Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle 12-21-18

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December 21, 2018 | 13 Tevet 5779

NOTEWORTHY LOCAL Squirrel HIll’s own Renaissance man

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Candlelighting 4:39 p.m. | Havdalah 5:43 p.m. | Vol. 61, No. 51 | pittsburghjewishchronicle.org

Healers help twice weekly in Squirrel Hill

Experts reflect on antiSemitism in America in wake of Tree of Life

Researcher Yaakov Barak also orienteers, plays Scrabble.

By Toby Tabachnick | Senior Staff Writer

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that “it’s not today, it’s not even next week, it’s next month and the month after that and the month after that” when people will seek help, said Braasch.

Still insistent that services be available to those desiring relief, the acupuncturist gathered additional practitioners. In the midst of assembling allies, he discovered Fife was similarly building a network of healers through social media.

“Practitioners, yoga teachers and folks who wanted to help the community in a different way” reached out, said Fife.

Fife spoke with Braasch and through Kesher Pittsburgh provided organizational support and funding.

“Right away when I posted it I was contacted by a Hebrew priestess who lives in New York State,” said Fife. “She asked how it was being funded and she immediately put it on Facebook and raised a few thousand dollars.”

The money has paid for supplies and will enable “The Healing Tent” to remain operational for the time being.

“Our hope is we can continue on for a

he murderer of 11 people at the Tree of Life synagogue building may have been motivated by right-wing, white supremist ideology, but Jews also should beware of the “insidious and quite toxic” anti-Semitism of the far left and of Islamic extremists, according to Deborah Lipstadt, a Holocaust historian and professor of Jewish history and Holocaust studies at Emory University.

Lipstadt, the author of the forthcoming book “Antisemitism Here and Now,” was part of panel of experts convened by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on Dec. 13 at Heinz Field to discuss anti-Semitism in America and its implications for the future of Jews in Pittsburgh and beyond.

The 90-minute discussion, which was open to the public, was moderated by David Shribman, editor of the Post-Gazette. Other panelists included Kathleen Blee, dean of the Dietrich School of Arts and Sciences at the University of Pittsburgh and a member of Congregation Dor Hadash, Rabbi Jeffrey Myers, spiritual leader of Tree of Life*Or L’Simcha Congregation, and Joshua Sayles, director of community relations for the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh.

Lipstadt was “shocked, but wasn’t surprised,” when she first heard of the Oct. 27 massacre in Pittsburgh, she said. “It’s not something new. Many people were first exposed to it in its intensity in what happened approximately seven weeks ago. But the depressing part is that we see it on the right, as what happened here, and we see it on the left.”

While anti-Semitism on the far left “may be not as violent,” it is nonetheless alarming, she said, pointing to pervasive anti-Jewish

Please see Healers, page 20

Please see Town hall, page 20

LOCAL Smallman Street closing branch

 From left: Arthur Berman, Maureen Tighe and Helmut Goth are area practitioners who have volunteered for The Healing Tent.

Photo by Adam Reinherz

Pastrami on rye now farther out, at original location.

Page 3 LOCAL Poet has pulse of community

Philip Terman’s verses capture Jewish experience.

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$1.50

By Adam Reinherz | Staff Writer

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ince Oct. 27, area healers have frequented a second-story Squirrel Hill space and provided free services to those seeking emotional and physical reprieve from stress and other ailments stemming from the Tree of Life attack.

Operating under the umbrella of “The Healing Tent,” the acupuncturists, naturopaths and alternative medical practitioners who have volunteered to fill the twice-aweek slots were introduced to the idea of collaborating by Peter Braasch, a licensed acupuncturist, and Hebrew priestess Keshira HaLev Fife.

In the hours after the anti-Semitic attack, in which 11 Jews were murdered inside the Tree of Life synagogue building, Braasch approached colleagues about offering aid to first responders.

Early that afternoon, “we tried to get to the JCC to help folks but they were focused on more immediate things and weren’t aware of what we were doing, so we went back to my office to figure out what to do,” he said.

A colleague of a colleague, who had been active in the Orlando, Fla., community after the Pulse Nightclub shooting, explained

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Headlines Science, Scrabble and a seven-figure prize — LOCAL —

By Adam Reinherz | Staff Writer

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omewhere between reading maps and choosing tiles Yaacov Barak just won $1 million. Receiving the inaugural Magee Research prize offered some relief, explained the Israeli-born associate professor of obstetrics, gynecology and reproductive sciences at the University of Pittsburgh, but appreciating its place is just one piece in a larger biographical puzzle.

Born in Kfar Saba, Israel, and educated at the Weizmann Institute in Rehovot, Barak, 56, spent his graduate studies investigating cellular molecular biology of cancer. As a postdoc, at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies, he began researching developmental biology and physiology.

Decades later, the field still piques his interest.

“I could tell you lofty stories of fulfillment but it’s all the nerdy stuff, it’s solving puzzles — the great puzzle of the universe,” he said.

“I’m a nerd; molecular biology is really nerdy and really fun.”

Ever curious, Barak realized something years ago which ended up netting him the seven figure Magee Research prize last month.

His team “messed up a gene in a mouse” and noticed that mouse embryos with the mutated gene in the placenta experienced placental defects as well as heart defects, he explained. “We went on to show that when we corrected the placental defects the heart defects also disappeared.”

For years Barak attempted to receive funding related to the work, “but people were not receptive,” he said. “They thought it was wacky and that it didn’t agree with

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EDITORIAL DEPARTMENT Email: newsdesk@pittsburghjewishchronicle.org BOARD OF TRUSTEES Evan Indianer, Chairman Andrew Schaer, Vice Chairman Gayle R. Kraut, Secretary Jonathan Bernstein, Treasurer David Ainsman, Immediate Past Chairman Gail Childs, Elizabeth F. Collura, Milton Eisner, Malke Steinfeld Frank, Tracy Gross, Richard J. Kitay, Cátia Kossovsky, Andi Perelman, David Rush, Charles Saul

p Yaakov Barak won the $1 million Magee Research prize.

what cardiologists thought caused congenital heart defects in babies.” The research was “dismissed as delusional at worst and unimportant at best.”

Nonetheless, last month, before a crowd of nearly 500 scientists and nonscientists at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center, Barak and his team, which included Myriam Hemberger of the University of Calgary, and Henry Sucov of the University of Southern California, demonstrated the research through a series of presentations and ultimately received a check for $1 million from the Richard King Mellon Foundation to continue studying the relationship between placental defects and heart defects.

The team’s discoveries “may usher in earlier detection, and potentially, prevention and treatment strategies,” read a statement from UPMC.

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Photo by Adam Reinherz

“Hopefully it makes an impact and many times the impact is not known for years to come,” added Barak.

Receiving the funding is sort of like winning the lottery in that the number he gets is far less than the original sum; after splitting the figure between the teams, Barak estimates that he will receive about $400,000.

“It’s not a lot considering the cost of science,” he said. “It helps keep two part-time people afloat.”

One of the employees happens to be his wife, Dr. Tali Shalom-Barak, who has worked in his lab for the past 14 years. Though she initially studied veterinary medicine, over time “we just gravitated science-wise in the same vein.”

The money also supports the price of mice, “and mice are extremely expensive,” he said.

“We pay 61 cents per each cage, per day,

and a typical research project like that is 80-100 cages. We’re talking about $20,000 a year just to pay for the mice even before we did the first experiment.”

Barak has been in labs for more than 20 years, but these days, given various responsibilities, his bench time is limited.

“I have to worry about the money. I have to worry about the training. I have to worry about people’s motivation and people’s performance, and when things go haywire I need to help people figure out why things went haywire — and things go haywire every day in science, it’s never a smooth sail,” he explained.

“So it’s a lot of sort of managing, which no one trains you, and when you train you do the work and you infer from your experiences somehow how to manage other people.”

For years, such concerns rendered him “a one-trick pony.”

Consumed by either work or family he found little time for other interests, but about five years ago Barak discovered another passion: orienteering.

It is a “sport that involves the mind, and fitness and sheer fun,” he said.

Competitors traverse forests, fields and unfamiliar terrain with aid of a compass and map. Whoever reaches the most checkpoints in the least amount of time, or a particular sequence of “controls” in a designated amount of time wins. According to the Western PA Orienteering Club, of which Barak is a member, “When done recreationally, orienteering is an excellent family activity — a way to get out and enjoy nature, a treasure hunt in the woods. When done competitively, there is a race-like atmosphere as orienteers try to be the fastest or get the highest score.”

The sport often appeals to runners seeking a more mindful pursuit, said Barak. And just as a Please see Barak, page 21

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Headlines Smallman Street Deli saying goodbye to Squirrel Hill — LOCAL —

By Adam Reinherz | Staff Writer

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hirteen years after setting up shop in Squirrel Hill, Smallman Street Deli will close its doors on Dec. 30. Saying goodbye is tough, but in a sense, co-owners Jeff Cohen and Bill Wedner are returning to where they started.

Five years after purchasing Weiss Provision Co., a wholesale meat business now located in the Strip, Cohen and Wedner opened the Smallman deli at 2840 Smallman St. Five years later, they opened the branch in Squirrel Hill.

“We have a lot of customers who used to come down to the Strip who then went to Squirrel Hill. Hopefully, they’ll come back down,” said Cohen.

The decision to close the Squirrel Hill location was due to “timing,” he explained.

“The lease was up … and in the end we felt it was easier to concentrate on the one store due to the fact that our main plant was here.”

Unlike eating a crisp, flavorful potato latke or sipping a Dr. Brown’s cream soda, closing the Squirrel Hill haunt is difficult to stomach, considering the role Smallman Street played in so many families’ lives, he explained.

“So many customers gave us business for catering for the holidays, whether it was

p Smallman Street Deli in Squirrel Hill will close on Dec. 30 after 13 years in the neighborhood.

Photo by Adam Reinherz

Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Chanukah or Passover. You feel like part of their family through these traditions,” and in the end “the neighborhood people became your friends, they were more your friends than they were your customers,” he said.

While watching families grow or seeing them celebrate the holidays served as high points, “the low point for me was on Oct. 27,” said Cohen. That morning, “I happened to be in Squirrel Hill. I saw cars racing by the deli and I knew something was terribly wrong, it’s something we have to live with.”

Like other area establishments, Smallman Street Deli offered an insider’s view of a community processing trauma.

“We saw tons of new faces within a few weeks of the tragedy. Everyone who came into the store — you could just see that everyone was hurt so badly — you could just see the look on everyone’s face, it was almost disbelief that it could happen,” he said. During those weeks after Oct. 27, “we just saw some different people, people who had never been to Squirrel Hill, who had to come stop in the deli.”

Fresh faces and old friends who found solace in a friendly environment where the wall is lined with classic photographs and the cash register and counters are beneath chalkboards denoting scrawled out menu items, such as roasted chicken, stuffed cabbage and fresh cut fries, were all appreciated, explained Cohen.

As a way of saying thanks to those who have supported them for so long, Smallman Street Deli has been distributing coupons for 10 percent off “all items from the deli or restaurant.” The coupons are redeemable at the Strip District location between Jan. 1 and March 31.

Additionally, a three-day customer celebration will be held at the Squirrel Hill store from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m., Dec. 28-30, with specials occurring throughout.

Giving gratitude is important, said Cohen.

“It’s always been about relationships. It’s always about the people first, everything else is second.

“We were thankful for all of the business, the customers and all of the good times we had in the deli,” he added. “It was a tremendous run.

“We were lucky to have so many customers and good friends who supported us over the years.” PJC Adam Reinherz can be reached at areinherz@ pittsburghjewishchronicle.org.

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Headlines From the shtetl to Tree of Life, Philip Terman’s poems speak to Jewish Pittsburgh — LOCAL —

By Toby Tabachnick | Senior Staff Writer

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he zeitgeist of the American Jewish experience flows from the pen of Philip Terman.

An award-winning poet who teaches creative writing and literature at Clarion University of Pennsylvania, Terman has published five books of poetry, drawing heavily on Jewish history, characters and wisdom.

He was the inaugural speaker at Temple Emanuel of South Hill’s Bagel Bites: Sunday Brunch Series, an adult education program that is free and open to the public. At the Dec. 16 event, Terman read several poems from his book “Our Portion” (Autumn House Press, 2015).

The poems brought laughter from the audience of about 25 people one minute, and tears the next — an echo of the Jewish experience itself.

Terman is drawn to Jewish themes, he said in an interview, because “there is boundless energy and spirit and history. It’s what I grew up with, and what I gravitate towards” Raised in Cleveland by a mother he describes as a “synagogue Jew,” and a father

p Poet Philip Terman was the inaugural speaker at Temple Emanuel of South Hill’s Bagel Bites adult education program.

Photo by Toby Tabachnick

he refers to as a “deli Jew,” it is his Jewishness that moves him, “from the texts to the corn beef sandwiches.”

Terman and his wife live in a rural area about 10 miles from Grove City, in a red brick school house with a slate roof built in 1884.

There are not too many Jews out that way, but nonetheless when it comes to his Judaism, “it’s hard to get away from it,” he said. He and his wife are active members of Congregation

B’nai Abraham in Butler and are former co-presidents of that congregation.

While “you couldn’t make a minyan” at Clarion University, he said, the broader campus community turned out in droves at a vigil to raise money for HIAS following the massacre at the Tree of Life synagogue building. Being one of a small number of Jews at Clarion, Terman tries to bring a Jewish essence to campus, and can “pretend

to be the expert,” he quipped.

Expert or not, it’s clear that Terman’s Jewish identity percolates deep in his kishkes, and is revealed through his accessible, clever and poignant poetry.

At his Temple Emanuel reading, Terman commenced with the poem “Eloquence,” a reflection on growing up with a speech impediment, with a tie-in to the Torah’s most famous stammerer, Moses.

“As a Jewish poet, of course I’m going to write about my ancestors,” Terman told his audience, before launching into “The Dress Factory,” a tribute to his immigrant grandparents in which he paints clear and loving imagery of an Eastern European shtetl, then the heartbreaking realities of the early 20th century American sweatshops.

In “My Russian Jewish Grandparents and the Birth Parents of Our Chinese Child Meet at a Café and Discuss our Child’s Future,” Terman imagines his Jewish ancestors bridging time, space and culture to connect for common cause with his adopted child’s birth family. It is an inspired fusing of Judaism’s past to its continuing evolution.

