Pittsburgh Mayor Ed Gainey is guided by a simple maxim: Everyone should be safe in the city of Pittsburgh.
It’s a principle he believes his administration has worked to realize in neighborhoods like the South Side and Downtown, where crime spiked before Gainey and the Pittsburgh police were able to stem the tide.
“Homicides are down 27% in the last year,” Gainey told the Chronicle in a July interview. “We’re down 14% in nonfatal shootings.”
The goal, the mayor said, is to have no one get hurt in any Pittsburgh neighborhood.
Gainey was motivated by that goal earlier this year when he worked with his administration and Allegheny County Executive Sara Innamorato to end the anti-Israel encampment at the University of Pittsburgh’s Cathedral of Learning.
“If I could avoid someone getting hurt or anything terrible, I wanted to do that,” Gainey said.
He decided to meet with protesters when the situation at Pitt escalated and a police
officer was injured. When Gainey arrived at the scene, he said, he saw a picture different from the one he had been led to believe.
The mayor said he was told the crowd consisted mainly of professional protesters, and while it was true that the encampment was largely populated by those people, the protesters around the camp were mainly students, he said.
He spoke with five representatives from the camp — a reverend, a Jewish student, a Palestinian student, a Jewish professor and a community activist — making clear that he was not negotiating the protesters’ demands, which were mostly focused on the university.
“I told them that they had an opportunity to go back to the encampment and talk to the leaders and explain to them, ‘They’re coming in. There’s SWAT outside. You’ve got all three government forces and police outside. There’s no way this is going to end good,’” Gainey recounted.
The mayor told the protesters that if they left, he would provide escorts and guarantee their safety.
Perpetrators of antisemitic vandalism could be charged with hate crimes, district attorney says
By Toby Tabachnick | Editor
Law enforcement officials are taking the recent antisemitic vandalism at Chabad of Squirrel Hill and the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh “extremely seriously” and are prepared to charge the perpetrators with crimes that could warrant jail time.
During an Aug. 3 news conference at Pittsburgh Police Zone 4 headquarters, Allegheny County District Attorney Stephen A. Zappala Jr. said he believes the defacement of Chabad and the Federation on July 29 is “hate speech,” and the crimes include elements of ethnic intimidation at the state level.
U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania Eric G. Olshan also is considering federal charges, Zappala said.
On July 29, vandals marked Chabad with an inverted red triangle, a symbol used by Hamas to target Israeli military sites. Chabad was also defaced with the words “Jews 4 Palestine.” A sign outside the Federation linked the umbrella Jewish institution with funding “genocide” and included the words “ Jews, hate Zionist.”
The vandalism followed several incidents of antisemitic graffiti around Pittsburgh since Hamas’ Oct. 7 terror attack in Israel.
Zappala said that officials were looking at “a series of five different incidents involving vandalism on its face,” including last week’s defacement of Chabad and the Federation. He considers the most recent graffiti messaging an “escalation in hate in
Back to School
Special Section begins on Page 5
Tom Wang/Adobe Stock
Scores of supporters attended "Fight With Light," a solidarity pre-Shabbat gathering on Aug. 2 at Chabad of Squirrel Hill, in response to the antisemitic vandalism that occurred on July 29. Several elected officials came in support, including City Controller Rachael Heisler, City Councilpersons Erika Strassburger and Paul Klein, and state Reps. Jessica Benham, Abigail Salisbury, Dan Frankel and Nick Pisciottano. Also in attendance were Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice David Wecht and former Mayor Bill Peduto.
Photo courtesy of Dan Gilman
Headlines
Federation welcomes new deputy security director
By David Rullo | Senior Sta Writer
Anew name has been added to the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh’s community security team and, for many, it will prove familiar.
Recently retired Pittsburgh Police Lieutenant Eric Kroll began walking the beat as Federation’s deputy security director on Aug. 5. He joins Director of Community Security Shawn Brokos and Security Program Coordinator Erin Fagan during a heightened threat environment — there have been 181 antisemitic incidents in the Pittsburgh area so far this year, logged by Federation’s Virtual Command, compared to 148 incidents in the same timeframe last year.
Kroll was most recently stationed at Zone 4 in Squirrel Hill but has served across the city and region since beginning his career in 1993, first in Mt. Oliver before moving to a department in Washington County.
He was hired by the city in 1995 and worked in the South Side before becoming certified as an instructor under the Municipal Police Officers’ Education and Training Commission in 1996.
After receiving his certification, Kroll began training other officers as an adjunct field training officer while still serving in Zone 3. He eventually became a full-time instructor before returning to police work in the West End and South Side, where he served as a community police officer and detective.
In 2005, Kroll was promoted to sergeant, working in the city’s North Side neighborhood before beginning a 10-year stint as a supervisor back at the police academy.
“In 2017, I was asked by then Director of Public Safety Wendell Hissrich to become the liaison to the Office of Emergency Management and work underneath the director,” he said.
Kroll spent two-and-a-half years in the position. His main focus was active shooter/active threat situations, a role that made sense given
director, was looking to do a drill at the Jewish Community Center of Greater Pittsburgh.
“That was the first time we tested our concept of the rescue task force,” Kroll said. “Ten months prior to the Tree of Life. We continued with our training after that. The actual concept was used that day (Oct. 27, 2018) to extract victims and police officers from the Tree of Life.”
Kroll will always remember his promotion to lieutenant, not necessarily for the achievement, but rather for its proximity to history, he said.
“The day I got promoted, the next day was the lockdown because of COVID,” he said.
point of pride for Kroll as it was the location where his father worked as a police officer.
Once a new commander was named, Kroll became night shift lieutenant, a position from which he eventually retired before being named Federation’s deputy security director.
Brokos said the decision to hire a deputy was a long time coming, noting she had discussions with Federation’s President and CEO Jeff Finkelstein soon after she was hired in 2020.
COVID, however, put a pause in those plans, as Brokos and Federation had to adapt.
“We really had to change how and what we
SUBSCRIPTIONS
subscriptions@pittsburghjewishchronicle.org
412-687-1000, ext. 2
TO ADVERTISE advertising@pittsburghjewishchronicle.org 412-687-1000, ext. 1
EDITORIAL DEPARTMENT
Email: newsdesk@pittsburghjewishchronicle.org
BOARD OF TRUSTEES
Evan H. Stein, Board Chair
Derek Smith, Treasurer
Gayle R. Kraut, Secretary
Evan Indianer, Immediate Past Chair
Gail Childs, Dan Droz, Malke Steinfeld Frank, Seth Glick, Tammy Hepps, Judith Kanal, Cátia Kossovsky, Charles Saul
GENERAL COUNSEL
Stuart R. Kaplan, Esq.
did,” she said. “It just wasn’t the right time to bring on a deputy security director, largely because we went virtual and many of our locations weren’t even open.”
And while the position might seem a reaction to Oct. 7 and the rise in antisemitic incidents since Hamas’ terrorist attack in Israel, Brokos said that isn’t the case.
“We began this process in early 2023,” she said. “It’s taken a while to find the right fit.” The time, she noted, was well used.
“We are beyond grateful to have Eric Kroll on board with us at Federation,” she said.
Brokos said she has a history of working with Kroll, who has assisted Federation with some of its security trainings. The two also worked together whenever there was a need for police coordination in Squirrel Hill.
Kroll, she noted, is a “full partner” whose focus will break down into four large responsibilities: target hardening to make sure the community’s buildings are safe; threat mitigation, serving as a person of contact when threats are made, especially in Zone 4; training; and serving as a law enforcement and community liaison.
Kroll’s experience, Brokos said, makes him perfect for his new role.
“One of the beautiful things is that he has spent years working in Zone 4 and is so familiar already, independent of us, of our organization and the people in our organization and the Jewish community,” she said. “For the past few years, he has been our point of contact for arranging security for the High Holidays. There’s a list of things that he has already done in his police capacity that led right into what he’ll be doing with Federation.”
Kroll said that while leaving the police force is difficult after 30 years, he’s enthusiastic to be working with Federation.
“I feel very welcomed,” he said. “I can’t say enough about it. I’m really excited to get started and build on what’s already been built.” PJC
David Rullo can be reached at drullo@ pittsburghjewishchronicle.org. 5915
Main phone number: 412-687-1000 Subscriptions: 412-687-1000, ext. 2
Jim Busis, CEO and Publisher 412-228-4690 jbusis@pittsburghjewishchronicle.org
Published every Friday by the Pittsburgh Jewish Publication and Education Foundation 5915 Beacon St., 5th Floor Pittsburgh, PA 15217 Phone: 412-687-1000
POSTMASTER: Send address change to PITTSBURGH JEWISH CHRONICLE, 5915 BEACON ST., 5TH FLOOR PITTSBURGH, PA 15217
(PERIODICAL RATE POSTAGE PAID AT PITTSBURGH, PA AND AT ADDITIONAL MAILING OFFICES) USPS 582-740
Manuscripts, letters, documents and photographs sent to the Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle become the property of this publication, which is not responsible for the return or loss of such items.
The Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle does not endorse the goods or services advertised or covered in its pages and makes no representation to the kashrut of food products and services in said advertising or
advertiser will indemnify, hold harmless and defend the Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle from all claims made by governmental agencies and consumers for any reason based on ads appearing in the Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle
Headlines
Greenfield continues to grow Jewish community
community outreach.
By Kathleen Gianni | Staff Writer
Greenfield and Squirrel Hill were once part of the same neighborhood — until they split into two in the late 1800s. At the time, many residents of Greenfield were people of Irish, Polish, Slovak, Italian, Hungarian and Carpatho-Rusyn descent, who worked in the steel mills in Hazelwood, Homestead and Duquesne, according to the Greenfield Community Association.
The last 13 years have brought some changes to Greenfield, as its proximity to Squirrel Hill — and its lower real estate prices — made it an attractive option for Jewish families wanting to be near several synagogues, Jewish day schools and kosher food offerings.
And Greenfield has grown to include its own Jewish community infrastructure as well.
“It’s right around the corner from Squirrel Hill and from Oakland, but it’s quieter, and it’s a nice neighborhood,” said Rabbi Yitzi Goldwasser, the director of Chabad of Greenfield, who moved there five years ago.
“Now that the Jewish community is being much more accommodated, it’s much more convenient and comfortable for the Jewish community to live here.”
“Any Jewish family in Greenfield should have what they need to be Jewish and to celebrate being Jewish in the good times and in the challenging times,” Goldwasser said. “That’s what we’re here for.”
B’nai Emunoh Congregation was established by Orthodox Jews in Greenfield in 1927, meeting in various locations for several years. The synagogue at 4315 Murray Ave. was completed in 1948. In 2011, as its congregation shrank, it was bought by Chabad Lubavitch of Pittsburgh.
Since Chabad acquired the building, Rabbi Elchonon Friedman of Bnai Emunoh Chabad has noted a significant increase in Chabad families in the area. He estimated that the number of Chabad families in Greenfield has swelled from about 10 in 2011 to about 70 today.
“The amount of Jewish people, young people who are new and are coming in on a regular basis, is also moving at a very, very high pace,” Friedman said. “It’s a different neighborhood in many, many different ways.”
Friedman said that, as more religious families move into the area, there are noticeable changes in the neighborhood.
“I think that you see it on just about every block,” Friedman said. “You see it every time davening prayers begin and end, and there are people flocking on streets. You’re seeing it on Shabbos with religious people on the
He also noted more kosher food options at neighborhood events and increased support
from the wider Greenfield community. very connected,” Goldwasser said. “I work hand in hand together with the GCA, the Greenfield Community Association, and they’re happy to support and promote what we do, as well as to have us by a lot of their things. We work together on a lot of different things, and they really speak for the broader Greenfield community.”
While there’s been an increase of Chabad families in Greenfield in recent years, the neighborhood has always had a Jewish presence, said Audrey Glickman, a longtime Jewish resident.
But even with a more prominent Orthodox community moving in, she said, there is still a lack of Jewish businesses and kosher restaurants in the neighborhood, which has two main shopping districts.
Businesses in Greenfield include “a couple restaurants and bars and a couple other stores,” Glickman said. “There’s also a pharmacy and a doctor’s office.”
Glickman noted an influx of cosmetic businesses, like nail spas and tanning salons. While she said that these businesses add to Greenfield’s economic improvement and future growth, she does not think they’re necessarily a draw for Jewish families.
Aside from the new businesses, Glickman said she has seen changes in the housing market, with increased prices and many people renting rather than buying.
Friedman said that while the increase in housing prices is a deterrent to some families, it demonstrates the community’s growth.
“We wanted a place where people could afford houses and move into the area and stay be close and be affordable,” Friedman said. “It’s still more affordable than Squirrel Hill, but the fact that it’s moving so quickly, I mean, is a testament to how this place is transforming.”
As the number of Orthodox families continues to rise and Greenfield’s Jewish community strengthens, Friedman said the area will expand even further. He compared the neighborhood to maturing trees.
“I think that Greenfield is, at this point, transforming from young seedlings to grown trees, at least from the time that I started,” Friedman said. “And I think the growing of these trees is going to take time for them to root and to take their place and everything to settle out.”
Friedman noted the new educational opportunities in Greenfield with the opening of the Yeshiva Boys School at the former St. Rosalia’s School on Greenfield Avenue and a new post-secondary program for young Jewish men beginning in the fall. He also shared his hopes for the completion of the men’s and women’s mikvahs in the coming months.
“How that all shapes up for the future?” Friedman asked. “That’s a good question. We’re really starting a new chapter in Greenfield, and I think that it’s a very exciting chapter. I think it’s going to change the Pittsburgh landscape in many ways.” PJC
Kathleen Gianni can be reached at kgianni@pittsburghjewishchronicle.org.
p Bnai Emunoh
Photo by Kathleen Gianni
p A view of Downtown from Bigelow Street in Greenfield
Photo by Kathleen Gianni
Calendar
Submit calendar items on the Chronicle’s website, pittsburghjewishchronicle.org. Submissions also will 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.
