Southern Jewish Life, April 2020

Southern Jewish Life

April 2020

Volume 30 Issue 4

“You shall observe to do all the social distancing and health guidelines which I command you this day, that you may live” — CDC 8:1 Sanctuary of Temple Sinai, Lake Charles

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

shalom y’all This isn’t exactly the April issue we had planned.

Despite being a print junkie for decades, we made the decision to distribute our April issue — and probably May as well — entirely as an online edition. Same magazine, same format — just on the screen.

As you will see in this issue’s stories, this is an unprecedented time, In previous major situations — the Gulf War, Sept. 11, the 2008 market crash and bubble burst — there were jolts to everyday life, but life mostly went on as normal.

In the wake of COVID-19, life has pretty much shut down in the public sphere, and with it, a lot of economic activity. We have been assisting our advertisers as much as possible, posting on our social media and keeping a webpage listing curbside service, online ordering and other ways to support them.

As an independent publication that does not receive Federation allocations (many Jewish publications are owned or heavily subsidized by the local Federations), advertising is how we are able to keep publishing. That world is mostly on hold. Even in 2008, when entire categories of advertisers disappeared, other market segments were still up and running.

COVID-19 has already led to the folding of Canada’s Jewish newspaper, and the two main national Jewish papers in Britain. Others in the U.S. have cut back their publishing schedules. Major publications have let well-known reporters go as part of their cost-cutting moves. Even for Federation papers, it will be interesting to see what May issues look like. Nobody can predict what the summer will bring.

That is why we decided that for now, with existing advertising way down and new advertising at a standstill, we are temporarily instituting this measure. Like

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I N S U R A N C E S April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

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commentary everyone else, we hope things will get back to a relatively normal state soon.

Pretty much every Jewish publication is running a campaign for support from readers and from the community. We are, as well.

Southern Jewish Life has always been the one to tell our communities’ stories, not just in Birmingham and New Orleans, but also from Shreveport to Panama City, from Lake Charles to Gadsden and everywhere in between. Please help us continue to serve our communities, as a vital part of our Southern Jewish landscape.

Fifteen years ago, we told the world about the toll of Katrina on the Jewish community and chronicled the long process of rebirth. We are a resource for the emerging Jewish civil rights tourism market. We continue to remind the world that yes, “there are Jews down there.”

In this issue, we have extensive coverage of the Passover graffiti attacks against two Jewish institutions in Huntsville, a story that spread worldwide. And when some had snide remarks about the vandalism being typical ignorant Alabama, we set the record straight with the story of how local churches and city officials rallied around the Jewish community.

And of course, we have original, local coverage of the effects of the current situation.

If you enjoy Southern Jewish Life and what we have done over the last 30 years, please consider helping support our work. Contributions can be mailed to the address on page 6 or made through supportSJL. com.

If you have a business, even if you’re not looking for new clients or don’t sell directly to consumers, please consider image ads, especially for the major holidays. We’re planning a 30th anniversary issue this fall, for those who might want to run a message there.

We thank those of you who have already contributed, your validation of our work means a lot.

There are so many stories out there that still need to be told, so much news to report.

We hope that you enjoy this edition, please continue to check our website for updates, and if you haven’t already signed up for This Week in Southern Jewish Life, our weekly e-news, please do so by sending your email to subscribe@sjlmag.com.

Again, thank you for your readership and support, and we can’t wait to get back to covering happier times, in person.

Lawrence Brook, Publisher/Editor

“Southern Jewish Life is a vital community asset” Help Support Independent, Quality, Original Southern Jewish Journalism!

We thank you for your continued support as we tell our stories — the stories of Southern Jewish Life!

www.supportSJL.com 4 April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

commentary

By Owen Averbuch

FINDING THE

Antisemitism Too Close to Home On the first night of Passover, I couldn’t help but smile and feel pride as I scrolled through pictures and videos on social media of my friends celebrating with their families, both at home and over Zoom. An intense pride and overwhelming sense of community that, after over 3,000 years and in amid a global pandemic, we still celebrate our Exodus from slavery in Egypt around the world.

That great feeling I had the night before was completely shattered the morning after with sadness and anger when I learned that our sister synagogue, in my hometown of Huntsville, was vandalized with hate speech and symbols while I slept only a couple of miles away.

There are no words to describe the feeling when your community and a central part of your identity are so blatantly and carelessly attacked. This feeling was compounded when on the morning after the second night of Passover, we found out that a second hate crime was committed on the synagogue and personal residence of Huntsville’s Chabad rabbi and his family. This second crime, the night after the first, sent an even deeper shockwave of fear and helplessness through our community.

Many of my Jewish friends from college, who are not from the South, were always surprised to learn that I was from Alabama: “There are Jews in Alabama?!” was the exclamation I received every time. I often inferred from that question the judgment that Alabama is seen across the country as a prejudiced place, and I always disagreed from my standpoint, feeling that I had (almost) always felt welcome as a Jew in Alabama. But today, I don’t. I can’t help but feel like a stranger, just as my ancestors did when they were in the land of Egypt. But the difference is: this is my home, and I have rarely felt like a stranger here before.

In an unprecedented time in our lives where we have seen the immense love and support of which the human race is capable, I feel like this attack of burning hate hits that much harder. It is sad that the Jewish people — my people — now have so many examples that continue to occur which point to why we feel that we are under attack across our country and the world.

Casual comments and a lazy society lead to injustices such as this one.

To school classmates who made the occasional Jewish or Holocaust joke, or argued with me about the relevance of an event that happened 80 years ago and why I should still be so “torn up about it,” this post is for you. And really, this post is for everyone, because we all play a part in creating an environment in which hate exists.

Hatred of groups of people builds up momentum gradually, and at least for the Jewish people, has ebbed and flowed over thousands of years, in countries across the world. Casual comments lead to prejudice; prejudice leads to hate speech and hate crimes; and hate leads to systematic disenfranchisement and persecution.

For those who say that something like the Holocaust could never happen again to the Jewish people, think again. Recent atrocities in this country have exhibited otherwise; in some parts of the country, members of our community have been killed for simply being Jewish.

Look around you, look at your community and your actions, and ask yourself, are you part of the problem? I’ll certainly be scrutinizing myself in the coming days and weeks, ensuring I do more going forward to promote the right of our community, and every other persecuted community, to exist freely and without fear. We live in the year 2020, a present where many believe we live in a tolerant and accepting world, unlike that of the antiquated generations of our forebears, but thanks to hate, our community can’t even satisfy the basic needs of security and safety.

I’m angered and devastated by these acts, but am comforted in knowing that the Jewish community is one that will always persevere in the midst of hate, and will never be defeated. Let us all work towards a more tolerant and loving world. I know we have it in us.

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

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commentary

MESSAGES

Maccabi USA leader praises Birmingham Games I have had the honor of attending many Maccabi competitions around the world. From Israel to Australia to South Gilad America, Europe and the JCC Maccabi games around the United States Consul General Katz and Canada, I have logged many miles seeing how sports can be a vehicle to help build Jewish identity, especially in our young.

Why do we still celebrate events from 3500 years ago?

IPassover felt honored to come Birmingham for the first and fell in love with not just the city is one of thetomost sacred holidays thattimewas established but the people.

You have taken Southern hospitality to a new level for the Jewish people, a holy day where we come centuries ago? with your kind and caring approach to the JCC Maccabi Games.liberty and together to celebrate our national Yigal Allon was the

freedom.

As we continue to faceyour the coronavirus of the PalLed by the Sokol and Helds, hard-working commander volunteers were wonderful.

They partnered crisisyour as a outstanding community, staff, we allled have had toLynch, make tomach, an 2017 elite JCC military with

by Betzy make the Maccabi games a huge hit. this includes even the director way unit during Israel’s Idifficult want toadjustments, take this opportunity as executive of Maccabi USA toWar say thank you on behalf weeveryone observe Passover. of Independence, a genof involved.

During this time where we celebrate our an- eral in the Israel Defense I had just returned from the 20th World Maccabiah games in Israel with a U.S. delegation of cestors’ liberation from slavery in Egypt, it is Forces, and a prominent over 1100, who joined 10,000 Jewish athletes from 80 countries. Back in July the eyes of the entire customary for Jewish families to gather around political figure in Israel Jewish world were on Jerusalem and the Maccabiah. This past month with 1000 athletes and the Seder table, read from the Haggadah, re- for over 30 years. Allon coaches from around the world being in Birmingham, you became the focal point. member our exodus from Egypt, and to reflect once referenced the imfrom the Jewish the community large, including a wonderful onEveryone the transformation that community the Israelitesand have portance ofatlearning and identifying with our police force,since are toour be commended.

These go down in history as being a seminal undergone emancipation.

Thisgames year, will heritage, tradition, and history.

Allow me to moment for thearound Jewish community asdisplaying we build to the future wonderful Jewish Jewish families the world are quote just by oneproviding sentence such that summarizes Allon’s memories. their ingenuity by recreating what we know as a approach: “People who do not know their past “traditional” Jed Margolis Passover seder. From video confer- — their present is poor and their future is hazy.” ences to intimate with one’s nuclear History is not just a story. History is who we Executive Director,gatherings Maccabi USA family, Jewish communities around the world are. Events that took place and affected our foreare showing yet again, our ability to persevere fathers shape our own identity. The lessons of supremacists like to see back through challenging times. our ancestorswould were passed on pushed from generation On Charlottesville into a corner and made to feel lesser.

We stand The historical events that we observe during to generation until they became part of who we with and pray for the family of Heather Heyer, Passover occurred over 3,500 years ago.

Alare today.

Editor’s Note: This reaction to the events in wasin there standing up totimes, the face this though many years have passed,Newman, miraculously who Even these uncertain theofmessage Charlottesville, written

by Jeremy hate. each one of us continues story of of the Passover story still rings true. The story Master of the Alpha EpsilontoPirelive Thetathe Colony yitziat Mitzrayim, leaving Egypt, by year after year. tells how thethe Jewish people overcame their Weofrecognize essence of the American at Auburn University, was shared AEPi Our sageswhich tell uscalled that we musteloquent” personally feel as narrative subjugation went from being shackled as a and two-century old struggle to rid National, it “very and though “our we, ourselves, in this epicatcre- ourselves and enslaved to prosperous free.those So today, of such corners, andand allow in praised brothers attook AEPipart Theta Colony ation of University the Jewish and… nation.the leadership they as we the faceseat a new obstacle, let they us remember the them at the table that so deserve.

Auburn Manyontimes people, ”even my own children, It strength of our ancestors andpromise know that we too is the struggle to fulfill the of the display their campus. ask these basic questions: Why should we care Declaration can overcome.

Let us find creative ways toare obof Independence, that “all men about what happened to our forefathers more created serve. Inequal… doing endowed this, not only do we honor the by their Creator with White supremacy been a cancer on do certain than three and a halfhas millennia ago? Why story ofunalienable our ancestors but ”we continue thework tradirights.

We know our our country since itshistorical beginning, threatening we celebrate ancient events that have is tions of thefinished, Jewish people. far from but we know we will not its its values, betterGiven angels. nohopes, influence on our and livesits today? the chal- move Chag Sameach. backwards.

The events place in Charlottesville lenges thatthat the took world is facing at this time, is (Pleasemen observe Passover Holiday When andthe women, fully armed,safely take and represented theholiday worst ofeven thisworth nation.the Those observing this effort? in the accordance with social distancing standards.) to streets in droves with swastikas and who marched thethe streets with tikiquestions: torches I then replyonto with following other symbols a reminder of how Gilad Katz of is hate, Israel’sit is Consul General to the and did so tothe provoke violence and Whyswastikas do we celebrate establishment of the relevant the issues of racism and anti-Semitism fear. whoWhy marched the streets did or Southwest, based in Houston. His territory also StateThose of Israel? do theonto American people, are today.

It is a wake-up call to the work that covers Louisiana and Arkansas. so profess an ideology thattheir harkens back to anytoother nation, celebrate independence needs to be done to ensure a better, more a bleaker, more wretched time in our history. welcoming country.

But it should not come A time when men and women of many creeds, without a reflection on how far we’ve come. races, and religions were far from equal and far America was born a slave nation. A century from safe in our own borders. A time where into our history we engaged in a war in part Americans lived under a constant cloud of to ensure we would not continue as one. We racism, anti-Semitism and pervasive hate. The events that took place in Charlottesville served found ourselves confronted by the issue of civil rights, and embarked on a mission to ensure as a reminder of how painfully relevant these the fair treatment of all peoples no matter their issues are today. skin color. Although we’ve made great strides, Auburn’s Alpha Epsilon Pi stands with the it is a mission we’re still grappling with today.

Jewish community of Charlottesville, and with the Jewish people around the country and around the world. We also stand with the minorities who are targeted by the hate that was on display in Charlottesville. We stand with the minorities of whom these white 6 April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

America was also born an immigrant country. As early as the pilgrims, many groups and families found in the country the opportunity to plant stakes, chase their future, and be themselves. Few were met with open

January April 2020 2020

Southern Jewish Life PUBLISHER/EDITOR Lawrence M. Brook editor@sjlmag.com ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER/ADVERTISING Lee J. Green lee@sjlmag.com V.P. SALES/MARKETING, NEW ORLEANS Jeff Pizzo jeff@sjlmag.com CREATIVE DIRECTOR Ginger Brook ginger@sjlmag.com SOCIAL/WEB Emily Baldwein connect@sjlmag.com PHOTOGRAPHER-AT-LARGE Rabbi Barry C. Altmark deepsouthrabbi.com CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Rivka Epstein, Louis Crawford, Tally Werthan, Stuart Derroff, Belle Freitag, Ted Gelber, E. Walter Katz, Doug Brook brookwrite.com BIRMINGHAM OFFICE P.O. Box 130052, Birmingham, AL 35213 14 Office Park Circle #104 Birmingham, AL 35223 205/870.7889 NEW ORLEANS OFFICE 3747 West Esplanade, 3rd Floor Metairie, LA 70002 504/432-2561 TOLL-FREE 866/446.5894 FAX 866/392.7750 ADVERTISING Advertising inquiries to 205/870.7889 for Lee Green, lee@sjlmag.com Jeff Pizzo, jeff@sjlmag.com Media kit, rates available upon request SUBSCRIPTIONS It has always been our goal to provide a large-community quality publication to all communities of the South.

To that end, our commitment includes mailing to every Jewish household in the region (AL, LA, MS, NW FL), without a subscription fee.

Outside the area, subscriptions are $25/year, $40/two years. Subscribe via sjlmag.com, call 205/870.7889 or mail payment to the address above.

Copyright 2020. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in whole or part without written permission from the publisher.

Views expressed in SJL are those of the respective contributors and are not necessarily shared by the magazine or its staff. SJL makes no claims as to the Kashrut of its advertisers, and retains the right to refuse any advertisement.

Documenting this community, a community we are members of and active within, is our passion.

We love what we do, and who we do it for.

agenda interesting bits & can’t attend events

On April 2, members of JNOLA had a virtual happy hour on Zoom with young Jewish professionals in Charleston, S.C.

On all other nights…

Judaism emphasizes community, but preservation of life mandates isolation Elijah has a rough challenge this year.

Typically, Elijah visits community Seders with dozens or hundreds in attendance, or large family gatherings that go well into the double digits.

This year, with social isolation mandates due to the novel coronavirus outbreak, the average Seder table was low into the single digits. A whole lot more households for Elijah to check in on — if they even would allow him in after being in contact with so many others’ wine cups. Many set aside their fancy Elijah’s Cups and placed a plastic cup with wine on the front porch.

All attempts at levity aside (and the Jewish people are famous for laugh-

As community Seders were cancelled everywhere, alternate plans were being made. Chabad of Southern Mississippi delivered 18 Seders in a Box to community members who found themselves needing to hold their own Seders in isolation.

ing in the face of tragedy), it is an incredibly challenging time. Those in the medical field are swamped. Most businesses had to adapt on the fly — if they are even allowed to remain open as “essential” services.

For Jewish institutions, the challenge has been maintaining the sense of community when everyone has to stay home — and, just like most businesses, they have to deal with how to keep the doors open in the face of uncertain revenues.

Some congregations — aside from Orthodox or Chabad — had already dabbled in or established streaming services for Shabbat and, in the case of Birmingham’s Temple Beth-El, twice-daily minyan. A lot more congregations had to do a crash course on Zoom an Facebook Live.

That was not without hiccups. Aside from the expected problems — connectivity, sound issues — the phenomenon of Zoombombing emerged, where someone would join a Zoom broadcast, and then either put antisemitic, Nazi or pornographic images in their feed.

New strategies and password protections were immediately instituted.

At the beginning of the self-isolation, we had links to many congregations’ Zoom feeds on our website, to let the community know how to access the programs. We soon stripped all those Zoom links out, though links to congregational websites and Facebook pages remain.

In the following pages, there are stories of community initiatives in response to the pandemic, the toll it has taken on the region, both economically and physically, a listing of what our advertisers are doing to keep their doors open (please help support them!), how those with simchas during a time when the community can’t gather are dealing with the new reality, and more.

One interesting note is that while communities around the country are talking in terms of facing a completely new challenge, in the New Orleans community there is a sense of deja vu. Uncertain times? The entire community shut down? Having to adapt quickly? Been there, though last time it was the levee failure.

We welcome your stories and reports on your experiences during this unprecedented time.

April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

Members of the Jewish community in New Orleans who are in need due to economic stresses of the coronavirus pandemic can now apply for the Jewish Community COVID-19 Emergency Financial Assistance Program.

“Stability bridge grants” of up to $2,500 will be available for those “who require life sustaining funds and have exhausted all other means to meet their basic needs.” The program is being funded by the Jewish Endowment Foundation of Louisiana and administered by Jewish Family Service of Greater New Orleans.

Created more than 53 years ago, JEF is a repository of charitable funds that are invested and administered to ensure a strong and vibrant Jewish community for future generations.

