The May 10 Edition of New York Jewish Life

Don’t Lecture Nassau Families About County Taxes, Government or Politics

Gov. Cuomo’s Liberty Defense Project Takes a Stand for Immigrants

For New York City Teachers Applying for Tenure, Success Remains Far from Assured

VOL. 1, NO. 10 | MAY 10 – 16, 2017 | NEWS THAT MATTERS TO JEWISH COMMUNITIES IN THE NEW YORK CITY METROPOLITAN AREA | NYJLIFE.COM | FREE

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Publisher’s Note

I’ve been involved in Nassau County politics and government for 17 years, and I’m constantly learning about our neighbor to the immediate east. It’s just a few quick steps from Queens to Nassau, but it might as well be hundreds of miles away. Proximity breeds comfort, but it’s a false familiarity with ongoing consequences in Mineola, the county seat; in New York City Hall; and in Albany.

I was, many years ago, deputy counsel, and then chief of staff, of the Nassau County Legislature. I’ve coordinated successful state Senate campaigns there, and lost a significant one. I’m not sure what I was thinking, but there was a time when I supervised the successful re-election campaigns of an entire Nassau legislative majority. I stay in regular touch with reporters and columnists from Newsday, Long Island’s daily paper of record, and had a role in many big stories about Nassau politics.

I regularly meet with candidates and public officials in diners throughout the county. Nassau synagogues, JCCs, nonprofits and personalities are all already regular features in New York Jewish Life.

All of which is to say that I’m not a tourist out there. The credentials matter because I’ve been proselytizing, to anyone who will listen, about the vast gulf in understanding between New York City and Nassau County. We haven’t yet gotten to the point where people are avoiding me, but that time is getting close.

Here’s what I’ve learned: New York City residents, and particularly New York City public officials and politicians, have no appreciation of how much Nassau County families pay in property taxes, and how that impacts pretty much everything.

A family can own a Victorian mansion in Brooklyn’s Ditmas Park, bought recently for over $1.5 million, or decades ago for a couple of hundred thousand dollars, and be paying less than $8,000 a year in property taxes.

A family on Nassau County’s North or South Shore, in a home assessed at less than half the above Brooklyn home, can be paying $30,000 in property taxes. Middle Nassau County numbers are lower, but just by a bit. These are conservative numbers, as city condos in luxury high-rises, with development abatements, can be worth $2.5 million with 10 years of minimal property tax bills, and many Nassau homes have taxes north of $40,000 annually.

While it is true that New York City has an income tax while Nassau County does not, and city properties are more regularly and accurately assessed, the disparity in tax bills is startling.

Property taxes may be how local Nassau schools (and most everything else) are funded, and there is less stress about where children go to middle and high schools, but it’s still a lot of money.

Nassau County parents are trapped, especially when their adult children move out. While there is much written about the delayed adulthoods of college graduates moving back in with Mom and Dad, there still comes a time when the nest becomes empty. Your kids are no longer in school, but you are still paying exorbitant tax bills. Unlike in New York City, where artificially low residentialproperty taxes are supplemented by commercial property taxes, an income tax and the vast wealth created by Wall Street, the Nassau burden remains on homeowners regardless of whether they’re still using the schools.

And never forget that many in Nassau County pay bills for schools they never use, because their children are in yeshivas. So these families, clustered in the Five Towns, Great Neck, Roslyn, Port Washington, Woodbury and Jericho, pay double and pay dearly.

The housing stock gets tight, because empty-nesters are loath to sell their homes, so prices and assessments go up and taxes go up more. Younger families have to move farther east—out into Suffolk County—or north, past Westchester into the Hudson Valley.

They pay high property taxes as well, and they have a commute. Anger and frustration grows. Populist votes ensue.

All the while, New York City politicians thunder on about affluent suburban voters, never really appreciating the stressful reality of those just beyond their urban borders.

This disconnect fuels bad policy in Albany, with city legislators driving discussions that make no sense for Long Island. Whether about state aid to local government or relief for tuitionpaying families, Nassau County needs are different from traditional urban needs.

Which brings us to a second political truth: Don’t lecture Nassau families about county taxes, government or politics. Those who do so come across as condescending, and no productive conversation can come of it.

What I learned working in government, reinforced by working in Long Island politics, is that Nassau families know about the shape of their government economics. They understand the dangers posed by mismanagement and bloated patronage payrolls. They know it can be better without overlapping public offices. But this is the system they return to office again. Whatever problems there are in public finances, they are comfortable paying out of their own pockets for supplemental education services, sports teams, civic associations, volunteer fire departments and landscaping. They are happy to pay for services that benefit their neighborhood.

For years, candidates at all levels of government have attacked finances managed by the Nassau County executive and town supervisors, usually with little success. To my mind, and there are lessons to be learned for statewide and national campaigns in the Trump era, this comes across as insulting the voters. Nassau County voters know what they’re deciding on.

Calling them wrong—in campaigns and in policy discussions afterwards—gets nothing done.

News that matters to Jewish communities in the New York City metropolitan area

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CANDLE LIGHTING

Friday, May 12 Candles: 7:46 p.m.

Shabbat Ends: 8:54 p.m.

Friday, May 19 Candles: 7:52 p.m.

Shabbat Ends: 8:59 p.m.

Michael Tobman, Publisher

MAY 10 – 16, 2017 | NYJLIFE.COM | 3

SCHUMER IN THE NEWS

BY STAFF

In this weekly feature, NYJL typically highlights a specific news item about or related to the senior Senator from New York. This week our editorial team decided to show you the best of Senator Chuck Schumer’s social media feed.

From the political to the politic, enjoy NYJL’s curation of Senator Schumer’s Twitter and Instagram feeds.

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BDSWatch

Bernie Sanders Just Defended Israel on Al Jazeera.

Here’s Why That’s a Big Deal.

BY RON KAMPEAS

WASHINGTON (JTA) – In an appearance on Al Jazeera, Bernie Sanders defended Israel’s right to exist, rejected BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) as a tactic and assailed the United Nations for singling out the country for condemnation.

The Vermont senator’s interview last Wednesday on the Qatar-based network, known for its often hypercritical coverage of Israel, was consistent with a style that Americans came to know last year during his run for the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination: Sanders does not modify his messaging for his audience.

Sanders, despite his defeat in the primaries to Hillary Clinton, who went on to lose to Donald Trump, remains the standard-bearer of the American left. His robust rejection of the BDS movement is evidence that a firewall remains among elected officials on the American left against more radical expressions of Israel criticism that have gained traction overseas.

The interviewer, Dena Takruri, challenged Sanders for joining every other U.S. senator last month in signing a letter to U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres urging him to remedy the body’s “anti-Israel agenda.”

Takruri asked why Sanders was “effectively trying to shield [Israel] from criticism.”

Sanders interrupted, “No, no, no, no, no, I don’t accept that,” saying that “there are many problems with Israel” and he would continue to “be critical of a lot of what Israel does.”

“On the other hand, to see Israel attacked over and over again for human rights violations which may be true, when you have countries like Saudi Arabia or Syria, Saudi Arabia—I’m not quite sure if a woman can even drive a car today,” Sanders said.

“So I think the thrust of that letter is not to say that Israel does not have human rights issues — it does — but to say how come it’s only Israel when you have other countries where women are treated as thirdclass citizens, where in Egypt, I don’t know how many thousands of people now lingering in jail, so that’s the point of that, not to defend Israel but to say why only Israel, you want to talk about human rights, let’s talk about human rights,” he said.

Asked by Takruri whether he “respected” BDS as

and I have my doubts about parts of the Palestinian leadership as well.”

Sanders, the first Jewish candidate to win majorparty nominating contests, was critical of conventional pro-Israel postures during the campaign, but also defended the state.