The penultimate poem of the morning was Terman’s tribute to the victims of the massacre at the Tree of Life synagogue building, Please see Poet, page 21

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Headlines ‘Rabbi caravan’ providing support to New Light and beyond Federation of Greater Pittsburgh, to rally rabbis to come each Shabbat to assist New Light, as well others in Jewish Pittsburgh, through mid-January.

By Toby Tabachnick | Senior Staff Writer After putting out a call for help to hen an anti-Semite murdered members of the Conservative movement’s New Light Congregation Rabbinical Assembly, “within 15 minutes, members Mel Wax, Richard all the dates I wanted coverage for were Gottfried and Dan Stein on Oct. 27, that filled,” Naditch said.

“And it’s really been a help to the rabbis congregation lost three of its most dedicated members — those who regularly who have visited because it’s given us an led its services. opportunity to feel less helpless in the face of While Wax, Gottfried and Stein can tragedy, that we can contribute in some way never be replaced, in the weeks since their and not just sit back and watch the suffering.”

Having the visiting rabbis at New Light murders, their synagogue duties have been assumed by a steady stream of out-of-state each Shabbat has been “very helpful,” said rabbis who have eagerly come to Pittsburgh Rabbi Jonathan Perlman, New Light’s spiritual leader, who was in the Tree of Life synato offer assistance.

Referred to as the “rabbi caravan” by gogue building when the murders occurred.

Rabbi Beth Naditch, who is helping to orga- “They provide a connection to the greater nize rabbinic aid to Pittsburgh in the wake Conservative movement,” as the RA “wants of the murders at the Tree of Life syna- to show support for New Light.”

The rabbis’ help “alleviates some of the gogue building, the rabbis not only help lead services, but also provide pastoral care and pressure on me to train other people that can willing ears to listen to the stories of those lead the service our martyrs can no longer do,” Perlman said, adding that the counseling affected by the attack.

Naditch, a chaplain and a certified educator offered by the visitors has also been valuable.

“Every single rabbi that has come comes of chaplains at Hebrew SeniorLife in Boston, was tapped by Rabbi Amy Bardack, director from a place that has been affected by of Jewish Life and Learning at the Jewish anti-Semitism in some way, and can share their own traumatic experiences with the people they talk to,” he said.

One of those rabbis was Francine Green Roston from Whitefish, Mont. In the winter of 2016-2017, she and two other families in Whitefish were the target of cyberthreats by white supremacists.

“I was horrified and grieving after the [Tree of Life] shooting, and like many people around the world, wanted to do something to offer support,” Roston said. “This was a great opportunity to be present for people. And because of my experience of living through the trauma of anti-Semitic attacks on our community, p Rabbi Beth Naditch Courtesy of Beth Naditch I felt like I could be a very understanding presence for people.”

The ordeal she experienced in Whitefish left her “very depressed,” she said. “I found my way through by the support of people from around the country and around the world.”

The visiting rabbis have been received by New Light with “open arms,” according to Naditch.

“I was there before shloshim, so even before a month had been up,” she said. “The energy there was of a shiva house. Even so, I felt like as a stranger walking in, I was received with open arms. I don’t take that lightly, because I know that it can sometimes feel very invasive when outsiders come.”

The rabbis who have come p Rabbi Francine Roston Courtesy of Francine Roston to Pittsburgh are all volunteers,

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“leaving behind their day jobs from all over the country,” said Bardack. Their travel expenses are being covered by the Federation, by a $2,500 grant from the RA, and sometimes through their own discretionary funds. Bardack has also received an offer of airline miles from a donor in New Jersey.

Having rabbis in town who are trained to deal with trauma counseling is important, Bardack said, as research has shown that people are five times more likely to talk to a member of the clergy in the wake of trauma than to all other mental health professionals combined.

Rabbi Yonason Meadows “Many people need to talk, but p Photo provided by Yonason Meadows are not going to ask for a referral to therapist,” she said, emphasizing that what members of the clergy provide is “not therapy.”

“It’s comfort care, and spiritual care,” she said. “That means a listening ear, a hand to hold, empathy, as well as spiritual questions. You wouldn’t pray with a therapist, but you can with a chaplain. You wouldn’t necessarily ask theological questions of a therapist, but a chaplain is there to handle questions such as ‘How could this happen?

Why did this happen? What does this mean for our safety as Jews?

How can I have hope?’”

Helping those who are charged with leading communities — such as rabbis — when they are Rabbi Amy Bardack File photo dealing with their own distress is p a unique challenge, said Naditch, who worked as a chaplain in New York City during 9/11 and in Boston certified clinical pastoral educator and the after the marathon bombing. senior staff chaplain at UnityPoint Health “One of the things I learned as chaplain Meriter Hospital in Madison, Wis., was the in both those experiences was how different first Orthodox rabbi and chaplain to come an individual trauma is from when an entire to Pittsburgh in the wake of the shootings, community experiences something because, to “be a listening and passive presence, among other things, when a community is to provide witnessing to the unbelievable hit, the people who are usually involved in trauma and resilience I encountered,” he said. helping others or comforting others are also “The Orthodox community wanted a dealing with their own trauma,” she said. “So chaplain rooted in a Torah philosophy or the complications multiply.” understanding,” Meadows said. “This is not When rabbis and other Jewish profes- an opportunity you say ‘no’ to.” sionals are working through their own Being in Squirrel Hill in the aftermath symptoms of trauma “it’s not as possible to of the shooting “was an experience that be as available as we usually are for others,” was simultaneously deeply inspiring and Naditch said. “I know the things that helped wonderful, to be of use and of service to my me during 9/11, and that helped during the people, and to see tremendous Jewish unity Boston Marathon bombing, was to make across the denominations in Pittsburgh.” sure the helpers had a support system of Other pastoral support to Pittsburgh’s their own so that they would be able to both Jewish community has come from the Red heal themselves and be as helpful to other Cross, which “dispatched ‘disaster spiripeople as they could be.” tual care’ chaplains, who were rabbis, from In addition to the Conservative rabbis the very start of the trauma,” Bardack said. who have been coming each week, Bardack They are volunteers, and Red Cross pays for and Naditch arranged for two Orthodox their travel. PJC chaplains to visit Pittsburgh, specifically to Toby Tabachnick can be reached at assist the Orthodox community.

Rabbi Yonason Meadows, MSW, a ttabachnick@pittsburghjewishchronicle.org.

PITTSBURGH JEWISH CHRONICLE

DECEMBER 21, 2018 5

Calendar >> Submit calendar items on the Chronicle’s website, pittsburghjewishchronicle.org.

Submissions will also be included in print.

Events will run in the print edition beginning one month prior to the date as space allows.

The deadline for submissions is Friday, noon.

q TUESDAY, DEC. 25

q MONDAY, DEC. 24

q THURSDAY, DEC. 27

MoHo Does Jewish Christmas from 7 to 10 p.m. at Moishe House. Got nothing to do on a random December Monday night? How about a tradition as old as the Torah itself … come to the Moish’ on Christmas Eve for a cozy night in with a movie and Chinese food.

Contact moishehousepgh@gmail.com for more information.

Roots of Steel, a benefit concert and silent auction for Tree of Life*Or L’Simcha, Dor Hadash and New Light Congregations, beginning with a silent auction at 6 p.m. and the show at 7 p.m. at the Carnegie Music Hall.

Visit rootsofsteel.org for more information and to purchase tickets.

q WEDNESDAY, JAN. 16

The Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh Mitzvah Day will take place at various times.

Visit http://jfedvolunteer.org/md18 for more information and to register.

q MONDAY, JAN. 7

Congregation Beth Shalom’s Derekh Speaker Series will present Elisha Waldman at 7:30 p.m., made available through the Jewish Book Council.

Waldman’s book is “This Narrow Space,” a memoir by an American pediatric oncologist who spent seven years in Jerusalem treating children of all faiths who had been diagnosed with cancer. There will be a book sale and author signing at the end.

q THURSDAY, JAN. 3

Beth El Congregation will host its First Mondays monthly lunch program with Rabbi Alex Greenbaum from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. featuring a showing and discussion of the film “The Sturgeon Queens: The story of Russ and Daughters.”

Lunch is deli-themed and includes popcorn.

Visit bethelcong.org for more information.

Call 412-561-1168 to make a reservation.

There is a $6 charge.

Chabad of the South Hills will host Torah & Tea: A Study Group for Women with speaker psychologist Sharon Saul on “Tips to Authentic Happiness” at 7:30 p.m. at 1701 McFarland Road. There is no charge. RSVP to batya@ chabadsh.com or 412-344-2424 or visit chabadsh.com for more information. q DEADLINE MONDAY, JAN. 7 The Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh’s 2019-2020 Wechsler Fellowship: Building Pittsburgh’s Next Jewish Leaders is now accepting nominations. Nominate one or more outstanding individuals from your organization, synagogue, community or social networks. Ideal candidates are between the ages of 22 and 45, who are passionate, innovative and inspired to lead our Jewish community into the future. q TUESDAY, JAN. 8

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Congregation Beth Shalom will hold a Lunch and Learn at noon at 535 Smithfield St., and Tuesday, Jan. 15 at noon at Congregation Beth Shalom. Ever wonder why you don’t have to park three blocks away from a Conservative synagogue on Shabbat? Or whether your rabbi can marry a gay couple?

The Rabbinical Assembly’s Committee on Jewish Law and Standards has been reviewing contemporary halachic issues for the Conservative movement for more than 90 years, and has a long-standing tradition of issuing thoughtful, sensitive responsa to the challenges of keeping Jewish law in

Renew TODAY!

today’s world. Learn about these teshuvot.

There is no charge. Visit tinyurl.com/ LunchLearnJan2019 for more information. q THURSDAY, JAN. 10 Chabad of Squirrel Hill will present SoulStir, an uplifting dance experience for women from 7:30 to 9 p.m. at 1700 Beechwood Boulevard. There is a $10 charge. Visit chabadpgh.com/dance for more information. q SATURDAY, JAN. 12 The Global Intergenerational Initiative for Grandparents and Grandchildren will hold an information session at Rodef Shalom Congregation. The G2 program is a yearlong Jewish journey for grandparents and their preteen grandchildren to connect, explore and strengthen their relationship with each other, Israel and the Jewish people. The program begins Sunday, Feb. 10. Contact Debbie Swartz for details about the information session and program at dswartz@jfedpgh.org or 412-992-5208. q SUNDAY, JAN. 13 Sisterhood Movie Night sponsored by the Women of Rodef Shalom will be at 7:30 p.m. in Levy Hall. “Green Fields,” a masterpiece of the Yiddish Cinema of the 1930s starring Hershel Bernardi and Helen Beverly, will be shown. The film is a Yiddish folktale of that period that has been remastered and has clear English subtitles.

The film is open to the community. Refreshments will follow the film. There is no charge. Visit rodefshalom.org for more information. PJC

Complete the form and mail or call 410.902.2308

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Robert Kraft visits Tree of Life

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6 DECEMBER 21, 2018

In a demonstration of respect and solidarity, Robert Kraft, CEO of the New England Patriots, and his son Jonathan Kraft, the team’s president, visited the Tree of Life building Saturday morning, Dec. 15. Following the visit, the Krafts attended Shabbat services for the congregation, which are currently being held at Rodef Shalom Congregation in Shadyside.

Midway through services, after being introduced to the congregation, Robert Kraft addressed attendees. During the Torah reading, he received a special aliyah.

Following services, the Krafts returned to

New England. Representatives of the Patriots had earlier reached out to Tree of Life to make sure the visit would be welcome.

The Patriots (9-5) played the Steelers (8-5-1) on Sunday. The Steelers won, 17-10.

During the game, Patriots player Julian Edelman wore cleats emblazoned with the Hebrew words “etz chaim” and “Stronger than hate.” The cleats also included Tree of Life’s logo and a blue Star of David. Prior to the game, Edelman tweeted out the names of the 11 victims. PJC —Adam Reinherz

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Headlines In London’s Jewish hub, Brexit jitters are causing a housing slump — WORLD —

By Cnaan Liphshiz

L

ONDON — Two and half years ago, Murray Lee voted in favor of the United Kingdom leaving the European Union.

A Jewish real-estate agent from northern London, Murray shared the concerns of many in the leave camp over the United Kingdom’s perceived vulnerability to Europe’s immigration problems. If England remained shackled to Brussels’ policies, he and other leavers argued, they’d pay the price for the exodus of work and asylum seekers from the Middle East and beyond.

Murray is still worried by those issues. But now, he is also concerned about the damage that the turmoil around the Brexit vote — in which the leavers won a narrow majority of 52 percent — may be wreaking on the British economy and Murray’s industry, not least in the Jewish hub of northern London.

“I don’t think we knew then what we know now,” Murray said about his vote, about which he now has some regrets. “We were badly advised.”

Referencing predictions of an economic downturn over the next 15 years, he added: “Unfortunately, I never thought of it.”

Murray, a real estate agent with 45 years of experience who founded the Dreamview

Estates agency on Golders Green Road, has seen housing prices drop by around 10 percent from their peak levels in 2016, with some assets attracting little to no bids, he said.

A busy artery running through the pricey neighborhood that gave it its name, Golders Green Road features multiple Israeli and kosher eateries and shops such as Florentin, Hummus Bar and Yarok, that reflect the heavily Jewish makeup of the area.

A bit further up the road, Richard Dangoor, managing director at his Jewish family’s real estate agency, Hausman & Holmes, has seen a drop of about 20 percent in the number of sales since the Brexit vote.

The U.K. housing market’s growth of 1.5 percent in October dropped sharply to a near-stagnant 0.3 percent in November, The Guardian reported earlier this month.

And London, which in 2015 saw a whopping 9.2-percent rise in housing prices, has become a “weak spot” in the U.K. property market, The Guardian reported in October.

The London bubble may have burst not only because of Brexit uncertainty, but also because “prices had become unaffordable,” Murray said. He and Dangoor both said they don’t at this point fear for the viability of their business.

More broadly, though, shares in British firms have taken considerable hits following the Brexit vote. The pound had lost nearly 15 percent of its value against the dollar since January 2016.

Complicating matters is the uncertainty and anger around the terms of Britain’s withdrawal as stipulated in a draft agreement that Prime Minister Theresa May made public last month, after lengthy negotiations. The document says that the United Kingdom will have to adhere to E.U. laws — including on unencumbered immigration within the bloc — for the duration of a two-year transition period, but lose its representation in its government bodies.

