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Rabbis tell Five Towns to end silence in drug war: P3

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Devarim • Tisha B’Av fast begins motzei Shabbat • July 20, 2018 • 8 Av, 5778 • Torah columns pages 18 –19 • Luach page 18 • Vol 17, No 28

The Newspaper of our Orthodox communities

President Donald Trump suggested after his summit on Monday with Vladimir Putin that he envisions a U.S.-Russian-Israel troika in support of the Jewish state’s interests in Syria.

Trump praised the Russian Federation strongman for his approach toward Israel.

“I think that working with Israel is a great thing,” Trump said during a press conference with Putin that followed their private meeting in Helsinki, Finland. “And creating safety for Israel is something that both President Putin and I would like to see very much.”

While most reaction to Trump’s performance on Monday — especially his siding with Putin against American intelligence officials — was negative, the notion of a mutuality of interests involving war-ravaged Syria offered some positive spin.

“The south of Syria should be brought to the full compliance with the treaty of 1974 about the separation of forces — about separation of forces of Israel and Syria,” Putin said through a translator, speaking with some detail on the subject. “This will bring peace to Golan Heights, and bring a more peaceful relation-

ship between Syria and Israel, and also to provide security of the State of Israel.”

The disengagement Putin referred to allowed Israel and Syria to coexist more or less without incident from 1974 until the 2011 civil war that wracked the country and brought in U.S. and Russian involvement.

Trump in his remarks said Israel’s security was preeminent both in American and Russian considerations of Syria.

“We’ve worked with Israel long and hard for many years, many decades. I think we’ve never — never has anyone, any country been closer than we are,” Trump said. “President Putin also is helping Israel. And we both spoke with Bibi Netanyahu, and they would like to do certain things with respect to Syria, having to do with the safety of Israel. So in that respect, we absolutely would like to work in order to help Israel. And Israel would be working with us. So both countries would work jointly.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in turn, welcomed the attention. In a statement, he commended “the abiding commitment of the U.S. and President Donald Trump to the security of Israel.” Netanyahu also “very much” appreciated “the clear position expressed by President Putin regarding the need to uphold the 1974 Separation of Forces Agreement between Israel and Syria.”

Implicit in Putin’s emphasis on ensuring Israel’s security in the “south” is that Iran, Russia’s de facto ally in assisting the Assad regime’s bid for survival, will be absent from that region, as will its proxy, the Lebanese militia Hezbollah.

But Netanyahu wants Iran out of Syria, period. Prior to meeting with Putin last week in See Protect on page 16

Trump trusts Putin to protect Israel

President Donald Trump and President Vladimir Putin of the Russian Federation on Monday.

White House

Know-nothing Ocasio-Cortez rips ‘occupation’ Left-wing Congressional candidate Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez upped her anti-Israel rhetoric last week, decrying “the occupation of Palestine” by Israel.

After inserting this reference into an interview on the PBS program “Firing Line,” she

sought to backtrack, claiming ignorance.

“I am not the expert on geopolitics on this issue,” she said. “I just look at things through a human rights lens and I may not use the right words.”

“Middle Eastern politics is not exactly at my kitchen table every night,” she said.

Although foreign affairs was not a significant issue in her upset of veteran Rep. Joe Crowley in a June Democratic primary in the Queens-Bronx district, in May she had referred to the killing in May of Gazan protesters by IsSee Ocasio-Cortez on page 7

Tehilla, back home, sends ‘View from Jerusalem’ Tehilla r. goldberg

J

ERUSALEM — Hello from Jerusalem! I am thrilled to take up the original dateline of my column, a continuation of my father’s View From Jerusalem from the 1970s and 1980s.

The last time I was in Israel was during Operation Protective Edge in 2014. I came to visit wounded IDF

soldiers and show solidarity with residents of the South. There were no beach days, Jerusalem meanderings, café tastings, book hunts or side trips.

It’s been a while since I spent time with Israel, the country and particularly Jerusalem, the sacred city.

Just pulling out of the airport and onto the new highways was amazing.

Getting money from the ATM yielded bills bearing new faces — the purple 50-shekel bill with the face and words of Shai Agnon was gone, but the new batch of banknotes continued to highlight literary personalities. And now women have been added.

The 20-shekel bill features “Rachel The Poetess,” as she is known in Israel, with a brief quote from one of her famous poems, Kinneret. Leah Goldberg, an acclaimed poet, writer and children’s book author, graces the

new 100 shekel bill. Dira Lehaskir, “An Apartment For Rent,” is a famous children’s book. Not only is her sophisticated poetry known and studied in university, but every child knows her work. The bill highlights her poem

“White Days,” replete with an image of two graceful Judean Desert deer.

Shaul Tchernichovsky has replaced Agnon on the 50-shekel bill. And Natan Alterman is the face of the new See Returning on page 21

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July 20, 2018 • 8 Av, 5778 THE JEWISH STAR

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By Ed Weintrob Several hundred Five Towners came together on Monday night to mobilize against a plague of drug and alcohol abuse that’s touching a growing number of local families.

“We’re in this problem beause the world is in this problem [and it’s] getting worse,” Rabbi Dov Silver, founder and executive director of Madraigos, told the gathering, convened by the community’s rabbanim and other leaders, at Congregation Beth Shalom in Lawrence.

Rabbi Dr. Aaron Glatt, assistant rabbi at the Young Israel of Woodmere and chief of infectious diseasaes at South Nassau Communities Hospital, cautioned that the “terrible afflictions” of substance abuse “occur in our community, not only in ‘those’ communities.”

He referenced the Gemara in which Rav tells his son to not use drugs. “If Rav had to tell his son, beware of the dangers of drugs,” certainly we need to do the same, Rabbi Glatt said.

Speakers emphasized the importance of addressing the issue and not being handicapped in doing so by concerns over shame and blame.

“There are people who sometimes, through no fault … of anyone, simply succumb to the problem,” said Rabbi Kenneth Hain of Beth Shalom. “It could be a number of risk factors — impulsiveness, anxiety, depression, lack of academic success, bullying, a whole host of possibilities. You [as a parent] may have done nothing wrong. You simply had the blessing of having a child who has issues. And last time I checked, sefer Bereshis is full of difficult children born to Jewish parents who have problems.”

“There’s a Jewish issue here,” Rabbi Hain said, “the worry about shame, about discovery.”

“We all need to solve this problem together, we can’t as a community pretend that this crisis doesn’t exist,” said Senior Hatzalah Paramedic Shlomo Katz. “Too many times Hatazalah calls that I’ve been on are kept a secret. I’ve been on Hatza-

From left: Rivka Drebin, LMSW; Rabbi Dov Silver, Madraigos founder and executive VP; Karen Bayer, LCSW; Shlomo Katz, senior Hatzalah paramedic; Nassau Police Commissioner Patrick Ryder; Rabbi Kenneth Hain of Congrega-

lah calls for overdoes where a week later the parents are trying to convince me that their child had some crazy bubonic plague or some crazy virus.”

“Addiction is a shame-based illness,” said Rivka Drebin, who spoke about losing a son to substance abuse. “[We have to] get over it and get treatment.”

“It’s not a shame to talk about these things,” said Rabbi Yaakov Trump, assistant rabbi of Young Israel of Lawrence-Cedarhurst. “It’s not a shame to come forward. It’s not a shame to save lives.”

Alcohol, marijuana and prescriptions left unsecured at home were described as gateway drugs to greater highs and addiction.

“Our kids know the happy feeling they get after a couple of shots of Scotch or after they pop two Percocets — and if you think your children don’t know, I assure you their classmates know,” said Katz. It’s an “overwhelming crisis.”

“No longer can you say not my son, not my daughter, not my backyard, not my house,” said Nassau Police Commissioner Patrick Ryder.

Katz described a beautiful Shabbos morning kiddush, with “50 types of herring, 12 types of cholent, everybody’s having a good time.” “[If] I walked over to the table where all the liquor is and I pulled out a loaded gun and I put it on the table and I walked away, every person in

toin Beth Shalom; Rabbi Yaakov Trump of the Young Israel of Lawrence-Woodmere; Rabbi Dr. Aaron Glatt of the Young Israel of Woodmere and SNCH; and the moderator, Rabbi Boruch Ber Bender of Achiezer.

The Jewish Star / Ed Weintrob

the room would have me arrested,” he said. “Yet we all stand around drinking at that same kiddush, we extol how great the Scotch is, how smooth it is, how sweet the bourbon is. I like to make a l’chaim too, but what are we teaching our kids?”

As a Hatzalah volunteer, “it’s hard when Shabbos after Shabbos you respond to the same neighborhood and find teenagers drunk,” he said, “when a family brings in a 16-year-old kid that’s laying the middle of the street. They have no idea who he is, he’s so drunk he can’t protect his airway.”

Katz spoke about a Shabbos Chanukah call in which a teenage girl was lost. “It’s an amazing family. I know them my entire life,” he said. “They’re a typical regular family like every one of us. …

“While we were kneeling on the floor over that beautiful child … we’re saying tehillim, we’re begging, we’re crying, we’re pleading, we’re negotiating with Hashem, please not this time, not again.”

Katz said that “this scenario of a drug overdose is playing out 50 times a month in our communities — that’s 600 times a year.”

Rabbi Boruch Ber Bender of Achiezer, the evening’s moderator, said that “we are here because we love our most cherished possession, our children.” Just as we teach of children about fire safety and awareness around strang-

ers, we must properly instruct them about the dangers of substance abuse, he said.

Rabbi Silver of Madraigos said that he keeps on his cellphones “the names of our children who passed away as a reminder” that “this problem of substance abuse hit every side of our community.”

He said the drug epidemic in our communities has been growing worse and hitting earlier, and access to drugs is easier than ever and easier to hide.

Whereas it was once a challenge for kids to venture into dangerous neigbohoods to buy drugs, now “it’s delivered to our houses while we’re away at work. Our children may come home for a few minutes to meet the drug dealer, and we don’t even realize,” he said.

Widespread vaping is another new danger, since its drug content cannot be detected by smell, Rabbi Silver and Commissioner Ryder said.

“The concept of the integrity of the child’s personal space must be reconsidered in light of the dangers,” said Karen Bayer, a Five Towns and Manhattan psychotherapist for 40 years.

There are many resources available in the Five Towns for those who need help. Questions addressed to Help5T@gmail.com will be triaged and appropriately forwarded, Rabbi Trump said.

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THE JEWISH STAR July 20, 2018 • 8 Av, 5778

Silence not golden in fight on substance abuse

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July 20, 2018 • 8 Av, 5778 THE JEWISH STAR

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Frigid Scandinavia cold-shoulders Jews In Finland, Jews bridged East and West

The countries of Scandinavia: Iceland (top left), Denmark (bottom left), then moving rightward toward Russia: Norway, Sweden, and Finland.

Sholom Bolotowsky wears a German-made uniform and holds a Finnish machine gun during World War II. Courtesy Gideon Bolotowsky

In Sweden, a Jihadist, Neo-Nazi squeeze

By Cnaan Liphshiz, JTA MALMO, Sweden — When Carinne Sjoberg dissolved the Jewish community of Umeå in northern Sweden, she knew it would send shockwaves far beyond the small congregation she had spent decades building.

The move in May owed to intimidation by neo-Nazis, making it the first time in decades that a Jewish organization in Western Europe acknowledged that it felt compelled to close shop over safety concerns.

Beginning in 2016, Neo-Nazis from the Nordic Resistance Movement pasted fascist stickers on Umeå’s Jewish community center, “making the place look like after Kristallnacht,” Sjoberg said. The closure followed surveillance activity on the center by the neo-Nazis, who published details about individual visitors.

“I didn’t take it lightly,” Sjoberg, a 56-yearold Jewish mother of two, told JTA. “I hate giving neo-Nazis this victory. But I can’t bear the responsibility for people’s lives, not under such threats,” she said of her city’s Jewish community of 70 people.

The closure caused a national uproar. Amid intense media coverage, Prime Minister Stefan Löfven mentioned it in a speech denouncing anti-democracy forces in his country.

But indignation did little to change the fact that in Sweden, Muslim extremism and the far right are part of a broader set of challenges to Jewish life. While the community of Stockholm may be growing, some Swedish Jews still fear for their future as a minority.

Carinne Sjoberg peels off a sticker left by neoNazis on the door of the former Jewish community center of Umea, Sweden.

Courtesy Sjoberg

A view of the Great Synagogue of Stockholm in 20 12.

WikiCommons

“Even here we face multiple threats, from Muslim extremism to far-right violence,” said Aron Verstandig of Stockholm, president of the Council of Swedish Jewish Communities — an umbrella group with approximately 6,000 members out of Sweden’s estimated 20,000 Jews.

None of these challenges are unique: Several Jewish communities in Eastern Europe suffer neo-Nazi intimidation, and many in the west experience violence from radical Muslims. Nor are the difficulties of living as a religious minority in an ultra-secular society unique to Sweden; they occur across Scandinavia and beyond.

But Sweden is perhaps the only country where Jews report a critical convergence of these issues. Far-right violence is not a concern for Jews in France, where more than a dozen have died since 2012 in attacks by Muslims.

Conversely, Muslim extremism is not an issue to Jews in Ukraine, where far-right nationalists have recently assaulted several congregants.

To some Jewish community leaders in Europe, Swedish Jewry is something of a test.

“The challenges that the Jewish community in Sweden face today are sadly indicative of far wider phenomena taking place across Europe,” said Moshe Kantor, president of the European Jewish Congress.

In the southern county of Skåne, a 15-yearold Jewish student attending a high school near Malmö suffers violent harassment at school from both ethnic Swedes and Muslim immigrants, his father said.

See Sweden on page 23

By Cnaan Liphshiz, JTA Monday’s summit in Finland between Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin recast the Scandinavian nation in a role it had not occupied in decades: that of a political bridge between Russia and the West.

An EU democracy whose border with Russia is longer than the distance between New York and Chicago, Finland during the Cold War relied on centuries of experience to chart a cautious independent course before aligning with the West following the Soviet Union’s collapse.

To Jews, though, Finland continues to serve as a portal between worlds. With all eyes on Finland, JTA collected five anecdotes connected to the country’s extraordinary Jewish history.

Finnish Jewry was born in sin Whereas most European Jewish communities began with merchants seeking new horizons, Finnish Jewry is rooted in a barbaric crime against society’s most vulnerable: impoverished children. The earliest Jewish settlers in Finland were Cantonists, Jewish children who until 1856 were forcefully conscripted into the army of czarist Russia for as long as 29 years.

Finland was a scarcely populated Russian protectorate — it declared independence in 1918 — but its relative independence as a frontier zone appealed to returning soldiers. They wanted to get as far away as possible from the government that had torn them from their families because they were Jews.

There, they “had finally overcome the system and found a safe haven,” Andre Swanström, See Finland on page 5

This synagogue in Turku is one of only two in Finland.

WikiCommons

In Iceland, mother’s milk has been rich in anti-Semitism Commentary by Manfred Gerstenfeld Over the centuries, there has been much anti-Semitism in Iceland.

In the context of modern Israel, it is difficult to find examples of Iceland playing a positive role.

One recent development is a petition circulating Iceland to pull out of next year’s Eurovision contest in Israel. It has 11,000 signatories — significant, in a country of 350,000.

Vilhjalmur Örn Vilhjálmsson, an expert on Icelandic Jewish history, describes anti-Semitism in Iceland over the centuries. In 1938, a German Jewish refugee was deported to Denmark, with Icelandic authorities offering to cover all costs for his expulsion to Nazi Germany if Denmark refused him entry. Decades after the war, similar cases came to light.