“JEF acts as a safety net in times of crisis,” said JEF Executive Director Bobby Garon. “We could not be more grateful to work with our community partners to provide the critical financial assistance and support that individuals and families need during this unprecedented time.”

As a social service agency dedicated to preserving and enhancing life, JFS hopes the program will provide both material aid and emotional relief to those impacted by the pandemic.

“One of our greatest moments as an agency was our Hurricane Katrina response” after the 2005 storm, said Roselle Ungar, JFS executive director.

“We’re using many of the tools and skills we learned during that period now. The challenges might be different, but working with other community agencies, foundations, and volunteers remains the most effective means of serving vulnerable populations.”

“It is our hope that JEF’s resources, combined with JFS’ program and implementation, will help local families overcome the immediate financial stability struggles that will surely exist as a result of the coronavirus,” said Garon. “The uncertainty of the pandemic’s scope and scale is a challenge greater than what we faced with Hurricane Katrina and I am proud of the JEF Board’s unanimous decision to utilize these funds to support those who will need it most.”

The Jewish Community COVID-19 Emergency Financial Assistance Program is part of a suite of response efforts managed by JFS. JEF and JFS partnered with the Jewish Federation of Greater New Orleans and area synagogues to launch the Jewish Community Response Volunteer Initiative, a helpline matching healthy volunteers with individuals needing connection and/or practical assistance during the social distancing phase of the outbreak.

JFS also launched a COVID-19 Resource Page to collect information and resources for enduring the pandemic. Visitors can expect to find mental health advice, ways to help, information regarding the City of New Orleans’ social safety net resources, and much more.

To provide critical emotional support to the community, JFS is hosting weekly Virtual Gatherings. On Thursdays at 3 p.m., community members can join a Zoom video conference with friends, neighbors, and JFS’ mental health professionals. JFS staff hope the Virtual Gatherings bring catharsis, connections, and helpful tips in a challenging and distant time.

“We’re operating without many of our normal resources in regards to reaching and serving our clients. I’ve been so impressed with our staff and community partners’ flexibility in transitioning to a mostly virtual workspace,” said Rachel Lazarus Eriksen, director of clinical services at JFS. “Our whole community is mobilizing to get everyone the help and support they need.”

“The JEF board continues to support our mission to serve the needs of

community our Jewish community, especially in times of crisis,” said Lawrence Lehmann, JEF president. “We are pleased to allocate money from our General Fund and the Oscar and Marjorie Tolmas Memorial Donor Advised Fund for this program.”

How To Apply Applicants for financial assistance must be 25 years of age or older, have maintained a permanent residence in Orleans, Jefferson, St. Tammany or St. Bernard Parish for at least one year, be a member of the Jewish community and have exhausted all other avenues for assistance.

Funds will be available for food, shelter and medical or other basic emergencies.

Applications may be made at https://jfsneworleans.org/covid-19financial-assistance/, downloading the form and filling it out. It should then be saved as a pdf, using the file name “(last name) (first initial) Financial Assistance Application.”

Requested documents should be scanned or photographed, then saved

as “(last name) (first initial) (what the document is).” The application and documents should then be emailed to FRS@jfsneworleans.org with the subject line “(last name) (first name) Emergency Assistance Application.”

Applications may also be mailed to the JFS office at 3300 West Esplanade Avenue South, Suite 603, Metairie, LA 70002, but that will delay processing. Applications can also be requested by mail by calling (504) 831-8475 and leaving a message.

NOLA Jewish Community Launches COVID-19 Assistance Initiative For those in the Greater New Orleans Jewish community, a Jewish Community Response Volunteer Initiative is being launched to assist those in the community who have needs during the coronavirus shutdown.

The Jewish Federation of Greater New Orleans, Jewish Family Service of Greater New Orleans and the Jewish Endowment Foundation of Louisiana have partnered with a number of area synagogues to create the program “Our community knows what it means to collaborate for the good of all during times of duress, and the COVID-19 pandemic is no exception,” said Arnie Fielkow, Federation CEO. “From volunteer recruitment to centralized resources, we’re doing our best to help as many people as possible during an unprecedented time.”

The program’s goal is to provide connection during a time when the stay in place orders are in force, as well as provide practical assistance to those who need it. The hotline is not for emergency or crisis services, and should not be considered a replacement for 911 medical emergency services of the 211 mental health emergency service.

“Our community has always come together in times of need and uncertainty, and the Volunteer Initiative is just another way we’re working together to meet challenges head-on and provide needed assistance,” said Roselle Ungar, JFS executive director. “We hope anyone needing errands run or just a friendly voice on the phone will reach out through the Initiative.”

Members of a Jewish household who currently reside in Orleans, Jefferson, St. Tammany, St. Charles, Washington, Tangipahoa, St. Helena, Livingston and St. Bernard parishes can contact the Initiative. Requests will be screened by JFS, who will send it to the appropriate synagogue or organization, which will then contact a volunteer to fill the need.

Requests can be made by phone or email, and aside from Shabbat or holidays, should be answered within 48 hours.

Volunteer tasks include picking up groceries or prescriptions, being available to talk to someone who simply wants company via phone or video call, help those who have technology questions or how to set up conferencing or phone apps, or running errands with up to two stops.

After the volunteer is notified of who they are to assist, the volunteer will be responsible for reaching out within 24 hours.

For any volunteer activity that requires commerce, the person being assisted will be responsible for paying the vendor in advance, or using a form of electronic payment that both parties agree with.

On March 27, the Federation announced that because volunteer recruitment had been so successful, they are launching “a little lagniappe:

a little extra contact with members of our community” for those who “could use a lagniappe outreach call right now, just to check in and say hello.”

The helpline launched on March 25 at 9 a.m. Call (504) 780-5672 or email covidresponse@jewishnola.com. Questions about the program may also be submitted.

To volunteer, the application is available through jewishnola.com. “This is an excellent opportunity to be helpful in a helpless time,” Ungar said.

Bobby Garon, JEF executive director, said the Foundation’s board and staff “are pleased to support the community volunteer response initiative and we are grateful that Jewish Family Service and Federation have taken the lead in coordinating this program. The fact that this initiative will be administered by volunteers predominantly from our synagogues demonstrates how our community continues to come together in times of need.”

Ungar added, “We will emerge from this temporary period of strife a stronger and more connected community, even as we stay apart.”

April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

9

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With facilities and programs at the Levite Jewish Community Center closed to the public due to COVID-19 restrictions, the usually-bustling hallways are mostly quiet.

But while JCCs in Nashville and New Orleans have completely shut down, the LJCC remains open, mainly as a Red Cross certified Disaster Relief/Preparedness Facility, offering services to the general community.

Operation Cares: Camp for Essential Worker Families is providing camp-style childcare in small groups to families where the parents are essential workers, such as health care workers or first responders, as defined by the state’s mandate.

The camp runs from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. weekdays, for ages six weeks to four years, and ages 5 to 12. Registration is $50 per day, $238 per week for the younger group, $30 per day and $140 per week for the older group.

Accommodations are being made due to financial constraints families are facing.

Space is limited by the social distancing guidelines mandated by the Jefferson County Department of Health.

Operation Cares Kitchen is taking donated food items and assembling lunches that are being distributed in the parking lot to those in need on weekdays from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., with no questions asked. The program is aimed toward families that rely on the school lunch program. The lunches began on March 18 and initially were to run through March 20, but the LJCC hopes to provide the service for as long as it is needed.

The LJCC has had the partnership of the Mountain Brook schools, Taco Mama, Homewood Bagel Company, Rojo, DeVinci’s Pizza and Italian Restaurant, Johnny Brusco’s New York Style Pizza in Hoover, The Fish Market Southside, Rojo and Demitri’s BBQ in providing goods for Operation Cares Kitchen.

On April 8, the LJCC was cleared to once again accept volunteers for the food program. All volunteers must furnish their own masks, and be willing to have a temperature screening at the beginning of their shifts.

The LJCC has also been the site of Red Cross blood drives, as blood donations have dropped sharply during the restrictions.

LJCC Executive Director Samantha Dubrinsky said when the LJCC realized the effect COVID-19 would have on the community, “The first question we asked was, ‘How can we help?’ Our mission, at its core, is to make our community better. Our vision is for a better Birmingham community — one that the LJCC helps build and shape through universal values expressed Jewishly.”

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

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community

Helping the Helpers Nola JCC children’s specialist now working at facility for children of Touro Infirmary staff

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While Jewish Community Centers and their preschools are shut down during the COVID-19 pandemic, there is still a need to supervise the children of first responders and essential workers. Brigid MacArthur-Thompson, assistant camp director and children’s program manager at the New Orleans JCC, is helping fill that need.

On March 24, Touro Infirmary opened a childcare center, the Touro Kids Activity Center, for Touro doctors, nurses and staff to drop off their children between 6:15 a.m. and 8 p.m. “All of the kids are out of school, and many hospital employees need childcare in order to be able to get to work,” MacArthur-Thompson explained.

She is an activity assistant, one of several daily staff members running programs for the kids, serving meals and helping with online school work.

Touro had reached out to the JCC to see if there were staff members who could help get the program started. “Since I run mini camps during times when kids are out of school, it made sense to send me so I could bring that background to the kids’ programs at Touro,” she said.

When asked to participate, “I was happy to have an opportunity to give back to the New Orleans community, and especially our healthcare workers during this difficult time.” She was eager to help kids deal with the stress of having big changes in their daily schedules, “and also provide some semblance of a routine and consistency in their lives.”

For the safety of everyone, “we are basical-

ly quarantining ourselves when we are not at Touro working. We take the temperatures of all staff and kids before they can enter the Activity Center each day, so people with a fever are not allowed into the center because they could be carrying the virus.” They are also wearing masks and constantly using sanitizing supplies.

MacArthur-Thompson knows the service “is really making a difference” and adapting to changing needs quickly. “The staff are so, so talented and have been doing such an amazing job making sure everyone’s needs are met!”

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On April 3, parents and Early Childhood Learning Center students drove through the parking lot at Birmingham’s Levite Jewish Community Center, maintaining social distancing, to receive 150 challahs that had been made by the ECLC preschool teachers.

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

community

Jewish chaplain at UAB Hospital provides view of pandemic’s emotional toll

COVID-19 Support from CJFS

by G. Michael Horwitz I am a staff Chaplain at the University of Alabama at Birmingham Hospital, the largest medical system in the state of Alabama and the only level 1 trauma center in the state, with patients every day from over 10 different states. While my particular role is seeing cardiology and pulmonary patients on various inpatient, outpatient and 10 different ICU units, we now are very involved in the outskirts of the COVID-19 care.

I begin my work day with a chance to gather with staff on various units to share information, support one another, and pray together. Our full time, part time and chaplain residents made up of about 35 individuals — at UAB we probably have among the largest pastoral care departments in the entire country — are still working our regular shifts and want to be at work and love what we do. While many are needing, required or encouraged to stay home, I do not have that as an option and am fine with that.

I want to share a few things about the current situation for me and medical staff in general, and other chaplains and medical staff I have been in touch with around the country. Therefore, some of this is from my firsthand experience. Some of it is from serving alongside others who have shared their stories with me. But before I do, let me add that social distancing does not exist in the same way in the medical profession. We do the best we can.

I am proud to be part of the interdisciplinary team here at the hospital and the only Jewish chaplain on staff.

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Here are a few things you should know: 1. Chaplains are not allowed to see any patients face to face right now in rooms that have COVID-19 or are under investigation for it. From my understanding, this is true across the country.

We have about 100 in our hospital in that category as of now, but surely will unfortunately have more. If these patients are actively dying, we can’t be there other than to talk to family in a waiting area. We are calling patients over the phone or videoconferencing (if they can talk). We are praying in the hallways. We are encouraging exhausted and anxious staff as best we can.

I quote one chaplain who said “It feels like every tool we normally use to provide ministry has been taken away.” No outside clergy are able to visit here either, and I am not able to visit patients in other hospitals as well.

2. Every medical professional is overstressed right now. Obviously, many are on the front lines, caring directly for COVID-19 patients. Others are trying to do their normal job with lots of restrictions and just waiting for: (1) the virus to enter their domain or (2) the call to be reassigned to the front lines. Experienced doctors are pronouncing death for the first time in their careers. Outpatient nurses are suddenly reassigned to intensive care. Things are literally changing by the minute. So it’s not just the virus. It is the unending uncertainty of the situation that wears you down.

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

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community 3. COVID-19 is a horrible way to die, and people are dying daily. You are most likely alone. Perhaps you are fortunate enough to have one family member with you who is very restricted in how they can comfort you in your last moments. You can’t breathe. That is perhaps the most distressing feeling that you can experience at end of life. As of March 29, Alabama has about 11 COVID-19 deaths and none yet have been at our hospital.

But this will change, unfortunately. We and other hospitals have already closed some units to prepare for the influx of patients that is coming in the near future.

4. Yet, God is walking up and down our hallways and bringing a supernatural peace. I’ve already seen amazing things happen in the hearts and souls of my fellow health care workers. These moments can refine us and make us stronger. They can bind us together. We can find the sacred in the midst of the chaos. As a cantor, I use my voice in many different ways through singing, spoken word, silence and now new ways amidst this ever-changing situation.

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5. We are used to bringing families to the morgue (at UAB it is called “office of decedent affairs”). Sometimes in large groups. I do this often.

However, now only one person period is able to go to the morgue and the family is faced with choosing who that one person is to be. While it is true that families can do this at the funeral home, many like to do it at the hospital, especially those who want to say their final goodbyes and missed being at the hospital when their loved one died.

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6. I have been with a few families so far when a loved one has died during this time our world faces. Special arrangements are made so families can be present whenever possible or brought to a conference room or waiting room. It’s a very difficult situation for them and I feel blessed to be part of their experience offering comfort.

We have no visitors permitted in the hospital. It is a very quiet place now in the hallways for the most part. Surgical waiting rooms are empty.

Some units are closed, being remodeled or prepared for additional ICU beds as the coronavirus continues to spread.

We are preparing. We wear masks. Sometimes we need to wear the same ones more than one day at a time. Some wear them up to one week.

Many special circumstances exist now regarding that situation that I can’t even elaborate on, because it makes my head spin as every day we receive emails and updates about the changes and protocols.

7. Pastoral Care staff meet to talk and learn from one another and are very respected and appreciated at all times, but especially during this crisis. We have a list of resources, prayers, songs, etc., on our website for people to access specifically for Coronavirus, led by members of our teams of chaplains individually, including myself. Other hospitals are likely doing the same.

So I ask that you pray. I ask that you help and support in ways that you can. I ask that you empathize with those that you know personally as well as those that you don’t know who are touched by the virus. Don’t forget that many people still go to work every day as they were before this happened, and will continue to do so to help others and be encouraging.

I am sure it is very difficult in congregations of all faiths now. May Pesach be an opportunity as always, but especially in 2020, for a time for creativity and love in whatever way possible.

A favorite quote comes to my mind during this time that was on the chapel door window in my previous hospital in Virginia. “I care more about the person who has the disease then what disease the person has.”

Unfortunately, that quote is very difficult to put into action and one that I now struggle with in new ways. I think we all do.

And remember to sing even if nobody can hear you.

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

Struggling with the Shutdown Local JCCs part of national trend in dealing with financial fallout of social distancing Jewish Community Centers pride themselves in being the front porch or living room of the Jewish community. But in a time of social distancing and forced shutdowns of fitness facilities, not to mention restrictions on gatherings of more than a couple of people, the JCCs are having to adapt — and deal with major financial stresses.

“For an agency that depends on program service fees to operate, these times have become particu- Virtual training with the New larly challenging,” said Leslie Fis- Orleans JCC’s Ivan Blazquez chman, executive director of the New Orleans Jewish Community Center, which closed the Uptown and Metairie facilities on March 13 for what they originally thought would be two weeks as the coronavirus pandemic started to spread.

Now, with no end in sight for the closures, many JCCs are being forced to restructure operations, including staff.

As of March 31, the New Orleans JCC has not laid anyone off, “but the future is uncertain,” Fischman said. “Our board and senior management are having to make difficult decisions to ensure the solvency of the JCC.” On April 7, the New Orleans JCC announced that while it had been able to pay the entire staff for the first three weeks of the shutdown, the closure has made “an insurmountable financial impact to the point that we are now being forced to place many of our staff on temporary furlough. This was a painful decision as our dedicated staff works every day to bring our mission to life and each person plays a critical role in our success.”

In a message to the Birmingham community, Levite JCC Executive Director Samantha Dubrinsky and President Jesse Unkenholz said “we have invested in transitioning to virtual service, but the resources we depend on will be extremely limited. Even in the most optimistic of analysis, the closure of our building has directly and meaningfully impacted our financial position.”

The LJCC gradually closed facilities starting March 16, and within a few days all in-person functions had ceased, except Operation Cares, a camp-style program for children of medical personnel and first responders, and a program that assembles free weekday lunches for those in need.

During the first two weeks the LJCC was closed, they were able to fully pay all staff, but that is not possible moving forward.

At the end of March, the LJCC instituted furloughs and wage reductions, though full medical coverage will continue for employees. “These changes are heart-breaking and felt at every level of our organization; we know that our staff family is the lifeblood of our service to the LJCC community and we will work every moment, in every way, to bring this full staff team back together as soon as possible,” the LJCC statement said.

All payments to the Cohn Early Childhood Learning Center are going to pay teachers through April. Parents were given the option of applying the second March payment to future enrollment, or as a contribution, and enrollment charges were to cease on April 1, unless families volunteered to continue as a contribution.

While acknowledging that many families will be unable to maintain their membership during the shutdown, the JCCs urge those who can do so to keep their membership active as a way of helping ensure the

community JCCs eventually reopen as close to full strength as possible.

