Jewish News - 11.29.21

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Southeastern Virginia | Vol. 60 No. 6 | 25 Kislev 5782 | November 29, 2021

31 Book Festival: Lots of authors, lots of topics

The Jewish response to climate change

32 Israeli artist at Chrysler Museum

—page 6 33 An afternoon of parenting and playing

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Business in the Jewish Community 34 Adam Mansbach Wednesday, December 8 Supplement to Jewish News November 29, 2021 jewishnewsva.org | November 29, 2021 | Business | Jewish News | 15

STEIN FAMILY COLLEGE SCHOLARSHIP The Stein Family College Scholarship is dedicated in loving memory of Arlene Shea Stein who was unable to finish college due to financial hardship.

Application is open Dec 1, 2021 to March 1, 2022 To apply or for more information, visit:

bit.ly/tjf-stein

ELIGIBILITY This annual college scholarship of up to $10,000 per year is awarded to Hampton Roads Jewish students entering college. Applicants are evaluated on financial need, Jewish/community engagement, and academic potential. Scholarship applicants must: • Identify as Jewish • Maintain residency in the Tidewater region • Demonstrate academic ability • Demonstrate a history of service and engagement in their academic, Jewish, and broader communities through extracurricular and volunteer activities

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UPFRONT

JEWISH NEWS jewishnewsva.org

Less than half of Jewish Israelis support a mandatory army draft, per new poll Shira Hanau

(JTA)—A new poll conducted in Israel found that more Israelis support professionalizing the army and abolishing the draft than opposed that idea.

The poll was the first time the Israel Democracy Institute found that more Israelis supported the idea of abolishing the draft than opposed it since the organization began studying the question in 2017.

In this year’s survey, 47% of Jewish respondents believe the draft should be abolished while 42% disagreed. In 2017, just 38% supported professionalization while 59% opposed it.

In Israel, all citizens are drafted into the army at age 18, though Arab and Druze Israelis are given exemptions, as are most haredi Orthodox citizens and many religious women.

The poll points to a future in which support for the army, already decreasing in recent years among the Israeli public, could sink low enough to actually undermine its ability to function. The poll also indicates that among younger Israelis, support for the draft is far lower

47% of Jewish respondents believe the draft should be abolished while 42% disagreed.

Shelia Josehberg: The mystery of my Russian Grandpa Joe. . . 28 Parenting (and Playing) with sanity. . . . . . . . . 29 Mitzvah Squad at Temple Israel . . . . . . . . . . . . 30 PJ Library in Tidewater honors military families. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30 Veterans Day activity at Toras Chaim. . . . . . . . 30 National Jewish Book Month celebrated in Tidewater. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31 Chrysler Museum partners with UJFT. . . . . . . 32 Israel Today partners with Glass Studio. . . . . . 33 What’s Happening. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34 Calendar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35 Obituaries. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

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CANDLE LIGHTING

QUOTABLE

CONTENTS Upfront . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Briefs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Deborah Lipstadt’s nomination delayed. . . . . . . 5 Jewish response to climate change. . . . . . . . . . . 6 National survey raises concern about Gen-Z Jews. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 JDC’s unique Hanukkah program. . . . . . . . . . . 10 TJF’s refreshed donor portal. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 Making Hampton Roads more equitable. . . . . . 12 Beth Sholom Village cares for all. . . . . . . . . . . . 13 CARES Act provides charitable deduction in 2021. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 Special Section: Business in the Jewish Community . . . . . . . 15

than among older Israelis, which could increase public support for ending the draft in the years to come.

Among those ages 18-44, 54-57% supported abolishing the draft while just 31-32% of those ages 55 and up felt the same.

Yohanan Plesner, president of the Israel Democracy Institute, warns that shifting from a universal draft to a professional army would be disastrous for Israel’s security.

“We may find ourselves in a situation in which a small minority of idealists serve in the military alongside those who chose to sign up for lack of any better employment options,” Plesner says, noting that the idea of professionalizing the army “should be removed from the public agenda.”

He adds: “It is important to understand that, without retaining some form of the ‘people’s army’ model, Israel’s security cannot be guaranteed for the long term.”

The poll, which surveyed 1,003 Israelis in Hebrew and Arabic, was conducted by the Israel Democracy Institute via phone calls and the internet between Sept. 30 and Oct. 4.

Published 20 times a year by United Jewish Federation of Tidewater.

All of us are the lucky recipients of those who bravely took a leap of faith. Thank you, Grandpa Joe for that gift.”

—page 28

Friday, Dec. 3/29 Kislev Light candles at 4:30 pm Friday, Dec. 10/6 Tevet Light candles at 4:31 pm Friday, Dec. 17/13 Tevet Light candles at 4:33 pm Friday, Dec. 24/20 Tevet Light candles at 4:36 pm Friday, Dec. 31/27 Tevet Light candles at 4:41 pm Friday, Jan. 7/5 Shevet Light candles at 4:47 pm

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BRIEFS ISRAEL IGNORED US WARNINGS THAT ATTACKS ON IRAN’S NUCLEAR PROGRAM WERE COUNTERPRODUCTIVE American officials have warned Israeli officials that their country’s repeated attacks on Iran’s nuclear program have been counterproductive, arguing that Iran has continually rebuilt the destroyed facilities to be more effective, according to a report in The New York Times.

Israeli officials have ignored the warnings, according to the report.

The report comes ahead of a planned meeting in Vienna between Iranian officials and the countries still remaining in the 2015 Iran deal to discuss the country’s nuclear program. Despite President Joe Biden’s interest in negotiating a new deal, U.S. leaders will not be part of the meetings as Iranian officials have refused to meet with them since Donald Trump’s 2018 decision to pull out of the agreement.

It also follows a period in which Israel is believed to have been behind a number of attacks on Iran’s nuclear facilities, as well as the assassination last year of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, one of the country’s top nuclear scientists.

But even with Israel’s frequent attacks on the nuclear program, American officials say Iran has quickly recovered from them, sometimes with new machines that can enrich uranium at a faster pace. (JTA) IN A BIG YEAR FOR HIS FAMILY, DOUG EMHOFF PICKS PUTTING MEZUZAH ON VP HOUSE AS A TOP MEMORY When Doug Emhoff, the husband of Vice President Kamala Harris, picked a favorite memory from the last year for a reflective Thanksgiving-themed tweet, he didn’t turn to the day in January when his wife was sworn in or mention their first diplomatic trip together.

Instead, he shared pictures from the day his family affixed a mezuzah on the doorframe of the vice president’s mansion.

Mezuzahs are tubes containing the text of the Shema prayer that Jews traditionally attach to their doorposts. Emhoff is the first Jew to reside in the vice president’s house.

One picture shows him in the process of affixing the family’s mezuzah, which is

narrow, white and mounted against what appears to be a pink hamsa. Another offers a close-up.

“For us, and for everyone, Thanksgiving is a time for reflection on the past year,” Emhoff wrote. “One of my favorite memories was when our family visited and together we hung a mezuzah on the front door of the Vice President’s Residence.”

That event took place Oct. 7, nine months after Emhoff and Harris moved into the residence and after it had undergone renovations, the Forward reported.

Rabbi Peter Berg of The Temple, a Reform synagogue in Atlanta, was present at the event. (Rabbis are not required to put up a mezuzah, which traditionally observant Jews mount inside their homes as well as on the front doors.)

The Temple has made other political appearances this year. Georgia Sen. Jon Ossoff borrowed a book of Jewish scripture from the synagogue, where he celebrated his bar mitzvah, for his swearing-in ceremony in January. The Bible had been used by the synagogue’s former rabbi who played an active role in forging relationships between Jews and Blacks in Georgia. (JTA)

AFTER PATRICK LEAHY’S RETIREMENT, DIANNE FEINSTEIN COULD BECOME THE FIRST JEW TO BE 3RD IN LINE FOR THE PRESIDENCY Patrick Leahy, the Vermont Democrat who is the longest-serving member of his party in the U.S. Senate, announced this month that he will not run for reelection next year, setting the stage for Dianne Feinstein of California to be the first woman and first Jew to be the Senate’s president pro tempore, the third in line to the U.S. presidency.

The president pro tempore presides over the Senate when the vice president is absent, and also has the power to name people to administrative positions and commissions. The Senate elects the president pro tempore, which means that the position is always filled by a member of the majority party.

Since the mid-20th century, both parties have named their longest-serving senator to the job. Leahy has served in the chamber since 1975 and Feinstein has

4 | JEWISH NEWS | November 29, 2021 | jewishnewsva.org

since 1992.

There is no guarantee that Feinstein, who was elected to serve until January 2025, will get the job. Republicans hope to regain the evenly divided Senate in next year’s midterm elections. Additionally, Feinstein, who is 88, is believed to be in ill health, and Democrats are not under any obligation to maintain the relatively recent tradition of nominating the longest-serving member of their caucus.

Feinstein stepped down last year from the chairmanship of the powerful Judiciary Committee and did not seek a leadership position on any other committee.

Should Feinstein assume the job, and should Democrats keep the U.S. House of Representatives in the midterms, there would be three California women lined up to succeed President Joe Biden should he leave office before the next election: In order, Vice President Kamala Harris, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and Feinstein. (JTA)

DANNY FENSTER, JEWISH JOURNALIST JAILED IN MYANMAR, IS RELEASED DAYS AFTER BEING HANDED PRISON SENTENCE Danny Fenster, a Jewish American journalist who had been imprisoned in Myanmar since May and was sentenced to 11 years in prison earlier this month, was released just days later.

Former New Mexico governor and former diplomat Bill Richardson, who was in the country on a humanitarian visit, told reporters that Fenster would travel back to the United States “through Qatar, over the next day and a half,” CNN reported.

Fenster’s brother Bryan celebrated the news in a tweet. “We are overjoyed that Danny has been released and is on his way home—we cannot wait to hold him in our arms,” he wrote.

Zaw Min Tun, a spokesman for Myanmar’s military, told CNN that Fenster “has been released and deported. We will release details why he was released later.”

Fenster, who had lived and worked in Myanmar since 2019 as a managing editor at the magazine Frontier Myanmar, had been detained at the airport while

trying to leave the country to visit the United States in May. Fenster had been held without bail on various charges by Myanmar’s military, all having to do with his journalism.

Fenster’s imprisonment had become a rallying cry in his hometown of Detroit, where many lawns display “Free Fenster” signs on their front lawns, and his family has organized rallies attended by local Congressman Andy Levin. A recent post in a “Bring Danny Home” Facebook group, which has more than 6,000 members, reads, “We wish more than anything that Danny would be brought home to this community that loves him so.” (JTA)

PROJECTION: NEARLY 1 IN 3 ISRAELI JEWS WILL BE HAREDI ORTHODOX BY 2050 Nearly one third of Israel’s Jewish population will be haredi Orthodox by the year 2050, according to projections by Israel’s National Economic Council.

Israel’s current population of 9.2 million is expected to grow to 16 million by 2050. Of those 16 million, about a quarter are projected by Israel’s National Economic Council to be haredi Orthodox, Haaretz reported.

The new population figures point to a future in which Israel’s Jewish population continues to make up about 80% of its population, but in which that Jewish population skews far more heavily Orthodox than ever before. Currently, Israel’s Orthodox population makes up 12.6% of the population. By 2050, that figure will rise to 24% of the total population, the council claims.

Most of that growth will result from the Orthodox community’s birth rate of 6.7 children per woman, far higher than the rate of 3.01 among the general population. Across all sectors of the population, Israelis ages 19 and younger will make up over a third of the population.

Most of Israel’s Orthodox Jews are expected to remain concentrated in Jerusalem and its surrounding area as well as in the city of Beit Shemesh. But the Orthodox population is also projected to grow in Israel’s south, where a new Orthodox city is being planned, as well as to a smaller degree in the north. (JTA)

NATION As Republicans delay Deborah Lipstadt’s nomination, Biden names Aaron Keyak to be deputy antisemitism monitor Ron Kampeas

The State Department is signaling that they want to convey that the Biden administration is taking antisemitism seriously.

Keyak was for many years a top aide to Democratic lawmakers before partnering with Steve Rabinowitz, a longtime strategist for liberal and Jewish groups, until he joined the Biden campaign last year. Rabinowitz in an interview said he saw his former partner’s appointment as a necessary stopgap while the Senate considers Lipstadt.

“Until Deborah is—God willing— Senate confirmed, Aaron will make a terrific complement,” he said. “He respects her tremendously, as we all do; she’s incomparable, after all. But in the meantime, he’ll also be a great acting U.S. special envoy in his own right for as long as it takes. In my mind, it’s like a recess appointment. I can’t say enough how outstanding I think it is.”

Keyak’s naming to the role was first leaked to the Forward.

Photo by Kobi Gideon / FLASH90

WASHINGTON ( JTA)—The Biden administration named Aaron Keyak, who spearheaded Joe Biden’s presidential campaign outreach to the Jewish community, to the post of deputy antisemitism monitor as Republican senators continue to block the nomination to the top position of Deborah Lipstadt, the noted Holocaust scholar.

“Aaron Keyak will be joining the Department shortly to assume the position of Deputy Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism,” a State Department spokeswoman told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency on Monday, November 22. “Aaron will play a key role in the Department’s efforts to tackle rising global antisemitism and will be a highly effective deputy to Dr. Deborah Lipstadt once she is confirmed by the Senate as the Biden-Harris Administration’s Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism.”

The deputy position is not at the ambassador level and does not require Senate confirmation. The State Department is giving unusual exposure to the naming of Keyak, signaling that they want to convey to the Jewish community that the Biden administration is taking antisemitism seriously.

“I am pleased to announce the appointment of Aaron Keyak as the new @StateDept Deputy Special Envoy for Antisemitism,” Ned Price, the State Department spokesman, said late Monday. “Aaron will play a leadership role in the Administration’s efforts to tackle rising global antisemitism.”

Republican senators have delayed Lipstadt’s nomination over past tweets in which she was critical of Republicans.

Congress last year elevated the position of antisemitism monitor to ambassador level, which requires Senate confirmation.

