolled in Part D plans.

Now, drugmakers have to sign agreements to join negotiations by October 1. CMS will then make an initial price offer to manufacturers in February 2024, and those companies have a month to accept or make a counteroffer.

The negotiations will end in August 2024, with agreed-upon prices published on September 1, 2024. The reduced prices won’t go into effect until January 2026.

If a drugmaker declines to negotiate, it must either pay an excise tax of up to 95% of its medication’s U.S. sales or pull all of its products from the Medicare and Medicaid markets.

The pharmaceutical industry contends that the penalty can be as high as 1,900% of a drug’s daily revenues.

After the initial round of talks, CMS can negotiate prices for another 15 drugs for 2027 and an additional 15 in 2028. The number rises to 20 negotiated medications a year starting in 2029 and beyond.

Simone Biles Makes History

a place in the world championships, which are scheduled to start September 30 in Antwerp, Belgium.

American Airlines Fined $4M for Delays

This weekend, Simone Biles became the most decorated gymnast in U.S. history, winning 32 medals across the Olympics and the world championships. On Sunday, the athlete won a record eighth national all-around title with a strong performance at the U.S. Gymnastics Championships in San Jose, California.

The 26-year-old Biles also became the oldest woman to ever win the championships when she finished 3.9 points ahead of Shilese Jones, the all-around silver medalist at the 2022 U.S .and world championships.

The eighth title for Biles breaks the record she shared with Alfred Jochim, who won his seventh all-around gold medal 90 years ago in 1933.

“I think it feels really special,” she told NBC, which broadcast the championships. “I’ve been doing it for so long. I feel like I don’t think about numbers, I think about my performance. And I think, overall, I hit eight for eight (routines). … I guess it’s a lucky number this year.”

For now, Biles is keeping mum on whether she will be competing in the Olympics next year.

“I like to keep (my goals) personal just so that I know what I am aiming for,” she told NBC. “I’m trying to move a little bit differently this year than I have in the past. So I think it’s working so far, so I’m gonna keep it a little bit secretive.”

Biles continues her return to competitive gymnastics after a two-year hiatus following the 2021 Tokyo Olympics, when she pulled out of several events suffering from what is known as the “twisties” – a mental block causing a gymnast to lose track of their positions in midair.

Throughout the competition, Biles effortlessly and powerfully completed elements of her routines no other female gymnast has ever landed in competition.

With Sunday’s win, Biles earned

On Monday, the Department of Transportation said it has fined American Airlines $4.1 million for keeping thousands of passengers onboard planes on airport tarmacs for hours at a time.

American agreed to pay $2.05 million and received an equal sum in credit against the fine for compensation already paid to passengers, according to a document outlining the deal. The penalty is the largest of its kind ever imposed.

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said the fine was part of the department’s push to uphold the rights of airline passengers.

“Whether the issue is extreme tarmac delays or problems getting refunds, DOT will continue to protect consumers and hold airlines accountable,” he said in a statement.

Federal rules strictly regulate tarmac delays, generally requiring airlines to let passengers disembark once a plane has been sitting at an airport for three hours, in the case of a domestic flight, and four hours for international flights.

The Transportation Department said it identified 43 flights from 2018 to 2021 in which American broke the rule, affecting 5,821 passengers. Most problems occurred at Dallas Fort Worth International Airport, one of American’s hubs, and were connected to bad weather.

American Airlines operates around 7.7 million flights a year.

A Tragic Search in Maui

The FBI has created a list of those still missing in the ruins of Maui, where wildfires brought death and destruction in the month of August. The list, which is not complete at this time, includes 388

names and was released to the public in order to aid with the search.

Hawaii Gov. Josh Green said in a Facebook post that the FBI’s mission is “to unduplicate people that have been reported missing,” so that the authorities know who to really search for and who has already been found. In fact, as of Friday, August 25, the authorities have heard from “at least 100 people that have notified us that a certain person shouldn’t be on the list,” added Steven Merril, the

FBI special agent assigned to Hawaii.

“We’re releasing this list of names today because we know that it will help with the investigation,” said Police Chief John Pelletier. “We also know that once those names come out, it can and will cause pain for folks whose loved ones are listed. This is not an easy thing to do, but we want to make sure that we are doing everything we can to make this investigation as complete and thorough as possible.”

The list will be updated weekly, added Pelletier.

As of now, the authorities have reported 115 deaths, although the number will likely rise as the search for survivors continues. According to Maui County officials last Tuesday, all the single-story homes in the affected areas have been searched. Currently, the search teams and cadaver dogs are searching through multi-story homes and commercial areas in hopes of finding more survivors or at least bring-

ing victims’ bodies to a final, honorable resting place.

Additionally, the FBI is searching through victims’ cell phone data in order to geolocate where the phones (and by extension, the ones missing) last were before their disappearance, in hopes of using that information to locate where they are now.

While the causes of the fires are not yet known, Maui County has sued Hawaiian Electric (HECO), an electric utility company which provides electricity for 95% of the state, for being what county officials claim is the direct cause of the wildfires. When the National Weather Service issued a High Wind Watch, the company allegedly “inexcusably kept their power lines energized” although the authorities warned that such powerful winds could blow down power lines which would then start a fire. Additionally, the wildfires are said to have started near an electrical substation “where authorities reported a downed power line early on August 8, 2023,” said the county’s complaint. Thus, Maui County is suing HECO for what will likely be tens or hundreds of millions of dollars.

However, the physical evidence, which includes fallen power poles and lines, has been moved around or even removed in order to help officials fight the fires and make the area habitable again. The absence of preserved evidence from the scene of the fire, notes Hawaiian Electric, makes it “possible, even likely” that evidence relating “to the cause of the fire” may be gone forever.

Mosquito Diseases in the U.S.

Several cases of rare mosquito and tick-transmitted diseases have been ap-

pearing throughout the country this summer, one of the rarest of which is eastern equine encephalitis, commonly abbreviated as EEE, which is a mosquito-borne illness with a 30% fatality rate.

In Alabama, two people caught EEE last week, one of whom has died from the disease. Aside for those two cases, no one else has caught the disease this year thus far. However, last week, mosquitoes in Vermont, New York, and Michigan were found to be carrying the

illness. While for the past decade the U.S. has experienced an average of eight EEE cases a year, in 2022, only one person was infected with the disease, while in 2019, thirty-eight tested positive, nine of whom died as a result of the illness. EEE causes inflammation of the brain, which can lead to neurological problems and death.

Another disease which has been popping up lately is the Powassan virus, an illness carried by ticks with a 10% fatality

rate. Last week, four citizens of Connecticut caught the virus, which makes these cases the first Powassan virus incidents of the year for the state. In mid-July, an elderly woman from Rhode Island died from the illness, and in May, the virus killed a resident of Maine. There are on average around thirty cases of the Powassan virus in the U.S. each year.

Additionally, the U.S. has seen a few rare cases of malaria this summer. When malaria is transmitted in the U.S., it gen-

erally comes from someone who got the disease from a different country. What is especially noteworthy is that this summer the U.S. has seen its first cases of locally transmitted malaria in two decades. Seven cases are from Florida, one from Maryland, and another from Texas.

Dengue fever and West Nile virus have also been appearing throughout the United States, with the number of cases this year of the former being 642, while the latter has infected around 247 people thus far.

Trump Has Mugshot Taken

On Thursday, former U.S. President Donald J. Trump was booked in Atlanta, Georgia, on charges regarding his alleged attempts to challenge the 2020 election results. The booking, which took place at the Fulton County jail, a prison where conditions are extremely poor, included the first mugshot ever taken of a former U.S. president.

Trump looked straight at the camera, his eyebrows furrowed and his head slightly tilted down; the former president wore a scowl on his face. This mugshot has since become an iconic, historic image in the eyes of Trump fans and haters alike.

During the twenty-minute-long booking, Donald Trump submitted physical measurements which had him at 6 feet 3 inches, 215 pounds, with strawberry or blonde hair.

Along with the former president, eighteen others were charged in connection with Trump’s actions during the 2020 election, including former New York City Mayor Rudy Guiliani and Trump’s former chief of staff Mark Meadows, both of whom the authorities similarly took mugshots of.

The former president was set free on a $200,000 bond, at which point he traveled back to his home in New Jersey. After the booking, Trump once again claimed that he “did nothing wrong” and that the charges against him are a “travesty of justice.”

“If you challenge an election, you

should be able to challenge an election,” the 45th president asserted.

Prior to his booking, Donald Trump replaced Drew Findling, his criminal defense attorney for the Georgia case, with Steve Sadow, a well-known lawyer who has represented other celebrities in the past.

“The president should never have been indicted. He is innocent of all the charges brought against him,” said Sadow. “We look forward to the case being dismissed or, if necessary, an unbiased, open-minded jury finding the president not guilty.”

Aside for the Georgia election indictment, which accuses Trump of illegally trying to overturn the 2020 election results in Georgia, the former commander-in-chief faces three other indictments, which include the federal documents case in Florida, a hush money case in New York, and a January 6th-related case in Washington, D.C.

San Fran Crime Closes Stores

On Sunday, Nordstrom closed the doors of its five-story department store in San Francisco, 35 years after the iconic store opened its door in the city. The closure is indicative of a suffering retail sector as crime soars and foot traffic diminishes in the Californian city.

The retailer announced the closure in May, saying that the “dynamics of the downtown San Francisco market have changed dramatically over the past several years, impacting customer foot traffic to our stores and our ability to operate successfully.”

Shoppers said that it was a “sad day” and that the 312,000-square-foot Nordstrom was an “anchor in San Francisco.” The once-vibrant store was filled with empty displays, sealed-off areas, and customers taking a ride on its memorable spiral escalator one last time.

Nordstrom Rack, which had been open close to the Nordstrom store, had closed last month.

After Nordstrom announced it was closing, shopping mall operator Westfield said it would give up control of its San Francisco mall, citing “challenging

operating conditions in downtown San Francisco, which have led to declines in sales, occupancy and foot traffic.”

Once a bustling retail center in the heart of the city, the San Francisco Centre has taken a significant hit in the past few years. Total sales have fallen from $455 million in 2019 to $298 million in 2022, and foot traffic has plunged from

9.7 million visits in 2019 to 5.6 million in 2022, according to Westfield.

Since the pandemic, when many

people began to work at home, the retail sector in San Francisco has never fully recovered. Three years after the pandemic, office vacancies in San Francisco have reached a 30-year high. Well-known chain stores like Whole Foods, Anthropologie, Office Depot and CB2 have also ceased operations in the city’s downtown since the start of the pandemic. In total, more than 39 retail stores have shuttered in San Francisco’s Union Square area since 2020.

Joe the Plumber Dies

You may not know him as Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher, but he made headlines back in 2008, when Barack Obama campaigned for the presidency. This week, the man known as “Joe the Plumber” passed away at the age of 49.

Wurzelbacher posed a question to then-candidate Obama regarding his tax

policies and the potential negative impact on small businesses. He quickly became synonymous with the quintessential “everyman,” which the Republican Party latched onto in their presidential campaign at the time.

the debate.

Still, Wurzelbacher didn’t enjoy his moment in the spotlight, mentioning that he felt uncomfortable with the scrutiny.

“When I met Joe, he was already known by everyone else as ‘Joe the Plumber’ but he wrote something to me that stood out and showed me who he truly was: ‘just Joe,’” his wife Katie said. “He was an average, honorable man trying to do great things for the country he loved so deeply after being thrust into the public eye for asking a question.”

Alligator Alley

While Obama was meeting with people during a campaign appearance in Ohio, Wurzelbacher asked whether Obama’s plan would force him to pay more in taxes after he purchases a company that made between $250,000 to $280,000 annually. Obama responded that his plan would actually offer Wurzelbacher a tax credit for health care costs and noted that 95 percent of small businesses make less than that.

Wurzelbacher’s name was later brought up 25 times during a debate between Obama and then Republican nominee John McCain. McCain even said that “Joe the Plumber” was the true winner of

In 2012, Wurzelbacher put himself in the spotlight by running in Ohio’s 9th U.S. House district against Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur. In one of his campaign ads, Wurzelbacher attempted to link the Holocaust with gun legislation. He said that the millions of Jews who died were left unable to defend themselves because of “gun control” enacted by Germany in 1939.

He ultimately lost against Kaptur in the 2012 general election and returned to his plumbing business.

Donald Woods went alligator hunting last Friday and came home with a huge prize. The Mississippi hunter set out on the opening day of the season and landed the largest alligator ever officially recorded in the state.

“We got on the water right at dark,” said Woods. “We were seeing a lot of alligators. It was a calm night. We saw a lot of 8-footers, 10-footers, but that’s not what we were after.”

Woods had gone hunting with his three buddies. Together they had harvested plenty of big alligators in the past, so they weren’t going to settle for something smaller the first night.

“We’ve been hunting these things a long time,” Woods said. “We’ve killed a lot of 12-footers.”

Soon, they came upon the big prize.

“We knew he was wide,” Woods said. “His back was humongous. It was like we were following a jon boat.”

At 9 p.m., Woods got a hook on the alligator. But it took seven hours, several broken lines and a broken tackle to wrangle in the beast.

“We hooked him eight or nine times and he kept breaking off. He would go down, sit and then take off. He kept going under logs. He knew what he was doing. The crazy thing is he stayed in that same spot.”

Woods added, “It was exhausting, but your adrenaline is going so you don’t notice it. It was more mentally exhausting than anything because he kept getting off.”

After fighting through the night and

well into the next morning, Woods said the alligator finally started tiring. And it couldn’t have happened at a better time. Wood said almost all of their rods and reels were unusable.

“We were down to pretty much down to those two rods and reels at that point,” Woods said.

Finally, at 3:30 a.m., they managed to get the gator into the boat. But they didn’t fully grasp how big it was until later.

Once on land, they measured the beast, and it was in the 14-foot range. When officially measured by Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks Alligator Program coordinator Andrew Arnett, the alligator came in at 14 feet, 3 inches and weighed 802.5 pounds. It bested the previous record set in 2017 of 14 feet, 3/4 inches.

Woods said this gator had gotten the best of him.

“We’re done with chasing big ones this year,” Woods said. “I might even call it a career after that, honestly.”

Message in a Bottle

It took a few years, but it finally got its message across.

On July 17, 2019, Aoife Byrne wrote a note, sealed it in a bottle, and threw it into the sea near her home in Ireland. Four years later, Frank Bolger of New Jersey found the bottle while cleaning the shore near his home.

“Greetings from Ireland,” the note reads. “I have thrown this bottle into the sea for someone to find another day. Maybe it’s traveled down to Africa or to Iceland! I won’t know if someone found this, but I hope it is found!”

The note was signed, “Aoife.”

Bolger posted his discovery online, hoping to connect with the author of the missive. A few days later, Byrne’s father was watching TV when a story came up

Did you know?

That little section of exposed shaved wood just above a pencil’s writing point is called the collar.

about the discovery. He called her into the room to see her note on the screen.

Byrne reached out to Bolger via email, but the New Jersey man was skeptical; perhaps she was an imposter?

Turns out, the Aiofe was real – she sent Bolger some photos and a writing sample to prove that she was the author of the note.

Byrne said she was excited that her message made it all the way across the ocean, although it took some time to get there.

“I am kind of obsessed, well, very interested in messages in bottles, to be honest,” Byrne said.

That sounds like a positive note.

World Bog Snorkeling

It’s more like a trudge in the sludge than a walk in the park. The World Bog Snorkeling Championship was held on Sunday, with contestants slithering through a swamp to nab the slimy title.

The annual competition in the tiny town of Llanwrtyd Wells, Wales, in Britain sees competitors race to complete two lengths of a 60-yard water-filled

trench cut through a peat bog. They can use flippers on their feet, but conventional swimming strokes are banned.

Some contestants accessorized their snorkels, masks and flippers with more flamboyant touches – one carried a giant plastic toad on their head, another had a bathing cap adorned with flowers.

minute and 12 seconds, beating the alltime record he set last year.

Rutter said that, comparatively, this year’s swim was easier than other years due to the rain that the area received this year, which diluted the bog.

“But still, you’re getting in, and it’s pitch black. It’s very cold and kind of claustrophobic,” he acknowleged.

“And then you become a little bit aware of what’s around you, and as you’re swimming along and you brush past a thing, inevitably, your brain starts to think, ‘Well, what was that thing?’ And you try and sort of cast it to the back of your mind.”

And the smell, well, let’s just say there’s a smell.

herring eaten in one minute.

A museum spokesperson hailed Norlin for having “astonishing focus, an ironclad stomach, and a tenacious spirit.”

“Sune has cemented his place among the legends here at the museum for this awe-inspiring accomplishment. His name will be etched in our halls and stories of his determination retold for years,” the representative said.

Sounds like he was fishing for compliments.

The Big Catch

Neil Rutter was one of those contestants. Once a year, he dons his snorkel and submerges himself into the muddy waters.

“It’s mad, and because there’s a long English and British and Welsh tradition of doing things that are completely bonkers on a bank holiday weekend,” Rutter, an art teacher from Bath, England, said when asked why someone would submit themselves to the slithery waters.

Rutter is now the five-time champion of the Championships. He won his fifth competition on Sunday, finishing in one

“Yeah, it has its whiff,” Rutter said. “That sort of peaty smell, which I’m sure is very good for the skin.”

For now, Rutter says that he’s pleased with his win. Still, he says that he’s taking a break from swamp swimming for now. Perhaps it’s water under the bridge.

A Revolting Race

Speaking of fish, a teenager from Minnesota went fishing last week and reeled in a prize catch: a cash-stuffed wallet.

Last week, the Disgusting Food Museum in Malmo, Sweden, organized a speed eating competition for surstromming. Lest you don’t know what that is, surstromming is a traditional Swedish delicacy of fermented herring that has been salted just enough to prevent it from rotting. And although it’s considered a delicacy, the smell alone is enough to make people want to throw up.

“The biggest part of the challenge will be to not vomit during the attempt, over actually eating a large amount in a short time,” a museum representative told Guinness World Records.

Because of the foul odor and taste, each participant received a large amount of fish to eat – along with a vomit bucket, which was placed near them.

Sune Valentin Norlin came out on top. The 71-year-old Swedish man consumed 13.85 ounces of the dish in one minute –and managed to keep it down. His strategy?

“You’ve just got to swallow it,” he shared.

Norlin’s victory earned him the Guinness World Record for most fermented

Connor Halsa was fishing with his family when he felt his line go taut.

“I thought I had a huge fish, so I set the hook really hard,” Halsa related. Turns out, it was a huge catch: $2K stuffed into a wallet.

After opening up the soaked wallet, the 14-year-old found a business card and tracked down the owner, Iowa farmer Jim Denney, who said he lost his wallet while fishing on the lake a year earlier.

“The odds of ever finding or hooking a billfold in 20 feet of water – I don’t think there’s a number,” Denney said.

Denney drove from his home in Iowa to Moorhead, where Halsa lives, to retrieve the wallet. He offered a cash reward to the teenager for finding his lost cash, but Halsa refused it.

“I would take Connor as a grandson any day, and I would fight for him any day,” Denney said.

Denney ended up gifting Halsa a personalized cooler and taking his family out to dinner as thanks.

Lost a wallet, found a friend.

Around the Community

Yeshivas Nishmas Hatorah Summer Bein Hazmanim: Adventure, Relaxation & Aliyah In Ruchniyus

While summer vacation certainly provides one the opportunity to relax and unwind, for the talmidim of Yeshivas Nishmas Hatorah, this past summer was also a time for a unique blend of adventure, learning, and personal growth.

This year, the Yeshiva organized an extraordinary summer bein hazmanim tech incentive trip to Utah, where boys who cut back on their technology usage were rewarded with an unforgettable and

fun-filled trip.

Highlights of the trip included a visit to Bryce Canyon, a rodeo, and an adrenaline filled Humvee hike trail excursion amongst other various activities.

The 12th grade talmidim spent the beginning of their summer bein hazmanim in Florida where the boys enjoyed staying at a house with a pool and basketball court, a visit to Top Golf, a luxurious Yacht ride, BBQs and more.

Meanwhile, other boys from Yeshi-

va toured Eretz Yisroel for three weeks where they were treated with a most uplifting and ruchniyus-charged trip. Highlights included a visit to Rav Shraga Shteiman, shlita, various kivrei tzaddikim, watersports in Teveria, ropes courses, paintball, a tour of the Dekarina Chocolate Factory and rafting down the Jordan River. The Kumzitz in the Old City on a rooftop overlooking the Kosel with singer Chaim Dovid was an especially uplifting and memorable highlight of the trip.

A special thank you to R’ Yisroel Goldman and R’ Moshe Brody for running the Yeshiva night Seder program throughout the summer.

As talmidim and rebbeim return to Yeshiva for Elul Zman, they do so recharged and invigorated with a renewed sense of connection to HKB”H, close friendships, and a treasury of memories that will last a lifetime.

Yeshiva University Launches YU Global: Highly Efficient Certificate Programs To Prepare Students For Success In Today’s Evolving Job Market

Yeshiva University on August 28 announced the launch of YU Global, a flexible educational arm of the university focused on preparing students for the current, ever changing job market. YU Global provides high-quality professional and post-professional training as an alternative to, or in addition to, traditional higher education. The program is designed to give learners a competitive edge with tangible skills to support pursuit of a new career, land a first job, or advance in their current workplace.

YU Global acts as a bridge to the rapidly changing job market offering relevant, real-world and current skills to provide learners with a faster and more direct route to use their education immediately. It serves as the missing piece of the puzzle, bringing together powerful knowledge from higher education to areas that have been overlooked or served incompletely by vocational schools, thus

providing highly applicable knowledge to students in a short amount of time, at low cost.

Most of YU Global’s certificate programs range from $1,000 to around $5,000 and have the goal of preparing students to be job-ready in eight to ten weeks. The program includes access to career counselors who help guide students, including building a resume, polishing their job interview skills, and searching and applying for open positions. The inaugural cohort of YU Global will launch in October 2023 and will offer certificates primarily online with a few face-to-face or hybrid offerings. Prospective students can view the full catalog of courses and sign up at https:// global.yu.edu

YU Global Certificates include:

Intro to AI, Advanced Techniques in Prompt Engineering, AI for Executives, Rapid Deployment of Integrated AI into Business Processes, AI for Marketing

and Design, Cybersecurity (in partnership with Flatiron), Instructional Design, Web Development, Web Design, Data Analytics and Visualization, AI for Accounting, AI for Business, AI for Digital Sales and Marketing, Construction Management, Emerging Controllers, Emerging CFOs, Project Manager, Human Resources, Entrepreneurship, Financial Analysis for Real Estate Risk Assessment & Acquisition, Paralegal, and AI for Real Estate Acquisition and Management, among others.

“The launch of YU Global exemplifies Yeshiva University’s commitment to be an innovative leader in education, creating advanced learning opportunities that benefit communities across the world and meeting students at all stages of life,” said Rabbi Dr. Ari Berman, President of Yeshiva University. “Versatile and practical, the YU Global programs provide students with an edge in the competitive job market, jump-starting and fast-tracking

careers – and bringing the excellence of a YU education exactly where it needs to be at this moment to help students navigate an ever-changing workforce.”

“Each certificate in YU Global has been intentionally curated based on well-researched job market trends indicating that the need for trained labor in these fields is growing,” said Danielle Wozniak, YU Vice President for Global Initiatives and Business Strategies. “YU Global is intentionally designed to meet learners wherever they are – whatever skill level they come to us with – and offer real world skills and training that will help them succeed in the job market at any stage of their life.”

The program’s certificates are stackable, meaning that learners gain knowledge in a subject area and can continue to deepen their expertise through sequenced learning opportunities as they progress through their careers or as content knowledge changes.

