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The Week In News

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AUGUST 1, 2019 | The Jewish Home

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AUGUST 1, 2019 | The Jewish Home

The Week In News

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The Week In News

AUGUST 1, 2019 | The Jewish Home

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Dear readers, A few weeks ago, my wife was reading our four-year-old a book describing how we all have two voices inside us, one pulling down and one pulling up. It describes in detail the things the yetzer tov says and the things the yetzer hara says. When done, my wife reminded our son to stay in bed, kissed him goodnight, and went into another room.

Sixty seconds later, a little figure appeared next to her. When asked why he was out of bed, he answered, “’Cause I’m listening to my yetzer hara!”

I learned two things: 1. The yetzer hara is already inside us. If we do too good a job describing him, it emboldens him. Perhaps instead we should focus most of our energy describing what the yetzer tov would do.

2. The fifth Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Shalom Dovber, once said, “Just as it is a biblical commandment to put on tefillin every day, so too is it incumbent upon us to spend 30 minutes a day thinking how we can get the children to follow in the ways they are taught.” First, they are taught, and then as parents we need to figure out how to help them follow in these ways.

The simplest way of doing this is by being a living example. If we are an example of what it means to be calm, our children will know the taste of being calm. If we are happy for others, our children will see the beauty of being gracious. If we value learning and study, they will cherish it as well.

A story along these lines is told by Dr. Ira Weiss of Chicago. He was one of the Rebbe’s doctors beginning in 1977. Amongst other things, he says the Rebbe once told him that “just like it’s a mitzvah to put on tefillin, so too is it a mitzvah to drink tea with your wife every day. I do so myself.”

Perhaps that’s the real way. When there’s harmony in the home, and the children see their parents being respectful to each other, they will then want to be a part of it and follow in their ways.

May this Tisha B’av be the first one we will celebrate as a yom tov.

Wishing you a wonderful Shabbos,

Shalom

T H E P R E M I E R J E W I S H N E W S PA P E R H I G H L I G H T I N G L A’ S O R T H O D OX C O M M U N I T Y The Jewish Home is an independent bi-weekly newspaper. Opinions expressed by writers are not neces­sarily the opinions of the publisher or editor. The Jewish Home is not responsible for typographical errors, or for the kashrus of any product or business advertised within. The Jewish Home contains words of Torah. Please treat accordingly.

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Torah Musings The Week In News

AUGUST 1, 2019 | The Jewish Home

What Teens Wished We Knew Part II “When I’m a parent, I’ll never…”

Sarah Pachter

As a teen, I found myself saying, “When I have children, I’ll never _____,” so many times I lost count.

Call it modeling or human nature, as parents most of us end up doing the very things our parents did, including many we swore we never would do. As swiftly as we forget our promises, we also forget what it felt like to be a teenager. Therefore, I interviewed teens across the nation regarding challenges they face. I posed questions on some of the toughest topics relating to parental boundaries, such as friends, dress codes, curfews, and phone usage.

I presented teens with two phrases, asking them to fill in the blanks: I wish my parents _____.

If I were a parent, I would _____.

Their answers were surprising, and I noticed an interesting pattern.

Friends Friends are of utmost importance in this stage of life and can be more influential than parents or teachers. As one child put it, “Your social status is everything.

There literally is nothing else right now.”

One teen bemoaned, “I wish my parents would let me spend more time with my friends.”

When questioned further on the influence of his friends and parental approval, his insight surprised me. “I would give my kids boundaries if I didn’t think their friends were good influences. But I wouldn’t strip them away completely.”

As a child, he wanted total freedom, yet as a potential parent, he agreed he would also set limits.

Dress Code One teenaged girl described how her parents’ rules included wearing skirts at all times, even at a public pool. She lamented, “I wish my parents understood my perspective on religion. We don’t really see eye-to-eye, especially regarding clothing.”

I asked her, “How would you dress if it were completely up to you?”

She answered confidently, “I would wear a bathing suit on vacation by a pool or beach.”

But as a parent, I countered, would she want her daughter to dress in that fashion?

I was utterly shocked to hear her dra-

matic response. “No! Definitely not!” She didn’t have a practical suggestion, but added, “I don’t know a solution, but a little leeway would be nice.”

Curfew One teen mentioned, “I wish my mom wouldn’t text me when I’m out to make sure I’ll be back by a certain time.”

I asked her how she would handle curfew if she were a parent. “I would totally check up on my kid, but at a certain age there should be a level of trust. I would not demand that she come home if I know she is in a safe place. I would make certain places off limits and then trust that my kids hold to that. There are a lot of good places to be, but I would set a reasonable curfew.”

Despite begging for freedom, what teens really want is someone who will care enough to set limits. One described, “Some parents are laissez faire, and they don’t bother parenting at all, it’s…like they don’t care. I’ve seen how the children of these parents turn out and what they do. Most of the time they end up with the wrong crowd and get themselves into trouble because there is no one to tell them no.

My parents do check in and it makes such a big difference.”

I asked her if she thought those kids felt uncared for.

“Oh, for sure! I’ve had someone say to me, ‘I wish my parents were like yours and checked in on me more. Then I’d feel like they actually cared about me or were concerned.’”

Phone Usage A young teen emphatically said, “I just wish my parents would give me a phone!”

His knee-jerk reaction had a reason behind it, as he admitted that he faced social challenges because his parents would not allow him to have an iPhone.

I asked him, “Would you want this phone for unlimited screen-time at all times?”

“No, no, no!” was his genuine response! “I wouldn’t want my parents to change their values at all!” When I asked him to offer a solution, he responded, “A little bit of flexibility would be great.”

One teenage girl even admitted that she didn’t mind her parents checking her

phone. “I think every parent should be doing that.”

Every teen wished their parents gave them more freedom, while simultaneously answering the ‘If I were a parent _____’ phrase with eerily similar boundaries as their own parents. How, then, is it that within moments, teens vacillated between wanting less boundaries to appreciating boundaries?

Solly Hess, who worked exclusively with teens for seven years as a director for NCSY, answers this question beautifully.

“The word ‘no’ is foreign to a teen. By nature, they’re pulling away, rebelling, and disregarding structure or boundaries. One of the greatest challenges I faced when working with unaffiliated students was explaining Shabbat. It can easily be seen as a bunch of NOs and DON’Ts. “Try likening Shabbat to their favorite game, however, and their view changes.

Explain the benefits of staying within the lines, why the structure of Shabbat is so carefully drawn, why the boundaries are so important. Explain that much like the game, the boundaries are there to fully focus you on the experience, that the rules are there to make sure the game works and flows properly. Then they understand structure, they appreciate it, and they recognize how essential it is.”

In a similar vein, every time I asked a teen what they wanted, the answer was invariably more freedom. Yet, when I asked

them to act as though they themselves were a parent, suddenly boundaries became obvious and necessary. Teens actually appreciated boundaries, and when presented with the right perspective, agreed they too would enlist similar boundaries as their parents.

Kids crave structure, and as hard as it is, the word ‘no’ is essential to providing it. They strongly wanted their parents to maintain their values but were also asking for some flexibility within normal reason.

Essentially, the desires of teens are reflective of basic human desire. Hashem bestowed upon us free will—with limitations. Yes, the world is at our fingertips, but how far we can stretch is limited by our physical boundaries. Hashem, our spiritual parent, gifts us freedom within boundaries.

Consider incorporating this concept when parenting our teens. Teenagehood is an emotionally and socially difficult time interspersed with natural rebellion. We can and should stick to our values when negotiating with our teens. We must determine and commit to our limits, while allowing for as much flexibility as possible within that range. Even though teens adamantly feel that boundaries feel restrictive, ultimately, most feel bad for teens whose parents were too carefree. Maybe the phrase “I would never,” really means a sheepish, “Well, I guess I would do that, too.”