Most ambassadors are political appointees, and many have pasts populated with partisan statements.

The delay has prompted three major

Jewish organizations, which rarely speak out on nominations, to urge swift consideration of Lipstadt’s nomination, citing the recent spike in antisemitic attacks worldwide.

An array of Jewish groups praised Keyak’s naming to the role.

“As antisemitism continues to run unabated across the world, Aaron’s experience on Capitol Hill, in politics, with the Jewish community, and with the news media make him particularly wellsuited to help lead American efforts to counter this scourge,” William Daroff, the CEO of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, said in a message to JTA.

It’s not too late to save a life in Israel this year.

For more than 90 years, American donors have provided vehicles, training, and supplies to Israel’s national paramedic and Red Cross service, equipping them to treat the sick and injured under the most difficult circumstances and to save lives.

In fact, this past year Magen David Adom’s 30,000 EMTs and paramedics have been on the front lines in the fight against coronavirus while also contending with terrorist and rocket attacks, riots, car accidents, and other threats to Israeli lives.

If you want to make a real difference in Israel, no other organization has a greater impact on its people than Magen David Adom.

Make an end-of-year donation at afmda.org/saving-lives-2021

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jewishnewsva.org | November 29, 2021 | JEWISH NEWS | 5

Bill’s Legacy Lives Forever

CLIMATE

The Jewish response to climate change: Back from COP26, Hazon’s CEO reflects on what’s needed to combat the threat

Norfolk business owner Bill Goldback valued good health and great arts performances.

Jesse Berman

Before he died in 2007, Bill arranged for a Hampton Roads Community Foundation bequest to provide grants for performing arts and medicine in Hampton Roads.

Goldback grants are helping Chesapeake Care, Hampton Roads Community Health Center, Todd Rosenlieb Dance and Young Audiences of Virginia do excellent work.

Thanks to Bill’s generosity he will forever help people in his home region.

Connect your passions to the future by ordering a free bequest guide. Learn how easy it is to leave a gift for charity.

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A quick

(Baltimore Jewish Times via JTA)—Tens of thousands of leaders and activists from around the world, representing world governments, NGOs and environmental organizations, gathered in Glasgow, Scotland, earlier this month for the United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP26.

Among those present for the talks was Jakir Manela, CEO of both the Pearlstone Center and Hazon, two Baltimore-based Jewish environmental organizations that are in the process of merging and that represent a sizable voice in the Jewish climate action space.

The stakes were high at the conference, as world leaders struggled to come to workable policy agreements for limiting the most harmful long-term effects of climate change. Many climate activists left COP26 frustrated that not enough was being done. Manela shared some of that frustration, but also said he saw many positive developments in Glasgow— including larger roles for Jews.

Upon his return, the Reisterstown, Maryland resident talked to the Baltimore Jewish Times about his impressions, his concerns and his hopes for the future of the struggle against climate change.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

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Baltimore Jewish Times: How would you describe this year’s U.N. Climate Change Conference?

Manela: More than any other COP in the past, the world was really watching COP26, because the climate crisis has come to, for lack of a better term, a boiling point. The increased intensity and frequency of wildfires and hurricanes and heatwaves and droughts and rising seas and polar ice melting and the alarm bells being rung by the global scientific community really demand urgent and aggressive action. And finally, the world’s media and the world’s countries and the people all over the world were really paying closer attention to this gathering than ever before.

BJT: Were there any moments from the conference that particularly stood out to you?

Manela: One is that [at] a number of these high-profile sessions…you look on the screen and you see a number of Jews on the stage, really at the forefront of this work. [I] was very proud to see that.

Then [Saturday], we’d had a beautiful week all week, but [in the] last moment, it was cold and windy and rainy as 200,000 people went to march in the streets to call for more aggressive and ambitious climate action. And there was a lot of optimism from inside the conference itself, from

government leaders, and even some of the environmental leaders [who] felt like some of the pledges that had been made were significant.

The increased intensity and frequency of wildfires and hurricanes and heatwaves and droughts and rising seas and polar ice melting and the alarm bells being rung by the global scientific community really demand urgent and aggressive action.

The marches certainly had some anger and some frustration to them, but also had a lot of love and joy and hope and song and dance. And, just again, people from all around the world marching together, singing together, calling for change together. I was really, really moved by that.

BJT: Setting out for the trip, did you have a particular goal for yourself in mind? Was there a particular goal you were hoping the conference could achieve?

CLIMATE Manela: I wanted to connect with multifaith leaders around the world. I was hoping the conference would make significant progress on the path to net-zero [emissions].

BJT: Would you say that you succeeded in your personal goal? Would you say the conference succeeded in what you were hoping it would achieve?

Manela: Yes to my personal goal.

Mixed results on the conference goal. In theory, according to the pledges that have been made, yes—there has been progress.

But not nearly enough concrete action is happening yet.

BJT: Did the conference have any effect on your future plans for either Hazon or the Pearlstone Center?

Manela: Yes. I believe we will now explore what it takes to become a United Nations-accredited organization so that we can continue to bring a Jewish voice to these important global gatherings.

BJT: During and right before COP26, Israel pledged to reach net-zero emissions by 2050 and emphasized the role that its startup economy could play in the development of green technology. What do you think of these things?

Manela: At our Shabbat dinner, we heard from a number of Israelis, including former members of Knesset. There was general gratitude and support for this pledge, and also criticism—not only of Israel’s leadership but of all leaders who are making these pledges for 30+ years from now. One former member of Knesset said, “Nu? Thank you for promising something on behalf of a future prime minister who won’t be you. What about now? What are you doing now?”

BJT: Did you learn anything you did not know before, such as about climate change or the fight against it?

Manela: I was really happy to see

nature-based solutions promoted in a significant way…

If we replace all the coal-fired power plants with solar panels, that actually doesn’t do it. We can have the world covered in solar panels and we’re still going to be in trouble. We need trees, we need green space, we need nature to be preserved and invested in for this to really work. I was happy to see that emphasis.

BJT: Do you think coming to the conference as the leader of a Jewish organization gave you a perspective that others might not have had there?

Manela: I found in the multifaith gatherings that I was in—I brought one other person with me—but really, we were bringing a Jewish voice that otherwise wasn’t present.

We [Jews] have, every single week, a day when we are supposed to just take a break from all the consumption and all the travel and all the fossil fuel and all the energy, and just enjoy life, be with people you love, enjoy the natural world, take a break. And if we could really embody that as a Jewish people, and really spread that practice across the world, it would actually have a huge impact on our global footprint as a species. So Shabbat is an ecological practice.

BJT: How do you think individuals and communities can best contribute to the fight against climate change?

Manela: Commit to the Brit Hazon, a personal commitment to creating a more sustainable world. We highlight six key action areas: 1. Eat less meat 2. Reduce energy use 3. Reduce food waste 4. Grow your own food and buy local 5. Reduce household waste 6. Buy less stuff A version of this interview was originally published in the Baltimore Jewish Times.

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NATION National survey on youth and religion raises concern about Gen-Z Jews— and questions about how to understand them Asaf Shalev, Ella Rockart

(JTA)—A massive survey conducted over the past year found that even as young Americans are rejecting traditional organized religion, they are still embracing faith and spirituality, broadly defined.

The pollsters behind the Springtide Research Institute, a new nonprofit dedicated to research about the “inner and outer lives” of young people, say their poll, of more than 10,000 Americans between 13 and 25, is without recent precedent in its size and breadth. They also said Jewish respondents—215 in total, a sample size they identified as statistically significant—appeared to be among those thriving the least in their religious and spiritual lives.

The Jewish results, shared exclusively with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, confirm some elements of conventional wisdom about Gen Z Jews in America and challenge others. They also raise longstanding questions about whether Jews can effectively be studied the same way as people from other religious backgrounds.

It’s difficult to study how Jews compare to other religious groups because some individuals may identify as culturally, but not religiously, Jewish, according to Richard Flory, a sociologist serving as the executive director of the Center for Religion and Civic Culture at the University of Southern California.

“A person can say ‘I’m an atheist, but I’m a Jew,’” Flory says. “Well, how do you deal with that? It’s a problem.”

The Springtide researchers opted to sort survey respondents into a wide range of categories: Jewish appears alongside other religious identities, as well as agnostic, atheist, “nothing in particular” and “something else.”

The respondents who identified themselves as Jewish stood out from their peers from other “major religious groups”— Protestant Christians, Catholics, Muslims, Buddhists and Hindus—in several ways, the Springtide poll found. Young Jews, more than members of any other group, said they were “not flourishing” in their

relationships with friends, family, teachers, or other trusted adults. The same was true when asked about their physical health, mental health, social and online lives, and “faith lives.”

Young Jews also led the pack with the highest percentage rejecting the sentence, “In general, I feel very positive about myself.”

And some 40% of young American Jews in the study said they do not need “a spiritual community,” the highest rate among major religions—a potential point of alarm for those who are hoping to increase young Jews’ engagement with synagogues and other Jewish institutions.

“This should be a call for greater urgency for those positioned to care for young Jews, including teachers, employers, coaches, and especially leaders of synagogues,” says Springtide CEO Josh Packard. “There is real need and opportunity to start leading with relationships to help young Jews flourish.”

But are Jews really so different from their counterparts in other religious groups? Springtide’s poll questions about “faith life” and “faith community” may not have captured the modes of religious engagement that are present for Gen-Z Jews, or their parents, says Ronit Stahl, a professor at UC Berkeley who studies recent history and is involved in the university’s Center for the Study of Religion and Center for Jewish Studies.

“It strikes me as very Christian language,” Stahl says. “If you ask young Jews about their relationship with the Jewish community, you’ll get a very different answer than if you asked about their relationship with their faith community, because Jews typically don’t talk about Jewish life as being part of a faith community.”

Surveys about Jewish engagement and attitudes more traditionally focus on measures that are less open to interpretation, such as synagogue affiliation and frequency of various practices. That is the case with the surveys conducted by the Pew Research Center, the latest of which focused on Jews was released earlier this

8 | JEWISH NEWS | November 29, 2021 | jewishnewsva.org

year and also found evidence of declining institutional engagement among younger Jews. Pew conducts similar surveys of Christians, as well, and regularly releases surveys of attitudes across religious groups that are broadly trusted by American Jews.

Springtide is trying to do something different from what Pew does. According to Packard, Springtide is hoping to understand and support young people as they “explore life’s biggest questions” like “Why am I here? How should I live? What happens when I die?”

Founded in 2019, Springtide operates under the fiscal structure of a Catholic nonprofit publishing company called Lasallian Educational and Research Initiatives but the two entities are independent, with Springtide pledging to study young people from a nonsectarian perspective.

Packard acknowledges the difficulties in developing poll language about spirituality that can be universal, but says the survey asked questions in multiple ways to capture different perspectives. He also notes that Springtide relies on an advisory board with representatives of many traditions including Judaism.

“Even with all of this in place, it’s tricky to try and find language and concepts that are accessible to young people broadly speaking,” Packard says. “Language that makes sense to young Muslims will not always resonate with Christians or Jews and the nearly 40% of young people who are unaffiliated might not understand much religious language at all.”

He says this team is open to adjusting its survey methods and adds that, next year, Springtide hopes to carry out a national study focused entirely on young Jews. If it does, other measures suggest that it might well draw some similar conclusions.

Flory, the University of Southern California sociologist, says Springtide’s findings match what’s already well known in his field. He is referring to the work of the National Study of Youth and Religion out of the University of Notre Dame and

to his own book published last year, BackPocket God: Religion and Spirituality in the Lives of Emerging Adults, which is based on a decade of research.

“There’s no surprise in any of the data that younger people across the board are moving away from institutionalized religion,” Flory says. “I can tell you the groups that are not doing well: Jews, mainline Protestants and Catholics. They’re doing the worst.”

The suite of Jewish organizations seeking to engage Jewish teens and young adults is large and diverse, ranging from legacy institutions with a presence on college campuses like Hillel and Chabad, to the newer models like the fast-growing world of Moishe House with its global network of homes-as-community-centers, and startups such as GatherDC, which just got a $1.5 million grant to take its work on something called “relational Judaism” national.

Leaders of several Jewish organizations who reviewed the Springtide numbers say they weren’t sure how seriously they should treat the data, and express optimism on the outlook of engaging young Jews.

David Cygielman, the CEO of Moishe House, for example, sees a glass half-full when he reads that 41% percent of Jewish respondents are not flourishing in their faith lives. It meant that 59% are.

“As we’re looking out into the future, and investing in this demographic, we’re not starting with a minority here, we’re starting with the majority that we want to see grow,” he says.

And from Chabad’s perspective, the numbers don’t exactly reflect the interest they are seeing at colleges.

“We’re seeing a surge of young Jews on campus clamoring for community, Jewish life and engagement,” says Rabbi Yossy Gordon, CEO of Chabad on Campus International. “They are looking for meaningful ways to build their own authentic Jewish identity.”

But some in the Jewish world say they find Springtide’s approach refreshing and think the findings should be seen as

Local Relationships Matter

NATION relevant to American Jews. Josh Feigelson, a rabbi who leads the Institute for Jewish Spirituality, says the fact that poll language about faith and spirituality is seen as out of step with Jewish culture is in fact a problem for young Jews.

“For a lot of reasons, the American Jewish community has shunned overt spiritual language,” Feigelson says. “We don’t talk about the presence of God in our lives or offer words of blessing to each other in a non-self conscious way.

There’s a correlation there with a feeling of estrangement that doesn’t surprise me.”

As an applied sociologist, Tobin Belzer conducts research and evaluations on

behalf of numerous organizations and philanthropists across the Jewish world.

Her findings, based on several studies of Jewish young adults’ perspectives and experiences, suggest that this demographic isn’t hopelessly estranged.

“Young adults aren’t necessarily interested in rabbis who act like a ‘sage on the stage,’” she says. “They want someone who is real and approachable and authentic, who is going to have an actual relationship with them. Also, they’re not typically looking for the one community where they can engage fully, they are looking for a smattering of different options.”