He told MSNBC last year that anti-Semitism was a factor driving the BDS movement, yet in a debate in the New York primary—with its critical mass of Jewish voters—Sanders chided Clinton for barely mentioning Palestinians in her speech earlier the same year to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee.

During the campaign, he hired as his Jewish outreach staffer Simone Zimmerman, who founded I f No t No w, which protests mainstream U.S. Jewish silence on Israel’s occupation.

Although Sanders fired Zimmerman after her vulgar postings about Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu came to light, the very hiring Bernie Sanders speaking to a crowd of supporters at a Democratic unity rally in Salt Lake City, Utah, April 21, 2017 was a signal that there GEORGE FREY/GETTY IMAGES was now a political home for young Jews who embraced the a legitimate nonviolent protest movement, Sanders idea of Israel but were willing to robustly protest its said, “No, I don’t.” The senator suggested in his reply government’s actions. that the tactic was counterproductive as a means of Sanders also named prominent Israel critics to bringing the sides to peace talks. the Democratic Platform Drafting Committee, yet “People will do what they want to do, but I think our when their Israel-critical language was rejected, he job as a nation is to do everything humanly possible to nonetheless robustly endorsed the platform because bring Israel and the Palestinians and the entire Middle it met his other demands on economic inequality. He East to the degree that we can together, but no, I’m described himself at a meeting in New York’s Harlem not a supporter of that,” he said. neighborhood as a “strong defender of Israel” and for “What must be done is that the United States the first time spoke warmly about the time he spent in of America is to have a Middle East policy which is Israel in the 1960s on a kibbutz. even-handed, which does not simply supply endless Democrats in recent years have grown increasingly amounts of money, of military support to Israel, but critical of Israel, a result in part of the difficult which treats both sides with respect and dignity and relationship between Netanyahu and President does our best to bring them to the table.”

Barack Obama, and the fraught tone of the debate in Sanders also rejected Takruri’s assertion that the 2015 over the Iran nuclear agreement. two-state solution is almost dead and said he would But the tense tone of the Al Jazeera interview not embrace a one-state solution. and Sanders’ refusal to accept anti-Israel pieties “I think if that happens, then that would be the commonplace among progressives here and overseas end of the state of Israel and I support Israel’s right suggests the resistance among Democrats to more to exist,” he said. “I think if there is the political will radical expressions of Israel criticism. Democratic to make it happen and if there is good faith on both lawmakers, for instance, continue to join Republicans sides I do think it’s possible, and I think there has not in overwhelmingly approving anti-BDS legislation on been good faith, certainly on this Israeli government the state and federal levels.

MAY 10 – 16, 2017 | NYJLIFE.COM | 5

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JEWS AND BREWS? YES! THE NYC MEETUP GROUP “JEWS AND BREWS” REACHES 1,000 TH MEMBER

BY STAFF

The Jews and Brews NYC meetup group was started in January 2014 as a way for young Jewish professionals to meets others with a similar background in a relaxed setting. Beginning with 20 people at its first event, the group’s popularity has grown tremendously as it plans to celebrate its 1,000th member at its May meetup event on Tues., May 23, at popular NYC beer bar Beer Authority, located at 300 W. 40th St. Jews and Brews NYC was founded

by Rebecca Dauer, a recent transplant from the Boston area, as a way to meet new friends in a new city. The group brings together Jewish people from all over New York and New Jersey, whether they are seeking friendships, romantic partners, business contacts, or just a venue in which to hang out and have fun with their peers—and they do it over their love of beer.

“New York can be a lonely place for some,” Dauer said. “We provide an outlet for Jewish professionals that didn’t exist before, in a fun and friendly environment. I really get a sense of pride when I see our members hanging out outside the group with friends

they made here, or some of our single members start dating and enter into a relationship. I can’t believe how much this group has grown in just over three years!”

Each month, the meetup group picks a local bar or brewery that has a vast and unique selection of beers, and it hosts its events there. But that’s not all the group does; Jews and Brews NYC has hosted Shabbat dinners, planned wine-tastings, attended ballgames and even participated in philanthropic causes. The group has volunteered in a soup kitchen and held fundraisers, including one for Jewish War veterans during the week of Veterans Day. It has been recognized as a terrific source for meeting new Jewish professionals as its group leaders and event organizers make introductions.

If you are interested in joining and attending its next event—where Jews and Brews NYC will be celebrating Jewish Heritage Month and its 1,000th He-Brew/She-Brew—please sign up as a member by going to the following site: https://www.meetup.com/ Jews-and-Brews-NYC/.

MAY 10 – 16, 2017 | NYJLIFE.COM | 7

Emmanuel Macron Wins French Election, but Marine Le Pen Wins Legitimacy

BY CNAAN LIPHSHIZ

(JTA) — Emmanuel Macron, the 39-year-old former investment banker and political centrist, handily defeated the far-right nationalist Marine Le Pen in France’s presidential election. Exit polls showed Macron winning Sunday’s vote by a margin of 65 percent to 34 percent.

Although her bid to lead the country failed, Le Pen’s divisive campaign against Macron achieved some of the goals that her supporters have sought for years.

Going mainstream

Under Le Pen, the National Front went from being a fringe movement with no real shot at achieving power to a veritable contender. Her percentage of votes was by far the party’s best electoral performance since its establishment in the 1970s.

While the support may diminish over the next five years, the National Front is now indubitably a major political power and a legitimate choice in the eyes of a third of the electorate.

Le Pen referenced this during an interview Friday, saying, “We moved everything. We have changed everything already.”

The transition came with a personal price for Le Pen, who had a public falling-out with her father and mentor, Jean-Marie, the National Front’s founder.

Convicted multiple times for Holocaust denial and incitement of racial hatred against Jews, the elder Le Pen is a hero to the hardcore of the French ultra-right for his apparent disregard both for his country’s laws against hate speech and his rhetoric’s political cost.

Since taking over the leadership of the National Front in 2011, Marine Le Pen has worked to rehabilitate the party’s public image by distancing it from the racist rhetoric favored by her father.

Jean-Marie Le Pen lost control of the party to a new generation of National Front politicians, led by his daughter, who viewed his provocations as an impediment to contending for power. In 2015, Marine Le Pen removed her father and dozens of other politicians who made anti-Semitic remarks from the party.

Still, Le Pen has remained the far-right’s go-to candidate thanks to her insistence on a ban on Jewish and Muslim religious symbols and ritual slaughter,

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and on immigration by Muslims, among other discriminatory policies.

Jean-Marie Le Pen had to go because he “personifies the ultra-right that does not seek to reach power” in a form of “self-destruction,” Florian Philippot, a National Front vice president and ally of Marine Le Pen, said in a 2015 interview.

Philippot may have been overstating things — in the 2002 presidential elections, the party attracted a respectable 18 percent of the vote. Still, Marine Le Pen has clearly taken National Front to a new level of acceptability while retaining the spirit of its founding mission.

Isolating minorities

The communal representatives of French Jews and Muslims mobilized almost without exception for Macron. In both communities, even members of the clergy abandoned their carefully cultivated nonpartisanship in an unusual effort, the likes of which had not been seen in at least 15 years.

On Friday, French Chief Rabbi Haim Korsia coauthored, with the president of the Protestant Federation of France and a Muslim faith leader, a statement endorsing Macron. Tellingly, the Catholic Church of France, by far the largest Christian denomination in the country, sat out the declaration.

“Fully aware that our roles require us to be nonpartisan,” the three clergymen wrote, “peace supersedes all other things and only a vote for Emmanuel Macron guarantees” it.

The rare statement followed efforts by French Jews to prevent a Le Pen victory on “a scale that was last witnessed in 2002, ahead of the runoff led by her father,” according to Philippe Karsenty, a Jewish Macron supporter and deputy mayor of the Paris suburb of Neuilly-sur-Seine.