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Living with the Times The Week In News

By Rabbi Pinchos Lipschutz

AUGUST 1, 2019 | The Jewish Home

Justice

Publisher of the Yated Ne’eman Back in the day when we were fighting for the life and freedom of Sholom Mordechai Rubashkin, there were those who castigated us for our crusade. They said that he is a criminal, and he was indeed eventually found guilty in a court of law.

“He is a felon,” they wrote. “How can you defend him? He’s a crook. Shame on you.”

We are not into conspiracy theories, but as we were following the story from the beginning, we saw that the hand of justice can at times be crooked. It can be used by people with an agenda to destroy someone who crossed them in one way or another.

We proved that was the case. His lawyers proved that the judge and prosecutors were in collusion, which is a common word these days, but back then, not everyone knew what that meant. Prosecutorial misconduct was proven, as were many oddities, mistakes and open bias in the case.

It was strange to many of us, because we were brought up to respect authority, the law, lawmen and agents of the court.

We didn’t want to believe that the law and those who swore to uphold it had twisted it to destroy a man, his family and his business. There are still people who look down upon him and seek to prevent him from doing what he does, namely, traveling the world to speak about emunah and bitachon and giving chizuk to broken souls.

Last week’s congressional hearings into President Donald Trump and the Special Council who was appointed to investigate him was eye opening even to people who thought they know the game. And while the president is no Rubashkin and the stakes were much higher, the allegations that he colluded with the Russians in order to get himself elected president become more ridiculous by the day.

Democrats still have not gotten over the fact that the political neophyte who had never run for anything beat their prized candidate and was elected president of this great country in 2016. While he was yet a candidate, the FBI - yes, the holy FBI - worked with the Justice Department and the Democrat campaign to concoct a story

that Trump was colluding with Russia and was guilty of other crimes. They sought to entrap people working on his campaign, as they compiled a dossier - whatever that means - of Trump’s alleged criminal and immoral behavior.

From the day he was elected, Democrats have been seeking to chase him from office, thus far to no avail. Working with old hands in the Justice Department, they had a special prosecutor appointed to get to the bottom of the Trump scandals. This man was promoted as the paragon of virtue, the most honest, straight, efficient lawman in the country. He had previously headed the FBI and had wanted to lead it again under Trump. He spent a lifetime in government and was heralded by all as justice incarnate. He was the epitome of wisdom and impartiality.

investigation.

It took someone as brash as Donald Trump to expose the scandal. Most targets of such campaigns capitulate and fear the outcome. The Justice Department wins 97% of its cases, and most often, the defendant pleads guilty rather than face the crush of veteran prosecutors and the FBI. You don’t have to be a supporter of Mr. Trump or his agenda to acknowledge the truth of the legal case against him. Yet, after the national embarrassment of their strawman’s ineptitude played out for the entire country, House Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler, facing a progressive primary opponent of his own, is pursuing his bid for impeachment of the president. He says that Mueller’s testimony clarified in greater detail than ever before that the president should be impeached.

Nadler said this week that the president “richly deserves impeachment. He has done many impeachable offenses; he’s violated the laws six ways from Sunday.” Nadler says with a straight face that Mueller’s report presents “very substantial evidence” that Trump is “guilty of high

We were brought up to respect authority, the law, lawmen and agents of the court.

Democrats thought that somehow, this man, who was not even familiar with the report he himself submitted to Congress, would be able, in live testimony, to hit it out of the park and convince the entire country that Trump is the evil person he has been portrayed to be. From the hearings, they would march him straight to impeachment and then to the guillotine.

But that was when the jig fell apart.

Under questioning by congressmen, he was shown to be slow and confused, with faint knowledge of the facts, doddering, and totally unable to answer the questions posed to him. The more the charade continued, the more it became obvious that the whole investigation and everyone involved in it were a farce. It was an abuse of power propped up by Clinton cronies, from the compilation of the dossier up until and including staffing and the council’s

crimes and misdemeanors.”

The facts don’t count. For two years now, the people have been sold a sham tale of fiction, perpetrated by the power elite and the mainstream media people used to rely on for information.

Such is life in golus. Such is life in the alma d’shikra. It is sad to see that democracy, the vaunted form of government that has been so kind to our people and to hundreds of millions of residents here, is in danger of being taken over by corrupt bureaucrats and socialists. Our people have flourished here like never before, and some have even felt as if the messiah had arrived and brought the Jewish people to this land of plenty.

Rarely has this much corruption been exposed in this country. Never has a major party been taken over by socialists, anti-Semites and haters of Israel.

Reading the news is a reminder that we are in g­ olus and the dangers that this represents. Everything that happens in this world provides a lesson for us in how to conduct ourselves and to seek improvement. Every story in every parsha of the Torah is there to teach us something.

As we are currently in the midst of the Three Weeks, when we mourn the destruction of the Bais Hamikdosh, we must also concentrate on what we are to do to merit its return. With small gestures, we seek to impress upon ourselves the great loss as we aspire to reach the levels of our forefathers with a home for the Shechinah in our world.

Parshas Mattos recounts the voyage of the Jewish people throughout the desert and the stops they made along the way to the Promised Land.

Sifrei Kabbolah and drush are replete with deeper meanings and the significance of each station along Klal Yisroel’s journey through the midbar. They teach that the 42 masa’os correspond to the 42-letter name of Hashem, the holy “Sheim Mem Bais.”

The journey, with its forks, turns, hills and valleys, was necessary to prepare the nation for acquiring Hashem’s land, Eretz Yisroel. As we study the parsha and follow the journey, we must be attuned to the mussar and chizuk encoded here. As we recount the difficult times and the exalted moments, we find direction for the masa’os of our own lives as well.

We know that whatever happens to us in our life is a sentence in an unfolding autobiography. By now, chapters have been completed and many more remain to be written. We forge ahead to our destiny, neither tiring nor being satisfied with past accomplishments, nor becoming bogged down by failure.

None of us knows which of our actions will be the one that earns us eternal life.

Something we say to someone today can have an impact years later. We can’t expect instant success and we must not be deterred by temporary failure.

We have many opportunities to act positively and put things into motion. Just like we invest money and understand that if there will be a payoff it will be sometime in the future, so too, when we invest in spiritual actions, we shouldn’t necessarily expect immediate results. We never know how our actions will turn out, but if we work lesheim Shomayim and give it all we have, we will have written yet another chapter in our book, made the world a better place, and brought us all one step closer to Moshiach and the rebuilding of the Bais Hamikdosh.

A speaker can travel a great distance to deliver a speech. He arrives at the hall and it is desolate; only a few sleepy-eyed people showed up. But if the speech awakens a spark within even one of the attendees, that single person may be inspired to undertake a tremendous project several years later. The reward will accrue to the speaker

Living withIn theNews Times The Week

AUGUST 1, 2019 | The Jewish Home

were battling the Yevonim.

“Der umbakanter soldat, that unknown kohen, was blessed with the calmness of spirit and presence of mind to do what had to be done at the time of great chaos that ensued when the Yevonim broke through the walls. Through his action, in the time of chaos there was oil with which to light

the menorah when the battle ended.”

Regardless of what is going on around us, no matter what our chances are for success, we must always remain calm and act intelligently. We must never lose ourselves and get swept up in the madness of the moment.

Always remain focused on the bigger

picture.

Let us engage in righteousness and charity, so that we help strengthen kedusha and honesty in this world and weaken the koach hatumah, allowing Moshiach to reveal himself and bring about the geulah.

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long after he forgot what he thought was a wasted night.

Adam le’ameil yulad. Man was created with the purpose of exerting himself towards accomplishing a goal. Each of us has to undertake masa’os, trips, toward that destination. Some are smooth rides, others are bumpier. There are many that are filled with “construction sites” and detours. Some people ride in a Cadillac and others in a Fiat 500. Whichever masoh we are on, and whatever type of wheels we roll on, the common denominator is that we have to ensure that we never stop moving forward.

