Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice

Articles from the February 22, 2019 edition


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  • 14 must-read books about Israel

    Jessica Halfin|Feb 22, 2019

    In this advanced digital age sometimes it's still nice to receive a good book that can be held in your hands, flipped through, and used as a learning tool in your household. The following 14 English-language books, all from the last decade, are excellent representations of Israel in food, culture, history, technology and children's literature, written by leading authors, illustrators, and photographers from Israel and the English-speaking world. Each one would make a stellar gift for family or...

  • Weekly roundup of world briefs

    Feb 22, 2019

    Mississippi House passes bill banning boycott of Israel By Marcy Oster (JTA)—The Mississippi House of Representatives passed a bill that would prevent the state from doing business with companies that boycott Israel. Following the 88-10 vote last week in the lower house of the state Legislature, the measure moves to the Senate. It prevents the state retirement system, treasury and any state government entity from investing in a company that boycotts Israel. The bill calls on the state to develop the list of boycotting companies. Existing invest...

  • A collection of Yiddish songs was thought lost forever-now they've been nominated for a Grammy

    Penny Schwartz|Feb 22, 2019

    BOSTON (JTA)-In the despair of the Soviet Union's fierce World War II battles against the Nazis, a 42-year-old Jewish man from Odessa wrote a song in Yiddish poking fun at Hitler's failures to seize control of Ukraine's coal and oil resources. "On the High Mountain," written by Veli Shargorodskii about the war experience in 1943-44, ends with the words "Germany is in trouble, Hitler is kaput!" The satirical song was among hundreds collected during the war by Moisei Beregovsky (1892-1961), a...

  • In 'To Dust,' a Hasidic cantor and a biology teacher played by Matthew Broderick are quite the odd couple

    Curt Schleier|Feb 22, 2019

    (JTA)-A Hasidic cantor and a jaded community college biology teacher don't seem like two individuals who would be fast friends. In "To Dust," the debut film from director Shawn Snyder, they make a hilarious team. The odd couple plot is not all lighthearted though. For Snyder, 37, how to deal with the loss of a loved one is the core of the film. "I watched my mom lose her mom about five years before I lost my own mom," Snyder said in a telephone interview. He recalls seeing "the value she [his...

  • Sarah Silverman opens up on 'Finding Your Roots'

    Curt Schleier|Feb 22, 2019

    (JTA)—“I was the hairy Jewish monkey in a sea of blond kids.” That’s not Seth Rogen or Jonah Hill—it’s Sarah Silverman talking about her upbringing in Bedford, New Hampshire, on an upcoming episode of “Finding Your Roots,” the celebrity genealogy show on PBS. Bedford, the comedian explains, was not exactly a very Jewish community. “My feeling of being Jewish came from my being the only Jew,” Silverman tells host Henry Louis Gates Jr. “We [her family] had no religion, but because I had this kind of intuition, when I went to any friend’s house I...