Originally supportive of François Fillon, the Republican candidate who lost in the first round last month and stands significantly to the right of Macron, Karsenty joined the Macron camp not because he believes in the candidate’s policies, but “to block Le Pen from ruining France,” as Karsenty put it in an interview with the JTA Saturday.

The CRIF, the federation of Jewish communities

of France, called on all Jews and non-Jews to vote for Macron, describing Le Pen as a “danger for democracy.” And the Union of Jewish Students of France held a string of rallies Friday against Le Pen, including a concert “against fascism.”

While these efforts served as a show of unity within French Jewry and with other faith groups, they also cast a partisan light on French Jews and Muslims, which leaders of both communities have worked hard to avoid. And that has the potential of highlighting a distinction, favored by many Le Pen supporters, between these minorities and the general population.

At the same time, this may also reinforce stereotypes held by many French about Jews and Muslims— presenting Le Pen and her party as the archenemy of groups that conspiracy theorists in France like to describe as cabals working in unison.

Making international alliances

Critics of Le Pen, who has vowed to dismantle the European Union, warned that her victory would leave France internationally isolated.

In a world where international trade is more important than ever, her isolationist policies had the potential of making France “a pariah nation with no international allies,” according to a position paper published by the liberal thinktank Terra Nova in March.

However, her campaign showed that the National Front has allies from Washington to the Kremlin— and also among some of the leading politicians of countries that founded the very European Union that she is seeking to break down.

President Donald Trump, whom Le Pen endorsed openly during the U.S. presidential election, partly returned the favor on April 21, when he offered what was widely interpreted as tacit support for Le Pen. The far-right candidate, Trump said, is “strongest on borders, and she’s the strongest on what’s been going on in France.” Stopping short of giving her his explicit endorsement, Trump added, “Whoever is the toughest on radical Islamic terrorism, and whoever is the toughest at the borders, will do well in the election.”

In March, Russian President Vladimir Putin hosted

Le Pen at the Kremlin and reportedly wished her good luck in the elections— though he, too, insisted Russia did not have any favorites in the runoff. Macron did not visit the Kremlin during the campaign.

Still, Putin, a rival and critic of the European Union, seemed to have an unsurprising soft spot for the woman who vowed to dismantle it.

Several computer experts claimed that Russian operatives were behind the hacking of huge amounts of internal correspondence by Macron’s campaign that were published 36 hours before the vote and presumably intended to sow chaos and discredit the frontrunner.

Le Pen also has powerful allies within the European Union, including Geert Wilders, the far-right Dutch politician who in March led his Party for Freedom as it became Holland’s second-largest political movement for the first time in its history. He publicly endorsed her.

So did Nigel Farage and his UKIP populist party in the United Kingdom, which lobbied forcefully and, ultimately, successfully in favor of a “yea” vote in last year’s referendum on whether or not Britain should leave the European Union.

Emmanuel Macron meeting supporters in Le Touquet-Paris-Plage, France, May 7, 2017, before winning the presidential election (Thierry Chesnot/Getty Images)

Reopening debate on the Holocaust

By uttering five words followed by the name of a place that most young people in France have never heard of, Marine Le Pen has reopened a debate on France’s complicity during the Holocaust, potentially reversing the results of decades of soul-searching that led to a belated admission of guilt.

On April 9, she said, “France is not responsible for Vel d’Hiv”—the name of a Paris stadium where in 1942 French police officers rounded up more than 13,000 Jews for the Nazi occupation forces, who had them sent to death camps. For decades after the war, leaders in France equivocated about the nation’s responsibility for the deportations.

In 1995, former President Jacques Chirac delivered a landmark speech at Vel d’Hiv that for many had put the issue to rest.

“Yes, it is true that the criminal insanity of the occupying forces was supported by some French people and the French state,” Chirac said.

Coming amid stubborn resistance by the French railway company lawyers to demands that the company assume responsibility for its central role in the deportations, Chirac’s speech was the first admission of collective guilt of its kind by a French head of state. He made it at what the Yad Vashem museum had for years called “a symbol of the responsibility of the regime and the French nation” for the Holocaust.

Marking a long and anguished journey by a nation that initially had perceived itself only as a victim of Nazism, Chirac’s speech opened the door to restitution agreements with the railway company.

It also mainstreamed the consensus of historians, relegating apologists for French collaborators to the fringes.

The impact of Marine Le Pen’s revisionism is not yet clear. But again, more than a third of French voters supported a candidate who sought to whitewash the historical record. And, according to some observers, her revisionism has politicized the Holocaust in a way that did not exist before the campaign.

Following Le Pen’s remark about Vel d’Hiv, Macron visited the Memorial for the Martyrs of the Deportation in Paris on April 30 during the last stretch of his presidential campaign. The gesture, however well intended, enraged the French Jewish philosopher Alain Finkielkraut and other critics. Finkielkraut said he was “furious” at Macron for “making the extermination of Jews a campaign argument.”

Attracting Jewish support

While the Jewish establishment rejected Le Pen and her party, it did not prevent Le Pen from making significant inroads into the Jewish community and in Israel. According to a 2014 poll, 13.5 percent of Jewish voters said they would vote for her.

And while that figure is significantly lower than Le Pen’s approval rating in the general population, it is a major achievement for her considering the nearly

nonexistent support her father got from Jews.

Numbering about 500,000, French Jews lack the electoral weight to determine a major political campaign nationally. But Jewish supporters foster Le Pen’s argument that her party has changed for the better.

Le Pen’s life partner, Louis Aliot, makes no secret of his Jewish origins. Aliot recently visited Israel, meeting in January with a low-level representative of its ruling Likud party.

Under Le Pen, the National Front has an active club of Jewish supporters: the Association for Patriots of Jewish Faith, led by Michel Thooris, a 36-year-old police officer who is also a member of the Central Board of the National Front.

She has secured Jewish support by saying that Jews are allies of other French people endangered

by Islam—a potentially potent argument within a community traumatized by jihadist terrorism. In 2015, she promised to be “the shield” for Jews against Islamists but asked Jews to “make a sacrifice” in the fight, including giving up ritual slaughter and the right to wear religious symbols.

Even the CRIF, the federation of Jewish communities of France, appeared to soften its opposition to Le Pen. In 2015, its then-president, Roger Cukierman, said Le Pen “cannot be faulted personally” for anti-Semitism.

Although he later added that the CRIF would continue to shun the National Front, his comments earned widespread criticism from prominent Jewish groups and individuals who consider Le Pen irredeemable.

MAY 10 – 16, 2017 | NYJLIFE.COM | 9

Prince Charles

PHOTO VIA JTA

Prince Charles Will Not Be Visiting Israel, Britain’s Foreign Office Says (JTA) — Prince Charles of Britain will not be visiting Israel, despite media reports citing senior officials saying he would, according to a London newspaper.

Charles, the heir to the throne, would have been the first member of the royal family to make an official state visit to Israel since its founding.

“Her Majesty’s government makes decisions on royal visits based on recommendations from the Royal Visits Committee, taking into account advice from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office,” a Foreign Office spokeswoman said in a statement. “The committee never proposed a royal visit to Israel for 2017. Plans for 2018 will be announced in due course.”

The British tabloid The Sun reported Sunday that the decision made by the Foreign Office may have been taken to avoid upsetting Arab nations in the region.

Though the visit was not officially announced, senior officials had been cited in the British and Israeli media in recent weeks saying that Charles or another member of the royal family would travel to Israel to mark the 100th anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, which stated the British government’s support for

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“the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people.”

Israeli President Reuven Rivlin extended an invitation for a royal state visit to Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson at a meeting in Jerusalem earlier this year. The Sun reported that the invitation never officially reached the royal family.

In October, Charles made a private trip to Israel to attend the funeral of former Israeli President Shimon Peres. While there, he visited, in secret, the grave of his grandmother, Princess Alice of Battenberg, who is buried in the Church of Mary Magdalene on the Mount of Olives. She died in 1969 in London and was transferred to a crypt in the church in 1988 in accordance with her wishes.