The document’s shortcomings triggered a no-confidence vote inside May’s Conservative party, where it angered moderates and hardliners alike. She survived last week’s vote, but it also revealed that she had lost the support of more than a third of her party’s own lawmakers in the House of Commons, British parliament’s lower house.

With less than four months to go before the proposed deal expires, the shaky support for it is raising the specter of the United Kingdom crashing out of the European Union with no deal. Economists warn that such a spectacle would be disastrous for a country that depends on the E.U. for 53 percent of its imported goods and services and for 44 percent of its exports.

In central London, this uncertainty is hitting the housing market particularly hard, said Dangoor, a father of three.

Central London’s real estate market depends on investment from overseas, including the Middle East, South Africa and China.

“You’re seeing a big drop in values there,” he said.

The drop is less noticeable in suburbs, though, due to low interest rates that mean “owners aren’t forced to sell,” Dangoor said.

Suburban assets that “tick all the requisite boxes” still fetch premium prices as “these areas are insulated by a micro-bubble of their own and buyers looking for a family home a have longer term-view point,” Dangoor added.

But the number of transactions is down there, too, “because people are concerned,” he added.

May’s tenuous position over Brexit increases the likelihood of an election and her government’s replacement with a cabinet headed by the leader of the Labour opposition, the far-left Jeremy Corbyn.

Corbyn, who has called Hamas and Hezbollah his friends and said that British “Zionists” don’t understand British irony, has been battling allegations of anti-Semitism, including from the former chief rabbi of Britain, Jonathan Sacks. Earlier this year, all of Britain’s leading Jewish newspapers in a joint editorial warned that Corbyn could pose an “existential threat” to British Jewry.

Murray, who specializes in the heavily Jewish northern London market, is already seeing what he called “the Corbyn effect” on some of his clients, he said.

One buyer, Murray said, told him: “I’m selling because I’m going to Israel if Corbyn gets elected.” PJC

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Headlines Soviet immigration, once a bane of Germany’s Jews, has become their salvation — WORLD —

By Cnaan Liphshiz | JTA

M

UNICH — Weeks after they emigrated from Russia and moved to Germany, the Nedlin family sought to join the local Jewish community.

Registering for membership in a Jewish community — a practice common in European countries — was a significant step for the Nedlins, who before emigrating in 1992 had grown up in the repressive Soviet Union.

There they were forced to hide or downplay their Jewish identity due to state anti-Semitism and discrimination against religion.

But the local community didn’t reciprocate the family’s desire for contact.

“At first they told us we can’t join,” Anna Nedlin, who was 5 at the time, recalled in an interview. “They didn’t want anything to do with us.” But at her parents’ insistence, “they sent our documents to Frankfurt to check if we’re really Jewish.”

The experience of the Nedlins, who eventually were allowed to join the synagogue, was a typical account of many of the 170,000 Russian speakers who immigrated to Germany following the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s. The newcomers faced a rift with the 30,000 “postwar” Jews whom many expected to welcome them to Germany.

The split has had a deep, lasting and polarizing effect on a community re-established

by Holocaust survivors, distracting at times from the mission of revival. It flares up in local communal politics but, 30 years on, has mostly healed. More often, the Russianspeaking immigrants and their children are credited with energizing and strengthening a minority group whose viability used to be uncertain.

When the post-Soviet immigration began, Jews in Germany suddenly found themselves struggling to cater to large numbers of people with little more than the shirts on their backs. It didn’t help that the newcomers had little knowledge of Judaism and attitudes shaped by decades of living under repressive governments.

Famously, many German Jews were shocked at how some newcomers would take away food that was set out as refreshments for the Kiddush ceremony at synagogue.

The postwar community, which was largely descended from recent Eastern European immigrants, would “look upon the Soviet Jews as maybe not even being Jews and being uneducated [yet] taking over their communities,” said Esther Knochenhauer, 34, who was born in East Germany one year after her parents immigrated there from Russia.

Even before the reunification of Germany in 1990, the East German leader Lothar de Maiziere began welcoming Soviet Jews. Helmut Kohl, the former chancellor, adopted the same policy after unification to make amends for and reverse the Nazis’ annihilation of Jewish presence in Germany.

Following reunification, immigration 8 DECEMBER 21, 2018

p Sergey Lagodinsky and Dana Golan attend a discussion in Berlin about Israel.

Photo by Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung/Frank Roehlp

p Children stick white roses into a Star of David sculpture at the construction site of a new synagogue in Potsdam, Germany, on the 80th anniversary of the Nazi Kristallnacht pogrom.

Photo by Bernd Settnik/AFP/Getty Images

requests by Jews were expedited and given equal status to those by ethnic Germans.

The Berlin Jewish community, under its president until 1992, Heinz Galinski, hired dozens of Russian-speaking Jews to help with the absorption of others. And many Jewish communities tried to assist penniless newcomers however they could — including charity.

But these well-intended steps sometimes stoked tensions.

It made some “wrongly frame” communal politics as “a struggle between Russian speakers in power who do shady things and German-speaking opposition,” according to Sergey Lagodinsky, a Russia-born jurist who has run for leadership roles in the Berlin Jewish community’s elections.

And some dismissed the desire of Russianspeaking Jews for contact with Jewish life as utilitarian, he added. In the European context, joining the community allows a member access to facilities as well as free or subsidized services for weddings, circumcision and b’nai mitzvah.

That suggestion was especially insulting to families like Knochenhauer’s. Her mother’s family was so attached to their Jewish identity

that they continued holding Passover seder dinners in communist Russia (though, out of caution, they neither read the Haggadah nor told the children what the bizarre dishes and customs were all about, she said).

Yet Nedlin and Knochenhauer’s own life stories reflect their divided community’s ability to transcend the challenges of this culture clash, which ended up becoming the community’s lifeline.

This year, both women married Jewish men descended from postwar families.

Anna Nedlin was married at a Cologne synagogue to Roni Lehrer, whom she met 10 years ago at the Mahane Jewish camp.

The couple, both historians, are expecting their first child.

Lehrer, 30, credits the Russian-speaking influx with more than just continuing his own Jewish family.

“We wouldn’t be around if not for their arrival,” he said. “We would’ve been doomed as a community.”

Lehrer’s mother, he said, joined the Jewish community of Cologne in the early 1980s, when it was “a dwindling group of 1,000 people.” She did not expect Jewish life to survive in Cologne, planning to move to

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Israel at some point so that her children would grow up with Judaism, her son said.

But a decade later, “we’re a community of 5,500 people.”

This resulted in the 2002 re-establishment of a Jewish school in Cologne, the Lauder Morijah School, and the opening of other Jewish institutions. Two-thirds of the 60 counselors trained annually by the community for youth work in Cologne, Lehrer said, come from Jewish homes with at least one Russian-speaking parent.

Language and food differences are some of the minor issues younger mixed couples can expect, according to Knochenhauer’s Berlinborn husband, who asked not to be identified by name in the article. (Knochenhauer said his preference for keeping a low profile was typical of postwar Jews, and one of the things that sets them apart from Russian speakers who “won’t stay silent.”)

Her family “makes enough food for an army, which always makes me wonder just how many people they plan on hosting,” Knochenhauer’s husband said. But these minor differences are not comparable to the challenges of interfaith marriages with partners from very different cultures, Knochenhauer said.

Still, the arrival of many thousands of Russian speakers has had a lasting and often divisive effect on communal politics, shaping the processes of some communities to this day, everyone interviewed for this article agreed.

One of the first parties representing Russian speakers in the internal elections of the Berlin Jewish Community was called “Silent Majority.” Its main platform was the members’ identify as Russian speakers.

From the mid-1990s onward, the RussianGerman divide became a permanent issue in internal election campaigns, according to Lagodinsky, the jurist.

“There was a lot of disappointment” among Russian speakers over how they were received by German-speaking Jews, he said.

Some politicians “played up” this sentiment, he said, naming the current president of the Berlin Jewish Community, Gideon Joffe. Born to Soviet immigrant Jews in Israel, he moved as a child to Germany. According to Lagodinsky, Joffe has “in Trumpian style played up the Russian-speaking identity card” in elections.

Lagodinsky and others accused Joffe of rigging the internal elections of 2015 and clinging to power with “tricks right out of the Soviet period,” as Lagodinsky put it.

Joffe, who has denied the allegations, did not reply to multiple requests for an interview.

But the fact that Joffe’s main challenger, Lagodinsky, also speaks Russian as a mother tongue “shows we’ve moved as a community passed the language divide and are focusing on the main issues,” Lagodinsky said.

To Lehrer, the historian, the internal divide “is a generational issue.”

“People aged 20-40 don’t care about this anymore,” he said. And whereas some aspects of the problem are “alive, it is quite literally dying out.” PJC

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Headlines Takeaways from Jared Kushner’s interview with Sean Hannity on Middle East peace — WORLD —

By Ron Kampeas | JTA

W

ASHINGTON — Jared Kushner, the presidential son-in-law and adviser, rarely speaks in public.

No surprise, then, that a rare appearance on cable news TV was with a friendly network, Fox News, with a friendly interviewer, Sean Hannity.

Kushner seemingly said little about the Israeli-Palestinian peace deal he hopes to strike, but in reading between the lines, some nuggets emerge: The release of the proposal is not absolutely certain, and statehood for the Palestinians seems for now to be a nonstarter. But Kushner also recognizes that he can’t get much else done in the region without an Israeli-Palestinian deal.

On Hannity’s show last week, the host and Kushner ran through three issues. The first two were President Donald Trump’s efforts to replace his chief of staff after nearly two fraught years with John Kelly (Trump is looking for someone with “great chemistry,” Kushner said) and a rare impending legislative win for Trump, passing prison reform.

Then Hannity asked whether tensions

over the murder of Saudi dissident Jamal Khashoggi were overwhelming Kushner’s quest for what his dad-in-law calls the “deal of the century” between Palestinians and Israelis.

Saudi officials murdered Khashoggi in Turkey, and U.S. intelligence agencies believe the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, ultimately was responsible for the operation. Kushner reportedly has led the effort within the administration to let the crown prince off the hook; the two men have struck a close friendship and political alliance.

Kushner quickly got Khashoggi out of the way.

“I think our intelligence agencies are making their assessments and we’re hoping to make sure that there’s justice brought where that should be,” he said.

The intelligence agencies have already made their assessment, holding the crown prince, known by his nickname, MbS, responsible.

Pivoting to Middle East peace, Kushner said, “We’re focused now on the broader region, which is figuring out how to hopefully bring a deal together between the Israelis and the Palestinians.”

Kushner and his team — top negotiator Please see Kushner, page 21

p Jared Kushner leaves a weekly Senate Republican policy luncheon at the U.S. Capitol in November.

Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

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Headlines Israel has a bobsled team, and it wants to compete in the Olympics — WORLD —

By Josefin Dolsten | JTA

N

EW YORK — In the span of just a couple days, Chaim Raice went from never having been on a bobsled to being a contender to represent Israel in the 2022 Winter Olympics. And it all started with a Facebook post.

Raice, a house builder based in Pomona, N.Y., was browsing the social media site in November when he saw a post saying that the Israeli bobsled team was in need of another athlete to compete in the North American Cup beginning that month.

He thought it was a joke, but he still reached out. Though Raice, 46, had little knowledge of bobsled, he had participated in several other sports as an amateur, and his Israeli citizenship meant he qualified to compete for the country.

It turned out to be a perfect match, and just two days after having reached out, Raice was driving up to Lake Placid to compete.

“I was kind of shocked that it actually worked out,” he said.

Raice had been told that he would be teaming with an athlete whose partner had

p Dave Nicholls, seated, rides in the bobsled.

dropped out due to scheduling conflicts. The other competitor would be serving as the pilot, sitting at the front of the racing sled and steering, while Raice would serve as the

Photo courtesy of Dave Nicholls

brakeman, pulling a lever to get the go-kartlike sleigh to slow down after crossing the finish line.

What he didn’t know was that his partner,

Dave Nicholls, uses a wheelchair to get around.

Though Nicholls, who sustained spinal damage in a skiing accident 15 years ago, had been participating in the sport for 14 years, this was the first time the disabled athlete was taking part in a competition for able-bodied people (rather than a para-athlete competition).

“I was a little shocked,” Raice said about finding out about Nicholl’s status.

The rules of bobsled, which has two- and four-person teams, actually make competing for wheelchair users less of a challenge than in most other sports. Team members typically push the sled and then jump in before going down the track, but the rules allow an athlete to start seated and the other team members to push — less of a disadvantage in the four-person sled than in pairs.

Raice arrived in Lake Placid on Nov. 29, just a day before the two-day competition.

He and Nicholls, who is in his 50s and based in Park City, Utah, were able to practice on the racetrack twice before the big day.

Prior to the first day’s run, Nicholls made what he calls “a rookie mistake”: He loosened his helmet strap, causing it to slide down over his eyes and block his line of vision on the track. With Nicholls not able Please see Bobsled, page 21

Treasured Video and Photo Memories? This week in Israeli history — WORLD —

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arms embargo enacted after the June 1967 war. The boats arrive in Haifa on Dec. 31.

Items provided by the Center for Israel Education (israeled.org), where you can find more details.

Dec. 25, 1918 — Sadat is born

Dec. 21, 1973 — Peace conference in Geneva

A Middle East peace conference opens under the auspices of the United States and the Soviet Union, although U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger keeps the Soviets in the dark about progress made in private by Israel and Egypt toward their 1974 Disengagement Agreement.

Dec. 22, 1948 — Britain fears Communist Israel

A cable from U.S. envoy Julius Holmes recounts the concerns expressed by British Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin due to immigrants from Communist-controlled countries.

Dec. 23, 1789 — French Citizenship debated

The National Assembly debates the issue of Jewish rights. Abbe Jean Siffrein Maury declares that Jews form a separate nation with their own laws. Count Stanislas de Claremont-Tonnerre says, “The Jews should be denied everything as a nation but granted everything as individuals.”

Dec. 24, 1969 — French Missile boats smuggled Israel uses a fake shipping company as a front to purchase five military boats and sneaks them out of Cherbourg, defeating a French

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Anwar Sadat, the president who leads Egypt into the 1973 Yom Kippur War and signs a peace treaty with Israel in 1979, is born into a family of 13 children in Mit Abu al-Kum, Egypt. He is part of the Free Officers movement that overthrows the monarchy in 1952, becomes Gamal Abdel Nasser’s vice president in 1964 and is named president in 1970.