Congressional Jewish Republicans lead efforts to head off reopening of US consulate in Jerusalem Ron Kampeas

WASHINGTON ( JTA)—The two Jewish Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives are leading the effort to keep the Biden administration from reopening the U.S. consulate in Jerusalem.

David Kustoff of Tennessee on Wednesday, November 17 introduced a bill that would block the Biden administration from reopening the consulate, Jewish Insider reported. His bill has the backing of the GOP leadership and about 100 cosponsors. His fellow Tennessean, Sen. Bill Hagerty, has introduced a companion bill in the Senate.

Among the cosponsors of the House bill is Lee Zeldin, a Jewish Republican from Long Island who is running for governor of New York, and who has garnered 206 signatures, all from Republicans, on a letter to President Joe Biden opposing the move.

Former President Donald Trump shut down the mission, which was located just outside the Old City walls in West Jerusalem since 1912, and merged its activities with the newly relocated U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem. In recent decades it served Palestinians in Jerusalem and the

West Bank, who considered the consolidation an endorsement of Israel’s claims on Jerusalem. The Republican bill says that opening a separate consulate meant to serve Palestinians undermines Israel’s claim on Jerusalem as its capital.

Reopening the consulate now, especially if it is in the building used in recent years in western Jerusalem, territory that the United States recognizes as sovereign Israel, would require the assent of the Israeli government.

Biden campaigned on reopening the consulate, believing it key to restoring U.S. relations with the Palestinians, all but smothered during the Trump years.

The government of Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett opposes the reopening but is also seeking to repair ties between Israel and Democrats, who chafed during the 12 years of former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s leadership. The sides are quietly seeking solutions behind closed doors.

Republicans are in the minority in the House and Senate, but that does not necessarily doom the bill: At least two House Democrats, Juan Vargas of California and Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey, have expressed reservations about the move.

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YOUR DOLLARS AT WORK

This unique Hanukkah program celebrates a world of Jewish miracles Larry Luxner

T

en years ago, Illya Buzunov never could have imagined that one day he’d be teaching Jews around the world how to prepare potato latkes.

Until 2014, the Ukraine native didn’t even know he was Jewish.

But that’s exactly what Buzunov, 24, will be doing on November 30—the third night of Hanukkah—as part of a new video event series that brings together Jews from a variety of countries for Hanukkah candle lighting celebrations and an inside look at their communities.

Each night, Jews from a different location around the globe will light candles as a part of the series, which highlights an aspect of local Jewish music, dance or cuisine, as well as the location’s Jewish history.

The global Hanukkah campaign is part of an effort by the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, the massive global Jewish humanitarian organization known as JDC, to highlight Jewish communities worldwide.

“I’ll demonstrate how to make latkes using a traditional recipe of potatoes, eggs, salt, baking powder and oil,” says Buzunov, who coordinates Active Jewish Teens, JDC’s teen network across the former Soviet Union, at the JDC-sponsored Halom Jewish community center in Kyiv, Ukraine.

The network is organized in partnership with Genesis Philanthropy Group and is part of the BBYO youth movement. “It’s one of the easiest things you can do for Hanukkah,” he says.

JDC’s Hanukkah series, “A Great Miracle Happened Here,” will be livestreamed each night at 7 pm ET on JDC’s event site, chanukah.jdc.org, as well as on its Facebook page. The events kick off Nov. 28 in New York with a segment hosted by author Dara Horn and featuring special guests including Chinese-Jewish celebrity Molly Yeh, who hosts the Food Network’s Girl Meets Farm TV show.

Subsequent nights will feature Jewish communities in Morocco, Ukraine, Estonia, the United Arab Emirates, Israel and Poland. The series concludes Dec. 5 with a broadcast from Latin America hosted by

Analucia Lopezrevoredo of Jewtina y Co, an organization that seeks to nurture and celebrate Latin-Jewish community, identity, leadership and resiliency.

The aim of this first-of-its-kind project, says Heather Morgan, JDC’s managing director of global marketing and communications, is to use the Jewish holiday to raise awareness of JDC’s own work worldwide— now in its 107th year.

“We’ve been involved in almost every monumental event in modern Jewish history, but there’s a disconnect between the

pensions as low as $2 per day.

Buzunov says he “became a Jew” totally by surprise. Seven years ago, when he was a teenager and a self-described introvert, Buzunov’s best friend invited him to go roller skating, where they met up with a large group of Jews Buzunov did not know.

It was Purim, and the group went around Kyiv giving out hamentashen to poor Jews.

By the time they got to the roller-skating venue at the end of the day, Buzunov felt like he’d fallen in love with the Jewish people.

primacy of JDC as an organization and how much people really know about us,” Morgan says. “We thought this would be a great opportunity to raise awareness and visibility by linking ourselves with the Hanukkah narrative, which in so many ways parallels JDC’s own narrative.”

Since its founding in 1914, the organization has provided urgent and non-urgent humanitarian aid to Jews and others in more than 70 countries worldwide, from Argentina to Uzbekistan.

In just this last year, JDC has assisted earthquake victims in Haiti, brought Israeli-made ventilators to hospitals in India overburdened with COVID-19 patients, and provided homecare for more than 80,000 elderly Jews in the former Soviet Union—many of them surviving on

Filled with enthusiasm, Buzunov eagerly shared his feelings with his elderly grandmother.

“She looked at me proudly and told me, ‘We are Jewish,’” Buzunov says, recalling how she revealed that his great-grandparents had been Jews but had kept it secret to avoid suffering discrimination under Soviet rule. “I had no idea. Even my parents had no idea. At that moment, I realized what I had been missing my whole life, and I understood what I wanted to do.”

In November 2019, after years of study and involvement in Jewish communal life, Buzunov formally converted to Judaism, celebrated his bar mitzvah and took the Hebrew name Eliyahu.

From another part of the world, Sarah Tagger, 27, will be showcasing a different

10 | JEWISH NEWS | November 29, 2021 | jewishnewsva.org

Jewish community on night two of the series. A native of Canada who generally lives in California, Tagger will be giving audiences a look at Jewish Morocco, where she is spending a few weeks as part of JDC’s yearlong Ralph I. Goldman Fellowship in Global Jewish Leadership through JDC’s Entwine platform. During the year, Tagger is traveling from place to place helping develop programs to assist far-flung Jewish communities.

So far, Tagger has been to the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Armenia, Georgia, Turkey and the Moroccan cities of Casablanca, Tangier and Marrakesh.

“Here in Morocco, JDC supports the local community with everything from elderly welfare to children’s education,” says Tagger, who wrote a master’s thesis on the potential of tourism to mitigate political conflict in the Middle East. “We’ve even helped families who were hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic with emergency humanitarian assistance.”

Tagger’s next destination is Warsaw.

“All of this makes me so proud, and what better time to reflect on it than Hanukkah—a celebration of coming together, of light, of miracles—and what greater miracle than to be here in Morocco with this incredible community, learning all about its heritage and spending time together.”

Ariel Zwang, JDC’s chief executive, calls the Hanukkah story “one of resilience, tenacity and Jewish connection”—a reflection of the diverse communities JDC helps every day worldwide.

“JDC proudly works with Jews in dozens of countries to strengthen Jewish life, engage with Jewish tradition and build Jewish identity,” she says. “By connecting in global celebration, we’ll be inspired by these modern miracles and ensure that the flame of Jewish life continues to burn bright.”

This story was sponsored by and produced in partnership with JDC. This article was produced by JTA’s native content team.

This is part of a series of articles spotlighting local and overseas partner agencies that are beneficiaries of the United Jewish Federation of Tidewater’s annual Community Campaign.

TIDEWATER JEWISH FEDERATION

TJF’s refreshed donor portal makes it easier to access and give online

TJF’s donor portal received a refresh last month, which included improved accessibility and visuals.

Thomas Mills

T

idewater Jewish Foundation’s online donor portal recently received a visual upgrade. The update, which went live last month, aims to make the donor portal more accessible and straightforward for users.

“We at TJF are committed to a positive donor experience. In real-time, our donors can see their grant history, and in a few quick clicks, they can make an impact on those organizations, programs, and services that are priorities for them,” says Naomi Limor Sedek, Tidewater Jewish Foundation president and CEO. “I have heard from several donors how simple it is to activate the resources in their Donor Advised Funds and that they are thrilled with this new format.”

Over the past few months, TJF has worked tirelessly with its technology partner to enhance the capabilities of its online donor portal. The new, streamlined interface makes it easier for users to access funds, make contributions, retrieve statements, and more.

“The donor portal refresh is convenient and very user-friendly to use,” says Todd Copeland, a member of TJF’s board of directors, its current treasurer, and one of the several hundred community members that use a TJF Donor Advised Fund (DAF). “It doesn’t require utilizing a staff member to request a donation, and it

provides real-time information. No need to wait for statements, but they are posted and stored there as well.”

Despite being live for only a few weeks, users are already reaping the benefits of the refreshed donor portal and its expanded functionality.

“TJF’s donor portal refresh, once we learned how to use, made it convenient to quickly review the history of all activity of our fund, anytime, 24/7,” says Warren Aleck, another ‘fund advisor.’

Additionally, the site has new features, which include a database of entities for giving and the portal being mobile-responsive for a unified experience across all devices.

“The portal has a database access of most approved 501c3 entities,” says Copeland. “It makes it easy to find the charity that you would like to donate to.”

“TJF is proud to offer our donor community the convenience of modern technology,” says Randy Parrish, TJF’s vice president and CFO. “Donor Advised Funds at TJF are a great vehicle for tax-savvy philanthropy and the newly refreshed portal makes them so easy to use. TJF has matching funds available for new DAFs and this is a great time to open one as we approach year-end.”

For more information or to open your online account, contact us at 757-965-6100 or tjfinfo@ujft.org.

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What is racial equity?

The phrase has been in the news, in communities, and in corporations with increasing attention of late.

Simply put, racial equity means acknowledging that racism exists, working together to fix problems caused by discrimination, ensuring People of Color have fair access to resources, and creating a more inclusive community with opportunity for all.

Racial equity can be seen in the work of the United Jewish Federation of Tidewater. The Federation’s Jewish Community Relations Council is helping to administer a program called the In[HEIR]itance project—a national organization that uses the arts to promote cross-cultural awareness.

The Federation secured a grant for this work from the Hampton Roads Community Foundation, which was awarded in partnership with Virginia Humanities. The local project includes Hands United Building Bridges, or HUBB, a diverse group of interfaith leaders. HUBB is hosting several community conversations and public playmaking workshops that will culminate in a special theatrical production.

As the region’s largest provider of chartable grants and scholarships, the community foundation believes racial equity is critical in helping Hampton Roads to thrive.

In 2019, the community foundation’s board of directors adopted a Racial Equity statement to highlight the importance of this work, to better align its grantmaking and scholarships programs for equitable outcomes, to host courageous conversations about race and the history of race, and to provide leadership through collaborative action to address racism in Hampton Roads.

Prior to the adoption of the statement, the community foundation began looking inwardly at its policies and practices

around equity, as well as its engagement with residents and community partners. Since then, HRCF has: • Worked Vivian Oden with a consultant to coach staff and board members about racial equity issues, and to create a Racial Equity statement and plan; • Hosted the annual Black Philanthropy Month celebration for the last four years to amplify Black voices often left out of traditional philanthropy; • Expanded grant guidelines to require nonprofits to report racial demographic data on their boards, staff, and clients in order to get a more comprehensive picture of the community, who HRCF helps, and opportunities for support; • Commissioned the Giving Black® Hampton Roads study to learn about Black philanthropists and giving trends; and • Joined diverse community organizations, including the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce of Coastal Virginia, Asian Business Association of Hampton Roads, Black BRAND, and others.

The work continues with trainings, conversations, research projects, and ongoing assessment of the organization’s internal practices and external actions.

Hampton Roads can achieve greater success when people from all backgrounds come together to tackle important community issues. To be sure, racial equity is a journey. We are learning more day by day.

Vivian Oden is the vice president for equity and inclusion at the Hampton Roads Community Foundation. She leads the foundation’s efforts to make Hampton Roads a more equitable and inclusive place with opportunity for all.

BETH SHOLOM VILLAGE

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The rabbi, spiritual care, and Beth Sholom Village Rabbi Adam Ruditsky

B

be the love of family).

Residents are encouraged to seek the ability to stand upon the shaky ground and turbulent waters when their health, and therefore humanity, has taken a turn. The journeys will impact both a resident and family differently.

This is also so with residents who come to live at the Terrace Assisted Living. They need to adjust to a new living environment, get used to new people and surroundings, different types of food, or loss of independence. That coupled with fewer visits and contact from family and friends is like a loss that can also require support for both resident and family.

Although a rabbi, I also function as an Ecumenical Chaplain, meaning that no matter what a person’s religion (or lack of) may be, I aspire to support each unique set of spiritual, physical, and emotional needs, assisting in strengthening any values and beliefs that are operating as healthcare needs and challenges are faced.

This is accomplished by collaborating with our medical team, our recreational therapy department, social workers, or our dietary team. As part of the team, the Religious and Spiritual Department aspires to ensure that Beth Sholom Village operates based on our Jewish values.

As the rabbi, I am also an advocate for the universal Torah-based principles, which are cultural, spiritual, religious, and emotional; values for all people that underscore the voices of our residents and their families.

We are privileged to care for those who have come to BSV.

eth Sholom Village is not a synagogue, but a skilled nursing and assisted living facility. At the same time, BSV is a Kosher facility and celebrates Jewish holidays and traditions, underscoring how it operates.

Aside from Shabbat services, a Christian service and Communion for Rabbi Adam Ruditsky Catholic residents are also offered.

A medical healthcare facility is different from a congregation. One might ask why is a rabbi needed at BSV? With a population comprised of Jewish and non-Jewish residents, all religions and denominations are welcome. However, all that takes place at BSV, from care to celebrations, is foundationally Jewish.