Since the churban, Jews have given of their spirit, blood and tears in a cyclical pattern of death and life. Some years were better, others worse. Sometimes, we have been fortunate, living comfortably and growing productively under the rule of kind masters. In other periods, millions died with the name of the Lord on their lips, alone and together, lined up at forest pits and in ghettos. They died sanctifying Hashem’s name, saying Shema Yisroel.

The chevlei Moshiach swallowed them up, and in their merit we live and prosper in freedom.

The posuk states, “Tzion bemishpot tipodeh veshoveha betzedakah.” Let us seek out and perform true justice, for then we will be redeemed. Know to differentiate between true justice and the fictitious version all too prevalent in our day. We should seek to perform justice, to work to ensure that proper justice is done, that the righteous are rewarded and the wicked punished. Let us not permit the thief to be exalted and the victim faulted.

President Donald Trump exhibits a rare kindness to our people and to Israel. Just this week, on Monday, he freed a religious man from prison who was convicted in a case involving a regulatory minefield.

Most of the trial was spent by his lawyers showing that he could not have known that what he dealt with regulated. In a verdict which justice authorities wrote “represents the worst kind of disproportionate sentence,” the man was found guilty and sentenced to a 20-year sentence. Numerous elected and former officials, along with the Aleph Foundation, reached out to the president and appraised him of the injustice and its repercussions on the man’s family.

The individuals who set out to help this man were mocked by others as wasting their time on a lost cause which nobody would care about. But they persisted anyway. Hashem rewarded their efforts.

Of course, we should appreciate what the president did, using his power to restore life to convict and his family, with no evident benefit for himself. His kindness should be noted and appreciated.

Rav Mordechai Pogramansky repeated that one time while he was in the Kovno Ghetto there was a major commotion and tumult. The city’s rov, Rav Avrohom Dov Kahane Schapiro, turned to him and said that he was jealous of the kohen who hid the jug of olive oil as the Chashmonaim

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The Week In News

Tisha B’Av Schedule

‫בס’’ד‬

Emotional Health

AUGUST 1, 2019 | The Jewish Home

How to Avoid a Spiritual Crash FOR WOMEN ONLY

Rabbi Dov Heller, LMFT

Motzei Shabbos August 10th 8:00pm Fast Begins 9:15pm Maariv/Eicha 10:30pm Rabbi Zechariah Wallerstein How to Survive in These Times of Moshiach

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Silvia, 25, was soaring after her discovery of Judaism in Jerusalem a year ago.

A new world of exciting possibilities had opened up for her. She had never felt so happy in all her life. She had been searching for something real and authentic, and now she was sure she’d found it!

She loved everything about being an observant. The people were so sincere and genuine. Shabbat gave her a deep sense of peace. Although her life had been rough— including her parents’ divorce and a bout of depression—she had a deep sense that she had finally come home to where she belonged. Judaism was something real and stable.

And then Silvia crashed. She started to feel pressured by people and felt smothered by the religious world she had immersed herself in. The prayers started to feel burdensome, and even Shabbat started to feel limiting and not so enjoyable. She started feeling anxious and depressed, old feelings she was quite familiar with, but tried to escape. What was happening? She had been so high, and now she felt so low.

The reason Sylvia crashed is that she lost touch with her feelings and was not being honest with herself. She was high in her head, but her body was in pain. In the beginning of her spiritual journey, she was swept up in the love of all the good people she met. At the same time, when she visited families for Shabbat and saw the beauty of their marriages and families, she started feeling sad. She remembered the happiness she felt as a child when her family was intact before it all fell apart. And then inner security, and her stability, crumbled.

She tried to push these feelings aside, because she was worried that she would get depressed like she had been as a teenager. Unfortunately, bad feelings never go away on their own; they need to be acknowledged, understood, and processed.

After a year of denial, her sadness turned into depression.

Silvia would not have crashed if she had listened to her feelings. If she would have acknowledged her sadness, she could have understood that the intact families she saw reminded her of her own intact

home before the divorce. She could have used this experience as an opportunity to come to grips with her childhood losses and mourn them which would have been healing and free her to move on in life.

Instead, she tried to move on without resolving these issues—but deep inside she knew the truth. The love she experienced in Jerusalem was only a Band-aid covering up a broken heart.

The goal of spiritual growth is to internalize every good idea and behavior.

The Torah teaches this principle saying, “And know this day, and bring it into your heart…” Spiritual growth may begin in our heads, but it must always end internalized in our hearts. Practically, this means facing and integrating our most difficult feelings and emotional struggles.

To achieve this, we must be emotionally honest. When we are not honest, and fail to integrate our bodies and our minds, the two will be in conflict. “A house divided against itself cannot stand.” A person with unresolved inner conflicts stands a good chance of crashing, like Sylvia did.

The problem with listening to our feelings is that it is extremely uncomfortable.

Feelings are messy. We don’t like messes.

It is more comfortable and simpler to stay in our heads and ignore our feelings. This is why so many people avoid dealing with their feelings.

If you are struggling with your spiritual growth, it may well be because you are avoiding facing something painful. Sit quietly for a while and listen to your heart.

It has some important things to tell you.

Ask yourself what am I feeling? What might I be afraid of? Am I running away from some part of myself or some part of my life? Although the process of emotional integration is slow and humbling, it leads to authentic growth and a deep sense of personal satisfaction.

Rabbi Dov Heller is in private practice offering psychotherapy and personal mentoring for individuals and couples. He can be contacted at Dov@ClarityTalk.com. You may also visit his website at www.ClarityTalk.com

AUGUST 1, 2019 | The Jewish Home

The Week In News

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The Week In News

Book Review

AUGUST 1, 2019 | The Jewish Home

The Prophetess

by Evonne Marzouk (Bancroft Press 2019) Reviewed by Rebecca Klempner

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Given the dearth of YA fantasy novels in Jewish literature, I was excited to learn of the upcoming publication of The Prophetess, by Evonne Marzouk. This new novel—more magic realism than fantasy, really—hits all the right YA notes while remaining entrenched in a Jewish worldview.

The Prophetess centers on Rachel, a 17-year-old girl living in contemporary Baltimore. After her grandfather’s death, she develops crippling migraines accompanied flashes of light. It soon becomes apparent to Rachel and to us that these are more than headaches. While under their sway, she catches glimpses of other people, experiencing events in their lives as if she were them.

Zaide’s death brings another change to Rachel’s life: While her grandfather and uncles remained firmly Orthodox, Rachel’s mother left the world of Torah and mitzvos before her marriage. The family keeps kosher in order to please Zaide and make him feel welcome. They attend Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur services at Zaide’s Orthodox shul. However, that’s pretty much the extent of the family’s religious practice. Rachel attends public school, goes to parties with boys, and has a crush on a non-Jewish classmate.

Following Zaide’s death, the family must choose whether to keep their kitchen kosher and whether they will continue to attend Zaide’s synagogue. Rachel and her mother find themselves at odds with her father and her sister, Beth. Rachel begins praying regularly from the children’s prayerbook that Zaide had given her, inscribed with the message, “May she grow into all of her gifts.”

When Rachel and her mother end up at the shul on Yom Kippur, Rachel spots a strange visitor—a visitor who can explain Rachel’s mysterious headaches and visions. Under his tutelage, Rachel unlocks the key to the gifts Zaide always told her she possessed. What follows is a fantastic journey to the Holy Land and back—and then again to the Holy Land.

The world of Jewish publishing has a poor track record with YA novels in general, largely because many of the frum book world’s gatekeepers are concerned with

some of the genre’s conventions. YA books often center on teens’ emerging interest in the opposite sex and their questioning of adult role models and social values. Jewish books with teen protagonists tend to be “aged up” and slid into the adult section, minus many traditional YA internal struggles, or “aged down” into gentler middle-grade or tween fare. This is to the detriment of Jewish teens—as teens often use YA’s on-page psychological struggles to sort out their real-life ones.