The White Shul Beit Medrash Sfardi celebrated a Hachnasat Sefer Torah, dedicated by the Alyeshmerni family

YU Global is led by Danielle Wozniak, YU Vice President for Global Initiatives and Business Strategies

Virtual Halacha Program Celebrates Milestone Chag HaSemicha for 14 Working Professionals

In a testament to the power of dedication and the pursuit of knowledge, fourteen working professionals from diverse fields have achieved a transformative milestone in their Torah journey. These individuals, fully engaged in their careers, embarked on a path of Torah study through the Virtual Halacha Program (VHP), culminating in a joyous Chag HaSemicha event celebrating the completion of the Orach Chaim section of the program. This accomplishment highlights the seamless integration of their professional lives with their spiritual aspirations.

Launched over four years ago, under the guidance of HaRav Avigdor Nebenzahl, Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem’s Old

City, with classes taught by his disciple HaRav Ami Merzel, the Virtual Halacha Program has become a sought-after platform for working professionals seeking to deepen their Torah knowledge.

The Chag HaSemicha events which took place in two locations – at Yeshivat Netiv Aryeh in Jerusalem and at Shaare Emunah in Cedarhurst – marked the completion of rigorous study of Hilchot Shabbat, Hilchot Berachot, and Hilchot Moadim.

Among the celebrants in New York was Dr. Moshe Mehlman, a respected dentist and devoted member of the Young Israel of Woodmere, who has been a dedicated learner from the start of the program. Rabbi Dr. Ezra Weinblatt, a pe -

diatrician at Hadassah Medical Center in Jerusalem, originally from Great Neck and now residing in Ramat Beit Shemesh, was one of the four who received semicha in Israel. The Semicha certificates, signed by Rav Aharon Bina, Rav Ami Merzel, and Rav Aharon Goldberg, were accompanied by heartfelt letters of bracha from Rav Nebenzahl, underscoring the profound value of learning halacha.

During the event, Rabbi Dr. Dov Rosen, a respected pediatrician in Beit Shemesh, Israel, shared his sentiments. He passionately remarked, “This program is gold; the VHP brought the Beis Medrash into the homes of many Jews.” This feedback effectively underscores the program’s impact in making Torah study

accessible to a wide audience. With the echoes of celebration still resounding, the Virtual Halacha Program is poised for new horizons. A new four-year cycle of Orach Chaim alongside a four-year study of certain Yoreh Deah topics including Hilchot Basar B’Chalav, Tevillat Keilim, Hechsher Keilim, Niddah, and Hilchot Yichud is set to commence on Rosh Chodesh Cheshvan (October 15). To those eager to deepen their understanding of Halacha B’Iyun who would like to join us in this this inspiring journey, we invite you to explore further details at vhalacha.com.

Westchester Medical Center and BioGenCell Open Fourth Chronic Limb-Threatening Ischemia Clinical Trial Site in U.S.

BioGenCell, a leader in personalized cell therapy solutions, and Westchester Medical Center, the academic affiliate of Touro University/New York Medical College, have announced the launch of BioGenCell’s fourth Phase II clinical trial site in the United States, following Yale University New Haven Hospital, Johns Hopkins University, and UCSF.

The ambitious, global, placebo-controlled trial targets a considerable reduction in the need for amputation in patients with chronic limb-threatening ischemia (CLI) and aims to deliver life-altering outcomes for these patients.

CLI is the most severe and debilitating stage of peripheral artery disease (PAD), affecting more than 2.5 million patients

annually.

Peripheral arterial disease (PAD), or occlusion of the peripheral vessels of the upper and lower limbs, usually occurs as part of systemic atherosclerosis in the coronary and cerebral arteries. Its prevalence is increasing due to the rise in risk factors, such as Diabetes mellitus (DM), which affects 1 in 7 Americans.

The outlook for CLI patients is bleak: within a year of diagnosis, approximately 20% will not survive the disease while 30% of patients will undergo amputation. Alarmingly, nearly 70% of these amputees pass away within five years following the amputation.

How BioGenCell Technology Works

BioGenCell’s cutting-edge yet low-risk

technology leverages the immune, stem and progenitor cells found in the patient’s own blood taken in a simple blood draw. When reinjected into the affected limb, these “trained” cells induce the formation of new, healthy blood vessels, restoring blood flow and potentially averting limb amputation or even death and significantly improving patient quality of life. BioGenCell’s earlier clinical trial showed a promising long-term amputation-free survival rate.

“We are delighted to be collaborating in this trial with WMCHealth, an important hospital system in the New York metropolitan area,” said Dr. Yael Porat, BioGenCell co-founder and CEO. “We hope to be able to help long-suffering individuals with CLI.”

According to Igor Laskowski, MD,

Westchester Medical Center’s Section Chief of Vascular Surgery and the trial’s principal investigator: “There is an imperative need for effective therapies. We are a center for research here at Westchester Medical Center, and we hope BioGenCell’s Phase II study – and the many other studies underway at our hospital – will improve the prognosis for patients impacted by this and other incapacitating diseases.”

Adds Dr. Salomon Amar, vice president for Research for Touro University and NYMC, “We are impressed with BioGenCell’s results to date and are happy that our teaching hospital, Westchester Medical Center, is taking part in this important trial. It is especially gratifying for Touro to be collaborating with an Israeli company.”

Lifespan vs. Healthspan

What if I told you, you could only live until 60 years old but you’d be in perfect health. That would seem a bit short, right?

On the other hand, what if I said you can live until 120 years old but the last 60 years would be marked by physical dependance in a wheelchair, and dementia… that choice probably wouldn’t seem too appealing either.

This thought experiment illustrates the concepts of lifespan and healthspan. When we talk about aging, we often fixate on the quantity of years we have – our lifespan. There’s more to consider. While lifespan is a measure of how long we live, healthspan is a measure of the quality of those years.

Lifespan = the quantity of years. Lifespan is straightforward; either you’re alive or you’re not. Advances in healthcare have extended our average lifespan, granting us more birthdays. Nevertheless, mere existence does not necessarily equal more satisfaction.

Healthspan = the quality of years

Healthspan is the period of life spent in good health, free from the burdens of chronic diseases and aging-related disabilities. It can be distilled into three key components: physical, emotional, and cognitive health.

1. Physical Health: This aspect of healthspan refers to the well-being of your body. It’s about the ability to be active, mobile, and physically independent. Good physical health allows you to walk to shul, dance at a wedding, pick up your grandkids, and play with them on the floor.

2. Emotional Health: Emotional well-being involves nurturing positive relationships, managing stress, and finding contentment. Good emotional health makes the years worth living. We can include things like social connections and spiritual health in this bucket.

3. Cognitive Health: Mental clarity and cognitive abilities play a vital role in healthspan. It’s about staying mentally sharp, making sound decisions, and effectively handling life’s challenges.

The basic idea is to figure out which of these three components is most lacking and then intervene to improve the trajectory moving forward. This might look like improving cardiovascular fitness, getting better quality sleep, or seeing a therapist.

By focusing on these three pillars, we can build a life that is not just longer, but also more vibrant and meaningful. As a board-certified clinical specialist, I take pride in helping my patients enjoy a better quality of life. It doesn’t need to feel daunting, it can start with small, manageable adjustments to be well on your way to an improved healthspan.

Dr. Yaakov Friedman is a licensed Physical Therapist who specializes in oneon-one personalized physical therapy and strength and conditioning for middle aged and older adults. He is also an adjunct professor in Touro University’s Physical Therapy program. Yaakov owns a physical therapy practice in Hewlett (www.ptathollywood. com). He can be contacted at (516) 2534017 or at PTathollywood@gmail.com.

A Sukkot of a Lifetime at the Ramada Jerusalem

Considering a Sukkot experience in Jerusalem? The Ramada Jerusalem is the perfect place where you can experience the city’s ancient spiritual traditions while relaxing in contemporary comfort.

Guests can look forward to the Ramada’s acclaimed gourmet cuisine. Fine dining at the hotel incorporates both traditional and modern offerings, all under the strict supervision of the Jerusalem Rabbinate Mehadrin and OU Glatt.

The Ramada is your premium address for special occasions all year round, and Sukkot is no exception, whether for a brit, bar mitzvah, or any significant gathering. In line with our commitment to ensuring an unparalleled experience, we’ve crafted two separate sukkahs – one for our esteemed guests and another designated

events sukkah, with space for up to 150 guests and a dance area.

Yom Tov services will be held at the hotel’s synagogue for both days of Yom Tov, led by Rabbi Dov Hendler, known for his magnificent voice and inspiring melodies. Additional spiritual sustenance will be provided by the scholars-in-residence, Rabbi Dr. Aharon Adler and Rabbi Shmuel Hirschler, who will both be delivering fascinating lectures in English and Hebrew.

During chol hamoed, guests can enjoy the indoor pool and health club as well as our games room, which stands ready to entertain both the young and the young at heart.

Book today to save your spot! reservations@ramadajerusalem.com

Did you know?

The most expensive pencil in the world is made from 240-year-old olive wood and 18-karat white gold and costs $12,800.

Meir Panim Redefines Israel’s Culture of Giving

By Hadassah Bay

As summer winds down, Meir

Panim is gearing up to feed the tens of thousands of needy Israelis who will be flocking to its branches across Israel on the High Holidays. On holidays, and every day, they know they can depend on Meir Panim for a delicious, nutritious, warm meal, served with dignity and a smile.

In addition to providing hot meals for the needy and hungry at the branches, Meir Panim supplies Meals on Wheels for the elderly and disabled, as well as for Holocaust survivors, and grocery vouchers for the working poor and single mothers. Fresh fruits and vegetables, staples that are critical for good health but often left off the grocery list due to their high price, are also distributed to individuals who are hard put to make ends meet.

According to Mimi Rozmaryn, Director of Global Development at Meir Panim, the kind, caring environment of Meir Panim’s Restaurant-Style Soup Kitchens and additional services provided at its branches throughout Israel is just as lifegiving as the food itself. That attitude extends not only to patrons but also includes salaried workers and the legions of volunteers who come to give back.

Mimi clarifies that with a very lean paid staff, Meir Panim could never accomplish all its wonderful work without the support of its devoted volunteers. “We absolutely rely on our volunteers, and that’s what makes it possible for 86 cents out of every donated dollar to be al-

located to food,” she said.

Often, it’s Meir Panim’s loyal donors from abroad who are eager to volunteer during their visits to Israel. “We work with their itineraries to accommodate them as much as possible,” explains Mimi, underscoring her efforts to create meaningful volunteer experiences.

With families, Mimi will try to choose an activity where all the kids can get involved, whether it’s working behind the scenes or handing a plate of food to a patron and giving them a smile.

“Everything we do aims to make someone’s day and boost their confidence, whether it’s a staff member, a volunteer or a patron,” shares Mimi.

This year, Meir Panim expects a record influx of hungry families unable to afford essential food items. To ensure every family receives the meals they require for the High Holidays, it is of critical importance for Meir Panim to raise additional funds. Traditionally, many people donate charity to worthy causes before Rosh Hashanah, as a way to earn extra merit for the new year. You, too, can be a part of Meir Panim’s life-changing work and receive the merit of feeding the hungry!

Make your donation today online at www.mpdonate.org, through the toll-free number at (877) 7-DONATE / 877.736.6283 , or by mail to American Friends of Meir Panim at 88 Walton Street, Suite B1, Brooklyn, NY 112064479. All donations made in the U.S. are tax-deductible under EIN# 20-1582478.

Hanhalas Yeshiva Ketana of Long Island presenting to the rabbeim as they prepare for another successful year of educating talmidim

The campers at Machaneh Yisrael donated almost $5,000 to RCCS this summer in their penny wars games

Mrs. Etti Siegel presenting to the YKLI General Studies staff on the topic of supporting students in the classroom

End-of-Summer Retreat at Camp Simcha Brings Relaxation to Chai Lifeline Families

Chai Lifeline recently offered families with children battling childhood illness an extraordinary end-of-summer retreat that delivered hope, comfort, and a meaningful vacation. One mother in attendance shared how “being in and out of the hospital the last few months has prevented her family from having any time together. This gave us time to be a family and enjoy summer.” The end-of-summer family retreat provided a much-needed break, offering an opportunity to create cherished memories at Camp Simcha in Glen Spey, NY.

“At the heart of our mission lies the unwavering commitment to support families facing the challenges of childhood illness. This family retreat offered

a haven of respite, where amidst the trials and tribulations, these families found a moment of calm,” said Rabbi Simcha Scholar, CEO of Chai Lifeline.

The retreat featured a range of activities that catered to both children and parents. From candle-making workshops to outdoor adventures like swimming and a ropes course to an evening ventriloquist show, families had the opportunity to bond, have fun, and relax together. Professionally trained staff and volunteers were on hand to ensure a safe and comfortable environment for all participants. Mayer and Chaya Rivky Fischl enhanced the program with a fancy dessert after dinner, an ice cream truck and a trampoline show.

Did you know?

On average, a pencil can be sharpened 17 times.

Rabbi Mordechai Gobioff, MSW, National Director of Client Services, said that “the end-of-summer retreat provides families with an opportunity to rediscover relaxation, forge unbreakable bonds with families facing similar challenges, and draw inspiration from one another’s courage.”

The end-of-summer retreat is made possible through the generous support of donors and volunteers. An appreciative mother who attended the retreat, shared that “the invitation to our family was so appreciated, and Chai Lifeline deeply un-

derstands what is needed to accommodate all children. Every member of our family felt taken care of…like a hug.” Her daughter shared how “even though I was unable to attend Camp Simcha, I felt like I was at camp and did not feel like people were staring at me because I have a tube in my nose. I felt so normal!”

The retreat not only offers a break from the medical routine but also serves as a platform for families to have special time together and build lasting friendships with other like-minded families.

Ben Choake, president of NORPAC, Martin Oliner, Senator Ted Cruz, and Elliott Lauer, treasurer of RJC, at the home of Trudy and Stanley Stern in Lawrence last week

The Zareinu Revolution is Here

By Chavie Cohen

It is the first week of school. Chani finds herself sitting in the same spot she’s had every year — back row, corner seat.

It has only been a few short days since the first day of school. Just like all the other girls in her class, she too walked into the school building on Monday with her carefully selected school supplies and stylish new backpack. But the novelty and excitement have faded quickly, replaced with the familiar emotions of fear, dread, and shame.

The hours drag by endlessly. Her mind wanders aimlessly. She sits wordlessly; the only thing escaping her lips is a sigh. And even recess does not provide the necessary reprieve.

Chani is sweet. She is bright. She has a learning difference. And it is for all the “Chanis” out there (and “Moshes,” “Meirs,” and “Miriams”) that Zareinu was founded earlier this summer by a group of seasoned educators and dynamic lay leaders.

Zareinu, built on a foundation of pioneering educational initiatives, was established with one fundamental belief: that every Jewish child in our community deserves the opportunity to be educated alongside their peers.

Baruch Hashem, the Orthodox population of the Far Rockaway and Five Towns area has grown by leaps and bounds in recent years and boasts many upstanding schools and yeshivos. Thousands of boys and girls go to school each day, eager for another day of successful learning. But what about the hundreds of

children who have learning differences that prevent them from succeeding in a mainstream classroom environment?

Zareinu’s model is unique, combining the best of both the general and special education worlds. Zareinu has partnered with the finest institutions in our community. Member schools include (as of press time) Bais Yaakov Ateres Miriam, Bais Yaakov of the Five Towns, Bnos Bais Yaakov, Shulamith School for Girls, Torah Academy for Girls, Yeshiva Darchei Torah, Yeshiva Ketana of Long Island, and Yeshiva Toras Chaim at South Shore. And it is inside the walls of these institutions where the magic takes place.

Each Zareinu class is limited to 12 students. This cap ensures that every single student gets personalized attention and a tailored education that targets their specific strengths and weaknesses. There is no such thing as slipping through the cracks or getting lost in the crowd — there is no crowd!

The Zareinu rebbi, morah, or teacher knows each child on a personal level. Moshe loves mathematics and just moved up one level in reading. Baruch has trouble reading but loves anything to do with planets. Relating to each student on an individual level allows for maximum growth and achievement.

Each Zareinu educator is highly ed-

ucated and trained in the latest methodologies. But just as importantly, each teacher, assistant, rebbi, and staff member is there to make a difference in the lives of their students.

“The warmth and love for each student is palpable,” says Rabbi Justin Lepolstat, MS, program director of Zareinu. Rabbi Lepolstat is in and out of each class, connecting, collaborating and— most importantly—caring.

Zareinu’s star leadership team also includes veteran educators Naomi Nadata, MS, program director, and Alice Feltheimer, MS, educational coordinator. Serving on its presidium are Messrs. Yehuda Biber, Alon Goldberger, and Chesky Newman— tireless and visionary community leaders who are passionate about Zareinu’s mission to help every child blossom.

As opposed to learning in a special-ed school, which sometimes carries an unwanted stigma, Zareinu students learn in a regular, inconspicuous classroom down the same hallway as their friends’. Zareinu gives each child the gift of normalcy—the chance to say, “I go to BBY” or “I’m also in Yeshiva Ketana’” like the other children on their block or in shul. They wear their uniforms with pride, blending right in with all the other students their age.

Aside from not feeling singled out or

different, this setup provides countless opportunities for socializing and integration. For example, Zareinu sixth-grade girls take part in the school-wide bas mitzvah play. Zareinu first-grade boys celebrate a Chumash Mesiba together with the rest of the peers. Their curricula mirror those of their fellow students but in a way that is perfectly tailored to them.

Zareinu students build close connections with each other. They celebrate their successes together and form a secure, close-knit community. But on the playground and in the lunchroom, they have the opportunity to branch out and form friendships with many other children their age.

Zareinu’s personalized pedagogy means Mendy might be mainstreamed for math while Gedalya is mainstreamed for Gemara. Sara struggles with science and gets a custom curriculum that covers the basics in the way that she learns best. This program recognizes that no two children are alike and works with each child’s team to determine the optimum framework that will enable them to soar and succeed.

“Some kids just need extra tutoring, and they’ll be fine in the typical environment,” says Rabbi Moshe Bender, s’gan rosh hayeshiva at Darchei Torah and one of the driving forces behind Zareinu. “But for kids who need more than that, Zareinu is a real lifesaver, and I’m eager to support this worthy cause in any way I can.”

To find out more about Zareinu, please call 718.406.8343; email info@zareinu5T.org; or visit Zareinu5T.org.

Because every child deserves the chance to blossom

Relating to each student on an individual level allows for maximum growth and achievement.

Torah Academy for Girls (TAG) and Yeshiva Toras Chaim at South Shore are two of the eight current member schools of Zareinu

Around The Year With Reb Meilech

Traveling through the Jewish Calendar with the Torah, Insights and Stories from Harav Elimelech Biderman

Have you ever wished you could be there, when Rav Elimelech Biderman — “Reb Meilech” — gives over his Torah wisdom, his unforgettable stories, his unflagging energy to serve Hashem, his exuberant simcha at being a member of His People? Now you can.

Bestselling author Yisroel Besser offers us Reb Meilech’s divrei Torah, stories, and, of course, his incomparable chizuk — for every month of the Jewish calendar. As he energizes and elevates the thousands who come to see and hear him, let us actually feel the excitement and passion that characterize his every word.

The following is an excerpt from this scintillating book.

The King Has the Power

The Gaavad of the Eidah HaChareidis in Yerushalayim, Rav Yitzchak Tuvia Weiss, was a child when World War II broke out. He lived in a small Slovakian town called Pesing, where the community leaders were uncertain as to how to proceed. They decided to send a child, who would not attract attention, to the closest big city to try to glean information about what lay ahead.

Bright young Tuvia was dispatched on this mission, and when he reached Pressburg, he saw only devastation and loss. He went to meet with the rosh hakahal, who had no good news to share.

The rosh hakahal was very taken by the sincere, courageous young boy, and he offered him a chance at life — a coveted ticket on the Kindertransport to England.

Tuvia returned to Pesing to discuss the offer with his parents. Understanding the reality of the situation, they encouraged him to hurry and go. After a tearful farewell, he left and joined thousands of children on the voyage to England, his mother’s cries of “Tuvia’le, bleib a Yid, remember that you are a Jew,” ringing in his ears.

Here, Reb Meilech’s voice seems to crack.

“Remain a Jew,” he says twice, and then concludes, “parents and their child parting from one another until techiyas hameisim.”

When they arrived, the British government celebrated them, these children

who had been snatched out of the jaws of danger and saved, and a large welcoming ceremony was held in a public park. The children lined up, and, at one point, the king passed through the group of assembled children, studying the young people saved by his government.

Suddenly, a boy standing near young Tuvia Weiss began to shout, “Your highness, your highness,” throwing himself at the royal carriage. The guards attempted to push him away, but his frantic cries attracted the attention of the monarch, who summoned him closer.

“Honored king,” the child said, tears running down his cheeks, “I owe you my life. You have been so kind to give me this chance and I can never repay you. But your highness, my heart is heavy when I contemplate the fate of my parents who are still back home, the ground burning beneath their feet. The enemy is all around them, so what good is my life when they are in such peril? Please, your highness, help them, too.”

The king was moved by the pleas of the young boy, and he asked for the details regarding the child’s family. Two weeks later, Rav Weiss related, that family had been located and brought to England as well.

The Gaavad of Yerushalayim reflected on what had happened.

There were one thousand children there, and each and every one of them knew how incredibly difficult it had been to rescue them. But this child asked anyway, because he knew that the king had the power to do it, and with his sincere plea, he succeeded in moving the king!

They all had the same chance, but none of the others believed they could do it, so none of them did it.

That’s Chodesh Elul!

HaMelech basadeh. During these holy days, He is close by, the King visiting His subjects, and we have the chance to call out, “My king, dear king, hear my pleas… hear my pleas, and have mercy…”

An Overflowing Account

A Yid went into the previous Rebbe of Toldos Aharon with a kvittel, in which he wrote that he had a bittere machalah, a dread disease, and needed a refuah sheleimah. The Rebbe wished him well and

asked if he says Tehillim. He doesn’t say much Tehillim, he admitted.

Then the Rebbe shared an insight. If a person has a bank account, he is able to write out checks against the balance in that account — the more funds in his account, the greater his ability to spend.

The way a person creates that sort of spiritual account is through saying Tehillim. The perakim add up and create a surplus against which one can make withdrawals when the need arises.

That’s what the Rebbe said.

Reb Meilech waves his hands. “Nu, be b’simchah. You just found out how to become a gvir, the secret to an overflowing bank account, so smile!”

The Ari Hakadosh reveals that the word Elul is roshei teivos for Ani l’Dodi v’Dodi Li, I am my Beloved’s and my Beloved is mine (Shir Hashirim 6:3), a reference to the fact that this month is a time for closeness, to mend our relationship with the Bashefer.

It’s a time of special rachamim, a time to immerse ourselves in our well-worn Tehillim — to fill up that account!

And this special opportunity makes us happy and gives us a new rush of energy… Elul is roshei teivos “leibidik uhn veiter leibidik” (enthusiasm and added enthusiasm), always with joy and only with joy.

Keep It Close

We usher in the new month by reciting a kapitel Tehillim (Chapter 27), L’Dovid Hashem ori, and with it comes a new light. Tehillim does that for us, the words healing and uplifting, and we therefore recite this kappitel in all our tefillos through Shemini Atzeres.

Reb Meilech looks around, as if he is surrounded by a handful of people and not hundreds.

In our chaburos, we undertake together to come to the heilege teg, the holiest days, bearing the whole Sefer Tehillim. There are five sefarim, five sections in Tehillim, so we start by saying one of the five sefarim on Shabbos mevarchim Elul and we say one more each Shabbos until Rosh Hashanah, finishing the entire sefer this way. Of course, those who have the minhag of saying the complete sefer each Shabbos — in my father-in-law’s beis medrash, like in all of those led by Nadvorna

descendants, they recite the Sefer Tehillim every Shabbos in the weeks leading to Rosh Hashanah — shouldn’t say less to take part in this… This is a minimum, but the more Tehillim said, the better!