In general, the British royal family refrains from official visits to Israel except for state funerals; it does not recognize eastern Jerusalem as part of Israel. The few royal visits to Israel have been defined as private.

Prince Philip visited in 1994 for a ceremony at the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial to honor his mother.

Prior to the ceremony, Philip and his sister, Princess Sophie, visited the crypt where their mother’s coffin lies.

German President Takes Swipe at Netanyahu During Hebrew Univ. Lecture JERUSALEM (JTA) — German President FrankWalter Steinmeier told an audience at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem that diverse voices are the “oxygen of democracy.”

Steinmeier, who met earlier in the day with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, was criticizing the prime minister for canceling a meeting last month with German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel after Gabriel refused to cancel meetings with representatives of B’Tselem, a human-rights watchdog, and Breaking the Silence, a veterans’ group that alleges the Israeli army abuses Palestinians.

There was no media coverage of Gabriel’s meetings with the left-wing NGOs (nongovernmental organizations), and he did not comment on the meetings after they took place.

“I believe that civilsociety organizations which are part of the social debate deserve our respect as democrats, even when they take a critical view German President of a government—in Frank-Walter Steinmeier Germany, but also here in Israel,” Steinmeier also said.

Steinmeier said that many had warned him that this was the wrong time to visit Israel, particularly in light of the Gabriel incident.

“Preserving the miracle that is this friendship is an unshakable task incumbent on us Germans. It was therefore clear to me that my first trip outside Europe as federal president would take me here to Israel. The events of the past two weeks have done nothing to change this—on the contrary, these discussions have strengthened my resolve to talk about democracy here in Israel,” Steinmeier said.

SHAVUOT FOOD TRES LECHES CAKE RECIPE FOR SHAVUOT A traditional Cuban cake made with three kinds of milk

BY JENNIFER STEMPEL

Cuban cuisine may boast some outrageously flavorful and savory dishes, but I’ll be the first to admit that when it comes to our desserts, the list is short and sweet. Sure, we have our version of flan, and there’s always the go-to guava and cheese pastry, but Cuban meals tend to really focus on the heavy hitters, like the main dishes—that is, of course, until someone brings a tres leches cake to the party.

Much like most cultures have their version of a dumpling (hello, matzah ball), most Latin countries have their version of tres leches. Tres leches, which literally translates to “three milks,” features a light, spongy cake that is then drenched in a mixture of three equally decadent forms of milk: evaporated milk, sweetened condensed milk and whole milk. Lastly, it’s topped with a light-as-air, fresh whipped cream and crowned with a brightly colored piece of fruit.

As in Jewish tradition, numbers play a special role in the making of this cake. Yes, there are three milks included, but it’s also best to consider breaking down the making of this cake into three sections: the cake, the milks and the frosting. With all the dairy included, this may be a winning option for replacing a classic cheesecake at your next Shavuot gathering.

Ingredients For the cake: • 2 cups cake flour • ½ tsp salt • 2 tsp baking powder • 6 eggs, separated • 2 tsp vanilla extract • 1 ¼ cup sugar • ¼ cup milk

and cinnamon. Mix with a whisk to ensure an even consistency.

2. Pour all but ¼ cup over the whole cake, making sure to moisten each part of the cake. Reserve the ¼ cup for serving.

Make the Frosting 1. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, whisk together whipping cream, powdered sugar and vanilla until desired whipped cream consistency is reached, and spread evenly over the cake. Top with colorful fresh fruit. Refrigerate until ready to serve.

2. To serve, drizzle a bit of the reserved milk on the plate, and add a slice of cake to the milky puddle.

For the milks: • 1 12-oz can evaporated milk • 1 14-oz can sweetened condensed milk • 1 cup whole milk • ½ tsp ground cinnamon For the frosting: • 2 cups heavy whipping cream • 4 tbsp powdered sugar • ½ tsp vanilla extract Directions Make the Cake 1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

2. Sift together cake flour, salt and baking powder into a large bowl.

3. In a separate bowl, whisk egg yolks, vanilla, sugar and milk until frothy and well combined. Add to flour mixture in three batches, mixing well after each bit is added.

4. Pour egg whites into the bowl of a stand mixer, and beat until stiff peaks form. (You can use a hand mixer for this step, but I found it easier to use the stand mixer.)

5. Gently fold the egg whites into the batter until just combined.

6. Pour batter into greased and floured metal

9×13-inch pan, and bake for 18-20 minutes or until golden brown. If you’re using a glass casserole dish, cook a few minutes longer.

7. Let cool in pan completely, and poke holes in cake using a fork or wooden skewer.

8. I recommend poking the entire surface of the cake with pokes about 1 inch apart. The more pokes, the more opportunities for the milks to soak in, making it a super-moist cake.

Prepare the Milk 1. Next, prepare the milks. In a pitcher, combine the evaporated milk, sweetened condensed milk, whole milk

MAY 10 – 16, 2017 | NYJLIFE.COM | 11

CULTURE & EVENTS

FIVE JEWISH RAPPERS You Should Know ’t n e r A (Who ) e k a r D

BY GABE FRIEDMAN

(JTA) — One of the most famous rappers in the world right now is a Jew from Canada. Drake—who grew up as Aubrey Drake Graham— attended day school in Toronto, once rapped about his bar mitzvah on Saturday Night Live and has appeared on the cover of Vibe wearing a diamond-studded chai.

As it happens, however, numerous 21st-century Jewish rappers are making waves in various hip-hop genres, even if none has achieved Drake’s superstardom (at least not yet). Their music ranges from intelligent comedy to so-called frat-rap, a genre popular at college parties for its glorification of sex and drinking. Here’s a primer on five of the best-known Jewish rappers on the scene today.

Asher Roth

Lil Dicky

Lil Dicky Real name: David Andrew Burd Best Jewish lyric: “Sicker than the Holocaust/That motherf***in’ Jewish flow/That Third Reich raw/ Concentration camp cold/Now we rollin’ in that motherf***in’ dough.” (from “Jewish Flow”) Listening to a Lil Dicky song is similar to watching a Jewish comedian’s standup routine. He mines his neuroses for topics—from his anxiety about saving money to his sexual prowess to worries about being good at his job—and then weaves a hilarious, firstperson narrative out of them.

Before becoming a rapper, the 29-year-old graduated from Cheltenham High School outside Philadelphia (fun fact: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is also an alum) and worked at an advertising agency. His comedic videos, which first propelled him to fame, garner tens of millions of views on YouTube—and nearly as many detractors as fans.

Nonetheless, his music pulls off an improbable feat: It skewers both hiphop and American Jewish culture while managing to honor both at the same time.

Asher Roth Real name: Asher Roth (bonus points for keeping it real!)

Best Jewish lyric: “If I’m Jewish or Christian/does it affect your decision/ to see past religion/to simply listen to wisdom?” (from “Just Listen”) Asher Roth burst onto the scene in 2008 by rapping about a topic pretty

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familiar to young American Jews: partying at college. His self-explanatory tune “I Love College,” which made Billboard’s Top 40 singles chart, is an ode to drinking, smoking weed, having sex—and remembering none of it.

While to some polo-wearing teenagers it may have seemed harmless at the time, the song inspired a generation of fraternity brothers, such as Sammy Adams and Mac Miller (see below), to start spitting about their red Solo cup party antics. After “I Love College,” Roth, 31—who rarely talks about his Jewish identity—released a few subsequent albums that flew largely under the mainstream radar.

Action Bronson Real name: Arian Asllani Best Jewish lyric: “I’ve been wilding since the rabbi snipped it.” (from “Steve Wynn”) Of all the characters on this list, Bronson may be the most colorful.