Fantasy novels do a little better in Jewish publishing. While references to avodah zarah, necromancy, and divination are largely avoided, portal magic and other sub-genres are acceptable—yet hey have yet to be fully embraced, forcing frum fans of fantasy books to turn to secular books.

While I hesitate to recommend The Prophetess for the small subset of frum readers who do not read any books referring to dating outside the shidduch system, romantic feelings, and so on, I do heartily suggest it to those teens who are already reading YA novels with such content and to adult readers who enjoy YA books. The book is never prurient, contains no foul language (twice, a questionable word is abbreviated to an inoffensive form), and the messages are overall wholesome. My suspicion is that most Jewish YA readers will embrace The Prophetess as a reflection of their heritage and a fun read. It’s scheduled for release in October but is available for pre-order on Amazon right now.

AUGUST 1, 2019 | The Jewish Home

The Week In News

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Feature The Week In News

AUGUST 1, 2019 | The Jewish Home

FROM HOLLYWOOD TO JERUSALEM

BY RIVKAH LAMBERT ADLER

Chana Studley Uses Her Past to Help Others Deal with their Pain

J

erusalem resident Chana Studley’s soft-spoken demeanor belies a dramatic life story. Her life to date has been marked by several divergent, even discordant, phases.

In the 1980s, while still living in the UK, she was a victim of three separate violent personal attacks. The attacks were followed by an intense period of healing and the genesis of a career as a trauma counselor. Parallel to that, she had a 20-year-long career in Hollywood, creating special effects. She and her team won an Academy Award for Best Achievement in Visual Effects 1994 for the movie Babe.

After connecting with her Jewish roots, Studley moved to Jerusalem, opened a wedding dress gemach, taught sewing classes, established a coaching practice, and recently published a novel titled, The Myth of Low Self-Esteem: a novel about PTSD, Hollywood and healing, based on some of her life experiences.

The Journey to Judaism Studley’s childhood memories of Israel consist of a single decorative item.

“I remember there was a plaque in our hallway that my parents had picked up on a trip to Israel,” she recalled. “It

was made from wood from the Mt. of Olives, some touristy thing that said Shalom.”

Her interest in Judaism didn’t begin in earnest until she was an adult.

“Before the age of 30, my connection with Israel was non-existent. I was living in California and searching, which I think a lot of people are doing in LA. They are looking for a career or to marry someone or to become famous.

“For me, a successful career made the internal space feel more empty. I tried yoga and meditation and walking on the beach. I recall going with a friend on a Friday night to ‘a meal and some singing.’ It sparked something in me.

“This was a community that was wonderful and very accepting. I lived on Venice Beach. There’s a shul right on the beach. The community of the beach was so wonderfully accepting. A very friendly, open community who just accepted me,” she said.

Speaking of her first time entering that shul on Venice Beach on Shabbat, she recounted with a laugh, “I walked in, and the first frum woman I met asked, ‘What are you doing for lunch?’

I thought, ‘Why do you care?’

“That woman was Elisa Rubinstein, wife of [the New York-based]

Rabbi YY Rubinstein. She invited me to lunch, and we’ve been good friends ever since.”

Studley’s journey to Jewish observance put an end to her days in Hollywood. “At the time, I was working in Hollywood, doing special effects in movies. I started keeping Shabbat. I couldn’t do that and keep my career, so I gave up my career.”

She had worked as a freelancer in Hollywood but was in high demand.

She helped design wings for a movie star, a lion in George of the Jungle, and a tiger in the movie Dr. Doolittle. She spent hours observing animals so she could produce life-like replicas.

To channel her artistic energies, Studley taught art classes in a Jewish day school in LA for five years. A decision to take a year off and come to Jerusalem to learn Torah at Neve Yerushalayim launched yet another phase of her life. “I was here three months and knew I wanted to stay,” she commented about that pivotal time. She officially made aliyah in 2010.

Looking back on her varied achievements, Studley reflected, “I see that they tie together now. I always thought I had two careers – theater, TV, movies, sewing, wedding dresses [on the one hand] and the counseling and coaching

career [on the other].

“The book has put those altogether, and what I see now is they are all creativity. The day after I finished the book, I printed it out to show a friend.

The next day, I woke up with ideas for three or four new books.

“Before that, the creativity was with my hands. Now its creativity with words. Now it’s coming out in the form of stories. When I’m counseling, I’m often telling stories to help people see the truth about their situation,” she explained.

Trauma Counseling Healing from her own trauma after surviving three violent attacks led to a 30-year career in coaching and counseling people in crisis. Coming to Israel added yet another dimension to that side of her.

“Since I’ve been in Israel, my own personal experience with trauma has become very helpful in helping people here who are suffering for many different reasons,” she noted. Studley trained with United Hatzalah’s psycho-trauma and crisis unit and got certified with the World Health Organization.

“Israel is one of the first countries to have psycho-trauma units attached to first responders. The person first re-

Feature The Week In News

AUGUST 1, 2019 | The Jewish Home

Photo credit Nefesh B’Nefesh

sponders help might need psycho-trauma stabilizing,” she explained.

Her work helps stabilize victims of domestic violence or construction accidents, witnesses to terrorist attacks and sometimes first responders themselves, in the moment of trauma.

Her work with United Hatzalah is also preventative. “If someone gets help immediately, they are 80% less likely to get PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) afterwards. We’re now training people all over the world with techniques that were developed here.”

Elaborating on her position as a trauma counselor, Studley explained that trauma means different things to different people. “Depending on your level of consciousness, that will determine how you respond. A first responder is trained to cope with high stress. Someone else might be traumatized by something minor. We’re always processing everything through our thinking. That’s how you’re going to experience life.”

By way of explanation, she told this story.

“I was in the Old City of Jerusalem.

A friend was visiting from New York for the first time so I took him to the Ramparts Walk. There was a European couple ahead of us. They were stuck between a turnstile and a padlocked gate.

“The woman collapsed in terror to her knees. Her eyes rolled back in her head. She started shaking and sank down to the floor. I was able to hold onto her by the arms and assure her

that she was going to be okay.

“Her husband was fine. This is a really good example of how trauma is completely relative to your thinking and not dependent on the outside situation.”

She offered another story to illustrate the same point. A previous client “had a fear of needles and needed a medical treatment that required a lot of injections. She was experiencing thoughts about the injections. It wasn’t

the injections. It was her thoughts about needles.

“It’s not the actual thing. It’s our thoughts about the thing [that are causing us pain]. That’s why we’re always feeling our thinking. Even if my actual circumstances are fine at the moment.”

These stories illustrate one of Studley’s chief points when she works with clients. “It’s almost natural to blame the outside circumstances,” she said.

“If I have a belief that my discomfort comes from someone else’s actions, then I’m at the mercy of the world or other people. If I can see that I’m really only ever experiencing my thinking, there is some freedom available to not be a victim of my circumstances.”

Studley elaborated on her work with a woman who had experienced a terrible trauma. The client told her that other therapists “have been torturing me for 10 years, getting me to relive and describe what happened to me.”

Studley took a different approach.

“I didn’t ask her about her traumatic experience. I don’t want people to get

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Feature The Week In News

drawn into the content of what happened. [I help them] understand that right here, right now [they are] okay.

[They are] only experiencing thoughts about what happened to [them]. That [awareness] brings freedom from what happened in the past.”

Another strategy she employs uses an analogy of a department store to teach her clients to how to slow their thinking down.

“We have different level of consciousness available at any time. In a department store, there are different levels. First floor, lots of natural light and open spaces. In the basement, there are housewares and garden equipment. Below that, it’s trash and broken mannequins.