This is the lashon of the Shaar HaMelech:

I have seen this in various places, and my father has told me about this very fitting custom — and that is to recite Tehillim following tefillah each day between Rosh Chodesh Elul and Yom Kippur, because the prime avodah in this month is to weaken the prosecuting angels who seek to harm us. The more strength one adds, the more effective this avodah will be, and nothing is more devastating to the forces of evil than perakim of Tehillim, which are called “mizmorim,” a term that denotes pruning. They are the means by which we weaken and uproot the destructive angels.

If there is a community that does not yet know of this minhag, please make them aware, so that they keep the Sefer Tehillim close by during this month…and the merit of Dovid HaMelech will stand by them…

The Tehillim needs to be your best friend at this time of year.

The mashpia reaches out and lovingly taps a Tehillim on the table. “Deine besteh freint, your best friend,” he says again.

TJH Centerfold 2023 School Supplies

List

Gluten-Free Glue Sticks: When you eat glue in class, at least it won’t have gluten.

Emoji Eraser Set: Erase mistakes while expressing your emotions with popular emojis.

Virtual Reality History Glasses: Relive historical events like you’re right there, without leaving your seat.

Selfie Stick Calculator: Crunch numbers and capture your best angles simultaneously.

Cryptocurrency Lunch Money Wallet: Pay for your lunch with the latest digital currencies.

Robot Homework Assistant: A tiny robot that finishes your homework while you’re gaming.

GIF-Sticker Textbook Covers: Customize your textbooks with animated GIF-sticker covers that reflect the subject.

Sustainable Energy Notebook: Your notebook generates energy from your writing, which you can use to charge your devices.

E-Book Page-Turner Drone: A mini drone that flips the pages of your e-books for you, leaving your hands free.

Nanobot Note-Taking Gloves: Gloves that release tiny nanobots to take notes for you while you daydream.

You Gotta be Kidding Me!

Teacher: Johnny, what is the chemical formula for water?

Johnny: HIJKLMNO!

Teacher: What are you talking about?

Johnny: Yesterday you said it’s H to O!

Riddle Me This

I am an odd number. Take away a letter, and I become even.

What number am I?

Answer: Seven

School Supply Trivia

1. Which school supply was patented first?

a. Ballpoint pen

b. Eraser

c. Pencil

d. Fountain pen

2. How many crayons are there in a standard box of Crayola crayons?

a. 12

b. 24

c. 48

d. 64

3. In what year were adhesive sticky notes (Post-It notes) invented?

a. 1960

b. 1974

c. 1982

d. 1996

4. What was the original purpose of the paperclip before it became a common office and school supply?

a. Surgical clamp

b. Hairpin

c. Necklace fastener

d. Bookmark

5. What is the main ingredient in traditional chalkboard chalk?

a. Salt

b. Vinegar

c. Iron Oxide

d. Calcium Carbonate

6. What year was the first modern pencil with an eraser attached patented?

a. 1789

b. 1858

c. 1902

d. 1965

7. What is the approximate number of sheets of paper used in all schools throughout the U.S. in a single school year?

a. 7 million

b. 109 million

c. 2 billion

d. 32 billion

8. How many words can the average pencil write?

a. 2,000

b. 13,000

c. 26,000

d. 45,000

9. What were erasers made out of before the 18th century?

a. Bread

b. Plastic

c. Spit

d. Animal skin

10. How much does the average American family spend yearly on school supplies?

a. $200

b. $450

c. $700

Answers:

Wisdom key:

8-10 correct: You probably had your school supplies since June. Is that a new pocket protector?

5-7 correct: You are in the middle of the pack. Use a protractor to find yourself.

0-4 correct: Do you have enough paper for your paper planes and spitballs?

Parshas Ki Savo

By Rabbi Berel Wein

The explicit descriptions of the disasters, personal and national, that make up a large portion of this week’s parsha raise certain issues. Why do Moshe and the Torah paint such a harsh and unforgiving picture of the Jewish future before the people? And if we expect people to glory in their Jewishness, is this the way to sell the product, so to speak? We all support the concept of truth in advertising but isn’t this over and above the necessary

requirement?

The fact that the description of much of Jewish history and its calamitous events related in this parsha is completely accurate, prophecy fulfilled to the nth degree, only compounds the difficulties mentioned above. But in truth, there is clear reason for these descriptions of the difficulties inherent in being Jewish to be made apparent.

We read in this book of Devarim that G-d poses the stark choices before the

Jewish people – life or death, uniqueness or conformity, holiness or mendacity. Life is made up of choices, and most of them are difficult. Sugarcoating the consequences of life’s choices hardly makes for wisdom. Worse still, it erodes any true belief or sense of commitment in the choice that is actually made. Without the necessary commitment, the choice itself over time becomes meaningless. The Torah tells us that being a Jew requires courage, commitment, a great sense of vision and eter -

the vision and grandeur of Judaism, the inheritance of our father Avraham and our mother Sarah and of the sheltering wings of the G-d of Israel that guarantee our survival. The potential convert is then asked to choose whether he or she is willing to truly commit to the project. Without that commitment, the entire conversion process is a sham and spiritually meaningless. And the commitment is not really valid if the downside, so to speak, of being Jewish is not explained and detailed. Judaism is not

nity, and deep self-worth. So the Torah must spell out the downside, so to speak, of the choice in being Jewish, The folk saying always was: “It is difficult to be a Jew.” But, in the long run, it is even more difficult and painful, eventually, for a Jew not to be a Jew in practice, thought and commitment.

According to Jewish tradition and halacha, a potential convert to Judaism is warned by the rabbinic court of the dangers of becoming Jewish. He or she is told that Jews are a small minority, persecuted by many and reviled by others. But the potential convert also sees

for fair-weather friends or soldiers on parade. The new phrase in the sporting world is that the players have to “grind it out.” Well, that is what being Jewish means – to grind it out, daily, for an entire lifetime. The positive can only outweigh the negative if the negative is known. Those who look for an easy faith, a religion that demands nothing, who commit to empty phrases but are never willing to pay the price of practice and discipline, will not pass the test of time and survival that being Jewish has always required. Shabbat

shalom.

Life is made up of choices, and most of them are difficult.

Parshas Ki Savo

The Attitude Toward Privacy

By Rav Moshe Weinberger

Adapted for publication by Binyomin

Wolf

The central feature of the parsha is the bris, the covenant at Har Gerizim and Har Eival. Although the Jewish people entered into a covenant with Hashem on Har Sinai, this next generation renewed their covenant with Hashem before entering Eretz Yisroel. Their entry into Eretz Yisroel represented not just the same covenant for a new generation but also a change in their whole way of life. They were about to go from Clouds of Glory, the Well of Miriam, and Manna descending from heaven every morning to a life engaged with physicality and working the land. Every major change in life requires a new covenant. On a deeper level, every new year is a new reality, according to the Baal Hatanya and other tzaddikim. So as we approach Rosh Hashana, we must also enter into a new covenant with Hashem. Every week is also a new reality, so the renewed covenant between ourselves and Hashem is reflected in the language of Havdala as well.

The focus of the covenant at Har Gerizim and Har Eival was the eleven specific

curses called out by the Levi’im and the last curse which was all inclusive (Devarim 27:26): “Cursed is one who does not uphold the words of this Torah...” These twelve curses correspond to the Twelve Tribes of the Jewish people who were standing to listen to them.

There was a significant difference between the terms of this covenant relative to the earlier covenants. The earlier covenants were worded generally, referring to the obligation to observe the Torah as a whole. Here, however, the eleven curses contained much more specificity. For example, one curse was (Devarim 27:16) “cursed is the man who makes an idol or graven image, which is an abomination to G-d, the work of an artisan’s hand, and places it [in his home] in secret...” (emphasis added). In addition, another curse is (Id. at 24) “cursed is one who smites his friend in secret...” (emphasis added).

We see an emphasis on strengthening that which people do in the privacy of their homes. This is related to the halacha that every Jew is responsible each

other’s actions. That concept is based on, among other sources, the Gemara (Sanhedrin 27b), which says, “Kulan areivim zeh b’zeh, all [Jews] are responsible for one another.” We are only responsible for other’s actions in public, as the pasuk in next week’s parsha (Devarim 29:28) says, “The hidden matters are for Hashem our G-d, but the revealed matters are for us and our children forever.” Rashi there explains that we are only responsible for others’ known actions but not those that are done privately. We only became responsible for others’ actions when we accepted the renewed covenant on Har Gerizim and Har Eival in this week’s parsha. Because others have no responsibility for our private actions, these curses were meant in part to strengthen us particularly with respect to our actions done in private.

Many people act one way in public and another way in private. Sometimes, this is for the good, and sometimes, it is the opposite. A person could give tzedaka or perform acts of kindness to strangers or even people in his own family without

anyone else knowing about it. On the other hand, others look like loving husbands and wives in public but live in a gehenom of this world in the privacy of their homes. Others seem righteous and holy to the outside world, but no one sees what they do on the computer at 1:30 in the morning when no one else is watching. The curses in this week’s parsha therefore come to strengthen our resolve to act just as righteously privately as we do publicly.

While the Jewish people were known for their modest conduct in the desert (See Bava Basra 60a), they were still living very close to a large number of neighbors. As we know from the days of the tenements in New York, no matter how much people respect each other’s privacy, when many people live so close together, everyone is aware of everyone else’s business. But as the Jewish people were about to move into Eretz Yisroel, to the “suburbs,” so to speak, with their own private homes and farms, they were about to experience a level of privacy that was quite new. They therefore needed to be strengthened in the

responsible use of such privacy.

But this concept goes even further according to the Ramban’s explanation of the final curse (Devarim 27:26), “Cursed is one who does not uphold the words of this Torah...” According to the Ramban, if it meant that one is cursed if he does not fulfill the Torah generally, it would have said, “Cursed is one who does not observe...” rather than “one who does not uphold.” The pasuk therefore means that one should uphold the words of the Torah in his heart, believing that they are true, and that those who keep the Torah will be rewarded and those who violate it will be punished. One must uphold the Torah not only in the privacy of his home, but also in the most private place of all – in his own heart.

No one else knows what is inside a person’s heart. Someone could seem very religious on the outside but be completely devoid of emunah in his heart. The world talks about a “new” type of Orthodox Jew called “orthoprax,” who lives an observant lifestyle but does not believe in the truth of the Torah, G-d forbid. I once read an article in which the author interviewed someone who described himself as a maggid shiur who gave a shiur in lomdus, complex Talmudic analysis, but who admitted

that he believed in absolutely nothing. He did not believe in the Torah he was teaching to others.

As the Jewish people entered Eretz Yisroel then, and as we enter into Rosh Hashana now, the Torah has one message for us. We must not rely exclusively on what our neighbors, friends, and family think of us. We must accept and keep the Torah because we recognize the absolute

great because we see them beside us. The Torah is asking us to feel in the privacy of our homes and our hearts that Hashem is right there with us just as surely as our neighbor is.

Hashem is called (Yishayahu 45:15

“the hidden G-d Who cannot be seen...”

But the Torah calls upon us to recognize the presence of Hashem, Who seems hidden, just as we recognize when another

Moshe Leib was. As they were riding, the driver stopped the wagon near an orchard and got off the wagon. Reb Moshe Leib asked him what he was doing, and the driver answered that he was going to go into the orchard and get them a meal. He instructed Reb Moshe Leib to be his lookout and whistle if anyone was watching. Before the man had gone a few feet into the orchard, Reb Moshe Leib whistled loudly. The man quickly came out and looked around and saw no one. He therefore asked why Reb Moshe Leib had whistled. Reb Moshe Leib pointed to the sky and said “The Ribbono Shel Olam is watching.”

truth of Hashem’s existence and presence in our lives and in our hearts. As Rav Yochanan ben Zakai blessed his students before his death (Brachos 28b), “‘May it be [Hashem’s] will that the fear of Heaven should be upon you like the fear of flesh and blood.’ His students said to him, ‘Only that much?’ He said to them, ‘Would that it would be that much...’” Our fear of other people knowing what we do or feel is

person is standing beside us. As we say every morning during davening, “A person should always fear heaven in hidden places and out in the open...”

There is a well-known story about Reb Moshe Leib Sasover. One day, he was walking along a road, and someone drove by on a wagon and offered him a ride. He gladly accepted the ride, and it was clear that the driver did not recognize who Reb

As we get closer to Rosh Hashana, the Torah’s message to us is to be a “yiras Shamayim b’seser u’b’galui,” to become conscious of Hashem’s presence in public, in private, and in the privacy of our hearts. In the merit of accepting this covenant with Hashem now, may we merit to enter Eretz Yisroel one final time as a nation, with the coming of Moshiach, may it be soon in our days.

One must uphold the Torah not only in the privacy of his home, but also in the most private place of all – in his own heart.

Rav Moshe Weinberger, shlita, is the founding Morah d’Asrah of Congregation Aish Kodesh in Woodmere, NY, and serves as leader of the new mechina Emek HaMelech.

Generating Momentum For Our Return

By Rabbi Shmuel Reichman

There’s a story of two elderly men who were childhood friends but had not seen each other in many years. One day, they ran into each other on the street and were delighted to recognize one another. One of them lived in the area, so he invited the other into his home. They happily caught each other up on their lives, getting lost in their stories and jokes as the day went on. The guest finally noticed that it had become dark outside, so he asked his friend if he had the time.

“I don’t have a watch,” his friend replied.

“So look at the clock, and tell me what time it is.”

“I don’t have a clock either,” his friend replied.

Puzzled, the first man asked his friend: “If you don’t have a watch, and you don’t have a clock, how do you tell the time?”

“I use my trumpet!” the second man proudly replied.

“A trumpet? How can you tell time with a trumpet?”

“I’ll show you.”

The man picked up his trumpet, opened the window, and blew a long, deafening blast. A few seconds later, a window opened below, and his neighbor shouted, “Three o’clock in the morning, and you’re playing your trumpet?!”

The man turned to his friend and proclaimed, “It’s three o’clock in the morning.”

The shofar is Hashem’s trumpet, begging us to wake up from our slumber. When we hear it, we must remind ourselves what time it is. It’s Elul; it’s time to question, to think, to redirect. Often, though, life has a way of running

on autopilot, controlled only by the flow of momentum. When things are going well, they flow forward, steadily picking up speed. When things fall apart, they tumble downhill, refusing to ease up. Making a healthy eating choice can serve as inspiration to wake up early the next morning and exercise. The feeling of making a great decision leads you to another great decision, and the cycle continues. The energy and confidence from this positive momentum leads to an increased surge of confidence, leading to another great decision, perhaps a push forward in your career, or a positive development in your relationships, or a focus on the next step of your spiritual growth. This is the beauty of momentum. This is also the psychological and practical root of the concept “mitzvah goreres mitzvah ,” one mitzvah leads to another (Avos 4:2). However, this same momentum can be the cause of our undoing as well. “Aveirah goreres aveirah” – one misstep leads to another.

Maybe it starts with a small slip up in our diet, when we promised ourselves we would do better. Now, we feel weak and foolish and begin muttering degrading insults to ourselves. Our confidence takes a major hit, and we begin to see ourselves as a failure. The next morning, we hit snooze, making ourselves feel even worse, even weaker, even more of a failure. Next, we sabotage our relationship, miss a meeting, or let our growth and spirituality slide. Of course, this makes us feel even worse, so we break our diet again, making us feel even worse, yet again. This is the deadly cycle of momentum. One thing leads to another, creating a cataclysmic landslide towards complete and utter breakdown.

While this picture is extreme, we can all relate. Sometimes, things seem to fall apart in our lives, and we struggle to pick up the pieces. When we start that downhill slide, how do we stop the momentum? How do we pick ourselves up? To understand this, we need to develop

an important theme connected to both Parshas Re’eh and the month of Elul as a whole.

Free Will

Parshas Re’eh begins with the principle of choice: Hashem presents us with the choice between blessing and curse, between good and bad (Devarim 11:26). A few parshios later, the Torah states: “u’bacharta ba’chaim,” you shall choose life (Devarim 30:19). This is cited by most commentators as the source for the principle of free will, the power of choice.

The month of Elul is deeply tied to the theme of teshuva, usually translated as repentance. The Rambam (Hilchos Teshuva, Chapter 5) includes the concept of free will within the laws of teshuva. This seems both strange and unnecessary. The necessity and nature of free will appears more philosophical than legal, so why does the Rambam include this in his work of halachic codes? And more specifically, why include this in the context of teshuva? To understand this, we must delve into the true nature of teshuva.

Teshuva: Act of Return

While teshuva is often translated as repentance, its literal meaning is “return,” as in the word “shuv.” The goal of teshuva is not only to free ourselves of punishment and responsibility for our past. Teshuva is about self-transformation, returning to a higher, better version of ourselves. We don’t only wish to escape; we wish to ascend. It is on this premise that the Rambam describes the three-step process of teshuva (Hilchos Teshuva 1:1).

The first step of teshuva is recognizing that there is a problem to fix, that a mistake has occurred. It is impossible to solve a problem without first admitting that the problem exists. It is all too easy to simply push forward in life, ignoring our inner and outer struggles. But that results in the downward cascade described above. Only by acknowledging the problem can we stop the downward momentum and actually solve it.

The second step of teshuva is to regret one’s mistake. Often, we know that a problem exists, but we don’t feel ashamed, hurt, or even bothered by it. Without internal regret or hurt, we will not be motivated enough to take the actionable steps required to make change. When we yearn for the truth and allow ourselves to powerfully feel the inner contradiction between how we could be living and how we currently are living, we generate the emotional response necessary to genuinely regret our past mistakes.

Third, one must commit to an improved future, one in which this mistake will not be repeated. We must commit to strive towards a greater version of ourselves, whereby if given the chance to repeat this mistake, we would not give in to temptation but would overcome the challenge instead.

The Necessity of Free Will

In order for the process of teshuva to exist, there is one essential element: free will. The only way we can genuinely change, transform, and evolve is if we have the capacity to assert our inner will, to create a new reality within ourselves. This requires a complete re-creation of self within our consciousness, a remolding of our inner world. While yesterday, we were the type of person who did one thing, today, a new decision is formed, a new reality is created within our inner world. This requires a complete assertion of willpower, an overcoming of self, a breakdown and reformation of inner drive and character. This means giving up who we are for who we want to be, sacrificing what we think we want for what we truly want (See Rambam, Hilchos Gerushin 2:20). It means overcoming the emotional and overwhelming pull of current desire and generating a new “want” within our very core. This is why the Rambam places his seemingly philosophical discussion of the concept of free will amongst the halachos of teshuva; free will is the very root and foundation of hilchos teshuva. Without free will, one could never change, one

could never become something else, someone new, someone better.

Strikingly, Rav Eliyahu Dessler explains that many people never experience a true assertion of their free will, due to its immense difficulty. This is why many people do not change. Change is hard, uncomfortable, and often requires sacrifice. One must fully and

to be better, to be great, to become our best and truest selves. As the Ramchal explains in Mesilas Yesharim, if you change what you want (akiras ha’ratzon), you change who you are. When you make a new decision, you create a new reality for yourself.

When the shofar blows this year, let us truly awaken. In some sense, we all

this Elul, to embark on a journey of genuine teshuva, and continue the process of becoming our ultimate selves.

Rabbi Shmuel Reichman is the author of the bestselling book, “The Journey to Your Ultimate Self,” which serves as an inspiring gateway into deeper Jewish thought. He is an educator and speaker who has lectured internationally on topics of Torah thought, Jewish medical ethics, psychology, and leadership. He is also the founder and CEO of Self-Mastery Academy, the transformative online self-development course based on the principles of high-performance psychology and Torah.

wholeheartedly believe in their new future in order to give up their current lifestyle. However, when we push with all our might, expressing a full force of our inner will, we get a taste of truth, an experience of destiny, and a glimpse of our true self.

Breaking Momentum

We can now return to our original question regarding how to stop the downwards momentum of failure and bad decisions. The answer is simple, a single word: decide! Choice is the most powerful tool Hashem has granted us. The power of choice allows us to accomplish anything. When life begins to fall apart and bad decisions start piling up, we must cut off the downward momentum before it grows out of control, before it destroys us. The key is making the decision, asserting your inner will, and focusing its full force towards cutting off the momentum. If you can stop the momentum of bad decisions, of a lifestyle that is draining the life out of you, you can stop it from spreading. With nowhere to spread, negativity is like a flame without oxygen – it sputters and disappears. It all starts with a single decision to turn the tide, to begin building positive momentum, to start climbing uphill, to start heading towards your ultimate destination. If you can take that first step and push towards your greatness, you will suddenly begin riding that new wave. This is the power of choice; this is the power of positive momentum.

The Root of Teshuva

Free will – choice – is the root of teshuva. Teshuva is about reengineering our will, recreating our desire, rewiring our wants. It’s about the decision

need a shofar for the shofar, we need a wakeup call to listen to this year’s wakeup call. Many are numb to the wordless blast, deaf to its existential calling. Some have given up on change, while others are too busy with life to stop and truly consider the possibility of more, of a greater life. This year, let us embrace the shofar’s call and tap into our higher purpose.

May we all be inspired to fully utilize

After obtaining his BA from Yeshiva University, he received Semicha from Yeshiva University’s RIETS, a master’s degree in education from Azrieli Graduate School, and a master’s degree in Jewish Thought from Bernard Revel Graduate School. He then spent a year studying at Harvard as an Ivy Plus Scholar. He currently lives in Chicago with his wife and son where he is pursuing a PhD at the University of Chicago.

To invite Rabbi Reichman to speak in your community or to enjoy more of his deep and inspiring content, visit his website: ShmuelReichman.com.

Without free will, one could never change, one could never become something else, someone new, someone better.

The Price to Pay

By Rabbi Avrohom Sebrow

The Gemara in Kiddushin (17a) discusses the situation of an eved Ivri, an indentured servant, who became ill. His boss contracted with him for six years of labor. However, he was ill for two years. Can his boss demand a refund for those two years where he just stayed in bed all day? The Gemara answers unequivocally in the negative. It is the boss’s bad mazal, and he must absorb the loss.

Tosfos comment that there are those who equate the situation in the Gemara to that of a rebbe who was hired to teach children and then fell ill. They would argue that if the rebbe was sick for less than half of his contracted term, then the school that hired him must pay his full salary. Since the rebbe cannot be faulted for becoming ill, the yeshiva must absorb the loss.

The Gemara in Bava Metzia (77a) discusses a day laborer who fell ill at midday. Tosfos say that the Gemara implies that he does not get his full daily salary, but neither is he penalized. For the half-day that he worked, he gets paid; the day laborer will not get paid for the half-day that he was legitimately AWOL. Regarding this issue, a rebbe should be treated the same as a day laborer: He should get paid for the time he taught, but if he was sick for a significant period of time, his pay should be docked.

However, Tosfos are left to explain why an eved Ivri is treated financially better than a day laborer or rebbe. Tosfos posit that when one buys an eved Ivri, he has actually acquired a lien on the individual. He received value for his funds. The fact that he was unable to benefit from his lien is of no consequence. It is similar to someone who leased a car for three years. What would happen if all the roads were declared off-limits for three years? Could the lessor demand a refund? Certainly not. He received the car that he leased;

he has no claim on the leasing company. Likewise, the purchaser of an eved Ivri received his six-year lien. If the eved Ivri was sick for two years, the purchaser still received value. However, standard employers, such as a yeshiva, do not acquire a lien on their employees. They only receive value when the

and the day laborer was revealed to him in a dream. According to the Maharam, the eved Ivri and the day laborer have essentially the same halachos in this matter. However, the eved Ivri is prepaid for his six years of work. Therefore, if he falls ill for two years, the boss absorbs the loss. The day laborer is post-

loss in the case of sickness. According to Tosfos, a teacher always suffers a financial loss for missing time due to illness, whereas according to the Maharam, this would only be true if the teacher was not paid in advance.

