Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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Thanks to the leadership of the Orlando Jewish community, UCF brought the fourth largest student delegation in the country to the AIPAC Policy Conference, which was held Sunday, March 4 through Tuesday, March 6....
Edna Woolman Chase, a former editor-in-chief of Vogue magazine who is often credited as creator of the world's first fashion show, once said, "Fashion can be bought. Style one must possess." With this quote in mind, the creation of a memoriam to honor Elayne Burke Wershil seems most fitting at this year's Jewish Pavilion spring fashion show, to be held Thursday, April 12, at the Mall of Millenia. For while fashion was her love, it was her style that makes her most memorable. Wershil, an active...
ISRAEL21c-Ten days after the shooting at Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, experts from the Israel Trauma Coalition arrived at the community to guide teachers, clinicians, law enforcers, first responders, social workers, parents and clergy through a "day after" strategy for helping people face the future with resilience. The community, which had never dealt with a shooting on this scale, was in shock. "It was devastating," said Nancy Teitelbaum, senior director of marketing and...
LOS ANGELES (JTA)—Half a century ago, Bob Hope’s films were wildly popular, but the comedian was never nominated for an Academy Award. So when Hope served as host of the 1975 Oscar bash, he opened his monologue with “Welcome to the Academy Awards... or as it’s known in my house, PASSOVER.” At Sunday’s 90th award ceremony, the notable Jewish nominees could largely repeat his punchline. The list of Jewish nominees, all with realistic chances to strike gold, included two for lead actors: Daniel Day-Lewis (in “Phantom Thread”) and Timothee Chalamet...
Every photo tells a story, and what you see here is no different. The photo shows two women, smiling and happy. On the right is Rebbetzin Rivkie Lipskier, Chabad at UCF co-executive director, wife, and mother of five young children. I stand on the left, professor of political science at UCF, wife, stepmother to two adult children, and old enough to be Rivkie's mother. Rivkie and I met about 11 years ago when she moved to Central Florida with her husband, Rabbi Chaim Lipskier, who, like Rivkie,...
Choices, the Jewish Federation of Greater Orlando’s annual women’s philanthropy event, is a little more than a week away—the evening of March 26 at The Roth Family Jewish Community Center in Maitland. Choices gives women in the local Jewish community an opportunity to socialize, catch up with old friends and make new ones, all while supporting the local Jewish community. In addition to the gifts they make to the Federation’s 2018 Annual Campaign, women at Choices also support the Federation through the very popular Choices Raffle. The raffle...
Family and friends, old and new, unite to mark the beginning of Passover with food, drink, song, and, of course, the retelling of the Exodus story at the Congregation of Reform Judaism Community Second-Night Seder at 6:30 p.m., Saturday, March 31, 2018 at the synagogue. This is the third year for the traditional interactive service, which has shown increased popularity, with last year’s attendance doubling the first. Led by clergy aid Gary Becker and with guitar accompaniment by talented CRJ youth, this event offers an opportunity for the c...
Celebration Jewish Congregation’s Second Night of Passover Seder Dinner Service will take place on Saturday, March 31, 5 p.m., with Rabbi Dr. Richard M. Cowin officiating the Passover service. A comprehensive, yet expeditious seder service will be achieved using the 30-Minute Seder Haggadah. This year’s seder will be conducted at The Artisan Club, 1343 Celebration Avenue, Celebration, FL 34747. The Seder is the most significant event in the Passover celebration, gathering family and friends together to observe the holiday in a meaningful way...
(JNS)-On the margins of the AIPAC policy conference in Washington, D.C., more than 300 conference attendees gathered at the prestigious Sixth & I Historic Synagogue on Monday to express support for the nearly 500,000 residents of Judea and Samaria, also known as the West Bank. AIPAC leaders did not permit the session on one of Israel's most controversial topics to be included within the conference's vast schedule. Yet the high-profile event was co-sponsored by Israel's Ministry of Strategic...
WASHINGTON (JTA)—Vice President Mike Pence said that unless the Iran nuclear deal is fixed in the “coming months,” the United States would withdraw from it. Pence made the promise, to cheers, during his address Monday night to the annual conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in Washington, D.C. The deal, which was signed in 2015 by Iran, the United States and a group of other world powers, curbs Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief. President Donald Trump opposes the agreement. In October, he declined to...
Milos Zeman, recently elected to his second five-year term as president of the Czech Republic, would like to speed up the process of moving his country’s embassy to Jerusalem, the Lidové noviny newspaper reported. The Americans announced in February that as an initial step they would be turning their consulate in Jerusalem into an embassy on May 14, coinciding with Israel’s 70th anniversary. Daniel Meron, Israel’s ambassador to Prague, tweeted that according to the Czech paper, Zeman would like his country to join US President Donald Trump...
(JNS)—In a bid to end the contentious debate surrounding Poland’s controversial Holocaust law, the Simon Wiesenthal Center released a declassified report on Thursday highlighting Polish complicity in persecuting Jews during the Holocaust. The U.S. State Department report from May 15, 1946—released by the Simon Wiesenthal Center on the same day that the Polish Holocaust law went into effect—found “evidence that Poles persecuted the Jews as vigorously as did the Germans.” The report, declassified in 1983, found that “native Poles” took p...
(JNS)-Queen Elizabeth II is marking her 66th year of reign in 2018, which by any standards is an extraordinarily long time for a single individual to be a head of state. (By comparison, King David is said to have reigned for 40 years, and Queen Victoria-comfortably overtaken now by Elizabeth-managed 64.) Off the top of my head, I can't think of any current ruler who has remained in place throughout the Cold War and beyond. In that sense, historians will have a grand second Elizabethan era to...