Spirituality is about our connection to our inner awareness that is not dependant on a particular religion, but represents the universal make-up of all people, reflected in a Kabbalist prayer that says, “Blessed are all of God’s self-portraits.” In Hebrew, that is called mu’da’oot ru’cha’nit, or spiritual awareness, which all people possess, Jewish or not. That does not mean that a person’s faith tradition, such as Judaism or Christianity, is not essential. It also recognizes that a person’s inner needs and religious beliefs often function like a hand (spiritual) and a glove (religion).

Therefore, it is important to be equally concerned with an individual’s spiritual and emotional needs.

When sitting with a resident coming to terms with their human limitations or even mortality, discussing halakha (Jewish law) or doctrine may be a part of the conversation—but it is just that—a part of the conversation. In a setting like BSV, it Rabbi Adam Ruditsky may be reached at is about helping residents find their inner 757-420-2512 ex. 208. power. (it could be religion, but it can also

Ruins of a Hellenistic fortress show ‘tangible evidence’ of Hanukkah story, Israeli archaeologists say Shira Hanau

( JTA)—Archaeologists excavating a 2,100-year-old fortress say it provides “tangible evidence” of the events from the Hanukkah story.

The site, located west of Hebron in the Lachish Forest, includes remnants of a fortress made of stone and wood that the archaeologists working with the Israel Antiquities Authority believe was burned by the Hasmoneans—Judean descendants of the Maccabees—during a battle with the Macedonian Greek Seleucids.

The excavation has turned up evidence of a fire in the form of burnt wooden beams as well as pottery, weapons and coins.

The coins found at the site point to the destruction of the fortress by the Hasmonean leader John Hyrcanus around 112 BCE, the archaeologists say.

“The excavation site provides tangible evidence of the Hanukkah stories. It appears that we have discovered a building

that was part of a fortified line erected by the Hellenistic army commanders to protect the large Hellenistic city of Maresha from a Hasmonean offensive. However, the finds from the site show that the Seleucid defenses were unsuccessful; the excavated building was badly burnt and devastated by the Hasmoneans,” leaders of the dig said in a statement.

The holiday of Hanukkah, which this year begins Nov. 28, commemorates the period during the 2nd century BCE when the Seleucid King Antiochus attempted to stamp out all expressions of Judaism in Israel, which was then under the control of the Seleucid Empire.

The Maccabees, a Hasmonean family that were part of the priestly class, led a guerrilla war against the Seleucids, eventually retaking the Temple in Jerusalem, which had been desecrated by idol worship at Antiochus’ direction. The holiday of Hanukkah celebrates the Maccabees’ cleansing and rededication of the Temple as well as the lighting of the menorah there.

B’nai Brith Canada shares Canada Post 2021 Hanukkah stamp Design

Canada Post’s 2021 Hanukkah stamp design had input from B’nai Brith Canada and other organizations. It captures the festive holiday with an image of a menorah. jewishnewsva.org | November 29, 2021 | JEWISH NEWS | 13

Cooking and Eating

UNITED JEWISH FEDERATION OF TIDEWATER

CARES Act provides $300 in charitable deductions for 2021 Matthew Kramer-Morning

A The Food Issue

Coming Jan. 25 To advertise call 757-965-6100 or email news@ujft.org

s December 31 approaches, tax filers should be aware of a provision in the CARES act passed last year for 2021.

While many choose to file itemized deductions, those who utilize standard deductions on their federal taxes have a unique opportunity for additional deductions to charitable organizations.

The CARES act, passed on December 27, 2020 includes in it an above-the-line deduction on federal taxes of $300 ($600 for joint returns) for charitable donations in 2021.

“This is a great way for our community members to save in taxes while giving to the community,” says David Calliott, United Jewish Federation of Tidewater’s

Young Adult Leadership chair. “While charitable deductions used to only apply to those who itemized, this change helps everyone who uses the standard deduction as well.

“I hope everyone looks at what they have given this year, and if they haven’t reached the $300/600 thresholds, thinks about how they can try to get to those levels in order to realize the maximum tax benefit for themselves and the community,” says Calliott.

This has been a record breaking year for the US stock market.

Protect your profits by donating appreciated stocks. Transferring shares of stocks, bonds, or other appreciated securities allows you to avoid capital gains.

Call or email in advance (pmalone@ujft.

org or 757-965-6115) to tell UJFT the name(s) and quantity of shares you’re transferring, so we’ll know exactly how to apply them.

Those looking for information about making or increasing their charitable gift to the United Jewish Federation of Tidewater can visit jewishva.org or contact Matt Kramer-Morning at mkmorning@ ujft.org. To-date, this benefit has not been extended into the 2022 tax year. Anyone with questions about the CARES act or their Federal taxes are encouraged to contact their tax advisors or visit the IRS website at www.IRS.gov.

Matthew Kramer-Morning is the Young Leadership Campaign director at United Jewish Federation of Tidewater.

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In fact, business is often very personal. That’s what Lisa Richmon learned when she spoke to Josh Leibowitz and Avidan Itzhak about their return to Tidewater to join their families’ businesses. Leibowitz joined his dad’s dental practice and Itzhak is managing a segment of his parents’ staffing business. Their interviews begin on page 18.

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Back in Business.

Dentist Josh Leibowitz returns home to ‘co-work’ with his friend, mentor, and father Lisa Richmon

‘P

laying it safe’ used to be a nice way to say cop out. Today, however, safety is the national trend for young professionals returning to the parental home to invest and save money, work remotely, job hop virtually, spend more time with family—and avoid becoming a CDC statistic.

For practicing dentist Josh Leibowitz, ‘back to the beach’ was always in the cards, not a default plan, or Plan B. Leibowitz is the son of Larry and Fern Leibowitz, and nephew to three dentists.

September 20, 2021 marked his first day seeing patients at his father’s celebrated dental practice on Kempsville Road.

While working in New York, Leibowitz made many discoveries about the dental industry and shaped his future. The question, however, that churned on repeat was where he would find the right person with which to build a life.

“The finality of a Virginia move was a never-ending struggle in my mind,” says Leibowitz.

When a good friend from dental school drilled career advice that hit home, he got the clarity he was searching for, but pandemic realities pumped the brakes on his plan to suit up with his dad.

“I always knew my dad was a dentist, but I didn’t really know that side of him or what that really meant. I saw that he really enjoyed his life and was a well-respected member of the community. Once I learned my gift for science and math, and my passion for healthcare, my dad really took me under his wing. Even before I joined the practice, he never reacted in a condescending manner when I introduced a dental concept that he didn’t think of first.

That’s rare among medical professionals and one reason why he’s always been the first person I talk to about my procedures and my patients.”

While in New York, Leibowitz began to carve his niche for patient care. The

city also gave him proximity to extended family, such as his uncle, Ira Langstein, a highly respected dentist who practiced in Virginia Beach for 14 years before moving back to New York. Langstein coached Josh on how to avoid becoming a mediocre dental cliché.

“New York was challenging,” he recalls. “Most offices for young dentists are mills with one goal: money. They weren’t concerned with my extensive medical knowledge, or the quality of my work. ‘Did it make us money? Great.’ I didn’t go into this field to be the richest guy out there. What mattered to me was seeing my patients cry tears of joy, no matter how small the product or procedure. That’s how I slept at night.

“Also, NYC is an amalgamation of people. It taught me how to deal with everybody out there.

“My greatest strength is patient interaction. I bring ‘ME’ to the community, I’m someone who really gets it. I’ve been a dental patient myself. I had braces three times, I had reconstructive jaw surgery. I have cried time and time again in doctors’ offices (as a child mainly, haha) over the simplest of injections. So, I feel that when a patient is in my chair, I understand them better than a lot of people might.

In dentistry, I do not believe in surprises.

Patients are empowered when they have a full understanding of their oral health and of their options.”

FAMILY BUSINESS AS USUAL Everything about the move to Virginia Beach has been positive for Josh Leibowitz, DMD. He’s gearing up to get an apartment in Norfolk and joined his first two young adult Jewish groups. Serendipitously, two of his closest friends from childhood, both Jewish, are also heading back home to Virginia Beach to continue careers they started in big cities.

Working with family also means ‘unplanned’ office visits from his 90-yearold grandfather ‘Sid.’ At Leibowitz Family

18 | JEWISH NEWS | Business | November 29, 2021 | jewishnewsva.org

Dentistry, a typical work week starts with patients who call in and ask when they can be seen because they’re experiencing a problem. They say something like, ‘Can you fit me in this week?’ Sid Glass, a Type-A, real estate broker, wakes up with a toothache and texts his grandson Josh, ‘I’m on my way.’”

Leibowitz takes it all in stride.

He’s an inquisitive empath much like his mother Fern, a former CPA, heavy knitter, and owner of Either Ore at Hilltop. Fern Glass Leibowitz showed Josh and his brother Jason, what caring

Josh Leibowitz works on a patient.

R O L E P L AY Q U E S T I O N S Larry Leibowitz. This is what Josh would say: What’s it like being back in Virginia Beach and working with your dad?

I have been away from the area for 12 years except for various visits. It was exciting and scary at the same time to come back to Virginia Beach. I have always known my dad to be a respected and competent dentist. It would be great to practice and learn from him. Who better than my father could serve as a teacher and mentor as I take my dentistry to the next level?

Josh Leibowitz: This is what my dad would say: What’s it like having Josh back in Virginia Beach and working with you at Leibowitz Family Dentistry?

I have been excited to have Josh work with me for some time. We have always had a bond in terms of science, the Yankees, Giants, and technology. Now, it’s exciting to add our profession to that list of areas we share. Josh and I are not only family, but also friends. I think it’s not only a great opportunity to learn from each other, but to also be able to share my practice with him. It is rewarding to see him interact and treat patients who I have taken care of for more than 30 years!

Business for others is all about. Credit goes to Sid, everyone’s role model for the human touch.

The one-time NYC cab driver never knew a stranger or was too busy to listen to someone’s problems.

Putting people at ease comes naturally to Leibowitz, but he credits his uncle Jonathan Jacobs, a local plastic surgeon and oral surgeon, for helping him see why Harvard was the school to beat. Unlike other excellent schools on the table, Jacobs illustrated why he should seriously consider Harvard’s combined dental and medical curriculum.

Yianni and Josh Leibowitz, sharing a beer and friendship.

PROGRESS MAKES PERFECT While implant dentistry is becoming less and less “advanced” and more standard of care, Josh envisions offering surgical implant placement as a key practice differentiator. He also plans to expand their technology with CBCT scans, laser technology and 3D scanning to eliminate the need to take impressions.

Two months into the game, Josh Leibowitz knows he made the right call at the right time. “I often think of my friend Yianni from dental school. Right before the pandemic, and within a year of joining his father’s orthodon- Drs. Josh and Larry Leibowitz. tic practice, a plan similar to my own, Yianni called to work with his dad as planned. ‘I think you let me know his dad had been diagnosed should move back to Virginia, Josh. I want with metastatic pancreatic cancer. you to have the experience with your dad For years, I knew I wanted to move that I won’t have.’ back to Virginia, but relationships and the Now that I’m here, and especially finality of a Virginia move seemed like a knowing what time stole from Yianni, I never-ending struggle in my mind, and I really don’t think too many people wake wasn’t sure how or if I’d be able to come up one day and wish that they had spent to peace with a decision. less time with their parents in the long After his father died, Yianni called and run.” shared the loss he felt not being able to

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jewishnewsva.org | November 29, 2021 | Business | JEWISH NEWS | 19

Business

Business as unusual.

Avidan Itzhak returns home to refresh and recruit at Remedy Staffing Lisa Richmon

C

OVID pulls families apart. COVID brings families together.

In May 2020, Avidan Itzhak returned home to Virginia where he continued to work as a corporate recruiter for a healthcare company. At that time, he had no intention to leave New York for the foreseeable future. The big city was his home.

“It was always in the back of my mind that I would one day move back here and work in the family business. But being down in the Tidewater area during COVID, I realized I can impact local companies by helping them scout great talent. The Remedy staff was swamped with orders, and no one wanted to work, so I decided to jump on board and join the team full time.”

COVID has not been kind to the recruiting industry. Itzhak believes the lingering effects will force management at companies to adapt to market shifts, leaving them no choice but to adjust to today’s employee market.

“Job hopping is an employer nightmare,” he says. “Millennials have job ADHD. The max is two to five years at one company. The problem swings both ways. Millennials want something trendy and new, and to be consistently challenged. If their current employer fails to deliver, they move on to one that does.

In the New York market, where perks are standard, and where they have beer on tap and fancy gyms, people still leave. It comes down to how employers treat their employees.”

The challenge about recruitment is

that the typical recruiter forgets they’re dealing with people. It’s just a name and resume to most recruiters. Cutting corners, brushing people off and ghosting them when they no longer have value to us—that’s the norm. I try to follow my mother’s lead. Shira is known for her personal touch and positivity. It’s hard sometimes, but I really try to give every single candidate some kind of honest feedback to help them down the road.”

Itzhak joined Remedy as the manager of the Executive Search division. Remedy operates under the umbrella of Remedy Intelligent Staffing, branded as Remedy Recruiting. The Hampton Roads Remedy office, owned by Shira and Shmuel Itzhak, is the local franchise office of one of the largest staffing companies in the country, EmployBridge.

Avidun Itzhak.

“We know that the recruitment industry has a bad rap,” says Itzhak. “Remedy

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20 | JEWISH NEWS | Business | November 29, 2021 | jewishnewsva.org

Business R O L E P L AY Q U E S T I O N S

Shmuel and Shira Itzhak.

is different.

Remedy is a family. We are a small company that cares for our employees and cares about each person we place. We are in the business of peoples’ livelihoods, helping people find employment so they can provide for themselves and their families. During my first week at Remedy, my mother set up an interview with a client in Norfolk and went to the site and physically introduced her candidate to the interviewer. That type of candidate care is unheard of in our industry, especially in New York.

I learned from my father how to be an honest and trustworthy businessman, and how to treat everyone with respect. I admire the way he incorporates religion into his everyday life. I hope that watching and learning from them shows how much I appreciate all they have done for me and my siblings.”