The Shach was not impressed with the ruling of the Maharam, especially since it was based on a dream. He said dreams are of little halachic value. Further, he reasons that the determination of who absorbs the loss should not be contingent on who is holding the money. It is true that in cases where there is a halachic doubt or question of fact, we often resolve the dispute by letting the money stay where it is (ha’motzi me’chaveiro alav ha’ra’ayah). However, the Gemara never said that there was any halachic doubt involved in this case. Therefore, the resolution of Tosfos is preferred, because it’s based on the explanation that an eved Ivri is categorically different from a teacher or day laborer.

In practice, this discussion is usually not relevant, as most institutions and employers have firm rules in place for sick days. Employees are hired with the understanding that their employment is on the employer’s usual terms. Therefore, notwithstanding the above opinions, the rules of the employer should be followed. Even if the employer has no specific rules, questions of this nature would follow the custom of the locale.

laborer performs his job. Consequently, if the worker did not fulfill his duties, even through no fault of his own, he should not be paid. The boss did not receive value for the wages he is supposed to pay.

Interestingly, the Shach (CM 333:25) quotes the Maharam Mi’Rottenberg who stated that a different explanation of the distinction between the eved Ivri

paid. Therefore, the worker himself absorbs the loss. The rule is that whoever is holding the funds gets to keep them in the event of the worker’s illness. According to this distinction, if a teacher was pre-paid a year’s salary (good luck with that!) and then fell ill for two months, the school would have to absorb the loss. However, teachers that are given weekly paychecks would themselves absorb the

Is there any real chance of an employee getting paid for two years of sick time? Based on the Maharam, we can say: dream on!

Rabbi Avrohom Sebrow is a rebbe at Yeshiva Ateres Shimon in Far Rockaway. In addition, Rabbi Sebrow leads a daf yomi chaburah at Eitz Chayim of Dogwood Park in West Hempstead, NY. He can be contacted at ASebrow@gmail.com.

They would argue that if the rebbe was sick for less than half of his contracted term, then the school that hired him must pay his full salary.

Mothers Giving Birth and Verbal Abuse

By Rabbi Yair Hoffman

According to new research released by the CDC on Tuesday, one in five women reported mistreatment during pregnancy and delivery care, including being threatened with withholding treatment and being shouted at or scolded. This, of course, is a violation of “velo sonu ish es amiso” – (Vayikra 25:17). The mitzvah is generally called “Onaas Devarim” or just plain “Onaah.”

Rav Elyashiv zt”l’s Ruling

A question was once posed to Rav Elyashiv, zt”l, A man was not giving his wife a get. Is it permissible to try to get his parents to influence the son to give a get by threatening to expose an illegal activity that one of the parents was doing? The response from Rav Elyashiv was, “No.” There is no permission whatsoever to cause pain to another, no matter what his son is doing.

Biblical Figures Suffered

The Midrash Rabbah (Bereishis 14:19) explains that Menashe, Yosef’s son, was punished for “finding” the goblet in Binyamin’s sack – even though he did so on his father’s instruction. He caused the Shvatim pain, and they ripped their clothes in agony over the fate of Binyamin. The Midrash explains that Menashe’s portion of his inheritance was also ripped.

Rachel Imeinu stole the Teraphim of her father Lavan. Her intent, of course, was absolutely proper. She wished to wean her father off of his belief in worshipping idols. Yet, the Zohar tells us (VaYeitzei 164b) that she did not merit to raise those whom she loved because she deprived her father of what he loved!

A Painful Past

Examples of this violation include reminding a Ger of the actions of his fathers or a Baal Teshuvah of his original behaviors or sins. Asking someone a question in a subject area where the person being asked does not know the subject well is also a violation of Onaah (See Rambam Hilchos

Mechira 14:12). Similarly, inquiring of the price of item when one has no intention at all of purchasing the item is also a violation of Onaah (See Bava Metziah 58b).

Even Through Inaction

In discussing this mitzvah, Rav Yechiel Michel Stern cites the Chikrei Laiv (YD Vol. III #80) that this prohibition could also be violated through inaction. For example, if someone recites a Mishebarach for a number of people but purposefully leaves one person out, he is in violation of this prohibition. A sad aspect of this prohibition is that violators are often unaware that that they are verbally abusing or causing pain. Often, they may characterize the recipient of their statement, words or actions as “overly sensitive.”

Different manifestations of Onaas Devarim include demonstrating kaas (anger) at another, name calling, threatening, and blaming one’s own behavior on someone else’s actions. Certain criticisms are also subsumed under the category of Onaas Devarim as well.

varim. This thin line must be navigated very carefully. For example, let’s assume that a mother is concerned and convinced that in today’s atmosphere where there is an emphasis on looking good, her daughter needs to change some of her appearance. [The prohibition of Onaas Devarim even applies to little children – the exceptions, of course, are when it is necessary for parenting (See Sefer HaChinuch 251)].

At what point, however, does the mother’s comments turn from constructive parenting into a Torah violation of Onaas Devarim? Often, most people do not get the message unless the issue is made clear to them in no uncertain terms.

There is a story of a young single man who never showered. His rav approached him and told him that he had to start showering daily. The young man responded that in his particular line of work, showering would not be effective because he constantly sweats and he would have to shower several times a day in order to be clean. The rav told him that that was his obligation and put his foot down. Within two months, the young man got engaged and was told by his fiancé that she did not even so much as look at him prior to his “complete turnaround.”

The point of the story is that, generally speaking, when people have an underlying issue, nicely telling them is not going to do the trick. Since that is the case, the issue is very pertinent – at what point is it Onaas Devarim and at what point is it constructive criticism or constructive parenting?

The answer to this question depends on the person’s response. The Torah in many places stresses the obligation for one to be intelligent,and to be able to accurately assess likely responses of people. This situation is no different. An accurate assessment of the person’s likely response must be made. If it is unlikely that a change will be effected, then further pressing the issue would be a violation of Onaas Devarim. This does not mean, however, that one should give up. One should constantly be thinking how to coordinate a change within the person –but one that would be effective.

If One Violates It

What if one violated this prohibition? What must he do? The Talmud (Yuma 87a) tells us that there is an obligation to try to placate him – to undo the damage. The Talmud quotes verses in Mishlei as to what he must do, “Press your plea with your neighbor...” There are opinions that one must “make nice” in front of three rows of three people, too.

The conclusion of all this is that the violation is a very serious one. It is a mitzvah that has also, somehow, fallen off the wayside. There is another prohibition called Onaas Mamon – monetary abuse. The Talmud (Bava Metziah 58b) quotes three sages who explain how the prohibition of verbal abuse is by far more serious than the prohibitions of monetary abuse. Yelling at a woman giving birth, however, is particularly heinous.

Rav Aaron Schechter, zt”l

By Rabbi Yair Hoffman

Klal Yisroel mourns the tremendous loss of a remarkable Rosh Yeshiva and tzaddik, who genuinely took achrayus, responsibility, for Klal Yisroel. He passed away early Thursday morning. Perhaps more than any other rosh yeshiva in the 20th and 21st century, Rav Aaron Schechter, zt”l, knew, understood, and felt the pain of the repercussions of communism to Russian Jewry and did whatever he could to undo that damage.

Most of Ashkenazic Jewry in America and elsewhere had grandparents and great-grandparents that lived in Tsarist Russia, Poland and Lita, what is called the Pale of Settlement. There were well over six million Jews that lived there. Communism destroyed what Nazi Germany left over.

Rav Aaron did whatever he could to save the remnant of Russian Jewry that came to America. He supported every mossad that was mekarev them and that educated them. He supported kiruv camps, high schools and yeshivos. It was not only Russian Jews, but others as well. Every kiruv worker knew that Rav Aaron was the address for assistance in this crucial area.

But Rav Aaron went above and beyond this. He ensured that they became talmidei chachomim as well. And not just talmidei chachomim – but outstanding ones, too. Rav Aaron chose the outstanding Russian bochurim as his chavrusos – to prepare his

Many of the seforim that we learn now from heintiga roshei yeshiva were put together by the facts on the ground that Rav Aaron Schechter had built. Rav Aaron inspired numerous people and his work with Vaad l’hatzalas Nidchei Yisroel still inspires those who assisted in these endeavors.

Rabbi Yaakov Bender, shlita, recollected how Rav Aaron Shechter was a role model of how a Rebbe should be concerned about his talmidim. “Even a talmid from fifty years ago, he would look out for and show love and concern.”

Rav Aaron had remarkable middos and such ahavas Yisroel that anyone that came in contact with him was thoroughly inspired. And that is how he was able to accomplish so much.

shiurim with him, as well as to learn with them. It was a tremendous kavod for them. The peiros of his actions can be seen now. Many of the outstanding talmidei chachomim in virtually every yeshiva are the fruits of his hard work.

This author’s family had taken in an NCSY girl who wanted to deepen her commitment to Yiddishkeit. She dated one of Rav Aaron Schechter’s chavrusos, and before their engagement, Rav Aaron gave me a large hug and with his remarkable warm smile said, “I will split the costs of the wedding with you and am glad to be your new mechutan.” For the next few years, when we would meet at any chasunah, he would warmly hug me and say, “Ahh mein mechutan! How are you?”

Rav Aaron was born in Brooklyn in the 1920s. Chaim Berlin was the yeshiva to go to even years

For the next few years, when we would meet at any chasunah, he would warmly hug me and say, “Ahh mein mechutan! How are you?”

before Rav Hutner, zt”l , arrived. Rav Hutner had learned in Slabodka in Europe and followed the Alter to Eretz Yisroel. Rav Hutner was close to Rav Kook in Eretz Yisroel, and when he developed talmidim in America, the focus of his mussar mehalech was combined with learning and deriving insights from Maharals.

Rav Schechter married in the mid-1950s to his Rebbetzin, Shoshana Roisa. She was the daughter of Rabbi and Mrs. Boruch and Sarah Gittel Leichtung and a talmidah at Rebbetzin Vichna Kaplan’s Bais Yaakov in Williamsburg. For more than two decades, Rebbetzin Schechter was the principal of General Studies at Yeshivah of Brooklyn.

In the early 1980s after davening at the Yeshiva, two of my chaveirim and I had asked the Rosh Yeshiva why Rav Hutner had thought to change the approach from that of Slabodka. He invited us to his home for shalosh seudos to further discuss it. At the table, he explained that Rav Hutner felt that American bochurim were not ready for the mussar mehalech of the Alter. But he noted that it was not a change – rather it was an adaptation of what the Alter would have done in America.

Rav Hutner built his talmidim just like the Alter had built his. He encouraged Rav Aaron to write a sefer on the Rambam’s hilchos Bi’as Mikdash – and

he even suggested the name to him: “Avodas Aaron.” It was published in 1967.

The Sefer has 19 simanim, and aside from the halachos of Beis HaMikdash further deals with such eclectic topics as inebriation in davening and ruling halacha (Siman gimel) to the mixture of a k’zais in kdei achilas pras to kavod habrius, osaik b’mitzvah patur min h’mitzvah and the nature of aninus.

Rav Hutner appointed Rav Aaron as co-rosh yeshiva of the yeshiva along with Rav Hutner’s son-in-law, Rav Yonason David, shlita, the current rosh yeshiva of Yeshiva Pachad Yitzchok in Yerushalayim. Shortly after Rav Hutner passed away, Rav Schechter was asked to join the nesius of Agudas Yisroel and helped lead it since then.

Rav Aaron, zt”l ,is survived by his sons, Rav Mordechai Zelig, shlita, mashgiach ruchani at Yeshiva Chaim Berlin, and Rav Nosson, an accomplished mohel, as well as his three daughters, Rebbetzin Esther Yormark, Rebbetzin Nechama Halioua, and Rebbetzin Yehudis Senderovitz.

Rav Schechter’s loss is incalculable. Nafla ateres rosheinu.

The author can be reached at yairhoffman2@gmail.com.

Rabbi Raphael Pelcovitz visiting Rav Aaron Schechter in Florida a few years ago

With members of the Moetzes

School of Thought Teachers Ensure Our Legacy

By Barbara Deutsch

On the day before we left Israel, we visited Yad Vashem with friends and our Israeli grandsons, 12 and almost 15. Although they were born and live in Israel and go to school, albeit the charedi school system, this was their first visit to the museum. Museum Educator Lori Gerson gave us a VIP educators’ tour, and it was magnificent on every level.

One may suggest that this is not a place for young children, and therefore it’s no surprise that the boys have never been at Yad Vashem; in most yeshivot in the United States, the eighth grade graduation trip is usually centered around the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C.

No matter how often I visit, I learn something new, and I always cry.

Following an informative introduction about the backstory, the architecture, the trees dedicated to the righteous gentiles, and purpose of the museum, we walked in.

It was a steamy hot day, and we welcomed the cold of the gray interior. Mrs. Gerson brought our attention to a small display to the left of the entrance which you could miss if it were not pointed out. The display contained assorted artifacts taken from the inmates from the Klooga Concentration Camp in Estonia. For some reason, the inmates did not get uniforms, and they were allowed to hold onto the small precious possessions in their pockets.

Few of the inmates survived the camp, but the displayed belongings that were found in their pockets tell their stories. As you would expect, there were legal documents and pictures. One particular picture caught my attention. It depicted a group of students surrounding their Rebbe. Written in a wobbly script on the back of the picture was a list of the names of the boys and a beautiful letter that they had written to him.

A teacher and his prized photograph of his students was what was found in the Rebbe’s pocket on his last day.

Before becoming a principal, I was a

teacher for more than 26 years. I actually believe that all good principals need to spend quality time in a classroom.

When my family came to America from post-war Germany (I was born in a displaced person’s camp), our family of five lived in three tiny rooms in Williamsburg. My parents’ bedroom, filled with secondhand clunky furniture, was my haven. I would stand in front of the mirror with my lineup of assorted dolls, wearing my mother’s fancy Persian hat (a black furry thing), earnestly trying to get my dolls to behave so that they could learn how to read.

That image still sits in my head when I reflect back to that growing up period of my life.

For someone of my generation, being a teacher was one of the two available options for a college-educated Bais Yaakov girl; the other one was becoming a nurse.

And so, after 45 education credits, hundreds of hours of student teaching, a Masters in Reading, and a rigorous licensing process, I, along with most of my contemporaries, went to work in Ocean Hill Brownsville or other “tough” neighborhoods in Brooklyn, New York.

I lasted eight months.

As it turned out, I was already pregnant with my son when I started, and it was not easy for me, a 23-year-old newly married innocent, to work in a tough neighborhood filled with complicated children while managing a difficult pregnancy.

Not a quitter by nature, I took a hot city bus every day to work; I tried my best to teach young children from challenging and oftentimes very difficult circumstances to read and write. On what turned out to be my last day at the school, a child followed me to the bus stop, and as I stepped onto the stairs of the bus, yanked me from behind off the bus and to the ground.

My public school teaching career ended with that fall. Luckily, my baby and I were fine; our son was born three weeks later.

I became a stay-at-home volunteer mom until one day, longing to be the teacher I had dreamed of becoming and in need of some extra cash, I started to sub for what was then good per diem pay in random public schools around the city. It worked for a while as it paid well and

it was stimulating.

Soon, I began to long for a class of my own.

When our son Dov was in first grade in the Yeshivah of Flatbush in Brooklyn, his teacher recommended me for a position with excellent benefits that I could not turn down. And so, I began my teaching journey which has now lasted more than 50 years.

I never looked back, and I have not one day of regret.

By choice, this coming year will be my final September in a school setting; I am already sad. As one of my colleagues recently told me, “Barbara, you and I have never left school!” I love school and never wanted to leave!

I am now faced with so many questions: Where will I go every day? What will I do? Will my life have value? Will what I say have any impact? I am hoping to find some of the answers as the year unfolds.

I am not alone in feeling and thinking that being a classroom teacher, nursery to high school, rewards one with a career that is filled with joy and a strong feeling of accomplishment.

Who but a teacher is given the opportunity to work with open and thirsty minds while helping them gain the tools that will set them up for success? Who but a teacher will get to spend days learning, playing, talking and guiding students on the ways of the world while giving them life skills? And, who but a teacher privileged to work in a yeshiva setting will be given the joy of sharing Torah, middot, chesed and the observant path?

During this summer, we enjoyed many adventures traveling, eating, exploring and living life as Israelis. We also get to meet former students, random people, relatives and friends from our past and present lives. Sometimes, you even get to run into Jewish celebrities.

Last week, we bumped into a former HANC colleague, the famous wonderful singer Mordechai Shapiro. Full disclosure: Mordechai is our son-in-law’s

The message found on the back of the precious photo

A rebbe with his students, a momento forever

brother and he credits HANC (and me) with giving him his start as the HANC music teacher.

Mordechai walked into the cafe where we were enjoying an Israeli breakfast; as he came to greet us, a young boy ran to him and asked for a selfie. As is Mordechai’s gracious way and much to the delight of the boy and his family, he agreed.

A couple at a nearby table remarked in a joking manner, “Are you some kind of celebrity?” Mordechai shrugged and smiled shyly.

He is also modest.

One day, my husband and I stopped for a drink on Ben Yehudah, a popular hangout for touring camp groups. This day happened to be the final pit stop for NCSY/JOLT. As we waited for our drink, a buzz went through the crowds of kids, “Mr. Deutsch is here!”

Within seconds, from every corner of the square, boys and more boys came by to say hello and take selfies with their “favorite teacher.” Ironically, even boys who have never met or been taught by Mr. Deutsch, having heard so much about him, also came to shake his hand.

Teachers!

As we plan for the new school year, a time for reflection and planning, schools

across the globe are struggling to fill their rosters with staff. No longer are there great numbers of talented men and women choosing this time-honored profession. Most, especially the women, are choosing PT, OT, law, medicine, computer science and more – not teaching!

about teachers and the schools in a public forum. The internet has turned private conversations into a forum for complaints and school bashing.

As I look forward to September with the same anticipation and joy that I have felt for the whole of my school life, I ea-

tunity that keeps on giving back.

I have never left school, and I invite any boy or girl who wants to make a real difference to consider becoming a teacher.

I keep in my head and close to my heart the memories and the faces of those that I have taught; sometimes, it makes me teary but always joyful. As we begin a new teaching cycle, as teachers, we look forward to inspiring future generations. And among our students, will we inspire someone to take the challenge.

If we don’t have more boys and girls choose teaching, who will keep the memory of the Shoah and its martyrs alive? Who will be the role models for future generations? Who will prepare children to take on their destinies and those of our people?

We need excellent teachers to ensure our legacy.

To qualify as a teacher today, it takes many years of education in pursuit of advanced degrees, hours of preparation time for classes, social and emotional concerns, and sometimes difficult and demanding parents.

For the past few years, added to the demands is the proliferation on the internet of the “WhatsApp chats” that have allowed for discussion and criticism

gerly await the sounds of running footsteps and the laughing voices of children excited about their new year at school.

When I started my teaching journey over 50 years ago, I began with dolls. With a lot of education and training, I was ready to work with children. For the past 25 years, I have included mentoring teachers and principals. It is, and has always been, a fulfilling and blessed oppor-

Let’s have a great year!

Mrs. Barbara Deutsch is currently the associate principal at HANC 609 and a longtime reflective educator, parent, grandparent, and new great-grandparent. Even after all these years, she still loves what she does and looks forward to working with kids every single day.

Who but a teacher is given the opportunity to work with open and thirsty minds while helping them gain the tools that will set them up for success?

Illegal Arab Building Around Efrat

By Larry Domnitch

The curvy windy road leading to the northern entrance of Efrat passes by an adjacent Arab town. The town extends from a nearby hill downwards and then ascends upwards almost reaching the Dagan and Tamar neighborhoods of Efrat. The town has no name, but it has schools and nearby homes. Some of the buildings have not been completed as many of its window frames are empty, revealing no residency within its walls. They are unoccupied structures. Piles of garbage line the sides of a nearby road. It must be cleaned, so Efrat taxpayers have it removed at their expense. Given that these buildings are constructed illegally, it is safe to say there are no building codes observed. As the road approaches the security gate at entrance of Efrat, lanes narrow due to the excessive building only allowing one lane on the road, with traffic squeezing the city’s entrance adding to rush hour traffic.

The building surge on Efrat’s northern entrance is not an aberration but part of a plan. It is a microcosm of the illegal construction which threatens Israel’s sovereignty over the region. Efrat is not alone in this predicament. It is the entire region which is in danger of illegal Arab construction which is pervasive in Judea and Samaria.

These homes have been constructed in violation of the Oslo Accords of 1993 between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. The Oslo Accords is an international agreement designating this area of the territory of Judea as part of Area C, where the Israeli government has jurisdiction.

Gazing over the landscape and the buildings, some schools are clearly visible. According to Naomi Kahn, director

of the international division of Regavim, a movement dedicated to protecting Israel’s lands and preventing illegal seizure of state land, the construction of schools are part of the process of illegal Arab building. “First you build a school. Then you build a town.” This is the process around Efrat as in so many other areas.

The Fayyad Plan of 2009, declared by then-Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, was to create a de-facto Palestinian State unilaterally. It was enthusiastically supported by the European Union, Western nations and President Obama. Fayyad published a pamphlet explaining his goals and his plans to work toward an independent

ations and build a PLO state with huge illegal land grabs and with the financial support of international bodies. The European Union and member states are well aware this constructive is illegal and yet actively demand that Israel not demolish the structures they have financed.

The Oslo Accords of 1993 were supposed to be the basis of negotiations. It was approved by a one vote majority in the Knesset. After land offers made by Israel during negotiations were rejected, a devastating intifada broke out vindicating the views of the opponents of the Oslo Accords that the objective of the Palestinian leadership had been and remained committed to armed conflict and the rejection of the very existence of Israel.

Schools are built in Area C as a means of establishing permanence, drawing new residents to the area, who in turn build additional illegal (residential) structures in the vicinity. Schools are built to create facts on the ground. After schools are constructed, roads and homes are then built to allow easier access under the false pretext of humanitarian considerations. This is all in accordance with the Fayyad plan.

Arab state with full sovereignty over all of the territory of the West Bank and Gaza Strip in the 1967 borders with Jerusalem as its capital. In a 2009 New York Times interview, Fayyad espoused a plan to “create facts on the ground that are consistent with the idea that the establishment of a state…. This is our agenda, and we intend to implement it with determination.” The purpose of the plan was to circumvent negoti -

According to the Oslo Accords, the Israeli government has the authority to approve all construction in Area C, which comprises 62% of the landmass of Judea and Samaria, containing the entire Jewish population of Judea and Samaria and approximately 11% of the Arab population. Area C also includes nature reserves, archeological sites, and firing zones. According to a study published on October 11, 2022 by Regavim, there are 81,317 illegal structures in Area C. The abundant land masses of A and B are under the full control of Palestinian Authority and are largely undeveloped.

The city of Efrat stands bold and proud but faces challenges to its future posed by the Palestinian Authority and members of the international community.

Larry Domnitch is the author of The Impact of World War I on the Jewish People by Urim Publications. He lives in Efrat.

It is a microcosm of the illegal construction which threatens Israel’s sovereignty over the region.

Sharing the Big Jewish Ideas

By Tammy m ark

How can accurate and authentic information regarding Israel, Judaism and the Jewish people ever combat all of the misinformation circling around the internet and compete successfully with the media platforms like Al Jazeera News? The first step is having the most engaging and informative content available, in the most modern and accessible way.

OpenDor Media is doubling-down on its efforts to educate the masses through media and making it more exciting. The organization, formerly Jerusalem U, has been bringing Jewish educational media to a global audience since 2009 on a mission to strengthen the connection of young people to Israel, Judaism and the Jewish people and help them navigate the challenges of being a proud vocal Jew and Zionist in the modern world. OpenDor’s primary digital platform, “Unpacked,” offers a wealth of unique resources for laypeople and educators. The company is determined to reach even more people directly on their newsfeed and playlists, engaging social media users with their newest informative and insightful videos.