“Low thinking is when my thinking is in the basement, where it’s dark and hard to make good decisions.” She encourages her clients to “keep going up on the elevator. From the roof, there’s a café, a view of the beach, fresh air.

It’s possible to see the bigger picture and easier to make good decisions. “[Like when you’re] in the basement, your thinking is speeded up when you’re anxious. [When your ] thinking slows down, there is more chance for peace, intuition and wisdom. Good things can come when your thinking slows down.

“I teach people how to slow their thinking down so they can find their own answers. Slower thinking has wisdom for their own answer to come through.”

The Myth of Low Self-Esteem The Myth of Low Self-Esteem is an unusual title for a novel. It’s also one of the organizing principles of Stud-

AUGUST 1, 2019 | The Jewish Home

ley’s counseling and coaching practice and a main theme of the novel.

“As a Jew, I believe that everyone is a pure neshama. When people talk about their low self-esteem, they are usually talking about their thinking.

The [essential thought that] you can never be broken or damaged. Once we understand this, we are able to change our thinking,” she elaborated.

To illustrate this point, she used the analogy of dirty Shabbat candlesticks.

“Silver candlesticks are still beautiful under the dust and wax. Similarly, we can never really be damaged.”

Her book, The Myth of Low Self-Es-

all human experience happens.”

Studley mentioned Sydney Banks, founder of the Three Principles, who was one of her most influential teachers. “My favorite quote from Sidney Banks is, ‘If everybody learned not to be afraid of their own experience, that alone would change the world.’

“Even if you’ve never experienced trauma, or low self-esteem, everyone has problems. Those thoughts can be scary. Your heart beats a little faster.

That makes you feel not so good. It’s a vicious cycle.

“Anxious thinking shakes up the snow globe. It can be a phone bill. Or

“WHERE I AM NOW, LIVING A TORAH LIFE IN JERUSALEM, IS MUCH MORE REAL.” teem, started out as a self-help book.

According to Studley, in that format, “it was way too preachy and teachy. I suddenly woke up with the idea that if I turned it into a story, the characters could do the journey. It seemed more accessible.”

Early reaction to the novel, “has been amazing. For me, it’s been a great experience because people know me as someone who is creative with my hands. People who know me are surprised to see I’ve written something.

“The response has also been great because self-esteem and trauma touches so many people. Hopefully people can read [the book] and learn from the stories. It’s describing how

carpool. [These things] keep shaking up the snow globe. Now put the snow globe down. The glitter will settle naturally on its own.

“Hashem gave us this ability to heal ourselves and also our minds. We are naturally made to heal ourselves. [We can learn to] not be afraid of the scary thoughts, to tell ourselves, ‘I know they are going to pass.’ All storms pass. That’s why I think [the message of this book] applies to anyone, whatever their circumstances are.”

Even though the book was just published in December, she has already had readers report that it has helped them understand their own thinking. “People get helped just from reading the book,” she reported.

Others readers, inspired by her approach, want to work directly with her.

Studley works face-to-face with people in Jerusalem or by Skype worldwide. Some clients grasp the core idea in just one session. For others, it might take a while.

“Change can happen overnight,” she noted. She works to remind her clients that “the terrible things that happened in the past aren’t happening anymore. They are only experiencing their thoughts about the situation.

They learn not to be afraid of the experience. Their flashbacks come less and less often.”

She’s already planning a few more books, using the same storytelling approach. “The stories for the next few books are situations where there is a lot of misinformation. By turning them into novels, I will make the information more accessible.”

Studley is currently at work on a novel about ADHD and drug company corruption. “I’m loving writing and watching it unfold before me,” she noted.

In the future, she plans to write a novel about back pain. “Since my attacks, I had back pain for 20 years.

Pain comes from stress. 99.9% of the time it’s coming from stress. Stress is caused by thoughts.

“Thinking is so powerful. When I was in a place of thinking like a victim, I had back pain. [Recognizing that thoughts] are internal and under my control, my back feels stronger today than when I was a teenager. My pain went away.

“Back pain can be fixed without need surgery or medications. This is information people need to hear,” she stated emphatically.

Looking back on her journey from Hollywood to Jerusalem, Studley reflected, “In many ways I’m very grateful for the experience. I got paid good money to fly around the world and meet interesting and challenging people. I got to dance with John Travolta!

“It’s so clear to me now how much an illusion it all is. You’re only as good as your last project. It’s very easy to get sucked up in that. People value themselves by what car you’re driving or who you know. There is a lot of backstabbing, which comes from fear, because it’s very competitive.

“I got sucked up into it too. One of the stories I told myself in the book was that I would be successful if my name would be on the movie poster.

I wanted my name on the poster. I made that criteria up and then measured myself against it. That’s how we set ourselves up for failure. We create a story and then measure ourselves against a story we made up.

“Where I am now, living a Torah life in Jerusalem, is much more real.

The values I have now seem true and real to me. It’s not stories. It’s real.

Volunteering for Hatzalah and working with lone soldiers are real, and I value them so much more.”

The Week In News

AUGUST 1, 2019 | The Jewish Home

The Week In News

Massive Gold Heist in Brazil A group of armed men made off with at least $40 million worth of gold in a daring heist in Brazil’s main airport last week.

The eight men had driven up to the cargo terminal at Sao Paulo-Guarulhos International Airport in two SUVs made to look like those used by the country’s federal police. After arriving at the terminal, at least four heavily armed and masked men entered the warehouse where the gold was being held.

The criminals can then be seen on CCTV footage using a forklift to load the cargo onto their vehicles. After taking the logistics manager and another employee hostage, the thieves drove off with 1,650 pounds of gold.

The SUVs were later found abandoned in a crime-infested neighborhood near the airport after the men ditched them for getaway cars. No shots were fired during the raid, and on one was injured.

Police believe that the audacious heist was an inside job and are investigating airport employees who would have known where the precious metals were being stored. The night before the heist, the group kidnapped the manager from the Brinks security company responsible

for guarding the cargo and forced him to reveal information about where it was being stored.

“The crime was perpetrated by a well-organized gang,” said police chief João Carlos Miguel Hueb “This certainly wasn’t their first robbery.”

Since the robbery on July 25, police have been able to arrest three people in connection to the heist. One of them, an airport cargo supervisor, initially claimed he had been kidnapped by the bandits.

They have not yet found the gold.

Thousands Arrested in Moscow Civil Unrest More than a thousand people were arrested in Moscow on Saturday as the massive civil protests in the Russian capital refuse to die down.

Protesters are angry at a decision by Moscow’s electoral body to bar several opposition candidates from contending in the race for city council in September.

The protests had been called by opposition leader Alexander Navalny, who was subsequently jailed for a month as a result.

Throughout the day, policemen decked out in full riot gear battled the estimated 20,000 protesters in the heart of Moscow.

Chanting “We love Russia! They love money!” demonstrators were hauled off to waiting police vans and taken in for questioning. By the end of the day, more than 1,300 citizens had been arrested for their part in the unrest.

According to a local legal aid group, 150 of the detainees remained in custody while the rest were released. A number of Russian opposition leaders were also arrested throughout the day, such as oppo-

sition candidate Dmitry Gudkov, who was arrested while visiting prisoners in Moscow.

The U.S. Embassy in Moscow slammed the Moscow council for the “use of disproportionate police force,” while Russian human rights groups accused police of being overly brutal towards demonstrators.

Moscow residents have been infuriated ever since a slew of prominent opposition politicians were banned from running for city council in September. The electoral body had disqualified several of the signatures the politicians had collected out of the 5,000 needed to run and then banned them from contention for not having enough signatures.

Finland: The World’s Happiest Country

Austria.

Israel fell out of the top 10 this year to take 13th place, behind Costa Rica and Australia. Israel traditionally performs well on the happiness index and came in at an even better 11th place the year before.