Helping Remedy maintain its core brand of personalized service is as important to Itzhak as re-imagining and re-joining the local Jewish community. “There are plenty of people in New York to take care of the community and meet its needs. But this small community needs to be cared for to sustain itself and grow. I know how challenging it is to get good people to move to a smaller community to start a family or a job. COVID may have accelerated my timeline, but I always knew I would come back one day and play an active role in our Jewish community’s future.”

Shira Itzhak. This is what Avidan would say.

What is it like being back in Virginia Beach and working for Remedy?

First of all, I never thought it would happen! I never thought I’d come back to Norfolk as a young professional. And if I didn’t think I’d come back to Norfolk, I certainly didn’t think I would be working in the family business!

But as we have learned, “man plans and G-d laughs.”

Actually, once I came back to Norfolk, I decided that I really like the community, the more “laid back “ environment, the people, and maybe even my family (lol).

I really enjoy being in the family business because I can use my experience that I gained in NY and work with companies that my family has developed relationships with over two generations, now three generations! It’s been really cool to hear my client say, “Avidan, your grandfather (Bob Low) was our accountant!”

I can see first-hand how my parents and grandparents have worked so hard in the community and I look forward to continuing to do so. It’s also been great developing business

and personal relationships with second and third generation community members and continuing the legacy in the Jewish community here in Tidewater.

I would like to see a kosher pizza shop though—let’s put that on the Tidewater Jewish Community bucket list!

Avidan Itzhak. This is what my mother would say: What’s it like having Avidan back in Virginia Beach and working with you at Remedy?

What more can I ask for than to work with my kids? This is the reason why we worked so hard to build this business for our children to come back and be valuable members of the community. I am ecstatic to have Avidan working at Remedy. It gives me time to play much more pickleball and go bike riding.

It’s funny because we never thought our kids would come back from the New York area to Norfolk, especially since Avidan has an affinity for kosher steak houses. I’m glad to have him working with us here so we can continue to impact the Hampton Roads community.

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jewishnewsva.org | November 29, 2021 | Business | JEWISH NEWS | 21

Business

Meet the Jewish founder of the world’s only bobblehead museum, and his Hanukkah bobbles Jacob Gurvis

( JTA)—A crochet museum in Joshua Tree, California features countless crochet animals that appear in airport

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ads worldwide. The National Mustard Museum in Wisconsin was founded by a Jewish condiment aficionado.

In February 2019, another niche museum opened around 90 miles east

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22 | JEWISH NEWS | Business | November 29, 2021 | jewishnewsva.org

of the mustard mecca: the National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum, located in Milwaukee.

Co-founded by Phil Sklar, a Jewish Illinois native, and his friend Brad Novak, the institution is the world’s only museum dedicated to bobbleheads. Its collection holds 7,000 unique bobbleheads, including some manufactured by Sklar and Novak.

Bobbleheads date back to the late 1700s, Sklar explains in an interview with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. A famous painting of Queen Charlotte—a replica of which hangs in the bobblehead museum—shows two figurines behind the monarch, with heads that bobble.

Fast forward to 2021, when the museum has unveiled its first-ever Hanukkah items: a Bobble Menorah that features nine bobbling “flames” (sans real fire, of course) and comes in three color patterns, and a Bobble Dreidel on a geltshaped base.

“Having the candles with the flame bobbling and the dreidel on a spring, we thought was pretty unique,” says Sklar. “It was something that was tasteful and that people would enjoy displaying on Hanukkah, or with their Judaica collection.”

We spoke to Sklar about how a unique collection turned into a one-of-a-kind museum, how he uses bobbleheads for a good cause and, of course, which famous Jews have their own bobbleheads.

This interview has been edited and condensed.

JTA: With any collection like this, the first question has to be: How did you get into bobbleheads?

Sklar: My dad collected baseball cards, and he got me into collecting when I was growing up. Brad was working for a minor league baseball team in the early 2000s, and they gave away a bobblehead for the first time in 2003. We decided the bobblehead was sort of cool, and the [Milwaukee] Brewers and Bucks and local soccer and hockey teams were giving out

bobbleheads. So, we started to circle the bobblehead dates on the calendar, since we were already going to several games a year anyway as big sports fans. The collection sort of grew from that.

JTA: How did this interest turn into the world’s only bobblehead museum?

Sklar: The collection grew out of traveling. We went on a journey to try to go to all the Major League Baseball stadiums, and as we traveled we’d go to different museums in local places. Several times we’d either go to the stores in the area of the stadium, or antique malls, and just pick up some bobbleheads from the area to bring back.

Before we knew it, we were doing some buying, trading and selling on eBay, in our free time. Then in 2013 we set out to produce a bobblehead for the first time of a friend of ours who was a manager for the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee sports teams, and also a Special Olympian. We thought it would be a cool way to honor him. During that process we realized there was a need in the market, an opportunity to produce bobbleheads—people or things that otherwise haven’t had bobbleheads produced—and market them.

At the time, our collection was numbering in the 3,000 range. I don’t even know how we got that many. We were running out of room for them. It’s a lot easier to store 3,000 baseball cards—you can get one box and store them. But 3,000 bobbleheads take up a lot more room. We started brainstorming, and realized, hey, there’s no museum in the world dedicated to bobbleheads. There are museums dedicated to mustard and spam, and a bunch of other random things. We started to do market research on the museum side, and in November 2014 we announced the idea for the museum.

JTA: How many bobbleheads do you have now, and what are some of the highlights?

Sklar: We have 7,000 unique bobbleheads on display in the museum. The collection itself is now in the 10,000-11,000

Business range. We’re getting in new bobbleheads pretty much daily. Teams send them, organizations, people across the country. It’s really everything from sports to pop culture, politics, music, movies, TV, comics. Anything and everything that can be turned into a bobblehead, including the menorah and the dreidel.

JTA: Do you have a personal favorite bobblehead?

Sklar: The one of [our friend] Michael is sort of the one that sparked the whole idea for the museum, so that’s my sentimental favorite. He’s also Jewish. We didn’t meet because of being Jewish, we just saw him around campus. Then we got to know his family, and found out we went to the same congregation.

JTA: What has the reception been to the museum? How did the pandemic impact your work?

Sklar: We’ve been blown away by the reception. We’ve had visitors from all 50 states and I think 25 different countries.

We opened on February 1, 2019, and then closed for about 14-and-a-half months in March 2020 because of the pandemic. Luckily, we were able to produce a ton of bobbleheads during that time. In the beginning of April was the first Dr. [Anthony] Fauci bobblehead.

That one became our best-selling bobblehead within like a week. Now we’ve raised over $300,000 for Protect the Heroes, which is administered by the American Hospital Association to get resources to first responders. We were able to keep busy, keep everybody employed that works for us, and also do something for a good cause during the pandemic.

JTA: With some unique collections, there can be subcultures that develop within particular groups—the cult-like popularity of the band Phish among Jews comes to mind. Is there any bobblehead subculture that you’ve seen?

Sklar: There definitely are various bobblehead subcultures. There’s definitely people out there who collect Jewish figures and bobbleheads. Or usually it’s their favorite team or player. There are definitely Grateful Dead [bobbleheads]—quite a few

different bobbleheads, and people try to collect all of them. There are people who are political, they want all the presidential- or historical-related.

The Wisconsin Jewish Chronicle did a story, and we sent them pictures of the different Jews that have been depicted in bobbleheads. Sandy Koufax, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a member of KISS, a wide variety of people. It’s sort of fun to see, there’s more [Jews] than we had anticipated when we were going through the list.

JTA: How did you decide to create the Hanukkah bobbles? What is your goal with the products?

Sklar: It was probably around this time last year, sort of close to Hanukkah, and we were thinking, there hasn’t really been anything Hanukkah-related when it comes to bobbleheads. And I mentioned to my aunt who lives in Omaha, she works at the [Jewish Community Center] and she really liked the idea and mentioned it to a few other family members and they thought it was pretty cool. We had a rendering made, and we went through some different iterations of the design, and thought, yeah, this would be pretty cool.

You go to Target or different stores, and you see a little small display of Hanukkah-related merchandise and then aisles of Christmas stuff. We could definitely help increase that assortment.

JTA: Are there any other Jewish holidays that you think would be particularly conducive for a bobble?

Sklar: I think my aunt actually sent a list. There were some characters like Judah Maccabee. We could do Purim.

We’re sort of waiting to see how the Hanukkah bobbleheads go. There’s also some other fun things that we could turn into bobbles. A bobble hamantaschen just came to mind. But I don’t know, it might get people to try to eat it or something.

We’ll put a warning on the package.

JTA: A lot of your products and launches are connected to charities. Why is it important to you to use the bobbleheads to support these causes? Does your Jewish identity have any impact on that?

Sklar: I think it probably does have

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something to do with my upbringing.

Being taught to give back, and taught about tzedakah [charity]. And we’ve seen other bobblehead companies start to do the same thing, and they hadn’t done it in the past, so I think we’ve actually inspired other people. We’re not doing it to boost

the sales, but we’ve seen that when it has that good cause, it can definitely help boost the sales and boost the excitement around it as well. But we’re really doing it to give back to causes and to get people engaged.

jewishnewsva.org | November 29, 2021 | Business | JEWISH NEWS | 23

Business

What do the Strelitz International Academy and the Entrepreneurship and Business Academy at Kempsville High School have in common?

Carin Simon

S

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24 | JEWISH NEWS | Business | November 29, 2021 | jewishnewsva.org

trelitz International Academy is known for giving students a great foundation for life. SIA students graduate with the ability to apply to a range of excellent middle school and high school programs in the area, both public and private.

Recently, a number of SIA graduates have applied and been accepted to one of the newest high school programs in Tidewater—the Entrepreneurship and Business Academy at Kempsville High School.

Launched in 2016, the Entrepreneurship and Business Academy at Kempsville High School is an innovative program for students looking for Evan Nied. not only an academic challenge, but also to hone in their leadership skills and entrepreneurial spirit.

The overall goal of the Entrepreneurship and Business Academy is to provide students the business skills and knowledge necessary to succeed in any career related fields of study in post-secondary education and in the workforce. Specific academy objectives include successfully completing a sequential program of study that focuses on specific skills, knowledge, and technology in the fields of entrepreneurship, business information technology, and corporate finance.

Students in the EBA program have opportunities to earn an Associate’s degree at Tidewater Community College, as well as post-secondary credit. EBA students participate in job shadowing, mentoring, and internship programs that extend, enrich, and refine student learning and create linkages with the academic

Ophek Newman.

and business communities. EBA students also complete a long-term project through an internship-mentorship experience. The program culminates with a presentation in the students’ senior year featuring

Business

Ophir Newman promotes the EBA at an Open House.

an in-depth study of an issue of related concern to their related industry. The students present ideas and solutions as viable options to address the issue to a panel of business and community leaders.

Evan Nied, SIA graduate and senior at Kempsville High School was accepted to the EBA program three years ago, “The EBA has business opportunities and resources that no other school in Virginia Beach offers. I’ve had many public speaking opportunities as the Master of Ceremonies of the school’s Shark Tank esq Pitch Night.”

Ophek Newman started SIA in second grade. His family is from Israel. Currently in 11th grade in the EBA, Ophek says she loves the school, “It offers a lot of programs that are not taught in other schools.

Students can learn subjects like entrepreneurship, marketing, accounting, finance, economics, computer programming, and technology. Students get exposed to all of them and have the ability to choose areas to focus on. The skills taught in the entrepreneurship and business academy are applicable in life regardless of students’ career choice.”

SIA Class of 2018 graduates Ophir Neuman, Ilan Rivera, and Nate Simon, went on to different middle schools in Virginia Beach and were all accepted to the EBA program this past spring. Due to the proximity to the Sandler Family Campus, all three have maintained their close connection to the Jewish community. Ophir and her brother, Ophek, volunteer regularly at SIA. Nate and Ilan volunteer at the

Simon Family JCC and Jewish Family Service and both are regulars at the JCC Gym. Although these three freshmen have only been in the EBA program for a few months, they’re enjoying the program and all that it has to offer.

“I love the EBA academy because it has three different strands, which all focus on business skills and have many learning opportunities. Even if you don’t know what you want to do in the future, all the skills you learn in the EBA can be applied past high school,” says Ophir.

“We love hearing about the wonderful accomplishments of all of our graduates, and we are proud of the excellent foundation that we provide our students to explore and develop their skills and interests in order to prepare them for middle school and high school,” says Heather Moore, SIA Head of School.

So what do the Strelitz International Academy and the Entrepreneurship and Business Academy at Kempsville High School have in common? As an IB World School, SIA has a strong focus on community, responsibility, and social action —all concepts that tie well into a program designed to prepare students for leadership, innovation, and opportunities in the future.

For more information on the Strelitz International Academy, contact Carin Simon, admissions director, at 757-424-4327 or csimon@strelitzacademy.org.

For more information on the Entrepreneurship and Business Academy at Kempsville High School, contact Megan Timlin, Academy Coordinator, at 757-648-5450 or meghan.timlin@vbschools.com.

The IB program approach empowers students to develop critical thinking skills and innovative ideas so we anticipate more SIA students

jewishnewsva.org | November 29, 2021 | Business | JEWISH NEWS | 25

Business

‘A new Judaica’: Meet the Israeli entrepreneurs putting the Bible on the blockchain Shira Hanau

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(JTA)—A Bible in printed form: about $20.

A Bible on the blockchain: priceless— or at least that’s the hope of two Israeli entrepreneurs who are turning verses from the Torah into NFTs. Nonfungible tokens, otherwise known as NFTs, have become a hot commodity among art collectors and blockchain enthusiasts in the last year. Everyone from Grimes to The New York Times has gotten in on the game, selling everything from art to a newspaper column to clip-art pet rocks, in a new industry that can sometimes feel like a scam.

Now CryptoVerses, a company founded by two secular Israelis, is hoping to make NFTs composed of verses from the Bible encrypted in Hebrew and English into the next big blockchain collectible.