Icelandic SS officers fought for

A magnificent waterfall in Iceland.

Nazi Germany, and others served in concentration camps. After the war, Vilhjálmsson said, former members of Iceland’s Nazi party quickly “attained high positions in society.”

Estonian Nazi war criminal Evald Mikson found refuge in Iceland.

When, at the end of the 1980s, Nazi hunter Ephraim Zuroff tried to bring him to trial for the murder of Jews in Estonia, Iceland resisted, leading to attacks on Israel by its media. Its government took more than 10 years after Zuroff’s initial appeals to investigate Mikson’s war crimes. Only after Mikson’s death did a commission find evidence of his guilt.

In 2004, Iceland offered asylum to Bobby Fischer, the former chess champion who said that he hoped the U.S. would “close down all the synagogues, arrest all the Jews, [and]

execute hundreds of thousands of Jewish ringleaders.” In 2004, he was arrested in Japan for using a revoked U.S. passport. Fischer fought extradition and was granted Icelandic citizenship by an act of parliament. He lived there until his death in 2008.

There are isolated examples of positivity. In 1947, Iceland’s representative at the UN, Thor Thors, was the rapporteur for the Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP) that recommended partitioning the British Mandate into two states, one Jewish and one Arab. Abba Eban reported that Thors was “magnificent” in introducing the recommendation to the General Assembly where the vote was taken.

But since then, media mentions of Iceland and Israel signal negaSee Iceland on page 23

Continued from page 4 chairman of the Finnish Society of Church History, wrote in a 2012 essay, “Nicholas I and the Jewish Cantonist Soldiers in Finland.”

Finnish Jews fought (and prayed) alongside Hitler’s soldiers Finland, always straining under Russian domination, fought in World War II against the Soviet Union. Staving off Russian invasion, Finns stabilized the front around the forests in the country’s south, where German soldiers deployed to fight alongside Finns – including Jews.

Finland’s Field Marshal Karl Gustav Mannerheim refused to hand over any of Finland’s 2,700 Jewish residents to the Nazis. As a precaution, he ordered that no Finnish Jewish soldiers serve under the command of his German allies. The Jewish troops even had a field synagogue, where dozens of them prayed regularly, less than a mile away from the German army’s main deployment in their native country.

The situation created plenty of awkward interaction, according to Gideon Bolotowsky, a former leader of Finnish Jewry. His late father Sholom served in the Finnish army as an interpreter.

“When the Germans asked my father how come he speaks such good German, he would tell them ‘It’s important to know your enemy’s language,’” Bolotowsky recalled, laughing.

“They didn’t like his answer very much.”

He has an old photograph showing his father wearing a gray Wehrmacht uniform and toting a Finnish machine gun.

“He felt awkward doing it,” Bolotowsky said of his father. “But you’re in the army. You follow orders.” Sholom and his brother Haim both served alongside the Nazis for three years until 1944. Bolotowsky’s other uncle fought with Russia against Finland and Germany.

Last of the unjust?

More than seven decades after the Holocaust, Finland this year became the latest European nation to announce an official inquiry into the complicity of its troops in genocide.

President Sauli Niinistö announced the first committee of inquiry in January, following the discovery of written testimony by a Finnish Waffen SS officer who said he actively participated in the mass murder of Jews in Ukraine.

It was a major blow to a nation that prides itself on being one of a handful to stand up to the Nazi policy of genocide. Until the discovery, it was believed that Finnish officials saved all but seven of the country’s 2,700 Jews, including 300 who weren’t even citizens.

But last year, Andre Swanström, the chairman of the Finnish Society of Church History, flagged to the Simon Wiesenthal Center the incriminating letters of Finnish volunteers serving in the Nazi SS unit, setting the inquiry in motion.

In one letter, Finnish SS soldier Olavi Kustaa Aadolf Karpo complains to chaplain Ensio Pihkala about having to shoot Jews —but not for moral reasons. Rather, he cites his desire to fight the Russians. “For the execution of Jews,” he wrote, “less skilled personnel would have

5 THE JEWISH STAR July 20, 2018 • 8 Av, 5778

Finland…

sufficed.” Following World War II, Karpo immigrated to Venezuela, where he died in 1988.

At least five other Finns participated in war crimes against Jews, Swanström wrote.

Finish route to freedom Even before the 1991dissolution of the USSR, Christian Zionists used Finland as a pipeline for Soviet Jews. In 1990 Ulla Järvilehto, a Finnish activist, coordinated from Helsinki the very first aliyah flight of the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem, or ICEJ. By the end of thee decade, ICEJ had sponsored 54 full airplanes and brought more than 15,000 olim through what became known as the “Finnish Route.” Helsinki became a major portal for the Jewish communities of northeastern Europe, including Riga and St. Petersburg. In many of these flights, Russian immigrants to Israel flew with Christian Zionists, leading to emotional encounters, according to Howard Flower, ICEJ’s aliyah director.

Today, leaving Russia is far less chaotic. But the Finnish Route is still popular with Russian olim (there were 7,224 of them in 2017, making Russia Israel’s largest provider of new immigrants that year). Finnish Christian Zionists host Israel-bound families in their homes for a few days of rest before they take the plunge.

“The hosts basically give the families a Finnish spa experience, but in a family setting,” Flower said. “Think long saunas and delicious Scandinavian meals.”

Safe haven Sandwiched between Sweden and Russia, Finland is perhaps the only European country where Jews have had uninterrupted safety. The country has seen no assault on a Jew in decades and anti-Semitic hate speech is rare. Neo-Nazism is a fringe phenomenon and jihadism isn’t a major issue: Unlike its Nordic neighbors, Finland has not opened its doors to Muslim immigration. It is believed to have about 40,000 Muslims and 1,400 Jews. In 2013, the community named a new chief rabbi, Simon Livson, who was 30 — one of the world’s youngest bearing the title.

Of course, Jewish life in Finland isn’t perfect. The production of kosher and halal meat is illegal, and the ritual slaughter is deemed cruel. And there’s the challenge of fasting for 19 hours — the amount of daylight Helsinki gets in summer. But being pro-Israel is easier in Finland than in any other Nordic country.

In recent years, Finland and Denmark have emerged as Israel’s closest allies in the region, where the Palestinian-Israeli conflict has soured the Jewish state’s reputation and diplomatic relations with Sweden, Norway and Iceland. Earlier this month, the Finnish media reported that Finland, a high-tech and communications innovator with few natural resources, will purchase Israel’s Gabriel naval missiles, a huge deal estimated at $500 million.

Such relations would have been unthinkable when Finland’s foreign policy was still designed to mollify its neighbor to the east, the famously anti-Israel Soviet Union. Back then, Finland aligned itself in the United Nations with Moscow when it came to the Middle East, according to Bolotowsky, the former communal leader.

“It was a cheap gesture to curry favor with Russia,” he said of Finland’s anti-Israel voting record. “But those days are long gone.”

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As left dumps Israel, what’s a Jewish Dem to do?

By Charles Dunst, JTA After Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez shocked the political world by defeating longtime QueensBronx Rep. Joseph Crowley in a Democratic primary last month, Democratic National Committee Chairman Tom Perez quickly aligned himself with the former political outsider, saying that “she represents the future of our party.”

If so, that future appears to include the kind of sharp criticism of Israel once considered taboo in both major parties.

Ocasio-Cortez ran on a platform of Medicare for all, fully funded public schools and a universal jobs guarantee. But she has also been critical of Israel, calling its military’s killing of Palestinian protesters in May a “massacre.”

The Democratic Socialists of America, of which Ocasio-Cortez is a member, supports the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel. Ocasio-Cortez has remained silent on the issue.

In Minnesota, Democratic congressional candidate Ilhan Omar calls herself an “intersectional feminist” and Israel an apartheid regime. In Virginia’s 5th Congressional District, Democratic nominee Leslie Cockburn is the co-author, along with her husband, of “Dangerous Liaison: The Inside Story of the U.S.-Israeli Covert Relationship,” a scathing 1991 attack on the Jewish state.

“It seems to me that some criticism of Israel is part of a package among young progressives along with health care for all and jobs for all,” Democratic strategist Brad Bannon told Newsweek.

That puts Democrats who are both liberal and pro-Israel in a bind. Whether the result of “intersectionality,” which links Israel’s treatment of Palestinians to other left-wing causes, or a willingness to call out its right-wing government, progressive criticism of Israel may make for some hard choices come Election Day. According to a Pew Research Center survey, the percentage of Democrats saying they sympathize more with Israel than Palestinians has declined from 38 percent in 2001 to 27 percent in

Congressional nominee Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez campaigning for Zephyr Teachout in New York on July 12.

Spencer Platt/Getty Images

2018 — the lowest on record. Support for Israel further decreased among self-identified “liberal” Democrats from 48 percent in 2001 to 19 percent in 2018.

Although the Pew survey received notable criticism, the general trends it notes have been shown elsewhere.

Some credit Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-VT, with normalizing such criticism of Israel. While the 2016 Democratic presidential candidate defined himself as “100 percent pro-Israel,” he recently called on the U.S. to adopt a more balanced policy. In late March, Sanders’ office posted three videos to social media harshly criticizing Israel for what he deemed excessive use of force in Gaza and the Trump administration for not intervening during the border clashes.

Last year, Perez appointed as his deputy Rep. Keith Ellison of Minnesota, who in addition to

being dogged by ties to the anti-Semitic Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, implied that U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East is “governed” by considerations of Israel. (Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress, is running for attorney general in Minnesota and is not seeking re-election. Omar is seeking his seat.)

Left-wing activists have also drawn Democratic politicians into controversy. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, a potential 2020 presidential candidate who has recently tacked left, penned a glowing writeup in Time magazine of controversial progressive heroines Tamika Mallory and Linda Sarsour. Mallory, in a non-apology steeped in progressive terminology, has since defended her relationship with Farrakhan. Sarsour, who argued that Zionism and feminism are incompatible, is a prominent supporter of BDS. “There’s a lot of evidence that defining liberalism through an intersectional lens has had the effect of casting Israel as an ‘oppressor’ and thus a nation worthy of condemnation even as its actual policies on issues associated with intersectionality are infinitely better than those of its neighbors,” KC Johnson, a history professor at Brooklyn College, told JTA. The Republican Jewish Coalition is expected to make the rise of the left a target of its activism. It already has run ads in a Philadelphia congressional district where the Democrat, Scott Wallace, faced heat after a charity he runs was shown to have given to anti-Israel groups. (He said he wasn’t aware.) RJC spokesman Neil Strauss told ABC News that anti-Israel rhetoric has become mainstream in the Democratic Party.

“They’ve jumped right now from some cautionary-type language to outright hostile language on Israel,” Strauss told ABC. “These people are becoming the standard-bearers in the Democratic Party and it’s unfortunate.”

Halie Soifer, executive director of the Jewish Democratic Council of America, said there is no contradiction between Democratic poli-

tics and Jewish interests.

“Given President Trump’s alignment with neo-Nazis and in his politicization of Israel as a partisan issue — not to mention his radically right-wing domestic agenda — we are confident that the overwhelming majority of the Jewish electorate will continue to support Democrats in the upcoming election,” Soifer told JTA. “JDCA is supporting Democratic candidates who share our policy platform and values, and we have, in some instances, spoken out against candidates who are not aligned with our views.

JDCA is proudly serving as the voice of proIsrael and socially progressive Democrats, and we will do everything in our power to ensure that the Jewish community’s values are represented in the midterm elections.”

“Every election, Republicans attempt to use Israel as a partisan wedge issue, and every year they fail to get a majority of the Jewish vote.

This year will be no different.”

Although anti-Israel attitudes certainly exist within progressive circles, some liberal Jews believe they are on the margins.

“I believe that support for Israel remains as strong among both Republicans and Democrats as ever,” said Jack Moline, executive director of the Interfaith Alliance and the former head of the National Jewish Democratic Council. “However, just as people who were formerly on the margins of both parties are now considered part of a big tent, ideas that were once marginal in Israel are being entertained by mainstream leaders.

“For a liberal Zionist like me, objecting to bad policy in Israel is an indication of deeper concern, not lesser support,” he said. “Consider it a victory for the reactionary right that honest disagreement with the current administration has been successfully depicted as betrayal.”

Daniel Shapiro, the former U.S. ambassador to Israel under President Obama, said there is no contradiction between liberal values and ZiSee Progressive Dems on page 16

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Ocasio-Cortez…

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service,” wrote Seth Mandel, op-ed editor of the New York Post, on Twitter. “Her argument is twofold: Israel a colonizing occupier of Palestine, and that she doesn’t know anything about the conflict. Accurate: those who think this have no idea what they’re talking about. At least she’s honest.”

The Republican Jewish Coalition tweeted: “Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez bashes Israel while admitting she is clueless about what is going on there. She simply toes the far-left, radical agenda. Elected Democrats are endorsing this when they endorse her.”

The Simon Wiesenthal Center said in a tweet that she “knows zero about 3,500 yr relationship of Jewish people to Land of Israel.”

Asad Abukhalil, a professor in political science at California State University, Stanislaus, lamented that Ocasio-Cortez’s comments about a two-state solution and support for Israel’s right to exist are “a sign that you have become an already mainstream Democratic candidate.” “’Israel’s right to exist’ is a euphemism for Israel’s right to occupy Palestine,” Abukhalil added. “@Ocasio2018 should have known that.”

Earlier in the PBS program, Ocasio-Cortez, who describes herself as a Democratic Socialist, said in response to a question about the economy that the United States did not have capitalist roots and that capitalism would end.

“Capitalism has not always existed in the world and it will not always exist in the world,” she said. “When this country started … we did not operate on a capitalist economy.”

While Democratic Socialists of America endorses the BDS movement, Ocasio-Cortez has not discussed her position on the boycott.

Tom Perez, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, has called Ocasio-Cortez the “future of our party.”

She is almost certain to win election in November to fill Crowley’s seat. Crowley was a staunch supporter of the Jewish state.

THE JEWISH STAR July 20, 2018 • 8 Av, 5778

Continued from page 1 rael troops as a “massacre.”

On “Firing Line,” she said, “I believe absolutely in Israel’s right to exist,” adding that her previous position on the Gaza classes “is not a referendum on the State of Israel.”

“The lens through which I saw this incident, as an activist, as an organizer — if 60 people were killed in Ferguson, Missouri, if 60 people were killed in the South Bronx, unarmed, if 60 people were killed in Puerto Rico — I just look at that [Gaza] incident … and to me, it would just be completely unacceptable if that happened on our shores,” she said.

“Front Line” host Margaret Hoover, a former aide to President George W. Bush, replied, “Of course the dynamics there, in terms of geopolitics … is very different than people expressing their First Amendment right to protest.”

“Yes,” Ocasio-Cortez conceded, adding, “But I also think that what people are starting to see at least in the occupation … of Palestine [is] just an increasing crisis of humanitarian condition and that to me is just where I tend to come from on this issue.”

When Hoover asked her to clarify what she meant, Ocasio-Cortez paused and answered: “I think what I meant is like the settlements that are increasing in some of these areas in places where Palestinians are experiencing difficulty in access to their housing and homes.”

When asked to expand on her comments, the candidate made her “I am not the expert” assertion.

Both Israel and Hamas, the terrorist organization that controls Gaza, have noted that many of those those killed at the Gaza border were members of Hamas terrorist group. Hamas encouraged its followers to breach the border fence in order to enter Israel and kill Israelis.