Meanwhile, bottoming out on the list at No. 156 was war-ravaged South Sudan, a country suffering from rampant poverty and desolation. The other nations in the lower ten are also torn apart by constant violence, including Syria (149), Yemen (151), and Afghanistan (154).

The seventh World Happiness Report was published in conjunction with the United Nations in honor of the International Day of Happiness. In the report, countries are ranked based on six variables that make up well-being: income, freedom, trust, healthy life expectancy, social support, and generosity.

“The top 10 countries tend to rank high in all six variables, as well as emotional measures of well-being,” notes economics researcher and report co-author John Helliwell.

Libya Mourns Those Killed in Shipwreck Finland is still the world’s happiest country, as the northern European country heads the World Happiness Index for the second straight year.

Coming in second was Finland’s Scandinavian neighbor, Denmark, followed by Norway, Iceland and The Netherlands.

Rounding out the top 10 were additional cold and mountainous nations such as Switzerland, Sweden, Canada, and

At least 140 Libyans died this past week after their ship capsized in the Mediterranean Sea. The ship had departed from the port city of Al Khoms on Wednesday and was packed with over 400 migrants who had hoped to reach Europe. Ninety minutes into the journey, however, the crew radioed for help after the craft began to capsize for reasons that remain unknown.

Following frantic rescue efforts by international organizations, the Libya Office

250,000 People Joined Last Year, 500,000 People Expected This Year For “Tu B’av Together” - The Global Day Of Tefillah For Shidduchim Initiative By Yad L’achim Last year over a quarter a million people gathered together at one moment across the globe to daven for all who need shidduchim. Many were helped. It’s happening again.

On Tu B’Av - Friday, August 16th, at 10:00 a.m. EST, (7am LA Time) thousands of Jews from around the world will unite in tefillah for all the singles in Klal Yisrael.

Tu B’Av has become synonymous with tefillah for Shidduchim. The Gemara writes in Maseches Taanis: “There have never been such good days for Klal Yisrael like Tu B’Av and Yom Kippur.”

For the third year in a row, with the blessings and encouragement of Gedolei Yisrael, Yad L’Achim is launching “Tu B’Av Together,” a global day of tefillah.

A minyan of talmidei chachamim, messengers of Yad L’Achim, will be davening in Amuka, the resting place of the

holy Tanna Yonasan Ben Uziel on Tu B’Av for all who submit their names to Yad L’Achim. As usual, there is no minimum donation required to submit names for tefillah through Yad L’Achim, ever. (visit tubav.org) While the talmidei chachamim will be davening for several hours, at exactly 10:00 a.m. EST (5 p.m. in Eretz Yisrael) they will lead the global tefillah for shidduchim. The following kapitlach (chapters) will be recited ,‫ פ»ב‬,›‫ ע‬,‫ ל»ח‬,‫ל»ב‬ ‫ קכ»ד‬,‫( קכ»א‬Psalms 32, 38, 70, 82, 121, 124). For those few minutes, the cries and heartfelt tefillah of the Jewish People around the world will beseech our Heavenly Father on behalf of all those who seek their bashert.

Thousands of Yidden from around the world will unite in tefillah at the very same moment so that all singles find their zivug hagun b’karov. Yad L’Achim is

launching this worldwide initiative as a merit all the singles to find their bashert and specifically for the women and young adults rescued from the Arab Villages that they may marry bnei Torah.

The success of “TU B’AV TOGETHER” is dependent on you! Here are several ways you can help make it a success; Gather a group of friends and or family to recite the kapitlach on Tu B’Av morning, download the tehillim from our website and distribute it Send the name of the website www.TubavTogether.com to friends and family, so that they can download the Tehillim as well as submit their names for tefillah for free!

- On TUBAVTOGETHER.COM Watch videos of Rabbis, YY Jacobson, Zecharia Wallerstein, Eli Mansour, Yisroel Majeski, David Ashear and much more.

Submit the names of all your friends

and family that need shidduchim (remember, there is no minimum donation required to submit names) Send us an email at tubav@yadlachim.org and we will send you updates as well as info to pass along to others.

Yad L’Achim has set up an informative website specifically for this momentous occasion , simply visit WWW. TUBAVTOGETHER.COM where people can sign up to receive updates and submit names for tefillah in Amuka if they wish (FOR FREE)! You can also make an optional donation to assist Yad L’Achim in rescuing Jewish women and children trapped in Arab villages, the great mitzvah of Pidyon Shvuyim.

For further information, call Yad L’Achim at 1-866-923-5224 or visit www.TUBAVTOGETHER.COM

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The Week In News of the International Organization for Migrants (IOM) announced that at least 140 of the passengers are dead, while another 145 had been rescued.

Libyan authorities buried the bodies of 46 migrants on Sunday.

United Nations Secretary General AntónioGuterres tweeted that he was “horrified” by the tragedy and added that the high death toll showed the need for “safe, legal routes for migrants and refugees.”

Libya is a popular exit point for African and Middle Eastern refugees who hope to reach European shores. Yet the trip is often hazardous due to the unsafe boats used by smugglers which often lead to tragedies such as the one that occurred this past week.

Since January, over 600 people have drowned trying to reach Europe via the Mediterranean. 2019 will likely be the sixth consecutive year with more than 1,000 deaths on the high seas.

France: Hands Off Our Wine Last week, French President Emmanuel Macron officially signed into law a bill that allows the French government to levy special taxes on certain revenues that large American tech companies such as Google, Amazon, Facebook and Apple earn in France. U.S. President Donald Trump, incensed by the levies, has threatened to impose retaliatory tariffs on French wines.

“They shouldn’t have done this,” Trump said Friday, speaking to reporters.

“I told them, I said, ‘Don’t do it because if you do it, I’m going to tax your wine.’”

Trump, who does not drink alcoholic beverages, still likes American wines better than French ones.

“I’ve always liked American wines better than French wines — even though I don’t drink wine,” he said. “I just like the way they look, okay?”

French Agriculture Minister Didier Guillaume shot back at the U.S. president on Tuesday. “It’s absurd, in terms of

AUGUST 1, 2019 | The Jewish Home

having a political and economic debate, to say that ‘if you tax the GAFAs, I’ll tax wine.’ It’s completely moronic,” he said on France’s BFM Television.

He added a crucial distinction. “American wine is not better than French wine,” Guillaume asserted.

GAFA is the acronym by which the new tax law is known in France — Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple. It would impose a 3 percent tax on certain revenues these firms earn in France on the grounds that they were paying insufficient income taxes.

Supreme Court ruling in 2018 requiring Japanese corporations to compensate former wartime laborers.

Tensions between both countries has risen as a result, with South Korean citizens launching boycotts on Japanese products. Tourism between the two nations also slumped, with South Korean travel agencies scrapping the once-popular vacation packages to neighboring Japan.

Tree Planting Marathon

Japan-Korea Trade War Heats Up

The trade war between Japan and South Korea is heating up after Tokyo announced curb exports to its neighbor.

Earlier this week, Japan decided to remove South Korea from a “white list” of countries that are granted preferential trade status. The 27 trusted export countries on the list have an easier time exporting their products by getting Japanese deferments from much of the approval process.

Yet with South Korea being left off the list, Seoul will now need to get approval for every contract it signs with Japanese companies, something that often takes as much as 90 days. The length of time and the extra bureaucratic hassle has left South Korea fuming over the immense economic damage it will suffer due to the inability to purchase Japanese products for its thriving tech sector.

“If restrictions remain, Korean chipmakers’ production lines and therefore global semiconductor supply chains are likely to be disrupted. Korean chipmakers are major actors in global semiconductor supply chains,” wrote Fitch Ratings in a report regarding the standoff.

Tokyo has invoked national security concerns to justify its decision to clamp down on the products it exports to South Korea. Yet Seoul has rejected Japan’s worries of sensitive technology being used for weapons as out of hand and argues that the new measure is punishment for a Korean

On Monday, Ethiopia planted more than 353 million trees in 12 hours, which officials believe is a world record.