“Because of our continued fixed expenses, including the continued employment of our staff, we ask that those who feel financially comfortable paying their membership dues continue to do so,” Fischman said. Any dues or program fees paid during the closure will be considered a tax-deductible contribution.

In New Orleans, membership can be frozen for $10 per month, paid on the 15th of the month. Membership will automatically resume when the facilities reopen. Those canceling membership would need to pay the rejoining fee on re-enrollment. All requests, for freezing or cancellation, must be made on the JCC website by the 10th of the month to be effective on the 15th.

For the LJCC, as of April 1 one could continue membership with the idea that if the shutdown is long term it could be considered a charitable contribution. Membership can also be frozen for 25 percent of the monthly dues. Those with hardships can check with the LJCC about scholarship resources.

The LJCC is providing online fitness classes, including Les Mills workouts. There is also an at-home activities page for all ages, and Camp LJCC at-home activities and projects. The Cohn ECLC teachers are doing personal FaceTime calls and holding a Shabbat event on Facebook Live. They are doing Circle Time at 8 a.m. and story time at 4 p.m. on Facebook.

The preschool at the New Orleans JCC had already been using a secure online application for schools. “This application has been an especially helpful tool during this time of distancing, allowing each student to connect with teachers and classmates on a daily basis,” Fischman said.

“Parents receive regular activities, check-ins and projects from their child’s teachers to keep the classroom connected despite the physical distance. In addition, the entire school receives daily enrichment activities such as music lessons and movement classes from familiar faces at the JCC.” The New Orleans JCC is also offering virtual dance classes, Lego challenges, fitness classes and a discussion of the hit Israeli television series “Shtisel.”

With New Orleans’ stay-in-place order, “we don’t know exactly when we will be able to reopen our fitness center, nursery school and Alzheimer’s respite program,” Fischman said.

In Atlanta, the Marcus JCC closed on March 13, and the Atlanta Jewish Times reported that a March 23 email from CEO Jared Powers stated that more than half of the staff would be laid off or furloughed. The remaining staff will take on added roles at reduced salaries.

A decision on summer camp will not be

made until mid-May. In addition to summer day camps, the Marcus JCC runs Camp Barney Medintz, a sleepaway camp in Georgia that attracts from around the region.

Among the online programming offered by the MJCC is Shabbat evening and morning services, led by Rabbi Brian Glusman, formerly of Birmingham. He will also lead Seder both nights, via Zoom.

In Orlando, the Roth Family JCC closed on March 27, laying off over 130 employees. Re-

maining employees are taking a 20 percent pay cut.

When the Kaiserman JCC near Philadelphia closed, it laid off 176 of 178 staffers.

The UJA-Federation of New York is allocating $10 million in interest-free loans and grants to the 22 regional JCCs in New York City to help sustain them.

The JCC Association has asked Jewish foundations across the country to provide the 164 JCCs across the U.S. with $1 billion in no- or

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

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community low-interest loans to help them through the shutdown.

Another casualty is the now-cancelled JCC Maccabi Games, which had been planned for San Diego, Calif., and Pace University in Westchester, N.Y. in August. Birmingham and New Orleans typically send delegations every year.

For all the JCCs, community safety and service to the broader community are the first priority. “We remain committed to being a community despite our physical distance and look forward to safely moving past this so that we can continue to serve our members’ needs soon,” Fischman said.

“We remain confident in our ability to build the strongest possible Jewish Community Center, and aiding in our community’s resilience in the face of this pandemic,” Dubrinsky said. “We miss seeing our members more than we can put into words and we look forward to the day when we will be physically together again.”

Kol Dichfin: NOLA Jewish community launches Second Harvest fund at Passover While social distancing means Passover Seders are taking place without guests — or even without relatives not living under the same roof — there is still the part of the Seder that invites all who are hungry to come and eat.

With that in mind, the Greater New Orleans Jewish Clergy Council has launched Kol Dichfin: Come and Eat Fund for Second Harvest Food Bank.

In a letter to the community, the area’s rabbis and cantors said “the ancient Jewish custom of ma’ot chittin instructs us to support those in our community who are experiencing food insecurity, especially around Pesach when we are deeply connected with the experience of slavery,” and also with the added needs brought on by the coronavirus pandemic.

The fund will collect donations from the community, with the Jewish Endowment Foundation of Louisiana serving as the collection point. All of the funds raised will be given directly to Second Harvest at the conclusion of Passover, on April 17.

Every dollar will purchase four meals for the organization, which serves over 700 community partners and programs in 23 parishes. Also, the donation will be matched by Entergy Corporation as part of a monthlong Partner of Two matching program of up to $75,000.

To donate online, go to the JEF website, select the JEF General Fund and indicate “Second Harvest, Power of Two” in the comments. Checks may also be sent to JEF, with Second Harvest on the memo line, and mailed to 314 Audubon Blvd., New Orleans, LA 70125.

“As we weather the storm of COVID-19 together, carrying one another through the experiences of illness and isolation, we are grateful for the strength of our Jewish community and its ability to rise to meet every challenge, including this one,” the clergy stated.

Flip COVID to Kavod In response to COVID-19, Beth Israel in Metairie is promoting Kavod-19, the Hebrew term for honor and respect. With the idea that social distancing should not mean social isolation, the congregation is urging people to reach out to 19 people who are sheltered in place, and “make Kavod-19 a virus of love.”

Phone or Facetime is preferred, but texts, emails and instant messages count.

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

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Unexpected Simchas Coronavirus shutdowns lead to quick changes of plans for B’nai Mitzvah, weddings Teo Hammer’s Bar Mitzvah on Zoom

A Zoom Bar Mitzvah from the dining room Teo Hammer’s Bar Mitzvah on March 28 is going to be memorable, just not for the reasons anyone anticipated.

That morning, he and his parents, Jenni and David Hammer, were at their dining room table, doing his ceremony on Zoom, as friends and relatives from around the world watched on their computers.

The ceremony had been planned for Touro Synagogue in New Orleans, but social restrictions imposed by the COVID-19 outbreak led to the unconventional ceremony.

It was to be an historic day at Touro as well, as they believe Teo was to be the first eighth-generation Touro member to have a Bar Mitzvah in the sanctuary.

Despite the ceremony being online, “people were really very positive about the experience,” David said, and “we’re super proud of him and how the whole thing came off.”

Touro Cantor Kevin Margolius said “this was a Bar Mitzvah service unlike any of 119 that I had officiated,” but in a sense, “it was also exactly like all of the others.”

When Teo finished his Torah portion, “the chat window erupted with messages of ‘mazal tov!’,” Margolius said. “The primary screen, usually selected automatically to match the voice of the speaker, bounced excitedly from one celebratory shout to the next. It was a moment of pure joy.”

Between Zoom and Facebook Live, there were 158 different computers logged in, including viewers in Sweden, Spain, Germany and Israel.

“We really could feel we had hundreds of people there,” David said.

In a sense, David said, Teo got a “better feel for all the people who were there, by seeing them on the screen than from the bimah.”

Teo agreed. “It was really cool to see all their faces a lot clearer than they would be in the sanctuary.”

Jenni’s family is from Spain, and many family members were going to come to the U.S. for the occasion, and then a couple weeks later, they were going to travel to Spain for a second ceremony in Spanish and Hebrew.

“That had to be cancelled because Spain was one of the hotspots before the U.S.,” David said.

Then travel restrictions were imposed on arrivals from Europe, mak20

April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

ing it impossible for relatives in Spain to come to the U.S. There were also growing restrictions on public gatherings in Louisiana. “Each day there seemed to be another obstacle to doing the service,” David said, “until it was clear we weren’t going to be able to have our nuclear family in the synagogue.”

The ceremony was their main concern. “Our focus was never the party, anyway,” David said. Teo “was mostly upset that people weren’t going to be there, and he wasn’t going to be able to see their reaction and hug them.”

“I was a little sad nobody could come,” Teo said. But being at home had a distinct advantage — his dog could attend his bar mitzvah, which was special to him because the dog died not long after.

David said he had his Bar Mitzvah at Touro in 1988, and his great-grandmother, who had been confirmed at Touro’s previous building in 1903, had been there.

With that and the eight-generation legacy, “there’s a real sense of family connection” to Touro.

The Bar Mitzvah also came at a time of challenges for David, as two days earlier, he started having symptoms of COVID-19, and was diagnosed a couple of days after the ceremony. “I don’t know if it was the adrenaline or a good day, but I felt real good on Saturday for his Bar Mitzvah,” he said. The worst day was the Sunday a week later, but he never had to be hospitalized. Despite the relatively mild symptoms, it was still “the scariest illness I’ve ever faced.”

For his Bar Mitzvah project, Teo is working with the University Medical Center of New Orleans on a project that provides support that homeless patients need as they transition from inpatient care to a shelter, home or other living situation. Donations can be made through the UMCNO Spirit of Charity Foundation, www.umcno.org/foundation.

While the site is currently concentrating on an employee wellness fund, there is a “programs” drop menu to select the Homeless Consult Service, and a place to indicate contributions are in honor of Teo’s Bar Mitzvah.

Teo said he has been “amazed” at the donations that have come in so far, and is still working on putting together the bags for the project. “It’s a long-term thing,” he said.

For Yoav Yammer, a Bar Mitzvah times eight If you are under an order not to leave home, how do you celebrate a Bar Mitzvah?

For Yoav Yammer, you take it out to the porch.

Yoav formerly attended Birmingham’s N.E. Miles Jewish Day School, where his mother, Nili Yammer, was PTA president for two years. They now live in Efrat, Israel, and celebrated a very unusual Bar Mitzvah on April 4.

Israel has some of the most stringent lockdown provisions in the world, to prevent the spread of COVID-19, leading to a “refocus” of his Bar Mitzvah.

Nili said they had planned a service in the shul and a Saturday night party, but “life happened,” leading to “a completely unexpected, exciting and meaningful week.”

Rabbi Eytan Yammer, former rabbi at Birmingham’s Knesseth Israel, said they expected many relatives from the United States to attend the weekend, but as travel restrictions were imposed, one by one they dropped out. “That was one thing Yoav had to wrap his brain around,” he said.

Nili’s mother, though, insisted that she was going to be there and changed her flight to arrive in Israel much earlier, as Israel was requiring a 14-day self-quarantine for all arrivals, and she did so at an AirBnB around the block from them.

Then as more stringent requirements were imposed in Israel, it became clear that Yoav’s classmates would not be able to gather, and relatives in Israel would not be permitted to travel.

As the day neared, they thought they would be able to have a minyan in the middle of the street, with appropriate distancing and a minimum of participants, but then Rabbi Shlomo Riskin, chief rabbi of Efrat, declared that nobody should leave their homes for a minyan.

Yoav’s Hebrew birthday was on April 1, but there was no minyan he could go to and exercise his new responsibilities as a Jewish adult. Instead, they had a meal outside, with a downstairs neighbor dining at the bottom of the stairs, after which Yoav led the Birkat, which he could not have officially led before.

On April 2, his class held a Zoom Bar Mitzvah for him, and he read Torah from a scroll belonging to a neighbor. His rabbi gave a d’var Torah,

and then each of his classmates took a turn congratulating him.

Rabbi Yammer said at a typical Bar Mitzvah, “how much are you focusing, how much attention does the kid get,” the kid gets a bunch of “good job” comments after. In this case, “His whole class went around one by one to wish him well, say blessings for him, for us and everybody, it was quite special.”

That evening, they did a similar Zoom event, this time for extended family and friends in Israel. About 70 people from around the world took part, including “people from all parts of his life.”

“It felt like a real celebration,” Rabbi Yammer said, and “people threw candy at their webcams.”

Then came Shabbat morning. To have 10 people in the vicinity but not violate orders, immediate neighbors came out onto their porches. “We didn’t have a minyan with davening,” Rabbi Yammer said, “just Torah reading, Haftorah and d’var Torah” using the borrowed scroll.

But there was another issue — with nobody leaving their homes, you can’t call people up for an aliyah. Yammer consulted with a colleague, who told him that Yoav would have to take all eight aliyahs — the seven regular aliyahs and the maftir. There would be no way for Rabbi Yammer to have an aliyah, as it is traditionally forbidden for a father and son to have consecutive aliyahs.

As the Torah reading echoed in the neighborhood, “people on the next street up went to their back porches and watched,” Rabbi Yammer said.

“People kept their distance in a really respectful way.”

For many, it was the first Torah reading they had heard in a month.

They had placed “Kiddush in a bag” with cakes on the doorsteps of neighbors, so at the end of the service, Yoav led Kiddush, “we sang together, our voices filling the street in celebration and unity. Yoav really brought us together in ways we hadn’t felt in a few weeks.”

April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

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When Birmingham native Naomi Schuster and Javier Rivgin became engaged last November and told friends they were going to have their wedding on April 1, “everyone was laughing, it’s a joke, you’re not getting married on April 1,” she said.

It turns out they were right — their wedding took place on March 17, on five hours’ notice, due to the increasing COVID-19 restrictions in Israel.

Back in Birmingham, her parents, Gail and Abe Schuster, sat in their basement by the Internet router, watching the wedding on Zoom.

“It was a little bittersweet sitting in my basement with my laptop watching my daughter get married,” Abe Schuster said. They had been prepared to go to Israel for the ceremony, where about 250 guests were expected.

“In Israel, that’s a tiny wedding,” he said.

In early March, Naomi said, they had their first indication that things would not go as planned when a friend from Germany had to cancel due to travel restrictions as the virus started its spread.

After that, every day there were new restrictions. No events with 1,000 people or more. “Then 500, then it’s 100 people,” she said, and how do you go back and pare down the guest list long after the invitations have gone out? Each day there were new conversations with relatives and friends, and “each day we received new information, new cases, more safety precautions.”

At first, she was adamant about not having the wedding without her parents and siblings. Then, just her parents. But it soon became apparent that they would have to quarantine for 14 days upon arrival in Israel, and likely have to quarantine for another 14 days upon returning to Birmingham.

They considered cancelling the wedding, but the venue, photographer and everyone else had been lined up. Then the venue got shut down.

From March 1 to March 15, she said, “every day we were coming up with a new plan,” and they decided to have the ceremony at a friend’s house on March 24 at 11 a.m., at Moshav Adi near Haifa. “We’d already talked to our rabbi,” she said.

On March 17, they were supposed to attend a couples counseling session, required by the rabbinate for all couples marrying in Israel. All of the other couples cancelled, but they decided to go, and “picked up the ketubah since we were there anyway.”

That afternoon, a friend called and told her that the country will be shutting down at any moment, and it likely would be impossible to have a wedding by the following week. “You better talk to your rabbi,” the friend advised.

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the rabbi called her and said the country is going into lockdown. In Jewish tradition, one should not postpone a wedding. The rabbi said that if a couple wants to get married, they should go ahead and do so.

“I can marry you tonight at 10, be ready,” he said. He would head to northern Israel after officiating weddings in Tel Aviv.

“His goal was to marry as many people as he could,” Naomi said.

Naomi and Javier then went “into overdrive.” They contacted their friend from their triathlon group who had offered his house and asked if they could push the ceremony up a week. The rabbi was bringing a tallit for the chupah but he told them to get four bamboo poles. They wound up using four broomsticks.

They bought wine and champagne, and had to retrieve her veil from the dressmaker. Instead of the planned wedding dress, she borrowed a white dress from another friend. Because of heavy rains that day, they had rain boots.

“Luckily, we have some amazing friends,” Naomi said. “There was food, wine, a wedding cake.” Outside the house, there was a table with hand sanitizer and instructions to wash hands before entering. This was before the mandate to wear masks, and just before gatherings of 10 or more were banned.

They had a minyan, the ketubah was signed and they did the ceremony, which was streamed online. “We put together a small wedding in four or five hours,” she said. “It was cold, it was rainy, the whole thing was insane.”

When it was all over, “it didn’t even seem real… we couldn’t believe we’d actually pulled it off,” and they were happy with how everything went.

“It wasn’t how we planned, but we decided we really wanted to get married, we didn’t want to wait,” she said. “It was really important to get married, even among this pandemic.”

Afterward, they had a honeymoon in quarantine — they were glad they had not yet booked a honeymoon that they would have had to cancel.

At some point, they will have a big party in Israel, “then maybe in the States” if flights resume. The Schusters said they will plan a celebration in Birmingham “after Corona goes away.”

There were “a lot of mixed emotions” about her family not being at the ceremony. “They were happy, but they were sad they couldn’t be with us.”

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23

On April 7, just before Passover, Birmingham’s Fred Friedman, 86, went home from the hospital after being in intensive care and on a ventilator. He was diagnosed with coronavirus on March 23. The Friedman family sponsors numerous events in the Jewish community, including the annual Jewish Culture and Food Festival, and the building that houses Knesseth Israel is the Friedman Center for Jewish Life.

New Orleans attorney Morris Bart tested positive for coronavirus on April 7, after what he originally thought were seasonal allergies would not go away. He has been recuperating at home with “relatively mild” symptoms and led the family Seder on Zoom.

The first virtual Shabbat service from Pensacola’s Temple Beth El attracted 40 participants, including a former member now in Japan.

B’nai Israel in Baton Rouge had to cancel in-person interviews with rabbinical candidates. The interview process is proceeding virtually. Rabbi Jordan Goldson is leaving the congregation this summer.

Rabbi Steven Silberman of Ahavas Chesed in Mobile said that “for nearly six decades of my life I have not used the phone on Shabbas and Yomtov. This withdrawal from phone use has been a source of spiritual growth and empowerment for me,” but the coronavirus has changed that. He now uses his phone to remotely lead Shabbat services for the congregation, “for leading prayers and for the sacred goal of establishing spiritual connections with you.”

The 24th annual Krewe du Jieux Seder, held virtually this year on April 9, was dedicated to the 2000 Big Macher, Ronald Lewis, who died from coronavirus on March 18. A preservationist of local African-American culture, Lewis founded the Big Nine Social Aid and Pleasure Club and the House of Dance and Feathers Museum. He was a founding member and mentor to the Jieux, hosting a Seder and placing a mezuzah on his home.