Ocasio-Cortez’s comments on Israel prompted criticism from the right and left.

“Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is doing a great

7

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8

The JEWISH STAR Wine & Dine Grilled fruit for summer, chock full of flavor Kosher Kitchen

JoNi SCHoCKett Jewish Star columnist

F

ruit has always been part of a healthy Jewish diet, and all those mentioned in Genesis and beyond are still around today.

Thanks to interstate and international commerce, we can get fruits from all over the world all year round. Reading the countries of origin on the packaging is like taking a trip around the world. Kiwi from New Zealand, oranges from Florida and California, grapes from Chili and Mexico, berries from Brazil. We get fruits and vegetables from Israel and Thailand, Venezuela and beyond.

However good these fruits are, there’s nothing like locally grown, in-season fruits — especially in summer, from sweet, juicy peaches to pineapple, mango, berries, cherries and more. Blueberries are sweet and huge this time of year and, along with strawberries and raspberries, peaches and melons.

My dad used to grow cantaloupes in part of our Massachusetts garden. One summer he even managed a watermelon.

We had a blueberry bush almost the length of our garage and strawberries in a patch that often broke free of its confines and grew a strawberry right in the middle of the lawn.

Summer fruits are loaded with vitamins and sweet goodness that can take the place of any other sweet treats in camp lunchboxes and brown bag work lunches.

Don’t miss the local, homegrown fruits this summer. Enjoy them fresh from the vines, in salads and — my favorite — grilled to perfection.

Grilled Peaches with Goat Cheese and Balsamic Vinegar (Dairy) 4 peaches, cut in half, pits removed 1 Tbsp. dark brown sugar 1/2 tsp. pure vanilla extract 2 Tbsp. butter, melted 2/3 to 1 cup soft goat cheese Good quality, flavored or plain, thick balsamic vinegar Heat the grill to medium high heat.

Cut the peaches in half, remove the pits and place on a plate. Set aside.

Mix the vanilla and brown sugar with the melted butter.

Set aside.

Brush the cut side of the peaches with the melted butter mixture and place on the grill, cut side down. Let cook, undisturbed for 3 to 5 minutes, until golden and easily moved. Turn and brush the cut side again. Place on a plate.

Scoop a small scoop of goat cheese or other cheese into the hole of each peach half. Drizzle with balsamic vinegar

and any remaining brown sugar, butter mix. Serves 4 to 8 as appetizer, side dish to grilled salmon or dessert.

Grilled Pineapple with Brown Sugar Bourbon Glaze (Pareve or Dairy) 1 pineapple, cored, cut into 1/2 to 3/4-inch thick slices 4 to 5 Tbsp. butter melted 3 to 4 Tbsp. dark brown sugar 1/4 to 1/2 tsp. freshly grated ginger OPTIONAL: 1-2 Tbsp. bourbon OPTIONAL: Raspberry or chocolate flavored balsamic vinegar Heat the grill to medium high.

Mix the butter, brown sugar, ginger and bourbon in a small bowl. Mix to dissolve the sugar (it’s fine if it is not all dissolved).

Brush the glaze on one side of the pineapple slices and place them, glaze side down on the grill. Cook until grill marks show, about 1 to 4 minutes. Brush the top side, flip carefully and grill until marks show. Place on a platter. Drizzle with balsamic vinegar. Serves 4 to 8.

Grilled Strawberry, Cantaloupe and Honeydew Skewers with Midori and Lime Glaze (Pareve) MIDORI GLAZE: 1/3 cup Midori liqueur 1/8 to 1/4 cup superfine sugar Juice of one large lime 1/2 to 1 tsp. finely grated lime zest FRUIT SKEWERS: 2 cups each cantaloupe and honeydew cubes, about 1-inch 12 strawberries, hulled GARNISH: Finely minced mint leaves Mix all glaze ingredients together in a small bowl and set aside. Stir frequently to dissolve the sugar.

Cut the melon and wash and hull the berries. Pat dry with paper towels. Place fruits in a large bowl. Pour the glaze over

the fruit and mix gently. Take 4 to 6 skewers and alternate the fruits onto the skewers. Grill over medium high heat, turning as grill marks appear. Turn to grill on all sides, 1 to 4 minutes per side. Brush with additional glaze before serving. Makes 4 to 6 skewers.

Grilled (or Not) Watermelon Pizza (Dairy) 1 small, seedless watermelon 1/3 cup sugar 2 to 3 Tbsp. freshly squeezed lemon juice 1 cup plain Greek-style yogurt 1 tsp. pure vanilla extract 2 Tbsp. sugar, or to taste 2 cups mixed berries, blueberries, raspberries, blackberries 1 to 2 sliced kiwi fruit, bananas, peaches, nectarines, etc.

— your choice Cut the watermelon in half. Cut one full, round slice, abut 1 inch thick, from each half. Set aside. Reserve remaining watermelon pieces for another use.

Mix the sugar, water and lemon juice together. Stir until dissolved.

Mix the yogurt with the sugar and vanilla. Set aside.

Cut the kiwi fruit into half slices. Slice the peaches or other fruit to bite-sized pieces and place in bowl. Set aside.

Heat the grill to medium high. Brush the watermelon rounds with the glaze and place, glaze side down, on the grill.

Cook until grill marks show and then brush the uncooked side with the glaze, turn and cook another few minutes until grill marks show. Carefully place on a large platter, as the water in the melon may heat to boiling and “pop.” Repeat with the other piece.

Let cool for several minutes. Divide the yogurt mixture evenly between both pieces and spread gently. Scatter the berries and other fruits over the yogurt and cut the “pizza” into wedges. Serves 8+.

One-Pot Paprika Chicken with Orzo and Olives

By Samantha Ferraro, The Nosher via JTA This one-pot paprika chicken is a take on my mom’s memorable paprika chicken recipe. I have very fond memories of cleaning the whole bird and then rubbing it down with loads of paprika for weeknight dinners. The spice gives a deep rich color and imparts a delicious smoky flavor.

This is my updated and modernized variation of Mom’s simple recipe, made into an easy one-pan meal. Oh, and find yourself some Castelvetrano olives — they are buttery with a bit of brine and are so addictive. If you can’t, substitute with the easier-to-find green manzanilla olives.

This recipe is excerpted with permission from Samantha Ferraro’s new cookbook, “The Weeknight Mediterranean Kitchen.”

Ingredients: 2 pounds chicken thighs, bone-in and skin-on 2 tsp. smoked paprika 1/2 tsp. salt Olive oil, as needed 1 shallot, chopped finely 2 garlic cloves, chopped finely 8 ounces dried orzo 2 cups chicken stock 1 lemon, sliced

1 cup whole pitted Castelvetrano olives Chopped parsley, for garnish Directions: 1. Preheat the oven to 350 F. 2. In a bowl, toss the chicken with the paprika and salt, making sure the spices evenly coat the chicken.

3. Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat and add enough olive oil to coat the bottom. Don’t add too much oil because the chicken will give off its own fat, as well.

4. Once the oil is hot, place the chicken thighs skin-side down into the hot pan and cook until a deep golden brown, about 3 to 4 minutes, and then flip the chicken over to the other side and cook for an additional 3 minutes.

5. Once both sides of the chicken are a deep golden brown, remove to a plate and set aside.

6. In the same hot skillet, add the shallot and sauté until lightly golden, about 2 to 3 minutes. Add the garlic and sauté for another minute.

7. Add the orzo and stir so it is coated in the oil and aromatics (this will give it great flavor). Use a spatula to even out the orzo. Add the chicken back into the pan, skin-side up and pour in the stock.

8. Scatter the lemon slices and olives over the chicken and orzo and place in the oven, covered, for 25 minutes. Remove the cover and continue cooking for an additional 12 to 15 minutes.

9. Once cooked, remove from the oven and garnish with parsley. Serves 2 to 4.

Samantha Ferraro is a food blogger and photographer at The Little Ferraro Kitchen.

9

THE JEWISH STAR July 20, 2018 • 8 Av, 5778

One of New York's Best!

We’re committed to meeting the needs of the Jewish Community: NYU Winthrop Hospital has a Shabbos & Yom Tov House, a kosher home where families of patients may stay during the Shabbos Festivals and High Holy Days.

Glatt Kosher food is available in the coffee shop located in the main lobby of the hospital.

Shabbos candles and kosher refrigerators are available to patients.

Mincha minyan services are held in the hospital chapel, Monday through Thursday at 1:30 pm.

Siddurim and benchers are available in the chapel.

A shabbos elevator is located in the North Pavilion of the hospital.

Rabbi A. Perl of Congregation Beth Sholom Chabad is available to meet any religious needs patients and their families may have. He may be contacted at 516-739-3636. The Synagogue is located 0.57 miles from the hospital within the eruv.

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By Ron Kampeas, JTA iting minors — also said he had fallen for the Sacha Baron Cohen is back, debuting “Who Israel-award thing.

Walsh said he had been asked to read a story is America?” on Sunday night on Showtime.

In one of four segments on opening night, off a teleprompter about a 4-year-old Israeli who the British Jewish comic — disguising himself grabbed a gun and subdued a terrorist. Walsh in order to prank the famous and not-so-famous said he thought, “Well, this is kind of crazy, but it — takes aim at the unconditional love for Israel is Israel and Israel is strong on defense.”

Cohen apparently intended the segment to among deeply conservative Americans. As Israeli be an expose of zealous support for Col. Erran Morad, a purported terrorgun ownership, although it could be ism expert, Cohen dupes a few curseen as an example of blind support rent and recent politicians, as well as of everything Israel. In real life, gun gun rights activists, into supporting a rights activists have frequently — fictitious initiative to arm toddlers. and often erroneously — cited Israel The gun rights activists, Philip as an example of a country with few Van Cleave and Larry Pratt, endorse restrictions on gun rights. In fact, reMorad’s “Kinderguardian” program. strictions on gun use and ownership So do Trent Lott, the former senator in Israel are far-reaching. from Mississippi; Reps. Dana RohraDavid Frum, a Jewish conservabacher, R-CA., and Joe Wilson, R-SC; Sacha Baron Cohen tive who writes for the Atlantic magand a former Rep., Joe Walsh, R-IL. (Van Cleave stars in a Barney-like instructional azine, tweeted that Cohen “repeatedly takes video in which he sings a variant of “Heads, advantage of people’s affection and respect Shoulders, Knees and Toes”: “Aim at the head, for the State of Israel to deceive and humiliate them.” shoulders, not the toes, not the toes.”)

Allison Kaplan Sommer, an Israeli AmeriRep. Matt Gaetz, R-FL., acquits himself well: “Typically, members of Congress don’t just hear can who writes for the liberal Israeli daily a story about a program and indicate whether Haaretz, was critical, too.

“Yes, your satire was outrageously on point they support it or not,” he tells Morad.

The entire segment appears to have taken and Col. Erran Morad was spot on,” she wrote advantage of the targets’ pro-Israel sympathies. on Facebook, addressing Cohen. “Still — bad Walsh told CNN that Cohen had fooled him enough that Israel gets demonized for the into participating by telling him that he was things it actually does — you have to go and “getting an award from some Israeli TV sta- make horrifying fake stuff up? Satire or not, I’m tion because I’m a great supporter of Israel.” afraid the American public is going to be left For a segment that did not air Sunday night, with the impression that we are, in fact, gun Roy Moore — whose bid for a Senate seat in fans when the truth is our gun control is a milAlabama fell apart over old allegations of solic- lion times stricter than in the US.”

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THE JEWISH STAR July 20, 2018 • 8 Av, 5778

Sacha Baron Cohen plays Israeli caricature

11

July 20, 2018 • 8 Av, 5778 THE JEWISH STAR

12

JEWISH STAR

Schools & Camps

Send news and hi-res photos to Schools@TheJewishStar.com • Deadline Mondays at Noon

Chessed-fun mix at Avnet day camp Chessed and fun fill each day at HALB’s Avnet Country Day School.

At left, campers participated in a special car wash to benefit Tomchei

Shabbos Yad Yeshaya of the Five Towns.

In center, the topic was hydration as almost 1,000 campers and over 300 staff members were enticed to drink

water in personalized water bottles.

At right, Tipot division children put their artistic skills to work when they decorated special Avnet pillowcases.

Ruach’s the word

Campers kicked off the season at the Ruach Day Camp with a July 4th week red, white and blue carnival. They enjoyed inflatable slides, bounce houses and games, and plenty of delicious cotton candy.

A new program for girls entering 4th, 5th, and 6th grades, revolves around empowering them, beginning with an ice-breaker activity. Throughout discussions, the girls demonstrated honesty, openness and tremendous support towards one another.

The first week ended with a fabulous oneg Shabbat.

An Israeli Tech guru at Touro Israeli tech guru Hillel Fuld (pictured) told the 37th commencement of the Touro College Division of Graduate Studies that “the core of business is passion and giving.”

Diplomas were conferred on 1,425 members of the Class of 2018, from six Touro grad-

uate schools, at David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center.

“Today, given the tools and resources you have at your fingertips and the knowledge you have acquired, the only thing preventing you from accomplishing the impossible is you,” Fuld told the assemblage.

He traced in detail his philosophy and path to achieving his goals, stressing that the core of business is “passion and giving.”

“Any small piece of success that I have had trace … back to the day when I started writing my very unstructured thoughts about the world of technology,” he said. “If one of the companies I now work with sold for billions tomorrow, I would change nothing. I would continue doing what I am doing and what I have always done, followed my passion and given as much as I possibly can to all those around me who can benefit from what I have to offer. I suggest you do the same and … right now.”

Fuld’s remarks followed those of Touro College President Alan Kadish, M.D., who encouraged the graduates to help make the world more enlightened and compassionate.

Carnival wraps up the year at SKA The end of year program of the Stella K. Abraham High School for Girls was a blast, as the school’s expansive grounds filled with inflatables, rides, and Rita’s ices. Horseback rid-

ing was a new addition this year.

Faculty and staff members brought their children to share in the fun before the advent of finals and Regent exams.

THE JEWISH STAR July 20, 2018 • 8 Av, 5778

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July 20, 2018 • 8 Av, 5778 THE JEWISH STAR

14

Israel salutes America: 70 who counted in 70

From left: Wiliam Safire (Credit: Alamy Stock Photo /Richard Ellis / Associated Press). James (“Jimmy”) Hoffa (Credit: New York World-Telegram and Sun /John Bottega). A.M. (“Abe”) Rosenthal (Credit: AP). Ruth Wisse. (Credit: Craig / Harvard University).

On the occasion of the Jewish state’s 70th anniversary, the Israeli embassy in Washington, in partnership with the Jewish News Syndicate, celebrates 70 of the greatest American contributors to the U.S.-Israel relationship.

Many of the people and organizations chosen for this acknowledgment will be readily recognized by readers of The Jewish Star, others less so, but their powerful stories build a collective history that reflects the broad base of American love and support for the Jewish state.

This week, The Jewish Star publishes the eighth part of a series that will cover all of the “70 who counted.”

Mortimer “Mort” Zuckerman

(56 of 70) When newspaper publisher and real estate magnate Mortimer Zuckerman was accused by academics of using his wealth and power to support Zionism, he responded: “The allegations of this disproportionate influence of the Jewish community remind me of the 92-yearold man sued in a paternity suit. He said he was so proud, he pleaded guilty.”

That mix of brilliance, wit and unabashed devotion to Zionism is characteristic of the Canadian-American billionaire.