CryptoVerses organizes its verses into small groups, arranged by story, and has already sold 30 of them for an average price of 0.91 Ethereum, or approximately $4,150. While others have created NFTs of artwork connected to chapters of the Torah, CryptoVerses appears to be the first company to encrypt the actual biblical text.

“It’s like an evolution of the printing press,” Yonatan Bendahan, a software developer and one of the cofounders of CryptoVerses, says. He likens the Bible verse NFTs to “a kind of a new Judaica.”

Yuval Meyraz, Bendahan’s co-founder, recalls carrying a Bible with him on hikes as a youth group counselor. He would read stories from the Bible that were relevant to wherever they were hiking in Israel as a way of connecting his campers to the text.

“It was a great way to deliver the story to the next generation, but these days I’m working on a bit more of a technology way to connect young people…with the stories we love and grew up on,” Meyraz says.

26 | JEWISH NEWS | November 29, 2021 | jewishnewsva.org

Meyraz and Bendahan explain why someone would want to own an encrypted Bible verse and how the idea has been received. This conversation has been edited and condensed.

JTA: First of all, can you explain what an NFT is for those of us who still don’t get it?

Meyraz: So, NFT stands for nonfungible token. A token is a piece of digital asset that you can own, just like Bitcoin or any other cryptocurrency. When it comes to NFT, it’s a different type of digital asset that you can own. But it’s not a coin; it’s something that represents something unique that you can own and transfer, buy and sell. It started mostly with digital art: people created digital images, and created a token, which represented those images and started to transfer ownership over those images.

JTA: Why would someone want to buy an NFT of a Bible verse?

Bendahan: We see it as kind of a new Judaica, some piece of something that you can collect that you have some personal connection to, and you want to give it to yourself or to one of your family members. Our second objective is to encrypt the Bible text on the blockchain. So we want to take the Bible text, which was started from writing on a piece of paper or something which was before even paper, and then transfer into digital copies over the internet. And now the next phase which we are leading is putting it on the blockchain. And what’s so unique about it is that we put this text on a distributed network, and in this way we can make sure that no one can delete it, and it can be available to anyone. So, by owning an NFT that encrypts a Bible verse, you can participate in preserving the text on the blockchain.

JTA: How can you even make the Bible into NFTs when no individual person can

really own the Bible?

Meyraz: As you said, no one can own the Torah, it’s totally public domain. And we don’t really claim that anyone is going to own it, of course. But we see it more like a piece of art that we made for the first time. For example, let’s say that I took 5,884 candlesticks from gold, and on each one of them I minted a different verse.

And we have each candlestick with a specific verse only once. It’s unique. Now, I’m going out there and selling my art with the specific verse, and it’s not that I’m selling the Bible, but we own the unique canvas, because you have only one. It’s the same when we created this NFT: It’s a piece of art, we sell the encrypted verse and it’s the first time in history of the Jewish people and it’s what we sell. So, the NFT is something that you can own—but no one owns the Bible itself.

JTA: Who are the people buying these NFTs? And has there been any backlash?

Meyraz: Religious people, some of them, we were surprised. They found it super interesting. We were afraid that we would get some backlash on the project.

We didn’t know how it would be accepted, especially with religious [Jewish] people.

And what surprised us was that it was mostly religious people who are more excited about the project. We have some investors who are religious, studying in yeshiva even now. One of them actually even helps us with the text, with analyzing the text—you’d be surprised how many versions of the Torah there are, so we had to choose which version is the right one. It’s really surprising how our intuition that we hope that everyone will connect to the story to preserve the story, how it really connects to everyone in the real world. This was really surprising, I think it’s very beautiful that people see texts as something precious, especially in the digital age.

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C A M P JC C.O R G jewishnewsva.org | November 29, 2021 | JEWISH NEWS | 27

JEWISH TIDEWATER FIRST PERSON

The mystery of my Russian Grandpa Joe Shelia Josephberg

L

ike so many immigrants who came to America around 1900, it took a great deal of courage to leave home. They came to escape persecution and hunger. They came not speaking English and often going to a kind relative they’d never met.

My four grandparents were part of this migration and they all came from what was then Russia. Three of my grandparents came as small children and bit by bit, as they could afford it, their immediate families reunited.

Growing up, we children knew very well Grandma Annie’s brothers and sisters. The Brooklyn apartment bustled with this extended family. They spoke with accents, broke into Yiddish when “der kinder” were nearby. They drank tea from a glass with a sugar cube between their teeth, kept cases of seltzer under the kitchen sink, and ate all the familiar Jewish foods. As children, we pretty much took all of these relatives for granted.

Three of my grandparents died while I was still a young teen. It is easy now to regret not getting to know them better; we were too busy being kids to be curious.

My paternal Grandpa Joe was the one with no other family. He was a bit of a tough guy, not easy to know. Why did the other grandparents have so much family and he didn’t? Who were his people?

Where in Russia had he come from? Why alone? We heard three rumors: that he arrived here at age 16, that his mother was a mid-wife, and that his sister was an actress. This was flimsy stuff at best, but finding the answers became a bit of an obsession.

In 1999, I got a big piece of the puzzle.

That fall, our Federation announced a mission to Ukraine in November. I had no interest in going to Ukraine in the winter.

Several days later, however, my dad dropped by with some papers he wanted me to keep. Looking through, I came

across my Grandpa Joe’s naturalization paper. He wrote his name as ‘Joseph Daniel Helfant,’ but just above that, he wrote ‘Josef Elfantel.’ Our actual surname!

I quickly found him on the Ellis Island site. The ship Argentina’s manifest listed him as 16 years old, accompanied to the ship at Triest, Austria by his father, destination 127 Hester St., New York, birthplace Kiev and resident of Zyhtomir.

I looked back at the Federation’s itinerary and saw Kiev with a day in Zyhtomir.

Ukraine in the winter it was.

Of course, one day in Zyhtomir was not enough time to research our name, but the visit gave me other things. At the Jewish cemetery, the portraits on the gravestones looked so much like Grandma’s family. A home visit to an older lady’s apartment could have easily been the Brooklyn apartment of my childhood. I felt overwhelmed with emotion walking the streets where my grandpa grew up and knowing that he could never have imagined one of his grandchildren visiting there.

Over the next 21 years, I entered our name in every site I could think of, including Yad Vashem. No results. Then out of the blue, I got a text from my nephew, Jaime, who had been on 23andMe and had gotten a message months earlier that he had not seen. The message was from a woman named Ingrid, who asked if by any chance the name Helfant was related to the name Elfantel. She said that her grandmother was an Elfantel, from Zyhtomir and that her much older brother had emigrated to America. Jaime replied, but got no answer from her.

I decided to try the white pages and egged on by my sister, called all the numbers for her with no result. Eventually, I reached a woman, who when asked if she was related to Ingrid, suspiciously asked why. As soon as I mentioned Elfantel she put her son, Ingrid’s nephew, on the line. He told me that his dad had done

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research and had created a family tree that he then pulled up on his computer. This is finally when I learned about Grandpa Joe’s family.

Our great grandparents were Riva and Mordechai, he was an army doctor and she was a nurse. This explained the mid-wife rumor. They had five children. Grandpa’s older sister Manya (Maria) married Feodor Pruvanov, and they were both actors; another rumor confirmed. Anna Babbitz and Joseph Helfant when they got engaged His brother, Boris, had at 18 and 20 years old. two sons: Nonik who died fighting in Kharkov and Marik, a fighter pilot killed in Vienna by a sniper. Grandpa Joe’s next brother was Volodya whose wife and three children are believed to have been murdered at Babi Yar. Volodya was imprisoned in Stalin’s camps until the end of the war. He Grandpa Joe’s sister Elizaveta with their nephews Nonik and Marik. later remarried, had two daughters and settled in Alma-Ata. That leaves Grandpa’s youngest afternoons, her grandma was an opera sister, Ingrid’s grandma, Elizaveta (Lisa). lover.

She was a nurse married to an Army She has promised to translate more of captain who survived the war with her her mother’s journals, but in the meandaughter and nine-year-old granddaughtime, I now know that Grandpa kept in ter, Ingrid. touch with his family until he lost contact They emigrated to America in the with them during the war. My dad recalls 1980s. letters that stopped coming at that time.

Ingrid has since sent me a number Apparently, he tried to encourage them to of photos of our great grandmother and come to America over all of those pre-war grandpa’s siblings and nephews. She years, but without success. also included her grandmother’s stateAll of us are the lucky recipients of ment of survival. I was told that they those who bravely took a leap of faith. were an educated family, and like my Thank you, Grandpa Joe for that gift. Your grandpa who never missed listening to family is so glad to know so much more Live at the Metropolitan Opera on Saturday about you.

Eric Jacobsen

&

IT’S A WRAP

Branford Marsalis

Parenting (and playing) with sanity Nofar Trem

A

flurry of family-minded activity took place at the Simon Family JCC on Sunday, November 14.

Parents and their children joined PJ Library in Tidewater for a special Sunday Fun Day that included a parenting workshop with Susan G. Groner, author of Parenting with Sanity & Joy, and founder of The Parenting Mentor.

As children were cared for and entertained by Camp JCC counselors, parents joined Groner for coffee and conversation.

During the workshop, participants had the opportunity to ask Groner specific questions, consult in a friendly environment with other parents on common parenting woes, and take plenty

of notes. When they left the workshop to rejoin their children for the remainder of Sunday Fun Day activities, they were rife with new parenting knowledge and ideas. Each parent received a free copy of Groner’s book, which she signed during the session.

This free program is just a glimpse at the many offered on the Sandler Family Campus.

To learn more about PJ Library in Tidewater and to register for upcoming events, visit JewishVA.org/PJLibrary or Contact Nofar Trem, Youth and Family Program coordinator, at ntrem@ujft.org.

Eric Jacobsen, conductor Branford Marsalis, saxophone

Sally Beamish: “The Imagined Sound of Sun on Stone” Sally Beamish: “Under the Wing of the Rock” Brahms: Symphony No. 2

Visiting author Susan G. Groner.

Join us to welcome new Music Director Eric Jacobsen with Grammy-winning saxophonist Branford Marsalis December for an evening of musical Ferguson celebration!

Th 3 Fr 5 Su 2

7:30pm

Chrysler 7:30pm

Sandler 7:30pm

Susan G. Groner and Nofar Trem, Youth and Family Program coordinator at the United Jewish Federation of Tidewater.

Children paint Hanukkah themed crafts at Sunday Fun Day.

Susan Groner and Mazal Sibony share a laugh when Sibony gets her book signed.

Nina Kruger and Byron and Amie Harrell.

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IT’S A WRAP

Mitzvah Squad is busy at Temple Israel

PJ LIBRARY IN TIDEWATER:

Havdalah with military families of Tidewater brings blessings, gratitude, and fun

Norman David Soroko

N

ovember was a very big month for the Mitzvah Squad at Temple Israel in Norfolk.

The congregation ended October by starting its Jewish Family Service Chanukah Gift Card Drive to benefit underprivilege children. Thanks to Temple Israel’s members, $3,737 in gift cards to places Debbie Mayer, Norman Soroko and Jody Laibstain. such as Target, Kohl’s, Subway, Jersey Mike, Amazon, Visa, Dairy Queen, in the midst of its number two mitzvah Burger King, and other establishments project, The Jewish Family Service Pantry were contributed to assist families during Food Drive. More than 1,000 items are this holiday season. Of that amount, already at the temple, ready to be distrib$,1800 was in cash donations to purchase uted in December to JFS. the gift cards; the rest were bought and A drive-by drop off of food is planned donated by congregants. on Sunday, December 12, 11 am to 1 pm These cards were presented to Jewish in front of the temple on Granby Street.

Family Service’s Jody Laibstain and Debbie Items may also be dropped off at the Mayer. They could not stop thanking temple, Monday through Friday, 10 am Temple Israel, indicating that the conto 2 pm. Monetary donations are also gregation gave the largest amount of gift accepted and appreciated. cards than any other single organization.

As the weather gets colder and misThis year, JFS is providing gift cards to 50 erable, remember there are people less kids, with the youngest three months old. fortunate who need help.

Muriel Hecht, Steve Legum, Lorna Legum, Mark Solberg, Richard Yanku, Contact Norman David Soroko, Temple and Sgt. DJ Dajero braved the cold winds Israel’s vice president of community and outto do the drive-by on November 7 at reach at 757-641-3445 for help in buying or Temple Israel. picking up items from your home.

At press time, the congregation is

Rabbi Yoni Warren and Rabbi Aaron Kleinman explains the Havdalah ceremony and why it is performed.

Nofar Trem

J

ewish Military Families of Tidewater joined PJ Library in Tidewater for a Havdalah ceremony in celebration of Veteran’s Day at the Simon Family JCC on Saturday, November 13.

The Havdalah ceremony was led by Navy Rabbis Yoni Warren and Aaron Kleinman. The families welcomed in the new week by joining in on the prayers, candle lighting, songs, and stories over coffee, cider, and some sweet treats. The

kids enjoyed Havdalah themed crafts and tunes while everyone got to know each other a little better.

PJ Library in Tidewater thanks all current and former military families for their service and sacrifice.

To learn more about PJ Library in Tidewater and to register for upcoming events, visit JewishVA.org/PJLibrary or contact Nofar Trem, the PJ Library Program coordinator at ntrem@ujft.org.

Veterans Day activity at Toras Chaim Craig Schranz

I

n honor of Veterans Day, the third and fourth grade class of Joanna Schranz at Toras Chaim School, under the leadership of Rabbi Yonah Lazar, held a special program to recognize the holiday.

Craig Schranz a Commander in the United States Navy Reserve (and the

teacher’s husband) shared information with the students on the makeup of the Armed forces and the history of Veterans Day. The children learned about the different components of military uniforms, the use of camouflage, and the contributions of Jewish men and women to the nation’s defense. They also had the opportunity to compose letters of

30 | JEWISH NEWS | November 29, 2021 | jewishnewsva.org

appreciation to thank veterans for their service. These letters were shared with koshertroops.com to go out with special Veteran’s Day care packages of kosher food to current Jewish military service members. The letters were also shared with the Jewish War Veterans of the USA to be distributed as a note of appreciation.