WEDNESDAYS, AUG. 7, 28
Join JFCS and 10.27 Healing Partnership for an artbased mindfulness program. The group will explore ways making art can help regulate the nervous system, promote playfulness and imagination, and connect us more deeply to our bodies, emotions, thoughts and worldviews. Attendees will come together in community as we explore di erent art mediums, share our personal experiences and reflect on how art can influence us all. Free. 10 a.m. 10.27 Healing Partnership Suite, 3rd floor of the JCC in Squirrel Hill. Membership not required. Registration required. 1027healingpartnership.org/ art-in-community-3.
WEDNESDAYS, AUG. 7, 28; SEPT. 4, 18
Chabad of Monroeville invites you to spend an hour playing mahjong and other games. Play, shmooze, learn a word of the Torah, say a prayer for Israel and, of course, nosh on some yummy treats. Free. 7 p.m. RSVP is required: SusanEBurgess@gmail.com, or text or call 412-295-1838. 2715 Mosside Blvd. jewishmonroeville.com/mahjong.
WEDNESDAYS, AUG. 7, SEPT. 4
Join Rodef Shalom Congregation for Biblical Garden Open Door Tours: docent-led tours of the congregation’s Biblical Botanical Garden the first Wednesday of the month. Free. Noon. 4905 Fifth Ave. rodefshalom.org/garden.
WEDNESDAYS, AUG. 7–DEC. 18
Temple Sinai’s Rabbi Daniel Fellman presents a
weekly Parshat/Torah portion class on site and online. Call 412-421-9715 for more information and the Zoom link.
Bring the parashah alive and make it personally relevant and meaningful with Rabbi Mark Goodman in this weekly Parashah Discussion: Life & Text. 12:15 p.m. For more information, visit bethshalompgh.org/life-text.
THURSDAY, AUG. 8
Join Chabad of the South Hills for family fun bowling Enjoy two hours of unlimited bowling and pizza. 4 p.m. $18/person; $65 family max. Crafton Ingram Lanes. RSVP by Aug. 8 at chabadsh.com/bowling.
Women are invited to join Chabad of Squirrel Hill to bake butterfly challahs at Loaves of Love 7 p.m. $12. 1700 Beechwood Blvd. chabadpgh.com/lol.
SUNDAYS, AUG. 11–DEC. 29
Join a lay-led online parshah study group to discuss the week’s Torah portion. No Hebrew knowledge needed. The goal is to build community while deepening understanding of the text. 8:30 p.m. For more information, visit bethshalompgh.org.
MONDAYS, AUG. 12–DEC. 30
Join Congregation Beth Shalom for a weekly Talmud study. 9:15 a.m. For more information, visit bethshalompgh.org.
Join Temple Sinai for an evening of mahjong every Monday (except holidays). Whether you are just starting out or have years of experience, you are sure to enjoy the camaraderie and good times as you make new friends or cherish moments with longtime pals. All are welcome. Winners will be awarded Giant Eagle gift cards. All players should have their own 2024 mahjong cards. Contact Susan Cohen at susan_k_cohen@yahoo.com if you have questions. $5. templesinaipgh.org.
US airlines extend Israel flight cancellations to September
TUESDAY, AUG. 13
Join Tree of Life congregants at the Schenley Park Oval as they meet to enjoy the outdoors, pet dogs and converse with one another. Free. Every other Tuesday, through August. 6:30 p.m. treeoflifepgh.org.
SATURDAY, AUG. 17
Celebrate Tu B’Av, Jewish Valentine’s Day, by wearing traditional white clothes and enjoy a musical Havdalah, a DJ, dancing, bar/bat mitzvahstyle games, activities, a chocolate fondue bar, a photo booth and more. Bring or maybe meet your bashert at this Tree of Life young Jewish community and Temple Sinai NextGen event. This event is for adults in their 20s and 30s. Free. 8:30 p.m. forms.gle/rxjdQPPgvJZyTovm9.
SUNDAY, AUG. 18
Join the Tree of Life Congregation for its annual summer picnic. Food, games and activities. 2 p.m. $10 member/$12 non-member. JCC Family Park, 261 Rosecrest Drive, Monroeville, 15146. Reservation deadline is Aug. 11. treeoflifepgh.org/ congregationalpicnic.
WEDNESDAY, AUG. 21
Rendezvous in Rodef Shalom’s Biblical Botanical Garden with drinks and hors d’oeuvres for a free live performance with Doug Levine and Cantor Toby Glaser. 6:30 p.m. 4905 Fifth Ave. rodefshalom.org.
Join AgeWell for the Intergenerational Family Dynamics Discussion Group at JCC South Hills the third Wednesday of each month. Led by intergenerational specialist/presenter and educator Audree Schall. The group is geared toward anyone who has children, grandchildren, a spouse, siblings or parents. Whether you have family harmony or
strife, these discussions are going to be thought-provoking, with tools to help build strong relationships and family unity. Free. 12:30 p.m.
FRIDAY, AUG. 23
Join Tree of Life Congregation as they celebrate the welcoming of Shabbat. Meet before Shabbat begins to greet one another in the beautiful Rodef Shalom Botanical Gardens for Shabbat on the Rocks. Free. 6 p.m. 4905 Fifth Ave.
MONDAY, AUG. 26
View “Dancing Without Their Timbrels,” photography by award-winning photographer Dale Lazar at the Rodef Shalom Congregation Jewish Museum. The art pieces include color and black-andwhite photographs of dancers on the modernistic bridge in Netanya, Israel. The opening reception is on Aug. 26, and the exhibition runs through Oct. 30. 6 p.m. Free. 4905 Fifth Ave. rodefshalom. org/dancers.
MONDAY, SEPT. 9
Join the 10.27 Healing Partnership for one or both sessions of this healing, consciousness-building forest bathing series. Enjoy gentle walks through Pittsburgh’s parks while nurturing your connection to the natural world through reflective practices. 9:30 a.m. Free. Registration required. Walled Garden in Mellon Park. 1027healingpartnership.org/ forest-bathing-4.
THURSDAY, SEPT. 12
Join StandWithUs for its inaugural Pittsburgh Community Reception honoring Pittsburgh City Controller Rachael Heisler and featuring keynote speaker Lt. Col. (Ret.) Jonathan Conricus. 6 p.m. Early bird: $90; VIP: $250. Rodef Shalom Congregation, 4905 Fifth Ave. standwithus.com/pittsburghevent-2024. PJC
Join the Chronicle Book Club!
TAmerican Airlines has not restarted flights to Tel Aviv since the war broke out.
By JNS Sta
United and Delta Airlines will not resume flights to Israel until next month due to the ongoing security tensions in the Mideast.
The decision by the two U.S. legacy carriers, which comes amid concern over a looming Iranian attack on the Jewish state, leaves Israel’s flagship carrier El Al as the only airline offering direct service to and from the United States through the duration of the summer.
Both U.S. airlines had just resumed service to Israel this spring after suspending flights, like most other carriers, following Hamas’ Oct. 7 massacre.
Delta is rebooking passengers to Tel Aviv on El Al and Air France, with which it is a codeshare partner. United is only rerouting passengers on its own flights to other countries in the region, including Greece and the United Arab Emirates.
Many foreign airlines, including Lufthansa, Austrian, Iberia and Brussels Airlines, suspended service to Israel anew last week amid escalating regional tensions following the killing of a senior Hezbollah commander in Beirut and Hamas leader in Tehran.
Some, including British Airways and Air France, continue to operate flights to the Jewish state. Budget carrier Wizz is resuming service, while RyanAir has also canceled flights.
El Al is increasing flights from Greece and Cyprus for Israelis stranded abroad. PJC
he Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle invites you to join the Chronicle Book Club for its Aug. 25 discussion of “House on Endless Waters,” by Emuna Elon. Overview: “Renowned author Yoel Blum reluctantly agrees to visit his birthplace of Amsterdam to promote his books, despite promising his late mother that he would never return to that city. While touring the Jewish Historical Museum with his wife, Yoel stumbles upon footage portraying prewar Dutch Jewry and is astonished to see the youthful face of his beloved mother staring back at him, posing with his father, his older sister ... and an infant he doesn’t recognize. This unsettling discovery launches him into a fervent search for the truth, shining a light on Amsterdam’s dark wartime history — the underground networks that hid Jewish children away from danger and those who betrayed their own for the sake of survival. The deeper into the past Yoel digs up, the better he understands his mother’s silence, and the more urgent the question that has unconsciously haunted him for a lifetime — Who am I? — becomes.”
Your hosts
Toby Tabachnick, editor of the Chronicle
David Rullo, Chronicle staff writer
How it works
We will meet on Zoom on Sunday, Aug. 25, at 1 p.m.
What to do
Buy: “House on Endless Waters.” It is available at some area Barnes and Noble stores and from online retailers, including Amazon. It is also available through the Carnegie Library system.
Email: Contact us at drullo@pittsburghjewishchronicle.org, and write “Chronicle Book Club” in the subject line. We will send you a Zoom link for the discussion meeting.
Happy reading! PJC
— Toby Tabachnick
WORLD — Papar Krub / Adobe Stock
Back to School
By Family Features
Whether your child is starting school for the first time or simply returning at a new grade level, preparations for the school year can feel overwhelming for both students and parents alike.
To help make the back-to-school transition as seamless as possible, consider taking these steps ahead of the academic term.
Set goals for the school year
As the new school year approaches, talk
with your student about what he or she wants to achieve academically, socially and personally. Whether it’s getting better grades, making new friends or getting involved in extracurricular activities, having clear goals can help your child stay focused and make the most of the school year. To stay organized and track progress along the way, consider creating a list of short-term goals that contribute to his or her long-term objectives.
Practice healthy habits
Establishing a routine that incorporates sleep, exercise, self-care and a healthy diet can help set your child on a path toward success. Start by setting consistent wake times
to ensure your student is well-rested and ready to focus during the day. Aim for at least 7-9 hours of sleep each night to support overall well-being.
In addition to sleep, ensure a balanced diet and regular exercise are priorities. Fueling your child’s body with nutritious foods can help boost energy levels and concentration. Also encourage physical activity through sports, exercise classes or going for walks. Don’t forget to make sure your student leaves time for relaxation and self-care. Whether it’s reading a book, practicing a hobby or spending time with friends and family, engaging in enjoyable activities can help recharge the mind and reduce stress.
Organize schedules and supplies
Organization is key to a successful school year. Using a planner or calendar to track assignment due dates, exams and extracurriculars can help your student effectively manage his or her time. In addition to organizing schedules, gather the necessary supplies. Make a list of the items he or she will need for each class, such as notebooks, pens, a calculator, textbooks and more. Check if any supplies from the previous year can be reused or if purchasing new ones is necessary.
Find more tips to make the school year a successful one at eLivingtoday.com. PJC
Photo courtesy of Pexels
Back to school
Uniting against hate: Hillel JUC prepares student leaders to tackle antisemitism
By Toby Tabachnick | Editor
Last year was challenging for Jewish college students around the country, including in Pittsburgh. Anti-Israel protests and encampments, where activists shouted antisemitic chants like “globalize the intifada,” created an environment of anxiety and distress for Jews on campus.
The situation came to a head in January when dozens of anti-Israel demonstrators protesting speaker Yadin Gellman, an IDF commando veteran and an Israeli actor, marched from the University of Pittsburgh’s Cathedral of Learning down Forbes Avenue to the Hillel Jewish University Center, shouting “Free Palestine” and blocking Jewish students from entering the building.
Dan Marcus, executive director and CEO of Hillel JUC, is expecting that anti-Israel activity may escalate this coming school year, and is being proactive in preparing Jewish student leaders.
Hillel JUC will be expanding its annual leadership seminar, which will be held just before the start of classes, to include student leaders from all the Jewish fraternities and sororities, as well as other Jewish groups at Pitt, Carnegie
Mellon University, Chatham University and Duquesne University.
The aim is to give the students a sense of “the strength and depth and breadth of the
wider Jewish student community,” Marcus said. Shawn Brokos, director of community security for the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh will provide security training and
Laura Cherner, director of the Federation’s Community Relations Council, will explain the resources available in the wider community.
Marcus hopes that by expanding the seminar, Jewish student leaders “from across the whole campus spectrum” will gain strength.
The one-day event, he said, will be “a launch pad for the whole year of leadership development and training,” to which all Jewish student leaders will be invited.
Part of the impetus for gathering a broad range of student leaders, Marcus said, was that last year was “challenging and painful for us as a community.” He pointed to the encampments and the demonstrations — specifically the demonstration outside of the Hillel JUC building.
Students and staff need to be “prepared for changes in environment,” Marcus said, and the demonstrations following Hamas’ Oct. 7 terror attack in Israel presented “clearly a significant change in environment for Jewish students on campus, and, of course, the Jewish people as a whole. So we want to ensure that these student leaders have the knowledge and supports to deal with it. That’s our responsibility to our students.”
Marcus, along with Pitt student Alon Leshem, were among other Jewish Pennsylvanian university stakeholders who testified last month at the
Jewish university students from Hillel JUC and Chabad on campus unite for a demonstration in support of Israel in October 2023.
Photo by Adam Reinherz
New
Yeshiva Schools: Early Learning Center head and Judaics teacher join community Back to school
By Justin Vellucci | Special to the Chronicle
This summer, educator Raiza Malka Hartz traded in the bustling day-to-day life of Manhattan’s Washington Heights for Squirrel Hill — and she’s not looking back.
“We were looking to leave New York in general — for more space for our family, for a more family-friendly environment,” said Hartz, who grew up in a Massachusetts suburb about 20 miles southwest of Boston, and also lived previously in Chicago.
“I am very much enjoying how much more relaxed it is,” Hartz laughed. “It is stressful just waking up and walking around New York. Everyone is so nice here; we’ve been so warmly welcomed.”
Hartz arrived in Pittsburgh in July and serves as the new head of Yeshiva Schools of Pittsburgh’s Early Learning Center. Her husband, Rabbi Herschel Hartz, is joining Yeshiva’s staff as a teacher of Judaics in the boys school. They recently moved to southwestern Pennsylvania with their five children, ages 3 months to 8 years.