Born and raised by an Orthodox family in Montreal, Zuckerman was an intellectual prodigy. Before turning 25, he earned a bachelor’s degree and a law degree from McGill University, an MBA from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and a master’s in law from Harvard.

He would show equal brilliance in business.

In 1970, he co-founded Boston Properties, building the real estate firm into one of the 500 largest companies in the United States.

Zuckerman, now 80, has used his wealth to advance humanitarian causes. A trustee of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and the Dana Farber Cancer Institute, he has contributed millions to cancer research and treatment.

A special focus, though, has been his support for Israel. Among his many contributions was a $100 million gift in 2016 to bring academics to the Jewish state, on a par with the Rhodes scholarship. The gift aims both to break boycotts against the Jewish state and to draw Israeli researchers abroad back home. The money will go to students and faculty at the

Technion, the Weizmann Institute of Science, Tel Aviv University and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, deepening collaboration between the best research institutions in Israel and the United States.

Perhaps even more importantly, in running news sources like The Atlantic, U.S. News & World Report and The New York Daily News, Zuckerman has been a passionate and informed advocate for Israel. He has published hundreds of articles and op-eds that present the facts of Israel’s history, expose the designs of its enemies, and explain the strategic importance of Israel to America.

In addition, he has served as chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations and as president of the America-Israel Friendship League. Through his philanthropy and outspoken advocacy, Mort Zuckerman has been a great friend of Israel, and a great champion of the U.S.-Israel alliance.

James “Jimmy” Hoffa (1913–1975) (57 of 70)

Jimmy Hoffa, the American labor union leader whose 1975 disappearance became the subject of conspiracy theories, grew up in Detroit in the 1920s. At a young age, he began organizing workers, inspiring strikes and walkouts to fight substandard pay and poor working conditions.

In the 1930s, Hoffa rose to prominence in Detroit’s local Teamsters union chapter, which focused on organizing truck drivers and warehouse workers. Hoffa greatly increased the size of the Teamsters and won numerous contracts that led his union to become one of the most powerful in the nation. Eventually becoming president of the Teamsters in 1957, Hoffa wielded influence and power, winning friends while also making fierce enemies.

Hoffa’s record as a controversial union leader is well known, including his time in prison. But what is not widely recognized is his staunch support of Zionism and the establishment of a Jewish state in British Mandate Palestine. Moved by Zionist dedication to the labor movement’ss ideals, Hoffa used the Teamster’s resources to organize gun-running and smuggling efforts to the yishuv throughout the 1940s.

One version of the story has it that weapons and ammo were hidden in the interior of com-

Jack Kemp with Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir.

Yaacov Saar/GPO

mercial dishwashers. Hoffa, then vice president of the Teamsters, used their trucks to ship the machines to the docks, where they were met by union longshoremen, who loaded some dishwashers onto regular shipments and some onto “special” cargo ships for the Jewish community in Palestine. Upon receipt of the shipment in Palestine, the supplies were diverted to the Jewish underground and reassembled.

In 1955, Hoffa sponsored a charity dinner, raising hundreds of thousands of dollars for a Jerusalem orphanage. Upon visiting Israel to dedicate the orphanage, he was received with a warm welcome by many Israeli leaders, including Golda Meir.

On the question of why Hoffa supported Israel, his son James P. Hoffa, also a supporter of Israel, answers simply that his father’s support was inspired by the Jewish role in building up the American labor movement.

Major labor leaders, such as George Meany and Lane Kirkland, were also significant supporters of Israel. But Jimmy Hoffa’s positive relationship with Israel and Zionism stood out, even among Israel’s numerous friends in the labor movement.

Jack Kemp (1935–2009)

(58 of 70) A seven-time all-star football player, Jack Kemp was equally successful in politics. In the course of that second career, he authored one of history’s most influential tax bills, served in George H. W. Bush’s cabinet and was a Republican nominee for vice president.

He was also an extraordinary friend of the Jewish state. Raised in Los Angeles’s Wilshire district, an Orthodox enclave, he attended a mostly Jewish high school. As with his later experiences playing football alongside black teammates, this set him on a lifelong path of appreciation and respect for his peers.

Almost as soon as he was elected to Congress, Kemp helped co-found the Congressional Coalition for Soviet Jewry. It became a passion for him and his wife; they attended countless events to raise awareness. Kemp was a co-sponsor of the Jackson-Vanik Amendment to ensure that Jewish emigration from the Soviet Union actually happened.

Later, in 1991, as U.S. Housing Secretary, he met with Israel’s Housing Minister Ariel Sha-

Mort Zuckerman with Israeli President Reuven Rivlin.

ron, in deliberate revolt against the wishes of the State Department. It was Kemp’s way of showing the world which side he was on.

As a prominent member of the Republican Party, Kemp made every effort to ensure that the GOP recognized the importance of the Israel-U.S. alliance. He was one of the party’s strongest pro-Israel voices, and his courageous leadership influenced many up-and-coming political figures, including future House Speaker Paul Ryan, that America should always stand with Israel.

Kemp “instinctively knew that Israel stood with America on the frontlines of human freedom,” said his colleague, former Speaker Newt Gingrich. “He was a leader throughout his time in Congress in building the support for Israel that exists to this day.”

The “bleeding-heart conservative,” as Kemp called himself, remained committed to righteousness throughout his life — from combating discrimination and poverty while in Congress to later helping to establish the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

In championing Israel, Kemp repeatedly explained that Israel was like America when it began: “a city on the hill, a place where it was important to protect, defend and display the light of freedom.”

Abe Rosenthal (1922–2006) William Safire (1929–2009)

(59 of 70) New York Times is well known for its criticism of Israel, which is what makes the work of A.M. Rosenthal and William Safire stand out.

When A.M. Rosenthal arrived at The New York Times in the 1950s, Jewish reporters were instructed not to use their first names if they were “too Jewish.” Its overseas bureaus deliberately limited the number of Jewish writers, and the paper worried about appearing too partial to Jews. This changed when A.M. Rosenthal became managing editor in 1969, and in his subsequent positions as an executive editor and columnist. A determined truth-teller, Rosenthal was unashamed about his Judaism and unapologetic in his support for Israel.

Born in Canada and raised in a secular family in the Bronx, Rosenthal showed his Jewish consciousness with his first famous article in Continued on next page

Courtesy Zuckerman Institute-Israel Hadari

Robert Wagner Sr. (1877–1953)

(60 of 70) Robert F. Wagner Sr. was one of the greatest of Christian Zionists who supported the creation of the State of Israel.

Born in Prussia, he came to the United States with his family around his eighth birthday. Grad-

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uating from law school in his hometown of New York, he was elected to the state legislature from the once heavily German-speaking Yorkville section on the Upper East Side. Though hardly monolithically anti-Jewish, this neighborhood would be a home base of German anti-Semitism, and, later, pro-Nazism, in the United States.

To his credit, Wagner, who became a state senator, lieutenant governor and then U.S. Senator, vehemently opposed it.

Wagner had a nearly unmatched record as a legislator, co-authoring the National Labor Relations Act (called the Wagner Act), helping create Social Security, railroad pensions and many other famous bills. But we should honor as well his determined opposition to Nazism.

In 1939, he co-authored the Wagner-Rogers bill to admit German Jewish refugees to the United States. Sadly, while the proposed law called for admitting only an additional 20,000 Jews, it was defeated.

But Wagner was not put off, and in the next year he joined and then became a leader of the organization We Americans of Yorkville, dedicated to opposing and shaming New Yorkers sympathetic to Nazism.

Support for the creation of Israel would become a focus of Wagner’s in the last few years of his life. Consequently, he also co-authored the Taft-Wagner Resolution. Passing both the House and Senate in December 1945, it affirmed U.S. support for a Jewish state and put pressure on U.S. President Harry S. Truman to back that commitment.

Wagner also pressed Truman not to support the Morrison-Grady plan for Palestine.

This scheme would have given the Jewish section of Palestine a territory of just 1,500 square miles, limited Jewish emigration to Palestine to 100,000 displaced persons and placed all of Palestine under what would ultimately be British control. Opposition to this plan was vital to the future of Israel.

Sen. Wagner would continue to show his determined support for the newly established State of Israel right up until his death.

THE JEWISH STAR July 20, 2018 • 8 Av, 5778

Continued from previous page 1958: “There Is No News from Auschwitz.” The article exposed readers to the horror of a visit to the death camp.

Over the decades, Rosenthal was a lucid and persuasive pro-Israel voice at The New York Times. In 1999, he saw that Yasser Arafat was not committed to peace. Whatever his public pronouncements, Arafat, stated Rosenthal, remained bent on “Israel’s defeat or the desiccation of its national will.” Rosenthal’s support for Israel never ran dry.

His pro-Israel stance helped pave the way for his Pulitzer Prize-winning colleague William Safire, the renowned language and opinion columnist who came to the paper after leaving the Nixon administration in 1973. Possessing a razor-sharp pen, Safire could humble the mightiest for any political or linguistic slip.

Yet he could also defend and praise, and he frequently did so in support of the Jewish state.

Indeed, a consistent theme of his columns was the danger that terrorism posed to both America and Israel. On numerous occasions, Safire called on Palestinian leaders to renounce violence and turn to building their society.

Safire enjoyed a decades-long friendship with Ariel Sharon, and in many interviews, allowed Sharon’s opinions on strategic matters to gain a fair hearing. The Safire-Sharon friendship proved especially vital during the Second Intifada (2000-05), when Safire conveyed the grave threat hat Israel faced and the necessity of its self-defense.

These two fixtures at the “Grey Lady” — America’s most prestigious newspaper — consistently made the case that justice was on Israel’s side.

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Continued from page 6 onism, which he said “is the expression of the wholly legitimate right of the Jewish people to sovereignty in their ancient homeland.”

“If there are those in the Democratic Party or the progressive coalition who misunderstand that — there may be some, but we tend to exaggerate the phenomenon — it is incumbent on people like me to educate them about Israel’s inherent legitimacy,” he said.

The larger divide, Shapiro said, relates to the Palestinian issue, not Israel’s existence.

“An Israel that is seen as still seeking to keep a realistic two-state solution alive, where its security needs are met and it is recognized

tinians,” Jacobs said. “The only defensible position is one that stands up for the human rights of both — and insists that these are not in conflict.

“That means working toward two states, and opposing the occupation and the growth of settlements that entrench it. This is the position of the Israeli left who should be the natural partners for the Democratic Party — in contrast to the Republican Party, which has allied itself with Likud, the Jewish Home party and the rest of the pro-settlement, pro-occupation hard right.”

Others see the Democrats’ continued embrace of progressive Israel critics like OcasioCortez, Omar, Ellison, Sarsour and Mallory as further divorcing their party from Israel, leaving liberal Zionists — a majority among American Jews — in political turmoil.

“Democratic base voters are more hostile to Israel than at any point in decades, which will produce a less supportive House Democratic caucus next year,” Johnson told JTA. “As the 2020 presidential primaries take shape, it’s easy to imagine more ideologically flexible contenders such as Kirsten Gillibrand or [California senator] Kamala Harris sharply criticizing Israel to boost their standing with progressive activists.”

“Liberal Zionists,” Johnson warns, “will need to more effectively communicate how Israel’s policies on women’s issues, LGBT rights and civil rights are consistent with a Democratic Party increasingly oriented around identity politics.”

A Wider Bridge, a pro-Israel LGBT group, insists that it is doing just that: making the progressive case for Israel.

“Israel has long received broad support from both Democrats and Republicans. I believe that is still true today,” said Ronit Bezalel, the group’s communications director. “Much of our work at A Wider Bridge is to make the case for Israel among progressive allies. We do not believe that support of Israel excludes the concerns raised on behalf of the Palestinian people.”

as a Jewish state — and even though Palestinian leaders have not yet met their obligations to make that outcome possible — will not have trouble retaining the broad, bipartisan support it has historically enjoyed,” he said.

Jill Jacobs, executive director of T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights, said the Pew study was flawed because it suggested that support for either Israel or the Palestinians implies a lack of advocacy for the other.

“The question of whether one is pro-Israel or pro-Palestinian is a false dichotomy. We need to stop asking questions, in polls and otherwise, that suggest that one must choose between the human rights of Israelis or Pales-

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By Celia Weintrob Photos by Doni Kessler note remarks that opened the fourth While Torah is nual an- passed down way for the mesorahforever true, the ideal tive Five Towns Community Collaboraaccording Conference on to be conveyed the time, emphasizing to the middah of children — and Sunday.

“What is the Torah how an everlastingto our that the primary of Torah and the kids need now?” ingredent needed in Yiddishkeit is embeddedlove he asked. “What today’s chinuch simcha. their beings — worked in 1972 is in necessarily changes won’t work today.”

Twenty-six speakers, “You’re still talking over time.

Rabbi Weinberger, about what rebbetzins, educators, including rabbis, for you in 1972 and insisting thatworked d’asrah of Congregationfounding morah ers and community leadwhat should work lecturers that’s Woodmere Aish Kodesh in and mashpia at sue that challengeeach addressed a key isMoshe Weinberger, for your kid,” Rabbi the YU, reminded families and parents Shila”a, said in key- that Torah and educators in attendance frum communities. The event, schools in will not be received the Young Israel hosted at of Woodmere, if it’s not was orgaSee 5 Towns Rabbi Moshe hosts on page Weinberger, of 15 Kodesh in Woodmere, Congregation Aish delivered keynote

STAR speech.

Presenting their topics, from left: Baruch Fogel of Rabbi Touro College, “Motivating our children to motivate themselves”; Reb-

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betzin Shani Taragin, 7:53 • Torah columns Tanach coordinator and mashgicha 6:46 pm, Havdalah nika, and Morah”; ruchanit at Midreshet Towns candles Rabbi • Five rah V’avodah, Ephraim 5777 Congregation Polakoff, don’t”; “Miriam: Meyaledet, To• 24 Elul Bais 15, 2017 Rabbi Jesse Horn Tefilah, “Teens Meiech • Sept. technology: What and kotel, of Yeshivat HaNitzavim-Vayeil you know and ognize your bashert”; what you and “Helping children balance ideology Rabbi Kenneth pleasure”; Esther of Congregation Hain Wein, “How to Beth Shalom, rec- A-OK to “When it’s say yes.”

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By The Jewish to remember Cedarhurst pausedmiracles of 9/11, at the the n on Sunday. the heroism, and commemoratio village’s annual Rabbi Shay Schachter of WoodIn his invocation, of the Young Israel the Master and (top right photo) pray that G-d, all the strength mere said, “we world, grant us Creator of the to stand firm together against of and the fortitude of extremism, of bigotry, all forms of terror, and of all evil that can be hatred, of racism, forms in our world.” who found in different obligation to those “We have a solemn on Sept. 11th to never injured died or were said Mayor Benjamin but we also forget what happened,” evil, “We saw Weinstock (bottom).

America.” survivor saw the best of (middle), a 9/11 78,” reAri Schonburn Fate of “Miracle and of was waitauthor He and that day. called his experiences on the 78th floor when elevators ing to change

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to an — we believe investiture speech Delivering his Wilf Campus in at YU’sThe Newspaper of our Orthodox communities with many assembly of 2,000 Washington Heights, in by livestream, more listening spoke of the Rabbi Berman the five central “Five Torot, or institution.” teachings, of our believe in Tor“We do not just Chayyim — Torat at Emet but also and values must that our truths he said. live in the world,” teachings, YU’s other central Adam,” “Torat he said, are “Torat Tziyyon, the Chesed,” and “Torat Torah of Redemption.” cereformal Following the community parmonies, the YU street fair at an “InvestFest” Am- tied street fair on Amsterdam Avenue.