The Toras Chaim students were

enthusiastic participants in the program and sincerely appreciate the sacrifice of all veterans, and in particular, Jewish military members who defend the United States of America, allowing them the freedom to study Torah, perform mitzvot, and proudly identify as Jews.

IT’S A WRAP

Lee and Bernard Jaffe Family Jewish Book Festival celebrates National Jewish Book Month

E

ach year, the United Jewish Federation of Tidewater and Simon Family JCC’s Lee and Bernard Jaffe Family Jewish Book Festival celebrates National Jewish Book Month by inviting prominent and emerging authors to share their latest books and projects with the Tidewater community.

Over the past month, the Jewish Book Festival stayed true to form, offering something for everyone. For lovers of non-fiction and crime thrillers, Tracy Walder, author of The Unexpected Spy, chronicled her time in the CIA and then the FBI working in counterintelligence.

Her powerful story was especially motivating for young women who are considering a career in this male-dominated field.

Then, author of X Troop: The Secret Jewish Commandos of World War II, Leah Garrett, told of a remarkable group of Jewish refugees who waged war on Hitler.

Robert Lefkowitz, a Nobel Prizewinning scientist, ignited passion and curiosity when sharing about his memoir A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Stockholm.

Finally, appealing especially to those who love a good beach read, Elyssa Friedland joined the community to discuss her recent book, Last Summer at the Golden Hotel.

David Brand and Tracy Walder.

Elyssa Friedland and Alicia Friedman.

Elyssa Friedland author of The Last Summer at the Golden Hotel and Alicia Friedman.

Tracy Walder signs a book for Molly Mancoll.

Janet Mercadante and Tracy Walder, author of The Unexpected Spy.

Visit JewishVA.org/BookFest for more information on upcoming events as Tidewater enjoys author visits all year long.

Mark Robbins Photography

Karen and Avraham Ashkenazi enjoyed the conversation with author Leah Garrett.

Rabbi Israel Zoberman with author Leah Garrett.

Wendy Auerbach and X Troop author Leah Garrett.

Leah Garrett, author of X Troop, signs books for Annabel Sacks and Skip Sacks.

Elyssa Friedland signs a copy of her book for Beth Scharlop.

Robert Lefkowitz, author of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Stockholm shares stories from his journey.

jewishnewsva.org | November 29, 2021 | JEWISH NEWS | 31

IT’S A WRAP

Chrysler Museum partners with UJFT to diversify Hampton Roads’ cultural landscape

O

n Exhibit now through December 12, 2021 in the Glass Gallery at the Chrysler Museum in Norfolk: If You Thirst for a Homeland: Flame-worked glass by Dafna Kaffeman.

Admission to the museum is free and includes this exhibit.

UJFT Executive Vice President Betty Ann Levin (foreground) and Chrysler Museum Director Erik Neil thank guests for attending the Dafna Kaffeman event.

Connie Jacobson with Anne Donnal.

Museum Director and CEO Erik Neil with museum board member Kirk Levy.

Matt and Karen Fine with artist Dafna Kaffeman and Glass Studio manager and program director, Robin Rogers.

Artist Dafna Kaffeman (center) with Lawrence and Anne Fleder and Beth Diamonstein.

32 | JEWISH NEWS | November 29, 2021 | jewishnewsva.org

Susan and Andy Cohen.

Israeli glass artist Dafna Kaffeman describes one of her pieces.

Leslie and Larry Siegel with Fred and Laura Gross.

IT’S A WRAP Israel Today partnered with Chrysler Museum of Art’s Perry Glass Studio to showcase flame-worked glass demonstration with visiting artist Dafna Kaffeman

Flame work during the demonstration.

Elka Mednick

I

Kaffeman demonstrates how to work with glass pieces.

n a first, the Jewish Community Relations Council of the United Jewish Federation of Tidewater, Simon Family JCC, Embassy of Israel & Community Partners’ 11th Annual Israel Today Series partnered with the Chrysler Museum of Art’s Perry Glass Studio to welcome Israeli artist Dafna Kaffeman.

Kaffeman demonstrated her process of creating glass pieces throughout the weekend of November 5 at the Chrysler Museum of Art’s Perry Glass Studio. Along with the demonstrations Kaffeman gave throughout the weekend, she spoke to a group on Saturday, November 6, sharing details of her process and the inspiration for her current exhibit, If You Thirst for a Homeland.

Kaffeman’s pieces remain on display at the Chrysler Museum until December 12.

For more information about the exhibit, visit www.chrysler.org. To learn more about the Israel Today series, visit www.

JewishVA.org.

Mark Robbins photography.

Dafna Kaffeman lectures to the in-person audience, along with the audience at home.

jewishnewsva.org | November 29, 2021 | JEWISH NEWS | 33

WHAT’S HAPPENING A piercing elegy, a poetic meditation An evening with Adam Mansbach

Congregation Beth El celebrates its 171st anniversary and Hanukkah

Wednesday, December 8, 7:30 pm, online

Sunday, December 5, 4–5:30 pm Congregation Beth El

Sierra Lautman

A

dam Mansbach is mostly known for fiction writing. He is the author of a #1 New York Times bestselling “children’s book” series that is, in fact, meant for adults in the throes of parenting who need a good laugh. His dry comedy has also propelled him into the world of television; he is the screenwriter of the 2016 Netflix Original BARRY—which stars Saturday Night Live alum Bill Hader and Henry Winkler.

Nearly a decade ago, at the beginning of an extensive media tour, Mansbach received a phone call that changed his life. His father uttered the words, “David has taken his own life” and a chasm was opened beneath his feet. In the shadow of his brother’s inexplicable death, Mansbach was forced to reckon with the ghost of someone he thought he knew.

Mansbach’s brother’s story is in his most recent publishing work. In the poem, I Had A Brother Once, he confronts his

unsettled family history, his distant relationship with tradition and faith, and how he might reconcile with the desperate need to understand an event that always escapes his grasp.

For eight years, Mansbach thought about how he might approach writing about his brother. As a novelist and screenwriter, he tried to box his brother’s story into a novel or screenplay, but always stopped short, blocked by the set rules and rigidity of those formats. Then, two years ago, after writing an elegy for a musician, Mansbach was reminded of the power in poetry. His poetic elegy breaks down the barriers that formerly held him back from writing, finally allowing the depth of an emotionally intense process that led to telling his brother’s story.

Join Adam Mansbach—novelist, humorist, and poet—as he shares excerpts from his new memoir, I Had a Brother Once. Presented by the Konikoff Center for Learning at the United Jewish Federation of Tidewater, as a part of the Simon Family JCC’s Lee and Bernard Jaffe Family Jewish Book Festival.

For more information or to register visit JewishVA.org/BookFest or contact Sierra Lautman, director of Jewish Innovation, at SLautman@ujft.org or 757-965-6107.

W

orld-renowned a cappella singing sensations Six13 will perform at a community-wide, family-friendly, high-energy celebration at Congregation Beth El to mark the congregation’s 71st anniversary. The in-person event will also be streamed.

Admission is free and reservations are requested. Vaccinations are required for everyone aged 12 years and older. Masks are required for everyone.

For more information or to RSVP, visit www.bethelnorfolk.com or contact Noelle at noelle@ bethelnorfolk.com or 757-625-7821. For information on sponsorships, contact Deb Segaloff at 757-285-9009 or deb@segaloff.net.

B’nai plans celebration for congregation’s 75 years Friday, January 14 and Saturday, January 15

A

commemorative and celebratory Shabbos Shira is planned for B’nai Israel Congregation’s 75th anniversary. This special Shabbos, featuring renowned singer and chazzan, Simcha Leiner, will be filled with memories, joy, and inspiring song.

For the past 75 years, B’nai Israel has fostered a warm and nurturing environment for anyone who has walked through its doors. The community is invited to join the congregation as it celebrates the beautiful and robust atmosphere the synagogue’s community has built.

In honor of the occasion, a dedicatory book will highlight B’nai Israel’s rich history through photos and memories. Come flip through memories, be inspired, and join in the simcha as the congregation celebrates nearly a century. Share any appropriate photos at MemoriesBI75@gmail.com. All Page Dedications and Tree of Life Leaves can be sponsored by visiting secure.cardknox.com/bnaiisraelcampaign.

34 | JEWISH NEWS | November 29, 2021 | jewishnewsva.org

Jewish News 3 days before the cover date: JewishNewsVa.org/digital.

EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITIES

CALENDAR

•

DECEMBER 1, 8, 15, WEDNESDAYS

•

Rabbi Ellen Jaffe-Gill of Tidewater Chavurah will present her class Belonging, Behaving, Believing on three Wednesday evenings in December, 6–8 pm. In three two-hour sessions, the class will offer an overview of Judaism as a faith, including its holidays and lifecycle rituals, along with insight into Jewish history and society. The class is free of charge and open to the community, and everyone who attends all three sessions will receive a free copy of Jewish Literacy by Rabbi Joseph Telushkin. Belonging, Behaving, Believing will be accessible by Zoom. Those who are fully vaccinated, may attend the class in person at the rabbi’s home in Virginia Beach. (Homemade latkes will be served on December 8.) To get more information or to sign up for the class, email Rabbi Ellen at rabbicantorejg@gmail.com.

Programs •

•

DECEMBER 5, SUNDAY Community-wide celebration of Congregation Beth El’s 171st Anniversary, featuring 613, a cappella male singing group. 4 pm. Free. Reservation requested. In-person and virtual attendance.

For information on available sponsorships, contact Deb Segaloff at deb@segaloff.net or 285-9009.

For more information on the event or to RSVP, contact Noelle Wright at noelle@bethelnorfolk.com or 625-7821.

•

DECEMBER 8, WEDNESDAY

JANUARY 10, MONDAY Society of Professionals inaugural program for 2022. Save the Date for a breakfast event on the Sandler Family Campus with experts discussing Virginia Beach’s offshore windfarm. Details and invitations will follow. For more information or to RSVP, contact Ronnie Jacobs Cohen at rcohen@ujft. org or 757-321-2341.

EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITIES REBA

AND

S A M S A N D L E R FA M I LY C A M P U S

• Director, Arts + Ideas Arts + Ideas Coordinator

Marketing

Marketing Associate/Graphic Designer (Full-Time) • Marketing Associate (Part-Time, Hourly)

Holocaust Commission

Program Associate (Part-Time hourly, 20 hrs, per wk.)

Finance

•

I Had a Brother Once: A Poem, A Memoir with Adam Mansbach. Mansbach was in the middle of his own busy life and approaching a career-high when the words from his father, “David has taken his own life” opened a chasm beneath his feet. I Had a Brother Once is the story of everything that comes after. Presented by the Konikoff Center for Learning in partnership with the Simon Family JCC’s Lee and Bernard Jaffe Family Jewish Book Festival and Jewish Family Service of Tidewater. 7:30 pm. For more information or to register, visit JewishVA.org/BookFestival or contact Sierra Lautman at SLautman@ UJFT.org. See page 34.

Development

Director, Donor Engagement Donor Engagement Associate

Accounting Associate (Full-Time, Non-exempt (hourly) Shared service with Campus agency

Salaries are competitive and commensurate with experience.

Complete job descriptions at www.jewishva.org Submit cover letter, resume and salary requirements to: resumes@ujft.org The United Jewish Federation of Tidewater/Simon Family Jewish Community Center is firmly committed to a policy of equal employment opportunity for all qualified persons without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, age, gender, sexual orientation, non-disqualifying disability or veteran status.

Equal Employment Opportunity

Join Our Team!

ADVERTISING ACCOUNT EXECUTIVE

Maintenance Supervisor

The UJFT Community Campus, LLC., seek an experience Maintenance Supervisor to oversee, coordinate, and perform the activities of the maintenance department to ensure the facility is maintained in good repair, and all systems comply with applicable safety and fire regulations and federal, state, and local building codes to ensure a safe, comfortable environment.

The Maintenance Supervisor oversees the upkeep of all physical facilities which includes general maintenance, handyman skills, and repair of mechanical properties, electrical components, and plumbing, as well as the overall appearance of the facility; focusing on improving operations and facilities while minimizing costs.

Position Available Sales experience a must • Media sales, a plus • Flexible hours • Great earning potential

•

Salary is competitive, and commensurate with experience

Building Services The UJFT Community Campus, LLC., (aka Sandler Family Campus) which houses the Simon Family JCC, and several affiliate agencies has immediate positions for Housekeeping/Building Service Workers to clean offices, classrooms, restrooms, athletic areas and assist with setups.

The Sandler Family Campus operates on a seven-day workweek.

If you are an ambitious, high-energy, self-starter with good people skills, this might be the job for you!

Interested?

Submit cover letter, resume and salary requirements to: resumes@ujft.org For complete job descriptions, contact Taftaleen Hunter, director of Human Resources at 757-965-6117

Equal Employment Opportunity

Contact Taffy Hunter, Human Resources director, at 757-965-6117, resumes@ujft.org or submit resume to

Jewish News

Attention: Human Resources 5000 Corporate Woods Drive Virginia Beach, 23462

jewishnewsva.org | November 29, 2021 | JEWISH NEWS | 35

OBITUARIES

Aaron Feuerstein, ‘Mensch of Malden Mills’ who paid his workers even after his factory burned down, dies at 95

Justus Rosenberg, professor and last surviving member of group that smuggled intellectuals out of Nazi-held Europe

Asaf Shalev

Shira Hanau

(JTA)—Aaron Feuerstein, who became known as the Mensch of Malden Mills for continuing to pay his workers even after the textile factory he owned burned to the ground, died at 95 on Thursday, November 4.

The devout Orthodox businessman died at his home in Brookline, Massachusetts, after being injured in a fall several days earlier, The Boston Globe reported.

“He did not suffer,” Feuerstein’s son, Daniel Feuerstein, told Boston 25 News.

“He lived a long, vibrant and exciting life.

His community was everything to him; from his Jewish community in Brookline, and equally important was the manufacturing community in the Merrimack Valley [of Massachusetts].”