Hartz did not grow up in an observant family but embraced Orthodox Judaism after meeting a rebbitzin while studying at the Art Institute of Chicago. She studied in Israel
after graduating from college, then moved to Crown Heights, where she attended seminary for two years at Machon L’Yahadus. She worked in a Jewish preschool in Park Slope, Brooklyn, and fell in love with the children there, ages 18 months to 5 years. She was there for two years. After marrying Herschel Hartz and starting a family, the two ran a Chabad house for about six years.
After moving to Washington Heights, Hartz taught preschool at Yeshiva Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch, leaving after nearly three years — for Pittsburgh — as the program’s director.
is that they both have had rich experiences in education and in the community,” said Rabbi Yossi Rosenblum, Yeshiva Schools’ CEO and head of school. “Already in her first three, four weeks of work here, she’s developed a terrific relationship with the other staff.”
Yeshiva School’s Early Learning Center, based at its Forbes Avenue building, serves about 130 children — from those just weeks old to those in pre-kindergarten.
Hartz said when she visited Pittsburgh for an interview, Yeshiva Schools’ programs quickly made an impression.
“Their philosophy really resonates with mine ... to center on the child, to make it about their interests and meet them where they’re at,” Hartz said. “We match.”
The Hartzes are living temporarily in Squirrel Hill but plan to move to Greenfield this month. They worship at Kether Torah.
“I think they bring a lot of experiences, a lot of energy,” Rosenblum said. “The Hartzes moved here for this — we expect this to be a longtime relationship.” PJC
Justin Vellucci is a freelance writer living in Pittsburgh.
Raiza Malka Hartz, Rabbi Herschel Hartz and their children
Photo courtesy of Raiza Malka Hartz
Raiza Malka Hartz
Photo courtesy of Raiza Malka Hartz
Back to school
5 tips to ace college entry exams
By eLivingtoday.com
Because most colleges and universities require applicants to submit ACT or SAT results as part of admissions consideration, prepping for the test itself can be a critical component of that process.
While it can oftentimes be hard to deal with the anxiety that comes with a rigorous test meant to show your mastery of certain subjects and concepts, such as reading and mathematics, consider these test prep tips to help boost your score while simultaneously lowering stress.
Register early
To allow yourself as much flexibility as possible, taking college entrance exams during your junior year of high school is encouraged. If you don’t get an ideal score, you can refine your approach and retake the exam with a better idea of what to expect.
Take a practice test
Any test prep plan should start with
a practice SAT or ACT exam. Taking practice tests under realistic conditions can help you gain a better understanding of the content of the test, improve your time management and help combat test anxiety. You can use your practice test as a baseline to set goals and focus the rest of your prep on areas you would like to improve before the real thing.
Sign up for a prep course
If you find studying on your own difficult or not as successful as you’d hoped, a prep course can put you through the paces and hold you accountable. Complete with homework and in-class practice, prep classes can range from small groups to larger classes taught by test experts. Some school districts
even offer after-school programs dedicated to ACT or SAT prep.
Gather supplies
To help reduce test day stress, gather everything you’ll need the night before. Check the list of banned items — cellphones aren’t permitted — to make sure you don’t accidentally bring something you’re not allowed to have. Ensure your bag is packed with your admission ticket, valid photo identification, several sharpened pencils with erasers, an approved calculator (with fresh batteries) and a watch, if allowed.
Get a good night’s sleep and eat breakfast
While it can be tempting to stay up late the night before the test to cram, you’re likely to perform better with a full night’s sleep. Sleep is important for retention, and eating a balanced breakfast before heading out the door can aid in your ability to focus. To make your morning easier, prep breakfast before bed to keep an early morning from starting even earlier.
Remember, the college admissions process involves more than just test scores. Visit eLivingtoday.com for more education tips and information. PJC
Photo by Andy Barbour via Pexels
Headlines
Digital pre-approval for tourists
to Israel pushed back to 2025
A new digital entry procedure for visitors to Israel from visa-exempt countries is being postponed until next year, officials announced on July 28, JNS.org reported.
The Electronic Travel Authorization (ETAIL) requirement, which is undergoing a pilot test and was due to go into force on Aug. 1, will now take effect on Jan. 1, Israel’s Population and Immigration Authority said.
The authority cited “a number of requests mainly from airlines that requested additional time to prepare for the implementation of technological systems” as the reason for the postponement.
The new program entails filling out an online form for entry approval before departure for Israel.
The application, which will cost $7 or 25 shekels, is intended to simplify the entry process so that visitors can just swipe their passports at Ben-Gurion Airport upon arrival, as holders of Israeli biometric passports already do.
The U.S., Britain and Canada all have similar digitalized systems in place, and the E.U. is expected to launch one soon.
Endangered whale shark spotted off Eilat coast
A massive whale shark stretching nearly 20 feet in length was spotted gliding through the waters of Eilat’s coral reserve in late July, JNS.org reported.
Local driving instructor Sagi David Kabra, who captured the sighting, said, “I was leading a freediving session in the coral reserve when
I suddenly spotted the whale shark. It was an incredibly moving experience.”
During one such sighting, Kabra saw the adult whale shark accompanied by two baby sharks.
According to Kabra, these massive fish often venture close to the shore in search of food, which is why he cautioned to “let them move freely and avoid touching them. There’s also a strict prohibition against harming them with any watercraft.”
As the largest fish in the world, the whale shark cuts an impressive figure but poses no threat to humans.
In Israel, these gentle giants are protected species, reflecting their global status as endangered. The International Union for Conservation of Nature has listed them in its Red List of threatened species.
The largest accurately measured whale shark was 41.5 feet long and tipped the scales at more than 47,400 pounds.
3,000 terror attacks in Judea and Samaria since January
Judea and Samaria saw more than 500 Palestinian terrorist attacks each month on average in the first half of 2024, according to figures Rescuers Without Borders (Hatzalah Judea and Samaria) published on July 31, JNS.org reported.
In the first six months of this year, first responders recorded 3,272 acts of terrorism in the region, including 1,868 cases of rockthrowing, 456 attacks with Molotov cocktails, 299 explosive charges and 109 shootings.
Palestinian terrorists have killed 14 people and wounded 155 others in Judea and Samaria since the start of the year, according to the group. Though the number of terrorist incidents
Today in Israeli History
Items are provided by the
for
(israeled.org), where you can find more details.
Aug. 9, 1982 — Terrorists attack Jewish deli in Paris
Two Palestinian terrorists, believed to be part of the Abu Nidal organization, attack a Jewish deli in Paris, Chez Jo Goldenberg, with grenades and machine guns. Six people are killed, and 22 others are wounded.
Chez Jo Goldenberg was repaired and continued operating after the 1982 terrorist attack.
By
Aug. 10, 1979 — Bank of Israel founder dies
Economist David Horowitz dies at 80. The Israeli Finance Ministry’s first directorgeneral, he lobbied for the creation of the Bank of Israel. When it happened in 1954, he was its first governor, a post he held until 1971.
Aug. 11, 1929 — Jewish Agency globalizes representation
The 16th Zionist Congress ratifies a broadly representative Jewish Agency for Palestine, including non-Zionists. World Zionist Organization President Chaim Weizmann wanted an agency reflecting the views of all Jews.
recorded in Judea and Samaria saw a slight decrease compared to the first six months of 2023, the number of deadly incidents rose, Rescuers Without Borders said.
Rescuers Without Borders’ figures do not include the hundreds of violent attacks on Israeli security personnel occurring during ongoing counterterrorism operations in Arab towns under the control of the Palestinian Authority.
The Jewish population living beyond the 1967 line accounts for 12% of all Jews in Israel.
The report projected the population in the region to exceed 600,000 by 2030, 700,000 by 2035 and 1 million by 2047.
Huge Second Temple-era quarry unearthed in Jerusalem
A massive quarry dating to the Second Temple period was uncovered in Jerusalem, offering a new glimpse into the capital’s ancient past, the Israel Antiquities Authority announced on July 31, according to JNS.org.
The quarry, which was unearthed in the city’s present-day Har Hotzvim industrial park several weeks ago, is one of the largest ever found in Jerusalem, the state-run archaeological body said.
Two stone vessels, impervious to ritual defilement according to Jewish law, were uncovered at the site. According to the IAA, such vessels always signal the presence of a Jewish population.
During the excavation, the archaeologists also uncovered scores of various-sized building stones, as well as quarrying and cutting trenches whose outlines indicate the size of the blocks being produced.
“Most of the building stones extracted were huge rock slabs, whose length reached about
2.5 meters. Their width was 1.2 meters and they were 40 centimeters thick,” said Michael Chernin and Lara Shilov, excavation co-directors on behalf of the IAA. “Each such quarried block weighed two and a half tons.”
US airlines cancel flights to Israel
United and Delta Airlines announced on July 30 the suspension of flights to Tel Aviv due to escalating security tensions in the Middle East, JNS.org reported.
The decision by the two American legacy carriers follows the back-to-back assassinations of a top Hezbollah leader in Lebanon and Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh in Iran. It again leaves Israel’s flagship carrier El Al as the only airline offering direct service to and from the United States.
“Beginning with this evening’s flight from Newark Liberty to Tel Aviv, we are suspending for security reasons our daily Tel Aviv service as we evaluate our next steps,” United Airlines said in a statement. “We continue to closely monitor the situation and will make decisions on resuming service with a focus on the safety of our customers and crews,” it added.
The statement did not specify when flights would resume.
Delta Airlines said it was suspending its daily New York flight to Israel through Aug. 2 “due to the ongoing conflict in the region,” but noted that the flights can be rebooked on partner airlines El Al and Air France.
At least five other carriers — Lufthansa, Austrian Airlines, Brussels Airlines, Air India and FlyDubai — also canceled flights to the Jewish state. PJC
— Compiled by Andy Gotlieb
Aug. 12, 1991 — Nasser friend Yeruham Cohen dies Yeruham Cohen dies at 75. He was an army intelligence aide, and during negotiations on a truce with a surrounded Egyptian army in the Negev in 1948, Cohen became friendly with Gamal Abdel Nasser.
Aug. 13, 1995 — Barak is named head of High Court
Aharon Barak, a Supreme Court justice since 1978, is appointed to serve as the court’s president. He expands the court’s power, especially in reviewing government and military actions and protecting civil liberties.
Aug. 14, 1910 — Writer Nathan Alterman is born
Nathan Alterman, a poet, journalist, translator, author and playwright, is born in Warsaw. He publishes his poetry book, “Stars Outside,” in 1938. One of his poems, “The Silver Platter,” is a Yom HaZikaron standard.
Aug. 15, 2005 — Gaza withdrawal begins Soldiers and police begin carrying out Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s plan for disengagement from the Gaza Strip. After the Aug. 14 deadline for settlers to leave, evacuation orders give residents 48 hours to depart. PJC
Soldiers erect a barrier between Israel and the Gaza Strip at the Kisufim checkpoint on Aug.
p
David Monniaux, own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Headlines
able to protest,” Gainey said. “We can’t stop them.”
Gainey said he was bothered by the antisemitic signs at the encampment but believed caution to be the better part of
Vandalism:
on the rise, both nationally and locally. Like his quiet presence at the Oct. 7 rally, he’s contacted the people targeted here without public fanfare. That is a calculated move, he said.
“I didn’t want to use them or where they
Continued from page 1
terms of communication.”
“I’m very concerned about that,” he said. “And that’s one of the reasons I wanted to talk to the United States attorney about where those guys are at and what they’re thinking.”
“There are a number of state crimes or a number of federal crimes potentially,” Zappala said. “I think the institution that was tagged is not only respected in the community, generally, but it’s very respected within the ecumenical community. And I’m not going to have those types of institutions targeted for any purpose, political or otherwise. And that’s why I’m saying I think it’s hate speech because I don’t think this is an appropriate way to communicate our First Amendment right.”
Zappala said that while the investigation is proceeding, officials are not yet ready to “charge a particular type of crime,” but are “investigating the vandalism aspect and the ethnic intimidation aspect.”
The chiefs of police are coordinating with the two detectives on the case, as well as the FBI, Zappala said, looking for things “that in the abstract may not be all that significant, but when you look at
I’m concerned every day, but we have plans in place. I learned anything can happen, so you have to stay prepared.”
– MAYOR ED GAINEY
ollowed shortly by the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting commemoration.
I’m concerned every day, but we have plans in place,” he said. “I learned anything can happen, so you have to stay prepared.”
The city, he said, will work closely with local enforcement, the FBI and the ederation to ensure the Jewish community is safe.
Gainey’s executive director on legal policy, Zeke Rediker, pointed to 2023 as a barometer for keeping the community safe during a heightened period of concern, hich included the conclusion of the Pittsburgh synagogue shooter’s trial, Oct. 7 and the five-year commemoration of Oct. 27. ctober, Rediker said, is a month when the mayor’s administration pays extra attention to what’s happening in the city. t the end of the day, Gainey said, he feels the same responsibility to the Jewish mmunity as he does to the entire city.
enough to have it as their venue, and that meant a lot to us. It means we are moving in the right direction.”
Gainey is aware of the approaching anniversary of the Oct. 7 Hamas attack,
everything together, and if they tie back to these we believe in association, then you know there may be something serious that we have to be concerned about in our county.”
While Zappala would not comment on whether officials had identified a suspect, he said “They’re moving in the right direction.”
There is evidence, he noted, that more than one person could have been involved in at least one incident.
“Tagging a church or tagging an ecumenical structure or some structure that’s extremely well respected in the community — I think you crossed the line,” Zappala said.
Zappala’s message to the perpetrators, he said, is that they will be charged, either under state or federal law.
“I will discuss the matter with the United States Attorney’s Office, because the crimes that we can charge you with under
“To me, it’s very intentional to be in these neighborhoods, to advocate for these neighborhoods, to fight for these eighborhoods, because at the end of the day we’re still one city,” he said. “We’re ne city with a lot of different cultures. If the only thing I knew was African American culture, I would be shallow. The more culture I know, the deeper I am as a person and the better I can serve.” PJC
David Rullo can be reached at drullo@ pittsburghjewishchronicle.org.
District Attorney
Stephen A. Zappala Jr.’s message to the perpetrators, he said, is that they will be charged, either under state or federal law.
federal law are much more substantial than under state law,” he said. “But right now, you know, Eric [Olshan] has pledged that we’re going to work together on this, and we’ll do whatever is in the best interest of the community.”