The marathon tree planting was part of a wider reforestation campaign named “Green Legacy,” spearheaded by the country’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed.

Millions of Ethiopians across the country were invited to take part in the challenge and within the first six hours, Ahmed tweeted that around 150 million trees had been planted.

“We’re halfway to our goal,” he announced and encouraged Ethiopians to “build on the momentum in the remaining hours.” After the 12-hour period ended, the prime minister took to Twitter again to announce that Ethiopia not only met its “collective #GreenLegacy goal,” but exceeded it.

A total of 353,633,660 tree seedlings had been planted, the country’s minster for innovation and technology, Getahun Mekuria, tweeted.

Monday’s challenge had encouraged citizens in Africa’s second most populous nation to plant 200 million trees in one day. In 2017, India set the world record when around 1.5 million volunteers planted 66 million in 12 hours.

Ethiopia plans to keep on planting.

Its ultimate goal is to plant 4 billion trees during the “rainy season,” between May and October.

According to Farm Africa, an organization working on reforestation efforts

in East Africa and helping farmers out of poverty, less than %4 of Ethiopia’s land is forested, compared to around %30 at the end of the 19th century. The landlocked country is also suffering from the effects of climate crisis, with land degradation, soil erosion, deforestation, and recurrent droughts and flooding exacerbated by agriculture. Eighty percent of Ethiopia’s population depends on agriculture as a livelihood.

In 2017, Ethiopia joined more than 20 other African nations in pledging to restore 100 million hectares of land as part of the African Forest Landscape Restoration Initiative.

A recent study estimated that restoring the world’s lost forests could remove two thirds of all the planet-warming carbon that is in the atmosphere because of human activity. The study, carried out by researchers at Swiss university ETH Zurich, calculated that restoring degraded forests all over the world could capture about 205 billion tons of carbon in total.

Global carbon emissions are around 10 billion tons per year.

Israel Conducts Arrow Missile Test in U.S.

Israel conducted a successful test of its Arrow anti-ballistic missile system in a joint test together with the United States at an Alaskan air base last week.

The advanced Arrow-3 successfully brought down ballistic missiles three separate times, including taking down one outside of the Earth’s atmosphere. The tests occurred over a 10-day period at Pacific Spaceport Complex-Alaska (PSCA) in Kodiak, Alaska, the first time Israel has tested the missile defense system outside

Press Release: Experience Ohr Naava this Tisha B’av through Its Live Stream In just a few days, Jewish people across the world will once again mourn 2000 years of unfathomable loss and devastation—felt more acutely than ever in the past tragic weeks.

As always, Ohr Naava is offering an extraordinary full night and day program on site, which is also view able online via

LIVE STREAM. Our team has invested significant resources in acquiring a premium internet connection to assure seamless viewing.

In the past, you’ve experienced the power of Tisha B’Av with Ohr Naava. Join us again this year as we transform a dreary day of hunger and lethargy into a transcen-

dent 24 hours packed with depth, meaning, and change.

To ensure you can view the event as soon as it begins, get a ticket now and receive your customized link.

To view the complete schedule, go to http://ohrnaava.squarespace.com/tisha-bav-schedule/. To purchase tickets,

visit https://www.ohrnaava.com/tishabav/ tickets To sponsor one of the shiurim and earn a part in the profound zechus, email info@ ohrnaava.com.

We hope you will join us in our quest to make this Tisha B’Av the last. https://www.ohrnaava.com/tishabav/

The Week In News

AUGUST 1, 2019 | The Jewish Home

of its borders.

Defense Ministry personnel said that Israel was forced to perform the tests in remote Alaska due to the inability to fire off long-range missiles in the Middle East as a result of the region’s sensitivity. Following the tests, which mimicked Iranian ballistic missiles, Israeli rocket scientists cleared the system to be fully operational.

“Ten challenging years of development have culminated in this moment: the Arrow 3 weapon system completed a test campaign, during which an Arrow 3 interceptor completed full interception of the target,” said Moshe Patel, who heads the Israel Missile Defense Organization.

“In addition, the fact that the tests were conducted in Alaska, tens of thousands of kilometers away from Israel, is another significant achievement that demonstrates the operational capabilities of the Arrow 3 system to successfully face any threat.”

News of the highly classified test first started filtering out in Israel over the weekend amid reports that Ron Dermer, who serves as Israel’s Ambassador to the United States, had made a secret trip to Alaska. The military censor originally banned Israeli media outlets from publishing additional information regarding Dermer’s Alaska trip but said that it constituted “an additional and significant upgrade in the security coordination with the U.S. against Iran.”

The successful interceptions were first officially announced by Prime Minister Netanyahu at a cabinet meeting on Sunday, who showed ministers and U.S. Ambassador David Friedman a video of the tests. “They were successful beyond any imagination,” exulted the prime minister.

“The Arrow 3 – with complete success – intercepted ballistic missiles beyond the atmosphere at unprecedented altitudes and speeds.”

The missile launch comes amid reports of tensions that Iran had tested a long range Shihab-3 missile on Friday, the latest launch of the missile that has an estimated range of 1,000 kilometers.

According to reports, the test was conducted near the Iranian capital of Tehran and was the result of months of preparation. The test was part of Iran’s efforts to improve the accuracy and range of its missiles despite contravening U.S. Security Council resolutions which ban such tests.

A day later, an Iranian military official insisted that the test was for “defensive needs” only. Speaking with Iran’s Fars news agency, the officer said that “the missile power of the Islamic Republic is entirely defensive, and is not against any country, and only to respond to possible aggression against the country’s territorial integrity.”

Abbas: PA Will Cut Off Ties with Israel Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman Mahmoud Abbas recently announced that the Palestinians would stop honoring

agreements they had with Israel following the demolition of illegal Arab houses in Jerusalem.

Abbas said that a committee would be set up to implement the decision of the PLO Central Council to totally cut off ties with the Jewish State. Senior advisor Omar al-Ghoul added that “President Abbas’s remarks also include security coordination” with Israel, including suspending operations against the Hamas terror group Speaking at a leadership meeting he convened in Ramallah, Abbas described Israel’s demolitions of the illegally built residential buildings in Jerusalem as “ethnic cleansing and a crime against human-

ity.”

“We will not give in to the dictates and the illegitimate occupation policy, especially in Jerusalem,” said Abbas, adding that “our hands were extended to a just, comprehensive and lasting peace, but we cannot surrender to the occupation. There is no peace, security and stability in the region without our people accepting all their rights, ending the occupation and establishing our independent state.”

Abbas was referring to Israel’s demolitions of 12 illegally-built multi-story buildings in the southern Jerusalem neighborhood of Sur Baher. The structures were constructed without a permit next to the

security barrier, which separates Judea and Samaria from pre-1967 Israel. Due to their prominent location that overlooks the barrier, Israeli defense officials classified them as a security threat that could be used to smuggle terrorists into Israel.

The demolitions came after a multiyear legal challenge by Palestinian and human rights groups and only ended after the Supreme Court gave the final approval earlier this year. The destruction of the buildings has resulted in significant civil unrest throughout Jerusalem, with daily riots breaking out in various flashpoints over the past week.

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The Week In News

UN Passes More Anti-Israel Resolutions The United Nations (UN) passed a pair of anti-Israel resolutions last week, including one that lambasted the Jewish State for its treatment of women.

Both decisions dealt with what it called “the Israeli occupation of Palestinian” and its acts against the Palestinian people.

In an overwhelming 40-2 vote with nine absentions, the UN Economic and Social Council’s “situation of and assistance to Palestinian women” resolution singled out Israel for brutalizing Arab women. According to the decision, the Israeli occupation remains a major obstacle for Palestinian women and girls with regard to the “fulfillment of their rights.”