He grew up in Queens, New York, the son of an Albanian Muslim father and Jewish mother, and he worked as a chef before becoming a renowned bulldog of a rapper. Now equally known for his size and big red beard, Bronson, 33, sprinkles foodie references into his tunes. Jewish cuisine in particular makes the occasional appearance: He has rapped about being drunk on Manischewitz and used brisket as an R-rated euphemism. In addition to hosting a food show, “F*ck, That’s Delicious,” on the Vice channel, he was spotted giving Brooklyn’s newest Jewish deli, Frankel’s, a thumbs-up when it opened last year.

CULTURE & EVENTS

Ivanka Trump’s Rabbi Throws First Pitch at New York Mets Game

Mac Miller

Mac Miller

Hoodie Allen

Real name: Malcolm James McCormick Best Jewish lyric: “Search the world for Zion or a shoulder I can cry on/I’m the best of all time, I’m Dylan, Dylan, Dylan, Dylan.” (from “S.D.S.”) Mac Miller—a self-described “Jewish Buddhist tryna consume the views of Christianity” who sports a Star of David tattoo on his hand—started out as the most commercially successful face of the frat-rap genre around 2011.

But since then Miller, 25, has managed to transcend that label and gain critical acclaim in the mainstream music world.

His latest album, the buttery-smooth “The Divine Feminine,” featured big-name producers, got positive reviews and climbed to No. 2 on the U.S. Billboard 200 albums chart. He’s also currently dating pop star Ariana Grande—so mazel tov, Mac.

Real name: Steven Markowitz Best Jewish lyric: “Let’s get this bar mitzvah poppin’.” (from “Won’t Mind”) In 2011, Steven Markowitz was a nice Jewish boy from Long Island who had graduated from the University of Pennsylvania’s prestigious Wharton business school and was working at Google. Now he’s an established rap star who plays sold-out shows across the country to fans affectionately nicknamed the “Hoodie Mob.” His style tends to be more poppy and melodic— often with hooks based around a piano or guitar riff—and there are plenty of sex stories and nods to frat culture to go around. As for the Jewy name? “I just wanted to come up with a fun, punny name that related to my roots as a New Yorker,” the 28-year-old said last year.

BY MARCY OSTER

(JTA) — Perhaps the injury-plagued New York Mets thought that having a rabbi throw the first pitch before a game would bring some divine intervention.

Rabbi Haskel Lookstein, the prominent modern Orthodox rabbi who oversaw Ivanka Trump’s conversion to Judaism, made the ceremonial toss at the Mets-Marlins game on Sunday to a smattering of applause at Citi Field in Queens.

The Mets suffered a 7-0 loss—the first time this season they were shut out—and managed just one hit against Miami, so interpret the Lookstein effect as you wish.

Lookstein is the rabbi emeritus of

Congregation Kehilath Jeshurun on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, where he served as the spiritual leader for more than 50 years. He also was the principal of the prestigious Ramaz School in Manhattan from 1966 through 2015.

It wasn’t his first time on a professional mound: Lookstein tossed the first pitch before a Mets-Phillies game in May 2006, when the New Yorkers played at Shea Stadium. The throw made it over the plate, earning the rabbi kudos for a “good pitch” from thenmanager Willie Randolph.

Ramaz posted a video on Facebook of Lookstein’s pitch on Sunday—which again made it over the plate.

Rabbi Haskel Lookstein

Hoodie Allen

MAY 10 – 16, 2017 | NYJLIFE.COM | 13

IN OUR COMMUNITY

Cuomo Launches First-inthe-Nation Liberty Defense Project for Immigrants LEGAL COMMUNITY GATHERS TO SUPPORT POPULAR PROJECT

BY STAFF

This month, Gov. Andrew Cuomo launched the nation’s first publicprivate immigrant legal-defense initiative, called the Liberty Defense Project. New York will become the first state in the nation to ensure that every immigrant held in detention has a lawyer, that all immigrants will have counsel in deportation hearings, and that any immigrant seeking asylum on American soil will have legal representation to make his/her case.

Indeed, the governor stunned advocates around the country last month when he announced that an unprecedented $10 million would be allotted to immigrant legal defense in this year’s state budget. This week, the governor followed up with a video featuring celebrities and highlighting the initiative, in which he says that “an attack on one of us is an attack on all of us.” Directly singling out President

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Trump’s anti-immigrant policies, the video states that the Liberty Defense Project will “provide legal assistance to immigrants experiencing prosecution by the federal government.”

“During these stormy times, it’s critical for all New Yorkers to have access to their full rights under the law,” Cuomo said when he announced the initiative. “The first-of-its-kind Liberty Defense Project will provide legal support to protect immigrants and ensure this state is living up to the values embodied by the Lady in Our Harbor.”

Just how much of a difference will this drastic increase in legal representation make for immigrants in New York?

In a report released just this month, the Center for American Progress estimates that immigrants appearing in proceedings with counsel are 14 times more likely to win their cases than those

appearing without counsel. In New York State, only one in 15 immigrants (6.7 percent) is able to file the necessary papers without counsel. Whether an immigrant has counsel often has lifeor-death consequences, as those who are deported are frequently at risk of torture, abuse or death. The problem has intensified under President Trump’s policies emboldening Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers to apprehend immigrants.

Some have called the lack of legal representation for immigrants immoral, as it means we are effectively deporting immigrant children to die. While, according to the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution, immigrants have the

right to counsel, U.S. Supreme Court jurisprudence has established that the state has no obligation to pay for that counsel. This has caused a due-process crisis in the courts, with backlogs of immigrants left defenseless and voiceless.

Last week, an event in support of the governor’s Liberty Defense Project at New York Law School drew hundreds of lawyers and immigration advocates from around the state. Jenifer Rajkumar, Cuomo’s director of Immigration Affairs and Special Counsel, described the project in an email to partners as an initiative to bring together “New York’s top legal talent” in what she called “a statewide effort to protect immigrants.”

The initiative has already amassed a statewide coalition of 230 privatesector law firms, legal departments, bar associations and advocacy organizations. The governor’s event was packed with hundreds of lawyers and advocates from around the state eager to support the groundbreaking initiative.

The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) is one of the organizations partnering on the governor’s Liberty Defense Project. Evan Bernstein, the New York regional director of the ADL, said that the partnership reflects the ADL’s commitment to “fighting tirelessly for those making their own exodus from war and oppression,” and remarked that “historically we have called for just and humanitarian immigration policies.”

Of note, the ADL has supported immigrants since 1958, when it

Jenifer Rajkumar addresses the crowd at New York Law School.

IN OUR COMMUNITY

Senior members of New York government at an announcement for Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s Liberty Defense Project

published President John F. Kennedy’s book A Nation of Immigrants, calling for nondiscriminatory immigration policies. Bernstein went on to applaud the governor’s enormous $10 million budgetary allotment to the project.

Heavy hitters in the legal and advocacy communities have quickly lent their support to the popular project.

The New York State Bar Association has committed to train and recruit attorneys to represent immigrants.

In June at New York Law School, the Liberty Defense Project will host a training course along with the New York State Bar that will train lawyers in every step of a deportation defense case. Prestigious white-shoe law firms Skadden Arps, Davis Polk and Debevoise have also joined the initiative, as have Columbia Law School, CUNY Law and New York Law, and many others. Private foundations Ford and Carnegie have contributed an additional $1 million to

the governor’s project.

In a polarized national environment with calls from the right to build a wall and crack down on immigration enforcement, and opposite calls from the left to pass the DREAM Act and provide drivers’ licenses to undocumented immigrants, Gov. Cuomo’s Liberty Defense Project

finds a common ground. While many cannot agree on numerous aspects of immigration policy, almost everyone can agree that anyone who lands on American soil deserves his/her day in court. And by ensuring those basic dueprocess rights, the governor’s project starts from that place of humanity and agreement.