“I don’t want to see hate on the rise,” Zappala said. “And so everybody understands there’s some exigency to getting this matter resolved. I want to know what it is. I want to know if there’s a threat beyond what was actually done that I can put my finger on right now.” PJC
Toby Tabachnick can be reached at ttabachninck@pittsburghjewishchronicle.org.
p David Knoll discusses graffiti painted on the Chabad of Squirrel Hill’s building with Pittsburgh Mayor Ed Gainey and Rabbi Yisroel Altein on July 29. Photo by David Rullo
p Pittsburgh Mayor Ed Gainey says he remains committed to safety. Photo by David Rullo
Back to school
Hillel:
Continued from page 6
state capitol building in Harrisburg about the hate they had experienced on their campuses.
Marcus said he told the lawmakers about “how responsive and caring the senior administration at both Pitt and CMU and have been to Jewish students’ concerns.”
But there was another piece to Marcus’ testimony: the “unacceptable nature of the protest outside of Hillel JUC, the antisemitic chanting — ‘From the river to the sea,’ the ‘Globalize the Intifada,’” he said.
He shared with the legislators “how this certainly caused anxiety and trauma for our students and for our staff while it was occurring, and the disgust that we have for them being able to be outside and intimidate and block the streets.”
Marcus further stressed in Harrisburg the “need for support from our politicians,” as well as the need for universities to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance working definition of antisemitism, which includes the demonization of the Jewish state.
Hillel was instrumental in having Pitt add the IHRA definition to its website as a resource for understanding antisemitism, Marcus said.
“My rationale is that in the IHRA definition, when Israel is consistently singled out from all the other nations to vilification and demonization, that is antisemitism,” he told the Chronicle. “And you only have to look outside your window to see how that’s playing out.”
students for more than two decades, acknowledged that his role inevitably has changed as a result of the surge in antisemitism.
“Look, when you’re walking outside your building to move people from your door chanting ‘From the river to the sea’ to let Jewish students get into your building, you’ve crossed the Rubicon,” he said. When these types of activities take place on campus, he continued, “We don’t have room to be philosophical. We have to be clear: Anti-Zionism is antisemitism. We don’t have the luxury anymore of not having clarity on that point.”
It’s also important to be clear on what Zionism is, he said.
“Zionism is not Netanyahu,” Marcus said. “It’s not Likud. That’s politics. And I’ve been trying — I’ve been sharing with our friends at the universities that Zionism is the belief the
security in our ancient homeland. Everything else we can discuss — that’s politics, that’s culture of course, that’s part of the pluralism and inclusivity. We can debate all sides of the coin. What we won’t debate is, ‘Does Israel have a right to exist?’”
Marcus anticipates that the anti-Israel protests, encampments and marches will continue this school year. And while they can’t be stopped, he intends to prepare Jewish students “in terms of being in community, being in support, being in good communication and strengthening each other,” he said.
One way to strengthen the Jewish campus community is gathering to celebrate the joys of Judaism, he said.
To that end, Hillel, in partnership with Chabad on Campus, will be hosting Shabbat 1000 on Sept. 13 at CMU. The aim is to
gather 1,000 college students from Pittsburgh’s campuses “to come together in community.”
“It is an extremely unifying event and a very empowering event for students to feel that they can celebrate their identity together,” said Sara Weinstein, co-director of Chabad on Campus. “It’s really exhilarating to get that many people together in honor of Shabbos, as Jews. There’s also a lot of unifying and positive activity leading up to it.”
In these “challenging times” on campus, marked by “such resistance and darkness for Jewish students,” Weinstein said, hosting the event at the beginning of the school year is a way to “start out with Jewish pride, Jewish unity, love of a fellow Jew and really just identifying and being able to feel safe and supported on campus.”
Public officials, including the governor and the mayor, will be invited to attend Shabbat 1000, as well as university presidents, administrators and some faculty, Weinstein said. The event, which was also held in 2015 and 2017, is free for students and is supported by Chabad, Hillel and individual donors.
Marcus stressed that through these challenging times, “Nothing’s changed from our mission and vision to engage every Jewish student. We are still focused on creating positive, vibrant Jewish lives. We will not let our enemies dictate how we behave and how we live and celebrate the pluralistic umbrella of our Judaism, period.” PJC
Toby Tabachnick can be reached at ttabachnick@pittsburghjewishchronicle.org.
Kamala Harris selects Tim Walz, pro-Israel Minnesota governor, as her running mate Headlines
By Philissa Cramer | JTA
Tim Walz, the Minnesota governor who burst into national view after calling Republicans “weird,” will be Kamala Harris’ running mate on the November Democratic ticket.
Multiple outlets reported the choice early Tuesday, hours before Harris was set to appear with her pick at a Philadelphia rally.
Harris’ decision ended speculation that Josh Shapiro, the Jewish governor of Pennsylvania, could be in line for the role. Walz and Shapiro were reportedly the two final choices narrowed from a larger pool of men over the course of two weeks.
Shapiro had faced criticism over his Israel record that some called antisemitic because other candidates with similar outlooks had not drawn the same critiques.
Walz is one of those candidates. He has expressed repeated support for Israel’s existence, including this year; has drawn the endorsement of pro-Israel groups; and, after Oct. 7, condemned Hamas and those who did not immediately do so themselves.
“If you did not find moral clarity on Saturday morning, and you find yourself waiting to think about what you needed to say, you need to reevaluate where you’re at,”
Walz said at a vigil held at Congregation Beth El in suburban Minneapolis, according to a local report.
“What was evident on Saturday morning was the absolute lack of humanity, the terrorism and the barbarism,” Walz said.
“That’s not a geopolitical discussion. That’s murder.”
This spring, he urged the Democratic Party to take pro-Palestinian protesters seriously and include them in the party’s thinking, while also condemning hostility toward Jewish students at campus protests against Israel.
“I think when Jewish students are telling us they feel unsafe in that, we need to believe them, and I do believe them,” he said on a
local PBS program. “Creating a space where political dissent or political rallying can happen is one thing. Intimidation is another.”
He also expressed support for Zionism and said those who do not recognize Israel are antisemitic this June at an event held by the Jewish Community Relations Council of Minnesota and the Dakotas.
“The ability of Jewish people to self-determine themselves is foundational,” he aid, according to a recent report in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. “The failure to recognize the state of Israel is taking away that self-determination. So it is antisemitic.”
Israel and foreign policy have largely not been Walz’s focus during his 20 years in politics, which followed careers in the U.S. military and teaching high school. He first ran for Congress in 2006 after attending a boot camp for aspiring elected officials run by a nonprofit created to honor Paul and Sheila Wellstone, a Minnesota Jewish senator and his wife who died in a plane crash.
In Congress, Walz joined the committees on agriculture and veterans affairs as well as caucuses that included the arts and LGBTQ affairs. He traveled to Israel on a 2009 diplomatic trip to the Middle East during which he met with both Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. He also voted with his party to allocate foreign aid, including to Israel, and to back the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, which
was reviled by Israel and its fiercest allies but supported by most Democrats in Congress.
Since being elected governor in 2018, Walz has advanced progressive policies including protecting abortion rights, expanding paid family leave and ensuring free school meals for all children, including immigrants. He has also condemned instances of antisemitism and this year he called for strengthening Holocaust education in Minnesota schools.
Jewish groups immediately began weighing in on Walz’s selection on Tuesday morning.
“Not only is Governor Walz an accomplished and beloved leader in the state of Minnesota, having been elected five times to the House of Representatives and twice to the governorship, but he is also a proud pro-Israel Democrat with a strong record of supporting the U.S.-Israel relationship,” said Marc Mellman, chair of the PAC affiliation with the group Democratic Majority for Israel, in a statement.
“We know the Harris-Walz team will stand up for our shared values, protect our community, and pursue smart, pro-Israel, pro-peace leadership abroad. We’re all in,” said the liberal pro-Israel lobby J Street, which has endorsed Walz in the past, in a statement.
The Zionist Organization of America, meanwhile, raised concerns about Walz’s past expressions of support for Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar, among Israel’s fiercest critics in Congress. PJC
p Shabbat 1000 in 2017
Photo courtesy of Sara Weinstein
p Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz arrives at City Hall in Bloomington, Minnesota, on Aug. 1. Photo by Stephen Maturen/Getty Images
Opinion
Not in our name
Guest Columnist
Sarah Kendis
It’s fascinating to witness the influence that Oct. 7 and its aftermath has had on Jews worldwide. For the resounding majority, there was a positive side effect of the horrendous event: Most Jews dug into their Jewishness, uplifting and prioritizing their identity, celebrating customs more than before, increasing their community involvement. Some who had never quite embraced being Jewish rediscovered their heritage and their history. So many communities fortified and grew in both size and resolution.
special kind of self-deprecation to display such willingness to be used as a pawn, just to earn a seat at the table. Further, it demonstrates a genuine and deeply rooted self-loathing to not only abandon one’s community in a dire time of need, but actively work against it.
We all know the usual suspects of this behavior: Jewish Voice for Peace and IfNotNow, for example. Of course, the irony is that these groups are not exactly Jewish — and I don’t just mean in terms of their values and goals, and
to cloud, confuse and create a general murkiness regarding the values and stances of Jews for an ignorant global audience that is all too susceptible to antisemitic beliefs. As long as there’s the appearance that enough Jews support anti-Zionism, it is then legitimized as a true Jewish stance — therefore not antisemitic — and much easier to spread among non-Jews. Simultaneously, this also delegitimizes the normality and morality of Zionism, and as a result, the overwhelming majority of Jews.
Even when it is apparent that not everyone in our city may be stronger than hate, it is absolutely clear that our community is.
necessary and genuine support during trying times. Even when it is apparent that not everyone in our city may be stronger than hate, it is absolutely clear that our community is. This blessing makes it all the more incredulous that anyone would ever want to self-exclude and leave such a treasure behind in exchange for pithy, fleeting validation from those who would drop them at any hint of faltering allegiance to antisemitism.
Then again, perhaps it isn’t all that difficult to exclude oneself from personal community when already choosing to exclude oneself from reality and morality as well.
But there is another side that also grew.
I know why they do it. Spending years in feminist circles — coming into contact with scores of handmaidens groveling to men for favor, despite it being against their better interests — it’s easy to understand why selfhating individuals defect and look to the other side. It is a survival mechanism as old as time and as vast as the globe, and Jews are by no means immune to the phenomenon. That doesn’t make it any less frustrating or disheartening to witness, however, especially in times of such tragedy.
The recent vandalism in Pittsburgh — including graffiti declaring “Jews 4 Palestine” — purportedly done in the name of Jews, is unfortunately just another escalation in the sinister trend of Western Jews seeking higher standing with demographics who fundamentally oppose them. Everyone has heard of the quintessential self-hating Jew, but it takes a
their promotion of antisemites, ranging from casual bigots to actual terrorists. Not only is it unnecessary to be Jewish to join their movements, it is no secret that even some of their leaders are not Jews, but are Christians and Muslims. That doesn’t change the unfortunate fact that Jewish members exist within these groups and are more than willing to tokenize themselves. And in return, the organizations are happy to exploit and promote such tokenism as the truth of Jews worldwide.
That is the real issue at hand, and the recent local vandalism serves as a sickeningly appropriate metaphor for this underlying goal: Though we have no idea if the perpetrators are actually Jews, it hardly matters, as the intention to send this message using our name produces the same detrimental effect on the rest of the world.
The main goal of these organizations is
An offering of ‘solidarity and friendship’
I am deeply disturbed by the graffiti incidents that affected the Jewish Federation of Pittsburgh, Chabad of Squirrel Hill and several private residences on the night of July 28 (“‘Supporters of Hamas’: Pittsburgh Jewish community targeted with antisemitic graffiti,” Aug. 2). There is no question that these acts were antisemitic, egregious and wrong. I am so sorry that, once again, the Jewish community of Pittsburgh has cause to feel targeted, threatened and isolated.
While you may indeed feel alone, let me assure you that you are in fact surrounded by the solidarity and friendship of your Christian neighbors. We are committed to standing with you and to making clear that there is never any excuse to vandalize a religious institution or house of worship. While our community holds a wide variety of perspectives on the war in Gaza, we must never allow any differences on foreign policy to jeopardize our peace, security and community harmony here in Pittsburgh. We must be particularly vigilant to stand against antisemitism in all its forms, including anti-Zionism.
As a Christian leader, I recognize my responsibility to help educate my colleagues and neighbors about antisemitism and to foster opportunities for Christians to learn, to repent, to grow and to build and maintain positive relationships with our Jewish neighbors. Please know that I am committed to fulfilling that responsibility in my ministry at Christian Associates, and that I am eager to be of service to you.
In solidarity and peace,
The Rev. Liddy Barlow Executive minister, Christian Associates of Southwest Pennsylvania
‘Fighting with light’
This past Friday, my husband and I were deeply moved and inspired by the great show of community support at our pre-Shabbat gathering of strength and solidarity, held in response to antisemitic acts of vandalism at Chabad of Squirrel Hill and the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh (“‘Supporters of Hamas’: Pittsburgh Jewish community targeted with antisemitic graffiti,” Aug. 2).
We are so grateful to everyone who joined, including leaders and members of all parts of the Jewish community, along with non-Jewish friends and neighbors and local politicians. The diverse group of about 200 people who came together to “fight with light” was a beautiful portrayal of the strength and power we have when we unite together. We may be very different, with varying
This effort is part of a larger attempt to sever Jews from Zionism and Judaism from Israel in order to validate today’s version of antisemitism. Achieving this disconnect is essential, as it makes this brand of bigotry more marketable, actual violence not only palatable but genuinely necessary, and the overall goal of Jewish dehumanization absolutely acceptable.
But what a doomed mission from the start — and I do mean the literal start, since Jews are tied to Israel from the beginning of our existence and no number of mediocre attempts at revisionism will change our objective history. And as with other attempts in our past, history will not look favorably on those who desire to distort it.