The decision concluded by demanding that Israel “immediately cease all measures contrary to international law, as well as discriminatory legislation, policies and actions in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem.”

Supporters of the resolution included Iran, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and Pakistan, who – ironically – frequently come under international criticism for refusing to honor women’s basic rights.

In another resolution, the UN blamed “Israel’s occupation of Palestinian and Syrian lands” for the suffering of the Palestinian and Syrian people. According to a UN press release, the resolution “reaffirmed the inalienable right of the Palestinian people and the Arab population in the occupied Syrian Golan to all their natural and economic resources” and called on Israel “to immediately cease its exploitation of natural resources and its dumping of waste materials in the occupied areas.”

The decision passed by a wide margin of 45 in favor, 2 opposed, and 4 abstentions.

Criticizing the pair of anti-Israel decisions was former U.S. Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley. “It amazes me how the U.N. condones votes like these,” Haley tweeted. “It is a total mockery of human rights to allow Saudi Arabia, Iran, Pakistan, and Yemen to name Israel as the world’s only violator of women’s rights.”

New Right Unites with Other Parties

The New Right reached a deal on Monday with the Jewish Home and National Union parties for a joint run in the upcoming elections in September.

The united slate will be headed by former Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked, who switched with Naftali Bennett as the lead-

AUGUST 1, 2019 | The Jewish Home

er of the New Right last week. The move makes Shaked the only woman to currently head a political party in Israel as well as the first time that a Religious Zionist party will be headed by a secular politician.

Following Shaked on the Knesset list is Education Minister and Jewish Home leader Rabbi Rafi Peretz, while third place goes to National Union head Bezalel Smotrich. After ceding the leadership role to Shaked, Bennett is a distant fourth.

The alliance will be named the United Right and will remain together until after the elections on September 17. As soon as the final ballots are counted, the New Right is expected to split off to become an independent bloc while the Jewish Home and National Union will stay together.

In addition, all three parties agreed to support Prime Minister Netanyahu as prime minister, despite the reluctance of Bennett and Shaked to commit to such a move. The union notably left out the farright Otzma Yehudit party and the libertarian Zehut, raising fears that the two parties will waste crucial right-wing votes by failing to cross the electoral threshold.

The union came after marathon negotiations between the parties and only saw progress after Peretz agreed to step down as the leader of the Knesset list in favor of Shaked. Peretz had vigorously opposed Shaked heading the union in the past due to claims that a secular person should not lead a party that is committed to observance of Jewish law.

UNWRA Head Accused of Corruption

A confidential report by the UN Refugee Agency’s ethics committee into the goings-on at the United Nations Refugee Works Administration (UNWRA) has exposed wide-reaching corruption inside of the organization.

The report, which was leaked to the Al-Jazeera television network, has extremely unfavorable conclusions and harshly criticizes the NGO’s top officials as corrupt. The list of compromised officials includes UNRWA Commissioner-General Pierre Krahenbuhl, former Deputy Commissioner-General Sandra Mitchell, and Chief of Staff Hakam Shahwan.

According to the report, the aforementioned officials are responsible for an “abuse of authority for personal gain, to suppress legitimate dissent and to otherwise achieve their personal objectives.”

The report singled out Krahenbuhl for

being the cause of the widespread corruption and accused him of neglecting his administrative duties in order to travel around the world on the agency’s dime.

Krahenbuhl also allegedly hired and promoted personal friends and ruled with a lack of accountability, leading the report to recommend that he be removed from his position.

Officials also used UNRWA’s recent cash flow crisis caused by reduced U.S. aid to “concentrate decision-making power” and “disregard agency rules and … procedures.”

The organization, which represents the Palestinians in the Middle East, has been criticized for years by Israel for collaborating with terror organizations such as Hamas. Earlier this year, former Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat launched an initiative to remove UNWRA schools from East Jerusalem after studies showed that the curriculum taught by the agency was heavily skewed against Israel.

Israel Hits Iranian Targets in Iraq Israel has expanded its operations against Iranian targets to Iraq, where Air Force jets have struck twice in ten days, a report said on Tuesday.

Israel commonly conducts strikes in Syrian territory, targeting Iranian missile shipments meant for the Lebanese terror group Hezbollah to use against the Jewish state, but strikes in Iraq by Israel have not been reported since the 1981 bombing of a nuclear reactor.

Asharq Al-Awsat, an Arabic-language newspaper published in London, cited Western diplomatic sources as saying that an Israeli F-35 plane was behind a July 19 strike on a rocket depot in a Shiite militia base north of Baghdad. The IDF has not commented on the report.

The Saudi-based al-Arabiya network reported at the time that members of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps and Hezbollah had been killed in the strike.

It said the base had received Iranian ballistic missiles, which had been hidden inside trucks, shortly before the strike. The strike was carried out by an unmanned drone. Two Iranians were wounded in the strike; one was killed.

Asharq Al-Awsat also said that Israel was behind another strike in Iraq carried out on Sunday at Camp Ashraf, the former headquarters of the exiled People’s Mujahedin of Iran, located 40 kilometers northeast of Baghdad and 80 kilometers from the Iranian border. That strike targeted Iranian advisers and a ballistic missile shipment, the report cited sources as saying.

The report also mentioned a strike in Syria last week blamed on Israel, in which nine were killed including six Iranians fighting for the Syrian regime, claiming it was meant to prevent Iran from taking over a strategic hill in the Daraa province in the country’s south. Israeli missiles tar-

geted “military positions and intelligence facilities belonging to Iran and [pro-Iranian] militias” in the southern provinces of Daraa and Quneitra early on Wednesday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at the time. The other three killed in the strike were pro-regime Syrian fighters.

Israel has carried out hundreds of airstrikes in Syria since the beginning of the conflict in 2011, targeting Iranian and Hezbollah forces in the country, as well as those loyal to the Assad regime, as part of a stated policy to prevent arms transfers to Hezbollah in Lebanon and the entrenchment of Iranian military forces across from Israel’s northern border.

Regional Cooperation Minister Tzachi Hanegbi boasted last week that Israel is the only country in the world that has been “killing Iranians.”

In a speech to the UN General Assembly last September, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned that “Israel will do whatever it must do to defend itself against Iran’s aggression. We will continue to act against you in Syria. We will act against you in Lebanon. We will act against you in Iraq. We will act against you whenever and wherever we must act to defend our state and defend our people.”

Muhammad Most Popular Baby Name in Israel According to a report released by the Central Bureau of Statistics on Tuesday, the name Muhammad is the most common name in Israel overall and especially among Muslim boys. Among Muslim girls the most common name was Miriam with 523 girls named in 2018.

The most popular baby name in Israel in 2018 among Jewish boys was David, given to some 1,447 newborns. Ariel was second on the list, given to 1,323 children, two percent of which were Jewish boys.

The most common name among Jewish girls for the third year in a row was Tamar, given to 1,289 girls in 2018. The name Noa dropped to fourth most popular and Maya rose to second.

The names Ayala, Abigail, Arbel, Ophir, Carmel, Shai-Lee, Aviv, Omer, Gefen, Levi, Hallel, Halali, Mayall, Ariel, Anhal, Emmanuel and Tohar rose in popularity from 2000 to 2018, as well as the names Aria, Miley, Mila, Emily, Romi, Liv, Lenny, Alma, Emma, Eve, Gaia and Ann. The name Maya was especially common in Kiryat Ono and Kiryat Motzkin and was given to 6.0% of girls born in each of these areas. Maya was also most common in Beer Sheva, Givatayim, Hod Hasharon, Herzliya, Haifa, Kfar Saba, Modi’in, Nahariya, Netanya, Petah Tikva, Rosh HaAyin, Rishon Lezion, Ramat Gan, Ramat Hasharon, Raanana and Tel Aviv.

AUGUST 1, 2019 | The Jewish Home

The Week In News

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