Chabad of Louisiana was contacted by a lieutenant colonel who is chief of staff at the coronavirus field hospital being set up in Belle Chasse, to see if Passover supplies were available.

Rabbi Yossie Nemes said they delivered him “a box with shmurah matzah, regular matzoh, gefilte fish, and other Passover stuff, with a note of thanks” on behalf of the community.

The premiere of the documentary “Unexpected Modernism: The Architecture of The Wiener Brothers” in Shreveport was postponed from April 2. The new date is currently June 29 at The Strand Theater. Tickets are $20 and $30, with a red carpet event at 6 p.m. and the film at 7 p.m.

For 22 years, Birmingham’s Temple Emanu-El has been on the rotation of host congregations for Family Promise, housing entire families that are homeless, as most shelters are just for men or women. The host congregations provide a place to stay overnight, for a week at a time. Temple Beth-El assists with Emanu-El’s efforts in the project. Now, following the example of other participating congregations, they are not hosting a family during the current rotation due to the coronavirus restrictions, but are hosting the family in a local extended-stay hotel, raising funds from members of the two congregations to pay for it. Volunteers are also being recruited to provide meals during the week.

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

community

Subject to change How do you plan a simcha when the guidelines keep shifting?

On April 18, Hannah Thornton will be called to the Torah as a Bat Mitzvah at Birmingham’s Temple Beth-El. But instead of a room filled with friends and relatives, the sanctuary will be mostly empty due to COVID-19, with everyone else watching the ceremony at home on BethEl’s Livestream.

Shortly after the invitations went out, her parents, Tim and Jenifer Schniper Thornton, realized that the long-scheduled plans would likely be altered. “By March 13, we decided we would have to change everything,” Jenifer said.

Over the next few days, they decided that the evening party would move to Sept. 12, and gave Hannah the option of having the service on April 18 or moving it as well. Between having to learn a whole new Haftorah and Torah reading, as well as starting eighth grade after five months out of school, she decided to stick with the original date.

“Moving everything has been incredibly stressful for all of us,” Jenifer said. Because no more than a minyan can be in attendance in person, “we have had to have hard conversations with our families about who can attend and who cannot.”

Only her immediate family will be on the bimah with Hannah. Her maternal grandfather will be “20 feet away” instead of on the bimah presenting her with her tallit, as he did for her mother 31 years ago.

The Thorntons said they are grateful to Rabbi Stephen Slater and Sarah Metzger for working with them to make the event happen. “They have encouraged us to move forward despite all of the craziness in the world right now.”

Though it will be in a mostly empty room, on April 18 Hannah “will read from the Torah and walk off of the bimah wearing her tallis and knowing that her parents are even more proud of her for accomplishing all that she’s accomplished and doing it in the midst of this global pandemic,” Jenifer said.

The Beth-El livestream is at templebeth-el.net. The service begins at 9:30 a.m.

That afternoon at 5, they are also planning a car parade in front of their house, for friends to drive by and throw candy. Car parades have become a social distancing alternative to birthday parties and other gatherings.

In Jackson, Morgan Pollack, daughter of Robyn and Greg Pollack, will have her Bat Mitzvah on April 18 at Beth Israel, broadcast on the congregation’s Facebook page starting at 9 a.m.

On March 28, Matthew Harris had his Bar Mitzvah on the Beth Israel livestream, then was surprised afterward by a Zoom meeting of friends and relatives.

Time for a wedding?

When a clergy member has a wedding, it is a community celebration.

But when the community isn’t allowed to show up…

As Victoria May, cantorial soloist at Metairie’s Gates of Prayer, prepares to retire this summer after 33 years with the congregation, she and Jeff Lust decided “it was time” for them to get married.

Originally, they planned a ceremony for April 17, the weekend of the French Quarter Festival. They would have a ceremony late in the afternoon on Friday with a French Quarter theme. After the ceremony, which would conclude before Shabbat, they would have the Shabbat evening service as Shabbat Unplugged, with a small band and “not your typical Shabbat music,” followed by a reception.

community They had a group of friends organizing the reception, and they had been making their own corned beef and freezing it in preparation.

Naturally, the community shutdown has thrown all of that into chaos.

Unsure whether the original date would still be valid, they went ahead and found a ketubah they liked and ordered it. “We didn’t want to risk a wedding with no ketubah,” she said. “They sent the proof right when this started happening.”

They considered having a civil ceremony that day and sign the ketubah — but with many services shut down, “who knows if we could get a license from the parish.” The license has to be issued between one to four weeks before the ceremony.

If they were able to obtain the license, they were floating several ideas, from Facetiming the ceremony, even having a drive-by wedding where the officiant is in a car while they are at least six feet away.

Now, there is a tentative plan to do the ceremony before services on June 12. “That’s a big if,” she said.

What about all the corned beef? Noting how many congregations in the region have corned beef sandwich fundraisers, especially in March, May quipped “we might have our own corned beef sandwich sale.”

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Last Simchas The last in-person service at Gates of Prayer in Metairie was the Bar Mitzvah of Max Pollock, son of Keri and Mark Pollock, on March 14.

On the same day at Temple Sinai, Eden Rung, daughter of Ariane and Kevin Rung, had her Bat Mitzvah, a couple of days before the building was closed.

Though most restrictions had not been put in place yet, both congregations encouraged viewing of the service on livestream, said anyone who had any symptoms or a compromised immune system should stay home, and those in attendance should keep their distance and keep their hands to themselves.

On March 21, Birmingham’s Knesseth Israel held what the leadership decided would be its last in-person event, the Bar Mitzvah of JJ Stein, son of Leslie Kahn and Martin Stein.

As an Orthodox congregation, the service was not livestreamed online. It was held outdoors, in an unenclosed area. A Mountain Brook police officer was on hand to ensure that public health guidelines were being met, with appropriate distancing and a plethora of hand sanitizer available. Only a minyan was allowed to be present; when anyone else showed up, others would leave.

April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

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While religious leaders have turned to the latest technology to provide spiritual leadership and guidance during the weeks of self-isolation, Rabbi Lexi Erdheim from Gates of Prayer in Metairie used older technology during the early days of Passover — a 1943 vintage World War II aircraft.

On April 10, Erdheim and the Archbishop of New Orleans, Gregory Aymond, undertook the first “Spirit Flights,” organized by the Big Easy Wing of the Commemorative Air Force, a group that preserves and maintains World War II Warbirds.

The flights were made in a 1943 Boeing PT-17 Stearman biplane, and zig-zagged over the metropolitan area from Kenner to St. Bernard Parish, including both sides of the river. The 30-minute flights departed from Lakefront Airport, and were at an altitude of about 1,000 feet.

“Since the beginning of time, people of faith have always looked to the sky for help, inspiration, and guidance,” Erdheim said. On April 10, “when people looked to the sky, they saw a rabbi and a priest flying over the city in a World War II airplane reminiscent of a Snoopy cartoon.”

Rather than that being the setup for a joke, she said “this was a very real representation of our community and what gets us through tough times.”

“We came up with the idea for the Spirit Flight because this is such an important spiritual week for the world, and for a city and people who have gone through so much, we thought it was something that may bring some joy to people who really need it,” said Big Easy Wing Leader David Capo. “We have asked a few other religious and community leaders to participate in Spirit Flight, and will likely be doing more in the future.”

Aymond said, “It is a privilege to fly over our city, and as a sign of our faith in Almighty God to ask for His blessing and protection. And we continue to ask for prayers for our health care workers, our leaders, those who are sick, and those who have died.”

Erdheim said, “We are a community that is blessed with a diversity of beliefs, cultures, backgrounds, and religions. No matter how different we may all be, we in New Orleans know that when our backs are against the wall, we are strongest when we are together.”

Aymond’s flight was at 10 a.m. on Good Friday. The 70-year-old archbishop announced he had tested positive for COVID-19 on March 23, and has recovered in the weeks since. During his flight, he prayed for protection and healing, and sprinkled holy water from the Jordan River in Israel. He quickly discovered that sprinkling water from an airplane can be a bit challenging.

Numerous precautions were taken. The airport limited the number of

Rabbi Lexi Erdheim on the April 10 Spirit Flight 26

April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

community people allowed on the ramp to just the essential aircrew and the participating clergy. The launch and recovery of the Spirit Flights were closed to all spectators, including media and the general public. After the plane was thoroughly disinfected, Erdheim took off at noon. During her flight, the 29-year-old rabbi did the mishebeirach, “to offer healing first and foremost for those who are ill, but also for our entire city which is in need of shleimut — of wholeness and peace,” she said.

Capo said this was an opportunity, on Good Friday and the second day of Passover, for homebound New Orleanians to get a blessing from the air. The group plans to announce additional flights on social media.

“After having spent weeks with the four walls of my own home as my only view, it was powerful to see the entirety of this amazing city from 1,000 feet in the air,” Erdheim said. “It was a reminder that New Orleans will emerge from this crisis just as resilient, diverse and vibrant as it has ever been.”

Montgomery-area Federation launches relief fund

In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Jewish Federation of Central Alabama in Montgomery has launched a COVID-19 Relief Fund “to support our community’s most at-risk members.” The fund will “enable our community to provide the maximum amount of assistance at a time when the needs are greater than ever.” All of the contributions “will directly support individuals and families impacted by the pandemic, and/or programs providing critical community services to the most vulnerable and at risk in our Jewish community and Jews throughout the world.”

Contributions can be made at jewishmontgomery.org, and one may also sign up to help deliver food and other necessities to those in need.

What to do with the corned beef…

What do you do when there is a corned beef sale fundraiser scheduled, but the world is shutting down due to coronavirus restrictions? For Beth Shalom’s Sisterhood in Baton Rouge, you rework the event at the last minute.

The 36th annual Corned Beef Sandwich Sale was scheduled for March 15 to 17, but with everything closing, a decision was made that rather than cancel the event or go on with the usual format of individual lunches, they would sell alternative do-it-yourself corned beef sandwich kits, with original, unopened sealed packages of corned beef, bread, chips and so forth. The kits would make five or 10 lunches and were sold in a shorter time-frame.

The kits did sell out, costs were covered and a small donation was able to be made to the congregation’s general fund.

April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

Michael Saag, world renowned AIDS researcher and expert on infectious diseases at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, and a member of Birmingham’s Jewish community, has regularly be answering questions about COVID-19 for readers of al.com. Little did he expect that he would soon be speaking not only as an expert researcher, but from personal experience.

In an announcement to the UAB community, University President Ray Watts said Saag had tested positive for the virus, and “wishes to make his case known as an example of the COVID-19 reality and the importance of practicing aggressive social distancing.”

A Tulane graduate, Saag founded the 1917 Clinic at UAB, providing comprehensive care to those with HIV and AIDS, working on cutting-edge treatments and publishing over 260 articles.

After coming down with symptoms on March 14 and testing positive on March 16, Saag had a two-week stretch that “kicked my butt,” but he did not have to be hospitalized. By the end of March, he was symptom-free.

He spoke on March 25 to a virtual meeting of the Birmingham Rotary and Rotaract Clubs, and wrote about his experiences in an April 6 op-ed for the Washington Post.

Saag was at a meeting in Boston in early March, then visited family in New York City and drove home from New York with his son, Harry, after his flight was cancelled, arriving in Birmingham on March 13. About half-way back, Harry started feeling ill, so when they got to Birmingham they both quarantined. Harry’s symptoms lasted three to five days, but it took two weeks for his father to feel “close to normal again.”

Because he has been answering COVID-19 questions for area readers, Saag said it is “ironic” that he was diagnosed with it. He had written one of his columns while on the train from Boston to New York.

He said it is unclear where he picked up the virus, “but that is the point. It is everywhere.

And we can’t be too careful.” Because it is a new virus that the human immune system does not have any experience with, “it is much more infectious than the average flu.”

Another difference from the flu is that the flu

Michael Saag addresses the Birmingham Rotary and Rotaract Clubs by remote hits all at once and those with it feel miserable immediately. COVID-19 starts slowly, then ramps up.

Saag said he was “doing all the things we were told to do, wash my hands, not touch my face and wiping down surfaces. Despite all that, I still got infected, so this is where the shelter at home policy comes from.”

He initially had mild symptoms, with cough, headaches and malaise. After a few days he had a fever of 101, “could not get comfortable, could not sleep well.”

At that point, “the scary part is that you never quite know if that feeling horrible is going to go into the stage of respiratory distress,” requiring hospitalization. Also, “we can’t predict who is going to get in trouble with it and who is not.”

Some people are admitted to the hospital and “then deteriorate quickly… it’s harrowing.”

He added, “If I had underlying conditions, I could well be in the hospital.”

The danger of the virus is that “it’s new, it’s rampant and it is much more infectious. We don’t know the natural history once someone gets it, and we don’t have any medicines for it yet.”

Having experienced it first-hand, he said “no one wants to get this. I don’t care your age, your underlying health condition. This is a bear, it does not want to let go.”

He stressed the need for everyone to stay home. “We have to do what we can do to prevent it from transmitting from person to person,” because the outbreak is a reminder that medicine has its limits.

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community

Birmingham Jewish Federation launches emergency campaign for COVID-19 response In response to community needs in the wake of the COVID-19 situation, the Birmingham Jewish Federation has launched an Emergency Response Fund The local Jewish agencies and synagogues are collaborating to identify immediate and shortterm needs in the Jewish and general communities, including “emergency financial support for housing and utilities, medicine, food assistance and delivery, and social work and counseling services.”

The campaign is to support local agencies, Israel and the greater community. This campaign is in addition to the Federation’s annual campaign, and 100 percent of the funds raised will go directly to support those affected by the pandemic, and programs providing critical community services.

Donors may select specific local Jewish agencies, the Israel World Jewry Bureau for the fight against COVID-19 in Israel, the United Way Community Crisis Fund or unrestricted funds that can go to what the Federation determines to be the greatest need.

Collat Jewish Family Services is providing mental health and wellness counseling, as well as assistance in meeting basic needs of vulnerable populations. Individuals of all faiths and financial abilities are assisted.

The Levite Jewish Community Center is a certified Red cross disaster relief and preparedness facility. Though currently closed to the general public, the LJCC is serving lunches to families that normally rely on the school lunch program, and is providing childcare and campstyle activities for children of essential workers and first responders. The facility is also holding blood drives as donations have dropped sharply, and provides a wide range of virtual programming for adults and children.

The N.E. Miles Jewish Day School has transformed to alternate instruction online for the rest of the school year, and is anticipating financial obstacles among student families.

Donations can be made online at bjf.org/ covid-19, or mailed to the Federation office.

Those with funds at the Birmingham Jewish Foundation can also recommend a gift.

Rabbi Bob Loewy of Metairie sports a Passover mask, made by Marilyn Kline, who had been using this material to make napkins for their family Seder. Loewy said she is making masks from lots of different material, all colorful, at no cost, just for people to donate to appropriate causes.

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

With the stresses of isolation and economic issues, it is a busy time for Jewish Family Services.

In New Orleans and Birmingham, the agencies are working to maintain services as safely as possible, with most services being done remotely and face-to-face appointments suspended.

In New Orleans, JFS has a COVID-19 resource page, a central platform of reputable sources of information, mental health advice, suggestions for how to spend time, ways to help out, and much more. It is at jfsneworleans.org/covid19.

The agency is also part of the New Orleans Jewish Community COVID-19 Response Initiative (see page 9) and the Emergency Financial Assistance Program (see page 8).

Virtual Gatherings, led by mental health professionals, are being held on Thursdays at 3 p.m. (except April 9 and 16, due to Passover). Spots are limited, so pre-registration is needed for the Zoom meetings.

Private telehealth counseling is available by calling (504) 831-8475 ex. 137 and leaving a message with name and phone number. An intake counselor will call back.

Birmingam’s Collat Jewish Family Services is offering free supportive counseling by phone, to help manage stress and anxiety. For needs such as food and medication, there is an Assistance for Older Adults and Vulnerable Populations initiative. Regular wellness checkins and critical needs assessments are ongoing with current clients.

The CJFS website, cjfsbham.org, has articles on managing emotions, maintaining relationships during social distancing, and “pandemic parenting.”

With the CARES program for those with memory or movement disorders currently suspended, CARES Assistant Program Director Elise Lapidus Grace and local singer/actor Greg Womble are doing sing-a-longs on the CJFS Facebook page, performing favorites from years past. The songbook can be downloaded and printed.

Mobile’s Jewish Family Services is also available for help, through “phone calls, online assessment counseling, and other forms of outreach,” said President Patricia Silverman. A case manager, she can be reached at (251) 610-9188, or contact Rabbi Steven Silberman or Rabbi Yossi Goldwasser. Volunteers are also encouraged.

Jackson Bazaar cancelled, but those in need will benefit After initially postponing the annual Beth Israel Bazaar in Jackson, the congregation announced that on April 10, the decision was made to cancel it for this year. “We are very disappointed and saddened that we are unable to hold this event for our members and the entire community,” said Beth Israel President Greg Pollack. “However, we know it’s the right decision based on the information we have today.”

The Katz family and the Crystal Family Fund purchased the hot food that was prepared for the Bazaar and donated it to the Jackson Stewpot for families in need. Options are being explored for a fundraiser to sell remaining frozen items that were prepared for the Bazaar’s take-out table.

The 53rd annual Bazaar had been scheduled for March 25. “We look forward to bringing back the Beth Israel Temple Bazaar in 2021, with a re-imagined event that will bring all of us closer together,” Pollack said.

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community Coronavirus’ Local Toll Etz Chayim in Huntsville announced the death of Gonzalo Cerezo Barredo, father of former member Fernando Cerezo. Barredo was 94 and passed away peacefully on March 19 in the Hospital de La Princesa in Madrid, Spain.