MAY 10 – 16, 2017 | NYJLIFE.COM | 15

For New York City Teachers Applying for Tenure, Success Remains Far from Assured

BY ALEX ZIMMERMAN

United Federation of Teachers President Michael Mulgrew endorses Mayor Bill de Blasio for re-election.

PHOTO BY MONICA DISARE

The proportion of New York City teachers earning tenure held steady last school year—remaining at its highest point under Mayor Bill de Blasio’s watch.

Sixty-four percent of the 5,450 eligible teachers were granted tenure during the 2015-’16 school year, an 11-percent increase since de Blasio took office, according to data obtained by Chalkbeat. But that’s still dramatically lower than a decade ago, when virtually every eligible teacher won the job protection.

Continuing a two-year trend, 34 percent had their tenure decisions deferred. Two percent were rejected outright, effectively ending their teaching careers in the district.

Under Mayor Bloomberg, who promised to move toward “ending tenure as we know it,” tenure approval rates plummeted from 89 percent in the 2009-’10

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school year to 53 percent the year before de Blasio took control of the city school system. Bloomberg argued that too many teachers were earning tenure too quickly, and the city began delaying decisions for a large portion of eligible teachers.

The numbers show that under de Blasio, teachers are slightly more likely to receive tenure as soon as they are eligible—typically after four “probationary” years. But the numbers also show that the mayor has not completely reversed Bloomberg’s approach of making attaining tenure more difficult—not by rejecting tenure applications, but by deferring a larger share of those decisions to a later year.

Over his first three years, de Blasio has slowly changed course. In his first year, tenure rates rose to 60 percent, a 7-percent increase that de Blasio said

reflected his administration’s interest in rewarding and retaining top teachers. In his second year, the approval rate increased again to 64 percent—which held steady last school year.

The number of teachers whose tenure prospects were deferred also remained flat at 34 percent, down from a high of 44 percent in Bloomberg’s final year.

Under both administrations, rejection rates have hovered between 2 and 3 percent. (Among the group of teachers whose tenure decisions had been previously delayed, 5 percent were denied last year, down slightly from 6 percent the previous year.)

“This year’s results illustrate a continuation in the trend of active, rigorous tenure decision-making,” according to a presentation provided by the education department. Officials said that deferrals are used as a way to give teachers more time to demonstrate their effectiveness, or in cases where there isn’t enough evidence to make a tenure decision.

But a more important statistic is that the city almost never denies tenure outright, according to David Bloomfield, a professor of education, law and public policy at Brooklyn College and the CUNY Graduate Center.

Focusing on the relatively low tenure rate “leaves the impression that these teachers are no longer in the classroom—and that’s just false,” he said. “Denials of tenure aren’t going up.”

Tenure rules have been the subject of increased national scrutiny in recent years, and have been subject to lawsuits from Minnesota to New York that claim the protections keep underperforming teachers in the classroom and violate students’ right to an adequate education. (The courts have not necessarily bought that argument.)

For its part, the city’s teachers union said the proportion of educators whose tenure decisions are delayed is not a significant concern.

“The more pressing issue,” said United Federation of Teachers President Michael Mulgrew, “is that thousands of teachers—who earned tenure and are in good standing—decide to walk away from New York City public schools every year because they did not get the support they needed to help the children in their care.”

Investigation of Activist Principal Has Free-Speech Advocates Asking Which Politics Are Allowed at School

BY CASSI FELDMAN

The strange saga of a Park Slope principal accused of promoting communism took another turn last Wednesday, when her request for a temporary halt to the probe against her was denied.

Jill Bloomberg, principal of Park Slope Collegiate, is known for her activism, particularly around the issue of school segregation. But the Department of Education (DOE) says that now she’s gone too far by sharing her political views at school and “actively recruiting” students into a communist organization.

“We lost the battle, not the war,” said Bloomberg’s attorney Jeanne Mirer after the judge’s decision to allow the investigation to proceed.

The war, it seems, will partly depend on whether or not Bloomberg violated D-130—a Chancellor’s Regulation that prohibits school employees from “being involved in any activities, including fundraising, on behalf of any candidate, candidates, slate of candidates or political organization/committee during working hours.”

The city claims, among other allegations, that Bloomberg violated the regulation by advocating at school on behalf of the Progressive Labor Party, a political organization with communist ties.

Bloomberg denies that and says she isn’t a member herself. But the case raises a larger question of what the regulation is meant to cover.

Mirer says a close read suggests it only bars election-related political activity—campaigning for a candidate, for instance—and not the type of organizing of which Bloomberg is accused.

If it did cover nonelectoral politics, she said in court Wednesday, that would create a slippery slope for any educator who dared to voice a political view. “Any ideological belief could be the subject of a violation,” she warned.

Judge Paul Gardephe seemed unmoved by her argument. “I read the relevant parts [of D-130],” he said. “This lawsuit is not about whether D-130 is fair.”

But Mirer is not alone in worrying about how the regulation is being applied. Arthur Eisenberg, legal director at the New York Civil Liberties Union, is advising Mirer and has his own concerns about the free-speech issues at play. According to Eisenberg,

The John Jay Educational Campus, home to Park Slope Collegiate PHOTO BY CASSI FELDMAN

the rules are the same for students, teachers and principals.

“It’s well established that school officials do not lose their First Amendment rights to speak out as citizens even when they are in school,” he said. “The standard is they can’t speak out in ways that are disruptive to the functioning of the school.”

Eisenberg declined to speculate on whether or not Bloomberg might have done that, but he said he was confident that D-130 could only apply to electoral politics.

A broader interpretation, he said, “puts the DOE in the position of having to regulate issue-oriented speech in ways that make it difficult to know how and where to draw the line.” Limiting free speech on issues that are political in nature, he said, could potentially impact student clubs that deal with gay

rights, environmental causes or racism, for instance.

“And we know that can’t be right,” he said.

Eisenberg also questioned another line in the regulation quoted in the city’s court documents, which calls for a “posture of complete neutrality” on political candidates. Even if that were possible, he said, it wouldn’t be desirable.

“The obligation of an academic or teacher is to engage in critical judgment and to support those judgments with reasoning and fact,” Eisenberg said.

“And that may be inconsistent with a principle of absolute neutrality.”

We asked the city’s law department what it made of Mirer’s argument that D-130 was meant to be more narrow in scope. Nick Paolucci, a spokesman for the department, said he wasn’t familiar with the argument and couldn’t comment.

MAY 10 – 16, 2017 | NYJLIFE.COM | 17

The Jerusalem Post At Its Most PHOTOS FROM THE ANNUAL JERUSALEM POST CONFERENCE IN NEW YORK

BY MAXINE DOVERE

For the past six years, The Jerusalem Post has gathered Israeli and American politicians and community leaders—the personalities who fill its daily pages—for a daylong conference in New York. On the docket for this year’s conference were the relations between the broad cross-section of global Jewish communities— Diaspora and Israel-based; political approaches to Israel’s on-the-ground realities; and taking a positive approach to the Trump administration in continued anticipation of its untethered support of the Jewish State. The following is a selection of photos of notable attendees and conference participants exclusive to New York Jewish Life.

TOP: Larry King joined the discussion.

LEFT: Minister Naftali Bennett delivers remarks.

RIGHT: Rep. Grace Meng in attendance

TOP: Alan Dershowitz being interviewed LEFT: Major General Moshe Ya’alon and Lt. General Dan Halutz

18 | NYJLIFE.COM | MAY 10 – 16, 2017

OPINION

Because You’re Worth It

BY JENNY MAENPAA

Equal Pay Day in the United States fell on April 4, 2017.

That date indicates how far into this year women had to work to earn what men earned in 2016. It’s even longer for women of color and women with disabilities.

The gender pay gap, as it’s known, is the disparity between what women and men make for doing the same jobs. The current estimate of the disparity hovers around 80 cents (women) to the dollar (men). This means that a 20-year-old female entering the workforce full time will lose $418,800 over a 40-year career compared to a male worker, and she will have to stay in the workforce 10 years longer than a man in order to earn the same amount.