Unpacked’s latest channel, “Big Jewish Ideas,” features “The Big Ten,” a video series focusing on the Ten Commandments. Hosted by familiar face Noey Jacobson, formerly of the Maccabeats, each video offers thought-provoking ideas to make the mitzvos accessible and relatable to a broader audience. One recent video

cleverly connects the precept of muktzah with the modern concept of mindfulness.

OpenDor’s CEO Andrew Savage has been involved in Jewish programming since his days at Oxford University.

joining OpenDor Media. He sat down to share some of OpenDor’s big ideas.

Tell us about OpenDor Media and the strategy behind the Unpacked platforms.

Our strategy is to reach people where they’re at and to speak to them in a language they can relate to. The way that we do that is on social media platforms, and if they’re school-age, it’s in the classroom. Our “direct to consumer” model, the means with which we reach people on social media, is that we have a pretty extensive operation with three channels on YouTube – Big Jewish Ideas is one of them. We post regularly on Instagram and TikTok, and we have a podcast division with a number of very successful podcasts. We have something like 600,000 downloads of various podcasts – the most successful of which is called “Unpacking Israeli History.” We also have a website with about two million unique visits in the last year or so.

Savage spent several years studying at Sh’or Yoshuv and the Mir Yeshiva. He founded the UK-based Forum for Jewish Leadership and went on to work for the Ronald S. Lauder Foundation. Savage came to the United States five years ago, working as VP of the Tikvah Fund before

In addition to that, we have a platform called “Unpacked for Educators,” where we essentially take everything we’re creating and create supplementary teaching resources that can be used by teachers in a classroom or educators in any context, formal or informal. The goal is to really give them something that’s ready to go so they can teach meaningfully about the subjects that we cover –Israeli history, Jewish history, Zionism, the ideas, the

we’re trying to educate and share meaning rather than preach or tell people what they should do.

Andrew Savage, CEO of OpenDor Media

Noey Jacobson, the host of the series

ideals, the key personalities, Jewish culture, the Jewish calendar, etc.

What’s special about the Big Jewish Ideas channel and The Big Ten series?

We launched a new channel for this series. Our main YouTube channel “Unpacked” has over 170,000 subscribers, and we put a video out every single week with approximately 900,000 views a month; part of its success is consistency. This new channel is exclusively dedicated to “Big Jewish Ideas,” to asking questions and bringing the relevance of Jewish ideas and texts to an audience that are young and are probably not looking for that but are still grappling with life’s big issues – as we all are.

Rabbi Shalom Schwartz of Aish recognized that the Aseret Hadibrot is the base and has everything contained within them. He wanted to build a movement around its ideas and ideals.

Rabbi Nitzan Bergman set up the U.S. organization, the goal of which is to bring the most compelling and relatable ideas contained within the Ten Commandments to a larger audience. Making great content is nothing without an audience for it, so that was the basis for our partnership with Project Aseret and the Big Ten.

Until relatively recently, we were predominantly focused on Israel history; this series is really an attempt to lean more seriously into creating great content that provides meaning around Judaism and its core ideas.

What would you say is the secret to the success and popularity of the material?

Our recipe for success is really a focus on three things. Subject matter – creating great content is a prerequisite for having an impact – and second, knowing your audience. We’re trying to reach beyond “the choir,” we’re trying to reach people who are not necessarily proactively searching for every possible video about Israel or who are the big advocates on campus chairing Israel clubs. We’re trying to reach the “undecided voter” – the vast majority of young Jews and non-Jews – when it comes to the content relating to Israel who are either apathetic or ill-informed. They may have some level of interest, and essentially our goal is to pique that interest, to create what we call “the irresistible hook,” to ask a question that’s going to be relevant to them and to show how topics that might not seem immediately relevant actually are interesting and relevant.

We’re trying to educate and share meaning rather than preach or tell people what they should do, and leave it for people to make their own decisions. If you want to be credible and respected, you have to respect your audience and be trustworthy.

The third thing, which is really important, is knowing the platforms themselves – each social media platform is a world onto itself.

The Big Ten videos cover authentic Torah concepts with modern perspectives. Is this the formula which makes them so relatable?

Our goal is to create content which is relevant to everyone. I’m an Orthodox Jew, although not all of our team are – it’s a pretty diverse group on the team. The common

theme is a shared passion and commitment to sharing the riches of Jewish heritage, tradition, Zionism. The goal is that our content should be equally usable and embraced by potentially anyone. We want to be relevant to people, and to do that, we don’t want to boxed into something –but everything is grounded in traditional Judaism and Orthodox Judaism.

Ultimately, the same questions that we try to grapple with in the series are the big questions in life. We’re trying for those who are not familiar to pique their curiosity, and even for those who are – who have been through years of Jewish day schools and may not be feeling that passion or that it’s entirely relevant for them – to give them some food for thought and some added meaning as well. We try not to use terms that could alienate anyone. Everything is there to be understood, but beyond that it’s to ask the kind of questions and provide the insights which should be equally relevant to anyone and everyone regardless of religious denomination, religiosity, or literacy.

“Who are the Jews?” We have a video about Jews of color, and another video we put out on YouTube a couple of weeks ago was, “Are Jews White?” We had 160 thousand views, and it’s going viral. The perception that all Jews are rich, white and Ashkenazi is both damaging and factually incorrect. Addressing questions of Jewish identity and ethnicity – those kinds of videos have been incredibly successful. We made a video on the surprising differences between Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews – we had over 2 million views – and that’s by far the highest performing video over six months and it continues to pick up thousands of views a day.

Most of our content is evergreen so at the time we release them, they’ll be moderately successful, but then something can happen to make them significantly more relevant. We saw it in May 2021, when things heated up in Israel with Hamas firing rockets. We had made a video 18 months earlier with the title “What is Hamas?” Suddenly, in May 2021, we were competing with Al Jazeera; if you type in “What is Hamas” on YouTube, the first couple of videos that come up is ours and Al Jazeera, so subsequently we’ve made a real effort to make the video before it becomes relevant. As a community, one of the real frustrations is that when things happen in Israel, suddenly everyone goes into rapid response mode, but actually it’s kind of too late then. In the space we’re in, consistency is key, so that’s an important thing we’ve done.

What are you looking forward to working on?

In the Jewish space, we’re just getting started. We’re planning to produce a whole series on spirituality, the goal of which is to look at how foundational concepts can be relevant in anyone’s life – about the sanctity of time, anxiety, what you eat – and those messages aren’t explicitly Orthodox, yet they are all grounded in Torah ideas. There’s a lot of bad stuff out there, and we’re trying to be a voice of positivity and meaning.

Who’s involved in the creative process?

We’re a team of about 40 people in OpenDor media. For The Big Ten, a good number of people are involved along the way. We have Noam Weissman, Executive Vice President, and we have Noey, who has a background in education. Our head of content was a school principal for a number of years. We have a pretty strong group of educators.

It’s a complicated and, at times, difficult process, and one of the real challenges is that you want the product to have that authenticity and be compelling. You want the face on the screen to be genuine, and in Noey’s case, it works, because Noey’s an incredibly passionate thoughtful Jew and hopefully that came out in the series.

Which videos have had the most success?

We’ve made a series of videos on the topic of antisemitism, and they’re great. The videos that people are really driven to, and often the spikes in antisemitism will drive them there, are the videos that speak to the question of

One of OpenDor’s mottos is “Media is the Ultimate Educator.” You’ve been involved with Jewish outreach and education throughout your career. How is this different for you?

Everything I’d done until then, as meaningful as it had been, whether an in-person educational program or working on campus, there are only so many people you could work with. The reality is that media – though there are all sorts of dangers and evils associated with it, and as a parent I’m super attuned to those and worry about some of the negative influences – at the same time, offers a unique opportunity. We can literally be reaching everyone at every moment of the day, every single day.

As a community, it’s incumbent upon us that we reach them there; TikTok is the search engine, the classroom, the newspaper – that’s it. No one’s watching documentaries or reading books or increasingly – if they’re teenagers – even looking at Google. There’s an opportunity to meet them there, otherwise we’re not even in the battle to lose. What we’re doing is both critically important, and we’re reaching hundreds of thousands of people every single month. That’s something I’ve never had the opportunity to do before, and it makes what we do particularly exciting and important.

we’re trying to reach the “undecided voter” – the vast majority of young Jews and non-Jews –when it comes to the content relating to i srael who are either apathetic or ill-informed.

What Would You Do If…

Moderated by Jennifer Mann, LCSW of The Navidaters

Dear Navidaters,

I know this is an unconventional question but wanted to send it to your wise panelists.

My son just told me he met a girl who was a counselor at the same camp he was working at. They were working in different divisions but started going out formally this summer. He’s been generally in charge of his own dating, so we don’t get so involved besides hearing about the girls when things get more serious. Anyway, surprisingly, I know of this girl because she is actually my friend’s daughter(!).

When she was in middle school and high school, my friend used to complain to me about her and how off the rails she was. I cannot believe my son is dating her and cannot imagine walking down the aisle with my son as her future husband based on what I know.

What on earth should I do? Thank you!

The Panel

The Rebbetzin

Rebbetzin Faigie Horowitz, M.S.

This is not a strange question. It’s one I have encountered in the past.

Here are some facts to keep in mind. Raising children is challenging. Mothers share with one another. Fathers do, too. They are under multiple pressures and frequently need to vent to their intimate friends. They need a listening ear and some validation. This is normal. It is also normal to remember what your close friends have said about their children. You care about them, and you care about their children. You paid attention to what they shared. They trusted you and your judgment.

It is also normal for children to grow up and develop their maturity, relationships, self-control, and character traits. Give your friend’s child, who is now a

young adult, the benefit of normal development. Children change as they progress towards adulthood. Keep an open mind and heart, just like you would want others to have for your son who was not a finished product when he was younger.

It is not OK (read normal) to hold back on sharing with a close friend when one’s kids are young children in case it will be remembered in the future when it is time for dating.

I remember discussing this with a close friend many years ago. She decided to stop sharing with her friends about her high school age daughter’s social struggles in case it would be remembered and shared when it came time for shidduchim. She was planning on sharing only good things about her children.

I thought this was strange then. I still think many years later that it is rather injurious to close relationships with dearest friends. You have to be able to trust your besties, otherwise the

relationships sour. Close friends notice lack of authenticity and when you are only spouting good things about your young children. The relationship will not continue in the same way if you feel you have to significantly edit your parenting struggles that you share with your nearest and dearest.

Worry not. Give the young woman the gift of ayin tova. You are the adult here. She is the new adult. Don’t focus on her childhood behaviors.

The Shadchan

Michelle Mond

This is a very difficult conundrum, I can only imagine the pit you have in your stomach! It would be helpful to know how old your son is, how long he has been dating, and if he has had experience. If he is a seasoned dater and

has found it hard to find an appropriate match, I would be quick to say let’s wait this out and see if it amounts to anything. If he just started dating and does not have much experience, I recommend you sit down with him and talk about his wants and needs as well as non-negotiables in a match.

At the same time, give your friend a call and be frank with her. A true friend will understand the predicament and be honest with you, and if she is hesitant or evasive, you WILL feel it and have reason to be worried. I would rather you lose a friend by being honest than

Children change as they progress towards adulthood.

beat around the bush at the expense of your son’s future. But the truth is, a real friend will understand where you are coming from and respect you for caring enough to reach out about the issue. Your son deserves to know what he is involved with so that he can make an informed decision.

The Single

Tzipora Grodko

It can be surprising to imagine that people change over time if they have made such a strong negative impression. I understand that you are trying to be cautious but also feel surprised by your judgment assessed by middle and high school behavior. How long ago was that? People change annually, if not monthly, and it’s unfair to assume you know who she is based on previous experiences from such a tumultuous, immature, and

developmental time period.

Stop worrying. If you trust your son to make good choices, then he will continue to do so until something concerning comes up that motivates him to choose otherwise. You haven’t even met her yet, and it doesn’t sound like things are serious. Trust. Your. Son. Don’t get ahead of yourself.

The Zaidy

Dr. Jeffrey Galler

There’s a lot of uncertainty here. When your friend told you that the daughter was “off the rails,” was it an accurate description of a very disturbed teenager, or was it simply a distraught parent looking for sympathy while experiencing a typical teenage daughter’s rebellious phase?

And, even if this girl was behaving in a way that was neither normal nor

acceptable as a teenager, who is to say that she is the same person today, years later? People do grow, mature, and learn from their mistakes.

Here’s the problem: If you tell your son what his girlfriend’s parent had confided to you years ago, you might ruin not only her relationship with her own parent but also any possible positive relationship that you might have with a potential daughter-in-law.

So, why not just wait and see? If your son keeps dating her, you might suggest that they join you for dinner at a restaurant or come to dinner in your home. Then, you can observe what she is actually like today, rather than as a teenager, and make your own intelligent evaluations.

And, if they continue to date, you might wish to call your old friend and say, “Hi! You’ll never guess who is seriously dating your daughter!”

Your friend might respond with, “Wow! Remember how I used to worry

about her? She is a completely different person today!” And then, my friend, you can breathe a sigh of relief.

But, if your friend responds with, “Wow! I’m so glad she found a serious boyfriend! She’s been nothing but trouble since the day she was born,” then, my friend, you do have a real problem!

If you are a wellbalanced, noncontrolling parent who has genuine concerns about your child’s wellbeing, you cannot keep quiet.

Pulling It All Together

The Navidaters

Dating and Relationship Coaches and Therapists

Thank

you for writing! I can’t tell you what to do, but we can break down this situation together and look at all the pieces and parts.

There are two main issues here, as I see it. The first is surrounding how much “control” we have as parents and what our belief system is around the choices our children make. The second, separate issue is whether this girl was “off the rails” in the sense that she had some mental health issues or engaged in truly dangerous behavior or, if she was simply…a teenager doing teenage things and her mom was like every other mom of teenage daughters… exhausted, drained and confiding in her good friend.

Another and possibly third thought to keep in mind is that people do out - grow a lot of the things they went through during teenhood. Kids who were reckless, did dangerous things to their bodies, were disrespectful and moody, did not pay attention in class etc., go on to become very well balanced and successful adults. (This is not true all the time, so I am not offering a guarantee, but it is true a lot of the time.)

You have two choices: To get involved and say something to your son, or to keep quiet and keep a close eye on the relationship. If your son’s beloved is waving red flags, I do believe it can be a parent’s place to open up a conversation or dialogue

around the behavior. You can ask him if he is aware of her past behavior and see how he responds. Truly, what is the role of a parent when he/she has concerns about a child’s future spouse? It’s an excellent question, and there are different schools of thought around it. Feel free to write to me with your ideas, dear readers, after the column goes to print, and know that I am only offering my opinion. It is not a parent’s place to criticize and critique and micromanage and reject every resume and person. This will drive your child crazy and will build well deserved resentment within your child.

If you are a well-balanced, non-controlling parent who has genuine concerns about your child’s wellbeing, you cannot keep quiet. You get in there, and in your loving, caring and non-controlling way, you open up that dialogue with your kid!

In our culture, children get married young. Sometimes, they do not see things that we as parents see. Ask your children before they start dating, “If you start dating someone and I see concerning behavior, would you like me to bring it to your attention?” Bring it up in a healthy way, showing them you respect them! Give them the choice. (Even if they say no, and something happens down the line, you will still have more leeway to bring it up.) And, with all this being said, ultimately, we cannot get in the way or stop anyone from making choices we disagree with. This is Hashem’s world. And our work is to surrender and accept (with oodles of appropriate and measured hishtadlus).

Best of luck!

Sincerely, Jennifer

Jennifer Mann, LCSW is a licensed psychotherapist and certified trauma healing life coach, as well as a dating and relationship coach working with individuals, couples, and families in private practice at 123 Maple Avenue in Cedarhurst, NY. To set up a consultation or to ask questions, please call 718-908-0512. Visit www.thenavidaters.com for more information. If you would like to submit a dating or relationship question to the panel anonymously, please email JenniferMannLCSW@gmail.com. You can follow The Navidaters on FB and Instagram for dating and relationship advice.

Sharing Themselves

By Sara Rayvych, MSEd

Opening my inbox, I saw an email from my daughter’s pen pal. The girls sometimes write snail mail letters or video chat, but their main method of communication is electronic. The letter featured an adorable ice cream cone she had drawn and wanted to share with her physically distant friend. You could see the effort she put into her masterpiece, and this frozen treat had lots of personality. I passed the device to my daughter so we could all appreciate her friend’s hard work.

We wrote back, and I made sure to include my own praise of her hard work.

I felt it was important for this correspondence to have more than a perfunctory response. After all, she had put so much of herself into this drawing.

Adults tend to look quickly at a child’s scribbles, giving little more than a brief comment. It’s easy to overlook how much they put into that picture. Even if it’s little more than crisscrossing lines, it’s their hard work, and they take pride in it.

As adults, it’s easy to take for granted the things children do. Kids sing,

dance, color and make jokes. They show off their somersaults while reciting their part in the play. Some of this is children entertaining themselves, but often it’s a child’s way of sharing their day, thoughts or accomplishments with us.

As the last school year closed, many parents found themselves staring at an unruly mound of projects and written work, unsure of what to do with it. With the new year about to begin, parents once again brace themselves for drawings and parsha songs. It’s easy to feel overwhelmed by the quantity of papers our children bring home. But we want to look past the number of trees sacrificed and see the accomplishments in their work.

Meaningful Creations

I remember being a young child and going out for a Shabbos day meal with my family. I still recall thinking how bored the adults must be just sitting at the table and talking. Adults are different from children in how they interact and connect to others. We shouldn’t

make the mistake of expecting children or teens to function similar to those more than twice their age and life experience.

Children are busy playing and entertaining themselves throughout the day. Rather than mere fun and games, they are learning and growing from these interactions. Children also express themselves differently from adults. Children often use art or other mediums to share with others. As an example, many grandparents will find themselves blessed to be on the receiving end of a picture or dance recital performed in their honor. Whether in-person or over video chat, it’ll be no less appreciated.

When seeing a child’s project, they are not merely showing us how they kept busy for a few minutes. They put their young hearts into it, and we want to appreciate that. When that child then proudly shares their work with us, we should feel grateful they value our place in their life. All you need to do is watch the care a youngster puts into their project. They focus intently and seriously deliberate which sequin or colored

button is perfect for each spot. That ice cream cone drawing my daughter received was a way for her friend to bring my daughter into her life and share a part of herself.

With school starting, most of this article will reference school projects and creativity. Everything written here applies equally to the fun and learning they have at home since we are their first and main teachers.

Multiple Modalities

There are many ways children learn and ideally your child’s teacher will use many of them – especially in the earlier years. Arts and crafts are very popular, and kids enjoy making a good mess. Movement is very important, and dancing or arm motions can help many learners. Even many adults will use songs or rhymes to help themselves remember important information. I still remember things I memorized years ago that were set to a tune or other memorization technique.

Many children will use hugs or oth-

er methods to show love. Some children are very verbal and can out-talk a radio show host. Each individual has their own way of sharing with others and expressing themselves. Your child wants to include you in their life or share their day with you and may not do so at convenient times. Recognizing that this is their way to bring you into their day –especially when they spend hours away from you – can help parents see the ultimate meaning behind these childish words.

Appreciate Their Contribution

Your child will come home with lots to share. We’re very busy and often don’t have patience for these little things. It’s easier for parents to make time and focus when we realize how valuable these moments are. They put a lot of work into whatever they’re showing us and waited a long time to tell us about their day’s experiences.

It may look or sound like gibberish to us, but it’s something that’s important to them. Let’s take the time to value their creativity. Focus on whatever they’re sharing. Look directly at them as

they’re speaking and make appropriate comments along the way.

Kids thrive on parental praise. A few well-placed words can make anyone feel good, regardless of their age. Praise is most powerful when it’s targeted and not generalized. “Nice picture” is better

to show how much we appreciate it. The fridge is a popular spot, but any visible location will do. You don’t need to keep everything, and it doesn’t need to remain there forever. Letting them share with grandparents or other relatives is another way to let them show off their

can thrive with a different rebbi/morah or class. Encouragement from their parents can go a long way in helping them start the right way. When we believe in them, they can believe in themselves.

Make sure your child is prepared for their first day of school and has everything they need. You’d be surprised how much it throws a student off to not have their notebook or other supplies.

Children spend many hours away from home. When possible, it means a lot to them when someone sends them off and welcomes them home. Additionally, a loving note or something similar in their bag will remind them of your love and support throughout the day.

than ignoring their work but doesn’t say much. “I like how you combined colors” is targeted and shows you really noticed their effort. “You jumped so high for that final dance move.” “I can tell that the backflip took lots of practice.”

Make sure your words are truthful. With a little thought, we can find something meaningful to say that is honest, too.

Displaying their work is another way

talent. Not only will most children feel proud to share with others, but it’s another way to make grandparents or family friends feel loved. Don’t pass it on to others if it will embarrass your child.

A New School Year

We’re about to begin a new school year, and each child gets a fresh start. Even children that had trouble last year

We’re about to start another year of growth and opportunities. Children will once again come home with projects spilling out of their bags and stories to tell. I wish all our students a successful year and lots of nachas for their parents.

Sara Rayvych, MSEd, has her master’s in general and special education. She has been homeschooling for over 10 years in Far Rockaway. She can be contacted at Rayvych Homeschool@gmail.com.

When that child then proudly shares their work with us, we should feel grateful they value our place in their life.

Decoding Nutrition Labels

By Aliza Beer MS, RD, CDN

In today’s world where processed foods are very accessible, making healthy food choices can be a challenge. With countless products available in the supermarket, understanding nutrition labels is essential for anyone trying to maintain a balanced diet. These labels are designed to provide consumers with vital information about a prod-

uct’s nutritional content per serving. They are typically found on the back or side of packaged foods. While the specifics may vary by region, most nutrition labels include the following key components:

Serving Size: This indicates the recommended serving size for the product. Be sure to compare the serv-

ing size on the label to the amount you actually consume to accurately assess the nutritional content. Tip: Pay close attention to the serving size on individually packed items. On these pre-packaged foods, it is easy to assume that one serving equals one package, but that is not always the case.

Calories: The number of calories per serving is listed prominently. This helps you gauge the energy content of the food and plan your overall caloric intake.

Nutrients: Nutrition labels detail the quantities of macronutrients (carbohydrates, proteins, and fats) and important micronutrients (vitamins and minerals) in a serving of the food. The values are typically given in grams or percentages of the recommended daily intake.

• Fats: The label breaks down total fat content into saturated, trans, and unsaturated fats. Opt for foods low in saturated and trans fats, as these can contribute to heart disease. Trans fat is found in foods such as margarine, microwave popcorn, and some coffee creamers. Also, partially hydrogenated oils are a major source of trans fats and are often used in processed foods, baked goods, and fried foods to enhance shelf life and texture. Saturated fat is found in full-fat dairy, fatty meats, and coconut oil. When choosing oil, choose extra virgin olive oil or avocado oil, as they are made up of unsaturated fats. Grapeseed oil is another good option. Unsaturated fats, like those found in

nuts and fish, are heart-healthy choices.

• Carbohydrates: Carbohydrates are divided into dietary fiber and sugars. Choose foods high in dietary fiber, as it aids digestion and helps control blood sugar levels. Foods that have 5 grams of fiber or more per serving are generally considered to be high in fiber and a good option. Minimize foods with added sugars, as they can lead to excessive calorie intake. The American Heart Association states that men should not consume over 36 grams of added sugar, and women no more than 25. Keep in mind that food manufacturers may use various names for added sugars on nutrition labels. Being aware of these alternate names can help you identify added sugars in the products you consume. Here are some common names for added sugars:

◊ Sucrose

◊ Glucose

◊ Fructose

◊ High-Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS)

◊ Corn Syrup

◊ Brown Sugar

◊ Agave Nectar

◊ Honey

◊ Maple Syrup

◊ Molasses

• Proteins: Proteins are vital for building and repairing tissues. Look for lean protein sources, such as lean meats, poultry, fish, legumes, and tofu, to support muscle health. Many Americans overconsume protein, so try to consume

Diagram from the U.S. Food and Agriculture Administration

an intake between 10-35% of your total caloric intake, as recommended by the National Institutes of Health.