In all times, but especially now, we are fortunate to have and be a part of such a resilient local community of Jews that always provides
Inevitably, these individuals’ temporary use as self-harming soldiers will expire, and they will become just as Jewish to their supposed comrades as the rest of us unsavory ones. I do hope that one day before then they will find their way back to reality, back home and back to themselves as others eventually have, no longer needing the validation of those who despise their unmasked true selves. Hopefully that day is sooner rather than later, if only for the fact that having such a flimsy spine must be hell supporting those trembling knees. But until such a time comes, it must be made clear that those who have forfeited Jewish history and values have also forfeited the right to ever speak for us, or the privilege to participate in our vibrant community and inherently Zionist traditions. And though they may still technically be Jews in name, despite all their efforts to the contrary, nothing they say or do will ever be in our name. PJC
Sarah Kendis is a musician living in Pittsburgh.
political and religious beliefs, but at our core, we are “am echad b’lev achad,” one people with one heart. I hope, as a community, we can continue to foster that sense of oneness and come together for better reasons in the future.
Unpacking the ‘messages’ of the antisemitic graffiti
Chabad of Squirrel Hill, the Jewish Federation and yard signs at private homes were defaced with markings including the phrase “Jews 4 Palestine” and an inverted red triangle (“‘Supporters of Hamas’: Pittsburgh Jewish community targeted with antisemitic graffiti,” Aug. 2). Let’s look at each of those “messages” separately.
My house was one of those whose “We Stand with Israel” lawn sign was vandalized with “Jews 4 Pali” spray-painted in red. I don’t know what the perpetrator had in mind, but I suspect he knows nothing about real “Jews for Palestine.” Let me tell you about a few of them.
Vivian Silver was the renowned co-founder of an organization of Israeli women, Women Wage Peace. For a decade, this grassroots group has worked to establish relationships with Palestinian women and campaigns for a political solution to war in the Middle East. Silver was also active in Road to Recovery (R2R), an organization of Israeli Jews who volunteer to transport Palestinian patients to and from the border crossings for treatment in Israeli hospitals.
On Oct. 7, Hamas terrorists assaulted these border communities and murdered R2R volunteers Tammy Suchman, Adi Dagan, Hayim Katsman and Eli Organ. Volunteer Yocheved Lifshitz was taken captive and later released. Two others, Oded Lipshitz and Chaim Peri, were kidnapped into Gaza; Peri died there. Three members of Women Wage Peace were murdered. Vivian Silver was brutally slaughtered in her home in Kibbutz Be’eri.
These well-meaning peace activists, actual “Jews 4 Palestine,” devoted their lives to building bridges and saving Palestinian lives. As thanks, they were terrorized, taken hostage and brutally murdered — by the very population they helped.
Regarding the red triangle, the Chronicle points out, “The inverted red triangle [is] used by Hamas to target ... sites” ... “and to glorify its use of violence.” This is a hostile message,
Chani Altein Squirrel Hill
— LETTERS —
Chronicle poll results: Shapiro as Harris’ running mate
Last week, the Chronicle asked its readers in an electronic poll the following question: “Would Josh Shapiro be a good choice as Kamala Harris’ running mate?” Of the 362 people who responded, 60% said yes; 32% said no; and 8% said they didn’t know. Comments were submitted by 132 people. A few follow.
While I support and value Josh Shapiro’s pro-Israel stances, I also worry about his electability among individuals and factions within the Democratic Party for whom support for Israel is a dealbreaker.
As much as I’d like to see Gov. Shapiro on this ticket, I’d rather he continue to build up his credentials for a presidential run in 2028.
Josh Shapiro would be the perfect choice for the VP slot. He is bright,
Continued from page 12
threatening Jewish homes, synagogues and communal institutions, intended to frighten and intimidate the Pittsburgh Jewish community. Marking synagogues and Jewish businesses as a target is reminiscent of what the Nazis did as a prelude to Kristallnacht.
The good people of Pittsburgh need to send a strong message that we will not tolerate these heinous acts: Capture, prosecute and imprison the perpetrators. Stop it now before threatening words become violent actions.
Simone Shapiro Squirrel Hill
personable and has proven capable of working successfully with both Democrats and Republicans. His common sense approach is desperately needed.
Sadly, I don’t think the U.S. is ready for a Black president and Jewish vice president.
I’m not planning on voting for Harris, but with Shapiro as VP, I’d change my mind.
There is too much antisemitism in the U.S. They would lose votes because of that.
He is certainly qualified as both a candidate and a potential president and a good balance for the ticket except for the fact that there would be two former attorneys general on the same ticket.
It’s quite telling that in the eyes of the Democrats his two “negatives” are that (a) he’s Jewish, and (b) he supports Israel.
Picking Josh is the only way she would make me consider her over Trump.
Yes, but I don’t want to lose him as Pennsylvania governor.
He is an outstanding choice who embodies family values, compassion and empathy and who understands the Middle East better than most. I wouldn’t hesitate to vote for him. PJC
— Compiled by Toby Tabachnick
Chronicle weekly poll question: Is anti-Zionism antisemitism ? Go to pittsburghjewishchronicle.org to respond. PJC
of divisiveness in our country, scoring Trump for saying that Jews who vote for Democrats should have their head examined, and accusing Jewish second gentleman Douglass Emhoff of being “a crappy Jew.” It is rich that the man who has trampled upon every tenet of honorable faith, including the Ten Commandments, would have the audacity to judge another based upon the religion to which he belongs.
Thank you and God bless you, Senator Schumer!
Fetterman has gone a ‘bridge too far’
Where is Jewish pride?
The same issue of the Chronicle that reported the antisemitic graffiti on a Chabad building and a Jewish Federation sign (“‘Supporters of Hamas’: Pittsburgh Jewish community targeted with antisemitic graffiti,” Aug. 2) carried a story about a book purporting to suggest strategies for “Saying No to Hate.” One of its reported suggestions was “showing Jewish pride.”
But where is Pittsburgh’s Jewish pride showing?
On Sunday, I went to Squirrel Hill’s farmers market. At each entrance stood people with petitions advocating divestment from Israel. But, aside from a table where Jewish men were offered the opportunity to don tefillin, there was no Jewish presence. No one with petitions to send to our representatives about supporting Israel. No handouts of pictures of hostages or Oct. 7 victims. No one offering “We Stand With Israel” signs. In fact, very few of such signs are visible in Squirrel Hill. They are absent from most of the lawns that, after the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting, were awash with “No Place for Hate” signs. There isn’t even one at the Tree of Life site itself. They are painfully absent from most of our Jewish institutions. Nothing is to be seen at the very heart of Squirrel Hill, at the Jewish Community Center. Do they adorn the lawns of our rabbis? Or those of the public officials who take their few minutes of recognition at the vigil for the hostages?
And, since we ourselves aren’t willing to show our support for Israel, it’s no surprise that little, if any, of the interfaith community whose support we so gleefully welcomed and praised in the aftermath of the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting are now nowhere to be seen. Or heard. But, as the author Dara Horn wrote, and we know too well, “People Love Dead Jews.” When we fight back, not so much.
Signs are, of course, only a beginning. But the time is long overdue for us to begin.
Ann Sheckter Powell Squirrel Hill
Praise for Schumer
Our community is fortunate to have a statesman and a mensch in our corner in U.S. Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer.
Responding to the antisemitic graffiti recently placed on Jewish institutions and homes in Squirrel Hill in an effort to intimidate and terrorize innocent people (“Supporters of Hamas: Pittsburgh Jewish community targeted with antisemitic graffiti,” Aug. 2) Schumer delivered an impassioned Senate speech on July 31, which included the following:
“This week, Squirrel Hill — the site of the Tree of Life synagogue massacre of 2018 — was targeted once again with antisemitic vandalism and attacks. These attacks are vile. They are hurtful. They poison our society with division, fear, grief. And for the Squirrel Hill community — which has already suffered unimaginable tragedy — this is particularly horrific.”
Schumer went on to call out Donald Trump for his prominent role in bringing about this time
Oren Spiegler Peters Township
Our excellent junior senator from Pennsylvania, John Fetterman, went a bridge too far when he said: (1) he would not have the United States recognize a Palestinian state now, even though in theory he believes in the two-state solution. He regards this as “rewarding” Hamas for attacking Israel on Oct. 7, 2023; (2) he has also said that he would give or sell military equipment to Israel without conditions, including 2,000 block buster bombs that the Biden administration held back as unsuited for military use in urban areas (“Recognizing Palestinian state rewards Hamas, Fetterman says in Israel,” July 8).
He thus was encouraging the Israeli extremist right-wing government to destroy the concept of even seeking a path to a two-state solution for the Israeli and Palestinian people. That path has already been endorsed by Israel’s major ally, the United States, as well as many European and Arab countries. This includes Arab countries with whom Israel has peace agreements (Egypt and Jordan) and others with whom Israel has normalized relations through the Abraham Accords.
Fetterman’s “bridge too far” statements do not encourage a cease-fire with full hostage releases; a gradual end of the war that Israel is conducting against the terrorist organizations in Gaza such as Hamas, and an end to hostilities with Hezbollah in the north. His position does not encourage humanitarian aid, reconstruction of Gaza, nor reforming and repairing Israel’s vital institutions and restarting their economy. Instead our senator is assisting Netanyahu’s extremist right-wing partners Itmar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich to (1) oppress Palestinians in the West Bank; (2) encourage the illegal settler movement in the West Bank; (3) demolish Bedouin villages (whose residents are soldiers in the Israel Defense Forces); and (4) continuing to fight a war against an enemy that Israeli Defense Minister Gallant says is already militarily defeated.
The senator’s statements also unwittingly encourage Israeli extremists to try to reoccupy the Gaza Strip, which Israel left in 2005.
Fetterman should not be giving such extremists carte blanche to create a clear path to occupy the West Bank and not follow the Biden plan to move toward a cease-fire immediately, return the hostages and begin pursuing a better future for Israel and the Palestinians. Instead, as the true progressive well-meaning senator that he is, he should be helping our government finally create a good peaceful solution to the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
We invite you to submit letters for publication. Letters must include name, address and daytime phone number; addresses and phone numbers will not be published. Letters may not exceed 500 words and may be edited for length and clarity; they cannot be returned. Send letters to: letters@pittsburghjewishchronicle.org or Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle, 5915 Beacon St., 5th Floor, Pittsburgh, PA 15217 We regret that owing to the volume of correspondence, we cannot reply to every letter.
Ivan Frank Squirrel Hill
Life & Culture
Linguine with oyster mushrooms
By Jessica Grann | Special to the Chronicle
Ilove refashioning recipes to make them kosher. Keeping kosher can be difficult at times, but especially when you’ve tasted all the flavors of the world.
When I’m missing or craving a certain food that I have not eaten in 20 years, I start experimenting — and I believe that I have done one heck of a job making a copycat linguine with clam sauce using oyster mushrooms and anchovies. Both of those ingredients give a beautiful umami flavor.
The mushrooms have a great texture when sautéed. Mushrooms generally can take the place of seafood if cooked correctly, but it’s the anchovy that really gives this dish its flavor.
This recipe is pareve. I’ve served it both hot and cold, as a side to a fish meal and many times as a main dish. To serve it cold, let it rest covered in the refrigerator overnight and add a little olive oil and some fresh lemon juice before serving.
Ingredients:
1 pound linguine pasta
4-5 tablespoons olive oil, divided 1-2 pints oyster mushrooms (each pint makes about 1 cup of raw mushrooms)
1 cup finely diced shallots
3 medium-sized cloves of minced garlic
2 2-ounce cans of whole anchovies in olive oil
1 teaspoon pepper, your choice; I love red pepper flakes but coarse black pepper is OK
Before starting the pasta water, prep the shallots, mushrooms and garlic so that each ingredient is ready to go when you are.
the stem to see if it’s tender to the touch and use a slotted spoon to remove the mushrooms to another bowl.
Add 2 more tablespoons of olive oil to the pot and stir in the diced shallots. Stir regularly for 10-12 minutes, or until the shallots are soft and translucent.
Adding the anchovies: I use 2 cans of flat-packed anchovies in oil. I have tried the 4-ounce glass jar but I don’t care for the texture of the fish. I leave a few larger pieces for flavor and I think that the tinned fish is better. Anchovies have bones but they are super fine, unlike pin bones in large filets. They are soft and break down well. They actually add extra texture.
(The bones are impossible to remove and you will see and bite a few.)
Add one can of anchovies with the oil to the shallots and stir constantly for 3-4 minutes, breaking the fish pieces down to create a sauce.
Add the minced garlic and cook until fragrant but not brown, about another minute or 2.
Add the second can of anchovies with the oil, along with a teaspoon of pepper. Break the pieces with a spoon but leave a few larger pieces if possible.
The anchovies make this dish salty, so salt this to taste at the very end.
Scoop ¼ cup of the boiling pasta water from the pot; use a small Pyrex measuring cup with a handle to scoop out the water and pour it into the sauce. This will release all of the flavor from the sides of the cooking pan.
Wash the mushrooms and trim the end of the stalks. Cut the stalks in ¼-inch pieces. If the mushroom tops are on the smaller side you can leave them whole. The large ones tend to break apart when cooking.
Dice the shallots as finely as you can. Shallots vary in size. To get one cup, you will need about 3 large shallots or about 6 smaller ones.
Making the sauce takes about the same amount of time as bringing the water to boil and cooking the pasta, so I prepare them both at the same time.
Bring a large pot of water to a rolling boil, add about a tablespoon of sea salt to flavor the water and then put the linguine in the pot to cook per the instructions on the box.
If you time this just right you can use a pasta fork or strainer to remove the pasta and add it to the finished sauce as it’s ready to be drained. (A note: This is always how I strain pasta. I very rarely use a colander unless I need to rinse it with cool water for a pasta salad.)
I use a 3-quart braiser-style pot to start the sauce. It’s wide, which makes it easier to sauté the vegetables, and it’s large enough to mix in a pound of cooked pasta. You can simply serve from that pot when you’re ready to eat.
Turn the stove burner to medium-low and let the pot warm for a minute before adding in 2 tablespoons of olive oil to heat.