So what can you do about it?

1. Do your homework. Find out how your salary compares to that of your peers, both male and female, not just in your company but across your industry.

This preparation is key to making your case for a raise.

2. Detail all of your accomplishments and contributions to your workplace. Write down every single thing you do that is above and beyond your current job description. Be exhaustive. Get testimonials from colleagues, even if you feel awkward asking. Tie all of the work you’ve done to results for the company’s bottom line.

3. Find out which protections or resources exist.

For example, New York City just banned interviewers from asking about salary history; women coming for an interview will likely have made less money at a previous position.

4. Practice negotiating in your everyday life to become comfortable with it. Ask for your latté on the house, your credit card’s annual fee to be waived, or a voucher for future travel from an airline that didn’t meet your needs.

5. Role-play with a friend as your boss. Practice both the delivery and your poker face. You need to be confident and firm while not appearing rude or unyielding. Make statements and don’t turn them into questions by succumbing to vocal fry (letting your

“A 20-year-old female entering the workforce full time will lose $418,800 over a 40-year career compared to a male worker.”

“If your manager returns with a number you are not comfortable with, stand your ground.

You are not asking for a favor; you are valuing yourself and your work.” voice go up at the end). Most importantly, remove your personal feelings from the whole process. Think of it as though you were selling a vacuum: You believe in the product (your work), you believe it’s worth this price (your raise), and your goal is to get your potential sale (your boss) to see it as worth that same price by rooting your pitch in what your work can do for him or her.

Now it’s time to make the big ask! Schedule a meeting with your manager—or maybe you have a performance or annual review coming up. Lay out your case, and ask for a raise based on your worth.

Ideally, let your manager propose the first concrete number. Have your dream number in mind, as well as the one you can comfortably live with and feel valued by. Counter with your dream number, and then WAIT. Silence is powerful and uncomfortable. Resist the urge to fill it.

If your manager returns with a number you are not comfortable with, stand your ground. You are not asking for a favor; you are valuing yourself and your work, and increasing your loyalty and productivity to a company that is willing to recognize you for it. No matter what the manager offers, even if it’s what you want or higher, keep your poker face straight. Say you would like some time to think it over and will get back to him/her once you’ve considered it.

If your company absolutely cannot or will not budge on money, you can ask for other perks. You can negotiate for more vacation time, a flexible schedule or location, a new title, a leadership coach, increased benefits, childcare options and plenty more.

Remember that it costs the company so much more to recruit, hire and train a new employee and get that employee comfortable with the culture and other intangibles than to give you what you are asking for.

Women are more likely to be granted a raise if they express their request in language that focuses on the company’s overall success, and show that they care about fostering positive relationships at work. By standing firm and demanding what you are worth, you are helping close the gender pay gap for yourself and all women.

MAY 10 – 16, 2017| NYJLIFE.COM | 19

OPINION

For Unity’s Sake, Let Jews Everywhere Vote in Israeli Elections

BY JOSHUA HAMMERMAN

(JTA) — As Israel turns 69, world Jewry is in a state of crisis. Israel and American Jewry are drifting apart: Within each of those groups we’re seeing increased polarization on fundamental issues like the two-state solution, Israel’s democratic vs. Jewish nature and the definition of who is a Jew. Rather than wallowing in malaise, I’d like to propose a solution that could resolve many of our challenges, a Grand Bargain fit for these chaotic times.

I propose that we create a class of Jewish “citizenship” that will reinvent the relationship between Diaspora Jewry and Israel, revitalize all streams of Judaism, minimize differences on conversion, strengthen Israeli democracy, boost proIsrael pride on college campuses and possibly even put the Jewish state on the path to reconciliation with its neighbors.

I sense your eyes rolling, but hear me out.

The beauty of this idea is that it relies on a definition of “who is a Jew” that is already in place. It’s found in Israel’s Law of Return, which establishes the right of almost any Jew in the world to automatically become a citizen of Israel.

Established in the aftermath of the Holocaust in 1950 and revised in 1970, the law states that those eligible for automatic Israeli citizenship include “those born of a Jewish mother or converted to Judaism, plus their non-Jewish children, grandchildren, and spouses, and to the non-Jewish spouses of their children and grandchildren.”

Step one of my Grand Bargain would be to extend this “Jewish citizenship” to anyone, anywhere, covered by the Law of Return, along with all current Israeli Jews. A Jewish citizen may not be recognized universally as a Jew according to halachah, or rabbinic law, but he or she would be eligible for something of potentially much greater value than an ark-opening at the local synagogue.

Step two: Give these “Jewish citizens” the right to vote in Israeli elections—in exchange for a real demonstration of commitment, but one that does not have to include aliyah (immigration to Israel).

Think how this idea would galvanize Diaspora Jewry and transform the relationship with Israel into what it most needs to be right now: a partnership of equals. Jewish citizens would be able to participate

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in forging a future for the Jewish people, taking them from the sidelines and thrusting them right into the middle of the action.

If Jewish citizenship is to have real meaning, there is no substitute for the right to vote for representatives of the Jewish state. Other bodies claiming to represent the Jewish people, such as the World Zionist Organization, are democratic and representative, but they have all the clout of the Mickey Mouse Club.

Dual citizenship is the norm in dozens of free countries. Fully belonging to the Jewish people should mean more than the right to lobby, rally, retweet and donate. Jewish citizenship would entitle us to directly impact the future of the only Jewish state the world has seen for 2,000 years, a place that we love and wish to cultivate.

What, short of actual aliyah, would qualify Jews for this citizenship? I would suggest a period of national service on behalf of the Jewish people. Each applicant would need to spend a certain amount of time in Israel, beginning, for many, with a Birthright trip, which would then have a more weighty function.

Some basic Jewish literacy requirement might also be considered.

A number of questions naturally arise: Is it fair to offer benefits of citizenship to those not living in the “home base” and paying taxes there? Children of American immigrants to Israel can attain American citizenship (and vote in American elections), even if they never actually lived in America. American expats are generally allowed to use foreign taxes paid as a credit against their U.S. tax obligation. Something similar could be considered for Jewish citizens living in the Diaspora. Perhaps annual federation pledges and synagogue dues could become part of the mix, on a sliding scale that is fair and affordable.

What about army service? About 35 percent of Israeli Jewish women avoid conscription, as do 27 percent of eligible men, primarily on religious grounds. Yet they get to vote, and some replace military service with the kind of national service that I am proposing. In addition, a number of Diaspora Jews already serve in the Israeli army without making aliyah. And of course Israel’s Arab citizens do not serve in the army or do national service, but do vote in elections.

But whether or not they serve in the Israel Defense

Forces, aren’t all Israelis on the “frontlines”? Increasingly, Diaspora Jewry is being called upon to fight existential battles for Israel’s physical survival (as many on the right call the fights over the Iran deal and the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement) and its soul (as many on the left consider the fights for pluralism, minority and women’s rights, and the two-state solution). Increasingly, terrorism and anti-Semitism threaten Jewish communities everywhere. No one can be a spectator anymore, and the need to draw the two communities closer together has never been more essential.

What about accusations of dual loyalty? Haters are gonna hate. Why should Jews face questions of dual loyalty when dual-citizen French, Irish and Italian Americans do not? American Jews need to get over this.

But isn’t Judaism a religion and not a political entity?

Jews have always been both a people and adherents of a faith, but the idea of religion divorced from peoplehood is relatively recent, pushed by Napoleon, 19th-century German reformers and mid–20thcentury American suburbanites. For the vast majority of Jews today, it is peoplehood that matters most.

That includes the 62 percent of American Jews who told Pew that being Jewish is mainly a matter of ancestry and culture; only 15 percent said “religion.”

When 94 percent of all American Jews say they are proud to be Jewish, most are thinking about being part of a people—a people with an idea.