Dec. 26, 1864 — Land buyer Hankin is born

Yehoshua Hankin, who personally buys 30 percent of the land owned by the State of Israel at its independence in 1948, is born in Ukraine.

He and his father make aliyah in 1882, and he makes his first land buy for the Yishuv (the area of Jewish settlement) in 1890 when he purchases a plot that becomes the town of Rehovot.

Dec. 27, 2008 — Operation Cast Lead begins

Israel launches Operation Cast Lead in Gaza after Hamas breaks a six-month Egyptianbrokered cease-fire. Nearly 12,000 rockets had been fired into southern Israel from the Gaza Strip in eight years, including roughly 3,000 in 2008 alone, before Israel launches the 22-day operation to stop rocket fire, Hamas terrorist attacks and weapons smuggling into Gaza. PJC

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Headlines Two Israeli soldiers killed in West Bank shooting

p Members of the haredi Orthodox Netzach Yehuda battalion mourn the death of Sgt. Yosef Cohen at his funeral.

Photo by Sam Sokol

— WORLD —

By Marcy Oster | JTA

J

ERUSALEM — Two Israeli soldiers were killed and two others seriously injured in a shooting attack near a bus stop in the West Bank.

The attack on Thursday morning, Dec. 13, occurred at a bus stop outside of the Givat Asaf settlement, about a mile down the same

road from the settlement of Ofra. Ofra was the site of a shooting the previous Sunday night that left seven people, including a pregnant woman whose prematurely delivered baby died on Dec. 12, wounded.

It was the second attack against Israelis on that Thursday. A third attack suspected to be a car ramming attack in the West Bank was later ruled to be an accident. The Palestinian driver in that incident was killed.

In the Givat Asaf attack a gunman stopped his car next to the bus stop, got

C OMMUNITY D AY S CHOOL GALA

‘

p A fellow Netzach Yehuda soldier at Yosef Cohen’s funeral on Dec. 14.

Photo by Sam Sokol

out of the car and began shooting. He fled the scene on foot.

Four people, all in their 20s, were shot in the attack. The two dead were later identified as Staff Sgt. Yovel Mor Yosef, 20, and Sgt. Yosef Cohen, 19. According to the Times of Israel, Mor Yosef was from Ashkelon. Cohen was a resident of Beit Shemesh. Both were members of the Kfir Brigade’s Netzah Yehuda infantry battalion, a unit for religious soldiers.

The soldiers reportedly were guarding the bus stop when the attack occurred.

One of the injured is a man in critical condition with a gunshot wound to his head; he also was identified as a soldier. The injured woman is a civilian.

“His condition is very serious. There is a threat to his life,” a Hadassah spokesperson told media about the injured soldier.

The attack came hours after Israeli troops shot a man in Ramallah suspected of involvement in Sunday’s attack near Ofra. The Please see Attack, page 22

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DECEMBER 21, 2018 11

Headlines they live and work,” she said. “But this type of hate crime does just the opposite: It mobilizes us to come together and unite around the common causes of tolerance and peace, and to continue fighting for a more inclusive, more just world.”

— WORLD — From JTA reports

Israeli ambassador ‘shocked’ at Ukraine’s honoring of Nazi collaborator In an unusual move, Israel’s ambassador to Ukraine protested a local region’s honoring of a collaborator with Nazi Germany.

Ambassador Joel Lion condemned the Lviv region’s decision to name 2019 the year of Stepan Bandera in a statement he published last week.

Lion wrote that he is “shocked” by the recent decision.

“I cannot understand how the glorification of those directly involved in horrible anti-Semitic crimes helps fight antisemitism and xenophobia,” he wrote.

Lviv already has a large statue of Bandera, who collaborated for a time with Nazi forces that occupied what is now Ukraine and is believed to have commanded troops that killed thousands of Jews. Kiev and several other cities have streets named for him.

Bandera was assassinated by a KGB agent in Munich in 1959.

Once regarded by Ukrainian authorities as illegitimate to serve as national role models because of their war crimes against Jews and Poles, he and other former collaborators are now widely regarded as patriot heroes.

Lion’s harsh tone is remarkable in light of how Israel has largely refrained from commenting on the phenomenon. Last week, he also spoke about the issue.

In 2017, the former ambassador to Ukraine, Eliav Belotzercovsky, called the glorification of collaborators “a problem.”

American Federation of Teachers building defaced with anti-Semitic graffiti The American Federation of Teachers said vandals defaced its headquarters in Washington D.C. with anti-Semitic graffiti.

A number of areas around the building, including a wall, were yellow spray-painted on Tuesday and Wednesday last week with “I want Jexit!” an apparent anti-Semitic play on “Brexit,” Britain’s planned pullout from the European Union.

Randi Weingarten, the president of the national union for teachers, is Jewish and has partnered AFT with Israeli programs.

She has become an outspoken critic of President Donald Trump.

In its statement, the AFT said it had reported the vandalism to police and had asked the Anti-Defamation League and the Southern Poverty Law Center to further investigate the term “Jexit.”

Weingarten in the statement said the union would not be intimidated. “Defacing our community with hateful rhetoric is meant to intimidate, otherize and sow fear, and to divide our community and make people feel unsafe and unwelcome where

Illinois warns Airbnb of blacklist placement over its settlement boycott The Illinois state body that sets investment policy gave Airbnb 90 days to explain why it will not list properties in West Bank settlements.

At the request of Gov. Bruce Rauner, the outgoing Republican governor, the Illinois Investment Policy Board last week unanimously voted to notify Airbnb it is in violation of state law that bars state investment in businesses that boycott Israel or Israeli entities in territories Israeli controls.

Airbnb now has 90 days to respond, or it will go on the state’s list of companies the state must not engage in business.

Rauner, defeated in a re-election bid last month by venture capitalist J.B. Pritzker, who is Jewish, was in 2015 among the first governors to sign into law a ban on doing business with entities that boycott Israel or its settlements.

Airbnb last month announced its change in policy, noting that it would continue to list properties inside Israel’s 1967 lines.

NYU Jewish center closes temporarily over threatening social media posts A Jewish center at New York University closed temporarily after concern over threatening social media posts.

The Edgar M. Bronfman Center for Jewish Student Life at NYU was closed for most of the day on Dec. 13.

“We became aware of several public online postings by an NYU student which were anti-Semitic in nature and potentially threatening,” Rabbi Yehuda Sarna, executive director of the center, wrote in an email to students on Tuesday night.

The building did not open in the morning while officials consulted with security experts. It reopened late in the day and remained open until 1 a.m. for students to talk to staff and a counselor from the university’s wellness center.

A Facebook page called SJP Uncovered posted screenshots of a post from a student it believed to be responsible for the posts, though the student responsible has not been named by the university or the center.

The NYU chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine said that the student that has been named on social media is not affiliated with the organization, “nevertheless, we completely oppose and condemn his statements,” SJP said in a statement.

The incident comes less than a week after New York University’s student government passed a resolution calling on the school to divest from companies with Israel ties. PJC

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Life & Culture Hershey Felder channels Irving Berlin in one-man show — THEATER —

By Toby Tabachnick | Senior Staff Writer

T

he fact that a late 19th-century Jewish immigrant from the shtetls of Eastern Europe wrote the best-selling Christmas song of all time makes perfect sense to Hershey Felder.

The story of Irving Berlin, the composer of “White Christmas,” is “one of the great American stories,” said Felder, an actor and pianist known for creating shows about iconic men of music, including Jewish composers Leonard Bernstein and George Gershwin. He will be performing his one-man show, “Hershey Felder as Irving Berlin,” at the Pittsburgh Public Theater from Dec. 19 to 30.

Born Israel Beilin in 1888 in the Russian Empire, Berlin became one of the chief contributors to the Great American Songbook. He immigrated to the Lower East Side of New York City with his family when he was five years old, and his father died just eight years later. Impoverished, Berlin, at the age of 13, began singing on the streets of New York for pennies, eventually becoming a singing waiter in Chinatown. He went on to Tin Pan Alley, and published his first song in 1907. By 1911, he had penned his first major hit, “Alexander’s Ragtime Band.”

Berlin, who lived to be 101, had a long and prolific career, writing thousands of songs.

The author of such classics as “Blue Skies,” “God Bless America” and “Easter Parade” scored 17 Broadway shows, many Hollywood musicals and, along with producer Sam Harris, launched his own theater on Broadway, the Music Box — the current New

p Hershey Felder as Irving Berlin

York venue for “Dear Evan Hansen.”

In “Hershey Felder as Irving Berlin,” Felder situates the music created by Berlin “in context with what [Berlin] was going through at the time, along with what was going on in America,” he said, speaking by phone from Seattle where he was performing his one-man show about Tchaikovsky.

Bringing Berlin’s music to Pittsburgh during the holiday season is fitting, he noted, given that “White Christmas,” the highest-selling song of all time, was written by “a nice Jewish boy.”

Berlin, Felder explained, can be credited with contributing to the transformation of the role of Christmas in American society.

Through the lyrics of “White Christmas,” with their emphasis on snow and sentiment, Berlin carried Christmas “out of the realm of

Photo courtesy of Pittsburgh Public Theater

religion. Christmas became a family holiday and event and feeling. It’s kind of a big deal.”

Berlin “had a handle on what America was going through, and what America was,” Felder continued. “He was looking at what the country was becoming. He had genius to be able to do that.”

The show, which has no intermission, runs an hour and 43 minutes, with Felder taking on the persona of not only Berlin, but of those people who played major roles in the composer’s life, including his wife of 60 years, Ellin; Florenz Ziegfeld; and the star of his Broadway show, “Annie Get Your Gun,” Ethel Merman.

Felder consulted with Berlin’s daughter and grandchildren when creating this show, and its content reflects their input, portraying the composer as they remember

him: “genuinely a patriot” and a man who “cared about his family, and America.”

“It’s a simple, straightforward, heartfelt story,” he said.

Felder, born in Canada to Holocaust survivors from Hungary and Poland, can relate to Berlin’s experiences as an immigrant.

“Times are different now, but I can understand what it means to be an outsider and wanting to contribute,” he said. “I came from a home where people spoke with accents.”

In addition to writing and performing, Felder also worked for Steven Spielberg’s Shoah Foundation, interviewing Holocaust survivors and collecting their histories on film.

The performer, who was raised “frum” and is fluent in Hebrew and Yiddish, is mindful of the fact that he is coming to Pittsburgh to showcase a Jewish musical luminary just two months after the anti-Semitic massacre at the Tree of Life synagogue building.

“It’s heartbreaking, it’s terrifying,” said Felder, adding that he has “friends of friends” who were directly affected by the attack. “But there is a thing we need to remember: we have to go on and not curl up in the face of anti-Semitism and murder.”

The motivation to continue moves beyond the adage “the show must go on,” he said.

“Why try to entertain people who are still mourning? It’s a complicated balance. It’s important that life goes on, and I am thinking this is something important for me to do.”

With the rise in anti-Semitism in America, he hopes that showcasing the work of Berlin, in addition to entertaining his audience, will “remind people that we are great contributors in a very significant way.” PJC Toby Tabachnick can be reached at ttabachnick@pittsburghjewishchronicle.org.

‘If Beale Street Could Talk’ features a yarmulke-clad Dave Franco — FILM —

By Stephen Silver | JTA

“I

f Beale Street Could Talk,” the new film from “Moonlight” director Barry Jenkins, is at heart a film about African-American love during a time of rampant racism. It’s an adaption of James Baldwin’s heartbreaking 1974 novel of the same name, which depicts a young AfricanAmerican couple in 1970s New York whose love story is unjustly derailed.

But one of the film’s most powerful — and most talked about — scenes begins with a close-up of the back of the head of a yarmulke-wearing man as he walks up the stairs of a Manhattan apartment.

The narrative of “Beale Street,” which opens Friday and is considered an award season contender, alternates between the present and various stages of the couple’s life together. The scene in question takes place almost two-thirds of the way through, and the kippah wearer is named Levy.

Levy, played by Dave Franco, is a prospective landlord for Fonny (Stephan James) and

p Barry Jenkins, right, directing Stephan James, center, and Dave Franco on the set of “If Beale Street Could Talk.”

Photo courtesy of Annapurna Pictures

Tish (Kiki Layne). It has been established in an earlier scene that Fonny and Tish, who are looking for an apartment together after learning they are expecting a child, have been rejected repeatedly by other landlords because they are black.

“Sometimes Tish and I go together, sometimes I go alone, but it’s always the same story, man,” Fonny tells a friend (Brian Tyree Henry) in the earlier scene.

Levy is different — not only does he not

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reject them, he plays along with Fonny as he mimes moving a refrigerator into the unfurnished space. Later, in a discussion on the roof, Fonny asks what the catch is, why he is willing to rent the apartment to them when no one else would.

“We’ve been looking for a long time, and there’s no reason for you to treat two Negroes so nicely,” Fonny says.

Levy responds with an impassioned speech about love.

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“Look, man, with me it’s pretty simple — I dig people who love each other,” he says.

“Black, white, green, purple, it doesn’t matter to me. Just spread the love.”

When Fonny asks if he’s a hippie, Levy replies, “I don’t know, I’m just my mother’s son. Sometimes that’s all that makes the difference between us and them.”

A version of the scene exists in Baldwin’s novel, although it’s a bit different. Levy is described on the page as an “an oliveskinned, curly-haired, merry-forced” 33-year-old from the Bronx. Franco (the younger brother of James) happens to be 33 and Jewish in real life, but the speech is an invention of the movie, and an older version of the screenplay floating around online did not include it.

The novel puts the “he dug people who loved each other” line in the mouth of narrator Tish rather than Levy himself.

Jenkins — the film’s writer and director, whose “Moonlight” won three Oscars, including for best picture, in 2017 — has described the scene as one of the most pivotal in the movie.

Please see Beale Street, page 22

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Opinion Vaccinations save lives — EDITORIAL —

A

n unintended consequence of the revolution in medical science in the last century has been complacency.

Measles, a highly contagious viral disease, was eradicated in this country in 2000 by nearly universal vaccination. But it has been much longer since its widespread appearance among children — along with mumps, rubella, whooping cough and others — to the point that many no longer view these diseases as potential health hazards.