He was a prominent politician, reporter, and writer. He and his wife Esquela, who pre-deceased him in 2012, had 10 children, 20 grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren. Memorials can be made to Etz Chayim.

Samuel Theodore Alcus, III, of New Orleans passed away on March 16, at Touro Infirmary. Born at Touro in 1935, Ted Alcus graduated from Isidore Newman High School in 1953 and attended Colgate University in New York for his freshman year of college. He then returned to finish his undergraduate studies at Tulane University, where he graduated in 1957 with a BA in history. He served two years in the U.S. Army before launching his career as a securities trader with Goldman, Sachs and Company in New York. He then returned to New Orleans for good, joining his father in the private investment firm, S.T. Alcus & Co. He went on to establish a career in numerous successful entrepreneurial ventures in finance, insurance and finally oil and gas.

He was the son of S.T. Alcus Jr. (New Orleans) and Frances Fies Alcus (Birmingham). Ted and his sister Nancy Alcus Marshall, who sadly predeceased him in 1959, led an active and idyllic adolescence in Uptown New Orleans. In his Newman years, Ted pursued his interests in sports, drama, chorus and particularly enjoyed rebuilding sports cars as a hobby.

While working in New York, he met Alice Faye Harris of Los Angeles.

The young couple were soon married and happily moved back to New Orleans. The Alcuses settled in Old Metairie where they started a family.

Gregory Philip Alcus in 1961 (currently of Los Angeles, Calif.) and Henry Darren Alcus in 1963 (currently of Potomac, Md., and married to Mary Patrice Alcus), both were born in the same Touro hospital as their father.

In 1969 Ted married Gwendolyn Fletcher of Tallahassee, and lived in Metairie. Ted’s third son, Paul Stuart Alcus joined the family in 1971 (currently of El Segundo, Calif., and married to Maria Porta Alcus) and became the final member of Ted’s sailing crew.

He was an original 1967 Saints Season Ticket holder from their inaugural campaign at Tulane Stadium until today. Ted was a second-generation Tulane Sports Booster. He and his three boys rarely missed a Tulane home game. An enthusiastic outdoorsman, he greatly enjoyed all varieties of water sports and recreation. Fishing with his sons and numerous good friends and acquaintances, Ted helped fill many an ice chest as well as a couple of trophy cases.

Ted was both socially and civically active. He participated in several formal and informal associations, clubs and organizations. He helped guide Isidore Newman School as a board member and parent from the 1960s to the 90s and enthusiastically attended virtually every sporting event and performance of his three boys. He continued to attend Newman sporting events through this past football season.

He was an original member of Pete Fountain’s Mardi Gras “Half-Fast Marching Club” in the 1960’s. Since 1975 Ted was an active member of The Moosehead Lake Yacht Club (Maine), where he regularly spent his summers. In 1980 Ted joined his most beloved Mardi Gras Krewe and rode in its Friday night parade for 40 years. His last ride was incredibly this year. He also reigned as King of two other Carnival Krewes over the years.

Recently, Ted rekindled his boyhood love for singing as a member of the Lambeth House Choir and enjoyed the camaraderie of the uptown Roundtable Club. For decades, he enjoyed the weekly lunch company of the very informal Friday lunch group at Pascal Manale’s and attending the Symphony and Tulane Lyric Theatre. And, he never missed a home Saints game.

Ted was married for a final time in 2008 to Joy Ann Cuoco Rodick of New Orleans. They remained married until her untimely passing in 2015. In their years together, they enjoyed world travel, socializing, Mardi

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Gras and their ever-broadening coterie of friends. They weathered Katrina together in Maryland and returned to make their life and home near Bayou St. John. In 2017, Ted moved to Lambeth House, where he enjoyed spending time with so many close friends and acquaintances.

The family held a private graveside burial on March 18, officiated by Temple Sinai Rabbi Emeritus Ed Paul Cohn. A memorial service to celebrate his life will be held this Fall. Remembrances in his name may be made to the Isidore Newman School.

Ronald Jay Rich, 65, born and raised in Birmingham, passed away on March 28, due to complications of Covid-19. He was predeceased by his parents, Marvin “Brother” Rich and Joyce Rich Benjamin. He is survived by his children, Becky (Jared) Glass, Marc Rich, Heather Rich, and Evan Rich; and their mother Rhonda Rich; and his sister Bobbye (Michael) Seligman and brother Charles Rich.

Ronnie was a talented musician who played many instruments. He attended Mountain Brook High School and graduated from The University of Alabama, where he was a member of the Million Dollar Band. He then took his passion for music to enrich the lives of young musicians at Hanceville High School and Grissom High School as their band director. Ronnie later became a successful mortgage banker in Birmingham. His final days were spent in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., surrounded by a large group of close friends.

Ronnie’s greatest accomplishment was his children. He was very proud of them and bragged about them whenever he could. He had a good sense of humor even though he was serious a lot of the time but was not afraid to laugh at himself and make jokes whenever he felt the mood needed to be lightened. He had a big heart and cared for his friends and family. His advice was second to none and he always ended up being right.

He was a supportive and loving person and he will be greatly missed.

The family has designated CurePSP or the Birmingham Jewish Federation for memorial contributions.

Dr. Jack Steckler Zoller died April 2 in New Orleans, surrounded by his family, in person and virtually. He went peacefully at the age of 91 due to complications from Covid-19. A graduate of Fortier High School and Tulane University, Zoller received his medical degree from Louisiana State University School of Medicine. He practiced obstetrics and gynecology for over 35 years and delivered thousands of babies. He often recalled the names of patients during a chance encounter and could be overheard saying, “Yeah, I think I delivered your sister’s kids.”

Zoller was married to Linda Malkin Zoller of Memphis, from 1962 until her passing in 1995.

Family, friends and admirers knew him as “Poppa Jack.” He treated everyone with dignity and respect. Wherever he went, he had a smile on his face, always offering a kind word or gesture. Jack made everyone feel as though he was their best friend. Though he was never the loudest voice in the room, people were always drawn to listen to Jack. He was a natural emcee and expert joke teller. He was an avid skier, and a longtime, parttime local for over 40 years at his second home in Telluride, Col. He was a doctor who could cook, enjoyed fly fishing, jeeping, and crossword puzzles. At any rate, he was quick-witted, loving and fair.

He was active on the boards and leadership of many organizations, including West Jefferson Hospital and the Jewish Federation of Greater New Orleans.

Zoller is survived by his four children, David (Sissy) Zoller of Dallas, Tex.; Gary (Lisa) Zoller of New Orleans; Glenn (Cindy) Zoller of Los Angeles; and Diana (Jason) Perkins of Tel Aviv, Israel; his eight grandchildren Benji, Lilly, Sammy, Zelda, Cameron, Sylvie, Liza and Lia, his partner Helen Wisdom, and countless life-long friends and extended family.

Donations to the “Linda Malkin Zoller Designated Fund at the Jewish Endowment Foundation of Louisiana” in his memory are welcome.

A celebration of Jack’s life will be held at a later date. Online condolences may be left on his Facebook page.

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

community

Who is Open?

Southern Jewish Life advertisers adapt For links and menus, go to sjlmag.com and click on the advertiser banner.

Birmingham area: Homewood Bagel: Offers pickup and curbside, doing free delivery in Homewood on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 9:30 a.m. to noon, and everywhere via UberEats. Four-item Pastry Boxes are also being offered for $13.50, with bagels, croissants and cinnamon rolls (maximum two cinnamon rolls in a box). Lunch combos and DIY pizza-making kits available. Offering cereal breakfasts and PBJ lunches to kids who depend on school for their meals, no questions asked. Food donations toward that effort are appreciated. Post-Passover bagel trays available April 16 and 17.

Bobby Carl’s Table: Family menu for takeout and curbside. Order online for pickup between 3 and 7 p.m. Menu is for two, four or more.

Bright Star: Open for curbside pick-up orders, call to order. Sixpacks of beer also available, along with half-price bottles of wine. Online ordering debuted on April 4.

Taj India: Instead of the popular lunch buffet, they are offering a Thali platter for $8.99, to go, for delivery or curbside. Dinner menu available for pickup from 5 to 8 p.m.

Classic Wine Company in Homewood: Offers FaceTime ordering through a virtual tour of the store, pay by credit card via FaceTime and then drive up to receive your order. Virtual Wine Tasting events held regularly.

Nabeels: Curbside pickup and third-party delivery, with full menu and new family dinner option for 6 to 8 people. The market remains open and fully stocked. Beer and wine available curbside, along with takeout DIY cocktails such as the John Daly (vodka/sweet tea/lemonade), Gimlet (Gin/simple syrup/lime) and Bee’s Knees (Gin/honey/ lemon) for $6 ea. Takeout orders include a 10 percent off coupon for dine-in when the dining room is able to reopen.

Makarios: Carryout and delivery available. They will endeavor to keep normal hours. Phone in orders for pickup.

Fish Market: Full menu available for pickup, curbside service and delivery. New family-style meals of Greek chicken or Athenian snapper available. New grab-and-go items added, the fresh seafood market remains open, and the regular grocery items are still available.

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Pies and Pints Birmingham and Montgomery: Curb-side and delivery available. Hours adjusted to noon to 8 p.m.

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Watkins Branch Bourbon and Brasserie on Culver Road in Mountain Brook is open for curbside service, 10 a.m. to 7 p.m., Tuesday through Sunday. In addition to the entrees, there are three family-style options available on their Facebook page.

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Niki’s West on Finley started curbside lunch with a limited menu from 10:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. on April 6. Orders can be placed by phone or curbside, the day’s options will be posted on their Facebook page.

Eli’s Jerusalem Grill is doing family-style dinners, with six combinations available, from $37.50 to $49.50, serving four to six people.

Barkan Israeli wine is also available for $25 a bottle. Regular menu also available for curbside, 10:30 a.m. to 8 p.m. Mon.-Sat., 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.

Sundays. Highway 280 location only, the Pizitz Food Hall location is currently closed.

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

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community New Orleans area: Tartine: Family-style heat-and-serve dinners for five, for $40. Menu changes daily, check website to order. Pickup at Tartine or Toast Gentilly between 1 and 2 p.m., or for delivery 1 to 3 p.m. in New Orleans or Metairie, or 3 to 5 p.m. in Algiers Point. Wine also available from Toast Gentilly.

Kosher Cajun: For dining, open for pickup orders only, they will bring items to the car. On Friday, they offer sushi and fried chicken in addition to the regular menu. Grocery is open and stocked with Passover goods. Hours shortened to 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sun-Thu, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Friday.

Saba: Closed its takeout until further notice. Saba pita and hummus available at Rouse’s downtown, including lunch and Mondays.

Acropolis: Offering no-contact curbside service, to-go orders or free delivery in a five-mile radius of the Metairie location, Monday to Saturday. Uptown location temporarily closed.

Galatoire’s: Offering a daily family-style to-go meal. Orders can be called in between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m., by 11:30 a.m. for same-day lunch and 2 p.m. for same day dinner, and pickup times can be scheduled from noon to 2 p.m. and 4 to 7 p.m. Some items will also be available at Rouse’s on Veterans-Causeway, Tchoupitoulas and Carrollton.

English Tea Room, Covington: Offers curbside and delivery in a five-mile radius from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Ships 225 different teas across the country through online ordering.

Avenue Pub: Making family meals for New Orleans EMS. Dorignac’s is open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. daily, and announced it will have dedicated hours for seniors, Mondays and Thursdays from 6:30 to 7:30 a.m., before the store is opened to all shoppers.

Retail: Four Seasons Gallery: Shop online, holding daily virtual Shop With Us features.

M&M Jewelers: April Quarantine Sale held online, limited in-store appointments Mon-Fri, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Vineyard Vines: Stores closed, shop online.

Applause Dance Wear: Showroom closed, but taking orders for curbside and online.

Mon Ami: Shop via FaceTime, free local delivery. Items also available online. Partnered with Johnnie-O for a 25 percent sitewide discount, and half of the sale will go to Mon Ami. See page 53 for code.

Chateau Drugs, Metairie: Open.

Nola Gifts and Decor: Online ordering, curbside pickup 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Mon.-Sat., or delivery. Burlap flag kits, “Quarantine Art” kits, fabric masks available.

Currently Closed Until Further Notice: Riccobono’s Peppermill: Closed temporarily Casablanca Fury’s: Bistro V: Announced on April 2 that it is taking April off and regrouping to better serve everyone when the restrictions end.

Apolline Rimon at Tulane Hillel Fisher and Sons Jewelers: Storefront closed, delivering customers’ finished work.

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

Part of the graffiti at Etz Chayim

As Passover begins, Huntsville’s Etz Chayim, Chabad vandalized Two days in a row, volunteers from area churches help clean up the graffiti while social distancing With a second antisemitic attack on area Jewish institutions in less than 36 hours, Huntsville authorities are vowing to find and prosecute whoever is responsible — but would prefer that the perpetrator go ahead and turn himself in.

As Jews around the world were at home celebrating the start of Passover, Etz Chayim, the Conservative congregation in Huntsville, was vandalized with several swastikas, racial slurs and “Holohoax.” The graffiti was on the building and driveway, and the sign facing Bailey Cove Road was tagged with a swastika and “Satan.”

Among the other phrases were “F--- Kikes,” “Gas Em All,” “White Power,” “Jew Scum” and the lightning-bolt “SS.” The attack happened during the night going from April 8 to 9.

One day later, the Chabad center in Huntsville was hit in a similar antisemitic attack, early in the morning on April 10, with many messages identical to the ones at Etz Chayim. Additional phrases referenced Moloch, a Canaanite deity associated with child sacrifice, and Rempha, a “Synagogue of Satan” reference. It is estimated that the vandalism took place around 1 a.m.

“Thank G-d for no harm to any persons,” said Rabbi Moshe Cohen, referring to both attacks. In his case, “We were seated inside, celebrating our Passover Seder that marks the birth of the Jewish people, without a clue that just outside our window this individual did what he did.”

The Chabad center is also his family’s personal residence.

“One minute before this person began his destructive, hate-filled actions, we opened the door with a prayer that the whole world come together in peace and brotherhood,” Cohen said. “We know which message will win out.”

In a press conference held outside Chabad later in the morning of the attack, Huntsville Police Chief Mark McMurray said numerous specialists, including video forensics specialists and cell phone specialists, are already working to track down the vandals. The Federal Bureau of Investigation is also working on the case.

“We do have a bunch of evidence collected already,” McMurray said.

That afternoon, the department released photos from surveillance footage at Chabad, but the vandal was hooded.

Security footage at Etz Chayim was hampered by rain, and one of the vandals apparently shined a flashlight into the camera to neutralize it.

Etz Chayim lay leader Bill Goldberg said the perpetrators seems to have planned it out, as it seemed they knew where the cameras were located.

April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

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community He said it is hard to tell if it was an organizational effort, or just the work of one or two lone individuals.

Huntsville Mayor Tommy Battle said “We’re going to do everything in our power to bring someone to justice.”

Addressing the vandals, McMurray said “we’re asking for you to go ahead and turn yourself in.” If not, there is a reward through Crimestoppers, where one can leave an anonymous tip. If the tip leads to an arrest and conviction, the tipster, who remains anonymous, can collect a reward. Currently, McMurray said, about $2,000 has been contributed toward the reward, and “people are donating to Crimestoppers just for this purpose.” The Anti-Defamation League’s regional office in Atlanta is offering an additional reward.

The Crimestoppers number is (256) 53-CRIME. The multi-agency crime center will continue to go through the evidence, McMurray said, and “we hope to have a capture pretty quickly.”

Battle visited Chabad to “tell At Huntsville Chabad them our deep heartfelt sorrow that this would happen anywhere in the world, and most importantly, it happened in Huntsville.”

Calling the attacks “senseless, thoughtless and stupid,” Battle added, “We do not condone this. We are not that community,” and Huntsville is going to “make sure we protect our community and stand with them.” He had also issued a statement within hours of the Etz Chayim vandalism.

Goldberg said someone driving by Etz Chayim initially saw the graffiti early on April 9, called the synagogue and got the emergency contact number, so he and the Rosenthals immediately went over there.

“The police precinct is one block away from the synagogue,” Goldberg said, so they were on scene instantly.

Pastors Patrick and Andrea Penn said they were driving by Etz Chayim around 8:15 a.m. when they saw the police cars in the parking lot. Their church, The Dwelling Place, which has hosted Israel solidarity events with the Jewish community, issued a statement saying they “condemn this horrendous act of hatred in our community. We are offering up prayers on your behalf. We love you and are standing with you.”

Patrick Penn said “It is simply unimaginable that such a manifestation of evil would be perpetrated any time, anywhere, but the fact that continued on page 38

Huntsville Police Chief Mark McMurray speaks outside Chabad of Huntsville the morning of the vandalism at that location 36

April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

Add Light campaign launched for security needs, program support Chabad of Huntsville has launched an online campaign to “ensure higher measures of security for Chabad and the Etz Chayim Synagogue. As well, it will advance Jewish activities and Jewish pride for the North Alabama.”

Three sponsors have issued matching funds for the first $30,000 donated toward a goal of $100,000. The campaign can be found at jewishhuntsville.com/addlight.

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When Brandy Lighthall heard about the vandalism at Etz Chayim, “I was heartbroken” and felt that she needed to do something.

Though the graffiti had been painted over and pressure washed away, “I didn’t want otherwise well-meaning people to think the job was done because I know that’s not how healing works.”

She also knew that with the COVID-19 restrictions on gatherings, there would not be an opportunity for an in-person show of solidarity. She posted on her Facebook account, “While it’s true there won’t be an in-person rally, they can’t stop us from showing support from our homes! Let’s show our Jewish friends they aren’t alone.”

She started a campaign to place hearts with the Together Against Antisemitism logo in windows of homes in the neighborhood. “We may not be able to go outside and rally, but we can inundate our homes and social media with the power of love,” she said.