11 at the “InvestFest” ceremony, was a along See YU on page new president, Star

Jewish of Yeshiva UniversiVayera • Friday, November 3, 2017 • 14 Cheshvan 5778 • Luach page By The president 21 • The fifth Torah columns pages 20–21 VolSunday 16, No 41 said •on

YU’s after the investiture for a selfie. sterdam Avenue who happily posed sought-after celebrity

Ben Cohen

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Arthur James Balfour

t was a minor news story when it broke in the summer of 2016. Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas announced he was suing Great Britain over the Balfour Declaration, issued on Nov. 2, 1917. But as we observe the centennial of the document this week, it’s important to understand that although his lawsuit was a stunt, Abbas was serious. More than that, the symbolism of his See Tobin on page 22

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or the Palestinians, the year zero is not 1948, when the state of Israel came into being, but 1917, when Great Britain issued, on Nov. 2, the Balfour Declaration—expressing support for the establishment of a “Jewish national home” in Palestine.

So central is the Balfour Declaration to Palestinian political identity that the “Zionist invasion” is officially deemed to have begun in 1917—not in 1882, when the first trickle of Jewish pioneers from Russia began arriving, nor in 1897, when the Zionist movement held its first congress in Basel, nor in the late 1920s, when thousands of German Jews fleeing the rise of Nazism chose to go to Palestine.

The year 1917 is the critical date because that is when, as an anti-Zionist might say, the Zionist hand slipped effortlessly into the British imperial glove. It is a neat, simple historical proposition upon which the entire Palestinian version of events rests: an empire came to our land and gave it to foreigners, we were dispossessed, and for five generations now, we have continued to resist. Moreover, it is given official sanction in the Palestine National Covenant of 1968, in which article 6 defines Jews who “were living permanently in Palestine until the beginning of the Zionist invasion” as “Palestinians”—an invasion that is dated as 1917 in the covenants’ notes.

As the Balfour Declaration’s centenary approached, this theme is much in evidence.

There is now a dedicated Balfour Apology See Cohen on page 22

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Britain Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn— who in 2009 called Hezbollah and Hamas his “friends” — said he would not attend a dinner commemorating the centennial of the Balfour Declaration. Prime Minister Theresa May she would attend “with pride” and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu would be her guest.

“We are proud of the role we played in the creation of the State of Israel and we will certainly mark the centenary with pride,” May said. “I am also pleased that good trade relations and other relations that we have with Israel we are building on and enhancing.”

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IsraAID brings relief to U.S. disasters

By Ron Kampeas, JTA Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico, and WASHINGTON — For 17 years, the then the wildfires in northern California.

Israeli NGO IsraAID has been performPolizer recalls that he was wrapping ing search and rescue, purifying water, up a visit to IsraAID’s new American providing emergency medical assistance headquarters in Palo Alto on Oct. 8 and and walking victims of trauma back to was on his way to a flight to Mexico to psychological health in dozens of disas- oversee operations after a devastating ter-hit countries.

No 25 earthquake there when he got word of • Vol 16, But no season has been busier than the wildfires. “I literally had Luach page 19 9:15 • to do a Uthis past summer and fall, its co-CEO Yo- turn,” he said Havdalah this week in an interview 8:07 pm, tam Polizer said in an interview — and ting Candleligh at the Israeli embassy in Washington.

Towns nowhere more than in the United States.

Polizer spoke with the exhilaration 5777 • Five Tamuz, “The last few months have been un- of an executive whose team has come 2017 • 20 believable,” he said, listing a succession through a daunting challenge.

“We’re of disasters that occupied local staff and the people who stay past the ‘aid festiNiveen Rizkalla working with IsraAID in Santa Rosa, Calif., in volunteers since August: Hurricane Har- val’,” he said, grinning, describing the the wake of deadly wildfires there. vey in Texas, Hurricane Irma in Florida, See IsraAID on page 5 Parsha Pinchas

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Continued from page 1 Russia, the Israeli leader met with top Russian officials and said in a statement that he “made it clear that Israel will not tolerate a military presence by Iran or its proxies anywhere in Syria.”

Putin made clear that he sees the United States and Russia as equal partners in determining the outcome in Syria.

“Russia and the United States apparently can act proactively and take considerable leadership on this issue, and organize the interaction to overcome humanitarian crisis and help Syrian refugees to go back to their homes,” he said.

Trump did not object.

Israel has long relied on U.S. preeminence in the region and watched in dismay as the Obama administration conceded some leadership in Syria to Russia. It’s not likely to welcome equal leadership between the two powers. The same goes for much of the U.S. Congress.

“It is imperative that Congress hold hearings on the extent and scope of any cooperation with Russia in Syria regarding Iran’s presence,” Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, a top Republican, said on Twitter.

As for Assad…

Israeli governments prior to 2011 opposed any bids to remove the Assad regime, saying its leadership of Syria was the least worrisome of multiple terrible options. That changed when Israelis saw the extent of the carnage during the civil war and Assad’s willingness to use chemical weapons against his own people.

For Russia, however, Assad staying in place is a bottom line: That’s the mission to which it committed troops, hardware and reputation for the past seven years. Israel again seems on board with having Assad stay.

“They have an active interest in seeing a stable Assad regime and we in getting the Iranians out,” a senior Israeli official told Reuters.

Reporting from combined news sources.

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subject to all specifications, terms and conditions stated therein. The Division of Purchasing and or the Town Board reserves the right to reject any and all bids, and to accept the bid that is deemed most favorable to the interests of the Town.

ATTENTION VETERANS: You may have certain rights under Section 162 of the New York State Finance Law in connection with public contracts for the purchase of commodities or provision of services. Specifically, this law may authorize acceptance of a bid submitted by a “qualified veteran’s workshop,” provided that the bid shall not exceed the lowest

responsible bid by greater than 15%. It is incumbent on you to submit all required documentation to the Town, demonstrating your qualification for treatment under that section. You should consult your attorney to determine your qualification for treatment under this provision.

DATED: July 19, 2018 HEMPSTEAD, NY LAURA A. GILLEN SUPERVISOR SYLVIA A. CABANA TOWN CLERK GORDON J. FOX DIVISION OF PURCHASING 98459

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‫כוכב של שבת‬

SHAbbAT STAR

Tisha B’Av thanks for our return to Jerusalem From Heart of Jerusalem

Rabbi biNNY FReeDMaN

Jewish Star columnist

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alk through the Old City, and you will find one of the oldest streets in the world.

Known as the Cardo, it was built by the Romans nearly 2,000 years ago and was the main thoroughfare in Jerusalem for nearly seven centuries. One can still see the magnificent columns that adorned its path.

Any tourist who has visited Jerusalem in the last 50 years has seen, even walked on, this magnificent colonnade. But one detail changed the way I will look at it forever.

When the second Beit HaMikdash was destroyed in 70 C.E., there was a sizeable Jewish community in Judea, suffering under Roman rule. By 131 C.E., they had enough: Shimon Bar Kochba, one of Rabbi Akiva’s prize students, rebelled, drawing tens of thousands to his cause. Rabbi Akiva believed it was within his power to be Mashiach. And it made sense: 70 years after the destruction of the first Temple, the Jews had built a second. So 70 years after the Second Temple was destroyed, perhaps it was time for a third?

Alas, it was not to be. The Jews had rebelled, and Emperor Hadrian was determined to put an end to it. He assembled an army of 100,000 men, brutally quashing the rebellion. As many as a million Jews were murdered, or died of hunger and disease.

But Hadrian wanted to stamp out every

last vestige of Jewish independence. It was illegal to practice Judaism. The great rabbis were hunted down and murdered. Rabbi Akiva himself was tortured to death. Hadrian razed to the ground what was left of Jerusalem and rebuilt it as a Roman city, Aelia Capitolina. The name “Jerusalem” was forbidden on pain of death; hence the popularity of the psalm (Tehillim 137:5): “If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right arm wither, may my tongue cleave to my palate.”

As part of the rebuilding, the Romans followed their standard plan for Roman cities, building a grid of streets with the Cardo at its center. And here is the detail that changed the Cardo for me forever: It was built by Jewish slaves, probably captured during the Bar Kochba rebellion — but once completed, it was forbidden for Jews to walk there. Any Jew caught inside the city that was once Jerusalem was put to death on the spot. recall, on a trip to Poland, wandering around the area that had once been the Warsaw ghetto. In the display window of a silver store, I noticed a menorah and a pair of Shabbat candles, complete with the Magen David symbol on their base. It did not take a genius to figure out how those Jewish articles had ended up there.

If you are ever in Rome, on the second level of the Coliseum you will find a plaque explaining that the original building of the Coliseum was funded by the loot of Judea.

The Cardo, then, represents Jewish exile; it was a symbol of Roman domination. We as a people should long ago have ceased to exist, and we should most certainly have given up on Jerusalem, and yet we never stopped dreaming about coming home.

Why does every Jew anywhere in the world, including Israel, pray facing Jerusalem? Why do we mention Jerusalem in the Grace after Meals, at every wedding, and three times a day in our prayers? Jerusalem is mentioned over 500 times in the Bible. No matter what happens to the Jewish people and how far away we may have been, Jerusalem will forever be our holy city. Why? Maimonides, in Hilchot Beit Habechirah (6:16) explains that the sanctity of Jerusalem stems from the Divine Presence, which is never lost.

My teacher, Rabbi Shlomo Riskin, points out that Jerusalem is first mentioned in the Bible when Avraham miraculously defeats four kings with an army of only a few hundred. Malkitzedek, the king of Shalem, proclaims: “Blessed be Avram to G-d most High, who delivers your enemies into your hands” (Bereishit 14:19-20). This is the first time G-d is recognized as the guiding hand of history, hence the name Jerusalem: Yerushalem, the place where G-d is seen.

Rav Soleveitchik points out that there are two significant mountains in Judaism: Sinai, where we received the Torah, and Moriah,

The name ‘Jerusalem’ was forbidden on pain of death.

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Moshe doesn’t tell the whole story Parsha of the Week

Rabbi avi billet Jewish Star columnist

I

n his effort to transmit a lasting imprint on the generation entering the Promised Land, Moshe reminds them of some of the events that defined their nationhood. Among these was the episode of the Spies, with its tragic consequences: 40 years in the wilderness, to die there and not enter the Promised Land.

Our Sages teach us that that this was decreed on the Ninth of Av, an unfortunate day for the Jewish people.

And yet Moshe is strangely mysterious in his depiction. In Devarim 1:23-26, Moshe declares that “the idea to send the twelve men was good in my eyes. They went up until the Eshkol riverbed, and spied the space. They brought back samples of fruit and told us ‘the land G-d is giving us is good.’ But you did not agree to go up, and you rebelled against the Lord your G-d.”

This is the first time the action of the spies is referred as ragel, as in meraglim. In Parshat Shlach they are referred to as anashim, men, who go latur, to scout, the Land.

Even more interesting is Moshe here references either the opening positive comment of the Spies (Bamidbar 13:26-27), or the words of Kalev and Yehoshua (14:6-9). The Spies’ blistering negative report is not mentioned here.

And yet, the consequence of the incident is relayed. One who is unaware of what actually happened in Bamidbar might read this report

by Moshe and wonder, “What is he talking about? What went wrong?”

The Seforno’s comment is most instructive.

Moshe speaks here not about the spies, but about the reaction of the people. The spies themselves are long dead, punished for their negative reports. But their positive report, that the land is flowing with milk and honey and has wonderful fruit, was ignored by the people.

Seforno essentially explains that Moshe meant: “You revealed your wickedness at that time. Your intent in sending spies was to see if you could conquer, which demonstrated that you did not believe in G-d and in His promise to give you the land. Once the spies indicated that the nation in the land was strong, you did not want to go up.”

Moshe digs in further. “The land being good was irrelevant. G-d’s real intent, you surmised, was to take you out of Egypt and have other nations wipe you out. Egypt had an economic interest in your survival, as you were their slaves, and your deaths would have destroyed their economy. A different nation, on the other hand, would lose nothing in destroying you.”

Moshe’s proof that the people did not trust G-d was their constant pining for Egypt. Their feeling was that Egypt was a very good land and that if G-d really wanted to help them, He could have given them Egypt! This, of course, is a complete rejection of the kindness G-d did in taking them out of Egypt and promising them Israel.

In other words, Moshe is suggesting that the only reason the people ignored the good report of the spies was because they did not trust in G-d’s promise. They were at fault for accepting the negative report, and it was their actions that were the source of any problems they faced.

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erhaps Moshe was teaching a few important lessons.

First, if the wicked are dead and buried, we need not recall their negativity, as it is only destructive. We can focus on the good they shared, while leaving out the bad. (The people had already seen under Moshe’s leadership that powerful leaders such as Sichon and Og can be vanquished.)

Second, if there is a problem that hasn’t been properly addressed, it needs to be addressed directly. Moshe’s point — that the 40 years in the wilderness was because of the people’s reaction more than the spies — demonstrates that lack of faith plagued the people even in Moshe’s time, which is why he focuses much more on the people’s reaction than on the spies’ report.

When we consider the first Tisha B’Av as having a negative outcome because of the undue crying of the people, consider that Tisha B’Av remains a day of sadness due to our remaining, in some form, unworthy.

In those days, the people didn’t adequately trust that G-d’s promises would be fulfilled.

They didn’t believe that the Land G-d had promised was good enough for them, partly because they were afraid of the people living there.

Would the Messiah come, would the exile end, would the Temple be built, if all the Jews in the world picked up and moved to Israel?

Would such a move herald the Final Redemption? In either case, are we all ready to do that?

Tisha B’Av is upon us. May we merit for this to be the last time it is not a holiday.

If G-d really wanted to help, He could have given them Egypt!

where the binding of Yitzchak took place and which tradition identifies as the Temple Mount. e have no idea where Mount Sinai is, and almost certainly gave it back to Egypt in the 1979 treaty with nary a mention.

Mount Moriah, on the other hand, is the center of all of Judaism. Rav Soleveitchik suggests that Mount Sinai is the mountain where we received the Torah from G-d; Mount Moriah, where Avraham was willing to give up his beloved son, is where we were willing to give back to G-d.

Jerusalem, then, represents the place where we become intensely conscious of all Hashem has given us, and feel a profound sense of responsibility to give back.

This Shabbat, the Ninth of Av, let us appreciate the gift we have been given to see Jerusalem rebuilt before our eyes, and live up to what that gift means.

Every summer, I noticed that pebbles would mysteriously appear on the tops of the Roman columns of the Cardo, but could never figure out how they got there. Then late one afternoon, I saw a group of kids from the Jewish Quarter, no more than seven or eight years old, standing at the railing opposite the Cardo. They were taking turns tossing pebbles across, trying to land them on the tops of the columns. They awarded one point for landing in the middle of the column, another point for landing close to the edge, and another if your stone knocked someone else’s off. … Jewish children, turning what is left of the Roman Empire into their game.

Shabbat Shalom, and a meaningful fast of Tisha B’Av, from Jerusalem.