Yet measles, one of the world’s most infectious diseases, is making a comeback. “A person with measles can cough in a room, leave, and — if you are unvaccinated — hours later, you could catch the virus from the droplets in the air that they

left behind. No other virus can do that,” Julia Belluz writes in Vox. Into the vacuum came the “anti-vaxers.”

Their chief argument is that the MMR vaccine that protects against measles, mumps and rubella can cause autism. That this view has been scientifically debunked has not stopped a small but growing number of stubborn families across the country from sending their children to school unvaccinated.

Among Jews, primarily in haredi Orthodox communities, the pseudo-scientific warnings of anti-vaxers, coupled with the exhortations of a very small minority of religious authorities and a belief that their insular communities shield them from the ills of the wider world, have contributed to measles outbreaks in Brooklyn’s Williamsburg and Borough Park neighborhoods, and in Rockland County, north

of New York City. The 94 measles cases in Rockland County alone is reported to be more than one-third of the cases in the entire United States for 2018.

As Vox reported, “The fearmongerers include the Brooklyn group called PTACH — or Parents Teaching and Advocating for Children’s Health — which spreads misinformation about vaccine safety, citing rabbis as authorities.” Brooklyn Orthodox Rabbi William Handler, another anti-vaxer, told Vox that parents who “placate the gods of vaccination” are engaging in “child sacrifice.”

Hogwash.

We have the shaping of a real crisis in the Jewish community — one that is completely preventable. There is no legitimate religious exemption to vaccinating one’s children — a truth endorsed by most haredi halachic authorities. Families that choose not

to vaccinate are endangering not only their own children but other people’s children as well. And since the close quarters of schools are the perfect place to transmit a highly contagious disease, the presence of unvaccinated children in any school creates a clear health hazard.

To be sure, only a fraction of the population is not vaccinating. But that fraction is still a serious threat to everyone else. As Rabbi Avi Greenstein, executive director of the Boro Park Jewish Community Council, put it: “We need to take away the lesson of how important it is for every one of us to avail ourselves of modern medicine and not to trust in herd immunity, but rather to follow the vaccination schedule recommended by medical professionals to protect our families and our entire community.”

Amen. PJC

When Bibi soft-pedaled my question Guest Columnist Alan Smason

T

he 2018 Jewish Media Summit in Israel, like its two previous iterations in 2014 and 2016, has now been relegated to history. While there were many similarities to the two previous summits, this year’s conference, put on jointly by the Government Press Office and the Diaspora and Foreign ministries, reached out to a new group of Jewish journalists, bloggers and social media influencers rather than the more traditional group of newspaper and magazine writers.

Even the title of the summit, “Israel and the Jewish World Relationship: It’s Complicated,” referred to a well-known Facebook status that was intended to engage those under 40. Not having been a member of that age bracket for some two decades, I felt challenged to take part in this year’s summit.

But, apparently, after the initial foray into the 40 and younger group failed to garner a full complement of journalists, the GPO announced that the more traditional group of writers and editors like me would, indeed, be welcome to join them in Jerusalem for the three-day event.

Nothing like being made to feel welcome.

Anxiety aside, I registered alongside several of my colleagues from the American Jewish Press Association, each of whom, one by one, elected to drop out of participating. By the time the summit was six weeks away, I had resolved to make the most of it and see what would bear fruit in such a tightly controlled environment.

To be sure, as I learned first-hand at the Knesset, Israel is not like the United States. Yes, it has a parliamentary democracy like England and Canada, but there is no Constitution or Bill of Rights set firmly in place that guarantees freedom of the press as we enjoy. With no protection under the law, a journalist works in the light of day with an implied threat hanging

18 DECEMBER 21, 2018

over his head that he could be shut down or detained were the government to see fit to do so. Without the luxury of freedom of the press or a responsibility on the part of journalists to be ethical, there is an opportunity for the public trust to be abused too.

As a result, the trust factor for the government and the press are both fairly low and almost exact, with the government holding a slight 34 percent to 33 percent over the press, according to a recent poll by the Israel Democracy Institute.

On Monday night, Nov. 26, a promised video welcome from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu failed to occur. The reason was an official state visit from the president of Chad, the first time the Muslim state had reached out to the Jewish state. The summit attendees understood his reasons so as to avert a diplomatic crisis.

But in his place, he sent Michael Oren, a fiery orator who is a low-level deputy minister in the government and the former ambassador to the United States. Oren was on the bill along with Avi Liberman, a stand-up comic, and a white-faced and white-clad a cappella group called Voca People.

After a day-long conference at historic Mishkenot Sha’namanim on a range of issues confronting Israel, attendees were whisked to Beit Shmuel and the Shimshon Center. Again, Naftali Bennett, the minister of education and Diaspora affairs, was another no-show. Talk about feeling like a red-headed step-child.

The next day was a busy day for four separate tracks intended to help journalists understand about religious differences, coexistence with the Palestinians, the vibrant arts scene in Jerusalem and Israel’s dominance as a Start-Up Nation and its leadership in the IT world. All of these tracks were engineered by the government to show as little negativity as possible.

Even the discussion about the Palestinians featured Israeli Arabs, not Gazans.

By the time Wednesday rolled around — the final day of the summit — I had expected the last day to be more fluff and stuff and no real substantive discussion of issues or answers to questions that begged to be asked.

After the first of three exhaustive security clearances, we made it to President Reuven Rivlin’s residence. My worst fears were confirmed when there were only two questioners allowed to speak following the president’s address. Of those, the first was a question that was not at all controversial.

The second person was a blogger who writes about kosher food. He used the opportunity to sing the praises of the government and the people for allowing him to attend the event and to write about food. Nowhere did he feel compelled to ask a question on behalf of the group about any of the bigger issues confronting Israel, such as the influence of Iran, the situation in Syria, the dangerous possibility of an entanglement with the Russians, the lack of progress in peace talks with the Palestinians, or any fallout from the charges of corruption that have been leveled at the prime minister and his wife.

After the second of intense security searches at the Knesset that took almost 45 minutes, I was somewhat jaded. Sure we were slated to see Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein and opponent spokesperson Tzipi Livni, but neither of them was a top-level minister or Prime Minister Netanyahu himself.

We were ushered into a party conference room and placed around a circular table obviously used for the prime minister and his cabinet or party leaders and their members to discuss or vote on items out of the chambers of the Knesset. The GPO spokesman Nitzan Chen told us to be patient. He had a surprise.

The prime minister was coming.

We waited for most of the next hour, expecting it to be at any moment. The talks with Edelstein and Livni were canceled due to the lateness of the day and the call for a vote on the floor of the Knesset.

And then in walked the prime minister, bearing a grin from ear to ear.

“So what do you want?” he asked, imploring for us to ask questions. Chen directed the first two or three questioners, but their questions were either self-serving about their home countries or were just outright dumb. “Mr. Prime Minister, should

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Israel keep the Golan (Heights)?”

It was then I made eye contact with Bibi.

I could tell he was going to allow me to ask a question. I girded myself and asked what I thought was a pointed question about Diaspora Jews and Israel.

“Mr. Prime Minister, there is a question about the relationship between the Diaspora and Israel. The question I have and (also) a lot of people: Is there any kind of a disconnect or not? Are we all together? Is it Am Yisrael Chai, or what?”

Netanyahu did not address the question of a disconnect at all. “My view is we are all one people. Israel should be the home of every Jew who wants to have Israel as his home.

It is, in fact. It doesn’t mean there aren’t any differences. There are disturbing demographic trends. We know that, especially with assimilation, which is chipping away at our numbers.”

It was there that the prime minister decided to answer a question not asked and he elected to move onto an area of population estimates and the numbers of Jews living inside of Israel and outside. While they were interesting, they were not an answer to my question about a schism that might exist between the Jewish state and the Jewish people.

According to the analysis by Times of Israel’s Amanda Borschel-Dan, Netanyahu’s answer to my question and the others amounted to “a game of softball.” But it wasn’t for lack of trying on my part. It’s just that Netanyahu, who is a student of television and a former NBC commentator, knows how to deliver sound bites, act charming and is skilled in the art of deflecting.

I will admit he even shook my hand as he was leaving.

There is a reason Bibi has survived the crucible of Israeli politics and still remains at the top of the heap. He is charismatic and he knows what to say and exactly how to wrap it up. It was a fitting Chanukah gift, don’t you think? PJC Alan Smason is the editor of the Crescent City Jewish News, where this article first appeared.

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Opinion Preserving the ‘Israeliness’ of the American Jewish community Guest Columnists Abby W. Schachter Anat Talmy

I

f the story of Chanukah teaches a lesson, it is certainly that out of dark times, light can emerge. So too can we appreciate the positive that has resulted from the anti-Semitic attack on our community on Oct 27. The establishment in Pittsburgh of the Israeli-American Council (IAC), which represents our rededication to a unified Jewish community, is one such bright light to grow out of dark days.

Two days after the shooting at Tree of Life, we were contacted by Shahar Edry, one of IAC’s national community directors who explained how Israelis in Columbus, Cleveland and Philadelphia wanted to show their support and help the Israeli community in Pittsburgh. His call was a powerful reminder — as was the outpouring of love, support and the arrival to our city of volunteer first responders and trauma professionals from Israel — that in times of crisis, our Israeli brothers and sisters are among the first to offer help.

With the support of IAC, and in consultation with the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh and Community Day School, we organized a Shishi Israeli event. On Nov. 9, more than 200 people from across the religious Jewish spectrum, both Israelis and Americans,

were warmly welcomed to Temple Sinai for an Israeli-style Friday night dinner that included a sing-along, a children’s program and a vigil to commemorate the 11 victims of the attack.

The Shishi Israeli dinner was a warm, comforting and energizing experience. But even before the shooting, which served as the catalyst, we had discussed the need for more of an organized Israeli presence here.

As longtime Pittsburgh residents, we’ve been missing something that other cities have already been enjoying — namely a way to come together as lovers of the Jewish national home to celebrate Israeli culture, language, music and food and to enjoy the connection forged between Israelis and all lovers of Israel who live in the Iron City.

We believe that as much as the Federation, our day schools, our synagogues, the JCC, and various other nonprofits value and promote the Jewish state, there is a significant distance between the existing Jewish community and the Israelis who live here.

And we were concerned that Israelis here — and especially their children — lack an outlet for their Israeli identity, which is why we turned to the IAC for help.

The IAC was established 11 years ago and has chapters across the United States. Its mission is to build an engaged and united Israeli-American community that works to strengthen the Israeli and Jewish identity of the next generation, the American Jewish community generally, and the bond between the people of the United States and the State of Israel. Events like Shishi Israeli help IAC build bridges between Israeli and Jewish American families by providing a communal

experience that combines Jewish traditions and Israeli culture.

The purpose, explains IAC co-founder Adam Milstein, is “to strengthen the IsraeliAmerican identity known as ‘Israeliness’ that loves and supports the State of Israel with no pre-conditions.”

In order to learn more, we were honored to attend the national conference of IAC in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., at the end of November. It was electrifying to gather with more than 3,000 other Israelis and Americans from across the country to hear about the special relationship between the two countries and the unique character that we bring to our local communities. We heard speeches from Vice President Mike Pence, Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein, “Fauda” star Tsahi Halevi and Israeli writer Meir Shalev, among others.

Participating in the conference reinforced for us the need to expand IAC in Pittsburgh for the same reason the organization is thriving in cities like Boston, Los Angeles and Las Vegas.

We want to help assert the unique character of Israeliness within the Pittsburgh Jewish community, while at the same time forging stronger ties between all Jews. Of course, this goes both ways; Israelis in America should know more about American Jewry. We can definitely learn from our fellow Jews here about pluralism and we should all be doing more to maintain our unique identity in a country where Jews are a minority. With the help of IAC we hope to act as a bridge between the Israeli and American Jewish communities, bringing them closer to each other.

Finally, we believe IAC in Pittsburgh can work against the growing perception that

Israel is no longer at the center of the Jewish experience, that she has ceased to serve as the glue that connects all Jews. Instead, Israel is alleged to be the wedge that divides us. Israeli Americans are the perfect candidates for changing this perception. The way to bridge this gap is by real engagement and real dialogue between the two communities.

Milstein couldn’t agree more. As he wrote to us in an email, “As parts of the JewishAmerican community push Israel out of the center of Jewish life, the IAC fills the void and provides a warm family, home and community for all pro-Israel Americans.” And coming to Pittsburgh is a priority for the national organization. “Following the tragic events at the Tree of Life Synagogue and the growing divide within the Jewish community,” Milstein explained, “the IAC’s role in strengthening and uniting our pro-Israel community has become more important than ever.”

We hope that by developing programming in Pittsburgh for both Israeli-Americans and Jewish-Americans we can serve as a welcoming home to Jews in America with Israeliness in their hearts. We believe strongly that connecting these two communities can greatly enrich the Jewish experience of both groups.

Shishi Israeli was a great success and with the continuing support from the IAC Midwest, as well as local Jewish organizations, we hope it will mark only the first of many such heartfelt community building experiences. PJC Abby W. Schachter, a writer and editor, and Anat Talmy, a software engineer, are both citizens of the United States and Israel.

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Headlines Healers: Continued from page 1

while,” said Fife. “I expect that on the anniversary of the shooting or when someone else may have an anniversary of a funeral — whatever triggers the grief and the trauma — we want to be there to offer support to those people who find that the modalities are supportive of them.”

Although healers initially convened at the Squirrel Hill Food Pantry, they quickly realized a more permanent place was needed.

Braasch suggested his office at 2301 Murray Ave. Within the second-floor walkup, three or four practitioners “provide access to modalities” on Wednesdays from 6 to 9 p.m. and Sundays from 12 to 4 p.m., said Fife.

Last Wednesday evening, Arthur Berman, Helmut Goth and Maureen Tighe were on site to provide various services.

It was important to create “a space where people can come and feel safe,” said Berman, a chiropractor also located at 2301 Murray Ave. “People are still having stress from being in the area.”

“When something as traumatic as the Tree

of Life event occurs … we can give back to help people heal,” added Tighe.

Whether it is “bringing about balance and well-being,” or addressing emotions and the spirit, “we are here to help,” said Goth, a Brennan Healing Science Practitioner and energy healer.

Since Oct. 27, communal organizations have sought to comfort, console and empower residents through various means.

This is no different, explained Fife.