Lighthall also contacted Rocket City Mom Jennifer Breuer to promote the idea, modeling it on her “Great Huntsville Easter Egg Hunt” that was being placed in windows around Huntsville, in lieu of the usual Easter egg hunts.

Lighthall told Southern Jewish Life that “I’m not naive enough to think taping paper on our windows will solve anything either, but I couldn’t stand back and do nothing.

And I didn’t want us all to forget and move on and let this type of thing stand.”

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community it occurred during the week of Passover in my hometown, just a couple of miles from my home, where my Jewish friends worship is particularly disturbing.”

He said many of his Christian colleagues have been in touch with him to see how they could do a “tangible expression of love and support.”

While Goldberg said they contacted the congregation’s “handy man,” numerous volunteers from the neighborhood, many of whom he doesn’t know, also showed up to aid in the cleanup.

Pastor Rusty Nelson and his wife showed up with several members of The Rock, a church

that has also held Israel events and maintains close ties to the Jewish community. “They had a member who had expertise with removing graffiti,” Goldberg said.

Etz Chayim is a congregation of about 60 families, and as with every other congregation, has suspended in-person services due to the coronavirus restrictions. Rabbi Stephen Listfield of Atlanta serves as visiting rabbi monthly.

Just before the Etz Chayim vandalism, Listfield had been conducting an online Seder for Etz Chayim from his home in Atlanta.

After news spread of the Chabad vandalism, members of The Rock and The Dwelling Place, along with many other volunteers, were on scene at Chabad, spending their Good Friday helping the Jewish community for the second day in a row. As April 9 and 10 were the first two days of Passover, those were days where religious work restrictions are observed, and Cohen did not comment until after Shabbat ended on April 11.

Though there was no vandalism at Temple B’nai Sholom, Huntsville’s Reform congregation, Rabbi Eric Berk said “our souls have been assaulted” by the attacks at Etz Chayim and Chabad.

Often, communities rally when an incident like this occurs. Following the September 2018 vandalism at Northshore Jewish Congregation in Mandeville, La., a rally drew a large crowd from the Christian community and filled the building. Due to coronavirus social distancing restrictions, such an event is not possible now.

Laura King, past president of the Jewish Federation of Huntsville and North Alabama, said “I am sure” once restrictions are lifted “we will do something.”

Cohen said that while he is a relative newcomer to the area, “I know friends who have been living here for decades have never seen anything like this.” He added, “For this to happen to the Jewish community is a shock for everyone.”

Community Reaction Reaction to the Huntsville vandalism poured in from far and wide, with many groups issuing statements after the Etz Chayim attack but before the one at Chabad, and some after both attacks had taken place.

After the Etz Chayim attack, Temple B’nai Sholom Rabbi Eric Berk and the congregation’s board issued a statement saying “an attack against one of us is an attack against all of us.”

B’nai Sholom has already asked Huntsville Police “to station an officer and police car at the Temple this evening, and to step up patrols of Temple B’nai Sholom today, tonight and over the next few days.”

The statement continued, “We offer our love and our support to the families of Etz Chayim.

We may be different congregations, but we are 38

April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

community all part of the greater Jewish Community of Huntsville, Alabama. We stand together united against all forms of antisemitism and hate speech.

We are still one people.”

After the Chabad attack, B’nai Sholom issued another statement, reiterating the thoughts of the day before. The Berks went to Chabad to show support.

The Jewish Federation of Huntsville and North Alabama said “the Jewish community of Huntsville and North Alabama are under attack” as “cowards have now attacked us twice.”

The Federation statement noted that while Passover is usually a time of community and family gatherings, the coronavirus lockdowns dramatically altered those celebrations this year. “To think anyone would take advantage of such a time to commit such heinous acts is the lowest of the low.” The images and messages in the graffiti “are a powerful reminder that anti-Semitism is still here and we, as a community, must come together and work tirelessly to end it.”

Allison Padilla-Goodman, vice president of the regional Anti-Defamation League office, said “This vandalism is a direct antisemitic attack on the Jewish community, and on one of our most sacred holidays of unity and liberation, Passover. Antisemitism is an enormous problem in our communities, and we must continue to stand up and prevent its normalization.”

Dan Weinrib, president of Birmingham’s Temple Beth-El, the state’s largest Conservative congregation, issued a statement on behalf of BethEl, saying “We Conservative Jews proudly stand shoulder-to-shoulder with our friends at Etz Chayim, and we are grateful for the immediate outpouring of love from their Christian neighbors. Whoever committed these hateful anti-semitic acts at the start of Passover knew exactly what they were doing. We look forward to the day these criminals get appre-

hended and held accountable for their disgusting actions.”

From Outside the Jewish Community Social media posts called for an “outpouring of love on the days leading up to Easter,” with one post urging people to leave flowers at Etz Chayim and Chabad, saying “never again will we repeat the past of spreading hatred for this group of God’s people.” Many asked online about volunteering to clean up — only to find out it had been swiftly taken care of by neighbors and leaders of area churches.

Interfaith Mission Service in Huntsville said the group “joins with our Jewish brothers and sisters and our interfaith communities offering our love and our support to the families of Etz Chayim. We stand together united against all forms of antisemitism and hate speech. We are still one people.”

Pastor Timothy Cox, president of the Alabama Baptist State Convention, said “My heart is saddened by the vandalism with Nazi graffiti of a Jewish synagogue in Huntsville. This is a condemnable attack on a place of worship and on religious liberty. Such attacks must not be tolerated.

Praying for those who are hurt by such hate and praying for authorities to make a swift apprehension of the perpetrators.”

John Buhler, co-leader of the Alabama-Israel Task Force, said the graffiti was “deeply troubling,” especially on Passover and in the month when the Holocaust is commemorated. “To our dear Jewish friends — You are not alone. We love you. We stand with you. May we soon see this plague of such hatred also eradicated. And may we see it together, with our own eyes, in this generation.”

Tim Tatum of Aldersgate United Methodist Church was teaching a class on connections between Passover and Easter when they found

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community out about the vandalism at Etz Chayim. “The words and actions of the vandals represent the worst of human hatred and prejudice,” the church posted on Facebook. “Please join together in praying for our brothers and sisters… Pray that the hearts of the vandals will changed.”

The Alabama Democratic Party tweeted “We stand with you, and the vandals who defaced your synagogue deserve prompt punishment. When the worst elements of our society speak of hate, we should stand up and speak against it. Alabama is a place for all y’all.”

After the Chabad vandalism, the Democratic Party tweeted, “The families of the Chabad of Huntsville should be able to worship without fear.

We hope that the perpetrators are caught and that justice is done.”

U.S. Rep. Mo Brooks recalled speaking at Etz Chayim before and urged anyone with information about it to share it with the police. “We cannot tolerate sordid, hateful conduct. We are better than that!”

Terry Lathan, chair of the Alabama Republican Party, said the vandalism was “absolutely despicable behavior fueled by hate,” but “it is good to see so many in the area supporting the synagogue. May their examples be what is remembered.”

Epworth United Methodist Church posted “Please join us in praying for Etz Chayim Synagogue and the Jewish community in Huntsville and beyond in response to this ugly act of vandalism during Passover.”

United Church of Huntsville stated that its members mourn with the members of the Jewish community. “As Christians, we decry any attacks on houses of the Lord and we pray for peace and safety for our Jewish neighbors.”

The Dwelling Place uploaded a video message, with Pastor Patrick Penn saying “We love you, we are heartbroken with you over this, it is a sickening thing that happened in our city.” He encouraged parents to

“teach your children what’s right, what’s wrong… racism is a learned behavior.”

Son Seth Penn said “To see in person something I have heard about and read about… in my hometown, it was a sickening, disgusting thing,” but he “felt the unity of our city coming together in support, past religion, past race.”

The Alabama chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations condemned the vandalism. “These despicable acts are particularly heinous in light of the commemoration of the Passover and in the midst of a global pandemic during which places of worship are especially vulnerable,’ said CAIR Alabama Executive Director Hamid M. Khan. “Every American should be able to practice their faith in peace and their places of worship regarded as sacrosanct.”

The Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery also condemned the attacks, saying to do so “during a time when the three Abrahamic religions — Judaism, Christian and Islam — commemorate their most holy holidays is a threat to religious liberty for all.”

Strong Community Support Rabbi Stephen Listfield, visiting rabbi at Etz Chayim, said many congregants had mentioned how many ministers, laypeople and city officials have “spoken forcefully and supportively on our behalf.”

While the Passover Hagaddah reminds that “in every generation there are those who rise up against us to destroy us,” Listfield said the primary message is “that decent people understand our common humanity,” and the countless decent people will prevail.

The American Jewish Committee thanked the city of Huntsville “for being allies against antisemitism,” saying “the response of local authorities couldn’t have been stronger. Words and solidarity matter. Swift law enforcement matters.”

The regional ADL office said “We are so grateful to the city of Huntsville, Huntsville Police Department, and the good citizens of Huntsville who have shown such service to and solidarity with the Jewish community and refused to let this define them.”

The ADL office said the Jewish community has been “completely overwhelmed by the outpouring of love and solidarity,” from city officials issuing “string” statements of solidarity, and how “every church community has shown up and shown up big: they gave equipment and supplies for cleaning the hatred off of their sacred space. Especially during the holy days when Jews do not work, they stepped in and cleaned the synagogue, restoring it to new.”

“The ugly was more than compensated for by our beautiful community, which I am so proud of,” King said.

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“We will not let the acts of a vicious individual or small group deter us from staying in a place the Jewish people have called home for well over a century,” said Tobias Mendelson, president of JFHNA. “This is a time for all us — Jews and non-Jews alike — to join together and do everything in our power to end the scourge of hatred, bigotry, and intolerance.”

Cohen said “If the intention of the hate crime was to bring hate and division in our midst, he failed miserably. Instead, we have a wonderful showing of togetherness and love that I know to be the true character of our community.”

He said the lesson of the vandalism is to “increase our activities and reach out to ever more people with love and brotherhood,” and provide even more events to “bring out the pride and joy of Judaism.”

In his Shabbat sermon on April 10, Berk said the most Jewish way to respond to the week’s events is “to keep living a Jewish life. We will allow no one to prevent us from living our lives, to prevent us from living our Jewish lives.”

community

Enlisting Christian media in the fight against antisemitism Tennessee-based PJTN holds panel discussion at National Religious Broadcasters convention At February’s National Religious Broadcasters convention, Tennessee-based Proclaiming Justice to the Nations challenged Christian media outlets to join in the fight against antisemitism.

The organization held a lengthy panel discussion on Feb. 27 at the convention in Nashville “to educate Christians about their Biblical responsibility to stand with their Jewish brethren,” said founder Laurie Cardoza-Moore.

Eight panelists spoke about different aspects of how antisemitism is prevalent in society and what to do about it, from the college campus to the church, and in general society.

Cardoza-Moore, special envoy to the United Nations for human rights and antisemitism, founded the group after discovering antisemitic, anti-Christian and anti-American content in her children’s textbooks. The organization “educates, advocates and moves to activate Christians, Jews and all people of conscience in building a global community of action and prayer in support of Jews and Israel.”

Cardoza-Moore said the NRB panel was to examine “what our role as Christian media is in combating and confronting” antisemitism.

Cardoza-Moore traced much of the current climate of antisemitism to the 2001 Durban World Conference Against Racism, which despite its name degenerated into an antisemitic hate-fest. The boycott-Israel movement known as BDS came into prominence at that event. It “came out of South Africa, under the watchful eye of Christians… and It was never

challenged,” she said.

She recently spoke throughout South Africa, and said because Christians did not speak out, “antisemitism has risen in mainline denominations, and even among evangelicals.”

The popular comparison of Israeli policy to South African apartheid is a “violation of the ninth Commandment, bearing false witness against Israel.” She told South African audiences that “if anybody knows apartheid, you do.”

She visited the Museum of Apartheid in Pretoria, where she saw how Jewish women protested against apartheid. It reminded her of the United States. She asked, “who was marching in the streets of Selma with our black brothers and sisters… it wasn’t the white evangelicals, it was the Jewish community.”

Audiences in South Africa “admitted they were silent and they admitted they want to reverse the course” about antisemitism.

Author and radio personality Jan Markell said there used to be greater

April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

enthusiasm for “the miracle of all time — the rebirth the nation of Israel, promised in the Bible.” While the parable of the Dry Bones used to generate excitement, today it is often met with a shrug.

Over the last 20 years, she said that excitement has been replaced with a “passion for social justice, and when you talk social justice, you hear churches say the Palestinians are the persecuted ones and we have to look out for the persecuted.”

Markell hosts a weekly program, “Understanding the Times,” and hosts the world’s largest Christian prophecy conference in Minnesota each year.

A decade ago, her alma mater, Bethel University, had a “Hope for the Holy Land” event, which she said was “a bash Israel for two hours session,” and “those of us who tried to speak truth were shut down.” That is alarming, she said, because that is one of the primary evangelical colleges.

“I’m sounding an alarm,” she said. “We need to pray for our churches” and go back to the day “when churches have a burden for things that matter. If the nation of Israel doesn’t matter to the church anymore, we have a serious problem.”

While many churches have shifted their attention to the Palestinians, she noted that “Bethlehem is unrecognizable” because the Palestinian Authority has driven out most of the Christian community. She called it “a tragedy of tragedies.”

As part of the event, Markell was presented with the PJTN Tree of Life Award. Cardoza-Moore, who said Markell has been a mentor to her, said the award was “for your commitment to combat antisemitism and support Israel,” and she has “gone above and beyond in defending Israel.”

Sandra Alfonsi, who speaks about “educational terrorism” through misleading narratives in textbooks, said in recent years “antisemitism has been made palatable.” The goal, she said, is “through education, to sever the relationship between the U.S. and Israel.”

Alfonsi noted that the British textbook giant Pearson Publishing has a history a falsifying the history of Israel, minimizing Jewish contributions to American history and downplaying Judaism as a world religion.

“We find this over and over,” since the 1970s when Saudi Arabia poured billions of dollars into American curriculum development. The problem also extends to the college campus, such as Georgetown, “where our diplomats are trained.”

Similarly, multiculturalism “had a tremendous negative impact on our education system… what we find is bias and slant on the Jews” and drawing division between Americans.

She spoke of the history of Christian antisemitism and stereotyping of Jews. “There would have been no inquisition without Christian anti-Semitism.”

Pulitzer Prize nominated author Carol Swain, a former professor at Vanderbilt who writes extensively about antisemitism in academia, said “It’s all about division. It’s not about unity but it uses the language of social justice.”

She mentioned that in 1935, Albert Einstein denounced anti-Semitism in American academia, and she commented, “The more things change, the more they stay the same.” But now, “academics don’t openly condemn Jews, they do it in very subtle ways,” claiming they are merely criticizing Israel or the level of Jewish influence.

Swain spoke about in the importance of recognizing the techniques of what she referred to as “cultural Marxism.”

Rev. Jeffrey Jemison, a leading voice of black leadership in Ohio, spoke about the deterioration of relations between blacks and Jews. “Social justice is love everybody,” he reminded.

Jemison spoke about how Martin Luther King Jr. was “a fighter for the Jews,” making it more troubling that “most anti-Semitism comes from civil rights leaders and activists… a lot of leaders have forgotten how much Dr. King loved the Jewish community and how much they loved him.”

community He said the relationship between blacks and Jews in New York City over the last 50 years has been very complicated. Part of it, he said, is after many Jews left the areas they “didn’t have that person-to-person contact,” then Arab and Asian communities became the business owners in the area. “It’s hard to hate up close,” and Jews often aren’t up close any more.

In the 1990s activists like Al Sharpton “helped to incite problems and divisions,” and the emergence of identity politics “really helped create walls between people, when in reality we are all Laurie Cardoza-Moore God’s children, we are all one nation.”

He said the lack of communication and the emergence of Nation of Islam rhetoric has led to higher anti-Semitism rates in the African-American community. He said this can be overcome through bringing faith leaders together, along with economic engagement through business coaching and empowerment.

Also, because African-Americans are proud of their Judeo-Christian heritage, it is imperative to educate about the basics of scripture and the responsibility to embrace Israel, he said.

While many panelists spoke of Christian theological roots of antisemitism, author Andrew Bostom spoke of the roots of antisemitism within Islam. He spoke about how global Zionism is conflated with Judaism, and discussed the outsized prevalence of antisemitism among Muslims versus the population at large.

He also noted that both Jewish and Christian leaders refuse to condemn canonical Jew-hatred by Muslim leaders.”

Rev. Tricia Miller, who is Christian research analyst for the Committee on Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America, said a key teaching of Christianity that had been used to justify antisemitism for centuries and is being widely rejected today has instead been adopted by the Palestinians.

She said the politically correct way to be antisemitic or anti-Jewish is to be anti-Zionism, which has at its core denying the theological “centrality of the land to the Jewish people.”

Palestinian Christians adopted replacement theology — the idea that Jews were rejected by God and replaced by the church — to fit in their narrative and promote a false claim that they are indigenous and Jews did not live in the land of Israel. Furthermore, they identify Jesus as a Palestinian. “You have to do great violence to everything the Bible says about the identity and historical context of Jesus” to accomplish that, she said.

Another method is to portray the situation as “two equally valid national narratives.” Nothing is said about how many times Israel has made tremendous concessions for peace or the repeated refusal of the Palestinians to accept any offer, she said. It is an “insidious narrative that ignores history and reinterprets facts on the ground.”

She said those distortions are egregious enough, but “when this is done

by Christian leaders in the Middle East, it is even more egregious” and counterproductive.

Accepting the Palestinian narrative, she said, is to show a tolerance of the Palestinian demonization of Jews. It “gives the Palestinian Authority hope they will succeed in possessing all the land from the river to the sea without recognizing Israel’s right to exist” and perpetuates an unwillingness to negotiate. Those Christian leaders are “actually doing more harm than good,” and “we need to remain grounded in the truth, which is the only real path to peace.”