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luach Fri July 20 • 8 Av Devarim Candlelighting: 8:03 pm Havdalah: 9:10 pm

Sun July 22 • 10 Av Fast of Tisha B’Av Havdalah: 9:10 pm

Fri July 27 • 16 Av Vaeschanan Candlelighting: 7:57 pm Havdalah: 9:05 pm

Fri Aug 3 • 23 Av

Eikev Candlelighting: 7:50 pm Havdalah: 8:58pm

Fri Aug 10 • 30 Av Rosh Chodesh Elul Re’eh Candlelighting: 7:41 pm Havdalah: 8:49 pm

Fri Aug 17 • 7 Elul Shoftim Candlelighting: 7:32 pm Havdalah: 8:39 pm

Fri Aug 24 • 14 Elul Ki Seitzei Candlelighting: 7:22 pm Havdalah: 8:29 pm

Five Towns times from White Shul

Kosher bookworm

AlAn JAy geRbeR

Jewish Star columnist

T

his week, the saddest on the Jewish calendar, I feature as my guest columnist Rabbi Jeremy Rosen of the Persian Jewish Community of Manhattan.

Rabbi Rosen is a graduate of Cambridge University and Mir Yeshivah with semicha from Rabbi Chaim Shmuelevitz zt’’l. He worked in education and the rabbinate in the UK and Europe before coming to the United States. His many publications include “Varieties of Jewish Religious Thought,” “Commitment and Controversy,” and “Understanding Judaism.” His popular weekly blog is a JeremyRosen.com.

Season of Fasts

by Jeremy Rosen

What actually happened on the fasts of the 17th day of Tammuz and the 9th of Av? Well, my dears, it depends whom you ask.

According to the Mishna (Taanit 4:6) five things happened on the 17th of Tammuz. It is the anniversary of when Moses smashed the first set of stone tablets on Sinai. It is the date that the daily sacrifices in the Temple ended, because the siege meant no animals were available, the defenses of the city of Jerusalem were

breached, Apostomus burnt a scroll of the Torah, and an idol was placed in the Temple.

On the 9th of Av the generation of the desert were told they could not enter the Land of Israel. The First and the Second Temples were destroyed. Betar was conquered, and the city of Jerusalem was plowed up. (Which is why) when the month of Av begins (which it does this year on Friday), we reduce happy occasions.

There are problems with this. Aren’t there always? We are an argumentative lot. The Talmud (Taanit 28b) reminds us that the prophet Jeremiah says that on the 9th of the of the fourth month (after Nissan) the walls of the city were breached and all the fighting men fled (52:7). And explains that the Mishna was referring to the Second Temple being destroyed by the Romans.

The Talmud also says that it was Apostomus who both burned the scroll and put up an idol in the temple. But elsewhere says it was King Menashe who was responsible for the idol. The commentators cannot agree about who Apostomus was, either. Some identified him with Ptolemy. Josephus thought he was a Roman soldier of around 50 CE. Some think he was Antiochus.

Others that he was Syrian procurator. In other words, someone who not only hated Jews, but delighted in humiliating them. Another opinion is that “Apostomus” is the Hebrew transcription for the Latin “Faustinus,” the name of Julius Severus, who was sent by Hadrian to put down the Bar Kochba rebellion, in which case the setting up of an idol in the sanctuary would have

to be refer to the dedication of a temple of Zeus upon the consecrated ground of the Temple.

The Jerusalem Talmud (Taanit 4:5) says that both under the Babylonians and the Romans the breaches in the walls took place on 17th of Tammuz and Jeremiah got slightly mixed up over the dates under the pressure of the war.

Similarly, there are different opinions amongst the rabbis about what day both Temples were destroyed. What is clear is the rabbis felt no compunction about rolling them into one. “We try to combine bad news” (Erchin 11b). he one thing we can all agree on, and that deserves emphasis, is that for 2,500 years we have been mourning the destruction of Jerusalem and the First Temple that the Babylonians destroyed. And for over 2,000 years, the rebuilt Jerusalem and the Second Temple, which the Romans did. Is there any other religion or people that does that? No, of course not. So, when fools (intentionally or not) claim that the Jewish presence in Jerusalem is a 20th century act of imperialism, I would argue that the Roman conquest and then the Muslim conquests of the Land of Israel were acts of earlier imperialism too. Indeed, the Israelite invasion of Canaan was an act of imperialism, except that they believed they were returning home too. One could go further back still to Homo sapiens dispossessing the Neanderthals.

But it seems to me that continuity of devotion, of cultural religious connection, and continued celebration of its victories, and equally

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Who to blame for Tisha B’Av Angel for Shabbat

RAbbi mARc d. Angel JewishIdeas.org

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hy were our Temples in ancient Jerusalem destroyed? Jewish tradition offers answers. The first Temple was destroyed in 586 BCE by the Babylonians, because of the sins of the people of Israel. The second Temple was destroyed by the Romans in 70 C.E., and the Talmud suggests it was a punishment for sinat chinam, Jews hating each other without justification.

The theme of being punished “because of our sins” weaves through religious tradition. We chant these words in the Mussaf on our festival days. We hear these words from various rabbis and teachers who attempt to explain each of our tragic periods as the result of our sins.

Yes, certainly we have made sins. Yes, certainly we should remember our sins, introspect, and repent.

But is it really fair to blame ourselves for all the suffering we have undergone? How about the wicked nations who have tortured, murdered, exiled and humiliated us? Shouldn’t we be aiming some of our anger and frustration against them?

Whatever sins were committed by the Jews of Temple days, weren’t the sins of the Babylonians and Romans far worse? Instead of blaming ourselves, shouldn’t we be blaming the vicious enemies who perpetrated such evil against us?

Should victims of evil focus on their own shortcomings, and ignore the shortcomings of their enemies? Isn’t this an added wound and insult to the victims? aimonides, in his Letter on Astrology, notes that our ancestors suffered for their sins. But the sins were that they did not act practically in their self-defense! They looked to astrologers and to magic to find supernatural ways out of their troubles. Their sin wasn’t of a ritual nature; it was of a practical, organizational and military nature. If they had been more clear-headed, they could have found ways to defend themselves better; they could have developed better foreign policies.

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As we prepare to observe Tisha B’Av, we should certainly have thoughts of repentance in mind. We should reflect on our religious shortcomings. But we should also keep Maimonides’ view in mind. It is not fruitful to blame ourselves and our sins for all the problems we face. Many of these problems aren’t caused by our ritual sins, but by the ruthlessness and hatred of our enemies. Our task must include practical strategies for strengthening ourselves against those who would hurt us. We don’t solve our problems by wishful thinking and chasing after the words of wonder-workers.

Teshuva entails repentance and improving our religious lives.

Teshuva entails clear-sighted, practical work to help our people stand tall and strong.

As we fast and mourn the destruction of our ancient Temples in Jerusalem, let us also give thanks to the Almighty that we live at a time when Jerusalem is a thriving and beautiful city under Jewish sovereignty. And let us thank all those heroes of the Jewish people who have worked, and who continue to work, for the strengthening of Jerusalem and the entire State of Israel.

Sefer Devarim: A beacon of light Torah

RAbbi dAvid eTengoFF

Jewish Star columnist

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n the first mishnah of Pirkei Avot, our Sages teach that the Torah was given to us by Hashem along with the Oral Law: “Moshe received the Torah at Sinai, transmitted it to Yehoshua, who did in kind to the Elders, the Elders to the Prophets and they, in turn, to the Men of the Great Assembly.”

All of Tanach is divrei Elokim emet. As the Talmud Bavli teaches us, it was communicated in humanly accessible form by a trans-historical community of writers: “Who wrote the Scriptures? — Moshe wrote his own book, and the portion of Balaam and Iyov…”

The phrase “his own book,” certainly refers to the Torah. In fact, the Torah is referred to in the Prophets as “Torat Moshe” no less than seven times.

While the entire Torah is the Book of the Law of Moshe, Sefer Devarim stands out most prominently. Indeed, the very first verse proclaims the personal nature of this final volume.

Instead of the usual, “And G-d spoke to Moshe saying,” we encounter: “These are the words which Moshe spoke to all Israel …”

In other words, this sefer is at once divrei Elokim emet, and the heartfelt expression of Moshe’s love for the Jewish people.

Our Sages refer to Sefer Devarim as “Mishneh Torah.” Tosafot and the Ramban translate this term as “repetition.” In their view, it is primarily a summary of previous narratives and halachic passages.

In the introduction to his commentary on Se-

fer Devarim, Rav Naftali Tzvi Yehudah Berlin, the Netziv, takes a very different approach. According to the Netziv, Chazal coined the name “Mishneh Torah” to connote Sefer Devarim’s emphasis on meticulous Torah study. Therefore, Mishneh means depth-level analysis and knowledge of the Torah — including its language, laws, and mussar. he Netziv underscores his understanding by quoting a fascinating Midrash that shows the preeminent position of Sefer Devarim in Rabbinic thought: “Rabbi Shimon ben Yochai said: ‘Sefer Mishneh Torah was the standard of Yehoshua.

At the very moment that the Holy One Blessed be He revealed himself to Yehoshua, He found him sitting [and learning], and the Mishneh Torah was in his hands’” (Bereishit Rabbah, section 6).

We might well ask: “Why not one of the other books of the Torah? Don’t they also incorporate crucial laws and ethics? Why was this Yehoshua’s touchstone?”

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The Netziv’s answer reveals the unique nature of our sefer: “We may learn [from this Midrash] that this book in particular incorporates the entire gamut of moral and ethical principles [that are found throughout the Torah].”

In a few days, we will commemorate the events that befell our people on Tisha b’Av. In light of the Netziv’s understanding, there is no more appropriate sefer than Devarim to read and study on the Shabbat immediately preceding this day.

Tisha b’Av teaches us the necessity of reaching out with compassion to our fellow Jews, whoever and wherever they may be. This is a lifelong journey fraught with many challenges and trials. We are blessed that Torat Moshe in general, and Sefer Devarim in particular, provide the roadmap we need to guide us on the proper path of understanding.

As the Netziv teaches us, Mishneh Torah uniquely encapsulates the mussar that serves as a beacon of light to guide us through the darkest of spiritual times. Like Yehoshua, may G-d grant us the wisdom and discernment to implement its eternal message in our lives.

19 THE JEWISH STAR July 20, 2018 • 8 Av, 5778

Season of Fasts: By Rabbi Rosen

mourning over its tragedies for millennia ought to be a relevant factor. But then, as with antiSemitism, some people are so infected with the virus they cannot see or entertain another point of view. This is one good reason why we should indeed remember, record, and keep the ancient practices of fasting over our losses.

It seems to me that there are some other issues here, too. We recall the fact that on both occasions we were divided amongst ourselves, religiously and politically. On both occasions there were similarities to the present state of the Jewish people.

There is a lot of talk about a decline in Jewish identity. A rift between American Jewry, predominantly Reform and Conservative, and Israeli Jewry, much more traditional. American Jewry mainly Ashkenazi. Israeli Jewry significantly Sephardi. And in both there are large numbers of anti-religious, non-religious, and secular Jews. e have always had sectarian and geographic divides and conflicts. Once it was Babylonia versus Israel. Sadducees against Pharisees or Rabbanites against Karaites. Then Zionists against anti-Zionists. Secular Zionists against religious Zionists. Mensheviks against Bolsheviks. In America there were secular left-wing Yiddish speakers against the Orthodox. Now it is Jews for Democrats versus Jews for Trump. Jews for Israel against those who support BDS. This is the challenge of open societies. So be it. Nothing new.

Reminds me of the secular, Marxist anti-religious Zionists I used to encounter in Israel 50 years ago. The sort who made fun of anyone religious and actively tried to interfere with them and prevent their involvement in civic affairs. In my opinion, the modern Jews who don’t care for Israel’s survival are the heirs of the Jews under Greek rule who tried to reverse their circumcisions and preferred Greek values. Or those Jews who felt closer to Roman or Christian societies than Jewish. There have always been some Jews who would rather see us disappear. Naturally, as someone who wants Judaism, any brand of Jewish identity, to survive, this is disturbing and merits recognition, even if I have no doubt that the committed will survive and thrive.

This sad loss of assimilation (which I disapprove of, as opposed to integration which I applaud) and the loss of so many Jews to our tradition and our people is all the more justification for mourning self-destruction, as the 9th of Av also does.

But I also recall that much of our religious leadership (not all, of course) failed then too, and the Talmud has no problem saying it. I mourn the constant flow of intolerance and insensitivity, not to say corruption, that I see too much of and causes so much negative press.

This is our tragedy now, as it was twice before. We survived it then and we will survive it now. But at what cost?

That is why I fast! We have always been our own worst enemies. What has saved us is that our enemies are so busy fighting each other that they always shoot themselves in the foot, and for the believers, history and the Divine intervening in world affairs.

July 20, 2018 • 8 Av, 5778 THE JEWISH STAR

20

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Exodus 1947: When Brits hit Shoah’s victims number of Jews who could enter then-Palestine The President Warfield was refitted in Baland sentencing thousands of Jews to death in timore and sailed for France on 25th February the Holocaust. The US refused to take them 1947 with a mostly American crew, where it (FDR believed there were too many Jews in picked up over 4,500 Jewish refugees.

America). Churchill refused to allow them onto During the journey, the people on the ExoEnglish soil or into the Jewish homeland. dus 1947 prepared for attack by the British Instead, the Jews Navy. The passengers themselves sought a practiced resistance way to bring Europesessions. The trainan Jews into the holy ing came in handy; land. One of the most the night after the famous of those misrenaming ceremony, sions was the Exodus the “Exodus 1947” 1947. was rammed from Decommissioned three sides, damagin 1946, the President ing the hull, railings, Warfield was bought and lifeboats, and was for $8,000 as scrap by boarded by sailors the Western Trading and Royal Marines.

Company, a front for The Jewish refugees the Haganah. Jewish The Exodus, 1947, after the British takeover. fought back, using tin American Sam Zemurcans, screwdrivers, poray was instrumental in obtaining the ship, tatoes, bottles, wooden boards and metal. which would explain its Honduran registration.

As described by passenger Noah Klieger, Mr. Zemurray’s United Fruit Company was so “The clash had lasted several hours and resulted large it pretty much owned Honduras, or so in three deaths — Second Officer William Berpeople claimed. nstein, an American Aliyah Bet volunteer crew

member; 15-year-old refugee Zvi Jakubowitz, and one other. Some 150 were injured.” he British who today complain about disproportionate response to Hamas rockets attacked the Exodus with guns and clubs while the passengers fought back by throwing potatoes.

Dr. Elana Yael Heideman for The Israel Forever Foundation wrote, “After the fierce and unexpected battle, a taut voice was heard broadcasting in a fine American accent to all of Palestine on Kol Yisrael (the Voice of Israel), the Haganah secret radio: “This is the refugee ship, Exodus 1947. Before dawn today we were attacked by five British destroyers and one cruiser at a distance of 17 miles from the shores of Palestine, in international waters. The assailants immediately opened fire, threw gas bombs, and rammed our ship from three directions. On our deck there are one dead, five dying, and 120 wounded.

The resistance continued for more than 3 hours.

Owing to the severe losses and the condition of the ship, which is in danger of sinking, we were compelled to sail in the direction of Haifa in order to save the 4,500 refugees on board from See Exodus 1947 on page 21 drowning.”

Irish Senate’s ‘boycott Israel’ debate

who reaped the rewards of Oliver Cromwell’s brutal conquest of Ireland in the 17th century, or the Boers in South Africa who placed the yoke of apartheid on the black majority during the 20th.

That the realization of Jewish sovereignty in Israel should be associated with these earlier outrages is nothing new. For nearly a century, the struggle for the autonomy and independence of the Middle East’s non-Arab or nonMuslim minorities — Jews, Kurds and Copts among them — has been ignored by Westerners in thrall to the myth that satisfying Palestinian demands against Israel will bring peace and prosperity to the region in general.