After another minute, add the mushroom stems, stirring regularly for 4-5 minutes before adding in the mushroom tops. Stir the mushrooms every minute or so for another 4-5 minutes. Test a small piece of
Use a wooden spoon or spatula to gently scrape the sides and bottom of the pot. The water will mix with the shallots and gently boil down to a light, browncolored sauce.
Add the mushrooms and let them cook in the sauce for 2 minutes before adding the last ¼ cup of hot water to the pan.
Allow it to simmer for 5 more minutes so the flavors develop.
If the sauce is finished and the pasta is still cooking, turn off the heat on the stove and cover the pan until you’re ready to mix in the pasta.
When the pasta is cooked to al dente, scoop it from the cooking pot and toss it with the sauce. If the pasta seems a little dry, add another 2 tablespoons of hot water and it should meld together with the sauce as you stir it.
If you are serving a dairy meal you can add cheese if you like, but I think that a strong parmesan cheese competes with the flavor instead of complementing it.
To bring this to the next level, add two tablespoons of butter and allow it to melt in before serving. It’s stellar without the butter, but this is another option and butter always adds to the flavor of a meal like this.
You can sprinkle this with fresh chopped parsley for color.
Enjoy and bless your hands! PJC
Jessica Grann is a home chef living in Pittsburgh.
½ cup hot water from the pasta pot Salt to taste
Fresh chopped parsley for garnish, optional
p Linguine with oyster mushrooms
Photo by Jessica Grann
Head back to school with all your favorites— and earn perks toward FREE gas & groceries while you shop!
Life & Culture
Western Pennsylvania native drives the ball downfield as head coach of Israel’s flag football team
By David Rullo | Senior Staff Writer
You can say that Jonathan Tekac’s life is an amazing journey that started with the first yard.
A Western Pennsylvania native, Tekac is the coach of Israel’s flag football team, ranked eighth in the world by the International Federation of American Football. His career has taken him to the heights of collegiate and pro sports and allowed him the opportunity to travel the world.
Before any of those things, though, Tekac was a kid growing up in New Wilmington, Pennsylvania, dreaming of the NFL.
“I remember playing in the front yard, imagining being in the Super Bowl and making big catches, doing this and that,” he said. “It was absolutely the dream.”
While his dream of the big game didn’t materialize, Tekac said he’s happy about where he’s ended up, downfield.
“My journey was different,” he said. “If for whatever reason I would have played in the NFL, my journey wouldn’t have taken me to where I’m at right now.”
The coach lives in Israel, where he says he was exposed to Judaism and chose to convert.
“My life has been very meaningful because
of the journey I’ve been on,” he said.
That scrimmage began for Tekac in earnest at Youngstown State University, where he studied international business.
Because of his major, Tekac was able to study in Mexico and Costa Rica. After college, he played in the Arena Football League for the Memphis Xplorers.
After an injury ended his career in the States, Tekac wound up in Europe. He visited Auschwitz, which he said made a major impact on his life. It was while in Italy, though,
“It is a tree of life to those who grasp her, and whoever holds on to her is happy.” (Proverbs 3:18)
where he was still playing ball and teaching, that fate threw a Hail Mary that Tekac was able to catch.
“I met an Israeli woman who said, ‘You have so many questions [about Israel], you’ve gotta go see it,’” he recalled. “I got to go to Israel and meet a great woman, who ended up being my wife. We’ve been married for 13 years and have three children —11, 8 and 5 years old.”
And though they left Israel and went back to the U.S. for work —the family spent time in New York, Philadelphia and Los Angeles — Tekac said they decided in 2022 to move back to the Jewish state.
“As we thought about our true north, we got focused on being in Israel to be closer to family and for the cultural values,” he said.
Tekac said that after moving to Israel, he emailed a former acquaintance asking if he could help with Israel’s football program and was offered the chance to coach the Jewish state’s flag football team. The team was looking for someone who could help build and direct the program, skills that combined both his business and football experience.
Aware that his experience was in tackle, rather than flag, football, Tekac said he learned about the game from his assistant coaches and veteran players. Israel, he said, has been at the cutting edge of the game for years, and his role was in operationalizing that experience.
“How can I optimize what they’re doing?” he asked. “How can I take some of the things I’ve learned from some of the leaders I’ve been under, as well as some of my business experience?”
Tekac’s decision came at the right time. Shortly after taking his role with the team, the International Olympic Committee announced flag football would be added to the 2028 summer games in Los Angeles. The excitement of the Oct. 16 announcement was blunted by Hamas’ terrorist attack in Israel on Oct. 7.
Many on the team, he said, are reservists in the Israel Defense Forces. In fact, there are 2,000 football players in Israel who are part of American Football in Israel, the sport’s governing body, and approximately 400 were called back to active duty.
The program, he noted, has lost four athletes so far — one during the Oct. 7 attack,
another three in combat.
After Oct. 7, the tackle football season was canceled, and Tekac’s flag football team took a pause in practicing.
“But it was the players that started to come back and say, ‘Hey, coach, we have to have practice. We need it,’” he said.
It’s been a long and hard road back, Tekac said, but added that overcoming difficult odds are part of the country’s DNA.
“They’re Israeli, so they’re used to that kind of stuff,” he said. “The majority have been in the military. They’re dynamic individuals who work really well in a command-and-control type of environment.”
Tekac’s family, too, has learned to live with the reality of terrorism in Israel’s daily life. His 10-year-old son’s bus stop was recently targeted by terrorists.
“He was probably six inches from taking the full brunt of the force from what we can tell,” Tekac told WYTV.
Tekac, who has been in the States visiting family for the last few weeks, recounted the story of the Israel football program’s resilience at a recent “Bring Them Home” rally in Squirrel Hill in support of the hostages still being held in Gaza.
“I was very humbled and honored to represent our program,” he said. “The hostage situation is constantly in our head. We don’t go to bed or wake up not thinking about them.”
Following the rally, Tekac was working on joining his team in Israel in preparation for the IFAF Flag Football World Championship in Lahti, Finland, on Aug. 27-30 — a task more difficult than one might imagine, given Israel’s recent attacks inside both Lebanon and Iran.
“We’re trying to figure out how to get to Europe and then take an El Al flight from Europe,” he said. “I need to get back to prepare for this tournament. We’ll see what happens but it might drastically change our ability to participate.”
The tournament includes countries from around the world.
“We’re looking forward to representing Am Yisrael. Not just the state of Israel but the Diaspora as well, and just being a point of pride,” he said. PJC
David Rullo can be reached at drullo@ pittsburghjewishchronicle.org.
p Jonathan Tekac with two of his Israeli flag football players Photo courtesy of Johnathan Tekac
p Western Pennsylvania native Jonathan Tekac is Israel’s flag football team’s head coach. He spoke at a recent “Bring Them Home” rally in Squirrel Hill. Photo by Jonathan Dvir
Life & Culture
Israeli scientist proposes massive space sunshade to cut global
were, he answered, “The cost.”
By Sue Surkes | The Times of Israel
An Israeli scientist is seeking $15 million to prove the technology for a potential huge sunshade that would block 2% of the sun’s radiation and bring global average temperatures down by some 1.5º C (2.7º F) within 12 to 18 months.
Throughout human history, there has generally been a balance between the sun’s heating of the Earth and the planet cooling by radiating heat back into space. However, humankind’s increasing emission of greenhouse gases since the Industrial Revolution has limited the Earth’s ability to cool itself.
Prof. Yoram Rozen and his team at the Technion’s Asher Space Research Institute in northern Israel envision a large shade that would slow the heating of Earth.
The idea would be to launch a 2.5 million-ton blanket, a distance of 1.5 million kilometers (93.2 million miles) into space, to a specific zone where the effects of gravitational pressure and solar winds would be minimal.
The shade would move with the Earth as it rotates around the sun, mainly above equatorial areas. The opaque blanket would be made of a thin, reflective material already used in solar propulsion sails in space. It resembles the blankets sometimes seen wrapped around migrants on boats when they reach European shores.
Rozen, who also teaches physics at the Technion and performs research at CERN, the prestigious European Laboratory for Particle Physics near Geneva, said the shading would barely be felt on Earth. The plan was to reduce radiation by just 2%.
“It’s not like when a cloud goes between you and the sun. It’s more like the difference in light between noon and 2 p.m.,” Rozen said.
He added that according to the data, the effects on biology and photosynthesis would be “negligible.”
Asked what the downsides of the project
The full project is estimated at $30 trillion — more than the US GDP but less than the $38 trillion estimated in annual damages due to global warming by mid-century, according to a recent study in the prestigious scientific journal Nature.
In the meantime, Rozen wants to create a prototype shade, the size of a classroom blackboard, attached to “a brain,” to prove that the technology for the project, which he calls Cool Earth, is workable in space.
“It will need a control unit,” Rozen explained, “a spacecraft that will rotate it and decide where it is and when it should turn on and off.”
The satellite would send pictures to Earth of the shade’s orientation in different positions at different times.
Rozen said the prototype could be launched within three to four years of a confirmed budget. However, the funds are not yet available.
The sunshade was “not my idea,” Rozen told The Times of Israel. “It’s been around for about 15 years. There are some papers about such solutions. But we’re the ones trying to turn it into reality. If we can’t show that it can work technologically, then nobody else will do it.”
He emphasized that if the technology could be proven, scientists would let entrepreneurs take it forward.
“As an academic institution, we’re interested in doing the first step,” he said.
If the technology is proven and $30 trillion can be found, the shade would have to be taken to space in stages, Rozen said, possibly in 10 square kilometer (3.85 square mile) sections. “Squares tie together better than circles,” he noted.
He noted that once the shade is deployed, it would take up to 18 months for the Earth to cool by 1.5 degrees Celsius.
Once that goal is reached, a few shade sections would be retained to maintain the temperature. The rest could be floated off toward the sun.
Rozen said the Asher Institute had worked with the United Arab Emirates National
Centre for Space and Science. The UAE had planned to present the project at COP28 in Dubai, which was held in NovemberDecember last year.
But the Gulf country halted that cooperation in October following the start of Israel’s war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip after Hamas’ Oct. 7 attacks.
Rozen explained that while reducing
global warming emissions was essential, that would not be enough to reverse the havoc global warming is wreaking on Earth, with extreme weather events, droughts, flooding and wildfires.
Removing emissions would slow the rate of temperature increase, but it would continue to rise for a long time before starting to come down. PJC
— SCIENCE —
p Professor Yoram Rozen
Courtesy photo via The Times of Israel
p Illustration of the sunshade being developed by Cool Earth at the Technion — Israel Institute of Technology, in northern Israel Youtube screenshot via The Times of Israel
Tears of a mother
he Shabbat before the fast of Tisha b’Av is known as Shabbat Chazon, literally the Sabbath of Vision. While ostensibly this somewhat mysterious appellation comes from the opening words of the haftarah “A Vision of Isaiah,” a number of Chassidic figures speak of this Shabbat as one associated with
prophetic vision: that before approaching a day of deepest grief, we need to borrow the penetrating eyes of our prophets to give us a perspective that elevates us from des pair and devastation to hope and redemption.
One of the most searing images that Jewish tradition associates with exile and hope for the future is that of our matriarch Rachel. Speaking to generations of Jews who would see the destruction of Jerusalem, the prophet Jeremiah shared a vision of our ancient ancestress:
“A voice is heard on high mourning and great weeping, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no more.” (Jer. 31:14)
The image of the wife of our father Jacob, who after years of infertility dies in childbirth, is transformed in the words of the prophet to the eternal mother who cannot stop crying over her missing children.
Rashi, quoting a midrash, explains Jacob’s choice to bury Rachel on the side of the road rather than bringing her to be buried in the family tomb in the cave of Machpelah as rooted in this same image:
“When Nebuzaradan exiles them (the Israelites), and they pass by there, Rachel will emerge from her grave and weep and beg mercy for them, as it is said: ‘A voice is heard on high, ... Rachel is weeping for her children] ...’”
How heartbreaking and strangely comforting! In imagining our ancestors, shackled and defeated, being led off into exile, passing by the humble tomb of Rachel, taking strength in the words that God says to Rachel:
“Restrain your voice from weeping and your eyes from tears, for your work will be rewarded,” declares Hashem. “They will return from the land of the enemy. So there is hope for your descendants,” declares Hashem. “Your children will return to their borders.”
In our liturgy over Tisha b’Av, when we mourn the destruction of the Temple and the other tragedies of Jewish history, the paytanim (liturgical poets) return again and again to this arresting image, of a mother whose love is so fierce that it
elicits a promise from God that her children will, one day, be redeemed and return.
For the last 300 days, this powerful image has merged for me with that of a contemporary mother Rachel: an old, cherished friend named Rachel Goldberg. R achel and her husband, Jon Polin, were beloved congregants of mine in Virginia before making aliyah. To the horror of all who know and love them, their son Hersh was kidnapped to Gaza this past Simchat Torah, and since then, their life has been consumed with advocating for his return all over the world, to whomever will listen to his story.
As we approach this Tisha b’Av, so many of our ultimate mother Rachel’s children continue to languish in horrible captivity in “the land of the enemy.” So many of our mother Rachel’s children “are no more,” heroes fallen in battle against murderous terrorists. So many of our mother Rachel’s children find themselves exiled from their homes in the north of Israel because of the rockets of Hezbollah. So many of our mother Rachel’s children struggle with the terror of the threats hurled at the Jewish people from Iran and across the world. This Tisha b’Av, our voices need to harmonize with Rachel G oldberg and Mother Rachel, not allowing our cries to God to be silenced until we merit to see the prophecy fulfilled: “and the children will return to their borders.” PJC
Rabbi Daniel Yolkut is the rabbi of Congregation Poale Zedeck. This column is a service of the Vaad Harabonim of
Public Meeting
Wednesday, August 14TH • 5:00 – 6:30 pm
If you desire to view this presentation in a different language or require special assistance when viewing it, please contact John Myler at jmyler@pa.gov or 412-429-5063.
Fay, S&B USA Construction, and PennDOT will hold a public meeting on August 14, 5:00 – 6:30 pm at https://bit.ly/CommercialStreetPublicMeeting to discuss the project plans for the $95M Commercial Street Bridge Replacement.