Dexter Van Zile, Christian media analyst for CAMERA, reports ex-

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community tensively on anti-Israel and antisemitic rhetoric by Christian leaders, and spoke about Christians who use their platforms of influence to spread antisemitism.

Van Zile said antisemitism, after World War II, was discredited and antisemites were generally kept to the fringe. “Unfortunately, those days are over,” he said, as anyone with a webcam can gain prominence, and two of the worst examples are Christians.

One of them, Rick Wiles of TruNews, is a conspiracy theorist who recently made headlines for calling the Trump impeachment a “Jew coup.”

Van Zile first ran into him at the 2018 Christ at the Checkpoint conference in Bethlehem, “an anti-Israel event organized by Palestinian Christians, most of them affiliated with Bethlehem Bible College.”

He also referenced E. Michael Jones, a Catholic activist who spreads antisemitism through his “Culture Wars.” He has recently been de-platformed on numerous sites, which Van Zile noted “enlivens their base” because they can say “look at what those Zionists have done, undermining our democracy and our right to free speech.”

To fight anti-Semitism, he said one must “get to those angry young men” who are attracted to the vitriol of Jones and Wiles before they do.

“As evangelists, that’s your calling,” he said.

Jones says the Jews are behind the problems of the world, something that appeals to those looking to blame others for their own situation.

Markell referenced Wiles, saying she and Cardoza-Moore “have a passion to shut down this kind of antisemitic bully.”

“He is bullying every one of you,” she added. “Christian antisemitism on steroids. Try to wrap your brain around that.”

Some “so-called” Christian peacemaking organizations also promote the idea that Jews control the media or U.S. political discourse, Van Zile said, and are the primary facilitators and enablers of antisemitism in the West in the last few decades. Though they present themselves as peacemakers, “They affirm the Palestinian vendetta narrative against Israel,” and he used the word “vendetta” because it is in the Palestinian national anthem.

Organizations such as the World Council of Churches translate and “sand off ” explicit antisemitism but leave the “overall grievance and vendetta narrative intact” and promote self-determination for Palestinians while the Palestinian leadership denies the right of Jews to the same.

Van Zile said one can’t buy into that narrative and expect to be taken seriously when expressing opposition to antisemitism.

Rabbi Jonathan Hausman of Ahavath Torah in Stoughton, Mass., gave a perspective about Jews and Christians working together for Israel and against antisemitism. “Is it a new era? I don’t know. Is it messianic? That’s not my field. Is it something unique? Absolutely.”

He said there are many in the Jewish community who are perplexed regarding Christian support for Israel. “They have no context when it comes to this form of conversation,” because they have “liberal political sensibilities” and are “divorced from” Jewish knowledge and history.

Hausman said being Jewish “is the most grateful gift that God can give you. If that’s the case, you can’t marginalize Christian Zionists… If you’re sitting across the table with somebody who supports BDS, what in the hell are you doing?”

He referenced the move away from replacement theology and the affirmation of the eternal nature of God’s covenant with the Jewish people.

“If God breaks his covenant with the Jewish people, what does that mean for you as a Christian? If God can break one promise, God can break another promise,” and that should be discomforting to Christians. More Christians are realizing that and reaching out their hands to the Jewish community, he added.

“Something is happening,” Hausman said. “I don’t know what.”

In summing up the event, Cardoza-Moore said “we are to protect our Jewish brethren so they can worship God without fear.”

Israeli Olympian Tiyouri wins half-marathon in Birmingham Maor Tiyouri, who ran for Israel in the 2016 Summer Olympics marathon, won the women’s division of the Mercedes Half-Marathon in Birmingham on Feb. 16, as part of her road back to the possibility of competing in the 2020 Olympics.

That road has been delayed, with the recent decision to push the 2020 Games in Tokyo to “no later than” July 2021, due to the global coronavirus fight.

At the half-marathon, Tiyouri finished 15th overall, leading all women with a time of 1:14:51, a personal best in the half-marathon. Two years ago, she ran a 10-kilometer race in Birmingham, where she also set her personal best for that distance.

She returned to Birmingham on March 7 for the Birmingham Wine 10-kilometer race, placing second out of 764 women. She finished in 33 minutes, 34.6 seconds, a new personal best.

She was born in Kfar Saba, and in fourth grade was asked if she wanted to take part in municipal competitions. She ran and placed eighth.

The next two years, she won, and when she was in eighth grade she was recommended for an after-school athletics program. She also did martial Israeli runner Maor Tiyouri gets ready to break through the banner as overall women’s champion at the Mercedes-Benz Half Marathon on arts and tennis, “I was all over the place in terms of athletics.”

Her parents told her to focus on one sport, so she decided to continue Feb. 16 running. “I saw I was winning the races in the region, then national,” and figured that she was good at it. “Running kind of chose me.”

3000-meter competition at the 2013 Maccabiah.

In 2009, she competed in the World Maccabiah Games, winning silBeing in the Maccabiah Games was “a cool experience in that it was an ver in the 1500-meter and bronze in 800-meters. She won silver in the international race in Israel,” and she is still in touch with many people she

April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

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met. She remembers Aly Goldfarb of Birmingham, who moved to Israel in 2011 to become part of the Israel national track team.

She ran for the San Francisco Dons while in college at the University of San Francisco, graduating in 2014. She competed twice in the NCAA Cross Country championships, and was first team All West Coast Conference for three years.

In Israel, she is a three-time national champion, and holds the Israeli record in the 5000-meter.

She competed on the Israeli team at the 2015 European Games, placing second in the 1500 and 3000, earning personal bests in both, and helping the Israeli team win the bronze medal.

She ran her first-ever marathon in May 2016 in Ottawa, and with a time of 2:42:20, she finished seventh and qualified to represent Israel at the Summer Olympics in Rio. Ottawa “was the last day you could qualify,” she said. In Rio, she finished 90th in a field of 133, with a time of 2:47:27.

Being in the Olympics “was an amazing experience. I was very honored and proud to put on my Israel jersey and run with it around Rio.” Being there was “probably the biggest accomplishment of my life.”

After competing in the 2017 World Championships, Tiyouri had four injuries in a row — “all small injuries that took me out for a long time,” she said.

Her Birmingham visits were part of her long road back. “I wanted to see what I’m capable of doing right now,” she said.

February is generally a slow time in running, due to the weather. This year, there are also Olympic qualifying events drawing the major names in running, and after the Mercedes event, noted the U.S. Olympic trials were two weeks away in Atlanta.

“Alabama should be warm enough to run a race in February,” she said.

“It’s snowing in Boulder,” where she lives and trains.

She had planned to run in Rotterdam in April, a qualifying race for the Olympics.

After the Birmingham Wine 10k, which she had also run in 2018, she said “it is an interesting process reacquiring racing skills.”

She noted that when she did the 10k in 2018, “everyone was super-welcoming,” and local race organizers have kept her updated on opportunities.

She is taking a “we’ll see” approach on making the Olympics in Tokyo.

Before the world shut down, she said she did not have a lot of time to prepare to qualify. “You never know, so you have to take your opportunities when they come.”

Alexandria “Who Will Write Our History” screening moves online The Arts Council of Central Louisiana’s April 15 screening of “Who Will Write Our History” at the Kress Theatre in Alexandria has been cancelled, but there will be a virtual screening online, April 27 at 6:30 p.m.

A question and answer session with filmmaker Roberta Grossman will follow. The film tells the story of Emanuel Ringelblum and the Oyneg Shabes Archive, the secret archive he created and led in the Warsaw Ghetto. With 30,000 pages of writing, photographs, posters, and more, the Oyneg Shabes Archive is the most important cache of in-the-moment, eyewitness accounts from the Holocaust. It documents not only how the Jews of the ghetto died, but how they lived. The film is based on the book of the same name by historian Samuel Kassow, and executive producer is Nancy Spielberg.

A link to sign up for the screening is on the Arts Council of Central Louisiana’s Facebook page.

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

community

Happy Passover

Barts give $1 million to Second Harvest

Judge Piper Griffin Orleans Civil Court Division I

On Feb. 13, Cathy and Morris Bart presented the Second Harvest Food Bank in New Orleans with a $1 million gift, a cornerstone donation to the capital campaign to renovate the group’s facilities.

The gift will expand the volunteer center, helping the agency serve thousands who are in need.

Second Harvest provides food and support to over 700 community partners and programs across 23 parishes, distributing the equivalent of more than 32 million meals to over 210,000 people annually. The organization hopes to more than double its capacity.

Morris Bart said “We believe in the mission of Second Harvest. There is nothing more important than feeding people. I hope that this gift raises awareness of Second Harvest’s impact in New Orleans and across South Louisiana, and also encourages others to give and volunteer.”

BJF holding COVID response panel with Rosh Ha’Ayin experts On April 19 at 10 a.m., Birmingham Jewish Federation CEO Danny Cohn will lead a panel discussion with Birmingham’s Israeli sister city Rosh Ha-Ayin. The panel will discuss the COVID-19 situation in Israel as well as informing them on what is happening in Birmingham.

Rosh Ha’Ayin is also the Partnership2Gether city for New Orleans.

Panelists include Aluf Yair Golan, a Member of Knesset for the Democratic Union. He is a retired major general who served as deputy chief of the Israeli Defense Forces and is also a retired general of the Home Front Command.

Also on the panel is Professor Nachman Ash, director of the Health Division of Maccabi Healthcare Services, the second-largest HMO in Israel, as the chief director of the “Sharon” district. He also serves as deputy CEO for Health Affairs. Ash is also a professor in the Department of Health Systems Management of the School of Health Sciences at Ariel University, in Mobile’s sister city.

Perry Aramy, director of the Education and Teaching Support Division of the Ministry of Education, will also participate. She is a member of the emergency room staff at the Ministry of Education.

To register for the Zoom meeting, email Florinan@bjf.org. The link will be sent out the previous evening.

April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

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community Judicial candidate Sara Lewis describes maintaining a campaign during Covid For three months, New Orleans First City Court Judge candidate Sara Lewis was in campaign mode. “Then, zero,” she said, as she — like everyone else — was abiding by the shelter-inplace order that postponed the upcoming election to June 20 — and just before press time, again to July 11.

On the day of this interview, she was heading off to Kosher Cajun to pick up Passover packages to distribute to those who were unable to leave their homes, on behalf of Jewish Family Service. She was also planning to make challah, saying that “in general I wouldn’t have the time for a four-hour recipe.”

But even with the shutdown, there is still an election coming up. With the campaign on isolation mode, “we have been trying to do volunteer outreach — phone banks, call centers” to let voters know about the date change for the election. She also is volunteering regularly at food banks and meal delivery non-profits.

Lewis came to New Orleans in 2006 to attend law school at Tulane, where her sister had attended as an undergraduate. They grew up in Buffalo, and Lewis received her undergraduate degree from Georgetown.

When she graduated from law school in 2009, she decided to stay in New Orleans, utilizing the Federation’s Jewish newcomers incentive package. “New Orleans can get its hooks into you,” she explained.

Her sister was already setting down roots in the area, and now, aside from a couple of cousins, the whole U.S. family is in the New Orleans area, after their mother, a native of Italy, moved to Bay St. Louis a couple of years ago.

Her father had moved to Israel, where several other family members are, when she was in high school, and died Nicole Harvey, Scott Goldin, Sara Lewis and Lee Rudin several years ago.

The family wound up in Buffa- at a December 2018 JNOLA event lo when her paternal grandparents moved there after the Holocaust. Her grandfa- that he was the only member of his family to ther, Leo Lewis, had been sent to the Achmunt survive. work camp in 1940 at age 16, and when it was He married a fellow survivor, Zelda, then in asked if there were any mechanics, he answered Buffalo, he became a well-known businessman. yes, even though the only thing in the ballpark He died in 2012. was his training as a dental technician. “The Lewis attends Touro Synagogue, and is on the mechanic” spent the war going from one forced board of JNOLA, heading the Jewish Life and labor camp to another, finding out after the war Social Action committee.

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community At Tulane, she earned her law degree magna cum laude, along with her mediation certification. She was a recipient of the Dean’s Scholarship, and the CALI award in Negotiable Instruments. While in law school, she clerked for Judge Fredericka Wicker, who she considers to be a role model, on the Louisiana Court of Appeal, 5th Circuit.

Lewis also completed an externship on domestic violence at Southeast Louisiana Legal Services with Judge Bernadette D’Souza’s law office, prior to D’Souza’s election. The organization provides “free, civil legal aid to low-income people in six offices, across 22 parishes throughout southeast Louisiana.”

Lewis has been in private practice with Wall, Bullington and Cook, LLC, where she is now a partner.

Having practiced “in over 20 parishes, different courthouses,” she said “the difference of having a judge who is prepared and knows what is going on, researches the issues and makes a legally based decision… is the difference between having access to justice, or not.”

The First City Court handles personal injury cases that are less than $25,000, small claims below $5,000 and evictions under $3,000. For a lot of people, that court is the only access they have to the court system, she said. Many are not well-represented, and because they live “paycheck to paycheck,” being able to put food on the table or keep a roof over their heads is a big deal.

She wants to bring a pro bono volunteer me-

diation process to New Orleans, working with the Access to Justice Commission on a program similar to one in the Baton Rouge Family Court and Baton Rouge City Court.

“As Judge, I would identify cases that would benefit from this program, and assist in implementing this pilot mediation program in Orleans Parish,” she said. Often, the process provides “an avenue for people to resolve a dispute in ways a court just can’t.” A judge “can do A or B,” but a mediation can scrap that as the only options and come up with a different resolution.

She noted studies that say 90 percent of those who go through mediation “feel it is better than going through a trial.”

With volunteer attorneys and law students, “the court could provide — at no cost to the parties — an independent third party who is well versed in the law to aid them in finding a mutually agreed upon solution to their conflict.”

She also wants to tackle the “crippling burden” of an eviction rate double the national average.

In communities of color, “1 in 4 people will deal with an eviction in three years, compared to 1 in 24 for predominantly white areas,” she said.

“I will thoroughly review cases and offer people all the information they need, along with a clear, easily accessible, and streamlined process.”

As judge, she wants to “implement programs people can use” and “give people the opportunity to resolve their life’s biggest problems.”

Happy Passover to my friends and supporters in the Jewish community

Judge Sidney H. Cates, IV Orleans Civil District Court Division C

Bruce Pearl program in Mobile postponed The Mobile Area Jewish Federation has postponed its April 28 Annual Campaign kickoff featuring Auburn Basketball Coach Bruce Pearl, “until the directive banning gatherings of 10 or more people has been lifted.”

Pearl was to speak about antisemitism, and the event was to be hosted by Aaron Fruh at Cottage Hill Baptist Church.

According to the Federation, “Coach Pearl is very passionate about the subject of the disturbing rise of antisemitism, and coming to Mobile to discuss it with us.”

The evening was also to include a “Meet the Coach” reception beforehand for the first 100 to make a reservation.

A new date will be set when possible.

The MAJF also cancelled its May 3 Israel Independence Day celebration because of the group gathering ban.

The Latest News… www.sjlmag.com April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

Growing up in Philadelphia, the idea of Southern Jews never entered Sue Eisenfeld’s mind. In that atmosphere, Jews had come to America from Europe in the beginning of the 20th century and settled in the north. The South was this far-off land, filled with racists and Klansmen, certainly inhospitable to Jews.

Fourteen years after moving to Virginia, she and her husband, Neil, made their first visit to Richmond, and as one who enjoys exploring Jewish cemeteries, she went to an historic one there.

The dedication date was 1816.

And… there was a Confederate Jewish cemetery.

“This was far away from my world experience,” she said.

After growing up steeped in the history of the Revolutionary War, “I had lived in Virginia for 15 years and had become interested in the Civil War, because that is inevitable if you live in Virginia,” she said.

Nobody had ever mentioned the idea that Jews lived in the Confederacy, let alone fought for it. Thinking of Passover, she wondered how that was even possible.

With an interest in history, and an emphasis on civil rights history because she had long heard stories of “second cousin once removed, by marriage” Andrew Goodman, who was killed in Mississippi in 1964, she set out on visits to that strange land, the South. The result is “Wandering Dixie: Dispatches from the Lost Jewish South,” which was published on April 2.

Eisenfeld is a faculty member at the Johns Hopkins University MA in Science Writing Program, and a freelance writer.

The book chronicles not only her search for the Jewish South, but reflections on her own identity, from trips they took between 2015 and 2018.

Because pivotal moments in that timeframe include the 2015 Charleston church shooting and the 2017 white supremacist show of force in Charlottesville, political comments about the emboldening of extremism does creep into the narrative on occasion.

They wanted to travel the civil war sites in the South, but now that she knew there was Jewish history to explore, “I knew that I wanted to have a Southern Jewish experience… Once I got the idea of Southern Jews in my head, that definitely was driving my trip.”

She visited Charleston, one of the oldest Jewish communities in the country, in 2014. “Hearing Jewish people with a Southern accent when I

culture went to Charleston and had my introduction to Southern Jews, I had never heard that before.”

While many of the stories seem spontaneous and she did, in fact, not arrange a lot in advance, she had contacted the Goldring/Woldenberg Institute of Southern Jewish Life in Jackson, where she got a long list of contacts, “not really knowing where I would show up. I had a lot of names in a lot of small towns,” and many that she did not get to.

“I’m happy that when I called these folks they were home, answered my call and were so receptive to the spur of the moment visits,” she said. When she was in Selma, “if Ronnie Leet hadn’t responded to my email that night I would have been leaving town the next morning” without learning about Selma’s extensive Jewish history.

The book starts off in Eufaula, where she meets the town’s remaining Jew, Sara Hamm.

She juxtaposes a Southern Jewish story with broader American history.

She details how Julius Rosenwald of Chicago worked with Booker T. Washington in Tuskegee on the Rosenwald Schools, which ultimately built over 5,000 schools for rural blacks throughout the South, one of which she visits.