From there, it is but a short step to an embrace of some form of boycott, along with an unquestioning acceptance of the anti-Zionist ideology that underpins it. And as Ireland shows us, those who argue against a boycott can share the same prejudiced assumptions as those in favor of it.

As it stands, the country that will be most damaged by an Irish boycott of Israel will be Ireland. Read the debate for yourselves, and see how many Irish politicians are willing to sacrifice the jobs and livelihoods of Irish citizens for the gesture politics of boycotting Israel.

Common sense may yet prevail. If it does, none of us should be surprised when Irish politicians explain their retreat as the consequence of “Zionist” pressure and American bullying.

After all, what other explanation could there be?

Politics to go

Jeff Dunetz

Jewish Star columnist

S

eventy-one years ago, this week, on July 17, 1947, a rickety old steamship named the President Warfield was renamed Exodus 1947. It was closely trailed by three British navy ships, but that didn’t stop it. The Zionist flag was raised, a wooden sign that read “The President Warfield” was flipped around to read “Haganah Ship Exodus 1947,” and Hatikvah, the future Israeli national anthem, was sung over and over by everyone on board.

With that, the Exodus 1947 became Israel’s first ship of state.

Forget what you saw in the movie. Paul Newman, Sal Mineo, and Eva Marie Saint had nothing to do with the voyage, and the British were more brutal than portrayed onscreen. In reality, they beat the Jewish refugees and took them back to Germany, not Cyprus.

With the White Paper of 1939, the British caved into Arab pressure, severely limiting the

Viewpoint

Ben COHen

Jewish News Service

R

eading the transcript of the debate that took place in the Irish Senate on July 11 before that body voted, by 25-20, to criminalize commercial relations with Jewish communities in the West Bank, I was struck by how the arguments that were traded fell neatly into one of two categories.

Category one: Those who believe that a boycott of Israel is a necessary moral undertaking and seek to introduce such a policy through legislation. Category two: Those who believe that a boycott of Israel is a necessary moral undertaking, but do not agree that enshrining legislation is the right way to go about it.

Here are some illustrations of those arguments. In category one, Sen. Niall Ó Donnghaile of the nationalist Sinn Féin Party invoked Nelson Mandela — who, incidentally, never once described Israel as an “apartheid state” — as he urged his colleagues to consider “what is happening in Palestine and to look at the will of the House and the majority of Irish people, who

want to see us take this mode of solidarity.”

Something approaching a counterargument was offered by Sen. Terry Leyden of the opposition Fianna Fáil Party on behalf of category two. “I would certainly boycott products coming from occupied territories sold by the Israelis on the international market, but it is a different thing for a state to involve itself directly in this area,” said Leyden. “I advise caution.”

Leyden elaborated on his advice with several sensible, practical reasons, including one so grave that you have to wonder why no other Irish politician is apparently worried about it.

“In 2017 we exported $868 million worth of goods to Israel, from where we imported $63 million worth of goods,” Leyden explained, in a bid to persuade his colleagues that many hundreds of jobs in Ireland are at stake.

“Boycotts are serious,” Leyden continued, before adding, “I do not recall a bill being introduced here when South Africa had apartheid.” When it came to addressing the rank hypocrisy that underpins the boycott of Israel, that final observation was about as far as the debate was willing to go. pponents were so nervous about being seen to defend Israel that they resorted to every other argument available. “I have spent hours trying to build relationships

O

with people who will be involved in decision making that can bring about peace — Palestinians, Americans, Israelis and others in Jordan, Egypt, Cyprus and many other neighbouring countries,” pleaded Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney of the ruling Fine Gael Party, as he made the case for a ‘no’ vote. “I have spent a substantial amount of taxpayers’ money funding my travel in these endeavors.”

These “endeavors,” said Coveney, were aimed at rectifying the “deep injustice” that has been imposed upon the Palestinians “for decades.” And it was crystal-clear from the wider debate — whether the speaker spoke in favor or against the legislation — that Ireland’s Senate was in near universal agreement that this injustice had been imposed by Israel alone.

It is this notion of Israel as conceived in “original sin,” with the Palestinians cast as the Christ-like victim, that binds this “soft” version of the BDS campaign, which ostensibly targets only Jewish communities in the West Bank and eastern Jerusalem, with the more familiar “hard” version that targets everything and everyone that is Israeli, or that is linked to Israel in some positive way, as most Diaspora Jews are. It is the consequence of a worldview that dismisses the Jewish nation in Israel as a foreign interloper — like the English settlers

T

Jonathan S. tobin

Jewish News Syndicate

W

hen Jonathan Greenblatt replaced Abe Foxman as national director of the AntiDefamation League in 2015, the shift from a career Jewish professional to a veteran Democratic Party operative with no experience working in the field raised questions about the future direction of the group.

It wasn’t just that after 28 years as the head of the ADL, it was hard to imagine the organization without Foxman. Although he was no stranger to controversy, Foxman had a keen understanding of when the ADL needed to weigh in on an issue and when to keep out of a dispute if taking a stand would threaten its status as a nonpartisan monitor of anti-Semitism.

Three years later, not only is Foxman badly missed, but his replacement has more or less destroyed the organization’s reputation. By repeatedly involving it in political controversies, it is impossible to pretend that Greenblatt’s vision of the group isn’t that of a Democratic Party auxiliary that is increasingly overshadowing and marginalizing its still vital role as the nation’s guardian against anti-Semitism.

The latest proof of this dismal transformation came this week when Greenblatt, a former Clinton and Obama staffer, wasted no time in making clear the group’s opposition to President Donald Trump’s nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to the U.S. Supreme Court. In a tweet only seconds after the White House ceremony announcing the pick ended, Greenblatt denounced Kavanaugh as lacking the “independence and fair treatment for all that is necessary to merit a seat on the nation’s highest court.” The tweet, which teased a press release ready to fire the moment Trump spoke, made it clear that there would be no questions or deliberative process. Indeed, the ADL was quicker to oppose the nomination than some of the most hyper-partisan members of the Democratic caucus. Like many on the left, Greenblatt’s ADL was set to oppose anyone nominated by Trump and wasted no time in doing so.. avanaugh is not above criticism, and the decision to confirm him has serious implications for the future of American law. But while the ADL has a role to play in the national discussion about constitutional issues, Kavanaugh is not an extremist or a radical. Moreover, the context (whether we like it or not) is primarily not about his fitness for the post or his judicial temperament, but about party affiliation. Opinions about Kavanaugh are, with few exceptions, an indicator of loyalty to the Republicans or the Democrats.

K

That’s why, in this moment in history, a group like the ADL ought to be even more careful to avoid stands that color it as a support group for either political party. Joining the fray against Kavanaugh wasn’t just a mistake. It was the act of a reckless partisan who doesn’t even feel the need to maintain the pretense that his group has a higher purpose.

Nor is this the first such instance of partisanship on Greenblatt’s part. In early 2017, he didn’t hesitate to blame Trump for what was being represented as a surge of anti-Semitic incidents across the United States, largely the result of a spate of bomb threats at Jewish community centers. But it turned out that contrary to the ADL’s charge that it was the work of alt-right extremists inspired by the new president, it was a disturbed Israeli teenager who made the threats. The ADL never apologized for its misleading accusations.

In April of this year, Greenblatt doubled down by not merely opposing the nomination of Mike Pompeo to be secretary of state, but joining radical Islamist groups like CAIR in labeling him an anti-Muslim bigot. The charge was false and even condemned Pompeo — a decent man, an ardent friend of Israel and the Jewish people, and an opponent of anti-Semitism — for making statements urging Muslims to denounce terror, identical to stands taken by the ADL in its preGreenblatt era.

Why is Greenblatt getting away with this?

Returning to ‘Jerusalem of Gold’…

Continued from page 1 beautiful 200. These days in Israel, even cash seems elevated to a literary pursuit.

Meanwhile, the souk Machane Yehuda has transformed into a hipster, boutique-y, upscale foodie heaven, replete with urban art, nightlife and an unbeatable local Middle Eastern culinary experience. Thankfully, the usual suspects, second- and sometimes even third-generation kiosk owners, are still there.

The most delicious lemony rice-stuffed cabbage and salatim from Zidkiyahu, the plumpest Medjool dates, the Etrog Man and his juice stall, rows and rows of fresh halva in all flavors, trays of glossed baklava cut to geometric perfection, and the spice and tea leaf market with mounds of desert colors, red paprika to golden turmeric.

They’ve done an unbelievable job with the alleyways of the souk — food tours and tastings and upgraded bastot. I just hope there are still stalls that provide cheap produce, so that poorer

Jerusalem residents can actually shop there. After all, that’s what Machane Yehuda was originally there for. hen I was living nearby and Machane Yehuda was my market, the first time I spied an ATM I was incensed. This was supposed to be an old-school Middle Eastern market for The People. How dare they! Of course, the following week, I ran out of cash, and somehow my conviction melted away.

Slowly, slowly, I saw the market change, little boutiques dotting its alleyways. I was still wistful for the grittiness, but now this space transcends its role as a resource for fish and cucumbers. The people-watching, the shouts of vendors hawking their wares, the fragrances, the opportunity to get lost among the winding alleys—it’s all still a part of the Machane Yehuda experience.

Waiting to catch a taxi at the corner of King George and Jaffa Road, the air suddenly fills with a soulful rendition of the Israeli classic Ad

W

Exodus 1947…

Continued from page 20 From that broadcast, the news began to filter out to the world.

After reaching Haifa, British soldiers transferred the exhausted passengers to three freighters, converted to prison ships, and departed Haifa. The refugees assumed that as “illegal emigrants” they would be interned on Cyprus, but the prison ships were sailing back towards France.

Conditions were harsh. The refugees were crammed together in the bare holds of the freighters. The British Government didn’t care that they were mistreating people who had just survived Hitler, many of whom survived concentration camps. After all, they were only Jews, just as the victims of Palestinian terror are today.

The British prison ships first landed at Toulon, France, where the passengers were ordered to disembark. They refused. French authorities were reluctant to forcibly remove them, so British authorities decided to wait until the passengers disembarked of their own accord.

The British Foreign Secretary threatened to send them back to Germany, but the passengers didn’t budge. They declared a hunger strike, so the British sent them to Hamburg, Germany,

where they again refused to leave. This time, the British authorities compelled the passengers to disembark — violently. Many of them were brutally beaten with clubs. The British took the 4,500 passengers, about half of them survivors of concentration camps, and transferred to displaced person camps in Germany under German guard.

By this time, the ship’s ordeals had received coverage from international media, causing the British government much public embarrassment.

Displaced persons all over Europe protested and staged hunger strikes. Massive protests erupted in the United States. Eventually, the former passengers made aliyah in small groups, and most were in Israel on May 15, 1948, when the nation declared its independence.

Britain’s public embarrassment played a significant role in the diplomatic swing of sympathy toward the Jews and the eventual recognition across the world of a Jewish state in 1948.

But not in Great Britain. In the UN Partition vote that created a Jewish state, Britain abstained. Just as they abstained in the recent UNESCO vote declaring that there is no historical Jewish connection to Jerusalem.

Britain also aided Arab attacks on the na-

Machar, “Until Tomorrow.” I turn to see who it is, and I see a young guy in tzitzit and kippah.

Someone whispers, “It’s Michael from Kochav Nolad,” Israel’s version of American Idol.

The magic of Mamilla is unchanged, yet each time I sit on a café balcony, the sunset deepening into night, the silhouette of the Old City walls take my breath away anew. It feels so peaceful, and, like time, it stretches into the faraway past of Jewish history.

Like the walls, the sea seems to stretch into an eternity of a different kind. Nearby Tel Aviv is a different world. Surfers, sailboats and matkot courts dot this landscape, the glorious promenade along the beach reaching all the way to the ancient port of Jaffa. This trip I wasn’t able to walk all the way there but seeing and hearing the late-night waves was relaxing enough.

For years I’ve been in search of a gem of a Hebrew children’s book that I adored as a child.

Not only was I unsuccessful, but no one seemed scent Jewish State. In his 1979 book A History of Israel, Howard Sachar reported, “Jordan’s Arab Legion was armed and trained by the British, and led by a British officer. At the end of 1948 and the beginning of 1949, British RAF planes flew with Egyptian squadrons over the IsraelEgypt border. On January 7, 1949, Israeli planes shot down four of the British aircraft.”

Seventy-one years ago, the British appeased Arabs, denied Jews entry into the Holy Land, sent them back to the Germany they had just escaped, and placed them in refugee camps. Today Great Britain and its European allies are still appeasing radical Islamists, their calls for destruction, and the hatred they teach their children.

In 1947, the British physically attacked Jews.

Today they attack Israel through diplomacy, such as the anti-settlement resolution they pushed through, and they attack Jewish heritage with cowardly abstentions in UNESCO votes.

The battle to save Israel no longer takes place on a rickety old steamship. The Jewish state now has a modern army for protection, but the Jewish people are in as precarious a position today as they were 1939 or in 1947. Anti-Semitism prevails in the Arab nations, Europe, and even in some places in America.

But thanks to an unbreakable spirit and the help of a loving G-d, Am Yisrael chai. The nation of Israel, both in the Holy Land and the Diaspora, lives!

There’s little doubt that anger against Trump is influencing ADL donors like many others in the Jewish world. Even normally levelheaded people have been driven off the deep end by Trump’s consistently inappropriate behavior and statements, leading many to make offensive analogies between Trump’s presidency and the Nazis. But rather than acting, as he should, as a brake on the worst instincts of the anti-Trump “resistance,” Greenblatt is leading the charge over the cliff.

Were the Kavanaugh nomination an example of Trumpian excess, there might be a leg for the ADL to stand on. But Kavanaugh, a respected mainstream conservative, is exactly the sort of person that any Republican would nominate.

Joining the Democrats in a futile attempt to portray him as an extremist isn’t merely dishonest, but also sends a signal that the ADL thinks all Republicans and conservatives, even the most sober and responsible, are beyond the pale. How can it possibly do its job on anti-Semitism if that’s where Greenblatt, who might have been in line for a senior position in a Hillary Clinton administration, has positioned it?

Perhaps that would be acceptable for other groups, whose brief is admittedly partisan in nature. But the ADL’s role as the nation’s anti-Semitism watchdog is too important to be squandered.

It’s time for the group to reverse course before it’s too late.

Jonathan S. Tobin is editor-in-chief of JNS. to recognize my description. Shabbat morning, I settled down for a cup of coffee and opened the newspaper to read one of the main stories of the weekend edition: A reprinting of this old Hebrew book series, the one that has eluded me for years.

It was crazy. I was flabbergasted. Forget about the renewal of the roads, of the banknotes, of the souk, of the road to the Tel Aviv beaches.

They are re-printing, or re-issuing, one of the Hebrew childhood books so close to my heart!

(Then again, it’s about Holland. But still.) ’ll tell you what hasn’t changed though, because some things never do. And that’s Jerusalem’s magic, still enchanting as ever. Especially dawn prayers at the Kotel. It’s the perfect jet lag activity after the long flight from America.

You’re up anyway. And the magic and mystery of the prayers at dawn never get old. This time was extra special and meaningful to me, because I had the blessing of going to pray with my father and share the experience with him.

Unlike the daytime, when the Kotel is something of a tourist site, the people at dawn are a community, who fill the Kotel with a purity that truly is inspirational. Passing through security, some men were already audibly murmuring morning prayers, siddurim in hand, as they handed their packs to the security guards for inspection.