(JNS)—A Palestinian state in Israel’s backyard, international control over Jerusalem’s Old City and the mass expulsion of tens of thousands of Jews from Judea and Samaria: Is this the “price” that President Donald Trump recently hinted Israel would have to pay? According to Arab diplomats cited by the London newspaper Asharq al-Awsat, the Trump plan for the Middle East, soon to be unveiled, includes “U.S. recognition of a Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital”; the imposition of “international protection” over Jerusalem’s Old C...
(JNS)—After beating ISIS, the administration can’t stand by idly as the chaos in Syria leads to war between Israel and Iran’s Hezbollah auxiliaries. Donald Trump was elected president of the United States promising an “America First” foreign policy. That was an ominous echo of America’s pre-World War II isolationists, and as troubling as that sounded to anyone with a sense of history, it seemed to match his belief that the United States had spent too much blood and treasure on wars in the Middle East. Though he promised to defeat the terrori...
(JNS)—It’s a very good thing that Poland took a step backwards against a decision that not only absolved it of guilt, but also made it a liar. It gave in to common sentiment, which populism tends to do. Wisely, the government decided not to implement a law that could lead to a fine and up to three years in prison for anyone who refers to Nazi extermination camps on its territory during World War II as “Polish death camps” or accuses Polish citizens of being complicit in the extermination of the Jews. Poland’s President Andrzej Duda signed th...
TEL AVIV (JTA)—The latest episode of Iran flexing its regional hegemonic muscles in the Middle East came with a direct and unprecedented military challenge to Israel. Last week, Iran used a technologically advanced drone—reverse-engineered from a U.S. drone captured in 2011—to penetrate Israel’s airspace. Israel took the drone down, and proceeded to strike Iranian and Syrian military targets deep in Syria. While Israel lost an F-16 in the exchange, the message to Iran and Syria regarding Israel’s willingness to respond quickly and decisivel...
(JTA)—In the aftermath of the fatal mass shooting in Parkland, Florida, the Jewish community should take note: Teenagers are not just the future of the Jewish people; they are the dynamic force driving social change today. Today we are witnessing history unfold as the American teenage populace is mobilizing. This moment will be recorded as one in which adolescents were the catalysts for societal change—and they will keep fighting because they know that they are on the right side of history. The irony should not be lost here. Generation Z (te...
MORNING AND EVENING MINYANS (Call synagogue to confirm time.) Chabad of South Orlando—Monday - Friday, 8 a.m. and 10 minutes before sunset; Saturday, 9:30 a.m.; Sunday, 8:15 a.m., 407-354-3660. Congregation Ahavas Yisrael—Monday - Friday, 7:30 a.m.; Saturday, 9:30 a.m.; Sunday, 9 a.m., 407-644-2500. Congregation Chabad Lubavitch of Greater Daytona—Monday, 8 a.m.; Thursday, 8 a.m., 904-672-9300. Congregation Ohev Shalom—Sunday, 9 a.m., 407-298-4650. GOBOR Community Minyan at Jewish Academy of Orlando—Monday – Friday, 7:45 a.m. – 8:30 a.m. Temple...
Congregation Ohev Shalom Sisterhood invites the community to an evening of display cooking, recipe sharing and tasting of Passover desserts. The event is on Monday, March 19 at 7 p.m. at they synagogue, located at 613 Concourse Parkway in Maitland. A suggested donation is $5. RSVP to Susan at susan@thehochstadts.com or call 407-284-1924. Please bring new or gently used bras and/or feminine hygiene products to be donated to local women’s shelters....
(JTA)-A prestigious think tank on tolerance comprising former European leaders honored Prince Albert II of Monaco for his apology for his country's treatment of Jews during the Holocaust, among other actions. The European Council on Tolerance and Reconciliation on Tuesday bestowed its European Medal of Tolerance on the head of state of the principality sandwiched between France and Italy, who in 2015 acknowledged his country's rounding up and deportation of 66 Jews in 1942."You have found the...
(JTA)—The heads of 139 Jewish day schools have signed an open letter urging action following last month’s deadly shooting at a Florida high school. The letter released Tuesday expresses support for the student movement calling for gun reform and seeks political change. Prizmah, a group representing over 300 Jewish day schools, organized the letter. The schools that signed on are from the United States and Canada, and represent various denominations and affiliations. They include those with students from early childhood through high school. “As...
WASHINGTON (JTA)—On the second floor of the downtown convention center here, hundreds attending the annual policy conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee packed a standing-room-only hall. A bouncer stood outside to control the overflow crowd. It wasn’t a session on boycotts, Iran or the peace process. It was mincha, the Jewish afternoon prayer service. Outside, smaller groups of Orthodox men gathered to form their own prayer quorums. High school students in kippahs and long skirts sat against the walls chatting. Meir Raskas k...
Young professionals from Orlando JNFuture and students from UCF Hillel attended a Passover cooking class at UCF Hillel taught by Myrna Ossin. Attendees assembled their own matzo lasagna and learned how to make their own macaroons and Passover bagels. They also learned about different cooking accessories and tips that make cooking easier. "Every Passover cookbook is geared toward cooking for the Passover Seder," Ossin said. "My book gives tons of Passover recipe options for the remaining seven...
A meaningful letter... LAWRENCE GROSSMAN, American Jewish Committee's director of publications, wrote this letter a few months ago. I found it very powerful and so I pass it on to you in part: "What happened at the 'Unite the Right' rally on Aug. 12 last year in Charlottesville, Virginia, was both a battle in the longstanding war over Confederate memorials and, more broadly, the latest episode in the blood-soaked, centuries-old history of racism in America. But for baby-boomer Jews like me, the...