• Sodium: Sodium can be hidden in processed and packaged foods, including cottage cheese, sauces, bread, canned goods, and processed meats. Even seemingly healthy foods like bread and breakfast cereals can contribute to your sodium intake. The recommended daily sodium intake varies based on individual factors, including age, health status, and activity level. However, a general guideline is to aim for less than 2,300 mg of sodium per day for adults. Also, MSG (monosodium glutamate) is a high sodium, flavor-enhancing additive used in some processed foods, restaurant dishes, and packaged seasonings. Look out for the presence of MSG on the nutrition label and try to avoid those foods. MSG can also be hidden under different names, such as “hydrolyzed vegetable protein” or “autolyzed yeast extract.”

• Vitamins and Minerals: Ensure that the food contributes to your daily requirements of essential nutrients like calcium, iron, vitamin D, and vitamin C.

Ingredients List: Ingredients are listed in descending order by weight, so the first few ingredients are the most

significant. Choose products with shorter ingredient lists, as these foods are typically less processed.

Percent Daily Values (%DV): This aspect of the label offers a quick way to assess how a food fits into your daily nutrient needs. %DV is based on a daily intake of 2,000 calories, which

smart label reading when choosing food.

• Start with Serving Size . Begin by checking the serving size and the number of servings in the container. Many people consume more than one serving, so adjust your calculations accordingly.

• Beware of Hidden Ingredients. Be vigilant about hidden sugars, sodium, and unhealthy fats. These can add up quickly, even in seemingly “healthy” foods.

• Compare Similar Products. When choosing between similar products, compare their nutrition labels to make the best choice for your health goals. This way, you can still eat food groups that you enjoy, while making a healthy choice.

may not be appropriate for everyone. Here’s how to interpret %DV:

• 5% or less: Low in the nutrient.

• 10-19%: A good source of the nutrient.

• 20% or more: High in the nutrient. Remember that the %DV will be greater if your caloric intake is under 2,000 calories, and adjust accordingly.

Now that we know what everything means, here are some strategies for

• Focus on Key Nutrients. Pay attention to total calories, fats (especially saturated and trans fats), sodium, added sugars, and dietary fiber. These are critical factors that impact your overall health.

• Choose Nutrient-Dense Foods. Opt for foods with higher %DV for nutrients like fiber, vitamins, and minerals. This helps you get more nutritional value from your meals.

Decoding nutrition labels empowers you to take control of your dietary choices. Armed with the knowledge of serving sizes, nutrient content, %DV, and ingredient lists, you can make informed decisions that align with your nutritional goals. Remember that a balanced diet is about overall patterns and choices, not just individual foods.

Aliza Beer is a registered dietitian with a master’s degree in nutrition. She has a private practice in Cedarhurst, NY. Patients’ success has been featured on the Dr. Oz show. Aliza can be reached at alizabeer@gmail. com, and you can follow her on Instagram at @alizabeer

Decoding nutrition labels empowers you to take control of your dietary choices.

A Guide to Your Child’s IEP

By Dr. Rebecca Soffer

School supplies, uniforms, eager faces, and nervous anticipation are not the only things accompanying our kids to school this fall. A program of support is available and for many already in place to ensure success for each of our children. Federal and NY State law requires a Free and Appropriate Public Education (FAPE) for each child in their Least Restrictive Environment (LRE). In other words, the school district is tasked with providing every child with an education regardless of ability.

What is an Individualized Education Program?

An Individualized Education Program, IEP, or IESP, for students enrolled in a private school, is the document developed by the public school district with input from parents, teachers, evaluators, and therapists that outlines the educational program designed to meet a child’s individual learning needs. To receive special education or any related service, a student MUST have an IEP/IESP. A student

is eligible for an IEP/IESP when district evaluations support one of 13 disability classifications. Some of the most common are: speech language impairment, learning disability, autism, emotional disability, and other health impairment. The IEP/IESP is updated yearly at a collaborative meeting with parents, school, and the public school district. A Mandated Three-Year Reevaluation entitles each student to updated evaluations at least once every three years to track progress and ensure that services continue meeting learning needs.

What is included in the Individualized Education Program?

The IEP includes information about student strengths and weaknesses which are taken into account to develop the plan for education support. The IEP contains the following sections:

• Present Levels of Performance: Using information from standardized tests, parent/teacher reports, and therapy

progress notes, this section describes how a student is doing academically, socially, and physically in school. It may also include IQ scores and a measure of everyday living skills.

• Measurable Annual Goals : The academic, social, behavioral, and/or physical goals IEP meeting participants believe should be met in the upcoming school year.

• Progress Reports: When parents can anticipate updates on student’s progress.

• Recommended Special Education Programs and Services: This is the list of services and/or programs the student is approved for with session length, how often sessions will happen, and where sessions will take place.

What are Related Services?

Related services help students meet educational goals outlined in the IEP. Related services include, but are not limited to:

Special Instruction: Different types of specialized teachers are available depending on a child’s age and learning needs. Preschool students ages 3 to 5 can have sessions with a Special Education Itinerant Teacher or SEIT. A SEIT is a certified special education teacher who directly and indirectly helps a preschooler with academic, emotional, and social skills. In other words, a SEIT teaches pre-academic skills like recognizing letters and numeracy and they can help a child make friends, manage stress, and cooperate with classroom routines. The SEIT works one-on-one, with their student as part of the classroom, and in consultation/collaboration with the teacher.

Once a child turns 5, related services start to focus exclusively on “academic need” and meeting academic goals. P3 or Special Education Teacher Support Services (SETSS) replaces SEIT and is available to support students learning the general education curriculum: reading, writing, math, and science. Most schools have P3/SETSS available in the resource

room where students work one-on-one or in a small group with a certified teacher. As needed, P3/SETSS can be provided at home, after school or on weekends. As students get older and the curriculum becomes more challenging, pull-out sessions in school are less practical. Missing valuable class time counteracts the gains made during tutoring sessions. Finding providers to work “off hours” or willing to travel can be difficult. Enhanced Rate SETSS which offers providers more money, can be approved by the district for a student designated to have a “significant need.”

Speech-language Pathology: Language is how we think and communicate. Words connect us not just with other people but also with our ideas, serving as the basic structure of thought. Thinking and communicating are essentials of learning. A speech therapist is a teacher with a graduate degree in Speech-Language Pathology tasked with teaching language and literacy. Reading, writing, gesturing, listening, and speaking are all types of language. Common skills addressed by speech therapy include:

-Receptive communication are the skills necessary for a student to understand what they hear. These include listening, making sense of what others say, comprehending a story read aloud, following directions, and answering questions.

-Expressive communication are the skills needed to speak. For younger students, this may be adding words to their vocabulary or learning to string together meaningful sentences. By elementary school, most students have accumulated a sufficient bank of words and can speak coherently. At that point, expressive communication skills are about integrating more complex content and students learn to describe their thoughts, talk about their day, and chit chat.

Alternatively, a student may have expressive language but struggle to be understood because words are pronounced poorly or because of trouble projecting their voice and speaking smoothly – a student who stutters, repeats sounds or words, or has long pauses when they talk. Accessing speech therapy to improve quality of articulation is tricky. Some articulation mistakes and stuttering are age-appropriate in preschool, so if referred too early, a student may not qualify as having a “disability.” For older students, sufficient evidence must be provided to show that poor articulation and/or stuttering meets the threshold of affecting “academic performance.”

-Pragmatic Communication is apply-

ing social rules to speech and enables a student to use the words they have to effectively communicate with others. Being able to understand what others think and feel allows students to find effective words to connect and make friends, make needs known, and negotiate everyday conflicts. Research shows that students with language and/or articulation disorders are at risk for difficulty with literacy skills. Grammar, vocabulary, and comprehension are all language skills fundamental to reading and writing. Difficulty producing speech sounds may make it difficult to associate those same sounds with letters, what is called phonemic awareness. Receptive communication skills such as following directions and understanding words and pragmatic communication

to pick up small items, buttoning, handwriting, and cutting.

Sensory processing is the brain’s ability to understand, organize, and react to information it receives from the outside world. Over- or under-sensitivity to sensory experiences like sights, sounds, and movement will cause a student to be irritable, “tuned out,” and/or very distractable. Occupational therapy teaches students to make sensory information manageable, meaningful, and informative, allowing the student to respond appropriately and be successful in everyday tasks.

Executive functioning is necessary for planning, organizing, and completing tasks. It is made up of working memory: the ability to retain information long enough to be used; mental flexibility: the

arate area or therapy gym. The goal is to improve movement and motor control through exercises that focus on strength, range of motion, and/or balance. Pushin physical therapy is when the physical therapist works with a student in the classroom to focus on getting around and managing the physical space of the classroom.

Besides for therapy, what other services does the district offer a student?

Management needs or 504 accommodations are available for “Physical or Mental Impairments” both short- and long-term. These include physical disabilities like a broken leg, health conditions, mental disorders like ADHD, and learning disabilities. Accommodations can be made in the classroom such as preferential seating, extra time or oral administration for tests, assistive devices like tablets or FM units, and transportation to/from school. Paraprofessionals can be assigned to students who require more hands-on support for safety or medical concerns.

Putting it all together

skills like taking other’s perspectives and “reading between the lines” to infer characters’ social-emotional information are essential to understanding meaning and plot. Writing requires expressive communication skills that are even more complex than spoken language. To be understood by a reader, the writer must express ideas in a logical, grammatically correct, and coherent manner, all without the advantages spoken language has like faceto-face feedback from the listener or use of facial expressions and gestures which typically accompany and add meaning to our speech.

Occupational Therapy: An occupational therapist is a medical professional with a graduate degree and training treating clients with difficulty participating in their “occupation.” A child’s “occupation” is playing, learning, and going to school. Occupational therapy therefore addresses a wide range of skills necessary for a child to be successful socially and academically.

Physically, occupational therapists target all things upper body. This includes strength in arms, shoulders, and core and bilateral coordination – using both hands together to perform a task like tying shoes, throwing/catching a ball. Occupational therapists also teach fine-motor skills like using a pincer grasp

ability to easily switch between activities; and self-regulation: the ability to control emotions and impulses. Occupational therapists provide students with strategies to improve these skills as well as practice creating and carrying out plans, staying on task despite distractions, working independently, and organizing and keeping track of assignments and school material.

Counseling: Meeting social, emotional, behavioral, and mental health needs of students is the foundation to effective learning. Counseling services are provided by graduate-level trained licensed social workers and mental health counselors. In counseling, students develop self-knowledge, learn how to think about and interact with others, take responsibility, and make better decisions. Counseling providers also work with teachers to implement positive behavioral supports or a plan of specific strategies to motivate good behavior and minimize problem behavior in the classroom.

Physical Therapy: School-based physical therapy is for students with a physical or functional limitation that restricts learning opportunities and participation in school. A physical therapist is a health specialist with a doctorate in physical therapy. Physical therapy is done during pull-out sessions, in a sep-

Most schools have a disability coordinator or resource room director on staff. If your child already has an IESP, confirm that the school has the most updated form on file. In order to assign providers, the school’s coordinator needs to be aware of which services your child has been approved for. If you believe your child would benefit from extra support and he/she does not have an IEP, the coordinator can give you more information about the referral process. The parent is the one who actually initiates the referral by directly emailing the school district to request an evaluation. In preschool, parents contact the school district where their home is located. After age 5, parents contact the school district where the school is located.

Anticipating challenges and creating a scaffolding of support is the best way to ensure those faces keep smiling throughout the year. Pride in last year’s accomplishments and growth fuels eager anticipation for each new school year. Best wishes to all.

Anticipating challenges and creating a scaffolding of support is the best way to ensure those faces keep smiling throughout the year.

Rebecca Soffer, Ph.D. is chair of psychology at the Touro University Lander College for Arts and Sciences in Flatbush. Dr. Soffer is a licensed Developmental Psychologist with a clinical practice in Long Island, NY.

School of Thought

Welcome Back to School

By Etti Siegel

The summer flew by so fast! Wow! I am so excited to be featured in The Jewish Home again this year. Keep the comments and questions coming.

Did you get away? Did you stay home? Did you work in a camp? Did you get to send your kids to camp while you had a little bit of summer downtime?

Let me tell you about what your children’s rebbeim, morahs, and teachers were doing over the summer. Many were working in camps. Some took the summer off. Hopefully, they all took a little time to recharge their batteries. Rebbeim were able to sit and learn. Regardless of what they were doing during the day, they were never too far from school.

Let me explain.

Torah Umesorah has teachers’ centers in Brooklyn, Chicago, St. Louis, Toronto, Lakewood, Los Angeles, and Manchester, England. And they were full all summer, with teachers creating posters and charts for their classrooms, purchasing ready-made materials and signs, networking with other teachers, and attending in-person and virtual workshops…all to make the coming year even better.

The teacher supply stores were all teeming in August with teachers buying supplies and aids to help their students succeed in class.

I have to believe Dollar Tree has trouble keeping the teacher posters and classroom decorations stocked with all the teachers who shared that they found materials there.

Teachers were networking wherever they were. I saw teachers sharing ideas at the grocery store and on teacher chats and heard that conversations about being a more effective teacher were happening by pools

and in lounge chairs. Conversations were happening among rebbeim before davening, after davening, and on walks home from davening.

I was busy giving workshops all summer; to dedicated and devoted teachers that took off from their summer jobs or traveled in from the bungalow colony they were at, giving up their precious down time to hear about best practices and ways to help students achieve more in school. I coached and gave workshops on Zoom, on the phone, and in-person as arranged by their principals, with teachers all over, including Deal, NJ; Seattle, WA; and South Bend, IN.

I gave a series of Zoom workshops as advertised in these pages, to teachers across the USA, and a teacher in Cleveland offered to help a teacher in Waterbury with ideas she had on the topics raised. Other teachers were eager to share an idea that others were wondering about.

Teachers spent time organizing their materials, retyping, tweaking, and looking for more ideas; and many of these teachers have been teaching for many years and could just teach what they taught and how they taught the year before!

Even teachers who were not recreating their mate -

rials were reflecting on their year. They were asking themselves questions, like What worked in my classroom? What didn’t work? What routines worked? What routine needs an overhaul? What subject area was great this past year? What wasn’t? Why? What do I want to change this upcoming school year for the better?

As you begin the school year, take a moment to think about all our dedicated rebbeim, morahs, teachers and support staff. Think about the enormous love and dedication they have for what they do, how they chose an occupation that is all about reaching children and helping students. They obviously aren’t in it for the money.

Our educators and hard-working principals don’t need our praise, but wouldn’t it be nice to show our children how much we value that dedication? A simple thank you is appreciated; a specific thank you is even nicer. Showing your children the middah of hakaras hatov might give your sons and daughters a deeper appreciation and positively affect their attitude towards learning and school.

Kesiva v’chasima tova,

-Etti

Mrs. Etti Siegel holds an MS in Teaching and Learning/Educational Leadership and brings sound teaching advice to her audiences culled from her over 35 years of teaching and administrative experience. She is an Adjunct at the College of Mount Saint Vincent/Sara Shenirer. She is a coach and educational consultant for Catapult Learning, is a sought-after mentor and workshop presenter around the country, and a popular presenter for Sayan (a teacher-mentoring program), Hidden Sparks, and the Consortium of Jewish Day Schools. She is a frequent contributor to Hamechanech Magazine and The Journal for Jewish Day School leaders. She will be answering your education-based questions and writing articles weekly for The Jewish Home. Mrs. Siegel can be reached at ettisiegel@gmail.com.

I saw teachers sharing ideas at the grocery store and on teacher chats and heard that conversations about being a more effective teacher were happening by pools and in lounge chairs.

Irrigating Friendships

By Miriam Hendeles

This morning, my close friend who is going out of town for a week asked me to water her front lawn while she’s gone. When I heard her request, I must admit I laughed as it wasn’t what I’d expected. I knew this friend was a regular nurturer of her front lawn, and I confess to being greener than her lawn with envy at the perfection of her grass. But somehow, I thought that this friend, who was so thorough at keeping her lawn looking lovely, would only entrust this job to her gardener.

her grass with water so she comes home to a nice green lawn.

While we’re away from our homes, we often ask others to take in our mail, feed the dog or the cat if we have one, or nurture the plants in our homes. All these things take time from our neighbors who are usually happy to do it for us. But there’s something special that I anticipate with watering the grass. While I stand out there in the fresh California air, with the lovely mountains surrounding me and the traffic whizzing by, I’ll know that I’m not only nurturing

grass doesn’t always have to be greener on the other side of the fence. We can help others and help ourselves. It takes a village, and we are not meant to do

things ourselves.

So go, water your lawn, help a friend if you can, and remember to nurture the grass in your lives.

When I asked her why her gardener wasn’t better at the job than I was (I wanted her to know I’m not a professional waterer; our grass manages with the minimal sprinkler system and it’s not as green as hers, alas...), she said he only comes on Wednesdays, and she wanted her grass to stay healthy. OK, fair enough. I was game. She mentioned to me that watering grass has therapeutic value and that really clinched it for me. I now look forward to going daily to her house while she’s gone and spending relaxing time sprinkling

the grass to stay green but I’m also nurturing a friendship.

We cannot do it alone in this world. We need to delegate to others that which we can’t do. Before leaving town, there’s a lot to take care of so that our trip is smooth, but when we have friends who take over, it makes our trip more relaxing, knowing that things are running smoothly while we are gone.

And maybe – just maybe – after I see how lovely her grass stays, I’ll head back to my own lawn and sprinkle some love and water on it as well. Because the

We cannot do it alone in this world.

The K tchen

Real Belgium Waffles

By Naomi Nachman

I made these delicious waffles with my friend Esther Bamberger from Antwerp as a demo on the river cruise I did this past week. I was asked to join the cruise to do cooking demos and social media. The cruise went from Amsterdam to Brugge, Belgium, making stops in beautiful European cities and towns along the way and exploring the Jewish history in each area we visited.

In Belgium, they use pearl sugar in the recipe. Pearl sugar doesn’t dissolve into the batter but holds its shape to give an extra sweet crunch into the waffle. Pearl sugar is also known as nib or hail sugar.

If you can’t get pearl sugar, you can smash some sugar cubes into smaller pieces.

This recipe is made with grams, and we used a digital scale. Scales are the preferred method of professional bakers.

Ingredients

◦ 750 g flour

◦ 270 g lukewarm milk

◦ 70 g fresh yeast diluted in 2 tablespoons warm water

◦ 3 eggs

◦ 2 egg yolks

◦ Pinch kosher salt

◦ 1 tsp vanilla sugar

◦ 400 g butter room temperature

◦ 500 g pearl sugar or smashed sugar cubes

Preparation

Mix all ingredients with electric mixer in a bowl.

Heat the waffle machine and add enough batter to the waffle machine to make your waffles. Close the lid and bake till light golden brown.

Top with your favorite toppings such as fresh cream, ice cream, chocolate syrup, fresh fruit, nuts, etc. sauté pan. Alternately, you can steam them in a bamboo steam basket.

Serve the dumplings with dipping sauce or soy sauce mixed with minced ginger.

www.theaussiegourmet.com or at (516) 295-9669.

Naomi Nachman, the owner of The Aussie Gourmet, caters weekly and Shabbat/ Yom Tov meals for families and individuals within The Five Towns and neighboring communities, with a specialty in Pesach catering. Naomi is a contributing editor to this paper and also produces and hosts her own weekly radio show on the Nachum Segal Network stream called “A Table for Two with Naomi Nachman.” Naomi gives cooking presentations for organizations and private groups throughout the New York/New Jersey Metropolitan area. In addition, Naomi has been a guest host on the QVC TV network and has been featured in cookbooks, magazines as well as other media covering topics related to cuisine preparation and personal chefs. To obtain additional recipes, join The Aussie Gourmet on Facebook or visit Naomi’s blog. Naomi can be reached through her website,

Mind Y ur Business

David Krengel: Be Open and Honest

This column features business insights from a recent “Mind Your Business with Yitzchok Saftlas” radio show. The weekly “Mind Your Business” show –broadcasting since 2015 – features interviews with Fortune 500 executives, business leaders and marketing gurus. Prominent guests include John Sculley, former CEO of Apple and Pepsi; Dick Schulze, founder and Chairman Emeritus of Best Buy; and Beth Comstock, former Vice Chair of GE; among over 400+ senior-level executives and business celebrities. Yitzchok Saftlas, president of Bottom Line Marketing Group, hosts the weekly “Mind Your Business” show, which airs at 10pm every Sunday night on 710 WOR and throughout America on the iHeartRadio Network.

On a recent 710 WOR “Mind Your Business” broadcast, Yitzchok Saftlas (YS) spoke with guest David Krengel (DK), CEO Of YD Wood Floors * * *

YS: Why is it important for a company to be as full service as possible, instead of focusing on a specific area?

DK: When we started YD Wood Floors, we only did installation and finishing, but we bumped into so many issues because we needed to take responsibility on every single piece of the project. When I’m not involved in every area, for example, selling the material that we use, then it’s very hard for me to keep control. We

would have to go and check where the customer bought the material from and why it wasn’t working. So, from then on, we took the approach that whatever we did, we were going to do it 100%. We’re going to bring the right products, so that we can make sure we apply finishes to floors that work. For example, years ago, there was a certain wood, Brazilian Cherry. It was very popular. All the designers wanted to use it. And every single job we did was failing. We couldn’t figure out how to finish with this product and ensure the customer was going to be happy. So, we went back and redid every house. And of course, it took tens of thousands of dollars to figure out what was going on. Eventually, we got to the bottom of it, and we figured out

which product worked and which ones didn’t. Since then, we’ve discontinued all the products from the failing line, and we only work with the product that works. So, when I get calls from customers saying, “We want you to use this company or that company,” we don’t work that way. We are a company that guarantees you that the quality is going to be the best, the finish is going to be the strongest, and that it’s going to last.

You really need to be involved in every aspect to ensure that kind of control.

How important is it to truly listen to every piece of customer feedback?

It’s extremely important to listen to

what the customer has to say, not only after a sale or project is completed, but even before. For example, when I start discussing a new flooring project with a customer, it’s important to become very attentive and listen to what they expect. You need to know exactly what they want and how they want it. Make sure that they get the experience that they asked for, because later, when everything is finished, if you didn’t meet their expectations, they’re going to repeat every sentence from that first conversation back to you. They’ll say, “We told you what we wanted back then. What is this?” That’s why it’s very important to just keep your ears open, and make sure that you listen to everything the customer has to say.

Can you share any stories on the importance of providing great customer service?

I had this customer that gave me a job for a very custom house with very expensive floors, and there were two parts to this job. First, we applied the plywood to the concrete, and then, we attached the wood to the plywood. At the time, we had two different glues that we used – one for plywood and one for hardwood. So, we did the installation, everything was done, and I came to check out the floor. But something felt funny. The whole floor was moving and squeaking. I went into the next room, and I saw that the glue that was supposed to be used for the plywood wasn’t used. Now, I could have kept quiet, walked away, and hoped for the best. But I want to make sure that when the customer moves in, he doesn’t have any problems. So, I called up the customer and I told him, “I have very bad news for you. We need to rip out the floor.” And he said, “OK, just do what you have to do.” So, we redid the whole project. The customer was left extremely impressed with us, and it led to unbelievable growth for us, just because we did the right thing.

What are the most important factors for developing lasting relationships with clients?