“The JFCS and others have done an amazing job of providing counseling support and we see these as providing

Town hall:

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Adam Reinherz can be reached at areinherz@ pittsburghjewishchronicle.org.

ACHIEVA honors Rosenfeld brothers with award in their names

Continued from page 1

activities on college campuses and within Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour Party in Great Britain as examples.

Just last week, New York University’s Jewish Student Center was forced to close for most of a day because of anti-Semitic threats posted online by an anti-Israel activist, including his “desire for Zionists to die.” Corbyn has described Hamas and Hezbollah as “friends.”

Lipstadt cautioned against Jews aligning themselves with activists who have ties to anti-Semitism, even in the face of common causes.

“I can’t make common cause with someone from a group that I feel is being discriminated against if they don’t see my pain, if they think because they see me as white — though certainly the far right doesn’t see Jews as white — or they see me as privileged, that I couldn’t possibly be a victim,” she said.

Though she did not mention by name Women’s March leaders Tamika Mallory and Linda Sarsour, Lipstadt referenced their connection to Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan. “[If] they are willing to tolerate someone calling me a termite, I’m not going to march with them, I’m not going to march behind them, I’m not going to align myself with them, even though I may share many of the grievances that they have,” she said.

Some of the panelists emphasized the responsibility of leaders to be mindful that bigoted speech can lead to violent actions, on the right and the left.

Political and religious leaders must be “unequivocal” in condemning instances of anti-Semitism, Lipstadt stressed. “Not just when a tragedy happens, but when others speak out or say things or do things or assume that they are getting a dog whistle that emboldens them, we have to be unequivocal about it.”

The massacre of Oct. 27 brought to light anti-Semitism and racial bigotry that has been festering in a “virtual world,” noted Blee.

“There has always been a lot of concern that that world could channel and mobilize people into violence even if they weren’t physically connected to a racist group, and this is clearly one of the things that seems to have happened in Pittsburgh,” she said. “One of my reflections since then is that we really aren’t well prepared to think about how we can intervene and stop that kind of radicalization into very extreme bigotry and the

complementary support,” she said.

Treatments being provided are scaled down, “sort of a quicker or easier version” of the “full-on customized one-on-one treatments that I typically do,” said Braasch.

Given the free nature of the program, for those unfamiliar with these types of offerings, this is a “good chance” to stop by and “try them out,” added Goth.

Appointments, though appreciated, are not necessary, said Fife. PJC

p From left: Mary Richter, chair, ACHIEVA Board of Trustees; Michele Rosenthal; Chris Brown (roommate of Cecil and David); Diane Rosenthal; and Steve Suroviec, ACHIEVA’s president & CEO Photo by Peggie Watson

p Anti-semitism expert Deborah Lipstadt addresses the audience at the town hall forum.

Photo by Andrew Rush

channeling of that bigotry toward vulnerable groups like Jews and others in a violent way.

“I feel now, in the light of what happened, a sense of urgency to be more proactive about identifying the sources of that violence and to intervene as a society.”

Sayles pointed out that “while antiSemitism is a form of racism that targets Jewish people, it’s also a distinct type of racism and discrimination that has existed in countless and various forms for millennia,” and that it is etched in various conspiracy theories. While Jews comprise less than 2 percent of the population in the United States, he observed, “according to FBI statistics, 60 percent of all religiously motivated hate crimes target Jews.”

But there is room for optimism in the face of the tragedy, the panelists noted, emphasizing the positive response of the American and global public to the massacre.

Jews and non-Jews alike offered support for the victims and the community, Lipstadt said. They “showed up” in synagogues and at rallies to mourn with Jewish Pittsburgh.

“They felt this in a very deep way,” she said. “The question is, did they recognize that while this was an attack on Jews — this man went to kill Jews, and to kill them in a synagogue where they either came to talk to God or talk to one another or both — that is it also a threat to all those who value democracy and a multifaceted, multicultural vibrant democratic society? That it may start with the

Jews, but it never ends with the Jews?”

The targeting of Jews in Pittsburgh is part of wider problem of racial and religious intolerance, according to Blee.

“It is happening more broadly,” she said. “We have an obligation to work with other peoples on common problems of bigotry and hatred and the violence that is motivated by that.”

Myers agreed.

“If we don’t bring a message to the rest of the world about this, then these 11 people’s souls will have died in vain, and I’m not going to let that happen on my watch,” he said.

With the outpouring of support from diverse ethnic and religious communities in the wake of the massacre, Sayles urged Jewish Pittsburgh to “strike while the iron is hot,” and to continue to forge positive relationships.

“It’s a lot harder to hate someone or something once you get to know them,” he said.

Just seven weeks after the shooting, it is too early to predict the how long the stamp the event has imprinted on Jewish Pittsburgh will last.

“Will we be identified by Oct. 27, 2018, for the rest of our lives?” Myers queried.

“Is that how we want to be known? Those are questions we are still dealing with as we go through the different stages of mourning.” PJC Toby Tabachnick can be reached at ttabachnick@pittsburghjewishchronicle.org.

PITTSBURGH JEWISH CHRONICLE

David and Cecil Rosenthal, who were well known in the Squirrel Hill community and within the ACHIEVA family of organizations, were two of the 11 congregants murdered in the Tree of Life synagogue building on Oct. 27.

The Rosenthal brothers received residential and employment services from ACHIEVA along with support from the ACHIEVA Family Trust, and with that help they lived the lives they wanted to live, which is the organization’s vision that disability as a distinction makes no difference.

This year at ACHIEVA’s annual Awards of Excellence ceremony on Dec. 11, the inaugural Cecil and David Rosenthal Community Award was awarded posthumously to the brothers.

The annual award will be given to an individual with an intellectual or developmental disability that, by virtue of how they live their life, has embraced their community and their community has embraced them. The ACHIEVA board of trustees adopted a resolution creating the Cecil and David Rosenthal Memorial Fund for all donations received in their memory to support community engagement activities for people with intellectual disabilities. Each year the award recipient will receive $1,000.

ACHIEVA has received more than $47,000 from over 441 individual donors in memory of Cecil and David.

ACHIEVA has asked the community to visit its Love Like the ‘Boys’ Facebook page, facebook.com/groups/loveliketheboys, to share random acts of kindness in honor of Cecil and David.

Cecil and David’s sisters Diane and Michele accepted the award on their behalf. PJC

PITTSBURGHJEWISHCHRONICLE.ORG

Headlines Barak: Continued from page 2

runner can easily register for anything between a 5k and an ultramarathon, orienteers have different options to choose from, including events lasting three hours to those much longer.

“If you like it, you can up it to really mind and body torturing proportions,” said Barak.

For instance, during one competition, he covered 69 kilometers in 24 hours and climbed two kilometers of elevation.

About 18 months ago, Barak began pursuing another interest of slightly less physical demands. On Wednesday evenings, at Panera Bread on the Boulevard of the Allies, he participates in a Scrabble club.

“I’m a word nerd, I’m a math nerd, I’m a molecular biology nerd. Anything that involves some sort of analytical thinking and puzzle solving I’m a nerd for it,” he said.

Last August, he traveled to Buffalo for

Kushner: Continued from page 9

Jason Greenblatt and U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman — have been focused for two years on a deal, so this isn’t exactly new. Trump said in September that he wants to see a deal by January.

Here are three takeaways: There’s a not unsubstantial chance we may never see this thing. “And we’re hopeful in the next couple of months we’ll put out our plan, which again not every side is going to love, but there’s enough in it, and enough reasons why people should take it and move forward,” said Kushner, whose second “hopeful” in 30 seconds sounded to many as less than hopeful.

Trump may want this deal, but insiders say its prospects of success are virtually nil given the Palestinian Authority’s unwillingness to participate since Trump recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital a year ago, and the continued preeminence of the rejectionist Hamas, a terrorist group, in the Gaza Strip.

The Trump administration, reportedly at Kushner’s behest, has severed all assistance

Bobsled: Continued from page 10

to steer properly, the sled flipped on its side.

He broke several fingers, and the team could not complete the race.

However, it didn’t stop the pair from competing the following day. They finished in 11th place, ahead of two teams that were unable to complete the race. But Nicholls will still participate in additional races as he tries to qualify for the World Cup, a prerequisite for the Olympics.

With seven athletes, the Israeli bobsled and skeleton team has a record number of members. Though the team is based in the United States, all the athletes have Israeli citizenship — some from birth, others from making aliyah to compete for the country.

Though pleased with his performance, Barak was particularly proud of playing tiles which spelled out “binaries.”

“Since I am new to the scene, and my national ranking is very low, my opponent was very flustered that somebody with a low ranking like mine could come up with it,” he said. Due to its placement on the board, the word was scored as a “triple triple,” the “Scrabble holy grail.” p Yaakov Barak’s laptop displays a map from orienteering.

Said Barak, “At the Photo by Adam Reinherz end of the day I’m just a the 2018 North American SCRABBLE regular Joe who happens to do science.” PJC Championship. Barak played 31 games during the five-day event. He placed 14th Adam Reinherz can be reached at areinherz out of 105 entrants in his division. @pittsburghjewishchronicle.org.

to the Palestinians as an incentive to get them back to the table. It hasn’t worked. Kushner also hoped the Saudi crown prince would get the Palestinians on board, but even before his Khashoggi troubles, the Palestinian leadership was disinclined to heed MbS. So a dead-on-arrival peace process may be the last thing Trump needs as he heads into a Congress in which the Democrats control the U.S. House of Representatives and are pledging many investigations, including into Trump’s alleged Russian ties.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has been close to Kushner’s family for years, may also be less than enthused for electoral reasons of his own.

Netanyahu must call a vote by next fall, and is feeling more pressure — at least for now — from his right flank than his left. Giving in to the slightest of Trump-demanded concessions could harm his prospects.

Don’t mention statehood. “I’ve been saying a lot that you shouldn’t be hijacking your children’s’ future because of your grandparents’ conflict,” Kushner said. “This is a conflict that has been going on for way too long, and the way that people are living in Gaza and in the West Bank right now is not acceptable

and there’s a lot that we can be doing to improve their quality of life, but it comes with resolving some of these core issues.”

Palestinians for decades have said that statehood was a baseline for any deal.

Trump has retreated from years of U.S. policy that calls Palestinian statehood a necessary outcome. Under Trump, alleviating Palestinian suffering takes priority over political outcomes.

Adamant about linkage, Kushner persists in the interview in his one substantive difference with Netanyahu, suggesting that solving the Israeli-Palestinian issue first is the key to regional diplomacy. Netanyahu has said that resolving the Palestinian issue may not be critical to advancing Israel’s other interests and rejects linking a peace deal to other regional issues. Kushner made clear a year ago that he is hewing to the more conventional wisdom that the Palestinian issue comes first, and it appears he has not changed his mind.

“And it’s not just the Israelis that want it, it’s not just the Palestinian people who want it, it’s all the people I speak to throughout the entire Middle East who would like to see this issue resolved so that they can start focusing on a brighter future,” he said. PJC

Earlier this year, an Israeli sledder competed for the first time in the Olympics, with American-Israeli A.J. Edelman representing the country in one-person men’s skeleton. David Greaves, who leads the team as head of the Israeli Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation, hopes that in 2022, the team will not only compete in men’s skeleton but in the women’s race and bobsled.

“There are a lot of small countries that are involved in these sports who struggle every year to find athletes to compete,” said Greaves, who is based in Winnipeg, Canada.

“And we have done something in terms of growing our program that most small nations have not been able to do successfully.”

Raice said that competing for the first time was “way more bone jarring and exhausting than I ever imagined.”

“You think you’re getting into a sled and slide down,” he said, “but it’s a really fast track and the G-forces are unreal. You feel like you almost get blackout on some of the curves.”

Still, he said he has become “slightly addicted” to the sport and hopes to continue with the goal of participating in the Olympics together with Nicholls. For his part, Nicholls says that representing the Jewish state holds a special significance.

“I’m wearing the Star of David when I compete,” he said. “I’m wearing on my left hand a blue and white glove, and on my right hand a USA red, white and blue glove.

People know now that I’m Team Israel, and it’s great to hear that over the loudspeaker when they’re announcing the different drivers and the different countries.” PJC

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Poet: Continued from page 4

“A Minyan Plus One,” excerpted below: I didn’t know them, but I knew them ,in the way we know those raised ,no matter where we originated in the same beliefs our ancestors inherited all the way back into those mysterious origins, however they formed — something certain ,in those stories of creation and exile ,of miracles and complicated kings —of commandments and wisdoms Dave Rullo, who helped organize the event, tapped Terman to be the Bagel Bites: Sunday Brunch Series’ first guest, he said, as he is renown throughout the region as being an accomplished Jewish poet.

“We are working to bring some interesting and different speakers to the community,” he added. “Our goal is to make this event something that people will say, ‘We can’t miss.’”

Bagel Bites is sponsored by the Larry & Brenda Miller Memorial Caring Community Fund. Upcoming speakers include Nathan Firestone, a professor of political science at Point Park University, and Rabbi Danny Schiff, Foundation Scholar at the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh. PJC Toby Tabachnick can be reached at ttabachnick@pittsburghjewishchronicle.org.

JCC announces Staunton Farm Grant The Jewish Community Center of Greater Pittsburgh’s Emma Kaufmann Camp and James and Rachel Levinson Day Camp received a two-year $100,000 grant from the Staunton Farm Foundation as part of the Beyond an Inclusion Policy: Ensuring Children and Adolescents Reach Their Developmental Potential program. The grant will be used to pilot a community project to broaden inclusion at both camps, and also to define and implement an expanded vision of inclusion related to invisible disabilities and fear of missing out.

The JCC will create a three-year strategic plan of broader inclusion at the camps that will include empowering and equipping staff, improving facilities and documenting efforts and the impact they will have on staff, campers and their families. This will include creating a sensory room at each camp as part of therapy that helps children calm and focus so they better prepare for learning and interacting with others. The initiative also will include training all camp staff in Mental Health First Aid to build mental health literacy and help them identify, understand and respond to signs of mental illness.

Emma Kaufmann Camp is part of a national research study being conducted by the JCC Association in collaboration with Screen Education, a nonprofit organization that conducts research on technology and human wellness. The Staunton Farm Foundation is dedicated to improving the lives of people who live with mental illness and substance use disorders. PJC DECEMBER 21, 2018 21

Headlines Attack: Continued from page 11

suspected attacker later died of his wounds.