She then discusses another Tuskegee story, the infamous Tuskegee Syphilis Study.

Additional anecdotes take place throughout Louisiana, in the Mississippi Delta, exploring communities during the Southern Jewish Historical Society conferences in Nashville and Natchez, and journeys through South Carolina and parts of Virginia.

Meeting with Leet, for the first time she “got a different side of the (civil rights) story than I’d ever heard before,” how Southern Jews were caught between the segregationists and the civil rights movement, and how Northern Jews were complicating the situation.

While on her tour, she visited the site where her cousin and two other civil rights workers, Michael Schwerner and James Chaney, were killed.

“It was very easy as a Northerner to relate to the story of Andrew Good-

man” and go to the South with that view of the civil rights struggle. She never thought of “the disconnect” in the views between Northern and Southern Jews. “They weren’t adversaries but the came to the situation with different world views,” she said.

A lot of life is like that, she said. “People get a world view based on where they live and what experiences they have.” For her, “a lot of this book was taking me out of the environment I had grown up and putting myself in a different environment with open ears.”

With that in mind, the book was really written for the Northern Jew, she said. “Southern Jews already know all this. Maybe they will find it interesting to read about my journey.”

She hopes that people will be inspired by the stories and seek to financially support some of the places that are still open and could use support.

“I’m hoping to share my story as an entrée into learning even more about the Jewish South,” she said.

While she describes herself as “non-observant” Jewishly, though she grew up in a Jewish home where relatives spoke Yiddish, the journey affected her Jewish identity. “I’ve always lived in places where there were lots of Jewish people and lots of synagogues. It never felt to me like something I needed to do because it was about to be lost.”

Seeing the small communities and places “that have a sense of loss,” it “made me realize not to take Judaism for granted.” In those communities, “it really takes each person to keep it alive.”

The experience “opened my eyes to a portion of history I was unfamiliar with, and now I’m interested in learning more and being part of my culture a little more.”

Though she wrote a book about it, she feels she would not have gotten as much out of the experience had she settled for just researching and reading.

The highlight was “talking to people who were part of those events,” and there is value in going “to places with my own two feet and get a sense of history by being somewhere.”

Fast, expert emergency care.

Take me to Touro View our current ER wait time at touro.com/emergency April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

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community The Pensacola Jewish Federation is hosting Good Morning Pensacola on Sundays at 9:30 a.m., starting April 12, with past Israeli Shlichim going back to 2001. The programs will be held via Zoom.

On April 12, Adiel, Tal, Shaked and Lior will be on. The April 19 lineup includes Erez, Yael, Maor and Shai. On April 26, Avishai, Cheli and Dvora will take part.

The series will not include every Shaliach, as Michal Elboim was killed in a boating accident just prior to her scheduled return to Israel in July 2008.

Maccabi USA will host a program on what is happening with the National Basketball Association and its coronavirus response initiative, with NBA senior executive Todd Jacobson. Arnie Fielkow, CEO of the Jewish Federation of Greater New Orleans and former president of the National Basketball Retired Players Association, will co-moderate with former WNBA Commissioner Donna Orender. The program is part of a Maccabi USA effort to highlight stories of where sports intersect with Jewish values. The Zoom program will be on April 20 at 7 p.m., and advance registration at bit.ly/nba-todd is required.

Have some spare time? The Birmingham Holocaust Education Center has hundreds of hours of digitized testimony from Holocaust survivors and needs volunteers to transcribe them. The transcripts will allow BHEC to have searchable resources to assist researchers. Volunteers should email archives@bhecinfo.org to review transcription guidelines, and then can do the work from home.

There will be encore broadcasts of “Dreams of Hope,” the docuJNOLA, the hub for next-gen Jewish life in New Orleans, will have a mentary about the Holocaust violins that were played in a concert at virtual Cancelled by Covid Trivia contest, “based on events cancelled Birmingham’s Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in 2018. The broadcasts, by Covid-19, ” April 22 at 6 p.m. Teams will compete, with gift cards to on Alabama Public Television, will be on April 13 at 9 p.m. and April 20 local restaurants as the prizes. Zoom details will be given to those who at noon. reserve on Eventbrite, with a deadline of April 21 to register teams of The Birmingham Holocaust Education Center will hold this year’s up to six people. community remembrance online, April 26 at 2 p.m. The ceremony On April 20, Reginelli’s Pizzeria in Uptown New Orleans and on will be available on the website and Facebook page of Temple EmaClearview in Metairie will have a Giveback for the New Orleans Jewnu-El, where the BHEC offices are temporarily located.

The theme will be “Unto Every Person There Is a Name,” and com- ish Community Center. Mention the JCC and 10 percent of the order munity members are invited to send names of loved ones who died between 11 a.m. and 10 p.m. will be donated to the JCC. Delivery and during the Holocaust. Their names will be recited as part of the event. take-out orders are valid.

Huntsville’s Jewish and Christian communities will unite for the JewThe city of origin, relationship to the person submitting and, if needed, ish Federation of Huntsville and North Alabama’s Virtual Yom HaShothe pronunciation of the names are also requested. ah memorial service. April 21 at 6:30 p.m., via Temple B’nai Sholom’s Names should be emailed to info@bhecinfo.org by April 22.

Facebook.

You Belong in Birmingham will have a virtual You Bake in Birmingham, April 26 at 2 p.m., making M&M cookies together online. Jars with pre-measured dry ingredients will be distributed, participants need to supply the wet ingredients, such as butter, egg and vanilla.

Reservations are requested by April 20.

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April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

community In Loving Memory…

Reva Shirley Schneider Hart, 95, died peacefully on March 15, at home surrounded by her children. Reva, who was “Mom” to her children and “Nonnie” to her grandchildren and great-grandchildren, was born in Louisville, Ky., on Sept. 11, 1924, and was raised in Winona, Miss.

She actually will always be remembered as “Reva Strong” due to her tenacity to overcome and find solutions to almost any challenge that came her way. This is the legacy that she leaves behind. One of Reva’s favorite expressions was “It Is What It Is.” She always got through it with valor and grace.

Reva attended Winona Public Schools and was valedictorian of her class. Reva was not only smart and wise academically; she was a strong example in and of life. She graduated from Stephens College, and it was during this time that she met the love of her life, Ellis T. Hart. While stationed in Malden, Mo., he and two buddies flew to Greenville, Miss., where they had their first date. Ellis loved Reva so much that after this first date, he pulled rank on a fellow serviceman and asked if he could be the one to take her out the following night. The rest became a love story of 74 years and the perfect example of marriage. It is considered one of the greatest gifts they passed on to their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren.

After the war, Ellis and Reva settled in Winona and took over the ownership of Schneider’s Department Store. Reva’s dedication to their business was exemplary. She was the buyer, the book-keeper, the lady on the selling floor, and even the window dresser. While also being a great partner in business with Ellis, she always made time for her children.

She placed great importance on the family’s faith and drove her children many Sundays to Sunday School 180 miles away. She attended all of their school activities and believed in taking part in the community and the arts. Reva made sure there were many trips to Memphis to expose her children to Broadway Theater. She was the ultimate trip planner and map reader while traveling out west for three weeks with the family during many summers. Reva and Ellis also owned and operated Perlinsky’s Men’s Store in Canton.

After their retirement, they moved to Lake Caroline, where Reva loved to play bridge and watch the Pelican Parades. She also had a favorite Heron that she personally named Hermie, and watching him was a favorite pastime that made her smile. Reva loved to travel, play golf, and she and Ellis truly loved the Jackson Cultural Arts scene and community.

Reva was the greatest mother and taught each of her children the meaning of family, respect, consideration, and tolerance for all. Her children and grandchildren knew that if her left eyebrow went up, it was time to say yes ma’am, and do what you were told. She loved fiercely, and she loved honestly. Her family learned so many life lessons from her examples and how she traveled her journey every day.

She was preceded in death by her loving husband, Ellis T. Hart, whom she was married to for 74 years. Additionally, her parents, Joseph and Fannie Schneider, siblings Bernard (Doris) Schneider, Macy Schneider, great-granddaughter, Savannah Hart, grandson, Jonathon Sonkin, and her son-in-law, Bill Gordon.

Reva is survived by her son Van Hart (Cheryl) of Brunswick, Ga., Macy Hart (Susan) of Jackson, and Ellen Hart and Jo Ann Gordon of Madison. She was resilient, persistent, and encouraged everyone to be their best version. This legacy will be passed on to 14 grandchildren and 23

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community great-grandchildren. She is also survived by many nieces and nephews, who were all “her” children as well.

The family requests that memorial contributions may be made to the Jewish Children’s Regional Service, P. O. Box 7368, Metairie, LA, 700107368, The Institute of Southern Jewish Life, P. O. Box 16528, Jackson, MS, 39236, Henry S. Jacobs Camp, 3863 Morrison Road, Utica, MS, 39175 or a charity of your choice.

Barbara Joyce Maso Shinpaugh, 78, humanitarian, caregiver and educator, peacefully passed away on April 1. She was surrounded by her devoted husband of 59 years, Robert Shinpaugh, and her loving daughters, Letitia Bonthron, Michelle Denney and Heather Shinpaugh.

Barbara was born in Chicago, Ill., on Dec. 10, 1941. She earned a Bachelor’s degree from Southern Illinois University in Carbondale and considered herself a lifelong learner. She met her husband at SIU when they performed in a talent show together — Barbara as a vocalist under the stage name Liz Collins, Robert as a drummer — and they went on to form the Liz Collins Trio Plus One and perform at events both on and off campus.

She was very proud to be an Air Force officer’s wife for 22 years. She provided a home away from home for young enlisted men and women and was very active in the Officer’s Wives Club. As part of an Air Force family, she lived in many places and developed numerous friendships all around the world. Barbara was always determined to live her life to the fullest and loved to travel. She created lasting memories with her children and grandchildren by achieving her goal of taking them to London when they each turned 13. She also fulfilled a lifelong dream of visiting Israel with her husband to connect with her Jewish heritage. More recently, she took her granddaughters all around Italy in 2018 and cruised through the Panama Canal with Robert in 2019.

Barbara powerfully impacted countless lives through her dedication to serving as a life-time volunteer for hospitals, schools, community theaters, libraries, and many civic and charitable organizations. She was instrumental in beginning the Hospice organization in Montgomery, served as volunteer coordinator for the UAB Hospice program, and was a member of the Council of Hospice Professionals.

As a very active member of the Cahaba Valley Elks Lodge, she was especially dedicated to serving the needs of homeless veterans and dialysis centers. She developed strong bonds with her Emblem sisters through her commitment to the Decatur Emblem Club. Among her many local, state and national roles, she served two years as Exalted Ruler of the Cahaba Valley Elks Lodge and was president of the Decatur Emblem Club. She had a passion for photography and was the official photographer for the Alabama Elks State Association. She was a life member of Hadassah and the National Council of Jewish Women, and played an active role in the Temple Beth Or Sisterhood in Montgomery.

In addition to her husband and daughters, Barbara is survived by three grandchildren whom she loved and adored, Seth Denney, Katie Denney, and Sydney Bonthron, her sons-in-law Jeff Denney and Scott Bonthron, her son-by-choice Steve Alexander, and her grandkitties and puppies Tika, Zoey, Merry, Pippin, Sophie, and Maggie. She was preceded in death by her mother, Adelle Ray Territo, her father, Victor Maso, and her stepfather, Dominic Territo. She also had many, many loving friends across the nation whom she considered family-by-choice.

All who knew Barbara recognized that her beautiful smile was a ray of sunshine in every room. Her compassionate, generous soul brought 54

April 2020 • Southern Jewish Life

community comfort to anyone who was in need. Her warm, caring heart enveloped others with so much love.

A Celebration of Barbara’s Life will be held at a later date (tentatively planned for August 18, 2020, which would have been her and Robert’s 60th wedding anniversary). In lieu of flowers, Barbara wished donations be made to any of the foundations she was so passionate about, including the Elks National Foundation, NCJW, Hadassah, and the National Hospice Organization.

Jane Rae Tarlow Barasch passed away peacefully on March 31 while in hospice in her home in St. Louis, Mo. She was 71 years old, and is survived by her loving husband of 34 years, Leonard Barasch of Birmingham and St. Louis.

She is also survived by her devoted only child, Sarah Barasch of Philadelphia, Pa. Jane Rae, as she was affectionately known, was born in Glasgow, Ky., in 1948, where her family was one of two Jewish families in their county. At 13 they moved to be closer to her mother’s family in Mobile. The stories of small Southern Jewish communities remained central to Jane’s life, as did the culture and beauty of the Alabama Gulf Coast.

Jane’s main joys were her family and her career as a public health nurse manager. She earned her BSN from UAB and her MSN from Emory University, summa cum laude, and went on to teach nursing at several universities, manage health departments’ high risk OB-GYN and maternal and child health programs, and even helped found the first hospice in the state of Alabama. For over five years, she managed HIV and AIDS cases for Eastern Missouri for the Missouri Department of Health. She is remembered lovingly by so many patients, students, colleagues, and families whose lives she touched through her passionate advocacy.

Judaism sustained her, and Jane was, at various times, a member of Temple Emanu-El in Birmingham (where she was married and where Sarah was named and consecrated), Springhill Avenue Temple in Mobile, Agudath Israel in Montgomery, and The Temple in Atlanta. Since settling in St. Louis in 1996, she was active at Congregation Shaare Emeth in St. Louis. She was a “lifetime member” of Hadassah and the National Council of Jewish Women and was proud that Sarah too became a lifetime member of both. Jane was a devoted supporter of the arts, animal welfare, and civil rights, and volunteered her time and resources whenever possible.

Donations may be made in her honor to the St. Louis Crisis Nursery.

Due to Covid-19, funeral and shiva were only open to immediate family.

Leonard and Sarah are planning a memorial celebration in honor of Jane to be held in St. Louis, along with a smaller gathering in Mobile, tentatively in the summer of 2020. Details will be shared in this publication when those plans are finalized.

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rear pew mirror • doug brook

Seder in place Sukkot is the fall holiday (or, in Aramaic, falliday) when we build a temporary shelter just like the Israelites used in the desert, but with more wifi. Jump ahead a few months to today — Sukkot’s fellow harvest holiday, the less distant and equally less leavened Passover.

Some Jews traditionally don’t get around to taking down their sukkahs until Passover. Why is this year different from all other years? Unlike all other years, this year it means already having a shelter in place for sheltering in place for the Passover seders.

While many are nobly inserting the ritual handwashing between every step of the seder, the ever-prescient recently discovered Mishnah tractate Bava Gump provides a different approach to what goes on your Seder-in-Plate.

Bava Gump provides a specially rewritten fifth commandment, “Lo COVID et avicha v’et imecha” — “don’t COVID your father and your mother.” Therefore, to make them worry less in their isolation, the following guidance will make any Jew’s seder more appealingly “covered.”

Judaic schools for years have done chocolate seders, in an experiment to see just how much sugar aftershock their parents can withstand.

On this night that will most certainly be different from all others, Jews throughout the land have special dispensation. So, add chocolate to your seder for a taste of the sweetness to come from the new, 21st century exodus — out our front doors — that awaits us all.

the special dye the Israelites used to make the cake look chocolate enough for the post-exodus desert dessert potluck. Conclude the story with a second glass of chocolatey liquidy goodness.

Magid: Retell the Passover story. Recount the ten plagues, from the Nile turning into chocolate all the way to the slaying of the firstborns’ chocolate privileges. Marvel at the Israelites fleeing through the Red Velvet Sea, without enough time to let the chocolate cake rise. Sing together the words of Dayenu, commemorating

Here, have some chocolate. You’ll need it.

Rachtza: Wash your hands, for another 20 seconds, in the chocolate fountain.

Motzi Matzah: Eat some chocolate matzah.

Finally. You’ve been staring at it. Good job resisting the Cadbury egg on the seder plate, by the way.

Marror: Eat some bitter herbs. Not too much, or you’ll hear ma roar.

Korech: Make a sandwich of chocolate matzah and bitter herbs. Again, you’ll be surprised.

Shulchan Orech: Dinner, at last! Chocolate matzah ball soup. Chocolate gefilte fish. Chocolate marinated brisket. Chocolate potato kugel.

Chocolate tzimmes. Chocolate roasted chicken. Chocolate carrots. Chocolate matzah meal dressing. Chocolate mashed potatoes. Chocolate chicken piccata. Chocolate stuffed peppers.

Chocolate chocolate macaroons. And steak.

Tzafun: Eat the afikomen, no matter how much of a letdown it might be after all this other chocolate.

Barech: Recite the grace after meals, while staring at more chocolate. Once complete, drink the third glass of chocolate wine. (At this point, everyone’s past the milk.) Also, set out a glass of Kadesh: Make a blessing over the first glass chocolate milk for Elijah, on a separate table six of chocolate wine. Or chocolate milk, if using feet from the main table. Use reduced fat chocopareve meat. Or chocolate martini. late milk for Elijah — he has a long night ahead.

Urchatz: Wash your hands, for 20 seconds, in Hallel: Sing praises in an attempt to start a chocolate fountain. Not the one you’re using working off all the sugar. If you successfully for dessert. fudge your way through this part, you get a Karpas: Dip parsley in salted chocolate. Real- fourth glass of chocolate wine. ly. You’ll be surprised.

Nirtzah: Sing a bunch of songs to drain whatYachatz: Break the middle chocolate-covered ever is left of the kids’ energy after all that chocmatzah. Prepare to hide half of it someplace so olate. Though they’re likely going to be awake obvious that no kid will ever find it and you all the way until you reinfuse them at seder won’t remember it. number two.

Doug Brook is a writer whose column the CDC has determined to be harmful for the immune-suppressed. To read past columns, visit http://brookwrite.com/. For exclusive online content, follow facebook.com/rearpewmirror.

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