To develop a long-term relationship with clients, you must be honest and open. It’s not going to work any other way. You’re going to be pushed to the corner if you say or do something that’s not right. You can’t just treat it like a sale. When you work in flooring, the job doesn’t end once you’ve made the sale. That’s only where the work begins. Once the customer gives you the go-ahead, you have to make sure to deliver 100%. And if there’s a problem that comes up, you must take care of it right away, and you must be open with the client about the issue. You cannot hide it. If you try to hide it, you’re going to be toast. You’re not going to get the next opportunity. You’re not going to get another chance. It’s easy to fail in this business, especially when the competition is so high. That’s why you cannot just sell a floor. You have to sell, but you also have to remain honest and open with the customer – and deliver.

Why is it so important for a CEO to put in the time to research and stay on top of the latest trends?

It’s very important to know what’s going to come next. You need to know

which type of product is going to be the next trend. That means going to trade shows, doing the research, and watching what’s happening in the industry, so you don’t fall behind and continue to sell products that people don’t want anymore. Stay focused. That’s how you win, by staying informed on trends and what works. The flooring industry, for example, is a very complex market. If you go into any local supplier, they’re going to sell you anything that’s on the shelf. There are so many different products that you could choose from, but

will have to deal with, and you must be positive in order to get through it.

How can a CEO balance growing a company, while still remaining involved in every project?

It’s very important to remain involved to some degree. When we go and confirm a sale with any client, customer, developer, contractor, or designer, they expect David Krengel to understand and to be a part of every little aspect of their project. So, when they call me, I need to

that period of time. And when you go to work, you bring your whole focus there. You don’t mix them up. You need to be focused to the fullest wherever you are.

After running your business for over a decade, what would you say is the number one key to your success?

there’s only a few that are going to make the customers happy, while most of them are just going to end up causing problems. The whole idea is that when you do a floor, you want to bring something that’s going to last a very long time. You want to bring something that’s good for each particular environment and belongs in that type of setting. Whether there’s high humidity or low humidity, you have to make sure that you’re going to bring something that’s going to last, or the customer is not going to be happy. If they have to call you with a problem, then the whole job wasn’t worth it. You never want to get to that point.

What is the most important trait for a CEO to have when managing a team?

It’s very important to be positive and confident. Work is hard. It’s not easy to go and knock out a job. That’s why it’s very important to come in with a positive approach and say, “Everything is going to be good, and we will figure everything out.” Things move so quickly. And when things are moving quickly, it’s easy for everything to break down and not go according to plan. You can make a schedule and say, “This is going to be finished in three days,” but by the time that day comes around, so many problems could have come up. This broke. That fell down. He didn’t show up. They didn’t show up. They weren’t ready. There are so many little details that you

be able to inform them right away about what’s going on. That’s why it’s very important to be in the know on each project, every step of the way. This is another place where focusing on developing strong systems comes into play. We used to have so many jobs, but I wasn’t in the know. I was constantly asking, “Who’s going to be ready next? When are we going to need to go to him?” Now that we have a system in place, and I am able to check all of this in advance and see what needs my attention. So, I’m only focused on the projects that are important at the moment. But I always keep space for the relationship aspect of every project, to make sure that I have time for each client, so they feel that they are being serviced, taken care of, and getting David Krengel 100%.

What’s your advice for balancing work and family?

I feel that you have to view work and family as connected. It’s two different zones that you have to focus on, but they’re connected. You have to work hard at work, and you have to work hard at home. And if you do both, then you’re going to grow tremendously. Never, ever give up on either of these two. If you’re leaving one aspect to focus solely on the other, then it’s going to break. When you’re with your family, you need to bring them your entire focus and attention. Because you’re only there for

A very big contributor to our success was setting up systems that helped us grow and execute. We’re primarily wood flooring specialists, but that comes with a lot of other work aside from installation and custom finishes. We have to come in and coordinate during the construction process. We have to be able to coordinate between so many different trades. And of course, the floor still needs to be something that lasts and is very strong. So, in order to get all of that done, you need to have systems in place to help you execute. We used to work jobs that would take us months. And between all the coordination with managers, owners, and developers, we wouldn’t have time for anything else. But we wanted to do more. We didn’t want to be stuck on one project at a time. So, we implemented systems to focus less on the job itself and more on the setup and preparation. This helped us be more proactive in taking care of all the little things that need to get done before a job. Because when you do wood floors, there’s a lot of set-up involved. You basically have to set up a whole shop each time. But when you have these good systems in place that tell you what needs to get done and line everything up, by the time you get the call to come do a new project, everything is ready.

There are so many little details that you will have to deal with, and you must be positive in order to get through it.

Notable Quotes

“Say What?!”

President Biden and many members of the media lecture us incessantly about the injustice of privilege, especially so-called “white privilege.” But to me, that’s like being lectured about gun safety by Alec Baldwin.

– Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) on Fox News

The trial will start three years, one month, and 27 days after the events of January 6, 2021. The trial involving the Boston Marathon bombing began less than two years after the events. The trial involving Zacarias Moussaoui for his role in the September 11 attacks was set to begin one year after the attacks; but due to continuances, appeals, and voluminous discovery, it began roughly four years later.

- Judge Tanya S. Chutkan, who is presiding over Trump’s Washington, D.C. criminal case, comparing the January 6th events during which one Trump supporter was killed to the horrific terrorist attacks of 9/11 and the Boston Marathon bombing

I knew Prigozhin for a very long time, since the early ‘90s. He was a man of complicated fate, and he made serious mistakes in his life, but he achieved the right results. He was a talented person, a talented businessman, he worked not only in our country, and worked with results, but also abroad, in Africa, in particular.

- Vladimir Putin after Yevgeny Prigozhin’s plane crashed two months after his failed short-lived attempted coup against Putin

He was involved there with oil, gas, precious metals and stones. As far as I know, he just returned yesterday from Africa. He met some officials here. But what is quite definite — the head of the Investigative Committee reported to me this morning — is they have already begun a preliminary investigation into this event. And it will be carried out in full, and taken right to the end.

Handsome guy, wonderful guy.

- President Joe Biden when asked about Trump’s mugshot

A death rattle of any democracy is when a sitting president uses that state security apparatus to go after political opponents and cover up lies and crimes committed by himself or his family. Biden is doing that now.

- Former Democrat Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard on Fox News His actions make it clear he believes himself to be not the enforcer of the rule of law but the exception to it. - Ibid.

I don’t find anything even remotely funny about a child, excited to help Mom in the kitchen, looking bewildered, then hurt, then embarrassed because the person they trust more than anyone in the world is cackling into their iPhone camera over the harm they just caused their young child.

- Blog writer Cassandra Stone writing about a strange new TikTok trend in which some parents are filming themselves cracking an egg on their child’s head for laughs and views

It’s not that Israel needs America. America needs Israel.

The failure of Kia and Hyundai to install basic auto-theft prevention technology in these models is sheer negligence, and as a result, a citywide and nationwide crime spree around automobile theft has been unfolding right before our eyes.

- Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley at the first GOP debate

- Chicago’s woke Mayor Brandon Johnson blaming automakers for rampant car theft in his city

There is nothing more racist than to assume the color of someone’s skin dictates something about the content of their viewpoints, which is what Ayanna Pressley peddles to Americans.

- Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy explaining to Politico why he referred to squad member Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), who advocates anti-white views, as one of the new grand wizards of the KKK

I think it is the same spirit to say that I can look at you and based on just your skin color, that I know something about the content of your character, that I know something about the content of the viewpoints that you’re allowed to express. For Ayanna Pressley to tell me because of my skin color I can’t express my views, that is wrong. It is divisive. It is driving hate in this country. This is dividing our country to the breaking point.

- Ibid., on CNN

Going sightseeing is not a must for women.

- A Taliban official explaining a new law banning women from parks in Afghanistan

Conservative firebrand Ann Coulter, in an interview with the New York Times

I don’t think Trump will be the nominee, but you’d really do the country a solid if you could get Democrats to stop indicting him.

-

With Prigozhin’s Death, Putin Projects a Message of Power

By Anton Troianovski and Valerie Hopkins

Just as the news broke Wednesday of the presumed death of mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, President Vladimir Putin of Russia was presiding over a televised World War II anniversary ceremony on a dark stage lit dramatically in red.

He held a moment of silence, flanked by service members in dress uniforms, while a metronome’s beats sounded, like the slow ticking of a clock: Tock. Tock. Tock.

The eerie split screen — the reported fiery demise of the man who launched an armed rebellion in June and the Russian president telegraphing the state’s military might — may have been coincidental. But it underscored the imagery of dominance and power that Putin, 18 months into his full-scale invasion of Ukraine, appears more determined than ever to project.

Prigozhin may have been brutally effective, throwing tens of thousands of his fighters into the maw of the battle for Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine, tying up Ukrainian forces in the process and hobbling Kyiv’s ability to stage a counteroffensive. His internet “troll farm” helped the Kremlin interfere in the

2016 U.S. presidential election, while his mercenary empire helped Russia exert influence across Africa and the Middle East.

But with his June rebellion, Prigozhin threatened something even more sensitive: Putin’s own hold on power. After the crash of Prigozhin’s plane Wednesday, the Kremlin appears to be sending the message that no degree of effectiveness and achievement can protect someone from punishment for violating Putin’s loyalty.

“Everyone’s afraid,” Konstantin Remchukov, a Moscow newspaper editor with ties to the Kremlin, said of the reaction among the Russian elite to the plane crash Wednesday that Western officials theorize was caused by an explosion on board. “It’s just that everyone sees that anything is possible.”

Never before has someone so central to Russia’s ruling establishment been killed in a suspected state-sponsored assassination, said Mikhail Vinogradov, a Moscow political analyst.

“This is a rather harsh precedent,” Vinogradov said, adding that the Kremlin appeared to be doing little to dissuade Russians of the view that it had

sanctioned Prigozhin’s killing. After all, if members of the ruling elite concluded that one of the Putin system’s most powerful players had been killed against the Kremlin’s wishes, it would send a devastating signal of Putin’s loss of control.

Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesperson, said Friday that the suggestion by foreign officials that the Kremlin was behind Prigozhin’s death was an “absolute lie.”

To some, the fact that Prigozhin was able to survive for two months after staging his rebellion was more surprising than the crash of his private jet. In an address to the nation on June 24, as Prigozhin’s forces were marching on Moscow and already in control of a city of a million people in Russia’s southwest, Putin accused the warlord of “betrayal.”

And betrayal, Putin has said previously, is the one act that cannot be forgiven. So when Putin appeared to strike a deal with Prigozhin allowing him to retreat safely to neighboring Belarus, the act struck some Russians as a sign of the president losing control. The view was magnified when photographs surfaced of Prigozhin meeting with African

officials on the sidelines of Putin’s marquee summit with African leaders in St. Petersburg in July.

“After he ‘forgave’ Prigozhin, it was understood by those around him as weakness,” said Alexei Venediktov, who headed the liberal Echo of Moscow radio station before the Kremlin shut it down last year.

Venediktov, in an interview in Moscow on Thursday, argued that Prigozhin’s apparent death had strengthened Putin’s dominance in the Russian political system after the chaos of the rebellion. Now, “Putin has shown his elite,” Venediktov went on, that “any betrayal will be found out.”

U.S. officials are increasingly certain that Prigozhin was killed in Wednesday’s crash and that Putin ordered the assassination. But when it comes to the power dynamics inside Russia’s ruling elite, whether Putin personally ordered the attack may be beside the point: What matters is that Prigozhin suffered a violent death after Putin publicly condemned him.

“He called him a traitor,” Remchukov said. “And that was enough for everyone to see that this person is no

longer invulnerable.”

When Putin broke his silence about the plane crash Thursday, some 24 hours after it happened, he described Prigozhin as a “talented man” with a “complicated fate.” Putin revealed that his personal ties with Prigozhin dated back to the early 1990s, and he acknowledged for the first time that he had personally asked Prigozhin to carry out tasks on his behalf.

“He made some serious mistakes in life, but he also achieved necessary results, for himself and, when I asked him about it, for our common cause,” Putin said.

Prigozhin had long been suspected of acting in the shadows in Putin’s interest while giving the Kremlin plausible deniability. His forces deployed to eastern Ukraine in 2014, back when Putin was stoking a separatist war there while insisting he had nothing to do with it.

But what Putin left unsaid in his brief eulogy of Prigozhin was that by turning against the Russian president after decades of devoted service, Prigozhin may have signed his own death sentence.

On Friday, another longtime confidant of Putin, Alexei Dyumin, issued

a statement that made the message a little clearer. Dyumin, a former bodyguard of Putin who is now the governor of a region south of Moscow, said he had known Prigozhin “as a true patriot, a decisive and fearless man.” He said he mourned the crash’s victims and all Wagner fighters who had died in Ukraine, and added: “You can forgive mistakes and even cowardice, but never betrayal. They were not traitors.”

The apparent subtext was that Prigozhin’s soldiers and commanders were loyal men worthy of respect. But it also hinted at the notion that if Prigozhin himself was a traitor — as Putin had said — then he may have deserved his death.

But Prigozhin’s death also carries risks for the Kremlin. In Ukraine, Wagner was seen as one of Russia’s most effective and brutal fighting forces, exacting and taking enormous casualties in the monthslong battle for the Ukrainian city of Bakhmut.

In Africa, where Prigozhin built a mercenary empire propping up autocrats loyal to Moscow in countries such as Mali and the Central African Republic, it is far from clear whether Wagner will be able to retain its footprint. Wagner’s top military commander, Dmitri Utkin, was listed as a passenger alongside Prigozhin on the plane that crashed, according to Russian authorities.

Abbas Gallyamov, a former speechwriter for Putin who is now a political consultant based in Israel, said the Kremlin was most likely behind the plane crash, and he argued that the risky decision to kill Prigozhin to send a signal of deterrence revealed the president’s fears of losing power.

“To send this signal, Putin decided to risk a bunch of projects,” Gallyamov wrote on social media. “This is important for understanding what his priorities are right now: maintaining power, not external expansion.”

Putin has also long made it clear that he sees his personal interests as inextricable from those of the Russian state. “He believes that if something is important for keeping him in power, then all other concerns are secondary,” said Grigorii Golosov, a professor of political science at the European University at St. Petersburg.

It’s a philosophy that Vyacheslav Volodin, the chair of Russia’s lower house of parliament, summed up simply earlier this year: “As long as there is Putin, there is Russia.”

New York Times

©The

To some, the fact that Prigozhin was able to survive for two months after staging his rebellion was more surprising than the crash of his private jet.

Prigozhin Might Be Gone, But His Ghost Will Haunt Vladimir Putin

By David Ignatius

Yevgeniy Prigozhin appears to be dead. But his ghost might haunt Russian President Vladimir Putin, who denounced him as a traitor and wanted him gone – yet has failed to extinguish Prigozhin’s critique of the Ukraine war.

Prigozhin’s apparent death last Wednesday in the crash of a plane listing him as a passenger clears the stage of an impudent rival to Putin. But this news, and speculation that it was an assassination, will add to the sense among some Russians that the country has reverted to instability mixed with the brutal politics of Stalin’s time.

“Whatever has happened to him, it will be seen by Russian elite as a retaliatory act,” said Tatiana Stanovaya, a well-connected Russia analyst at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. The Kremlin will encourage this sense that Putin has taken revenge, whatever the facts, she says.

“Putin is the ultimate apostle of payback,” CIA Director William J. Burns said last month in an interview with NPR’s Mary Louise Kelly at the Aspen Security Forum. Russians will assume Putin had a role in the crash of the private plane.

If the facts are confirmed, Putin will have consolidated his position in the short run. The man he had accused of “armed mutiny” will be gone. Russian defenses are holding in Ukraine against Kyiv. Putin’s hold on power seems firmer than two months ago, when Prigozhin ordered his Wagner militia to march toward Moscow.

But Putin’s aura of political mastery has been tarnished, perhaps irreparably. He has weathered past storms because of his role as arbiter of Russia’s elites and his reputation for decisiveness. The Prigozhin revolt damaged both; some members of the president’s inner circle are said to share Prigozhin’s critique of Putin’s impulsive invasion of Ukraine, and of his tactics since.

Analysts believe the doubts extend to the Russian security services. Those questions will persist.

After the crash, a few members of Prigozhin’s militia threatened on social media to stage another “march on Moscow.” They don’t have the numbers to deliver on that threat. But the liquidation of Putin’s challenger might fuel Russian political anxiety rather than dampen it.

Russia watchers have noted the widening circle of skepticism within the Russian elite about Putin’s erratic decision-making. The reckless full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 is the most stunning example. But Putin has fumbled in other ways since then: He delayed mobilizing the Russian army long after it became clear the war wouldn’t have a quick ending; he dithered about whether to withdraw troops from potential encirclement last fall in Kherson; and when Prigozhin launched his revolt, Putin took a day to react decisively.

In Aspen, Burns summarized the Rus-

sian public’s reaction to Putin’s indecision after Prigozhin launched his June revolt: “The question was, ‘Does the emperor have no clothes?’ Or at least, ‘Why is it taking so long for him to get dressed?’”

Paradoxically, Putin’s consolidation of power probably reduces the risk of escalation in Ukraine. Last fall, when Russian lines were collapsing in Kharkiv and Kherson, analysts saw a real risk he would use tactical nuclear weapons to avert a catastrophic defeat. Now, that danger is reduced.

China remains crucial for Putin’s military and political survival. For Beijing, too, Prigozhin’s demise might be a confidence-booster. Chinese leaders told U.S. diplomats in recent months that they were concerned about Russia’s staying power in Ukraine, and they prepared a peace plan as a possible exit ramp.

Biden administration officials say China’s help is increasingly important for Russia’s military presence in Ukraine. The

Chinese aren’t directly supplying weapons and ammunition. But they are said to be boosting shipments of dual-use items, such as computer chips, that are essential for precision weapons and drones.

There’s a growing consensus in Washington that Ukrainian troops aren’t likely to punch all the way to the Black Sea this year, the prize that Ukraine seeks in its counteroffensive. But even so, some officials continue to believe Ukraine’s grinding assaults could rock the Russian army, steadily chipping away at its logistics and command-and-control nodes in the rear. Russian lines could prove brittle as Ukraine breaches the first layers of defense.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is also likely to escalate his efforts to bring the war home to Russia, through drone strikes and deniable cross-border assaults.

Prigozhin’s message to Russians was that the war wasn’t worth the terrible cost the nation was paying in blood and treasure. He underlined that by questioning the leadership of Putin’s team and, implicitly, of Putin himself. The Ukraine war was based on a lie, Prigozhin said on June 23, the day before his militia’s march on Moscow. “There was nothing extraordinary happening on the eve of February 24,” the day last year when Russian attacked. “The oligarchic clan that rules Russia needed the war,” he said. “The mentally ill scumbags decided: ‘It’s okay, we’ll throw in a few thousand more Russian men as cannon fodder. They’ll die under artillery fire, but we’ll get what we want.’”

This visceral critique will outlive Prigozhin, and if Ukraine and its Western allies can continue the fight into next year, it might grow more intense.

Prigozhin is not a martyr so much as a warning.

How the U.S. Sees Ukraine’s Push: No Stalemate, But No Breakthrough

By David Ignatius

As Biden administration officials assess Ukraine’s slow progress in this summer’s counteroffensive, they have been candidly discussing with Kyiv what they see as “lessons learned.” The bottom line for the administration is that this war will probably grind into next year – and that the United States and its allies must remain steadfast in helping Ukraine keep pushing forward.

I heard this same sentiment across all levels of the U.S. government in recent days. The summer has been frustrating and, in some ways, disappointing for Ukraine and its Western backers. But rather than look for a quick diplomatic exit ramp, most senior U.S. officials appear more convinced than ever of the need to stand fast with Kyiv. The United States, in their view, cannot be seen to abandon its ally.

“We do not assess that the conflict is a stalemate,” national security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters on Wednesday, during a week when the media reported unnamed senior officials voicing pessimism about Ukraine’s progress. Perhaps hoping to bolster spirits in Kyiv, Sullivan countered: “We are seeing [Ukraine] continue to take territory on a methodical, systematic basis.”

This commitment to continued support doesn’t mean that U.S. officials don’t have criticisms of how Ukrainian commanders have conducted the counteroffensive. They have been offering detailed guidance to their counterparts, often prefaced with a recognition that no currently serving U.S. officer has fought the kind of relentless, brutal, World War I-style of combat that Ukraine has faced.

The starting point in this assessment is that Ukrainian forces aren’t likely to reach the Sea of Azov and cut off Russia’s land route to Crimea before winter sets in, as they had hoped. U.S. officials still think the Ukrainians can significantly breach

Russian positions this year, as they pass beyond Russia’s hardened first and second lines of defense. U.S. officials believe Kyiv’s mobile units could then move quickly east and west, confounding Russian defenders. But Ukraine probably won’t deal any decisive blow before year’s end. That means a continuation of this grueling war into 2024 and beyond, and a continuation of the heavy casualties and emotional trauma for both sides. U.S. officials believe strategic patience remains the best weapon against Russian President Vladimir Putin, who still thinks he can outlast Ukraine and the West.

Pentagon officials have urged their Ukrainian counterparts to prioritize better and concentrate their forces on potential breakout points along the 600-mile front. Ukraine initially placed equal emphasis on three axes, rather than concentrating on the main thrust south through Zaporizhzhia toward the Sea of Azov. Ukraine is said to have responded, finally, by moving some units toward the south from Bakhmut and other areas in the East where, despite U.S. arguments, they had remained entrenched.

American commanders have long believed that the Ukrainians waste artillery fire in crushing barrages that emulate Soviet tactics. By one U.S. estimate, the Ukrainians have fired about 2 million rounds of 155mm artillery ammunition since the war began, nearly exhausting Western stockpiles. U.S. officials urge Ukraine instead to weight its artillery fires toward the most important targets and use them to advance quickly toward their objectives.

Pentagon officials have also urged Ukraine to rely less on drones for battlefield awareness and more on ground reconnaissance forces, which can assess Russian positions better. And they have pressed Kyiv to give junior officers more latitude to exploit opportunities along the sprawling front. On all these points, U.S. officials believe the Ukrainians are responding positively. But the discussion has been prickly in recent weeks.

As Biden administration officials assess the likelihood that the war will continue into next year and perhaps beyond, they’re considering several important new augmentations of Western support. There’s growing backing in Washington for provid-

ing rocket-launched cluster munitions, for example, which could strike deeper than the artillery-fired versions the United States began supplying last month.

The United States is also working hard to plan a Ukrainian “force of the future” that could deter continued Russian aggression. The F-16s that will begin arriving in a few months will be part of that, but U.S. officials are working with allies on many other weapons systems and training.

Ukraine and its supporters continue to plead for long-range missiles, known as ATACMS, that could hit deep behind Russian lines. But the Pentagon continues to resist, largely because officials fear the United States doesn’t have enough ATACMS to supply Ukraine without undercutting its own readiness for any future conflict with China.

With Ukrainian forces stymied on the ground, U.S. officials believe that President Volodymyr Zelensky will take the fight increasingly to Russian territory and occupied Crimea. Friday’s reported Ukrainian attacks – with 42 drones launched at Crimea and a missile aimed at Moscow, according to Russian reports – is a foretaste of what’s ahead. The Biden administration’s position is that it doesn’t encourage or enable Ukrainian attacks on Russian territory, but officials do expect more.

Perhaps the best example in military history of a long bloody fight against a stronger power that ended in eventual victory was the American Revolution. Along the way, there were many periods of demoralization, backbiting, complaints about insufficient foreign support and, occasionally, despair. But the rebels stayed in the field, and the British eventually withdrew.

Ukraine has entered a season of discontent, with recriminations on all sides, because of the sluggish counteroffensive. But this war is far from over.

(c) 2023, Washington Post Writers Group

Which Red Tie Did the Most?