Hamas praised the Dec. 13 attack. “Hamas praises numerous resistance attacks as well as the citizens of the occupied West Bank and the revolutionary youth,” Hamas spokesman Abdul Latif al-Qanou said in a statement, according to the Jerusalem Post. He said the attack “is in response to the crimes of the Zionist occupation in the occupied West Bank. Our members will stand against the occupation and will resist it — until it ends.”

The Fatah Party of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas blamed the attack on Israel, referring to the deaths of three Palestinians alleged to have been involved in two separate West Bank attacks while being apprehended by Israeli soldiers.

“When the occupation army harms and destroys Palestinian land and Israeli soldiers execute three Palestinians in a kangaroo court, they have to understand that the Palestinian response will be in proportion to the aggression,” said Fatah spokesperson Munir Jaghoub.

Israeli activists protested the attack by blocking Route 60, the road on which the attack occurred. Other activists also were filmed throwing rocks at Palestinian cars.

Settler leaders called for the closing of West Bank roads to Palestinian traffic in response to the recent attacks.

Early that morning two Israel Border Police

Beale Street: Continued from page 17

“There’s this very simple scene where his character walks into the film and is appointed this very important task,” Jenkins said of Franco in an interview with Vulture at the Toronto Film Festival. “I was really careful about writing into the source material too much, but it just felt like there was something that this character needed to say to our main characters.

“You would assume black people are one of us and white people are one them. But it’s like no, there are us [sic], people raised right by our mothers, and there are them, who maybe haven’t been. We can’t even blame them for that because maybe their mothers didn’t have the capability to raise them the way that we were raised.”

Despite his good intentions, some on the festival circuit found the scene a little corny and even jarring — mostly, as Vulture also pointed out, because of the casting of Franco, who has come to be associated with the numerous wacky comedies in which he has starred in recent years, like “Neighbors” and “The Little Hours.”

“Is this scene a poignant moment underlining the necessity of human connection to cut through oppressive power structures, as Jenkins clearly intends?” Nate Jones wrote. “Or, as some viewers who found it pretty corny argued at the movie’s premiere party, is it a disruption of the movie’s carefully considered tone to hand one of the most pivotal emotional beats to the guy from ‘Neighbors’?”

The scene also paints a rosy portrait of 22 DECEMBER 21, 2018

p The Israeli army’s Human Resource Division says 2,850 haredi soldiers were recruited in 2016 and 3,100 the next year.

Photo by Sam Sokol

officers were injured in a stabbing attack in the Old City of Jerusalem near the Damascus Gate.

The assailant, identified in Palestinian media as a 26-year-old resident of the Qalandiyah refugee camp near Jerusalem, was shot and killed by other officers at the site of the attack. He is seen on surveillance video first trying to stab a civilian in the area.

A policeman, 21, was stabbed near his eye.

The policewoman, 19, was stabbed in the leg.

Meanwhile, the Palestinian man suspected of killing two Jewish-Israeli co-workers at a factory in the Barkan industrial zone in the West Bank was killed in a shootout with Israeli forces who came to arrest him.

Ashraf Naalwa, 23, was killed early on Dec. the black-Jewish relationship at the time, when in reality it was far more complicated.

In the 20th century, and especially in New York City, tensions between blacks and Jews often manifested through landlord-tenant relations — a topic addressed elsewhere by James Baldwin himself.

“When we were growing up in Harlem, our demoralizing series of landlords were Jewish, and we hated them,” Baldwin wrote in The New York Times in 1967 in an essay titled “Negroes Are Anti-Semitic Because They’re Anti-White.”

“We hated them because they were terrible landlords, and did not take care of the building. A coat of paint, a broken window, a stopped sink, a stopped toilet, a sagging floor, a broken ceiling, a dangerous stairwell, the question of garbage disposal, the question of heat and cold, of roaches and rats — all questions of life and death for the poor, and especially for those with children — we had to cope with all of these as best we could.”

But Baldwin goes on to note in the same essay that most of the white people who had treated him poorly probably weren’t Jewish and, after all, “it is not the Jew who controls the American drama. It is the Christian …

The crisis taking place in the world, and in the minds and hearts of black men everywhere, is not produced by the Star of David, but by the old, rugged Roman cross on which Christendom’s most celebrated Jew was murdered. And not by Jews.”

So in the end, the Franco scene is just a touching moment meant to remind us of the kindness of people of all races. And it adheres not only to Jenkins’ vision, but also to Baldwin’s. PJC

13 after Israeli forces surrounded his hideout.

He was armed when security forces came to his hideout, the Israel Security Agency said in a statement about his apprehension and death. From several other suspects already captured who had aided Naalwa, the ISA, also known as the Shin Bet security service, had learned that Naalwa was planning to soon carry out a new terror attack, which was thwarted with his arrest and death.

In the attack on Oct. 7, Naalwa shot and killed Kim Levengrond Yehezkel, 29, and a mother of one from Rosh Haayin, and Ziv Hajbi, a 35-year-old father of three from Rishon Lezion. Both had been tied up and shot at close range.

Naalwa lived in the village of Shweika, near the West Bank city of Tulkarem, and had a permit to enter the Barkan settlement for work, but it is not known how he was able to bring the weapon into the industrial zone.

It was reported to be the first of its kind in the Barkan Industrial Park, which is home to 160 factories that employ thousands of Israelis and Palestinians.

Late on the night before, Israeli security forces shot and killed the son of a West Bank Hamas leader suspected of involvement in Sunday’s shooting attack outside of the West Bank settlement of Ofra. Four other Palestinian men alleged to have been involved in the attack also were arrested in the operation.

The killed man is Saleh Barghouti. He was shot and killed after firing on Israeli troops while trying to evade arrest. Several of the men reportedly were hiding out in a building in Ramallah located near the Muqata, the seat of the government of the Palestinian Authority.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during an event at the Defense Department headquarters in Tel Aviv, commented on the recent violence.

“Last night we settled accounts with the murderers from the terrorist attacks in the Barkan Industrial Zone and Ofra and today we suffered a harsh attack in which two soldiers were killed. We will settle accounts with whoever did this. Our guiding principle is that whoever attacks us and whoever tries to attack us — will pay with his life. Our enemies know this and we will find them,” he said. PJC

Jewish Association on Aging gratefully acknowledges contributions from the following: A gift from ...

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Anonymous ............................................Stanley Bernard Blatt

Shirley E. Preny ..........................................Bessie M. Bleiberg

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Phyllis E. Anatole ..................................... Abraham J. Epstein

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Harry Davidson .......................................... Florence Davidson Elinor & Ivan Gold ...........................................Herbert A. Gold Robert & Kathleen Grant.......................................Ruth Cohen Jerrie Johnson .......................................................Abe Zwang Jan & Ed Korenman ...................................... Freda Winerman Jeffrey L. Kwall .................................Frances Winsberg Gusky Len & Joyce Mandelblatt ................................... Abner Crumb

Evelyn Rebb .................................................. Freda Winerman Rhoda Rofey .................................................... Leonard Rofey David Rosenberg ............................Edward David Rosenberg David Rosenberg ........................................ Jacob Rosenberg Rosalyn Sherman .................................... Goldie Colker Gross Sharon Snider ........................................................ Dan Snider

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Dr. Larry & Mrs. Brenda Winsberg ...Frances Winsberg Gusky

THIS WEEK’S YAHRZEITS — Sunday December 23: Dorothy Augenblick, Mayer Berenfield, Isadore L. Cohen, Ronald E. Fishman, Ernie M. Friedman, Saul Garber, Sara Barbara Goldberg, Pauline Goldenson, Israel Heyman, Pearl C. Lazar, Samuel Levenson, Jerome Zachery Lieber, Morris K. Manela, Morris Nathan, Benjamin Raphael, Irwin Shapiro, Melvin Silberblatt, Joseph A. Simon, Esther Rose Singer, Dan Snider Monday December 24: Simon Alpern, Nathan G. Bagran, Howard Jay Dunhoff, Joseph Elias, George Goldberg, Louis Gordon, Sera Herskovitz, Albert Lenchner, George A. Levenson, Beatrice Loeb, Morris Martin, Myna Shub, Rose Berkowitz Simensky, Esther Teplitz Tuesday December 25: Herman Godfrey Bigg, Jacob Bloom, Esther Broad, Israel Buck, Samuel Davis, Albert Epstein, Sam Faigen, Mortimer M. Frankston, Maurice A. Golomb, Lillian Granoff, Elizabeth Kopelman, Samuel E. Latterman, Dr. Fred Laufe, Faye Lester, Sam Liebman, Katherine Greenberg Lincoff, Sam Melnick, Milton Moses, Florence Neft, Bessie Silverstein Perman, Harry Rom, Ethel Sachs, Louis Seder, Anne Deutch Shapiro, Meyer S. Sikov, Seymour Solomon, Herman Spiegelman, Helyn R. Spokane, Ike Tepper, Mollie B. Weiss Wednesday December 26: Albert Ackerman, Julius Caplan, Jacob L. Cohen, Jacob Diznoff, Rose Friedberg, Morris Gross, Minnie Gusky, Gertrude P. Katz, Margaret Kopelson, Charles Lipsitz, Sylvia R. Litman, Irwin Luick, Maurice H. Margolis, Rose Steinman Morris, Philip H. Nevins, Dr. William Ratowsky, Kenneth E. Rosenberg, Bernard Roth, Belle Somach, Jennie Spokane, Rev. Alex Spokane, Nathan Stalinsky, Samuel Sidney Zelmanovitz Thursday December 27: Charles Bardin, Samuel Brill, Gertrude Cohen, Ithiel A. Cohen, Miriam Gusky Dajczmann, Philip B. Eatman, Anna Kitman Epstein, Dov Baer Friedland, Gerson E. Friedlander, Mary L. Furman, Bessie Goldberg, Isadore L. Horewitz, Ernestine Gold Klein, Samuel Levy, Ben Lipsitz, Ida Makler, Mildred Broida Markowitz, Margaret Weinberg Milligram, Rose Pitler, Herschel Pretter, Sol Rattner, Nathan Rosenthal, Herman Skirble, Therese Wechsler Friday December 28: Isaac Joseph Bachrach, Harry Caplan, Lena Diamond, Gerald Field, Jennie Fienberg, Irwin Firestone, Rae Cohen Frank, Annie Genstein, Clara Schutte Gordon, Samuel Horwitz, Jacob Krimsky, Sarah Mervis, Jean Merwitzer Nydes, Rev. Rubin Rabinovitz, Rose Weisman, Harry Young Saturday December 29: Celia Berman, Leona Ruth Broad, Florence Cohen, Dr. Robert Diznoff, Nathan Florman, Freda Frank, I. Leon Friedman, Alison Beth Goldman, Ella Ruth Levy, Rita Lupovich, Louis J. Marks, Saul Osachy, Pauline Reznick, Henry Schor, Albert Shaer, Julius Lewis Shamberg, Elimalech Sigman, Lena Soffer

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DECEMBER 21, 2018 23

Celebrations

Torah

Wedding

The blessings of the fish

Protass-Mendelson: Gary and Sharyn Protass of Roslyn, N.Y., announce the marriage of their daughter, Melanie Nicole, to Dr. Andrew Michael Mendelson, son of Wayne and Debbie Mendelson of Marlboro, N.J. The wedding took place on Aug. 4 at Temple Israel of Lawrence, N.Y. Melanie graduated from Penn State University and received her Master of Arts in speech-language pathology from Long Island University Post. Andrew graduated from Penn State University and received his degree in osteopathic medicine from Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine. He is currently in his third year of anesthesiology residency at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital.

The newlyweds are currently residing in Philadelphia with their adorable puppy Nittany.

Melanie is the granddaughter of Carol Lazear and the late Paul Lazear of Pittsburgh and Barbara Protass, and the late Harvey Protass of Long Island, N.Y.

Bar Mitzvah Daniel Jacob Berger, son of Jody Berger and Steven Berger, celebrated becoming a bar mitzvah on Saturday, Dec. 15 at Congregation Beth Shalom. Daniel has an older sister, Rachel, and an older brother, Josh. Daniel’s grandparents are Lynne and Marvin Gross, Paul Berger and the late Marilyn Berger. Daniel attends Community Day School and his hobbies include playing and watching sports, computers and cars.

Daniel is donating to the Humane Animal Rescue Center for his mitzvah project. PJC

Julian Falk November 29, 2018

Rabbi Rabbi David Novitzky Parshat Vayechi Genesis 47:28-50:26

T

owards the conclusion of the Book of Genesis in the beginning of the Torah portion of Vayechi, Jacob on his deathbed bids farewell to his family and then blesses all of his offspring. He begins with blessing Joseph’s sons Ephraim and Menashe.

Throughout Jewish history whenever Jewish parents wish to bless their sons they utter this same blessing. Many Sephardic Jews refer to Jacob’s blessing at a circumcision: “May G-d make you like Ephraim and Menashe.” There is a different, more meaningful blessing for daughters.

When reading the Torah, many of us interpret the text in a strict literal manner.

Every letter or omission of a letter or word has special meaning and significance. On many occasions the Oral Law of the Talmud, Midrash or even a commentator’s perspective may provide the proper meaning to understand each letter of the Torah, whose text by itself cannot provide an accurate meaning to any section. For instance, if we mistakenly interpret an “eye for an eye” literally and as not referring to the payment of compensation, we will not only administer a harsh and cruel punishment but also incur a violation of the Torah and a grave injustice.

The text informs us that Jacob placed his hands on the boys’ heads and recited, “May the angel who redeems me from all evil bless the lads, and may my name be declared upon them, and the names of my forefathers Abraham and Isaac and may they proliferate abundantly [like fish] within the land.”

Why was it necessary to relate the children’s future proliferation and success to fish? He didn’t use another word for multiplication; he could have easily said, let them multiply, proliferate and have many offspring. That would have been sufficient.

Who needs to mention fish?

Rashi, the great biblical commenter, suggests that in life almost everything we see is subject to an ayin hara, or “evil eye.” One

can cast an evil eye on a neighbor or friend’s car, home, wife, baby or anything else their neighbor possesses and cause irreparable damage. There is one thing that is immune to the evil eye, and that is a fish, because the water shields fish from human eyesight. Evil cannot be cast on something you cannot see, nor can a person be jealous about something invisible.

Jacob wanted Ephraim and Menashe to multiply, but like fish in the water, they should have protection from the evil eye and evil peoples.