There’s something about entering the Kotel in the dark of night, and then exiting into the morning when it’s all over, light shining off the Jerusalem stone with a halo that transforms them into a vision of Yeruhalayim shel Zahav. As my father said, “Suddenly, when the sun rose, silence at the Kotel reigned,” due to the synchronicity of Shemone Esrei coinciding with sunrise.

It was Friday morning, Erev Shabbat, when we went. As I left the women’s section, an elderly, wrinkled woman with the aura of Old Jerusalem, greeted me, a heady fragrance of fresh mint engulfing her. A sack of branches and myrtle was at her side, and she reached into the sack and handed them to us to make the blessing, encouraging us to savor it for after the Sabbath nightfall, following the recitation of Friday night Kiddush, when there is the custom of smelling these perfumed branches and spices to the blessing of borei isvei besamim.

The intervening four years of my absence from Jerusalem highlighted so much of the renewal that has transpired here. But also, some things really don’t ever. Because Jerusalem still is Yerushalayim Shel Zahav, Jerusalem of Gold.

Once more, dear reader, I sign off to you with a View From Jerusalem.

Copyright Intermountain Jewish News

I

THE JEWISH STAR July 20, 2018 • 8 Av, 5778

What happened to anti-Semitism-fighting ADL?

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The JEWISH STAR

CAlendar of Events

Send your events to Calendar@TheJewishStar.com • Deadline noon Friday • Compiled by Zachary Schechter Parsha Shiur: [Weekly] Join Michal Horowitz at the YI of Woodmere for a special shiur on the parsha. 9:30 am. 859 Peninsula Blvd, Woodmere.

516-295-0950.

Iyun Tefilah: [Weekly] Rabbi Moshe Teitelbaum at the Young Israel of Lawrence Cedarhurst. 9:45 am. 8 Spruce St, Cedarhurst.

Advanced Yiddish Lessons: [Weekly] YI of Woodmere will be offering advanced Yiddish reading lessons. 10:30-11:30 am. 516-295-4212.

859 Peninsula Blvd, Woodmere.

Lunch and Learn: [Weekly] Join Rabbi Eliyahu Wolf and Rabbi Shay Schachter for a lunch and learn at Traditions. $13 per person. 12:301:30 pm. 516-398-3094.

Learn Maseches Brachos: [Weekly] Join Rabbi Eliyahu Wolf at the YI of Woodmere for a shiur on Maseches Brachos. 5:15 pm. 859 Peninsula Blvd, Woodmere. 516-295-0950.

Building Families: Annual gala to benefit Puah Institute, honoring Dr. Joshua Klein. 7:30 pm. 75 Willow Rd, Woodsburgh. 718-336-0603.

Halacha Shiur: [Weekly] Join Rabbi Yoni Levin at Aish Kodesh for a halacha shiur. 9:30 pm. 894 Woodmere Pl, Woodmere.

Friday July 20

Erev Shabbos Kollel: [Weekly] Eruv Shabbos Kollel starting with 6 am Chassidus shiur with Rav Moshe Weinberger and concluding with 9 am Chevrusah Learning session with Rabbi Yoni Levin. 894 Woodmere Pl, Woodmere. 390 Broadway, Lawrence. 516-569-3600.

Sunday July 22

Tisha B’Av Shiur for Women: Mrs. Michal

Horowitz will be giving a shiur for women at the YI of Woodmere. 1:30 pm. 859 Peninsula Blvd, Woodmere. 516-295-0950.

Tisha B’Av Kumzitz: Rabbi Axelrod and Yakov Hagler will be leading a Tisha B’Av kumzitz at the YI of Woodmere. 859 Peninsula Blvd, Woodmere. 516-295-0950.

Rabbinic Riddles: Rabbi Avi Miller will be giving a Tisha B’av shiur titled “Rabbinic Riddles: The Humorous 1st Chapter of Eicha Rabba” at Congregation Beth Shalom. 390 Broadway, Lawrence.

Relevance of Tisha B’av: Rabbi Kenneth Hain Tisha B’av shiur titled “The Questionable Relevance of Tisha B’av at Congregation Beth Shalom. 8:10 pm. 390 Broadway, Lawrence.

Monday July 23

Bein Adam L’Chavero: Rabbi Issac Rice will be giving a shiur for women at YI of Woodmere on “Bein Adam L’Chavero.” 9:30 am. 859 Peninsula Blvd, Woodmere. 516-295-0950.

Women’s Shiur: [Weekly] Dr. Anette Labovitz’s women shiur will continue at Aish Kodesh.

10 am. 894 Woodmere Pl, Woodmere.

County Fair: Bonei Olam invites the community to its annual event, with wine tasting by Herzog and entertainment by Pumpidisa. 7:30 pm.

Fulton St & Central Ave, Lawrence.

Seeing Things Clearly: [Weekly] Join Rabbi Shalom Yona Weis at Aish Kodesh for a shiur for women and high school girls titled “Seeing Things Clearly- Learning to View Our World and Our Lives Through Positive Lenses. 8:45 pm. 894 Woodmere Pl, Woodmere.

The Formation of the Talmud Bavli: Both women and men are invited to Join Rabbi Dr. Ari

Bergman for a shiur on “The Formation of the Talmud Bavli: Historical, Literary and Theological Dimensions.” 9 pm. 859 Peninsula Blvd, Woodmere. 516-295-0950.

Gemara Shiur: [Weekly] Join Rabbi Dr. Aaron Glatt at the YI of Woodmere for a gemara shiu.

9:15 pm. 859 Peninsula Blvd, Woodmere. 516295-0950.

Tuesday July 24

Wednesday July 25

Connect: [Weekly] Breakfast Connect is a business and networking group that meets for breakfast at Riesterer’s Bakery and to discuss business and networking opportunities. 7:30-8:30 am. 282 Hempstead Ave, West Hempstead. 516-662-7712.

Life Lessons: Rabbi Shay Shachter will be giving a shiur for women on “Life Lessons From Pirkei Avos” at YI of Woodmere. 9:30 am. 859 Peninsula Blvd, Woodmere. 516-295-0950.

Women’s Shiur: [Weekly] Rebbetzin Weinberger of Aish Kodesh will give a shiur on the “Midah of Seder in our Avodas Hashem.” 11 am.

894 Woodmere Pl, Woodmere.

Summer Spectacular Open House: The Chabad Center for Jewish Life invites families to an open house BBQ as they kick off registration for the 2019 camp season and the 2018-19 school year. 5:30 pm. 2174 Hewlett Ave, Merrick. 516833-3057.

Yiddish Classes: [Weekly] YI of Woodmere will be offering basic Yiddish lessons for seven weeks. Must know how to read Hebrew. Covers basic Yiddish and conversation. 8-9 pm. 859 Peninsula Blvd, Woodmere. 516-621-7880.

Jewish History: [Weekly] Join Rabbi Evan Hoffman at the YI of Woodmere for a talk on Jewish History. 8:15 pm. 859 Peninsula Blvd, Woodmere. 516-295-0950.

Halacha Shiur: [Weekly] Join Rabbi Moshe Sokoloff at the YI of Woodmere for a halacha shiur. 8:40 pm. 859 Peninsula Blvd, Woodmere.

516-295-0950.

Timely Tanach: [Weekly] Join Rabbi Ya’akov Trump of the Young Israel of Lawrence Cedarhurst for a shiur on Sefer Shoftim. 8 pm. 8 Spruce St, Cedarhurst.

Chumash and Halacha Shiur: [Weekly] Shiur with Rabbi Yosef Richtman at Aish Kodesh.

8 pm. 894 Woodmere Pl, Woodmere.

Sefer Yonah: Men and women are invited to Mrs. Gitta Neufeld’s in depth study of Sefer Yonah at YI of Woodmere. 8:00-9:00 pm. 859 Peninsula Blvd, Woodmere. 516-295-0950.

OneIsrael Dinner: Join OneIsrael Fund for a BBQ and Israeli wine tasting. 8:00 pm. 47 Barrett Road, Lawrence. For more information, email events@oneisraelfund.org. $200 per couple.

Shiur and Tehillim Group: [Weekly] Join the women of YI of Woodmere at the home of Devorah Schochet. 9:15 pm. 559 Saddle Ridge Rd.

Sunday July 29

Timely Torah: [Weekly] Join Rabbi Ya’akov Trump, assistant rabbi of the Young Israel of Lawrence-Cedarhurst, for a shiur on relevant Halachic and philosophical topics related to Parsha Moadim and contemporary issues. Coffee and pastries. 8 am. 8 Spruce St, Cedarhurst.

Learning Program: [Weekly] At Aish Kodesh led by Rav Moshe Weinberger following 8:15 Shacharis including 9 am breakfast and shiurim on subjects such as halacha, gemara and divrei chizuk. 894 Woodmere Pl, Woodmere.

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Iceland…

Continued from page 4 tive news. In 2011, its parliament was the first in Western Europe to recognize a Palestinian state, under foreign minister Össur Skarphéðinsson, who has been sharply critical of Israel. MP Birgitta Jónsdóttir was the first parliamentarian of any country to visit participants of the Gaza flotilla.

In 2015, Iceland’s capital, Reykjavik, decided to boycott Israeli products. City council members said the boycott was a symbolic act of support for Palestinian statehood. The Icelandic Foreign Ministry said the city council’s decision did not reflect the country’s policy.

The latest indignity was this year’s proposal to ban circumcision, which would have made Iceland the first country in Europe to do so.

The bill attracted much negative international attention — Reinhard Marx, the cardinal of Munich and Chairman of the Commission of the Bishops Conferences of the European Community, denounced it as an attack on religious freedom. The bishop of the National Church of Iceland said the ban could criminalize Judaism and Islam.

Every year before Easter, hymns full of hatred for the Jews are broadcast on Iceland’s public radio station. These were written in the 17th century, years before Jews arrived in Iceland, by the priest and poet Hallgrímur Pétursson. One hymn, entitled “The Demand for Crucifixion,” reads: “The Jewish leaders all decide that Jesus must be crucified. The Prince of Life their prey must be.

The murderer set at liberty.” The Wiesenthal Center protested this practice, but to no avail.

Recently, a Chabad emissary arrived in Reykjavik and established a Chabad House, the first permanent Jewish institution in Iceland’s history. The highest estimate of Jews in the country is 250 — a tiny presence. One can only hope that the new emissary will not be subjected to abuse.

Dr. Manfred Gerstenfeld is a Senior Research Associate at the BESA Center.

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Continued from page 4 “The leader of one gang is an Afghan boy,” the father, an Israeli who moved to Sweden eight years ago for work, told JTA on condition of anonymity. One beating happened after his son refused to play a soccer match with one team called “Jews” and another “Palestinians.”

His son “goes to school reluctantly. He doesn’t want to live here. He wants to move back to Israel as soon as he turns 18, join the army and fight the Arabs. He’s become very right-wing,” the father said.

Stefan Dozzi, the secretary-general of the Sweden-Israel Friendship Association, has firsthand experience. During the Almedalen political activism conference last week on the island of Gotland, south of Stockholm, he and another activist were assaulted by neo-Nazis who attempted to place their banner on the association’s flag in the group’s pavilion. It was the first time the pro-Israel group had set up a pavilion during the Almedalen conference.

The incident was widely reported in Swedish media. However, Dozzi said, “no one wrote about the intimidation by Muslims” at Almedalen. At least two men he described as Muslims told him they would burn the Israeli flag on display at the association’s pavilion. Dozzi said the flag was stolen during a break later that day.

“We have two kinds of enemies,” said Dozzi, who says he has Jewish roots. “I think things will only get worse here, with the Muslims and the neo-Nazis. We will have to flee this country eventually.” Dozzi, who works for the association full time, said he feels “safer in Israel.”

In Umeå, Sjoberg said she has faced various forms of anti-Semitism, ranging from the neoNazi harassment to “Arabs who spat at me on the street for wearing a Star of David pendant.”

Such incidents involving Muslims are on the mild end of the spectrum. Last month, three Arab men were convicted of firebombing the synagogue of Gothenburg in southern Sweden in December after President Donald Trump announced that the U.S. Embassy in Israel would be moved to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv.

It was one of several attacks on Jewish places in worship in southern Sweden in recent years, especially in Malmö, where a third of the population is Muslim and only about 1,000 are Jewish.

Jihadism and neo-Nazi anti-Semitism “feed off one another” in Sweden, Sjoberg said.

The arrival of hundreds of thousands of Muslims to Sweden, starting in the 1970s, generated “less tolerance to people who are perceived as foreign,” emboldening the far right.

“I don’t think they would have dared to go after us like this 15 years ago,” Sjoberg said.

The boldness of neo-Nazis in Sweden seems unusual for Western Europe, where law enforcement agencies with bitter memories of Nazism have a relatively low tolerance for farright shenanigans.

In 2015 and 2017, skinheads disrupted lectures in Swedish schools by Holocaust survivors. In Gothenburg last year, hundreds of neoNazis marched on Yom Kippur. The march’s original itinerary had them pass the synagogue, but city authorities made them avoid it.

Part of the problem, Sjoberg said, is that Sweden was never de-Nazified after World War II — it was officially neutral, but in practice collaborated with Nazi Germany.

“There was massive support for the Nazis, but none of the reckoning against collaborators that happened in occupied countries after liberation,” she said, referencing prosecutions in France, Italy, the Netherlands and beyond.

In Umeå, authorities lack the determination to stand up for the Jewish community, Sjoberg said.

Talks on moving the Jewish center to a secure location ended abruptly last year, she said, when authorities put the intended space up for rent and backed out of an agreement to turn it into a JCC. “They were giving us the run-around, not keeping to agreements and leaving us twisting in the wind when we were being targeted by neo-Nazis keeping track of our comings and goings. I had to pull the plug,” Sjoberg said.

Umeå’s deputy mayor, Margareta Rönngren,

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disputed this. “The members decided to close down the community; the municipality cannot take responsibility for that,” Rönngren told JTA. “Accommodation was an urgent issue.

The municipality tried to help the community, but could not at this time find a safe solution that met the community’s requirements.”

The city “in fact offered the Jewish community center other accommodation, safety premises were checked by our security department, but the community didn’t approve,” she said.

“The closure of the Umeå Jewish community center is very sad” and “very serious when the causes are threats and harassment.”

In addition to violent harassment, Swedish Jews also need to deal with strict state secularism. Ritual slaughter is illegal, and although circumcision of boys under 18 is allowed, it is a constant subject for debate. In Gothenburg, a Chabad rabbi and his wife are facing hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines for homeschooling their children. In March, two Cabinet ministers called for shuttering all faith schools.

Yet even against this backdrop, Jewish life has prevailed, at least in Stockholm, according to Petra Kahn Nord, the community’s spokeswoman. The capital, she said, has three synagogues, a JCC with a kosher shop and a newly opened Jewish library.

Stockholm also has a Jewish kindergarten and a Jewish school “with a long waiting list,” Kahn Nord said, adding that the community in the city is growing with a lively participation of young congregants and at least one Limmud Jewish learning conference annually.

But this success feeds off other communities, like Malmö, where there are so few Jews left that the Jewish kindergarten there now has mostly non-Jewish children, Kahn Nord acknowledged. She said some Jews from her hometown of Malmö, Gothenburg and beyond leave for Stockholm because of harassment.

But many do so “for positive reasons — because they want to have a more Jewish life,” Kahn Nord said. So while “Stockholm’s Jewish community is growing,” in the rest of Sweden “it’s just dying away.”

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