Obituaries
BRODSKY: Allan J. Brodsky passed away in Silver Spring, Maryland, on Sunday, July 28, 2024, after a brief illness. Allan was born on Nov. 19, 1932, in Brooklyn, New York, to Ralph and Eva (Jollowsky) Brodsky and grew up in Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, where his parents ran a women’s clothing store. He relished his childhood in a small town in the Poconos where he learned to ski and fish, became a bar mitzvah and an Eagle Scout, and had easy access to New York City. There he joined his father on clothing buying trips to the Lower East Side, visited his grandparents, aunts and uncles in Brooklyn, learned to use chopsticks on trips to Chinatown with his local Boy Scout leader, and enjoyed the first of a lifetime full of musical and theater performances. After graduating from high school at Blair Academy in Blairtown, New Jersey, in 1951, Allan enrolled at Lehigh University. Midway through his studies and at the tail end of the Korean War, he was drafted into the U.S. Army, serving two years in Germany, including three tours on the National Ski Patrol in the Alps. Allan returned to Lehigh and graduated with a degree in sociology in 1957 and took his first job with the Boy Scouts of America. Across his career he worked for Ketchum, Binney and Smith, and then struck out on his own as a small business owner, focusing on a myriad of business services. In 1958, Allan married Clementine (Clemmy) Klein, a graduate of Beaver (now Arcadia) College whom he met on a blind date two years prior. They settled briefly in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, before moving to Pittsburgh, where they lived for 55 years, nearly all of it in Shaler Township before moving to Silver Spring, Maryland, in 2015 to be closer to their children. Clemmy predeceased Allan in 2017. In Pittsburgh, Allan and Clemmy were dedicated to many civic and cultural activities, as well as to the lives of their children Anne (Margaret Chriss) Brodsky and Jay (Lynn Westwater) Brodsky. Allan and Clemmy were one of the founding families of Temple Ohav Shalom, where they both took on many volunteer roles over the years. They were tennis players, active Shaler Area Marching Band parents, and season ticketholders for the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, Civic Light Opera, Three Rivers Shakespeare Festival, Pittsburgh Public Theater and Pittsburgh Pirates. Allan was a member of the North Hills Shaler Library board, the Allegheny County Library Association board, the Glenshaw Kiwanis Club, a docent at the Heinz History Center and played the bagpipes as a member of the Syria Highlanders Shriners band. He was an avid photographer from his time in Germany to his retirement in Maryland, who enjoyed doing his own darkroom — and eventually Photoshop — work. He was a dedicated cheerleader and supporter of Clemmy’s full-time social justice volunteer efforts, serving beside her at events and activities around the Pittsburgh area. After moving to Riderwood Senior Community in Silver Spring, Allan remained active in the photography club and outings committee, read the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Washington Post and The New York Times every day on his iPad, texted daily with his kids, sent emails to friends he and Clemmy had made worldwide, and took full advantage of D.C.’s museums and cultural events. Allan was always on the hunt for restaurant recommendations from his friends at Riderwood and reviews in the Post. He took great joy in recommending meals out to try new food with whichever constellations of the family were available and particularly when everyone, including his three granddaughters (Sofia, Julia, Anna), could join in a meal out with the whole family. Allan will be remembered for the delight and pride he took in the accomplishments of his wife, children, daughters-in-law, and granddaughters; his strong moral compass, support of women’s rights, dedication to service, and respect for education, wisdom and knowledge; love of classical, jazz and bluegrass music and abiding interest in sociology, technology and gadgets; and for possessing a deep appreciation of his full life. Graveside service and interment were held at West View Cemetery of Rodef Shalom Congregation in Pittsburgh. The family will hold a celebration of Allan’s life at Riderwood in Silver Spring, Maryland, in August. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to Kamala Harris for President kamalaharris.com/, The Family and Nursing Care Foundation familynursingcare.com/foundation/, the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra give.pittsburghsymphony.org/donate-now or Blair Academy blair.edu/ all-in-campaign. schugar.com
LICHTENSTEIN: Stanley Lichtenstein, 91, of White Oak, passed away peacefully at home on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2024. He was born Feb. 5, 1933, in McKeesport and was the son of the late Sam and Sadye (Friedman) Lichtenstein. He was the husband of the late Helen (Kestenbaum) Lichtenstein, who passed away March 21, 2018. They were married for 67 years. Stanley was a member of Gemilas Chesed Congregation and was a U.S. Army veteran serving in the Korean War. For his service he received the Korean Service Medal, the National Defense Service Medal, the United Nations Service Medal and the Good Conduct Medal. He was executive vice president of their family corporation, Lico, Inc. He is survived his children, Sam (Randi) Lichtenstein of Monroeville and Shari (Henry) Rondon of Pembroke Pines, Florida; grandchildren, Stephanie (Jesse) Naber, Matt (Riley) Lichtenstein, Ashley Cuneo and Ryan Lichtenstein; great-grandchildren, Jace and Luke Naber, and Landon and Lowan Lichtenstein; and all his great fur babies. He was preceded in death by his son Steven Lichtenstein and sister Renee Agnew. Friends were welcomed Sunday, Aug. 4, 2024, from 2-3 p.m. at the Gilbert Funeral Home and Crematory, Inc. 1638 Lincoln Way, White Oak. (412) 672-6322 Troy J. Gilbert, director, where the service began at 3 p.m., with Rabbi Mendy Schapiro, officiating. Interment with military honors followed at Gemilas Chesed Cemetery, White Oak. Memorial contributions may be made to Gemilas Chesed Congregation, 1400 Summit St., White Oak, PA 15131. Condolences may be made at gilbertfuneralhomeandcrematory.com
RUDOLPH: Barbara R. Rudolph, age 91, of Pittsburgh, formerly of Rancho Mirage, California, and North Woodmere, New York, passed peacefully on Saturday, Aug. 3, 2024. Daughter of the late Nathan and Toby “Tanya” Gorbaty. Beloved wife of the late Howard Rudolph. Dear mother of Steven Rudolph and Randy (Sonia) Rudolph. Loving grandmother of Nathan, Noah and Jennifer. Dear sister of Libby Daniels. Also survived by her loving nephews, Jonathan (Laura) Daniels and Howard Daniels, and many nephews, nieces, grandnephews and grandnieces, as well as her beloved caregiver, Agnes Oino. Barbara was born in Brooklyn, New York, and graduated from Lafayette High School. She started her career as a bookkeeper and became the devoted wife of her husband, Howard, for 60 years. A graveside service will be held at Beth Moses Cemetery, Long Island, New York, by Gutterman’s Funeral Home. A memorial service in Pittsburgh will be announced in the future. In lieu of flowers donations may be sent to a charity of your choice in her memory. Local arrangements entrusted to William Slater II Funeral Service, Scott Twp. slaterfuneral.com
Please see Obituaries, page 20
Jewish Association on Aging gratefully acknowledges contributions from the following: A gift from ... In memory of...
Anonymous
Regina Bardin
Cheryl Bloch
Edward M Goldston
Sharon Green
Meyer Grinberg
HALPERN: Bernard (Bernie) Halpern. Born March 1, 1936, to the late Herman and Bessie Halpern. He passed away peacefully on July 28, 2024, in Delray Beach, Florida, at the age of 88. Bernie was a successful highly driven entrepreneur with one meaningful goal: to love and provide a comfortable life for the love of his life (Betty), married for 68 years, and to raise their three children, Michael, Ina and Francine. Bernie also had a passion for sports and was extremely competitive, an avid tennis player, enjoyed bowling, poker, pool and ping pong. He was unbeatable in each sport. He was also a risk taker and loved playing the stock market. This was his No. 1 hobby and became a second career after he retired at 55, continuing to trade just days before he passed. Bernie had a big personality and was usually the life of the party; he had a laugh that was infectious and made friends so easily. Bernie leaves behind his loving wife, Betty, daughters Ina and Jeffrey Levinson, and Francine Wilson. Deceased son and daughter-in-law Michael and Sue Halpern. Grandchildren, Stephanie and Mark Aiken, Heather and Dustin Campbell, Brittany and Jonathan Cummings, Jaynie and David Soloman, Lauren Levinson, Jaison and Raquel Wilson, Sydnie Wilson and Devin Sadler. Great-grandchildren, Ryan and Jack Wilson, Tyson Sadler, Aidan Campbell, Alaina Sue Cummings, Tobin Soloman and Graham Aiken. Services and interment were private. Contributions in Bernie’s memory can be made to the American Cancer Society (donate.cancer.org). schugar.com
Labovitz
Esther Klee
Meyer I Grinberg
Marvin A Perer, M .D .Ethel R Perer
Nathaniel S Pirchesky .Esther Caplan
Nathaniel S Pirchesky .Beatrice Galler
Claire & Morris Z”L Weinbaum .Stuart D Weinbaum
Contact the Development department at 412-586-2690 or development@jaapgh.org for more information. THIS WEEK’S YAHRZEITS —
Sunday August 11: Lt Richard Stanley Ackerman, Jack Neville Berkman, Ben Cowen, Albert Edelstein, James J Gluck, Rebecca Goisner, Leonard Klevan, Samuel Maysels, Jacob Melnick, Rose Paul, Ethel R Perer, Bernard A Price, Molly Schwartz, Leah Shapiro, Max L Siegle
Monday August 12: Lillian Brody, Sarah Cohen, Pauline Davis, Nathan Fishman, Lawrence M Grossman, Anne Levine, Ethel Linder, Ida Mandel, Maurice L Moritz, Bernard Murstein, Judith Ashinsky Rosen, Martha Schwortz, Jacob Sheffler, Jack Sherman, Sidney Siegman, Harold Leighton Winkler
Tuesday August 13: Fryma Maete Berenstein, Herbert Cohen, Beatrice Galler, Julius Hemmelstein, Bluma Shaindel Labovitz, Irwin Levinson, Eva Corn Makler, Sophia Weinerman Sands, Eleanor J Slinger, Harry Weisberg
Wednesday August 14: Harry Blumenthal, Israel I Brody, Sarah Fish Hassel, Esther Klee, Isaac Latterman, Ruth Mazefsky, Joseph Ostrow, Morris Rubin, Isaac Schor, Malcolm Slifkin, Sadye Steinman
Thursday August 15: Robert Chamovitz, Miriam “Mitzie” Feinberg, Julius Field, Anna Rose Frieman, Nathan Gilles, Esther Glick, Sarah Geller Goisner, Saul Greenberg, Leonard Herbert Hochhauser, Annette Kranich, Mildred Golanty Krauss, Herman Labowitz, Minnie Landay, Benjamin Lazier, Sarah Sattler, Harry Silverstein, Clemens Simon, Dr Morris Benjamin Weber, Hymen J Wedner
Friday August 16: Bess Baker, Marilyn Brody, Meyer Coon, Samuel Finkelstein, Meyer I Grinberg, Irwin “Ike” Kitman, Blanche Labovitz, Albert H Levenson, Dorothy Levine, Emil Mendlow, Jean Ostfield, Dr Herman Pink, Hermina Schwartz, Harriet Taper, Benjamin H Tauberg, Stuart D Weinbaum, Lillian Wells
Saturday August 17: Morris Chetlin, Ida Daly, Miriam Friedlander, Bruce Robert Gordon, Max Harris, Sylvia G Levine, Morris Linder, Ida Match, Jacob Mazer, Pearl C Numer, Charles Olinsky, Goldie Faleder Recht, William Myer Rose, Simon Jacob Rosenthal, Reuben C Solomon, Leonard Stein, Tsivia Topaz Sussman, Ray Weiner Wesosky, Florine K Wolk, Benjamin I Young, Harry N Zeligman
Obituaries
Obituaries:
Continued from page 19
WEIS: Mark S. Weis, age 66, of Gibsonia, Pennsylvania, passed away after a valiant fight against pancreatic cancer on July 31, 2024. Born in Pittsburgh, Mark is survived by his wife, Debbie, sons, Jason and Matthew, mother and stepfather, Fay and Frank Ribich. He is also survived by siblings Shereen Hoffmann (Michael) and Daniel Weis (Robyn); sister-in-law Sharon Donlon (Michael), and nieces and nephews Adam Solomon, Melissa Solomon, Rachel Weis, Zachary Weis and Joshua Weis. Mark was a dedicated and beloved husband, father, son, brother, brother-in-law and uncle. Mark grew up in Monroeville, Pennsylvania, and attended Gateway High School (class of 1976). He went on to pursue an undergraduate degree in accounting at Penn State main campus in State College, Pennsylvania, and a JD from Dickinson School of Law. While working for a “Big Eight” accounting firm in Central Pennsylvania, he pursued a Master of Law in taxation (LLM) from Georgetown University. Following completion of his LLM, Mark began what became a highly successful career that spanned over three decades as an estate planning and tax attorney. Mark developed long-lasting relationships with both his colleagues and clients, many of whom became dear friends. He was known as their “problem solver” — and was always willing to help others in ways that went far beyond his areas of technical expertise. Mark met his wife, Debbie, shortly after he moved back to Pittsburgh in 1989; they married in 1992. Mark was a devoted
This is one in a series of articles about Elder Law by Michael H. Marks., Esq. Michael H. Marks is an elder law attorney with offices in Squirrel Hill. Send questions to michael@marks-law.com or visit www.marks-law.com.