By Guy Trebay

It was the battle of power ties. Red is the Republican Party color. Red was the tone of offense mounted by presidential candidates who came out swinging. And red, of course, is the 800-pound political gorilla who skipped the debate: Donald Trump. With the exception of former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, every Republican in Milwaukee for the first debate of the 2024 presidential campaign wore a red necktie. Most were solid slashes against a crisp white (or in Tim Scott’s case, white-ish blue) shirt and offset by the frame of a

dark blue suit. It was as though Betsy Ross had styled the debate.

For at least some segment of the viewing public, however, the most pressing issue of the day may not have concerned Bidenomics, abortion rights, deregulation or the candidates’ general positions and values. It was not even who might wrest voter attention back from the canniest scene-stealer in American political life. It was whether Ron DeSantis — the governor of Florida and, pre-debate, the stiffest competition Donald Trump faces for the Republican nomination — wears lifts.

Height and hair are often cited as key determinants in how voters view candidates. That’s the folklore, and history suggests it contains a germ of truth. Think of John F. Kennedy’s forelock. Think of George W. Bush’s Texas barbershop special. Think of Bill Clinton’s Arkansas pompadour or even Trump’s preternaturally blond hairdo, a tonsorial confection defying equally comprehension and the laws of physics.

As for DeSantis, his hair looks thick enough to comb with a rake. It is a matinee idol mane, styled perhaps in a manner more “West Side Story” than West Wing, yet projecting potency and vigor, as Samson’s did. In the battle of optics, he has that undeniable asset. So, too, do Vivek Ramaswamy, Doug Burgum (salt-and-pepper version) and Mike Pence. Questions about DeSantis’ height, on the other hand, arose again online as they have since he first threw his hat in the ring.

How did he suddenly level up onstage? What were the debaters standing atop? Absent a camera pullback, the debate stage contenders all appeared to be the same height. When Piers Morgan interviewed DeSantis, the internet lit up about the stature of the governor, who seemed dwarfed by the British television host in their photo op.

Out on the trail, the issue is manageable, as candidates stand on daises or boxes at state fairs or, when they are out pressing the flesh, can be maneuvered out of harm’s way by their handlers. This is hard to do when everyone is arrayed onstage, where it was impossible to know how Vivek Ramaswamy, who has about an inch on Nikki Haley in flats, stood apparently as tall as Chris Christie, a modern colos

sus at 6 feet, 2 inches.

In his long-shot bid for president, Doug Burgum, the governor of North Dakota, has tended to augment his stature (he is 5’9” — the median for American males) by wearing cowboy boots with raked elevated heels. Cowpoke gear reads as populist and distracts potential voters from the uncomfortable reality that Burgum is, in fact, a tech billionaire.

Why does any of this matter? It doesn’t. Or it shouldn’t, considering that no clear science exists to back up the notion that Americans choose their politicians based on height. And yet it is an established fact that a man shorter than the current average height has not been elected president since William McKinley won the 1896 election and that the average U.S. president has been roughly 2 inches taller than the average American man. Jimmy Carter, at 5-9½ inches, was the exception. Carter has been the exception in everything.

Yet in an image-based world, most understand how crucial optics are to political success. The reality is that, for many beyond the chattering classes, the takeaway from Wednesday night’s debate may in the end have much to do with the rhetoric. The group photo after the debate will tell the tale.

“Where we are in the culture right now, it’s the nonverbal communication tools that matter most,” said Lauren Rothman, a political image consultant based in Washington, D.C. “We probably don’t have the sound on. The debate is in the background and we’re seeing you on mute. We may ultimately vote for you based on how you come across in a photograph.”

(© The New York Times)

Ke NNY H OLSONNew York Times

The Eagle Squadrons

By Avi Heiligman

World War II started in September 1939 when Germany invaded Poland, and soon most of Europe was embroiled in the conflict. Outside of Europe, it was a different story as some foreign governments, like the United States, did not want to get involved militarily. The U.S. did send over military aid, but it wasn’t until the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, that the U.S. entered the war. Some Americans did want to fight the Nazis and looked towards other militaries to fight fascism. The Eagle Squadrons were three fighter squadrons comprised of American pilots in the British RAF. They fought in the years before the U.S. joined and were noted for their flying skills and courage during air battles like the Battle of Britain.

While it was illegal for American citizens to fight for a foreign nation at the outbreak of World War II, it still didn’t stop thousands from joining other militaries. Later in the war, a blanket pardon by Congress was issued for these volunteers, and they regained their U.S. citizenship. Charles Sweeney, an American businessman living in England, had organized a Home Guard unit in England and filled the ranks with Americans. He then went to the British Air Ministry and convinced them to form

air units also comprised of Americans. The idea was accepted in July 1940 and soon three Eagle Squadrons were formed, with Sweeney and his uncle doing much of the recruiting. Eagle Squadrons flew British-built planes, and several took part in the vital air Battle of Britain that prevented the Germans from invading Great Britain.

No. 71 Squadron was the first to form and became operational in February 1941. They first flew Hurricanes and

escorts and often fought German fighters over France.

Some of the pilots had amazing stories as they fought against some of the best Luftwaffe (German air force) pilots. In July 1942, pilots from the No. 121 Squadron were escorting bombers when they were attacked by a Messerschmitt Bf-109 fighter plane. The pilot was ace Rudolf Pflanz who had 52 kills to his record. After shooting down one of the Spitfires, No. 121 Squadron caught

One of the first Eagle Squadron pilots, William Dunn, became the first American to achieve the status of ace pilot. The Minneapolis native flew both Hurricanes and Spitfires and shot down five German aircraft while flying for No. 71 Squadron. He described his first aerial victory which was the squadron’s first kill as well: “I jammed the throttle wide open and, attacking the Me-109 from the port quarter, fired one burst of four seconds and three bursts of two seconds each. At about 50 yards…I could see my machine gun bullets striking all over the German’s fuselage and wingroot. Then he began to smoke.”

A few minutes later, another American pilot, Gregory Augustus Daymond, shot down another Me-109 for the squadron’s second victory. Daymond also became an ace pilot and has seven enemy planes shot down to his record.

an early version of the Spitfire before transitioning to an updated model of the Spitfire. No. 121 Squadron formed in May 1941, flew Hurricanes, and was placed on coastal escort duties. The third unit was No. 133 Squadron. It was formed in July 1941 and flew in Hurricanes before switching over to Spitfires. Their main mission was to fly as bomber

up to him and shot him down. The Nazi pilot was killed, and the kill was credited to Eagle Squadron pilot Sergeant William P. Kelly. Kelly was from Saratoga Springs, New York, and was later killed when his own plane was hit by flak. Incredibly, research indicates that this kill was Kelly’s first and only plane he shot down.

The Dieppe Raid on August 19, 1942 was the only time that the three Eagle Squadrons fought together. The raid on the French coast ended in disaster for the Allied ground forces, but the Eagle Squadrons garnered some successes in the air. They shot down nine aircraft but suffered the loss of one of their own in the air battles.

After some research, one of the pilots killed in action was determined to have been Jewish. Flight Lieutenant Andrew

The Dieppe Raid on August 19, 1942 was the only time that the three Eagle Squadrons fought together.

Mamedoff was born in Warsaw in 1912, and his family fled during the Bolshevik Revolution. The family soon settled in Thompson, Connecticut, and after receiving his pilot’s license, he performed at air shows. Sweeney recruited him together with Eugene Tobin and Vernon Keogh to fly for the RAF, and they first joined No. 609 Squadron. On one mission, Mamedoff was flying in the back of the formation over British airspace and his plane was shot full of bullets by

a German plane. He was forced to land but was soon back in action. In September 1940, Mamedoff became a founding member of No. 71 Squadron and in August 1941 became a flight Commander with No. 133 Squadron. Mamedoff was flying his Hurricane on an ordinary flight to Ireland on October 8, 1941, but never made it to his destination. The loss of the plane and pilot was thought to have been due to bad weather, and the wreckage was later recovered.

In September 1942, the Eagle Squadrons were transferred to the Eight Air Force of the U.S. Army Air Forces and flew Spitfires until transferring over to the P-47 Thunderbolts on 1943. Altogether, 244 Americans served with sixteen British pilots in the three squadrons. Eighty-three were killed in combat, and sixteen became prisoners of war. Their record of downing German aircraft was put at 73.5 (a half kill means that it was shared with another

pilot), and many others damaged. The story of the Eagle Squadrons is history not to be forgotten as they bravely fought the Nazis before their own country joined the war.

Avi Heiligman is a weekly contributor to The Jewish Home. He welcomes your comments and suggestions for future columns and can be reached at aviheiligman@gmail.com.

William Dunn in front of his plane. The small crosses indicate aerial victories

Eugene Tobin, Vernon Keough, and Andrew Mamedoff all died in active service

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LAWRENCE

One Bedroom Renovated Apartment

In Prime Lawrence. Efficiency

Kitchen, Renovated Bathroom. Sunken LR, Dining Room, Close to All, Transportation, Shopping, Worship. $275k Mark Lipner Associate Broker Berkshire Hathaway Laffey International 516-298-8457 mlipner@bhhslaffey.com

FAR ROCKAWAY

Beautiful 2 nd floor Condo on Reads Lane, in Far Rockaway Center hall, 1 bedroom, full den, 2 full baths, washer dryer room, total open floor plan of the living room, dining room and kitchen. Floor to ceiling windows. Deck off the kitchen. Phenomenal location, with beautiful view. Asking $599,000. Please email all inquiries to: Shira@bestdevco.com for more details

WOODMERE

Exquisite and expansive 1 Bedroom co-op in Heathcote. Recently renovated. Large foyer, vast Eat-InKitchen. Classic pre-war building with elevator. Private storage room. Don’t miss this opportunity to experience the perfect combination of space, style, and convenience in the most desirable location. Mark Lipner

Associate Broker Berkshire Hathaway Laffey International 516-298-8457

mlipner@bhhslaffey.com

APT./COOP/CONDO SALE APT./COOP/CONDO SALE

HEWLETT

Totally renovated 1 and 2 Bedroom, Apartments with washer/dryer, kitchen with quartz countertops, stainless steel appliances. Recessed lighting, hardwood floors, storage in basement. Close to RR, shopping, and houses of worship. Mark Lipner Associate Broker Berkshire Hathaway Laffey International 516-298-8457 mlipner@bhhslaffey.com

LAWRENCE

1 bedroom apartment, elevator building, eat-in kitchen, full bath, hardwood floors, plenty of closet space. Ceiling fan in bedroom & kitchen, laundry room in the basement. Close to the railroad, shopping, and houses of worship $179k Mark Lipner Associate Broker Berkshire Hathaway Laffey International 516-298-8457 mlipner@bhhslaffey.com

CEDARHURST

1, 2 and 3 bedroom apartments, totally renovated private entrance , central air conditioning, hardwood floors, washer/dryer, garage parking, dishwasher, recessed lighting, private playground, close to railroad, park, shopping and houses of worship. Call for more details

Mark Lipner Associate Broker Berkshire Hathaway Laffey International 516-298-8457  mlipner@bhhslaffey.com

CEDARHURST

Rental Just listed 3 bedroom, 2 full bathroom apartment with spacious rooms, central air conditioning, underground parking, washer/dryer, hardwood floors, recessed lighting, kitchen with refrigerator , microwave, stove and dishwasher, minutes from shopping, transportation restaurants and houses of worship. Mark Lipner Associate Broker Berkshire Hathaway Laffey International 516-298-8457

mlipner@bhhslaffey.com

APT./COOP/CONDO SALE

LAWRENCE

Spacious 2BR, 2 Full Bath Apt with an enclosed terrace in the heart of Lawrence. Well maintained & manicured building. New hardwood floors, updated Eat-in Kitchen with gas stove. warming draw, dishwasher & microwave. New windows on the enclosed terrace & one of the bedrooms. 3 New A/C Units & New Refrigerator. Close to shopping, transportation, library, schools, and houses of worship. $339K Mark Lipner

Associate Broker Berkshire Hathaway Laffey International 516-298-8457 mlipner@bhhslaffey.com

WOODMERE

Well maintained 1 Bedroom apartment. Elevator Building. Pet Friendly, SD#14, Corner Unit, Bright + Sunny, Hardwood Floors, Eat-in Kitchen, Full Bathroom, 3 Closets, 2 Ceiling Fans, 1 A/C Unit, Full Time Super on Premises. Minutes from the Railroad, Shopping, Houses of Worship, and Laundry Room on Premises. Mark Lipner Associate Broker Berkshire Hathaway Laffey International 516-298-8457 • $175K

APT./COOP/CONDO SALE ISRAEL REAL ESTATE

LAWRENCE JUST LISTED

This amazing two-bedroom two full bathroom condo Features a luxurious lifestyle in the beautiful city of Lawrence. What more could you ask for? The building has a 24-hour doorman and elevator access, with a social room, library, washer/dryer inside the unit, and terrace. Plus, the added benefit of having a live-in super to ensure maximum safety and security! And don’t forget about your new kitchen complete with a gas stove, refrigerator, microwave, and even two dishwashers! The living room and dining room are spacious and have recessed lighting installed throughout. Both bedrooms feature lots of closet space for storage. To top it off, there’s even garage parking available to make your life just that much easier! Don’t miss out on this incredible opportunity. Please call for a private showing Mark Lipner Associate Broker Berkshire Hathaway Laffey International 516-298-8457 • mlipner@bhhslaffey.com

APT./COOP/CONDO SALE

LAWRENCE

New to the market Jr. 4 apartment in an elevator building with a terrace and underground parking, laundry on premises. Kitchen with granite countertops, 2 sinks, ss appliances, spacious step down living room with high ceilings, guest room/ office, spacious primary bedroom with 3 closets, full bathroom with full vanity, medicine cabinet, toilet and lighting, custom blinds, near the railroad, shopping and houses of worship.$289K Mark Lipner Associate Broker Berkshire Hathaway Laffey International 516-298-8457 mlipner@bhhslaffey.com

HEWLETT

Spacious and Sundrenched 1st Floor 2 Bedroom, 2 Full Bath Unit In The Incredibly Maintained Garden Town. Updated kitchen with Granite Countertops and Gleaming Hardwood Floors Throughout With A Private Washer/Dryer. Best Views from Every Window And The Large Terrace Facing The Beautifully Landscaped Courtyard. Indoor Parking Available As Well And An I Adjacent Municipal Lot. Convenient To The LIRR, Shops & Restaurants. Maintenance includes all your taxes, heat and water. No more shoveling or gardening for you reduced to $185k Mark Lipner

Associate Broker Berkshire Hathaway Laffey International 516-298-8457

mlipner@bhhslaffey.com

WOODMERE

Totally renovated bright and sunny 1 bedroom corner unit apartment with a washer/dryer. Features quartz countertops, ss appliances, recessed lighting, bathroom with chrome fixtures, close to the railroads, shopping and houses of worship. Call for details Mark Lipner Associate Broker Berkshire Hathaway Laffey International 516-298-8457

mlipner@bhhslaffey.com

LAWRENCE

New to the market Generously sized 1 bedroom 1.5 bathroom coop in an elevator building, with a 24 hour doorman, underground parking, double terrace, central air conditioning, washer/dryer and storage on the floor, eat-in-kitchen, living room and dining room, no steps into the building or to the apartment, minutes from shopping, park, transportation, and houses of worship. $479,000 Mark Lipner

Associate Broker Berkshire Hathaway Laffey International 516-298-8457

mlipner@bhhslaffey.com

RAMAT BEIT SHEMESH G1

*Available this summer in RBSG1*

5 bedroom/4 bathroom (3 full- 1 half) 1st floor • Building w/ an elevator

Quiet street • Close to bussing (local and to Yerushalayim)

Across the street from a few different Shuls

Walking to G1 Mercaz

Available July 12 - Aug 9 with flexibility

For more info WhatsApp 347-831-5128 or call 053-412-7194

HELP WANTED

BOOKKEEPER

Excellent growth potential, Frum environment, Excellent salary & benefits. Email resume to: resumetfs1@gmail.com

JOIN OUR TEAM!

ABA company located in the 5 Towns looking to fill multiple full-time administrative positions Knowledge of Central Reach a plus, but will train the right candidate Great work environment Call 516-670-5374 or Email your resume to: Careers@supportivecareaba.com

SEEKING ELA TEACHER

Teaching position for Gr. 6. Mon.-Thurs., afternoon hours. Far Rockaway/5T area. Great salary, warm, supportive environment. Training in our curriculum is provided. Teachersearch11@gmail.com

5 TOWNS BOYS YESHIVA

Seeking Elem Gen Ed Teachers

Excellent working environment and pay. Only lic/exp need apply. Email resume to yeshivalooking@gmail.com

IMMEDIATE OPENING

ELA teaching position for Gr. 5. Mon.-Thurs., afternoon hours. Far Rockaway/5T area. Competitive salary, warm supportive environment. Teachersearch11@gmail.com

SHEVACH HIGH SCHOOL, the Bais Yaakov High School of Queens, seeks a dynamic, warm, and experienced Limudei Kodesh teacher for Chumash and additional subjects. Full morning hours, Monday through Friday. Please send resume to rwittenstein@shevachhs.org.

HELP WANTED HELP WANTED HELP WANTED HELP WANTED

GIRLS’ HIGH SCHOOL IN QUEENS seeks a full time, experienced clinician (school psychologist, LCSW, LMHC, etc.) to work in conjunction with current school psychologist. Salary commensurate with experience. Please send resumes to rwittenstein@shevachhs.org

A YESHIVA IN QUEENS

is looking for an experienced part/ full time secretary, 2-year-old morah, kindergarten morah, kindergarten morah assistant and Pre-1A English teacher for the 2022-2023 school year. Nice and timely pay. Please email resume to mshelt613@gmail. com or call/text 718-971-9799.

DEVELOPMENT ASSISTANT

A multi-tasker needed for general office work. The ideal candidate is someone who is detail-oriented, responsible, and can take ownership. Looking for someone who is eager to learn, and expand his/her skill set while possessing the ability to work independently and as part of a team. Experience with Excel required. Five Towns location. In-office position only, not remote. Please send resume to 5tpart.timecareer@gmail.com

MDS REGIONAL NURSE

5 Towns area Nursing Home management office seeking a Regional/Corporate level MDS Nurse to work in our office. Must be an RN. Regional experience preferred. 2-3 years MDS experience with good computer skills required. Position is Full Time but Part Time can be considered. Great Shomer Shabbos environment with some remote options as well. Email: officejob2019@gmail.com

SHEVACH HIGH SCHOOL

in Queens is seeking dynamic teachers for the 2023-2024 school year in the General Studies department in English, Maths, and Sciences, some positions will require Masters’ degrees (positions are all in the afternoon).

There are a limited number of openings in the Limudei Kodesh department. Salary commensurate with experience. Resumes welcome. Please send resumes to rwittenstein@shevachhs.org

DELIVERY PERSON NEEDED to deliver Newspaper every Thursday morning to locations in Brooklyn. Must have Minivan or SUV and availability to work consistently every week!

Please e-mail gabe@fivetownsjewishhome.com or call (917) 299-8082

ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT

Local school looking to hire a capable administrative assistant.  Job responsibilities include data entry, database management, assisting the administrator in his daily tasks.   Candidates must be detail-oriented, organized, and have the ability to multi-task.  Prefer full-time but would consider part-time for the right individual. Proficiency in Microsoft Office required. Enjoyable working environment, personal, sick, vacation days offered, Yom Tovim and certain legal holidays off. Salary commensurate with experience. Please email resume to admin@ shoryoshuv.org

YESHIVA OF SOUTH SHORE

Seeking the following positions: Assistant teachers

Learning Center Teacher for ELA and Math, MS Science Teacher

Please send resume to: monika@yoss.org

ESHET CHAYIL BOUTIQUE

Is looking to hire a full time sales lady!  504 Central Ave, Cedarhurst, NY. 10am-6pm Sundays-Thursdays

Please call: 516-612-2797

MISC.

SHMIRAS HALASHON

Text 516-303-3868 with a time slot of your choice to be careful on lashon hara. Be a part of the 1,000 people for klal yisroel!

SEEKING TO RENT

Any Property with Option to buy. Good credit. Cash. Terms$$$$. 212-470-1708

When you hear the name Abraham Maslow, you probably think of his hierarchy of needs: a pyramid, starting with a base of life-sustaining fundamentals like air, food, and water at the bottom, progressing upward through shelter and security, love and belonging, self-esteem, and finally an aspirational triangle of self-actualization at the top. Generations of therapists have made good livings helping clients claw their way up that pyramid, along with figuring out where things like Porsches and Birkin bags belong on its rungs.

Maslow is also known for something called Maslow’s Hammer: a cognitive bias that involves over-reliance on a familiar tool. As Maslow wrote in 1966, “If the only tool you have is a hammer, it is tempting to treat everything as if it were a nail.”

Uncle Sam faces those sorts of biases just like the rest of us. And he’s got a big challenge raising $6 trillion to spend every year. Bake sales won’t do it (although we hear the apple pie is great). Fortunately, he’s got a hammer: taxes. But sometimes, he uses that hammer when maybe a screwdriver or wrench would be a better tool.

Medicare is one of Washington’s most

If I Had a Hammer

By Allan Rolnick, CPA

popular programs. Back in the 1960s, when President Johnson was pushing it through Congress as a cornerstone of his Great Society, opponents attacked it as a step towards socialism. Today, you’ll occasionally see the comic spectacle of straight-faced seniors protesting with signs saying, “Keep Your Government Hands Off My Medicare!”

play ball can face penalty excise taxes up to 1,900%. (Not a misprint.)

What will this mean to the government’s bottom line? The Congressional Budget Office estimated the drug pricing provision would save Medicare $101.8 billion over 10 years. And how much will the excise tax raise? Zero, actually. That’s because companies that balk at Uncle Sam’s

is great and all, but that’s not why Big Pharma is in business.) It takes an average of 10 years and $2 billion to bring a new drug to market. Ultimately, just 12% of drugs that enter clinical trials actually make it to pharmacy shelves. The new pricing rule will squeeze the profits that drug companies say they need to finance researching new treatments for conditions like cancer, Alzheimer’s, and Parkinson’s disease.

The whole debate poses a classic conflict between short-term savings and longterm innovation. More than that, it raises the question of whether taxing a product so much that we run it off the market is an acceptable use of the tax hammer in the first place. Or should Washington just be honest for a change and say, “Our seniors can’t afford to fund the profits you want”?

Unfortunately, Medicare is also expensive. Last year, the program spent $747 billion, including $220 billion on prescription drugs. Naturally, Washington would love to save a buck or two if they can. Last year’s Inflation Reduction Act finally allowed the government to negotiate the price that Medicare will pay for certain prescription drugs. Pharmaceutical companies that don’t

price will just take their drugs off the market. So you can call it a “tax,” if you like. But it’s more like the tax equivalent of a mobster walking into a laboratory and saying, “Nice drug you got there…. Sure would be a shame if anything happened to it.”

Here’s the downside of negotiating drug prices. Drug companies invent new drugs to make money. (Saving lives

As far as we’re concerned, it doesn’t matter why Washington passes new tax laws or how effective they are at shaping our economy. We’re here to help you pay less. Call us with your questions!

Allan J Rolnick is a CPA who has been in practice for over 30 years in Queens, NY. He welcomes your comments and can be reached at 718-896-8715 or at allanjrcpa@aol.com.

But it’s more like the tax equivalent of a mobster walking into a laboratory and saying, “Nice drug you got there…. Sure would be a shame if anything happened to it.”

ROSH HASHANA EDITION

AD DEADLINE: Tuesday, Sept. 12

ON NEWSSTANDS: Thursday, Sept. 14

YOM KIPPUR EDITION

AD DEADLINE: Tuesday, Sept. 19

ON NEWSSTANDS: Thursday, Sept. 21

SUCCOS EDITION

AD DEADLINE: Tuesday, Sept. 26

ON NEWSSTANDS: Thursday, Sept. 28

POST- SUCCOS EDITION

AD DEADLINE: Tuesday, Oct . 10

ON NEWSSTANDS: Thursday, Oct. 12

place

516.734.0858