What would David Ben-Gurion say? Back in 1950, Israel’s prime minister and American Jewish leaders came to an agreement that the state of Israel would not claim to speak on behalf of all the Jewish people.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has often ignored that memo, but under this proposal, the prime minister would truly represent world Jewry ( just as the American president still represents American expats living in Kfar Saba).

Ben-Gurion would say this is an abandonment of the Zionist dream of universal aliyah. But after calming down with a glass of tea and turning his visionary gaze ahead seven decades, he would see that the Jewish people today are hopelessly split and that mass aliyah is a pipe dream. Bipartisan support for Israel in American politics is waning dramatically, and Israel’s democracy is in jeopardy. Desperate times require desperate measures, and it’s not hard to imagine that the most visionary individual in modern Jewish history might give this idea serious consideration.

OK, wouldn’t Judaism become corrupted by politics?

Have you seen the Knesset? Have you seen some of our American Jewish organizations at work? Judaism can never be completely divorced from politics, but Jewish citizenship would go a long way toward fostering the exchange of ideas and empowering the development of creative Jewish visions. If you are asking whether American Jewish life would become more Israel-focused, the answer is yes, and I believe that’s a good thing. With some actual skin in the game, American Jews would all be encouraged to engage with Israel constructively rather than throwing their hands up and dissociating from it.

How would this impact pluralism and conversion? This

OPINION

plan places world Jewry on a trajectory toward unity rather than further disengagement.

With Diaspora Jewry now part of the electoral equation, thereby marginalizing rejectionist groups that have held veto power for too long, we could begin to collaborate on thorny issues like conversion, patrilineal descent, and nonOrthodox and women’s prayer groups at the Western Wall. Old compromises could be dusted off, including conversion-related proposals of the Neeman Commission of the late ’90s and the more recent Western Wall compromise. At the very least, Diaspora and Israeli leaders would be talking about solutions rather than ignoring the problem.

Would the Israeli right ever agree to this?

While this plan could cost current parties some power, there’s a solid chance that those Diaspora Jews who take on the responsibilities of Jewish citizenship will skew right, both politically and religiously, because they would be more motivated and better organized than the progressives. But all Israelis should understand that the more Diaspora Jews signed on to this, the more the burdens of the Jewish future would be shared and the less isolated Israel would be.

As for progressive American Jews, at last they would have a chance to feel that their concerns were being heard, and that they had the opportunity to help construct an Israel consistent with the visions of its founders, not as spectators but as builders. Nearly 22,000 American Jews voted for the Reform movement representatives in the 2015 World Zionist Congress elections. Imagine how many would be drawn to vote for an election of far greater consequence.

What about Israeli minorities? Israeli Arabs might reasonably be concerned about this demographic bump of voting Jews, just as the Palestinians were petrified by the mass immigration of Russian Jewry in the 1990s.

I would hope that the opportunity would be seized to imagine new ways to create two states for two peoples with two thriving diasporas.

This is a lot to swallow, so let’s simply chew on these questions for a while: What would it mean for Diaspora Jewry to have more than a vicarious involvement in the Jewish people’s boldest collective venture since the Talmud?

What would it mean for American and Israeli Jews to view themselves as full partners, and for the varieties of Judaism emerging from each community to be embraced and shared?

What would it mean for Diaspora Jews who now shun Israel to suddenly realize that they can be part of the solution?

What would it mean for Jews to speak of unity—and actually mean it?

Israel is 69. Time to think big.

College Doesn’t Turn Jews Away From Judaism

BY LAURENCE KOTLER-BERKOWITZ

(JTA) — In a recent analysis of U.S. religious groups, the Pew Research Center reported that the most educated American Jews are also the least religious.

In considering these findings, it’s tempting to think that secular education leads to assimilation among American Jews. (I want to be clear that Pew, a leading source of data on contemporary Jews in the United States, Israel and globally and a nonadvocacy fact-tank, did not put forth this reading of the data). The finding could be explained as follows: In a diverse, open society, education can draw people away from their particular group and its ways of life. Highly educated Jews, it seems, may be more likely to distance themselves from some traditional Jewish practices.

But that interpretation would be narrow and incomplete. It turns out that sometimes secular education is linked to assimilation, sometimes to connectivity and sometimes to neither.

Using data from its landmark 2013 survey of U.S. Jews, Pew showed that college-educated Jews are less likely than Jews without a college degree to believe in God with absolute certainty and less likely to affirm that religion is very important to them. Partly accounting for these differences, Pew noted, are Orthodox Jews, who are more religious and tend to have lower levels of secular schooling than nonOrthodox Jews. But even when only non-Orthodox Jews are examined, the more educated are less religious.

My own analysis of the same survey data confirmed Pew’s findings and more. Jews with a college degree are also less likely to keep kosher at home, to refrain from handling money on Shabbat, to report that all or most of their close friends are Jewish, and to say that being Jewish is very important to them. (Note: I analyzed Jews 30 and older because by that age most people have either gone to college or decided not to.)

These data points may be particularly troubling because secular education has been one of the prime engines of Jewish social, political and economic success in America.

Could it be that higher education, that storied upside of American Jewish life, has a serious downside, too?

Fortunately, the answer is no.

Jewish life is multifaceted. It encompasses religion, ethnicity and culture. It spans family, local community and global peoplehood. It has attitudinal and behavioral aspects. By looking further at the Pew survey data, we can see that in many cases college education has no association with assimilation. In other cases, higher education encourages Jewish connectivity, the very opposite of assimilation.

The data reveal that Jews with and without college degrees display many similar attitudes and behaviors.

The two groups are just as likely to express pride in being Jewish, to have a strong sense of belonging to the Jewish

people, to feel a special responsibility to Jews in need, to say it’s essential to them to be part of a Jewish community and to be emotionally attached to Israel. In addition, they are just as likely to attend Jewish religious services monthly or more, to be able to converse in Hebrew and, among those who are married, to have a Jewish spouse.

On these measures, college education and assimilation do not go hand in hand.

The data also show that in some circumstances, higher education is associated with connections to other Jews and especially to Jewish organizations. College-educated Jews are more likely than their non-college-educated counterparts to belong to synagogues and other types of Jewish organizations, to make donations to Jewish causes, to travel to Israel, to hold or attend Passover seders and to fast on Yom Kippur. Here, higher education may promote increased Jewish connectivity (which elsewhere I have called cohesion), not assimilation.

These patterns intensify when non-Orthodox Jews are analyzed separately, as I (like Pew) did. Among the nonOrthodox, college education promotes connectivity on even more measures and assimilation on fewer.

So yes, higher education appears to make Jews less certain about the existence of God, less observant of some rituals, and less inclined to say religion and being Jewish are very important to them. It also appears to weaken Jewish friendship networks modestly. In these ways, then, education may contribute to assimilation.

But taking a broader view of the multiple connections Jews have to each other and Jewish life allows us to see a fuller picture. Secular education often has no relationship to assimilation; Jews with and without college degrees are remarkably similar to each other on numerous Jewish behaviors and attitudes. Meanwhile, those with college education are sometimes more connected to other Jews, Jewish organizations and Jewish life—that is, less assimilated—than those with less secular schooling.

Higher education, responsible for so much American Jewish achievement and vitality, has no consistent, straight-line relationship with assimilation. Instead, its association with assimilation and connectivity varies quite a bit.

Jews have a quip that conveys the complexity of Jewish life: “Jews are just like everyone else, only more so.” As this example shows, Jews with a college education are no exception. The complexity of their lives demands close examination. It deserves a rich and nuanced understanding. And it defies easy interpretation.

Laurence Kotler-Berkowitz, Ph.D., is senior director of research and analysis and director of the Berman Jewish DataBank, both at The Jewish Federations of North America.

He served as an adviser to the Pew Research Center on its 2013 survey of U.S. Jews.

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