There are other interpretations of this text. Everything we eat has the potential to become treif. Meat and milk can accidentally or purposely become non-kosher if they are mixed together. An animal is unkosher if it is shot, trapped or not slaughtered properly.

If an animal is not salted properly it can also become forbidden.

A fish with both scales and fins, however, always remains kosher, no matter how it is mixed, prepared, killed or salted. Jacob meant that the future generations should always remain kosher, no matter their destiny or fate. Joseph prayed that these boys like fish should remain permissible no matter what they encounter in life.

Another interpretation of the blessing relates to the nature of fish. A fish is usually eaten whole and intact by another fish. Even though the future descendants of Ephraim and Menashe might be consumed by great empires and powerful nations such as Greece, Rome, Babylon — or also by assimilation in the United States or Europe — their identity and culture as Jews shall remain intact and complete. They shall be protected from assimilation in alien customs and civilizations.

When the Messiah will arrive, all righteous people will feast not on a land creature, but on the great fish known as the Leviathan, which G-d preserved for us in the future world. Let us all merit that we may partake in this meal. PJC Rabbi David Novitzky is the rabbi of Beth Israel Congregation. This column is a service of the Greater Pittsburgh Rabbinical Association.

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Obituaries FA R G OT S T E I N : Ruth Ganz Fargotstein, on Saturday, December 15, 2018. Beloved wife of the late Milton Goldstein, Ralph Ganz and William Fargotstein; Loving mother of Karen H. Valeri (Robert Schupfer); cherished sister of Marion Wein, the late Joseph, Martin, and Saul Mandel. Grandmother of Jennifer Zerby and Anthony Valeri. Greatgrandmother of Joshua McMunn and Alexis McMunn. Ruth is survived by Cyd and Norm Josephy, and the entire extended Fargotstein and Goldberg families. Treasured aunt of Marilyn Feldman, Steve and Joe Blattner, Eileen Sposato, Jeffrey and Joel Mandel; also survived by Shelly and Donna Rosen, many cousins, extended family and dear friends.

Ruth was involved with numerous Jewish organizations throughout Pittsburgh. She was a longstanding member of Congregation Beth Shalom, where she was an Honorary President. She was an active and devoted volunteer for the Western Pennsylvania Auxillary for Exceptional People for the past 25 years. Services were held at Congregation Beth Shalom. Interment Beth Shalom Cemetery. Contributions in Ruth’s memory may be made to the Ruth Ganz Education Fund at the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh, 234 McKee Place, Pittsburgh, PA 15213. Arrangements entrusted to Ralph Schugar Chapel, Inc., family owned and operated. schugar.com FREDLAND: Sylvia (Hartzberg) Fredland, on Friday, December 14, 2018. Beloved wife of the late Edwin Fredland. Beloved mother of Allan Fredland (Constance Greene) and Jill (Mark) Portland. Sister of the late Hertzel (late Ann) Hartzberg and late George (late Sarah) Hartzberg. Nana to Edwin Conor Fredland, Kate Frances Portland and Jennifer Lynn Portland (Jesse Paulson). Great-grandmother of Harper Edie and Dean Robert Paulson. Services and interment Private. Arrangements entrusted to Ralph Schugar Chapel, Inc., family owned and operated. schugar.com FRIEDMAN: Bernard M. Friedman, age 93, died peacefully after a long struggle with

Alzheimer’s disease.

A Pittsburgher his whole life, he had a sense of humor and a joie de vivre that he passed on to his children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, extended family and friends.

He will be missed by his wife, Vitie; his children: Daniel, Janet and Marty Seltman, Pamela z”l and Juan Vazquez, Erica, Jack and Karen, and Sally; his grandchildren: O.E. Zelmanovich and Rayden Sorock, Jake and Cortney Seltman, Hillary Friedman and Max Friedman; his great-grandchildren evoked his smiles until his last day: Noah, Ari and Isaiah Seltman, and Calder Sorock. Bernie was a wordsmith, whether completing The New York Times crossword puzzles in ink, running political campaigns, writing advertising jingles and copy, or creating poems and songs for family events. He invested his time and energy in the technologies of his day, radio, TV and cable. He loved playing tennis, golf, chess, bridge and poker. He was an avid skier and sailor. The family wants to thank everyone who provided loving care for Bernie. Donations can be made to Ahava Memory Care Unity, c/o JAA, 200 JHF Drive, Pittsburgh PA 15217.

LAZER: Georgian “Gege” (Ehrenpreis) Lazer, formerly of Uniontown, passed away on Monday, December 10, 2018, at age 86.

She was the beloved wife of the late Zolen Lazer and the loving mother of Dianne Crimmins and husband Brian of Voorhees, N.J., Sally Lazer of Blue Bell, Pa., and Edward Lazer and wife Amy of Owings Mills, Md. She was the loving Bubbie of Aaron Crimmins and Jake and Julie Lazer; the dear sister of Stanley Ehrenpreis and wife Linn and the late Eileen Sheer and husband Robert. She is also survived by loving nieces and nephews.

Graveside services and interment were held at Holy Society Cemetery, Hopwood, Pa. The family requests that memorial contributions be made to a Jewish charity of the donor’s choice or to The Michael J. Fox Foundation, Donation Processing, P.O. Box 5014, Hagerstown, MD, 21741, michaeljfox.org. Arrangements entrusted to Goldsteins’ Rosenberg’s Raphael-Sacks, goldsteinsfuneral.com.

WECHSLER: Helene D. Wechsler, age 91, died on Saturday, December 8, 2018. She was born in New York City on August 17, 1927, and is the daughter of the late Leo and Irene Barth Dreyfus. She was the wife of the late Dr. Harry L. Wechsler who died on June 17, 1996. Helene received her Bachelor of Science from New York University and worked as a buyer at Lerner’s Department Store in New York City. After marrying Harry and moving to McKeesport, her life was devoted to her beloved husband and her three children. She served on the board of directors of the Carnegie Library of McKeesport and was a member of Temple B’nai Israel. She volunteered at the Bryn Mawr-Vassar Book Store. She is survived by children, Lynn (Glenn) Wechsler Kramer of Summit, N.J, Laura (Charles) Broff of Pittsburgh, Richard “Dick” (Carolyn) Wechsler of New York City; grandchildren, Doug (Rachel) Kramer, Alex Kramer, Stephanie (Alex) Broff Lince, Casey (Jeff) Broff Berg, Zachary Wechsler, Sam Wechsler, Emmett Wechsler, Elias Wechsler; great-grandchildren, Dylan Kramer, Greyson Kramer, Jane Lince, and Edward Berg. Services were held at Temple Cemetery with Rabbi Paul Tuchman officiating. Arrangements were handled by Strifflers of White Oak Cremation & Mortuary Services. Remembrances may be made to Temple B’nai Israel, 2025 Cypress Drive, White Oak, PA 15131. Condolences may be made at strifflerfuneralhomes.com.

WEINBERGER: Miriam Weinberger died peacefully at home on Wednesday, December 12, 2018. Daughter of Catherine and Martin Weinberger. Survived by her sister Lois “Lila” Feldman, nephews; Max, Robert and Martin Feldman and many other nieces, nephews and friends. Great-aunt of Nicholas, Joseph, Michael and Chad Feldman. Preceded in death by her brother Harold Weinberger, and sisters Ruth Adler and Mindy Kovinow.

Graveside services and interment were held at Poale Zedeck Cemetery, Sheridan.

Arrangements entrusted to Ralph Schugar Chapel, Inc. schugar.com

WEINGARDEN: Esther D. Weingarden, on Friday, December 14, 2018. Beloved wife of the late Sidney J. Weingarden. Loving mother of Dr. Mark (Debi) Weingarden of Fox Chapel and Lois (Kenneth) Kotler of Boca Raton, Fla. Sister of Wilbert (the late Estelle) Darling and Sandy (Carole) Darling.

Grandmother of Jonathan Weingarden (Carrie Benson), Hilary Weingarden (Teddy Obrien), Brett (Katherine Gross) Kotler and the late Michael Kotler, M.D. Services were held at Ralph Schugar Chapel, Inc. Interment private. Contributions may be made to Alzheimer’s Foundation, alzfdn. org. schugar.com.

WEISS: Jack H. Weiss, age 85, on Monday, December 17, 2018. Husband of Andy, father of Lou (Amy), Stacy (Will Carpenter) and the late Ellen (Gregg Kander), (Anna Hollis). Grandfather of Bari, Casey (Doug), Molly (Jon), Suzy, Cyd, Danny (Tonya), Maura, Isabelle (Chris), Desmond, Benjamin (Ali), Jacob, and Kate. Great-grandfather of Finn, Sonny, and Elle. Newsboy - Pittsburgh Press, Shipper and Packer - Modern Curtain and Rug Co., Sergeant - U.S. Army, Head Honcho - Weisshouse, Founder - Chappy Goldstein Handball Club, Developer Weiss Properties, Painter, Mensch. Jack was a rags to riches tale come to life. From poor beginnings to amazing success, his life was beyond anything he imagined. He said that he owed his good fortune to the love of his life, Andy. Jack was especially proud of the awards he won for his paintings in juried shows. He wasn’t sure if mentioning his homes in Longboat Key and North Truro would appear to be bragging.

He was a sage advisor to family and friends and touched many lives. We will miss him terribly. Services were held at Temple Sinai. Entombment Homewood Cemetery.

Contributions to Community Day School, 6424 Forward Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA 15217 or at comday.org/give or do a good deed in Jack’s name. Arrangements entrusted to Ralph Schugar Chapel, Inc., family owned and operated. schugar.com PJC

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Community Machers & Shakers The Forward publication’s 50 of 2018 named several honorees from Pittsburgh based on the dignity, humanity and respect they showed in the wake of the shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue building on Oct. Dr. Jeffrey Brian 27. They are Rabbi Hazzan Rabbi Hazzan Jeffrey Myers Cohen Schreiber Jeffrey Myers of Tree of Life*Or L’Simcha Congregation, who called 911; Dr. Jeffrey Cohen, president of Allegheny General Hospital, where the shooter and victims were treated; and Brian Schreiber, president and CEO of the Jewish Community Center of Greater Pittsburgh.

The Forward 50 lists the American Jews who have had a profound impact on the American Jewish community or on the national situation this year.

The list reflects how the year has affected the Jewish community and how America’s Jews have engaged with the national conversation.

Chronicle file photos

Temple David celebrates 60 years!

p Temple David’s time capsule containing important items is placed into the cornerstone by JoAnn White (left) and Temple President Kay Liss for the 60th anniversary celebration.

Photo courtesy of Temple David

Photo courtesy of Anti-Defamation League

Shloshim in Paris’ Great Synagogue

Representing Pittsburgh, City Councilperson Erika Strassburger participated in a panel discussion on Healing After Hate during the 2018 Anti-Defamation League’s Never is Now Summit on Anti-Semitism and Hate on Dec. 3 in New York City. Strassburger, third from left, discussed the strength with which Pittsburgh, Squirrel Hill and allies around the world responded to the shooting at the Tree of Life*Or L’Simcha, Dor Hadash and New Light Congregations.

The Pittsburgh School Board elected officers for the 2019 fiscal year at the board organization meeting on Dec. 3. Lynda Wrenn of Point Breeze was elected board president. Wrenn recently served as first vice president of the board. She is a mother of four PPS graduates and has a rich history in the Pittsburgh Public Schools. Wrenn holds a Master’s in Teaching from Chatham University and did her student teaching at Pittsburgh Spring Hill K-5 on the North Side.

Photo courtesy of Pittsburgh Public Schools

Lynda Wrenn

First Mondays at Beth El Congregation

p Beth El Congregation’s First Mondays program with Rabbi Alex Greenbaum, right, in December featured Bill Greenspan on Jewish Life in Shanghai.

Photo courtesy of Beth El Congregation

26 DECEMBER 21, 2018

p A shloshim service was held for Joyce Fienberg on Nov. 28 at the Great Synagogue in Paris. Fienberg was one of 11 victims in the Oct. 27 attack at the Tree of Life synagogue building. Fienberg’s son Anthony Fienberg, who attends the Parisian congregation, was one of several speakers during the trilingual service. Anthony Fienberg was joined by his son Adam Fienberg during the service.

Photo by Rabbi Moshe Sebbag

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Community Chanukah at CDS Chanukah celebrations filled Community Day School with joy and light, with holiday activities throughout the week in all grades. The celebrations included traditional favorites like making sufganiyot and latkes and new traditions like a Chanukah Extravaganza in middle school complete with a rap battle.

p From left: CDS fifth-graders Maya Gelman, Mika Loberant, Alia Rapport, and Sivon Feinberg play Chanukah music on their recorders before lighting the Chanukiah menorah during a full-school Kabbalat Shabbat service.

p CDS Early Childhood student Isaac Perlow, 3, watches his spinning dreidel during Chanukah activities organized and led by fourth-grade students.

p From left: CDS kindergarten students Ezekiel Dunn, Sammy Smuckler and Arieh Friedman make dreidel crafts together with parent volunteers during their class Chanukah celebration.

p CDS kindergarten Hebrew and Jewish studies teacher Michal Schachter dusts the hands of her kindergarteners in powdered sugar as they make her delicious homemade sufganiyot (jelly doughnuts) to celebrate the miracle of the oil during Chanukah. From left: Olliver Glick, Anna Olshan, Sammy Smuckler and Maya Newman Photos courtesy of Community Day School

Mayor Peduto lights menorah

JResponse visits Pittsburgh

p Mayor Bill Peduto and chiefs of emergency responders join Chabad of Pittsburgh in lighting the menorah in front of the City-County Building on Dec. 6. From left: Deputy Chief of the Bureau of Police Thomas Stangrecki; Chief of the Bureau of Fire Darryl Jones; Chief of the Bureau of Emergency Medical Services Ron Romano; Mayor Bill Peduto; and Rabbi Yisroel Altein of Chabad of Pittsburgh Photo courtesy of Chabad of Pittsburgh

p Doron Krakow, president and CEO of Jewish Community Center Association of North America, was among a group of JCC professionals who traveled to Pittsburgh to relieve local Jewish Community Center of Greater Pittsburgh staff. The visitors came as part of JResponse, a program that deploys trained JCC professionals after a disaster.

Photo by Adam Reinherz

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DECEMBER 21, 2018 27

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