Malden Mills was a textile manufacturer in Lawrence, Massachusetts, best known for its line of synthetic fleece products called Polartec.

In December 1995, the company’s redbrick factory complex caught on fire, causing one of the largest blazes in Massachusetts history. Work for the factory’s 1,400 employees stopped, but Feuerstein kept paying them.

Feuerstein also bucked the trend that saw industrial manufacturing leave the area by rebuilding the family-run factory.

At the time, the Globe quoted Feuerstein as saying, “I’m not throwing 3,000 people out of work two weeks before Christmas.”

Feuerstein also explained after the fire that he was guided by Jewish tradition.

“When all is moral chaos, this is the time for you to be a mensch,” he said.

Feuerstein’s grandfather, Henry Feuerstein, a Jewish immigrant from Hungary, founded Malden Mills in 1906, with grandson Aaron taking over in 1956.

The company survived the fire of

( JTA)—Justus Rosenberg, a professor whose long career teaching literature was preceded by a remarkable tenure in the French resistance during World War II, died last month at the age of 100.

Rosenberg was a professor at Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York for decades where he taught literature and languages, including German, French, Yiddish, Russian and his native language, Polish. It wasn’t until he was in his mid-70s that he began to speak about his experiences during the Holocaust, when, as a Polish-Jewish refugee in Paris, he worked as a courier for a rescue effort led by the American journalist Varian Fry to save intellectuals, writers and artists stuck under Nazi rule.

Even Rosenberg’s wife Karin, who he first met in the 1980s, was unaware of her husband’s heroic past until 1998. “I believe he was a hero. But he did not think of himself as a hero. To him, he was just doing what needed to be done,” Karin told The New York Times.

Rosenberg was born in Danzig, Poland in 1921 to a well-off Jewish family that was not particularly religious. After being forced out of school as a teenager due to new laws barring Jews from the schools, his parents sent him to Paris to continue his studies. When the Nazis invaded Poland in 1939, Rosenberg lost all contact with his parents and sister, who he would only learn had survived after the war ended. He was finally reunited with them in 1952 when they made their way to Israel.

When the Nazis took over Paris, Rosenberg fled to Toulouse where he met a woman who recruited him to join Varian Fry’s Emergency Rescue Committee-sponsored rescue effort in Marseille. Rosenberg, who was blonde, appeared younger than his age and spoke French, worked as a courier for Fry, ferrying forged documents and accompanying some refugees across the border to

Aaron Feuerstein.

1995, rebranded as Polartec, and stayed in the family’s hands until 2007. But by then, the business had seen a downturn and Feuerstein took it into bankruptcy.

A private equity firm then bought the factory, shut down and moved the brand’s manufacturing to Tennessee. In 2019, industrial manufacturing company Milliken acquired Polartec.

A graduate of Yeshiva University, Feuerstein belonged to the Brookline congregation of Young Israel. Jewish teachings informed how he treated his workers.

“You are not permitted to oppress the working man, because he’s poor and he’s needy, amongst your brethren and amongst the non-Jew in your community,” he said on 60 Minutes during an episode titled The Mensch of Malden Hills that aired in 2003.

Feuerstein’s wife Louise died in 2013.

They are survived by their sons Daniel and Raphael and their daughter Joyce.

36 | JEWISH NEWS | November 29, 2021 | jewishnewsva.org

Spain. The rescue effort saved about 2,000 people, among them the writers Hannah Arendt and Heinrich Mann and artists Marc Chagall and Marcel Duchamp.

When Fry’s efforts ended in 1941, Rosenberg, himself a refugee, was on his own again and was soon sent to a prison camp outside Lyon. When he learned that his fate and that of the other prisoners was to be sent to a labor camp in Poland, Rosenberg feigned an illness that would get him sent to a hospital. But even after having his appendix removed due to his nonexistent illness, Rosenberg was still slated to be sent to the camp. Devising a new plan, he sent a message to a group of priests that worked with the Resistance who brought him a bundle of clothing and a bicycle, which Rosenberg used to escape before he had recovered from surgery.

After his recovery, Rosenberg joined the French Resistance and later worked as a guide for the American Army.

He described his wartime experiences in a 2020 memoir, The Art of Resistance: My Four Years in the French Underground.

After the war, Rosenberg continued his studies in Paris before immigrating to the United States in 1946. He earned his PhD at the University of Cincinnati and went on to teach literature at several schools before settling at Bard College in 1962.

During his years in Cincinnati, he supplemented the meager Jewish education he received as a child by conducting his own study at the Hebrew Union College’s library.

He continued to teach literature classes at Bard after his official retirement in 1992 until his death and was buried at the Bard College Cemetery. Bard College president Leon Botstein wrote of Rosenberg’s love of teaching in a letter to the Bard community.

“For Justus, learning and study were instruments of redemption, remembrance, and reconciliation. He possessed a magnetic capacity to inspire the love of learning,” Botstein wrote.

Rosenberg and his wife established the

OBITUARIES Justus and Karin Rosenberg Foundation in 2011 to fight hate and antisemitism. In 2018, the foundation endowed the Bard Center for the Study of Hate. The foundation also supported the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research and the National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene.

In 2017, Rosenberg was honored as a Commandeur in the Légion d’Honneur by the French ambassador to the United States in recognition of his work with the French Resistance.

Speaking to the New York Jewish Week in 2016, Rosenberg said his survival during World War II was “bashert.”

“It was a fortuitous twist of fate,” he explained.

Even so, he didn’t consider his work for Fry particularly worthy of note.

“I didn’t consider it particularly heroic,” he told the Jewish Week. “It was just part of my life. I regret that we did it for only a limited amount of people. There were so many people who did much more and were much more heroic.”

JONI ANN GOODMAN BROOKS BELLEVUE, NEBRASKa—Joni Ann Goodman Brooks 62, of Bellevue, Nebraska, peacefully passed away on Wednesday, November 3, 2021.

Joni was born on February 25, 1959 in Norfolk, Virginia to the late Martin and Blanche (Scheinberg) Goodman.

Joni was a child advocate for her entire adult life in the Special Olympics and was also a big part of Child and Family Services in Norfolk, and The Hope Center in Chesapeake. Later, she was PTA treasurer and PTA president in Bellevue, Neb. and received a Lifetime Achievement Award from Bellevue Public Schools. She also was an event coordinator for craft and vender shows.

She had worked in various fields culminating in the Cellular Telecommunications Industry designing then launching new networks in Virginia, New York, Colorado, and Utah. She followed this up by returning home to be close to family and started another career working where she ended up as a regional manager for multifamily properties at SL Nusbaum in Norfolk.

Joni is survived by her husband Scott

Brooks; sons, Shawn (Ashley) Lemke, Brad (Kjerstin) Lemke and Braden Brooks; daughter-in-law Ashley (Kyle) Wilson; eight wonderful grandchildren; brother Jeffrey (Andi) Goodman; niece Tracey (Whit) Watson; nephew Josh (Nathalia) Goodman; very close friend Cathy Scribner, many cousins, close friends and countless people whose lives she touched during every stage of her life.

A graveside service was held in Woodlawn Memorial Gardens with Rabbi Israel Zoberman officiating. Online condolences may be made to the family at hdoliver.com.

Memorial donations may be made to: University of Nebraska Foundation 1010 Lincoln Mall Ste 300, Lincoln, NE 68508. Note that it is for Fund #01144590 and in memory of Joni Brooks or on the web at https://nufoundation.org/ fund/01144590 noting it is in memory of Joni Brooks.

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WHO KNEW?

John Oliver just celebrated ‘Look for the Union Label,’ a ’70s labor jingle with deep Jewish roots

2022 Grammy Awards: The Jewish nominees

who made women’s garments, was instrumental in organizing immigrant women, particularly Jews, who worked in the “rag trade.” David Dubinsky, a Russian-born Jew who came to New York as a teenager, served as its president from 1932 until 1966.

As the NYHS show explained, the union reached the height of its power in 1959, when it claimed nearly a half-million members, mostly in the New York area. But by the 1970s, unionized shops were closing throughout the United States and work was being shipped to factories overseas.

As Nicholas Juravich, at the time a postdoctoral fellow at the NYHS’s Center for Women’s History, explained in an essay, “the new ‘union label’ campaign was imagined as a national, industry-wide strategy to build support for the ILGWU beyond its traditional strongholds.” In 1975, he writes, only 1.7 billion garments left union shops, a decline of nearly 40% in just seven years.

The lyrics were by the ad campaign’s director, Paula Green. Green was a Jewish woman who moved to New York from California and became one of the first woman executives in the advertising industry when she founded what would become Paula Green Advertising.

(At the famed Doyle Dane Bernbach agency in 1962, Juravich explains, she created the “We Try Harder” catchphrase and campaign for Avis, which the car rental company still uses.) The music was

by Malcolm Dodds, a Brooklyn-born, African-American vocalist and choral leader who sang in the ’50s doo-wop group The Tunedrops.

The campaign had to avoid a pitfall of earlier “union label” campaigns, which were often nativist and racist in urging consumers to buy American instead of foreign-made goods.

“They really avoid that kind of ugly nativism conceit that, certainly in the ’70s and ’80s, was bubbling up in parts of the labor movement and in popular culture

(JTA)—Some of the music industry’s most popular Jewish artists were included in the 2022 Grammy Award nominations unveiled on Tuesday, November 23.

Here’s a roundup: Doja Cat, a Black and Jewish pop star-rapper hybrid who has become one of the most listened-to artists in the world— Spotify lists her as the 7th-most-streamed musician on its platform as of Wednesday, November 24—racked up nominations in in seven categories, including Record of the Year, Album of the Year, Song of the Year, Best Pop Duo/Group Performance, Best Pop Vocal Album, Melodic Rap Performance and Rap Song. She has a Jewish mother and a non-Jewish South African father.

Jewish day school grad Jack Antonoff, who wore a Star of David necklace to the MTV Music Awards in 2017, has become one of the most in-demand pop producers in the industry. He was nominated for Non-Classical Producer of the Year for his work with Taylor Swift, Lana Del Ray, Lorde and others.

Canadian Jewish rapper Drake, winner of four past Grammys (in addition to a record-breaking 29 Billboard Music Awards), was nominated for Best Rap Performance for his hit Way 2 Sexy and Best Rap Album of the year for his latest LP, Certified Lover Boy. Stephen Schwartz, the legendary musical theater writer, was nominated for Best Musical Theater Album for Stephen Schwartz’s Snapshots, a scrapbook musical including songs from a range of his musicals, including Wicked, Pippin and Godspell.

Aaron Dessner, part of the indie rock band The National, was included in Taylor Swift’s nomination in the Album of the Year category for the album Evermore, which he helped write, along with Antonoff.

Dessner’s brother Bryce, who is also in The National and was also included in the nomination for helping in the recording.

Israeli cellist Matt Haimovitz was co-nominated for his work on an album up for Best Classical Solo Voice Album.

The awards ceremony will take place Jan. 31 in Los Angeles.

Andrew Silow-Carroll

(New York Jewish Week via JTA)—If you watched television in the 1970s and early 1980s, chances are you can sing a few bars of Look for the Union Label, a jingle sung on commercials for the International Ladies’ Garment Workers Union. The infectious song was meant to prop up what was then the sagging American-made clothing industry, and the ads featured actual union members singing the praises of union-made garments.

The song was more memorable than effective: Labor unions never recovered from a host of trends that shifted power from organized labor to management, as John Oliver recently explained on an episode of his Last Week Tonight show on HBO. Oliver began his segment on union-busting with a clip of Look for the Union Label, an early version showing a multicultural cast of women singing the iconic lyrics: Look for the union label, when you are buying that coat, dress, or blouse.

Remember somewhere, our union’s sewing, our wages going to feed the kids and run the house, We work hard, but who’s complaining?

Thanks to the ILG we’re making our way, So always look for the union label, it says we’re able to make it in the U.S.A.!

The song always felt vaguely Jewish to me, especially that line, “but who’s complaining?”—which sounds like it was translated directly from the Yiddish. It turns out I was right, up to a point.

While the Yiddish trade union roots of the ILGWU are undeniable, and the song’s lyricist was a pioneering Jewish advertising executive, the jingle also has a back story that touches on gender, feminism, and the civil rights movement.

The song was discussed in 2019 at an exhibit at the New-York Historical Society, “Ladies’ Garments, Women’s Work, Women’s Activism.” ILGWU, founded in 1909 to unionize workers

38 | JEWISH NEWS | November 29, 2021 | jewishnewsva.org

around jobs going overseas,” Juravich, now assistant professor of History and Labor Studies at the University of Massachusetts Boston, says. “The campaign showcases the creativity and the multiculturalism of the union, and it puts workers and their faces front and center. Because so much of the rhetoric, even in the ’80s, around what happened to the American working class focuses on the white male worker. But the ILG ads are gloriously chaotic and full of people from all over.”

In other ways, too, the campaign fought cliches of unions as male-dominated, cigar-munching syndicates. “I felt particularly close to the women in the union,” Green told The New York Times in 2004. “They are real examples of women’s liberation.”

The song left a cultural imprint: Jimmy Carter called it one of his favorites, Al Gore sang it on the campaign trail, and both Saturday Night Live and South Park lampooned it. Cory Matthews sings the first line in an episode of the 1990s sitcom Boy Meets World.

And the Jewish stamp on the song is unmistakable, if not immediately apparent. Juravich cites the work of Daniel Katz, a labor historian at CUNY, who argues in his 2011 book All Together Now that Yiddish socialism helped create a distinctive workers’ culture that embraced various ethnicities and nationalities. “This socialist tradition infuses the ILG,” Juravich says.

Nevertheless, the song didn’t do much either to sell union-made products or bolster organized labor.

“It’s a great song. It’s a great history,” says Juravich. “The depressing thing is that it didn’t inspire the consumer activism it could have, which required policy-level interventions by the U.S. government. But I do think there’s some positives in the way it really engaged the workers and their story in a very public and deliberate way.”

Shira Hanau

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