September 14, 2012

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Bookworm on readings for Rosh Hashanah Page 7 Rosh Hashanah story from the Labovitzs’ Page 11 Who’s in the kitchen uses a pomegranate glaze Page 13 More school updates Page 21

THE JEWISH

STAR

VOL 11, NO 36 ■ SEPTEMBER 14, 2012 / 27 ELUL 5772

WWW.THEJEWISHSTAR.COM

Stanley Smith:

Inspired by a Rabbi By Malka Eisenberg

Photo by Howard Wechsler

Cedarhurst IDF soldier welcomed at FIDF gala FIDF New York Real Estate Division Chairman Ofer Yardeni welcomes Cpl. Zev Simcha Grushka, 19, from Cedarhurst, who made Aliyah to serve in the IDF where he is now a tank commander. The event raised a whopping $250,000 to support Israel’s troops. Story by Karen C. Green page 12.

In the 1960s, the Board of Education barred Stanley Smith, a 27 year old industrious electrical contractor, from bidding for electrical work, implying that Smith was “too young and didn’t know what to do.” His mentor told him to go “right to the mayor” even though Smith said that he didn’t know him. When he was stopped by a police officer for lack of an appointment at City Hall, Smith took down the officer’s badge and name saying that he was there to report corruption in the Board of Education, a front-page story in the New York Post that day. The officer then ushered Smith in to see Mayor Robert Wagner who was at a meeting with Abe Beame. “There was nothing stopping me,” explained Smith. “I go right to the front door. Rabbi Kalmanowitz gave me the chutzpah.” Stanley Smith, aged 80, president of Mo-

rales Electrical Contractors in Valley Stream, divides his time between Manhattan and Lido Beach. He has many interconnected stories to tell, his eyes piercing and direct under a head of thick white hair. Smith is chairman of the Mirrer Yeshiva Archives Committee, and he holds out letters from Simon Weisenthal and Hubert Humphrey, spreading out photos of himself, ubiquitously Zelig-like, but with more of a pivotal role, with actors, politicians and international figures from over 60 years of networking. But above all, he credits his success and his outlook on life to a man he calls his mentor, Rabbi Avrohom Kalmanowitz, zt”l, who was instrumental in saving the Mirrer Yeshiva in its entirety from the flames of World War II, and worked to save Jews from Hungary and Egypt as well. “He was like Moses of our generation,” said Smith. “I was Continued on page 11

Winthrop hospital gears up for Zadroga Bill additions By Malka Eisenberg The repercussions of the devastation of the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center continue to reverberate on its eleventh anniversary, not only in the raw, searing, emotional pain of those who witnessed its horror, but in those who went to help or breathed in the toxins of that day and the days following. Many developed illnesses ranging from gastrointestinal reflux disease, to sleep apnea, respiratory illness and now, the federal government acknowledges, fifty forms of cancer. This supplements the James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act of 2010 and will expand the free coverage of these and the previously covered illnesses. It covers medications, the co-pay, surgeries, CAT scans, breathing tests and sleep apnea in personnel and workers who can prove that

they were involved in the rescue, recovery and cleanup in the sites of the 9/11 terrorist attack in New York City, the Pentagon and Shanksville, Pennsylvania. “The original Zadroga Bill did not cover any cancers,” said Dr. Marc Wilkenfeld, Chief of the Division of Occupational and Environmental Medicine at Winthrop University Hospital in Garden City, the clinic there that treats patients under the Zadroga Bill. “We do know that the workers and survivors had exposure to carcinogens in the World Trade Center debris. Developing cancer takes a number of years after exposure to carcinogens. Recently, studies of the WTC exposed populations have suggested an increased incidence of cancer.” Wilkenfeld noted that some cancer patients are unable to afford treatment and that “doctors, responders, and sur-

Alfonso Martinez, first responder on 9/11 stares up at the towers during the Town of Hempstead 9/11 memorial ceremony

Photo by Penny Frondelli

Continued on page 3

Shabbat Candlelighting: 6:46 p.m. Shabbat ends 7:55 p.m. 72 minute zman 8:17 p.m. Torah Reading Parshat Nitzavim. Rosh Hashanah Monday, Tuesday. Tzom Gedaliah Wednesday.

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September 14, 2012 by The Jewish Star - Issuu