Estates and inheritances are subject to several kinds of tax if you reside in Pennsylvaniaa. No one likes to pay tax! I know how to help my clients save taxes on estates, both through advance lifetime estate planning, and later while administering an estate left behind by a decedent. Today we focus on taxes that are assessed at the time someone has died. There is not space here to describe these taxes in detail nor is this an exhaustive list. These suggestions are by necessity broad and general in nature. The main taxes that apply are: Pennsylvania Inheritance Tax –This tax applies to the value of almost everything that you leave behind, except life insurance on your life. The flat tax rates in a nutshell are 0% for a surviving spouse, charity or minor child, 4 ½% for descendants, 12% for siblings, and 15% for any other relative or friend. PA Inheritance tax also applies to almost all gifts made less than a year before dying. There are a variety of Federal Income Taxes potentially due on an inheritance:
• Deferred Income Tax on a Retirement account (IRA, 401K etc). Under the Federal “Secure Act 2.0”, income tax may be owed on the entire amount in an “inherited IRA.”Under the Secure Act, a beneficiary has to take all the money out within 10 years and pay income tax on the proceeds withdrawn each year. There are exceptions for spouses, disabled or chronically ill people, minor children and others. These exceptions can allow them to stretch out the withdrawals and defer the tax ‘till later. An inherited Roth IRA is subject to this 10-year withdrawal requirement, but no more tax will be owed.
husband and father to his sons, Jason and Matthew. He was a huge proponent and supporter of Debbie’s full-time career, gladly helping with a range of duties on the home front. As a dad, he beamed at his sons’ accomplishments, whether academic, athletic or related to their blossoming careers. He loved helping them learn how to read at a young age and was often found working through flashcards or reading books to them at bedtime. As they grew up, some of Mark’s favorite moments were coaching their teams and cheering on the boys from the sidelines of the soccer, baseball and football fields as well as from the stands at many a basketball game or swim meet. He also loved warm weather vacations, and especially enjoyed family trips to Hilton Head, South Carolina, and the Hawaiian Islands, as well as cruising in the Caribbean islands. Mark was a lover of all sports — including the Pittsburgh Steelers, Penguins and Pirates, as well as the Boston Celtics. He was also an avid fan of college football and basketball. Mark’s happy place was being back in State College, Pennsylvania, attending Penn State football games at Beaver Stadium. He loved nothing more than a fall football weekend in Happy Valley, and especially looked forward to annual White Out nights. When Mark wasn’t working or watching sports, he was an avid gym-goer, often pushing his friends and even instructors from the gym to achieve new heights in their workouts. In recent years, Mark served as a volunteer on the Charitable Gifts Committee at Penn State, helping with fundraising efforts and providing tax advice on major donations to the university. We have established the Mark Weis Accounting Scholarship at the Smeal College of Business at Penn State to carry on the legacy of providing students majoring in accounting the support they need to succeed. Services were held at Temple Ohav Shalom. Interment Temple Ohav Shalom Memorial Garden. Contributions may be made to Penn State University: Checks should be made payable to Penn State University. Please note “Mark Weis Accounting Scholarship - SCBA6” in the memo section. Mail checks to Smeal Development Office, 475 Shortlidge Road, 209 Business Building, University Park, PA 16802. Arrangements entrusted to Ralph Schugar Chapel, Inc. schugar.com PJC
• Capital gain tax on the sale of appreciated inherited assets. The beneficiary’s basis (cost) of the inherited asset is often “stepped up” to the value of the asset on the date of death. Assets sold soon after i receipt, therefore, generally do not generate a capital gain. Assets sold later may generate a gain or loss.
• Dividends and Interest Income. Income tax also applies to certain taxable ordinary income in an estate on e.g. dividends and interest income.
• Federal Estate Tax only applies to multimillionaires. In 2024, you can leave behind about $13 million per person, or $27 million per couple before you owe any Federal estate tax (at rates from 18% to 40% on the taxable part). In 2026 that amount comes down by half and an individual can leave about $7 million, or $14 million per couple.
Tax Saving Strategies
Here are some strategies to save on some of these taxes, either in advance or after someone has died.
PA Inheritance Tax: One way to avoid this tax is to move your legal residence to a State without an Inheritance/Estate tax, like Florida.
Lifetime gifts either outright or through an irrevocable trust made more than a year before you later pass away can save PA inheritance tax. However, the tax will still apply if you retain the use and enjoyment of property, or keep the income even though you give up right to the principal.
One way to reduce (but not eliminate) PA inheritance tax is by joint ownership of property (again, if created more than one year before you die) such as on a joint deed to a house, or joint depositors with right of survivorship on a bank account. Note that mere Pay on Death beneficiary designations, short of actual joint ownership or title, leave the inherited assets still completely taxable.
For unmarried life partners, biting the bullet and tying the knot by marrying – even at the last minute - lowers the applicable tax rate from 15%, all way down to 0% for a spouse.
SPONSORED CONTENT
HOW TO SAVE TAXES ON AN ESTATE
Yet another strategy is to use taxable resources to buy life insurance, instead, which is not subject to PA inheritance tax.
Federal Taxes
DEFERED INCOME TAX ON IRAS AND APPRECIATED ASSETS: tax planning for inherited retirement accounts is all about who you leave it to.
To start, a roll over to a surviving spouse is most often the most effective strategy.
When you have flexibility, sending taxable retirement account money to “qualified designated beneficiaries” who can stretch out and defer the tax payments, or to lower income recipients, can also be effective.
If you have charitable intentions, funneling retirement account money that would be taxable if received by an individual, to a tax exempt charity instead, means no income tax on that money.
For appreciated assets, always be careful to preserve the step up in basis whenever possible in any transition planning.
FEDERAL ESTATE TAX: If you are in this territory based on accumulated wealth, you may need advice
and planning beyond the scope of this brief article. Suffice it to say that if a couple has more than the applicable individual exclusion amount, e.g., more than about $13 million now, then on the death of the first spouse, it’s important to promptly file a Federal Estate Tax return on the death of the first spouse to die – even if no tax is actually yet due – to secure and preserve the exemption amount in the estate of the first spouse and not lose it, by “transporting” that protection amount forward, for use at the second death.
Also, there are steps that you can take between now and the end of next year to preserve the greater exemption amount, before it’s cut half at the end of 2025.
Finally, there’s a very common misconception about the annual gifting limit, currently $18,000 per person per year. Unless you are wealthy enough to owe Federal Estate Tax later, this limit has no practical effect or bottom-line impact on you, even if you make a gift exceeding that amount.
At Marks Elder Law, we help people every day with issues like these. I invite your questions and feedback. Please let me know how I can help you and your family.
Real Estate
me today to discuss all of your real estate needs!
www.kaminrealty.kamin.com 5125 Fifth Ave. 2 & 3 Bedrooms Corner of Fifth and Wilkins Spacious 1500-2250 square feet ”Finest in Shadyside” 412-661-4456
YOUR EMAIL INBOX
Smith-Rosenthal Team
Jason A. Smith & Caryn Rosenthal Jason: 412-969-2930 | Caryn: 412-389-1695 Jasonasmith@howardhanna.com Carynrosenthal@howardhanna.com
pittsburghjewishchronicle.org
Sign up on the right hand side of our homepage. pittsburghjewishchronicle.org
A WEEK. Sign up on the right hand side of our homepage. pittsburghjewishchronicle.org
A masterful new Kafka book will bring you closer to the writer than ever before
By Aviya Kushner | Forward
“Selected Stories”
By Franz Kafka, translated by Mark Harman Harvard University Press, 304 pages, $28
Franz Kafka was not a household name during his lifetime, but he was admired by the kinds of readers who could recognize greatness and immediately usher it into their house of reading — Rainer Maria Rilke and Thomas Mann. The Nazis banned Kafka’s books, yet that didn’t stop the great poet W.H. Auden from reading him and writing, in 1941, as the Nazis were doing their utmost to exterminate Jews and Jewish culture, that Kafka “was the artist who comes nearest to bearing the same kind of relation to our age that Dante, Shakespeare, and Goethe bore to theirs.”
I admit I was skeptical about what turned out to be the best book I have read this year. When I first heard about this new translation of Kafka’s stories, I wondered whether it was even necessary. Good translations into English exist, dating back to the influential postwar efforts of Willa and Edwin Muir, who introduced Kafka to English-language readers; there is also plenty of intriguing biographical information available, such as the lauded recent biography of Kafka by Reiner Stach, translated into English by Shelley Frisch. But it’s clear that there is far more to say, and that it’s a pleasure to learn how Gabriel Garcia Márquez reacted to reading Kafka, along with his effect on Auden, Rilke and Mann.
From its very first sentence, “Kafka: Selected Stories,” edited and translated by Mark Harman, dispelled all my doubts. Harman’s translation moved me deep into Kafka’s world, bringing to life Kafka’s friends, girlfriends, parents, sisters, and most of all, his concerns as a writer and as a Jew in a way no other book I have ever read has.
At every turn, and whenever possible, Harman — a professor emeritus of German and English at Elizabethtown College — brings the reader super-close to Kafka’s original German with notes that explain what might seem like minor moments in translation that are in fact essential in the German. And it must be said that Harman’s translation is not like other translations; for starters, Harman re-titles “The Metamorphosis,” “The Transformation,” and explains why. He traces how Kafka transformed himself to focus entirely on writing, creating “the compelling yet also stylized autobiographical persona that Kafka creates in his diaries and letters.” Harman also tries hard to preserve what he describes as “Kafka’s shifting choices when it comes to punctuation,” which can lead to surprises for readers familiar with other translations. Through it all, Harman tries hard to stay very close to the German. He writes that he resisted the urge to “make the English more vivid, expressive, and colorful than Kafka’s
a ton about Kafka, this 60-page introduction will reveal something about Kafka you never knew before.
“While working on this project, I kept discovering new things about Kafka that I had missed in four decades reading, teaching, and writing about his work,” Harman writes. “My hope is that readers of this book will also make their own discoveries.”
Among other tidbits, I learned that Kafka’s grandfather was a shochet, or ritual slaughterer; what Kafka’s writing desk likely looked like, that Kafka’s father forced his mother to work long hours in their store, and that his mother blamed the deaths of two of her sons in infancy on those interminable hours. Harman suggests that the roots of Kafka’s loneliness came from the mere fact that his parents worked all the time.
And there are plenty of fascinating and new-to-me details about Kafka’s high-stress, high-caliber education, which his parents very much wanted him to acquire, and which they themselves did not have. Some of the biggest surprises here come from quotes from people who knew Kafka. For example, I was deeply moved by this passage from the obituary that Milena Jesenská — his only non-Jewish girlfriend — wrote for Kafka:
He understood people as only someone of great and nervous sensitivity can, someone who is alone, someone who can recognize others in a flash, almost like a prophet.”
It’s a beautiful sentence, and I couldn’t resist thinking about how so many Jewish writers seem to be fascinated by prophecy or described by others as prophets of sorts. Isaac Bashevis Singer, in his Nobel Prize acceptance speech, said: “In the history of old Jewish literature there was never any basic difference between the poet and the prophet. Our ancient poetry often became law and a way of life.”
Harman seems to have read and watched everything related to Kafka, including the Shoah Foundation’s interview with Kafka’s niece. In that interview, she mentions Kafka’s three sisters’ amazement when they received posthumous royalties for their brother’s work. Only then did they realize he was a “real writer,” shortly before all three were murdered at a concentration camp.
Throughout this book, Harman also annotates everything worth annotating, so that the reader can get as close to the German as possible. One of his strengths is explaining when and why it is “difficult to interpret exactly what is meant,” which reminded me of what some Torah commentators sometimes say about thorny passages in the Torah; the great Rashi, famously occasionally comments
eineni yodea, or “I don’t know.” *
Another pleasure of this book is how Harman traces Kafka’s increasing interest in Judaism as well as his ambivalence — “what do I have in common with Jews? I hardly have anything in common with myself, and should stand very quietly in a corner, content that I can breathe,” Kafka writes.
Harman details Kafka’s interest in Hebrew, as well as his interest in Hasidic rabbis, as evidenced by his encounter with the Belzer Rebbe, leader of the Belz Hasidic sect, at a spa in 1916. The photo of the Hasidim at the spa is one of the treasures of this book.
Then there is the role of friendship in Kafka’s exploration of Jewish identity. Harman writes of how Kafka befriended an actor in the Yiddish theater, Yitzhak Löwy, who had a deep influence on Kafka; so, too, did Georg Mordechai Langer, who grew up in an assimilated family, became a Hasid, and then returned to secular life in the big city but did not give up some of his Hasidic garb, to the horror of his family.
Harman relates that “the character in “The Judgment” known only as the “friend in Russia,” may be partly modeled on Löwy, who grew up in Warsaw while it was still under Russian rule and whose life as a nomadic actor became increasingly precarious.
Harman also explores Kafka’s relationships with women. “Although the relationship with Milena was short-lived, it nonetheless affected him deeply as a person, a writer, and a Jew,” Harman writes. “During the affair with Milena, his only serious relationship with a non-Jewish woman, Kafka began to see himself as the ‘most Western-Jewish’ of European Jews, a notion which covertly underlies his third and final novel, ‘The Castle.’”
The truth is that everything in this book is worth reading — the translator’s introduction; the actual introduction; the titles of the stories; the actual stories in translation; even the notes in the back of the book, which are a veritable treasure trove. From the notes, I learned that Auden’s 1941 essay in The New Republic, in which he praised Kafka as being in the same league as Dante and Shakespeare, was, amazingly enough, titled “The Wandering Jew.”
But I would be remiss if I did not mention that another important contribution Harman’s book offers is a window into history. It’s easy to forget that 500 million people died globally in the influenza epidemic of 1918-1920, according to one estimate; Harman slips this in as he mentions that Kafka managed to survive it. As we consider how the coronavirus pandemic, inflation, and ongoing wars are contributing to global political instability, those small historical details of the years of Kafka’s life add contemporary resonance — and of course, fear and foreboding — to the reading experience. It’s just another way Harman brings us into Kafka’s inner world. PJC
This story was originally published in the Forward. To get the Forward’s free email newsletters, go to forward.com/newsletters.
p Franz Kafka
Photo in public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Community
Let my people vote
Rep. Abigail Salisbury (center) and generations of Jewish community members lent support at a voting rights news conference at the Allegheny County Courthouse on July 30.
with Zisser
Shufuni
style
Shufuni, an Israeli band that shares its stories of Oct. 7, performed for hundreds of community members at Beth El Congregation of the South Hills on Aug. 1. The event was sponsored by the Jewish Community Center of Greater Pittsburgh, the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh, Temple Emanuel of South Hills, South Hills Interfaith Movement–SHIM, Jewish Community Centers of North America, StandWithUs and Moving to our Center.
Good
times
p
Running
Hole in one
p From left: Mira Semandoyev, Linor Ein Gedi, Rotem Meir Levi and Daniel Weiss
Photo courtesy of the Jewish Community Center of Greater Pittsburgh
Light and Unity Days after Chabad of Squirrel Hill was targeted with graffiti, community members gathered for a light and unity event.
